The Mysteries of London Volume 1

by Reynolds, George W. M.

  The Resurrection Man filled a flask with pure gin, and consigned it to his pocket.

  “We must now be off,” he said. “You, Banks, can go home and get the cart ready: the Buffer and me will go our way.”

  “At what time shall I come with the cart?” demanded the undertaker.

  “At a quarter past one to a second—neither more nor less,” answered Tidkins.

  Banks then took his departure.

  “Are you going to stay here with Meg, or what?” asked the Buffer of his wife.

  “I shall go to bed,” said the Rattlesnake hastily. “Tony can take the key with him.”

  “Then I shall be off home,” observed Moll. “Besides, Mrs. Smith may think it odd if we both remain out so late.”

  The Buffer’s wife accordingly took her leave.

  “Now come, Jack,” said the Resurrection Man. “We have no time to lose. There’s the tools to get out.”

  The two men descended the stairs, and issued from the house. They hastened up the little alley: the Resurrection Man opened the door of the ground-floor rooms; and they entered that part of the house together.

  “Bustle about,” said Tidkins, when they found themselves in the front room; and having lighted a candle, he hastily gathered together the implements which they required.

  Laden with the tools, the two men were about to leave the room, when the Buffer suddenly exclaimed, “What the devil was that? I could have sworn I heard some one moaning.”

  “Nonsense,” said the Resurrection Man; but, as he spoke, he observed by the glare of the candle, that the countenance of his companion had suddenly become ashy pale.

  “Well, I never was more deceived in my life,” observed the Buffer.

  “You certainly never was,” answered the Resurrection Man: then, hastily extinguishing the light, he pushed the Buffer into the alley, and locked the door carefully behind himself.

  The two body-snatchers then proceeded to the scene of their midnight labour.

  We take leave of them for a short space, and follow the movements of the Rattlesnake.

  It was not without an object that this woman had got rid of the company of the Buffer’s wife, by declaring that she was about to retire to rest.

  She permitted ten minutes to elapse after the Resurrection Man and his companion had left the room; then, deeming that sufficient time had been allowed for them to provide themselves with the implements necessary for their night’s work, she started from her chair, involuntarily exclaiming aloud, “Now for the great secret!”

  From an obscure corner of a shelf in the bed-room she drew forth a bunch of skeleton keys, which she had procured on the preceding day.

  She then provided herself with a dark-lantern, and descended to the alley.

  In five minutes she lighted upon a key, after many vain attempts with the others, which turned in the lock. The door opened, and she entered the ground floor.

  Having closed the door, she immediately proceeded into the back room, the appearance of which was the same as when she last visited it. The mysterious cloak and mask were there; but in the cupboard, which was before empty, were now a loaf and a bottle of water.

  “Then there is a human being concealed somewhere hereabouts!” she said to herself: “or else why that food! And it must have been the supply of bread and water that I saw him put into his basket the other night.”

  She listened; but no sound fell upon her ear. Then she carefully examined the room, to discover any trap-door or secret means of communication with a dungeon or subterranean place. She knew, by the situation of the house in respect to those on either side of it, that there could be no inner room level with the ground-floor; she therefore felt convinced that if there were any secret chamber or cell connected with the premises, it must be underneath.

  She scrutinized every inch of the floor, and could perceive no signs of a trap-door. The boards were all firm and tight. She advanced towards the chimney, which was divested of its grate; and suddenly she felt the hearth-stone move with a slight oscillation beneath her feet.

  Her countenance became animated with joy; she felt convinced that her perseverance in examining that room was about to be rewarded.

  She placed the lantern upon the floor, and endeavoured to raise the stone; but it seemed fixed in its setting, although it trembled as she touched it.

  Still she was not disheartened. She scrutinized the boards in the immediate vicinity of the stone; but her search was unavailing. No evidence of a concealed lock—no trace of a secret spring met her eyes. Yet she was confident that she was on the right scent. As she turned herself round, while crawling upon her hands and knees the better to pursue her examination, her rustling silk dress disturbed a portion of the masonry in the chimney, where a grate had once been fixed.

  A brick fell out.

  The heart of the Rattlesnake now beat quickly.

  She approached the lantern to the cavity left by the dislodged brick; and at the bottom of the recess she espied a small iron ring.

  She pulled it without hesitation; the ring yielded to her touch, and drew out a thick wire to the distance of nearly a foot.

  The Rattlesnake now tried once more to raise the stone, and succeeded. The stone was fixed at one end with stout iron hinges to one of the beams that supported the floor, and thus opened like a trapdoor.

  When raised, it disclosed a narrow flight of stone steps, at the bottom of which the most perfect obscurity reigned.

  The Rattlesnake now paused—in alarm.

  She longed to penetrate into those mysterious depths—she panted to dive into that subterranean darkness; but she was afraid.

