What attorney will take up the case of a man without a farthing? If the debtor wins his case how is he to pay the attorney and costs out of four-pence a day? If he wishes to plead in _forma pauperis_, the law allows the warder to charge six shillings and eight-pence for leave to go to the Court and half a crown for the turnkey to take him there--what prisoner on the poor side can pay these fees? So that when a prisoner is really poor he cannot get his groats at all, for the creditor will not pay them unless he is obliged. Again there are other ways of evading the law. If a debtor surrenders in June there is no Court till November and the creditor need not pay anything till the order of the Court is issued. There are a few doles and charities; but these amount to no more than about 100 a year, say, two pounds a week or six shillings a day.
Now there are 600 prisoners as a rule. How many of these are on the poor side? And how far will six shillings a day go among these starving wretches? There are also the boxes into which a few shillings a day are dropped. But how far will these go among so many? It is within my certain knowledge that many would die of sheer starvation every week were it not for the kindness of those but one step above them.
If, for instance, one would understand what poverty may mean he must visit the Common side of the King"s Bench Prison. Those who have visited the courts and narrow lanes of Wapping report terrible stories of rags and filth, but the people, by hook or by crook, get food. In the Prison there is neither hook nor crook: the prisoner unless he knows a trade which may be useful in that place: unless he can repair shoes and clothes: unless he can shave and dress the hair, cannot earn a penny.
Look at these poor wretches, slinking about the courts, hoping to attract the compa.s.sion of some visitor; see them uncombed, unwashed, unshaven; their long hair hanging over their ears; a horrid bristling beard upon their chin; their faces wan with insufficient food, their eyes eagerly glancing here and there to catch a look of pity, a dole or a loan. If you follow them to the misery of the Common side where they are thrust at night you will see creatures more wretched still. These can go abroad even though skewers take the place of b.u.t.tons; these have shoes--which once had toes; these have beds, of a kind; there are others who have no beds, but lie on the floor; who have no blankets and never take off their rags; who go bare-footed and bare-headed. Remember that their life-long imprisonment was imposed upon them because they could not pay a debt of a pound or two. Their pound or two, by reason of the attorney"s costs and the warden"s fees, has grown and swelled till it has reached the amount of 20 or 40 or anything you will. No one can release them; the only thing to be hoped is that cold and starvation may speedily bring them to the end--the long sleep in the graveyard of St.
George"s Church.
I speedily found that I could manage to live pretty well by means of my fiddle. Almost every evening there was some drinking party which engaged my services. I played for them the old tunes to which they sang their songs about wine and women--bawling them at the top of their voices; they paid me as much as I could expect. By good luck there was no other fiddler in the place; a harpist there was; and a flute-player; we sometimes agreed together to give a concert in the coffee-room.
I continued this life for about six months, making enough money every week to pay my way at the Ordinary. Perhaps--I know not--the prison was already beginning to work its way with me and to reduce me, as Tom Shirley said, to the condition of a fiddler to Jack in the Green.
I had a visit, after some three months, from Mr. Probus. He came one day into the prison. I saw him standing on the pavement looking round him.
Some of the collegians knew him: they whispered and looked at him with the face that means death if that were possible. One man stepped forward and cursed him. "Dog!" he said, "if I had you outside this accursed place, I would make an end of you."
"Sir," said Mr. Probus, at whose heels marched a turnkey, "you do me an injustice for which you will one day be sorry. Am I your detaining creditor?"
The man cursed him again, I know not why, and turned on his heel.
Then I stepped forward. "Did you come here to gloat over your work, Mr.
Probus?"
"Mr. William? I hope you are well, Sir. The prison air, I find, is fresh from the fields. You look better than I expected. To be sure it is early days. You are only just beginning."
"You will be sorry to hear that I am very well."
"I would have speech in a retired place, Mr. William."
"You want once more to dangle your bribe before me. I understand, sir, very well, what you would say."
"Then let me say it here. Your cousin, I may say, deplores deeply this new disgrace to the family. He earnestly desires to remove it. I am again empowered to purchase an imaginary reversion. Mr. William, he will now make it 4,000. Will that content you?"
"Nothing will content me. There is some secret reason for this persecution. You want--you--not my cousin--to get access to this great sum of money. Well, Mr. Probus, my opinion is that my cousin will die before me. And since I am firmly persuaded upon that point, and since I believe that you think so too, my answer is the same as before."
