The waterman was now upon the point of urging his boat forward again, when Gray said quietly:—
“Hold still a moment, my friend. Your time shall be paid for. Surely yon boat is making speed through the water.”
The waterman looked in the direction of the wherry with the two rowers, and exclaimed:—
“Some one is in haste. Yet, no,—they are pulling but lazily suddenly.”
Gray’s small eyes twinkled as he replied:—
“I have altered my mind; row easily up the stream.”
The boat’s head was turned in the required direction, and the waterman, with regular and long sweeps of his oars, propelled the wherry towards Westminster Bridge, and presently glided beneath one of its gloomy arches. For a few moments the rowers in the boat in which Jacob Gray suspected was some one upon his track, appeared quite undecided what to do; then, in obedience to some order apparently from the cloaked figure, they gently followed in the wake of Gray’s wherry.
“So,” muttered Gray to himself between his clenched teeth; “I am followed;—and with what intent?—my safe destruction, of course. Waterman,” he said, in a louder tone, “we are going with the tide?”
“Scarcely,” replied the man; “it is just on the turn.”
“When it is fairly running down,” said Gray, “I will go back. Keep on, however, as you are for a short time.”