Cousin Ned unfolded his length, rolled up his little eyes, and spoke softly in a deep resonant voice:
“Grieved I am to say it,” he began, “my friends over there mistake my poor uncle’s condition. He can be sly and plausible, sirs, but with me, whom he trusts”—old Mr. Trevelyan stiffened, and Cicely put a dismayed hand to her mouth—“with me he speaks otherwise. His brain still swarms with lunatick fancies. He proposes to get upon the roof and with his wings elude them all, and a good job too, says he, for the Governor is a puppy that wants a cannister to his tail, and Dr. Monro is a cork-brained clunch—”
With a roar the uncle broke from his keepers and flung himself upon his nephew.
“Thou prevaricating pup! Thou lying leech! Thou Judas! Where is my letter that I gave thee for my safety?”
“The man is mad,” growled Dr. Monro. “Take him away, and let him be close confined.”
We four met again next morning for breakfast in Johnson’s Court. We shared a loaf, and little Levet brewed pot after pot of tea, for which Dr. Johnson’s capacity was vast.
“And now,” pronounced Dr. Johnson, setting down his cup at last, “what’s to be done next for our incarcerated friend, Mr. Silas Trevelyan? He cannot stay where he is. Chains and fetters would soon drive the sanest man mad.”
“If we could perswade the keepers he is sane?” suggested Miss Cicely timidly.
“After Dr. Monro’s verdict,” said I, “how can we so? We can never get him away openly.”
“Then we must bring him away covertly,” said Dr. Johnson. “Can you not, Mr. Boswell, devise some bam that shall bamboozle the keepers and set Mr. Silas free?”
“Let me think. What do you say, sir, if we take a leaf from Shakespeare, and deliver our friend, like Falstaff, in a buckingbasket of foul linen?”
“Chain and all?”
“True, there’s the chain.”
“Take a leaf from Romeo and Julet, and they’ll undo the chain fast enough, I warrant you,” mused little Levet.
Johnson frowned; then smiled: “We’ll try it.”
Accordingly we spent the best part of the day concerting our measures and assembling our properties. As the afternoon wore on, our physician was furnished forth with a bagful of flasks and vials, clean linen, and money to spend, and so departed for Bedlam to acquaint Mr. Silas with our plan, and put things in motion. We set our rendezvous there for midnight.
Punctually at midnight, we two, escorting Miss, drove up to Bedlam gate in a hackney coach. A cart followed us, with a large pine box for freight. Instructing our Jehu to stand, we rang the porter’s bell. That functionary presently appeared, rubbing sleep from his eyes.
We soon saw that our precursor had opened the way for us by his authority as a medical man, plus, I doubt not, a judicious outlay of cash bribes. When we named our stricken friend, Mr. Silas Trevelyan, the fellow looked grave, passed us up the stair, and went yawning back to his hole.
At the barred gate on the landing, a second blue-coated warder was ready with the keys. They hung by a loop at his broad leather belt. As he selected and turned the right one, I scrutinized him narrowly, for upon his behavior depended, in part, the success of our scheam.
The fellow was tall and muscular, as befitted one who was often called upon to grapple with lunaticks. Little squinting eyes in a broad doughy face gave him a look more dogged than quick. True to his looks, he dogged us close as we entered the ward.
The long shadowy corridor was empty; the madmen had all been sequestered for the night. Eerie noises attested to their presence behind the locked doors: a snore and a snort here, a patter of prayer there, an occasional howl or screech of laughter that shocked the ear.
One door only was open, whence faint candle light fell along the floor. Dr. Levet stood in the doorway.
“Be brave, my dear,” said he to Cicely, taking her hand. “He is very far gone, and turning black. He has sent for you, only to give you his last blessing. Stand back, fellow (to the mad-keeper), these moments are sacred.”
The warder, looking solemn, took up his stance by the door, and we passed within. Our friend Mr. Silas lay on his straw pallet, his eyes turned up in his head. Out of respect for his obviously moribund condition, his chains had been removed.
As Dr. Levet advanced the candle and pushed back the tangled locks, I saw the awful leaden blackness of the skin. Had I not been prepared for it, I should have been shocked. Even prepared, Miss Cicely clung to my hand as she whispered:
“How do you, uncle?”
The dark eyes came into focus upon her.
