Читать книгу: «Sheppard Lee, Written by Himself. Vol. I (of 2)», страница 5

BOOK II.
CONTAINING SUNDRY ILLUSTRATIONS OF THE ADVANTAGES OF GOOD LIVING, WITH A FEW CHAPTERS ON DOMESTIC FELICITY

CHAPTER I.
SOME PASSAGES IN THE LIFE OF JOHN H. HIGGINSON, ESQ., THE HAPPY SPORTSMAN; WITH A SURPRISING AFFLICTION THAT BEFELL THE AUTHOR

I went off in a towering rage, to think of the reception I had met, and that too after an absence of a whole night. I had been bitten by my own dog, and driven from my own doors by my own servants! But there was something in these circumstances to admonish me of the change that had come over me. They reminded me of a fact that was not always present to my thoughts, – to wit, that I was no longer Sheppard Lee, but Mr. John Hazlewood Higginson, a very different sort of personage altogether.

To account for my forgetfulness of this important transformation, I must relate that, although I had acquired along with his body all the peculiarities of feeling, propensity, conversation, and conduct of Squire Higginson, I had not entirely lost those that belonged to Sheppard Lee. In fact, I may be said to have possessed, at that time, two different characters, one of which now governed me, and now the other; though the squire's, it must be confessed, was greatly predominant. Thus, the moment after the transformation, I found myself endowed with a passion for shooting, as if I had had it all my life long, a buoyant tone of mind, and, in addition, as I by-and-by discovered, with somewhat a hot temper; none of which had ever been known to me before. The difficulty was, that I could not immediately shake off my old Sheppard Lee habits; and the influence of these, perhaps (if one must scrutinize into the matter), more than the absolute retention of any other native peculiarities, drove me into the inconsistencies of which I was for a short time guilty. But I will not trouble the reader with philosophizing.

I perceived, from the repulse I had received from Jim Jumble, that it now became me to sink his old master altogether, which I was very well content to do, and resolved accordingly; although I could not help thinking, as I strode over the forty-acre farm, how much satisfaction I should have, now that I was a rich man, in putting it into fine order. But these thoughts were soon driven from my mind by Ponto making a set at some game, and in a moment I was banging away, right and left, and slaughtering the birds in the finest style imaginable.

Oh, the delights of shooting woodcock! It is rather hot work, though, of a midsummer day; and notwithstanding the prodigious satisfaction I had in pursuing the sport, I felt that my satisfaction would have been still greater, had I been a few stone lighter. I began to think Squire Higginson's fat rather inconvenient; and I had the same opinion of a touch of asthma, or something of that nature, which I found in his lungs; and, besides, there was a sort of whizzing, and humming, and spinning in my head, where they had been all the morning which were not altogether agreeable.

In consequence of these infirmities of my new body, I began, after a while, to weary of the sport; and was just on the point of setting off to the village to get my dinner, when a crowd of men made their appearance in the marsh, and setting up a great shout at sight of me, began to run towards me. I could not conceive the cause of such a concourse, nor could I imagine for what reason they directed their steps towards me; but hearing them utter the most furious cries, and perceiving that a multitude of dogs they had with them were rushing against me, as if to devour me, I was seized with alarm, and began to retreat towards a wood that was not far off.

This evidence of terror on my part only caused the people to utter louder and more savage cries, besides setting the dogs to running faster; and these ferocious animals gaining upon me, and being on the point of tearing me to pieces, I was obliged to let fly my piece among them, whereby I shot one dead, and disabled two or three others. I then defended myself with the breech of my gun, until the men came up; one of whom tripped up my heels, while the others seized and disarmed me, crying out "that I was a murderer; that I was found out, and should be hanged, if there was any law in the county."

I was confounded at this charge; but how much greater was my amazement, when I understood, as they haled me along towards the village, which they did very roughly, that I was accused of having murdered Sheppard Lee – that is, my own identical self!

This accusation appeared to me so preposterous, that in spite of my indignation (for my fears had now subsided), I burst into a laugh; which only made them rail at me more furiously than I can express. "Hear him!" said they; "he laughs! He thinks, because he is a rich man, he can shoot any poor man he pleases, and buy himself off. But we will show him there's law in Jersey for aristocrats as well as poor men, and that we can hang a purse-proud man as soon as a beggar."

