“Nick and Nan would come to tea with me.”
]
He was an ambitious lad and wanted, when he was grown quite to man’s
estate, to be something better than the promise of his surroundings held
out. He did not know exactly how to put in words his ideas of what he
wished to be, for they were crude and unformed, but the yearning was in
him.
“And whatever I become,” he said, “Nan is to be with me always, and to
share my lot. It may be good, it may be bad, but we are to be always
together.”
“Yes, Nick,” said Nan, softly, “I could not be happy without you.”
“Nor I without you, Nan,” he said, with serious tenderness.
They were approaching that wonderful change in life, when the boy
realizes that he is a man, and the girl that she is a woman. Then the
world takes a different colour.
There is a new light in the sky, a new meaning in the song of birds and
the kiss of the summer’s breeze. All that is brightest and most
beautiful rises to the surface, and stirs with solemn significance the
pulses of those whose hearts are attuned to what is highest and best in
Nature. It is not all joy; touches of sadness come in when we begin to
understand things aright; and it is out of those new experiences that
the angel of Pity is born.
It was so with Nick and Nan. I bring to mind the last Christmas Eve we
spent together. Before another Christmas came round, there was a woeful
change in their fortunes, and dark clouds had settled upon their young
lives.
I had called the hour—eleven o’clock—when Nick and Nan joined me
unexpectedly.
“Christmas Eve, Mr. Dix,” said Nick.
“Yes, Nick,” said I, “Christmas Eve. What brings you out?”
“We thought we would like to pass an hour with you,” said Nick, “and
walk about a bit.”
“I shall be glad of company,” I said, and so we walked on, talking of
Christmas and what it meant.
Nan pressed something into my hand. It was a pipe; I have it now.
Nick pressed something into my hand. It was a packet of tobacco; that is
smoked long years ago, but I can see, even at this distant day, what
brought a touch of sacred tenderness into my feelings for them, as the
curling wreaths of smoke from their Christmas gifts floated in the cold
air.
A light snow was falling, but they did not mind that; nor did I. The
stars were shining, and the moon came into the sky as the Christmas
bells were ringing. We stopped and listened, and, cold as it was and
poor as we were, something of the sweetness of the time entered our
hearts, and we were gratefully happy.
A woman, in rags, passed us, shivering and muttering to herself. She
stopped, as she saw us.
“Hullo, Mr. Dix,” she said, through her chattering teeth, and her voice
sounded like a mixture of sobs and groans, “a Merry Christmas to yer! It
_is_ a Merry Christmas, ain’t it? Oh, _wot_ a Merry Christmas it is!”
She stumbled past us, shuddering with cold, hugging misery to her breast
in defiant despair.
I knew her. She was an unfortunate.
Nan looked after her, and a little sob came into her throat. Suddenly
she ran from us towards the living emblem of human sorrow, shame, and
woe. We followed slowly, divining the impulse that led her on.
We saw her take the woman’s hand, we saw the woman try to snatch it
away, but Nan held it fast. Standing a little apart from them, we saw
that Nan was speaking tenderly; the light shone upon her upturned face,
and, as the woman’s eyes rested upon it, the hard, rebellious look
softened; her lips quivered, and her limbs trembled so, that she could
hardly keep herself from falling.
Nan took out her poor, common purse, and pressed a coin or two into the
woman’s hand. God knows it could have been very little, perhaps sixpence
or eightpence, but had it been wealth untold, it would not have enhanced
the sweetness of the act.
“Thank yer, miss,” we heard the woman say. “I can pay for a bed now. God
bless yer!”
There were tears on Nan’s face, when she joined us. We walked on in
silence for many minutes. Then Nick put his arm round Nan’s neck and
kissed her.
“Dear Nan!” he whispered.
“Dear Nick!” she murmured.
Well, that was very nearly the last I had to do with them as boy and
girl. Before the New Year I was laid up in a hospital with rheumatic
fever, and remained there a good many months. Some part of the time I
was delirious, and the last Christmas Eve I had spent with Nick and Nan
came back to my fevered mind in all sorts of ways, and I never saw Nan’s
sweet phantom face, that it did not soothe me and ease my pain. When I
got about, I heard news that cut me to the heart. What it was, I must
leave to another to relate.
DAVID DIX.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
EVE THE THIRD.
STRAY RECOLLECTIONS OF CHARLES CHALLICE, POLICEMAN 999 X, RESPECTING
THAT YOUNG MAN AND THAT YOUNG WOMAN, WHO GOT INTO TROUBLE.
