of horror.

"And what particular pleasure will it give you, even supposing such an
outcome possible, to see me hanged?"

The old woman's indecent delight faded gradually from her face as she
looked at him. Then she rose slowly from her chair and came a step
nearer to Dudley, who instinctively recoiled from the threatened touch.
She noticed this movement, and resented it fiercely.

"Why do you go back? Why do you want to get away? Always to get away?"
she asked, angrily. "That's what makes me so mad! Why do you try to get
out of the business in the way you do? Sneaking out of it, as if it had
nothing to do with you? Why don't you throw in your lot with me and go
away with me, as I wished you to, as you once were ready to do?"

Dudley looked searchingly into the wrinkled face.

"I was never ready to go," said he. "I did affect to be ready. I was
ready to go as far as Liverpool with you, to get you safely out of the
country, out of danger to me and to yourself. But I should never have
gone farther than that. I never meant to. I would run any risk rather
than that."

Mr. Higgs never blinked. Staring steadily up into his face, with a
malignity more pronounced than ever, she asked, in a mocking tone:

"Why? Why?"

Dudley was silent.