'Think not, Allora, that I dread their hate:Nor hate, nor vile conspiracy shall turn me—Still on their own presumptuous heads shall fallThe lightning they invoke for mine; for lowerHangs yon black thunder cloud; and even louderI hear the rumbling of the angry earth.Wait but a moment: then the flash shall shoot;Then shall the thunder roar; the earth shall gape;And where they stood there shall be nothingness.'
'Think not, Allora, that I dread their hate:Nor hate, nor vile conspiracy shall turn me—Still on their own presumptuous heads shall fallThe lightning they invoke for mine; for lowerHangs yon black thunder cloud; and even louderI hear the rumbling of the angry earth.Wait but a moment: then the flash shall shoot;Then shall the thunder roar; the earth shall gape;And where they stood there shall be nothingness.'
'That is your position, Will. For my own part, if I were you, I should prefer safety, and I should not object to revenge.'
'It is true, Jenny.'
'Perhaps. For my own part, I have known a monstrous number of wicked people on whom no lightnings fell, and for whom the earth did never gape. Nothing has happened to them so long as they were gentlemen. With the baser sort, of course, there is Tyburn, and I dare say that feels at the end like the gaping of the earth and the flash of lightning and the roar of the thunder, all together. Even with them some escape.'
I would have quoted the Psalmist, but refrained, because by this time I had made the singular discovery that Jenny seemed to have no knowledge of religion at all. If one spoke in the common way of man's dependence she looked as if she understood nothing: or she said she had heard words to that effect on the stage: if one spoke indirectly of the Christian scheme she showed no response: had I mentioned the Psalmist she would have asked perhaps who the Psalmist was, or where his pieces were played. She never went to church: she never read any books except her own parts. She was sharp and clever in the conduct of affairs: she was not to be taken in by rogues: how could such a woman, considering our mode of education and the general acknowledgment of Christianity, even in an atheistical age, that prevails in our books, escape some knowledge, or tincture, of religion?
'Do not call it revenge,' she insisted. 'In your own safety you should strike: and without delay. I repeat it: I cannot put it too strongly before you. There is a great danger threatening. When Probus finds that the money is really gone, he will become desperate: he will stick at nothing.'
'Since he knows, now, that nothing will persuade me to sell that chance of succession, he will perhaps desist.'
'He will never desist. If you were dead! The thought lies in both their minds. If you were dead! Then that money would be Matthew's.'
'Do you think Mr. Probus will murder me?'
'Not with his own hands. Still—do you think, Will, that when two villains are continually brooding over the same thought, villainy will not follow? If I were you I would take this tale to the Alderman first, and to Probus next, and I should then keep out of the way for six months at least.'
'No.' I said. 'They shall be left to themselves.'
Perhaps I was wrong. Had I told my uncle all, the bankruptcy would have been precipitated and Probus's claim would have been treated with all the others, and even if that large sum had fallen it would have been added to the general estate and divided accordingly.
It was in the afternoon: the sun was sinking westward: it shone through the window upon Jenny as she restlessly moved about the room—disquieted by all she had to tell me. I remember how she was dressed: in a frock of light blue silk, with a petticoat to match: her hair hung in its natural curls, covered with a kerchief—the soft evening sunlight wrapped her in a blaze of light and colour. And oh! the pity of it! To think that this divine creature was thrown away upon my wretched cousin! The pity of it!
'Tell me, Jenny,' I said, 'how you became his wife?'
'Yes, Will, I will tell you,' she replied humbly. 'Don't think that I ever loved him—nor could I endure his caresses—but he never offered any—the only man who never wanted to caress me was my husband—to be sure he did not love me—or anyone else—he is incapable of love. He is a worm. His hand is slimy and cold: his face is slimy: his voice is slimy. But I thought I could live with him, perhaps. If not, I could always leave him.'
She paused a little as if to collect herself.
'Every actress,' she went on, 'has troops of lovers. There are the gentlemen first who would fain make her their mistress for a month: those who would make her their mistress for a year: and those who desire only the honour and glory of pretending that she is their mistress: and then there are the men who would like nothing better than to marry the actress and to live upon her salary—believe me, of all these there are plenty. Lastly, there is the gentleman who would really marry the actress, all for love of her, and for no other consideration. I thought, at first, that your cousin Matthew was one of these.'
'How did you know him?'
'He was brought into the Green Room one night by some gambling acquaintance. I remarked his long serious face, I thought he was a man who might be trusted. He asked permission to wait upon me——'
'Well?' For she stopped.
'I thought, I say, that he was a man to be trusted. He did not look like one who drank: he did not follow other actresses about with his eyes: I say, Will, that I thought I could trust him. He came to my lodging. He told me that he was a rich City merchant: he asked me what I should like if I would marry him and he promised to give it to me—that—and anything else——'
'If you did not love him—Jenny——'
'I did not love him. I will tell you. I wanted to get away from the man I did love; and so I wanted, above all, to be taken away from London and the Theatre into the country, never to hear anything more about the stage. Had he done what he promised, Will, I would have made a good wife to him, although he is a slimy worm. But he did not. He broke his word on the very morning when we came out of church——'
'How?'
'He began by saying that he had a little explanation to offer. He said that when he told me he was a rich merchant—that, indeed, was his reputation: but his position was embarrassed: he wanted money: he wished not to borrow any: he therefore thought that if he married an actress—that class of persons being notorious for having no honour—his very words to me, actually, his very words an hour after leaving the church—he intended to open a gaming-house at which I was to be the decoy. Now you understand why I call him a villain, and a wretch, and a slimy worm.'
'Jenny!'
'I left him on the spot after telling him what he was—I left him—I left the Theatre as well. I had a friend who found me the money to take this place under another name. I have seen the man many times here—last night—and once I called upon him and I made him give me the money to get you out of the Prison, Will.'
'Matthew found that money?'
'Of course, he did. I had none—I went to him and reminded him that he had contributed nothing to the maintenance of his wife, and that he must give me whatever the sum was. He was obliged to give it, otherwise I should have informed the clerks of the Counting-house who I was.'
I laughed. 'Well, but Jenny, there was another man——'
'You are persistent, Sir. Why should I tell you? Well, I will confess. This man protested a great deal less than the others. He was a noble Lord, if that matters. He was quite different from all the rest: he never came to the Green Room drunk: he never cursed and swore: he never shook his cane in the face of footman or chairman: he was a gentle creature—and he loved me and would have married me: well—I told him who and what I was—I will tell you presently—that mattered nothing. He would carry me away from them all. I would have married him, Will: and we should have been happy: but his sister came to see me and she went on her knees crying and imploring me to refuse him because in the history of their family there had never been any such alliance as that with an actress of no family. Would I bring disgrace into a noble family? If I refused, he would forget me, and she would do all in her power for me, if ever I wanted a friend. It was for his sake—if I loved him I would not injure him. And so she went on: and she persuaded me, Will—because, you see, when people pride themselves about their families it is a pity to bring the gutter into it—with Newgate and Tyburn, isn't it?'
'Jenny, what has Newgate got to do with it?'
'Wait and I will tell you. I gave way. It cost me a great deal, Will—more than you would believe—because I had never loved anyone before—and when a woman does love a man——' The tears rose in her eyes,—'and then it was that your cousin came to the Theatre.'
