It has been said that Charles Peace carried out the burglaries on the other side of London entirely by himself, and without the assistance of even one confederate, and to a considerable extent the statement is borne out by facts.
Nevertheless, it is quite certain that occasionally he had a helpmate or accomplice, this being none other than Bandy-legged Bill.
Rawton, however, was fortunate enough to escape notice.
He was never implicated in the extensive series of depredations carried on by our hero during what may be termed his London career.
We have it upon good authority that there was another person besides Bill who occasionally accompanied Peace on his predatory excursions—this personage also escaped detection.
It is true that both he and the gipsy only acted in concert with our hero some half-dozen times or so.
As a rule Peace certainly did commit an almost incredible number of burglaries entirely by himself, and this perhaps furnishes us with the series of daring exploits which for audacity and fearlessness are without a parallel in the history of criminals.
But Peace was altogether a character far above the level of the ordinary housebreaker.
His cunning, finesse, his hypocrisy and assumption of the character of a well-to-do respectable member of the community when in his house in the Evelina-road, seems to be altogether outside the barriers which hedge in the lawless class to which he most unquestionably belonged.
The neighbours, as they saw him drive his pony trap along the Evelina-road, said, “The old gentleman has gone out for his evening drive.” They saw him go out, but none of them saw him come back. Whither he went nobody seemed to take the trouble to inquire. The supposition was that he was going to pay a visit to some friend who did not live within walking distance, and as Peace made it appear that he was an invalid and was not able to bear much fatigue, they naturally concluded that the respectable independent gentleman had a large circle of acquaintances who lived on the outskirts of London, and to these persons he was accustomed to pay periodical visits.