"Which other way can I go? Please--please release my arm; you're hurting me."
The girl paid no heed to her request.
"Why, if you was to go down the stairs someone would be sure to see you, and as likely as not they'd stop you; it isn't many as would throw away a hundred pounds like I'm a-doing. And if they was to let you go out of the house it would be almost the same; if them police was to ask them if they'd seen you they'd be bound to say they had. Cause why? They might get into trouble themselves if they was to say they hadn't; it's not easy to deal with them police in a job like this; you don't know the risk I'm running in acting as your friend. What you want is not to do the family a worse turn than you've done 'em already; so what you've got to do is to get off the place without their knowing anything about it, nor anyone else neither; because, of course, I don't count. Very well, then; the stairs is no good for that, nor yet the front door; the only way's the window." Dorothy thought of the window in that private sitting-room in "The Bolton Arms." She shut her eyes, and shivered. The girl mistook the cause of the other's evident disturbance. "Don't you be afraid, there's no call for you to go shivering; why, I felt you right up my arm. It's no distance from this window to the ground; why, it's nothing of a drop, to say nothing of there being a flower bed, what's pretty nearly as soft as a feather bed, for you to drop upon. If you haven't noticed come here and I'll show you."
She made as if she proposed to drag Dorothy to the window, nolens volens, for she still retained her grasp on her arm. But Dorothy stood fast.
"Will you please to take your hand away? I don't like you to hold me. I've already told you that you hurt." The girl looked at her a moment, then withdrew her hand. Dorothy held out her arm. "Look at the marks you have made."
Although in the room it was nearly dark there was light enough to enable them to see the imprints of the other's fingers on Dorothy's white arm.
"Sorry, miss, I'm sure. You must mark easy."
"You are stronger than you think."
"I am strong; I know I am stronger than some; still, I never should have thought that I was hurting you. I was only going to show you that the window's no distance from the ground."
"I'm not afraid of dropping from the window; I am not such a coward as that. Only what am I to do, and where am I to go, when I am down?"