IV.—­The Fate of the Rioters

The riots had been stamped out, and once more the city was quiet.

Barnaby sat in his dungeon.  Beside him, with his hand in hers, sat his mother; worn and altered, full of grief, and heavy-hearted, but the same to him.

“Mother,” he said, “how long—­how many days and nights—­shall I be kept here?”

“Not many, dear.  I hope not many.”

“If they kill me—­they may; I heard it said—­what will become of Grip?”

The sound of the word suggested to the raven his old phrase, “Never say die!” But he stopped short in the middle of it as if he lacked the heart to get through the shortest sentence.

“Will they take his life as well as mine?” said Barnaby.  “I wish they would.  If you and I and he could die together, there would be none to feel sorry, or to grieve for us.  Don’t you cry for me.  They said that I am bold, and so I am, and so I will be.”

The turnkey came to close the cells for the night, the widow tore herself away, and Barnaby was alone.

He was to die.  There was no hope.  They had tried to save him.  The locksmith had carried petitions and memorials to the fountain-head with his own hands.  But the well was not one of mercy, and Barnaby was to die.  From the first, his mother had never left him, save at night; and, with her beside him, he was contented.

“They call me silly, mother.  They shall see—­to-morrow.”

Dennis and Hugh were in the courtyard.  “No reprieve, no reprieve!  Nobody comes near us.  There’s only the night left now!” moaned Dennis.  “Do you think they’ll reprieve me in the night, brother?  I’ve known reprieves come in the night afore now.  Don’t you think there’s a good chance yet?  Don’t you?  Say you do.”

“You ought to be the best instead of the worst,” said Hugh, stopping before him.  “Ha, ha, ha!  See the hangman when it comes home to him.”

The clock struck.  Barnaby looked in his mother’s face, and saw that the time had come.  After a long embrace he rushed away, and they carried her away, insensible.

“See the hangman when it comes home to him!” cried Hugh, as Dennis, still moaning, fell down in a fit.  “Courage, bold Barnaby, what care we?  A man can die but once.  If you wake in the night, sing that out lustily, and fall asleep again.”

The time wore on.  Five o’clock had struck—­six—­seven—­and eight.  They were to die at noon, and in the crowd without it was said they could tell the hangman, when he came out, by his being the shorter one, and that the man who was to suffer with him was named Hugh; and that it was Barnaby Rudge who would be hanged in Bloomsbury Square.

At the first stroke of twelve the prison bell began to toll, and the three were brought forth into the yard together.

Barnaby was the only one who had washed or trimmed himself that morning.  He still wore the broken peacock’s feathers in his hat; and all his usual scraps of finery were carefully disposed about his person.