CHAPTER CXLVI.

THERE IS A FIRE IN FLEET STREET AFTER ALL.--TODD ESCAPES.

When once he had gained that back room, Todd considered that his design

against the peace of mind of the two men was all but accomplished; and

it was with great difficulty that he kept himself from giving a hideous

chuckle, that would at once have opened their ears to the fact that some

one was close at hand, who, whether of this world or the next, was a

proficient in horrid noises.

He controlled this ebullition of ill-timed mirth, however, and listened

attentively.

"There don't seem much else beside lots of clothes," said one of the

men, "and hats, and sticks, and umbrellas."

"Ah!" said the other, "and they all belong to the murdered men that Todd

cut up to make pies of!"

"Horrible!--horrible!"

"You may say that, old friend. It's only a great pity that Sir Richard

has so expressly forbid anything to be touched in the old crib, or else

there's some nice enough things here, I should say, that would make a

fellow warm and comfortable in the winter nights."

"Not a doubt of that. Here's a cloak, now!"

"A beauty--quite a beauty, I say. He can't know what is really here. Do

you think he can?"

"What, Sir Richard?"

"Yes."

"Oh, don't he. I wouldn't venture to touch so much as an old hat here,

for I should feel, as sure as fate, he'd find it out."

"Oh, nonsense, he couldn't; and as for the ghosts, they don't seem at

all likely to interfere in the matter, for there's not one of them to be

seen or heard of to-night."

"No, I defy the ghosts--a-hem! I begin to think, do you know, that

ghosts are all a sham. Why here we are, two men as brave as lions, or we

should not have come here, and yet the deuce a ghost is to be seen. I

tell you what I'd do if one was to come. I'd say, 'Old fellow, was this

your cloak?' and then if he said 'yes,' I'd say, 'well, old fellow, it's

of no use to you now, you know; will you give it to me?'"

"Ha!--ha! Capital! Why you have quite got over all your fears."

"Fears? Rubbish! I was only amusing myself to hear what you would say."

"Was you, though? Only acting, after all?"

"Precisely."

"Well, then, I must say you did it remarkably well, and if you take to

the stage you will make your fortune. Oh, here's a nice brown suit now,

that would be just my size. I should feel inclined to say to the ghosts

what you would say about the cloak."

"Well, let's say it, and if nobody says anything to the contrary, we

will take it for granted. I will take the cloak, and you the brown suit;

Sir Richard will be none the wiser, and we shall be a little the richer,

you know. 'Mr. Ghost, may I have this cloak, if you please, as you can't

possibly want it?'"

"Upon my life you are a funny fellow," said the other; and then holding

up the brown suit, he said, "Mr. Ghost who once owned this, may I have

this brown suit, as it is of no use to you now?"

It was at this moment that Todd dashed open the two folding doors, and

with one of the most frightful, fiendish yells that ever came from the

throat of man, he made one bound into the front room.

The effect of this appearance, and the sound that accompanied it, was

all that Todd could possibly wish or expect. The two men were almost

driven to madness. They dropped the light, and with shrieks of dismay

they rushed to the door--they tore it open, and then they both fell

headlong down the staircase to the passage below, where they lay in a

state of insensibility that was highly amusing to Todd.

[Illustration: Todd Alarms The Two Bow Street Officers.]

"Ha! ha!" he laughed, as he stood at the head of the stairs; "Ha! ha!"

He listened, but not so much as a groan came from either of the men, and

then he clapped his huge hands together with a report like the discharge

of a pistol, and laughed again. Todd had not been so well pleased since

his escape from Newgate.

He slowly descended the stairs, and more than once he stopped to laugh

again. The passage was intensely dark, so that when he reached it he

trod upon one of the men, but that rather amused him, and he jumped

violently upon the body.

"Good," he said. "Perhaps they are both dead. Well, let them both die.

It will be a lesson to others how far they interfere with me. Society

and I are now fairly at war, and I will win as many battles as I can.

They can't say but this is a well-fought one, two to one. Ha! They ought

to make me a Field-Marshal. Ha!"

Making the most hideous faces, just for the fun of the thing, Todd made

his way to the parlour, and taking from a corner, where he knew to lay

his hands upon them in a moment, a couple of old newspapers, he twisted

them up into a kind of torch, and lighting it then at the fire, he went

with it flaming in his hand to the passage.

The two men lay profoundly still. Terror and the fall they had had,

combined to throw them quite into a swooning state, from which probably

it would be hours before they would recover.

"This is capital," said Todd. "Lie there, both of you, until I have

transacted the business in this house that brought me here. Then I will,

perhaps, think of some amusing way of finishing you both off--ha!"

Still carrying the flaming papers in his hand, Todd now made his way to

the first-floor, and found the candle that the men had dropped. That he

lighted, as it would be much more convenient to him than the papers; and

then he trod them out, for he did not wish any great light as yet to

appear from the windows of that house, and perchance awaken the

attention of some passing traveller or curious neighbour.

Shading the light with his hand, and looking like some grim ogre, Todd

took his way to the second-floor. As he went, he every now and then

muttered his satisfaction to himself, or gave utterance to one of his

unearthly laughs; for in the whole of that night's adventure there was

much to please him.

In the first place, he hoped, and fully expected, to get enough booty

from the house to place him a little at his ease as regarded money

matters, provided that with it he should be fortunate enough to get away

from England. Then, again, it was no small satisfaction to Todd to do

anything which looked like a triumph over Sir Richard Blunt, and this

not only looked like it, but really was.

