"Yes--ah! ye-es--well--no--no."
And the peering eye came, as it were, forward out of its recess, and
scanned the face of the officer, who, on the other hand, was busy
watching every turn of the Jew's features.
"No; I cannot mend that."
"Why? You said you could mend anything."
"Ye-es, anything; but not that."
"No matter--no harm in asking," replied the officer, as he looked round
the apartment, and fixed his eye on the back wall, where, in utter
opposition to all convenience, let alone taste, and even to the
exclusion of required space, there were battered two or three coarse
engravings.
"Good night!"
"Goo-ood night!"
"Now what, in the name of decoration, are these prints hung up on that
wall for?" asked the officer of himself, without making any question of
the import of the Jew's look, and his yes and no. He was now standing in
the middle of the square, and, turning round, he saw the light put out.
Another thought struck him, but whatever it was, it was the cause of a
laugh that took hold of him, even in the grasp of his anxiety; yea, he
laughed, for a detective, greatly more heartily than could be authorized
by anything I have recorded.
"Why, the lower print is absolutely the old Jewish subject of the cup in
the sack," he muttered, and laughed again. "Was ever detective so
favoured?--a representation of concealed treasure on the very wall
where that treasure is! Were the brethren fools enough to put the
representation of a cup on Benjamin's sack?"
"Robertson!" he called to one of his men, whom, by the light at the
street-end of the entry, he saw passing, "send two men here upon the
instant."
"Yes, sir."
And then he began to examine more thoroughly the premises, to ascertain
whether there were any exit-openings besides the door and window. There
were none. He had a quarter of an hour or twenty minutes to wait, and
five of these had not passed before he observed some one go up and tap
at Abram's door. A question, though he did not hear it, must have been
put by the Jew, for an answer, in a low voice, responded,
"Slabberdash!"
"The crack name of that fellow Clinch, whom I've been after for a week,"
said the officer to himself, as he kept in the shadow of a cellar which
jutted out from the other houses.
The Jew had again answered, for the visitor repeated to himself, as if
in fear and surprise, "Red-light," and, looking cautiously about him,
made off.
"It is not my cue to follow," muttered the detective; "but I will do
next best."
And hurrying out of the mouth of the entry at the heels of the visitor,
he caught the policeman on the Nicolson Street beat almost immediately.
"Track that fellow," he said; "there--there, you see him--'tis
Slabberdash; do not leave him or the front of his den till sunrise. I'll
get a man for your beat."
"Yes, sir," replied the policeman, adroitly blowing out his bull's-eye
and making off at a canter.
The officer returned to his post, and within the time the two assistants
arrived.
"Go you, Reid, to the office, and send a man to supply Nicolson Street
beat till Ogilvy return; he's on commission; come back instantly."
The man obeyed with alacrity.
"And now, Jones, you and your neighbour take charge of that door--keep
seeing it without it seeing; you understand? Keep watch; and if any one
approach, scan him for Slabberdash, but take care he doesn't see you. I
will relieve you at shutters-down in the morning; meanwhile, I'm at home
for report or exigency."
"I comprehend," replied the man, "and will be careful."
The officer took for home, weary and drowsy, though a little awakened by
the events of one half-hour. There was sight of game, as well as scent.
The Jew's look by itself was not much, yet greatly more to the eye of a
detective than even an expert physiognomist could imagine. The
picture-plastered wall was more; the cup in the sack was merely an
enlivening joke; but Slabberdash was no joke, as many a douce burgher in
Edinburgh knew to his cost. The fellow was a match for the father of
cheats and lies himself; and therefore it could be no dishonour to our
clever detective that hitherto he had had no chance with him, any more
than if he had been James Maccoul, or the great Mahoun.
Meanwhile, the other watch having arrived, the two kept up their
surveillance; nor would they be without something to report to their
officer, were it nothing more than that little Abram--for he was very
diminutive--about one in the morning rather surprised one of the guard,
who was incautiously too near the house, by slowly opening the door,
and looking out with an inquiring eye, in his shirt; and upon getting a
glimpse of the dark figure of the policeman, saying, as if to himself,
though intended for the said dark figure, whoever it might be,
"I vash wondering if it vash moonlight."
And, shutting the door hurriedly, he disappeared. About an hour
afterwards, a tall female figure, coming up the entry from North
Richmond Street, made a full stop, at about three yards from Abram's
door, and then darted off, but not before one of the guard had seen
enough, as he thought, to enable him to swear that it was Slabberdash's
companion, a woman known by the slang name of Four-toed Mary, once one
of the most dashing and beautiful of the local street-sirens. About an
hour after that the two guards forgathered to compare notes.
