“Just his old way!” cried Chuffey, looking up into his face. “I almost believe it's Mr Chuzzlewit alive again. Yes! Take me with you! Stay, though, stay.”
“For what?” asked old Martin.
“I can't leave her, poor thing!” said Chuffey. “She has been very good to me. I can't leave her, Mr Chuzzlewit. Thank you kindly. I'll remain here. I haven't long to remain; it's no great matter.”
As he meekly shook his poor, grey head, and thanked old Martin in these words, Mrs Gamp, now entirely in the room, was affected to tears.
“The mercy as it is!” she said, “as sech a dear, good, reverend creetur never got into the clutches of Betsey Prig, which but for me he would have done, undoubted; facts bein” stubborn and not easy drove!”
“You heard me speak to you just now, old man,” said Jonas to his uncle. “I'll have no more tampering with my people, man or woman. Do you see the door?”
“Do YOU see the door?” returned the voice of Mark, coming from that direction. “Look at it!”
He looked, and his gaze was nailed there. Fatal, ill-omened blighted threshold, cursed by his father's footsteps in his dying hour, cursed by his young wife's sorrowing tread, cursed by the daily shadow of the old clerk's figure, cursed by the crossing of his murderer's feet—what men were standing in the door way!
Nadgett foremost.
Hark! It came on, roaring like a sea! Hawkers burst into the street, crying it up and down; windows were thrown open that the inhabitants might hear it; people stopped to listen in the road and on the pavement; the bells, the same bells, began to ring; tumbling over one another in a dance of boisterous joy at the discovery (that was the sound they had in his distempered thoughts), and making their airy play-ground rock.
“That is the man,” said Nadgett. “By the window!”
Three others came in, laid hands upon him, and secured him. It was so quickly done, that he had not lost sight of the informer's face for an instant when his wrists were manacled together.
“Murder,” said Nadgett, looking round on the astonished group. “Let no one interfere.”
The sounding street repeated Murder; barbarous and dreadful Murder. Murder, Murder, Murder. Rolling on from house to house, and echoing from stone to stone, until the voices died away into the distant hum, which seemed to mutter the same word!
They all stood silent: listening, and gazing in each other's faces, as the noise passed on.
Old Martin was the first to speak. “What terrible history is this?” he demanded.
“Ask HIM,” said Nadgett. “You're his friend, sir. He can tell you, if he will. He knows more of it than I do, though I know much.”
“How do you know much?”
“I have not been watching him so long for nothing,” returned Nadgett. “I never watched a man so close as I have watched him.”
Another of the phantom forms of this terrific Truth! Another of the many shapes in which it started up about him, out of vacancy. This man, of all men in the world, a spy upon him; this man, changing his identity; casting off his shrinking, purblind, unobservant character, and springing up into a watchful enemy! The dead man might have come out of his grave, and not confounded and appalled him more.
The game was up. The race was at an end; the rope was woven for his neck. If, by a miracle, he could escape from this strait, he had but to turn his face another way, no matter where, and there would rise some new avenger front to front with him; some infant in an hour grown old, or old man in an hour grown young, or blind man with his sight restored, or deaf man with his hearing given him. There was no chance. He sank down in a heap against the wall, and never hoped again from that moment.
“I am not his friend, although I have the honour to be his relative,” said Mr Chuzzlewit. “You may speak to me. Where have you watched, and what have you seen?”
“I have watched in many places,” returned Nadgett, “night and day. I have watched him lately, almost without rest or relief;” his anxious face and bloodshot eyes confirmed it. “I little thought to what my watching was to lead. As little as he did when he slipped out in the night, dressed in those clothes which he afterwards sunk in a bundle at London Bridge!”
Jonas moved upon the ground like a man in bodily torture. He uttered a suppressed groan, as if he had been wounded by some cruel weapon; and plucked at the iron band upon his wrists, as though (his hands being free) he would have torn himself.
“Steady, kinsman!” said the chief officer of the party. “Don't be violent.”
