CHAPTER XXXIV.The Girl in Her Melancholy Home.—The Prison House.—A Dungeon’s Gloom.—Unavailing Sorrow.WhenJacob Gray pitched upon the lone house at Battersea as his place of abode, he could not have resolved upon a house less likely to be visited by the curious, although seen from the river at a considerable distance: it was always pointed out by the watermen to their customers, as “Forest’s haunted house.”The fact was, that a most awful and cold-blooded murder had been committed in the house, since which it had been allowed to fall into decay, and the land around it, which had been at one time well drained, had subsided into its old character of a marsh. The fall of a stack of chimnies had impressed every one with a belief of the extreme danger of venturing within its crazy walls, lest they should fall and engulf the rash intruder in their ruins.It was with great caution that Gray first visited this place, that he was long in discovering that the signs of decay were more superficial than otherwise, and, inquiring diligently and cautiously concerning it, he heard the character of the deserted house, which induced him mentally to resolve upon making it his next abode, should he be hunted out of his miserable residence in the ruined street at Lambeth.The only risk he considered he ran of discovery was in conveying Ada there by daylight; but, after that, he resolved upon never leaving or approaching his gloomy abode except by night, or early in the morning, when he was quite sure no one was observing him, save upon special occasions, such as his recent visit to Learmont, whom he was anxious to see after the stormy meeting in his former residence.When Ada recovered consciousness, she at first felt all that sensation of relief which comes over any one awakening from a horrible dream; but this feeling of satisfaction lingered but for a few fleeting moments in the breast of the persecuted, betrayed girl. The gloom that surrounded her—the damp air that imparted a chill to her very heart—the dim ray of light that proceeded from a candle, the wick of which showed that it had been some hours unattended, all convinced her that she was a prisoner.With a cry of despair she started to her feet: she clasped her hands, and called on Heaven to protect her, as she hastily glanced round the gloomy place in which she found herself.The dismal echo of her own voice only answered her wild and incoherent appeal.“Oh! Heaven,” she cried, “I shall be murdered here. No one to hear my cries! No one to aid me! I am lost—lost! Oh!—Albert, Albert!”She sank upon the ground, and wept long and bitterly as the thoughts of how foolishly she had allowed herself to be deceived by Gray crowded upon her oppressed mind.“No hope!—No hope!—Now there is no hope!” she cried, bitterly. “Oh! Why was I preserved for this dreadful fate! I thought it hard to endure the cold air from the river, while crouching on the bridge. O God! O God! What would I not give now to be as free beneath the canopy of Heaven as I was then!”After a time the native energy of Ada’s character overcame her first bursts of bitter grief; and raising her head she strove to pierce, with her tear-filled eyes, the dim obscurity by which she was surrounded.“What can this place be?” she asked herself. “Let me recollect. He brought me across swampy fields to a ruined house, and there, at that point, recollection ceases—memory fades away in a confused whirl, none of which are sufficiently distinct for the mind to grasp and reason upon.”She now approached the light, and, carefully trimming it, she held it as high as she could, and, turning slowly round, took a long and anxious survey of as much as she could see of her dungeon, for such she considered it.The floor was of earth merely, and the walls seemed to be composed of the same material, mingled with stones and broken bricks, to give them some degree of solidity and strength. The place altogether appeared to be of considerable extent, and, by the various refuse matter that lay about, it would seem to have been a cellar for strong vegetables, wood, &c. during the winter season. A quantity of rough sacks and baskets lay in different corners mouldy and moist, with the accumulated damp of many years, and the air, too, was loaded with unwholesome moisture, and pernicious exhalations.With a slow and cautious step Ada traversed the whole of this gloomy place, and what surprised her much was that she could see no means of ingress or egress from it.“How have I been placed here?” she asked herself. “There is no food. Good Heaven! Am I doomed to starve in this wretched place? Alas! Is this the awful mode which the fears of Jacob Gray have suggested to him as the easiest and safest of compassing my death?”So terrible did the dread of death in that damp, gloomy dungeon become to the imagination of Ada that she could scarcely hold the light for trembling, and she placed it on one of the mouldy baskets, while with clasped hands, and upon her knees, she breathed a prayer to Heaven for protection and safety in her extreme peril.How calming and sweet is the soothing influence of prayer! As the trembling words, wrung from the pure heart of the gentle and beautiful Ada in her deep anguish, ascended to that Heaven which never permits the wicked to prosper, but always interposes to protect the innocent and virtuous, a holy balm seemed to fall upon her blighted spirit, and the benign influence of some air from the regions of eternal bliss seemed to fill the gloomy dungeon with a brightness and a beauty that deprived it of its horrors.For many minutes now Ada remained silent, and her fancy strayed to the last kind words of Albert Seyton. Then she pictured him and his father seeking her in the house at Lambeth. In her mind’s eye she saw his despair when he found her not, and she thought then that her heart must break to think that she should never see him more.“Albert—Albert!” she cried.—“Oh save me—save—seek for me! Oh, could your eyes but cast themselves upon this gloomy abode and know that I was here, how happy might I be—far happier than before, for now I feel convinced this dreadful man Gray is not my father. No—no, he could not thus before Heaven have betrayed his child! Albert—Albert!”She dropped her head upon her breast, and again the tears blinded those beautiful eyes, and rolled gently down her cheeks, thence falling upon a neck of snowy whiteness, and losing their gem-like lustre in the meshes of her raven hair. Suddenly she ceased to weep. She ceased to call on Albert, and a chill came over her heart, as she heard Gray’s voice, cry,—“Ada—Ada!”She looked up, and from a square opening in the wall far above her reach, she saw a streaming light enter the dungeon.“Ada!” again cried Gray, and she saw him peering into the gloom below, and shading his eyes from the glare of the light he carried. “Ada!” he cried, impatiently.“I am here,” said Ada.Gray immediately disappeared from the opening, and all was again darkness whence the light had issued.“What can he mean?” thought Ada. “Did he suppose that already my spirit had yielded to this gloomy prison, and is he disappointed to find that I still live?”While Ada was pursuing these reflections, Gray suddenly re-appeared, and placing a ladder from the opening into the dungeon, he said, in a voice intended to be conciliatory,—“Ascend, Ada—ascend.”“I can meet death here,” said Ada.“There is no death to meet,” said Gray. “I mean you no harm.”“Because you have done me as much, short of taking my life,” said Ada, “as lies in your power. By what right—by what flimsy shadow of justice am I immured here?”“Ascend I say,” cried Gray. “There is warmth and comfort above here.”“I may as well,” thought Ada, with a shudder, “meet my death from his hands above as by starvation in this place.”She placed her foot upon the ladder, and slowly ascended. When she neared the top, Gray reached out his hand, and assisted her into the room in which he was.“You tremble, girl!” he said.“And so do you,” replied Ada, fixing her eyes upon Jacob Gray’s pale face.“You—you think I mean you harm,” he said, in a hesitating tone, and avoiding Ada’s gaze as much as possible.“Think!” repeated Ada,—“think, Jacob Gray!”“Jacob Gray?” he cried. “You speak strangely. I thought you now knew me.”“I do—too well,” said Ada.“I have told you I am your father, girl.”“You have told me.”“And you believe—”“No,” said Ada, with sudden energy; “on my soul, no—as I hope for heaven, no!”“Indeed!”“Yes, Jacob Gray, for the honour of all fathers—for the credit of humanity, I cannot—will not believe myself your daughter. No, no, Jacob Gray, I am no longer scared by that dreadful thought—thank God!”“Girl, you know not what you say.”“My words may be incoherent—not aptly chosen—but the sense is the same. Jacob Gray, you are neither father, uncle, kith, nor kin of mine. No, no!”“Who—who—told you so?” gasped Gray.“There—there!” cried Ada. “Your fears speak the truth; you have confessed the cheat. Jacob Gray, I could forgive you all, now that that dreadful weight is removed from my heart.”“Know you where you are, since you know so much?” said Gray, after a pause.“I do not, save that I have been deceived by you, and lured by false promises to this dismal place.”“You are in my power. Still, likewise, I assert you are my daughter.”“In your power I grant myself, as far as Heaven will permit you; but you are no kindred to me, Jacob Gray.”“By hell, if you call me Jacob Gray again—”“Jacob Gray,” shouted Ada, her face kindling with excitement, and her delicate form appearing to dilate as she pointed to the abashed and writhing countenance of the villain who trembled before her.“Be it so,” said Gray; “we understand each other now. You defy me.”“I ever defied you, Jacob Gray!”“Be it so,” he repeated. “Follow me.”“It is my heart that defies you, Jacob Gray,” said Ada. “You are a man, and I a weak girl. You are strong enough to enforce me to accompany you.”“Come on!” cried Gray.Ada slowly followed him from the room. Gray passed out at a large doorway into a smaller apartment, in which was a table, some baskets, similar to those Ada had seen in the cellar turned up for seats, and a small fire dimly burning on an ample hearth; before which a bullock might have been roasted, and perhaps had been in days gone by.“Ada,” said Gray, “look around you.”Ada did so, and Gray continued,—“This is a place of discomfort; there is little to recommend it, but it is preferable to yon gloomy dungeon from whence you have but now emerged.”“I grant it,” said Ada.“Your secret existence here is necessary for me; nay, my very life depends upon it. It may be but for a very short time. You may imagine that I am not in love with this mode of life. I have gold—store of gold—but I want more, and each day shall add to the glittering mass. When it has reached the amount I wish, you shall be free.”“Free?”“Yes; free as air.”“When you have the gold you wish?”“Even so, Ada.”“I have read that the love of gold is one of those passions that increase as they are fed.”“Not with me; I have fixed in my imagination a sum which I must have. Then, Ada, I leave England for ever, and you are free!”“But wherefore is my captivity essential?”“Ask no questions,” interrupted Gray. “Circumstances make you valuable; but mark me, you are equally valuable, dead as alive. Nay, start not—I wish you to live, if possible. I do not want to take your life—because—because—”“Because, what?”“I can use you as such an implement of revenge that—that—but no matter, no matter, your fate is in your hands; you shall yourself decide your destiny.”“Myself?”“Yes; swear to me that without my permission you will not leave this place. Swear to me you will aid me in keeping you in silence and secrecy. Swear this, and you return no more to yon loathsome dungeon, and perhaps, in a short time, I may place you on a dazzling height of power, and wealth shall make all England ring with your name! You could be the admired of all; your beauty, your wit, your gold, would be the themes of every tongue, if you will but swear.”“How can I believe you?” said Ada.“If ever words of truth passed my lips,” said Gray, “these are such.”“On what pretence was I lured hither?”“Ada, by force or fraud I was compelled to bring you here. ’Twere better the latter than the former.”“And now,” said Ada, “by force or fraud I am to be kept here. Jacob Gray, I will not swear faith to thee.”“You will not?”“I will not.”“Girl, you are mad—you know not what you do. This is a device of mine to save your life—to place you above the reach of fortune’s malice.”“Answer me one thing, and call on Heaven to witness your truth,” said Ada. “Are you father, uncle, or nothing else?”“Will you swear as I bid you?”“I cannot resign the dear hope of escape,” said Ada.“Escape,” replied Gray, “is impossible. The dungeon from which I have even now brought you is inaccessible save by the means in my power. For my own safety, I must keep you a prisoner, or—or—”“Or murder me, you would say. Jacob Gray, I think you dare not kill me.”“Dare not?” said Gray, trembling.“Yes; dare not were my words. Now, I will make to you a proposal. Trust me; tell me all, who and what I am. Tell me all, and I will forgive injuries, and perchance do your bidding.”“No, no, I cannot tell you yet,” said Gray. “I wish you one day to know all—when I have my gold.”“Am I to be the slave of your avarice?”“Call it so, if you will.”“Who am I?”“I cannot tell you.”“Who were those men who sought your life? Was the name of one Andrew Britton.”Gray absolutely shrieked as Ada pronounced the name of the smith, which it will be recollected she had heard from Mad Maud on Westminster-bridge.“A—what is this—what do you mean? Who—what devil told you—speak—Ada—speak. Have the—the dead risen? Speak, or you will drive me mad!”
