Cranford, Chapter 10 - The Panic

Relax and drift off to sleep listening to the tenth chapter of Elizabeth Gaskell's gently humorous classic novel, in which, following Signor Brunoni's visit to Cranford, a spate of burglaries breaks out. Rumors circulate and some even speculate that the conjuror himself is involved.

For more gentle writing you might like Ted the Shed, also available on Free Tracks.

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Transcript

Hello,

It's Mandy here.

Welcome back to Cranford by Elizabeth Gaskell.

We've reached chapter 10.

But before I begin,

Just an interesting fact about Gaskell is that she did become popular for her writing during her lifetime and especially for her ghost stories,

Aided by Charles Dickens who published her work in his magazine Household Words.

Her ghost stories are quite gothic so they're very distinct from her works like Cranford.

So before I start reading,

Please go ahead and make yourself really comfortable.

Settle down into your chair or your bed.

Relax your hands.

Loosen your shoulders.

And just release your jaw which is a place where many of us carry a great deal of the day's tension.

That's great.

So if you're sitting or lying comfortably,

Then I'll begin.

Chapter 10.

The Panic.

I think a series of circumstances dated from Signor Brunoni's visit to Cranford,

Which seemed at the time connected in our minds with him,

Though I don't know that he had anything really to do with them.

But all at once,

All sorts of uncomfortable rumours got afloat in the town.

There were one or two robberies,

Real bona fide robberies,

Men had up before the magistrates and committed for trial.

And that seemed to make us all afraid of being robbed.

And for a long time at Miss Matty's,

I know,

We used to make a regular expedition all around the kitchens and cellars every night,

Miss Matty leading the way armed with the poker,

I following with the hearth brush and Martha carrying the shovel and fire irons with which to sound the alarm.

And by the accidental hitting together of them,

She often frightened us so much that we bolted ourselves up,

All three together in the back kitchen or storeroom or wherever we happened to be,

Till when our fright was over,

We recollected ourselves and set out afresh with double valiance.

By day,

We heard strange stories from the shopkeepers and cottagers of carts that went about in the dead of night,

Drawn by horses shod with felt and guarded by men in dark clothes going round the town,

No doubt in search of some unwatched house or some unfastened door.

Miss Pole,

Who affected great bravery herself,

Was the principal person to collect and arrange these reports so as to make them assume their most fearful aspect.

But we discovered that she had begged one of Mr Hoggin's worn out hats to hang up in her lobby and we,

Well at least I,

Had doubts as to whether she really would enjoy the little adventure of having her house broken into as she protested she would.

Miss Matty made no secret of being an errant coward but she went regularly through her housekeeper's duty of inspection.

Only the hour for this became earlier and earlier till at last we went the round at half past six and Miss Matty adjourned to bed soon after seven in order to get the night over the sooner.

Cranford had so long piqued itself on being an honest and moral town that it had grown to fancy itself too genteel and well-bred to be otherwise and felt the stain upon its character at this time doubly.

But we comforted ourselves with the assurance which we gave to each other that the robberies could never have been committed by any Cranford person.

It must have been a stranger or strangers who brought this disgrace upon the town and occasioned as many precautions as if we were living among the French.

This last comparison of our knightly state of defence and fortification was made by Mrs Forrester whose father had served under General Burgoyne in the American war and whose husband had fought the French in Spain.

She indeed inclined to the idea that in some way the French were connected with the small thefts which were ascertained facts and the burglaries and highway robberies which were rumours.

She had been deeply impressed with the idea of French spies at some time in her life and the notion could never be fairly eradicated but sprang up again from time to time.

And now her theory was this.

The Cranford people respected themselves too much and were too grateful to the aristocracy who were so kind as to live near the town ever to disgrace their bringing up by being dishonest or immoral.

Therefore we must believe that the robbers were strangers.

If strangers why not foreigners?

If foreigners who so likely as the French?

Signor Brunoni spoke broken English like a Frenchman and although he wore a turban like a Turk Mrs Forrester had seen a print of Madame de Stael with a turban on and another of Mr Denon in just such a dress as that in which the conjurer had made his appearance showing clearly that the French as well as the Turks wore turbans.

