The Lights o' Gotham; or, The Gilded Villain — page 11: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

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' 4 " « ae - i - * bu *y “" . , - 7 iv » Are As - cane ‘alt he) foe ; , es — i eee ee As the colonel had surmised, the robbery of the safe was as} Despite the storm a group of men, and even some women were | yet undiscovered when they reached the office, and before even- | among them were standing on the spot, ejaculating and talking ing the new firm of Thorndyke & Co. was duly established. in excited tones. Some blue-coated policemen were standing The news was spread broadcast, there’was no run on the bank, | on the sidewalk surveying the crowd with an important air, and the crisis was averted, but at what a fearful price! gruffly answering questions which were continually being put to them. . CHAPTER VII. There was no mistaking the cause of all this commotion and AT THE MORGUE. bustle. There are sorrows under which people do not swoon, griefs| ‘The murder had been discovered. which do not find escape in shrieks and lamentations. Into this crowd rushed Alice, with her child in her arms, and Such was Alice’s grief. While her husband’s fate was in sus- | glancing wildly around her, she exclaimed: pense her tears were ready to flow, her surcharged heart could} ‘‘My husband! my husband! Where is he? Oh, tell me, find vent in words and utterances. Now that the blow had | where is he?” fallen, now that the dread apprehension was.a reality, she could The crowd respectfully drew back, and muttered among them- only kneel beside the cradle and gaze up into Tom’s face with a selves: fixed, strong, tearless expression which frightened him more “It is his wife!” : ‘‘She’s got her child with her, too!”’ ‘* Poor woman!”’ { ‘‘ Alice,” he tremblingly exclaimed, ‘‘do not give way thus! The distracted widow looked around her, but could fiad ne For your child’s sake bear it like a mother. Speak to me, trace of the body of her murdered husband. Alice.” ‘They've taken him away,” she moaned. ‘‘ Oh, where have She pressed her hand to her heart, as if to still a sudden pain they taken him ? Will no one tell me? I want to look upon there, and then, rising to her feet, in a dull hollow voice, asked: him once again.” ‘‘Where is he?”’ ‘‘ Yer see, ma’am,” said a policeman, politely touching his ‘You surely do not intend to look upon his dead body!” he | hat to her, ‘‘some of the boys from our station found him and exclaimed, fearful lest the agony had turned her brain, ‘‘and brought him to the station-house, and the sergeant, he thought certainly not now!” it best to have him taken to the morgue——”’ ‘‘ Yes, now, this very minute!” she vehemently replied. ‘‘Am| ‘‘To the morgue!’ she wildly interrupted—‘‘ among all the I not his wife?” dead bodies?” ‘But you have just recovered from a serious illness. You are| +‘ Well, ma’am, he was dead, you see,” spluttered the officer, weak and excited. The night is terrible without. Besides, who| hopelessly bewildered by the sight of her agony. will remain with your babe?” ‘Tom,’ she said, turning to the tramp, ‘‘ get a carriage—any- She seemed to be paying no attention to his words, as with | thing. We must go to the morgue.”’ feverish eagerness she put on a cloak and hat, and then caught| Tom ran up Rector street, and by mere luck, managed to up the child and hastily dressed it without awakening it from | catch a cab, into which he assisted Alice and the infant, and its sleep. seating himself with them, they were driven to the morgue. ‘‘T will take her with me!”’ she exclaimed, as she wrapped her| It was long past midnight when they reached the solemn, cloak around it. ‘‘She shall have a last look on her father’s gloomy receptacle of the unknown dead. A ring on the bell dead body.” brought an attendant to the door, and on stating their errand, «T will not allow it,” said Tom, placing himself against the} he ushered them into the office of the nignt-warden. door to bar her egress; ‘‘it would be suicide!” ‘‘There was a body of a man found dead in the street brought Alice stood in the center of the room holding her babe to her into the morgue a couple of hours ago,” said the official, when breast, under the cloak; there spies Nenana ice vivid red spot on each |}, had heard their story. ‘It is somewhat against the rules to cheek, while her eyes glittered with a strange, unnatural fire. permit visitors into the morgue at night, but I believe I can make ‘Tom Brewster,” she said, and her voice was low and hissing, | ,,, exceptton in your sad case. Follow me.” And he led the ‘(it is you who bring me the first news of my husband’s murder; way to the room where the dead were lying upon marble slabs. you, a rejected lover of mine—you who have uttered threats ‘<T don’t know exactly where they have put him,” he added; against him. There are some men who will commit murder and | ,, but I suppose you will recognize Ti re then pire gloat over - agony of their victim's wife Suddenly they paused before one of the slabs in the rear end “Alice!” interrupted ‘Tom, muaty , “you do not mean—great | o¢ the room, and a shriek from Alice announced that their Heaven! You eae pea: a ag _ | funereal journey was at an an end. A SUspeeh ROPING). BUS COMnTCD, Ap ie Ones ae ae There lay the body of her husband, still clad asit had been while the spots on her cheeks grew more crimson, and the fire me's Ps in her eves more glittering. ‘‘They say that at the murderer's brought'to the m¢rgue, its face now white and pallid, wearing : aca oh hes eae a tranquil, peace ‘al air, the red streak around the throat alone approach the wounds in his victim’s body will reopen and bleed Sicwinie hawith See derer ‘had done his ‘deadly: work i in tl rer’ | Pae afresh; they say that in the murderer Ss presence t 9 still tongue; | Henoat} Ernest!” ‘she dried ‘Ainging hierself across the d has moved again and the dead lips huve pronounced the assas- 1 ; body. ‘‘Gone! gone!—forever gone! gin’s name. Tom Brewster,” she added suddenly raising her She took her sleeping child from under her cloak and pressed voice, ‘‘I demand that you lead me to my husband's corpse!” ! ‘4 demand couched in such a form I must obey,” replied he, | the little lips to its father’s dead ones. The contact awakened he babe, and it commenced to cry. The widowed mother, in sorrowfully, but with with no trace of anger. ‘‘ Heaven grant t that you survive it! Come.” turn, pressed her lips to her dead husband’s, then, suddenly be- He took her by the hand and led her out of the room. Then coming ghastly pale, she sank to the floor, with her child in her locking the door, and putting the key in his pocket, he descend- | arms. ed the stairs with her and passed out into the cold wintry night,| With an ejaculation of alarm, Tom sprang to raise her up. and at once trudged through snow and slush in the direction of| She shook her head. the scene of the murder. | ‘““My—my heart is broken!” she gasped, holding her babe out At last, at the end of an hour, they arrived at the square at|to him. ‘t Take her—love her—for my sake, and—avenge——" the foot of Rector street. She pointed to her husband’s corpse, and then fell back dead. He approached and touched her lightly on her shoulder. - “3 “er . / a. ; 2 a Ven Pa Veo > ie Na sig YY ik. *} ep Na —e a so a7 . ~ \ ate ~ ie . ie 5 — x See. ye Est. Cah Noo hy eae Ly ee At Pe ‘ ’ >4 . : ~ "4 . te : * 35 —— comicbooks.com