Poor Jenny! And she always seemed so cheerful, so lively, so happy! Her face might have been drawn to illustrate Milton's 'L'Allegra.' How could she look so happy when she had this unhappy love story and this unhappy marriage to think upon?'
'Will,' she cried passionately, 'I am the most unhappy woman in the world.'
I made no reply. Indeed I knew not what there was to say. Matthew was a villain: there can be few worse villains: Jenny was in truth a most injured and a most unhappy woman.
It was growing twilight. What followed was told, or most of it, because I have set down the result of two or three conversations in one, by the light of the fire, in a low voice, a low musical voice—that seemed to rob the naked truth of much of its horrors.
'I told my Lord, Will,' she said, 'what I am going to tell you because I would not have him ignorant of anything, or find out anything—afterwards—but there was no afterwards—which he might think I should have told him before. He has a pretty gift of drawing: he makes pictures of things and people with a pencil and a box of water-colours. I made him take certain sketches for me. He did so, wondering what they might mean.' Here she rose, opened a drawer in a cabinet and took out a little packet tied up with a ribbon. 'First I begged him to sketch me one of the little girls who run about the streets in Soho. There are hundreds of them: they are bare-footed: bare-headed: dressed in a sack, in a flannel petticoat: in anything: they have no schooling: they are not taught anything at all: their parents and their brothers and sisters and their cousins and their grandparents are all thieves and rogues together: what can they become? What hope is there for them? See,' she took one of the pictures out and gave it to me. By the firelight I made out a little girl standing in the street. In her carriage there was something of the freedom of a gipsy in the woods: her hair blew loose in the wind, her scanty petticoat clung to her little figure: she was bare-legged, bare-footed, bare-headed. 'Can you see it, Will? Well—when I had got all the pictures together, I asked the artist to sit down, as I have asked you to-day. And when he was sat down, I had the bundle of pictures in my hand, and I said to him, "My Lord, this is a very pretty sketch—I like it all the better because it shows what I was like at that age." "You, Jenny?" "Yes, my Lord, I myself. That little girl is myself." "Well!" he cried out on the impossibility of the thing. But I assured him of the truth of what I said. Then I took up the next picture. It represented the entrance of a court in Soho. Round this entrance were gathered a collection of men and women with the most evil faces possible. "These, my Lord," I said, "are the people who were once my companions when they and I were young together." "But not now?" he asked. "Not now," I told him, "save that they all remember me and consider me as one of themselves and come to the Theatre in order to applaud me: the highwaymen going to the pit; the petty thieves and pickpockets and footpads to the gallery." Well, at first he looked serious. Then he cleared up and kissed my hand: he loved me for myself, he said, and as regards the highwaymen and such fellows, he would very soon take me out of their way.'
'But, Jenny——'
'Will, I am telling you what I told his Lordship. Believe me, it does not cost me to tell you half as much as it did to tell that noble heart. For he loved me, Will, and I loved him.' Again her eyes glistened by the red light of the fire.
She took up a third picture. It represented a public-house. Over the door swung the sign of a Black Jack: the first story projected over the ground-floor, and the second story over the first: beside the public-house stood a tall church.
'This,' I told my Lord, 'is the Black Jack tavern. It is the House of Call for most of the rogues and thieves of Soho. The church is St. Giles's Church. As for my own interest in the house, I was born there: my mother and sister still keep the place between them: it is in good repute among the gentry who frequent it for its kitchen, where there is always a fire for those who cook their own suppers, and for the drinks, which are excellent, if not cheap. What is the use of keeping cheap things for thieves? Lightly got, lightly spent. There is nothing cheap at that House. My mother enjoys a reputation for being a Receiver of Stolen Goods—a reputation well deserved, as I have reason to believe. The Goods are all stowed away in a stone vault or cellar once belonging to some kind of house—I know not what.'
I groaned.
'That is how my Lord behaved. Then he kissed my hand again. "Jenny," he said, "it is not the landlady of the Black Jack that I am marrying, but Jenny Wilmot." He asked me to tell him more. Will you hear more?'
'I will hear all you desire to tell me, Jenny.'
'Once I had a father. He was a gipsy, but since he had fair hair and blue eyes, he was not a proper gipsy. I do not know how he got into the caravan with the gipsies. Perhaps he was stolen in infancy: or picked up on a doorstep. However, I do not remember him. My mother speaks of him with pride, but I do not know why. By profession he was a footpad and—and'—she faltered for a moment—'he met the fate that belongs to that calling. See!' She showed me a drawing representing the Triumphal March to Tyburn. 'My mother speaks of it as if it was the fitting end of a noble career. I have never been quite able to think so too, and Will, if I must confess, I would rather that my father had not been——'
'Not formed the leading figure in that procession,' I interposed. 'But go on, Jenny.'
She took up another picture and handed it to me. It was a spirited sketch representing a small crowd; a pump; and a boy held under the pump.
'I had two brothers. This was one. He was a pickpocket. What could be expected? He was caught in the act and held under a pump. But they kept him so long that it brought on a chill and he died. The other brother is now in the Plantations of Jamaica.'
She produced another picture. It represented an Orange Girl at Drury Lane. She carried her basket of oranges on her arm: she had a white kerchief over her neck and shoulders and another over her head: her face was full of impudence, cleverness and wit.
'That, Will, is the first step upwards of your cousin's wife. From the gutter to the pit of Drury Lane as an Orange girl. There was a step for me! Yes. I looked like that: I behaved like that: I was as shameless as that: I used to talk to the men in the Pit as they talk—you know the kind of talk. And now, Will, confess: you are heartily ashamed of me.'
'Jenny!' Like the noble Lord, I kissed her fingers. 'Believe me, I am not in the least ashamed of you.'
'The next step was to the stage. That, Will, was pure luck. The Manager heard me imitating the actors and actresses—and himself. He saw me dancing to please the other girls—I used to dance to please the people in the Black Jack. He took a fancy in his head that I was clever. He took me from among the other girls: he gave me instruction: and presently a speaking part. That is the whole history. I have told you all—I never told these things to Matthew—why should I? But to my Lord, I told all——'
'Yes—and he was not ashamed.'
'No—but he did not like the applause of the rogues, and the orange girls. While the highwaymen applauded in the pit and the pickpockets in the Gallery, the Orange Girls were telling all the people that once I was one of them with my basket of oranges like the rest—and so it was agreed that I was to leave the stage and go away into the country out of the way of all the old set.'
'And then.'
'Then I could no longer oblige my Lord. I left it to oblige myself and to marry Matthew.'
She sat down and buried her face in her hands. 'But I loved my Lord,' she said. 'I loved my Lord.'
Jenny finished her story, much as you have heard it, though some has been forgotten.
'And now,' she said, 'I will take you to the very place where I was born. You shall see for yourself the house, and my mother and my sister and the company among whom I was brought up. Wait for a moment while I change my dress. I cannot go like this. And I do not want all of them to learn where I now live.'
She returned in a few minutes dressed in the garb of an orange girl of Drury. Everybody knows how these girls are attired; a frock of the commonest linsey-woolsey; a kerchief over her head tied under her chin: another kerchief round her neck and bosom; her sleeves coming down to her elbows; on her arm a round deep basket filled with oranges. But no orange girl ever had so sweet a face; so fine a carriage; hands and arms so white. Nor could any disguise deprive this lovely creature of her beauty or rob her face of its pure and virginal expression. That such a being should come out of the Black Jack! But then we find the white lily growing beside a haystack or a pigsty and none the less white and delicate and fragrant.
