The Collected Novels. William Harrison Ainsworth

say her son’s taken at last, and is to be hanged. I’m glad of it, I’m sure; for it’s all owing to him his poor mother’s here. See what crime does, Sir. Those who act wickedly bring misery on all connected with them. And so gentle as the poor creature is, when she’s not in her wild fits — it would melt a heart of stone to see her. She will cry for days and nights together. If Jack Sheppard could behold his mother in this state, he’d have a lesson he’d never forget — ay, and a severer one than even the hangman could read him. Hardened as he may be, that would touch him. But he has never been near her — never.”

      Rambling in this way, the matron at length came to a halt, and taking out a key, pointed to a door and said, “This is Mrs. Sheppard’s ward, Sir.”

      “Leave us together, my good woman,” said Jack, putting a guinea into her hand.

      “As long as you please, Sir,” answered the matron, dropping a curtsey. “There, Sir,” she added, unlocking the door, “you can go in. Don’t be frightened of her. She’s not mischievous — and besides she’s chained, and can’t reach you.”

      So saying, she retired, and Jack entered the cell.

      Prepared as he was for a dreadful shock, and with his nerves strung to endure it, Jack absolutely recoiled before the appalling object that met his gaze. Cowering in a corner upon a heap of straw sat his unfortunate mother, the complete wreck of what she had been. Her eyes glistened in the darkness — for light was only admitted through a small grated window — like flames, and, as she fixed them on him, their glances seemed to penetrate his very soul. A piece of old blanket was fastened across her shoulders, and she had no other clothing except a petticoat. Her arms and feet were uncovered, and of almost skeleton thinness. Her features were meagre, and ghastly white, and had the fixed and horrible stamp of insanity. Her head had been shaved, and around it was swathed a piece of rag, in which a few straws were stuck. Her thin fingers were armed with nails as long as the talons of a bird. A chain, riveted to an iron belt encircling her waist, bound her to the wall. The cell in which she was confined was about six feet long and four wide; the walls were scored all over with fantastic designs, snatches of poetry, short sentences and names — the work of its former occupants, and of its present inmate.

      Jack Sheppard visits his Mother in Bedlam

      When Jack entered the cell, she was talking to herself in the muttering unconnected way peculiar to her distracted condition; but, after her eye had rested on him some time, the fixed expression of her features relaxed, and a smile crossed them. This smile was more harrowing even than her former rigid look.

      “You are an angel,” she cried, with a look beaming with delight.

      “Rather a devil,” groaned her son, “to have done this.”

      “You are an angel, I say,” continued the poor maniac; “and my Jack would have been like you, if he had lived. But he died when he was a child — long ago — long ago — long ago.”

      “Would he had done so!” cried Jack.

      “Old Van told me if he grew up he would be hanged. He showed me a black mark under his ear, where the noose would be tied. And so I’ll tell you what I did —”

      And she burst into a laugh that froze Jack’s blood in his veins.

      “What did you do?” he asked, in a broken voice.

      “I strangled him — ha! ha! ha! — strangled him while he was at my breast — ha! ha!”— And then with a sudden and fearful change of look, she added, “That’s what has driven me mad, I killed my child to save him from the gallows — oh! oh! One man hanged in a family is enough. If I’d not gone mad, they would have hanged me.”

      “Poor soul!” ejaculated her son.

      “I’ll tell you a dream I had last night,” continued the unfortunate being. “I was at Tyburn. There was a gallows erected, and a great mob round it — thousands of people, and all with white faces like corpses. In the midst of them there was a cart with a man in it — and that man was Jack — my son Jack — they were going to hang him. And opposite to him, with a book in his hand — but it couldn’t be a prayer-book — sat Jonathan Wild, in a parson’s cassock and band. I knew him in spite of his dress. And when they came to the gallows, Jack leaped out of the cart, and the hangman tied up Jonathan instead — ha! ha! How the mob shouted and huzzaed — and I shouted too — ha! ha! ha!”

      “Mother!” cried Jack, unable to endure this agonizing scene longer. “Don’t you know me, mother?”

      “Ah!” shrieked Mrs. Sheppard. “What’s that? — Jack’s voice!”

      “It is,” replied her son.

      “The ceiling is breaking! the floor is opening! he is coming to me!” cried the unhappy woman.

      “He stands before you,” rejoined her son.

      “Where?” she cried. “I can’t see him. Where is he?”

      “Here,” answered Jack.

      “Are you his ghost, then?”

      “No — no,” answered Jack. “I am your most unhappy son.”

      “Let me touch you, then; let me feel if you are really flesh and blood,” cried the poor maniac, creeping towards him on all fours.

      Jack did not advance to meet her. He could not move; but stood like one stupified, with his hands clasped together, and eyes almost starting out of their sockets, fixed upon his unfortunate parent.

      “Come to me!” cried the poor maniac, who had crawled as far as the chain would permit her — “come to me!” she cried, extending her thin arm towards him.

      Jack fell on his knees beside her.

      “Who are you?” inquired Mrs. Sheppard, passing her hands over his face, and gazing at him with a look that made him shudder.

      “Your son,” replied Jack — “your miserable, repentant son.”

      “It is false,” cried Mrs. Sheppard. “You are not. Jack was not half your age when he died. They buried him in Willesden churchyard after the robbery.”

      “Oh, God!” cried Jack, “she does not know me. Mother — dear mother!” he added, clasping her in his arms, “Look at me again.”

      “Off!” she exclaimed, breaking from his embrace with a scream. “Don’t touch me. I’ll be quiet. I’ll not speak of Jack or Jonathan. I won’t dig their graves with my nails. Don’t strip me quite. Leave me my blanket! I’m very cold at night. Or, if you must take off my clothes, don’t dash cold water on my head. It throbs cruelly.”

      “Horror!” cried Jack.

      “Don’t scourge me,” she cried, trying to hide herself in the farthest corner of the cell. “The lash cuts to the bone. I can’t bear it. Spare me, and I’ll be quiet — quiet — quiet!”

      “Mother!” said Jack, advancing towards her.

      “Off!” she cried with a prolonged and piercing shriek. And she buried herself beneath the straw, which she tossed above her head with the wildest gestures.

      “I shall kill her if I stay longer,” muttered her son, completely terrified.

      While he was considering what would be best to do, the poor maniac, over whose bewildered brain another change had come, raised her head from under the straw, and peeping round the room, asked in a low voice, “If they were gone?”

      “Who?” inquired Jack.

      “The nurses,” she answered.

      “Do they treat you ill?” asked her son.

      “Hush!” she said, putting her lean fingers to her lips. “Hush!