"You may call it killing."
"If I thought it could be done with anything like a certainty of result, I would make no more of the life of the Governor than—than—"
Todd was at a loss for a simile, and Lupin helped him out of the difficulty by saying—
"Giving a man a clean shave for one penny, or eating a veal pie."
Todd nodded.
"Now, hark you," continued Lupin, speaking in the same very low whisper, indeed, that he had conducted the conversation in. "It is quite a maddening thing, you see, to find that there is nothing between us and liberty but this door. Every moment is of the greatest possible importance. Will you do it?"
"Are you mad?"
"No. I am quite sane, I confess, though that I have not the pluck to do it. You ought to be a man of courage. What is it to you, if you were to murder everybody in this house, so that you got this door open? That is the great object, the only object; and to you, you know, three or four more deaths will not make much consequence."
"My friend," said Todd, with a sickly smile, "I am afraid you believe the calumnies that have been heaped upon my innocent head. But, if nothing can be done, but what you say, I will make the attempt. There are two files, though, and they are equally sharp. Do you take one, and I will take the other."
"You want me with you?"