WINDING UP THE CLOCK.
It was eleven o'clock that night when Tom Stamer, dressed in the seedy
black clothes and wearing the false beard and whiskers he had on in
the morning, started from the Borough once more for the West. He had
not replaced the spectacles broken in his fall at the Hanover in
Chetwynd Street. He carried a very substantial-looking walking-stick
of great thickness and weight. It was not a loaded stick, but it would
manifestly be a terrible weapon at close quarters, for, instead of
consisting of metal only in one part of one end, it was composed of
metal throughout. The seeming stick was not wood or leaded wood, but
iron It was not solid, but hollow like a gas pipe, and at the end
intended to touch the ground, the mouth of the tube was protected by a
brass ferrule to which a small tampion was affixed. The handle was
massive and crooked, and large enough to give ample hold to the
largest hand of man. About a couple of inches from the crook there was
a joining where the stick could be unscrewed.
Stamer accounted to the eyes of observers for carrying so massive a
stick by affecting a lameness of the right leg. When he entered a
dense crowd or came upon a point at which the people were hurrying, he
raised the stick up from the ground and laid aside his limp. But where
people were few and close observation of him possible, his lameness
grew very marked, and not only did his stick seem indispensable, but
he put it down on the pavement as gingerly as though the least jar
caused him pain. Sympathetic people who saw him fancied he had but
just come out of hospital, and were inclined to be indignant that he
had not been supplied with more effectual support, such as crutches.
One old gentleman asked him if he ought not to have a second stick;
Stamer snivelled and said he knew he ought, but declared with a sigh
he had no money to buy another one. The old gentleman gave Stamer a
shilling. Stamer touched his hat, thanked the old gentleman for his
kindness and his gift, and requested Heaven to bless him. The old
gentleman wore a heavy gold chain and, no doubt, a watch. But Stamer
had important business on hand, and there were a great number of
people about, and he did not want to run, for running would make his
arm unsteady, so he asked Heaven to bless the old gentleman and
forebore to rob him.
But the thought of that missed opportunity rankled in him. The feeling
that he had been obliged to neglect business and accept charity
fretted and vexed him. The thought of the mean squalid shilling made
him sick, and as soon as he came to a quiet place he threw it with a
curse into the middle of the road. He had shillings of his own, and
didn't want charity of any man. If he had stolen the shilling that
would have been a different affair. Then it would have come to him in
a straightforward business-like way, and would, doubtless, be the best
he could have done under the circumstances. But now it seemed the
result of a fraud committed upon him, to which he had been forced to
consent. It was the ransom he had under duress accepted for a gold
watch and chain, and was, therefore, loathsome and detestable in his
sight. Its presence could not be endured. It was abominable. Foh! He
was well rid of it?
He did not approach Welbeck Place by Chetwynd Street. He did not
intend repeating his visit to Mr. Williams's house. He had got there
all he wanted and a little more. He kept along by the river and then
retraced the way he had come that afternoon after leaving the Hanover.
On his previous visit to-day to this locality he had been silent and
watchful as a cat, and he had a cat's strong sense of locality. He
never forgot a place he was once in; and, piercing northward from the
river through a network of mean streets he had never seen until today,
he hit upon the southward entrance to Welbeck Mews with as much ease
and certainty as though he had lived there for twenty years.
The mews were lonely after nightfall, and the road through them little
used. When Stamer found himself in the yard, the place was absolutely
deserted. They were a cabman's mews and no one would, in all
likelihood, have business there for a couple of hours. The night was
now as dark as night ever is at that time of the year, and the place
was still. It wanted about twenty minutes of twelve yet.
When Stamer came to the gable of the house next but one to the
Hanover, and the wall of which formed one half of the northern
boundary of the yard, he paused and listened. He could hear no sound
of life or movement near him beyond the snort or cough of a horse now
and then.
The ostler who waited on the cabmen lived in the house at the gable of
which he stood, and at this hour he had to be aroused in case of any
man returning because of accident, or a horse knocked up by some long
and unexpected drive. As a rule, the ostler slept undisturbed from
eleven at night till half-past four or five in the morning.
After a pause of two or three minutes, Stamer stooped, slipped off his
boots, slung them around his neck, and having hitched the crook of his
heavy stick to a belt he wore under his waistcoat, he laid hold of the
waterpipe that descended from the gutter of the double roof to the
yard, and began ascending the gable of the house with surprising
agility and speed.
In less than two minutes from the time he first seized the waterpipe
he disappeared in the gutter above. He crawled in a few yards from the
edge and then reclined against the sloping slates of the roof to rest.
The ascent had taken only a couple of minutes, but the exertion had
been very great, and he was tired and out of breath.
Then he unscrewed the ferrule and withdrew the tampion and unscrewed
the handle of his stick, and was busy in the darkness for a while with
the weapon he carried. Overhead the stars looked pale and faint and
wasting in the pall of pale yellow cloud that hangs by night over
London in summer, the glare of millions of lights on the vapour rising
up from the great city.
