"You could give me ten thousand a year," he said, composedly; "you are a rich woman, you would never miss it."
"I will give you enough to get to some philanthropists, who will teach you to live an honest life."
"Thank you, ma'am,—we've got enough of them in New York. They go to the low-down streets and preach, 'Lead an honest life, and you will star it through the world,' but no fellow those praying folks ever took has got as high up in the sky as Gentleman George."
"He is your model?"
"He's the biggest man in America," said her companion, with quiet enthusiasm.
"How old are you?"
"Twenty-three."
Her convulsed face showed that she pitied him, and with his small and ferret-like eyes gleaming approvingly on her he continued, "You're a lady, ma'am, and I'll tell you what I'm aiming at. I don't want to give up this life. If I did, I could earn ten thousand dollars to-morrow by going to the detectives in New York and splitting on Gentleman George. But I'm not anxious to play spy. I'd be found out, and I've just been watching a young crook, that turned State's evidence in a Boston jail, come out and go crazy on account of the whole gang turning against him. He slunk round the streets like a sick cat, and he squealed in his sleep. No one spoke to him, and he died in the horrors."
"Can't you run away from them?" said Miss Gastonguay, with a burst of impassioned appeal. "Leave the atmosphere of crime. I'll send you anywhere."
"Anywhere; I don't want to go. Would you be happy in my hang-out? No, ma'am. Would I be happy in yours? No, ma'am, again. You rich people don't know what liberty is."