When Mr Dean succeeded, with some difficulty, in obtaining a private interview with Mr Spivin’s servant Martha, he proceeded with much politeness and subtlety to pump and squeeze her.
And it may be remarked here that Mr Dean had what Martha afterwards styled “a way with him” that was quite irresistible, insomuch that she was led, somehow, to speak of things she never meant to mention, and to reveal things she never intended to confess.
“You see, sir,” she said, “it’s the dooty of me an’ Mary to do the bedrooms w’en the family’s at breakfast. Well, that morning we went as usual to Mr Laidlaw’s room first, because ’e’s quick with ’is meals an’ wants ’is boots put in ’is room so as he may get out immediately. Mr Laidlaw ’as no luggage, sir, only a shoulder-bag, an’ it was lyin’ open on the table, so me an’ Mary looked into it just to—to—”
“To see that nothing had tumbled out,” suggested Mr Dean. “I understand.”
“Just so, sir,” assented Martha; “and there was nothink in it but a spare shirt rolled up, and a pair of socks, and a small Bible—no money or watch or anythink that would break even if it did tumble out,—’is shavin’ things and all that being on the dressin’-table—so—”
“So your mind was relieved, Martha—well, go on.”
“But as we was agoin’ to close the bag,” continued the girl, “we observed an inner pocket, an’ Mary says, p’raps there was a love-letter in it! I laughed an’ said, ‘Let’s look an’ see.’ So we looked an’ saw nothink.”
“You both looked and were quite sure of that?” asked Mr Dean.
“Yes, quite sure, for we both felt the pocket all round as well as looked into it.”
“Well, go on.”
“Then we shut the bag, and after we had finished the room, we was just goin’ out, when master he ran up-stairs as if he was in a hurry. He came into the room with a bit of paper in ’is ’and, somethink like a bank note, but he started on seein’ us, an’ crumpled up the paper an’ stuffed it in ’is pocket. At the same time ’e got very angry, scolded us for being so slow, and ordered us off to the other rooms. Not ten minutes after that in comes Mr Lockhart, the lawyer, with two policemen, an’ seizes Mr Laidlaw, who was still at ’is breakfast. At first he got very angry an’ shoved one policemen over the sofa and the other into the coal-scuttle, at the same time sayin’ in a growly voice, ‘I think—’ee’ve—aw—geen—mad—thee—gither’—oh, I can’t speak Scotch!” exclaimed Martha, bursting into a laugh.
“Better not try, my dear,” said Dean, with a peculiar smile.
“Well, then,” continued Martha, on recovering herself, “when the policemen got up again Mr Laidlaw said he had no intention of running away (only ’e said rinnin’ awa’), and that he would go with them quietly if they’d only be civil (’e called it seevil!), and assured them they had made a mistake. They was more civil after that, for Mr Laidlaw ’ad doubled ’is fists an’ looked, oh my! like a Bengal tiger robbed of its young ones. So they all went straight to the bedroom, and me an’ Mary followed with master and missis and the waiters, an’ they searched all round the room, coming to the bag last though it was the only thing on the table, and right under their noses, an sure enough they found a 50 pound note there in the little pocket!”
“And what said the Scotsman to that?” asked Mr Dean, with a slight grin.
“He said, turning to master, ‘It was you did that—’ee—blagyird!’” cried Martha, again bursting into laughter at her Scotch. “And then,” continued Martha, “one of the policemen said ’e ’ad seen Mr Laidlaw not long ago in company with a well-known thief, and the other one swore ’e ’ad seen ’im the same night in a thieves’ den, and that ’e was hevidently on a friendly footin’ wi’ them for ’e ’ad refused to quit the place, and was hinsolent. At this lawyer Lockhart shook ’is ’ead and said ’e thought it was a bad case, an’ the poor Scotsman seemed so took aback that ’e said nothink—only stared from one to another, and went off quietly to prison.”
After investigating the matter a little further, and obtaining, through Martha, a private interview with Mary, who corroborated all that her fellow-servant had said, Mr Dean went straight to Pimlico, and interviewed the butler who had been in the service of the Weston family. Thereafter he visited Colonel Brentwood, and, in the presence of his wife and daughter discussed the whole affair from beginning to end. We will spare the reader that discussion, and turn towards Newgate.
