The Gift of the Sailor: The String of Pearls & Sweeney Todd, the Demon Barber of Fleet Street — page 29: what you’re looking at

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

CHAPTER VII. THE BARBER AND THE LAPIDARY. It is night; and a man, one of the most celebrated lapidaries in London, but yet a man frugal withal, although rich, is putting up the shutters of his shop. This lapidary®* is an old man; his scanty hair is white, and his hands shake as he secures the fastenings, and then, over and over again, feels and shakes each shutter, to be assured that his shop is well secured. This shop of his is in Moorfields, then a place very much frequented by dealers in bullion and precious stones. He was about entering his door, just having cast a satisfied look upon the fastening of his shop, when a tall, ungainly-looking man stepped up to him. This man had a three-cornered hat, much too small for him, perched upon the top of his great, hideous-looking head, while the coat he wore had ample skirts enough to have made another of ordinary dimensions. Our readers will have no difficulty in recognising Sweeney Todd, and well might the little old lapidary start as such a very unprepossessing-looking personage addressed him. “You deal,” he said, “in precious stones.” “Yes, I do,” was the reply; “but it’s rather late. Do you want to buy or sell?” “To sell.” “Humph! Ah, I dare say it’s something not in my line; the only order I get is for pearls, and they are not in the market.” “And I have nothing but pearls to sell,” said Sweeney Todd; “I mean to keep all my diamonds, my garnets, topazes, brilliants,® emeralds, and rubies.” “The deuce you do! Why, you don’t mean to say you have any of them? Be off with you! I am too old to joke with, and am waiting for my supper.” “Will you look at the pearls I have?” “Little seed pearls, I suppose; they are of no value, and I don’t want them, we have plenty of those. It’s real, genuine, large pearls we want. Pearls worth thousands.” “Will you look at mine?” “No; good night!” “Very good; then I will take them to Mr. Coventry® up the street. He will, perhaps, deal with me for them if you cannot.” The lapidary hesitated. “Stop,” he said; “what’s the use of going to Mr. Coventry? he has not the means of purchasing what I can pay present cash for. Come in, come in; I will, at all events, look at what you have for sale.” Thus encouraged, Sweeney Todd entered the little, low, dusky shop, and the lapidary having procured a light, and taken care to keep his customer outside the counter, put on his spectacles, and said— “Now, sir, where are your pearls?” “There,” said Sweeney Todd, as he laid a string of twenty-four pearls before the lapidary. The old man’s eyes opened to an enormous width, and he pushed his spectacles right up upon his forehead, as he glared in the face of Sweeney Todd with undisguised astonishment. Then down he pulled his spectacles again, and taking up the string of pearls, he rapidly examined every one of them, after which, he exclaimed,— “Real, real, by Heaven! All real!” Then he pushed his spectacles up again to the top of his head, and took another long stare at Sweeney Todd. “T know they are real,” said the latter. “Will you deal with me or will you not?” “Will I deal with you? Yes; I am not quite sure that they are real. Let me look again. Oh, I see, counterfeits; but so well done, that really for the curiosity of the thing, I will give fifty pounds for them.” “T am fond of curiosities,” said Sweeney Todd, “and as they are not real, I will keep them; they will do for a present to some child or another.” “What! give those to a child? you must be mad—that is to say, not mad, but certainly indiscreet. Come, now, at a word, I’ ll give you one hundred pounds for them.” “Hark ye,” said Sweeney Todd, “it neither suits my inclination nor my time to stand here chaffing® with you. I know the value of the pearls, and, as a matter of ordinary and every-day business, I will sell them to you so that you may get a handsome profit.” “What do you call a handsome profit?” “The pearls are worth twelve thousand pounds, and I will let you have them for ten. What do you think of that for an offer?” “What odd noise was that?” “Oh, it was only I who laughed. Come, what do you say, at once; are we to do business or are we not?” “Hark ye, my friend; since you do know the value of your pearls, and this is to be a downright business transaction, I think I can find a customer who will give eleven thousand pounds for them, and if so, I have no objection to give you eight thousand pounds.” “Give me the eight thousand pounds,” said Sweeney Todd, “and let me go. I hate bargaining.” CORniclooo S CO)