“Across this court.”
“Across a court? I cannot—I cannot.”
“You must.”
“I am lost—I am lost,” said Gray, wringing his hands, for the feat of jumping across a court at the risk of a fall into the gulph below, appeared to him to be totally impossible.
“Well,” cried the man, “if ever I came near such an out-and-out sneak in the whole course of my life. Why you are afraid of what you know nothing about. You’ve only got to jump off a parapet of one house in at Bill’s attic window opposite.”
“Only,” said Gray, trembling exceedingly. “Do you call that easy?”
“Yes; and if you don’t jump it, I must just ease you of all you have got in the money way on the roofs here, and leave you to your luck.”
Gray looked despairingly around him. There was no hope for him. He stood in a drain between the two roofs, and he was as ignorant of the locality of his position as it was possible to be. With a deep groan he sunk grovelling at the feet of the man in whose power he was, and in imploring accents he said,—
“Take me back, and let me run my chance of escape from the house you live in. Oh, take me back, for I am unequal to the fearful task you propose to me. I am, indeed—I should falter and fall—I know I should. Then an awful death would be my lot—a death of pain and horror. Oh, take me back—take me back!”
“I’ll see you d—d first,” cried the man. “Come on, or I’ll cut your throat where you are. Come on, I say, you whining hound, come on, and look at the jump you are so scared at afore you know anything about it. Come on, I say. Oh, you won’t?”