At length, in despair, our Reporter, having no alternative, inquired of a woman in the house whether a person of the name of Cowlrick was within. The woman looked suspiciously at our Reporter, and said she would call “her man.” Her man came, and our Reporter repeated his question.
“Cowlrick!” cried the man. “Send I may live if that ain’t the name of the feller as was up at the perlice court for the murder in Great Porter Square! Yer don’t mean to say that it’s ’im you’ve come to inquire for at a respectable ’ouse?”
“Shut the door in his face, Jim!” called out the woman, from the top of the stairs.
No sooner said than done. The door wasslammed in our Reporter’s face, and he was “left out in the cold,” as the saying is.
What, now, was our Reporter to do? He had no intention of giving up his search; the woof of his nature is strong and tough, and difficulties rather inspire than depress him. Within a stone’s throw from a weak hand there were six public-houses; within a stone’s throw from any one of these were half-a-dozen other public-houses. It was as though a huge pepper-box, filled with public-houses, had been shaken over the neighbourhood. There was a certain peculiarity in the order and arrangement of their fall. Most of them had fallen into the corners of the courts and narrow streets. There must be a Providence in this—a Providence which, watching over the welfare of brewers and distillers, has conferred upon them and upon their heirs and assigns an inalienable right in the corners of every street and lane in the restless Babylonian City.
Our Reporter made the rounds of these public-houses, ordered liquor in every oneof them, and poured it on the floor—to the indignation of many topers, who called it “sinful waste;” especially to the indignation of one blear-eyed, grey-haired, old woman, with three long strong hairs sticking out of her chin. This old creature, who looked as if she had just stepped away from the witches’ cauldron in Macbeth (the brew there not being strong enough), screamed out to our Reporter, “You’ll come to want! You’ll come to want! For Gawd’s sake, don’t spill it, my dear! Give it to me—give it to me!” and struggled with him for the liquor.
Within half-an-hour of midnight our Reporter found himself once more before the house in which he supposed Antony Cowlrick would sleep that night. But he was puzzled what to do. To ring the bells again was hazardous. He determined to wait until a lodger entered the house; then he himself would enter and try the chamber doors.
The minutes passed. No guardian angel of a lodger came to his aid. But all at once hefelt a tug at his trousers. He looked down. It was a little girl. A very mite of a girl.
“If yer please, sir——”
“Yes, little one,” said our Reporter.
“Will yer pull the blue bell, and knock five times? I can’t reach.”
THE SPECIAL REPORTER OF THE “EVENING MOON” MAKES THE ACQUAINTANCE OF A LITTLE MATCH GIRL.
Pullthe blue bell, and knock five times!
The request was not to be denied. That the small party who made it couldnot“reach” was self-evident, for she was scarcely three feet and a half in height. But to say, “pull the blue bell” was one thing, and to pull the blue bell was another. Our Reporter had pulled every bell on the door, as he believed, and he looked in vain for a blue one.
“I don’t see the blue bell, little girl,” he said.
“Yes, yer do,” replied the little girl, with audacious effrontery. “Not where yer looking! It’s all by itself on the other side.”
Our Reporter found the bell, “all by itself,”on the left hand side of the door, where bells usually are not, and he pulled it, and knocked five times slowly.
“That ain’t right!” cried the little girl; her voice came as loud and shrill as if it proceeded from the throat of a canary. “Yer must knock like a postman, and a little ’un in—rat-tat, rat-tat, tat!”
Our Reporter obeyed, fully expecting to be assaulted for kicking up such a row so late in the night; but no one took any notice of him, and no one answered the ring and the knocks.
The little girl waited patiently, much more patiently than our Reporter, who rang and knocked again with the air of a man who was engaged in a contest and was getting the worst of it.
“Must I give it up?” he mentally asked himself, and answering immediately, “No, I will see Antony Cowlrick to-night, or I’ll know the reason why.” Then he looked down at the form of the little girl, and called, “Little girl!”
The little girl did not reply. She was leaning against the door-post in a state of perfect contentment. The particular house with which our Reporter might be said to be wrestling was in the shade; there was no lamp-post within twenty yards of it, and the night was dark.
“Little girl!” repeated our Reporter, in a louder voice.
Still no reply.
He leant down, and placed his hands on her shoulders. She did not move. He stooped lower, and looked into her face. She was fast asleep.
Even in the dark he saw how much she was to be pitied. Her poor wan face was dirty, and traces of tears were on it; her hair hung in thick knots over her forehead; her hands were begrimed; her clothes were rags; on her feet were a pair of what once were dancing shoes, and had twinkled in the ballet. They were half-a-dozen sizes too large for the little feet, and were tied to her ankles with pieces of twine. Their glory was gone indeed,and, though they had once been satin, they were fit only for the rag-bag or the dust-hole.
“Poor child!” sighed our Reporter. “It is easy to see what you are growing up into!”
He whispered in her ear, “Wake up, little one! I’ve knocked loud enough to raise the dead, and no one answers. Wake up!”
As she made no movement, he shook her, gently and with tenderness, whereupon she murmured some words, but so indistinctly that he did not gather their import.
“Eh?” he said, placing his ear to her lips. “What did you say?”
“Two boxes a penny,” she murmured. “Please buy a box!—starving mother at ’ome!”
A woman shuffled along the street, and stopped before the house, with the supper beer in a brown jug. As she opened the door with the latch-key, she glanced at the sleeping child.
“Why, it’s little Fanny!” she cried.
“Who asked me,” added our Reporter, “to pull the blue bell, and knock five times?”
“Yes,” observed the woman. “Third-floor back.”
“The young woman,” said our Reporter, taking up the cue, and slipping sixpence into the woman’s hand—(when do our poor refuse alms?)—“the young woman in the third-floor back—is she at home?”
“Goodness only knows,” replied the woman, who, having accepted the money, felt that she must earn it; “she’s that quiet, is Blanche, that there’s no telling when she’s in or when she’s out.”
“Let me see,” said our Reporter, pretending to consider, “how long has Blanche lived in the house?”
“About three months, I should say. Pretty, ain’t she?”
“Very. Young, too, to be the mother of little Fanny here.”
“Lord love you!” exclaimed the woman; “little Fanny’s no relation of her’n. She’s asingle woman is Blanche. I thought you was a friend.”
“So I am. But this is the first time I’ve been here to see her.”
“You’re the first I’ve ever seen come after her.”
“She has not many friends, then?”
“Not one that I know of.”
