The String of Pearls; Or, The Barber of Fleet Street. A Domestic Romance.

vapour. The present we can grasp--ha!" "What is our wealth, Todd?" "Hundreds of thousands." He shaded his eyes with his hands, and peered from the parlour into the shop. "Who is that keeps dodging past the window each moment, and peeping in at every convenient open space in the glass that he can find?" Mrs. Lovett looked, and then, after an effort, she said-- "Todd, I was going to speak to you of that man." "Ah!" "Listen; I suspect him. For some days past he has haunted the shop, and makes endeavours to become acquainted with me. I did not think it sound policy wholly to shun him, but gave him such encouragement as might supply me with opportunities of judging if he were a spy or not." "Humph!" "I think him dangerous." Todd's eyes glistened like burning coals. "Should he come into your shop to be shaved, Todd--" "Ha! ha!" The horrible laugh rang through the place, and Mrs. Lovett's lover, with the moustache, sprung to the other side of Bell Yard, for the unearthly sound even reached his ears as he was peeping through the window to catch a glimpse of the charming widow. "You understand me, Todd?" "Perfectly--perfectly--I shall know him again. Ah, my dear Mrs. Lovett, how dangerous it is to be safe in this world. Even our virtue cannot escape detraction; but we will live in hopes of better times. You and I will show the world, yet, what wealth is." "Yes--yes." Todd crept close to her, and was about to place his arm round her waist, but she started from him, exclaiming-- "No--no, Todd--a thousand times no. Have we not before quarrelled upon this point. Do not approach me, or our compact, infernal as it is, is at an end. I have sold my soul to you, but I have not bartered myself." The expression of Todd's countenance at this juncture was that of an incarnate fiend. He glared at Mrs. Lovett as though with the horrible fascination of his ugliness he would overcome her, and then slowly rising, he said-- "Her soul--ha! She has sold her soul to me--ha! I will call to-morrow." He left the shop, and as he passed the gent who, by force of his moustache, hoped to win the affections of Mrs. Lovett, he gave him such a look that he terrified him and the gent found himself in the shop before he was aware. "Bless me, what a horrid looking fellow! I swear by my courage and honour I never saw such a face. Ah, my charmer! Who was that left your charming presence just now?" "Some one who came for a pie." "'Pon honour, he's enough to poison all the pies! Oh, you beauty, yo--ou--ou--ou--" The gallant's mouth was so full of a veal pie that he had stuffed into it that for some few moments he could not produce an intelligible sound. When he had recovered, he walked into the parlour and sat down, saying-- "Now, Mrs. Lovett, here am I, 'pon honour, your humble servant, and stop my breath if I'd say as much to the commander-in-chief. When's the happy day to be?" "Do you really love me?" "Do I love you? Do I love fighting? Do I love honour--glory? Do I love eating and drinking? Do I love myself?" "Ah, Major Bounce, you military men are so gallant." "'Pon honour we are. General Cavendish used to say to me--'Bounce,' says he, 'if you don't make your fortune by war, which you ought to do, Bounce, 'pon honour, you will make it by love.' 'General,' says I--now I was always ready for a smart answer, Mrs. Lovett--so 'General,' says I, 'the same to you!'" "Very smart." "Yes, wasn't it. 'Pon honour it was, and 'pon soul you looks more and more charming every day that I see you." "Oh you flatterer!" "No--no. Bar flattering--bar flattering. His Majesty has often said, 'Talk of flattery. Oh dear, Bounce is the man for me. He is right down--straight up-off handed. And no sort of mistake, on--on--on.'" Another pie converted the oratory of the major into something between a grunt and a sigh. "But major, I'm afraid that you will regret marrying me. If I convert all I have into money"--the major pricked up his ears--"I could not make of it more than fifty thousand pounds." The major's eyes opened to the size of pint saucers, as he said-- "Fifty--fift--fif.--Say it again!" "Fifty thousand pounds." The major rose and embraced Mrs. Lovett. Tears actually came into his eyes, and gulping down the pie, he cried-- "You have fifty thousand charms. Only let me be your slave, your dog, damme--your dog, Mrs. Lovett, and I shall consider myself the luckiest dog in the world, but not for the money--not for the money. No, as the Marquis of Cleveland once said, 'If you want a thoroughly disinterested man, go to Bounce.'" "Well, major, since we understand each other so well, there are two little things that I must name as my conditions." "Name 'em--name 'em. Do you want me to bring you the king's eye-tooth, or her majesty's wig and snuff-box--only say the word." "One is, that I will leave England. I have a private reason for so doing." "Damme, so have I. That is a-hem! If you have a reason, that is a reason to me, you know." "Exactly. In some other capital of Europe we may spend our money and enjoy all the delights of existence. Do you speak French?" "Ah-hem! Oh, of course. I never tried particularly, but as Lord North said to the Duke of Bridgewater, 'Bounce is the man if you want anything done of an out of-the-way character.'" "Very well, then. My next condition is, that you shave off your moustache." "What?" "Shave off your moustache; I have the greatest possible aversion to moustache, therefore I make that a positive condition without which I shall say no more to you." "My charmer, do you think I hesitate? If you were to say to me, 'Bounce, off with your head,' in a moment it would roll at your feet." "Go, then, to Mr. Todd's, the barber, in Fleet-street, and have them taken off at once, and then come back to me, for I declare I won't speak another word to you while you have them on." "But, dear creature--" Mrs. Lovett shook her head. "'Pon honour!" She shook her head again. "I'll go at once then, 'pon soul, and have 'em taken off. I'll be back in a jiffy, Mrs. Lovett. Oh, you duck, I adore you. Confound the cash! It's you I knuckle under to. Man doats on Venus, and I love Lovett. Bye, bye; I'll get it done and soon be back. Fifty thousand--fifty--fif.