"Of course—yes. That's what I mean. With Miss Palffy as an object, there could scarcely be a limit to the hush-money one would put up to clear away any obstacles that might exist."
"I expect not," said Andrew nervously. "I couldn't lose her now—I simply couldn't. It would kill me."
"I once knew of such a case," said Radwalader musingly. "Chap just about to marry the girl, and he found out that there was something very crooked about his birth—that he was illegitimate, in fact. The father hung on to him like an octopus and bled him like a leech. But the—er—girl never knew."
"It was worth it to him," commented Andrew, "if he'd have lost the girl else."
"I've forgotten what he paid," said Radwalader, "but I know it was pretty stiff—in the form of a regular allowance by the year."
"Was the chap rich?" asked Andrew. He was looking down the river, and taking great breaths of the delicious night air, thrilling with the memory of Margery waiting back there for him; and his part in the conversation was little more than automatic.
"Reasonably," said Radwalader. "Enough to stand the strain. Curious old house, this—isn't it?"
He paused, and leaned upon the railing of the bridge.
"The plaster's rotten as possible," answered Andrew after a moment, during which he had been hacking boyishly at it with his knife.
"You know both sides of the bridge were lined with houses once," said Radwalader. "Picturesque it must have been! This is the only one left, and it doesn't look as if it could keep from toppling over into the river very much longer. Lord! how fast the water runs down there! It's a veritable mill-race. I shouldn't care to have to swim against it."