“Not yet!” ejaculated Heathcote, fiercely, and frowning in his own peculiar fashion at the same time. “Nor sent either?” he added, interrogatively.
“No, sir,” responded the junior clerk.
“This is strange—very strange,” murmured the lawyer. “He can’t be ill—poor devils like him cannot afford to be unwell. But if he were,—if he did happen to be so indisposed that be couldn’t shut his eyes to the fact,—he would have sent word. You know where he lives? demanded Mr. Heathcote, abruptly addressing himself to the young man.
“Yes, sir,” was the answer.
“Then go to his lodgings directly,” exclaimed the lawyer, in an imperious tone; “and if you find him at home, tell him that I am very angry indeed at his absence. Should he be ill, you must desire him to get out of bed, take a cab, and come to me at once to give an account of his conduct. Two guineas a-week, indeed, to a fellow who takes it into his head to be ill!”
And with this humane reflection Mr. Heathcote was about to resume his work, while the young clerk was turning towards the door, when Mr. Green suddenly made his appearance.
“Oh! you are come at last, sir—are you?” cried the lawyer, glancing up at the clock. “A quarter past five—and the office hours are from nine till six. What the deuce does this mean, sir?”
“I had a little business to transact, sir,” answered the head clerk, closing the door by which the junior functionary had just evaporated.
“A little business!” repeated Mr. Heathcote, staring at the man in unfeigned amazement: for he could not possibly conceive how Mr. Green should have any affairs of his own to attend to.
“Yes, sir—a little business,” returned the head clerk, who, though now feeling comparatively independent of his master could not shake off an obsequiousness of manner, which had become habitual to him. “Is it strange, sir, that for once in a way I should have taken the holiday which was certain to be refused if solicited beforehand?”
“Have you been drinking, Mr. Green—or are you mad—to talk to me in this style?” demanded Heathcote, surveying his clerk with more than usual attention.
“I have had nothing to drink, sir, beyond a single glass of sherry—and I beg to inform you that I am not crazy,” answered the head clerk, growing a trifle bolder.
“A glass of sherry!” repeated Heathcote, again evincing the most unfeigned astonishment. “How is it possible, sir, that you can indulge in such extravagances and pay for them honestly? A few days ago you ventured to appear before me in a new suit of clothes, with the gloss actually on them—whereas your regular office-suit had not been thread-bare more than two years. Let me tell you, sir, that I take note of these things: I observe the most minute symptoms of change in a man’s character or habits; and no one can deceive me, Mr. Green—no one can deceive me,” repeated the lawyer, looking hard at the individual whom he thus addressed, as much as to say that he had suspected something wrong and was now certain of it.
“Well, sir—and who has attempted to deceive you?” asked Green, in a bolder tone than had ever yet characterised his language when in the presence of his hitherto dreaded master.
“Who has attempted to deceive me!” vociferated Heathcote, his lips becoming white and quivering with rage. “You, sir—you have made the endeavour—you are making it now! But it will not do, Mr. Green—it will not do. Take care of yourself! New suits of clothes—sherry—a day’s absence without leave, and even without the humble apology that should mark your return,—all this is suspicious, sir—very suspicious, let me tell you.”
“Suspicious of what?” demanded the head clerk, approaching Mr. Heathcote’s desk, and looking steadily across it at that gentleman.
“That you were either bribed in my brother’s affair—or that you have robbed me,” was the immediate answer.
“You are a liar, sir—a deliberate liar,” exclaimed Green, now beginning to experience the first feelings of exultation at the independence which he was enabled to assert.
The lawyer could make no reply: he was amazed—bewildered—stupefied!
“Yes, sir,” continued Green, his voice now losing all its obsequiousness and his manner rising completely above servility,—“you are a liar if you say that I robbed you! Where was the chance, even if I had possessed the inclination, of pilfering even a single farthing? You know that you reckon up the office-money to the very last penny—and that if I tell you how a box of lucifers, or a piece of tape, or any other trifling article was required, you were always sure to say we were very extravagant in that front-office. These are truths, sir; and therefore how dare you pretend to believe in the possibility of my robbing you?”
“Mr. Green—Mr. Green,” exclaimed Heathcote, absolutely frightened at his head clerk’s manner: “what is the cause of all this excitement?”
The lawyer was frightened, we say,—because his conscience told him that something had occurred to place Mr. Green upon a more independent footing with regard to him; and the greater became such independence on the part of one who had long been his tool and instrument, the less secure was the lawyer himself in his own position. In fact, when a wretched being who had long grovelled in the dust at his feet, suddenly started up and dared to look him in the face,—it was a sign that the fabric of despotism was shaken and was tottering to its fall. Mr. Heathcote felt all this—and he trembled for a moment,—trembled with a cold and death-like shudder, as he beheld his clerk’s eyes glaring savagely at him; and it was under the influence of this sensation that he uttered the words which, by proving his own weakness, gave Green additional courage.
