"No, wretch! my ransom will never be paid! No! I have not asked anyone for the money! Thou wilt get from me only my head, which will serve thee nothing. Take it quickly if it seems good to thee. It will do me a favor and thyself also. Thou wilt spare me two weeks of torture, and the disgust of looking at thee, which is the most of all. Thou wilt save my board for fifteen days. Do not miss it, it is the only benefit that thou wilt reap from me!" He smiled, shrugged his shoulders, and replied: "Ta! ta! ta! ta! Thus it is with young people! Extremists in everything! They throw the helve after the hatchet. If I listened to you, I would regret it before eight hours had passed, and so would you. The Englishwomen will pay, I am sure of it. I know women yet, although I have lived in retirement for a long time. What would be said if I killed you to-day, and your ransom arrived to-morrow? The story would go out that I had broken my word, and my prisoners would allow themselves to be killed like sheep, without asking a centime of their parents. It would spoil the trade." "Ah! thou believest that the Englishwomen will pay thee, my clever fellow? Yes, they will pay thee as thou meritest!" "You are very good." "Their ransom will cost thee 80,000 francs, dost thou hear? Eighty thousand francs out of thy pocket!" "Do not say such things. One would think that the blows of the stick had turned your brain." "I tell thee the truth. Dost thou recall the name of thy prisoners?" "No, but I have it in writing." "I will jog thy memory. The lady called herself Mrs. Simons." "Well!" "Partner of the firm of Barley in London." "My banker?" "Precisely." "How doest thou know my banker's name?" "Because thou didst dictate before me." "What matter, after all? They cannot escape; they are not Greeks, they are English; the courts--I will make complaint!" "And thou wouldst lose. They have a receipt!" "That is so. But by what mischance did I give them a receipt?" "Because I advised thee to do it, poor man!" "Wretch! dog wrongly baptized! heretic of hell! thou hast ruined me! thou hast betrayed me! Thou hast robbed me! eighty thousand francs! I am responsible! If they were the bankers of the company, I would lose only my share. But they hold only my capital; I shall lose it all. Art thou very sure that she is a partner of the firm of Barley?" "As I am sure of dying to-day." "No! thou shalt not die till to-morrow. Thou hast not suffered enough. We will make thee pay for those 80,000 francs. What punishment can we invent? Eighty thousand francs! Eighty thousand deaths would be little. What have I done to this traitor who has robbed me! Peuh! Child's play, a pleasantry! He has not howled two hours! I must invent something better. But may be there are two firms of the same name?" "Cavendish Square, No. 31."