ne view of the case. But you
are free to try if you like. I am only a mere miserable bag of bones,
and you are a strong man. Get to work."

The cackling challenge passed unheeded. Actually there was something
about the strange little man to be afraid of. He took up the thread of
conversation again.

"You will find that every exit is guarded in the same way," he said. "I
have only to set the whole machinery in motion and you are powerless.
You are in my hands. If you had touched me when I asked you just now,
you would have been dead at my feet. But strange as it may seem, I have
a heart hidden in this crooked little body of mine somewhere. I was not
always bad, as you know. There was a time when I was another man."

"Never," Berrington said dispassionately. "The seeds of evil were always
there."

"Well, let that pass, if you like. A bad man and a bad woman and a
dreadful accident have reduced me to what you see. What took place here
to-night is beside the mark. The fact remains that you know too much.
You stand between us and a scheme that I have been plotting for years.
Whether that scheme is connected with Sir Charles Darryll matters
nothing. The great point, as I said before, is that you know too much.
What are you going to do?"

"Wait my chance and publish my knowledge to the world," Berrington
cried.

"And lose Mary for ever? Oh, I know that you are still in love with her,
I know that you will never be happy till she is your wife. But you seem
to lose sight of the fact that she is strongly attached to me. And if
harm comes to me through you, Mary will never become Mrs. Berrington.
She will love you and leave you as they do in the stories."

"You cannot detain me here for any length of time," Berrington said
coldly.

"I can keep you here till I have finished my campaign," Sartoris
replied. "I could murder you, and nobody be any the wiser."

Berrington thought of Field, and smiled. Hitherto he had not tried
diplomacy. His contempt and hatred for this man, his knowledge of his
own strength and courage, had sufficed for the present. Now it seemed
time to resort to strategy.

"You are quite correct, so far," he said. "I know much, I know a great
deal more than you imagine. But in taking the risks I took to-night I
did not do so blindly. I had my own reasons for attending to the work
privately. But I recognized my danger and the man I had to deal with.
So, indeed, I would proceed to make my retreat safe. Did