University of Virginia Library

2. CHAPTER II.

Up stairs went Bogle, two steps at a Time. The door of
thirty-two slammed, as he reached the door of his apartment;
it slammed on a brown coat-tail, about half a yard of which
remained on the outside; there was a muttered ejaculation,
then a deep growl, and—rip! went the coat-tail, the fragment
remaining in the door.

“Gracious! Goodness!” said Bogle, “what a passionate
man! he's torn it off! he's like Halley's comet; no! that

never had a tail! he's like that fox,”—and Bogle entered his
apartment.

Here sat his interesting wife, rocking their offspring, and
instilling into its infant mind the first lesson of practical
economy, by singing that popular nursery refrain,

“Hush!” said Bogle, as he entered on tip-toe, and, carefully
closing the door of thirty-one, held up a warning finger
to the partner of his joys and sorrows. The lullaby ceased.
It is said that all women become like their husbands after a
certain time, both in appearance and disposition. Mrs.
Bogle, who had been a Miss Artemesia Stackpole before marriage
(Bogle said she was named for an elder sister, Mesia,
who died, and she was called Arter-mesia), certainly did not
at all resemble her husband in appearance. She was of the
thread-paper order; one of those gaunt, bony females of no
particular age, who always have two false eye-teeth, and wear
brown merino dresses and muslin night-caps with a cotton
lace border, in the morning. But in disposition she was his
very counterpart. Curious, meddling, inquisitive, fond of
gossip and indefatigable in “the pursuit of knowledge under
difficulties,” she was an invaluable coadjutor to Bogle, whom
she had materially assisted many times in obtaining information,
that even his prying nature had failed to accomplish.
Eagerly she listened to his tale about the mysterious Brown
and his tail, and, like a good and dutiful wife, all quietly she

nursed the olive branch, while Bogle, seated in close proximity
to the partition, listened with eager ear, intent, to the
motions of their neighbor.

Three times in as many quarters of an hour did that
mysterious General ring the bell; three times came up the
waiter; three times he replied to the General's anxious
question, “that no one had called for him,” and three times
he went down again. After each interview with the waiter,
Bogle listening at the partition, heard the General mutter to
himself a large word, a scriptural word, but not adapted to
common conversation; it began with a capital D and ended
with a small n. Each time that he heard it, Bogle said
“Gracious! Goodness!” At length his patient exertions
were rewarded. As the clock struck ten, a step was heard
upon the stairs; nearer and nearer it came. Bogle's heart
beat heavily; it stopped in front of “thirty-two;”—he held
his breath;—a knock;—the General's voice, “Come in;”—
he heard the door open, and the stranger commence with
“Good evening, General,” but before he could say “Brown,”
that gentleman exclaimed, “Charles, have you seen Fanny?”

Bogle, his ear glued to the wall, turned his eye toward
his wife and beckoned. Artemesia approached, and seating
herself on his knee, the infant clasped to her breast, listened
with her husband.

The stranger slowly replied, “I have.”

“And who was she with?”

“That Frenchman, as you supposed.”

“Good God!” exclaimed the stricken Brown, as in agony

he paced the room with fearful strides. There was a moment's
silence.

“Did you take her from him?”

“Yes, I persuaded her to accompany me to my room at
`The Union.”'

“Why did you not bring her to me at once?”

“I knew your passionate nature, General, and I feared
you would kill her.”

“I will!” growled the General, “By Heaven, I will!—
but not so—not as you think; I'll poison her!”

Bogle, his face pallid with apprehension, his teeth chattering
with fear, looked at Artemesia;”—she met his horror-stricken
gaze, and with a subdued shriek, clasped the baby;
—it awoke.

The General, in a low, deep voice of concentrated passion,
continued;—“I'll poison her, Charles!”

“Oh!” he exclaimed with deep emotion, “how I have
loved that—”

Here the infant Bogle, who had been drawing in his
breath for a cry, broke forth;—“At once there rose so wild
a yell.” Human nature could not stand it longer.

“Smother that little villain!” said Bogle in a fierce
whisper; “I can't hear a word.”

Artemesia, with the look of Lucretia Borgia, withdrew
with the child to the adjoining room, (No. 31, Tehama,
contains two rooms, a small parlor and a bed-chamber), and
administered a punishment that must have astonished it—

it was certainly struck aback. If babies remember any
thing, that youthful Bogle has not forgotten that bastinado—
applied a little higher up than is customary among the
Turks—to this day. “At length the tumult dwindled to a
calm,” and again Bogle clapped his ear to the wall. He
heard but the concluding words of the murderous General—

“Bring her up with you at ten o'clock to-morrow evening,
and a sack; after it is over, we will put her body in it, and
carry her to Meiggs' wharf, where there are plenty of brick;
we can fill the sack with them and throw her off.”

“Well, sir,” replied the stranger, “if you are determined
to do it, I will; but poor Fanny!”—here emotion choked
his utterance.

“You do as I tell you, sir;” growled the General, “there's
no weakness about me!” Here the door opened and closed.

Bogle rose from his knees, the perspiration was running
down his fat face in streams.—“No weakness,” said he,
“Goodness Gracious! I should say not;—what an awful
affair;—coming so close, too, upon the Meiggs' forgeries,
and the loss of the Yankee Blade;—how providential that
I happened to overhear it all! Gracious Goodness!”

That night, in a whispered consultation with his Artemesia,
Bogle's plan of action was decided upon. But long
after this, and long after the horror-stricken pair had sunk
into a perturbed slumber, the footsteps of the intended murderer
might have been heard, as hour after hour he paced
the floor of his solitary chamber, and his deep voice might

have been heard also, occasionally giving vent to his fell
determination—“Yes, sir! I'll-mur-der!!!!—!!!!—
!!!—!