'Ah, poor thing! do they? Now, confound you! what are you laughing at now? What do you mean by it?'
'Didn't you say, "Ah, poor thing?" Just turn your head a little on one side; that will do. You have been to sea, sir?'
'Yes, I have, and have only now lately come up the river from an Indian voyage.'
'Indeed! where can my strop be? I had it this minute; I must have laid it down somewhere. What an odd thing that I can't see it! It's very extraordinary; what can have become of it? Oh, I recollect, I took it into the parlour. Sit still, sir. I shall not be gone a moment; sit still, sir, if you please. By the by, you can amuse yourself with the Courier, sir, for a moment.'
Sweeney Todd walked into the back parlour and closed the door. There was a strange sound suddenly compounded of a rushing noise and then a heavy blow, immediately after which Sweeney Todd emerged from his parlour, and, folding his arms, he looked upon the vacant chair where his customer had been seated, but the customer was gone, leaving not the slightest trace of his presence behind except his hat, and that Sweeney Todd immediately seized and thrust into a cupboard that was at one corner of the shop.
'What's that?' he said, 'what's that? I thought I heard a noise.
The door was slowly opened, and Tobias made his appearance, saying, 'If you please, sir, I have forgot the money, and have run all the way back from St Paul's churchyard.'
In two strides Todd reached him, and clutching him by the arm he dragged him into the farthest corner of the shop, and then he stood opposite to him glaring in his face with such a demoniac expression that the boy was frightfully terrified.
'Speak!' cried Todd, 'speak! and speak the truth, or your last hour is come! How long were you peeping through the door before you came in?'
'Peeping, sir?'
'Yes, peeping; don't repeat my words, but answer me at once, you will find it better for you in the end.'
'I wasn't peeping, sir, at all.'
Sweeney Todd drew a long breath as he then said, in a strange, shrieking sort of manner, which he intended, no doubt, should be jocose, 'Well, well, very well; if you did peep, what then? it's no matter; I only wanted to know, that's all; it was quite a joke, wasn't it - quite funny, though rather odd, eh? Why don't you laugh, you dog? Come, now, there is no harm done. Tell me what you thought about it at once, and we will be merry over it - very merry.
'I don't know what you mean, sir,' said the boy, who was quite as much alarmed at Mr Todd's mirth as he was at his anger. 'I don't know what you mean, sir; I only just come back because I hadn't any money to pay for the biscuits at Peterson's.'
'I mean nothing at all,' said Todd, suddenly turning upon his heel; 'what's that scratching at the door?'
Tobias opened the shop-door, and there stood the dog, who looked wistfully round the place, and then gave a howl that seriously alarmed the barber.
'It's the gentleman's dog, sir,' said Tobias, 'it's the gentleman's dog, sir, that was looking at old St Dunstan's clock, and came in here to be shaved. It's funny, ain't it, sir, that the dog didn't go away with his master?'
'Why don't you laugh if it's funny? Turn out the dog, Tobias; we'll have no dogs here; I hate the sight of them; turn him out - turn him out.'
'I would, sir, in a minute; but I'm afraid he wouldn't let me, somehow. Only look, sir - look; see what he is at now! did you ever see such a violent fellow, sir? why he will have down the cupboard door.'
'Stop him - stop him! the devil is in the animal! stop him I say!'
The dog was certainly getting the door open, when Sweeney Todd rushed forward to stop him; but that he was soon admonished of the danger of doing, for the dog gave him a grip of the leg, which made him give such a howl, that he precipitately retreated, and left the animal to do its pleasure. This consisted in forcing open the cupboard door, and seizing upon the hat which Sweeney Todd had thrust therein, and dashing out of the shop with it in triumph.
'The devil's in the beast,' muttered Todd, 'he's off. Tobias, you said you saw the man who owned that fiend of a cur looking at St Dunstan's church.'
'Yes, sir, I did see him there. If you recollect, you sent me to see the time, and the figures were just going to strike three-quarters past six; and before I came away, I heard him say that Mark Ingestrie was dead, and Johanna should have the string of pearls. Then I came in, and then, if you recollect, sir, he came in, and the odd thing, you know, to me, sir, is that he didn't take his dog with him, because, you know, sir?'
'Because what?' shouted Todd.
'Because people generally do take their dogs with them, you know, sir; and may I be made into one of Lovett's pies, if I don't?'
'Hush! someone comes; it's old Mr Grant, from the Temple. How do you do, Mr Grant? glad to see you looking so well, sir. It does one's heart good to see a gentleman of your years looking so fresh and hearty. Sit down, sir; a little this way, if you please. Shaved, I suppose?'
'Yes, Todd, yes. Any news?'
'No, sir, nothing stirring. Everything very quiet, sir, except the high wind. They say it blew the king's hat off yesterday, sir, and he borrowed Lord North's. Trade is dull, too, sir. I suppose people won't come out to be cleaned and dressed in a misling rain. We haven't had anybody in the shop for an hour and a half.'
'Lor! sir,' said Tobias, 'you forgot the seafaring gentleman with the dog, you know, sir.'
'Ah! so I do,' said Todd. 'He went away, and I saw him get into some disturbance, I think, just at the corner of the market.'
'I wonder I didn't meet him, sir,' said Tobias, 'for I came that way; and then it's so very odd leaving his dog behind him.'
'Yes very,' said Todd. 'Will you excuse me a moment, Mr Grant? Tobias, my lad, I just want you to lend me a hand in the parlour.'
Tobias followed Todd very unsuspectingly into the parlour; but when they got there and the door was closed, the barber sprang upon him like an enraged tiger, and, grappling him by the throat, he gave his head such a succession of knocks against the wainscot, that Mr Grant must have thought that some carpenter was at work. Then he tore a handful of his hair out, after which he twisted him round, and dealt him such a kick, that he was flung sprawling into a corner of the room, and then, without a word, the barber walked out again to his customer, and he bolted his parlour door on the outside, leaving Tobias to digest the usage he had received at his leisure, and in the best way he could.
When he came back to Mr Grant, he apologised for keeping him waiting by saying -
'It became necessary, sir, to teach my new apprentice a little bit of his business. I have left him studying it now. There is nothing like teaching young folks at once.'
'Ah!' said Mr Grant, with a sigh, 'I know what it is to let young folks grow wild; for although I have neither chick nor child of my own, I had a sister's son to look to - a handsome, wild, harum-scarum sort of fellow, as like me as one pea is like another. I tried to make a lawyer of him, but it wouldn't do, and it's now more than two years ago he left me altogether; and yet there were some good traits about Mark.'
'Mark, sir! did you say Mark?'
'Yes, that was his name, Mark Ingestrie. God knows what's become of him.'
'Oh!' said Sweeney Todd; and he went on lathering the chin of Mr Grant.
II. The Spectacle Maker's Daughter
'Johanna, Johanna, my dear, do you know what time it is? Johanna, I say, my dear, are you going to get up? Here's your mother has trotted out to parson Lupin's and you know I have to go to Alderman