The Girl in Her Melancholy Home.—The Prison House.—A Dungeon’s Gloom.—Unavailing Sorrow.
WhenJacob Gray pitched upon the lone house at Battersea as his place of abode, he could not have resolved upon a house less likely to be visited by the curious, although seen from the river at a considerable distance: it was always pointed out by the watermen to their customers, as “Forest’s haunted house.”
The fact was, that a most awful and cold-blooded murder had been committed in the house, since which it had been allowed to fall into decay, and the land around it, which had been at one time well drained, had subsided into its old character of a marsh. The fall of a stack of chimnies had impressed every one with a belief of the extreme danger of venturing within its crazy walls, lest they should fall and engulf the rash intruder in their ruins.
It was with great caution that Gray first visited this place, that he was long in discovering that the signs of decay were more superficial than otherwise, and, inquiring diligently and cautiously concerning it, he heard the character of the deserted house, which induced him mentally to resolve upon making it his next abode, should he be hunted out of his miserable residence in the ruined street at Lambeth.
The only risk he considered he ran of discovery was in conveying Ada there by daylight; but, after that, he resolved upon never leaving or approaching his gloomy abode except by night, or early in the morning, when he was quite sure no one was observing him, save upon special occasions, such as his recent visit to Learmont, whom he was anxious to see after the stormy meeting in his former residence.
When Ada recovered consciousness, she at first felt all that sensation of relief which comes over any one awakening from a horrible dream; but this feeling of satisfaction lingered but for a few fleeting moments in the breast of the persecuted, betrayed girl. The gloom that surrounded her—the damp air that imparted a chill to her very heart—the dim ray of light that proceeded from a candle, the wick of which showed that it had been some hours unattended, all convinced her that she was a prisoner.
With a cry of despair she started to her feet: she clasped her hands, and called on Heaven to protect her, as she hastily glanced round the gloomy place in which she found herself.
The dismal echo of her own voice only answered her wild and incoherent appeal.
“Oh! Heaven,” she cried, “I shall be murdered here. No one to hear my cries! No one to aid me! I am lost—lost! Oh!—Albert, Albert!”
She sank upon the ground, and wept long and bitterly as the thoughts of how foolishly she had allowed herself to be deceived by Gray crowded upon her oppressed mind.
“No hope!—No hope!—Now there is no hope!” she cried, bitterly. “Oh! Why was I preserved for this dreadful fate! I thought it hard to endure the cold air from the river, while crouching on the bridge. O God! O God! What would I not give now to be as free beneath the canopy of Heaven as I was then!”
After a time the native energy of Ada’s character overcame her first bursts of bitter grief; and raising her head she strove to pierce, with her tear-filled eyes, the dim obscurity by which she was surrounded.
“What can this place be?” she asked herself. “Let me recollect. He brought me across swampy fields to a ruined house, and there, at that point, recollection ceases—memory fades away in a confused whirl, none of which are sufficiently distinct for the mind to grasp and reason upon.”
She now approached the light, and, carefully trimming it, she held it as high as she could, and, turning slowly round, took a long and anxious survey of as much as she could see of her dungeon, for such she considered it.
The floor was of earth merely, and the walls seemed to be composed of the same material, mingled with stones and broken bricks, to give them some degree of solidity and strength. The place altogether appeared to be of considerable extent, and, by the various refuse matter that lay about, it would seem to have been a cellar for strong vegetables, wood, &c. during the winter season. A quantity of rough sacks and baskets lay in different corners mouldy and moist, with the accumulated damp of many years, and the air, too, was loaded with unwholesome moisture, and pernicious exhalations.
With a slow and cautious step Ada traversed the whole of this gloomy place, and what surprised her much was that she could see no means of ingress or egress from it.
“How have I been placed here?” she asked herself. “There is no food. Good Heaven! Am I doomed to starve in this wretched place? Alas! Is this the awful mode which the fears of Jacob Gray have suggested to him as the easiest and safest of compassing my death?”
So terrible did the dread of death in that damp, gloomy dungeon become to the imagination of Ada that she could scarcely hold the light for trembling, and she placed it on one of the mouldy baskets, while with clasped hands, and upon her knees, she breathed a prayer to Heaven for protection and safety in her extreme peril.
How calming and sweet is the soothing influence of prayer! As the trembling words, wrung from the pure heart of the gentle and beautiful Ada in her deep anguish, ascended to that Heaven which never permits the wicked to prosper, but always interposes to protect the innocent and virtuous, a holy balm seemed to fall upon her blighted spirit, and the benign influence of some air from the regions of eternal bliss seemed to fill the gloomy dungeon with a brightness and a beauty that deprived it of its horrors.
For many minutes now Ada remained silent, and her fancy strayed to the last kind words of Albert Seyton. Then she pictured him and his father seeking her in the house at Lambeth. In her mind’s eye she saw his despair when he found her not, and she thought then that her heart must break to think that she should never see him more.
“Albert—Albert!” she cried.—“Oh save me—save—seek for me! Oh, could your eyes but cast themselves upon this gloomy abode and know that I was here, how happy might I be—far happier than before, for now I feel convinced this dreadful man Gray is not my father. No—no, he could not thus before Heaven have betrayed his child! Albert—Albert!”
She dropped her head upon her breast, and again the tears blinded those beautiful eyes, and rolled gently down her cheeks, thence falling upon a neck of snowy whiteness, and losing their gem-like lustre in the meshes of her raven hair. Suddenly she ceased to weep. She ceased to call on Albert, and a chill came over her heart, as she heard Gray’s voice, cry,—
“Ada—Ada!”
She looked up, and from a square opening in the wall far above her reach, she saw a streaming light enter the dungeon.
“Ada!” again cried Gray, and she saw him peering into the gloom below, and shading his eyes from the glare of the light he carried. “Ada!” he cried, impatiently.
“I am here,” said Ada.
Gray immediately disappeared from the opening, and all was again darkness whence the light had issued.
“What can he mean?” thought Ada. “Did he suppose that already my spirit had yielded to this gloomy prison, and is he disappointed to find that I still live?”
While Ada was pursuing these reflections, Gray suddenly re-appeared, and placing a ladder from the opening into the dungeon, he said, in a voice intended to be conciliatory,—
“Ascend, Ada—ascend.”
“I can meet death here,” said Ada.
“There is no death to meet,” said Gray. “I mean you no harm.”
“Because you have done me as much, short of taking my life,” said Ada, “as lies in your power. By what right—by what flimsy shadow of justice am I immured here?”
“Ascend I say,” cried Gray. “There is warmth and comfort above here.”
“I may as well,” thought Ada, with a shudder, “meet my death from his hands above as by starvation in this place.”
She placed her foot upon the ladder, and slowly ascended. When she neared the top, Gray reached out his hand, and assisted her into the room in which he was.
“You tremble, girl!” he said.
“And so do you,” replied Ada, fixing her eyes upon Jacob Gray’s pale face.
“You—you think I mean you harm,” he said, in a hesitating tone, and avoiding Ada’s gaze as much as possible.
“Think!” repeated Ada,—“think, Jacob Gray!”
“Jacob Gray?” he cried. “You speak strangely. I thought you now knew me.”
“I do—too well,” said Ada.
“I have told you I am your father, girl.”
“You have told me.”
