Part 5

“I was oot very early ae Sunday morning, for however late I’m up on a Saturday, I can never sleep on Sunday morning,” he continued, with a dutiful grin at my remark. “I gaed doon by the Abbey Hill to the Easter Road, and when I was hauf way to Leith I saw a yellow finch flee oot at a dyke where its nest was, and begin flichering along on the grund to draw me away frae the place. Cunnin’ brutes them birds, but I was fly for it, and instead o’ following it, and believing it couldna flee, I stoppit and begoud to look for the nest in the dyke. But before I got forrit I had kind o’ lost the exact place. I searched aboot, wi’ the bird watchin’ me geyan feared-like a wee bit off, and at last I found a hole half filled up wi’ a loose stane. Oot cam’ the stane, and in gaed my haund; but instead o’ a nest I fund a gold watch and chain; and that’s the God’s truth, though I should dee this meenit.”

“Did you mention the finding to any one?”

“No me; I didna even tell my daughter, for I kent if it was fund oot I might get thirty days for keeping it up. I had an idea that the watch had been stolen and planted there, or I might have gaen to a pawnshop wi’ it. It was kind o’ damaged wi’ lying in the dyke, so at last I made up a story and sellt it to Maister Burge.”

“You are good at making up stories, I think?” I reflectively observed.

“I’m thinkin’ there’s a pair of us, Maister M^cGovan,” he readily returned, with a pawky dab at my ribs.

But for his coolness and evident relief at getting the thing off his mind, I should have set down the whole as another fabrication. But when a man begins to smile and joke, it may be taken for granted that he does not think himself in immediate danger of being hanged. His story, however, might have availed him but little had I not chanced to turn up my notes on the case at its earlier stages, and found there the hitherto meaningless words muttered by Daniel O’Doyle. “Starr Road” muttered in sleep might be but a contraction of Easter Road, or be those actual words imperfectly overheard. Then there were the words about something being “hidden safely there,” and the whole tallied so closely that I was at last sure that I was on the right track. These additional gleanings made me revert to my anonymous correspondent in the west. It was scarcely likely that I should be able to trace him; but he spoke in his note of the guilty one being a person or persons outside of himself—known to him. This lessened my interest in him personally, but made me think that if I visited the town I might get hold of O’Doyle himself, which would be quite as good, if not better. I accordingly went to the place, in which there is a public prison, and as a first step called on the police superintendent. An examination of the books at length sent me in the direction of the prison, in which a man answering the description, and having O’Doyle for one of his names, had been confined on a nine months’ sentence for robbery. I was now in high spirits, and quite sure that in the prisoner I should recognise the O’Doyle I wanted; but on reaching the place I found that a more imperative and inexorable officer had been there before me in shape of death. Immediately on getting the answer I made the inquiry, “Did he make any statement or confession before he died?” This was not easily answered, and before it could be, with satisfaction, a number of the officials had to be questioned, and then I found that O’Doyle had been attended, as is usual, in his last moments by a Catholic priest.

This gentleman was still in the town, though not stationed in the Prison, and knowing something of the vows of a priest, I despaired at once of extracting anything from him, but became possessed of a desire to have a look at his handwriting. Accordingly I sent him a polite note requesting him to send me word when he would be at liberty to see me for a few minutes’ conversation. I fully expected to get a written note in reply, however short, but instead I got a message delivered by the servant girl, to the effect that her master was at home, and would see me now. I grinned and bore it, though it is not pleasant to feel eclipsed in cunning by anyone. I went with the girl, and found the priest, a pale, hard-worked looking man, leaning back in his chair exhausted and silent, and certainly looking as if he at least did not eat the bread of idleness. I felt rather small as I introduced myself and ran over the case that had brought me there, he listening to the whole with closed eyes, and a face as immovable as that of a statue. When I had finished there was an awkward pause. I had not exactly asked anything, but it was implied in my sudden pull up, but for a full minute there was no response.

