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Title: Traced and Tracked
       Memoirs of a City Detective

Author: James McGovan

Release Date: January 17, 2019 [EBook #58711]

Language: English

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 TRACED AND TRACKED

 OR

 _Memoirs of a City Detective_.

  BY JAMES M^cGOVAN,

  AUTHOR OF “BROUGHT TO BAY,” “HUNTED DOWN,” AND
  “STRANGE CLUES.”

  SEVENTH EDITION.

  EDINBURGH:
  JOHN MENZIES & COMPANY

  LONDON: SIMPKIN, MARSHALL, & CO.
  1886.

 _All rights reserved._



 _WORKS BY THE SAME AUTHOR_

  BROUGHT TO BAY;
  OR,
 _EXPERIENCES OF A CITY DETECTIVE_.
  THIRTEENTH EDITION.

  HUNTED DOWN;
  OR,
 _RECOLLECTIONS OF A CITY DETECTIVE_.
  ELEVENTH EDITION.

  STRANGE CLUES;
  OR,
 _CHRONICLES OF A CITY DETECTIVE_.
  NINTH EDITION.

The above are uniform in size and price with “TRACED AND TRACKED,”
and the four works form the complete set of M^cGovan’s Detective
Experiences.




 To
 JOHN LENG, ESQ.,
 KINBRAE, NEWPORT, FIFE

 This Book
 IS INSCRIBED, IN GRATEFUL REMEMBRANCE OF HIS
 LOVING-KINDNESS DURING A CRITICAL
 ILLNESS OF THE AUTHOR.




PREFACE.


The gratifying success of my former experiences—25,000 copies having
already been sold, and the demand steadily continuing—has induced
me to put forth another volume. In doing so, I have again to thank
numerous correspondents, as well as the reviewers of the public
press, for their warm expressions of appreciation and approval.
I have also to notice a graceful compliment from Berlin, in the
translation of my works into German, by H. Ernst Duby; and another
from Geneva, in the translation of a selection of my sketches into
French, by the Countess Agènor de Gasparin.

A severe and unexpected attack of hæmorrhage of the lungs has
prevented me revising about a third of the present volume. I trust,
therefore, that any trifling slips or errors will be excused on that
account.

In conclusion, I would remind readers and reviewers of the words
of Handel, when he was complimented by an Irish nobleman on having
amused the citizens of Dublin with his _Messiah_. “Amuse dem?” he
warmly replied; “I do not vant to amuse dem only; I vant to make dem
petter.”

 JAMES M^cGOVAN.

 EDINBURGH, _October 1884_.




CONTENTS.


 A PEDESTRIAN’S PLOT, • 1

 BILLY’S BITE, • 13

 THE MURDERED TAILOR’S WATCH, • 24

 THE STREET PORTER’S SON, • 44

 A BIT OF TOBACCO PIPE, • 57

 THE BROKEN CAIRNGORM, • 68

 THE ROMANCE OF A REAL CREMONA, • 79

 THE SPIDER AND THE SPIDER-KILLER, • 104

 THE SPOILT PHOTOGRAPH, • 115

 THE STOLEN DOWRY, • 127

 M^cSWEENY AND THE MAGIC JEWELS, • 139

 BENJIE BLUNT’S CLEVER ALIBI, • 150

 JIM HUTSON’S KNIFE, • 161

 THE HERRING SCALES, • 174

 ONE LESS TO EAT, • 185

 THE CAPTAIN’S CHRONOMETER, • 196

 THE TORN TARTAN SHAWL, • 207

 A LIFT ON THE ROAD, • 218

 THE ORGAN-GRINDER’S MONEY-BAG, • 229

 THE BERWICK BURR, • 240

 THE WRONG UMBRELLA, • 252

 A WHITE SAVAGE, • 263

 THE BROKEN MISSIONARY, • 274

 A MURDERER’S MISTAKE, • 285

 A HOUSE-BREAKER’S WIFE, • 297

 M^cSWEENY AND THE CHIMNEY-SWEEP, • 308

 THE FAMILY BIBLE, • 320

 CONSCIENCE MONEY, • 332

 A WOLF IN SHEEP’S CLOTHING, • 343




TRACED AND TRACKED.




A PEDESTRIAN’S PLOT.


I have alluded to the fact that many criminals affect a particular
line of business, and show a certain style in their work which often
points unerringly to the doer when all other clues are wanting. A
glance over any record of convictions will convey a good idea of how
much reliance we are led to place upon this curious fact. One man’s
list will show a string of pocket-picking cases, or attempts in that
line, and it will be rare, indeed, to find in that record a case of
robbery with violence, housebreaking, or any crime necessitating
great daring or strength. Another shows nothing but deeds of brute
strength or bull-dog ferocity, and to find in his record of _prev.
con._ a case of delicate pocket-picking would make any one of
experience open his eyes wide indeed. The style of the work is even
a surer guide than the particular line, as the variety there is
unlimited as it is marked. This is all very well; and often I have
been complimented on my astuteness in thus making very simple and
natural deductions leading to convictions. But the pleasure ceases
to be unmixed when the criminal is as cunning as the detective, and
works upon that knowledge. To show how a detective may be deceived in
working on this—one of his surest modes of tracing a criminal—I give
the present case.

Dave Larkins was a Yorkshire thief, who had drifted northwards by
some chance and landed in Edinburgh. Street robbery was his line,
and, as he was a professional pedestrian, or racing man, he was not
caught, I should say, once in twenty cases. The list of his previous
convictions in Manchester, Liverpool, Preston, and other places
showed with unvarying monotony the same crime and the same style of
working. He would go up to some gentleman on the street and make an
excuse for addressing him, snatch at his watch, and run for it. More
often the victim was a lady with a reticule or purse in her hand, and
then no preliminary speaking was indulged in. He made the snatch,
and ran like the wind, and the whole was done so quickly that the
astounded victim seldom retained the slightest recollection of his
appearance.

Yet Dave’s appearance was striking enough. He was a wiry man of
medium height, with strongly-marked features, red hair, and a stumpy
little turned up nose, the round point of which was always red as a
cherry with bad whisky, except at those rare intervals when he was
“in training” for some foot race which it was to his advantage to win.

Then his dress had notable points. He generally wore a knitted jersey
in place of a waistcoat, and he had a grey felt hat covered with
grease spots, for which he had such a peculiar affection that he
never changed it for a new one. Under these circumstances it may be
thought that a conviction would have been easily got against Dave.
But Dave was “Yorkshire,” as I have indicated, and about as smart
and cunning in arranging an _alibi_ as any I ever met. No doubt his
racing powers helped him in that, but his native cunning did more.

There is a popular impression that a Yorkshire man will hold his
own in cunning against all the world, but I have here to record
that Dave met his match in a Scotchman who had nothing like Dave’s
reputation for smartness, and who was so stupid-looking that few
could have conceived him capable of the task. This man was known in
racing circles—for he was a pedestrian too—as Jake Mackay, but more
generally received the nickname of “The Gander.”

Why he had been so named I cannot tell—perhaps because some one
had discovered that there was nothing of the goose about him. Your
stupid-looking man, who is not stupid but supremely sharp-witted, has
an infinite advantage over those who carry a needle eye like Dave
Larkins, and have cunning printed on every line about their lips and
eyes.

The Gander was not a professional thief, though he was often in the
company of thieves. He had been in the army, and had a pension, which
he eked out by odd jobs, such as bill-posting and acting as “super.”
in the theatres. He was a thorough rascal at heart, and would have
cheated his own grandfather had opportunity served, and had there
been a shilling or two to gain by it.

These two men became acquainted at a pedestrian meeting at Glasgow,
and when Dave Larkins came to Edinburgh they became rather close
companions. The Gander had the advantage of local knowledge, and
could get at all the men who backed pedestrians, and then told them
to win or lose according to the way the money was staked. A racing
tournament was arranged about that time in which both of them were
entered for one of the shorter races, in which great speed, rather
than endurance, was called for. In that particular race they had the
result entirely in their own hands, though, if fairly put to it,
Dave Larkins, or “Yorky” as he was named, could easily have come in
first. The other men entered having no chance, these two proceeded
to arrange matters to their mutual advantage—that is, had they been
honest men, the advantage would have been mutual, for they agreed to
divide the stakes whatever the result. But in these matters there is
always a great deal more at stake than the money prize offered to the
winner. The art of betting and counterbetting would task the brain
of a mathematician to reduce its subtleties to a form intelligible
to the ordinary mind; and the supreme thought of each of the rogues,
after closing hands on the above agreement, was how he could best
benefit himself at the expense of the other. What the private
arrangements of The Gander were does not appear, except that he had
arranged to come in first, though the betting was all in favour of
Yorky; but just before they entered the dressing tent, a patron of
the sports—I will not call him a gentleman—took Yorky aside and said—

“How is this race to go? Have you any money on it to force you to
win?”

Yorky, having already arranged to lose, modestly hinted that, for a
substantial consideration, he would be willing to come in second.

“Second? whew! then who’d be first?” said the patron, not looking
greatly pleased with the proposal. “The Gander would walk off with
the stakes. He’d be sure to come in first. Could you not let Birrel
get to the front?”

“It might be managed,” said Yorky, with a significant wink.

“Then manage it;” and the price of the “management” was thrust into
his hand in bank notes, and the matter settled.

Yorky counted the money, and ran up in his mind all that The Gander
had on the race, and decided that the old soldier would promptly
refuse to lose the race in favour of Birrel. The money was not enough
to stand halving, so Yorky decided to keep it all, and also to
“pot” a little more by the new turn things had taken. He therefore
passed the word to a boon companion to put all his spare money on
Birrel, and then took his place among the competitors dressing for
the race. The start was made, and, as all had expected, Yorky and
The Gander gradually drew together, and then moved out to the front.
Birrel at the last round was a very bad third, while the other
runners were nowhere, and evidently only remaining on the track in
the faint hope of some unforeseen accident taking place to give one
of them the chance of a place. They had not long to wait. Yorky,
running at his swiftest, and apparently in splendid form, about
three yards in front of The Gander, instead of slackening his speed
as he had arranged, suddenly reeled and fell to the ground right in
front of his companion. The result may be guessed. The Gander was
on the obstruction before he knew, and sprawling in a half-stunned
condition a yard in front of Yorky’s body, while Birrel, amid a yell
from the spectators, drew up and shot ahead. The yell roused The
Gander, and he feebly scrambled to his feet, and made a desperate
effort for the first place, but all in vain, for Birrel touched the
tape before him, and he was second in everything but swearing. To the
surprise of all, Yorky did not rise to his feet, and remained to all
appearance insensible for five minutes after he had been tenderly
carried to the dressing tent. Of course there was a protest of the
most vigorous description to the referee by The Gander, who not only
found that he had laid his money the wrong way, and disappointed
numerous friends who had followed his advice, but was not even to
have the meagre satisfaction of sharing the first prize. But under
the impression that Yorky had simply over-exerted himself, and
fainted on the course, the referee, who possibly had money on the
result, refused to listen to the appeal, and Birrel got the prize.
The Gander denounced Yorky with great vehemence, but was met with the
most solemn protestations of innocence. He then put on his clothes
and left the tent in a bad temper, but in leaving the grounds was
accorded a “reception” which did not tend to soothe his feelings. A
dozen or so of his friends, who had received his private “tip” as to
the way the race was to go, gathered round the supposed traitor, and,
before the police could interfere, had him beaten almost to a jelly.
The poor Gander was removed in a cab to the Infirmary to have his
wounds dressed, while the elated and successful Yorky went to enjoy
himself with his ill-gotten gains.

When the two met again, The Gander appeared to have recovered his
temper, and listened to Yorky’s explanations of the mishap on the
course as pleasantly as if he believed them, which was very far from
being the case. Then Yorky so far unbent as to spend some of his
money in drinks for The Gander, and was foolish enough to believe
that he had cheated the stupid-looking Scotchman very nicely, and
that he would hear no more of the matter.

The races had taken place during the New Year holidays, and while the
pantomimes were running at the theatres. In one of these The Gander
was engaged as a “super.,” and it was known to him that the treasurer
was in the habit of leaving the theatre for his home, at the foot of
Broughton Street, late every night, carrying under his arm or in his
hand a tin box resembling a cash-box. This box contained nothing but
metal checks, which the treasurer counted at his home. All the money
drawn at the doors remained in possession of the manager. Had Yorky
not been an unusually cunning man it is probable that The Gander
would have manipulated him direct, but as it was, he was forced
to confide in another. A loafing acquaintance of Yorky’s seemed a
suitable tool, and he was engaged and primed accordingly. Bob Slogger
had himself an old grudge against Yorky, so, on the whole, perhaps a
better choice could not have been made.

The opportunity came when Bob and Yorky were drinking together one
afternoon, when the former incidentally remarked that they were doing
immense business at the theatre, and making piles of money. Yorky
only grunted in reply. It seemed hard that any one but him should be
making money, and he did not like the subject.

“I got it out of The Gander that the treasurer can hardly carry the
money home some nights,” continued Slogger, repeating his lesson. “He
lives at the foot of Broughton, and carries it there in a tin box
every night about half-past eleven. I could do with that boxful of
silver on a Saturday night.”

“Ah! Saturday night? is there most in it then?” observed Yorky,
suddenly rousing into deep interest.

“Of course there is;” and Slogger at once gave the reasons, and
repeated all that The Gander had said regarding the appearance of
the treasurer, his hour of going home, and the dark and deserted
appearance of the streets at that lonely locality. Yorky snapped at
the bait, but did not abandon his usual caution. He said nothing to
his informant of his intentions, and much of The Gander’s after
proceedings had to be founded on mere acute inferences. The spot to
be chosen for the attack he guessed at by one of Yorky’s questions,
and the night most likely to be selected for the attempt was
Saturday, for, of course, when the robbery was to be done, it might
as well be for a big sum as a little one. He made sure of this last
point, however, by trying hard to get Yorky to engage to meet him
that night after business, but failed, as Yorky gruffly indicated
that he was engaged.

So far all had succeeded to The Gander’s satisfaction. It only
remained for him to give the finishing stroke. He got a sheet of
note-paper, of a kind used in the theatre, and penned the following
note to me:—

 “If M^cGovan will watch at the west end of Barony Street between
 eleven and twelve o’clock on Saturday night, he will see a gent
 attacked and robbed by a desperate thief who can run like Deerfoot.
 The gent always carries a tin box, and, as it’s supposed to be full
 of money, it’s the box that will be grabbed at. There had better be
 more than one at the catching, or he’s sure to get off.”

There was no signature, and at first I was inclined to believe the
thing a hoax, or worse—a plot to draw me away from some spot where I
was likely to be more useful, but in the end I decided to act on the
advice.

I had no idea that the gent described was the worthy treasurer of the
theatre, and I suppose The Gander had purposely remained silent on
that point lest I should warn the gentleman threatened, and so spoil
the little plot.

I was down at Barony Street before eleven o’clock. I took the west
end, and planted M^cSweeny under shelter at the east. It was a dark
night, and scarcely any one passed me at my lonely lurking-place. I
was so suspicious of a hoax that I was positively surprised when a
gentleman appeared at the other end of the street carrying the tin
box in his hand, and whistling away as cheerily as if there were no
such thing as street robbers in existence. He had scarcely appeared
in sight when another man turned the corner walking rapidly in his
wake, and looking hastily round to make sure that they were alone in
the short street.

The distance between the two rapidly diminished, and then, looking
anxiously along behind them, I had the satisfaction of seeing
M^cSweeny’s head cautiously appear from his hiding-place at the other
end of the street. I had scarcely noted the fact when the footpad was
on his victim, making a dash from behind at the treasurer, tripping
him up, and at the same moment wrenching the tin box from his grasp.

None but an expert thief could have done the thing so swiftly. The
moment the box was in his possession the thief caught sight of me
making a dash towards him, and turned and flew towards the end of
the street by which he had entered. He flew so fast that his feet
seemed scarcely to touch the ground. M^cSweeny had emerged from his
hiding-place at the first outcry, and appeared directly in front of
the flying man with his great, strong arms extended for a bear’s
hug; but the flying man, unable to check his pace, yet unwilling to
be taken, merely raised the tin box of tokens and dashed it full in
M^cSweeny’s face, flattening my chum’s little nose with his face, and
laying him on his back on the snowy pavement as neatly as if he had
been tugged back by the hair. I paid no attention to M^cSweeny, but
flew on in the wake of the thief; but when I turned the corner of the
street into Broughton he had vanished, I knew not in what direction.
I turned back, after a run up the brae, and found M^cSweeny sitting
up on the pavement and tenderly feeling the place where his nose had
been.

“Oh, you thickhead!” was my only remark, as I passed on to speak to
the robbed man.

“Thick, is it?” he dolefully returned. “Faix, it’s a great deal
thinner than it was a minit ago.”

“And you let him off, money and all,” I added, in deep disgust.

“Begorra, if you’d felt the weight of the money, like me, you’d wish
it far enough away,” he returned, busy with his handkerchief; “a
steam hammer’s nothing to it.”

“I am happy to say that there was no money in the box,” said the
robbed man, who was little the worse of his fall. “Nothing but a
number of metal tokens used as checks at the theatre.”

“Tokens?” groaned M^cSweeny, clenching his fists. “I’d like to give
him some more.”

A few words of explanation followed, which considerably relieved
my concern over the loss of the thief; and then the robbed man
accompanied us to the Central to report the case, and get a look at
the handwriting of the note sent us in warning. He readily recognised
the note-paper as of a kind used in the theatre, but could make
nothing of the handwriting. However, the fact that the warning had
come from some one employed in the theatre was a clue of a kind, and
with the promise to give us every help in following it out, he took
leave.

Meantime, Yorky had gone with his plunder no farther than a lighted
stair at the foot of Broughton Street, which had stood conveniently
open when he dashed round the corner of Barony Street. There he
quickly wrenched off the lid, plunged his hand into the box to empty
big handfuls of silver and gold into his pockets, and found instead
only lead. The fact that he was alone draws a veil over the scene
which followed. I have no doubt that his words flowed rapidly over
his immediate disappointment, and his disgust may be inferred from
the fact that he left the box and tokens entire in a corner of the
stair. But a deeper rage was to come. Yorky remembered that the first
information had come from The Gander, and the fact that we had been
in waiting for him, and dummies or tokens substituted for the money
the treasurer had been said to carry, seemed to the quick-witted
Yorky to point to a plot to trap him. If he could bring that plot
home to The Gander he resolved to put a knife in him. I have stated,
however, that Nature had favoured The Gander with a look of dense
stupidity, and, though Yorky took the first opportunity of seeking
his society, and suspiciously sounding him on the subject, he made
nothing of it. Bob Slogger he could not get at, for he was already in
our hands for a separate offence.

The suspicious manner and queer questions of Yorky alarmed The Gander
quite as much as the failure of his plot disappointed him.

“If I don’t have him laid by the heels soon he’ll shove a knife into
me,” was his acute thought, which shows how sharp-witted folks can
read each other through every fence of face and words.

I took Yorky on the Monday, and we kept him for a day or two on
suspicion, but, as the street had been dark and we had but a
momentary glimpse of him, he had to be let off for want of evidence.
Meantime, The Gander’s wits had been at work on a plot which, I must
confess, was quite worthy of the object.

When Yorky was set at liberty he was greeted by The Gander, who, with
many demonstrations of satisfaction, and to celebrate the occasion,
proposed that they should adjourn to Yorky’s den in the Canongate and
there consume a bottle of brandy at The Gander’s expense. No proposal
could have been more welcome. Yorky had a weakness for drink at
all times, but when some one else paid for that drink it was to him
perfect nectar. They had the garret all to themselves, as Yorky’s
wife, in anticipation of a long sentence on her husband, had fled
to her native clime. The drinking began, and from the first Yorky
managed to appropriate the lion’s share. He was not easily affected
by drink, but his ideas were getting a little cloudy by the time the
brandy was finished, and readily assented to The Gander’s proposal
to go for more. Into this second supply The Gander poured a strong
dose of laudanum, and, as Yorky swallowed the whole, he was soon
insensible. The Gander and he were of about a height and build, but,
of course, in appearance and features they were not at all alike. As
soon as it was quite certain that Yorky had succumbed, his amiable
friend stripped him and tumbled him into bed. He then exchanged his
own shabby and paste-spotted clothing for Yorky’s trousers, jersey,
and pilot jacket. Then, taking from his own pocket a short-haired red
wig which he had got from some of the theatricals, he drew it over
his scalp, and then with a little rouge did up the point of his nose
to resemble the fiery organ of the slumbering thief. Having fastened
about his throat the red cotton handkerchief used by Yorky as a
scarf, and topped the whole with the greasy and battered grey felt
hat, The Gander softly left the den, locking the door after him and
taking the key with him. It was between three and four o’clock in the
afternoon, but not nearly dark. The Gander got down to Leith Street
in his strange disguise, and when near the foot, at that part where
Low Calton branches off towards Leith Wynd, he stopped a suitable
gentleman and asked the time by the clock. Quite unsuspicious in the
broad daylight, the gentleman took out his watch, and in a moment it
had changed hands. The grasp had been made at it with such force by
The Gander, that the gold Albert attached to the watch was snapped,
and half of it left dangling at the owner’s button-hole.

The moment the grasp was made, The Gander ran like the wind, and got
clear away by Low Calton and the Back Canongate, and never halted
till he landed breathless but triumphant at the bedside of the
sleeping Yorky. His first business was to resume his own clothing,
clean the paint from his nose, and take the wig from his head. Then
he took the watch, with the fragment of gold chain still attached,
and thrust it as far as his arm could reach in under the mattress
on which lay the virtuous form of the sleeping Yorky. This done,
he pocketed the red wig, laid Yorky’s clothes at the bedside beside
his muddy boots, in some confusion, as if they had been taken off
somewhat hurriedly, and then left the house, with the pleasing
consciousness of having done all he could to help Fate to do the
right thing to a great rascal.

While this was being done, the robbed man had made his way to the
Central Office to report his loss. He had got a full view of the
robber’s face and dress—or at least imagined he had—and went over the
details with such minuteness and fidelity that I turned to some one
and said in surprise—

“Surely it can’t be Yorky at his old games already, and he was only
let out this morning? It’s just his style.”

I then went over one or two of Yorky’s peculiar features, to all of
which the gentleman so eagerly responded in the affirmative that I
thought it could do no harm at least to look for Yorky, with a view
to bringing him face to face with the victim. I should have found
him at once if I had gone to his den, but that was the very last
place I thought he would go near when in danger of being taken. I
therefore went over all his haunts, but in vain. No one had seen him,
and several told me of the flight of his wife, which gave me the
idea that Yorky, finding himself “on the rocks,” and deserted, had
committed the robbery with great audacity, and then left the city for
good with the proceeds in the wake of his partner. It was quite late
at night when I thought of his garret in the Canongate. I believe it
was M^cSweeny’s suggestion that I should go there—at least he always
insists that it was, and possibly he is right, for the way in which
Yorky had grinned at his damaged face had made my chum certain that
the hands which inflicted the injuries were before him, and M^cSweeny
was now eager for revenge.

There was no answer but snores to our knock, so we opened the door
and entered.

“How sound the divil sleeps,” said M^cSweeny, with a sceptical grin,
as he struck a light. “Sure a fox himself couldn’t do it better.”

Yorky refused to wake with a word, and even when violently shaken
by both of us only half opened his eyes, and uttered some sleepy
imprecations. At length, getting impatient, M^cSweeny lifted a dish
containing water and emptied it over Yorky’s face, which startled him
into a wakefulness and some vigorous protests.

“What do you want now?” he growled at last, when he was able to
recognise us.

“I want to know where you were at half-past three o’clock to-day?”
was my significant reply. “On with your things and trudge. You’ve got
drunk too soon—you’ve overdone it. Man, see, there’s the slush off
your boots all over the floor.”

“I haven’t been across the door since morning,” he solemnly
protested, on which M^cSweeny somewhat savagely remarked that “we
believed him every word.”

While M^cSweeny was helping him to put on his clothes, and replying
to his protests, I made a search through the room, and finally drew
out from under the mattress the stolen watch and fragment of gold
chain.

Yorky stared as it was held up before his eyes, and became very sober
indeed.

“I never saw that in my life before; somebody must have put it
there,” he cried, with the most vigorous swearing, all of which we
listened to with great merriment and marked derision.

“I thought we should sober you before long,” I said to him, as I
fastened his wrist to my own. “We’ll see what the owner of the watch
says to it.”

The owner of the watch had a great deal to say, all of which
astonished Yorky beyond description. The watch and fragment of
chain he identified at a glance, and Yorky as well. He swore most
positively that Yorky was the man who attacked him—he had had too
good a view of the rascal’s features and dress to have a moment’s
doubt on the matter. Yorky, as he listened to it, was a picture to
behold. He scratched his head in the most solemn manner imaginable,
and muttered to himself—

“I _was_ very tight, but I never yet did anything in drink that I
couldn’t remember when sober. I can’t make it out at all; but I know
I’m as innocent as a lamb.”

A grin ran round the room as he uttered the words, and, after a word
with the superintendent, the “lamb” was led off to the cells. He was
next day remitted to the High Court of Justiciary. I strongly advised
him to plead guilty, but the wilful man would have his own way, and
took the opposite course.

Then the Fiscal pointed out that Yorky had been often convicted of
the same crime, and produced a list of these, and demanded the
heaviest penalty. The judge promptly responded to the appeal by
sentencing Yorky to fourteen years’ penal servitude. As he was being
removed, a voice among the audience behind exclaimed—

“Ah, Yorky, what a time it’ll be before you can make me lose another
race!”

The voice came from The Gander. So elated was that worthy over the
success of his scheme that he took to boasting of the feat, and
giving details to his companions, and thus the story eventually
reached my ears. Shortly after, when taking The Gander for helping
himself to a bank-note out of a coat pocket in one of the actors’
dressing-rooms, I twitted him about depriving the sporting world of
such a treasure as Yorky. He denied the whole, but with a twinkle of
superlative cunning and delight in his eyes.

“I never before believed it possible to overreach a Yorkshire man,” I
suggestively remarked.

“A Yorkshire man?” cried The Gander, with great contempt; “if he’d
been twenty Yorkshire men rolled into one, I could have done him.”

I think he spoke the truth.




BILLY’S BITE.


The boy whose name I have put at the head of this paper was looked
upon as a timid simpleton, perfectly under the power of the two men
to whom his fate was linked. If Billy had been a dog they could not
have looked upon him with more indifference—he was so small, and
thin, and insignificant, and above all so quiet and submissive, that
they felt that they could have crushed him at any moment with a mere
finger’s weight.

Rodie M^cKendrick, the first of his masters, was a big fellow with an
arm like a giant, whose standing boast was that it never needed more
than one drive of his fist to knock the strongest man down. Rodie was
a housebreaker, who filled up his spare time by counterfeit coining
and “smashing,” or passing, the same. The other, his companion
and partner, Joss Brown by name, I can best describe as a comical
fiend—that is, he always did the most cruel acts with a grin or a
smile, joking away all the while about the wriggles or agony of
his victim, as if it was the best fun in the world to him. Joss, I
believe, fairly delighted in the sufferings of others, and would have
reached the height of happiness had he been appointed chief torturer
in an inquisition. He was an insignificant-looking wretch, but an
extraordinarily swift runner. These two had settled in Glasgow, for
the benefit of that city, and Billy Sloan was their spaniel and
slave. There was another spaniel and slave in the person of Kate,
Billy’s sister, but as she was in bad health she did not count for
much. The two children had been left to Rodie by their mother, a
Manchester shop-lifter, whom he had brought to Scotland with him, and
managed to hurry out of the world shortly after.

They were not his own children, therefore, and that fact encouraged
him to deal with them as he pleased. Kate was ten, and Billy
nearly nine, and both were small and weakly, so Rodie’s treatment
of them was not the kindest in the world. Kate’s ill health had
arisen from that treatment. She had bungled in the passing of some
pewter florins made by Rodie and Joss, and not only nearly got
captured—which could have been forgiven—but had almost got these two
worthies into trouble as well. It was a narrow escape, and Rodie
thought best to impress it on her memory by first knocking her down
with one tap of his big fist, and then kicking her ribs till she
fainted. Billy crouched in a corner, clasping his hands, and looking
on pale as death, and with his eyes fixed steadily on Rodie’s face.
Joss, who was looking on in exuberant delight, noticed the peculiar
look, and said—

“Look at the other whelp; he looks as if he could bite, if he’d only
teeth in his head.”

“Oh, him? Poh!” grunted Rodie in supreme contempt, as he rested from
his task; but Joss could not resist the temptation, and reproved
Billy’s look by sinking his nails into the boy’s ear, and then
shaking him about till Billy thought that either the ear or the head
must come off.

Joss made jokes all the while, and then went back to his supper and
his whisky-drinking with fresh zest. Billy crouched in the corner,
watching the slow breathing of his senseless sister till he saw that
Rodie and Joss were considerably mollified by eating and drinking.
Then he crept forward and lifted Kate from the floor, and bore her
into a little closet off the room, in which they both slept. Kate
moaned a little on being moved, but it took an hour’s persistent
efforts on Billy’s part to bring her back to consciousness, and then
he was almost sorry he had restored her, for she suffered dreadful
agony where Rodie’s iron-toed boots had been at work.

It is possible that some of her ribs were broken,—the dreadful pains
and the after-effects all point to that conclusion,—but, though the
whole night was spent in sleepless agony by Kate, she was forced to
rise next day and attend to her two masters. Kate was the housewife;
and though Billy would willingly have undertaken her duties for a
time, the comical fiend Joss would not allow it, and insisted, with
many jokes, on pulling her out of bed by the ear, with his nails,
as usual, and then goading her on to every task which his ingenious
brain could suggest as likely to aggravate her trouble.

The children had no idea of resenting this treatment, or of running
away, or of anything but their own utter dependence upon these men;
and they longed with all the strength of their young minds for the
happy moment which should see Rodie and Joss either senseless with
drink or out of the house. It happened, however, that the men were
alarmed at their narrow escape of the day before, and had decided to
keep out of sight for a day or two; so the children had a weary time
of agony and secret tears. At night, when clasped in each other’s
arms in the hole under the slates which was their sleeping place,
they sympathised and communed, and mingled their bitter tears; but
Kate’s dreadful sufferings did not abate much. As weeks passed away
she grew shadowy and pale, and a bad cough afflicted her incessantly,
so much so that Joss was often compelled to rise out of bed in the
night-time and sink his nails into her ears, or stick a long pin
into her arm, or wrench a handful of hair out of her head by the
roots to induce her to desist, and give him some chance of enjoying
his much-needed repose. And the jokes he showered on her and Billy
on these occasions would have filled a book. One day both men were
providentially out of the house, and Kate, sitting by the fire with
her face looking strangely pinched, and her eyes big and shiny, while
Billy cooked the dinner by her directions, pressed her hand on her
breast, and said to the boy—

“Oh, Billy, is there nothing that would take away this awful pain?”

Billy stopped his stirring at the pot and reflected. His knowledge
was exceedingly limited, and his ideas did not come fast at any time;
but after a little his face brightened, and he said briefly—

“Yes—I know—medicine.”

“Are you sure?”

Billy scratched his head. He wasn’t sure, but he thought so.

“Then where could we get some?” was Kate’s next query.

They both knew of the chemists’ shops, but to go to them required
money. At length they remembered of some one in the rookery getting
medicine and doctor’s advice at the dispensary, and, setting the
dinner aside, they decided to slip out of the house, and see what
could be done at that blessing to the ailing poor. When they got to
the place, and their turn came, Kate went in with great trepidation
before a couple of doctors and some students, and explained that she
was troubled with a cough and pains in her breast and side. Dozens
more were waiting, so there was little time to spare upon each.

“What brought it on?” the doctor asked when he had hastily sounded
her lungs. “Caught cold, I suppose?”

Kate blushed and nodded. She did not care to reveal all she had
suffered at the hands and feet of Rodie, or she would have told the
doctor that far from having caught cold she had caught it very hot
indeed. A bottle of medicine was quickly put up and labelled, and
Kate was free to depart.

Billy was in high spirits, and danced and pranced all the way home,
quite sure that the magic elixir which was to banish all pain from
Kate’s poor breast was in the bottle she carried. When they got home
they found to their great relief that the house was still empty, and
after Kate had taken a spoonful of the medicine they hid the bottle
away under their bed, lest the comical fiend should jokingly throw it
out at the window. The medicine thus applied for and taken in stealth
had the effect of soothing the pain somewhat and easing the cough,
but it did not stop the decay of Kate’s lungs. She got weaker and
thinner, till at last even the comical fiend confessed his ingenuity
and skill in forcing her out of bed quite exhausted and at fault.
Kate spent most of her time in bed in the hole under the slates,
while Billy became housewife and nurse combined. Strange thoughts
came into her head, and half of the time she was in a hazy dream,
through which she saw little but Billy’s eager face as he tended, and
nursed, and soothed, and consoled, and tried every device for keeping
the comical fiend out of the hole. One morning, while Rodie and Joss
were still snoring in bed, Kate was more wide awake than she had
seemed for a long time, and startled Billy, as she had often done of
late, with one of her odd questions—

“Wouldn’t it be nice, Billy, if I was to fall asleep, and sleep on
and never wake?”

Billy stared at her and tried to realise the thought.

“It wouldn’t be nice for me,” he said at last, “for I couldn’t get
speaking to you. You’d be the same as dead.”

“Well, what becomes of folks when they’re dead?” pursued Kate. “I
heard a man say once that there’s another world they go to, all
bright and beautiful, where there’s no pain. I’d like to be there, if
there’s such a place.”

Billy didn’t think there was such a place—at least, he had never
heard of it, and anyhow he did not wish Kate to die. His heart gave
a great pang as he thought for the first time of what it would be to
be left in the world—alone—without Kate, and he choked and gulped and
would have cried, if it had not been that he did not wish to excite
or alarm her.

“But, Billy, I sometimes in my dreams see a hole in the ground, with
a light shining through from the other side,” persisted Kate. “I see
it often, and always want to go into it.”

“There ain’t no such hole,” said Billy, sturdily and determinedly.

“There may be if I die and am put in the ground,” said Kate, wearily.
“Sometimes I’m so tired that I can hardly wake up again. But, Billy,
how would I find the road to the other place if I should fall asleep
and not wake again? I’ve heard it’s not easy found, and I think it’s
only a place for good folks, and we’re not that, you know.”

“That’s true,” said Billy, “so you needn’t bother your head about
going to that place; you’re better beside me. You’d never find it; I
know you wouldn’t.”

“That’s what I’m afraid of,” said Kate, with dreadful earnestness.
“I’m afraid I’ll be left wandering about in the dark at the other
side. I’ve heard that there’s a man with a light shining out of his
head walking about ready to take folks’ hands and guide them, but
he’s a kind of an angel, and would never look at me. Isn’t it a pity
that Rodie kicked so hard? That’s what has done it all. And now I’m
always sinking. I often catch myself up when I’ve sunk about half-way
through the world, and grip on to your hand just to keep myself here,
but if I get much weaker I’ll not be able to do that.”

Billy clenched his teeth and hands, and said—

“Yes, Rodie did it all. He called me a dog the other day, and maybe I
am, for I feel like biting him. Yes, I’ll bite him some day, when I’m
big enough.”

“Could you not help me, Billy?” said Kate, after a long silence. “I’m
afraid to go there without knowing something of the road. Couldn’t
you get some one to tell me how to do when I get through the hole?”

“I tell you there ain’t no such hole; and don’t you speak about it,
for I do-o-o-n’t like it,” sobbed Billy, almost in anger; “but if
there was, I’d be willing glad to go into it to find the road for
you,” he added, more lovingly, as he noted the distressed look which
gathered on her pinched face. “Maybe you need a new kind of medicine.
I’ll ask them to-day when I’m at the dispensary.”

Billy did ask, and in such a way that the doctor’s attention was
roused, and he whispered a few words to one of the students, who put
on his hat and kindly told Billy that he was going home with him. The
student was a tall man, and had difficulty in getting into the hole
where Kate lay, but when he did, and looked into her pinched face
and brilliant eyes, and listened to her quick, gasping breath, he
merely gave his head a slight shake, and knelt down by the bedside to
take her thin hand tenderly in his own. He had been very merry and
chatty with Billy on the way, but now he was grave and solemn, and
scarcely spoke a word.

“Will she be better soon?” asked Billy at last, when the silence had
almost sickened him.

The student looked down on the white features of the sick girl, and
said softly—

“Yes—very soon.”

There was another painful silence, and then Kate dropped off into
slumber, with her hand resting trustfully in that of the student.
Then the gentleman softly disengaged his hand, and motioned Billy out
of the hole.

“Where’s your father or mother?” he gravely asked, for the room was
empty.

“Not got any—mother’s dead,” said Billy. “Rodie looks after us,” and
his hands and teeth clenched, as they generally did now when Rodie
was in his thoughts, or at his tongue’s end.

“Then I should like to see Rodie for a minute,” said the student with
the same pitying look in his eyes, which Billy could not understand
at all. “Could you find him now?”

No, no, Billy could not do that; and did not know when Rodie would be
at home, or where he was likely to be found. The student looked round
the miserable hovel, and sighed and shook his head, and then left. He
had ordered no medicine, he had said nothing about Kate, except that
she was to be better very soon, yet Billy felt a vague uneasiness and
distrust. The house seemed oppressively quiet, and Kate’s slumber
unusually deep. What if she should sleep on and never wake?

Billy crept into the hole again, and sat down on the floor beside the
bed to listen intently to every breath Kate drew, holding her hand
softly the while to make sure that she did not slip away from him as
she slept.

“Oh, if Rodie had only kicked me instead!” he thought for the
hundredth time. “A boy is more able to stand kicks, and Rodie’s so
strong—he’d kick anybody right through the world, whether there was a
hole or not.”

Late in the afternoon Rodie and the comical fiend came in boisterous
and gleeful to dinner. They had been unusually successful in passing
some bad florins, and had invested some of the proceeds in drink,
part of which they had brought home with them to make a night of it,
and laughed consumedly over the manner in which they had cheated one
of their victims.

Billy served them passively, and then, unable to taste food himself,
he crept quietly back to watch Kate. The comical fiend made some
splendid jokes, having Billy for their subject, but for once Billy
was undisturbed, for he did not hear them. He sat on the floor
holding Kate’s hand, and sometimes he put his other arm softly round
her neck, lest his hold should not be strong enough to keep her by
him.

The men got very noisy and uproarious; Rodie banged the table with
tumblers and the bottle, and shouted and stamped his feet, and then
the comical fiend, at his own request, favoured the company with
several songs.

One smash rather louder than the rest caused Kate to start and open
her eyes. She looked up in Billy’s face steadily for some moments
without moving, and the expression was so strange that in alarm he
cried—

“Kate, Kate! don’t you know me?”

There was no immediate answer. There was in the slates immediately
above them a single pane of glass, which gave light to the closet,
and that pane now showed a deep red square of the crimson sky. Kate’s
eyes wandered to the pane, and became fixed for some moments.

“What’s—that?” she whispered at last, with a strange trembling
eagerness.

“It’s only the winder,” answered Billy, a little scared.

“No, it isn’t; it’s the hole you go through into the other world,”
said Kate joyfully. “Billy, dear, I can’t stay any longer. I’m going
through!”

Billy threw both his arms around her slight form, and rained his
tears upon her face. At the same moment there was a chorus of gleeful
shouts and table-smashing like thunder in the adjoining room. It was
the comical fiend applauding his own song. Kate continued to gaze
steadily at the crimson pane in the roof with a smile brightening on
her face.

“I wish—oh, I wish there had been somebody to tell me what to do at
the other side,” she said at last in a whisper so low that Billy
could scarce catch it. “But maybe somebody will hold out a hand to
me. I’ll keep feeling about for it. It’s growing darker. Am I going
through? and is the light only at the door?”

“No, its almost night, and Rodie’s lit the candle,” said Billy. “Do
you hear me, Kate? You’re awful dreamy and queer—I’m saying it’s
almost night.”

“Night! night!” feebly and hazily breathed Kate. “Good-night.”

Her lips stood still, and her eyes, though fixed on the crimson pane,
were strange and big and unearthly. Billy stared at them in awe, and
then moved a hand quickly before them to break the steady stare and
draw it to himself. There was no response. Her eyes remained fixed on
the pane.

“Kate! Kate!” he cried in a scream of alarm.

A slight spasm—almost shaping into a smile—crossed the pinched
features; the eyes gazed unwinkingly at the pane—the breath came and
went in long-drawn sighs—paused—came again—then paused for ever.
Kate had slipped through to another world, where her feeble and
groping hand would surely be gently taken by a Guide who Himself knew
all suffering and temptation and weakness that can afflict frail
humanity, and who will surely be as pitiful to the benighted savages
of our land as of any other.

Billy screamed and wept, and threw himself on the still form; and
at length even the comical fiend, who had got up on the table to
execute a flourishing hornpipe, became annoyed and got down to put a
stop to the unseemly disturbance. Rodie, too, who became stupid and
sullen with drink just as his partner became lively, roused himself
sufficiently to stagger across the room towards the hole, vowing that
if he could only trust himself to the support of one foot he would
use the other in stopping Billy’s howling.

“Kate stares up, and won’t move or speak to me,” cried Billy in
gasps, as soon as he was conscious of the nails of the comical fiend
almost meeting in his ear.

“Maybe she’s croaked at last,” suggested Rodie. “See if she breathes.”

Joss hopped in, and soon answered in a gleeful negative.

“It’s a good job,” said Rodie, “for she’d never have been of any more
use.”

“Three cheers for her death!” cried the comical fiend, and as there
was nobody to laugh at his joke, Rodie being too sullen, Joss laughed
the required quantity for a dozen people himself.

Rodie tried to kick Billy, but, finding himself unable to stand
on one leg, he contented himself with some horrible threats, and
then they went back comfortably to their drinking. Billy cried and
cried—softly, so that the men should not hear him—with his arms
round the still form, till he fell asleep, and there they lay all
night, the living and the dead. Next day Rodie and Joss put all their
implements and money out of sight, and sent word to the poorhouse,
and a medical inspector came and glanced at the wasted body, and
asked a few questions, and signed a paper, which Billy took to the
undertaker, who brought a coffin the next day, and placed Kate’s form
in it, and then asked if they wished it screwed down. Rodie and Joss
were too drunk to reply, but Billy, never tired of looking at the
wide open eyes, and fancying they were looking at him, said he should
like it kept open as long as possible.

The funeral took place the day after, and there was only one mourner
to follow the coffin to the grave—Billy himself, in his ragged jacket
and bare feet. The only mournings he had to put on were the tears
which flowed down his cheeks all the way. Even when the coffin was
hid in the ground, and the earth tumbled in, and the turf spread
over the top, he could not put off his mournings, or leave the place
chatting gaily about business matters, as is the custom at funerals.
He still seemed to see Kate’s open eyes shining up at him through
earth and turf, and he had a firm idea that she could still hear him
speak, though herself unable to reply. He loitered long after the
gravediggers were gone, and stuck a little twig in the ground so that
he should know the spot again, and then, when no one was near to see,
he lay down on the grass and whispered to Kate through the openings
in the turf. He had but two thoughts to reiterate—the regret that
Rodie had not kicked him out of the world instead of Kate, and the
wish that he might live to “bite Rodie” for what he had done to Kate.
Whenever Billy was in trouble after that he came to the graveyard
to whisper his griefs to Kate through the turf. He told her of all
his adventures and the tortures of the comical fiend and the kicks
of Rodie; and though he got no reply, he felt quite certain that
he had Kate’s sympathy in every word he uttered. Billy’s was not a
large mind, or a very acute one, but when an idea did get fairly in,
it stuck there firmly. When Kate had been some months in the grave,
Rodie and Joss prepared a lot of florins—their most successful effort
in base coining—and informed Billy that they were going through to
Edinburgh to attend the Musselburgh Races, on business, and that
he was to accompany them, and have the honour of carrying their
luggage—an old leather valise containing the base florins. Joss and
Rodie, for prudential reasons, went by different trains, and Billy,
though he accompanied Rodie, had strict orders to sit at the other
end of the carriage, and take no more notice of Rodie than of any
stranger.

It chanced, however, that by the time the train drew up at the
Waverley Station platform, that particular carriage was empty of
all but Billy and Rodie, and the base coiner had no sooner glanced
along the platform than he uttered an oath and drew in his head with
surprising quickness.

“Do you see that ugly brute standing over there, near the cabman with
the white hat?” he observed to Billy.

“That ugly brute” was I, the writer of these experiences, on the look
out for any of my “bairns” who might be drawn thither by the race
meeting, and Billy quickly signified that he did see me.

“Well, keep clear of him, or we’re done for. That’s M^cGovan, and
he’s a perfect bloodhound,” and Rodie cursed the bloodhound with
great heartiness. “If he gets his teeth on us, we’ll feel the bite, I
tell ye.”

“Ah!” it was all Billy said, and it was uttered with a start, for
Rodie’s words had suggested a strange idea to him.

“Yes, if he gets us at it it’ll mean twenty years to us if it means
a day,” continued Rodie, still wasting a deal of breath on me. “Now
you get out first, and go straight to the place I told ye of, while I
jink him and get round by the other.”

Billy obeyed, and was soon lost in the crowd, while Rodie—who
mistakenly believed that his face was as familiar to me as mine was
to him—cut round by another outlet, and escaped to the appointed
rendezvous.

Meantime Billy had only gone far enough with the crowd to get behind
one of the waiting cabs, whence he watched Rodie leave the station.
Then he crept out of his hiding-place, and walked back to the spot
where I stood, and touched me lightly on the arm.

“I’m Rodie’s boy,” he said, while I stared at him in astonishment.
“I’ve come from Glasgow with him, and we’re to go ‘smashing’ at the
races to-morrow. Would it be twenty years to him if you caught us at
it?”

“What Rodie do you mean?” I asked at length. “Is his other name
M^cKendrick?”

“That’s it; and Joss Brown is with him,” said Billy with animation.
“He says you’re a bloodhound, and can bite. Twenty years would be a
good bite, wouldn’t it?”

“Ah, I see, he has injured you, and you want to pay him back,” I
said, not admiring Billy much, though his treachery was to bring
grist to my mill.

“He kicked Kate, my sister, and she died, and I’ve told her often
since then that I would bite him for it, and now I’ve got the chance
I must keep my word.”

I took Billy into one of the waiting-rooms and drew from him his
story. Billy told the story much better than I could put it down
though I were to spend months on the task. He showed me also the
piles of base florins put up in screws ready for use, and offered
them to me. But while he had been telling the story I had been
studying the position. I had perfect faith in Billy’s truthfulness.
The tears he shed over the narrative of Kate’s death would have
convinced the most sceptical. I therefore explained to him that
in order to secure Rodie the full strength of a good bite it was
necessary that I should take him and Joss in the act, and if possible
with the supply of base coin in their possession. To that end I
arranged to see the three next day at the race-course, and explained
to Billy how he was to act when he got from me the required signal.

I had the idea that Billy was densely stupid—almost idiotic—and that
therefore the scheme would be sure to be bungled, but in this I
misjudged the boy sadly. If Billy had been the most acute of trained
detectives he could not have gone through his part with more coolness
or precision. When I had my men ready and dropped my handkerchief,
Billy quickly wriggled himself out of a crowd and hastily thrust
the valise containing the reserve of base florins into the hands of
Rodie, who hid the same under his jacket and looked nervously round.
The comical fiend helped him. They had not long to look. We were on
them like bloodhounds the next moment. Joss was easily managed, but
Rodie fought hard, and struggled, and kicked, and finally threw away
the valise of base coin in the direction of Billy, with a shout to
him to pick it up and run. Billy looked at him, but never moved.

“You kicked Kate, and she died. It’s Billy’s Bite,” he calmly
answered, when Rodie worked himself black in the face, and the
comical fiend nearly choked himself with hastily concocted jokes.

The two got due reward in the shape of fifteen and twenty years
respectively, but Billy was sent to the Industrial School, and is now
an honest working man.




THE MURDERED TAILOR’S WATCH.

(A CURIOSITY IN CIRCUMSTANTIAL EVIDENCE.)


The case of the tailor, Peter Anderson, who was beaten to death near
the Royal Terrace, on the Calton Hill, may not yet be quite forgotten
by some, but, as the after-results are not so well known, it will
bear repeating.

Some working men, hurrying along a little before six in the morning,
found Anderson’s body in a very steep path on the hill, and in a
short time a stretcher was got and it was conveyed to the Head
Office. The first thing I noticed when I saw the body was that one
of the trousers’ pockets was half-turned out, as if with a violent
wrench, or a hand too full of money to get easily out again; and
from this sprang another discovery—that the waistcoat button-hole in
which the link of his albert had evidently been constantly worn was
wrenched clean through. There was no watch or chain visible, and the
trousers’ pockets were empty, so the first deduction was clear—the
man had been robbed.

Robbery, indeed, appeared to me, at this stage of the case, to have
been the prime cause of the outrage, and an examination of the body
confirmed the idea. The neck was not broken, but there were marks of
a strangulating arm about the neck, and the injuries about the head
were quite sufficient to cause death. These seemed to indicate that
two persons had been engaged in the crime, as is common in garroting
cases—one to strangle and the other to rob and beat—and made me more
hopeful of tracking the doers. On examining the spot at which the
body had been found, I found traces of a violent struggle, and also
a couple of folded papers, which proved to be unreceipted accounts
headed “Peter Anderson, tailor and clothier,” with the address of his
place of business. These might have given us a clue to his identity
had such been needed, but his wife had been at the Office reporting
his absence only an hour before his body was brought in, and we had
only to turn to her description of his person and clothing to confirm
our suspicion.

Anderson, on the fatal night on which he disappeared, had
unexpectedly drawn an account of some £10 or £12 from a customer, and
in the joy of receiving the money had invited the man to an adjoining
public-house to drink “a jorum,” and one round followed another until
poor Peter Anderson’s head was fitter for his pillow than for guiding
his feet. On entering the public-house—which was a very busy one,
not far from the Calton Hill—Anderson, I found, had gone up to the
bar, and before all the loungers or hangers-on pulled a handful of
notes, and silver, and gold from his trousers’ pocket, saying to his
companion—

“What will you have?”

Afterwards, when they got into talk, they adjourned to a private
box at the back; but it was there I thought that the mischief had
been done. Anderson had a gold albert across his breast, and might
be believed to have a watch at the end of it; but the chain, after
all, might have been only plated, and the watch a pinchbeck thing,
to a thief not worth taking; but the reckless display of a handful
of notes, gold, and silver, if genuine criminals chanced to see
it, was a temptation and revelation too powerful to be resisted.
The man who carried money in that fashion was likely to have more
in his pockets, and a gold watch at least. If he got drunk, or was
likely to get drunk, he would be worth waiting and watching for;
so, at least, I thought the intending criminals would reason, never
dreaming of course of the plan ending in determined resistance and
red-handed murder. Your garroter is generally a big coward, and will
never risk his skin or his liberty with a sober man if he can get one
comfortably muddled with drink.

There was no time to elaborate theories or schemes of capture. A gold
watch and chain valued at about £30, and £14 in money, were gone.
A rare prize was afloat among the sharks, and I surmised that the
circumstance would be difficult to hide. The thief and the honest
man are alike in one failing—they find it difficult to conceal
success. It prints itself in their faces; in the quantity of drink
they consume; in the tread of their feet; the triumphant leer at
the baffled or sniffing detective, and in their reckless indulgence
in gaudy articles of flash dress. I went down to the Cowgate and
Canongate at once, strolling into every likely place, and nipping
up quite a host of my “bairns.” I thought I had got the right men
indeed when I found two known as “The Crab Apple” and “Coskey” flush
of money and muddled with drink, but a day’s investigation proved
that they owed their good fortune to a stupid swell who had got
into their clutches over in the New Town. Coskey, indeed, strongly
declared that he did not believe the Anderson affair had been managed
by a professional criminal at all.

“If it had been done by any of us I’d have heard on it,” was his
frank remark to me.

I was pretty sure that Coskey spoke the truth, for in his nervous
anxiety to escape Calcraft’s toilet he had actually confessed to
me all the particulars of the New Town robbery by which his own
pockets had been filled, and which afterwards led to a seven years’
retirement from the scene of his labours.

The hint thus received prepared me for making the worst slip of all
I had made in the case. I went to Anderson’s widow to get the number
of the watch, and some description by which it might be identified.
She could not tell me the number or the maker’s name; she could only
say that it had a white dial and black figures, but declared that she
would know it out of a thousand by a deep “clour” or indentation on
the back of the case.

“I was there when it got the mark,” she said, “and I could never be
mistaken if the watch was put before me. A thief might alter the
number, but nobody could take out that mark, for we tried it, and
the watchmaker could do nothing for it. My man was working hard one
day with the watch on, when a customer called to be measured. The
waistcoat he wore wasn’t a very bonny one, and he whipped it off in
a hurry, forgetting about the watch, which was tugged out, and came
bang against the handle of one of his irons. The watch was never
a bit the worse, but the case had aye the mark on it—just there,”
and the widow, to illustrate her statement, showed me a spot on the
back of my own watch, and then so minutely explained the line of the
indentation, its length and its depth, that I felt sure that if it
came in my way I should be able to identify it as readily as by a
number.

This would have been all very well if her information had there
ended, but it didn’t.

“You are hunting away among thieves and jail birds for the man that
did it,” she bitterly remarked, “but I think I could put my hand on
him without any detective to help me.”

“You suspect some one, then?” I exclaimed, with a new interest.

“Suspect? I wish I was as sure of anything,” she answered, with great
emphasis. “The brute threatened to do it.”

“What brute?”

“Just John Burge, the man who was working to him as journeyman two
months ago.”

“Indeed. Did they quarrel?”

“A drunken passionate wretch that nobody would have any thing to do
wi’,” vehemently continued the widow, waxing hotter in her words
with every word she had uttered, “but just because they had been
apprentices together Peter took pity on him and gave him work. They
were aye quarrelling, but one day it got worse than usual, and I
thought my man would have killed him. It was quite a simple thing
began it—an argument as to which is the first day in summer—but in
the end they were near fighting, and after Peter had near choked
him, Burge swore that he would have his life for it—that he would
watch him night and day, and then knock the ‘sowl oot o’ him in some
dark corner, before he knew where he was.’ That was after the master
and the laddies had thrown him out at the door and down the stair;
and for some days I wouldn’t let Peter cross the door. But he only
laughed at me after a bit, and said that Burge’s ‘bark was waur than
his bite,’ and went about just as usual. And all the time the wicked,
ungrateful wretch was watching for a chance to take his life.”

“Why did you not tell us of this quarrel at first?” I asked, after a
pause.

“Because I thought you detectives were so sharp and clever that you
would have Burge in your grips before night, without a word from me;
but you’re not nearly so clever as you’re called.”

“But he never actually attacked your husband?” I quietly interposed,
knowing that wives are apt to take exceedingly exaggerated views of
their husband’s wrongs or rights.

“Oh, but he did, though. He came up once, not long after the quarrel,
and said he had not got all the money due to him, and tried to murder
Peter with the cutting shears.”

“Murder him? How could he murder him with shears?” I asked, with
marked scepticism.

“Well, I didn’t wait to see; but ran in and gripped him by the arms
till my man took the shears from him. The creatur’ had no more
strength than a sparry, though he’s as tall as you.”

“No more strength than a sparrow?” That incidental revelation
staggered me. It seemed to me quite impossible that a weak man could
have been the murderer of Anderson, unless, indeed, he had had an
accomplice, and that was unlikely with a man seeking mere revenge.
For a moment I was inclined to think it possible that Burge might
have tracked his victim to the hill and accomplished the revenge,
and that afterwards, when he had fled the spot, some of the “ghosts”
haunting the hill might have stripped the dead or dying man of
his valuables; but several circumstances led me to reject the
supposition—wisely, too, as it appeared in the end. Burge, the widow
told me, was a tall man, with a white, “potty” face, and a little,
red, snub-nose, and always wore a black frock coat and dress hat. I
took down the name of the street in which he lived—for I could get
no number—and turned in that direction. In about fifteen minutes I
had reached, not the street, but the crossing leading to it, when I
met full in the face a man answering his description, and having the
unmistakable tailor’s “nick” in his back.

“That should be Burge,” was my mental conclusion, though I had never
seen him before. “If he’s not, he is at least a tailor, and may know
him,” and then I stopped him with the words—

“Do you know a tailor called John Burge who lives here-about?”

“That’s me,” he said, with sudden animation, taking the pipe from his
mouth, and evidently expecting a call at his trade, “who wants me?”

“I do.”

“Oh,” and he looked me all over, evidently wondering how I looked so
unlike the trade.

There was a queer pause, and then I said—

“My name’s M^cGovan, and I want you to go with me as far as the
Police Office, about that affair on the Calton Hill.”

A wonderful change took place in his face the moment I uttered the
words—a change which, but for the grave nature of the case, would
have been actually comical; his “potty” white cheeks became red, and
his red snub-nose as suddenly became white.

“Well, do you know, that’s curious!” he at length gasped; “but I
was just coming up to the Office now, in case I should be suspected
of having a hand in it. I had a quarrel with Anderson, and said some
strong things, I’ve no doubt, in my passion, but of course I never
meant them.”

I listened in silence; but my mental comment, I remember, was, “A
very likely story!”

“I was coming up to say what I can prove—that I was at the other
end of the town that night, and home and in my bed by a quarter to
eleven,” he desperately added, rightly interpreting my silence.

I became more interested at the mention of the exact hour; for I had
ascertained beyond doubt that Anderson had not left the public-house
and parted with his friend till eleven o’clock struck. He had, in
fact, been “warned out,” along with a number of bar-loafers, at
shutting-up time.

“Did any one see you at home at that hour?” I asked, after cautioning
him.

“Yes, the wife and bairns.”

“Imphm.”

“You think that’s not good evidence; but I have more; I was in a
public-house with some friends till half-past ten; they can swear to
that; and they went nearly all the road home with me,” he continued
with growing excitement. “Do I look like a murderer? My God! I could
swear on a Bible that such a thing was never in my mind. Don’t look
so horrible and solemn, man, but say you believe me!”

I couldn’t say that, for I believed the whole a fabrication got up in
a moment of desperation; and little more was spoken on either side
till we reached the Head Office, where he repeated the same story
to the Fiscal, and was locked up. I fully expected that I should
easily tear his story to pieces by taking his so-called witnesses
one by one, but I was mistaken. His wife and children, for example,
the least reliable of his witnesses in the eyes of the law, became
the strongest, for when I called and saw them they were in perfect
ignorance both of Burge’s arrest and the fact that he expected to be
suspected.

They distinctly remembered their father being home “earlier” on
that Friday night, and the wife added that it was more than she had
expected, for by being in bed so early Burge had been able to rise
early on the following morning and finish some work on the Saturday
which she had fully expected would be “disappointed.” Then the men
with whom he had been drinking and playing dominoes up to half-past
ten were emphatic in their statements, which tallied almost to a
minute with those of Burge. Burge had not been particularly flush
of money after that date, but, on the contrary, had pleaded so hard
for payment of the work done on the Saturday that the man was glad
to compromise matters and get rid of him by part payment in shape of
half-a-crown. The evidence, as was afterwards remarked, was not the
best—a few drinkers in a public-house, whose ideas of time and place
might be readily believed to be hazy, and the interested wife and
children of the suspected man; but in the absence of condemning facts
it sufficed, and after a brief detention Burge was set at liberty.

About that time, among the batch of suspected persons in our keeping
was a man named Daniel O’Doyle. How he came to be suspected I
forget, but I believe it was through having a deal of silver and
some sovereigns in the pockets of his ragged trousers when he was
brought to the Office as a “drunk and disorderly.” O’Doyle gave a
false name, too, when he came to his senses; but then it was too
late, for a badly-written letter from some one in Ireland had been
found in his pocket when he was brought in. He was a powerfully-built
man, and in his infuriated state it took four men to get him to the
Office. He could give no very satisfactory account of how he came by
the money in his possession. He had been harvesting, he said, but
did not know the name of the place or its geographical position,
except that it was east of Edinburgh “a long way,” and he was going
back to Ireland with his earnings, but chanced to take a drop too
much and half-murder a man in Leith Walk, and so got into our hands.
On the day after his capture and that of his remand O’Doyle was “in
the horrors,” and at night during a troubled sleep was heard by a
man in the same cell to mutter something about “Starr Road,” and
having “hidden it safe there.” This brief and unintelligible snatch
was repeated to me next morning, but, stupid as it now appears to
me, I could make nothing of it. I knew that there was no such place
as “Starr Road” in Edinburgh, and said so; and as for him having
hidden something, that was nothing for a wandering shearer, and
might, after all, be only his reaping hook or bundle of lively linen.
O’Doyle was accordingly tried for assault, and sentenced to thirty
days’ imprisonment, at the expiry of which he was set at liberty and
at once disappeared. My impression now is that O’Doyle was never
seriously suspected of having had a hand in the Calton Hill affair,
but that, being in our keeping about the time, he came in for his
share of suspicion among dozens more perfectly innocent. If he had
had bank-notes about him it might have been different, for I have
found that there is a strong feeling against these and in favour of
gold among the untutored Irish, which induces them to get rid of them
almost as soon as they chance to receive them.

So the months passed away and no discovery was made; we got our due
share of abuse from the public; and the affair promised to remain as
dark and mysterious as the Slater murder in the Queen’s Park. But for
the incident I am now coming to, I believe the crime would have been
still unsolved.

About two years after, I chanced to be among a crowd at a political
hustings in Parliament Square, at which I remember Adam Black came
in for a great deal of howling and abuse. I was there, of course, on
business, fully expecting to nip up some of my diligent “family” at
work among the pockets of the excited voters; but no game could have
been further from my thoughts than that which I had the good fortune
to bag. I was moving about on the outskirts of the crowd, when a face
came within the line of my vision which was familiar yet puzzling.
The man had a healthy prosperous look, and nodded smilingly to me,
more as a superior than an inferior in position.

“Don’t you remember me?—John Burge; I was in the Anderson murder, you
mind; the Calton Hill affair;” and then I smiled too and shook the
proffered hand.

“How are you getting on now?”

“Oh, first rate—doing well for myself,” was the bright and
pleased-looking answer. “Yon affair was a lesson to me; turned
teetot. when I came out, and have never broke it since. It’s the best
way.”

It seemed so, to look at him. The “potty” look was gone from his
face; his cheeks had a healthy colour, and his nose had lost its
rosiness. His dress too was better. The glossy, well-ironed dress
hat was replaced by one shining as if fresh from the maker, and
the threadbare frock coat by one of smooth, firm broadcloth. He
was getting stouter, too, and his broad, white waistcoat showed a
pretentious expanse of gold chain. He chatted away for some time,
evidently a little vain of the change in his circumstances, and at
length drew out a handsome gold watch, making, as his excuse for
referring to it, the remark—

“Ah, it’s getting late; I can’t stay any longer.”

My eye fell upon the watch, as it had evidently been intended that
it should, and almost with the first glance I noticed a deep nick in
the edge of the case, at the back. Possibly the man’s own words had
taken my mind back to the lost watch of the murdered tailor and its
description, but certainly the moment I saw the mark on the case I
put out my hand with affected carelessness, as he was slipping it
back to his pocket, saying—

“That’s a nice watch; let’s have a look at it.”

It was tendered at once, and I found it to have a white china dial
and black figures. At last I came back to the nick and scrutinised it
closely.

“You’ve given it a bash there,” I remarked, after a pause.

“No, that was done when I got it.”

“Bought it lately?”

“Oh, no; a long time ago.”

“Who from?”

“From one of the men working under me; I got it a great bargain,”
he answered with animation. “It’s a chronometer, and belonged to an
uncle of his, but it was out of order—had lain in the bottom of a sea
chest till some of the works were rusty—and so I got it cheap.”

“Imphm. There has been some lying in the bargain anyhow,” I said,
after another look at the watch, “for it is an ordinary English
lever, not a chronometer. Is the man with you yet?”

“No; but, good gracious! you don’t mean to say that there’s anything
wrong about the watch? It’s not—not a stolen one?”

“I don’t know, but there was one exactly like this stolen that time
that Anderson was killed.”

In one swift flash of alarm, his face, before so rosy, became as
white as the waistcoat covering his breast.

Then he slowly examined the watch with a trembling hand, and finally
stammered out—

“I remember it, and this is not unlike it. But that’s nothing—hundreds
of watches are as like as peas.”

I differed with him there, and finally got him to go with me to
the Office, at which he was detained, while I went in search of
Anderson’s widow to see what she would say about the watch.

If I had an opinion at all about the case at this stage, it was that
the watch taken was not that of the murdered man. I could scarcely
otherwise account for Burge’s demeanour. He appeared so surprised
and innocent, whereas a man thus detected in the act of wearing such
a thing, knowing its terrible history, could scarcely have helped
betraying his guilt.

My fear, then, as I made my way to the house of Anderson’s widow, was
that she, woman like, would no sooner see the mark on the case than
she would hastily declare it to be the missing watch. To avoid as far
as possible a miscarriage of justice, I left the watch at the Office,
carefully mixed up with a dozen or two more then in our keeping, one
or two of which resembled it in appearance. I found the widow easily
enough, and took her to the Office with me, saying simply that we had
a number of watches which she might look at, with the possibility
of finding that of her husband. The watches were laid out before
her in a row, faces upward, and she slowly went over them with her
eye, touching none till she came to that taken from Burge. Then she
paused, and there was a moment’s breathless stillness in the room.

“This ane’s awfu’ like it,” she said, and, lifting the watch, she
turned it, and beamed out in delight as she recognised the sharp nick
on the back of the case. “Yes, it’s it! Look at the mark I told you
about.”

She pointed out other trifling particulars confirming the identity,
but practically the whole depended on exactly what had first drawn my
attention to the watch—the nick on the case. Now dozens of watches
might have such a mark upon them, and it was necessary to have a much
more reliable proof before we could hope for a conviction against
Burge on such a charge.

I had thought of this all the way to and from the widow’s house. She
knew neither the number of the watch nor the maker’s name, but with
something like hopefulness I found that she knew the name of the
watchmaker in Glasgow who had sold it to her husband, and another
in Edinburgh who had cleaned it. I went through to Glasgow the same
day with the watch in my pocket, found the seller, and by referring
to his books discovered the number of the watch sold to Anderson,
which, I was electrified to find, was identical with that on the
gold lever I carried. The name of the maker and description of the
watch also tallied perfectly; and the dealer emphatically announced
himself ready to swear to the identity in any court of justice. My
next business was to visit the man who had cleaned the watch for
Anderson in Edinburgh. I was less hopeful of him, and hence had left
him to the last, and therefore was not disappointed to find that he
had no record of the number or maker’s name. On examining the watch
through his working glass, however, he declared that he recognised
it perfectly as that which he had cleaned for Anderson by one of the
screws, which had half of its head broken off, and thus had caused
him more trouble than usual in fitting up the watch after cleaning.

“I would have put a new one in rather than bother with it,” he said,
“but I had not one beside me that would fit it, and as I was pressed
for time, I made the old one do. It was my own doing, too, for I
broke the top in taking the watch down.”

I was now convinced, almost against my will, that the watch was
really that taken from Anderson; my next step was to test Burge’s
statement as to how it came into his possession. If that broke down,
his fate was sealed.

When I again appeared before Burge he was eager to learn what had
transpired, and appeared unable to understand why he should still
be detained; all which I now set down as accomplished hypocrisy. It
seemed to me that he had lied from the first, and I was almost angry
with myself for having given so much weight to his innocent looks and
apparent surprise.

Cutting short his questions with no very amiable answers, I asked the
name and address of the man from whom he alleged he had bought the
watch. Then he looked grave, and admitted that the man, whose name
was Chisholm, might be difficult to find, as he was a kind of “orra”
hand, oftener out of work than not. I received the information in
silence, and went on the hunt for Chisholm, whom I had no difficulty
whatever in finding at the house of a married daughter with whom
he lodged. He was at home when I called,—at his dinner or tea,—and
stared at me blankly when I was introduced, being probably acquainted
with my face, like many more whom I have never spoken to or noticed.

“I have called about a watch that you sold to Burge the tailor, whom
you were working with some six months ago,” I said quietly.

The man, who had been drinking tea or coffee out of a basin, put down
the dish in evident concern, and stared at me more stupidly than
before.

“A watch!—what kin’ o’ a watch?” he huskily exclaimed. “I haena had a
watch for mair nor ten years.”

“The watch is a gold lever, but he says you sold it to him as a
chronometer which had belonged to your uncle, a seaman.”

Chisholm’s face was now pale to the very point of his nose, but that
did not necessarily imply guilt on his part. I have noticed the look
far oftener on the faces of witnesses than prisoners.

“What? an uncle! a seaman!” he cried with great energy, turning an
amazed look on his daughter. “I havena an uncle leeving—no ane. The
man must be mad,” and this statement the daughter promptly supported.

“Do you mean to say—can you swear that you never sold him a watch of
any kind—which was rusty in the works through lying in a sea-chest?”

“Certainly, sir—certainly, I can swear that. I never had a watch to
sell, and I’ll tell him that to his face,” volubly answered Chisholm,
whose brow now was as thick with perspiration as if he had been doing
a hard day’s work since I entered. “Onybody that kens me can tell ye
I’ve never had a watch, or worn ane, for ten year and mair. I wad be
only owre glad if I had.”

I questioned him closely and minutely, but he declared most
distinctly and emphatically that the whole story of Burge was an
invention. I ought to have been satisfied with this declaration—it
was voluble and decided, and earnest as any statement could be—but
I was not. The man’s manner displeased me. It was too noisy and
hurried, and his looks of astonishment and innocence were, if
anything, too marked. I left the house in a puzzled state.

“What if I should have to deal with _two_ liars?” was my reflection.
“How could I pit them against each other?”

Back I trudged to the Office, and saw Burge at once.

“I have seen the man Chisholm, and he declares that he not only did
not sell you a watch of any kind, but that he has not had one in his
possession for upwards of ten years.”

Burge paled to a deathly hue, and I saw the cold sweat break out in
beads on his temples.

“I was just afraid of that,” he huskily whispered, after a horrible
pause. “Chisholm’s an awful liar, and will say that now to save his
own skin. There must have been something wrong about the way he got
it. I was a fool to believe his story. I remember now he made me
promise not to say that I had bought the watch from him, or how I got
it, in case the other relatives should find out that he had taken it.”

“Indeed! Then you have no witness whatever to produce as to the
purchase?” I cried, after a long whistle.

“None.”

“Did you not speak of it to anybody?”

“Not a soul but yourself that I mind of.”

“Well, all I can say is that your case looks a bad one,” I said at
last, as I turned to leave him. “By the by, though, what about the
chain? Did you buy that from him too?”

My reason for asking was, that the chain was a neck one, not an
albert, and, of course, had not been identified by the widow of
Anderson.

“No, I had the chain; I had taken it in payment of an account; but he
wanted me to buy a chain, too, now that I remember.”

“What kind of a chain? Did you see it?”

“No; I said I did not need it; but I would look at the watch. He
wanted a pound for the chain, and eight for the watch. I got it for
£5, 10s., and then he went on the spree for a fortnight.”

“A whole fortnight? Surely some one will be able to recall that,” I
quickly interposed, half inclined to believe that Burge was not at
least the greater liar of the two. “His daughter will surely remember
it?”

“I don’t know about that,” groaned Burge, in despairing tones.
“That man takes so many sprees that it’s difficult to mind ane frae
anither.”

I resolved to try the daughter, nevertheless, and after getting from
Burge, as near as he could remember, the date of the bargain, I left
him and began to ponder how I could best get an unvarnished tale from
this prospective witness. While I pondered, a new link in this most
mysterious case was thrown into my hands.

We had been particularly careful after the arrest of Burge to keep
the affair secret, but in spite of the precaution, an account of
the arrest, altogether garbled and erroneous, appeared in the next
day’s papers. From this account it appeared that we were confident of
Burge’s guilt, and were only troubled because we could not discover
his accomplices in the crime, and on that account “were not disposed
to be communicative,” as the penny-a-liner grandly expressed himself.
The immediate result of this stupid paragraph, which seemed to book
Burge for the gallows beyond redemption, was a letter from the West,
bearing neither name nor address, it is true, but still written
with such decision and vigour that I could not but give it some
weight in my feeble gropings at the truth. This letter was placed
in my hands, though not addressed to me particularly, just as I was
wondering how to best question Chisholm’s daughter about her father’s
big spree. The letter was short, and well-written and spelled, and
began by saying that Burge, whom we had in custody on suspicion of
being concerned in the robbery and murder of Anderson, was perfectly
innocent; that the whole of the facts were known to the writer, whose
lips were sealed as to who the criminal really was, and who only
wrote that he might save an innocent man from a shameful death. The
post-mark on the letter was that of a considerable town on the Clyde,
or my thoughts would inevitably have reverted to Chisholm as the
author or prompter. With the suspicion of this man had come at last
an idea that he was in some way mixed up in the crime; yet he did not
look either strong enough or courageous enough to be the murderer.
Quite uncertain how to act, I left the Office, and wandered down in
the direction of Chisholm’s home. It was quite dark, I remember,
and I was ascending the narrow stair in hope that Chisholm might by
that time be out of the house, when a man stumbled down on me in the
dark, cursing me sharply for not calling out that I was there. The
man was Chisholm, as I knew at once by the tone of the voice, and how
I did not let him pass on, and make my inquiries at the daughter,
is more than I can tell to this day. I merely allowed him to reach
the bottom of the stair, and then turned and followed him. At the
bottom I watched his figure slowly descending the close towards the
Back Canongate till he reached the bottom, when he paused and peered
cautiously forth before venturing out. The stealthy walk and that
cunning look forth I believe decided me, coupled with the decided
change in the tone in which he cursed me in the dark from the smooth
and oily manner in which he had answered my questions during the day.
I would follow him, though wherefore or why I did not trouble to
ask. About half-way down the South Back Canongate, where the Public
Washing House now stands, there was at that time an open drain which
ran with a strong current in the direction of the Queen’s Park. As
it left the green for the Park, this drain emptied itself down an
iron-barred opening in the ground, and made a sudden dip downwards of
twenty or thirty feet on smooth flag-stones, which carried the water
away into the darkness with a tremendous rush and noise. So steep was
the gradient at this covered part of the drain, and so smooth the
bottom, that miserable cats and dogs, doomed to die, had merely to be
put within the grating, when down they shot, and were seen or heard
no more.

I followed Chisholm as far as this green, which he entered, and then
wondered what his object could be. That it was not quite a lawful
one I could guess from the fact that he so often paused and looked
about him that I had the greatest difficulty in keeping him in sight
without myself being seen. At length he came to the opening in the
wall where the open drain ceased and dipped into the iron bars with a
roar audible even to me, and then with another furtive look around,
and before I had the slightest idea of what he was intending to do,
he put his hand in his pocket, drew something forth, and threw it
sharply into the roaring, scurrying water. A moment more and my hand
was on his arm. He started round with a scared cry, and recognised
and named me.

“What’s that you threw down the drain?” I sternly demanded, without
giving him time to recover, and tightening my grip on his arm.

“Oh, naething, naething, sir—only an auld pipe that’s nae mair use,”
he confusedly stammered.

“A pipe!” I scornfully echoed. “Man, what do you think my head’s made
of? You didn’t come so far to throw away a pipe. Were you afraid
that, like some of the cats the laddies put down there, it would
escape and come back again?”

He tried to grin, cringingly, but the effect was ghastly in the
extreme.

“No, no, Maister M^cGovan; I was just walking this way ony way, and
thought I wad get rid o’ my auld pipe.”

“More like, it was a gold albert,” I sharply said, getting out the
handcuffs. “If I had only guessed what you were after I might have
been nearer, and prevented the extravagance. You’re unlike every one
else in the world, throwing away good gold while others are breaking
their hearts to get it. Come, now, try your hand in these; and then
I’ll have to see if the burn will give up your offering.”

He was utterly and abjectly silenced, and accepted the bracelets
without demur, which led me to believe that my surmise was a hit. The
tailor’s gold albert, supposing Burge’s story to be true, was all
that remained unaccounted for, and its possession now was frightfully
dangerous. What more natural, then, that Chisholm should take alarm
at my visit, and hasten to dispose of it in the most effectual
manner within his reach? If he had put it through the melting pot,
and I had arrived only in time to see the shapeless nugget tossed out
of the crucible, he could not have given me a greater pang; but of
course I did not tell him that. I expected never to see it again, and
I was right, for the chain has never been seen or heard of since. My
thoughts on the way to the Office were not pleasant; afterthoughts
with an “if” are always tormenting; and mine was “If I had only
seized him before he reached the drain, and had him searched.” Then
he was so secretive and cunning that I had no hope whatever of him
committing himself to a confession. In this I made the error of
supposing him entirely guilty. I forgot the case of “Cosky” and
“The Crab Apple,” who were only too glad to save their necks at the
expense of their liberty. Chisholm, though cunning as a fox, was a
terrible coward, and as we neared the Office he tremblingly said—

“Will I be long, think ye, o’ getting oot again?”

I stared at him in surprise, and then, with some impatience, said—

“About three weeks after the trial probably.”

“What? how? will three weeks be the sentence?” he stammered in
confusion.

“No; but that is the interval generally allowed between sentence and
hanging.”

“Good God, man! They canna hang me!” he exclaimed, nearly dropping on
the street with terror.

“Wait. If I get that chain out of the drain it will hang you as sure
as fate,” I grimly replied. I was rather pleased at being able to say
it, for I was snappish and out of temper.

“But I never killed the tailor; never saw the man,” he exclaimed,
evidently fearfully in earnest.

“I’ve nothing to do with that; it all depends on what the jury
think,” I shortly answered, and then we got to the Office, and he
made a rambling statement about being taken up innocently, and was
then locked up.

My immediate task was to have the drain explored, but that was all
labour thrown away. The rush of water had been too strong, and the
chain was gone, buried in mud and slime, or carried away to sea. I
soon had abundant evidence that Chisholm had been on the spree for a
fortnight about the time stated by Burge, but my intention of weaving
a complete web round him was stayed by a message from himself, asking
to see me that he might tell all he knew of the watch and chain. He
did not know that I had failed to get the chain, or he might have
risked absolute silence.

“Ye ken, I’m a bit of a fancier of birds,” he said, in beginning his
story.

“Including watches and chains,” I interposed.

“I was oot very early ae Sunday morning, for however late I’m up on
a Saturday, I can never sleep on Sunday morning,” he continued, with
a dutiful grin at my remark. “I gaed doon by the Abbey Hill to the
Easter Road, and when I was hauf way to Leith I saw a yellow finch
flee oot at a dyke where its nest was, and begin flichering along on
the grund to draw me away frae the place. Cunnin’ brutes them birds,
but I was fly for it, and instead o’ following it, and believing
it couldna flee, I stoppit and begoud to look for the nest in the
dyke. But before I got forrit I had kind o’ lost the exact place. I
searched aboot, wi’ the bird watchin’ me geyan feared-like a wee bit
off, and at last I found a hole half filled up wi’ a loose stane. Oot
cam’ the stane, and in gaed my haund; but instead o’ a nest I fund a
gold watch and chain; and that’s the God’s truth, though I should dee
this meenit.”

“Did you mention the finding to any one?”

“No me; I didna even tell my daughter, for I kent if it was fund oot
I might get thirty days for keeping it up. I had an idea that the
watch had been stolen and planted there, or I might have gaen to a
pawnshop wi’ it. It was kind o’ damaged wi’ lying in the dyke, so at
last I made up a story and sellt it to Maister Burge.”

“You are good at making up stories, I think?” I reflectively observed.

“I’m thinkin’ there’s a pair of us, Maister M^cGovan,” he readily
returned, with a pawky dab at my ribs.

But for his coolness and evident relief at getting the thing off his
mind, I should have set down the whole as another fabrication. But
when a man begins to smile and joke, it may be taken for granted that
he does not think himself in immediate danger of being hanged. His
story, however, might have availed him but little had I not chanced
to turn up my notes on the case at its earlier stages, and found
there the hitherto meaningless words muttered by Daniel O’Doyle.
“Starr Road” muttered in sleep might be but a contraction of Easter
Road, or be those actual words imperfectly overheard. Then there were
the words about something being “hidden safely there,” and the whole
tallied so closely that I was at last sure that I was on the right
track. These additional gleanings made me revert to my anonymous
correspondent in the west. It was scarcely likely that I should be
able to trace him; but he spoke in his note of the guilty one being
a person or persons outside of himself—known to him. This lessened
my interest in him personally, but made me think that if I visited
the town I might get hold of O’Doyle himself, which would be quite
as good, if not better. I accordingly went to the place, in which
there is a public prison, and as a first step called on the police
superintendent. An examination of the books at length sent me in the
direction of the prison, in which a man answering the description,
and having O’Doyle for one of his names, had been confined on a
nine months’ sentence for robbery. I was now in high spirits, and
quite sure that in the prisoner I should recognise the O’Doyle I
wanted; but on reaching the place I found that a more imperative
and inexorable officer had been there before me in shape of death.
Immediately on getting the answer I made the inquiry, “Did he make
any statement or confession before he died?” This was not easily
answered, and before it could be, with satisfaction, a number of the
officials had to be questioned, and then I found that O’Doyle had
been attended, as is usual, in his last moments by a Catholic priest.

This gentleman was still in the town, though not stationed in the
Prison, and knowing something of the vows of a priest, I despaired
at once of extracting anything from him, but became possessed of a
desire to have a look at his handwriting. Accordingly I sent him
a polite note requesting him to send me word when he would be at
liberty to see me for a few minutes’ conversation. I fully expected
to get a written note in reply, however short, but instead I got a
message delivered by the servant girl, to the effect that her master
was at home, and would see me now. I grinned and bore it, though it
is not pleasant to feel eclipsed in cunning by anyone. I went with
the girl, and found the priest, a pale, hard-worked looking man,
leaning back in his chair exhausted and silent, and certainly looking
as if he at least did not eat the bread of idleness. I felt rather
small as I introduced myself and ran over the case that had brought
me there, he listening to the whole with closed eyes, and a face
as immovable as that of a statue. When I had finished there was an
awkward pause. I had not exactly asked anything, but it was implied
in my sudden pull up, but for a full minute there was no response.

At last he opened his eyes—and very keen, penetrating eyes they
were—and, fixing me sternly with his gaze, he said—

“Did you ever come in contact with a Catholic priest before Mr
M^cGovan?”

“Frequently.”

“Did you ever know one to break his vows and reveal the secrets of
heaven?”

“Never.”

“Do you think one of them would do it if you asked him?”

“I think not.”

“Do you think he would do it if you threatened him with prison?”

“Scarcely.”

“Or with death—say if you had power to tear him limb from limb, or
torture every drop of blood from his body?”

“I don’t know—I shouldn’t like to try.”

