“Who is this with them?”
Mr. Hawes muttered an oath. “It is a refractory prisoner I had sent to the dark cell. I suppose they will examine him next, and take his word against mine.”
(Chorus of Visiting Justices.) “Shame!”
CHAPTER XXV.
MR. EDEN had taken Mr. Lacy to the dark cells. Evans, who had no key of them, was sent to fetch Fry to open them. “We will kill two birds with one stone—disinter a patient for our leathern gallows, and a fresh incident of the —— Inquisition. Open this door, Mr. Fry.”
The door was opened. A feeble voice uttered a quavering cry of joy that sounded like wailing, and a figure emerged so suddenly and distinctly from the blackness that Mr. Lacy started. It was Thomas Robinson, who crept out white and shaking, with a wild, haggard look. He ran to Mr. Eden like a great girl. “Don't let me go back—don't let me go back, sir!” And the cowed one could hardly help whimpering.
“Come, courage, my lad,” rang out Mr. Eden, “your troubles are nearly over. Feel this man's hand, sir.”
“How he trembles! Why, he must be chicken-hearted.”
“No! only he is one of your men of action, not of passive fortitude. He is imaginative, too, and suffers remorse for his crimes without the soothing comfort of penitence. Twenty-four hours of that black hole would deprive him or any such nature of the light of reason.”