The tavern called the Black Jack stands over against the west front of St. Giles's Church, at the corner of Denmark Street, with a double entrance which has proved useful, I believe, on the appearance of constables or Bow Street runners. The Church which is large and handsome, worthy of better parishioners, stands in the midst of a quarter famous for harbouring, producing and encouraging the most audacious rogues and the most impudent drabs that can be found in the whole of London. As for the Church, of course they never enter it: as for religion, they have never learned any: as for morals, they know of none; as for the laws, they defy them; as for hanging, whipping and imprisonment, they heed them no more than other folk heed the necessity of death or the chances of pain and suffering, before death releases them.
Every man must die, they say. Few people among them live naturally more than forty years or so. Fever, small-pox, ague, carry off most of their class before forty. If, therefore, one takes part in the march to Tyburn at five-and-thirty one does but lose two or three years of life. Then, again, there is the punishment of the lash—that seems very terrible. But every man, rich or poor, has to endure pain; very often pain worse than that of the lash. Certainly, the agony of the whip is not worse than that of rheumatism or gout: it is sooner over: it makes no man any the older: it does not unfit him for his work: after a day or two, he is none the worse for it. As for imprisonment; a prison, if your friends look after you, may be made, with the help of a few companions, as cheerful a place as the kitchen of the Black Jack with drinking and singing and tobacco. This kind of talk is the religion of Roguedom, and since it is so, we may cease to wonder why these people are not deterred by the severity of their punishments. For no punishment can deter when it is not feared: that is beyond question: and since after punishment, the rogue is still regarded as a rogue, whom no one will employ, punishment does not convert. Nor does the prison chaplain effect any miracles in conversion, because no one listens to his exhortations.
Over against the church of St. Giles's, the tavern of the Black Jack lifts its shameless head: the projecting upper windows bend threatening brows against the west end of the Church with its pillars of white stone: the house has villainy written large over all the front: it is covered with yellow places breaking away in lumps and showing the black timbers behind: the roof, of red tiles, is sunken in parts: many of the windows are broken and stuffed with rags.
The ground floor consists of a long low room: at one end is a bar with a counter, behind it casks of beer and rum and shelves with bottles containing cordials: there is a door behind the bar opening to a cellar staircase: and is said to communicate with a subterranean passage leading one knows not whither. It is also rumoured that the cellar, into which no one but the landlady of the Black Jack and her daughter has ever penetrated, is a large stone vault with pillars and arches, the remains of some Roman Catholic building. The kitchen, or public room, is on the ground floor about twelve inches below the level of the street: it is entered by two steps: the window is garnished with red curtains, which on wintry evenings give the place a warm and cheerful look: the bright colour promises a roaring fire and lights and drink. Both in the summer and winter the place is always cheerful because it is always filled with company.
Three or four candles in sconces light up the room, and, in addition, a generous fire always burning every night, adds to the light of the place. The fire is kept up partly for warmth: partly for the convenience of those who bring their suppers with them and cook them on the fire. Also, for their convenience, frying-pans and gridirons are lying ready beside the fireplace: and for the convenience of the punch-drinkers a huge kettle bubbles on the hob. Two tables stand for those who take their supper here. As the food principally in favour consists of bloaters, red herrings, sprats, mackerel, pig's fry, pork, fat bacon, beefsteak and onions, liver and lights and other coarse but savoury dishes, the mingled fragrance makes the air delightful and refreshing. As the windows are never open the air is never free from this fragrance, added to which is the reek, or stench of old beer, rum, gin, and rank tobacco taken in the horrid manner of the lower classes, by means of a clay pipe, not in the more courtly fashion of snuff. Nor must one forget the—pah!—the company—the people themselves, the men and women, the boys and girls who frequent this tavern nightly. Taking all into account, I think it would be difficult, outside Newgate, to find a more noisome den than the kitchen or bar-room of the Black Jack.
All round the room ran a bench: the company sat on the bench, every man with a pipe of tobacco and a mug of drink: the walls were streaming: one felt inclined to run away—out into the fresh air for breath. The space in the middle was mostly kept open for a fight, perhaps: for a dance, perhaps, if a fiddler could be found. Every evening, I believe, there was a fight either between two men, or between two women: or between two boys. What would an Englishman of the baser sort become if he were forbidden to fight?
I describe what I saw after we entered. When Jenny pushed open the door and the breath of that tavern ascended to my nostrils I trembled and hesitated.
'Strong, at first, isn't it?' said Jenny. 'Cousin Will, to stand here and breathe the air that comes up carries me back to my childhood. You are ready to face it? After a little one grows accustomed. They like it, the people inside.' She stood with the handle of the half opened door in her hand. 'Now,' she said. 'You shall visit the Rogues' Delight: the Thieves' Kitchen: the Black Jack: the favourite House of Call for the gallows bird. You shall see what manner of woman is the old lady my mother: and what sort of woman is the young lady my sister.'
'I am ready, Jenny,' I replied, with an effort. One would join a forlorn hope almost as readily.
'Don't mind me. Take no notice whatever I say or do,' she whispered. 'I must humour the wretches. It is more than twelve months since I have been among them. They may resent my absence. However, you keep quiet, and say nothing. Call for drink if you like, and pretend to be an old hand in the place.'
Jenny threw up her head: opened her lips: laughed loudly and impudently: looked round her with an impudent stare: became, in a word, once more, one of the brazen young queans who sell oranges and exchange rude jokes with the gentlemen in the Pit of Drury Lane Theatre. It was a wonderful change. I saw a girl who would perhaps be beautiful if she had preserved any rags or the least appearance of feminine modesty: as for Jenny's sweet and attractive look of innocence, that had vanished. She had, in fact, resumed her former self, and more than her former self. I saw her as she had been. Was there ever before known such a thing that a girl who had never been taught what was meant by feminine modesty should be able to assume, at will, the look of one brought up in a convent—all innocence and ignorance—and, at will, be able to put it off and go back to her former self? No—it is impossible: the innocence of Jenny's face proclaimed the innocence of Jenny's soul.
'Follow me,' she said. 'Keep close, or expect a pewter plate or a pot hurled at your head. They love not strangers.'
She pushed open the door: she descended the steps: I followed. The room was quite full, and the reek of it made me sick and faint for a moment. But to the worst of stinks one quickly grows hardened.
'By——!' cried a voice from out of the smoke. 'It's Madame.'
'Lawks, Mother'—this was a girl's voice-''tis Jenny. Why, Jenny, we all thought you was grown too proud for the Black Jack.'
'Good-evening all,' she cried with a loud coarse laugh; she added, as a finishing stroke of art, a certain click or choking in the middle of the laugh such as one may hear among the lowest sort of women as they walk along the street. 'How are you, mother? You did not expect me to come in to-night, did you? How's business? How are you, Doll? Adding up the figures on the slate as usual? How are you, boys? I haven't seen any of you at the Theatre for a spell. That's because I've been resting. Actresses must rest sometimes. Where have I been? That's my business. Who with? That's my business, too. Now'—she brandished her basket, and walked about among them shaking her petticoats in the way of the impudent orange girls—'choose a fine Chaney orange! Choose a fine Chaney orange! One for your sweetheart, my curly boy? Here is a fine one: pay me when I come again. Doll, chalk up to the gentleman an orange for his girl. One for this pretty country girl? Take it, my beauty. I will tell your fortune presently—a lover and a pile of gold and babies as sweet as this orange.' So she got rid of her oranges, offering and presenting them here and there with the impudence of the craft she assumed, yet with something of her own inimitable grace which she could not quite put off. Then she turned to me. 'Sit down here,' she ordered. 'Lads,' she said, 'I've brought you a friend of mine. He's a fiddler by trade. If you like he will fiddle for you till he puts fire into your toes and springs into your heels.'
