Part 2

The moment the grasp was made, The Gander ran like the wind, and got clear away by Low Calton and the Back Canongate, and never halted till he landed breathless but triumphant at the bedside of the sleeping Yorky. His first business was to resume his own clothing, clean the paint from his nose, and take the wig from his head. Then he took the watch, with the fragment of gold chain still attached, and thrust it as far as his arm could reach in under the mattress on which lay the virtuous form of the sleeping Yorky. This done, he pocketed the red wig, laid Yorky’s clothes at the bedside beside his muddy boots, in some confusion, as if they had been taken off somewhat hurriedly, and then left the house, with the pleasing consciousness of having done all he could to help Fate to do the right thing to a great rascal.

While this was being done, the robbed man had made his way to the Central Office to report his loss. He had got a full view of the robber’s face and dress—or at least imagined he had—and went over the details with such minuteness and fidelity that I turned to some one and said in surprise—

“Surely it can’t be Yorky at his old games already, and he was only let out this morning? It’s just his style.”

I then went over one or two of Yorky’s peculiar features, to all of which the gentleman so eagerly responded in the affirmative that I thought it could do no harm at least to look for Yorky, with a view to bringing him face to face with the victim. I should have found him at once if I had gone to his den, but that was the very last place I thought he would go near when in danger of being taken. I therefore went over all his haunts, but in vain. No one had seen him, and several told me of the flight of his wife, which gave me the idea that Yorky, finding himself “on the rocks,” and deserted, had committed the robbery with great audacity, and then left the city for good with the proceeds in the wake of his partner. It was quite late at night when I thought of his garret in the Canongate. I believe it was M^cSweeny’s suggestion that I should go there—at least he always insists that it was, and possibly he is right, for the way in which Yorky had grinned at his damaged face had made my chum certain that the hands which inflicted the injuries were before him, and M^cSweeny was now eager for revenge.

There was no answer but snores to our knock, so we opened the door and entered.

“How sound the divil sleeps,” said M^cSweeny, with a sceptical grin, as he struck a light. “Sure a fox himself couldn’t do it better.”

Yorky refused to wake with a word, and even when violently shaken by both of us only half opened his eyes, and uttered some sleepy imprecations. At length, getting impatient, M^cSweeny lifted a dish containing water and emptied it over Yorky’s face, which startled him into a wakefulness and some vigorous protests.

“What do you want now?” he growled at last, when he was able to recognise us.

“I want to know where you were at half-past three o’clock to-day?” was my significant reply. “On with your things and trudge. You’ve got drunk too soon—you’ve overdone it. Man, see, there’s the slush off your boots all over the floor.”

“I haven’t been across the door since morning,” he solemnly protested, on which M^cSweeny somewhat savagely remarked that “we believed him every word.”

While M^cSweeny was helping him to put on his clothes, and replying to his protests, I made a search through the room, and finally drew out from under the mattress the stolen watch and fragment of gold chain.

Yorky stared as it was held up before his eyes, and became very sober indeed.

“I never saw that in my life before; somebody must have put it there,” he cried, with the most vigorous swearing, all of which we listened to with great merriment and marked derision.

“I thought we should sober you before long,” I said to him, as I fastened his wrist to my own. “We’ll see what the owner of the watch says to it.”

The owner of the watch had a great deal to say, all of which astonished Yorky beyond description. The watch and fragment of chain he identified at a glance, and Yorky as well. He swore most positively that Yorky was the man who attacked him—he had had too good a view of the rascal’s features and dress to have a moment’s doubt on the matter. Yorky, as he listened to it, was a picture to behold. He scratched his head in the most solemn manner imaginable, and muttered to himself—

“I _was_ very tight, but I never yet did anything in drink that I couldn’t remember when sober. I can’t make it out at all; but I know I’m as innocent as a lamb.”

A grin ran round the room as he uttered the words, and, after a word with the superintendent, the “lamb” was led off to the cells. He was next day remitted to the High Court of Justiciary. I strongly advised him to plead guilty, but the wilful man would have his own way, and took the opposite course.

