The Sword of Damocles: A Story of New York Life

by Anna Katharine Green

  XXII.

  HOPGOOD.

  "Give it an understanding but no tongue."

  --HAMLET.

  Hopgood was a man who could keep a secret, but who made so much ado inthe process that he reminded one of the placard found posted upsomewhere out west which reads, "A treasure of gold concealed here;don't dig!" Or so his wife used to say, and she ought to know, for shehad lived with him five years, three of which he had spent in thedetective service.

  "If he would only trust the wife of his bosom with whatever he's got onhis mind, instead of ambling around the building with his eyes rollingabout like peas in a caldron of boiling water, one might manage to takesome comfort in life, and not hurt anybody either. For two days now,ever since the wife of Mr. Sylvester died and Mr. Sylvester has beenaway from the bank, he's acted just like a lunatic. Not that that hasanything to do with his gettin up of nights and roamin down five pair ofstairs to see if the watchman is up to his duty, or with his askin adozen times a day if I remembers how Mr. Sylvester found him and me,well nigh starvin in Broad Street, and gave him the good word which gothim into this place? O no! O no, of course not! But _something_ has, andwhile he persists in shutting out from his breast the woman he swore tolove, honor, and cherish, that woman is not bound to bear the trials oflife with patience. Every time he jumps out of his chair at the sound ofMr. Sylvester's name, and some one is always mentionin' it, I plumps medown on mine with an expression of my views regarding a kitchen stovethat does all its drawin' when the oven's empty."

  So spake Mrs. Hopgood to her special crony and constant visitor, Mrs.Kirkshaw of Water Street, pursing up a mouth that might have beengood-natured if she had ever given it an opportunity. But Mrs. Kirkshawwho passed for a gossip with her neighbors, was a philosopher in theretirement of the domestic circle and did not believe in the blow forblow system.

  "La!" quoth she, with a smoothing out of her apron suggestive of heremployment as laundress, "show a dog that you want his bone and you'llnever get it. Husbands is like that very stove you've been a slanderinof. Rattle on coal when the fire's low and you put it out entirely; butbe a bit patient and drop it on piece by piece, coaxing-like, and you'llhave a hot stove afore you know it."

  Which suggestion struck Mrs. Hopgood like a revelation, and for a dayand night she resorted to the coaxing system; the result of which was tosend Mr. Hopgood out of the room to sit on the stairs in mortal terror,lest his good nature should get the better of his discretion. His littledaughter, Constantia Maria--so named and so called from twograndmothers, equally exacting in their claims and equally impecuniousas regards their resources--was his sole solace in this long vigil. Herpretty innocent prattle scarcely disturbed his meditation, while itsoothed his nerves, and with no one by but this unsuspecting child, hecould roll his great eyes to his heart's content without fear of herdescrying anything in them, but the love with which her own little heartabounded.

  On the morning after the funeral, however, Constantia Maria was restoredto his wife's arms on the plea that she did not seem quite well, andHopgood went out and sat alone. In a few minutes, however, he returned,and ambling restlessly up and down the room, stopped before hispersistently smiling wife and said somewhat tremulously:

  "If Mr. Sylvester takes a notion to come up and see Constantia Mariato-day, I hope you'll take the opportunity to finish your ironing orwhatever else it is you may have to do. I've noticed he seems a littleshy with the child when you are around."

  "Shy with the child when I am around! well I do declare!" exclaimed she,forgetting her late role in her somewhat natural indignation. "And whathave I ever done to frighten Mr. Sylvester? Nothing but putting on of aclean apron, when he comes in and a dustin' of the best chair for hisuse. It's a trick of yours to get a chance of speakin' to him alone, andI'll not put up with it. As if it wasn't bad enough to have a kettlewith the nozzle dangling, without living with a man who has a secret hewon't share with his own wife and the mother of his innocent babe."

  With a start the worthy man stared at her till he grew red in the face,probably with the effort of keeping his eyes steady for so long a time."Who told you I had a secret?" said he.

  "Who told me?" and then she laughed, though in a somewhat hystericalway, and sat down in the middle of the floor and shook and shook again."Hear the man!" she cried. And she told him the story of the placard outwest and then asked him, "if he thought she didn't remember how he usedto act when he was a chasin' up of a thief in the days when he was onthe police force."

