“I am ready to give you an equivalent.”

“Of what value?”

“I am willing to be silent.”

“And how can your silence benefit me?”

John Somerville asked this question with an assumption of indifference, but his fingers twitched nervously.

“That you will be best able to estimate,” said Peg.

“Explain yourself.”

“I can do that in a few words.  You employed me to kidnap a child.  I believe the law has something to say about that.  At any rate, the child’s mother may have.”

“What do you know about the child’s mother?” demanded Somerville, hastily.

“All about her!” returned Peg, emphatically.

“How am I to know that?  It is easy to claim the knowledge.”

“Shall I tell you all?  In the first place she married your cousin, after rejecting you.  You never forgave her for this.  When a year after marriage her husband died, you renewed your proposals.  They were rejected, and you were forbidden to renew the subject on pain of forfeiting her friendship forever.  You left her presence, determined to be revenged.  With this object you sought Dick and myself, and employed us to kidnap the child.  There is the whole story, briefly told.”

John Somerville listened, with compressed lips and pale face.

“Woman, how came this within your knowledge?” he demanded, coarsely.

“That is of no consequence,” said Peg.  “It was for my interest to find out, and I did so.”

“Well?”

“I know one thing more—­the residence of the child’s mother.  I hesitated this morning whether to come here, or carry Ida to her mother, trusting to her to repay from gratitude what I demand from you, because it is your interest to comply with my request.”

“You speak of carrying the child to her mother.  She is in New York.”

“You are mistaken,” said Peg, coolly.  “She is in Philadelphia.”

“With you?”

“With me.”

“How long has this been?”

“Nearly a fortnight.”

John Somerville paced the room with hurried steps.  Peg watched him carelessly.  She felt that she had succeeded.  He paused after awhile, and stood before her.

“You demand a thousand dollars,” he said.

“I do.”

“I have not that amount with me.  I have recently lost a heavy sum, no matter how.  But I can probably get it to-day.  Call to-morrow at this time,—­no, in the afternoon, and I will see what I can do for you.”

“Very well,” said Peg.

Left to himself, John Somerville spent some time in reflection.  Difficulties encompassed him—­difficulties from which he found it hard to find a way of escape.  He knew how impossible it would be to meet this woman’s demand.  Something must be done.  Gradually his countenance lightened.  He had decided what that something should be.

CHAPTER XXIII.