The Penny Dreadfuls MEGAPACK™ (301 page)

‘I do not think it probable, but it has struck me that, if we obtain any information whatever of Thornhill, it will be in consequence of these very pearls. They are of great value, and not likely to be overlooked; and yet, unless a customer be found for them, they are of no value at all; and nobody buys jewels of that character but from the personal vanity of making, of course, some public display of them.’

‘That is true; and so, from hand to hand, we might trace those pearls until we come to the individual who must have had them from Thornhill himself, and who might be forced to account most strictly for the manner in which they came into his possession.’

After some more desultory conversation upon the subject, it was agreed that Colonel Jeffery should take a bed there for the night at Lime Tree Lodge, and that, in the morning, they should both start for London, and, disguising themselves as respectable citizens, make some attempts, by talking about jewels and precious stones, to draw out the barber into a confession that he had something of the sort to dispose of; and, moreover, they fully intended to take away the dog, with the care of which Captain Rathbone charged himself.

We may pass over the pleasant, social evening which the colonel passed with the amiable family of the Rathbones, and skipping likewise a conversation of some strange and confused dreams which Jeffery had during the night concerning his friend Thornhill, we will presume that both the colonel and the captain have breakfasted, and that they have proceeded to London and are at the shop of a clothier in the neighbourhood of the Strand, in order to procure coats, wigs, and hats, that should disguise them for their visit to Sweeney Todd.

Then, arm-in-arm, they walked towards Fleet-street, and soon arrived opposite the little shop within which there appears to be so much mystery.

‘The dog you perceive is not here,’ said the colonel; ‘I had my suspicions, however, when I passed with Johanna Oakley that something was amiss with him, and I have no doubt but that the rascally barber has fairly compassed his destruction.’

‘If the barber be innocent,’ said Captain Rathbone, ‘you must admit that it would be one of the most confoundedly annoying things in the world to have a dog continually at his door assuming such an aspect of accusation, and in that case I can scarcely wonder at his putting the creature out of the way.

‘No, presuming upon his innocence, certainly; but we will say nothing about all that, and remember we must come in as perfect strangers, knowing nothing whatever of the affair of the dog, and presuming nothing about the disappearance of anyone in this locality.’

‘Agreed, come on; if he should see us through the window, hanging about at all or hesitating, his suspicions will be at once awakened, and we shall do no good.’

They both entered the shop and found Sweeney Todd wearing an extraordinary singular appearance, for there was a black patch over one of his eyes, which was kept in its place by a green ribbon that went round his head, so that he looked more fierce and diabolical than ever; and having shaved off a small whisker that he used to wear, his countenance, although to the full as hideous as ever, certainly had a different character of ugliness to that which had before characterised it, and attracted the attention of the colonel.

That gentleman would hardly have known him again anywhere but in his own shop, and when we come to consider Sweeney’s adventures of the preceding evening, we shall not feel surprised that he saw the necessity of endeavouring to make as much change in his appearance as possible for fear he should come across any of the parties who had chased him, and who, for all he knew to the contrary, might, quite unsuspectingly, drop in to be shaved in the course of the morning, perhaps to retail at that acknowledged mart for all sorts of gossip—a barber’s shop—some of the very incidents which he was so well qualified himself to relate.

‘Shaved and dressed, gentlemen,’ said Sweeney Todd, as his customers made their appearance.

‘Shaved only,’ said Captain Rathbone, who had agreed to be the principal spokesman, in case Sweeney Todd should have any reminiscence of the colonel’s voice, and so suspect him.

‘Pray be seated,’ said Sweeney Todd to Colonel Jeffery. ‘I’ll soon polish off your friend, sir, and then I’ll begin upon you. Would you like to see the morning paper, sir? I was just looking myself, sir, at a most mysterious circumstance, if it’s true, but you can’t believe, you know, all that is put in the papers.’

‘Thank you—thank you,’ said the colonel.

Captain Rathbone sat down to be shaved, for he had purposely omitted that operation at home, in order that it should not appear a mere excuse to get into Sweeney Todd’s shop.

‘Why, sir,’ continued Sweeney Todd, ‘as I was saying, it is a most remarkable circumstance.

‘Indeed!’