“Whom do you call kinsman?” asked old Martin sternly.
“You,” said the man, “among others.”
Martin turned his scrutinizing gaze upon him. He was sitting lazily across a chair with his arms resting on the back; eating nuts, and throwing the shells out of window as he cracked them, which he still continued to do while speaking.
“Aye,” he said, with a sulky nod. “You may deny your nephews till you die; but Chevy Slyme is Chevy Slyme still, all the world over. Perhaps even you may feel it some disgrace to your own blood to be employed in this way. I'm to be bought off.”
“At every turn!” cried Martin. “Self, self, self. Every one among them for himself!”
“You had better save one or two among them the trouble then and be for them as well as YOURself,” replied his nephew. “Look here at me! Can you see the man of your family who has more talent in his little finger than all the rest in their united brains, dressed as a police officer without being ashamed? I took up with this trade on purpose to shame you. I didn't think I should have to make a capture in the family, though.”
“If your debauchery, and that of your chosen friends, has really brought you to this level,” returned the old man, “keep it. You are living honestly, I hope, and that's something.”
“Don't be hard upon my chosen friends,” returned Slyme, “for they were sometimes your chosen friends too. Don't say you never employed my friend Tigg, for I know better. We quarrelled upon it.”
“I hired the fellow,” retorted Mr Chuzzlewit, “and I paid him.”
“It's well you paid him,” said his nephew, “for it would be too late to do so now. He has given his receipt in full; or had it forced from him rather.”
The old man looked at him as if he were curious to know what he meant, but scorned to prolong the conversation.
“I have always expected that he and I would be brought together again in the course of business,” said Slyme, taking a fresh handful of nuts from his pocket; “but I thought he would be wanted for some swindling job; it never entered my head that I should hold a warrant for the apprehension of his murderer.”
“HIS murderer!” cried Mr Chuzzlewit, looking from one to another.
“His or Mr Montague's,” said Nadgett. “They are the same, I am told. I accuse him yonder of the murder of Mr Montague, who was found last night, killed, in a wood. You will ask me why I accuse him as you have already asked me how I know so much. I'll tell you. It can't remain a secret long.”
The ruling passion of the man expressed itself even then, in the tone of regret in which he deplored the approaching publicity of what he knew.
“I told you I had watched him,” he proceeded. “I was instructed to do so by Mr Montague, in whose employment I have been for some time. We had our suspicions of him; and you know what they pointed at, for you have been discussing it since we have been waiting here, outside the room. If you care to hear, now it's all over, in what our suspicions began, I'll tell you plainly: in a quarrel (it first came to our ears through a hint of his own) between him and another office in which his father's life was insured, and which had so much doubt and distrust upon the subject, that he compounded with them, and took half the money; and was glad to do it. Bit by bit, I ferreted out more circumstances against him, and not a few. It required a little patience, but it's my calling. I found the nurse —here she is to confirm me; I found the doctor, I found the undertaker, I found the undertaker's man. I found out how
the old gentleman there, Mr Chuffey, had behaved at the funeral; and I found out what this man,” touching Lewsome on the arm, “had talked about in his fever. I found out how he conducted himself before his father's death, and how since and how at the time; and writing it all down, and putting it carefully together, made case enough for Mr Montague to tax him with the crime, which (as he himself believed until to-night) he had committed. I was by when this was done. You see him now. He is only worse than he was then.”
Oh, miserable, miserable fool! oh, insupportable, excruciating torture! To find alive and active—a party to it all—the brain and right-hand of the secret he had thought to crush! In whom, though he had walled the murdered man up, by enchantment in a rock, the story would have lived and walked abroad! He tried to stop his ears with his fettered arms, that he might shut out the rest.
As he crouched upon the floor, they drew away from him as if a pestilence were in his breath. They fell off, one by one, from that part of the room, leaving him alone upon the ground. Even those who had him in their keeping shunned him, and (with the exception of Slyme, who was still occupied with his nuts) kept apart.
