THE MEAGER FAMILY.
On the day after the committal a lady, who had got out of a cab at
the corner of Northumberland Street, in the Marylebone Road, walked
up that very uninviting street, and knocked at a door just opposite
to the deadest part of the dead wall of the Marylebone Workhouse.
Here lived Mrs. and Miss Meager,--and also on occasions Mr. Meager,
who, however, was simply a trouble and annoyance in the world,
going about to race-courses, and occasionally, perhaps, to worse
places, and being of no slightest use to the two poor hard-worked
women,--mother and daughter,--who endeavoured to get their living by
letting lodgings. The task was difficult, for it is not everybody who
likes to look out upon the dead wall of a workhouse, and they who
do are disposed to think that their willingness that way should be
considered in the rent. But Mr. Emilius, when the cruelty of his
wife's friends deprived him of the short-lived luxury of his mansion
in Lowndes Square, had found in Northumberland Street a congenial
retreat, and had for a while trusted to Mrs. and Miss Meager for
all his domestic comforts. Mr. Emilius was always a favourite with
new friends, and had not as yet had his Northumberland Street gloss
rubbed altogether off him when Mr. Bonteen was murdered. As it
happened, on that night,--or rather early in the day, for Meager
had returned to the bosom of his family after a somewhat prolonged
absence in the provinces, and therefore the date had become specially
remarkable in the Meager family from the double event,--Mr. Meager
had declared that unless his wife could supply him with a five-pound
note he must cut his throat instantly. His wife and daughter had
regretted the necessity, but had declared the alternative to be out
of the question. Whereupon Mr. Meager had endeavoured to force the
lock of an old bureau with a carving-knife, and there had been some
slight personal encounter,--after which he had had some gin and had
gone to bed. Mrs. Meager remembered the day very well indeed, and
Miss Meager, when the police came the next morning, had accounted
for her black eye by a tragical account of a fall she had had
against the bed-post in the dark. Up to that period Mr. Emilius had
been everything that was sweet and good,--an excellent, eloquent
clergyman, who was being ill-treated by his wife's wealthy relations,
who was soft in his manners and civil in his words, and never gave
more trouble than was necessary. The period, too, would have been
one of comparative prosperity to the Meager ladies,--but for that
inopportune return of the head of the family,--as two other lodgers
had been inclined to look out upon the dead wall, or else into the
cheerful back-yard; which circumstance came to have some bearing
upon our story, as Mrs. Meager had been driven by the press of her
increased household to let that good-natured Mr. Emilius know that
if "he didn't mind it" the latch-key might be an accommodation on
occasions. To give him his due, indeed, he had, when first taking the
rooms, offered to give up the key when not intending to be out at
night.
After the murder Mr. Emilius had been arrested, and had been kept in
durance for a week. Miss Meager had been sure that he was innocent;
Mrs. Meager had trusted the policemen, who evidently thought that
the clergyman was guilty. Of the policemen who were concerned on the
occasion, it may be said in a general way that they believed that
both the gentlemen had committed the murder,--so anxious were they
not to be foiled in the attempts at discovery which their duty called
upon them to make. Mr. Meager had left the house on the morning of
the arrest, having arranged that little matter of the five-pound
note by a compromise. When the policeman came for Mr. Emilius, Mr.
Meager was gone. For a day or two the lodger's rooms were kept vacant
for the clergyman till Mrs. Meager became quite convinced that he
had committed the murder, and then all his things were packed up
and placed in the passage. When he was liberated he returned to the
house, and expressed unbounded anger at what had been done. He took
his two boxes away in a cab, and was seen no more by the ladies of
Northumberland Street.
But a further gleam of prosperity fell upon them in consequence of
the tragedy which had been so interesting to them. Hitherto the
inquiries made at their house had had reference solely to the habits
and doings of their lodger during the last few days; but now there
came to them a visitor who made a more extended investigation; and
this was one of their own sex. It was Madame Goesler who got out
of the cab at the workhouse corner, and walked from thence to Mrs.
Meager's house. This was her third appearance in Northumberland
Street, and at each coming she had spoken kind words, and had left
behind her liberal recompense for the trouble which she gave. She
had no scruples as to paying for the evidence which she desired to
obtain,--no fear of any questions which might afterwards be asked
in cross-examination. She dealt out sovereigns--womanfully, and had
had Mrs. and Miss Meager at her feet. Before the second visit was
completed they were both certain that the Bohemian converted Jew had
murdered Mr. Bonteen, and were quite willing to assist in hanging
him.
