Before describing the strange committee or group-meeting about to be dealt with, it is necessary to say a few words concerning the mysterious affair which gave rise to it.
On the 17th of December 189- the posters of the evening papers had announced in striking characters:—
"DEATH OF AN ANARCHIST: ATTEMPTED OUTRAGE IN A LONDON PARK."
That same afternoon a loud explosion had aroused the inhabitants of a quiet suburban district, and on reaching the corner of —— Park whence the report emanated, the police had found, amid a motley debris of trees, bushes, and railings, the charred and shattered remains of a man. These, at the inquest, proved to have belonged to Augustin Myers, an obscure little French Anarchist, but despite the usual lengthy and unsatisfactory routine of police inquiries, searches, and arrests, practically nothing could be ascertained concerning him or the circumstances attending his death. All that was certain was that the deceased man had in his possession an explosive machine, evidently destined for some deadly work, and that, while traversing the park, it had exploded, thus putting an end both to its owner and his projects.
Various conflicting theories were mooted as to the motive which prompted the conduct of the deceased Anarchist, but no confirmation could be obtained to any of these. Some held that Myers was traversing London on his way to some inconspicuous country railway station, whence to take train for the Continent where a wider and more propitious field for Anarchist outrage lay before him. Others opined that he had contemplated committing an outrage in the immediate vicinity of the spot which witnessed his own death; and others, again, that, having manufactured his infernal machine for some nefarious purpose either at home or abroad, he was suddenly seized either with fear or remorse, and had journeyed to this unobserved spot in order to bury it. The papers hinted at accomplices and talked about the usual "widespread conspiracy"; the police opened wide their eyes, but saw very little. The whole matter, in short, remained, and must always remain, a mystery to the public.
Behind the scenes, however, the Anarchists talked of a very different order of "conspiracy." The funeral rites of the poor little Augustin were performed with as much ceremony and sympathy as an indignant London mob would allow, and he was followed to his grave by a goodlycortègeof "comrades," red and black flags and revolutionary song. Among the chief mourners was the deceased man's brother Jacob, who wept copiously into the open grave and sung his "Carmagnole" with inimitable zeal. It was this brother whose conduct had given rise to suspicion among his companions, and "spies" and "police plots" were in every one's mouth. The office of theBomb, as being the centre of English anarchy, had been selected as the scene for an inquiryen groupinto the matter.
Thus on a wet and chilling January evening—one of those evenings when London, and more especially squalid London, is at the height of its unattractiveness—I set out towards my first Anarchist "group-meeting." And certainly the spirit which moved me from within must have been strong that the flesh quailed not at the foul scenery amid which my destination lay.
Half-way down one of the busiest, grimiest, and most depressing streets in the W.C. district stands a squalid public-house, the type of many hundreds and thousands of similar dens in the metropolis. The "Myrtle Grove Tavern," pastoral as the name sounds, was not precisely the abode of peace and goodwill. From four A.M., when the first of herhabituésbegan to muster round the yet unopened doors, till half-past twelve P.M., when the last of them was expelled by the sturdy "chucker-out," the atmosphere was dense with the foul breath and still fouler language of drunken and besotted men and women. Every phase of the lower order of British drinker and drunkard was represented here. The coarse oaths of the men, mingled with the shriller voices of their female companions, and the eternal "'e saids" and "she saids" of the latter's complaints and disputes were interrupted by the plaintive wailings of the puny, gin-nourished infants at their breasts. Here, too, sat the taciturn man, clay pipe in mouth, on his accustomed bench day after day, year in year out, gazing with stony and blear-eyed indifference on all that went on around him; deaf, dumb, and unseeing; only spitting deliberately at intervals, and with apparently no other vocation in life than the consumption of fermented liquor.
The side-door for "jugs and bottles" gave on to a dirty and odoriferous mews, down which my destination lay. The unbridled enthusiasm of eighteen years can do much to harden or deaden the nervous system, but certainly it required all my fortitude to withstand the sickening combination of beer and damp horsy hay which greeted my nostrils. Neither could the cabmen and stablemen, hanging round the public-house doors and the mews generally, be calculated to increase one's democratic aspirations, but I walked resolutely on, and turning to my left, dexterously avoiding an unsavoury heap of horse manure, straw, and other offal, I clambered up a break-neck ladder, at the top of which loomed the office of theBomb.
The door was furtively opened in response to my kick by a lean, hungry-looking little man of very circumspect appearance. He cast me a surly and suspicious glance, accompanied by a not very encouraging snarl, but on my mentioning Dr. Armitage he opened the door a few inches wider and I passed in.
