 
Transcriber's Note:
THE IMPENDING SWORD.
LONDON: | ||||||||||||||||||||
CONTENTS OF VOL. II.Book the Second.THE CRIME. | |
| CHAP. | |
| I. | DOWN TO LIVERPOOL. |
| II. | TRAPPED. |
| III. | HELEN'S JOURNAL. |
| IV. | 'SCOT FREE.' |
| V. | A BLAZE OF TRIUMPH. |
| VI. | STARTLING NEWS. |
| VII. | ONLY TOO TRUE. |
| VIII. | THORNTON CAREY. |
Book the Second.
THE CRIME.
CHAPTER I.
DOWN TO LIVERPOOL.
Bryan Duval had not forgotten his promise to Miss Montressor. Early in the morning of that eventful day, when she and Mr. Dolby had parted so strangely, and before she had even yet shaken off the extra slumber occasioned by the fatigue of the Richmond dinner, the fair actress had received a letter from her entrepreneur which ran thus:
'My dear Clara,--The business which I feared might possibly have detained me has been smoothed over, and we positively sail on Saturday, in the Cuba. We shall go down to Liverpool by the twelve o'clock train, on Friday, stop the night at the Adelphi, and have plenty of time to see our traps--and what with music scores, promptbooks, and costumes, I have a tolerable amount of luggage--comfortably on board one of the first tenders which will be despatched to the ship. I think we shall be a pleasant party. I have concluded engagements with Mrs. Regan, for old women and heavies, with Skrymshire for first low comedy, and with Cooington for walking gentleman and utility. He is a nice-looking young fellow, can make-up very fairly, and will, consequently, make an excellent foil for me; all the other people I can get over there, but these are absolutely necessary. Cooington will be especially valuable. You are young, and your ideas of the dreadful are, probably, vague, but when you have once seen an American jeune premier, with his peculiar style of hair and costume, they will immediately become definite.
'By the way, my dear, talking about costumes, I think it would be advisable that you should have two first-rate evening gowns--don't fly into a rage now. Your toilette yesterday was particularly good, and I have no doubt you show quite as much good taste in your evening dress, but I want something exceptionally stylish; you will be seen a great deal more in public over there than you are here. You will probably have a reception, as they call it, from one of their artistic societies, and on off-nights will have to show-up at the opera, or one of the other theatres; and as our good friends on the other side attach immense importance to dress--and rightly too, according to my notions--I want you at once to send a pattern-body to Madame Lagrange, 118 Rue Vivienne. That's all! You need take no further trouble about the matter. I have written to old Lagrange by this post--I have known her ever since I was a boy--and told her exactly what you want; for my sake the old lady will put on all steam, and you will have your gowns in time to pack them for America. I have also desired Madame Lagrange to send the bill to me, a liberty which, I trust, under the circumstances, you will excuse.
'I have an enormous number of things to get ready before I start; the rehearsal of Pickwick's Progress to superintend at the Gravity, and an action to bring against a rascal in the North who has been producing an exact copy of the Cruiskeen Lawn, fights, songs, Irish wake, and all under the title of the Jug of Punch. The copyright law in this country is disgraceful. By the way, did you see those absurd remarks in the Earwig about me and Mr. Dickens, in connection with Pickwick's Progress? I mention this in case I may not be able to call upon you before we start, so that you may be perfectly sure to be at Euston very soon after eleven. Till then good-bye.
'Yours always,
'BRYAN DUVAL.
'P.S.--What a good dinner it was yesterday, and how very jolly we all were! I have taken a great fancy to Foster, he seems to be an exceptionally good fellow. He talks of coming down to Liverpool to see us off. If he does, I shall make a point of giving him a dinner at the Adelphi the night before we sail--they have some green turtle there--but women don't understand these things.'
'Mr. Foster is an exceptionally good fellow,' said Miss Montressor, laying down the letter, 'and you are another, Bryan Duval. This experience confirms me in my opinion, that whenever you hear men bitter and disparaging in their remarks about a man who is before the world, and who is successful, he is sure to prove remarkably pleasant, agreeable, and kind-hearted. Now I am sure nothing could be more thoughtful or more delicate than Mr. Duval's suggestion about those gowns, and what a queer fellow he is too!' she said, taking up the letter again; 'fancy his writing about a "pattern-body"--he seems to know everything.'
By this time the fact of the great actor-author's departure for America, taking with him a select troupe for the purpose of playing certain of his own pieces, had been heralded in the newspapers, and had created as much excitement as even he could have wished. Most of the journals congratulated Mr. Duval on the engagement, and the Americans on the fact that they were about to renew their acquaintance with that distinguished combination of literature and art, who would add fresh laurels to the wreath which had already adorned his brows, and from this they proceeded in a tone of patronage towards the Western hemisphere generally, telling it how thankful it ought to be in having such a school of talent as England to draw upon for its artists.
Some of the other journals, however, the conductors or writers of which had a personal pique against Mr. Duval, did not think so strongly on the matter. They averred, roundly enough, that the autumn was the usual time for English actors to go out to America, and not the spring; and that probably the reason which induced Mr. Duval to take his departure from his native country at the present time was that he was entirely played out and used up there, and he hoped to recoup himself by repeating his previous success in America, an expectation which would be undoubtedly disappointed.
Mr. Duval read these various reports with equal delight. He liked being praised; but he did not in the least mind being found fault with.
'I like to see 'em pitch in,' he would say, slowly rubbing his hands together, with a broad grin, such as those who had only seen him in his melo-dramatic parts on the stage, could never believe him capable of giving. 'I like to see them pitch in; it shows their interest in me. I would sooner that they would write about me with bradawls dipped in vitriol, rather than that they should say nothing. This,' touching one of the journals before him, 'is Cosby's doing. Cosby is a stupid ass. I have told him so in print and by word of mouth many a time and oft. I have dropped down hot and heavy upon Cosby frequently, and he don't forgive that. When my Varco the Vampire was produced at the Parthenon, Cosby's original comedy of Gold and Gloom (taken from a play of Maquet and Dumas, produced at the Porte St. Martin in '52--I have it there in the bookcase, and can show it to you) was brought out at the Gravity. Varco ran for one hundred and fifty nights, when I stopped it myself, as I wanted a little chamois shooting in Styria, and Gold and Gloom fizzled out in a fortnight. Cosby didn't like that--he don't like the notion that my Pickwick's Progress is about to be produced at the Gravity, which he looks upon somewhat as his own theatre; he don't like, what he knows to be the fact, that I have a splendid engagement with Van Buren in New York, and so he writes these lies about me, thinking to rile me and to draw me out. No good, dear Cosby; no good, dear boy. There is nothing makes a venomous ruffian like that so wild as to completely ignore his attack, and if you chance to meet him in the street, greet him with the utmost politeness; you need not take his hand, but you also need not put your fist into his face. Cosby will watch the papers daily, looking for an indignant letter from me in reply to his screed; but he will find none; and if I see him at the first night of Pickwick's Progress, I shall wag my head at him, and express a hope that he is pleased with the entertainment.'
