The Gift of the Sailor: The String of Pearls & Sweeney Todd, the Demon Barber of Fleet Street — page 136: what you’re looking at

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

rejoiced to get his name in the papers, even if it were only connected with a story of a pie. Yes, the dream of freedom still clung to the imagination of the cook, and he waited, with every nerve thrilling with expectation, the result of his plan. One, two, three hours had passed away, and nothing came of the pie or the letter. All was as quiet and as calm as though the malignant fates had determined that there he was to spend his days for ever, and gradually as in a frigid situation the narrow column of mercury in a thermometer will sink, sank his spiritt—down—down—down! “No—no,” he said. “No hope. Timidity or incredulity has consigned my letter to the flames, perhaps, or some wide-mouthed, stupid idiot has actually swallowed it. Oh that it had choked him by the way. Oh that it had actually stuck in his throat.—It is over, I have lost hope again. This horrible place will be my charnel-house—my family vault! Curses!—No—no. What is the use of swearing? My despair is past that—far past that—” “Cook!” said a voice. He sprang up, and looked to the wicket. There was Mrs. Lovett gazing in at him. “Cook!” “Well—well.—Fiend in female shape, what would you with me? Did you not expect to find me dead?” “Certainly not. Here is a letter for you.” “A—a—letter?” “Yes. Perhaps it is an answer to the one you sent in the pie, you know.” The unfortunate grasped his head, and gave a yell of despair. The letter—for indeed Mrs. Lovett had one—was dropped upon the ground floor from the opening through which she conversed with her prisoner, and then, without another word, she withdrew from the little orifice, and left him to his meditation. “Tost!—lost!—lost!” he cried. “All is lost. God, is this enchantment? Or am I mad, and the inmate of some cell in an abode of lunacy, and all this about pies and letters merely the delusion of my overwrought fancy? Is there really a pie—a Mrs. Lovett—a Bell Yard—a letter—a—a—a—damn it, is there such a wretch as I myself, in this vast bustling world, or is all a wild and fathomless delusion?” He cast himself upon the ground, as though from that moment he gave up all hope and desire to save himself. It seemed as though he could have said— “Let death come in any shape he may, he will find me an unresisting victim. I have fought with fate, and am, like thousands who have preceded me in such a contest—beaten!” A kind of stupor came over him, and there he lay for more than two hours; but youth will overcome much, and the mind, like some depressed spring, will, in the spring of life, soon recover its rebound; so it was with the unhappy cook. After a time he rose and looked about him. “No,” he said, “it is no dream. It is no dream!” He then saw the letter lying upon the ground, which Mrs. Lovett had with such irony cast unto him. “Surely,” he said, “she might have been content to tell me she had discovered my plans, without adding this practical sneer to it.” He lifted the letter from the door, and found it was addressed “To Mrs. Lovett’s Cook, Bell Yard, Temple Bar;” and what made it all the more provoking was, that it seemed to have come regularly through the post, for there were the official seal and blue stamp upon it. Curiosity tempted him to open it, and he read as follows:— Sir—Having, in a most delicious pie, received the extraordinary communication which you inserted in it, I take the earliest opportunity of replying to you. The character of a highly respectable and pious woman is not, sir, to be whispered away in a pie by a cook. When the whole bench of bishops were proved, in black and white, to be the greatest thieves and speculators in the known world, it was their character that saved them, for, as people justly enough reasoned, bishops should be pious and just— therefore, a bishop cannot be a thief and a liar! Now, sir, apply this little mandate to Mrs. Lovett, and assure yourself; but no one will believe anything you can allege against a female with so fascinating a smile, and who attends to her religious duties so regularly. Reflect, young man, on the evil that you have tried to do, and for the future learn to be satisfied with the excellent situation you have. The pie was very good. I am, you bad young man, A Parishioner of St. Dunstan’s, SWEENEY TODD. “Now was there ever such a piece of cool rascality as this?” cried the cook. “Sweeney Todd—Todd—Todd. Who the devil is he? This is some scheme of Mrs. Lovett’s to drive me mad.” He dashed the letter upon the floor. “Not another pie will I make! No—no—no. Welcome death—welcome that dissolution which may be my lot, rather than the continued endurance of this terrible imprisonment. Am I, at my time of life, to be made the slave of such a demon in human shape as this woman? Am I to grow old and grey here, a mere pie machine? No—no, death a thousand times rather!” Tears! yes, bitter scalding tears came to his relief, and he wept abundantly, but those tears were blessed, for as they flowed, the worst bitterness of his heart flowed with them, and he suddenly looked up, saying— “T am only twenty-four.” There was magic in the sound of those words. They seemed in themselves to contain a volume of philosophy. Only twenty-four. CORniclooo S CO)