Benjamin Farjeon - Devlin the Barber

The manner in which I became intimately associated with a fearful mystery with which not only all London but all England was ringing, and the strange, inexplicable Being whom the course of events brought to my knowledge, are so startling and wonderful, that I have grown to believe that by no effort of the imagination, however wild and bewildering the labyrinths into which it may lead a man, can the actual realism of our everyday life be outrivalled. What I am about to narrate is absolutely true-somewhat of an unnecessary statement, for the reason that human fancy could never have invented it. To a person unfamiliar with the wondrous life of a great city like London the story may appear impossible, but there are thousands of men and women who will immediately recognise in it features with which they became acquainted through the columns of the newspapers. I venture to say that the leading incident by which one morning-it was but yesterday-the great city was thrilled and horrified can never be entirely effaced from their memories. Dark crimes and deeds of heroism, in which the incidents are pathetic or pitiful, draw even strangers into sympathetic relation with each other. These events come home to us, as it were. What happened to one whose face we have never seen, whose hand we have never grasped, may happen to us who move in the same familiar grooves of humanity. Our hopes and fears, our joys and sorrows, our duties and temptations, are the same, because we are human; and it is this common tie of kinship that will cause the story of Devlin the Barber to be received with more than ordinary interest. Now, for the first time is revealed, in these pages, the strange manner in which the fearful mystery in which it was enshrouded was unravelled. The facts are as I shall relate them, and whatever the impression they may create, a shuddering curiosity must inevitably be aroused as to the nature and movements of the inscrutable Being through whose instrumentality I was made the agent in revealing what would otherwise have remained for ever hidden from human knowledge. By a few incredulous persons-I refer to those to whom nothing spiritual is demonstrable-the existence of this Being may be doubted; but none the less does he live and move among us this very day, pursuing his mission with a purpose and to an end which it is not in the power of mortal insight to fathom. It is not unlikely that some of my readers may have come unconsciously in contact with him within the last few hours.

I am a struggling man-the phrase will be well understood, for the class to which I belong is a large one-and I reside in a neighbourhood which is neither very poor nor very fashionable. I have, of course, my friends and acquaintances, and among the most intimate of the former is a family of the name of Melladew.

Mr. Melladew is a reader in a printing-office in which a weekly newspaper is printed. Mrs. Melladew, with the assistance of one small servant, manages the home. They had two daughters, twins, eighteen years of age, named respectively Mary and Elizabeth. These girls were very beautiful, and were so much alike that they were frequently mistaken for one another. Mrs. Melladew has told me that when they were very young she was compelled to make some distinguishing mark in their dress to avoid confusion in her recognition of them, such as differently coloured socks or pieces of ribbon. The home of the Melladews was a happy one, and the sisters loved each other sincerely. They were both in outdoor employment, in the establishments of a general linendraper and a fashionable dressmaker. Mary was in the employment of the linendraper-Limbird's, in Regent Street. It is a firm of wide repute, and employs a great number of hands, some of whom sleep in the house. This was the case with Mary Melladew, who went to her work on Monday morning and did not return home until Saturday night. Elizabeth, or Lizzie as she was always called, was employed by Madame Michel, in Baker Street. She went to her work at half-past eight every morning and returned home at half-past seven every night.

The printing-office in which Mr. Melladew is engaged employs two readers, a night reader and a day reader. Mr. Melladew is the day reader, his hours being from nine in the morning till seven in the evening. But on Saturdays he has a much longer spell; he is due in the office at eight in the morning, and he remains until two or three hours past midnight-a stretch of eighteen or nineteen hours. By that time all the work for the Sunday edition of the weekly newspaper is done, and the outside pages are being worked off on the steam presses.

Now, upon the Saturday morning on which, so far as I am concerned, the enthralling interest of my story commences, certain important events had occurred in my career and in that of Mr. Melladew. Exactly one month previous to that day, the firm in which I had been employed for a great many years had given me a month's notice to leave. My dismissal was not caused by any lapse of duty on my part; it was simply that business had been for some time in a bad state, and that my employers found it necessary to reduce their staff. Among those who received notice to quit, I, unfortunately, was included. Therefore, when I rose on Saturday morning I was in the dismal position of a man out of work, my time having expired on the day before. This was of serious importance to me. With Mr. Melladew the case was different. In what unexpectedly occurred to him there was bright sunshine, to be succeeded by black darkness.

He had visited me on the Friday night, and I perceived at once that he was in a state of intense and pleasurable excitement.

"I have come to tell you some good news," he said.

For a moment I thought that this good news might affect myself, and might bring about a favourable turn in my affairs, but Mr. Melladew's next words dispelled the hope.

"I am the happiest man in London," he said.

I reflected gravely, but not enviously, upon my own position, and waited for Mr. Melladew to explain himself.

"Did I ever mention to you," he asked, "that I had a brother-in-law in Australia?"

"Yes," I replied, "you have spoken of him lately two or three times."

"So many years had passed," said Mr. Melladew, "since my wife heard from him that I had almost forgotten him. He is her brother, you know, and his name is Portland-Richard Portland. That was my wife's name before we were married-not Richard, of course, but Portland." He laughed, and rubbed his leg with his right hand; in his left hand was a letter. "It was about eight months ago that we received a letter from him, asking us to give him information about our family and circumstances. He did not say anything about his own, so we were left quite in the dark as to whether he was rich or poor, or a married man or a bachelor. However, my wife answered his letter, and sent him the pictures of our two girls, and in her letter she asked whether he was married and had a family, and said also that she would like him to send us their pictures. Well, we heard nothing further from him till to-day. Another letter came from him while I was at the office. You may read it; there is nothing private in it. It isn't from Australia; it is written from Southampton, you see. But that is not the only surprise in it."

I took the letter and read it. It was, indeed, a letter to give pleasurable surprise to the receiver. Without any announcement to Mr. Melladew of his intention, Mr. Portland had left Australia, and was now in Southampton. He intended to start by an early train on Saturday morning for London, and would come straight to his brother-in-law's house. In the letter he replied to the questions put by Mrs. Melladew. He was a bachelor, without family ties of any kind in Australia. Moreover, he had made his fortune, and it was the portraits of his two nieces which were the main cause of his return to England. Their beauty had evidently made a deep impression upon him. He spoke of them and of Mrs. Melladew in the most affectionate terms, and said it was a great pleasure to him to think that he was coming to a home which he hoped ho might look upon as partly his own. He sent his warmest love to them all, and in pleasantly tender words, the meaning of which could scarcely be mistaken, he desired a message to be given to his "dear nieces," to the effect that "their ship had come home." I handed the letter back to Mr. Melladew, and expressed my gratification at the good news.