Short Fiction · The Spotted Dog (3/3) (2/4)

In Fleet Street, as we came out of the Temple, we turned into an eating-house and had some food. By this time the exercise and the air had carried off the fumes of the liquor which he had taken, and I knew that it would be well that he should eat. We had a mutton chop and a hot potato and a pint of beer each, and sat down to table for the first and last time as mutual friends. It was odd to see how in his converse with us on that day he seemed to possess a double identity. Though the hopeless misery of his condition was always present to him, was constantly on his tongue, yet he could talk about his own career and his own character as though they belonged to a third person. He could even laugh at the wretched mistake he had made in life, and speculate as to its consequences. For himself he was well aware that death was the only release that he could expect. We did not dare to tell him that if his wife should die, then things might be better with him. We could only suggest to him that work itself, if he would do honest work, would console him for many sufferings. “You don’t know the filth of it,” he said to us. Ah, dear! how well we remember the terrible word, and the gesture with which he pronounced it, and the gleam of his eyes as he said it! His manner to us on this occasion was completely changed, and we had a gratification in feeling that a sense had come back upon him of his old associations. “I remember this room so well,” he said⁠—“when I used to have friends and money.” And, indeed, the room was one which has been made memorable by Genius. “I did not think ever to have found myself here again.” We observed, however, that he could not eat the food that was placed before him. A morsel or two of the meat he swallowed, and struggled to eat the crust of his bread, but he could not make a clean plate of it, as we did⁠—regretting that the nature of chops did not allow of ampler dimensions. His beer was quickly finished, and we suggested to him a second tankard. With a queer, half-abashed twinkle of the eye, he accepted our offer, and then the second pint disappeared also. We had our doubts on the subject, but at last decided against any further offer. Had he chosen to call for it he must have had a third; but he did not call for it. We left him at the door of the tavern, and he then promised that in spite of all that he had suffered and all that he had said he would make another effort to complete the Doctor’s work. “Whether I go or stay,” he said, “I’d like to earn the money that I’ve spent.” There was something terrible in that idea of his going! Whither was he to go?

The Doctor heard nothing of the misfortune of these three or four inauspicious days; and the work was again going on prosperously when he came up again to London at the end of the second month. He told us something of his banker, and something of his lawyer, and murmured a word or two as to a new curate whom he needed; but we knew that he had come up to London because he could not bear a longer absence from the great object of his affections. He could not endure to be thus parted from his manuscript, and was again childishly anxious that a portion of it should be in the printer’s hands. “At sixty-five, Sir,” he said to us, “a man has no time to dally with his work.” He had been dallying with his work all his life, and we sincerely believed that it would be well with him if he could be contented to dally with it to the end. If all that Mackenzie said of it was true, the Doctor’s erudition was not equalled by his originality, or by his judgment. Of that question, however, we could take no cognizance. He was bent upon publishing, and as he was willing and able to pay for his whim and was his own master, nothing that we could do would keep him out of the printer’s hands.

He was desirous of seeing Mackenzie, and was anxious even to see him once at his work. Of course he could meet his assistant in our editorial room, and all the papers could easily be brought backwards and forwards in the old despatch-box. But in the interest of all parties we hesitated as to taking our revered and reverend friend to the Spotted Dog. Though we had told him that his work was being done at a public-house, we thought that his mind had conceived the idea of some modest inn, and that he would be shocked at being introduced to a place which he would regard simply as a gin-shop. Mrs. Grimes, or if not Mrs. Grimes, then Mr. Grimes, might object to another visitor to their bedroom; and Mackenzie himself would be thrown out of gear by the appearance of those clerical gaiters upon the humble scene of his labours. We, therefore, gave him such reasons as were available for submitting, at any rate for the present, to having the papers brought up to him at our room. And we ourselves went down to the Spotted Dog to make an appointment with Mackenzie for the following day. We had last seen him about a week before, and then the task was progressing well. He had told us that another fortnight would finish it. We had enquired also of Mrs. Grimes about the man’s wife. All she could tell us was that the woman had not again troubled them at the Spotted Dog. She expressed her belief, however, that the drunkard had been more than once in the hands of the police since the day on which Mackenzie had walked with us through the squares of the Inns of Court.