But though he declined to resent this newspaper controversy, Mr. Duval found more than enough to occupy his mind and to fill up his time. Half a dozen needy persons belonging to the theatrical profession--not adventurers, and in no way dishonest--simply men and women who, from stress of circumstances, had undertaken to do something for which they were not in the least qualified, and who consequently had gone to the wall, were simultaneously struck with the brilliant idea that it would be a remarkably good thing for Mr. Duval if he took a temporary farewell of the British public in a performance the proceeds of which should be devoted to their benefit. Others there were who addressed him on the strength of having read that he was about to take a company with him to perform his pieces in the United States, and at once expressing themselves as perfectly certain that such company would not be complete unless they, the writers, joined it in prominent positions with high salaries. In fact, the notice of his departure brought upon him all the horde of impertinent correspondents who prey upon a public man's time, and rob him of such leisure as he might otherwise have; autograph hunters, photographers, who could make it convenient to receive him at any time, sanctimonious begging-letter writers, who declared that his path across the ocean would neither be happy nor successful unless he were blessed with the inward consciousness of having left behind him half a crown to succour modest misery in distress.
Applications such as these Mr. Duval treated with sovereign contempt--he had quite enough real business on hand. His rooms in Vernon-chambers were very much changed from their normal condition; all the nick-nacks were put away, all the pictures and handsome furniture covered over, and in the midst stood enormous boxes, some crammed to repletion, others yet gaping as it were for food, all bearing the great actor's name in large red letters, all marked with the word 'Hold.'
Thither, threading their way among the packages which littered the landings as well as the apartments, came those anxious to have a last few words with Mr. Duval. Mr. Moss Marks, the manager of the Gravity, was there, nervously anxious about the forthcoming Pickwick's Progress, and constantly endeavouring to cut down costly items of furniture and decoration which Duval had insisted upon being provided. Mr. Hodgkinson, too, came to impress upon his friend his parting injunctions, that if he saw anything in the States likely to make a sensation, any 'fakement' likely to hit up the British public, he should wire him at once and send it over by the next boat. There, too, was the great impresario, Wuff, who began to find that camels and coryphÉes spelt bankruptcy as well as Shakespeare, and he was eager to beg a few last words of advice from the omniscient Bryan Duval before he started. Mr. Foster looked in, too, once or twice, to see how his friend was getting on, and to ask whether he could be any use in helping him in his preparations for the voyage.
Nor was Miss Montressor without her visitors. Two days after the announcement of her intended visit to America appeared in the Sunday papers, a mysterious old lady, neatly dressed in black silk, with an old-fashioned bonnet, appeared at the Brompton villa, and giving her name as Mrs. Porter, begged permission to speak for a few minutes to the lady of the house. The page, who, though a sharp boy, was not yet sufficiently versed in his business to gauge the social position of visitors, was about to usher the old lady into the drawing-room, but Justine, happening to pass downstairs at the moment, promptly bade her take a seat in the hall, and took upon herself the task of announcing her arrival.
Miss Montressor started very much at tearing the name, but recovering herself, desired that the visitor should be shown to her bedroom. The old lady bowed when she received the summons; and Justine noticed that she trembled very much as she ascended the stairs. What passed during the interview Justine did not exactly know, though she loitered about the passage to gather as much as she could. First, she heard her mistress's voice in high sharp tones of rebuke, and the old lady apparently pleading. Miss Montressor's voice then softened very much, and the conversation was carried on in a low earnest undertone, mingled, so Justine thought, with sobs from one, if not from both, and just before the door opened she could have sworn she heard a sound as of many kisses, broken with words of blessing and farewell. And Miss Montressor's eyes were very red, and her brilliant complexion rather tear-blurred, after her visitor's departure; and though she speedily rectified this irregularity, she remained singularly quiet and subdued all that evening.
Also, just before the day of her departure, arrived Miss Thomasina Campbell and Miss Georgina Goss, formerly Miss Montressor's colleagues at the T.R.D.L., where they had many a bitter quarrel together; but now that she was going to rid them of her presence, and to interfere no more, her devoted friends. The visit of these young ladies was ostensibly to bid their dear Clara good-bye, but in reality to endeavour to ascertain from her what terms she had got, and what parts she was likely to play, and to look at the dresses she was going to take with her. As regards the first items, they failed lamentably--Miss Montressor spoke vaguely of enormous sums, and of 'leading business,' but declined to enter into any particulars--but as regards the latter, they were gratified to the highest extent. Miss Montressor showed them all her pretty things, and even went to the extent of unpacking an enormous trunk for the sake of displaying the two splendid gowns which had duly arrived from Madame Lagrange, and which were pronounced by staid Miss Campbell to be 'truly superb,' and by giggling Miss Goss to be 'perfect ducks.' When they had seen all the pretty things, and partaken of sherry and seltzer-water, with which gay little Miss Goss moistened a cigarette, they took their leave, not without warning their hostess to beware of the fascinations of Bryan Duval, who, they insinuated, was a heartless wretch who made love to everybody.
Finally, Mr. Foster paid his first and last visit to the young lady in whom he seemed to have taken so kindly an interest.
'You are surprised to see me here, Miss Montressor,' he said, 'more especially when you recollect that you never asked me to call upon you.'
'I am very much delighted to see you, Mr. Foster,' said Miss Montressor frankly, extending her hand to him, 'and I should be more pleased if I did not think that your presence here meant that there was no chance of your sailing with us in the Cuba, on Saturday.'
'It does mean that, indeed,' said Mr. Foster. 'I shall not be able to complete my business so early, but I hope to follow you in a very short time. You are kind enough to say you wish I were coming with you, Miss Montressor, but you cannot regret the impossibility half so much as I do. I am home sick, and that talk which we had the other day about my wife and my belongings has made me more than ever anxious to get back to them.'
'I verily believe it was the chance of another chat about them that procured me the pleasure of this visit,' said Miss Montressor. 'But, however, you shall not be gratified this time. You shall talk to me of nothing but what I shall do in New York, where I shall go, what I shall see, and to whom I must make myself most gracious and agreeable in order to insure my success. By the way,' she added, turning suddenly round to him, 'one thing struck me in thinking over our talk the other day. This business of which you think so much, and in connection with which you came over here, it must be still going on in New York, is it not?'
'Certainly.'
'But not by itself; you must have left it in somebody's charge?'
'Of course, in the charge of my most intimate friend.'
'O, indeed,' said Miss Montressor. 'And Mrs. Foster, she is doubtless with her family--father or mother, or something of that sort?'
'No, indeed, poor Helen is an orphan; she remains at home, in our own house, but I have desired my friend to look after her.'
'The same friend?' inquired Miss Montressor.
'The same friend!'
'O, indeed,' said Miss Montressor, in the same tone. 'It must be a great comfort to you to think that there is some one to whom you can confide your business and your wife with a perfect feeling of security.'
And then they talked of subjects connected with theatricals and New York until Mr. Foster took his departure.