  "But," he cried, quite as pale now as he had been florid the momentbefore, "I'm not in the police force now and you are acting quite sillyand I've no patience with you." And he was making for the door,presumably to sit upon the stairs, when with a late repentance sheseized him by the arm and said:

  "La now," an expression she had caught from Mrs. Kirkshaw, "I didn'tmean nothin' by my talk. Come back, John; Constantia Maria is not well,and if Mr. Sylvester comes up to see her, I'll just slip out and leaveyou alone."

  And upon that he told her she was a good wife and that if he had anysecret from her it was only because he was a poor man. "Honesty andprudence are all the treasures I possess to keep us three from starving.Shall I part with either of them just to satisfy your curiosity?" andbeing a good woman at heart, she said "no," though she secretlyconcluded that prudence in his case involved trust in one's wife first,and disbelief in the rest of the world afterward; and took her futureresolutions accordingly.

  "Well, Hopgood, you look anxious; do you want to speak to me?"

  The janitor eyed the changed and melancholy face of his patron, with anexpression in which real sympathy for his trouble, struggled with therespectful awe which Mr. Sylvester's presence was calculated to inspire.

  "If you please," said he, speaking very low, for more or less of thebank employees were moving busily to and fro, "Constantia Maria is notwell and she has been asking all day for the _dear man_, as she insistsupon calling you, sir, with many apologies for the freedom."

  Mr. Sylvester smiled with a faint far-away look in his dark eye thatmade Hopgood stare uneasily out of the window. "Sick! why then I must goup and see her," he returned in a matter-of-fact way that proved hisvisits in that direction were of no uncommon occurrence. "A moment moreand I shall be at liberty."

  Hopgood bowed and renewed his stare out of the window, with an intensityhappily spared from serious consequences to the passers-by, by themerciful celerity with which Mr. Sylvester procured his overcoat, putsuch papers in his pocket as he required, and joined him.

  "Constantia Maria, here is Mr. Sylvester come to see you."

  It was a pleasure to observe how the little thing brightened in hermother's arms, where but a moment before she had lain quite pale andstill, and slipping to the ground rushed up to meet the embrace of thisstern and melancholy-faced man. "I am so glad you have come," she criedover and over again; and her little arms went round his neck, and hersoft cheek nestled against his, with a content that made the mother'seyes sparkle with pleasure, as obedient to her promise, she quietly leftthe room.

  And Mr. Sylvester? If any one had seen the abandon with which he yieldedto her caresses and returned them, he would have understood why thischild should have loved him with such extraordinary affection. He kissedher forehead, he kissed her cheek, and seemed never weary of smoothingdown her bright and silky curls. She reminded him of Geraldine. She hadthe same blue eyes and caressing ways. From the day he had come upon hisold friend Hopgood in a condition of necessity almost of want, thisblue-eyed baby had held its small sceptre over his lonely heart, andunbeknown to the rest of the world, had solaced many a spare fiveminutes with her innocent prattle. The Hopgoods understood the cause ofhis predilection and were silent. It was the one thing Mrs. Hopgoodnever alluded to in her gossips with Mrs. Kirkshaw. But to-day theattentions of Mr. Sylvester to the little one seemed to make the janitorrestless. He walked up and down the narrow room uneasily surveying thepair out of the corner of his great glassy eye
s, till even Mr. Sylvesternoticed his unusual manner and put the child down, observing with asigh, "You think she is not well enough for any excitement?"

  "No sir, it is not that," returned the other uneasily, with a hasty lookaround him. "The fact is, I have something to say to you, sir, about--adiscovery--I made the other day." His words came very slowly, and helooked down with great embarrassment.

  Mr. Sylvester frowned slightly, and drew himself up to the full heightof his very imposing figure. "A discovery," repeated he, "when?"

  "The day you paid that early visit to the bank, sir, the day Mrs.Sylvester died."

  The frown on Mr. Sylvester's brow grew deeper. "The day--" he began, andstopped.

  "Excuse me, sir," exclaimed Hopgood with a burst. "I ought not to havementioned it, but you asked me _when_, and I--"

  "What was this discovery?" inquired his superior, imperatively.

