reminds me of another pair of lizards that in turn inhabited the
bell-glass. These were brought from Brazil, and introduced to me by
the name of _Taraquira Smith_. An _i_ or two should perhaps terminate
and dignify the latter name, to commemorate the particular Smith who
bestowed it on _Taraquira_; but _Smith_ is simple and practical;
and the Taraquira Smiths was the name of my two little Brazilian
lizards. The smaller one measured about eight inches from the snout
to the tip of his slender tail; the larger one was ten or more
inches in length. They are, however, less agreeable to handle than
the previous pets, their tails being armed with very finely-pointed
sharp scales in whorls. The lizards seem to know how to use this long
tail protectively, having acquired a habit of retrogression, and
when held, of backing out of the hand, as if with the intention of
pricking or inconveniencing you with these sharp spines, which are
thus converted into weapons of defence. When persistently held or
detained, the pricking effect caused by this backward motion is by
no means agreeable. For food, they were provided with a supply of a
peculiar kind of cockroach, which infested the reptile house at the
Zoological Gardens of London, near which I happened to reside; but my
two little foreigners persistently declined them and any other equally
tempting food. Indeed, the poor little _Smiths_ were in such a feeble
condition from exposure to cold during their transfer from the ship
to their glass home, that the smaller one soon died. On the voyage,
they had been kept in a warm temperature; and at the Reptilium they
have been preserved by artificial heat. It was December when mine
arrived, and though in the daytime they could be made comfortable near
the fire, during the night a regular heat could not be maintained;
notwithstanding, at the risk of suffocating them, warm woollen wraps
were folded round and over the glass, to keep the frosty air from them.
When the smaller _Taraquira_ died, redoubled care was bestowed on
the survivor, but unfortunately, we could not transfer the Brazilian
climate to a London residence, and my _Taraquira Smith_ only lived long
enough to display that peculiar and yet not vicious instinct of letting
you know that its tail was armed throughout its entire length with
those sharp prickly scales.
One more lizard-pet deserves an obituary notice.
‘I have a horned toad from Texas down at my office,’ said an Ohio
editor to me, when I was visiting in that State. ‘Will you like to call
in and see it, when you pass that way?’
The reader will surmise that a very short time elapsed ere I did ‘pass
that way;’ and my friend the editor bade me welcome by beginning an
immediate search for the ‘horned toad,’ which apparently was allowed
the free run of the office. Has the reader ever been introduced into
the office of a Western newspaper editor? A chaos of ‘exchanges’ is
its principal characteristic. You wonder how one man in a lifetime,
much less a week—this was the office of a weekly paper—could look over
and ‘scissors and clip’ from that astonishing miscellany. However, the
object now was to hunt up the toad, not news. Exchanges in compact
piles and loose piles were moved from shelf to table and table to
shelf; exchanges half-opened and unopened, exchanges already clipped
and thrown under the spacious table; papers filed and papers not
filed; books and magazines in vast piles to be reviewed; ink of all
colours in bottles of all sizes, some full, some empty; penholders and
pencils enough to kindle a fire; paper-knives, scissors, rulers, and
clips anywhere but in their natural places; and as for manuscripts,
advertisements, and advertising books—from the size of a bath-towel
down to the daintiest card—not to mention samples and offerings
presented to the influential man in order to win a good word in his
paper (here is the office-boy with another armful by the mail just in),
and ‘copy’ enough for six months’ use scattered about! All these things
were moved, lifted, separated, swept on one side and swept back again,
turned over again and again; but no toad rewarded that amiable editor’s
search. ‘Toads like damp,’ I suggested, while offering my small aid
in picking up a shower of literature which my friend scattered in his
haste. ‘The poor thing can scarcely feel comfortable among this wealth
of information and so near the stove.’
‘Well, it is an improvement on a boy’s pocket, anyhow,’ returned the
erudite man. ‘I rescued it from a boy who had been carrying it about in
his pocket for a whole fortnight. His uncle, just from Texas, brought
it for him to play with. It _was_ here half an hour ago, for I saw
it,’ continued the editor, rummaging a shelf of exchanges for the
fourth time. ‘It’s half dead anyhow; for horned toads won’t eat when
they’re caught. Do, pray, take a seat.—Why, there he is!’ and down on
the floor, in a dusty corner behind a chair which the editor drew out
for me, was a poor, pretty little saurian, with a pointed tail, and a
cornet of spikes round its head, which gave it a quaint and decorated
appearance.
‘It is not a toad after all!’ I ventured to explain; but belief in
vernaculars is strong.
