NIGHT-WALKERS—A “NICE JOB”—CLEARING THE PLATE-BASKET—JUST IN TIME—DRUM-HEAD COURT-MARTIAL—FIRST LOVE—A RAT BEHIND THE ARRAS—ON THE TRAIL—AN EFFECTUAL OPIATE

It was a soft dark night—such a night as is peculiar to our temperate climate towards the close of autumn. There was no moon, and not a star to be seen, yet was it not pitch dark, save under the gigantic trees or in the close shrubberies that surrounded Newton-Hollows. A man could see about ten yards before him, and one bound on an evil errand, by cat-like vigilance and circumspection, might have made out the figure of an honest man at that distance, and remained himself unseen. The night-wind sighed gently through the half-stripped hedges; and the fragrance of the few remaining autumnal flowers floated lightly on the breeze. It was a beautiful night for the purpose. “Quite providential,” Mr. Fibbes said, as, clad in a long great-coat, he stumbled up the dark lane that led from Newton station to General Bounce’s residence. His companion made no answer; Tom Blacke was pre-occupied and nervous. It may be that the stillness of the hour, the soothing tendency of all around him, brought back too painfully the innocent days of the past—it may be that he contemplated with some misgivings the hazardous undertaking of the immediate future. Mr. Fibbes, however, allowed no such gloomy reflections to influence his spirits, and the pair proceeded in silence, save where the latter, stumbling in some unseen rut, anathematised the slovenly finish of “these here country roads,” and sighed for the gas-lit pavement of his beloved London. Once Tom halted, grasping his comrade’s arm with a low “Hush!” and whispering in his ear, “that there was a step behind them, walking when they walked, and stopping when they stopped.”

“Hecho,” replied Mr. Fibbes, accounting for the phenomenon by natural causes, but prefixing a superfluous aspirate to the name of the invisible nymph. “Hecho,” said he; “I’ve often knowed it so—’specially at night. But, Tom, what’s up, man? blessed if you ain’t a-shakin’ all over,—have a drain, man, have a drain!” and the never-failing remedy was forthwith produced in a goodly case-bottle from the great-coat pocket. Nor did the doctor neglect his own prescription, and much refreshed the twain proceeded on their way. A slight difficulty occurred in scaling the park-railings, Mr. Fibbes affirming with many oaths that nothing but his weight and the age of his nether garments saved him from being impaled there for life; and the tremendous disturbance occasioned by a panic-stricken cock-pheasant compelled a halt of several minutes’ duration, lest the inmates of the Hall should have been aroused by the vociferous rooster. All was at length still—the church clock at Guyville chimed the half-hour after one. The night grew more cloudy, and the wind died away into a low, moaning whisper. The pair stole across the lawn, like two foul shades returning to the nether world. A heavy foot-mark crushed Blanche’s last pet geranium into the mould. Tom shook like an aspen leaf, much to the covert indignation of Mr. Fibbes, and they reached the scullery window unheard and unsuspected.

