The Eustace Diamonds (62 page)

‘Six penn'orth of brandy – warm, if you please, my dear,' said the pseudo-Howard, as he strolled easily into an inner room, with which he seemed to be quite familiar. He seated himself in an old-fashioned wooden arm-chair, gazed up at the gas lamp, and
stirred his liquor slowly. Occasionally he raised the glass to his lips, but he did not seem to be at all intent upon his drinking. When he entered the room, there had been a gentleman and a lady there, whose festive moments seemed to be disturbed by some slight disagreement; but Howard, as he gazed at the lamp, paid no attention to them whatever. They soon left the room, their quarrel and their drink finished together, and others dropped in and out. Mr Howard's ‘warm' must almost have become cold, so long did he sit there, gazing at the gas lamps, rather than attending to his brandy and water. Not a word did he speak to any one for more than an hour, and not a sign did he show of impatience. At last he was alone; – but had not been so for above a minute when in stepped a jaunty little man, certainly not more than five feet high, about three or four and twenty years of age, dressed with great care, with his trousers sticking to his legs, with a French chimney-pot hat on his head, very much peeked fore and aft and closely turned up at the sides. He had a bright-coloured silk handkerchief round his neck, and a white shirt, of which the collar and wristbands were rather larger and longer than suited the small dimensions of the man. He wore a white greatcoat tight buttoned round his waist, but so arranged as to show the glories of the coloured handkerchief; and in his hand he carried a diminutive cane with a little silver knob. He stepped airily into the room, and as he did so he addressed our friend the policeman with much cordiality. ‘My dear Mr 'Oward,' he said, ‘this is a pleasure. This is a pleasure. This is a pleasure.'

‘What is it to be?' asked Gager.

‘Well; – ay, what? Shall I say a little port wine negus, with the nutmeg in it rayther strong?' This suggestion he made to a young lady from the bar, who had followed him into the room. The negus was brought and paid for by Gager, who then requested that they might be left there undisturbed for five minutes. The young lady promised to do her best, and then closed the door. ‘And now, Mr 'Oward, what can I do for you?' said Mr Cann, the burglar.

Gager, before he answered, took a pipe-case out of his pocket, and lit the pipe. ‘Will you smoke, Billy?' said he.

‘Well; – no, I don't know that I will smoke. A very little tobacco goes a long way with me, Mr 'Oward. One cigar before I turn in; – that's about the outside of it You see, Mr 'Oward, pleasures should never be made necessities, when the circumstances of a gentleman's life may perhaps require that they shall be abandoned for prolonged periods. In your line of life, Mr ‘Oward – which has its objections – smoking may be pretty well a certainty.' Mr Cann, as he made these remarks, skipped about the room, and gave point to his argument by touching Mr Howard's waistcoat with the end of his cane.

‘And now, Billy, how about the young woman?'

‘I haven't set eyes on her these six weeks, Mr 'Oward. I never see her but once in my life, Mr ‘Oward; – or, maybe, twice, for one's memory is deceitful; and I don't know that I ever wish to see her again. She ain't one of my sort, Mr ‘Oward. I likes 'em soft, and sweet, and coming. This one – she has her good p'ints about her – as dean a foot and ankle as I'd wish to see; – but, laws, what a nose, Mr 'Oward! And then for manner; – she's no more manner than a stable dog.'

‘She's in London, Billy?'

‘How am I to know, Mr 'Oward?'

‘What's the good, then, of your coming here?' asked Gager, with no little severity in his voice.

‘I don't know as it is good. I ‘aven't said nothing about any good, Mr 'Oward. What you wants to find is them diamonds?'

‘Of course I do.'

‘Well; – you won't find 'em. I knows nothing about 'em, in course, except just what I'm told. You know my line of life, Mr ‘Oward?'

‘Not a doubt about it.'

