AN ESCAPED CONVICT.
HULLOH!’ said Mr. Jarvis; ‘did you hear that gun? There’s another of
them there conwicks escaped.’
‘Poor fellow!’ ejaculated Mr. Jarvis’s better half; ‘and I hope as
he’ll get away.’
Mr. and Mrs. Jarvis were the proprietors of a travelling theatrical
show, and this conversation occurred late one winter afternoon, as the
caravan jolted along over the rough roads of Dartmoor.
Mr. Jarvis’s ‘temple of the drama,’ packed up very small, and the whole
affair was very comfortably accommodated in two living-vans and a
baggage-waggon.
Mrs. Jarvis was sitting inside the first van with the door open, and
Mr. Jarvis was walking behind, to keep himself warm and to enjoy his
afternoon pipe. The company had been dissolved at the last town, for
the season was over, and the Jarvises were making their way as fast as
they could to London, to complete their arrangements for a metropolitan
circuit, with a new drama and a specially organized company.
Their last tour had not been a great success. The attendance at the
country fairs had fallen off, and in small places where they had built
the theatre up and stayed for a week, they had hardly cleared expenses.
The new fashion of the London companies touring, combined with the
number of first-class theatres rapidly rising in the provincial towns,
was slowly but surely dealing a death-blow to the ‘booth’ business.
To add to the misfortunes of the worthy couple, their only son,
Shakspeare, the most valuable member of the company, had been down with
a wasting fever, and was so ill when they left town that he was unable
to be brought with them.
‘Ah!’ Mrs. Jarvis would exclaim, with a sigh, when she counted the
takings after each performance, ‘there ain’t no luck about the show
without Shakspeare—Shakspeare allus was the draw, father, and we shan’t
do no good without him.’
‘Poor chap!’ answered Mr. Jarvis. ‘I’ope as he’s a-goin’ on all right.
It don’t seem like the old show without him—do it, mother?’
‘No, it don’t. And what we should ha’ done if we hadn’t ha’ had sich a
lodger as Mrs. Smith to leave to look arter him I don’t know! He writes
as she’s been like a mother to him, and nussed him till he can almost
stand on his ‘ed as easy as ever, and he’s turned his fust caterine
wheel last Saturday, and ‘as been better ever since.’
‘He’s a beautiful scholard, ain’t he?’ said Mr. Jarvis, as he took
Shakspeare’s letter from his wife, and looked at it reverently.
‘With the eddication he’s got he’ll do something for the dramar some
day, as’ll astonish the purfession. Hulloh, there’s the gun again! Why,
they’re coming this way!’
As Mr. Jarvis spoke a body of men came running along, peering into the
hedges, and looking on every side of them.
The fog was deepening as the darkness came on, and the snow lay thick
on road and hedge and tree, so that it was no easy matter to
distinguish anything at a distance.
As the men came up with the caravan they stopped, and the leader, an
armed warder, addressed Mr. Jarvis.
‘Seen anybody go by here, governor?’
‘What, one of your gents?’ answered Mr. Jarvis. ‘No, that I ain’t.
There ain’t ne’er a one passed here.’
The officer hesitated.
‘Perhaps you wouldn’t mind letting us look inside,’ he said presently.
‘Look, and welcome, master! answered Mrs. Jarvis. Then, bridling up,
she added, ‘A pretty fine thing, indeed! What d’ye think we should want
a-harbourin’ conwicks for?’
The officer, without vouchsafing a reply, searched the two living-vans
thoroughly, and then, satisfied that his prey was not in them,
apologized, and held a council of war among his followers.
If the convict had not passed the caravan he could not be on that road.
The man who had informed him he had seen a convict running that way
must have been mistaken. The snow was so hard and crisp on the roadway
that no footsteps were visible. It would be better to turn back and try
in another direction.
The warder and his party returned, and the caravan went jolting on its
way.
Hardly had the pursuers disappeared in the mist, when Mrs. Jarvis’s
attention was attracted to the baggage-waggon in the rear. The
tarpaulin flung over it was moving.
This waggon was unoccupied, the horse following mechanically the
vehicles ahead of him.
Mr. Jarvis, attracted by his wife’s exclamation, looked, and he too
distinctly saw the tarpaulin move.
He stood still in the roadway till the horse came up to him, and
stopped it.