“Gently, now!” Why does Tom shake so, and even Mr. Fibbes, with his bull strength and iron nerves, feel so ill at ease, so willing even now to go back a guiltless trespasser, and leave the job undone? But no—it has been boasted of in anticipation at their flash resorts; what would the professionals think? Why, the very detectives would sneer to learn that “Leary Tom” and “the Battersea Big ’un” had been frightened at their own shadows, and after a long journey into the country had returned bootyless to London, the sleepers undisturbed—the “crib uncracked.” “Gently, again!”—a jackdaw on the roof brings their hearts into their mouths; were it not for the case-bottle they would “drop it” even now. Another pause, and Mr. Fibbes, summoning all his energies, proceeds to act. Gently and stealthily he produces the brown paper, and the treacle with which it is to be smeared. Lightly he applies it to the selected pane, Tom turning the dark-lantern deftly on the job. How ghastly the white face on which a chance ray happens to gleam! Warily—gradually—the heavy hand presses harder, harder still, and the glass gives way; but the faithful treacle absorbs every stray fragment, and not a particle reaches the ground either without or within. Fortune favours the rogues; the shutters have not been put up. They are in for it now, and both gather confidence, Mr. Fibbes assuming the initiative. A large dirty hand gropes through the broken pane, and the hasp of the window is moved cautiously back; but with all their care it gives a slight click, and again they pause and listen with beating hearts. “The grease,” whispers Mr. Fibbes to his confederate, and the sashes being plentifully smeared with that application, the window opens noiselessly to the top. Admittance thus gained to the body of the place, our housebreakers are now fairly embarked on their enterprise. Their shoes are pulled off and stowed away in their pockets. The centre-bit is got in readiness, and Mr. Fibbes feels the edge of his long knife with a grim sense of dogged, bloodthirsty resolution. All is, however, in their favour. The scullery door is left open, and they reach the passage on the ground-floor without the slightest noise or hindrance. And here we may remark for the benefit of those who are affected by nervous apprehensions of their houses being “burglariously entered and their property feloniously abstracted,” to use the beautiful language of the law—that there is no precautionary measure better worth observing than that of carefully locking on the outside the door of every room on the ground-floor, and leaving the key in the lock. There are three things, it is said, of which the housebreaker has a professional horror—a little dog loose, an infant unweaned, and a sick person in extremis. The first is an abomination seldom permitted where there is anything worth stealing; the second, a misfortune which Nature kindly suffers only to exist at considerable intervals; the third, a calamity to which we may hope not to be subjected very often in a lifetime. In the absence, then, of these unwelcome defences, every door secured as above makes an additional fortification against the enemy. The thief having perhaps effected a skilful and elaborate entrance into your dining-room, where he finds no booty but an extinguished lamp and a volume of family prayers, must commit a fresh burglary before he can reach your study, or wherever you keep your small stock of ready money for household expenses; and though he came in at the window, reversing the usual order of things with an unwelcome visitor, he finds it no easy matter to get out at the door. The probability is he will hardly work through three solid inches of mahogany, for he cannot conveniently pick the lock, if the key is left in it, without some little noise. Thus (although to the damage of your upholstery) you get an additional chance of being aroused, and a few minutes more time to betake yourself to your weapons, whether they consist of an unloaded blunderbuss, a twelve-barrelled revolver (out of order), or a hand-candlestick and a short brass poker. In the meantime, your placens uxor, uttering piercing shrieks out at the window, alarms the country for miles round, and, what is more to the purpose, frightens the robber out of his wits, who decamps incontinently, leaving no further marks of his visit than a window-frame spoilt, an inkstand or a jar of curry-powder upset, and a small box of lucifer-matches, his own property, and seized on by you as the spolia opima of this bloodless victory.