Then the Fiscal pointed out that Yorky had been often convicted of the same crime, and produced a list of these, and demanded the heaviest penalty. The judge promptly responded to the appeal by sentencing Yorky to fourteen years’ penal servitude. As he was being removed, a voice among the audience behind exclaimed—

“Ah, Yorky, what a time it’ll be before you can make me lose another race!”

The voice came from The Gander. So elated was that worthy over the success of his scheme that he took to boasting of the feat, and giving details to his companions, and thus the story eventually reached my ears. Shortly after, when taking The Gander for helping himself to a bank-note out of a coat pocket in one of the actors’ dressing-rooms, I twitted him about depriving the sporting world of such a treasure as Yorky. He denied the whole, but with a twinkle of superlative cunning and delight in his eyes.

“I never before believed it possible to overreach a Yorkshire man,” I suggestively remarked.

“A Yorkshire man?” cried The Gander, with great contempt; “if he’d been twenty Yorkshire men rolled into one, I could have done him.”

I think he spoke the truth.

BILLY’S BITE.

The boy whose name I have put at the head of this paper was looked upon as a timid simpleton, perfectly under the power of the two men to whom his fate was linked. If Billy had been a dog they could not have looked upon him with more indifference—he was so small, and thin, and insignificant, and above all so quiet and submissive, that they felt that they could have crushed him at any moment with a mere finger’s weight.

Rodie M^cKendrick, the first of his masters, was a big fellow with an arm like a giant, whose standing boast was that it never needed more than one drive of his fist to knock the strongest man down. Rodie was a housebreaker, who filled up his spare time by counterfeit coining and “smashing,” or passing, the same. The other, his companion and partner, Joss Brown by name, I can best describe as a comical fiend—that is, he always did the most cruel acts with a grin or a smile, joking away all the while about the wriggles or agony of his victim, as if it was the best fun in the world to him. Joss, I believe, fairly delighted in the sufferings of others, and would have reached the height of happiness had he been appointed chief torturer in an inquisition. He was an insignificant-looking wretch, but an extraordinarily swift runner. These two had settled in Glasgow, for the benefit of that city, and Billy Sloan was their spaniel and slave. There was another spaniel and slave in the person of Kate, Billy’s sister, but as she was in bad health she did not count for much. The two children had been left to Rodie by their mother, a Manchester shop-lifter, whom he had brought to Scotland with him, and managed to hurry out of the world shortly after.

They were not his own children, therefore, and that fact encouraged him to deal with them as he pleased. Kate was ten, and Billy nearly nine, and both were small and weakly, so Rodie’s treatment of them was not the kindest in the world. Kate’s ill health had arisen from that treatment. She had bungled in the passing of some pewter florins made by Rodie and Joss, and not only nearly got captured—which could have been forgiven—but had almost got these two worthies into trouble as well. It was a narrow escape, and Rodie thought best to impress it on her memory by first knocking her down with one tap of his big fist, and then kicking her ribs till she fainted. Billy crouched in a corner, clasping his hands, and looking on pale as death, and with his eyes fixed steadily on Rodie’s face. Joss, who was looking on in exuberant delight, noticed the peculiar look, and said—

“Look at the other whelp; he looks as if he could bite, if he’d only teeth in his head.”

“Oh, him? Poh!” grunted Rodie in supreme contempt, as he rested from his task; but Joss could not resist the temptation, and reproved Billy’s look by sinking his nails into the boy’s ear, and then shaking him about till Billy thought that either the ear or the head must come off.

Joss made jokes all the while, and then went back to his supper and his whisky-drinking with fresh zest. Billy crouched in the corner, watching the slow breathing of his senseless sister till he saw that Rodie and Joss were considerably mollified by eating and drinking. Then he crept forward and lifted Kate from the floor, and bore her into a little closet off the room, in which they both slept. Kate moaned a little on being moved, but it took an hour’s persistent efforts on Billy’s part to bring her back to consciousness, and then he was almost sorry he had restored her, for she suffered dreadful agony where Rodie’s iron-toed boots had been at work.

