Dusty Diamonds Cut and Polished - Robert Michael Ballantyne (best ebook reader txt) 📗

tired."

"Well, old girl, you'd better cut home."

"I think I will, Ned, but first I'll sit down on this step to rest a bit."

"All right, old girl," said Ned, who would have said the same words if she had proposed to stand on her head on the step--so easy was he in his mind as to how his wife spent her time; "if you sit for half-an-hour or so I'll be back to see you 'ome again. I'm on'y goin' to Bundle's shop for a bit o' baccy. Ain't I purlite now? Don't it mind you of the courtin' days?"

"Ah! Ned," exclaimed the wife, while a sudden gush of memory brought back the days when he was handsome and kind,--but Ned was gone, and the slightly thawed spring froze up again.

She sat down on the cold step of a door which happened to be somewhat in the shade, and gazed at the opposite windows. There was a light in one of them. She knew it well. She had often watched the shadows that crossed the blind after the gas was lighted, and once she had seen some one carrying something which looked like a baby! It might have been a bundle of soiled linen, or undarned socks, but it might have been Matty, and the thought sent a thrill to the forlorn creature's heart.

On the present occasion she was highly favoured, for, soon after Ned had left, the shadows came again on the blind, and came so near it as to be distinctly visible. Yes, there could be no doubt now, it _was_ a baby, and as there was only one baby in that house it followed that the baby was _her_ baby--little Matty! Here was something to carry home with her, and think over and dream about. But there was more in store for her. The baby, to judge from the shadowy action of its fat limbs on the blind, became what she called obstropolous. More than that, it yelled, and its mother heard the yell--faintly, it is true, but sufficiently to send a thrill of joy to her longing heart.

Then a sudden fear came over her. What if it was ill, and they were trying to soothe it to rest! How much better _she_ could do that if she only had the baby!

"Oh! fool that I was to part with her!" she murmured, "but no. It was best. She would surely have bin dead by this time."

The sound of the little voice, however, had roused such a tempest of longing in Mrs Frog's heart, that, under an irresistible impulse, she ran across the road and rang the bell. The door was promptly opened by Mrs Twitter's domestic.

"Is--is the baby well?" stammered Mrs Frog, scarce knowing what she said.

"_You've_ nothink to do wi' the baby that I knows on," returned Mrs Twitter's domestic, who was not quite so polite as her mistress.

"No, honey," said Mrs Frog in a wheedling tone, rendered almost desperate by the sudden necessity for instant invention, "but the doctor said I was to ask if baby had got over it, or if 'e was to send round the--the--I forget its name--at once."

"What doctor sent you?" asked Mrs Twitter, who had come out of the parlour on hearing the voices through the doorway, and with her came a clear and distinct yell which Mrs Frog treasured up in her thinly clad but warm bosom, as though it had been a strain from Paradise. "There must surely be some mistake, my good woman, for my baby is quite well."

"Oh! thank you, thank you--yes, there must have been some mistake," said Mrs Frog, scarce able to restrain a laugh of joy at the success of her scheme, as she retired precipitately from the door and hurried away.

She did not go far, however, but, on hearing the door shut, turned back and took up her position again on the door-step.

Poor Mrs Frog had been hardened and saddened by sorrow, and suffering, and poverty, and bad treatment; nevertheless she was probably one of the happiest women in London just then.

"_My_ baby," she said, quoting part of Mrs Twitter's remarks with a sarcastic laugh, "no, madam, she's not _your_ baby _yet_!"

As she sat reflecting on this agreeable fact, a heavy step was heard approaching. It was too slow for that of Ned. She knew it well--a policeman!

There are hard-hearted policemen in the force--not many, indeed, but nothing is perfect in this world, and there are a _few_ hard-hearted policemen. He who approached was one of these.

"Move on," he said in a stern voice.

"Please, sir, I'm tired. On'y restin' a bit while I wait for my 'usband," pleaded Mrs Frog.

"Come, move on," repeated the unyielding constable in a tone that there was no disputing. Indeed it was so strong that it reached the ears of Ned Frog himself, who chanced to come round the corner at the moment and saw the policeman, as he imagined, maltreating his wife.

Ned was a man who, while he claimed and exercised the right to treat his own wife as he pleased, was exceedingly jealous of the interference of others with his privileges. He advanced, therefore, at once, and planted his practised knuckles on the policeman's forehead with such power that the unfortunate limb of the law rolled over in one direction and his helmet in another.

