Authors: George W. M. Reynolds,James Malcolm Rymer
the miscreant William Bolter.
Oh! if he could but escape to
some foreign land, - if he could but avoid the ignominious consequences of his
crime in this,- he would dedicate the remainder of his days to penitence, - he
would toil from the dawn of morning till sunset to obtain the bread of honesty,
- he would use every effort, exert every nerve to atone for the outrage he had
committed upon the laws of society!
But - no! it was too late. The blood-hounds of the law were
already upon his track.
An hour passed away; and during that interval the murderer
sought to compose himself by means of his pipe and the rum-bottle: but he could
not banish the horrible ideas which haunted him.
Suddenly a strange noise fell upon his ear.
The blood appeared to run cold to his very heart in a
refluent tide; for the steps of many feet, and the sounds of many voices,
echoed through the old house.
The truth instantly fleshed to his mind: the police had
entered the premises.
With hair standing on end, eye-balls glaring, and forehead
bathed in perspiration, the murderer sate motionless upon the cold stone bench
- afraid even to breathe. Every moment he expected to bear the trap-door at the
head of the spiral staircase move: but several minutes elapsed, and his fears
in this respect were not accomplished.
At length he heard a sound as of a body falling heavily; and
then a voice almost close to him fell upon his ear.
The reader will remember that the vault in which he was concealed,
joined the cellar from whence Walter Sydney had escaped. The officers had
entered that cellar by means of the trap-door in the floor of the room
immediately above it. Bolter could overhear their entire conversation.
"Well, this is a strange crib, this is," said one.
"Show the bull's-eye up in that farther corner: there may be a door in one
of them dark nooks."
"It will jist end as I said it would," exclaimed
another: "the feller wouldn't be sich a fool as to come to a place that's
knowed to the Force as one of bad repute."
"I didn't think, myself, there was much good in coming
to search this old crib: but the inspector said
yes,
and so we couldn't say
no.
"
"Let's be off: the cold of this infernal den strikes to
my very bones. But I say - that there shelving board that we first lighted on
in getting down, isn't made to help people to come here alive."
"Turn the bull's-eye more on it."
"Now can you see?"
"Yes - plain enough. It leads to a hole that looks on
the ditch. But the plank is quite old and rotten; so I dare say it was put
there for some purpose or another a long time ago. Pr'aps the thieves used to
convey their swag through that there hole into a boat In the ditch, and —
"
"No, no," interrupted the other policeman: it
wasn't swag that they tumbled down the plank into the Fleet: it was stiff
'uns."
"Very likely. But there can't be any of that kind of work
ever going on now: so let's be off."
The murderer In the adjoining vault could hear the policemen
climb up the plank towards the trap-door: and in a few minutes profound silence
again reigned throughout the old house.
This time he had escaped detection; and yet the search was
keen and penetrating.
The apparent safety of his retreat restored him to something
like good spirits; and he began to calculate the chances which he imagined to
exist for and against the probability of his escape from the hands of justice.
"There is but five men in the world as knows of this
hiding-place," he said to himself; "and them is myself, Dick Flairer,
Crankey Jem, the Resurrection Man, and Tom the Cracksman. As for me. I'm here -
that's one what won't blab. Dick Flairer isn't likely to sell a pal: Tom the
Cracksman I'd rely on even if he was on the rack. Crankey Jem is staunch to the
backbone; besides, he's in the Jug: so is the Resurrection Man. They can't do
much harm there. I think I'm tolerably safe; and as for frightening myself
about ghosts and goblins — "
He was suddenly interrupted by the rattling of the bones
beneath the stone-bench. He started: and a profuse perspiration instantly broke
out upon his forehead.
A huge rat had disturbed those relics of mortality; but this
little incident tended to hurl the murderer back again into all that appalling
gloominess of thought from which he had for a moment seemed to be escaping.
Time wore on: and heavily and wearily still passed
the hours. At length darkness
again came down upon the earth: the light of the little grating disappeared;
and the vault was once more enveloped in the deepest obscurity.
