Put Yourself in his Place

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PUT YOUESELF IN HIS PLACE. >» j PUT YOURSELF IN HIS PLACE. BY CHARLES READE, AUTHOR OF " IT IS NEVER TOO LATE TO MEND," " HARD CASH," " TOUL PLAT, etc. etc. " I will frame a work of fiction upon notorious fact, ao that anybody shall think he can do the same ; shall labour and toil attempting the same, and fail — such is thc power of sequence and connection in writing." — Horace : Art of Poetry. IN THREE VOLUMES. VOL. III. LONDON: SMITH, ELDER & CO., 15, WATERLOO PLACE. 18 70. [THE EIGHT OF TRANSLATION 18 RESERVED.] PUT YOURSELF IN HIS PLACE.

Chapter I

Coventry and Cole met that night near a little church. Hill was to join them, and tell them the result. Noav, as it happens, Little went home rather late that night, so these confederates waited, alternately hoping and fearing, a considerable time. Presently, something mysterious occurred, that gave them a chill. An arrow descended, as if from the clouds, and stuck quivering on a grave not ten yards from them. The black and white feathers shone clear in the moonlight. To Coventry, it seemed as if heaven Avas retaliating on him. The more prosaic, but quick-witted cutler, after the vol. in. ■2 PUT YOURSELF IN HIS PLACE. first stupefaction, suspected it was the very arrow destined for Little, and said so. " Heaven flings it back to us," said Coventry, and trembled in every limb. " Heaven has nought to do in it.

The fool has got drunk, and shot it in the air. Anyway, it mustn't stick there to tell tales." Cole vaulted over the churchyard, drew it out of the grave, and told Coventry to hide it. " Go you home," said he. " I'll find out what this means." Hill's unexpected assailant dragged him back so suddenly and violently that the arrow went up at an angle of forty-five, and, as the man loosed the string to defend himself, flew up into the sky, and came down full a hundred yards from the place. Hill twisted violently round, and, dropping the boAv, struck the woman in the face with his fist : he had not room to use all his force ; yet the blow covered her face Avith blood. She cried out, but gripped him so tight by both shoulders that he could not strike again, but he kicked her savagely. She screamed, but slipped her arms down and got him tight round the waist.

Then he was done for : with one mighty whirl she tore him PUT YOULSELF IN HIS PLACE. off his feet in a moment ; then dashed herself and him under her to the ground with such ponderous violence that his head rang loud on the pavement, and he was stunned for a few seconds. Ere he quite recovered she had him turned on his face, and her weighty knee grinding down his shoulders, while her nimble hands whipped off her kerchief and tied his hands behind him in a twinkling. So quickly was it all done, that by the time Little heard the scrimmage, ascertained it was behind him, and came back to see, she was seated on her prisoner, trembling and crying after her athletic feat, and very little fit to cope with the man if he had not been tied. Little took her by the hands. " Oh, my poor Jael. What is the matter ?

Has the blackguard been insult ing you? " And, not waiting for an answer, gave him a kick that made him howd again. " Yes, kill him, the villain ! he wanted to murder you. Oh, oh, oh ! " She could say no more, but became hysterical. Henry supported her tenderly, and wiped the blood from her face : and, as several people came up, and a policeman, he gave the man in charge, on Jael's authority, and he was conveyed to the station accord ingly, he and his bow. TLACE. They took Jael Dence to a chemist's shop, and gaA-e her cold water and salts : the first thing she did, when she was quite herself, was to seize Henry Little's hand and kiss it with such a look of joy as brought tears into his eyes. Then sbe told her story, and was taken in a cab to the police-office, and repeated her story there.

Then Henry took her to Woodbine Villa, and Grace Carden turned very pale at Henry's danger, though passed : she wept over Jael, and kissed her ; and nobody could make enough of her. Grace Carden looked wistfully at Henry and said, " Oh that I had a strong arm to defend you." " Oh, Miss Grace," said Jael, " don't you enA-y me. Go away with him from this wicked, murdering place. That will be a deal better than anything I can do for him." " Ah, Avould to heaven I could this minute," said Grace, clinging tenderly to his shoulder. She insisted on going home with him and sharing his peril for once. Hill was locked up for the night. In the morning a paper was slipped into his hand. " Say there was no arrow." He took this hint, and said that he was innocent as a babe of any harm. He had got a bow to repair for a friend, and he wrent home twanging it, was attacked by a woman, and, in his confusion, struck her once, but did not repeat the blow.