There could be no doubt Signor Brunoni was a Frenchman,

A French spy come to discover the weak and undefended places of England and doubtless he had accomplices.

For her part she,

Mrs Forrester,

Had always had her own opinion of Miss Pole's adventure at the George Inn seeing two men where only one was believed to be.

French people had ways and means which she was thankful to say the English knew nothing about and she had never felt quite easy in her mind about going to see that conjurer.

It was rather too much like a forbidden thing even though the rector was there.

In short Mrs Forrester grew more excited than we had ever known her before and being an officer's daughter and widow we looked up to her opinion of course.

Really I do not know how much was true or false in the reports which flew about like wildfire just at this time but it seemed to me then that there was every reason to believe that at Marden,

A small town about eight miles from Cranford,

Houses and shops were entered by holes made in the walls and bricks being silently carried away in the dead of night and all done so quietly that no sound was heard either in or out of the house.

Miss Matty gave it up in despair when she heard of this.

What was the use said she of locks and bolts and bells to the windows and going around the house every night.

That last trick was fit for a conjurer.

Now she did believe that Signor Brunoni was at the bottom of it.

One afternoon about five o'clock we were startled by a hasty knock at the door.

Miss Matty bade me run and tell Martha on no account to open the door until she,

Miss Matty,

Had reconnoitered through the window and she armed herself with a footstool to drop down on the head of the visitor in case he should show a face covered in black crepe as he looked up in answer to her inquiry of who was there.

But it was nobody except Miss Pole and Betty.

The former came upstairs carrying a little hand basket and she was evidently in a state of great agitation.

Take care of that,

She said to me as I offered to relieve her of her basket.

It's my plate.

I am sure there is a plan to rob my house tonight.

I am come to throw myself on your hospitality,

Miss Matty.

Betty is going to sleep with her cousin at the George.

I can sit up here all night if you will allow me but my house is so far from any neighbours and I don't believe we could be heard even if we screamed ever so.

But,

Said Miss Matty,

What has alarmed you so much?

Have you seen any men lurking about the house?

Oh yes,

Answered Miss Pole.

Two very bad looking men have gone three times past the house very slowly and an Irish beggar woman came not half an hour ago and all but forced herself in past Betty saying her children were starving and she must speak to the mistress.

You see,

She said mistress though there was a hat hanging up in the hall and it would have been more natural to have said master.

But Betty shut the door in her face and came up to me and we got the spoons together and sat in the parlour window watching till we saw Thomas Jones going from his work when we called to him and asked him to take care of us into the town.

We might have triumphed over Miss Pole who had professed such bravery until she was frightened but we were too glad to perceive that she shared in the weakness of humanity to exalt over her and I gave up my room to her very willingly and shared Miss Matty's bed for the night.

But before we retired the two ladies rummaged up out of the recesses of their memory such horrid stories of robbery and murder that I quite quaked in my shoes.

Miss Pole was evidently anxious to prove that such terrible events had occurred within her experience that she was justified in her sudden panic and Miss Matty did not like to be out done and capped every story with one yet more horrible till it reminded me oddly enough of an old story I had read somewhere of a nightingale and a musician who strove one against the other which could produce the most admirable music until poor Philomel dropped down dead.

One of their stories that haunted me for a long time afterwards was of a girl who was left in charge of a great house in Cumberland on some particular fair day when the other servants all went off to the gators.

The family were away in London and a peddler came by and asked to leave his large and heavy pack in the kitchen saying he would call for it again at night and the girl a gamekeeper's daughter roaming about in search of amusement chanced to hit upon a gun hanging up in the hall and took it down to look at the chasing and it went off through the open kitchen door hit the pack and a slow dark thread of blood came oozing out.

How Miss Pole enjoyed this part of the story dwelling on each word as if she loved it.

She rather hurried over the further account of the girl's bravery and I have but a confused idea that somehow she baffled the robbers with Italian irons heated red hot and then restored to blackness by being dipped in grease.

We parted for the night with an awe-stricken wonder as to what we should hear of in the morning and on my part with a vehement desire for the night to be over and gone I was so afraid lest the robbers should have seen from some dark lurking place that Miss Pole had carried off her plate and thus have a double motive for attacking our house.

