Dr. Sam Johnson, Detector

by Lillian de la Torre

  “’Tis well, at that rate,” remarked Mr. Page, “that the Flying Highwayman proved a fancier, neither of religion nor of dancing, but only of horse-flesh and haberdashery; I had scarce satisfied him else.”

  Suddenly Sir John turned his closed eyes towards the door. It opened, and Barrock entered.

  “Your phaeton, sir,” he cried to Mr. Page, “I’ve brought it back safe and sound; as likewise, sir,” turning to Sir John, “we’ve taken him that had it.”

  With that through the open door stepped Watchett, urging by the collar a bow-legged youth in the striped vest of an hostler. He bent his black brows in a dark scowl upon his captive, and shook him a little as if to shake speech out of him.

  “Which I am hostler at the Rose and Crown,” the bandy-legged fellow whined, “and I’m innocent, me Lord.”

  “Innocent!” cried Watchett, “when I caught him in the inn yard, red-handed with the phaeton! One of the horses was gone, and he was just upon loosing the other from the traces when I rode in and caught him at it.”

  “One of the horses was gone!” cried young Page in agony. “The finest matched pair in the county, and one gone! Where is my horse, villain?”

  “I don’t know, indeed, your Honour,” cried the miserable boy. “I found the phaeton in a copse, indeed, indeed I did, with one horse gone and the other standing in the traces, and so led him gently to the inn, where indeed, me Lord, I meant only to refresh the beast before informing the horse patrole.”

  “Pray, Watchett, did you search the stables?”

  “I did, sir, but never a black horse did I find.”

  “’Cause why?” retorted the young hostler stubbornly, “’cause never a black horse was there, bar him was still in the traces.”

  Sir John probed the youth with rigour, but no better answer could he get, and at last we all trooped out to inspect the recovered phaeton.

  ’Twas a luxurious vehicle, fit for a lord, and the single black in the traces was a glossy, handsome animal. I noted the empty pistol-holders by the side of the vehicle. The seat was richly upholstered, and on it, neatly folded, reposed Mr. Page’s missing cloathes. All was there—the brocaded coat, the laced waistcoat, the fine cocked hat, even the handsome powdered wig. Only the purse full of guineas was still missing. Sir John, though he could not see the equipage, inspected all with nose and fingers, even going so far as to inhale the otto given off by the powdered wig.

  “Past question,” he remarked, “Mr. Page, this gear is yours.”

  The young fellow laughed as he donned his coat once more.

  “And happy am I to have it,” he replied. “Depend upon it, from this day I’ll take good care to carry pistols in yonder empty holsters. I’ll not rest, till this miscreant of the pad be laid by the heels.”

  “I muse,” replied Sir John, “how it is to be done; for the man wears a cloak of invisibility.”

  “He must be decoyed into the open,” declared Dr. Johnson.

  “How, decoyed?”

  “We must provide him a traveller to rob, who shall take care to be well armed in secret. Once he has come forth, he may be taken, be he never so invisible at the turnpikes and barriers.”

  “How shall I find such a traveller? My men are known.”

  “I will gladly make one in the scheam,” cried young Page eagerly.

  “No, sir,” replied Dr. Johnson, “for having once been robbed, you also are known. But come, Mr. Boswell, let us take this adventure upon ourselves; ’twill be something to tell in Edinburgh.”

  “With all my heart, sir,” I cried.

  “You must take care to have gold about you,” suggested Watchett, “and shew it at the inns and turnpikes; for I am perswaded, that the scoundrel hath friends at both, who keep him advised, and it may be turn the other way as he goes past the barriers.”

  Ay, thought I, picturing the weasel-face turnpike man—and not a thousand miles from here.

  “Gold!” exclaimed Dr. Johnson. “Nay, sir, if I must find gold, the adventure is ended before it begins.”

  “It is for the magistrate to find the gold,” replied Sir John, “for Watchett is in the right, you will scarce flush the Flying Highwayman from his covert without it. The men of the horse patrole shall be close at hand to take the scoundrel.”

  “No, sir,” replied Dr. Johnson, “for the same spies who report the gold, are sure to report also that Sir John Fielding’s people are on the roads, and so our scheam will fail. No, sir, we shall be very well. Mr. Boswell, in the character of a postilion, will be armed with a pair of horse-pistols, and between us we shall take him.”