It took me some seconds before I could accustom my eyes to the fetid atmosphere of this den, which was laden with the smoke of divers specimens of the worst shag and cheapest tobacco in the metropolis. But various objects, human and inanimate, became gradually more distinct, and I found myself in a long, ill-lighted wooden shed, where type and dust and unwashed human beings had left their mark, and where soap and sanitation were unknown. Past the type racks and cases, which occupied the first half of this apartment, were grouped benches, stools, packing-cases, and a few maimed and deformed chairs for the accommodation of the assembly. Then came a hand printing-press, on which were spread the remains of some comrade's repast: the vertebral column of a bloater and an empty condensed-milk can, among other relics. The floor, from one extremity to the other of the "office," was littered with heaps of unsold revolutionary literature, the approximate date of which could be gauged by the thickness of dust in which it was smothered. On the walls and from beams and rafters hung foils and boxing-gloves; artistic posters and cartoons, the relics of a great artist who had founded theBomb, and the effigies of divers comrades to whom a pathway to a better world had been opened through the hangman's drop. But what most riveted my attention was an indistinct animatesomethingenveloped in a red flag, rolled up in a heap on the frouziest and most forbidding old sofa it had ever been my lot to behold. That thissomethingwas animate could be gathered from the occasional twitchings of the red bundle, and from the dark mop of black greasy hair which emerged from one end. But to what section of the animal kingdomitbelonged I was quite at a loss to decide. Other stray objects which I noted about this apartment were an ostentatious-looking old revolver of obsolete make, and some chemical bottles, which, however, contained no substance more dangerous than Epsom salts.
The human occupants were not less noticeable than the inanimate, and some of them are deserving of our attention.
The man Myers, round whom the interest of the meeting was principally centred this evening, was to all appearances a mean enough type of the East End sartorial Jew. His physiognomy was not that of a fool, but indicated rather that low order of intelligence, cunning and intriguing, which goes to make a good swindler. The low forehead, wide awake, shifty little eyes, the nose of his forefathers, and insolent lock of black hair plastered low on his brow—all these characteristics may frequently be met with in the dock of the "Old Bailey" when some case of petty swindling is being tried.
Next Myers I noticed Dr. Armitage, who stood out in striking contrast from the rest of his companions. The smile with which he welcomed me was eloquent of the satisfaction with which he noted this my first entrance into an Anarchist circle.
The short bench on which he sat was shared by a man in corduroys of the navvy type, a large honest-looking fellow whose views of the Social question appeared to be limited to a not very definite idea of the injustice of third-class railway travelling and the payment of rent, and he expressed his opinions on these knotty problems with more freedom and warmth of language than was perhaps altogether warranted by the occasion.
Gracefully poised on one leg against an adjoining type-rack leaned a tall youth with fair curling hair, a weak tremulous mouth, and an almost girlish physiognomy. This youth had been drummed out of the army, the discipline of which he had found too severe, for feigning illness, since when he had passed his time between the bosom of his family, the workhouse, and the Anarchist party. He paid very little attention to the proceedings of the meeting, but discoursed eloquently, in a low voice, of the brutality of his parents who refused to keep him any longer unless he made some attempt to find employment. I remember wondering,en passant, why this fair-haired, weak-kneed youth had ever entered the Anarchist party; but the explanation, had I but known, was close at hand.
This explanation was a square-built, sturdy-looking man of some forty years. His appearance was the reverse of engaging, but by no means lacking in intelligence. He was ill-satisfied and annoyed with the universe, and habitually defied it from the stronghold of a double bed. Thither he had retired after the death of his father, an old market-porter, who had been crushed by the fall of a basket of potatoes. The son saw in this tragic circumstance the outcome and the reward of labour, swore a solemn oath never to do a stroke of work again, threw up his job, and from that day became a confirmed loafer in the Anarchist party. Some months previously, while propagandising in the workhouse, he found the youth there, and learned from his own lips how, being disinclined to become a burden on his poor old parents after his exit from the army, he had seen no other alternative but to become a pauper, and make the best he could of the opportunities afforded him by the poor-rates. From the workhouse he was dragged triumphantly forth by his new friend, and became an easy convert to anarchic and communistic principles.
The only feminine element in this assembly was a fair, earnest-looking Russian girl, whose slight knowledge of English did not allow her to follow the proceedings very accurately. She was an almost pathetic figure in her naïve enthusiasm, and evidently regarded her present companions as seriously as those she had left behind her in Russia, and seemed to imagine they played as dangerous a rôle, and ran the same risk as they did.