At last he opened his eyes—and very keen, penetrating eyes they were—and, fixing me sternly with his gaze, he said—

“Did you ever come in contact with a Catholic priest before Mr M^cGovan?”

“Frequently.”

“Did you ever know one to break his vows and reveal the secrets of heaven?”

“Never.”

“Do you think one of them would do it if you asked him?”

“I think not.”

“Do you think he would do it if you threatened him with prison?”

“Scarcely.”

“Or with death—say if you had power to tear him limb from limb, or torture every drop of blood from his body?”

“I don’t know—I shouldn’t like to try.”

“Then what do you come to me for?” he sharply continued, with a slight tinge of red in his pale cheeks. “Am I, think you, more unworthy than any other that has yet lived?”

“No, I should hope not,” I stammered; “and I did not come expecting you to reveal what was told you in confession——”

“What then—you wish to know if I wrote that letter maybe?”

“Yes.”

“And you’ll be satisfied that I speak the truth when I answer?”

“Yes.”

“And you’ll ask no more?”

“I’ll ask no more.”

“Then I didn’t. Bridget, show the gentleman out.”

I was so staggered and nonplussed that I was in the street before I had time to ponder his reply. I was convinced then, as I am now, that the priest spoke the literal truth; how then had the letter been written? Certainly not by O’Doyle himself. Was it possible that a third person could have got at the information?

Back I went to the jail, and by rigid questioning discovered that at the time of O’Doyle’s death there was one other person, a delicate man of some education, in the hospital, who complained of pains in the head, and of having grown stone deaf since his incarceration. This man had been set at liberty shortly after, and made no secret of having malingered so successfully as to get all the luxuries of the hospital instead of the hard labour of the other prisoners. There was then an excited and prolonged conversation between this man and the priest I had visited; and as they were of the same faith I have little doubt but the father had bound him down in some way to keep secret what he had chanced to overhear of O’Doyle’s confession. This at least was my theory, and a peculiar flash of the priest’s eyes when I afterwards hinted at the discovery convinced me that I was not far off the truth.

Chisholm, for his bird-nesting experiment, got thirty days’ imprisonment, and Burge, after about a month’s detention, was discharged.

THE STREET PORTER’S SON.

The old street porter appeared at the Central Office one winter morning, but refused to reveal his business to any one but me. I had been delayed a little beyond my usual time by other work, but Corny Stephens patiently sat there the whole time. He appeared to know me, too, for the moment I entered the “reception-room” he rose and deferentially touched his forelock. He was an old man, very thin and bloodless, with poverty shining out of every bit of his meagre clothing and decayed boots. He wore at his lapel the polished badge of a licensed street porter, and over his shoulder had slung a hank of frayed rope, apparently as aged and weak as himself. It is not unlikely that I had seen him often before, but my interest is not so strong in honest folks, and, as he belonged to that healthy majority, I did not remember noticing him particularly. He was blue with cold, but the hand touching his forelock trembled violently, not so much with cold as strong excitement.

“It’s your help I want, sir,” he said, when I had tried to dispel the awe and dread with which he seemed to regard me, “and mebbe I can give you some news that’ll be of use to you; only I’m afeared I might get mixed up in it myself. I’ve been honest for sixty years now, and it would be mighty hard to be mistook for a thafe and a villain now.”

These words put me upon my guard, and while he was speaking them I was reading his face closely. Listening to the specious stories of rogues makes one suspicious of everything. He did not suffer under the ordeal, but I still made no sign, merely asking him to go on.

“Do you know a man called Micky Hill?” he abruptly resumed.

I started a little, for Micky had been in my thoughts more than once lately. I knew him, of course—a convict and ticket-of-leave man, who had already endured two long terms, and who knew me just as well as I did him, and never passed me without an impudent grin, as much as to say, “Your mighty smart arn’t you—why don’t you get hold of me?” Micky had small eyes set deep in his head, and every twinkle of them was full of cunning. I believe those eyes of his irritated me more than the man himself. I hated them from the depths of my soul.

“Yes,” I quietly answered, “what of him?”

