"That's hard," rejoined the Tinker--"werry hard. But how d'ye account for livin' so long?" he added, winking as he spoke to the others.

"I've already given you an explanation," replied the dwarf.

"Av, but it's a cur'ous story, and I vants my friends to hear it," said the Tinker, in a coaxing tone.

"Well then, to oblige you, I'll go through it again," rejoined the dwarf. "You must know I was for some time servant to Doctor Lamb, an old alchemist, who lived during the reign of good Queen Bess, and who used to pa.s.s all his time in trying to find out the secret of changing lead and copper into gold."

"I've known several indiwiduals as has found out that secret, wenerable," observed Ginger. "And ve calls 'em smashers, nowadays--not halchemists."

"Doctor Lamb's object was actually to turn base metal into gold,"

rejoined Old Parr, in a tone of slight contempt. "But his chief aim was to produce the elixir of long life. Night and day he worked at the operation;--night and day I laboured with him, until at last we were both brought to the verge of the grave in our search after immortality.

One night--I remember it well,--it was the last night of the sixteenth century,--a young man, severely wounded, was brought to my master's dwelling on London Bridge. I helped to convey him to the laboratory, where I left him with the doctor, who was busy with his experiments. My curiosity being aroused, I listened at the door, and though I could not distinguish much that pa.s.sed inside, I heard sufficient to convince me that Doctor Lamb had made the grand discovery, and succeeded in distilling the elixir. Having learnt this, I went down-stairs, wondering what would next ensue. Half-an-hour elapsed, and while the bells were ringing in the new year joyfully, the young man whom I had a.s.sisted to carry up-stairs, and whom I supposed at death's door, marched down as firmly as if nothing had happened, pa.s.sed by me, and disappeared, before I could shake off my astonishment. I saw at once he had drunk the elixir."

"Ah!--ah!" exclaimed the Tinker, with a knowing glance at his companions, who returned it with gestures of equal significance.

"As soon as he was gone," pursued the dwarf, "I flew to the laboratory, and there, extended on the floor, I found the dead body of Doctor Lamb.

I debated with myself what to do--whether to pursue his murderer, for such I accounted the young man; but, on reflection, I thought the course useless. I next looked round to see whether the precious elixir was gone. On the table stood a phial, from which a strong spirituous odour exhaled; but it was empty. I then turned my attention to a receiver, connected by a worm with an alembic on the furnace. On examining it, I found it contained a small quant.i.ty of a bright transparent liquid, which, poured forth into a gla.s.s, emitted precisely the same odour as the phial. Persuaded this must be the draught of immortality, I raised it to my lips; but apprehension lest it might be poison stayed my hand.

Rea.s.sured, however, by the thought of the young man's miraculous recovery, I quaffed the potion. It was as if I had swallowed fire, and at first I thought all was over with me. I shrieked out; but there was no one to heed my cries, unless it were my dead master, and two or three skeletons with which the walls were garnished. And these, in truth, did seem to hear me; for the dead corpse opened its gla.s.sy orbs, and eyed me reproachfully; the skeletons shook their fleshless arms and gibbered; and the various strange objects, with which the chamber was filled, seemed to deride and menace me. The terror occasioned by these fantasies, combined with the potency of the draught, took away my senses. When I recovered, I found all tranquil. Doctor Lamb was lying stark and stiff at my feet, with an expression of reproach on his fixed countenance; and the skeletons were hanging quietly in their places.

Convinced that I was proof against death, I went forth. _But a curse went with me!_ From that day to this I have lived, but it has been in such poverty and distress, that I had better far have died. Besides, I am constantly haunted by visions of my old master. He seems to hold converse with me--to lead me into strange places."

"Exactly the case with the t'other," whispered the Tinker to the Sandman. "Have you ever, in the coorse o' your long life, met the young man as drank the 'lixir?" he inquired of the dwarf.

"Never."

"Do you happen to rekilect his name?"

"No; it has quite escaped my memory," answered Old Parr.

"Should you rekilect it, if you heerd it?" asked the Tinker.

"Perhaps I might," returned the dwarf; "but I can't say."

"Wos it Auriol Darcy?" demanded the other.

"That _was_ the name," cried Old Parr, starting up in extreme surprise.

"I heard Doctor Lamb call him so. But how, in the name of wonder, do you come to know it?"

"Ve've got summat, at last," said the Tinker, with a self-applauding glance at his friends.

"How do you come to know it, I say?" repeated the dwarf, in extreme agitation.

