SECOND CHAPTER OF MR. PICKWICK’S TALE
We left Will Marks leaning under the gibbet with his face towards thetown, scanning the distance with a keen eye, which sought to pierce thedarkness and catch the earliest glimpse of any person or persons thatmight approach towards him. But all was quiet, and, save the howling ofthe wind as it swept across the heath in gusts, and the creaking of thechains that dangled above his head, there was no sound to break thesullen stillness of the night. After half an hour or so this monotonybecame more disconcerting to Will than the most furious uproar would havebeen, and he heartily wished for some one antagonist with whom he mighthave a fair stand-up fight, if it were only to warm himself.
Truth to tell, it was a bitter wind, and seemed to blow to the very heartof a man whose blood, heated but now with rapid riding, was the moresensitive to the chilling blast. Will was a daring fellow, and cared nota jot for hard knocks or sharp blades; but he could not persuade himselfto move or walk about, having just that vague expectation of a suddenassault which made it a comfortable thing to have something at his back,even though that something were a gallows-tree. He had no great faith inthe superstitions of the age, still such of them as occurred to him didnot serve to lighten the time, or to render his situation the moreendurable. He remembered how witches were said to repair at that ghostlyhour to churchyards and gibbets, and such-like dismal spots, to pluck thebleeding mandrake or scrape the flesh from dead men’s bones, as choiceingredients for their spells; how, stealing by night to lonely places,they dug graves with their finger-nails, or anointed themselves beforeriding in the air, with a delicate pomatum made of the fat of infantsnewly boiled. These, and many other fabled practices of a no lessagreeable nature, and all having some reference to the circumstances inwhich he was placed, passed and repassed in quick succession through themind of Will Marks, and adding a shadowy dread to that distrust andwatchfulness which his situation inspired, rendered it, upon the whole,sufficiently uncomfortable. As he had foreseen, too, the rain began todescend heavily, and driving before the wind in a thick mist, obscuredeven those few objects which the darkness of the night had beforeimperfectly revealed.
‘Look!’ shrieked a voice. ‘Great Heaven, it has fallen down, and standserect as if it lived!’
The speaker was close behind him; the voice was almost at his ear. Willthrew off his cloak, drew his sword, and darting swiftly round, seized awoman by the wrist, who, recoiling from him with a dreadful shriek, fellstruggling upon her knees. Another woman, clad, like her whom he hadgrasped, in mourning garments, stood rooted to the spot on which theywere, gazing upon his face with wild and glaring eyes that quite appalledhim.
‘Say,’ cried Will, when they had confronted each other thus for sometime, ‘what are ye?’
‘Say what are _you_,’ returned the woman, ‘who trouble even this obsceneresting-place of the dead, and strip the gibbet of its honoured burden?Where is the body?’
He looked in wonder and affright from the woman who questioned him to theother whose arm he clutched.
‘Where is the body?’ repeated the questioner more firmly than before.‘You wear no livery which marks you for the hireling of the government.You are no friend to us, or I should recognise you, for the friends ofsuch as we are few in number. What are you then, and wherefore are youhere?’
‘I am no foe to the distressed and helpless,’ said Will. ‘Are ye amongthat number? ye should be by your looks.’
‘We are!’ was the answer.
‘Is it ye who have been wailing and weeping here under cover of thenight?’ said Will.
‘It is,’ replied the woman sternly; and pointing, as she spoke, towardsher companion, ‘she mourns a husband, and I a brother. Even the bloodylaw that wreaks its vengeance on the dead does not make that a crime, andif it did ’twould be alike to us who are past its fear or favour.’
Will glanced at the two females, and could barely discern that the onewhom he addressed was much the elder, and that the other was young and ofa slight figure. Both were deadly pale, their garments wet and worn,their hair dishevelled and streaming in the wind, themselves bowed downwith grief and misery; their whole appearance most dejected, wretched,and forlorn. A sight so different from any he had expected to encountertouched him to the quick, and all idea of anything but their pitiablecondition vanished before it.
‘I am a rough, blunt yeoman,’ said Will. ‘Why I came here is told in aword; you have been overheard at a distance in the silence of the night,and I have undertaken a watch for hags or spirits. I came here expectingan adventure, and prepared to go through with any. If there be aughtthat I can do to help or aid you, name it, and on the faith of a man whocan be secret and trusty, I will stand by you to the death.’
‘How comes this gibbet to be empty?’ asked the elder female.
‘I swear to you,’ replied Will, ‘that I know as little as yourself. Butthis I know, that when I came here an hour ago or so, it was as it isnow; and if, as I gather from your question, it was not so last night,sure I am that it has been secretly disturbed without the knowledge ofthe folks in yonder town. Bethink you, therefore, whether you have nofriends in league with you or with him on whom the law has done itsworst, by whom these sad remains have been removed for burial.’
