Punctually, to a minute, our jailors returned, and once again drew up in
a row before us.
"Now, lads, wot have ye got to say?"
"My friends," began Jack, standing up and balancing himself on his one
leg as well as he could, at the same time speaking with the utmost
gravity and candour of expression, "my companion here in _temporary_
distress--for I feel that it will be but temporary--has devolved upon me
the interesting duty of making known to you the secret which has
burthened his own mind for some time, and which has had so impressive
and appropriate an effect upon yours. But first I must request you to
lock the door, and hang the key on this nail at my elbow. You hesitate.
Why? I am in chains; so is my comrade. We are two; you are four. It
is merely a precaution to prevent the possibility of any one entering by
stealth, and overhearing what I say."
The man with the battered face locked the door, and hung up the key as
directed, merely remarking, with a laugh, that we were safe enough
anyhow, and that if we were humbugging him it would be worse for us in
the long-run.
"Come, now, out with yer secret," he added, impatiently.
"Certainly," answered Jack, with increased urbanity, at the same time
taking down the key, (which caused the four men to start), and gazing at
it in a pensive manner. "The secret! Ah! yes. Well, it's a wonderful
one. D'you know, my lads, there would not be the most distant chance of
your guessing it, if you were to try ever so much?"
"Well, but what is it?" cried one of the men, whose curiosity was now
excited beyond endurance.
"It is this," rejoined Jack, with slow deliberation, "that you four men
are--"
"Well," they whispered, leaning forward eagerly.
"The most outrageous and unmitigated asses we ever saw! Ha! I thought
it would surprise you. Bob and I are quite agreed upon it. Pray don't
open your eyes too wide, in case you should find it difficult to shut
them again. Now, in proof of this great, and to you important truth,
let me show you a thing. Do you see this torch," (taking it down), "and
that straw?" (lifting up a handful), "Well, you have no idea what an
astonishing result will follow the application of the former to the
latter--see!"
To my horror, and evidently to the dismay of the men, who did not seem
to believe that he was in earnest, Jack Brown thrust the blazing torch
into the centre of the heap of straw.
The men uttered a yell, and rushing forward, threw themselves on the
smoking heap in the hope of smothering it at once. But Jack applied the
torch quickly to various parts. The flames leaped up! The men rolled
off in agony. Jack, who somehow had managed to break his chain, hopped
after them, showering the blazing straw on their heads, and yelling as
never mortal yelled before. In two seconds the whole place was in a
blaze, and I beheld Jack actually throwing somersets with his one leg
over the fire and through the smoke; punching the heads of the four men
most unmercifully; catching up blazing handfuls of straw, and thrusting
them into their eyes and mouths in a way that quite overpowered me. I
could restrain myself no longer. I began to roar in abject terror! In
the midst of this dreadful scene the roof fell in with a hideous crash,
and Jack, bounding through the smoking _debris_, cleared the walls and
vanished!
At the same moment I received a dreadful blow on the side, and _awoke_--
to find myself lying on the floor of my bedroom, and our man-servant
Edwards furiously beating the bed-curtains, which I had set on fire by
upsetting the candle in my fall.
"Why, Master Robert," gasped Edwards, sitting down and panting
vehemently, after having extinguished the flames, "wot have you been
a-doin' of?" I was standing speechless in the midst of my upset chair,
table, and books, glaring wildly, when the man said this.
"Edwards," I replied, with deep solemnity, "the mystery's cleared up at
last. _It has been all a dream_!"
"Wot's been all a dream? You hain't bin a bed all night, for the clo'se
is never touched, an' its broad daylight. Wot has bin up?"
I might have replied, that, according to his own statement, I had been
"up," but I did not. I began gradually to believe that the dreadful
scenes I had witnessed were not reality; and an overpowering sense of
joy kept filling my heart as I continued to glare at the man until I
thought my chest would rend asunder. Suddenly, and without moving hand,
foot, or eye, I gave vent to a loud, sharp, "Hurrah!"