“From that garret-window opposite,” said Nadgett, pointing across the narrow street, “I have watched this house and him for days and nights. From that garret-window opposite I saw him return home, alone, from a journey on which he had set out with Mr Montague. That was my token that Mr Montague's end was gained; and I might rest easy on my watch, though I was not to leave it until he dismissed me. But, standing at the door opposite, after dark that same night, I saw a countryman steal out of this house, by a sidedoor in the court, who had never entered it. I knew his walk, and that it was himself, disguised. I followed him immediately. I lost him on the western road, still travelling westward.”
Jonas looked up at him for an instant, and muttered an oath.
“I could not comprehend what this meant,” said Nadgett; “but, having seen so much, I resolved to see it out, and through. And I did. Learning, on inquiry at his house from his wife, that he was supposed to be sleeping in the room from which I had seen him go out, and that he had given strict orders not to be disturbed, I knew that he was coming back; and for his coming back I watched. I kept my watch in the street—in doorways, and such places—all that night; at the same window, all next day; and when night came on again, in the street once more. For I knew he would come back, as he had gone out, when this part of the town was empty. He did. Early in the morning, the same countryman came creeping, creeping, creeping home.”
“Look sharp!” interposed Slyme, who had now finished his nuts. “This is quite irregular, Mr Nadgett.”
“I kept at the window all day,” said Nadgett, without heeding him. “I think I never closed my eyes. At night, I saw him come out with a bundle. I followed him again. He went down the steps at London Bridge, and sunk it in the river. I now began to entertain some serious fears, and made a communication to the Police, which caused that bundle to be—”
“To be fished up,” interrupted Slyme. “Be alive, Mr Nadgett.”
“It contained the dress I had seen him wear,” said Nadgett; “stained with clay, and spotted with blood. Information of the murder was received in town last night. The wearer of that dress is already known to have been seen near the place; to have been lurking in that neighbourhood; and to have alighted from a coach coming from that part of the country, at a time exactly tallying with the very minute when I saw him returning home. The warrant has been out, and these officers have been with me, some hours. We chose our time; and seeing you come in, and seeing this person at the window—”
“Beckoned to him,” said Mark, taking up the thread of the narrative, on hearing this allusion to himself, “to open the door; which he did with a deal of pleasure.”
“That's all at present,” said Nadgett, putting up his great pocketbook, which from mere habit he had produced when he began his revelation, and had kept in his hand all the time; “but there is plenty more to come. You asked me for the facts, so far I have related them, and need not detain these gentlemen any longer. Are you ready, Mr Slyme?”
“And something more,” replied that worthy, rising. “If you walk round to the office, we shall be there as soon as you. Tom! Get a coach!”
The officer to whom he spoke departed for that purpose. Old Martin lingered for a few moments, as if he would have addressed some words to Jonas; but looking round, and seeing him still seated on the floor, rocking himself in a savage manner to and fro, took Chuffey's arm, and slowly followed Nadgett out. John Westlock and Mark Tapley accompanied them. Mrs Gamp had tottered out first, for the better display of her feelings, in a kind of walking swoon; for Mrs Gamp performed swoons of different sorts, upon a moderate notice, as Mr Mould did Funerals.
“Ha!” muttered Slyme, looking after them. “Upon my soul! As insensible of being disgraced by having such a nephew as myself, in such a situation, as he was of my being an honour and a credit to the family! That's the return I get for having humbled my spirit— such a spirit as mine—to earn a livelihood, is it?”
He got up from his chair, and kicked it away indignantly.
“And such a livelihood too! When there are hundreds of men, not fit to hold a candle to me, rolling in carriages and living on their fortunes. Upon my soul it's a nice world!”
His eyes encountered Jonas, who looked earnestly towards him, and moved his lips as if he were whispering.
“Eh?” said Slyme.
Jonas glanced at the attendant whose back was towards him, and made a clumsy motion with his bound hands towards the door.
