find that not only was the garden-gate open, but that the street-door was unlocked; and pushing it gently open, they observed the reflection of a light at the end of the passage, upon which of course they both cried "Thieves!" and screamed for help. A man who was employed at Sadler's Wells happened to be passing at the time, and tendered his assistance.
"Do you wait here with Mrs. Lewis a minute," said Grimaldi's mother, "and I will go into the house; don't mind me unless you hear me scream; then come to my assistance." So saying, she courageously entered the passage, descended the stairs, entered the kitchen, hastily struck a light, and on lighting a candle and looking round, discovered that the place had been plundered of almost everything it contained.
She was running up stairs to communicate their loss, when Grimaldi and his friends arrived. Hearing what had occurred, they entered the house in a body, and proceeded to search it, narrowly, thinking it probable that some of the thieves, surprised upon the premises, might be still lurking there. In they rushed, the party augmented by the arrival of two watchmen—chosen, as the majority of that fine body of men invariably were, with a specific view to their old age and infirmities—and began their inspection: the women screaming and crying, and the men all shouting together.
The house was in a state of great disorder and confusion, but no thieves were to be seen; the cupboards were forced, the drawers had been broken open, and every article they contained had been removed, with the solitary exception of a small net shawl, which had been worked by Miss Hughes, and given by her to her chosen mother-in-law.
Leaving the others to search the house, and the females to bewail their loss, which was really a very severe one, Grimaldi beckoned a Mr. King, one of the persons who had accompanied him home from the theatre, and suggested in a whisper that they should search the garden together.
King readily complied, and he having armed himself with a heavy stick, and Grimaldi with an old broadsword which he had hastily snatched from its peg on the first alarm, they crept cautiously into the back garden, which was separated from those of the houses on either side by a wall from three to four feet high, and from a very extensive piece of pasture-land beyond it at the bottom, by another wall two or three feet higher.
It was a dark night, and they groped about the garden for some time, but found nobody. Grimaldi sprang upon the higher wall, and looking over the lower one, descried a man in the act of jumping from the wall of the next garden. Upon seeing another figure the robber paused, and taking it for that of his comrade in the darkness of the night, cried softly, "Hush! hush! is that you?"
"Yes!" replied Grimaldi, getting as near him as he could. Seeing that the man, recognising the voice as a strange one, was about to jump down, he dealt him a heavy blow with the broadsword. He yelled out loudly, and stopping for an instant, as if in extreme pain, dropped to the ground, limped off a few paces, and was lost in the darkness.
Grimaldi shouted to his friend to follow him through the back gate, but seeing, from his station on the wall, that he and the thief took directly opposite courses, he leapt into the field, and set off at full speed. He was stopped in the very outset of his career, by tumbling over a cow, which was lying on the ground, in which involuntary pantomimic feat he would most probably have cut his own head off with the weapon he carried, if his theatrical practice as a fencer had not taught him to carry edge tools with caution.
The companion having taken a little run by himself, soon returned out of breath, to say he had seen nobody, and they re-entered the house, where by the light of the candle it was seen that the sword was covered with blood.
The constable of the night had arrived by this time; and a couple of watchmen bearing large lanterns, to show the thieves they were coming, issued forth into the field, in hopes of taking the offenders alive or dead—they would have preferred the latter;—and of recovering any of the stolen property that might be scattered about. The direction which the wounded man had taken having been pointed out, they began to explore, by very slow degrees.
Bustling about, striving to raise the spirits of the party, and beginning to stow away in their proper places such articles as the thieves had condescended to leave, one of the first things Grimaldi chanced to light upon was Miss Hughes's shawl.
"Maria's gift, at all events," he said, taking it up and giving it a slight wave in his hand; when out fell a lozenge-box upon the floor, much more heavily than a lozenge-box with any ordinary lozenges inside would do.
Upon this the mother clapped her hands, and set up a louder scream than she had given vent to when she found the house robbed.
"My money! my money!" she screamed.
"It can't be helped, my dear madam," said everybody; "think of poor Mrs. Lewis; she is quite as badly off."
"Oh, I don't mean that," was the reply. "Oh! thank Heaven, they didn't find my money." So with many half-frantic exclamations, she picked up the lozenge-box, and there, sure enough, were thirty-seven guineas, (it was completely full,) which had lain securely concealed beneath the shawl!
They sat down to supper; but although Mrs. Grimaldi[20] now cheered up wonderfully, and quite rallied her friend upon her low spirits, poor Mrs. Lewis, who had found no lozenge-box, was quite unable to overcome her loss. Supper over, and some hot potations, which the fright had rendered absolutely necessary, despatched, the friends departed, and the usual inmates of the house were left alone to make such preparations for passing the night as they deemed fitting.
[20] Mrs. Brooker.
They were ludicrous enough: upon comparing notes, it was found that nobody could sleep alone, upon which they came to the conclusion, that they had better all sleep in the same room. For this purpose, a mattress was dragged into the front parlour, upon which the two females bestowed themselves without undressing; Lewis sat in an easy chair; and Grimaldi, having loaded two pistols, wiped the sanguinary stains from the broadsword, and laid it by his side, drew another easy-chair near the door, and there mounted guard.
All had been quiet for some time, and they were falling asleep, when they were startled by a long loud knocking at the back-door, which led into the garden. They all started up and gazed upon each other, with looks of considerable dismay. The females would have screamed, only they were too frightened; and the men would have laughed it off, but they were quite unable from the same cause to muster the faintest smile.
Grimaldi was the first to recover the sudden shock, which the supposed return of the robbers had communicated to the party, and turning to Lewis, said, with one of his oddest looks,
"You had better go to the back-door, old boy, and see who it is."
Mr. Lewis did not appear quite satisfied upon the point. He reflected for a short time, and looking with a very blank face at his wife, said he was much obliged to Mr. Grimaldi, but he would rather not.
In this dilemma, it was arranged that Lewis should wait in the passage, and that Grimaldi should creep softly up stairs, and reconnoitre the enemy from the window above—a plan which Lewis thought much more feasible, and which was at once put in execution.
While these deliberations were going forward, the knocking had continued without cessation, and it now began to assume a subdued and confidential tone, which, instead of subduing their alarm, rather tended to increase it. Armed with the two pistols and the broadsword, and looking much more like Robinson Crusoe than either the "Shipwrecked Mariner," or the "Little Clown," Grimaldi thrust his head out of the window, and hailed the people below, in a voice which, between agitation and a desire to communicate to the neighbours the full benefit of the discussion, was something akin to that in which his well-known cry of "Here we are!" afterwards acquired so much popularity.
It was between two and three o'clock in the morning—the day was breaking, and the light increasing fast. He could descry two men at the door heavily laden with something, but with what he could not discern. All he could see was, that it was not fire-arms, and that was a comfort.
"Hollo! hollo!" he shouted out of the window, displaying the brace of pistols