The murderer ate a mouthful, and then endeavoured to compose
himself to sleep, for he was worn out mentally and bodily.
The clock of Saint Sepulchre's proclaimed the hour of seven,
as he awoke from a short and feverish slumber.
He thought he heard a voice calling him in his dreams; and
when he started up he listened with affright.
"Bill - are you asleep?"
It was not, then, a dream: a human voice addressed him in
reality.
"Bill - why don't you answer?" said the voice.
"It's only me!"
Bolter suddenly felt relieved of an immense load; It was his
friend Dick who was calling him from the little trap-door. He instantly hurried
up the staircase, and was surprised to find that there was no light in the
room.
"My dear feller," said Dick, in a hurried tone,
"I didn't mean to come back so soon again, but me and Tom is a-going to do
a little business together down Southampton way - someot that he has been told
of; and as we may be away a few days, I thought I'd better come this evenin'
with a fresh supply. Here's plenty of grub, and rum, and bakker."
"Well, this is a treat - to hear a friendly voice again
so soon," said Bill;- "but why the devil don't you light the
candle?"
"I'm a-going to do it now," returned Dick; and he
struck a lucifer-match as bespoke. "I thought I wouldn't show a light here
sooner than was necessary; and we must not keep it burning too long; cos there
may be chinks in them shutters, and I des say the blue-bottles is on the
scent."
"They come and searched the whole place this
mornin'," said Bill: "but they didn't smell me though."
"Then you're all safe now, my boy," cried Dick.
"Here, look alive - take this basket, and pitch it down the stairs: it's
well tied up, and chock full of sold meat and bread. Put them two bottles into
your pocket: there - that's right. Now - do you want anythink else?"
"Yes-a knife. I was forced to gnaw my food like a dog
for want of one."
"Here you are," said Dick; and, taking a knife
from the secret cupboard between the windows, he handed it to his friend.
"Now are you all right?"
"Quite - that is, as right as a feller in my sitivation
can be. You won't forget to come — "
Bolter was standing within two or three steps from the top
of the staircase; and the greater part of his body was consequently above the
trap-door.
He stopped suddenly short in the midst of his injunction to
his companion, and staggered in such a way that be nearly lost his footing.
His eye had caught sight of a human countenance peering from
behind the half-open door of the room.
"Damnation!" exclaimed the murderer: "I'm
sold at last!" -and, rushing up the steps, he fell upon Dick Flairer with
the fury of a tiger.
At the same moment four or five officers darted into the
room:- but they were too late to prevent another dreadful deed of blood.
Bolter had plunged the knife which he held in his hand. into
the heart of Dick Flairer. the burglar.
The blow was given with fatal effect: the unfortunate wretch
uttered a horrible cry, and fell at the feet of his assassin, stone dead.
"Villain! what have you done!" ejaculated the
serjeant who headed the little detachment of police.
"I've drawn the claret of the rascal that nosed upon me,"
returned Bolter doggedly.
"You were never more mistaken in your life," said
the serjeant.
"How - what do you mean? Wasn't it that scoundrel Dick
that chirped against me?"
"No - ten thousand times
No!
" cried the officer:
"it was a prisoner in Newgate who split upon this hiding place. Somehow or
another he heard of the reward offered to take you; and he told the governor
the whole secret of the vault. Without knowing whether we should find you here
or not, we came to search it."
"Then it was the Resurrection Man who betrayed me after
all!" exclaimed Bolter; and, dashing the palms of his two hands violently
against his temples, he added, in a tone of intense agony, "I have
murdered my best friend - monster, miscreant that I am!"
The policeman speedily fixed a pair of manacles about his
wrists; and in the course of a quarter of an hour he was safely secured in one
of the cells at the station-house in Smithfield.
On the following day he was committed to Newgate.
THE BLACK CHAMBER
Once more does the scene change.
The reader who follows us through the mazes of our
narrative, has yet to be introduced to many strange places - many hideous
haunts of crime, abodes of poverty, dens of horror, and lurking-holes of
perfidy - as well as many seats of wealthy voluptuousness and aristocratic
dissipation.