Per contra, Jael Dence distinctly swore there was an arrow-, w-ith two white feathers and one black one, and that the prisoner was shooting at Mr. Little. She also SAvore that she had seen him colloguing with another man, who had been concerned in a former attempt on Mr. Little, and captured, but had escaped from Raby Hall. On this the magistrate declined to discharge the prisoner ; but, as no arrow could be found at present, admitted him to bail, two securities fifty pounds each, which w-as an indirect way of imprisoning him until the assizes. This attempt, though unsuccessful in one way, was very effective in another. It shook Henry Little terribly; and the effect was enhanced by an anony mous letter he received, reminding him there were plenty of noiseless Aveapons. Brinsley had been shot tAvice, and no sound heard.

" When your time comes, you'll never know what hurt you." The sense of a noiseless assassin eternally dogging him preyed on Little's mind and spirits, and, at last, this life on the brink of the grave became so intolerable that he resolved to leave Hillsborough ; but not alone. He called on Grace Carden, pale and agitated. " Grace," said he, " do you really love me ? " " Oh, Henry ! Do I love you ? " " Then save me from this horrible existence. Oh, my love, if you knew what it is to have been a brave man, and to find your courage all oozing away under freezing threats, that you know, by experience, will be followed by some dark, subtle, bloody deed or other. There, they have brought me down to this, that I never go ten steps without looking behind me, and, when I go round a corner, I turn short, and run back, and Avait at the corner to see if an assassin is folloAving me.

I tremble at the wind. I start at my own shadow." Grace threw her arms round his neck, and stopped him Avith tears and kisses. " Ah, bless you, my love," he cried, and kissed her fondly. " You pity me — you will save me from this miserable degrading life ? " " Ah, that I Avill, if I can, my own.' " You can." " Then tell me how " Be my wife — let us go to the United States together. Dearest, my patents are a great success. We are making our fortune, though we risk our lives. In America I could sell these inventions for a large sum, or work them myself at an enormous profit. Be my wife, and let us fly this hellish place together." " And so I would in a moment ; but " (with a deep sigh) " papa Avould never consent to that." " Dispense with his consent." " Oh, Harry ; and marry under my father's curse !

" " He would not curse you, if he loves you half as Avell as I do ; and, if he does not, why sacrifice me, and perhaps my life, to him ?" "Henry, for pity's sake, think of some other way. Why this violent haste to get rich ? Have a little patience. Mr. Raby will not always be abroad. Oh, pray give up Mr. Bolt, and go quietly on, at peace with these dreadful trades. You know I'll wait all my life for you. I will implore papa to let you visit me oftener. I will do all a faithful loving girl can do to comfort you." " Ay," said Henry, bitterly, " you will do anything but the one thing I ask." " Yes, anything but defy my father. He is father and mother both to me. How unfortunate we both are ! If you knew what it costs me to deny you anything, if you knew how I long to follow you round the world " She choked with emotion, and seemed on the point of yielding after all.

But he said, bitterly, " You long to follow me round the world, and you won't go a tAvelve-days' voyage with me to save my life. Ah, it is always so. You don't love me as poor Jael Dence loA-es me. She saA-ed my life without my asking her; but you won't do it when I implore you." " Henry, my OAATn darling, if any Avoman on earth loves you better than I do, for God's sake marry her, and let me die to prove I loved you a little." " Very well," said he, grinding his teeth. " Next AA'eek I leave this place with a Avife. I give you the first offer, because I love you. I shall give Jael the second, because she loves me." So then he flung out of the room, and left Grace Carden half fainting on the sofa, and drowned in tears. But, before he got back to the works, he repented his violence, and his heart yearned for her more than ever.

With that fine sense of justice Avhich belongs to love, he spoke roughly to Jael Dence. She stared, and said nothing, but Avatched him furtively, and saw his eyes fill with tears at the picture memory recalled of Grace's pale face and streaming eyes. She put a few shrewd questions, and, his heart Avas so full, he could not conceal the main facts, though he suppressed all that bore reference to Jael herself. She took Grace's part, and told him he was all in the Avrong; why could not he go to America alone, and sell his patents, and then come back and marry Grace AA-ith the money ? " Why drag her across the water, to make her quarrel with her father? " "Why, indeed?" said Henry: "because I'm not the man I was. I have no manhood left. I have not the courage to fight the trades ; nor yet the courage to leave the girl I love so dearly."