“And you believe—”
“No,” said Ada, with sudden energy; “on my soul, no—as I hope for heaven, no!”
“Indeed!”
“Yes, Jacob Gray, for the honour of all fathers—for the credit of humanity, I cannot—will not believe myself your daughter. No, no, Jacob Gray, I am no longer scared by that dreadful thought—thank God!”
“Girl, you know not what you say.”
“My words may be incoherent—not aptly chosen—but the sense is the same. Jacob Gray, you are neither father, uncle, kith, nor kin of mine. No, no!”
“Who—who—told you so?” gasped Gray.
“There—there!” cried Ada. “Your fears speak the truth; you have confessed the cheat. Jacob Gray, I could forgive you all, now that that dreadful weight is removed from my heart.”
“Know you where you are, since you know so much?” said Gray, after a pause.
“I do not, save that I have been deceived by you, and lured by false promises to this dismal place.”
“You are in my power. Still, likewise, I assert you are my daughter.”
“In your power I grant myself, as far as Heaven will permit you; but you are no kindred to me, Jacob Gray.”
“By hell, if you call me Jacob Gray again—”
“Jacob Gray,” shouted Ada, her face kindling with excitement, and her delicate form appearing to dilate as she pointed to the abashed and writhing countenance of the villain who trembled before her.
“Be it so,” said Gray; “we understand each other now. You defy me.”
“I ever defied you, Jacob Gray!”
“Be it so,” he repeated. “Follow me.”
“It is my heart that defies you, Jacob Gray,” said Ada. “You are a man, and I a weak girl. You are strong enough to enforce me to accompany you.”
“Come on!” cried Gray.
Ada slowly followed him from the room. Gray passed out at a large doorway into a smaller apartment, in which was a table, some baskets, similar to those Ada had seen in the cellar turned up for seats, and a small fire dimly burning on an ample hearth; before which a bullock might have been roasted, and perhaps had been in days gone by.
“Ada,” said Gray, “look around you.”
Ada did so, and Gray continued,—
“This is a place of discomfort; there is little to recommend it, but it is preferable to yon gloomy dungeon from whence you have but now emerged.”
“I grant it,” said Ada.
“Your secret existence here is necessary for me; nay, my very life depends upon it. It may be but for a very short time. You may imagine that I am not in love with this mode of life. I have gold—store of gold—but I want more, and each day shall add to the glittering mass. When it has reached the amount I wish, you shall be free.”
“Free?”
“Yes; free as air.”
“When you have the gold you wish?”
“Even so, Ada.”
“I have read that the love of gold is one of those passions that increase as they are fed.”
“Not with me; I have fixed in my imagination a sum which I must have. Then, Ada, I leave England for ever, and you are free!”
“But wherefore is my captivity essential?”
“Ask no questions,” interrupted Gray. “Circumstances make you valuable; but mark me, you are equally valuable, dead as alive. Nay, start not—I wish you to live, if possible. I do not want to take your life—because—because—”
“Because, what?”
“I can use you as such an implement of revenge that—that—but no matter, no matter, your fate is in your hands; you shall yourself decide your destiny.”
“Myself?”
“Yes; swear to me that without my permission you will not leave this place. Swear to me you will aid me in keeping you in silence and secrecy. Swear this, and you return no more to yon loathsome dungeon, and perhaps, in a short time, I may place you on a dazzling height of power, and wealth shall make all England ring with your name! You could be the admired of all; your beauty, your wit, your gold, would be the themes of every tongue, if you will but swear.”
“How can I believe you?” said Ada.
“If ever words of truth passed my lips,” said Gray, “these are such.”
“On what pretence was I lured hither?”
“Ada, by force or fraud I was compelled to bring you here. ’Twere better the latter than the former.”
“And now,” said Ada, “by force or fraud I am to be kept here. Jacob Gray, I will not swear faith to thee.”
“You will not?”
“I will not.”
“Girl, you are mad—you know not what you do. This is a device of mine to save your life—to place you above the reach of fortune’s malice.”
“Answer me one thing, and call on Heaven to witness your truth,” said Ada. “Are you father, uncle, or nothing else?”
“Will you swear as I bid you?”
“I cannot resign the dear hope of escape,” said Ada.
“Escape,” replied Gray, “is impossible. The dungeon from which I have even now brought you is inaccessible save by the means in my power. For my own safety, I must keep you a prisoner, or—or—”
“Or murder me, you would say. Jacob Gray, I think you dare not kill me.”
“Dare not?” said Gray, trembling.
“Yes; dare not were my words. Now, I will make to you a proposal. Trust me; tell me all, who and what I am. Tell me all, and I will forgive injuries, and perchance do your bidding.”
“No, no, I cannot tell you yet,” said Gray. “I wish you one day to know all—when I have my gold.”
“Am I to be the slave of your avarice?”
“Call it so, if you will.”
“Who am I?”
“I cannot tell you.”
“Who were those men who sought your life? Was the name of one Andrew Britton.”
Gray absolutely shrieked as Ada pronounced the name of the smith, which it will be recollected she had heard from Mad Maud on Westminster-bridge.
“A—what is this—what do you mean? Who—what devil told you—speak—Ada—speak. Have the—the dead risen? Speak, or you will drive me mad!”
CHAPTER XXV.Ada’s Appeal.—The Promise.—Ada’s Despair.—Gray’s Triumph.Ada hadseen too often the nervous terrors of Jacob Gray to feel much alarm at his present emotion, and she merely replied,—“The man I mention—Andrew Britton by name—was one of them who came to you at our late house. That he is in some manner connected with the mysterious circumstances which envelope me, I am convinced. Oh, Jacob Gray, bethink you now of the evil of wickedness; you cannot gain more, nay, not half so much by deceiving and persecuting me than you would gain by trusting me with every secret. Besides, there is one possession which would then be yours, which is beyond all price—that dear inheritance we all have from Heaven as its best, most costly gift, and which is too often bartered for a bauble. You would have peace of mind, Jacob Gray, which you have not now. He who tries may read pain and disquiet in your face. You are haunted by the fearful creations of your own over-hardened conscience. I—even I—can see that some hideous spectre of the past is ever rising, perhaps in bloody guise, before your appalled imagination. Oh, I am weak, young, and unknowing in the ways of life, but I can tell you, Jacob Gray, that guilt is misery. You are wretched—most wretched—you lead a life of apprehension. Your own fears will carry you to an early grave. Oh, do some solitary but great act of justice, and it will stand as a shield betwixt you and your trembling soul—will plead with Heaven for you, and by its brightness so dim the record of your guilt that you may cherish such dear hopes of mercy as shall in themselves be happiness. Release me—trust me. Tell me, Jacob Gray, who and what I am. Justice, though tardy, is justice still. I will invent causes for you up to this moment—I will pray for you, Jacob Gray. Oh, end at once this life of horror, suspicion and distress!”Gray waved his hand several times while Ada was speaking, as if he would implore her to cease, but wanted power of speech to stop her in her appeal. When she had ceased speaking, she stood with clasped hands gazing in his face, and waiting with a deep and holy anxiety the words that would pass his lips in reply.“Girl!” he gasped, “you know not what you ask! I wish you well, but dare not—dare not—dare not tell you a tale would drive you mad! Enough—enough—urge me no more! All this will have an end—it must—but not as you ask. Have patience, Ada, and I will do great things for you! Yes, great things, when I am far away in another land, and safe—safe from those who would take my life—who would spill my blood like water! Have patience, girl! Have patience, and all will be well.”“I am your prisoner, then, Jacob Gray,” said Ada—“still your prisoner.”“For a time—only for a time. Promise me, by the faith you have in Heaven—swear that you will abide here without an effort to escape, and such a freedom as you can safely have, you shall have.”“If I refuse?”“Then you must take the consequences. My safety—my life, I tell you, depends upon your security. I will not trifle with my own existence! Night and day yon cellar shall be your home!”“But how can my being your unknown, solitary, and unseen prisoner avail you?”“Ask me not,” cried Gray. “There is but one other alternative.”“And that is—”“Your death, Ada!”“Ay—my death! Such was my thought.”“But I—I do not want to kill you,” cried Gray, hurriedly. “On my soul, I do not! Understand me, girl; your existence is equally valuable to me as your death! Perhaps more so, although it has its risks. Promise me that you will not increase those risks, and on my oath, you shall live unharmed by me.”Ada sank into a seat, and a feeling of despair came over her heart.“Jacob Gray,” she said, “let me promise to go far away—I will be unseen—unknown.”“Not yet,” cried Gray. “I tell you I have not gold enough for that yet. There will come a time when to proclaim who and what you are will be so sweet to me, that it is only my love for that gold which brings in its train the means of every enjoyment that can stifle pangs that spring from the past, that induces me now to put off the dear gratification of that deep revenge!”“Still a bad and unworthy motive,” said Ada. “You will only do justice to me for the gratification of your own malignant passions.”“Say what you will, girl,” cried Gray. “Call me what you will, I care not. You are to me now a mine of wealth! When my love of gold is glutted to the full, I can make you an instrument of such revenge that I shall wish for no greater gratification! You understand your position now—you may baulk me of my revenge by forcing me to kill you! Save yourself, Ada, by your solemn promise to remain here!”Ada felt that all further appeal was useless, and she wept bitterly as the dreary future presented itself to her as a protracted imprisonment, or a speedy and cruel death.Gray watched her keenly, and advancing close to her, he whispered in her ear,—“Ada, life is sweet to the young! A world full of beauty and enjoyment is before you—if you promise what I ask—you shall have wealth—and wealth is power. You shall be able to raise the lowly—to crush the proud if you promise! Those whom you love you may do wonders for! He too—that youth who has wound himself around your girlish heart—he you can enrich! He will owe all to you! It will be Ada that will lift him from his low estate, and make him great—perhaps noble! But you must promise! How hard it is to die so young! Think of the last bitter pang! None to pity—none to love you! But I need not point such agony to you, you will promise?”“Jacob Gray,” said Ada, dashing the tears from her eyes, “the allurements you hold out to me are not sufficient; but I will not cast away the life God has given me.”“You promise?”“On condition, I will. But hear me, Gray. I do not believe the tale you tell me, that you will take my life some time when I am sleeping, for awake you dare not—if I promise not, I do believe, for already have you attempted the deed.”“You—you will promise?” cried Gray, impatiently.“Not unconditionally,” replied Ada. “For one month from now I do promise.”“To make no effort to leave here?”“I will be passive merely. I will repel no one.”“But you will remain?”“Unsought by any one, I will not leave this place.”“You swear?”“No, Jacob Gray, I will not swear.”“Well! I—I will take your word. You have made a wise decision.”“Heaven knows I am helpless,” said Ada. “The decision is scarcely mine.”She burst into tears, and wept bitterly. The name of Albert mingled with her sobs, for she felt now that she was separated from him for an indefinite period.“Heaven help me,” she sobbed, “I am now desolate, indeed.”“Hope,” cried Gray. “Hope, Ada. The time may come sooner than you think. The time for my revenge, but I must have more gold yet—much more gold; then, Ada, begins your triumph. You shall find yourself raised to a height you dream not of. Jacob Gray’s revenge shall be your fortune. You need not weep. You will cause tears of blood—yes, the blood of those who would have murdered me, but they dare not. Ha! Ha! They dared not; and Jacob Gray is still too cunning—far too cunning to fall their victim.”Ada sat silent and spirit-broken in that lonely house. A weight seemed to hang upon her heart, and even hope, that one dear solace of the unfortunate, appeared to have flown from her breast.Gray had brought food with him, which Ada partook of in silence, and when the night had come, and the short-lived winter’s sun had gone to rest, he took his hat and cloak, and prepared to go forth.“Ada,” he said, “attend to nothing—heed nothing while I am gone. If danger—that is, I mean, if any one should venture here, extinguish your light, and seek some hiding-place, for be assured, your life is the object sought by those who would visit the dwelling of Jacob Gray. You understand me. Be cautious.”Ada answered not, and Gray slouching his hat over his face, and drawing his cloak closely around him, left the lone house with a slow and stealthy step, taking his route towards the river’s bank, from where he took a boat to Westminster.
