“In the name of the Queen, we arrest you,” spoke Tom the gamekeeper, in a tone befitting the occasion.
“Arrest us! well that’s good, too! What are you a-goin’ to arrest us for, now?”
“Murder. For the murder of the man whose body is now lying tied up in a sack in your cart.”
The light of Joe’s lantern still rested on the faces of the two men, and though I was trembling to that degree as more than once excited a remonstrative growl from my canine guard, I could see that Mr. Belcher and Perks exchanged glances that could have but one meaning.
“In a sack! in a sack with a slit in it, eh?-—him, I’d give a summat to have him here this minnit,” observed Ned Perks, grinding his teeth.
“That’s right! in a sack with a slit in it, and the dead man’s hand showing through the slit Tumble out, or make room for us that we may drive you to Ilford; that’s where we’d better lodge ’em, eh, Tom?”
“Have a peep in the cart first, Joe, to make sure,” observed the man who still held the head of the mare, who was by this time comparatively quiet
Joe, acting on his friend’s instruction, walked to the back of the cart, and peeping over, threw in the light of the lantern to find, no doubt, things just as I had described them, but he had no time to tell his friend what he saw. While the cart was rocking up and down, and the brief conversation was taking place between Mr. Belcher and one of the men, Mr. Perks had slyly provided himself with a long stout iron rod out of the bag of “clinking” tools, and as Joe the gamekeeper peeped over, he raised the rod, and dealt a blow at Joe’s head that, had not that person been swiftly warned by a cry of “Mind, Joe!” from his mate, would probably have cracked his skull. As it was, it merely made a big splinter fly from the top rail of the tail-board.
“Run, Belcher! it’s all up,” cried Ned Perks, and being a nimble fellow, at one spring he vaulted over the side of the cart, swift as thought Mr. Belcher, although not a nimble man, was not on that account to be deterred from attempting to make his escape; he stepped in a mighty hurry from the cart, but happening thereby to bring his head within gun-stock reach of Tom, who still held the mare’s bit, he received the full benefit of a swinging crack on it from the butt-end of Tom’s gun, and dropped like a log into the road.
Ned Perks was more lucky. He still had the iron rod in his hand when he jumped from the cart, and seeing the gap in the hedge fairly before him, he jumped the narrow ditch and made for it; with his head low, he scuttled swiftly along straight in the direction where I was lying in custody, and I verily believe would have stumbled over me, had not the loud cry of terror I uttered pulled him up short
His fiendish satisfaction at finding me, blinded him for the moment to everything save my hateful presence. I believe he did not see the dogs at all; he only saw me. He didn’t say a word; he only made a hideous face at me, and threw up the iron rod above his head with both his hands. Duke and Slot, however, were obedient dogs, and knew but one meaning for their master’s injunction “mind him.” They rose on their long legs as the bar was swung upward, and before it had time to descend, they were at him, and plucked him down with his face to the ground, as easy as one could pluck down a stalk of hollyhock.
Chapter XXX. In which one jail-bird escapes, and the other one is securely caged. I flee from the law and its officers to avoid the evil consequences of “chirping.”
While the dogs still retained their tenacious hold on Mr. Perks, the one to his neckcloth and the other to his right arm just above the elbow, Joseph the gamekeeper, with an alacrity increased, possibly, by the reflection that the ruffian on the ground would have felt no scruples in beating his brains out, whipped a pair of handcuffs out of his coat pocket, and hauling Mr. Perks’s unresisting wrists behind his back, there locked them securely together. While he was doing this, he spied an end of stout cord hanging out at the pocket of Mr. Perks’s jacket, and of this, without asking leave, he possessed himself, and made fast Mr. Perks’s legs just above the ankles; and there being no longer a possibility of that gentleman getting up and running away, Joseph made the dogs quit their hold, and went out into the road to ascertain how his mate was getting on. As is needless to remark, I went with him.