Stealthily, noiselessly, like the tiger on his velvet footfall, our two ruffians glide along the passage towards the butler’s sleeping-room, where the plate is kept. Small need have they of the dark lantern, so accurately have they studied the plan of the house, so apt are they in their nefarious trade. But they have reckoned without their host upon that official’s absence at Bubbleton; the late arrivals from Africa have kept him at home. However, he has been celebrating their return so cordially that, as far as being aroused and making an alarm goes, he might as well be a hundred miles off. They pass the lantern twice or thrice across his sleeping, open-mouthed face, and Fibbes feels the edge of his knife once more, with devilish ferocity, ere the centre-bit is brought into play, and a hole bored in the plate-cupboard, which soon makes the robbers masters of its contents. That receptacle is emptied, and its treasures transferred to the blue bag, with astonishing silence and celerity. The adepts, growing bold with impunity, almost regret the deep slumbers of the inmates, sufficiently attested by the prolonged snores resounding from that portion of the basement where the other male servants repose, and arguing that the jollifications of the evening have not been confined to the somnolent butler alone: had the garrison been more on the alert, think the invaders, there would have been more satisfaction in foiling them, and it would have been a “more creditable job” altogether. Hush! is that a footfall along the passage? They stop and listen intently. The kitchen clock ticks loudly throughout the darkness, but other sound is there none. They resume their labours. By this time the plate is packed; the great object of the foray has been attained—melted silver tells no tales—and there is nothing further to be done than to strip the drawing-room of such portable articles as are worth the carrying, and so decamp in triumph. Up the back-stairs they steal. The General hates a door to slam, in which aversion we cordially agree with him; and the green-baize one communicating with the offices revolves noiselessly on its hinges. So they glide through without hindrance, and on past that statue the nudity of which had shocked Tom’s sense of propriety on a previous occasion. Mr. Fibbes, who is of a facetious humour when under excitement, seizes the dark-lantern, and turns its glare full upon this work of art, with a high-seasoned joke. They reach the drawing-room door; for the space of a minute they listen intently; prolonged snores from the direction of the General’s apartment pervade the house; other sounds there are none. Cautiously the lock is turned, and the door thrown quickly open, that no creaking hinge may betray them by its moan. A gleam of light well-nigh blinds them, accustomed to the darkness of the passages through which they have been groping; and Mr. Fibbes, who enters first, starts back, paralysed for a moment by the unexpected apparition of a female figure robed in white, and shining like some unearthly being in the strong light of his lantern turned full upon the place she occupies. The figure starts up, and utters a long piercing shriek. There is no time for deliberation; Tom hisses a frightful oath into his confederate’s ear, and the big ruffian gripes Blanche’s white throat in one hand, whilst the other gropes in his dress for the long knife. Already the blade quivers aloft in the candle-light. Crash!—a terrific blow levels the villain to the floor. Tom, turning madly to escape, finds himself in the powerful grasp of Frank Hardingstone, who shakes him as a terrier would shake a rat—Frank’s extremely airy costume being highly favourable to such muscular exertions. Bells peal all over the house; lights are seen glancing along the passages; female voices rise shrill and high, in scream and sob and voluble inquiry. Charlie and Mary Delaval meet on the stairs, and he only exclaims, “What is it? Thank God, you are safe!” The General rushes tumultuously down in a scanty cotton garment, disclosing the greater portion of a pair of extremely sturdy supporters, and in which, crowned with a red nightcap, and armed moreover with a short brass poker, he presents the appearance of some ancient Roman of “the baser sort,” inciting his brother-plebeians to an agrarian tumult. “Guard, turn out!” shouts the General, in a voice of thunder. “Murder, thieves! Let me get at ’em; only let me get at ’em!” And he bursts into the drawing-room, where he beholds Frank still shaking Tom Blacke, who is by this time nearly strangled; Blanche in a “dead faint” on the sofa; Mr. Fibbes’ huge body extended senseless on the floor, and standing over him, apparently ready to knock him to shivers again the very instant he should show the slightest symptom of vitality, our old friend, rough, honest, undaunted Hairblower!

