"I can guess."
"I was tricked. The man said he wanted to marry me. I didn't know. I believed him. An' they beat me an' starved me and did things I couldn't think about an' couldn't help thinkin' about. An' all I want is just for you to do me this one little favor. I won't bother you. I won't blow on you——"
"What's that?"
"Oh, you know I wouldn't blow on you! I couldn't. I want to forget the whole thing. I've got friends to go to who'll get me work. I only want you to get me out of the door and safe away."
Like most men of his sort Dyker, although ready enough to make a living out of the results of cruelty, hated the sight of cruelty's self. The girl's words touched, though lightly, his selfish heart.
"But I can't afford to help you," he protested. "You see how I'm tied up here. I can't have Rose jump on me now."
"You know she's jumping on you already. You know she's knifing you in the back. The only way you can stop her is by using what I've told you."
"Of course," said Dyker in the tone of a man thinking aloud, "if she really was playing both ends against the middle, I could pull her teeth by going straight to O'Malley and telling him so."
Violet did not wholly understand this, but she agreed immediately.
"Of course you could," she said.