He was a prisoner, whose only privilege was a larger but most uncertain liberty.
And that liberty was becoming penetratingly uncomfortable.

An hour had passed, the ground on which he sat was wet and cold, and the misty air was assuming a distressing kinship with departed winter and was making shivering assaults upon his bones.

At the best, he realized, he could not hope to remain secure in this cultivated wilderness beyond daylight.
With the coming of morning he would certainly be the prey of either his pals or the police.

And if they did not beat him from his hiding, plain mortal hunger would drive him out into the open streets.

If he was to do anything at all, he must do it while he still had the moderate protection of the night.
And then for the first time there came to him remembrance of Hunt's rapid injunction, given him in the hurly-burly of escape when no thoughts could impress the upper surface of his mind save those of the immediate moment.