  "Nothing much," murmured the other now all in a cold sweat. "But I feltas if I ought to tell you. You have been my benefactor, sir, I can neverforget what you have done for me and mine. If I saw death or bereavementbetween me and any favor I could do for you, sir, I would not hesitateto risk them. I am no talker, sir, but I am true and I am grateful." Hestopped, choked, and his eyes rolled frightfully. Mr. Sylvester lookedat him, grew a trifle pale, and put the little child away that wasnestling up against his knee.

  "You have not told me what you have discovered," said he.

  "Well, sir, only this." And he took from his pocket a small roll ofpaper which he unfolded and held out in his hand. It contained a goldtooth-pick somewhat bent and distorted.

  A flush dark and ominous crept over Mr. Sylvester's cheek. He glancedsternly at the trembling janitor, and uttered a short, "Well?"

  "I found it on the floor of the bank just after you went out the othermorning," the other pursued well-nigh inaudibly. "It was lying near thesafe. As it was not there when you went in, I took it for granted it wasyours. Am I right, sir?"

  The anxious tone in which this last question was uttered, the studiedway in which the janitor kept his eyes upon the floor could not havebeen unnoticed by Mr. Sylvester, but he simply said,

  "I have lost mine, that may very possibly be it."

  The janitor held it towards him; his eyes did not leave the floor. "Theresponsibility of my position here is sometimes felt by me to be veryheavy," muttered the man in a low, unmodulated tone. It was his duty inthose days previous to the Manhattan Bank robbery, to open the vault inthe morning, procure the books that were needed, and lay them about onthe various desks in readiness for the clerks upon their arrival. He hadalso the charge of the boxes of the various customers of the bank whochose to entrust their valuables to its safe keeping; which boxes werekept, together with the books, in that portion of the vault to which hehad access. "I should regret my comfortable situation here, but if itwas necessary, I would go without a murmur, trusting that God would takecare of my poor little lamb."

  "Hopgood, what do you mean?" asked Mr. Sylvester somewhat sternly. "Whotalks about dismissing you?"

  "No one," responded the other, turning aside to attend to some trivialmatter. "But if ever you think a younger or a fresher man would bepreferable in my place, do not hesitate to make the change your ownnecessities or that of the Bank may seem to require."

  Mr. Sylvester's eye which was fixed upon the janitor's face, slowlydarkened.

  "There is something underlying all this," said he, "what is it?"

  At once and as if he had taken his resolution, the janitor turned. "Ibeg your pardon," said he, "I ought to have told you in the first place.When I opened the vaults as usual on the morning of which I speak, Ifound the boxes displaced; that was nothing if you had been to them,sir; but what did alarm me and make me feel as if I had held my positiontoo long was to find that one of them was unlocked."

  Mr. Sylvester fell back a step.

  "It was Mr. Stuyvesant's box, sir, and I remember distinctly seeing himlock it the previous afternoon before putting it back on the shelf."

  The arms which Mr. Sylvester had crossed upon his breast tightenedspasmodically. "And it has been in that condition ever since?" asked he.

  The janitor shook his head. "No," said he, taking his little girl up inhis arms, possibly to hide his countenance. "As you did not come downagain on that day, I took the liberty of locking it with a key of my ownwhen I went to put away the books and shut the vault for the night." Andhe quietly buried his face in his baby's floating curls, who feeling hischeek against her own put up her hand and stroked it lovingly, crying inher caressing infantile tones,

  "Poor papa! poor tired papa."

  Mr. Sylvester's stern brow contracted painfully. The look with which hiseye sought the sky without, would have made Paula's young heart ache.Taking the child from her father's clasp, he laid her on the bed. Whenhe again confronted the janitor his face was like a mask.

  "Hopgood," said he, "you are an honest man and a faithful one; Iappreciate your worth and have had confidence in your judgment. Whomhave you told of this occurrence beside myself?"

  "No one, sir."

  "Another question; if Mr. Stuyvesant had required his box that day andhad found it in the condition you describe, what would you have repliedto his inquiries?"

