CHAPTER XXXIII.
Learmont at Home.—Dark Reflections.—The Summons.—The Confederates.—Suspicions.
In the small room which he had fitted up specially for himself, sat the Squire Learmont, in an attitude of deep thought. His lips occasionally moved as if he were repeating to himself the subject of his meditations. The colour went and came upon his agitated face, according to the uneven tenor of his thoughts. For more than an hour he thus sat, and then suddenly rising as if with a violent determination to shake off completely “the thick coming fancies” that disturbed his brain, he went to the window and looked out upon the court yard of his mansion.
The uneasy thoughts of Learmont were not, however, to be thus laid aside. In a few moments he again threw himself into the chair from which he had risen, and commenced in a low, anxious, trembling tone, muttering half aloud, the subject of his gloomy thoughts:—
“Was ever a man,” he said, “so circumstanced as I? With all the will to act, yet so hemmed in by strange circumstances as to be powerless—completely powerless. In truth, the wily Jacob Gray has had a triumph. Can the smith have played me false, and warned him of his danger; yet, no—I cannot think so. Britton hates him, and would gladly take his life. He could not, with such consummate art, act the passion he exhibited at that lonely hovel, wherein I thought I had entrapped this Gray. There is yet another supposition. Does the boy live? Ay, is there a young heir to Learmont’s broad acres and princely revenues? That is a grave doubt; but let me doubt ever so strangely, I dare not act. Jacob Gray—Jacob Gray, the arch-fiend himself could not have woven a better web of protection around a human life than you have cast around yours! I dare not kill you. No! Jacob Gray, you are very safe.”
Learmont clenched his hands and ground his teeth together, in impotent rage, as he felt the full conviction upon his mind that he dared not, for his own life’s sake, interfere with Jacob Gray.
“There is no plan but one,” he said, after a long pause. “I must try to purchase from him, by some large and tempting offer, both the boy and the confession—then, should he be attracted by such a bait, he shall die for the disquiet he has given me. If I slaughter him here in my own house, he shall die. I shall know no peace till that man is a corpse.”
A small timepiece in the room now struck the hour of twelve.
“Twelve o’clock,” muttered Learmont. “’Tis the hour the smith said he would be here; but punctuality is not one of his virtues. He knows I must wait for him? Curses on him—curses!”
A servant slowly opened the door at this moment, and said, in a timid voice, for the household had had several specimens of Learmont’s wild passions and violence,—
“An it please your worship, here is Master Gray.”
“Show him here,” said Learmont, quickly, and the man was out of the room as expeditiously as if he had been pulled from behind with a sudden jerk.
“They will meet here,” muttered Learmont. “Well, be it so. Three persons so strangely knit together, as these two men and myself, were surely never heard of. Hating them with that hatred which requires to be glutted with blood to calm its fury; yet I am obliged to supply their wildest extravagancies and most insolent demands. Oh, if I, dared, if—oh, you are here, Jacob Gray?”
“As you perceive, most worshipful sir,” said Gray, as he closed the door behind him, and fixed his keen, ferret-looking eyes upon the Squire.
For a few minutes they regarded each other in silence. Learmont at length, uttered the word,—
“Well?”
“I am rejoiced to hear you are well,” sneered Gray. “The fog last night was very damp.”
“Jacob Gray,” said Learmont, “I sought your life.”
“Your worship was so kind,” said Gray, “and since my connexion with your worship has grown so dangerous, it shall bear a higher price.”
“What mean you?”
“I mean,” said Gray, striking the palm of his hand with his fist—“I mean that where I have had one guinea, Squire Learmont, I will have ten; where ten, a hundred. Thank yourself for raising my price. My nerves are weak, and yet I prize them. I like my blood to keep its even pace. If I am to be tortured—if I am to be threatened—broken in upon at midnight, and cold steel held to my throat, I will be well paid—extremely well paid. You understand me, Squire Learmont, I have raised my price.”
There was a strange mixture of cunning, rage, and ferocity in Jacob Gray’s tone and manner as he made this speech. Every other word that he spoke showed a disposition to shout with anger, but then it was as quickly subdued again by his habitual caution and timidity. When he had finished he glared at Learmont with a pale and distorted countenance awaiting his reply.
“Jacob Gray,” said Learmont, “I did seek your life, but it was not for your life’s sake I sought it.”