And so they went on reviling me as if I had been the greatest criminal in the land, and dragging me, as they said, to a squire, who would soon show me what law was.

I tried to reason with them, but it was all in vain; I then fell into a passion, and cursed and swore at them in a way which I am certain I never did before at any human being; having always had, while Sheppard Lee, a great horror of profanity; but this was just as fruitless an expedient as the other. They dragged me on until we reached the village, where we found all in a hubbub, men, women, and children running about as if mad, and exclaiming that "Squire Higginson had murdered Sheppard Lee, and hid the body in the Owl-roost Swamp." As soon as they saw me they set up a shout, and some low fellows among them raged in such a degree that I thought they would have massacred me in the street. They crowded round me, hustled me, seized me by the collar, shook their fists in my face, and, in general, testified such a vindictive concern for the murder of poor Sheppard Lee, as they called him, that I might have supposed there was never a man more widely beloved than myself, had I not known otherwise – or, rather, had I not been too closely occupied to suppose any thing about it.

In a word, they carried me before Squire Andrew Parkins, who was a fat man that I heartily despised; and here they called upon him for justice, while I did the same thing, swearing that I would prosecute every rascal of them for assault and battery, conspiracy, defamation, and the Lord knows what beside; all of which, it seems, only inflamed the mob against me the more. They charged me with the murder, and the evidence they brought to support the charge appeared to Justice Parkins sufficient to authorize his issuing a mittimus. There were twenty persons to swear I had, two or three days before, acknowledged having had a quarrel with Sheppard Lee on his farm – that is, the forty-acre – and that he had ordered me off; and there were twenty more to swear I was a man of such a hot and furious temper, that it was a wonder I had not shot the poor man down on the spot. Then came old Turnbuckle and his son, who swore that the ghost of Sheppard Lee had come to them in the gray of the morning, calling for help, and assuring them that he (or his body) lay murdered under the beech-tree in the hollow; that as soon as the phantom had vanished, and they recovered from their fears, they roused the neighbours, and sending some to my house, who learned I had not been at home all night, the others proceeded to the hollow, where they found a freshly-dug grave, with spade and mattock in it, and near it they lit upon my hat and one of my shoes, which latter was bloody, as well as the grass on which it lay; that then, looking round them, they discovered me (that is, John Higginson), sneaking away through the reeds on the marsh in a suspicious way; that at that moment old Jim Jumble was brought forward, who said I (John Hazlewood Higginson) had come to the house, shot his bulldog, threatened to blow his brains out, and bragged that I had just finished, or, in other words, murdered his master, Sheppard Lee; and, finally, that this confirming the suspicions they all had against me, they pursued me (I retreating and shooting their dogs, like a man conscious of guilt, and anxious to escape), and captured me, not without a furious resistance on my part.

On the strength of this testimony I was committed to jail, whither I was conducted amid the shouts of the mob. Squire Parkins (doubtless to beg off as well as he could) afterward privately assured me, that he had committed me to prison, not from any belief that I was guilty, or that the testimony really warranted such a step, but because he was afraid the people would otherwise murder me, and considered that the only way to protect me from their violence.

Meanwhile, there was a great search made for my – that is, Sheppard Lee's – body; the general belief being that I – that is, John H. Higginson – had cast it into the swamp, after having been at the pains to dig a grave, wherein I at first designed to hide it; and I do verily believe that, had my unfortunate old casing been found, I should have begun my new existence in the body of the man I had so much envied by being hanged for the murder. Its sudden disappearance was therefore not more extraordinary than it was really fortunate.

CHAPTER II.
THE AUTHOR, BEING IN PRISON, MAKES A CONFIDANT OF A DEPUTY ATTORNEY-GENERAL. – THE INCONVENIENCE OF TELLING A TRUTH WHICH HAPPENS TO BE SOMEWHAT INCREDIBLE

My wrath gave way when I found myself in prison; and hearing from the jailer that the grand jury was then in session, and the prosecuting attorney actually engaged in framing a bill of endictment against me, to send up to its members, I began to think the matter rather serious, and resolved to end it before it proceeded further.