'Who is he?' cried a voice. Through the smoke I now recognised the Bishop, formerly of the King's Bench Prison. The reverend gentleman's face was redder and his cheek fuller than when last I saw him. He seemed, however, in better case: he had gotten a new cassock: his bands and his cuffs were of whiter hue: his wig was better shaped and better dressed: it came, I make no doubt, from some place where are deposited the wigs snatched from the passengers in hackney coaches or even in the streets. His looks, however, were certainly more prosperous than when I had seen him last. He did not recognise me, which was as well. Beside him sat the Captain, also more prosperous to all appearance. He wore a purple coat and a fawn-coloured waistcoat: he had rings on his fingers, and his hat was laced with gold: he wore gold buckles: buttons silver gilt and white silk stockings. He looked what he was—a ruffian, a robber, and a swashbuckler. He had a girl on his knee, and one arm round her waist: she was a handsome, red-faced wench dressed up in all kinds of finery, somewhat decayed and second hand. A pipe was between the gallant Captain's lips and a glass of punch was in his right hand. 'Twas a picture of Rogues' Paradise: warmth, light, fire, clothes, drink, tobacco, good company, and a fine girl. What more can a man want?
'Who's your man?' repeated the Bishop. 'We are not going to have strangers here spying on us for what we do. Who is he?'
'Who is he? What's that to you? I shall bring anybody I like to the Black Jack. If you don't like your Company, Bishop, get up and go.' He growled, but made no attempt to rise. 'If'—she appealed to the Company generally—'I choose to bring my fancy man here, am I to ask the Bishop's leave?' Then before there was time for a reply: 'Mother, bustle about. Let every man call for what he wants. Score it to me. This evening I pay for all.'
Her mother, a fat old woman of fifty, red faced, with the look of callous indifference that belongs to such a woman, sat behind the Bar, a piece of knitting in her hand. She got up grumbling.
'Oh! ay,' she said. 'When Jenny comes you must all get drunk at her expense. She'd better give me the money to keep for her. Well—what shall it be? Doll, stir about: stir about—you leave it all to me. Ask the gentlemen what they will take. And the ladies too. Whatever they like. Jenny pays to-night. Whatever they like—that's Jenny's way—whatever they like so that it ruins my poor girl.'
Doll, the other daughter, made no response. She was continually occupied with the slate, and I suppose she was slow at calculation for she kept adding up over and over again, wiping out with her wet finger and adding up again. The Black Jack refused credit as a rule: most of the company had to pay for what they called for on the spot; but there were a few to whom limited credit was granted, as a privilege.
The girl called Doll, I remarked, was not in the least like her sister. She had black hair and a somewhat swarthy complexion and appeared to belong, as indeed she did, to the people called gipsies. The mother had also the same black hair and dark skin. Strange, that a girl of Jenny's complexion with her fair hair, blue eyes, and peach-like skin, should come of the same stock. I sought in vain for any likeness between Jenny and this girl. I thought that she might present the same features with a difference: debased: but I could find none. She wore a red kerchief tied round her head, a red ribbon tied round her neck: a red scarf tied round her waist. In her way she was a handsome girl: in her manners she showed no inclination to oblige the company or to be civil to them. She paid no heed when her mother bade her stir about. On the contrary, she went on with her sums on the slate.
It was Jenny who ran round laughing and joking with the men, ordering punch for one and gin for another. Most of the company regarded her with bewilderment. It was long since she had been among them: they knew something about her: she was the daughter of the house: she had been an orange girl at Drury: she had been an actress at the same theatre: some of them had seen her there: then she disappeared, and no one knew where she was.
One young fellow there was who sat on the bench with hanging head. He had apparently no friends among the company. 'Here,' cried Jenny, 'is a lad half awake. What art doing here, friend?' The lad shook his head mournfully. 'Hast any money?' He shook his head again. Jenny pulled out a piece of silver. 'Go,' she said. 'Get food, and'—she whispered—'come back here no more. Go—get thee home again.' And so, let me believe, she saved one lad that night from the gallows. For he got up slowly and walked out.
There was another lad also from the country whose fresh cheek and country dress betokened the fact. He sat sheepishly, as a new comer.
Jenny stopped before him. 'And pray what do they call thee, Sirrah? Jack? 'Twill serve. What lay is it, Jack? Oh! Shop-lifting?' He nodded. 'For Mr. Merridew?' she whispered. He nodded again. 'Drink punch, Jack, and forget thyself awhile.'
Some of the men were dressed like the Captain, but not so fine: the buttons had been cut off their coats and their shoes had lost the buckles. There were boys among them: boys who had none of the innocence of childhood; their faces betrayed a life of hunting and being hunted: they were always on the prowl for prey or were running away and hiding. They had all been whipped, held under the pump, thrown into ponds, clapped in prison. They were all doomed to be hanged. In their habits of drink as in their crimes, they were grown up. In truth there were no faces in the whole room which looked more hopeless than those of the boys.
The women, of whom there were nearly as many as there were men, were either bedizened in tawdry finery or they were in rags: some wearing no more than a frock stiffened by the accumulation of years, black leather stays, and a kerchief for the neck with another for the head: their hair hung about their shoulders loose; and undressed: it was not unbecoming in the young, but in the older women it became what is called rats' tails. With most of the men, their dress was simple and scanty. Shirts were scarce: stockings without holes in them were rare: buttons had mostly vanished.
Most of them, I observed further, had an anxious, hungry look: not the look of a creature of prey which has always in it something that is noble: but the look of one insufficiently fed. I believe that the ordinary lot of the rogue is, even on this earth, miserable beyond expression: uncertain as to food: cruelly hard in cold weather in the matter of raiment.
In a little while they were all happy: happier, I am sure, than they had been for a long time. While they drank and while they talked, I observed among them a veritable brotherhood. The most successful rogue—he in gold lace—was hail fellow with the most ragged. And although the successful rogue stood the nearest to the gallows, and he knew it and the other rogue knew it, yet the beginner envied the success of his brother as a soldier envies the successful general. They drank and laughed: they drank more and they laughed more. Then the Captain called silence for a song.
'Now, you fiddler!' he cried with a curse. 'Sit up, man, and show us how you can play.'
The tune, the Captain told me, was 'The Warbling of the Lark.' I struck up that air which every frequenter of Vauxhall, or even the Dog and Duck, knows very well, and the Captain began his song.
Now in such a company I expected a song in praise of Roguery and Robbery; or at least something of the kind introduced in Gay's Opera. On the contrary, the song which the Captain gave us was a sentimental ditty which you may hear at any Pleasure Garden on a summer evening: it was all about the flames of love which could only be extinguished by Chloe: and a broken heart: and darts and groves, and, in fact, a song such as would be sung in a concert before a party of ladies. The fellow had a good voice, and rolled out his lovesick strains to the admiration of the women, some of whom even shed tears. This is the kind of song they like: not the song in praise of a Highwayman's life, because in matters of imagination these women are but poorly provided, and they always see the reality beyond the words, and if they love the man his certain end makes them unhappy. But hearts, and flames and love! That, if you please, which is unreal, seems real.
