Devlin the Barber

"'Don't touch me! Don't touch me, you-you-'

"'You what?' asked Devlin in his false voice, moving a little away from my chair.

"My scream, and him speaking agin, brought me to myself.

"'Never mind, never mind,' I said. 'If you know what I'm thinking about, it's no use my telling you.'

"'I do know,' he said. 'Why, it's wrote on your face. And I know, too, that you want to ask me some questions. Fire away.'

"'Mr. Devlin, I said, upon that, 'you slep at home last night, didn't you?'

"'Certainly, I did,' he answered. 'Don't you remember Lemon and me coming in together?'

"'Yes,' I said, 'I remember.'

"'Don't you remember,' he said, 'that you brought me up a cup of tea before you went to bed, and that I told you I had a lot of writing to do, and that I said what a treasure you was, and how happy Lemon ought to be with sech a wife?'

"'Yes,' I said, 'I remember.' I couldn't say nothing else, it was the truth.

"'Inspired by the egsellent tea you make,' he went on, 'I stopped up late and did my writing. If I mistake not, you put the chain on the street-door before you went to bed.'

"'Yes, I did.'

"'And when you went down this morning the chain was still up?'

"'Yes, it was.'

"'And I breakfasted with you and Lemon?'

"'Yes, you did.'

"'And I presume you made my bed some time during the day?'

"'Of course I did.'

"'Did it look as if it had been slep in?'

"'Yes.'

"'So that you see, my dear landlady,' he said, grinning at me, 'that it wasn't possible for me to have murdered the girl.'

"'Who said you did it?' I asked, starting back, for he had come close to me, and I thought he was going to touch me ag'in.

"'You didn't say so,' he said, 'but you thought so. It was wrote in your face, as I told you a minute ago. It is women like you who would put a man's life in danger, and think no more of it than snuffing a candle.'

"He didn't remain with me much longer, but went up to his room. He was right in what he said he saw wrote in my face while he was smoothing my hair; an idea had entered my head that it was him who had killed the poor girl. I think him bad enough for anything; there's nothing wicked I wouldn't believe of him. But of course it wasn't possible for him to have done it; and I thought with thankfulness it wasn't possible for Lemon to have done it, for he never stirred out of the house that night. It was what Lemon said in his sleep that made me tremble and shiver. Why, sir, he spoke of the murder before it was done! It says in the papers that when the poor girl was found she had been dead hours, and the doctor fixes it that she must have been murdered between two and three o'clock in the morning. And two hours and a half before she was murdered Lemon was raving in his sleep and telling all about it! How did he know, sir? how did he know?

"If it had been a ordinary case-if Lemon had only spoke in his sleep about some murder or other, and I'd read the next day that a murder had been committed that night, it would have been strange, but nothing so very much out of the way. Our minds sometimes runs on dreadful things, enough to give one the creeps, and we ain't accountable for everything we say when we're asleep. But Lemon said Victoria Park, and it was done in Victoria Park. He said eighteen years, and that was jest her age. He said golden hair, and she had golden hair. He said a bunch of white daisies, and she wore a bunch of white daisies. He said blood on 'em, and there was blood on 'em. He said stabbed to the heart, and she was stabbed to the heart!

"I'll tell you, sir, what come to me, and made me feel almost like a murderess. It was that if I'd really known what was going to happen when I heard Lemon talking in his sleep, I might have saved the life of that poor girl. But how was it possible for me to know? Still, that didn't prevent me feeling like a guilty woman.

"But how much did Lemon know? Did the wretch who killed the girl tell him beforehand what he was going to do, and was Lemon wicked enough to keep it to hisself? Was the murderer an acquaintance of Lemon's? If he was, I made up my mind that a hour shouldn't pass after Lemon was awake this morning before I put the police on the wretch's track. Lemon would know his name, and where he lived, perhaps. Whatever was the consequences, I'd do what I could to bring the monster into the dock.

"I was more than sorry that the doctor had give Lemon sech a strong sleeping draught, and I prayed that he would wake up sooner than I expected. I went to the bedroom, but there was Lemon fast asleep, with a face as innocent as a babe unborn. He wasn't dreaming, he wasn't talking; his mind was at rest as well as his body. You know more than I do, sir. Could anybody with something dreadful on his mind have slep' like that? But my mind was made up. The very minute Lemon was sensible, and knew what he was about, to the police-station he should go with me, and make a clean breast of it."