But until Lady Glenmire came to call next day we heard of nothing unusual.

The kitchen fire irons were in exactly the same position against the back door as when Martha and I had skillfully piled them up like spillikens ready to fall with an awful clatter if only a cat had touched the outside panels.

I had wondered what we should do if thus awakened and alarmed and had proposed to Miss Mattie that we should cover up our faces under the bedclothes so that there could be no danger of the robbers thinking that we could identify them.

But Miss Mattie who was trembling very much scouted this idea and said we owed it to society to apprehend them and that she should certainly do her best to lay hold of them and lock them up in the garret till morning.

When Lady Glenmire came we almost felt jealous of her.

Mrs Jamieson's house had really been attacked.

At least there were men's footsteps to be seen on the flower borders underneath the kitchen windows where nay men should be and Carlo had barked all through the night as if strangers were abroad.

Mrs Jamieson had been awakened by Lady Glenmire and they had rung the bell which communicated with Mr Mulliner's room in the third story and when his knight-capped head had appeared over the banisters in answer to the summons they had told him of their alarm and the reasons for it.

Whereupon he retreated into his bedroom and locked the door for fear of draughts as he informed them in the morning and opened the window and called out valiantly to say if the supposed robbers would come to him he would fight them.

But as Lady Glenmire observed that was but poor comfort since they would have to pass by Mrs Jamieson's room and her own before they could reach him and must be of a very pugnacious disposition indeed if they neglected the opportunities of robbery presented by the unguarded lower stories to go up to a garret and therefore a door in order to get at the champion of the house.

Lady Glenmire after waiting and listening for some time in the drawing room had proposed to Mrs Jamieson that they should go to bed but that lady said she should not feel comfortable unless she sat up and watched and accordingly she packed herself warmly up on the sofa where she was found by the housemaid when she came into the room at six o'clock fast asleep but Lady Glenmire went to bed and kept awake all night.

When Miss Pole heard of this she nodded her head in great satisfaction.

She had been sure we should hear of something happening in Cranford that night and we had heard.

It was clear enough they had first proposed to attack her house but when they saw that she and Betty were on their guard and had carried off the plate they had changed their tactics and gone to Mrs Jamieson's and no one knew what might have happened if Carlo had not barked like a good dog as he was.

Poor Carlo his barking days were nearly over whether the gang who infested the neighbourhood were afraid of him or whether they were revengeful enough for the way in which he had baffled them on the night in question to poison him or whether as some among the more uneducated people thought he died of apoplexy brought on by too much feeding too little exercise.

At any rate it is certain that two days after this eventful night Carlo was found dead with his poor legs stretched out stiff in the attitude of running as if by such unusual exertion he could escape the sure pursuer death.

We were all sorry for Carlo the old familiar friend who had snapped at us for so many years and the mysterious mode of his death made us very uncomfortable.

Could Signor Brunoni be at the bottom of this?

He had apparently killed a canary with only a word of command his will seemed of deadly force who knew but that he might yet be lingering in the neighbourhood willing all sorts of awful things.

We whispered these fancies among ourselves in the evenings but in the mornings our courage came back with the daylight and in a week's time we had got over the shock of Carlo's death all but Mrs Jamieson.

She poor thing felt it as she had felt no event since her husband's death indeed Miss Paul said that as the Honourable Mr Jamieson drank a good deal and occasioned her much uneasiness it was possible that Carlo's death might be the greater affliction but there was always a tinge of cynicism in Miss Paul's remarks.

However one thing was clear and certain it was necessary for Mrs Jamieson to have some change of scene and Mr Mulliner was very impressive on this point shaking his head whenever we inquired after his mistress speaking of her loss of appetite and bad nights very ominously and with justice too but if she had two characteristics in her natural state of health they were a facility of eating and sleeping.

If she could neither eat nor sleep she must indeed be out of spirits and out of health.

Lady Glenmire who had evidently taken very kindly to Cranford did not like the idea of Mrs Jamieson's going to Cheltenham and more than once insinuated pretty plainly that it was Mr Mulliner's doing who had been much alarmed on the occasion of the house being attacked and since had said more than once that he felt it a very responsible charge to have to defend so many women.