The women spoke together, and Will retired a pace or two while theyconversed apart. He could hear them sob and moan, and saw that theywrung their hands in fruitless agony. He could make out little that theysaid, but between whiles he gathered enough to assure him that hissuggestion was not very wide of the mark, and that they not onlysuspected by whom the body had been removed, but also whither it had beenconveyed. When they had been in conversation a long time, they turnedtowards him once more. This time the younger female spoke.
‘You have offered us your help?’
‘I have.’
‘And given a pledge that you are still willing to redeem?’
‘Yes. So far as I may, keeping all plots and conspiracies at arm’slength.’
‘Follow us, friend.’
Will, whose self-possession was now quite restored, needed no secondbidding, but with his drawn sword in his hand, and his cloak so muffledover his left arm as to serve for a kind of shield without offering anyimpediment to its free action, suffered them to lead the way. Throughmud and mire, and wind and rain, they walked in silence a full mile. Atlength they turned into a dark lane, where, suddenly starting out frombeneath some trees where he had taken shelter, a man appeared, having inhis charge three saddled horses. One of these (his own apparently), inobedience to a whisper from the women, he consigned to Will, who, seeingthat they mounted, mounted also. Then, without a word spoken, they rodeon together, leaving the attendant behind.
They made no halt nor slackened their pace until they arrived nearPutney. At a large wooden house which stood apart from any other theyalighted, and giving their horses to one who was already waiting, passedin by a side door, and so up some narrow creaking stairs into a smallpanelled chamber, where Will was left alone. He had not been here verylong, when the door was softly opened, and there entered to him acavalier whose face was concealed beneath a black mask.
Will stood upon his guard, and scrutinised this figure from head to foot.The form was that of a man pretty far advanced in life, but of a firm andstately carriage. His dress was of a rich and costly kind, but so soiledand disordered that it was scarcely to be recognised for one of thosegorgeous suits which the expensive taste and fashion of the timeprescribed for men of any rank or station.
He was booted and spurred, and bore about him even as many tokens of thestate of the roads as Will himself. All this he noted, while the eyesbehind the mask regarded him with equal attention. This survey over, thecavalier broke silence.
‘Thou’rt young and bold, and wouldst be richer than thou art?’
‘The two first I am,’ returned Will. ‘The last I have scarcely thoughtof. But be it so. Say that I would be richer than I am; what then?’
r />
‘The way lies before thee now,’ replied the Mask.
‘Show it me.’
‘First let me inform thee, that thou wert brought here to-night lest thoushouldst too soon have told thy tale to those who placed thee on thewatch.’
‘I thought as much when I followed,’ said Will. ‘But I am no blab, notI.’
‘Good,’ returned the Mask. ‘Now listen. He who was to have executed theenterprise of burying that body, which, as thou hast suspected, was takendown to-night, has left us in our need.’
Will nodded, and thought within himself that if the Mask were to attemptto play any tricks, the first eyelet-hole on the left-hand side of hisdoublet, counting from the buttons up the front, would be a very goodplace in which to pink him neatly.
‘Thou art here, and the emergency is desperate. I propose his task tothee. Convey the body (now coffined in this house), by means that Ishall show, to the Church of St. Dunstan in London to-morrow night, andthy service shall be richly paid. Thou’rt about to ask whose corpse itis. Seek not to know. I warn thee, seek not to know. Felons hang inchains on every moor and heath. Believe, as others do, that this wasone, and ask no further. The murders of state policy, its victims oravengers, had best remain unknown to such as thee.’
‘The mystery of this service,’ said Will, ‘bespeaks its danger. What isthe reward?’
‘One hundred golden unities,’ replied the cavalier. ‘The danger to onewho cannot be recognised as the friend of a fallen cause is not great,but there is some hazard to be run. Decide between that and the reward.’
‘What if I refuse?’ said Will.
‘Depart in peace, in God’s name,’ returned the Mask in a melancholy tone,‘and keep our secret, remembering that those who brought thee here werecrushed and stricken women, and that those who bade thee go free couldhave had thy life with one word, and no man the wiser.’
Men were readier to undertake desperate adventures in those times thanthey are now. In this case the temptation was great, and the punishment,even in case of detection, was not likely to be very severe, as Will cameof a loyal stock, and his uncle was in good repute, and a passable taleto account for his possession of the body and his ignorance of theidentity might be easily devised.
