CHAPTER CXCIII.

JACK RILY AND MRS. MORTIMER.

The individual whom Mrs. Mortimer thus unexpectedly and unpleasantly encountered, had made a considerable improvement in his personal appearance during the few days that had elapsed since she saw him last.

The old fur cap, the greasy velveteen shooting-jacket, the rusty waistcoat, the corduroy trowsers, and the heavy high-lows, were exchanged for a shining silk hat, a complete suit of black clothes, and a pair of Wellington boots: his shirt was likewise new and clean, and he wore a satin stock instead of the blue cotton handkerchief tied loosely round his neck.

He had evidently endeavoured to make himself look as respectable as he could: but the almost African hue of his complexion--the horrible hare-lip, through the opening of which the large white teeth glistened up to the gums--and the yellow fire that seemed to shine in the small and restless eyes, gave him such a peculiar aspect that it was scarcely possible for any one who passed to avoid noticing him.

“Mrs. Mortimer, my beloved tiger-cat, how are you?” he exclaimed, grasping the old woman’s hand and shaking it violently.

“Very well, thank you, Mr. Rily: but pray do not detain me now, there’s a good soul--for I have not a moment to spare----”

“I shan’t detain you, old beauty,” interrupted Jack; “because I’ll just do myself the pleasure of walking along with you. Come--take my arm--you needn’t be ashamed to do so now: I think I’m pretty tidily rigged--eh?”

Thus speaking, he glanced complacently over his own person, and then bestowed a look upon the outward appearance of Mrs. Mortimer, who, as we have already observed, was dressed with unusual gaiety.

“Come, my dear--take my arm,” exclaimed the Doctor.

“Really, Mr. Rily, you must excuse me,” said the old woman, who was most anxious to get away from the vicinity of the bank, but by no means desirous of remaining in the company of the Doctor: “I have a particular matter to attend to immediately! If, however, you desire to see me, I shall be most happy to meet you this evening----”

“This fiddlestick!” interrupted Jack Rily, impatiently. “You know that you never kept the appointment you made with me after that Stamford Street affair the other day--when you went away with the young girl in the cab; and yet you assured me that there was money to be got through her----”

“Well, well--I have not time to talk of the matter now,” said Mrs. Mortimer, angrily: “and I _must_ take my leave of you.”

“Lord bless you! I’m not going to be put off in this fashion, old lady,” cried Jack. “It suits me to have a little further chat with you--and I’m determined the whim shall be gratified. So take my arm at once, and come along. If we stand here palavering, we shall soon have a mob about us--because it isn’t every day that two such handsome people as you and I are seen together,” he added, with a horrible chuckle.

“But perhaps you are not going my way,” said Mrs. Mortimer, still hesitating to take the proffered arm, and deeply vexed at this encounter.

“Oh! yes I am--because I’ll go any way you like,” responded Jack Rily, in the most accommodating spirit.

“Well--you shall be my companion for a short time,” exclaimed Mrs. Mortimer, affecting to laugh in good humour; and, taking his arm, she proceeded with him along the Strand.

“I met our friend Vitriol Bob last night at a public-house,” observed Jack, who seemed quite proud of having the hideous old woman clinging to him. “He looked remarkably savage when he saw me in my bran new toggery--for he thought to himself that the money which purchased it ought to have belonged to him. I hadn’t seen him since the night in Stamford Street; and, as he had the impudence to stare at me in a threatening manner, I went up to him and whispered in his ear, ‘_What about old Torrens, Bob?_’ He turned quite livid with rage, and ground his teeth together; then, after a few moments’ consideration, he said--also in a whisper--‘_If it wasn’t that you knew that secret, I’d serve you out nicely, old fellow: but I’ll be even with you yet, I dare say._’--‘_Whenever you like, Bob_,’ said I; and then we sate down in different parts of the room and stared at each other all the time we were smoking our pipes. But not another word passed between us; and the other people who were present, knowing that we were excellent pals until lately, wondered what the devil was the matter.”

“And did he bury the dead body, do you know?” inquired Mrs. Mortimer.

“I didn’t put the question to him,” answered Jack Rily. “Nothing more passed between us than what I have just told you: but I have no doubt that he laid old Torrens two or three feet under the kitchen floor in the Haunted House. And now, how do you suppose that I and Vitriol Bob stand with regard to each other?”

“As enemies, I should suppose,” replied Mrs. Mortimer, wondering by what means she could possibly shake off her disagreeable companion.

