Joseph Wilmot, or, The Memoirs of a Man-Servant — page 24: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

) JOSEPH WILMOT; OR, THE MEMOIRS OF A MAN-SERVANT. 11 marily I was hurried off from the Prefecture when visited by the Duke and the barrister. The de- ductions I drew from all these circumstances, were natural enough,—especially as I had read of the unscrupulous and iniquitous stratagems to which ‘Louis Philippe’s government had recourse when -having a particular aim to carry out. In a word, I felt convinced that I had been spirited away into. secret confinement in order to stifle the evidence which I could give with regard to the Cresson affair—that it was intended to leave me out of the prosecution altogether—and that when, through the absence of my vitally important testimony, a conviction should have been obtained and ven- geatice wreaked against the offenders, it would be held time enough to dispose of me. I therefore concluded that when all was over, I should be set at liberty and hurried out of France, with an order never to return. I have already said that I was allowed to take a couple of hours’ exercise each day in the court- yard of the prison; and this was usually between nine and eleven in the morning, or between three and five in the afternoon, according to my own option: for at both of those intervals the prisoners in that particular compartment were assigned to their own quarters. I had been about five weeks at the Conciergerie, when the following incident occurred. It was one afternoon, as I was walking in the court-yard between three and five, that the gate opened and a gendarme appeared, leading in a prisoner. With an instinctive feeling of curiosity my eyes settled upon that prisoner; and to my astonishment I immediatety recognised Mr. Dor- chester. He was no longer apparelled nor disguised in the same fashion as when a few months back he had played the part of Mr. Dowton at Meurice’s Hotel, and had so successfully plundered me of my property: but he now looked precisely the same Mr. Dorchester whom I first knew at Oldham. He was dressed in black, with a white neckcloth, and therefore had a clerical air. The reeognition was instantaneously matual: an ejaculation burst from my lips: but the villanous hypocrite, assuming a sanctimonious demeanour, lifted up his hands— raised his eyes also, until the whites were visible beneath the pupils—and in a canting lugubrious tone, said, “It is heaven’s will, Joseph, that we should be thus chastised for our misdeeds!” The gendarme immediately ordained silence, and imperiously waved his hand for me to retreat to the farther end of the yard. ‘his intimation I at once obeyed; and he conducted Mr. Dorchester into one of the buildings overlooking the enclosure. I marvelled what offence the sanctimonious villain had committed—but entertained little doubt that it was his swindling propensity which had at last brought him within the fangs of the law. It would be a miserable affectation on my part to pretend that I felt at all on his behalf: on the contrary, I was by no means sorry to think that he was at length obtaining his deserts. On returning to my own chamber, [informed the turnkey who attended me thither to lock and bolt the door upon me as usual, that had recognised in a new prisoner an individual who had robbed me in a particular manner a few months back. | The turnkey, not belonging to the department of the gaol to which Dorchester had been assigned, was ignorant of the offence for which he was brought thither: but he promised to make inquiries and let me know. Accordingly, in the evening the mau informed me that the Rey. Mr. Dorchester had only arrived in Paris a few days previously—that he had taken up his quarters at an hotel in the Place Venddme—and that having formed the ac. quaintance of an English gentleman there, he had persuaded him to change his Bank-notes for French gold at some particular money-dealer’s of whom he (Dorchester) pretended to have a special knowledge. The Englishman, it appeared, thank. fully aceepted the proposal, and was induced to entrust a bundle of bank-notes to Mr. Dorchester, to be added to his own. Dorchester contrived to give his new acquaintance the slip, and managed to decamp out of his sight : but he was discovered and arrested within half-an-hour, just as he was about to enter a diligence starting for some town in the mterior. The turnkey farther informed me that Dorchester had been tried this very day of which IT am writing—and that it was from the Palace of Justice (where the tribunals are) that he was being brought back to prison by the gendarme at the moment I had seen him. His sentence was a year’s imprisonment, to be under- gone in the gaol of La Force, to which he would be removed in the course of three or four days. The reader will be struck, as I was, with the similitude between my own case in respect to Dor- chester and that for which he was now condemned; and it appeared to me a most extraordinary coin- eidence that I should be by circumstances placed in a position to see the culprit immediately after he had received his sentence from the court. I could not help noticing that the turnkey lin- gered about in the room after he had given me the information relative to Mr. Dorchester; and methought, by,the official’s manner, that he had something more to say, but hesitated whether to give utterance to what was in his mind. I asked him if he had told me allin respect to Dorchester ? —he replied in the affirmative: then he looked hard at me—then he played with his keys—and then, with a strange abruptness, he bade me “good night,” issuing quickly forth and locking the massive door behind him. To a person in my position the slightest incident was of importance, not merely as breaking in upon the monutony of a prison-life, but also as appearing to be the har- binger of some change. That the turnkey hada communication to make, but hesitated to make it, was evident enough. Yet I did not think it was any evil intelligence whick he had to impart: for his manner, while conversing about Dorchester, was gay and laughing; and subsequently there was nothing in his hesitation, his fidgetting, and his sense of embarrassment, that could be taken as an augury of ill. What, then, could it mean? Was the term of my imprisonment now really at hand ?—did he know the hour and the day ?—was he prompted by good feeling to set my mind at ease, but prevented by a sense of duty from speak- ing the word which would have that effect? I slept but little that night—and anxiously looked for the turnkey’s coming with my breakfast in the morning. But when he made his appearance his de- meanour was the same as it ordinarily was; and I fancied that I must have been mistaken on the preceding evening. I felt disappointed: a hope OMiGdoOo KS (Cc (0) =)