“You ask what is the cause of all this excitement,” exclaimed the latter: “and yet only a few minutes have elapsed since you dared to accuse me of having robbed you.”
“A man who has committed a forgery, may very well be suspected of theft,” returned Heathcote, who, having recovered his presence of mind, answered with his usual brutality of manner.
“And what may you not be accused of, then?” demanded Green, scarcely able to restrain himself from flying like a tiger-cat at his master: “for what have you not committed?”
“By heaven, Mr. Green, this shall last no longer!” ejaculated Heathcote, starting from his seat: “you are drunk, sir—you have been drinking, I tell you. Come—be reasonable,” he continued, almost in a coaxing tone: “go home quietly—and be here early in the morning to make an apology for your present bad conduct. I promise to forgive you.”
“Forgive me!” repeated Green:—“forgive me!” he exclaimed again, with a chuckling laugh which did Mr. Heathcote harm to hear it: “I have done nothing, sir, that needs forgiveness—and if I was to kick you thrice round this room where you have tyrannised over me for twelve years, it would only be paying back a minute portion of all I owe you.”
“Mr. Green, you will provoke me to do something desperate,” retorted Heathcote, in a low, thick tone, as he approached his head clerk to read in that individual’s countenance the solution of his present enigmatical conduct: “you will provoke me, I say—and then you will be sorry for your rashness. Consider—reflect—in another month’s time the thousand pounds must positively be forthcoming——”
“Will you replace it for me?” demanded Green, abruptly.
“You know what I have always said——”
“Yes—and I now know likewise what you have always meant,” interrupted Green, darting a look full of malignant hate and savage spite at the lawyer. “For twelve long years, sir, I have been your slave—your vile and abject slave. I was a criminal, it is true, when I first came to you—for I had committed that forgery which you detected, and which placed me in your power. But I had still the feelings of a man—whereas you soon imbued me with such ideas and reduced me to such a miserable state of servitude, that I have wept bitter, bitter tears at the thought of my own deep degradation. I could have lied for you—I could have committed perjury for you—I could have performed all the meannesses and condescended to do all the vile and low trickery which form part and parcel of your business:—but when I found myself used as a mere tool and instrument and treated like a spaniel, without ever having a single kind word uttered to cheer me beneath a yoke of crushing despotism——”
“You have had two guineas a week, paid with scrupulous regularity,” interposed Heathcote, who, from the tenour of the observations which Green had just made, began to fancy that he was only excited by liquor to make vague and general complaints, but that he was still as much in his power as ever.
“Two guineas a-week!” repeated the man, indignantly: “you are always dinning that fact in my ears. But heaven knows that were my salary six times as much, it would not repay me for all the cruelty I have endured at your hands—nor for all that one is obliged to see and go through while in your employment. I had some tender feelings once: but they have long ago been stifled by the horrible spectacles of woe and misery which have been forced upon my sight, and which have sprung from your detestable covetousness. I have seen children starving—mothers weeping over their dying babes—while the fathers and husbands have been languishing in gaol,—yes, in the debtor’s gaol where you have thrown them, and where some of them have died, cursing the name of James Heathcote! Yes, sir—I have seen all this: and what is more—aye, and worse, too—far worse—I have been an involuntary instrument, as your clerk, in causing much of that awful misery, the mere thought of which almost drives me mad. Talk of the black turpitude of murdering with a dagger or a pistol!—why, it is a mercy to the slow—lingering—piece-meal murders which you and men of your stamp are constantly perpetrating. For as true as there is a God in heaven, there are more slow and cold-blooded murders committed in one year by a certain class of attorneys, than are recorded in the annals of Newgate for a whole century!”
Heathcote’s fears had all returned by rapid degrees as his head clerk, turning full upon him, levelled at his head the terrible charges summed up in the preceding speech: but when these last words fell upon his ear, he grew ghastly pale, and, staggering back a few paces, sank into his chair,—for he knew how sternly true was the appalling accusation!
“Ah! well may your eyes glare upon me in horror,” resumed Green: “but it is high time that you should hear a few home truths—even though they come from such lips as mine. For you doubtless think that it is all very fine to issue a writ—refuse delay—decline everything in the shape of compromise—and then seize upon the goods of your victim, or clap him into gaol:—but it is we who sit in the outer office—we clerks, who can best penetrate into the effects of such a heartless course. When we see the door open, and the miserable wretch come in with care as legibly written on his countenance as if it were printed in letters on a piece of paper,—and when he comes crawling up to our desk, as if his utter self-abasement would be so pleasing to us clerks as to induce us to say a good word in his behalf to you,—then, when he asks in a tone of anguish which is ready to burst forth into a flood of tears, ‘Do you think it likely that Mr. Heathcote will give me time?’—it is then, I say, that the real feelings of such poor wretches transpire, and the murderous effects of the harsh proceedings adopted by lawyers of your stamp become painfully apparent.”
“To what is all this to lead, Mr. Green?” demanded Heathcote, in a low and subdued tone: for it struck him that such a long address could only be meant to herald some evil tidings, to which his clerk, in the refinement of vindictive cruelty, sought to impart a more vivid poignancy by prefatory delays.
