Ada sat silent and spirit-broken in that lonely house. A weight seemed to hang upon her heart, and even hope, that one dear solace of the unfortunate, appeared to have flown from her breast.
Gray had brought food with him, which Ada partook of in silence, and when the night had come, and the short-lived winter’s sun had gone to rest, he took his hat and cloak, and prepared to go forth.
“Ada,” he said, “attend to nothing—heed nothing while I am gone. If danger—that is, I mean, if any one should venture here, extinguish your light, and seek some hiding-place, for be assured, your life is the object sought by those who would visit the dwelling of Jacob Gray. You understand me. Be cautious.”
Ada answered not, and Gray slouching his hat over his face, and drawing his cloak closely around him, left the lone house with a slow and stealthy step, taking his route towards the river’s bank, from where he took a boat to Westminster.
CHAPTER XXVI.
The Squire.—The Life of a Captive.—A Strange Fatality.—The Associates.
Vice, by the decrees of Providence, seems to have its allotted span. Truly may we say, “The wicked triumph for a season,” and by some strange combination of circumstances, notwithstanding the turbulence, the anxiety, and the danger of Learmont’s early days in the metropolis, matters so arranged themselves, or were arranged for wise purposes by the great Dispenser of all things, that from the day on which Ada made her promise to Jacob Gray, Learmont had prospered in his career of villany. His natural sagacity had told him, that now Jacob Gray was put upon his guard, any further open attempt against his life would be attended with great danger; and might possibly have the effect of driving him to some desperate measure of retaliation and revenge, which might involve both. From a deep and careful review, therefore, of the whole of circumstances by which he was surrounded, the criminal and unscrupulous squire decided upon a safer, although more expensive and protracted course of action, than he had hitherto pursued; that was, to continually tempt Gray by large offers to give up the supposed boy, together with his own confession, and go to some foreign land to spend the earnings of his criminality.
Jacob Gray, with the cunning which formed such an ingredient in his character, favoured this idea on the part of Learmont, by apparently always hesitating upon his offers, while at the same time he had thoroughly and entirely made up his mind not to accept them; feeling, as he did, that his life would not be worth a minute’s purchase after he had declared Ada’s sex, and given her up together with his written confession.
Learmont at the same time was not neglectful of the chance that continually presented itself of discovering Gray’s place of abode, and pouncing upon him some night unawares, and wresting from him both the boy and the confession, at the same time that he glutted his hatred by putting him to death.
Jacob Gray for once in his life had been injudicious when he told Ada that he only waited for a certain amount of gold before he gratified his revenge by declaring who and what she was. He really had decided upon such a course. The taunts and undisguised contempt of Learmont had awakened a revengeful spirit in his breast, while the attempt to murder him in the old house at Lambeth inflamed to perfect fury, and made, as it were, part of his very nature.