A TALE OF TWO KNAVERIES.
IN FOUR CHAPTERS.—CHAP. I.
It was a melancholy and foggy November morning, and in its yellow gloom that legal byway known as Southampton Buildings, Holborn, looked even more frowzy and less respectable than usual. That, at least, was the opinion of Mr Blackford, solicitor, who had no love for the scene of his daily labours, as he turned into his office at the usual hour, nodded to the clerk and the office-boy who made up his modest staff, hung up his hat and coat on their particular peg, and passing into his private room, proceeded to open and read the half-dozen letters which lay on his desk. With one exception, these were not of a pleasing or cheerful nature. There was, in the first place, a rather peremptory reminder that the office rent was overdue, and must be paid forthwith. Then came a refusal to ‘settle,’ by the payment of a sum of money, a doubtful compensation-for-injuries action against a Railway Company, which Mr Blackford had undertaken upon the very sporting principle of charging nothing unless he should succeed; in which happy event he would retain half the spoils. Beneath this lay a letter declining to make an advance on certain dilapidated house-property belonging to a client, and commenting sharply on certain alleged misrepresentations; and then followed two or three more such epistolary missives.
Mr Blackford’s face wore a very excusable expression of disgust as he took up the last of the pile; but he brightened a little as he read it through. This at anyrate meant ‘business’—above all, business for which the payment, though not large or ungrudgingly rendered, would be certain and prompt. It was signed ‘William Franklin,’ and it contained a request that Mr Blackford would call on the writer that day, in order to take instructions for his will. Now, William Franklin was the lawyer’s best client; a retired tradesman of some wealth, and of a litigious disposition which had for several years brought as much profit to the business as all the rest of the connection put together. The solicitor hastily replied to such of his correspondents as required that attention, glanced at his diary, which showed him plenty of leisure time for the day—a far too usual circumstance with him; and was preparing to keep Mr Franklin’s appointment, when his office-boy knocked and entered.
‘A gentleman to see you, sir.’
‘Who is it?’ asked his master, rather suspiciously. Unexpected male visitors are not always welcome to a man whose finances are shaky.
‘Won’t give his name, sir—says he wants to see you on particular business. I think it’s a new client, sir,’ added the boy confidentially, understanding tolerably well the reasons of his employer’s hesitation.
‘Oh! Well—show him in; and don’t forget to hand a chair.’
The visitor entered—a tall, dark, powerful man, with remarkably bright eyes—well dressed, as Mr Blackford, drawing comfortable auguries therefrom, at once observed.
‘Take a seat,’ said the solicitor. ‘What can I do for you?’
The stranger sat down, glanced uneasily round the room, went back to the door, opened and closed it, and returned to his chair. ‘First of all,’ said he, speaking with the voice and manner of a gentleman—a voice and manner not too common among Mr Blackford’s clients—‘I must apologise for presenting myself in this mysterious way. I didn’t give my name to your clerk, for reasons which you will appreciate presently. It is Willoughby—Charles Willoughby—and here is my card. I have also a letter of introduction from my landlord, a client of yours.’
‘I wonder what he’s done?’ was Mr Blackford’s silent comment as he took the proffered letter. ‘Forgery, perhaps, or embezzlement. The last, most likely—if either. I daresay it’s only a trumpery County Court matter, after all.’
The letter simply stated that Mr Willoughby had for the last month occupied rooms in the writer’s house; that he was a very quiet lodger, and quite the gentleman; that he seemed to have plenty of money; that he had asked the writer to recommend a solicitor to him, and that the writer had at once named Mr Blackford; from whom, it was added in conclusion, a fair commission on any profits arising from the introduction would be expected by his zealous client.
‘And what can I do for you, sir?’ once more asked the solicitor, with the increased respect due to a man who was ‘quite the gentleman’ and ‘seemed to have plenty of money.’
The visitor fixed an anxious look on the lawyer, and replied: ‘Well, the fact is, Mr Blackford, that I have of late been greatly worried and annoyed.’
‘I’m sorry to hear that. Not very pleasant in this depressing weather, is it?’
