“I—I must do my duty, ma’am,” stammered Tilley. “This gentleman is my prisoner, and he must come along with me.”
“Four hundred pounds are offered for his capture,” said Edith. “No one but you knows that he is here. Keep that knowledge to yourself—lock it up as a secret in your own breast, and six hundred pounds shall be put into your hands this very night.”
“Six hundred pounds!” murmured Tilley. He was staggered by the amount.
“Yes, two hundred pounds more than the reward shall be yours, and your hands will be free from the stain of innocent blood. Look at him—look at that man,” she cried, “and tell me, is that the face of a murderer?”
Lionel came a step or two nearer. “My wife has but spoken the truth,” he said. “As there is a Heaven above us, I am as innocent of the murder of Mr. Osmond as you are!”
“You are a good man—you are a kind-hearted man,” pleaded Edith. “I can see it in your face—I can read it in your eyes. You have a wife and children. Think what you can buy for them—think with what comforts you can surround them, out of six hundred pounds. But stain your hands with that vile blood-money, and you will be a marked man among your fellow-men to the last hour of your miserable life!”
“Tilley, Tilley, where are you? Why don’t you come down?” called Mr. Drayton from below.
“Coming, sir—coming,” cried Tilley.
For a moment he hesitated. But Edith was still before him. His rough hands were still clasped by her delicate fingers. Her lovely face—pallid, despairful—was gazing up at him with tearful and beseeching eyes. Sergeant Tilley was but a man, and a softhearted one. Here was a beautiful woman begging and praying of him to accept six hundred pounds. “I never could stand out against a woman’s tears,” he said to himself; and being no more than mortal, he succumbed.
“Have the money ready by nine o’clock to-night,” he said in a hoarse whisper. “I’ll come for it myself, and give three taps at the kitchen-door. One of you can just open the door a few inches, and put the money out, and I’ll take it—and you needn’t see me and I needn’t see you.”