“As mortal--implacable--unrelenting enemies,” continued the man, lowering his voice: for his loud talking had already attracted the notice of the passers-by in the Strand, and he had just caught sight of a policeman who appeared to be eyeing him rather suspiciously. “Yes--as bitter enemies,” he repeated. “Not that I have any resentment _now_ against Bob: because my revenge is gratified, and I am more than even with him. But as he will take the first opportunity to thrust a knife into my ribs, or dash his vitriol bottle in my face, whenever he catches me in a lonely place,--why, I must be prepared to struggle with him to the very death. So, my old tiger-cat,” added the Doctor, with amazing cheerfulness, considering the gravity of the topic, “whenever he and I do so meet, only one of us will walk away alive. That’s as certain as that you’re leaning on my arm, and that I’m proud of your company.”

“Is Vitriol Bob, as you call him, such a desperate fellow?” inquired Mrs. Mortimer, wishing the Doctor at the hottest place she could think of.

“Why, I’ve told you all about him before,” exclaimed Jack. “And now let me give you a little piece of advice about yourself, old gal----”

“About me!” repeated Mrs. Mortimer, with a shudder occasioned by a presentiment of what she was going to hear.

“Yes--about you, my tiger-cat,” repeated the Doctor. “Remember that Vitriol Bob never forgets or forgives--and he owes you _one_. That’s all! But, when I think of it, I shall constitute myself your lawful protector--because I never _did_ meet any woman so precious ugly as you are; and ugliness, when joined to ferocity, is beauty in my eyes--as I have before told you.”

“Well, well--we will discuss all these points another time,” said Mrs. Mortimer. “I must leave you here,” she added, stopping suddenly short at the corner of Wellington Street, leading to Waterloo Bridge.

“Your way is mine,” observed Jack Rily, coolly, as he compelled her to walk on. “But, by the bye, what were you doing in that bank at the door of which I met you?”

“I merely went in to see a clerk of my acquaintance,” replied the old woman, cursing in her heart the odious companion who thus pertinaciously attached himself to her.

“Come, that won’t do, old gal!” exclaimed Jack, as he paid the toll for them both at the gate of the bridge. “I am so well acquainted with all the rigs and moves of London life, as to be able to tell in a moment whether a person coming out of a bank has been to receive money, or not. If it’s a gentleman, he feels at his breeches-pocket to see that the cash is all safe--or he buttons his coat over his breast which proves that the notes are in his waistcoat. If it’s a woman, she gripes her reticule precious tight--or smoothes down her dress just over where her pocket is--or else settles her shawl over her bosom, when the notes are there. This last was precisely what you did; and therefore, my old tiger-cat, I know that you’ve got money in the bosom of your dress as well as if I saw you put it there.”

“You’re quite wrong for once in your life, Mr. Rily,” said Mrs. Mortimer, trembling at the remarks which had just fallen upon her ears.

“Then why does your arm shake so as it hangs in mine?” demanded the Doctor, with an imperturbability which frightened the old woman more than if he had actually used threats: for, little as she had seen of him, she was well enough acquainted with his character to perceive that he was meditating mischief.

“My arm did _not_ shake,” cried Mrs. Mortimer, mastering up all her courage and presence of mind, “But here we are at the end of the bridge, and I must bid you good-bye. When shall we meet again?”

“We are not going to separate in a hurry, I can tell you,” said the Doctor: “so don’t think it. You know I love you,” he added with a horrible grin, which opened his harelip so wide that he seemed to be an ogre about to devour her; “and I love much more still the bank-notes that you have got in your bosom. Besides, it is my duty to protect you from Vitriol Bob; and, in addition to all this, I think we shall be able to knock up a very cozie partnership together.”

“And suppose that I decline the honour you intend me?” asked the old woman, assuming a tone of bitter sarcasm in order to induce Rily to believe that she was not afraid--though, in reality, her heart was sinking within her.

“In the case which you have suggested, I shall force you to do as I choose and act as I desire,” coolly responded the Doctor.

“Force me, indeed!” repeated the old woman, withdrawing her arm, and stopping short in the Waterloo Road.

“Yes--force you,” said Jack Rily, compelling her to take his arm again and also to walk on. “You had better not provoke me, because I am not the man to stick at trifles; and if you make a noise and raise a mob, I will swear black and blue that you are my wife--that you have bolted with my money--and that the notes are concealed somewhere about your person. Then, if the police should interfere, you will have to give an account of how you became possessed of the notes aforesaid;--and I dare say, from the estimate I have formed of your character, you would not like to be questioned on that point. In a word, then--unless I am mightily deceived--you have committed some nice little bit of roguery; and I mean to go halves with you.”

