Having secured and destroyed his papers, he finished his packing. He had always been lavish in decking his person with jewelry, and the trinkets and odds and ends of gold and gems which he possessed represented a large sum of money. He thought of packing them and taking them with him, but ultimately decided to leave them behind, and locked them in his safe.
Then he forced himself to eat a little of the early dinner which had been provided for him, and at last got into the carriage and was driven to the station. He noticed the Grange carriage standing at the steps, but he saw that it was empty, and concluded that it had been sent to bring the squire, who may have been traveling up the line on some business.
He did not see Bessie, who was standing in the shadow; and, more important still, he did not see Seth and the woman who entered the train just as it was starting.
Coiled in a corner of a first-class compartment, he tried to sleep, but every jolt and rattle of the train seemed to voice that sudden shriek which rose from the lips of Bella-Bella as the bullet struck her, and he tossed and turned in that hideous, acute wakefulness which is a signpost on the road to madness.
Then it suddenly occurred to him that possibly the note had been found and the police were already searching for him! If so, to alight at the London terminus would be to step into the arms of his captors. His ready brain met this new difficulty and danger. He resolved to get out at one of the stations on the line this side of London, and, after some consideration, fixed upon Basingstoke.
When the train pulled up at the station, he called a porter to take his portmanteau, and stepped quickly, but not hurriedly, from the train and passed into the refreshment room.
As he did so, a window in a third-class compartment was gently let down, and Seth looked out in time to see Bartley Bradstone’s back, as it disappeared. Seth turned to Liz, who was crouched in the corner.
“I’m going to get out here,” he said. “You go on to London to the old shop, and don’t you stir hand or foot till I come to you—if it’s days or weeks, d’ye hear?—or I’ll——”
She looked at him; then, with a sigh, flung her shawl over her face.
He got out, and with an affectation of indifference, sauntered along the platform, and hiding himself behind the projecting side of the book stall, took out a paper and held it up before his face as if he were reading, but every now and then glanced round it toward the door of the refreshment room.