The Garret and the Garden; Or, Low Life High Up, R. M. Ballantyne [romance book recommendations txt] 📗

When Mr Dean succeeded, with some difficulty, in obtaining a private interview with Mr Spivin’s servant Martha, he proceeded with much politeness and subtlety to pump and squeeze her.

And it may be remarked here that Mr Dean had what Martha afterwards styled “a way with him” that was quite irresistible, insomuch that she was led, somehow, to speak of things she never meant to mention, and to reveal things she never intended to confess.

“You see, sir,” she said, “it’s the dooty of me an’ Mary to do the bedrooms w’en the family’s at breakfast. Well, that morning we went as usual to Mr Laidlaw’s room first, because ’e’s quick with ’is meals an’ wants ’is boots put in ’is room so as he may get out immediately. Mr Laidlaw ’as no luggage, sir, only a shoulder-bag, an’ it was lyin’ open on the table, so me an’ Mary looked into it just to—to—”

“To see that nothing had tumbled out,” suggested Mr Dean. “I understand.”

“Just so, sir,” assented Martha; “and there was nothink in it but a spare shirt rolled up, and a pair of socks, and a small Bible—no money or watch or anythink that would break even if it did tumble out,—’is shavin’ things and all that being on the dressin’-table—so—”

“So your mind was relieved, Martha—well, go on.”

“But as we was agoin’ to close the bag,” continued the girl, “we observed an inner pocket, an’ Mary says, p’raps there was a love-letter in it! I laughed an’ said, ‘Let’s look an’ see.’ So we looked an’ saw nothink.”

“You both looked and were quite sure of that?” asked Mr Dean.

“Yes, quite sure, for we both felt the pocket all round as well as looked into it.”

“Well, go on.”

“Then we shut the bag, and after we had finished the room, we was just goin’ out, when master he ran up-stairs as if he was in a hurry. He came into the room with a bit of paper in ’is ’and, somethink like a bank note, but he started on seein’ us, an’ crumpled up the paper an’ stuffed it in ’is pocket. At the same time ’e got very angry, scolded us for being so slow, and ordered us off to the other rooms. Not ten minutes after that in comes Mr Lockhart, the lawyer, with two policemen, an’ seizes Mr Laidlaw, who was still at ’is breakfast. At first he got very angry an’ shoved one policemen over the sofa and the other into the coal-scuttle, at the same time sayin’ in a growly voice, ‘I think—’ee’ve—aw—geen—mad—thee—gither’—oh, I can’t speak Scotch!” exclaimed Martha, bursting into a laugh.

“Better not try, my dear,” said Dean, with a peculiar smile.

“Well, then,” continued Martha, on recovering herself, “when the policemen got up again Mr Laidlaw said he had no intention of running away (only ’e said rinnin’ awa’), and that he would go with them quietly if they’d only be civil (’e called it seevil!), and assured them they had made a mistake. They was more civil after that, for Mr Laidlaw ’ad doubled ’is fists an’ looked, oh my! like a Bengal tiger robbed of its young ones. So they all went straight to the bedroom, and me an’ Mary followed with master and missis and the waiters, an’ they searched all round the room, coming to the bag last though it was the only thing on the table, and right under their noses, an sure enough they found a 50 pound note there in the little pocket!”

“And what said the Scotsman to that?” asked Mr Dean, with a slight grin.

“He said, turning to master, ‘It was you did that—’ee—blagyird!’” cried Martha, again bursting into laughter at her Scotch. “And then,” continued Martha, “one of the policemen said ’e ’ad seen Mr Laidlaw not long ago in company with a well-known thief, and the other one swore ’e ’ad seen ’im the same night in a thieves’ den, and that ’e was hevidently on a friendly footin’ wi’ them for ’e ’ad refused to quit the place, and was hinsolent. At this lawyer Lockhart shook ’is ’ead and said ’e thought it was a bad case, an’ the poor Scotsman seemed so took aback that ’e said nothink—only stared from one to another, and went off quietly to prison.”

After investigating the matter a little further, and obtaining, through Martha, a private interview with Mary, who corroborated all that her fellow-servant had said, Mr Dean went straight to Pimlico, and interviewed the butler who had been in the service of the Weston family. Thereafter he visited Colonel Brentwood, and, in the presence of his wife and daughter discussed the whole affair from beginning to end. We will spare the reader that discussion, and turn towards Newgate.

On the evening of that day poor David Laidlaw found himself in durance vile, with massive masonry around him, and a very Vesuvius of indignation within him. Fortunately, in the afternoon of the following day, which chanced to be Sunday, a safety valve—a sort of crater—was allowed to him in the shape of pen, ink, and paper. Using these materials, he employed his enforced leisure in writing to that receptacle of his early and later joys and woes—his mother.

“Whar d’ye think I’ve gotten t’ noo, mither?” the letter began. “I’m in Newgate! It’s an auld gate noo-a-days, an’ a bad gate onyway, for it’s a prison. Think o’ that! If onybody had said I wad be in jail maist as soon as I got to Bawbylon I wad have said he was leein’! But here I am, hard an’ fast, high and dry—uncom’on dry!—wi’ naething but stane aroond me—stane wa’s, stane ceilin’, stane floor; my very hairt seems turned to stane. Losh, woman, it bates a’!

“It’s no maner o’ use gaun into the hale story. A buik wad scarce ha’d it a’. The details’ll keep till you an’ I meet again on the braes o’ Yarrow—if we iver meet there, which is by no means sure, for thae Englishers’ll be the death o’ me afore I git hame, if they gang on as they’ve begood. Here’s the ootline:—

“I’ve been thick wi’ thieves, burglars, pickpockets, an’ the like. Veesitin’ at their dens, an’ gaun aboot the streets wi’ them, an’ I’ve stolen a fifty-pun’ note, an’ it’s been fund i’ the pouch inside my bag. That’s the warst o’t; but it seems that I’ve also resistet the poliss in the dischairge o’ their duty, which means that I flang ane ower a sofa an’ stappit anither into a coal-scuttle—though I didna mean it, puir falla, for his breeks suffered in the way that ye’ve aften seen mine whan I was a wee laddie. But I was roused to that extent whan they first gruppit me that I couldna help it!

“I wadna mind it muckle if it wasna that I’ve no a freend to help me—

“I was interruptit to receive a veesiter—an’ a rebuik at the same time, for he turned oot to be a freend, though a stranger, a Colonel Brentwud, wha’s been cheetit by that blagyird lawyer that’s tryin’ to play the mischief wi’ me. But he’ll fin’ that I’m teuch! The Colonel says they’ll hae nae diffeeculty in clearin’ me, so let that comfort ye, mither.—Yer ill-doin’ son, David.

“P.S.—There’s a wee laddie I’ve faw’n in wi’ since I cam’ to Bawbylon, they ca’ him Tammy Splint. O woman, but he is a queer bairn. He’s jist been to see me i’ my cell, an’ the moment he cam’ in, though he was half greetin’, he lookit roond an’ said, ‘Isn’t this a sell!’ Eh, but he is auld-farrant! wi’ mair gumption than mony full-grown men, to say naething o’ women.”

But David Laidlaw had more friends in London than he was aware of. At the very time that he was penning the foregoing epistle to his mother, a number of disreputable-looking men were bewailing his fate and discussing his affairs in the thieves’ den, and two equally disreputable women were quarrelling over the same subject in a wretched dwelling in the presence of a third woman, who presided over a teapot.

One of the women, whose visage exhibited marks of recent violence, struck her fist on the table and exclaimed, “No, Mrs Rampy, you are wrong, as usual. The story I ’eard about ’im was quite different an’ I believes it too, for