Page:The Prime Minister by Hall Caine.djvu/119

Rh present. This house is the only safe place for you to-night. While you are here, you are Freda Michel. The moment you pass my door you are Margaret Schiller, who has been found out and is making a bolt for it.  [After another moment, breaking into wild laughter.] So that's how it is, is it? I'm a prisoner in a cell, unable to escape at either end of it. Very well, do what you like with me. Do what you like with all of us. It can't be worse than what you did with my father when you said in Parliament he had eaten your bread—your country's bread—and you thought you had bought his soul with it. My miserable country! What about yours—that robs children of their fathers, and leaves them to beggary, though they are as innocent as your own child in her cot upstairs. Yes, do what you like. It will only be a quicker death. You killed my father—kill his daughter also. Do you think I shall be afraid?  I am not called upon to defend myself against your accusations, my girl. But, since you speak of your father again, and may have acted from a personal rather than a quasi-patriotic impulse, would it surprise you to learn that I had nothing to do with your father's case except to save him from the gallows?  [With a gasp.] Eh?