At length the eventful Friday morning arrived, and though, from the ordinary condition of the Euston Station, it would seem impossible that there should ever be any extra bustle there, some little additional excitement might have been noticed. Mr. Bryan Duval, never oblivious of the chances of advertisement, had written to the traffic manager, enclosing a slip cut from the newspaper, announcing his departure, and requesting some extra facilities in the way of transport. The traffic manager, with great politeness, had ordered a saloon carriage to be placed at the disposal of the theatrical party; and thus their intended arrival became known. People who were waiting about on the platform, ordinary passengers and their friends, saw the handsome saloon carriage, and concluding immediately that it must be for some member of the Royal Family, or some other equally distinguished personage, lingered round it in the pleasant expectation of being gratified with the sight of a hat or a beard, the skirt of a robe or the end of a bonnet-string.
They were not, however, much disappointed when, upon inquiry, they learned who were really to be the occupants of the carriage. A live actor or actress in their ordinary citizen garb has an immense attraction for the many-headed, and Bryan Duval was both well known and popular; his very luggage, arriving, as it did, in a huge break, interested them much, and they studied the enormous red letters announcing 'Bryan Duval, passenger per Cuba, New York, U.S.A.,' and the mysterious word 'Hold,' with a feeling akin to awe. The well-informed told the ignorant of the plays he had written and what characters he had played, what a magnificent fortune he had, and what a number of duchesses and marchionesses were dying of love for him.
The great actor was the first to arrive. Ordinary people travel in rough clothes, and drive to the station in a cab. Not so Mr. Bryan Duval. His belief in the necessity of advertising himself remained with him to the last, and the hoofs of the spanking chestnuts, as their master tooled them under the archway, roused the echoes of the Euston courtyard. No sign of vulgar luggage appeared in Mr. Duval's trap--the only hint that he was about to travel might have been found in the natty morocco-leather courier's pouch, slung over his shoulder by a trap; otherwise he might have been going down to a picnic at St. Albans, for he was dressed in a suit of gray dittos, wore a crimson tie, shiny-tip jean boots, and his usual curly-brimmed hat.
The little crowd gathered round him as he drew up to the station, but he pretended to take no notice of them, and to be absorbed in giving directions to his groom. When these were concluded, he was apparently about moving off, when the groom touched his hat, and said, with something like a quiver in his voice, 'Take the liberty of wishing you good-bye, sir--happy voyage and a safe return.'
'Thank you, James, very much,' said Mr. Duval, in his clearest tones. 'Take care of the horses--see that Black Bess and Tantivy are always properly exercised, and remember me very kindly to your wife.' And Mr. Duval moved off midst a murmur of sympathetic admiration from the crowd.
'Sharp fellow that James,' he muttered to himself, as he entered the ticket office; 'spoke that line I taught him deuced well. I shall probably be able to make something of him on the stage when I come back.'
His elation was a little dazed at the sight of Mrs. Regan, who, running up to him, clasped him by both hands, and whose appearance was scarcely calculated to impress bystanders with admiration. This worthy old person, who was of Hibernian descent, and had what is known amongst her countrymen as a 'potato' face, was dressed in a voluminous chintz gown, like bed furniture, and, slung on her arm, carried a check wicker basket, like a soft chess-board, with what was obviously the neck of a bottle protruding from it. He was gratified, however, by the appearance of Mr. Cooington, who, with a feeling that he was about to spend ten days on the ocean, arrived at Euston Station in a yachting costume, a straw hat with a very narrow brim, and a ribbon with 'Plover' in gold letters round it. Mr. Skyrmshire, the low-comedy man, had apparently adopted some of his theatrical wardrobe for travelling purposes, and consequently arrived in a suit of such enormous stripes, that in it he looked like a zebra on his hind legs. He was a practical as well as a poetical humourist too, and combining jocosity with business, carried about with him a number of small labels, printed 'Go and hear Skrymshire, the brilliant Momus,' and gummed at the back, with which he adorned the velveteen jackets of all the porters with whom he came in contact.
And then Mr. Foster arrived, and then Miss Montressor, looking very pretty, and dressed with great simplicity and good taste. Mr. Duval offered her his arm, and led the way to the saloon carriage, the others following. Then rushed out to take a last look that the baggage was all safe, to compliment the inspector and tip the porters, and returned. A whistle, a shriek, Mr. Skrymshire said, 'Give him his head, John,' Mrs. Regan breathed hard and cried, 'Now we're off,' the train moved on a little, and then stopped.
A porter put his head into the carriage in which the actor's party had already begun to lean back, and realise the fact that they had started, and inquired whether the gentleman who owned the portmanteau left at the station an hour ago, and which he had just put into the van, according to orders, was there. The occupants of the carriage glanced at each other, shook their heads in a general negative, and Bryan Duval answered for them, 'No, the gentleman was not there.'
'Beg pardon, gentlemen,' said the porter, 'but I can't find the owner of the portmanteau.'
'And you want your tip, I suppose?' said Bryan Duval, in an undertone, to the man, who was standing on the step of the carriage, with his hands on the door.
'No, sir, I don't,' said the man; 'the gentleman paid me to look after the portmanteau. I only wanted to make sure that he was here, so as it shouldn't go amongst missing luggage, but I can't find him--he isn't in the train.' He fell back, made a sign to the guard, and the train moved on this time, to pursue its way unbrokenly.
'What a horrid nuisance!' said Miss Montressor to Mr. Foster. 'I can't imagine anything more worrying than losing one's luggage.'
'And yet,' said Mr. Foster, 'it is one of those things no one gets pitied for. For my part, I always stick to mine in this country, where matters of that kind are certainly not regulated with the intelligence and attention to public convenience they are amongst us. However, I daresay this gentleman and his portmanteau will not be long parted. That porter was an honest fellow. Shall I pull the window up?'
'No, thanks,' said Miss Montressor. 'I am perfectly comfortable. You have very good notions of travelling, Mr. Foster, and have chosen my seat with admirable discretion. Where is the library?--O, overhead, I see. Not that I care much for reading in a train; it tries one's eyes. Do you always read in the train?'
'That depends on my company,' said Mr. Foster. 'I don't feel inclined to read to-day.'
'Then suppose we make a law that nobody is to read?' said Miss Montressor, looking round upon her companions with the proud consciousness of being a leading lady in every sense of the word.
'Never make a law unless you are sure of its being obeyed,' said Bryan Duval drily, as he settled his travelling cap, and ensconced his head in a convenient angle of the partition between his seat and that of his fair neighbour, opposite to whom Mr. Foster was placed, and immediately immersed himself in the pages of the Times.
The journey was a very pleasant one; every one was good-humoured, and Miss Montressor had her own way. She and Mr. Foster talked a good deal more than any of their companions, but the tone of the conversation was necessarily general. Thus, there was no reference on his part to the domestic circumstances which had annoyed Miss Montressor when he confided them to her at Richmond, and her versatile nature had enabled her almost entirely to dismiss the recollection of her sister Bess, except in the general sense of being rather glad than otherwise that she should have an opportunity of seeing her.
