"Don't you?" Cheniston's blue eyes gleamed in his brown face. "I think you do. Look here, Anstice. There is nothing to be gained by hedging. Let us fight fair and square, gloves off, if you like, and acknowledge that we both admire and respect Miss Wayne very deeply."
"I quite agree with that." Anstice's eyes, too, began to glitter. "And--having said so much, what then?"
"Well, having cleared the ground so far, suppose we go a little further. I think--you will correct me if I am wrong in my surmise--I think I am right in saying that we both cherish a dream in regard to Miss Wayne."
His unexpected phraseology made Anstice pause before he replied. There was a touch of pathos, an unlooked-for poetry about the words which seemed to intimate that whatever his attitude towards the world in general, Cheniston's regard for Iris Wayne was no light thing; and when he replied Anstice's voice had lost a little of its hostility.
"As to your dreams I can say nothing," he said quietly. "For mine--well, a man's dreams are surely his own."
"Certainly, when they interfere with no other man's visions." Bruce hesitated a moment. "But in this case--look here, Anstice, once before you shattered a dream of mine, broke it into a thousand fragments; and by so doing took something from my life which can never be replaced. I think you understand my meaning?"
White to the lips Anstice answered him: "Yes. I do understand. And if ever a man regretted the breaking of a dream I have regretted it. But----"
"Wait." Cheniston interrupted him ruthlessly. "Hear me out. It is three years since that day in India when the woman I loved died by your hand. Oh"--Anstice had made an involuntary movement--"I am not here to heap blame upon you. I have since recognized that you could have done nothing else----"
"For that, at least, I thank you," said Anstice bitterly.
"But you can't deny you did me an ill turn on that fatal morning. And"--Cheniston threw away his cigarette impatiently--"are you prepared to make amends--now--or not?"
For a second Anstice's heart seemed to stop beating. Then it throbbed fiercely on again, for he knew he had guessed Bruce Cheniston's meaning.
"Make amends?" He spoke slowly to gain time. "Will you explain just what you mean?"
"Certainly." Yet for all his ready reply Cheniston hesitated. "I mean--we're both of us in love with Iris Wayne. Oh"--Anstice had muttered something--"let's be honest, anyway. As to which--if either--of us she prefers, I'm as much in the dark as you. But"--his voice was cold and hard as iron--"having robbed me of one chance of happiness, are you going to rob me--try to rob me--of another?"