As Richard was this afternoon permitted to mix with his fellow-prisoners for the first time, the boy from Slopperton was ordered to keep an eye upon him; and a very sharp eye the boy kept, never for one moment allowing a look, word, or action of the prisoner to escape him.
The keepers this afternoon were assembled near the portico, before which the gardens extended to the high outer wall. The ground between the portico and the wall was a little less than a quarter of a mile in length, and at the bottom was the grand entrance and the porter’s lodge. The gardens surrounded the house on three sides, and on the left side the wall ran parallel with the river Sloshy. This river was now so much swollen by the late heavy rains that the waters washed the wall to the height of four feet, entirely covering the towing-path, which lay ordinarily between the wall and the waterside.
Now Richard and the Emperor of the Waterworks, accompanied by the gushing charmer in the green boots, being all three engaged in friendly though rather erratic conversation, happened to stroll in the direction of the grounds on this side, and consequently out of sight of the keepers.
The boy from Slopperton was, however, close upon their heels. This young gentleman had his hands in his pockets, and was loitering and lounging along with an air which seemed to say, that neither man nor woman gave him any more delight than they had afforded the Danish prince of used-up memory. Perhaps it was in utter weariness of life that he was, as if unconsciously, employed in whistling the melody of a song, supposed to relate to a passage in the life of a young lady of the name of Gray, christian came Alice, whose heart it was another’s, and consequently, by pure logic, never could belong to the singer.
Now there may be something infectious in this melody; for no sooner had the boy from Slopperton whistled the first few bars, than some person in the distance outside the walls of the asylum gardens took up the air and finished it. A trifling circumstance this in itself; but it appeared to afford the boy considerable gratification; and he presently came suddenly upon Richard in the middle of a very interesting conversation, and whispered in his ear, or rather at his elbow, “All right, general!” Now as Richard, the Emperor of the Waterworks, and the only daughter of the Pope all talked at once, and all talked of entirely different subjects, their conversation might, perhaps, have been just a little distracting to a short-hand reporter; but as a conversation, it was really charming.
Richard — still musing on the wild idea which was known in the asylum to have possessed his disordered brain ever since the day of his trial — was giving his companions an account of his escape from Elba.
“I was determined,” he said, taking the Emperor of the Waterworks by the button, “I was determined to make one desperate effort to return to my friends in France—”
“Very creditable, to be sure,” said the damsel of the green boots; “your sentiments did you honour.”
“But to escape from the island was an enterprise of considerable difficulty,” continued Richard.
“Of course,” said the damsel, “considering the price of flour. Flour rose a halfpenny in the bushel in the neighbourhood of Drury Lane, which, of course, reduced the size of muffins—”
“And had a depressing effect upon the water-rates,” interrupted the gentleman.
“Now,” continued Richard, “the island of Elba was surrounded by a high wall—”
“A very convenient arrangement; of course facilitating the process of cutting off the water from the inhabitants,” muttered the Emperor of the German Ocean.
The boy Slosh again expressed his feelings with reference to Alice Gray, and some one on the other side of the wall coincided with him.
“And,” said Richard, “on the top of this wall was a chevaux-de-frise.”
“Dear me,” exclaimed the Emperor, “quite a what-you-may-call-it. I mean an extraordinary coincidence; we too have a chevaux-de-thing-a-me, for the purpose, I believe, of keeping out the cats. Cats are unpleasant; especially,” he added, thoughtfully, “especially the Tom-sex — I mean the sterner sex.”
“To surmount this wall was my great difficulty.”
“Naturally, naturally,” said the damsel, “a great undertaking, considering the fall in muffins — a dangerous undertaking.”
“There was a boat waiting to receive me on the other side,” said Richard, glancing at the wall, which was about a hundred yards distant from him.
Some person on the other side of the wall had got a good deal nearer by this time; and, dear me, how very much excited he was about Alice Gray.
