He walked hurriedly as if on urgent business, and Lovel had followed him up through Covent Garden, across the Oxford road, and into the Marylebone fields.

There the magistrate's pace had slackened, and he had loitered like a truant schoolboy among the furze and briars.

His stoop had deepened, his head was sunk on his breast, his hands twined behind him.
Now was the chance for the murderer lurking in the brambles.

It would be easy to slip behind and give him the sword-point.

But Mr.Lovel tarried.
It may have been compunction, but more likely it was fear.