But whatever may have been his fears—his hopes—his fancies—or his thoughts, there suddenly flashed along the wires of the electric telegraph which were stretched close beside him the following words:—
“A murder has just been committed at Salthill, and the suspected murderer was seen to take a first-class ticket for London by the train which left Slough at 7h. 42m. p.m.
“He is in the garb of a Quaker, with a brown greatcoat on, which reaches nearly down to his feet. he is in the last compartment of the second first-class carriage.”
And yet, fast as these words flew like lightning past him, the information they contained, with all its details, as well as every secret thought that had preceded them, had already consecutively flown millions of times faster; indeed, at the very instant that, within the walls of the little cottage at Slough, there had been uttered that dreadful scream, it had simultaneously reached the judgment-seat of Heaven!
On arriving at the Paddington Station, after mingling for some moments with the crowd, he got into an omnibus, and as it rumbled along, taking up one passenger and putting down another, he probably felt that his identity was every minute becoming confounded and confused by the exchange of fellow-passengers for strangers that was constantly taking place. But all the time he was thinking, the Cad of the omnibus—a policeman in disguise—knew that he held his victim like a rat in a cage. Without, however, apparently taking the slightest notice of him, he took one sixpence, gave change for a shilling, handed out this lady, stuffed in that one, until, arriving at the Bank, the guilty man, stooping as he walked towards the carriage-door, descended the steps;—paid his fare;—crossed over to the Duke of Wellington’s statue, where pausing for a few moments, anxiously to gaze around him, he proceeded to the Jerusalem Coffee House,—thence over London Bridge to the Leopard Coffee House in the Borough,—and finally to a lodging-house in Scott’s Yard, Cannon Street.
He probably fancied that, by making so many turns and doubles, he had not only effectually puzzled all pursuit, but that his appearance at so many coffee-houses would assist him, if necessary, in proving an alibi; but, whatever may have been his motives or his thoughts, he had scarcely entered the lodging when the policeman—who, like a wolf, had followed him every step of the way—opening his door, very calmly said to him—the words no doubt were infinitely more appalling to him even than the scream that had been haunting him—
“Hav’nt you just come from Slough?”
The monosyllable “NO,” confusedly uttered in reply, substantiated his guilt.
The policeman made him his prisoner;—he was thrown into jail;—tried;—found guilty of wilful murder;—and—HANGED.
A few months afterwards, we happened to be travelling by rail from Paddington to Slough, in a carriage filled with people all strangers to one another. Like English travellers, they were all mute. For nearly fifteen miles no one had uttered a single word, until a short-bodied, short-necked, short-nosed, exceedingly respectable-looking man in the corner, fixing his eyes on the apparently fleeting posts and rails of the electric telegraph, significantly nodded to us as he muttered aloud—