“To what is all this to lead?” repeated Green: “why—to your utter confusion, black-hearted old man that you are! Think of the conversation that took place between us a few days ago: did I not then tell you that there were many deaths to be laid to your door? And I was right! You sent off Thompson to prison—his wife and child perished, and he cut his throat:—you are the murderer of those three human beings! The man Beale, whom you likewise threw into Whitecross Street, died in the infirmary of that gaol—died of a broken heart, sir;—and you were his murderer! Hundreds and hundreds of deaths have you caused in the same way,—hundreds and hundreds of legal murders!”
“Green—Mr. Green!” gasped the lawyer, writhing as if he were a dwarf in the grasp of a giant: then, wondering why he should thus put up with the insolence of his clerk, and falling back upon the belief that the man could not possibly conduct himself in such a way unless he were under the influence of liquor, he suddenly started from his seat, exclaiming, “By heaven! sir, you have gone so far that all hope of forgiveness on my part is impossible.”
“I care nothing for your pardon—and shall not even condescend to solicit it,” replied Mr. Green, in a tone of complete and unmistakeable defiance. “I am going to leave you at once——”
“Leave me!” ejaculated Heathcote, who had hitherto believed it to be impossible that his clerk could throw off the chains of servitude and thraldom which had been so firmly rivetted upon him: “leave me!” he repeated: “yes—oh! yes,” he added, his countenance assuming an expression of the most diabolical sardonism;—“yes—you shall indeed leave me—but it will be to change your quarters for a cell in Newgate!”
“Perhaps you will be the first to repair thither,” said Green, with a chuckle that seemed to grate upon the lawyer’s ears like the sound emitted by the process of sharpening the teeth of a saw.
“In less than two hours, Mr. Green, Clarence Villiers shall be made acquainted with the fact that the thousand pounds have long ceased to be in the Bank of England,” exclaimed Heathcote.
“The thousand pounds are there, sir—yes, there at this very minute,” answered Green, in a tone of assurance which convinced Heathcote that the man was speaking the truth. “And what is more, sir, Mr. Villiers knows all—and has forgiven all! This morning did I replace the money; this afternoon did I repair to Brompton to throw myself at the feet of Mr. Villiers—confess everything—and implore his pardon. Oh! sir, he is a generous man—and he forgave me. ‘You have been guilty of a terrible breach of trust—nay, a heinous crime, Mr. Green,’ he said; ‘but you have atoned for your turpitude. It is our duty in this world to forgive where true contrition is manifested; and I will take care to hold you harmless in this case, should it ever transpire that the money had been sold out.’—I wept while I thanked him; and I said, ‘But I have a bitter enemy who is acquainted with the whole transaction: what can be done to save me from disgrace, should he inform against me?’—‘He cannot prove that you forged my name,’ responded Villiers: ‘I alone can prove that; and under present circumstances, I would not for worlds inflict an injury upon you.’ I again thanked him, and took my leave. You now perceive, Mr. Heathcote, that so far from being in your power, you are entirely in mine. The other day you told me that you would crush me as if I were a worm—that you would send me to Newgate—that you would abandon me to my fate—and that you would even help to have me shipped for eternal exile. I thank you for all your kind intentions, sir,” added Green, in a tone of bitter satire; “and I mean to show my gratitude by exposing you and your villany to the utmost of my ability.”
“And what injury can you do me, reptile?” exclaimed Heathcote, quivering with rage.
“What injury!” repeated Green: “I can ruin you!” he added, speaking loudly and triumphantly. “Oh! I am acquainted with far more of your dark transactions and nefarious schemes than you can possibly imagine. The deeds that are contained therein,” he added, pointing to the japanned tin-boxes, “are not sealed books to me. I have read them all—yes, all—and have gleaned enough information to enable me to bring upon you such a host of ruined and defrauded clients, that you would never dare to face them even for a moment. Ah! you may turn pale as death—and your eyes may glare with rage: but it is not the less true that I hold you in my power. If you destroy those deeds, you then annihilate the only documents which prove your title to the vast property which you have accumulated: if you do not destroy them, you leave in existence the damning evidences of your villany. At this very moment there are old men and old women struggling on in the bitterest penury, and cursing the life from which they have not the moral courage to fly through the medium of suicide,—some of them in the workhouse—others dependent on the bounty of relatives;—and all these have been plunged into this appalling misery by you! But every step you took to enmesh and ensnare them—every scheme you devised to get them completely into your power, so that you might wrench from them the last acre of their lands and the last guinea of their fortunes,—all—all has been illegal—fraudulent—extortionate—vile! Oh! it will alone prove a fine harvest for me, when I again take out my certificate to practise as an attorney—which I am about to do,—it will be a splendid commencement, I say, to take up the causes of all those persons and compel you to render an account to your ruined clients. This, sir, is what I am about to do: and now it shall be war between us—war to the very knife,—and ere many months have elapsed, you will bitterly repent your conduct to one who only asked for a little kindness in return for his faithful—far too faithful services.”
