The Stories of the Three Burglars
Page 9
truthit may be, and is intended to be received as fiction. A lie is a falsestatement made with the intention to deceive, and that is what I believewe have heard to-night."
"I agree with you exactly," said my wife.
"It may be," said Aunt Martha, "that the man's story is true. There aresome things about it which make me think so; but if he is really acriminal he must have had trials and temptations which led him into hispresent mode of life. We should consider that."
"I have been studying him," I said, "and I think he is a born rascal,who ought to have been hung long ago."
My aunt looked at me. "John," she said, "if you believe people are borncriminals, they ought to be executed in their infancy. It could be donepainlessly by electricity, and society would be the gainer, although youlawyers would be the losers. But I do not believe in your doctrine. Ifthe children of the poor were properly brought up and educated, fewer ofthem would grow to be criminals."
"I don't think this man suffered for want of education," said my wife;"he used very good language; that was one of the first things that ledme to suspect him. It is not likely that sons of boat-builders speak socorrectly and express themselves so well."
"Of course, I cannot alter your opinions," said Aunt Martha, "but thestory interested me, and I very much wish to hear what that other manhas to say for himself."
"Very well," said I, "you shall hear it; but I must drink my tea and goback to the prisoners."
"And I," said Aunt Martha, "will take some tea to them. They may be badmen, but they must not suffer."
I had been in the library but a few moments when Aunt Martha entered,followed by Alice, who bore a tray containing three very large cups oftea and some biscuit.
"Now, then," said Aunt Martha to me, "if you will untie their hands, Iwill give them some tea."
At these words each burglar turned his eyes on me with a quick glance. Ilaughed.
"Hardly," said I. "I would not be willing to undertake the task oftying them up again, unless, indeed, they will consent to drink somemore of my wine."
"Which we won't do," said the middle burglar, "and that's flat."
"Then they must drink this tea with their hands tied," said Aunt Martha,in a tone of reproachful resignation, and, taking a cup from the tray,she approached the stout man and held it up to his lips. At this act ofextreme kindness we were all amused, even the burglar's companionssmiled, and David so far forgot himself as to burst into a laugh, which,however, he quickly checked. The stout burglar, however, saw nothing tolaugh at. He drank the tea, and never drew breath until the cup wasemptied.
"I forgot," said my aunt, as she removed the cup from his lips, "to askyou whether you took much or little sugar."
"Don't make no difference to me," answered the man; "tea isn't maltliquor; it's poor stuff any way, and it doesn't matter to me whetherit's got sugar in it or not, but it's moistenin', and that's what Iwant. Now, madam, I'll just say to you, if ever I break into a roomwhere you're sleepin', I'll see that you don't come to no harm, even ifyou sit up in bed and holler."
"Thank you," said Aunt Martha; "but I hope you will never again beconcerned in that sort of business."
He grinned. "That depends on circumstances," said he.
Aunt Martha now offered the tall man some tea, but he thanked her veryrespectfully, and declined. The young man also said that he did not carefor tea, but that if the maid--looking at Alice--would give him a glassof water he would be obliged. This was the first time he had spoken. Hisvoice was low and of a pleasing tone. David's face grew dark, and wecould see that he objected to this service from Alice.
"I will give him the water myself," said Aunt Martha. This she did, andI noticed that the man's thirst was very soon satisfied. When David hadbeen refreshed, and biscuits refused by the burglars, who could not verywell eat them with their hands tied, we all sat down, and the stout manbegan his story. I give it as he told it, omitting some coarse and roughexpressions, and a good deal of slang which would be unintelligible tothe general reader.
"There's no use," said the burglar, "for me to try and make any of youbelieve that I'm a pious gentleman under a cloud, for I know I don'tlook like it, and wouldn't be likely to make out a case."
At this the tall man looked at him very severely.
"I don't mean to say," he continued, "that my friend here tried anythinglike that. Every word he said was perfectly true, as I could personallytestify if I was called upon the stand, and what I'm goin' to tell youis likewise solid fact.
"My father was a cracksman, and a first-rate one, too; he brought me upto the business, beginning when I was very small. I don't rememberhavin' any mother, so I'll leave her out. My old man was veryparticular; he liked to see things done right. One day I was with him,and we saw a tinner nailing a new leader or tin water-spout to the sideof a house.
"'Look here, young man,' says Dad, 'you're makin' a pretty poor job ofthat. You don't put in enough nails, and they ain't half drove in.Supposin' there was a fire in that house some night, and the family hadto come down by the spout, and your nails would give way, and they'dbreak their necks. What would you think then? And I can tell you what itis, young man, I can appear ag'in you for doing poor work.'
"The tinner grumbled, but he used more nails and drove 'em tight, Dadand me standin' by, an' looking at him. One rainy night not long afterthis Dad took me out with him and we stopped in front of this house.'Now, Bobbie,' said he, 'I want you to climb into that open second-storywindow, and then slip down stairs and open the front door for me; thefamily's at dinner.'
"'How am I to get up, Dad?' said I.
"'Oh, you can go up the spout,' says he; 'I'll warrant that it will holdyou. I've seen to it that it was put on good and strong.'
"I tried it, and as far as I can remember I never went up a saferspout."
"And you opened the front door?" asked Aunt Martha.
"Indeed I did, ma'am," said the burglar, "you wouldn't catch me makin'no mistakes in that line.
"After a while I got too heavy to climb spouts, and I took to theregular business, and did well at it, too."
"Do you mean to say," asked Aunt Martha, "that you willingly andpremeditatedly became a thief and midnight robber?"
"That's what I am, ma'am," said he; "I don't make no bones about it. I'ma number one, double-extra, back-springed, copper-fastened burglar, withall the attachments and noiseless treadle. That's what I am, and nomistake. There's all kinds of businesses in this world, and there's gotto be people to work at every one of 'em; and when a fellow takes anyparticular line, his business is to do it well; that's my motto. When Ibreak into a house I make it a point to clean it out first-class, andnot to carry away no trash, nuther. Of course, I've had my ups and mydowns, like other people,--preachers and doctors and storekeepers,--theyall have them, and I guess the downs are more amusin' than the ups, atleast to outsiders. I've just happened to think of one of them, and I'lllet you have it.
"There was a man I knew named Jerry Hammond, that was a contractor, andsometimes he had pretty big jobs on hand, buildin' or road-makin' orsomethin' or other. He'd contract to do anything, would Jerry, no matterwhether he'd ever done it before or not. I got to know his times andseasons for collecting money, and I laid for him."
"Abominable meanness!" exclaimed my wife.
"It's all business," said the stout man, quite unabashed. "You don'tcatch a doctor refusin' to practise on a friend, or a lawyer, nuther,and in our line of business it's the same thing. It was about the end ofOctober, nigh four years ago, that I found out that Jerry had a lot ofmoney on hand. He'd been collectin' it from different parties, and hadgot home too late in the day to put it in the bank, so says I to myself,this is your time, old fellow, and you'd better make hay while the sunshines. I was a little afraid to crack Jerry's house by myself, for he'sa strong old fellow, so I got a man named Putty Henderson to go alongwith me. Putty was a big fellow and very handy with a jimmy; but he wasawful contrary-minded, and he wouldn't agree to clean out Jerry until Iprom
ised to go halves with him. This wasn't fair, for it wasn't his job,and a quarter would have been lots for him.
"But there wasn't no use arguin', and along we went, and about oneo'clock we was standin' alongside Jerry's bed, where he was fast