AN UNEXPECTED EVENT
At this juncture the question of money became pressing. For three months
I had been out of a place. Jenny's money, of which she was so prodigal,
was coming to an end; and although she hinted at other resources it
became obvious to me that the attempt must be made to find employment. I
looked forward to another round of walking about the town day after day
in fruitless search. At this juncture, however, an event happened wholly
unexpected, which changed the position altogether both for myself and,
as it proved, for Jenny.
You have heard how I visited my cousin in the Prison; how I found him
ragged and half starved; and how I gave him five guineas from his wife,
which he instantly gambled away. Jenny sent him no more money; nor did
she speak of him again; nor did I again visit him; nor did I think upon
him. To think of one who had been my life-long enemy served no purpose
but to make me angry: even now, after thirty years, when I have long
since forgiven this poor deluded wretch, ever running after a
Will-o'-the-wisp, I cannot think of what he did for me--how he made it
impossible for my father to be reconciled--without a momentary wrath
boiling up in my heart. Still, I say, at thinking of my Cousin Matthew
the pulse beats quicker; the blood rises to my cheeks; it is like a
wound whose scar never vanishes, though it may be hidden away: I would
not injure Matthew if he were still living in the world, but I cannot
forget. The old rule taught to children was that we must forget and
forgive; two boys fight and are reconciled: the master flogs the boy,
who is then forgiven and his offence at once forgotten: we all forget
and forgive daily: yet some things may not be forgotten: the long years
of continued persecution, animosity, misrepresentation and conspiracy
against dear life I cannot forget, though I have long since forgiven.
One evening Mr. Ramage came to see me. 'Mr. Will,' he said, 'I have
called to tell you what you ought to know. The Alderman, Sir, has I
fear, lost his wits: his misfortunes have made him distracted: he now
dreams that he is living in a palace, and that his riches have no limit.
He buys land; he gives his daughters diamonds; he founds almshouses----'
'If he believes all that, he is surely happy,' I said.
This faithful servant shook his head. 'There is a look in his eyes which
belies his words,' he said, 'I would rather see him wretched in his
senses than happy without them.'
'How does he live?'
'He has a room on the Master's side; some of his old friends of the City
send him a guinea every week: his daughters pass the day with him. He
wants for nothing. But, Mr. Will--the change! the change!' and so his
eyes filled with tears. 'And he who would have been Lord Mayor--Lord
Mayor--next year!'
'How do my cousins treat you?'
'If I was a dog and toothless they could not treat me worse, because I
gave that evidence.'
The unfortunate Alderman! This was, indeed, a wretched ending to an
honourable career. I suppose that he knew nothing and suspected nothing
of what was threatening; and that the news of his wrecked fortunes fell
upon him like a thunderbolt. That some of his friends sent him a guinea
a week showed that he was pitied rather than blamed for this wreck and
ruin of a noble House. Poor old merchant! And this after his Alderman's
pride and glory: after being Warden of his Company: after a long
partnership in one of the oldest Houses in the City! Fortune, which used
to put Kings down and put Kings up, just by a turn of her wheel, now
makes rich merchants bankrupt and consigns Aldermen to Debtors' Prisons
in order to bring home to all of us--even the humble musician--the
uncertainty of human wealth. His wits gone a-wandering! A happiness for
him: a thing to be expected, when, at his age, there had fallen upon him
the thing which City merchants dread worse than death.
'How can we help him?' I asked.
'Nay: there is no help, but pity and to bear the scorn of the young
ladies as best one may.'
'Do they know that Matthew is in the prison with him?'
'No, Sir. They do not know. They do not inquire after Mr. Matthew. But
it was of him, Sir, that I came to speak.'
It then appeared that since in every depth of misery there is a lower
depth, so the unfortunate man had sunk still lower since I last saw him.
He was absolutely destitute, ragged, starving, even bare-footed.
'Will,' said Alice, 'we must take him to-morrow what we can spare. After
all he is your cousin. You must forgive him.'
'I would not harm him, certainly.'
Alas! Silver and gold had we little: out of our slender store we might
spare two or three shillings and some provisions. Half a loaf; a piece
of cheese; a piece of gammon; a bottle of beer; these things I carried
over to the Fleet Prison in the morning. I also carried over a warm coat
which I could ill spare; a pair of shoes and stockings; a warm wrapper
for the neck; and a thick blanket.
I had no difficulty in finding Matthew. He sat in a bare and wretched
room where, on this cold day of January, with a sharp frost outside,
there was no fire in the grate, no curtains to the rattling windows, no
carpet, no beds, nothing but the hard planks to lie upon when night fell
and the poor debtors could huddle together for such warmth as the
half-starved human body could afford. There was a small bench--I suppose
it found its way there by accident. Matthew sat on that, his feet under
the bench, his body bent, his hands clasped. I called him by name.
'Matthew!'
He looked up. He knew me. He murmured something, I know not what, but it
was unfriendly. To the last, he remained unfriendly.