There were several others present among whom the loafer type was perhaps in the ascendant. But there were also many of the more intelligent artisan class, discontented with their lot; labourers and dockers who had tramped up after a hard day's work, a young artist who looked rather of the Social Democratic type, a cabman, a few stray gentlemen, a clever but never-sober tanner, a labour agitator, a professional stump-orator, and one or two fishy and nondescript characters of the Hebraic race. O'Flynn, the printer of theBomb, was a cantankerous Irishman with a taste for discoursing on abstract questions, concerning which he grew frightfully muddled and confused. He had a rather mad look in his eye and a disputatious manner.
When at last inquiry was made whether all companions expected were present, the red flag began to quiver and writhe most noticeably and finally to unfurl, and there emerged from its depths the dirtiest and most slovenly man I had ever seen, and the frouziest and most repulsive of dogs. This man, if man I may call him, was bony and ill-built, and appeared to consist largely of hands and feet. His arms were abnormally long and his chest narrow and hollow, and altogether he seemed to hang together by a mere fluke. His ill-assorted limbs were surmounted by a sallow, yellowish face, large repulsive lips, and a shapeless nose, and to him belonged the long, black greasy hair which I had already noted amid the folds of the red banner. Large gristly ears emerged from his uncombed mop of hair, and the only redeeming feature about the abject creature was his large, brown, dog-like eyes. He crept forward, grinding his teeth and rubbing his bony hands, and subsided into a waste-paper basket which was the only available seat left unoccupied.
And now at last, after much talking and shifting about, and not before a young German hairdresser had been stationed with one eye glued to a hole in the outer wall of the shed, in order to make sure that no detective was listening outside, the proceedings commenced.
Banter, the little man who had opened the door to me, rose to his feet, cleared his throat, and said "Comrades" in a stentorian voice. Then followed a long and rambling statement which he read out, from amid the grammatical inaccuracies and continual digressions of which I was enabled to gather that he had noticed of late something very peculiar about the conduct of Jacob Myers, who had appeared to exercise undue influence and power over his brother Augustin; that, moreover, Jacob had been seen by a third party drinking a glass of rum in the "Nag and Beetle" in company with a well-known detective, and that, in final and conclusive proof of some very fishy transactions on his part, three undeniable half-crowns had been distinctly observed in his overcoat pocket the previous week. "And how should he come by these by honest means?" indignantly inquired Banter. "He says he's out of work, and he's not got the courage to steal!"
"'Ear, 'ear! Why pay rent to robber landlords?" the navvy, Armitage's neighbour, ejaculated at this juncture, after which irrelevant inquiry he spat defiance at Society.
Then followed the speeches for the prosecution, if the use of such a word may be permitted in connection with an Anarchist transaction. The chief accusations made against Myers were his violent blood-and-thunder speeches which he had in no wise carried out in action, but which he had delivered under the eyes and in the hearing of the police who had listened and seen it all with quite commendable Christian forbearance. Besides this several sensational articles had appeared in the daily press in connection with Augustin's death, exaggerating the importance of the affair and hinting at dark plots; of which articles he was suspected of being the author. Jacob was in fact accused of having egged on his unfortunate brother to his doom in order that he might turn a little money out of the transaction between newspaper reports and police fees. It apparently mattered little to this modern Shylock whence came his pound of flesh or what blood ran or congealed in its veins.
Through all these statements and questions Myers sat in stolid and insolent silence—occasionally whistling snatches of some music-hall air. At last when reference was made to some chemicals which he was alleged to have procured and handed on to his brother, he roused up from his affected indifference and appealed to Armitage for assistance. "Dr. Armitage knows," he exclaimed indignantly, "that I only procured the sulphuric acid from him for domestic purposes."
My eyes were riveted on the doctor's face, and only to one who knew him well could the expression be at all decipherable. To me it distinctly denoted disappointment—that humiliating sense of disappointment and disillusion which must invariably come upon a man of strong and fanatical convictions when brought into contact with the meanness and cowardice of his fellows.
