"Well, let the matter bide, Peterssen. Your searching questions have exhausted me."
"We will suspend it, then. There is time before us. Meanwhile I attach myself, and with myself another, to your party."
"Are you mad?" cried Leonard. "Why that would ruin all!"
Dr. Peterssen's previous laughter was tame in comparison to the sounds of merriment he emitted now. He made the echoes ring again.
"So there is work to be done," he said when his merriment ceased. "Good. Two things to be kept always in view--personal safety and the reward to be earned for the work. Still I attach myself to your party, but now secretly. I follow you wherever you go, but I do not mix with you. Our parties may meet, but it shall be in a casual, accidental way, and there shall be no close intimacy. I do not affect disguise, Leonard. I follow you for the purpose of making money out of you. I have very little; I want some. I put a question to you, to which I must have an answer. Without encroaching further on your confidence, I wish you to inform me what the end you are scheming for is worth, supposing I accomplish it in safety. I do not ask what that end is, but how much it would be worth to me? You are silent. Shall we say a thousand pounds?"
"Yes," replied Leonard, slowly, "say a thousand pounds."
"Much obliged to you. The subject is now dismissed. Have you any questions to ask me? I put myself in the witness-box."
"When did you come here?" asked Leonard.
"Yesterday."
"When do you go away?"