so artfully and successfully combated that Tyrrell yielded to his natural
inclination, and returned once more to the infatuation of his favourite
pursuit. However, I had become restlessly impatient for the conclusion to
this prefatory part of my revenge; and, accordingly, Thornton and myself
arranged that Tyrrell should be persuaded by the former to risk all, even
to his very last farthing, in a private game with me. Tyrrell, who
believed he should readily recruit himself by my unskilfulness in the
game, fell easily into the snare; and on the second night of our
engagement, he not only had lost the whole of his remaining pittance,
but had signed bonds owning to a debt of far greater amount than he,
at that time, could ever even have dreamt of possessing.

"Flushed, heated, almost maddened with my triumph, I yielded to the
exultation of the moment. I did not know you were so near,--I discovered
myself,--you remember the scene. I went joyfully home: and for the first
time since Gertrude's death I was happy; but there I imagined my
vengeance only would begin; I revelled in the burning hope of marking the
hunger and extremity that must ensue. The next day, when Tyrrell turned
round, in his despair, for one momentary word of comfort from the lips to
which he believed, in the fond credulity of his heart, falsehood and
treachery never came, his last earthly friend taunted and deserted him.
Mark me, Pelham: I was by and heard her! "But here my power of
retribution was to close: from the thirst still unslaked and unappeased,
the cup was abruptly snatched. Tyrrell disappeared; no one knew whither.
I set Thornton's inquiries at work. A week afterwards he brought me word
that Tyrrell had died in extreme want, and from very despair. Will you
credit that, at hearing this news, my first sensations were only rage and
disappointment? True, he had died, died in all the misery my heart could
wish, but I had not seen him die; and the death-bed seemed to me robbed
of its bitterest pang.