As he did so he distinctly heard a low groan.
‘Now then, governor!’ he exclaimed, ‘whoever you are, come out o’
that.’
No answer, only a groan deeper than before.
The two living-vans had turned a sharp corner of the road by this time,
and there was no one in sight.
Mr. Jarvis climbed up on to the waggon and pulled the tarpaulin back.
As he did so he uttered an exclamation of astonishment.
There lay the escaped convict, his face deadly pale, his eyes half
shut, and his hands clenched.
Mr. Jarvis shook him.
‘Here, master, this won’t do. Come, you must get out of this. We can’t
have no gaol-birds here.’
The man opened his eyes.
‘Oh, sir, for God’s sake help me!’ he exclaimed. ‘Don’t give me
up!—don’t give me up!’
‘I don’t want to give you up; but I can’t harbour ye, ye know—it’s a
crime.’
‘Let me lie here, then, till I can walk!’ exclaimed the man. ‘In
dodging behind the hedges I slipped and twisted my ankle. I managed to
crawl into the waggon and hide among these things, or I should have
been caught.’
‘And I’ve been and turned the officers back, and declared as I hadn’t
seen ye!’ exclaimed Mr. Jarvis, looking very uncomfortable.
‘Hear me!’ exclaimed the man, raising himself on his arm with
difficulty, for the pain from his twisted ankle was excruciating. ‘Hear
my story, and then do with me as you will. I’m an escaped convict, but
I am innocent of the crime I was condemned for. My time had nearly
expired—in a few weeks more I should have been out on a ticket of
leave. Unfortunately I incurred the hatred of one of the warders. I
refused to help him in a dishonest act. He never forgave me. Twice he
found tobacco in my cell. _He put it there!_ For the second offence I
lost all my privileges. I was not allowed to write to my wife or to
hear from her for nine months, and I lost my chance of a ticket.’
‘Poor devil!’ said Mr. Jarvis.
‘I was maddened with rage. Up in London my wife lay ill, perhaps
dying—for her last letter was written in a hand that told its own
weakness, though she spoke hopefully. I had counted the days till I
should see her again—and now, oh! sir, can you blame me if when I saw
at last a chance of escape I seized it? That chance came to-day. I
escaped from the guard who were marching us to some outdoor work, and
you know the rest. I am here at your mercy; but for God’s sake save me!
Think of my poor wife! Think——’
The man spoke no more.
In his excitement he had moved too hastily and hurt the twisted ankle;
the anguish was so great that he fainted dead away.
‘There, there, my poor fellow!—don’t you fidget. You lie still. We’ll
carry you safe to London, or my name is not Lizer Jarvis.’
The speaker was Mrs. Jarvis, and the person addressed was the escaped
convict.
Mr. Jarvis had consulted his better half before deciding what to do,
and when she had heard the story, the good soul’s motherly heart went
out to the poor man, and she determined he should not be given up.
So the baggage-waggon was brought up close to the living-van, and the
poor fellow was lifted carefully out and put up snugly in a corner and
covered over with a rug, and Mrs. Jarvis, who was clever at sprains and
bruises, soon found out what was the matter with his ankle, and bound
it up with cold-water bandages.
‘Now, all you’ve got to do is to keep still,’ she said, ‘and lie close,
and we’ll get up to our crib in London, and there we can rig you out,
and then you must look out for yourself.’
And that night, as the vans went jolting along the road, the convict
slept calmly, a free man for the first time for six long years, and he
dreamed that his wife was sitting by his side.
When they halted for the night the horses were taken out. The convict
awoke with a start.
‘Where am I, Bess?’ he exclaimed.
‘You’re all right,’ answered Mrs. Jarvis cheerily. ‘You stop where you
are. Nobody won’t interfere with you.’
‘So his wife’s name’s Bess, is it?’ thought the good lady to herself.
‘It’s a purty name. It’s the name o’ our lodger, Mrs. Smith, as has
been so good to Shakspeare. Lor’, how I do long to give that there boy
a good motherly hug—bless him!’
Then she walked across to the snug corner where the convict lay.
‘Poor chap!’ she muttered; ‘I hope he’ll find his wife alive., He don’t
look a bit like a convict, and I believe as he’s quite as hinnercent as
he makes out. If faces goes for anything, I should say he was a born
gentleman.’