In her present sanguine mood, Miss Montressor doubted not that she should be able to induce Bess to say, or to leave unsaid, precisely whatever she pleased to indicate--at the worst, this was an annoyance to be postponed for consideration, until after her arrival on the other side; she was not going to trouble herself about it prematurely.
To tell the truth about Miss Montressor, she thought very little of Mr. Dolby during the pleasant hours of her journey to Liverpool. It would be good fun finding him in New York, and either making up the quarrel which had marked their parting or not making it up, precisely as it should suit her humour and her convenience, when the time had arrived. That, too, she need not think of beforehand. Altogether, Miss Montressor could recall few days in her life which had passed more completely to her satisfaction than that of her departure from London, and she mentioned the fact to Mr. Foster, when, for the first time, she found herself out of hearing of her companions on the arrival of the train, when he gave her his arm to walk along the platform at Lime-street.
During a momentary pause in order to rally their party, the attention of Miss Montressor and Mr. Foster was attracted to the unloading of the luggage van. A solitary portmanteau had been chucked upon the platform with a contemptuous indifference, which is the destiny of waifs and strays among luggage.
'I am sure that is the unclaimed portmanteau,' said Miss Montressor; 'looks new too. What will they do with it?'
'Put it in the parcel-office, of course,' said Mr. Foster, 'for the present, and then they forget all about it.'
The portmanteau, a shiny black one of the most commonplace appearance, lay upon the pavement until all the claimed luggage had been disposed of and wheeled away on trucks to its various destinations; then the waif was carried by a porter to the parcel-office and there deposited, with a brief intimation to the official who resided behind a sliding window, amid huge barricades of packing-cases, hampers, and every description of impedimenta, from camel trunks to brown-paper parcels and stray hand-bags, 'That this 'ere box, name o' Dunn, hadn't been owned.'
Travellers to Liverpool by all trains, at all hours, are a motley crew; all ranks and classes of society, all industries, all circumstances, may be found represented in the voyagers going towards the great outlet of England. The train which conveyed Bryan Duval and his troop was no exception, but rather a notable example of this truth. Only two components of the crowd which were whirled from the great social to the great commercial capital on that particular day have any interest for us; they are our theatrical friends, and one other man, a solitary and insignificant unit among the number.
This man wore a sailor's dress, and carried a parcel, done up in a bit of tarpaulin, under his arm. He had arrived at Euston Station a few minutes before the party whose departure had formed a feature of the day; had stood wholly unnoticed among the third-class passengers crowding that portion of the platform opposite to the pens appointed for their use, and had quietly taken his seat in the farthest corner of the last compartment in the train. There was nothing remarkable in this man's appearance or manner. His sailor's clothes were clean, and fitted with characteristic looseness. He did not remove his cap or relinquish his hold of his tarpaulin bundle, which he placed upon his knees, and folding his arms upon it, kept them there during the whole of the journey. He exchanged not a word with his fellow passengers, except a mechanic and his family about to exchange the used-up old world for the new and happy land--though they thought him a morose surly sort of fellow, no doubt; but they were full of their own hopes, interests, and regrets, which they discussed with the simple unreserve of the poor, and, after a few minutes, did not notice him.
He was a dark-complexioned man, with a rough red beard and hair to match, and had probably but recently adopted the avocation of a sailor, for his hands were rather delicate for a man of that class, and had evidently had no prolonged acquaintance with the ropes or great familiarity with tar. Though he travelled down the whole way to Liverpool without appearing to be conscious of the presence of his immediate companions, this sailor seemed to have some attraction towards the more distinguished passengers by the train. He lingered for a few minutes on the platform on their arrival at Lime-street, though he had put no luggage in the van, and had no occasion to wait while its contents were being turned out and sorted; and during this delay he surveyed,--with an intentness probably caused by his knowledge of their celebrity,--the party of actors as they took their way to the exit. He was but a few steps behind them when they reached the entrance of the station, and he stood in the doorway while they crossed the street on foot and entered the hospitable portals of the Adelphi Hotel, where their rooms had been engaged. When they had gone in, and were quite hidden from his view, he still lingered; indeed, the greater part of the burden which the train had carried had been discharged from the station before this desultory mariner moved on. Even then he only crossed the street, still hugging his tarpaulin bundle under his arm, and slouched along under the windows of the Adelphi, as though the place had some attraction for him.
The contrasts offered by London itself are hardly greater than those to be found in Liverpool; the physical division of the great town into high and low is not more marked than its moral division into luxury and want, into respectability and infamy, into leisure and toil. There is a calm, tranquil, well-bred comfort about some of the uncommercial districts of Liverpool as characteristic and as striking as the splendour of its great streets, the long line of shops, each displaying the products of the teeming wealth of many countries, and are lost in those wonderful masses of warehouses, stores, factories, and shipping offices, which epitomise the whole history of commerce in its greatest forms, while they exhibit it in its minutest detail. The actual story of the world in its most practical, and at the same time not in its least romantic, aspect may be read by him who runs--if his hurried way should take him past the great landing-stages which project upon the Mersey. All the interests of life in its present crowded phase, and in its extended intercourse of business and of greatness, find their symbols there; its transitoriness, its change, its tumultuous variety, its youthful hope, its keenest anxieties, its bitterest partings, have found their theatre there since the first ship brought in the wealth of a foreign land, and the first ship carried out the produce of our own. The steadiest industry, the most inveterate vagabondism, find their representatives among the population of Liverpool; there is no place in existence in which the student of human nature may discover more to interest, to edify, to puzzle, and to appal him.
The sailor who had travelled by the five-o'clock train to Liverpool was seemingly possessed by a great curiosity concerning the commercial city. He had not eaten or drunk since early in the day; but this circumstance, rarely devoid of interest to persons of his class, seemed to trouble him but little. He had not turned into any eating-house, he had not visited any drinking-bar; but he took his way slowly, and always meditatively, along the streets which led to the water-side. In Water-street he lingered long. The great business centres and conduits were emptying themselves of the swarms of human beings whose business lies in the deep waters, who, if they did not go down to the sea in ships themselves, spent their lives in business matters connected with those who do; hurrying crowds jostled the sailor upon the pathways, crowds whose backs were turned upon the direction in which he was going; and as he took his way at a lounging pace, which contrasted curiously with the vigorous hurry and breaking-up air of bustle around him which marks the close of the business day in Liverpool, and the 'coming on of evening mild,' with its welcome recreation, at home or elsewhere, according to the diversity of tastes. The water-side was almost deserted when he debouched upon it from Water-street under the shadow of the huge warehouses.
In the dim light the prosaic landing-stage looked almost picturesque--shortly to be turned to a silver radiance by the yet unrisen moon; the waters of the Mersey lay in solemn calm; in the dim light, the long lines of huge warehouses, with their cumbrous apparatus of crank and pulley, of windlass and stage, looked more than ever like a series of gigantic gallows, prepared for a general execution. The mind speedily loses itself in the mere contemplation of their resources in the way of sacks and bales. To stray into considerations of cotton is to get lost, to think of pig-iron is distraction; the best way is to accept it all as a picture, happily unaccompanied at that hour of the night by the maddening noise of the day-time, and to be satisfied, without attempting to comprehend them, with the vastness, with the wealth, of Liverpool.
