The Mysteries of the Court of London — page 376: what you’re looking at

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

THE MYSTERIES OF THE COURT. 370 the old sexton wanted an assistant; and the Burker saw at a glance that the situation would suit him for the present most admi- rably, inasmuch as it would give him bread and a bed to sleep in; and of all places in the world an out-of-the-way secluded village such as this, was perhaps the best calculated to yield him a re- fuge against the consequences of a hue and cry. His original intention was to push on into the wildest parts of Scotland: but his experiences of an outcast condition were already painful enough to make him wish for something settled,even though it might be nearer to Liverpool than prudence would have exactly suggested. The hope, there- fore, of becoming the old sexton’s assistant was one of the results arising from his accidental listening at the loop-hole of the vault. The other was the spectacle of the brandy-flask, which the Burker longed to apply to his lips. But how was he to introduce himself to the old man? Hark! Jonathan Carnabie resumes his musings. “Yes—I am resolved to have an assistant— that’s settled! But I must have one that will do my bidding in all things without being questioned —that will be tutored into taking as much pride in digging a neat grave and having a care of these vaults as I do myself, Now where is such a person to be found P” “Here!” answered the Burker: for it struck him at the instant that this was the best, as assu- redly it was the shortest, way of introducing him. self to the notice of the individual whose patronage he soucht. The old sexton started, perhaps for the first time in his life smitten with a superstitious terror : but quickly recovering his self-possession, his first thought was that he must have been deceived by some unusual sound. He nevertheless instinctively looked towards the loop-hole; and on perceiving that the light of the shining heavens was inter- cepted by a human form, his next impression was that some belated villager was bent on playing off a joke upon him. “You have nothing to do with me or my con- cerns,” said Jonathan. “Go your ways back to the Green Dragon—unless they have shut up— and in decency they ought—in which ease go to your bed.” ““T don’t happen to have never an acquaintance with the Gyeen Dragon,’ responded the Burker ; “and as for seeking the bed I last slept in But no matter!” he interrupted himself, as his thoughts had wandered back to the narrow iron bedstead, the hard mattress, and the horsecloth coverlid in the gaol whence he had escaped. “ I’m not a native of this here willage, though as re- spectable for a poor man as any that is.” “How came you here?” asked Jonathan bluntly. “Tm out of work,” responded the Burker—as indeed he eas out of the work which constituted his ordinary occupation before his capture. “I’m on the tramp—I was passing through the church- yaud—I saw the light—but not being afeard of ghostesses, I peeped in.” ee Not afraid, eh ?? said old J onathan, to whom this was at once a recommendation on the Burker’s behalf. “ More afeard of the living than the dead,” re- plied the Burker: “ cog why there’s a many people ing how they may dewour innocent and unwary chaps hke me.” “Rather pious after your own fashion P” said Jonathan Carnabie. “‘Wery pious,” responded the Burker,—“ but unassuming, unpretending, doing whatever I’m bid without axing a question—and uncommon strong and active at work.” “And where do you come from?” asked Jona- than. “From Gowler—a good way off,’ replied Mr. Barnes; so that this vague response might have embraced any point of the compass and any con- ceivable distance. “But where from?” inquired Jonathan, who though to a certain extent simple-minded through having dwelt all his life in that village, was never- theless precise and circumstantial enough in his habits to require definite replies to his questions. “Tm a Lincolnshire man,” said the Burker, with a tone of uncommon frankness. “As I have already told you, I’m out of work. The last job {did was for Farmer Nuggans-——perhaps you have heerd talk of him ?” * T can’t say that I have,’ responded the old man. “But you had better step round into the church, and we will talk over the matter here. A few steps to the right will bring you to a little door; and the light from the vault will guide ou.” ‘ Jonathan Carnabie evidently thought that the vault was the most comfortable place to sit and discourse in; and it was perfectly indifferent to the Burker where he deposited himself so long as he had a chance of carrying out his aims. He proceeded to the little door—he entered the church—and the light frora the vault, gimmermg feebly, seemed to be a dim, uncertain, ghostly halo hanging about the dead. But the moon- beams were shining through the windows; and they helped to subdue the light of the lantern, or to render it more sickly. They fell upon the pews of dark wood—upon the pulpit standing against one of the thick pillars—and upon three or four monuments with the sculptured effigies of the long defunct warriors whose remains had been buried there. It was evidently a very old church: —in former times there had been a castle in the neighbourhood; and hence the monuments to which we have referred. The silence which pre- vailed until broken by the Burker’s heavy stamp- ing feet, would have struck solemnly to the soul of any other man, and would have induced him to tread lightly: but he was totally unsusceptible of such impressions—and he went tramping along the aisle, indifferent to the mournful echoes which his nailed boots raised, and which might have been taken for the moanings of the spirits of the de- parted as they died away under the groined roofs at the farther extremity. On reaching the mouth of the vault, Barney the Burker descended into it by a flight of stone steps; and he very deliberately seated himself upon a coffin near the block of stone on which Jonathan Carnabie was placed. The old man started at what he considered to be an act of im- pious desecration: but the Burker, not compre- hending the meaning of that movement, fancied it was produced by a nearer es his own hang- in this world as goes about like roaring lions seek- i NT TS AT SS GEomichboo (C S (C©)