Their way led them from the gate-house into Bridge street, and from thence to Ormond Gate, Earl's Gate, "Geata-na-Eorlagh," as it was then sometimes called. With Major Ormiston in their company, this was opened to them without a question, and they afterward proceeded, as fast as Nellie's strength permitted, up the steep hill street, debouching into the Corn Market. Entering the latter, they found themselves face to face with Newgate, the great criminal prison of the city. There it stood, dark, strong, and terrible—too strong, Roger could not help thinking, to be a fitting prison for the frail, dying woman it was guarding for the hangman. It seemed, indeed, almost like an abuse of power to have cast her there, so helpless as she was, and powerless, in the strong grasp of the law.
Newgate had originally formed a square, having at each of its four angles a tower, three stories high, and turreted at the top. Two of these however, those facing toward the city, had been recently taken down; and when Nellie looked upon it for the first time, it consisted merely of the gate-house, with its portcullis and iron gates, and a strong tower at either end. Near the prison stood the gibbet, metaphorically as well as really; for few, indeed, in those sad days, were the prisoners who, once shut up within the walls of Newgate, ever left them for a pleasanter destination than the gallows. From the position in which it stood, they could hardly avoid seeing it as they passed onward toward the prison; but in the faint hope of sparing at least poor Nellie's eyes this terrible apparition, Ormiston stepped a little in advance of his companions, and placed himself between her and it. Roger, however, upon whose arm she leaned, knew, by the sudden tremor which shook her frame that this tender caution had been in vain. Nellie, in fact, had already seen and guessed at the ghastly nature of its office there; and as her eye glanced reluctantly—and almost, as it were, in spite of herself—toward it, she felt as if she had never before thoroughly realized the awful position in which her mother stood. What wonder that she grew sick and giddy as the thought forced itself, in all its naked reality, on her mind, that her mother—her mother, the very type and personification of refined and delicate womanhood—might at any hour be dragged hither, shrinking and ashamed, beneath the rude hangman's grasp? What wonder that her very feet failed to do their office, and that Roger was compelled rather to carry than to lead her past the spot, never pausing or suffering her to pause until they stood before the gates of Newgate?
Here, as at the city gate, the name and authority of Ormiston procured them ready admission, the jailer receiving them with courtesy, and showing them at once into a low, vaulted room on the ground-floor of the prison. Notwithstanding this, however, Ormiston had no sooner announced the name of the prisoner they had come to visit, than the man showed symptoms of great and irrepressible embarrassment.
"The prisoner had been very ill," he muttered; "had burst a blood-vessel in the morning, and the bleeding had returned within the hour. A doctor had been sent for, and was at that moment with her; but if Major Ormiston could condescend to wait, he would call his wife, who was also in attendance on the poor lady, and would tell her to announce the arrival of a visitor. It must be done gently," he repeated over and over again, "very gently; for the doctor had already told him that any sudden shock would of necessity prove fatal."
Ormiston eyed the man curiously as he blundered through this statement. He knew enough of Newgate, as it was then conducted, to doubt much if the visit of a doctor was a luxury often vouchsafed to its inhabitants; and feeling in consequence that some mystery was concealed beneath the mention of such an official, he was almost tempted to fancy that Mrs. Netterville was already dead, and that, on account of the presence of her daughter, the man hesitated to say so. The next moment, however, he had leaped to another and more correct conclusion, though for Nellie's sake, and because intolerance formed no part of his character, he made neither question nor comment, as the jailer evidently expected that he would, on the matter. Greatly relieved by this apparent absence of suspicion on the part of the English officer, the man brought in a stool for Nellie to sit upon, and then once more announced his intention of going in quest of his wife. Just as he opened the door for this purpose, Ormiston caught a glimpse of a tall, gray-haired man, who passed down the passage quickly in company of a woman. The jailer saw him also, and with a sudden look of dismay upon his features, closed the half-opened door, and turned again to Ormiston.
"It was the doctor," he said with emphasis—"the doctor who had just taken his departure; and as there was nothing now to prevent their seeing the sick lady, he would send his wife at once to conduct them to her cell."
A long ten minutes followed, during which time Nellie sat quite still, her face hidden by her hands, and shivering from head to foot in fear and expectation. The door opened again, and she sprang up. This time it was the jailer's wife who entered.
"The poor lady had been informed," she said, "of the arrival of her daughter, and was longing to embrace her. Would the young lady follow her to the cell?"
Nellie was only too eager to do so, and they left the room together. Ormiston hesitated a moment as to what he would do himself; but not liking to leave Nellie entirely in the hands of such people as jailers and their wives were in those days, he at last proposed to Roger to follow and wait somewhere near the cell during her approaching interview with her mother. To this Roger readily assented, and they reached the open door just as Nellie entered and knelt down by her mother's side.
More than a hundred years later than the period of which there is question in this tale, the treatment of prisoners in the Dublin Newgate was so horrible and revolting to the commonest sense of decency and humanity as to demand a positive interference on the part of government. There is nothing, therefore, very astonishing in the fact, that the state in which Nellie found her mother filled her brimful with sorrow and dismay. The cell in which she was confined was low, and damp, and dark, and this she might have expected, and was in some degree prepared for; but she had not counted on the utter misery of its appointments; and the sight of her pale mother—death already haunting her dark eyes, and written unmistakably on her ghastly features—stretched upon the clammy pavement, a heap of dirty straw her only bed, and a tattered blanket her only covering, was such a shock and surprise to Nellie that, instead of joyfully announcing the fact of her reprieve to the poor captive, as she had intended, she fell upon her knees beside her, and wept over her like a child.