Dr. Armitage was a fanatic and an idealist, and two convictions were paramount in his mind at this time: the necessity and the justice of the "propaganda by force" doctrine preached by the more advanced Anarchists, and the absolute good faith and devotion to principle of the men with whom he was associated. A man of the Myers type was quite incomprehensible to him. Not for a single instant had Armitage hesitated to throw open the doors of his Harley Street establishment to the Anarchists: to him the cause was everything, and interests, prudence, prospects, all had to give way before it. And here was this man who had professed the same principles as himself, with whom he had discoursed freely on the necessity of force, who had openly advocated dynamite in his presence—this man who had spoken of the revolution and the regeneration of Society with the same warmth as himself—talking of "domestic purposes," and ready to recant all that he had preached and said. And what lay behind this reticence and these denials? Treachery of the basest kind, and the most sordid, abominable calculations which it was possible to conceive.
These thoughts I read in the doctor's face, and turning my eyes from him to the abject Jacob I could only wonder at the naïve sincerity of Armitage, which could ever have laid him open to such illusions and disillusions.
After some seconds' hesitation Armitage replied: "I do not desire or intend to go into any details here concerning my past conversations or relations with Jacob Myers, neither do I consider myself in any way bound to discuss here the motives which prompted, or which I thought prompted his actions, and the requests he made of me. As Anarchists we have not the right to judge him, and all we can do is to refuse to associate ourselves any further with him, which I, for one, shall henceforth do. The knowledge of his own abominable meanness should be punishment enough for Myers."
The doctor's words were received with very general approval.
"Armitage is perfectly right," said Carter. "We Anarchists cannot pretend to judge our fellows, but we can form our own opinions and act accordingly. Myers' conduct proves him to be no better than a spy; we of theBombcan have no further relations with him."
"Damn about judging and not judging," exclaimed a sturdy-looking docker. "All I know is that if Myers does not quickly clear out of theBombI'll kick him out. He ought to be shot. I don't pretend to understand none of these nice distinctions. I call a spade a spade, and if...."
"'Ear,'ear! Down with ..." commenced Elliot again, and Jacob opened his mouth to speak, but he was saved from any further need of self-defence or explanation, for at this moment the door of the office was broken rudely open and there entered like a hurricane a veritable fury in female form—a whirlwind, a tornado, a ravening wolf into a fold of lambs. This formidable apparition, which proved to be none other than the wife of the suspected Myers, amid a volley of abuse and oaths delivered in the choicest Billingsgate, pounced down on her ill-used husband, denounced Anarchy and the Anarchists—their morals, their creeds, their hellish machinations; she called on Jehovah to chastise, nay, utterly to destroy them, and soundly rated her consort for ever having associated with such scoundrels. And thus this formidable preacher of dynamite and disaster was borne off in mingled triumph and disgrace by his indignant spouse.
I left the office of theBombtowards 1 A.M., undecided whether to weep or to laugh at what I had witnessed there. This, my first introduction into an English Anarchist circle had certainly not been very encouraging, but I was too deeply persuaded of the truth and justice of the Anarchist doctrines to be deterred by such a beginning, and I did not for one instant waver from my resolve to enter and take part in the "movement." That some insincere and dishonest men and some fools should also play their part in it I from the first recognised as inevitable, but I could not see that this affected the Anarchist principles or rendered it less necessary for those believing in them to advocate and spread them. Dr. Armitage accompanied me part of my way home and we talked the matter overen route. "Why trouble ourselves," he exclaimed, "about a few unprincipled men in such a wide, such a universal movement? Our objects and ideals are too far above such considerations to allow us to be influenced by them. Men like Myers are but the outcome of unnatural and vitiated conditions; they are produced by the very society which it is our object to abolish—as all manner of disease is produced by vitiated air. With better conditions such men will disappear; nay, the very possibility of their existence will be gone."
"But in the meantime," I rejoined, "they are surely damaging our Cause, and scenes like the one we have just witnessed would, if known to the public, bring our party into ridicule and discredit."
"The Cause is too great and too high to be influenced by such men or such scenes," answered the doctor with conviction. "Moreover it is our duty to bring fresh blood and life into the party, so that no place will be left to renegades of the Myers type."
And in face of Armitage's unswerving faith and optimism my moment of disgust and perplexity passed, and I felt more than ever determined to bring my quota of time and strength to the propagation of the Anarchist ideals. "I have only seen a very limited and narrow circle," I said to myself; "the field is wide, and I only know one obscure and unclean corner of it. I cannot judge from this night's experience."
As far as the squalor of the men and their surroundings was concerned, although it was at first something of a shock to me, I did not allow myself to be disconcerted on its account. I had no desire or ambition to be a mere dilettante Socialist, and as dirt and squalor had to be faced, well, I was ready to face them. A famous Russian writer has described a strange phase through which the Russian youth passed not many years since, the "V. Narod" ("To the People!") movement, when young men and girls by the thousands, some belonging to the highest classes in society, fled from their families, tore themselves free from all domestic and conventional yokes, persuaded that it was their duty to serve the cause of the masses, and that in no way could they better accomplish this object than by settling in the people's midst, living their life, taking part in their work. I was passing through a similar phase of mental evolution.