"The devil is surely in that little man," said the one who had heard the
soliloquy about the moon; "for, whether or not he wanted light outside
or in to drive away the shadows of his conscience, he served his purpose
a few minutes since by lighting his lamp. I saw the light through the
chinks, and venturing to listen, heard noises as of working. He is
labouring at something, if not sweating."
"Perhaps _melting_," said the other, with a laugh.
"But here comes our officer; there is never rest for that man when
there's a bird on the moor or a fox in the covert."
The truth was, as the man said, the detective had gone home to sleep;
but no sooner had he lain down than the little traces he had discovered
began to excite his imagination, and that faculty, so suggestive in his
class, getting inflamed, developed so many images in the camera of his
mind, that he soon found sleep an impossibility, and he was now there
to know whether anything further had transpired. The men made their
report, and he soon saw there was something more than ordinary in
Abram's curiosity about the moon, and still more in the coincidence of
the visits of Slabberdash and Four-toes. He had a theory, too, about the
working, though it did not admit the melting. He knew better what to
augur. But he had a fault to find, and he was not slow to find it.
"Why didn't one of you track Four-toes? One of you could have served
here. She has been off the scene for three weeks, and is hiding. You
ought to have known that a woman is a good subject for a detective. Her
strength is her weakness, and her weakness our opportunity. But there's
no help for it now. We must trace the links we have. If she come again,
be more on the alert, and follow up the track. Keep your guard, and let
not a circumstance escape you."
"The light is out again," remarked one of the men; "he has gone to bed."
"But not to sleep, I warrant," said his superior. "Look sharp and listen
quick, and I will be with you when I promised."
He now proceeded to the office in the High Street, where he found the
superintendent waiting for a report in another case. He recounted all he
had seen and heard.
"You have a chance here," said the latter; "and, to confirm our hopes, I
can tell you that Four-toes' mother gave yesterday to a shebeen-master
in Toddrick's Close, one of the rings for a mutchkin of whisky; and,
what is more, Clinch has been traced to the old woman's house in
Blackfriars Wynd. I suspect that the picture's true after all. The cup
is verily in Benjamin's sack."
Thus fortified, our detective sought his way again down the High Street;
and as he had time to kill between that and the opening of the shutters
in Simon Square, he paid a visit to Blackfriars Wynd, where he found his
faithful myrmidon keeping watch over the old mother's house, like a Skye
terrier at the mouth of a rat-hole. He here learned that Mary with the
deficient toe had also been seen to go upstairs to her mother's garret,
which circumstance accorded perfectly with the statement of the guard in
the square, as no doubt she had returned home after being startled at
the door of Abram. But then she was seen to go out again, about an hour
before, though whither she went the watch could not say. The hour of
appointment was now approaching. The day had broken amidst watery
clouds, driven about by a fitful, gusty wind, and every now and then
sending stiff showers of rain, sufficient to have cooled the enthusiasm
of any one but a hunter after the doers of evil. He had been drenched
two or three times, and now he felt that a glass of brandy was necessary
as an auxiliary to internal resistance against external aggression. He
was soon supplied, and, wending his way to the old rendezvous, he found
his guard, but without any addition to their report of midnight. Abram
was long of getting up, and it seemed that he was first roused by the
clink of a milkwoman's tankard on the window-shutter. The door was
slowly opened, but in place of the vendor of milk handing in to her
solitary customer the small half-pint, she went in herself, pails, and
tankard, and all. Our detective marked the circumstance as being
unusual, and, more than unusual still, the door was partly closed upon
her as she entered. Then he began to think that she had nothing about
her of the appearance of that class of young women.
"Has not that woman the appearance of Four-toes?" said the officer.
"I'm blowed if she's not the very woman I saw in the dark," said one of
the men.
"Split," said the lieutenant; "but be within sign."
The precaution was wise. In a few minutes Abram's face was peering out
at the door, not this time looking for the moon--more probably for the
enemies of her minions; and what immediately succeeded showed that he
had got a glimpse of the men, for by-and-by the milk-maid came forth and
proceeded along the square.
"Go and look into her pails," said the lieutenant to Reid, as he
hastened up to him. "Jones and I will remain for a moment here."
Reid set off, and disappeared in the narrow passage leading to West
Richmond Street; but he remained only a short time.
