The Staircase.—The Old Attic.—A Friend in Need.—Fair Play.—Gray’s
Despair.
For several moments now Gray stood in the passage quite incapable of
thought or action; his only impulse was by a kind of natural instinct
to stand as close to the damp passage wall as he possibly could, to
decrease the chances of any one seeing him or touching him in the act
of passing.
His brain seemed to be in a complete whirl, and many minutes must have
elapsed before he acquired a sufficient calmness to reflect with any
degree of rationality upon his present very precarious position.
When he could think, his terrors by no means decreased; for what
plausible course of action was there now open to him, as he could not
leave the house? The thought then occurred to him, that if he could
make his way into the cellars, he might have a chance of lying
concealed until the guard at the door was removed, and with this
feeling he crept along the passage, with the hope of finding some
staircase leading to the lower part of the premises.
He was still engaged in this task when the door of a room leading into
the passage suddenly opened, and a flood of light immediately
dissipated the pitchy darkness of the place.
Fortunately for him, Gray was within one pace of the bottom of the
staircase he had so recently descended; and, with the fear of instant
discovery upon his mind, from the person who was coming with the light,
he bounded up the staircase, nor paused till he reached the first
landing, from whence he had entered the room containing the mother and
her child.
There he stopped; but, to his extreme fright, the flashing of the light
evidently indicated that its bearer was coming up the stairs. With a
stifled groan Gray cautiously ascended the next flight, and again
paused on the narrow landing.
Still the light came on, and he could not conceal from himself the fact
that the person was still ascending, and that he had no other resource
than to continue his flight to the very upper part of the house. The
next flight of stairs was steep, narrow, and crazy, so that, tread
where he would, they wheezed, creaked, and groaned under the pressure
of his feet.
There was, however, no resource, and onward he went, until he was
stopped by a door exactly at the top: he pressed it, and it yielded to
his touch, allowing him to enter a dark attic.
Further progress Jacob Gray felt there could not be, and he stood in
the doorway, listening attentively if he could detect any sounds of
approaching feet.
A gush of blood to his heart, and an universal tremor of all his limbs,
seized him as he saw the light coming, and felt convinced that the
destination of the person approaching was one of the attics, if not the
very one he had sought refuge in. All hope appeared to die within him.
There was no time for the briefest reflection. With his eyes fixed upon
the door, and the pistol in his grasp, he retreated backwards into the
room as the footsteps came nearer and nearer to the door.
Then there was a slight pause; after which the door was flung open, and
a tall, heavy, coarse-looking man entered the room, carrying in his
hand a light.
One glance convinced Jacob Gray that the man was by far his superior in
strength—his only chance lay in the loaded pistol he had, and that he
was resolved to use should he not be able to bribe the man to connive
at his presence, and aid his escape.
It was a moment before the man observed the figure of Jacob Gray with
his back to the wall opposite to the door, and the pistol in his grasp.
When he did, he by no means betrayed the emotion that might have been
expected; but shading the light with his disengaged hand, he cried in a
loud voice,—
“Hilloa! Who are you when you are at home?”
“Do you love gold?” said Gray.
“Rather,” replied the man.
“Will it tempt you to assist me to escape from this place? If so, name
your price.”
“That’s business like,” said the man. “I suppose it’s you they are
making all the rout about below there?”
“It is. They are hunting me, and, with your assistance, I may yet
escape.”
“The devil doubt it. Curse me if I don’t actually love you. Why, I have
been poking about for this half hour to do you a good turn.”
“Is that possible?”
“To be sure. Why that fellow, whose crown you have cracked so
handsomely below there, was the pest of all the cracksmen in the
neighbourhood. I love you. I tell you.”
“Then you are—”
“Jem Batter, the cracksman.”
“Then you will befriend me?”
“In course—though hang me if I know you. I thought I knew all the hands
on town; but I never clapped eyes on your paste-pot of a mug before.”
Gray replaced his pistol, as he assumed a sickly smile, and said,—
“Then I have really found a friend?”
“A friend! Ah, to be sure you have. I say, I’ll tell you what we’ll do.
We’ll wait till the enemy is gone, and then I’ll poke you out on the
roof, and you can get in at Bill Splasher’s attic. It’s only across a
dozen houses or so. He’ll let you out then by the cellars of Somerset
House, and you’ll be as safe as any gentleman need wish to be.”
“I thank you,” said Gray. “I am now faint and weary.”
“Sit down then,” cried the man. “Don’t stand upon ceremony here. I
suppose you’ve been at some fakement of value—eh?”
“Yes, yes—a robbery,” said Gray, who thought it best to fall in with
the humour of his new friend.
“Plenty o’ swag?”
“A trifle, a mere trifle.”
“Never mind, better luck next time,” cried the man dealing Gray an
encouraging blow upon the back that nearly took his breath away.
“Thank you,” said Gray.
The thief, for such indeed he was, now proceeded to a cupboard, and
handed to Gray therefrom a bottle covered with protective wicker-work,
saying,—
“Drink; you’ll find that the best stuff.”
Gray took a hearty draught of the contents, which consisted of
exceedingly strong raw spirit.
“Don’t you feel better?” said the man.
“Yes,” replied Gray, “a great deal better.”
“Very good. Now, you see, short reckonings make long friends.”
“What do you mean?”
“Oh, you know the reg’lar terms of business. It’s share and share alike
with all who help a lame dog over a stile.”
“I am quite willing,” said Gray, “to award—”
“Oh, bother award,” interrupted the other; “I’m above it. Do you think
I’d take anything but my rights of lending a hand to help a poor fellow
when the bull dogs are on his track? No, sink me!”
“You are very kind,” said Gray, “but still—”
“Still, nonsense. There’s you, me, and there will be Bill, and Bill’s
young woman—that’ll make four of us. Share and share alike’s the plan.”
“Share?”
“Yes—the swag. Come, honour bright, now produce it, will you?”
“Really, I—I—”
“Do you doubt my honour?” cried the ruffian. “If you do, why don’t you
say so, you sneak? Take my life, but don’t doubt my honour!”
Gray’s hand mechanically moved towards his breast for his pistol, but
before he could reach it the brawny hand of the man was upon his
throat, and holding Gray as if he had been an infant in his herculean
grasp, he himself took the pistol from him and put it in his own
pocket, saying,—
“Thank you, I’ll mind it for you.”
“Let me go,” gasped Gray.
“Then you don’t doubt my honour?”
“No, no—certainly not.”
“Oh, very well, I thought you didn’t mean it.”
Gray was then liberated from the grasp which came within one degree of
suffocation, and he said,—
“I will be candid with you. I have forty pounds with me, which I will
divide as you propose.”
“Forty? Humph! It’s d—d little; but I hate all grumbling. We can’t have
more than a cat and her skin, say I.”
“No, certainly,” said Gray. “I didn’t understand you at first you see,
or I should never have for a moment hesitated.”
“Oh, it’s all right—it’s all right. Never say die, sink me.”
“That’ll be ten pounds each,” remarked Gray, who really, as we know,
had a very large sum about him—a sum so large indeed as materially to
have inconvenienced him in his race down the Strand.
“So it will,” replied the man. “Now, you know the rules, my covey, as
well as I do, I dare say?”
“What rules?”
“Why, you must strip and let me examine, for myself and Bill and Bill’s
young woman, all your togs, to see whether you haven’t forgot a stray
five pound note or so. No offence, my covey; but you know rules is
rules all the world over, and fair play is a jewel of very great
lustre, my rum ’un.”