with every appearance of pride and pleasure. "This is what keeps him in
order, my lady," said the brute, cheerfully. "Just take it in your hand."
My aunt sprang to her feet. She was so indignant that I believe she would
have laid the whip across the man's shoulders, if his master had not
pushed him back without ceremony. "A zealous servant," said the
superintendent, smiling pleasantly. "Please excuse him."
My aunt pointed to the cell door.
"Open it," she said, "Let me see _anything,_ rather than set eyes on that
monster again!"
The firmness of her tone evidently surprised the superintendent. He knew
nothing of the reserves of resolution in her, which the mere sight of the
whip had called forth. The pallor had left her face; she trembled no
longer; her fine gray eyes were bright and steady. "That brute has roused
her," said the lawyer, looking back at the assistant, and whispering to
me; "nothing will restrain her, David--she will have her way now."
CHAPTER V
The superintendent opened the cell door with his own hand.
We found ourselves in a narrow, lofty prison, like an apartment in a
tower. High up, in one corner, the grim stone walls were pierced by a
grated opening, which let in air and light. Seated on the floor, in the
angle formed by the junction of two walls, we saw the superintendent's
"lucky lunatic" at work, with a truss of loose straw on either side of
him. The slanting rays of light from the high window streamed down on his
prematurely gray hair, and showed us the strange yellow pallor of his
complexion, and the youthful symmetry of his hands, nimbly occupied with
their work. A heavy chain held him to the wall. It was not only fastened
round his waist, it also fettered his legs between the knee and the
ankle. At the same time, it was long enough to allow him a range of
crippled movement, within a circle of five or six feet, as well as I
could calculate at the time. Above his head, ready for use if required,
hung a small chain evidently intended to confine his hands at the wrists.
Unless I was deceived by his crouching attitude, he was small in stature.
His ragged dress barely covered his emaciated form. In other and happier
days, he must have been a well-made little man; his feet and ankles, like
his hands, were finely and delicately formed. He was so absorbed in his
employment that he had evidently not heard the talking outside his cell.
It was only when the door was banged to by the assistant (who kept behind
us, at a sign from the superintendent) that he looked up. We now saw his
large vacantly-patient brown eyes, the haggard outline of his face, and
his nervously sensitive lips. For a moment, he looked from one to the
other of the visitors with a quiet childish curiosity. Then his wandering
glances detected the assistant, waiting behind us with the whip still in
his hand.
In an instant the whole expression of the madman's face changed.
Ferocious hatred glittered in his eyes; his lips, suddenly retracted,
showed his teeth like the teeth of a wild beast. My aunt perceived the
direction in which he was looking, and altered her position so as to
conceal from him the hateful figure with the whip, and to concentrate his
attention on herself. With startling abruptness, the poor creature's
expression changed once more. His eyes softened, a faint sad smile
trembled on his lips. He dropped the straw which he had been plaiting,
and lifted his hands with a gesture of admiration. "The pretty lady!" he
whispered to himself. "Oh, the pretty lady!"
He attempted to crawl out from the wall, as far as his chain would let
him. At a sign from the superintendent he stopped, and sighed bitterly.
"I wouldn't hurt the lady for the world," he said; "I beg your pardon,
Mistress, if I have frightened you."
His voice was wonderfully gentle. But there was something strange in his
accent--and there was perhaps a foreign formality in his addressing my
aunt as "Mistress." Englishmen in general would have called her "ma'am."
We men kept our places at a safe distance from his chain. My aunt, with a
woman's impulsive contempt of danger when her compassion is strongly
moved, stepped forward to him. The superintendent caught her by the arm
and checked her. "Take care," he said. "You don't know him as well as we
do."
Jack's eyes turned on the superintendent, dilating slowly. His lips began
to part again--I feared to see the ferocious expression in his face once
more. I was wrong. In the very moment of another outbreak of rage, the
unhappy man showed that he was still capable, under strong internal
influence, of restraining himself. He seized the chain that held him to
the wall in both hands, and wrung it with such convulsive energy that I
almost expected to see the bones of his fingers start through the skin.
His head dropped on his breast, his wasted figure quivered. It was only
for an instant. When he looked up again, his poor vacant brown eyes
turned on my aunt, dim with tears. She instantly shook off the
superintendent's hold on her arm. Before it was possible to interfere,
she was bending over Jack Straw, with one of her pretty white hands laid
gently on his head.
"How your head burns, poor Jack!" she said simply. "Does my hand cool
it?"
Still holding desperately by the chain, he answered like a timid child.
"Yes, Mistress; your hand cools it. Thank you."
She took up a little straw hat on which he had been working when his door
was opened. "This is very nicely done, Jack," she went on. "Tell me how
you first came to make these pretty things with your straw."
He looked up at her with a sudden accession of confidence; her interest
in the hat had flattered him.
