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—sat 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 sat, 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 gray eye, piercing through
the 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

[figure description] Page 230.[end figure description]

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 eavesdropper,
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 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 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 goadon
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 wont 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, chanting Old Hundred; to be sure, in
a somewhat dissonant and imperfectly developed
vocalization. This divertisment 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.

“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 awhile and looked at Fyler.

“You heard nothing,” he said, eying Ishma
el 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 thunderclap, 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 very same, sir,” answered Ishmael,
“yaller with age, and patched up like a old
bed-quilt.”

If the blackest thundercloud 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

[figure description] Page 231.[end figure description]

the light, glaring like a wild beast on Ishmael,
and showing his teeth firmly set together, in
the extremity of his passion.

After travelling 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 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 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 signed 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 that 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 couldn't 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 hadn'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 neighborhood.

“Where, in the name of Heaven, have you
been to-night?” continued Mr. Close, “running
about citizens' roofs, like a cat?”

“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 twopence a glass,
compared with it. Then there was a wery
charming 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 'spragus-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-five years. That isn't 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 anything 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 Ishmael, then lifting his
meager finger, and shaking it in the direction
whence these sounds had come. “Stout

p265-235 [figure description] Page 232.[end figure description]

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 sat 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.