“You say that you know him thoroughly, and that he never would—”
“No, no,” broke in Linton, passionately; “he'll not break one tittle of his word, even to save his life! When he promised me that all should be secret between us, he made no reservations, and you 'll see that he 'll not avail himself of such privileges now. I do know him thoroughly.”
“Then what, or whence, is your fear?”
Linton made no other answer than a gesture of his hand, implying some vague and indistinct dread. “But go,” said he, “and go quickly. You ought never to have left the court. Had you remained, perhaps this might have been prevented. If all goes right, you 'll be here by daybreak at furthest, and Keane along with you. Take care of that, Jones; don't lose sight of him. If—if—we are unfortunate—and do you think such possible?”
“Everything is possible with a jury.”
“True,” said he, thoughtfully; “it is an issue we should never have left it to. But away; hasten back. Great Heaven! only to think how much hangs upon the next half-hour!”
“To Cashel, you mean?” said Jones, as he prepared himself for the road.
“No; I mean to me, I do know him thoroughly; and well I know the earth would be too narrow to live upon, were that man once more free and at liberty.”
In his eagerness for Jones's departure, he almost pushed him from the room; and then, when he had closed and locked the door again, he sat down beside the low flickering fire, and as the fitful light played upon his features, all the appliances of disguise he wore could not hide the terrible ravages that long corroding anxiety had made in him. Far more did he resemble the arraigned criminal than he who now stood in the dock, and with a cheek blanched only by imprisonment, waited calm, collected, and erect—“Equal to either fortune.”
Linton had often felt all the terrible suspense which makes the paradise or the hell of the gambler: he had known what it was to have his whole fortune on the issue, at a moment when the rushing mob of horsemen and foot concealed the winning horse from view, and mingled in their mad cheers the names of those whose victory had been his ruin and disgrace. He had watched the rolling die, on whose surface, as it turned, all he owned in the world was staked; he had sat gazing on the unturned card, on which his destiny was already written;—and yet all these moments of agonizing suspense were as nothing compared to that he now suffered, as he sat with bent down head trying to catch the sounds which from time to time the wind bore along from the town.