Learmont’s Improved Prospects.—The Park.—Ada’s Recollections.—The
Meeting.
When Learmont was once more left alone, a dark scowl of triumph came
over his face, and he breathed more freely than he had done for many a
day.
“So,” he said “many mysteries are suddenly cleared up now; I—I am
myself again. A weight is lifted off my heart. Several things are now
clear and plain to me that I have been tortured with for many days.
This being who has been my bane, and is now my greatest danger, is a
girl, and not a boy, as Jacob Gray would always fain have made me
think. He has lost her too; and it must have been she whom I saw at my
door step and at the window of Sir Francis Hartleton. So far all is
clear; and Gray’s confused manner, wretched appearance, and offer to
compromise with me when last we met are now accounted for. He has lost
his great stronghold upon me, losing the child of—of—I cannot name him.
No—no—his name shall never pass my lips.”
He rose and paced the room for a few minutes with unequal strides, then
suddenly pausing, he muttered,—
“All must be safe. This girl, Ada, as she is called,—and now I
recollect me, it was the name of her mother—she must know but very
little, too little evidently, to enable Sir Francis Hartleton to annoy
me in any way, or he would have swooped upon my devoted head like an
eagle on its prey. He may surmise much, but he can know nothing; and
now for some plan of operation in which this lover can play his part,
and when all is done, should he suspect anything or prove troublesome,
it is but another deed, and he is gone to his last account. He leaves
no clamouring confession behind him, to enable him to have a posthumous
revenge upon those whom he hates. Perhaps after all my hopes and fears,
a greater triumph than any I have experienced is at hand for me. My
wealth may, after all, insure me some, if not all the advantages I so
much coveted, and I may, really free and unshackled, attain the high
station my panting soul has longed for.”
For the first time for many a day, Learmont gazed proudly around him
upon the many articles of rare magnificence that crowded his chamber.
“I shall triumph yet—I shall triumph yet,” he exclaimed. “I must mature
some plan of operations now that will result in the possession of this
girl, the destruction of Gray and Britton, and the recovery of all
papers of a dangerous tendency. Methinks it will be easy now. This
hair-brained boy, Seyton, if I tell him I can put him on the track of
Gray, will surely hunt him down; and then my prey is in my grasp, for
he has not now two safeguards, as he had before. I will to the park,
and there, beneath the grateful shadows of the trees, mature my plans.
Tremble, Britton, Gray, Hartleton—you have one to deal with that will
yet triumph over you.”
He hastily wrapped himself in his cloak, and with a haughtier stride,
and a prouder and more confident mien than he had worn since his first
arrival in the metropolis, he left his lordly home, and took his way to
the great mall of St. James’s Park.
Leaving Learmont to pursue his walk, and to congratulate himself upon
what he considered his improved prospects, we will, with the reader’s
permission, present ourselves at the breakfast table of Sir Francis
Hartleton, where sat the magistrate himself, his lady, and Ada.
Sir Francis had passed nearly a sleepless night in reflecting, over and
over again, upon the various circumstances connected with the fortunes
of his beautiful guest. His great object was, if possible, to decide
upon some regular course of action, which might be safely and
perseveringly pursued with a prospect of an ultimate result of a
successful nature.
After much thought, repugnant as he was to any step which savoured of
trespassing upon the undoubted rights of another, he determined
secretly and quietly, unknown to every one, to make a visit to the
village of Learmont, and explore the old Smithy, with a faint hope that
he might find there some indications of what had occurred on that
fearful night of the storm and the fire, which he could never forget.
He had slept calmly after making this resolve, and arose more refreshed
than he expected from the anxious night he had passed, and now his
object was, before he undertook his journey, to have some conversation
with Ada, in order by leading her mind to the occurrences at the Old
Smithy, to discover if her memory, young as she was, retained any
traces of the event; for that she was the child brought from the
burning ruins, and that Jacob Gray was the man who so brought her, he
entertained but a very faint doubt indeed.
“Ada,” he said, “does any event of very early life come ever to your
memory?”
“Since I have been here,” replied Ada, in her clear and sweet liquid
tones, “and so very happy, it seems to me as if my mind had assimilated
itself to some circumstances that must have happened long since to me,
so long that I can hardly believe that I am now in the same state of
existence. Kind words seem now as familiar as they are grateful to me,
and it seems to me that memory, wavering from the shock of years of
harshness and misery, is beginning to pour forth the hidden stores and
crushed remembrances of kind and gentle words, and friendly, loving
smiles which guided me before I knew Jacob Gray.”
Lady Hartleton could not suppress a tear as Ada spoke, and Sir Francis
listened with eager pleasure to her words.
“My dear Ada,” he said, “if you will endeavour to tell me in your own
gentle, admirable way, what these recollections consist of, they may be
of the greatest service in enabling me to unravel the mysteries that
now surround you.”
“Sometimes,” said Ada, “I fancy I recollect some one who used to weep
over me and kiss me fondly; and when, yesterday, your dear lady,”
turning to Sir Francis’s wife, “took me to the ancient tower, it seemed
to me that some of the large ships and the cries of the seamen were not
altogether strange to me.”
“Do you recollect anything of a fire?“ said the magistrate.
“A fire?”
“Yes—do you ever recollect a fire, and loud screams and much confusion?”
Ada shuddered.
”I have always fancied that a dream,” she said, “but it has haunted me
so often that I have feared to find it real. I have dreamt of a wild,
dark place, and then bright flames have lit it up, and cries and
shrieks have filled the air, and my heart has sunk within me, for it
seemed as if some one had torn me from all I ever loved. Then snow
would dash in my face, and it seemed to me as if I was borne onwards by
some one with terrific speed, and such dreadful shouts and cries as
have made me awaken in horror, and pray to Heaven to spare me such
another dream.”
“And in the midst of all this could you never recognise any well-known
form or face, or familiar voice?”
“None but Jacob Gray’s. His pale hideous face seemed ever turned
towards me, and I used to fancy that being in so solitary a mode of
life with him, put such fancies in my sleeping brain.”
“Well, Ada and you, my dear,” said Sir Francis Hartleton, “must endure
my absence from London, I think, for about a week.”
“A week?” said Lady Hartleton.
“Yes, I must endeavour to get leave to go for that time. It is upon
business of the utmost importance.”
He rose as he spoke, and his wife looked at him regretfully, as she
said,—
“You are not going to-day, Francis?”
“No, nor to-morrow,” he replied, smiling; “and when I do go, I have not
quite made up my mind that I shall not take you both with me.”
“Then you may go as soon as you like, Francis, if Ada will accompany
us.”
A tear started to Ada’s eye, as she said,—
“What other friend, save Heaven, have I but you to cling to now, for
he—”
She thought of Albert Seyton, and paused.
Sir Francis Hartleton took her hand gently, and said,—
“My dear Ada, I mean to find Albert Seyton, and make him my clerk.”
Ada looked up in his face, and thanked him by a glance that spoke more
eloquently than words could have done. The magistrate then smiled an
adieu, and left his house to proceed to his office by Buckingham House
across the park.
He entered the park by the back of his house, which, as the reader is
aware, opened into and near to the Birdcage-walk, and with an easy
step, for he had plenty of time in which to go the distance, Sir
Francis walked on, nor observed that any one was looking at him, until
he by chance glanced round and saw Learmont regarding him with a fixed
gaze, while a sneer of ill-concealed triumph sat upon his mouth and
curled his lip.