CHAPTER XXI. ISHMAEL SMALL MAKES A DISCOVERY.
Angel-guarded as a generous faith would fain
persuade us, were the little tailor and his country
friend, within—an eye, by no means so kindly or auspicious
in its gaze, watched all their doings, from without. Perched
in the very gutter of the Fork, clinging to the casement
of the dormer window, as he best could, and holding his
head obliquely—sate or couched—Ishmael Small. His
turned-up nose against the window as close as he could
press it, he kept a hungry look fastened on every glance,
or gesture, or motion, that passed within: he could not
catch their voices where he sate, but seemed to know all
that passed as if he had heard it slowly uttered, word by
word. When the deed was produced, could they have
caught sight of that sharp grey eye, piercing through the
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very centre of the bull's-eye with which the cheap casement
was glazed, they would have both shrunk back, and
said, “What ugly spirit is that—that glares, like a sunglass,
upon us!”
Up to that moment, Ishmael had looked calmly on; but
when he saw the old, shivering parchment brought forth,
and clutched so greedily by the poor tailor, he gnashed
his teeth, and, turning about, with a glance downward
at a stout man in jolly health who passed in the street
below, with a market-basket on his arm, as if it would
afford him a most exquisite pleasure to topple himself
down upon him, and crush all that manly vigor out of
him—he crept up the roof, and espying a narrow rent—
scarcely larger than his hand—where a single ray came
through from the chamber, laid his ear close down, and
with his chalky visage turned to the sky, he held his
breath, and listened to what passed. He was right. All the
hours he had spent in tracking Hobbleshank from place
to place; all the vague rumors that had crept into his
mind, as from time to time his acquaintance with Puffer
Hopkins grew; all his long vigils about the Fork, (whose
evil genius, as night and day, but mostly by night, he
hovered round it, he seemed,)—all confirmed and made
true. When this conviction shot through the brain of the
deformed little eaves-dropper, his knees shook, his eyes
dimmed for a moment, his grasp relaxed, and, had he not
summoned at once with desperate force his ebbing
strength, he would have rolled headlong into the street.
Recovering himself, he paused not a minute to listen—he
knew enough and more than enough already—clambered
the roof again—plunged into the open scuttle by
which he had at first emerged—and dived—so swift was
his descent of the narrow stairs, it seemed, from top to bottom,
a single act—into the open air. Buttoning his coat
close together—fixing his cap firmly on his head, and
thrusting in his straggling pocket handkerchief behind—so
that not a single fluttering rag might check his course, he
started off. Like lightning he sped along, bounding over
obstacles; winding his way through crowds that crossed
him; and gliding between vehicles that seemed rushing together
from opposite directions—in a fashion that was
perfectly miraculous.
It was only a few minutes, and he stood at the broker's
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door. He stopped an instant to recover his breath, listening
if he were astir; then, thrusting his arm in at a
concealed opening in the wall, he drew back the bolt,
and stepped in. Closing the door behind him, and cautiously
crossing the room, he knocked at the broker's
closet.
“Hold back,” cried the old man, in a suppressed voice,
like one engaged in a desperate struggle, “what are you
choking me for? Take it back, take it all back; but let
me go. There, curse it, there—she glides by again. It
was your own fault.”
Ishmael knocked again.
“Let me go, or I'll beat you,” shouted the old broker,
who seemed to be vexed and goaded on by the sound,
mingled, as it doubtless was, with the subjects of his
dream. “What did you cross me for? She is mine, I
tell you, as much as yours, Hobbleshank! Marry her,
and I'll grind you to powder; ha! ha!” and he laughed
with a broad chuckle in his dream. “That fixes you.
Buy bread if you can: a cord or two of wood; I'm sorry
the poor lady's so sickly. Take the boy away: smother
him, choke him, drown him! ha! ha!”
“Wake up, wake up!” whispered Ishmael, whose
spirits, to tell the truth, were not a little subdued by what
the restless slumbers of the old broker seemed to point at.
“I have news, great news for you!”
“I know you have,” continued Fyler, who seemed
bent on pursuing his dreaming thoughts at all hazards.
