The Mysteries of the Court of London — page 153: what you’re looking at

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> 138 THE MYSTERIES OF THE COURT, her like a barren waste—and the poor girl felt that; “Late! it’s on’y just midnight,’ was the re - phe had now naught worth living for ! sponse; “‘and you told me as how I was to be here . It was about eleven o’clock when Florina reached | as the clocks was a-striking twelve—didn’t yer?” the house in Cavendish Square; and she succeeded| “They have struck twelve at least ten minutes in effecting her entrance unperceived by any of | ago,” returned the Cannibal.” the inmates. Her absence, thanks to the precaution | ‘“ Well, ten minutes more or less,’ observed she had taken, was not discovered; and on gaining | Wilkins, “isn’t no great thing, Von can’t be quite her own apartment she really felt as she had de- | so particular.” scribed herself to her lady’s-maid two hours’ back— “Yes—but what was the use of keeping me namely, exceedingly unwell. trudging about here at the risk of being twigged by the blue-bottles? Howsomever, we won’t lose any more time. So come along.” : “To. tell yer the truth, Chiffin,’ said Tony, CHAPTER XXXI. clutehmg the Cannibal by the arm, “ 1 don’t over A NIGHTOADVENTURE, and above like this here affair. You say you've never been inside the premises—that you don’t Ir was about twelve o’clock on the same night of | know nuffin about ’em—that you ain’t got no pals which we have been writing in the previous chapter, | -amung the slaveys 5 that Chiffin the Cannibal emerged from.the Edge- | “ But I know that there’s plenty of swag to be ware Road, and crossing Oxford Street, entered got—and so I suppose that’s enough,” interrupted Park Lane, But instead of immediately pursuing Chiflin fiercely. ‘Why, here you are as down in his way, he stopped short—looked up and down— | your luck as you well can be; and here am I ready and not perceiving the person whom he expected to | | to take you ie the hand and put a good thing in meet him at that spot, he gave vent to a deep im- , your way.’ precation, muttering likewise, “If he don’t come, | * All right, Chiffin!” exclaimed Tony. “If you’re I'll make him repent it the next time I meet him so deuced sure of the business I suppose it’s all —baug me if I don’t!” sate. So here Boes—and Vm the man to second Fearful of encountering a policeman, the Can- | you, old feller.” aibal walked a little way down Park Lane,and then! “But I tell you what it is, Tony,” growled the turned back; but when he found that the person - | Cannibal, as he fixed his reptile-like gaze upon his whom he awaited did not make his appearance, a , companion, “if so be you feel afraid, say so at onee, deeper and more terrible impreeation denoted the | and there’s an end of the matter—ause why, I ruflian’s ferocious rage. | don’t like dealing with cowards.” In order to avoid attracting any inconvenient | ‘Come, Chiffin—none of this here sort of talk notice, his bludgeon was concealed beneath his loose | : with me!” exclaimed Wilkins angrily. “Pm no shaggy coat; and he kept as much as possible in| coward—but I don’t want to run my neck bang the deep shades of the place where he was now into a noose. You know deuced well I ain’t afeard loitering. For it was a clear bright night; and | —I never wor afeard of nuffin in my life. Fear and moreover the street-lamps in front of the mansions | prudence is two wery different things, I takes it. in Park Lane gave forth a light which rendered it If so be you was to see a mad bull a-thundering all the more necessary for him to observe the utmost | along this here lane, I s’pose yer wouldn’t go and caution. grapple him by the ’orns—would yer? Not you, “Perhaps he thinks because it’s a fine night, I indeed—you’d precious soon bolt a von side. Well shouldn’t do the trick,” muttered the Cannibal to then, that’s prudence. But if so be he comed right himself: “but he’s no business to have any opinion | up and ’tacked yer, then I knows wery well you'd of his own in the matter. For the job of getting let fly at him with yer club inajiffey. Well, then, into a strange place without a confederate inside, | that’s walour.” and no put-up affair, I rather like a clear night.| “Do hold your jaw, Tony, and come along,” One sees better how to go to work. Some cracks- | growled the Cannibal. ‘‘ There—I'll go on in front, men always do their’ business in the dark; and and you foller at a distance. Slip bang round the though it’s a good rule on most occasions, it isn’t | second turning to the lett, and you'll find me always to be followed. But here's Tony after all, a. -waiting.” blow him !” Having thus spoken, Chiffiin the Cannibal walked The reader will remember a certain individual rapidly on, Tony Wilkins keeping in his track, but named Tony Wilkins, who belonged to the gang that , at an interval of about fifty yards. They encountered infested Agar Town and made Solomon Patch’s no policemen in their way: the truth is, there very house their head-quarters. ‘This Tony Wilkins was seldom are policemen to be found on their beats in the person whom Lady Bess had especially chosen that fashionable region, between the hours of eleven to be the bearer of the small sealed packet which and one—those officials being either at some public- she had ordered him to deliver to a gentleman at house which keeps open all night, or else supping King’s Cross; and we have described him as a young cozily with the female domestics in the kitchen of man of about four-and-twenty, clad in a squalid some mansion where dancing-and card-playing are garb, and with a countenance as sinister in its ex- going on up-stairs in the drawing-rooms. Thus was pression as that of any one of his wonted com- it that Chiflin the Cannibal and Tony Wilkins panions. It was this same Tony Wilkins for whom passed on unmolested, and the former halted at a the Cannibal had been waiting, and who now at side-door in a garden-wall, where he was speedily length made his appearance. joined by his confederate. “Well, what the deuce has made you so late?” “Now, hush—and ’tis all right!” whispered said Chillin in a growling tone. _Chiflin, as be flung a rope over the wall; and the CORMICOOOKS. EO