“She has had an old friend with her to-day,” said our Reporter, thinking he might by this question obtain some information of Antony Cowlrick.
“Has she? I’m glad to hear it. I’ve wondered a good deal about the girl, and so has all of us in the street. She don’t mix with us free like. Not that she ain’t affable! But she keeps herself to herself. I must go in now,” said the woman, with a giggle, “or my old man’ll think I’ve run off with somebody.”
She entered the house, and our Reporter, with little Fanny asleep in his arms, followed. On the first floor the woman vanished, and he pursued his way to the third. The stairswere in utter darkness, and he had to exercise great care to save his shins and to avoid disturbing the lodgers in the house. In due time he reached the third floor, and struck a match. There were only two doors on the landing, and he saw at once which of the two led to the back room. He knocked, and received no response; and then he tried the handle of the door. It gave way, and he was in the room, in utter darkness.
“I beg your pardon,” he said, addressing, as he believed, the occupant, “but as no one answered”——
He did not finish the sentence, for the stillness of the room affected him. His position was certainly a perplexing one. He listened for the breathing of some person, but heard none.
“Antony Cowlrick,” he thought, “have you been playing me a trick?”
He struck another match, and lit a candle which was on a small table. Then he looked around. The room was empty.
“Now,” thought our Reporter, “if this isnot the room in which Antony Cowlrick led me to expect he would receive me, and the tenant properhimself orherself should suddenly appear, I shall scarcely be prepared to offer a reasonable excuse for my intrusion.”
No articles of clothing were in sight to enlighten him as to the sex of the tenant of this third-floor back. There was a bed in decent order, and he laid little Fanny upon it. Having done this, he noticed that food was on the table—the remains of a loaf cut in slices, with a scraping of butter on them, a small quantity of tea screwed up in paper, and a saucer with about an ounce of brown sugar in it.
“Not exactly a Rothschild,” mused our Reporter, “but quite as happy perhaps.”
For our Reporter has his own views of things, and contends that more happiness is to be found among the poor than among the rich.
Continuing his investigations, our Reporter was not long before he made an important discovery. Exactly in front of the slice ofbread and butter on the table was a chair, upon which the person who appeared to be invited to the frugal supper would naturally sit, and exactly behind the bread and butter was a piece of paper, set up on end, upon which was written:
“Dear little Fanny. Good-bye. If ever I am rich I will try and find you. Look on the mantelshelf.”
There was a peculiarity in the writing. The letters forming the name “Fanny” were traced in large capital letters, such as a child who could not read fine writing might be able to spell; the rest was written in small hand.
Our reporter argued the matter logically thus: The little girl asleep on the bed could not read, but understood the large letters in which her name was written. The supper on the table was set out for her. Preparing to partake of it, her eyes would fall on the paper, and she would see her name upon it. Curiosity to know what else was written would impel her to seek a lodger in the house—perhapsthe landlady—who would read the message aloud to her, and would look on the mantelshelf.
Why should not our Reporter himself read the message to little Fanny, and why should he not look on the mantelshelf?
He did the latter without further cogitation. Upon the mantelshelf he found two unsealed envelopes, with writing on them. Each contained money.
One was addressed “For Fanny.” It contained a shilling. On the other was written: “Mrs. Rogers, landlady. If a gentleman engaged upon a newspaper calls to see Blanche and a friend whom she met in Leicester Square to-day, please give him the enclosed. Blanche is not coming back. Her rent is paid up to next Saturday. Good-bye.”
He had not, then, entered the wrong apartment. This room had been occupied by Antony Cowlrick’s fair friend, and the enclosure was for our Reporter.
He took it out; it was a sealed letter. Heopened it, and read, as a sovereign fell to the floor:—
“Sir,—I am enabled thus soon to repay you the sovereign you so generously lent me to-day. Had it been out of my power to do so to-night you would most probably have seen me as you expected. It is better as it is, for I have nothing to communicate which I desire to make public. I shall ever retain a lively sense of your kindness, and I depend upon the fulfilment of your promise not to write about me in your paper for three days. If you do not know what else to do with the money received by your paper in response to its appeal for subscriptions on my behalf, I can tell you. Give it to the poor.—Your faithful servant,“Antony Cowlrick.”
“Sir,—I am enabled thus soon to repay you the sovereign you so generously lent me to-day. Had it been out of my power to do so to-night you would most probably have seen me as you expected. It is better as it is, for I have nothing to communicate which I desire to make public. I shall ever retain a lively sense of your kindness, and I depend upon the fulfilment of your promise not to write about me in your paper for three days. If you do not know what else to do with the money received by your paper in response to its appeal for subscriptions on my behalf, I can tell you. Give it to the poor.—Your faithful servant,
“Antony Cowlrick.”
The handwriting was that of an educated man, and the mystery surrounding Antony Cowlrick was deepened by the last proceeding.
A voice from the bed aroused our Reporter from his meditations. Little Fanny was awake, and was calling for Blanche.
“Blanche is not in yet,” said our Reporter. “Come and eat your supper.”
The little girl struggled to her feet, and approached the table. The curiosity of our Reporter was strongly excited, and before giving Fanny the message and the shilling left for her by Blanche, he determined to question her. Thereupon the following colloquy ensued:—
Our Reporter: Thisisyour supper, Fanny.
Fanny (carefully spreading the brown sugar over her bread): Yes. Blanche never forgits me.
Our Reporter: Sugar every night?
Fanny: Yes, I likes it.
Our Reporter: Blanche is not your mother?
Fanny (with her mouth full): Lor! No.
Our Reporter: Is she your aunt or your cousin?
Fanny: Lor! No. She ain’t nothink to me but a—— a——
Our Reporter (prompting, seeing that Fanny was in a difficulty): Friend?
Fanny: More nor that. A brick!
Our Reporter: She is good to you?
Fanny: There ain’t nobody like her.
Our Reporter: What are you?
Fanny (laughing): Wot am I? A gal.
Our Reporter: Do you go to school?
Fanny (with a cunning shake of her head): Ketch me at it!
Our Reporter: What do you do?
Fanny: I sells matches—two boxes a penny—and I falls asleep on purpose in front of the Nacheral Gallery.
Our Reporter: The National Gallery. In Trafalgar Square, where the fountains are?
Fanny: That’s the place—where the little man without legs plays the accorgeon.
Our Reporter: Why do you fall asleep there?
Fanny (with a sad, wistful smile): That’s mother’s little game. She makes me.
Our Reporter: Mother’s little game! Then you have a mother?
