Bidwell's Travels, from Wall Street to London Prison Part 18

"I have since received, thanks to the strenuous and prompt action of the British Minister at Munich, a very ample apology in writing for the blunder that had been committed. It was signed by the Burgermeister of the city, and as the intelligence of this worthy seems to be equaled by his simplicity, he sends me a safe pa.s.s to protect me in my further travels, in case Warner should again be considered the same as Warren. I remain, sir, your obedient servant,

"CHARLES W. C. WARNER, "Ex-Sheriff, London and Middles.e.x

"I now return to my narrative. In the second-cla.s.s compartment where I sat were two burly, loud-talking, well-informed farm proprietors, one of whom had imbibed a little too freely of the native distillation. The sober one had just finished reading a column article on the 'Great Bank Forgery' to his lively companion, who at length turned and addressed me.

I answered him politely in broken French, and he then went on to give his opinion of the bank affair, as nearly as I can remember, as follows:

"'You, being a Frenchman, don't understand about our great bank; but I tell you those Yankees did a clever thing when they attacked that powerful inst.i.tution. The one they have got penned up here in Ireland can't possibly escape; indeed, according to the newspapers, he is already in the hands of the police. I am almost sorry to hear it, for in getting the best of that bank so cleverly the rascal deserves to get off; and see, here is a description of him.'

"I looked at the paper and saw that it was a fair general outline of my appearance, even to my ulster which I had with me in the valise, and the Scotch cap which was in my pocket. Before we reached Drogheda I had explained to one of my new friends, in broken French, that, owing to my ignorance of the English language, I had purchased a wrong ticket, and being liable to make a similar mistake, should feel obliged if he would take the trouble to procure me a ticket at that station. He readily a.s.sented, and by this means I procured it without exposing myself. The hunt for me was becoming so extremely hot that I dared not show myself again at a ticket office; and if I should be found on a train ticketless that fact might lead to closer scrutiny--the rule in that country being that every pa.s.senger must be provided with a ticket before entering a car.

"The train arrived in Belfast at 9 o'clock, and I at once took a cab to the Glasgow steamer. It was very dark, and I went on board un.o.bserved, two hours before the time of departure. Going down into the saloon cabin, I saw the purser sitting near the entrance, to whom I said: 'Parlez vous Francais?' He shook his head. I then asked in jargon for 'une billet a Glasgow.' Surmising what I wished, he gave me a ticket, putting on it the number of my berth.

"Expecting to be followed, I had taken that instant precaution of impressing on the purser's mind that I was a Frenchman. I pa.s.sed into the washroom, just opposite where the purser sat, washed myself and brushed my hair. Just at this moment I heard steps descending the cabin stairway, then the words:

"'Purser, a cab just brought a man from the Dublin train. Where is he?'

"'Oh, you mean the Frenchman,' replied the purser; 'he's in the washroom.'

[Ill.u.s.tration: ONE WHO HAS BEEN ROBBED IDENTIFYING THE THIEF AT NEWGATE.]

"While this was pa.s.sing I had put on my silk hat and taken up my valise, and was standing before the gla.s.s (a la Francais) taking a final view of my toilette, and snapping off some imaginary dust and lint, as the two detectives stepped in, and after looking me well over went out, and I saw them no more. That proved to be the last ordeal through which I pa.s.sed in Ireland. After being convinced that they had left the steamer I went to my berth, and being thoroughly exhausted I fell asleep in an instant, not awaking until the steamer was entering the harbor of Glasgow.

"After my arrest a month later in Scotland, during the transfer to London and afterward to Newgate, while awaiting trial, the detectives told me that they were in Cork three hours after I had left, and one of them related their adventures substantially as follows:

"'We arrived in Cork Sat.u.r.day afternoon and were not long in finding the temperance hotel where you stayed on Friday night, and the hat you left behind. After a long hunt we ascertained that a jaunting car had left the stand some hours previously and was still absent.

"'We had a good laugh at those blunder-heads, the Cork officers, letting you slip through their fingers, and then showed them how we do things.

After some delay we traced the cab across the bridge to the shop where you got the boy to go for it. The shopwoman was quite voluble about you, saying she knew all the time that you were an American by the accent, and described the bag and ulster which we had ascertained were in your possession. Of course, we were now satisfied that we were on the right scent, but could get no further trace or the direction taken by the cab.