The cavalier explained that a coveted cart had been prepared for thepurpose; that the time of departure could be arranged so that he shouldreach London Bridge at dusk, and proceed through the City after the dayhad closed in; that people would be ready at his journey’s end to placethe coffin in a vault without a minute’s delay; that officious inquirersin the streets would be easily repelled by the tale that he was carryingfor interment the corpse of one who had died of the plague; and in shortshowed him every reason why he should succeed, and none why he shouldfail. After a time they were joined by another gentleman, masked likethe first, who added new arguments to those which had been already urged;the wretched wife, too, added her tears and prayers to their calmerrepresentations; and in the end, Will, moved by compassion andgood-nature, by a love of the marvellous, by a mischievous anticipationof the terrors of the Kingston people when he should be missing next day,and finally, by the prospect of gain, took upon himself the task, anddevoted all his energies to its successful execution.
The following night, when it was quite dark, the hollow echoes of oldLondon Bridge responded to the rumbling of the cart which contained theghastly load, the object of Will Marks’ care. Sufficiently disguised toattract no attention by his garb, Will walked at the horse’s head, asunconcerned as a man could be who was sensible that he had now arrived atthe most dangerous part of his undertaking, but full of boldness andconfidence.
It was now eight o’clock. After nine, none could walk the streetswithout danger of their lives, and even at this hour, robberies andmurder were of no uncommon occurrence. The shops upon the bridge wereall closed; the low wooden arches thrown across the way were like so manyblack pits, in every one of which ill-favoured fellows lurked in knots ofthree or four; some standing upright against the wall, lying in wait;others skulking in gateways, and thrusting out their uncombed heads andscowling eyes: others crossing and recrossing, and constantly jostlingboth horse and man to provoke a quarrel; others stealing away andsummoning their companions in a low whistle. Once, even in that shortpassage, there was the noise of scuffling and the clash of swords behindhim, but Will, who knew the City and its ways, kept straight on andscarcely turned his head.
The streets being unpaved, the rain of the night before had convertedthem into a perfect quagmire, which the splashing water-spouts from thegables, and the filth and offal cast from the different houses, swelledin no small degree. These odious matters being left to putrefy in theclose and heavy air, emitted an insupportable stench, to which everycourt and passage poured forth a contribution of its own. Many parts,even of the main streets, with their projecting stories totteringoverhead and nearly shutting out the sky, were more like huge chimneysthan open ways. At the corners of some of these, great bonfires wereburning to prevent infection from the plague, of which it was rumouredthat some citizens had lately died; and few, who availing themselves ofthe light thus afforded paused for a moment to look around them, wouldhave been disposed to doubt the existence of the disease, or wonder atits dreadful visitations.
But it was not in such scenes as these, or even in the deep and miryroad, that Will Marks found the chief obstacles to his progress. Therewere kites and ravens feeding in the streets (the only scavengers theCity kept), who, scenting what he carried, followed the cart or flutteredon its top, and croaked their knowledge of its burden and their ravenousappetite for prey. There were distant fires, where the poor wood andplaster tenements wasted fiercely, and whither crowds made their way,clamouring eagerly for plunder, beating down all who came within theirreach, and yelling like devils let loose. There were single-handed menflying from bands of ruffians, who pursued them with naked weapons, andhunted them savagely; there were drunken, desperate robbers issuing fromtheir dens and staggering through the open streets where no man daredmolest them; there were vagabond servitors returning from the BearGarden, where had been good sport that day, dragging after them theirtorn and bleeding dogs, or leaving them to die and rot upon the road.Nothing was abroad but cruelty, violence, and disorder.
Many were the interruptions which Will Marks encountered from thesestragglers, and many the narrow escapes he made. Now some stout bullywould take his seat upon the cart, insisting to be driven to his ownhome, and now two or three men would come down upon him together, anddemand that on peril of his life he showed them what he had inside. Thena party of the city watch, upon their rounds, would draw across the road,and not satisfied with his tale, question him closely, and revengethemselves by a little cuffing and hustling for maltreatment sustained atother hands that night. All these assailants had to be rebutted, some byfair words, some by foul, and some by blows. But Will Marks was not theman to be stopped or turned back now he had penetrated so far, and thoughhe got on slowly, still he made his way down Fleet-street and reached thechurch at last.
As he had been forewarned, all was in readiness. Directly he stopped,the coffin was removed by four men, who appeared so suddenly that theyseemed to have started from the earth. A fifth mounted the cart, andscarcely allowing Will time to snatch from it a little bundle containingsuch of his own clothes as he had thrown off on assuming his disguise,drove briskly away. Will never saw cart or man again.
He followed the body into the church, and it was well he lost no time indoing so, for the door was immediately closed. There was no light in thebuilding save that which came from a couple of torches borne by two menin cloaks, who stood upon the brink of a vault. Each supported a femalefigure, and all observed a profound silence.
By this dim and solemn glare, which made Will feel as though light itselfwere dead, and its tomb the dreary arches that frowned above, they placedthe coffin in the vault, with uncovered heads, and closed it up. One ofthe torch-bearers then t
urned to Will, and stretched forth his hand, inwhich was a purse of gold. Something told him directly that those werethe same eyes which he had seen beneath the mask.
