“I think with 100,000 roubles we might pull it off,” he replied, tentatively, eyeing me cautiously to see how I took it. I nodded silently. “Of course, we might do it for a little less,” he added as if by afterthought, “but then there would be subsequent expenses.”
“Well, well,” I replied, indulgently, “we will see. We’ll talk about it again some time.”
“There is no time like the present, Michael Ivanitch.”
“But there are other things to think of. We will speak of it again when——”
“When——?”
“When you have got Mrs. Marsh out of prison.”
The little man appeared completely to shrivel up when thus dragged brusquely back into the world of crude reality. He flushed for a moment, it seemed to me, with anger, but pulled himself together at once and reassumed his original manner of demonstrative servility.
“At present we have business on hand, Alexei Fomitch,” I added, “and I wish to talk first about that. How do matters stand?”
The Policeman said his agents were busily at work, studying the ground and the possibilities of Mrs. Marsh’s escape. The whole town, he stated, was being searched for Marsh, and the inability to unearth him had already given rise to the suspicion that he had fled. In a day or two the news would be confirmed by Bolshevist agents in Finland. He foresaw an alleviation of Mrs. Marsh’s lot owing to the probable cessation of cross-examinations. It only remained to see whether she would be transferred to another cell or prison, and then plans for escape might be laid.
“Fire ahead,” I said in conclusion. “And when Mrs. Marsh is free—we will perhaps discuss other matters.”