“Then what do you come to me for?” he sharply continued, with a
slight tinge of red in his pale cheeks. “Am I, think you, more
unworthy than any other that has yet lived?”

“No, I should hope not,” I stammered; “and I did not come expecting
you to reveal what was told you in confession——”

“What then—you wish to know if I wrote that letter maybe?”

“Yes.”

“And you’ll be satisfied that I speak the truth when I answer?”

“Yes.”

“And you’ll ask no more?”

“I’ll ask no more.”

“Then I didn’t. Bridget, show the gentleman out.”

I was so staggered and nonplussed that I was in the street before
I had time to ponder his reply. I was convinced then, as I am now,
that the priest spoke the literal truth; how then had the letter been
written? Certainly not by O’Doyle himself. Was it possible that a
third person could have got at the information?

Back I went to the jail, and by rigid questioning discovered that at
the time of O’Doyle’s death there was one other person, a delicate
man of some education, in the hospital, who complained of pains in
the head, and of having grown stone deaf since his incarceration.
This man had been set at liberty shortly after, and made no secret
of having malingered so successfully as to get all the luxuries of
the hospital instead of the hard labour of the other prisoners. There
was then an excited and prolonged conversation between this man and
the priest I had visited; and as they were of the same faith I have
little doubt but the father had bound him down in some way to keep
secret what he had chanced to overhear of O’Doyle’s confession. This
at least was my theory, and a peculiar flash of the priest’s eyes
when I afterwards hinted at the discovery convinced me that I was not
far off the truth.

Chisholm, for his bird-nesting experiment, got thirty days’
imprisonment, and Burge, after about a month’s detention, was
discharged.




THE STREET PORTER’S SON.


The old street porter appeared at the Central Office one winter
morning, but refused to reveal his business to any one but me. I
had been delayed a little beyond my usual time by other work, but
Corny Stephens patiently sat there the whole time. He appeared to
know me, too, for the moment I entered the “reception-room” he rose
and deferentially touched his forelock. He was an old man, very thin
and bloodless, with poverty shining out of every bit of his meagre
clothing and decayed boots. He wore at his lapel the polished badge
of a licensed street porter, and over his shoulder had slung a hank
of frayed rope, apparently as aged and weak as himself. It is not
unlikely that I had seen him often before, but my interest is not so
strong in honest folks, and, as he belonged to that healthy majority,
I did not remember noticing him particularly. He was blue with cold,
but the hand touching his forelock trembled violently, not so much
with cold as strong excitement.

“It’s your help I want, sir,” he said, when I had tried to dispel the
awe and dread with which he seemed to regard me, “and mebbe I can
give you some news that’ll be of use to you; only I’m afeared I might
get mixed up in it myself. I’ve been honest for sixty years now, and
it would be mighty hard to be mistook for a thafe and a villain now.”

These words put me upon my guard, and while he was speaking them I
was reading his face closely. Listening to the specious stories of
rogues makes one suspicious of everything. He did not suffer under
the ordeal, but I still made no sign, merely asking him to go on.

“Do you know a man called Micky Hill?” he abruptly resumed.

I started a little, for Micky had been in my thoughts more than once
lately. I knew him, of course—a convict and ticket-of-leave man, who
had already endured two long terms, and who knew me just as well as
I did him, and never passed me without an impudent grin, as much as
to say, “Your mighty smart arn’t you—why don’t you get hold of me?”
Micky had small eyes set deep in his head, and every twinkle of them
was full of cunning. I believe those eyes of his irritated me more
than the man himself. I hated them from the depths of my soul.

“Yes,” I quietly answered, “what of him?”

“Well, it’s him I’d like to see with your bracelets on,” answered
Corny with fearful energy, “to see booked for ten years, as he will
be, I’ve no doubt, if you can prove a good case agin him.”

“You’ve quarrelled with him, then?” I remarked, with some surprise at
the association of an honest man with a thief.

“Not me,” cried the old porter, with warmth. “Ye don’t think I’d
speak to the likes of him? But he’s brought me bitter sorrow, and
it’s only fair he should suffer for it. I think I can do that, and
do you a good turn at the same time, sur, and him never be a bit the
wiser. There was a grocer’s broke into down at Greenside last week,
was’nt there? and a lot of brandy and things took?”

“Ah! did he do that?” I cried, for it was in connection with that
very case that Micky’s name had cropped up in my mind, coupled with
the fear, I confess, that I should never bring the crime home to him.
Micky did a deal in shebeening, and who more likely to find a use for
strong spirits which cost him nothing? but experience told me that
he would never be the dolt to keep the plunder where any connection
between it and himself could be traced.

“Will no harm come on me or mine if I tell ye all I know?”
tremblingly inquired Corny.

“Had you anything to do with the affair yourself?” I sharply demanded.

“No, by me immortal sowl, no!” cried the old man, “I’d sooner
drop dead with starvation than rob any one of a hap’orth. But my
son Pat—he’s a labourer, sur, and been out for two months with the
frost—he has been too much in Micky’s company—mebbe you’ve seen
him—and it’s him I’m afeard for. He got fourteen days just for being
in Micky’s company, yet he won’t keep away from the villain. My
belief is, Micky has throw’d a charm over him, and Pat’s being led
off his feet without the power to help himself. Oh, sur, it’s an
awful thought to me and to his sister, that would give the very heart
out of her own breast to keep him straight.”

There could be little doubt of his sincerity now, for his whole heart
was in his eyes, and he had broken down pitifully as he spoke. I now
dimly understood the case, for it was not the first by many dozens
which had come in my way.

“Tell me all you know, and I will do what I can for you, though I can
promise nothing,” I said, thinking that the son might be involved
more than the father was aware.

“I’m content with that, sur,” he gratefully responded, “for I hear
there’s thaves that think your word surer than the bank. But it’s not
much I do know. There’s an empty place in the court down there where
Micky lives. It used to be a coal-house, but nobody uses it now, and
the roof’s nigh dropping to pieces. Well, I believe if you go to that
place and get the door open, and dig up the dross, you’ll find a good
deal of what was tuck out of the grocer’s. I think Micky did the job,
but anyhow he has a key that opens that place, and nobody but him
ever gets a finger near the stuff.”

“How did you find out all that?” I promptly demanded. “Did your son
tell you?”

“Him tell me? Do you think Pat ’ud betray any one, even a
black-hearted villain like Micky Hill? No, he’s too honourable,
though Micky, I’ll swear, wouldn’t have any such scruples. Must I
tell you how I found it out?”

“You’d better, if only to save your own character, and take all
suspicion away from yourself.”

“Well, then, his sister Annie heard him speak it all in his sleep.”

I whistled aloud, and the glance I turned on the trembling old man
was one more of pity than pleasure. Before the son could have been
so full of the knowledge as to be oppressed by it in his dreams,
he must have been very deeply involved—probably one of the actual
perpetrators—and in that case how could I possibly save him? At the
moment I heartily wished that the old man had never come near me. If
only he and Micky were in the job, and I nipped up the elder rogue,
I knew for certain that he would at once suspect treachery, denounce
Pat, and put proof in our hands as well. And then another difficulty
immediately occurred to me—even if we searched the cellar and found
there the stolen goods, how would that bring conviction on Micky? He
had not the shed rented, but had cunningly taken possession unknown
to any one, and probably entered it only by night when no one was
likely to see him. Altogether the case seemed a knotty problem, and
I had to send away Corny with less encouragement and hope than he had
looked for. If the old porter had known what awaited him outside, his
trembling and fears would have been increased rather than diminished,
for in an entry in the close was snugly ensconced the very man he had
been denouncing.

Micky did not allow himself to be seen, but followed the old man
down to the Cowgate, and there allowed him to be some distance along
before he made up to him and addressed him.

“Fine morning, Corny,” he said, with a wicked leer, which struck the
old man with a nameless dread.

“Is it, then?” he hotly retorted; “then you’ll see to keep away from
me.”

“Where have you been so early?” asked Micky, smiling and looking more
wicked than ever.

“Where you’ll——” The Irish blood of the old man was up, and the two
words were out before he knew. He checked himself, however, and
walked off without a word more.

But the worst was now known to Micky. He now _knew_ that he had in
some way, incomprehensible to himself, been betrayed. His suspicions
could fall on none but his partner, the porter’s son, and on him he
resolved should fall the full brunt of the punishment. He abused
himself roundly for taking such a greenhorn into his confidence,
but, on the whole, thought that he had so managed matters as to
keep his own skin safe. The porter’s son being out of work, was not
difficult to find; but Micky was rather surprised to find that his
most ingenious hints and questionings did not for a moment disconcert
or disturb Pat Stephens. He began to think the labourer more cunning
than himself, when in reality the other was a perfect child in
comparison. The apparent innocence of Pat only added to Micky’s rage
and hatred, and, taking the labourer home with him, he told him
vaguely of some one having seen him going to his hide, and pressed
upon Pat the key of the cellar, with the request that as soon as it
was dark he would go to the shed and bring out certain bottles which
Micky was in need of for the concoction of the peculiar “fire water”
which he doled out as whisky. Quite unsuspicious, Pat took the key
and carried it about with him all day; and late that night, when all
was quiet in the court, he went to the shed, unlocked the door, and
was busy digging up the stuff when we entered and offered to help
him. He dropped the spade at once, and then dropped himself right
into the grave of coal dross he had made, where he sat helplessly
staring at us, speechless with astonishment and terror. We had
been watching the place since nightfall from a safe hide close by,
and were as much astonished at our capture as the cowering culprit
himself.

I had made sure that none but Micky himself would have the run of
that cellar, and was intensely chagrined to find in our clutches
only a rather stupid-looking fellow, who had not even the daring to
attempt resistance or make a dash for liberty.

“What’s your name?” I demanded, while the others rapidly unearthed
the contents of the hide.

“Patrick Stephens,” he nervously answered.

“Good gracious! you don’t mean to say that you are the porter’s son?”
I exclaimed, more vexed than I cared to show.

He nodded, but then perhaps conscious that he had said too much, he
took refuge in silence. Behold the stupidity of the man; just when
speaking would have benefited him he closed his mouth. I asked him
what he was doing there; if he had been sent by any one, and how he
accounted for some of the bottles bearing the address of a Greenside
grocer; but to all these questions he remained perversely dumb. He
had not the slightest suspicion that Micky had betrayed him, still
less that he owed his capture to his own tongue and his anxious
father. His idea was that he had been suspected by us, watched and
followed to the place, and thus captured in the ordinary course of
events. Finding him so stubborn, I sent him to the Office in charge
of the others, leaving a man to guard the plunder till it could
be taken away in a barrow, while I went up to Micky’s house and
considerably surprised him by telling him to get up and come with
me—for the cunning rascal had, for the sake of appearances, got into
bed, where he stared at me, the very picture of virtuous innocence.

He showed every one of his yellow teeth in that devil’s grin of his
when I sharply repeated the command, and then I inwardly guessed
that I should have some trouble in getting him convicted. My hope,
however, was strong in the porter’s son, who, I was convinced, was
by far the more innocent of the two, so I snapped the bracelets on
Micky with apparent zest, and he was locked up till morning, when I
again visited Pat, and found him as obdurate as before. I had still
one resource—the old porter, and to him I went as soon as I could get
away.

His distress—and that of his daughter, who appeared to keep house for
them—was overwhelming, and, not unnaturally, the heaviest of their
reproaches fell upon me.

“You tuck him away after promising that you would do your best to
save him and ketch the other villain!” cried the old man, with bitter
tears. “Saints above us! and I’ve been the means of sending me own
heart’s blood to prison. Och! och! the curse of Heaven be on me for
that, and may the tongue that betrayed him wither in me head!”

“I may save him yet, if you can only get him to speak—if you can get
him to denounce Micky. Could you not prove an _alibi_ for the night
of the robbery?”

The old man paused in his lamentations to think for a moment, and
then honestly confessed that the night of the robbery and that which
followed were two on which he was certain his son was not at home.
I had therefore no doubt but Pat had actually been engaged in the
robbery, which had been executed in a clumsy and haphazard fashion,
quite in keeping with the two men in custody. I got the porter to see
his son in prison, but the effort was made in vain, for Pat would not
open his mouth. Tears, prayers, and entreaties were showered upon
him in vain, and the only thing which moved him was his old father
lifting his hands to invoke the curse of heaven upon his ungrateful
head.

“Don’t, father, dear!—don’t,” he piteously cried, grasping through
the bars at the feeble arms of his father as they were about to be
upraised; “don’t say the black words, for sure I’ve an oath on me
sowl, and I can’t break it!”

“Well, well, poor lad!” and the father struggled no more. “May the
Almighty give ye strinth to throw id off;” and so they parted, and
the misguided victim went unflinchingly to his trial. There was not
the smallest tittle of evidence to connect Micky with the crime, and
after a short detention he was liberated. Pat was tried shortly after
at the High Court, and sentenced to eighteen months’ imprisonment.

“Oh, Patrick dear! it’s somebody else should be in your shoes this
day,” came like a “keen” from among the audience as he was led out;
and the cry seemed to unman him a little, for it came from his sister.

Some time after, when the circumstances had faded a little in my
memory, I was over in the jail seeing a prisoner who worked near Pat.
I noticed the porter’s son, whose head was now closely cropped, and
his appearance considerably changed by the prison dress, and, half
recognising him, I said dubiously—

“Well, what are you in for?”

“It’s yourself should know that, sur,” he said, with a sad smile.
“I’m Patrick Stephens. Could I have a word with you, sur?”

“Yes, if you look sharp about it,” was my answer, for my time had
nearly expired.

I expected that he had thought better of the case which had landed
him there, and was ready to denounce Micky, but in that I was
mistaken. He had not a word to say on that point; his sole concern
was for his father and sister.

“When Micky was in on suspicion he found out that it wasn’ me, but my
father or my sister, that betrayed the hiding-place,” he said to me
in a hurried whisper. “He’s sorry now that I was took, but he’s mad
agin them, and has sworn to be even with them. You’ve no idea what a
divil he is when he takes it into his head. Now, sur, if you’d only
take the hint and watch him and them, for though they are as honest
as the babe unborn, he’ll get them into a scrape as sure as he’s
sworn it.”

“Ah, it’s easy getting into scrapes,” I significantly rejoined,
glancing at his oakum heap and his prison garb; “the difficulty is to
get out of them.”

“Sure, I know what ye mane, sur,” he returned, with a slight flush
of shame, “but since I’ve been in here I’ve got a mighty load off me
sowl, and, if I’m spared to get out, please the Lord, I’ll never take
it on again.”

I thought of a certain road being paved with good intentions, but
said nothing. There was one chance in a thousand that Pat’s might
hold good. Even if the thought only comforted him in his seclusion, a
blessing was gained.

I questioned him further on the matter he had placed before
me, and learned that the information had reached him through a
newly-incarcerated prisoner. I could not but admire through the
whole revelation the quick intelligence of Micky in piecing together
facts which to anyone else would have indicated nothing. From the
mere excited exclamation of old Corny, and that of the sister in the
Court-room, he had gathered that it had been intended to trap him and
save the porter’s son. He knew that as well as if I had revealed to
him the whole particulars of my interview with Corny. I began to envy
Micky his quickness. But though he was just the man to thirst for
revenge, I did not think that he would interfere with the old street
porter, and it is probable I said so to Pat at the time, and his
warning would speedily have been forgotten but for the curious events
which followed.

A month or two after my interview with Pat his father was accosted
while on his stance by a well-dressed man having the appearance of a
commercial traveller, and asked to carry a rather heavy portmanteau
to a certain address. The job was executed with alacrity, and
liberally paid for. A few days later the same man hired Corny, after
dark, to carry a box to another part of the town, paid him with the
same liberality, and told him he might need him again soon.

The occasion came only two days later. The man, who was well dressed,
and always carried an ivory handled umbrella in his hand and a
cigar in his mouth, stopped the old porter on the street, and in an
off-hand way asked him if he could carry some crystal and china from
a house at the south side to an address at the opposite end of the
city. Of course the porter was eager and willing.

“The only awkward thing is that I won’t be there till nearly nine
o’clock,” said the man; “would that be too late for you?”

“Sorra a bit, sur,” was the ready response. “Any hour will suit me,
more by token there’s no wan likely to be needing me so late.”

Punctually at the hour named, Corny appeared at the place—a common
stair in Clerk Street. As he was ascending the stair in search of the
name furnished by his employer, that gentleman appeared descending
the stair, and carrying in his arms a good-sized square parcel.

“I was beginning to think you had forgotten me,” he pleasantly
observed to the old porter, “and was afraid I should have to send the
things over in a cab, at the risk of getting half of them broken.”

Corny apologised for the trouble he had given, adjusted the bundle to
his own shoulders, and prepared to go.

“You will get half-a-crown, which I left for you when you deliver
them,” said the man graciously, “and there is little danger of you
breaking anything, as they are all carefully packed in soft goods.”

Corny was pleased with the explanation, for the weight of the bundle
did not suggest china or crystal to him, and in taking and adjusting
it to his ropes, he had heard not a single clink or rattle from
within. He went his way with the load, while his employer reascended
the stair and was gone. Corny was not a robust man by any means, so
it was past ten o’clock before he reached his destination. Then he
found that there had been some mistake in the address, for he could
not find any one who expected such a consignment, or answered to the
name he sought. After trailing about for half an hour, Corny was
reluctantly compelled to turn southward once more, with the intention
of returning the load to its owner. But there a fresh difficulty
awaited him. He found the stair easily, but in the whole land could
discover no one answering to the name given him by his employer.
Corny got a good deal of abuse, indeed, for rousing some of the
tenants out of bed, and as he was now thoroughly knocked up with his
weary trailing, he resolved to let the matter rest till morning, and
turned his face homeward.

Now, at that moment, by a curious train of circumstances, I was
sitting in Corny’s house patiently waiting for him. That very
afternoon I had been passing down one of the closes, when my eye
caught a bright-coloured and new shoulder shawl decorating a woman
moving in the same direction.

“Hullo, Bess,” I said, stopping short, “let me have a look at your
shawl.”

She stopped with wonderful willingness, saying—

“Ah, you think it’s one of the lot taken from that shawl shop on
the Bridge, but you’re wrong. I bought it this morning in another
place, and there’s the receipt,” and she produced one of those little
flimsies which drapers give with their goods, showing that three
shillings had been paid for the shawl that very day. “Would you like
to know who did that job?” she added with suspicious loquacity.

“Yes—had you a hand in it?”

I was only chaffing her. I never expected to get a single grain of
truth out of her, for she was bad to the very heart’s core.

“Me! No; but I heard about it, that’s all.”

“You’re an awful liar, Bess; but go on,” I calmly answered.

“Well, I believe an old porter called Corny Stephens had the big hand
in it,” she boldly continued.

“I don’t believe it,” was my answer.

“Well, please yourself; I only heard it; but if you went to his house
late to-night you might find something, that’s all,” and away she
went, singing unmusically.

I knew very little of the old porter, but, had I put my impressions
of him against my knowledge of Bess, her statements would at once
have kicked the beam. Still I could not deny that the taint of Pat’s
conviction and sentence extended in a certain sense to his relatives,
and my duty was to act on any hint, however meagre, so that I decided
to visit Corny the same night, at an hour when he was likely to be at
home and in bed. I got there at ten o’clock, and was frankly received
by his daughter, who told me he had a late job, and would not be in
for an hour or so. She was preparing his supper, so I decided to
accept her offer and sit down by the fire till he came.

In the ordinary course of events Corny should have appeared, bearing
his undelivered load, about eleven o’clock, and this had probably
been calculated upon, but I waited till midnight, and much to the
concern of Annie his daughter, no Corny appeared. How that happened
was simple enough, though not in the programme.

Corny was slowly trailing through Argyle Square with his load, on his
way home, when he chanced to be met by M^cSweeny. My chum was in a
good humour, for he had been spending a night jovially at a friend’s,
where a widow had made a dead set at him; and M^cSweeny’s joy arose
from the fact that at the last moment he had ingeniously saddled the
widow on to an unsuspicious friend, while my chum took his way home
in happy freedom alone. But though elated and exultant, at peace
with all the world, and trying his best to merrily whistle “The Poor
Married Man,” M^cSweeny’s duty was not so far from his mind as to
allow him to pass Corny and the big bundle at such an hour.

“Stop, you!” he imperatively commanded. “What’s that you’re carrying
on your back? and where are you going with it?”

“It’s some chany and crystal I got to carry over to the New Town, and
I couldn’t find the place, so I’m taking it home,” said Corny.

M^cSweeny suspiciously poked his fingers into the bundle, but could
feel nothing like china or crystal.

“It’s uncommon soft,” he said, with a grunt. “Who gave it to you to
carry?”

“The gintleman.”

“The gintleman, ye blockhead; hasn’t he got a name?” said M^cSweeny
wrathfully.

“He has; it’s written on that paper; but I couldn’t find him when I
took the load back.”

“I daresay not,” said M^cSweeny, dryly. “Well, you’ll need to come up
to the Office wid me, till we see what’s in the bundle.”

“I’m an honest man,” said Corny indignantly. “Do you take me for a
thafe?”

“Well, you don’t look like one of my bairns,” said M^cSweeny, in
imitation of me; “but you’ll have to trot all the same. Mebbe you
don’t know that I’m M^cSweeny, the detective, that all the books has
been writ about?”

“I know the other one,” said Corny simply. “M^cGovan’ll spake a good
word for me.”

“You’ll not need that if your bundle’s all right,” was the lofty
reply, and to the Office they went.

The bundle unfortunately was not all right. It contained a deal of
rubbish of no use to any one, but it also contained a number of
bright-coloured shawls of a certain pattern, which were already down
in our list as having been taken from a shop on the Bridge.

Corny seemed thunderstruck at the grave looks of every one about
him, and wildly went over the details I have put down, but without
impressing his hearers much. The story seemed such a poor one and
so common. There is not a “smasher” taken with the counterfeits in
his possession but volubly declares that he got the parcel from some
one on the street, either to hold or to take to some address. Corny
seemed to realise his position only when he was handed over to the
man to be taken down to the cells. Then he dropped on his knees
before the lieutenant, and, clasping his hands, besought them to
spare him the disgrace.

“I’m not a thafe, sur, and though I’m sixty years of age I never was
in a cell in my life. Send to the praist and ax him what he knows of
poor owld Corny Stephens.”

The tears of the quivering old man, and his desperate energy might
have had some effect, but just then one of the officers present,
touching his cap to the lieutenant, said briefly—

“His son got eighteen months lately for shopbreaking.”

That settled the matter. It was the old doom reversed—the sins of the
children coming back on the father.

Before Corny was locked up he besought them to send word to his
daughter, so that his absence might be accounted for, and it was
from the messenger thus sent that I learned these facts, and that
further waiting was useless. I was considerably staggered by the
news, and had now so much suspicion of Corny that I took the
precaution of searching his house thoroughly before I left. That was
the first impression. Next morning, after I had seen Corny, I began
to think differently, though still puzzled. It was well on in the
forenoon, and after Corny had been remitted to a higher Court, that
I remembered about the warning of his son Pat. Curiously enough, the
thing which brought it to my mind was the presence of Micky Hill
among the audience of the Police Court, coupled with the fact that he
left as soon as Corny had been removed.

“A plant! a plant, I believe!” was my mental exclamation, but I was
too busy for some hours to give the matter further attention. Then I
began my work. I found that Bess had followed me from the Office down
the close in which I had addressed her about the shawl, and it now
recurred to me that she and Micky were old acquaintances, and very
likely to work into each other’s hands. Then she had volunteered the
information about Corny, without my asking for it, and I knew her so
well that I had not for a moment believed it until Corny was taken
with the goods in his possession. I did not know very well how to
act, but there was no time for delay, and I began by pouncing upon
Bess. She was so frightened that she let out a word or two more than
she intended, and in a short time I was at Micky’s house inquiring
for him.

Micky was drunk—speechlessly drunk—to which state he had reduced
himself, I think, in joy over the success of his scheme; but the
capture of the shebeener was a trifle to the one which accompanied it.

In the same room with Micky, and not much more sober, was a
swell-mobsman, who had been lodging there for some time. He had
come down for the purpose of attending the races, and was a smart
man altogether. He did not get to the races that year, for the old
street porter easily identified him out of a dozen men as the man who
employed him to carry the bundle to the New Town. His ivory-headed
umbrella and his cigar case were also identified as promptly—a clear
proof that a rogue should not indulge in easily recognisable finery.

Before the day of the trial we had also discovered a person living
in the stair in Clerk Street who had seen the smart man loitering in
the stair with the bundle and handing it over to Corny, and that,
with a stolen shawl found on the back of Micky’s wife, served to
successfully rivet the fetters on both.

The actual perpetrator of the robbery had really been the
swell-mobsman, Micky having had no hand in it but the resetting of
some of the things; but some of the evidence appeared to implicate
him, and he was found guilty, and sentenced to the same term as his
companion in the dock—seven years’ penal. Corny, of course, had
been released as soon as we got Bess to make a clean breast of it,
and he appeared as a witness at the trial, and got some handsome
commendations from the presiding judge. His case attracted some
attention, and a gentleman willing to help the old porter came to me
for advice in the matter, to make sure that the case was a deserving
one. The result was that Corny’s lot was made more easy; and when his
son was released, they were all helped out of the country by the same
generous hand, Pat proving one of the exceptions to the rule, “Once
a thief, always a thief.”




A BIT OF TOBACCO PIPE.


Criminals vary in character and degree of guilt as much as the leaves
of the forest do in form and colour, but there is always a large
number whom no one of experience ever expects to reform. They are the
descendants of generations of thieves; they have known nothing else
from babyhood, and will know nothing else till they are shovelled
into the earth. It would be far cheaper to the country to keep them
in perpetual imprisonment, but so many objections can be raised to
such a scheme that I question if it will ever become law.

To this class belonged Peter Boggin, otherwise known as “Shorty.” He
had received this name not so much on account of his height, which
was medium, as on account of his temper, which was of the shortest. I
question, indeed, if Shorty would ever have been in prison at all but
for his temper.

Shorty’s boon companion and working pal was a quiet, lumpish-looking
fellow named Phineas O’Connor. Phineas, when his tongue was loosened
by drink, was wont to assert that he was descended from the Irish
Kings, and therefore had been derisively dubbed “The Fin.” He was a
still man, rather sullen, and not lacking in deadly ingenuity, as
will appear before I have done.

Among the many schemes proposed or tried by Shorty and The Fin
was one for entering a big house in the New Town, occupied by a
fashionable family much given to receiving company. The Fin had noted
this circumstance, and had also ascertained beyond a doubt that
the family were really, and not apparently, wealthy. By following
the line of houses with his eye to one of the common streets of
Stockbridge, close by, The Fin then decided that to enter the upper
part of the major’s house would not be difficult. The place was
marked and watched for some time before the opportunity occurred, as
no intimation of his intention regarding parties was ever sent by the
major to either Shorty or The Fin.

One evening, when the season was at its height, and the nights
conveniently long and dark, the two, when taking their customary
stroll for inspection, found the house lighted from top to bottom,
and the longed-for party in full swing. The usual dinner hour they
knew was six o’clock, and, as that hour was approaching, Shorty
set out for a tour of inspection in the next street, while The Fin
patiently waited for the dinner gong to sound.

The first warning had been given by the gong when Shorty returned
and reported the road clear, and the two took their way to the next
street, where they ascended a common stair, and by standing on the
railing at the top managed to reach the hatch leading to the roof, by
Shorty climbing up on The Fin’s shoulders and then pulling his helper
up as soon as he had forced the hatch and reached the low den between
that and the slates. There was another hatch yet to force—that which
led out on to the slates—and to reach that the two had to crawl
along in a stooping position, carefully feeling with their feet
for the cross beams lest they should suddenly plunge through the
lath and plaster into the room below. In crawling along thus they
felt and passed the water cistern which supplied the whole tenement
beneath them, which stood as close in under the slope of the roof as
its height would admit of. Getting open the upper hatch proved no
difficult task, and then they tossed up who should get out and make
his way along the housetops to the major’s house.

The lot fell to Shorty, and he got out and patiently worked his
way along the slates and over ranges of chimney cans to the more
aristocratic street hard by. When he reached the attic windows of
the major’s house he looked at his watch and decided that the whole
household and all the guests must then be busy downstairs, the
dinner in full swing, and the servants too excited and flurried to
think of coming near the bedrooms or upper flats. One of the attics,
presumably occupied by the servants, had its window open, and Shorty
had merely to raise the sash a little higher to pass within and have
the free range of the whole of the house but the area and first flat.

An experienced man, Shorty did not hurry with the task. He went over
the trunks of the servants first, but found nothing worth lifting but
a small gold brooch and a silver ring. The ring was not worth two
shillings, and Shorty was at one moment inclined to toss it back into
the box, but he changed his mind and took it with him. He should have
left it. Leaving the servants’ room, with many an inward imprecation
on them for keeping bank books instead of money in their boxes,
Shorty softly ranged through all the other rooms and bedrooms within
his reach, and soon had quite a respectable pile of plunder gathered
into his capacious coloured cotton handkerchief. He took nothing but
articles of jewellery and the contents of two ladies’ purses, which
he found in one of the bedrooms; and among the articles there chanced
to be a very heavy gold chain—either a bailie’s or a provost’s chain
of office. Although the haul was a fair one, Shorty was dissatisfied,
for he had expected to get something out of the plate chest in the
tablemaid’s room. He found the room and the chest in it conveniently
open, but inconveniently empty. All the plate was on the dinner
table, or downstairs ready to be placed there, and Shorty, forgetting
that he owed his ease and success to the dinner and guests, was
ungrateful enough to curse both. Even thieves are never content.

In leaving by the attic window Shorty was careful to close the window
after him, a circumstance which afterwards led to some confusion on
our part, as the servants, finding it thus closed, declared most
positively—probably to screen themselves from blame—that the window
had not only been closed, but firmly fastened on the inside. This
statement led us to think that, during the confusion of the party,
the thief might have entered by the front door and made his escape
in the same manner. There was some hunting and examination in the
direction of the roof, and the hatch in the adjoining street was
found to have been forced, but at the time that led to nothing. Had
we even guessed at the curious incident which had followed Shorty’s
exit on to the roof our action would have been very different. It is
these unlooked-for events which continually trip up the most astute.
We suffered by the slip, but we did not suffer alone.

When Shorty got out on the slates, carrying his handkerchief of
valuables, he found something more deserving of cursing than the
dinner—namely, a clear sky and a tolerably bright moon. Speaking
rapidly and energetically under his breath, he crawled along, keeping
on the safest side of the roof till he could do so no longer, having
to go forward to make his way over a range of chimney cans. As chance
would have it, at the same time he glanced anxiously down on the
steep street running down towards that spot, and saw the policeman
of the beat looking, as he fancied, in his direction. Not only did
the officer look, but he made some motion with his hand, and crossed
the road as if to come nearer.

“Spotted!” cried Shorty, with an oath; and the rest of the journey
across the roofs to the hatch where The Fin awaited him was performed
in “the best time on record.” As a matter of fact the policeman had
neither seen Shorty nor made a motion in his direction, but Shorty
hurriedly explained the position to his chum, and after a brief
council of war they rid themselves of the plunder, dropped through
the inner hatch, and escaped downstairs, by the backdoor, across some
greens. They took separate routes, certain that they were being hotly
pursued, and got into hiding at once.

A few hours later the robbery was discovered and reported at the
Office. As in few cases of the kind, we were able to take down a
pretty full and accurate list of the articles stolen, including,
of course, the silver ring of the servant and the heavy gold chain
already noticed.

With this list, and the knowledge that so many of the articles were
easily identifiable, I had little doubt but we should soon lay hands
on either the thief or part of the plunder. I was mistaken. None of
my “bairns” showed an overflow of money; not the slightest sign of
“a great success” appeared anywhere; and none of those had up on
suspicion had heard of the deed. Some of them strongly asserted that
the whole thing was a sham, and really done by an amateur—one of the
servants or some of her followers. One of the boldest to assert this
was Shorty himself, whom I had invited to accompany me to the Office,
and who had followed me with an alacrity which caused my hopes to
sink at once to zero. As for The Fin, he was not a man of words, and
only scowled, and told us to hurry with our investigations, as he
did not care for the Lock-up, and wanted back to his den. We did not
hurry particularly, knowing that both were safer and more harmless
under lock and key than at liberty, but events hurried for us in a
manner anticipated neither by them nor us. While the two worthies
were still in our keeping, I chanced one day to call upon an honest
jeweller who dealt in the precious metals, and was shown by him a
piece of a heavy gold chain which he had that day bought from a lad
whose name and address was in his book. The piece was about eighteen
inches long, and at one end showed a clean cut, as if it had been
either clipped through with strong shears or cut with a chisel, half
of the severed link being still attached to the chain. It was fine 22
carat gold, and so uncommon-looking that the jeweller had questioned
the seller closely as to how it came into his possession.

“He said that it had belonged to his mother, and they had had it for
years locked away, but, seeing that it was of no use, they thought of
having it made into a brooch,” continued the jeweller. “He was just a
working lad,—not at all like a thief,—so I believed him, and paid him
for it according to weight and quality.”

“Why did he not have it made into a brooch?” I sceptically inquired.

“Because there was not enough of it to make one such as he desired,
and none of those I offered him in exchange pleased him.”

“I daresay not,” I dryly returned, and then I decided to take the
piece of chain over to the major’s, and at the same time hunt up the
lad who had sold the old gold. The result of my visit to the major’s
was that the piece of chain was strongly believed by that gentleman
to be part of that taken from his house, and the hunt for the lad who
had sold it proved only that the young rascal had given a false name
and address.

So much was gained, however, for we were a step nearer the criminal,
as we imagined. We had a full description of his age and appearance,
and there was a strong probability that, being a novice, he would not
stop short at his first attempt to dispose of the plunder. A very
stringent order was issued to all the jewellers likely to be visited,
but as it turned out, the order was not needed, for, not many days
later, the lad again appeared with another piece of gold chain to
sell.

“We’ve found the other piece at the bottom of a drawer,” he said,
“and we thought you might give more for it, as it might be joined on
to the first piece and sold as a chain, instead of being melted down
as old gold.”

Scarcely able to believe his eyes, the jeweller asked him to sit
down while he went into the back shop to assay the gold. He did
not set about the task with great alacrity, but contented himself
with sending an apprentice out by a side door with a message to the
Central Office, while he stood and watched the lad through the glass
door. The message was handed to me, and I went to the shop at my
smartest.

As I entered I saw the lad seated in the front shop in the overalls
of a working joiner. At the same moment the jeweller came from the
back shop with the piece of chain in his hand.

“A piece of old gold which this lad wants me to buy,” he observed,
and then, while the lad started and glanced at me, I, with apparent
carelessness, and without looking in his direction, took from my
pocket my little staff of authority, as if to polish up with my
sleeve the silver crown. The lad’s eyes became fixed on that in a
kind of fascination, and when I took the bit of chain and glanced
full in his face, I was not astonished to find him deadly pale, and
almost tottering on his legs.

“Where did you get it?” I demanded, and then, after a feeble grip at
the counter, he sat down, looking ghastly indeed.

“At home; it’s my mother’s,” he stammered; then he seemed to think
better of it, for he hastily added, “No—I found it.”

“Imphim; where the Hielantman found the tongs—at the fireside, eh?” I
returned, after cautioning him. “Did you find any other things in the
same place?”

“No.” It was a lie. I saw that, but then it was meant more as a
dogged refusal than a denial. A reaction had come to his terror; he
had pondered the position for a moment, and decided to take shelter
in silence.

“Where do you live?”

“I’d rather not say,” was the tardy answer.

“Very well; work at anything?”

“Yes; I’m a joiner.” He appeared to regret the admission, for he bit
his lip the moment he had said it.

“Apprentice or journeyman?”

“Apprentice. I’ll be out with my time next year.”

“Maybe you will,” I significantly answered; “meantime you’d better
come with me and see what the Fiscal has to say to it.”

He objected most strongly to have his wrist fastened to mine, but the
jeweller happened just then to address me by name, and my prisoner
collapsed and submitted to the degradation. We had no great distance
to go, but the road seemed long enough to him, for, though anything
but an honest-looking fellow, I guessed rightly that it was his
first experience of the handcuffs. At the Office he took refuge in
silence, or tried to screen himself with absolute falsehood. He gave
a false name; would give no address; denied that he had a mother
living; would not say for whom he worked; and altogether emitted
as stupid a declaration as any one could well have done. I believe
he meant well—he meant to screen himself from further trouble; to
save his friends from disgrace along with him; and to keep the
knowledge of the scrape into which he had fallen from his employer
and acquaintances generally; but then every liar has exactly the same
excuse.

It was simply a little more work for me, and as the task was
gradually accomplished, the facts revealed seemed to point to his
guilt with no uncertain finger.

The discovery of his identity was made simply enough by his mother
coming to the Office next morning to report her son missing. He
had been absent all night, and had not returned to his work on the
previous afternoon, and she was greatly distressed and concerned for
his safety. It was the mention of the trade he followed, and the name
and address of his employer, which first gave me the idea that we
had the missing son; and when she was shown our prisoner he did not
appear at all grateful for the boon, but swore at her in a manner in
which no mother should be addressed, and which would have put many a
professional criminal to the blush.

The mother appeared stunned and stupefied by the discovery that she
had helped to rivet fetters on him, and that he was likely to be
tried for housebreaking with an alternative charge of theft. How the
charge came to assume this form is the most striking and curious
feature of the case. As soon as I got the two addresses I went first
to the home of the prisoner, Alfred Scott, and searched in vain for
the rest of the plunder; then I went to his employer’s workshop, and
unearthed the treasure-trove from a most ingenious hiding-place under
a pile of wood which took us ten minutes to remove. Everything was
there but the gold chain and the servant’s silver ring, and the whole
were still wrapped up in Shorty’s spotted cotton handkerchief, which
unfortunately did not bear either name or address. But this discovery
was not the most important made at that place. From Scott’s master we
learned that our prisoner, along with a journeyman, had been employed
making some alterations or repairs in the major’s house about six
months before the robbery. The natural inference then was that he
upon that occasion had provided himself with casts of some of the
keys, and so prepared to commit the robbery—hence the framing of the
charge on the serious lines I have indicated.

As soon as these facts were made plain, and when the major had
identified Scott as one of the joiners who had worked in his house, I
went to Shorty’s cell and said that we had got the thief, and that in
all probability he and The Fin would be soon at liberty.

Shorty received the news not with the satisfaction I had expected,
but with a stony stare which seemed to me absolutely idiotic. He made
no remark of any kind, and showed neither gratitude nor resentment.
It turned out, however, that he and The Fin did not get off so
easily, but were convicted and sent for thirty days to prison for
“loitering with intent.”

Meanwhile Scott persisted in his fatal and blundering silence, and
his case came on for trial. He pleaded “not guilty,” and the case
went to proof, when the evidence, which, link by link, appeared
to demonstrate his guilt beyond the shadow of a doubt, took him
completely by surprise. There was the selling of the chain; his
contradictions and prevarications; the finding of the plunder, and
the fact that he had worked on the premises—all damning.

The summing up of the evidence had been completed, and the jury
were about to find him guilty without leaving the box, when Scott
excitedly asked to be allowed to make a statement in his defence.

“I am innocent of either theft or housebreaking—such crimes never
entered my head,” he tremulously declared. “If I’ve done wrong at
all it was only in not giving up the articles when I found them. I
was sent to a land in H—— Street to repair the fastenings on the
hatches leading to the roof, which had been broken by the sweeps or
some one. The landlord had been ordered by the police to have them
repaired, and I was sent to do it. There were two hatches—one at the
head of the stair, and one in the roof; and in the loft between was a
cistern. It is a big one, and stands at the side of the loft. I had
to get a candle to see my way across the beams, and when I was coming
back, after putting on a new hasp, I saw something like the corner of
a cotton handkerchief in the space behind the cistern. It just caught
my eyes as I was passing, and I went round and pulled it out, and
found in it all the things I am accused of stealing. I had no idea
they were stolen, or how long they might have been hidden there, and
I thought I might keep them.”

This statement produced no impression either upon the Bench or the
jury, or, if it did, the impression was damaging to the accused. In
the first place, there was an air of romance about his story—it
looked like another ingenious lie—and did not account for the plunder
being left there, or give any clue to the real thieves. Then, even
supposing the strange statement to be true, it still left Scott
self-convicted of a serious crime—appropriating to his own use what
he perfectly well knew did not belong to him. Without hesitation
the jury found him guilty, and he was sentenced to six months’
imprisonment, it being his first offence.

And he was innocent! what a shame! some one exclaims. Well, I don’t
know. He was not innocent in intention. He was actually a thief,
though not the actual first thief, and he suffered a just punishment.

And now to return to Shorty and The Fin. It does not appear that
these amiable gentlemen met Scott in prison, or, if they did, that
they exchanged confidences on the case which interested them so
deeply, and in their seclusion the newspapers were not regularly
placed upon their breakfast table, even had they been blessed with
the ability to read them. It was agreed that Shorty should go over to
the hide and get the plunder, while The Fin went to a safe reset to
arrange about its disposal. This programme worked perfectly in all
but one trifling item—the finding of the plunder. Shorty did himself
up with soot to resemble a chimney-sweep, and with a ladder and the
proper key of the hatch got up to his hide behind the cistern, only
to groan and curse over the fact that the cotton handkerchief and
its contents were gone. The truth flashed on him at once—some one
had found the plunder. Shorty was as much enraged as if he had been
robbed. While he stood there cursing, something bright caught his
eye between the beams behind the cistern, and, stooping down, he
picked up the servant’s silver ring—the sole remnant of the valuable
plunder, which had in some way fallen out of the cotton handkerchief.
Shorty was so furious that he was near pitching it as far as he could
throw, but again that fateful second thought came to restrain him,
and he put it into his pocket and returned to The Fin, to whom he
related the facts, with the exception of the finding of the ring. The
Fin, as I have noticed, was a silent man. He heard the whole with
open eyes and shut mouth, and Shorty was himself too much enraged to
notice that The Fin was displeased and suspicious. Some men would
have stormed, and taunted, and uttered their suspicions, and even
fought over it, but that was not The Fin’s style. He uttered no
reflection, but when Shorty left him, The Fin took the precaution of
following him.

Being newly out of prison, Shorty’s funds were low, and he went
to the reset who had just been visited by The Fin, and managed to
extract two shillings out of him in exchange for the servant’s silver
ring. Every article of the plunder was by that time known to The Fin,
having been frequently described by Shorty, and more particularly
this ring, which Shorty had been so near leaving behind.

Scarcely had Shorty got into a public-house and exchanged one of the
shillings for some brandy, when The Fin was up at the reset’s house
demanding to know what Shorty had sold, and how many pounds sterling
he had got for it. The reset, rather staggered, at last declared
that Shorty had sold only the silver ring, and showed the trinket in
confirmation.

The Fin did not believe a word of it, but he was a still man, and
said nothing. Before three hours were gone he was with me, and had
given me such information regarding another feat of Shorty’s that
at last I drew a long breath of satisfaction, for I was sure of a
conviction and a good long sentence.

As soon as I had taken Shorty—not without a fight—The Fin regretted
his hastiness. He saw that if Shorty got a long sentence, he, The
Fin, would perhaps never get near him for vengeance, whereas, had
he allowed him to remain at liberty, a quick shove down some stair
or toss out at some window when Shorty was drunk would have settled
the whole business. The Fin’s regret did not last long, for before
many hours he was in the cells too, Shorty having in turn revealed
some awkward facts which seemed likely to put The Fin as long out of
harm’s way as himself. These expectations were fully verified shortly
after, when they both received sentence of seven years’ penal, and
were duly removed to the penitentiary.

And now I come to the bit of tobacco pipe, which will prove how
a mean and insignificant trifle often comes into the world to
accomplish a great work, and confer a blessing on all mankind. Every
one who knows anything of prison life can understand how a bit of
an old tobacco pipe is valued by convicts shut off from tobacco
for years. The smallest crumb of it, having the faintest taste of
nicotine, is treasured and passed from prisoner to prisoner, to be
sucked and finally broken up and chewed to its inmost recesses. It is
worth twenty times its weight in gold to them. When The Fin had spent
a year in prison in almost absolute silence, he got into hospital
for some trifling complaint, and so ingratiated himself with the
doctor that he was once or twice allowed into the laboratory. There
by some means he had managed to secrete a minute quantity of a deadly
poison, which he inserted into the hole in a piece of old tobacco
pipe shank. This bit of tobacco pipe he concealed till he was again
among the working convicts. He and Shorty were tacit foes, but this
difficulty The Fin got over in a manner worthy of the cause. Once,
when the warder was approaching, and a search possible, he managed,
in sight of Shorty, to conceal the bit of tobacco pipe in a place
easily accessible to his old pal, and then, when the danger was
past, forgot to go back for it until Shorty had had a chance of
appropriating the treasure. Not many minutes later Shorty took a fit
and dropped dead among the convicts.

Every one was horrified and astonished, till one of the warders
noticed a smell of tobacco about the mouth of the dead convict, and
fished out of his clenched teeth the bit of tobacco pipe. It was then
supposed that part of the pipe shank had been bitten off by Shorty
and drawn back into the windpipe so as to cause his death; and he
duly occupied his six feet of prison soil.

And was The Fin convicted and hanged? Not a bit of it. He lived out
his sentence and was released, and went about long enough to boast
of his deed, though I am bound to confess that few believed him, and
the general opinion was that Shorty died of the bit of tobacco pipe
without the poison. However, The Fin claimed all the credit, and
insisted that he was not to blame for the result, seeing that he did
not administer the poison, and that Shorty, in appropriating what
he knew was not his own, committed a grave offence against convict
society, and could not complain if he suffered for the crime.

The Fin should have been a lawyer, and with education might have
risen to be one, had he not been soon after choked by an overdose of
shebeen whisky.




THE BROKEN CAIRNGORM.


I had to take Jess Murray for her share in a very bold robbery, in
which a commercial traveller, peaceably walking home to his hotel,
had been waylaid and stripped of pocket-book, purse, and watch,
the haul altogether amounting to upwards of £100 in value, the
greater part of which was not his own. The gentleman could give no
description of the men, but remembered that they had been assisted
at a critical moment by a woman, who, so far as he could judge, was
tall and handsome, and not very old. It was the style of the robbery
as much as that brief and imperfect description which directed my
attention to Jess Murray. She was a bold wench, strong as a lion,
and so thoroughly bad that I took the trouble of hating her—an
exceptional case indeed, as in general one gets to look upon her kind
with as much indifference as a drover does upon a herd of horned
knowte, under his care one day and gone the next.

I believed Jess to be one of the few who have not one redeeming
quality or trait, and was eager for the chance which should put her
out of harm’s way for a good long term of years.

I had really no evidence, but an instinctive feeling, connecting Jess
with the robbery; but when on my way to her place I chanced to pass
one of her acquaintances on the street. I let him pass, and then a
thought struck me, and I turned back and stopped him. A scared look
at once came into his face, so I asked him to come with me—back to
the Office. He came reluctantly, and the cause I speedily understood
when he tried to throw away behind his back a £20 bank note taken
from the pocket-book of the commercial traveller. The number and
description of this note was already in my possession, and I picked
up the paper money with the most lively satisfaction, when the fellow
immediately began to protest that he had only been sent to change the
note, and was willing to tell all about the robbery if things were
made right for himself.

The result of this chance capture was that we had abundant evidence
against Jess and another, and I went for her with the greatest of
pleasure. She was in the “kitchen” of the place among a crowd of her
kind when I entered, and it needed only a motion of my finger and a
nod of my head to chase the merriment from her face, and bring her
slowly across the floor to my side. It is not usual for me to be
communicative, but on the present occasion I was elated, and said in
reply to her sullen inquiry—

“It’s that affair of the commercial traveller. It’s all blown, and
you are in for five years at least. Jim White is in the office
already, and the £20 bank note with him.”

Jess seemed struck in a heap with the news. She flashed deadly pale
and sank feebly into a chair, with her bold, bright eyes becoming
shiny with tears.

“Where’s Dickie?” she faintly articulated to some of the silent
onlookers, and, fearing treachery, I snatched out a double brass
whistle which can be heard a whole street off, and swiftly raised it
to my lips.

“Stop! you needn’t,” Jess quickly interposed, understanding the
motion. “Dickie’s only my laddie. Oh, what will become of him when
I’m away?”

Dickie was said to be playing down on the street, so I told her we
might see him as we left. Jess began to cry bitterly—Jess! whom I
believed to have not one genuine tear in her! and thus we descended
the stairs together. In the street a ragged and unkempt boy of seven
or eight was brought to her side, and she clutched him to her breast,
kissing his smudged face with a passionate fervour which gave me
quite a fresh insight into her character. The boy resembled her in
features, and would have passed for good-looking had he only been
washed and dressed up a little.

“What’s to ’come o’ my bairn?—oh, what’s to ’come o’ my bairn?”
wailed Jess, and the boy began to howl in concert, and I saw that it
would be useless to try to separate them just then.

“Oh, he’ll be looked after as he has often been before,” I carelessly
answered. “He’ll go to the Poorhouse. He’ll be safer there than under
your care—and cleaner.”

The remark did not appear to console Jess in the least. Dickie
was her only child, and the whole strength of her nature seemed
concentrated in her love of that boy. I was astonished, and
speculated on the matter all the way to the office, quietly wondering
what “line of business” that same gutter child was destined to
torment me and others by adopting, when he should be a few years
older.

I had made a pretty shrewd guess at Jess’s sentence, for the list of
previous convictions was so strong against her that she was awarded
exactly the number of years I had named. I was convinced by that
time that she did not grieve over the punishment at all, but over
her separation from her child, and I remember thinking—“We are poor
judges of one another. What a strong hold could be taken of that
woman through that child, if one only knew how to use the power.”

Dickie was allowed to see his mother once before she was sent to the
Penitentiary, and then he went back to the Poorhouse. He was a good
deal cleaner by that time, and had on different clothing, but there
was one plaything, or fetish, with which he had resolutely refused to
part, and that still hung from his neck. It was a broken cairngorm
stone, with a hole drilled at one end, through which a bit of twine
had been drawn, that he might suspend the trinket from his neck. I
had noticed the stone when I took him to the office with his mother,
but merely glanced at it, thinking that it was but an imitation
moulded in yellow glass. I was mistaken, for it was part of a real
stone, and had probably been set in some stolen brooch which had been
broken up for the metal.

It was of no great value, but it pleased Dickie, and kept him from
wearying during his long confinement in the Poorhouse, which to
him was as irksome as being shut up in a prison. He was a lively,
spirited boy, and had never been checked or curbed, so it may be
imagined he got into as many scrapes as the average boy of his age.

However, in spite of his mischief and wild pranks, Dickie had a soft
spot in his heart, and could be tamed by a gentle word or appeal
when lashing had been tried in vain. When he had been about eighteen
months in the Poorhouse, a poor knife-grinder was admitted for a day
or two, who told Dickie such grand romances of his free life on the
road that the boy took an insatiable longing for freedom. Squinting
Jerry was the man’s name, but though he had an evil look, he was
really an honest fellow.

Jerry had been driven to the Poorhouse for a night’s shelter, and
while there had been laid up for a day or two with a bad leg which
troubled him at times, but as soon as he was able to move he hastened
to quit the oppressive confinement. Before he had done so, Dickie, by
a series of pathetic appeals, had extracted from him a consent to
receiving him as an apprentice.

Jerry was really not reluctant to having an assistant, whom he needed
sorely at times, but he was afraid that the arrangement might get him
into trouble with the parochial authorities, should he be followed
and Dickie taken back. Then there were Dickie’s antecedents to be
considered—he was the son of a convict, and might have the “bad
blood” in him, as Jerry expressed it. The old knife-grinder therefore
agreed to the proposal with reluctance, as we often do with what
turns out a great blessing. Dickie had no difficulty in fulfilling
his part of the agreement, for he had already run away twice, and
each time gone back of his own accord.

He therefore got out of the Poorhouse easily, and joined Jerry a
mile or two out of the city. He took with him his only treasure, the
broken cairngorm, which some one had declared to him was a diamond,
and worth a great deal of money. This opinion was not shared by
Jerry, who failed to find a purchaser for the stone, and finally
relegated it to a little box in the grinding machine, which they
trundled before them wherever they went. Perhaps the parochial
authorities were glad to get rid of Dickie, for he was not followed
or taken back. The new life suited him—it was free and untrammelled;
it had constant variety, and there was a certain spice of romance
about it, which made sleeping in the open air, or getting drenched
with rain, or lost and benighted, as they often were, mere trifles,
to be forgotten with the first blaze of sunshine. Compared with his
life in the Poorhouse Dickie found it heavenly, and very soon a new
and altogether unexpected result began to arise from his changed
condition.

When Dickie had taken to the road it was sheer impatience of
restraint that sent him thither, and he had many ideas of right and
wrong which are tolerated only among my “bairns.” Now Jerry was an
ignorant man, who did not know one letter from another, but there was
one lesson he had learned—that a life of crime is the worst paying
trade in the world. Halting by roadside hamlets, resting under shady
hedges, or wandering along green lanes, Jerry laid down his ideas
to Dickie in a homely fashion, which would have thrown a teacher of
grammar into hysterics, but which nevertheless carried conviction to
the heart of the boy. Not that Dickie had ever meant to wrong Jerry,
but he had only taken to this life as a make-shift till his mother
should be released from prison.

When questioned as to his intentions for the future, and especially
after rejoining his mother, he coolly said that he supposed he should
take to her trade. It was this callous idea that Jerry set himself
to undermine, and admirably the old man succeeded, thus affixing a
brighter gem to his brow for all eternity than if he had gone as a
missionary to the heathen and converted a whole troop of savages.
Dickie first listened in respectful patience to the new doctrines
of honesty and hard work, then began to imbibe them and manfully
adopt them himself, and finally became as firm and resolute in their
dissemination as Jerry himself. Out of this sprang a strange act.
Dickie had once written to his mother describing his new life, and
promising to rejoin her on her liberation; he now wrote a final
letter, asserting his intention of separating himself for ever from
her and her influence, and declaring his intention of growing up
“on the square.” Jess was nearly insane over the news—not that she
cared whether he grew up honest or a thief—but that he should think
of separating his life entirely from her own. Three months elapsed
before she was able to reply to his letter, and by that time Dickie
was hundreds of miles away, leaving no address, and the letter was
returned to the Penitentiary, marked “_Not Found_.” Jerry was an
Irishman, and though he always earned less money in his own country
than in Scotland or England, he inclined more to wander at that side
of the Channel, where, if the people could give nothing else, they
were always ready with a kindly greeting or a sympathetic answer,
and, of course, Dickie accompanied him, and gradually acquired such a
strong smack of the Irish brogue that he would have passed for one of
themselves.

When the queer partnership had first been formed, Dickie did little
but go round the houses at which they paused and ask for knives or
scissors to grind, but gradually, as he grew stronger and mastered
the intricacies of the grinding as taught by old Jerry, the position
of the partners became inverted, Dickie taking the heavy part of the
work and Jerry the light. A strong affection had sprung up between
them, and Dickie never thought he could do too much for the feeble
old man, whose bad leg at times held them in a poor locality till
they were literally starved out of it. During these detentions,
Dickie, not at all dismayed, sturdily faced the road alone, sometimes
making a round of thirty miles in a day, and faithfully returning
with the grinding machine and his earnings at night. In this way he
had “eaten the district bare,” as he said, while Jerry’s leg showed
no sign of mending or allowing him to move.

“Ye’ll have to take another county, Dickie, darlint,” he said, after
they had discussed the matter, and found some action imperative.
“I’m not afeard of ye running away an’ forgetting your poor owld
grandfather. I’ve teached ye better nor that, more by token they can
never expect to prosper that wrongs the helpless or the suffering.”

“May I drop dead the minute such a thought enters my head!” said
Dickie with energy. “Rest where you are, Jerry dear—and get well and
take all the comfort ye can, for sure ye’ve been a blessed friend to
me, and made a man of me when I’d have turned out nothing but a jail
bird and a vagabone.”

The “man,” as he termed himself, was then just twelve years of age,
but his sentiments, as the reader will admit, were worthy of twice
that number of years.

Thus it was that Dickie came to face the world as an independent
traveller. He moved over a great part of Ireland in this way, always
sending the net gains regularly to old Jerry, and, on the whole,
doing nearly as well as before the separation. He almost invariably
met with kindness and sympathy, but once he was attacked and robbed
of three days’ earnings. But in taking the money the wretches took
also Dickie’s carefully cherished talisman, the broken cairngorm, and
by that they were identified and convicted, while the trinket was
returned to Dickie, who cherished it and guarded it, with greater
faith than ever in its power. He would not have parted with that
senseless bit of stone for a twenty-pound note, for it was the only
link which connected the present with the past, and he never looked
at it, as he was wont to declare, without remembering what he might
have been but for old Jerry.

“Faith, I believe if I were to lose that stone my good luck would go
with it,” he repeatedly asserted, from which it will be seen that
there was mixed up with Dickie’s well-doing a spice of superstition,
which, however, is not a bad thing, when it keeps in the straight
path feet inclined to wander.

On one of the rare occasions when Dickie was able to get back as far
as Belfast to see Jerry, he found the old grinder unusually weak and
worn. Hitherto Jerry had doctored his leg himself, but now it had
assumed such a strange appearance that he was glad to have Dickie by
his side to advise him. It had begun to grow black, and, what was
more strange, the pain had all gone out of it. Dickie had been doing
pretty well on his travels, so he promptly decided that they should
call in a doctor.

When that gentleman came he looked at the leg, and then at the
emaciated face of the old man, and then said compassionately—

“Why did you send for me?”

“To mend me leg, plase God,” said Jerry.

The doctor quietly covered up the limb and shook his head.

“Ye’ve more need of a praist, good man,” he said, shortly, but not
unkindly. “No doctor alive will ever make you well.”

Dickie felt his heart suddenly grow cold and empty within him; then
a revulsion came and he burst into tears. Jerry alone was calm, and
even radiant.

“I’ve been expecting the message,” he quietly returned. “Plase the
Lord, I’m ready to die. Dickie, avourneen, don’t sob the heart out ov
ye like that. Sure, it’s rejoicing ye ought to be that I’m getting
rid of all my troubles and pains at wanst; and, blessed be God, it’s
aisy dyin’ when love smooths the pillow. Ye’ve been a true son to me,
and my own heart’s blood couldn’t have been affectionater. Pay the
gintleman for his trouble, Dickie, aroon, and then run for a praist,
for I feel the blackness creeping up on me, and when it covers my
heart I’ll be in heaven. The Lord is always good; He’s kept me alive
till you got back, Dickie, to take my hand an’ help me over the dark
stile.”

The doctor would accept of no fee, and Dickie ran off and got a
priest, who came and went, leaving Jerry happy and peaceful, with
one arm round Dickie’s neck and the other clasping his hand. He
had a great deal to tell his young partner, but the most important
of all was a strong injunction that he should continue honest and
industrious.

“There’s some money in the owld snuff-box under my head,” he
continued. “I’ve tuck care of it for ye, for ye’ve earned the most of
it, and deserved it all. You’ll get all that, and give me a dacent
funeral, and keep the rest. It’ll maybe start ye in a better way of
doing some day, but if the other way isn’t the straight way, ye’d
better pitch the money into the salt say and go on as ye are.”

The next morning the blackness crept up on Jerry’s tender heart, and
Dickie, still clasping the old man’s hand and wetting it with his
tears, helped him over the dark stile, and stood alone in the world.

The courage had nearly gone out of Dickie under this blow, but youth
is buoyant, hopeful, and active. After laying the head of Jerry in
the grave, and paying every one, Dickie found that he had nearly £20
left, all in gold sovereigns, for Jerry had imbibed the national
distrust of bank notes. Dickie left the money in safe keeping,
and started once more with his grinding machine. It was only when
going over his old rounds that he discovered how much Jerry had
been beloved and respected—truly another testimony that “honour and
shame from no condition rise.” Every one had a good word for his
memory, and many a tear was shed as Dickie described his peaceful
and courageous end. After another year of this wandering in Ireland,
Dickie crossed to Liverpool, and spent a year in England, at the end
of which time he sold his grinding machine, and became a hawker of
cheap jewellery.

He was now a smart-tongued lad of fifteen, nicely dressed, with a
good stock, all bought with Jerry’s careful savings, and found the
new line much more congenial, and quite as profitable as the old.
Much of the Irish accent dropped from his tongue, and at length it
would have puzzled even an expert to decide his nationality by his
speech. As he increased in experience and accumulated capital, he was
enabled to deal in a finer class of jewellery, which he carried about
in a mahogany box having several lifting trays and compartments, and
having on the side a stout leather handle, and on the top a brass
plate bearing the words—

 “RICHARD MURRAY,
 Licensed Hawker.”

Till he was seventeen he never thought of coming near Scotland, and
had long since forgotten his mother’s features, and given up any idea
of seeking her out, or joining his fortunes with her own; but some
one then fired his mind with a glowing account of what could be done
in his line in some of the towns, and Dickie crossed the Border and
worked his way to Glasgow, in which city he succeeded well. Saturday
afternoon and night were his best times for business, as then the
working folks were all free and plentiful of money.

After one of these successful days he had wandered into a big, flashy
public-house, close to one of the theatres, for a last effort before
going home to his humble lodging. The place was crowded, bar and
boxes, for the theatre had just disgorged its contents, and it was
near closing time. Dickie sold some of his wares, and then found
himself in one of the boxes offering a silver brooch, set with
imitation diamonds, to a company of three there seated—two men and a
big muscular woman, with some traces of beauty still about her face.

The woman fancied the brooch, and appeared resolved on buying it,
but among them they could not muster the price of the trinket, and
as Dickie would not abate to their price, the brooch was reluctantly
handed back and shut up in his box. The moment he had gone a
significant look ran round the three.

“It would be easily done, and he’s quite a boy,” said Jess Murray
eagerly. “He won’t give it for a fair price; if you’ve any spirit at
all, you’ll take the boxful.”

One of the men, Bob Lynch by name, was indifferent whether they
adopted the suggestion or not, and rose carelessly to follow the
lad; the other, known as “Jockey” Savage, thought that the boy, as
Jess called him, was not such a stripling, and might give them more
trouble than they bargained for. They all agreed, however, that it
was worth while following him, and, if a suitable spot were found,
making the attempt. They left the public house and separated, one man
going on either side of the street, and Jess following some distance
behind, to assist in any emergency. Dickie’s lodging was in a narrow
close off the Gallowgate, and they had to follow him thus far before
any opportunity occurred for attacking him, as, though he did no
business on the way, he kept persistently to the main thoroughfare,
thronged with passengers. The moment he entered the close the men
exchanged signals and dived in after him. Dickie had scarcely walked
twenty yards when a garrotting arm was thrown round his neck, and
a snatch made at the box in his hand. But Dickie had not knocked
about the world so long without learning something. He held on to
the leather strap of his box with all his strength, and at the same
time delivered a backward kick at Jockey Savage’s shin bone, which
made him slacken his grip, and squirm and howl with agony. As the
intended victim made a great outcry at the same moment Bob Lynch made
a desperate effort to bring out a leaden-headed life-preserver, but
then Dickie, divining what the motion meant, grasped at the villain’s
arm with his disengaged hand while he tried to pin the other to
Lynch’s side with his teeth. Just then there was a swift rush to the
spot, and Jess Murray, snatching the “neddy” from Lynch’s pocket,
brought it down with a crashing swing on the fair brow of the lad.
Dickie dropped like a log, and Jess caught the box as it fell from
his hand, tossing the neddy back to its owner, and saying—

“You bunglers would take all night to it. Now bolt! I’ll take care of
the swag.”

They vanished from the spot like magic, and by different routes
gained a den further east, known to them all, and peculiarly handy
in their present condition, as it was kept by a man who would reset
anything—the Great Eastern, even, if anyone chose to steal it. Jess
was the last to arrive, with the box hidden under her shawl, and she
tossed it down on the table with much pride and satisfaction.

“You hit him twice, Jess,” observed Lynch, who was a bit of a coward,
and was now very pale and concerned. “I hope to goodness you haven’t
croaked him.”

“His own fault if I have,” coolly answered Jess. “Turn out the box
and see what we’ve got, and then into the fire with it before the
spots come.”

The order was speedily obeyed. The stock was of greater value than
they had anticipated, but in addition, in the bottom compartment of
the box, they found five or six pounds in money, and a bank-book
representing a good deal more.

“What a pity! what a pity!” cried Jockey reflectively; “banks are a
nuisance—if the money had only been here instead of the book!”

“What’s that in the tissue paper?” said Jess eagerly—“a pile of
sovereigns, very like. Turn them out—the greedy beggar was as rich as
a Jew.”

Jockey obeyed, and gave a whistle of disappointment. All that the
tissue paper contained was a broken cairngorm stone, with a bit of
dirty twine drawn through a hole at one end.

“There’s your pile of gold,” he said, tossing Dickie’s talisman over
to Jess. “I hope you like it.”

Jess lifted the trinket and stared at it with her face slowly
becoming ghastly, and her heart freezing within her.

“I’ve seen that before!” she slowly whispered, as the men stared at
her in awe-stricken wonder and silence. “It was his when he was taken
from me. Perhaps it is a mistake—perhaps I have not killed my own
bairn. Read! read! you that can read—read what is on that brass plate
on the lid of the box.”

Jockey glanced at the plate, and sprang to his feet in horror.

“God alive! it’s there,” was all he could articulate.

“What? what? tell me what?” moaned Jess, beginning to clutch at her
breast with her hands, and to writhe about like one grown mad.

 “RICHARD MURRAY,
 Licensed Hawker,”

was the awe-stricken response, and only the half of it was heard.
Shriek upon shriek went pealing through that rookery. Nothing could
check her outcry; she screamed at every one; tore at them like a
tiger; denounced them with every gasp and mad exclamation, and
finally drew to the spot the police by struggling to throw her two
accomplices out at the window. They were all marched off to the
Central—with the reset as a make-weight, and Jess was there put in a
padded cell and watched the long night through, or she would never
have seen the light of another day. The first thing that helped to
soothe her was the news that Dickie was not killed, and though there
was concussion of the brain, he was likely to recover. When he did
recover he was allowed to visit her in prison, and put his arms
through the bars and clasp her close and hear her say that she was
done for ever with a life of crime.

Jess and her companions were tried shortly after, when she, on
account of the peculiar circumstances of the case, and the tearful
appeal to the jury by the chief witness—Dickie—got the mild sentence
of two years’ imprisonment. Jockey and Lynch got ten each, as by
a fiction of the law Jess was supposed to have acted under their
influence.

When Jess was released, Dickie waited for her, and they vanished
together.




THE ROMANCE OF A REAL CREMONA.


A grand ball was being given one night in November at the mansion
of the Earl of ———, a great castellated place a good bit within
a hundred miles of this city. The dancing room was a perfect
picture—the floor polished mahogany in mosaic work, the walls
panelled in white flowered satin, with gold slips at the edges, and
the whole lighted by hundreds of wax candles inserted in brackets and
chandeliers of cut crystal, glittering with pendants, while flashing
in the head-dresses and on the necks and bosoms of the fair guests
were enough diamonds and other precious stones to have bought up the
Regalia twice over.

It was in this scene of brightness and grandeur, and strictly
exclusive gaiety, that the curious robbery which was to cause me so
much trouble and concern took place.

In an assemblage of this kind, one would expect a thief, if he
managed to get into the place at all, to turn his attention to the
guests and their jewels; but such was not the case, and it was there
that the first puzzling element came into the affair.

At one end of the room, partly in a large recess formed by one of
the bow windows, and partly in a portion of the room screened off by
a rope covered with red cloth, was a raised kind of a dais for the
orchestra. This corner was at the end nearest the door, and clustered
within the rope, with stands and music complete, was an orchestra of
local musicians, under the leadership, for that night only, of a more
distinguished player from England. This gentleman, whom I may name Mr
Cleffton, had been engaged at some high-class concerts in Edinburgh,
and was about to return to England when he was asked as a great
favour and at a high fee to play at this distinguished gathering. To
play at a dancing party was rather out of this gentleman’s line—to
accept a high fee was not, so he went—much to his grief as he soon
found.

About midnight, when the room was beginning to become uncomfortably
warm, the guests filed out grandly to a supper room close by, and
shortly after the musicians were similarly entertained in a smaller
room, to which they were led through a long range of carpeted lobbies
by the butler himself. Most of the players left their instruments on
the seat they had occupied or on the music stand or floor—Mr Cleffton
alone took the trouble to return his to its case. He was about to
shut and lock this for additional security when he chanced to notice
that all the others were waiting on him, and said hurriedly to the
butler—

“I suppose the violins will be perfectly safe here? No one will
meddle them while we’re out?”

The butler smiled lightly at his concern, and said emphatically—

“Not a soul will go near them.”

So the fiddle case was left open and unlocked, and its owner went
away with his companions to regale himself upon cold fowl and tongue
and champagne, or whatever wine he fancied most.

Now, when I say that Mr Cleffton fairly worshipped his own
instrument, I am, I believe, giving only an ordinary case—all
fiddlers, I understand, do that, and the more wretched the instrument
the more devout is their homage. Whether this particular fiddle
merited the slavish devotion I cannot say. It was very ugly, and
rather dirty-looking; but its owner, besides never tiring of admiring
it from every possible point of view, had given £40 for it, and
afterwards spent a good many more, as I shall presently show, in
trying to establish at law that the fiddle he had bought belonged to
him; so I suppose it must have had good qualities of some kind.

When, therefore, the orchestra had finished supper and strolled
back under the guidance of one of the servants to the ball-room, Mr
Cleffton’s first look was towards his fiddle—or rather towards the
case in which he had so tenderly deposited it before leaving the
room. Then he started, and blinked sharply to make sure that the
champagne had not affected his vision. The case was there, as was
also a beautifully quilted bag of wadding and green silk in which he
was wont to tenderly wrap the fiddle when done playing, and before
inserting it in the case; the fiddle bow, too, was there, but the
Cremona was gone.

“Hullo! what’s this!” exclaimed Mr Cleffton, in his quick, sharp way,
and trying to smile in spite of his concern and pitiable pallor.
“Which of you has been meddling with my fiddle.”

Nobody had been touching it, as they all hastened to assure him,
reminding him at the same time how he had been the last to leave the
room; and then, with concerned looks and widely opened eyes, they
looked everywhere about the recess for the missing fiddle, narrowly
inspecting every one of the instruments left; but it was all in
vain—the fiddle had vanished.

“My beautiful _Strad!_ my beautiful _Strad!_ worth £400!” was all Mr
Cleffton could moan out, as, wringing his hands, tearing at the few
hairs left in his head, and almost shedding real tears of grief, he
trotted feverishly and excitedly round the ball-room, peering into
every corner in search of his treasure.

“Perhaps some of the servants may have taken it out to have a scrape
while we were at supper,” suggested another player, keeping his own
instrument tight under his arm so that there might be no danger of a
second tragedy. All the other fiddlers echoed the suggestion, and,
carrying their instruments under their arms, followed the distracted
leader through the lobbies in search of the butler, or any of the
servants likely to throw light on the strange disappearance.

The butler was soon found, and brought out from the supper room
proper to hear the story of the Cremona; and in amazement and
incredulity he followed the players to the ball-room, where, however,
he could only stare and count over the instruments left, with the
invariable result of finding them one short. Then the servants were
questioned closely and searchingly, but not one of them had thought
of looking at the fiddles, far less of taking one out of the room to
try it, and the end of the investigation found them exactly where
they had begun—that is, staring blankly at each other and saying,
“Well, that is strange—how on earth could it have gone?”

By and by odd couples of the guests began to drift into the
ball-room, and at length Lady ——— herself, the amiable hostess,
appeared, and was informed in a whisper by the butler of the
unexpected difficulty.

“One of the violins taken out of the room? oh, impossible,” she
incredulously echoed, with a coolness which must have stabbed Mr
Cleffton like a sword of ice. “You will find it lying about somewhere
when the dancing is over. Could you not play on one of the other
violins, Mr Cleffton, and look for your own afterwards?”

Mr Cleffton looked at the honourable lady in pitying and profound
contempt for her ignorance, and deep reproach for what to him seemed
an indifference absolutely brutal. What! sit down and calmly play on
another instrument while his own—to him the best in the world—might
be speeding in the hands of the exultant robber to the other end of
the world.

This was more than fiddler humanity could endure. High fees and even
the countenance of earls were not to be despised, but they were as
nothing compared with the loss of his darling instrument, and in a
torrent of excited language, such as the lady was seldom favoured
with hearing, the bereaved musician told her so. Not another note
would he play till he got his own fiddle.

A horrible pause followed, but in the end a compromise was effected,
by which all but Mr Cleffton continued to play, while he followed the
butler from the room to prosecute his inquiries in the regions below.

A tardily stammered-out word from one of the servants had given them
a slight clue to the strange disappearance. During the interval
occupied by supper, some of the strange servants being entertained
below—that is, the coachmen and footmen of those who had come a
distance, and merely put up the horses to wait till the party was
over—had proposed that they should take a peep at the glories of the
empty ball-room, and, this being readily agreed to, they slipped
quietly upstairs under the guidance of one of the servants, and
gratified their curiosity.

“But they had been only a moment in the room,” the quaking servant
added, “and hardly inside the door.”

The butler made no reply, but to Mr Cleffton he hopefully remarked—

“I suspect some of the coachmen will have your fiddle down in the
kitchen,” and to the kitchen they went to find there more than one
coachman, but no fiddle, or trace of one. Every one there seated
swore that they had not as much as noticed the fiddle, and then
they voluntarily underwent a process of searching. Greatcoats were
produced and inspected, pockets turned out, and every means tried
without success. Then some suggested that they should see if all in
waiting were there; they counted off at once, and found that, by
comparing the number with that of the plates set for supper in the
servants’ hall, they were exactly one short. Who was the missing one!
No one could tell, till one jolly-faced coachman said—

“Where’s the surly chap that sat next to me, and never took off his
driving coat all the time?”

“Ay, where was he?” every one echoed, and soon to this was added the
question, for the first time asked, “Who was he?”

There was no answer to either question. Nobody had noticed the man
particularly, though to the jolly-faced coachman he had gruffly said
that his name was “Smith, or Jones, or something,” and that he had
been “driving some of the folks up stairs.”

Every one in this case, down to the servants of the house themselves,
had imagined that every body else knew all about the strange man, and
so had paid little attention to him and his odd manner.

Smith had done little but smoke and stare, though he had shown great
alacrity in going up to see the ball-room; some, indeed, insisted
that it had been he who proposed the treat. More, he had gone up
with his heavy driving coat on, and some of the servants had a faint
recollection of him loitering near the music stands while the rest of
the servants walked round the room looking at the decorations.

“That’s the man that has stolen my violin,” cried Mr Cleffton at
this stage of the inquiry. “He would have a big pocket inside his
coat,—probably made for the occasion,—and has slipped my Cremona into
it when no one was looking or thinking of him. Who does he serve
with?”

“Who, indeed?” All echoed the question; but when guest after guest
had been enumerated or appealed to by the butler, there came the
still more surprising discovery that Smith served no one—came with no
one—and was known to no one—had gained admittance, indeed, entirely
by the dress he wore, his own cool audacity, and the general flurry
in which every one was plunged by the party being held up stairs.

“Get out your horses, and let the villain be pursued,” cried Mr
Cleffton, more and more distracted, “the whole robbery has been
systematically planned and carried out; but the wretch can’t be far
off, and we may overtake him yet. I will give ten pounds to any of
you who help to put it into my hands again.”

The incentive was little needed, for a good deal of Cleffton’s
excitement had communicated itself to those about him. In a few
minutes several vehicles were horsed and ready in the stable yard
behind, and on one of these Mr Cleffton took his place beside the
driver and with a grand lashing of whips and excited whooping they
were off down the avenue, at the foot of which they separated to take
the different roads running from the spot. Mr Cleffton, from some
idea of his own, had chosen that leading to Edinburgh; but, though
the night was clear, and the moon and stars out in the sky, not a
trace of the fugitive did they come upon between the mansion and
the city. Several tramps they did overtake and rouse up and search
without ceremony, but as none of these answered the description of
the surly Mr Smith, they were allowed to resume their tramping or
snoring, while the agonised fiddler entered the city. Of course his
first visit was to the Central Police Office, where he made known his
loss to the lieutenant on night duty, and then excitedly demanded
to see a detective. It was explained to him that detectives require
sleep as well as ordinary mortals, and are not usually kept at the
office during the night waiting for such exceptional cases, but this
produced little impression upon the musician.

“Everything depends on this matter being seen to with promptitude,”
he said. “Give me the man’s address, and I’ll go to him myself.”

They ought to have given him M^cSweeny’s address, considering the
hour and the work I had done the day before, but they didn’t; they
gave him mine; and out to Charles Street he came at half-past four
in the morning, and roused me out of bed, sleepy, stupid, and dazed
with having got only three hours rest instead of eight, and, without
waiting to see if I understood him, at once began to bemoan his loss.

“My lovely Cremona! my beautiful _Strad!_ spirited away—stolen from
under my very eyes! Good heavens, what am I to do? What is to become
of me if you don’t trace out the thief?”

“Strad! Strad! Who is she?” I vacantly asked, thinking from the man’s
tears that he must mean some young and beautiful maiden, violently
abducted from her home and friends.

“The best fiddle in the world—at least, the best that I ever tried,
and I’ve tried a few,” he moaned, wringing his hands. “I’d rather
have had a leg broken, or lost my head, than that Cremona.”

I stared at him, only half understanding the speech, and inclined to
think that he had lost his head.

“You don’t mean to say that it’s a—a fiddle you’ve come to make all
this fuss about?” I at last found voice to say.

“A beauty—and the tone of it, three fiddles in one, and as sweet and
soft as a flute,” he cried, not noticing my rising anger.

“Good heavens, man!” I shouted at last, “you don’t mean to tell me
that you’ve come here and roused me out of bed at four in the morning
about a miserable fiddle that you’ve lost? I thought it was something
serious.”

“And do you not call that serious?” he returned, after favouring me
with a pitying look which was meant to kill me, but did not. “It is
serious for me. I’ll never sleep till I get it.”

“I’m sorry for you, but you might at least have let me sleep—till
morning.”

“Worth £400—refused £200 for it the other day,” he continued, quite
undisturbed.

“£400!” I echoed. “Is it possible you gave that sum for a fiddle?”

“No, not quite so much, but that’s its value,” he slowly admitted.

“How much did it cost you?”

“£40,” he rather reluctantly answered.

“There’s a slight difference between 40 and 400,” I ventured to
remark.

“A mere nothing,” he said, with the greatest gravity stumbling on a
joke; “that’s common in fiddle buying. You don’t always give for an
instrument exactly what it’s worth.”

“Then its value is just the price which you choose to put on it?”

“That’s about it;” and then he hastily changed the subject by
narrating all the circumstances of the strange robbery much as I have
put them down, only taking much longer to go through.

When he had finished I quietly returned to the point at which he had
broken off, pretty sure that he had a reason for avoiding it.

“If the fiddle is worth £400, and you got it at a tenth of that
price, you must have got a great bargain?” I observed.

“I am coming to that,” he answered, with a groan. “A great bargain?
Yes, I thought so too at the time, but I’ve never had peace since I
bought it. It has a history, and as that, I am sure, has something to
do with the robbery, you may as well hear it now.”

“Then there is more to listen to?” I ruefully returned, with
something like an echo of his groan, and a wistful thought of the
cosy blankets I had left. “Will it take long to tell?”

“Not very long—it must not, for I must have you and some of your
comrades out to watch the departure of the Newcastle trains.”

I groaned in reality then, and resignedly began to dress.

“Well, go on—I’m listening,” I said, with a very bad grace, which,
however, he was too grief-stricken to notice.

“Well, I was swindled in buying the violin—regularly diddled,” he
said, with some exasperation.

“_You_ were swindled? I thought it was the other way?” I said,
stopping in surprise.

“So did I, but I was mistaken,” he answered, with a writhe. “This
was how it happened. I was playing at Newcastle last year, when a
man named John Mackintosh, who said he had a real Cremona violin,
or one that was said to be real, called upon me, and said he wanted
my opinion of it. I had nothing to do during the day, so I went to
his shop,—a little den down near the New Quay, in which he sold
ginger beer, sweets, and newspapers,—and saw at a glance that it was
a splendid instrument. It was of no use to him, for he is only a
wretched scraper, who would be as happy with a twelve-and-sixpenny
German fiddle, so I determined if possible to get him to sell it. He
asked what I thought of it, and I said indifferently that it might be
a real Cremona and it might not, but it was worth about £10.”

“That would be a lie, of course?” I quietly observed.

“Well, in a sense, yes,” he stammered, flushing a little. “You know I
was speaking professionally.”

“Oh, indeed? Professionals always lie, then?”

“No, no—you mistake. I mean that professionals can never afford to
give so much as ordinary buyers with lots of money. But the man was
deeper than I had expected—he’s a Scotchman, you know, and they’re
always cursed long-headed. He said, ‘Ah, but I wadna gie that fiddle
for twice £10.’ I laughed at him, but at length I said I would buy it
from him, and give him the £20. Blast him, then I found he wouldn’t
sell it at all!”

“And you came away without it?”

“I tried him every way—pointed out how much more useful the money
would be than the fiddle to him, but he only said dryly that ‘he
would think aboot it,’ and thus I left him. The next time I was in
Newcastle I called upon him again, and saw the violin, but this time
Mackintosh was not in the shop, but an uncle of his, who said he
could not sell the fiddle without the owner’s consent, but hinted
that if I made a reasonable offer for it he had no doubt I might make
a bargain the next time I came. Well, I did call on my next visit,
and saw the uncle, who said that Mackintosh had decided to sell it
if I would make the price £40, and I snapped at the offer at once. I
asked when I could see Mackintosh, but the uncle only said, ‘You can
get the fiddle frae me as weel as frae him—if ye hae the money wi’
ye?’ I had the money, and counted it out at once, while he wrote out
a receipt, put a stamp on it, and signed it ‘John Mackintosh.’ Then
I got the fiddle, and thought as I bore it off that I was happy for
life.”

“But you weren’t?”

“I wasn’t. I had not been home many days when I got a note, vilely
written and spelled, from Mackintosh, demanding back his fiddle,
and saying hotly that his uncle, the drunken beast, had no right to
_lend_ the fiddle to me, or even let it out of the shop. I replied
sharply that I had bought it, paid £40 for it, and held the receipt;
to which he replied that his uncle had left him, and gone no one knew
where, but the fiddle was never his uncle’s, nor had he power to sell
it, and that Mackintosh himself had never fingered a penny of the
price, and did not mean to, but insisted on getting back his Cremona.
Here was a nice swindle; yet what could I do? I offered him other £20
to let me keep it, but he laughed at the offer, and then brought an
action-at-law against me for the return of the fiddle.”

“And what was the result?”

