The girl answered, speaking in a husky whisper, as if she feared that the walls had ears:
"Never mind who I am; don't ask me to tell you my name; then, if anyone asks you, you can't tell them--see? You don't want to get me into trouble, do you? Of course you don't." She put a stubby red finger, in which the dirt was engrained, to her lips, with an air of the utmost mystery. "I am a friend, that's who I am; and, placed as you are, that's all you want to know about me, and as a friend I've come to give you a word of advice, which is--bolt!"
"I don't know what you mean! Why--why have you come to me like this? Who has sent you?"
"No one hasn't sent me--not much! Only they've found out all about you in the kitchen; and West, she's the parlourmaid, she's after that hundred pounds."
"Which hundred pounds? What--what do you mean?"
"Mean to say you don't know they've offered a hundred pounds for you?"
"Who--has offered a hundred pounds?"
"Why, over at Newcaster--I suppose it's them police--it generally is the police what offers rewards, isn't it? Mean to say you didn't know there was a reward out for you?"
Dorothy shrank back. A sound came from her lips which might have been "No."
"Why, it's in all the papers; I expect there's thousands looking out for it by now. That's what West says: someone's sure to get it, so it might as well be her. So she went to put her hat on; meaning to start off to them police; and if she didn't leave the key outside her room--so I gave it a turn, and here it is." She produced a door-key from a pocket in her skirt. "And there she is, locked in. Won't she be in a tear when she finds out!" The girl grinned, as if enjoying the mental picture she called up of the parlourmaid's rage when she discovered she was prisoned. "They won't be so eager to let her out, neither; there's none of them loves her. So if you're sharp you ought to get clear off before she's even started after that reward."