Probably this was not the line on which the sailor's thoughts were running when he examined the before-mentioned long range of warehouses, which lie parallel to the great landing-stage, with the wide roadway lying between, to inspire the observer with constant wonder how, by any effort of human industry, it is ever kept in a state of repair. His examination was minute, careful, and marked by one peculiarity. He laid his hand on every door as he passed it by, giving the sturdy panel a strong and stealthy push; in every instance but one, the response to this movement was the steady resistance of a stout bolt. One door, very far down the range, and in a place where already the profoundest tranquillity reigned, fell open at his touch, and the sailor, with a lounging gait of perfectly idle curiosity, ready, if challenged, to apologise for an intrusion on that score, passed into the yard to which the complying portal gave admittance.
It was some minutes before he emerged and began to retrace his steps towards Water-street; but he had now discarded his lounging gait, his step was purpose-like, quick, and wholly out of unison with his dress and appearance; nor had he any longer the uncertain discovery-making manner of a man unacquainted with the locality in which he finds himself for the first time.
He threaded his way with great rapidity through a number of small streets and lanes, best described by the generic term of 'slums,' quite regardless of the sights and sounds in perfect harmony with the neighbourhood, which was a particularly villanous one; he bent his steps to a low public-house, and close to the river.
Here he called for bread-and-cheese, of which he ate sparingly, and for a pot of beer, of which he drank a very small quantity--the meal did not seem to recommend itself to his palate; here, too, he spoke no word, and looked no one in the face, but he passed in and out quite disregarded.
The drinking-den--for it was hardly more--was, indeed, crowded, as it was at most hours of the day, and as far into the night as the police would permit but its occupants were either drinking or quarrelling, or both, and too much engaged in these pursuits to notice the surly newcomer.
Having thus sparingly satisfied the hunger and thirst which he must have been experiencing, the sailor sought for a place of repose. He selected for this purpose a common lodging-house, much in use by men of his craft when on shore, under circumstances which may be briefly described as 'down on their luck.' It was a dirty, ill-ventilated, wretched place, where beds of the very coarsest sacking, with very repulsive-looking bed-clothes, were stretched out in long lines on two sides of the low whitewashed room; a carpetless and matless lane ran up the centre, encumbered with the discarded garments of the occupants of the beds, and every accessory of the scene was unpleasant. The sailor seemed indisposed to avail himself of even the full extent of the accommodation which this uninviting hostelry afforded, limited as it was; he abstained from undressing himself, but flung himself down in his clothes upon the bed which was pointed out to him, and which he was congratulated by the proprietor of this hideous retreat upon having been so fortunate as to secure, as it was the only one which had not already a tenant.
This was not exactly a place in which good order might be expected to reign. Its temporary occupants were in many instances drunk, in very few decent, in almost all noisy; but the new-comer contributed no more to the horrid merriment of the sleeping den than he had contributed to the conviviality of the drinking den during that day. He met all attempts at questioning with a sullen growl; and placing his tarpaulin bundle under his head for a pillow, he soon fell, or seemed to fall, into a heavy slumber.
CHAPTER II.
TRAPPED.
The normal state of the Adelphi Hotel at Liverpool is one of such bustle and confusion, that when the entire establishment goes stark staring mad, as is the case twice a year, on the occasions of the Grand National Steeplechase and the Waterloo Meeting, the people are not inclined to regard the eccentricity as anything to be wondered at. Passing a night at the Adelphi, you are liable to come across the man who went out to California five-and-twenty years ago with the full determination never to revisit the motherland where the first half of his life had been so thrown away, but who, his fortune made and the nostalgia strong upon him, arrived last night from New York, to travel for six months like a gentleman in the country where, for a quarter of a century, he had starved and slaved. Or you are equally likely to run into the arms of the elderly friend whom you have always considered as a fixed item of London life, but who, having heard a rumour 'that things are going wrong out there,' is starting by the next day's outward-bound mail to satisfy himself. The halls and passages of the Adelphi are always crammed with sea-going chests and Saratoga boxes, and deckchairs, more or less maimed; and there is generally a dozen of champagne being cracked in some of the rooms to drink the health of the captain who has just brought the good ship safely over, or success to the captain who is just going to take the good ship out; and there are newspaper reporters flying to and fro to get lists of passengers, or details of any occurrences on the voyage, and relations of the newly-arrived, who are very much elated, and relations of the departing, who are very much depressed, and whose excessive emotion in their case contrasts curiously with the steady-going business tone of the members of the establishment.
It was not to be supposed that a man of Mr. Bryan Duval's foresight would have neglected writing beforehand to secure rooms, any more than that he would have omitted sending a hint of his intended arrival to two or three members of the local press with whom he was on terms of friendship. Consequently, when the theatrical party from London walked into the house, they were not merely received with gracious smiles from the three young ladies in the bar, and with portentous grins from Sam the boots (not naturally a good-natured man, but an old acquaintance of Mr. Duval's, and the recipient of many orders for the upper boxes when that gentleman was staying there on a starring tour), but with a warm acclamation from Mr. Lavrock, the popular editor of the Liverpool Lion, and two or three of his comrades. It was not Mr. Lavrock's fault that he was not a London editor; it was the one hope of his life; but being unable to accomplish the feat, and finding himself tied to Liverpool, he revenged himself on the fate which had dictated, as his duty, the pulverisation of the Mayor, the castigation of the Corporation, and the flaying of the Mersey Board, by devoting every minute of his off-time to London things and London people, by running to the metropolis at all times when he could get away, and by acting as general agent for every London literary or theatrical celebrity.
It had not wanted the presence of these gentlemen to remind Bryan Duval that he had intended giving a little banquet that evening in honour of Mr. Foster; but when he saw them, he at once thought that they would not be merely pleasant additions to the party, but that they might be the means of giving it world-wide publicity by inserting a neat little paragraph in the next morning's editions, which he would take over with him, and have copied immediately after arrival in the New York journals. Mr. Lavrock and his friends would be delighted to accept the invitation, and the party separated with the understanding that they were to meet at seven o'clock, the travellers going to their bedrooms to rest themselves after their journey, and the newspaper men to their offices, to prepare that little paragraph concerning which Mr. Duval had dropped a hint into the ear of each of them.
The Adelphi can give a dinner when it has a mind, and it had a mind this day. The turtle was superb; so good that Mr. Foster, who had had two or three rather sharp culinary arguments with Mr. Duval since their acquaintance, was compelled to acknowledge that on one point, at least, he had been wrong, and that he had never, even at the Brevoort House in New York, tasted better soup than that then set before him; and when dinner was over, Mr. Duval made a very prolonged epigrammatic speech, proposing Mr. Foster's health, and Mr. Foster, with that self-possession and flow of language so characteristic of his countrymen, returned thanks. And then Mr. Lavrock stood up and exhausted the dictionary of flattery upon Bryan Duval, who, in responding, remarked that he hoped in a couple of months or so to give another dinner to almost the same party in the same place, on his return from what he intended should be a prosperous run; and then, as they were most of them tired, and had to get up betimes, the party broke up.