“Drum-head court-martial!” exclaimed the General, as he struggled hastily into a somewhat warmer costume than that which he had worn during the brunt of the action—“drum-head court-martial at three in the morning. Zounds! I only wish I was in India, I’d have ’em hanged in front of the house before breakfast-time. Frank—hollo!—march the prisoners into my study, under escort, my boy, and be d——d to them. No, I will not swear,” and the General took his place at his study-table, with all the pomp and circumstance of a district court-martial, as the hapless housebreakers, with their arms pinioned behind them, and guarded by the whole male strength of the establishment, were paraded before him, Hairblower bringing up the rear, and keeping his eye steadily fixed on Mr. Fibbes, as if only watching his opportunity for an insubordinate movement on the part of that individual to knock him down again. Mr. Fibbes maintained a dogged silence throughout; save once, when he muttered a complimentary remark, containing the figurative expression, “white-livered son of a ----,” supposed to be explanatory of the state of prostration in which he saw his fellow-prisoner. Tom Blacke was utterly unnerved; he cried, and shook, and staggered like a man with the palsy, and would have gone down on his knees to the General, had he not been forcibly held up by the two tall footmen, who seemed to mistrust even the slightest movement as preparatory to a fresh outbreak of ferocity. “This once,” pleaded the wretched coward, “forgive me this once, General, for the sake of my poor wife—Miss Blanche’s maid she was, sir—only this once, and I’ll confess all—the forgery and everything—you might transport me for life, but you won’t be hard upon me, General—this job wasn’t my doing, ’twas him that set me on it; ’twas his plan, I’ll swear,” pointing to Mr. Fibbes, whose countenance was expressive of intense contempt and disgust. “Well,” muttered that gentleman, as if this was indeed a climax, “well, I am ——,” something which he certainly was not, however much the mode of life he affected might eventually lead to such a consummation. “Forgery!” exclaimed the General, “what? Zounds! here’s something of importance! swear him—no, he’s on his trial—take his words down in writing—forgery indeed!—here’s a pretty discovery!” As Blacke became more composed, out it all came—how his wife had forged Mrs. Kettering’s name, and obtained the legacy, and got the will proved, through that knowledge of the law which he was always ready to turn to evil account—the whole confession, which was indeed full and satisfactory, for he was frightened into telling the truth, closing with another earnest appeal for mercy, and another denunciation of his dogged confederate.

The General was in raptures—Blanche was an heiress once more—even Charlie’s contumacious refusal to be married against his will was now a matter of secondary importance. In his delight he would have let both the rogues go, and pledged himself not to prosecute them, had Frank Hardingstone not reminded him that the duty he owed to civilised society would hardly admit of such injudicious lenity; so the prisoners were marched off, still under a numerous and voluble escort, and carefully locked into a coal-house, whence, it is needless to observe, they made an easy escape within two hours, when their temporary gaolers, after beer all round, returned to their repose—nor should we omit to mention that they were retaken by the London police within five days, and eventually transported—Mr. Fibbes for fourteen years, and Tom Blacke, in consideration of divers little matters that came up against him, for the term of his natural life.

But in the meantime, the General, his guests, and servants, returned to their respective couches. Blanche, after the administration of such restoratives as ladies alone understand, was put to bed by Mary Delaval, who would not leave her till she saw her sink into a quiet refreshing slumber—then the governess too sought her room, and oh! what a happy heart she carried with her to her rest. “Thank God, you are safe!” It was but five words—yet what depths of joy and hope and tenderness that short sentence opened up—what a different world it was now—true, they were far apart as ever in reality, but she felt that in the bright realms of fancy they were linked in a bond that could never be forgotten—“yes, he loved her.” ’Twas his cousin’s scream that had disturbed him in his chamber; ’twas his cousin, his betrothed wife, as she had once thought, who was in peril and distress; yet in all the hurry and confusion of the moment, she, the poor governess, was uppermost in his thoughts. “Thank God!” he said, “you are safe!”—yes, he loved her, he loved her, and he was hers for evermore. They would never be united in the material world; other duties, other affections would supplant her in his outer life, his every-day existence—but when the cloud of sorrow overshadowed him—when joy more than common flooded him in its golden light—when a strain of music, or a gleam of sunshine, or the song of a bird, or the ripple of a stream touched his higher nature—whenever the springs of feeling gushed up in his inmost heart, then would her image rise to vindicate its sovereignty over its spiritual being—then would she claim him and possess him as her own, her very own. First love is a fatal illusion—the plant may never come into full bloom—it may blossom but to be cut down—it may be nipped by bitter frosts or rent by the blustering gale—it may be trodden into the dirt by rude feet, and covered by grass mould, or spotted by the slime of trailing reptiles. For years it may be buried and forgotten, yet when the south wind breathes its fragrance over earth, when the gentle rain descends from heaven, its fibres will again put forth their leaves; from its burial-place the meek plant will again raise its head above the surface, and its perfume will steal over the senses like a sigh from Paradise. So thought Mary with regard to that superstition. To do them justice, women in general cling with wonderful tenacity to this article of their faith. Poor things! they seldom have it in their power to observe it practically, but their adoration in theory for the holiness and inviolability of first love is all the more disinterested and edifying. So Mary lay awake for hours in an ecstasy of happiness, and when she did close her eyes what wonder that her dreams, take whatever shape they would at first, invariably resolved themselves into a circle of merry-makers, and in the middle a figure on its knees before her, with fair, upturned face, and tender, smiling lips, whispering, “Thank God, you are safe!”

