The Mysteries of the Court of London, Vol. 7 — page 114: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

imran, f THE MYSTERIES OF THE COVET. Me Sem: aes ui Giese; ges Gye i ii Poet ee pein Bde E: =a v= name arlene ns sttineeetn eeeiatiniet Re a ies beli has just rung. Go, mother, quick—and-eea tho instant rendered intolerable for arty, ayes. to what ho wants!” ° | gaae upon. cee Mrs. Wabber accordingly bustied up the fight | * Adv! i¥s an uncommon convenient planeta’ ef of stepa; and having remained abseut for five it, Barney?" obscrved Jack Smediey, ufter @ PARe | minutes, she re-sppeared in the seullery. which had followed the ruitian's wntimente @ad : “ He has made up his mind to leave,” she said, ; the gold-beater, ae he thus spoke, looked daw io a mysterious whisper, and with still more omi- | upon the dragget a9 his wife had previously doge..'] nously mysterious looke, “He says he shall go '* Now, what things do go on in London! | the day aftor to-morrow—and he asked if I could , would ” J get eomebody who, might be trusted to deliver | “Don’t be so silly, Jack,” interrupted Bab. letter to-morrow’ ——” }* One would think you were going to moraljge on | “To he sure!” interjected the Burker, with a | the secrets that this house could reveal if it liked. significant leer. “ You said yes, of course?” | I am always afraid of your tonguo——” “Of course I did!’ responded the old woman, | “ No-~you needn't be afeard,” interrupted the almost indignantly, as if she thought that it was; Rorker. “I’ve knowed Jack Sinediey long onongh ean insult é deubt the nature of the reply abe ; to be eure that he’s as downy as the knocker at had given. ‘‘ Who knows but that the letter may | Newgate, and as safe and tight as tha stone-jug be a full confession ot all the wrong be hes done? | itself. ‘Why, let me sce~—it’s a mattor of ton year Perhaps it will be to the people he has robbed: | you've been in this house—and you've kept up’ a fur that ho has done sowething of the sort, there | good name the whole time.” can’t be the slightest uncertainty.” “It was my dodge, the joining in with the chaps © Not a bit of it!” said Bab ussentingly. “Bat | next door!” observed Smediey, with a triumphant , under present circumstances, we won't doanything | grin expanding over his mean-lovking counto- to-night: we will want till to-roorrow night. We nance: “and let me tell you it’s the very bost will read the letter that he wants to send; and| dodge that ever was. They take mo for as maybe it will put him so much in our power that | snivelling and sanctimonious a fwllow aa them- we may be able to make him give up to us all he , has got, and so save ua the necessity of ---~you know what:’—and with a darkly sinister look, we a dodge you must keep up. selves.” “To ba sure they do!” ejaculated Barney: “and I thought of she glunced dewn to that part of the floor whore | taking to it myself—only when [ peep in the glass, Ahe table stuod upon a small square picco of | drugget. “Aye,” said the Burker, “that’s the best plan, | psalm-singing mug. JT oan’t bring iy mind to the beliof that my looks is the wery best that’s euited for putting on No—tbset garamen won't do If aa how we ean get it by fair means, well and/ for me: 1 must atick to what Lam. Besides, I Bd rood: and if not, then——— And hfting up lus ¢lub, he shook it in a wigmé- cant manner, lis countenance at the satte time becuming so diubolically ferocisus that even bis accomplices in crime could not prevent themselves from shuddering. “That place has seen one or two go down,” observed Jnck Smedley ; “and rmaay be it will seo another before we are mueh older.” “ Yes—you and me have done a little business sha))} make suzmut of them two Seotta sven. But ['il tell you what's wanted.” “And what's that P” inquired Geb Steodley. “Just to look on such a businoss an .we may perhaps have here to-morrow night,” answored the Burker. “There’s ne ure for chaps like the Beotty to think of launching theirselyes regular in the profession till they've seen summut of that sort. Thoy've got mischief enow in’em: but they want hardenin’. - 1 understand it right well enow, teyether in our time, Jack,” responded the Burker, | I know what human nature is. Que must be as of the antecedents just alladed to wore a subject | deep in .or it, as thd sayin’ is, before one is at all for satiefacte@y retyospection. “So, way our friend. | times ready to go the whole hog. The feelin’s ship never be leas !’—~and with this sentiment, the ruiban nodded to his thres accomplices as he raised the glaes ty bis lips. Good heavens! that the burning alcohol did not muat bo blunted. Bless you! it’s experience as does ig all. Why should we be a sitting hore and talking so cool over a little affair of this sort, if we hadn’t gone through it all ature? To be suxo choke the misvreant whose tongue had thus im-}‘not!’—and as if to clench the argument, the piously perverted the sacred name of friendship, and had made it the illustration. of hie own hotri- bie ideas of fellowsinp and intimacy. For it was a frightful friendship, if the word which linked d&im with that md@fand with those two women—a friendship which held tham together for the sake of crimes the darkest and the deepesd —a terrible intimeecy, that was cemented with be eo used, Burker again struck his fies forcibly upon tho table. “¥Yush!” said Bab Smedley: “not sb loud! The old man up-stairs may hear you.” “TI suppose ho hasn’t no suspicion ?”’. askod Barney. “Not a bit!” ejaculated Mes. Webber. “Zo fakes me for a nice, good-natured, comfortable blood—a fellowship cuoh as that which may be! matron that tries to do all ebe can for him; and supposed to prevail in pandemonium! Yet thosa| he thinke that Jack ie everything that all the wretehes dared look each other in the face; and if! meighbours think him. As for Bub, he one day three of them shuddered for an instant at the | ssid to me that my son-in-law ought to be proud frightful expression which appeared upon the! of such a five handsome wife——” countenance of the foarth, it was not that they} “And so he ought!” exclaimed Mrs. Smedley, were stricken with remorse for past misdeeds, nor} flinging upon her husband a look which was se with loathing for their sesovitte—but merely thas } such ns to repruash bim for not glorifying hire there was an instinctive reecil from a physical | self sufficiently in the of bia spowee. Ugliness which the reflex of a blood-stained soul af! ~ Well,” said the Burker, “I think 12 he j'g- NOG SS