it,' said Slyme. 'It's not so easy when your wrists are tight
together. Now then! Up! What is it?'

'Put your hand in my pocket. Here! The breast pocket, on the left!' said
Jonas.

He did so; and drew out a purse.

'There's a hundred pound in it,' said Jonas, whose words were almost
unintelligible; as his face, in its pallor and agony, was scarcely
human.

Slyme looked at him; gave it into his hands; and shook his head.

'I can't. I daren't. I couldn't if I dared. Those fellows below--'

'Escape's impossible,' said Jonas. 'I know it. One hundred pound for
only five minutes in the next room!'

'What to do?' he asked.

The face of his prisoner as he advanced to whisper in his ear, made him
recoil involuntarily. But he stopped and listened to him. The words were
few, but his own face changed as he heard them.

'I have it about me,' said Jonas, putting his hands to his throat, as
though whatever he referred to were hidden in his neckerchief. 'How
should you know of it? How could you know? A hundred pound for only five
minutes in the next room! The time's passing. Speak!'

'It would be more--more creditable to the family,' observed Slyme, with
trembling lips. 'I wish you hadn't told me half so much. Less would have
served your purpose. You might have kept it to yourself.'

'A hundred pound for only five minutes in the next room! Speak!' cried
Jonas, desperately.

He took the purse. Jonas, with a wild unsteady step, retreated to the
door in the glass partition.

'Stop!' cried Slyme, catching at his skirts. 'I don't know about this.
Yet it must end so at last. Are you guilty?'

'Yes!' said Jonas.

'Are the proofs as they were told just now?'

'Yes!' said Jonas.

'Will you--will you engage to say a--a Prayer, now, or something of that
sort?' faltered Slyme.

Jonas broke from him without replying, and closed the door between them.

Slyme listened at the keyhole. After that, he crept away on tiptoe, as
far off as he could; and looked awfully towards the place. He was roused
by the arrival of the coach, and their letting down the steps.

'He's getting a few things together,' he said, leaning out of window,
and speaking to the two men below, who stood in the full light of a
street-lamp. 'Keep your eye upon the back, one of you, for form's sake.'

One of the men withdrew into the court. The other, seating himself self
on the steps of the coach, remained in conversation with Slyme at the
window who perhaps