“I am fly, master!”
And so, good night.
A ghostly shade, frilled and night-capped, follows
the law-stationer to the room he came from and glides
higher up. And henceforth he begins, go where
he will, to be attended by another shadow than his
own, hardly less constant than his own, hardly less
quiet than his own. And into whatsoever atmosphere
of secrecy his own shadow may pass, let all concerned
in the secrecy beware! For the watchful Mrs.
Snagsby is there too—bone of his bone, flesh
of his flesh, shadow of his shadow.
Sharpshooters
Wintry morning, looking with dull eyes and sallow
face upon the neighbourhood of Leicester Square, finds
its inhabitants unwilling to get out of bed.
Many of them are not early risers at the brightest
of times, being birds of night who roost when the sun
is high and are wide awake and keen for prey when
the stars shine out. Behind dingy blind and curtain,
in upper story and garret, skulking more or less under
false names, false hair, false titles, false jewellery,
and false histories, a colony of brigands lie in their
first sleep. Gentlemen of the green-baize road
who could discourse from personal experience of foreign
galleys and home treadmills; spies of strong governments
that eternally quake with weakness and miserable fear,
broken traitors, cowards, bullies, gamesters, shufflers,
swindlers, and false witnesses; some not unmarked by
the branding-iron beneath their dirty braid; all with
more cruelty in them than was in Nero, and more crime
than is in Newgate. For howsoever bad the devil
can be in fustian or smock-frock (and he can be very
bad in both), he is a more designing, callous, and
intolerable devil when he sticks a pin in his shirt-front,
calls himself a gentleman, backs a card or colour,
plays a game or so of billiards, and knows a little
about bills and promissory notes than in any other
form he wears. And in such form Mr. Bucket shall
find him, when he will, still pervading the tributary
channels of Leicester Square.
But the wintry morning wants him not and wakes him
not. It wakes Mr. George of the shooting gallery
and his familiar. They arise, roll up and stow
away their mattresses. Mr. George, having shaved
himself before a looking-glass of minute proportions,
then marches out, bare-headed and bare-chested, to
the pump in the little yard and anon comes back shining
with yellow soap, friction, drifting rain, and exceedingly
cold water. As he rubs himself upon a large
jack-towel, blowing like a military sort of diver just
come up, his hair curling tighter and tighter on his
sunburnt temples the more he rubs it so that it looks
as if it never could be loosened by any less coercive
instrument than an iron rake or a curry-comb—as
he rubs, and puffs, and polishes, and blows, turning
his head from side to side the more conveniently to
excoriate his throat, and standing with his body well
bent forward to keep the wet from his martial legs,
Phil, on his knees lighting a fire, looks round as
if it were enough washing for him to see all that
done, and sufficient renovation for one day to take
in the superfluous health his master throws off.