‘Yes, sir, an old gentleman of the name of Fidler had been to receive a sum of money at the west-end of the town, and has never been heard of since; that was only yesterday, sir, and there is a description of him in the papers of today.’

‘”A snuff-coloured coat, and velvet smalls—black velvet, I should have said—silk stockings, and silver shoe-buckles, and a golden-headed cane, with W. D. F. upon it, meaning William Dumpledown Fidler”—a most mysterious affair, gentlemen.’

A sort of groan came from the corner of the shop, and, on the impulse of the moment, Colonel Jeffery sprang to his feet, exclaiming, ‘What’s that—what’s that?’

‘Oh, it’s only my apprentice, Tobias Ragg. He has got a pain in his stomach from eating too many of Lovett’s pork pies. Ain’t that it, Tobias, my bud?’

‘Yes, sir,’ said Tobias, with another groan.

‘Oh, indeed,’ said the colonel, ‘it ought to make him more careful for the future.’

‘It’s to be hoped it will, sir; Tobias, do you hear what the gentleman says: it ought to make you more careful in future. I am too indulgent to you, that’s the fact. Now, sir, I believe you are as clean shaved as ever you were in your life.’

‘Why, yes,’ said Captain Rathbone, ‘I think that will do very well, and now, Mr Green,’—addressing the colonel by that assumed name—‘and now, Mr Green, be quick, or we shall be too late for the duke, and so lose the sale of some of our jewels.’

‘We shall indeed,’ said the colonel, ‘if we don’t mind. We sat too long over our breakfast at the inn, and his grace is too rich and too good a customer to lose—he don’t mind what price he gives for things that take his fancy, or the fancy of his duchess.’

‘Jewel merchants, gentlemen, I presume,’ said Sweeney Todd.

‘Yes, we have been in that line for some time; and by one of us trading in one direction, and the other in another, we manage extremely well, because we exchange what suits our different customers, and keep up two distinct connections.’

‘A very good plan,’ said Sweeney Todd. ‘I’ll be as quick as I can with you, sir. Dealing in jewels is better than shaving.’

‘I dare say it is.’

‘Of course it is, sir; here have I been slaving for some years in this shop, and not done much good—that is to say, when I talk of not having done much good, I admit I have made enough to retire upon, quietly and comfortably, and I mean to do so very shortly. There you are, sir, shaved with celerity you seldom meet with, and as clean as possible, for the small charge of one penny. Thank you, gentlemen—there’s your change; good-morning.’

They had no resource but to leave the shop; and when they had gone, Sweeney Todd, as he stropped the razor he had been using upon his hand, gave a most diabolical grin, muttering,-

‘Clever—very ingenious—but it wouldn’t do. Oh dear no, not at all! I am not so easily taken in—diamond merchants, ah! ah! and no objection, of course, to deal in pearls—a good jest that, truly a capital jest. If I had been accustomed to be so defeated, I had not now been here a living man. Tobias, Tobias, I say!’

‘Yes, sir,’ said the lad, dejectedly.

‘Have you forgotten your mother’s danger in case you breathe a syllable of anything that has occurred here, or that you think has occurred here, or so much as dream of?’

‘No,’ said the boy, ‘indeed I have not. I never can forget it, if I were to live a hundred years.’

‘That’s well, prudent, excellent, Tobias. Go out now, and if those two persons who were here last waylay you in the street, let them say what they will, and do you reply to them as shortly as possible; but be sure you come back to me quickly, and report what they do say. They turned to the left, towards the city—now be off with you.’

* * * *

‘It’s of no use,’ said Colonel Jeffery to the captain; ‘the barber is either too cunning for me, or he is really innocent of all participation in the disappearance of Thornhill.’

‘And yet there are suspicious circumstances. I watched his countenance when the subject of jewels was mentioned, and I saw a sudden change come over it; it was but momentary, but still it gave me a suspicion that he knew something which caution alone kept within the recesses of his breast. The conduct of the boy, too, was strange; and then again, if he has the string of pearls, their value would give him all the power to do what he says he is about to do—viz., to retire from business with an independence.’

‘Hush! there did you see the lad?’

‘Yes; why it’s the barber’s boy.’

‘It is the same lad he called Tobias—shall we speak to him?’

‘Let’s make a bolder push, and offer him an ample reward for any information he may give us.’

‘Agreed, agreed.’