He particularly wished to have a steady hand and arm that night, in a
few minutes, so he made up his mind to rest until five minutes to
twelve. Then he should get into position. He should creep down the
gutter until he came to the wall of the Hanover, the gable wall of the
Hanover standing up over the roofs of the houses on which he now was
lying. He should then be almost opposite the window at which he last
night saw the dwarf wind up his clock. He should be a little out of
the direct line, but not much. The width of Welbeck Place was no more
from house to house than fifty feet. The distance from the wall of the
house he should be on then, and the wall of Forbes's bakery could not
be more than sixty feet. The weapon he carried was perfectly
trustworthy at a hundred, a hundred-and-fifty yards, or more. He
had been practising that afternoon and evening at an old hat at forty
yards, and he had never missed it once. Forty yards was just double
the distance he should be from that window if he were on a parapet
instead of being at the coping tile, lying on the inside slope of the
roof. Allow another ten feet for that. This would bring the distance
up to seventy feet at the very outside, and he had never missed once
at a hundred and twenty feet. He had given himself now and then a good
deal of practice with the gun, for he enjoyed peculiar facilities;
because the factory wall by which the lane at the back of his place
ran, prevented anyone seeing what he was doing, and the noise of the
factory drowned the whurr of the gun and the whizz of the bullet.
There was to be a screen, or curtain, or blind up to-night, but that
was all the better, for it made no difference to the aim or bullet,
and it would prevent anything being noticed for a while, perhaps until
morning no one would know.
The work would go on at the window until half-past twelve. It would be
as well not to _do it_ until very near half-past; for then there would
be the less time for anyone in the Hanover to spy out anything wrong,
At half-past would come the noise and confusion of closing time. There
would then be plenty of people about, and it would be quite easy to
get away.
It was a good job there were no windows in the Hanover gable, though
no one was likely to be upstairs in the public-house until after
closing time. The landlord was not a married man. It was a good job
there was no moon.
It would be a good job when this was done.
It was a good job he thought of waiting until just half-past twelve,
for then everything would be more favourable below, and his hand and
arm would have more time to steady.
It was a good job that in this country there were some things stronger
than even smelling-salts!
At half-past eleven that night the private bar of the Hanover held
about half-a-dozen customers. The weather was too warm for anything
like a full house. Three or four of the men present were old
frequenters, but it lacked the elevating presence of Oscar Leigh, who
always gave the assembly a distinctly intellectual air, and it was not
cheered and consoled by the radiation of wealth from Mr. Jacobs, the
rich greengrocer of Sloane Street.
The three or four frequenters present were in no way distinguished
beyond their loyalty to the house. They came there regularly night
after night, drank, in grave silence, a regular quantity of beer and
spirits, and went away at closing time with the conviction that they
had been spending their time profitably attending to the improvement
of their minds. They had no views on any subjects ever discussed.
They had, with reference to the Hanover, only one opinion, and it
was that the finishing touches of a liberal education could nowhere
else in London be so freely obtained without derogation and on the
self-respecting principle of every man paying his way and being
theoretically as good as any other. If they could they would put a
stop to summer in these islands, for summer had a thinning and
depreciating effect on the company of the private bar.
A few minutes later, however, the spirits of those present rose, for
first Mr. Jacobs came in, smiling and bland, and then Mr. Oscar Leigh,
rubbing his forehead and complaining of the heat.
Mr. Jacobs greeted the landlord and the dwarf affably, as became a man
of substance, and then, knowing no one else by name, greeted the
remainder of the company generally, as became a man of politeness and
consideration.
"I'll have three-pennyworth of your excellent rum hot," said Mr.
Jacobs to the landlord, in a way which implied that, had not the
opinion of an eminent physician been against it, he would have ordered
ten times the quantity and drunk it with pleasure. Then he sat down on
a seat that ran along the wall, took out of his pocket a cigar-case,
opened it carefully, and, having selected a cigar, examined the weed
as though it was not uncommon to discover protruding through the side
of these particular cigars a diamond of priceless value or a deadly
drug. Then he pierced the end of his cigar with a silver piercer which
he took out of a trouser's pocket, pulled down his waistcoat, and
began to smoke, wearing his hat just a trifle on one side to show that
he was unbent.
Just as he had settled himself comfortably, the door of the public
department opened, and a tall, thin man, with enormous ears,
wearing long mutton-chop whiskers, a brown round hat, and dark
chocolate-coloured clothes, entered and was served by the potman.
"I have only a minute or two. I must be off to wind up," said Leigh.
"Ten minutes to twelve by your clock, Mr. Williams, that means a
quarter to right time. I'll have three of rum hot, if you please."
"That's quite right, Mr. Leigh," said the landlord, proceeding to brew
the punch and referring to his clock. "We always keep our clock a few
minutes fast to avoid bother at closing time. The same as always, Mr.
Jacobs, I see, and I _smell_."
"I beg your pardon?" said the greengrocer, as though he hadn't the
least notion of what the landlord alluded to.
"A good cigar, sir. That is an excellent cigar you are smoking."
It was clear that up to that moment Mr. Jacobs had not given a thought
to the quality of his cigar, for he took it from his lips, looked at
it as though he was now pretty certain this particular one did not
exude either priceless diamonds or deadly drugs, and said with great
modesty and satisfaction, "Yes, it's not bad. I get a case now and
then from my friend Isaacs of Bond Street. They cost me, let me see,
about sixpence a piece."