“Well, it’s him I’d like to see with your bracelets on,” answered Corny with fearful energy, “to see booked for ten years, as he will be, I’ve no doubt, if you can prove a good case agin him.”

“You’ve quarrelled with him, then?” I remarked, with some surprise at the association of an honest man with a thief.

“Not me,” cried the old porter, with warmth. “Ye don’t think I’d speak to the likes of him? But he’s brought me bitter sorrow, and it’s only fair he should suffer for it. I think I can do that, and do you a good turn at the same time, sur, and him never be a bit the wiser. There was a grocer’s broke into down at Greenside last week, was’nt there? and a lot of brandy and things took?”

“Ah! did he do that?” I cried, for it was in connection with that very case that Micky’s name had cropped up in my mind, coupled with the fear, I confess, that I should never bring the crime home to him. Micky did a deal in shebeening, and who more likely to find a use for strong spirits which cost him nothing? but experience told me that he would never be the dolt to keep the plunder where any connection between it and himself could be traced.

“Will no harm come on me or mine if I tell ye all I know?” tremblingly inquired Corny.

“Had you anything to do with the affair yourself?” I sharply demanded.

“No, by me immortal sowl, no!” cried the old man, “I’d sooner drop dead with starvation than rob any one of a hap’orth. But my son Pat—he’s a labourer, sur, and been out for two months with the frost—he has been too much in Micky’s company—mebbe you’ve seen him—and it’s him I’m afeard for. He got fourteen days just for being in Micky’s company, yet he won’t keep away from the villain. My belief is, Micky has throw’d a charm over him, and Pat’s being led off his feet without the power to help himself. Oh, sur, it’s an awful thought to me and to his sister, that would give the very heart out of her own breast to keep him straight.”

There could be little doubt of his sincerity now, for his whole heart was in his eyes, and he had broken down pitifully as he spoke. I now dimly understood the case, for it was not the first by many dozens which had come in my way.

“Tell me all you know, and I will do what I can for you, though I can promise nothing,” I said, thinking that the son might be involved more than the father was aware.

“I’m content with that, sur,” he gratefully responded, “for I hear there’s thaves that think your word surer than the bank. But it’s not much I do know. There’s an empty place in the court down there where Micky lives. It used to be a coal-house, but nobody uses it now, and the roof’s nigh dropping to pieces. Well, I believe if you go to that place and get the door open, and dig up the dross, you’ll find a good deal of what was tuck out of the grocer’s. I think Micky did the job, but anyhow he has a key that opens that place, and nobody but him ever gets a finger near the stuff.”

“How did you find out all that?” I promptly demanded. “Did your son tell you?”

“Him tell me? Do you think Pat ’ud betray any one, even a black-hearted villain like Micky Hill? No, he’s too honourable, though Micky, I’ll swear, wouldn’t have any such scruples. Must I tell you how I found it out?”

“You’d better, if only to save your own character, and take all suspicion away from yourself.”

“Well, then, his sister Annie heard him speak it all in his sleep.”

I whistled aloud, and the glance I turned on the trembling old man was one more of pity than pleasure. Before the son could have been so full of the knowledge as to be oppressed by it in his dreams, he must have been very deeply involved—probably one of the actual perpetrators—and in that case how could I possibly save him? At the moment I heartily wished that the old man had never come near me. If only he and Micky were in the job, and I nipped up the elder rogue, I knew for certain that he would at once suspect treachery, denounce Pat, and put proof in our hands as well. And then another difficulty immediately occurred to me—even if we searched the cellar and found there the stolen goods, how would that bring conviction on Micky? He had not the shed rented, but had cunningly taken possession unknown to any one, and probably entered it only by night when no one was likely to see him. Altogether the case seemed a knotty problem, and I had to send away Corny with less encouragement and hope than he had looked for. If the old porter had known what awaited him outside, his trembling and fears would have been increased rather than diminished, for in an entry in the close was snugly ensconced the very man he had been denouncing.

Micky did not allow himself to be seen, but followed the old man down to the Cowgate, and there allowed him to be some distance along before he made up to him and addressed him.

