The Mysteries of the Court of London — page 68: what you’re looking at

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

THE MYSTERIES. of the letter: “that would be about the period when she must have been in daily expectation of becoming a mother. And she was perhaps con- fined at Stamford Manor? Ah! everthing tends to corroborate the rumour respecting the mystery attending the birth of the present baronet, Sir Richard Stamford. Well, it will be hard if these papers do not serve my turn in some way or an- other. They are worth buying up, J should think —and who knows but that Mr. J. H. Page may shortly becomee rich man? But who could the old man in that miserable chamber have been ?— whom was that Julia whom he invoked so pas- sionately, And who appeared to have abandoned him in the hour of his dissolution? Fool that I am to ask myself questions to which no power of conjecture or skilfulness of surmise can possibly suggest satisfactory replies! Let me finish my examination of the pocket-book first—and think over the matter afterwards.” With these words, muttered to himself in a mu- sing tone, the commercial traveller took up an- other letter; and he was somewhat surprised and startled, when he found that instead of bearing the slightest relationship to the affair of Hannah Lightfoot, it was addressed to no less a person than Joseph Warren, at the Beggar’s Staff, Horsly- down. This document bore the Aylesbury post- mark on the outside; and the contents were writ- ten in a fluent, mercantile hand. The paper itself, though soiled and greasy, was comparatively quite new : the date of the epistle was very recent ; —and the ink had not lost its blackness. Page hastened to read this letter, which ran as follows :— “* March 17th, 1794. “Tho terms are accepted. A Bank-note for a hun- dred pounds is enclosed in this letter. You will acknow- ledge the t thereof, directing your reply, as here- tofore, to Mr. M——, putting -‘ private ° in the corner out- aide the letter. We will three thousand {fn the first instance, and three thousand more this day six months. You will pack the goods up in a square deal box, the boards of which mast be at least vuarters of an inch thick; and the lid must be well nailed down. Book it per carrier; and print ‘(. and Co.'in the corner of the card of address. On receipt of the box, the other hundred pound note shall be duly forwarded.” Page wasforsometimoata loss to conjecturo the meaning of this cautiously-worded letter, which bad not the writer’s name appended to it: but all of a sudden the reminiscence flashed to his mind that Sir Richard Stamford had alluded in his nar- rative to a certain former transaction which his villanous partners had had with Joe the Mags- man, and which related to spurious coin ;—and a second glance at the letter convinced him that it referred to this affair. ‘“ Yes—'tis as clear as daylight!” thought Page. “There's the Aylesbury post-mark ;—Mr. M means Mr. Martin: the word ‘ private’ was to be placed on thé address of the Magsman’s reply to prevent any of the clerks in the bank from opening it. The goods meant spurious guineas. Ah! the scoundrels—they’re deep enough, God knows! The coin was to be packed in just such a box as that used by London bankers to remit specie—and ‘C, and Co.’ stood for Coutts and Company. Egad! I see it all. Tho thing was so managed that when the box arrived at the bank, the cashier would receive and open it in the usual way, under the impression that it had really been sent from Coutts’s. Well, the busi- SR a ag i Tc 58 ness was superbly done—and those fellows Martin and Ramsey are the cloverest rascals I ever heard of in all my life. But I shall not befriend Sir Richard the lees on that account—and this letter will form a link in the chain of evidence his pertners. Now let us see what we have next ?” Thus speaking, the commercial traveller took up apother paper, which was a short note in a neat female hand, but bearing no resemblance to the writing in anyof the documents which he had previously read. Its contents wero as laconic as they were mysterious :— “ July 7, 1794. a Taz, Dert nowt i eng ono oe iat Plot ver ee preparation, I shall sce T. M. to-morrow _— The envelope which had contained this note was not amongst the papers in the pocket-book; and Page was therefore unable to ascertain to whom it was ad Two pepers only now remained to be examined. One was a blank sheet foldedin the form of a letter; and although Page held it up to the light and scra- tinized it in all possible ways, he could not discover even the slightest trace of writing, nor any sign that the paper had ever been written on at all, The last item in the contents of this singular pocket-book, was a scrap whereon the ensuing lines were scrawled with a pencil evidently guided by 9 tremulous hand :— “ Loox ander the stone in the farthest corner to the right, in the cellar. Use it wisely, Julia—and you will prosper; act rash!y—and you will be ruined.” With the perusal of this laconic and mysterious note, ended the commercial traveller's investiga- ‘tion of the pocket-book ; and having locked up the document safely in his trunk, he retired to rest, to dream of the Magsman—Hannah Lightfoot—fir Richard Stamford—the old man who gave up the ghost in his presence—and, in a word, all the incidents of the last few hours. But when Mr. Page awoke between nine and ten o'clock, he became painfully convinced of the fact that he had caught such a severe rheumatism from the dampness of the dungeon where he had been confined, as to renderhim utterly incapable of rising from his bed. His legs appeared to be com- pletely paralysed; and his body ached all over, as if he had been soundly thrashed with cudgels. Under these disagreeable circumstances, he was compelled to remain in bed and have medical ad- vice without delay—while a messenger was de spatched to Wood Street to inform Messrs. Hodse and Morley of his return to his quarters at tho George and Blue Boar, and likewise to caution them (if it were yet time) not to send the ransom- money to the Boggar’s Staff. CHAPTER XVI. THE PRINCE OF WALES. Ar about the same hour that Mr. Page awoke to the consciousness of an excruciating rheumatism in all his limbs, the following scene took place ip Cariton House. | COMIC OOOKS. Com