‘It is not, indeed,’ assented the other, with a spasmodic and mirthless laugh, which began and ended in a peculiarly sudden manner.
‘What is the nature of the annoyance?’
The visitor was looking round the room in a bewildered way, and did not seem to hear the question. On its being repeated, he came to himself with a start.
‘The annoyance? Oh, it is just this—that I am being followed about by people who accuse and threaten me in a most unfounded and unjustifiable manner.’
‘And of what do they accuse you?’
‘Well, I hardly know, the accusations are so extremely vague. But they all point to horrible crimes committed in the past, without particularly specifying them. The threats are distinct enough: I am to be utterly ruined by exposure and denunciation.’
‘Have you ever done anything which would be likely to give these people a hold on you? You can be perfectly frank with me, you know; we lawyers hear a great many curious things, but we never talk about them. Few men can say that their lives will bear very close inspection.’
‘I declare to you solemnly that I can reproach myself with nothing which, if known, would produce the consequences with which I am threatened. But you know persistent slander is sure to make its mark sooner or later; it is impossible to say what harm may have been done already.’
‘Who are the people?’
‘I don’t know.’ Before giving this unexpected answer, Willoughby looked down on the floor and round the room with the same lost and puzzled air as before.
‘You don’t know who they are!’ said Mr Blackford with incredulity. ‘That’s rather strange, isn’t it?—Come, Mr Willoughby; we are quite alone. Who are they?’
‘I can’t tell you,’ repeated the client; ‘I wish I could.’ He looked at the lawyer with a pitiably anxious expression, and beads of perspiration began to appear on his forehead.
‘When and where do they attack you?’
‘Incessantly and everywhere. I am never safe from them. Principally at my lodgings, and after I am in bed at night. They keep me awake with their outcry.’
Mr Blackford began to be puzzled. His new acquaintance continued to regard him with the same eager and helpless look, and wiped his forehead with a tremulous hand.
‘But—but—bless me,’ said the lawyer, ‘if they come and annoy you in your lodgings, why don’t you give them in charge?—How many are there of them?’
Willoughby shook his head gloomily. ‘They are too cunning for that,’ he answered. ‘They are careful to keep out of my sight. I never set eyes on them; I only hear their voices. And they are in hundreds—in thousands, for all I can tell.’
Mr Blackford of course at once understood the true state of the case, and the discovery was not a pleasant one. He was by no means a nervous man, yet he experienced an electrical sensation in the scalp of his head at the idea that he was sitting within a yard of an athletic madman. Clearly, it would not do to contradict so opinionated a person as this was likely to be; he must be humoured, and induced, if possible, to go away quietly.
‘That’s awkward—very awkward,’ said the solicitor in a reflective tone. ‘If we can’t see them, you know, how can we get at them so as to set the law in motion?’
‘I can’t tell what to do,’ said the other despondently; ‘that is why I have come to consult you. All I know is that they continue to denounce and threaten me night and day, and that it cannot go on without being noticed. In that case, my character will be materially injured, and they will have attained their object. Besides, they are killing me, Mr Blackford. A man can’t exist without sleep, and I have had but little for weeks past. And now I learn that they are contriving a plan to relieve one another at night, so as to keep me awake.’
There was something inexpressibly grim in the earnest yet matter-of-fact way in which these impossibilities were related; with agitation, indeed, but with nothing in the nature of abnormal excitement or maniacal frenzy. He spoke as a man who found great matter for trouble, but none for astonishment, in the nightly irruption into his lodgings of hundreds or thousands of abusive persons, whose numbers were no hindrance to their remaining effectually concealed in the space of two small rooms. But he surveyed the walls and floor at more frequent intervals in his dazed manner, as though he suddenly found himself in a strange place, while his moist and shaking hands nervously and convulsively worked his handkerchief into a compact ball.
Actuated at first by the best motives, Mr Blackford began to question him cautiously as to his connections and private affairs. It seemed that, with the exception of some distant relatives at the Cape, he was alone in the world; nor did he appear to have any friends in England upon whom he could rely. Having elicited the further fact that he had an income of five hundred pounds a year, derived from funded property, the solicitor ceased his questions and delivered himself up to reflection, while his client anxiously awaited the voice of the oracle.