Fanny (shuddering): Raythur.
Our Reporter: Where does she live?
Fanny: At the pub round the corner, mostly—the Good Sir Mary Tun—till they turns her out.
Our Reporter: The Good Samaritan. But why does your mother make you fall asleep on purpose in front of the National Gallery?
Fanny: Don’t yer see? It’s a dodge. Mother gives me twelve boxes o’ matches, and I’ve got to sell ’em. If I don’t, I gits toko! Well, I don’t always sell ’em, though I try ever so ’ard. Then I falls down on the pavement up agin the wall, or I sets down on the church steps oppersite, with the boxes o’ matches in my ’and, and I goes to sleep. Pretends to, yer know; I’m wide awake all the time, I am. A lady and gent comin’ from the theaytre, stops and looks at me. “Poor little thing!”sheses. “Come along!”heses. Sometimes the lady won’t come along, and she bends over, and puts ’er ’and on myshoulder. “Why don’t yer go ’ome?” she ses. “I can’t, mem,” I ses, “till I’ve sold my matches.” Then she gives me a copper, but don’t take my matches; and other gents and ladies as stops to look gives me somethink—I’ve ’ad as much as a shillin’ give me in a lump, more nor once. When they’re gone, mother comes, and wrenches my ’and open, and takes the money, and ses, “Go to sleep agin you little warmint, or I’ll break every bone in yer body!” Then I shuts my eyes, and the game’s played all over agin.
Our Reporter: Is your mother near you all the while, Fanny, that she comes and takes the money from you?
Fanny: Lor! No! That would spoil the game. She’s watchin’ on the other side of Trafalgar Square. She knows ’er book, does mother! Sometimes I’m so tired that I falls asleep in real earnest, and then I ketches it—’ot!
Our Reporter: Does she beat you?
Fanny: Does she miss a chance?
The child hitches her shoulder out of herragged frock, and our Reporter sees on the poor thin back, the bladebones of which stick up like knives, the marks of welts and bruises. There is room in our literature for another kind of book on “The Mothers of England” than that written by a celebrated authoress many years ago. Fanny’s poor little back is black and blue, and when our Reporter, with gentle finger, touches one of the bruises, the child quivers with pain.
Our Reporter: Altogether, Fanny, your life is not a rosy one?
Fanny: O, I ’ave lots of larks with the boys! And I’ve got some ’air.
Our Reporter (very much puzzled): Some what?
Fanny: Some ’air. I’ll show yer.
She jumps from her chair, creeps under the bed, and emerges presently, her face flushed and excited, with something wrapped in a piece of old newspaper. She displays her treasure to our astonished Reporter. It is a chignon, apparently made of tow, which she fixes proudly on her head. The colour ismany shades lighter than Fanny’s own hair, which is a pretty dark brown, but that is of the smallest consequence to the child, who evidently believes that the chignon makes a woman of fashion of her.
Fanny: I wears it on Sundays, when I goes to the Embankment. Mother don’t know I’ve got it. If she did, she’d take it from me, and wear it ’erself. I say—ain’t it splendid, the Embankment?
Our Reporter: It is a fine place, Fanny. So you have larks with the boys?
Fanny: Yes. We goes to the play on the sly. ’Tain’t a month ago since Bob the Swell comes and ses, “Fanny, wot do yer say to goin’ and seein’ ‘Drink’ at the Princesses? Give us a kiss, and I’ll treat yer!” My! I was ready to jump out of my skin! He ’ad two other gals with ’im. He ses, ses Bob, “This is a lady’s party. It’s a wim of mine”—I don’t know wot he means by that, but he ses—“it’s a wim of mine. I wos allus a lady’s man, wosn’t I, Fan?” (And he is, a regular one!) “I’ve got three young women to myown cheek, all a-growin’ and a-blowin’! Let’s trot.” Wot a night we ’ad! He takes us to a ’Talian ice-shop in Williers Street, and we ’as penny ices, and then we goes to the Princesses—to the best part of the theaytre, ’igh up, where you can look down on all the other people. ’Ave you seen ‘Drink?’ Prime—ain’t it? But I shouldn’t like to be one o’ them gals as throws pails of water over each other. And when Coop-o falls from the scaffoldin’—ain’t it nacheral! I almost cried my eyes out when he was ’aving dinner with ’is little gal. Then he gits the trembles, and goes on awful. I never seed one so bad as that! When the play’s over Bob takes us to a pub’——
Our Reporter (shocked): Fanny!
Fanny: Wot’s the matter?
Our Reporter: You don’t drink, I hope?
Fanny: Yes, I does—but not what Bob the Swell drinks. I likes water with raspberry jam in it, stirred up. I ’ad some white satin once, but it made me sick. That night Bob drinks beer, and the other gals too. I wasgenteel; I ’ad lemonade. I got a wollopin’ when I got ’ome. Mother was waitin’ for me outside the Good Sir Mary Tun; I tried to dodge ’er, but it was no go; she caught me and give it me. “That’ll teach yer,” she said, “to leave your pore mother with a throat as dry as a salt ’erring, while you go gallivantin’ about with a parcel of boys!” I didn’t mind; it was worth the wollopin’.
Our Reporter: Now, let us talk about Blanche.
Fanny: Yes. ’Ow late she is to-night!
Our Reporter: Have you known her long, Fanny?
Fanny: Ever since she’s bin ’ere.
Our Reporter: About three months?
Fanny: I can’t count. It was a ’ot night—late, and I was cryin’; I couldn’t help it—I wos ’ungry, and mother ’ad been givin’ it to me. Blanche comes up, and arks a lot of questions—just the same as you’ve been doin’; then she brings me ’ome ’ere, and I’ve slept with ’er ever since.
Our Reporter: Does she work?
Fanny: I never seed ’er. She don’t do nothink.
Our Reporter: And no one comes to see her?
Fanny: Not as I knows on. Look ’ere! You don’t want to ’urt ’er, do you?
Our Reporter: No, Fanny. I would like to be a good friend to her, but I am afraid she has put it out of my power. You would be sorry if she went away from you?
Fanny (slowly, after a pause): I don’t know what I should do if she did. Are yer makin’ game of me? Who are yer?
Our Reporter: A friend of yours, Fanny, if you like. Do you see this paper? It was left for you.
Fanny: There’s my name on it. I can readthat. Wot else does it say?