Ada’s Appeal.—The Promise.—Ada’s Despair.—Gray’s Triumph.
Ada hadseen too often the nervous terrors of Jacob Gray to feel much alarm at his present emotion, and she merely replied,—
“The man I mention—Andrew Britton by name—was one of them who came to you at our late house. That he is in some manner connected with the mysterious circumstances which envelope me, I am convinced. Oh, Jacob Gray, bethink you now of the evil of wickedness; you cannot gain more, nay, not half so much by deceiving and persecuting me than you would gain by trusting me with every secret. Besides, there is one possession which would then be yours, which is beyond all price—that dear inheritance we all have from Heaven as its best, most costly gift, and which is too often bartered for a bauble. You would have peace of mind, Jacob Gray, which you have not now. He who tries may read pain and disquiet in your face. You are haunted by the fearful creations of your own over-hardened conscience. I—even I—can see that some hideous spectre of the past is ever rising, perhaps in bloody guise, before your appalled imagination. Oh, I am weak, young, and unknowing in the ways of life, but I can tell you, Jacob Gray, that guilt is misery. You are wretched—most wretched—you lead a life of apprehension. Your own fears will carry you to an early grave. Oh, do some solitary but great act of justice, and it will stand as a shield betwixt you and your trembling soul—will plead with Heaven for you, and by its brightness so dim the record of your guilt that you may cherish such dear hopes of mercy as shall in themselves be happiness. Release me—trust me. Tell me, Jacob Gray, who and what I am. Justice, though tardy, is justice still. I will invent causes for you up to this moment—I will pray for you, Jacob Gray. Oh, end at once this life of horror, suspicion and distress!”
Gray waved his hand several times while Ada was speaking, as if he would implore her to cease, but wanted power of speech to stop her in her appeal. When she had ceased speaking, she stood with clasped hands gazing in his face, and waiting with a deep and holy anxiety the words that would pass his lips in reply.
“Girl!” he gasped, “you know not what you ask! I wish you well, but dare not—dare not—dare not tell you a tale would drive you mad! Enough—enough—urge me no more! All this will have an end—it must—but not as you ask. Have patience, Ada, and I will do great things for you! Yes, great things, when I am far away in another land, and safe—safe from those who would take my life—who would spill my blood like water! Have patience, girl! Have patience, and all will be well.”
“I am your prisoner, then, Jacob Gray,” said Ada—“still your prisoner.”
“For a time—only for a time. Promise me, by the faith you have in Heaven—swear that you will abide here without an effort to escape, and such a freedom as you can safely have, you shall have.”
“If I refuse?”
“Then you must take the consequences. My safety—my life, I tell you, depends upon your security. I will not trifle with my own existence! Night and day yon cellar shall be your home!”
“But how can my being your unknown, solitary, and unseen prisoner avail you?”
“Ask me not,” cried Gray. “There is but one other alternative.”
“And that is—”
“Your death, Ada!”
“Ay—my death! Such was my thought.”
“But I—I do not want to kill you,” cried Gray, hurriedly. “On my soul, I do not! Understand me, girl; your existence is equally valuable to me as your death! Perhaps more so, although it has its risks. Promise me that you will not increase those risks, and on my oath, you shall live unharmed by me.”
Ada sank into a seat, and a feeling of despair came over her heart.
“Jacob Gray,” she said, “let me promise to go far away—I will be unseen—unknown.”
“Not yet,” cried Gray. “I tell you I have not gold enough for that yet. There will come a time when to proclaim who and what you are will be so sweet to me, that it is only my love for that gold which brings in its train the means of every enjoyment that can stifle pangs that spring from the past, that induces me now to put off the dear gratification of that deep revenge!”
“Still a bad and unworthy motive,” said Ada. “You will only do justice to me for the gratification of your own malignant passions.”
“Say what you will, girl,” cried Gray. “Call me what you will, I care not. You are to me now a mine of wealth! When my love of gold is glutted to the full, I can make you an instrument of such revenge that I shall wish for no greater gratification! You understand your position now—you may baulk me of my revenge by forcing me to kill you! Save yourself, Ada, by your solemn promise to remain here!”
Ada felt that all further appeal was useless, and she wept bitterly as the dreary future presented itself to her as a protracted imprisonment, or a speedy and cruel death.
Gray watched her keenly, and advancing close to her, he whispered in her ear,—
“Ada, life is sweet to the young! A world full of beauty and enjoyment is before you—if you promise what I ask—you shall have wealth—and wealth is power. You shall be able to raise the lowly—to crush the proud if you promise! Those whom you love you may do wonders for! He too—that youth who has wound himself around your girlish heart—he you can enrich! He will owe all to you! It will be Ada that will lift him from his low estate, and make him great—perhaps noble! But you must promise! How hard it is to die so young! Think of the last bitter pang! None to pity—none to love you! But I need not point such agony to you, you will promise?”
“Jacob Gray,” said Ada, dashing the tears from her eyes, “the allurements you hold out to me are not sufficient; but I will not cast away the life God has given me.”
“You promise?”
“On condition, I will. But hear me, Gray. I do not believe the tale you tell me, that you will take my life some time when I am sleeping, for awake you dare not—if I promise not, I do believe, for already have you attempted the deed.”
“You—you will promise?” cried Gray, impatiently.
“Not unconditionally,” replied Ada. “For one month from now I do promise.”
“To make no effort to leave here?”
“I will be passive merely. I will repel no one.”
“But you will remain?”
“Unsought by any one, I will not leave this place.”
“You swear?”
“No, Jacob Gray, I will not swear.”
“Well! I—I will take your word. You have made a wise decision.”
“Heaven knows I am helpless,” said Ada. “The decision is scarcely mine.”
She burst into tears, and wept bitterly. The name of Albert mingled with her sobs, for she felt now that she was separated from him for an indefinite period.
“Heaven help me,” she sobbed, “I am now desolate, indeed.”
“Hope,” cried Gray. “Hope, Ada. The time may come sooner than you think. The time for my revenge, but I must have more gold yet—much more gold; then, Ada, begins your triumph. You shall find yourself raised to a height you dream not of. Jacob Gray’s revenge shall be your fortune. You need not weep. You will cause tears of blood—yes, the blood of those who would have murdered me, but they dare not. Ha! Ha! They dared not; and Jacob Gray is still too cunning—far too cunning to fall their victim.”
Ada sat silent and spirit-broken in that lonely house. A weight seemed to hang upon her heart, and even hope, that one dear solace of the unfortunate, appeared to have flown from her breast.
Gray had brought food with him, which Ada partook of in silence, and when the night had come, and the short-lived winter’s sun had gone to rest, he took his hat and cloak, and prepared to go forth.
“Ada,” he said, “attend to nothing—heed nothing while I am gone. If danger—that is, I mean, if any one should venture here, extinguish your light, and seek some hiding-place, for be assured, your life is the object sought by those who would visit the dwelling of Jacob Gray. You understand me. Be cautious.”
Ada answered not, and Gray slouching his hat over his face, and drawing his cloak closely around him, left the lone house with a slow and stealthy step, taking his route towards the river’s bank, from where he took a boat to Westminster.
