The String of Pearls; Or, The Barber of Fleet Street. A Domestic Romance.
If he had only had but a pair of pistols, he thought that not only would
he have escaped, but escaped likewise with the intense gratification of
destroying two of his enemies; but, then, he was totally unarmed, and if
they should succeed in coming up with him, he had not even the means of
self-destruction about him.
Indifferent horseman, however, as Todd was, even he could not help
seeing that he was far better mounted than those who were pursuing him
and so, from that circumstance, he gathered just a faint hope that he
might distance them by knocking up their steeds. From what he had
already experienced of the mettle of the horse he had got hold of so
providentially for him, he felt certain that if his pursuers were
obliged to come to a pause only for a quarter of an hour, he should be
able to place such a distance between him and them, that he might
consider himself to be in comparative, if not absolute safety.
To accomplish such a result, then, he felt that his plan was to keep
right on within their sight, and let them sooner be tired out by the
unwonted exertions that they would compel their inefficient cattle to
make, with the vain hope of overtaking him. But Todd had to do with a
man, in Colonel Jeffrey, who was quite equal to such an emergency.
A stern chace is a long chace, but an escape even at considerable speed
is a weary affair, with a foe directly behind; and the colonel
calculated that allowing Todd all the difference in speed between the
horses, it would be yet a long distance before he could throw them back
so far that they would not be in a position to take advantage of any
accident that might occur to him.
"Cool and easy, Ingestrie," he said; "it's a question of time, now. The
longer we can keep our horses on their legs, the better for us. Don't
urge your horse too much."
Todd had now reached a very wild and romantic part of the road. It wound
through a cutting in a mass of chalk, which, as it would be impossible
to surmount, and a tedious thing to go round, had been very roughly
levelled to the width of a road, and the sides were covered with rank
vegetation, for successive rains had washed down upon the face of the
chalk a facing of loam, from which had sprung up gigantic weeds, and
innumerable wild flowers.
Todd had got about half way through this place, when, from the other end
of it, there came a party of five horsemen.
One man rode at the head of the party upon a black horse, which had
evidently gone far that day. Todd and this man met face to face, and
they simultaneously pronounced each other's names.
"Sir Richard Blunt!" shrieked Todd.
"Sweeney Todd!" said the magistrate.
"Stop him!" shouted Ingestrie, as he and the colonel just got a sight of
the horsemen beyond Todd. "Stop him!"
With a yell, like that which might be supposed to come from a fiend,
Todd swerved from the grasp of Sir Richard Blunt, who made a dart at his
throat, and then, drawing up his knees, he gave his horse the rein, and
darting past Sir Richard, he dashed right into the midst of the party of
officers, who were behind, and fairly broke his way through them.
"Not yet--not yet!" he shouted. "Ha!--ha! not yet!"
"Fire!" cried Sir Richard Blunt.
The sharp report of four holster-pistols sounded in the narrow road-way.
Todd fell from his horse, and, terrified by the shots, the steed went
off without him at a mad gallop.
Twice Todd rolled over, and grasped handfuls of chalk and dust from the
road; and then he lay upon his back profoundly still. In an instant, Sir
Richard Blunt dismounted; and then Colonel Jeffrey and Mark Ingestrie
rode up to the spot.
"You have--have--" cried Ingestrie.
"Yes, at last, Mr. Ingestrie," said Sir Richard. "I had some information
that he was hovering about the coast, and came here to see you all. I am
sorry to defraud the gallows of its due: but there lies Todd!"
A couple of the officers now dismounted, while the others held their
horses, and they dragged the wretched man to the side of the road.
"Is he dead?" said Ingestrie.
"No," said Todd, opening his eyes. "He still lives to curse you all!
I--"
It was evident that he wished to say more; but he was bleeding
internally, and he began to struggle with the volumes of blood that rose
to his throat. With a horrible shriek, he rolled over on to his face,
and then, after one sharp convulsion of his limbs, he lay perfectly
still.
One of the officers turned him round again. One glance at the face was
sufficient. The guilty spirit of Sweeney Todd had fled at last to its
account!
"Dead," said Sir Richard Blunt. "Let the body lie here, and we will all
ride on to Brighton, and from there send some conveyance for it. Mr.
Ingestrie and you, Colonel Jeffrey, are witnesses of his end, and I can
only say that I feel now as if a heavy weight were lifted off my breast.
The good, and the kind, and true, need no longer live in fear of the
wild vengeance of this man. Let us hope that Heaven will have more mercy
upon his guilty soul than ever he had consideration for the sufferings
of others."
CHAPTER CLXXIII.
THE CONCLUSION.
We have little to say in conclusion, now that the chief actor in the
fearful Domestic Drama it has been our fate to record, is no more. Todd
was buried in the old church-yard at Brighton, but no record of the spot
where the murderer's bones decayed was preserved.
Sir Richard Blunt lived long to enjoy the respect and the admiration of
all who knew him, and died full of years and honours.
The sunshine of the existence of Johanna and Mark was perfectly
unclouded, and the colonel and Arabella, likewise, presented a true
picture of connubial felicity. In due time Tobias was married to her
whom he loved so well; and as he got older and more used to the world,
that timidity of disposition that Todd by his cruelties had induced,
entirely left him.
Ben did not marry after all, and he never ceased to congratulate himself
upon his escape. Mr. and Mrs. Oakley were happy in the happiness of
Johanna.
The mad-house at Peckham was completely pulled down, and in the well at
the back of it was found the skeleton of the wretched victim of Fogg's
villany. It was by his own hand that Fogg really died.
Often as Johanna would sit on a winter's evening, with her children
climbing upon her knee, she would, with a faltering voice, tell them
what their dear father had suffered to procure for her and for them THE
STRING OF PEARLS.
PUBLISHED BY E. LLOYD, SALISBURY-SQUARE, FLEET-STREET.
* * * * * *
Transcriber's note:
Archaic and colloquial spelling and punctuation were retained.
Chapter numbers were retained, even when mis-numbered.
Missing or obscured punctuation was corrected.
Typographical errors were silently corrected. Three unpaired
double quotation marks could not be corrected with confidence.