To see me thus in complete control of the situation, her father and Le Gaire prisoners, all their plans frustrated, was maddening, particularly so as she realized that this result came largely through her own indiscretion.

I began myself to doubt the complete success of my scheme.

Without question I had the power now to prevent her marriage, yet I might have gone too far, and caused a revulsion of feeling.

She had been interested in me before--for it had been her part to help me in times of danger, and sympathy lies very close to love--but now the conditions were changed, and she might feel very different toward my interference.
Perhaps I was destined to lose rather than gain, yet it was too late now to draw back--I must play the game out to its ending.

I wrote rapidly, utterly ignoring her conversation with Hardy, yet someway conscious that Le Gaire sought to join in, and was answered in a single swift sentence, the girl not even turning to glance at him.