Tuesday's Serial: “Lavengro” by George Borrow (in English) - XLIV

Chapter 86

at tea—vapours—isopel berners—softly and kindly—sweet pretty creature—bread and water—truth and constancy—very strangely

 

In the evening of that same day the tall girl and I sat at tea by the fire, at the bottom of the dingle; the girl on a small stool, and myself, as usual, upon my stone.

The water which served for the tea had been taken from a spring of pellucid water in the neighbourhood, which I had not had the good fortune to discover, though it was well known to my companion, and to the wandering people who frequented the dingle.

'This tea is very good,' said I, 'but I cannot enjoy it as much as if I were well: I feel very sadly.'

'How else should you feel,' said the girl, 'after fighting with the flaming Tinman? All I wonder at is that you can feel at all! As for the tea, it ought to be good, seeing that it cost me ten shillings a pound.'

'That's a great deal for a person in your station to pay.'

'In my station! I'd have you to know, young man—however, I haven't the heart to quarrel with you, you look so ill; and after all, it is a good sum for one to pay who travels the roads; but if I must have tea, I like to have the best; and tea I must have, for I am used to it, though I can't help thinking that it sometimes fills my head with strange fancies—what some folks call vapours, making me weep and cry.'

'Dear me,' said I, 'I should never have thought that one of your size and fierceness would weep and cry!'

'My size and fierceness! I tell you what, young man, you are not over civil this evening; but you are ill, as I said before, and I shan't take much notice of your language, at least for the present; as for my size, I am not so much bigger than yourself; and as for being fierce, you should be the last one to fling that at me. It is well for you that I can be fierce sometimes. If I hadn't taken your part against Blazing Bosville, you wouldn't be now taking tea with me.'

'It is true that you struck me in the face first; but we'll let that pass. So that man's name is Bosville; what's your own?'

'Isopel Berners.'

'How did you get that name?'

'I say, young man, you seem fond of asking questions: will you have another cup of tea?'

'I was just going to ask for another.'

'Well, then, here it is, and much good may it do you; as for my name, I got it from my mother.'

'Your mother's name, then, was Isopel!'

'Isopel Berners.'

'But had you never a father?'

'Yes, I had a father,' said the girl, sighing, 'but I don't bear his name.'

'Is it the fashion, then, in your country for children to bear their mother's name?'

'If you ask such questions, young man, I shall be angry with you. I have told you my name, and, whether my father's or mother's, I am not ashamed of it.'

'It is a noble name.'

'There you are right, young man. The chaplain in the great house where I was born told me it was a noble name; it was odd enough, he said, that the only three noble names in the county were to be found in the great house; mine was one; the other two were Devereux and Bohun.'

'What do you mean by the great house?'

'The workhouse.'

'Is it possible that you were born there?'

'Yes, young man; and as you now speak softly and kindly, I will tell you my whole tale. My father was an officer of the sea, and was killed at sea as he was coming home to marry my mother, Isopel Berners. He had been acquainted with her, and had left her; but after a few months he wrote her a letter, to say that he had no rest, and that he repented, and that as soon as his ship came to port he would do her all the reparation in his power. Well, young man, the very day before they reached port they met the enemy, and there was a fight, and my father was killed, after he had struck down six of the enemy's crew on their own deck; for my father was a big man, as I have heard, and knew tolerably well how to use his hands. And when my mother heard the news, she became half distracted, and ran away into the fields and forests, totally neglecting her business, for she was a small milliner; and so she ran demented about the meads and forests for a long time, now sitting under a tree, and now by the side of a river—at last she flung herself into some water, and would have been drowned, had not some one been at hand and rescued her, whereupon she was conveyed to the great house, lest she should attempt to do herself further mischief, for she had neither friends nor parents—and there she died three months after, having first brought me into the world. She was a sweet pretty creature, I'm told, but hardly fit for this world, being neither large, nor fierce, nor able to take her own part. So I was born and bred in the great house, where I learnt to read and sew, to fear God, and to take my own part. When I was fourteen I was put out to service to a small farmer and his wife, with whom, however, I did not stay long, for I was half-starved, and otherwise ill treated, especially by my mistress, who one day attempting to knock me down with a besom, I knocked her down with my fist, and went back to the great house.'

'And how did they receive you in the great house?'

'Not very kindly, young man—on the contrary, I was put into a dark room, where I was kept a fortnight on bread and water; I did not much care, however, being glad to have got back to the great house at any rate—the place where I was born, and where my poor mother died; and in the great house I continued two years longer, reading and sewing, fearing God, and taking my own part when necessary. At the end of the two years I was again put out to service, but this time to a rich farmer and his wife, with whom, however, I did not live long, less time, I believe, than with the poor ones, being obliged to leave for—'

'Knocking your mistress down?'

'No, young man, knocking my master down, who conducted himself improperly towards me. This time I did not go back to the great house, having a misgiving that they would not receive me; so I turned my back to the great house where I was born, and where my poor mother died, and wandered for several days I know not whither, supporting myself on a few halfpence which I chanced to have in my pocket. It happened one day, as I sat under a hedge crying, having spent my last farthing, that a comfortable-looking elderly woman came up in a cart, and seeing the state in which I was, she stopped and asked what was the matter with me; I told her some part of my story, whereupon she said, 'Cheer up, my dear; if you like, you shall go with me, and wait upon me.' Of course I wanted little persuasion, so I got into the cart and went with her. She took me to London and various other places, and I soon found that she was a travelling woman, who went about the country with silks and linen. I was of great use to her, more especially in those places where we met evil company. Once, as we were coming from Dover, we were met by two sailors, who stopped our cart, and would have robbed and stripped us. 'Let me get down,' said I; so I got down, and fought with them both, till they turned round and ran away. Two years I lived with the old gentlewoman, who was very kind to me, almost as kind as a mother; at last she fell sick at a place in Lincolnshire, and after a few days died, leaving me her cart and stock in trade, praying me only to see her decently buried—which I did, giving her a funeral fit for a gentlewoman. After which I travelled the country—melancholy enough for want of company, but so far fortunate that I could take my own part when anybody was uncivil to me. At last, passing through the valley of Todmorden, I formed the acquaintance of Blazing Bosville and his wife, with whom I occasionally took journeys for company's sake, for it is melancholy to travel about alone, even when one can take one's own part. I soon found they were evil people; but, upon the whole, they treated me civilly, and I sometimes lent them a little money, so that we got on tolerably well together. He and I, it is true, had once a dispute, and nearly came to blows; for once, when we were alone, he wanted me to marry him, promising, if I would, to turn off Grey Moll, or, if I liked it better, to make her wait upon me as a maid-servant; I never liked him much, but from that hour less than ever. Of the two, I believe Grey Moll to be the best, for she is at any rate true and faithful to him, and I like truth and constancy—don't you, young man?'

