Читать книгу The Adventures of Ralph Rashleigh - James Tucker - Страница 4

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RALPH RASHLEIGH was the son of London shopkeepers of decent rank, received a sound education, and at the end of his schooling he was articled to an established conveyancer in the vicinity of Chancery Lane. At the termination of the second year of his training it is known that, by virtue of a provision in his indentures whereby he was entitled to a small but sufficient allowance, he was able to leave his master’s roof-tree and live in a lodging of his own.

He had been subject to the normal amount of discipline and surveillance until this freedom came to him, but there is no great evidence that he was harshly treated, or that he was greatly irked by this restraint. Indeed, very little is known of his early youth, and nothing at all about his character and attainments as a child. Record is meagre, indeed, of the years prior to his assumption of the alias of Ralph Rashleigh. It is known that after attaining the freedom of a personal lodging his chief concern, out of office hours, was to indulge himself in such pleasures as his slender means afforded. He was a weak, easy-going fellow, not positively vicious, but apt to pursue any reasonably safe course which would add to his means of living flashily as a man-about-town. His legitimate means being scanty, he was prevented from going to excess with his tavern companions and from exercising the more expensive pleasures. He was a man tasting and savouring fragments of dishes, the whole of which only could have satisfied his taste and hunger. His appetite for the lighter satisfaction of life was continually whetted, but never really satisfied.

There was among his acquaintance a young articled clerk, similarly circumstanced to himself, who seemed not to be under any monetary disability. Rashleigh came to know that Hartop, as the man was named, had no private means, and he began to wonder at his ability to spend in a single night’s drinking more than Rashleigh himself could afford to spend in a week. Evidently Hartop knew of some way to come by money, which was outside his friend’s experience, and Rashleigh waited for an occasion to discover what the particular trick of Midas might be. The opportunity occurred one night when unrestrained drinking had reduced them both to the condition in which reserves vanish and confidences are carelessly exchanged. Rashleigh, as Hartop ordered another generous round of drinks, asked him bluntly how he managed to spend so much money on drink and pleasure.

‘You are only an articled clerk, like myself, yet you seem to have ten times as much cash as I. How do you manage it?’ he asked.

Then Hartop told him how simple it was. He was in touch with coiners of spurious sovereigns, who sold them to him at a reasonable rate, which left a considerable profit to the purchaser. There was, of course, a certain element of risk in changing and passing them, he explained, but that risk could be reduced very simply to a minimum. A single rule of action solved the whole problem. This was: never to have more than one spurious coin on one’s person at any time, and, if possible, always to have a genuine sovereign with which to replace the counterfeit, should it be detected. The visions of comparative wealth which the prospect conjured up in Rashleigh’s mind, made the risks and the criminality of the affair dwindle into insignificance, and he eagerly accepted Hartop’s offer to supply him in a few days with twenty spurious sovereigns. He was the more blinded to the dangers of the course which he was so wholeheartedly ready to take up, by the immunity from them which his friend had been fortunate enough to enjoy. Hartop related experiences of his own in disposing of the coins which made safety seem utterly assured, provided one followed the one golden rule.

For long the event seemed to prove that one could escape detection with the ease and impunity which Hartop claimed. Rashleigh discovered himself cunning and resourceful as a petty malefactor, and his success in the disposal of spurious sovereigns removed the spur which had hitherto kept him to his work. He abandoned his habits of punctuality and industry and became insufferably negligent and careless. The remonstrances and advice of his principal were ineffectual, and in a few months the exasperated conveyancer dismissed him and cancelled his articles. The success of his new, dishonest method of securing his needs and occasional luxuries made this apparent calamity appear as a relief to Rashleigh, who, however, was astute enough to realize that he must affect some legitimate occupation in order to allay suspicion. His work had developed him into a penman of surpassing capacity, both as to speed and beauty in the writing of legal documents, and he resolved to set himself up as a law scrivener. His regimen thereafter was to work as a free-lance for two or three hours a day, in his lodging, and to spend the rest of his time wherever in and around London he could count upon opportunities for disposing of his coins.

