Reprinted Pieces

by Dickens, Charles

  then another says, "Are you from the country, young man?" "Yes," I

  says, "I am. I'm come out of Northamptonshire, and I'm quite

  lonely here, for I don't know London at all, and it's such a mighty

  big town." "It IS a big town," they says. "Oh, it's a VERY big

  town!" I says. "Really and truly I never was in such a town. It

  quite confuses of me!" and all that, you know.

  'When some of the journeymen Butchers that used the house, found

  that I wanted a place, they says, "Oh, we'll get you a place!" And

  they actually took me to a sight of places, in Newgate Market,

  Newport Market, Clare, Carnaby - I don't know where all. But the

  wages was - ha, ha, ha! - was not sufficient, and I never could

  suit myself, don't you see? Some of the queer frequenters of the

  house were a little suspicious of me at first, and I was obliged to

  be very cautious indeed how I communicated with Straw or Fendall.

  Sometimes, when I went out, pretending to stop and look into the

  shop windows, and just casting my eye round, I used to see some of

  'em following me; but, being perhaps better accustomed than they

  thought for, to that sort of thing, I used to lead 'em on as far as

  I thought necessary or convenient - sometimes a long way - and then

  turn sharp round, and meet 'em, and say, "Oh, dear, how glad I am

  to come upon you so fortunate! This London's such a place, I'm

  blowed if I ain't lost again!" And then we'd go back all together,

  to the public-house, and - ha, ha, ha! and smoke our pipes, don't

  you see?

  'They were very attentive to me, I am sure. It was a common thing,

  while I was living there, for some of 'em to take me out, and show

  me London. They showed me the Prisons - showed me Newgate - and

  when they showed me Newgate, I stops at the place where the Porters

  pitch their loads, and says, "Oh dear, is this where they hang the

  men? Oh Lor!" "That!" they says, "what a simple cove he is! THAT

  ain't it!" And then, they pointed out which WAS it, and I says

  "Lor!" and they says, "Now you'll know it agen, won't you?" And I

  said I thought I should if I tried hard - and I assure you I kept a

  sharp look out for the City Police when we were out in this way,

  for if any of 'em had happened to know me, and had spoke to me, it

  would have been all up in a minute. However, by good luck such a

  thing never happened, and all went on quiet: though the

  difficulties I had in communicating with my brother officers were

  quite extraordinary.

  'The stolen goods that were brought to the public-house by the

  Warehouse Porters, were always disposed of in a back parlour. For

  a long time, I never could get into this parlour, or see what was

  done there. As I sat smoking my pipe, like an innocent young chap,

  by the tap-room fire, I'd hear some of the parties to the robbery,

  as they came in and out, say softly to the landlord, "Who's that?

  What does HE do here?" "Bless your soul," says the landlord, "he's

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  only a" - ha, ha, ha! - "he's only a green young fellow from the

  country, as is looking for a butcher's sitiwation. Don't mind

  HIM!" So, in course of time, they were so convinced of my being

  green, and got to be so accustomed to me, that I was as free of the

  parlour as any of 'em, and I have seen as much as Seventy Pounds'

  Worth of fine lawn sold there, in one night, that was stolen from a

  warehouse in Friday Street. After the sale the buyers always stood

  treat - hot supper, or dinner, or what not - and they'd say on

  those occasions, "Come on, Butcher! Put your best leg foremost,

  young 'un, and walk into it!" Which I used to do - and hear, at

  table, all manner of particulars that it was very important for us

  Detectives to know.

  'This went on for ten weeks. I lived in the public-house all the

  time, and never was out of the Butcher's dress - except in bed. At

  last, when I had followed seven of the thieves, and set 'em to

  rights - that's an expression of ours, don't you see, by which I

  mean to say that I traced 'em, and found out where the robberies

  were done, and all about 'em - Straw, and Fendall, and I, gave one

  another the office, and at a time agreed upon, a descent was made

  upon the public-house, and the apprehensions effected. One of the

  first things the officers did, was to collar me - for the parties

  to the robbery weren't to suppose yet, that I was anything but a

  Butcher - on which the landlord cries out, "Don't take HIM," he

  says, "whatever you do! He's only a poor young chap from the

  country, and butter wouldn't melt in his mouth!" However, they -

  ha, ha, ha! - they took me, and pretended to search my bedroom,

  where nothing was found but an old fiddle belonging to the

  landlord, that had got there somehow or another. But, it entirely

  changed the landlord's opinion, for when it was produced, he says,

  "My fiddle! The Butcher's a purloiner! I give him into custody

  for the robbery of a musical instrument!"

  'The man that had stolen the goods in Friday Street was not taken

  yet. He had told me, in confidence, that he had his suspicions

  there was something wrong (on account of the City Police having

  captured one of the party), and that he was going to make himself

  scarce. I asked him, "Where do you mean to go, Mr. Shepherdson?"

