“What?” I cried, starting forward. “You would bribe me to murder your own daughter?”
He shrugged his thin shoulders, made an impatient movement, his small eyes glittered, and in a cold hard voice, he exclaimed—
“I said that it is imperative she should die before the money is yours—that is all.”
Chapter Three.
Concerning a Compact.
“Then you make murder one of the conditions of payment?” I said, facing him.
“I have only said she must die before sunset,” he answered. “She cannot live, in any case, longer than a few hours. It is easy for you, a doctor, to render her agony brief.”
“To speak plainly,” I said, with rising indignation, “you wish me to kill her! You offer me twenty thousand pounds, not for marriage, but for the committal of the capital sin.”