When he finished, Jenny sprang to her feet. I will dance for you, lads.' She turned to me. 'Play up—the Hey.'
She ran into the middle of the room, bowed to the people as if she had been on the stage, and danced with such grace and freedom and simplicity that it ravished my heart. Her sister, I observed, went on adding up figures on the slate without paying the least attention to the performance.
'Ah!' said her mother growing confidential. 'Thus would she dance when she was quite a little thing on the stones in front of the church, when the fiddler played in the house. A clever girl, she was, even then, a clever girl! You are her friend. I hope, Sir, that you are going to behave handsome by my girl. You look like one of the right sort. Make over, while there is time. I will keep the swag for you—you may trust the poor girl's mother. Many a brave fellow she might have had: many a brave fellow: they come and go——I wish you a long rope young man, if so be you're kind to my girl. Life is short—what odds, so long as 'tis merry? Where do you work, if I may ask?'
'Jenny will tell you, perhaps,' I replied.
'I don't know, I don't know. Since she left off the orange line, Jenny hasn't been the same to her old mother: not to tell her things, I mean, and to take her advice. I should have made her rich by this time if she had taken my advice.'
'Many people like to have their own way, don't they?'
'They do, Sir—they do—to their loss.' She took another pull at the punch and began to get maudlin and to shed tears—while she enlarged upon what she would have done had Jenny only listened to her. I gathered from her discourse that the old gipsy woman, like the whole of her tribe, was without a gleam or a spark of virtue or goodness. Her nature was sordid and depraved through and through. With such a mother—poor Jenny!
Suddenly the old woman stopped short and sat upright with a look of terror.
'Good Lord!' she murmured. 'It's Mr. Merridew!'
At sight of the new-comer standing on the steps a dead silence fell upon the whole Company. All knew him by name: those who knew his face whispered to each other: all quailed before him; down to the meanest little pickpocket, they knew him and feared him. Every face became white; even the faces of the women who shook with terror on account of the men. I observed the girl on the Captain's knee catch him by the hand and place herself in front of him, as if to save him. Then his arm left her waist and she slipped down and sat humbly on the bench beside her man. Thus there was some human affection among these poor things. But the Captain's face blanched with terror and the glass that he was lifting to his lips remained halfway on its journey. The Bishop's face could not turn white, in any extremity of fear, but it became yellow—while his eyes rolled about and he grasped the table beside him in his agitation. Doll, I observed, after a glance to learn the cause of the sudden silence went on sucking her fingers, rubbing out the figures on the slate and adding them up again.
'Who is it?' I whispered to Jenny.
'Hush! It's the thief-taker: they are all afraid that their time has come. If he wants one of them he will have to get up and go.'
'Won't they fight, then? Do they sit still to be taken?'
'Fight Mr. Merridew? As well walk straight to Tyburn.'
The man was a large and heavy creature, having something of the look of a prosperous farmer. His face, however, was coarse and brutal. And he looked round the terrified room as if he was selecting a pig from a herd, with as much pity and no more! This was the man whose perjuries had added a new detainer to my imprisonment. I could have fallen upon him with the first weapon handy, but refrained.
He came into the room. 'Your place stinks, Mother,' he said, 'and it's so thick with tobacco and the steam of the punch that a body can't see across.'
'To be sure, Mr. Merridew,' the old woman apologised. 'If we'd known you were coming——'
'There would have been a large company, would there not?'
'Well, Sir, you see us here, as we are, as orderly and peaceful a house as your Worship would desire.'
The fellow grinned. 'Orderly, truly, mother. It is a quiet and a well-conducted company, isn't it? These are quiet and well-conducted girls are they not?' He chucked one of the girls under the chin.
'As much as you like—there,' said the girl, impudently, 'so long as you keep your fingers off my neck.'
At this playful allusion to his profession, that of sending people to the gallows, Mr. Merridew laughed and patted the girl on the cheek. 'My dear,' he said, 'if you were on my list you should get rich and you should have the longest rope of any one.'
'The man,' Jenny told me afterwards, 'is the greatest villain in the whole world. He is a thief-taker by profession.'
'You mean, he informs and takes the reward.'
'Yes: but he makes the thing which he sells. He lays traps for pickpockets and such small fry and while he has them in his power he encourages them to become bigger rogues who will be worth more to him. Do you understand? A highwayman is worth about eighty pounds' reward to him: a man returned from transportation before his time is worth no more than forty. He does not therefore give up the returned convict until he has returned to his highway robberies. All those fellows you saw last night are in his power. The Captain is a returned convict whose time must before long be up, for Merridew only allows a certain amount of rope. He says he cannot afford more. As for the Bishop, he will go on longer: he is useful in many other ways: he can write letters and forge things and invent villainies: he persuades the young fellows to take to the road. I think he will be suffered to go on as long as his powers last.'
'Why was your mother so terrified?'
Jenny hesitated. 'Because—I told you, but you do not understand—because she, too, is in his power for receiving stolen goods. My mother is what they call a fence. Oh!' she shook herself impatiently: 'they are all rogues together. I wonder I can ever hold up my head. To think of the Black Jack and the Company there!'
The Captain sprang to his feet with an effort at ease and politeness. 'What will your Honour think of us?' he cried. 'Gentlemen, Mr. Merridew is thirsty and no one offers him a drink. Call for it, sir—call for the best this house affords.'
'Punch, mother,' the great man replied. 'Thank you, Captain.'
Then the Bishop, not to be outdone, got up too. 'Gentlemen,' he said, 'let us all drink to the health of Mr. Merridew. He is our truest friend. Now, gentlemen. Together. After me.' He held up his hand. They watched the sign and all together drank and shouted—hollow shouts they were—to the health of the man who was going to sell them all to the hangman. I wondered that they had not run upon him with their knives and despatched him as he stood before them, unarmed. But this they dared not do.
Mr. Merridew acknowledged the compliment. 'Boys and gallant riders,' he said, 'I thank you. There was a friend of ours whom I expected to find here, but I do not see him.' He looked round the room curiously. I think he enjoyed the general terror. 'No matter, I shall find him at the Spotted Dog.'
Every one breathed relief. No one, then, of that company was wanted. The Captain sat down and drank off a whole glass of punch: the rest of the men looked at each other as sailors might look whose ship has just scraped the rock.
'I like to look in, friendly, as it might be,' Mr. Merridew went on, 'especially when I don't want anybody—just to see you enjoying yourselves, happy and comfortable together, as you should be. There's no profession more happy and comfortable, is there? That's what I always say, even to the ungrateful. Plenty to eat: no work to do: no masters over you: girls, and drink, and music, and dancing, every night. Find me another trade half so prosperous. Mother, I'll take a second glass of punch. I drink your healths—all of you—Bless you!' The fellow looked so brutal, and so cunning that I longed to kill him as one would kill a noxious beast.
'A long rope and a merry life,' he went on. 'It is not my fault, gentlemen, that the rope is not longer. The expenses are great and the profits are small. Meantime, go on and prosper. You are all safe under my care. Without me, who knows what would happen to all this goodly company? A long rope, I say, and a merry life.'