It is now high time that we should explain by what fortunate train of circumstances Hairblower and Blanche should have met at that critical moment, when the astonished girl found herself in the grasp of a ruffian, who but for the timely intervention of the seaman’s arm, would in all probability have murdered her on the spot. Her champion’s own account of his proceeding was so intermixed with professional terms and peculiar phrases, which in his vocabulary possessed an entirely different meaning from that which is found attached to them in Johnson’s Dictionary, or any other standard authority on the English language, that we prefer giving it in our own words, merely observing that the whole robbery and rescue was a proceeding which he designated “special,” and should, indeed, be considered, so he said, “a circumstance from beginning to end.” Hairblower, then, having transacted his fishing affairs with his “governor,” as he called him, in which interview, we have since been informed, the “governor,” a shrewd, hard-headed man of business, got very much the better of the seaman; and having failed in his intention of making a ceremonious call on his foreign friends, “the True-blues,” who were then making a tour of the provinces, was irresistibly impelled by a species of morbid curiosity to revisit the scene of his former misfortunes. So he actually turned into the very public-house where he had been robbed on his previous visit to London; and finding no one there but the bar-maid (a late acquisition), very quietly had his dinner and drank his beer in the small snuggery of the bar, which we have mentioned as being lighted by a window from the identical room in which Tom Blacke and Mr. Fibbes were in the habit of holding their nefarious consultations. The seaman had paid for his liquor, and was in the act of departing—in fact, the girl thought he had already gone, when the two housebreakers entered the door, and Hairblower, resisting his first impulse, which was to do battle on the spot with the twain, “one down, t’other come on,” shrank back unobserved into the little room he had been occupying, and taking off his shoes, concealed himself behind an old-fashioned chest that stood against the wall. His first idea was to remain in hiding till the two worthies should have arrived at the height of their jollification, and then, bursting in upon their banquet, to administer to each what he termed “his allowance.” The conversation, however, which he overheard was of such a nature as to modify considerably this desire for immediate blows, and when the horrid method of silencing the alarm likely to be raised by some female watcher was discussed in cold blood as a matter of regular business, the listener’s hair stood on end as he resolved, come what might, to prevent this deliberate and inhuman murder.

But Hairblower was completely in the dark still as to the “where” and the “when” of the intended burglary. He could not therefore warn the inmates, nor had he time to inform the police. He could but watch the plotters, lie still, and listen. Little thought Tom Blacke, when he looked outside the door and peeped through the red-curtained window, as he imagined to make all safe, that the avenger in the shape of his old sailor friend was within five yards of him; little thought Mr. Fibbes, in his acoustic speculations about “Hecho,” that in this instance hers was a substantial frame dogging his every footstep, a strong heavy arm ready and willing to strike him to the earth. They thought they were secure at least of all outside the house, and they took their measures accordingly.