"Crumbie is yeld! there's not a drop of milk in her pitchers," said he,
on his return; "and it's no other than Four-toes."
"Ah, we've been seen by Abram," said the officer; "and the pitchers are
sent away empty, which otherwise would have contained something more
valuable than milk. After her again, and track her. Jones and I will pay
Abram a morning visit."
The man again set off; and the officer and Jones having hung about a few
minutes till Abram came out to open the shutters and afford them light
inside, they caught their opportunity, and, just as the Jew was taking
down the shattered boards, they darted into the house. Abram was at
their heels in a moment.
"Vat ish it, gentlemen?"
"A robbery of plate has been committed," said the officer at once; "and
I am here, with your permission no doubt, to search this house."
"Very goo-ood; there ish nothing but vat ish my property."
The officer had even already seen a half of the bench--which had
consisted of two parts put together, probably originally intended for
some other purpose than mending jewellery--had been removed and placed
against the wall where Joseph and his brethren were standing round the
cup in the sack, so that it was more difficult to reach the wall, though
the device was clearly only the half of an idea, as the prints still
stood above the bench, and might, by a sharp eye, have still suggested
the suspicion that they were intended for something else than
decoration, or even the gratification of a Jew's love for the legends of
his country. But the officer did not go first to the suspected part. He
took a hammer from his pocket, and began rapping all round the wall.
"Stone, stone--lath, lath; ah, a compact house."
"Very goo-ood. Vash only three weeks a tenant."
The officer recollected the estimate of the time given by the
street-walker, the _fons et origo_ of all, and his hammer went more
briskly till he came to the patriarchs. "Good head, that, of Joseph," he
said with a laugh; "hollow, eh?"
"Vash a good head--not hollow; the best at the court of Pharaoh."
In an instant, a long chisel was through the picture; and in another,
the poker, driven into the chisel-hole, and wrenched to a side, sent a
thin covering of fir lath into a dozen of splinters. The hand did the
rest. A cupboard was exposed to the eyes of the apparently wondering
Israelite, containing, closely packed, an array of plate, watches,
rings, and bijouterie, sufficient to make any eye besides a Jew's leap
for the wish of possession.
Abram held up his hands in affected wonderment as the lieutenant stood
gazing at the treasure, and almost himself entranced. Jones was fixed to
the ground; at one time looking at the costly treasure, at another at
his superior, who had already, in this department of his art, acquired
an envied reputation.
"Very goo-ood!" exclaimed Abram; "vash only here three weeks. What fools
to leave here all this wonderful treasure!"
"Abram, will you be so good as take a walk up the High Street? Jones
will show you the way. Breakfast will be waiting you. And do you,"
looking to Jones, "send down a box large enough to hold this silver, and
two of our men to remove it to the office."
"Vash the other tenant," cried Abram, as he saw the plight he had got
into--"vash not me, so help me the God of my forefathers, even Abraham,
Isaac, and Jacob, who were just men, as I am a just man; it vash not me.
Vash not the cup put in Benjamin's sack?"
The officer laughed--at this time inside, for it behoved him now to be
grave--at the recollection of the strange coincidence of the picture and
the stolen plate.
"Come," said Jones, "let us start;" and, clapping the Jew's old hat on
the head of the little man, he took him under the arm to lead him out.
"After depositing him," whispered the officer into Jones' ear, "get
help; proceed to Blackfriars, where Ogilvy is on the watch, and lay hold
of Clinch. Some others will start in search of Reid, who may have
tracked Four-toes, and seize her. You comprehend?"
"Perfectly. Come, Abram--unless you would like to walk at a safe
distance?"
"Surely I would," replied Abram; "and so would every man who vash as
innocent as the child vash born yesterday, or this minute."
When the prisoner had departed, the officer sat down on the Jew's stool
to rest himself, previous to making a survey of the articles, with
reference to an inventory he had in his pocket. In this attitude, he
took up a pair of Abram's nippers to fasten a link in his watch chain,
which threatened to give way, so that he might very well have
represented the master of the establishment sitting at his work. This
observation is here made, as explanatory of another circumstance which
presently occurred in this altogether remarkable case. The door, which
Jones had closed after him, was opened stealthily; an old woman, wrapped
up in a duffle cloak, slipped quietly and timidly in, and going round
the end of the bench, whispered into the ear of the lieutenant--
"You'll be Abram, nae doubt?"
"Ay," replied he.
"Ye're early at wark."
"Ay."
"Weel, the milk-woman--ye ken wha I mean?"
