Such was the man I saw before me; on whose face, as if heaven purposed
to warn his fellows against him, malignant passion and an insane
vanity were so plainly stamped that party spirit must have gone to
lengths, indeed, before it rendered men blind to his quality. His
shambling gait seemed a fitting conveyance for a gaunt, stooping
figure so awkward and uncouth that when he gave way to gesticulation
it seemed to be moved by wires; yet, once he looked askance at you,
face and figure were forgotten in the gleam of the eyes that,
treacherous and cruel, leered at you from the penthouse of his huge,
ill-fitting wig.
Nevertheless, I confess that, while I hated and loathed the man, he
cowed me. His latest escape had intoxicated him, and astride on my
table, or stalking the floor, he gave way to his vanity. Pouring out a
flood of ribald threats and imaginings, he now hinted at the fate
which had never failed to befall those who thwarted him; now he
boasted of his cunning and his hundred intrigues, and now he touched,
not obscurely, on some great design soon to be executed. His audacity,
no less than his frankness, bewildered me; for if he did not tell me
all, he told enough, were it true, to hang a man. Yet I soon found
that he had method in his madness; for while I listened with a
shamefaced air, hating him and meditating informing against him the
moment I was freed from his presence, he turned on me with a hideous
grin, and thrusting the muzzle of his pistol against my temple, swore
with endless curses to slay me if I betrayed him.
"You will go to Brome to-morrow, as usual," he said. "The Whiggish old
dotard, I could pluck out his inwards! And you will say not one word
of Mr. Ferguson! For, mark me, sirrah Dick, alone or in company I
shall be at your elbow, nor will all Cutts's guards avail to save you!
Do you mark me? Then d---- you, down on your knees! Down on your
knees, you white-livered dog, and swear by the Gospels you will tell
no living soul by tongue or pen that you have seen me."
He pressed the cold steel muzzle to my temple and I knelt and swore.
When it was done, he roared and jeered at me. "You see, I have my
oath!" he cried, "as well as Little Hooknose! And no non-jurors! Now
say 'Down with King William!'"
I said it.
"Louder! Louder!" he cried.
I could only comply.
[Illustration: HE PRESSED THE RING OF COLD STEEL]
"Now, write it! Write it!" he continued, thrusting a piece of paper
under my nose, and slapping his huge hand upon it. "I'll have it in
black and white! Or write this--ha! ha! that will be better. Are you
ready? Write, 'I hereby abjure my allegiance to Prince William.'"
"No," I said faintly, laying down the pen which I had taken up at his
bidding. "I will not write it."
"You _will_ write it!" he answered in a terrible tone. "And within a
very few seconds. Write it at once, sirrah! 'I hereby abjure my
allegiance to Prince William!'"
I wrote it with a shaking hand, after a glance at the pistol muzzle.
"And swear that I regard King James as my lawful sovereign. And I
undertake to obey the rules of the St. Germain's Club, and to forward
its interests. Good! Now sign it."
I did so.
"Date it," cried the tyrant; and when I had done so he snatched the
paper from me and flourished it in the air, "There is my passport!"
quoth he, with an exultant laugh. "When I am taken that will be taken,
and when that is taken the worse for Mr. Richard Price if he is taken.
He will taste of the hangman's lash. So! You are a clever fellow,
Richard Price, but Robert Ferguson is your master, as he has been
better men's!"
The man was so much in love with cruelty, that even when he had gained
his point he could not bear to give up the pleasure of torturing me;
and for half an hour he continued to flout and jeer at me, sometimes
picturing my fate if the paper fell into the Secretary's hands, and
sometimes threatening me with his pistol, and making sport of my
alarm. At last, reluctantly, and after many warnings of what would
happen to me if I informed, he took himself off; and I heard him go
into the opposite rooms, and slam the door.
Be sure I was not long in securing mine after him! I was in a pitiable
state of terror; shaking at thought of the man's return, and in an
ague when I considered the power over me, which the paper I had signed
gave him. I could hardly believe that, in so short a time, anything so
dreadful had happened to me! Yet it were hard to say whether, with all
my terror, I did not hate him more than I feared him; for though at
one time my heart was water when I thought of betraying him, at
another it glowed with rage and loathing, and to spite him, and to
free myself from him, I would risk anything. And as I was not wanting
in foresight, and could picture with little difficulty the slavery in
which he would hold me from that day forward--and wherein his cruel
spirit would delight--it was the latter mood that prevailed with me,
and determined my action when morning came.
Reflecting that I could expect no mercy from him, but had little to
fear from the Government, if I told my tale frankly, I determined at
all risks to go to the Secretary. I would have done so, the moment I
rose, the thought that at any moment he might burst in upon me keeping
me in a cold sweat; but I was prudent enough to abide by my habits,
and refrain from anticipating by a second the hour at which it was my
custom to descend. I waited in the utmost trepidation, therefore,
until half-past seven, when with a quaking heart, but a mind made up,
I ventured down to the street.
It was barely light, but the coffee-houses were open, and between
early customers to these, and barbers passing with their curling
tongs, and milkmen and hawkers plying morning wares, and apprentices
setting out their masters' goods, the ways were full and noisy; so
that I had no reason to fear pursuit, and in the hubbub gained courage
the farther I left my oppressor behind me. Nevertheless, I took the
precaution of going first to Mr. Brome's, opposite St. Dunstan's; and
passing in there, as was my daily custom, lingered a little in the
entry. When by this ruse I had made assurance doubly sure, I slipped
out, and went through the crowded Strand to Whitehall.
