The Mysteries of London; or, Lights and Shadows of London Life — page 52: what you’re looking at

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

1 -—- = Pas — - —— ee eee -_ 44 THE MYSTERIES OF LONDON. my little house in the Mile End Road, a young fellow, up every sixpence that young Howard was ever speaking, and I hated him for it. I longed to rid myself of him. I told him of fortunes made at sea, of glorious gains that awaited those who risked the chances of another clime; and at last he yielded to the subtle persuasion that I was artfully exerting, and he went.” “ Glad enough, I'll be bound, to escape from such a covetous old uncle, that him every penny he spent,” said Randall, with a half jesting tone, and again replenishing his glass; “ but do you mean to tell me that you sent the lad off without a coin to help him on the road?” “He would go; he never even came to bid me farewell—I who had fed and clothed him from a child,” pursued the miser. “He had prevailed upon some soft-hearted captain to take him to the West Indies asa cabin- boy, or something of that kind, and I was too much rejoiced at his departure to inquirefurther what became of him. I hoped never to see him more; for, as I tell you, he was an object of my hatred, and his eyes never looked into mine but I dreaded lest he should have become possessed by chance of my secret, and was but thinking of the misery and ruin to which a word would reduce me.” “This happened, I suppose, some time back ?” “ It was five years ago,” continued Hawkins; “he was then nearly sixteen, and a weak and sickly-look- ing lad. I thought the climate to which he went would have carried him off, and that I should have been safe in the early death to which I had hoped he was destined. I had only one fear then to harass me. I dreaded being robbed; and the mcre I had to lose, the more I trembled for the risk I ran. But I con- trived to cheat the world famously, after all. Except on the day when I collected my rents, I wore these miserable clothes, and people looked upon me as a DSeggar. My money I had concealed in places where I knew none would find it but myself; and again I was free from every anxious care.” “Yes, it was on one of those expeditions that I first became acquainted with you,” cried Randall. “ What a sly old hunks, to be sure, you were! Getting up at four in the morning to bury a bag of gold in the marshes! Ha! ha! I shall not forget in a hurry the start you gave when I stole noiselessly behind you, slapped you on the back, and asked you whetber you wanted a cage for the yellow-hammers you had found ;” and the bird-fancier indulged himself with a hearty laugh at the reminiscence thus suggested. “True, Mr. Randall, it was a great fright for me,” assented the miser, who endeavoured to join in the merriment thus excited; but his shrivelled physiog- nomy only assumed a more rueful and wretched aspect under this melancholy effort at mirth ; “it was for the purpose of concealment that I bought that hovel, and many a day have I gone there silently and secretly to gloat over my treasure, and increase it by fresh addi- tions, But I knew the chance of discovery was very small, and I had other hiding-places besides.” “Well, you had a queer taste for amusement, I must confess,” sneered the bird-fancier; “but the boy— what became of him? How was it he managed, after all, to find you out ?” “T was about to tell you that,” resumed Hawkins, with a rapid utterance, that evinced the excitement occasioned by this return to the subject on which he had first spoken. “The five years had flown like as many days. I was so certain of his never returning, that I had almost ceased to remember his connection with the business, when one afternoon, as I was entering al —_—_ < — a a dressed like a midshipman, tapped me familiarly on the shoulder, and asked me if I had forgotten him. It was young Howard. He had recognised me in an instant; and though the timid, irresolute look of the boy had changed to the firmer glance of maturity, and the warmth of a foreign sun had bronzed his pallid cheek, I felt his features were too vividly im- pressed upon my memory to be mistaken. He told me that he had been several voyages in the ship which he had first embarked, and that through favour of the captain, with whom he had become great favourite, he was now the second mate of vessel. Believing me still his uncle, he had me several presents from abroad, I, in the weakness of my heart, received into the house, I before told you how I him. that he had returned, my hatred in in sity. His very presence under the same roof seemed a curse upon me, He began to ask me for monsy to supply his extravagances, and was more than ever eager to learn about his parents, who, in a plausibly constructed tale, 1 had previously informed him had died during his infancy. By what means I know not, but he had ascertained that this story was false, and Es Ps i sEE= 1 EEE there deposited he fled.” “And you of course tracked him like a blood- hound?” observed Randall. : 4 “T knew, fortunately,” continued Hawkins, “the name of the vessel in which he was to sail; and I would have set the police upon him, had I dared to risk the exposure which would follow. Butit was too dangerous an experiment to try; and so, my good friend, you know I got you to assist me in obtaining restitution.” * And I should think you ought to be satisfied with the way in which it has been done,” added Randall; “you have got back your money and the boxes by the paper which you made him sign; and now you have both those in your possession, what more can you require?” “Ha! your threat, and the slender fare which we gave him, soon brought him to reason, did it not?” ejaculated the miser with exultation; “he was glad enough to sign any thing to procure his release, he did storm and rave about it at first, didn’t he?” “Well, no matter about that. What you wished you had, and what you wanted me to doI did. Now tell me what further roguery I am to do, and get well paid for, in this affair?” “Ay! that brings us near to the great question, Mr. Randall,” said the other, subsiding into a contem mood. *‘One glance at those documents which he stole from me, and which I haye recovered with your help, would tell him all that I have been so long struggling to conceal; and I should be a ruined man, Mr. Ran- dall—beggared beyond a hope of retrieving myself.” “ And you fancy, then, that even in the short time that has intervened, he has possessed himself of that information ?” “Just so; and it was for that reason, before we returned to liberate him to-morrow, that I wanted te consult you upon the subject. I have related all to . you, Mr. Randall, without disguise; for you have been my friend, and I know vou will not desert me and ECORMICLOOO_ Keke)