Our Reporter: Listen. (He reads.) “Dear little Fanny. Good bye. If ever I am rich I will try and find you. Look on the mantelshelf.” You were asleep, Fanny, and I looked on the mantel shelf. This was there for you. (He gives her the shilling.)
Fanny (turning the shilling over and over in her hand): I don’t know wot it means. Please read it agin—the fust part.
Our Reporter (after reading the farewell again): It means, Fanny, that Blanche is gone, and that if she is fortunate she will be kind to you by-and-bye.
Fanny’s head sinks on the table, and her little body is shaken with sobs. In vain does our Reporter attempt to comfort her, and at length he is compelled to leave her alone in the humble room in which poor Fanny has learnt a lesson of love which will abide with her, and, let us hope, will purify her days.
THE “EVENING MOON” FOR A TIME TAKES LEAVE OF THE CASE OF ANTONY COWLRICK.
Wehave but little to add to the graphic statement of our Special Reporter. He paid altogether three visits to the house in which Antony Cowlrick’s female friend, Blanche, rented a room; the last visit was paid at noon of this day. His desire was to obtain some information relating to the young woman’s history; he has been unsuccessful. Nothing is known of her history; she made her first appearance in the neighbourhood about three months ago, took a furnished room, lived a quiet life, and did not mix with the neighbours. She was never seen in public-houses, and had no visitors. All that is known of her relates to the little match girl, Fanny, her kindness to whom is the theme of admirationand praise. Her name was Blanche—simply Blanche; she gave and was asked for no other. The police have nothing to say against her. There are few single young women living alone in the locality in which Blanche resided against whom the tongue of scandal is not busy, generally, it must be admitted, with sufficient reason; but nothing has been elicited to the discredit of Blanche. Thus far, her record is a good one.
Nothing has been seen of Antony Cowlrick; he has vanished utterly from the sight of the police, who, although he was acquitted of the charge they brought against him, had determined to keep their eye on him. He has proved himself more than their match. The description given of him by our Special Reporter is that of a man of medium height, probably five feet eight inches, with spare frame, lithe and sinewy. His hair is auburn, and appeared to grow freely. This free growth, and the circumstance of his having been unshaved for weeks, render it difficult to describe his features; all that can be said on this point isthat his face was haggard and distressed, and that there dwelt upon it an expression which denoted deep trouble and perplexity. Every person who has followed this case in our columns, and who has carefully read the accounts we have presented to our readers, must feel a deep interest in the man. The impression he made upon our Special Reporter—the prompt repayment of the sovereign he borrowed—his language and manners—even the collateral evidence supplied by what is known of his friend Blanche—all tell in his favour. And stronger than every circumstance combined are the concluding words of his letter to our Special Reporter. “If you do not know what else to do with the money received by your paper in response to its appeal for subscriptions on my behalf, I can tell you—give it to the poor.” There spoke a man in whose bosom beats the true pulse of a lofty humanity. Antony Cowlrick, who, without doubt, since his release, has read all that has appeared in our columns concerning him, is aware that our last edition of yesterdaycontained a full list of subscriptions sent to our office for him, the total amount being £68 17s. It is a sum worth having, and might be supposed to be especially acceptable to a man in Antony Cowlrick’s apparently destitute condition—a man upon whose person, when he was arrested, was found some stale bread and cheese, and not a penny of money. In the face of this evidence of poverty, Antony Cowlrick has not called for the handsome sum we hold in trust for him, and has instructed us to give it to the poor. We shall do so in a week from this date, unless Antony Cowlrick presents himself at our office to receive it; or unless those who have subscribed object. We trust they will not withdraw their subscriptions, which we promise shall be faithfully and worthily applied in charity’s cause.
Here, then, for the present, we leave the subject which has occupied so large a portion of our space. The man murdered in the house, No. 119 Great Porter Square, lies in his grave, and his murderer is still at large. Any of our readers may have come in contact with himthis very day; we ourselves may have walked elbow to elbow with him in the crowded thoroughfares; and he will, of a certainty, if he be in England, read to-night the words we are now writing. Tremble, thou unspeakable monster! Though thou escape thy doom at the bar of earthly justice, God’s hand lies heavy upon thee, and shall weigh thee down until the Judgment Day, when thou and thy victim shall stand face to face before the eternal throne!
MRS. PREEDY HAS DREADFUL DREAMS.
Soprofound was the sleep of Mrs. Preedy, lodging-house keeper, whom we left slumbering in the first chapter of our story, that we have been able, without disturbing her, to make the foregoing extracts from the copies of theEvening Moonwhich lay on the table immediately beneath her nose. Deep as were her slumbers, they were not peaceful. Murder was in her brain, and it presented itself to her in a thousand hideous and grotesque shapes. Overwhelming, indeed, was her trouble. Only that morning had she said to Mrs. Beale, a bosom friend and neighbour on the other side of the Square—
“I shall never rest easy in my mind till the man’s caught and hung!”
Dreams, it is said, “go by contrary.” Ifyou dream of a marriage, it means death; if you dream of death, it means marriage. Happy augury, then, that Mrs. Preedy should dream that her dead and buried husband, her “blessed angel,” was alive, that he had committed the murder, and that she was putting on her best black to see him hanged. Curious to say, in her unconscious state, this otherwise distressing dream was rather enjoyable, for through the tangled threads of the crime and its punishment ran the refrain of a reproach she used to hurl at her husband, when fortune went against him, to the effect that she always knew he would come to a bad end. So altogether, it was a comfortable hanging—Mr. Preedy being dead and out of the reach of danger, and Mrs. Preedy being alive to enjoy it.
A more grotesque fancy was it to dream that the wooden old impostor in the weather indicator on her mantelshelf was the murderer. This antiquated farmer, who was about four inches in height, unhooked himself from his catgut suspender, slid down to the ground,and stood upon the floor of the kitchen, with Murder in his Liliputian carcase. With no sense of wonder did the dreamer observe the movements of this incredible dwarf-man. He looked around warily, his wooden finger at his wooden lips. All was quiet. He walked to the wall, covering about a quarter of an inch at every step, and rapped at it. A small hole appeared; he vanished through it. The opening was too small for Mrs. Preedy’s body, and the current of her fancies carried her to a chair, upon which she sat and waited for the murderer’s return. The opening in the wall led to the next house, No. 119, and the sleeper knew that, as she waited, the dreadful deed was being done. The wooden old impostor returned, with satisfaction in his face and blood on his fingers, which he wiped on Mrs. Preedy’s apron. He slid up to his bower in the weather indicator, and re-hooked himself on to his catgut suspender, and stood “trembling in the balance,” but perfectly easy in his mind, predicting foul weather.
