Fogg writhed again. "I say you shall have so much, Watson, and you shall keep the books, and have your clear half of all future proceeds. Is there anything else you have set your mind upon, because if you have, while we are talking about business, you may as well state it, you know."
"No, there's nothing else—I am satisfied. All I have to add is, that you had better put your head into the fire than attempt to play any tricks with me. You understand?"
"Perfectly."
Watson was not altogether satisfied. He would have been better pleased if Fogg had made more resistance. The easy compliance of such a man with anything that touched his pocket looked suspicious, and filled the mind of Watson with a thousand vague conjectures. Already—aye, even before he left Fogg's room, Watson began to feel the uneasiness of his new position, and to pay dearly for the money he was to have. Even money may be given an exorbitant price for. When he was by himself, as he traversed the passage leading to his own sleeping room, Watson could not forbear looking cautiously around him at times, as though gaunt murder stalked behind him, and he fastened his bed-room door with more than his usual caution. The wish to sleep came not to him, and sitting down upon his bed-side he rested his chin upon his hand and said to himself in a low anxious shrinking kind of whisper—
"What does Fogg mean to do?"
Nor was the recent interview without its after effects upon the mad-house keeper himself. When the door closed upon Watson he shook his clenched hand in the direction he had taken, and muttered curses,
"Not loud, but deep."
"The time will come," he said, "Master Watson, and that quickly too, when I will let you see that I am still the master spirit. You shall be satisfied for the present, but your death-warrant is preparing. You will not live long to triumph over me by threats of what your low cunning can accomplish."
He rose and drank more raw brandy, after which, still muttering maledictions upon Watson, he returned to his bed-room, where, if he did not sleep, and if during the still hours of the night his brain was not too much vexed, he hoped to be able to concoct some scheme which should present him with a prospect of exemplary vengeance upon Watson.