Mr. Brome had a species of understanding with the Government; and on
one occasion being ill, had made me his messenger to the Secretary's.
I knew the place therefore, but none the less gave way to timidity
when I saw the crowd of ushers, spies, tipstaves, and busybodies that
hung about the door of the office, and took curious note of everyone
who went in or out. My heart failed me at the sight, and I was already
more than half inclined to go away, my business undone, when someone
touched my sleeve, and I started and turned. A girl still in her
teens, with a keen and pinched face, and a handkerchief neatly drawn
over her head, handed a note to me.
"For me?" I asked.
"Yes," said she.
I took it on that and opened it, my hands shaking. But when I read the
contents, which were these--"Mr. Robert Ferguson's respects to the
Secretary, and he has to-day changed his lodging. He will to-morrow be
pleased to supply the bearer's character"--I thought I should have
fallen to the ground. Nor was my alarm the less for the reflection
which immediately arose in my mind that the note had of necessity been
written and despatched before I left Mr. Brome's door; and
consequently before I had taken any step towards the execution of my
design!
Still, what I held was but a piece of paper bearing a message from a
man proscribed, who dared not show his face where I stood. A word to
the doorkeepers and I might even now go in and lay my information. But
the man's omniscience cowed my spirit, terrified me, and broke me
down. Assured after this, that whatever I did or wherever I went he
would know and be warned in time, and I gain by my information nothing
but the name of a gull or a cheat, I turned from the door. Then seeing
that the girl waited, "There is no answer," I said.
"Will you please to go to the gentleman?" quoth she.
My jaw dropped. "God forbid!" I said, beginning to tremble.
"I think you had better," said she.
And this time there was that in her voice roused doubts in me and made
me waver--lest what I had done prove insufficient, and he betray me,
though I refrained from informing. Sullenly, therefore, and after a
moment's thought, I asked her where he was.
"I am not to tell you," she answered. "You can come with me if you
please."
"Go on," I said.
She cast a sharp glance at the group about the office, then turned,
and walking rapidly north by Charing Cross led me through St. Martin's
Lane and Bedford Bury to Covent Garden. Skirting this, she threaded
Hart Street and Red Lion Court, and crossing Drury Lane conducted me
into Lincoln's Inn Fields, where she turned sharply to the left and
through Ralph Court to the Turnstile. Seeing that she lingered here
and from time to time looked back, I fancied that we were near our
destination; but starting afresh, she led me along Holborn and through
Staple Inn. Presently it struck me that we were near Bride Lane, and I
cried "He is in my room?"
"Yes," she said gravely, and without explanation. "If he pleases you
will find him there." And without more she signed to me to go on, and
disappeared herself in the mouth of an alley by Green's Rents.
It did please him. When I entered with the air, doubtless, of a
whipped hound, I found him sitting on my table swinging his legs and
humming an air; and with so devilish a look of malice and triumph on
his face as sent my heart into my boots. Notwithstanding, for a while
it was his humour not to speak to me but to leer at me askance out of
the corner of his eyes, and keep me on tenterhooks, expecting what he
would say or do; and this he maintained until he had finished his
tune, when with a grin he asked after his friend the Secretary.
"Was it Trumball you saw, or the new Duke?" said he; and when I did
not answer he roared out an oath, and snatching up the pistol which
lay on the table beside him, levelled it at me. "Answer, will you? Do
you think that I am to speak twice to such uncovenanted dirt as you?
Whom did you see?"
"No one," I stammered, trembling.
"And why not?" he cried. "And why not, you spawn of Satan?"
"I received your note," I said.
"Oh, you received my note!" he whimpered, dropping his voice and
mocking my alarm. "Your lordship received my note, did you? And if you
had not got my note, you would have informed, would you? You would
have informed and sent me to the gallows, would you? Answer! Answer,
or----"
"Yes!" I cried in an agony of terror; for he was bringing the pistol
nearer and nearer to my face, while his finger toyed with the trigger,
and at any moment might press it too sharply.
"So! And you tell me that to my face, do you?" he answered, eyeing me
so truculently, that I held up my hands and backed to the door. "You
dare tell me that, do you? Come here, sirrah!"
I hesitated.
"Come here!" he cried. "Or by ---- I will shoot you! For the last
time, come here!"
I went nearer.
"Oh, but I would like to see you in the boot!" he said. "It would be
the finest sight! It would not need a turn of the screw to make you
cry out! And mind you," he continued, suddenly seizing my ear in his
great hand, and twisting it until I screamed, "in a boot of some kind
or other I shall have you--if you play me false! Do yon understand,
eh? Do you understand, you sheep in wolf's clothing?"
"Yes!" I cried. "Yes, yes!" He had forced me to my knees, and brought
his cruel sneering face close to mine.
"Very well. Then get up--if you have learned your lesson. You have had
one proof that I know more than others. Do not seek another. But,
umph--where have I seen you before. Master Trembler?"
I said humbly, my spirit quite broken, that I did not know.
"No?" he answered, staring at me with his face puckered up. "Yet
somewhere I have. And some day I shall call it to mind. In the
meantime--remember that you are my slave, my dog, my turnspit, to
fetch or carry, cry or be merry at my will. You will sleep or wake, go
or come as I bid you. And so long as you do that--Richard Price, you
shall live. But on the day you play me false, or whisper my name to
living soul--on that day, or within the week, you will hang! Do you
hear, hang, you Erastian dog! Hang, and be carrion: with Ayloffe, and
many another good man, that would stint me, and take no warning!"