"Eh, poor lad," said Jael, "thou hast courage enough ; but it has been too sore tried, first and last. You have gone through enough to break a man of steel." She advised him to go and make his submission at once. He told her she was his guardian angel, and kissed her, in the warmth of his gratitude ; and he went back to Woodbine Villa, and asked Grace's forgiveness, and said he would go alone to the States, and come back Avith plenty of money to satisfy Mr. Carden's prudence, and Grace clutched him gently with both hands, as if to hinder him from leaving her. She turned very pale, and said " Oh my heart ! " Then she laid her head on his shoulder, and wept piteously. He comforted her, and said, " What is it ? a voyage of twelve clays ! And yet I shall never have the courage to bid you good-by."

" Nor I you, my own darling." Having come to this resolution, he was now seized Avith a fear that he would be assassinated before he could carry it out : to diminish the chances, he took up his quarters at the factory, and never went out at night. Attached to the works was a small building near the water-side. Jael Dence occupied the second floor of it. He had a camp bed set up on the first floor, and established a wire communication with the police office. At the slightest alarm he could ring a bell in Ransome's ear. He also clandestinely unscreAved a little postern door, that his predecessors had closed, and made a key to the lock, so that if he should ever be compelled to go out at night, he might baffle his foes, who would naturally watch the great gate for his exit. With all this he became very depressed, and moody, and alarmed Doctor Amboyne, who remembered his father's end.

The Doctor advised him to go and see his mother for a day or two; but he shook his head, and de clined. PUT YOURSELF IN HIS PLACE. A prisoner detained for want of bail is allowed to communicate with his friends, and Grotait soon let Hill knoAv he was very angry with him for undertaking to do Little without orders. Hill said that the job \A-as given him by Cole, who was Grotait' s right-hand man, and Grotait had better bail him, otherwise he might be induced to tell tales. Grotait let him stay in prison three days, and then sent two householders Avith the bail. Hill Avas discharged, and went home. At dusk, he turned out to find Cole, and tracing him from one public-house to another, at last lighted on him in company with Mr. Coventry. This set him thinking; however, he held aloof till they parted ; and then following Cole, dunned him for his twenty pounds.

Cole gave him five pounds on account. Hill grumbled and threatened. Grotait sent for both men, and went into a passion, and threatened to hang them both if they presumed to attack Little's person again in any way. "It is the place I mean to destroy," said Grotait, "not the man." Cole conveyed this to Coventry, and it discouraged him mightily, and he told Cole he should give it up, and go abroad. But, soon after this, some pressure or other was brought to bear on Grotait, and Cole, knowing this, Avent to him, and asked him whether Bolt and Little were to be done or not. "It is a painful subject," said Grotait. " It is a matter of life and death to us," said Cole. " That is true. But mind, the place and not the . > man. Cole assented, and then Grotait took him on to a certain bridge, and pointed out the one weak side of Bolt and Little's fortress, and showed him how the engine-chimney could be got at and bloAvn doAA-n, and so the [works stopped entirely : " And I'll tell you something," said he; "that chimney is built on a bad foundation, and was never very safe ; so you have every chance."

Then they chaffered about the price ; and, at last, Grotait agreed to give him 201. Cole went to Coventry, and told him how far Grotait would allow him to go : " but," said he, " 201. is not enough. I run an even chance of being hung or lagged." " Go a step beyond your instructions, and I'll giA-e you a hundred pounds." " I daren't," said Cole : " unless there Avas a chance to blow up the place with the man in it." Then, after PUT YOURSELF IN HIS PLACE a moment's reflection, he said: "I hear he sleeps in the works. I must find out where." Accordingly, he talked ov-er one of the women in the factory, and gained the folloAving information, Avhich he imparted to Mr. Coventry. — Little lived and slept in a detached building, recently erected, and the young woman, who had over powered Hill, slept in a room above him.

She passed in the works for his sweetheart, and the pair Avere often locked up together for hours at a time in a room, called the " Experiment Room." This information took Coventry quite by surprise, and embittered his hatred of Little. While Cole was felicitating him on the situation of the building, he Avas meditating how to deal his hated rival a stab of another kind. Cole, however, was single-minded in the matter; and, the next day, he took a boat and drifted sloAA-ly doAvn the river, and scanned the place very carefully. He came at night to Coventry, and told him he thought he might perhaps be able to do the trick, without seeming to defy Grotait's instructions. "But," said he, "it is a very dangerous job. Premises are Avatched : and, what do you think ? they have got Avires up uoav that run over the street to the police-office, and Little can ring a bell in Ransome's room, and bring the bobbies across with a rush in a moment.