There are many members of the junior branch of the legal profession who are of unbending uprightness and fastidious honour; there are a few downright knaves; and there are others who stand neither on the upper nor on the lower rungs of the moral ladder, but occupy a position somewhere about the middle. These last are equally prepared to be honest should honesty be made easy for them, or rogues in the face of difficulty or temptation; and among their number was Mr Blackford. He was not altogether favourably known to his brother practitioners; but neither could any definite charge be brought against him. He had done things which were certainly worthy of condemnation; but he had hitherto kept clear of any offence which would endanger his position on the rolls. He dressed neatly, he had a good manner and a correct accent, and he did not drink. His business was small, and not of a high class, lying mostly among the smaller sort of tradesmen; yet he had a certain connection, and even a few clients of means and fair position; and he was said to understand his work. He was quite without capital, and lived a hand-to-mouth life; and he had certain extravagant tastes of the lower kind. Money was always scarce with him, and he was prepared to acquire it in any way which offered, so that it was unattended with risk; for he was quite unburdened with scruples, considering all profit fair which could be safely gained. And he thought that in this case he saw a chance of such profit. Willoughby had answered all his questions, some of them bordering on impertinence, in the most open and unreserved fashion; he was evidently disposed to place the fullest confidence in his legal adviser, looking to him for sympathy and deliverance. Mr Blackford felt more at his ease in thus parleying with a probably dangerous lunatic, than a few minutes before he would have thought possible.
The upshot of his meditations was that he concluded to abandon, at all events for the present, his first very proper and humane purpose of communicating with the police, and trying to induce them to deal with the case as that of a lunatic at large, so that the poor fellow might be properly cared for until his friends could be communicated with. For this he substituted a different plan of action with admirable readiness, and with an entire absence of pity or compunction. It was clear that there was money to be made out of the man by judicious handling; and Mr Blackford was of opinion that no one could be better qualified to make it, or more deserving of it when made, than himself.
He accordingly advised that the threats and accusations should for the present be treated with contempt. No doubt they were made for the purpose of extorting money; any sign that they were producing an effect would only cause the annoyance to be redoubled. In the meantime he, Blackford, would use his wide experience and not inconsiderable abilities in his client’s behalf, and had no doubt of the ultimate success of his endeavours to discover the offenders and bring them to justice. The poor madman, with tears in his eyes, thanked him for his kindness and attention, declared that a load had been lifted from his mind, and was about to withdraw, when the solicitor stopped him with an air of having suddenly recollected something.
‘By the way,’ said he, ‘it’s hardly worth mentioning—but cases of this nature involve considerable expense to begin with, in the way of inquiries and so forth. It is generally the custom—— Well, to put it plainly, I think I must ask you for a small present payment on account; say five pounds or so.’
‘Of course, of course—certainly,’ said the other, fumbling nervously in his pocket. ‘I am much obliged to you for mentioning it; this is my first experience of the kind, I am happy to say. I have not quite the sum you mention with me at this moment. Would three pounds ten be enough for the present? and I will send the rest by post.’
‘O yes, that will do very well; only a matter of form, you know,’ said the solicitor carelessly, but laying an eager grasp upon the coins. ‘I hope to write to you satisfactorily before long—till then, good-bye.’
So soon as his new client had left, Mr Blackford assumed his coat and hat and went off to keep his appointment with Mr Franklin, who lived in Camden Town with his married niece and her husband. As the solicitor strode rapidly along, he felt a different being from the man who, but a short half-hour before, had been reading his letters in so despondent a mood. The sudden and unwanted accession of business from two quarters at once on the same day gave him a feeling of importance; and the consciousness of the four unexpected gold coins in his pocket thrilled through him with a comforting glow, like that of a glass of old ale on a frosty day. Willoughby, if properly managed, might prove a small gold mine before his madness should develop itself to an extent incompatible with attention to legal matters; and visions arose before him of a possible inquiry de lunatico, with its expensive accompaniments of the appointment of a ‘committee’ and the administration of a nice little estate; all to be conducted, in the not distant future, to his great pecuniary profit, by that trustworthy and able man of law, James Blackford. His castle-building extended to an important family connection thence to arise; to the hiring of more commodious offices in a better situation, necessitated by a rapidly increasing business; and by the time that he found himself at the end of his walk, the unpaid rent and the uncompromised compensation action had faded in a glow of splendid possibilities.
