Plot on thy little hour, and skein on skein
Weave the vain mesh, in which thy subtle soul
Broods on its venom! Lo! behind, before,
Around thee, like an armament of cloud,
The black Fate labours onward--ANONYMOUS.
The dusk of a winter’s evening gathered over a room in Crauford’s house
in town, only relieved from the closing darkness by an expiring and
sullen fire, beside which Mr. Bradley sat, with his feet upon the
fender, apparently striving to coax some warmth into the icy palms of
his spread hands. Crauford himself was walking up and down the room with
a changeful step, and ever and anon glancing his bright, shrewd eye at
the partner of his fraud, who, seemingly unconscious of the observation
he underwent, appeared to occupy his attention solely with the
difficulty of warming his meagre and withered frame.
“Ar’n’t you very cold there, sir?” said Bradley, after a long pause, and
pushing himself farther into the verge of the dying embers, “may I not
ring for some more coals?”
“Hell and the--: I beg your pardon, my good Bradley, but you vex me
beyond patience; how can you think of such trifles when our very lives
are in so imminent a danger?”
“I beg your pardon, my honoured benefactor, they are indeed in danger!”
“Bradley, we have but one hope,--fidelity to each other. If we persist
in the same story, not a tittle can be brought home to us,--not a
tittle, my good Bradley; and though our characters may be a little
touched, why, what is a character? Shall we eat less, drink less,
enjoy less, when we have lost it? Not a whit. No, my friend, we will go
abroad: leave it to me to save from the wreck of our fortunes enough to
live upon like princes.”
“If not like peers, my honoured benefactor.”
“‘Sdeath!--yes, yes, very good,--he! he! he! if not peers. Well, all
happiness is in the senses, and Richard Crauford has as many senses as
Viscount Innisdale; but had we been able to protract inquiry another
week, Bradley, why, I would have been my Lord, and you Sir John.”
“You bear your losses like a hero, sir,” said Mr. Bradley. “To be sure:
there is no loss, man, but life,--none; let us preserve that--and it
will be our own fault if we don’t--and the devil take all the rest. But,
bless me, it grows late, and, at all events, we are safe for some hours;
the inquiry won’t take place till twelve to-morrow, why should we not
feast till twelve to-night? Ring, my good fellow: dinner must be nearly
ready.”
“Why, honoured sir,” said Bradley, “I want to go home to see my wife and
arrange my house. Who knows but I may sleep in Newgate to-morrow?”
Crauford, who had been still walking to and fro, stopped abruptly at
this speech; and his eye, even through the gloom, shot out a livid and
fierce light, before which the timid and humble glance of Mr. Bradley
quailed in an instant.
“Go home!--no, my friend, no: I can’t part with you tonight, no, not
for an instant. I have many lessons to give you. How are we to learn our
parts for to-morrow, if we don’t rehearse them beforehand? Do you not
know that a single blunder may turn what I hope will be a farce into a
tragedy? Go home!--pooh! pooh! why, man, I have not seen my wife, nor
put my house to rights, and if you do but listen to me I tell you again
and again that not a hair of our heads can be touched.”
“You know best, honoured sir; I bow to your decision.”
“Bravo, honest Brad! and now for dinner. I have the most glorious
champagne that ever danced in foam to your lip. No counsellor like the
bottle, believe me!”
And the servant entering to announce dinner, Crauford took Bradley’s
arm, and leaning affectionately upon it, passed through an obsequious
and liveried row of domestics to a room blazing with light and plate. A
noble fire was the first thing which revived Bradley’s spirit; and,
as he spread his hands over it before he sat down to the table, he
surveyed, with a gleam of gladness upon his thin cheeks, two vases of
glittering metal formerly the boast of a king, in which were immersed
the sparkling genii of the grape.
Crauford, always a gourmand, ate with unusual appetite, and pressed the
wine upon Bradley with an eager hospitality, which soon somewhat clouded
the senses of the worthy man. The dinner was removed, the servants
retired, and the friends were left alone.
“A pleasant trip to France!” cried Crauford, filling a bumper. “That’s
the land for hearts like ours. I tell you what, little Brad, we will
leave our wives behind us, and take, with a new country and new names, a
new lease of life. What will it signify to men making love at Paris what
fools say of them in London? Another bumper, honest Brad,--a bumper to
the girls! What say you to that, eh?”
“Lord, sir, you are so facetious, so witty! It must be owned that a
black eye is a great temptation,--Lira-lira, la-la!” and Mr. Bradley’s
own eyes rolled joyously.
“Bravo, Brad!--a song, a song! but treason to King Burgundy! Your glass
is--”
“Empty, honoured sir, I know it!--Lira-lira la!--but it is easily
filled! We who have all our lives been pouring from one vessel into
another know how to keep it up to the last!
‘Courage then, cries the knight, we may yet be forgiven,
Or at worst buy the bishop’s reversion in heaven;
Our frequent escapes in this world show how true ‘t is
That gold is the only Elixir Salutis.
Derry down, Derry down.’
‘All you who to swindling conveniently creep,
Ne’er piddle; by thousands the treasury sweep
Your safety depends on the weight of the sum,
For no rope was yet made that could tie up a plum.
Derry down, etc.’”
[From a ballad called “The Knight and the Prelate.”]
“Bravissimo, little Brad!--you are quite a wit! See what it is to have
one’s faculties called out. Come, a toast to old England, the land
in which no man ever wants a farthing who has wit to steal it,--‘Old
England forever!’ your rogue is your only true patriot!” and Crauford
poured the remainder of the bottle, nearly three parts full, into a
beaker, which he pushed to Bradley. That convivial gentleman emptied it
at a draught, and, faltering out, “Honest Sir John!--room for my Lady
Bradley’s carriage,” dropped down on the floor insensible.