On the evening of that day poor David Laidlaw found himself in durance vile, with massive masonry around him, and a very Vesuvius of indignation within him. Fortunately, in the afternoon of the following day, which chanced to be Sunday, a safety valve—a sort of crater—was allowed to him in the shape of pen, ink, and paper. Using these materials, he employed his enforced leisure in writing to that receptacle of his early and later joys and woes—his mother.
“Whar d’ye think I’ve gotten t’ noo, mither?” the letter began. “I’m in Newgate! It’s an auld gate noo-a-days, an’ a bad gate onyway, for it’s a prison. Think o’ that! If onybody had said I wad be in jail maist as soon as I got to Bawbylon I wad have said he was leein’! But here I am, hard an’ fast, high and dry—uncom’on dry!—wi’ naething but stane aroond me—stane wa’s, stane ceilin’, stane floor; my very hairt seems turned to stane. Losh, woman, it bates a’!
“It’s no maner o’ use gaun into the hale story. A buik wad scarce ha’d it a’. The details’ll keep till you an’ I meet again on the braes o’ Yarrow—if we iver meet there, which is by no means sure, for thae Englishers’ll be the death o’ me afore I git hame, if they gang on as they’ve begood. Here’s the ootline:—
“I’ve been thick wi’ thieves, burglars, pickpockets, an’ the like. Veesitin’ at their dens, an’ gaun aboot the streets wi’ them, an’ I’ve stolen a fifty-pun’ note, an’ it’s been fund i’ the pouch inside my bag. That’s the warst o’t; but it seems that I’ve also resistet the poliss in the dischairge o’ their duty, which means that I flang ane ower a sofa an’ stappit anither into a coal-scuttle—though I didna mean it, puir falla, for his breeks suffered in the way that ye’ve aften seen mine whan I was a wee laddie. But I was roused to that extent whan they first gruppit me that I couldna help it!
“I wadna mind it muckle if it wasna that I’ve no a freend to help me—
“I was interruptit to receive a veesiter—an’ a rebuik at the same time, for he turned oot to be a freend, though a stranger, a Colonel Brentwud, wha’s been cheetit by that blagyird lawyer that’s tryin’ to play the mischief wi’ me. But he’ll fin’ that I’m teuch! The Colonel says they’ll hae nae diffeeculty in clearin’ me, so let that comfort ye, mither.—Yer ill-doin’ son, David.
“P.S.—There’s a wee laddie I’ve faw’n in wi’ since I cam’ to Bawbylon, they ca’ him Tammy Splint. O woman, but he is a queer bairn. He’s jist been to see me i’ my cell, an’ the moment he cam’ in, though he was half greetin’, he lookit roond an’ said, ‘Isn’t this a sell!’ Eh, but he is auld-farrant! wi’ mair gumption than mony full-grown men, to say naething o’ women.”
But David Laidlaw had more friends in London than he was aware of. At the very time that he was penning the foregoing epistle to his mother, a number of disreputable-looking men were bewailing his fate and discussing his affairs in the thieves’ den, and two equally disreputable women were quarrelling over the same subject in a wretched dwelling in the presence of a third woman, who presided over a teapot.
One of the women, whose visage exhibited marks of recent violence, struck her fist on the table and exclaimed, “No, Mrs Rampy, you are wrong, as usual. The story I ’eard about ’im was quite different an’ I believes it too, for them Scotsmen are a rough lot—no better than they should be.”
“Mrs Blathers,” remarked Mrs Rampy, in a soft sarcastic tone which she was wont to assume when stung to the quick, and which her friend knew from experience was the prelude to a burst of passion, “I may be wrong as usual, but as you have never seen or conwersed with this Scotsman, an’ don’t know nothink about ’im, perhaps you will condescend to give me an’ Liz the kreckt wershion.”
“Now, Mrs Rampy,” interposed old Liz, grasping her teapot, “don’t be angry, for Mrs Blathers is right. Scotsmen are no better than they should be. Neither are English nor Irish nor Welshmen. In fact, there’s none of us—men or women—nearly as good as we should be. Now, I am sure it won’t be denied,” continued Liz, in an argumentative tone, “that Mrs Blathers might be better—”
“Ha! I won’t deny it,” said Mrs Rampy, with emphasis.