CHAPTER XVI

Mr. LEMON WAKES UP

"I was that impatient that I hardly knew what to do. Minutes was like dymens, and there Lemon lay like a log. Couldn't I bring him to his senses somehow or other? I tried. I walked about heavy. I threw down things. I even turned Lemon over, but it had no more effect on him than water on a duck's back. He never give so much as a murmur, and I don't think a earthquake would have roused him. I had to give it up as a bad job, but I felt that it would be a mockery for me to go to bed, because in the state I was in it wasn't likely I could git a wink of sleep. Then I knew, too, that there wouldn't be a minute to lose when Lemon opened his eyes, and that it was my duty to git everything ready. So I spread out Lemon's clothes in regular order, not forgetting his clean Sunday shirt, and I put on my bonnet and cloak, and set down and waited all through that blessed night, looking at Lemon. I didn't hear a sound in the room up-stairs, so I supposed that Devlin was asleep, and I thought how dreadful it was to have a man like that in the house, a man as spoke of murder as though he enjoyed it. The only sound that come to my ears two or three times in the night was the policeman on his beat outside as he passed through the square, and you may guess, sir, I didn't get any comfort out of that. I had my fancies, but I shook 'em off, though they made me shake and shiver. One of 'em was that all of a sudden, jest as the policeman had passed by, there rung through the square shrieks of 'Murder! murder!' and millions of people seemed to be battering at the street-door and crying that they'd tear Lemon and me to pieces. It didn't seem as if they wanted to hurt Devlin, for there he was, standing and grinning at us and the people, with that aggravating look on his face that makes me burn to fly at him, if I only had the courage. Of course it was all fancy, sir; but how would you like to pass sech a night?

"At nine o'clock this morning, and not a minute before, Lemon woke up. I had a cup of tea ready for him in the bedroom, and a slice of bread and butter. He's gone off his breakfast for a long time past, and one slice of bread and butter is as much as he can git down, if he can do that. Before I took Devlin as a lodger, Lemon used to eat a big breakfast, never less than a couple of rashers, and a couple of boiled eggs on the top of that, and four or five slices of bread and butter cut thick. It is a bad sign when a man begins to say he's got no appetite for breakfast. If his stomach ain't going all to pieces, it's something worse, perhaps.

"'Why, Fanny,' said Lemon, seeing me with my bonnet on, 'have you been out? What's the time?'

"He spoke quite calm and cheerful; the sleeping draught had done him good, and had made him forgit.

"'The time's nine o'clock, Lemon,' I answered, 'and I ain't been out.'

"'What's to-day?' he asked.

"'Sunday,' I answered.

"'Sunday!' he exclaimed. 'It's funny. Everything seems mixed. Sunday, is it? But, I say, Fanny, if you ain't been out, what have you got your bonnet on for?'

"'I'm waiting for you,' I said. 'Git up, quick, you must come with me at once.'

"'Come with you at once,' he said, rubbing his eyes, to make sure whether he was awake or asleep; and then he must have seen something in my face, for he looked at me strange, and left off rubbing his eyes, and began to rub his forehead. 'I can't understand it. Has anything gone wrong?'

"'Lemon,' I said, speaking very solemn, and speaking as I felt, 'you know too well what has gone wrong, and I only hope you may be forgiven.'

"I shouldn't have stopped short in the middle if it hadn't been that we heard Devlin moving about in the room up-stairs. I looked up at the ceiling, and so did Lemon, and when I saw his face grow white I knew that mine was growing white as well; and I knew, too, that Lemon was gitting his memory back.

"'Speak low, speak low,' he whispered. 'Devlin mustn't hear a word we say. You hope I may be forgiven! For what? What have I done? O, my head, my head! It feels as if it was going to burst!'

"His face begun to get flushed, and the veins swelled out. I thought to myself, I must be careful with Lemon; I mustn't be too sudden with him, or he'll have another fit. I was going to speak soothing, when he clapped his hand on my mouth and almost stopped my breath.

"'Don't say nothing yet,' he said. 'You must tell me something first that I want to know. I feel so confused-so confused! What's been the matter with me? I don't remember going to bed last night.'

"'You fell down in a fit, Lemon,' I said, 'and I had to get the doctor to you.'

"'Yes, yes,' he said eagerly. 'Go on-go on.'

"'We carried you up-stairs here, the doctor and me, and undressed you and put you to bed; and when you come out of your fit he give you a sleeping draught.'

"'It's not that I want to know,' he said. 'What made me go into a fit? I never had a fit before, as I remember. O Fanny, is it all a dream?'

"'Lemon,' I answered, 'you must ask your conscience; I can't answer you. You come home with a evening paper in your pocket, a-moaning and crying, and you ketches hold of me, and looks round as if a ghost had follered you into the room, and then you falls down in your fit.'