'Yes,' said I, 'they are very nice things. I feel very strangely.'

'How do you feel, young man?'

'Very much afraid.'

'Afraid, at what? At the Flaming Tinman? Don't be afraid of him. He won't come back, and if he did, he shouldn't touch you in this state, I'd fight him for you; but he won't come back, so you needn't be afraid of him.'

'I'm not afraid of the Flaming Tinman.'

'What, then, are you afraid of?'

'The evil one.'

'The evil one!' said the girl, 'where is he?'

'Coming upon me.'

'Never heed,' said the girl, 'I'll stand by you.'

 

 

Chapter 87

a hubbub of voices—no offence—the guests

 

The kitchen of the public-house was a large one, and many people were drinking in it; there was a confused hubbub of voices.

I sat down on a bench behind a deal table, of which there were three or four in the kitchen; presently a bulky man, in a green coat of the Newmarket cut, and without a hat, entered, and observing me, came up, and in rather a gruff tone cried, 'Want anything, young fellow?'

Bring me a jug of ale,' said I, 'if you are the master, as I suppose you are, by that same coat of yours, and your having no hat on your head.'

'Don't be saucy, young fellow,' said the landlord, for such he was; 'don't be saucy, or—' Whatever he intended to say he left unsaid, for fixing his eyes upon one of my hands, which I had placed by chance upon the table, he became suddenly still.

This was my left hand, which was raw and swollen, from the blows dealt on a certain hard skull in a recent combat. 'What do you mean by staring at my hand so?' said I, withdrawing it from the table.

'No offence, young man, no offence,' said the landlord, in a quite altered tone; 'but the sight of your hand—' then observing that our conversation began to attract the notice of the guests in the kitchen, he interrupted himself, saying in an undertone, 'But mum's the word for the present, I will go and fetch the ale.'

In about a minute he returned, with a jug of ale foaming high. 'Here's your health,' said he, blowing off the foam, and drinking; but perceiving that I looked rather dissatisfied, he murmured, 'All's right, I glory in you; but mum's the word.' Then, placing the jug on the table, he gave me a confidential nod, and swaggered out of the room.

What can the silly impertinent fellow mean? thought I; but the ale was now before me, and I hastened to drink, for my weakness was great, and my mind was full of dark thoughts, the remains of the indescribable horror of the preceding night. It may kill me, thought I, as I drank deep—but who cares? anything is better than what I have suffered. I drank deep, and then leaned back against the wall: it appeared as if a vapour was stealing up into my brain, gentle and benign, soothing and stilling the horror and the fear; higher and higher it mounted, and I felt nearly overcome; but the sensation was delicious, compared with that I had lately experienced, and now I felt myself nodding; and, bending down, I laid my head on the table on my folded hands.

And in that attitude I remained some time, perfectly unconscious. At length, by degrees, perception returned, and I lifted up my head. I felt somewhat dizzy and bewildered, but the dark shadow had withdrawn itself from me. And now once more I drank of the jug; this second draught did not produce an overpowering effect upon me—it revived and strengthened me—I felt a new man.

I looked around me; the kitchen had been deserted by the greater part of the guests; besides myself, only four remained; these were seated at the farther end. One was haranguing fiercely and eagerly; he was abusing England, and praising America. At last he exclaimed, 'So when I gets to New York, I will toss up my hat, and damn the King.'

That man must be a Radical, thought I.

 

 

Chapter 88

a radical—simple-looking man—church of england—the president—aristocracy—gin and water—mending the roads—persecuting church—simon de montfort—broken bells—get up—not for the pope—quay of new york—mumpers' dingle—no wish to fight—first draught—half a crown broke

 

The individual whom I supposed to be a Radical, after a short pause, again uplifted his voice; he was rather a strong-built fellow of about thirty, with an ill-favoured countenance, a white hat on his head, a snuff-coloured coat on his back, and when he was not speaking, a pipe in his mouth. 'Who would live in such a country as England?' he shouted.

'There is no country like America,' said his nearest neighbour, a man also in a white hat, and of a very ill-favoured countenance—'there is no country like America,' said he, withdrawing a pipe from his mouth; 'I think I shall—' and here he took a draught from a jug, the contents of which he appeared to have in common with the other,—'go to America one of these days myself.'

'Poor old England is not such a bad country, after all,' said a third, a simple-looking man in a labouring dress, who sat smoking a pipe without anything before him. 'If there was but a little more work to be got, I should have nothing to say against her; I hope, however—'

'You hope! who cares what you hope?' interrupted the first, in a savage tone; 'you are one of those sneaking hounds who are satisfied with dogs' wages—a bit of bread and a kick. Work, indeed! who, with the spirit of a man, would work for a country where there is neither liberty of speech nor of action? a land full of beggarly aristocracy, hungry borough-mongers, insolent parsons, and “their . . . wives and daughters,” as William Cobbett says in his “Register.”'

'Ah, the Church of England has been a source of incalculable mischief to these realms,' said another.

The person who uttered these words sat rather aloof from the rest; he was dressed in a long black surtout. I could not see much of his face, partly owing to his keeping it very much directed to the ground, and partly owing to a large slouched hat which he wore; I observed, however, that his hair was of a reddish tinge. On the table near him was a glass and spoon.

'You are quite right,' said the first, alluding to what this last had said, 'the Church of England has done incalculable mischief here. I value no religion three halfpence, for I believe in none; but the one that I hate most is the Church of England; so when I get to New York, after I have shown the fine fellows on the quay a spice of me, by . . . the King, I'll toss up my hat again, and . . . the Church of England too.'

'And suppose the people of New York should clap you in the stocks?' said I.

These words drew upon me the attention of the whole four. The Radical and his companion stared at me ferociously; the man in black gave me a peculiar glance from under his slouched hat; the simple-looking man in the labouring dress laughed.

'What are you laughing at, you fool?' said the Radical, turning and looking at the other, who appeared to be afraid of him; 'hold your noise; and a pretty fellow, you,' said he, looking at me, 'to come here, and speak against the great American nation.'

'I speak against the great American nation!' said I; 'I rather paid them a compliment.'

'By supposing they would put me in the stocks. Well, I call it abusing them, to suppose they would do any such thing—stocks, indeed!'—there are no stocks in all the land. Put me in the stocks! why, the President will come down to the quay, and ask me to dinner, as soon as he hears what I have said about the King and Church.'

'I shouldn't wonder,' said I, 'if you go to America you will say of the President and country what now you say of the King and Church, and cry out for somebody to send you back to England.'

The Radical dashed his pipe to pieces against the table. 'I tell you what, young fellow, you are a spy of the aristocracy, sent here to kick up a disturbance.'

