‘I suppose you will do something for Mrs Seaton?’ inquired Slimm.
‘Do something for them—of course I will,’ she laughed hardly. ‘I’ll go and call on them. I will let them see me ride in my carriage, while they are begging in the gutter. I will give them a sixpence when they come to ask alms at my house.—Oh, tell me, are they starving?—are they starving, I say?’ she gasped in her passionate utterance, clutching the American by the arm. ‘Are they living on charity? Oh, I hope so—I hope so, for I hate them—hate them!’ The last words hissed lingeringly and spitefully through her teeth.
‘Well, not quite,’ Slimm replied cheerfully. ‘It must be consoling to your womanly feelings to know they are getting on first-rate—in fact, they are as happy and comfortable as two people can be.’
‘I am sorry for that,’ she said, with a little pant between each word. ‘I hoped they were starving. What right have they to be happy, when I am so miserable?’
‘Really, madam, it is no pleasure to bring you news, you take it so uncomfortably,’ Slimm replied. ‘These histrionics, I know, are intended merely to disguise your delicate and tender feelings. Now, we admit this money belongs to you. What will you stand for the information? ‘Forty thousand pounds is a lot of money.’
‘Not one farthing,’ replied the woman—‘not one single farthing. The money is mine, and mine it shall remain.’
‘In that case,’ said Slimm cheerfully, ‘my mission is at an end.—I wish you a very good-morning.’
‘Stop! Do you mean to say you intend to hold the secret unless I agree to some terms?’
‘Your powers of penetration do you credit, madam. That is precisely what I do mean.’
‘And what, pray, is the price placed upon your secret?’