"'And him?' he said, pointing to the ceiling. 'Him-Devlin? Was he with me? Did he see me while I was in the fit?'

"'No,' I answered. 'He come home after we'd got you to bed, and said he wanted to see you; but I wouldn't let him. I whipped up-stairs here, and turned the key, so as he shouldn't git at you.'

"'You did right, you did right. Was he angry?'

"'If he was, he didn't show it. He kep with me a long time, talking about the-the-'

"'About the what?' asked Lemon, the perspiration breaking out on him.

"'About the murder! Well may you shiver! It was in the newspaper you brought home with you, and he read it out loud, and talked about it in a way as froze my blood.'

"'Blood!' groaned Lemon, 'Blood! O Fanny, Fanny!'

"He is my husband, sir, and he was suffering, and I ain't ashamed to say that I took him in my arms, and tried to comfort him.

"'One word, Lemon,' I said, 'only one word before we go on. You ain't guilty, are you?'

"'Guilty?' he answered, but speaking quite soft; we neither of us raised our voices above a whisper 'My God, no! How could I be? Wasn't I at home and abed when it was done? O, it's horrible! horrible! and I don't know what to think.'

"'Thank God, you're innocent!' I said, and I was so grateful in my heart that my eyes brimmed over. 'And you didn't have nothing to do with the planning of it? Tell me that.'

"'No, Fanny,' he said. 'Him up-stairs there-did he sleep at home last night?'

"'Unless there's something going on too awful to think of,' I said, 'he did. I ain't been in bed, Lemon, since home you come yesterday and had your fit. And here in this room I've been setting with you from the time I put the chain on the street-door last night till now. I've only left you once-to take in the milk at seven o'clock this morning, and then the chain was on; it hadn't been touched. No one went out of this house last night by the street-door.'

"'They couldn't have gone out no other way,' said Lemon.

"'I don't see how they could,' I said, though I had my thoughts.

"'And the night before, Fanny,' said Lemon, and now he looked at me as if life and death was in my answer, 'the night it was done, did he sleep at home then?'

"'To the best of my belief he did,' I said. 'You may put me on the rack and tear me with red hot pinchers, and I can't say nothing but the truth. He did sleep here the night that awful murder was done in Victoria Park. Drag me to the witness-box and put me in irons, and I can't say nothing else. I saw him go to his room after I'd put up the chain; he called out 'Good night;' and the next morning the chain was up jest as I left it. You can't put the chain on the street-door from the outside; it must be done from the in. And now, Lemon, listen to me.'

"'What do you want?' he groaned. 'O, what do you want? Ain't I bad enough already that you try to make me worse?'

"'I must say, Lemon, what is on my mind.'

"'Won't it keep, Fanny?' he asked.

"'It won't keep,' I answered. 'You know the man as committed the murder, and you'll come with me to the police-station, and put the police on his track.'

"'Me know the wretch!' Lemon cried, his eyes almost starting out of his head. 'Have you gone mad?'

"'No, Lemon,' I answered, 'I'm in my sober senses. Whatever happens afterwards, we've got to face the consequences, or we shall wake up in the middle of the night and see that poor girl standing at our bedside pointing her finger at us. It's no use trying to disguise it. I know you know the wretch, and deny it you shan't.'

"'O,' he said, speaking very slow, as if he was choosing words, 'you know I know him!'

"'I do,' I answered.

"'Perhaps,' he said, with something like a click in his throat, 'you will tell me how that's possible, when it's gospel truth I've never set eyes on him all my born days.'

"'Lemon,' I said, 'be careful, O, be careful, how you speak of gospel truth! Remember Ananias! You may beat about the bush as much as you like, but I'm determined to do what I've made up my mind to, and nothing shall drive me from it.'

"'Of course,' he said, upon that, and speaking flippant, 'if you've made up your mind to the egstent you speak of, I'd best shut my mouth. I'll keep it shut till you tell me how you know what you say you know.'

"'Lemon,' I said, 'light you speak, but sech you don't feel. You can't deceive me. When we was first married, you slep the sleep of innocence, and your breathing was that regular as showed you had nothing on your mind to take egsception to. But since that Devlin come into the house, the way you've gone on of a night is simply awful. Jumping about in bed as you've been doing night after night, and screaming and talking in your sleep-'

"'Talking in my sleep!' he cried, and I saw that I'd scared him. 'You shouldn't have let me! Call yourself a wife? You should have stopped me!'