Having thus spoken, Mr. Green abruptly quitted the office, leaving James Heathcote in a state of mind not even to be envied by a criminal about to ascend the steps of the scaffold.
Mr. Green had so well managed matters in respect to the Bank-notes, that in the course of a few hours he had contrived to obtain cash for about twelve thousand pounds’ worth; and the Doctor was so delighted at his success, that he had testified his satisfaction by making him a present of a couple of thousand for himself.
Being now a rich man, Mr. Rily resolved to quit his lodgings in Roupel-street and take superior apartments in a better neighbourhood. Then it struck him, as he was walking leisurely along in the City, after having parted from Green, that it would be far more agreeable to become the possessor of a nice little cottage in a pleasant suburb; and, while this idea was uppermost in his mind, he happened to observe in the window of a house-agent an announcement to the effect that “several elegant and desirable villas were to be let on lease or sold, in the most delightful part of Pentonville.” The Doctor entered the office, obtained a card to view the premises thus advertised, and, taking a cab, proceeded straight to the suburb indicated.
Having nothing particular to do, Jack Rily spent several hours in inspecting the villas, and at length fixed upon one which he resolved to purchase. The individual who had built the houses on speculation, and who was compelled to dispose of one on any terms before he could possibly finish another, resided close at hand; and a bargain being speedily concluded, a particular hour on the following day was agreed upon as the time for a final settlement.
Jack Rily, having proceeded thus far in his arrangements, entered a public-house which had lately been built on an eminence within a quarter of a mile of the New Model Prison; and there he ordered some dinner—for it was now four o’clock in the afternoon. The repast over, he took a seat at an open window which commanded a view of Copenhagen Fields and all the neighbouring district; and with his pipe and some hot brandy-and-water he was enjoying himself to his heart’s content, when he was suddenly startled by the appearance of Vitriol Bob, who happened to pass that way.
Though a brave, fearless, and desperate man, the Doctor nevertheless uttered an ejaculation of mingled surprise and annoyance; and his enemy, who would not have otherwise perceived him, instantly glanced towards the window. Their looks met—and a diabolical scowl distorted the countenance of Vitriol Bob,—while Jack Rily, immediately recovering his presence of mind, surveyed the miscreant with cool defiance.
Vitriol Bob appeared to hesitate for a moment what course to pursue: then, suddenly making up his mind, he entered the public-room where the Doctor was seated.
Taking a chair at another table, he rang the bell and ordered some spirits-and-water, in payment for which he threw down a sovereign, receiving the change.
When the waiter had disappeared, and the two villains were alone together, Vitriol Bob looked maliciously at Jack Rily, as much as to say, “You see I am not without money;” and then he glanced complacently at the new suit of black which he had on.
For a change had taken place in Vitriol Bob’s appearance; and he seemed to be “in high feather,” as well as his enemy the Doctor. His huge black whiskers had been trimmed, oiled, and curled—a process that did not however materially mitigate the hang-dog expression of his countenance: for his small, reptile eyes still glared ferociously from beneath his thick, overhanging brows,—his lips were as usual of a livid hue,—and his broken nose positively appeared more flat on his face than ever.
“Your health, Jack,” said the miscreant, nodding with a kind of malignant familiarity, as he raised the steaming glass to his lips.
“Thank’ee kindly, Bob,” returned the Doctor, in a tone of mock civility.
“Now that we have met at last, old feller, we won’t part again in a hurry,” observed Vitriol Bob after a pause, during which he lighted a cigar.
“Just as you choose, my tulip,” said Rily, calmly puffing away and contemplating the thin blueish vapour which curled lazily from the bowl of his pipe out of the window.
“You and I have a score to settle, you know, Jack,” continued Vitriol Bob; “and it seems as if the Devil had thrown us in each other’s way this evenin’ on purpose to reggilate our accounts.”
“Oh! that’s the construction you put upon it, eh?” said the Doctor. “Well—just as you like.”
“You know that you used me shameful in that Stamford-street business t’other day,” proceeded Vitriol Bob.
“It was only what you deserved for the trick you played me, old fellow,” retorted the Doctor, but with amazing coolness alike of tone and manner.
“I don’t deny that I bilked you out of a part of your reglars in the matter alluded to,” said Bob: “but it didn’t deserve such a return as you gived me in the Haunted House. Thank God, I had my revenge on the old o’oman t’other night.”
“Yes—she’s disposed of,” observed Jack; “and I can’t forgive you for it, Bob—even if you wished us to be friends. She was a fine old creature,—and I had an affection for her, because she was the ugliest wretch I ever saw in the shape of a woman—and her spirit was admirable.”
“I meant the blow for you, Jack,” said Vitriol Bob: “but it’s just as well now that the bottle broke over her, since you and me have met again.”
“Have you got another bottle in your pocket, Bob?” demanded the Doctor: “because if we are to have a tuzzle for it before we part, I may as well put myself on as equal terms with you as possible.”