“Nor,” continued Liz, hastening to equalise her illustration, “nor that Mrs Rampy might be better—”
“Right you are,” said Mrs Blathers, with sarcasm. “And I’m still surer,” said Liz hurriedly—a little put out at the ready reception of her propositions—“that I might be better—”
“Not at all,” interrupted both ladies at once; “you’re a trump, Liz, you’re a dear creetur!”
“Come, then,” cried old Liz, with a laugh that set the fang wobbling, “you are at all events agreed upon that point so—have another cup, Mrs Rampy.”
“Thankee, Liz, and plenty of sugar.”
“H’m! you need it!” muttered Mrs Blathers; “no sugar at all for me, Liz.”
“Well, now,” cried Liz, rendered bold by desperation, “I do wonder that two such strong, warm-hearted women as you should so often fall out. Each of you loves some one—don’t I know!—with powerful affection, so, why couldn’t you love each other?”
This tribute to their feelings so tickled the women that they set down their tea-cups and laughed prodigiously.
“Now, do,—there’s a couple of dears!—shake hands over your tea, an’ let’s have a pleasant talk,” said old Liz, following up her advantage.
The mollified women did not shake hands, but each raised her tea-cup to her lips and winked.
“Your ’ealth, Blathers.”
“Same to you, Rampy.”
“And now, Liz,” said the latter, as she pushed in her cup for more, “let’s ’ear all about it.”
“Yes,” said Mrs Blathers also pushing in her cup, “let’s ’ave your wersion, Liz.”
While Liz gives her version of Laidlaw’s misfortunes we will return to the garden, where, being Sunday afternoon, Susy Blake was busy with a small class of the most disreputable little ragged boys that the neighbourhood produced.
The boys were emphatically bad boys. They feared neither God nor man. The property of other people was their chief source of livelihood, and the streets, or the jails, were their homes. Nevertheless, when in the garden class, those boys were patterns of good behaviour, because each boy knew that if he did not behave and keep quiet he would infallibly be dismissed from the class, and this was a punishment which none of them could endure. Unlike many other teachers, Susy had not to go about enticing boys to her Sabbath class. Her chief difficulty was to prevent them coming in such numbers as would have overflowed the garden altogether.
And the secret of this was that Susy Blake possessed much of an unconscious influence called loving-kindness. No weapon of the spiritual armoury is equal to this. In the hands of a man it is tremendous. In those of a pretty girl it is irresistible. By means of it she brought the fiercest little arabs of the slums to listen to the story of Jesus and His love. She afterwards asked God, the Holy Spirit, to water the good seed sown, and the result was success.
But loving-kindness was not her only weapon. She had in addition quite a glittering little armoury in which were such weapons as play of fancy, lively imagination, fervent enthusiasm, resolute purpose, fund of anecdote, sparkling humour, intense earnestness, and the like, all of which she kept flashing around the heads of her devoted worshippers until they were almost beside themselves with astonishment, repentance, and good resolves. Of course, when away from her influence the astonishment was apt to diminish, the repentance to cease, and the good resolves to vanish away; but resolute purpose had kept Susy at them until in the course of time there was a perceptible improvement in the environment of Cherub Court, and a percentage of souls rescued from the ranks of the ragamuffins.
On this particular Sunday Tommy Splint, who was a regular attendant at the garden class, arrived late.
“Why, Tommy,” said the teacher, turning herself from a little boy on whom she had been trying specially to impress some grand eternal truth, “this is not like you. Has anything happened to detain you?”
“No, Susy,” answered the boy, slipping into his place—with a compound expression in which the spirit of fun, whom no one doubted, gave the lie to the spirit of penitence, in whom no one believed—“but I’ve bin to a sort o’ Sunday class a’ready.”
“Indeed, where have you been?”
“At Mrs Rampy’s, w’ere I see’d a most hedifyin’ spectacle—granny tryin’ to bring Mrs Rampy an’ Mrs Blathers to a ’eavenly state of mind over a cup of tea, an’ them both resistin’ of ’er like one o’clock!”
“Ah! my boy,” said Susy, shaking her head and a finger at the urchin, “you’ve been eavesdropping again!”