[Picture: Will Marks arrives at the Church]
‘Take it,’ said the cavalier in a low voice, ‘and be happy. Though thesehave been hasty obsequies, and no priest has blessed the work, there willnot be the less peace with thee thereafter, for having laid his bonesbeside those of his little children. Keep thy own counsel, for thy sakeno less than ours, and God be with thee!’
‘The blessing of a widowed mother on thy head, good friend!’ cried theyounger lady through her tears; ‘the blessing of one who has now no hopeor rest but in this grave!’
Will stood with the purse in his hand, and involuntarily made a gestureas though he would return it, for though a thoughtless fellow, he was ofa frank and generous nature. But the two gentlemen, extinguishing theirtorches, cautioned him to be gone, as their common safety would beendangered by a longer delay; and at the same time their retreatingfootsteps sounded through the church. He turned, therefore, towards thepoint at which he had entered, and seeing by a faint gleam in thedistance that the door was again partially open, groped his way towardsit and so passed into the street.
Meantime the local authorities of Kingston had kept watch and ward allthe previous night, fancying every now and then that dismal shrieks wereborne towards them on the wind, and frequently winking to each other, anddrawing closer to the fire as they drank the health of the lonelysentinel, upon whom a clerical gentleman present was especially severe byreason of his levity and youthful folly. Two or three of the gravest incompany, who were of a theological turn, propounded to him the question,whether such a character was not but poorly armed for single combat withthe Devil, and whether he himself would not have been a strongeropponent; but the clerical gentleman, sharply reproving them for theirpresumption in discussing such questions, clearly showed that a fitterchampion than Will could scarcely have been selected, not only for thatbeing a child of Satan, he was the less likely to be alarmed by theappearance of his own father, but because Satan himself would be at hisease in such company, and would not scruple to kick up his heels to anextent which it was quite certain he would never venture before clericaleyes, under whose influence (as was notorious) he became quite a tame andmilk-and-water character.
But when next morning arrived, and with it no Will Marks, and when astrong party repairing to the spot, as a strong party ventured to do inbroad day, found Will gone and the gibbet empty, matters grew seriousindeed. The day passing away and no news arriving, and the night goingon also without any intelligence, the thing grew more tremendous still;in short, the neighbourhood worked itself up to such a comfortable pitchof mystery and horror, that it is a great question whether the generalfeeling was not one of excessive disappointment, when, on the secondmorning, Will Marks returned.
However this may be, back Will came in a very cool and collected state,and appearing not to trouble himself much about anybody except old JohnPodgers, who, having been sent for, was sitting in the Town Hall cryingslowly, and dozing between whiles. Having embraced his uncle and assuredhim of his safety, Will mounted on a table and told his story to thecrowd.
And surely they would have been the most unreasonable crowd that everassembled together, if they had been in the least respect disappointedwith the tale he told them; for besides describing the Witches’ Dance tothe minutest motion of their legs, and performing it in character on thetable, with the assistance of a broomstick, he related how they hadcarried off the body in a copper caldron, and so bewitched him, that helost his senses until he found himself lying under a hedge at least tenmiles off, whence he had straightway returned as they then beheld. Thestory gained such universal applause that it soon afterwards brought downexpress from London the great witch-finder of the age, the Heaven-bornHopkins, who having examined Will closely on several points, pronouncedit the most extraordinary and the best accredited witch-story ever known,under which title it was published at the Three Bibles on London Bridge,in small quarto, with a view of the caldron from an original drawing, anda portrait of the clerical gentleman as he sat by the fire.
On one point Will was particularly careful: and that was to describe forthe witches he had seen, three impossible old females, whose likenessesnever were or will be. Thus he saved the lives of the suspected parties,and of all other old women who were dragged before him to be identified.
This circumstance occasioned John Podgers much grief and sorrow, untilhappening one day to cast his eyes upon his housekeeper, and observingher to be plainly afflicted with rheumatism, he procured her to be burntas an undoubted witch. For this service to the state he was immediatelyknighted, and became from that time Sir John Podgers.
Will Marks never gained any clue to the mystery in which he had been anactor, nor did any inscription in the church, which he often visitedafterwards, nor any of the limited inquiries that he dared to make, yieldhim the least assistance. As he kept his own secret, he was compelled tospend the gold discreetly and sparingly. In the course of time hemarried the young lady of whom I have already told you, whose maiden nameis not recorded, with whom he led a prosperous and happy life. Years andyears after this adventure, it was his wont to tell her upon a stormynight that it was a great comfort to him to think those bones, towhomsoever they might have once belonged, were not bleaching in thetroubled air, but were mouldering away with the dust of their own kithand kindred in a quiet grave.