  All those terrible reminiscences which were associated with her knowledge of the Resurrection Man, rushed to her mind; and she trembled to descend into the vault at her feet, for fear she should never return.

  These terrors were too much for her. She, moreover, recalled to mind that nearly an hour had now elapsed since the Resurrection Man and the Buffer had departed; and she knew not how speedily they might conclude their task. Besides, some unforeseen accident or sudden interruption might compel them to beat a retreat homewards; and she knew full well that if she were discovered there, death would be her portion.

  She accordingly determined to postpone any further examination into the mysteries of that house until some further occasion.

  Having closed the stone trap-door and replaced the brick in the wall of the chimney, she hastened back to the upper-floor, where she speedily retired to bed.

  We may as well observe that during the time she was in the lower room, no sound of a human tongue met her ears.

  But perhaps the victim slept!

  CHAPTER CVIII.

  THE EXHUMATION.

  THE night was fine—frosty—and bright with the lustre of a lovely moon.

  Even the chimneys and gables of the squalid houses of Globe Town appeared to bathe their heads in that flood of silver light.

  The Resurrection Man and the Buffer pursued their way towards the cemetery.

  For some minutes they preserved a profound silence: at length the Buffer exclaimed, “I only hope, Tony, that this business won’t turn out as bad as the job with young Markham three nights ago.”

  “Why should it?” demanded the Resurrection Man, in a gruff tone.

  “Well, I don’t know why,” answered the Buffer. “P’rhaps, after all, it was just as well that feller escaped as he did. We might have swung for it.”

  “Escape!” muttered the Resurrection Man, grinding his teeth savagely. “Yes—he did escape then; but I haven’t done with him yet. He shall not get off so easy another time.”

  “I wonder who those chaps was that come up so sudden?” observed the Buffer, after a pause.

  “Friends of his, no doubt,�
�� answered Tidkins. “Most likely he suspected a trap, or thought he would be on the right side. But the night was so plaguy dark, and the whole thing was so sudden, it was impossible to form an idea of who the two strangers might be.”

  “One on ’em was precious strong, I know,” said the Buffer. “But, for my part, I think you’d better leave the young feller alone in future. It’s no good standing the chance of getting scragged for mere wengeance. I can’t understand that sort of thing. If you like to crack his crib for him and hive the swag, I’m your man; but I’ll have no more of a business that’s all danger and no profit.”

  “Well, well, as you like,” said the Resurrection Man, impatiently. “Here we are; so look alive.”

  They were now under the wall of the cemetery.

  The Buffer clambered to the top of the wall, which was not very high; and the Resurrection Man handed him the implements and tools, which he dropped cautiously upon the ground inside the enclosure.

  He then helped his companion upon the wall; and in another moment they stood together within the cemetery.

  “Are you sure you can find the way to the right grave?” demanded the Buffer in a whisper.

  “Don’t be afraid,” was the reply: “I could go straight up to it blindfold.”

  They then shouldered their implements, and the Resurrection Man led the way to the spot where Mrs. Smith’s anonymous lodger had been buried.

  “I’m afeard the ground’s precious hard,” observed the Buffer, when he and his companion had satisfied themselves by a cautious glance around that no one was watching their movements.

  The eyes of these men had become so habituated to the obscurity of night, in consequence of the frequency with which they pursued their avocations during the darkness which cradled others to rest, that they were possessed of the visual acuteness generally ascribed to the cat.

  “We’ll soon turn it up, let it be as hard as it will,” said the Resurrection Man, in answer to his comrade’s remark.

  Then, suiting the action to the word, he began his operations in the following manner.

  He measured a distance of five paces from the head of the grave. At the point thus marked he took a long iron rod and drove it in an oblique direction through the ground towards one end of the coffin. So accurate were his calculations relative to the precise spot in which the coffin was embedded in the earth, that the iron rod struck against it the very first time he thus sounded the soil.

  “All right,” he whispered to the Buffer.

  He then took a spade and began to break up the earth just at that spot where the end of the iron rod peeped out of the ground.

  “Not so hard as you thought,” he observed. “The fact is, the whole burial-place is so mixed up with human remains, that the clay is too greasy to freeze very easy.”

  “I s’pose that’s it,” said the Buffer.

  The Resurrection Man worked for about ten minutes with a skill and an effect that would have astonished even Jones the grave-digger himself, had he been there to see. He then resigned the spade to the Buffer, who took his turn with equal ardour and ability.

  When his ten minutes elapsed, the resurrectionists regaled themselves each with a dram from Tidkins’ flask; and this individual then applied himself once more to the work in hand. When he was wearied, the Buffer relieved him; and thus did they fairly divide the toil until the excavation of the ground was completed.

  This portion of the task was finished in about forty minutes. An oblique channel, about ten feet long, and three feet square at the mouth, and decreasing only in length, as it verged towards the head of the coffin at the bottom, was now formed.