I had already experienced the ill effects of attempting to sustain the character of Sheppard Lee while in the body of another man, and for this reason was resolved to be more cautious for the future; but I now perceived I had no better way of relieving myself of my troubles than by making the prosecutor, who had been an old friend of mine, and had always treated me with respect, acquainted with my transformation; after which, I had no doubt, he would throw his bill of endictment into the fire. I sent for him accordingly; but was obliged to repeat the message before he thought fit to make his appearance.

"You have perhaps made a mistake, Mr. Higginson," said he, as he entered. "You have occasion for counsel, but none that I can imagine for me; for as to my giving you any advice in this unfortunate affair – ".

"The devil take the affair," said I, in no amiable voice; "it was to get rid of it entirely that I sent for you; for I must stop that cursed endictment of yours. I don't want it said of me hereafter that I was once in my life endicted for a felony."

"Oh, sir," said he, with a smile, "we are in no hurry about these things; the bill will lie over till we can procure a little more evidence, and some of a better quality. Don't be in any alarm; but allow me to recommend you to employ counsel. My friend Sharphead, I think, will be your best man."

"I don't want any counsel," said I, "and Sharphead may go to the devil; I want to confide to you the true secret of this extraordinary affair."

"Faith, sir," said he, looking at me in surprise, "if you can do that, the case is not so ridiculous as I thought. Really, Mr. Higginson, I was rather amused than otherwise at the charge brought against you, not supposing you knew any thing of, or had any connexion whatever with, the disappearance of poor Sheppard Lee. But, since you talk of secrets, sir, I must inform you, I am not the person you should make any confessions to. I must again recommend you to employ counsel."

And with that he was about leaving me, but I arrested him. "Stop, Jack," said I (his name was John Darling, and he is very well known in the state, though he was turned out of office), "you and I are old friends, and we must have a talk together."

At these words he gave me a hard stare, looking more astonished than ever.

"Jack," said I, taking him by the hand, "I'll make you stare harder than that. Sheppard Lee is no more dead than I am; though, as for his body, I believe Old Nick has got it. Now, my boy, I take it you will act as a friend in this matter, and not blab my secret: but the truth is, it is John H. Higginson who is dead, and I who am living."

"The deuse it is!" said the lawyer, whose amazement set me into a capital humour. "And pray, sir," he added, "if John H. Higginson is dead, who are you?"

"Sheppard Lee!" said I, bursting into a laugh, "only that you see me now in John H. Higginson's body."

I then proceeded to inform him, as I have informed the reader, of my digging for the treasure, of my sudden death, of the visit of my spirit to old Turnbuckle's, of the disappearance of my body, of my finding and entering that of Squire Higginson, in which he now saw me, and, in fine, of all the other circumstances connected with the transformation; all which he heard like a man whom the novelty of the relation astounded into marble.

"Upon my soul," said he, when I had done, "you have told me a most surprising story. And so you really think yourself Sheppard Lee – that is, Sheppard Lee's spirit in Squire Higginson's body?"

"Think myself, sir!" said I, a little fiercely.

"Do you presume to slight my veracity, sir? or to doubt my common sense?"

"By no means," said he; "I have the utmost respect for both. Your story has completely satisfied me of your innocence. A most wonderful story, sir! truly, a most wonderful story!" And repeating these words over and over again, he fell to nodding his head and musing, staring at me all the time, like one who is lost in wonder; and then suddenly rousing up, he burst into a roar of laughter. Seeing that I was incensed at his merriment, he hastened to apologize, declaring that he was not laughing at my story, but at the absurdity he had been so nigh committing in endicting me for my own murder; and he added, that my relation was altogether the most remarkable he had ever heard in his life.

