"Ah! you have the means of imprisoning persons—of keeping them for ever out of the way—and yet not go to the last extreme?" said Adeline, catching at this alternative.
"I have, ma'am," was the calm reply.
"But wherefore do you speak thus freely to me? why do you tell me so much?" demanded Adeline, a vague suspicion entering her mind that this fearful man knew her. "I am a complete stranger to you——"
"Yes, ma'am: and you may remain so, if it suits your purpose," answered Tidkins, who divined the motive of her observations. "Tell me what you wish done—pay me my price—and I shall ask you no questions. And if you think that I am incautious in telling you so much concerning myself, let me assure you that I am not afraid of your being a police-spy. The police cannot get hold of such persons as yourself to entrap men like me. I know that you have business to propose to me: your words and manner prove it. Now, ma'am, answer me as frankly as I have spoken to you. You have a bitter enemy?"
"I have indeed," answered Adeline, reassured that she was not known to the Resurrection Man: "and that enemy is a woman."
"Saving your presence, ma'am, a woman is a worse enemy than a man," said Tidkins. "And of course you wish to get your enemy out of the way by some means?"
"I do," replied Adeline, in a low and hoarse tone—as if she only uttered those monosyllables with a great exertion.
"There are two ways, ma'am," said the Resurrection Man, significantly: "confinement in a dungeon, or——"
"I understand you," interrupted Lady Ravensworth, hastily. "Oh! I am at a loss which course to adopt—which plan to decide upon! Heaven knows I shrink from the extreme one——and yet——"
"The dead tell no tales," observed Tidkins, in a low and measured tone.