For some time his success and immunity continued, and when he ventured farther afield to fairs and races in the country, his prosperity increased. He discovered from experience that country people were easy victims, and he decided to abandon the golden rule of carrying only one counterfeit coin at a time. He went to Maidstone to attend the annual fair, was forced to submit to being searched when a townsman made an outcry at receiving from him a spurious sovereign, and, a second counterfeit being found on his person, he was arrested and committed for trial upon a charge of uttering counterfeit coins. At the next Assizes he was found guilty and sentenced to twelve months’ imprisonment with hard labour.

In the eighteen-twenties, although prison treatment was severe to harshness, its discipline did not include the banning of free speech between prisoners. Rashleigh was set to the tasks of picking oakum and beating hemp in the company of other criminals, many of whom were experts in crime. In their perverse vanity these old hands boasted of their achievements in the past, and detailed their plans for future coups when liberty should be theirs again. Rashleigh speedily became a humble and eager disciple, studying assiduously all that he could learn of the art and craft of crime. At the end of his term he was released, and walked out of prison a master-craftsman of his illegal trade, anxious to put to practical tests the theoretical knowledge which he had acquired.

His immediate plan of action had long been mature in his mind. An old cracksman had told him of a jeweller’s shop in the city of Winchester which could be easily and profitably rifled, and the two had agreed to make the attempt together as soon as his informant was released. Confident of his capacity, Rashleigh decided to commit the robbery singlehanded, without waiting for his associate, and on his release proceeded immediately to London, where he converted into cash such possessions as he had left there in store. He next went to an address given him by a fellow-prisoner and purchased a full equipment of burglar’s tools. These he packed into a bag with a complete change of clothing, and without delay took coach to Winchester. There he put up at a small inn on the outskirts of the town, and after eating dinner, found his way to the shop which he proposed to burgle. The directions and details given him by his informant proved correct, and having entered the shop and purchased a small trinket, he returned to the inn possessed of all the information he required for the completion of his plans. He supped early, paid his bill, and went to bed, leaving instructions with the landlord that he was to be called at two o’clock in the morning, at which hour a coach would be due to start for Portsmouth.

It was a sleety November night, utterly dark, as he walked through the empty ancient streets to recommence his criminal career. It was such a night as no sane person would venture out into unless compelled, and Rashleigh reached the shop without meeting a soul. He set to work swiftly, and with chisel, brace and bit and hacksaw, removed a panel of the protecting shutter. Cutting the glass and removing the wire grating presented no difficulty, and he was about to load himself with booty from the window, when the raucous voice of a watchman crying the hour gave him pause. He quickly pinned a sheet of dark brown paper over the panel opening, and hurried to concealment in an ancient dark archway a few doors from the jeweller’s. The inclemency of the night favoured him. The watchman did his duty faithfully but swiftly, and observed nothing as he hastened by on his way back to the warm comfort of the watchhouse. As the sound of his retreating footsteps grew faint, Rashleigh returned to the shop, filled his bag, his pockets and his hat with gold, silver and gems, and replaced the paper screen to postpone discovery as long as possible. Thrilled with success, he made his cautious way to the wood which he had selected as a hiding-place on the previous day, and buried his booty carefully. He then set out to place as long a distance as possible between himself and Winchester by day-break, by which time he found he had covered twenty-four miles. He breakfasted at a wayside public-house, after which he mounted a passing coach to Farnham and determined to stay a day or two in that town.

He took a room at a small inn there, and spent the hours of daylight sleeping away the fatigue of his night’s work. In the evening he rose and went downstairs to the bar parlour, where he heard news of his recent depredation. A man had just arrived from Winchester, and was recounting to the assembled company the details of a most audacious robbery which had occurred in that city during the previous night. Rashleigh called for a drink and listened with unapparent interest. The man’s story was that fifteen hundred pounds’ worth of jewellery had been stolen from a Winchester shop, and that the whole city was in a ferment of excitement and conjecture. The local opinion was that the robbery had been committed by a gang of expert thieves. The magistrates had already examined all the loose and suspicious characters among the less fortunate residents, and had filled their day with a mort of arrests, searchings and questionings such as had not troubled Hampshire since, as the man put it, ‘William Rufus, the king, was found dead of an arrow.’ Finally the distracted magistrates, as eager to act as to talk, had arrested two harmless sailors begging their way to Portsmouth, and had sent the pair of them to jail for six months, because the only account of themselves which they could give was the truth itself.