It isn't as it was under the old chief constable ; this one's not to be bought nor blinded. I must risk a halter." " You shall have fifty pounds more." " You are a gentleman, sir. I should like to have it in hard sovereigns. I'm afraid of notes. They get traced somehow." " You shall have it all in sovereigns." " I want a little in advance, to buy the materials. They are costly, especially the fulminating silver." Coventry gave him ten sovereigns, and they parted with the understanding that Cole should endeavour to blow up the premises on some night when Little was in them, and special arrangements were made to secure this. Henry Little and Grace Carden received, each of them, an anonymous letter, on the same day." Grace Garden's ran thus : — I can't abide to see a young lady made a fool of by a villain.

Mr. Little have got his miss here : they dote on each other. She lives in the works, and so do he, ever since she came, which he usen't afore. They are in one room, as many as eight hours at a stretch, and that room always locked. It is the talk of all the girls. It is nought to me, but I thought it right you should know, for it is quite a scandal. She is a strapping country lass, with a queerish name. This comes from a stranger, but a well-wisher. " Fair Play." The letter to Henry Little Avas as follows : — " The reason of so many warnings, and ne'er a blow, you had friends in the trade. But you have worn them out. You are a doomed man. Prepare to meet your God. This was the last straw on the camel's back, as the saying is. He just ground it in his hand, and then he began to act. He set to work, packed up models, and despatched them by train : clothes ditto, and wrote a long letter to his mother.

Next day he was busy writing and arranging papers TLACE. till the afternoon. Then he called on Grace, as related, and returned to the works about six o'clock ; he ordered a cup of tea at seven, which Jael brought him. She found him busy writing letters, and one of these was addressed to Grace Carden. That was all she saw of him that night ; for she went to bed early ; and she was a sound sleeper. It was nine o'clock of this same evening. Mr. Coventry, disguised in a beard, was walking up and down a certain street opposite the great door of the works. He had already walked and lounged about two hours. At last Cole joined him for a moment and whispered in a tone full of meaning, " Will it do now ? " Coventry's teeth chattered together as he replied, "Yes; now is the time." " Got the money ready ?

" "Yes." " Let us see it." " When you have done what you promised me." " That very moment ? " " That very moment." " Then I'll tell you what you must do. In about an hour go on the new bridge, and I'll come to you ; and, before I\-e come to you many minutes, you'll see summut and hear summut that will make a noise in Hillsbro', and, perhaps, get us both into trouble." " Not if you are as dexterous as others have been " Others ! I was in all those jobs. But this is the queerest. I go to it as if I was going to a halter. No matter, a man can but die once." And, with these words, he left him and went softly down to the Avaterside. There, in the shadoAv of the new bridge, lay a little boat, and in it a light-jointed ladder, a small hamper, and a basket of tools. The rowlocks were covered with tow, and the oars made no noise whatever, except the scarce audible dip in the dark stream.

It soon emerged below the bridge like a black spider craAvling down the stream, and melted out of sight the more rapidly that a slight fog was rising. Cole roAved softly past the works, and observed a very faint light in Little's room. He thought it prudent to wait till this should be extinguished, but it was not extinguished. Here was an unexpected delay. However, the fog thickened a little, and this en couraged him to venture ; he beached the boat very vol. in. gently on the muddy shore, and began his work, looking up every now and then at that pale light, and ready to fly at the first alarm. He took out of the boat a large varnish-can, which he had filled Avith gunpowder, and wrapped tightly round with Avire, and also with a sash-line ; this can was perforated at the side, and a strong tube screwed tightly into it; the tube protruded twelve inches from the can in shape of an* S : by means of this a sIoav burniug fuse was connected with the powder ; some yards of this fuse were wrapt loosely round the can.

Cole crept softly to the engine-chimney, and, groping about for the right place, laid the can in the engine bottom, and uncoiled the fuse. He took out of his pocket some small pieces of tile, and laid the fuse dry on these. Then he gave a sigh of relief, and crept back to the boat. Horrible as the action was, he had done all this without much fear, and AA-ith no remorse, for he was used to this sort of work ; but noAv he had to commit a neAv crime, and with new and terrible materials, which he had never handled in the way of crime before. He had in his boat a substance so dangerous, that he had made a nest of soft cotton for the receptacle which held it ; and, when the boat touched the shore, light as the contact was, he quaked lest his imprisoned giant devil should go off and blow him to atoms.