_By FLORENCE MARRYAT._
IT’S many a time and oft, as I’ve been had up in the police courts and
ordered by the beaks to stand forward and narrate on oath all I had seen
or heerd on concerning certain strange circumstances, as had come across
my path whilst on dooty. And I never made no bones about it neither, but
spoke up, bold and true, for it seemed to come nateral like, and all in
the way of the perfession.
[Illustration:
Charles Challice, 999 X.
]
But when a man is called upon, at my age, to give the perticulars of the
most tenderest memory of his life, it don’t come so easy, and if these
here words as I’m about to put down is to be printed and published, and
happen to fall into my missus’s hands, why, the Lord help me! for I
shall never hear the end of it.
Howsomever, it’s been put to me, as my testimony is needed to complete
the history of the life of a young woman, as was once a great friend of
mine, and so I won’t refuse to give that testimony, though the doing of
it may go to scrape the ashes off a fire, as was kindled twenty-eight
years ago.
Twenty-eight years ago! Only to think of it, and yet I can remember
everything as took place then, as plain as if it happened yesterday,
though I’m a married man now, with six boys and gals round me a-growing
up to men and women as fast as they can do it.
First there’s my Charley, a fine strapping young feller, as will be in
the Force with me before long; and then his sister Maggie, as was
married more than three months ago; and little Annie, in the Telegraph
Office, who’s keeping company with the brewer’s young man. And after
them come three youngsters, all in the Board School as yet (though it’s
little enough, they’ll learn there to be any use to them), and the
youngest is eight year old, so you may suppose their mother and I are no
chickens.
Though my wife’s a comely woman still and a good woman into the bargain
(if her tongue was a bit shorter), still she’s a hard worker and she
means well by all of us, and she has a nice red and white skin and a
plump figger as any man might be proud of.
Yet, would you believe it, that sometimes, after all these years, as I’m
sitting opposite to her at the table and thinking what a fine, well-kept
woman she is, her chestnut hair and her blue eyes and white skin seems
all to fade away from me, and I sees instead of them a thin, almost a
pinched, little face, with pale cheeks and large, dark eyes, like two
stars glowing in the sky at night, and a tangle of black curls falling
all about a young gal’s neck.
And when that vision (or whatever you likes to call it) rises before me,
I feel as if the food I was eating would choke me, and I’m forced
sometimes to make an excuse to rise from the table, in order to sweep
the back of my hand across my eyes. And yet it all happened eight and
twenty years ago, and she’s a lady now, and rides in her carriage.
Well, well! we mortals are fools at the best, and I suppose I’m not
behind my neighbours. But I must tell you the story, and then you can
judge for yourself.
Twenty-eight years ago, I was four and twenty years of age, and had not
long entered the Force. I believe I was a tolerably good-looking chap,
at least the women used to tell me so. I know I was strong and big,
measuring forty-eight inches round the chest, and standing six foot two
in my stocking feet. But I didn’t think much about women in those days.
People make great mistakes about policemen. The comic papers print so
much fun about the cooks and rabbit pies, that the public take it all
for gospel. But, that ain’t the ambition of all of us. I can speak for
myself that, in the days that I was young, I wouldn’t have looked at a
cook as was a cook in the way of sweethearting. Cooking is an art as
comes by experience, and though I liked a good dinner as well as any
man, I couldn’t have gone to the length of making love to a greasy old
woman in order to get it, nor I wouldn’t have accepted, what wasn’t hers
to give away, neither.
I was brought up by my sister Margaret (having lost my poor mother,
before I could remember her), and the first thing she taught me was
never to lie and never to steal, and, thank God, I’ve not forgotten the
lesson.
Margaret’s a good woman, the best I’ve ever known, and if I’m found on
the right hand, at the last day, it will be all due to her. As soon as
father was dead and didn’t want her no more, and she had got me into the
Force, she went for a hospital nurse, and at the time I speak of was
going on nicely and giving great satisfaction to the doctors. Whenever
she could get an hour’s leave I used to try and get leave too, to go and
meet her, and if it was impossible she would come down to my beat and
stand in one place, maybe for half a day at a time, only to exchange a
few words with me as I passed backwards and forwards. And I didn’t
loiter on my beat those times, I can tell you!