We therefore sent dispatches to all the telegraph stations within fifty miles to put the police on the watch and sent messengers to the outlying places, but somehow you slipped through our meshes, and nothing turned up until the car man returned at about 11 p.m., as drunk as a soldier on furlough. After putting him under a water tap until he was half drowned we got him sober enough to tell where he had left you; but he swore you were a priest, and his evident sincerity caused us all to roar with laughter. This angered him, and he said: "Ye may twist me head an'

dhroun me intirely, but I wull niver spake another wurrud about the jintelman at all, at all," and sure enough we could get nothing more out of him.

"'We had a carriage ready, and, jumping in, we were at the wayside inn by midnight and terrified the old woman half out of her wits in arousing her out of bed. After a while she gathered them sufficiently to show us that you had six hours the start of us. The boy who carried your bag could give us no points, but we concluded you intended taking the branch line at Fermoy for Dublin. We drove right on, arriving at the Fermoy station at 1 p.m., but, getting no trace we telegraphed to all the stations along the line to Dublin, and there as well to be on the lookout. Who would ever have thought of your taking the opposite direction, penning yourself in at the end of a branch line, at a small inland town like Lismore? Why, you were, as we discovered the next morning, at that moment sleeping quietly at the Lismore Hotel, and only about ten miles from where we were working so industriously for that 5,000! Well, you "done" us fine that time!

"'After you so cleverly threw us off the trail, we could get no trace until Sunday morning, when we received a dispatch from Lismore, stating that a man had come on the last train, stayed at the hotel and left at daylight without paying his bill. "h.e.l.lo!" said I, as soon as I read the dispatch, "we never suspected Lismore; he has been there all night and is off again!" We telegraphed to Clonmel, Waterford and other places; then left for Lismore, where we arrived, paid your bill and took the bag with us. Surmising that you might make for Clonmel, we looked for and found the place where you got the car, but no news as to what direction you had taken. It would have made you laugh, as it did us, to see the old livery man stamp about and tear his hair when he found how easily he could have made the 5,000--if he had "only known."

"'Starting on the way to Clonmel, we soon had news which satisfied us we were once more on the right track. Shortly after we met, sure enough, the cab you had sent back from the country store. Arriving there we took the boy, who had just returned from driving you to Clonmel, with us, and, feeling sure that we should soon come up with you, we made our horses spin toward that town. Arriving there, we saw the inspector, who informed us that he had sent a constable in pursuit of a man who had hired a car to go to Cahir.' (This must have been one of the men in the car whom I escaped by dodging into the ruined cottage.) 'It being then sundown we drove to Cahir with all speed, arriving there just after dark, pa.s.sing the Clonmel mail car inside the gate; but it contained no one but the driver.

"'We soon found the constable sent from Clonmel, who said you had disappeared into the fort, where a friend must have concealed you, and that you must be there still. He then took us to the fort, which was closed for the night. As soon as my eyes lighted on the ruined cottages I asked him if he had searched them and received an answer in the negative. "Why," said he, "they are, as you see, all open to the day, without roof, doors or windows, and no one would think of hiding in them." "You are a fool," I replied. "Give me your lamp and come with me." After a look around and seeing how easily any person could stand in a corner out of sight, I remarked to him emphatically that he was the biggest specimen of a goose I had ever seen in my line. "I think," said I, "you had better go home and play pin. Here is where he dodged you, and now he is off again, with an hour or more start." We worked until after midnight and gave Cahir such a "turning over" that the inhabitants won't soon forget, but could not get hold of the least trace, except at one place (Maloy's), where a woman said a stranger came in at supper time, who said he was an American seeing the people in their homes. We cross-questioned the man, but could get nothing out of him more than that you had departed.

"'At last we gave it up, went to the hotel to get some sleep, which we needed badly, and the next day went to Dublin, heard about the finding of your neck-wrapper at the Cathedral Hotel, and knocked about Ireland for some time. During this time we arrested several persons, but soon discovered none of them was the right party, and we never obtained a genuine trace until you were discovered later in Edinburgh.'"

[Ill.u.s.tration: MARKET CROSS, EDINBURGH.]

CHAPTER XXVII.

THE FLOWERS IN THE PRIMROSE WAY ARE SWEET.