He put off touching it till the last moment. He got his jointed ladder, set it very softly underneath the window where the feeble gas-light AA-as, and felt about Avith his hands for the grating he had observed when he first reconnoitred the premises from the river. He found it, but it was so high that he had to reach a little, and the position was awkward for working. The problem was how to remove one of those bars, and so admit his infernal machine : it was about the shape and size of an ostrich's egg. It must be done without noise, for the room above him was Little's, and Little, he knew, had a Avire by means of which he could summon Ransome and the police in the turn of a hand. The cold of the night, and the now present danger, made Cole shiver all over, and he paused. But he began again, and, taking out a fine steel saw highly tempered, proceeded to saw the iron slowly and gently, ready at the first alarm to spring from his ladder and run away.

With all his caution, steel grated against steel and made too much noise in the stilly night. He desisted. He felt about and found the grating was let into wood, not stone ; he oiled the saw and it cut the wood like butter ; he made two cuts like a capital V, and a bar of the grating came loose ; he did the same thing above, and the bar came out. Cole now descended the ladder, and prepared for the greatest danger of all. He took from its receptacle the little metal box lined Avith glazed paper, which contained the fulminating silver and its fuse ; and, holding it as gently as possible, Avent and mounted the ladder again, putting his foot down as softly as a cat. But he was getting colder and colder, and, at this unfortunate moment, he remembered that, when he was a lad, a man had been destroyed by fulminating silver, quite a small quantity, in a plate over which he was leaning ; yet the poor Avretch's limbs had been found in different places ; and he himself had seen the head ; it had been torn from the trunk and hurled to an incredible distance.

That trunkless head he now fancied he saw, in the middle of the fog ; and his body began to sweat cold, and his hands to shake so that he could hardly hold the box. But if he let it fall He came hastily down the ladder, and sat down on the dirty ground, Avith the infernal engine beside him. By-and-by he got up and tried to warm his hands and feet by motion, and, at last, he recoA-ered his fortitude, and Avent softly and cat-like up the steps again, in spite of the A-arious dangers he incurred. Of what was this man's mind composed, Avhom neither a mere bribe could buy to do this deed, nor pure fanaticism without a bribe ; but, where both induce ments met, neither the risk of immediate death, nor of imprisonment for life, nor both dangers united, could divert him from his deadly purpose, though his limbs shook, and his body was bedeAved with a cold perspiration ?

He reached the top of the ladder, he put his hand inside the grate ; there was an aperture, but he could not find the bottom. He hesitated. Here was a fresh danger : if he let the box fall it might explode at once and send him to eternity. Once more he came softly doAvn, and collected all the toAv and wool he could find. He Avent up the ladder and put these things through the grating ; they formed a bed. Then he went back for the fatal box, took it up the ladder AA'ith beating heart, laid it softly in its bed, uncoiled the fuse and let it hang down. So now these two fiendish things were placed, and their devilish tails hanging out behind them. The fuses had been cut with the utmost nicety to burn the same length of time — twelve minutes. ■22 PUT YOURSELF IN HIS PLACE. But Cole AA-as too thoughtful and wary to light the fuses until everything was prepared for his escape.

He put the ladder on board the boat, disposed the oars so that he could use them at once ; then crept to the engine-chimney, kneeled down beside the fuse, looked anxiously up at the faint light glimmering above, and took off his hat. With singular cunning and forethought he had pasted a piece of sand-paper into his hat. By this means he lighted a lucifer at once, and kept it out of sight from the windows, and also safe from the weather; he drew the end of the fuse into the hat, applied the match to it out of sight, then blew the match out and darted to his other infernal machine. In less than ten seconds he lighted that fuse too ; then stept into the boat, and left those two deA-ilish sparks creeping each on its fatal errand. He pulled away Avith exulting bosom, beating heart, and creeping flesh.

He pulled swiftly up stream, landed at the bridge, staggered up the steps, and found Coventry at his post, but almost frozen, and sick of waiting. He staggered up to him and gasped out, " I've done the trick, give me the brass, and let me go. I see a halter in the air." His teeth chattered. But Coventry, after hoping and fearing for two hours and a half, had lost all confidence in his associate, and he said, "How am I to know you've done any thing?" " You'll see and you'll hear," said Cole. " Give me the brass." ;' Wait till I see and hear," was the reply. "What, wait to be nabbed? Another minute, and all the town will be out after me. Give it me, or I'll take it." " Will you ?" And Coventry took out a pistol, and cocked it. Cole recoiled. "Look here," said Coventry; "there are one hundred and fifty sovereigns in this bag.