It is possible that some of her ribs were broken,—the dreadful pains and the after-effects all point to that conclusion,—but, though the whole night was spent in sleepless agony by Kate, she was forced to rise next day and attend to her two masters. Kate was the housewife; and though Billy would willingly have undertaken her duties for a time, the comical fiend Joss would not allow it, and insisted, with many jokes, on pulling her out of bed by the ear, with his nails, as usual, and then goading her on to every task which his ingenious brain could suggest as likely to aggravate her trouble.

The children had no idea of resenting this treatment, or of running away, or of anything but their own utter dependence upon these men; and they longed with all the strength of their young minds for the happy moment which should see Rodie and Joss either senseless with drink or out of the house. It happened, however, that the men were alarmed at their narrow escape of the day before, and had decided to keep out of sight for a day or two; so the children had a weary time of agony and secret tears. At night, when clasped in each other’s arms in the hole under the slates which was their sleeping place, they sympathised and communed, and mingled their bitter tears; but Kate’s dreadful sufferings did not abate much. As weeks passed away she grew shadowy and pale, and a bad cough afflicted her incessantly, so much so that Joss was often compelled to rise out of bed in the night-time and sink his nails into her ears, or stick a long pin into her arm, or wrench a handful of hair out of her head by the roots to induce her to desist, and give him some chance of enjoying his much-needed repose. And the jokes he showered on her and Billy on these occasions would have filled a book. One day both men were providentially out of the house, and Kate, sitting by the fire with her face looking strangely pinched, and her eyes big and shiny, while Billy cooked the dinner by her directions, pressed her hand on her breast, and said to the boy—

“Oh, Billy, is there nothing that would take away this awful pain?”

Billy stopped his stirring at the pot and reflected. His knowledge was exceedingly limited, and his ideas did not come fast at any time; but after a little his face brightened, and he said briefly—

“Yes—I know—medicine.”

“Are you sure?”

Billy scratched his head. He wasn’t sure, but he thought so.

“Then where could we get some?” was Kate’s next query.

They both knew of the chemists’ shops, but to go to them required money. At length they remembered of some one in the rookery getting medicine and doctor’s advice at the dispensary, and, setting the dinner aside, they decided to slip out of the house, and see what could be done at that blessing to the ailing poor. When they got to the place, and their turn came, Kate went in with great trepidation before a couple of doctors and some students, and explained that she was troubled with a cough and pains in her breast and side. Dozens more were waiting, so there was little time to spare upon each.

“What brought it on?” the doctor asked when he had hastily sounded her lungs. “Caught cold, I suppose?”

Kate blushed and nodded. She did not care to reveal all she had suffered at the hands and feet of Rodie, or she would have told the doctor that far from having caught cold she had caught it very hot indeed. A bottle of medicine was quickly put up and labelled, and Kate was free to depart.

Billy was in high spirits, and danced and pranced all the way home, quite sure that the magic elixir which was to banish all pain from Kate’s poor breast was in the bottle she carried. When they got home they found to their great relief that the house was still empty, and after Kate had taken a spoonful of the medicine they hid the bottle away under their bed, lest the comical fiend should jokingly throw it out at the window. The medicine thus applied for and taken in stealth had the effect of soothing the pain somewhat and easing the cough, but it did not stop the decay of Kate’s lungs. She got weaker and thinner, till at last even the comical fiend confessed his ingenuity and skill in forcing her out of bed quite exhausted and at fault. Kate spent most of her time in bed in the hole under the slates, while Billy became housewife and nurse combined. Strange thoughts came into her head, and half of the time she was in a hazy dream, through which she saw little but Billy’s eager face as he tended, and nursed, and soothed, and consoled, and tried every device for keeping the comical fiend out of the hole. One morning, while Rodie and Joss were still snoring in bed, Kate was more wide awake than she had seemed for a long time, and startled Billy, as she had often done of late, with one of her odd questions—

“Wouldn’t it be nice, Billy, if I was to fall asleep, and sleep on and never wake?”

Billy stared at her and tried to realise the thought.