I then gave him to understand, I expected, for very good and obvious reasons, that he would keep the story to himself; which he faithfully promised. He then fell to cross-questioning me in relation to different points; and he was particularly curious to know what I supposed had become of my body; when, not being able to satisfy him on that point, he himself suggested that perhaps Squire Higginson's spirit had taken possession of it, as I had done with his, and carried it off for some purpose or other, and that we should soon have news of him; an idea that was so agreeable to him, that he fell to laughing as hard as ever. "Sir," said he, shaking me by the hand in excellent good-humour, "we will soon have you out of this dog-hole, and that without betraying your secret. Heaven forbid I should spoil the good fortune of my old friend Sheppard Lee! No, sir, I am no tale-bearer, or blabber of secrets. Comfort yourself, sir; I never had the least idea of endicting you on this absurd charge. Nobody believes Sheppard Lee has been murdered by you, nor, indeed, by any one else. No, poor devil! the general opinion now is, that he has taken himself off, to get clear of duns and sheriffs; and as for the bloody shoe and hat, why that's a common way of turning pursuers off the scent, by throwing dust in their eyes. The charge will be abandoned, sir; you will be liberated, and may, if you like such amusement, prosecute your captors by the dozen for assault and battery. Farewell, Mr. Higginson, – that is, Mr. Lee; fortune smiles upon you at last; and you are a happy, – a wonderful man, sir. – Farewell!"

The attorney then left me; and so much diverted was he by my adventure, that I could hear him indulge peal after peal of mirth, until he had got out of the prison.

Now it may be supposed that my story, from its reasonableness, carried conviction to the attorney's mind; and so I was persuaded. But I reckoned without my host; the hypocritical gentleman did not believe a word of it, however much he pretended to do so. But in this he was like the rest of the fraternity: I never, indeed, knew a lawyer to believe any thing unless he was paid for it; and I forgot to present my gentleman a fee. My story, therefore, not being paid for, or proved according to law, only convinced this skeptical person that I – "the unfortunate Higginson," as he called me – had suddenly lost my senses, and gone staring mad; and in consequence, disregarding all his promises of secrecy, he ran over the whole village, diverting every one he could lay hands on with an account of "the poor squire's hallucination," as he termed it – that is to say, his conceit that his body was now inhabited by the soul of Sheppard Lee.

But to give a certain personage his due, or one of that personage's representatives, I must confess that Darling, who was at bottom a good-natured fellow, recollected one part of his promise, and took measures to effect my discharge from prison; which was no very difficult matter, people being now pretty well aware of the folly of the charge they had brought against me, and the absurdity of the evidence designed to support it. The opinion was already entertained that poor Sheppard Lee, instead of being murdered, had taken himself out of the neighbourhood to avoid his creditors, having left his hat and shoe in the swamp only as blinds to those who might be most anxious to secure his person; and pursuers had already left the village to discover his place of concealment.

CHAPTER III.
SHEPPARD LEE IS VISITED BY NEW FRIENDS, RELEASED FROM PRISON, AND CARRIED TO HIS NEW PLACE OF ABODE

Another service that the attorney did me, according to the jailer, through whom I discovered all these things, was to despatch a messenger to my friends in Philadelphia, with the news of my insanity and imprisonment, and a request that they should send proper persons to take charge of me after being liberated: and I was roused the following morning by the appearance of some half a dozen kinsmen who had come to the village for that purpose, fully persuaded that they should find me a raging lunatic.

But the jailer's information had set me to reflecting upon my difficulties, all of which, as I clearly perceived, were owing to my indiscretion in attempting to keep up the character of Sheppard Lee while in another man's body. I saw the necessity I was now placed under to be Mr. John H. Higginson, and nobody else, for the future; and so I resolved to be – for I did not like the idea of being clapped into a mad-house by my new friends.

Yet they took me so much by surprise that I was guilty of some few inconsistencies; for it was not immediately that I felt myself at case in my new character.

The truth is, my situation was peculiar and embarrassing. With the body of Mr. Higginson, I had acquired all his distinctive peculiarities, as I mentioned before. But many of these were in a manner stupified within me, and required to be renewed, or resuscitated, by processes of association. I was like a man who has been roused from a lethargy, which had destroyed or obscured his memory, though not his instincts; and who betrays complete ignorance of past events, and forgetfulness of old friends, until some accidental circumstance – a casual reference to some past event, the tone of a voice, or other such cause – recalls him, it may be, to sudden and complete, though usually imperfect, consciousness.

