Christmas Penny Readings Part 23

"No," said d.i.c.k, suddenly sitting up. "I'll die here. This is good enough for a rogue and a vagabond of a strolling player. But doctor,"

he said, with his eyes almost blazing, "can you cure my complaint?"

"Well, well! we'll see," said the doctor, laying his hand upon poor d.i.c.k's chest.

"No, no; not there, sir," said d.i.c.k. "It's here--here--in my heart, and it's sore about that poor girl and this little one: that's my complaint, not this cough. What are they to do? Where are they to go? Who's to keep them when I'm gone? Not that I've done much for them, poor things."

"d.i.c.k, d.i.c.k," I said, reproachfully.

"My girl!" he says, so softly and tenderly and with such a look, that I was down next moment upon my knees beside him, when he threw one arm round my neck and rested his head again my cheek so loving, so tender, while his other arm was round the little one now fast asleep.

And there we all stayed for a bit; no one speaking, for the doctor stood with his head bent down and his hat off, while the light of the candle shone amongst his silver-looking hair. Two or three times over I saw Balchin and his wife and the others look hard at him, and once Balchin touched him on the sleeve, but he stood still looking on, while poor d.i.c.k lay there with his head upon my shoulder, and me, not crying but confused and struck down, and dazed like with sorrow.

At last every one seemed so still and quiet, that I looked up wondering to see the doctor hold up his hand to the others to be silent, when, whispering to me that he would be back in a few minutes, he hurried away. And still no one moved for perhaps a quarter of an hour, when through being half blind now with the tears that began to come, I could not see the doctor come back; and this time he had something in his hand which he made as though he would give to d.i.c.k, but he shrunk back next moment shaking his head, gave the gla.s.s to Balchin to hold, and then as Mrs Balchin began sobbing loudly, the doctor knelt down beside the bed and said some words in a low tone at first, but getting more earnest and loud as he went on and then he was silent, and d.i.c.k seemed to give a deep drawn sigh.

Then I waited to hear the next sigh, for all was still and quiet; Balchin and his wife stood with their heads bent down, and Mrs Balchin had left off sobbing; the others stood about, one here and one there, and the good doctor was still upon his knees, and I couldn't help thinking how calm and easy poor d.i.c.k's laboured breathing had become, when all at once little Totty began to say some prattling words in her sleep, and then as if some bright little dream was hers she began to laugh out loud in her little merry way, and nestled closer to her father.

All at once I started, for a horrible thought came into my mind, and turning my face I looked as well as I could at poor d.i.c.k's eyes. The light was very dim and I could only see that they were half open, while there was a quiet happy smile upon his lip. Then I eagerly held the back of my hand to his mouth to feel his breath, but there was nothing.

I felt his heart--it was still. I whispered to him--

"d.i.c.k! d.i.c.k! speak to me," and I fancied there was just another faint sigh, but no answer--no reply--for with his arms round all he loved and who loved him on this earth, he had gone from us--gone without me fancying for a moment it was so near. And then again for a moment I could not believe it, but looked first at the doctor, and then at first one and then another, till they all turned their heads away, when with a bitter cry I clasped him to me, for I knew poor d.i.c.k was dead.

CHAPTER TWENTY ONE.

A SPIRIT OF THE PAST.

Of course they were--the good old times, or, as Macaulay has it, "the brave days of old." Things are not now as they used to be; and mind, O reader, these are not my words, but those of a patriarch. Things are not as they used to be; the theatres even have not the casts now that they had fifty years since; those were the fine old coaching times, when team after team started from the old Post-office in style. There were beaux and bucks, and men of spirit then--men who could dress, and spent their money as it should be spent. Gambling, duelling, and such spirited affairs were common, and really, there can be no doubt of it, times are altered.

I am foolish enough to think for the better--but then I am only a unit,--and I think so in spite of the incessant mess the railway, gas, water, telegraph, pneumatic, and all the other companies are making of our streets. One cannot help admiring our monster hotels, gigantic railway schemes, palatial warehouses, etcetera, etcetera, but then we miss many of our delightful old inst.i.tutions. Where are the dustmen's bells of our childhood? Surely those polished articles in our railway stations, always reposing upon a wooden block when one is at a distance, but which our approach seems to be the signal for the "stout porters" to seize and jangle harshly in our ears--surely those are not the "bells, bells, bells" so familiar of old. Where are the organs with the waltzing figures turning round and round to the ground-up music of Strauss or Weber, then in their popularity? Where the people who so horrified our diaper pinafore-encased bosom by walking upon stilts to the accompaniment of drum and Pan pipes? Where the ancient glories of Jack in the Green and Guido Fawkes? Where are numbers of our old street friends who seem gone, while Punch alone seems immortal, and comes out yearly with fresh paint covering his battered old phiz? Certainly we had in the street "twopence more and up goes the donkey," though no man had the good fortune to be present when the twopence more was arrived at, and the miserable asinine quadruped was elevated upon the ladder and balanced upon its owner's chin--certainly we had that; but after all said and done, how our acrobats have improved, how much brighter are the spangles, how much better greased the hair and developed the muscles.