“I shan’t take no unfair advantage, Jack,” was the reply: and, as the villain thus spoke, he slapped his hands against the skirts of his coat his breeches’ pockets, and his breast, to convince his antagonist that he had no bottle about his person.
“There’s nothing like fair play, Bob,” returned the Doctor; “and therefore if you like to feel about me to convince yourself that I have no fire-arms, you’re welcome.”
“I’ll take your word for it, Jack,” responded Vitriol Bob. “But I suppose you have got a clasp-knife.”
“I never go without one,” was the answer: “and it’s as sharp as a razor.”
“So is mine,” observed the other miscreant; and then there was a long pause, during which the two men contemplated each other with a calmness and serenity that would have prevented even the most acute observer from noticing the malignant light that gleamed in the depths of their eyes.
And while the one continued to puff his pipe in a leisurely manner, the other smoked his cigar with equal ease; so that they appeared to be two friends enjoying themselves in a pleasant way in the cool of the evening.
“I suppose I interrupted some sport t’other night, Jack,” said Vitriol Bob, at length breaking the silence. “You and the old o’oman wasn’t out together at that hour for nothink—particklerly in such a neighbourhood.”
“Yes—we were going to do a little business together,” observed the Doctor. “You first twigged me in Sloane Street. I saw you!”
“I knowed you did: but you didn’t suspect that I follered you.”
“Rather,” said Jack Rily. “At least, I thought it very probable.”
“You’re aweer that the old o’oman’s dead, I suppose?”
“I said as much just now. ’Twas in the papers,” remarked Jack Rily.
“Yes—I read it in the Adwertiser,” responded Vitriol Bob.
There was another pause, during which the two miscreants had their glasses replenished. The Doctor also refilled his pipe, and the other lighted a second cigar.
“We’ll make ourselves comfortable, Jack,” said Vitriol Bob, “as long as you like: and whenever you feel disposed to go, mind that I shall be arter you.”
“Well—I can’t prevent that,” observed the Doctor, coolly. “You’ve a right to walk which way you choose in this free country.”
“Thank’ee for giving me the information,” said Bob, in a satirical tone. “But of course I mean to stick to you till you’re so wearied of my company that you must come to a last struggle either to shake me off altogether, or perish yourself. For, mind, if I catch you asleep, Jack, I shall stick my clasp-knife into you up to the haft.”
“I’m obliged to you for letting me know your kind intentions beforehand,” observed the Doctor: “because I shall adopt precisely the same mode of warfare.”
“Now, then, we understand each other,” said Vitriol Bob; “and that’s a comfort. But it’s a great pity that two such fine fellers as you and me should be at loggerheads. Howsomever, it can’t be helped—and a reconcilement, or whatever they call it, is impossible. Your life or mine, Jack—that’s the question to be decided now.”
“Depend upon it, old fellow, that you’ll be a croaker before morning,” returned the Doctor, as he raised his glass to his lips.
“No—it’s you that’ll be a stiff’un, my boy,” was the pleasant retort.
“Time must show. Remember that it’s no infant you’ll have to deal with.”
“I should have beat you that night in the Haunted House, Jack, if the old o’oman hadn’t come to your assistance,” observed Vitriol Bob, with a low but diabolical chuckle.
“Yes—but it was because I slipped over something, old fellow,” was the answer; “and I shall take care to keep more steady on my pins next time.”
“Depend upon it that when the death-struggle does come, Jack, the fust that slips will be the dead ’un. Did you ever hear of the Kentuckian fashion of dealing with an enemy?” demanded Vitriol Bob.
“Never,” was the reply. “But I dare say it’s something damnable—as bad, perhaps, as breaking a vitriol-bottle over a person’s face—or else you wouldn’t know anything about it.”
“You’re right there, Jack: it’s gouging that I mean.”
“And what’s gouging, pray?”
“Tearing a fellow’s eye out of its socket,” answered Vitriol Bob.
“One can play at that game as well as another,” observed the Doctor, totally unmoved by the horrid nature of the conversation.
“To be sure: and we shall sooner or later see who beats at it.”
Another pause succeeded this last remark of Vitriol Bob; and again did the two men sit contemplating each his enemy with a composure that was unnatural and dreadful to a degree under the circumstances.
Time wore on in this manner: their glasses were frequently replenished—and yet the liquor appeared not to produce the least effect upon them; but, cool, collected, and self-possessed, they sate measuring each other’s form and calculating its strength, until darkness insensibly stole upon them. The waiter then entered to light the gas; and several frequenters of the house began to drop in to take their evening’s allowance of alcoholic drink and stupifying tobacco.
At length Jack Rily rose, and, looking hard at his enemy, said, “I am going now.”
“Wery well,” returned Vitriol Bob: “I’ll keep you company.”
There was nothing in these observations to excite either the curiosity or the suspicions of the other persons in the public-house-parlour: nevertheless, those words had a terrible significancy for the two men who had exchanged them.
