“Ada, you know not what you have lost by your precipitancy. I have thought of a means of vengeance upon you. Here in this paper, I declare you illegitimate. The old priest, who performed a marriage at Naples between your father and mother, must be assuredly dead long since, and there was no witness but myself. Ha! Ha!”
He started at the hollow echo of his own laugh, and looked suspiciously around him as if he feared to see some awful visitant who had mocked his guilty exultation.
“I—I am alone,” he muttered. “’Twas but an echo. These old buildings are full of them—where now shall I hide this precious and most dangerous document?” He remained in deep thought for some time, and then he made a sudden resolution that he would keep it always about him, so that it must be found in case of anything happening to him personally, and his mind would be free from apprehension when he was from home.
He then carefully unripped part of the lining of his waistcoat, and placed the confession in between the cloth and the lining, after which, by the aid of several pins, he firmly secured it in its place.
“It is safe,” he said, “security against its loss is all I wish, not absolutely concealment; and yet, should the villain Learmont ever suspect I had this document with me, I should never leave his house alive; but how should he? I have never hitherto had any cause to fear violence at his hands in his own house; and then he thinks I have the child at home. I must consider, and, perchance, change my waistcoat when I favour you with a visit, Master Learmont.”
He then carefully searched his room to discover some place of concealment for the confession, should he feel disposed ever to leave it at home, and finally pitched upon the upper shelf of an old cupboard, in one corner where was stowed away a quantity of lumber.
“Yes,” he muttered, “I will, whenever I suspect there may be danger in carrying this document abroad with me, place it here, it will then surely be found sooner or later, and conveyed to its address. Now let me consider what changes I can make in my personal appearance, in order further to ensure my safety from those who are still on the scent for me on account of Vaughan.”
The night was by this time fairly set in, and the various objects of Gray’s miserable apartment began to lose their outlines, mingling strangely together, and in some cases assuming to his alarmed imagination, fantastic shapes that made his heart beat with fright.
“I must never be here without lights,” he muttered, “darkness itself is not so bad in its intensity as this kind of dim obscurity before the night has fairly begun its reign. I must never be without lights.”
He crept to his door, and opening it gently and cautiously, without having any motive for so doing, he slunk down the stairs as if he were afraid of being overheard. Caution and fear had become habits with Jacob Gray now, and he could not have spoken or walked boldly had he been ever so much inclined so to do.