Look at that tub feat, or the man balanced upon the pole, of course an improved donkey trick. Look at--look at the length of thy article, oh!

writer.

It seems only yesterday, but some years have pa.s.sed now since we used to lie in bed of a cold, dark winter's morning, and listen to the prolonged rattle of the sweep's brush upon some chimney-pot far on high, and then hear the miserable little fellow's doleful "halloo, halloo, halloo," by way of announcement that he had achieved his task, and had head and shoulders right out of the pot. And it seems only yesterday, too, that, by special favour, our household Betty allowed me to descend and see the sweeps do the kitchen chimney, when I stood trembling in presence of our blackened visitors and the smoke-jack, and then saw the great black pall fastened before the fireplace with three forks, when the sooty boy covered his head and face with a cap, grinning diabolically at me before he eclipsed his features, and then by the light of the blackened tallow candle I saw him disappear behind the cloth.

That was quite enough, and I could stand no more, but turned and fled upstairs, feeling convinced that he would never come down again.

And it really was but yesterday, comparatively speaking, when, in the depth of winter, a few days before Christmas, Mrs Scribe and self were staying at a friend's house in Lower Bleak Street, Grimgreen Square, close by Glower Street, North. I had a cold whose effect was to make me insufferably hot and feverish, and as I lay in bed, somewhere about what seemed the middle of the night, by which I mean the middle of one's sleeping night, not twelve o'clock, when one has just plunged into bed-- about the middle of the night, while I was dreaming of being where there were rows upon rows of lights, through which I was being somehow propelled at the risk of being dashed against an indescribable object, while my hands were apparently swelling out to a large size, and I was in a wild, semi-delirious dream, from which it was a charity to wake me, I felt my arm roughly grasped, and a well-known voice whispered in my ear--

"Are you awake?"

As soon as I could collect myself and make sure that I really was in the required state, I said, "Yes." But that was not until some few seconds had pa.s.sed.

"Only listen, dear," there's some one in the room, the voice whispered again in an agitated manner.

"Pooh, nonsense," I said perversely, "I know that. There's been some one all night." And then I stopped short, for though I knew that I had fastened the door when we came to bed, I could hear a gentle rustling noise, as of some one in a silk dress slowly gliding about the room very slowly, and then coming to a stop, and apparently agitating the robe, when again the rustling began, and it appeared just opposite the foot of our bed.

"What shall we do?" gasped Mrs Scribe in a smothered voice, from beneath the clothes.

I didn't know, so of course I could not tell her. I knew what I ought to do, which was to have leaped boldly out of bed, and grappled the intruder, but then the rustling was like that of a silk dress, and if a ghost, of course it was of the feminine gender, and one could not help studying decorum.

"Hadn't you better get up and see what it is?" said Mrs S, accompanying the remark with a touch from her elbow.

"I'm in such a perspiration, I daren't stir," I whispered. "Remember what a cold I have." And how I blessed that cold just then, for to a man not too brave in his const.i.tution, it did seem such a neat creephole, for if one is no hero to his valet, one likes to be somebody in the eyes of a wife. But still I must confess to a horrible dread of ghosts, owing no doubt to the fact, that in our old house in Pimlico, where I dwelt till the age of five, there was a huge black bogie who had his habitat in the cellar, and though I never saw him, I was a.s.sured of his existence upon the competent authority of both maids, and consequently always had a wholesome dread of the coal-scuttle and the coals, over which he must have walked.

"But what shall we do?" whispered Mrs Scribe again. "You really must get out, dear."

Which was likely, wasn't it, to jump out of bed in the dark on purpose to attack an unseen form in a rustling silk dress, creeping and gliding about apparently by the wall? Why, to have attacked a ghost one could have seen would have been bad enough, but in the dark when it could take one at such disadvantage, it was not to be thought of, so I said by way of compromise--

"Stop a minute," and there I lay listening to the horrible, creeping, gliding, rustling noise. Ah! I could see it all plainly enough in my imagination. We were in one of the old houses of the past century, and here no doubt there had been a lady murdered after betrayal, and concealed behind the wainscot. And now I remembered a peculiar smell there was in the place when we entered it, a smell that I could not name then, but which I know now, from having experienced it in the British Museum--it was a mummy. There it was, all as plain as could be, a tall slight figure in a brocaded silk dress extended with hoops, short sleeves, and long lace tr.i.m.m.i.n.gs hanging over the soft well rounded arms; and there she was with her hair built right up, and secured by a great comb, slowly gliding along by the wall, not on the floor, but some feet up, and slowly rising higher and higher towards the ceiling.

All at once I fancied she turned her face to me, and, horror of horrors, it was fleshless--nothing but the gaping sockets of the eyeb.a.l.l.s, and the grinning white teeth of a skull, and then I could bear no more, but tried to cover my eyes with my hands, but found they did not need the cover as the clothes were already to a certain extent over them. I solemnly protest, however, that this must have been the act of Mrs Scribe, for I could not have done such a thing.