Rashleigh heard the tale with relief touched with ironic amusement. No suspicion attached to him yet: that was clear and comforting. It was, however, too soon to attempt to remove his plunder from its hiding-place in the woods, yet he disliked the idea of going so far away as London. He therefore decided to visit some relatives who lived at Southampton, as if he were still employed as a lawyer’s clerk, and was taking a holiday.

During his stay at Southampton an adventure befell Rashleigh which was, unknown to him, premonitory of a still more desperate one which was to occur to him in later years. He had taken advantage of a fine winter day to walk out to Netley Abbey, a noble pile of ruins in the New Forest, and, lingering later into the afternoon than was discreet, he lost his way back to town. It was dark before he hit upon a beaten path which appeared to run in the right direction, but, after walking along it for some distance, he discovered himself on the western bank of Southampton Water among ruins and rocks. Rashleigh had all a townsman’s fear of darkness in open country, and his anxiety was not lessened by the recollection that he had heard his relatives speak of ruins on this part of the coast as being the haunt of deerstealers, smugglers, and others living on the fringes of outlawry. It was therefore with considerable caution and a sense of uneasiness that he stumbled towards the only light which was visible in the November blackness. He had gone only a few yards when the light disappeared, to show again some minutes later. Half inclined to think that the light, which continued to show only spasmodically, must be the will-o’-the-wisp of which he had heard, he was on the point of abandoning its guidance, when he was startled to hear a voice, near yet below him, cry out:

‘Bob! Bob! is it all right?’

Immediately the light shone again very close, and Rashleigh dropped silently to the grass-covered ground, quaking with fear. He saw that the light shone from a lantern in the hands of a tough-looking sailor whose murderous expression made it clear that the pistols stuck in his belt were rather for use than ornament.

‘Is Curtis in sight?’ called the voice below.

‘No, he ain’t,’ answered the lantern-bearer gruffly, walking forward and appearing to meet the ascending man behind a crumbling wall, which hid them from the view of the scared onlooker. The conversation between them made him crouch low and motionless.

‘It’s damned strange!’ said the first speaker.

‘Sure it is, an’ I don’t like the looks of it,’ said Bob.

‘It can’t be for fear of the Hawks that he ain’t turned up,’ continued the other. ‘They are all off the Wight on the look out for Jack Simmons. He sent a note to an old pard of his at Cowes a-purpose so it got into the hands of the preventive men. Wrote that he would try it on to-night at Blackgang or the Undercliff, and I heard as how the Southampton and Portsmouth cutters, with all the spare officers, have been sent over to the island.’

The men were obviously uneasy, and Rashleigh gathered from the snatches of the ensuing talk that they feared that they might have been sold by their spy in the preventive service. Then the conversation ended, and for some minutes Rashleigh lay wondering how he was ever going to get out of the fix he was in.

‘By cripes, there she is!’

The excited exclamation was immediately followed by a loud, long whistle, obviously a prearranged signal. Instantly the quiet and stillness were broken by the sound of trampling horses all round the spot where Ralph lay hidden. Next the splash of oars told him that a boat was approaching. He raised his head to look, and saw three boats pull ashore. Numbers of men immediately surrounded them and unloaded their cargoes with frantic haste, using as few lights and making as little noise as possible. Swiftly the contraband was tied on the backs of the waiting horses, and placed in two light wagons which had been brought down to shore when the signal had been given.

Suddenly another whistle sounded, and startled heads were raised among the smugglers as it was repeated at a little distance.

‘The Hawks!’

‘Blast them, they’re coming!’

Rashleigh heard the exclamation spoken in low vicious tones. The smugglers gathered into a group, apparently taking orders from their leader.

‘Jump now, you swine!’ he heard the man say. ‘Drive off them wagons and horses while we keep the bleeders back for a bit. Get away with the swag. Get!’