I opened my bundle. I took out my provisions and the bottle of beer. He
ate and drank enormously, but without a word of thanks. Then I took out
the stockings and the shoes and put them on: tied the kerchief round his
neck; laid the thick blanket on the floor, laid him on it and rolled it
round him. He was quite unresisting; he was without gratitude; he
cursed, but mechanically, and as if he could say nothing else. Instead
of getting warmer, his teeth chattered and he shivered still.
I spoke to him again. 'Is there anything more I can do for you,
Matthew?'
'You can go away,' he said, articulate at last. 'You can go away and
leave me. The sight of you makes me mad.' I have since thought that this
might be a sign of repentance.
'I will go away directly. Is there anything more I can do for you?'
'I want,' he said, lifting his head and looking round, 'I want to have
my turn. The last time I lost. If you will find the man who won my coat
and will send him here, I shall be warm directly, and I can have another
turn. I've lost a good deal, somehow. The luck's been against me, always
against me.'
He lay back and shivered again, though now he was wrapped up in the
blanket with a warm coat on over his old rags. He should have been quite
warm. I felt his forehead; it was hot and dry.
'Matthew,' I said, 'I think you are in some kind of fever. Shall I bring
a doctor for you?' There are generally about a thousand people in this
barrack, men, women, and children, yet they have not so much as an
apothecary in the place. Outside, there is the wise woman who knows the
herbs and professes to cure all the diseases that flesh is heir to with
a bundle of camomile, feverfew, or vervain. She commonly lives in a
court. In Fleet Street there is the apothecary who has a shop full of
drugs. He despises the wise woman, yet is not so much wiser than she is,
except in his own conceit. There is the tooth-drawer; and there is the
bone-setter; but for physicians there are none.
His face, now that the pains of cold and hunger were appeased, looked
gray, and what the old women call drawn. It is a bad sign had I known
it, but I did not. I thought he was suffering from cold and hunger
first, and from some kind of fever brought on by privation.
'You think,' he murmured--his voice was sunk almost to a whisper--'to
bring a man--a murderer--to make an end--that is your revenge. But you
shall not. I will send to the Warden for protection. Go away. Leave me
alone. I can do you no more harm. I will have no doctor sent by you, to
poison me.'
'Do you know, Matthew, that Probus received such terrible injuries in
pillory that he will remain blind for the rest of his life?'
'Blind?' he sat up eagerly repeating. 'Blind for the rest of his life.
Ha! Then he will not be able to find me. Will, he wanted to get you
hung--so as to be out of the way. He was going to try next to get me
hung. Then all the money would be his. Blind, is he? Then he can't find
me. Will, the man is a devil; now a blind devil; a devil in the dark.'
The thought seemed to revive and to comfort him.
'The other man, Merridew, was killed by the mob in pillory.'
'Killed--killed--by the mob. I was afraid he was going to give me up for
the reward. Then I am safe; at last. Both of them out of the way. Now I
shall prosper again.'
'Yes--you are quite safe.'
'Will,' he held out his hand. 'Don't bear malice. Don't give information
against me.'
'I am not going to give any information against you.' But I could not
take his hand, for which I was afterwards sorry.
'The information ought to be worth fifty pounds at least and a Tyburn
ticket--a Tyburn ticket,' he went on repeating the words over one after
the other, which showed the weakness of his condition.
It is useless setting down all the nonsense he talked. After a while I
left him and looked about for someone who would attend to him. Presently
I found an old man in rags, almost as bad as Matthew's, who undertook to
look after him and give him some food from time to time. So I went away
and repaired to my daily post at Newgate again, saying nothing to Jenny
about this illness.
I repeat that I had no thought of anything but what they call a feverish
cold, which would be checked by the warmth and the food. You may
therefore imagine my surprise when I went to visit the sick man in the
morning to learn that he was dead.
'He talked a lot of nonsense,' said the old man, his nurse; 'all day
long he talked nonsense about murdering and hanging, and dividing
thousands. Now and then I gave him a bit and a sup and he went on
talking. There was no candle and I lay down beside him with a corner of
his blanket over me, and in the middle of the night I woke up and found
that he had left off talking and was quite still and cold. So I went to
sleep again.' The insensate wretch had actually finished his sleep
beside the corpse.
Matthew was dead.
They showed me his body lying in a small shed against the wall. It was
laid in a shell of pinewood roughly painted black, with no name or plate
upon it. It was to be taken across to the churchyard of St. George's
that afternoon, to be laid in a pauper's grave without mourners or
friends, and with a service hurriedly gabbled over his coffin.
The old man who had nursed him was now comfortably wrapped in the
blanket and clothed in the coat and stockings which Alice had sent for
the use of the dead man. I hope the things kept him warm.
Matthew was dead. At first I did not understand the difference it made
to me. I asked if he had left anything behind him; any letters or papers
or anything at all that his sisters might desire to have. There was
nothing; absolutely nothing was left of him at all.