This tirade was spun out to such a length and delivered in such a measured tone of coolness, that Mrs. Mortimer, who was perfectly astounded at the menaces with which it opened, had leisure to recover her self-possession: but the rapid survey of her position which she was enabled to take while the Doctor was finishing his harangue, was far from consolatory. She had indeed committed a little roguery, and would indeed be sorry to be questioned by the police; and she knew, moreover, that Jack Rily was quite capable of carrying all his threats into immediate execution.

What, then, was she to do? There was no alternative but to bend to circumstances--make the best of a bad job--and trust to the chapter of accidents so as to avail herself of any occurrence that might turn up in her favour.

“Well--you keep silent, old gal,” said the Doctor, after a short pause. “Is it that you don’t admire me sufficiently to take me as a husband, in the fashion of leaping over the broom-stick?”

“It is of the utmost importance that I should attend to certain pressing matters,” returned Mrs. Mortimer; “and afterwards I shall be happy to fall into all your plans and projects.”

“Well, we will attend to the pressing matters together,” said the Doctor. “A husband and wife must have no secrets from each other. But since we have come this way, and as my abode happens to lie in the immediate neighbourhood, I propose at once to introduce you thereto and install you as mistress of the place. I have got a comfortable crib--for Torrens’s money did wonders for me as you may well suppose.”

At this moment a project flashed to the mind of the old woman. What if she were to yield, without farther hesitation or remonstrance, to the Doctor’s proposals, and watch her opportunity either to murder him or escape when he was asleep? By wheedling herself into his confidence, she would know where he deposited the money which, she feared, must pass from her hands into his own; and she could repossess herself of it, if he were disposed of, or if she were wakeful while he slept.

“I do not mind accompanying you to your lodgings,” she said; “and there we can talk over the whole business much better than in the open street.”

“There! now you are getting into a better frame of mind,” observed Jack Rily. “This way:”--and he turned into the low streets lying on the left-hand side of the Waterloo Road, between Upper Stamford Street and the New Cut.

The neighbourhood alluded to swarms with brothels of the most infamous description; and half-naked women may be seen at all hours lounging about at the doors, and endeavouring to entice into their dens any respectable-looking men who happen to pass that way. Robberies are of frequent occurrence in those houses of ill fame; and the great aim of the vile females inhabiting them, is to entrap persons who are the worse for liquor and whose appearance denotes a well-filled purse. Neighbourhoods of this kind should be shunned by all decent persons, as if a pestilence were raging there!

It was into Roupel-street that Jack Rily conducted Mrs. Mortimer; and when he had introduced her to a small but well furnished parlour, with a bed-chamber communicating by means of folding-doors, he produced a bottle of brandy, saying, “Now let us drink to our happy meeting this day!”

Filling two glasses with the potent liquor, he handed one to the old woman, who swallowed the contents greedily: for she felt that she stood in need of a stimulant.

“Now, my beautiful tiger-cat,” exclaimed the Doctor, as he drew down the blind over the window, “I am about to subject you to a little ceremony which may be perhaps looked upon as the least thing uncourteous; but it must be accomplished all the same. So don’t let us have any bother about it.”

Thus speaking, he approached the cupboard whence he had taken the brandy, and drawing forth a huge clasp-knife, he touched a spring which made the blade fly open and remain fixed as if it were a dagger.

“You do not mean to hurt me?” exclaimed the old woman, now becoming terribly alarmed--so much so, that she sank exhausted into a chair, while her looks were fixed appealingly on the man’s countenance.

“Not unless you grow obstreperous or have any of your nonsense,” said Jack. “I love you too well to harm you,” he added, with a leer that made him more hideously ugly than ever: “but I must have my own way all the same. So just be so kind as to place upon the table the Bank-notes which you have got in the bosom of your gown. It is but fair that I should have a wife who can bring me a dowry--and you must leave it to my generosity,” he went on to say, with a chuckling laugh, “how much I shall settle upon you afterwards.”

While he was thus speaking, Mrs. Mortimer rapidly revolved in her mind all the chances that were for or against her at that moment. Were she to scream and attempt resistance, could she succeed in alarming the neighbourhood before the miscreant would have plunged his dagger into her?--or, indeed, would he have recourse to such an extreme measure at all? These questions she at once decided against herself; and, reverting to her former project of affecting obedience, she thrust her hand into her bosom, dexterously separated a couple of the notes from the rest of the bundle, and threw those two upon the table.