When Mr. Foster came down the next morning, he found Bryan Duval, already the centre of an admiring crowd, giving directions for the stowage of his luggage on the huge trucks which were to convey it to the steamer's tender. Mr. Duval had exchanged his costume of the previous day for a yachting suit, and with an oilskin-covered straw hat, low patent-leather shoes, and striped silk socks, looked ready to lead off a hornpipe on any given cue. It had been arranged that they should breakfast in their rooms, and that Mr. Foster, who might be looked upon as accustomed to this kind of thing, should act as convoy to the company, Mr. Duval going in front to attend to the luggage. No sooner, therefore, was the truck duly piled than Bryan rattled off before it in a swift-going hansom, while Mr. Foster, Miss Montressor, and the others followed in a more sober vehicle.
The landing-stage at which the Cunard tender was lying was thronged on this occasion with even a more motley crowd than usual, for the paragraphs in the morning journals had announced to the actors the presence among them of their great colleague, and several of them had come down to see him off. Many of the young brokers and shipping clerks too had rushed away from their offices for a few minutes to catch a glimpse of the popular artistes, and, as if to act as a corrective to the light tone of thought likely to be engendered by these people, a dark-bearded sombre-faced man, in the rustic garb of a Methodist preacher, made his way in and out amongst the crowd, distributing tracts to whoever would take them. There was no chance for his admirers mistaking any one else for Mr. Duval; that gentleman's activity was preternatural; and when the tender left the shore, they raised a little cheer, which he gratefully acknowledged by squeezing his hat over his chest exactly as he had done on many occasions after a successful first night's performance.
There was not much talk among the little party as they made their way to the ship. They praised her noble proportions as she lay at anchor in mid-stream, cast looks at the sky, and prophesied about the weather; but their hearts were too full to say much, and they soon lapsed into silence. When they were once on board they, those who were to make the voyage, went straight to their state-rooms, and of our friends all remained there with the exception of Miss Montressor and Bryan Duval; the latter had still to see the luggage safely stowed away in the hold, the former came straight to Mr. Foster as he was standing very dejectedly on the hurricane-deck.
'I have just found another instance of your kindness, another thing to be grateful to you for.'
'Not in the least,' he replied with a sad smile. 'I had forgotten all about it; but I know there is no preventive of sea-sickness like champagne, and you can depend upon that case being genuine.'
'I wish you would have a bottle of it now,' she said. 'I think it would do you good.'
'I am afraid not,' he replied, with an attempt at gaiety. 'I am very depressed and very dull, I know, and I do not think champagne would help me; the only cure for me will be when I find myself on this or some sister ship bound for home.'
'And Helen!' whispered Miss Montressor.
'And Helen,' he repeated gravely, lifting his hat as though invoking a blessing on the name.
Then the shore-bell rang, and Bryan Duval came up, and in a few words of kindly friendship, without a trace of professional affectation, spoke his thanks and adieux to his newly-made friend.
When Mr. Foster turned to Miss Montressor he tried to put on a light and rallying manner, but his voice broke, and the tears rose in his eyes. He muttered something, she could not distinguish what, for she herself was very much overcome, and vanished down the ladder and across the gangway.
Then the tender steamed away. Bryan Duval and Clara Montressor, leaning over the rail, watched the figure of the man in whom alone they had an interest until it was undistinguishable; still stood gazing until the tender herself became a mere speck in the distance. Then he touched her on the arm.
'You had better go down and see to your things, Clara, my dear,' he said, in a kindly tone. 'We shall meet Foster again, I trust--he is a downright good fellow.'
'He is a gentleman,' sobbed Clara Montressor, 'and one of the best men on the face of the earth.'
By this time the good ship was standing out to sea.
* * * * * *
Mr. Foster returned to his hotel in very low spirits; the mere sight of the sea, the mere sense of being on board a steamer, the bustle and departure, and the glad anticipations which he heard all around him, had produced a fit of home-sickness. It rarely occurred that Mr. Foster, as the strictly business man, revolted against business in any shape, or resented its exactions, but he did so on this occasion, and yielded to a sort of physical and mental malaise, which he was ready to impute partly to fatigue, and partly to the fact that he had been amusing himself more than was his custom during the last few days, and this was the reaction. 'I go back to the grind now,' he thought, 'and I will get it over as soon as possible--I can't stand much more of this kind of thing; it doesn't pay. My Helen would be cured of her funny unreasonable notions about the supremacy of my business in my thoughts, her pretty jealousy would vanish like a cloud if she could only see me now, if she could only look into my heart and know how I longed to have done with it all and to get back to her. How I envy the people who are going where she is!'
He was walking slowly, with bent head and a musing manner, rarely seen in the busy streets of the water-side city, as he thought this, and he mechanically put his hand into his breast-pocket searching for his wife's last letter, which he felt sure he had brought down with him; but it was not there. 'I must have left it in my room,' he thought, and quickened his steps. On reaching the hotel, Mr. Foster went to his room and found the letter, which he glanced over and placed in his pocket-book.
Everything, tide included, had favoured the departure of his friends. It was nigh noon when the ship steamed down the Mersey, and the solitary man, who was in a humour to indulge the sense of solitude, had several hours to dispose of before returning to London. He had contemplated staying one night in Liverpool, but he changed his mind; he would go and have a look at the chief places of interest in the city and its environs, and so dispose of the hours until he could go away.
It was a little after one when he left the Adelphi, and set out on a sort of strolling tour, and his mind, an active and intelligent one, soon became diverted and interested in the novel scene. There is a good deal to be seen in Liverpool and at Birkenhead, and Mr. Foster gave his mind to seeing it; so that it was much later than he had calculated upon when he was crossing in the ferry from the latter place, and he perceived, with some vexation, that he had overstayed his time, and could not possibly leave by the night train as he had intended. 'Not that it matters,' he thought, 'except that Helen's letter will be waiting for me instead of my being waiting for it.'
'I beg your pardon,' he said, making room on the bench where he was sitting for a man who had stood, with rather an ostentatious air of expecting to have room made for him, just in front of Mr. Foster, 'I didn't see that you wanted a place;' and the man sat down, after some words of course.
He was a slight man, who carried himself awkwardly, with high shoulders and sunken chest and stooping head; he was of dark complexion, had straight black hair, which fitted his head like a thatch, and a black beard, but he was painfully nearsighted, and wore spectacles of such power that his eyes, seen through them, seemed to be buried in cavities altogether disproportionate to the other feature. He was curiously ill-dressed, not only as regards the fabric of his garments, which was incongruous, but also as regards their fit, which had not the slightest reference to either his height or his breadth. They were formed of two or three kinds of cloth of different degrees of coarseness, but all of the cheapest description, and all rusty black, which associates itself in one's mind with the Scripture-reading, amateur-preaching, charity-letter writing, and tract-distributing class. He wore shoes, which might have been made for any one of the passengers on board the ferry with as much reference to their fit as for him, and his gray cotton gloves were too long in the fingers and too wide in the wrists. In the dog's-eared pocket of his black cloth waistcoat he carried a clumsy silver watch, attached to a frayed piece of black braid; and a shiny leather case, which had evidently been replenished with tracts since he had lavishly distributed his morning supply of that improving order of literature, protruded from the breast-pocket of his shapeless coat.
