“Why not?”
“I don't like the idea of your putting yourself in his power.”
“His power?”
“Yes, in Dudleigh Manor, or any other place. He is desperate. He will not shrink from any thing that he thinks may save him from this danger. You will be his chief danger; he may think of getting rid of it. He is unscrupulous, and would stop at nothing.”
“Oh, as for that, he may be desperate, but what can he possibly do? Dudleigh Manor is in the world. It is not in some remote place where the master is superior to law. He can do no more harm there than he can here.”
“The man,” said Reginald, “who for all these years has outraged honor and justice and truth, and has stifled his own conscience for the sake of his comfort, must by this time be familiar with desperate deeds, and be capable of any crime. I am afraid, mother dear, for you to trust yourself with him.”
“Reginald,” said Lady Dudleigh, “you speak as though I were a child or a schoolgirl. Does he seem now as though he could harm me, or do I seem to be one who can easily be put down? Would you be afraid to go with him?”
“I—afraid? That is the very thing that I wish to propose.”
“But you could not possibly have that influence over him which I have. You might threaten, easily enough, and come to an open rupture, but that is what I wish to avoid. I wish to bring him to a confession, not so much by direct threats as by various constraining moral influences.”
“Oh, as to that,” said Reginald, “I have no doubt that you will do far better than I can; but at the same time I can not get rid of a fear about your safety.”