Wagons and horses disappeared at a gallop into the darkness, evidently taking some track which Rashleigh had failed to observe. The remaining smugglers dropped prone to earth, or sheltered behind rocks and ruined walls, as a strong patrol of the Coastguard advanced round a projecting point, visible because of the links [torches] which they carried, throwing a wavering light over the scene, so that Rashleigh — now frantic with fear — could see the lugger off-shore crowding all her canvas to make a get-away. The Coastguard party fired a few shots after her, but made no attempt at pursuit, confining their efforts to the capture of the landed cargo. They came towards the place where the concealed smugglers lay, the lights they carried rendering them easy targets. As soon as they were within sure range, the flashes of twenty muskets stabbed the darkness. Two officers fell, and the remainder retreated quickly out of danger. They next attempted to outflank the enemy, and turned inland, only to find themselves exposed to a punishing volley from the snugly-concealed gang. The patrol returned the fire as best they could, shooting more or less blindly at the spots where the musket flashes revealed the presence of the smugglers. In desperation the leader of the King’s men, calling upon his followers, charged in among the smugglers, who, firing a final volley, leaped up and met the cutlasses of their attackers with clubbed guns. Chance alone saved Ralph from being trampled upon and shot while the mêlée went on all around where he lay shivering with fright. The opposing leaders met in personal combat only a few yards away, to be joined by their followers.

Sudden cheers mingled with curses and imprecations against the Hawks, broke from the inland wood as a reserve of smugglers came to the assistance of the gang.

At this the Coastguard seized their officers and insisted upon withdrawing from a now hopelessly unequal fray. Shots were exchanged as they retreated in good order along the beach, but the smugglers made no attempt at pursuit. Instead, they began hurriedly searching for their dead and wounded comrades. Lanterns were lit, and Ralph mastered his quaking limbs and lay shamming dead. A man held a lantern over him, and uttered a cry of surprise at finding someone who, by his dress, was obviously neither smuggler nor preventive man.

‘Who in hell’s this?’ he cried. ‘Here, Jack, here’s a gunman. Let’s run through his pockets, anyhow.’

The man addressed, a fierce-visaged, whiskered ruffian, came up and held the lantern close to Rashleigh’s face.

‘By the hokey! He ain’t dead. He’s either shamming or he’s in a swound.’

‘Shake a leg there, you two,’ came the leader’s voice. ‘We’ve got to get going — and quick. What you hanging about for?’

‘Here’s a bloke as pretended to be dead,’ answered Jack. ‘By his dress, reckon he’s a spy.’

‘A spy — hey?’ said the leader. ‘We’ll put him from pretending death any more — ever. He shall swing from the Beaulieu Oak before the night’s an hour older.’

What self-possession Rashleigh had managed to retain left him in a swirl of utter panic, but all his wild babblings for mercy were ignored. Seizing him by the arms, Jack and his companion hurried him along at a run between them. They were in the wake of the retreating gang and feared to lose contact, and consequently paid attention to nothing but the direction from which occasional guiding whistles came. At the end of the run, which Ralph guessed must have been three miles, they came to a halt in a forest clearing in the centre of which was an enormous and ancient oak.

The smugglers’ leader, with two other men, stood at the foot of the tree, and immediately asked Rashleigh who he was. The unfortunate man answered in a voice stammering with terror by telling the simple truth, explaining how he came to be on the shore when the raid occurred.

‘A damned fine tale!’ replied the smuggler. ‘You are a blasted spy, and you’re going to die in a suitable way, at the bight of this good rope. You, Bill, count a hundred; and, Harry and Jack, you stand by ready to string this young shaver up when Bill’s done.’

Confronted with the actual rope and the tree, and the menace of the callous leader’s manner, Rashleigh was crazed with fear. In less than two minutes he had to face God, with a daring crime as his last significant achievement. For years he had forgotten God and all that august Name connoted, and at the blinding realization that he was about to meet his fate as a criminal, the fear of hell became real. He dropped on his knees before his contemptuous persecutor and begged for pity, and swore by everything holy and unholy that he was no spy. Might he be struck dead if he had not spoken truth. . . .

He might have been speaking to one deaf and dumb for all the effect his pleadings had upon the smuggler. He came out of his agony of wild, plunging terror as he realized that the man called Bill was counting and had reached sixty-four.

