A LIFE-AND-DEATH STRUGGLE.
It was an hour past midnight, and the fog had deepened so that a man
could scarcely see a yard before him. On the North Finchley Road it lay
particularly thick, and the sky and surrounding space seemed to be
blotted out--as they certainly were from two wayfarers who plodded their
way slowly onward through the darkness. They were a man and a woman,
who, although they were wrapped in gloom, cast apprehensive glances on
all sides, and frequently stopped to listen for sounds of footsteps.
"Jeremiah, my love," said the woman, shivering, "why did you insist upon
our leaving our nice warm quarters on such a night? It will be the death
of me."
"_I'll_ be the death of you," growled the man, "if you call me by my
name! Mind that, you old fool!"
"Don't speak to me so hard!" implored the woman; "no one can hear us.
The night ain't fit for a dog to be out in it."
"That's the reason we're out in it," said Jeremiah, with a curse. "Hold
your row, if you don't want me to do you a mischief!"
"Oh!" murmured Mrs. Pamflett, "that you should say such things to me
after all I've done for you!"
"After all you've done for me! Yes, you _have_ done for me! If it hadn't
been for you dragging at my heels I should have been out of this
infernal scrape weeks ago. You're a nice mother, you are! What's the use
of such as you, I'd like to know?"
They were so well disguised that it would have been difficult even for
those best acquainted with them to identify them; hence Jeremiah's
caution to his mother as to being careful with her speech was not
unnecessary. Nevertheless, he presently spoke again, either because he
deemed that the darkness by which they were surrounded afforded them
sufficient security or because he dreaded the terrors of silence.
"Why did I insist upon our leaving our nice warm quarters? You want me
to tell you that, do you?"
"Yes," she whined. "We were safe there--we were safe there!"
"We were not! Had we remained we should have been nabbed by this time,
and then what chance would have been left for us? The landlord warned
me; he told me we were being hunted down, and that there was danger in
our keeping in our hiding-place another night."
"Who has hunted us down--who, my love?"
"Yah! keep your love to yourself; I'm sick of it. Who? Ah, I should like
to know, and have him here! There'd be no more hunting down for him, I
promise!"
"The landlord was frightened; he wanted to get rid of us."
"Frightened? Perhaps he was; but he would not have been in a hurry to
get rid of such good customers without good cause. He's had a matter of
a hundred pounds already out of me, and he knew I had enough left to go
on with a pretty long time yet. But I kept the diamond bracelet from
him, with all his cunning. He wormed and wormed, but he never got out
of me that I had it safe about me. I was his match there. Let's have a
look at it, mother. It does one's heart good. It's the only thing that
keeps me up."
He crouched down by the side of the hedge and drew forth a dark lantern,
which he lighted. Then he rose, and looked about him, projecting the
light into dark spaces around to make sure that no person was near. He
saw nothing, heard nothing. Down he crouched again, and from an inner
pocket pulled out a jewel-case, which he opened.
"Look at them, mother--how they glitter and shine! Ah, you beauties,
there's nothing false about you! If we were safe in a foreign country,
or in America--I prefer America, mother; looking for us there would be
like looking for a needle in a bottle of hay--if we were safe there,
with this in our pockets, we could live a long life of pleasure and
comfort. I should know how to dispose of the stones one by one,
secretly, secretly! It's the land for diamonds. Then I could have my
fling."
Neither of the pair saw or had any suspicion of the shadow that was
creeping through thicker shadows than itself, closer, closer, closer.
Neither of them saw, or had any suspicion of, the hand of doom coming
nearer, nearer, nearer, to strike terror to their guilty souls.
"Here, take a pull at this, mother," said Jeremiah, handing her a
bottle.
"It warms me, it warms me!" murmured Mrs. Pamflett.
"Don't empty the bottle," cried Jeremiah, snatching it from her. "You're
a selfish cat!"
"What did the landlord tell you, Jeremiah, about our being hunted down?"
"There's been a man making inquiries about the lodgers, and offering
money to find out things. He didn't know who he was, but it looked
suspicious, and we were safer out of the house than in it. Take another
look at the beauties, mother, before I put them away."
Closer, closer, closer crept the shadow. Closer, closer, closer came the
hand of doom.
"Do you think we _shall_ get safe away?" whispered Mrs. Pamflett, as
Jeremiah crouched, gloating over the diamonds.
"Do I think it?--I'm sure of it! The police have been too long off the
scent for them to get on to it again. All we've got to do is to be
cunning, cunning--"
"Jeremiah!" screamed Mrs. Pamflett.
The shadow loomed over them, fell upon them, and seized them and the
diamond bracelet. In a moment Jeremiah had wrested it back again, and
three human beings were engaged in a deadly struggle.
"I arrest you," cried Tom Barley, "for the murder of Miser Farebrother
and Maria Baily!"
The contest was unequal. Strong as Tom Barley was, Jeremiah and his
mother had the strength of desperation, and they succeeded in flinging
him off. But he fell on them again, and his cries for help rang loud
through the night.