Thus, when I was roused up in the morning, and beheld a good-looking personage of about my own years shaking me by the shoulder, I regarded him only as some impertinent stranger intruding upon my privacy, saluted him with divers epithets expressive of rage and indignation, and concluded by asking him "who the devil he was?"

"What! I?" said he, with the most doleful visage in the world; "why, Timothy – that is, Tim Doolittle, your brother-in-law – Don't you know me?"

And "Don't you know me? and me? and me? your cousin, Tom This, and your old friend, Dick That?" cried they all, with horrible long faces; the oddity of which after a while set me a laughing, especially when I came to recollect them all, as I did by-and-by when they had pronounced their names; for at each name it seemed to me as if a film fell from my eyes, and some spirit within awakened me to a vague recollection of the person to whom it belonged. In a word, I became aware that I was surrounded by a knot of my oldest and best friends, all of them excellent jolly dogs and good fellows, who were come to escort me home, and assured me that I was no longer a prisoner.

I shook them all by the hand, and contrasting for a moment in my mind the melancholy condition in which I had lived as Sheppard Lee, with my present glorious state, surrounded by friends, and conscious of possessing lands, houses, stocks, Schuylkill coal-mines, and the Lord knows what other goods beside, I fell into a rapture, danced about my cell, and hugged every person present, as well as the jailer, and my old friend Darling, the attorney, who happened at that moment to enter.

"Bravo!" said Tim Doolittle; "now you're the true Jack Higginson again; and I don't believe you are mad a bit."

"Mad!" said I, thinking it needful to explain away that imputation, "No, and I never was. I tumbled over an old rotten fence, and hurt my head, which was, in consequence, in a whiz all day yesterday; but now it is clear enough. I think I said some silly things about one thing and another; but that's neither here nor there."

"Ah!" said Tim Doolittle, touching his forehead and looking as grave as a bullfrog, "it's well it's no worse; for I always thought you had a turn for apoplexy. But I'm glad you are so well; it will be good news for poor Margaret."

"Margaret! who the deuse is she?" said I, feeling quite strange at the name.

"Why, my poor sister, your wife, to be sure," said he.

My wife!!! I recollected that I had a wife; but the recollection made me feel, I knew not exactly why, as if I had been suddenly soused into cold water. It was a highly uncomfortable idea, and accordingly I hastened to get rid of it.

"Let us leave this confounded place," I said; and we left the prison.

The prospect of a fine sunshiny day infused animation into my mind, which was vastly increased when I stepped into a splendid new barouche, with a pair of bay horses worth a thousand dollars – for so much Tim gave me to understand I– that is to say, my prototype – had given for them scarce a month before – the whole establishment being therefore my own! "What a happy man am I! Ah! poor miserable Sheppard Lee! Farewell now to poverty! farewell to discontent!"

Such were my secret ejaculations as we set out in my splendid barouche, followed by a train of gigs and carriages that contained my friends. I esteemed myself the happiest man in the world; and I gave my last sigh to the memory of Sheppard Lee.

What a glorious time we had of it on our way to Philadelphia! I found myself the richest man in the company – my pocketbook was full of bank-notes – and I resolved to give my friends a blow-out. We stopped at a certain village, and at a certain hotel therein, the master of which prepares the best dinners, and has the best butt of genuine Madeira, in all New-Jersey. "Let us rest and rejoice," I said, "and we will drive into town after nightfall."

My friends agreed; we ate, drank, and were merry; and it was not until after sunrise the next morning that we found ourselves in Philadelphia, and in my – yes, excellent reader – in my house in Chestnut-street, south side, two doors from the corner of – But it is needless to be particular. The house is yet standing, in a highly aristocratic neighbourhood, and is not yet converted into a dry-goods shop.

I reached my house: I – But before I relate what befell me in that splendid pile of red bricks, which, like its neighbours, seems to be blushing all the year round at its naked simplicity, I must say a few words more of Sheppard Lee.