The Doctor walked leisurely out of the room first; and Vitriol Bob followed him. But the instant they were outside the premises, the former turned abruptly round upon his enemy, saying, “Come, let us proceed abreast: I don’t mean to give you a chance of stabbing me from behind.”
“Just as you like,” observed Vitriol Bob; and he placed himself at the Doctor’s right hand, leaving an interval of about a couple of feet between them.
In this manner they walked on in silence,—each occupied with his own peculiar reflections.
Vitriol Bob was intent only on vengeance,—dread, full, complete, and diabolical vengeance; and, though he seemed to be looking straight forward, he was nevertheless watching his companion with the sidelong glances of his reptile-like eyes.
Jack Rily was calculating in his mind what course he should adopt. He was naturally as brave as a lion: but he did not perceive any advantage in risking his life in a struggle that, even were he victorious, would produce neither profit nor glory. The only possible good that could result to him from a triumphant issue of the quarrel, would be the removal of a bitter, inveterate, and determined enemy. Nevertheless, the Doctor had most potent reasons to induce him to avoid this deadly encounter. He had just obtained a vast sum of money, and had the means of realising five times as much: the world, therefore, had suddenly assumed a smiling aspect in his eyes. He had already resolved to abandon his nefarious pursuits, which indeed were no longer necessary—and settle down quietly in the cottage for the purchase of which he had that day concluded a bargain;—and all these prospects were to be staked on the hazard of a die—risked fearfully at the bidding of the miscreant who was walking by his side!
At one moment the Doctor seriously thought of giving his companion into charge to the first corps of policemen whom they might encounter; for this was the hour when the little detachments of constables went about relieving their comrades on duty. But that idea was abandoned almost as soon as formed: inasmuch as Jack Rily had all his money about him, and he knew that if he handed Vitriol Bob over to the police as the murderer of Torrens or of Mrs. Mortimer, the miscreant would unhesitatingly turn round with some charge that would at least place him (the Doctor) in temporary restraint, and lead to an examination of his person.
Jack Rily therefore came to the determination of pushing on into the heart of London, well knowing that Vitriol Bob’s object was not to assail him in any neighbourhood where the contest was likely to be observed and prevented, but to drive him by dint of persecution, dogging, and a hateful companionship, into the open country, where through very desperation the Doctor should make up his mind to settle the matter decisively by a struggle on equal terms. Feeling convinced that this was his enemy’s purpose, Jack Rily resolved either to weary him out or give him the slip if possible—or else to seize an opportunity of stabbing him suddenly in some place where an immediate escape was practicable.
We must again observe it was through no cowardice that the Doctor was desirous of avoiding a conflict from which only one could possibly depart alive: but he had so many inducements to cling to existence, that he saw no advantage in risking them all in a quarrel where the personal animosity was entirely on the other side.
In the course of half an hour they arrived in the vicinity of the Angel at Islington; and Jack Rily, now breaking the silence which had lasted since they quitted the public-house at Pentonville, said, “This walking makes one thirsty: let’s have some beer.”
“Willingly,” answered Vitriol Bob: “and we’ll drink out of the same pot to make people believe we’re friends.”
They accordingly entered a gin-shop and shared a pot of porter at the bar; after which they resumed their walk, passing down the City Road. They kept abreast, and preserved a deep silence,—each watching the movements of the other—the Doctor in the hope of being able to give his companion a sudden thrust with his knife—and Vitriol Bob for the purpose of preventing the escape of his enemy.
It was ten o’clock when they came within sight of the Bank of England; and as they passed under its solid wall, Jack Rily wondered whether he should be alive to keep an appointment which he had with Green for eleven next morning in order to have some more of his notes changed by that individual.
“All the money in that there place, old feller, won’t save one or t’other of us from death before many hours is gone by,” observed Vitriol Bob, in a low and ferocious tone.
“You must make the best use of your time, then,” returned Jack; “since you’ve got a presentiment that it’s so near.”
“No—it’s you that had better say your prayers,” retorted the miscreant. “But what’s the use of keeping both your hands in your pockets? If you think you’ll be able to draw out your knife suddenly and give me a poke under the ribs, you’re uncommonly mistaken.”
“I wasn’t dreaming of such a thing,” answered Jack Rily, for the first time showing a slight degree of confusion in his manner.
“It’s false, old feller,” said Vitriol Bob: “you’ve got the clasp-knife open in your pocket—I know you have. The gas-lights is strong enough about there to enable a sharp-sighted chap, like me, to twig all that goes on.”
“It’s you that speaks false,” returned Jack Rily, still keeping his hands in his pockets.
And, again relapsing into silence, they pursued their way.
Passing in front of the Exchange, and up Cornhill, they turned into Birchin Lane. There Jack Rily hesitated for an instant which way to proceed: but suddenly recollecting that in a little passage to the left there was a public-house called the Bengal Arms, he said, “There’s a crib here where they sell capital ale.”
“Let’s have some,” cried Vitriol Bob. “You go on fust—the place is too narrer for us both.”