I felt a strong desire to free myself from all the ideas, customs, and prejudices which usually influence my class, to throw myself into the life and the work of the masses. Thus it was that I worked hard to learn how to compose and print, that I might be of use to the Cause in the most practical manner of all—the actual production of its literature. Thus it was also that I resolutely hardened myself against any instinctive sentiments of repulsion which the unclean and squalid surroundings of the people might raise in me. I remember reading an article by Tolstoi which appeared in the English press, dealing with the conditions of the Russianmoujik, in which he clearly and uncompromisingly stated that in order to tackle the social problem, it is necessary to tackle dirt and vermin with it. If you desire to reach yourmoujikyou must reach himà travershis dirt and his parasites: if you are disinclined to face these, then leave yourmoujikalone. It was in fact a case of "take me, take my squalor." I determined to take both.
Dr. Armitage left me at the corner of Oxford Circus, but before I had taken many steps farther, I heard him suddenly turn round, and in an instant he had come up with me again.
"By the way, Isabel," he exclaimed, "I was quite forgetting to mention something I had done, to which I trust you will not object. You know how full up my place is just now with hard-up comrades. Well I took the liberty to send on to you a young Scotchman, I forget his name, who has just tramped up from the North; a most interesting fellow, rather taciturn, but with doubtless a good deal in him. He had nowhere to pass the night, poor chap, and no money, so I told him that if he waited on your doorstep some time after midnight you would be certain to give him a night's lodgings when you returned. Did I do right?" and the doctor's kindly face beamed with the look of a man who expected approbation.
"Ye—es," I gasped out, somewhat taken aback, "quite right, of course;" for I felt that any hesitation would be feeble, a mere relic of bourgeois prejudice.
And, sure enough, on reaching my domicile, I found installed on the doorstep a most uncouth and villainous-looking tramp. Taciturn he certainly was, for he scarcely opened his mouth to say "Good-evening," and indeed during the three days of his residence with me he hardly ever articulated a sound. As I was getting out my latch-key the local policeman chanced to pass: "That fellow has been hanging about for the last hours, miss," he said to me. "Shall I remove him for you?"
"Certainly not," I replied firmly, and opening the door, I requested my unknown comrade to enter. I can still see in my mind's eye that constable's face. It looked unutterable things.
After conducting the tramp to the pantry, and letting him loose on a cold pigeon-pie and other viands, and finally installing him on the study sofa, I retired to my own apartment, well prepared to enjoy a good night's rest.
This was destined, however, to be of short duration. Towards 6.30 I was roused from sleep by a loud rat-tat at the front door and, the servants not being up at such an hour, and suspecting that this early visit was in some way connected with the Anarchists, I hastily slipped on a wrapper and ran downstairs.
On opening the door I found one of the members of the previous night's meeting, the taciturn hero of the potato tragedy.
"It's rather early to disturb you," he began, "but I came to let you know that last night, after you had all gone, Comrades Banter and O'Flynn were arrested."
"Arrested!" I exclaimed, as yet unused to such incidents; "why, what on earth are they charged with?"
"Well," answered Carter, "the charge is not yet very clear, but so far as we can understand, it is in some way connected with the Myers business. They are charged with manufacturing explosives, or something of the sort. The fact is, the police and Jacob Myers are at the bottom of the whole matter, and Banter, O'Flynn, and Augustin have all played into their hands."
"Come in here," I interrupted, leading the way to the dining-room. "Let us sit down and talk the matter over together;" and we entered, Carter casting a distinctly disapprobatory glance at the "bourgeois luxury" of this apartment.
As soon as we were seated my companion returned to the question of the moment. "I fear," he said, "that it is rather a serious affair for the comrades. That Myers is a police emissary there can no longer be any reasonable doubt, and the death of his brother is clear proof that he has not been wasting his time lately. And it is only too likely that the same hand which provided Augustin with explosives may have placed similar material in the possession of Banter and O'Flynn."
"How abominable!" I exclaimed indignantly.
"Yes, but Anarchists should not be stupid enough to take any one into their confidence in such matters," returned Carter. "It is merely encouragingmouchardsand police plots. However, the question now is—What can be done to help the comrades out of the mess?"
"I am willing to do my best," I answered; "only tell me how I can be of use."