‘And I know yours. I'm in the way of hearing about these things – and for the matter of that, so are you too. It maybe, my ears are the longer. I ‘ave ‘eard. You don't expect me to tell you more than just that. I 've 'eard. It was a pretty thing, wasn't it? But I wasn't in it myself, more's the pity. You can't expect fairer than that, Mr ‘Oward?'

‘And what have you heard?'

‘Them diamonds is gone where none of you can get at 'em. That five hundred pounds as the lawyers 'ave offered is just nowhere. If you want information, Mr ‘Oward, you should say information.'

‘And you could give it; – eh, Billy?'

‘No – ; no —' He uttered these two negatives in a low voice, and with much deliberation. ‘I couldn't give it. A man can't give what he hasn't got; – but perhaps I could get it.'

‘What an ass you are, Billy. Don't you know that I know all about it?'

‘What an ass you are, Mr 'Oward. Don't I know that you don't know; – or you wouldn't come to me. You guess. you're always a-guessing. And because you know how to guess, they pays you for guessing. But guessing ain't knowing. You don't know; – nor yet don't I. What is it to be, if I find out where that young woman is?'

‘A tenner, Billy.'

‘Five quid now, and five when you've seen her.'

‘All right, Billy.'

‘She's a-going to be married to Smiler next Sunday as ever is down at Ramsgate; – and at Ramsgate she is now. you'll find her, Mr ‘Oward, if you'll keep your eyes open, somewhere about the “Fiddle with One String”.'

This information was so far recognized by Mr Howard as correct, that he paid Mr Cann five sovereigns down for it at once.

‘Never thought there was, ma'am,' said Gager. ‘And there's nothing wrong as I know of with the young woman.' Then the husband and wife consulted together, and Mr Gager was asked to take a seat in a little parlour, while the woman ran upstairs for half an instant. Gager looked about him quickly, and took in at a glance the system of the construction of the ‘Fiddle with One String‘. He did sit down in the little parlour, with the door open, and remained there for perhaps a couple of minutes. Then he went to the front door, and glanced up at the roof. ‘It's all right,'
said the keeper of the house, following him. ‘She ain't a-going to get away. She ain't just very well, and she's a-lying down.'

‘You tell her, with my regards,' said Gager, ‘that she needn't be a bit the worse because of me.' The man looked at him suspiciously. ‘You tell her what I say. And tell her, too, the quicker the better. She has a gentleman a-looking after her, I daresay. Perhaps I'd better be off before he comes.' The message was taken up to the lady, and Gager again seated himself in the little parlour.

We are often told that all is fair in love and war, and, perhaps, the operation on which Mr Gager was now intent may be regarded as warlike. But he now took advantage of a certain softness in the character of the lady whom he wished to meet, which hardly seems to be justifiable even in a policeman. When Lizzie's tall footman had been in trouble about the necklace, a photograph had been taken from him which had not been restored to him. This was a portrait of Patience Crabstick, which she, poor girl, in a tender moment, had given to him, who, had not things gone roughly with them, was to have been her lover. The little picture had fallen into Gager's hand, and he now pulled it from his pocket. He, himself, had never visited the house in Hertford Street till after the second robbery, and, in the flesh, had not as yet seen Miss Crabstick; but he had studied her face carefully, expecting, or, at any rate, hoping, that he might some day enjoy the pleasure of personal acquaintance. That pleasure was now about to come to him, and he prepared himself for it by making himself intimate with the lines of the lady's face as the sun had portrayed them.
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There was even yet some delay, and Mr Gager more than once testified uneasiness. ‘She ain't a-going to get away,' said the mistress of the house, ‘but a lady as is going to see a gentleman can't jump into her things as a man does.' Gager intimated his acquiescence in all this, and again waited.

‘The sooner she comes, the less trouble for her,' said Gager to the woman; ‘if you'll only make her believe that' At last, when he had been somewhat over an hour in the house, he was asked to walk upstairs, and then, in a little sitting-room over the bar, he had the opportunity, so much desired, of making personal acquaintance with Patience Crabstick.

