Aristides spat.
“You want my help?” he asked.
“I thought we might get away together,” said Cavalcini, afraid of what he had already spoken, and horrified at the things he yet might utter. “Two can sometimes contrive a thing that is impossible for one,” he added.
“Well,” said Aristides, “ten thousand drachmæ would not be enough. Can you get twenty thousand?”
“I might. I will try. My friend is coming this afternoon with my food. I will ask her what she can do.”
And as Aristides stood silently contemptuous, Cavalcini turned miserably away, feeling that he had committed himself to some frightful scheme he could not possibly carry out, and that he had done so to no purpose, for it was obvious Aristides was no better disposed towards him now than he had been before.
“I must not talk to anyone again,” he said to himself; “my nerve is gone, and I say things I do not mean.”
It was true he could get the sum of money he had named, but it was not true that he wished to attempt to escape. Only heroes and very desperate men escaped from that prison, and he was too deeply involved in misery to be desperate. But when his mistress came and he spoke to her for a few moments, as the prison rules permitted, he told her how to get the money.
“Bring it next time you come—bring it in hundred-drachmæ notes. Wrap them into a little parcel and when you are talking to me, slip it into this pocket of my tunic. I will stand as I am standing now. But be very careful you are not observed.”
“But where shall you go when you escape?”