'Kicking up a disturbance,' said I, 'is rather inconsistent with the office of spy. If I were a spy, I should hold my head down, and say nothing.'

The man in black partially raised his head, and gave me another peculiar glance.

'Well, if you aren't sent to spy, you are sent to bully, to prevent people speaking, and to run down the great American nation; but you shan't bully me. I say, down with the aristocracy, the beggarly British aristocracy. Come, what have you to say to that?'

'Nothing,' said I.

'Nothing!' repeated the Radical.

'No,' said I, 'down with them as soon as you can.'

'As soon as I can! I wish I could. But I can down with a bully of theirs. Come, will you fight for them?'

'No,' said I.

'You won't?'

'No,' said I; 'though, from what I have seen of them, I should say they are tolerably able to fight for themselves.'

'You won't fight for them,' said the Radical triumphantly; 'I thought so; all bullies, especially those of the aristocracy, are cowards. Here, landlord,' said he, raising his voice, and striking against the table with the jug, 'some more ale—he won't fight for his friends.'

'A white feather,' said his companion.

'He! he!' tittered the man in black.

'Landlord, landlord,' shouted the Radical, striking the table with the jug louder than before. 'Who called?' said the landlord, coming in at last. 'Fill this jug again,' said the other, 'and be quick about it.' 'Does any one else want anything?' said the landlord. 'Yes,' said the man in black; 'you may bring me another glass of gin and water.' 'Cold!' said the landlord. 'Yes,' said the man in black, 'with a lump of sugar in it.'

'Gin and water cold, with a lump of sugar in it,' said I, and struck the table with my fist.

'Take some!' said the landlord inquiringly.

'No,' said I, 'only something came into my head.'

'He's mad,' said the man in black.

'Not he,' said the Radical. 'He's only shamming; he knows his master is here, and therefore has recourse to these manœuvres, but it won't do. Come, landlord, what are you staring at? Why don't you obey your orders? Keeping your customers waiting in this manner is not the way to increase your business.'

The landlord looked at the Radical, and then at me. At last, taking the jug and glass, he left the apartment, and presently returned with each filled with its respective liquor. He placed the jug with beer before the Radical, and the glass with the gin and water before the man in black, and then, with a wink to me, he sauntered out.

'Here is your health, sir,' said the man of the snuff-coloured coat, addressing himself to the one in black; 'I honour you for what you said about the Church of England. Everyone who speaks against the Church of England has my warm heart. Down with it, I say, and may the stones of it be used for mending the roads, as my friend William says in his “Register.”'

The man in black, with a courteous nod of his head, drank to the man in the snuff-coloured coat. 'With respect to the steeples,' said he, 'I am not altogether of your opinion; they might be turned to better account than to serve to mend the roads; they might still be used as places of worship, but not for the worship of the Church of England. I have no fault to find with the steeples, it is the Church itself which I am compelled to arraign; but it will not stand long, the respectable part of its ministers are already leaving it. It is a bad Church, a persecuting Church.'

'Whom does it persecute?' said I.

The man in black glanced at me slightly, and then replied slowly, 'The Catholics.'

'And do those whom you call Catholics never persecute?' said I.

'Never,' said the man in black.

'Did you ever read Foxe's Book of Martyrs?' said I.

'He! he!' tittered the man in black; 'there is not a word of truth in Foxe's Book of Martyrs.'

'Ten times more than in the Flos Sanctorum,' said I.

The man in black looked at me, but made no answer.

'And what say you to the Massacre of the Albigenses and the Vaudois, “whose bones lie scattered on the cold Alp,” or the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes?'

The man in black made no answer.

'Go to,' said I; 'it is because the Church of England is not a persecuting church, that those whom you call the respectable part are leaving her; it is because they can't do with the poor Dissenters what Simon de Montfort did with the Albigenses, and the cruel Piedmontese with the Vaudois, that they turn to bloody Rome; the Pope will no doubt welcome them, for the Pope, do you see, being very much in want, will welcome—'

'Hollo!' said the Radical, interfering, 'what are you saying about the Pope? I say, hurrah for the Pope; I value no religion three halfpence, as I said before, but if I were to adopt any, it should be the Popish as it's called, because I conceives the Popish to be the grand enemy of the Church of England, of the beggarly aristocracy, and the borough-monger system, so I won't hear the Pope abused while I am by. Come, don't look fierce. You won't fight, you know, I have proved it; but I will give you another chance—I will fight for the Pope, will you fight against him?'

'Oh dear me, yes,' said I, getting up and stepping forward. 'I am a quiet peaceable young man, and, being so, am always ready to fight against the Pope—the enemy of all peace and quiet; to refuse fighting for the aristocracy is a widely different thing from refusing to fight against the Pope; so come on if you are disposed to fight for him. To the Pope broken bells, to Saint James broken shells. No Popish vile oppression, but the Protestant succession. Confusion to the Groyne, hurrah for the Boyne, for the army at Clonmel, and the Protestant young gentlemen who live there as well.'

'An Orangeman,' said the man in black.

'Not a Platitude,' said I.

The man in black gave a slight start.

'Amongst that family,' said I, 'no doubt, something may be done, but amongst the Methodist preachers I should conceive that the success would not be great.'

The man in black sat quite still.

'Especially amongst those who have wives,' I added.

The man in black stretched his hand towards his gin and water.

'However,' said I, 'we shall see what the grand movement will bring about, and the results of the lessons in elocution.'

The man in black lifted the glass up to his mouth, and, in doing so, let the spoon fall.

'But what has this to do with the main question?' said I; 'I am waiting here to fight against the Pope.'

'Come, Hunter,' said the companion of the man in the snuff-coloured coat, 'get up, and fight for the Pope.'

'I don't care for the young fellow,' said the man in the snuff-coloured coat.

'I know you don't,' said the other, 'so get up, and serve him out.'

'I could serve out three like him,' said the man in the snuff-coloured coat.

'So much the better for you,' said the other, 'the present work will be all the easier for you, get up, and serve him out at once.'

The man in the snuff-coloured coat did not stir.

'Who shows the white feather now?' said the simple-looking man.

'He! he! he!' tittered the man in black.

'Who told you to interfere?' said the Radical, turning ferociously towards the simple-looking man; 'say another word and I'll—' 'And you!' said he, addressing himself to the man in black, 'a pretty fellow you to turn against me, after I had taken your part. I tell you what, you may fight for yourself. I'll see you and your Pope in the pit of Eldon before I fight for either of you, so make the most of it.'

'Then you won't fight?' said I.

'Not for the Pope,' said the Radical; 'I'll see the Pope—'

'Dear me!' said I, 'not fight for the Pope, whose religion you would turn to, if you were inclined for any. I see how it is, you are not fond of fighting; but I'll give you another chance—you were abusing the Church of England just now: I'll fight for it—will you fight against it?'