"'I couldn't help letting you, and I couldn't have stopped you, Lemon, and I'm not sure whether it would have been right to do it if sech was in my power.'

"'What have I said, what have I said?' he asked.

"'The night before last as ever was,' I said, 'when that dreadful deed was done as was printed in the paper you brought home yesterday, you said, while you was laying asleep on the very bed you're laying on now, words as chilled my blood, and it's a mercy I'm alive to tell it. You spoke of Victoria Park; you spoke of a beautiful young girl with hair the colour of gold; you spoke-O, Lemon, Lemon! – you spoke of her being stabbed to the heart; you spoke of a bunch of white daisies as she wore in her belt, and you said there was blood on 'em-'

"I had to stop myself, sir; for Lemon had hid his face in the bedclothes, and was shaking like a man with Sam Witus's dance in his marrer. I let him lay till he got over it a bit, and then he uncovered his face; it was as white as a sheet.

"'Fanny,' he said-and he was hardly able to get his words out-'there's the Bible on the mantelshelf, there. Bring it to me.'"

CHAPTER XVII

LEMON'S VISION IN THE TWISTED COW

"I fetched the Bible, sir, and he took it in his hand, and swore a most solemn oath, and kissed the book on it, that he didn't know the man, that he didn't know the girl, and that he had no more to do with the murder than a babe unborn. Never in my life did I see a man in sech a state as he was.

"'But, Lemon,' I said, 'how could you come to speak sech words? How could you come to know all about the murder hours and hours before it was done?'

"'I'll tell you, Fanny,' he said, 'as fur as I know; and if you was to cut me in a thousand pieces I couldn't tell you more.'

"'It ain't to be egspected,' I said.

"'If there's men in the world,' Lemon went on, 'as can look into the future, Devlin's one of 'em. If there's men in the world as can tell you what's going to happen-without having anything to do with it theirselves, mind-Devlin's one of 'em. The things he's told me of people is unbelievable, but as true as true can be. "Did you take particular notice of the gentleman whose hair I've been jest cutting?" he said to me. "No," says I; "why should I?" "He's the great Mr. Danebury that all the world's talking of," says he. "Is he?" says I. "I wonder what brings him to our shop? What a charitable man he is! "What a good, good man he is!" "Good ain't the word for him," says Devlin. "He comes to our shop because it's out of the way. All the while I was operating on him he was thinking of a little milliner's girl as he's got an appointment with to-night. 'Pritty little Ph[oe]be!' he was saying to hisself as I was cutting his hair. 'What eyes she's got! Bloo and swimming! What a skin's she's got! like satting, it is so white and smooth! What lips she's got! She's a bit of spring, jest budding. Pritty little Ph[oe]be-pretty little Ph[oe]be!'" "But what was he saying that for?" I asks. "He can't be in love with her. He's a family man, ain't he?" "I should think he was a family man," says Devlin. "He's got the most beautiful wife a man could wish for, and as good as she's beautiful; and he's got half-a-dozen blooming children. But that don't prevent his being in love with pritty little Ph[oe]be, and he's got an appointment with her to-night; and, what's more, he's going to keep it." I'm putting a true case to you, Fanny,' says Lemon, 'one of many sech. I fires up at what Devlin says about such a good man-that is, I used to fire up when things first commenced. I don't dispute with him now; I know it's no use, and that he's always right, and me always wrong. But then I did, and I asks him how dare he talk like that of sech a man as Mr. Danebury, as gives money to charities, and talks about being everybody's friend. "O, you don't believe me!" Devlin says. "Well, come with me to-night, and we'll jest see for ourselves." And I go with him, and I see a pritty little girl walking up and down the dark turning at the bottom of the Langham Hotel. Up and down she walks, up and down, up and down. "That must be her," says Devlin. We keep watching a little way off on the other side of the way, where it's darker still than where she's walking and waiting, and presently who should come up to her but the great Mr. Danebury; and he takes her hand and holds it long, and they stand talking, and he says something to make her laugh, and then he tucks her arm in his, and walks off with her. "What do you think of that?" Devlin asks. "He's going to take her to a meeting of the missionary society." What I think of it makes me melancholy, and makes me ask myself, "Can sech things be?" At another time Devlin says, "I shouldn't wonder if you heard of a big fire to-morrer." "Why do you say that?" I asks. "The man who's jest gone out," Devlin answers, "was thinking of one while I was shampooing him-that's all." And that was all; but sure enough I do read of a big fire to-morrer in a great place of business that's heavily insured, and there's lives lost and dreadful scenes. And then sometimes when Devlin and me is setting together, he gits up all of a sudden and stands over me, and what he does to me I couldn't tell you if you was to burn me alive; but my senses seems to go, and I either gits fancies, or Devlin puts 'em in my head; but when I come to there's Devlin setting before me, and he says, "I'll wager," says he, "that I'll tell you what you've been dreaming of." "Have I been asleep?" I asks. "Sound," he answers, "and talking in your sleep." And he tells me something dreadful that I've said about something that's going to happen; and before the week's out it does happen, and I read of it in the papers. For a long time this has been going on till I've got in that state that I'd as soon die as live. If you don't understand what I'm trying to egsplain, Fanny,' said my poor Lemon, 'it ain't my fault; it's as dark to me as it is to you. Sometimes I says to Devlin, "I'll go and warn the police." "Do," says Devlin, "and be took up as a accomplice, and be follered about all your life like a thief or a murderer. Go and tell, and git yourself hanged or clapped in a madhouse." Of course, I see the sense of that, and I keep my mouth shut, but I get miserabler and miserabler. So the day before yesterday-that's Friday, Fanny-Devlin and me is sitting in the private room of the Twisted Cow, when he asks me whether I've ever been to Victoria Park, and I answers "Lots of times." Now Fanny,' said Lemon, breaking off in his awful confession, 'if you ain't prepared to believe what's coming, I'll say no more. It'll sound unbelievable, but I can't help that. Things has happened without me having anything to do with 'em, and I'd need to be a sperrit instead of a man to account for 'em.'

