Tribulations connected with "Old Lucas," the constable, with an account of the subsequent proceedings before Mr. Blamire, the magistrate, at Hatton Garden, and the mysterious appearance of a silver staff—A guinea wager with a jocose friend on the Dartford-road—The Prince of Wales, Sheridan, and the Crockery Girl.
At this time all the ground upon which Claremont, Myddleton, Lloyd, and Wilmington Squares have since been built, together with the numberless streets which diverge from them in all directions, was then pasture-land or garden-ground, bearing the name of Sadler's Wells Fields. Across these fields it was of course necessary that Grimaldi should pass and repass in going to and returning from the theatre. Upon this particular morning, a mob, consisting of at least a thousand persons, were actively engaged here in hunting an over-driven ox,—a diversion then in very high repute among the lower orders of the metropolis, but which is now, happily for the lives and limbs of the more peaceable part of the community, falling into desuetude: there not being quite so many open spaces or waste grounds to chase oxen in, as there used to be a quarter of a century ago. The mob was a very dense one, comprised of the worst characters; and perceiving that it would be a task of some difficulty to clear a passage through it, he paused for a minute or two, deliberating whether he had not better turn back at once and take the longer but less obstructed route by the Angel at Islington, when a young gentleman whom he had never seen before, after eyeing him with some curiosity, walked up and said—
"Is not your name Grimaldi, sir?"
"Yes, sir, it is," replied the other. "Pray, may I inquire why you ask the question?"
"Because," answered the stranger, pointing to a man who stood among a little group of people hard by,—"because I just now heard that gentleman mention it to a companion."
The person whom the young man pointed out was a very well known character about Clerkenwell and its vicinity, being an object of detestation with the whole of the neighbourhood. This man was Lucas,—"Old Lucas" was his familiar appellation,—and he filled the imposing office of parish constable. Parish constables are seldom very popular in their own districts, but Old Lucas was more unpopular than any man of the same class; and if the stories which are current of him be correct, with very good reason, unless the man was dreadfully belied. In short, he was a desperate villain. It was very generally understood of him, that where no real accusation existed against a man, his course of proceeding was to invent a false one, and to bolster it up with the most unblushing perjury, and an ingenious system of false evidence, which he had never any difficulty in obtaining, for the purpose of pocketing certain small sums which, under the title of "expenses," were paid upon the conviction of the culprit.
Being well acquainted with this man's reputation, Grimaldi was much astonished, and not at all pleasantly so, by the information he had just received; and he inquired with considerable anxiety and apprehension, whether the young man was quite certain that it was his name which the constable had mentioned.
"Quite certain," was the reply. "I can't have made any mistake upon the subject, because he wrote it down in his book."
"Wrote it down in his book!" exclaimed Grimaldi.
"Yes, he did, indeed," replied the other: "and more than that, I heard him say to another man beside him, that 'he could lay hold of you whenever he wanted you.'"