In Which Mrs. Catherine Becomes An Honest Woman Again
In this woeful plight, moneyless, wifeless, horseless, corporalless, with a gag in his
mouth and a rope round his body, are we compelled to leave the gallant Galgenstein,
until his friends and the progress of this history shall deliver him from his durance. Mr.
Brock's adventures on the Captain's horse must likewise be pretermitted; for it is our
business to follow Mrs. Catherine through the window by which she made her escape,
and among the various chances that befell her.
She had one cause to congratulate herself,--that she had not her baby at her back; for
the infant was safely housed under the care of a nurse, to whom the Captain was
answerable. Beyond this her prospects were but dismal: no home to fly to, but a few
shillings in her pocket, and a whole heap of injuries and dark revengeful thoughts in her
bosom: it was a sad task to her to look either backwards or forwards. Whither was she
to fly? How to live? What good chance was to befriend her? There was an angel
watching over the steps of Mrs. Cat--not a good one, I think, but one of those from that
unnameable place, who have their many subjects here on earth, and often are pleased
to extricate them from worse perplexities.
Mrs. Cat, now, had not committed murder, but as bad as murder; and as she felt not the
smallest repentance in her heart--as she had, in the course of her life and connection
with the Captain, performed and gloried in a number of wicked coquetries, idlenesses,
vanities, lies, fits of anger, slanders, foul abuses, and what not--she was fairly bound
over to this dark angel whom we have alluded to; and he dealt with her, and aided her,
as one of his own children.
I do not mean to say that, in this strait, he appeared to her in the likeness of a
gentleman in black, and made her sign her name in blood to a document conveying
over to him her soul, in exchange for certain conditions to be performed by him. Such
diabolical bargains have always appeared to me unworthy of the astute personage who
is supposed to be one of the parties to them; and who would scarcely be fool enough to
pay dearly for that which he can have in a few years for nothing. It is not, then, to be
supposed that a demon of darkness appeared to Mrs. Cat, and led her into a flaming
chariot harnessed by dragons, and careering through air at the rate of a thousand
leagues a minute. No such thing; the vehicle that was sent to aid her was one of a much
more vulgar description.
The "Liverpool carryvan," then, which in the year 1706 used to perform the journey
between London and that place in ten days, left Birmingham about an hour after Mrs.
Catherine had quitted that town; and as she sat weeping on a hillside, and plunged in
bitter meditation, the lumbering, jingling vehicle overtook her. The coachman was
marching by the side of his horses, and encouraging them to maintain their pace of two