They both walked up to Tobias, who was listlessly walking along the streets, and when they reached him, they were both struck with the appearance of care and sadness that was upon the boy’s face.

He looked perfectly haggard, and careworn—an expression sad to see upon the face of one so young, and, when the colonel accosted him in a kindly tone he seemed so unnerved that tears immediately darted to his eyes, although at the same time he shrank back as if alarmed.

‘My lad,’ said the colonel, ‘you reside, I think, with Sweeney Todd, the barber. Is he not a kind master to you that you seem so unhappy?’

‘No, no, that is, I mean yes, I have nothing to tell. Let me pass on.’

‘What is the meaning of this confusion?’

‘Nothing, nothing.’

‘I say, my lad, here is a guinea for you, if you will tell us what became of the man of a seafaring appearance, who came with a dog to your master’s house, some days since to be shaved.’

‘I cannot tell you,’ said the boy, ‘I cannot tell you, what I do not know.’

‘But, you have some idea, probably. Come, we will make it worth your while, and thereby protect you from Sweeney Todd. We have the power to do so, and all the inclination; but you must be quite explicit with us, and tell us frankly what you think, and what you know concerning the man in whose fate we are interested.’

‘I know nothing, I think nothing,’ said Tobias. ‘Let me go, I have nothing to say, except that he was shaved, and went away.’

‘But how came he to leave his dog behind him?’

‘I cannot tell, I know nothing.’

‘It is evident that you do know something, but hesitate either from fear or some other motive to tell it; as you are inaccessible to fair means, we must resort to others, and you shall at once come before a magistrate, which will force you to speak out.’

‘Do with me what you will,’ said Tobias, ‘I cannot help it. I have nothing to say to you, nothing whatever. Oh, my poor mother, if it were not for you—’

‘What, then?’

‘Nothing! nothing! nothing!’

It was but a threat of the colonel to take the boy before a magistrate, for he really had no grounds for so doing; and if the boy chose to keep a secret, if he had one, not all the magistrates in the world could force words from his lips that he felt not inclined to utter; and so, after one more effort, they felt that they must leave him.

‘Boy,’ said the colonel, ‘you are young, and cannot well judge of the consequences of particular lines of conduct; you ought to weigh well what you are about, and hesitate long before you determine keeping dangerous secrets; we can convince you that we have the power of completely protecting you from all that Sweeney Todd could possibly attempt. Think again, for this is an opportunity of saving yourself perhaps from much future misery that may never arise again.’

‘I have nothing to say,’ said the boy, ‘I have nothing to say.’

He uttered these words with such an agonised expression of countenance, that they were both convinced he had something to say, and that, too, of the first importance—a something which would be valuable to them in the way of information, extremely valuable probably, and yet which they felt the utter impossibility of wringing from him.

They were compelled to leave him, and likewise with the additional mortification, that, far from making any advance in the matter, they had placed themselves and their cause in a much worse position, in so far as they had awakened all Sweeney Todd’s suspicions if he were guilty, and yet advanced not one step in the transaction.

And then to make matters all the more perplexing, there was still the possibility that they might be altogether upon a wrong scent, and that the barber of Fleet-street had no more to do with the disappearance of Mr Thornhill than they had themselves.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

THE STRANGER AT LOVETT’S

Towards the dusk of the evening in that day, after the last batch of pies at Lovett’s had been disposed of, there walked into the shop a man most miserably clad, and who stood for a few moments staring with weakness and hunger at the counter before he spoke.

Mrs Lovett was there, but she had no smile for him, and instead of its usual bland expression, her countenance wore an aspect of anger, as she forestalled what the man had to say, by exclaiming,-

‘Go away, we never give to beggars.’

There came a flash of colour, for a moment, across the features of the stranger, and then he replied,-

‘Mistress Lovett, I do not come to ask alms of you, but to know if you can recommend me to any employment?’

‘Recommend you! recommend a ragged wretch like you!’

‘I am a ragged wretch, and, moreover, quite destitute. In better times I have sat at your counter, and paid cheerfully for what I have wanted, and then one of your softest smiles has been ever at my disposal. I do not say this as a reproach to you, because the cause of your smile was well-known to be a self-interested one, and when that cause has passed away, I can no longer expect it; but I am so situated that I am willing to do anything for a mere subsistence.’