“Ah, my man,” said Mrs. Preedy, in hersleep, shaking her fist at him, “it will be foul weather for you to-morrow, when I have you taken up and hanged for it!”
Then came another fancy, that he had murdered the wooden young woman in her bower (so that she should not appear as a witness), and that it would never be fine weather any more.
These and other fancies faded and were blotted out, as though they had never been, and a dread silence fell upon the soul of the slumbering woman.
She was alone in a room, from which there was no outlet but a door which was locked on the outside. No person was within hail. She was cut off from the world, and from all chance of help. She had been asleep, dreaming of an incident in her childhood’s days. A dream within a dream.
From the inner dream she was suddenly awakened. Still asleep, and nodding over the table, upon which lay the copies of theEvening Moon, she believed herself to be awake. What had roused her? A footfallupon the stairs in the upper part of the house.
It was a deserted house, containing no other occupant but herself. The door was locked; it was impossible to get out. The very bed in which she lay was a prison; she could not move from it. Afraid almost to breathe, she listened in fear to the sound which had fallen on her sleeping senses.
She knew exactly how the house was built—was familiar with every room and every stair. Another footfall—another—a long pause between each. The man, who was creeping down to her chamber to murder her, was descending the staircase which led from the third to the second floor. He reached it, and paused again.
There was no doubt about his intention. In her dream, it appeared as if she knew the whole history of this murderer, and that he was the terror of every householder in London. He worked in secret, and always with fatal, deadly effect. He left nothing to chance. And Mrs. Preedy was to be his next victim.
She could not avert her doom; she could only wait for it.
From the second floor to the first, step by step, she followed him in her imagination. Slow and sure was his progress. Frantic were her efforts to escape from the bed, but the sheets held her tight, like sheets of steel.
*****
In reality a manwasdescending the stairs to the kitchen. There was something stealthy in his movements which curiously contrasted with a certain air of bravado, which, if it were assumed, was entirely thrown away, as no eye was on him as he crept from the top of the house to the bottom.
*****
In her dream, influenced as dreams are in an excited brain by any sound, however light, Mrs. Preedy accompanied this man in his slow progress from his attic to her kitchen. He reached the landing, which led this way to the street door, and that to the room in which Mrs. Preedy lay in her nightmare of terror. Which direction would he take?
Downwards!—to the bed in which she was imprisoned. Her last moments were approaching.
She strove to think of a prayer, but her tongue clave to the roof of her mouth. Closer—closer—he came. He opened the door, and stood upon the threshold. The louder sound than the sound of his steps aroused her to full consciousness, and, opening her eyes, she confronted him with a face white with fear.
MRS. PREEDY’S YOUNG MAN LODGER.
Thedoor of the kitchen opened outwards into the passage, and the man, turning the handle with his right hand, stood upon the threshold with his left raised and resting, for support, upon the framework. In Mrs. Preedy’s imagination, the concealed hand held the deadly weapon with which she was to be murdered. There was, however, nothing very murderous in the intruder’s face, and when he advanced a step and his arms fell peaceably by his sides, Mrs. Preedy saw, with a sigh of relief, that his hands were empty. This sigh of relief was accompanied by a recognition of the man, in whom she beheld a lodger named Richard Manx, who had been her tenant for exactly three weeks, and wasexactly three weeks in arrear of his rent. Mrs Preedy called him her young man lodger.
He was probably younger than he looked, for his complexion was dark and his black hair was thick and long. His eyes were singularly bright, and had a cat-like glare in them—so that one might be forgiven the fancy that, like a cat’s, they would shine in the dark. He spoke with a slightly foreign accent, and his mode of expression may be described as various, affording no clue to his nationality.
Mrs. Preedy was re-assured. The frightful impressions produced by her dream died away, and the instincts of the professional landlady asserted themselves. “My young man lodger has come to pay his rent,” was her first thought, and a gracious and stereotyped smile appeared on her lips. The sweet illusion swiftly vanished, and her second thought was, “He is drunk.” This, also, did not hold its ground, and Mrs. Preedy then practically summed up the case: “He has come to beg—a candle, a piece of bread, a lump of soap—somethinkhe is in want of, and ain’t got money to pay for. And his excuse is that he is a foringer, or that all the shops are shut. I don’t believe he’s got a penny in his pocket. You don’t deceive me, young man; I wasn’t born yesterday!”
Mrs. Preedy glanced towards the clock, and her glance was arrested on its way by the weather indicator, with the old wooden farmer in full view. Grotesque and improbable as were the fancies in which he had played a tragic part, Mrs. Preedy could not resist the temptation of ascertaining with her own eyes whether the young wooden woman, whom she dreamt he had murdered, was in existence; and she rose and pushed the old farmer into his bower. Out sailed the young woman, with her vacant face and silly leer, as natural as life, and an impetus having been given to the machinery, she and her male companion who had lived under the same roof for years, and yet were absolute strangers to each other (a striking illustration of English manners), swung in and out, in and out,predicting fair weather foul weather, fair weather foul weather, with the most reckless indifference of consequences. In truth, without reference to the mendacious prophets, the weather gave every indication of being presently very foul indeed. Thunder was in the air; the wind was sobbing in the Square, and a few heavy drops of rain had fallen with thuds upon roof and pavement.
The hands of the clock pointed to twelve.
“A nice time,” thought Mrs. Preedy, “to come creeping downstairs into my kitchen! I never did like them foringers! But I’d give anything to get my ’ouse full—whether the lodgers paid or not for a week or two. Did the young man expect to find me out, or asleep? Is there anything goin’ on atween ’im and Becky?”
This dark suspicion recommended itself to her mind, and she readily gave it admittance. It is to be feared that Mrs. Preedy’s experiences had not led her to a charitable opinion of maids-of-all-work. Becky, as Mrs. Preedy called her servant, was a new girl,and had been in her service for nearly a fortnight. Mrs. Preedy had been agreeably disappointed in the girl, whom she did not expect to stay in the house a week. Since the murder at No. 119, she had had eight different servants, not one of whom stayed for longer than a few days—two had run away on the second day, declaring that the ghost of the murdered man had appeared to them on the first night, and that they wouldn’t sleep another in such a place for “untold gold.” But Becky remained.
“Is there anything goin’ on atween ’im and Becky?” was Mrs. Preedy’s thought, as she looked at the clock.
Richard Manx’s eyes followed hers.
