It Is Never Too Late to Mend Part 51

"I don't know."

"What if he keeps a book and enters everything in it?"

"But if he had, shouldn't we have caught a glimpse of it?"

"Humph! A man does not take notes constantly and destroy them. Fry, too, is an enthusiast in his way. I am sure he keeps a record, and if he does it is a true one, for he has no object in tampering with his own facts.

Bring me such a book or any record kept by Fry; let me have it for twelve hours and Hawes shall be turned out of the jail and you stay in it."

"Sir!" cried Evans, in great excitement, "if there is such a thing you shall see it to-morrow morning."

"No! to-night! come, you have an hour before you. Do you want the sinews of war? here, take this five pounds with you; you may have to buy a sight of it; but if you ask him whether I am right in telling you it is not the custom of jails to crucify prisoners in the present century, perhaps the barbarian will produce his record of abuses to prove to you that it is. Work how you please; but be wary--be intelligent, and bring me Fry's ledger--or never look me in the face again."

He waved his hand, and Evans strode out of the room animated with a spirit not his own. He who had animated him lay back on the sofa prostrated. Half an hour elapsed, no Evans; a quarter of an hour more, still no Evans; but just before the hour struck, in he burst out of breath but red with triumph.

"Your reverence is a witch--you can see in the dark--look here, sir!"

and he flung a dirty ledger on the table. "Here's all the money, sir. He did not get a farthing of it. I flattered the creature's pride, and he dropped the cheese into my hand like the old carrion crow when they asked him for one of his charming songs. But he had no notion it was going out of the jail; so you'll bring it in and give it me back the first thing to-morrow, sir. I must run back, time's up!--Good-night, your reverence. Am I on your side or whose?"

"Good-night, my fine fellow; you shan't be turned out of the jail now.

Good-night."

He wanted him gone. He went to a drawer and took out his own book, a copy of Hawes's public log-book, which he had made as soon as he came into the jail, with the simple view of guiding himself by the respectable precedents he innocently expected to find there. He lighted candles, placed his sheets by the side of Fry's well-thumbed ledger, and plunged into a comparison.

It was as he expected. On one side lay the bare, simple, brutal truth in Fry's hand, on the other the same set of facts colored, molded and cooked in every imaginable way to bear inspection, with occasional suppressions where the deed and consequences were too frightful to bear coloring, molding, extenuating or cooking.

The book was a thick quarto, containing a strict record of the prison for four years; two years of Captain O'Connor, and two of Hawes, the worthy who had supplanted him.

Mr. Eden was a rapid penman; he set to, and by half-past eleven o'clock he had copied the first part; for under O'Connor there were comparatively few punishments. Then he attacked Hawes's reign. Sheet after sheet was filled and numbered. He threw them on another table as each was filled. Three o'clock; still he wrote with all his might. Four o'clock; black spots danced before his eyes, and his fingers ached, and his brow burned, and his feet were ice. Still the light, indefatigable pen galloped along the paper. Meantime the writer's feelings were of the most mixed and extraordinary character. Often his eye flashed with triumph, as Fry exposed the dishonesty and utter mendacity of Hawes.

Oftener still it dilated with horror at the frightful nature of the very revelations. At six o'clock Fry's record was all copied out.

Mr. Eden shaved and took his bath, and ran into the town. He knocked up a solicitor, with whom he was acquainted.

"I want you to make my will, while your son attests this copy of this ledger."

"But my son is in bed."

"Well! he can read in bed. Which is his room?"

"That one."--Rap! (Come in.)

"Here, Mr. Edward, compare these two, and correct or attest this as a true copy--Twenty minutes' work--Two guineas; here they are on your drawers;" and he chucked the doc.u.ments on the bed, opened the shutters, and drew the bed-curtains; and pa.s.sing his arm under the father's, he drew him into his own office, opened the shutters, put paper before him, and dictated a will. Three bequests (one to Evans), and his mother residuary legatee. The will written, he ran upstairs, made father and son execute it, and then darted out, caught a fly that was going to the railway, engaged it; upstairs again. The work was done, copy attested.

"Half a crown if you are at the jail in five minutes."

Galloped off with his two doc.u.ments-entered the jail--went to his own room--sent for Evans--gave him Fry's book, and ordered himself the same breakfast the prisoners had.

"I am bilious, and no wonder. I have been living too luxuriously; if I had been content with the diet my poor brothers live on, I should be in better health. It serves me just right."

Then he sat down and wrote a short memorial to the Secretary for the Home Department, claiming an inquiry into the jailer's conduct.

