Bruised and bleeding. Gray and the adventurous stranger who had essayed to capture him, arrived at the bottom of the flight of stone steps, and for one or two seconds it was doubtful if either of them were in a condition to make any further effort either offensive or defensive. The fear of capture and death, however, was sufficiently strong in the mind of Jacob Gray to overcome for the moment the sense of pain arising from personal injury; and with an energy, lent to him by despair alone, he rose on his knees and felt about for his antagonist. His hand touched the man’s face, and now he began to move. With something between a shriek and a shout, Gary laid hold of his head by the hair on each side. He lifted it as far as he could from the stones and then brought it down again with a sinking awful crash. One deep hollow groan only came from the man, and again Gray lifted the head, bringing it down as before with frightful violence. The skull cracked and smashed against the hard stones. The man was dead, but once more was the bleeding and crashed head brought into violent contact with the stones, and that time the sound it produced was soft, and Jacob Gray felt that he held but loose pieces of bone, and his hands were slimy and slippery with the blood that spouted on to them. Faltering, dizzy, and faint, he then rose to his feet, and from the open throughfare there came to his ears shouts, cries, and groans. Then he cast his eyes to the dim opening of the court, and he heard several voices cry,— “He is hiding down here. Let’s hunt him out. Lights—lights!” In a state of agony beyond description Gray now turned to seek shelter further down the dark court, and in doing so he trod upon the dead body of the man he had just hurried from existence. Recoiling then, as if a serpent had been in his path, he crept along by the wall until he thought he must have passed the awful and revolting object which now in death he dreaded quite as much as he did in life. He then plunged wildly forward, heedless where his steps might lead, so that it was away from his pursuers. A few paces now in advance of him he descried a dim faint ray of light, and hastening onwards he found himself at the entrance of a court running parallel with the Strand, and consisting of mean, dirty, squalid-looking houses inhabited by the very dregs of the poorer classes. Some of the half-broken dirty parlour windows in this haunt of poverty were converted into shops by being set open, and a board placed across in the inside displaying disgusting messes in the shape of eatables, mingled with wood, old bones, rags, &c. Gray hesitated a moment and cast his eyes behind him. A loud yell met his affrighted ears, and lights began to flash in the direction he had left behind him. With a groan of despair, he rushed into the dark open passage of one of the houses.