"You can be of great use, if you care to be," answered Carter. "A barrister must be procured to defend them, witnesses must be found, money procured (and here he cast a side-glance at my plate), and some one ought to interview the comrades in Holloway, and take some food to the poor fellows."
"I am quite willing to do my best in all these matters," I answered enthusiastically.
Carter stayed some little while longer instructing me in the various things I was to do, and then left me, retiring presumably to his double bed again, for I saw no more of him till long after the trial was over. He had handed the work over to me, and doubtless felt that so far as he was personally concerned his responsibilities were at an end.
As soon as the morning papers arrived I scanned them eagerly and from them learned further particulars of the arrest. A widespread conspiracy was suspected, the object of which was to blow up the West End of London, and leaders were devoted to the denunciation of the Anarchists and their infamous teachings. Explosives, it was alleged, had been found in the possession of the arrested men, "evidently destined to carry into effect the deadly work which was only stopped by the hand of God in Queen's Park three weeks ago."
Having disposed of a hasty breakfast, I left the house, and my morning was spent in places which were new and strange to me—Holloway Jail, the Old Jewry, and the Middle Temple. Holloway Prison was my first destination, for before any other steps could be taken it was necessary to ascertain what views the prisoners themselves held as to the course to be adopted in their defence.
I awaited my turn in the prison waiting-room along with a motley crowd of other visitors—burglars' and forgers' wives, pickpockets' mates, and the mother of a notorious murderer among others. Their language was not very choice when addressing the jailers, but sympathetic enough when talking among themselves and inquiring of one another, "What's your man up for?" or, "How did your mate get copped?" I felt painfully conscious of the tameness of my reply: "It's a friend: incitement to murder." How far more respectable murder itself would have sounded in the midst of such superior crime!
One burglar's spouse confided to me that her husband had been "at it for years, but this was the first time he'd been copped:" which latter incident she seemed to consider an unpardonable infringement of the privileges and rights of citizenship. She was a bright buxom little woman and had evidently flourished on his plunder.
In striking contrast to the burglar's wife, I noticed the daughter of a would-be suicide, a tall, beautiful girl, who formed a pathetic contrast to her surroundings. Her unfortunate father—an unsuccessful musician—had succumbed in the struggle for an honest life, and the cares of a large family had driven him to desperation. As I gazed at the poor girl with her tear-swollen eyes and noted her extreme thinness and the shabbiness of her well-worn clothes, and as, from her, my eyes turned to the cheerful burglar's wife, I meditated on the superiority of virtue over dishonesty—especially in the reward accorded to it.
At last, having stated my name, the name of my prisoner, the relationship or lack of relationship between us, and declared my non-connection with the case, and having received a tin number in return for this information, I was ushered through various passages and apartments into a kind of dark cage, separated by a narrow passage from a still darker one, in the depths of which I perceived my Anarchist, O'Flynn, as soon as my eyes had grown accustomed to the darkness. I had several questions to ask him during the few minutes at our disposal, and conversation was anything but easy; for on all sides of me other prisoners and their relatives were talking, weeping, arguing, disputing, and shouting one another down with all their might and lungs.
Two things struck me in Holloway Prison on this my first visit to such a place. Firstly, the outward cleanliness, and I might almost say pleasantness, of the place; and secondly, the illogical nature of the law which treats the unconvicted men, who in its eyes are consequently innocent, like convicted criminals. Nothing could be more uncomfortable and unattractive than the conditions under which the detained men are allowed to see their relatives; no privacy of any sort is allowed them, the time allotted is of the briefest, and only one visitor a day is permitted to pass. The censorship over books allowed is very strict and hopelessly stupid, and altogether everything is made as uncomfortable as possible for those under detention.
Later in the course of my Anarchist career I had occasion to visit Newgate on a similar errand, and was struck by the same incongruity in the system. The external impression made by Newgate was very different, however.
There is no suggestion of pleasantness about Newgate. It strikes you indeed as the threshold of the gallows, and is calculated to arouse qualms in the most strenuous upholder of capital punishment. A constant sense of gloom is settled like a pall over the whole building, blacker even than the soot and grime which encrust it. Inside, the dreary atmosphere is ominous of the constant vicinity of the hangman's drop, doors seem for ever to be swinging heavily and locking, keys and chains clanking, and over all the uncompromising flagstaff looms like an embodied threat.
After my many dreary wanderings round London, the clambering in and out of omnibuses and other vehicles, and prison interviews, I found the old-world tranquillity of the Temple quite a relief.
