The fence only stared at him in a fierce and sombre manner; for the brain of the old man had become a chaos of wild and terrible thoughts at the contemplation of the daring robbery which was thus practised on _him_—the patron of robbers! Indeed, the incidents of this eventful night were sufficient to level the powers of a mind stronger even than that of Old Death,—for those incidents had followed each other in such rapid, whirlwind-like succession, and were all so hostile to his interests, that he felt as if he were the victim of a hideous nightmare composed of all the most frightful images that the terrors of a guilty conscience can possibly conjure up during the long dark nights of winter. The failure of his expedition to Lock's Fields—the exposure of his treachery to Tom Rain—the discomfiture he had undergone in the presence of Toby Bunce and the lad Jacob—the coercion exercised to force him to discover the secrets of his receiving-house and the mysteries of his store-rooms and dwelling-house—the discovery of his deeply injured nephew in the highwayman, and the revival of the history of his villany in reference to one long since dead,—and, lastly, the robbery of his money and papers,—all these events, occurring with such consecutive rapidity that they appeared to form but one single dreadful blow, were sufficient to paralyse the energies of the old villain. "Is there any one living in _this_ house besides yourself?" repeated Rainford. "It is for your own good that I ask; for I shall leave you bound in this chair—but, if you are really alone here, I will hasten to drop your friend Tidmarsh a hint, that he may come presently and release you, by which arrangement I shall get as long a start of you as I require." "There is no one here but myself," at length replied Old Death, aroused from his torpor by the words thus addressed to him. "Then good bye," said Tom; and, taking up the candle, he quitted the room, heedless of the prisoner's intercession to be released from his captivity. On gaining the bed-chamber situate above the spiral staircase leading to the subterranean passage, the highwayman remembered two circumstances which made him pause ere he raised the trap-door. In the first place he recalled to mind the anxiety of Old Death to prevent him from securing the candle at the moment when they were about to emerge from the secret avenue; and it struck Rainford that the old man had intended to have extinguished the light as if by accident—but whether for motives of treachery, or merely to avoid the discovery of something that the fence wished to be concealed, Tom was at a loss to conjecture. Secondly, Rainford remembered that Old Death had manifested considerable uneasiness when he had approached the first of the two doors opening from that bed-chamber; and he now thought it probable that the fence had been desirous of extinguishing the light in order to prevent Rainford from observing that there were two doors in that room.