‘Maybe it’s a frog, then; there are horned frogs, too, in Texas.’
On a first glance, the reptile has somewhat the appearance of a frog
or a toad (with the addition of a tail). Its body was broader for its
length than is usual in lizards, and its head was short and flat,
looking all the more so for the horny spines, which stood out like a
frill. The poor little half-dead thing was too feeble to struggle, and
too thickly coated with dust to display any other than mud colour.
From its long fast, it was merely skin and skeleton, painfully concave
beneath. I gladly accepted it from the editor; and on reaching home
gave it a bath, letting it remain in the water, and douching it
thoroughly, which seemed to invigorate it, as it tried to crawl out
of the basin, and opened a pair of bright black eyes. Gradually,
its markings and true colour appeared, and it turned out to be an
exceedingly pretty iguanian lizard; but, as my friend the editor had
with reason said, it is generally known in Texas as ‘the horned frog’
or ‘the horned toad,’ or scientifically, _Phrynosoma cornutum_.
It now already gave signs of recovery, and when placed on its back,
could right itself, and even crawl, and was a quaint, pretty little
creature, worth preserving. But a tremendous obstacle here arose.
There were young ladies in the house, and had they known I had
surreptitiously brought home a toad to ‘sting them with its poisonous
horns,’ the consequences are too appalling to conjecture! Such a
terrific creature of four and a half inches long, tail inclusive,
to be introduced into the family circle! So Iguana and I kept our
secret; and I slyly smuggled a large, empty flower-pot into my room,
and lined it with fresh grass and a clump of turf from the garden,
and had the pleasure of seeing the poor little stranger nestle in it
with evident satisfaction. I got its mouth open and gave it water,
which it swallowed readily; and by-and-by administered a few flies,
one at a time, which it also swallowed; and at night it crept under
the turf. Next day, it meekly swallowed more food and drink, similarly
administered, and was so greatly strengthened as to try to climb
up the side of the flower-pot, then standing in the sunshine. This
great flower-pot and its inmate caused me continuous alarm. When any
one was expected in my room, it was hidden in all manner of places;
but when there was no danger of interruption, it could stand on the
window-ledge, fortunately hidden from outside view by a veranda
beneath. And in this way Iguana lived for many days, during which it
rapidly improved. It is not surprising that such reptiles do not eat
in captivity. Their habit is to pursue insects, and swiftly too, or to
pounce upon one that takes its fancy; and no half-dead fly or amputated
spider thrown into its cage would excite its natural instincts. But
this queer little animal submitted to be fed in a ludicrous manner.
Without much difficulty I got its mouth open; and after suspiciously
swallowing the first mouthful, it took the second and third as
passively as a baby fed with a spoon. In this way it ate four or six
insects a day, varied by a few drops of water or the soft pulp of a
grape.
When my visit in Ohio was terminated, Iguana was secretly packed
in moss in a little flat box and put in my bag; and the huge empty
flower-pot was left outside the window, to excite the wonder of the
curious. The friends I next visited knew nothing of ‘horned toads’ and
their ‘venomous spines,’ and all alarms were forestalled by my saying:
‘I have such a pretty little animal up-stairs—a tame lizard which was
given me at B.’—‘Oh, do let us see it!’ was the encouraging reply;
and when duly presented in my palm, whatever natural shrinking the
ladies might have felt, was over-ruled by the ‘queer thing’s’ evident
harmlessness and its undeniably pretty coat. And now it was made happy
in a large birdcage with a carpet of turf and moss; and when placed
in the sunshine, was—in unexaggerated language—‘wild with delight.’
My hopes were to feed and strengthen it for another week or two, by
which time it might be safely consigned to a box and to hibernation.
But—and it is sad to end this little history with a ‘but’—there came at
the beginning of November some very warm days, and the sun had so much
power, that when the cage was placed in the window, _Phrynosoma_ must
have imagined itself back in Texas. Only twenty minutes elapsed, and
when I looked again, it was gone! How it could have squeezed itself and
its long spikes between the wires, surpasses comprehension; but gone it
was!
Great was the commotion throughout the house. The square of grass
plot which separated the house from the pavement, and the neighbours’
front gardens, and the flights of steps leading to the street, and all
the gratings, possible and impossible, were hunted over by the united
family, neighbours included. Pavement, road, and cellars were carefully
searched by my good-natured cousins, after, of course, every inch of
the room itself had been well examined. We felt sure that the sunshine
would have enticed it outwards, and we began to think poor little
Iguana must have fallen a victim to some dog or cat, when one of the
family, who had been out walking, came hurrying home exclaiming: ‘Why,
here’s your lizard! I found it on the pavement wa-a-y up the street,
with its mouth all bleeding!’