It may be imagined that the poor waiting-woman had not been in a happy state of mind since she had been told that a gentleman was waiting to see her downstairs, who had declared himself to be a policeman immediately on entering the shop. To escape was of course her first idea, but she was soon made to understand that this was impracticable. In the first place there was but one staircase, at the bottom of which was the open door of the room in which the policeman was sitting; and then, the woman of the house was very firm in declaring that she would connive at nothing which might cost her and her husband their licence.
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‘You've got to face it,' said the woman. ‘I suppose they can't make me get out of bed unless I pleases,' said Patience firmly. But she knew that even that resource would fail her, and that a policeman, when aggravated, can take upon him all the duties of a lady's maid. She had to face it – and she did face it. ‘I've just got to have a few words with you, my dear,' said Gager.

‘I suppose, then, we'd better be alone' said Patience; whereupon the woman of the house discreetly left the room.

The interview was so long that the reader would be fatigued were he asked to study a record of all that was said on the occasion. The gentleman and lady were closeted together for more than an hour, and so amicably was the conversation carried on that when the time was half over Gager stepped downstairs and interested himself in procuring Miss Crabstick's breakfast. He even condescended himself to pick a few shrimps and drink a glass of beer in her company. A great deal was said, and something was even settled, as may be learned from a few concluding words of that very memorable conversation. ‘Just don't you say anything about it, my dear, but leave word for him that you've gone up to town on business.'

‘Lord love you, Mr Gager, he'll know all about it'.

‘Let him know. Of course he'll know – if he comes down. It's my belief he'll never show himself at Ramsgate again.'

‘But, Mr Gager-'

‘Well, my dear?'

‘You aren't a perjuring of yourself?'

‘What; – about making you my wife? That I ain't. I'm up-right,
and always was. There's no mistake about me, when you've got my word. As soon as this work is off my mind, you shall be Mrs Gager, my dear. And you'll be all right. you've been took in, that's what you have.'

‘That I have, Mr Gager,' said Patience, wiping her eyes.

‘You've been took in, and you must be forgiven.'

‘I didn't get – nothing out of the necklace; and as for the other things, they've frighted me so, that I let 'em all go for just what I tell you. And as for Mr Smiler – I never didn't care for him; that I didn't. He ain't the man to touch my heart – not at all; and it was not likely either. A plain fellow – very, Mr Gager.'

‘He'll be plainer before long, my dear.'

‘But I'll been that worrited among 'em, Mr Gager, since first they made their wicked prepositions, that I'll been jest – I don't know how I've been. And though my lady was not a lady as any girl could like, and did deserve to have her things took if anybody's things ever should be took, still, Mr Gager, I knows I did wrong. I do know it – and I'm a repenting of it in sackcloth and ashes; – so I am. But you'll be as good as your word, Mr Gager?'

It must be acknowledged that Mr Gager had bidden high for success, and had allowed himself to be carried away by his zeal almost to the verge of imprudence. It was essential to him that he should take Patience Crabstick back with him to London – and that he should take her as a witness and not as a criminal. Mr Benjamin was the game at which he was flying – Mr Benjamin, and, if possible, Lord George; and he conceived that his net might be big enough to hold Smiler as well as the other two greater fishes, if he could induce Patience Crabstick and Billy Cann to cooperate with him cordially in his fishing.

But his mind was still disturbed on one point. Let him press his beloved Patience as closely as he might with questions, there was one point on which he could not get from her what he believed to be the truth. She persisted that Lord George de Bruce Carruthers had had no hand in either robbery, and Gager had so firmly committed himself to a belief on this matter, that he
could not throw the idea away from him, even on the testimony of Patience Crabstick.

On that evening he returned triumphant to Scotland Yard with Patience Crabstick under his wing; and that lady was housed there with every comfort she could desire, except that of personal liberty.