“That was well done, Jack Leycraft—excellent; the
little fellow fainted away, did he?—so far that he won't
come back again, I guess.”
And Mr. Fyler Close, wonder at it as the world may,
such was the flow of his spirits, went off, chaunting
Old Hundred; to be sure, in a somewhat dissonant and
imperfectly developed vocalization. This divertisement
had the effect of restoring him to the familiar use of his
organs, and availing himself of his ears, quite readily, he
heard a quadruple rap, which Ishmael was now practising
on the door; and asked, who was there. Ishmael made
himself known, and the old man, sliding rapidly into his
garments, unbarred his closet door, and stepped forth.
“Well, what word, Ishmael?” he asked, as soon as
he was disinterred.
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“Come this way,” said Mr. Small, taking the broker by
the arm, and leading him toward the window. As they stood
where the light fell from a neighboring chamber, in which
watch was kept with one disordered in his reason, and
whose cries could be heard where they stood, and Ishmael
saw how haggard and withered was the broker's look, he
doubted whether to utter his news now that he was there.
He paused a while and looked at Fyler:
“You heard nothing,” said he, eyeing Ishmael in turn.
“Did I disturb you? I was running over a long sum in
compound interest. I got the figures wrong, and that put
me in a passion. You saw that?”
Ishmael professed to have seen nothing.
“What's your news?” asked Fyler. “Nothing terrible,
I hope. Is it a thunder-clap or a burst of music?—
speak quick.”
Before he answered, Mr. Small went to the door, thrust
forth his head into the hall, and, opening wide both his
ears, listened to catch any sound that might be stirring.
The whole house was dead and still, and he returned.
“A cross between the two,” answered Ishmael, subduing
his voice; “they have found the deed.”
“What deed—Hobbleshank's?” asked the old man,
gasping for breath, and drawing Ishmael close up to him
by the collar, so that their faces almost touched.
“The wery same, sir,” answered Ishmael, “yaller with
age, and patched up like a old bed-quilt.”
If the blackest thunder-cloud hovering in the sky had
settled down that moment, and become part and parcel of
the features of Fyler Close, they could not have scowled
more darkly than they did. He let fall his hand from its
hold on Ishmael Small; and turning away, he paced the
chamber; at every turn, as he came near the light, glaring
like a wild beast on Ishmael, and showing his teeth
firmly set together, in the extremity of his passion.
After traveling the apartment in this wild way for twenty
times or more, he suddenly stepped aside, and leaping
into his closet, bolted it within. Ishmael waited till the
clock struck midnight, sitting on a broken chair, listening
to the disordered sick man's cry from above: but not
a breath or sound denoted that any other living creature
was in that chamber but himself. The closet might
have been the broker's tomb, for all he heard. At the end
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of that time, the closet-door was again opened; Fyler
Close came forth, as if nothing unusual had passed, and,
bringing a chair, took his seat, calmly and pleasantly,
directly opposite Mr. Small.
“Where is John Leycraft, of late, Ishmael?” asked Mr.
Close, as though his mind was entirely disengaged, and
free to any general subject that might come up. “He doesn't
come here, now-a-days. Have you kept track of him?”
“I have,” answered Ishmael. “Last week, he was
busy in a cardin' mill; week afore last, he was journeyman
to a stun-mason; this week he's a rope-walker: where
he'll be next week, and the week after, would puzzle a
jury of o' Solomons to guess. His mind's distempered,
judging by what he says to me when I sees him, about
that old business of the farm-house. He can't rest a day
anywheres, but flies about like a singed pigeon over a
conflagration, or a dove what's got sore feet.”
“Will he blab, Ishmael?” answered Mr. Close, in a
perfectly calm and dispassionate tone. “He's got a first-rate
memory, and might turn it to account with the magistrates.
Don't you think so, eh?”
“By no manner o'means,” rejoined Mr. Small. “It's
his own mind what unrests him and keeps him wake o'
nights. He wants to find the boy, and clear his conscience
with the yolk of the egg: that's all.”
“If he's got an eye that can look through the crust of
the earth, six feet or more, perhaps he'll find him, perhaps
he won't,” said the broker, smiling on his companion,
and twisting his shrubby whiskers in his fingers.