Strange that, in a public thoroughfare, it had escaped at all. Several
of its horns were broken, and its mouth was wounded internally, giving
evidence of a violent struggle against the wires of the cage. It must
have partly pushed its head between them, and found difficulty in
extricating itself, going sideways, and then falling from the window
on to some iron bars beneath. The jaw and teeth on one side were much
injured; for when, after this, I attempted to feed it, it struggled
violently and swallowed nothing more.
It never regained sufficient energy to attempt another escape, but
always held its head sideways, as if stiff or in pain; and after four
or five days, poor little _Phrynosoma cornutum_ died, and was buried.
WHERE THE TRACKS LED TO.
IN FOUR CHAPTERS.—CHAP. III.
I don’t know that I ever thought more closely or continually over
any event in my life than I did over this queer meeting with Sam
Braceby. There was too much of a coincidence about this matter; and my
experience has been that coincidences do not happen unless there is
something to bring them about. I could make nothing of it, however, and
so set seriously to work in watching Mr Godfrey. But in this affair it
seemed as though I was never to keep steadily on in any course, for on
the very evening I was to begin my observations, I received a letter
from Mr Thurles, asking me to call on him.
I found the merchant as harsh as before, and, in addition, a little
inclined to be offensive; at anyrate, his banter on my want of success
was particularly annoying to me. He did not seem able to say anything
pleasantly, and his speech ended in his throwing down a number of
letters and papers, and telling me that the utterer of the forged bills
had been discovered; the man himself had escaped by the merest chance;
but upon his lodgings being searched, there was found among his papers
correspondence which proved that he was a friend of Mr Godfrey, from
whom several letters, all on business matters—that is, relating to the
borrowing of money—were found.
‘It was not to be expected,’ continued the merchant, ‘that these
letters would state in so many words that they meant to forge bills or
break into houses; but there is quite enough to show the footing they
were on, and to convince us, if any more conviction were needed, that
they were both in the forgery.—Look over the papers, and see if you can
get a hint from them.’
I saw the name of the man to whom the letters were addressed, and knew
it as that of a young fellow who had borne a doubtful reputation,
although he had never been in actual ‘trouble.’ He was certainly a
dangerous companion for Godfrey Harleston. I took the papers, and
left Mr Thurles with the belief that the step-son was in an awkward
position. Hitherto, I had by no means been a believer in his guilt; but
I was obliged to own that things were now looking much blacker against
him. Knowing as much as I did, I determined on a different course of
action. I resolved to make some inquiries, and, if necessary, spend
some money among the associates of this newly discovered accomplice,
some of whom I knew pretty well.
But again I was destined to be balked in my plans—in fact, it was the
continual drifting about, which seemed to be our luck just now, which
made this undertaking so different from any other on which I had ever
been engaged. This time the interruption came from Long-necked Sam,
who had never been out of my waking thoughts for any one quarter of an
hour since I had seen him in the public-house. I found that Sam was
remanded on a serious charge, which, if proved, would probably secure
him, in his own phrase, ‘a lifer;’ and he wished to see me at once.
It was rather sharp work, as only a few days had elapsed since I saw
him, and now he had been apprehended, had his first hearing, and been
remanded. But I knew that the police were constantly looking after him,
and that he was always doing something which required him to keep out
of their way as much as possible.
He would be a very fresh detective who would slight such a summons,
meaningless as it might appear, for in such a business you can never
tell what is going to turn up. I went, and saw Sam, who looked serious
enough. Just as a matter of form and civility, I began to say that I
was sorry to see him there, and so on.
‘Never mind that, Mr Holdrey,’ said Sam; ‘you may be sure I did not
send for you to cry over spilt milk. I was sure to be “shopped” some
time or another, although I must own I thought I should have had a
little longer run. No; it isn’t that; it’s about that business of old
Thurles.—You are working with the old fellow, are you not?’
This was a staggerer! If I had ever tried to keep a business quiet,
this was the one. If I had been asked to name the job which had been
completely kept from oozing out, I should have named this; and yet
here was a notorious thief, a man who had nothing whatever to do with
Thurles & Company, speaking confidently and correctly as to my share in
the affair!
‘Well,’ I said, ‘what then?’ It was of no use denying it, as it was
plain that Sam _knew_.