“The result as yet is only that I’ve had to pay away nearly £20 in
lawyer’s fees; but, as I stick to the fiddle, and would burn it
sooner than give it up to him, I suspect that in desperation he has
planned this robbery, and now is making his escape to Newcastle with
the fiddle in his possession.”

“Oho! and that’s the end of it,” I exclaimed, now seeing the
awkwardness of the case he was putting into my hands. “Was it this
man Mackintosh who offered you £200 for the fiddle the other day?”

“No, no! That was another person altogether. But what has that got to
do with the case in hand?”

“Nothing, perhaps, but we’ll see. Who was he?”

“Oh, a curious, half-daft customer, who has a craze for buying
fiddles. He lives a mile or two out from this city, but heard me play
on mine at one of the concerts, and invited me out to try his and
compare them with mine.”

“Did he seem very anxious to buy yours?”

“Oh, fairly daft about it—offered me my pick of his selection of
fiddles and £200 down for it, but I only laughed at him. He doesn’t
play at all, so of what earthly use would it be to him? He has been
in an asylum, I understand, at one time, and I could believe it,
for none but a daft man would give the prices he has given for the
fiddles he has. One wretched thing, with no more tone in it than a
child’s sixpenny toy, cost him £180. He’s been beautifully swindled.”

“Swindling seems to be rather a prominent feature in fiddle-buying,”
was my comment; but while I made it I was thinking of something else.

It is a pity that he told me of the Newcastle affair, for from the
first I had caught the idea that the offerer of the £200 would
be found to have some connection with the theft. The bringing in
of another clue completely upset my first instincts, and made me
give them less prominence than I should otherwise have done. The
description of the surly, sham coachman, too, did not tally in any
particular with that of either Mackintosh or his uncle, though, as
Cleffton remarked, that did not go for much, as they might have
employed another to do the job for them.

There was little time for either thinking or further inquiries, for
on consulting the railway time tables I found that trains started by
both lines for Newcastle at a few minutes past seven, and as I could
not divide myself into two, I would have to rouse M^cSweeny—rather a
joyful task—and prime him with details and descriptions, and set him
on to watch one station, while I and Mr Cleffton took the other.

As the early train from the Waverley Station did not run farther
than Berwick without a break, I thought the Caledonian more likely
to be tried, and decided to take that one, while M^cSweeny took the
Waverley. There was no boat for Newcastle from Leith till next day,
so we were pretty safe in trying only the railway stations.

We got down to the Pleasance, roused M^cSweeny without compunction,
and then hurried off to our different posts of observation. I took up
my stand close to the booking-office, with Cleffton watching close
by, and there we stood till every passenger had been served with
tickets, and the train moved out of the station. Not one carried a
fiddle, or suspicious bundle, or had any appearance of having one
concealed about them, and not one answered the descriptions either of
Mackintosh, his uncle, or the sham coachman. Cleffton was manifestly
disappointed, and eager to know what I thought.

“Wait till we hear what M^cSweeny has to say,” was my reply, and we
drove along to the other station to find that my chum had actually
made a capture, and lugged him off to the Office, fiddle and all.
Cleffton was in high spirits, but swore horribly when he found that
the prisoner was only a harmless blind fiddler, with an instrument
having more patches and splices than his coat, and worth only
half-a-crown. Then I gave my opinion freely—

“I’m afraid we’re on the wrong scent.”

Cleffton, however, had formed his own theory, and insisted on all
the trains for Newcastle being watched that day; and this was done,
but without success. Even then he would have held out, but in the
course of the day I sent a telegram to a skilful man on the Newcastle
staff, asking him to find out if Mackintosh had been out of town, and
at night I had an answer giving a decided negative. Not only was he
at home, and serving his customers as usual, but he had even spoken
confidently of recovering his valuable Cremona, in a month or two at
the most, by the ordinary processes of law.

“Recover it, the cheating scoundrel!” cried Cleffton, when I read him
the message, “after me paying him forty pounds for it!”

“Not him—you did not pay him,” I quietly corrected.

“A regularly planned swindle!—all made up between them,” he hoarsely
iterated.

“I have little doubt it was,” I thoughtfully replied; “but did it
never strike you as curious that a man in his position should possess
such a valuable instrument. Did he never tell you how it came into
his possession? It is just possible that it was not really his to
sell.”

“Do you think so?” eagerly cried the excited victim. “By heavens, I
would give a ten pound note this minute if you could fasten a crime
of any kind on him. That would be revenge! He always declared to me
that he bought it in a disjointed state from a broker in Edinburgh
here for £3. Perhaps it was stolen.”

I said nothing, for either way Cleffton would lose his fiddle, and
probably the money he had paid for it. I had no doubt that the false
sale had been planned and arranged by Mackintosh; and was quite sure
that the man who could do so would not stick at trifles, but it did
not therefore follow that he had stolen the fiddle. I gave the
whole matter a night’s thought, and in the morning wished heartily
that the fiddle had been burned to ashes a year before I was born,
for I seemed to get deeper into troubles and difficulties the more I
studied and investigated.

I now put Cleffton and his theories aside, and began to work the case
in my own way. After getting from him the address of the gentleman
who had offered him £200 for the Cremona, I made my way out to the
mansion which had been the scene of the robbery. I then worked my
way in towards the city, and, after two days’ hard work, at length
discovered two persons who had seen a man answering the description
of the sham coachman at an early hour on the morning of the robbery.
One had seen him on the road, another had seen him in the city; but
neither seemed to have any suspicion that under the big coachman’s
coat there was concealed a bulky thing like a fiddle.

From some of the servants I had learned that the man was red-haired
and big boned—that he had a slight cast in the eye, and that he
undoubtedly knew something about horses and driving. I therefore
decided that if I should have the good fortune to discover him I
would find him to be some dodging groom or stableman of doubtful
reputation rather than one of my own family of recognised “bairns.”

My next step was naturally a visit to the eccentric connoisseur,
whom I shall call Mr Turner. It happened, however, that before I had
advanced to this stage Mr Cleffton had to leave the city for England
to fulfil several important engagements, and I was for a little
rather puzzled as to how I should be able to identify his violin, if
I were lucky enough to get my eyes on it. Fiddles, of course, are
all alike to me, and unless by some marked difference in the colour
I could not tell one from another. Mr Cleffton tried to prime me a
little by speaking of certain marks and printed tickets which I would
find about the fiddle, but when he admitted that some of the fiddles
already in Mr Turner’s possession had these very tickets and marks
I was more helpless than ever. At last a happy thought struck him
just as he was leaving town, and he dropped me a note directing me
to an old Edinburgh musician who had been playing second fiddle with
him on the night of the ball. This gentleman had seen and closely
examined the Cremona more than once, and, having a perfect knowledge
of all the peculiarities of such valuable instruments, would know
the missing one, I was assured, among dozens. To this gentleman,
therefore, I went, and we arranged that he should take me out to
Mr Turner’s as a friend wishing to see the rare collection of old
violins. We then set out for the nearest cab-stand, as the place was
three miles out of town, and on the way I chanced to say—

“But are you perfectly sure that you would know this fiddle so as to
be able to swear to it? It would be very awkward for us all if we
made a false accusation.”

“I’ll know it when I see it,” was the confident reply, “and I’ll
tell you why. I have a strong suspicion that I’ve seen the fiddle
before—ay, and played on it, too. If it’s not the £50 Cremona that
my old chum, M——, of the Theatre Royal, lost about ten years ago, it
must be its twin brother.”

“Lost? How could a fiddle be lost?” I faintly returned, as with a
sinking heart I anticipated fresh complications.

“Well, or stolen—it was never rightly known how it happened,”
promptly returned my companion. “I was there at the time myself, and
I’ll tell you all about it as we go out.”

I groaned, and resigned myself to listen.

We got to the cab-stand, and were soon rattling out from Edinburgh,
and when out on the smooth country road my new assistant very eagerly
threw off the following information:—

“We were playing at a ball out by Penicuick—six or seven of us
altogether—and as it was a jolly affair at a gentleman’s seat, we
were driven out and in in an open trap. My chum, M——, of the Theatre
Royal,—he’s dead now, as you know,—was leader, and had his best
fiddle with him—a splendid _Stradivarius_ Cremona, which cost him
£50. I had a great liking for the instrument, and used often to try
it, and have got the loan of it often when I had a solo to play. We
were through with our business about three in the morning, and I
remember perfectly that it was a clear, cold night, with plenty of
moonlight. We had had some refreshments during the night, but every
one of us knew perfectly well what he was about. M—— was the last to
step into the vehicle that was to bring us in, and he came out with
his fiddle and case in his hand, and said, ‘Mind yer feet or I pit in
my fiddle—better that you sud be crampit for room than that my fiddle
sud come to ony herm.’ We made room—the fiddle case was shoved in on
the floor of the vehicle among others there lying, the door at the
back was shut, and we drove off, singing, laughing, and joking, and
as jovial and happy as kings. There was a toll-bar some distance in,
and I remember some of us getting out to knock up the toll-keeper and
get him to open the gate; and it is possible that the door of the
trap may not have been shut immediately on the journey being resumed,
but, at all events, the door was found open when we came to the next
toll, which was near Edinburgh. When we got to the Theatre Royal—the
most central place for us all—we got out, and M——, who was joking and
laughing till we had all got out our instruments, began groping about
under the seats, and then said, ‘Some o’ ye hae taen my fiddle.’ We
counted over, and searched everywhere, but the Cremona and case were
gone.”

“Lost on the road, I suppose?”

“Yes, or stolen—it was never found out which. The loss was not
thought serious at first, for there was a brass plate on the case
bearing the owner’s name, and it was expected that the fiddle would
be picked up by some of the early carters coming in to the market,
and that a mere advertisement and small reward would ensure its
restoration. But though the advertising was tried, and every inquiry
was made, the fiddle has never been heard of since.”

“And did you not tell Cleffton all this when you saw the fiddle in
his possession?”

“No; I was not sure that it _was_ the fiddle. But I thought of it,
and was very near saying it.”

I made no further comments on the new information. I was not anxious
that he should prove correct in his surmise, but hoped that the case
would be narrowed rather than broadened. With this end in view I
thought proper to prime my companion well as to the questions he was
to ask the gentleman we were on our way to see, leaving to myself
rather the task of watching and analysing.

Mr Turner had a craze for buying fiddles which he never did, and
never could, play upon, and I mentally placed him in the same
position as a bibliomaniac, who would sell his soul to get hold of
some old musty volume not worth reading, simply because it happened
to be the only copy in existence. Such a man, I had no hesitation
in deciding, would steal as readily as a man drunk with opium. My
only difficulty was how to make sure that the fiddle had been stolen
at his instigation, and, if that were made clear, how to get at the
stolen article.

The cab stopped at a little hamlet about three miles from the city,
and I was shown into the drawing-room of Mr Turner’s house, in which
we were speedily joined by a dirty-looking man, very shabbily and
raggedly attired, and evidently straight from digging in the garden,
whom I had difficulty in believing to be the wealthy gentleman I had
come to see.

The face was rather repulsive, on the whole, until my companion spoke
of his rare fiddles, when it became animated and bright with the
ruling passion of his life. Then he turned to a cabinet in the room,
and unlocked it as solemnly as if it had been an iron safe full of
diamonds and gold, and brought out several old fiddles, very much
cracked and mended, and every one, if possible, uglier than another,
and which were placed successively in my hands, with a triumphant
look, which evidently meant, “Admire that, or be for ever condemned
as ignorant and stupid.”

I examined them closely as I had been instructed by Mr Cleffton,
and even brightened a little when I found one which had the printed
ticket inside of which he had spoken, but on referring the matter to
my companion, he only smiled and said—

“Oh, that’s a _Strad._, too, but it’s only a copy, and a very poor
one. The other was a _real_ Cremona. By the by, Mr Turner,” he
abruptly added aloud, in response to a signal from me, and while I
pretended to bend over the fiddle in my hand in wrapt devotion and
admiration, “Do you remember that _Stradivarius_ which Cleffton
refused to sell you?”

“Yes; what of it?” The words were somewhat hastily thrown out, and I
fancied I noticed a kind of nervous flutter in his voice as he spoke.

“It has been stolen.”

“Stolen? Impossible!”

These were his words, and natural enough under the circumstances,
but it is impossible to convey in print the whole effect of the
exclamation. There is more in the manner in which words are spoken
than in the words themselves. The appearance of surprise and
incredulity was—or appeared to me to be—manifestly forced; the eyes
of the man had an absent and uneasy expression, as if, while he was
mechanically pronouncing the words, he was saying to himself—“Is
there any danger? Can any one have hinted to him that I might have
been the thief?”

“It is not only possible, but a fact,” pursued my companion.

“And how was it done?” asked Mr Turner, with more coolness.

The fiddler briefly ran over the incidents of the theft, but when he
came to explain that all the suspicion rested on the sham coachman,
Mr Turner dissented warmly. “They’ll find that that has been a
cock and bull story of the servants to screen themselves,” he said
decidedly. “The whole thing is absurd; and my opinion is that the
fiddle is safely hidden somewhere about the house in which it was
missed.”

“The police don’t seem to think so,” I quietly observed.

“The police!” he scornfully echoed, “a parcel of blockheads—they’ll
never lay hands on it, I’ll swear. When anything is stolen, of
course, they have to make a show of activity, but it’s all humbug.
They never recover the stolen thing.”

“I think you’re mistaken,” said I, with some truth, as the reader
probably is aware.

“They’ll never see it,” he hotly and positively persisted. “I’ll
stake twenty pounds on it.”

“Perhaps you’ll lose,” I laughingly returned. “Now, Mr ——, you bear
witness that Mr Turner has promised to pay £20 to the—say the Royal
Infirmary—if the police get back Mr Cleffton’s fiddle.”

Mr Turner appeared to think this a very good joke, and laughingly
repeated his offer. We had by this time looked over every fiddle in
his possession, as he averred, and as I had no search warrant, and
no grounds for trying to get one, we had to take leave without any
further discovery. But while we were being shown to the door by the
shabby and ragged proprietor, I busied myself with inquiries as to
the number of servants he employed. The house was a big one, and
there was at least half an acre of garden ground attached to it,
and I was in hope that he might keep a man, or hire one to help him
to keep it in order. In this I was disappointed. He kept but two
servants, and never hired a man for his garden, unless when actually
forced to it by bad health. He kept neither horse nor machine, and
always walked in to Edinburgh when business called him thither, so my
sniffing after a horsey manservant went for nothing. I knew, however,
that Mr Turner had been perfectly aware of Cleffton’s engagement to
play at the Earl of ——’s, and was loath to believe that I was on the
wrong scent.

I therefore bade the eccentric man rather an absent-minded good-bye,
and had moodily settled myself in the cab for a good think, when a
sudden thought came to me as we were leaving the hamlet behind. A
little further down the road from the house we had visited was a
wayside cottage with a few jars of sweets and biscuits and a couple
of tobacco pipes stuck prominently in one of the windows, thus
intimating that the place was meant for a shop. If any gossip—any
news or information was to be collected regarding any one in the
place, it was surely to be got in such a house as this, and my hand
was on the check string in a moment.

When I got inside the cottage, a clean, tidy woman came bustling
through from the back room, wiping her hands on her apron as she
came. I was a little at a loss how to begin till I noticed some
bottles of lemonade in a case behind the little counter, and asked to
be served with two.

Chairs were handed us, and we decanted the lemonade in comfort,
talking about the weather and roads as we did so, and then I
indifferently turned the conversation to the strange customers that
the good woman would be in the habit of noticing on the road.

“I suppose you never notice any men coming to see Mr Turner up the
way there—a coarse, red-haired man, for instance, in a big coachman’s
coat, and having a slight cast in his eyes?”

“Mr Turner’s no ane to hae mony folk coming aboot his hoose—he’s owre
greedy for that,” was the answer, “but I think I did see a man like
that a day or twa syne—no gaun to Mr Turner’s, but coming the other
road. He cam’ in here and bocht a half-ounce o’ tobacco and a pipe.”

“Going in towards Edinburgh, you mean?”

“No that either, for he asked the nearest road to the railway
station.”

“He couldn’t be going to Edinburgh, then, for the station is two
miles farther on, and he would have been nearly as quick to have
walked. Have you any idea if he had been at Mr Turner’s?”

“No me; I never clapped een on the man afore.”

“Was he carrying anything?—a fiddle case, for instance?”

“No, no—naething but a deal box, tied roond wi’ a string. It wasna
sae big as a fiddle case. He laid it doon on the counter while he
filled his pipe. I think there was a ticket on it—put on wi’ iron
tacks—and a name on the ticket.”

“What name?”

“I never lookit. Maybe it wasna a name. I never like to be impident,
and didna look very close.”

I questioned her closely on the man’s appearance, and found that
it tallied very closely with that of the sham coachman. Yet I was
anything but hopeful of the result. The description might have suited
fifty innocent men who might pass her little shop in the course of a
forenoon. Still I resolved to follow the clue a little further, and
directed the cabman to turn his horse off at the first bye-road, and
make for a railway station two miles further on. It was quite a small
place, a branch from the main line, and to my satisfaction I found
the booking clerk who had been on duty on the day named by the woman.
This lad recollected the red-haired man perfectly, but when I said,
“Where did he book for?” he looked at me with a puzzled expression,
then thought a moment, and said—

“_Did_ he book for any place?”

It was now my turn to look puzzled.

“I don’t know—I suppose he did when he walked two miles to get to the
station,” I said at last. “Why else would he come here?”

“He brought a parcel,” said the lad, turning to one of his ledgers
and flapping over the leaves. “He booked _it_, I know, but I don’t
think he took out a ticket or waited for the train.”

“What kind of a parcel?”

“A light box. I think he said it was to be kept dry, as there were
artificial flowers and ribbons in it. Ah, here is the entry—it is
not paid you see—he said we’d take greater care of it if it wasn’t
prepaid—‘Sent by James Paterson, to Robert Marshall, Linlithgow. To
lie at station till called for.’”

“Was the box big enough to have held a fiddle?”

“About that size, sir. I don’t think it would have held the
fiddlestick too. The fiddlestick is longer, and would take more room.”

“Was the box called for at the other end, do you know?” I asked,
beginning to be more hopeful.

“I don’t know about that—it was sent away, and that’s all we have to
do with it. These parcels are generally expected, and don’t lie long
unclaimed.”

“You’ve got a telegraph handy—would you just send a message through,
particularly asking if that box has been called for?” and I calmly
sat down and motioned the clerk to his place at the instrument; and
in a short time had the welcome news that the “box was there still,
and had not been asked for.”

I looked at my watch and then consulted a time-table, and found that
if I drove smartly into Edinburgh I could easily get a fast train
to Linlithgow, without waiting for the slow connection with this
out-of-the-way branch line. Afraid of looking foolish if I found
myself mistaken, I dropped my companion at Edinburgh and took train
for Linlithgow alone. The moment I got out, and the bustle of the
train’s arrival and departure was over, I got the booking-clerk to
turn out his parcel press, and easily found the box I was in search
of. It was but roughly put together, and appeared to have been made
out of the undressed spars of an old orange box; but by shaking it
sharply I soon ascertained that it contained something harder than
either flowers or ribbons. After a consultation, I was allowed to use
a chisel to the lid, and easily prised it up sufficiently to pull
out the paper and straw with which it was padded, and found snugly
reposing underneath, a fiddle which in every respect answered the
description of that stolen from Mr Cleffton.

I had little doubt that I had fairly recovered the stolen property,
but I was just as anxious to get hold of the thief. It appeared to
me that the sending of the fiddle by rail to this quiet station was
merely the adoption of a safe hiding-place till the hue and cry of
the robbery were over, and that as soon as the actual instigator felt
safe he would appear to claim the box. I could not afford to wait so
long; so I got permission to fasten up the box and leave it, while I
returned to Edinburgh bearing the fiddle.

My first visit was to the gentleman who had introduced me to Mr
Turner, and he identified the fiddle at a glance as Cleffton’s; but
he did more. Getting out a fiddle bow, he ran his fingers over the
strings in a testing way, and at last said decidedly—

“I could stake my life on it that that’s M——’s £50 Cremona that was
stolen as I told you. Suppose we go along to his house and see?”

“I thought you said he was dead?”

“So he is; but his widow is alive, and may know the fiddle. We will
not prompt her in any way, but just show it her and see if she has
any suspicion of the truth.”

I was so pleased at the identification of the fiddle as that stolen
from Cleffton—which was all I had been employed to find—that I
offered no objection, and we walked through a street or two to a
semi-genteel place, where I was introduced to the widow of the
musician, and found her a shrewd and superior woman—one picked out
of a hundred, I should say, for quick intelligence.

My companion opened the conversation by asking to see one of her late
husband’s instruments to compare it with that we had with us, and in
the course of the testing he managed that our fiddle should find its
way into the widow’s hands. In a moment or two I saw her start and
look at it more closely, then take it nearer the light and examine it
closely at the scroll work close to the screwing pegs, and then she
turned to my companion perfectly amazed, and said—

“Do you know what I’ve discovered?”

“What?”

“This is my fiddle—the one that was stolen from M———the £50 Cremona
lost on the Penicuick road.”

“Impossible!—that one was bought in Newcastle.”

“That’s nothing. I don’t care though it had been bought in
Australia—it’s his fiddle. Look here”—and she pointed to some
scratching on the varnish in among the scroll carving—“what do you
call that?”

We both looked very closely, and I said at last—

“It’s like the letter M scratched with a pin.”

“It is just that, and was scratched with a pin in this very room. He
did it one night before me, saying, ‘If ever any one runs away with
my fiddle I’ll know it by that whether they change the ticket or
not.’ You need not take the fiddle away with you, for I claim it as
mine.”

Here was a poser, but I was not to be so easily deprived of what was
mine only on trust. I quietly took the instrument into my hands,
saying—

“At present, Mrs M———, the fiddle is in the hands of the police, and
as soon as you make good your claim to it I have no doubt it will
be surrendered to you, but it seems to me that you will require to
advance better evidence than that of a mere scratched letter.”

“I for one can swear to the instrument,” observed my companion.

“And half a dozen more, when they see it,” added the widow warmly. “I
will raise an action for its recovery to-morrow.”

“Tuts! do not be so hasty—save your money in the meantime,” I
advised. “I may get the evidence for you quite easily, if I can
get the thief to confess. But that will necessitate a journey to
Newcastle, so it can hardly be done in a day.”

I said this pretty confident that the swindling Mackintosh who had
sold the fiddle to Cleffton would turn out to be the original thief,
and took away the instrument and made preparations to secure him. I
had before this made an arrangement whereby any one calling for the
box at Linlithgow station should be detained and arrested; and the
whole case now presented the curious spectacle of two robberies,
two claimants, and two thieves. A telegram to England, according to
arrangement, brought Mr Cleffton down in joy and ecstacy to claim
his beloved fiddle, but only to be all but heart-broken with the
intelligence that it was believed to be stolen property, and could
not be given up till all claims had been fully investigated. The day
after, I managed to run down to Newcastle. I easily found the little
shop of Mackintosh, and considerably startled him by saying—

“My name is M^cGovan, and I have come from Edinburgh about that
affair of the Cremona. I want you to come with me.”

The name appeared to be known to him, for he became ashy white before
I had done speaking, and then with chattering teeth managed to say—

“I can’t leave my business; but I’m willing to lose the money. I’ll
pay Cleffton back the £40 out of my own pocket, if he gives me back
the fiddle.”

“Out of your own pocket?” I growled. “Man, don’t try that on me. The
whole thing was a regular plant. But, as it happens, it’s not that
part of the business that has brought me here. It’s the way you got
the fiddle—it was stolen.”

“Stolen? Then it wasn’t by me,” he cried, with fearful earnestness.
“I can swear that with my hand on the Bible. I bought it from a
broker in the Cowgate, in Edinburgh.”

“That’s a common story—you’ll have a receipt, I suppose?” I answered,
with a grin.

“I have, and I’ll show it you,” and much to my surprise he very
quickly produced a badly written and spelled receipt for £3, bearing
a stamp, and signed “Patrick Finnigan.”

“Now, be cautious what you say,” I returned, after a long look at
the paper. “I happen to know Finnigan, and know him to be an honest
man. You declare that you bought the fiddle from him—the fiddle which
Cleffton bought from you for £40?”

“I declare that solemnly.”

“Then how did he get it?”

“I don’t know; but it runs in my head that he said he bought it at a
country auction sale. It was in two pieces when I got it—the neck was
away from the body.”

All this seemed probable enough, but I thought proper to take
Mackintosh with me to the Newcastle Central, and have him locked up,
while I returned to investigate his statements. Taking the fiddle and
receipt with me, I called on Finnigan and asked him to try and recall
the circumstances of the sale. That he managed to do when prompted
by several statements of Mackintosh to me—particularly one as to the
fiddle being in a broken state, and having hung in the back shop in a
green bag, when Mackintosh asked to see it. Questioned then as to how
it came into his possession, he said—

“I was out in the country at an auction sale—it was at a farm about
six miles from here—and there were two or three fiddles put up. This
was the last, and as it was broke—though the auctioneer declared
that it only needed a little glue and new strings to make it play
beautiful—nobody would bid for it, and I got it for five shillings.
I always meant to sort it up, but was afraid I mightn’t do it right.
One day the man who bought it came in and looked at a fiddle I had in
the window, and then asked if I had any more. I showed him that, and
saw him look pleased and eager like, so when he asked the price of it
I thought I’d drop on him, and said £5. He prigged me down to £3 and
then took it away, saying he didn’t think it dear.”

“You can’t remember the name of the farm, I suppose?” I wearily
remarked, beginning to despair of getting to the bottom of the
strange complication.

“I don’t know the name of the farm, but I think the name of the
farmer who had died, and who had owned the fiddle, was Gow, or
something like that. I could take you to the place though, and maybe
that would do as well.”

I thought the proposal a good one, and got a cab the same afternoon,
and drove out towards Penicuick, then by some cross roads, through
which the cabman was unerringly directed by Finnigan, we reached the
farm in question. Here I was not surprised to learn that nothing was
known of the Gows who had formerly occupied the farm. Gow himself
was dead, and his surviving relations gone, none knew whither; but,
in the course of my inquiries, I came across an old man—a ploughman
or farm worker, who had served with Gow for many years, and to him I
turned as a kind of forlorn hope, though, as it happened, I could
not have hit upon a better if I had hunted for years.

“It’s about an old fiddle that was sold at the roup when the old
man died,” I explained, in rather a loud key, for the old man was
a little deaf. “It was broken at the time, and was sold for five
shillings.”

“I mind o’d perfectly,” said the old man. “It was the fiddle that
we fund on the road gaun to market. The maister was on ae cairt and
me on the tither; and it was quite dark at the time, but there was
a heavy rime on the grund, and the fiddle was in a black case, and
I noticed it as we drave by, and stoppit my cairt to pick it up.
The maister stoppit his too, and then when he had lookit at the
fiddle, and tried hoo the strings soonded, he said, ‘Them ’at finds
keeps, Sandy. I’ll gi’e ye five shillings to yoursel’, an we’ll say
naething aboot this to naebody.’ So we shoved it in alow the strae,
and there it lay till we got back frae Em’bro’. The maister played
on it, and likit it better nor his ain; but on the Saturday after he
cam’ to my hoose late at nicht, wi’ the case and fiddle in his hand,
and said, kind o’ excited like, ‘Sandy, in case onybody should ask
after this fiddle I think we’d better pit it ooten sicht for a wee.
Get your shuill, and dig a hole ony place where it’s no likely to be
disturbed.’”

“And you did it?”

“Deed did I. I dug a hole, and the fiddle and case lay there for
mair nor a year. But it was never claimed, and we got it oot, and he
played on it for a while, but the damp ground had spoiled it in some
way, and he never likit it sae weel as at first. Then it gaed in twa
ae day in his hands, and was put awa in a bag till the day o’ the
sale.”

“And what became of the case?” I asked, with great eagerness.

“Ou, the maister used it for a long time to haud ane o’ his ain
fiddles, and it went wi’ it at the sale to Thompson o’ the Mains.”

“Was there not a brass plate on it bearing a name?”

“A brass plate? I raither think there was a brass plate on it when
we fund it, but I never saw it after. Maybe the maister had ta’en it
aff.”

“Not unlikely,” I dryly observed. “Did you never hear of the fiddle
being advertised for?”

“No me; I didna fash muckle wi’ papers at that time.”

“You must have known that you were as good as stealing the
fiddle?—that it must have had an owner?” I sternly pursued.

“I said that at the time, and advised the maister to adverteese it in
the papers, but he only laughed, and said he would tak’ a’ the risk.”

“Can this Mr Thompson who bought the case be found now?”

“Naething easier, sir,” the man readily returned. “The farm’s no a
mile off.”

I began to see the end of my task now, and, with the old ploughman
to lead the way, at once drove to the Mains and was introduced to Mr
Thompson. The fiddle case was at once produced, and then I smiled as
I discovered on the top of the lid a square indentation and two rivet
holes, which had evidently at one time contained a brass name-plate.
With little difficulty I got the fiddle case away with me, and drove
back to Edinburgh, where it was identified by the widow at a glance
as that of her husband’s lost instrument.

I now had the whole case traced out to its core, and lying clear as
a written history before me, but as there was only one fiddle to
give away among the claimants, it will be seen that the task before
us was not only difficult, but almost certain to bring upon us the
dissatisfaction of some of the so-called owners.

While I had been investigating, Mackintosh, thoroughly frightened,
had sent a draft for £40 to Cleffton, asking him to return the
fiddle at his leisure and say no more about it; but when he was set
at liberty he had the doubtful satisfaction of finding that he had
lost both the money and the fiddle. I waited patiently to see if the
box at Linlithgow would be called for, but evidently the senders had
become alarmed, for they never turned up. I then tried to ascertain
from Mr Turner’s servants if a man like the sham coachman had been
seen about that gentleman’s house, but they were too wary for me,
and denied it point blank. I then turned to Mr Turner himself, and,
hinting in no measured terms that he was the prime mover in the
robbery, _commanded_ him to pay over to the Infirmary the sum of £20,
which the grasping villain very reluctantly but abjectly consented to
do.

There now remained but the two rival owners to deal with, and I am
certain the case would have gone to the Court of Session but for a
thought which struck me when Cleffton was one day arguing his view of
the case to me.

“You gave £40 for the fiddle, and thought it well worth the money,”
I said. “How much do you really think the fiddle is worth?—I mean
privately, between ourselves.”

“It would be cheap at £400,” he said with a sigh. “I should never
have sold it for that.”

“Then I’ll tell you what to do,” was my prompt rejoinder. “The widow
to whom the fiddle undoubtedly belongs never speaks of it as worth
more than £50, she has no use for the fiddle herself, and would
doubtless be glad of the money. Go to her and offer her £50 for it,
and that, according to your own confession, will be £350 below its
value.”

“Hang it! I never thought of that! I’ll try it,” he exclaimed,
“though I’m afraid even fifty pounds will not buy it, and I don’t
know how on earth I’m to raise more.”

“Perhaps you’ll get it for less,” I hopefully suggested, but I
was mistaken. The value of the fiddle had risen in the widow’s
estimation, but in a day or two Cleffton came back with a
carefully-worded receipt, penned by his own lawyer, and empowering
us to hand him the Cremona, which he had bought from the widow for
£65. When the fiddle was placed in his hands he fairly hugged it,
and kissed it as fervently as I have seen mothers embrace their lost
children. I smiled pityingly at the spectacle, but perhaps he would
have done the same had he seen the mothers getting back their idols.
We are good at pitying each other.




THE SPIDER AND THE SPIDER-KILLER.


In some of the isles of the Pacific, I have been told, it is not
uncommon for a spider, while in the act of seizing and sucking the
heart’s blood of a tender and juicy fly, to be himself pounced upon
by a larger insect peculiar to the clime, having as keen a zest for
raw spider as the spider has for fresh fly. Nature repeats itself
in all its grades and conditions. Human spiders abound among my
“bairns,” but then fortunately the spider-devourer occasionally crops
up in the same class.

In passing through one of the fashionable crescents down in the New
Town, one day about noon, on some business which admitted of little
delay, I was a little surprised to see one of the most cunning rogues
within my ken ascend the steps of a big main-door house, and ring the
bell as coolly as if the residence had been his own. Peter Hart was
an exceedingly cautious rascal who could never be caught napping,
or booked for anything like the sentence he deserved, from the fact
that he never personally conducted any operation which he could
conveniently transfer to a “cat’s paw.”

That was the man whom I saw ascend the steps of that fine residence.
What was the villain after there? My business was urgent, but the
effrontery of the knave pointed so clearly to some carefully-planned
crime that I instinctively slackened my pace to watch if he should
enter the house. Unfortunately I had been almost upon him before
aware of his identity, and these quiet crescents are almost deserted
by day, so there was no opportunity for concealment before his quick
eyes, ever on the alert, had turned round and taken in the position
at a glance. Peter’s impression probably was, that I had been
following him all the way from his house in James’ Square. He might
have known me better. Had the meeting been anything but a purely
accidental one, I should never have allowed him to get a glimpse of
me, more especially at that critical moment.

I fully expected Peter to cave in at the first glimpse of me, and
slink off from the house at his smartest; but, to my surprise, he
only bestowed upon me a patronising wink and a confident grin, and
stood still to await the answering of his ring. His coolness did
not seem to me that of sheer impudence or audacity. It seemed to be
boastful and exultant—as much as if he had said, “Ah, Jamie, what a
lot of trouble you have had for nothing. Here I am safe from you;
just try me and see.”

There was something irritating in the challenge, although it was
given only by a look, and, in spite of my anxiety to get away, I
determined to wait a little, and possibly do the very thing he defied
me to attempt. I therefore only passed on slowly, far enough to hear
the door opened, then I turned, never expecting to see him admitted.
The cunning rascal was watching me all the time, and possibly
guessing my thoughts, for when I looked round he was being admitted
by the smart servant maid, and in the act of disappearing favoured me
with another exulting grin and wink, which said as plainly as words
could have done, “Sold for once, Jamie.”

I did not believe it, and determined to let all other business
stand that I might see the end of this adventure. With this object
I loitered about, never within sight of the windows of the house,
yet always having my eyes on the front door till Peter reappeared.
There was no name on the door of the house he had entered, but by
questioning a servant who passed I learned that the occupant or owner
was an independent gentleman named Matthew Bannister, who had taken
some degrees at college, and was a kind of _savant_ in his way,
having published some works on chemistry. The gentleman was well
known to me by reputation, and the moment his name was mentioned I
decided that Peter Hart’s visit to the house could have no connection
with him. Mr Bannister had a young and beautiful wife, who had
bestowed not only herself and her love upon the somewhat elderly
gentleman, but a fortune as well; but she came of a high family, and
I as emphatically decided that Peter’s visit could have no connection
with her. There then remained only the servants, and, knowing Peter’s
reputation and his modes of working, I quickly decided that he was
in collusion with some of them, and working out some scheme entirely
unknown to their employers.

Peter did not remain long in the house—possibly ten minutes at the
most; and when he did appear I thought best to be out of sight. To
my surprise he had no bundle or trace of one about him: nor did
his person appear more bulky than when he had entered. He looked
carefully around in every direction—for me, of course—and, apparently
slightly relieved at seeing no one, started off in the direction he
had come. He made his way by Broughton Street to Greenside, where he
entered a favourite public-house. Not two minutes later the pot-boy
came out with something like a bank note in his hand, and, knowing
the boy well, I stopped to make inquiries for Peter.

“Where are you running to now?” I carelessly asked, not wishing to be
too sudden in my questions.

“To get change for a £5 note,” he smartly answered, with a peculiar
wink, at the same time opening the crisp note for my inspection.
“We’ve lots of change, but it’s aye safer to try a big note outside.”

I examined the note carefully, and found it to be perfectly genuine.

“You might have risked it with that one,” I said at last, handing it
back. “Who offered it?”

“Ah, that’s just it,” said the quick-witted boy; “even a good note
isn’t quite safe from him; it was Peter Hart. You’ll know _him_ I
daresay?”

“Oh, indeed!” I cried with a start, and a thrill of satisfaction. “He
offered this to be changed, did he? Then you needn’t bother going any
further with it. I particularly want to see Peter.”

The pot-boy was quite accustomed to such events, and did not seem
surprised. We entered the shop together, and the boy conducted me to
the box in which sat Peter. I had in my hand the £5 note. Peter had
in his a glass of brandy, which he was in the act of raising with
manifest gusto to his lips. He was transfixed in the act, more by
anger, it seemed to me, than fear.

“This is yours, isn’t it?” I said pleasantly, whereupon he scowled
most malignantly. My “bairns” take pleasantry very badly from me.

“Yes, it’s mine,” he said with an oath at me, which, being quite
undeserved, need not be put down. “What do you want with it? It’s
good enough, isn’t it?”

“I believe so. Where did you get it?”

“What’s that to you?” was the bullying reply.

I folded up the note and put it into my pocket, and then produced my
handcuffs.

“Everything in the world,” I replied. “You must either answer that
to me or put on these before answering it to the Fiscal.”

Slightly disconcerted, but still defiant, he thought for a moment,
and then said—

“Well, I got it from a gentleman—a friend of mine I was a-calling on
this morning.”

“His name?”

“Mr Bannister,” he sullenly responded, after another pause.

“I believe you!” I returned with marked scepticism. “You had better
say no more, for you’ll have to go with me.”

Peter lost his temper, and said he would see me very much altered
first, but he didn’t. He was foolish enough to resist, so I got
another man, and after much kicking and struggling on Peter’s part
we landed him at the Central Office. This resistance on Peter’s part
seemed so utterly unlike him—his usual conduct being cheerful and
polite to an irritating degree—that I rashly considered that for once
I had caught him napping, and that by the merest accident.

At the office I stated all the facts, how I had seen Peter entering
the house of Mr Bannister, and watched him leaving it, and knowing
his character and antecedents had followed him and arrested him
passing a £5 note, for the possession of which he could not properly
account. Peter, on being searched, was found to have in his
possession other £5, in one pound notes, thus clearly proving that
the changing of the large note had been a matter of choice or policy,
not necessity. To the Fiscal, however, he boldly declared that he had
got all the money in way of business from his very good friend Mr
Bannister, and he was put in the cells till I should go over to that
gentleman to make inquiries. What the “business” was for which he had
been paid ten pounds he refused to state, and I concluded that that
business existed only in Peter’s imagination.

When I reached the house and was shown in, the impression I had
formed was strengthened. Everything in the place seemed so stately
and grand that I could not conceive how the possessor could be
beholden to such a crime-stained wretch as Peter Hart. Mr Bannister
at length appeared, and accompanied by his amiable young wife. I
studied their faces closely as they entered, and it struck me that
that of the husband was careworn, fearful, and anxiously watchful in
expression; that of the young wife looked tenderly solicitous, and
somewhat saddened and subdued.

“I have called about rather an awkward business,” I at length said,
not knowing very well how to begin. “My name is James M^cGovan, and I
am connected with the detective staff——”

I would have proceeded to say that I had watched and arrested Peter
as already described, but I was at that juncture interrupted in a
manner altogether unexpected. The gentleman who had an appearance
at once refined and dignified, started back at the mention of my
name, with his face as suddenly changed to a deadly and anguished
expression as if he had been at the moment stabbed to the heart. He
seemed ready to drop to the floor in his pitiable agony, and his wife
saw the change even before my eye had taken it in.

“O Matthew! dearest!” she cried, starting forward, with her own face
flashing almost as white as his own. “What is wrong? What is to
happen to you?”

I scarcely caught his answer, it was so huskily spoken, but it seemed
to me something like—

“The very worst that could happen to me.”

Then the young wife gave a low moan, and fell slowly forward in his
arms. She had fainted, and her very helplessness, I believe, was all
that kept him in his senses.

Mr Bannister rang for a servant, and had his wife removed, and then
with a blanched face turned to me and said—

“Now, sir, I am ready to attend to you. Will you state your business
with me?”

“A man named Peter Hart entered your house this morning, and shortly
after left, having in his possession £10 in bank notes, which he
declared had been given him by you. Is that actually the case?”

I had expected Mr Bannister’s face to lighten up and express
astonishment as I proceeded, but instead it became darker and more
troubled.

“Why do you ask?” he at length answered in a helpless tone.

“Because we know him to be a daring criminal, and suspect that the
money was obtained by robbery, and possibly without your knowledge.”

“Is that all that brought you here?” he demanded, with a look of
intense relief. “Did he make no other statement of any kind?”

“None except that we could refer the matter to you for confirmation
of his statement, and for that purpose I have called.”

“Oh, if that is all,” he readily answered, looking now positively
radiant, “I can readily relieve your anxiety. I did pay him the
money, freely and willingly, for work done.”

“For work done!” I echoed, a good deal staggered, and thoroughly
puzzled. “Have you any objection to say what kind of work it was?”

“I have. It is not necessary to go into details,” he coldly returned.

“You are aware, then, of the character of the man you have employed?”
I continued, with undisguised disappointment.

“I believe him to be a scoundrel,” he faintly and somewhat wearily
answered. “I know nothing of his private character, and care less.”

“Then we are to conclude that we have made a mistake in arresting
him, and that we have no just cause for detaining him?” I pursued,
trying in vain to read in his face the real secret.

“Exactly. You have made a mistake, but it was a natural one on your
part, seeing, as you say, that the man is a professional criminal,”
he dejectedly responded. “By the way,” he added, with more animation,
“I wonder that a man like you does not lay such a rascal by the
heels. Is he too clever for even you?”

“That remains to be seen,” I dryly returned. “He will not be at
liberty a moment longer than I can help.”

“I am glad to hear you say that,” said the gentleman, shaking me
warmly by the hand. “When you do get him, and ensure his conviction,
come to me and I will put a £5 note in your hand as an honorarium.”

“Honour among thieves!” was my contemptuous thought. “There is some
bond of villainy between the two, and now this man wishes to get rid
of his leech. I wonder if I could not take them both?”

I left the house, after bidding Mr Bannister a not over-gracious
farewell, and Peter Hart was promptly set at liberty, with much
crowing and exultation on his part. The next day or two I spent
chiefly in trying to guess at the nature of the hold which Peter
exercised over the gentleman. That he was the spider and Mr Bannister
the fly, I felt certain after making some inquiries regarding the
character of the latter. Mr Bannister was spoken of by all as the
soul of honour and goodness. I was more than disappointed at losing
Peter—I was angry; for in leaving he did not scruple to say some
nasty things regarding my capacity, and to hint in a lordly fashion
that any other attempt to interfere with him would be followed by
a letter “from his lawyer.” I replied, in the irritation of the
moment, that I should probably interfere with him before long in such
a way that his lawyer would be powerless to help him or injure us.
I ought not to have spoken so rashly, but then I felt savage, and,
as good luck would have it, the very boldness of the threat added to
my reputation when the spider-devourer had adjusted things nicely
to my hands. Thus many of us live—continually tottering between a
great success and a great failure. To the spider-devourer I now come,
though, of course, I did not at first recognise him in that character.

Not many days after Peter’s release I was accosted at the head of
Leith Walk by a sharp-witted fellow, pretty well known to me, named
Dick M^cQueen. Dick was not a thief, but one who lived chiefly by
billiards and cards. He had been ostler, waiter, boots, groom,
cabdriver, and I know not all what by turns, and was about as keen a
blade as it is possible to become by continually rubbing edges with
others as sharp. He was always poor, and I think was partly supported
by relatives at a distance.

“I believe you said you’d take Peter Hart before long,” he said to
me, after some of that preliminary talk which conjurers and men of
the world use to throw one off his guard.

“Did I?” was my careless reply.

“You’ll never do it single-handed,” he darkly continued, “but if you
could make it worth my while I’m ready to give you the straight tip,
which will book him for twenty years.”

“What do you mean?”

“Twenty years to him is surely worth as many pounds to me?” he
suggestively returned.

“Perhaps, but I’m not in a position to offer anything; indeed, I’d
much rather do the work myself.”

“You can’t, for Peter’s got a gent at his back who’ll stand any
amount of bleeding, and he doesn’t need to put out a hand now. Now,
if you could only help me to find out who that gent is, I believe
he’d stand a poney to get rid of Peter.”

I watched Dick’s face keenly for some moments in silence.

“You don’t know who the gent is, then?” I said at last, suspiciously.

“No; I’ve tried hard to find out, and I’ve watched Peter all over the
town to no purpose. He’s too blessed fly for me.”

“Have you any idea what hold Peter has upon the gent?” I asked, after
a pause to think.

Dick bestowed upon me one of the most superlatively cunning winks
that humanity could create.

“I’ve an idea,” he curtly answered.

“Well, what is its nature?”

“Look here, M^cGovan, you’re a detective, and pretty fly, but you
don’t come it over me so easy,” he retorted sharply, but without any
anger. “I’ll swop secrets with you, there! Nothing could be fairer,
could it? You find out the gent’s name and address and gi’ me them,
and then I’ll tell you what hold Peter has on him.”

“Is it anything in connection with that hold which is to book Peter
for twenty years,” I quietly continued.

“Oh, no; that’s a different affair altogether—a job Peter did years
ago down in Sunderland. I was there at the time, and know all about
it, and I’m the only one who has the real tip in his hands.”

“Why are you so anxious to get rid of Peter?” I presently inquired.
“Have you quarrelled?”

“No, not exactly, but Peter cheated me out of half-a-crown months
ago, and I’ve never forgotten it, nor never will.”

Half-a-crown! fancy a man being threatened with twenty years’
entombment—probably the whole term of his life—through cheating a
companion out of a miserable half-crown! If Peter had only known that
a spider-devourer was on his track, would he not have hastened to
place a whole heap of half-crowns at his enemy’s disposal, and have
abjectly craved his pardon as well?

I took the proposal of Dick to _avizandum_; and shortly decided
to let him have the desired information. I had first paid a visit
to Mr Bannister, and found him not only willing but eager to pay
twenty pounds to any one who would give such information as would
lead to Peter’s incarceration, conditionally, of course, that his
name did not appear in the case. I made no conditions, but allowed
Dick to settle his own terms. Before I gave him Mr Bannister’s name
and address, I insisted on being told what hold Peter had on that
gentleman, when Dick readily answered—

“Do you know Bell Diamond—she who’s said to be Peter’s sister, though
her name’s different? Well, I don’t know all the outs and ins of it,
but Bell is said to be that gent’s real and lawful wife.”

“Never!”

“A fact, I believe. Peter’s got all the papers somewhere to prove it.
They were married quite young—twenty years ago, at least—when Bell
wasn’t such a harridan as she looks now.”

The moment this information was tendered I regretted my compact. What
though I sent Dick to Mr Bannister, and the money were cheerfully
paid, if the arrest and imprisonment of the gentleman himself on a
charge of bigamy followed? The very execution of my duty would then
look, in the eyes of those most interested, an act of the deepest
treachery. There was no going back, however, and I could only hope
that Dick had been misled or mistaken. The same afternoon Dick
appeared at the office, and gave minute details of a daring forgery
case in which Peter Hart had been engaged years before. The facts
were so striking that we were for a time doubtful of their reality,
and telegraphed south for information. The answer put at rest every
doubt. Two men had been tried and convicted in connection with the
affair, but they were mere tools, and the principal had escaped. That
man was said to be Peter Hart, changed only in name; and an officer
able to identify the real culprit was on his way to Edinburgh when
the reply had been despatched.

So far Dick’s information seemed valuable and accurate, and with the
greatest alacrity and delight I went for Peter Hart, whom I found
sitting at his ease in his inn—the same public-house in which the
former arrest had taken place.

He returned my salutation rather sternly and haughtily, and resumed
his game with the air of a man who was certain to be the last to be
“wanted” by me.

“I’m waiting on _you_, Peter,” I at length pointedly remarked.

“Oh, you are, are you?” he snappishly and defiantly answered, jumping
up with the greatest readiness. “Perhaps you’ll take me to the office
and lock me up as you did before, and risk me bringing an action
of damages against you and the rest of ’em? Perhaps you’ll be kind
enough to call in a policeman to hit me over the head and arms like
as he did the last time, eh?” and after this scathing and satirical
outburst he paused for breath, to pose grandly before his friends,
thinking doubtless that he had quite cowed and overawed me.

“There is a man at the door,” I quietly answered, bringing out my
bracelets, “but he won’t need to hit you over the head unless you act
as foolishly as you did the last time. You’re not afraid of these!”

“Afraid of them? Not me. I want them on—I want them on badly. See,
I’ll put them on myself. Now take me away, and abuse me, and lock me
up, and then take the consequences!”

Delighted to find that his facetious mood made him so pliant, I
obeyed him in every particular, and Peter’s exultant smile only
faded when the first two or three questions had been put to him at
the office. The moment “Sunderland” was mentioned his jaw fell,
and he fixed upon me a look of hatred most flattering and pleasing
to me. On searching the lining of Peter’s coat we came upon a flat
packet of papers. There were some six or seven letters, and a
properly authenticated certificate of marriage, all proving that
Isabella Diamond had been courted and married some twenty years
before by Matthew Bannister. Peter’s rage had been working up during
the search, and he now shouted out that he knew who had set that
“bloodhound,” as he was pleased to name myself, on his track, and
after a burst of the most awful language, he wound up by accusing Mr
Bannister of having two wives living, and commanding us to go and
arrest the gentleman as smartly as we had arrested the rogue.

When the papers had been discovered I fully expected to have that
disagreeable task to perform. The whole case seemed clear and the
proof positive to my mind, for I had seen the working of the hidden
springs from the first. But the law has certain forms of its own; and
I was sent first to Bell Diamond herself, who was the proper person
to make the charge. To my surprise, though she gave vent to rage and
vituperation over the capture of Peter, she most positively refused
to charge Mr Bannister with bigamy; nay in the very face of the
discovered papers she swore most positively that she had never been
married in her life, and had never spoken to Mr Bannister. My firm
conviction, upon hearing this extraordinary denial, was that Bell
had a spark of generosity in her breast, low as she had fallen, and
wished to save the man who had once loved her from the ignominy of a
prison; but in that I was very far mistaken. Bell was actuated by a
very different motive—a desire to get well out of an awkward plight
and a very threatening complication. The secret was partly laid bare
by referring to Mr Bannister, but it was not wholly made clear till
long after.

Mr Bannister had really married a girl named Isabella Diamond, who
drifted away from him and was lost sight of. That lost wife, after
sinking lower and lower, died in a lodging-house in Glasgow, in
which Peter Hart and his sister at that time lived. Nelly Hart was
in trouble and likely to be taken, and the name of the dead woman
was boldly given in as Helen Hart, while the living owner took the
name of Bell Diamond, as well as the papers left by her, and vanished
in the direction of Edinburgh. There they remained for some time,
till, by merest accident, they discovered that Mr Bannister was newly
married, and conceived the plan of frightening him into paying black
mail, under the idea that his lost wife was still alive.

Where there is real love there is always perfect trust, and Mr
Bannister had confided the whole story of his life to the devoted
girl who had laid her all at his feet; and it was that knowledge and
the idea that she was to be torn from him for ever which had caused
her terrible agitation and swoon on the occasion of my first visit to
the house.

Peter Hart duly received his sentence of twenty years, and Dick
M^cQueen, the spider-killer, as I may name him, was avenged of his
half-crown.




THE SPOILT PHOTOGRAPH.


The photographer had put up a rickety erection in shape of a tent
close to the grand stand at Musselburgh race-course. He was a
travelling portrait-taker, and his “saloon” was a portable one,
consisting of four sticks for the corners and a bit of thin cotton to
sling round them. There was no roof, partly from poverty and partly
to let in more light. It was the first day of the races, and masses
of people had been coming into the place by every train and available
conveyance.

The photographer’s name was Peter Turnbull—a tall, lanky fellow, like
an overgrown boy who had never got his appetite satisfied. He was
clad in the shabbiest of clothes, but talked with the stately dignity
of an emperor or a decayed actor. In spite of the gay crowds pressing
past outside, business did not come very fast to Turnbull, so, after
waiting patiently inside like a spider for flies, he issued from his
den and tried to force a little trade with his persuasive tongue.

In front of his tent he had slung up a case of the best photographs
he could pick up for money, which were likely to pass for his own,
and occasionally some of those bent on pleasure paused to look at the
specimens, when Turnbull at once tackled them to give him an order.
Women he invariably asked to have their “beautiful” faces taken; men,
who are not accustomed to be called beautiful, or to think themselves
so, he manipulated in a different fashion. He appealed to them as to
whether they hadn’t a mother who would like a portrait of them always
beside her, or a sweetheart who would value it above a mountain of
diamonds. Turnbull’s appearance was against him—he looked hungry down
to the very toes of his boots—and most of those he addressed were as
suspicious of his eloquence as of that of a book canvasser.

At length, however, he did get a man to listen to him—a sailor,
evidently, with a jovial, happy look about his face, and plenty of
money in his pocket.

“You’ll be just off your ship, I suppose, you’re looking so fresh and
smart,” said Turnbull at a venture. “Your sweetheart will be pleased
to see you, but she’d be more pleased if you brought her a good
portrait to leave with her.”

The sailor laughed heartily.

“Sweetheart?” he echoed between his convulsions of merriment. “Why,
I’m a married man.”

“So much the better,” returned the photographer, not to be daunted.
“She’ll want your portrait exactly as you stand—not as you were
before this voyage, or when you were courting her. Folks’ faces
change so soon.”

“Maybe they do, but their hearts remain the same,” returned the
sailor cheerily.

“Well, not always—they change, too, sometimes,” said Turnbull, with
the air of one who had bitterly experienced the truth of his words;
“but with your portrait always beside her, her heart couldn’t change.
Just step in—I won’t keep you a moment, and you can take it with
you. You’ll have it, and she’ll have it, long after the races are
forgotten.”

The sailor easily yielded, and followed him into the tent, and then
Turnbull, having now a professional interest in the man, took notice
of his dress and appearance particularly for the first time. The
man was low in stature, thick set, and evidently a powerful fellow.
He wore an ordinary sailor’s suit of dark blue, but had for a
neckerchief a red cotton handkerchief loosely rolled together, and so
carelessly tied that the ends hung down over his breast.

In order to get all the sailor’s face into the portrait, Turnbull
with some difficulty persuaded him to remove his cap, and then drew
from him an admission that his objection arose from the fact that
there was a flesh mark on one side of his forehead which he did not
wish to appear in the portrait. The difficulty was got over—as it
was with Hannibal—by taking a side-view, and the first attempt came
out all right, so far as the portrait was concerned. But the sailor
wished to appear as if he had just removed his cap, and with that in
his hand, so the first was put aside as spoilt, and another taken,
which, though not so successful, pleased the owner better, as in
that the cap appeared in his hand. The portrait was finished and
framed, and so free and good-natured was the owner that he insisted
on paying for the spoilt one, which, however, he refused to take
with him. While Turnbull had been putting a frame on the portrait,
the sailor took out a long piece of tobacco and a pocket knife and
cut himself a liberal quid, at the same time offering a piece to the
photographer, which was accepted. The knife with which the tobacco
was cut was a strong one, with a long, straight blade and a sharp
point.

The whole transaction over, they bade each other good-day, and the
sailor disappeared among the crowds of spectators and betting men
on the course with the avowed intention of enjoying himself, and
scattering some money before he went home.

Six or seven hours later a man was found lying in one of the narrow
back lanes of the town, so inert, and smelling so strongly of drink,
that more than one person had passed him under the impression that
he was drunk, and without putting out a hand to help. At length the
ghastly hue of his face attracted attention, and it was found that he
was lying in a pool of blood, which had flowed from two deep wounds
in his breast and side, and thence oosed out at the back of his
clothes on the ground below.

Some of the crowd who gathered about him as he was being carried to
a house close by identified him as a baker named Colin M^cCulloch,
belonging to a town some miles off, but who was well known in a wide
district from the fact that he went about with a bread van. He was
not quite dead when found, but an examination of his wounds soon
indicated that life was ebbing away.

One of these was as deep as the doctor’s finger could reach, and
appeared to have been inflicted with the narrow, straight blade of a
long, sharp-pointed knife.

I had been on the race-course for the greater part of the day looking
for a man who did not turn up, and heard of the occurrence only when
I called at the station before leaving for town. It had been decided
that M^cCulloch was not fit to be removed, and I went to see him,
but found him far beyond speech or explanation. By visiting the spot
on which he had been found I discovered a girl who gave me the first
clue.

She had been passing along the lane, and had been “feared” as she
expressed it, to pass M^cCulloch, who was tottering along in the
same direction, very drunk and demonstrative, though all alone.
Every one was away at the races, and the narrow lane seemed quite
deserted, but there appeared in front a sailor, who had no sooner
sighted M^cCulloch than he began quarrelling with him and threatening
him. Thankful of the opportunity, the girl slipped past during the
quarrel, having just time to notice that the sailor was a short,
thick-set fellow, and that he wore a red cotton handkerchief for a
necktie. When she was at a safe distance she chanced to look back,
and saw the sailor give M^cCulloch “a drive in the breast,” and so
knock him down. She did not wait to see anything more, but hurried
home, thinking that it was only an ordinary drunken quarrel.

Questioned by me, she could not say whether the sailor had used a
knife. Her idea was that he had only given the man a drive with his
hand to knock him down or get him out of the way. The sailor spoke in
a low tone; M^cCulloch was noisy and defiant. She saw no knife in the
sailor’s hand, and was sure he was a stranger. She did not think she
would know him again, as she did not look at his face, but she knew
every one about the town, and was positive that the sailor did not
belong to the place. It was the sailor who stopped M^cCulloch, whom
he seemed to know; and she thought he was quite sober, though pale
and angry-looking. “Look me in the face and say it’s not true,” were
the only words she could remember hearing, and they were spoken in a
fierce tone by the sailor, just as she was getting beyond earshot.

Having thus a little to work upon, I tried all the exits of the
town for some trace of him, without success. He had not gone away
by rail or coach, and no one had seen him leave on foot, so far as
I could discover; but that was to be expected in the state of the
town. Dozens of sailors with red neckties might have come and gone
and never been noticed in such a stir. In the town itself I was
more successful. To my surprise I found that a man answering the
description had visited nearly every public-house in the place. He
had never spoken or called for drink; he had merely looked through
the houses in a pallid, excited manner, and gone his way.

“He seemed to be looking for some one,” a publican said to me, “but
he was gone before I could ask him.”

I spent a good deal of time in the place, though not sure that if
I got that man I should be getting the murderer, and returned to
Edinburgh with the last train. I went back again next morning, and
found M^cCulloch still alive, and sensible enough to be able to give
an assent or dissent when asked a question. But about the murderous
attack upon himself he could not or would not give a sign. He would
only stare, or shut his eyes, or turn away. The doctor thought he did
not understand me—that the patient’s head was not yet quite clear;
I thought quite the reverse. The same curious circumstance occurred
when it was suggested that his deposition should be taken. M^cCulloch
had no deposition to make, or would not make one. He seemed quite
prepared to die and give no sign.

Not an hour later I was favoured with a visit from Turnbull, the
travelling photographer. He had been lodging in the town, and of
course had heard of the strange crime. He had heard also of my
unsuccessful hunt for the sailor, and would probably have gone up to
Edinburgh to see me had he not been loth to lose another day at the
race-course, his stance being taken for three days.

I could not conceive what the lank, hungry-looking being could want
with me, or why there should be about his lean jaws such a smirk of
intense satisfaction, as he gave his name and occupation.

“A murder has been committed—or what is as good as a murder, for the
man, I believe, is at his last gasp,” he exultingly began. “There
will be a hanging match—that is, if you can trace and capture the
murderer. Now, Mr M^cGovan, you’re said to be clever, but you haven’t
got him yet, and never will unless you get my help.”

“Your help?” I echoed in amazement; “why, who are you, and how can
you help me?”

“My name you know, and I am not unknown to fame, I am an actor as
well as a photographic artist. I have trod the boards with some
success, and you know that that in itself is a kind of training in
acuteness eminently fitting one for detective work.”

I could not see it, and said so. I thought him an escaped lunatic.

“Mark me, Mr M^cGovan,” he continued, quite unabashed, “I have in
my possession the only means whereby you can trace and arrest the
murderer. Now just tell me what it is worth, and we may come to a
bargain.”

“What it is worth?” I said, with a grin. “I don’t know that it is
worth anything till I try it.”

“A hundred pounds? Surely they’ll offer that as a reward for such
information as shall lead to the capture of the murderer?”

“I don’t know that they’ll offer a hundred pence,” was my reply.
“Tell me what you know, and if it is of any use I will see that you
are suitably rewarded.”

“Ah, that won’t suit me,” he answered with great decision. “I will
leave you to think over my offer; you know where to find me when you
have made up your mind.”

He was moving off, after making a low and stagey bow, but I got
between him and the door, and brought out a pair of handcuffs.

“I know where to find you now, which is far more convenient,” I
quietly remarked. “You have admitted that you know something of the
murder—I shall detain you on suspicion.”

“What! arrest me? an innocent man; lock me up in prison!” he
exclaimed, in genuine terror. “You cannot—dare not! I know nothing of
the murder; I merely think I can put you in the way of tracing the
man who did it.”

“Do so, then, if you would prove your innocence,” I said, rather
amused at his terror and dismay. “Were you an accomplice?”

“An accomplice! how can you ask such a question?” he tremblingly
answered. “You are taking a mean advantage of me, for I feel sure
that my secret is worth a hundred pounds at least. But I will trust
to your honour, and put it all before you. People will give _you_ all
the credit. Everyone will say ‘M^cGovan is the man that can do it;
we might have known he wouldn’t escape when M^cGovan was after him.’
Nobody will think of me, or hear of me, who have given you the clue.
It’s the way of the world; one man toils, and ploughs, and sows, and
another man reaps the harvest.”

“Ah, nothing pleases me so much as envy, flavoured with a little
spitefulness,” I quietly returned. “It is the most flattering unction
you can lay to a man’s soul.”

“I am not envious,” he dolefully replied, “but it is hard to supply
another with brains.”

“Especially when he has none of his own,” I laughingly retorted.
“Well, come along; bring on your brains—I’m waiting for them.”

“I really believe you are laughing at me in your sleeve,” he
observed, with a half pathetic look. “It is brave to crush the poor
worm under your heel when you know he can’t retaliate.”

“You’re a long worm—six feet at least,” I solemnly answered; “a
long-winded one, too, unfortunately. I must leave you in the cells
for an hour or two——”

“Oh, no! I will speak; I will tell you it all in half a minute,”
he wildly answered. “The murderer is said to have been a sailor—a
short, thick-set fellow, wearing a red neckerchief. I photographed
such a man in the forenoon, and I have the first portrait, which
didn’t please him, though it is like as life.”

“Ah! let me see it. Have you it with you?” I cried, with sudden
interest and great eagerness.

“Now you change your tune,” he reproachfully answered. “I have it
with me, or I should not have given in so easily. I was afraid
you might have me searched, and, finding the photo, think me an
acquaintance or accomplice of the man,” and, with a little more
wearisome talk, he produced the portrait, and slowly put before me
the incidents already recorded.

When he had done I was not greatly elated. The thread which connected
his early customer with the man supposed to have attacked M^cCulloch
was of the slenderest. Then I was disappointed that Turnbull’s story
looked so real. I had fondly hoped he would stumble and prevaricate
enough to allow us to lock him up on suspicion—in other words, that
we should find him to be an accomplice, anxious to save himself at
the expense of a companion in crime. I took the photograph, but
plainly told him that I feared it would be of little use to me.

“Ah, you wish to undervalue it in order to get out of paying me a
good round sum when the man is caught,” he answered, with a knowing
wink. “I haven’t knocked about so much without being able to see
through that dodge,” and away he went, as elated and consequential as
if he had really laid the man by the heels.

When I was alone I had a long study over the notes I had taken during
the interview. The sailor photographed had stated that his ship only
got in the day before, and that he was on his way home, and merely
visiting the race-course in passing. He had not said where he lived
or at what port he had come in, but the general impression left on
Turnbull’s mind was that the port was not far off. Leith or Granton
seemed to me the likeliest places, and I turned to the shipping
lists to have a look at the names of new arrivals. At Leith only one
vessel had come in on that day, The Shannon; and at Granton, though
there were several arrivals, none of them were from long voyages. The
sailor had hinted that he had not been home for eighteen months, and
that to my mind implied a long voyage, or long voyages.

To Leith accordingly I went, and found The Shannon, her cargo already
discharged, and only a few of the men on board. Some had been paid
off and some were off for a few days on leave. The man whom I
questioned—for the captain had gone home too—seemed to me sullen and
suspicious. He did not know if one of the men had gone eastwards to
see his wife; if any of them lived in that quarter he had never heard
of it, and so on. I was dissatisfied with the answers and the man’s
manner, and had he resembled in the slightest degree the portrait in
my pocket I should have arrested him on the spot. I thought I would
bring out the photograph as a test. Holding it up before him, I said
sharply—

“Do you know that man?”

“No, I don’t.” The answer came out almost before he had time to look
at the features. It was too prompt. It was a lie. The falsehood told
me more than the truth would have done. It not only convinced me that
I was at least on the track of the photographed sailor, but roused in
my mind for the first time a strong suspicion that he was the knifer
of M^cCulloch. I went from the ship to the shipping agents. I found
the clerk who had handed their pay to all the men; and on producing
the photograph saw that he recognised it instantly.

“Yes, that was one of them,” he said, “but he was paid off, and has
gone home.”

I asked the man’s name, and, on referring to the books, he gave it as
Tom Fisher. With some difficulty he got me the man’s address—which
was in a town some miles east—and his trouble arose from the fact
that no money had been sent to Fisher’s wife for nearly a year.

The sailors’ wives often drew one half the men’s pay, but she had not
applied for it during that time, and was supposed to have changed her
address.

“I didn’t say anything of it to Fisher,” said the clerk in
conclusion, “and he seemed quite elated at having so much money to
draw. It’s a kittle thing interfering between a man and his wife, and
it might have alarmed him needlessly. If there’s anything wrong he’s
best to find it out himself.”

I left the shipping office, and took the first train for the town in
which Fisher had his home. If he was to be found anywhere, I thought
it would be there—and especially so if he turned out to be innocent.
It is a quiet country place in which everyone knows his neighbours,
and I had no difficulty in finding the house. But it was occupied by
an old woman, who said she had been in it for nearly a year. I asked
for Mrs Fisher, the sailor’s wife.

“Oh, she was a bad lot,” was the blunt rejoinder. “She sellt a’ her
things, bit by bit, and gaed awa’ in the end withoot paying her rent
and other debts.”

“Where did she go to, do you know?”

“Oh, dear kens. She was a drunken hussy, and thought hersel’ bonny.
Some say that she went awa’ wi’ a baker-man they ca’ M^cCulloch, and
was aboot Leith for a while, but maybe it’s no true. He used to hae a
great wark wi’ her.”

“And her husband—has he never been here?”

“Never since I cam’; but I heard that M^cCulloch was stabbed at the
races by a sailor and I wadna wonder if that sailor turned oot to be
Fisher himsel’.”

I thought the old woman the most acute I had met for a while; we
always do when we find a person’s thoughts and opinions tallying with
our own. I left the house and pursued my inquiries elsewhere. I found
no one who had seen Fisher near the town, or in it; but at length
there was mentioned to me the name of a man who had been at the
races, and had there seen Fisher and spoken to him. This man I found
out, but he was not nearly so communicative to me as he had been to
others. He admitted that he had seen Fisher and spoken to him, but
couldn’t remember what they had talked of. He knew M^cCulloch also,
and had seen him at the races, too, but in a drunken condition, and
not fit for conversation. Questioned more closely, he admitted that
Fisher was an old friend of his, and that the last thing in the world
he would wish for would be to do Fisher any injury by what he should
say. He had heard of the stabbing of M^cCulloch, and did not wonder
at it, the man was so quarrelsome, but he had no idea who had done
it. Fisher might have done it, or anybody else—he knew nothing about
it, as he was out of the place two hours at least before the attack
was made.

I could read the man as plainly as if he had spoken all he knew.
There was the same reticence which the sailor had shown on board The
Shannon, and it probably arose from the same cause—a desire to screen
and save a friend. I got back to Leith, and found with some relief
that no vessel of importance had left during the two days; I then
tried Granton with the same result. “Glasgow” then rose promptly in
my mind, and I drove to both the Edinburgh railway stations to make
inquiries. At neither had any person resembling the photograph been
seen, but a telegram to one of the stations a mile or two from the
city elicited the news that a man in sailor’s dress had taken a third
class ticket thence to Glasgow. He had driven out to that station
in a cab, and the cab had come from the direction of Edinburgh. I
telegraphed to Glasgow, and followed my message by the first train.
When I got to that city I found my work nearly all done for me.
Fisher had been traced to an American liner, in which he had shipped
under the name of George Fullerton.

Strange fatality! George Fullerton was the name of the man who had
seen him at the races, and so clumsily tried to screen him from
me. The vessel in which he had shipped was gone—it had sailed the
night before—but there was a chance of it stopping at Liverpool.
I telegraphed thither and took the night mail, in case the vessel
should touch, but the weather had proved too stormy, and she held
on her course. Being so far on the way, and now perfectly sure of
my man, I did not dream of turning back, but took passage for New
York in a fast liner, which would easily have outstripped that in
which the fugitive had got the start, but for one or two unforeseen
accidents on the way, which added three days to the length of the
passage. When we landed, the vessel in which “George Fullerton” had
sailed was in the harbour, and my man gone. He was described to me by
one of the sailors as depressed and sullen, but singularly free with
his money. He had been taken on at the last moment in place of a man
who had failed to appear, and so, instead of working his passage, had
received full pay. On landing he had treated several of his mates
liberally, and had seemed bent on nothing but getting rid of his
money.

“I believe I could find him for you,” said the man at last, and I
readily accepted the offer.

We made our way to a tavern near the harbour much frequented by
seamen, and there, sitting alone with some drink before him, I
found the counter-part of the spoilt photograph. I should have
easily recognised him in a crowd, but with a foolhardiness almost
incredible, he wore the fatal red neckerchief, which proved to be of
silk, not cotton.

I said nothing to my conductor beyond ordering for him a drink at the
bar, and then went up and took a seat opposite the red necktie.

“You’re a Scotchman, I think?” I said to him at last.

“So are you,” he said, a little startled.

“Yes. Long since you left the old country?”

“Long enough,” he growled, “and it’ll be longer or I go back.”

“Nonsense, man,” I said, without a smile. “I’m going back by the
first ship. Suppose you go back with me?”

“Never!”

The word was accompanied by a deep oath, but I was busy with my hand
in my pocket, which came out as he made a gulp at the drink before
him, and brought up the barrel of a pistol levelled straight at his
eyes.

“Hands up! Tom Fisher,” I shouted as he staggered back, and the
bystanders came crowding round. “I believe that’s the custom of this
country, or the right thing to say when two are likely to play at one
game. I’ve come all the way from Edinburgh to arrest you for stabbing
Colin M^cCulloch. My name is M^cGovan, and I’ve the warrant in my
pocket.”

He gave in in the most sheepish and stupefied manner imaginable, and
some one was obliging enough to snap my handcuffs on his wrists. I
took him away in a _coupé_, and had him locked up till I should get
the necessary papers filled up for his conveyance across the Atlantic.

On the passage home we got quite friendly, and he told me the whole
story of the attack. He had met George Fullerton, and been told by
him of his wife’s faithlessness and flight, coupled with M^cCulloch’s
name. He was quite frenzied, and went off at once to look for
M^cCulloch, whom Fullerton had seen not long before in the town. He
met him at last by chance, and stabbed him twice, meaning to kill him.

When he came to be tried, which was two months later, on account
of the state of his victim, he pleaded “Not guilty” by advice, and
M^cCulloch was called as a witness, when, to the astonishment of all,
M^cCulloch declared most positively that he could not remember who
stabbed him, but that he had a strong impression that the assailant
was _not_ the man at the bar.

None looked more astonished than the prisoner, but a moment later he
recovered himself and rose to his feet.

“He’s telling a lie! I did stab him. I’m guilty, and I’m not sorry.
He led away my wife, and she’s now on the streets. Ask him if it’s
not true? That’s all I’ve to say.”

M^cCulloch, when questioned, made some shuffling answers, and was
finally ordered out of the box. Then Fisher, in consideration of the
peculiar circumstances of the case, and his having been already two
months in prison, was sentenced to a month’s imprisonment.

I saw him after his release. He was searching for his wife, and had
come to me to get my assistance, but we only found her grave.




THE STOLEN DOWRY.


In a public-house in the Saltmarket of Glasgow there had been a
leak in a barrel of spirits which stood in a dark corner inside
the counter. The whisky was pure and unreduced as it came from the
distillery. Before being retailed it would have been mixed with
water in certain proportions, according, to the price labelled on
the fancy-painted casks ranged along the wall, to which it would
have been partly transferred on the day after its arrival. As it
happened, however, that particular barrel was not to be sold. An old
spigot had got loose during the night, and the pot-boy who opened
the shop waded into what he thought was water instead of the thick
coating of sawdust generally covering the floor. The shop was dark,
and the boy got a stump of candle and lighted it, to have a search
into the cause. The smell might have enlightened him. Behind the
counter the floor was covered with escaping whisky. The boy crouched
down and poked the candle-stump in under the barrel, and at the same
moment was burnt by some of the melted grease. His fingers were of
most importance to him, and he dropped the candle with a howl. If
the whisky had been gunpowder, it could scarcely have put him out
of the shop more quickly. There was a blaze and a roar, and then an
explosion, and the boy had scarcely reached the opposite side of the
street, with more burns than the candle had inflicted, when the whole
shop was in flames.

The land of houses above the shop was a high one, and crowded in
every flat with families of the poorest. Before these unhappy inmates
were well aware of the calamity the flames and smoke had burst
through the ceiling of the shop, and into the stair, thus cutting
off the only means of escape. Then followed a scene exactly like
that which happened in our own Canongate, when a maker of fireworks
had his shop blown up about his ears. The terrified inmates gathered
at the windows shrieking for help—those in the lower flats being
gradually forced upwards by flame and smoke. In a few seconds beds
and mattresses began to fly out at the windows of the adjoining
houses, and these were held up by the eager and excited crowd below
to break the fall of those leaping from the high windows. Some were
killed on the spot, many were injured, but a great number were
successfully caught, scarcely the worse of the fall. At one of the
top windows two women stood in desperation and despair. Though living
in the same land, and possibly on the same flat, they were strangers
to each other till that moment. One had a child of five clinging to
her, white and speechless with terror, and this woman was a poor,
hard-working seamstress, a year or two widowed, and having nothing
but her needle to depend on for support. The other was Bet Cooper, as
bold and irrepressible a thief as ever infested Glasgow.

“We’ll have to jump—it’s the only chance,” said Bet, addressing the
terrified dressmaker. Bet was scared and awed herself, but her terror
had not the effect, as in the person beside her, of rendering her
limbs perfectly powerless.

The poor dressmaker shook her head, and feebly moaned out something
about the child clinging to her.

“If my wee Mary was only safe I wadna care for mysel’,” she
hysterically exclaimed at last.

“Then throw her down—they’ll catch her safe enough,” said Bet with
energy.

“I couldna dae’t—ye couldna dae’t yoursel’ if she was your ain
bairn,” sobbed the poor mother.

“Then I’ll do it for you, if you like?” volunteered Bet.

“Oh, no, no!” screamed the mother, and the child echoed the terrified
cry, which was faintly caught and responded to by the anxious crowd
watching them and urging them from below.

“Then I’ll take her in my arms and jump with her?” said Bet
generously. “If I am killed, she’ll fall soft on top of me and be
saved.”

The perfect antipodes of each other in character and training, these
two women were for the moment drawn together by the warm humanity
which makes the whole world kin. The weaker spirit, the half-fainting
dressmaker, clung to the bold thief, and mingled her tears with those
of Bet as trustfully as if she had been the purest in the land. It is
doubtful if she would have consented even then, but a great cloud of
smoke and flames sweeping and roaring in their direction hastened the
decision. The child screamed and shrank towards the outstretched arms
of Bet, and the mother let her go with an effort.

“You’ll take care of her?” she tremulously said, as she kissed the
child’s white face over and over again.

“I’ll take care of her,” said Bet, shortly. “Now stand back a bit,
and let me jump.”

She grasped the clinging child high over her shoulder and sprang into
the air, while a sympathising roar from the crowd below greeted the
action. Four men were holding aloft one of the beds, and Bet sank
into the yielding mass almost as softly as if she had descended only
her own height. The child was breathless and a little shaken, but
quite sensible. Bet sprang to her feet and waved the rescued child in
triumph in the air towards the mother far above, though the ringing
cheer rising around must have carried to her the glad tidings even
before Bet’s cry rang out.

“She’s safe! Now jump! jump for your life!” was Bet’s eager
exclamation. But the mother still clung to the window in powerless
terror, and finally motioned to those below that she would try to
escape by the roof. Her gesture was not understood at the moment, or
a dozen voices would have been raised to warn her that that means had
already been tried in vain. The building by that time was filled with
smoke, and the unhappy mother had never got farther than the passage
leading to the stair landing. Her body was found there, scarcely
scorched, with the features calm and placid as in a gentle slumber.
Little Mary, the rescued child, when shown the still form, cried
out joyfully, “Mother’s only sleeping.” So she was, but it was that
blissful rest which knows no troubled dreams, the last and longest
that is sent to weary humanity.

Bet took the child with her for that night. She had no lack of
acquaintances to give her shelter, but Mary appeared to be without
a friend in the world. Bet was not easily moved, but somehow that
last speech of the poor mother, and her appealing gaze as she uttered
it, had got imprinted in her memory—“You’ll take care of her?” Bet
fancied she heard the words still, and determined to keep the child
under her own eye till its nearest relatives should be sought out and
found. Bet was then comparatively young—still under thirty, but she
had never had a child of her own, and it was a queer sensation to her
to be treading the streets with that little innocent one’s hand so
trustfully reposing in her own.

The talk of the child was also different from anything Bet had ever
listened to; it actually seemed for the time that Bet was the child,
and Mary the woman. With a gentleness quite new to her, Bet tried to
explain to Mary that there was a possibility of her mother sleeping
on and never waking, an idea which Mary utterly derided, though in
the end she said contentedly—

“If mother doesn’t wake, you’ll be my mother instead?”

“No, no; that would never do,” said Bet hurriedly, and with some
agitation. “I’m not good enough, and it wouldn’t be allowed.”

“I think you’re _very_ good,” said Mary, with the air of a judge.
“You saved me from the fire. Oh, what a jump it was! Won’t you let
me sleep with you to-night, and cuddle close in your arms, if mother
isn’t back?”

Bet wasn’t sure, and she mumbled out something to that effect, which
Mary chose to take for consent to the arrangement.

They made their way, thus talking and considering, to the house of an
acquaintance of Bet—a thief, of course, like herself, and almost as
well known. Bet was careful to keep the child apart from her friends,
that their strange talk might not reach or contaminate its ears, and
early in the evening undressed Mary with her own hands to put her
into the bed under the slates which had been appropriated to her use.
She tucked the child in very tenderly, and got a hearty kiss for
her pains, and was then about to leave the little closet, when Mary
called her back with the words—

“But I haven’t said my blesses.”

“Jerusalem! and what is that?” said Bet, for a moment puzzled.

“Oh, you just sit there, and put your hands together like mine, while
I say them like a little angel,” said Mary, and to teach her new
pupil she illustrated the matter by getting out of the bed-clothes
and kneeling beside Bet, clasping her hands and beginning to repeat
her prayers. Bet’s attitude—expressive more of astonishment than
anything—not quite pleasing her, Mary had to stop and place her new
friend’s hands in the same position as her own; and, that being
adjusted, she proceeded—

“God bless mother; bless Bet, my new mother; bless everybody—for
amen. Good-night. This night I lay me down to sleep; I give my soul
to Christ to keep. If I should die and never wake, I pray the Lord my
soul to take. For amen. Good-night. Our Father which art in heaven,
hallowed be Thy name. Kingdom come. Thy will be done—earth as ’tis
heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. Forgive us our debts, as we
forgive those trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation.
But deliver us from evil. For amen. Good-night.”

Bet was hushed and subdued, and the second kiss which she imprinted
on the child’s lips was very near being a tearful one. Possibly the
simple utterances of the little one had awakened in her breast some
memories of her own childhood, long dormant; or perhaps the pure
radiance of the child’s innocence was showing her the darkness of her
own heart and life. At any rate Bet left the little closet very bad
company for her friends, and was more than once twitted by them upon
her solemnity. Bet had begun to think; but as yet the only tangible
idea that came to her out of that whirl was expressed in the words—

“I wish the bairn’s friends would not turn up. I think I should like
to keep her myself.”

Next day inquiry proved that Bet’s “bairn” was literally without
friends. Her mother had been in receipt of parochial aid on account
of the child and her own poverty, and the parochial authorities
could prove beyond question that she had been friendless and alone.
Under these circumstances the glad wish welled up naturally to Bet’s
lips—she would take it; she would be a mother to the orphan, and seek
help from no parochial board. Alas! Bet forgot in the warmth of her
newborn love that all her past life was against her. What kind of
guardian for a tender and innocent child was a woman who had spent
most of her life in open defiance of the law, when not actually in
prison?

The truth only dawned upon Bet when those who had the power evaded
her request by saying that they would consider the matter, make
inquiries, and let her know. Meantime the child was allowed to remain
with Bet, and, as she slowly sauntered home, the thought rose in her
mind—

“They’ll take her from me; they’ll never allow me to keep her. I’m
too bad; too well known. They’ll ask the police about me, and take
her away to-morrow. And they’re right. I’m not fit to bring her
up—not unless I make a change.”

That was the thought which pulled Bet up, and made her pace the
streets for hour after hour before returning to her charge.
Change!—was it possible for her to change sufficiently to bring up
a child to a good and useful life? Bet was afraid that it was not.
But then her very boldness and seeming callousness covered a strong
will and a passionate nature, which, once roused to love, loved with
head-strong impetuosity.

The more imminent the separation from the child seemed, the more
Bet longed to keep her, and the result of her long thinking on the
plainstones of Glasgow was that she went home to nestle down beside
Mary, saying to herself, “I’ll try! I’ll try, for her sake!”

Her case, however, was desperate, so Bet was awake very early in the
morning, and had Mary up and dressed and out into the cool morning
air before the bells and steam whistles had begun to call the factory
folks and ironworkers from their homes. Bet’s intention was to make
her way to Edinburgh, but as she was fearful of her destination being
suspected, and herself pursued, she took a very different route
when leaving the city. She had not a penny in her pocket, and, as a
matter of fact, had to beg her way, by a long and circuitous route,
to the capital. We were duly informed of her disappearance, and,
though there was no special charge against her, we should doubtless
very soon have had her in our hands had Bet resumed her own line
of business. But this did not happen. Bet, while begging at a farm
outside the city, had been told to go and work, and replied that
she was willing to do so there and then. This resulted in her being
employed on the place for nearly a month. At the end of that time she
had a little money to draw, and entered the city to have a struggle
for honesty and a new life.