"Once," he said, "there was a time when my hands were the maddest things
about me. They used to turn against me and tear my hair and my flesh. An
angel in a dream told me how to keep them quiet. An angel said, "Let them
work at your straw." All day long I plaited my straw. I would have gone
on all night too, if they would only have given me a light. My nights are
bad, my nights are dreadful. The raw air eats into me, the black darkness
frightens me. Shall I tell you what is the greatest blessing in the
world? Daylight! Daylight!! Daylight!!!"
At each repetition of the word his voice rose. He was on the point of
breaking into a scream, when he took a tighter turn of his chain and
instantly silenced himself. "I am quiet, sir," he said, before the
superintendent could reprove him.
My aunt added a word in his favor. "Jack has promised not to frighten me;
and I am sure he will keep his word. Have you never had parents or
friends to be kind to you, my poor fellow?" she asked, turning to him
again.
He looked up at her. "Never," he said, "till you came here to see me." As
he spoke, there was a flash of intelligence in the bright gratitude of
his eyes. "Ask me something else," he pleaded; "and see how quietly I can
answer you."
"Is it true, Jack, that you were once poisoned by accident, and nearly
killed by it?"
"Yes!"
"Where was it?"
"Far away in another country. In the doctor's big room. In the time when
I was the doctor's man."
"Who was the doctor?"
He put his hand to his head, "Give me more time," he said. "It hurts me
when I try to remember too much. Let me finish my hat first. I want to
give you my hat when it's done. You don't know how clever I am with my
fingers and thumbs. Just look and see!"
He set to work on the hat; perfectly happy while my aunt was looking at
him. The lawyer was the unlucky person who produced a change for the
worse. Having hitherto remained passive, this worthy gentleman seemed to
think it was due to his own importance to take a prominent part in the
proceedings. "My professional experience will come in well here," he
said; "I mean to treat him as an unwilling witness; you will see we shall
get something out of him in that way. Jack!"
The unwilling witness went on impenetrably with his work. The lawyer
(keeping well out of reach of the range of the chain) raised his voice.
"Hullo, there!" he cried, "you're not deaf, are you?"
Jack looked up, with an impish expression of mischief in his eyes. A man
with a modest opinion of himself would have taken warning, and would have
said no more. The lawyer persisted.
"Now, my man! let us have a little talk. 'Jack Straw' can't be your
proper name. What is your name?"
"Anything you like," said Jack. "What's yours?"
"Oh, come! that won't do. You must have had a father and mother."
"Not that I know of."
"Where were you born?"
"In the gutter."
"How were you brought up?"
"Sometimes with a cuff on the head."
"And at other times?"
"At other times with a kick. Do be quiet, and let me finish my hat."
The discomfited lawyer tried a bribe as a last resource. He held up a
shilling. "Do you see this?"
"No, I don't. I see nothing but my hat."
This reply brought the examination to an end. The lawyer looked at the
superintendent, and said, "A hopeless case, sir." The superintendent
looked at the lawyer, and answered, "Perfectly hopeless."
Jack finished his hat, and gave it to my aunt. "Do you like it, now it's
done?" he asked.
"I like it very much," she answered: "and one of these days I shall trim
it with ribbons, and wear it for your sake."
She appealed to the superintendent, holding out the hat to him.
"Look," she said. "There is not a false turn anywhere in all this
intricate plaiting. Poor Jack is sane enough to fix his attention to this
subtle work. Do you give him up as incurable, when he can do that?"
The superintendent waved away the question with his hand. "Purely
mechanical," he replied. "It means nothing."
Jack touched my aunt. "I want to whisper," he said. She bent down to him,
and listened.
I saw her smile, and asked, after we had left the asylum, what he had
said. Jack had stated his opinion of the principal officer of Bethlehem
Hospital in these words: "Don't you listen to him, Mistress; he's a poor
half-witted creature. And short, too--not above six inches taller than I
am!"
But my aunt had not done with Jack's enemy yet.
"I am sorry to trouble you, sir," she resumed--"I have something more to
say before I go, and I wish to say it privately. Can you spare me a few
minutes?"
The amiable superintendent declared that he was entirely at her service.
She turned to Jack to say good-bye. The sudden discovery that she was
about to leave him was more than he could sustain; he lost his
self-control.
"Stay with me!" cried the poor wretch, seizing her by both hands. "Oh, be
merciful, and stay with me!"
She preserved her presence of mind--she would permit no interference to
protect her. Without starting back, without even attempting to release
herself, she spoke to him quietly.
"Let us shake hands for to-day," she said; "you have kept your promise,
Jack--you have been quiet and good. I must leave you for a while. Let me
go."
He obstinately shook his head, and still held her.
"Look at me," she persisted, without showing any fear of him. "I want to
tell you something. You are no longer a friendless creature, Jack. You
have a friend in me. Look up."
Her clear firm tones had their effect on him; he looked up. Their eyes
met.
"Now, let me go, as I told you."
He dropped her hand, and threw himself back in his corner and burst out
crying.
"I shall never see her again," he moaned to himself. "Never, never, never
again!"
"You shall see me to-morrow," she said.