“Ill, ill, my dear,” he breathed. “The lawyer—is he here?”
“I am here, sir.”
“Then write my last will—quickly. To my niece—every thing to my niece.”
His head dropped back. Dr. Levet held a draught to his lips. I drew forth my tablets and wrote down his bequest the briefest way. Faltering fingers signed it, and Dr. Johnson added his firm neat signature as witness.
“Take it, Cicely,” murmured the testator. She slipped it into her bodice. “And,” the failing voice continued, “may Heaven bless you. I forgive—”
The voice died, the white head dropped back, the jaw fell. Dr. Levet touched the slack wrist. Swiftly he closed the eyelids and drew the sheet over the darkened face.
“Our friend is no more,” he pronounced gravely.
“What, dead?” ejaculated the mad-keeper, starting forward.
“Stand back!” cried Dr. Levet. “On your life, stand back! Such a death has not been these hundred years in England, for our friend is dead of the Black Plague! Look at his face—”
He flicked back the sheet and momentarily by the pale light of the candle revealed the blackened countenance; at which the mad-keeper started back with an oath.
“Now hark’ee, my friend,” began Dr. Johnson portentously, “be guided by me: were this known, there would be rioting within these walls; what keeper would be safe? Do you but keep silence, all shall be decently done by us, his friends. He shall be gone by morning, and the episode forgotten. Nor shall you be the loser,” he added, fingering his pocket suggestively.
The fellow was stupid, which suited us; but so stupid that precious moments went past while we strove to make him see the supposed seriousness of the situation. Not so another keeper, a dark-visaged fellow with a squint who happened by. Hearing that Mr. Silas Trevelyan had but now died of the Black Death, he at once clapped a dirty handkerchief to his nose, and clattered off down the stair.
The first fellow was still mumbling when Dr. Levet settled the matter. He advanced the candle, clapped a hand to the fellow’s face, and cried out:
“What, friend! ’Tis too late! You have taken the infection! You are all of a sweat, and turning black! (And so he was, glistening with ink from Levet’s hand.) A clyster! Only a clyster will save you now! This way! To your own quarters!”
Speaking thus urgently, the physician steered the terrified fellow in the direction of his lair in the attick. We were left to do the last offices for the “dead,” who lay motionless, looking more risible now than ever.
The supposed corpse was neatly laid out, cocooned in his winding sheet, when Dr. Levet appeared in the gallery alone, chuckling.
“A good strong enema—that will take care of the keeper,” said he with a grin. “He’ll be busy for a while. Come, let us go.”
“Go!” cried Dr. Johnson. “Without the keeper, how are we to make our way through the barriers?”
“With his keys,” said Levet, and produced them. “A clyster is a powerfully distracting operation. ’Twas child’s play to get at the keys, though under his nose.”
“Well done, Mr. Levet. Come, let us go.”
Among us we made shift to carry the sheeted body through the barred gate, down the wide stair, and out at the portal, which the largest key unlocked, not without an alarming screech. A snore from the porter’s lodge gave us Godspeed. Dawn light was greying the sky as we lifted our burden into the wa
iting cart. We eased the sheeted figure into the pine coffin. I lowered the lid, and Dr. Johnson screwed it lightly down.
“—in case we encounter the curious. ’Tis but until we get clear of the grounds,” he reassured his friend in an undertone.
I noted with approval that underneath the bow of crape that mournfully adorned the lid, auger holes had been bored to provide the “corpse” air to breathe.
The carter, a scrawny pock-marked boy, was regarding our proceedings between alarm and superstitious awe.
“Is he dead? I’ll have no part in it! Give me my money and get him out of my cart!”
By paying a double fee, we managed to retain the cart; but the carter took to his heels. I must perforce take the reins. Miss elected to share my lot. She could not be perswaded to leave her uncle in my hands, but sat herself determinedly upon his coffin. Dr. Johnson and Mr. Levet mounted the hackney coach without us.
We had wasted precious time. Before we could drive off, we were intercepted. Two fellows came up at the run. One wore the blue coat of a mad-keeper. I recognized the swarthy keeper who had sheered off so quickly. Now it became clear: the fellow was one of Ned’s tools, and had run off, not to shun infection, but to inform; for his companion was Ned.