CHAPTER XXVI.The Squire.—The Life of a Captive.—A Strange Fatality.—The Associates.Vice, by the decrees of Providence, seems to have its allotted span. Truly may we say, “The wicked triumph for a season,” and by some strange combination of circumstances, notwithstanding the turbulence, the anxiety, and the danger of Learmont’s early days in the metropolis, matters so arranged themselves, or were arranged for wise purposes by the great Dispenser of all things, that from the day on which Ada made her promise to Jacob Gray, Learmont had prospered in his career of villany. His natural sagacity had told him, that now Jacob Gray was put upon his guard, any further open attempt against his life would be attended with great danger; and might possibly have the effect of driving him to some desperate measure of retaliation and revenge, which might involve both. From a deep and careful review, therefore, of the whole of circumstances by which he was surrounded, the criminal and unscrupulous squire decided upon a safer, although more expensive and protracted course of action, than he had hitherto pursued; that was, to continually tempt Gray by large offers to give up the supposed boy, together with his own confession, and go to some foreign land to spend the earnings of his criminality.Jacob Gray, with the cunning which formed such an ingredient in his character, favoured this idea on the part of Learmont, by apparently always hesitating upon his offers, while at the same time he had thoroughly and entirely made up his mind not to accept them; feeling, as he did, that his life would not be worth a minute’s purchase after he had declared Ada’s sex, and given her up together with his written confession.Learmont at the same time was not neglectful of the chance that continually presented itself of discovering Gray’s place of abode, and pouncing upon him some night unawares, and wresting from him both the boy and the confession, at the same time that he glutted his hatred by putting him to death.Jacob Gray for once in his life had been injudicious when he told Ada that he only waited for a certain amount of gold before he gratified his revenge by declaring who and what she was. He really had decided upon such a course. The taunts and undisguised contempt of Learmont had awakened a revengeful spirit in his breast, while the attempt to murder him in the old house at Lambeth inflamed to perfect fury, and made, as it were, part of his very nature.Learmont laboured under considerable difficulty in any attempts he might make to trace Jacob Gray to his abode, in consequence of the impossibility of trusting any one to do the office of spy upon him, except the smith or himself. To the smith, Britton, there were many weighty objections now. Intoxication was doing its work, and moreover Gray knew him so well. Learmont therefore felt that henceforward Britton could be no useful agent in any attempt to discover the retreat of Gray.Then for him, Learmont himself, to dog the footsteps of the cautious villain from his own house, was an undertaking full of difficulty. The very haste with which he would have had to attire himself for the street had its objections; and were Gray to come some day by appointment, and find him ready equipped to follow him, would not his extremely suspicious mind at once conclude the object?Thus the task of following Jacob Gray became one of no ordinary difficulty, and Learmont wasted many months in trying to dissuade himself from persevering in his present course, and take a large sum at once; expatriating himself immediately afterwards, which, by-the-by, Learmont never for one moment intended to permit him to do, for he would have slaughtered him upon his own marble steps rather than allow him to escape, the moment he could do so with no other danger than that to be encountered from the mere fact of taking a life, in justification of which he would easily have found some plausible excuse, if questioned concerning the act by the laws.Not a week passed without a visit from Gray, and at each he always carried away as much as he could wring from Learmont’s policy or his fears.But how truly did poor Ada say that the love of gold was a passion which grew if it was fed. Already had Gray received from Learmont a sum far exceeding that which he had first fixed in his mind as what would content him ere he sought his revenge. Still, however, he lingered, and as each visit to Squire Learmont’s mansion added something to his store, he could not bring his mind to stop in time. Day after day—week after week—month succeeding month—he still hoarded, saying over to himself,—“Not yet—not yet! I will have more gold ere I have my revenge.”The smith, too, was to Learmont ever a sight of terror. He still lived at the Chequers, close to Learmont’s mansion; and he, too, paid periodical visits to the proud squire, although his demands were insignificant in comparison with those of Jacob Gray.While a few guineas sufficed for the coarse vices, the drunkenness, and the debaucheries of the smith, Jacob Gray was not satisfied unless he increased his hidden store by a large sum.Thus, although the smith’s eternal “message from the Old Smithy“ grated upon his very soul, Learmont did not feel that intensity of hatred to Britton that he did to Jacob Gray.Nevertheless he made frequent offers to Britton to quit the country, and give up to him certain papers which, on the night of the murder at the Old Smithy, had been by Britton taken from the corpse of him who met his death within that ill-named pile.These papers were of as much importance to Learmont as any could well be; for if they did not prove his illegitimacy, they raised the point so strongly that had he stood alone as the last and only heir to the vast estates of Learmont, he could scarcely have established his claim.Of this he was assured by Gray, who would himself have gloried in the possession of such a document, but he dared not take them from the body; hence they fell, knowingly by him, into the hands of Britton.It was likewise constantly urged by Britton that he, too, had a confession written, and in pursuance of his word, had rolled it round the knife of Jacob Gray, which the latter had left behind him at the smithy in the body of his victim.For a long time it had become an object with Learmont to discover from Britton where he kept such important documents, determining, should he find out, to make some desperate effort by fraud or violence to possess himself of them; but the smith constantly and pertinaciously eluded the most artful inquiries, and Learmont could obtain no clue to where they were concealed, although by Britton’s manner he felt satisfied they were not at the Chequers. Still he feared to do violence to Britton, lest he might have adopted some means of bringing them to light after his decease.Never probably were three persons placed by a curious train of circumstances in such strange relation to each other.Learmont hating the two accomplices of his guilt, and not deterred by the slightest compunctions of conscience from taking their lives if he dared, yet placed in so singular a position with regard to them, that he trembled at the idea of any accident or sudden illness depriving either of them of existence, as such an event might bring to light the documents by which they held themselves safe from assassination at his hands.Jacob Gray received large sums of money which he dare not use, and trembled with apprehensions from day to day lest his miserable retreat in the marshes of Battersea should be discovered, yet with a species of insanity lingered on with an unquenchable thirst of adding to his store of gold before he began the enjoyment of a single guinea of it.Britton, the reckless savage smith, was the only one of these three men who in his own brutal manner enjoyed the fruits of his crimes. He feasted, drank, and led a life of awful and reckless debauchery from day to day—defying the future and drowning the present in a sea of intoxication.And now let us speak of Ada—the young, the beautiful, the persecuted Ada—who now for many weary months had endured the solitary and miserable life of a captive in the little house at Battersea.From time to time Jacob Gray had enforced a renewal of the girl’s promise not to escape from her state of bondage; and who, under similar circumstances, would have refused the pledge when death was the only alternative? Life to all is dear and precious—it is the one possession to which mankind fondly clings under all privations—all sufferings. Rob life of all its joys—clothe it in misery—attack the frame in which lingers by disease and unceasing pain; still, while the brain retains its healthy action, there will be a clinging to life—to mere vitality, which is in human nature a feeling altogether independent of all that makes up the pains or joys of existence. But if life is thus clung to with a desperate reluctance to quit it by the aged, the diseased, and the hopeless, how much greater must be its charms to the young, healthful, ardent, and enthusiastic spirit that in its young existence seems almost immortal!Ada was unhappy—miserable, but she had not yet done with hope; she could not say, take my life, Jacob Gray, for I will promise no more; that would have been a species of moral suicide from which she shrank aghast; and feeling, from Gray’s manner, a firm conviction that he did speak the truth when he declared that her death or life were alike indifferent to him, except so far as the former placed him in a less dangerous position, and the latter would eventually gratify some wild feelings of revenge against some one, she did go on from month to month promising that she would make no effort to escape, and still hoping that a day of deliverance was near, till the hue of health began to fade upon her cheeks, and she felt that dreadful sinking of the heart which ever waits on hope deferred.We have now another person in ourdramatis personæto speak of, and that is the gallant, young, and enthusiastic Albert Seyton.The sudden and mysterious disappearance of Ada had struck deeply upon his heart, and after about a fortnight’s hopeless search through London, during which he endured immense fatigue, and scarcely took any nourishment to sustain his exhausted frame, he was seized with an illness which brought him to the point of death, and from which he recovered but very slowly, although a good constitution and the affectionate solicitude of his father at length triumphed over the disease.
The Squire.—The Life of a Captive.—A Strange Fatality.—The Associates.
Vice, by the decrees of Providence, seems to have its allotted span. Truly may we say, “The wicked triumph for a season,” and by some strange combination of circumstances, notwithstanding the turbulence, the anxiety, and the danger of Learmont’s early days in the metropolis, matters so arranged themselves, or were arranged for wise purposes by the great Dispenser of all things, that from the day on which Ada made her promise to Jacob Gray, Learmont had prospered in his career of villany. His natural sagacity had told him, that now Jacob Gray was put upon his guard, any further open attempt against his life would be attended with great danger; and might possibly have the effect of driving him to some desperate measure of retaliation and revenge, which might involve both. From a deep and careful review, therefore, of the whole of circumstances by which he was surrounded, the criminal and unscrupulous squire decided upon a safer, although more expensive and protracted course of action, than he had hitherto pursued; that was, to continually tempt Gray by large offers to give up the supposed boy, together with his own confession, and go to some foreign land to spend the earnings of his criminality.
Jacob Gray, with the cunning which formed such an ingredient in his character, favoured this idea on the part of Learmont, by apparently always hesitating upon his offers, while at the same time he had thoroughly and entirely made up his mind not to accept them; feeling, as he did, that his life would not be worth a minute’s purchase after he had declared Ada’s sex, and given her up together with his written confession.
Learmont at the same time was not neglectful of the chance that continually presented itself of discovering Gray’s place of abode, and pouncing upon him some night unawares, and wresting from him both the boy and the confession, at the same time that he glutted his hatred by putting him to death.
Jacob Gray for once in his life had been injudicious when he told Ada that he only waited for a certain amount of gold before he gratified his revenge by declaring who and what she was. He really had decided upon such a course. The taunts and undisguised contempt of Learmont had awakened a revengeful spirit in his breast, while the attempt to murder him in the old house at Lambeth inflamed to perfect fury, and made, as it were, part of his very nature.