Be that as it might Mrs Jamieson went to Cheltenham escorted by Mr Mulliner and Lady Glenmire remained in possession of the house her ostensible office being to take care that the maidservants did not pick up followers.

She made a very pleasant looking dragon and as soon as it was arranged for her stay in Cranford she found out that Mrs Jamieson's visit to Cheltenham was just the best thing in the world she had let her house in Edinburgh and was for the time houseless so the charge of her sister-in-law's comfortable abode was very convenient and acceptable.

Miss Pole was very much inclined to install herself as a heroine because of the decided steps she had taken in flying from the two men and one woman whom she entitled that murderous gang.

She described their appearance in glowing colours and I noticed that every time she went over the story some fresh trait of villainy was added to their appearance.

One was tall he grew to be gigantic in height before we had done with him.

He of course had black hair and by and by it hung in elf locks over his forehead and down his back.

The other was short and broad and a hump sprouted out on his shoulder before we heard the last of him.

He had red hair which deepened into carotid and she was almost sure he had a cast in the eye a decided squint.

As for the woman her eyes glared and she was masculine looking a perfect virago most probably a man dressed in woman's clothes.

Afterwards we heard of a beard on her chin and a manly voice and stride.

If Miss Pole was delighted to recount the events of that afternoon to all inquirers others were not so proud of their adventures in the robbery line.

Mr Hoggins the surgeon had been attacked at his own door by two ruffians who were concealed in the shadow of the porch and so effectually silenced him that he was robbed in the interval between ringing his bell and the servants answering it.

Miss Pole was sure it would turn out that this robbery had been committed by her man and went the very day she heard the report to have her teeth examined and to question Mr Hoggins.

She came to us afterwards so we heard what she had heard straight and direct from the source while we were yet in the excitement and flutter of the agitation caused by the first intelligence for the event had only occurred the night before.

Well said Miss Pole sitting down with the decision of a person who has made up her mind as to the nature of life and the world and such people never tread lightly or seat themselves without a bump.

Well Miss Matty men will be men every mother's son of them wishes to be considered Samson and Solomon rolled into one too strong ever to be beaten or discomforted too wise ever to be outwitted.

If you will notice they always foresee events though they never give warning before the events happened.

My father was a man and I know the sex pretty well she had talked herself out of breath and we should have been very glad to fill up the necessary pools as chorus but we didn't exactly know what to say or which man had suggested this diatribe against the sex so we only joined in generally with a grave shake of the head and a soft murmur of they are very incomprehensible certainly.

Now only think said she there I have undergone the risk of having one of my remaining teeth drawn for one is terribly at the mercy of any surgeon dentist and I for one always speak them fair till I've got my mouth out of their clutches and after all Mr Hoggins is too much of a man to own that he was robbed last night.

Not robbed exclaimed the chorus don't tell me Miss Pole exclaimed angry that we could be for a moment imposed upon I believe he was robbed just as Betty told me and he is ashamed to own it and to be sure it was very silly of him to be robbed just at his own door.

I dare say he feels such a thing won't raise him in the eyes of Cranford society and is anxious to conceal it but he need not have tried to impose upon me by saying I must have heard an exaggerated account of some petty theft of a neck of mutton which it seems was stolen out of the safe in his yard last week.

He had the impertinence to add he believed it was taken by a cat.

I have no doubt if I could get to the bottom of it it was that Irish man dressed up in woman's clothes who came spying about my house with the story about the starving children.

After we had duly condemned the want of candor which Mr Hoggins had evinced and abused men in general taking him for the representative and type we got round to the subject about which we've been talking when Miss Pole came in namely how far in the present disturbed state of the country we could venture to accept an invitation which Miss Matty had just received from Mrs Forrester to come as usual and keep the anniversary of her wedding day by drinking tea with her at five o'clock and playing a quiet pool afterwards.

Mrs Forrester had said that she asked us with some diffidence because the roads were she feared very unsafe but she suggested that perhaps one of us would not object to take the sedan and that the others by walking briskly might keep up with the long trot of the chairmen and so we might all arrive safely at Overplace a suburb of the town.

No,

Suburb is too large an expression a small cluster of houses separated from Cranford by about 200 yards of a dark and lonely lane.