'Come, Hunter,' said the other, 'get up, and fight against the Church of England.'

'I have no particular quarrel against the Church of England,' said the man in the snuff-coloured coat, 'my quarrel is with the aristocracy. If I said anything against the Church, it was merely for a bit of corollary, as Master William Cobbett would say; the quarrel with the Church belongs to this fellow in black, so let him carry it on. However,' he continued suddenly, 'I won't slink from the matter either; it shall never be said by the fine fellows on the quay of New York that I wouldn't fight against the Church of England. So down with the beggarly aristocracy, the Church, and the Pope to the bottom of the pit of Eldon, and may the Pope fall first, and the others upon him.'

Thereupon, dashing his hat on the table, he placed himself in an attitude of offence and rushed forward. He was, as I have said before, a powerful fellow, and might have proved a dangerous antagonist, more especially to myself, who, after my recent encounter with the Flaming Tinman, and my wrestlings with the evil one, was in anything but fighting order. Any collision, however, was prevented by the landlord, who, suddenly appearing, thrust himself between us. 'There shall be no fighting here,' said he; 'no one shall fight in this house, except it be with myself; so if you two have anything to say to each other, you had better go into the field behind the house. But, you fool,' said he, pushing Hunter violently on the breast, 'do you know whom you are going to tackle with?—this is the young chap that beat Blazing Bosville, only as late as yesterday, in Mumpers' Dingle. Grey Moll told me all about it last night, when she came for some brandy for her husband, who, she said, had been half killed; and she described the young man to me so closely that I knew him at once, that is, as soon as I saw how his left hand was bruised, for she told me he was a left-hand hitter. Aren't it all true, young man? Aren't you he that beat Flaming Bosville, in Mumpers' Dingle?' 'I never beat Flaming Bosville,' said I, 'he beat himself. Had he not struck his hand against a tree, I shouldn't be here at the present moment.' 'Hear, hear!' said the landlord, 'now that's just as it should be; I like a modest man, for, as the parson says, nothing sits better upon a young man than modesty. I remember, when I was young, fighting with Tom of Hopton, the best man that ever pulled off coat in England. I remember, too, that I won the battle; for I happened to hit Tom of Hopton in the mark, as he was coming in, so that he lost his wind, and falling squelch on the ground, do ye see, he lost the battle, though I am free to confess that he was a better man than myself; indeed, the best man that ever fought in England; yet still, I won the battle, as every customer of mine, and everybody within twelve miles round, has heard over and over again. Now, Mr. Hunter, I have one thing to say, if you choose to go into the field behind the house, and fight the young man, you can. I'll back him for ten pounds; but no fighting in my kitchen—because why? I keeps a decent kind of an establishment.'

'I have no wish to fight the young man,' said Hunter; 'more especially as he has nothing to say for the aristocracy. If he chose to fight for them, indeed—but he won't, I know; for I see he's a decent, respectable young man; and, after all fighting is a blackguard way of settling a dispute; so I have no wish to fight; however, there is one thing I'll do,' said he, uplifting his fist, 'I'll fight this fellow in black here for half a crown, or for nothing, if he pleases; it was he that got up the last dispute between me and the young man, with his Pope and his nonsense; so I will fight him for anything he pleases, and perhaps the young man will be my second; whilst you—'

'Come, Doctor,' said the landlord, 'or whatsoever you be, will you go into the field with Hunter? I'll second you, only you must back yourself. I'll lay five pounds on Hunter, if you are inclined to back yourself; and will help you to win it as far, do you see, as a second can; because why? I always likes to do the fair thing.'

'Oh, I have no wish to fight,' said the man in black, hastily; 'fighting is not my trade. If I have given any offence, I beg anybody's pardon.'

'Landlord,' said I, 'what have I to pay?'

'Nothing at all,' said the landlord; 'glad to see you. This is the first time that you have been at my house, and I never charge new customers, at least customers such as you, anything for the first draught. You'll come again, I daresay; shall always be glad to see you. I won't take it,' said he, as I put sixpence on the table; 'I won't take it.'

'Yes, you shall,' said I; 'but not in payment for anything I have had myself: it shall serve to pay for a jug of ale for that gentleman,' said I, pointing to the simple-looking individual; 'he is smoking a poor pipe. I do not mean to say that a pipe is a bad thing; but a pipe without ale, do you see—'

'Bravo!' said the landlord, 'that's just the conduct I like.'

'Bravo!' said Hunter. 'I shall be happy to drink with the young man whenever I meet him at New York, where, do you see, things are better managed than here.'

'If I have given offence to anybody,' said the man in black, 'I repeat that I ask pardon,—more especially to the young gentleman, who was perfectly right to stand up for his religion, just as I—not that I am of any particular religion, no more than this honest gentleman here,' bowing to Hunter; 'but I happen to know something of the Catholics—several excellent friends of mine are Catholics—and of a surety the Catholic religion is an ancient religion, and a widely-extended religion, though it certainly is not a universal religion, but it has of late made considerable progress, even amongst those nations who have been particularly opposed to it—amongst the Prussians and the Dutch, for example, to say nothing of the English; and then, in the East, amongst the Persians, amongst the Armenians.'

'The Armenians,' said I; 'oh dear me, the Armenians—'

'Have you anything to say about those people, sir?' said the man in black, lifting up his glass to his mouth.

'I have nothing further to say,' said I, 'than that the roots of Ararat are occasionally found to be deeper than those of Rome.'

'There's half a crown broke,' said the landlord, as the man in black let fall the glass, which was broken to pieces on the floor. 'You will pay me the damage, friend, before you leave this kitchen. I like to see people drink freely in my kitchen, but not too freely, and I hate breakages; because why? I keeps a decent kind of an establishment.'

Monday's Illustrated Word: "Captain Marvel and the Plot Against Christmas" by unknown writer (in English).

  art by unknown artist - Captain Marvel Adventures #42 - Fawcett, january 1945.

 

 

Saturday's Good Reading: “The Dead Hand” by Seabury Quinn (in English).

 

 

"Morbleu," exclaimed Jules de Grandin, passing his coffee cup across the breakfast table for its third replenishment, "but it seems, almost, Friend Trowbridge, as if I exercise some sinister influence on your patients! Here I have been your guest but one little week, and you all but lose that Mademoiselle Drigo, while, hélas, the so excellent Madame Richards is dead altogether entirely."

“I hardly think you can be blamed for Mrs. Richards' death," I replied as I handed back his refilled cup. "The poor lady suffered from mitral stenosis for the past two years, and the last time I examined her I was able to detect a diastolic murmur without the aid of a stethoscope. No, her trouble dated back some time before your coming, de Grandin."