It was late when we reached the public-house on the occasion to which we now allude, and the evening was dark and rainy. It was then the end of January, and it might have been about six o’clock. We knew that we should not find Mackenzie at the public-house; but it was probable that Mrs. Grimes could send for him, or, at least, could make the appointment for us. We went into the little parlour, where she was seated with her husband, and we could immediately see, from the countenance of both of them, that something was amiss. We began by telling Mrs. Grimes that the Doctor had come to town. “Mackenzie aint here, Sir,” said Mrs. Grimes, and we almost thought that the very tone of her voice was altered. We explained that we had not expected to find him at that hour, and asked if she could send for him. She only shook her head. Grimes was standing with his back to the fire and his hands in his trousers pockets. Up to this moment he had not spoken a word. We asked if the man was drunk. She again shook her head. Could she bid him to come to us tomorrow, and bring the box and the papers with him? Again she shook her head.

“I’ve told her that I won’t have no more of it,” said Grimes; “nor yet I won’t. He was drunk this morning⁠—as drunk as an owl.”

“He was sober, John, as you are, when he came for the papers this afternoon at two o’clock.” So the box and the papers had all been taken away!

“And she was here yesterday rampaging about the place, without as much clothes on as would cover her nakedness,” said Mr. Grimes. “I won’t have no more of it. I’ve done for that man what his own flesh and blood wouldn’t do. I know that; and I won’t have no more of it. Mary Anne, you’ll have that table cleared out after breakfast tomorrow.” When a man, to whom his wife is usually Polly, addresses her as Mary Anne, then it may be surmised that that man is in earnest. We knew that he was in earnest, and she knew it also.

“He wasn’t drunk, John⁠—no, nor yet in liquor, when he come and took away that box this afternoon.” We understood this reiterated assertion. It was in some sort excusing to us her own breach of trust in having allowed the manuscript to be withdrawn from her own charge, or was assuring us that, at the worst, she had not been guilty of the impropriety of allowing the man to take it away when he was unfit to have it in his charge. As for blaming her, who could have thought of it? Had Mackenzie at any time chosen to pass downstairs with the box in his hands, it was not to be expected that she should stop him violently. And now that he had done so we could not blame her; but we felt that a great weight had fallen upon our own hearts. If evil should come to the manuscript would not the Doctor’s wrath fall upon us with a crushing weight? Something must be done at once. And we suggested that it would be well that somebody should go round to Cucumber Court. “I’d go as soon as look,” said Mrs. Grimes, “but he won’t let me.”

“You don’t stir a foot out of this tonight;⁠—not that way,” said Mr. Grimes.

“Who wants to stir?” said Mrs. Grimes.

We felt that there was something more to be told than we had yet heard, and a great fear fell upon us. The woman’s manner to us was altered, and we were sure that this had come not from altered feelings on her part, but from circumstances which had frightened her. It was not her husband that she feared, but the truth of something that her husband had said to her. “If there is anything more to tell, for God’s sake tell it,” we said, addressing ourselves rather to the man than to the woman. Then Grimes did tell us his story. On the previous evening Mackenzie had received three or four sovereigns from Mrs. Grimes, being, of course, a portion of the Doctor’s payments; and early on that morning all Liquorpond Street had been in a state of excitement with the drunken fury of Mackenzie’s wife. She had found her way into the Spotted Dog, and was being actually extruded by the strength of Grimes himself⁠—of Grimes, who had been brought down, half dressed, from his bedroom by the row⁠—when Mackenzie himself, equally drunk, appeared upon the scene. “No, John;⁠—not equally drunk,” said Mrs. Grimes. “Bother!” exclaimed her husband, going on with his story. The man had struggled to take the woman by the arm, and the two had fallen and rolled in the street together. “I was looking out of the window, and it was awful to see,” said Mrs. Grimes. We felt that it was “awful to hear.” A man⁠—and such a man, rolling in the gutter with a drunken woman⁠—himself drunk⁠—and that woman his wife! “There aint to be no more of it at the Spotted Dog; that’s all,” said John Grimes, as he finished his part of the story.