It will be our task to guide those who choose to accompany
us, to scenes and places whose very existence may appear to belong to the
regions of romance rather than to a city in the midst of civilisation, and
whose characteristic features are as yet unknown to even those that are the
best acquainted with the realities of life.
About a fortnight had elapsed since the events related in
the preceding chapter.
In a small, high, well-lighted room five individuals were
seated at a large round oaken table. One of these persons, who appeared to be
the superior was an elderly man with a high forehead, and thin white hair
falling over the collar of his black coat. He was short and rather corpulent:
his countenance denoted frankness and good-nature; but his eyes, which were
small, grey, and sparkling, had a lurking expression of cunning, only
perceptible to the acute observer. The other three individuals were young and
gentlemanly-looking men, neatly dressed, and very deferential in their manners
towards their superior.
The door of this room was carefully bolted. At one end of
the table was a large black tray covered. with an immense quantity of
bread-seals of all sizes. Perhaps the reader may recall to mind that, amongst
the pursuits and amusements of his school-days, he diverted himself with
moistening the crumb of bread, and kneading it with his fingers into a
consistency capable of taking and retaining an accurate impression of a seal
upon a letter. The seals - or rather blank bread-stamps - now upon the tray,
were of this kind, only more carefully manufactured, and well consolidated with
thick gum-water.
Close by this tray, in a large wooden bowl were wafers of
all sizes and colours: and in a box also standing on the table, were numbers of
wafer-stamps of every dimension used. A second box contained thin blades of
steel, set fast in delicate ivory handles, and sharp as razors. A third box was
filled with sticks of sealing-wax of all colours, and of foreign as well as
British manufacture. A small glass retort fixed over a spirit-lamp, was placed
near one of the young men. A tin-box containing a little cushion covered with
printer's red ink in one compartment and several stamps such as the reader may
have seen used in post-offices, in another division, lay open near the other
articles mentioned. Lastly, an immense pile of letters - some sealed, and
others wafered - stood upon that end of the table at which the elderly gentleman
was seated.
The occupations of these five individuals may be thus
described in a few words.
The old gentleman took to the letters one by one, and bent
them open, as it were, in such a way, that he could read a portion of their
contents when they were not folded in such a manner as effectually to conceal
all the writing. He also examined the addresses, and consulted a long paper of
an official character which lay upon the table at his right hand. Some of the
letters he threw, after as careful a scrutiny as he could devote to them
without actually breaking the seals or wafers, into a large wicker basket at
his feet. From time to time, however, he passed a letter to the young man who
sate nearest to him.
If the letters were closed with wax, an impression of the
seal was immediately taken by means of one of the bread stamps. The young man
then took the letter and held it near the large fire which burnt in the grate
until the sealing-wax became so softened by the heat that the letter could be
easily opened without tearing the paper. The third clerk read it aloud, while
the fourth took notes of its contents. It was then returned to the first young
man, who re-sealed it by means of the impression taken on the bread stamp, and
with wax which precisely matched that originally used in closing the letter.
When this ceremony was performed, the letter was consigned to the same basket
which contained those that had passed unopened through the hands of the
Examiner.
If the letter were fastened with a wafer, the second clerk
made the water in the little glass retort boil by means of the spirit-lamp; and
when the vapour gushed forth from the tube, the young man held the letter to
its mouth in such a way that the steam played full upon the identical spot where
the wafer was placed. The wafer thus became moistened in a slight degree; and
it was only then necessary to pass one of the thin steel blades skilfully
beneath the wafer, in order to, open the letter. The third young man then read
this epistle, and the fourth took notes, as in the former instance. The
contents being thus ascertained, the letter was easily fastened again with a
very thin wafer of the same colour and size as the original; and if the job
were at all clumsily done, the tin-box before noticed furnished the means of
imprinting a red stamp upon the back of the letter, in such a way that a
portion of the circle fell precisely over the spot beneath which the wafer was
placed.