Mr. Belcher was still lying in the mud as when struck down, and Tom the gamekeeper, having made fast the brown mare’s reins to a tree, was in the cart investigating its contents by the light of Mr. Belcher’s own bull’s-eye lantern.
“My man’s fast,” exclaimed Joseph, bustling eagerly up to the cart; “how do you find things, Tom? Is he dead? Are there any signs of life in the poor fellow?”
“I should rather say not,” answered Thomas, certainly with more of disappointment than commiseration in his tone. “He’s dead enough—dead about a week, I should say.”
“What! murdered a week ago?” exclaimed Joseph in a horror-stricken voice. “You don’t mean that! Good Lord, what ruffians!”
“Ruffians enough, I’ll go bail, but not murderers, Joey; leastwise, there’s no murder here.” “What then?” asked Joseph, in amazement, at the same time hauling himself up for a peep at the mystery.
“Body-snatching—that’s all; judge for yourself.”
“But the boy said it was murder. What made you say that is was murder, boy?” asked Joseph, reproachfully.
“’Cos I thought that it was,” I replied, beginning to feel alarmed lest I had altogether put my foot in it, as the saying is; “he wouldn’t have let ’em put him into the sack without they killed him first, would he, mister? Hain’t they done no harm arter all, mister?”
“Harm enough to send ’em to Botany Bay,” replied Mr. Thomas; “and that’s where they’ll go, as sure as they’re nabbed. Well, I’m precious glad it ain’t so bad as we thought it was,” (this might have been his conclusion on cool reflection, but at the time he spoke I much doubt if he was not fibbing.) “See here, Joe, they’re old hands at it,” continued he, holding open the mouth of the bag in which the “clinking” tools alluded to by Sam were kept; “here’s the gimlets, and the boring-rods, and the ropes, and all the set complete. My eyes! there’ll be a stir in the morning. Lend a hand, Joe; we’ll stow the beggars at the bottom of the cart, along with the game they’ve been fishing for, and drive over to Ilford at once. Got the cuffs on this fellow?” asked Joe, getting down, and speaking in allusion to Mr. Belcher.
“He’s got a cuff o’ the head that fits him quite tight enough,” grinned Mr. Thomas; “you may as well pop ’em on, though, Joe; it’ll be as well to go through with the job fair and easy.”
Joe went round to the other side of the cart, where, half a minute before, one of the “beggars” in question was lying stunned and bleeding; and, arrived there, he uttered a cry of astonishment.
“Why, he’s off; danged if he isn’t!”
It was quite true. The blood-letting, combined, perhaps, with the reviving influence of the cooling rain, had restored Mr. Belcher to consciousness; and, having fresh in his mind, probably, the example of the policeman, whose case Mr. Perks had made mention of in connexion with his funny story of Spifler Wilkins, he had crept away and was gone.
The men’s first fear was that Mr. Belcher had availed himself of the opportunity to release his companion, and that they had both stolen away together; but, in supposing such a thing, they had given my master credit for much more generosity than was his due, and as the trail he had left behind him in the shape of foot-marks and a few spots of blood showed. The said foot-marks and spots led up to a low wall that skirted the right-hand side of the road, as the hedge and the coppice skirted the left-hand side, and formed the boundary of an extensive park. It was evident that, with a stealth and nimbleness his profession. conferred on him, Mr. Belcher had reached and climbed this wall, and was by this time, in all probability, as far away as two minutes’ desperate running would carry him. He had not gone empty-handed. The gun belonging to Thomas the gamekeeper had been rested against the cart, while Thomas climbed into the body of the vehicle, to see about the “murdered man,” and the said weapon had vanished along with the “resurrectionist.” This possibly formed one reason why the men came to the conclusion that it would be better to take care of the fellow remaining in their hands than to attempt the pursuit of the runaway. Thomas’s gun was a double-barrelled one, and though one of its charges had been expended in frightening the brown mare to a standstill, the contents of the second barrel remained; and a loaded gun in the hands of a desperate man is a thing to be avoided.