He tossed off his glass and went out.
When he was gone, the talk began again, but it was flat. The mirth had gone out of the party. It was as if the Angel of Death himself had passed through the room.
I played to them, but only the boys would dance: Jenny asked them to sing, but only the girls would sing, and, truth to say, the poor creatures' efforts were not musical. They drank, but moodily. The Captain took glass after glass, but his arm had left the girl's waist: she now sat neglected on the bench beside him. The Bishop, sobered by the fright, said nothing, but sat with his eyes fixed upon the sanded floor, shuddering. He thought his time had come, and the shock made him for the moment reflect. Yet what was the good of reflecting? They were in the hands of a relentless monster: he would sell them when it was worth his while to put younger men in their place. They tried to forget this, but from time to time, his presence, or the absence of one of their Company, reminded them and then they were subdued for a time. It filled me with pity: it made me think a little better of them that they should be capable of being thus affected.
Jenny touched my arm. 'Come,' she said. 'Let us be gone.' So without any farewells she led the way out. The old woman, by this time, was sound asleep beside her half finished glass: and Doll was still adding up the figures on her slate, putting her finger in her mouth, rubbing out and adding up again.
Outside, the tall white spire of St. Giles's looked down upon us. In the churchyard the white tombs stood in peace, and overhead the moon sailed in splendour.
Jenny drew a long breath: she caught one of the rails of the churchyard and looked in curiously.
'Will,' she said shuddering, 'I am ashamed of myself because the manners and the talk come back to me so easily. Once I am with them, I become one of them again. I tremble when the man Merridew appears. It is as if he will do me, too, a mischief some day. I cannot forget the old times and the old talk. Yet I know how dreadful it is. Look at the graves, Will. Under them they sleep so quiet; they never move: they don't hear anything: and beside them every night collects this company of gaol-birds and Tyburn birds. Why, they don't shiver and shake when Mr. Merridew looks in.'
'Let us get back, Jenny.' I shuddered, like all the rest.
'Will, I have seen that man—that monster—that wretch—for whom no punishment is enough—three times. Each time I have felt that, like the rest of those poor rogues, my own life was in his hands. Do you think he can do me a mischief? Why do I ask? I know that he will. I am never wrong.'
'What mischief, Jenny, could he do?'
'I don't know. It is a prophetic feeling. But who knows what such a villain may be concocting? Good-night, you happy people in the graves. Good-night.'
I drew her away, and walked with her to her own door in the Square.
'Will?' she asked, 'what do you think of me now?'
'Whatever I think, Jenny, I am all wonder and admiration that you are—what you are—when I see—what you might have been.'
She burst into tears. She flung her empty basket out into the road. 'Oh,' she cried, 'if I could escape from them! If I could only escape from them for ever! I should think nothing too terrible if only I could escape from them!'
A month or two later I remembered those words. Nothing too terrible if only she could escape from them!
As soon as we had once more found the means of keeping ourselves we went back to our former abode under the shadow of Lambeth Church on the Bank looking over the river on one side and over the meadows and orchards of Lambeth Marsh on the other. The air which sweeps up the river with every tide is fresh and strong and pure; good for the child, not to speak of the child's mother, while the people, few in number, are generally honest though humble: for the most part they are fishermen.
Here I should have been happy but for the thought, suggested by Jenny, that my cousin and his attorney Probus were perhaps devising some new means of persecution, and that the man Merridew, who had perjured himself concerning me already, whose sinister face I had gazed upon with terror, so visibly was the mark of Cain stamped upon it, was but a tool of the attorney.
Yet what could they devise? If they swore between them another debt, my patron Jenny promised to provide me with the help of a lawyer. What else could they do? It is a most miserable feeling that someone in the world is plotting your destruction, you know not how.
However, on Sunday afternoon—it was in November, when the days are already short, we had a visit from my father's old clerk, Ramage.
He was restless in his manner: he was evidently in some anxiety of mind. After a few words he began:
'Mr. Will,' he said, 'I have much to say. I have come, I fear, to tell you something that will make you uneasy.'
'I will leave you alone,' said Alice, taking up the child.
'No, Madam, no, I would rather that you heard. You may advise. Oh! Madam, I never thought the day would come that I should reveal my master's secrets. I eat his bread; I take his wages: and I am come here to betray his most private affairs.'
'Then do not betray them, Mr. Ramage,' said Alice. 'Follow your own conscience.'
'It ought to be your bread and your wages, Mr. Will, and would have been but for tales and inventions. Sir, in a word, there is villainy afloat——'
'What kind of villainy?'
'I know all they do. Sir, there is that sum of one hundred thousand pounds in the hands of trustees, payable to the survivor of you two. That is the bottom of the whole villainy. Well, they are mad to make you sell your chance.'
'I know that.'
'Mr. Matthew, more than a year ago, offered Mr. Probus a thousand pounds if he could persuade you to sell it for three thousand.'
'That is why he was so eager.' This was exactly how Jenny read the business.
'Yes, he reported that you would not sell, he said that if it was made worth his while, he would find a way to make you.'
'That is why he put me in the King's Bench, I suppose?'
'That was agreed upon between them. Sir, if ever there was an infamous conspiracy, this was one. Probus invented it. He said that he would keep you there till you rotted; he said that when you had been there four or five months you would be glad to get out on any terms. You were there for a year or more. Probus sent people to report how you were looking. He told Mr. Matthew with sorrow that you were looking strong and hearty. Then you were taken out. They were furious. They knew not who was the friend. An attorney named Dewberry had done it. That was all they could find out. I know not what this Mr. Dewberry said to Mr. Probus, but certain I am that they will not try that plan any more.'
'I am glad to hear so much.'
'Mr. Will, there is more behind. I know very well what goes on, I say. A little while after the death of your father, when the Alderman retired and Mr. Matthew was left sole active partner, he began to borrow money of Mr. Probus, who came often to see him. I could hear all they said from my desk in the corner of the outer counting-house.'
'Ay! Ay! I remember your desk.'
'Sitting there I heard every word. And I am glad, Mr. Will—I ought to be ashamed, but I am glad that I listened. Well. He began to borrow money of Mr. Probus at 15 per cent, on the security of the business. Anyone would lend money to such a house at 10 per cent. He said he wanted to put the money into the business; to buy new ships and to develop it. This made me suspicious. Why? Because our House, in your father's time, Sir, wanted no fresh capital; it developed and grew on its own capital. This I knew. The business wanted no new capital. What did he borrow the money for then?'
'I know not, indeed.'
'He bought no new ships: he never meant to buy any. Mr. Will, to my certain knowledge'—here his voice deepened to a whisper, 'he wanted for some reason or other more ready money. I am certain that he has got through all the money that your father left him: I know that he has sold some of the ships: he has mortgaged the rest; the business of the House decays and sinks daily; he has got rid of all the money that Mr. Probus advanced him. It was £25,000, for which he is to pay 15 per cent. on £40,000. 'Tis a harpy—a shark—a common rogue!'
'How has he lost this money?' I pretended not to know: but, as you have heard, I knew, perfectly well.
'That, Sir, I cannot tell you. I have no knowledge how a man can, in three years, get through such an amazing amount of money and do so much mischief to an old established business. But the case is as I tell you.'