I loved my sister Margaret as much as she loved me, and her cheery face
and words was better for me to see and hear than those of any
woman—leastways till I met Nan. And this is how I met her.
In those days my beat lay up Whitechapel way, and a nasty neighbourhood
it is, particularly at night time—full of thieves and drunkards, and not
fit for a decent woman to pass through.
Hardly a night passed without some serious row. The men thought no more
of sticking their knives into each other, than of swearing, and as for
the females—well, I was pretty case-hardened by that time, but it turned
my blood cold to hear those females go on at one another and the men!
I used to think sometimes, as I pushed my way amongst them, that hell
itself couldn’t be worse them they was.
Well! there was a little baker’s and sweet stuff shop in those days,
standing not far from the theayter, and sometimes I’d turn in there to
get something to eat, for I was growing still and could stow away any
amount of food. And behind that there counter, in that there common
little shop, I seed the most beautiful young woman as ever my eyes fell
on.
Not one of your red and white beauties at all, mind ye! None of your
yellow-haired buxom gals, with broad shoulders and a pinched-in waist.
On the contrairy, she was very thin and slight, with a figure like a
willow wand, and a soft, brown skin without a bit of red in it, except
on her scarlet lips. But her hands and feet were as small as small could
be, and her eyes!
Well, _I_ never seed such eyes before or after! They was like two
glowing lamps set in her face, and her hair was like a black silk,
curling all over her head and shoulders!
She _was_ a beauty—well-made and clean cut, from the crown of her head
to the soles of her feet. She seemed very poor to me, for she was worse
clad, than ever I’d seen my sister Margaret, and we was humble folk.
Her black dress was patched in several places, and more brown than
black, but I noticed how beautiful her hair was kept, and that she
generally contrived to have a bit of clean white frilling round her
neck. She was mostly grave and serious when she was serving me, but if
anything made her laugh—and I could see she had a merry soul by
nature—Lord, how beautiful her mouth would be! Well, I fairly fell in
love with that gal.
I went into the little shop as often as I could, and I fell to dreaming
of her on my beat, and to watching her, as she went in and out. She
didn’t live there, for I often saw her arrive at about seven in the
morning, sometimes with her poor thin shawl wet through with the rain,
and with never an umbrella, which went to my heart; and sometimes, when
she left off work (which was never till late) a lad, whom I took to be
her brother, used to wait outside for her, but oftener she went home
alone.
The reason I took the young man to be her brother was, not only, because
they were much of an age, but, because she always seemed so pleased to
see him and used to kiss him on the face right before everybody, and
tuck her arm under his and go off singing, as if she was a queen.
Not that the lad resembled her at all, for he had hair and eyes more of
my colour than hers, and a fair, clean complexion. But he seemed no
better off—just a rough working lad in fustian and corderoys—and I put
them down as some labourer’s children, and fell to wondering, if she
would think a policeman’s wages enough, to keep a decent home on.
From seeing her so often and thinking of her so much, I come to seem to
know her as a sort of friend, and I always said “Good evening, Miss,”
when she passed me. And she would look up with those wonderful eyes of
hers, and answer “Good evening, officer!” in a voice like music.
You know we policemen like to be called “officer!” It sounds higher and
more important like, and when Nan said it, it sounded sweeter and better
than ever.
From passing the time of day, we came to exchanging a few words, but my
love always made me too timid to say much.
I longed to hear all about her family and her home, but I never seemed
to get to know more, than that the lad, whom I took for her brother,
called her “Nan,” and she called him “Nick,” in return. “Dear Nick” and
“darling Nick.” Lord! how I used to envy the feller, though I wouldn’t
have been her brother for all the world.
One night, however, I see something that disturbed me very much. I met
Nan at the end of my beat, walking along home with a young man of the
name of Rummles. Now, I knew this Rummles well. He was an
ostler—leastways he professed to be one—but it was only a cover for
thieving.
He was one of the sharpest pickpockets in the East-end. All the Force
knew it, and yet not one of us had ever catched him at it, and we was
quite on our mettle to do it. He was a flashy-looking cove, as could
dress very well, when it suited his purpose to do so, and there he was,
perking along of Nan, and looking in her face as impudent as you choose.
It was a sight to upset anyone as loved her. I _knew_ Rummles was no
company for her, and yet I had no right to say so. I gave her a look as
I passed, as much as to say, “Well, this is a rum dodge,” but didn’t
speak a word, until I met her again, which happened to be the next
evening.