Mr William Franklin was a tall and gaunt old man, with a red face, on which dwelt continually a savage and sardonic smile, framed in a bristling fringe of silvery-white hair. His character might almost be summed up in the expressive phrase of certain of his acquaintance—friends he had none—by whom it was predicated of him that he was ‘an ugly customer.’ He was, in fact, an evil-tempered and malicious bully, whose selfish and tyrannical disposition had been fostered by an undue consciousness of the twenty-five thousand pounds which he had made in business, and by the assiduous court which his wealth caused to be paid to him by expectant relatives, with all of whom he took pleasure in quarrelling in turn, enjoying with a fiendish glee their subsequent agonies of self-abasement.
‘So, it’s you at last!’ said this amiable old gentleman, when Mr Blackford was shown into his presence. ‘Thought you were never coming. What’s kept you?’
The solicitor, with great humility of manner, apologised for the unavoidable delay, and alluded to the overwhelming pressure of business and the constant calls upon his time.
‘Oh, I’m sure—I’m sorry to have put you about so,’ said Mr Franklin with vast politeness. ‘I couldn’t think of detaining you when you’re so busy. It’s a matter of no consequence, after all. Pray, don’t wait; I’ll send to Jones and Crowder; I daresay they won’t be too much engaged to come at once.’
Greatly alarmed, Mr Blackford hastened to protest that his time was entirely at Mr Franklin’s disposal.
‘Then don’t tell me a pack of lies!’ roared the client with an instantaneous change of manner, facing round from the fireplace, poker in hand, with every apparent intention of committing a violent assault upon his solicitor. ‘Man alive! don’t I know that it’s just as much as you can do to keep body and soul together in that poky little hole of an office of yours?—Business, indeed! As if I wasn’t about the only decent client you have! And why I am your client, goodness only knows. It’s compassion, I suppose. I always was too soft-hearted for this world.’
His visitor could have furnished him with a better reason—namely, that no other lawyer had ever been found capable of putting up with his insolence and tyranny. But Mr Blackford had plenty of self-control, and could bear a good deal where anything was to be got by doing so.
The soft-hearted gentleman smote the coals violently, fulminating subdued anathemas the while with a dreadful grin. The solicitor, knowing his man, remained perfectly quiet; and presently Mr Franklin spoke again, abruptly, but in a quieter tone.
‘Here! I want to make my will. I’m going to do it at last—in a fashion that will astonish some of ’em. They’ve been anxious enough about it these ten years and more. I hope it’ll please ’em when it’s done. A set of hungry hounds! Ready to lick the dirt off my boots for the money, and nothing too bad to say of me behind my back. I know it as well as if I heard it. Not a penny—not a penny for one of ’em! I’d rather take it into my grave with me—not but what they’d grub me up again, if I was in the middle of the earth.’
There was again a short silence. Mr Blackford awaited his instructions.
‘Then there’s this young Tom Wedlake been giving me his sauce, just because I spoke a word to that lazy young baggage of a wife of his—said he wasn’t going to stand it—he wasn’t going to stand it—the beggar! and if I didn’t like it, I could go. Will I! I’ll stay here, just to spite him. Besides, I’m a deal too comfortable to move. She won’t let him turn me out—the artful minx. “Dear uncle—don’t be cross with me, dear uncle!”’ said Mr Franklin with an access of fury, and a ludicrous assumption of a feminine falsetto. “Leave all your money to your niece, dear uncle; that’s what you’ve got to do.” Not a brass farthing, by Jove! He doesn’t want my money, doesn’t he? and he has the impudence to tell me so! Very good, Mr Thomas Wedlake; I’ll take you at your word. I’ll pay you out, you—you—rapscallion!’
The furious monologue seemed to have spun itself out; so Mr Blackford ventured a word.