These processes were accomplished in total silence, save
when the contents of the letters were read; and then, so accustomed were those
five individual, to hear the revelations of the most strange secrets and
singular communications, that they seldom appeared surprised or amused -
shocked or horrified, at anything which those letters made known to them. Their
task seemed purely of a mechanical kind: indeed, automatons could not have
shewn less passion or excitement.
Oh! vile - despicable occupation, - performed, too, by men
who went forth, with heads erect and confident demeanour, from their atrocious
employment - after having violated those secrets which are deemed most sacred,
and broken the seals which merchants, lovers, parents, relations, and friends
had placed upon their thoughts!
Base and diabolical outrage - perpetrated by the commands of
the Ministers of the Sovereign!
Reader, this small, high, well-lighted room, in which such
infamous scenes took place with doors well secured by bolts and bars, was the
Black Chamber of the General
Post-Office, Saint Martin'-le Grand.
And now, reader, do you ask
whether all this be true ;- whether, in the very heart of the metropolis of the
civilized world, such a system and such a den of infamy can exist ;- whether,
in a word, the means of transferring thought at a cheap and rapid rate, be
really made available to the purposes of government and the ends of party
policy? If you ask these questions, to each and all do we confidently and
boldly answer "YES."
The first letter which the Examiner caused to be opened on
the occasion when we introduce our readers to the Black Chamber, was from the
State of Castelcicala, in Italy, to the representative of that Grand-Duchy at
the English court. Its contents, when translated, ran thus:-
City of Montoni, Castelcicala.
"I am desired by my lord the Marquis of Gerrano, his Highness's Secretary
of State for Foreign Affairs, to inform your Excellency that, in consequence of
a general amnesty just proclaimd by His Serene Highness, and which includes
all political prisoners and emigrants, passports to return to the Grand
Duchy of Castelcicala, may be accorded to his Highness Alberto Prince of
Castelcicala, nephew of his Serene Highness the Reigning Grand Duke, as well as
to all other natives of Castelcicala now resident in England, but who may be
desirous of returning to their own country,
"I have the honour to renew to your Excellency
assurances of my most perfect consideration.
"BARON RUPERTO,
"Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affair., &c. &c.
The second letter perused upon this occasion,
by the inmates of the Black Chamber, was from a famous London Banker to his
father at Manchester:-
"You will be astounded, my dear father, when your eye meets
the statement I am now at length compelled to make to you. The world believes
my establishment to be as firmly based as the rocks themselves: my credit is
unlimited, and thousands have confided their funds to my care. Alas, my dear
father. I am totally insolvent: the least drain upon the bank would plunge me
into irredeemable ruin and dishonour. I have, however, an opportunity of
retrieving myself, and building up my fortunes: a certain government operation
is proposed to me; and if I can undertake it, my profits will be immense. Fifty
thousand pounds are absolutely necessary for my purposes within six days from
the present time. Consider whether you will save your son by making him this
advance; or allow him to sink into infamy, disgrace and ruin, by withholding
it. Whichever way you may determine breathe not a word to a soul. The
authorities in the Treasury have made all possible inquiries concerning me, and
believe me to be not only solvent, but immensely rich. I expect your answer by
return of post.
Your affectionate but almost heart-broken son,
"JAMES
TOMLINSON
The writer of this letter flattered himself that the government
had already made "all possible enquiries:" - he little dreamt
that his own epistle was to furnish the Treasury, through the medium of the
Post Office, with the very information which he had so fondly deemed unknown to
all save himself.
When the third letter was opened, the clerk whose duty it
was to read it, looked at the signature, and, addressing himself to the
Examiner, said, "From whom, sir, did you anticipate that this letter
came?"
"From Lord Tremordyn. Is it not directed to Lady
Tremordyn?" exclaimed the Examiner.
"It is, sir," answered the clerk. "But it is
written by that lady's daughter Cecilia."
"I am very sorry for that. The Home Office," said
the Examiner, "is particularly anxious to ascertain the intention of Lord
Tremordyn in certain party matters; and it is known," he added, referring
to the official paper beside him, "that his lordship communicates all his
political sentiments to her ladyship, who in now at Bath."
