CHAPTER LXXXVII.
Jacob Gray’s Disguise.—The Troublesome Shoemaker Again.—The Visit.
Gray looked now anxiously right and left for a perruquier’s, where he might purchase a wig; for contrary to the general fashion of the day, he had worn his own hair and unpowdered. Time and great mental anxiety had, however, very much thinned as well as whitened his locks, and as he remarked, a black wig was certainly calculated to make a very material difference in his personal appearance.
There were several little mean barber’s shops in the immediate neighbourhood, but they were not possessed of such articles as he wished to purchase—the sphere of their operations being confined to the shaving of his majesty’s lieges, and particularly that portion of them who only once in a week submitted to the tonsorial operation.
Jacob Gray had, therefore, much to his dread, to wander into a better thoroughfare and more respectable street, in order to suit himself, and finally he got to Parliament-street before he could see a shop in which he was likely to get suited.
This he would not venture into until he was satisfied there was no one there but the master of the shop, when, more like an apparition than a welcome customer, he glided in, and asked for a black wig.
“Black wig, sir?—Yes, sir—certainly, sir—black wig, sir,” replied the shopkeeper, with great volubility—“should say, sir, you’ll look well, sir, in black wig, sir.”
“My time is precious,” said Gray. “Show me one immediately.”
“Certainly, sir. Time’s a precious commodity. No overtaking time, sir, no how. Lots of wigs, sir—black, brown—all sorts of shades, sir—all the gentry of Westminster wear my wigs, sir—once curled the wig of the speaker of the House of Commons, and once—”
“I am in haste, sir,” said Gray, drumming with his fingers upon the counter.
“Certainly, sir. Business is business—wigs are wigs now-a-days. Here’s one, sir, that will fit you to a miracle—your sized head, sir, is what we call number six. That’s a wig, sir, that’s a credit to me and will be a credit to you, sir.”
Jacob Gray took the wig, and fitting it on his head, looked at himself attentively in a glass.
“I think this will do,” he said, as he remarked with satisfaction the alteration it made in his aspect.
“You look wonderfully well in that wig, sir—upon my word you do,” said the barber. “I could not have believed it, sir. You look twenty-two years and a quarter younger, sir.”
“Pshaw,” said Gray. “The wig will do, I have little doubt.”
“No doubt whatever, sir—not a small shadow of a doubt. You look uncommonly well, sir in that wig. ‘So I do in anything,’ says you—but a wig is a wig, you know, and when—”
“Peace—peace,” said Gray. “The price?”
“The price, sir; why I should call that wig uncommonly cheap at two guineas, sir.”
“There,” said Gray, throwing the required amount upon the counter, and then immediately walked out of the shop of the loquacious perruquier.
“Well, I never,” exclaimed the man, after his customer had gone. “Most extraordinary man—horrid fright in that wig—must be highwayman!”
Jacob Gray did certainly look somewhat different in his wig; but no one who had ever known him well could, for a moment, have doubted the identity of his strange face, with its peculiar expression of cunning, mingled with apprehension.
“Learmont,” he muttered, “would have me visit him in the morning for some purpose, but I will make it night always, until I discover what can possibly be his motive for dragging me into daylight.”
Little suspecting then, that he was kept in view by Sir Francis Hartleton’s man, from the other side of the way, Gray walked at a rapid pace towards Learmont’s.
The squire was within, and he gave a slight start, when Gray was announced; for, at that very moment, he had been planning his murder, when he should, through the instrumentality of Albert Seyton, discover his abode.
The wig which Gray wore gave him a strange look, and Learmont could not for some time divine what it was that made the remarkable difference in Jacob Gray, but kept his eyes fixed upon him with a look of surprise, that the other could not but notice.
“I have thought it safer,” said Gray, “to try some personal disguise, as I came a long way to visit you.”
“As you please,” said Learmont coldly. “I cannot, however, perceive anything you have to fear.”
“No—no—” said Gray, “but I like not being known and recognised often by the same persons.”
“As you please—as you please, Jacob Gray.”
“Have you considered my last proposal?” said Gray.
“To take a sum of money and leave England for ever?”
“Yes.”
“If you could find some means,” said Learmont, “of ridding me of Sir Francis Hartleton—”
“Who—I—I—I cannot—I dare not.”
“Yet, you might, Jacob Gray.”
“No, no,—I can undertake no such enterprise—what I have already done Squire Learmont, has scarcely met reward.”
“Not met reward, Jacob Gray! Why, you must, methinks, by this time, have a goodly sum of money by you?”
Gray groaned, as he replied,—
“Yes—yes—of course; but not enough for independence; my expenses have been great.”
“Is your—young charge quite well?” sneered Learmont.
“Quite,” said Gray.
“Then you refuse to aid me in the destruction of this Hartleton?”
“I do. I am content with what I have done in so far as it entitles me to your gratitude—your substantial gratitude.”
“Be it so then. I will, however, consider more deeply your proposal regarding a large sum of money at once. And—and if you will come to me, say, to-morrow, I will let you know, more at large, my thoughts upon that subject.”
“I will come to-morrow,” said Gray.
“In the morning?”
“I do not know—but it will be morning or evening. Give me now twenty pounds.”
“Twenty?”
“Yes. ’Tis a small sum, Squire Learmont. Look at the enjoyments that surround you—your house—your carriages—your servants—rich wines! Ah! Squire, you need not start at twenty pounds to Jacob Gray. Happy man!”
Learmont fixed his eye upon the mocking countenance of Gray, with such an expression of deadly hatred that even he quailed under it.
“Jacob Gray,” said the squire, hoarsely—“there is in me, when I am stirred by taunts, something dangerous, that even the fear of the revelations, that such as you are may leave behind you, cannot conquer. Beware, I say—beware.”
Gray trembled before his master’s spirit, and in silence took up the purse that Learmont threw him, and quitted the house.
When he gained the street, he shook his clenched hand, menacingly at the house, muttering between his clenched teeth,—
“Beware yourself, Squire Learmont; Jacob Gray will yet bring you to a gallows!”