Page:The Strand Magazine (Volume 6).djvu/152

Ted Lane's simulated indignation is simply nonsense.

When I felt myself going, I did the most natural thing in the world—I made a snatch at something. I suppose it is not my fault if Ted Lane's leg was the only thing there was to snatch. I presume that even Ted Lane himself will not venture to suggest that I put his leg where it was. Nor, when I touched his leg, if he chose to go sprawling forward on to his face, was that any affair of mine. Anyhow, he did go forward. And there we both of us lay.

"So I've got you!"

This observation was made in a tone of voice which induced me, after a short interval for reflection, to look round. The speaker was the gentleman—but why should I write "gentleman"? I will write it plainly. The speaker was the unmitigated ruffian who had escaped from Princetown Gaol.

I sat up, feeling a little out of sorts. In my sanguine way, I imagined that the time had not yet passed for peaceful overtures. So I spoke to the fellow as I would have spoken to an ordinary Christian.

"Good-day! Warm weather for walking."

"I'll make it warmer for you before I've done."

That was what the crime-stained wretch replied. Yet, such was the extent and fulness of my Christian charity, still I did not wish him to look upon us as his natural enemies.

"You need not be afraid of us, my dear sir," I remarked, in that friendly and affable way I have. "We have a fellow feeling for a fellow creature in distress, and rather than re-consign you to the dungeons which you appear to have so recently quitted———"

"Afraid of you!" he yelled. He gave a whoop which would have done credit to a Red Indian on the war-path. He also bounded about four feet from the ground. "I am Jim Slim, the Camden Town murderer. I have slain nine people with this right hand—seven women, three men, and a boy." His arithmetic reminded me of a dining-room waiter's, but that is what he said. "And why should I not add you to the number of the slain?"

This inquiry was such a peculiar one, even proceeding from an escaped convict in the middle of Dartmoor, that I was induced to look more carefully at the speaker. He was quite worth looking at, from the point of view of the people who derive satisfaction from gazing at the ladies and gentlemen in the "Room of Horrors."

A more horrible and malignant-looking scoundrel I never saw. I am not prepared to state what were his exact measurements in inches, but he was certainly head and shoulders taller than I am. I should say, if we had been placed rear to rear, that the top of my head would have reached somewhere about the middle of his back. And, what is more, he was more than broad in proportion.

But he was not only a dreadful object as regards his physical configuration, but, if the thing was possible, his attire lent to his appearance an added charm. He was, of course, clad in convict's clothing, but, although one does not expect that clothing to be "cut" in Savile Row, one certainly does expect to see about it some sort of a fit. For instance, one does not expect to see a man of, say, seven foot in a suit of clothes which would not be large enough for a man of three foot six. The hideous miscreant in front of us had been crammed into garments which had apparently been intended for his infant brother. I don't know, but I had always supposed that they provided even convicts with boots or shoes. This individual had neither. He had on a pair of stockings, the whole of which was scarcely large enough to contain his feet. His knickerbockers stopped short about ten inches above his knees. They looked more like curtailed bathing drawers, of novel design and pattern, than any other garment I ever saw. He had apparently cut them open at the back to induce them to meet in front, and the result was singular. He had cut his jacket open at the seams to enable him to get into it. Between the bottom of that garment and the top of his knickerbockers was a vacant space of about two feet. This was scantily covered by the ragged remnants of a parti-coloured shirt. No waistcoat was visible to the naked eye. As for hat or cap, perhaps the gentleman had come away so hastily that he had forgotten to bring that with him.

I felt that if that is the costume in which a grateful country attires her criminals, honesty may be the better policy, after all.

While Ted and I regarded the guilt-smirched scoundrel with eyes of wonder and admiration, he plunged his hand into the bosom of what, I presume, was intended for his shirt. When that hand reappeared it held what I have seen described as a "shooting-iron." A revolver was flashed in our faces. It only needed that to make the situation perfect.

"What shall I do with you?" he de-