The Dark Court.—A Deed of Blood.—The Pursuit Continued.—The Mother and
the Child.
Bruised and bleeding. Gray and the adventurous stranger who had essayed
to capture him, arrived at the bottom of the flight of stone steps, and
for one or two seconds it was doubtful if either of them were in a
condition to make any further effort either offensive or defensive.
The fear of capture and death, however, was sufficiently strong in the
mind of Jacob Gray to overcome for the moment the sense of pain arising
from personal injury; and with an energy, lent to him by despair alone,
he rose on his knees and felt about for his antagonist. His hand
touched the man’s face, and now he began to move. With something
between a shriek and a shout, Gary laid hold of his head by the hair on
each side. He lifted it as far as he could from the stones and then
brought it down again with a sinking awful crash. One deep hollow groan
only came from the man, and again Gray lifted the head, bringing it
down as before with frightful violence. The skull cracked and smashed
against the hard stones. The man was dead, but once more was the
bleeding and crashed head brought into violent contact with the stones,
and that time the sound it produced was soft, and Jacob Gray felt that
he held but loose pieces of bone, and his hands were slimy and slippery
with the blood that spouted on to them.
Faltering, dizzy, and faint, he then rose to his feet, and from the
open throughfare there came to his ears shouts, cries, and groans. Then
he cast his eyes to the dim opening of the court, and he heard several
voices cry,—
“He is hiding down here. Let’s hunt him out. Lights—lights!”
In a state of agony beyond description Gray now turned to seek shelter
further down the dark court, and in doing so he trod upon the dead body
of the man he had just hurried from existence.
Recoiling then, as if a serpent had been in his path, he crept along by
the wall until he thought he must have passed the awful and revolting
object which now in death he dreaded quite as much as he did in life.
He then plunged wildly forward, heedless where his steps might lead, so
that it was away from his pursuers. A few paces now in advance of him
he descried a dim faint ray of light, and hastening onwards he found
himself at the entrance of a court running parallel with the Strand,
and consisting of mean, dirty, squalid-looking houses inhabited by the
very dregs of the poorer classes.
Some of the half-broken dirty parlour windows in this haunt of poverty
were converted into shops by being set open, and a board placed across
in the inside displaying disgusting messes in the shape of eatables,
mingled with wood, old bones, rags, &c.
Gray hesitated a moment and cast his eyes behind him. A loud yell met
his affrighted ears, and lights began to flash in the direction he had
left behind him. With a groan of despair, he rushed into the dark open
passage of one of the houses.
Breathing hard from his exertions and the fright he was in, Gray groped
his way along by the damp clammy walls of the passage until he came to
some stairs—he hesitated not a moment, but slowly and cautiously
ascended them.
As he crept stair after stair up the dark flight of steps the sound of
pursuit seemed to come nearer and nearer, and he could hear the hum of
many voices, although he could not distinguish exactly what was said.
Only one word came perpetually as clearly and distinctly to his ears as
if it had been spoken at his side, and that word was murder!
“They—they have found the body,” he gasped. “Yes, they have found the
body now. My life hangs on a thread!”
The cold perspiration of fear rolled down his face, and notwithstanding
his great exertions which would ordinarily have produced an intolerable
sense of heat, he was as cold and chilled as if he had suddenly
awakened from sleep in the open air. His teeth chattered in his head,
and his knees smote each other. He was fain to clutch with both hands
the crazy banisters of the staircase for support, or he must inevitably
have fallen.
“This is dreadful,” he whispered to himself, “to die here. They have
hunted me to death—I—I feel as if a hand of ice was on my heart. This
must be death.”
Slowly the cold sensation wore off, and like the flame of a taper,
which suddenly renews its origin most unexpectedly, when apparently
upon the point of dissolution, Gray gradually revived again, and his
vital energies came back to him.
With a deep sigh he spoke,—
“’Tis past—’tis past. They have not killed me as yet. It was, after
all, but a passing pang. They have not killed me yet.”
Again the cry of murder echoed in the court, and, with a start, Jacob
Gray set his teeth hard, and continued to ascend the dark staircase.
Suddenly, now, he paused, for a sound from above met his ears—it was
some one singing. How strangely the tones jarred upon the excited
senses of Jacob Gray: the sound was low and plaintive, and to him it
seemed a mockery of his awful situation.
He now by two more steps gained the landing, and he was sure that the
singing proceeded from some room on that floor. The voice was a
female’s, and by the softness and exquisite cadences of it evidently
proceeded from some person not far advanced in life.
Gray held by the banisters at the top of the stairs, and for some
minutes he seemed spell-bound, and to forget the precarious situation
in which he stood as those low, soft strains came upon his ear.
The female was evidently singing to a child, for occasionally she would
pause to express some words of endearment to the little one, and then
resume her song.
The few short lines of which the song was composed came fully to Gray,
and there was a something about their very simplicity and innocence
that rooted him to the spot, although they brought agony to his heart:
The Mother’s Choice.
“My babe, if I had offers three,
From gentle heavenly powers,
To bless thee, who, with aching heart,
I’ve watched so many hours,
I’d choose that gift should make thee great
In true nobility—
That greatness of the soul which leaves
The heart and conscience free.
Gold should not tempt me, gentle babe,
It might not bring thee rest;
Nor power would I give to thee,
’Tis but an aching breast.
But I would ask of Heaven, my babe,
A boon of joy to thee,
To make thee happy in this life,
From sin and sorrow free.