"'Lemon,' I said, 'I'm prepared to believe everything, only don't keep nothing from me.'

"'I won't,' said Lemon; 'I'll tell you as near and as straight as I can what happened after Devlin asked me whether I'd ever been to Victoria Park. His eyes was fixed upon me that strange that I felt my senses slipping away from me; it wasn't that things went round so much as they seemed to fade away and become nothing at all. Was I setting in the private room of the Twisted Cow? I don't know. Was it day or night? I don't know. I wouldn't swear to it, though the moon was shining through the trees. The trees where? Why, in Victoria Park, and no place else. And there was a man and a woman-a young beautiful woman, with golden hair, and a bunch of white daisies in her belt-talking together. How do I know that she's young and beautiful when I didn't see her face? That's one of the things I'm unable to answer. And I don't see the man's face, either. Whether a minute passed or a hour, before I heard a shriek, I can't say, and perhaps it ain't material. And upon the shriek, there, near the water, laid the young girl, dead, with the bunch of white daisies in her belt, stained with blood. Then, everything disappeared, and, trembling and shaking to that degree that I felt as if I must fall to pieces, I looked up and round, and found myself in the private room of the Twisted Cow, with Devlin setting opposite me. "Dreaming agin, Lemon?" he says, with a grin. But I don't answer him; my tongue sticks to the roof of my mouth. That's all I know, Fanny. Whether I saw what I've told you, or was told it, or only fancied it, is beyond me. What I've said is the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help me God!'

"That's what I heard from Lemon's own lips this morning, sir, up-stairs, abed, where he is laying now, with the door locked on him.

"I took off my hat and cloak, and Lemon burst out crying.

"'You believe me, Fanny!' he cried.

"'I believe every word you said,' I answered. 'It's no use going to the police-station this morning. A good friend of our'n is coming to see me to-day, and we'll wait and do what he advises us. Only you must promise to see him.' And I told him who you was, and why I wrote to you on Friday before poor Lizzie Melladew met her death.

"'I promise,' said Lemon, 'and you've done right, Fanny.'

"And now, sir, I've told you everything as I said I would, and you know as much as I do about this dreadful business."

CHAPTER XVIII

FANNY'S STORY BEING CONCLUDED, I PAY A VISIT TO MR. LEMON, AND RESOLVE TO INTERVIEW DEVLIN THE BARBER

This was the story which Fanny related to me, and to which I listened in wonder and amazement. As she related it I wondered at times whether it was possible that what she said could be true, but I saw no reason to question her veracity; and there certainly could be no doubt of her sincerity. I had to some extent conquered the fascination which Lemon's portrait on the wall, the stuffed bird in its glass case, and the evil-looking monster on the mantelshelf had exercised over me, but even now I could scarcely gaze upon them without a shudder. Fanny did not relate her story straight off, without a break, and I need hardly say that it was much longer than is here transcribed. But I have omitted no important point; everything pertinent to the tragedy of the murder of Mr. Melladew's daughter is faithfully set down. When she finished it was quite dark; at my request she had not lighted lamp or candle.