'This is very serious, Ramage. Does my uncle know?'
'He does not, Sir. That poor man will be a bankrupt in his old age. It will kill him. It will kill him. And I must not tell him. Remember that most of what I tell you is what I overheard.'
'I think that my uncle ought to know.' I remembered Jenny's advice. Here was another opportunity. I should have told him. But I neglected this chance as well.
'I cannot tell him, Sir. There is, however, more. This concerns you, Mr. Will. Yesterday in the afternoon Mr. Probus came to the counting-house. He came for the interest on his money. Mr. Matthew told him, shortly, that it was not convenient to pay him. Mr. Probus humbly explained that he had need of the money for his own occasions. Now Mr. Matthew had been drinking; he often goes to the tavern of a forenoon and returns with a red face and heavy shoulders. Perhaps yesterday he had been drinking more than was usual with him. Otherwise, he might not have been so plain-spoken with his creditor. "Mr. Probus," he said, "it is time to speak the truth with you. I cannot pay you the interest of your money—either to-day or at any other time."
'"Cannot ... cannot ... pay? Mr. Halliday, what do you mean?"
'"I say, Sir, that I cannot pay your interest ... and that your principal, the money you lent me—yes—your £25,000—is gone. You'll never get a penny of it," and then he laughed scornfully. I heard Mr. Probus's step as he sprang to his feet, I heard him strike the table with his open hand. His face I could not see.
'"Sir," he cried, "explain. Where is my money?"
'"Gone, I say. Everything is gone. Your money; my money; all that I could raise—my ships are sold; the business is gone: the creditors are gathering. Probus, I shall be a bankrupt in less than three months. I have worked it out; I can play one against the other, but only for three months. Then the House must be bankrupt."
'"The House—bankrupt?—this House—Halliday Brothers? You had a hundred thousand of your own when you succeeded. You had credit: you had a noble fleet: and a great business. And there's your father's money in the business as well. Itcan'tbe gone."
'"It is gone—I tell you—all gone—my money, Probus—integer vitae—that's gone: and your money, old Scelerisque Probus. That's gone too. All gone—all gone." To be sure he was three parts drunk. I heard Mr. Probus groan and sink back into his chair. Then he got up again. "Tell me," he said again, "tell me, you poor drivelling drunken devil—I'll kill you if you laugh. Tell me, where is the money gone?"
'"I don't know," his voice was thick with drink, "I don't know. It's all gone. Everything's gone."
'"I lent you the money to put into the business—it must be in the business still."
'"It never was in the business. I tell you, Probus—it's all gone."
'There was silence for a few minutes. Then Mr. Probus said softly, "Mr. Halliday, we are old friends—tell me that you have only been playing off a joke upon me. You are a little disguised in liquor. I can pass over this accident. The money is in the business, you know; in this fine old business, where you put it when you borrowed it."
'"It's all gone—all gone," he repeated. "Man, why won't you believe? I tell you that everything is gone. Make me a bankrupt at once, and you will share with the creditors: oh! yes, you will be very lucky: you will divide between you the furniture of the counting-house and the empty casks on the Quay."
'Then Mr. Probus began to curse and to swear, and to threaten. He would throw Mr. Matthew into prison and keep him there all his life: he would prosecute him at the Old Bailey: he called him thief, scoundrel, villain: Mr. Matthew laughed in his drunken mood. He would not explain how the money was lost: he only repeated that it was gone—all gone.
'Mr. Will—I know that he was speaking the truth. I had seen things done—you cannot hide things from an old accountant who keeps the books: cargoes sold at a sacrifice for ready money: ships sold: our splendid fleet thrown away: there were six tall vessels in the West India trade: one was cast away: the underwriters paid for her. Where is that money? Where are the other five ships? Sold. Where is that money? Our coffers are empty: there is no running cash at the Bank: the wharf is deserted: clerks are dismissed: creditors are put off. I know that what Mr. Matthew said was true: but for the life of me I cannot tell what he has done with the money unless he has thrown it into the river.
'Then I think that Mr. Matthew took more drink, for he made no more reply, and Mr. Probus, after calling him hog and beast and other names of like significance, left him.
'When he came out of the counting-house he was like one possessed of a devil: his face distorted: his eyes blood-shot: his lips moving: his hands trembling. Sir, although he is a villain I felt sorry for him. He has lost all that he cared for: all that he valued: and since he is now old, and can make no more money, he has lost perhaps his means of livelihood.'
Ramage paused. Alice brought him a glass of beer, her own home-brewed. Thus refreshed, he presently went on again.
'After two days Probus came again to the counting-house. Mr. Matthew was sober.
'"Probus," he said, "I told you the other day when I was drunk what I should have kept from you if I was sober. However, now you know what I told you was the truth."
'"Is it all true?"
'"It is all true. Everything is gone."
'"But how—how—how?" I heard his lamentable cry and I could imagine his arm waving about.
'"This way and that way. Enough that it is all gone."
'"Mr. Matthew," I think he sat down because he groaned—which a man cannot do properly—that is to say movingly, unless he is sitting—"I have been thinking—Good God! of what else could I think? You can keep yourself afloat for three months more, you say—Heavens! Halliday Brothers to go in three months! And my money! Where—where—where has it gone?"
'"In about three months—or may be sooner, the end must come."
'"Mr. Matthew," he lowered his voice, "there is one chance left—one chance—I may get back my money—by that one chance."
'"What chance? The money is all gone."
'"If we can make your cousin part with his chance of the succession, we can raise money on it before the bankruptcy—we can divide it between us."
'"Put it out of your thoughts. My cousin is the most obstinate self-willed brute that ever lived. You couldn't bend him with the King's Bench Prison. You cannot bend him now."
'"I will try again. He is still poor. He plays the fiddle at some wretched gardens I believe. He lives where he did before—I know where to find him. I will try again. If I succeed we could raise say £50,000 upon the succession, it should be more but you are both young. Let me see, that will be £40,000 for me; £6,000 interest due to me: that makes £46,000 for me and £4,000 for you."
'"No, friend Probus. You have lent me £25,000. That you shall take and no more. If you are not content with that you shall have none. Remember that the money must be raised by me for my own use, not by you. Get him to sign if you can—and you shall have back all your money, but without any interest. If you think you are going to get all this money for yourself, let me tell you that you are mistaken."
'Mr. Matthew can be as hard as—as your father, sometimes. He was hard now. Well, the pair wrangled over these terms for a long time. At last it was arranged that if Mr. Probus can persuade you to sign the paper which he is to bring you he is to take £25,000 and interest on that and not on the alleged £40,000, at 15 per cent. And Mr. Matthew is to pay you the sum required to buy out. When they had completed this arrangement Mr. Probus started another line of discourse. Now listen to this, Mr. Will, because it concerns you very closely.
'"If," he said, "your cousin were to die—actually to die——"
'"He won't die. I wish he would."
'"I said—If he were to die—you would then immediately take over £100,000 together with the interest at 5 per cent. already accumulated for three years, namely, about £115,000. That would put all square again. You could get back some of your ships and your credit."
'"What's the use? Man, I have told you—my cousin is a selfish, unfeeling, obstinate Brute. He won't die."
'"I said. If he were to die. That is what I said. If he were to die."
'Then there was silence for a space.
'"Probus," said Mr. Matthew, "I believe you are a devil. Tell me what you mean. We can't make him die by wishing."