‘I’ll give you everything I possess,’ screamed Rashleigh. ‘Only let me go.’

‘Sixty-five, sixty-six . . . ‘

The smuggler caught up the rope and began to prepare the knot for the noose.

‘Sixty-eight, sixty-nine . . . ‘

Until then only the grip of the two men on his arms had kept him from sinking in a collapse upon the ground, but the sight of the leader running the rope through the knot horrified him. Strong with despair he broke from his captors, snatched up a gun which stood against a tree, and dealt the chief so sound a blow on the head that the smuggler crashed sprawling to the ground and the gun broke off at the breech, leaving only the barrel in his hand. Before the others had recovered their wits, he leapt away across the clearing for the forest. The smuggler who pursued him was fleet of foot, and Rashleigh, glancing back, saw that he was gaining on him. He dodged round sharply, hoping to lay him out also with a surprise blow, but slipped and fell in a heap. His pursuer wrested the gun-barrel from him, struck him twice with it, and proceeded to drag him back to the tree of doom. He was no match for the smuggler, and could only struggle ineffectually while shouting for help. The second smuggler joined his confederate, and between them took him back to their chief, whose head, bleeding profusely, was being bound up by the man Jack.

He greeted Rashleigh with a grim laugh.

‘So ho, my shaver, you thought you’d settled me, eh?’ he said. ‘But Long Frank has got a tougher nut than you can crack. Now, lads, stop gaping. Chuck the end of the rope over that bough, and fix the noose round that bloody pup’s neck. We’ll choke him good and hearty.’

The men obeyed with alacrity. The noose, feeling cold and rough against his skin, was adjusted round his neck; three men laid hold of the loose end of the rope, and Rashleigh, struggling madly, felt the tautening, and then his feet left the ground.

‘Ho! you blasted thieves, we’ve got you at last!’

Rashleigh heard the thunderous voice just as he raised his hands to clutch the rope round his neck, and next instant found himself miraculously in a heap on the grass. Picking himself up in a daze, he saw the three men who had been pulling on the rope, struggling in the grasp of a number of armed men, who speedily overpowered them. The smuggler chief and Jack had disappeared. All this Rashleigh realized in a flash, and was immediately surrounded by members of the crowd who had so opportunely arrived. He judged them from their dress to be gamekeepers, and found that his conjecture was right. They had been out in search of deer-stealers, when his cries for help had brought them to the spot at a run. Ralph told his tale and thanked them, and agreed to accompany them to Southampton, whither they proposed to escort the three captured smugglers.

Before the strangely assorted party had gone a mile, two decent-looking men came up and, taking the head gamekeeper to one side, talked earnestly with him. Presently Ralph was beckoned over to the little group, and asked by the new-comers whether he would agree not to charge the smugglers if a certain sum of money were paid him. The gamekeeper, in whose view smuggling was a much milder crime than deer-stealing, raised no objection to freeing his prisoners; and Ralph was only too eager to agree to a course which would put money in his pocket and at the same time make it unnecessary for him to appear before a magistrate. So it was settled that he would forgive his persecutors on receipt of a sum of twenty pounds. The bargain was confirmed over a smoking breakfast in an alehouse on the border of the forest, Rashleigh receiving one-half of the agreed sum then, and arranging to call at the inn that evening to receive the balance. He then left the company to pursue their obvious intention of getting drunk together, and went home to his anxious relatives. In the evening he returned to the inn, received the balance of the money, and a few days later bade his relatives farewell and went to Portsmouth for a week.

It was now three weeks since he had robbed the Winchester jeweller, and he judged it safe to return to that city to spring his plant. He purchased a travelling trunk and went by coach to the scene of his first major crime. He unearthed his plunder and carried it safely to his inn in the evening, without any untoward incident troubling him. The following morning he arrived with his packed trunk in London and sought out a ‘fence,’ a receiver of stolen goods, who had been recommended to him by one of the old lags he had met in jail.

He presented himself at a dingy marine store in a court leading to the Minories, expecting to find in Mr. Jacobs the traditional type of Jewish old clothes merchant. Instead a man in the prime of life, well-clothed and with every sign of respectability, came into the shop at his summons, and on hearing Rashleigh speak the password, which he had learnt in prison, made an appointment to call at his lodgings next morning to discuss the business.