"Yes, Ma'am," said Mrs. Meager, "he did take the key with him. Amelia
remembers we were a key short at the time he was away." The absence
here alluded to was that occasioned by the journey which Mr. Emilius
took to Prague, when he heard that evidence of his former marriage
was being sought against him in his own country.
"That he did," said Amelia, "because we were put out ever so. And he
had no business, for he was not paying for the room."
"You have only one key."
"There is three, Ma'am. The front attic has one regular because he's
on a daily paper, and of course he doesn't get to bed till morning.
Meager always takes another, and we can't get it from him ever so."
"And Mr. Emilius took the other away with him?" asked Madame Goesler.
"That he did, Ma'am. When he came back he said it had been in a
drawer,--but it wasn't in the drawer. We always knows what's in the
drawers."
"The drawer wasn't left locked, then?"
"Yes, it was, Ma'am, and he took that key--unbeknownst to us," said
Mrs. Meager. "But there is other keys that open the drawers. We are
obliged in our line to know about the lodgers, Ma'am."
This was certainly no time for Madame Goesler to express
disapprobation of the practices which were thus divulged. She smiled,
and nodded her head, and was quite sympathetic with Mrs. Meager. She
had learned that Mr. Emilius had taken the latch-key with him to
Bohemia, and was convinced that a dozen other latch-keys might have
been made after the pattern without any apparent detection by the
London police. "And now about the coat, Mrs. Meager."
"Well, Ma'am?"
"Mr. Meager has not been here since?"
"No, Ma'am. Mr. Meager, Ma'am, isn't what he ought to be. I never do
own it up, only when I'm driven. He hasn't been home."
"I suppose he still has the coat."
"Well, Ma'am, no. We sent a young man after him, as you said, and the
young man found him at the Newmarket Spring."
"Some water cure?" asked Madame Goesler.
"No, Ma'am. It ain't a water cure, but the races. He hadn't got the
coat. He does always manage a tidy great coat when November is coming
on, because it covers everything, and is respectable, but he mostly
parts with it in April. He gets short, and then he--just pawns it."
"But he had it the night of the murder?"
"Yes, Ma'am, he had. Amelia and I remembered it especial. When we
went to bed, which we did soon after ten, it was left in this room,
lying there on the sofa." They were now sitting in the little back
parlour, in which Mrs. and Miss Meager were accustomed to live.
"And it was there in the morning?"
"Father had it on when he went out," said Amelia.
"If we paid him he would get it out of the pawnshop, and bring it to
us, would he not?" asked the lady.
To this Mrs. Meager suggested that it was quite on the cards that Mr.
Meager might have been able to do better with his coat by selling it,
and if so, it certainly would have been sold, as no prudent idea of
redeeming his garment for the next winter's wear would ever enter his
mind. And Mrs. Meager seemed to think that such a sale would not have
taken place between her husband and any old friend. "He wouldn't know
where he sold it," said Mrs. Meager.
"Anyways he'd tell us so," said Amelia.
"But if we paid him to be more accurate?" said Madame Goesler.
"They is so afraid of being took up themselves," said Mrs. Meager.
There was, however, ample evidence that Mr. Meager had possessed a
grey great coat, which during the night of the murder had been left
in the little sitting-room, and which they had supposed to have lain
there all night. To this coat Mr. Emilius might have had easy access.
"But then it was a big man that was seen, and Emilius isn't no ways a
big man. Meager's coat would be too long for him, ever so much."
"Nevertheless we must try and get the coat," said Madame Goesler.
"I'll speak to a friend about it. I suppose we can find your husband
when we want him?"
"I don't know, Ma'am. We never can find him; but then we never do
want him,--not now. The police know him at the races, no doubt. You
won't go and get him into trouble, Ma'am, worse than he is? He's
always been in trouble, but I wouldn't like to be means of making it
worse on him than it is."
Madame Goesler, as she again paid the woman for her services, assured
her that she would do no injury to Mr. Meager. All that she wanted of
Mr. Meager was his grey coat, and that not with any view that could
be detrimental either to his honour or to his safety, and she was
willing to pay any reasonable price,--or almost any unreasonable
price,--for the coat. But the coat must be made to be forthcoming if
it were still in existence, and had not been as yet torn to pieces by
the shoddy makers.
"It ain't near come to that yet," said Amelia. "I don't know that
I ever see father more respectable,--that is, in the way of a great
coat."