'"I was only supposing: If he were to die—strange things have happened—would you be disposed to let me take the half of that money—say £55,000?"
'"If he were to die," Mr. Matthew repeated. "Have you heard, by accident, that he is ill? Has he taken small-pox, or gaol fever? I did hear that was gaol fever in Newgate some time ago."
'"No: on the contrary, I believe that he is in perfect health at present. Still, he might die. Anybody may die, you know."
'"Why do you say that he may die?"
'"I only put the case. Anybody may die. What do you say about my proposal?"
'"You call it a proposal—Man—you look like a murderer—are you going to murder him?"
'"Certainly not. Well—what do you say?"
'"Well—if you are not going to murder him, what do you mean?"
'"Men die of many complaints, besides murder. Some men get themselves into the clutches of the law——"'
When Ramage said this, I became suddenly aware of a great gulf opening at my feet with a prospect of danger such as I had never before contemplated. I thought that the man might swear upon me some crime of which I was innocent and so bring it home to me by a diabolical artifice that I should be accused, found guilty, and executed. I reeled and turned pale.
Alice caught my hand. 'Have faith, my dear,' she said.
Yet the thought was like a knife piercing me through and through. I could not afterwards shake it off. And I made up my mind—I know not why—that the charge would take the form of an accusation of forgery.
'"Probus," said Mr. Matthew, "I will have nothing to do with this——"
'"Sir, you need not. Give me your word only, your simple word that if your cousin refuses to sign the paper I shall lay before him, so that you cannot raise money on that succession—and if within two months of this day your cousin dies, so that you will succeed before you are bankrupt, I am to take half that money in full discharge of all my claims. That is all. I will leave you now, to think the matter over."
'He went away. The next day he returned, bringing with him a man whom I had never seen before.
'"Mr. Matthew," he said, "I have brought you a gentleman whose acquaintance with our criminal law is vast—probably unequaled. His name, Sir, is Merridew."
'"His honour says no more than what is true," said Mr. Merridew. "I know more than most. I understand you want me to advise you on a little matter of prosecution. Well, Sir, I can only say that if you want a friend put out of the way, so to speak, nothing is easier, for them that knows how to work the job and can command the instruments. It is only a question of pay." Then they talked in whispers and I heard no more. When they were gone Mr. Matthew began to drink again.
'That is all, Mr. Will. But have a care. You now know what to expect, sir; there will be no pity from any of them. Have a care. Go away. Go to some place where they cannot find you. Sir, the man Probus is mad. He is mad with the misery of losing his money. There is nothing that he will not do. He is a money-lender: his money is all in all to him: his profession and his pride and everything. And he has lost his money. Go out of his way.'
'Is that all, Ramage?'
'Yes, Sir. That is all I had to say.'
'Then, my old friend, you have come just in time, for if I mistake not there is Mr. Probus himself walking across the meadow with the intention of calling here. You could not have chosen a better time.' Indeed, that was the case. The man was actually walking quickly across the Marsh. 'Now, Ramage,' I said, 'it would be well for you to hear what he has to say. Go into the kitchen and wait with the door ajar—go. Alice, my dear, stay here with me.'
'Remember, Will,' she said, 'it was your father's last command. To sell it would be to sell your father's forgiveness—a dreadful thing.'
The man stood at the open door. Ramage was right. He looked truly dreadful. Anxiety was proclaimed in his face, with eagerness and courage: he reminded me of a weasel, which for murderous resolution is said to surpass the whole of the animal creation. He came in blinking after the light and offered me his hand, but I refused it.
'Fie!' he said. 'Fie, Mr. Will! This is ill done. You confuse the attorney's zeal for his clients with an act of hostility to yourself. Put that out of your thoughts, I pray.'
'Why do you come here, Mr. Probus?'
'I said to myself: It is not easy to catch a man of Mr. William's reputation at home, his society being eagerly sought after. I will therefore visit him on Sunday. Not in the morning, when he will be lifting the hymn in Church: but in the afternoon. I came here straight from St. George's, Borough, where I sometimes repair for morning service. A holy discourse, Mr. William, moving and convincing.' His eyes kept shifting to and fro as he spoke.
'Very likely. But we will not talk about sermons. Look ye, Mr. Probus, your presence here is not desired. Say what you have to say, and begone.'
'Hot youth! Ah! I envy that fine heat of the blood. Once I was just the same myself.'
He must have been a good deal changed, then, since that time.
He went on. 'I will not stay long. I am once more a peacemaker. It is a happy office. It is an office that can be discharged on the Sabbath. Sweetly the river flows beneath your feet. Ah! A peacemaker. I come from your cousin again.'
'To make another offer?'
'Yes, that is my object. I am again prepared to offer you terms which, I believe, no one else in the world would propose to you. Mr. William, I will give you the sum of four thousand pounds down—equivalent to an annual income of two hundred pounds a year if you will sell your reversion.'
'No.'
'Mr. Matthew can use the money to advantage: while it lies locked up it is of no use to anyone.'
'No.'
'Such obstinacy was never known before, I believe. Why, Sir, I offer you an annual income of two hundred pounds a year—two hundred pounds a year. You can leave this wretched little cottage overhanging a marsh: you can move into a fashionable quarter, and live like a person of Quality: you can abandon your present mode of life, which I take to be repellent to every person of virtue—that of musician to the Dog and Duck or some other resort of the profligate. Oh, we know where you are and what you do! Instead of servant you will be master. You, Madam, will no longer be a household drudge: you will have your cook, your maids, your page to carry your Prayer-Book to church.'
'No.'
He hesitated a little, the sham benevolence dying out of his face, and the angry look of baffled cunning taking its place. Mr. Probus was a bad actor.
He took out a parchment. 'Sign it, Mr. William—here.' He unrolled it and indicated the place. 'Let us have no more shilly shally, willy nilly talk. It is for your good and for my client's.'
'And yours, too, Mr. Probus.'
'My dear,' said Alice, 'do not exchange words any longer. You have said No already. It is my husband's last word, Sir.'
There I should have stopped. It is always foolish to reveal to an enemy what one has discovered. I think that up to that moment Mr. Probus was only anxious: that is to say, he was crazy with anxiety, but he could not believe that his money was all gone, because he had no knowledge or suspicion in what way it had gone. Things that appear impossible cannot be believed. I think that he would have assured himself of the fact in some other way before proceeding to the wickedness which he actually had in his mind. He would have waited: and I could have eluded him some way or other. As it was, the mere statement of Matthew drunk drove him half mad with fear: but there was still the chance that Matthew sober would have spoken differently.
'No,' according to Alice, was my last word.
'Not quite the last word,' I said. 'Hark ye, Mr. Probus. The sum waiting for me when Matthew dies, is one hundred thousand pounds with accumulations of interest, is it not? If he were to die to-morrow—to be sure it is not likely—but he may be murdered, or he may put himself within the power of the Law and so be executed——' Mr. Probus turned ghastly white and shook all over. 'Then I should come in for the whole of that money, which is much better than four thousand pounds, whereas if I were to die to-morrow—either by the operation of the law or by some other manner, Matthew would have the whole and you would get back the twenty-five thousand pounds you have lent my cousin with a noble addition. If you do get it, that is—Mr. Probus, I think that you will not get it. I think you will never get any more of your money back at all.'