“It wouldn’t be nice for me,” he said at last, “for I couldn’t get speaking to you. You’d be the same as dead.”

“Well, what becomes of folks when they’re dead?” pursued Kate. “I heard a man say once that there’s another world they go to, all bright and beautiful, where there’s no pain. I’d like to be there, if there’s such a place.”

Billy didn’t think there was such a place—at least, he had never heard of it, and anyhow he did not wish Kate to die. His heart gave a great pang as he thought for the first time of what it would be to be left in the world—alone—without Kate, and he choked and gulped and would have cried, if it had not been that he did not wish to excite or alarm her.

“But, Billy, I sometimes in my dreams see a hole in the ground, with a light shining through from the other side,” persisted Kate. “I see it often, and always want to go into it.”

“There ain’t no such hole,” said Billy, sturdily and determinedly.

“There may be if I die and am put in the ground,” said Kate, wearily. “Sometimes I’m so tired that I can hardly wake up again. But, Billy, how would I find the road to the other place if I should fall asleep and not wake again? I’ve heard it’s not easy found, and I think it’s only a place for good folks, and we’re not that, you know.”

“That’s true,” said Billy, “so you needn’t bother your head about going to that place; you’re better beside me. You’d never find it; I know you wouldn’t.”

“That’s what I’m afraid of,” said Kate, with dreadful earnestness. “I’m afraid I’ll be left wandering about in the dark at the other side. I’ve heard that there’s a man with a light shining out of his head walking about ready to take folks’ hands and guide them, but he’s a kind of an angel, and would never look at me. Isn’t it a pity that Rodie kicked so hard? That’s what has done it all. And now I’m always sinking. I often catch myself up when I’ve sunk about half-way through the world, and grip on to your hand just to keep myself here, but if I get much weaker I’ll not be able to do that.”

Billy clenched his teeth and hands, and said—

“Yes, Rodie did it all. He called me a dog the other day, and maybe I am, for I feel like biting him. Yes, I’ll bite him some day, when I’m big enough.”

“Could you not help me, Billy?” said Kate, after a long silence. “I’m afraid to go there without knowing something of the road. Couldn’t you get some one to tell me how to do when I get through the hole?”

“I tell you there ain’t no such hole; and don’t you speak about it, for I do-o-o-n’t like it,” sobbed Billy, almost in anger; “but if there was, I’d be willing glad to go into it to find the road for you,” he added, more lovingly, as he noted the distressed look which gathered on her pinched face. “Maybe you need a new kind of medicine. I’ll ask them to-day when I’m at the dispensary.”

Billy did ask, and in such a way that the doctor’s attention was roused, and he whispered a few words to one of the students, who put on his hat and kindly told Billy that he was going home with him. The student was a tall man, and had difficulty in getting into the hole where Kate lay, but when he did, and looked into her pinched face and brilliant eyes, and listened to her quick, gasping breath, he merely gave his head a slight shake, and knelt down by the bedside to take her thin hand tenderly in his own. He had been very merry and chatty with Billy on the way, but now he was grave and solemn, and scarcely spoke a word.

“Will she be better soon?” asked Billy at last, when the silence had almost sickened him.

The student looked down on the white features of the sick girl, and said softly—

“Yes—very soon.”

There was another painful silence, and then Kate dropped off into slumber, with her hand resting trustfully in that of the student. Then the gentleman softly disengaged his hand, and motioned Billy out of the hole.

“Where’s your father or mother?” he gravely asked, for the room was empty.

“Not got any—mother’s dead,” said Billy. “Rodie looks after us,” and his hands and teeth clenched, as they generally did now when Rodie was in his thoughts, or at his tongue’s end.

“Then I should like to see Rodie for a minute,” said the student with the same pitying look in his eyes, which Billy could not understand at all. “Could you find him now?”

No, no, Billy could not do that; and did not know when Rodie would be at home, or where he was likely to be found. The student looked round the miserable hovel, and sighed and shook his head, and then left. He had ordered no medicine, he had said nothing about Kate, except that she was to be better very soon, yet Billy felt a vague uneasiness and distrust. The house seemed oppressively quiet, and Kate’s slumber unusually deep. What if she should sleep on and never wake?