"You relieve me," he asserted with a serio-comic expression on his alert face. "And now you go to offer your condolences to her sorrowing husband, yes? May I accompany you? Always, Friend Trowbridge, there is an opportunity for those who will to learn something."

 

 

"Nom d'un nom, but it is the good Sergeant Costello!" de Grandin cried delightedly as a heavy-set man closed the door of the Richards mansion behind him and strode across the wide veranda toward the steps. "Eh bien, my friend, do you not remember me?" He stretched both his slender, carefully groomed hands toward the huge Irishman. "Surely, you have not forgotten——"

"I'll say I haven’t," the big detective denied with a welcoming grin, shaking hands cordially. "You sure showed me some tricks I didn’t know was in th' book. Dr. de Grandin, when we was in that Kalmar case. Maybe you can give me a lift in this one, too. Sure, it’s like a bughouse in there." He jerked an indicative thumb over his shoulder toward the Richards residence.

"Eh, what is it you say?" de Grandin demanded, his little blue eyes dancing with sudden excitement. "A mystery? Cordieu, my friend, you interest me!"

"Will you help?" the big plain-clothes man asked with almost pathetic eagerness, half turning in his tracks.

"But most certainly," my companion assented. "A mystery to me is what the love of woman is to weaker men, my friend. Pardieu, how far I should have traveled in the profession of medicine if I had but been able to leave the solving of matters which did not concern me alone! Come, let us go in; we will shake the facts from this mystery of yours as a mother shakes stolen cookies from her enfant's blouse, cher sergent."

 

 

Willis Richards, power in Wall Street and nabob in our little sub-metropolitan community, stood on the hearth-rug before his library fire, a living testimonial to the truth of the axiom that death renders all mankind equals. For all his mop of white hair, his authoritative voice and his imposing embonpoint, the great banker was only a bereft and bewildered old man, borne down by his new sorrow and unable to realize that at last he confronted a condition not to be remedied by his signature on a five-figured check.

"Well, Sergeant," he asked, with a pitiful attempt at his usual brusk manner, as he recognized Costello at de Grandin’s elbow, "have you found out anything?"

"No, sir," the policeman confessed, "but here's Dr. de Grandin, from Paris, France, and he can help you out if anyone can. He’s done some wonderful work for us before, and——"

"A French detective!" Richards scoffed. "You don't need to get one of those foreigners to help you find a few stolen jewels, do you? Why——"

"Monsieur!" de Grandin’s angry protest brought the irate financier's expostulation to an abrupt halt; "you do forget yourself. I am Jules de Grandin, occasionally connected with the Service de Sureté, but more interested in the solution of my cases than in material reward."

"Oh, an amateur, eh?" Richards replied with even greater disgust. "This is a case for real detective work, Costello. I'm surprized that you’d bring a dabbler into my private affairs. By George, I'll telephone a New York agency and take the entire case out of your hands!"

"One moment, Mr. Richards," I interposed, relying on my position as family medical adviser to strengthen my argument. "This is Dr. Jules de Grandin, of the Sorbonne, one of Europe’s foremost criminologists and one of the world’s greatest scientists. The detection of crime is a phase of his work, just as military service was a phase of George Washington's; but you can no more compare him with professional police officers than you can compare Washington with professional soldiers."

Mr. Richards looked from de Grandin to me, then back again. "I'm sorry," he confessed, extending his hand to the little Frenchman, "and I shall be very glad for any assistance you may care to render, sir.

"To be frank"—he motioned us to seats as he began pacing the floor nervously—"Mrs. Richards' death was not quite so natural as Dr. Trowbridge believes. Though it’s perfectly true she had been suffering from heart disease for some time, it was not heart disease alone which caused her death. She was scared to death, literally.

"I returned from New York, where I’d been attending a banquet given by my alumni association, about 2 o’clock this morning, I let myself in with my latch key and went upstairs to my room, which adjoined my wife’s, and was beginning to undress when I heard her call out in terror. I flung the connecting door open and ran into her bedroom just in time to see her fall to the floor beside her bed, clutching at her throat and trying to say something about a hand."

"Ah?" de Grandin looked at our host with his sharp cat-stare. "And then?"

"And then I saw—well, I fancied I saw a—a something drift across the room, about level with my shoulders, and go out the window. I ran over to where my wife lay, and—and when I got there she was dead."

"Ah?" murmured de Grandin thoughtfully, inspecting his well-manicured nails with an air of preoccupation.

Richards gave him an annoyed look as he continued: "It was not till this morning that I discovered all my wife’s jewels and about twenty thousand dollars’ worth of unregistered Liberty bonds had disappeared from the wall-safe in her room.

"Of course," he concluded, "I didn’t really see anything in the air when I ran from my room. That’s impossible."

"Quite obviously," I agreed.

"Sure," Sergeant Costello nodded.

"Not at all," Jules de Grandin denied, shaking his head vigorously in dissent. "It is more possible your eyes did not deceive you, Monsieur. What was it that you saw?"

Richards’ annoyance deepened into exasperation. "It looked like a hand," he snapped. "A hand with four or five inches of wrist attached to it, and no body. Silly rot, of course. I didn’t see any such thing!"

"Quod erat demonstrandum!" de Grandin replied softly.

"What say?" Mr. Richards demanded testily.

"I said this is truly a remarkable case."

"Well, do you want to look at the room?" Richards turned toward the door leading to the stairway.

"But no, Monsieur," de Grandin blandly refused. "The good Sergeant Costello has already looked over the ground. Doubtless he can tell me all I need to know. I shall look elsewhere for confirmation of a possible theory."

"Oh, all right," Richards agreed with a snort of ill-concealed contempt; "tackle the matter in your own way. I’ll give you forty-eight hours to accomplish something; then I’ll call up Blynn’s agency and see what real detectives can do."

"Monsieur is more than generous in his allowance," de Grandin replied icily.

To me, as we left the house, he confided, "I should greatly enjoy pulling that Monsieur Richards’ nose. Friend Trowbridge."

 

 

"Can you come over to my house right away, Dr. Trowbridge?" a voice hailed me as de Grandin and I entered my office.

"Why, Mr. Kinnan," I answered, as I recognized the caller, "what’s the matter?"

"Huh!" he exploded. "What isn’t the matter? Hell’s broken loose. My wife’s had hysterics since this morning and I’m not sure I oughtn’t ask you to commit me to some asylum for the feeble-minded."

"Pardieu, Monsieur," de Grandin exclaimed, "that statement, he is vastly interesting, but not very instructive. You will explain, n’est-ce-pas?"

"Explain?" growled the other. "How am I going to explain something I know isn’t so? At twenty minutes past 5 this morning my wife and I saw something that wasn’t there, and saw it take the Lafayette cup, to boot!"