There was no doubt but that a similar note was awaiting Miss Pole at home so her call was a very fortunate affair as it enabled us to consult all together.

We would all much rather have declined this invitation but we felt it wouldn't be quite kind to Mrs Forrester who would otherwise be left to a solitary retrospect of her not very happy or fortunate life.

Miss Matty and Miss Pole had been visitors on this occasion for many years and now they gallantly determined to nail their colours to the mast and to go through darkness and to go through darkness lane rather than failing loyalty to their friend.

But when the evening came Miss Matty for it was she who was voted into the chair as she had a cold before being shut down in the sedan like a jack-in-a-box implored the chairmen whatever might befall not to run away and leave her fastened up there to be murdered and even after they had promised I saw her tighten her features into the stern determination of a martyr and she gave me a melancholy and ominous shake of the head through the glass.

However we got there safely only rather out of breath for it was who could trot hardest through darkness lane and I'm afraid poor Miss Matty was sadly jolted.

Mrs Forrester had made extra preparations in acknowledgement of our exertion in coming to see her through such dangers.

The usual forms of genteel ignorance as to what her servants might send up were all gone through and harmony and preference seemed likely to be the order of the evening but for an interesting conversation that began I don't know how but which had relation of course to the robbers who infested the neighbourhood of Cranford.

Having braved the dangers of darkness lane and thus having a little stock of reputation for courage to fall back upon and also I dare say desirous of proving ourselves superior to men,

Mr Hoggins,

In the article of candour we began to relate our individual fears and the private precautions we each of us took.

I owned that my pet apprehension was eyes,

Eyes looking at me and watching me glittering out from some dull flat wooden surface and that if I dared to go up to my looking glass when I was panic stricken I should certainly turn it around with its back towards me for fear of seeing eyes behind me looking out of the darkness.

I saw Miss Matty nerving herself up for a confession and at last out it came.

She owned that ever since she'd been a girl she had dreaded being caught by her last leg just as she was getting into bed by someone concealed underneath it.

She said when she was younger and more active she used to take a flying leap from a distance and so bring both her legs up safely into bed at once but that this had always annoyed Deborah who piqued herself upon getting into bed gracefully and she had given it up in consequence.

But now the old terror would often come over her especially since Miss Pole's house had been attacked.

We had got quite to believe in the fact of the attack having taken place and yet it was very unpleasant to think of looking under a bed and seeing a man concealed with a great fierce face staring out at you.

So she had bethought herself of something.

Perhaps I had noticed that she had told Martha to buy her a penny ball such as children play with and now she rolled this ball under the bed every night.

If it came out on the other side well and good if not she always took care to have her hand on the bell rope and meant to call out John and Harry just as if she expected men servants to answer her ring.

We all applauded this ingenious contrivance and Miss Matty sank back into satisfied silence with a look at Mrs Forrester as if to ask for her private weakness.

Mrs Forrester looked askance at Miss Pole and tried to change the subject a little by telling us that she had borrowed a boy from one of the neighbouring cottages and promised his parents a hundredweight of coals at Christmas and his supper every evening for the loan of him at nights.

She had instructed him in his possible duties when he first came and finding him sensible she had given him the major's sword.

The major was her late husband and desired him to put it very carefully behind his pillow at night turning the edge towards the head of the pillow.

He was a sharp lad she was sure for spying out the major's cocked hat he had said if he might have that to wear he was sure he could frighten two Englishmen or four Frenchmen any day but she had impressed upon him and knew that he was to lose no time in putting on hats or anything else but if he heard any noise he was to run at it with his drawn sword.

Am I suggesting that some accident might occur from such slaughterous and indiscriminate directions and that he might rush on Jenny getting up to wash and have spitted her before he had discovered that she wasn't a Frenchman?

Mrs Forrester said she didn't think that was very likely but he was a very sound sleeper and generally had to be well shaken or cold pigged in a morning before they could rouse him.

She sometimes thought that such dead sleep must be owing to the hearty suppers the poor lad ate for he was half starved at home and she told Jenny to see that he got a good meal at night.

Still this was no confession of Mrs Forrester's peculiar timidity and we urged her to tell us what she thought would frighten her more than anything.