“Indeed!” sneered Gray.
“No,” continued Learmont. “What is your life to me? But the precautions that you have taken to protect yourself keep me in continual and imminent danger. What’s so uncertain as human life?”
“Ay—what?“ said Gray.
“Suppose your sudden death—by accident or illness—what though I had poured into your coffers half my income?—What though I had satisfied your wildest demands, still might I be exposed to danger most imminent, nay, to death without your meaning so to involve me.”
“Well I know,” said Jacob Gray, “that life is uncertain—too well I know if, Squire Learmont, you have coined for yourself the danger you describe. While you live, it will haunt you.”
“But wherefore should I?” said Learmont. “You talk of increasing your demands by tens and hundreds—why not name thousands at once as the price of—”
“Of what?”
“The boy, and your absence for ever from England.”
“I—I—had thought of that,” said Gray.
“And a wise thought too,” urged Learmont. “What is your life to me were it not that you have surrounded me with danger? Do I thirst for your blood for its own sake? Certainly not—have your own price—bring me the boy, and destroy your written confession.”
“And leave England for ever?” muttered Gray.
“Yes—seek safety and enjoyment somewhere else in another land, where the finger of suspicion can never be pointed at you, and where you will only appear as the wealthy stranger.”
“’Tis tempting,” said Gray; “but—”
“But what?—Why do you hesitate?”
“Would there be no danger even between the threshold of this house and the deck of the vessel which was to convey me and my fortunes from England for ever?”
“Danger?—a—What danger?”
“The assassin’s knife,” said Gray. “Hear me, Squire Learmont; if we could trust each other for so brief a space as half an hour, it might be done; but we cannot—you know we cannot!”
“You refuse upon danger,” said Learmont, trying to smile, and producing a ghastly distortion of visage. “You are over cautious, Master Gray.”
“I think not,” said Gray, “and yet I will think upon your offer, Squire Learmont. I will not deny that some scheme of the kind has already dawned upon my own mind. I will think upon your offer; and should some means occur to me by which safety can be so well assured as to be past a doubt, I will accept it, for I loathe the life I lead.”
“’Tis well,” said Learmont.
“And now I want a hundred pounds,” said Jacob Gray, in an affectedly submissive voice.
“A hundred pounds!” exclaimed Learmont.
“Yes, a hundred! And I will have them.”
“Jacob Gray,” said Learmont, “why have I plunged myself into crime, and leagued myself with such men as you and Britton, but for this gold which your and his insatiable demands would wring from me?”
“Agreed,” cried Gray. “But now ’tis done, and to keep the gibbet—”
“The gibbet!”
“Ay, the gibbet, Squire Learmont. To keep that without its victim, you must, and will pay the last farthing, if needs be, of that gold you talk of as your tempter. Why, it tempted me, and I will riot in it! A hundred pounds, good squire.”
“Ten thousand are yours, if you bring me the boy and your written confession.”
“Ten thousand! You may safely make it twenty, squire, or thirty.”
“What do you mean?”
“You call me cautious—cunning—wily as a fox, and am I all that; and because I am, I will not sell my life for five minutes at the utmost possession of any sum.”
“Sell your life!”
“Yes, my life. How many paces from this room would suffice to carry Jacob Gray to his grave, provided he gave up his two most rare securities—the boy and the confession?”
“You wrong me by your suspicions,” said Learmont, with difficulty suppressing the rage that was swelling in his bosom.
“A hundred pounds!” said Gray.
“Jacob Gray, hear me—”
“Hear me first. A hundred pounds!”
Learmont went to a cabinet in the apartment, and without another word counted out the sum.
“Have you moved Jacob Gray?” he said, in a calm voice.
“Nay,” replied Gray, “why need you ask?”
“A message from the Old Smithy,” announced a servant at this juncture.
“’Tis Britton,” whispered Learmont to Gray.
“What, cunning Master Britton!” answered Gray. “Ho! Ho! I shall be glad to see him.”
“Admit him,” said Learmont to the servant; then turning to Gray, he added,—
“Will you leave me, now?”
“No,” said Gray.
“Wherefore?”
“Because I do not want the smith again upon my track, like a blood hound!”