“But the question,” Richard continued, “was how to climb the wall,” — still looking up at the chevaux-de-frise.
“I should have tried muffins,” said the lady.
“I should have cut off the water,” remarked the gentleman.
“I did neither,” said Richard; “I tried a rope.”
At this very moment, by some invisible agency, a thickly knotted rope was thrown across the chevaux-de-frise, and the end fell within about four feet of the ground.
“But her, heart it is another’s, and it never can be mine.”
The gentleman who couldn’t succeed in winning the affections of Miss Gray was evidently close to the wall now.
In a much shorter time than the very greatest master in the art of stenography could possibly have reported the occurrence, Richard threw the Emperor of the Waterworks half-a-dozen yards from him, with such violence as to cause that gentleman to trip-up the heels of the only daughter of the Pope, and fall in a heap upon that lady as on a feather bed; and then, with the activity of a cat or a sailor, clambered up the rope, and disappeared over the chevaux-de-frise. The gentleman outside was now growing indifferent to the loss of Miss Gray, for he whistled the melody in a most triumphant manner, keeping time with the sharp plash of his oars in the water.
It took the Emperor and his female friend some little time to recover from the effects of the concussion they had experienced, each from each; and when they had done so, they stood for a few moments looking at one another in mute amazement.
“The gentleman has left the establishment,” at last said the lady.
“And a bruise on my elbow,” muttered the gentleman, rubbing the locality in question.
“Such a very unpolite manner of leaving too,” said the lady. “His muffins — I mean his manners — have evidently been very much neglected.”
“He must be a Chelsea householder,” said the Emperor. “The householders of Chelsea are proverbial for bad manners. They are in the habit of slamming the door in the face of the tax-gatherer, with a view to injuring the tip of his nose; and I’m sure Lord Chesterfield never advised his son to do that.”
It may be as well here to state that the Emperor of the Waterworks had in early life been collector of the water-rate in the neighbourhood of Chelsea; but having unfortunately given his manly intellect to drinking, and being further troubled with a propensity for speculation (some people pronounced the word without the first letter), which involved the advantageous laying-out of his sovereign’s money for his own benefit, he had first lost his situation and ultimately his senses.
His lady friend had once kept a baker’s shop in the vicinity of Drury Lane, and happening, in an evil hour, at the ripe age of forty, to place her affections on a young man of nineteen, the bent of whose genius was muffins, and being slighted by the youth in question, she had retired into the gin-bottle, and thence had been passed to the asylum of her native country.
Perhaps the inquiring reader will ask what the juvenile guardian of Richard is doing all this time? He has been told to keep an eye upon him; and how has he kept his trust?
He is standing, very coolly, staring at the lady and gentleman before him, and is apparently much interested in their conversation.
“I shall certainly go,” said the Emperor of the Waterworks, after a pause, “and inform the superintendent of this proceeding — the superintendent ought really to know of it.”
“Superintendent” was, in the asylu
m, the polite name given the keepers. But just as the Emperor began to shamble off in the direction of the front of the house, the boy called Slosh flew past him and ran on before, and by the time the elderly gentleman reached the porch, the boy had told the astonished keepers the whole story of the escape.
The keepers ran down to the gate, called to the porter to have it opened, and in a few minutes were in the road in front of it. They hurried thence to the river-side. There was not a sign of any human being on the swollen waters, except two men in a punt close to the opposite shore, who appeared to be eel-spearing.
“There’s no boat nearer than that,” said one of the men; “he never could have reached that in this time if ho had been the best swimmer in England.”
The men took it for granted that they had been informed of his escape the moment it occurred.
“He must have jumped slap into the water,” said another; “perhaps he’s about somewhere, contriving to keep his head under.”
“He couldn’t do it,” said the first man who had spoken; “it’s my opinion the poor chap’s drowned. They will try these escapes, though no one ever succeeded yet.”
There was a boat moored at the angle of the asylum wall, and one of the men sprang into it.