  “You must have help, sir,” cried Sir John.

  “If we are to have help, it must be of a private person,” replied Johnson firmly.

  “You are right,” cried Page, “and in this I may be of use to the scheam; for if the Flying Highwayman will scarce assail me a second time, he can be under no apprehension if I am seen on the road; for on that road, and at the inns and turnpikes, I am as well known as the Hertford coach, passing nigh as often between my house in the country and my house in town.”

  We accepted of this offer. Sir John promising us a purse of twenty guineas, we parted to prepare against the adventure of the morrow, Dr. Johnson and I to Fleet Street, Mr. Page to Waltham Cross. We agreed to rendezvous betimes the next evening at the Rose and Crown.

  The next day’s sun was setting as we paid our toll at the Stamford Hill turnpike. The lad Watchett of the horse patrole sat on the stile eating an apple; his horse cropped grass. The boy ignored us ostentatiously. I did not see Barrock. With one of his frequent convulsive starts, Dr. Johnson contrived to spill the purse of guineas, at which the turnpike man stared. Then he turned the long pike, and we rolled into the stretch of road haunted by the Flying Highwayman.

  ’Twas a new experience for me, riding postilion on the lead horse in my buckskins and tight cap. I touched the horse-pistols in their holsters, and was reassured. I longed to be riding in the chaise with my illustrious friend, who never discoursed better than when elevated and inspired by the pleasures of rapid motion to which he was so addicted; but it was not to be, and I kept the horses at a lively trot, wondering every minute whether we should ever reach our rendezvous at the Rose and Crown.

  I wondered the more as twilight fell, for slowly the conviction was growing upon me that we were being followed. I seemed to hear our horses’ hoof-beats reechoed from a distance; yet when I turned, the road was bare and empty. I fear I turned often to stare along the dusty road, with its dark copses on either side, its squalid little hedge-ale-houses sheltering who knows what? It was with relief that I saw ahead the lights of the Rose and Crown.

  I left the chaise standing in the yard, and together we entered the common room of the inn and called for refreshment. A buxom, masterful woman presided at the tap—Hester Palmer, hereditary mistress of the old house. The pot-boy took the filled tankards from her brawny hand, and slapped them down on the bare oaken table before us. Dr. Johnson regarded the man with interest. He was no boy, being on in years, lame in one leg, and but sparsely provided with teeth. But for us the room was empty. The antient drawer leaned against the table, ready for a bit of talk.

  “Ye’ll be London gentlemen?”

  “Ay,” said Dr. Johnson, according to plan, “we’re for London tonight, and sorry I am to be benighted, for we carry a purse of gold, and here’s an ill strip of the road by reputation.”

  “’Tis so, sir,” assented the pot-boy eagerly. “’Tis the worst stretch of road north of London, I’ll be bound, and has been since the great days of Dick Turpin. Ah, Turpin! There was the greatest of all the lads on the scamp. I mind him many a time, striding into this very inn with his pockets full of gold.”

  “This very house!” I exclaimed.

  “And why not?” croaked the antient pot-boy, “for he married the landlord’s daughter, and more by token there she stands at the bar, Mrs. Richard Turpin as ever was, though the name’s forgotten these many ye
ars.”

  The door creaked open. On the threshold stood a sturdy young man muffled to his lips in a long sand-coloured horseman’s greatcoat. He wore a flapped hat pulled down about his brows, presenting to our gaze no more than a bold nose and a bit of tanned cheek. He was swarthy as a gypsy.

  He stood motionless in the doorway and swung his eyes slowly about the room. He raked with his glance the virago at the bar, the empty tables, and ourselves in our corner. Satisfied, he strode in and took a place in a sheltered settle well back from the fire. Mistress Palmer brought him a pot, and for a while their heads were together in close converse.

  “Ah, Turpin!” the antient was rambling on, “no thief-taker ever took Turpin. He lay snug in his cave, him and Tom King, just over the river,” he pointed in the general direction of east—“and Mistress Hester victualled them from the inn. I was the hostler’s boy then, and many’s the time I’ve carried the hamper, ay and eat with Turpin and King too, and drunk at the mouth of the cave.”

  “Where is this cave?” enquired Johnson.

  “’Tis but a trot, sir, for a man on a horse, but for all that ’tis not so easy found, I’ll warrant you, without you was shewed the way.”