As narrated in an earlier chapter, I left England two days before the first lot of forged bills were sent in. I left serene and confident of the future. My departure was a happy event in a double sense. All my negotiations had been carried on at a considerable expense of nerve, and in leaving I left everything in such trim that success seemed certain, with all chance of danger eliminated from the venture. I felt that the trying toil was now all over, with nothing for me to do but to reap the harvest, and that without effort or care on my part.

So, when the late November sun looked down on me--I crossed by daylight this time--standing on the deck of that same wretched Channel steamer, it looked on a happy man. I did not know then that success in wrongdoing was ever a failure. The anxious toil of the London and Continental negotiations was a thing of the past. Was I not young; wealth was or soon would be mine; was I not in perfect health, body sound and digestion good, and, above all, was not the woman I loved awaiting me in Paris, to give herself to me, in all her youth and beauty, and then somewhere across the Western waters would I not find in some tropic seas a paradise, which gold would make mine, where I could bear my bride, and there, turning over a new leaf, live and die with the respect of all good men mine?

Here was a stately structure I was going to erect, but how rotten the foundation! I, in my egotism, fancied, in my case, at least, the eternal course of things would be stayed, and that justice would grant me a clean bill of health. She did give me that, but it was long years after, and only when she had had from me her pound of flesh to the very last ounce.

I joined my sweetheart and her family at the Hotel St. James, Rue Saint-Honore. She was an English lady, and for a whole year our courts.h.i.+p had been going on, and now, our wedding day being fixed a week ahead, we all set out sightseeing and having a good time generally. I now engaged the coachman I had met before as my valet, and a very good, all-around, handy man he proved to be. Of course I was anxious to hear that the first coup on the bank had succeeded, but I was tolerably confident it was all right. Had it fallen through it would have proved awkward for me. In that event the Paris climate would have been too warm for me, and I would have had to find a score of excuses to hasten our marriage and leave for the Western World as speedily as possible.

I had a four-in-hand coach, and we drove everywhere in and around Paris, once to Versailles and on to Fontainebleau, where we dined, a merry party. What a strange world is this, what a stage it is, ever crowded with tragedies, too! How absolutely in the dark we are as to the motives and actions of men.

There I was, the centre of merry pleasure parties in gay Paris. A young dude, driving my four-in-hand, and yet a criminal, waiting in hourly expectation a telegram announcing success in a great plot which, when it exploded, was destined to startle the business world, and to hurl me from the summit of happiness, where I was reveling, apparently free from care, to the misery of a dungeon, banis.h.i.+ng the happy smiles from my face and the joyous ring from my voice, leaving in place of the smiles the sombre gloom of the prison, and in place of the s.n.a.t.c.hes of song and eager accents I was wont to speak with, the hushed voice subdued to prison tones.

Late one morning, on opening my eyes, my first thought was: It will be hit or miss at the Bank of England within the next sixty minutes. We had engaged for a coaching party to Versailles and were to dine there. I left for the drive that day with a dim fear that before the sun set I might be under the necessity of leaving Paris in a hurry.

When starting for Versailles I left my servant behind to wait for the expected telegram, and to bring it to me by rail. We were at dinner, and I was just raising a gla.s.s of champagne to my lips when I saw my valet, Nunn, crossing the esplanade. He entered the room and handed me a telegram. Tearing open the envelope I read:

"All well. Bought and s.h.i.+pped forty bales."

That meant the first lot for $40,000 had gone through safely. It was certainly a great relief. The next day I received $25,000 in United States bonds, from George in London, my first share of the proceeds. I sold the bonds in Paris, receiving payment in French notes.

On Thursday, the day before our marriage, I had a telegram from Mac and George to meet them in Calais, and to Calais I had to go. I arrived there at midnight, just before the Dover steamer got in, and was on the pier to meet them. We exchanged warm greetings; as we did so Mac placed a small but very heavy bag in my hands, and they began laughing over my surprise. It contained 4,000 in sovereigns, and was stuffed with bonds and paper money. We went to a hotel near by, and there they counted out to me the very nice sum of $100,000 in gold, bonds and French money. As they were going back on the same steamer, and I was to return to Paris by the train carrying the pa.s.sengers of the steamer just arrived, we had only a brief half hour's talk. After giving me the money we went out and sat down on the pier, and that conversation and scene are forever impressed on my memory. I shall make no attempt to describe either, but could both be put on the stage, with the audience in possession of a full knowledge of the enterprise we were embarked in, there would be seen a picture of human life such as the novelist or playwright never had the imagination nor the daring to depict. To the earnest student of human life it would have been a revelation.