Nor gold nor silver should’st thou have,
Nor power to command,
But thou should’st have a guileless heart,
An open, unstained hand.
So should thou happy be, my babe,
A thing of joy and light;
While others struggled for despair,
You’d wish but to be right.”
The song abruptly ceased, for the loud tones of men reached the ears of
the singer, crying,—
“Murder!—Hunt him—secure the murderer! This way—this way!”
Those sounds roused Gray from his temporary inaction: he started
forward as if he had received some sudden and irresistible shock.
More from impulse than any direct design or preconcerted plan, Jacob
Gray made towards the door of the room in which was the mother and her
infant child.
At the moment, then, a sudden thought struck his mind that possibly he
might convert the affection of the mother for her infant into a means
of saving himself: it was a hope, at all events, although a weak and
forlorn one. Time, however, was precious, and Jacob Gray, with his
pale, ghastly face, torn apparel, bleeding-hands, and general
dishevelled look, made his appearance in the room.
By the remains of a miserable fire sat a young female scarcely above
the age of girlhood, and in a cot at her feet slept a child, the face
of which she was regarding with that rapt attention and concentrated
love which can only be felt by a mother.
So entirely, in fact, were all the faculties of the young mother wound
up in the contemplation of her sleeping child, that Gray’s entrance
into the room failed to arouse her, and he had time to glance around
the room and be sure that he and the mother, with the child, were the
only occupants of the place before he spoke.
He then drew the pistol he still retained from his breast, and suddenly
cried,—
“One word, and it shall cost you your life! Be silent and obedient, and
you are safe.”
A cry escaped the lips of the young female, and she stood
panic-stricken by Gray’s strange appearance, as well as his threatening
aspect and words.
“Listen to me,” he said, in a low, hoarse voice; “you love your child?”
“Love my child?” re-echoed the mother, in a tone that sufficiently
answered the question of Gray, who added,—
“I am a desperate man. I do not wish to do you harm; but, betray me to
those who are seeking my life, and your child shall die by my hands.”
“No—no—my child—no,” cried the mother, in a voice of alarm.
“Hush!” cried Gray, advancing; and pointing the muzzle of his pistol
towards the sleeping form of the child. “Such another outcry, and I
will execute my threat.”
The young mother stood paralysed with terror, while Gray hastily added,—
“I am hunted, I tell you. Have you no place of concealment? Speak!”
“Concealment? Good Heaven! How can I aid you? What have I done that you
should menace my child? You cannot, dare not be so wicked.”
A loud shout at this moment rang through the court, and the flashing
beams of several torches blazed through the murky windows of the
miserable abode of poverty.
“What sounds are those?” cried the female.
“My pursuers,” said Gray. “Now, hear me; I dare not leave this place.
They are on my track—your infant is sleeping—place its cot as nigh to
the wall as you can, and I will hide beneath it. If this room is
entered by my enemies, you must on the plea of not disturbing your
child, prevent a search from taking place.”
“I cannot.”
“You must—you shall! Betray me by look, word, or gesture, and your
child shall die, if the next moment were my last. By all hell I swear
it!”
The mother shuddered.
“Quick—quick!” cried Gray; “my life is now counted by moments!”
“Hunt him—hunt him! Hurrah!” cried the voices of the pursuers. “Hunt
the murderer!”
“You hear!” cried Gray. “Quick—quick!”
With a face of agonised terror the mother drew the cot, without
awakening the fastly-slumbering child, towards the wall.
“Now,” cried Gray, “remember—your child’s life is at stake: if I
escape, it escapes. If I am taken, it dies.”
“But I may not be able to save you,” said the mother, in imploring
accents.
“The child then dies,” said Gray.
“Guard the entrance to the court well,” cried a loud, authoritative
voice from the outside of the house. “Search every one of these hovels,
from top to bottom.”
“You hear?” said Gray, trembling with terror, and scarcely able to
speak from the parched state of his lips.
“I do,” she said.
“Give me some water.”
She handed him a small, earthen pitcher, from which he took a copious
and refreshing draught.
“Now,” he said, “sit you by the fire, and sing that song you were
singing. It will seem then as if you had been undisturbed, and remember
you are playing a game in which the stake is the life of your child.”
“Heaven aid me!” said the mother.
“Hush! To your seat!—To your seat!”
“Oh! Even be you what you may, I will do my best to save you, if you
will allow me to sit here.”
She pointed to the side of the cot.
“No, no,” said Gray; “the child shall be nearer to me than to you.”
“Why—oh, why?”
“Because it will then be out of your power to prevent its doom.”
“I swear—”
“Pshaw! I trust no oaths. Away to your seat—to your seat, or—”
He pointed the pistol again to the sleeping babe, and with a shudder
the young mother sat down by the fire-side.
The tramp of men was now heard below in the passage, and a voice cried,
“Detain any one who attempts to leave the house. Should you meet with
resistance, cut him down at once.”
“The song!” cried Gray.
He then insinuated himself between the wall and the cot, so that no
part of him was visible, and in a hissing whisper, he again cried to
the trembling agonised mother,—
“The song! The song!”
A confused sound on the staircase now announced the approach of the
persons and once more from his place of concealment, Gray hissed
between his teeth,—
“Curses on you! Will you do as I bid you, or must I do the deed?”
“Spare him! Spare him!” said the mother. “Oh, spare him!”
“The song!” cried Gray.