The Boy Soldier; Or, Garibaldi's Young Captain — page 12: what you’re looking at

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

—_—— 6 THE BOY SOLDIER; OR, GARIBALDI'S YOUNG CAPTAIN. — Sudden faint flashes of lightning darted through the sky, and low, rumbling, distant thunder gave token of an approaching tempest. All was quiet in the streets at the west end of London ; scarcely asingle person was abroad, and a solitary policeman could be seen here and there in his heavy overcoat and shining cape slowly and drearily walking his lonely beat. The appearance of all things in the heavens and in the streets betokened the fast approach of a ter- rific storm of thunder, lightning, wind and rain, It was late. The bells of neighbouring churches had tolled the hour of ten, and their solemn sounds fell upon the ear with a melancholy cadence. The winds sighed mournfully at times, and then again at intervals increased in violence till they screamed aloud as if the cold bleak winds were peopled with a thousand mysterious voices high in rage and anger. Suddenly, and’ when least expected, the lightning flashed with almost blinding brilliancy. ¥ Its fiery forks struck a solitary tree in the large garden of a two-story house, which stood alone and far apart from others in the street. The tree was instantly shivered into a thousand splinters, and deafening thunder peals burst right over the house with tremendous power and un- earthly grandeur, shaking tiles off the roof, breaking window panes, and causing more than one chimney pot to topple over and fall into the yard and gar- den with a teriffic crash. The policeman, to escape the deluging rain that now poured forth from the heavens, stood in a neighbouring doorway. He was in full view of the lonely, tumble-down- looking house, which, as we haye said, stood far trom the street, surrounded by a large garden, and he perceived that the solitary tree which had stood near the entrance gate had been felled to the earth. Ere many minutes had elapsed he was joined by his sergeant, a red-faced policeman, with enormous sandy whiskers, and he, too, crept into the door- way out of the pouring rain. ‘ “ Terrible storm, Tomkins ?” said the sergeant to 61 Z.” “Yes, sir; just such a night as ’ud suit some on ?em to crack a crib.” “Just so, just so, Tomkins; but I don’t think any of that craft will trouble yowr beat. What are you looking at across the way ?” “Well, sir, ’ve been for some time a looking at that there house opposite, that old, two-story red brick building standing there all alone in that big wilderness of a garden. I don’t like the looks o’ that place much ; what a dark, dingy, miserly, cut-throat- looking place it is!” “ Just so; that’s what they call the ‘Haunted House ;’ it’s gone under that°name ever since I entered the ‘force,’ and that’s a good many years ago.” “ But it ain’t haunted, is it?” said Tomkins, who had come from the country, and had not long been in the “‘ force,” “ Haunted, no; but there’s been some very queer stories told about it, J can tell you.” “ Well, I dqn’t know whether it be haunted or not,’ said Tomkins ; “but I have heard of haunted houses afore now, and it strikes me that that is, if there ever was one, You should have seen how the lightning struck that tree down in the yard; it — shivered it all to pieces in a minute ; the light was so brilliant for a short time that I thought it would blind me,” “ So the old tree has fallen at last, eh ?” said the sergeant. “ Well, I thought it would one 0 these stormy nights. It has bezn shaky and withered is many a year,” ee See a Ta single light moves about in the second floor window,” said Towkins. ‘‘I never much liked the looks o’ that place.” ‘So it does. Somebody sick, I suppose.” ‘¢Who lives there?” . “Oh, a miserly old devil named Ford. The house belongs to him ; he’s only got two servants, a red-headed slavey for cook, housekeeper, and general servant, and a man—a sort of half-butler, half-gardener, half-anything. Both of ’em look as thin as starved rats, for the old man is so stingy.” ~ © Ts he rich?” “ Rich? No; he can’t be very well to do, or he wouldn’t live as he does. He had a horse once; but he soon sold him, ’cause he couldn’t abear to buy him beans or oats.”’ 1 # ‘‘ He must be an old miserly hound, then,” i? ¢ ‘“‘T believe you. He gives his servants five pounds _ a year, and allows ’em seven bob a week to keep themselves, so I hear, and thinks it quite enough to get fat on.” “61 Z” whistled very low at this, as if it were too hard to believe. “ Fact, though,” said the sergeant. ever see him ?”’ “No, never, He’s a curiosity whoever he is.” “No; nor anybody else, as I’ve heard of. Nor the servants either much. The old cook goes out every night to buy sixpennorth o’ “pieces” at the market-stalls for the governor’s grub, I’ve heard ; but the half-starved, hang-dog-looking butler isn’t seen at all. He tends on the old devil night and day, so I hear.” While they thus spoke together, “61 Z” nudged the sergeant, and said in a whisper, ‘“‘ Did yer see that ?” “What, the shadow o’ the man passing the blind ?” “ Yes.” ‘Ts that the butler, I wonder ?” “T dare say itis; but come, the rain has given over. We must make a move.” So saying, the two policemen; left the doorway, and resumed their duties. They walked leisurely down the street, and their heavy footfalls soon died away. The church clocks struck eleven. While the two officers had stood out of the rain looking at the Haunted House, as it was “Did you ‘| called, the proper name of which was “ Red Lodze,” their conversation had been overheard by a man, who, like themselves, had crouched in the dark recesses of a spacious, overhanging, beetle-browed doorway near by. © This person was a tall, stout, middle-aged man, and wore a large cloak that enveloped him com- pletely from head to foot. . He had walked up the street unseen by the officers, and his boots were encased in gutta percha goloshes, so that his footsteps could not be heard. He was on his way to “ Red Lodge ;” but he re to enter it unseen. + e voices of the policemen had prom 1 hide near them, and listen to all Te ae Bae So well did he crouch in the deep dark doorway that their sharp eyes had not perceived him, ; _Had they by accident turned their lamps upon him, he would have opened the street door, and entered, for he had lodgings in that house : but for reasons of his own, did not wi . Richt ) wish to enter that Bosns : Se a CO Eomicbooks