  The janitor colored to the roots of his hair in an agony of shame Mr.Sylvester may or may not have appreciated, but replied with thestraightforward earnestness of a man driven to bay, "I should have beenobliged to tell him the truth sir; that whereas I had no personalknowledge of any one but myself, having been to the vaults since theevening before, I was called upon early that morning to open the outsidedoor to you, sir, and that you came into the bank," (he did not saylooking very pale, agitated and unnatural, but he could not helpremembering it) "and finding no one on duty but myself,--the watchmanhaving gone up stairs to take his usual cup of coffee before going homefor the day--you sent me out of the room on an errand, which delayed mesome little time, and that when I came back I found you gone, and everything as I had left it except that small pick lying on the floor."

  The last words were nearly inaudible but they must have been heard byMr. Sylvester, for immediately upon their utterance, the hand whichunconsciously had kept its hold upon the tooth-pick, opened and with anuncontrollable gesture flung the miserable tell-tale into the stove nearby.

  "Hopgood," said the stately gentleman, coming nearer and holding himwith his eyes till the poor man turned pale and cold as a stone, "hasMr. Stuyvesant had occasion to open his box since you locked it?"

  "Yes sir, he called for it yesterday afternoon."

  "And who gave it to him?"

  "I sir."

  "Did he appear to miss anything from it?"

  "No, sir."

  "Do you believe, Hopgood, that there was anything missing from it?"

  The janitor shrank like a man subjected to the torture. He fixed hisglance on Mr. Sylvester's face and his own gradually lightened.

  "No sir!" said he at last, with a gasp that made the little one lift hercurly head from her pillow and shake it with a slow and wistful motionstrange to see in a child of only two years.

  The proud man bowed, not with the severity however that might have beenexpected; indeed his manner was strangely shadowed, and though his lipbetrayed no uneasiness and his eye neither faltered or fell, there was avague expression of awe upon his countenance, which it would take morethan the simple understanding of the worthy but not over subtle manbefore him, to detect much less to comprehend.

  "You may be sure that Mr. Stuyvesant will never complain of any onehaving tampered with his effects while you are the guardian of thevaults," exclaimed Mr. Sylvester in clear ringing tones. "As for his boxbeing open, it is right that I should explain that it was the result ofa mistake. I had occasion to go to a box of my own in a hurry thatmorning, and misled by the darkness and my own nervousness perhaps, tookup his instead of my own. Not till I had opened it--with the tooth-pick,Hopgood, for I had been to a reception and did not have my k
eys withme--did I notice my mistake. I had intended to explain the matter to Mr.Stuyvesant, but you know what happened that day, and since then I havethought nothing of it."

  The janitor's face cleared to its natural expression. "You are verykind, sir, to explain yourself to me," said he; "it was not necessary."But his lightened face spoke volumes. "I have been on the police forceand I know how to hold my tongue when it is my duty, but it is very hardwork when the duty is on the other side. Have you any commands for me?"

  Mr. Sylvester shook his head, and his eye roamed over the humblefurniture and scanty comforts of this poor man's domicile. Hopgoodthought he might be going to offer him some gift or guerdon, and in alow distressed tone spoke up:

  "I shall not try to ask your pardon, sir, for anything I have said.Honesty that is afraid to show itself, is no honesty for me. I could notmeet your eye, knowing that I was aware of any circumstance of which yousupposed me ignorant. What I know, you must know, as long as I remain inthe position you were once kind enough to procure for me. And now thatis all I believe, sir."

  Mr. Sylvester dropped his eyes from the bare walls over which they hadbeen restlessly wandering, and fixed them for a passing moment on thecountenance of the man before him. Then with a grave action he liftedhis hat from his head, and bowed with the deference he might have shownto one of his proudest colleagues, and without another look or word,quietly left the room.

  Hopgood in his surprise stared after him somewhat awe-struck. But whenthe door had quite closed, he caught up his child almost passionately inhis arms, and crushing her against his breast, asked, while his eyeroamed round the humble room that in its warmth and comfort was a palaceto him, "Will he take the first opportunity to have me dismissed, orwill his heart forgive the expression of my momentary doubts, for thesake of this poor wee one that he so tenderly fancies?"

  The question did not answer itself, and indeed it was one to which timealone could reply.

  BOOK III.

  THE JAPHA MYSTERY.