The convict, as I say, was a tall, thin fellow, with a cadaverous face lined with suffering, while the hair at his temples was prematurely white. And as I looked at him, it occurred to me that the suffering which had set its mark so deeply upon him was not altogether the grosser anguish of the body. Now for our criminal who can still feel morally there is surely hope. I think so, anyhow! For a long moment there was silence, while I stared into the haggard face below, and the Imp looked from one to the other of us, utterly at a loss.
“I wonder if you ever heard tell of ‘the bye Jarge,’” I said suddenly.
The convict started so violently that the jacket tore in my grasp.
“How - how did ye know - ?” he gasped, and stared at me with dropped jaw.
“I think I know your father.”
“My feyther,” he muttered; “old Jasper - ‘e ain’t dead, then?”
“Not yet,” I answered; “come, get up and I’ll tell you more while you eat.” Mechanically he obeyed, sitting with his glowing eyes fixed upon my face the while I told him of old Jasper’s lapse of memory and present illness.
“Then ‘e don’t remember as I’m a thief an’ convict 49, master?”
“No; he thinks and speaks of you always as a boy and a pattern son.”
The man uttered a strange cry, and flinging himself upon his knees buried his face in his hands.
“Come,” I said, tapping him on the shoulder; “take off those things,” and nodding to the Imp, he immediately began unwrapping Peter’s garments.
“What, master,” cried the convict, starting up, “are you goin’ to let me see ‘im afore you give me up?”
“Yes I nodded; “only be quick? In less than live minutes the tattered prison dress was lying in the bed of the river, and we were making our way along the path towards old Jasper’s cottage.
The convict spoke but once, and that as we reached the cottage gate: “is he very ill, sir?”
“Very ill,” I said. He stood for a moment, inhaling the fragrance of the roses in great breaths, and staring about him; then with an abrupt gesture he opened the little gate, and gliding up the path with his furtive, stealthy footstep knocked at the door. For some half hour the Imp and I strolled to and fro in the moonlight, during which he related to me much about his outlaw and the many “ruses he had employed to get him provision.” How upon one occasion, to escape the watchful eyes of Auntie Lisbeth, he had been compelled to hide a slice of jam-tart in the trousers-pockets, to the detriment of each; how Dorothy had watched him everywhere in the momentary expectation of “something happening;” how Jane and Peter and cook would stand and stare and shake their heads at him because he ate such a lot, “an’ the worst of it was I was aw full’ hungry all the time, you know, Uncle Dick!” This and much more he told me as we waited there in the moonlight.
At last the cottage door opened and the convict came out. He did not join us at once, but remained staring away towards the river, though I saw him jerk his sleeve across his eyes more than once in his furtive, stealthy fashion; but when at last he came up to us his face was firm and resolute.
“Did you see old Jasper?” I asked.
“Yes, sir; I saw him.”
“Is he any better?”
“Much better - he died in my arms, sir. An’ now I’m ready to go back, there’s a police-station in the village.” He stopped suddenly and turned to stare back at the lighted windows of the cottage, and when he spoke again his voice sounded hoarser than ever.
“Thought I’d come back from furrin parts, ‘e did, wi’ my pockets stuffed full o’ gold an’ bank-notes. Called me ‘is bye Jarge, ‘e did!” and again he brushed his cuff across his eyes.
“Masters I don’t know who ye may be, but I’m grateful to ye an’ more than grateful, sir. An’ now I’m ready to go back an’ finish my time.”
“How much longer is that?”
“Three years, sir.”
“And when you come out, what shall you do then?”
“Start all over again, sir; try to get some honest work an’ live straight.”
“Do you think you can?”
“I know I can, sir. Ye see, he died in my arms, called me ‘is bye Jarge, said ‘e were proud of me, ‘e did! A man can begin again an’ live straight an’ square wi’ a memory the like o’ that to ‘elp ‘im.”
“Then why not begin to-night?”
He passed a tremulous hand through his silver hair, and stared at me with incredulous eyes.
“Begin-to-night!” he half whispered.
“I have an old house among the Kentish hop-gardens,” I went on; “no one lives there at present except a care-taker, but it is within the bounds of probability that I may go to stay there - some day. Now the gardens need trimming, and I’m very fond of flowers; do you suppose you could make the place look decent in - say, a month ?”
“Sir,” he said in a strange, broken voice, “you ain’t jokin’ with me, are you?”
“I could pay you a pound a week; what do you say?”
He tried to speak, but his lips quivered, and he turned his back upon us very suddenly. I tore a page from my pocket-book and scrawled a hasty note to my care-taker.
“Here is the address,” I said, tapping him on the shoulder. “You will find no difficulty. I will write again to-night. You must of course have money to get there and may need to buy a few necessaries besides; here is your first week’s wages in advance,” and I thrust a sovereign into his hand. He stared down at it with blinking eyes, shuffling awkwardly with his feet, and at that moment his face seemed very worn, and lined, and his hair very grey, yet I had a feeling that I should not regret my quixotic action in the end.
“Sir,” he faltered, “sir, do ye mean - ?” and stopped.
“I mean that to-night ‘the bye Jarge’ has a chance to make a new beginning, a chance to become the man his father always thought he would be. Of course I may be a fool to trust you. That only time will show; but you see I had a great respect for old Jasper. And now that you have the address you’d better go; stay, though, you must have a hat; folks might wonder - take this,” and I handed him my cap.
“Sir, I can’t thank ye now, I never can. It - it won’t come; but - ” with a nervous, awkward gesture he caught my hand suddenly pressed it to his lips, and was gone down the lane.
Thus it was that old Jasper’s “bye Jarge” went out to make a trial of life a second time, and as I watched him striding through the moonlight, his head erect, very different to the shambling creature he had been, it seemed to me that the felon was already ousted by the man.
“I ‘specks he forgot all ‘bout me !” said the Imp disconsolately.
“No,” I answered, shaking my head; “I don’t think he will ever forget you, my Imp.”
“I ‘spose he’s awfull’ fond of you, Uncle Dick?”
“Not that I know of,”
“Then why did he kiss your hand?”
“Oh, well - er - perhaps it is a way he has.”
“He didn’t kiss mine,” said the Imp.
A door opened and closed very softly, and Lisbeth came towards us down the path, whereupon the Imp immediately “took cover” in the ditch.
“He is dead, Dick!” she said as I opened the gate. “He died in his son’s arms - the George he was always talking about. And oh, Dick, he died trying to sing ‘The British Grenadiers.”
“Poor old Jasper!” I said.
“His son was a convict once, wasn’t he?”
“Yes.”
“It was strange that he should come back as he did - just in time; it almost seems like the hand of Providence, doesn’t it, Dick?”
“Yes.” Lisbeth was standing with her elbows upon the gate and her chin in her hands, staring up at the moon, and I saw that her eyes were wet with tears.
“Why, where is your cap ?” she exclaimed when at last she condescended to look at me.