---I hope we shall have your portrait published?'
'This morning, sir,' said the locksmith, taking no notice of these
compliments, 'early this morning, a message was brought to me from
Newgate, at this man's request, desiring that I would go and see him,
for he had something particular to communicate. I needn't tell you
that he is no friend of mine, and that I had never seen him, until the
rioters beset my house.'
Sir John fanned himself gently with the newspaper, and nodded.
'I knew, however, from the general report,' resumed Gabriel, 'that the
order for his execution to-morrow, went down to the prison last night;
and looking upon him as a dying man, I complied with his request.'
'You are quite a Christian, Mr Varden,' said Sir John; 'and in that
amiable capacity, you increase my desire that you should take a chair.'
'He said,' continued Gabriel, looking steadily at the knight, 'that he
had sent to me, because he had no friend or companion in the whole world
(being the common hangman), and because he believed, from the way in
which I had given my evidence, that I was an honest man, and would act
truly by him. He said that, being shunned by every one who knew his
calling, even by people of the lowest and most wretched grade, and
finding, when he joined the rioters, that the men he acted with had no
suspicion of it (which I believe is true enough, for a poor fool of an
old 'prentice of mine was one of them), he had kept his own counsel, up
to the time of his being taken and put in jail.
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