  The Resurrection Man provided himself with a stout chisel, the handle of which was covered with leather, and with a mallet, the ends of which were also protected with pieces of the same material. Thus the former instrument when struck by the latter emitted but little noise.

  He then descended into the channel which terminated at the very head of the coffin.

  Breaking away the soil that lay upon that end of the coffin, he inserted the chisel into the joints of the wood, and in a very few moments knocked off the board that closed the coffin at that extremity.

  The wood-work of the head of the shell was also removed with ease—for Banks had purposely nailed those parts of the two cases very slightly together.

  The Resurrection Man next handed up the tools to his companion, who threw him down a strong cord.

  The end of this rope was then fastened under the armpits of the corpse as it lay in its coffin.

  This being done, the Buffer helped the Resurrection Man out of the hole.

  “So far, so good,” said Tidkins: “it must be close upon one o’clock. We have got a quarter of an hour left—and that’s plenty of time to do all that’s yet to be done.”

  The two men then took the rope between them, and drew the corpse gently out of its coffin—up the slope of the channel—and landed it safely on the ground at a little distance from the mouth of the excavation.

  The moon fell upon the pale features of the dead—those features which were still as unchanged, save in colour, as if they had never come in contact with a shroud—nor belonged to a body that had been swathed in a winding-sheet!

  The contrast formed by the white figure and the black soil on which it was stretched, would have struck terror to the heart of any one save a resurrectionist.

  Indeed, the moment the corpse was thus dragged forth from its grave, the Resurrection Man thrust his hand into its breast, and felt for the gold.

  It was there—wrapped up as the undertaker had described.

  “The blunt is all safe, Jack,” said the Resurrection Man; and he secured the coin about his person.

  They then applied themselves vigorously to shovel back the earth; but, when they had filled up the excavation, a considerable quantity of the soil still remained to dispose of, it being impossible, in spite of stamping down, to condense the earth into the same space from which it was originally taken.

  They therefore filled two sacks with the surplus soil, and proceeded to empty them in different parts of the ground.

  Their task was so far accomplished, when they heard the low rumble of wheels in the lane outside the cemetery.

  To bundle the corpse neck and heels into a sack, and gather up their implements, was the work of only a few moments. They then conveyed their burdens between them to the wall overlooking the lane, where the well-known voice of Mr. Banks greeted their ears, as he stood upright in his cart peering over the barrier into the cemetery.

  “Got the blessed defunct?” said the undertaker interrogatively.

  “Right and tight,” answered the Buffer; “and the tin too. Now, then, look sharp—here’s the tools.”

  “I’ve got ’em,” returned Banks.

  “Look out for the stiff ’un, then,” added the Buffer; and, aided by the Resurrection Man, he shoved the body up to the undertaker, who deposited it in the bottom of his cart.

  The Resurrection Man and the Buffer then mounted the wall, and got into the vehicle, in which they laid themselves down, so that any person whom they might meet in the streets through which they were to pass would only see one individual in the cart—namely, the driver. Otherwise, the appearance of three men at that time of night, or rather at that hour in the morning, might have excited suspicion.

  Banks lashed the sides of his horse; and the animal started off at a round pace.

  Not a word was spoken during the short drive to the surgeon’s residence in the Cambridge Road.

  When they reached his house the road was quiet and deserted. A light glimmered through the fan-light over the door; and the door itself was opened the moment the cart stopped.

  The Resurrection Man and the Buffer sprang up; and, seeing that the coast was clear, bu
ndled the corpse out of the vehicle in an instant; then in less than half a minute the “blessed defunct,” as the undertaker called it, was safely lodged in the passage of the surgeon’s house.

  Mr. Banks, as soon as the body was removed from his vehicle, drove rapidly away. His portion of the night’s work was done; and he knew that his accomplices would give him his “reg’lars” when they should meet again.

  The Resurrection Man and the Buffer conveyed the body into a species of out-house, which the surgeon, who was passionately attached to anatomical studies, devoted to purposes of dissection and physiological experiment.

  In the middle of this room, which was about ten feet long and six broad, stood a strong deal table, forming a slightly inclined plane. The stone pavement of the out-house was perforated with holes in the immediate vicinity of the table, so that the fluid which poured from subjects for dissection might escape into a drain communicating with the common sewer. To the ceiling, immediately above the head of the table, was attached a pulley with a strong cord, by means of which a body might be supported in any position that was most convenient to the anatomist.

  The Resurrection Man and his companion carried the corpse into this dissecting-room, and placed it upon the table, the surgeon holding a candle to light their movements.

  “Now, Jack,” said Tidkins to the Buffer, “do you take the stiff ’un out of the sack, and lay him along decently on the table ready for business, while I retire a moment to this gentleman’s study and settle accounts with him.”

  “Well and good,” returned the Buffer. “I’ll stay here till you come back.”

  The surgeon lighted another candle, which he placed on the window-sill, and then withdrew, accompanied by the Resurrection Man.