There we were, three earnest, ambitious young men, enthusiastic for all that was good and n.o.ble. I about to wed a pure-souled woman, who thought me an angel of goodness, and about to fly with my plunder and bride to Mexico. My two companions were returning to London to continue carrying out a giant scheme of fraud against a great moneyed inst.i.tution, but there we were, with $100,000 in plunder at our feet, sitting under the stars, listening to the dash of the waves, and talking not at all like pirates and robbers, but much more like crusaders setting out on a crusade, or like pilgrims going on a pilgrimage.

I told my friends I should go to the City of Mexico for a year or two, and then meet them somewhere in America where we would unite our wealth to inaugurate some scheme that would benefit thousands in our own generation and millions in the generations to come. We would hedge ourselves about with kindly deeds, so live as to win the respect of all, and when under the sod live in the eyes and mouths of men.

Too soon the whistle sounded, and we had to say good-bye, which we did in an enthusiasm that told how deeply we felt. We were walking in the Primrose Way, its flowers and songs were sweet, and we thought their perfume and melody eternal.

I again arrived in Paris at daylight, but early as it was, my sweetheart, escorted by my servant, was waiting my arrival. It was our wedding morning. During our drive to the hotel, radiant with joy, she told me the separation had been a cruel one, and she was so happy to know we should never be separated again!

At 4 o'clock that afternoon we were married at the American Emba.s.sy.

I had told every one I was going to leave the next day for Havre, to embark for New York. Our baggage was all packed and placed in a van, which I accompanied to the Havre station, and had stored there. Sunday I purchased one ticket to Bayonne, one for Madrid and one to Burgos, each from different agencies. On Sunday morning I took a van to the Havre station, and transferring our baggage to the road into Spain, checked all of it to Madrid.

My purpose was to sail by the Lopez & Co. steamer El Rey Felipe from Cadiz to Mexico, which was advertised to sail ten days later.

We were married very quietly on Friday, and our friends, wisely recognizing the fact that young married people like to be alone, the next day said good-bye and returned to Normandy. We spent a quiet and happy Sat.u.r.day and Sunday, and on Sunday night we left--my wife, servant and self--for Cadiz, via Madrid. My wife, like all English people, knew little of geography, and had such hazy notions of America that she thought it quite the thing to go to such an outlandish and far off quarter of the globe as America via a Spanish port. Columbus, she knew, had gone that way, and why should not we?

We had an all-night ride to Bayonne in one of those antiquated compartments used in railway carriages all over Europe, but the ride was not tedious, nor was the night long. This little earth had no happier couple, and, talking of the happy years that lay before us, the night rushed by like a fairy dream.

Where was my conscience? Why, my dear reader, I had sung it such a song that it was delighted with the music, and had, I was going to say, gone to sleep, but it had not. It was wide awake, and we were good chums. We both--conscience and I--had persuaded ourselves it was a virtuous deed to do evil that good might come. My conscience was perhaps as old as the sun, but I myself was young and too inexperienced to see the fallacy of the argument, since I myself was the doer of the wrong; but, of course, I should have hotly denounced any other such philosopher as a villain and rogue.

The night flew by, and to our surprise we found 240 miles had slipped away and we were in Bayonne. Thirty minutes more and we were speeding south, and soon crossed the Bida.s.soa, the boundary between France and Spain. Then my wife saying, "Now I will sleep," laid her head on the shoulder of the happiest man in or out of Spain, and in ten minutes her regular breathing told me she was in the land of dreams.

The Pyrenees, in dividing France and Spain, stand between two distinct peoples, and as the centuries go by the streams of national life meet, but only to repel each other, never to mingle. One has but to cross the bank to realize that he is among a different race. Dress, food and cooking--social life, religious devotion, modes of thought--are all different. To us here in America it is difficult to realize that so slight a thing as a mountain barrier, easily traversed, crossed by many defiles and good roads, should continue to separate two distinct peoples. But so it is. Stranger still, for nearly all time the inhabitants of the Spanish mountains have been more or less opposed to the people of the Spanish plains, and every century has seen several insurrections among the mountaineers. In 1872 and '73 the Carlists held the mountains and more or less fusillading was going on. The possibility of my way being blocked by the Carlists never entered into my calculations.