"Sacré nom d’un porc!" de Grandin swore. “What is it that you say? You saw that which was not there, and saw it take a cup of le Marquis de Lafayette? Non, non, non; it is I who am of the deranged mind. Friend Trowbridge, look to me. I hear remarks which this gentleman has not made!"

In spite of himself, Kinnan laughed at the little Frenchman’s tragic face. "I’ll be more explicit," he promised, seating himself opposite me and drawing a cigar case from his pocket. "Smoke?" he asked, proffering the case to each of us in turn.

"Now, here goes, and I don’t care whether you believe me or not, for I’m not at all sure I’m not a liar myself.

"The baby was fretful the entire early part of the evening, and we didn’t get him to sleep till well after midnight. Along about 5 o’clock he woke up on another rampage, and my wife and I went into the nursery to see what we could do.

"Ella, the maid, had gone to New York for the night, and, as usual, there wasn’t a drop of milk ready for the youngster. So Mrs. Kinnan and I trotted down to the dining room and I started to pasteurize some milk in the chafing dish. I can place the time exactly, for the library clock has been running erratically lately, and only yesterday I’d gotten it so it ran just ten minutes fast. Well, that clock had just struck half-past 5 when —like an echo of the gong—there came a crash at the window, and the pane was shattered, right before our eyes."

"Ah?" observed de Grandin, non-committally.

Kinnan shot him a sidelong glance as he continued, "It had been broken by a hammer."

"Ah?" de Grandin edged slightly forward on his chair.

"And whether you believe me or not, that hammer was held in a hand—a woman’s hand—and that was all! No arm, no body, just a hand—a hand that smashed that windowpane with a hammer, and floated through the air, as if it were attached to an invisible body, and took the Lafayette cup from the sideboard, then floated away with it!"

"A-a-ah!" de Grandin ejaculated on a rising accent, forgetting to puff at the cigar our caller had given him.

"Oh, I don’t expect you to believe me," Kinnan shot back. "I’d say anyone who told me such a story was full of dope, or something, myself; but I tell you I saw it—or thought I did—and so did my wife. Anyhow"—he turned to us with a gesture of finality—"the Lafayette cup is gone."

"On the contrary, Monsieur," de Grandin assured him gravely, "I do believe you, most implicitly. That same bodiless hand was seen at Monsieur Richards’ home last night."

"The deuce!" This time it was Kinnan who looked skeptical. "You say someone else saw that hand? Wh— why, they couldn't!"

"Nevertheless, my friend, they did," the Frenchman asserted. "Now tell me, this Lafayette cup, what was it?"

"It’s a silver wine goblet which belonged to my great-grandfather," Kinnan replied. "Intrinsically, I don’t suppose it’s worth more than twenty-five or thirty dollars; but it’s valuable to us as a family heirloom and because Lafayette, when he made his second visit to this country, drank out of it at a banquet given in his honor. I’ve been offered up to a thousand dollars for it by collectors."

"Morbleu!" De Grandin ground the fire from his cigar in the ash-tray and beat his fingertips together in a nervous tattoo. "This is a remarkable burglar we have here, Messieurs, a most remarkable burglar. He—or she—has a hand, but no body; he enter sick ladies’ bedrooms and frightens away their lives, then steal their jewelry; he break honest men’s windows with a hammer, then deprives them of their treasured heirlooms while they heat the milk for their babies. Cordieu, he will bear investigating, this one!"

"You don’t believe me," Kinnan declared, half truculently, half shamefacedly.

"Have I not said I do?" the Frenchman answered, almost angrily. "When you have seen what I have seen, Monsieur,—parbleu, when you have seen one-half as much!—you will learn to believe many things which fools declare impossible.

"This hammer"—he rose, almost glaring at Kinnan, so intent was his stare—"where is he? I would see him, if you please."

"It’s over at the house," our visitor answered, "lying right where it fell when the hand dropped it. Neither my wife nor I would touch it for a farm."

"Tremendous, gigantic, magnificent!" de Grandin ejaculated, nodding his head vigorously after each adjective. "Come, mes amis, let us hasten, let us fly. Trowbridge, my friend, you shall attend the so excellent Madame Kinnan. I, I shall go on the trail of this bodiless burglar, and it shall go hard, but I shall find him. Morbleu, Monsieur le Fantôme, when you kill that Madame Richards with fright, that is one thing; when you steal Monsieur Kinnan’s cup of le Marquis de Lafayette, that is also one thing, but when you think to thumb your invisible nose at Jules de Grandin,—parbleu, that is something else again! We shall see who will make one sacré singe out of whom, and that right quickly."

 

 

The hammer proved to be an ordinary one, with a nickeled head and imitation ebony handle, such as could be bought at any notion store for twenty-five cents; but de Grandin pounced on it like a hungry tom-cat on a mouse or a gold prospector on a two-pound nugget or a Kimberley miner on a twelve-carat diamond.

"But this is wonderful; this is superb!" he almost cooed as he swaddled the implement in several layers of paper and stowed it tenderly away in an inside pocket of his great coat.

"Trowbridge, my friend"—he threw me one of his quick, enigmatic smiles—"do you attend the good Madame Kinnan. I have important duties to perform elsewhere. If possible, I shall return for dinner, and if I do, I pray you will have your amiable cook prepare for me one of her so delicious apple pies. If I return not"— his little blue eyes twinkled a moment with frosty laughter—"I shall eat all that pie for breakfast, like a good Yon-kee."

 

 

Dinner was long since over, and the requested apple pie had been reposing untouched on the pantry shelf for several hours when de Grandin popped from a taxicab like a jack-in-the-box from its case and rushed up the front steps, the waxed ends of his little blond mustache twitching like the whiskers of an excited tom-cat, his arms filled with bundles—a look of triumphant exhilaration on his face. "Quick, quick, Friend Trowbridge," he ordered as he deposited his packages on my office desk, "to the telephone! Call that Monsieur Richards, that rich man who so generously allowed me forty- eight hours to recover his lost treasures, and that Monsieur Kinnan, whose so precious cup of the Marquis de Lafayette was stolen—call them both and bid them come here, right away, at once, immediately!

"Pardieu"—he strode back and forth across my office with a step which was half ran, half jig—"this Jules de Grandin, never is the task imposed too great for him!"

"What in the world’s the matter with you?" I demanded as I rang up the Richards house.

"Non, non," he replied, lighting a cigarette, then flinging it away unpuffed. "Ask me no questions, good friend, I do beseech you. Wait, only wait till those others come, then you shall hear Jules de Grandin speak. Morbleu, but he shall speak a great mouthful!"

 

 

The Richards limousine, impressive in size, like its owner, and, like its owner, heavily upholstered, was panting before my door in half an hour, and Kinnan drove up in his modest sedan almost as soon. Sergeant Costello, looking mystified, but concealing his wonder with the inborn reticence of a professional policeman, came into the office close on Kinnan’s heels.