‘The old man,’ he continued, ‘is employing you to find out who broke
into his office; but not so much for that as to find out about some
forged bills. Well, I know all about the burglary, and pretty near all
about the bills. The breaking-in was more in my way, as you know; but
I could not do that without learning a good deal about the other.—Mr
Holdrey, I have been badly used; the man who is deepest in the job has
treated me shabbily, and means to act worse, I can see; so I must tell
some one whom I can trust, and who will be honest with me. You know
what my pals are, and that I cannot ask them, though some of them would
be as true as the day; so I sent for you. Besides, you spoke up for me
and helped me when you could get nothing by it. I would trust you for
that good turn alone; and without it I would have trusted you, knowing
your character. But I say again and again, there are not many who would
have acted as you did. There’s a reward out, on the quiet, for this
robbery; you can get it through me.—You know my wife, don’t you?’
I had seen her once or twice, and so I told him.
‘Well, she has been badly used in this affair; so have I; but I meant
the money for her—I did honestly, to take her away where she was not
known, and no one could bring her convict husband up against her, after
he was sent off to Portland. Now, all I ask is, will you see to her
and the young one, and share the reward with them? I don’t ask you to
do anything which may seem in the least wrong, but so far as you can,
consistent with your character as a man, very different from me, help
her—will you do it? And will you share what reward you get?’
I did not see that there could be much harm in promising this, and on
my saying so, Sam was at once satisfied.
‘Then here goes,’ he said. ‘These bills were forged by a friend of
young Harleston—step-son to old Thurles, you know—but I am inclined to
think the young fellow never got any of the money. He does not say so
himself; but I have heard a little from others.’
He went on to tell me, in detail, what I had heard from Mr Thurles; but
all this, he owned, was at second-hand; his own share did not begin
till later. Mr Godfrey had found him out—how, Sam had no idea—and
proposed an easy job to him, which was, of course, to enter the office
and spoil the safe. The young man made no secret of his wish to get the
bills into his possession—all the rest of the property found, Sam might
keep for himself. ‘And there was precious little worth having, I can
tell you,’ said the prisoner—‘only a matter of seven or eight pounds.
I fancied I should have a rare haul, and, if you will believe me, I
took a big bag tied round me, on purpose to hold the money. However, I
gave him the papers he wanted, honourable, and in course expected him
to act likewise in regard of my share. His game was to save himself
in the first case, and then to get money from Mrs Thurles to buy off
the people who, he pretended to her, had got the bills, and were
threatening to give them up to the police.’
‘Mrs Thurles! Why, that is the young fellow’s own mother!’ I exclaimed.
‘You surely don’t mean to say that he was going to play such a fraud on
his mother?’
‘It was not very nice, was it?’ returned Sam. ‘I don’t pretend to any
fine feelings; but when I heard his plan, I had half a mind to knock
him down. But there was my wife and child to be thought of, so I simply
let the matter go. Well, I know for a certainty he has had some money
from her, and expects a good deal more directly. All he ever gave me
was two pounds. Two pounds out of five, he said; when I know from Bill,
the potman at the _Royal Blue_, that he asked the landlord if he could
cash him a cheque for a hundred that very night. The landlord could not
do it, so Bill didn’t learn much more; but he saw the cheque was in a
lady’s writing. But without all that, where could he get a cheque for a
hundred, except from Mrs Thurles? He’s always worrying her. Why, he was
on the business that night you met me at the public-house in the mews.
He had not gone on there above five minutes, when you came in.’
Recollecting on what errand it was I found myself at the public-house
in question, this bit of information seemed queerer than all that had
gone before. It would have been so strange if I could have seen him and
Sam together.
‘He deceived me then,’ continued Sam; ‘and as I am boxed up here and
can’t help myself, he will deceive me again, and do me out of my
lawful rights in respect of that money. So I mean to spoil him. What I
have told you is the truth. I don’t know whether you can do anything
about the bills, as he neither forged them nor passed them; but that
he arranged the cracking of his governor’s crib’—everybody knows the
speaker meant the breaking into the step-father’s office—‘and had the
best of what was got, is a fact, as you can call me as a witness upon.
And I will tell you this, Mr Holdrey: I am a bad one, I own, and nearly
all my ’sociates are bad uns too—they have all been in quod, and will
all go there again; but none of us is worse than that young Harleston,
and, in fact, very few of us are so bad.’
I was disposed to agree with him, and to think the worst of a young man
who could cheat a fond mother so heartlessly. I felt that I would never
believe in faces again; for if ever I saw a man who looked incapable of
such conduct, young Godfrey Harleston was that person.
We had a long conversation after this, in which Sam arranged that his
wife should meet me the next day; I was to write and tell her when and
where—which I did directly after leaving the prison—then we were to go
before a magistrate; the rest would be plain sailing.