He looked at her through his tears, and looked away again with an abrupt
change to distrust. "She doesn't mean it," he muttered, still speaking to
himself; "she only says it to pacify me."
"You shall see me to-morrow," my aunt reiterated; "I promise it."
He was cowed, but not convinced; he crawled to the full length of his
chain, and lay down at her feet like a dog. She considered for a
moment--and found her way to his confidence at last.
"Shall I leave you something to keep for me until I see you again?"
The idea struck him like a revelation: he lifted his head, and eyed her
with breathless interest. She gave him a little ornamental handbag, in
which she was accustomed to carry her handkerchief, and purse, and
smelling-bottle.
"I trust it entirely to you, Jack: you shall give it back to me when we
meet to-morrow."
Those simple words more than reconciled him to her departure--they subtly
flattered his self-esteem.
"You will find your bag torn to pieces, to-morrow," the superintendent
whispered, as the door was opened for us to go out.
"Pardon me, sir," my aunt replied; "I believe I shall find it quite
safe."
The last we saw of poor Jack, before the door closed on him, he was
hugging the bag in both arms, and kissing it.
CHAPTER VI
On our return to home, I found Fritz Keller smoking his pipe in the
walled garden at the back of the house.
In those days, it may not be amiss to remark that merchants of the
old-fashioned sort still lived over their counting-houses in the city.
The late Mr. Wagner's place of business included two spacious houses
standing together, with internal means of communication. One of these
buildings was devoted to the offices and warehouses. The other (having
the garden at the back) was the private residence.
Fritz advanced to meet me, and stopped, with a sudden change in his
manner. "Something has happened," he said--"I see it in your face! Has
the madman anything to do with it?"
"Yes. Shall I tell you what has happened, Fritz?"
"Not for the world. My ears are closed to all dreadful and distressing
narratives. I will imagine the madman--let us talk of something else."
"You will probably see him, Fritz, in a few weeks' time."
"You don't mean to tell me he is coming into this house?"
"I am afraid it's likely, to say the least of it."
Fritz looked at me like a man thunderstruck. "There are some
disclosures," he said, in his quaint way, "which are too overwhelming to
be received on one's legs. Let us sit down."
He led the way to a summer-house at the end of the garden. On the wooden
table, I observed a bottle of the English beer which my friend prized so
highly, with glasses on either side of it.
"I had a presentiment that we should want a consoling something of this
sort," said Fritz. "Fill your glass, David, and let out the worst of it
at once, before we get to the end of the bottle."
I let out the best of it first--that is to say, I told him what I have
related in the preceding pages. Fritz was deeply interested: full of
compassion for Jack Straw, but not in the least converted to my aunt's
confidence in him.
"Jack is supremely pitiable," he remarked; "but Jack is also a smoldering
volcano--and smoldering volcanos burst into eruption when the laws of
nature compel them. My only hope is in Mr. Superintendent. Surely he will
not let this madman loose on us, with nobody but your aunt to hold the
chain? What did she really say, when you left Jack, and had your private
talk in the reception-room? One minute, my friend, before you begin,"
said Fritz, groping under the bench upon which we were seated. "I had a
second presentiment that we might want a second bottle--and here it is!
Fill your glass; and let us establish ourselves in our respective
positions--you to administer, and I to sustain, a severe shock to the
moral sense. I think, David, this second bottle is even more deliciously
brisk than the first. Well, and what did your aunt say?"
My aunt had said much more than I could possibly tell him.
In substance it had come to this:--After seeing the whip, and seeing the
chains, and seeing the man--she had actually determined to commit herself
to the perilous experiment which her husband would have tried, if he had
lived! As to the means of procuring Jack Straw's liberation from the
Hospital, the powerful influence which had insisted on his being received
by the Institution, in defiance of rules, could also insist on his
release, and could be approached by the intercession of the same official
person, whose interest in the matter had been aroused by Mr. Wagner in
the last days of his life. Having set forth her plans for the future in
these terms, my aunt appealed to the lawyer to state the expression of
her wishes and intentions, in formal writing, as a preliminary act of
submission towards the governors of the asylum.
"And what did the lawyer say to it?" Fritz inquired, after I had reported
my aunt's proceedings thus far.
"The lawyer declined, Fritz, to comply with her request. He said, 'It
would be inexcusable, even in a man, to run such a risk--I don't believe
there is another woman in England who would think of such a thing.' Those
were his words."
"Did they have any effect on her?"
"Not the least in the world. She apologized for having wasted his
valuable time, and wished him good morning. 'If nobody will help me,' she
said, quietly, 'I must help myself.' Then she turned to me. 'You have
seen how carefully and delicately poor Jack can work,' she said; 'you
have seen him tempted to break out, and yet capable of restraining
himself in my presence. And, more than that, on the one occasion when he
did lose his self-control, you saw how he recovered himself when he was
calmly and kindly reasoned with. Are you content, David, to leave such a
man for the rest of his life to the chains and the whip?' What could I