 only increased the
unspeakable eagerness with which I meditated my escape. The hours usually
observed by our family in this country residence were regular; and one in the
morning was the time I selected for my undertaking.
    In searching the apartment where I slept, I had formerly discovered a
concealed door, which led to a small apartment of the most secret nature, not
uncommon in houses so old as that of Mr. Falkland, and which had perhaps served
as a refuge from persecution, or a security from the inveterate hostilities of a
barbarous age. I believed no person was acquainted with this hiding place but
myself. I felt unaccountably impelled, to remove into it the different articles
of my personal property. I could not at present take them away with me. If I
were never to recover them, I felt that it would be a gratification to my
sentiment, that no trace of my existence should be found after my departure.
Having completed their removal, and waited till the hour I had previously
chosen, I stole down quietly from my chamber with a lamp in my hand; I went
along a passage that led to a small door opening into the garden, and then
crossed the garden to a gate that intersected an elm walk and a private
horse-path on the outside.
    I could scarcely believe my good fortune in having thus far executed my
design without interruption. The terrible images Mr. Falkland's menaces had
suggested to my mind, made me expect impediment and detection at every step,
though the impassioned state of my mind impelled me to advance with desperate
resolution. He probably however counted too securely upon the ascendancy of his
sentiments, when imperiously pronounced, to think it necessary to take
precautions against a sinister event. For myself, I drew a favourable omen as to
the final result of my project, from the smoothness of success that attended it
in the outset.
 

                                   Chapter IX

The first plan that had suggested itself to me was, to go to the nearest public
road, and take the earliest stage for London. There I believed I should be most
safe from discovery, if the vengeance of Mr. Falkland should prompt him to
pursue me; and I did not doubt among the multiplied resources of the metropolis
to find something which should suggest to me an eligible mode of disposing of my
person and industry. I reserved Mr. Forester in my arrangement as a last
resource, not to be called forth unless for immediate protection from the hand
of persecution and power. I was destitute of that experience of the world, which
can alone render us fertile in resources, or even enable us to