"Oh yes; Four-toes."
"Ha! ha! ay, just Four-toes, that's Mary Burt; ah! she _was_ a buxom
lass in my kennin'. Weel, she has sent me to you, in a quiet way, ye
ken, to tell ye that the p'lice have an e'e on you. That ill-lookin'
scoondrel, the cleverest o' the 'tectives, as they ca' them--I never saw
him mysel, but dootless you'll ken him--has been seen in the coort here,
wi' twa o' his beagles, and you're to tak tent."
"Yes, I know the ill-looking Christian dog. Vat ish your name?"
"Chirsty Anderson."
"Where do you live, Christian?"
"In Wardrop's Coort, at the tap o' the lang stair. And the
milk-maid--ha! ha!--says you're to shift the things to my room i' the
dark'nin', whaur Geordie, my laddie, will hae a plank lifted, and you
can stow them awa, ayont the ken o' the cleverest o' them."
"And where ish the milk-woman?"
"In my room, pitchers an' a'."
"Well, tell her to keep there, as vash a prisoner, till I come to her
place."
"I will."
"Isn't Geordie, my good woman, called Squint?"
"Just the same," she replied with a laugh; "and, ye ken, he has a right
to a silver jug or twa, for he risked his neck for't as weel as Clinch."
"Surely, surely."
"But you're to gie me a ring to tak to her, for she's hard up, and I'll
try Mr. E----e wi' 't at night, and get some shillings on't."
"Certainly, Christian--not a good name that; but here," taking her by
the shoulders, and turning sharply in the direction of the door--for he
was afraid she might notice the wreck made in the recess,--"look out at
the door, and be on the good watch for the ill-looking dog."
"Ah, Abram, ye're sae clever! The deil's in them if they put saut on
_your_ tail."
"Here, give that to Four-toes, and tell her to keep good prisoner till I
come."
"Just sae--a bonny ring!"
"Quick! turn to your right, and go by the Pleasance, along St. Mary's
Wynd, up the High Street, to your home."
"Ay," replied the woman as she departed.
Not five minutes elapsed, when Jones and the two assistants with the box
arrived; when the officer cried--
"Jones, follow up an old woman, in a grey duffle cloak, Christian
Anderson by name, who is this moment gone down by the Pleasance, to
take St. Mary's Wynd and the High Street on her way to her room, in
Wardrop's Court, at the top of the stair. Having seen her landed, stop
five minutes at the door, to give her time to deliver a ring to
Four-toes, then step in, and take the young woman to the office. You
will find Geordie Anderson there also, the notorious Squint; so pick up
a man as you go, and make Squint sure."
"At once, sir," replied the man, and was off.
By-and-by, and just as our officer was beginning to compare the plate
with the inventory, the superintendent, who had got intelligence of the
discovery, came hurrying in. They found, to their astonishment, that
every article was there, excepting two rings--the one, probably, that
offered to the shebeen-man by Four-toes' mother, and the other that
which had been presently sent to Four-toes herself. A more complete
recovery was perhaps never achieved; and it was all the more wonderful
from the small beginning from which the trace had been detected. Having
completed the examination and packed the treasure, which was presently
removed to the office, the discoverer set about examining Abram's room;
but so cunningly had the whole affair of the resettership been
conducted, that there was not found a trace of any kind to show his
connection with the burglars. The joke of the man in reference to the
process of melting had, however, had a narrow escape from being
realized; for a kind of furnace had been erected with bricks, and a
large crucible, sufficient to hold a Scotch pint of the "silver soup,"
was lying in what had been used as a coal-bunker. Meanwhile, Reid
hurried in in great dejection, because the milk-woman had baffled him by
going into a house in one of the wynds, and emerging by the back, and
escaping.
"She's provided for," said the officer, "and you may go. I don't need
you here; but you may go to Wardrop's Court, top of stair, and help
Jones to take care of Four-toes and George Anderson called Squint; you
know him?"
"Who that has once seen him will ever forget him?" replied the other.
"When will Jones be there?"
"Just when you will arrive, giving you time to walk slow, like a good
detective."
"And now," said our officer, as he proceeded to fasten up the door, "so
much for a casual question,--a good night's work, and a reward of a
hundred for recovering a thousand. I think I am entitled to my
breakfast. It's not often a man makes so much of a morning." And
resuming his deliberate walk--a characteristic, as he himself
acknowledged, of a true thief-catcher--he repaired to a coffee-house in
Nicolson Street, and allayed his hunger by coffee and a pound of chops.