  "Why, Butcher," says he, "the Setting Moon, in the Commercial Road,

  is a snug house, and I shall bang out there for a time. I shall

  call myself Simpson, which appears to me to be a modest sort of a

  name. Perhaps you'll give us a look in, Butcher?" "Well," says I,

  "I think I WILL give you a call" - which I fully intended, don't

  you see, because, of course, he was to be taken! I went over to

  the Setting Moon next day, with a brother officer, and asked at the

  bar for Simpson. They pointed out his room, up-stairs. As we were

  going up, he looks down over the banister, and calls out, "Halloa,

  Butcher! is that you?" "Yes, it's me. How do you find yourself?"

  "Bobbish," he says; "but who's that with you?" "It's only a young

  man, that's a friend of mine," I says. "Come along, then," says

  he; "any friend of the Butcher's is as welcome as the Butcher!"

  So, I made my friend acquainted with him, and we took him into

  custody.

  'You have no idea, sir, what a sight it was, in Court, when they

  first knew that I wasn't a Butcher, after all! I wasn't produced

  at the first examination, when there was a remand; but I was at the

  second. And when I stepped into the box, in full police uniform,

  and the whole party saw how they had been done, actually a groan of

  horror and dismay proceeded from 'em in the dock!

  'At the Old Bailey, when their trials came on, Mr. Clarkson was

  engaged for the defence, and he COULDN'T make out how it was, about

  the Butcher. He thought, all along, it was a real Butcher. When

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  the counsel for the prosecution said, "I will now call before you,

  gentlemen, the Police-officer," meaning myself, Mr.
Clarkson says,

  "Why Police-officer? Why more Police-officers? I don't want

  Police. We have had a great deal too much of the Police. I want

  the Butcher!" However, sir, he had the Butcher and the Policeofficer,

  both in one. Out of seven prisoners committed for trial,

  five were found guilty, and some of 'em were transported. The

  respectable firm at the West End got a term of imprisonment; and

  that's the Butcher's Story!'

  The story done, the chuckle-headed Butcher again resolved himself

  into the smooth-faced Detective. But, he was so extremely tickled

  by their having taken him about, when he was that Dragon in

  disguise, to show him London, that he could not help reverting to

  that point in his narrative; and gently repeating with the Butcher

  snigger, '"Oh, dear," I says, "is that where they hang the men?

  Oh, Lor!" "THAT!" says they. "What a simple cove he is!"'

  It being now late, and the party very modest in their fear of being

  too diffuse, there were some tokens of separation; when Sergeant

  Dornton, the soldierly-looking man, said, looking round him with a

  smile:

  'Before we break up, sir, perhaps you might have some amusement in

  hearing of the Adventures of a Carpet Bag. They are very short;

  and, I think, curious.'

  We welcomed the Carpet Bag, as cordially as Mr. Shepherdson

  welcomed the false Butcher at the Setting Moon. Sergeant Dornton

  proceeded.

  'In 1847, I was despatched to Chatham, in search of one Mesheck, a

  Jew. He had been carrying on, pretty heavily, in the bill-stealing

  way, getting acceptances from young men of good connexions (in the

  army chiefly), on pretence of discount, and bolting with the same.

  'Mesheck was off, before I got to Chatham. All I could learn about

  him was, that he had gone, probably to London, and had with him - a

  Carpet Bag.

  'I came back to town, by the last train from Blackwall, and made

  inquiries concerning a Jew passenger with - a Carpet Bag.

  'The office was shut up, it being the last train. There were only

  two or three porters left. Looking after a Jew with a Carpet Bag,

  on the Blackwall Railway, which was then the high road to a great

  Military Depot, was worse than looking after a needle in a hayrick.

  But it happened that one of these porters had carried, for a

  certain Jew, to a certain public-house, a certain - Carpet Bag.

  'I went to the public-house, but the Jew had only left his luggage

  there for a few hours, and had called for it in a cab, and taken it

  away. I put such questions there, and to the porter, as I thought

  prudent, and got at this description of - the Carpet Bag.

  'It was a bag which had, on one side of it, worked in worsted, a

  green parrot on a stand. A green parrot on a stand was the means

  by which to identify that - Carpet Bag.

  'I traced Mesheck, by means of this green parrot on a stand, to

  Cheltenham, to Birmingham, to Liverpool, to the Atlantic Ocean. At

  Liverpool he was too many for me. He had gone to the United

  States, and I gave up all thoughts of Mesheck, and likewise of his

  - Carpet Bag.

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  'Many months afterwards - near a year afterwards - there was a bank

  in Ireland robbed of seven thousand pounds, by a person of the name

  of Doctor Dundey, who escaped to America; from which country some

  of the stolen notes came home. He was supposed to have bought a

  farm in New Jersey. Under proper management, that estate could be

  seized and sold, for the benefit of the parties he had defrauded.

  I was sent off to America for this purpose.