Learmont laboured under considerable difficulty in any attempts he might make to trace Jacob Gray to his abode, in consequence of the impossibility of trusting any one to do the office of spy upon him, except the smith or himself. To the smith, Britton, there were many weighty objections now. Intoxication was doing its work, and moreover Gray knew him so well. Learmont therefore felt that henceforward Britton could be no useful agent in any attempt to discover the retreat of Gray.
Then for him, Learmont himself, to dog the footsteps of the cautious villain from his own house, was an undertaking full of difficulty. The very haste with which he would have had to attire himself for the street had its objections; and were Gray to come some day by appointment, and find him ready equipped to follow him, would not his extremely suspicious mind at once conclude the object?
Thus the task of following Jacob Gray became one of no ordinary difficulty, and Learmont wasted many months in trying to dissuade himself from persevering in his present course, and take a large sum at once; expatriating himself immediately afterwards, which, by-the-by, Learmont never for one moment intended to permit him to do, for he would have slaughtered him upon his own marble steps rather than allow him to escape, the moment he could do so with no other danger than that to be encountered from the mere fact of taking a life, in justification of which he would easily have found some plausible excuse, if questioned concerning the act by the laws.
Not a week passed without a visit from Gray, and at each he always carried away as much as he could wring from Learmont’s policy or his fears.
But how truly did poor Ada say that the love of gold was a passion which grew if it was fed. Already had Gray received from Learmont a sum far exceeding that which he had first fixed in his mind as what would content him ere he sought his revenge. Still, however, he lingered, and as each visit to Squire Learmont’s mansion added something to his store, he could not bring his mind to stop in time. Day after day—week after week—month succeeding month—he still hoarded, saying over to himself,—
“Not yet—not yet! I will have more gold ere I have my revenge.”
The smith, too, was to Learmont ever a sight of terror. He still lived at the Chequers, close to Learmont’s mansion; and he, too, paid periodical visits to the proud squire, although his demands were insignificant in comparison with those of Jacob Gray.
While a few guineas sufficed for the coarse vices, the drunkenness, and the debaucheries of the smith, Jacob Gray was not satisfied unless he increased his hidden store by a large sum.
Thus, although the smith’s eternal “message from the Old Smithy“ grated upon his very soul, Learmont did not feel that intensity of hatred to Britton that he did to Jacob Gray.
Nevertheless he made frequent offers to Britton to quit the country, and give up to him certain papers which, on the night of the murder at the Old Smithy, had been by Britton taken from the corpse of him who met his death within that ill-named pile.
These papers were of as much importance to Learmont as any could well be; for if they did not prove his illegitimacy, they raised the point so strongly that had he stood alone as the last and only heir to the vast estates of Learmont, he could scarcely have established his claim.
Of this he was assured by Gray, who would himself have gloried in the possession of such a document, but he dared not take them from the body; hence they fell, knowingly by him, into the hands of Britton.
It was likewise constantly urged by Britton that he, too, had a confession written, and in pursuance of his word, had rolled it round the knife of Jacob Gray, which the latter had left behind him at the smithy in the body of his victim.
For a long time it had become an object with Learmont to discover from Britton where he kept such important documents, determining, should he find out, to make some desperate effort by fraud or violence to possess himself of them; but the smith constantly and pertinaciously eluded the most artful inquiries, and Learmont could obtain no clue to where they were concealed, although by Britton’s manner he felt satisfied they were not at the Chequers. Still he feared to do violence to Britton, lest he might have adopted some means of bringing them to light after his decease.
Never probably were three persons placed by a curious train of circumstances in such strange relation to each other.
Learmont hating the two accomplices of his guilt, and not deterred by the slightest compunctions of conscience from taking their lives if he dared, yet placed in so singular a position with regard to them, that he trembled at the idea of any accident or sudden illness depriving either of them of existence, as such an event might bring to light the documents by which they held themselves safe from assassination at his hands.
Jacob Gray received large sums of money which he dare not use, and trembled with apprehensions from day to day lest his miserable retreat in the marshes of Battersea should be discovered, yet with a species of insanity lingered on with an unquenchable thirst of adding to his store of gold before he began the enjoyment of a single guinea of it.
Britton, the reckless savage smith, was the only one of these three men who in his own brutal manner enjoyed the fruits of his crimes. He feasted, drank, and led a life of awful and reckless debauchery from day to day—defying the future and drowning the present in a sea of intoxication.
And now let us speak of Ada—the young, the beautiful, the persecuted Ada—who now for many weary months had endured the solitary and miserable life of a captive in the little house at Battersea.
From time to time Jacob Gray had enforced a renewal of the girl’s promise not to escape from her state of bondage; and who, under similar circumstances, would have refused the pledge when death was the only alternative? Life to all is dear and precious—it is the one possession to which mankind fondly clings under all privations—all sufferings. Rob life of all its joys—clothe it in misery—attack the frame in which lingers by disease and unceasing pain; still, while the brain retains its healthy action, there will be a clinging to life—to mere vitality, which is in human nature a feeling altogether independent of all that makes up the pains or joys of existence. But if life is thus clung to with a desperate reluctance to quit it by the aged, the diseased, and the hopeless, how much greater must be its charms to the young, healthful, ardent, and enthusiastic spirit that in its young existence seems almost immortal!
Ada was unhappy—miserable, but she had not yet done with hope; she could not say, take my life, Jacob Gray, for I will promise no more; that would have been a species of moral suicide from which she shrank aghast; and feeling, from Gray’s manner, a firm conviction that he did speak the truth when he declared that her death or life were alike indifferent to him, except so far as the former placed him in a less dangerous position, and the latter would eventually gratify some wild feelings of revenge against some one, she did go on from month to month promising that she would make no effort to escape, and still hoping that a day of deliverance was near, till the hue of health began to fade upon her cheeks, and she felt that dreadful sinking of the heart which ever waits on hope deferred.
We have now another person in ourdramatis personæto speak of, and that is the gallant, young, and enthusiastic Albert Seyton.
The sudden and mysterious disappearance of Ada had struck deeply upon his heart, and after about a fortnight’s hopeless search through London, during which he endured immense fatigue, and scarcely took any nourishment to sustain his exhausted frame, he was seized with an illness which brought him to the point of death, and from which he recovered but very slowly, although a good constitution and the affectionate solicitude of his father at length triumphed over the disease.
CHAPTER XXVII.Learmont at Home.—The Baronetcy.—A Visitor.—The Rejected Offer.A rich, glowing summer’s sun was shining through the stained glass in a large window of one of the principal rooms in the mansion of Learmont. The very air seemed filled with glorious tints, rivalling in hues of gorgeous beauty the brightest refulgence of the rainbow. The songs of birds from the gardens came sweetly to the ear: a dreamy stillness, such as is often to be observed towards the close of some delicious summer day, seemed to pervade all things. He, however, who sat in that richly-decked apartment, had no ear for the melodies of nature; for him the glorious sunlight had no romantic charms. His brow was knit with anxious care—deep furrows were on his cheeks, and a nervous irritation of manner betrayed the heart ill at ease.It was Squire Learmont himself who thus sat at the close of that summer’s day, and the change in his appearance since we last presented him to the reader was so great that it might have been supposed many years had passed over his head instead of the comparatively short time that had actually elapsed. His lank black hair was thickly mingled with grey tints, and the sallow of his complexion had changed more and more to a sickly awful white, such as might be supposed to sit upon the countenance of one risen from the grave.He sat for a long time silent, although his lips moved as if he were muttering to himself something that formed the principal subject of his meditation.“Well,” he suddenly said, half aloud, “if I have made so great an inroad in my accumulated wealth as to reduce it by one-fourth of its whole amount, I have achieved something—ay, a great deal, for I have made the first step up the ladder of nobility. This baronetcy that is promised me is what I suggested to myself long since. Yes, that is the commencement of power, the limit of which who shall define—then a marriage—one of those marriages of convenience on one side and ambition on the other. My wealth will make me a most acceptable suitor to some branch of a noble family, whose peerage will look all the better for a new coat of gilding. Humph, what says the minister?”He took from the table before him a note which lay open, and read it slowly and distinctly. It ran thus;—There can be no doubt of his Majesty’s most gracious inclination to confer a baronetcy upon you, without the slightest reference to your patriotic and disinterested offer to purchase the means of occupying six seats in the lower house. The matter may be well concluded this present week.“May it?” muttered Learmont. “It shall. I am not one who brooks delays. I have paid dearly for my baronetcy, and I will have it. Those six seats have cost me thrice their sums in thousands—ay, more than that. There can indeed be no doubt of the gracious intentions of his Majesty; that business is settled. I am to all intents and purposes even now a baronet—I have paid the price, and, thank the Fates, this is a country where all things have a price, nobility included; and now, how much longer am I to be tortured by these rascals, Gray and Britton? My bitterest curses on them both. Gray’s demands increase each time he comes here; his love of gold is insatiable, and he never relaxes in his caution. How on earth to cope with that man I know not. Must I ever be the victim of his avarice until some day he dies, leaving behind him that which might condemn me? No; this must, cannot last. Too long already have I groaned under the weight of this man’s hideous presence, and frequent visits. Some bold or hazardous scheme must rid me of him; and, too, he peremptorily refuses aught to do with the destruction of Britton. He thinks the job too dangerous, and taunts me with the sneer that he gets of me already what gold he chooses to demand. Jacob Gray, beware. Some accident may yet arise to place you at my mercy—my mercy? Ha! Ha! Oh, if I could invent some torture—some—Ha! What now?”