"Well—will that do?" cried Tidkins, triumphantly.
"Admirably," answered Gilbert, averting his face—for there was something fiend-like and horrible in the leer of his companion.
There was a short pause; and then those two villains resumed their conversation. But as the remainder of their discourse was connected with the last act of their tragic drama, which we shall be compelled to relate in detail, it is unnecessary to record in this place any more of what passed between them upon the present occasion.
After having been nearly an hour together, Gilbert Vernon and the Resurrection Man separated, in order to return by different routes to the Hall.
Five minutes after they had left the building, the head of a man looked cautiously over the brink of the empty cistern to which Tidkins had jocularly alluded, and which stood on the top of the least dilapidated portion of the lodge.
Seeing that the coast was now perfectly clear, the person who was concealed in the cistern emerged from his hiding-place and let himself drop lightly upon the ground.
This individual was the gipsy, Morcar.
Being on his way to London,—alone, and upon some business connected with his tribe,—he had stopped to rest himself in those ruins: but he had not been there many minutes, when he heard the sound of footsteps; and, almost immediately afterwards, he beheld, through a cranny in the wall behind which he was seated, the well-known form and features of the Resurrection Man.
His first impulse was to dart upon the miscreant and endeavour to make him his prisoner; but, seeing that Tidkins looked suspiciously about, Morcar instantly imagined that he had some object in seeking that place. At the same time it struck him, from his knowledge of the Resurrection Man's character, that this object could be no good one; and he resolved to watch the villain's proceedings.