Here began a new order of search. I had to find a barrister, and that without delay. But how, whom, and in what court or lane did the right man dwell? During one brief moment indeed my thoughts turned towards our family solicitor as a possible counsellor in this matter, but only to be promptly diverted into other channels. That worthy gentleman's feelings would certainly not have withstood so rude a shock. I could picture him, in my mind's eye, slowly removing his gold pince-nez and looking at me in blank but indulgent surprise, as at one who had suddenly taken leave of her senses. No, this would never do. Barristers by the score must surely reside in the labyrinths of the Temple, and I determined to seek one first hand.
And thus it was that, after some little hesitation, I finally ascended the stairs of a house in Fig Tree Court in the hope that J. B. Armstrong, Esq., selected at random, might answer my purpose.
The clerk who opened the door looked politely surprised at my appearance and inquired my business, into which I promptly plunged headfirst. His eyebrows gradually ascended higher and higher into the regions of his hair, and his face grew stern and sad as I proceeded. "Allow me to inquire," he interrupted, "the name of the solicitor who is instructing the case."
"I have not got a solicitor," I replied, somewhat taken aback.
Then he re-opened the door. "I feel confident, madam, that Mr. Armstrong would not care to undertake such a case. Good morning."
I retired from this gentleman's presence neither bent nor broken, though slightly disappointed. "So it is usual to engage a solicitor first," I reflected, "and to communicate through him with the barrister, is it? Well, a solicitor can't be afforded here and we must do without him." The Anarchist in me revolted at such red-tapeism. "Well, here's for another plunge," I said to myself; "let us try a B this time. C. Bardolph sounds promising." And I ascended another staircase and knocked at another inhospitable door.
Mr. Bardolph I saw in person, a very pompous gentleman with manners the reverse of polite. He could scarcely contain his outraged feelings when it came to the question of the solicitor. "I can have no connection with such a case," he said firmly, and I again retired, feeling quite disreputable.
My next defeat occurred in the chambers of Mr. Anthony C. Frazer. No sooner did my eyes fall on that gentleman than I regretted my entry, and the utter hopelessness of my mission was borne in upon my mind, for I was beginning to realise the difficulties of the situation and to scent failure in the very air. Mr. Frazer requested me to be seated and eyed me curiously, as though I were some queer zoological specimen recently escaped from captivity, and listened with an incredulous smile to my narrative. He did not even wait for the missing solicitor. "This is scarcely in my line, madam," he said, rising. "You have certainly made some mistake." And he left his clerk to accompany me to the door.
I descended the stairs from this gentleman's chambers feeling distinctly crestfallen and tired, and at my wits' ends as to where next to go, when, turning the corner into another court, I became aware of rapid footsteps in my pursuit, and next moment I was overtaken by the youth who had ushered me out from the scene of my last defeat.
"I think, miss," he began, "that I can direct you to a—er—barrister who would just do for your business. On no account say that I recommended you to him, or you will get me into trouble. But you try Mr. Curtis in Brick Court. He undertakes the defence of burglars and swindlers and all sorts of people, and you'll find him cheap and satisfactory."
I thanked the youth, and although this did not strike me as altogether the most promising introduction, I thought it best to try my luck in this new direction, and, having at length discovered the house, I ascended the three rickety flights of stairs which led to Mr. Curtis's apartment and entered.
This Curtis was a small, wizened old man, of obsolete cut, but with remarkably up-to-date manners, and a pair of keen little eyes, penetrating as Röntgen rays. His hair was weedy, and his clothes snuffy and ill-fitting; but spite of this there was something uncommonly brisk and wide awake about the little man, and a certain business-like directness in his manner which impressed me favourably. I felt hopeful at once.
One of the first remarks he addressed to me—for we primarily discussed the financial aspect of his services—struck me by reason of its uncompromising common sense. "Five guineas down and another three next Tuesday, miss, and I make no inquiry where the money comes from," he said, "not so long as it is the current coin of the realm and paid punctually. Without this, however, I cannot undertake or proceed with the case."
On my immediately producing the required sum he requested me to be seated, and sitting down opposite me himself, he asked me for full particulars of the case. These I gave him to the best of my ability and he took notes.
The question of witnesses he tackled with the same uncompromising lack of veneer which had characterised his remarks on the money question. "Witnesses to character and so forth must be found," he said, "the more authentic and reputable the better, but at all costs they must be procured. Whom can you suggest?"
I confessed that I could for the moment think of nobody.
