Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 434, page 19 by Various Authors
<< Return to Title Details & Download20
is: it is this brat, and the memories he recalls, that'----
Mrs Irwin screamed, and I stepped sharply into the room. The grasp of the lunatic was on the child's throat. I loosed it somewhat roughly, throwing him off with a force that brought him to the ground. He rose quickly, glared at me with tiger-like ferocity, and then darted out of the room. The affair had become serious, and the same night I posted a letter to Yorkshire, informing Mr Oxley of what had occurred, and suggesting the propriety of his immediately coming to London. Measures were also taken for securing Mrs Irwin and her son from molestation.
But the cunning of lunacy is not easily baffled. On returning home the fourth evening after the dispatch of my letter, I found the house and immediate neighbourhood in the wildest confusion. My own wife was in hysterics; Mrs Irwin, I was told by half-a-dozen tongues at once, was dying; and the frightful cause of all was, that little George Irwin, a favourite with everybody, had in some unaccountable manner fallen into the river Lea, and been drowned. This, at least, was the general conviction, although the river had been dragged to no purpose--the poor child's black beaver-hat and feather having been discovered floated to the bank, a considerable way down the stream. The body, it was thought, had been carried out into the Thames by the force of the current.
A terrible suspicion glanced across my mind. 'Where is Mr Renshawe?' I asked. Nobody knew. He had not been seen since five o'clock--about the time, I soon ascertained, that the child was missed. I had the house cleared, as quickly as possible, of the numerous gossips that crowded it, and then sought a conference with Dr Garland, who was with Mrs Irwin. The distracted mother had, I found, been profusely bled and cupped, and it was hoped that brain-fever, which had been apprehended, would not ensue. The physician's suspicions pointed the same way as mine; but he declined committing himself to any advice, and I was left to act according