The Orange Girl

The case was over – I stepped out of the Dock: I was free: everybody, including Mr. Caterham, K.C., was shaking my hand: the Lord Mayor sent for me to the Bench and shook my hand warmly: he said that he had known my worthy father, Sir Peter, and that he rejoiced that my innocence had been made as clear as the noonday: all the Jury shook hands with me: my cousin Tom paid my dues to the prison, without payment of which even a free man, proved innocent, must go back to the prison again and there stay till he discharges them – because a gaoler everywhere has a heart made of flint. At last, surrounded by my friends I went out of Court. Outside in the street there was a crowd who shouted and cried my name with 'Death to the Conspirators!' But I saw many who did not shout. Who are they who had no sympathy with innocence? They stood apart, with lowering faces. They came down from the public gallery where – I was afterwards told – the appearance in that witness-box first of the well-known landlady of the Black Jack – their ancient friend: next, of her daughter – also their friend: thirdly, of the young fellow called Jack, one of themselves, a rogue and the companion of rogues: and lastly, of the woman of whom they had been so proud, Jenny the actress, Jenny the Orange Girl: Jenny of Drury Lane: filled them with dismay and rage. What? Their own people turn against their own friends? The landlady of the Black Jack, even the landlady of the Black Jack, that most notorious receiver of stolen goods, and harbourer of rogues, to give evidence against her own customers? Thief betray thief? Dog bite dog? Heard ever man the like? Now you understand the lowering and gloomy faces. These people whispered to each other in the Gallery of the Court House: they murmured to each other outside on the pavement: when we climbed into a hackney coach – Jenny – her mother and sister – the young fellow called Jack and myself – they followed us – in pairs; – by fours, talking low and cursing below their breath. After a while they desisted: but one or two of them still kept up with the coach.

I sent Alice home under charge of Tom. I would get home, I said, as quickly as I could, after seeing Jenny safely at her own house.

We arrived at the house in Soho Square. It was empty save for some women-servants, for there was no entertainment that evening. We went into the small room on the left and lit the candles.

It was then about seven o'clock in the evening and quite dark, as the time of year was November. Jenny was restless and excited. She went to the window and looked out. 'The Square is quiet,' she said. 'How long will it remain quiet?'

The servants brought in some supper. Jenny took a little glass of wine. She then went away and returned in a plain dress with a cloak and hood.

'I must be ready,' she said, 'to set off on my travels – whither? Mother' – she turned to the old lady – 'you are a witch. Look into the fire and tell me what you see.'

The old woman filled and drained a glass of Madeira and turned her chair round. She gazed intently into the red coals.

'I see,' she said, 'a crowd of people. I see a Court. I see the condemned cell…' She turned away. 'No, Jenny, I will look no more. 'Twas thus I looked in the fire before thy father was taken. Thus and thus did I see. I will look no longer.'

'Well,' said Doll, 'what will they do next? They know now where you live, Madame Vallance.'

The old woman sat down and sighed heavily. 'The Black Jack!' she murmured. 'We shall never see it again.'

Jenny was quiet and grave. 'We have beaten them,' she said. 'They never suspected that so complete a beating was in store for them. Now comes our turn – my turn rather.'

'Your turn, Jenny?'

'Yes, Will, my turn. Do you suppose they will forgive us? Why, we have given evidence against our own people. All St. Giles's trusted my mother and sister – Could one suspect the Black Jack? Why, because I was a daughter of the house, all St. Giles's trusted me – and we have betrayed them! There will be revenge and that quickly.'

Doll nodded expressively. Her mother groaned.

'What kind of revenge?'

Doll nodded her head again and drew a long breath. Her mother groaned again.

'I do not know, yet. Listen, Will. The people know very well that this case has been got up by myself. I found out, by my mother's assistance, those facts about the trials and floggings and imprisonments: I went into the country and secured the evidence. I brought up the gaolers to testify to the men's identity. I even went to my husband and promised – yes, I swore – that I would put him into the conspiracy as well as the other four if he did not give evidence without saying a word to Probus. And then I bought my mother out.'

'You bought out your mother?'

''Twas as sweet a business, Sir,' the old woman interrupted, 'as you ever saw. A matter of three pounds a day takings and two pounds a day profit.'

'I bought her out,' said Jenny. 'I also compensated her for the contents of her vaults.'

'Ah!' sighed the old woman. 'There were treasures!'

'The Black Jack is shut up. When the people go there this evening' – again Doll nodded – 'they will find it closed – and they will wreck the place.'

'And drink up all that's left,' said Doll.

'Let us prevent murder. Jack, you will find it best for your health to get at far as possible out of London. Take my mother and sister to one of the taverns in the Borough. There's a waggon or a caravan starts every morning for some country place or other; never mind where. Go with them, Jack: stay with them for a while till they are settled. Mother, you won't be happy unless you can have a tavern somewhere. If you can find one, Jack will do for you. There you will be safe, I think. St. Giles's doesn't contain any of our people. But in London you will be murdered – you and Doll, too – for sure and certain.'

'For sure and certain,' said Doll, grimly.

Jenny gave her mother more money. 'That will carry you into the country,' she said. 'You can let me know, somehow, where you are. But take care not to let anyone know who would tell the people here. The gipsies are your best friends, not the thieves.'

I asked her if it was really necessary to make all these preparations.

