“It matters not, ten pounds or a hundred, the result must be the same; I must and will have a certain sum, and now I am resolved to have it in a certain time. Farewell, Squire Learmont, you have begun your independence too early. Farewell.”
He left the room, and Learmont looked after him with such a smile as he had not worn for years, and muttered,—
“Have I begun my independence too early Jacob Grey? Humph, by some half dozen hours only, I do devoutly hope and trust. If you see another sunrise, I shall be a disappointed man.”
CHAPTER XCI.
The Pursuit.—The Spy.—The Three Wherries on the Thames.
Could Jacob Gray, in his wildest flight of fancy, have for one moment imagined that Albert Seyton stepped after him from Learmont’s door in a few moments after he had left it, how different would have been his feelings to what they were—how changed would have been the expression of his countenance! Never, in the whole course of their guilty career, had he and Learmont had so strange an interview. Never had each succeeded in deceiving each, as they had done on that eventful evening. Jacob Gray departed with a smile of triumph on his face, and he left Learmont with its counterpart upon his.
The impatience of Albert Seyton after he had received Learmont’s short intimation of Jacob Gray’s avowal knew scarcely any bounds, and it appeared to him an age before Gray passed across the hall to leave the house.
Albert had taken his station just within a small waiting-room which commanded a view of the great staircase, and at the first sight of Jacob Gray descending; his emotions were so powerful that he was compelled to sit down to recover his composure, during which brief period, Gray crossed the hall, and passed into the street with a rapid pace.
The necessity, however, for immediate action soon roused Albert to some exertion, and being fully equipped for the streets, he made but one bound across the hall, to the great astonishment of the servants, and reached the street just in time to see Gray turn the first corner.
The emotion of Albert Seyton had now died away, and he kept but one object in view, and that was the restoration to him of his much-loved Ada, as a consequence of his successful pursuit of Jacob Gray.