Spring-Heel'd Jack, The Terror of London — page 150: what you’re looking at

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a 152 SPRING-HEEL D JACK: THE TERROR OF LONDON. herself on the bed; and burying her face in the pillow, sobbed aloud. “ When—when will my sufferings end !” she cried. ‘Oh! why am I suffered to live this life of misery? Alas! the worst has’ not yet come, I fear, for 1 am more than suspected of being a criminal. That cheque I had so wished to destroy has been seen, will be spoken of, and I shall be traced as the thief who stole the hoary-headed villain’s pocket-book. Oh! I have ‘left it below. Will she find it? What if she does? What can it matter what becomes of me now? They may drag me to prison! Shall I suffer more than I do now? No. Let it re- main then—let it be found—-brought forward in evidence against me—I care not ; for nothing can enhance my misery—nothing bring happi- ness again to this aching heart!” She buried her face still further in the pillow, and, wearied in mind and body, .at length:sank to sleep. Oblrvious to all, she saw not, shortly after the shades of night had fallen, the policeman’s wife- bending over her, and, by the light of a candle, assuring herself that Jane Slater slept. ‘* Now,” said the woman speaking to herself, as she stole away from the side of the bed witha cat-like step, and silently closed the door behind her, “ now to search for anything I can find that may prove her to be what I think her—as guilty as her husband.- Who knows but I may search out something that mine may turn to account, and obtain for him a sergeant’s. stripes and a sergeant’s pay. It won’t,be the first time a woman has raised her husband by her: wit and perseverance. I feel certain that I .shall find something. . Yes, I feel quite certain of that.” She silently went down stairs, and commenced a search of the front apartment. But nothing of an extraordinary character met her gaze. Taking the candle in her hand, she was about to proceed to the back room, when she recol- lected she had not looked beneath the mattress of the sofa. She turned and raised the swab, and the rays of the candle fell upon the pocket-book, hidden |- there by Jane. : She grasped it eagerly, placed the candle upon the table, and opened it with trepidation. She was not much of ascholar, but she saw at ° granee the name of Ralph Grasper on the first eaf. With a chuckle she. laid it upon the table, took up the candlestick, and walked towards the door, muttering — | ‘“That’s something. I'll find something else yet, or I’m much mistaken.” She pulled the dogr open, uttered. a stifled ery of terror, and let fall the light from her hand, which was instantly extinguished. In the doorway stood a tall figure, with a hideous countenance ; .a white cloak fell from its shoulders, and its arm was extended towards her, while one word only rang in her ears— “ Wretch !” For some time she stood trembling in terror, then staggering to the mantleshelf she felt for a lucifer she had placed there in the morning, hurriedly struck a light, and looked around. T — rey The figure was gone, and so also was the | © pocket-book she had left upon the table. —— CHAPTER LITI. THE SUICIDE’S GRAVE—THE VILLAIN AND HIs PUNISHMENT. *¢ FELO-DE-SE!”’ Such was the verdict of the jury who sat on the inquest on the body of the forger suicide. James Slater was to be denied Christian burial. He had usurped God’s prerogative—he had taken that life which was not his own, and that, too, when in a sound state of mind, at least, so thought the jury, and he was to be buried like a dog at midnight, in the cross-roads. — What could it matter to that lump ’ of inani- mate clay where they placed his bones to moulder into dust? — ) Nothing. He could rest as well in the cross-roads as in the consecrated ground. To dust he must return. What mattered whether he mingled it with the road-side or the grass-bedecked mould of the churchyard, where sculptured stones with lying epitaphs rear their — heads, and mark the last homes of many whose — hearts were as black, and whose crimes were as great, as the poor suicide’s, but whose failing had not been seen by the world. But though to that dead man it mattered little © where they placed his remains, to the living it was a bitter and lasting reproach. s eWhat could be more painful to the feelings of those who loved him in hfe, revered his memory in death, spite of his faults-? "Tis those on- whom the weight of such verdict falls with crushing effect. It was. another blow to the already su a ffering heart of the poor wife—an overwhelming blow, and bitterly did she feel it. But against that verdict there was no appeal. The fiat had gone forth—James Slater must fill a suicide’s grave. | ) But was it just ? . opinion among mankind. Jane Slater felt that her husband had b On such a point there is always a difference of een driven to madness by the words she had written on that fatal night, and that in the height of his frenzy he closed his eyes upon the world, which had become hateful to him. But the jury knew not this, and felo-de-se their verdict. was The clocks of the various steeples were chiming E the quarter to midnight, when the body of the ill-fated man was carried from that once happy home in a common black shell, and jolted along on the shoulders of four rough men, to where — four roads met, about a quarter of a mile from the scene of the tragedy. Half the world was bathed in peaceful slum- . bers, and thought not, cared not, for the end of him who, in an evil hour, had broken the com- mandments and his poor wife’s heart. , There was but one who closely fol remains to the grave, and that one was her who so ardently longed to lay by his side. Weeping piteously, Jane Slater strode with “S com boo <) ee i * lowed his | r + € ; 4 com