“So you've seen the deed,” he added, as if that had just
occurred to him. “You could'nt borrow it for me to look
at for a few minutes, eh? Was it in good preservation,
in a fine state of health?”
“Capital,” answered Ishmael, “considerin' it
had n't a sound square inch on its body, and was
a little bilious in the face: if there had been a
hole two inches bigger in the roof, I'd have brought
it round for a interview.” Whereupon, Mr. Small
indulged in a gentle laugh; but not so as to disturb the
neighbourhood.
“Where in the name of heaven, have you been tonight?”
continued Mr. Close, “running about citizens'
roofs, like a cat?”
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“To be sure I have,” answered Mr. Small; “and a
wery agreeable time I've had of it I can tell you; overseein'
the city, and lookin' out that the watchmen was
on duty, and the lamps lit. Church steeples and tops o'
public buildings, is spruce beer, at two pence a glass,
compared with it. Then there was a wery charmin'
young 'oman, that brought the parchment out of the country
where she found it, inside, sitting like a wax-figure to
be looked at; and Fob, the little tailor, actin' like mad,
kissing 'sparagus-sprigs and mock-oranges, like a hero,
just for greens. I can't say I ever had a more agreeable
night of it in my life, where there was only three of the
party!”
“Ishmael,” said Fyler Close, withdrawing the attention
of his companion from these delightful prospects,
“we must distrain in the Row to-morrow.”
“Out and out?” asked Ishmael.
“Out and out,” answered Mr. Close. “Down to the
plant-pots, and Dutch oven. No nonsense, but a clean
sweep: here's the warrants. Go down to Meagrim, at
the very earliest hour in the morning.” And he handed
Ishmael a bundle of documents filled up and ready for
use.
“No delay?” asked Ishmael.
“Not a minute: and tell Meagrim to move the goods
off, sell at the shortest notice, close up at once, and bring
me the result in gold. He must throw off interest on his
commissions: mention that to him when you see him
to-morrow.”
Ishmael promised it should be looked to the very hour
the court opened; and was about to leave.
“You'll stand by me, Ishmael!” asked Fyler, regarding
him with a look that Ishmael did not recollect to have
seen him ever wear before. “You'll stick to me through
all?”
“I will, uncle Fyler,” answered Ishmael, taking the old
broker's proffered hand. “I'll be a stren'thin' plaster to
your back; a pair o' double magnifiers to your eyes: and
a patent truss to your hip-jints. Losin' the use of your
legs, I'll be crutches to you; and when you come to give
up the ghost”—
“As to that last particular,” interposed Fyler
Close, “suppose we adjourn conversation twenty
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five years. That is'nt too long? But when it does happen,
as I suppose it must one day, I'll leave you an old
chest or two to rummage, that's all I can, you know; and
if you find any thing it shall be yours.”
Mr. Small shook hands upon the understanding, and
was moving off again.
“Come this way Ishmael,” said the broker, as Mr.
Small was at the door. “Listen!”
At that moment, a fearful cry issued from the chamber
where the disordered man lodged; voices in supplication
or menace were raised upon him; and, presently, a
dead silence followed, as if the struggler had been finally
subdued.
“There's close quarters, up there,” said Fyler, looking
first at Ismael, then lifting his meagre finger, and shaking
it in the direction from whence these sounds had
come. “Stout chaps, brawny fellows; and not a word
uttered by the poor sick devil that's believed.” He
dropped his voice to the lowest whisper, and added,
“I'll drive Hobbleshank to that pass yet!” Ishmael renewing
his promise to execute his orders promptly, on
the morrow, and smiling in answer to the hideous grin
that lighted the old broker's countenance, withdrew.
The broker himself sate by the window, listening to
the cries of the lunatic, and waiting for the break of day
that he might hear the blacksmith's mortgaged hammer
sound, and fix his eyes once more on the securities spread
about him.
Mathews, Cornelius, 1817-1889 [1842], The career of Puffer Hopkins (D. Appleton & Co., New York) [word count] [eaf264].
