"Darling forgive me, pardon me, I am beside myself. I am your slave, your worshipper. Oh, my heart, my love, my dearer self, be kind to one whose life is yours."
Olive dried her eyes and became more composed as Mallow changed his tone. She turned towards him with face as white as marble.
"Laurence," she said quietly--"for I dare call you Laurence--I love, I have always loved you, and I always shall love you; but I am not my own mistress. I would to Heaven that I were; but I am helpless. I must marry this man, not for the money--ah, no; the money can go, but because my dear father left a letter for me in which he urged me to obey his dying wish and marry Angus Carson. . . . If I do not, evil will come of my refusal."
"I do not know. My father's letter gave no explanation. It simply said that terrible evil would come if I did not obey his wish. I dare not refuse. I dare not ignore that solemn command. Much as I love you, I must sacrifice it--yes, and you--to the memory of my father."
"You will marry Carson?" asked Laurence, his face growing pale.
Olive bowed her head. "What else would you have me do?" she asked pitifully.
"Do?" With a burst of passion, he seized her again in his arms. "Do?--I would have you become my wife."
"Your father had no right to condemn you to lifelong misery. It shall not be. You are mine. I will not give you up."
"Cruel, cruel, when you know how I suffer," she sobbed. "If you love me, you would let me go; you would urge me to fulfil the wish of the dead."
Almost rudely he flung her from him. "Go then," he said bitterly. "I want no love so feeble that it bends to another's will. Obey your father if you think fit; marry Carson, and leave me to go----"
"How dare you to speak to me like that?" cried Olive, passing from tears to fury. "If you suffer, do not I suffer? I loathe to marry this man. I would kill myself if I dared. I----"
"You talk like a child," he said roughly.
"I feel like a woman," she retorted heartily.
"You think only of your own misery. What is it to mine? You are not forced into the arms of a woman you detest."
"If you go, you go to Carson of your own free will."
"Oh, Laurence, how can you say that I go to another man of my own free will when you know how I love you? It is unjust; cruel. If my father were alive, I might have the courage to refuse. As it is, how can I disobey? If I refuse Angus Carson some evil will surely follow, and if I marry you I involve you in it too. Would that be right?"