Jack Rily instantly snatched them up; and when he perceived that they were for _a thousand pounds_ each, he could scarcely contain his joy.

Flinging the terrible clasp-knife on the floor, he rushed upon the old woman, who was seized with too sudden and too profound a terror to permit her even to give utterance to the faintest ejaculation--for she thought that he intended to murder her: but her cruel apprehensions fled in another moment when the loathsome monster, throwing his arms about her neck, began to embrace and fondle her as if she were a blooming beauty of seventeen instead of a hideous harridan upwards of sixty. Nevertheless, old and polluted as she was, and inured to all circumstances of disgust as her term of transportation had rendered her, she revolted with a sickening sensation from the pawings and caresses of the hare-lipped wretch who had thus enfolded her in his horrible embrace. She therefore struggled to rid herself of him--to escape from his arms: but he, almost maddened with the joy which the sight of the bank-notes had raised up in his breast, hugged her only the more tightly in proportion as her resistance became the more desperate.

“By heavens! I’ll kiss you again, old gal!” he exclaimed. “I care not how ugly the world may consider you----Be quiet now, can’t you?----to me you’re a paragon of beauty----Perdition! let go of me, you hell-cat----there! now you’re magnificent in your rage--that’s the humour I like to see a woman in----Hey-dey! what’s that?”

And, as he uttered this ejaculation, he suddenly quitted his hold upon Mrs. Mortimer, and pounced upon something that had rolled on the floor.

It was the bundle of Bank-notes, which had fallen from the old woman’s dress during the struggle.

“By Jove! here’s a treasure--a fortune--a King’s ransom!” ejaculated the Doctor, scarcely able to believe his eyes, as he hastily turned over the notes with his hands. “My God! it is impossible!” he cried, his wonderment increasing to such a pitch, that he began to think he must be insane: then, a sudden idea striking him, he turned abruptly towards Mrs. Mortimer, who had sunk back, exhausted and overwhelmed with rage and grief, into the chair. “Ah! I understand it all now,” he said, his voice changing in a moment to the low tone of solemn mystery: “you are a nice old girl, you are! Yes--yes--I understand it at last! These are all queer screens[26]--and you went into the bank to smash[27] some of them. By Jove! it’s glorious.”

Mrs. Mortimer, who was gasping for breath, could make no reply: her mouth was parched--her tongue was as dry as if she had been travelling for hours over a desert without tasting water.

“And yet,” resumed Jack Rily, scrutinising the notes more narrowly still, “these are precious good imitations--too good to be imitations, indeed. I know enough of Bank-notes--aye, and of forged ones too--to see that these are the genuine flimsies. Blood and thunder! what a glorious old wretch you are!” he cried, again surveying her with a joy that was entirely unfeigned and amounted almost to admiration. “I suppose you have committed some splendid forgery. But of course it must be something of that kind,” he added, a sudden reminiscence striking him: “or else you wouldn’t have been so deucedly alarmed when I threatened just now to kick up a row in the streets and attract the notice of the police. So, you perceive, that I was pretty keen in my surmises. I knew you had money concealed in your bosom--and I was equally well convinced you had not obtained it by means that would bear inquiry. However, here it is--in my possession--and it can’t be in safer hands. I’ll just sit down quietly, and count how much there is.”

Thus speaking, the monster picked up his clasp-knife, which he closed and consigned to his pocket; and he next proceeded to inspect the Bank-notes. But when he discovered the enormous sum to which they amounted, his astonishment grew to such an extreme as even to subdue his joy; and, shaking his head slowly, he observed, “This is such a heavy affair that the police will leave no stone unturned to detect the holders of the notes. Whatever we do, must be done at once; and in order that I should be able to judge what course to pursue, you must give me all the particulars of the transaction.”

Mrs. Mortimer was struck by the truth of this observation: for she knew that the moment the forgery was detected, payment of the notes would be stopped, and advertisements announcing the usual caution would be inserted in the newspapers.

“Well, I suppose there is no use in disguising the real truth,” she exclaimed, recovering her self-possession; “and I will tell you all about it in a few words. A certain nobleman----”

“Who is he?” demanded Rily. “Come--speak out plainly.”

“The Marquis of Delmour, since you must know,” returned the old woman.

“And what did he do,” asked the man, impatiently.

“He gave me a cheque for six hundred pounds for a particular service that I rendered him; and he also gave my daughter----”

“Ah! you have got a daughter, eh?” exclaimed Jack Rily. “Is she anything like yourself?”