“It is—a—what you call wrong,” he muttered.
“Very wrong,” said Mrs. Preedy, aloud, under the impression that he had unwittingly answered her thought, “and you ought to be ashamed of yourself. You may do what you like in your own country, but I don’t allow such goings on in my ’ouse.”
“I was—a—thinking of your watch-clock,” said Richard Manx. “It is not—a—right. Five, ten, fifteen minutes are past, and I counted twelve by the church bells. Midnight, that is it—twelve of the clock.”
“It’s time for all decent people to be abed and asleep,” remarked Mrs. Preedy.
“In bed—ah!—but in sleep—that is not the same thing.Youare not so.”
“I’ve got my business to look after,” retorted Mrs. Preedy. “I suppose you ’aven’t come to pay your rent?”
“To pay? Ah, money! It is what you call it, tight. No, I have not come money to pay.”
“And ’ow am I to paymyrent, I should like to know, if you don’t pay yours? Can you tell me that, young man?”
“I cannot—a—tell you. I am not a weezard.”
Although Mrs. Preedy had fully regained her courage she could not think of a fitting rejoinder to this remark; so for a moment she held her tongue.
She had occupied her house for thirty years, living, until a short time since, in tolerable comfort upon the difference between the rent she received from her lodgers and the rent she paid to the agent of the estate upon which Great Porter Square was situated. It was a great and wealthy estate. Mrs. Preedy had never seen her aristocratic landlord, who owned not only Great Porter Square but a hundred squares and streets in the vicinity, in addition to lovely tracts of woodland and grand mansions in the country. The income of this to-be-envied lord was said to be a sovereign a minute. London, in whose cellars and garrets hundreds of poor wretches yearly die of starvation, contains many such princes.
Richard Manx rented a room in the garret of Mrs. Preedy’s house, for which he had to pay three shillings a week. It was furnished, and the rent could not be considered unreasonable. Certainly there was in the room nothing superfluous. There were a truckle bed, with a few worn-out bed clothes, ajapanned chest of drawers, so ricketty that it had to be propped up with bits of paper under two of its corners, a wreck of a chair, an irregular piece of looking-glass hooked on to the wall, an old fender before the tiniest fire-place that ever was seen, a bent bit of iron for a poker, an almost bottomless coal scuttle, a very small trunk containing Richard Manx’s personal belongings, a ragged towel, and a lame washstand with toilet service, every piece of which was chipped and broken. In an auction the lot might have brought five shillings; no broker in his senses would have bid higher for the rubbish.
“If you ’aven’t come to pay your rent,” demanded Mrs. Preedy, “what’aveyou come for?”
Richard Manx craned his neck forward till his face was at least six inches in advance of his body, and replied in a hoarse whisper:
“I have—a—heard it once more again!”
The effect of these words upon Mrs. Preedy was extraordinary. No sooner had they escaped her lodger’s lips than she startedfrom her chair, upsetting her glass of gin in her excitement, and, pulling him into the room, shut the door behind him. Then she opened the door of the little cupboard in which the servant slept, and called softly:
“Becky!” and again, “Becky! Becky!”
The girl must have been a sound sleeper, for even when her mistress stepped to her bedside, and passed her hand over her face, she did not move or speak. Returning to the kitchen, Mrs. Preedy closed the door of the sleeping closet, and said to Richard Manx:
“Look ’ere, young man, I don’t want none of your nonsense, and, what’s more, I won’t stand none!” And instantly took the heart out of her defiance by crying, in an appealing tone: “Do you want to ruin me?”
“What think you of me?” asked Richard Manx, in return. “No, I wish not to ruin. But attend. You call your mind back to—a—one week from now. It is Wednesday then—it is Wednesday now. I sit up in my garret in the moon. I think—I smoke. Upon my ear strikes a sound. I hear scratching,moving. Where? At my foot? No. In my room? No; I can nothing see. Where, after that? In this house? Who can say? In the next to this? Ah! I think of what is there done, three months that are past. My blood—that is it—turn cold. I cannot, for a some time, move. You tell me, you, that there is no—a—man, or—a—woman, or—a—child in the apartment under-beneath where I sit. I am one myselfinthat room—no wife, no—a—child. I speak myself to—I answer myself to. No— I am not—a—right. Something there is that to me speaks. The wind, the infernal—like a voice, it screams, and whistles, and what you call, sobs. That is it. Like a child, or a woman, or a man for mercy calling! Ah! it make my hair to rise. Listen you. It speaks once more again!”
It was the wind in the streets that was moaning and sobbing; and during the pause, a flash of lightning darted in, causing Richard Manx to start back with the manner of a man upon whom divine vengeance had suddenlyfallen. It was followed, in a little while, by a furious bursting of thunder, which shook the house. They listened until the echoes died away, and even then the spirit of the sound remained in their ears with ominous portent.
“It is an angry night,” said Richard Manx. “I will—a—continue what I was saying. It is Wednesday of a week past. I in my garret sit and I smoke. I hear the sound. It is what you call—a—secret. To myself I think there is in that house next to this the blood of a man murdered. Why shall there not be in this house, to-morrow that rises, the blood of one other man murdered. And that man! Who shall it be? Myself—I. So I rouse my courage up, and descend from my garret in the moon to the door of the street. Creeping—is that so, your word?—creeping after me a spirit comes—not for me to see, not for me to touch—but to hear with my ears. All is dark. In the passage appear you, and ask me what? I tell you, and you laugh—but not laugh well, it is like a cry—and you say, it is—a fancy; it is nothing I hear. And you,with hands so”—(clasping his hands together, somewhat tragically)—“beg of me not to any speak of what I hear. I consent; I say, I will not of it speak.”
“And you ’aven’t?” inquired Mrs. Preedy, anxiously.
Richard Manx laid his hand on his breast. “On my honour, no; I speak not of it. I think myself, ‘The lady of the house is—a—right. I hear only—a—fancy. I will not trouble. I will let to-morrow come.’ It come, and another to-morrow, and another, and still another. Nothing I hear. But to-night—again! I am smoking myself in bed. Be not afraid—I shall not put your house in a fire. It would not be bad. You are what they call insured?” Mrs. Preedy nodded. “Listen you—comes the rain. Ah—and the wind. God in heaven! that fire-flash!”
It blinded them for a moment or two. Then, after the briefest interval, pealed the thunder, with a crash which almost deafened them. Instinctively, Richard Manx drew nearer to Mrs. Preedy, and she also movedcloser to him. At such times as this, when nature appears to be warring against mortals, the human craving for companionship and visible, palpable sympathy most strongly asserts itself.
