“Yes,” he asserted. “The place could be wired.”
“W-wired?” said Cousin Ronald. “I don’t—”
“I’m an electrical engineer,” said Ordway. “I’ve been looking around here. Think what electricity could do for you here! Light—plenty of light—electric water heater—pump—dish washer—vacuum cleaner—percolator—stoves. You could have decent comfort!”
Cousin Ronald could not fathom the motives of the stranger, but he felt sure that they were profoundly subtle, and inimical to Cousin Ronald’s welfare. Again he said:
“Will you—er—step into my study, sir?”
Ordway stepped, and when he got in there he loomed worse than ever.
“See here!” he said. “Let me do this job for you—wiring the house.”
Cousin Ronald felt a sort of illness, a sort of faintness. He believed that he could comprehend the plot now. Instead of bluntly demanding a certain sum for Mme. Van Der Dokjen’s letter, he was going to demand this job—this impious, this vandal job, of “wiring” the cottage. And the price—the price—
“I—er—fear it would be a somewhat costly undertaking,” said Cousin Ronald.
Ordway thought of the wonderful girl, groping about in this dismal house, cold, forlorn, captive to an ogre relative. He was perhaps a little obsessed by electricity—a good thing for one of his profession. He thought it the great hope of the modern world. And he could not endure the idea of a wonderful girl deprived of its benefits. He said: