"Don't misunderstand me. I've taken a wrong move to-night, but I mean to take another and a safer one. I'll not go back on what I mean to do; I'll not knuckle under to a young cub like that. It shall be as if the girl had really been here--only I'll work in a more secret fashion. I have a love for plotting and mystery; I'll leave that young fool staring up at these windows for a few days, and eating his heart out, and thirsting for my blood; and I'll be comfortably slipping away elsewhere. You shall help me, Tinman--and you too, Fanshawe--and I'll promise you some sport." "What are you going to do?" I asked. "In the first place, I don't quite like the idea of being kept prisoner here, under the fear of what may happen if I venture outside. The boy's mad--but it's a sort of madness from which he may only wake when he has stuck a knife into me, or has done something else that may bring him to the gallows. That's too much of a risk for me; at the same time, I mean to get the whip hand of him. You and Fanshawe shall help me." "Willingly--very willingly," said Fanshawe, speaking mechanically, and not raising his eyes. "You may trust us, Mr. Olivant; Tinman and I have no life that is not concerned with you and your affairs. But for you we must starve." I looked at the despicable creature; I remembered what he had said to me, and what he had promised that very night; I was glad to think that I had not trusted him. I thought he looked at me strangely, when for a moment he raised his eyes to me; there was a look in them I did not understand. "Well, I'm glad you recognize that fact," said Murray Olivant, with a laugh. "That's been my way always: to pay people to do things for me I don't care to do myself. You can listen, then, to my plans." He was so exuberant about it, and chuckled so much to himself at the thought of it, that it was some time before he began to set it forth; and even then he prefaced the business with a sudden generous bringing out of bottles and glasses for our entertainment. Fanshawe drank greedily, with many slavish expressions of gratitude; I refused to take anything. At last Murray Olivant, standing with his back to the fire, and with a cigar stuck in the corner of his mouth, began to say what was in his mind. "Suppose that a certain man is threatened by another--goes, in fact, in fear of his life from a madman; and suppose that it is not convenient for him to have that other arrested, or cautioned, or withheld from what he means to do by the law. In other words, he does not wish a certain fair lady's name to be dragged into the light of day, and things said about her. I have always been mighty sensitive on such matters," he added complacently. "You have indeed!" broke in Fanshawe, with a grin.