“Oh, Jacob Gray,” said Learmont, “if you could destroy Britton, securing at the same time the dangerous papers he has—bring me the boy—commit your own confession to the flames, and share my fortune!”
“Humph!“ said Gray. “If I could.”
“You might.”
“Well, that’ll do,” roared Britton, as the servant held the door open for him to enter the room. “Oh—oh—you here?”
“Yes, cunning Britton,” said Gray, “I am here.”
“Curse you, then!” said Britton, flinging himself into a chair.
“Bless you!” said Gray. “Ho, ho! Clever Britton.”
“Perhaps, gentlemen,” sneered Learmont, “you will condescend to carry your quarrels to some pot-house, when you have said what you wish to say to me?”
“Yes,” said Gray, “we shall anger his worship.”
“Damnation take—”
“Hold, Britton,” cried Learmont. “You come here for money. Name the sum, and go.”
“Oh, name the sum!” said Britton. “What’s to-day?”
“Friday, my dear Britton,” said Gray. “It’s generally considered an unlucky day, I pray you to take care of yourself, cunning Britton.”
Britton cast a savage scowl upon Gray, as he said,—
“I shall, and mind you be as careful. Friday, is it? Twenty pounds will last me till next Monday, squire.”
“Will they, indeed?” sneered Learmont. “Here they are, then. May I now be indulged with the privacy of my own house?”
“There now,” said Gray, “you hear his worship; why don’t you go, Britton?”
“Because I intend staying out, Jacob Gray,” cried Britton, fiercely.
“Well,” said Gray, rising, “be it so, but hearken to me, Squire Learmont. If I find this ruffian upon my track, I will be revenged with safety to myself—bitterly revenged—now beware!”
So saying, Jacob Gray left the room, with an expression of countenance perfectly demoniac.
Britton made a movement to follow him, but the squire laid his hand upon his arm, and said,—
“No—not now, Britton. We must devise some better means yet of destroying, with perfect safety, this Jacob Gray.”
“Curses on him!” growled Britton. “Did you hear how he taunted me?”
“I did.”
“Then, I say I must have his blood.”
“You shall.”
“I will—I have sworn it—I will take the hateful life of Jacob Gray.”
“Britton, we understand each other. This Gray is as great an enemy to you as he is to me.”
“I know he is,” growled Britton. “You need not tell me that. And who, think you, is in London, and raving through the streets to every one she meets, about the Old Smithy, and a murder?”
“She? Who mean you?”
“Mad Maud, who used to haunt the village, and ever vented her bitterest curses upon me.”
“Mad Maud! She must be secured. Even her clamour might arouse suspicion in some quarter, and many a prying knave would be glad to pick a hole in the reputation of the rich and proud Squire Learmont. When did you see her, Britton?”
“On Westminster-bridge, after you and I had parted last.”
“The—water—was—near.”
“It was, but the old beldame raised a clamour that brought help. When next we meet, she may not be so near assistance.”
“True. How true is the lesson taught by Jacob Gray, that safety is best doubly assured. You stay still at the Chequers?”
“Yes—you know I do. Why do you ask?”
“From no special motive.”
“Yes; I am still at the Chequers. Ho! Ho! Ho! Money flies there. Mine host is about to build a new front to his house and it’s all with your money, squire. By G—d, they sell good liquor at the Chequers, and there’s a merry company—a good song and a silver tankard on purpose for good Master Britton. Ho! Ho! Ho!”
“You sleep there?”
“Yes; but mind ye, squire; drunk or sober, at home or abroad, those papers are well secured. Don’t try to play any tricks with me, squire; you would rue the hour.”
“Pho! Pho!” interrupted Learmont. “We understand each other—our interests are mutual—but, as for this Jacob Gray—”
“Ah! Curse Jacob Gray!”
“To which I devoutly cry—Amen!” said Learmont. “And now, Britton, it is our policy to let matters sleep for a time, until Gray’s newly awakened caution is somewhat calmed. Go, now, good Britton, and—mind you, when you are inclined to set a price upon the papers you have, tell me and we will talk about it.”
“Oh, very well,” said Britton. “I shall be glad to see you at the Chequers any time. I will say this for you, Squire Learmont, that you pay very well, indeed. I lead the life of a gentleman now—nothing to do, and so many people to help me—drink—drink from morning till night. Damme, what could a king do more.”