“Master Gray desires speech of your worship,” said a servant.In a moment Gray entered the room. Anxiety of mind, and the necessity of constant caution, had had all their effect upon Jacob Gray. He stooped considerably, and moved along with a slow, silent, shuffling tread, as if he feared the very sound of his own footsteps would betray him. He peered into the face of Learmont from his half-closed eyes, and then gently sliding to a seat, he said, in a half whisper,—“Well, squire, how fares it with you?”“Indifferently well, Jacob Gray,” said Learmont. “You look pale and ill.”“No, no!” said Gray, quickly, “I’m very well, quite well and strong. I shall have many years to live yet, I am quite well and strong.”“Your looks belie you then; your hands tremble; you are weak, Jacob Gray.”“And yet so strong,” said Gray, trembling, his small eyes fixed at Learmont, “that those who would destroy me dare not lay a finger on me in violence!”“I understand your taunt,” said Learmont; “it has long been settled between us that I dare not take your life, Jacob Gray. But even now, will nothing tempt you to conclude a business which is slowly but sorely hurrying you to the grave?”“Squire Learmont,” said Gray calmly, “it may be hurrying me to my grave, but I do not wish to avoid the hurry by being at once placed in it; I may be ill, but I am not yet disposed to take death as a remedy. You understand me, Squire Learmont?”“’Twere needless to affect to be ignorant of your meaning; you think that I would be so foolish as to run the great risk of not letting you go in peace.”“I know it.”“You are wrong, Jacob Gray. There was a time, I admit, when I panted for your destruction—I longed to be revenged upon you for your hints and instructions to Britton, but that time is past—personal safety is now all I care for.”“Humph!” said Gray, “revenge is such a long-lived passion, ’tis sometimes like a blazing fire craving fiercely for its prey, and then it moves to something desperate and dangerous; but at others ’tis like a smouldering combustion, scarcely telling of its existence, but still slowly and surely burning on till the end of time, as if it were by some mysterious means fed by its own ashes. Squire Learmont, I do not say absolutely nay to your offer. There may come a day when I shall wish for freedom of action in another land; then I will bring the boy perchance to you, reserving the confession until my foot is on the shore, or some other safe method which I have not yet matured: at present, however, we will wait; yes, we will have a little patience, Squire Learmont.”Learmont bit his lips, and bent a scowl of such fierce hatred at Gray, that if he had for a moment doubted the flame of resentment still lived in Learmont’s breast or not, such doubt would have been at once dissipated, and he would have felt convinced that their relative positions had not altered one iota.“Well, well,” said Gray, after a moment’s pause, “we will talk of other things. The boy improves exceedingly.”Learmont bent on him a glance of peculiar meaning as he said—“Gray, that boy would be to me a dainty sight in his coffin.”“No doubt—no doubt,” said Gray. “The time may come when you may enjoy such a sight; but not yet—not yet.”“I must needs wait your pleasure in this matter, Master Gray; but you are not serious in refusing to exert your skill in the destruction of the besotted knave, Britton? Ah! Jacob Gray, you stand in your own light most grievously.”“Do I?” said Gray. “Hem! Squire Learmont, some time since I listened to your proposals for the death of Britton, the savage smith, I agreed with you that his love of drink should be the means used to lure him to destruction. The plan was thus to stultify his judgment and never very active caution by the strong stimulants he so dotes on, till I wound from him the secret of where he kept the papers, you know, and the confession, if indeed he had written one—a fact I always doubted; and then a subtle poison in his cup would remove him for ever. Two things prompted me to the deed, Squire Learmont.”“What were they?”“The one was my love of gold. Look ye, sir; had I obtained the papers which prove, as I well know, your illegitimacy, and bar you for ever from possessing the estates of Learmont, be assured I should have kept them.”“Kept them, Gray?”“Ay, kept them.”“But you had—you have—sufficient hold on me already, in the person of that boy.”“A hold I had, but scarcely sufficient, squire. I am as a careful mariner who in the calmest sea, would like two anchors to hold his bark. The boy is a great thing; a valuable property; but human life is uncertain, and the Squire of Learmont deep and bold.”“What mean you?”“I mean, that I have lived upon the rack!“ said Gray, his pale face quivering with emotion. “Was I not by you watched, hunted like a wild beast to my lair? You know I was; and the possession of these papers would have made me sleep more soundly at night, for it would scarcely have been prudent of you to hunt a man who possessed such certain means of disinheriting you, even although you had paved your path to wealth with oceans of blood. I tell you I would possess these papers.”“And what benefit would the death of Britton have been to me, then?”Gray smiled hideously as he replied,—“It is always better to consolidate debts, Squire Learmont; you would have had one creditor then, instead of two. Then, likewise, I would have sold you the boy and left England forever.”“Indeed?”“Yes; with the papers.”“And yet,” said Learmont, after a pause, “with all these advantages to you resulting from the deed, you refuse to prosecute the enterprise of removing Britton safely, which I am quite sure that you can do.”“Hem!” said Gray, and his small eyes twinkled as he fixed them upon the countenance of the squire. “There is an old fable of two dogs fighting for a bone, while a third walks off unscathed with the object of contention. Squire Learmont, you are scarcely yet a match for Jacob Gray!”Learmont was silent, and Gray laughed, and then started in alarm at the unwonted sound of his own mirth.“You spoke of two reasons for the death of Britton,” said Learmont, after a pause of several minutes’ duration.“Ay,” said Gray, “I did, and there I was indiscreet. My second reason was, revenge. I hated Britton. I still hate him. I—I loathe him; and my deep hatred, the direful spirit of my revenge, urged me to run some little risk to gratify it. I knew your policy—I saw it as clearly as the sun at noon-day. But I was a little blinded by my revenge, and I did make an attempt to get the savage smith in my toils.”“You failed?”“Yes, because you were too hasty in your wish to get rid of Jacob Gray. You recollect the Bishop’s-walk on a certain frosty morning some time since?”“The Bishop’s-walk?”“Yes. There was a man who would have assisted me in the destruction of Britton. You, Squire Learmont, left that man a mangled, bleeding corpse in the Bishop’s Walk.”“I!” exclaimed Learmont.“Yes you! I did not see you do the deed, but after some thought I could stake my life upon the fact that Sheldon, the Thames waterman, came by his death from your sword. Thus it was squire; that man was tempted by me to assist in the murder of Britton. Curiosity, or breach of faith, induced him to dog my footsteps to the lonely house in which you and I and Britton had the pleasant interview at midnight.”Learmont made a gesture of impatience, and Gray proceeded.“You note how candid and explanatory I am; it is not worth my while to lie or conceal aught from you. By some means then, which I own I know not, you met with this Sheldon. He told you my place of abode, and for the information you murdered him.”Learmont bit his lips with passion.“That circumstance awakened me,” added Gray. “Oh! It did me a world of good, I then saw on what slippery ground I stood. I let my revenge sleep, and had its proper time for awaking. You taught me a useful lesson, squire, a lesson on prudence.”“Jacob Gray,” said Learmont, gravely. “You have great talent. Think over my offers. If you can, procure me Britton’s papers. Give me up the boy, and spend your life in any other land you choose. I will charge my lands with an annuity of five thousand pounds per annum.”“But the smith?”“I will, you having rendered him innoxious by depriving him of the papers, undertake to destroy him. He shall not live four-and-twenty hours after that event.”“I—will—think,” said Gray, rising.“You had better,” cried Learmont. “Here is more money now; but you had better take my offer. It is a large one.”“Hem!” said Gray.“And before you go, now,” added Learmont in a tone of excitement, “since you have been so candid with me, know that I am not altogether so much in your power as you, in your great cunning and admirable wisdom, may imagine.”“I am all attention,” answered Gray.“Then I tell you there is a point of endurance beyond which even I may be goaded: pass that by your demands, and I collect all my portable wealth and leave England forever, first handing you over to the tender mercy of the laws.”“Indeed!” said Gray; “I have too much faith.”“Faith in what?”“In your love.”“My love?”“Ay—for yourself. I wish you a good evening, and pleasant dreams. Hem!”
Learmont at Home.—The Baronetcy.—A Visitor.—The Rejected Offer.
A rich, glowing summer’s sun was shining through the stained glass in a large window of one of the principal rooms in the mansion of Learmont. The very air seemed filled with glorious tints, rivalling in hues of gorgeous beauty the brightest refulgence of the rainbow. The songs of birds from the gardens came sweetly to the ear: a dreamy stillness, such as is often to be observed towards the close of some delicious summer day, seemed to pervade all things. He, however, who sat in that richly-decked apartment, had no ear for the melodies of nature; for him the glorious sunlight had no romantic charms. His brow was knit with anxious care—deep furrows were on his cheeks, and a nervous irritation of manner betrayed the heart ill at ease.
It was Squire Learmont himself who thus sat at the close of that summer’s day, and the change in his appearance since we last presented him to the reader was so great that it might have been supposed many years had passed over his head instead of the comparatively short time that had actually elapsed. His lank black hair was thickly mingled with grey tints, and the sallow of his complexion had changed more and more to a sickly awful white, such as might be supposed to sit upon the countenance of one risen from the grave.
He sat for a long time silent, although his lips moved as if he were muttering to himself something that formed the principal subject of his meditation.
“Well,” he suddenly said, half aloud, “if I have made so great an inroad in my accumulated wealth as to reduce it by one-fourth of its whole amount, I have achieved something—ay, a great deal, for I have made the first step up the ladder of nobility. This baronetcy that is promised me is what I suggested to myself long since. Yes, that is the commencement of power, the limit of which who shall define—then a marriage—one of those marriages of convenience on one side and ambition on the other. My wealth will make me a most acceptable suitor to some branch of a noble family, whose peerage will look all the better for a new coat of gilding. Humph, what says the minister?”