This convinced me that I could not have seen the figure, so I raised myself upon my elbow, urged thereto by the words of Mrs S, who exclaimed--

"Do pray get up, dear, or I shall faint."

"I wish you would," I muttered to myself, but then, thinking of the cruelty of the remark, I added, "or go to sleep," and then I tried to pierce the thick darkness, but found that I was unable even to distinguish the parts of the bedstead, and there, all the while, was the noise, "rustle, rustle, rustle"--then a stoppage, and a sound as if a hand beat against the wall, and at last the rustling quite ceased, and was succeeded by a peculiar sc.r.a.ping sound, at times quite loud, and then dying away, or stopping, and seeming as if it was not in the room at all.

"Is it gone?" whispered Mrs S, and then, as I did not answer, and she could not hear any noise, sitting up in bed by my side, "Oh! how dreadful it is--isn't it, dear?" she whispered. "Pray do get up and see what it can be."

The catarrh had made me so weak, and preyed so upon my nerves, that I was obliged to take refuge again under my cold, and plead perspiration and sudden check, and then, with the exception of the grating noise, all seemed quiet; and I was about thinking of lying down again, when "rustle, rustle," came the sound again, and Mrs S collapsed, that is to say, sank beneath the clothes, while I--well I _didn't_ leap out of bed, and try to grapple with our nocturnal visitant. I knew there were matches upon the table, and I remembered exactly where the candle stood, but I put it to the reader, who could get out of bed and try to light a candle when there was a ghost in the room in a brocaded silk dress, rustling about from place to place, and seeming as if the floor was no necessity at all, for sometimes the noise came from far up, and sometimes from low down; and at last, as I sat there in a regular Turkish Bath, minus the shampooing, it seemed that the tall figure I imagined to be there gliding about by the wall grew shorter and shorter until but a foot high, then a few inches, and at last it was upon a level with the floor, and then the noise grew fainter and fainter, and at last was gone entirely, leaving a deep silence as intense as the darkness which closed us in upon all sides.

With what a sigh of relief I fell back in the bed, and exclaimed--

"She's gone?"

"Then get up and light the candle, dear," exclaimed Mrs S; but suffering as I was from catarrh, I might have made myself worse--at all events, such a proceeding would have been imprudent--so I lay quite still, thinking that, perhaps, after all, it was but a delusion and a snare, and that I might be attacked as soon as I got out of bed; or even if the ghost were gone, might she not come back again?

It was of no use though. I fought hard, but some women are so powerful in their arguments; and before ten minutes had pa.s.sed, I was standing s.h.i.+vering by the dressing-table, fumbling about after the matches, which I could not find until I had knocked over the candlestick and a scent-bottle, and then put my foot upon one of the broken pieces. Then, when I opened the box and took hold of a match, it would come off all diabolical and phosph.o.r.escent upon my fingers, but no light could I get.

Sometimes it was the wrong end I was rubbing upon the sand-paper; sometimes the head came off, and I could see it s.h.i.+ning like a tiny star upon the carpet. The beastly things would not light upon the looking-gla.s.s, nor yet upon the table; but after I can't say how many tries, I managed to get a light, though it went out again in an instant, and there I stood trembling and expecting to be clutched by a cold hand or to be dragged back.

Light at last though, for, drying my damp hands as well as I could, I tried again by rubbing the match upon the paper of the wall, and then, though the candle would not ignite with the extinguisher upon it, yet I managed to get it well alight at last, and then tremblingly began to search the room.

The door was fast, and at the first glance there was nothing to be seen anywhere; but I examined behind the curtains, beneath the bed, in the cupboard, and, as a last resource, up the chimney, and found--nothing.

"Why, it was fancy," I said, quite boldly, putting down the candle upon the dressing-table, and looking at my watch, which, for the moment, I made sure was wrong, for it pointed to seven.

"Don't put out the candle," said Mrs S, and I left it burning; but I had hard work to make her believe it was so late.

"But not another night will I stop," she exclaimed. "I could not bear it, for my nerves would be completely shattered if I had to put up with this long. The place must be haunted."

Hot water and daylight put a stop to the dissertation which we had upon the subject, and soon after--that is to say, about nine o'clock--we made our way to the breakfast-parlour, where our host and hostess did not appear for another quarter of an hour, and then it was nearly half an hour more before we began breakfast, on account of delays in the kitchen relating to toast, eggs, bacon, hot water, and other necessaries for the matutinal repast.

"You see, it happened so unfortunately," said our hostess; "but I'm sure you will look over it, as we wanted to be all clear for Christmas-day."

"Oh, don't name it," said Mrs S; "we are often later than this, for Mr S will keep such late hours, especially if he is interested in anything he is reading or writing."

"I'm sure I need not ask if you both slept comfortably," said our hostess, "for you both look so well."