"It's you, Tom Barley, is it?" muttered Jeremiah, as the struggle was
proceeding. "It's you that's been hunting us down, is it?"
"Yes, it's me," said Tom Barley, getting his mouth free--Mrs. Pamflett
was endeavouring to stifle his cries with her hand--"and as God is your
judge you're as good as dead!"
"Hold on to him, mother, a moment," said Jeremiah; "fix your teeth in
him! Say your prayers, Tom Barley; it's you that's as good as dead!"
"Ah!" screamed Tom, and he dropped.
Jeremiah had succeeded in plucking a knife from his pocket, and, opening
it, had plunged it into Tom. He had aimed at the honest fellow's heart,
but he had missed, and the knife had gone through the upper part of the
right arm, cutting it cruelly to the bone. It was this that had caused
Tom to let go his hold upon them. They took advantage of the release,
and fled through the darkness. But in a moment Tom was on his feet
again, and pursuing them, the blood flowing fast from the wound. He did
not feel the pain of it; all that he bemoaned was that his arm was
useless and that his voice was growing weak. Before fifty yards were
traversed he had seized them again.
"Curse it!" cried Jeremiah, "I have lost my knife."
"That's my luck," muttered Tom, clinging to them.
"Help! help!"
They beat him frightfully about the head, and he flung it feebly this
way and that in the endeavour to escape the cruel blows; but he did not
loose his hold of them again. In the blind and dreadful struggle they
stumbled wildly about, and suddenly they fell crashing down over an
embankment. And still Tom Barley, feeling now that life was ebbing from
him, held desperately on to them, and still his cries floated on the
air. To the frightful sounds of this contest another was added the
moment they reached the bottom of the embankment. They had fallen upon a
railway track, and a train was approaching. Two huge fierce eyes glared
luridly in the fog. Tom's voice grew fainter and fainter, but he never
relaxed his hold of the murderers.
"Help! help! help! I have caught the murderers! Help! help! help!"
The clatter of the approaching train almost, but not quite, drowned his
appeals. They fell vaguely upon the ears of the engine-driver, and he
instantly slackened steam. But the huge lurid eyes were now very close
upon the struggling forms.
"Damn you!" screamed Jeremiah, "will you let go?"
"No," said Tom, through his clenched teeth, "not till I'm dead! And then
I won't!"
"Then there's an end of you!" cried Jeremiah, and by a determined and
powerful effort he succeeded in throwing the lower portion of Tom's body
across the rails. Fortunately Tom's head was off the line, and his left
arm was wound tightly round Jeremiah's neck. The train passed over Tom's
foot, and cut it clean away, but Tom, although he had swooned, held on
like grim death, and did not even feel Jeremiah's teeth fixed in his
arm. In this position they were found a moment or two afterward, when
the train was stopped, and it was with great difficulty that the
engine-driver and passengers could part him who lived from him who
looked like dead.
The news ran through the length and breadth of the kingdom the next
morning, and telegraph wires flashed it all over the world. Tom Barley
did not wake to find himself famous, for the reason that for several
weeks he was in delirium, and very, very near to death. But none the
less was he made famous and dubbed a hero of heroes for the wondrous
battle he had fought. Newspapers and magazines sang his praises, and
poets deified him. The days of Homer died not in Homer's verse. We have
as glorious heroes to-day as have been handed down, immortalized from
those by-gone times. We have hearts as valiant, and souls as noble, and
love as sweet and pure, in this age which is dubbed commercial and
prosaic; and though Tom Barley has a wooden leg, he is worthy to shake
hands with Achilles. No such desire possesses him, or possessed him,
when he saw Phoebe sitting by his bedside in the hospital.
"You are getting strong again, Tom?"
"Yes, Miss Phoebe; thank God! Is everybody well?"
"Everybody, Tom."
"Your aunt and uncle, and Miss Fanny and Master Robert?"
"They are all well, Tom. They send their love, and will come and see you
when they are allowed."
"They are very good. And Mr. Cornwall, Miss Phoebe--he is well, I
hope?"
"Quite well, Tom. He is below, waiting for me."
"I am glad to hear it, Miss Phoebe. But perhaps I am making a
mistake."
"In what, Tom?"
"In calling you Miss Phoebe."
"No, Tom." She held up her left hand.
"If I dared to ask a favour?"
"You may dare to ask anything, Tom."
"That I may be allowed to come to the wedding?"
"Indeed, Tom, I think that is what we are waiting for. We could not be
happy without you."
"I can't thank you now, Miss Phoebe," said Tom, tears gathering in his
eyes. "I will when I'm stronger. There is another thing."
"Yes, Tom?"
"Say that you forgive me!"
"Ah, Tom!"
"It will make me happy, Miss Phoebe."
"Only because you have that foolish idea in your head--Tom, I forgive
you!"
She stooped and kissed him, as she had kissed him on the morning he
brought her from Parksides and gave her into the care of her good Aunt
Leth.
"I am truly grateful," murmured Tom, in a choking voice, as he turned
his face to the wall.