He took from the table before him a note which lay open, and read it slowly and distinctly. It ran thus;—
There can be no doubt of his Majesty’s most gracious inclination to confer a baronetcy upon you, without the slightest reference to your patriotic and disinterested offer to purchase the means of occupying six seats in the lower house. The matter may be well concluded this present week.
“May it?” muttered Learmont. “It shall. I am not one who brooks delays. I have paid dearly for my baronetcy, and I will have it. Those six seats have cost me thrice their sums in thousands—ay, more than that. There can indeed be no doubt of the gracious intentions of his Majesty; that business is settled. I am to all intents and purposes even now a baronet—I have paid the price, and, thank the Fates, this is a country where all things have a price, nobility included; and now, how much longer am I to be tortured by these rascals, Gray and Britton? My bitterest curses on them both. Gray’s demands increase each time he comes here; his love of gold is insatiable, and he never relaxes in his caution. How on earth to cope with that man I know not. Must I ever be the victim of his avarice until some day he dies, leaving behind him that which might condemn me? No; this must, cannot last. Too long already have I groaned under the weight of this man’s hideous presence, and frequent visits. Some bold or hazardous scheme must rid me of him; and, too, he peremptorily refuses aught to do with the destruction of Britton. He thinks the job too dangerous, and taunts me with the sneer that he gets of me already what gold he chooses to demand. Jacob Gray, beware. Some accident may yet arise to place you at my mercy—my mercy? Ha! Ha! Oh, if I could invent some torture—some—Ha! What now?”
“Master Gray desires speech of your worship,” said a servant.
In a moment Gray entered the room. Anxiety of mind, and the necessity of constant caution, had had all their effect upon Jacob Gray. He stooped considerably, and moved along with a slow, silent, shuffling tread, as if he feared the very sound of his own footsteps would betray him. He peered into the face of Learmont from his half-closed eyes, and then gently sliding to a seat, he said, in a half whisper,—
“Well, squire, how fares it with you?”
“Indifferently well, Jacob Gray,” said Learmont. “You look pale and ill.”
“No, no!” said Gray, quickly, “I’m very well, quite well and strong. I shall have many years to live yet, I am quite well and strong.”
“Your looks belie you then; your hands tremble; you are weak, Jacob Gray.”
“And yet so strong,” said Gray, trembling, his small eyes fixed at Learmont, “that those who would destroy me dare not lay a finger on me in violence!”
“I understand your taunt,” said Learmont; “it has long been settled between us that I dare not take your life, Jacob Gray. But even now, will nothing tempt you to conclude a business which is slowly but sorely hurrying you to the grave?”
“Squire Learmont,” said Gray calmly, “it may be hurrying me to my grave, but I do not wish to avoid the hurry by being at once placed in it; I may be ill, but I am not yet disposed to take death as a remedy. You understand me, Squire Learmont?”
“’Twere needless to affect to be ignorant of your meaning; you think that I would be so foolish as to run the great risk of not letting you go in peace.”
“I know it.”
“You are wrong, Jacob Gray. There was a time, I admit, when I panted for your destruction—I longed to be revenged upon you for your hints and instructions to Britton, but that time is past—personal safety is now all I care for.”
“Humph!” said Gray, “revenge is such a long-lived passion, ’tis sometimes like a blazing fire craving fiercely for its prey, and then it moves to something desperate and dangerous; but at others ’tis like a smouldering combustion, scarcely telling of its existence, but still slowly and surely burning on till the end of time, as if it were by some mysterious means fed by its own ashes. Squire Learmont, I do not say absolutely nay to your offer. There may come a day when I shall wish for freedom of action in another land; then I will bring the boy perchance to you, reserving the confession until my foot is on the shore, or some other safe method which I have not yet matured: at present, however, we will wait; yes, we will have a little patience, Squire Learmont.”
Learmont bit his lips, and bent a scowl of such fierce hatred at Gray, that if he had for a moment doubted the flame of resentment still lived in Learmont’s breast or not, such doubt would have been at once dissipated, and he would have felt convinced that their relative positions had not altered one iota.
“Well, well,” said Gray, after a moment’s pause, “we will talk of other things. The boy improves exceedingly.”
Learmont bent on him a glance of peculiar meaning as he said—
“Gray, that boy would be to me a dainty sight in his coffin.”
“No doubt—no doubt,” said Gray. “The time may come when you may enjoy such a sight; but not yet—not yet.”
“I must needs wait your pleasure in this matter, Master Gray; but you are not serious in refusing to exert your skill in the destruction of the besotted knave, Britton? Ah! Jacob Gray, you stand in your own light most grievously.”
“Do I?” said Gray. “Hem! Squire Learmont, some time since I listened to your proposals for the death of Britton, the savage smith, I agreed with you that his love of drink should be the means used to lure him to destruction. The plan was thus to stultify his judgment and never very active caution by the strong stimulants he so dotes on, till I wound from him the secret of where he kept the papers, you know, and the confession, if indeed he had written one—a fact I always doubted; and then a subtle poison in his cup would remove him for ever. Two things prompted me to the deed, Squire Learmont.”
“What were they?”
“The one was my love of gold. Look ye, sir; had I obtained the papers which prove, as I well know, your illegitimacy, and bar you for ever from possessing the estates of Learmont, be assured I should have kept them.”
“Kept them, Gray?”
“Ay, kept them.”
“But you had—you have—sufficient hold on me already, in the person of that boy.”
“A hold I had, but scarcely sufficient, squire. I am as a careful mariner who in the calmest sea, would like two anchors to hold his bark. The boy is a great thing; a valuable property; but human life is uncertain, and the Squire of Learmont deep and bold.”
“What mean you?”
“I mean, that I have lived upon the rack!“ said Gray, his pale face quivering with emotion. “Was I not by you watched, hunted like a wild beast to my lair? You know I was; and the possession of these papers would have made me sleep more soundly at night, for it would scarcely have been prudent of you to hunt a man who possessed such certain means of disinheriting you, even although you had paved your path to wealth with oceans of blood. I tell you I would possess these papers.”
“And what benefit would the death of Britton have been to me, then?”
Gray smiled hideously as he replied,—
“It is always better to consolidate debts, Squire Learmont; you would have had one creditor then, instead of two. Then, likewise, I would have sold you the boy and left England forever.”
“Indeed?”
“Yes; with the papers.”
“And yet,” said Learmont, after a pause, “with all these advantages to you resulting from the deed, you refuse to prosecute the enterprise of removing Britton safely, which I am quite sure that you can do.”
“Hem!” said Gray, and his small eyes twinkled as he fixed them upon the countenance of the squire. “There is an old fable of two dogs fighting for a bone, while a third walks off unscathed with the object of contention. Squire Learmont, you are scarcely yet a match for Jacob Gray!”
Learmont was silent, and Gray laughed, and then started in alarm at the unwonted sound of his own mirth.
“You spoke of two reasons for the death of Britton,” said Learmont, after a pause of several minutes’ duration.
“Ay,” said Gray, “I did, and there I was indiscreet. My second reason was, revenge. I hated Britton. I still hate him. I—I loathe him; and my deep hatred, the direful spirit of my revenge, urged me to run some little risk to gratify it. I knew your policy—I saw it as clearly as the sun at noon-day. But I was a little blinded by my revenge, and I did make an attempt to get the savage smith in my toils.”
“You failed?”
“Yes, because you were too hasty in your wish to get rid of Jacob Gray. You recollect the Bishop’s-walk on a certain frosty morning some time since?”
“The Bishop’s-walk?”
“Yes. There was a man who would have assisted me in the destruction of Britton. You, Squire Learmont, left that man a mangled, bleeding corpse in the Bishop’s Walk.”
“I!” exclaimed Learmont.
“Yes you! I did not see you do the deed, but after some thought I could stake my life upon the fact that Sheldon, the Thames waterman, came by his death from your sword. Thus it was squire; that man was tempted by me to assist in the murder of Britton. Curiosity, or breach of faith, induced him to dog my footsteps to the lonely house in which you and I and Britton had the pleasant interview at midnight.”
Learmont made a gesture of impatience, and Gray proceeded.
“You note how candid and explanatory I am; it is not worth my while to lie or conceal aught from you. By some means then, which I own I know not, you met with this Sheldon. He told you my place of abode, and for the information you murdered him.”
Learmont bit his lips with passion.
“That circumstance awakened me,” added Gray. “Oh! It did me a world of good, I then saw on what slippery ground I stood. I let my revenge sleep, and had its proper time for awaking. You taught me a useful lesson, squire, a lesson on prudence.”
“Jacob Gray,” said Learmont, gravely. “You have great talent. Think over my offers. If you can, procure me Britton’s papers. Give me up the boy, and spend your life in any other land you choose. I will charge my lands with an annuity of five thousand pounds per annum.”
“But the smith?”
“I will, you having rendered him innoxious by depriving him of the papers, undertake to destroy him. He shall not live four-and-twenty hours after that event.”
“I—will—think,” said Gray, rising.
“You had better,” cried Learmont. “Here is more money now; but you had better take my offer. It is a large one.”
“Hem!” said Gray.
“And before you go, now,” added Learmont in a tone of excitement, “since you have been so candid with me, know that I am not altogether so much in your power as you, in your great cunning and admirable wisdom, may imagine.”
“I am all attention,” answered Gray.
“Then I tell you there is a point of endurance beyond which even I may be goaded: pass that by your demands, and I collect all my portable wealth and leave England forever, first handing you over to the tender mercy of the laws.”
“Indeed!” said Gray; “I have too much faith.”
“Faith in what?”
“In your love.”
“My love?”
“Ay—for yourself. I wish you a good evening, and pleasant dreams. Hem!”