"Never mind," rejoined the Tinker, with a cunning look; "you see I does know some cur'ous matters as veil as you, my old file. Yo'll be good evidence, in case ve vishes to prove the fact agin him."

"Prove what?--and against whom?" cried the dwarf.

"One more questin, and I've done," pursued the Tinker. "Should you know this young man agin, in case you chanced to come across him?"

"No doubt of it," replied Old Parr; "his figure often flits before me in dreams."

"Shall ve let him into it?" said the Tinker, consulting his companions in a low tone.

"Ay--ay," replied the Sandman.

"Better vait a bit," remarked Ginger, shaking his head dubiously.

"There's no hurry."

"No; ve must decide at vonce," said the Tinker. "Jist examine them papers," he added, handing the pocket-book to Old Parr, "and favour us vith your opinion on 'em."

The dwarf was about to unclasp the book committed to his charge, when a hand was suddenly thrust through the banisters of the upper part of the staircase, which, as has been already stated, was divided from the lower by the door. A piece of heavy black drapery next descended like a cloud, concealing all behind it except the hand, with which the dwarf was suddenly seized by the nape of the neck, lifted up in the air, and, notwithstanding his shrieks and struggles, carried clean off.

Great confusion attended his disappearance. The dogs set up a prodigious barking, and flew to the rescue--one of the largest of them pa.s.sing over the body of the drowsy waiter, who had sought his customary couch upon the coals, and rousing him from his slumbers; while the Tinker, uttering a fierce imprecation, upset his chair in his haste to catch hold of the dwarf's legs; but the latter was already out of reach, and the next moment had vanished entirely.

"My eyes! here's a pretty go!" cried Ginger, who, with his back to the fire, had witnessed the occurrence in open-mouthed astonishment. "Vy, curse it! if the wenerable ain't a-taken the pocket-book with him! It's my opinion the devil has flown avay with the old feller. His time wos nearer at 'and than he expected."

"Devil or not, I'll have him back agin, or at all events the pocket-book!" cried the Tinker. And, dashing up the stairs, he caught hold of the railing above, and swinging himself up by a powerful effort, pa.s.sed through an opening, occasioned by the removal of one of the banisters.

[Ill.u.s.tration: The Hand and the Cloak.]

Groping along the gallery, which was buried in profound darkness, he shouted to the dwarf, but received no answer to his vociferations; neither could he discover any one, though he felt on either side of the pa.s.sage with outstretched hands. The occupants of the different chambers, alarmed by the noise, called out to know what was going forward; but being locked in their rooms, they could render no a.s.sistance.

While the Tinker was thus pursuing his search in the dark, venting his rage and disappointment in the most dreadful imprecations, the staircase door was opened by the landlord, who had found the key in the greatcoat left behind by the dwarf. With the landlord came the Sandman and Ginger, the latter of whom was attended by all his dogs, still barking furiously; while the rear of the party was brought up by the drowsy waiter, now wide awake with fright, and carrying a candle.

But though every nook and corner of the place was visited--though the attics were searched, and all the windows examined--not a trace of the dwarf could be discovered, nor any clue to his mysterious disappearance detected. Astonishment and alarm sat on every countenance.

"What the devil can have become of him?" cried the landlord, with a look of dismay.

"Ay, that's the questin!" rejoined the Tinker. "I begin to be of Ginger's opinion, that the devil himself must have flown avay vith him.

No von else could ha' taken a fancy to him."

"I only saw a hand and a black cloak," said the Sandman.

"I thought I seed a pair o' hoofs," cried the waiter; "and I'm quite sure I seed a pair o' great glitterin' eyes," he added, opening his own lackl.u.s.tre orbs to their widest extent.

"It's a strange affair," observed the landlord gravely. "It's certain that no one has entered the house wearing a cloak such as you describe; nor could any of the lodgers, to my knowledge, get out of their rooms.

It was Old Parr's business, as you know, to lock 'em up carefully for the night."

"Vell, all's over vith him now," said the Tinker; "and vith our affair, too, I'm afeerd."

"Don't say die jist yet," rejoined Ginger. "The wenerable's gone, to be sure; and the only thing he has left behind him, barrin' his topcoat, is this here bit o' paper vich dropped out o' the pocket-book as he wos a-takin' flight, and vich I picked from the floor. It may be o' some use to us. But come, let's go down-stairs. There's no good in stayin' here any longer."

Concurring in which sentiment, they all descended to the lower room.

CHAPTER IV

THE IRON-MERCHANT'S DAUGHTER