"Then, sir, this letter need not be read?" cried
the clerk interrogatively.
"Not read, young man!" ejaculated the Examiner,
impatiently. "How often am I to tell you that every letter which is once
opened is to be carefully perused? Have we not been able to afford time
government and the police some very valuable information at different times, by
noting the contents of letters which we have opened by mistake?"
"Certainly," added the first clerk. "There is
that deeply-planned and well-laid scheme of Stephens, and his young lady
disguised as a man, who lives at Upper Clapton, which we discovered by the mere
accident of opening a wrong letter."
"I beg your pardon, sir," said the clerk whose
duty it was to read the epistles, and whose apology to the Examiner was
delivered in a most deferential manner. "I will now proceed with the
letter of the Honourable Miss Cecilia Huntingfield to her mother Lady
Tremordyn."
The young clerk then read as follows:-
"Oh! my dear mother, how shall I find
words to convey to you the fearful tale of my disgrace and infamy of which I am
the unhappy and guilty heroine? A thousand times before you left London, I was
on the point of throwing myself at your feet and confessing all! But, no - I
could not - I dared not. And now, my dear parent, I can conceal my shame no
longer! Oh! how shall I make you comprehend me, without actually entrusting
this paper with the fearful secret? My God! I am almost distracted. Surely you
can understand my meaning? If not, learn the doleful tidings at once, my
dearest and most affectionate parent: I AM ABOUT TO BECOME A MOTHER! Oh! do not
spurn me from you - do not curse your child! It has cost me pangs of anguish
ineffable, and of mental agony an idea of which I could not convey to you, to
sit down and rend your heart with this avowal. But O heavens! what am I to do?
Concealment is no longer possible: IN THREE MONTHS MORE I SHALL BE A MOTHER!
That villain Harborough - the friend of our family, Sir Rupert Harborough,- the
man in whom my dear father put every confidence, - that wretch has caused my
shame! And yet there are times, my dear mother, when I feel that I love him ;-
for he is the father of the child which most soon publish my disgrace! And now,
my fond - confiding - tender parent, you know all. Oh! come to my rescue: adopt
some means to conceal my shame ;- shield me from my father's wrath! I can write
no more at present: but my mind feels relieved now I have thus opened my heart
to my mother.
"Your afflicted and almost despairing daughter,
CECILIA
HUNTINGFIELD."
Thus was a secret involving the honour of a noble family, - a
secret compromising the most sacred interests - revealed to five men at one
moment, by means of the atrocious system pursued in the Black Chamber of the
General Post Office.
The fourth letter was from Mr. Robert Stephens of London to
his brother Mr. Frederick Stephens of Liverpool:-
"MY DEAR BROTHER,
"I
write you a few hasty instructions, to which I solicit your earnest attention.
You are well aware that the 26th instant is my grand day - the day to which I
have been so long and so anxiously looking forward. All my schemes are so well
organized that detection is impossible. That fellow Montague gave me a little
trouble a fortnight or so ago, by suddenly and most unexpectedly declaring that
he would not act as the witness of identity; and I was actually compelled to
give him five hundred pounds to silence him. What could have been his motive
for shirking out of the affair I cannot tell. Be that as It may, I have
supplied his place with another and better man - a lawyer of the name of Mac
Chizzle. But now for my instructions. The grand blow will be struck soon after
mid-day on the 26th instant. Immediately it is done I shall give Walter (I
always speak of HER as a man) the ten thousand pounds I have promised him, and
then off to Liverpool in a post-chaise and four. Now, if there be a packet for
America on the 27th, secure me a berth; if not, ascertain if there be a vessel
sailing for Havre or Bordeaux on that day, and them secure me a berth in such
ship:- but should there be none in this instance also, then obtain a list of
all the ships which, according to present arrangements, are to leave Liverpool
on the 27th, with their place of destination, and all other particulars.
"Burn this letter the moment you have read it: we then
know that it cannot possibly have told tales.
"Your affectionate brother,
"ROBERT STEPHENS."