“Go on,” said Orde grimly.
“Dere is no go on. Dot is all.”
“Why do you come to tell me now?”
“Because for more than one year now I say to mineself, 'Carl Heinzman, you vas one dirty scoundrel. You vas dishonest; a sneak; a thief'; I don't like to call myself names like dose. It iss all righdt to be smart; but to be a thief!”
“Why didn't you pull out?” asked Orde.
“I couldn't!” cried Heinzman piteously. “How could I? He haf me cold. I paid Stanford five hundred dollars for his vote on the charter; and Joseph Newmark, he know dot; he can PROVE it. He tell me if I don't do what he say, he put me in jail. Think of dot! All my friends go back on me; all my money gone; maybe my daughter Mina go back on me, too. How could I?”
“Well, he can still put you in prison,” said Orde.
“Vot I care?” cried Heinzman, throwing up both his arms. “You and your wife are my friends. She save my Mina. DU LIEBER GOTT! If my daughter had died, vot good iss friends and money? Vot good iss anything? I don't vant to live! And ven I sit dere by her always something ask me: 'Vy you do dot to the peoples dot safe your Mina?' And ven she look at me, her eyes say it; and in the night everything cry out at me; and I get sick, and I can't stand it no longer, and I don't care if he send me to prison or to hell, no more.”
His excitement died. He sat listless, his eyes vacant, his hands between his knees.
“Vell, I go,” he said at last.