The Mysteries of the Court of London — page 174: what you’re looking at

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6 2° eel! OO Te THE MYSTERIVS OF THE COURT. °. 163 pottery.” 7 “Then how-is the money to be raised?” de- manded Ben Limber: “for if this new idea of your's is such a good one-——Bat, I say, we have got to the bottom of the bottle! and there isn’t a weed left |” “ My credit is good for a fresh supply of both,” answered Mr. Bealby; “and as we are combining business with pleasure, we may as well keep up the discourse an hour or two longer. I will just run over the way--——” “I rather think I will accompany you,’ said Ben Limber, glancing somewhat shudderingly eround towards the skeleton and the mummy. “I don’t exactly like the eompanionship.” Mr. Bealby burst out laughing; and rising from his eeat, he said, “Come along, Ben: I’ve gota latch-key, and we can let ourselves out and in.” ‘* Holloa! what was that?” asked Ben Limber, turning somewhat pale as he glanced towards the door. “I heard nothing,” responded Bealby. did you faney it to be ?” “Only some strange noise. I say, who lodges overhend P” ‘The landlady and the servant,” replied Bealby: “but they have been in bed a long time, and are by no means likely to listen. However we shall goon see.” Thue speaking, he opened the door, and paused for a few moments on the threshold: but all was etill. “Come along Ben,’ he said, in a whispering fone eo as not to disturb the landlady. ‘“ We shan’t be many mioutes in obtaining a fresh eupply; and then we can make a regular night of it.” The two friends accordingly stole gently down “ What stagnant—armour is heavy—and there ie no ase in trying to create a sensation on behalf of Roman mediate capture: for it was into Bow Street that he would have to pass. Every instant was pre- cious: Bealby and his friend would be quickly re- turning. Even if he flung on some disguise selected from the choice around him, he might en- counter them on the stairs—or at the door—or | perhaps in the street itself; and the archeologist would raise a hue and ory at the appearance of his | own property thus making its escape on the person | of astranger. The position was most criftal: but a thought struck the Burker. “These chaps are as precious a pair of rogues as ever one would wish to meet,” he said to him- self: and then, hastily drawing from his pocket the bank-notes given him by Marchmont, he counted them over. “Ninety pounds!” be mu- singly ejaculated; “and these fellers want a matter of twenty or thirty. By jingo, it’s my ouly chance |” Searcely had he arrived at this conclusion, when he heard the front door open and sbut; and be at once slipped behind the mandarin’s robe, which was stretched upon the wooden frame in the same way that gentlemen’s morning-gowns are displayed at the doors of haberdashere’ shops. Almost immediately afterwards Bealby and his friend Ben Limber re-entered the room, with a f.esh supply of liquor and cigars. It would secm that during their absence some farther conversa- tion on business-matters must have taken place: for as Ben Limber threw himself down upon his sent, he ejaculated, “’Pon my soul, Bealby, this new idea of your’s is a capital one! What a ter- rible nuisance it would be if any one eles should take it up-—-e=” “ A precious nuisance |” observed Bealby; “ and just for the want of about thirty pounds or so! I wish I knew how to get the mummy out of the place without the landlady’s knowledge: but it is impossible. She has got the eyes of a lynx; and stairs: but at the same time footsteps were still | what’s more, when she dunned me for her rent thie more silently cescending from the upper storey ; and the Burker made his way into the museum of curiosities. He had penetrated through an unve- eupied attic into the house; and he had been listening at the door to all the latter part of Mr. * EBealby’s discourse. It was his temporarily re- treating footstep which bad alarmed Ben Limber. The Burker had heard sufficient tu inspire him with the hope that the nuseum would furnish him with some disguise; and now that the coast wae clear, he had taken the liberty of penetrating into Mr. Bealby’s arch@ological sanctuary. | afternoon, I told her that the old gentleman would come tao buy the mummy-and she was satisfied with my promise that she should receive the cash with her own fair hands.” “Tt is uncommon provoking !” seid Ben Limber, in a tone of deep annoyance. “ Provoking ? I believe you !” rejoined Bealby. ‘“'There’s thousands to be made by that idea of mine. I would give anything to get hold of a clear thirty-pound note at this moment—so that wé might start fair and unshackled: but where the Closing | deuce such a sum is to be got by anything like the dour, he was afivancing into the midst of the honest means, I don’t know.” encumbering assemblage of goode,—when be was “Well, 1 say, Bealby,” observed Mr. Limber, after skeleton. Seized with dismay, the Burker sank | drinking and smoking went on,— “suppose there was down upon the seat which Mr. Bealby had recently any way of raising this money eithout the strictest occupied: but it was only for an instant that the regard for what the world calls bhonesty,—what Burker’s consternation lasted. He was not the ‘should you say? Mind—I have no settled plan man to be long overpowered by such a spectacle; | —I'm only just thinking whether we ought to be and starting up, he muttered to himself, “By : over nice and particular ” Jingo! I ought to be more afeard of the livin’ than | “Nice and particular indeed!” ejeculated Bealby of the dead !” with contempt : “ nothing of the sort! You know ae ey ee ee eee suddenly startled by the appearance of the colossal ' a few minutes’ pause, during which the process of 1 | He looked around him in search of some snit- able dieguise : but he was bewildered by the variety of the articles which met his view, and the confu- sion in which they were amassed pell-mell. He knew mot what course to adopt. the house, dressed as he was, would be to risk im- To steal out of | Nice and particular indeed! enough of me, and you’ve heard enough to-night, Ben, to be pretty well aware that I shouldn’t stick ata trifle: but at the seme time, my boy, I try to eteer clear of the Jaw as well as 1 possibly can. Just to show you how nice and particular I am, | shouldn’t mind (COLL G OOO SS} (COLL