I had a few shillings in my pocket, and when I knew the dawn was coming I started off down into London, in the hope to lose myself and my miseries in the crowded streets. But there I found that apparently everyone had some business to be engaged upon; everyone was hurrying hither and thither, far too busy to take note of me or of my downcast face. The mere instinct to live kept me clear of the traffic, or I must have been run over a hundred times in the day, so little did I trouble where I walked, or what became of me. When my body craved for food I went into an eating-house, and sat shoulder to shoulder with other men, who little suspected who I was, or what was my strange story. But then everyone against whom one rubs shoulders in a great city must have some strange story of their own to tell, if they cared to say what it was.
I spent the long day in the streets; but at night a curious fascination drew me across Hampstead Heath, and so in the direction of the cottage in which Harvey Scoffold lived. I had no hope of seeing the girl; I only felt it would be some poor satisfaction to me to see the house in which she was; perhaps my very presence there might serve in some vague way to shield her from harm; for by this time I had come to the conclusion that Scoffold was as much her enemy and mine as anyone else by whom she was surrounded.
I wandered about unhappily there for more than an hour; I was just turning away, when the old woman I had seen on the previous night came out of the door of the cottage, and advanced down the garden to the little gate in the fence. I think a cat must have got astray; for she called to some animal fretfully more than once. She was just turning away again, when I ventured to step up to the gate.
"I hope the young lady is quite well?" I said, in a low tone.
She looked at me curiously; looked especially, I thought, at the long livid weal across my face. "Ah! I remember you now, sir," she said; "I didn't recognise you for a moment. But, bless you, sir, they've all gone away."
"Gone away?" I echoed.
"Yes, sir. Mr. Scoffold and the young lady went off early this morning, sir; Mr. Scoffold said that letters were to be addressed to him at the house of Dr. Bardolph Just. I've got the address inside, sir, if you should want it."
I told her I did not want it, and I turned away abruptly. I could not understand the position at all; I wondered how Harvey Scoffold had persuaded her to go back to that house, and to the man she so much dreaded. I saw how badly I had blundered in the matter, and how I had done the very thing I had striven not to do. She would trust Harvey Scoffold; she would believe in his honesty, as I had believed in it; and I was convinced now that he was working hand in glove with Bardolph Just. I stood out there in the darkness, cursing myself, and the world, and everyone, with the solitary exception of Debora Matchwick.
On one point I was resolute; I would go on to the house of the doctor, and would be near at hand in case the girl wanted me. It was a mad idea, and I now recognise it as such; but at the time it seemed that I might be able to do some good. I set off at once, tired out as I was, for Bardolph Just's house.
It was not yet late, and the house was still lighted up when at last I came to it. I opened the gate in the wall noiselessly, and went in; crept forward among the trees, until I was quite near to the house. I think I had a sort of vague idea that I would get in somehow, and confront the doctor; for, after all, nothing much worse could happen to me than had already befallen me. While I waited irresolutely in the grounds, a door opened at one side of the house, letting out a little flood of light for a moment; then the door was closed again, and I saw a figure coming swiftly towards me through the trees. I drew back behind one of the trees, and watched; presently the figure passed so close to me, going steadily in the direction of the gate, that I could see the face clearly. It was Martha Leach, habited for a journey.