Crauford rose instantly, satisfied himself that the intoxication was
genuine, and giving the lifeless body a kick of contemptuous disgust,
left the room, muttering, “The dull ass, did he think it was on his
back that I was going to ride off? He! he! he! But stay, let me feel my
pulse. Too fast by twenty strokes! One’s never sure of the mind if one
does not regulate the body to a hair! Drank too much; must take a powder
before I start.”
Mounting by a back staircase to his bedroom, Crauford unlocked a chest,
took out a bundle of clerical clothes, a large shovel hat, and a huge
wig. Hastily, but not carelessly, induing himself in these articles of
disguise, he then proceeded to stain his fair cheeks with a preparation
which soon gave them a swarthy hue. Putting his own clothes in the
chest, which he carefully locked (placing the key in his pocket), he
next took from a desk on his dressing-table a purse; opening this,
he extracted a diamond of great size and immense value, which, years
before, in preparation of the event that had now taken place, he had
purchased.
His usual sneer curled his lip as he gazed at it. “Now,” said he, “is
it not strange that this little stone should supply the mighty wants
of that grasping thing, man? Who talks of religion, country, wife,
children? This petty mineral can purchase them all! Oh, what a bright
joy speaks out in your white cheek, my beauty! What are all human charms
to yours? Why, by your spell, most magical of talismans, my years may
walk, gloating and revelling, through a lane of beauties, till they fall
into the grave! Pish! that grave is an ugly thought,--a very, very ugly
thought! But come, my sun of hope, I must eclipse you for a while! Type
of myself, while you hide, I hide also; and when I once more let you
forth to the day, then shine out Richard Crauford,--shine out!” So
saying, he sewed the diamond carefully in the folds of his shirt; and,
rearranging his dress, took the cooling powder, which he weighed out
to a grain, with a scrupulous and untrembling hand; descended the back
stairs; opened the door, and found himself in the open street.
The clock struck ten as he entered a hackney-coach and drove to another
part of London. “What, so late!” thought he; “I must be at Dover in
twelve hours: the vessel sails then. Humph! some danger yet! What a
pity that I could not trust that fool! He! he! he!--what will he think
tomorrow, when he wakes and finds that only one is destined to swing!”
The hackney-coach stopped, according to his direction, at an inn in the
city. Here Crauford asked if a note had been left for Dr. Stapylton. One
(written by himself) was given to him.
“Merciful Heaven!” cried the false doctor, as he read it, “my daughter
is on a bed of death!”
The landlord’s look wore anxiety; the doctor seemed for a moment
paralyzed by silent woe. He recovered, shook his head piteously, and
ordered a post-chaise and four on to Canterbury without delay.
“It is an ill wind that blows nobody good!” thought the landlord, as he
issued the order into the yard.
The chaise was soon out; the doctor entered; off went the post-boys; and
Richard Crauford, feeling his diamond, turned his thoughts to safety and
to France.
A little, unknown man, who had been sitting at the bar for the last two
hours sipping brandy and water, and who from his extreme taciturnity and
quiet had been scarcely observed, now rose. “Landlord,” said he, “do you
know who that gentleman is?”
“Why,” quoth Boniface, “the letter to him was directed, ‘For the Rev.
Dr. Stapylton; will be called for.’”
“Ah,” said the little man, yawning, “I shall have a long night’s work of
it. Have you another chaise and four in the yard?”
“To be sure, sir, to be sure!” cried the landlord in astonishment.
“Out with it, then! Another glass of brandy and water,--a little
stronger, no sugar!”
The landlord stared; the barmaid stared; even the head-waiter, a very
stately person, stared too.
“Hark ye,” said the little man, sipping his brandy and water, “I am a
deuced good-natured fellow, so I’ll make you a great man to-night; for
nothing makes a man so great as being let into a great secret. Did you
ever hear of the rich Mr. Crauford?”
“Certainly: who has not?”
“Did you ever see him?”
“No! I can’t say I ever did.”
“You lie, landlord: you saw him to-night.”
“Sir!” cried the landlord, bristling up.
The little man pulled out a brace of pistols, and very quietly began
priming them out of a small powder-flask.
The landlord started back; the head-waiter cried “Rape!” and the barmaid
“Murder!”
“Who the devil are you, sir?” cried the landlord.
“Mr. Tickletrout! the celebrated officer,--thief-taker, as they call
it. Have a care, ma’am, the pistols are loaded. I see the chaise is out;
there’s the reckoning, landlord.”
“O Lord! I’m sure I don’t want any reckoning: too great an honour for my
poor house to be favoured with your company; but [following the little
man to the door] whom did you please to say you were going to catch?”
“Mr. Crauford, alias Dr. Stapylton.”
“Lord! Lord! to think of it,--how shocking! What has he done?”
“Swindled, I believe.”
“My eyes! And why, sir, did not you catch him when he was in the bar?”
“Because then I should not have got paid for my journey to Dover. Shut
the door, boy; first stage on to Canterbury.” And, drawing a woollen
nightcap over his ears, Mr. Tickletrout resigned himself to his
nocturnal excursion.
On the very day on which the patent for his peerage was to have been
made out, on the very day on which he had afterwards calculated on
reaching Paris, on that very day was Mr. Richard Crauford lodged in
Newgate, fully committed for a trial of life and death.