"Then," he said, "stay here and rot." He looked round the prison. "It is a pleasant place for a young man to spend his days, is it not? All his days--till an attack of gaol fever or small-pox visits the place. Eh?
Eh? Eh? Then you will be sorry."
"I shall never be sorry, Mr. Probus, to have frustrated any plots and designs of yours. Be a.s.sured of that--and for the rest, do your worst."
He slowly walked away without a word. But all the devil in his soul flared in his eyes as he turned.
"You do wrong," said the turnkey who had accompanied him. "Tis the keenest of his kind. Not another attorney in all London has brought us, not to speak of the Fleet and Newgate, more prisoners than Mr. Probus.
For hunting up detainers and running up the costs he has no equal."
"He is my detaining creditor," I said.
The turnkey shrugged his shoulders.
"Young gentleman," he said, "I see that you are a gentleman, although you are a fiddler--take advice. Agree with his terms quickly, whatever they are. He made you an offer--take it, before he lands you in another court with new writs and more costs."
In fact, the very next day, I heard that there was another writ in the name of one John Merridew, Sheriff"s officer, for fifty pounds alleged to have been lent to me by him. As for Mr. John Merridew, I knew not even the name of the man, and I had never borrowed sixpence of anyone.
I showed the writ to my friend the turnkey. He read it with admiration.
"I told you so," he said, "what a man he is! And Merridew, too--Merridew! And you never borrowed the money, and never saw the man!
What a man! What a man! Merridew, too, under his thumb! There"s ability for you! There"s resource!"
I murmured something not complimentary. Indeed, I knew nothing, at that time, of Merridew.
"Ah! He means to keep you here until you accept his offer. Better take it now, then he"ll let you go for his costs. He won"t give up the costs.
What a man it is! And you"ve never set eyes on John Merridew, have you?
What a man! He knows John Merridew, you see. Why, between them--"He looked at me meaningly, and laid his hand upon my shoulder. "Take my advice, Sir. Take my advice, and accept that offer of his. Else--I don"t say, mind, but Merridew--Merridew----"He placed his thumb upon the left side of my neck, and pressed it. "Many--many--have gone that way--through Merridew. And Probus rules Merridew."
END OF BOOK I
PART II
OUT OF THE FRYING PAN INTO THE FIRE
CHAPTER I
RELEASE
You have read how a certain lady came to the Prison: how she spoke with two prisoners of the baser sort in a manner familiar and yet scornful: and how she addressed me and appeared moved and astonished on hearing my name. I thought little more about her, save as an agreeable vision in the midst of the rags and sordidness of the Prison, now growing daily--alas!--more familiar and less repulsive. For this is the way in the King"s Bench.
She came, however, a second time, and this time she came to visit me. It was in the morning. Alice was in my room; with her the boy, now in his second year, so strong that he could not be kept from pulling himself up by the help of a chair. She was showing me his ways and his tricks, rejoicing in the wilfulness and strength of the child. I was watching and listening, my pride and happiness in the boy dashed by the thought that he must grow up to be ashamed of his father as a prison bird.
Prison has no greater sting than the thought of your children"s shame.
For the time went on and day after day only made release appear more impossible. How could I get out who had no friends and could save no money? I had now been in prison for nearly a year: I began to look for nothing more than to remain there for all my life.
While I was looking at the boy and sadly thinking of these things, I heard a quick, light step outside, followed by a gentle tap at the door.
And lo! there entered the lady who had spoken with those two sons of Belial and with me.
"I said I would come again." She smiled, and it was as if the sunshine poured into the room. She gave me her hand and it was like a hand dragging me out of the Slough of Despond. "Your room," she said, "is not so bad, considering the place. This lady is your wife? Madam, your most respectful."
So she curtseyed low and Alice did the like. Then she saw the child.
"Oh!" she cried. "The pretty boy! The lovely boy!" She s.n.a.t.c.hed him and tossed him crowing and laughing, and covered him with kisses. "Oh! The light, soft, silky hair!" she cried. "Oh! the sweet blue eyes! Oh! the pretty face. Master Will Halliday, you are to be envied even in this place. Your cousin Matthew hath no such blessing as this."
"Matthew is not even married."
"Indeed? Perhaps, if he is, this, as well as other blessings, has been denied him," she replied, with a little change in her face as if a cloud had suddenly fallen. But it quickly pa.s.sed.
I could observe that Alice regarded her visitor with admiration and curiosity. This was a kind of woman unknown to my girl, who knew nothing of the world or of fine ladies: they were outside her own experience.