She paused and stirred the fire and snuffed the candles and then she said in a resounding whisper ghosts.

She looked at Miss Pole as much as to say she had declared it and she would stand by it.

Such a look was a challenge in itself.

Miss Pole came down upon her with indigestion,

Spectral illusions,

Optical delusions and a great deal out of Dr Ferrier and Dr Hibbert besides.

Miss Matty had rather a leaning to ghosts as I have mentioned before and what little she did say was all on Mrs Forrester's side who,

Emboldened by sympathy,

Protested that ghosts were a part of her religion,

That surely she,

The widow of a major in the army,

Knew what to be frightened at and what not.

In short,

I never saw Mrs Forrester so warm either before or since for she was a gentle,

Meek,

Enduring old lady in most things.

Not all the elder wine that ever was mulled could this night wash out the remembrance of this difference between Miss Pole and her hostess.

Indeed,

When the elder wine was brought in,

It gave rise to a new burst of discussion for Jenny,

The little maiden who staggered under the tray,

Had to give evidence of having seen a ghost with her own eyes not so many nights ago in Darkness Lane,

The very lane we were to go through on our way home.

In spite of the uncomfortable feeling which this last consideration gave me,

I couldn't help being amused at Jenny's position which was exceedingly like that of a witness being examined and cross-examined by two counsel who were not at all scrupulous about asking leading questions.

The conclusion I arrived at was that Jenny had certainly seen something beyond what a fit of indigestion would have caused.

A lady all in white and without her head was what she deposed and adhered to,

Supported by a consciousness of the secret sympathy of her mistress under the withering scorn with which Miss Pole regarded her.

And not only she but many others had seen this headless lady who sat by the roadside wringing her hands as in deep grief.

Mrs Forrester looked at us from time to time with an air of conscious triumph,

But then she had not to pass through Darkness Lane before she could bury herself beneath her own familiar bedclothes.

We preserved a discreet silence as to the headless lady while we were putting on our things to go home,

For there was no knowing how near the ghostly head and ears might be or what spiritual connection they might be keeping up with the unhappy body in Darkness Lane.

And therefore even Miss Pole felt it was as well not to speak lightly on such subjects for fear of vexing or insulting that woe-begone trunk.

At least so I conjecture,

For instead of the busy clatter usual in the operation,

We tied on our cloaks as sadly as mutes at a funeral.

Miss Mattie drew the curtains round the windows of the chair to shut out disagreeable sights,

And the men,

Either because they were in spirits that their labours were so nearly ended,

Or because they were going downhill,

Set off at such a round and merry pace that it was all Miss Pole and I could do to keep up with them.

She had breath for nothing beyond an imploring,

Don't leave me,

Uttered as she clutched my arm so tightly that I could not have quitted her,

Ghost or no ghost.

What a relief it was when the men,

Weary of their burden and their quick trot,

Stopped just where Headingley Causeway branches off from Darkness Lane.

Miss Pole unloosed me and caught at one of the men,

Could not you take Miss Mattie round by Headingley Causeway?

The pavement in Darkness Lane jolts so and she is not very strong.

A smothered voice was heard from the inside of the chair.

Oh pray,

Go on,

What is the matter,

What is the matter?

I will give you sixpence more to go on very fast,

Pray don't stop here.

And I'll give you a shilling,

Said Miss Pole with tremulous dignity,

If you'll go by Headingley Causeway.

The two men granted acquiescence and took up the chair and went along the causeway,

Which certainly answered Miss Pole's kind purpose of saving Miss Mattie's bones,

For it was covered with thick soft mud and even a fall there would have been easy until the getting up came,

When there might have been some difficulty in extrication.

To be continued.

Reviews

These readings are so charming and help me to sleep well. I also love learning about Gaskell at the beginning! Many thanks Mandy! 💞🕊️

My my! She does go on and on about this fearful business of robbers and how a bunch of frightened women imagine the worst! Fading in and out it was hard to follow, so I let myself fall asleep! Thanks, as always, Mandy.

I love these ladies. I noticed there is no music in the Cranford series and wondering why. I quite like the music in your other readings. Thanks Mandy 🙏🏻