I am afraid that Bet’s resolve would have all gone to the wall
through the taint of crime and the power of hunger had she not
chanced to meet an old prison companion who had been struggling in
the same way for some months. This woman not only gave temporary
shelter to the wanderers, but introduced Bet to a lady who, with
some of her friends, had formed a kind of private prisoners’ aid
society. Mrs Colbrun—as I shall name her, knowing her aversion to
publicity—heard Bet’s story, which, probably for the first time in
Bet’s life, was a truthful one in every detail, and, with many a
warning that the new life would be full of hardship and temptation,
agreed to give her a start by recommending her among her friends as
help in rough house-work. Thus Bet was secured from absolute want,
and, as she was a strong-bodied woman and eager to do her best, it
was not long before she had a regular round of houses employing her
at stated intervals at washing and cleaning, besides occasional
jobs from outsiders. During the first few years of this life Bet
had many a hard struggle and sore temptation; but then the innocent
prattle and loving caresses of Mary made all smooth and endurable.
Bet, I should have observed, was by no means a good-looking woman.
She had an evil look which was very much against her in her new line.
People often employed her with reluctance on that account, and got
rid of her as soon as possible, so with all her willingness she was
always very poor. Her life was a lonely one, and I have no doubt
she often asked herself with bitterness whether the change from her
former reckless course was altogether a good one. As Mary grew in
years and cleverness, however, and became more of a companion to
her protector, her gentle influence gradually asserted itself, and
chased many of these clouds from Bet’s half-savage mind. When she
was just twelve Mary insisted upon being taken from school and set
to work, and through Mrs Colbrun was apprenticed to dressmaking in
a big establishment in Princes Street. Mary did not grow up a great
beauty, but she had a quiet, engaging manner, and an artlessness
and simplicity which made her a favourite. She remained in that
establishment for six or seven years, by the end of which time the
relative positions of Bet and her had changed, for Bet’s health
had become uncertain, and Mary’s wage formed almost their sole
support. Mary had forgotten many of the incidents of her youth, but
singularly enough, the scene at the fire was imprinted on her memory
as vividly as the day after it had occurred. She often spoke of it,
and speculated on how different both their lives might have been but
for that great calamity. She never really understood Bet’s shudder at
the thought, for Mary did not know that her second mother had been a
thief, and saved from a life of crime by her own innocent prattle. We
are all children alike in that respect, and never know a tithe of the
good we have done.

At this time came the grand turning-point in Mary’s life, for the
son of one of the partners of the firm, who acted as cashier, fell
in love with the quiet, lady-like Mary Cooper, passing over beauties
in dozens to do so, and, after a long course of opposition from his
parents, which as usual only strengthened his passion, succeeded in
so adjusting matters that Mary consented to become his wife. When the
matter was settled Bet looked as if she did not know whether to cry
or rejoice, and, I believe, did a little at both.

“How am I ever to fit you to go among such grand folks,” she said in
manifest distress.

“You have been fitting me all my life,” said Mary, with a bright
look and a soft embrace, which she had generally found effectual in
banishing all objections.

“That’s all very well,” answered Bet, only half mollified; “but where
is your outfit to come from? You must have dresses, and no end of
things. Ten or twenty pounds would not be too much. Only think! if
you went among them in your poor rags, wouldn’t they sneer at you all
your life after?”

“I don’t know; I never thought of that,” was Mary’s simple rejoinder,
“but so long as Herbert does not sneer at me I shall never care for
any one else. He will shield me from all trouble.”

“Ay, you’re like every one else in love, you see nothing but sunshine
before you,” dryly returned Bet, “but it’s possible that even he
would turn round and sneer at your former poverty if I allowed him to
provide your outfit, as he offered to do. ‘Nothing of the kind,’ I
said, quite sharp; ‘Mary will provide all that herself.’ But though I
said that to look independent, I can’t for the life of me tell where
the money’s to come from. I have not one pound to rub on another.”

“Don’t distress yourself about that, mother dear,” said Mary, with
another nestling kiss; “for if he cannot love me for ever without
a paltry dress or two, his love isn’t worthy the name. And if his
devotion is to change to sneers, all the outfits in the world would
not prevent it. So just let the matter rest. I’ll take all the risk.
He knows we are poor in everything but a good name, so where is the
shame?”

Mary thought she had effectually settled the difficulty; but Bet
continued to harp on the same theme. It was an awkward position
certainly. There was Mary living in a house of one room and a
closet, in a not very choice locality, and her affianced in one of
the biggest villas in the Grange. The inequality of their positions
cropped out painfully whenever he chanced to visit the humble home,
and Bet was in such a feverish state of distress over her poverty
that she would have made any sacrifice for a little temporary
grandeur. As the time drew near when Mary was to leave her for
another’s care, Bet’s uneasiness increased. She had rashly pledged
herself to provide Mary’s outfit, and was now further from that than
ever. It is difficult to analyse her feelings so as to account for
all her actions; but I suppose her mind had got into such a morbid
state that she was scarcely responsible for her own actions.

At this critical juncture Bet’s old friend and adviser, Mrs Colbrun,
sent for her and Mary to congratulate them on the approaching event,
and make some small present to the bride. What the present was I have
no recollection, but it was something which led Mrs Colbrun and Mary
to leave the room for a few minutes.

Bet had often been left with the free range of the whole house before
with no evil result. In the room in which she was now left there
stood a writing table, one drawer of which was open, showing quite a
pile of bank notes and other money.

Bet fought valiantly with the temptation till Mrs Colbrun was
actually crossing the lobby to re-enter the room, when the old
thieving nature struggled uppermost, and Bet, with one swift movement
of her hand, had possessed herself of a bunch of the notes, and
concealed them with magical celerity about her person.

The remainder of her stay in the house was torture to Bet, not
only on account of the fear of discovery, but because she had a
conscience, and could not disguise even to herself the dastardly act
she had committed in robbing a benefactor.

They got away at last, but Bet was nearly an hour at home before she
ventured to bring out the notes, which she did with a shaking hand,
telling Mary they were for her marriage outfit, which she had better
go and purchase forthwith.

Perhaps it was the tone in which the strange request was made, or the
guilty look which accompanied the offer of the money, or possibly
sheer astonishment at Bet possessing such a sum, that roused Mary’s
suspicions; but she had scarcely taken the notes and counted them
when a chill thought fell on her heart.

“Where did you get so much money, mother dear?” she tremulously
asked. “Did Mrs Colbrun give it you?”

“No, no! ask no questions, but away you go and spend it to the best
advantage,” hurriedly responded Bet, in a strange voice.

Mary stared at her for a minute, then began to tremble violently, and
finally sat down with the notes in her hand, and burst into tears.
Thoroughly alarmed, Bet sprang up and tried to soothe the young
girl, but the first words which Mary could articulate stabbed her
through.

“Mother, dear,” she cried, clasping the guilty woman in her arms, and
trying in vain to get a clear look into the shrinking eyes, “tell
me true and plain. There was a drawer in Mrs Colbrun’s room with a
pile of bank notes in it. I saw them. You didn’t—oh, mother! forgive
me for the horrible thought!—but say you didn’t take them—steal
them—from Mrs Colbrun.”

“I didn’t” was shaped on Bet’s lips, but the words stuck in her
throat, and the guilty look on her face, and her abashed attitude
as she shrank before the accusing eyes gave the lie to the husky
response.

“Oh, mother, how could you?—you have ruined us!” was all Mary could
utter, but after an agonised pause she sprang up with startling
energy, and said—

“I must take them back! I shall never allow her to be robbed!”

“And send me to prison for ten or twenty years?” cried Bet in
reproach. “No; rather throw them into the fire. That will hide all.”

“I shall not! Mother, you are mad—you are not in your senses to
propose such a thing. It would be robbery just the same, whether we
use the notes or not, if we do not restore them. I shall take them
back, but try to give them in a way that will not criminate you. Yes,
whatever happens, you must be safe.”

Mary hurried on her things and left the house, amid the feeble
protests of Bet. She had not been out of the place many minutes
when I knocked at the door and entered. Mrs Colbrun had missed the
notes immediately on the departure of Bet and Mary, and, shocked and
indignant, had brought word to the Central. It needed but a word or
two regarding Bet’s past life to convince me that she was the thief,
and I took the address and went there direct. Bet, however, was bold
as brass, and denied all knowledge of the notes, and officiously
assisted me to search the house for them. I left her at last baffled,
but not convinced, and made my way to Mrs Colbrun’s for consultation
and advice. It was nearly dark when I reached the place, which was at
the outskirts of the city, and on a very dark and badly-lighted road.
As I approached the place I fancied that I saw a skulking figure
cross the road and move round towards the back of the house. It was
Mary, who had loitered about vainly trying to think of some mode of
restoring the notes which should not re-act upon her benefactor, Bet.
At length she had conceived the project of getting round to the back,
raising the window of Mrs Colbrun’s room, and tossing the notes into
some corner. Quite ignorant of these facts, I followed the figure;
saw the dark window stealthily approached, and then was witness to an
attempt to force up the window, which chanced to be fastened on the
inside. When this had continued for a short time I slipped rapidly up
behind, and laid a hand on the woman’s shoulder. She uttered a scream
of terror, and instantly dropped the bunch of notes, which I as
quickly picked up. I took her round to the front door, and introduced
her to Mrs Colbrun, who besought me, as I have seldom been pleaded
with, to let poor Mary go, “and say no more about it.”

That was quite beyond my power, and Mary—who had not a word to say
in her defence, and even faintly admitted the identity of the stolen
notes—was taken away and locked up.

No sooner did Bet hear of the capture than she appeared in a frenzied
state at the office, tearing her hair and altogether conducting
herself like a maniac, and loudly declared that she and not Mary was
the thief. I had known so many cases in which a mother sacrificed
all, even her reputation, to save her offspring from prison, that I
felt certain this was but another instance of the kind, and we paid
little attention to Bet’s story.

The same day Mary’s affianced appeared at the office, and was allowed
to see the prisoner, when he besought her in the most piteous accents
to declare the truth and save her name, but to all this Mary would
say nothing. At the trial she was informed that her sentence would be
lighter if she pled guilty, and “Guilty” she pled accordingly.

Her sentence was one month’s imprisonment, but the moment it was
pronounced she turned to her affianced, who had been seated behind
her, and whispered with a face positively radiant—

“Now, I may speak, Herbert. Yes, I am innocent.”

Strenuous efforts were immediately made to quash the conviction and
have Mary released, but the law gives forth no uncertain sound on the
point, and Mary served the full month like an ordinary malefactor.

When the position was explained to me by her lover, I said to him—

“Stick by her. She is a noble girl. Marry her when she comes out;
for, when she could sacrifice so much from love of her mother, what
would she not sacrifice for her husband!”

He thought the advice good enough to act on, and I believe has never
regretted his choice.




M^cSWEENY AND THE MAGIC JEWELS.


A kick from a brute having iron toe-plates on his boots had placed
me on the sick, or rather the lame, list, and so the scientific
gentleman, with his strange story of robbery, was referred to
M^cSweeny. The gentleman, who was well known as an author and
student, and whom I may here name Mr Hew Stafford, insisted that
none but the very cleverest and most acute detective on the staff
could properly follow and understand the almost supernatural events
connected with the robbery of the jewels, and as my chum’s opinion
has always been that he answers to that description, and every one
else was busy, he was allowed to take the case in hand.

“I’m Detective M^cSweeny, at your service, sur,” he said, bowing
stiffly, as the old gentleman blinked at him through his spectacles.
“I daresay you’ll have read my experiences? They are published in
books, and that’s how some call me the great M^cSweeny.”

“No, I have not had that pleasure,” politely responded Mr Stafford.
“I never heard the name before.”

“Ah, I know how that is,” returned M^cSweeny, with alacrity. “It’s
because a kind of assistant of mine puts his name to the books. Ye
see, sur, I’m troubled wid a kind of stiffness in me right hand, and
writin’s bothersome to me, so I let him do it. His name’s M^cGovan,
and he gets all the praise and all the money for the books, which I
wouldn’t mind at all, at all, if he didn’t try to make me look as
small as possible. If ye believe him, I can’t do a dacent job without
him. For a story-teller, I’ll back him agin all the world.”

“Yes, I think I have heard his name, but I never look at that kind of
literature,” wearily answered Mr Stafford.

“An’, good for you, sur; for the lies that’s in it—especially about
me—no wan knows better than meself; but it’s no use me saying
anything, for paiple believe every word he writes. He drives his own
carriage, while I’ve to walk on futt. Never moind! I’ve the pull on
him in cleverness. Give me your difficult job, and see if I don’t run
down the thafe better than a dozen M^cGovans rolled into wan.”

“I understand—you mean that he is but a lame detective?”

“He is that,” said M^cSweeny, with a twinkle in his eye, as he
thought of the kick which had laid me up. “If there’s a lame
detective annywhere in the world this minit, it’s him.”

“Then I am delighted to have met you instead,” exclaimed the innocent
Mr Stafford, “for of all the mysteries that ever were brought here to
unravel, none could be more incomprehensible than the robbery which
has brought me here. You can understand how valuables might go where
there are hands to take them,—servants or professional thieves,—but
for jewels to vanish before one’s eyes in a locked room, with windows
fastened, and not a living creature near, seems as nearly impossible
as anything I can imagine, yet that is exactly the case which I have
brought to you.”

“Nothing at all—nothing at all to us,” said M^cSweeny, with the most
unbounded confidence in himself. “Just go over the whole story, and
I’ll soon put it all to rights.”

“Well, I am, as you probably know, a bachelor, and live out at
Newington in a self-contained house of my own. My servants are a
housekeeper, a kitchen-maid, and good-for-nothing page—a boy of
thirteen, who eats his own weight of food every day, and torments
the life out of me generally. I must tell you at once, however, that
it is quite impossible that any of these three servants can be the
thief.”

M^cSweeny smiled knowingly to himself, but made no remark. He had
already decided that the good-for-nothing page-boy was the thief.

“You will understand how it is impossible that the servants could be
involved, when you learn the circumstances,” pursued Mr Stafford. “A
young relative of mine is getting married, and, as I am not exactly
a poor man, I decided upon giving her a handsome present. I said
nothing about my intention to anyone, but went to the bank and drew
£200.”

“£200,” said M^cSweeny, gravely noting down the facts, with a severe
official frown on his brow, in imitation of some peculiarity of my
own.

“With that money in my pocket I went over to Princes Street, and
bought, in a first-class jeweller’s, a necklace, brooch, and
ear-rings. They were set with diamonds and pearls, and, I believe,
full value for the money I paid for them, which was only a pound
or two less than I had drawn from the bank. They were very pretty
trinkets, and, though no admirer of such things generally, I could
not help looking more than once at these. I mention these facts just
to let you understand that they were _bona-fide_ jewels, paid for
at the highest price, and bought from a man above suspicion, and
no trick affairs made up in some magic way to deceive the eyes or
fingers, and then vanish into gas or air before one’s eyes. After I
had paid for the jewels they were put into a small casket covered
with morocco and lined with velvet, and this casket, wrapped in
paper, was placed in my own hands, and carried by me to my own home.
I still said nothing of my purchase to anyone. The page-boy was
in the hall as I entered, but the casket was at that moment in my
coat pocket, and he could not possibly have guessed that I carried
anything uncommon. I left my hat, and umbrella, and boots in the
hall, and went straight up to my study. This room is always closed
with a check-lock, and no one can enter it during my absence. There
is no furniture in the room which could screen any person from sight.
When you enter the room you see at a glance all that is in it—my
book-case, my writing-table, and a sofa and four chairs. There is
a fire and fire-place, of course, but no one could conceal himself
there, as the grate is a small register one, and the fire was blazing
up when the magical disappearance took place. I always light the fire
and trim it myself, and the page never gets further than the outside
of the door when he fills and brings up the coal scuttle. The floor
is covered with one piece of wax-cloth, so there are no crevices
or holes into which any small trinket could drop or roll. You are
following me clearly, I hope?”

“Yes, sur—as clear as day,” answered M^cSweeny, with rather less
confidence in his tones.

“Well, on entering the room, I knocked up the fire, put on fresh
coals, and then seated myself before my writing-table, directly
in front of the fire. I took out the casket of jewels and placed
it on the table before me. The door, you will remember, was shut,
and cannot be opened from the outside except by me, who carry the
only key. I could see all the room, and both door and window, and
am certain no human being but myself was in that room. I thought I
should like to have another look at the trinkets, and opened the
casket and laid them out, one by one, on the writing-table before
me. I felt them—touched them—turned them over, and in every possible
manner was convinced that they were exactly as I had received them
from the maker. Now listen. After I had admired them for some little
time, I replaced them in the case, which was fitted with grooves to
hold them. I did not close the case, but began to reflect on the
possible weal or woe which might await the young girl who was to
receive them. While thus reflecting, my eyes left the table for a few
minutes, and rested on the window and the distant green hills and
clear sky. I was in what is called a brown study for perhaps five
minutes. When I awoke from that reverie, and brought my eyes back to
the table, the jewels were gone!”

“Gone?” echoed M^cSweeny, incredulously.

“Yes, gone—casket, and necklace, and brooch, and ear-rings had
vanished bodily, leaving not a trace of their existence before me on
the mahogany table.”

“You’d drapped them on the flure, mebbe?” suggested M^cSweeny, whose
hair was beginning to rise on end.

“Not at all, though, like you, I thought at first that that was
possible,” calmly continued Mr Stafford. “I looked at my feet, over
the table, under the table, and into every drawer and cranny about
the table. I did not find them. I tried the door; it was firmly
closed. The window the same. I felt every pocket. All in vain. The
jewels and the case were gone.”

“Ay, but how? There must have been some greedy fingers to take them,”
said M^cSweeny, who seemed to instinctively guess the suggestion that
was coming.

“Perhaps not,” said the old gentleman, as calmly; “a spirit hath not
flesh or bones. Did you never hear of evil spirits?”

M^cSweeny almost jumped to his feet, and fumbled apprehensively with
his red scalp.

“Faith have I,” he answered, with a shudder, thinking probably of
the “Spirit Rappers” described in “Strange Clues.” “If it’s a good
healthy ghost of the owld-fashioned kind your going to mintion, it’s
all right, but your table-rapping ones I’ll have nothing to do with.”

“I don’t profess to say what kind of spirit took them,” solemnly
replied Mr Stafford, “but it must have been a covetous spirit. I’ve
told you all I know of the affair. The jewels are gone, and that’s
exactly how they vanished. I could not ask the servants about them,
for they never saw them, and were not near me at the time. I don’t
feel inclined to lose them, yet I am certain that no human hand took
them.”

“Rats, mebbe?” hopefully suggested M^cSweeny.

“No; there is not a hole in the room.”

“A jackdaw then—it might have come down the chimney.”

“Impossible. I must have heard it, and seen it. No; the jewels
disappeared right under my nose, without a sound. I leave you to
solve the mystery and recover the property.”

M^cSweeny had asked for a difficult case, and now that he had got
one he was bound to express himself highly elated at the apparently
unsolvable mystery. He volubly promised the robbed gentleman not only
that he would speedily lay the thief by the heels, but that, spirit
or no spirit, he would recover the property as well. His inward
resolve, of course, was that if he found himself making no progress
with the case, he would shove the finishing of it on me, while, if
by some rare stroke of good luck he did succeed, the greater renown
would attach to his efforts on account of his emphatic declarations.
Full of these assurances, he accompanied Mr Stafford out to that
gentleman’s house at the South Side, and was taken up to the room in
which the jewels had so magically disappeared. He got Mr Stafford
to sit down in the exact spot and attitude he had occupied when the
robbery took place. When this had been done, and every part of the
room examined, M^cSweeny was more puzzled than ever. His reason told
him most emphatically that the valuables could not have gone without
hands, and yet he could not suggest even to himself how fingers could
have got at them. There was not a crevice in the room—the house was a
modern one, and therefore could not have any invisible stairs, doors,
or passages in the walls; and even if these had existed, he could
not conceive it possible for anyone to enter the room and remove the
jewels before the owner’s eyes, and he sitting there wide awake,
looking straight before him. However, he had promised great things,
and by his confident looks, and winks, and nods hinted at greater,
so all he could now do was to take refuge in a little boldness. In
entering the house he had got his eye on the page-boy, who was in
the act of stuffing something out of sight into one of his pockets.
As M^cSweeny reached the boy’s side a whiff of the page’s breath
ascended to his nostrils, and seemed to point to the cause of the
hurried act of concealment.

“Tobacco, the young spalpeen!” was M^cSweeny’s mental exclamation.
“The boy that can smoke is fit for anything. Just wait a minit, my
jewel, and I’ll frighten the very sowl out of ye.”

Having inspected Mr Stafford’s study, and made nothing of the work,
M^cSweeny had no difficulty in working himself up into a fit of rage
against the page.

“Just ring the bell, plase, for that boy in the tight jacket and
buttons,” he said to Mr Stafford when they had returned to the
sitting-room. The bell was rung, and the page appeared, when
M^cSweeny grandly requested to be left alone with the quaking boy.
Mr Stafford accordingly withdrew, when M^cSweeny elaborately took
from his pocket first a note-book and pencil, and then a pair of
handcuffs, which he clanked noisily down on the table before the
boy’s eyes.

“Now, you boy—your name?” he sternly began.

“William Lister, sir,” said the page, visibly alarmed.

“Well, William, I’m the great detective M^cSweeny, and I’ve come here
on a great case. You know what I can do to you, I suppose?”

“Ye—ye—yes, sir,” stammered the page, nearly crying, and shaking on
his legs.

“Now look me in the face, sur,” and M^cSweeny grabbed the boy
suddenly by the arm, and forced him down on his knees—no very
difficult task—while he chained him with his fierce eyes. “Now, sur!
you’ve been robbing your master!”

“No—no—no—sir!” cried the boy, clasping his hands in an agony of
terror, and beginning to howl.

“You tuck them; I can see it in your eye,” sternly returned
M^cSweeny. “Now, where have ye hid them? Out with it, or off to jail
ye go!”

More abject howling and protesting, and then the boy blubbered out—

“It was for my mother I took them.”

“Your mother, ye villin. She’s fond o’ them things, I s’pose?”
derisively returned M^cSweeny.

“Ye—ye—yes, sir.”

“And she’s got them now, eh!”

“Yes—oo! hoo! hoo!”

“And where does she live?”

“Bu—bu—bu—ccleuch Street, sir.”

“Then we’ll go there now,” sternly observed M^cSweeny, highly elated
with the success of his bold measures; “and luck here now, if ye try
to escape I’ll shoot you—shoot you! with a double-barrelled poker.”

The terror-stricken culprit rose and got his cap; and they were
moving out of the lobby when Mr Stafford appeared.

“It’s all right, sur,” whispered M^cSweeny, with a significant wink;
“you’ll have them here for identification in an hour.”

“But how was it done?” cried the gentleman in amazement.

“Done? What trick is there that’s too difficult or dirty for an idle
vagabone of a boy?” responded M^cSweeny with a wise look. “I knew
what a scamp he was the minit I smelt tobacco on him,” and M^cSweeny
got out his own pipe ready for lighting when he should be outside the
door.

The boy, all the way to his home, was tremulously asking what would
be done to him, but his captor smoked away in dignified silence,
more terrible to the prisoner than the most voluble of threats. At
length the great oracle spoke, and gave the boy to understand that
the nature and duration of his punishment would depend very much upon
himself—if he agreed to tell how the robbery had been accomplished,
and all other particulars, his punishment would probably be extremely
light. This gracious concession gave great comfort to the boy, who
instantly promised to keep back nothing. They had then arrived at the
house in Buccleuch Street.

It was a poor hovel of a room, both damp and dark, being on the
ground floor. A woman who opened the door was promptly introduced to
M^cSweeny as the boy’s mother. The boy whispered to her for a moment,
and then led M^cSweeny to the fireplace. A small fire burned in the
grate, and on that fire was a pot of broth. The boy lifted down the
pot on to the hearth, and, handing an old ladle to M^cSweeny, told
him to “take them out.”

“What a hiding-place!” was M^cSweeny’s inward comment. “The young
scoundrel’s as clever as if he had been wan of my bairns all his
life. To think of him making broth of jewels!—begorra, he deserves a
prize for fine cookery.”

As he made these comments M^cSweeny began to rake up the contents of
the pot, but found no trace of the magic jewels.

“What do ye mane, ye young spalpeen?” he cried at last, in terrible
tones, to the boy and his quaking mother. “Didn’t you say they were
here, in the pot?”

“Yes—that’s them,” said the boy, stopping his whimpering to point
to a heap of beef bones, with some shreds of meat still adhering to
them, which M^cSweeny had removed one by one from the pot.

“What?” The thought was too humiliating—too horrifying; and M^cSweeny
could find voice for only the one word.

“That’s them,” repeated the boy, touching the steaming bones, “and
I’d never have taken them, only the servant said they were no use.”

“It’s jewels I’m after!” shouted M^cSweeny in a great rage. “Jewels!
£200 worth of jewels!”

“Jewels? I never saw them,” cried the boy, drying up his tears with
marvellous alacrity. “You said bones, I thought—at least it was the
only thing I ever took, and thought you meant them.”

All this was dreadful to M^cSweeny, and yet it was so simply
and naturally spoken, that he could not for a moment doubt the
truthfulness of either. With a great show of bluster and official
activity he searched the whole of the little hovel, but, of course,
found no trace of jewellery of any kind; indeed, the page-boy
protested loudly that he had never seen his master with jewellery in
his possession, and so could not possibly have stolen it.

The return to Mr Stafford’s house was not quite such a triumphal
procession as M^cSweeny had expected, and when there he had nothing
but utter failure to recount. He went over the whole house, and
questioned the other servants, with a like result. He was not a step
nearer the solution than when he began. There remained then but one
slender hope—that the thief might attempt to dispose of the jewels,
so M^cSweeny finished his work by taking a minute description of
these valuables, and having them inserted in our printed lists sent
round to all dealers and pawnbrokers. A tour round the most of these
produced no better result. No one had offered such articles either
for sale or pledge. At the end of a week, when I was beginning to
“hirple” about again, we were in one of these dealers’ places, when
I suggested that the description of the jewels was rather vague for
the pawnbrokers, and that we might go along to the jeweller who had
sold them to Mr Stafford, and have it made fuller and more complete.
A reference to the scribbles which M^cSweeny called notes revealed
the fact that no such name was recorded. I sent M^cSweeny out to the
South Side to have the omission rectified, not being able to walk as
far myself, and on his return learned that Mr Stafford had had some
difficulty in remembering the name himself. However, on M^cSweeny
naming two or three of the principal ones in Princes Street, he at
length spotted one as the right one. In the evening I chanced to be
in Princes Street, and went into the shop to get the description. To
my surprise, the jeweller and all his assistants declared that no
such purchase had been made in the shop. Back I sent M^cSweeny to Mr
Stafford, when that gentleman at once smiled out knowingly, and said—

“I think I understand that statement of the jeweller. It is all a
plot between him and my servants—he is to swear that he never sold
them, and they are to declare that they never took them. The jeweller
will thus get them back, and they will divide the spoil.”

M^cSweeny scratched his red pow, looked up at the ceiling, and then
down at the carpet, and finally confessed that he did not exactly
catch the drift of the gentleman’s reasoning.

“I will explain—I will confide in you as a friend,” said Mr Stafford,
waxing warm. “I am a lonely man, without wife or children to look
after my interests and protect me from designing persons. The
consequence is that I am continually being persecuted, robbed, and
cheated. One of my acquaintances, whom I never injured by thought or
deed, carried this torture to such an extent that I was forced to
leave the city.”

“Could you not have got the protection of the police?” suggested
M^cSweeny.

“Useless. How could I prove the persecution? I fled to London; the
wretch followed me there; I took the first train from the place; it
landed me at one of their pleasure gardens—the grounds of the Crystal
Palace, I think. I enjoyed myself there; when all at once my fiend—my
tormentor—as I must call him—appeared before me. I ran from the spot;
a balloon was just starting; I leaped in, cut the rope, and shot up
into the air, laughing in triumph at the chagrin of my persecutor.”

“That was a neat escape,” observed M^cSweeny; “but how did ye get
down again?”

“The most awful part of the adventure was to come,” pursued Mr
Stafford. “When I had got up a certain distance I got freezing cold,
and thought to warm myself with a smoke. In striking a light some of
the gas escaping from the balloon must have touched and exploded, for
the next moment the whole thing was in shreds and flames, and I was
flying towards earth with the speed of a cannon ball.”

“And ye was kilt? Smashed to atoms?” exclaimed M^cSweeny in earnest
horror, with his hands raised, and his eyes almost starting from
their sockets.

“No; fortunately I fell into the water, and, being an excellent
swimmer, I managed to save myself. I returned to Edinburgh, but my
tormentor was soon upon my track again, and even yet he continues his
persecutions upon every occasion when there is no chance of being
seen. Possibly he is at the bottom of this mysterious robbery.”

M^cSweeny asked the name of this persecutor, and after a good deal of
demur on the part of Mr Stafford, the name was given, when it proved
to be that of an eminent professor, as renowned for his learning
as for his goodness. M^cSweeny was a good deal staggered, but took
leave, saying he would make inquiry into the matter, and see that Mr
Stafford was annoyed no longer.

When he came to me with his report I laughed outright, and said—

“Why, the man’s mad! I wonder you did not see it in him before.”

“What man? The Professor?” inquired M^cSweeny, with great simplicity.

“No, this Mr Stafford.”

M^cSweeny would not believe it, and I suggested that we should
ascertain if he had really drawn £200 from the bank on the day of
the alleged purchase of the jewels. I did not believe that he had,
but was surprised at the bank to find that he had really drawn
that sum. We then went over every jeweller’s in Princes Street,
but could not discover one who had sold to any one on that day the
jewels described as stolen so magically. After thinking over these
discoveries for a little, I formed in my mind a theory, which proved
pretty sound in the end, and which I proceeded to test, by going
out to Mr Stafford’s house in company with M^cSweeny, and having
a talk with that gentleman upon general topics. When done, I felt
slightly disappointed. I could find no trace of insanity about the
man, but then I ought to have remembered that my profession is not to
detect lunacy, but thieves. Still, acting on my theory, I requested
permission, and Mr Stafford’s assistance, to search the whole house.
This was given with the greatest alacrity. We went over every room
and closet, but Mr Stafford’s study, without discovering anything.
Then we came to that room, and I promptly asked for his keys. The
request appeared to stagger him, but was granted, and I turned out
all the drawers in his writing-table. At the bottom of one of them
was an envelope or thick packet, which I took up, but which he as
hastily tried to take from me, saying—

“That’s only some bank notes—some money of mine.”

Very impolitely, as it may seem, I retained the envelope, turned out
the contents, and found, on counting the notes, that they amounted to
£200 exactly. I then handed them to the owner without a comment, and
searched no more. With a shrewd suspicion of what I might expect, I
went to the Professor whom Mr Stafford had named as his persecutor,
and from him learned Mr Stafford had, on a former occasion, been
unfortunate enough to injure his brain by over-study, and was by
the Professor’s advice removed to an asylum for the insane. That
gentleman, who evinced the liveliest friendship for Mr Stafford,
agreed to see his friend at once, and report on his mental condition.
The result was, that Mr Stafford was proved to be not exactly insane,
but in a condition of mental derangement which threatened to become
more pronounced, and it was decided that he had better have an
experienced attendant from one of the asylums. This was arranged
quietly, and with very little demur on the part of the patient, but
his condition became more grave, and eventually he had to be removed
to an asylum, in which, with one brief interval, he has remained ever
since. His mind, however, has taken firm hold of the story of the
magic jewels, and the development which that incident has now assumed
is that I, the writer of these sketches, was the robber of the
jewels, and that, in fear of detection, I smuggled the money I had
received for them into his drawer. He also asserts that I declared
him insane only to protect myself from the consequences of the crime,
and that if I could be removed from power his liberation would at
once follow. Poor, suffering humanity! who shall minister to a mind
diseased?




BENJIE BLUNT’S CLEVER ALIBI.


How Benjie Blunt came to get his name I never could discover—possibly
it was prompted by the law of contrariety, because Benjie was so
sharp. His real name had not the remotest resemblance to this, but as
he refused to answer to that, he was always put down in the prison
books as Benjamin Blunt.

Benjie’s vanity was much greater than his acquisitiveness. He liked
to boast of the feats he had done, hence the cases in which he was
mixed up generally showed a superlative degree of ingenuity and
cunning, however small the stake. I do not find, however, that
Benjie’s cleverness produced any marked diminution in the number of
his convictions—indeed, it was the grave length of that list which
prompted him to make such elaborate preparations in the following
case.

Close to the Meadows, and before that quarter was so much built
upon, there was a cottage occupied by an old army surgeon, whom I
may name Dr Temple, and his servant, Peggy Reid. This gentleman was
a bachelor, and somewhat eccentric, and, as he had spent the most of
his life in India, he was supposed to be very rich. Dr Temple was as
exact and punctual in his habits and engagements as if he had been
still in the army. Everything went on like clock-work in his snug
little home, and if a servant did not please him in that respect,
he discharged her on the spot. One of his habits was to spend every
Thursday evening at a friend’s house, leaving his own house at seven
o’clock, and returning at half-past ten. His house was full of Indian
curiosities and nicknacks, but most of them were of a kind which
could not have been readily turned into money. The cottage had a
little garden in front, railed in, and had also a space at one end,
in which stood a coal cellar, a wash-house, and an empty dog kennel.

A working joiner happened to be passing this cottage about nine
o’clock on a Thursday night, and, glancing up towards the front
door, was surprised not so much at seeing it standing half-open as
at noticing something like a human foot and the skirt of a dress
lying motionless on the lobby floor. There was a light in the lobby,
and the inner glass door was also ajar. The man stopped and stared,
wondering whether it was not some servant busy scrubbing the floor,
and lying on her side to reach some corner scarcely accessible. But
the foot did not move, and as the place was lonely and dark, the
man suspected something was wrong, looked round for a policeman
in vain, and then pushed open the gate and advanced towards the
strange object. He found Dr Temple’s servant, Peggy Reid, lying on
the lobby floor behind the outer door quite insensible. At first the
man thought she had been knocked down, and so stunned, but seeing no
traces of a blow, and finding that she breathed calmly and regularly,
he came to the conclusion that she was drunk, and vainly tried to
arouse her by shaking her and propping her up on a lobby chair.
As she gave but faint signs of awaking, he then tried to call the
assistance of the household by ringing the bell, and, getting no
response, concluded that the house was empty, and went in search of
a policeman. At the Middle Walk he was fortunate enough to catch the
glare of a policeman’s lantern, and soon had the man informed of the
strange discovery. They went back together to the cottage, and found
the servant girl still sitting in the lobby, and looking stupid and
confused.

“A man rang the bell and said the doctor sent him for his stick,”
she feebly explained in reply to the policeman’s questions. “Then he
shoved himself in and held something to my mouth, and everything grew
dark.”

“Chloroform,” said the policeman shortly. “The house has been robbed,
I’ll swear. Let’s look through it and see.”

With some assistance Peggy was able to get on her feet and lead them
through the house. A great deal of damage had been done; ornaments
and curiosities smashed and tossed down in sheer wantonness or anger,
but not much of value taken. Some silver ornaments and jewellery,
and an old-fashioned gold watch, were all that the servant could
say positively were gone; but it turned out afterwards that a
considerable sum of money in gold and bank notes had been taken
besides these valuables. An Indian casket of carved wood, ornamented
with ivory, was also missed on the day following. It was not worth
sixpence to any one but the owner, and why it had been taken was a
mystery to all.

While this discovery was being made, or possibly a short time
before, a curious arrest was being made in the High Street, which, as
everyone knows, is about seven minutes’ walk from the Meadows. Benjie
Blunt had made his appearance in the High Street, not far from the
Central Station, uproariously drunk and apparently reckless of all
consequences. He staggered about, shouting out sundry sounds which
were supposed to represent a song, he insulted everyone within his
reach, and, finally, in making a mad grasp at some of the tormenting
gamins clustered about him, he fell forward on his face, and was
so overcome that he could not get up again. A crowd cannot gather
in the High Street at any time without almost instantly attracting
our attention. The man on the beat was soon at Benjie’s side, and
on telling him to get up was rewarded with a kick on the shin bone.
Another man had to be summoned, and between them, with the greatest
difficulty, they managed to carry the limp and drooping figure
of Benjie into the station, by which time that worthy was quite
incapable of speech, and was locked in a cell to sober at leisure.
Benjie passed the night in a profound slumber, and was next morning
placed at the bar of the Police Court, and fined in five shillings,
or seven days. When had a professional thief five shillings to spare?
or the inclination to part with the sum, unless he had urgent and
profitable work awaiting him outside?

Benjie declared himself bankrupt, and made a pathetic appeal to the
Sheriff to be let off “just this once,” and was then hustled out and
taken to the cells, no more depressed than if he had been starting
for a week’s holidays. Indeed, from the manner in which he thrust his
tongue into his cheek, and bestowed on me an impudent wink as he was
led off, it struck me that Benjie was highly delighted with himself
or his oratorical display. I failed to see any cleverness in it; I
was to think differently later on.

I had been out at Dr Temple’s cottage not an hour after the
discovery; and as I found the servant perfectly recovered, and with
not a scratch to show as the result of the attack, I rashly concluded
that she herself was the thief, with or without an accomplice.
My idea was that the lying in the lobby with the door open and
apparently insensible was a mere feint to throw suspicion off herself
while her companion escaped with the booty. My only wonder was that
she had not been found bound and gagged as well, and it was that
omission which made me wonder if she had done the whole thing single
handed. With this thought uppermost I searched the whole cottage
and garden very carefully, expecting to find the plunder there
buried or hidden. The dog kennel already noticed stood on feet,
and was about four inches off the ground, and it seems strange to
me now that I did not have it moved or looked below. However, the
oversight—which I actually made—mattered little, for at that time
the plunder was not there. I merely mention the fact to show what
a narrow escape the girl made, for had the stolen things been got
there she would certainly have been arrested; and that they were not
there found was not through any planning or skill of the thief. That
which complicated the case to all concerned proved a blessing to the
servant girl.

Peggy Reid, when questioned by me, asserted her belief that she would
know the man again who had held the handkerchief over her mouth
and nostrils, and stated that she had noticed a man resembling him
hanging about the place, and passing and repassing some days before.
I had no faith in her ability to do so, for at that time I strongly
suspected herself, but I made a raid among “my bairns,” and picked up
two fellows, who were shown to her without success.

She was positive that neither of them was the man, and they were
liberated. If Benjie Blunt had been at liberty I might have thought
of him, but at that time he was demurely picking oakum in Calton
Jail to wile away the tedium of his sentence of seven days. He had
been carried into the Central Office, dead drunk, an hour before the
robbery was reported, and what could be more satisfactory to us?
Candidly, the thought of Benjie in connection with the singular and
daring robbery never once rose in my mind.

Failing with the two first arrests, I kept my eyes open for the
spending of the money which had been the chief part of the plunder.
A flutter of interest quivers through the whole thieving community
the moment a big haul is taken by any of their number. It will not
hide; you see it in their faces, in their manner, in their gorging
and drinking, and in a certain indescribable furtive uneasiness and
excitement which they show when visited and questioned.

The only one whom I found to be unusually flush of money was a man
named Pat Corkling, better known as “Pauley.” Pauley was more a
beggar and tramp than a thief, and had got his nickname by evading
hard labour during a sentence for vagrancy by pretending that he had
a “pauley,” or paralysed, right hand. Pauley, then, was spending
money freely, and yet always too drunk to go out begging. I
therefore removed him to the Central, and had him searched.

We found more money on him than he could account for, but none of it
could be identified, and Peggy Reid, on being shown Pauley, declared
most positively that he was not the man.

Pauley was therefore released, and went away triumphant, with the
money in his pocket, to resume his drinking and gorging.

At this stage of the affair there occurred a most singular and
unaccountable event. Benjie Blunt was set at liberty, having duly
served his term of seven days, and that very night the policeman
Bain, on the beat past Dr Temple’s cottage, was suddenly attacked
in a ferocious manner by a man who ran off the moment the assault
was made. Since the discovery of the robbery Bain had been ordered,
with Dr Temple’s permission, to enter the garden by the gate during
the night, and make the circuit of the cottage to see that all was
secure. He had done so on that occasion, and was scarcely out of the
garden when a powerful hand drove the hat over his eyes, while a
powerful foot administered a vicious kick to the small of his back.
While he was dropping to the ground in agony a voice growled out
something to the effect that he was to “take that you thief!” Bain
managed to spring his rattle; but when he scrambled to his feet again
he found himself alone, the nimble assailant having flown like the
wind. No arrest was made, though Bain had to get a substitute for the
rest of the night, and go home to bed.

Next day, as if to add to the complications, a note was handed into
the Office addressed to me, with twopence of deficient postage to
pay, and which ran thus—

“A blake Sheep. yul finde the rober of mr temples is thee Peg on the
bete. serche him an his howse an yul see. giv him 10 yers the vilin.”

The most of this precious epistle was written in a species of
half-text, which did not seem altogether unfamiliar to me. So
impressed was I with the idea that I went over to the prison and had
a look at the copy-books of most of those in the school or who had
been in it lately. I did not come on any resembling it, and it was
not till Benjie Blunt came up to me on the street a few days later
that the possible connection between him and the curious writing
flashed upon my mind.

“Now, I remember—Benjie used to write a hand something like that,”
was my thought when he addressed me, and I fully expected that
Benjie’s first words to me would have a reference to the policeman
Bain, a most sterling and tried man, in whom we had implicit
confidence.

Benjie took a long time to work round to the subject uppermost on his
mind, but at length he said—

“I know you’re always on the look-out for hints, and you’re so kind
and attentive when I’m in you’re hands that I couldn’t help coming to
you with what I’ve found out.”

I grinned unfeelingly into his solemnly puckered-up face.

“O Benjie, try that on somebody else,” I rejoined, with a look which
must have convinced him that I was wide awake to his clumsy flattery.
“Out with what you’ve to say; I’ll find out your motive afterwards,
if it’s of any importance.”

“What’s it worth to put the thief in your hands?” he asked with
cunning look, which could not possibly be described on paper.

“It’s worth about as much as the thief or yourself—nothing,” I calmly
answered.

Ah, well, he was sorry for that, but he was still anxious to help
us—virtuous Benjie!—and would not mind doing a good action for once.

“You know Pat Corkling? Pauley, they call him,” he continued.

“Why! is he the man?” I cried in surprise. “I had a letter accusing
Bain, the policeman on the beat, of the crime, and I strongly
suspect, Benjie, that that letter came from _you_.”

Oh, no, it was quite a mistake. Benjie protested strongly—a trifle
too strongly—that he had never written such a letter in his life;
and I immediately concluded that he had written that letter, but was
puzzled to think why he should now come to me accusing Pauley.

“How do you know that Pauley did the job?” I asked, when Benjie had
done protesting.

“I didn’t say he did, and I’m not going to say it. I’m not to appear
as a witness in the case at all, mind—that must be the agreement, or
I tell nothing.”

“All right; I agree to that; go ahead with your story—I daresay it’s
a lie from beginning to end, so it doesn’t matter much.”

Benjie smiled delightedly at the compliment, and proceeded—

“When I got out of quod and heerd of the thing—which had been done
when I was in—I had a idee that the peg was the man that did it, just
like the man, whoever he was, that wrote to you,” demurely observed
Benjie. “Pegs is an awful bad lot—except you, of course—oh, honour
bright, except you,” he added, catching himself up barely in time.
“But then I found out that Pauley had been flush of money for near a
week, and I took to watching him. I didn’t get much out of him, for
he’s fly, I tell you.”

“That’s a great compliment from you, Benjie—what a pity he can’t hear
it,” I remarked.

“But there was some Indian ornaments took, wasn’t there?” Benjie
added, suddenly coming to the point, and looking innocently anxious
for enlightenment.

“Yes.”

“Well, I saw Bell Corkling with one of them—at least I think it would
be one of them—a silver thing, made like a butterfly—and I heerd that
others saw her with more, which she had put away in a safe place. O
Jamie! ye had Pauley up on suspicion—why didn’t you keep him while
you had him?”

“That’s a mistake which may be easily rectified, if we can find any
of the things in their possession.”

“Trust you for that, Jamie,” said Benjie, in servile admiration, at
the same time giving me a poke in the ribs for which I did not thank
him. “And, mind, be awful suspicious of him if he tries to prove a
_nalibi_, as they call it,” he added, with careful concern. “He’s an
awful liar, and could get others to swear anything.”

“Ah! he’s not alone in the world in that respect, Benjie,” I
significantly rejoined, “and has no chance to be till the hangman
gets you.”

Benjie gracefully acknowledged the compliment, and, after some more
advice and instruction, left me.

I knew, from the moment that Bell Corkling was named, that I should
have some trouble in getting evidence against them. They had no
fixed abode, and generally lodged at a place where dozens besides
themselves might as reasonably be suspected of the crime. This
beggars’ howf was in the Grassmarket, and its occupants had such a
reputation for stealing from one another that I scarcely expected
Bell or Pauley to be so foolish as leave their plunder about that
place. My opinion to this day is that Benjie _did not_ see the Indian
trinket in Bell’s possession, but merely inferred their guilt
from circumstances which I shall notice further on. Therefore the
task which Benjie conferred on me was much more difficult than I
imagined. I had Bell watched for a day by a smart little ragamuffin
whom I engaged for the purpose, and then I broke in on them at what
I thought was the most favourable moment—about ten o’clock at night.
The “kitchen” was full, but Pauley and Bell were in more select
and favoured society—the room of the lodging-house keeper, who was
helping them to dispose of some bad whisky. Bell looked angry and
excited when I appeared and my men closed the door; Pauley looked
concerned, and hurriedly said something across the table to Bell in
an undertone, when she made a swift motion as if to wipe her mouth
with her hand. All that took place while the fat lodging-house keeper
was rising, and, in tones of innocent wonder, asking what I sought at
such a time.

I had not an answer ready, for I was thinking of Bell’s peculiar
action, and watching her closely the while; but at length I said
pleasantly to Bell—

“I want to know how old you are, Bell.”

“Then I won’t tell you,” she fiercely answered.

“I didn’t ask you. I mean to find out for myself. You’re such a horse
of a woman—I want to see if I can tell by looking at your teeth. Come
away, now, like a good soul, open your mouth.”

Pauley turned pale, and Bell closed her lips more rigidly.

“Sha’nt,” she defiantly answered, in a mumble through her teeth.

“Ah, ladies are always shy on that point; I must take you to the
Office, and get a crowbar to prize open your jaws,” and I got out my
handcuffs to fit one on her, when she suddenly made a desperate gulp,
and then turned crimson in the face, and began to wave her arms and
kick her legs at a fine rate, gasping, and choking, and sputtering,
but failing to get the impediment either up or down her capacious
throat. She opened her mouth now without being asked, and the chasm
thus displayed was enough to frighten the bravest, but she was so
evidently in pain, and urgent in her motions, that I made an attempt
to relieve her.

Others tried in turn, but at length we had to send for a doctor, who,
with a peculiar instrument—like a long bent pair of forceps—managed
to bring out of her throat an Indian gold coin. As soon as I had
examined the coin, and made some pleasant remarks thereon, which
were very badly received by Bell, I asked for the remainder of the
plunder, and not getting it, searched the place thoroughly, when I
at last found a small paper parcel tied with a piece of twine, and
fastened up inside the chimney with a table fork. In this parcel
was most of the plunder, including the old-fashioned watch, which
seemed not a bit the worse of its smoking. The landlady was loud
in her denunciations of my prisoners, and they were good enough to
confirm her protests, by declaring that she knew nothing of the hide.
Still all three had to trudge, though the landlady afterwards got
off with an admonition. It was the table fork which saved her, for
it was proved that she had missed the fork days before, and kicked
up a terrible row, accusing one of the lodgers of having stolen that
useful article.

The arrest, and the manner in which it had been accomplished, seemed
to impress Pauley with a more exalted opinion of my powers. He did
not know that it was by a mere chance that I entered at the moment
when Bell had the Indian coin in her possession, and seemed to think
there was something uncanny about me. That was his first impression.
A day or two’s reflection made him veer a little. He had never told
the particulars of the robbery to a living being—even Bell had not
been so trusted. How then could I have known that he must be the
man? That was Pauley’s puzzle, and it led his thoughts insensibly in
the direction of Benjie Blunt. He sent for me at last, and asked me
point blank if he had been informed on by that worthy. I was a little
staggered by the question, and Pauley took me up at once.

“I see it was him that set you on to me and Bell—and there’s nobody
else could,” he bitterly continued. “Well, I can be even with him,
for I’m not the real man after all. If you’ll undertake to get me
off, I’ll put you up to the whole plant.”

I could make no such pledge, but Pauley’s anger was roused, and he
had resolved that Benjie should suffer, so he made unconditionally
the following statement:—

“That night when the robbery was done I met Benjie in a public-house
in the Pleasance. He pretended to be very drunk, but he wasn’t, and
I knew it, and wondered what he was after, as I smelt chloroform,
and knew he was the only one who could have it about him. He got
quarrelsome and broke a glass, and was put out of the place. I didn’t
stay long after, as I was curious about him. He went along a street
or two pretty drunk like, and then got as sober as a judge, and went
out very smart to the cottage at the Meadows. The whole job didn’t
last five minutes, and I watched it all a bit off. When he came
out again he had a narrow box in his hands, and he went to the dog
kennel and pushed the box in below it, and then bolted. I went for
the box, and got it, and bolted too, for I was frightened, seeing the
servant’s foot in the lobby, and thinking maybe he had given her too
strong a dose. I burned the box whenever I got under cover, and hid
everything but the money. I heard that Benjie was locked up for being
drunk and abusive the same night. He was no more drunk than I am now,
but I s’pose he thought he’d be safer in there than out.”

This story was too wonderful for me to credit at a moment’s notice,
but I thought there could be no harm in getting hold of Benjie. I had
pledged my word to him that he was not to appear in the case as a
witness; his appearing as a prisoner was quite outside of the bond.

I went to look for Benjie soon after my interview with Pauley, and
chanced to meet him coming up a close in the High Street, when he
graciously smiled out, and seized hold of my hand to shake it warmly,
while he thanked me most heartily for so neatly securing Pauley and
Bell. He seemed to look upon the capture as a personal favour done to
himself. He was shortly to change his opinion.

“I’ll go up the close with you,” I quietly remarked, turning and
accompanying him as far as the High Street. “There are some points in
that affair I’m not quite sure of, and I want you to go with me as
far as the Office.”

“All right, but I am not to appear as a witness,” he warningly
observed.

“No, no, not as a witness,” I assuringly returned, “and, lest anyone
should suspect you of peaching, suppose I put one of these on you and
take you along on suspicion?”

He looked at me suspiciously, but recovered and grinned out as I
snapped the steel on his wrist—

“It’s a good joke,” he said delightedly.

“I don’t mean it for a joke at all,” I said, becoming serious.
“Really and truly I am arresting you on suspicion.”

His whole countenance changed, his jaw fell, and for a moment he
stopped walking, and looked as wicked as any human being could look.

“You can’t prove anything against me,” he at length answered, moving
along with me in apparent confidence. “I can prove a _nalibi_, as
it’s called. I was in Fernie’s public-house in the Pleasance all the
afternoon, and was put out there drunk, and lugged into the Office
long before the robbery came off. I was drunk, but I knew what I was
about, and I know I was never near the Meadows.”

“Done!” I cried. “Oh, you fool! Why did you say so much? You’ve
convicted yourself by speaking of an _alibi_. It was the only link
awanting in the chain of evidence, for I could not conceive why you
should pretend to be drunk and then get back to the High Street and
have yourself locked up as drunk and incapable. Thank you, Benjie,
for your help in this matter. It was all a clever _alibi_ you were
arranging?”

Benjie emitted one oath, and then became silent, conscious,
doubtless, of the soundness of my remarks. An hour or two after
he had been locked up, I had Peggy Reid brought to see him, when
she unhesitatingly identified him as the man who had held the
handkerchief to her mouth on the night of the robbery. This drove
the last prop out from under Benjie, and he plaintively asked if
Pauley was to be accepted as evidence. Being informed that that
was a likely contingency, he thereupon stated that he would prefer
to plead guilty, in order that Pauley might suffer along with him.
His benevolent intention was humoured, and the three went to the
Penitentiary together, Benjie getting the lion’s share in the number
of years.




JIM HUTSON’S KNIFE.


Jim’s mother touched me on the arm as I ushered him into the Police
Court for the first time. I remember it all as well as if it had
happened yesterday. She had been loitering about the lobby, tearful
and oppressed, but was roused as by an electric shock when “James
Hutson!” was shouted out, and echoed through the corridor. She
gripped my arm as I was hurrying him in at the door, and the whole
arm attached to those rigid fingers shook as with an ague. The
tearful eyes brimmed over freely, and the parted lips moved, but for
a moment no sound came forth.

“Jim was aye a guid laddie,” she at length chokingly articulated.
“He’s been led away; he was never meant for a thief. Save him!
make it licht for him, and he’ll never come back here. Oh, Maister
M^cGovan, he’s the only ane left me—the only ane oot o’ six.”

I did not hear any more, for I was in a hurry, and the roll that
morning rather long, but the appealing face, the tears, and hurriedly
breathed outpourings of that poor mother’s heart, followed me
right into the court-room. Frantic and voluble appeals under such
circumstances are common, but this one was quiet, sudden, and
overpowering. I looked at the prisoner for the first time with
special interest. He was a young lad of sixteen or so, rather
strongly built, and manly-looking, but, of course, hanging his
head in shame as they generally do the first time. The case was a
very simple one. Jim was an apprentice plumber in a big workshop;
quantities of brass-fittings, copper wire, and tin had been missed,
and at last I was set to watch the workers. I followed several
innocent ones for a time, but at length came to Jim. I should have
overlooked him, for he had rather an innocent face, but for a certain
bulkiness about his body. Jim did not go straight home, but took a
certain broker’s on the way. He went through to the back shop, and I
surprised him there in the act of unloading. The broker, of course,
protested perfect innocence, but I took them both. The broker got
off by some means, and Jim now stood there alone. The charge was
theft, and confined to the articles taken with him, though that did
not cover a hundredth part of his pilferings. Was he guilty?

“Yes sir, guilty,” was Jim’s hurried answer, with his head lower on
his breast.

“Hae mercy on him!” rang out from the benches behind in the
unmistakable tones of Jim’s mother, as the magistrate paused in
doubt, possibly feeling to send such a fine lad to prison. “Let him
off this time, and he’ll never come back again.”

I was motioned to the side of the magistrate to give my opinion in an
undertone. I did try to make it light for the lad. I said I thought
he had been prompted to the acts by some one who was uncaught, that
his home training had been against such a course, and that he had
never been in court before. But I could not refute the statements of
his employers, that their losses had extended over more than a year,
and been serious indeed. A few moments thought, and the magistrate
spoke out without comment of any kind—“Thirty days.”

There was an impassioned outcry in a woman’s voice, but I did not
turn in that direction, as I did not want to see anything. I hurried
out the prisoner by the side door a moment or two later, and was
again clutched by the mother.

“He’ll come oot waur than he gangs in,” she exclaimed in despairing
accents, and with bitter reproach.

“Exactly, there’s little doubt of that,” I answered with assumed
coolness.

“Is that a just punishment?” she pursued, almost choked with tears,
as she clung to the arm of her son, who now seemed to shrink from her
in shame, and to long for the seclusion of the cells.

“It’s the Nemesis of crime—the chief part of the punishment,” I
returned; “they should think of that before they begin.”

We had to part them by force, and she called me a monster and a
brute, which I don’t think I am, though I did feel a little like one
at that moment.

Whether Jim had any prompter to his first crime, other than poverty
or the desire for tobacco and other luxuries, I never knew. If he
had, the man was probably one of the working plumbers, and possibly
took warning by Jim’s detection and pilfered no more. At the end
of the thirty days his mother was over at the jail door to receive
him with open arms and take him home with her. He promised there, at
the jail gate, that he would have done with crime for ever. I heard
him speak the words, and I believe he sincerely meant to keep the
pledge. But there were two things which neither he nor his mother
calculated upon. The first was that the taint of crime was now upon
him. Who would employ a lad who had been convicted and imprisoned
for theft? The second was still more serious, though at the time it
probably seemed trifling indeed. In prison, Jim had met his fate in
the shape of a young fellow of about his own age, named Joe Knevitt.
Joe was the very antipodes of Jim in nature and disposition, yet a
very strong friendship appears to have sprung up between them. Joe
was sly, cold, cautious, and thoroughly unscrupulous with friend or
foe; Jim was daring, hot-headed, impulsive, and passionate. Joe was
a professional thief by birth and training; Jim was the reverse. Joe
was as cunning a rascal of his age as ever came through my hands, and
could never be limed for any but the most trifling sentences, and
probably did not reveal his real character to his new acquaintance.
When Jim was set at liberty Joe had a week or two to remain in jail,
so they might have been separated for ever but for the taint of crime.

Jim was really not much worse through being in prison, but things
were very much worse for him. He tried to get work, and was
everywhere asked for his character. Sometimes he took courage and
confessed the truth, but when he did he was invariably dismissed
at once without further parley and with marked distrust. Then his
mother scraped together enough money to send him to Glasgow, in the
hope that he would succeed better where he was not known. Jim used
every penny of the money, and tramped back the forty miles in a
half-famishing state. Of course his mother cheered and consoled him,
and slaved for him at her wash-tub without a murmur; but a young lad
must fill up his time in some way. He could not sit all day looking
at his fingers, and he needed a little money if only to keep him in
tobacco. He met Joe Knevitt one day, and from that hour his troubles
seemed at an end; his silence and sullen despair vanished, he was
always cheerful and kind to his mother, and never wanted money. But
how the money was earned and how his time was spent he never could
clearly explain. He was not much in the house, and was never absent
for a night at a time, but his mother was deep in her work and knew
nothing, whatever she may have feared. I daresay she had many a
sorrowful hour, and pleaded and remonstrated with him unceasingly,
for the singular feature of Jim’s case was that his new life did not
harden him against his mother. If he was becoming dissipated and
brutalised, no trace of that was ever expended upon her. With her he
was always subdued and silent or full of promises for the future.
There were thus two influences at work—one dragging him downwards and
the other tugging him back. Joe Knevitt’s proved the stronger, for
when this had gone on for some time Jim was again in my hands. This
time it was for an attempt—the very daring of which almost took my
breath away. I suppose the planning had been done by Joe Knevitt, but
the execution—the lion’s share of the work—fell to Jim.

The place chosen was a clothier’s at the South Side—a shilling-a-week
clubman—whose business premises were the third flat of a land of
houses, the fourth of which was the top. There was not the slightest
chance of getting in unseen by the door, as one part of the flat was
let to a person who was seldom out of the house. The remainder was
locked up when not occupied by the clothier and his band of tailors,
and most of the windows looked to the back. It happened that the
house was a corner one, and after much study and reconnoitering the
intending thieves decided upon a mode of entering which I would
not have risked for all the webs of cloth that ever were woven. A
quiet and very dark Sunday night was chosen for the attempt. The
two got up on the roof of the corner house joining that occupied by
the clothier, and Jim, who had under his coat a long length of rope
wound round his body with which to lower the webs of cloth to his
pal, crept down to the edge of the slates, and loosened with his
practised hand the zinc roan or rain gutter running along the edge of
the slates. This precarious bridge he sloped over the angle to the
window of the clothier’s store-room, a distance of only about twelve
feet, but with a slope on it that would have made anyone shudder had
they been forced to walk that plank against their will. Joe steadied
the top end of the frail bridge, and Jim went sliding down and
across with his life in his hands. He was _seen_ doing it, and the
accidental spectator afterwards assured me that his own hair nearly
stood on end as he saw it done. The passage was accomplished swiftly,
and in safety, but Jim’s difficulties were only begun. He stood on
the window-sill, three storeys from the ground, but tug as he could
the window-sash refused to move. Fancying that it might have been
fastened inside he removed one pane of glass in a fashion of his own,
inserted his arm, and found to his dismay that the window was not
bolted in any way, but only paint-fast. To attempt to move it he knew
would be folly, and yet he could not go back to the opposite roof.
There was only one way out of the fix—to strip off his jacket and
the rope he had brought and try to wriggle through that open pane.
He removed as many of the points of broken glass as he could with
the aid of his jacket, but in doing so let go the end of his rope,
which dropped into the green behind, and left him there isolated and
helpless. He cursed over the loss, doubtless, but quickly began the
wriggling business, and in a few minutes had struggled through—his
shirt sleeves and waistcoat, and even his skin, considerably torn
and damaged in transit. When he was in, and the whole coast clear,
he thought little of the trouble and danger. He passed to the next
room, found the window of that more manageable, and coolly proceeded
to select his plunder. He did not hurry himself, for he had not the
slightest suspicion of having been seen, every window near him being
dark. Having made his selection, he was in the act of tearing up a
web of cloth into strips to replace his lost rope, and lower the
plunder by, when he was startled by a sudden, shrill whistle, at the
far-off end of the green below. He knew the whistle, and what it
meant—danger! but could not conceive why the shrill sound should have
been thrown out at such a time. Joe was surely growing childishly
timid. Jim went to the window, ready opened, and peered out. Not
a soul was in sight. Reassured, he went back to his rope-making,
but had made no progress worth recording, when a loud knock at the
outer door of the house brought him to his feet, with his heart
beating fast with dismay. Only till he heard the door opened and
a rough voice say something about “thieves in the house,” did he
delay. He did not even think of a rope of cloth strips. The hands
of the police were already on the door of the room. He sprang at
the window, remembering as he did so the exact position of the roan
pipe running down outside the house into the drains below. The pipe
was of cast-iron, and fastened to the wall with strong stancheons.
Jim grasped it from his perch on the window-sill, and ran down it
hand under hand as if it had been a rope. It was a feat he would
never have attempted in cold blood. He reached the green just as
the policemen thrust out their heads at the window above and sprang
their rattles. Then he dived for the nearest doorway, but was there
met by a man who had helped to give the alarm, and who collared him
and gave him a hard struggle for liberty. Jim was younger and lighter
than his captor, but he was desperate, and he came off victor, and,
leaving the man almost breathless on the ground, he was off into
hiding as fast as fear and his supple limbs could carry him. The
struggle, however, had taken place near a bright stair-light, and
the vanquished man had a full and clear view of Jim’s features, and
was able to give me, an hour or two later, such a description that I
had little doubt of being able to trace the scared thief. Only _one_
had really been seen at the job, and I was not surprised, on making
inquiries for Joe Knevitt, to hear that he was “away in Glasgow,
and had been there for a week.” The same could not be said of Jim
Hutson, for I found him in his mother’s house demurely kneeling
by the hearthstone, and helping his mother by chopping sticks. He
denied having been out the night before, and his mother with tears
supported his statement—doubtless believing it true—for he might have
waited till she slept before he went out. But I had to take him, and,
of course, he was identified—picked out of a dozen men without a
moment’s hesitation—and locked up. His mother was at the Police Court
next day (in tears, of course), and with her old appeal on her lips—

“Jim was aye a gude laddie; he may be guilty, but he’s been led away.”

I could not listen to her this time, and kept out of her reach. How
could I say a word in favour of him now, when I knew him to keep
company constantly with the worst of my “bairns?” Jim was remitted to
the High Court, where he got a year’s imprisonment. I nipped up Joe
for another affair some time after, so in misfortune they were not
divided.

I have not yet noticed Jim Hutson’s knife. It was at this capture
that I saw it first, when I emptied his pockets at the Central
Office. It was a murderous looking weapon with two blades. The big
blade was at least six inches long, but was not fitted with a spring
back, or Jim would have looked upon it for the last time, as it
is illegal to carry such a knife. Perhaps it would have been well
for Jim if such a confiscation had taken place. The knife was of a
peculiar make, probably foreign, and had a hole drilled through the
buck-horn handle, as for a cord, and most likely had been stolen
from some sailor. Across the buck-horn handle Jim had made two deep
notches with a file, with a cross cut between, forming the letter H.

This knife, after some joking comments by me, was put away with Jim’s
tobacco pipe and other treasures, to be returned to him when his
term expired. But before that time came Jim had done something which
quickened curiously the interest I already felt in his career. One of
the warders had in some way excited the rancour of three prisoners,
and they laid their heads together and recklessly resolved to “pitch
into him.” By a most ingenious plot they managed to get him alone,
and then ferociously attacked him with hammers. Jim, however, had
taken a liking to the man, and, happening to be near, he at once,
with that bull-dog bravery which had always distinguished him, took
the part of the warder. He fought two of them single handed, though a
good deal pounded and hurt in the struggle, and was seized with them,
by mistake, and hurried off to the dark cell. As soon as matters
had been explained by the rescued warder, Jim was brought forth and
handsomely complimented by the governor, and from that day till the
expiry of his sentence treated with marked lenience and favour. I
was over in the jail shortly after this affair, and, chancing to see
Jim among the workers, I took him aside for a word. “Jim,” I said,
putting my hand on his shoulder and speaking with great earnestness,
“you’re in the wrong line entirely. You are just the stuff a good
soldier is made of. Get into that as soon as you are let out. It’ll
be a new life—an honest one—and advancement is sure for you. It’s a
sheer waste of material to have you herding here with these louts.
Rise above them. These cowards are fit for nothing else, but you, you
can be a man if you choose.”

While I spoke I saw his eyes—which were fixed somewhat shame-strickenly
upon the ground—gradually light up. A new possibility had dawned upon
him.

“I think you’re right, sir,” he said at last, very gratefully; then
he added with great firmness—“I’ll enlist whenever I get out.”

He meant to do it, and would have done it, but for his mother. What
fatality prompted her to veto the whole plan?—to abjure him with
tears and clinging love, which were resistless, to remain at home
and not trouble himself about the future while he had her to slave
for him? She shuddered at the idea of her boy—her youngest, and the
last of them all, going into a battle, and recklessly tearing through
showers of bullets and walls of steel, as she knew he would do. But,
could she have looked into the future, as I can now look back on the
past, she would have seen there something more to be dreaded. So Jim
continued to loaf about and live upon his wits, and when Joe Knevitt
joined him, the old practices came as a natural result. I saw Jim
once or twice and tried to reason with him, but his answer was always
the same—

“Mother won’t let me list.”

“Then I’ll have you again soon,” I gravely remarked.

“I can’t help it,” was his cool reply, and I suppose he thought the
event far off. With the confirmed thief it is always some one else
who is to be taken, never himself. Jim had really not over-rated
his cleverness. He had grown more cautious by experience, and might
have eluded me but for his rock a-head—Joe Knevitt. I believe there
was a woman in this rupture—one of those flashy shop girls who sell
cigars and tobacco and flirt with everybody, and whom Joe wanted
entirely to himself; but the ostensible reason was a difference about
their respective shares in the plunder from a certain robbery down
at Greenside which puzzled us not a little. There is a certain style
in every thief’s work. In any kind of job where Jim’s old plumber
experience helped him, he was perfectly at home, and had this affair
shown any trace of that, I should have gone for him at once. But
there was no trace of violence or tearing down of wood-work, or
wrenching or unscrewing. It was a shop, and the door was found locked
as usual when the owner entered it next morning and found the most
valuable part of his stock gone, and about twenty pounds in silver as
well, which he had thought too heavy to take home the night before.
I searched the whole shop _carefully_, and found no trace of the
thieves or clue to their identity; and candidly may now confess that
I suspected the _owner_ was the thief, that for some purpose he had
robbed himself. I was mistaken, of course, for the door had been
opened and locked again with skeleton keys made by Knevitt.

Meanwhile Joe and Jim were quarrelling, and Joe proceeded to settle
the dispute in a fashion of his own. On the second morning after the
robbery, the shop boy in sweeping out the place found a big clasp
knife, which he had not noticed before, in a dark corner behind the
counter. The knife was shown to his master, and finally brought
up to the office to me. The moment it was placed in my hands I
exclaimed—“What! did you find that in the shop? How did I miss it
when I was there? It’s Jim Hutson’s knife. I’ll soon have the thieves
now, and possibly the plunder too.”

Down I went to Jim’s home in College Wynd. He was not in.

“He’s got wark,” his mother explained.

“So I think,” was my dry rejoinder. I looked over the house, and
finally under the bed found a parcel tied up in brown paper.

“He brocht it in last nicht,” his mother simply remarked. “He’s
keeping it to obleege a freend.”

I opened the parcel, and found it contained part of the stolen goods.
I was explaining this to the mother when Jim appeared in working garb
for his breakfast. He changed colour at once, and sat down, or rather
dropped down, into a seat by the fire.

“It’s all up, Jim,” I said with some pity. “I told you I’d have you
soon.”

He stared at me, not in resentment, but with a strange, thoughtful
look in his eyes. “Have I been sold?” he at last inquired, rather
quietly. “Did he—I mean—did anyone betray me?”

“No,” I promptly answered, believing what I said. “Have you your
knife about you?”

He dived his hand into his pocket, and then appeared to reflect.

“You needn’t look there for it,” I remarked. “I’ll find it for you
when we get up to the office.”

“I had it yesterday—I’m sure I had it yesterday,” he said, after a
horrible pause.

“I don’t think so,” I gently observed in correction. “You dropped it
the night before.”

“What! do you mean to say you found it _there_?” he cried, his whole
face becoming white with fury.

“It was found,” I oracularly returned; and then, taking my advice, he
relapsed into silence, and quietly accompanied me.

Of course the mother had to go too, but she was speedily released, as
it was quite evident, from her artless admission to me, that she knew
nothing of the robbery, and her character was above suspicion.

Jim did not deny his knife. He only said occasionally under his
breath—“He has done it! Wait; I’ll give it him back!”

His suspicion, which was probably sound, was that Joe had picked his
pocket of the knife, and then made some errand into the shop, and so
managed to drop the tell-tale article where it was likely to be found.

From these muttered imprecations I guessed that Joe was his partner
in the crime, and went for him as soon as Jim was locked up. An
ordinary thief would have betrayed his pal at once after such
dastardly treatment, but, as I have indicated, there was about Jim
a kind of manliness which scorned such a mean revenge. He remained
absolutely silent regarding Joe’s complicity, and, as that rascal was
cunning enough to take care of himself, we had no evidence against
him, and he was released.

In order to have his sentence shortened Jim pleaded guilty, and got
off with eighteen months’ imprisonment.

“When your term is up, Jim, go for a soldier,” I whispered to him as
he was led down stairs.

“Maybe I will—it depends,” he grimly answered with set teeth, and so
he disappeared for a year and a half’s moody reflection.

When the time came for his release he was fearfully excited for a
little over the fact that his beloved knife could not be found among
his treasures.

“My knife! my knife! I must have my knife!” he feverishly exclaimed,
and he absolutely refused to stir out of the prison till he got it.
When it was found and placed in his hands he appeared exuberantly
happy, and as impatient for liberty as he had before been reluctant
to leave.

At the gate, his mother, as usual, was there to receive him, but she
found him a good deal changed. He was moody and strange, except when
questioning her regarding Joe Knevitt. The little she knew of his old
pal was eagerly devoured, but beyond that he had little to say. At
home his first task was to get out his knife and grind its edge to a
razor-like keenness. His mother noticed the fact, and fancied that he
appeared specially careful with the point, but the only answer she
got was—

“Ah, it’s been lying a long time unused, mother. Eighteen months is a
long time—in prison;” and Jim’s teeth became set, and his two hands
shook as he tested the keenness of the point of the knife with his
thumb. His mother saw that she had touched a sore spot, and remained
silent. As soon as Jim’s task was over he set out to look for Joe. He
wanted him particularly, and was quite joyful when he learned that
Joe was still about the city, and not in prison. But search as he
could he did not find Joe, and at length learned that that cautious
customer had left for Glasgow on the very day of Jim’s release. No
matter, Jim thought distance a trifle, and followed as soon as he
could scrape enough money together. He took his knife with him. On
the second day he did see Joe for a moment or two—met him full in the
face in an entry off the Gallowgate; but the moment their eyes met,
and Jim’s hand went into his pocket, Knevitt ran like a hound, and
managed to distance Jim completely and escape. Next day Knevitt left
for Perth, after saying that he was off to Edinburgh; but Jim met a
man who had seen Joe take a ticket for Perth, and he followed. At
Perth he traced Knevitt without difficulty to a house known to them
both. But the hunted man had seen him approach, and by slipping on a
woman’s skirt and shawl and bonnet boldly passed him on the stair,
and escaped. Jim fathomed the trick a few minutes later, and cursed
his own stupidity in allowing the unnaturally tall female figure to
pass him; but by that time Knevitt was on his way to Dundee. The next
train took Jim there also. After a day’s hunting he met his man in
Couttie’s Wynd.

“By G—d! your hour has come!” he cried, darting his hand into his
breast pocket; but again Knevitt put on that fearful speed and ran
for life. Not far from the place is a ferry across to Fife. The pier
at which the boat starts is guarded by a gate which is closed when
the boat is about to move. Knevitt managed to get within that gate
just as it was being closed, and scrambled into the boat nearly dead
with terror, while Jim was thundering and shouting in vain outside
the gate in hope of admission. Knevitt had thus a whole hour’s start,
and, besides, had more money in his pocket. Jim, when he reached the
other side, was uncertain whether the hunted man had decided to walk
or ride; and his own funds being low, he resolved to walk. He had no
doubt as to the next goal.

“Edinburgh! he’ll be sure to land in Edinburgh!” he muttered to
himself, and thus he confidently tramped through Fife, reserving the
little money he had to pay the ferry at Burntisland. It was the dead
of winter, and bitterly cold, and when Jim arrived at his mother’s
house he was nearly dead beat. He had got over with a goods boat,
and reached home early in the morning. He lay down and slept all
day—a fevered, unrestful sleep, full of dreams and mutterings, and
suppressed threats and deadly words, which filled his mother with
terror. At night he awoke, and moodily consumed the meal placed
before him, and then limped to the door.

“Where are you for now?” asked his mother with a palpitating heart.

“Just going out to look about me,” was the answer, and then he
was gone. His mother thought she would look about her too, and
threw a shawl over her head and followed. During the two hours’
wandering which followed, she never lost sight of him. At last she
discovered that he was following a man—Joe Knevitt—who appeared quite
unconscious of the fact. Knevitt made for a tumble-down rookery in
a close a little below the Bridges. It was his home, and had the
advantage of being accessible from two sides—by the two flights of
wooden steps on one side, and by a back window on a level with a
higher close beyond. The garret on the top flat was all Joe’s, and he
clearly indicated to his foe that no one else was within by unlocking
the door as he went in. Jim had his shoes off in a twinkling, and
then crept up the first flight of steps and patiently waited in the
dark, with his knife ready unclasped in his hand. The poor mother
understood it all now, and, having before heard the place described,
she slipped round to the next close, clambered upon an outhouse,
and astonished Knevitt by tapping lightly at the window and madly
motioning him to come out and fly for his life. Knevitt needed no
explanation; her face was enough, and he was out at the window and
gone before she had well got over her excitement and terror. She
waited there for a full quarter of an hour to give him time to
escape; and then resolved to go in, open the door, and go down and
tell Jim that his plot was discovered and his intended victim far
beyond his reach. The door was opened, and Jim, watching below with
the knife in his hand, dimly saw a female figure descend where only a
man had entered.

“That trick won’t deceive me!” he cried, as he dashed up the steps
and drew back his right arm. “You’ve tried it once too often, Joe!”

One plunge of the sharp steel with all the strength of his powerful
arm, one low groan as the poor victim sank back on the steps, and
it was done, and Jim flying for life and liberty. His mother was
not dead when she was found, but it was quite evident that she was
mortally wounded. When her state was known, and preparations made
to take her deposition, she persisted that she had been stabbed by
Joe Knevitt. The knife found by her side was Jim Hutson’s, but his
mother, innocently or knowingly—I cannot tell which—said—

“Jim was aye a gude laddie, and though he was led away he wadna lift
his hand against his mother. Joe Knevitt did it, the ungrateful
scoondrel, after me daeing him a gude turn. _But dinna tell Jim_ or
he’ll kill him, and twa deaths winna mak’ ae life.”

We easily picked up Knevitt, but he denied the whole with such
manifest horror, and gave such explanations, that we set out to hunt
for Jim, and I was the one destined to unearth him; and also, I
regret to say, to inform him of the fearful crime he had committed.
That scene I can never describe. He dropped on his knees, rolled and
writhed on the floor, tearing his hair in a frenzy of agony, moaning
out but the two words—“My mother! My mother! My mother!” Of course he
confessed the whole crime in every detail; but his mother was never
told of the hand that gave her the death-blow. She lingered for some
months, and, the doctors said, did not actually die of the wound, but
of some trouble of the heart, brought on by the excitement and pain.
Jim was tried and convicted of manslaughter only, and was sentenced
to two years’ imprisonment. The sentence may seem light, but _that_
was not his punishment. He carried that within him. Joe Knevitt’s
bones now lie in the prison yard, but Jim’s dust is in a foreign
land, where he died on a battlefield in a way that made men call him
a hero. They did not know the secret of his daring.




THE HERRING SCALES.


The hawker of the herrings was not of the class usually seen in
the streets of Edinburgh, where they seldom own more than the
wheel-barrow containing the fish. He was a man of some substance,
having a donkey to draw his cart, and a number of pigs, and a big
garden, in which he worked during his spare hours. The place in which
he lived is a town some miles from Edinburgh, and the time when
the quarrel began the month of July. The quarrellers were a baker
named Dan Coglin, and the herring hawker aforesaid, Jamie Burfoot
by name. The baker was also a man of some means, being in business
for himself, and he would have prospered had it not been for his
uncontrollable temper. Coglin had in his time threatened to murder
every friend and acquaintance in the place, and doubtless in the
heat of his passion really meant to do so, but fresh objects for his
resentment constantly arose to divert him from his purpose. He was
one of those unhappy beings who meet with mighty wrongs, and slights,
and insults every day of their lives, and feel called upon to set
the world right in that respect, no matter at how great a risk to
themselves.

The quarrel took place at the bakehouse door, and was witnessed from
a stairhead above by a tailor named Thomas Elder, who had already had
more than one disagreement with the hot-headed baker.

Burfoot had stopped his donkey cart at the bakehouse door, and
offered some of his herrings for sale. They were fresh herrings, but
that was just the point on which the dispute began. Coglin said they
were stale, and added that Burfoot had cheated him often in the same
way before, adding some lively reflections on his character, from
which it appeared that the herring hawker ought to have been hanged
many years before.

Now, as often happens quite providentially in such cases, only one
of the men was violent. Burfoot was a quiet, canny customer, who
only laughed at the most outrageous of the baker’s remarks. His
character was in no danger from the insane ravings of such a man, and
the herrings were there to speak for themselves. He lifted one of the
finest, and handed it to the baker, saying simply—

“If that isn’t fresh out of the sea this morning I’ll give you the
whole load for nothing.”

This was said laughingly. Coglin took the herring, affected to sniff
at it, and then, with an expression of disgust, threw it back.
Burfoot’s mouth was open, and the pitched herring dived into the
cavity as neatly as if it had really been, what the hawker asserted,
“living.” Burfoot sputtered and choked, while the tailor above,
though wishing the quarrel to go the other way, could not restrain
a burst of laughter at the comical appearance the hawker cut. There
is a limit even to the endurance of a peaceable man. Burfoot no
sooner was free of the unexpected mouthful than he wildly grabbed
a handful of herrings from the cart, and battered them, as fast as
he could fire them, in the direction of the baker’s head. Coglin
retreated and closed the bakehouse door, and after some storming and
threatening Burfoot picked up the missiles he had used, tossed them
back into the cart, and drove on, shouting “Fine fresh herrings!”
Four or five of them, which had been dashed in at the open door at
the retreating baker, that worthy gathered up and complacently put
into a dish in the oven for his dinner. He was in a good temper,
for he thought he had got decidedly the best of the quarrel. He was
to change his mind next morning. Coglin’s business was a small one,
and, except at specially busy times, he did all his baking himself.
He was therefore the first and only one on the spot next morning.
The hour was an early one, but it was quite light, and he noticed at
once that something was wrong. The principal window to the bakehouse
had been raised, and the lower sash left wide open. The circumstance
excited his curiosity and surprise, but did not at first greatly
concern him. There was little of value in the bakehouse for thieves
to take, and he thought the raising of the sash might be only the
trick of some mischievous boy. He unlocked the door and got inside,
looked around the place, and then groaned and cursed to his heart’s
content. The batch for his early baking had been carefully “set” the
night before, that is, the dough had been carefully mixed in a wooden
trough, covered over with a board and some empty sacks, and left to
“rise.” It had not risen as he had expected, for the coverings had
been removed; his bakehouse “bauchles” had been stuck into the soft
mass, with all the shapes and biscuit markers, and a dirty can of
sugar and water, with its paint-brush, with which he anointed cookies
when they came hot from the oven, added on the top. That was not all.
A bag half-full of flour, which generally stood in a corner, had been
dragged forward and turned out on the floor, while into the white
heap had been poured his whole supply of barm.

When he had quite exhausted his stock of language, Coglin rose, and,
closing the window and door, made his way to the chief constable’s
house, where he roused that worthy man out of bed, and insisted upon
him dressing and coming to see the wreck.

The constable came and examined all, and then very naturally asked
who had been quarrelling with the baker. With a man of Coglin’s
disposition it would have been safer to ask whom he had not been
quarrelling with. Coglin went over the names of some of his foes,
but, having had the best of the slight affair with the herring
hawker, he never thought of naming Burfoot.

The constable made no great progress with the case, and I suspect
did not exert himself much, as there was general rejoicing over the
baker’s calamity, which was thought to be well deserved. Finding
this to be the case, Coglin insisted on having a detective brought
from Edinburgh. The case was important, he declared—nothing but
a conspiracy conceived and executed by half of the town’s folks,
including a magistrate and several leading town councillors, and
he would have the law to them though he should have to call in the
aid of the Home Secretary himself. Accordingly I went down to look
at the place, and was greatly amused by Coglin’s wild statements of
his troubles and daily martyrdom. In looking over the bakehouse,
I chanced to notice on the board which had been used to cover the
“batch,” or “sponge,” a number of herring scales—almost enough to
convey the idea of a hand-print.

I said nothing of the circumstance till I had examined the window
sash, and found two similar hand-prints of herring scales there also.

“Are you in the habit of handling herring often?” I asked, to which
he gave a prompt response in the affirmative.

“Oh, yes; there’s often as many as two dozen dishes of them here in
the morning to be fired in the oven.”

“And you take toll of a herring out of each?” I laughingly observed.

“No, no, I never touch them,” he hastily returned; and then I showed
him the herring scales on the board and the window sash. He looked
grave enough for some moments, and then burst out into a ferocious
“Aha!”

