CHAPTER LXIII.
NED WARBECK AND BOB BERTRAM HAVE AN INTERVIEW WITH CAPTAIN JACK AND OLD BATES IN PRISON—ASTOUNDING REVELATIONS OF DEEDS OF CRIME.
NED WARBECK AND BOB BERTRAM HAVE AN INTERVIEW WITH CAPTAIN JACK AND OLD BATES IN PRISON—ASTOUNDING REVELATIONS OF DEEDS OF CRIME.
Captain Jack and Bates wrote long accounts of their career in crime which greatly startled the pious old chaplain who attended them daily.
There was only one request which either Captain Jack or Bates desired, and this was to have a final and a parting interview with Ned Warbeck and Bob Bertram.
This request was, of course, immediately granted, and, at an early hour, Ned and Bob Bertram entered the prison cell wherein Jack and Bates were chained and manacled.
“I have sent for you, Ned Warbeck, to say a few words before I die.”
“Then unburden your conscience, Jack,” said Ned, “and, in order that what you say may be made public hereafter, I have brought a quick writer with me, who will put down on paper all you say.”
“I have no objection in the world,” said Jack.
“Nor I,” said Bates, in a surly tone.
“Then let me, in the first place ask, why did you arrest young Bolton, old Redgill’s travelling collector for?”
“So as to screen Phillip Redgill, who gave me several thousand pounds to shift the guilt from his own shoulders to that of some one else.”
“Oh, the villain!” said Bob.
“But why did you still screen him when you knew that he had dealings with Death-wing and his villanous Skeleton Crew?”
“Because I knew if I arrested him, he might give evidence against me in turn; for I know, and have long known, that Colonel Blood was only waiting an opportunity to hang me—before my time,” said Jack, laughing.
“How can you account for his father’s death?”
“Why, he upset the carriage, and thus drowned him; but instead of getting any property, the old man was insolvent, and not worth a penny.”
“And what became of his wife?”
“She lived for some time with Mr. Augustus Fumbleton, and kept a house of ill-fame. Her father, old McTurk, however, did not disdain to receive money from her, but ultimately the house was accidentally burnt to the ground, and Fanny, young Redgill’s wife, was as the same time consumed in the flames.”
“And what became of old McTurk?”
“He went to the workhouse, and there lingers out a wretched life. His wife is dead, and he himself is like a walking skeleton.”
“And do you know how it was that my brother, Charley, got into such disgrace at the Indian house?”
“Yes. Phillip Redgill told me all one night when drunk, and seemed to glory in it.”
“What did he say?”
“Why, that he stole the notes, and lost them that same night in gambling.”
“He must have been an unscrupulous, inconceivable villain! But he is dead, I hear,” said Ned.
“No, he is not,” said Jack; “but if he doesn’t die, I have written down and sworn to more than enough to gibbet him.”
“And are you content to die?” asked Bob, in great surprise at the coolness of Jack and Bates.
“I must be so,” was the reply. “We have had Gibbet in our eye for more than fifteen years, and surely now that the time’s come, we are men enough to face it.”
“Perhaps ’tis well that society is about to get rid of you?” said Ned.
THIS TALE WILL CONCLUDE IN No. 24,
With which Number will be presented
NUMBERS 1 & 2 OF A NEW WORK.
“Perhaps it is. We have had a long and successful run of it; but if we had lived a little longer, I have no doubt we should have made ourselves more famous than we are.”
“Infamous, you should have said,” remarked Ned.
“Well, just as you please to word it; it is of little consequence to us now, eh, Bates?”
“Not a particle, as I can see. So they lets us spend all our money in drink and grub, I don’t care what they do with us afterwards.”
“And cannot this Blood be brought to justice?” asked Ned, in a whisper.
“I think not, Ned Warbeck,” said Captain Jack; “he’s a bigger villain than any of the ‘Dozen’ ever were; but, you see, his case is different; he’s a great rogue, and tried to steal the crown jewels out of the Tower, and everybody thought he would have suffered on the block; but, instead of that, the king not only pardons him, but gives him a handsome pension into the bargain.”
“He is a desperate scoundrel,” growled Ned.
“Yes; and for that very reason I’d advise you to have as little to do with him as possible, for when one is a king’s favourite every one must smile upon him if they wish to live in peace and quietness.”
“Good advice,” said Bates, “very, and if the young gentleman follows it, he will do well, and enjoy the title and riches, which, as the descendant of the once famous Edward Lawrence, he will be sure to receive from his natural guardian—old Sir Richard Warbeck.”
“What mean you?” said Ned, in surprise.
“I mean what I say.”
“How know you this?”
“Phillip Redgill once asked us to go down to Darlington Hall to rob it.”
“No.”
“’Tis true every word, my brave lad.”
“You surprise me.”
“Well, while we were there, I and Jack pulled about the old knight’s papers and parchments, while the Skeleton Crew were fighting and hanging the servants, and so drank good wine in the library, and read the family papers.”
“And was it Phillip Redgill who planned that attack?”
“Yes, and no other.”
“No wonder, then, that I always instinctively hated him,” said Ned.
“You two were as different as fire and water. Phillip Redgill planned your murder once or twice.”
“I know he did.”
“But you had a charmed life, Ned,” said Jack, “and no one can harm you; all the gipsies and weird women on the Cornish coast have said so.”
“Oh, yes, no doubt about that,” said old Bates. “Ned Warbeck must have as many lives as a cat, or he would have been killed long and long enough ago.”
“Can you account for the fact that my father was found with his legs cut off,” said Bob Bertram.
“Yes. When Phillip Redgill murdered him, he ‘limbed’ the poor old man to get the bank notes which he heard your father had sewn up in his leather leggings.”
“The infamous scoundrel! the barbarian!” swore Bob, in a great rage.
“But he’s paid out for that bit of butchery, long ago,” said Jack, “for he has confessed it.”
“How? In what way?”—
“The phantom legs of old Farmer Bertram follows him both night and day.”
“Follows him?” said Ned, aghast with horror.
“Yes, follows him; at certain times and on particular occasions they are visible to him, and to others also.Isaw them once.”
“You?”
“Yes; but I never want to look at them any more,” said Captain Jack, shrugging up his shoulders, “for it is a most awful sight.”
“When did this happen?”
“The very night he, and I, and old Bates were secreted in the library at Darlington Hall.”
“Aye, true,” said old Bates, with chattering teeth, “and when they walked on to the table right afore us, with their gory tops and stumps, an awful voice was heard; but I was too horror-struck to remember what was said.”
“But I did though,” said Jack.
“And what were the words,” said Ned and Bob Bertram, both at once.
“Why, the legs walked across the table, and stood right before Phil Redgill, and some awful voice said,
“‘Phillip Redgill, I will follow you for ever!’
“Awful!” said Ned. “It was a judgment of heaven!”
“Whether it was or not, we didn’t stop to see any more, but made our exit as quickly as possible.”
“And that was the only thing that prevented us destroying all the old gentleman’s family papers,” said Bites. “If it hadn’t been for that, we had all things ready to set fire to the library and the whole mansion.”
Much more was revealed to Ned Warbeck and Bob Bertram by Jack and Bates than we have room for in this concluding number of the Skeleton Crew; but what else happened after the gibbeting of the Baker’s Dozen, and their two notorious leaders, will appear in the next chapter.