“Fine morning, Corny,” he said, with a wicked leer, which struck the old man with a nameless dread.

“Is it, then?” he hotly retorted; “then you’ll see to keep away from me.”

“Where have you been so early?” asked Micky, smiling and looking more wicked than ever.

“Where you’ll——” The Irish blood of the old man was up, and the two words were out before he knew. He checked himself, however, and walked off without a word more.

But the worst was now known to Micky. He now _knew_ that he had in some way, incomprehensible to himself, been betrayed. His suspicions could fall on none but his partner, the porter’s son, and on him he resolved should fall the full brunt of the punishment. He abused himself roundly for taking such a greenhorn into his confidence, but, on the whole, thought that he had so managed matters as to keep his own skin safe. The porter’s son being out of work, was not difficult to find; but Micky was rather surprised to find that his most ingenious hints and questionings did not for a moment disconcert or disturb Pat Stephens. He began to think the labourer more cunning than himself, when in reality the other was a perfect child in comparison. The apparent innocence of Pat only added to Micky’s rage and hatred, and, taking the labourer home with him, he told him vaguely of some one having seen him going to his hide, and pressed upon Pat the key of the cellar, with the request that as soon as it was dark he would go to the shed and bring out certain bottles which Micky was in need of for the concoction of the peculiar “fire water” which he doled out as whisky. Quite unsuspicious, Pat took the key and carried it about with him all day; and late that night, when all was quiet in the court, he went to the shed, unlocked the door, and was busy digging up the stuff when we entered and offered to help him. He dropped the spade at once, and then dropped himself right into the grave of coal dross he had made, where he sat helplessly staring at us, speechless with astonishment and terror. We had been watching the place since nightfall from a safe hide close by, and were as much astonished at our capture as the cowering culprit himself.

I had made sure that none but Micky himself would have the run of that cellar, and was intensely chagrined to find in our clutches only a rather stupid-looking fellow, who had not even the daring to attempt resistance or make a dash for liberty.

“What’s your name?” I demanded, while the others rapidly unearthed the contents of the hide.

“Patrick Stephens,” he nervously answered.

“Good gracious! you don’t mean to say that you are the porter’s son?” I exclaimed, more vexed than I cared to show.

He nodded, but then perhaps conscious that he had said too much, he took refuge in silence. Behold the stupidity of the man; just when speaking would have benefited him he closed his mouth. I asked him what he was doing there; if he had been sent by any one, and how he accounted for some of the bottles bearing the address of a Greenside grocer; but to all these questions he remained perversely dumb. He had not the slightest suspicion that Micky had betrayed him, still less that he owed his capture to his own tongue and his anxious father. His idea was that he had been suspected by us, watched and followed to the place, and thus captured in the ordinary course of events. Finding him so stubborn, I sent him to the Office in charge of the others, leaving a man to guard the plunder till it could be taken away in a barrow, while I went up to Micky’s house and considerably surprised him by telling him to get up and come with me—for the cunning rascal had, for the sake of appearances, got into bed, where he stared at me, the very picture of virtuous innocence.

He showed every one of his yellow teeth in that devil’s grin of his when I sharply repeated the command, and then I inwardly guessed that I should have some trouble in getting him convicted. My hope, however, was strong in the porter’s son, who, I was convinced, was by far the more innocent of the two, so I snapped the bracelets on Micky with apparent zest, and he was locked up till morning, when I again visited Pat, and found him as obdurate as before. I had still one resource—the old porter, and to him I went as soon as I could get away.

His distress—and that of his daughter, who appeared to keep house for them—was overwhelming, and, not unnaturally, the heaviest of their reproaches fell upon me.

“You tuck him away after promising that you would do your best to save him and ketch the other villain!” cried the old man, with bitter tears. “Saints above us! and I’ve been the means of sending me own heart’s blood to prison. Och! och! the curse of Heaven be on me for that, and may the tongue that betrayed him wither in me head!”