--Oh, lor' why Flukes, your fortune is made at last." These last words did not reach the ear of Mrs. Lovett. That lady threw herself into a chair, where the gallant major had left her. "Another!" she said. "Another! Why did he try to deceive me? The fool, to pitch upon me, of all persons, to make his victim. I must have found him out, and poisoned him, if I had married him. It is better that Todd should take vengeance for me, and then the time shall come when he shall fall. Yes, so soon as I can, by cajollery or scheming, get sufficient of the plunder into my own hands, Todd's hours are numbered." After this, Mrs. Lovett fell into a train of musing, and her face assumed an expression so different from that with which she was wont to welcome her customers in the shop, that not one of them would have known her. But we must look at Todd. It was upon his return home from several calls, the last of which had been this recent visit to Mrs. Lovett, that he had heard the noise in his house, which had terminated in his going up stairs, and being so terrified by Crotchet. It will be recollected that he fell insensible upon the staircase, and that Crotchet took that opportunity of making good his retreat. How long he lay there, he, Todd, had no means of knowing, for all was profound darkness upon the staircase, but his first sensation consisted of a tingling in his feet and hands, similar to the sensation which is properly called "your limbs going to sleep." Then a knocking noise came upon his sense of hearing. "What's that? Where am I?" he cried. "No--no. Don't hang me. Where's Mrs. Lovett? Hang her. She is guilty!" Knock!--knock!--knock! "Hush! hush! What is it? Who wants me? Good God--no--no. There is no good God for me!" Knock! knock! knock! came again with increased violence at the door of the shop below. CHAPTER XLIII. AN OLD ACQUAINTANCE. Todd scrambled to his feet. He held his head in his hand. "What does it all mean? What does it all mean?" Knock! knock! knock! Todd's senses were slowly returning to him. He began to recollect events at first confusedly, and then the proper order of their occurrence--how he had come home, and then heard a noise, and gone up stairs and seen--what? There he paused in his catalogue of events. What had he seen?" Knock! knock! knock! "Curses!" he muttered. "Who can that be hammering with such devilish perseverance at my door? By all that's horrible they shall pay dearly for thus disturbing me. Who can it be? Not any one to arrest me? No--no! They would not knock so long. An enforced entrance long before this would have brought them to me. What did I see? What did I see? What did I see? Dare I give it a name?" He slowly descended the stairs, and reaching the shop, he peeped through a place in the door which he had made for such a purpose. There stood the hero of the moustachios knocking away with all his might to get the behests of Mrs. Lovett obeyed. Todd suddenly flung open the door, and in fell Major Bounce, alias Flukes. "The devil! What do you want?" "'Pon honour. Damn it. Is this the way to treat a military man?" Todd turned to the side of the shop, and hastily put on a wig--by an adroit movement of his fingers, he pulled his cravat sufficiently out from his neck to be able to bury his chin in it, and when he turned to the mock major, the latter had no suspicion that he looked upon the same person who had so alarmed him by a look, in Bell Yard. "Shaved or dressed sir?" said Todd. "Confound you. Why did you open the door so quick?" "Thought you knocked, sir." "I did, but stop my breath, if you haven't given me an ugly fall. But no matter. None but the brave deserve the fair. You perceive I am a military man?" "Oh, yes, sir, anybody may see that by your martial air." "A-hem! You are right. Well then, Mr. Barber, I want my moustache shaved off. It's a fancy of a lady. One of the most charming of her sex. One with a fifty thousand pound charm. 'Pon my valour, she has. Ah! I am a lucky dog. Thirty-eight--handsome as Apollo, and beloved by the fairest of the fair." "Life is a jolly thing, Life is a jolly thing, While I drink deep and go frolicking, Fair maids, wives, and widows, Fair maids, wives, and widows Doat on the youth that goes frolicking." "Ha! ha! ha! Life's a bumper. Upon my valour, Mr. Barber, I feel like a young colt, that I do." "Really, sir. You don't say so?" "Oh, yes, yes! Ha! ha! All's right. All's right. Now, Mr. What's-your-name. Off with the moustache. It's only in the cause of the fair that I would condescend to part with them, that's a fact, but when a lady's in the case--upon my valour, you are an ugly fellow." "You don't say so," replied Todd, as he made a most hideous contortion. "Most people think me so fascinating that they stay with me." "Ha! ha! A good joke." Major Bounce--we may as well still call the poor wretch Major Bounce--placed his hat upon a chair, and his sword upon the top of it. "Pray, sir, be seated," said Todd. "Ah! Damme, is this seat a fixture?" "Yes, sir, it's in the proper light, you see, sir." "Oh, very well--I--pluff, pluff--puff, puff! Confound you, what have you filled my mouth with soap-suds for?" "Quite an accident, sir. Quite an accident, for which I humbly beg your