I was looking out for her, of course, but she was later than usual, and
made a dash to cross the road without warning. I laid my hand on her
shoulder. “Excuse me, Miss,” I said, “but you don’t want to be run over,
do you? The tram’s coming!”
She give a little impatient jerk, and says,
“What nonsense, officer! I could have crossed the road twice before the
tram caught me.”
“But it’s my dooty to see you don’t come to any harm,” I answered; “and
I wish I could see you run no worse risk than this. Is Mr. Rummles
a-waiting for you on the other side?”
She turned them wonderful eyes of hers straight up to my face, and said,
“What do you mean by that?”
“I mean as he ain’t no fit company for such as you, and I was very sorry
to see him alongside of you.”
She wrenched her shoulder from under my hand, and turns upon me quite in
a passion, with her black eyes blazing.
“How _dare_ you say that of any friend of mine? It was Nick who
introduced Mr. Rummles to me, and asked him to see me home, and _he_
knows what is right for me to do far better than you. You exceed your
duty, officer.”
And with that she darted away from me, all amongst the cabs and the
trams and the omnibuses, and left me with oh! such a heavy heart to
think I had offended her! And from that day she seemed to look quite
gloomy at me, to what she had done before, and to join that scoundrel,
Rummles, as often as she could. And I think the brute was gone on her,
too, as well he might be, though I never see her give him any
encouragement except as a friend.
Her whole heart seemed wrapped up in the young feller she called Nick,
but the three was quite chummy together, and I’ve often watched them go
arm-in-arm down the Mile End-road, laughing fit to split themselves with
merriment.
One day our chief, Mr. Bostock, says to me, “Who’s that young chap as
goes about so constantly with Rummles?”
“I don’t know, sir,” I answered, “more than I’ve heard the young lady
call him ‘Nick.’”
“Keep your eye on both of them, Challice,” he says, “for no one, who
keeps company with Rummles, will keep straight for long.” And yet I dare
not caution the gal I thought so much of against her brother’s friend.
But I watched him, aye! like a lynx. My eye was never off Rummles, night
nor day. I knew I had but to spot him in the trick to set myself right
with Nan. To gain her heart and to marry her, was the dream of my life
at that period.
If you had told me then, that I should marry Deborah, with her red hair
and blue eyes, and live pretty comfortably with her for the remainder of
my life, I should have called you a liar. Black eyes and black hair was
all the go with me at twenty-four.
Nan was my first love—sometimes I think she was my last. I was hard hit,
no mistake about it, and she was (unfortunately for me) such an uncommon
sort of gal, with a Spanish look about her, and such a devil in her eye,
as made it difficult for a man to forget her!
Well, I followed my chief’s orders to the letter, and kept my weather
eye on Mr. Rummles. The brute seemed to be in luck’s way just then, for
he dressed like a gentleman, and kept his hands, as far as I could see,
out of other men’s pockets. But I knew I had but to bide my time, to
catch him at his old tricks, and so it fell out.
It was a big night at the theayter, the benefit of the manager, who was
a favorite all round London, and the crowd was immense, both going in
and going out. I had watched Mr. Rummles swaggering in, when the play
began—dressed up to the nines, and looking quite the toff, in his own
estimation—paying down his money at the box-office like a lord, and
ogling all the gals through a sham eye-glass.
“There you go, my beauty,” I thought, “and I daresay, if the truth was
known, every copper of your money has come out of your neighbour’s
pocket. But I’m looking after you, my lad, and you’ll have to be very
clever next time, if you want to do it without my seeing you.”
I spoke to one of my pals about him at the same time, who was told off
to look after the inside of the theayter.
“There’s that beauty, Rummles, gone in, Looseley,” I said. “Keep your
eye on him. He bought a dress-circle ticket.”
“All right! I know him well! He won’t get the better of me,” says
Looseley.
I took care to be about the doors when the performance was over, and the
crowd come out. It _was_ a crowd!
A lot of swells had come over from the West-end to show their respect
for the manager, and we couldn’t find cabs enough for them. I was
standing on the kerb, hailing the hansoms one after the other, when I
see a gentleman cross the road, to get one for himself on the other
side.
He was a middle-aged man, very handsome and dignified in appearance, and
well dressed. We policemen see so much of all sorts that we know a
well-dressed man at a glance.
