"Could I?"
"Anybody could."
"Well, and what's your price?"
"Fifty pounds."
"Nonsense! I'm not a rich man like Mr. Steel."
"I don't take less from anybody—not much less, anyhow!"
"Not twenty in hard cash?"
"Not me; but look here, mister, you show me thirty and we'll see."
The voice drew uncomfortably close. And there were steps upon the cross-roads at last; they were those of one advancing with lumbering gait and of another stepping nimbly backward. The latter laughed aloud.
"Did you really think I would come to meet the writer of a letter like yours, at night, in a spot like this, with a single penny-piece in my pocket? Come to my cottage, and we'll settle there."