“I may save him yet, if you can only get him to speak—if you can get him to denounce Micky. Could you not prove an _alibi_ for the night of the robbery?”

The old man paused in his lamentations to think for a moment, and then honestly confessed that the night of the robbery and that which followed were two on which he was certain his son was not at home. I had therefore no doubt but Pat had actually been engaged in the robbery, which had been executed in a clumsy and haphazard fashion, quite in keeping with the two men in custody. I got the porter to see his son in prison, but the effort was made in vain, for Pat would not open his mouth. Tears, prayers, and entreaties were showered upon him in vain, and the only thing which moved him was his old father lifting his hands to invoke the curse of heaven upon his ungrateful head.

“Don’t, father, dear!—don’t,” he piteously cried, grasping through the bars at the feeble arms of his father as they were about to be upraised; “don’t say the black words, for sure I’ve an oath on me sowl, and I can’t break it!”

“Well, well, poor lad!” and the father struggled no more. “May the Almighty give ye strinth to throw id off;” and so they parted, and the misguided victim went unflinchingly to his trial. There was not the smallest tittle of evidence to connect Micky with the crime, and after a short detention he was liberated. Pat was tried shortly after at the High Court, and sentenced to eighteen months’ imprisonment.

“Oh, Patrick dear! it’s somebody else should be in your shoes this day,” came like a “keen” from among the audience as he was led out; and the cry seemed to unman him a little, for it came from his sister.

Some time after, when the circumstances had faded a little in my memory, I was over in the jail seeing a prisoner who worked near Pat. I noticed the porter’s son, whose head was now closely cropped, and his appearance considerably changed by the prison dress, and, half recognising him, I said dubiously—

“Well, what are you in for?”

“It’s yourself should know that, sur,” he said, with a sad smile. “I’m Patrick Stephens. Could I have a word with you, sur?”

“Yes, if you look sharp about it,” was my answer, for my time had nearly expired.

I expected that he had thought better of the case which had landed him there, and was ready to denounce Micky, but in that I was mistaken. He had not a word to say on that point; his sole concern was for his father and sister.

“When Micky was in on suspicion he found out that it wasn’ me, but my father or my sister, that betrayed the hiding-place,” he said to me in a hurried whisper. “He’s sorry now that I was took, but he’s mad agin them, and has sworn to be even with them. You’ve no idea what a divil he is when he takes it into his head. Now, sur, if you’d only take the hint and watch him and them, for though they are as honest as the babe unborn, he’ll get them into a scrape as sure as he’s sworn it.”

“Ah, it’s easy getting into scrapes,” I significantly rejoined, glancing at his oakum heap and his prison garb; “the difficulty is to get out of them.”

“Sure, I know what ye mane, sur,” he returned, with a slight flush of shame, “but since I’ve been in here I’ve got a mighty load off me sowl, and, if I’m spared to get out, please the Lord, I’ll never take it on again.”

I thought of a certain road being paved with good intentions, but said nothing. There was one chance in a thousand that Pat’s might hold good. Even if the thought only comforted him in his seclusion, a blessing was gained.

I questioned him further on the matter he had placed before me, and learned that the information had reached him through a newly-incarcerated prisoner. I could not but admire through the whole revelation the quick intelligence of Micky in piecing together facts which to anyone else would have indicated nothing. From the mere excited exclamation of old Corny, and that of the sister in the Court-room, he had gathered that it had been intended to trap him and save the porter’s son. He knew that as well as if I had revealed to him the whole particulars of my interview with Corny. I began to envy Micky his quickness. But though he was just the man to thirst for revenge, I did not think that he would interfere with the old street porter, and it is probable I said so to Pat at the time, and his warning would speedily have been forgotten but for the curious events which followed.

A month or two after my interview with Pat his father was accosted while on his stance by a well-dressed man having the appearance of a commercial traveller, and asked to carry a rather heavy portmanteau to a certain address. The job was executed with alacrity, and liberally paid for. A few days later the same man hired Corny, after dark, to carry a box to another part of the town, paid him with the same liberality, and told him he might need him again soon.