It was all he said for a few moments, but it clearly indicated that
the herring scales had suggested a great idea to him. What the idea
was I soon knew, for he proceeded to describe the encounter with
Burfoot, and ended by boldly affirming that the herring man and no
other was the author of the outrage. The inference seemed a very fair
one, and after getting a description of the quarrel, I decided to
see after the herring man. The result of my investigations in that
direction was absolute failure, so far as bringing home the guilt to
Burfoot was concerned. I not only got clear proof that Burfoot on the
night and morning of the outrage had been out of the town altogether,
but that he had been confined to bed and too ill to move out of the
house. Nothing could be clearer than the evidence on this point;
and when I had finished I was convinced that, whether Burfoot had
planned the outrage or no, he at least could not have been the actual
perpetrator.

Nothing more seemed to come of the herring scales, and I reported the
result to Coglin, who received it with a burst of abuse.

“And you call yourself a detective?” he scornfully shouted, and his
private opinions which followed are not worth recording.

“I believe that is what I am called, and what I earn my bread by,” I
quietly returned.

“Well, I’ll tell you what you are!” he shouted, working himself
nearly black in the face; and he then proceeded to declare that I had
been bought over by his enemies, and that he would now trust, not to
the police or the law for redress, but to himself. He looked so like
a maniac in his rage and fury, that I did not trouble to reply, but
left him and got back to Edinburgh, where other work soon drove the
recollection of the baker’s petty affair out of my head.

Coglin’s detective work did not begin where mine left off. He had
quite settled in his own mind who was the guilty one, and his only
difficulty was to decide on what punishment should be meted out to
the herring hawker. Many plans suggested themselves, but they mostly
had the objectionable feature of bringing the self-appointed judge
and executioner within reach of the law. At length a chance remark of
Burfoot—who, all unconscious of impending evil, was still on friendly
terms with the baker—prompted him to a scheme as ingenious as it was
diabolical. A son and heir had been born to Burfoot, and he gleefully
told the baker that he should soon hold a party of rejoicing over the
event, when the christening could conveniently take place. He did not
invite Coglin to form one of the party, but that oversight did not
distress the baker.

“I wish I could poison the whole of them,” was his inward comment as
he turned to his bakehouse, and out of that remark sprang the great
scheme.

Coglin of course knew something of the baking of fancy bread, and
the same evening, as soon as his ordinary work was over, he set to
and made a fine christening cake. He was careful to cover up the
windows and every chink in the door before beginning. In making up
the cake he hesitated long between some arsenic which he had got for
the rats in the bakehouse and another powerful drug as a seasoning;
but, having made his choice and hurried up the cake, he waited and
watched the firing of it as eagerly and attentively as if a Princess
Royal had been intended as the joyful recipient. The cake did not
rise well, probably owing to the queer spicing it had got, but Coglin
chucklingly decided that the sugaring would cover that. He snowed it
over with a preparation of white sugar, and then flowered it over the
corners and edges with pink, and finished up by lettering it boldly
in sugar as “A Present from Edinburgh.”

When the cake was finished, he covered it with a strong wrapper of
brown paper, and addressed it to “James Burfoot, Fishdealer,” adding
the name of the town in which they both lived, and the words “_per_
rail—carriage paid.” He was careful, in writing the address, to
disguise as much as possible his handwriting, and, it is needless to
add, he did not as usual put a printed label on the parcel bearing
his name and address.

Next morning he considerably astonished his son Bob, a boy of twelve,
by telling him that he needed him to go an errand.

The command was an awkward one for Bob, who had arranged with two
companions to spend the day at a town not far off, at which there
were to be races, and no end of shows and sports. Bob accompanied
his father to the bakehouse about as nimbly as a murderer going to
execution.

Above the cover bearing the name and address, Coglin had tied a
wrapper of paper to conceal the address, and inside that had placed
a sixpence wrapped in paper to pay the carriage. The parcel thus
arranged he sternly placed in Bob’s hands.

“You’re to take that to Edinburgh, and hand it in at the railway
parcel office. They’ll find the address and the money inside.
You’re to say nothing—just put down the parcel and walk out; do you
understand?”

“Could I not take it to the railway station here?” sulkily returned
his son. “It’ll go just as well.”

“No! You’re to go to Edinburgh, and ask no questions, or I’ll half
murder you!” cried Coglin. “It’s a present, and the—the customer
doesn’t want the folk to know who sent it, or where it comes from.”

“And am I to walk all the way to Edinburgh?” groaned the boy,
ruefully.

His father tossed him a sixpence, with the words—

“You can take the train;” and Bob’s spirits rose somewhat, but
scarcely to their normal level.

At the end of the lane he found his two companions patiently waiting.
They were overjoyed to see the sixpence, but the sight of the parcel
was a terrible damper. That load was all that lay between them and a
day of pure, unalloyed joy. They could have kicked the parcel; and
one seriously suggested to Bob that they should quietly drop it into
the river or the sea, and go their way undisturbed. Bob reluctantly
declined the proposal, but was easily persuaded to go to Portobello
first instead of to Edinburgh, and have his fill of fun before taking
the parcel to that city.

“It’s a present,” the boys reasoned, “and they’re not to know who
sends it or where it comes from, so it doesn’t matter whether they
get it soon or late, or whether they get it all, for that matter.”

Reader, did you ever, when a boy, tramp to Portobello and spend
half a day there on a light—a very light—breakfast? I have, and can
testify that the edge which that fine seaside resort puts on a boy’s
appetite would make chuckie stones or hedge leaves seem princely
fare. The wonder is—at least my wonder used to be, when we went in
droves—that some small boy, juicy and tender, in the gang, did not
mysteriously disappear on the return journey. The three travellers
enjoyed themselves famously on the sands. The sixpence of train
money vanished like magic. They bathed seven times, like the ancient
pilgrims of Jordan. They saw the races, and Punch and Judy, and
every kind of cheap delights, dragging that parcel about with them,
and each taking turns at carrying it through the crowd. At length Bob
and another decided to have another bathe, and left their clothes and
the parcel in charge of the third on the hot sandy beach. When they
returned, the wolfish guardian had the paper covers off the cake,
and was volubly explaining how a bit of the sugar coating must have
been broken off during their travels. He had eaten the bit, as it was
of no further use, and “Edinburgh” had disappeared. The two bathers
looked on with wonderful calmness. Their teeth were chattering, and
they were longing for a “hungry bite.” The remaining words of the
inscription were suggestive—“A Present from ——.” A mysterious unseen
donor was offering them a present.

“The folk wouldn’t like to get a broken cake like that,” suggested
one of the boys to Bob. “If we were to eat it, they’d never miss it.”

Hunger quickens the reasoning faculties. Bob at once saw the point,
and without waiting to dress he broke up the cake, and they all
filled their stomachs. The cake just fitted the three nicely; and
then they tore up the covers, annexed the sixpence found within, and
had a glorious somersault on the sands to celebrate their victory.

But “pleasures are like poppies spread,” and poppies, as everybody
knows, contain a deal of poison. These three conquerors were in turn
to be conquered—the fate of all. They began to feel queer, as if the
wild war-dance had not agreed with them. They got worse, and another
bathe was proposed; but their clothes were scarcely off, and their
toes in the sea, when they fell down writhing and howling. It was a
clear case of cramp. A great crowd gathered about them; rescue-men
distinguished themselves in hauling the three boys out of a full inch
of water; and they were borne howling to the baths. They roared while
they had breath, and then lay limp and insensible. A doctor summoned
in haste placed his hand on one of the stomachs—he must have been a
family man—a pump was sent for, but before it arrived they had each
begun to relieve themselves. Still they were very ill, and it was
quite clear to the doctor that they had been poisoned. As they said
nothing of the sugared cake they had devoured, but admitted that they
had eaten a pennyworth of gingerbread among them, the poor seller of
the gingerbread was pounced upon by the police, and lugged off to
prison as a wholesale poisoner. The three hapless victims being quite
unfit for removal, a telegram was sent to their parents, stating
that they had been poisoned, but were expected to recover.

The effect of this message upon the parents of the two companions was
alarming, but Coglin it only enraged. At first he stood horrified
like the rest, but then, guessing something like the truth, he burst
into a fit of passion, and said that it was all Burfoot’s doing. His
mode of reasoning was this—Burfoot had been the cause of him having
to prepare the poisoned cake; through him preparing that cake his own
boy had been poisoned; therefore Burfoot, in addition to his past
crimes, was guilty of a deliberate attempt to murder the baker’s son.
What reprisal, what punishment, could be too great for such a wretch?

Coglin resolved to be his own avenger as before, and went to
Portobello to see his son. He affected to believe Bob’s story of
being poisoned by the pennyworth of gingerbread, and reminded him
of how often he had warned him against eating anything that was
not baked at home. Bob was delighted to get off so easily, and
humbly promised to remember the advice, which he did by never again
putting a cake baked by his father within his lips. When the boys
were brought home, and the unhappy seller of the gingerbread had
been liberated, with his raven locks turned grey with terror of the
scaffold, Coglin was at liberty to punish the criminal. This time
he resolved to make his vengeance sweeping in its character, and to
confide the execution of it to no one but himself. To decide on the
special punishment required a deal of thinking, but all Coglin’s
thinking pointed to one qualification—the retaliation must include
personal loss to Burfoot. Coglin had already lost considerably by
Burfoot’s crime; it was but just that Burfoot should suffer in the
same manner. While Coglin was at a loss to decide the matter, the
newspapers or public press kindly came to his aid. In these he saw
described a case of fire-raising by wandering tinkers, who had made
up a pellet of chemicals, procurable at any drysalter’s, which, on
being thrown down among straw or wood, spontaneously ignited, and
burned so fiercely that the whole place was speedily in a blaze.
Coglin for nights on end devoted himself to amateur chemistry, and
with such ardour that he at length produced a pellet, quite good
enough to set the whole of Burfoot’s donkey-shed and pig-styes in
flames. The pellet, when finished, resembled a lump of badly-dried
clay; and to ensure its safety, Coglin, when it was finished, placed
it in one of his metal confection pans, and locking it in his
bakehouse, went to survey his foe’s premises and decide upon the best
spot for throwing the pellet. He succeeded to perfection. There was
easy access to the place, a convenient window to the shed, plenty
of straw inside, and the whole of the sheds were of wood as dry
as tinder, and promising a grand blaze. It gave Coglin additional
satisfaction to know that Burfoot’s place was not insured. While
the baker was thus settling matters at the other end of the town, a
curious incident was taking place on his own premises. His shop and
house were in the front street, and the bakehouse in a lane at the
back. While Coglin was gone, his wife attended to the shop, and while
doing so was asked by a customer for a little barm. To get that she
had to take down the key of the bakehouse from its accustomed nail,
and go down to the place herself, while the customer waited in the
shop. She was not long gone, but woman’s curiosity in that short time
had induced her to peep into the closed pot. Finding only a dirty
piece of clay inside she examined it closely, and then tossed it into
a corner among some chopped wood there stacked, and then hurried off
to her customer with the barm. They conversed earnestly for a time,
and then parted mutually pleased. When the barm-buyer had gone, a boy
ran into the shop with the startling message—

“Your bakehoose is bleezing!”

It was blazing, and had been for some time, as the infuriated tailor
above could testify. He had barely time to secure his kirkgoing suit
and his spectacles when the whole tenement was in a blaze. He swore
at the bakehouse and its owner as the ruin of him and his prospects.
His furniture and effects were all lost, and he did not hesitate to
hint that the whole had been done intentionally.

He was in the midst of these recriminations when Coglin appeared, and
stood speechless before the blazing house.

“You did it on purpose, because you kent I wasna insured, and because
you thought I went into your bakehouse and spoilt your batch,” cried
the distracted tailor, pouncing on the astonished baker and trying to
throttle him black in the face; “but I’ll hae the law to you, or I’ll
tak’ your life wi’ my ain hands.”

They fought madly for some moments, and were then, considerably
damaged, torn asunder by the bystanders. The tailor raved like a
madman, and, astonishing to all, the baker listened to his frenzied
accusations with the greatest meekness and calmness.

The truth is that the tailor, in his passion, had allowed several
words and expressions to escape him which for the first time made
Coglin doubt his own acumen in accusing Burfoot of the first outrage,
and ask himself at the same time if it was not possible that the real
perpetrator was Thomas Elder, tailor. The man had a strong hatred to
him, and they had quarrelled quite as bitterly as he and Burfoot.

The words and expressions would admit of no other explanation than
Elder’s guilt, and now several circumstances recurred to Coglin’s
memory to confirm the idea. The tailor had bought herrings on that
day, and witnessed the quarrel, and might easily have conceived the
plan of entering the bakehouse and smearing the window and board with
herring scales to convey the idea that the herring hawker was the
criminal.

While Coglin was slowly evolving these ideas, a hand was placed
on his arm, and, looking round, he found Burfoot at his side with
genuine concern and consternation on his face.

“I’m real sorry for this,” he said, wringing Coglin’s hand, “and if
the loan of thirty or forty pounds will help you in your strait, you
can depend upon me.”

“Good God! no!” cried Coglin, chokingly.

“But I say, yes. I can surely help a friend in distress,” persisted
Burfoot, warmly.

“A friend?” said Coglin, helplessly. “Yes.”

“And I’m almost glad to have the chance, for that tailor has lost
everything,” added Burfoot, in a whisper. “Nobody can be sorry for
him, for, between ourselves, I believe he was the man who entered
your bakehouse and spoiled your flour.”

“What?”

“Yes; I was told by one who knows, but wanted to keep it quiet, that
the tailor was seen coming out of your bakehouse window at about one
o’clock in the morning.”

“And you never told me!” cried Coglin, reproachfully.

“I can’t tell you even yet; I only say I think it,” said Burfoot,
cautiously.

Coglin was conquered at last, and he and Burfoot left the spot
arm-in-arm and fast friends for life. Some of these facts came out
long after, when I had the tailor in my hands on another charge, and
some were given me by Coglin himself. He is in business still, and
prospering in a town on the opposite side of the Forth, and Burfoot
often goes through to spend a few days there with his firm friend,
golfing on a nice links near the place. As he knows all about the
baker’s misconceptions and plans for his punishment, and the names
are all changed here, I have decided that the giving of the details
can do no harm now, and may at the same time teach those seeking
revenge that it is possible for punishment intended for another to
drop very neatly on to their own shoulders.




ONE LESS TO EAT.


The number of mysterious disappearances in great cities can be
calculated upon with almost the same certainty as the death rate. A
very few of these are accounted for; a body is found and identified,
or a man vanished is found to have been in difficulties, and it
is shrewdly or rashly surmised that he has fled to escape the
consequences; but the majority of the cases pass into the great
unknown, so far as either police or public are concerned.

No. 7 Hill Place, at the South Side, leads to a back court of
wretched dwellings occupied by the very poor. At the west side of
that court is a block or “land” of houses which are now rather worse
than they were at the time of which I write, for a theatre has been
built up against the back windows, almost shutting out the light
of day from one side of the building. At that time the top windows
looked into an auctioneer’s yard, and, having a better share of light
than the lower flats, were considered rather respectable abodes for
working men. In one of these lived George Mossman, a journeyman
baker. The house consisted of two rooms, and had been at one time
very nicely furnished; but on the Saturday night of which I write the
two places were almost empty, for Mossman had been off work for many
months with a poisoned hand, which refused to heal, and so kept him
and his wife and family “living on the furniture.” At first Mossman,
who was of a cheery, blithe disposition, had made a joke of his
disabled hand, and laughingly declared that he had “an income in his
hand, but nane in his pouch;” but as month after month went past, and
the hand showed no signs of healing, joking was hushed on his lips.
Hunger, starvation, and perhaps death stared them in the face; for
Mossman shared the common horror of pauperism, and would have dropped
dead before he could have applied at the Poorhouse for a dole.

The terrible pinchings which had been endured by that family were
scarcely known outside their own door, for it was believed that
Mossman was getting an allowance off some sick fund or trade society.
There were two boys and three girls, the youngest of these being an
infant at the breast, and the eldest only ten; but these children
were so drilled and trained by their parents in their own spirit of
independence, that not a whisper of the truth reached the neighbours.

“When things are at their worst they begin to mend.” These were the
words of the poor, disabled baker to his wife on this Saturday night,
but as they did not satisfy hungry bairns, a council was held to
accelerate the mending. The house was empty, and the whole family
almost naked, so of late they had been seldom outside the house.
The general messenger was Johnny, the eldest boy, and he it was who
appeared to feel the position most keenly. Johnny was ashamed of his
rags, and had a firm opinion that he was a strong, able-bodied man,
instead of being the skinny little shadow he was, and that his proper
sphere was the sea, to which he had more than once threatened to
run away, not returning till he was a captain all covered with gold
lace, and with a fair share of the same metal in his pockets for his
parents.

“If I was away,” he remarked on the present occasion, “there would
always be one less to eat.”

“We might all say that,” said his father, who had grown somewhat
sharp and fierce with famine and fretting. “I have thought about it
myself often of late. A poor man in trouble and without a friend in
the world would be far better out of it.”

This sentiment was received with a strong and general protest, the
mother especially having got frightened of late at some of the
desperate looks and words of the disabled baker.

“You’re not without friends, if you like to apply to them,” she
remarked, after a pause, to let him cool down a little. “There’s
Borland, for instance, your old companion.”

“He’s a master now,” said Mossman, snappishly.

“So much the better—he may be the readier to help you, for you could
work it up to him when you are well. At any rate, something must be
done to-night, for the bairns canna want ower Sunday.”

“I quarrelled wi’ him over a game at draughts,” said Mossman,
stubbornly, “and I havena spoken to him for ten years, and I winna
now. He’d only crow over me.”

“You were at the schule thegither, and apprentices in the same shop.
I dinna believe he would laugh at ye,” persisted the wife, “but if ye
like I’ll gang mysel’.”

“I winna gang, and I winna let you be seen in such rags,” said her
husband, determinedly.

“I’ll gang then, faither,” eagerly cried Johnny. “I dinna care though
he laughs at me, if he only helps us.”

Johnny was kissed by his mother for the brave speech, and the
darkness hid the tear that came with it, though Johnny felt the tear
all the same. It fired his mind and made him blurt out a thought
which otherwise he would have kept in his own head.

“It couldn’t be so very bad to steal a loaf,” he remarked with a
wistful look round on the hungry ones. “I felt near doing it this
mornin’ when a baker asked me to help his board off his heid. The
smell o’ the new bread just took my heart, and I was like to bolt wi’
ane.”

His father’s bony fingers gripped him by the ear, and the touch was
no gentle one.

“If ever you turn thief while I’m living,” he fiercely hissed out,
“never come near me or look me in the face again! I wad rather see
you deid, ay, and mysel’ too,” he brokenly added, with a quiver
getting into his tones.

The boy was moved and awed, and hurriedly answered—

“I ken that, faither, but I couldna help the thought getting into my
heid. I’ll run down to Mr Borland’s, and ask him to trust you two
loaves till your hand gets weel. It’ll be nothing to him; I’ve seen
you bring hame as much into your wages.”

The father remained silent, but after a little pressing and pleading,
said with a weary sigh—

“Do as you please; it’ll sune be a’ ower noo.”

The boy darted out of the house, afraid that his father might change
his mind and command him to stay.

Johnny, be it observed, was in rags, and wore boots which a
cinder-gatherer would have passed in contempt in a dust-heap.
Pinching hunger had given him a haggard and disreputable look, and
all that he wanted to pass for one of my “bairns” were a dishonest
heart and hand.

Ten minutes’ walking brought him to the baker’s shop, which he
thought was Mr Borland’s, but which had been quitted by that master
more than a year before, in favour of one in a better locality.
However, it was a baker’s shop still, and Johnny, noticing no change
in the name, and seeing the place closed, began to knock gently at
the door in hope that the occupant might be still within. There was
no answer, and at length the boy, with a hazy idea that the baker
might live behind the shop, went through a narrow entry to have a
look at the back.

By the dim light he picked out the window of the back shop. There
were bags of flour and shelves of loaves dimly discernible within,
but no light and no human face. A moving thing he did see, and a pair
of shining eyes gruesome enough to have frightened the wits out of
one less hungry, but a steady look for a moment or two showed him
that the living creature was only a cat, which had got shut in, and
was now mewing most piteously, as if imploring to be let out. The
misery of another creature often draws us from our own. Johnny became
interested in the cat, and its desperate scratchings and mewings,
and, after watching it for some time—quite forgetful of the fact that
he might be watched as well—said to himself—

“It would be easy to push up the window and let the puir brute out.”

Accordingly, putting his small strength to the frame, he raised the
sash high enough to let the cat scramble out into freedom. But, alas!
his efforts did not end there.

When the cat was gone his own desperate condition returned to his
mind with redoubled strength. There were the loaves in dozens on the
shelves within, but there was no sympathising friend present to whom
to appeal. How much easier it would be to take a loan of two loaves,
and come back on Monday and explain all about them to Mr Borland. If
he went home without the loaves, Johnny had an idea they would all
be dead before Monday, and then his father need never know anything
about it till it was all explained and adjusted.

I am not trying to give his reasoning as sound, but rather to show
that when a child is wolfish with hunger he and reason have for the
time parted company.

Johnny prised the window sash a few inches higher, and wriggled
himself inside. The first loaves that came to hand were grasped at.
He meant to take only two, but there happened to be four sticking
together, and he concluded that he might as well take the lot. He
placed the big square of bread out on the window sill, and then
clambered out, and was turning to reclose the window, when something
glaring and far more terrible than a cat’s eye caught his gaze, and
riveted him helpless and speechless to the spot. It was a bull’s
eye, and the holder was a policeman, who had first been attracted
by Johnny’s knocking at the front door, and then had slipped in by
another entry to watch the whole proceedings from the other end of
the green.

The slide of the lantern had been closed till the critical moment
when Johnny had accomplished his burglary, when out shone the light,
and with a few quick strides the man was upon the trembling boy.

“What! you’re young begun,” said the policeman, throttling Johnny
nearly black in the face, and then shaking him violently lest there
should be any breath left in his body by the throttling. “How old are
you?”

“Twelve,” gasped Johnny at random.

He was barely ten, but with the wild, reproachful thought at his
heart that he had disgraced and ruined himself for ever by his
rashness had come a queer resolve.

“And what’s yer name?” continued the man, who was from the far north,
and thought he saw the gallows written in every line of the boy’s
face.

“Peter M^cBain.”

It was the first name that came to the tongue of the boy, and he
blurted it out, with death at his heart.

“And far dee ye live?” continued his captor.

“In the West Port.”

Lies, lies! every word of it. Johnny simply named the place farthest
from his own home, but then he had an object in view, and the lies
wrung more agony out of him than the truth would have done. He was
thinking of his father and that fierce warning in the dark—“If ever
you turn thief while I’m living, never come near me or look me in the
face again.”

“How did I ever come to do it? how did I do it?” he bitterly added to
himself; but to that there came no answer.

He did not know that famine and excitement had slightly unhinged his
faculties; he knew only that in some amazing manner he had become a
housebreaker and a thief in the face of his father’s commands, and
got captured by the police in the very act.

“Then jist you tak’ up your bundle and come awa’ wi’ me to the
office,” said the policeman; and Johnny lifted the loaves and obeyed,
the man closing the window, and taking down the name and address
before leaving. While the pair were passing up St Mary’s Wynd towards
the High Street, I chanced to be coming down, and stopped to learn
the nature of the crime. Johnny’s face was quite unknown to me, and
I could not believe that he or his relatives belonged to the West
Port, a suspicion which was strengthened when Johnny became taciturn,
and refused to reveal aught of his antecedents. I turned back with
them, and went as far as the Central, trying in vain to draw the
truth from the poor quivering boy. I should not have taken half the
trouble with him but for the fact that he was evidently labouring
under great excitement, and that more than once I saw his eyes become
brimful of tears. Your true gutter child—the raggamuffin who steals
as naturally as he draws his breath—is case-hardened against either
tears or trembling. There is no mistaking him; and the first glance
at Johnny half convinced me that in spite of his wretched clothing
and haggard looks, he was not of that class. As he refused to speak,
he was entered as “Peter M^cBain, West Port, aged twelve,” and locked
up, charged with breaking into the shop of a baker whom I may name
Brown, “and stealing therefrom four loaves of bread, of the value of
2s. 8d. or thereby.”

My idea was that he was a runaway from some distant town, who had
tramped the boots off his feet, and then been forced by sheer hunger
to the robbery. I therefore had him tested with the offer of food.
But Johnny was now too excited and overwhelmed with grief and shame
at his position, and refused the food with unaffected loathing. Then
the last prop was soon driven from my theory by a policeman on the
West Port beat declaring, on being shown “Peter M^cBain,” that he
believed he knew him well as one who had long been a pest to that
district.

While this small and terrible burglar was thus seeing the inside
of a cell for the first time, his parents were awaiting his return
in anxiety and trembling expectancy. Hour after hour passed, and
still the light footfall failed to strike upon their ears, and at
last, near midnight, the father could bear the strain no longer, and
started out to search for the wanderer. Had the hour been an earlier
one, Mossman would have gone in the same direction as the boy had
taken, and probably have discovered that the name had been changed.
But he logically reasoned that now the shop must be shut, and Borland
at his own home, which was a street or two further off.

“He’ll have taken pity on the boy and asked him to go home with
him,” was his parting remark to his wife, and to the home of his
old friend he turned his steps—a shabby shadow, walking softly and
hurriedly upon stocking soles, for his boots had long since gone to
feed the hungry bairns. He was thoroughly ashamed of his appearance,
and nothing short of his great anxiety for the boy would have roused
him to brave the humiliation of appearing before Borland. The house
was a respectable flat in Lothian Street, and the same which the
baker had occupied for years. Mossman made certain by examining the
bell-plates by the light of the street lamps, and then rang and was
admitted. To his relief the door was opened by Borland himself, who
had been busy looking over his books at home after the rest of the
household were in bed. The prosperous baker stared at the gaunt and
poorly-clad figure rising before him out of the darkness of the
stair, and then exclaimed, in lively horror—

“Good God! it’s not Geordie Mossman?”

“I’ve come after my laddie,” said the other, hurriedly. “I sent him
to your shop hours ago, to—to ask a favour, and he’s never come back.”

“I’m no an hour hame,” said Borland, “and he never came near while I
was there. But I’m no in the auld place now, and maybe he’s wandered
a bit in lookin’ for the new shop. Man, Geordie,” he added with deep
feeling, and wringing the other’s hand with a fervour unmistakable,
“is it possible ye’ve been in distress and never let me ken? Come in
by and tell me a’ about it.”

Kindness is more overpowering than cruelty. The poor baker staggered,
trembled, and then fairly broke down, and was then hurried into the
house, planted down by a rousing fire, and there forced to sit at
ease, while the stout baker hastened to pile before him half the
eatables in the house. While thus busy diving in and out the room
as a means of concealing his own emotion, Borland managed to draw
from his broken-down visitor an account of his misfortunes, and
the state of things in his home; and then he quietly slipped out
of the room, roused his wife out of bed, and sent her off in that
direction with a bundle and a basket, which she and the servant girl
could scarce carry between them. Then he got a pair of boots and
a coat and muffler for Mossman, and the two set out to search for
Johnny. Borland advised that they should go to the Police Office
first, but that Mossman would not hear of, declaring that that was
the last place Johnny would go near. When they had spent an hour in
the streets they went to Hill Place in full hope that the boy would
be there before them. They found some appearance of comfort in the
house, but the poor mother was in tears, and the cause of her grief
was explained in a few words—

“Johnny said that if he was away there would be ane less to eat, and
he said he would run away and be a sailor. He’s away now, and we’ll
maybe never see him again.”

“I never thought of that,” gasped Mossman, with a sinking heart. “One
less to eat—he’s been craiking aboot that for weeks. We’ll never see
him again;” and then in that relieved household there was more of
tears than mirth or rejoicing.

“If I had only gone myself!” the father cried in unsparing
self-reproach.

“If I had only known an hour or two earlier,” said the kind-hearted
master baker.

But the mother was most inconsolable.

“I made him gang—if it hadna been for me he would have been here
yet!” she sobbed. “I have done it all.”

“Tuts, the laddie is not out o’ the world surely,” said her husband,
with more lightness than he really felt. “I’ve often heard him speak
of trying to find out his uncle, who is a fisherman in Kirkcaldy, and
of learning under him. Have patience for a day or two, and we’ll hear
of him all right.”

They waited the day or two, but Johnny was as effectually hidden
from them as if he had been buried alive. On the Monday morning he
had been placed at the bar of the Police Court, and, when asked if
he had taken the loaves in the manner described, said simply that he
had, but had never thought of taking them till he opened the window
to let out the cat. The magistrate thought for a little, and spoke of
sending him to a reformatory, but as there was a difficulty in having
no parents to fall back on for the cost of maintenance, he contented
himself with a sentence of three days’ imprisonment, and a warning to
the terrible burglar not to be seen there again or it would be worse
for him.

At the trial Johnny’s father never appeared, and from that the boy
concluded that he was cast off for ever as an unclean thing. Neither
was he once inquired for by his mother, which fact cut him keenest of
all.

“_She_ might have known I didn’t mean it,” he thought with bitter
tears, “but was just led to take them by thinking of them at home.”

As “Peter M^cBain” he served his term of three days, and then was
free. Curiously enough, his first thought was of his fisher uncle in
Kirkcaldy, whom he had often heard of but never seen. Johnny never
thought of going home, but asked the way to Kirkcaldy. He had not a
penny in his pocket, and the rags he called clothes could scarcely
hold together, and, when he was told that there were two ways to
Kirkcaldy—a short way by the ferry, and a long way by land—he had
no choice but to go by land, and turned his face with the utmost
coolness in the direction of Stirling.

Very little alters the whole course of a life. As with most boys,
Johnny’s little head was full of romance, and he had determined
either to be a fisherman or a sailor, and actually might have had his
desire accomplished had he ever found that uncle in Kirkcaldy. But he
had not got many miles on his way when he picked up an acquaintance
in shape of a boy a year or two older than himself, who, having been
well thrashed by his father for some fault, was “running away” to a
grannie in Dundee. He had run away before, and was never tired of
describing the glories of life in the mills there, and the kindness
of his grannie, who kept lodgers, and was always glad to see him when
his own home became too hot for him. So Johnny, who still stuck to
the name of “Peter M^cBain,” decided to accept the boy’s offer of
friendship and guidance, and the two small waifs at length reached
that town, where the reception by the grannie was quite as kind and
loving to Johnny as if he had been her own grandson. After the boys
had rested two days to heal their blistered feet, they went to one of
the largest mills, and were readily engaged for some simple part of
the jute spinning which could be learnt in an hour or two. At this
work Peter M^cBain showed real smartness, and soon attracted the
notice of the foreman. Peter lived with the grannie who had first
welcomed him to Dundee, and learned to call her grannie too. The
first flush of prosperity was on Dundee at the time; wages were high,
and work was plentiful, and anyone showing peculiar smartness was
almost certain of speedy promotion.

When Peter had been in the mill for nearly a year, the manager asked
him if he would like to learn a trade instead of to be a tenter.
Peter was willing, and was taken into the mechanics’ shop attached to
the mill, there to learn to make and fit up machinery. He grew stout
and sturdy, and gave great satisfaction, as he never seemed happier
than when tearing in at his work. He never dared to write home, and
was mourned as one dead. In six years Peter became a full-fledged
journeyman. He was now a tall, strapping fellow, with a good face,
and a clear, laughing eye, and was qualified to go anywhere and
command a high wage as a first-class engine-fitter. He had been
diligent and steady, and had studied drawing and designing to help
him in his trade, and altogether was quite a different character from
what he had promised as a small and terrible burglar. He had even
saved a little money, and it was the thought of that money lying
idle, and the heaps more which he was now able to earn, which sent
his thoughts homewards and his heart throbbing for dear Auld Reekie.
When he had been a few weeks journeyman, and engaged in the same mill
at a capital wage, the Fair holidays came on, and Peter’s eye caught
a bill announcing a “Trip to Edinburgh.” Edinburgh! The very sight
of the word thrilled him through. He got a ticket and went through
next day. He made his way first to Hill Place. His parents had not
lived there for years. No one knew them, or had heard of them, and he
began to faintly wonder if they could have been all starved to death
at that fearful time when he was locked up in prison as a burglar.
Then he thought of the bakers’ house of call, and went thither and
got a great lift to his heart. His father was alive and doing well
as foreman to Borland the baker, who had now two shops, and was
flourishing also. Peter went to the principal shop, and found Mr
Borland behind the counter. As he entered the shop a floury-faced
man, in his shirt sleeves, was leaving for the regions below, and the
young engine-fitter stared into the face with a palpitating heart.

“That’s my faither! that’s my faither!” he thought, with a great lump
rising in his throat; but he could no more have spoken than he could
have flown in the air.

Borland stared at him curiously, and thought from his incoherent
words and strange manner that the stranger was drunk. At length he
understood that the young man wished to be directed to the home of
Mossman, the foreman, and, as he refused to see the foreman, he got
the address and departed. Mossman came up from the bakehouse a few
minutes later, and was apprised of the circumstance, but thought
nothing of it till he was half-way down the stair again. Then
something familiar in the face he had seen for a moment in the shop
had flashed upon his memory, and he dashed up to the shop, whiter
than the flour on his face, and faintly staggered towards his friend
and master, Borland, with the words—

“I’ll hae to gang hame for a minute. I believe that fellow was my
lost laddie—my Johnny come back!”

Meanwhile Peter M^cBain had gone a street or two farther, and found
the house—a much nicer one than the last he had called his home in
Edinburgh. A shining brass-plate on the door bore his father’s name,
and when he knocked, a little urchin, chubby and rosy, whom he had
never seen before, opened the door and allowed him to step within. A
grey-haired woman sat sewing by the window, and some older children
were clustered around, but they all stared at the stranger in blank
amazement, and in utter ignorance of his identity. Peter stepped
forward and gazed into his mother’s face, with the tears creeping
into his eyes.

“Dae ye no ken me, mother?” he slowly and chokingly articulated. “I’m
Johnny that ran awa’!”

A scream of joy and a wild clasp of the arms was the answer, and
then the floury-faced father broke in on them to join in their great
rejoicing.

Johnny became a sailor in one sense, for he is now engineer on board
one of the American liners, but his heart always turns to Auld Reekie
as warmly as when he stood thus before his mother, like one restored
from the grave.




THE CAPTAIN’S CHRONOMETER.


The captain had come home with honours—that is, he had saved the
ship and a very valuable cargo under his care by sheer bravery and
indomitable energy, and been presented with the chronometer by the
combined owners in token of their appreciation of his labours. That
pleasing memento he carried in his pocket, enclosed in a little
chamois leather cover to keep it from dust and wear. It was a ship
chronometer, and therefore not meant for use on land or carrying in
the pocket; but the captain was proud of his present, and especially
of the flattering inscription engraved on the back of the case, and
had carried it home to show to his wife and family and any friends he
might meet during his short stay.

His ship was at Tynemouth, but his home was in Leith Walk, and
about a week of his furlough had gone when he one forenoon met an
old friend, and with that gentleman entered a big and respectable
public-house in Leith Walk to drink and have a chat over old times.
The place was divided into boxes by wooden partitions about six feet
high; so customers, though enjoying a certain degree of privacy,
could never be certain that their words were not being listened to by
others in the adjoining compartments.

Captain Hosking and his friend were too much overjoyed at meeting
to think of that, and chatted away in the loudest tones, while a
nimble little thief named Tommy Tait, seated at the other side of the
partition, swallowed every word. One of the topics was the recent
storm and the dangers through which the captain had successfully
struggled, and, as a natural result, the chronometer was brought out
and displayed to every advantage. The heads of the two friends were
close over the valuable present when that of Tommy Tait cautiously
rose over the partition.

“It must have cost a good round sum?” said the friend, as he returned
the chronometer, and it was carefully encased in the chamois leather
cover and returned to the captain’s vest pocket.

“Sixty pounds, at least,” returned the captain, proudly; “perhaps a
good bit more. I know they wouldn’t give me a shabby present.”

Sixty pounds! Tommy Tait’s mouth fairly watered as he prudently
withdrew his head, and rubbed his hands in gloating anticipation.
Such a prize had not come in his way for many a day. But would the
captain be an easy victim to manipulate? There was the rub. Had Tommy
Tait’s line been one of violence he would have had not the ghost of
a chance against the captain, who was six feet two in his stockings,
broad in proportion, and strong as a lion. But Tommy’s was the
delicate art of the pick-pocket, and had the time been night instead
of day, and the captain only sufficiently befogged with drink, Tommy
would have felt as sure of his prey as if the chronometer already lay
in his clutches. Everything was against him. The captain was drinking
only lemonade, and had the look of an exceedingly wide-awake customer
besides; the sun was shining brightly, and the streets, he knew, were
crowded with passengers. Tommy uttered a few strong imprecations
under his breath, coupled with a wish that all temperance captains
might come to a bad end for creating extra risks and dangers to
hard-working fellows like himself. Still the chance was there and
must not be missed; and what was a thief worth if his genius could
not rise to an occasion like that?

The captain was going towards Edinburgh, as Tommy learned from the
conversation, while the friend was going to Leith. So much the
better. Tommy would have one pair of eyes less to trouble him. He
waited patiently till they had talked their fill, and then followed
them out of the shop. They stood for five minutes at the door; but
that interval Tommy filled up ingeniously by lighting his pipe at
the bar. When the friends fairly parted, Tommy lost all interest in
the barman and his dogs, and abruptly closed the conversation and
left. As the captain moved on before him with firm and giant-like
strides Tommy’s heart sank within him. He was a bit of a coward, and
he felt certain that if he bungled, and got into the clutches of that
powerful man, he would not have to wait long for a sore punishment.
Sea captains are accustomed to administer law for themselves, and
Tommy’s body tingled all over at the very thought of those boots and
fists playing about his diminutive person.

The captain wore a pilot coat, the top button of which was fastened.
The chronometer, as Tommy knew, was in the right-hand pocket of the
vest, with no chain or guard attached. There was both a watch and
chain in the opposite pocket, but that was only of silver, and had no
attraction for Tommy.

The captain gave no chance till Greenside was reached. There a
tobacconist’s window had been done out with fountains and grottoes,
and real flowing water, as a Christmas decoration, and the crowd
around it attracted the captain, and drew a sigh of profound
thankfulness from the breast of Tommy Tait. The captain was amused
and interested, and pressed closer; Tommy helped him diligently.
Looking hard at the window and laughing consumedly, Tommy got his
fingers under the pilot coat and touched the chronometer. The absence
of a chain was a sore trial to his skill, but at length he got the
chamois leather cover between his fingers, and had the whole out and
into his own pocket like lightning. But, alas, the thing had been so
roughly done, that Tommy was actually ashamed of his own clumsy work.
He felt that the captain had started suspiciously and looked him full
in the face, and he concluded that it was time to go.

He moved off as unconcernedly as possible for about twenty yards,
when the thrilling shout of the captain fell on his ears, and almost
stopped the beating of his heart—

“Hi! you! thief!—stop thief!”

Tommy heard no more. Whatever he lacked, he could run with great
swiftness, and that wild cry, and the thought of the powerful limbs
of the man who emitted the words, made him put on his most desperate
pace.

He dived for the Low Calton, in which he managed to burrow
successfully, while the crowd, led by the captain and a policeman
who had joined, ran on and did not halt till the foot of Leith Wynd
was reached. Not a trace of the fugitive was to be found, and the
captain, quite breathless with the race, exclaimed resignedly—

“Oh, what a fool I’ve been! Well, that’s the last I’ll see of my
chronometer.”

The policeman, by a question or two, elicited the fact that the
captain had got a good look at the thief, and promptly advised him to
go up to the Central Office and report the case, assuring him that
it was by no means uncommon, when a case was thus quickly reported,
for us to recover the stolen property in a few hours. This friendly
exaggeration sent the captain up to the Central, when it became
necessary for me to tone down his hopes a little. By the description
given of the thief, I recognised Tommy Tait unmistakably, for Tommy
had certain peculiarities of ugliness about his figure-head which,
once seen, were always remembered, and I firmly assured the captain
that I could easily lay hands on the nimble pickpocket in an hour’s
time; but as to recovering the watch, that was altogether a different
matter. I could not pledge myself to that.

“Why, it’s the chronometer I want,” exclaimed the bluff seaman,
looking quite aghast. “I’ll give twenty pounds this minute to the
man who puts it into my hands safe and sound. What do I care for the
blessed thief? Though you got him and gave him twenty years on the
treadmill, that wouldn’t do me a bit of good.”

“There’s a chance of getting the chronometer, too, if we get the
man,” I quietly observed. “Just leave your name and address, and all
particulars, while I go and see if I can lay hands on Tommy.”

I fully expected that I should get Tommy at some of his usual haunts,
and return within the hour, but I was giving Tommy credit for far
less ability than he possessed. I chanced to know his favourite
hiding-place, and went to that direct. He was not there, and had not
been near it for days. All his haunts were tried with a like result.
Then, a little annoyed, I “tried back,” and discovered the entry and
common stair in the Low Calton in which he had burrowed while his
pursuers rushed by. Two boys had seen him there, and they testified
that he had turned back towards Greenside as soon as it was safe to
venture forth; and from that point all trace of him disappeared.
I hunted for him high and low, for days on end, in vain; and what
added to my mystification was the fact that Tommy’s relatives and
acquaintances were as puzzled and distressed at his disappearance
as I could possibly be. At first I thought it possible that he had
left the city, but in a day or two had reason to believe that such
was not the case. Tommy never went farther than Glasgow or Paisley,
and as he had not been heard of or seen in either of these places, a
queer thought came into my mind. Could it be possible that Tommy had
wandered into bad company and got knocked on the head—in other words,
murdered—for the valuable treasure he carried? I note the strange
suspicion, not because it turned out to be correct in regard to the
loss of Tommy’s valuable life, but because the treasure he carried
was to bring him trouble quite as unexpected as his disappearance
had been sudden. While I had thus been hunting in vain, and Tommy’s
friends had been almost mourning him as dead, and even ungenerously
hinting that I had had a hand in his slaughter, Tommy was enjoying
the sweets of a well-earned repose in—of all places in the world
the last I should have thought of—the Infirmary! He had got hurt,
then—run over with a cab or something—in his flight? Not at all.
Seized with a fever, then? Neither. He was as sound in body and limb
as myself. It was simply this. Before the chronometer had come in his
way, Tommy, who was lazy and hard-up, had gone once or twice to the
Infirmary complaining of some imaginary trouble, which the doctors
could not understand. His object was to get admitted as a patient,
and have a month or two’s rest and retirement from the uncertainties
of the thieving profession—to be coddled up in bed and tended night
and day, and fed up with wine and other delicacies too often denied
to the most ingenious malingerer in prison. Tommy was one of those
clever malingerers, but he preferred to practise the art in a
place where he could at any moment gain his liberty by ending the
distressing symptoms of disease.

That was the position. The thought of making the Infirmary his
hiding-place came to him as an inspiration. In Greenside he caught
a ’bus which took him up to the head of Infirmary Street for a
penny. He just managed to get within the gate of the Infirmary when
he was seized with such a paroxysm of his trouble that he dropped
almost insensible at the feet of the janitor. The house surgeon was
summoned, and, as Tommy was then too far gone to be removed with
safety to his home, he was borne in an invalid’s chair to the nearest
ward, and there put to bed. Close to the head of this bed, and below
the sash of one of the windows, was a little shelved cupboard, in
which was stowed some of the other patients’ clothing—tied up in
bundles till they should be needed again. Tommy’s agony was never
so bad but that he could look after the folding up of his clothes,
and more especially his trousers, in the pocket of which now reposed
a gold chronometer worth at least £60. Such tender solicitude did
he evince for the safety of these worn and shabby articles that the
attention of more than one person was attracted, and the surgeon
sharply demanded whether he had not any tobacco concealed about the
pockets, to which Tommy gaspingly replied that he never used tobacco
or snuff—a pathetic lie. As soon as the clothes were bundled up and
put away in the little cupboard, Tommy had a relapse which occupied
the surgeon and nurses for an hour at least, and effectually banished
from their minds all remembrance of the little incident of the
clothes.

Next forenoon, when the time arrived for the professors and students
to make their round, it was found that Tommy’s trouble had all
settled in his back and neck, for in the one he had such dreadful
pains that he could scarcely lie in bed, and in the other a chronic
stiffness which a year or two’s rheumatism could hardly have
equalled. There was much grave consultation around his bed, and Tommy
tried hard to learn the result of the deliberations, for he had a
wholesome dread of being scarified on the nape of the neck with hot
irons, or cupped on the shoulders, as he had been in the prison
hospital for a similar attack, but all that passed was spoken in
whispers, and sometimes in a language which Tommy did not understand.

Tommy was left ill at ease on two points. He feared some surgical
appliance of a painful nature, and he had fidgetty feeling regarding
the safety of his hard-earned chronometer. He never took his eyes
off the door of the little cupboard except in sleep, and even then
the slightest footfall roused him to wakefulness. Then there was a
danger of some patient recovering and needing his clothes, and taking
out those of Tommy by mistake. Tommy fidgetted himself almost into
a fever over that possibility, the more so as he had on one side of
him an evil-looking cabman, with a face as bloated as a Christmas
pudding, who he was sure was a thorough rascal. In the bed on the
other side was an innocent-looking Irishman, named Teddy O’Lacey, who
sympathised with him very heartily, and whom Tommy set down as a born
idiot and simpleton.

He had no fear of the fool of an Irishman; it was the bloated cabman
he watched and dreaded. After considering the whole matter, Tommy
decided that the chronometer was not in a safe place, and that night
waited till every one in the ward was sound asleep, and the night
attendant out of the way. Then he nimbly slipt out of bed, opened
the cupboard, took out his clothes, and hid the chronometer under
his pillow. He could there feel it with his hand almost constantly,
and, if any nurses came to make his bed, could conceal it in his hand
till they were gone. At all events he felt more comfortable with
it beside him, and acutely reasoned that, even if it were seen, in
its chamois leather cover it would excite no suspicion, as several
patients had watches hanging by their beds or under their pillows.

Another day passed away, and all Tommy’s fears had subsided. The
professors ordered nothing but harmless physic, and the chronometer
was safe under his pillow, so Tommy settled himself to the full
enjoyment of his well-earned repose. He slept soundly that night,
and was so refreshed in the morning that he did not immediately
think of his chronometer. After breakfast, when he did thrust in his
hand, the treasure was gone! Tommy could scarcely believe his own
senses. He grabbed wildly under the pillow, over the bed, under the
sheet—everywhere; he even forgot in his sweat of mortal agony that
he had a stiff neck, and stooped over the edge of the bed to see if
haply it had fallen to the floor.

All in vain. The prize had vanished. Worse and worse, he dared not
report the loss, for if the chronometer were hunted for and found, no
matter who should be the thief, a police case would certainly follow,
and Tommy get seven years at least. He looked around. The Irishman
was sleeping, as was his wont; the cabman, on the contrary, was
eyeing Tommy in a manner that convinced the latter of his guilt.

“You’ve got it then?” was Tommy’s savage thought. “I’ll see if I
can’t take it back from you. I always know’d that cabmen was thieves,
but I hardly think they’ll match a professional.”

The day passed away, and the hour for visitors arrived, bringing
Teddy O’Lacey’s wife, who spent an hour with her husband, and was
introduced to Tommy, and departed, hoping that he would soon be well.

Tommy paid little attention to her kind words, for all his powers
were concentrated on the cabman. He watched the man till his very
eyes became telescopic, and gloated over the fact that the scrutiny
was evidently painful to the suspected one. After the gases were lit
his patience was rewarded by seeing the cabman furtively take from
under his pillow something in shape of a watch enclosed in a chamois
leather cover. The sight was too much for Tommy.

He sprang out of bed, forgetful alike of pains in his back and
stiffness of neck, and pounced on the watch with a cry of joy.

“That’s my watch, you plunderer!” he shouted; but to his surprise
the cabman resisted stoutly, and stuck to the watch, dealing Tommy
at the same time several blows, which sent him reeling back on his
bed. The man was big-bodied and strong; such an unequal contest could
never be maintained by Tommy; so he snatched up a kind of tin flagon,
which stood handily near, and hurled it at the cabman’s head, closing
up one of that patient’s eyes and scattering the contents all over
his bed. Up sprang the cabman, and the next moment Tommy knew what a
real pain in his back meant, for his breast bone had nearly driven
the spine out of him through a tremendous blow from his opponent.
The din of the battle, the shouts and imprecations, and the cries
of the other patients, brought a number of nurses and attendants
to the spot; and at length the combatants were torn apart and some
explanation offered. Each accused the other of being a dastardly
robber in attempting to steal a watch.

The cabman stated his case, and proved beyond question that the
watch he held was his own—a silver lever, with his initials engraved
on the case. Tommy had then very little to say, except that he had
been robbed of a watch, which no one had ever seen, and which was
certainly not in his possession when he entered the Infirmary. On
the whole, Tommy looked and felt rather foolish, and not even the
sympathy of Teddy O’Lacey, who warmly took his part, could quite
convince him that he had not done a rash thing. This fear was
confirmed when the house surgeon came round and audibly commented
on Tommy’s astonishing agility and freedom from pain during the
encounter, and ended in saying—

“I’m afraid you’re an impostor and malingerer, but we’ll see
to-morrow when the professors come round.”

Morning came, and Tommy was sternly asked whether he would rise and
put on his clothes and depart, or wait till a policeman was sent for
to assist him from the place. With a deep groan Tommy chose to leave
the building unaided. It cut him to the heart to make the decision,
for had he not been robbed of the chronometer, and was he not thus
putting himself farther than ever from the thief? O’Lacey, the simple
Irishman, almost wept in sympathy with him, and hoped they would
meet again when Tommy was free from all such persecutions and wicked
conspiracies. They wrung hands pathetically, while the cabman, with a
bread poultice on his eye, audibly wished that he might be present
at Tommy’s execution.

While this affectionate adieu was taking place, I was entering the
gate of the Infirmary with no thought of Tommy in my mind, but
intending to see a miserable girl in another part of the building.
I wished to see this girl, with the chaplain by my side, and had to
get that gentleman before going farther. When this had been arranged,
we crossed the quadrangle together, so intent on the subject of
conversation that, when Tommy appeared before me, I looked him full
in the face without seeing him, and should have passed on had he but
been as inattentive as myself. He made sure I had come for him, and
dashed away down the steps towards the Surgical Hospital. A high wall
surrounded the building, covered with iron spikes, and facing the
High School Yard. A ladder left by some workmen stood near, and Tommy
pounced on that as a godsend, bore it to the wall, and was up like a
monkey before I could reach the spot. The ladder was short, and he
had to reach up and grasp the iron spikes to hoist himself up. As he
did so, the rotten and rusted iron gave way, and down he flopped at
my feet with a sprained ankle, a broken leg, and many more pains and
aches than he had simulated for the past few days. He was carried
into the building, and his leg set, and then I told him to be ready
to accompany me as soon as he was able to leave the establishment.
He would say nothing regarding the captain’s chronometer; but one of
the nurses chanced to speak of the battle, and his strange accusation
against the cabman, and I gradually pieced the facts together well
enough to clear up all mystifications but one. That was—where was the
chronometer?

The cabman had it not; and every other patient and crevice in the
ward was searched with a like result. I firmly believed that the
chronometer had never been in the place, and that the charge against
the cabman was only some eccentric ruse on Tommy’s part to draw our
attention from the real hiding-place. I visited him occasionally
during his stay in the Infirmary, and at length, when he was able to
move, took him with me and had him charged with the theft. But here
an awkward circumstance arose, apparently to defeat justice. Captain
Hosking had gone off to sea again before my capture of Tommy, and
was not returned, so that Tommy’s identification could not be made.
There was nothing for it but to remand him, when he kindly came to
our help by confessing all that I have put down. But he declared
most positively that he had been robbed of the chronometer during his
sleep, and, as one of the nurses had been discharged on suspicion of
having pilfered from a dead patient, I lost a deal of good time in
ferreting after her. She proved to be innocent, having been out of
the building on that particular night, and I was left as far from
success as ever. A chance remark of Tommy’s about the “simplicity” of
Teddy O’Lacey drew my attention to that patient, and one day when I
was in the building I walked to the old ward to have a talk with him.
He was gone, and his bed occupied by a new patient. I got an outline
of his address, and began hunting for him in the West Port. While
making this tour through one of the worst rookeries in the place I
met a Roman Catholic priest well known to me, and hailed him at once
with the question—

“Do you know one Teddy O’Lacey?”

The face of the priest became grave in a moment, and he appeared to
me to _think well_ before he answered.

“Who are you after now? and what do you want with O’Lacey?” he slowly
asked, when he had done thinking.

He was a keen-eyed, intelligent man, beloved as much for his
acuteness as for his benevolence, and I saw that his eyes were
reading every line and expression of my face—much as I have seen
those of an anxious mother do when I have asked for her son.

“Never mind what I want, but tell me where he lives,” I laughingly
replied. “I want to see him, if you will know.”

The priest made no answer for a full minute.

“Mr M^cGovan,” he said at last, with a tremor of deep feeling in his
tones, “perhaps I know what you’re seeking, and perhaps I don’t. But
answer me one question—do you believe me? can you depend on my word
of honour as a Christian gentleman?”

“From my soul I can!” I warmly responded, grasping his proffered hand.

“Well, then, take my advice, and don’t show your face in that land
to-day. If you do, _I think_ what you seek will be destroyed. Wait
another day, and I will try to help you all I can. The man O’Lacey
has been very ill, and he believes it is the visitation of God, which
I do myself,” and he lifted his hat and looked reverently upwards.
“Will you have patience for another day, especially when I assure
you, on my soul’s salvation, that by going there now you will not
get, and never see, what you’re after?”

“I will,” I answered, after revolving the proposition for a moment or
two, and so we parted.

Next day a starch box, wrapped in brown paper and addressed to me,
was handed into the office. Inside, in many folds of paper, was
the captain’s chronometer, in its chamois leather cover, bright,
beautiful, and perfect as when it left the maker’s hands. Pinned to
it was a paper, on which were badly written these words—

“A contrite sinner restores what was wickedly stolen, and lifts a
mighty load off his mind.”

I smiled, and though I made some inquiries after O’Lacey, they never
came to anything. Tommy Tait was duly identified by the captain,
and sentenced to seven years’ retirement, the captain getting back
his chronometer, and saying and doing some handsome things on the
occasion.




THE TORN TARTAN SHAWL.


A servant in a house at the outskirts of the city had been tempted
by the clear air and dry frost to leave a whole “washing” of things
out over night. She wanted them to get a nip of the frost, she said,
but instead they got a nip of another kind. The girl woke at four
o’clock in the morning and happened to look out at the green, when
the clothes were there all right. She rose again at six, and, looking
out, had to rub her eyes to make sure that she was not still in bed
and dreaming. Nearly the whole of the things were gone.

Satisfied that she was awake, she first asked herself if some kind
“brownie” had taken the brunt of the morning’s work off her hands
by taking down and folding up the things; but then, remembering
that these useful fairies had all vanished before the steam engine
and electric telegraph, she ran out of the house, fearing theft and
hopeful of catching some of the thieves. No one was visible. The very
best of the clothes were gone; the clothes pegs, all scattered over
the ground, the empty ropes, and a few articles of trifling value
alone being left to tell of the robbery. At least so the girl thought
as she ran into the house and roused all within it with the news. Of
course the servant got the blame, and received notice of dismissal
at once, although, as she afterwards informed me, it had been by her
mistress’s express orders that the things had been left out. The lady
denied that—it is convenient at times to have a bad memory—and so
the disgrace rested on the girl’s shoulders. Had the lady, instead
of indulging in recrimination and wrangling, sent word promptly to
us, the whole case might have assumed a very different aspect, as we
could thus have sent word to most of the pawnbrokers by their hour
of opening. A good haul had been made, including some gentlemen’s
shirts of fine linen, the best of the lady’s underclothing, and some
twenty or thirty pairs of worsted stockings, of all sizes and sorts,
as there was a big family. The most of the linen was marked with the
letters “A. M. B.,” and some of the stockings had the same initials
worked into them with pink worsted near the top of the leg.

When the news reached us I went out to see the place and get a list
of the stolen articles. Six valuable hours had been lost, and I
frankly told the lady that she need scarcely hope to recover all
she had lost, and all through that stupid delay. The green had been
left exactly as the servant had found it when she rushed out in the
morning—the clothes pegs littered the ground; and while I glanced
over the approaches to the green, the girl began to pick up these
pegs and put them into a cotton bag which hung about half-way up
one of the clothes poles. This bag was suspended from a nail at a
height convenient for the hand, and at the head of the nail there
fluttered a little pennon, which had never been meant for that queer
flag-staff. It was a shred of bright coloured tartan, which appeared
to have been rent out of some one’s shawl, as the owner hurriedly
switched past.

“You’ve been damaging your shawl, Maggie,” I remarked to the servant
girl, who was busy laying off to me her wrongs and grievances, and
the deplorable failings of mistresses in general.

“It’s no mine—I dinna wear shawls,” said Maggie shortly as she
continued her task. Her head was full of her troubles—mine was far
away from what she was most anxious to speak of.

I took down the shred of tartan. It began narrow at the nail head
which had caught it, and got gradually broader, till it ended, liked
a filled-up A, in a fringe of the same colours. I spread the piece
out along my palm, and then called to Maggie.

“Look here, now, and tell me if any one about the house, or living
near, wears a shawl of that pattern?”

Maggie looked at the scrap of tartan, and declared most emphatically
that no one in the household did wear such a shawl, and added with
a smile that none of her acquaintances would be seen in such a
thing—the colours being about the brightest and “loudest” that could
be made for money. The same thought had already struck me, and my
thoughts instinctively wandered in the direction of some of my own
“bairns.” The tartan was of just such a pattern as one may see on
scores of shoulders about the Cowgate on a Sunday afternoon. I seemed
to see the whole shawl in that shred—a little square thing, folded
across, and just big enough to cover the shoulders. By mentally
picturing the shawl on a woman’s shoulders, and gauging her height by
that treacherous nail, I could guess her to be a person rather under
than above medium height, and immediately began to ask myself which
of my “bairns” given to “snow-dropping” had been lately displaying
such a grand shawl. Useless! their name is legion. They nearly all
delight in these things, and a dozen at least might wear tartan of
the identical colours of the shred in my hand. I began to think that
I should make little of my discovery. However, I placed the scrap
of tartan carefully between the leaves of my pocket-book, completed
my list as far as I could at the house, and left. A bundle of the
stolen things was in the Office before me. They had been offered at a
pawnbroker’s shortly after the opening hour, and pledged for fourteen
shillings. The boy who had taken in the things and paid over the
money was a _blockhead_. He knew that the pledger was a woman, but
could not describe her appearance. He did not think she was very old,
and he did not think she was very young. Did she wear a tartan shawl?
Yes, he thought so; but then he changed his mind, and thought that
she hadn’t any shawl. No one could make anything of such a fool, and
I strongly recommended the pawnbroker, for his own safety, to get rid
of such a stupid assistant, to which the man replied that he would
have been happy to do so, had the lad not been his own son. I grinned
over my mistake, the pawnbroker helping me liberally, and then left.
I then took a long stroll through the likeliest quarters, with a
keen eye to every tartan shawl. Twice in the course of that walk
did I start joyfully at sight of a shoulder shawl of the identical
pattern, but in both cases the owners were decent, hard-working
folks, and not a trace of a rent or patch to be found in either of
the articles. With my eyes thus grown familiar in the search, I was
wearily trudging homewards late in the afternoon with the shawl
nearly gone from my thoughts, when on the South Bridge, near the head
of Infirmary Street, I came up to a wretchedly-clad woman bearing
in her arms a child, round which was wrapped a gaudy and apparently
new shawl of the exact pattern I sought. Now, at the first glimpse
of this shawl I decided that it was not the one I sought, which
I imagined would scarcely be so bright and fresh-looking; but it
was the incongruity of that bright shawl, allied to such rags and
poverty, which made me slacken my pace, and almost instinctively
follow the owner of the child.

The woman was not a professional thief—a glance at her somewhat
pinched features told me that—yet her poverty was so apparent that I
felt by no means certain that she would not have committed a robbery
under such pressure. Poverty and a hungry bairn—where is the mother
who could resist the pleadings of these? Then the shawl was the only
fresh thing about the queer pair. The mother’s clothes were meagre
and shabby in the extreme; her boots were mere apologies for foot
coverings, and her bonnet only fit for a scarecrow, and the clothing
of the child equally poor. They had also a worn and travel-stained
look, and stood out prominently among the ordinary passengers as
dusty tramps always do when they enter a city. They were strangers,
they were poor, and the child wore a tartan shawl of the exact
pattern I sought—it could do no harm to follow them, which I did with
a sigh for the dinner I had hoped so soon to be consuming.

My interesting pair turned down Infirmary Street, and stopped at the
gate of that institution—became, indeed, part of a crowd already
gathering there—visitors waiting the hour of admittance to see
friends. Five o’clock was the hour, and it lacked nearly ten minutes
of the time. Most of these visitors were of the poorest, and they
varied the monotony of the waiting by exchanging experiences and
expressions of sympathy. My tramp joined in the conversation, and
I soon learned from her tongue that she came from the West. The
Glasgow brogue was strong in her tongue, but not strong enough, and
I soon heard her say that she had come from Airdrie, which accounted
for the slight difference in the accent. She was the wife of a pit
labourer—an occupation considered far beneath that of a collier, who
ranks as a skilled workman; and her husband in working among the
hutches had got hurt in some way, and been laid up at home till their
little house was almost stripped of furniture. Then the disabled man
had gone to Glasgow for advice; and afterwards hearing of the great
skill of the Edinburgh professors, he had scraped together enough to
bring him through to this Infirmary, into which he was admitted as
an indoor patient. He did not write very hopefully of recovery; and
at length the wife, reduced to her last penny, had resolved to come
through and see him with her own eyes.

“I’m feared that he’s waur than he says, and maybe winna get better,”
she said, shedding tears freely as she spoke. “I’ve walkit every fit
o’ the road, thinking I saw a coffin at the end o’ the way.”

Cheering words and homely sympathy were showered upon her without
stint, most of those present seeming to find their own troubles light
beside what that slight woman had endured.

“Is that your only bairn?” one asked, to which the mother replied—

“Yes, and I thocht we wad baith a’ been frozen to death on the road.
It was awfu’ caul’ last nicht; I never thocht we’d see morning.”

“What? did ye sleep in the open air?” cried an old woman, holding up
her hands.

“I hadna a penny to pay a lodging; and I was tired and dune, and
didna like to gang to a poorhouse,” was the choking answer.

The old Irishwoman wiped her own eyes, and then I saw her slowly
fumble in her own pocket and produce twopence, which she tried to
slip into the hand of the baby.

“Oh, no, no! No, thank ye,” cried the mother, in strong protest, and
flushing painfully at the proffered help so thinly disguised. “I’m no
needing that now; I’ve got money since then. There’s some kind folk
in the world yet, and I’ve as muckle as take me to my mither’s after
I see how my man is.”

I did not hear the rest of her speech, for in putting back the
proffered coppers she had thrown up the corner of the tartan
shawl—turned it back with a whisk right under my eyes, and there I
saw a wedge-shaped rent, as if a piece had been neatly torn out of
the pattern near the edge. I was in a manner fascinated and horrified
by the discovery, and stood staring at the torn shawl in a manner
that must have looked idiotic in the extreme.

“That’s a bonnie shawl you’ve got on your bairn,” I at length managed
to say, by way of opening up a conversation.

“The bairn’s bonnier than the shawl,” one woman hastened to add, “but
that’s aye a man’s way o’ looking at things. The brightest colours
catch his e’e first.”

“Have you had it long?” I continued to the mother.

“He’ll be eleven months next week,” she answered, with a look of
pride.

“I don’t mean the bairn—the shawl,” I said in correction.

“Oh, no, not long,” she answered frankly; and then she appeared to
catch herself up, and said no more.

“You’ve torn it a little there,” I continued. “The bit seems to be
taken clean out.”

“Yes, I noticed that,” she quietly answered. She did not seem to like
me or my remarks—just when she was becoming so interesting to me, too!

“Would you mind turning back the corner of the shawl again for a
moment—just to oblige me?” I continued, in no ways abashed by her
coldness.

She gave me a look as if wondering at my impudence, and then threw
back the corner of the shawl over the baby’s shoulder as I had
desired. Her look of contempt was beginning to be reflected in
the faces around her, but I heeded the looks no more than if they
had been the glassy stares of so many wax figures. I took out
my pocket-book, turned open the leaves, and produced the shred
of tartan. Then I spread the torn part of the shawl flat on the
baby’s shoulder, placed the wedged-shaped piece I had taken from my
pocket-book in the opening, and found that in shape, colour, and size
they fitted and corresponded exactly.

The woman followed my movements with no great interest. Her
indifference might have been assumed or caused by the door being
about to be opened.

“Where were you this morning between four and six o’clock?” I
demanded, when I had satisfied myself that I had at last got the
right shawl.

“That’s nothing to you,” she indignantly answered, with a slight
flash of annoyance.

“It is everything; and if you won’t answer it here, you must go with
me up to the Police Office and refresh your memory there.”

The woman turned right round and looked me full in the face, more in
astonishment than alarm. Then some one whispered to her—

“It’s M^cGovan, the detective,” with a significant nudge on the arm,
and in a moment she became terribly agitated.

“Do you think I stole it?” she chokingly exclaimed.

“No, not exactly.”

“Then what for do you want me to gang to the Office?”

“That is not for me to explain, but go you must.”

“I winna! I’ve trampit a’ this way to see my puir man, and I maun see
him.”

I brought out my handcuffs, whereupon the assembled crowd began to
groan and hoot and abuse me to their hearts’ content. Would I drag
a poor creature like that away to jail at such a moment, before she
could even see her invalid husband? I replied that I would not
drag her if she was inclined to walk. Then names were showered upon
me enough to have stocked a slang dictionary. I pointed out to the
crowd that the door was now open, and that through it was their way,
while ours was in quite a different direction; and at length, with
the aid of a policeman who chanced to pass the head of the street, I
convinced them that I was right. The woman was now crying bitterly,
and the child was screaming in concert.

“What am I ta’en awa’ for? Am I charged as a thief?” she at length
sobbed as I led her off.

“Not yet. Just keep your mind easy for a little. It’s only your
baby’s shawl as yet that is in trouble. Why are you afraid to say
where you got it, and when?”

She could not see that anyone had a right to ask that. She had not
stolen it, nor had she bought it, but she declined to say more, till
she saw how serious things looked at the Office.

She was carefully searched, with the result that in her pocket was
found a half sovereign and some coppers, but none of the stolen
articles. Her baby was then inspected, and on it were found a pair of
worsted stockings a world too big for its little legs, with the fatal
initials “A. M. B.” worked in pink worsted near the top of the leg.

The case now seemed very clear, if a little sad. The woman had been
in great want; had been tramping past the place, and under a sudden
temptation had taken the clothes and pawned some of them. I fully
expected her to admit the robbery, and plead the circumstances in
piteous tones in extenuation, but nothing of the kind. She roused
out of her torpor of grief, and in the most indignant tones made a
statement which seemed to us to have not even the merit of ingenuity.
She had been sleeping in the open air on the outskirts of the city,
with her child closely clasped in her arms, “to keep it frae the
caul’,” as it was but thinly clad, when she was roused by a hand
shaking her violently. The disturber of her half-frozen torpor was
a woman dressed like a servant girl in a common print wrapper, and
carrying a big bundle. The strange woman shook her till certain that
she was awake, and then rebuked her strongly for exposing herself and
her child when shelter was within her reach.

“I tellt her I was a stranger, and didna ken where the Night Asylum
was, and that I hadna a penny in the world,” continued our prisoner.
“Then she took my bairn in her arms, and kissed it and cuddled it
to make it warm, and then she took the shawl off her shouthers—that
shawl that you’re makin’ sic a wark aboot—and wrapped it roon’ my
wean, an’ brocht a pair o’ stockin’s oot o’ her bundle for it, an’
tellt me to keep them. Then she gie’d me a shillin’, an’ tellt me
to gang to a lodging in the Grassmarket, and then said she was in a
hurry or she wad have ta’en me there hersel’, and gaed awa’.”

And the half-sovereign found in her possession? How did she account
for that? How did it happen that when the mysterious woman with
the bundle spoke to her she had not a penny, and now she had a
half-sovereign?

“Oh, a gentleman gied me that,” she answered, quite promptly. “I was
sittin’ restin’ on a step, when I got in the toon a bit—for I didna
think it worth while to gang to the lodging as it was after six
o’clock—when a gentleman cam’ up to me and asked me hoo far I had
come, and aboot my man and my wean, and then he put his hand in his
pooch, and brought oot a half-sovereign and put it in my hands. I
thought it was a sixpence, for it was dark at the time, and maybe he
thought that too. He looked a wee touched wi’ drink—drunk, ye ken—and
I was gled when he gaed awa’.”

Clumsy, clumsy! a clumsy story in the extreme. We tried to convince
her of that, and by cross-examining her to trip her up, but she stuck
to her statements with amazing firmness, and even volunteered fresh
details in confirmation. Finding her obdurate, we gave her up in
despair, and she was taken away and locked up in a state of frenzy
which looked wonderfully real, and therefore piteous enough.

The only wonder to us now was where the rest of the stolen clothes
had been hidden. Allowing for the woman spending some money in
the forenoon, she might be reasonably expected to have about ten
shillings left of the fourteen given by the pawnbroker, but that
disposal accounted for only a part of the stolen things. Could she
have had any assistant who would share the plunder? I was anxious to
settle that question. I brought in the pawnbroker’s son to see her,
and he identified her in a haphazard fashion as the woman who pawned
the things, but then, as I have recorded, he was a _blockhead_,
and his evidence had no great value. I then thought of visiting
the Infirmary to see if she had a husband there, and learn if the
name she had given—Ellen Hunter—was real or assumed. A little to my
surprise I found the husband there, Archibald Hunter by name, as the
card at the head of his bed testified; and the moment that a hint of
the truth was given him he was so terribly excited and agitated that
he would almost have been out of the place there and then had he been
allowed.

“Hoo can you blame a starving woman with a wean at her breast?” was
his wild inquiry. “Can ye no show mercy where it’s no a real thief,
but ane forced to it?”

“I daresay she would be shown mercy if she would admit the truth,
and declare that she was driven to the act,” I replied, “but that
she refuses to do. She persists in trying to screen herself and put
all the crime upon some imaginary persons who gave her the things.
There’s nothing new in that story; every thief has it at his tongue’s
end.”

Though we thus disbelieved Ellen Hunter’s story, we made every search
for the rest of the plunder, and actually did come upon traces of
it. Several articles were recovered, which had been either sold or
pawned, in which the linen mark had been removed bodily with a pair
of scissors. This was particularly noticeable on the gentlemen’s
shirts, which had been marked on a little tab at the bottom of the
breast. In the case of one recovered, this tab had been cut off and
the remaining end neatly stitched down. The consequence was that,
though morally certain as to the identity of the shirt, the owner
could not swear to it, and it was given back to the buyer, who
declared that it had been bought from a man, whose appearance he
described, and whom he declared himself able to identify.

Meantime the trial of Ellen Hunter came on at the Sheriff Court, to
which she had been remitted. No reasoning or persuasion could induce
her to plead guilty, or advance extenuating circumstances by way of
lightening her sentence.

“They may do what they like to me, but I winna say I’m guilty when
I’m innocent,” was her firm declaration. “If my wean could only
speak, it wad tell ye that I’ve spoken naething but the truth.”

The case accordingly went to proof, and was speedily settled to
the satisfaction of the jury, who, without leaving the box, found
the charge proven. But then there arose in the Court, close to the
bar, a pale shadow of a man, who in broken tones stated that he
was the husband of the accused, and pleaded for permission to say
a few words in mitigation of his wife’s offence. The permission
was granted, and, in a husky and broken tone, Hunter proceeded to
narrate the circumstances which had brought him to the Infirmary—his
wife’s devotion, integrity, and sterling honesty; and the dread
fear which had brought her on that long journey on foot, and in the
dead of winter, with a child at her breast. The speech was given in
the homeliest of language, and without any attempt at grammatical
correctness; but there was a power and native eloquence about it
which went to every heart. The wife was sobbing loudly at the bar
with her infant in her arms, and the judge, visibly affected along
with the whole Court, was about to pass a light sentence, when there
came an interruption, the very last that any would have looked for in
that place.

“I will do it, and I don’t care for you!” was shouted out in a
woman’s voice in the audience, and as all looked round a girl known
to me as “Sally the Snowdropper,” struggled up from one of the seats
in spite of the efforts of a man at her side to detain her. Then
there was a brief struggle and altercation, and the man rising with
her dealt the poor girl a terrific blow in the eyes. The whole Court
was aghast, and the brute was speedily collared and brought forward
in custody. Then the prisoner at the bar started up with a joyful
scream, and pointing to Sally, cried out—

“That’s the woman! that’s the kind lassie that gied me the shilling
and wrappit her shawl roon’ my wean. Ask her and she’ll tell ye.”

Sally came forward, staunching the blood flowing from her nose, and
looking pale with excitement, but firm and self-reliant withal.

“The woman is innocent as the child in her arms,” said Sally, as soon
as she could speak. “A month or two in quod is nothing to me, but
it’s hard to send an honest man’s wife there for nothing. I can’t
stand that. I never thought it would come to this, or I would have
spoken out sooner. I _stole the things_—every one of them—and I met
her and gave her the shawl I had on, as her child was nearly dead
with cold. I never knew the shawl was torn, or likely to be traced,
or I’d never have given it. I gave her the stockings too—the first
pair that came to hand in the bundle, and put them on her bairn with
my own hands. The mother was half-frozen in her sleep, and at first
I thought they were both dead. Just let her go, and shove me in her
place, and the thing will be squared.”

“She’s mad!—she’s drunk, and doesn’t know what she’s saying,” shouted
the man who had assaulted her; but he was promptly removed and locked
up, the immediate result of which was that he was discovered to be
wearing a gentleman’s white shirt resembling one of those stolen, and
having the tab cut away from the breast, and stitched down exactly
like the one already described.

Sally very speedily proved that she was neither mad nor drunk by
revealing where all the stolen things had been disposed of, and
stating that the tabs of the white shirts had been doctored by her
own hands. Her companion was next day identified as the man who had
sold one of the shirts, and the case was complete.

Ellen Hunter, half frenzied with delight, was set at liberty and
taken into her husband’s arms; and when our case was complete,
Sally, instead of appearing as prisoner, was taken as a witness,
and so moved every one that the Sheriff, before allowing her to
be dismissed, thought fit to address to her a few words of strong
commendation for her generous spirit and truly noble nature, at the
same time advising her, in a kind and feeling manner, to try to get
out of the debasing life for which she was so ill-suited. In vain! he
might have saved his breath. Sally was too far gone to mend her ways;
and, while her companion went to prison, she went drifting on to the
death and destruction which speedily became her lot. But she left one
green spot on her memory. How many such can each of us boast?




A LIFT ON THE ROAD.


A curious difficulty sometimes faces the administrators of the law in
dealing with some of that numerous class known as swindlers. A man
calls at various houses and represents that he is a clergyman in want
or distress, and thus gets money. Some one sharper than the rest runs
him down, and he is caught and charged; when, lo! it turns out that
the so-called rogue—and rogue he generally is—has actually been a
clergyman, and of course is, in common with all broken men, actually
in want. The result is clear—there has been no fraud. He has deceived
no one; he has told the truth; and though he might be convicted of
begging, he cannot be charged with swindling or obtaining money under
false pretences.

It is a man of this stamp I have now to introduce. His real name was
Alfred Johnston. He was a college-bred man of great smartness, and
would have soon made a mark as a clergyman had he not been caught and
ruined by a bad woman. Rendered dissolute in his habits and disowned
by his friends, he changed his life and became as great a rascal as
before he had been promising as a man.

Even with talents such as Johnston possessed this life is not all
smooth sailing. There come times of want and danger, when their
dearest companions would betray them without reward, or see them drop
dying of hunger at their feet without putting out a hand to save.
These are the reverses which are never heard of, but which are more
common in a life of crime than any other on the face of the globe.

Johnston had tramped on foot the greater part of the road from
Glasgow to Edinburgh, and had just crossed the boundary of the
shire, which means that he was ten or twelve miles from the capital.
His appearance was very much against him, or his route would have
been easier. His boots were mere shreds of leather, through which
his feet showed conspicuously, and he had no stockings. He had no
shirt, and the utmost ingenuity in buttoning up his ragged coat
could scarcely conceal the fact. The only trace of respectability
remaining about his attire was a shabby and much battered dress
hat. Johnston was a very good-looking fellow, with fine flowing
black hair, and a big beard and moustache, and was still young—about
thirty—but Apollo himself would have had an evil look in such a garb,
so this prodigal’s lines had been hard ones for some time. In this
plight—wearied in body, tired of life, disgusted with himself and
all the world—Johnston lay down on a green bank by the road-side,
wondering whether it were best to lie there and die, or struggle on
over the remaining miles, which seemed to lengthen as they grew fewer
in number.

A lovely sunset was shedding glory on the scene, and all was peaceful
but the mind of that lost man. In looking listlessly around, his eye
fell on a comfortable and well-sheltered residence, the very air of
which proclaimed it, to Johnston’s experienced eye, a minister’s
manse. There was a large garden attached, well stocked with fruit
trees and bushes, and every other appurtenance that could render a
country house snug and attractive. I don’t know whether the thought
struck him that he might have been the comfortable occupant of such
a house—possibly it did, for he was conscious that he had more
talent than dozens of the drones occupying manses of the kind—but
his immediate action was to rouse himself to consider whether he
could not lay the occupant under contribution. A passing field hand,
belonging to the village close by, supplied him with the occupant’s
name and opinions, and, thus armed, he ventured up to the house,
gently rang the bell, and with some difficulty induced the servant to
take up his name—“The Rev. Alfred Johnston”—to her master.

Johnston stood demurely in the lobby, to which he had been admitted
with marked suspicion by the servant, till the Rev. Robert Goodall
appeared, in spectacles and slippers, direct from his study. If
he had been startled to learn that a brother clergyman wished to
see him, he was much more so at seeing the brother clergyman. But
Johnston was fluent of tongue, and he had experience in dealing with
such surprise.

“I am really a clergyman, as I can prove to you, but have been
reduced to this state by my own folly,” he hastened to humbly say.
“And I have not come to beg or ask you for money, as I daresay there
are so many legitimate calls upon your goodness that you can ill
afford to succour strangers. But I have walked all the way from
Glasgow, and am now nearly fainting with hunger. If you could tell
your servant to give me, out on the door-step or at the road-side,
enough broken victuals, no matter how plain or coarse, to support me
till morning, your kindness will never be forgotten.”

The clergyman heard him in silence, and probably scepticism; but
on questioning him closely as to his college career, was surprised
to find every statement agreeing with his own knowledge. Johnston
described the classes; mimicked the Professors; quoted Greek and
Hebrew writings with the utmost ease and correctness, and even showed
that he had made the acquaintance of personal friends of Mr Goodall
who had attended during the same sessions. In this narration Johnston
had only to keep to the truth to make it saddening to listen to, and
this he did, adding a few pathetic touches about a wife and child
left in great want in Glasgow, while he made a struggle to reach
Edinburgh on foot, in hope of securing a tutor’s place, for which he
was well qualified.

“Do you mean to try to reach Edinburgh to-night?” inquired the
clergyman, with some pity in his tones.

“No, that is impossible, for I am quite exhausted,” said the
wanderer, with apparent frankness. “I cannot go much further. I shall
rest under some hedge or hay-stack till morning, and then make my way
thither by daylight.”

“I am sorry for you, a man of education and talent, who might be in
so much better a position,” said the clergyman, in gentle rebuke.
“However, you shall have the food you require, but not out on the
door-step. Come this way.”

Mr Goodall led the way to a comfortable parlour, where he lighted
a lamp, drew the blinds, and then ordered in the remains of his
own dinner—cold, of course, but much better fare than Johnston had
tasted for many a day. When he had eaten his fill, and finished with
a glass of wine brought to him by the kind clergyman, he was in no
hurry to leave, and his entertainer was as willing that he should
linger. Johnston’s tongue was fluent, and he could tell many strange
stories of his ups and downs, and in the present case so suited them
to a clerical ear that the good-hearted man at length felt strong
qualms as to sending such a man out into the darkness. The best plan
would have been to give the needy being a shilling wherewith to pay
for a lodging at some travellers “howff,” but that never occurred
to the minister. He was entertained, flattered, and amused by the
queer waif cast up at his door, and fancied that the best way to show
his gratitude was to invite Johnston to stay there over the night.
The wanderer affected to receive the invitation with unbounded
astonishment, but was at length prevailed upon to accept the offer,
and after patiently listening to some of Mr Goodall’s printed
sermons, and passing very flattering criticisms upon their logic and
learning, he followed the good man upstairs to a spare bedroom, where
an old suit of the minister’s, with a pair of boots and a shirt, made
a considerable improvement in his appearance.

After supper they parted for the night with mutual good wishes,
and the minister lay down to a sound night’s sleep, conscious of
having that day emulated his great Master in doing one good action
to the neediest near his hands. Johnston ought to have slept soundly
too, for he had travelled far and fasted, and then eaten well, but
cupidity was in him stronger than drowsiness. In producing his pet
sermons to read them over for his guest’s edification, the clergyman
had used his keys to a drawer in the writing-table and exposed
something very like a cash-box. When the sermons had been restored
to their place of security, the drawer had been again locked,
but the keys were left in the lock. Johnston, during a momentary
absence of his entertainer, unlocked the drawer and placed the keys
ostentatiously on the top of the writing-table, from which they were
lifted by the owner a few minutes later, all unconscious but that he
had himself left them there.

No opportunity occurred during the evening for testing the contents
of the unlocked drawer; but in anticipation of there being something
in it worth carrying away, he arranged with his kind host that he
should be allowed to leave the house very early in the morning.

The thought of that money-box kept him awake for three hours, by
which time he guessed rightly that both the clergyman and his
housekeeper would be fast asleep. He then slipped down to the parlour
on his stocking-soles—the first use to which he put the gift of Mr
Goodall—and took from the box about £50 in notes and coin. A gold
pencil-case, a silver fruit knife, and a pair of spectacles, which
were lying close by, he was mean enough also to appropriate. He then
slipped upstairs, and lay down and slept the sleep of the unjust till
about seven in the morning.

I don’t know what the man’s feelings had been when he found that Mr
Goodall was up, and had caused the servant to prepare breakfast for
him, and when that was hastily swallowed, insisted on accompanying
the wanderer back part of the way to the nearest railway station, at
which he paid his fare to Edinburgh, and pressed a few shillings
into his hand, merely saying at parting—

“Go in peace, and sin no more.”

