Now and then he thought his desire was about to be realised. Now and then for a moment a confusion arose in his senses, and he lost the sharp outlines of reality, only to return to intense wakefulness and renewed despair.
"I shall go mad!" he cried in his heart. "Something tells me I shall go mad. Between Ray, and the Club, and Singleton Terrace, and Hetty, and the money, and this want of sleep, I know I shall go mad. Insomnia is one of the surest signs of coming insanity. O, it would be cruel--cruel if anything happened to me now that I have just won all! I am free of Nellie; I have the money; I have felt the influence of Hetty's luck, and will feel it again to-night. If Hetty would only come with me I should be out of the way of Kate's brother. Curse him a thousand times! And now I feel my head is going, my brain is turning. It isn't fair or just after all the trouble I have taken. It is horrible to think of losing everything now that I have so much within my grasp. I think that fall into the river and the meeting with Kate afterwards must have hurt my brain. And this sleeplessness, this wearing sleeplessness, will finish the work! O, it is too bad, too cruel! It is not fair!"
With a cry of despair he rose and began pacing up and down the room, frantically waving his hands over his head, and moaning in his misery.
Mrs. Grainger knocked at the door.
"It's half-past two, sir."
"All right."
The voice of the woman acted like a charm.
"What on earth," he asked himself, pausing in his walk, "have I been fooling about? I daresay that ducking and the fright of it, and the meeting with Kate, and the long repression at Singleton Terrace, and the cards, and finding myself so near Ray, and this bridge from the island to the Quay, and having the anxiety of the money on my mind, have all helped to put me a little out of sorts, and therefore, like the fool that I am, I must think I am going mad. The only sign of madness there is about me is that I should fancy such a thing. Why, the mere lying down has made me all right. I feel quite refreshed and young again. And now I must off. I don't want to meet that grinning bearded oaf."
Crawford put on his coat, waistcoat, and boots, replaced the money and the revolver in his pockets, and went downstairs. He could see Hetty through the open door of the sitting-room, arranging the table for dinner.
"I perceive," he called out to her in a blithe voice, "that you have opened up communications with your Robinson Crusoe. You have got a plank, or a stage, or something, from the Quay to the Ait."