“Humph!” said Slyme, thoughtfully. “I couldn't hope to disgrace him into anything when you have shot so far ahead of me though. I forgot that.”
Jonas repeated the same look and gesture.
“Jack!” said Slyme.
“Hallo!” returned his man.
“Go down to the door, ready for the coach. Call out when it comes. I'd rather have you there. Now then,” he added, turning hastily to Jonas, when the man was gone. “What's the matter?”
Jonas essayed to rise.
“Stop a bit,” said Slyme. “It's not so easy when your wrists are tight together. Now then! Up! What is it?”
“Put your hand in my pocket. Here! The breast pocket, on the left!” said Jonas.
He did so; and drew out a purse.
“There's a hundred pound in it,” said Jonas, whose words were almost unintelligible; as his face, in its pallor and agony, was scarcely human.
Slyme looked at him; gave it into his hands; and shook his head.
“I can't. I daren't. I couldn't if I dared. Those fellows below—”
“Escape's impossible,” said Jonas. “I know it. One hundred pound for only five minutes in the next room!”
“What to do?” he asked.
The face of his prisoner as he advanced to whisper in his ear, made him recoil involuntarily. But he stopped and listened to him. The words were few, but his own face changed as he heard them.
“I have it about me,” said Jonas, putting his hands to his throat, as though whatever he referred to were hidden in his neckerchief. “How should you know of it? How could you know? A hundred pound for only five minutes in the next room! The time's passing. Speak!”
“It would be more—more creditable to the family,” observed Slyme, with trembling lips. “I wish you hadn't told me half so much. Less would have served your purpose. You might have kept it to yourself.”
“A hundred pound for only five minutes in the next room! Speak!” cried Jonas, desperately.
He took the purse. Jonas, with a wild unsteady step, retreated to the door in the glass partition.
“Stop!” cried Slyme, catching at his skirts. “I don't know about this. Yet it must end so at last. Are you guilty?”
“Yes!” said Jonas.
“Are the proofs as they were told just now?”
“Yes!” said Jonas.
“Will you—will you engag
e to say a—a Prayer, now, or something of that sort?” faltered Slyme.
Jonas broke from him without replying, and closed the door between them.
Slyme listened at the keyhole. After that, he crept away on tiptoe, as far off as he could; and looked awfully towards the place. He was roused by the arrival of the coach, and their letting down the steps.
“He's getting a few things together,” he said, leaning out of window, and speaking to the two men below, who stood in the full light of a street-lamp. “Keep your eye upon the back, one of you, for form's sake.”
One of the men withdrew into the court. The other, seating himself self on the steps of the coach, remained in conversation with Slyme at the window who perhaps had risen to be his superior, in virtue of his old propensity (one so much lauded by the murdered man) of being always round the corner. A useful habit in his present calling.
“Where is he?” asked the man.
Slyme looked into the room for an instant and gave his head a jerk as much as to say, “Close at hand. I see him.”
“He's booked,” observed the man.
“Through,” said Slyme.
They looked at each other, and up and down the street. The man on the coach-steps took his hat off, and put it on again, and whistled a little.
“I say! He's taking his time!” he remonstrated.
“I allowed him five minutes,” said Slyme. “Time's more than up, though. I'll bring him down.”
He withdrew from the window accordingly, and walked on tiptoe to the door in the partition. He listened. There was not a sound within. He set the candles near it, that they might shine through the glass.
It was not easy, he found, to make up his mind to the opening of the door. But he flung it wide open suddenly, and with a noise; then retreated. After peeping in and listening again, he entered.
He started back as his eyes met those of Jonas, standing in an angle of the wall, and staring at him. His neckerchief was off; his face was ashy pale.
“You're too soon,” said Jonas, with an abject whimper. “I've not had time. I have not been able to do it. I—five minutes more—two minutes more!—only one!”
Life And Adventures Of Martin Chuzzlewit Page 96