As every one knows, the police sometimes suffer severely at the hands of roughs, and on this occasion that truth was verified, but the policeman who had been knocked down by this prize-fighter was by no means a feeble member of the force. Recovering from his astonishment in a moment, he sprang up and grappled with Ned Frog in such a manner as to convince that worthy he had "his work cut out for him." The tussle that ensued was tremendous, and Mrs Frog retired into a doorway to enjoy it in safety. But it was brief. Before either wrestler could claim the victory, a brother constable came up, and Ned was secured and borne away to a not unfamiliar cell before he could enjoy even one pipe of the "baccy" which he had purchased.

Thus it came to pass, that when a certain comrade expected to find Ned Frog at a certain mansion in the West-end, prepared with a set of peculiar tools for a certain purpose, Ned was in the enjoyment of board and lodging at Her Majesty's expense.

The comrade, however, not being aware of Ned's incarceration, and believing, no doubt, that there was honour among thieves, was true to his day and hour. He had been engaged down somewhere in the country on business, and came up by express train for this particular job; hence his ignorance as to his partner's fate.

But this burglar was not a man to be easily balked in his purpose.

"Ned must be ill, or got a haccident o' some sort," he said to a very little but sharp boy who was to assist in the job. "Howsever, you an' me'll go at it alone, Sniveller."

"Wery good, Bunky," replied Sniveller, "'ow is it to be? By the winder, through the door, down the chimbly, up the spout--or wot?"

"The larder windy, my boy."

"Sorry for that," said Sniveller.

"Why?"

"'Cause it _is_ so 'ard to go past the nice things an' smell 'em all without darin' to touch 'em till I lets you in. Couldn't you let me 'ave a feed first?"

"Unpossible," said the burglar.

"Wery good," returned the boy, with a sigh of resignation.

Now, while these two were whispering to each other in a box of an adjoining tavern, three police-constables were making themselves at home in the premises of Sir Richard Brandon. One of these was Number 666.

It is not quite certain, even to this day, how and where these men were stationed, for their proceedings--though not deeds of evil--were done in the dark, at least in darkness which was rendered visible only now and then by bull's-eye lanterns. The only thing that was absolutely clear to the butler, Mr Thomas Balls, was, that the mansion was given over entirely to the triumvirate to be dealt with as they thought fit.

Of course they did not know when the burglars would come, nor the particular point of the mansion where the assault would be delivered; therefore Number 666 laid his plans like a wise general, posted his troops where there was most likelihood of their being required, and kept himself in reserve for contingencies.

About that "wee short hour" of which the poet Burns writes, a small boy was lifted by a large man to the sill of the small window which lighted Sir Richard Brandon's pantry. To the surprise of the small boy, he found the window unfastened.

"They've bin an' forgot it!" he whispered.

"Git in," was the curt reply.

Sniveller got in, dropped to his extreme length from the sill, let go his hold, and came down lightly on the floor--not so lightly, however, but that a wooden stool placed there was overturned, and, falling against a blue plate, broke it with a crash.

Sniveller became as one petrified, and remained so for a considerable time, till he imagined all danger from sleepers having been awakened was over. He also thought of thieving cats, and thanked them mentally. He likewise became aware of the near presence of pastry. The smell was delicious, but a sense of duty restrained him.

Number 666 smiled to himself to think how well his trap had acted, but the smile was lost in darkness.

Meanwhile, the chief operator, Bunky, went round to the back door. Sniveller, who had been taught the geography of the mansion from a well-executed plan, proceeded to the same door inside. Giles could have patted his little head as he carefully drew back the bolts and turned the key. Another moment, and Bunky, on his stocking soles, stood within the mansion.

Yet another moment, and Bunky was enjoying an embrace that squeezed most of the wind out of his body, strong though he was, for Number 666 was apt to forget his excessive power when duty constrained him to act with promptitude.

"Now, then, show a light," said Giles, quietly.

Two bull's-eyes flashed out their rich beams at the word, and lit up a tableau of three, in attitudes faintly resembling those of the Laocoon, without the serpents.

"Fetch the bracelets," said Giles.

At these words the bull's-eyes converged, and Sniveller, bolting through the open door, vanished--he was never heard of more!

Then followed two sharp _clicks_, succeeded by a sigh of relief as Number 666 relaxed his arms.

"You needn't rouse the household unless you feel inclined, my man," said Giles to Bunky in a low voice.

Bunky did _not_ feel inclined. He thought it better, on the whole, to let the sleeping dogs lie, and wisely submitted to inevitable fate. He was marched off to jail, while one of the constables remained behind to see the house made safe, and acquaint Sir Richard of his deliverance from the threatened danger.

Referring to this matter on the following day in the servants' hall, Thomas Balls filled a foaming tankard of ginger-beer--for, strange to say, he was an abstainer, though a butler--and proposed,