"So that if I can introduce to her some one she does not know—some one who is bound, by reasons of policy, to do what he is told, without thought of the consequences—I am a gainer," went on the man at the table. "You have reason to hate a girl, so unfortunately formed in the image of the woman who deceived you, and brought disaster upon you; you have reason to be loyal to me, because I can keep you from starving, and can give you clothes and shelter. You're a poor broken worn-out thing, and I take pity on you. Now do you understand the situation?"
I understood it so well that my mind, for the first time since I had stepped out from the prison gates, was clear, and I was fully alive. I looked eagerly from one to the other; I told the man brokenly that I would do all he asked; I think I suggested that I would be his slave. He might tell me to do anything; I was eager to take up that old story that I had been compelled to lay down.
"For your revenge?" he asked, with a grin.
"For my revenge!" I said; and burst into a shout of laughter.
"Don't take any notice of him," I heard my guardian whisper. "The poor fool is only half-witted; his years of prison life have told upon him. But he's the man you want!"
CHAPTER III
[I ENTER UPON SERVITUDE]
While I stood in the room watching the two men, and eager to know what work was to be given me to do that would enable me to touch again the life I had left, Fanshawe and the stranger discussed me in low voices, as they might have discussed some piece of furniture they contemplated putting in some particular place. I caught one or two of their remarks; I listened with the humility that years had bred in me to what they said of me.