“What kind of man was he with?” said Gray.
“A tall man.”
“Thin and dark?”
“Nay, as for his complexion I can say nothing, for in the dark, you know, all cats are grey.”
“True; but you could swear to the man being tall and thin, Master Landlord?”
“In faith I could, and your tall, thin men are just what I dislike—bah! They seldom drink much.”
“Most true—I thank you. ’Tis a barbarous murder.”
“Would you like, sir, to see the corpse?” said the landlord, in an under tone.
“The corpse?” echoed Gray.
“Ay; he was a fine fellow. You must know that Sir Francis Hartleton has been here—”
“The magistrate?”
“Yes. He is here, and there, and everywhere; and no sooner did he hear of the body of a murdered man being found in the Bishop’s Walk, than he had a cast across the Thames from his own house in Abingdon-street.”
“Yes—yes,” said Gray, abstractedly.
“He had the body brought here,” continued the loquacious landlord, “and he says to me—‘Landlord, allow no one to see or touch the corpse or it’s clothing until you hear from me.’—‘No, your worship,’ says I, and I’ve kept my word for excepting neighbour Taplin, the corn-factor, Mrs. Dibbs, next door, Antony Freeman, the hosier, John Ferret, the bishop’s steward, Matthew Briggs, who keeps the small wareshop at the corner, Matthew Holland, the saddler, Dame Tippetto, the old midwife, and just a few more friends, no one has crossed the threshold of the room the corpse lies in. That I could take my solemn oath of, sir, I assure you.”
“No doubt—no doubt,” said Gray, “I—I will, if it so please you, see the body.”
“Come along, then,” said the landlord, placing his finger by the side of his nose, and keeping up a succession of winks all the way up the staircase, till he came to the room door in which the body of the murdered waterman was lying.
Jacob Gray entered after the landlord, and closed the door behind him.
“Now, sir, you will see him,” said the host. “Just let me move a shutter, and you will have a little more light. There, sir—there he lies. Ah, he was fond of his glass—that he was—a fine fellow.”
A stream of light came from the partially unclosed shutter, and Gray saw the corpse of the man whom he had tempted to commit a murder upon Britton himself, lying cold and stark in the bloody embrace of death.
The body lay upon a table, and the warmth of the house had caused the wound to bleed slightly again. The face was ghastly and pale, and the wide open staring eyes gave an awful appearance to the fixed rigid countenance.
“See there, now,” cried the landlord. “You may note where he has been run through the breast; don’t you see the rent?”
“I do,” said Gray.
“There are two such wounds.”
“Don’t it strike you,” remarked Gray, “that these are sword wounds?”
“Of course it does.”
“Then who but a gentleman accredited to wear a weapon could have killed the man?”
“That’s true. I’ll solemn swear to that,” cried the landlord.
“The tall, thin, dark man,” added Gray, “must be some gentleman, residing probably hereabout, or directly across the bridge.”
“No doubt; I’ll swear.”
“Most properly,” added Gray. “Good day to you, sir. I may perchance look in again.”
“Come to the inquest, sir,” said the landlord. “There you shall have it all out, I’ll warrant. There you shall hear me solemnly swear everything.“
“Perchance, I may,” said Gray, as he descended the staircase. “Will it be to-day?”
“To-morrow, at noon; as I understand, sir.”
“Thank you. Thank you.”
Gray left the house, and when he was some paces from the door, he muttered.—
“So, Master Learmont, I have another hold upon your kind generosity. That by some strange chance, which I cannot conjecture, this waterman found out my place of abode, and thus communicated it to you, Squire Learmont. I am convinced. Humph! He has got his wages. I could accuse you of a crime, good, kind, considerate Learmont, that would not in the least compromise my own safety. We shall see—we shall see. I—I must now make my way homewards again. Surely by this time Ada has returned. She must be waiting. Home! Home! And then, to think of another place in which to hide my head from my worst foe, and yet my only source of wealth.”
CHAPTER XXVII.
Ada’s Flight and Despair.—Old Westminster Bridge at Daybreak.—The Smith.—Mad Maud.
When Ada, the beautiful and persecuted child of the dead, passed from the room in the garments befitting her sex, she thought her heart must burst with the suppressed feelings which were conjured up in its inmost recesses. One awful question occurred to her to be traced in letters of liquid fire upon her brain, and that was: “Is it true that Jacob Gray is my father?” His assertion of the fact had come upon her so entirely unawares that, as Gray had himself exultingly supposed, she had not time to think—but the doubt—the merest suspicion that it might true, was madness. Ada did not—she could not, even at the moment that Gray declared himself her father, believe his words; but still the doubt was raised, and although all reason—all probability—all experience gave the lie to the assertion, there was still the awful intrusive thought that it might be so.
Upon the impulse of that small possibility, that in that moment of despair and agony of soul Jacob Gray had spoken truly, Ada acted. She could not run the dreadful risk of sacrificing even a brutal and criminal father, and with a speed that in her state of mind was marvellous, she altered herself, in her girl’s clothing, and, as we have seen, for the time, saved Jacob Gray from death.
As she descended the narrow, dilapidated staircase, she pressed her hands convulsively upon her heart to still its tumultuous beatings. Her position in life appeared to her to be all at once strangely altered. If—and oh! That horrid if—if conveying as it did a possibility of the fact—if Jacob Gray was really her father!—What was she now to do?—How think of him?—How address him? Could she ever bestow upon him the smallest fraction of that dear love which flows in so easy and natural a current from a child to its parent? Could she call him father?—No, she felt that she could not. She examined her feelings to endeavour to detect some yearnings of natural love and duty—some of that undefined, mysterious instinct she had read of as enabling the parent to single out the child—the child the parent, from the great mass of humanity; but the search—the self-examination was in vain. Jacob Gray was to her but the cruel, vindictive tyrant, rioting in oppression and brutality when un-resisted, and shrinking from her like a beaten hound when she dared to confront him, and question his acts.
“God of Heaven!” she said, when she had reached the street; “there should be some similarity of thought, some community of feeling between a father and his child. Do I and Jacob Gray think alike in anything? Have we one feeling in common?—No—not one.”
As the probabilities of his not being her father crowded upon her mind, now that the intense excitement of the minute was over, Ada became more happy and composed, and she slackened her pace, seeing that she had already placed a considerable