Surely his heart must have got a sore twinge at that moment.

Johnston soon reached Edinburgh, and the telegram announcing the
robbery followed an hour or two later. This message contained a brief
description of the man, who, however, was known to me by reputation,
though I had never seen him. My only wonder was that he had given
his real name and antecedents, which, I suppose, may be accounted
for by the robbery being an after-thought. With such a sum of money
in his possession Johnston was practically at the ends of the earth,
and it might be thought foolish to look for him in Edinburgh; but
I reasoned otherwise. Your very needy rascal, who has not fingered
money for a long time, grudges to throw away much of it on railway
fares, or anything, indeed, which does not minister immediately to
his own gratification. Besides, Johnston had spoken of going to
“friends” in Edinburgh, and I had no doubt but he had in his mind
at the moment certain of my “bairns” hailing from Glasgow, and
already known to him, who would be glad to profit by his superior
education and planning power. By telegraphing to Johnny Farrel I had
a list of these “friends” an hour after the receipt of the news,
and immediately went out to seek some of them, sending M^cSweeny in
another direction on the same errand. The brief description from the
robbed clergyman was supplemented by a fuller one from Glasgow, and
thus we were pretty certain of identifying our man, even if we had
met him on the street. Now, behold how, when you are most certain,
you may be most easily deceived. M^cSweeny went to a certain house in
Potterrow, which he entered without ceremony, and then proceeded to
question the inmates. This house had generally a stranger or two in
it at every inspection, and the present occasion proved no exception.
There were two strangers—one a hawker, and the other an evil-looking
character with the hair of his head cropped close to the skull, and
his face as smooth and hairless as the palm of his hand. Neither of
these answering the description, M^cSweeny began to make inquiries
for Johnston, and was even obliging enough to describe his character
and general appearance to those present in that kitchen.

“I believe I saw him not an hour ago,” said the cropped-headed man
sullenly, after a dead silence on the part of all present.

“Where?” eagerly demanded M^cSweeny.

“Where I could get him again in five minutes, I think, if it was
worth my while,” suggestively returned the man.

“Will you take me to him now, then?” cried M^cSweeny.

“No. But I’ll send him up here if you like to wait. Is it worth
half-a-crown?”

M^cSweeny considered for a moment, and then said that it was. The man
slowly rose from his place by the fire and held out his hand for the
money; but the clever and cunning M^cSweeny only winked hard, and
made a few remarks about great detectives, famous all over the world,
not being easily cheated.

“No, no, my jewel,” he added; “ye’ll get the money when ye’ve earned
it—not a minute sooner.”

The man scowled horribly, and slowly slunk out of the room and the
house. Was ever an escape more neatly effected? That clean-shaven,
cropped-haired man was Johnston! The moment he had entered the city
he had gone to a barber and got shaved and cropped—I afterwards spoke
to the man who did it—and the alteration which such an operation
effects on the appearance can be understood only by those who have
seen it performed. Had Johnston been placed at that moment under the
eyes of Mr Goodall he most certainly would not have been able to
identify his late guest; nay, I am not sure but he might have sworn
most positively that that was not the man.

M^cSweeny waited patiently for nearly half an hour, and then it began
to dawn upon him that he had been done. The grins of the occupants
of that kitchen as he went out did not tend to soothe his feelings.
Not a word was said on either side; it was all understood. What had
first roused my chum’s suspicion of the truth was the recollection
that the man had passed out of the room without a head-covering, and
that the remainder of his body was covered with a very loose-fitting
old suit of blacks. Now the clergyman had made Johnston a present of
just such a suit, and being himself a stout man, had not been able to
give him a very good fit. Along with the suit went a broad-brimmed
clerical-looking dress hat; but that Johnston had only assumed when
out of M^cSweeny’s sight. What made the thing more aggravating was
that M^cSweeny had seen the hat hanging on a window-shutter in one
of the rooms in searching the house, yet had never thought of
connecting it with the evil-looking wretch by the fire. Not long
after M^cSweeny’s discomfiture, one of the county police appeared
with a full description of this suit of clothes and broad-brimmed
hat—just too late, of course.

When M^cSweeny had spent a deal of time in hunting for the man who
had so neatly escaped him, and appeared to report to me, I was in a
very bad temper, for I was conceited enough to think that, if it had
been I who had clapped eyes on Johnston, he would not have got off—an
opinion which I changed when I knew the rascal better.

Like Jim Macluskey, [See _Brought to Bay_, page 5] he had the rare
faculty of being able to change the whole expression of his face by
ingeniously contorting his features, and could speak in any kind
of language or tone to suit. M^cSweeny’s mistake was really not so
surprising or stupid as it appeared to me at the moment, or as it now
appears in print.

I had no time to say much, for I felt that Johnston must have
realised that the city was too hot for him, and would get out of it
at his swiftest. If I was to get him it must be at once.

What route or means was he most likely to take? That was the
all-important question with me. First I decided that he would not
go near any of the railway stations, else I should have hopefully
turned in the direction of the Forth and the North—quite a favourite
route for escaping criminals. Then it struck me that, having gone
the length of sacrificing his fine beard and hair, and been so
successful in thus altering his appearance, he might boldly try the
most dangerous route of all, as that on which he was least likely to
be looked for—the road for Glasgow. He was not to know that, when it
was too late, we had penetrated his disguise, and at that moment was
probably exulting over his cleverness. I did not expect him to walk
all the way to Glasgow, but thought he might go out a good distance,
and then take train at some obscure railway station for whatever town
he meant to favour with his presence. My idea was that Glasgow itself
was to be thus favoured, but that point did not concern me for the
present.

Now, there were the three roads all crossed by the railway to choose
from, and I was a little puzzled which to try. He had come by that
leading through East Calder, and I scarcely thought he would take
that. That left the Bathgate and Linlithgow routes to choose from. I
got a gig with a strong stepping horse, and drove out the Linlithgow
road till I came upon one of the county police, who satisfied me that
no such man had passed along that road within the last three hours.
My reason for trying that route was that there was a possibility of
him, when once on the railway skirting that road, branching away
to the north by way of Stirling, and so escaping. However, there
was nothing for it but to drive back in all haste and get on to the
Bathgate road, which is the favourite one for tramps. When I was a
few miles from the city, I could scarcely believe my own eyes when I
saw a man approaching me from the opposite direction, clad in a suit
identical with that I was looking for. There it was—loose-fitting,
shabby, old, and black, with the broad-brimmed hat to crown all. The
man’s face had no beard either, but it was roasted brown with the
sun, and had on the chin a stubbly growth of hair some days old.
Nevertheless, I pulled up and stopped him.

“Here, you!” I said, displaying my staff as I jumped down.

“Alfred Johnston, I’ve been looking for you. I’ve a warrant for all
Scotland, so step up quietly;” and before he had recovered from his
astonishment, or uttered a word, I had the handcuffs on his dirty
wrists.

“My name isn’t Johnston—that I’ll swear,” he said, simply, when he
got his breath; then a light appeared to break on him, and with a
great oath he added, “Now I think I know why the kind gentleman got
me to change clothes with him, though mine were sorry rags and them
is first-class. Whew! who’d have thought it? He’s done something, and
the police is after him for it?”

This seemed not bad at all, and quite worthy of the man who had so
neatly befooled M^cSweeny, but I only grinned unfeelingly in his
simple face, and said dryly that “I believed so,” and bundled him
without ceremony into the gig.

“But—but—ye don’t mean to tell me ye’re going to take me instead of
him?” he at length articulated, with a look of half-comical alarm.

“I am—just.”

“Then the real man’ll get off, and I’ll be hanged in his stead!” he
cried, fairly breaking down with terror; “for he’s footing it out
fast enough, I tell ye.”

“The real man?” I said, thinking to humour him, as I resumed the
reins and turned the horse’s head; “and what was he like, pray?”

“A clean-shaved, smooth-spoken gentleman—for all the world like a
priest or a minister, only that his head’s cropped as close as if
he was just new out of jail,” was the prompt answer; “though, by my
troth, he looked more like a shockerawn in my old duds when I left
him.”

I started, and began to think. Then I pulled off my prisoner’s hat,
and found his hair not at all close cropped. I drove rapidly back to
one of those wayside stations of the county police, and there left my
prisoner safely locked up, every question he answered confirming my
impression that he had been speaking the truth. The only difficulty
I had with him was in getting him to describe the clothes which he
had exchanged for the old blacks he wore. These he either could not
or would not name—in colour, shape, or material—a difficulty which I
only understood when the rags were before me—and then it would have
puzzled _me_ to do what I wondered at him not doing. Even a detective
can be unreasonable at times.

Leaving the Irish-speaking man thus, I turned the horse’s head and
made him spin along the road at a fine rate, being not only anxious
to overtake the wearer of the “duds,” if he existed, but also to
escape a storm of rain which had been threatening for half the day
and was then beginning to descend. When I had gone on thus for
a few miles, and passed a good many on the road—not one of whom
answered the description of my man—I allowed the horse to “breathe”
in ascending one of the braes by laying the reins on his neck and
letting him take his own pace. In thus moving slowly along, I turned
a corner allotted to stone breaking, and there caught sight of a dark
object huddled in to shelter from the rain. I was all but past, and
had just noticed that the figure was that of a ragged tramp, when the
man rose and trotted hurriedly after the gig, saying respectfully—

“If you please, sir, would it be asking too much, sir, for you to
give me a lift?”

I pulled up the horse and scanned him closely, while I appeared to
busy myself pulling up my collar to keep out the driving rain.

“Well,” I said, in a tone by no means gracious or obliging, “how far
are you going?”

“I’m not particular, sir,” he answered with alacrity, “as far as
you’re going yourself, sir.”

“Come up, then.”

I had decided that he might not be my man, but I would be as well to
have him beside me till I saw if there were any others further on.
Besides, it was already growing dark, and I had little time to lose.

The bundle of rags got up, and I had a better view of his face as
he made his ragged legs comfortable under the knee cloth. It was
clean shaven and by no means so loutish as his speech. His hair, I
saw, was cropped to the bone. I drove on till it was dark without
overtaking any other, drawing my companion out on the weather and
other every-day topics.

“What are you when you are at home?” I at length half jocularly asked.

I had kept him at arm’s length, so to speak, all the way, never
allowing him to become familiar in the least.

He paused over his answer, looking up at my face through the darkness.

“I’d astonish you if I told you,” he at last replied, in a somewhat
altered tone.

“Indeed!” I answered, apparently with great indifference, but really
trembling with eager curiosity.

“Yes, I am really a clergyman, but reduced to this state by my own
folly.”

At last I had him! There he was sitting close by me in the dark,
betrayed by his own pet phrase, so truthful, and yet so often used to
deceive. I could have shouted with exultation, but I was too anxious
to see him safe under lock and key. Plenty of time for crowing when I
had him in the cells.

I gave a dissatisfied grunt and a dry “Imphum,” and remained silent
for some time. During that interval a bright thought flashed upon me,
and at the first cross road I purposely turned the horse off the main
road, and went on till we were stopped by a farm.

I had gig lamps, and these I got lighted, and then I mounted and
turned back till we reached the main road, which I boldly turned
into—in the direction leading back to Edinburgh.

“Are you sure you’re not going the wrong way?” said my companion,
after a little.

“I am going my way—this is my road,” I replied, with some gruffness;
“I can’t say anything about yours. I think you said you weren’t
particular?”

“All right—neither I am,” he said, evidently not relishing the
thought of being turned out on the dark road in such a rain. “Just
drive on, please, and never mind me.”

I did drive on at my fastest. I soon reached the little
station-house; but before that I had decided that it might not be
very safe to trust Johnston in such a place for the night, and I
passed it without stopping. At last the lights of the city appeared
in front of us, and my companion roused himself to watch them with
growing interest.

“What town is this?” he at length asked.

“Edinburgh,” I shortly answered.

“What! Edinburgh?” he cried, almost jumping up from his seat. “How
can that be? I thought we were driving towards Bathgate?”

“We were at first, but I changed my mind and turned back. Want to get
down, or will you go further?”

He considered the matter, though I was really laughing at him in my
sleeve while making the suggestion; for, as may be guessed, I had no
intention of allowing him to get down—alone. Then he said ruefully—

“Which way are you going?”

“Round by the back of the Castle towards the High Street,” was my
prompt answer; and he directed me to drive on, signifying that he was
going that way too—which was perfectly true. At the Puseyite Chapel
he touched me on the arm and said—“I’ll get down here, sir, if you
please.”

I was driving along at a great speed and appeared not to hear him,
and in a moment more we were tearing into the brightly-lighted
Lawnmarket and High Street.

“I wanted to get down,” he said reproachfully, and a little angrily,
as we went careering madly down the street.

“It’s all right,” I said; “I’m getting down in a minute myself;” and
sure enough, in less than that time, I pulled up in front of the
Central, where I gave the reins to a man, who delightedly exclaimed—

“Oh, M^cGovan’s got him!”

My prisoner gave me a look—long and steady—which spoke more than a
thousand words, and then I helped him down with the words—

“Come away, Johnston; we’ve had a very successful drive, haven’t we,
though it has been disagreeably wet?”

He replied in the affirmative, but the language in which it was
couched was not clerical. That lift on the road cost him just five
years’ penal servitude. I shall allude to him again.




THE ORGAN-GRINDER’S MONEY-BAG.


When the organ-grinder appeared in a distracted state at the Office,
his face was quite familiar to me through seeing him on the streets
and at race-courses and other gatherings with his organ. He was a
big-bodied, swarthy man, with a full black beard, and, of course,
till that moment I had taken him for an Italian. To hear the Irish
brogue come pouring in a torrent out of his mouth, therefore, was
a little startling. His very grief, and earnestness, and evident
unconsciousness of anything ludicrous added comicality to the
discovery, and it was with the greatest difficulty that I restrained
a smile while he incoherently made known his loss.

“The savings of tin years tuck from me in a lump,” he groaned, with
a shower of lamentations; “and however the thafe did it, or found
out where my money was, or that I had any to stale, I can’t for the
life of me tell; for even my friend Tom Joson here thought I hadn’t a
penny, and didn’t know where it was kept.”

The friend thus alluded to bobbed to me, and I recognised him also as
a street musician. He was a lame man, and used a crutch and stick to
move about, and his instrument was a tin whistle. Sometimes, I think,
he used two of these whistles tied together, and he affected to be
much more lame and helpless than he really was. His favourite “pitch”
was to squat cross-legged at the edge of the pavement on the Mound
with his crutch and stick ostentatiously displayed before him, and
a tin mug placed on the kerb ready for contributions, and there he
droned out his tunes, generally of a plaintive character, for hours
together, with wonderful taste and skill. He got drunk at times, and
became troublesome, and had to go to jail to cool down.

That was the man who now bobbed to me, and shook his head dolefully
over his friend’s misfortune.

“I came here to show him the way, and introduce him to the great
detective,” Joson volunteered, with a sympathetic snifter and cringe.

“Yes, having been here so often yourself, you were quite qualified
for that task,” I dryly returned, whereat the lame man cringed and
bobbed again, and affected to take the observation as a very good
joke, though his mental remarks, I feel sure, were quite unfit for
publication.

“You say you have lost a bag of money,” I continued to the
organ-grinder, after taking down his name as Peter M^cCarthy. “How
did it happen, and how much money did the bag contain?”

“’Twasn’t lost—’twas stole from me,” cried the organ-grinder, with a
fresh burst of expletives on the head of the robber; “and there was
two hundred and seven golden sovereigns in the bag—two hundred and
seven, sur. ’Twas a heap of money, and it was so pleasant to feel
the gold running through your fingers. But I’m afeared I’ll never
touch it again. And I worked hard for it, sur; if I’d coined every
sovereign of it out of me own blood it couldn’t have been got slower.
Tin years! och, if I lose it, I may creep into me grave.”

“You were foolish to carry such a large sum about with you,” I could
not help observing.

“I didn’t carry it about with me—it had got too heavy for that,”
quickly returned the organ-grinder. “Faith, I only wish I’d never
given up carrying it, and I’d have had it now. No; I had it stowed
away in a hole of the chimney of my house, where no living being
could get at it.”

“And yet it was taken—how do you explain that?”

“I can’t explain it. I only know that it’s gone,” he answered with
a mysterious look, much as if he thought some greedy ghosts had
been at work removing his hidden pile. “My house is a garret in the
Grassmarket. I’ll take you to it, and show you the place whenever you
like. The landlord is a hawker called Jimmy Poulson. He has the other
two rooms; but he can’t get into my place at any time, as I’ve a lock
on the dure, which I had put on myself, which no one can pick.”

At the mention of Jimmy Poulson’s name, Tom Joson, the lame man,
jerked his head to me significantly.

“I’ve always till now thought Jimmy an honest man,” continued the
organ-grinder, “and even if he had got into my house while I was
out, how could he have known I had money, or got it out without
leaving marks?”

“Ay, how?” groaned the lame man in sympathy.

“You see, sur,” pursued the other, “I never had a fire on in my room,
for the agreement was I was to get the use of Jimmy’s kitchen and
fire for a shilling a week extra, so I had a board made to fit the
fire-place, and I had that always fixed in while I was out. I’ll tell
ye how I fixed it so as nobody could move it without me knowing. I
always pasted a paper over the edges, and the paper had generally a
picture on it. If any one had tuck it down when I was out the paper
picture must have shown the cracks and tears. Last night when I got
home there wasn’t a scratch or tear in the paper—this morning the
same; but when I took out the board with my own hands I found that
the hole in the chimney was empty, and my bag of gold stole away.”

“Stole away!” echoed the lame man, like an obedient chorus, with a
doleful shake of the head.

“Then I wondered how it was I hadn’t seen Jimmy for three days,
for I’d never known him to be away so long before,” continued the
organ-grinder. “You see, we have both keys to fit the outer door, and
when Jimmy’s away I just look after things for him. He’s a bachelor,
and so am I, and likely to keep so if I don’t get back my money. Oh,
what will my poor darlin’, Honora, say when she hears of me being
robbed!” he moaned, flying off at a tangent again. “She’s waited
for me for ten years, and the money was to fulfil a vow I made as a
penance to me sowl, for I wance struck my mother, and knocked her
senseless, and I vowed before God that if He’d restore her I’d save,
and slave, and scrape, and stint myself, and never marry my own
devoted girl till I’d bought the little bit of land and the house for
the owld paiple to end their days in peace; and another year would
have done it. Surely the blessed Lord above us, that heard my vow
and helped me to keep it, won’t let me be sent broken-hearted to the
grave with this cruel loss?”

“You ought to have put the money in the bank,” I said severely. “The
interest alone during these years would have amounted to something
handsome, and allowed you to fulfil your purpose by this time.”

“I couldn’t trust a bank,” he said, with the national prejudice in
every word and tone. “When the bank broke I’d have blamed myself
for my simplicity and foolishness, but now I blame nobody but the
black-hearted thafe. If it’s Jimmy Poulson that’s done it, he’ll
never prosper in this world; for it’s not me alone he’s wronged, but
the owld paiple, that are less able to bear it, and my sweet colleen,
that would lay down her life for me.”

“Oh, but Mr M^cGovan will soon run him down,” observed the lame man,
hopefully.

I was not so sure of that, for, supposing the thief to be Poulson,
that worthy had already got three days’ start. As yet, however, I was
by no means certain that there had been any thief in the case. When
I had got from the organ-grinder a description of the land of houses
in which he lived, I found that it was one well known to me as one
of the ricketiest buildings in the quarter, and I quickly formed a
theory, from his description of the place and circumstances, that
seemed to offer the only feasible explanation. He had thrust the
bag of money into a hole inside the chimney; that hole might have
been deeper than he thought; might have led into another chimney;
and so, in thrusting in the treasure, it was possible he might have
sent it tumbling down, like a gift from heaven, into some wretched
abode beneath. I said little of this idea at the moment, but anxiety
to test the matter induced me to go with the queer pair to the
organ-grinder’s garret. It was a poor place, and very small. There
was a bed at one side, and a window jutting out on the slates. This
window was fastened with two thick screw nails on the inside, and
had not been opened for years. I tried with all my strength to open
it, but it did not yield in the slightest. The place was very tidy
and clean, considering that no woman ever got within the door. I
turned to the fire-place, beside which stood a square board very much
papered over on one side, but showing clean white wood and two cross
spars on the other. This fitted the fire-place exactly. Directed by
the organ-grinder I reached up inside the fire-place and soon touched
a recess in the wall of the chimney. It was a mistake to call it a
hole; it was a mere ledge in the wall on which a bag of money might
have rested easily, but in which it could scarcely be said to be
hidden. There was no soot in the chimney, and my fingers were not
even soiled by the inspection. My theory, of course, was completely
knocked on the head, but I immediately formed another.

Looking up the chimney I could see daylight at quite a short distance
above. The vent was nearly straight till near the fire-place,
where it widened considerably. The organ-grinder was positive that
the strange door of his safe and its fastenings had been quite
untampered with before he himself opened it. He declared that if it
had been he should have detected the fact at a glance. The money
therefore had not come out at that door; neither had it gone through
the wall or down any other chimney; there remained therefore but one
way for its abstraction, that was—up the chimney. The lame man Joson,
who assisted me officiously during the examination, was anxious when
I had concluded to learn what theory I had formed in regard to the
robbery, but I did not enlighten him; and though the second theory,
like the first, proved to be not quite correct, it was perhaps as
well that I said nothing of it at the time. No such caution is
necessary here, however, and I may state the theory. I had often
seen ragamuffins fishing down the street gratings or inaccessible
areas for odds and ends dropped by passers by, their fishing-tackle
generally consisting of a long bit of twine and a piece of wood or
stone, the under side of which was coated with tar or some such
sticky substance. Sometimes, instead of a tarred stone, there was a
well-sharpened table fork, which was simply lowered and let “dab”
into the article to be hoisted.

If the article happened to lie in any corner “off the plumb,” some
difficulty was generally experienced in the fishing, though even then
captures were sometimes made by setting the fork or sticky stone in
motion, pendulum wise, and at the proper moment letting it fall on
the article. Now, applying this knowledge to the organ-grinder’s
money-bag, it seemed to me quite likely that it had been fished
out in the same fashion, though I was doubtful if a fork or even a
sticky stone could have laid hold of a money-bag of green flannel,
especially when that bag was weighted with 207 sovereigns. But even
supposing the “fishing” theory correct, boys do not generally wander
along roofs fishing down chimneys for possible hoards.

To fish down that chimney implied a knowledge that the gold was
there, and that knowledge, the organ-grinder insisted, had been till
that day confined strictly to his own breast. Even his own relations
in the west of Ireland, he declared, knew nothing of his hiding-place
or the amount of his savings. In saying so he possibly spoke what
he believed to be the truth. It is possible to betray many a secret
without ever using the tongue or opening the lips, and certainly
without ever knowing or dreaming that we have revealed what we are
striving to conceal. I therefore made no comment on these strong
statements, but sought by a series of indirect questions to discover
whom he consorted with most, and, above all, who was favoured so far
as to be admitted into this house of his, as he chose to dignify the
garret.

Only two persons, so far as I could learn, were thus favoured, and
these were the landlord, Jimmy Poulson, and the lame man, Tom Joson.
The organ-grinder did not make a confidant of either of these men,
but if one of them had a higher place in his esteem than the other,
that one was Joson. I suspect the organ-grinder was inclined to be
miserly, and liked Joson, because the lame man treated him to drink
without ever asking him to return the compliment.

The street whistle-player, unlike his dear friend, was a married
man, and never got into difficulties with the police except by
getting drunk and quarrelling with his wife. He had therefore got
into a habit of shunning public-houses when he wanted a comfortable
spree—as he knew only too well that there he would be unerringly
hunted out by his wife—and going instead to the organ-grinder’s
garret, where, after the labours of the day, they could enjoy in
peace what was denied to Joson elsewhere. Much of this I drew out
of the organ-grinder after getting rid of Joson, by sending him out
for some writing-paper and ink. When I had drawn from him all I
wished, I began to speculate as to whether it was not possible that
both Poulson and Joson had participated in the robbery. If I had had
any choice in the matter, I should rather have blamed the lame man
than the hawker. Poulson was a hard-working man, and had never been
through our hands, while the lame man was a bit of an imposition,
had often been in jail, though not for stealing, and was exceedingly
cunning besides. But there was the condemning fact—Poulson had run
off and disappeared, while the lame man not only remained, but had
been the adviser and guide of the organ-grinder in seeking the aid of
the police. Still I could not see what interest the lame man could
have had in so constantly seeking the society of the organ-grinder.
What object could he have in view? Had he suspected that the man kept
a hoard somewhere about the room, and determined to find out where
that hide was?

These were some of the thoughts which troubled me, but I put them
past for after consideration, while I made arrangements with the
organ-grinder to try a curious experiment, first binding him to
absolute secrecy, even from his “friend, Tom Joson.” The lost
money-bag had been made out of a piece of the green cloth which had
covered M^cCarthy’s organ when he was overtaken by rain. He had made
the bag himself, and said he would know it again among a thousand. I
asked him if he could make one a little like it in size, to which he
promptly answered that he could, and out of the same stuff. I then
left him, and returned late at night, and long after it was dark.
We weighted the new money-bag with a quantity of coppers which the
organ-grinder had taken in the streets, and then placed it on the
ledge in the chimney. I then mounted to the roof and easily found the
right chimney top, as I had made M^cCarthy light a candle and place
it within the fire-place. I then lowered the “fishing tackle” I had
prepared for my experiment. This was a leaden sinker at the end of a
string, to which was attached an arrangement of hooks, which could
not have failed to catch the money-bag if I could only have brought
them near it. But there was the difficulty. I fished and fought
away for half an hour, but I could never get swing enough on that
sinker to bring the hooks near the bag, though I knew exactly where
the bag lay, which was more than the thief could have known. As the
fire-place widened considerably from the chimney proper, I could not
see the bag for which I was fishing, and in the end I gave up the
attempt, almost convinced that the robbery had not been effected
by any such means. I had gone there after dark to make my queer
experiment with a view to keeping the thing as quiet as possible,
and also because I thought it likely that the real attempt had been
made under like conditions. While doing so I was, without knowing it,
within a few feet of what would have given me the real clue to the
mystery—I might almost have touched it with my hand—and yet I saw
nothing, and left the roof rather more puzzled than when I ascended.
Had I gone in daylight all that might have been different.

I had now done with experiments, and set myself to something
practical by hunting for the absconding hawker. The finding of his
whereabouts was no difficult matter. He was well known, and though
out of the city, he had to pursue his calling to get a living, and so
a few messages across the adjoining counties soon revealed the fact
that Poulson, after an eccentric tour, was returning to Edinburgh
for a fresh stock. I was surprised at the news. I had fully expected
that a man with 207 stolen sovereigns in his possession would not
only cease working for a while, but give the scene of his exploit a
wide berth for some time to come. At length I heard that he was in
the city, and went to his house to look for him. As I had expected,
he was not there, and had not been near the place. There was another
place known to him, as I had discovered through Tom Joson, the lame
man, in which any one who had means could hide for any length of
time. I had been in that den before, and went there direct.

It was a quiet place, down near the bottom of the North Back
Canongate. The house was entered by an outside stair in a dark court,
where there were excellent corners for concealment.

I took up my position there as soon as it was dark, and had not
been long there before I saw a man enter the court, take in all the
bearings of the place much as I had done myself, and then select
a corner quite as good as my own. In this he ensconced himself so
coolly that in sheer wonder I crossed the court and grabbed him by
the shoulder. Then in the dim light I recognised a sheriff-officer
well known to me.

“Hullo! are you watching for some one too?” I exclaimed.

“Yes, and a bonnie chase I’ve had,” he growled in a whisper. “It’s a
hawker called Poulson——”

“Ah, indeed! and what do you want him for?”

“Oh, just an affiliation case—decree for ten pounds and expenses, and
the usual aliment. I’ve been all over Fife after him, and he knows
it. Fourpence a mile will never pay me for all the trouble I’ve had.
I know he’s in here, but I’ll wait till he comes out. I wouldn’t go
into that den for a hundred pounds. They’d jump on me and stave in my
ribs, or break my leg as soon as look at me.”

“Then, if you’re sure he’s in here, let’s go in together,” I
answered; “I’ll warrant they won’t jump on me, or break my leg
either. I want Poulson, too; what are we to do with him when we get
him, eh?—halve him?”

“Oh, you can keep him if we get him,” he returned, with a gruesome
shrug of the shoulders. “He’ll be as safe with you as any one.”

We ascended the stair and knocked, and after some delay were
admitted. Poulson, they said, was not there, and of course we did not
see him. After locking the outer door on the inside and pocketing the
key, I went over the three rooms. In the windows of two apartments
adjoining each other there were fixed boxes, with lids, which
appeared to be used as seats.

I lifted the lid of one. There was nothing inside, and the space
revealed was only about three feet long by a foot and a half deep. I
got into the next room after a little, and saw the exact counterpart
of this box seat in the window of that. It also was empty, but in
length was rather shorter than the other. Something about one of the
ends attracted my attention, and I put my hand to it. The whole end
moved a little. I touched a small nail in the centre and pulled it.
The end slid easily towards me, and, looking through, I saw that the
two window seats were one compartment with a movable division. In the
long end—that is the end I had searched first—Poulson was lying on
his side, and he looked considerably astonished when I hauled him out
by the leg.

But when we got him out of the house, and he learned that he was
wanted by me more than the sheriff-officer, his surprise increased.
He could not understand it at all. When we got him to the Central,
and the charge was made known, he broke out into the most indignant
protestations of innocence. He had never heard of the robbery of the
organ-grinder’s money-bag, and had not dreamt of the man possessing
such a sum.

“If I had thought it,” he added, “I would have asked him to lend me
enough to get over this difficulty.”

He was locked up, and every search made for the stolen sovereigns,
but without success; and after a few days’ detention he was handed
over to the sheriff-officer. As he pledged himself to pay all his
debts, he was released under certain conditions.

This fact having been made known to me, I had him strictly watched,
as I had the idea that the money would be drawn from that pile of
sovereigns taken from the organ-grinder. No such call, however,
was made upon that store. Poulson proceeded to “realise” upon his
furniture and effects, and with that and the little money he had for
buying a new stock, he managed to clear himself of the disagreeable
surveillance of the sheriff-officer. He was still being watched
closely by M^cSweeny, and as he soon became conscious of the
fact, he became very unhappy. His recent misfortunes had somewhat
broken his spirit, and he began to drink and loaf about instead
of bestirring himself to retrieve his position. There was not the
slightest indication that he had the organ-grinder’s sovereigns
hidden anywhere; and in his straits he was dependent chiefly upon
the organ-grinder and the lame man, Tom Joson. One day when he had
reached his last coin and was groaning over the fact that he was
the object of such attention from the police, it was proposed to him
by the lame man that he should get rid of the espionage by a sudden
flight.

“I’ll lend you enough to pay your passage to London,” said the
generous Joson confidentially; “and to tell you a secret, I’m
thinking of going there myself if I can manage to give the wife the
slip.”

The offer was jumped at by the hawker, the more so as Joson told him
he would give him a trifle to start with when he should reach the
metropolis. One afternoon, accordingly, they met at an appointed
place, and walked towards Granton together. As a touching proof of
his confidence, the lame man entrusted Poulson with a bundle of his
to carry. The bundle was not very large, but it was heavy. When they
reached Trinity, the lame man said he could walk no further, and
took a penny ride by rail for the rest of the way, the agreement
being that they were to meet on board the steamer. M^cSweeny, who
had got word of the movement from the organ-grinder, was already
at the ticket office at Granton Pier. The lame man went on board
unchecked. Half an hour later Poulson appeared, carrying the bundle
given him by the lame man, and was promptly stopped by M^cSweeny. The
weight of the bundle gave my chum great hope, and for once he was
not disappointed. When the bundle was opened at the station-house,
there was found within a bag of coarse green cloth, containing 203
sovereigns. Then the hawker confessed that he had got the bundle from
the lame man to carry, but was well laughed at for his pains. By that
time the London steamer had sailed, and it appeared probable that the
lame man had gone with it, for he was nowhere to be found. M^cSweeny
was very proud of his capture, but while he was thus engaged I had
been busy in another quarter. A slater had gone up on to the roof
of the house upon which I had made my fishing experiment, and found
there a long iron rod, bent at the end and fitted with a sharp hook.
The moment I got word of this discovery I made the circuit of the
district to find the nearest blacksmith, and from him I learned that
the rod had been made to order by him for “a lame man who played the
whistle on the streets.” Back to the organ-grinder I went, and tried
the patent rod down his chimney with perfect success. I hooked up the
dummy bag at the very first attempt. At the same time I drew from the
organ-grinder a confession that “in drink” he was very loquacious
and communicative. I had now no doubt but he had in some such
unguarded moment allowed the lame man to draw from him part of his
secret, the man’s native cunning and ingenuity filling up the blanks.

I now wished very much to see Joson, and with that end in view took
the night mail for London. I was in the city long before the steamer
arrived, and waiting for it at the wharf when it slowly crept up the
river. No tender relative could have looked out for a dear friend
with more anxious solicitude than I did for the face of the cripple
whistle-player, and, as luck had it, his was almost the first face I
saw.

He was looking over the taffrail, and evidently viewing the lively
scene with great interest, for he saw no one—not even me—till my hand
was laid upon his arm with the words—

“Well, Joson, I’m glad to see you. I hope you’ve had a good passage?”

The kind inquiry was never answered. Joson appeared to collapse at
the very sight of my face, and submitted to be led away without
a murmur. Poulson would have had some difficulty in proving his
innocence, had not the lame man made a clean breast of it, and
pleaded guilty with a view to shortening his own sentence.

For a long time there was one whistler less in the streets, and the
organ-grinder’s motto ever after was, “Save me from my friends!”




THE BERWICK BURR.


The first time my attention was directed to Will Smeaton, was by
a telegram from a Border town which described his appearance, and
stated—a little late, however—that he had escaped in the direction of
Edinburgh. The message called for Smeaton’s arrest on suspicion of
a very deliberate attempt at murder, the victim being a sweetheart,
named Jessie Aimers. The full particulars followed the telegram,
and they seemed to leave little doubt of Smeaton’s guilt. Jessie
Aimers was a girl of superior education, a teacher in the town,
and greatly beloved by all. She and Smeaton had been brought up at
the same school, but with very different results—for he became a
kind of coarse dare-devil, a brass-finisher by trade, with a strong
inclination for salmon poaching; while Jessie grew up refined,
modest, and gentle. What possible bond of love could exist between
two such natures? is the question which naturally rises to one’s
lips; yet, with that tantalising contrariety which humanity seems to
revel in, the answer was only, that such love did exist, and in no
common degree of strength. The question was asked and echoed by all
the townsfolk, and debated and wondered over, but the only decision
was that Jessie Aimers was foolish to lavish her love on such a
worthless object, and very much to be pitied on that account. Simple,
short-sighted townsfolk! Jessie’s love was her life, her breath, the
very pulse of her heart. To give up that would have been simply to
lie down in the grave.

The circumstances under which the attempt at murder was said to have
been made were these:—Jessie Aimers had left her home about dusk on a
fine October evening to meet her lover, who was positively forbidden
her father’s house. They had met at some appointed spot, and were
seen about an hour later wandering slowly up by the river side.
Smeaton appeared to be in a bad temper, for he was talking loudly and
hotly. Jessie was answering gently and pleadingly. It was then quite
dark, but they were readily recognised by their voices. Further up
the river, and but a short time after, a great scream was heard, and
very soon Smeaton was seen returning along the path alone, in great
haste, and so intent on his own thoughts that he passed an intimate
acquaintance close enough to brush his sleeve, silent as a ghost.
Smeaton had gone straight home, but stayed there only long enough to
get some money and his watch, and then made his way to the railway
station and took a ticket for Edinburgh.

It was the manner in which this ticket was procured which first
excited suspicion. Smeaton did not go to the ticket window himself,
but skulked at the other end of the station, while he sent a boy
whom he had hailed for the purpose to get the ticket. The boy was
known, and the ticket clerk—astonished at him taking such a long
journey—refused to give the ticket till he admitted that he was
acting not for himself but for Will Smeaton. The boy probably made
no mention of the circumstance to Smeaton, for when the ticket clerk
went over the train helping to examine the tickets, and came upon
Smeaton in an obscure corner, he said to him laughingly—“Were ye
feared to come for the ticket yoursel’?” whereat the passenger looked
horribly scared and taken aback, so much so that he was unable to
reply before the ticket clerk was gone.

While this had been taking place, some young fellows were making
a queer catch on the river. They were salmon poachers, and were
hurriedly making a cast of a net at a shady part of the stream after
seeing the watchers safely out of sight, when suddenly one of them
cried out—

“Pull in! pull in! we’ve gotten as bonnie a beast as ever was ta’en
oot the water. I saw the white glisk o’ her as she tried to skirt
roond ootside the net, but we’ve gotten her! The sly witch is hidin’
at the bottom, but ye’ll see her in a meenit!”

Very much more quickly and eagerly than paid salmon labourers, the
others rushed the ends of the close-meshed net ashore, agreeing the
while that if it was but a single fish, it was a sixty or seventy
pounder at least, and in a moment or two had landed the bonnie white
fish—sweet Jessie Aimers, with her light dress clinging close to
her slight figure, her eyes closed as in death, and her white face
gleaming up at them like a shining moon out of the gloom.

“Gude save us, it’s a wuman! drooned! deid!” the scared poachers
cried in a breath, and by a common impulse they were near dropping
her and the net, and taking at once to their heels.

But one more sharp-sighted than the rest, bending down, noticed first
that there was a wound on the white brow, which was bleeding, and
next, that the features were familiar to him.

“Dog on it, lads, if it’s no bonnie Jessie Aimers!”

Exclamations of incredulity and horror ran round the group, and it
was only on one striking a match and holding the light close to the
cold face that they were convinced of the truth.

They stood there, silent and sorrowful, and with watchers and their
own dangers far from their thoughts, and then one threw out a wonder
as to how Jessie had got into the water.

“Fell in, maybe?” suggested one.

“Or jumped in, mair likely,” said another. “The puir thing has been
fretting her life away for Wull Smeaton. I aye thoucht it wad come to
this. She was far owre gude for him.”

“Maybe he helped her in,” darkly suggested a third. “I’ve seen them
often walking here thegither, and he’s a perfect brute when he’s in a
passion. He wad ding her in as sune as look at her.”

This last suggestion found most acceptance. These men knew Smeaton
thoroughly—his fiery temper, brutal strength, and impulsive
ferocity—and had little doubt but his hand had sent the poor girl to
her watery grave. Their only difficulty was how to act in the dilemma.

One thought that it would be safest, in order to avoid awkward
questioning by those in authority, to quietly slip the body into
the water again, stow away their net in its usual hiding-place, and
drop work for the night; but this proposal was not well received,
for Jessie was a general favourite, and was admired from a distance
by the roughest in the place. While they stood thus in doubt, one of
them suddenly exclaimed—

“Deid folk dinna bleed! She’s maybe living yet—let’s gie the puir
thing a chance—row her on the grass—lift up her airms—dae onything
that’s like to bring her roond.”

The result of this electrifying speech was that the whole gang lent
a hand in the rough and ready means of restoration, and, with such
good effect, that very shortly the supposed drowned girl gave signs
of life, though not of consciousness. Thus encouraged, the men made a
litter of their coats, and ran with her to the nearest cottage, where
she was put to bed, and tended and nursed as carefully as if she had
been in her own home.

Jessie’s parents were sent for and informed as gently as possible
of the accident, and their first exclamation on reaching their
daughter’s side was—“Oh, the villain! this is Smeaton’s wark!”

Jessie was able to recognise her father, and smile faintly when he
took her hand in his own, but she was too weak to give any account of
the accident or crime till next morning. By that time the flight of
Smeaton had been discovered, and telegrams despatched ordering his
arrest and detention; and when Jessie woke she found not only the
lieutenant of police, but a magistrate at her bedside, ready to hear
her statement and act upon her charge. Then they all were surprised
to find that Jessie had no charge to make. She would not, by as much
as a look, admit that Smeaton had thrown her into the water, or even
struck her so as to cause her to fall in or receive the wound on her
temple. How had the accident happened then?

“I must have fallen in,” said Jessie, after a long pause, and with
tears in her eyes.

“Yes, you must have fallen in,” impatiently interposed her father,
who positively hated her lover, “or you could never have been picked
out, but was the falling in purely accidental? Surely, Jessie, I have
trained you well enough in truthfulness to be able to rely on your
answer in a matter of life and death?”

“Yes, father, dear,” meekly answered Jessie, with fresh tears. “I
will always be truthful. But I cannot answer every question. I would
rather die and be at rest.”

“If this wretch attempted to drown you—to take your life—do you think
you are doing right to screen him from the just punishment of his
crime?” sternly observed her father.

“Will would never attempt such a thing,” warmly answered the girl.
“He has faults—though not so many as people imagine—but that he would
never do. It is not in his nature.”

“The police are after him now, and likely to get him, and when he is
tried you will be forced to speak the truth,” said her father; “you
will be the principal witness, and if you do not speak the whole
truth, you will be sent to prison yourself.”

“I will never say anything against him though they cut me in pieces,”
said Jessie, with a deep sigh. “Why did they take me out of the
river? It would have been better to let me lie than torture me with
questions.”

As Jessie’s condition was still precarious, it was decided to let
the matter rest for a little, and meanwhile make every effort to
capture Smeaton, trusting to Jessie becoming less reticent, or other
evidence turning up sufficient to secure his conviction. On the same
forenoon that Jessie was thus questioned, I was going along a street
near Nicolson Street, with my thoughts about as far from this case
as the moon is from the sun. As yet I had only the brief telegram to
guide me, and that contained but a meagre description of the man. He
was said to be a native of Berwick, of medium height, and to have
curly hair of a sandy hue, and a florid complexion, and to be rather
muscular and firmly built. These points might suit a dozen out of
every hundred one might meet in passing along the street, and the
description interested me so little that the actual features had,
at the moment, all but left my memory. What invisible finger is it
that guides many of our sudden impulses? When I entered that street
I had no intention whatever of visiting a pawnbroker’s, but when I
came to one of their prominent signs I turned into the stair and
ascended it, as gravely as if I had gone south for no other purpose
than to visit that particular establishment. I had been there the day
before looking for some trinkets which were reported stolen, and as
I entered, the thought struck me that I might ask for them again as
an excuse for my reappearance. I was in no hurry, however, and as I
could hear that there were some customers in before me, I simply took
my stand inside one of the little boxes, and nodded to the proprietor
to intimate that I should wait my turn. For the benefit of those
lucky mortals who have never been forced to enter such a place, I may
explain that these boxes run along in front of the counter, and are
chiefly useful for screening one customer from another. Once shut in,
you are safe from every eye but that sharp million-power magnifier
owned by the proprietor or his assistant.

As soon as I was shut in I noticed that the box next to me was
occupied by a male customer, who was busy extolling the value
and powers of a silver lever which he was trying to pledge. The
pawnbroker was quite willing to take the watch, but, as is usual
in such cases, the point on which they disagreed was the sum to be
advanced on the pledge. The argument was not particularly interesting
to me, and I gradually left it behind in my thoughts while I revelled
in the queer brogue of the stranger. It was a rich and musical twang
to my ears; and when the man came to any word with the letter R in
it—such as “tr-r-r-ain”—he rolled that R out into about a thousand,
with a rich swell which made one imagine he enjoyed it. I was
puzzled for a moment or two to decide on the exact locality of the
dialect—though I have often boasted that I can tell the dialects of
Scotland and a good part of England to within thirty miles of the
exact spot on hearing them spoken.

“The man is from Newcastle,” I rather hastily decided; then came a
slight mental demur at the decision. There were slight points of
difference and many strong points of resemblance. I listened for a
little longer, and then smiled out at my own slowness and stupidity.

“I might have known that tongue at the first sentence,” was my mental
exclamation. “It’s the Berwick burr.”

While this analysis was going on in my mind, the haggling over the
watch was concluded by the stranger accepting a loan of thirty
shillings on the pledge, and a ticket was rapidly filled up to that
effect, till it came to the important question—

“What name?”

There was a pause before the answer came, and when it was spoken
there was much in the careless tone which implied that too much
reliance was not to be placed on the truthfulness of the reply.

“Oh, say John Smith.”

“I can’t take it at all unless you give me your real name,” said the
pawnbroker, sharply. I have no doubt my presence put a little _edge_
on him. “How am I to know,” he virtuously added, “that the watch is
not stolen?”

“Stolen?” echoed the stranger, warmly. “Man, there’s the name of the
man I bought it frae;” and he turned out a watch-paper inserted under
the back. I could not see the name, but I did make out the words
“Berwick-on-Tweed.” “I’m no a thief—I’m a brassfounder to trade,”
continued the man, with energy, “and I expect to lift it again in a
week or two.”

“A brassfounder?” I thought, with a start. “I wonder if his name is
Smeaton?”

While I was wondering the bargain was concluded, and the money paid
over, and then the man left. I left my box at the same moment, and we
moved out together.

“It’s a nice morning,” he said, and I returned the greeting.

When we reached the street he turned northwards, and I decided that
that was my way too.

“I heard you say you are a brassfounder,” I remarked. “You’ll be
looking for a job?”

No, he didn’t think he was—he meant to lie quiet for a little.

“Oh, indeed?—got into trouble, I suppose,” I returned, with interest.
“Well, man,” I added, in a confidential whisper, “I know a place
where your dearest friends couldn’t get at you. You’d be safer there
than anywhere. Care to go?”

He wasn’t sure. He didn’t mind going, but he did not promise to stay
there. He was glad of company, however, and offered to treat me to
some drink. I was in a hurry, and begged to be excused.

“You belong to Berwick?” I said, decidedly.

He looked startled and troubled.

“Who said that? How do you know?” he stammered.

“I know the Berwick burr, and you’ve got it strong,” I quietly
answered.

“I haven’t been in Berwick for mony a year,” he said firmly.

“I thought that—that’s what puzzled me for a while—you’ve got a touch
of Coldstream or Kelso on your tongue,” I coolly remarked.

He stared at me in evident consternation, and getting a trifle pale,
but made no reply. I had been studying his appearance, and from that
moment felt almost certain of my man.

I conducted him by North College Street, down College Wynd, chatting
familiarly all the way, but never extracting from him his real name.
I took him that way to convey to him the idea that he was going to
some low “howf,” in which a man in trouble might burrow safely, and
was pleased to note that, as the route became more disreputable,
his spirits rose. He evidently did not know the city, and that
circumstance aided me. I turned up the Fishmarket Close, and into the
side entrance to the Central.

“What kind o’ a place is this?” he asked, staggered at the width and
spaciousness of the stair.

“It’s the place I told you of,” I carelessly answered, taking care
to make him move up the stairs in front of me. I saw his step become
more faltering and unsteady, and when we reached the door of the
“reception room,” I knew by his ghastly pallor that the truth had
flashed upon him.

“Straight in there, Smeaton,” I said, as his eye fell on me. “This is
an unexpected pleasure to both of us.”

He looked at me like a trapped tiger, and I fully expected him to
make a dash and dive for liberty.

“What’s your name?” he almost groaned.

“M^cGovan.”

“The devil!” he ungratefully exclaimed; and then I led him in, and
accommodated him with a seat. He became fearfully agitated, and at
length blurted out—

“If anything has happened to the girl, I’m not to blame for it.”

He did not once seem to think of denying his identity, and yet till
that moment I was anything but certain that I had the right man. He
seemed a desperate, callous, and daring fellow, and but for the canny
way in which he had been led to the place, would, I feel sure, have
given us a world of trouble to capture. But once fairly limed, he
became but a quaking coward. I did not understand his terror till I
learned that he did not know that Jessie Aimers had been rescued, and
her life saved. There was a visionary gallows before the villain at
the moment seen only by himself. We were smiling all round, but there
wasn’t a ghost of a smile left in him. After he had emitted a very
brief declaration, he was locked up; and next day a man came through
and took him back to the town he had left so suddenly. Jessie Aimers
still persisted in her silence, and the only charge which could
justify Smeaton’s detention was one of salmon poaching. The evidence
took some time to collect, and when the trial came on, Jessie Aimers
was just able to drag herself out of bed and be present. Smeaton was
found guilty, and fined heavily, with an alternative of imprisonment,
which every one said would be his reward. But to the astonishment of
all, and the disgust of Jessie’s father, the fine was paid. No one
but Smeaton then knew that the money had been furnished by Jessie
Aimers; and yet when the brute was set at liberty, and she waited at
the Court entrance to see him and speak with him as he passed out,
he was seen by many to push the loving girl violently from him with
some imprecation, and walk off with a servant girl of evil reputation
named Dinah King. Jessie pressed back the rising tears, and was able
to draw on a faint smile before she was joined by her father. Her
father had almost to carry her home, and every one looking on that
pale face and drooping form declared that Jessie was not long for
this world.

Some months after the trial, the house in which Dinah King served was
broken into and robbed. Although the plunder was mostly of a kind
not easily hidden or carried away, no trace of it was got, and the
thieves were never heard of. After a decent interval Dinah discovered
that the work of that house was too heavy for her, and gave notice
to leave. When she did go she left the town, and Smeaton disappeared
with her. Had she gone alone, perhaps no suspicion would have been
roused, but his reputation was already tainted, and the result was
another intimation to us to look after the pair, as it was rumoured
that they had gone to Edinburgh. The very day on which this message
arrived a young lady appeared at the Office asking for me, and giving
her name as Miss Aimers. As she appeared weak and faint, she was
allowed to wait my arrival. When I saw her face my first thought
was—“How young and how sweet to have death written on her face!” Yes,
death was written there—in the pale, sunken cheeks and waxy lips; in
the deep lustrous eyes, and in the gasping and panting for breath
which necessitated every sentence she uttered being broken in two. A
word or two introduced her, and then I distinctly recalled the former
case with Smeaton, and a thrill of pity ran through me as I looked on
that wistful face and eager pair of eyes, and listened to her story.

“Every one is prejudiced against him but me,” she said with strange
calmness. “Look at me. I am dying. I know it, and yet I am calm and
fearless. I could even be happy were it not for him, and the thought
of him being lost to me through all eternity. I could not exist in
heaven sundered from him. It would not be heaven to me. Oh, sir! you
have seen much misery and much wickedness, but you know that a woman
is not always blind even when she loves with all her soul. He is not
so bad; but he is easily influenced and led away. If he is taken and
put in prison, through that fearful woman, will you remember that?
And if I should not be allowed to see him, or if I am taken away
before then, will you give him a message from me?”

I bowed, for I could not speak.

“Tell him I have never lost faith in the goodness of his heart,
that I shall love him for ever, and that heaven will never be
heaven to me without him beside me. Will you tell him to think of
that—sometimes—when he is alone; and of the sweet, happy hours we
spent together when we were but boy and girl, full of innocent glee
and love, before he was contaminated and led away. Oh, if God would
only grant me a little time longer on earth—a little time—just enough
to see poor Will led back to the right road and safe for heaven, I
could lay my head and say—‘Take me, Lord Jesus, take me home!’”

“You may be quite sure that time will be granted you for all that God
needs you to do on earth,” I softly returned. “He will not take you
till your work is done.”

I spoke with her for some time, going over many points in her history
already partly known to me, but I found that she would not breathe
one word against the man. She would not admit that in a fit of
passion he had thrown her into the river, or that she owed to that
immersion her present feeble condition. She would not listen with
patience to one slighting expression or word of demur; her whole soul
was wrapped up in him; and no tender, pure-souled mother could have
yearned over her child more eagerly than she did over the man whose
very name I could scarcely utter with patience. When she was gone I
drew a long breath, and mentally wished that I might get my clutches
on Smeaton firmly enough to treat him to a good long sentence of
penal servitude. I felt as if that would relieve my mind a bit.

A day or two later I came on Dinah and her companion, and took them
without trouble, but they had not an article about them which could
connect them with the robbery at Dinah’s last place. After a short
detention they were released, and I hoped that they would take fright
and leave the city. During my short acquaintance with Dinah, it
struck me that she was a great deal worse than her companion. “She is
of the stuff that jail birds are made of, and a bad one at that,” was
my reflection, and I remember thinking that it would certainly not be
long before I heard of her again, supposing they favoured the city
much longer with their presence. I saw them occasionally after that,
and noted the general decay in their appearance, and guessed at their
means of living, but never managed to get near them. One evening I
was surprised by a visit from Dinah at the Central. She looked savage
and sullen—a perfect fiend.

“You want to take Will Smeaton?” she abruptly began. “I know you do,
for you’ve been after him often enough.”

“I would rather take you,” was my cold reply, and I spoke the truth.

She affected to take the remark as a joke, and laughed savagely—having
the merriment all to herself. Then she revealed her message. Smeaton
and another were to break into a shop in the New Town by getting
through a hatch, creeping along the roof, and thence descending
through an unoccupied flat, and so reaching the workrooms and shop.

“You’ve quarrelled with him, and this is your revenge, I suppose?”
was my remark when she had finished, but Dinah’s reply cannot be
written down.

My only regret at the moment was that I could not warn Smeaton of
his danger. Dinah went back and had dinner and supper with the man
she had betrayed—actually broke bread with him and smiled in his
face, and appeared more loving than she had showed herself for weeks.
A woman, when good, can be holier, purer, and more strong in her
devotion and love than a man; but when she is bad, the depths of
iniquity which she can reach have never been touched by mortal man.

I sent over a posse of men one by one to the marked establishment,
and when Smeaton and his companion appeared and ascended the stair
I followed, and so closed up the retreat. They were not long
gone. We heard the alarm, and some shouting and struggling, and
soon saw Smeaton come scrambling out at the window on the roof by
which he had entered, and come flying along the slates towards the
hatch. As he got close my head popped out in front of him, and he
started—staggered back with an oath—lost his footing, and vanished
over the edge of the roof. He was picked up on the pavement below,
very much injured and quite senseless, and borne on a shutter to
the Infirmary, while his captured companion was marched over to
the Office and locked up. Dinah, in ferocious joy over Smeaton’s
accident, got drunk and disorderly, and was taken to the cells next
day. Smeaton remained for the most part unconscious during two days
and nights. Towards the close of the second day, a cab drove up to
the Infirmary gate, and out of it stepped a young girl, so pale and
feeble that every one thought it was a patient instead of a visitor
who had arrived. It was Jessie Aimers, who had risen from bed and
taken that long journey the moment she heard of the accident. She
was helped in to the ward, and sat there with Smeaton’s hand in her
own till evening, when he opened his eyes for a moment and hazily
recognised her.

“Oh, Jessie, I’ll never rise off this bed,” he feebly exclaimed; and
then, as her warm tears rained down on his cheeks, and her lips were
pressed to his own, he said—“Dinna! dinna dae that! I dinna deserve
it. Pray for me, Jessie, lass; it’s a’ I can ask o’ ye now.”

A screen had been put up round the bed, shutting them off from the
gaze of the other patients, and inside that the nurses glanced
occasionally. They remained there, whispering and communing till
Smeaton relapsed again. Towards morning there was a cry, loud and
piercing, behind the screen, but the night nurse was out of the
ward at the moment. When she appeared, one of the patients spoke of
the cry, and the nurse looked in on the pair. Jessie lay across the
bed with her arms clasped tight about the patient, and her face hid
in his bosom. Smeaton’s face was marble-like, his eyes half open
and fixed. The nurse knew that look at a glance, and called to her
companion that Smeaton was dead, and that she feared the young girl
had fainted. Gently they tried to disengage the clasping fingers,
that they might raise her and restore her to consciousness, but the
deathly coldness of the thin hand caused them both to start back
and exchange a look of inquiry and alarm. They bent over her, they
listened; all was still—still as the grave, still as eternity. Jessie
was dead.




THE WRONG UMBRELLA.


A gentleman drove up to a Princes Street jeweller’s in a carriage or
a cab—the jeweller was not sure which, but inclined to think that it
was a private carriage—in broad daylight, and at the most fashionable
hour. He was rather a pretty-faced young man, of the languid Lord
Dundreary type, with long, soft whiskers, which he stroked fondly
during the interview with the tradesman, and wore fine clothes of the
newest cut with the air of one who was utterly exhausted with the
trouble of displaying his own wealth and beauty. He wore patent boots
fitting him like a glove, and appeared particularly vain of his neat
foot and the valuable rings on his white fingers.

When this distinguished customer had been accommodated with a seat
by the jeweller—whom I may name Mr Ward—he managed to produce a
card-case, and then dropped a card bearing the name of Samuel
Whitmore. The address at the corner at once gave the jeweller a clear
idea of the identity of his customer. The Whitmores were a wealthy
family, having an estate of considerable size in the West, and had,
in addition to the fine house on that estate, a town residence in
Edinburgh and another in England. There was a large family of them,
but only one son; and that gentleman the jeweller now understood
he had the pleasure of seeing before him. He was said to be a fast
young man, with no great intellect, but traits of that kind are not
so uncommon among the rich as to excite comment among tradesmen.
The follies of some are the food of others, and the jeweller was no
sooner aware of the identity of his visitor than he mentally decided
that he was about to get a good order. He was not disappointed—at
least in that particular.

“I want your advice and assistance, Mr Ward, as to the best sort of
thing to give—ah—to a young lady—you know—as a present,” languidly
began the pretty young gentleman. “It must be a real tip-top
thing—artistic, pretty, and all that; and you must be willing to take
it back if she shouldn’t like it—that is, in exchange for something
as good or better.”

“Hadn’t we better send a variety of articles to the young lady, and
let her choose for herself?” suggested Mr Ward.

“Oh, hang it, no!—that would never do,” said Mr Whitmore, with
considerable energy. “She’d stick to the lot, you know; women are
never satisfied;” and he gave a peculiar wink to convey the idea he
wished to express. “You just be good enough to show me the things,
and I’ll choose what I think best, and you can send them to the house
addressed to me. I’ll take them to her myself to-morrow, and if they
don’t suit, I’ll send them back by my valet, or bring them myself.”

All this was fair and quite business-like, and Mr Ward hastened to
display his most tempting treasures to his customer, who, however,
speedily rejected the best of them on account of their high price.
At length he chose a lady’s small gold lever, ornamented with jewels
on the back, and a set of gold ear-rings, with brooch and necklet to
match. The price of the whole came to a trifle under £60, and the
buyer expressed much satisfaction at the reasonable charges and the
beauty of the articles.

“You will put them up carefully and send them home, and, if I
keep them, you can send in your bill at the usual time,” said the
agreeable customer; and so the pleasant transaction concluded, the
jeweller showed him out, the cab was entered, and Mr Whitmore not
only disappeared from the jeweller’s sight, but also, as it seemed,
from every one else’s. As he left the shop, the languid gentleman had
looked at his watch, and the jeweller had just time to notice that it
was an expensive gold one, with a very peculiar dial of gold figures
on a black ground. Some reference had also been made to diamonds
during the selection of the presents, and Mr Whitmore had been
obliging enough to remove one of the rings from his white fingers
and place it in the hands of the jeweller, when that gentleman read
inside the initials “S. W.”

These two circumstances were afterwards to add to the intricacy
of the case when it came into our hands. From the moment when the
pretty-faced gentleman was shown out by Mr Ward, he could not have
vanished more effectually if he had driven out of the world. Half
an hour after, a young apprentice lad in Mr Ward’s employ took the
small parcel given him by his master out to the stately residence
of the Whitmores at the West End, and, according to his statement
afterwards, duly delivered the same. There was no name-plate upon
the door, but there was a big brass number which corresponded with
that on the card left by the pleasant customer. The messenger, who
was no stupid boy, but a lad of seventeen, declared most positively
that he looked for the number in that fine crescent, rang the bell,
and was answered by a dignified footman. He then asked if the house
was that of the Whitmores, was answered with a stately affirmative,
and then departed. None of the articles thus sent home were returned,
and they were therefore entered in the books as sold. A month or two
later the account was made up and sent to the buyer. There was no
response for many weeks, but at length the answer did come, and in
a manner altogether unexpected. A gentleman, young, but by no means
good-looking, drove up to the shop door one forenoon and entered
the shop. Mr Ward had never seen him before, but the card which he
placed before the jeweller was familiar enough to cause him to start
strangely. It bore the name, “Samuel Whitmore,” with the address at
the lower corner—it was, indeed, the _facsimile_ of that which had
been produced by Mr Ward’s languid but agreeable customer months
before.

“I wish to see Mr Ward,” said the new comer, evidently as ignorant of
the jeweller’s appearance as that gentleman was of his.

“I am Mr Ward, sir,” was the reply; and then the stranger brought
out some papers, from which he selected Mr Ward’s account for
the articles of jewellery, which he placed before the astonished
tradesman, with the words—

“I am Mr Whitmore, and this account has been sent to me by mistake.
It would have been checked sooner, but it happened that I was away
in Paris when it was sent, and as I was expected home they did not
trouble to forward the paper.”

The jeweller stared at his visitor. He was a young man, and wore
Dundreary whiskers, and had on his fingers just such rings as Mr Ward
remembered seeing on the hand of his customer, but there was not the
slightest resemblance of features.

“You Mr Samuel Whitmore?” he vacantly echoed, picking up the card of
the gentleman, and mentally asking himself whether he was dreaming or
awake.

“Mr Samuel Whitmore,” calmly answered the gentleman.

“Son of Mr Whitmore of Castleton Lee?”

“The same, sir.”

“Then you have a brother, I suppose?” stammered the jeweller. “There
has been a mistake of some kind.”

“I have no brother, and never had,” quietly answered his visitor;
“and I never bought an article in this shop that I know of, and
certainly did not purchase the things which you have here charged
against me.”

“A gentleman came here—drove up in a cab, just as you have done—and
presented a card like this,” said the jeweller, beginning to feel
slightly alarmed. “Surely I have not been imposed upon? and yet that
is impossible, for the things were safely sent home and delivered at
your house.”

The gentleman smiled, and shook his head.

“I thought it possible that my father might have ordered and received
these things,” he politely observed, “but on making inquiry I learned
that not only was that not the case, but no such articles ever came
near the house.”

This was too much for the jeweller. He touched a bell and had the
apprentice lad, Edward Price, sent for, and drew from him such a
minute account of the delivery of the parcel, that it became the
gentleman’s turn to be staggered and to doubt his own convictions.
The lad described the house, the hall, and the clean-shaven footman
so clearly and accurately that his narrative bore an unmistakable
impress of truthfulness. The gentleman could, therefore, only suggest
the possibility of Price having mistaken the _number_ of the house,
and the things being accepted as a present by the persons who had
thus received them by mistake. But even this supposition—which was
afterwards proved to be fallacious—did not account for the most
mysterious feature in the case—how the things had been ordered and
by whom. It was clear to Mr Ward that the gentleman before him and
the buyer of the presents were two distinct persons, having no facial
resemblance; but the new Mr Whitmore having, in his impatience to be
gone, drawn from his pocket a gold watch, with the peculiar black
dial already described, a fresh shade of mystery was cast over the
case.

“I have seen that watch before,” he ventured to say. “The gentleman
who ordered the things wore just such a watch as that. I saw it when
he was leaving. And he had on his finger a diamond ring very like
that which you wear. I had it in my hand for a few moments, and it
bore his initials inside.”

The gentleman, looking doubly surprised, drew from his finger the
ring in question and placed it in the jeweller’s hand. The initials
“S.W.” were there inside, exactly as he had seen them on the ring of
the mysterious representative.

“Did you ever lend this ring to any one?” he asked in amazement.

“Never; and, what is more, it is never off my finger but when I
am asleep,” was the decided reply; and then he listened patiently
while Mr Ward related the whole of the circumstances attending the
selection of the articles. No light was thrown on the matter by the
narrative; but the gentleman, who before had been somewhat angry
and impatient, now sobered down, and showed sufficient interest to
advise Mr Ward to put the case in our hands, promising him every
assistance in his power to get at the culprit. This advice was acted
upon, and the next day I was collecting the facts I have recorded.
I had no idea of the lad Price being involved in the affair, but I
nevertheless thought proper to make sure of every step by taking him
out to the Crescent and getting him to show me the house at which he
delivered the parcel. He conducted me without a moment’s hesitation
to the right house. I rang the bell, and when the door was opened by
a clean-shaven footman, Price rapidly identified the various features
of the hall. He failed, however, to identify the footman as the
person who had taken the parcel from him. I was not disappointed,
but rather pleased at that circumstance. I had begun to believe that
the footman, like the purchaser, was a “double.” Being now on the
spot, I asked to see Mr Samuel Whitmore, and, being shown up, I began
to question that gentleman as to his whereabouts on the day of the
purchase. That was not easily settled. Mr Whitmore’s time was his
own, and one day was so very like another with him that he frankly
told me that to answer that question was quite beyond his power.

By referring to Mr Ward’s account, however, we got the exact day and
month of the purchase, and the naming of the month quickened the
gentleman’s memory. That day had been one of many days spent in the
same manner, for he had been two weeks confined to bed by illness.
He could not give me the exact date, but I guessed rightly that his
medical man would have a better idea, and, getting that gentleman’s
address, I soon found beyond doubt that Mr Samuel Whitmore had on
the day of the purchase been confined to his own room, and so ill
that his life was in actual danger.

“Some of his friends may have personated him for a lark,” was my
next thought, but a few inquiries soon dispelled that idea. None of
Mr Whitmore’s friends had looked near him during his illness, and to
complete the impersonation, it was necessary that they should have
had his ring and watch, which he declared had never been out of his
possession.

The discovery of these facts narrowed down the inquiry considerably.
They all seemed to focus towards that invisible and mysterious
footman who had taken in the parcel.

There is a great deal in a name. The lad Price had used the word
“footman” in describing the servant, probably because he had a vague
idea that any one was a footman who wore livery and opened a door.
It had never struck him to ask if there was any other man-servant in
the house, and it might not have struck me either if I had not seen
another—a valet—busy brushing his young master’s clothes in a bedroom
close to the apartment in which we conversed.

“Who is that brushing the clothes?” I asked of Mr Whitmore. “The
coachman?”

“Oh, no; the coachman does not live in the house while we are in
town; that’s my valet.”

“And what does he do?”

“Attends me—gets my clothes, helps me to dress—looks after
everything, and serves me generally.”

“Does he ever answer the door bell?”

“Really, I could not say,” was the answer, somewhat wearily given,
“but you may ask him.”

The gentleman, I could see, had a sovereign contempt for both me and
my calling, and was impatient to see me gone; but that, of course,
did not disturb me in the least.

I had the valet called in, and in reply to my question he gave me to
understand very clearly that answering the door bell “was not his
work,” but lay entirely between the footman and tablemaid.

“Supposing they were both out of the way, and you were near the door
when the bell rang, would you not answer it by opening the door?”

“No, certainly not.”

He appeared to think me very simple to ask such a question.

“Then who would open the door?”

“I don’t know; somebody else—it wouldn’t be me; but they wouldn’t be
both out of the way at once without leaving some one to attend the
door.”

“Just so; and that one might be you. Now don’t interrupt, and try to
carry your mind back five months, and to the 21st day of that month,
while your master here lay ill, and tell me if you did not answer the
door bell and take in a small parcel addressed to your master?”

“I wasn’t here five months ago, sir,” was the quick response; “I was
serving in the north then.”

“Indeed!” and I turned to his master in some surprise; “have you
discharged your valet within that time?”

“Oh, yes,” he lazily drawled; “I had Atkinson before him.”

“At the time you were ill?”

“Possibly so. I really don’t remember.”

“You did not tell me of this before.”

“No? Well, it doesn’t matter much, I suppose?”

I found it difficult to keep my temper. I had the lad Price brought
up from the hall, and he said most decidedly that the valet before us
was not the man who had taken in the parcel.

“Why did Atkinson leave you?” I resumed, to the master.

“He did not leave exactly. I was tired of him. He put on so many airs
that some thought that he was the master and I the man—fact, I assure
you. He was too fast, and conceited, and vain; and I thought—though
I’d be the last to say it—he wasn’t quite what you call honest, you
know.”

“Good-looking fellow?”

“Oh, passable as to that,” was the somewhat grudging reply. Mr
Whitmore himself was very ugly.

“Did he ever put on your clothes—that is, wear them when you were not
using them yourself?”

“Oh, yes; the beggar had impudence enough for anything.”

“And your jewellery, and watch, too, I suppose?”

“Well, I don’t know as to that—perhaps he did. I could believe him
capable of anything that was impudent—coolest rascal I ever met. I
tell you, Mr—Mr—Mr M^cFadden—I beg your pardon, M^cGadden—ah, I’m
not good at remembering names—I tell you, I’ve an idea; just struck
me, and you’re as welcome to it as if it were your own. P’r’aps that
rascal Atkinson has ordered those things, and got them when they were
sent home. Rather smart of me to think of that, eh?”

“Very smart,” I answered, with great emphasis, while his valet
grinned behind a coat. “The affinity of great minds is shown in the
fact that the same idea struck me. Can you help me to Atkinson’s
present address?”

He could. Although he had been wearied and disgusted with the fellow
himself, he had not only given Atkinson a written character of a high
order, but personally recommended him to one of his acquaintances
with whom, he presumed, the man was still serving. I took down the
address and left for Moray Place, taking the lad Price with me.
When we came to the house a most distinguished-looking individual
opened the door—much haughtier and more dignified than a Lord of
State—and while he was answering my inquiries, the lad Price gave me
a suggestive nudge. When I quickly turned in reply and bent my ear,
he whispered—

“That’s like the man that took the parcel from me at Whitmore’s.”

“Like him? Can you swear it is him?”

The lad took another steady look at the haughty flunkey, and finally
shook his head and said, “No, I cannot swear to him, but it is like
him.”

The haughty individual was John Atkinson, formerly valet to Mr
Whitmore. A few questions, a second look at the lad Price, and one
naming of Mr Ward the jeweller, disturbed his highness greatly, but
failed to draw from him anything but the most indignant protestations
of innocence.

I decided to risk the matter and take him with me. He insisted upon
me first searching his room and turning over all his possessions, to
show that none of the articles were in his keeping. I felt certain
of his guilt. There was in his manner an absence of that flurry and
excitement with which the innocent always greet an accusation of the
kind; but his cool request as to searching made me a little doubtful
of bringing the charge home to him. It convinced me, at least, that
the articles themselves were far beyond our reach. From this I
reasoned that they had not been procured for the ordinary purposes of
robbery—that is, to be sold or turned into money. The buyer had said
that they were intended as a present for a lady: could it be possible
that he had told the truth?

I began to have a deep interest in Atkinson’s love affairs and a
strong desire to learn who was the favoured lady. On our way to the
Office I called in at Mr Ward’s, but the jeweller failed to identify
Atkinson as the buyer of the articles. He was like him, he said, but
the other had Dundreary whiskers, and this man was clean shaven.
Afterwards, when I had clapped a pair of artificial whiskers upon
Atkinson, the jeweller was inclined to alter his opinion and say
positively that it was the man, but, on the whole, the case was so
weak that it never went to trial.

Atkinson was released, and returned to his place “without a stain
upon his character,” and so justice appeared to be defeated. The
first act of the drama had ended with villainy triumphant.

Let me now bring on “the wrong umbrella.” A great party was given,
some months after, in a house in the New Town, and, as usual at such
gatherings, there was some confusion and accidental misappropriation
at the close. All that happened was easily explained and adjusted,
but the case of the umbrella. Most of the guests had come in cabs,
but one or two living near had come on foot, bringing umbrellas with
them. The number of these could have been counted on the fingers
of one hand, yet, when the party was over, the lady of the house
discovered that a fine gold-mounted ivory-handled umbrella of hers
had been taken, and a wretched alpaca left in its place. The missing
umbrella was a present, and therefore highly prized; it was also
almost fresh from the maker. It was rather suggestive, too, that the
wretched thing left in its place was a gentleman’s umbrella—a big,
clumsy thing, which could not have been mistaken for the other by a
blind man. It seemed therefore more like a theft than a mistake, and
after fruitless inquiries all round, the lady sent word to us, and a
full description of the stolen umbrella was entered in the books.

The theory formed by the owner was that the umbrella had been stolen
by some thief who had gained admittance during the confusion, and
that the umbrella left in its place had simply been forgotten by some
of the guests, and had no connection with the removal of her own.
Reasoning upon this ground, I first tried the pawnbrokers, without
success, and then, remembering that the missing article had been
heavily mounted with gold, I thought of trying some of the jewellers
to see if they had bought the mounting as old gold. I had no success
on that trial either, but, to my astonishment and delight, M^cSweeny,
whom I had sent out to hunt on the same lines in the afternoon,
brought in the umbrella, safe and sound, as it had been taken from
the owner’s house. The surprising thing was that the umbrella had
been got in a jeweller’s shop, at which it had been left by a
gentleman to get the initials E. H. engraved on the gold top. It was
a mere chance remark which led to its discovery, for when M^cSweeny
called the umbrella was away at an engraver’s, and had to be sent for.

I went over to the New Town very quickly and showed the umbrella to
the lady, who identified it—with the exception of the initials—and
showed marks and points about the ivory handle which proved it hers
beyond doubt. I kept the umbrella, and went to the jeweller who had
undertaken the engraving of the initials. He described the gentleman
who had left the umbrella, and, turning up his books, gave me the
name and address, which I soon found to be fictitious. He stated,
however, that the umbrella was to be called for on the following day,
and I arranged to be there at least an hour before the stated time
to receive him. When I had been there a couple of hours or so—seated
in the back shop reading the papers—a single stroke at a bell near
me, connected with the front shop, told me that my man had come.
I advanced and looked through a little pane of glass, carefully
concealed from the front, and took a good look at him. What was my
astonishment to find that the “gentleman” was no other than my old
acquaintance, John Atkinson, the valet!

According to the arrangement I had made with the jeweller—in
anticipation of finding the thief to be a man in a good position in
society—the umbrella was handed over to the caller, the engraving
paid for, and the man allowed to leave the shop.

I never followed any one with greater alacrity or a stronger
determination not to let him slip. I fully expected him to go to his
place in Moray Place, and intended to just let him get comfortably
settled there, and then go in and arrest him before his master, who
had been very wrathful at the last “insult to his trusted servant.”

But John did not turn his face in that direction at all. He moved
away out to a quiet street at the South Side, where he stopped before
a main door flat bearing the name “Miss Huntley” on a brass plate. A
smart servant girl opened the door, and John was admitted by her with
much deference. When he had been in the house a short time, I rang
the bell and asked for him.

“He is with Miss Huntley,” said the girl, with some embarrassment,
evidently wishing me to take the hint and leave.

“Indeed! and she is his sweetheart, I suppose?”

The girl laughed merrily, and said she supposed so.

I only understood that laugh when I saw Miss Huntley—a toothless
old woman, old enough to be my mother, or John’s grandmother. From
the girl I learned that her mistress was possessed of considerable
property, and that John and she were soon to be made one.

I doubted that, but did not say so. I had no qualms whatever, and
sharply demanded to be shown in. John became ghastly pale the moment
he sighted my face. Miss Huntley had the stolen umbrella in her
hands, and was admiringly examining her initials on the gold top.

“Is that your umbrella, ma’am?” I asked, in a tone which made her
blink at me over her spectacles.

“Yes, I’ve just got it in a present from Mr Atkinson,” she answered.

“Oh, indeed! And did he give you any other presents?” I sternly
pursued, as John sank feebly into a chair.

She refused to answer until I should say who I was and what was my
business there; but when I did explain matters, the poor old skeleton
was quite beyond answering me. She was horrified at the discovery
that John was a thief, but more so, I am convinced, to find that he
was not a gentleman at all, but only a flunkey. In the confusion of
her fainting and hysterics, I had the opportunity of examining the
gold watch, which was taken from her pocket by the servant, and found
inside the back of the case a watch-paper bearing Mr Ward’s name and
address, and also the written date of the sale, which corresponded
exactly with that already in my possession. The brooch and other
articles were readily given up by Miss Huntley, as soon as she was
restored to her senses. Had she been fit for removal, we should have
taken her too, but the shock had been too much for her, and her
medical man positively forbade the arrest.

John made a clean breast of the swindle and impersonation, and went
to prison for a year, while the poor old woman he had made love to
went to a grave which could scarcely be called early. I met John some
years after in a seedy and broken-down condition, and looking the
very opposite of the haughty aristocrat he had seemed when first we
met. I scarcely recognised him, but when I did, I said significantly—

“Ah, it’s you? I’m afraid, John, you took the _wrong_ umbrella that
time!”

“I did,” he impressively returned, with a rueful shake of the head;
and I saw him no more.




A WHITE SAVAGE.


The woman had a queer and almost crazed look; was miserably clad,
with no bonnet on her head, and her hair covered with the “fluff”
which flies about factories and covers the workers. I am not sure if
she had any covering on her feet; if she had, it must have been some
soft material which gave out no more noise than her bare soles would
have done.

Added to this, she smelled strongly of whisky, though she was not in
any way intoxicated. She had come into the Office at the breakfast
hour, and patiently waited till I appeared, without enlightening any
one as to her business. “No one but Mr M^cGovan was of any use to
her,” she said; and when I appeared and heard her begin her strange
story I soon thought that I should be of no use to her either.
Her statements were so wild and improbable, and her delivery so
incoherent, that I speedily decided that if I was not conversing
with a mad woman I was at least beside one suffering from _delirium
tremens_. Her age seemed to be about twenty-five, and she was by no
means bad looking, had she not been such a miserable wreck.

“I want you to help me to hunt for my man,” she said, with perfect
self-possession. “My name is Janet Hanford, and I’m married—maybe
you’ll mind the name.”

I thought for a little—or appeared to do so—and then told her that
she had the advantage of me, for I did not remember the name.

“Your husband has run away from you, then?” I remarked, secretly not
at all surprised at his action.

“No, not that,” she answered, and it was then that I began to doubt
her sanity. “It was not running away. They told me he was dead and
buried, and I believed them; but I saw him to-day riding along in a
carriage with a grand lady—a new wife, as I suppose—and I want you to
hunt him out. I’m not so good as I should be, but I’m still his wife,
surely?”

“Surely,” I echoed, thinking it best to humour the maniac.

“You must know that though I’ve been in jail I’m not a bad woman,”
she continued. “If I had been, he’d have divorced me, or at least put
me away, for he was too poor to afford lawyer’s fees. He’s only a
factory worker like myself.”

“How can that be, when you told me just now that you saw him riding
in a carriage with a grand lady?” I asked, thinking to catch her up.

“That’s the mystery which I can’t understand,” she answered. “You are
to find out all about that. I did not see the lady’s face right, as
the carriage went by so fast, and I was horrified at seeing him, and
could scarcely take my eyes off him; but I know it was Dick Hanford,
my husband.”

“Some one resembling him in features,” I thought. “What were you put
in jail for, pray?” I added aloud.

“I was put in once or twice for drink,” she said, hanging her head a
little. “He wouldn’t pay the fines, and so I had to suffer. It’s my
only failing. I was brought up as a girl behind the bar, and I got
to take drink secretly till I couldn’t keep from it. Then I was put
away, and went into the factory. It’s down in Leith Walk. I used to
be called ‘the Beauty of the Mill,’ and all the men were daft about
me.”

“Good heavens!” was my mental exclamation; “daft about a creature
like this!”

“I could have had my choice of a dozen men, but I took Hanford,
though his wage was the poorest in the place,” she calmly continued.
“I suppose it was because I was daft about him. I’m that yet. I never
loved anybody else, and never can.”

“You said ‘once or twice for drink’—were you ever in jail for
anything else?” I asked, pretty sure that she had kept something back.

“Yes, I was in for two years. It’s only about nine months since I got
out. It was then they told me he was dead, and I believed them.”

“What were you put in for?”

She trembled and grew paler, and tears came into her eyes.

“I don’t remember much about it,” she hurriedly answered; “perhaps
you will. It was after one of my drinking fits. I was always
excitable after them; and they say I sharpened a knife and lay in
wait for him for a whole day and night, saying I meant to kill him. I
couldn’t have meant that, for I love him dearer than my own life. But
when he came he was stabbed, and taken to the Infirmary. They said
that I did it, and I suppose it’s true. I don’t remember doing it.
He was very badly hurt, and they thought he would die. That’s why I
was so long in prison before they tried me. If he had died I should
have wished to be hanged, so as to be done with everything. You look
frightened. Does it seem horrible for me to say these things, when
they are true?”

“They do not sound nice from a woman’s lips,” I gravely replied. “I
remember your case now. You hid in the loft of the factory for two
days after stabbing him, and it was I who had the hunting for you. I
thought it a very bad case at the time, and I remember your husband
in Court giving a picture of your domestic life which would have
melted a heart of stone. I suppose my plain speaking horrifies you
quite as much as yours does me?”

“No; everybody speaks that way, so I suppose I must bear it, though
I don’t feel so bad as people think me,” she answered, with a
despairing ring in her tones. “If I hadn’t been brought up in a
public house, and so learned to drink, I might have been in a very
different position. Everybody is against me, and sometimes I feel as
if I was against myself.”

“There was a child, too, I think,” I continued. “Didn’t you injure it
in some way, or ill-treat it? I forget the particulars now.”

“Its leg was broken,” she answered, with a quiver in her voice, and
tears again filling her lustrous eyes. “I think the doctor said he
would never walk right if he lived, because it was the thigh that
was broken. It was hurt about the head too. Perhaps it fell down the
stairs and hurt itself. Some of them believed that I flung it down.
I don’t think I could have done that, though I was at the top of the
stair when they picked him up. I don’t remember anything about it.”

“And what has become of the child?” I asked in a low tone, not sure
whether to feel overwhelmed with horror or pity.

“They told me he was dead too when I came out, but perhaps they’ve
told a lie about that too. Perhaps he’s living, and only hidden from
me as Hanford has been. That’s more work for you. I have no money,
and I must have justice. If he is alive, he is bound to support me;
and if he has married that grand lady, he must go to prison for
bigamy.”

Broken and lost though she was, she seemed to know the law pretty
well, but I thought there was little chance of it coming to an appeal
of that kind.

“Who told you that your husband was dead?” I asked.

“His mother. That was when I came out of prison. I went home, of
course, but I found the house let to strangers, and was told it had
been so for two years. Then I went to his mother’s, and she would
scarcely let me in, or speak to me. She has an awful hatred to me. At
last she let me in, and told me he was dead.”

“And you believed it without further inquiry?”

“No, I didn’t believe it at all at first; but then she got out a
certificate from the registrar and showed it to me. I read his name
on it with my own eyes—Richard Hanford. If he isn’t dead, that name
must have been forged. You’ll maybe have to take her for that. I
shouldn’t be sorry at that, for she has caused me many an unhappy
hour.”

Here was a case altogether uncommon. It is usual for injured persons,
not the injurers, to seek our aid.