  'I landed at Boston. I went on to New York. I found that he had

  lately changed New York paper-money for New Jersey paper money, and

  had banked cash in New Brunswick. To take this Doctor Dundey, it

  was necessary to entrap him into the State of New York, which

  required a deal of artifice and trouble. At one time, he couldn't

  be drawn into an appointment. At another time, he appointed to

  come to meet me, and a New York officer, on a pretext I made; and

  then his children had the measles. At last he came, per steamboat,

  and I took him, and lodged him in a New York prison called the

  Tombs; which I dare say you know, sir?'

  Editorial acknowledgment to that effect.

  'I went to the Tombs, on the morning after his capture, to attend

  the examination before the magistrate. I was passing through the

  magistrate's private room, when, happening to look round me to take

  notice of the place, as we generally have a habit of doing, I

  clapped my eyes, in one corner, on a - Carpet Bag.

  'What did I see upon that Carpet Bag, if you'll believe me, but a

  green parrot on a stand, as large as life!

  '"That Carpet Bag, with the representation of a green parrot on a

  stand," said I, "belongs to an English Jew, named Aaron Mesheck,

  and to no other man, alive or dead!"

  'I give you my word the New York Police Officers were doubled up

  with surprise.

  '"How did you ever come to know that?" said they.

  '"I think I ought to know that green parrot by this time," said I;

  "for I have had as pretty a dance after that bird, at home, as ever

  I had, in all my life!"'

  'And was it Mesheck's?' we submissively inquired.

  'Was it, sir? Of course it was! He was in custody for another

  offence, in that very identical Tombs, at that very identical time.

  And, more than that! Some memoranda, relating to the fraud for

  which I had vainly endeavoured to take him, were found to be, at

  that moment, lying in that very same individual - Carpet Bag!'

  Such are the curious coincidences and such is the peculiar ability,

  always sharpening and being improved by practice, and always

  adapting itself to every variety of circumstances, and opposing

  itself to every new device that perverted ingenuity can invent, for

  which this important social branch of the public service is

  remarkable! For ever on the watch, with their wits stretched to

  the utmost, these officers have, from day to day and year to year,

  to set themselves against every novelty of trickery and dexterity

  that the combined imaginations of all the lawless rascals in

  England can devise, and to keep pace with every such invention that

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  comes out. In the Courts of Justice, the materials of thousands of

  such stories as we have narrated - often elevated into the

  marvellous and romantic, by the circumstances of the case - are

  dryly compressed into the set phrase, 'in consequence of

  information I received, I did so and so.' Suspicion was to be

  directed, by careful inference and deduction, upon the right

  person; the right person was to be taken, wherever he had gone, or

  whatever he was doing to avoid detection: he is taken; there he is

  at the bar; that is enough. From information I, the officer,

  received, I did it; and, according to the custom in these cases, I

  say no more.

  These games of chess, played with live piec
es, are played before

  small audiences, and are chronicled nowhere. The interest of the

  game supports the player. Its results are enough for justice. To

  compare great things with small, suppose LEVERRIER or ADAMS

  informing the public that from information he had received he had

  discovered a new planet; or COLUMBUS informing the public of his

  day that from information he had received he had discovered a new

  continent; so the Detectives inform it that they have discovered a

  new fraud or an old offender, and the process is unknown.

  Thus, at midnight, closed the proceedings of our curious and

  interesting party. But one other circumstance finally wound up the

  evening, after our Detective guests had left us. One of the

  sharpest among them, and the officer best acquainted with the Swell

  Mob, had his pocket picked, going home!

  THREE 'DETECTIVE' ANECDOTES

  I. - THE PAIR OF GLOVES

  'IT'S a singler story, sir,' said Inspector Wield, of the Detective

  Police, who, in company with Sergeants Dornton and Mith, paid us

  another twilight visit, one July evening; 'and I've been thinking

  you might like to know it.

  'It's concerning the murder of the young woman, Eliza Grimwood,

  some years ago, over in the Waterloo Road. She was commonly called

  The Countess, because of her handsome appearance and her proud way

  of carrying of herself; and when I saw the poor Countess (I had

  known her well to speak to), lying dead, with her throat cut, on

  the floor of her bedroom, you'll believe me that a variety of

  reflections calculated to make a man rather low in his spirits,

  came into my head.

  'That's neither here nor there. I went to the house the morning

  after the murder, and examined the body, and made a general

  observation of the bedroom where it was. Turning down the pillow

  of the bed with my hand, I found, underneath it, a pair of gloves.

  A pair of gentleman's dress gloves, very dirty; and inside the

  lining, the letters TR, and a cross.

  'Well, sir, I took them gloves away, and I showed 'em to the

  magistrate, over at Union Hall, before whom the case was. He says,

  "Wield," he says, "there's no doubt this is a discovery that may

  lead to something very important; and what you have got to do,

  Wield, is, to find out the owner of these gloves."

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  'I was of the same opinion, of course, and I went at it