  “Yet if no thief-taker ever took Turpin,” I struck in, “how came he to be hanged at last?”

  “Alack, sir, ’twas all along of his high spirits. He went down into Yorkshire, d’ye see, for the better presarving of his health; swinging in a rope, said he, he had a mortial aversion to, for his prophetical great-grandmother had formerly told him, it was a plaguy dry sort of death. Well, sir, here he was, living quietly at York, when he takes a notion to a bit of sport, and discharges his piece at his landlord’s cock. ‘You do me wrong, sir, to shoot my fowl,’ cries the landlord. ‘O ho,’ says bold Turpin, ‘is it you? Do but stay till I have charged my piece again, I’ll shoot you too.’ Sir, the curmudgeonly old hunks swore the peace against him; and when they had him, by ill luck they learned who he was. Oh, sir, he swung with spirit! ‘Don’t hurry,’ says he to the crowds hastening gallows-wards, ‘there’ll be no fun till I come!’ On the scaffold he kicked off his boots among the crowd, to make a liar of his old mother, who often said, he was a bad lad, and would die in his boots.”

  To all of this discourse Dr. Johnson listened with rapt attention, as the fowler learns the habits of the birds, or the courser notes the ways of the hare. Now, however, the discourse was cut short by the arrival of William Page.

  He came in with a rush. Under the brooding eye of the brown young man, Dr. Johnson tried to frown him off, but to no avail. He rushed up to us.

  He was splendidly attired in a raspberry-coloured coat with gold upon it, a laced waistcoat, a great cocked hat, and a pea-green greatcoat reversed with fawn. His newly powdered wig, clubbed behind, set off his handsome, fresh-coloured face.

  “All is well,” he cried, “I came over the Turner’s Hill barrier but now, all is in order, and no such horseman as we seek has passed the barrier. Neither did I pass anyone on the road, save an old clergyman ambling along on his pad. Depend upon it, our man, if he but comes, will come from another direction.”

  “Ay,” cried I, “from Turpin’s cave, may be.”

  “There’s no great mystery in this,” mused Dr. Johnson. “In my early days in London, just such a Flying Highwayman exercised the wits of the town. ’Twas simple in the end—the daring miscreant would put his horse to the turnpikes, and so clear them while the turnpike man was still withinside. The great thing is, not to worry our wits in surmise, but to lay the fellow by the heels and so resolve all at once. Come, let us go.”

  He paid the scot accordingly, with a great display of guineas, and we descended to the inn yard. There we found our chaise, Mr. Page’s phaeton, and the stranger’s grey, all under the care of our acquaintance of Stamford Hill, the bandy-legged hostler who had been found in possession of the phaeton.

  Mr. Page scowled upon him. I felt for the sporting gentleman, for in the traces of his phaeton, instead of his darling matched blacks, stood an ill-assorted pair—the remaining black, incongruously yoked to a nondescript bay. He was a man of action, however; instead of mourning over his severed pair, he strode to the phaeton-side and without a word corrected the priming of his pistols.

  “Allow me, Mr. Boswell.”

  He did the same for mine. Somehow the action pierced me with a new realization of the danger involved in our nocturnal adventure.

  “Let us go,” said Johnson resolutely. “Do you, sir, follow us. ’Tis a matter for nicety, to keep so far behind, that the Flying Highwayman will not take alarm at our confederacy, yet so close that one may come to the assistance of the other. Pray look to it, gentlemen.”

  “Trust me, sir.”

  With these words I leaped to horse and in my character as postilion guided our chaise out of the inn yard. Mr. Page mounted his phaeton and followed. The bandy-legged hostler watched us go.

  We turned into the road, and proceeded at a good pace towards Stamford Hill. No sound was to be heard save the jingle of our harness. On either side we passed darkened cottages, or quiet fields and copses. I loosened my pistols in the saddle-holsters.

  We had passed Houndsfield, and were proceeding through dark coverts, when behind us I heard the hoof-beats of a horse ridden hard. Another moment, and the beast had drawn up level with the lead horse.

  “Stand!” cried the rider, and caught my bridle. “Stand and deliver!”

  My reply was resolute. I snatched the loosened pistols and fired point-blank at the menacing figure. I heard the highwayman laugh as my pistols flashed in the pan. He dragged our team to a stop, and pranced his horse to the chaise-side.