“No—you go first,” said the Doctor.
“In this way then,” responded Vitriol Bob: and stepping nimbly in front of his companion, he turned round and walked backwards along the passage until it suddenly grew wider opposite the door of the Bengal Arms.
Jack Rily laughed at this manœuvre: but he was in reality disappointed—for had Vitriol Bob acted with less precaution, he would have assuredly received the whole length of the Doctor’s formidable knife in his back, ere he had proceeded half way up the passage.
“We’ll go into the parlour here,” said Jack, “and have some bread and cheese. I’m hungry.”
“So am I,” observed Vitriol Bob, in a dry, laconic tone which denoted the terrible determination that inspired the man’s mind,—a determination never to part from his companion until one of them should be no more!
There was something awful—something frightfully revolting and hideously appalling in the circumstance of those two miscreants thus wandering about together in a manner that appeared amicable enough to all who beheld them,—two wretches possessing the hearts of fiends and the external ugliness of monsters,—two incarnate demons capable of any turpitude, however black the dye!
The parlour at the Bengal Arms is—or at least was at the time whereof we are writing—a long, low, dingy room, very dark in the day-time and indifferently lighted in the evening. It is always filled with a motley assembly of guests; and ale is the beverage most in request—while to one who indulges in a cigar, at least ten patronise the unaffected enjoyment of the clay-pipe.
On the present occasion the company was numerous: the tobacco-smoke hung like a dense mist in the place, the gas-burners showing dimly through the pestiferous haze;—and the heat was intense.
Jack Rily and Vitriol Bob contrived to find room at one of the tables; and a slip-shod waiter supplied them in due time with a pot of ale and bread and cheese, to the discussion of which they addressed themselves in a manner affording not the slightest suspicion of the deadly enmity which existed between them.
While they were thus engaged they had an opportunity of listening to the conversation that was taking place amongst the other guests.
“Well, for my part,” said a little, stout, podgy individual, with a bald head and a round, red, good-humoured countenance, “I have always been taught to look on the City institootions as the blessedest things ever inwented.”
“And I maintain that they’re the foulest abuses in the universe,” exclaimed a tall, thin, sallow-faced individual, striking the table with his clenched fist as he spoke. “Why should everything east of Temple Bar be different from everything west?” he demanded, looking sternly round upon the company as if to defy any one to answer his questions. “Why should it be necessary to have barristers as magistrates in Westminster, and fat stupid old Aldermen in the City?—why should the ridiculous ostentation, useless trappings, and preposterous display of the Mayoralty be maintained for so miserably small a fraction of the great metropolis? Talk of your City Institutions, indeed!—they are either the most awful nonsense that ever made grown up persons look more absurd than little boys playing with paper cocked-hats and wooden swords—or else they are rottenness and corruption. When the Municipal Corporations were reformed in 1835, why was the City of London omitted! Did not Lord John Russell then pledge himself most solemnly and sacredly to bring in a separate bill for the London Corporation?—and has this promise, almost amounting to a vow, ever been fulfilled? No: and why? Because every Government, one after another, is afraid to lose the political support of this precious Corporation. And to these selfish considerations is sacrificed every principle of justice, propriety, and common sense. Look at the rascally extravagance and vile profusion which characterise the Corporation. The parish of St. Marylebone, with its hundred and forty thousand inhabitants, only expends a hundred and twenty-eight thousand pounds for those parochial purposes which cost the City, with a population of ten thousand less than the other, nearly a million! The difference is that Marylebone is governed by an intelligent vestry—whereas London is under a stupid Corporation! Look, again, at the iniquities perpetrated by the Aldermen in their capacity as licensing magistrates—the gross partiality that they show towards some publicans, and the inveterate hostility they manifest towards others. The rights of the freemen are a scandal and a shame—many able mechanics and other operatives being frequently driven from the City on account of their inability to pay the money for taking up their freedom.32 Then again, look at the preposterous power which the Lord Mayor enjoys of stopping up all the thoroughfares and impeding business in every shape and way, on any occasion when it may suit him and his bloated, guzzling, purse-proud adherents to pass in their gingerbread coaches through the City. Is this consistent with British freedom?—is it compatible with the rights or interests of the citizens? Faugh!”
And the speaker resumed his pipe, in deep disgust at the abuses which he had thus succinctly, but most truly enumerated.
“Well, I don’t know—but I like all our old institutions,” said the bald-headed man, with the stolid obstinacy and contemptible narrow-mindedness which so frequently characterise the John Bullism of a certain class. “The wisdom of our ancestors——”
“The wisdom of the devil!” ejaculated the tall, sallow-faced individual who had held forth on the City abuses. “That is a fool’s reason for admiring established and inveterate corruption. The wisdom of our ancestors, indeed! Why—those ancestors believed in the divine right of Kings, and were sincere in praying on the 30th of January as if Charles the First was really a Martyr instead of a Traitor. Our ancestors, too, put faith in witches—aye, and burnt them also! It was our ancestors who kindled the fires in Smithfield where persons suffered at the stake; and our ancestors advocated the most blood-thirsty code of laws in Europe, in virtue of which men were strung up by dozens at a time at the Old Bailey. Our ancestors prosecuted writers for their political and religious opinions, and seemed to take a delight in everything that gratified the inhuman ambition of Kings and Queens, to the prejudice of real freedom. Our ancestors, in fact, were the most ignorant—besotted—bloody-minded miscreants that ever disgraced God’s earth; and any man who turns an adoring glance upon the deeds of those ruffians, deserves to be hooted out of all decent society.”
