“Indeed, Heath! And who hunted you?”
“Fiends—demons in human form. I have been so that I could not sleep for fear of them. They have always been on my track—on the road through the desert, across the mountains, at the port, on shipboard; they appeared again here in England, at the docks, at the hotel, in the streets; hunted, I tell you, till I have seemed to be hunted to death.”
“Be calm, my dear boy, be calm. Come, you must have sleep.”
“Sleep? Yes, if I could only sleep; but no, I could not—I could not—only drink, doctor, drink; and it has never made me drunk, only keep me up—help me to escape from the devils.”
“Ah, you have drunk a good deal, then?”
“Yes; brandy—brandy. It has been my only friend and support, doctor. I dared not go to an hotel; I was afraid to trust a bank; I had no friend to whom I could go; and I swore I would trust myself till I could get here safe in England.”
“Where you are safe now.”
“No, not yet, for they are tracking me. I got to Liverpool yesterday, and tried to throw them off; but they followed me to the hotel, and I dared trust no one there. They might have said I was mad, and claimed me; said I was a thief—a dozen things to get me into their hands.”
“Be calm, Heath, be calm.”
“Calm? How can a hunted man be calm with the jaws—the wet, hungry jaws—of the hounds on his heels—while he feels that in a moment they may spring upon him and rend him? Oh, doctor, doctor, you never were a hunted man.”