Mr. Foster glanced at the stranger as one naturally glances at a person to whom one has done a passing civility, and was not far out in his estimate of his social position and professional character; not that he was familiar with the precise type, but the character was too ostentatiously put forward to be mistaken.
A respectable-looking stout woman, with a large basket, which she held tenaciously upon her knees, to her extreme discomfort, no doubt considering it much too precious to be intrusted to the open space of deck at her feet, got into conversation with Mr. Foster's neighbour, with all the facility accorded by custom to social intercourse with gentlemen of his profession, and after a few minutes Mr. Foster found himself taking an interest in the conversation. It referred to the physical and spiritual needs of the water-side population, and the man spoke in a sensible and straightforward way, quite devoid of cant, which pleased Mr. Foster, and was singularly at variance with his appearance--that of the most conventional theatrical type, which one is almost irresistibly tempted to associate with imposture and hypocrisy.
'I wonder,' said the woman, 'you are not afraid to go down into them dens. What extraordinary sights you must see there!'
'I see a great deal of poverty and suffering,' said the man, in a marked Irish accent, 'but much less wickedness than people think for.'
And he then proceeded to tell one or two stories of his experience of that day, which had a very real ring about them, and which he related with no affectation, self-seeking, or technical phraseology. Probably he had observed that the gentleman who had made way for him was taking an interest in the conversation, for he shifted his position, in which he had previously had his shoulder turned towards Mr. Foster, for one which placed him straight between his two neighbours, his shoulders against the rail of the bench, and his bent head on his breast. There was occasionally the slightest possible glance of the strange-looking eyes, from under the magnifying spectacles, in the direction of Mr. Foster's attentive and sympathising face.
'May I ask if you have seen much of this sort of thing?' said Mr. Foster, when the speaker came to a pause, and the kindly woman on his other side was unaffectedly wiping from her eyes tears of compassion evoked by his story of a scene which the narrator had that morning witnessed at a certain 'rookery,' as he called it.
'O yes; my life has passed among such scenes,' said the man.
'Do you get used to them?' asked Mr. Foster.
'In a certain sense, of course I do; as a surgeon gets used to the sight of pain, and a judge to the presence of criminals; but if you mean do I leave off feeling them, do the individual cases become merged in the general, no, certainly not. And, sir,' said the man, now turning decidedly towards Mr. Foster, but propping his arm on his knee, and covering with his hand the end of his nose and the upper lip, already sufficiently hidden by his straight black moustache, which shaded his teeth and mingled with the hair of the beard, 'mine is a life which has its consolations as well as its duties. I see a great deal of misery, vice, sickness, cruelty, and injustice, but I see a great deal of charity too. I am made the channel through which not a little of it flows. Are you familiar with Liverpool?'
'No,' said Mr. Foster; 'I never was here until yesterday, having merely passed through when I came from New York, and I am going back to town to-morrow morning, and should have gone to-night if I hadn't over-stayed my time in sight-seeing, and run myself late for the train.'
'Among the sights you have seen,' said the man with the spectacles, 'had the low quarters of Liverpool and their inhabitants any place?'
'O no,' said Mr. Foster. 'I had not time for anything of that kind--just to get a look at the surface was all I have been able to do; besides, one never sees anything of that sort in reality, I fancy, if one goes loafing into it as a casual stranger; one must go round with the police to get any real insight into the life of such places.'
'Do you think so?' said the man, in a remonstrating tone. 'Did you ever try ta get a look into the lives of the poor and the dangerous classes in the company of their friends, for they have friends, rather than in that of their enemies?'
'No,' said Mr. Foster; 'the idea never occurred to me; indeed, I am sorry to say, I am such a busy man, that I have hardly ever seen anything of that sort, even at home. I am afraid I have been rather remiss,' he continued, with a cordial frankness, which was one of his pleasant peculiarities; 'too easily satisfied with giving a little money now and then, which I can readily spare, and shielding my own feelings from the sight of poverty, which we are all ready to talk about and depute other people to relieve.'
At this point in the conversation the brief crossing came to an end, and the two men stepped off the ferry-boat together. He whom we may call for convenience the stranger scrupulously assisted the woman and her cumbersome basket--an act of politeness which he accomplished with not a little difficulty, as it appeared he also had a parcel to carry. As the ferry touched the landing-stage, he stooped down and picked up from under the bench, where he had placed it unnoticed by either of his temporary companions, a good-sized package, rather neatly done up in tarpaulin.
Mr. Foster was the first to step off the ferry, and he and the stranger stood for a moment outside, while the latter relinquished her basket to the woman, who took a civil leave of both, and then waited, as if supposing that the sentence addressed to him was incomplete.
'I beg your pardon,' he said, as if expecting Mr. Foster to resume it; 'I thought you asked me a question.'
'I did not,' said Mr. Foster; 'but may I now ask you if your day's work is done?'
The first smile which had appeared upon the face of the stranger crossed it now, but it was instantly controlled, and had been almost imperceptibly brief. 'O dear, no,' he replied, giving the parcel which he had tucked under his arm a significant squeeze; 'I am on an errand to one of the poorest places in all Liverpool--a rookery down near the landing-stage--and I am taking some clothes there which have just been given me for the purpose for a woman and two children, who are lying on old sacks under a piece of old sail-cloth, because the mother has no clothes in which she can go and beg for work. That was not a case in which to wait for to-morrow, so I went and begged the clothes from some people I know at Birkenhead, and I am going down there direct.'
They had walked on a few steps, but the stranger stood still now, as if expecting--several places branching off here--the gentleman would take leave of him. In that moment of waiting he had an indescribable look of suspicion: the nostrils expanded and closed, the dark complexion paled slightly, and the fingers of one hand clenched themselves. It was only for a second, though; the next Mr. Foster spoke:
'I suppose the place you're going to is quite a representative den?' he said. 'Would you mind taking me with you--I should like to see it, and I should like to help a little through you, who know these poor people? I suppose it isn't very far? But of course it is not, down by the landing-stage. I should hardly have thought there were dens of that kind down there in the region of the great wharves and warehouses.'
'That's just where they swarm,' said the stranger in a bold tone of assertion, 'as you will see' (he stepped out briskly as he spoke). 'I will show you several as we go down to the one my business lies in.'
The night had fallen rapidly; there was no moon, and though the stars were coming out, there was a considerable drift of cloud, so that the sky was gloomy. As the two men walked side by side along the lighted streets, Mr. Foster found himself occasionally outstripping his companion, with whom he was talking familiarly, not exclusively upon topics which had previously engaged them, but with reference to the aspect of Liverpool. On each occasion of the kind he apologised; on the first the stranger complained of a slight lameness, which prevented his keeping up with the alert step of the strange gentleman.