Having thus delivered his sentiments on the subject, the sallow-faced individual was about to resume his pipe, when, another idea occurring to him, he suddenly burst forth again in the following terms:—
“But who are those people that generalise so inanely when they speak of the wisdom of our ancestors? They are persons who inherit all the old, wretched, and worn-out prejudices of their forefathers, without having the intellect or the courage to think for themselves. They are the statesmen who gladly fall back upon any argument in order to defend the monstrous abuses of our institutions against the enlightening influence of reform. They are the churchmen who are deeply interested in preserving the loaves and fishes of which their ancestors in the hierarchy plundered the nation. They are, in fact, all those individuals who have anything to lose by wholesome innovation, and everything to gain by the maintenance of a system so thoroughly rotten, corrupt, and loathsome that it infects and demoralizes every grade of society. The Peer eulogises the wisdom of his ancestors, because they handed down to him usurped privileges and an hereditary rank the principle of which is a crying shame. The Member of the House of Commons speaks of the wisdom of his ancestors, because he holds his seat through the frightful corruption introduced by them into the electoral system. The placeman talks of the wisdom of his ancestors, because they invented sinecures and distributed with the lavish hand of robbers the gold which they wrung from the marrow and the sinew of the industrious millions. The parson praises the wisdom of his ancestors, because they invented the atrocious system of allowing a rector to enjoy five thousand a-year for doing nothing, and paying his curate ninety pounds a-year for doing everything. The lawyer praises the wisdom of his ancestors, because they devised such myriads of insane, stupid, unjust, rascally, and contradictory enactments, that a man cannot move hand or foot even in the most trivial and common sense affairs, without the intervention of an attorney: and wherever that common sense does exist on one side, law is almost sure to be on the other; in the same way that wherever justice is, there law is not. For my part, I do firmly believe that there is not a more wretched and oppressed country in all the world than England—nor a more duped, deceived, gulled, and humbugged people on the face of the earth than the English. Talk of freedom, indeed: why, almost every institution you have is in favour of the rich and against the poor!”
“I can’t say that I see it,” observed the bald-pated man, in the usually dogmatic tone of confirmed obstinacy and unmitigated ignorance.
“Then you must be blind!” ejaculated the other, his emphasis indicating sovereign contempt for the individual whom he addressed. “Look at the Game Laws: are they made for the rich or for the poor? Are not thousands of miserable creatures thrown into gaols for daring to kill a hare or a pheasant, because, forsooth! it interferes with the sport of the ‘squire? Do not the rich ride when out hunting through the corn-fields of their tenants?—and what redress can the latter obtain? Then, again, look at the state of the law generally. What chance has a poor man of bringing a wealthy oppressor to justice?—who can go to Westminster Hall without a pocket full of gold? Why, the very Railway Companies make it a boast that by means of capital they can ruin—aye, and break the heart of any poor antagonist in a law-court, let his cause be ever so just! Look, too, at the privileges enjoyed by the landowners: what proportion of the taxes do they bear in comparison with the industrious, toiling, starving peasantry or mechanics on those estates? Look at the condition of our taxation: are not all the necessaries of life subjected to frightful imposts, while the luxuries are comparatively cheap to the favoured few who can obtain them? What is the proportion between the duty on a poor man’s horse and cart and a rich man’s carriage and four?—what the proportion between the poor man’s beer and spirits and the rich man’s foreign wines? Again, if a scion of the aristocracy wants money, he is provided with a good place if not an absolute sinecure; whereas the poor man is sent to die a lingering and degraded death in that awful gaol denominated a work-house. Look at the combination of capital against labour. If capitalists and monopolists lower wages, there is no redress save by means of a strike on the part of the workmen; and a strike is looked upon as something akin to rebellion against the Sovereign. In every way is the law in favour of the rich—in every way is it grinding and oppressive to the poor.”
A profound silence followed these observations: for every one present, save the bald-pated man, perceived their truth and recognized their justice,—and even he had not impudence enough to venture a denial which he could not sustain by argument.
“What we require, then,” resumed the sallow-faced individual, at length breaking the long pause, “is an entire reform,—a radical reform, and not a measure bearing the name without any of the reality. I love my country and my countrymen as well as any British subject: but it makes my heart bleed to witness the misery which exists throughout the sphere of our industrious population;—and it makes my blood boil to think that nothing is done to remedy the crying evils and reform the tremendous abuses which I have this night enumerated.”