‘Then I gather, sir, that you do not intend to leave any portion of your property to your nephew and niece—and I have no doubt you are exercising a sound discretion, as always. But as you are justly offended with your other relations, what disposition do you think of making?’
‘Mind your own business!’ was the unexpected retort.
Mr Blackford felt rather aggrieved, as the matter was clearly his business; but he said nothing. The old man continued his jerky discourse, addressed more to himself than to his visitor.
‘You’re right, though.—What shall I do with it? I’ve been asking myself the same question ever since I wrote to you last night; and now you’re here, I’m no nearer the answer. It’s a deal of money, hard got, and soon spent; and I don’t know who it’s to go to. Plaguy hard to leave it at all. No good grumbling about that, though. I won’t give it to an hospital, or build a church, or endow almshouses; I’ve no patience with that sort of humbug. As if a man hadn’t been robbed enough all these years, what with rates and what with taxes. I can’t keep the money myself, and there’s no one to give it to—no one.’
Perhaps, through that heart, all seared and scorched with evil passions, eaten through and through with corroding suspicion, there darted a momentary pang at the thought that there was not a human being from whom the gift of all his painfully acquired wealth would buy one tear of sorrow, or even one grateful remembrance of the giver.
He sat brooding with a gloomy brow; and this time the silence was so long that Mr Blackford was about to break it at the risk of another rebuke, when Mr Franklin smote his hand upon his thigh and laughed—a harsh and cackling laugh, devoid of mirth or geniality.
‘Blackford,’ said he, ‘I’ll leave it to you!’
Had the lawyer received a blow from the ready poker which stood in the nearest corner of the fireplace, he could hardly have been more thoroughly stunned. ‘To me!’ he managed to gasp out, after a moment’s astounded silence.
‘I’ll leave it to you!’ repeated Mr Franklin, nodding emphatically. ‘Ain’t you willing, that you stare like a stuck pig? It’s not because of any regard for you—don’t think it. I’ll leave it to you, just because it will be about the worst kind of sell for ’em all I could anyhow invent. I hate ’em—every one! and the thought of their faces when they come to hear the will read, will be about the only consolation I shall have for being obliged to part with it at all. And mind you, I shall make it a condition that they do hear it read. You are to call them all together for the purpose, and you’re not to breathe a word beforehand of the nice little surprise in store for ’em. Every man-Jack will think he’s been “remembered”—and so he has, I assure you! You’ll have a nice time of it with ’em, Blackford. D’ye quail at the thought of it—eh? If so, say the word, and we’ll think of something else.’
‘Not on my account, I beg,’ said the solicitor, recovering his senses. ‘I daresay I shall be equal to the occasion. But Mr Franklin, my dear sir, how am I to thank you for such munifi’——
‘You’d better not thank me at all, if you’re wise,’ said the eccentric testator; ‘you may sicken me like the rest, and then I shall alter my mind. Bosh! I know you well enough. You’ll try to double the money as soon as you get it; and you’ll either lose it all and hang yourself, or you’ll get mixed up in some piece of rascality that will bring you to penal servitude. You have my instructions. Go and make the will; and bring it here to-morrow, and I’ll sign it. And look here! bring two witnesses with you; I don’t want any one in this house to know what I’ve been about. Here’s a list of the securities. Be off! Good-bye—get out!’ And with this unceremonious dismissal, the interview came to an end.
As he hurried back to his office, Mr Blackford was able at last to realise the immensity of the good luck which had befallen him in this extraordinary manner. Twenty-five thousand pounds, all invested in sound Stock Exchange securities! Good-bye to the strife for bread; to the trap-net of petty pecuniary embarrassments which meets and deadens effort at every struggle; to the haunting care which makes hard the nightly pillow and drives away slumber before the dawn; to the hand-to-mouth existence, and the thousand-and-one daily degradations of a struggling professional man. Good-bye to one and all—if Mr Franklin’s suddenly conceived purpose would but hold until he should in good time, the best of time, betake himself to a region where codicils are an impossibility. But one thought was present to the lawyer’s mind at that moment—to get the will drawn and signed with all possible expedition; but one hope was his—that his client might thereafter make an edifying end with as little delay as possible.