It was about ten o'clock when he reached the office, where he had the
pleasant scene presented to him of a well-assorted bag of game--the last
victims, Four-toes and Squint, being in the act of being deposited as he
entered. The principals secure, the accessories were of less
consequence. There were there Abram, Slabberdash, Squint, and Four-toes.
"To complete our complement we must have Four-toes' mother and Mrs.
Anderson," he said to the superintendent, "and Reid and Jones will go
and fetch them."
In the course of an hour both these ladies were brought into the already
considerable company. That they were all surprised at the unexpected
meeting, belongs to reasonable conjecture; and that Christian Anderson
was more surprised than any of them, when she discovered her mistake in
trusting her secrets to the "ill-looking scoundrel" of a detective in
place of Abram, is not less reasonable. Our officer was, in truth, too
gallant a man to traverse those laws of etiquette which demand respect
for the feelings of females, and he never once alluded to the
_contretemps_. But Chirsty did not feel the same delicacy in regard to
him, who she feared would hang her for misplaced confidence. She had no
sooner recovered from her surprise than she cried out to him, in a
shrill, piercing voice--
"I hope you'll hae mercy on me, sir. It wad do ye nae guid to stretch
the wizzened craig o' an auld woman, because some silly words--I wish
they had choket me--cam oot o't."
"They will never be brought against you," said he; "make yourself easy
on that score."
"Then what am I here for?" she growled, as, relieved somewhat from her
fear, she got into her natural temper.
"For agreeing to hide stolen property."
"Stolen property!" she replied. "And did ye no steal from me my secret
about my puir laddie, that ye may string him to a wuddy? There's an auld
sayin' that speech is silvern, but silence is gowden. Whaur is the
difference between stealing frae me the siller o' my speech, and robbing
a man o' the siller o' his jugs and teaspoons?"
"Quiet," he said calmly. "Abram, I want to speak with you. Separate
these," he added, addressing one of the men.
And having got Abram by himself, he asked him if he was inclined to run
the risk of a trial and condemnation, or tell the truth, and trust to
the Royal mercy. The Jew hesitated; but our officer knew that a
hesitating criminal is like a hesitating woman--each waits for an
argument to resolve them against their faith and honour. He knew that
misfortune breaks up the bonds of etiquette, even among the virtuous;
and that the honour among themselves, of which thieves boast, and a
portion of mankind, for some strange reason, secretly approve, becomes
weak in proportion to the danger of retributive justice. Not much given
to speculate, he yet sometimes wondered why it was that one should be
despised and treated harshly because he comes forward to serve the ends
of justice and benefit society; but a less acute mind may feel no
difficulty in accounting for the anomaly. The king's-evidence, while he
proves himself a coward and false to his faith, acts from pure
selfishness; and though he offers a boon to society, it is in reality a
bargain which he drives for self-preservation. These speculations
certainly did not pass through the mind of Abram, if his prevailing
thought was not more likely in the form--
"If I can't get my pound of silver out of the Christian, I can at least
keep my own pound of flesh."
But whether he thought in this Jewish form or not, it is certain that he
was not long in making as clean a breast as a Jew might be expected to
make of the whole secret of the robbery. It was planned and executed, he
said, by Slabberdash and Squint, and he agreed to become resetter on the
condition of being allowed to retain a half of the proceeds. Four-toes
brought the plate to him at half a dozen courses of her pitchers, and he
had intended on that very day to melt all that was meltable. The watches
and rings were to be reserved for opportunities, as occasions presented.
I give this story by way of an example of those strange workings in a
close society, whereby often great events are discovered from what is
termed chance. Such occurrences, however they may startle us, are all
explainable by the laws of probabilities. They occur often just in
proportion to the increase of ramifications in civilised conditions.
More people come into the plot; the increased activity drives the
culprits to shifts, and these shifts are perilous from the very
circumstance of being forced. We thus find detection often more easy and
certain in populous towns, with a good staff of criminal officers, than
in quieter places, where both plotters and shifts are proportionally
fewer. If nature is always true to her purpose, so art, which is second
nature, is equally true to hers, and man is better provided for than he
deserves. I do not concern myself with the vulgar subject of
punishments, never very agreeable to polite minds, and not at all times
useful to those who gloat over descriptions of them. It is enough to say
that the law was justly applied. Two got clear off--the mothers of
Squint and Four-toes; and I may add that Chirsty Anderson probably
afterwards acted up more to her own proverb, that "speech is silvern,
but silence is golden."