Either the breaking of the storm, or some other cause, had produced a strange effect upon Becky, whom Mrs. Preedy supposed to be sleeping in the little room adjoining the kitchen; for the girl in her night-dress was kneeling on the ground, with her head close to the door, listening, with her heart and soul in her ears, to the conversation between her mistress and the young man lodger. It would have astonished Mrs. Preedy considerably had she detected her maid-of-all-work in such a position.
The thunder and lightning continued for quite five minutes, and then they wandered into the country and awoke the echoes there, leaving the rain behind them, which poured down like a deluge over the greater part of the city.
IN WHICH BECKY COMMENCES A LETTER TO A FRIEND IN THE COUNTRY.
Onthe following evening, Becky, the maid-of-all-work, having received a reluctant permission from her mistress to go out until ten o’clock, wrote and posted the following letter:—
My darling Fred,—I will now give you an account of all that has passed since I saw your dear face. I could not write to you before to-day, for the reason that I did not get an address until this morning, when I received your dear letter. It was short, but I was overjoyed when the man at the post office gave it to me. He looked at me suspiciously, having a doubt whether I was the person I represented myself to be. I dare say thisremark makes you wonder a little; but you would wonder more if you had seen me when I asked for your letter. Now, be patient, and you will soon learn why.
Patient! Have you not been patient? What other man in the world would have borne what you have borne with such fortitude and courage? None—no, not one! But it is for my sake as well as your own, that, instead of taking your revenge upon the wretches who have persecuted you, you schooled yourself to the endurance of their cruelty, in the hope that the day would come when they would be compelled to set you free. And it came—and you are free! O, my dear! I pray day and night that all will come right in the end.
It seems as if this were going to be a long, long letter, but I cannot help it. I must wander on in my own way, and I have got more than three hours, all to myself.
What have I been doing since you went away? That is what you are asking yourself? Prepare for wonders. I would give you tenthousand guesses, and you would not come near the truth.
You shall be told without guessing. I found it very dull in the lodging you took for me; the days dragged onsoslowly, and I thought the nights would never end.
What did I want? Something to do.
Now, with this in my mind, an inspiration fell upon me one night, and the moment it did so I could not help thinking myself a selfish, idle little woman for not having thought of it before. That sounds rather confused, but you will understand it.
So the very next morning I set about it. How, do you think? And about what?
I went to a poor little shop in a lane in Chelsea, where they sell second-hand clothes, and I bought two common frocks, and some common petticoats, and everything else—boots, cloak, hat—such a hat!—and a bunch of false hair. The clothes were very cheap. I do not know how the woman could have sold them for the money except that the poor creatures who sold them tohermusthave been so near starvation’s door that they were compelled to part with them at any price.
I took them home to my lodgings, and dressed myself in them, put on my false hair, and smudged my face. I looked exactly like the part I intended to play—a servant-of-all-work, ready to go on the stage.
You are burning to know in what theatre I intended to play the part. I will tell you. Don’t start. Great Porter Square.
Of all places in the world (I hear you say) the one place I should wish my little woman to avoid. Your little woman thought differently—thinks differently.
This is what I said to myself: Here is my darling working day and night to get at the heart of a great mystery in which he is involved. He endures dreadful hardships, suffers imprisonment and cruel indignities, and travels hundreds and hundreds of miles, in his endeavour to unravel the mystery which affects his peace and mine—his future and mine—his honour and mine! And here am I, withnothing to do, living close to the very spot where the fearful crime was committed, sitting down in wicked idleness, without making the slightest attempt to assist the man for whom I would cheerfully die, but for whom I would much more cheerfully live. Why should I not go and live in Great Porter Square, assuming such a disguise as would enable me to hear everything that was going on—all the tittle-tattle—all the thousand little things, and words, and circumstances which have never been brought to light—and which might lead to a clue which would help the man I would much more cheerfully live for than die for?
There was no impropriety in what I determined to do, and in what I have done. I must tell you that there is in me a more determined, earnest spirit than you ever gave me credit for. Now that I am actively engaged in this adventure, I know that I am brave and strong and cunning, and a little bird whispers to me that I shall discover something—God alone knows what—which will be of importance to you.
Do you think I shall be debarred by fear of ghosts? I am not frightened of ghosts.
Now you know how it is I arrived at my resolution. Do not blame me for it, and do not write to me to give it up. I do not think I could, even if you commanded me.
I did not make a move until night came. Fortunately, it was a dark night. I watched my opportunity, and when nobody was on the stairs, I glided down in my disguise, slipped open the street door, and vanished from the neighbourhood.
I had never been in Great Porter Square, but it seemed to me as if Imustknow where it was, and when I thought I was near the Square I went into a greengrocer’s shop and inquired. It was quite close, the woman said, just round the corner to the left.
The Square, my dear, as you know, is a very dismal-looking place. There are very few gas lamps in it, and the inclosure in the centre, which they call a garden, containing a few melancholy trees and shrubs, does notadd to its attractiveness. When I came to 119, I crossed the road and looked up at the windows. They were quite dark, and there was a bill in one, “To Let.” It had a very gloomy appearance, but the other houses were little better off in that respect. There was not one which did not seem to indicate that some person was lying dead in it, and that a funeral was going to take place to-morrow.
There were a great many rooms to let in Great Porter Square, especially in the houses near to No. 119. No. 118 appeared to be almost quite empty, for, except in a room at the very top of the house, and in the basement, there was not a light to be seen. I did not wonder at it.
Well, my dear, my walk round the Square did not help me much, so what did I do but walk back to the greengrocer’s shop. You know the sort of shop. The people sell coals, wood, gingerbeer, and lemonade, the day before yesterday’s bunches of flowers, and the day before yesterday’s cabbages and vegetables.
“Didn’t you find it?” asked the woman.
“O, yes,” I replied, “but I didn’t find what I was looking for. I heard that a servant was wanted in one of the houses, and I have forgotten the number.”
“There’s a house in the Square,” said the woman, “where they want a servant bad, but they can’t get one to stop.”
“What’s the number?” I asked.
“No. 118,” the woman answered. “Next to—but perhaps you don’t know.”
“Don’t know what?” I inquired.
“That it’s next door to the house where a murder was committed,” she said.
“What is that to me?” I said. “Ididn’t do it.”