'You don't know these people, Will. I do. The one thing to which they cling is their safety from the law so long as they are among themselves. There will be wild work this evening. As for me I have under my dress all my money and all my jewels. I am ready for flight.'

'Why, Jenny, you don't think they will attack you here?'

'I do, indeed. There is nothing more likely. Did you observe a woman running along Holborn beside the coach? I know that woman. She is the Captain's girl. Revenge was written on her face – easy to read – revenge – revenge. She stood beside the doorstep when we came in. She marked the house. She has gone back to St. Giles's to tell them where we can be found this evening. But they learned that fact in Court. Oh! They will come presently.'

'Well, Jenny, let us escape while we can.'

'There are many ways of escape,' she said. 'There is no hurry. We can pass over the roof of the next house and so into the garrets of the house beyond. I have proved this way of escape – Oh! Will, I counted the cost beforehand. Or there is the back door which opens on Hog Lane. We can get out that way. I am sure they will not think of the back door. Or it is easy to climb over the garden wall into the next house: there are plenty of ways. I am not afraid about our escape – if we can keep them out for a few minutes. But, Jack, you had better take my mother and sister away at once.'

'No,' said Jack, stoutly. 'Where you are, Madame, there I am.'

'You are a fool, Jack,' she replied with her sweet smile, which made him more foolish still. 'They will murder you if they can.'

'They shan't murder you, then,' the lad replied, clutching his cudgel.

By the time we finished supper and held this discourse it was close upon eight.

'Will,' said Jenny, 'you and Jack had better barricade the door. It is a strong door but even oak will give way. Take the card-tables and pile them up.'

The card-tables were thin slight things with curved legs all gilt and lacquer. But the long table was a heavy mahogany thing. We took out some of the pieces by which it was lengthened and closed it up. Then we carried it out to the hall and placed it against the door: the length of the door filled the breadth of the hall and jammed in the boards until it seemed as if it would bear any amount of pressure from without. We piled the smaller tables one above the other behind the large table: if the mob did get in, they would be encumbered for awhile among the legs of so many tables. This was the only attempt we could make at fortifying the house: the lower windows were protected by the iron railings outside.

'Will,' said Jenny, 'we have made the door safe. But Lord! what is to prevent their breaking down the railings and entering by the area? Or why should they not bring a ladder and force their way at the first floor?'

'Would they be so determined?'

'They scent blood. They are like the carrion crow. They mean blood and pillage. The latter they will have. Not the former.'

At this point we heard a low grumbling noise in the distance, which became the roar of many voices.

'They are already at the Black Jack,' said Jenny. 'I should like to see what they are doing. Come with me, Will. It is too dark for anyone to recognise me, and there will be a great crowd. All St. Giles's will be out to see the wreck of the Black Jack.'

She drew her hood over her head which in a measure hid her face, and taking my hand, she led me through the garden and so out by the back door into Hog Lane. The place, always quiet, was deserted and, besides, was nearly pitch dark, having no lamps in it.

Jenny's house – the Assembly Rooms of Soho Square – stood at the corner of Sutton Street, and with its gardens extended back into Hog Lane. Nearly opposite Sutton Street, a little lower down, the short street called Denmark Street ran from Hog Lane into St. Giles's High Street opposite the Church. The Black Jack stood opposite to the Church.

When we got to Denmark Street we took the north side, because there were fewer people there. Yet the crowd was gathering fast. We stood at the corner of the street at the East and where we could see what was going on and be ready to escape as quickly as possible in case of necessity.

A company of men with whom were a good many women and a few boys, were besieging the dark and deserted Black Jack. They were a company apart acting by themselves without any assistance from the crowd, which looked on approvingly and applauded. They neither asked for, nor would they accept, assistance. If any man from the outside offered to join them, he was roughly ordered back. 'It is their revenge, Will,' said Jenny. 'They will have no one with them to join in their own business.' Their resolution and the quiet way with which they acted – for the roars and shouting we heard did not proceed from the company of revenge but from the crowd that followed them – struck one with terror as if we were contemplating the irresistible decrees of Fate. They battered at the doors: as no one answered, they broke in the doors; but first with a volley of stones they broke every window in the house.

'Poor mother!' said Jenny. ''Twould break her heart. But she will lose nothing. I bought her out. It is the landlord who will suffer. Now they have found candles: they light up; see, they are going all over the house in search of the landlady.' We saw lights in the rooms one after the other. 'They will not find her: nor her money: nor anything that is valuable. It is all gone, gentlemen: all provided for and stowed away in a safer place. This is not a house where a woman who values her throat should be found, after to-day's work. See – now, they have made up their minds that no one is left in the house. What next? Will they set fire to it?'

No: they did not set fire to the house. They proceeded to break up everything: all the furniture: the beds, chairs and tables and to throw fragments out of windows into the open space below where some of them collected everything and made a bonfire. When the house was emptied they began to bring out the bottles and to haul up the casks out of the cellars: upon this there was a rush of the crowd from the outside: strange as it may appear the company of revenge were going to break the bottles and to set the casks running. But the mob rushed in: there was fighting for a few minutes: someone blew a whistle and the rioters drew apart, and stood together before the house. Then one of them; their leader, spoke.

'This is the revenge of St. Giles's on the landlady of the Black Jack. Drink up all her casks and all her bottles, and be damned to ye!'