“She is as beautiful as an angel,” answered Mrs. Mortimer, a scintillation of a mother’s pride flashing at the moment in her bosom: “but as depraved and dissolute as a demoness,” she added almost immediately. “Well, this Marquis of Delmour was wheedled by her out of a cheque for sixty thousand pounds; and though my daughter kept it quiet enough, I found out the secret. So away I sped--back to England I came----”

“Where did all this happen, then?” demanded Jack.

“In Paris--three days ago,” replied Mrs. Mortimer. “On my arrival in London, my course was easy----”

“You may almost say _natural_,” interrupted the Doctor. “I understand the business plainly enough at present. You altered your six hundred pound draft into one for sixty thousand--and you have thus forestalled your daughter?”

“That is precisely how the matter stands,” said the old woman.

“And when is it likely that your daughter will be in London to present _her_ cheque?” asked the Doctor.

“I should say that I had about twelve hours’ start of her,” was the response; “and then, as she would not travel by night--having a handsome young foreigner as her companion--the circumstance of her stopping to sleep on the road would delay her pretty nearly another twelve hours. Besides, she believes me to be still in Paris--she has not the least idea of my sudden return to England; and therefore she has no particular motive to induce her to adopt any extraordinary speed.”

“Well, well,” cried the Doctor, impatiently: “but all this palaver does not answer my question. When do you expect your daughter will reach London?”

“This evening,” replied the old woman: “too late to present her cheque at the bank. And there _are_ means--yes, there are means,” she continued in a musing tone, “which, if skilfully adopted, would compel my daughter to refrain from offering her draft at all, and likewise force her to leave us in undisturbed possession of the money.”

“And those means?” demanded Jack Rily, his eyes brightening.

“Before I explain myself, let us come to a thorough understanding,” said Mrs. Mortimer. “Will you restore me one-half of the amount you now hold in your possession? I am content to abandon the other half to you.”

“Yes, that is a bargain,” answered Jack Rily; “for I see that you do not relish the idea of living with me altogether, and that you will leave me when this matter is properly settled. Is it not so?”

“Well, such is indeed my intention,” responded the old woman.

“Our relative position now stands in this manner,” continued Jack Rily: “there are sixty thousand pounds’ worth of good notes. With all my connexion amongst fences and receivers of such flimsy, I could not manage to obtain gold for more than two or three thousand in the course of the day; and to-morrow morning your daughter may present her cheque, when a discovery will take place, and all the rest of the notes will be useless. As for going over to the continent, and endeavouring to pass them there, the thing would be ridiculous; for the advertisements in the newspapers would put all the money-changers in Europe upon their guard. Thus far, then, the notes are not worth more than two or three thousand pounds to me. But, on the other hand, you say that you have the means of stopping your daughter’s mouth, and compelling her to put up with the loss. In this case, the whole amount of notes becomes available; and therefore we will share and share alike.”

“Then give me my moiety at once,” said the old woman, with greedy impatience.

“No such thing!” ejaculated Rily: “I must have some guarantee that you act properly in this business; and you can have no hesitation in putting your trust in me, because you have had a proof of my good feeling before. I have not forgotten that you saved my life in the struggle with Vitriol Bob; and the same feeling that made me give you half the spoil _then_, will prompt me to act with equal fairness now. You are therefore at liberty to depart when you choose, and to go where you like: the notes will remain in my possession--and when you come back to me with the assurance that you have prevented your daughter from taking any step that may lead to an explosion of the whole business, your share shall be immediately forthcoming. I have now put the matter in the proper light; and with such a good understanding, there can be no quarrelling. As to whether you afterwards choose to become my broom-stick wife, I must leave it entirely to yourself: for though I should be as happy as a king in the possession of your old person and sixty thousand pounds, yet I shall be able to console myself for your loss by means of the thirty thousand that will remain to me.”

During this long tirade, all the first portion of which was delivered in a tone of business-like seriousness, Mrs. Mortimer was hastily reflecting upon the improvement that had so unexpectedly taken place in the aspect of her affairs: for she now found herself at liberty to leave the monster whom she loathed and abhorred, and she had every chance of regaining and being able to make use of the moiety of the Bank-notes.

She accordingly assented to the conditions proposed by the Doctor, leaving the broom-stick marriage “an open question;” and having settled her disordered attire, she took her departure--not however before she had been compelled to submit to another hugging on the part of the hare-lipped wretch whose caresses were so revolting and intolerable.