"A good step," he muttered, "a capital step, and a bold one, too; but

bold steps are always good ones. Who knows but that from some place of

security I may laugh at them all yet; and then, if I do not succeed in

killing any of them before I go, I can at my leisure think of and mature

some scheme of revenge against them; and there is much to be done with

ingenuity, if you are quite unscrupulous. Ha! ha! I have some dainty

schemes, if I can but carry them out in the time to come--ha!"

When Todd reached the second-floor, he at once went into the front-room,

in one corner of which was a large old fashioned bureau. Now it was not

to be supposed that this bureau had escaped the scrutiny of Sir Richard

Blunt; but then it had so happened that before he came to search it he

had all the evidence he wished against Todd, so that the search was not

so complete or so scrutinising as it might have been.

We shall see that it was not.

"Ah" said Todd, as he drew out the drawers one after the other, "all the

locks forced! Well, be it so. That was just what I expected. But I do

not think they have moved it from the wall by the look of it."

The bureau, it was quite evident, had not been removed from the wall. It

was of immense weight, but Todd managed to move it by short sudden

jerks; and then when he had got it quite away at right angles from the

wall, he said--

"Here was it that I hid, until some favourable opportunity should occur

for the private disposal of them, various articles of value, that I dare

not try to convert into money in my open way, for fear of detection.

Here are watches, and rings, and jewels, that were described in

hand-bills, offering rewards for missing persons, and in advertisements

in the papers; so that it became most unsafe for me to show them even to

the not very scrupulous Hebrews, who have from time to time bought goods

of me."

As he spoke, he removed a portion of the back of the bureau, which slid

out of its place softly and easily, for it was made with great skill and

care. This sliding piece, when it was fairly removed, disclosed a

receptacle capable of holding a great quantity of small articles, and

filled up with narrow shelves, as if to hold them securely.

There were costly watches--wigs with rare jewels set in them; for the

fashion of wearing wigs was so common at the time, that many wealthy

residents of the Temple would pop into Todd's shop for a little

arrangement of their wigs or a puff of fresh powder, if they were going

somewhere in a hurry, and so lost their lives. Then there were some

pairs of rich diamond knee and shoe buckles, and a few lockets, and a

whole heap of chains of gold.

"Ah," said Todd; "here is enough to set me up for a time, if I can

dispose of them; and now I must run risks that I would not think of

while I had thousands at my command. I must take these things that I was

content enough to leave behind me, lest they should at some inopportune

moment lead to my detection. Now they shall do me service."

Todd commenced filling his pockets with this dangerous kind of property,

each article of which was associated with the frightful crime of murder!

A couple of thousand pounds certainly would not have paid for what Todd

upon this occasion managed to stow away about him; and he thought that

if he could get one-fourth of that amount for the articles, that it

would not be a very bad night's work, considering the not very

flourishing state of his finances at that time, compared with what they

had been.

During the process, though, of stocking himself with the contents of the

secret place in the bureau, he more than once crept to the door of the

room, and going out upon the landing, he leant over the staircase and

listened. All was most profoundly still, and he was satisfied that Sir

Richard Blunt's two men remained in the passage, in the same state of

insensibility--if not of death--in which he had left them.

Leaving there some articles of smaller importance than those with which

he loaded himself, Todd pushed the bureau back into its place again; and

then, taking the light in his hand, cautiously descended the stairs.

When he reached the passage, there lay the two men as he had left them.

Indeed, he had been absent much too short a space of time for any very

material change to take place in their condition.

"Well," he said. "Now to dispose of you two. What shall it be? Shall I

cut your throats as you lie there, or--no, no, I have hit it. No doubt

you have both been full of curious speculations respecting how I

disposed of those persons whom I polished off in my shop; so you shall

both know exactly how it was done. Ha! a good joke."

Todd's good joke consisted now of going into the parlour, and fastening

the levers which held up the shaving-chair. Then he lifted up one of the

insensible bodies of the men, and carried it into the shop.

"Sit there, or lie there, how you like," he said, as he flung the man

into the large shaving-chair.

It was quite a treat now to Todd, and put him in mind of old times, to

arrange his apparatus for giving this wretched man a tumble into the

vaults below. He went into the parlour and drew the bolt, when away went

the man and the chair, and the other chair that was on the reverse side

of the plank took the place of that which had gone.

"Ha! ha!" shouted Todd. "This is grand--this is most glorious! Ha! ha!

Who would have thought, now, that I should ever live to be at my old

work again in this house? It is capital! If that fall has not broken his

neck, it's a wonder. It used to kill five out of seven; that was about

the average--ha!"

Todd didn't fasten the bolt again, but went at once for the other man.

He was sitting up!

Todd staggered back for a moment, when he saw him in that position

looking at him. The man rubbed his eyes with his hands and said in a

weak voice--

"Good God! what is it all about?"

Todd placed the light on the floor within the parlour, so that it shed

sufficient rays into the shop to let him see every object in it; and

then, with a cry like that of some wild beast rushing upon his prey, he

dashed at the man.

The struggle that ensued was a frightful one. Despair, and a feeling

that he was fighting for his life, nerved the man, who had recovered

just in time to engage in such a contest, and they both fought their way

into the shop together. Todd made the greatest exertions to overcome the

man, but it was not until he got him by the throat, and held him with a

clutch of iron, that he could do so. Then he flung him upon the chair,

but the man, with a last effort, dragged Todd after him, and down they

both went together to the vault below!

[Illustration: Todd And The Bow Street Officers--The Death Grapple.]