Then, at last, Mrs. Grimes became voluble. All this had occurred before nine in the morning. “The woman must have been at it all night,” she said. “So must the man,” said John. “Anyways he came back about dinner, and he was sober then. I asked him not to go up, and offered to make him a cup of tea. It was just as you’d gone out after dinner, John.”

“He won’t have no more tea here,” said John.

“And he didn’t have any then. He wouldn’t, he said, have any tea, but went upstairs. What was I to do? I couldn’t tell him as he shouldn’t. Well;⁠—during the row in the morning John had said something as to Mackenzie not coming about the premises any more.”

“Of course I did,” said Grimes.

“He was a little cut, then, no doubt,” continued the lady; “and I didn’t think as he would have noticed what John had said.”

“I mean it to be noticed now.”

“He had noticed it then, Sir, though he wasn’t just as he should be at that hour of the morning. Well;⁠—what does he do? He goes upstairs and packs up all the papers at once. Leastways, that’s as I suppose. They aint there now. You can go and look if you please, Sir. Well; when he came down, whether I was in the kitchen⁠—though it isn’t often as my eyes is off the bar, or in the taproom, or busy drawing, which I do do sometimes, Sir, when there are a many calling for liquor, I can’t say;⁠—but if I aint never to stand upright again, I didn’t see him pass out with the box. But Miss Wilcox did. You can ask her.” Miss Wilcox was the young lady in the bar, whom we did not think ourselves called upon to examine, feeling no doubt whatever as to the fact of the box having been taken away by Mackenzie. In all this Mrs. Grimes seemed to defend herself, as though some serious charge was to be brought against her; whereas all that she had done had been done out of pure charity; and in exercising her charity towards Mackenzie she had shown an almost exaggerated kindness towards ourselves.

“If there’s anything wrong, it isn’t your fault,” we said.

“Nor yet mine,” said John Grimes.

“No, indeed,” we replied.

“It aint none of our faults,” continued he; “only this;⁠—you can’t wash a blackamoor white, nor it aint no use trying. He don’t come here any more, that’s all. A man in drink we don’t mind. We has to put up with it. And they aint that tarnation desperate as is a woman. As long as a man can keep his legs he’ll try to steady hisself; but there is women who, when they’ve liquor, gets a fury for rampaging. There aint a many as can beat this one, Sir. She’s that strong, it took four of us to hold her; though she can’t hardly do a stroke of work, she’s that weak when she’s sober.”

We had now heard the whole story, and, while hearing it, had determined that it was our duty to go round into Cucumber Court and seek the manuscript and the box. We were unwilling to pry into the wretchedness of the man’s home; but something was due to the Doctor; and we had to make that appointment for the morrow, if it were still possible that such an appointment should be kept. We asked for the number of the house, remembering well the entrance into the court. Then there was a whisper between John and his wife, and the husband offered to accompany us. “It’s a roughish place,” he said, “but they know me.” “He’d better go along with you,” said Mrs. Grimes. We, of course, were glad of such companionship, and glad also to find that the landlord, upon whom we had inflicted so much trouble, was still sufficiently our friend to take this trouble on our behalf.

“It’s a dreary place enough,” said Grimes, as he led us up the narrow archway. Indeed it was a dreary place. The court spread itself a little in breadth, but very little, when the passage was passed, and there were houses on each side of it. There was neither gutter nor, as far as we saw, drain, but the broken flags were slippery with moist mud, and here and there, strewed about between the houses, there were the remains of cabbages and turnip-tops. The place swarmed with children, over whom one ghastly gas-lamp at the end of the court threw a flickering and uncertain light. There was a clamour of scolding voices, to which it seemed that no heed was paid; and there was a smell of damp rotting nastiness, amidst which it seemed to us to be almost impossible that life should be continued. Grimes led the way without further speech, to the middle house on the left hand of the court, and asked a man who was sitting on the low threshold of the door whether Mackenzie was within. “So that be you, Muster Grimes; be it?” said the man, without stirring. “Yes; he’s there I guess, but they’ve been and took her.” Then we passed on into the house. “No matter about that,” said the man, as we apologised for kicking him in our passage. He had not moved, and it had been impossible to enter without kicking him.