Here, then, at last, I should be able to satisfy my employer; he would
be proved to be right, and the business he had given me would be
brought to a successful conclusion. I should make a handsome profit,
and, as is always the case in such things, get credit for an immense
amount of ability I had never shown. Yet I never felt so dissatisfied
with anything in my life, and though all was now as clear as crystal,
there was something in it which, like a wrong figure in a sum, would
not fit.
I don’t know what induced me to do it, but before going home, I went
round by Thurles & Company’s office, where I waited to see Mr Picknell
come out. I thought as he came towards me, alone and thoughtful, under
the shade of a big black wall which was there, I had never seen a more
disagreeable-looking fellow. I was in his way, so that he almost ran
against me. What a start he gave, to be sure! As I could see by the
light of a lamp, he staggered and turned ghastly pale for an instant;
but he rallied quickly, and exclaimed, with something like a laugh:
‘Ah!—David!’—he paused a moment before he uttered the name—‘is that
you? I declare you almost startled me.’
‘Yes,’ I said; ‘you looked as if you had seen a ghost.’
‘Ghost! It would take a good many ghosts to startle me,’ he began; then
at once changing his tone, continued; ‘Well, have you found a fresh
job, David? It is just now a bad time to be out of work.’
I made some answer, and could not help keeping my eyes closely on him.
He noticed this; I was sure enough of that, although he said nothing
about it.
‘Look in next week, David,’ he went on. ‘I will ask among my friends,
and perhaps I may have something for you. Do not forget; this day week.
Good-night.’
In a friendly manner, he went away, nodding and smiling, as much as to
say he would bear me in mind; and I felt as strongly as I had ever felt
anything in my life that he knew I was no messenger—that he knew I was
a detective. From the first moment I had spoken to him, I had never
felt confident as to his motives for being so friendly, and now I was
as certain of them as if he had told me plainly. Well, after all, that
need not interfere with my making use of various hints he had given me,
especially as they fitted in with what I now found to be the real state
of the case. But I did not like him.
The end of my engagement was now, I considered, fairly in sight. In
the morning, I should go with Sam’s wife to the Mansion House; young
Godfrey would be arrested; I should get my two hundred and fifty of the
reward; Sam’s wife would have the same; and there would be an end of it
all. This was a great deal of money for me to clear; but I could not
feel pleased over it. I don’t mean to say that I had any idea of giving
up the job, now I had gone so far with it, or of refusing the reward; I
was too old a bird for that; yet I could not wake up, as we may say, in
the matter.
I was so absorbed in thinking of the change in my life I would make,
and thinking, too, of the pleasure it would give Winny as well as
myself, that I hardly noticed anybody or anything as I went along, and
was so deep in thought, indeed, that I almost ran against two persons,
as I turned into a quiet street which was a short cut towards my home.
These persons were as interested in their conversation as I was in my
reverie, for they seemed as startled as I felt myself to be. I began
an apology with a smile; but the words and the smile at once died on
my lips; and so with them. The girl was my Winny! my daughter, who had
turned ghostly white when she recognised me; but it was her companion
who had, I may say, petrified me. Little as I thought to see my Winny
in company with a stranger, you may guess what I felt when I saw that
stranger was—of all men in the world—Godfrey Harleston!
For the moment I could not believe my eyes; yet, as if by some magical
vision, I recalled the night when I thought I had seen Winny in the
crescent. I now knew I _had_ seen her; and I recognised her companion
as clearly as though I had seen him a hundred times over. Brief as was
the glance I had had on that night of him, I knew him as being the same
man to an absolute certainty.
Winny was the first to recover herself, although, by her colour coming
and going as it did, I could see how unnerved she was. Turning to her
companion, she said: ‘This is my father, Godfrey.—It is very strange we
should have met him at this moment, is it not?—Father, this is’——
‘Silence, Winny!’ I exclaimed. My voice had somehow turned so hoarse
and harsh that it was not like my voice at all. ‘I want no introduction
here. You will come home with me, and I shall then be glad to hear an
explanation of what’—— I could not very well finish the sentence.
Winny turned pale; she had never been spoken to by me in such a manner
in all her life.
‘I trust, Mr Holdrey,’ said the young man—and his tone was very
pleasant—‘you are not in any way displeased with—with your daughter;
indeed, we were just agreeing to wait on you to-morrow morning’——
‘Do not come, then!’ I interrupted. I could not help glancing at
Winny, who looked as much astonished as frightened at hearing me speak
like this, for I am not a rude man in general.