Rashleigh prepared a list of the articles he had to sell, and had ready a few specimens when Jacobs arrived. The fence had a good reputation among his criminal customers, but Rashleigh was taking no chances. When the fence arrived he was kept in ignorance of the fact that the goods were in the house. He went carefully over the list and examined the specimens in a business-like way, and then turned to Rashleigh.

‘Well, how much you want for the lot?’ he asked.

‘In round figures, a thousand pounds,’ answered Rashleigh.

He smiled at the racial gesture of consternation with which the Jew greeted this announcement.

‘A t’ousand pounds! Mein Gott, are you mad! Where you t’ink all that moneys shall come from?’ demanded Jacobs.

‘Come now, Mr. Jacobs,’ said Rashleigh. ‘You know that you could find twenty times that amount, if the goods were there. It’s a bargain I’m offering you.’

‘I tell you how it is, zen. Money is so scarce zese days, and besides, if I borrow ze money to pay for all zis junks, ven the devil do you t’ink I get it back? Tell me that.’

‘Oh, well, if money is as scarce as all that, Mr. Jacobs,’ answered Rashleigh, ‘you can buy half of what is on the list. We can divide them into two heaps and toss up for first choice.’

Jacobs caught at this suggestion, and offered three hundred pounds for the fair half. Rashleigh countered by demanding three hundred and fifty.

‘Not I,’ retorted Jacobs finally. ‘Shall I go?’

‘If you won’t give me what I want, you may as well go.’

The Jew went to the door and partly opened it, then suddenly returned to whisper confidentially in his customer’s ear:

‘I will give you six hundred and forty pounds for the lot.’

Rashleigh shook his head, and the Jew fairly ran out of the room and down the stairs.

A few minutes later he returned, as Rashleigh expected he would do, and concluded the bargain at six hundred and fifty pounds, paying down Bank of England notes on the spot, and taking the portmanteau and jewellery with him.

Happy in the consciousness that he had successfully completed his first big achievement in the new career which he had learnt in prison, Rashleigh settled down to enjoy the life of unimaginative dissipation for which he had traded his honour and his integrity. Theatres, gaming houses and women soon absorbed the money which such hard bargaining had won from Jacobs the Jew, and only months had passed before he found himself again practically penniless. Whilst he was questing round for some opportunity to renew his fortunes, he met by chance a girl who had been in the service of his old employer. In those early days he had had an affair with her under his employer’s roof, and he found her ready to resume it. She told him that she was now in the service of an elderly gentleman of great wealth in Welbeck Street. Rashleigh saw his chance, and cultivated her liking for him with ardour, so that very soon he had gained admittance to her master’s house, where he made love to her while acquainting himself with all the details he needed to know. His intention was to break into the house and steal the valuable silver, which, he learnt from his paramour, was kept in the butler’s pantry. In a short time he had everything he needed for his plan of plundering the silver except an accomplice, and an accomplice was essential. It almost seemed as if fate were eager to give him all the assistance he needed for his schemes, for he met almost at once one of his onetime companions in prison, who had only recently been discharged and was penniless. He was ready for anything that would make him some money, and gladly agreed to Rashleigh’s proposal. He also undertook to find, that night, a hackney coachman who could be relied upon to do what he was told and keep silent.

Rashleigh’s plan being now complete, he decided to act at once. At midnight they went to the house, with the necessary housebreaking implements, and Rashleigh entered it by means of the circular coal-plate in the pavement, this being the only detail which had necessitated an associate. The other man replaced the coal-plate, and walked away, the understanding being that he should return in half an hour. In less than half the time he had allowed Rashleigh had removed all the plate from the pantry and had locked himself, with his spoil beside him, in the cellar. No hitch occurred. His confederate received the plate through the coal-hole, Rashleigh climbed out, the coal-plate was replaced, and the pair drove to a furnished room at Paddington which he had rented the day before.

Next day he went to a famous fence in Saint Mary Axe, and came away with two hundred pounds, which he shared with his accomplice.