Most of our lives are like the stones thrown in the water; it makes
circles widening and growing indistinct; presently these signs vanish
altogether. Then the stone is clean forgotten. So the man and his life
are clean forgotten, never to be brought to mind again. Matthew left no
circles even; his was a stone that fell into the water silently and made
no splash and left no mark upon the surface even for a minute. He lived
for eight-and-twenty years: he ruined an old and noble House of trade;
he lost all the wealth and possessions and money of the House; he lost
all the money he could borrow; he plotted against me continually in
order to get some of the money which might be mine; he wilfully and
deliberately deceived the woman who married him; he died in a debtors'
prison without a single friend in the world or a single possession to
bequeath to a single friend, if he had one. To die lying on the
floor--it would have been on the bare planks but for Alice; in the dark
room without fire or light; what more wretched end could one desire for
his worst enemy? What more miserable record could one set down against a
man?
I could do nothing more. I left the poor shell in the shed and passed
over to the other side. If my uncle could understand anything I had to
communicate the sad news to him. His only son was dead--What a son! What
a life! What a death!
The alderman was sitting before the fire. With him sat his two
daughters. The guinea a week which was meant for him alone procured food
for the two girls as well. They passed the whole day, I believe, sitting
thus before the fire in gloom and bitterness; their bitterness was
mostly directed against myself as the supposed cause of all their
troubles.
'Cousin,' said one of them looking up, 'you are not wanted here.'
'Perhaps not. I have come, however, to bring you news. It is not good
news, I am sorry to say.'
'That one can see by the joy expressed in your face.' Yet I did not feel
joyful.
'Sir,' I addressed my uncle. 'I bring you bad news.'
He looked up and smiled vacuously. 'You will find my brother, sir, on
Change, I believe.'
'Yes, Sir. I would speak to you of Matthew.'
'He is in the counting-house, or perhaps on board one of the ships. Or
on the Quay.'
I turned to the daughters. 'I see that he understands nothing.'
'No. He eats and sleeps. He talks nonsense. It is no use speaking to
him. You have seen us in our shame and misery. Give us your news and
go.'
'It is about Matthew.'
'Matthew? Where is he? We heard he had escaped.'
'You do not know? Matthew has been in this prison for some weeks.'
'Here? In this prison? And we have not see him?'
'He has been on the Common side; on the Poor side. Perhaps that is the
reason; perhaps he did not know that.
They looked at each other. Then they burst into tears. I thought they
were natural tears such as a sister might shed over the loss of her
brother. But they were not. 'Oh!' they cried. 'Oh! Oh! Oh! And now you
will have the whole of that great fortune. And we thought that you would
die and that Matthew would have it. What a misfortune! What a dreadful
thing!' They wept and lamented, capping each other in lamentations all
to the effect that the fortune had fallen to the undeserving one. 'And
after all his plots and after his shameful trial before all the world!
And after his highway robbery! And after the things that have been done
to us! and now that people will say that Matthew died a Pauper--on the
Common side! On the Poor side! We can never hold up our heads again.'
So I left these dear creatures. Never could I understand why they
attributed any one of their misfortunes to me; nor of what nature were
the plots to which they referred; nor why my trial was shameful.
However, I left these poor ladies. The reduction in their circumstances;
their precarious condition; their having nothing but the guinea a week
given by the Alderman's old friend; the uncertainty of his life; all
should be considered when we think of their bitterness.
For my own part it was not until my cousins reminded me that I
understood the great difference which the event made to me.
I was the survivor: and my succession came to me in less than three
years after my father's death.
I was the survivor. At a single step I rose from the condition of a
simple fiddler, at twenty-five or thirty shillings a week, to the
possession of a fortune of over a hundred thousand pounds.
I hastened to our trusty attorney, Mr. Dewberry. I apprised him of what
had happened; he undertook to present my claims and to transfer the
money to my name, which he faithfully effected, and without difficulty.
Then I went on to Newgate.
'What is the matter, Will?' cried Jenny, 'you look strangely agitated.'
'Jenny'--I took her hand and held it--'you told me the other day that
you were in no anxiety about money.'
'I never am, Will. For people of parts there is always plenty of money.'
'You are a Prophetess, Jenny. You will never want for money so long as
you live. For all that I have is yours, and I am rich.'
'You are rich?' Over her face, so quick to change, there passed a cloud.
'You are rich? Then--Will ... then ... if you are rich--I must be--a
widow. Is Matthew dead?'
'He is dead, Jenny.'
She sank into a chair. She shed no tears: she expressed no sorrow.
'Matthew is dead. I wish I had never met him--Matthew is dead.'
'He is dead, Jenny. He died in the prison.'
'And I am a widow. I am free again. I am a widow who never was a wife.
Will, I would not speak ill of the dead--of the unburied: but ... alas!
I can find no good words to speak of him. He can do no more harm--either
to you or to me.'
'Let us not speak of him, then.'
'No--we must forget him. As for this money, Will, it is yours--your
own--yours and Alice's--and the lovely boy's.'
'Jenny--all that we have is yours: all that we have and
more ... more ... gratitude and love and devotion--which are
more than gold.'