CHAPTER XLI.

GRACE'S ALTERNATIVE.


VERY shortly after that remarkable speech in the servants'
hall, Jonathan found another reason for believing that Mr. Simon
Jennings was equal to any imaginable amount of human wickedness. That
reason will shortly now appear; but we must first of all dig at its
roots somewhat deeper than Jonathan's mental husbandry could manage.

If any trait of character were wanting to complete the desperate infamy
of Jennings--(really I sometimes hope that his grandfather's madness had
a kind of rëawakening in this accursed man)--it was furnished by a new
and shrewd scheme for feeding to the full his lust of gold. The bailiff
had more than once, as we have hinted, found means to increase his evil
hoard, by having secretly gained power over female innocence and honest
reputation: similarly he now devised a deep-laid plot, nothing short of
diabolical. His plot was this: and I choose to hurry over such foul
treason. Let a touch or two hint its outlines: those who will, may paint
up the picture for themselves. Simon looked at Sir John--young, gay,
wealthy; he coveted his purse, and fancied that the surest bait to catch
that fish was fair Grace Acton: if he could entrap her for his master
(to whom he gave full credit for delighting in the plan), he counted
surely on magnificent rewards. How then to entrap her? Thus:--he,
representing himself as prosecutor of Roger, the accused, held for him,
he averred, the keys of life and death: he would set this idea (whether