"You will think of somebody," he replied persuasively, "youmustremember somebody," and there was that in his voice which did not brook or encourage contradiction, "some one in a respectable position, of course," he continued, "a man pursuing one of the liberal professions, or a business man of means. Plenty of doctors and professional men among your people, are there not? The evidence of such a man would carry weight. The court's belief in a witness's veracity is, generally speaking, proportionate to his means. Doubtless you will be able to think of a desirable man ... who knows the prisoners," he added, rapidly turning over his notes, and speaking in such a manner as to convey to me the idea that the exact extent of the witness's knowledge of the prisoners was not of any very great consequence, so long as he was prepared to swear to their respectability, and that his banking account and general appearance were satisfactory.
"I will look round and let you know the result to-morrow," I answered.
"Good," replied Curtis, "two witnesses at least, and men of position and education at all costs. Good afternoon."
I had enough to do during the remainder of the day in finding those witnesses, but found they were at last, though not without a tremendous effort on my part and some considerable degree of ingenuity. When attired in some of my brother Raymond's discarded clothes, and produced for Curtis's inspection the following day, they really made a respectable couple, and I felt proud of them—one a physician of superior accomplishments and aristocratic appearance, the other a master-tailor, of prosperous if not verydistinguépresence. I likewise discovered a cabman who had been present in Hyde Park at an allegedly incriminating speech made by Banter; and on jogging his memory with a little whisky he distinctly recalled several points valuable to the defence.
Up till the very day of the trial my time was kept well occupied with such errands. Indeed, remarkable as the fact may appear, practically the whole labour of preparing the defence devolved upon me.
It was neither an easy nor a very encouraging task. The greater number of the English Anarchists mysteriously disappeared at this approach of danger. Mindful of the truth of the axiom that discretion is the better part of valour, A thought it well to suddenly recollect his duties towards his family; B discovered that he had a capacious stomach, which required feeding; C, that the Anarchist policy was in discord with his own true principles. At such a moment, therefore, and surrounded, or rather unsurrounded by such men, the task in front of me was not easy, and in the actual state of public opinion it was not very hopeful either.
Public feeling was against the Anarchists. So long as violence and outrage had been reserved entirely for the benefit of foreign climes, the British public had regarded the Anarchists with tolerance and equanimity. But the mysterious death of Myers had alarmed and disquieted it, and heavy sentences were generally invoked against the prisoners.
That the whole conspiracy was a got-up affair between Jacob Myers and the police was evident. Neither Banter nor O'Flynn was a dangerous man; a little loud and exaggerated talk was the utmost extent of their harmfulness. Neither of them was any better capable of making a bomb than of constructing a flying-machine, and they were less capable of throwing it than of flying. But political detectives would have a slow time of it in this country unless they occasionally made a vigorous effort on their own behalf, and an unscrupulous and impecunious man like Myers proved a valuable tool to help such gentlemen along, and fools of the Banter type suitable victims.
And thus it was that these two men now found themselves in the dock with twelve serious-minded tradesmen sitting in solemn conclave to consider their crimes.
The trial itself was a ridiculous farce. Jacob Myers, who would have been the one witness of any importance, was not subpoenaed; he had in fact discreetly quitted the country under his wife's escort. The police, with imperturbable gravity, brought ginger-beer bottles into court which had been found in O'Flynn's apartment, and which, they averred, could be converted into very formidable weapons of offence. Many gaseous speeches made by the prisoners, or attributed to them, were solemnly brought up against them, and a shudder ran through the court at the mention of such phrases as "wholesale assassination" and "war to the death."
The evidence, however, sufficed to impress the jury with the extreme gravity of the case and to alarm the public, and the prisoners were found guilty.
I well recollect the last day of the trial, which I attended throughout in more or less remote regions of the Old Bailey, recruiting recalcitrant witnesses, sending food in to the defendants, &c. Two other cases were being tried at the same time, one of which was a particularly revolting murder, for which three persons were on trial. The prisoners' relatives were waiting below in a state of painful excitement. "Guilty or not guilty," was on all their lips, "release or penal servitude, life or death, which was it to be?" Friends were constantly running in and out of the court giving the women news of the progress of the trials. "It is looking black for the prisoners!" "There is more hope!" "There is no hope!" and finally "guilty" in all the cases was reported. The wife of a horrible German murderer who had strangled his employer's wife, while a female accomplice played the piano to divert her children's attention from her cries, swooned away at the news. O'Flynn's old mother went into hysterics and became quite uncontrollable in her grief when, a few minutes later the news, "Five years' penal servitude," was brought down.