"Well," Harry replied grudgingly; "what is it?"
"If you will tell me how much Mr. Eversleigh owes you, I will pay it to you--every farthing," replied Kitty.
Bennet shook his head with an almost savage gesture.
"Miss Thornton," said he, "you will not understand me. I have told you that I love you. And all's fair in love and war. I am glad to have this hold on you--glad to think that if it is even against your will I have such a chance of making you marry me, and I shall not relinquish it. Don't you see, Kitty, I should be a fool to give you up?"
"I will give you twice the amount Mr. Eversleigh owes you, if you like."
"It is useless, quite useless, to make any proposition of that kind," said Bennet, who, of course, thought that the girl's money would come to him in any case. "Will you marry me, yes or no?"
"But you know, Mr. Bennet, that I do not love you. You know that I am engaged to Gilbert Eversleigh?"
"Gilbert Eversleigh!" cried Bennet, with a fierce, scowling, threatening expression. "Why should I consider him? He took you from me; if it had not been for him, perhaps you would have loved me. I hate and loathe the very sound of his name. I should like to see him disgraced and ruined, but I am foregoing that gratification because I love you. I would rather marry you than wreak my vengeance on him, and to give up this opportunity of revenge is no slight thing for me to do."
"He has given you no cause for such feelings!"
"Cause enough," said Bennet. "But all this is stupid. For the last time, I tell you that the fate of the Eversleighs is in your power. Will you send Francis Eversleigh to prison, or will you marry me? That is the issue. And you must answer at once; I will be trifled with no longer."
There was a sudden panic in the girl's heart. She was asking how could she bring herself to marry this man, with his coarseness and brutality.
"It is No, then!" exclaimed Bennet. "You doom your friends to hopeless ruin and infamy."
"Mr. Bennet, the answer is Yes," said Kitty, her voice quivering, but her heart once more steadfast.
"You will marry me?" asked Bennet, a note of joy in his rough tones.
"Mr. Bennet, you must remember that my father has only been dead a few weeks."
"Kitty, now you have promised to marry me," said Bennet, and he spoke with an accent of sincerity, "I will remember anything you like to ask me to remember, for I do love you. But you will not keep me waiting too long?"