Billy crept into the hole again, and sat down on the floor beside the bed to listen intently to every breath Kate drew, holding her hand softly the while to make sure that she did not slip away from him as she slept.

“Oh, if Rodie had only kicked me instead!” he thought for the hundredth time. “A boy is more able to stand kicks, and Rodie’s so strong—he’d kick anybody right through the world, whether there was a hole or not.”

Late in the afternoon Rodie and the comical fiend came in boisterous and gleeful to dinner. They had been unusually successful in passing some bad florins, and had invested some of the proceeds in drink, part of which they had brought home with them to make a night of it, and laughed consumedly over the manner in which they had cheated one of their victims.

Billy served them passively, and then, unable to taste food himself, he crept quietly back to watch Kate. The comical fiend made some splendid jokes, having Billy for their subject, but for once Billy was undisturbed, for he did not hear them. He sat on the floor holding Kate’s hand, and sometimes he put his other arm softly round her neck, lest his hold should not be strong enough to keep her by him.

The men got very noisy and uproarious; Rodie banged the table with tumblers and the bottle, and shouted and stamped his feet, and then the comical fiend, at his own request, favoured the company with several songs.

One smash rather louder than the rest caused Kate to start and open her eyes. She looked up in Billy’s face steadily for some moments without moving, and the expression was so strange that in alarm he cried—

“Kate, Kate! don’t you know me?”

There was no immediate answer. There was in the slates immediately above them a single pane of glass, which gave light to the closet, and that pane now showed a deep red square of the crimson sky. Kate’s eyes wandered to the pane, and became fixed for some moments.

“What’s—that?” she whispered at last, with a strange trembling eagerness.

“It’s only the winder,” answered Billy, a little scared.

“No, it isn’t; it’s the hole you go through into the other world,” said Kate joyfully. “Billy, dear, I can’t stay any longer. I’m going through!”

Billy threw both his arms around her slight form, and rained his tears upon her face. At the same moment there was a chorus of gleeful shouts and table-smashing like thunder in the adjoining room. It was the comical fiend applauding his own song. Kate continued to gaze steadily at the crimson pane in the roof with a smile brightening on her face.

“I wish—oh, I wish there had been somebody to tell me what to do at the other side,” she said at last in a whisper so low that Billy could scarce catch it. “But maybe somebody will hold out a hand to me. I’ll keep feeling about for it. It’s growing darker. Am I going through? and is the light only at the door?”

“No, its almost night, and Rodie’s lit the candle,” said Billy. “Do you hear me, Kate? You’re awful dreamy and queer—I’m saying it’s almost night.”

“Night! night!” feebly and hazily breathed Kate. “Good-night.”

Her lips stood still, and her eyes, though fixed on the crimson pane, were strange and big and unearthly. Billy stared at them in awe, and then moved a hand quickly before them to break the steady stare and draw it to himself. There was no response. Her eyes remained fixed on the pane.

“Kate! Kate!” he cried in a scream of alarm.

A slight spasm—almost shaping into a smile—crossed the pinched features; the eyes gazed unwinkingly at the pane—the breath came and went in long-drawn sighs—paused—came again—then paused for ever. Kate had slipped through to another world, where her feeble and groping hand would surely be gently taken by a Guide who Himself knew all suffering and temptation and weakness that can afflict frail humanity, and who will surely be as pitiful to the benighted savages of our land as of any other.

Billy screamed and wept, and threw himself on the still form; and at length even the comical fiend, who had got up on the table to execute a flourishing hornpipe, became annoyed and got down to put a stop to the unseemly disturbance. Rodie, too, who became stupid and sullen with drink just as his partner became lively, roused himself sufficiently to stagger across the room towards the hole, vowing that if he could only trust himself to the support of one foot he would use the other in stopping Billy’s howling.

“Kate stares up, and won’t move or speak to me,” cried Billy in gasps, as soon as he was conscious of the nails of the comical fiend almost meeting in his ear.