Rising to the surface, he uttered a wild shriek, and attempted to stem the current. He was a powerful swimmer, and despair lent him energy to buffet the waves for a short time; but he was again swept away by the irresistible tide, and had almost given up hope of being saved, when his forehead was grazed by a rope which hung from a vessel's side. Seizing this, he held on, and with much difficulty succeeded in gaining the vessel's deck. With his safety Gorman's fear of being captured returned. He hid himself behind some lumber, and while in this position wrung some of the water out of his clothes. In a few minutes he summoned courage to look about him, and discovered that the vessel was connected with the one that lay next to it by a plank. No one appeared to be moving, and it was so dark that he could not see more than four or five yards before him. To pass from one vessel to the other was the work of a few seconds. Finding that the second vessel lay moored to the quay, he sprang from it with all his might and alighted safely on the shore. From the position of the shipping he knew that he stood on the south bank of the river, having been swept right across the Thames, so he had now no further difficulty in hiding his guilty head in his own home. CHAPTER THIRTY ONE. NEW LIGHTS OF VARIOUS KINDS. Time sped on apace, and in its train came many changes. To the confusion of the doctor and despite the would-be murderer, David Boone recovered. But that brought no relief to Gorman, whose remorse increased daily, insomuch that he became, if not quite, very nearly, insane, and his fear of being caught was so great that he never ventured near the quarter of London in which Boone dwelt. He therefore remained in ignorance of the failure of his murderous attempt. What would he not have given to have known the truth! to have had the dreadful _word_ removed from the light which shone upon it brighter and brighter every day until it was made red-hot, as it were, and became within him as a consuming fire! Preferring darkness to light more than ever, Gorman kept in secret places during the day, and only ventured out, with other human vultures, at night. The wretched man feared the darkness, too, although he sought it, and what between the darkness that he feared yet courted, and the light that he feared and fled from, and the light within that he feared but could not fly from, he became one of the most miserable of all the outcasts in London. As for his deep-laid plans they were all scattered to the winds. In the presumption of ignorance he had fancied that he knew his own power, and so in one sense he did, but he was not aware of his own want of power. He knew, indeed, that he had the brute courage to dare and do anything desperate or dastardly, but he did not know that he lacked the moral courage to bear the consequences of his deeds. The insurance policies, therefore, lay unclaimed--even uncared for!