The woman looked at me admiringly. “Well,” she said, “you’ve got a nerve! And you don’t look it, neither. You look delicate.”
“Don’t you go by looks,” I said, “I’m stronger than you think.”
Then I thanked her, and went to No. 118 Great Porter Square, and knocked at the door.
IN WHICH BECKY CONTINUES HER LETTER AND RELATES HOW SHE OBTAINED THE SITUATION AT NO. 118.
I hadto wait a little while before my knock was answered, and then I heard, in a woman’s voice,
“Who’s there?”
“A girl,” I replied. “I heard you were in want of one.”
“Are you alone?”
“Yes.”
The street-door was thrown suddenly open, and a woman appeared on the doorstep, with a lighted candle in her hand, which the wind instantly blew out. The woman was Mrs. Preedy, lodging-house keeper, my present mistress. She tried to see my face, but the night was too dark.
“Wait a minute,” she said; “stand where you are.”
Upon my word, my dear, I believe she was afraid of poor little me.
She retreated into the passage, and re-lit the candle. Shading and protecting it with her hand, she bade me walk in, but not to shut the street-door. I obeyed her, and she examined me, seeming to measure whether she was a match for me in strength.
“How did you know I wanted a servant?” she asked.
“They told me at the greengrocer’s round the corner,” I said.
“Where did you live last?”
I replied promptly, “I have never been in service. But I am sure I should suit you. I am strong and willing, and I don’t mind what I do so long as the place is comfortable.”
“It’s comfortable enough,” she said. “Are you a London girl?”
“No, I come from the country.”
“What made you leave the country?”
I cast down my eyes. “I had a quarrel with my young man.”
Just reflect for a moment, my dear, upon my boldness!
“It ain’t the thing to take a girl without a character,” said Mrs. Preedy.
Upon this I delivered a master-stroke.
“You can consider it in the wages,” I said.
It had an effect upon the woman. “How much do you expect?” she asked.
“I’m not particular,” I answered; “all I want is a comfortable home.”
There were plenty more questions and answers. Mrs. Preedy must have been in a desperate plight for a domestic, or I should have stood a poor chance of being engaged; but engaged I was at £8 a year, “all found,” and I commenced my new life at once by following my mistress into the kitchen, and washing up the plates and dishes, and cleaning the candlesticks. Mrs. Preedy’s eye was on me.
“It’s easy to see,” she said, “that you’ve never been in service before. But I dare sayyou’ll do. Mind! I make my girls pay for all they break!”
I can’t help laughing when I think of her words. Reckoning up the things I have already let slip—(theywilldo it; I can’t prevent them; really I believe they are alive)—I have arrived at the conclusion that the whole of my first month’s wages will be presented to me in broken crockery. My cheerfulness over my misfortunes is a source of considerable astonishment to my mistress.
When I finished washing up the things, I was sent out to “The Green Dragon” for the supper beer, and upon my return, took possession of my very small bedroom, and, unpacking my bundle of clothes (which had already been untied and examined by Mrs. Preedy while I was fetching the supper beer—artful woman!) I went to bed. Mrs. Preedy had no need to tell me to be up early in the morning. I was awake all night, but I was not unhappy, for I thought of you and of the likelihood that I might be able to help you.
My name, my dear, is Becky.
So behold me fairly launched on my adventure. And let me entreat of you, once and for all, not to distress yourself about me. I am very comfortable, and as the house is almost empty there is not much to do. It is astonishing how easily we accustom ourselves to circumstances.
Mrs. Preedy had only one lodger when I entered her service—a bedridden old lady, Mrs. Bailey, who has not left her bed for more than three years. She lives on the first floor in a back room, and is the widow of a soldier who bequeathed to her half-a-dozen medals, and a small annuity, upon which she just manages to live. This is what the old lady herself declares; she has “barely enough—barely enough; not a penny to spare!” But Mrs. Preedy is firm in the belief—popularly shared by every householder in Great Porter Square—that the old lady is very rich, and has a hoard of gold hidden in her apartment, the exact locality being the mattress upon which she lies. As she never leaves her bed, the demonstration of this suspicion is notpracticable without violence to the old lady’s bones and feelings. She pays Mrs. Preedy twelve shillings a week for her room and two meals a day, and she occasionally takes a fancy to a little delicacy, which may cost her about eighteenpence more a week, so it is not difficult to calculate the amount of the annuity.
The days of Mrs. Bailey’s existence should pass wearily enough in all conscience, but she appears to enjoy herself, her chief source of amusement being two birds, a linnet which never sings a note, and a bullfinch that looks as old as Methuselah. Their cages hang on the wall at the foot of the old lady’s bed. They never catch a glimpse of the sun, and their movements have scarcely in them the brisk movement of feathered things. Their hops are languid, and the bullfinch mopes dreadfully.
The old lady was an object of interest to me at once. One by one, shortly after the murder next door was committed, Mrs. Preedy’s lodgers left her. Only Mrs. Baileyremained, the apparent reason being that she was helpless. She appears to have but one friend in the world (not taking her birds into account), a sister older than herself, who comes to spend an afternoon with her once in every month, who is very deaf, almost blind, and who cannot walk without the assistance of a thick stick. The old creature, whose name I do not know, takes snuff, and inspires me with a fear that she will one day suddenly fall all to pieces—in the way that I once saw harlequin in a pantomime do. I have no hope that, if such a dreadful thing happens, she will have a clown at her elbow, as the harlequin had, who in the most marvellous manner put the pieces together and brought them to life again. To see these two old ladies, as I saw them a few days ago, with the languid linnet and the moping bullfinch, is a sight not easy to forget.
Although I have written such a long letter, I have not told you half I intended. To-morrow I will send you another, which I will write to-night, while Mrs. Preedy isasleep. If you think I have nothing to say which has the slightest bearing upon the murder, you are mistaken; but you must restrain your impatience till to-morrow.
My darling, I write in a light vein, I know, but my feeling is deep and earnest. I want to cheer you, if I can, and win a smile from you. Before we met in Leicester Square, on the day you were released, I was serious enough, and in deep trouble; but the moment we were together again, hope entered my heart, and, with that bright angel, a little of the gaiety of spirits in which you used to take delight. Hope is with me now. Receive it from me, if you are despondent. I kiss it into this letter, and send you my heart with it. No—how can I do that, when you have my heart already! And if, with that in your possession, you do not now and then see a ray of light in the midst of your anxieties, I shall call you ungrateful. Adieu, my love for a few hours.
For ever and ever your own,Becky.