“Alas, my uncle!” said the false, mellifluous voice. “Why was I not notified? As his heir—”
“We have performed the last offices,” said Dr. Johnson coldly from the coach, “and you shall hear further. We’ll not bandy words at Bedlam gate. Drive on, Mr. Boswell.”
I drove on.
How it fell out I know not, but I missed my rendezvous in the leafy walks of Moorfields. It was not the coach that overtook me, but a pair of footpads coming suddenly out of the shadows.
“Stand and deliver!”
A weapon glinted, and a rough hand pulled me from the high seat.
“Stay, you mistake,” I cried; “here is no treasure chest—”
But the two fellows were up and slapping the reins, and off they went, cart and coffin and Miss and all; and as I stood dumbfounded, there floated back to me the girl’s despairing cry:
“Cousin Ned!”
Here was calamity indeed. I could think of no better plan than to bellow “Stop thief!” which I did with a will. Wheels crunched on gravel, and the coach drew up beside me. Little Levet reached a hand and pulled me inside.
When he had heard my story, Dr. Johnson looked utterly grave.
“What have we done? We have delivered our friend, out of Bedlam indeed, straight into the hands of his enemy!”
“And his heir!” exclaimed Dr. Levet.
“No, sir.” I corrected him. “Recall, sir, that as part of the comedy of the ‘death bed,’ I made his will. ‘Every thing to my niece.’ The girl is his heir.”
“But does her venal cousin know that?”
“She knows it,” said Levet wryly. “She need not lift a finger. She has only to let him be buried, and his fortune is hers.”
“Great Heavens!” I cried. “That innocent face!”
“Innocent faces have masked murderous hearts before now.” mused Dr. Johnson. “Vide Mary Blandy, vide your own Katharine Nairn.”
“I’ll never believe it,” said I stoutly.
“Believe it or no, we must act to save him, and quickly.”
“The more quickly,” said Levet urgently, “that in too slavish imitation of Romeo and Juliet, I have made him helpless with a sleeping draught.”
“Thus, then, the matter stands,” Johnson summed up. “The lawyer thinks himself the heir. Perhaps he supposes he is in possession of his uncle’s corpse. If so, he will bury him, thus rendering him a corpse indeed. Perhaps he has unscrewed the coffin lid and found a sleeping man. What is to hinder him from quietly doing away with him? Either way, he looks to inherit.”
“And perhaps he is in concert with Miss, they’ll bury him and split the swag,” suggested Levet.
I shook my head vehemently.
“We must find him,” said Dr. Johnson. “There is one hope yet. No one at all will inherit, if the old gentleman is not known to be dead. They cannot inter him secretly. Come, let us make inquiries. They all dwell together in a house in Jasper Street. To Jasper Street, coachman.”
Jasper Street was nearby. There all was silent. No cart stood before the door, but as we stood knocking, a manservant trudged up. He stared.
“Han’t you heard? I have just carried the news to our nearest friends. The master is dead of a mighty infection. They daren’t keep him. His sermon will be preached as soon as may be, and so they’ll put him hastily under ground.”
“Where, friend?”
“At the parish church, where else, St. Giles Cripplegate.”
Without further parley we drove off in haste. As we turned into the street called London Wall, we heard the great bell of St. Giles begin to toll. A few moments more, and we were there. The east transept door was nearest, and we entered in haste. A charnelhouse smell seemed to taint the dusky air. It emanated from the opened vault before the Trevelyan monument, where soon the deceased must be inhumed.
Was he deceased? Within that plain pine coffin forward in the aisle, sleeping or waking, did he still live? Could we bring him off alive from this peril we had put him in?
My eye sought the chief mourner where he sat in his forward pew. Nephew Ned wore a black mourning cloak, and made play with a large cambrick handkerchief. Miss was not beside him.
Then I saw her, kneeling at the coffin foot in her dove-grey gown, clinging with both hands to the edge. As I looked, the sexton tried to detach her from this unseemly pose, but she shook her head and clung.
From the pulpit the sermon was already flowing over us in a glutinous tide. The deceased was a mirror of all the works of mercy, visiting the sick, the imprisoned, the distracted, and now gone to his reward in the blessed hope of the resurrection.