This gentleman had a black cloth cape cloak over his evening clothes,
all lined with black satin, and as it flew open I could see the glitter
of his gold watch chain, and the flash of the diamond solitaire in his
shirt front. He had hailed a hansom, and was standing by the wheel
telling the driver, I fancy, where to go to, when another man rushed
across the road and thrust himself in front of the gentleman, crying
out, “Hi! cabby, are you engaged?”
The cabman said “Yes,” and the first gentleman jumped into the cab and
drove off; but not before I had seen the other pass his hand quickly
under the loose cape and draw out something, that glittered for a moment
as he thrust it in his own pocket.
As he did so, the cab dashed out of sight, and he turned his face
towards the lamplight. I recognized Rummles, and guessed at once that he
had taken the gentleman’s watch. I was after him like a streak of
lightning. “I saw you this time, my lad,” I cried, as I cut across the
road, and at the sound of my voice he began to run.
Lord! how that fellow did run! Talk of greased lightning! It wasn’t in
it with Rummles. He went like a hare down the Mile End-road, darting in
and out of the crowd, and doubling, whenever I gained upon him.
One moment I would think I had lost him altogether, and the next, I
would see him scudding before the wind on the opposite side of the way.
At last, when I was almost inclined to give up the chase, who should I
come upon, outside the Aldgate Station, but my gentleman himself,
leaning—as free and easy as you like—against the wall, not a bit blown,
but quietly striking a match on the heel of his boot to light his cigar
with, whilst Nick and Nan, who seemed to have been to the theayter too,
was standing by, talking and laughing with him. I grasped him pretty
roughly by the shoulder.
“So I’ve caught you at last!” I said, as I give him a shake. “Now! just
hand over that watch, will you, and come along to the station with me.”
“What watch?” he says, looking as innocent as a child.
“The watch I see you take from the gentleman’s pocket,” I answered.
“It’s no good shirking it! I seed you with my own eyes, and you don’t
get off this time, I can tell you, my beauty.”
“All right!” he says. “Search my pockets and take the watch for
yourself, copper! I can’t say fairer than that, can I!”
Looseley, who had joined in the chase, had come up with us by that time,
and together we rummaged the whole of Rummles’ clothes. But not a sign
of the watch could we find anywhere. And yet I knew I had not been
mistaken, but had seen the glimmer of the gold chain in his hand.
“Go on!” exclaimed Rummles, sarcastically; “why don’t yer take the
ticker out? What’s the trouble? P’r’aps it’s in my boots or up the
sleeve of my coat! You’re a fine copper, you are, not to be able to
shake it out.”
But though we did look in his boots and up his sleeves and all over him,
we couldn’t find the watch. I began to think my eyes had deceived me,
but Looseley, who was a much older hand than myself, was not a bit put
out.
“He’s got accomplices,” he said; “they all have, and he’s passed it on
to one of his pals. Don’t you let go of him, Challice, and I’ll search
this young man and woman,” pointing to Nick and Nan, who were standing
by, open-mouthed with horror at the accusation we had made against
Rummles.
“No, no, Looseley, it ain’t either of them. I know these young people,”
I says quickly, “and they’re quite respectable.”
“All the same I’ll search them,” replied Looseley, and as he was my
senior I had no power to stop him. But, as he approached Nan (who was
shrinking back against the wall), Nick sprang at him like a young lion.
“Don’t you dare to lay a finger on that young woman,” he cried, “or I’ll
fell you to the ground.”
We should have laughed at such a threat from a stripling to Looseley,
who was one of the strongest men in the Force, only as the lad sprang
forward, we could all hear distinctly the rattle of some metal in his
coat-pocket.
“Well, suppose I take you first, my young cockerel,” said Looseley, as
he thrust his hand into the pocket, and drew forth a gold watch and
chain.
“I think we’ve got hold of the right thing and the right man this time,”
he continued, as he clapped the darbies on Nick’s wrists. For a moment
we was all taken so much by surprise, that we hadn’t a word to say, but
Rummles was the first to speak.
“Well! what’s all yer blooming row come to?” he exclaimed. “What price
for my stealing watches now, eh, copper? My friend here’s been to the
theatre as well as me, but I ain’t responsible for his actions, and yer
can’t make me so.”
“They was together, and you mistook one for t’other,” said Looseley to
me, in a low voice.
“They was _not_ together,” I answered firmly, “I haven’t seen Nick
before, to-night. This chap, Rummles, was the only one near the hansom,
and I see him rob the gentleman.”
“Anyway, I took this fellow red-handed,” he said.