"I have evidence on the spot to show that for two years he has been guilty of illegal practices. That he has introduced into the prison an unlawful instrument of torture. That during his whole period of office he has fabricated partial, colored and false reports of his actions in the prison, and also of their consequences; that he has suppressed all mention of no less than seven attempts at suicide, and has given a false color, both with respect to the place of death, the manner of death and the cause of death of some twenty prisoners besides. That his day-book, kept in the prison for the inspection and guide of the magistrates, is a tissue of frauds, equivocations, exaggerations, diminutions and direct falsehoods; that his periodical reports to the Home Office are a tissue of the same frauds, suppressions, inventions, and direct falsehoods.

"The truth, therefore, is inaccessible to you, except by a severe inquiry conducted on the spot. That inquiry I pray for on public grounds, and if need be, demand in my own person, as her majesty's servant driven to this strait.

"I am responsible to her majesty for the lives and well-being of the prisoners, and yet unable, without your intervention, to protect them against illegal violence covered by organized fraud."

Mr. Eden copied this, and sent the copy at once to Mr. Hawes with two lines to this effect, that the duplicate should not leave the town till seven in the evening, so Mr. Hawes had plenty of time to write to the Home Secretary by same post, and parry or meet this blow if he thought it worth his while.

It now remained only to post the duplicate for the Home Office. Mr. Eden directed it and waxed it, but even as he leaned over it sealing it the room suddenly became dark to him, and his head seemed to weigh a ton.

With an instinct of self-preservation he made for the sofa, which was close behind him, but before he could reach it his senses had left him, and he fell with his head and shoulders upon the couch but his feet on the floor, the memorial tight in his hand. He paid the penalty of being a blood-horse--he ran till he dropped.

CHAPTER XVII.

"Two ladies to see you," grunted the red-haired servant, throwing open the door without ceremony; and she actually bounced out again without seeing anything more than that her master was lying on the sofa.

Susan Merton and her aunt came rapidly and cheerfully into the room.

"Here we are, Mr. Eden, Aunt Davies and I--Oh!" The table being between the sofa and the door the poor gentleman's actual condition was not self-evident from the latter, but Susan was now in the middle of the room and her gayety gave way in a moment to terror.

"Why, the man has fainted!" cried Mrs. Davies hurriedly. Susan clasped her hands together and turned very pale; but for all that she was the first at Mr. Eden's head; "he is choking! he is choking! help me, aunt, help me!" but even while crying for help her nimble fingers had untied and flung away Mr. Eden's white neck-tie, which, being high and stiff, was doing him a very ill turn, as the air forcing itself violently through his nostrils plainly showed.

"Take his legs, aunt; oh! oh! oh!"

"Don't be a fool, girl, it is only a faint." Susan flew to the window and threw it open, then flew back and seized one end of the couch. Her aunt comprehended at a glance, and the two carried it with its burden to the window.

"Open the door, aunt," cried Susan, as she whipped out her scent-bottle and with her finger wetted the inside of his nostrils with the spirit as the patient lay in the thorough draught. Susan sobbed with sorrow and fear, but her emotion was far from disabling her.

She poured some of her scent into a water-gla.s.s and diluted it largely.

She made her aunt take a hand-screen from the mantel-piece. She plunged her hand into the liquid and flung the drops sharply into Mr. Eden's face; and Mrs. Davies fanned him rapidly at the same time.

These remedies had a speedy effect. First the film cleared from the patient's bright eye, then a little color diffused itself gradually over his cheek, and last his lips lost their livid tint. As soon as she saw him coming to, Susan composed herself; and Mr. Eden, on his return to consciousness, looked up and saw a beautiful young woman looking down on him with a cheerful, encouraging smile and wet cheeks.

"Ah!" sighed he, and put out his hand faintly to welcome Susan; "but what--how do I come here?"

"You have been a little faint," said Susan smiling, "but you are better now, you know!"

"Yes, thank you! how good of you to come! Who is this lady?"

"My aunt, sir--a very notable woman. See, she is setting your things to rights already. Aunt, I wonder at you!"

She then dipped the corner of her handkerchief in scent, and slightly coloring now that her patient was conscious, she made the spirit enter his nostrils.

He gave a sigh of languid pleasure--"That is so invigorating." Then he looked upward--"See how good G.o.d is to me! in my sore need He has sent me help. Oh! how pleasant is the face of a friend. By-the-way, I took you for an angel at first," added he naively.

"But you have come to your senses now, sir! ha! ha! ha!" cried busy, merry Mrs. Davies, hard at work. For as soon as the patient began visibly to return to life, she had turned her back on him and fallen on the furniture.

"I hope you are come to stay with me." As Susan was about to answer in the negative, Mrs. Davies made signals for a private conference; and after some whispering, Susan replied, "that her aunt wanted to put the house in apple-pie order, and that she, Susan, felt too anxious about him to go until he should be quite recovered."