"What’s all this nonsense, Trowbridge?" Richards demanded testily as he sank into a chair. "Couldn’t you have come over to my house, instead of dragging me out at this hour o’ night?"

"Tut, tut, Monsieur," de Grandin cut him short, running the admonitions so close together that they sounded like the exhaust of a miniature motorboat. "Tut, tut, Monsieur, is it not worth coming out into the cold to recover these?" From a brown-paper parcel before him he produced a purple velvet case which he snapped open with a dramatic gesture, disclosing an array of scintillating gems.

"These, I take it," he announced, "were once the property of Madame, your wife?"

"Great Scott!" gasped Richards, reaching out his hands for the jewels, "why, you got ’em!"

"But of course," de Grandin agreed, deftly withdrawing the stones from Richards’ reach and restoring them to their paper bag. "Also, Monsieur, I have these." From another parcel he drew a sheaf of Liberty bonds, ruffling through them as a gambler might count his cards. "You said twenty thousand dollars’ worth, I believe? Trés bien, there are just twenty one-thousand dollar certificates here, according to my count.

"Monsieur Kinnan," he bowed to our other visitor, "permit that I restore to you the cup of Monsieur le Marquis Lafayette." The Lafayette cup was duly extracted from another package and handed to its owner.

"And now," de Grandin lifted an oblong pasteboard box of the sort used for shoes and held it toward us as a prestidigitator might hold the hat from which he is about to extract a rabbit, "I will ask you to give me closest attention. Regardez, s'il vous plait. Is this not what you gentlemen saw last night?"

As he lifted the box lid we beheld, lying on a bed of crumpled tissue paper, what appeared to be the perfectly modeled reproduction of a beautiful feminine hand and wrist. The thumb and fingers, tipped with long, almond-shaped nails, were exquisitely slender and graceful, and the narrow palm, where it showed above the curling digits, was pink and soft-looking as the under side of a La France rose petal. Only the smear of collodion across the severed wrist told us we gazed on something which once pulsated with life instead of a marvelously exact reproduction.

"Is this not what you gentlemen saw last night?" de Grandin repeated, glancing from the lovely hand to Richards and Kinnan in turn.

Each nodded a mute confirmation, but forebore to speak, as though the sight of the eery, lifeless thing before him had placed a seal of silence on his lips.

"Very good; very, very good," de Grandin nodded vigorously. "Now attend me, if you please:

"When Monsieur Kinnan told me of the hammer which broke his window last night I decided the road by which to trace this bodiless burglar was mapped out on that hammer's handle. Pourquoi? Because this hand which scares sick ladies to death and breaks windowpanes is one of three things. First"—he ticked off on his fingers—"it may be some mechanical device. In that case I shall find no traces. But it may be the ghost of someone who once lived, in which case, again, it is one of two things: a ghost hand, per se, or the reanimated flesh of one who is dead. Or, perchance, it is the hand of someone who can render the rest of him invisible.

"Now, then, if it is a ghost hand, either true ghost or living-dead flesh, it is like other hands, it has ridges and valleys and loops and whorls, which can be traced and recognized by fingerprint experts. Or, if a man can, by some process unknown to me, make all of him, save his hand, invisible, why, then, his hand, too, must leave finger marks. Hein?

"'Now,' Jules de Grandin asked Jules de Grandin, 'is it not highly probable that one who steal jewels and bonds and the cup of Monsieur le Marquis de Lafayette, has stolen before, perchance been apprehended, and fingerprinted?'

"'Parbleu! It is even as you say,' Jules de Grandin answer Jules de Grandin.

"Thereupon I take that hammer from Monsieur Kinnan's house and go with it to New York. I see the Commissioner of Police. 'Monsieur le Prefet,' I say to him, 'I am Jules de Grandin. Do you know me?'

"'Morbleu, but I do,' reply that so excellent gentleman. 'Who but a fool has not heard of Jules de Grandin?'"

He paused a moment, easting a pregnant glance at Richards, then continued:

"'Monsieur le Prefet' I reply, 'I would that you permit your identification experts to examine this hammer and tell me, of their kindness, whose fingerprints appear thereon.'

"Bien, the order was given, and in good time come the report that the hammer handle is autographed with the fingerprints of one Katherine O’Brien, otherwise known to the police as Catherine Levoy, and also known as Catherine Dunstan.

"The police of New York have a dossier for this lady which would do credit to the Paris Sûreté. They tell me she was in turn a shoplifter, a decoy-woman for some badger game gentlemen, a forger and the partner of one Professor Mysterio, a theatrical hypnotist. Indeed, they tell me, she was married to this professor à l’Italienne, and with him she traveled the country, sometimes giving exhibitions, sometimes indulging in crime, such as, for instance, burglary and pocket-picking.

"Now, about a year ago, while she and the professor are exhibiting themselves at Coney Island, this lady died. Her partner gave her a most remarkable funeral; but the ceremonies were marred by one untoward incident—while her body lay in the undertaker’s mortuary some thief did climb in the window and remove one of her hands. In the dead of night he severed from the beautiful body of that wicked woman the hand which had often extracted property from other people’s pockets, and made off with it; nor could all the policemen’s efforts find out who did so ghoulish a deed.

"Meantime, the professor who was this woman’s theatrical partner has retired from the stage and lives in New Jersey on the fortune he has amassed.

"'New Jersey, New Jersey,' I say to me. 'Why, that is the place where my dear Trowbridge lives, and where these so mysterious burglaries have taken place.'

"So back I come to Sergeant Costello and ask him if any stranger whose mode of income is unknown has lately moved into this vicinity. I have a picture of this Professor Mysterio which the New York police give me from their archives, and I show the picture to the good Costello.

"'Pardieu' (in English) he say, 'but I know the gentleman! He live in the Berryman house, out on the Andover Road, and do nothing for his living but smoke a pipe and drink whisky. Come, let us gather him in.'

"While Sergeant Costello and I ride out to that house I do much thinking. Hypnotism is thought, and thought is a thing—a thing which does not die. Now, if this dead woman had been in the habit of receiving mental commands from Professor Mysterio for so long, and had been accustomed to obey those commands with all parts of her body as soon as they were given, had she not formed a habit of obedience? Trowbridge, my friend, you are a physician, you have seen men die, even as I have. You know that the suddenly killed man falls in an attitude which was characteristic of him in life, is it not so?"

I nodded agreement.

"Very well, then," de Grandin continued, "I ask me if it is not possible that the hand this professor have commanded so many times in life can not be made to do his bidding after death? Mon Dieu, the idea is novel, but not for that reason impossible! Did not that so superb Monsieur Poe hint at some such thing in his story of the dying man who remained alive because he was hypnotized? Most assuredly.