“For verily he shall rise again—”
Miss Cicely stood up suddenly. A long creaking rasp set my teeth on edge as the coffin lid was slowly pushed up, and a sheeted figure rose to a sitting position.
The parson gabbled a prayer, ladies shrieked, and Lawyer Trevelyan uttered a most unseemly curse.
Helped by Cicely, the supposed corpse put back his cerements and bowed to the startled company.
“I thank you, reverend sir,” said Mr. Silas coolly, “for your good opinion, and you, my friends, for paying me my honours, tho’ prematurely. ’Tis too long a tale, how I came hither thus. Suffice it to say, I am neither dead nor mad, and I desire you will all join me at my house to break fast in celebration. You, nephew, need not come. You’ll hear from me later. But you, dear niece, give me your hand. Come, friends, let us go.”
So saying, in his madman’s rags as he was, wearing his winding-sheet like a cloak, handing Miss Cicely, he led the way down the center aisle. We fell in behind him, and so the strange procession came to the house in Jasper Street. There the dumbfounded servants served the old gentleman his own funeral baked meats (hastily fetched from the nearby tavern).
Only when the general company had dispersed did we learn the full story of those hours between the time the coffin was stolen by nephew Ned, and the time we found it lying in the church to be preached over.
“The rattling of the cart awoke me,” said old Trevelyan, “for your sleeping draught, sir (to Dr. Levet), was not so very strong. When I heard my nephew’s voice, I knew my situation was precarious indeed. I kept silence, only thanking Dr. Johnson for his foresight in screwing down the lid.”
“What is screwed may be unscrewed,” remarked Dr. Johnson, “that was the most of my concern.”
“That it was not,” said Mr. Silas, “we may thank this brave girl here. She sat upon the lid, and would not stir, and between seeming stubborn grief and the menace of infection, she kept her cousin at a distance. She never budged from my side. Only after Ned had left my coffin in the aisle and was gone to instruct the parson and the sexton, did I hear the screws turn in the lid.”
> “How, with what, then, Miss Cicely, did you make shift to turn them?” asked Dr. Johnson.
“The scissors of a hussif, sir, have more use than snipping thread. But, sir,” she went on, with a smile that irradiated her quiet face, “I dared not lift the lid while my cousin ruled. I still clung tight to the coffin, hoping, sir (to Dr. Johnson), for your arrival to protect us. When I saw you in the doorway, I whispered, ‘Now, uncle—’ and the rest you know.”
“A very pretty resurrection scene,” remarked my friend with a smile.
“’Tis not every man,” added Mr. Trevelyan, “that lives to hear his own eulogy preached. I am your debtor, sir (to Dr. Levet), for that privilege. To you, gentlemen three, I owe my liberty; and to you, dear Cicely, having fallen into Ned’s hands, I am well assured I owe my life. I have made you my heir in a mummery, my dear: you shall be so in earnest.”
[In Dr. Sam: Johnson’s day, it was still a fashionable amusement to visit Bethlehem Hospital and laugh at the lunatics; and the philosopher once made such an excursion with his young friend Boswell, though certainly not to laugh.
The lot of the madman in Bedlam is here described as depicted by many contemporary writers and artists, notably Hogarth. For more about Bedlam, see F. O. O’Donoghue, The Story of Bethlehem Hospital (London: T. Fisher Unwin, 1914).
The prime mover in the fictitious “bam” (short for “bamboozle”), Dr. Robert Levet, Johnson’s friend and inmate, comes straight out of Boswell’s Life of Johnson. The character of Old Trevelyan owes something to real reformers like John Howard; otherwise he and his kin are fictitious.]
THE DISAPPEARING SERVANT WENCH
Elizabeth Canning went from her Friends between nine and ten on Monday Night, being New Year’s Night; betwixt Houndsditch & Bishopsgate, freshcolour’d, pitted with ye Small-pox, high Forehead, light Eyebrows, about five foot high, well-set, had on a purple masquerade stuff Gown, black stuff Petticoat, a white Chip Hat bound round with green, white Apron and Handkerchief, blue Stockings, and leather Shoes. Any Coachman, who remembers taking up such a Person, and can give any Account where she is, shall have Two Guineas Reward, to be paid by Mrs. Canning, in Aldermanbury Postern, Sawyer, which will greatly satisfy her Mother.
The Detections of Dr. Sam Johnson Page 22