“You would like your husband to be put in prison too, if he is alive,
and yet you fancy you love him?” I remarked. “It’s a queer kind of
love which seeks a revengeful retaliation like that. I’ve seen women
sunk in degradation of the deepest kind who would make the blush rise
to your cheek.”

The crimson rose to her face there and then under the taunt.

“I don’t wish him any ill, but I am his wife, and he has deserted me
and thrown me off, and I want you to find him. I want to try to do
better, and live a different life. I want to deserve that he should
love me; and I will not allow him to have the love of another while I
am his wife.”

“I am afraid you have made some strange mistake,” I hastened to
observe. “Your husband is probably dead, and beyond the reach of
your love or your neglect. The gentleman you saw in a carriage
possibly resembled him strongly—such cases often come under our
notice. Mistaken identity? why, it’s as common as day. We had a
woman here the other day who insisted upon us arresting a man whom
she alleged was her husband, and she would not be convinced till
he brought his father and mother and a whole host of relatives to
prove that he was another man altogether, and had never been married
in his life. And even supposing your husband were alive, how could
you prevent him loving another? To retain a man’s love is even more
difficult than to win it, and can never be done by running a knife
into him, or throwing dishes at his head.”

“I did not do that; it was the drink did it,” she tearfully pleaded.
“He said I would never be better till the grave closed over me. You
heard him say so at the trial. But I think there’s a chance for me
yet. It’s a dreadful struggle to keep away from drink, but I win the
battle sometimes. No one knows what I have fought against; and I’m
so poor, and despised, and wretched now that nobody cares to ask. If
I were a black savage in a far off country, they’d send missionaries
to me and give me every comfort and help; but I’m only a white savage
living in Scotland; and I tell you I’m _not_ mistaken about seeing
my man. I could not be mistaken. I saw him alive and well in that
carriage as sure as there’s a God in heaven.”

“How could a poor factory worker like him rise to such a position?” I
incredulously remarked.

“I don’t know, but there he was sitting by the lady’s side and
looking as happy as he used to look when he was courting me; and he
saw me too, and turned as white as death at the sight. Perhaps he
thought I should die in prison for want of drink, and so married
again without waiting to see. I thought of going to his mother’s and
asking if he was really dead; but then I changed my mind, and came
here. It would be better for you to go; you know better how to get at
the truth.”

“You charge him with deserting you and marrying another woman?” I
said, scarcely able to restrain myself.

To this she replied with a wavering affirmative, and then she
produced the certificates of her marriage and of the birth of her
child, and gave me the address of her mother-in law. She then
described minutely the place and circumstances of the meeting with
her husband’s counterpart, and left the Office. She left her own
address also, but I had no expectation of ever needing that. It
seemed to me that the supposed fraud, forgery, and bigamy were
entirely the offspring of her own drink-sodden brain, and that to
ascertain that her husband was dead and buried would be so simple a
matter that there was not the slightest occasion for her putting the
task upon us. Still I remember thinking—“If the man is really alive,
I hope he will really be nimble enough to escape me. It would be an
actual blessing to such a man if the jade fell downstairs and broke
her neck.”

In the afternoon I went to the address of the mother. The house
was a small one in Greenside, but the woman appeared a respectable
widow, and I found her quietly preparing the supper of her sons, two
of whom supported her. She seemed a superior person to be in such
a situation; and noting that fact I guessed that her son, though a
poor worker, must have had some natural refinement. I told her I had
called to make some inquiries about her son, and she probably thought
I meant one of the younger members of her family, for she smiled
brightly, and invited me to enter. While I accepted the offer I
studied her quiet and somewhat shadowed features, and quickly decided
that I had before me a woman who, if she had occasion, could throw as
many obstacles in my way as any one who ever hampered a detective.

“It is your son Richard, I mean,” I quietly continued, as I sat down
at the clean little fireplace.

The mother gave a great start, and I saw the hands busy at the supper
grow suddenly tremulous. She looked at me, too, but it was not so
much a look of surprise as of searching inquiry or suspicion.

“What about him?” she cautiously returned, when she had recovered
somewhat.

“I want to know where he lives, what he does, and all about him,” I
quickly answered. I fully expected her to blurt out, possibly with
tears, that her son was dead, but no such words rose to her lips. She
stared at me keenly for a moment or two, as if trying to discover
from my appearance what was the nature of my occupation, and then she
said—

“What are you? a sheriff-officer or something of that kind?”

“Something of that kind,” I lightly returned. “Now, about your son
Richard. Is it true that he is dead?”

“I suppose that fiend that he married has sent ye here?” she said
with great energy; “but if she has, ye’ll get naething oot o’ me.”

“Well, but you told her he was dead,” I persisted; “either he is dead
or he is not.”

“Ay.”

“And you showed her a certificate of death bearing his name?”

“Did I?”

“If you altered that name you committed a felony, and are liable to
arrest and imprisonment.”

“Am I? I’m no feared,” she answered, with a sneer and a toss of the
head.

“Will you let me see that certificate?”

“Humph! will I, indeed! Ye’ll see nae papers here, I can tell ye.”

“We can force it.”

“Force awa’ then—naebody’s hinderin’ ye.”

“Come, come now—it is quite evident to me that you have something to
conceal,” I said, fairly baffled.

“Everybody has,” she grimly returned.

“Perhaps your son has paid you to be silent?”

A flashing look was the answer; it said scornfully—“As if that would
be necessary!”

“Did you forge the certificate?”

“Humph!” The grunt was utterly derisive of me and my powers. After
trying her for nearly half an hour I gave the old woman up in despair
and left, determined to overhaul the books of the registrar for the
district. I did so for a period extending over the two years, but
could find no record of such a death. I had not expected to find
it. The strange reticence of the mother had convinced me that I had
misjudged the broken wife, and that the man was really alive. My
visit to the registrar was productive of one discovery, however,
which pointed to a solution to one mystery. I found recorded the
death of one Richard Hanford, aged 58 years, spouse of the old woman
who had proved so intractable under my questioning. By referring to
the broken wife I discovered that she had never thought of looking
at the _age_ of the deceased as recorded in the certificate; and
I had a strong suspicion that it had been the certificate of the
father’s death which had been shown her, with a view to severing the
connection for ever.

Back I went to the old woman’s home, only to find her flown, and the
house shut up and empty. She had taken alarm, then, and deemed flight
the most easy way out of her difficulties.

I had now no clue whatever to the discovery of Hanford, and, truth to
tell, was not sorry. I heartily hoped that he, too, had taken alarm
and left the city, and that I should thus hear no more of the case.
But the broken wife, from the hour of the first meeting, had never
rested. She was continually on the prowl, never going to her work,
seldom eating or sleeping, and almost forgetting to drink. The result
was that one night, in watching a quiet hotel or boarding-house at
the West End, she saw a man come out and hurry towards a waiting
cab, and flew across and pinned him in her arms with his foot on the
steps.

“Dick! Dick Hanford! look at me and say why you have tried to make me
believe you were dead?” she cried in frenzied tones.

The man was alone, and did not seem greatly surprised, though he was
labouring under great excitement and emotion.

“Call me John Ferguson,” he said, tremulously, without trying to push
her off or escape. “Dick Hanford is dead—dead to everyone.”

“Not to me, for I am still your wife,” she excitedly returned. “Oh,
Dick! I am bad and weak, and foolish—maybe mad at times—but I love
you; and I want to be better, and get back my bairn that they say I
nearly killed. I think it would keep me from falling. Oh, give me one
more chance! I thought you were both in the grave, and that I had put
you there, but when I found you alive a new life seemed to spring up
in me.”

“Call me John Ferguson—Dick Hanford is dead,” he still answered, in
low husky tones.

He dismissed the cab, and motioned to the broken wife to follow him
out to the dark road beyond the city, where they could converse
unseen and unheard. He would not say he was married to another woman,
nor would he admit that he was Hanford, or this broken woman’s
husband; though his grave, earnest manner, his gentleness, and
every thrill of his voice, convinced her of his identity, if such
convincing had been needed.

“I am nothing to you, or you to me,” he said; and with a pang she
noticed that he never even touched her or offered her his arm.
“We are strangers; our ways are different—far apart; just as much
sundered as if we were both dead, and buried at different sides of
the globe. But I have money now, and I am willing to give you that,
if it will do you any good, just to relieve my own mind, if you will
let me go in peace. Why should we fight over a dead past? Say how
much you want, and it shall be yours, though it should be every penny
I own.”

“I don’t want money, but the bairn I nearly killed,” cried the
weeping wife. “Money would curse me, but the bairn might lift me up.
I’m not the first lost woman who has been pulled up to heaven by a
bairn’s wee hand.”

“That can never be,” said the husband, decidedly. “More likely you
would drag him down with you. Be content with the ill you’ve done.
Freddy is dead.”

“I don’t believe it,” screamed the broken wife. “He is hidden from
me, not dead. I will make a bargain with you. If your love for me
is dead, go your way in peace, but leave me the bairn. I’ll sell my
rights for him. Is it a bargain? or must I put you in prison?”

“You can do neither,” was the agitated reply. “You cannot put me in
prison, and you cannot touch the boy. You will never see him again.
He is far beyond your reach.”

They quarrelled over that point, and had to separate without an
arrangement. Janet Hanford came to me the same night, demanding that
I should arrest the “bigamist,” as she declared him to be, and also
hunt out her boy, wherever he was hidden, as the care of the child
would legally fall to her, who had committed no offence against the
moral law. A light task, certainly!

In the first place, I found that the accused persisted that he
was not Richard Hanford, but John Ferguson. He had been at the
Cape for nearly two years, so he had no one to whom he could refer
in confirmation of his statement. He was very hazy as to his
antecedents. He had prospered at the Cape, he admitted, but would
not say that the money he now possessed had come to him by marriage;
he would not admit that he was married at all to the lady who
accompanied him, though it was proved that at the private hotel at
which they resided they were known as Mr and Mrs Ferguson. The lady
herself, being referred to, declined to say whether she was married
or not; and when _she_ took up that position, I need not say that our
chance of bringing home to him a charge of bigamy became poor indeed.
Then there remained the charge of desertion, but that could scarcely
be brought forward, seeing that the wife had been in prison, serving
a term of two years, while he had been away at the Cape and had but
recently returned, and so might be supposed not to know that she was
alive.

But the weaker Janet Hanford’s case grew, the more determined
and desperate she seemed to become. John Ferguson’s wife had a
maid-servant to attend her, and Janet Hanford appears to have
taken to watching the girl. One forenoon, when the case was at its
most critical point—that is, when there were evidences that John
Ferguson and his wife would soon be out of the country—the broken
wife saw this girl leave the hotel with two letters in her hand.
The girl walked rapidly along Princes Street, with the intention of
posting them at the General Post Office; but before she had gone two
divisions, Janet Hanford became a highway robber, by snatching the
letters from her hand and vanishing like magic. One of the letters
was addressed to “Master Frederick Hanford,” at a boarding-school
some miles from the city; and almost before the amazed girl got back
to her master, Janet Hanford was in a railway carriage and speeding
towards that school.

The letter she had stolen proved beyond a doubt that John Ferguson
was Richard Hanford, and father of the boy, and also revealed the
fact that it had been Hanford’s intention to remove the boy in a day
or two, as he was “leaving the country.” Janet Hanford stopped all
that by taking a policeman with her, and demanding that the boy—who
readily recognised her as his mother—should be delivered up to her.
The grief and consternation of the father were terrible to behold,
and we had now the singular case of two persons charging each other
with a crime, and each demanding the other’s arrest.

Hanford made the most strenuous attempts to get back the custody of
his boy—who was lame and rather weakly—but failed completely, though
he had money and lawyers to help him. An inquiry had been by that
time despatched to the Cape, to ascertain whether the so-called John
Ferguson had been legally married to Rosa Gladwin, the girl who in
Scotland had passed as his wife. In anticipation of the answer to
that question being against him, Hanford redoubled his exertions to
quicken the slow processes of law which were to give him charge of
his boy; but with almost the same result as if he had single-handed
tried to push on some great Juggernaut. The ponderous thing moved
none the faster, but all the heat and turmoil and excitement fell to
Hanford. He was continually running between his temporary home and
his lawyers, and in one of these races he caught a chill which he
“had not time to attend to.”

When the pain became unbearable, he was forced to lie down and send
for a doctor. By that time he was almost delirious and in a high
fever. The doctor pronounced the trouble inflammation of the lungs,
and the case critical.

The moment Janet Hanford heard of the illness she came to see her
husband, bringing with her the boy, whom she had hitherto kept
studiously out of sight. She was loud in her self-recriminations. She
blamed herself for the calamity; in grovelling grief cried aloud to
heaven to witness her vow, that if Hanford’s life were only spared
she would restore his boy, suffer him to leave the country with his
father, and nevermore seek to molest either, or wish for anything
but their welfare and happiness. The cry was vain; the resolve came
too late. Hanford scarcely knew her, and appeared to be living the
misfortunes of his life over again; for when his eye did light on
her face, he implored those present to take her from him, or at
least to save the boy from her remorseless hands. In a day or two he
died, to the very last turning from her with aversion, and speaking
of his other attendant as his true and only wife, and denouncing
Janet Hanford as a curse to herself and all mankind. Of course these
delirious utterances could not be taken for his real feelings;
indeed, his second wife afterwards assured Janet that the love he
bore her was greater than that which he had conceived for herself—it
was merely the outside shell of wretchedness and debauchery which
he loathed and detested. There was no more concealment of the truth
then. It was freely admitted that Hanford had married again out at
the Cape, getting a rich settler’s daughter and a little fortune by
the union, as well as the unselfish devotion of a woman who knew the
whole of his past life, and yet did not hesitate to sacrifice her all
for his sake. A strange result sprang from that death-bed scene. The
second wife imbibed a strong affection for the lame boy, and could
not think of parting with him; at the same time a feeling of pity
grew up in her breast for the broken wife, who was so prostrated by
her great loss that for weeks her life was despaired of. Rosa Gladwin
nursed her through it all, and, I suppose, must have discovered in
her some good qualities which were hidden from ordinary onlookers,
for when Mrs Hanford fairly recovered they did not separate. At first
Rosa offered to provide for her by settling on her an annuity quite
sufficient for her wants, but the proposal was never carried out.
They went out to the Cape together, and no sisters could have been
more firmly bound together in affection. Neither of them ever married
again, but their lives have been spent in watching the development of
Hanford’s son, who is no longer a lame boy, but a strong man, bidding
fair to leave a big mark in the world’s history. The most singular
thing in the case, however, is the fact that Janet Hanford left her
drunkenness and debasement in the grave which swallowed her husband.
Truly there is hope for all, even for the White Savage.




THE BROKEN MISSIONARY.


The place was called a church, but it was really little more than a
mission-house thrown out and partly supported by a religious body
in Edinburgh wishing to extend its connection. The town is a few
miles from Edinburgh, and the building used for the church had at
one time been used as a school, then as a slaughter-house for pigs,
and at last, with a little painting and fitting up, as a church or
meeting-house.

It is not necessary to name the particular sect of which this small
church was a part. All churches are formed of men and women, and with
these there is always to be found some twist of character, which we,
who are twisted in another direction, call an imperfection. Such
men as the deacon in the following case may be found in almost any
church—men of strong convictions and great pugnacity, who are such
heroes for virtue that they never think it possible to fall on the
other side.

The little church had no vestry, and but one door, so the minister
and congregation all entered from the front. Just within the door
there was a small partition, and a folding door to keep the draught
off the congregation during the assembling, and conspicuously in
front of that, and facing the outer door, stood a three-legged stool
bearing a big pewter plate for contributions. The contents of this
plate were in general so scanty that they might easily have been
counted by the eye, but occasionally, during the summer, visitors
from the city would drop into the little place and leave in the plate
a practical proof of their interest in the struggling church. After
the services, it was the duty of the deacon or deacons to count the
collection and place the sum to the credit of the general fund of
the church. The minister or missionary, Arthur Morrison by name,
was a young man with a wife and two children, who was struggling
vainly to exist upon £55 a year. He had striven hard, but had so far
failed that he was considerably in debt to different tradesmen about
the town. He could scarcely be blamed for that, for his wife was a
delicate woman, and most of the expenses had been forced upon him on
her account. There was little prospect of his position in that town
improving, as only a part of his salary was made up by the church,
the rest being a grant from the main body; and as he was a quiet mild
fellow, with no great energy or ability, there was little chance of
him being sought after by a richer congregation. The poor fellow,
however, seemed very earnest and sincere, and to love the work, and
had never uttered a word of complaint to one of his people during the
three years he had been among them.

That was the position when an incident occurred, so curious and so
strange in its results, that it is necessary to put it down minutely,
and exactly as it was afterwards narrated by the chief witness in the
case, the deacon himself.

It was immediately before the morning service, and the congregation
had nearly all assembled. The Rev. Arthur Morrison had not arrived,
but an agreeable incident had kept the deacon who stood at the plate
from noting the fact. A lady, evidently a summer visitor of wealth,
had put a bank note into the plate, and asked to be shown to a seat
as graciously as if she had been in the finest cathedral in the world.

The deacon was a man named Thomas Aikman, a baker by trade, a sharp
business man, who considered himself the main pillar of that church.
He fluttered into the building and showed the distinguished visitor
to his own pew—if pew it could be called—placed books before her, and
returned to the plate. There was an interval during which no other
worshippers entered, and Mr Aikman spent the time in admiring that
bank note as it lay in the plate, contrasting so deliciously with
the thin strata of coppers below. It was a crisp note of the Bank of
Scotland, and so new that it would not remain folded. Of course it
had a number, and that number Mr Aikman declared he could not help
noting, as the paper lay open before him. He did not mark down the
number—did not think of doing so—but he had a good memory, and he
could trust to that, and swear by his convictions.

As he gazed the deacon rapidly ran up in his mind all that this bank
note would do. There was a trifling debt on the building fund, and
this would all but clear it off. There would be no difficulty in
getting the other managers of the church to agree to that; they were
afraid of the stout and pugnacious baker, and always hurriedly agreed
to whatever he thought fit to propose.

While he was settling this matter another stranger appeared, and
placed a silver coin in the plate, at the same time asking to be
shown to a seat. The half-crown which this gentleman dropped into
the plate rested on the bank note already there, and thus the two
contributions were left while the deacon went inside and showed the
gentleman to his own form. Not a minute was occupied in the task,
and during the interval only one person entered the church. That
person was the Rev. Arthur Morrison, who appeared heated and flushed
as he pressed past the deacon and made his way to the little desk
from which he preached. Mr Aikman went straight back to his post at
the plate, and the bank note being still prominent in his thoughts,
he glanced at once in that direction. Then he started and rubbed
his eyes. He himself had been the last to leave the spot—for the
gentleman had preceded him into the church—and then the bank note lay
in the plate all right, with the half-crown safely weighting it; now,
when he got back, the note was gone. The half-crown was there—shining
like a white disc among the coppers, but not a vestige of paper money
was near it. The deacon looked around. There was no wind, but the
note might have got over the edge of the plate, and fallen to the
ground. No; it was not in the vestibule. Aikman darted outside; there
was not a human being in sight. He staggered back again and stared
at the plate till his goggling eyes might have speared a hole in it.
There could be no doubt about it—the church had been robbed, and was
the poorer by £5 of the deacon’s momentary absence. He had no one to
advise or assist him, the other deacon on the list having failed to
appear, and felt doubly angry and excited over the strange loss from
having already mentally decided how the money should be utilised.
He was in a fever of bewilderment, perspiring in every pore, and
even madly thrusting his hands into his own pockets to make sure
that the note had not fluttered in there. Then, after another dart
outside to make sure that no prowling thief could have been near,
the deacon did a little mental reasoning. No one, so far as he was
aware, had entered the church during his absence from the plate but
the minister. Could it be possible? No, never! Well, yes it might
be. The man was poor and needy, and he might consider the drawings
at the door as in a manner his own, or intended for him. Mr Aikman
had an old grudge at his minister, who had once dared not only to
correct him on some theological points, but had satirized him in a
quiet way as well. The man who could utter a joke at the expense
of a great man like Aikman was fit for anything, and the bank note
could not have gone without hands. The deacon began to understand the
whole mystery, and put up the collection and closed the door to go
inside and listen to the sermon in no frame of mind to profit by the
discourse. At every telling point in the oration Aikman turned up his
nose, and mentally exclaimed—

“How can he, with that stolen £5 note in his pocket!”

On the whole, the deacon felt more of pity than of anger at the cool
appropriation, but he determined that the minister should know that
the robbery had been discovered. How best to make the revelation
exercised Aikman’s small brain pretty closely during the service. He
had not quite settled the matter when the benediction was pronounced.
As the lady who had made the handsome gift handed him back the books
she had used, and made some remarks about the church, a happy idea
struck the deacon. He boldly thanked her for her liberality, and then
concluded by asking her—much to her surprise—if she knew the number
of the note she had put in the plate. She did not; and as she was too
polite to ask the reason for inquiry, no more passed between them,
and the lady departed and was seen no more. Had Mr Aikman been of a
less active disposition the matter might have ended there. No one had
seen the bank note but himself, and it was now gone through no fault
of his. But then there was the minister, and the suspicion, and his
own old grudge. He could not remain passive.

When all the congregation were gone Aikman steadily fixed the young
clergyman with his ferocious eye, and said—

“There was one lady very good to us to-day—she put a £5 note in the
plate.”

A slight flush overspread the pale face of the young preacher, and he
said a little hurriedly—

“Ah, indeed? I am pleased to hear that. Excuse me just now; I must
hurry home.”

He moved away abruptly, and the deacon stood staring after him, now
thoroughly convinced of the soundness of his suspicions.

“A minister of the Gospel to descend to a mean theft like that!” he
said to himself. “I must call a meeting of the managers and report
the whole case.”

It happened to be the month of July, and there was a difficulty in
getting a quorum of the managers together, but at length Aikman was
promised a full meeting, which took place on the Wednesday following
in his own house. There, after shutting themselves in, and making
sure that no one could overhear, the four men considered the case
of the stolen bank note. Of course they were shocked at the implied
guilt of one whom they revered and trusted so much, but Aikman piled
up his facts in such a minute and positive manner, that even without
additional evidence there would have been little diversity of opinion
among them. At this stage, and when Aikman had scarcely concluded,
another of the managers quickly exclaimed—

“Why, Mr Morrison changed a £5 note with me yesterday.”

“Yesterday?” echoed another, to whom the minister owed a small sum.
“And he told me on Saturday that he had no money, and would not have
till next quarter day.”

“There! What did I say?” cried Aikman with triumphant energy. “Could
anything be clearer than that? I know for a fact that he has no
money—it is all eaten up long before it is paid to him by me; yet
there you have proof that near the end of the quarter he pays away
money, and that a £5 note. Have you the note yet?” he added to the
man who had received the payment.

He had, and would run and get it. A wiser plan would have been to
first make Mr Aikman describe the note put in the plate, and write
down its number, and then send for that received from the minister,
and compare the record with the note, but that was never thought of.
The other deacon had only half a street to traverse, and was back in
a few minutes with a crisp bank note. It was of the Bank of Scotland,
and nearly new. Mr Aikman snatched it from the bearer—opened it,
glanced at the device and the number, and then exclaimed—

“It’s a clear case! look at the number for yourselves, ‘7607’—the
very figures of the one I saw lying in the plate. I couldn’t help
reading them, for the note lay open, and I never forget anything.”

A painful silence followed. At length some one asked the question
which was uppermost in all their minds—What was to be done? They
could not pass over the robbery in silence, and yet it would be a
delicate and possibly a dangerous thing to charge a clergyman with
such a theft.

“Nothing dangerous about it,” said Aikman, brusquely. “I can swear
to the note being put in the plate, and the number, and the name of
the bank; also, that the minister was the only one near the plate
while I was absent for half a minute; and you can swear that he paid
away the note to you and got change. What’s to be done? Shall we ask
him to resign, demand the money back, or give him up to the police to
be dealt with as they think best?”

It was quite clear to all present which of these courses Mr Aikman
wished followed, and they unanimously decided that the most rigorous
course was necessary in dealing with such a criminal. Mr Aikman was
therefore deputed to lay the matter before the chief constable of the
town, who, however, happened to have a personal acquaintance with the
young clergyman, and a great liking for him as well, and not only
scouted the idea of him stealing the bank note, but strongly urged
Aikman to say nothing of the matter to his minister, whatever other
means he might employ for the recovery of the note.

Finding it impossible to move the deacon, the constable at length
compromised the matter by agreeing to go with Aikman to the
minister’s house—it was not a manse, but a little flat, up an outside
stair—and see if Mr Morrison had any explanation to offer. They found
the young clergyman at home by the bedside of his wife, who was
almost a confirmed invalid, and had been rather weaker than usual
for some days. The constable was moved at the sight of the young
preacher’s pale and concerned expression as he hung over the invalid,
but the deacon had no such qualms—he looked upon these as indications
of guilt, and would have blurted out the charge in hearing of the
sick wife but for a huge pinch on his arm by the constable, who at
the same time quietly nodded to Morrison, and invited him to speak
with them for a moment in the next room.

“There is some difficulty about that £5 note which you paid away on
Tuesday to Blackie, the grocer,” observed the constable, kindly;
while the deacon, as a duty he owed to society, steadily speared the
young preacher with his goggling eyes. “Would you mind saying where
you got the note?”

The righteous deacon had his reward, for the moment these words were
uttered, a startled look came to the worn features of the minister,
and his face flushed a deep crimson.

“I scarcely know myself,” he at length responded, with considerable
hesitation; “is it necessary that I should make that known? What has
happened? Is there anything wrong with it? Is it a forged note?”

“Oh, no; the note is good enough,” cried the deacon, sternly, still
using his spears liberally; “as good as any ever put out by the Bank
of Scotland. The lady who put it into the plate on Sunday was not
likely to have a forged note in her pocket.”

The young preacher started as if the deacon had run a knife into him.
He seemed petrified, breathless, and dumb with astonishment.

“I do not know what you mean, or what you are hinting at,” he at
length replied; “but I know that the note you speak of could not
possibly have been in any lady’s pocket on Sunday, seeing that it was
then lying in my desk here, in this house.”

“You’ll have to prove that,” derisively returned Aikman. “Where did
you get it, and when?”

“I got it on Saturday afternoon,” answered the suspected man, with
calm dignity. “It came to me in an envelope, by post, and without
a line to indicate the sender. There were a few words written
inside the flap of the envelope, which I had not noticed when I put
the envelope in the fire. I snatched it out again and read them.
They were—‘For the little ones, from a well-wisher.’ I was quite
overpowered,” continued the young preacher, with a quiver in his
tones; “I had seen nothing but darkness and trouble before me, as one
of my creditors was pressing me sorely for money, knowing perfectly
that I had none. I went to God with my trouble in prayer, and that
was His answer.”

The deacon was horrified. That the minister should steal the note
he could readily understand, but that he should account for its
possession in such a manner showed a depth of depravity and a
hypocrisy which he had not conceived possible to dwell in man.

“You have the envelope, of course?” he sneeringly observed, after a
significant silence.

“No; unfortunately I have not. I put it into the fire in case my
wife should see it, and—and be pained by the thought of me having to
accept such help from an unknown friend.”

The deacon looked at the constable with a significant jerk of the
head. It was quite evident they could make nothing of a man so lost
in wickedness, and so ready with plausible excuses. The constable,
however, appeared to be foolishly overcome by the cunning reply of
the culprit, and made no remark. It therefore devolved upon Aikman to
make a noble stand for honesty and religion.

“Mr Morrison,” he impressively began, “that bank note which you paid
to Blackie the grocer was put in the plate on Sunday by a lady. I
saw it, and read the number of it as it lay. After you had passed
the plate, it had vanished. Either admit your crime, or take the
consequences.”

“Now—at last—I understand you,” answered the minister, with more
dignity and calmness than his accuser. “You accuse me of stealing the
bank note?”

“We do, upon the clearest evidence,” snorted the deacon.

“Then I deny it emphatically,” said the accused, almost smiling. “I
cannot believe you to be in earnest. Steal it! why should I do that?
It was put there for the general benefit of the church, I suppose,
and that includes me, doesn’t it?”

“So you thought when you took it, I’ve no doubt,” angrily returned
Aikman, “but you will find yourself grievously mistaken. Constable, I
charge that man, in the name of the managers, with the theft of £5.
Do your duty.”

Matters had now become serious, but the gentleness of the constable
smoothed away much that might have been painful.

They walked together to the house of the Fiscal, and, after an
account of the circumstances had been gone over, the young minister
was allowed to go back to his home on his own recognisance.

The next day I had a visit from the young minister, in at the
Central, in Edinburgh. I have but a faint recollection of the
interview, but I remember that he appeared greatly excited and
agitated, and ended his somewhat incoherent statement of the facts
by imploring me to take up the case with a view to—what think
you?—with a view to convicting Mr Aikman of perjury or conspiracy!
The reasoning of the young clergyman was this:—No one but the deacon
had seen a £5 note in the plate, and he alone had reported the note
stolen—therefore the note might never have been there at all! From
this followed the deduction—the deacon from his old grudge had got up
the whole as a revenge on the young preacher to injure his reputation
and force him out of his post. In consequence of this appeal I went
out to the place and made some inquiries, but was met almost at the
outset with clear proof that a £5 note had been put into the plate.
The lady who had been the donor was gone, but at the hotel in which
she had been staying the landlord had heard her mention the gift to
her husband.

The case was tried shortly after at the Burgh Court, the accused
conducting his own case. From the evidence led few could doubt
the guilt of the poor preacher the deacon was so cool, and clear,
and positive in all his statements. On one point alone did he show
confusion, and that was regarding his noting the number of the note
while it lay in the plate. Here the deacon, from his very evident
desire to make all clear and firm, contradicted himself slightly, and
then floundered worse under a very simple question from the Sheriff,
and was put down in confusion. The result was that the case was
dismissed—quite an unsatisfactory result to both parties. The deacon
was enraged—having recovered from his momentary confusion, and being
now ready with a clear and minute explanation—and the poor minister
was quite broken down under the disgrace. When he returned to the
town which had brought him so much suffering, he met with so many
cold looks from those whom he had believed to be his warmest friends,
that he was almost forced to resign his charge. The resignation
was accepted with a promptitude even more crushing to his spirit;
and then, while he was making preparations to leave the place, his
creditors swooped down on his few possessions, and left him and his
family with little but the clothes in which they stood.

Morrison appeared to bear it all with calm dignity, but his wife,
who was a quick-tempered, high-spirited woman, though delicate, felt
the disgrace keenly. They moved in to Edinburgh, and Morrison tried
hard to get another appointment, but in vain. The ban was upon his
reputation—his name had appeared in connection with an accusation
of mean thieving, and he was looked upon with suspicion even by
strangers. At length he got employment for a few hours daily in
keeping a tradesman’s books, for which he got nine shillings a week,
and with that and a little copying and tuition he managed for a time
to keep himself and his family alive.

But poor diet and a mean habitation among the very roughest
characters soon broke the spirit and constitution of his wife, and
she passed out of his arms into her long rest before a year was
gone. One of the children followed in three months, and he was left
alone with the baby. He struggled on quietly and without complaint,
shunning all, but ever ready when sought for to go and pray and
converse with any of the sick or dying among the very poor who might
express a wish for his presence. He became gaunt and thin, and the
tradesman who employed him told him he needed a change of air.

I met him more than once in some of the lowest slums, but I failed to
recognise the bloodless face and stooping figure. I knew him as “the
broken missionary,” and it was dimly understood that he had either
been in prison or found guilty of some offence against the law,
though the poor wretches with whom he conversed and prayed declared
their firm belief in his purity and innocence.

One day, at that time, I found a stout, red-faced man waiting for
me at the Office, who nodded to me, and appeared greatly pleased at
seeing me. I had to tell him that he had the advantage of me, and
then he introduced himself as Mr Aikman, the deacon who had figured
as such a prominent witness in the case against the minister.

“I have been a cruel wretch, and I deserve ten years in prison for
the misery I have brought on an innocent man,” he said, shedding
tears freely—great hot tears, genuine as genuine could be. “A lady
in delicate health belonging to our congregation was ordered to live
abroad, and came back only yesterday. The moment she heard of Mr
Morrison’s disgrace, she came to me and said that it was she who had
sent the £5 note to the minister. She sent it from Edinburgh just as
she was setting out. I am a sinful and wicked man! God help me! If I
could only find out where he is—if you could help me to that—there is
no atonement or reparation I should think too great to make to him
and his poor wife and bairns. Every penny I have shall be spent in
the effort.”

I remembered the case then, and immediately set about tracing
Morrison, a task which would have been easy indeed if I had thought
for a moment of him being identical with “the broken missionary.” At
length I came upon a solicitor who occasionally employed Morrison to
copy deeds, and by him was referred to the tradesman who employed
the broken man to keep his books. It was only when we were near the
hovel which Morrison called his home that the idea flashed upon me
that the broken missionary was the man I was after. I knew where he
lived, and went straight to the house, which tallied perfectly with
the description given by the tradesman.

When we knocked at the door a low voice told us to “Come in,” and on
entering we saw only a child of eighteen months creeping about the
floor in great glee, with a doll of rags in its hands. But a glance
round showed us where the voice had come from. There was a bed behind
the door, and in that there was a pale, bloodless face, and a pair
of shiny eyes, bearing a shadowy resemblance to the man we sought.
The broken missionary feebly attempted to raise himself upon his arm,
while the deacon rushed forward, dropped on his knees before the bed,
and hid his face and tears in the thin wasted hands he had clasped.

“My poor wronged minister!” he exclaimed; “say you forgive me. We
have found out the lady who sent you the £5 note; and I know I have
been cruel and wicked——”

A strange convulsion passed over the ghastly face and sunken features
of the missionary, while his great eyes appeared to shine out with a
perfect radiance.

“Bless the Lord, O my soul, and all that is within me bless his holy
name!” he fervently exclaimed, as the great eyes became soft and
beautiful with tears.

The child on the floor crowed with delight, and hammered vigorously
on the floor with the head of its doll of rags. The deacon gathered
the thin form of the sick man in his arms, and hurriedly breathed out
all his plans for reparation. He would carry him back with him to his
own home; he would care for him, and send him away to the country, to
fresh green fields and cool shady woods, where he would have nothing
to do but take his fill of the balmy air, and draw health from the
glorious sunshine. But the grey head was shaken on his breast in
quiet demur, with a pitiful look in the great eyes as they rested on
the laughing face of the neglected child on the floor.

“I am going to fair fields and a glorious country,” he feebly gasped,
“but not there—not there. God has sent his sunshine into my soul, and
I can depart in peace.”

He fainted away as he spoke, and it was long before he could be
restored. The deacon had a nurse and a doctor there in an hour, but
they came too late. In the dead of night, with the deacon clasping
his hand and wetting it with his repentant tears, the missionary went
quietly to his rest.

The child was taken to the deacon’s house, and trained and
educated, and finally sent to college, and now promises to occupy a
distinguished position in the profession which proved so disastrous
to his father.

The stolen bank note was never traced, but it was believed to have
been taken by a woman who had acted as chapel-keeper, and who was
afterwards sent to prison for a theft quite as mean, though less
disastrous in its results.




A MURDERER’S MISTAKE.


A toll-keeper on the main road some miles south of Edinburgh was
standing at his open door watching the gambols of his two children,
when a weary traveller approached and arrested his gaze. There
was something uncommon about the dusty tramp when his appearance
could rouse interest in an old toll-keeper, accustomed to look
with indifference on every kind of wanderer that God’s earth can
produce. This one was an old man, tall and gaunt and white-haired.
So far there was a bond of interest between them, but with age the
comparison ceased, for the toll-keeper was stout and well-clad, and
had a comfortable expression beaming from every part of his face;
while the stranger was haggard, worn, and drooping, like one who
had got all that earth was likely to give, and did not care how
soon the giving ceased. Above the toll-keeper’s happy face was a
ticket intimating that he was licensed to sell tobacco; while in
one window a few bottles of confections and biscuits, and the words
“Refreshments and Lemonade” on a show card, summed up his efforts at
trading. The dusty tramp halted in front of the toll-keeper, giving
the stout man a full view of his poor clothing and fragile boots,
from which his toes were peeping, and his sharp eyes eagerly devoured
the intimation above the doorway.

“Good evening, sir,” he said quietly, as he fumbled among his clothes
for a pocket, and at length produced a penny.

The toll-keeper in general was gruff enough with tramps, even when
they seemed disposed to buy his wares, but there was a ring in the
tones of this one which struck a chord of pity in his breast, and
he returned the greeting kindly. In front of the window showing
the biscuits and sweets was a wooden bench. The haggard one limped
towards this bench, saying in the same quiet tones—

“Might I rest for a bit on this bench?”

There was nothing arrogant or bold in this request, but rather a ring
of indifference or despair. It was as if he had said—“It doesn’t
matter whether you say yes or no, or whether I sit down or move on,
or drop dead by the way. The end is not far off either way.”

“Oh, ay, sit as lang as ye like; ye’re welcome,” said the
toll-keeper, heartily. “You look like you had come a far way?”

“I have, sir—a matter of four hundred miles,” said the white-haired
tramp, knitting his brows; then recovering himself, he said in his
former quiet tones, “I suppose you couldn’t let me have a penn’orth
of tobacco? I’ve on’y a penny left.”

“Hout, ay;” and the toll-keeper brought a liberal length of roll
tobacco, which the weary traveller grasped eagerly and paid for
promptly with his penny. He bit off a piece and chewed it fiercely,
his eye resting steadily the while on the face of one of the
toll-keeper’s children, a rosy-cheeked girl of seven or eight, who
was gazing on the gaunt face and figure in a species of awe.

“It’s good for killing hunger,” he observed, with his eye still
meditatively fixed upon the child; “not that I’ve felt much of it,”
he hastily added, as if in fear that the toll-keeper would think
that he meant to beg; “I haven’t had time to think of that. That’s a
pretty child,” he abruptly added, alluding to the girl.

“Yes, but she’s not looking so well as she did,” answered the
toll-keeper, with a father’s pleased look at the compliment. “We
nearly lost her with fever a while ago.”

“Imphm!” grimly returned the white-haired tramp. “Mebbe some day
you’ll wish she had been taken. She’ll grow up to a fine lass, and
then some one will envy you of your bonny flower and crush it up in
his fingers, never thinking or caring to think that your heart’s
inside of it. You’ll go mad, then, and think how happy you could have
been smoothing the turf on her grave when she was a little child.”

“God forbid!” fervently exclaimed the toll-keeper, catching the child
up in his arms, as if to shield her there.

“God? What’s God got to do with it, I’d like to know?” cried the
white-haired tramp, with his hard tones rising to a despairing snarl.
“Is there any God? I never see him, though there’s plenty of devil
about—that everybody can see with their eyes shut. Look you, sir!”
he added, clenching one bony hand and smiting the palm of the other
in fearful excitement, “I’ve done with God for ever! When my girl
was like that little one I used to go to church o’ Sundays, and feel
pious and good, and have my heart full of softness and gratitude.
I’ve felt as if I could have took the whole world into my arms to
bless it. But that’s all gone now, and the devil’s the one I speak
to. He’s been with me all the way, cheering and helping me over the
weary miles, and I won’t turn agen him now when I’m near the end of
it.”

The toll-keeper shrank back before the terrible words and sudden
hurricane of passion which convulsed the speaker; then he gathered
the two children in his arms, and said softly to them—

“Run round into the garden, bairns, and pull some bonnie flowers, and
make a fairy’s feast in a corner, with rose leaves for plates. I’ll
come round and see it when it’s done. Haste ye now!” and, with a kiss
and a smile, he dismissed them.

“Excuse me, sir; I forgot about the little uns,” said the tramp,
falling back into his former subdued tones, and evidently perfectly
understanding the toll-keeper’s haste to get the children out of
hearing. “I’ve seen the day when I’d ’a’ been horrified at such
words myself. It’s the way the world goes. We’ve good occasion to
look mercifully on them as is far down, ’cause we may get into their
state afore we die. I knew a man once—a Methody he was—who preached
a sermon on that man that was hanged for killing his sweetheart up
in London. It would have done you good to hear it—how he pitched
into that poor chap in the condemned cell. Well, that same Methody
quarrelled with a man about some furniture, and went home and got a
log of wood, and came back and struck the other over the head till he
died, and he was had up for murder, and convicted and hanged for it,
as sure as you stand there. I wondered, when I saw him brought out,
if he had been pitching into himself when he was in the condemned
cell;” and the white-haired tramp laughed a hard, sardonic, unmusical
laugh, without a vestige of merriment in the sound.

The toll-keeper fidgeted uneasily, and began to wish this man of such
changing moods gone.

“Are you going far?” he asked, wishing to change the subject.

“I’m going on—on—to be hanged,” said the stranger, absently; then,
recovering himself on noting the toll-keeper’s look of horror, he
said, abruptly, “What do you call this ’ere town?”

The toll-keeper named the place.

“That’s it!” cried the tramp, rousing up and speaking with a kind of
triumphant ferocity. “That’s the place—I’m not going far past that.
I’ve come to find a man out and pay a debt.”

To pay a debt!—a man who had just parted with his last penny! The
toll-keeper’s suspicions were confirmed—the old man’s brain was
affected; his wrongs, if he had any, had deprived him of reason. At
this stage there came an interruption to their conversation from a
field on the opposite side of the road. There was no gate or stile
at that part of the field, but over the wall there came clambering a
gamekeeper and a gentleman, who had evidently been hard at work with
the gun among the woods and coverts further back. The gamekeeper,
after a word or two from his companion, walked on with the heavy
bag of game, while the gentleman strolled forward familiarly to the
toll-keeper’s door, wiping the sweat from his brow, and looking
almost as tired as the tramp there seated. As he did so, the tramp
noted what a fine face the gentleman owned—not so very pretty or
finely proportioned, but full of sympathy and gentle courtesy, and
altogether likeable and attractive even to a man old, soured, and
broken in spirit.

“A warm day, John,” the new-comer said, with just one swift passing
glance at the tramp on the bench. “A glass of lemonade, as quick as
you can, for I’m dying of thirst.”

“Will you no come in an’ sit doon, sir?” returned the toll-keeper,
obsequiously.

“No, thank you—this will do nicely. Now, hurry!” and the gentleman
seated himself easily beside the tramp on the bench, where they
formed a queer contrast—the tramp old and done, the gentleman in the
full flush of youth and strength, and evidently with everything at
his command that could make man happy.

“A warm day this,” he added pleasantly to the white-haired tramp.
“You look tired and thirsty too. Will you have a drink with me? John,
another glass of lemonade and some biscuits,” he imperatively called
out, as the tramp refused the proffered gift, with an instinctive
touch at his fore-lock. The lemonade was brought and decanted, the
first glass being handed to the gentleman, who politely handed it
to the white-haired tramp, who, with another protest, not quite so
firm as the first, and the words, “Long life to you, sir!” placed the
grateful beverage to his lips and drank it off, the gentleman then
following his example. The biscuits had been brought out on a tray,
and the frank sportsman lifted one of these, and then crammed the
remainder bodily into the hands of the tramp.

“Eat away; I only want a bite. I shall be having dinner when I get
home,” he said, in a careless, yet kindly manner, which disarmed the
gift of anything calculated to offend the most sensitive. “You’re
English, I think?”

“Yes, sir,” answered the white-haired man, in so soft a tone that the
toll-keeper felt inclined to rub his eyes to see if it was really the
same man.

“London way, eh?” continued the gentleman, toying with the biscuit.

“Yes, sir—Rotherhithe,” said the tramp, eating as if he had not eaten
for some time.

“Ah, I’ve been often there myself—a fine place,” said the gentleman,
with kindling eyes; and then they talked pleasantly of London and its
attractions, the gentleman never once showing by word or look that he
considered the tramp his inferior. At length he rose to go, took up
his gun and paid the toll-keeper, and then, with a pleasant nod to
both toll-keeper and tramp, he walked off towards the town.

The tramp looked after him in silence, munching the while at one of
the biscuits.

“Who is that?” he said at length, with less gloom on his face and
bitterness in his tones.

“Oh, that’s young Gowlieden.”

“Gowlieden? Good heavens! what a name to go to bed with!” said the
tramp. “Well, anyway, he’s a good fellow; God bless him, and send
more of his kind into this hard world!”

“Gowlieden isn’t his real name,” said the toll-keeper with a smile.
“It’s the name of one of his father’s estates, and it’s our fashion
here in Scotland to give the big folks the name of their land. That’s
the heir, you know, and we call him young Gowlieden. His real name is
Stephen Barbour. They live at a place called Frearton Hall, on the
other side of the town.”

“What!”

The tramp had started to his feet, and given out the word with a
shout which almost drove the breath out of the toll-keeper’s body.

“Yes, Frearton Hall—what’s wrong with that?” stammered the
toll-keeper.

“And Stephen Barbour, you say, is his name?” cried the tramp, with
every feature of his face gradually overspreading with horror and
loathing.

“Yes, that is his name.”

“My God!” moaned the white-haired tramp, snatching the bite from his
own mouth and dashing it down on the road, and then trampling on it
with insensate fury; “my God! and I broke bread with him, and took
the drink from his hands, and thought him so kind and noble-looking!
And I said ‘God bless him,’ not knowing any better. Why did the words
not blister on my tongue?”

“You know him, then? You have met the young laird before?” said the
astonished toll-keeper.

“Never, never! But I know him, the scoundrel! I know him too well.”

“He’s no scoundrel,” cried the toll-keeper, warmly. “He’s as good and
true a man as any that breathes. Everybody likes him far or near, and
never yet did I hear any but yourself say a word against him.”

The tramp did not seem to hear the words. He sent the last of the
biscuits skimming as far as he could throw them, and, wringing his
hands, he dropped on his knees on the dusty road.

“Forgive me, Meg, forgive me!” he muttered in a frantic fashion, with
his thoughts evidently far away. “How could I know any better?”

Tears were flowing down his cheeks, and these stopped the harsh words
which were rising to the lips of the toll-keeper. The tramp tugged
out a ragged handkerchief to wipe away the tears, and in doing so
dragged out something hard and shiny, which dropped with a metallic
clank on the road. The toll-keeper looked round just in time to see
that the dropped article was a pistol, which the tramp was hurriedly
putting out of sight again. All his sympathy vanished at the sight of
the weapon.

“You had better be going,” he said coldly, “for if the police saw you
carrying that, they’d soon give you a place to sleep in.”

“I’m going,” said the tramp calmly, rising and moving off. “I haven’t
far to go now. Oh, if I had only known!”

Thus he limped away, still wiping his eyes with the ragged
handkerchief; and if the county constable had chanced to pass the
spot that night, the toll-keeper would certainly have warned him to
look after the mad old man, as he thought him. As it was, he got
leave to go on to the town, and further. On the north side of the
place, and but half a mile from the toll, Frearton Hall stood within
its own grounds. There was a lodge at the entrance, kept by the
gamekeeper already alluded to, but if the tramp entered there, he had
opened the gate and walked in unseen. The dinner at the hall was just
over when one of the servants brought a message, which she whispered
into the ear of the young laird.

“Wants to see me? Who is he? Did he give no name?” he was heard
hurriedly to say.

“No, sir; and he’s such an awful-like man—just like a tramp or a
beggar,” answered the girl.

“A tramp? Oh, I see! Is he old and white-haired?” said the gentleman,
remembering the scene at the toll-keeper’s house, and the queer
character he had assisted there. “Excuse me; I’ll be back in a
minute,” he said to the others in the room; and he ran out, expecting
to find the man in the hall.

“He wouldn’t come in; he said he’d wait outside,” said the girl,
noticing her young master’s look of disappointment. “P’r’aps he’s
away by this time.”

The young laird stepped briskly through the hall and looked out into
the dusk. The sun had just set, and there was still light enough to
see any one near the spot. At the head of the walk leading to the
house there was a clump of laurels and a drooping ash, and Stephen
Barbour fancied he saw a white-haired head look out from behind that,
and quickly cleared the space to find his suspicions correct. The
queer tramp stood before him, with his right hand hidden down among
the rags by his side.

“Oh, it’s you again?” said the gentleman frankly, at the same time
extending his hand to be shaken.

“You’re Stephen Barbour, eldest son of Russel Barbour, aren’t you?”
said the tramp, taking no notice of the proffered hand, and glaring
on the young man with a ferocity which startled the other.

“I am, sir—what then?”

“Then I’ve come to pay you back for what you did to Meg,” said the
old man, with suppressed fury. “Take that!” and instantly he raised
his right hand, and a pistol-shot rang out on the soft evening air.

Quickly as the hand was raised the victim had time to throw out his
own in a futile grasp at the old man’s arm; then, when the bullet
reached him, though desperately wounded, Barbour, with a loud cry,
threw himself upon his assailant, grasping him tightly in his arms
as if he would have squeezed the breath out of the man’s body. The
tramp had made no attempt to escape, and probably meant to make
none; but the grasp annoyed him, and he struggled violently for a
moment, and at length, as the senses of the wounded man were leaving
him, succeeded in throwing Barbour backwards. At the same moment
a coachman, turning a corner of the house with a pitchfork in his
hands, ran forward to learn the cause of the disturbance, and seeing
his young master in the act of being thrown down by a ragged tramp,
he ran at the old man full tilt with the prongs of the fork, one of
which passed clean through the tramp’s arm.

This assault seemed to rouse the old man to a pitch of insane fury,
which gave him an unnatural strength. He rushed at the coachman,
wrenched the pitchfork from his hands, smashed him furiously over
the head with the long pole, and then, throwing down the new weapon,
turned and vanished.

The spectacle which met the eyes of the alarmed household when
they rushed out was that of two men lying prostrate on the ground,
with the pitchfork and pistol near them, and the first impression
naturally was that the coachman in an insane moment had turned and
attacked his young master. In a minute or two the true state of
affairs was made known; the wounded man was borne into the house,
and messengers despatched in every direction in search of the
murderous assailant. From the first the medical man summoned gave
very little hope of Barbour’s recovery, and positively forbade him
being questioned in any way. But when the news of the crime had been
sent to Edinburgh, and I went out to get the facts of the case, the
toll-keeper had spoken to the county constable of all that took place
at the door, and, after a visit to that worthy, I thought I had the
true solution of the mystery, which was far from being the case.
During some of his visits to London the young heir had met the old
tramp’s daughter; the usual heart-rending result had followed, and
the visit of the father had been undertaken solely for revenge. That
was my view of the case, and in spite of the deadly determination
with which that vengeance had been wreaked, my sympathy lay more with
the poor father than his victim. To my surprise, however, both the
toll-keeper and the county police strongly dissented from my opinion.
Stephen Barbour, they strenuously declared, was quite incapable
of such villainy. His character was singularly pure, and his whole
life had been known to these men to be honourable and upright. From
the lowest to the highest, every one had a good word for Stephen
Barbour, and at the time of the shooting he was about to be married
to a gifted young lady, who for years had been sole mistress of his
affections. Without troubling to argue the point I set out to trace
the murderer. Edinburgh was not a great distance from the scene of
the attack, and the nearest large city, and my experience is that
a genuine red-handed murderer always seeks safety among the masses
of the biggest town within reach, unless he can at once leave the
country. This one was poor—his last penny had been expended—therefore
he could not go far quickly. I returned to Edinburgh, and the same
afternoon met a man at the Night Asylum who had given the old tramp
twopence, and a bit of white cotton to bind round his wounded arm. He
had come upon him at the roadside near the city trying to remove the
ragged coloured handkerchief with which he had bound up the arm, and
which he was afraid might poison the wound.

On getting this news I started for the South Side, and had got as far
as Minto Street, when, looking up one of the quiet streets leading
towards St Leonards, I saw a tramp seated on a gate step, and moved
up to have a look at him. So minutely had the man been described to
me, that I recognised him at a glance. He was seated on the step
holding his wounded arm, and staring straight before him in despair
and apathy, his face white as his hair, and his whole expression that
of a man longing for death to end his troubles.

I stopped before him, and when his dull eyes at length rose to meet
my own, I said to him sharply—

“You were out at Frearton Hall last night?”

A slight flush came into his bloodless face at the words, and he
faintly tried to rise.

“Yes, sir,” he answered. “You’re a pleeceman, though you don’t wear
the clothes?”

“Take care what you say—it’ll all be used against you,” I said, as I
gave him my hand to help him to his feet.

“Oh, I don’t mind that a bit,” he said in a woeful and weary way that
went straight to my heart. “Is he dead?—the man I fired at—is he
dead?”

“He was not when I left him, but they’re expecting that,” I curtly
answered. “Can you walk with me to the Central—it’s more than a
mile—or would you need a cab?”

“I’m willin’ to walk as far as my strength will carry me,” he said,
with child-like obedience, as he took my arm for support. “Only to
think that I’ve been an honest working man, striving to do what’s
right all my life, and yet to come to be hanged for murder after all!
And I’m not sorry, either. I’m glad I’ve killed him, for I expect my
Meg to die through him.”

I looked at him curiously, thinking that his mind was affected, but
the quick eyes took in the look at once, and he added—

“I’m not touched here;” and he put a finger-point to his forehead;
“don’t think that. I’m as right in the head as you are—only worn out
and done. I was strong enough till it was all over, and then I seemed
to have not the strength of a sparrow.”

I thought he was right, and at the end of the street hailed a cab
from the stance, and we drove to the Central, he looking out on the
crowded streets with great interest, and making another of his queer
remarks.

“I s’pose it’s the last time I’ll see so many people till I’m brought
out to be hanged,” he said, stolidly. “Well, it won’t be any worse
than what I’ve felt already here—here;” and he put his hand on his
breast and quickly added, “Be you a family man, now?”

I nodded gravely.

“And you don’t look a bad ’un—you didn’t kick me or pull me about
as I’ve seen some do, never thinkin’ they’ll be old themselves one
day. You’ve a gal, mebbe?—one you’ve sort o’ set your heart on!” he
added, hooking his bony fingers on one of my arms and fixing me with
those searching eyes of his. “How’d you feel if any one stole her
out of your bosom, and ruined her, and cast her at your feet—a poor,
bleeding, crushed thing, ready to lie down and die? Wouldn’t you feel
like killing that man? I see it in your face. Well, that’s just how I
felt; we’re both alike, only that I’ve done it, and you haven’t come
to that yet.”

At the Office he quietly and calmly gave his name as Philip
Huddlestone, and when asked if he had any statement to make, he said—


“I’ve nothing to say but that I shot the man, and that I’m not
sorry I did it. I’m only a poor man, a journeyman painter by trade,
but I’ve my feelings the same as the richest. I’ve a daughter I
set my heart on, and though she was only a barmaid, you mustn’t
think she wasn’t good and pure. That man—him that I shot, and ain’t
sorry for—met her at the bar, and got talking to her about love and
nonsense, and kept telling her of his estate that he’d come into
when his father died, and of the money he had coming to him. Well,
the poor gal didn’t know no better, and made up to run away with him
to Paris. He was to marry her there, and I believe did go through
some affair of the kind to blind her eyes when he saw she was set on
coming back if he didn’t. But then the law ain’t strong enough there
to make it binding in England, and he knowd she was no more his wife
in this country than I am. Well, he kept her till he was tired of
her, and then bolted and left her. She got helped across the water,
and then came back to her poor old dad. I didn’t know my own gal—my
own flesh and blood. I think she’s dying, and I left her in safe
hands while I came up to Scotland to see her righted. She sent me to
do that, but she didn’t know I meant to do it with a pistol. I walked
most of the way, ’cause we’re very poor, and I’m not so able to work
as I used to be.”

That was the substance of the prisoner’s declaration, and, after
emitting the same, he was taken away and locked up, his wounded arm
being first properly dressed. But before a week had elapsed there
came a surprise for us all. The wounded man had so far recovered as
to be able to receive an account of the prisoner’s declaration, when
he expressed the most unbounded astonishment, and emphatically denied
all knowledge of the circumstances. That he spoke the truth few could
doubt, for it was ascertained beyond question that Stephen Barbour
had not been in Paris for more than a year. The complication seemed
so mysterious, and the statements of both men remained so emphatic,
that a messenger was despatched to the prisoner’s home, and that man
found the daughter as emphatic in her statements as her father, and
in the end brought her to Scotland to see the wounded man whom she
claimed as her lawful husband. This step proved a wise one, for on
the poor girl being introduced to the invalid, she at once cried out—

“That is not Stephen Barbour—he is like him, but older and fairer.”

This answer gave the old laird the first clue to the mystery. His
second son, a fast youth whom it was impossible to keep at home,
spent most of his time in London, and often got into good society by
passing himself off as the eldest son and heir. Thus he had been
introduced to the pretty barmaid, and by the name of Stephen he had
been married to her in Paris.

This, his latest piece of villainy, plunged the whole family into
grief, involving as it did not only the family honour, but almost
costing his innocent and beloved brother and another man their lives.

So enraged were his relatives that the case was given into the
hands of the police, and Adam Barbour, to his profound disgust and
surprise, was arrested in London, and tried and convicted of false
impersonation, for which he was sent for three months to prison.

Stephen Barbour made a good recovery, and was able at the trial of
Huddlestone to speak so feelingly and kindly of the prisoner, that
all—even the accused—were moved, and the sentence was the light one
of nine months’ imprisonment. The daughter Meg was cared for by the
Barbours, and ultimately, I believe, on the death of the man she
had married, received the second son’s portion, supplemented by a
handsome addition from Stephen Barbour. Her father rejoined her in
London at the expiry of his sentence; but either the excitement of
his journey to Scotland, or the prison life which followed it, had
been too much for his slender frame, and he scarcely saw the end of
the year.




A HOUSE-BREAKER’S WIFE.


Going down the Canongate one day I was accosted by a little
treacherous rascal known as Dirty Dick. I suppose he had followed
me down the street for the purpose of so addressing me, but at
the moment I did not think much of the circumstance. Dick was not
particularly dirty in his appearance or person, so it is possible he
had got the name rather for some dirty trick or act of treachery. He
had the distinction of being heartily despised by every one who knew
him, myself included.

After a little preliminary patter, to throw me off my guard, Dick
said—

“Bob Brettle has finished his time and got back here.”

That, then, was Dick’s business with me. Had he quarrelled with the
convict and ticket-of-leave man he named? I knew perfectly well that
the reckless Bob Brettle had returned, for he had duly reported
himself to us, as bound by his ticket-of-leave, but I thought proper
to say innocently in reply—

“Has he, really?”

“Yes,” continued Dick, with animation; “I’ve seen him often, and know
where he hangs out—Brierly’s, in the Grassmarket. Is a straight tip
of any use to you?”

I looked at the rascal, and if the imp had only had the sense of an
owl he would have seen how contemptuous was the glance. But it is
given to some natures to be perfectly unconscious of the loathing
they inspire, and Dick’s was one of these.

“I’ll tell you when I get it,” was my reply. I did not expect Dick
to give me any news or promp me to anything that was not likely to
benefit himself.

“Well, you’ll soon have Bob Brettle in your hands again,” said Dick,
button-holing me with an affectionate caress, which made my flesh
creep. “He’s planning something now. I don’t know what the job is,
but it’s something dashing and daring. If he was took at the same old
game, wouldn’t it be ten years this time?”

“What was his last term?” I asked, affecting ignorance.

“Seven.”

“Well, you don’t need to ask, knowing that,” I said, making Dick
uncomfortable with a steady stare.

“If you was to watch him well, and get me to help you, I believe
you’d be sure of nabbing him,” said the traitor temptingly.

“Oh, you’ve quarrelled with him, then?” I sharply returned.

“Not me!” he exclaimed with great fervour.

I set the answer down as a lie, but pursued—

“Well, you think to get money for the dirty work of betraying him?”

“Not a penny,” he vociferated, with a tremendous oath, “and there’ll
be no betraying about it. Only I thought you’d be always glad to hear
the news or get a tip. You helped me so much in that last fix that I
haven’t forgot it;” and the villain tried to put on a sentimental and
grateful look by way of drawing a red herring across my path.

I was not deceived, but Dick’s next words were lost to me. I was
thinking hard, and trying to account for Dick’s sudden zeal in the
cause of law and order. He did not want money—I was bound to believe
that at least;—could he have an old grudge at Brettle, or was this
freak of treachery only the result of a quarrel?

I could not see how it could be either, for Brettle was not the man
to associate much with a cur like Dick, but I resolved to make some
inquiries with a view to laying bare the informer’s motive.

Brettle was a man who, in spite of the fact that we were
professionally enemies, called out from within me a deal of
admiration and sympathy. He was a powerfully-built fellow, still
under thirty, and had once been handsome. He had not been born into a
life of crime, but had been a hard-working silversmith, led off his
feet and ruined by a pretty woman. The woman was really a beauty, but
with the figure and face of an angel she had the heart of a devil.

She was known as Pretty Polly, and Brettle conceived such a passion
for her that he actually married her. Brettle’s dash and daring
carried him on for a long time unscathed, but at length he was caught
and had a smart sentence. Pretty Polly supported herself as a barmaid
during the interval, but being detected in helping herself from the
till, she went into prison just as Bob came out. When her three
months were finished they got together again. Brettle had another
spell of good luck, till in a moment altogether unexpected by him he
was neatly trapped, and laid past for seven years. I had the taking
of him, but I was quite ignorant of the source of the information
upon which I had acted. There had been a traitor, but I did not
trouble to seek out the person, when the act brought grist to my mill.

Now, in surveying Dirty Dick’s shifty countenance, the thought came
to me for the first time—Could he, that insignificant looking wretch,
have been the betrayer of Brettle before his last conviction? I could
scarcely credit it, but if it was he, then the fact would point to
a long-standing grudge and a revengeful feeling not yet satiated.
Now, I had never given Dick credit for brain enough to conceive and
nourish a good hatred, and one does not care to discover a flaw in
his own estimate of another’s character.

After a little further conversation, from which I learned that it
was not yet settled how Brettle was to distinguish himself, I parted
with Dick, he kindly volunteering to “see me again” as soon as he had
important information to tender.

For a day or two after I could not be called idle. The foremost
question in my mind was—Why does Dirty Dick wish Brettle laid up
for ten years? and all my work was in the direction of a feasible
explanation or answer. I searched, and questioned, and ferreted in
every conceivable direction, but was only left more puzzled than
before. Dick, I found, had had no quarrel with Brettle, nor could I
discover that he had any grudge against the ticket-of-leave man. I
discovered also that it was absolutely impossible that Dick could
have been the cause of Brettle’s last capture, as at the time Dick
had himself been fulfilling a three months’ sentence for theft.

I happened one afternoon to meet Brettle himself, and, though he
generally showed great hostility to me, and never exchanged words
with me if he could avoid it, I thought I would have a word with him
in passing.

“How are you getting on Bob?” I pleasantly asked, before he could
hurry past.

“Not getting on at all,” he gloomily answered. “I’ve been trying to
get work, but can’t.”

I opened my eyes to their widest, and for a moment could scarcely
speak.

“What kind of work?” I cautiously inquired, thinking he might mean
his adopted trade of housebreaking.

“Any kind—anything to keep life in me,” he cried, with some
bitterness. “I’m sick of prison, and don’t mean to go inside of one
again if I can live on the square.”

I could scarcely trust my own senses. I had never expected such words
out of his mouth; and then, after the hint I had received from Dirty
Dick, I was doubly suspicious, and must have looked the feeling.
Could it be possible that he was trying to deceive me for some
purpose? I could not believe it. It was quite out of his line. He was
not of the stuff out of which a good hypocrite could be made.

“I’m glad to hear that you’ve come to your senses,” I dryly remarked.
“What has given you the notion?”

“I don’t know, but the spunk’s all gone out of me,” he dejectedly
answered. “I haven’t my wife now.”

“Oh, indeed! what has become of her?” I asked with fresh interest.

“Gone,” he said, with a sorrowful shake of the head and a quiver of
the lip.

“Gone where?”

“Gone dead, I’m afraid,” he huskily answered. “If she’d been alive
she would have met me whenever I got out. She worshipped the very
ground I trod on. I hear she went on the stage as a ballet-girl after
I was laid up, and that and the loss of me killed her, I suppose. We
had a bit of a tiff before I was took. I was so hanged jealous of
her—but that was nothing. The like of her doesn’t walk the earth.
True as steel, and she loved me so!”

I said nothing; for if I had spoken I should have had to say that if
the loss of Pretty Polly made him adopt an honest life, her absence
would be a blessing.

I chatted away for a little, and then said abruptly—

“What was your object in telling me you were going on the square?” I
thought perhaps that he might want assistance.

“What was your object in speaking to me?” he roughly and snappishly
returned. “I had no object at all. I know that the more thieves there
are the better it is for you.”

“You’re mistaken there, Bob, and I’ll prove it some day,” I answered
pleasantly, and then I left him.

My curiosity was roused regarding Brettle, and I took the trouble to
have him watched, when I discovered that he really was trying to get
work, and even undertaking the meanest drudgery to earn a living.
Everything was against him, of course, and he went back steadily till
his clothes would scarcely allow him to appear on the street.

In making these investigations I was continually contrasting
Brettle’s condition and evident inclinations with Dirty Dick’s
prophecy, that I should soon have the ticket-of-leave man in my
hands again, and with no success so far as a solution is concerned.
The promised “tip” had never come, and even Dick was a mystery to
me. I was at a loss to know whence came the money which Dick spent
so freely upon himself. He did not work; he was too cowardly to
engage in any act of plundering likely to produce much gain; and
yet he had abundance, while Brettle was in great want. Dick had
the reputation of being able to arrange a robbery very nicely, but
would never risk his own liberty in the affair, however tempting the
gain; but even knowing that to be a source of income to him, I was
at a loss to account for his seeming wealth. Thus it chanced that my
attention came to be more earnestly fixed upon Dick than upon the
man he had promised to betray into my hands. When I saw Dick moving
in a stealthy and cat-like way before me, one day when I was passing
along Princes Street, and knew that he was quite unconscious of my
presence, I was quickly roused to an interest in his movements. I
had not watched him long, when I thought the solution of the whole
mystery was in my hands. It seemed to me that Dick’s new line was
pocket-picking, and that he was following a likely plant—an elderly
gentleman and a lady—with the intention of exercising his new art.
After a time it dawned upon me that Dick’s cowardice was against him.
Several chances occurred which he did not attempt to make use of.
At length the gentleman went into one of the shops alone, and then,
to my surprise, the lady, who had remained standing at the window,
turned slightly, noticed Dick standing near, moved a little closer
to him, and addressed some words to him in a hurried and constrained
manner, which Dick as swiftly answered. The lady then took out her
purse, and, placing a coin in his hand, turned once more to look in
at the window, while Dick passed on with the crowd as if nothing had
happened. Now, had Dick been the first to speak, and had the lady’s
manner been different, I should have considered it an ordinary case
of begging, and had no scruple in following and taking Dick. But
as it was I could only wonder what connection such a haughty and
evidently wealthy person could have with a miserable coward like
him. Instead of following Dick I followed the lady as soon as she had
been rejoined by the white-haired gentleman, whom I took to be her
husband. From the side glimpse which I had of her face she seemed to
be quite young and very good-looking, though there was a nameless
something in the expression of her face which told me that she had
not always been in such a position. In order to get a better look
at her, I got past the couple on the opposite side of the street,
crossed over while they stood inspecting a window, and then, as
soon as they moved, sauntered slowly forward and met them full in
the face. Purposely I got directly in front of the lady, in seeming
forgetfulness, and, as she stopped in haughty surprise, I had a good
look into her eyes. Then I started and looked again, upon which her
glance fell before mine as surely as those of one of “my bairns” ever
did. In a moment more she was past, and I was left wondering. I was
puzzled and bewildered. The face seemed strangely familiar to me; I
could have sworn that I had known the owner of it long before, and
yet I could not tell her name or recall a single circumstance in her
history. I stood there cudgelling my brains till I had almost lost
sight of the couple who had so interested me; then, unable to make
a better of it, I roused myself and followed them for a full hour,
till they entered one of the biggest hotels in the city and remained
there. A waiter running out a moment or two after, on being stopped
by me, said that the couple were “Mr and Mrs Harper, from Glasgow,”
and that he understood that the gentleman was very wealthy. They
were in Edinburgh on a pleasure trip, and, so far as he knew, had no
children.

That was all I could get from the waiter, but the news did not banish
that beautiful face—so full of sweetness and innocence, if a certain
flash could have been taken from her fine eyes. That flash was the
only thing to turn the scales, and it did that most effectually. It
gave just such an expression to the whole face as I could imagine
Lucrezia Borgia to have owned.

Later in the day, when thinking of Brettle and his affairs, by some
queer turn of memory I recalled the name of Pretty Polly, and then
her sweet-looking features rose before me as vividly as if I had seen
them only the day before. But that was not all; for lo! as I looked,
the fine features became somewhat stouter and coarser, and rapidly
changed into those of Mrs Harper, whom I had that day followed along
Princes Street.

“How like they are to each other!” was my mental exclamation. “It
must have been that resemblance which puzzled me. But could they be
the same person? Never! Brettle says Pretty Polly is dead.”

This reasoning did not convince me, for there still remained the
curious fact that the haughty Mrs Harper had allowed her glance to
fall before my own in that fashion so suggestive to me of “auld
acquaintance.” Could Pretty Polly have had a sister who resembled
her? I thought not; for had not Brettle himself said, “The like of
her doesn’t walk the earth?” Besides, if she had a sister, and she in
such a good position, I could scarcely believe that the lady would be
so heartless as to allow her brother-in-law to almost perish of want
while she revelled in luxury.

I was waited for by Dick at a street corner on the afternoon of the
following day. When I saw him I was a little pleased, as I thought it
possible that I might get out of him all I wanted in regard to the
strange woman. But as Dick was full to the eyes with his own affairs,
I let him chatter about them first.

“I can give you the straight tip about Brettle at last,” he eagerly
began.

“Do you expect me to pay you for it?” I quietly interposed.

“No, no, not a penny.”

“You work for nothing, then—for the mere love of the thing?” I said,
with a palpable sneer.

“Just that,” he said, swallowing the insult smilingly. “Brettle is to
break into a shop in Leith Street to-night—Calderston’s, No.—. The
place above enters from the Terrace, and the key of that is sent home
every night by a drunken porter. Brettle will treat him on the way,
get the key from him, and work inside all night. Perhaps he will stay
there over the Sunday. He is to work the job single-handed, and take
the plunder out by the Terrace stair in different lots.”

“And who arranged all this for him?” I asked, nailing Dick’s shifty
glance with a steady stare.

“Oh, I don’t know—himself, I suppose,” he confusedly answered.

That was enough for me. I saw that Dick had arranged it all as a nice
trap for Brettle. What could be his object?

“Dick,” I said suddenly, after noting down all he had revealed,
“have you any idea what has become of Brettle’s wife, Pretty Polly?”

The start the man gave! and his face! I never thought that there was
such a blush in him.

“Dead, I think,” he guiltily stammered, after a horrible pause.

I thought not, and said so.

“She couldn’t be married again, to a richer man?” I suggestively
observed. “I understand she and Brettle were lawfully man and wife.”

Dick’s face was the picture of guilt and confusion. If the ground
could have swallowed him at that moment I imagine he would have been
thankful. I was reading all the answers to the questions which had
puzzled me for days in his tell-tale features.

“You have seen her lately, then?”

“No,” he faltered, while his face said “Yes,” and cursed me into the
bargain.

“And have you no idea where she could be found?”

“Not the least,” he said, with the lie almost choking him.

“Imphm! Well, that’s all I want with you just now,” I coldly
remarked, and with a dive he was gone.

I saw the whole plot now, and felt sure that that beautiful devil
of a woman was at the bottom of it all. But was I to allow that
miserable man—that well-meaning convict who had actually made an
effort towards a life of honesty—to walk into the shambles? No doubt
it would look like a feather in my cap to take him in the act and
walk him off for his certain ten years’ penal; every one would think
it neat and clever, and speak of the vigilance and sharpness of the
police, &c., but there would still be a voice within me crying out
against the whole as a crime—an offence against a law that never was
written. After giving the matter some thought, I went out to the
Grange to a gentleman with a big heart and unbounded faith in myself.

“I want you to give me some money,” I said, as his hand grasped my
own, “without asking any questions. It is to help a convict and
ticket-of-leave man till he shall be able to help himself.”

“All right, Mr M^cGovan; you shall have it,” was the frank response.
“Just say how much it is to be.”

I named the sum, and it was placed in my hands. Little more was said,
and I left that wide-souled and big-hearted man to have a hunt for
Bob Brettle. I expected to find him quite easily, but I did not; and
what gave me more concern was to learn in the course of my search
that Bob had broken out—that is, had been drinking hard, and was,
when last seen, in a state of savage ferocity and excitement, which,
I feared, would not help me greatly in my mission. Still it was no
time to delay. I must see him then, or be forced to take him as a
house-breaker a few hours later. I persevered till I found him in a
public-house—savage and fierce as could be. He would scarcely answer
me, and only consented to speak with me alone when I told him he
_must_.

“You’ve had a struggle lately, and I promised to prove that I had no
interest in you remaining in the old line,” I quietly began. “I’ve
brought you some money which a gentleman has given, on my assurance
that it would not be thrown away, to help you till you get work.”

“Take it back to him then—I don’t need it now,” he angrily returned.
“I’ve got work, or at least expect to get it.”

“Yes, I can guess what kind of work you mean,” I pointedly answered.
“Do you know what your next sentence will be, Bob, if you’re taken at
the old game?”

“I’m not taken yet,” he confidently answered, with an oath and a
thundering blow of his fist on the little table of the box in which
we were secluded. “He’ll be a clever man that will take me; ay, and
he’ll need to be a strong man too!”

“Bob Brettle!” I cried, starting up and leaning across the table
towards him, “you’re a fool!”

“What!” and his big fist was clenched as if to let drive at my face.

“A fool—a perfect baby—a blind idiot, who would walk into a trap
chuckling all the while over his own cleverness and daring. Man
alive! what is all your bravery or daring against the wiles of a
wicked woman?”

“A woman! what woman?” he faltered, apparently pulled up by my very
abuse.

“Why, the woman you call your wife—Pretty Polly—who is now in this
city with a wealthy man to whom she is married. Her name is Mrs
Harper now, and I suppose she feared that your claims on her might
be awkward, and so employed Dirty Dick to prepare a job for you—that
Leith Street affair which you mean to go to as soon as you leave this
place, and at which I am to take you in the act, so that you may be
booked for ten years at least. Now, smash out at me now, and say I’ve
an interest in keeping you on the cross!”

“My wife—Pretty Polly—living and married to another man!” he
breathed, with a look positively frightful settling on his heavy
features. “I—don’t—believe—a—word—of—it!”

I folded my arms and said nothing. The idea was a new one to him; I
would let it work. I had not long to wait. I could see the workings
of the demon Jealousy in his face, in his twitching lips and flushed
cheeks, in his clouded brow and clenched hands.

“You’ve got a name for telling the truth,” he at last hoarsely
observed, with a look of piteous agony on his haggard face, “but I
must see the woman before I believe it. Tell me where she lives, or
take me to her. The she-devil! Oh, if it’s only true!”

“Rest content with my word. I shall not give you her address—at least
not now. It wouldn’t be safe. When you are sober and calm you shall
have it.”

“I am sober,” he quickly returned; and he seemed to speak the truth,
for every trace of drink had vanished like a flash, “and I am calm—as
death. Give me her address!”

I refused most positively, and at length he rose, deliberately put on
his cap, and quietly walked out of the shop with the simple remark
that he would see me again. I knew enough of Brettle’s character to
warn me that the sooner Pretty Polly was got out of his reach the
better it would be for her.

I therefore hurried over to the hotel, and learned that she and
her husband had gone out about six o’clock, and not yet returned.
I sat down to wait for them, little guessing that I was to remain
there till nearly eleven o’clock, they being at the theatre, as
I afterwards learned. While I was thus waiting at the hotel, Bob
Brettle had taken action in a style characteristic of him and his
passionate nature. He hunted through all the dens till he came
upon Dirty Dick singing songs in a half-gleeful and half-fuddled
condition. Dick remained gleeful not one moment after he saw
Brettle’s face. The house-breaker invited him out to the darkness
of the stair-head, and there brought out a long-bladed clasp-knife,
at the same moment throttling Dick with his left hand, and forcing
him down on his knees. There, with the point of the knife at Dick’s
heart, he dragged out of the quaking wretch a full and abject
confession of the plot, and also of the name of the hotel at which
Pretty Polly and her wealthy husband had put up. When Dick had
finished, Bob simply swung round his powerful left hand, and in a
moment Dick lay groaning on the landing below with a broken leg
and fractured rib. Paying no attention to the injured wretch or his
cries, Brettle ran down the stair and made for the hotel.

A waiter at the portico told him that the Harpers were not in, but
were expected shortly. Brettle stood sentry there at the door or near
it for a full half hour, and at length was rewarded by seeing a cab
drive up, and a gentleman get out and hand forth a sweet-faced and
elegantly dressed lady—the veritable Pretty Polly.

With a bound like that of a tiger Brettle was upon her, and had
her taper wrist clenched in his hand, and her face swung round to
the light of the street lamps with a force that almost crushed the
delicate bones.

“You jewelled serpent!” he hissed, “you would sell me to the
shambles! Look at me, you beautiful devil, and say, if you can, that
it is not true!”

A shriek—appalling enough to reach my ears above, and bring me
rushing down—was Pretty Polly’s only answer.

Her husband, however, laid a hand on Brettle’s shoulder—

“How dare you, sir? Who are you?”

“Her husband!” shouted the infuriated house-breaker; and at the same
moment there was the flash of a knife and an agonising cry from the
wounded woman, and a rush upon the assailant from all sides. I was
among the number, and Brettle recognised me with a quiet nod.

“I’m not going to struggle or bolt,” he quietly observed, as Pretty
Polly was lifted from the pavement and borne insensible into the
hotel, with the blood gushing from a deep wound in her breast. “I’m
satisfied now. I have paid her off. I’ve taken it out of her, and she
was the only woman I ever loved!”

Bob’s grief, however, seemed quiet and tame compared with that of
Polly’s second husband, upon whom the revelation came with a shock
which nearly proved fatal. Mr Harper quietly slipped away out of
Edinburgh without once asking to look on the face of the woman who
had deceived him. Brettle went to prison, of course, and Pretty
Polly, as soon as she could be moved, was sent to the Infirmary.
She lingered long, but did not die. In about six months she was
pronounced able to leave the hospital. She appeared as witness
against Brettle, and helped to fix a year’s imprisonment on him, and
then she drifted out to a life of hardship and degradation which
ended her before Brettle’s sentence had expired. Brettle heard the
news unmoved when he was liberated, and then disappeared. I have
never heard of him since.




M^cSWEENY AND THE CHIMNEY-SWEEP.


The things were missed from one of the rooms in a house in George
Square not many hours after the sweeps had been there, and of
course suspicion at once fell upon these men. Who ever trusted a
chimney-sweep the length of his own nose? The blackness of their
faces is supposed to be nothing to that of their souls, and what was
the old and popular portrait of the devil but a chimney-sweep with a
tail tacked on? There were three articles taken—a gold bracelet, a
very valuable necklet and pendant, and one gold ear-ring.

The leaving behind of one of the ear-rings gave the robbery an odd
look, for the whole of the things had been taken from the drawer or
a dressing-table, and the ear-ring left was the first article which
caught the eye of the owner when she opened the drawer.

Either the thief had wanted only one ear-ring, or had been scared
in grasping at the plunder, and so left the odd trinket. The drawer
had been locked, but the key had been left in the lock, and must
have been made use of by the thief both to open and refasten that
receptacle. Mrs Nolten, the lady of the house, was the first to make
the discovery, and, not knowing that the sweeps had been in the
house, fancied that one of the servants might have taken the use of
the jewels.

A furious ring at the bell brought the two girls up in great
consternation, and then the truth was known. Neither of them had
been near the drawer of the dressing-table, and one of them, while
admitting that the sweeps had been there, declared that she had “kept
her eye on them” all the time, and so could scarcely conceive it
possible for them to be the thieves.

Mrs Nolten paid no heed to the remark, but wisely sent word to us in
all haste. When the report arrived it was about eleven o’clock in the
forenoon, and I was on the point of starting off to look after a much
more important case. However, as I had to go southwards, I decided to
take George Square on the way, and then let M^cSweeny do the rest.
We soon got to the house, and were shown into the dressing-room from
which the articles had vanished.

The two servants were brought up, and from one of them I learned that
the sweeps had been simply a man and a boy. They had both been in the
room for a little, and after the man had helped to lift out the grate
and fasten up a blanket in the fire-place, he had gone up on the
roof to complete the work, leaving the boy in the room alone. They
believed that the boy was the sweep’s own son. I examined the carpet
in front of the dressing-table. It showed no marks of sooty feet. I
then looked at the drawer in which the articles had been secured, and
finally took the key from the lock and smelt it. There was a distinct
smell of soot about it, but then the whole room had a flavour of the
kind just then, and the smell on the key might mean nothing. After
taking down a minute description of the articles missing, and getting
the sweep’s address, we left the house, and I directed M^cSweeny to
go to the chimney-sweep and see what he could make of the case. We
then parted, with the understanding that I also was to call at the
sweep’s on my return. The man’s name was Sandy Brimely, and his place
only a couple of streets from the spot.

It was a dark dingy hole below the level of the street, and consisted
of three rooms or cellars, lighted through gratings on the pavement.
One place was used as a kitchen and sleeping-place, another smaller
place was also used as a bedroom, and the third hole was used as a
store-room for soot. This third place was in reality part of the
first, but had been divided off by the wooden partition which kept
the soot from sliding all over their living room.

Sandy was standing at the head of the stair leading down to this
sooty abode when M^cSweeny arrived. His work was generally over by
that time, except when a godsend came in shape of a chimney afire,
and Sandy leant against the wall enjoying his pipe as peacefully
as if there had been no such beings as detectives in the world. He
was a sly, oily tongued fellow, but so far as I know had never been
convicted of any worse crime than beating his wife, or occasionally
taking more whisky than he could carry unassisted.

After a little preliminary blarney on both sides, during which it
appeared that Sandy knew both M^cSweeny’s face and his profession, my
chum considerably startled him by saying abruptly—

“You were at Mrs Nolten’s, in George Square, this morning?”

The sweep took the pipe from his mouth, with his pleased look
effectually banished. If he had not been so sooty he might have been
said to turn pale, so constrained and almost scared did he become.

“Let me see. Yes—yes, I was there,” he awkwardly answered. “I was
there doing two vents.”

“Did you take anything away wid ye?” said M^cSweeny, pointedly.

He expected the man, if guilty, to show signs of concern or
confusion; but, if anything, the sweep looked brighter after the
question.

“Away with me?” he echoed, to gain time for the answer. “Of course I
did. I took the soot.”

“Nothing else?” suspiciously pursued M^cSweeny.

“Nothing else, sir, as I’m a living man,” energetically returned
Sandy. “I hope you don’t think I would touch an article belonging to
any one else?”