“Show me the place where he jumped over the wall,” he called to the boy, who pointed out the spot at his direction. The man rowed up to it.
“Not a sign of him anywhere about here!” he cried.
“Hadn’t you better call to those men?” asked his comrade; “they must have seen him jump.”
The man in the boat nodded assent, and rowed across the river to the two fishermen.
“Holloa!” he said, “have you seen any one get over that wall?”
One of the men, who had just impaled a fine eel, looked up with a surprised expression, and asked —
“Which wall?”
“Why the asylum, yonder, straight before you.”
“The asylum! Now, you don’t mean to say that that’s the asylum; and I’ve been taking it for a gentleman’s mansion and grounds all the time,” said the angler (who was no other than Mr. Augustus Darley), taking his pipe out of his mouth.
“I wish you’d give a straight answer to my question,” said the man; “have you seen any one jump over that wall; yes, or no?”
“Then, no!” said Gus; “if I had, I should have gone over and picked him up, shouldn’t I, stupid?”
The other fisherman, Mr. Peters, here looked up, and laying down his eel-spear, spelt out some words on his fingers.
“Stop a bit,” cried Gus to the man, who was rowing off, “here’s my friend says he heard a splash in the water ten minutes ago, and thought it was some rubbish shot over the wall.”
“Then he did jump! Poor chap, I’m afraid he must be drowned.”
“Drowned?”
“Yes; don’t I tell you one of the lunatics has been trying to escape over that wall, and must have fallen into the river?”
“Why didn’t you say so before, then?” said Gus. “What’s to be done? Where are there any drags?”
“Why, half a mile off, worse luck, at a public-house down the river, the `Jolly Life-boat.’”
“Then I’ll tell you what,” said Gus, “my friend and I will row down and fetch the drags, while you chaps keep a look-out about here.”
“You’re very good, sir,” said the man; “dragging the river’s about all we can do now, for it strikes me we’ve seen the last of the Emperor Napoleon. My eyes! won’t there be a row about it with the Board!”
“Here we go,” say s Gus; “keep a good heart; he may turn up yet;” with which encouraging remarks Messrs. Darley and Peters struck off at a rate which promised the speedy arrival of the drags.
CHAPTER IV. JOY AND HAPPINESS FOR EVERYBODY.
WHETHER the drags reached the county asylum in time to be of any service is still a mystery; but Mr. Joseph Peters arrived with the punt at the boat-builder’s yard in the dusk of the autumn evening. He was alone, and he left his boat, his tridents, and other fishing-tackle in the care of the men belonging to the yard, and then putting his hands in his pockets, trudged of in the direction of Little Gulliver Street.
If ever Mr. Peters had looked triumphant in his life, he looked triumphant this evening: if ever his mouth had been on one side, it was on one side this evening; but it was the twist of a conqueror which distorted that feature.
Eight years, too, have done something for Kuppins. Time hasn’t forgotten Kuppins, though she is a humble individual. Time has touched up Kuppins; adding a little bit here, and taking away a little bit there, and altogether producing something rather imposing. Kuppins has grown. When that young lady had attained her tenth year, there was a legend current in little Gulliver Street and its vicinity, that in consequence of a fatal predilection for gin-and-bitters evinced by her mother during the infancy of Kuppins, that diminutive person would never grow any more: but she gave the lie both to the legend and the gin-and-bitters by outgrowing her frocks at the advanced age of seventeen; and now she was rather a bouncing young woman than otherwise, and had a pair of such rosy cheeks as would have done honour to healthier breezes than those of Slopperton-on-the-Sloshy.
Time bad done something, too, for Kuppins’s shock of hair, for it was now brushed, and combed, and dragged, and tortured into a state not so very far from smoothness; and it was furthermore turned up; an achievement in the hair-dressing line which it had taken her some years to effect, and which, when effected, was perhaps a little calculated to remind the admiring beholder of a good sized ball of black cotton with a hair-pin stuck through it.
