“Time enough for you to come to my terms,” I replied.
“Give me a plainer answer, Mr. Hartright. What hour is the clock to strike?”
“Nine, to-morrow morning.”
“Nine, to-morrow morning? Yes, yes—your trap is laid for me before I can get my passport regulated and leave London. It is not earlier, I suppose? We will see about that presently—I can keep you hostage here, and bargain with you to send for your letter before I let you go. In the meantime, be so good next as to mention your terms.”
“You shall hear them. They are simple, and soon stated. You know whose interests I represent in coming here?”
He smiled with the most supreme composure, and carelessly waved his right hand.
“I consent to hazard a guess,” he said jeeringly. “A lady’s interests, of course!”
“My Wife’s interests.”
He looked at me with the first honest expression that had crossed his face in my presence—an expression of blank amazement. I could see that I sank in his estimation as a dangerous man from that moment. He shut up the drawer at once, folded his arms over his breast, and listened to me with a smile of satirical attention.
“You are well enough aware,” I went on, “of the course which my inquiries have taken for many months past, to know that any attempted denial of plain facts will be quite useless in my presence. You are guilty of an infamous conspiracy! And the gain of a fortune of ten thousand pounds was your motive for it.”