There was a faint murmur of approval at this statement. It was most
elevating to know that you were acquainted with a man who smoked
cigars he bought in Bond Street, and that he did not buy them by the
dozen or the box even, but by the case! If a man bought cigars by the
case from a friend in Bond Street at the rate of sixpence each, what
would be the retail price of them across the counter? It was
impossible to say exactly and dangerous to guess, but it was certain
you could not buy one for less than a shilling or eighteen-pence, that
is, if a man like Mr. Jacobs' friend Mr. Isaacs would bemean himself
by selling a single one at any price to a chance comer.
"Still working at your wonderful clock, Mr. Leigh?" said the
greengrocer from Sloane Street, with the intention of sharing his
conversation fairly between the landlord and the dwarf, the only men
present who were sitting above the salt.
"Well, sir, literally speaking, I cannot be said to be working at it
now. But I am daily engaged upon it, and before a quarter of an hour I
shall be busy winding it up."
"Have you to wind it every day?"
"Yes. St. Paul's clock takes three quarters of an hour's winding every
day with something like a winch handle. My clock takes half an hour
every night. It must be wound between twelve and one, and I have made
it a rule to wind it in the first half hour. My one does not want
nearly so much power as St. Paul's. It is wound by a lever and not a
winch handle. By-and-by, when it is finished and placed in a proper
position in a proper tower, and I can increase the power, once a week
will be sufficient."
"It is, I have heard, the most wonderful clock in London?"
"In London! In London! In the worlds sir. It is the most wonderful
clock ever conceived by man."
"And now suppose you forgot to wind it up, what would happen?"
"There is no fear of that."
"It must be a great care on your mind."
"Immense. I have put up a curtain today, so that I may be able to keep
the window open and get a breath of air this hot weather."
"Are you not afraid of fire up there and so near a bakehouse?"
"I never thought of fire. There is little or no danger of fire. Mr.
Forbes is quite solvent."
"But suppose anything were to happen, it is so high up, it could not
be got down?"
"Got down! Got down! Why, my dear sir, it is twelve feet by nine, and
parts of it are so delicate that a rude shake would ruin them. Got
down! Why it is shafted to the wall. All my power comes through the
wall, from the chimney. When it is shifted no one will be able to stir
bolt or nut but me. _I_ must do it, sir. No other man living knows
anything about it. No other man could understand it. Fancy anyone but
myself touching it! Why he might do more harm in an hour than I could
put right in a year, ay, in three years. Well, my time is up. Good
night, gentlemen."
He scrambled off his high stool and was quickly out of the bar. It was
now five minutes to twelve o'clock right time.
He crossed Welbeck Street and opening the private door of Forbes's in
Chetwynd Street went in, closing the door after him.
As he came out John Timmons emerged from the public bar of the
Hanover, and turned into Welbeck Place. He went on until he came
opposite the window of the clock-room. Here he stood still, thrust his
hands deep down in his trousers' pockets, and leaning his back against
the wall, prepared to watch with his own eyes the winding of the
clock.
In less than five minutes the window of the top room, which had been
dark, gradually grew illumined until the light came full through the
transparent oiled muslin curtain. Timmons could see for all practical
purposes as plainly as through glass.
"There Leigh is, anyway," thought Timmons, "working away at his lever.
Can it be he was doing the same thing at this hour last night?
Nonsense. He was walking away from this place with me at this hour
last night as sure as I am here now. But what did he say himself
to-day? I shouldn't mind Stamer, for he is a fool. But the landlord
and Stamer say the same thing, and Leigh himself said it too this day.
I must be going mad.
"There, he is turning round now and nodding to the men in the bar.
They said he did the same last night, and, as I live, there's the
clock we were under striking the quarter past again! I must be going
mad. I begin to think last night must have been all a dream with me. I
don't think he's all right. I don't believe in witchcraft, but I do
believe in devilry, and there's something wrong here. I'll watch this
out anyway. I must bring him to book over it. I'll tell him straight
what I know--that is if I know anything and am not going mad----"
Whurr--whizz!
"Why what's that over head?"
Timmons looked up, but saw nothing.
"It's some young fellows larking."
He glanced back at the window.
"What a funny way he's nodding his head now. And there's a hole in the
curtain and there seems to be a noise in the room. There goes the gas
out. I suppose the clock is wound up now. Well, it's more than I can
understand and a great deal more than I like, and I'll have it out of
him. It would be too bad if that fool Stamer were right after all,
and--but the whole thing is nonsense.
"Strange I didn't hear the clock strike the hour and yet Leigh's light
is out. I suppose his half hour winding was only another piece of his
bragging.
"Is the light quite out? Looks now as if it wasn't. He must have put
it out by mistake or accident, for surely it hasn't struck half-past
twelve yet.
"Ah, what's that? He is lighting a match or something. No, my eyes
deceive me. There is no light. Everything here seems to deceive me.
I'll go home.
"Ah, there's the half-hour at last!"
And John Timmons walked out of Welbeck Place, and took his way
eastward.