What made Kuppins in such a state of excitement on this particular evening, who shall say? Certain it is that she was excited. At the first sound of the click of Mr. Peters’s latchkey in the door of No. 5, Little Gulliver Street, Kuppins, with a lighted candle, flew to open it. How she threw her arms round Mr. Peters’s neck and kissed him — how she left a lump of tallow in his hair, and a smell of burning in his whiskers — how, in her excitement she blew the candle out — and how, by a feat of leger-de-main, or leger-de-lungs, she blew it in again, must have been seen to be sufficiently appreciated. Her next proceeding was to drag Mr. Peters upstairs into the indoor Eden, which bore the very same appearance it had done eight years ago. One almost expected to find the red baby grown up — but it wasn’t; and that dreadful attack of the mumps from which the infant had suffered when Mr. Peters first became acquainted with it did not appear to have abated in the least. Kuppins thrust the detective into his own particular chair, planted herself in an opposite seat, put the candlestick on the table, snuffed the candle, and then, with her eyes opened to the widest extent, evidently awaited his saying something.
He did say something-in his own way, of course; the fingers went to work. “I’ve d—” said the fingers.
“‘One it,” cried Kuppins, dreadfully excited by this time, “done it! you’ve done it! Didn’t I always say you would? Didn’t I know you would? Didn’t I always dream you would, three times running, and a house on fire? — that meant the river; and an army of soldiers — that meant the boat; and everybody in black clothes — meaning joy and happiness. It’s come true; it’s all come out. Oh, I’m so happy!” In proof of which Kuppins immediately commenced a series of evolutions of the limbs and exercises of the human voice, popularly known in the neighbourhood as strong hysterics — so strong, in fact, that Mr. Peters couldn’t have held her still if he had tried. Perhaps that’s why he didn’t try; but he looked about in every direction for something cold to put down her back, and finding nothing handy but the poker, he stirred her up with that in the neighbourhood of the spinal marrow, as if she had been a bad fire; whereon she came to.
“And where’s the blessed boy?” she asked, presently.
Mr. Peters signified upon his fingers that the blessed boy was still at the asylum, and that there he must remain till such time as he should be able to leave without raising suspicion.
“An
d to think,” said Kuppins, “that we should have seen the advertisement for a boy to wait upon poor Mr. Marwood; and to think that we should have thought of sending our Slosh to take the situation; and to think that he should have been so clever in helping you through with it! Oh my!” As Kuppins here evinced a desire for a second edition of the hysterics, Mr. Peters changed the conversation by looking inquiringly towards a couple of saucepans on the fire.
“Tripe,” said Kuppins, answering the look, “and taters, floury ones;” whereon she began to lay the supper-table. Kuppins was almost mistress of the house now, for the elderly proprietress was a sufferer from rheumatism, and kept to her room, enlivened by the society of a large black cat, and such gossip as Kuppins collected about the neighbourhood in the course of the day and retailed to her mistress in the evening. So we leave Mr. Peters smoking his pipe and roasting his legs at his own hearth, while Kuppins dishes the tripe and onions, and strips the floury potatoes of their russet jackets.
Where all this time is the Emperor Napoleon?
There are two gentlemen pacing up and down the platform of the Birmingham station, waiting for the 10 p.m. London express. One of them is Mr. Augustus Darley; the other is a man wrapped in a greatcoat, who has red hair and whiskers, and wears a pair of spectacles; but behind these spectacles there are dark brown eyes, which scarcely match the red hair, any better than the pale dark complexion agrees with the very roseate hue of the whiskers. These two gentlemen have come across the country from a little station a few miles from Slopperton-on-the-Sloshy.
“Well, Dick,” said barley, “doesn’t this bring back old times, my boy?”
The red-haired gentleman, who was smoking a cigar, took it from his mouth and clasped his companion by the hand, and said —
Delphi Works of M. E. Braddon Page 24