"So, when we get to the house of Professor Mysterio, Sergeant Costello points his pistol at the gentleman and says, 'Put 'em up, buddee, we've got the deceased wood upon you!' Meanwhile, I search the house.

"I find Monsieur Richards' jewelry and his bonds; I find Monsieur Kinnan's cup of Monsieur le Marquis de Lafayette. I find much else, including this hand of a dead woman which are not itself dead. Dieu de Dieu! When I go to take it from its case it attack me like a living thing, and Sergeant Costello have to promise he will blow the top from the professor’s head before he order it to be quiet. And it obeyed his voice! Parbleu! When I see that, I have the flesh of the geese all over me."

"Rot!" Richards flung the contemptuous comment like a missile. "I don’t know what kind of hocus-pocus made that hand move; but if you expect to make me believe any such nonsense as this stuff you’ve been telling, you’ve got the wrong pig by the ear. I shouldn’t be surprized if you and this Professor What's-His-Name were in cahoots in this thing, and you got cold feet and left your confederate holding the bag!"

I stared aghast at the man. De Grandin's vanity was as colossal as his ability, and though he was gentle as a woman in ordinary circumstances, like a woman, he was capable of sudden flares of vixenish temper when his regard for human life became no greater than his concern for a troublesome fly. If the little Frenchman had launched himself at his traducer like a bobcat attacking a hound I should have been less surprized than I was at the ominous calm with which he replaced the cover of the cardboard box containing the hand.

"Friend Trowbridge," he asked, the muscles of his jaws standing out like whipcords as he strove to prevent a telltale quiver from creeping into his face, "will you be good enough to represent me—ha!"

With the ejaculation he dodged suddenly downward, almost falling to the floor in his haste to avoid the flashing, white object which dashed at his face.

Nor was his dodge a split-second too soon. Like the lid of a boiling kettle, the top of the shoe box had lifted, and the slender, quiescent hand which lay within had leaped through the opening, risen throat-high in the air and hurtled across the intervening space like a quarrel from a crossbow. With delicate, firm-muscled fingers outspread, it swooped through the air like a pouncing hawk, missed de Grandin’s throat by the barest fraction of a second—and fastened itself, snapping like a strong-springed steel-trap, in the puffy flesh sagging over the collar of Willis Richards' dress shirt.

"Ah—ulp!" gasped, or, rather, croaked, the startled financier, falling backward in his chair and tearing futilely at the eldritch thing which sank its long, pointed nails into his purple skin. "Ah—God, it’s choking me!"

Costello was at his side, striving with all his force to pry those white, slender fingers open. He might as well have tried to wrench apart the clasp of a chrome-steel handcuff.

"Non, non," de Grandin shouted, "not that way, Sergeant. It is useless!"

Leaping across the room he jerked open the door of my instrument case, seized an autopsy knife and dashed his shoulder against the burly detective, almost sending him sprawling. Next instant, with the speed and precision of an expert surgeon, he was dissecting away the deadly white fingers fastened in Richards' dewlap.

"C'est complet," he announced matter-of-factly as he finished his grisly task. "A restorative, if you please, Friend Trowbridge, and an antiseptic dressing for the wounds from the nails. He will not suffer un- necessarily."

Wheeling, he seized the receiver from my desk telephone and called authoritatively: "Allo, allo, the jail, if you please, Mademoiselle Central!"

There was a brief parley, finally he received his connection, then: "Allo, Monsieur le Geôlier, can you tell me of Professor Mysterio, please? How is he; what does he do?"

A pause: "Ah, do you say so? I thought as much. Many thanks, Monsieur."

He turned to us, a look of satisfaction on his face. "My friends," he announced solemnly, "Professor Mysterio is no more. Two minutes ago the authorities at the city prison heard him call out distinctly in a loud voice, 'Katie, kill the Frenchman; I command you. Kill him!' When they rushed to his cell to discover the cause for his cries they were but in time to see him dash himself from his bed, having first bound his waist-belt firmly to his throat and the top of his barred door. The fall broke his neck. He died before they could cut him down.

"Eh bien," he shook himself like a spaniel emerging from a pond, " 'twas a lucky thing for me I saw that box top begin to lift and had the sense to dodge those dead fingers. None of you would have thought of the knife, I fear, before the thing had strangled my life away. As it is, I acted none too soon for Monsieur Richards' good."

Still red in the face, but regaining his self-possession under my ministrations, Willis Richards sat up in his chair. "If you’ll give me my property, I’ll be getting out of this hell-house," he announced gruffly, reaching for the jewels and bonds de Grandin had placed on the desk.

"Assuredly, Monsieur," de Grandin agreed. "But first you will comply with the law, n’est-ce-pas? You have offered a reward of five thousand dollars for your property's return. Make out two checks, if you please, one for half the amount to the good Sergeant Costello, the other, for a similar amount, to me."

"I'll be hanged if I do," the banker declared, glaring angrily at de Grandin. "Why should a man have to buy his own stuff back?"

Sergeant Costello rose ponderously to his feet and gathered the parcels containing Richards' belongings into his capacious hands. "Law's law," he announced decisively. "There'll be no bonds or jools returned till that reward's been paid."

"All right, all right," Richards agreed, reaching for his checkbook, "I'll pay you; but it's the damndest hold-up I've ever had pulled on me."

 

 

"H'm," growled Costello as the door slammed behind the irate banker, "if I ever catch that bird parkin' by a fireplug or exceedin' th' speed limit, he'll see a hold-up that is a hold-up. I'll give 'im every summons in my book, an' holler for more."

"Tiens, my friends, think of the swine no more,” de Grandin commanded. "In France, had a man so insulted me, I should have called him out and run him through the body. But that one? Pouf! Gold is his life’s blood. I hurt him far more by forcing the reward from him than if I had punctured his fat skin a dozen times.

"Meantime, Friend Trowbridge"—his little eyes snapped with the heat-lightning of his sudden smile—"there waits in the pantry that so delicious apple pie prepared for me by your excellent cook. Sergeant—Monsieur Kinnan, will you join us? Wind and weather permitting, Friend Trowbridge and I purpose eating ourselves into one glorious case of indigestion."

Friday's Sung Word: "Eva Querida" by Benedito Lacerda and Luiz Vassalo (in Portuguese)

  This song makes a pair with "Querido Adão".

Eva querida
Quero ser o teu Adão
Dar-te-ei o meu amor
A minha vida
Em troca do teu coração!

Hei de conquistar
O teu amor, se Deus quiser
Custe o que custar
Haja o que houver
Serei capaz de qualquer prejuízo
Mas te darei um paraíso!

 

You can listen "Eva Querida" by Mário Reis with the Diabos do Céu band here.

You can listen "Querido Adão" here.