But honest Hairblower enjoyed one of those enviable organisations to which fear seems positively unknown, and when he reflected that, in his ignorance of where they were bound and when their plot was to be ripe, his only chance was never to let the ruffians out of his sight till he could place them in safe custody, it seemed to him the most natural thing in the world, alone and unarmed, to dog the footsteps of two desperate men, one of whom was an acknowledged murderer. He followed them accordingly from the house; he waited on the opposite side of the street whilst they got their implements from Tom’s lodgings; he arrived at the station twenty yards behind them, stole up and heard them take tickets to “Newton,” took a similar one himself, and sat down in the very next carriage to them, with the collar of his pea-jacket pulled high over his face, and a guard placed upon his lips, lest his old acquaintance should by any means overhear and recognise his voice. As he journeyed down, he thought over every possible plan by which he could frustrate the robbery. If he gave them into custody with the railway people, he could prove nothing; they were two to one; they would not hesitate to swear black was white, and they might easily turn the tables upon him, and perhaps succeed in transferring him to durance vile instead of themselves. If he asked for assistance from a fellow-passenger (and there was one stout-made countryman in whom Hairblower was sorely tempted to confide) he would probably not be believed, or at any rate the explanation and consequent watching would be very likely to place the ruffians on their guard. No, he would do it all himself. He could rely on his own stout heart and powerful frame; he would hunt them to the world’s end. At Newton station great caution was necessary. He remained in the train till they had left the platform, then nimbly jumped out as it was on the point of starting, and delivering up his ticket, got clear of the building in time to distinguish their footsteps stealing up the lane not fifty yards ahead of him. This distance he cautiously diminished. Like most sailors, he could see pretty well in the dark, and was used to going barefoot, so taking his shoes off once more, he had no difficulty in keeping within earshot of the chase. At last they reached the house; Hairblower no more knew whose it was than the man in the moon; but he had determined, as soon as they were all safe inside, to make a dash at Tom Blacke, knock him senseless, close with Fibbes, and alarm the inmates; thus, he thought, they will be taken in the fact. Had he known his dear Miss Blanche was in jeopardy, perhaps he might not have been so cool. Fortunately, sailors are so used to every sort of difficulty that it is next to impossible to put one wrong, and Hairblower managed to creep through the scullery window nearly as deftly as either of the professionals, with whom proficiency in such exercises is a necessary part of their trade. Whilst they robbed the butler’s pantry he stood behind the door; but the moment, he thought, had not yet arrived. In that small room, he calculated, he had hardly space to “tackle” with them properly, and with admirable coolness waited a better opportunity, and followed them up-stairs. As they entered the drawing-room he was close upon them; and had it not been that he was as much startled as Fibbes himself at the apparition of “Miss Blanche,” his arm would have been raised an instant sooner, and might perhaps have saved that young lady a fainting-fit, as it did save her life. As he turned to seize Tom Blacke he beheld him in the grasp of Mr. Hardingstone, and then Hairblower felt indeed that he could have encountered a host; but by this time the house was alarmed, and further violence unnecessary.

Now, although we are aware that it is not customary for well-nurtured damsels to sit with lighted candles in drawing-rooms at an hour when the rest of the family have retired to rest, yet allowances must be made for such as have the misfortune to be in love. This was Blanche’s case, and being unable to sleep, she wisely slipped on her dressing-gown, and stole down-stairs for the purpose of getting the last new novel, then lying on the drawing-room table, and administering it as the never-failing soporific. When there, she found the room so much more comfortable than her own, that she lit the candles and sat quietly down to read, till disturbed by what she thought at the moment a frightful apparition. Her delight at recognising Hairblower when she came to her senses was only equalled by the enthusiasm of that formidable auxiliary himself, who with difficulty refrained from embracing her on the spot, a mode of worship in which Frank Hardingstone would willingly have joined. That gentleman, we have reason to think, was in love too; at least, on the night in question he was restless and fidgety, and courted slumber in vain. Then he heard a door open, and got up and put on a few clothes, and then he fancied he distinguished a stealthy footfall in the passage below; so he too left his room, and arrived on the scene of action in the nick of time. How the disturbance of that night influenced the destiny of several of the party it is not now necessary to state, nor can we tell what Frank saw, heard, or felt, to induce him the following morning to send to Bubbleton for his horses, and to make such arrangements as argued his intention of protracting his visit at Newton-Hollows during some considerable portion of the hunting-season. We are satisfied, however, although she did not say so, that this arrangement was by no means unwelcome to Blanche Kettering.