The tide rose, and the various docks filled. One by one the American-bound vessels dropped out and put to sea. It was a moment of agony to Neville to see their sails unfurl, swell to the wind, and make a speedy and distant offing. He now began to accuse himself bitterly of neglect--he believed that there was but one mode of redeeming his fault--to hurry on board one of the packets, and to arrive in America as soon as Osborne, whom, he felt convinced, was already on his way thither. Swift in his convictions, rash in execution, uncertainty was peculiarly hostile to his nature; and these moments of vacillation and doubt, and then of self-reproach at having lost all in consequence, were the most painful of his life. To determine to do something was some consolation, and now he resolved on his voyage. He hurried back to his hotel for a few necessaries and money. On his entrance, a letter was put into his hands--the contents changed the whole current of his ideas. His countenance cleared up--the tumult of his thoughts subsided into a happy calm. Changing all his plans, instead of undertaking a voyage to America, he the same evening set out for London. CHAPTER XLVI The prisoner and his faithful companion knew nothing of these momentous changes. Day by day Elizabeth withdrew from the fire to the only window in her father's room; moving her embroidery table close to it, her eyes turned, however, to the sky, instead of to the flowers she was working; and leaning her cheek upon her hand, she perpetually watched the clouds. Gerard was already, she fancied, on the waste of waters; yet the clouds did not change their direction--they all sped one way, and that contrary to his destination. Thus she passed her mornings; and when she returned to her own abode, where her heart could more entirely spend its thoughts on her lover and his voyage, her lonely room was no longer lonely, nor the gloomy season any longer gloomy. More than happy--a breathless rapture quickened the beatings of her heart, as she told over again and again Neville's virtues, and, dearer than all, his claims on her gratitude.