“No, indeed, Susy, I ha’n’t,” returned the boy quite earnestly, “not since the time you nabbed me with my ear to the key-’ole of quarrelsome Tim’s door. I was a-sittin’ at Mrs Rampy’s open door quite openly like—though not quite in sight, I dessay—an’ they was pitchin’ into each other quite openly too, an’ granny a-tryin’ to pour ile on the troubled waters! It was as good as a play. But w’en Mrs Rampy takes up her cup to drink the ’ealth of Mrs B an’ says, with sitch a look, ‘Your ’ealth, Blathers,’ I could ’old on no longer. I split and bolted! That’s wot brought me ’ere a little sooner than I might ’ave bin.”
There was a tendency to laugh at this explanation, which Susy did not check, but after a few moments she held up a finger, which produced instant silence, while she drew a letter from her pocket.
“I’m sorry to disappoint you to-day, Tommy,” she said, handing him the letter, “but I must send you with this to my father. Mr Brentwood called with it not half an hour since, saying it was of importance to have it delivered soon, as it was connected with the case of Mr Laidlaw. So be off with it as fast as you can. You know where to find father—on board the Seacow.”
Tommy Splint was indeed disappointed at having to leave the garden class thus abruptly. He consoled himself, however, with the reflection that he was perhaps doing important service to his friend Da-a-a-vid Laidlaw. He further consoled himself, on reaching the court below, by uttering a shriek which sent a cat that chanced to be reposing there in rampant alarm into the depths of a convenient cellar. Thereafter he went into a contemplative frame of mind to the docks, and found Sam Blake as usual in his bunk.
“I say, Sam, d’ee spend all yer time—night and day—in yer bunk?”
“Not exactly, lad,” answered the seaman, with a smile, but without showing any intention to rise. “You see we sea-dogs have a hard time of it. What with bein’ liable to be routed out at all hours, an’ expected to work at any hour, we git into a way of making a grab at sleep when an where we gits the chance. I’m makin’ up lee-way just now. Bin to church in the forenoon though. I ain’t a heathen, Tommy.”
“You looks uncommon like one, anyhow—with your ’air an’ ’ead an’ beard an’ blankits mixed up together all of a mush. There’s a letter for ’ee, old man.”
Without a word the sailor took the epistle, read it slowly, while the boy watched him keenly, then thrust it under his pillow.
“You ain’t agoin’ to clear for action at once, then?” said the boy.
“No, not just yet.”
“Any message for me?” asked Tommy.
“None wotsomedever.”
Seeing that his friend did not intend to be communicative the boy wisely changed the subject.
“Now, Sam, about them pirits. W’ere was it they fust got ’old of you?”
“Down somewheres among the Philippine Islands,” replied Sam, drawing the blankets more comfortably round him, “but to tell you the truth, lad, after they’d taken our ship an’ made every man o’ the crew walk the plank except me an’ the skipper, they putt us in the hold, tied up hand an’ futt so as we could scarce move. Why they spared us was a puzzle to me at the time, but I afterwards found out it was because somehow they’d got it into their heads that the skipper an’ mate of our ship knew somethin’ about where some treasure that they were after had been buried. Hand me that there pipe, Tommy—not the noo one; the short black fellow wi’ the Turk’s head on the bowl. Thankee.”
“An’ did you know about the treasure?” asked Tommy, handing the pipe in question.
“Bless you, no,” returned the seaman, proceeding to render the confined air of the bunk still more unbearable; “we know’d of no treasure. If we had we’d have bin arter it ourselves, double quick. As it was, they burnt us wi’ hot irons an’ tortered us in various ways to make us confess, but we had nothin’ to confess, so had to grin an’ bear it—sometimes to yell an’ bear it! You see, lad, they mistook me for the mate, so that’s how I came to escape. He was a fine man was that mate,” continued the seaman in a lower tone, “a strong, handsome, kind young officer, an’ a great favourite. I’ve often wondered why he was taken an’ me spared.”
“P’raps it was for Susy’s sake!” suggested Tommy.
Sam looked at the boy—a quick half-surprised glance. “Not a bad notion that, my lad. I shouldn’t wonder if it was for Susy’s sake. I never thought o’ that before. Anyhow I comfort myself sometimes when I think o’ the poor mate that he was saved a deal o’ torterin’; which, let me tell you, ain’t easy to bear.”
“But go a’ead, Sam, with more about the pirits,” said Tommy.
“No, lad, no—not just now. I wants to snooze. So—you clap on all sail an’ you’ll be in time yet for the tail end o’ Susy’s lesson.”
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