The question was a delicate one, and M^cSweeny did not attempt an
answer, further than to state that some things had been missed, and
that he was there in his official capacity to investigate the case,
and try to find the articles missing.

Sandy allowed him to talk on, drinking it all in and becoming
brighter and more beaming at every word.

“I hope you’ll search every hole and corner in my place, sir,” he
fervently exclaimed, when M^cSweeny had done. “I want my character
cleared, and my honesty established. What,” he added grandly, “what
is dearer to a poor man than his good name? and what would become of
my business if folks took me for a thief? I insist on you searching
my place—never mind about a warrant, or anything else—my honour is at
stake, and I must have it done at once.”

He led the way downstairs to his abode, in which M^cSweeny found
quite a crowd of small sooty children scrambling about the earthen
floor in noisy glee. These were all sent outside, and then Sandy
explained to his wife with much warmth the absurd suspicion which had
been raised against his character.

“I see it all now! I see it all now!” he suddenly exclaimed, smiting
his sooty brow with tragic force. “Could anybody believe they would
be so cunning?”

M^cSweeny hinted that an explanation would be acceptable.

“Why, don’t you see, sir—the servants—the servants; they’re at the
bottom of this. They’ve taken the chance while we were there to steal
the things, knowing the blame would fall on me. You’ve no idea,” he
continued, waxing pathetic, “what sweeps have to put up with. There’s
scarcely a house we go into that we’re not watched like glaziers on
tramp. You can see it in their eyes. It’s hard to be looked at like a
thief when you’re doing your best to earn an honest living.”

“Are you quite sure now that the boy you had with you mightn’t help
himself if he got a dacent chance?” suggested M^cSweeny, by way of
appearing to sympathise with the sweep.

“Him? Why, he’s my own son!” exclaimed the sweep, as if that quite
settled the matter. “But he’s just out in the square there playing at
the bools. I’ll send for him, and you can question him yourself.”

This was done, and the sooty apprentice appeared, and denied all
knowledge of the missing articles.

M^cSweeny, on the invitation of the father, somewhat gingerly
searched the sooty clothes of the boy, but found nothing. He then
performed the same office upon the father, with a like result. The
wife also turned out her pockets for inspection, and then M^cSweeny
settled himself to the not very agreeable task of searching the
house. The furniture was poor and scanty, and the floor an earthen
one, so there was no great difficulty in the task. But there was soot
everywhere. It was on the floor, on the shelves, in the very beds,
and so pervaded the whole atmosphere of the house that M^cSweeny had
soon drawn such a quantity into his nostrils that he would willingly
have paid half-a-crown down for the pleasure of sneezing his own head
off. He went gaping, and blinking, and sputtering over the place till
he had searched every part but the soot cellar. Before that he paused
ruefully. I firmly believe he would have shirked searching that
altogether, and that the resolve was showing itself in his face, when
the cunning sweep affected to make a suspicious movement or two with
his hands near the partition, as if in the act of dropping something
into the soot.

“What’s that you’re after now?” cried M^cSweeny, starting round
sharply and dragging forth the sweep’s hand.

“Nothing—oh, nothing, sir,” was the glib reply; “I was only feeling
how high the soot is.”

M^cSweeny suspiciously lifted a candle, held it over the partition
and peered down into the soot-bin at the spot, but could see nothing
to indicate that any article had been dropped. This partition was
about two feet and a half high and immediately behind it the soot was
fully a foot deep, sloping up thence to the back wall to a height of
about three feet. Against that wall several sacks of soot were piled,
and resting on one of these sacks was the end of a spar of wood which
reached across the soot to the wooden partition, upon which the other
end rested. This plank was evidently used as a standing-place from
which they could conveniently empty their soot-bag after a morning’s
work. M^cSweeny thought it possible that there might be a hide of
some kind behind these soot bags, and, candle in hand, clambered up
on the partition and thence on to the spar bridging the soot. As he
stepped across the frail bridge he had to turn his back for a moment
to the innocent-looking sweep, and knew no more until he had dived
down nose foremost into the sea of soot.

He always declared that the sweep had shoved the end of the plank
from the partition; but when he scrambled to his feet among the
soot, sputtering, gasping, and sneezing enough to rend himself,
there was Sandy standing gravely by him with a look of earnest and
sorrowing condolence on his grimy face. The wife went into fits
of laughter over M^cSweeny’s appearance as he stood in the soot,
with his face and beard thickly coated with the soft black, and
only his well-rubbed eyelids beginning to show white through the
sable covering, but she was solemnly rebuked and sworn at by her
demure-faced husband.

“Eh, sir, to think that the plank should have slippit just when it
wasna wanted to slip,” cried Sandy, handing M^cSweeny a sooty rag
with which to clean his face and clothes; “but it’ll dae ye nae herm,
sir, nae herm. Soot’s a healthy thing, sir—healthier than clean
water.”

“You—you—ah—ah——choof!—you did that!” cried M^cSweeny, as soon as he
could speak, ferociously fixing Sandy with his eye. “You’ll suffer
for—ah—ah——choo—oof! Begorra, I’ve a good moind to stick your head in
it, and make you swallow a bag of it before I let you out.”

“Me, sir!” cried Sandy, in pious horror. “May I never soop another
lum if I ever thought o’ sic a thing. See, I’ll gie ye a brush doon,
sir. It’s a kind o’ a pity ye had thae licht-coloured troosers on,
but they’ll clean at the dyer’s, and never look a whit the waur.”

“Don’t thrubble yourself to brush me, for I’m not done wid the hole
yet,” savagely responded M^cSweeny; “but for this I’d have let you
off aisy, but now, sweet bad luck to you! I’m as black as I can be,
and I’ll see to the bottom of this before I stir.”

M^cSweeny at the same moment seized a big shovel which he found in
one corner of the soot-bin, and deliberately began to spade out the
soot into the middle of the kitchen floor, carefully examining every
shovelful before he pitched it over the partition. While he was thus
engaged bending over a spadeful of the soot, Sandy managed to make
a sign to his wife, who stooped to the floor, picked something up,
and threw it over into the heap of soot rising in the middle of her
kitchen.

M^cSweeny was just conscious of some swift movement having taken
place, but saw neither the movement nor the direction of the pitch.

“What divil’s game are you two up to now?” he suspiciously growled,
looking from one to the other. “I’ll have to take yez both. You
throw’d something just now—what was it?”

The sweep and his wife raised their hands as if horrified at the
accusation, and solemnly declared that M^cSweeny’s imagination had
deceived him; that they had nothing to throw, and they would as soon
attempt to fly in the air as to try to deceive such a world-renowned
and keen-sighted detective as he. M^cSweeny, still suspicious, came
out of the soot-bin and searched about for a little, but found
nothing; and then, after a deal of snorting and swearing, went back
to his work, and soon had all the loose soot out in the kitchen.
There remained then only the sacks at the back to be removed, and
M^cSweeny was diligently setting his brawny arms and shoulders to
them when I descended the stair and stood before them. I stood
transfixed with astonishment at the strange scene, till a familiar
grin from the demon of darkness at work in the soot-bin made me look
at him more closely, and then I faintly recognised my chum.

“Good heavens! what does all this mean?” I exclaimed, after a hearty
laugh at M^cSweeny’s solemn face and the eloquent burst of abuse
which he heaped upon the sweep and his wife.

“It means,” he responded, making a virtue of a necessity, “that I’m
not afraid to do my duty properly, even though I do get a little
black by it, and spoil a good suit of clothes into the bargain.
Jamie, avick, I’ve found nothing, but we may take them both on
suspicion, for a pair of bigger blackguards never walked the streets
unhung.”

It seemed to me that had the sweep been an innocent and honest man,
he would have resented this language hotly. He did not. He was all
smoothness and politeness still, and officiously offered to help me
in any way. What I liked worse was to observe that he was also all
cheerfulness. There was even a twinkle of gloating and delight in
the corners of his demurely drawn eyes over M^cSweeny’s grinning
and discomfiture, or possibly over the consciousness that he was
perfectly safe. Now, I had never believed that we should find the
missing articles in that sooty den, and had hinted as much to
M^cSweeny. Supposing the sweep to have nerve and effrontery enough to
commit such a robbery, he would have been an arrant fool to have kept
the stolen trinkets about his house. After a look round the place
myself, and a short conversation in an undertone with M^cSweeny, I
decided that we might go, and trust to tracing the missing articles
elsewhere. But there was the sweep’s kitchen in a dreadful state of
confusion, with a great pile of soot filling the centre of the floor;
it would never do to leave the poor man’s house in that state, and I
promptly said so.

“Oh, that’s naething, sir—I’ll put back the soot mysel’,” smoothly
and graciously answered the sweep. “Dinna disturb yoursel’, sir; I’ll
see ye up that stair, for it’s very dark and narrow. This way, sir;
this way.”

He quickly made for the stair, but I paused before following, and
exchanged a look of inquiry with M^cSweeny. The wife, squatted by the
fire with a pipe in her mouth, watched us furtively out of the corner
of her eye. That sly, cautious glance decided me. The sweep had shown
a trifle too much alacrity in wishing to bid us good-bye and see us
out. I stood still and conversed in a low tone with M^cSweeny. The
sweep looked back from the doorway somewhat anxiously.

“We’re not quite ready yet,” I quietly said; “we must put things
as we got them.” Then I added with apparent coolness to M^cSweeny,
“Shovel it back _carefully_.”

The face of the sweep, sooty though it was, showed a visible and
concerned change as I spoke, and I felt that I had scored a point.

“I’ll help you, sir; I’ve another shovel here,” he cried with
alacrity after the first stagger, pouncing on a shovel and
approaching the soot heap.

“Thank you—no,” I coldly and sternly returned, pointing to a seat by
the fire; “sit there till I tell you to rise.”

He sat down, or rather flopped down, with an attempt at a gracious
grin, and, taking the pipe from his wife, began puffing fiercely,
watching us anxiously all the while. M^cSweeny slowly and
deliberately shovelled up the soot in small quantities, according
to my directions, narrowly inspecting it as it was returned to the
bin, and before the half of the soot had been so lifted he paused to
inspect a soot-covered object which had got into one of these small
shovelfuls. I was at his side in a moment; and as the glitter of
metal caught my eye I glanced towards the sweep and saw that he was
painfully anxious to look indifferent. The object, when cleared of
soot, proved to be a small handle of gilt brass, fastened to a flat
piece of ivory, on which was some neat carving. The four eyes at the
fireside were goggling, like distended telescopes, at us as we stood
clearing the strange object of soot.

“What’s this?” I sharply demanded of the sweep.

“That, sir?” and he took a stride or two forward to look at the
fragment. “I’m sure I dinna ken; it’s a thing ane o’ the bairns found
oot on the street and brought in to play wi’.”

Sandy’s face said “lie” all over in spite of the soot as he made
the hurried answer, and I said nothing. Every thief has “found”
these things, or had them given him, or innocently brought into his
house by some third person not conveniently at hand. After a close
inspection of the fragment I was inclined to think that it had formed
part of the lid of an ivory box or casket. No such article was in our
list so far as I could remember; but the expression of the sweep’s
face and his general manner induced me to say that I would take the
fragment with me.

“Certainly, sir, certainly; it’s of nae value to me,” cried Sandy
with forced alacrity. “Will I wrap it in a bit paper for ye?”

I declined the officious offer, put the fragment in my pocket, and
shortly after took leave with M^cSweeny, who made a dive at once
for the baths in Nicolson Square. A wash in water and a brush at
the fragment seemed to confirm my suspicion. The ivory appeared to
be fine, and was prettily carved, and it seemed to have been rudely
smashed. I took the piece to a dealer in such articles, and he not
only confirmed me in my suspicion, but showed me a complete casket
of the same style of workmanship. It was a small thing, about six
inches long by four broad, and might be used, the dealer said, for
holding either jewels or money. They were very expensive, and but
few were sold. This last bit of information I found to be correct,
for after going over all the dealers in such articles in Edinburgh I
could not find one who had sold a casket answering the description of
the fragment I had found. I wished to find the owner for a particular
reason. In examining the ivory one day it struck me that it had a
smoked appearance—a kind of dingy hue which could never have been
imparted by simply lying among soot. How could it have got that
tinge? Not by being thrown into the fire, for there was not a burn
on the whole fragment. Could Sandy have hung it up his own chimney
like a red herring or a ham to give it that colour, or had it been
so tinged when it came into his possession? The chimney in Sandy’s
house had been the place which we searched most rigorously, so I was
tolerably certain that he had no other interesting herrings there
in pickle. I thought the owner of the bit of ivory and brass might
help me to an answer, and at length decided to advertise for him.
“An Ivory Casket, Carved,” was notified in the newspapers as having
been found, and the owner was requested to call without delay upon
me. The day that this advertisement appeared, Sandy called at Mrs
Nolten’s house in George Square, and asked permission to go up on the
roof to get a rope which he believed he had left there on his last
visit. The request was put before the lady of the house, and promptly
refused. Sandy then went to the next house and made the same request,
and received as prompt a refusal. After the second appearance of the
advertisement, a gentleman named Dundas called, and requested to see
the “Ivory Casket.” There was a strange reserve about him, which I
only understood when in confidence he imparted to me the suspicion
that his own son had been the robber, at the same time emphatically
stating that he was firmly resolved not to give in any charge against
the runaway. On being shown the fragment, he identified it as part
of the lid of an ivory casket stolen from his house, and containing
at that time nearly £10 in gold and silver. The casket had not
been missed till after the flight of his son, who had left a good
situation and gone to London with the craze strong upon him to be an
actor. I found, however, that Mr Dundas had a distinct recollection
of employing Sandy to sweep his chimneys about that time, and as six
months had since elapsed, Sandy had been there on the same errand but
a month or two ago. On calling the gentleman’s attention to the smoky
appearance of the ivory, he declared that it had not been so tinged
when in his possession, and spontaneously remarked—

“It must have been hanging in some chimney.”

In a chimney certainly, but what chimney? whose chimney? I revolved
the matter in my mind, and at length concluded that Sandy would never
have been foolhardy enough to conceal anything in his own chimney.
And yet there was pretty palpable evidence that the stolen article
had been in _a_ chimney.

After half a day’s cogitation, an idea struck me which gave such a
feasible explanation of the thing that my only wonder is that it did
not occur to me earlier. Sandy, if he wanted a chimney as a hide,
was not limited in his choice to one or twenty. He visited some at
regular intervals, and was in these cases the only man employed. What
was to hinder him from using them boldly as establishments of his
own? depots for goods which he could not conveniently store at home?
I began to wonder how I could get hold of a list of these houses that
I might inspect the chimneys. In sweeping a chimney it was often
necessary for Sandy to lift out the grate, when it was what is known
as a “Register,” and it seemed to me that in doing so he could easily
make use of the space behind as a hide when the grate was put back;
but in making this guess it will be found that I gave Sandy credit
for less ingenuity than he possessed. While Mr Dundas was diligently
hunting for the address of his runaway son, that he might fairly ask
him if he had been the thief of the casket and its contents, I was
ferreting out the most prominent of Sandy’s customers. In making
the round of these it is singular, but true, that I never thought
of calling at Mrs Nolten’s, and when I did find myself there, it
was more by accident than from choice. Being on the spot one day, I
thought I would go in and have the register grate lifted out; but
when this had been done in presence of the lady and myself, and
nothing found, Mrs Nolten recalled the recent visit of Sandy, and
detailed to me the circumstances. I immediately conceived a strong
desire to go up on the roof and have a look for that “rope which he
thought he had left.” I did not look about the slates or rhone pipes,
but went straight to the chimneys, though I confess I was at a loss
to understand how anything could be safely concealed in them. After
going over all the chimney-cans, I came to one inside which, just at
the bottom where the can was embedded in mortar to secure it to the
stones, I saw sticking a common three-inch nail.

It was all but hidden with soot, but enough was left bare to show
that it had attached to it a bit of twine, which hung down inside
the chimney proper. I grasped at the nail, easily pulled it out, and
drew up with it the bit of twine. Something dangled at the end of the
twine, which proved to be a paper parcel not very neatly tied up. I
felt the contents of the parcel through the paper, and smiled out
broadly.

“What a dunce I was not to think of this sooner!” was my comment upon
myself.

I distinctly felt the shape of a bracelet through the paper, and did
not trouble to open the parcel till I should get down into the house.
I went down, and Mrs Nolten, seeing me smile and the parcel in my
hand attached to the sooty string, instantly grasped at the truth.

“You’ve found them in my own chimney?”

A woman’s instincts seldom mislead her. The lady was right. I opened
the paper parcel, and there, snugly reposing within, and not a whit
the worse of the smoking, were the bracelet, the necklet, and the
odd gold ear-ring. I left the house at once, taking the interesting
parcel with me, and in a minute or two stood before Sandy in his own
home.

“It’s a fine day, sir,” he graciously began.

“It is—a very fine day,” I returned, with emphasis. “Do you remember
that bit of ivory, Sandy, with the brass handle attached, which we
found here?”

Sandy found his memory conveniently defective.

“I had quite forgot aboot it, sir,” he said awkwardly, when I had
refreshed his powers a little.

“Well, I’ve discovered the gentleman who owns it, and strangely
enough he declares that _you_ were in his house sweeping some
chimneys the day before it went amissing.”

Sandy’s sooty face was a curious study, but he wisely made no audible
reply.

“Don’t say anything unless you like, but did you ever see this parcel
before?” I gently pursued, as I brought out the parcel and showed
him its contents. “Nothing to say?—very good. Just put on your coat
and cap and we’ll go, then. I’m only sorry,” I added, as I put a
handcuff on his wrist, and retained the other end in my hand, “that
I haven’t a pair of these with a longer chain between the bracelets,
for I never come close to you, Sandy, without sneezing for half a day
after.”

Sandy grinned a feeble and ghastly assent, and then went with me
without a word. We could easily have proved both robberies against
him, but he decided to make the best of his position by pleading
guilty, and so got off with three months imprisonment.




THE FAMILY BIBLE.


To men of business or wealth, accustomed to handle large sums of
money, bank-notes for large sums—such as £50 or £100—suggest nothing
but convenience of handling and counting. With those who never owned
£50 in their lives it is very different. The sum represented seems
fabulously great—a fortune in itself. And then the thing is so
small—a little oblong square of paper—so compressible—so thin—that
the second stage—that of temptation—easily follows. Fifty or a
hundred pounds in gold would be a good weight to carry, and a sum
difficult to conceal; but a slip of paper! how many cunning and
impenetrable places of hiding could be devised in a few minutes for
that?

I have to give here the adventures of three £50 bank-notes. These
notes had been paid to Mr George Lockyer, a builder, who dabbled a
little in money lending, by a friend in quittance of a bond on some
property. The payer of the money was but a working man, else the
transaction would probably have been settled with a cheque; and the
fact that this man was in working clothes had an important bearing
upon the whole case, apart from the absence of a cheque altogether.
The money had been drawn from the bank, but neither the teller who
paid over the notes nor the receiver of them thought of noting the
numbers.

Mr Lockyer, however, though anything but a careful or methodical man
in regard to money, chanced to notice the number of the top note,
from the fact that it was formed of two twenties, thus—“2020.”

The notes were scarcely opened out—they were quickly counted—the
necessary papers handed over to the payee, and the whole transaction,
and some friendly conversation as well, was all over in about fifteen
minutes.

When the payee was gone, Mr Lockyer lifted the lid of his desk, and
carelessly placed the notes, folded in three, on the top of some
papers, intending to take them out in a short time, and bank them
on his way home to dinner. He did not take them out or bank them—he
forgot all about them. About half an hour later he left the little
office, locking the door after him, and taking the key with him.

This little office was part of a small erection attached to the
building yard. That part which Mr Lockyer used as an office was not
above ten feet square. It was fitted up with two desks, as at times
the builder employed a clerk, but at that time was entered by no one
but himself, or any callers he might have to receive while there.

The remainder of the erection was used as a kind of tool-house, and
was fitted all round with shelves. This apartment entered from the
building yard, and at one time the door between the two places had
been open, but now it was not only closed and locked, but crossed on
the tool-house side by the shelves aforesaid. This door had not been
open for years, and the builder had not even a key for the lock. The
other door, and that now in use, entered from the street, close to
the gate of the yard.

Mr Lockyer remained away from his office during the whole afternoon,
the reason being that he found some friends waiting him, and had no
particular press of business to call him away. Late in the evening,
however, he remembered suddenly of the three £50 notes left so
carelessly in his desk at the office, and started up and whispered to
his wife that he would have to go out on business for half an hour.

“I have left some money in the place which should have been in the
bank or here,” was his explanation, “and I must go and get it,
for the place is a mere shed;” and as the word “money” rouses the
strongest instincts of some wives, he was suffered to depart in peace.

He reached his office in ten minutes, and found it to all appearance
exactly as he left it. It was then quite dark, but he was so sure
of the spot on which he had placed the three notes that he did not
trouble to strike a light, but merely raised the lid of the desk and
groped for the notes. His fingers did not touch the soft, greasy
papers, but the harder and smoother pile of accounts which had been
beneath them. He groped and groped; he struck a light—first only a
match, then the gas—but in vain. The three bank-notes were gone.

“Did I leave them here? Did I not put them in my pocket?” was his
first wild thought, followed by a hurried groping and searching for
his pocket-book.

The notes were not there. Then he distinctly remembered placing them
in the desk, and the fact that he had never removed them. He searched
the whole desk, turned out every scrap of paper and article that it
contained, carefully examined the room from floor to ceiling, turned
over everything in the other desk, and finally sat down with his
hands in his pockets, thoroughly baffled and puzzled. He had locked
the notes in that small apartment; the key had never been out of his
pocket, yet, on returning a few hours later, he found that they had
vanished.

The builder glared about him in a state of great excitement,
imprecating under his breath, and heartily abusing himself for his
carelessness, though he had done the same often before with impunity.
While he sat thus vainly seeking a solution his eye fell upon the
disused door. There was no key to it that he knew of, and the outer
door of the tool-house, entering from the yard, he felt sure was
locked. Still there was a possibility of entrance in that direction,
and that fact set the builder a-thinking. But one man had the entry
of that tool-house—a disabled mason, named John Morley, whom out of
charity he kept employed about the yard. Morley had injured himself
permanently by lifting a heavy weight, and could do little but
look after the things in the yard, and give them out as they were
wanted by the men. Mr Lockyer had known him nearly all his life, and
had never found him to do a dishonest action. Yet still the fact
remained that there was a man, very poorly paid—his wage was 12s. a
week—having a wife and two bairns to keep, and with a possible means
of access to the missing money. Might the money not have been taken
in a moment of strong temptation even by a man like John Morley,
reputed sterling and honest?

“If he has taken it, I can hardly blame him,” was the generous
reflection of the builder. “They have a sair struggle to make ends
meet, I’ve no doubt; and I was a fool to leave the money lying about.
But I never knew him to have a key for that door, and how could he
possibly knew that the money was there, even if he had a key? I had
better act cautiously, as much for my own sake as for his and his
family’s. I must say nothing to the police or any one till I see John
himself.”

Mr Lockyer had been kind to his yard-keeper; he had all but supported
the man and his family during Morley’s illness; then he had devised
how he could employ him at some nominal task by way of making the
man feel less dependent; and lastly, he had promised to assist him
and his family to join a brother abroad who was in a more flourishing
condition and had promised him work suited to his bodily strength.
The builder, therefore, could scarcely believe that the man he had
so helped and shielded could return the kindness by robbing him of
£150; and he locked up his office and turned in the direction of
the yard-keeper’s home, resolved to be as guarded in his words as
possible, so as not to hurt the man’s feelings. Mr Lockyer was a man
who had risen—a bluff, hearty, generous-hearted fellow—and had always
a lenient hand for a working man in difficulties.

Morley’s home was a cellar in Buccleuch Street—a dingy, damp hovel,
lighted by a grating under a shop window. The place was not far from
the yard, and therefore was speedily reached by the builder. Morley
was at home, smoking by the fire, and the bairns were playing in a
corner. The wife was out washing, as she often was, in order to eke
out their income.

Morley looked a good deal surprised at the visit, and scarcely asked
his employer to enter. Mr Lockyer, however, walked in and seated
himself, and, after a few preliminary words, said abruptly—

“John, was there anybody about the yard this afternoon?”

How Morley looked it is impossible to say, for the light was only
that of the fire, and his back was towards it.

“No, sir,” he answered very readily.

“Nor in the tool-house?” continued his employer.

“No; it’s been lockit a’ day,” said Morley, decidedly.

“You’re sure?”

“Quite sure, sir.”

There was an awkward pause, and then Morley, with a slight tremor in
his tones, said—

“Is there onything wrang?”

“Yes; I left three notes—bank-notes for £50—in my desk when I went
away to dinner, and they were gone when I got back half an hour ago.”

“Impossible!” The man looked shocked and astonished, but there was
nevertheless a something constrained or unusual in his manner which
the builder did not like. “Naebody could get into the office by the
tool-house,” Morley hastened to add; “that door hasna been open for
years, and the key’s lost. Besides, there’s the shelves in the road.”

“How could they get in, then?” cried Mr Lockyer. “The front door was
locked, and the key in my pocket; and it’s not likely that they would
pick the lock in broad daylight in the front street.”

“Oh, thieves are clever now-a-days,” observed Morley; “they’re fit
for onything.”

“They may be, but that’s a little beyond the ordinary,” drily
returned his master. “How were they to know I had left the money in
my desk, or how long I would be away?”

“Ah, that’s it!” said Morley.

“Do _you_ know anything about it?” said Mr Lockyer at last, with an
effort.

“Me! Do you think I’m a thief?” said Morley, flushing up. “If you do,
you’re welcome to search the house now.”

“Oh, I daresay!” sneeringly returned his master, liking his
yard-keeper’s manner less than ever. “It would be easy finding three
notes, wouldn’t it, if you liked to hide them well? I might as well
look for a needle in a haystack. No, no, Morley; I don’t say you
took them, or that you didn’t, but they’re to be found, and I’ll
leave that to the men that are bred to the trade—the police or the
detectives.”

“Yes, they’re the best hands at that,” said Morley feebly.

No strong and indignant protestations of innocence; no hot words, or
tears, or reproaches; nothing but that meaningless answer, and that
look of guilt and fear.

“The man’s a thief if looks are to be trusted,” thought the builder.
“If it turns out so, I’ll never be kind to mortal being again.”

Mr Lockyer had done a foolish thing; he had let the man know he was
suspected; but in the action he had been prompted by the best of
intentions. He had failed in these, and he now did the next best
thing to redeem the mistake—he came to us with news of the robbery.
He described the circumstances of the robbery and the position of the
place much as I have put them down, and concluded by stating it to
be his firm belief that Morley was either himself the thief, or knew
how the clever robbery had been accomplished. I agreed with him, but
blamed him strongly for going near the suspected man.

“It is the money you are most anxious to recover, and yet you go and
put the man on his guard. You may make up your mind now that you will
never see the notes again. They will either go into the fire, or be
put away in some hiding-place far beyond our reach.”

“That’s nice comfort to a fellow,” observed the builder ruefully. “Is
there anything you can do?”

“Oh, yes; we can do our best to make up for your blunder, by hunting
for both the thief and the notes; but I have told you what is most
likely to be the result.”

I had no expectation of making anything by a search in Morley’s
house, but I thought it advisable that the form should be gone
through, if only that I might study the man’s face the while. I could
have gone and done it there and then, but deemed it best to wait till
morning.

There was a possibility, as Mr Lockyer suggested, of Morley repenting
of his act and returning the plunder in the night time, and, besides,
by delaying till morning, we might take him unexpectedly. Of course I
afterwards regretted the delay; we always do when we find ourselves
disappointed in results.

Morley appeared as usual at the yard before six o’clock, and made
no allusion to the interview of the night before beyond asking his
master, when he appeared about eight o’clock, “if he had got any word
of the missing money.”

He got a very curt and ungracious answer, and spoke no more. At the
breakfast hour, when Morley locked up the yard and went home, I was
waiting near the spot with two assistants skilled in searching. We
just allowed John to enter his house and get comfortably seated at
his porridge, when we knocked and were admitted. He did not seem
greatly disturbed when I gave my name and showed the search warrant.

“You didna need a warrant to search my house,” he said boldly. “I
tellt the maister that he was welcome to search it whenever he liked.”

He sat down and finished his porridge with evident zest and appetite,
while we turned over every article in the little den of a house. The
place had not been disturbed so much for many a day. Morley’s wife
seemed much more distressed at the charge than he, and assisted us
with the greatest eagerness and anxious concern. We found no trace
of the notes, and Morley’s manner convinced me that they were not
in the house. He was too cool and careless. Had they been hidden
there—however securely or effectively—he could not have concealed
some perturbation when we came near the spot or grew “hot” in our
little game of “hide and seek.” Just once did I notice anything
like a change in his expression of face. When we had turned over
everything in the house, I chanced to say to Mrs Morley—

“These are all the things you have, I suppose?”

“Oh, yes, sir,” she earnestly answered. “Since John rackit himsel’
we’ve had to make shift with less and less.”

While she thus spoke, I saw her eye run round the room as if in
search of something; then she began poking about with the aid of one
of our lanterns, and finally she turned to her husband and said in a
kind of whisper—

“Where’s the famil——”

She did not get the sentence finished, nor even enough of it to be
intelligible to me. Morley was standing close to her, and whether
he kicked her on the leg, or trod on her toe, or merely gave her
a look, I cannot tell, but he checked her speech most suddenly
and effectually. I just saw enough and heard enough to make me
suspicious, for the den was dark, and I was not expecting the words
so unguardedly uttered by the wife. The last word sounded to me like
“fummel,” and I racked my brains for many an hour after to discover
what on earth a “fummel” was. I had no doubt at all _now_ of Morley’s
guilt, and, of course, I could have arrested him; but what good would
that have done? There was no evidence whatever to support the charge,
and likely to be none with Morley locked up in prison. Besides, I
now felt tolerably certain that the notes were not destroyed, but
concealed in the “fummel”—whatever that meant. I wanted badly to find
that “fummel,” and reasoned that I was more likely to do so with
Morley moving about in freedom than with him cooped up in prison. The
secret of the hiding-place was known to Morley alone; that was quite
evident to me from the eagerness of the wife to assist me, and help
to prove her husband’s innocence, and also by the simplicity with
which she had let out the remark about the “fummel.” I determined
to draw off my men, with so many apologies that Morley should think
himself quite safe from further trouble or suspicion. To confirm this
impression, I directed his master to take no further notice of the
matter, and to keep him in his employment as usual, which was done.

I now had Morley carefully watched during the hours he was free
from his work. I changed the men occasionally, and never watched
him myself, that he might not take alarm, but nothing came of the
watching. Morley never once attempted to change a fifty pound note,
never appeared a penny richer than before the robbery, and never
went near any place likely to be used for the concealment of the
notes. The only thing that concerned me was the fact that he was
preparing to leave the country, nor could I make that a ground for
suspicion, as he had begun those arrangements long before the date
of the robbery. At length I grew impatient, and took to relieving
the men watching him after dark, as then there was little chance of
him recognising me. Morley generally took a solitary stroll after
partaking of his frugal supper, and on one of these occasions he
stopped before a broker’s in the Potterrow, a place suspected to be
a kind of “wee pawn”—that is, an unlicensed pawnbroker’s. Morley
looked in at the window first, then all round him, and then walked
into the shop, and was soon engaged in a violent altercation with
the boy in charge. He stormed, and he threatened, and he swore, and
I could see his arms moving about more energetically than those of a
preacher “dingin’ the poopit cushion a’ to bits,” but I was afraid to
venture near enough to hear the words and understand their meaning.
At length he left the shop in a furious and excited state, volubly
threatening to “send the police” to them. I was strongly tempted
to offer my services, but, being curious to learn the cause of the
dispute, I allowed the blustering man to depart, and then entered the
shop. The boy was a smart young shaver named Tim Cordiner, and knew
me perfectly.

“What did Morley kick up such a row about?” I asked.

Tim put on an air of simplicity and said—

“Who’s Morley?”

“That man who was here just now.”

“His name isn’t Morley—it’s Peter Mackintosh,” said Tim, with an air
of superior knowledge.

“Oh, is it? I beg your pardon,” I returned, with a fine-drawn sneer,
which Tim perfectly appreciated. “Well, what was he in such a state
about?”

Tim fenced cunningly, but finding me in dead earnest, was forced at
last to say—“He’s in a state about something which he sold to my
father, and wants now to buy back again. He says the agreement was
that it was to be kept for a month, to give him a chance to buy it
back. Did you ever hear the like? We’re not allowed to do that,” the
monkey solemnly added, “it would be as bad as keeping a ‘wee pawn.’”

“Oh, come now, Tim, don’t try that with me; play ‘the daft laddie’
with somebody else,” I laughingly returned. “What was the article he
sold or left with you?”

“A Bible—a Family Bible——”

“Good gracious!”

“Ay, you may say that. Bibles is a drug in the market; and to expect
us to keep one when we had a chance to sell it! Family Bibles is out
of fashion now—can’t get the price of the binding for them—and the
last we had lay for a year in the windy.”

“And so you sold this one?” I said quietly, having got time to think
during Tim’s speech. “Who was the buyer?”

“Blest if I can tell—seemed a sort of ‘revival,’” by which Tim meant
a “revivalist,” a name given to a sect of religious enthusiasts then
newly started in Edinburgh. “Was it you who sold the Bible to him?”

“Yes, that’s why that man kicked up the row. He says my father knew
it wasn’t to be sold. I wasn’t to know that, and I was glad to get
rid of it. The ‘revival’ was near not taking it because the Family
Register was cut out—tried to beat me down two shillings for that.
Religious folks are always the biggest screws.”

“You must be terribly religious then,” I calmly remarked to Tim, for
I knew that that youthful precocity could drive a bargain which would
have drawn a blush to the cheeks of the biggest rogue of a broker who
ever bartered and sold.

Tim grinned delightedly at the tribute to his genius.

“Would you know the ‘revival’ again?” I asked, beginning to think I
was fairly done at last.

“Oh, fine. I’ve seen him before, giving away tracts on the streets.
He left me one, after buying the Bible and trying to beat me down two
shillings.”

“Have you got it now?”

“No; I used it to light the gas—it saved a match, you know.”

I thought if any one was likely to save money and die rich that one
was Tim, but I was to change my opinion soon by discovering that the
smart young broker was as great a spendthrift as he was a screw.
After some further conversation I warned him to say nothing to Morley
of my visit, should that worthy return, as I had no doubt he would,
to see Tim’s father. I am doubtful if Tim kept his promise. Certainly
if any one offered him a shilling to break it, the promise would
instantly kick the beam.

After the visit to Tim the suspected yard-keeper seemed a good deal
depressed. He went back once, and had a hot quarrel with Tim’s
father, threatening the police again, but failing to fulfil that
threat. He said the Bible must be got, and the broker promised to do
his best—which meant nothing.

In the meantime I had been much occupied in thought about Tim
himself. His answers to me had appeared frank and truthful enough,
but a dire suspicion that it was possible for the monkey to cheat
and deceive even me crept into my mind. I discovered that Tim was
squandering money right and left, quite unknown to his father. He
sometimes went to Portobello, or Leith, or Musselburgh with his
companions, and spent a day there, Tim always paying the entire
expense, like a lord of the land.

Could it be possible that Tim was himself the purchaser of that
Family Bible, and the “revival” merely a creation of his vivid
imagination?

So strong a hold did this idea take of my mind that I gave up
watching Morley, and turned my undivided attention to Tim. I could
not find that he had changed a £50 bank-note, but I did discover that
he had been seen with two twenties. I, therefore, only waited till
he should be out with his friends for a day’s squandering, and then
I pounced on him in the midst of his jolity. Tim appeared mightily
crestfallen, but grandly demanded to know what was the charge against
him. I replied by asking where he got all the money he had been
spending. His reply staggered me a little.

“What! is it my father who has set you on to this?”

Now, why should Tim blurt out that? To me it implied that Tim had
taken the money from his father. I threw out a hint about a Family
Bible being a good bank to draw from. Tim looked puzzled, and really
did not seem to grasp the idea. I did not enlighten him with an
explanation, but I myself was enlightened next day by his father, who
had discovered that his smart son had broken in on a hoard of his
own, and lessened it by nearly £60. He nevertheless did not wish to
charge Tim with the robbery, but merely requested that that clever
monkey might be handed over to him for punishment.

I could not oblige him, though he promised that the chastisement
should bring Tim as near the grave as he would ever be without
entering it. I had now to put the matter before Tim in a plain,
straightforward question—“Had he or had he not lied about the sale of
that Family Bible?”

He loudly protested his truthfulness, and offered to help me to find
the buyer.

“How can you do that when you say he left neither name nor address?”
I impatiently returned.

“Oh, we could easily find him at some of the revival meetings,” was
Tim’s quickwitted reply. “He’ll be at the door giving out tracts when
the meeting breaks up. I know his face fine.”

I stared at Tim, and then spoke out the thought that flashed across
my mind. “Tim, if you don’t turn out a thief, you’ll maybe be a
detective some day.”

“A detective!” he echoed, with a merry twinkle in his eyes. “Oh, no,
Mr M^cGovan, I haven’t enough wickedness in me for that.”

Tim and I went to a revival meeting that night together. By going
together I mean to imply that we were closely attached to each
other—by a pair of handcuffs. Tim could not have gone forward to
the penitent form though he had been ever so strongly inclined.
We did not need to wait till the close, nor look out for a tract
distributor, for one of those who rose to address the meeting was
instantly identified by Tim as the buyer of the Family Bible. The lad
was quite young, and had on his face as he spoke a look of etherial
happiness and rapt delight which could never have been assumed. I
think I see that fair face before me now. It looked noble, exalted,
thrilling—just such a face as we could imagine smiling at the stake,
and breathing forth forgiveness and peace amidst the roaring of the
flames.

When the address was over, the young man had occasion to move
through the hall and past the place where we sat. I touched him on
the arm, and drew him out to the door. He promptly admitted that he
had bought a Family Bible, second-hand, from the boy before him. He
had it at home, but though he had used it twice every day in his
home, he declared most earnestly that he had found nothing in it.
At my suggestion we walked with him to his home. He was evidently
unmarried, for the home was presided over by his mother, a quiet,
respectable-looking widow.

The Family Bible I sought occupied a place of honour in the little
home, and the owner had only to point to it and tell me to take it
down with my own hands. I opened the book, and he quietly informed
me that the only alteration I should find would be at the beginning,
where he had inserted a new leaf as a Family Register.

I turned to the leaf and read there his own name, and quite a recent
date, in the column of “Births,” with the words below—“Saved from
wrath by the mercy of Jesus Christ.” Without a remark I sat down and
turned over every single leaf in that book, but found nothing. When I
had finished, and was in despair, I happened to notice that the paper
pasted against the inside of the back board did not correspond in
colour and texture with that on the front board. A little examination
revealed the cause. The lining of the back board was simply one of
the fly-leaves pasted down at the edges. I passed my fingers over
the pasted leaf. There was a feeling of something below. I took
out my pen-knife and ran the point into the sheet and round the
pasted edge—the whole family, and Tim in particular, looking on
with goggling eyes. When I turned back the leaf, I found it glazed
and yellow on the under side, like that inside the front board, but
I found also other three slips of paper neatly ranged above one
another, flat against the board of the Bible—three £50 bank-notes.
The owner of the Bible looked simply and truly surprised. Tim looked
terribly disappointed and chagrined.

“If I had known they were there, I’d never have sold it so cheap,” he
blurted out.

“Maybe not at all?” I suggested; and Tim did not deny the soft
impeachment.

The notes were readily identified by the builder by the number
“2020” which one of them bore; but when we came to look for Morley,
he had vanished. From another country he afterwards sent a detailed
confession of the circumstances which led to the crime. The payer of
the money was dressed as a working man, and asked at the gate for Mr
Lockyer. Morley at once conceived a suspicion that the man had come
after the post of yard-keeper, and applied his eyes and ears to the
inner door in the tool-house to ascertain the truth. He saw the notes
placed in the desk, and the temptation followed, for he had found a
key shortly before in the tool-house which fitted the lock perfectly.
After taking the notes he dropped the key into a street “siver,” or
we might have stumbled on it during our search. Tim was set free, but
he has not yet developed into a detective.




CONSCIENCE MONEY.


An old man, a jobbing gardener, named Alexander Abercorn, stopped one
of the day policemen at the West End one morning in July, and said in
great concern and agitation—

“Man, I’m afraid this house has been robbed in the night time. And
the worst of it is I have the keys, and they’ll be sure to say it’s
been done by me.”

The house in question was a big one known as the Freelands, and
occupied by a Mr Arthurlie and his family. The family were gone
to country quarters, and the house was empty even of servants.
Abercorn hurriedly explained, what indeed was already known to the
policeman, that he had a contract for doing the gardening about the
place, and, being a tried and trusted man, had been left with the
keys of the place, with orders to enter it every day to see if all
was safe. Other families had left him a similar charge, and he had
some half-dozen bunches of keys, which he showed to the policeman
in confirmation. Hitherto his task had been easy, and the result
satisfactory enough, but now for the first time a calamity had come,
and he begged the officer to step in and see. They entered the house,
and the old gardener walked straight to the pantry, in which was
built an iron safe for containing the plate and valuables of the
family. This safe was inserted bodily into a large cupboard, which
had an ordinary wooden door fastened with a common sixpenny lock,
and so looked innocent enough outside. The wooden door stood wide
open, and so also did that of the iron safe within, though both had
hitherto been locked.

There were no breakages, or marks of prising with crowbars or
chisels—the door appeared to have been opened in the ordinary way,
by inserting a key and turning back the bolts of the locks. The
detectors on the lock of the safe showed that no skeleton keys had
been applied or used, and yet the old gardener declared that the
key of the safe had never been intrusted to him. He did not know who
had it, or where it was kept. He had the keys of all the rooms, and
also the key of the press in which the safe was built, but not the
actual key of the safe. The entire contents of the safe had been
turned out on the pantry floor, and the thieves had then shown great
discrimination in the selection of their plunder. None of the plated
articles had been removed; only genuine silver, and, as some of these
exactly resembled each other, the thieves had shown a skill almost
magical.

The old gardener, of course, knew nothing of what had been in the
safe; and, seeing the plated articles littering the floor, he only
said he _thought_ the place had been robbed. It was only after word
had been sent to the Central Office, and we had telegraphed to the
Arthurlies, that we learned that the value of the silver plate alone
was upwards of £500, and that there had been in the safe other
articles of value which brought the total loss nearly up to £800.

Within an hour of the report being sent in, I was out at the house,
and was shown over the various rooms by the old gardener. To say
that the old man looked excited and strange would be but faintly to
describe his appearance. He was deathly pale; he trembled at the
slightest question or look; his teeth chattered when he spoke; and
he gave the most stupid and confused answers to some of the simplest
queries. I had not been long in the premises when I found that there
were several peculiarities about the robbery which marked it off from
the ordinary burglary. There were three doors to the house. Two of
these—the area door and the back door—had never been touched. They
were bolted and locked just as they had been left. No window had been
forced; every one was closed, and fastened, and shuttered exactly as
it had been left. This narrowed the means of ingress to one door—the
main door, which was secured by two patent locks. It was the keys
of these locks which the old gardener carried and used in entering
the house. I examined these locks closely, and when done, decided
that they had not been opened with skeleton keys or tampered with
in any way; either the door had been left unlocked, or the keys, or
duplicates of these keys, had been used in effecting an entrance.
The second peculiarity was that no room in the whole house of three
storeys had been entered but the pantry. There had been no rummaging
through bedrooms for valuables, no turning out of rare china and
curiosities in the drawing-room, though there were articles of that
kind there far exceeding in value the plate stolen. The thieves
appeared to have had but one object in view—the contents of the
safe—and for that they had made without a single divergence right or
left. Now, that is not at all like the ordinary housebreaker, who is
never satisfied with a moderately good haul, but must go tearing, and
searching, and smashing, and destroying all over a house before he is
convinced that there is no more to carry off. Then, what professional
housebreaker could have resisted at least tasting a bottle of those
rare wines which were within arm’s length of him in the pantry! I
have caught them drunk on the spot just through that weakness, but
I never knew them to be so rigidly abstemious as to pass good drink
untouched.

When I had concluded my examination, the old gardener was very
anxious to know my opinion. Had any one else plied me with the
question, I might have answered, but with him I was forced for the
present to be silent. The truth is, I suspected him, and nobody but
him, as the thief. He was a poor man to begin with; the clothes he
stood in were not worth ten shillings; and I was led to believe
that being somewhat old and frail, and having a daughter entirely
dependent upon him, these formed almost his sole possessions. I
could not conceive, indeed, how so many had thought fit to trust
him with the keys of their houses, but then I did not know that he
had the reputation of being a sterling and honest man, respected
alike for his deep religious feeling and humble worth. He had
a poverty-stricken look to my eyes, and then his confusion and
agitation, and the other discoveries, were against him. The same
afternoon Mr Arthurlie and his wife came to town by express; and then
I got from them the surprising intelligence that the keys of the safe
were always kept secreted in a little niche in a wooden cupboard
exactly opposite the press containing the safe. This precaution had
been taken through the keys once having been lost by being carried
about, thus necessitating the fitting on of a new lock on the safe.
Until I saw the hiding-place I thought this arrangement one of the
most foolhardy imaginable; but when I went out to the house I found
that the nail on which the keys were usually hung was in a place the
last that an ordinary thief would have looked to. It was in behind
the hinge of the door of a wooden press or wine rack. You had to
open first the door of the press, then grope in behind the left-hand
door and get the keys. No one knew of this place but the tablemaid
and the housekeeper. The Arthurlies kept no man-servant. They were
positive that the old gardener, Abercorn, did not know of the keys
being thus hid in the place, though they admitted that he might have
discovered them if he had exerted himself to search. I had found the
keys of the safe lying on the floor of the pantry under some of the
discarded plated articles, so it was certain that the thief had not
only searched for the keys but found them and used them. I began to
question the Arthurlies regarding old Abercorn, the gardener, and
they, divining at once the drift of my suspicions, assured me that I
was quite mistaken, and gave me such a description of the man that I
felt half ashamed of my own convictions. I had thought of at least a
search in the gardener’s humble home, but implicit trust and strong
protestations of the Arthurlies forced me to shelve that idea for the
present. So long as the man was not a prisoner or formally accused
I could question him to my heart’s content, and I resolved to take
full advantage of the circumstance, by making him account for his
actions from the time he had been in the house on the morning before
the robbery until the discovery of the robbery as already described.
He had asserted most positively that upon his last visit there had
been not an article out of place or the slightest trace of a robbery,
and if that were true the whole must have been executed within the
twenty-four hours. Again, it was not likely that a thief would choose
the day time for such a feat, so this further limited the time by
twelve hours at least. What had Abercorn been about during that
night? If he could not account for that time I should have a fair
excuse for arresting him.

I therefore said no more to the Arthurlies, but got the address of
the old gardener—a little cottage down by the Dean—and next day
went down to have a talk with him. The place was easily found, for
he had in front of the cottage a strip of ground full of all kinds
of flowers, and “Alex. Abercorn, Jobbing Gardener,” conspicuously
painted on the little gate. An old woman opened the door, and I asked
for the gardener.

“He’s no in; he’s working,” was her reply, and the news was rather
pleasing to me than otherwise.

“Oh, well, I daresay you will do quite as well,” I said pleasantly.
“You’re Mrs Abercorn, I suppose?”

“Na, na, I’m only his hoosekeeper,” she promptly answered. “Mrs
Abercorn’s deid three years syne. I never was married, and maybe
never will be.”

As she was old enough to have been my mother, I thought her marriage
by no means a likely occurrence, but took care to throw out no hint
to that effect. We chatted together very nicely for a minute or two,
during which I got from her nearly her whole life story, and then
she invited me to enter and see the gardener’s daughter. But for the
fact that this daughter, Jeanie, as she named her, was an invalid,
the old woman declared that she would not have been needed in the
place, as they were “very poor.” I followed her into the front room,
in which was a bed facing the window. In the bed was a young woman
of perhaps twenty-five years. She had a sweet face, and a delicate
complexion, gradually tinging out into rosy cheeks, and a pair of
big, lustrous eyes, which were turned on me, wide open with wonder,
as I entered. But the beauty of the face, and its fine hues, and even
the brightness of the great eyes, was not of the kind to draw out
one’s admiration so much as to stir in the bosom a thrill of pity,
for the stamp of death was over it all. Consumption was written on
that face, with a sure and early death, as plainly as if the green
turf had already been spread above her. I scarcely liked to look into
the face—it was so eager, and bright, and beautiful.

It was a little difficult to explain my business, but before I had
made much of an attempt in that direction I was surprised to find
that neither the invalid nor the old housekeeper had heard aught of
the robbery. I was staggered. Why had the old gardener concealed
that from his little household? I had to put aside the query and go
on with those more important. Could they remember what time the old
gardener had come home the night before last?

Oh, perfectly. He had been home about seven o’clock, for he was
rather busy, and might have stayed at his work later, but for the
fact that Jeanie had taken a bad turn that day, and he was anxious to
be beside her.

Did he stay long at home?

The question appeared to puzzle them both, and then, when I
explained, they said, as a matter of course, that he had never gone
out again the whole evening. Why should he, indeed? His daughter was
all in all to him; he was never happy but when he was beside her; and
if walking round the world barefooted would have made her well, he
would cheerfully have undertaken the task.

“I never will be well, though, till I go abroad,” added the girl
with a smile, which made her look still more lovely. “The doctor
said so long ago, but father is so poor and has to work so hard for
every penny, that till lately he could not think of it. But now it’s
settled that I’m to go before the winter comes on. Father has got
the money from some one. He wouldn’t say who it was, but it’s a kind
friend anyhow who would lend such a sum—and I’m to get strong and go
back to service next spring.”

Her very heart seemed to overflow with exultation and proud hope as
she uttered the words. It almost drew tears to my eyes to witness her
joy.

“Then your father was with you in this house all night? You’re quite
sure of that?” I said, reverting to the old theme.

“Oh, quite, for he was never away from my bedside. He did not go to
bed at all, seeing me so ill, but just dovered the best way he could
in that big chair. I watched him all the time, and when he did fall
asleep I couldn’t help crying a little to think what a hard lot he
has, all on account of me being so weak and ill. What I would give
for strength to work and slave for him as he deserves—oh, what I
would give!”

“And the bunches of keys he has—the keys of the houses that are empty
just now—where were they all the time?”

“Oh, in the box there,” said the housekeeper, taking up the question
at once, and without the slightest trepidation. “I put them in there
myself. They lie there every nicht.”

“And would it not be possible for any one to get at them there?” I
pursued. “I mean any one who wished to make use of them to effect a
robbery at one of the houses?”

“Oh, no! They both assured me that such a thing was impossible. Not a
soul ever came near the house, and certainly no one had been within
the door on that particular night.” The daughter concluded by saying
proudly that she was quite sure that no one would ever get near the
houses, or into them, so long as her father had charge of the places.
He was so careful and reliable, that he was better than twenty
policemen.

“He has not told you, then, that one of the houses has been entered?”
I said, in an unguarded moment of surprise.

“No; was it really?” they both exclaimed in a breath.

The expression of the two faces was a study. The withered face of
the old woman was scarcely stirred—it showed interest indeed, but
merely that of a passing curiosity. The face of the invalid girl,
on the contrary, was full of changes and fluttering emotions, as her
own mind was evidently full of tumult. She questioned me rapidly,
and I answered her as guardedly as possible, but her features as I
proceeded became slowly blanched with a kind of rigid horror. That
strange look—so full of far-reaching thought and deep anguish—I could
not at the moment understand. To say that suspicion was hovering
over her father did not account for all that was pictured in her
face—there was something behind all that, and I am afraid my words
became somewhat incoherent in trying to fathom what that secret was.
I never saw a face which told so much, if I had but had the key to
those flitting expressions.

Her horror, and anguish, and deadly despair, and the tears which
would force themselves into her eyes to make them more pitifully
beautiful, arose from something I had said, which had evidently more
meaning to her than to me, and I cudgelled my brains in vain to
recall anything which should so affect her.

I did not remain long after this queer change had come over the
invalid, for with that change had come reticence, thoughtfulness,
and silence. Her brightness and loquacity were gone, and the gossipy
old woman had all the talking to herself. My impression of the whole
case, when I had left the cottage, was that there was guilt behind
all I had seen, and that the best plan would be to arrest the old
gardener, and have his house thoroughly searched.

That was the substance of my report; but against this was brought the
strenuous request of the Arthurlies, and the arrest was delayed that
I might have the suspected man watched, and, if possible, accumulate
stronger evidence of his guilt. I was not sorry for the delay in the
light of the curious incident which followed. Two days after my visit
to the cottage a parcel was handed in at the Central Office, which on
being opened was found to contain bank-notes to the amount of £70,
and the following brief note:—

“One of those concerned in the robbery at Mr Arthurlie’s returns his
share of the proceeds, which his conscience will not allow him to
keep.”

It needed but one reading of these lines to convince one that no
professional thief ever composed or penned them. The diction was
too correct, to say nothing of the spelling; and whoever heard of a
professional housebreaker having a conscience, or returning entire
his share of a robbery on that account? Then in looking over the
note it was evident that there was a painful effort to disguise the
handwriting—to make it heavy and lumpy, and strong like that of an
unlettered man, while the verdict of all who looked upon it was that
the writing was that of a woman. Who could that woman be, and how
could she have accomplished the robbery? If she had got only a fair
share of the proceeds, there must have been at least seven or eight
more in the robbery. The parcel had been handed to one of our men
outside the Office by a boy, who had walked off the moment he got rid
of it. He had spoken enough, however, to reveal that he was of that
class of country folks living outside the city proper—the accent of
these being strong and broad, and easily distinguishable from that of
the city.

The moment these facts were made known to me I had a cab brought, and
drove rapidly over to the Dean, taking the man with me. When we got
to the place we dismissed the cab and took up our station near the
cottage of the gardener. I was in hope that if the boy had been sent
from that place he would return to report, but I was mistaken. We
waited about for fully an hour, and then gave up the task in despair,
and wandered through the little village to have a look at the faces.
In doing so my companion spotted a boy at play, and collared him
sharply with the words—

“It was you who gave me the parcel at the Police Office, wasn’t it?”

The boy denied it stoutly, but in a tone which left no doubt on
our minds that he was lying. When threatened with the cells he
admitted that he had got sixpence to deliver it, from old Marjory,
the gardener’s housekeeper! Taking the boy with us, we went to the
gardener’s cottage. Old Marjory was outside cutting vegetables in the
garden, and the moment her eye fell upon us I felt convinced that we
would have no easy task in getting information from her.

“You sent this boy with a parcel to the office, Marjory?” I began.
“Where did you get it?”

“Somebody gied me it, and it wasna Maister Abercorn, either,” she
dourly answered.

“Do you know what was in it?”

“No, me—I never asked.”

“Did you not write the letter that was inside?”

“No, I canna write, or read either—a’body kens that.”

“You could rob, though, at a pinch, I suppose?” I dryly returned.

She flashed a pair of angry eyes on me, and then said—“I never robbed
onybody in my life, and it’s no likely I’ll begin now.”

“Well, you’ll have to tell all you know about that parcel, or go to
jail, that’s all,” I shortly answered.

“I canna leave the lassie,” she said, dourly, “she’s rael ill, and
there’s naebody can attend till her like me.”

“I thought she was going away abroad?”

“She’s no gaun now,” said the queer old woman with a slight softening
in her tones. “She’ll never get to a foreign country till she reaches
the better land. The puir thing’s sinking fast. I wad ask ye to come
and see her, but I’m feared the sicht o’ you wad upset her as it did
before. She’s never been weel since ye was here.”

This news startled me. Why should my presence agitate the invalid?
Could it be possible that she was the thief? How could she, when she
had not been able to leave the house for months?

The old woman determinedly refused to speak, and while we were
arguing the point, Abercorn himself appeared. He appeared quite
overwhelmed with confusion when the position of affairs was explained
to him. I told him that his housekeeper, Marjory, was arrested, and
that he must go with her. He made no complaint or demonstration of
any kind, except when I regretted that his daughter was so ill that I
could not take her too, when he gave me a glance so full of anguish
that I half regretted having spoken the words. He quietly asked leave
to go in and see his lassie, and to satisfy myself that the girl was
really unable to go with us I accompanied him. The girl, by a kind
of instinct, seemed to read the dreadful truth in our faces, and I
thought she would have died before we got her and her father parted.
Only one exclamation I thought strange—that was when she was clinging
to him and raining her tears in his face, and cried bitterly—

“Oh, father, I’ve brought all this on you—I’ve brought it all on you,
and I meant to save you!”

When the old man and his housekeeper were examined they had no
declaration to emit—nothing to say. They had made it up between them,
I suppose, to take refuge in stern silence, and perhaps on the whole
the course was as wise a one for themselves as any they could have
been directed to follow. Not an hour after they had been locked up, I
got an urgent message from the invalid daughter to come and see her.
How urgent it was may be judged from one expression in the message,
which was, “Come to-night—to-morrow may be too late, for then I may
be dead.”

I found her in a state of great prostration; but she roused up at the
sight of my face, and was able to dismiss her attendant, in order
that none might hear what passed between us.

“You can never know what I have suffered since you were first here,”
she said with an earnestness fearful to behold. “I have sent for you
to see if it is not possible to save my father. It is the real robber
you wish to put in prison, is it not? My father is innocent, except
that he was tempted, and that his love for me made him weak. Would it
not be in his favour—would it not save him—if you were put in the way
of taking the real criminal?”

“I cannot pledge my word that it would save him, but it would
certainly go far to lighten his punishment,” I soothingly returned.
“If he is really innocent it can do him nothing but good to reveal
all you know. Nothing is more certain than that, as the case now
stands, he will be convicted and probably severely punished.”

“I will trust all to you—I may not live to see it, but I will leave
you to do what is best for my poor old father,” she said, weeping
freely. “I only suspected something of the truth when you came here
first and said there had been a robbery. I had noticed something
strange about my father for a day or two, and when he told me that at
last he was to get the money that was to take me abroad and make me
strong, it was said in such a queer way, that I didn’t know whether
to cry or be glad. I fretted over the horrid thought for a whole
night, and then I spoke to him about it. I saw by his face that he
had done it—that he had become a criminal for me. I was horrified,
but could I be angry? It was his love for me—it was to save my life
he had risked his whole life, and reputation, and immortality. Who
could be angry at being so loved? Then he told me all he had done.
The Arthurlies used to keep a man-servant, but he was put away for
drunkenness and dishonesty. I have seen him once or twice. His name
is David Denham. This man met father one day and asked for me, and
was sorry to hear that father could not get the money to send me
abroad. Then he said that _he_ could get the money, and would get
it if father would just lend him the keys of the Freelands for one
night. Father would not hear of it at first, but the other kept
tempting him, and saying how cruel it was of him to let his only
daughter die, and at last he gave in. The keys were only out of his
keeping for one night, and Denham knew where the keys of the safe
were kept, and so got at the silver plate and carried it all off.
It was sent to Glasgow to some one who had agreed to buy it, and
Denham brought the money to father after dark. I could not bear to
look at it or touch it. I seemed to see in it the thing that was to
part me and my father for ever, instead of letting us spend eternity
in heaven, with neither poverty nor suffering. I bundled it up and
wrote the note which you would get with it. I felt so happy when it
was gone, and I made Marjory send it in a way that would not give
you a chance to find out the sender. But you did find it out, and I
have done more harm than good. It would have been better for my poor
father if I had had no conscience troubling me.”

I soothed and cheered her as well as I could, and then went after
Denham. I found he had gone to Glasgow, and, by sending off a
telegram, had him neatly nipped up at the station by Johnny Farrel.
Denham was thoroughly taken by surprise, and in his amazement did
a rash thing. He had had some disagreement with the fence about
the plunder, and had gone through to settle that, but only to find
himself nipped up at the station. What could be clearer? He had been
betrayed by the swindling fence. Would it not be a fair retaliation
to betray the fence in turn? He thought it would, and did so; which
greatly rejoiced our hearts, for it enabled us to recover a deal of
the plunder before it went into the melting-pot.

Jeanie Abercorn declined rapidly after her statement to me, and in a
week had passed to her long rest. Her last message was to her father
in prison, telling him that she was only going out of his sight for
a time; that God would forgive him, whether men did or no, knowing
that it was his great love for her that tempted him to the crime. The
old gardener received the message in a stupefied state. He had never
appeared the same man since the arrest. He was told that he would be
accepted as a witness against Denham, and agreed in a dull, listless
manner to tell all he knew, which he did, with the result that Denham
was convicted and sentenced to five years’ penal servitude. When the
trial was over, the old gardener was told that he might go.

“What have I to gang to?” was his reply, as he wrung his hands and
tottered out. “What have I to gang to?”

In a month or two the poor old man had drifted away to join Jeanie in
the Great Unknown, beyond earth and sky.




A WOLF IN SHEEP’S CLOTHING.


“Once a criminal, always a criminal,” is a pretty safe maxim. When
a man—and more especially one of education—is degraded into a thief
and a liar, who would believe him if he expressed a wish for a better
life? Nay, if he actually did change, and became a very anchorite or
saint, would not the whole world howl out “Hypocrite?”

In the present case there was neither the profession of repentance
nor the desire for a different life. The “Rev. Alfred Johnston,”
already alluded to in “A Lift on the Road,” [See page 218, _ante_]
on being released from prison, was in bad health, bodily as well as
mentally. Some of the wages of sin had been paid out to him during
the last year in prison, and he went out into the world a mere wreck,
the shadow of his former self. He cursed me as a cause, and the whole
world besides—and he even at times, I suspect, cursed himself—but he
had no power to retaliate or avenge his fancied wrongs.

The glory of man is strength, and when that is gone, the best bed and
blanket are the grave and a green turf. There was still the genteel
begging left to him, but somehow the returns were now poor compared
with his former gains, and Johnston was impatient for a chance which
should allow him to leave this country for the Cape with a good
pocketful of money at his command. During his seclusion his consort
had drifted out to that colony as a barmaid—his real wife had been
laid in the grave years before by his brutality and dissipation—and
the moment he learned the truth he conceived the plan of following
and joining her there. The climate was just such a one as he needed
to restore his health, and a bold rogue, he thought, might in that
place realise a fortune in a very short time. He had been landed in
Edinburgh, as being the scene of his capture and conviction, and so
it was around on the Edinburgh citizens that he now cast his eyes
with a view to his own welfare. What is really one’s welfare none
can decide for himself, and Fate often steps in and with inexorable
hand fixes that for him. I daresay Johnston had often, in his better
days, preached that truth, but he had either ceased to believe it,
or allowed it to become buried in his mind, for at the strange turn
events were to take none could have been more surprised than himself.

By studying carefully the subscription lists of the various local
charities, and making diligent inquiries, Johnston decided upon
a Mr Samuel Cooper, a retired merchant, living at Bonnington,
as the likeliest man to make an easy victim. Mr Cooper was old,
and benevolent as well as wealthy, and what was more important,
he did not read the newspapers much, and so was not likely to
know of Johnston’s past misdeeds. He was indeed a quiet, modest,
feeling-hearted man, and the greatest tribute to his goodness was
this very selection of him as a victim by the shrewd and unscrupulous
Johnston. For a wide radius around his home, and more especially
among the poor of Leith, this good man had raised up to his name a
hedge of blessings and prayers; and who knows but these were now to
be his protection in the hour of need?

The appearance of Johnston at this time was interesting. He had been
a good-looking man, and the strict prison life and diet had removed
the bloated look from his features, while his cough, and weak chest,
and gasping for breath, only served to make him a pitiable object for
charity and help. His clothing was the same wretched garb in which
I had taken him more than four years before, but that too helped to
excite commiseration.

This was the spectacle which greeted Mr Cooper one afternoon at
his own home, when he had been told that a visitor, in the person
of the Rev. Alfred Johnston, wished to speak with him, and awaited
him in the adjoining room. Instead of a gentleman in blacks, he saw
before him a ragged outcast, coughing painfully and looking ready
to drop into the grave, and he started and looked round the room in
wonderment.

“I am the Rev. Alfred Johnston,” said the outcast, reading aright
the expression of Mr Cooper’s face. “I am really a clergyman,
reduced to this state by my own folly and the wicked persecution of
others. I have heard of your goodness—of your great heart, and your
truly Christ-like compassion, and therefore I have crawled here to
implore your help. Christ did not turn away the greatest sinner,
and if I have sinned you can see I have also suffered. Ah, sir! if
my life were but given me to begin again, how different would be my
condition!”

“But how do you come to be thus reduced?” cried the benevolent old
man, exceedingly sceptical of the truth of the statement. “Surely you
have friends to whom you could appeal before a stranger like me?”

“Friends!” echoed Johnston, in a choking voice, and with a bitterness
which was not exactly assumed; “when did a friend cling to one
in adversity? No, sir! Give me the cold, callous world—the most
unfeeling stranger—before the dearest friend. But I do not ask you to
trust to my statements being true. Write to some of the deacons of
my former church—with all their prejudice and ill-will they will at
least bear testimony to the truthfulness of my statements;” and at
random he named a small town in the west, the furthest away he could
think of on the spur of the moment.

“Give me their names,” gravely returned Mr Cooper. “I may write, and
I may not, but it can do no harm to leave the address. One is so
liable to be imposed upon,” he soothingly added, afraid that he might
have hurt the feelings of an unfortunate and injured man.

Thus cornered, Johnston gave two names, assuring Mr Cooper that
the town was small, and that no other address was necessary
to find these prominent deacons. He then launched out into a
history of himself, partly real and partly imaginative. He had
been unfortunate—exceedingly—in his congregation, and had roused
opposition and animosity by his very bluntness and truthfulness.
At length he had been forced to resign, and supported himself by
tuition and other means till reduced to the verge of starvation.
Then a wicked woman got up a plot against him, and, because he
refused to marry her, lodged information with the police and had him
arrested on a false charge. This charge she supported with gross
perjury, and Johnston had been sent to prison a martyr to his own
resolute goodness. The confession regarding the prison experience
was thrown out merely in case the good man to whom he appealed might
know something of it already. It would be quite impossible to convey
in writing any idea of the plausible manner in which his story was
concocted and narrated. As a preacher Johnston had been eloquent and
persuasive; and now, when so much depended upon the exercise of
these gifts, he carried all before him. It was not all false, and the
hardships he had endured were not all imaginative. Several times Mr
Cooper was moved to tears; and when Johnston concluded by saying he
did not want money, but merely some decent clothing and his passage
paid to the Cape, the good old man was on the point of giving him
what he wished without a word of inquiry. Prudence prevailed, and in
the end Johnston was delighted to hear him say—

“If all you have told me is true, I shall see that you are helped
as you desire. I shall interest several members of our own church,
and perhaps the pastor as well, in your unhappy circumstances, and
possibly they may be disposed to give you help as well.”

“Excuse me, sir,” interposed Johnston, getting alarmed at the
proposal; “spare a sensitive if a fallen man the degradation of
having his sins and sufferings paraded before others. I had rather
want their help than have to appear before these gentlemen and
answer their questions. Let me creep out of the country unseen and
unknown, to begin in a far-off land a nobler life, fearless alike of
recognition and of censure.”

This seemed such a natural request that Mr Cooper hastily agreed, and
promised strict secrecy to all in the city. He then dismissed him
with a trifling sum for his immediate needs, and the request that he
should come back in a day or two—as soon, indeed, as it was possible
to receive answers from the deacons, whose addresses he had just
taken down.

Those who do not know the boundless resources of the rogue of
education will imagine that Johnston had got to the end of his
tether, and would never again dare to look near the benevolent Mr
Cooper, knowing that certain exposure would follow the written
inquiries. Nothing of the kind. The circumstances were just such as
roused Johnston to his keenest activity. From Mr Cooper’s house he
went to a stationer’s and bought some notepaper and envelopes of
different kinds, and, being accommodated with a pen and ink, he wrote
out two polite notes, addressed to the postmaster of the town in the
west he had named, in two different hands, and signed with the names
he had given to Mr Cooper, requesting that any letters which might
arrive for him should be re-addressed to two different addresses in
Edinburgh. No one but an expert looking at these notes could have
guessed that they were penned by the same man—the handwriting, the
phraseology, the notepaper, and the style were entirely different.
They were posted at once, and thus arrived one mail in advance of
Mr Cooper’s two notes, which were at once re-addressed as directed,
and duly delivered into Johnston’s hands. To write replies for the
two imaginary deacons was then an easy matter; to get them duly
authenticated with the post-mark of the town in question was more
difficult. But during the interval, Johnston had called upon Mr
Cooper, and made such rapid progress in his favour that he had not
only been provided with a complete suit of clothes, but had been
allowed to dine with Mr Cooper and his wife. So much familiarity
implied also the gift of some money, and part of this money Johnston
now hastened to use in a trip to the west. He left Edinburgh by an
early train, posted the letters in the town, and took the first train
back to Edinburgh, which he reached in time to take tea with the
good man he had imposed upon. The same evening Mr Cooper chanced to
mention that in a day or two he would have in his possession a large
sum of money, out of which he intended to pay a steerage passage for
Johnston to the Cape. The place where he kept his money was already
known to Johnston, from the fact that a pound note had been taken
from the drawer as a present to the broken-down minister. This place
was a small parlour on the ground floor, easily accessible from a
green behind the house. The window was fastened with an ordinary
spring check, but that was no impediment to a man of Johnston’s
experience; and the shutters were seldom closed, and certainly not
fastened at night. A great scheme flashed upon Johnston’s brain. At
first his only desire and concern had been to get clothing and a
passage to the Cape; now, however, the bloodthirsty excitement of
the old convict and jail-bird crept over his faculties, and goaded
him on to a greater haul. He would empty the drawer the first night
the money was there to take. There would be but one night in which
the crime could be committed, for Mr Cooper had shown no reserve or
concealment of his plans, and Johnston knew that on the following
day most of the money would be paid away in quarterly accounts, &c.
With part of the money given him by the benevolent man, he bought
some housebreaking implements—a thin putty knife to force open the
spring fastening of the window, a bracebit to cut an arm-hole in the
shutters if they should happen to be closed and fastened; and lastly,
a leaden-headed neddy or life-preserver with which to smash the skull
of anyone who might oppose or attempt to capture him. Fate might
order it that that victim should be the white-haired and warm-hearted
man who had helped him in his sore plight—well, so be it; he had
not the ordering of fate, and was content to risk even that. As to
escaping after the crime, he trusted to his own experience and skill
in disguising himself; and even if a swift flight were impossible, he
knew several who would be only too glad to hide him, with such a sum
in his possession, till the hue and cry were over.

Thus provided for every emergency, Johnston went down to the house at
Bonnington one evening after dark, ostensibly to hear the result of
Mr Cooper’s letters to the imaginary deacons, but really to ascertain
if the money was in the house, and to see how the room lay for his
midnight attempt. He was shown into the very parlour he was most
anxious to reconnoitre, and left there so long alone that he began
to get alarmed, although the interval had given him the opportunity
to draw back the spring fastening of the windows and reclose the
shutters as he found them, adjusting the slender hook which fastened
them so lightly that a mere touch from the outside would drive them
open. At length Mr Cooper appeared, looking grave and concerned, but
Johnston’s alarm was speedily dispelled by hearing his benefactor say—

“You will excuse me for keeping you waiting so long, but the truth is
my grandchild—the little girl you saw at the table the other night—is
not very well, and we have thought it advisable to send for a doctor.
I thought she had only caught a little cold, but now she has lost her
voice and can only speak in a whisper, and seems, besides, to be in
a state of high fever as well. Oh, if anything should happen to her,
I could never get over it. She is only ten, and the last one left to
us.”

Johnston offered a few commonplace words of a soothing nature, and
then adroitly turned the conversation to the subject of the letters
from the “deacons.”

“Oh, I have got answers from both, and they are satisfactory in every
respect,” said Mr Cooper, rousing himself a little, and producing the
two letters concocted and posted in the West by Johnston himself, and
frankly placing them in the hands of that arch-rogue. “You may read
them for yourself, and consider it settled that I shall give you the
assistance you require—a passage to the Cape. Willingly would I give
twice that sum to see that poor child well and strong as usual——”

A ring at the door-bell interrupted the speech, and Mr Cooper started
up and again left Johnston alone, with the words, “Ah! at last, there
is the doctor.”

The intending criminal sat there and heard the doctor admitted
and led to the bedroom of the sick child. Then there was a long
stillness, and at last the footsteps sounded in the lobby; the doctor
whispered for a time with Mr Cooper, and finally the front door
closed and the carriage drove off. Some slow and feeble footsteps
then came in the direction of the parlour door, and in a moment or
two Mr Cooper stood before Johnston, ghastly pale, and tottering, and
with the tears gathering thick in his eyes.

“Oh, my friend, the worst of news!” he at length found voice to say,
as he sank feebly into a seat and covered his face with his hands.
“The doctor says it is not a simple ulceration of the throat, as we
imagined—the trouble is diphtheria! and—and it is so far gone that he
does not believe she will recover!”

Before that awful grief and those flowing tears Johnston was stricken
dumb, and he uneasily began to wish himself a mile from the spot. In
broken accents the stricken old man proceeded to describe the nature
of the disease—how a kind of fungus had begun to grow across the
windpipe, which would shortly choke the breath out of the young body
as surely as if a strangulating cord had been tightened about the
neck, and how the child, though still chatting cheerily and brightly
in its hoarse whispers, was actually within a few hours of death
and heaven. Johnston felt more uncomfortable than ever. He started
round not to see the grief-stricken face, and something heavy hit
him sharply on the leg. It was the leaden-headed neddy in his coat
pocket, with which he had been prepared to deal out death to any one
opposing him in robbing the man before him. The blow on the leg,
however, was nothing to the knocking which was at that moment going
on in his heart.

“Oh, my friend! you—you are sent to me as a blessing from heaven in
my hour of sore trial!” exclaimed Mr Cooper at last, starting up and
clasping Johnston’s hand in his own, and welling it over with his
warm tears. “Little did I dream of this when I first thought to help
you. God has a purpose in everything. You will come with me to my
darling child; you will pray with her and speak to her of heaven. How
could I pray when my whole heart is rising in rebellion against God
taking the dear child from us? Forgive me! forgive my wickedness—but
she is the only one left—the only one!”

If Johnston had been asked to go up to a cannon’s mouth, that he
might be blown into a thousand fragments, he would have gone more
cheerfully than to the task required. His pale cheeks crimsoned—the
first blush that had visited them for many a day—then he as swiftly
became a ghastly white. He tried to speak, but the words choked him,
and the hand which grasped that of his benefactor was nerveless and
feeble, and cold as ice.

“Excuse me,” he at length managed to falter forth, “but I’d rather
not. I had a girl of my own once who was taken away much in the same
way, and to go through the same experience again would tear my heart
open;” and he sank down in a chair and abjectly covered his face with
his hands.

“Your are not in earnest—you cannot be!” cried the old man, opening
his eyes in wonder. “You surely will not desert me in my hour of
need? I cannot believe you are ungrateful, and your very experience
in the same affliction should help you to console us. I do not care
so much for myself, but my poor wife has set her whole heart upon
that child. Come with me and speak to her—tell her of your own
child—of all you endured, and how God blessed the calamity to your
soul—come, for I fear she will go mad!”

Who could hold out against such an appeal? Johnston rose, and allowed
the old man to lead him slowly to the sick chamber. He was in a
dream—the present and much of the past had fallen away from him as
by magic, and he was looking on a familiar little room, with a sick
child and a tending mother, both of whom hung on his words with
reverence and love. He saw the whole as vividly as if he had looked
upon the real faces there and then, and a great cry struggled for
utterance in his heart—

“My God! my God! have mercy upon me, a sinner!”

He felt some one place a book in his hand, and he opened it
mechanically, and began to read part of Christ’s Sermon on the Mount;
but all the words which fell, in such rich tones and eloquent accents
from his lips, seemed to him to come from the mouth of his own
visionary sick child. The gentle eyes seemed to flash out fire into
his very soul as the words were uttered—“Beware of false prophets,
which come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ravening
wolves. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down
and cast into the fire.”

Johnston was a splendid reader. To listen to him reading was to be
thrilled, but the one most thrilled in that little group was himself.
He seemed for the moment to have been wrenched suddenly out of his
degraded life into a holier, nobler one, long since buried in the
past. They told him afterwards that his conversation with the sick
child seemed inspired—that the very gates of heaven seemed to open
before their eyes under his eloquence, but the man himself remembered
nothing of it.

He saw _those other faces_ all the time; and if his tender words
seemed such as could only come from the lips of a father, it was
simply because he seemed to be addressing his own child. But when his
benefactor led him from the sick-room back to the little parlour the
spell was broken, the vision vanished, and the stricken wretch fell
on his knees and groaned out—

“I am a wretch! I am a scoundrel! Why has not God struck me dead
before your eyes?”

Tears, groans, and imprecations against himself followed; and then,
to the astonishment of his benefactor, Johnston poured forth an
abject confession of the truth—how he had deceived him with the
letters, and actually meditated a midnight robbery with violence
against the very hand that was now pressing his own in such gratitude
and affection.

Mr Cooper, though shocked and horrified, heard the narration as
only a Christian man could. He could not believe that Johnston was
half as depraved and wicked as he imagined himself, and gently and
feelingly reminded the cowering wretch that he had already confessed
to many faults and shortcomings. In the end Johnston was shown out,
and grasped as warmly by the hand in parting as if what he had just
confessed had raised him tenfold in his benefactor’s estimation. As
they were thus bidding each other good night, in the expectation of
meeting again in the morning to arrange for the passage to the Cape,
I stepped out of the shade close by the doorway, and laying my hand
on Johnston’s arm, said sharply to Mr Cooper—

“Do you know that this man is a released convict, and a thief and
housebreaker?”

“I know all that, and more, for he has just confessed all to me,” was
the mild reply.

“Let me warn you that he has this very day bought some housebreaking
tools, which he may use at any moment, even upon your own house,”
I continued, a little astonished that Johnston made no attempt to
escape.

“I know that also, for he has already delivered the tools into my
hands,” said Mr Cooper. “If you choose to come in, you may take them
away with you.”

Quite nonplussed, I accepted the offer, allowing Johnston to depart,
and in a few minutes was told all that had happened. I placed no
reliance upon Johnston’s contrition, and while taking the implements,
again warned Mr Cooper to be strictly on his guard in dealing with
such a wretch.

Very early next morning Johnston returned to the house at Bonnington,
and spent nearly the whole day with the sick child, tending it,
nursing it, and conversing as sweetly and gently as any mother could
have done. This continued for some days, till at length the doctor
pronounced the child out of danger, when Mr Cooper actually, in the
height of his joy and gratitude, went down on his knees before the
degraded minister, and blessed God aloud for sending the man to
his house. A few days later a passage was taken for the apparently
contrite and reformed rogue to one of the colonies, and Mr Cooper
made no secret that he intended to give Johnston, when fairly aboard
the vessel, £50 to start a new life with on the other side. But on
the very morning when the passage-money was paid, Johnston discovered
something wrong with his throat, and his pulse high and fevered, and
went to the Infirmary to ask advice. The house surgeon looked at his
throat, and told him he must remain as an indoor patient, as the
trouble was diphtheria, and the case a serious one indeed. Before
night Johnston had lost his voice, and next day the disease was in
his windpipe. His last words were a written message to Mr Cooper and
his grandchild, bidding them farewell, and adding—“I was asleep in
sin, but God through you awakened me, and now I am not afraid to die.”




TRANSCRIBER’S NOTE

Original spelling and grammar have been generally retained, with
some exceptions noted below. Original printed page numbers have
been removed. Original small caps are now uppercase. Italics look
_like this_. Both of the original footnotes have been converted to
inline text surrounded by square brackets, and placed where the
original footnote anchors were placed. The transcriber produced the
cover image and hereby assigns it to the public domain. Scottish
or Irish proper names such as M^cGovan, M^cBain, M^cKendrick,
etc. were originally printed with a turned comma, similar to the
Unicode character [‹ʻ› U+02BB; MODIFIER LETTER TURNED COMMA] in place
of the superscripted _c_. This character is poorly supported in
current browsers, and so these names have been rendered herein
with superscript _c_. The author of this book is William Crawford
Honeyman (1845–1919), whose pen name is “James M^cGovan”, as
shown on the title page. Original page images are available from
archive.org—search for “tracedtrackedorm00mgovrich”.

Page 19. The phrase ‹and is the light onl at› was changed to ‹and is
the light only at›.

Page 41. Right double quotation mark was added after ‹something being
“hidden safely there,›.

Page 53. Full stop was added after ‹no Corny appeared›.

Page 57. The full stop in ‹common streets of Stockbridge, close by.
The Fin then decided› was changed to comma.

Page 69. Right double quotation mark was added after ‹Oh, what will
become of him when I’m away?›.

Page 85. The phrase ‹point at which he had broken of,› was changed to
‹point at which he had broken off,›.

Page 86. Comma in ‹as ordinary buyers with lots of money,› was
changed to full stop.

Page 91. The phrase ‹companion. I was there› was changed to
‹companion. “I was there›.

Page 96. The phrase ‹prepaid—“Sent by James Paterson, to Robert
Marshall, Linlithgow. To lie at station till called for.”› was
changed to ‹prepaid—‘Sent by James Paterson, to Robert Marshall,
Linlithgow. To lie at station till called for.’”›.

Page 111. The phrase ‹paid a visit to Mr Baninster› was changed to
‹paid a visit to Mr Bannister›.

Page 116. The phrase ‹but with your protrait always› was changed to
‹but with your portrait always›.

Page 122. The phrase ‹id ntifying our man› was changed to
‹identifying our man›.

Page 133. Changed ‹establishment in Princes Street,› to
‹establishment in Princes Street.›.

Page 155. Changed ‹when I’m in you’re hands› to ‹when I’m in your
hands›. Also changed ‹clumsy flatttery› to ‹clumsy flattery›.

Page 198. Changed ‹Greenside was reached There a› to ‹Greenside was
reached. There a›.

Page 225. Left double quotation mark was added to ‹Alfred Johnston,
I’ve›.

Page 233. The phrase ‹who asisted me› was changed to ‹who assisted
me›.

Page 262. The phrase ‹and that John and she were soon to be made
one.”› was printed with a right double quotation mark which has no
matching left mark in the text. This mark has been removed in this
edition. However, another possible interpretation might be ‹and that
John and she were “soon to be made one.”›.

Page 300. The phrase ‹with some biterness› was changed to ‹with some
bitterness›.

Page 315. The phrase ‹it’s a thing ane o⸲ the bairns› was printed
with what would now be represented by the Unicode codepoint [‹⸲›
U+2E32 TURNED COMMA] after ‹o›. The phrase has been changed herein to
‹it’s a thing ane o’ the bairns›.

Page 337. The phrase ‹that particular night. The› was changed to
‹that particular night.” The›.









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