  “Pray, sir,” says he to Dr. Johnson in a soft, light, caressing voice, shewing pistols in his turn, “pray oblige me with your purse, for you see there’s no help for it.”

  My usually intrepid friend shewed no fight. He regarded the pistols the highwayman presented, and handed out his purse without a word. I stared at the highwayman as he weighed it.

  He sat like a centaur upon William Page’s black. He was well-set and elegant, modishly attired in a long dun horseman’s greatcoat reversed with some dark material. Lace ruffles fell to his knuckles. He wore dark hair, unpowdered and clubbed behind, and his laced hat was flapped. His shoulders were dusted with white, and he smelled of otto. His face was entirely covered by a black lace mask. Behind the cobwebby thing his eyes gleamed.

  “What’s this, Dr. Johnson,” says he softly, “cockleshells? Curling-paper money?”

  “As to that,” says my friend, “I am but a poor man—”

  “You are richer than this,” cut in the highwayman, “by Sir John’s twenty guineas; so out with them, for I’ll not be trifled with.”

  “Sir,” said Johnson heavily, “I’m loath to have it known that I delivered Sir John’s guineas without striking a blow for them. Pray, give me such a Gadshill scar as I may shew—oblige me by putting a ball through the crown of my hat.”

  The highwayman gave a chime of laughter.

  “’Tis a shrewd old fogram. Well, sir, so be it.”

  The blast of the horse-pistol was deafening. It tore a gaping hole through Dr. Johnson’s respectable old cocked hat.

  “Here’s your battle-scarred bonnet,” said the highwayman contemptuously, “so you may deliver with a clear conscience. Over with it.”

  “Sir, my friend Boswell has also a character to lose. Come, Bozzy, reach him your coat that he may put a ball through the tail.”

  At this outrageous proposition I stiffened.

  “’Pon honour, sir,” I began haughtily.

  “No words, sir,” thundered Dr. Johnson, “do as you are bid.”

  “Ay,” seconded the highwayman with a sneer, “do as your governor bids you, for by God if you don’t reach it me, I’ll as lief put the hole into you as into your coat.”

  Sullenly I obeyed, and a second blast shook the copses as the highwayman emptied his second pistol into my coat.


  Here was an ignominious ending to our adventure! I strained my ears to hear if our ally in his phaeton were not at hand; and sure enough I heard far off the beat of horse’s hoofs.

  “Now, sir,” says the Flying Highwayman in his affected, girlish voice, “I’ve obliged you by marring your apparel, do you oblige me with Sir John’s guineas.”

  “Pray, satisfy my curiosity in one thing,” replied Dr. Johnson. “Say, how you contrive to come over the turnpikes?”

  “I jump them,” replied the knight of the road shortly, “and so no more words, but out with your gold, for I’m not such a fool as to stand here prating while your ally approaches.”

  “If I must,” said Dr. Johnson, and slowly drew Sir John’s purse from his breast. The highwayman leaned forward impatiently to snatch it. The hoof-beats were nearing now at a gallop.

  As the highwayman stretched forth his hand, suddenly my burly friend caught his wrist in a grip of iron. With an oath the highwayman set spurs to his horse, an ill-considered act which merely served to seal his doom; for as the startled creature shied, my muscular friend, so far from relaxing his grip, with one powerful impulse fairly pulled the marauder from his horse.

  “Yield!” cried Dr. Johnson triumphantly. “Yield, for you’ve shot your bolt!”

  The breath was out of him. In a trice I had leaped to earth and secured him, just as still another rider gallopped up and reined in beside us.

  “You have taken him!” he cried.

  ’Twas Barrock, the thick pursuer of the horse patrole. I looked at him astonished. He wore a venerable full-bottomed wig and clergyman’s bands.

  “Disguise,” said he with a grin. “Sir John set us to watch over you, but in our own persons ’twould not do.”

  I thought privately that no clergyman’s blacks could make the man look other than a thief-taker. He looked precious odd as he competently took up the sullen highwayman, masked as he had fallen, and bound him securely into his saddle, and thus we drove him before us towards Stamford Hill. I momentarily expected the phaeton to catch us up, but it never appeared; though as we neared the turnpike I again had the disagreeable sensation of a horseman at our backs.