The slowness and the slouchingness of his gait certainly did not decrease during their long walk; their progress was tediously slow; and Mr. Foster would probably have been surprised at the lateness of the hour, had it occurred to him to think about it.
The city was settling down into the silence produced by the general evacuation of its business quarters before that walk commenced. By the time the two turned on Water-street--along the great line of the warehouses past which the sailor who had been Mr. Foster's fellow-traveller from London on the previous day had taken his way the night before--that part of Liverpool was as silent as the City of London at midnight. It presented somewhat of a similar aspect, from a picturesque point of view, of a great centre of wealth and business in isolation and inaction. With this aspect of London Mr. Foster was well acquainted. One of the sights and sensations he had procured for himself some time before was 'the City'--properly so called--when nobody is in it; and Liverpool was now affording him a similar study; but the locality was entirely new, and very shortly Mr. Foster was quite bewildered, and had lost all notion of where he was. Out there lay the river, on the other side of the town, and the great buildings stretched endlessly under the frowning sky, like a giant wall between him and its life.
They had passed along innumerable immense blocks of building, profoundly still, when they reached one where there was a kind of yard surrounded on three sides with high walls, pierced with many windows. The fore wall forming the front was considerably lower than the other three, and in one corner was a door standing ajar, and kept from closing by a stone; the aperture was very slight, and the probability of any passer-by, previously unacquainted with the locality, perceiving that the door was unfastened was exceedingly small. As the two passed it, Mr. Foster, who was on the inner side, would not have been the least aware of the fact, had not his companion stretched his arm across him and pushed the door wide open.
'This is the rookery,' said the stranger, having checked Mr. Foster's steps by the movement of his arm, and stopped with suddenness which took him by surprise; 'clean and quiet as it looks outside, it swarms like a London court.'
Mr. Foster stepped back on the pathway for a moment, while his companion crossed the threshold, and expressed some astonishment at no light being visible.
'They are all at the back,' replied the man, as he kicked away the stone and held the door for Mr. Foster to pass through. He did so, and it was shut behind him. 'Follow me,' said the stranger; 'the door into the house is in an opposite corner, and the stairs are dark till you get to the first landing--mind the step.'
Mr. Foster followed him in silence, and they passed through the narrow door into the flagged passage, from which a steep and narrow staircase, with an iron railing, led to a square landing at some height above them. Still there was no light, except a feeble glimmer emitted from the window above the landing. When they had mounted the staircase so far, and could see each other's faces by the feeble light, Mr. Foster remarked:
'There cannot be any rooks here tonight--there is no cawing.'
It was not, perhaps, any feeling so decided as distrust which lent a peculiar tone to his voice, but it was certainly discomfort.
'I beg your pardon,' said the man; 'I didn't catch what you said,' and he drew quite close to him on the narrow landing, from which a second flight of steep stairs went up.
Mr. Foster repeated the sentence. 'There cannot be any rooks here to-night--there is no cawing;' and had hardly uttered it when the man pushed him into the angle of the wall on which the little ray of light fell obliquely, and stabbed him to the heart! Stabbed him with a hand so sure, with a thrust so steady, with a blade so keen, with an aim so precise, that he only groaned and sank down dead when the hand which pressed him back, the hilt of the weapon within it, was withdrawn.
Then the murderer, making one cautious step backward, which just withdrew him beyond the reach of the outstretched feet, as the dead man dropped into a heap in the corner, lighted an inch of wax candle which he took from his pocket, and, standing well away from the blood which soaked through the dead man's clothes, welling upwards from the wound, but neither spurting nor dropping, for it was all caught in the folds of the waistcoat and the shirt, stooped over him and closely examined the features, without touching the body. The examination, prolonged until the fixity of death had gripped every feature, and the film of death had covered the wide-open eyes, was perfectly satisfactory.
This ascertained, the murderer, standing at the full length of his arm from the dead man, slowly and carefully withdrew the weapon, and placing it on his victim's lap, proceeded to search the breast-pocket from which he had seen a note-book peeping out. He found the note-book, and, after a hasty glance at its contents, transferred it, taking care that it received no stain of blood, to his own pocket; but his rifling of the dead stopped there, with one trifling exception. There was a handkerchief in the same pocket with the note-book, marked in initials which did not correspond with Mr. Foster's name; this he took possession of.
There was no hurry, there was no tremor, there was not a moment's uncertainty, there was not an undecided movement throughout the whole of these proceedings. This man and his victim might have been alone in the universe for any trace of haste or fear of detection which he displayed. His face was motionless, his lips were still, there was no hurried breathing, no muttered words, as he minutely inspected his own clothes and hands. His precautions had been eminently successful; there was no stain on either.
The landing was narrow, the space was small, and for his next operation the murderer required a little more room. Mr. Foster had fallen completely in the angle of the wall, and when the body slipped down, the feet projected almost to the top of the lower stair. The murderer took hold of these feet and gently pushed them towards the wall, so as to leave himself more space; he had deposited his bundle on the second step of the upper stair, and he left it undisturbed while he divested himself of every article of clothing except his shirt, and folded them up into a neat roll, corresponding in size with that enclosed in the tarpaulin covering.
This done, he took off his black wig, beard, and moustaches, placed them in the centre of the roll, and proceeded to unpack the bundle. It contained a suit of sailors clothes, including a blue shirt, a red wig, and a red beard. These were very carefully constructed, and he assumed them without any difficulty. He then put on the sailor's dress complete, wrapped his white shirt round the clothes he had taken off, and sitting down on the topmost step of the lower stair, with the dead man's feet within a foot of his elbow, sewed up the second bundle in the tarpaulin cover which had enclosed the first, by the aid of a packing-needle and a piece of twine which he took with him ready in his trousers pocket.
This done, he stood up and stood still for two clear minutes, mentally recapitulating the precautions he had just taken, and comparing them with the programme he had arranged. He had omitted nothing, he was quite satisfied; so he put his bundle under his arm, blew out the scrap of candle, and without a glance in the direction in which the dead man lay in a mass rapidly becoming indistinguishable in the darkness, almost groped his way down the stairs, passed out of the door, crossed the yard noiselessly, and noiselessly pushing back the bolt of the outer gate, emerged from it just as a policeman on his beat had reached the second block of building above it, and was safe not to observe him.
The sailor strolled leisurely down to the landing-stage. If any one had met him, it would have been impossible to mistake his character of houseless, companionless, foreign sailor; but no one did meet him, and a few minutes' keen inspection of the lonely scene satisfied him that the opportunity for the last precaution to be taken with success was there. He advanced to the edge of the stage, and leaning against one of the iron posts which supported the boundary chain, he slowly dropped the parcel with its tarpaulin covering into the river. Even to his impassiveness, to his almost incredible indifference of manner, the finality of this act seemed to be a relief. He straightened his figure, drew a deep breath, stretched his arms out to their full length, and brought them down by his sides, and after standing for a few minutes, with a straight look-out seawards, he turned away, and keeping the side of the road which borders the landing-stage, avoiding on this occasion the shade of the great warehouses, he took his way towards the tramps' quarters where he had passed the previous night.