"Certainly."
"And do you imagine I am going to pay the bill?" demanded the woman, tartly.
"Well, I had forgotten that a little of the root of evil was necessary in your case."
A smile, deepening into a disagreeable laugh, followed, as Professor Ruggles laid a greenback in the hand of his tool.
A moment later he was gone.
As the door closed on his retreating form, the countenance of Madge Scarlet underwent a change. The wrinkled face flushed with wrath, and the skinny hands were raised on high.
"Professor Ruggles, you may have successfully duped the girl, but you cannot make one of me. I can read you like a book, and it maybe that I shall conclude not to permit you to have your way in this matter. Through this girl I shall be able to wring the heart of the man I hate, and I mean to do it. Ah! Dyke Darrel, venomous scoundrel! The hour of my revenge draws nigh! I shall willingly cast my soul into Hades for this one drop of satisfaction."
There was an awful glitter in the woman's eyes at the last, and her fierce emotions caused her frame to tremble visibly.
In the meantime, how fared it with poor Nell Darrel, who had gone thus blindly to her doom? She did not awake from the stupor caused by the chloroform, until another day had dawned upon the world, although but little light was permitted to find its way into this underground apartment, whose stone walls were damp with ooze, and from whence no voice could penetrate to the busy world above.
A faint light entered the place from between iron bars that spanned a narrow window, far above the head of little Nell Darrel.