"I need no reminding of mine, Lije," replied the man gloomily, as the door was closed behind him and the broker proceeded to light a lantern, which he took with apparent familiarity from one corner of the carpetless hall. "They are before me night and day. If I had the courage I'd kill myself, but I have no more than a mouse. I'm a doomed man, Lije Callister, I feel it more and more, but being past redemption must go on sinning to the end."
"Well, if you ain't positively the worst," exclaimed Callister, impatiently. "What ails you?"
"I should think enough ailed me. With poor Maria's blood upon my hands calling for vengeance—ain't that enough?"
"You ought to have thought of that before you struck her. What's done is done. Be your old self, Rube. We are likely to want all our courage before this bank affair quiets down."
"What's the latest, Lije?" asked Tisdale, in a low tone, and with some expression of anxiety. "I have not seen a paper to-day."
"Oh, you may speak as loud as you wish," replied Callister, taking off the top of the lantern, and picking up the wick with a pin. "There's no one within a quarter of a mile of us. There's no special news other than what you know, except so far as concerns Frank Mansfield."
"And what of him? Did the plan of Billy Cutts succeed?"
"Yes, and no. Frank was arrested just as he was entering the bank, but on the way to the police station he managed to escape."
"The deuce! How was that?"
"No one seems to know. I sent a party to interview the detective who arrested him—a fellow by the name of Hook—but could only learn that somewhere in the neighborhood of the wall of Trinity church-yard he managed to give the officer the slip."