The Mysteries of the Court of London — page 248: what you’re looking at

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

TWO FRIENDS | 221 with his more timid friend it assumed a most ludicrous aspect. With a ghastly pale countenance, and quivering in every limb, he looked toward the skeleton, thence his af- frighted glances travelled to the mummy, and he knew not from which the voice proceeded, though he was firmly im- pressed with the conviction that from one or the other of those sources did it emanate. Mr. Bealby started up to’see what the truth might really be, and what intruder had found his way into his museum, when the Burker, thinking that the lapse of nearly half a minute was sufficient to prepare the gentlemen for his appearance, slowly emerged from his hid- ing-place. “Who the devil are you?’”’ demanded Mr. Bealby, not exactly perceiving sufficient of the individual’s appearance to make him suspect who he might possibly be, for there was but one candle in the room, and this was burning dimly. “Yes, who the devil are you?” echoed Mr. Limber, snatching up a tomahawk with one hand and a Roman pipkin in the other. ‘““1’m achap as can let you genelmen have the little matter of thirty pound which you seems to stand in need of,’’ and as the Burker spoke, he advanced nearer toward the table. “A Jew!” ejaculated Bealby. ‘‘ And yet he is not a Jew!— Ah!” and a sudden suspicion flashed to his mind. “A Jew, and not a Jew?” echoed Mr. Limber, at the same time smitten with the same thought; and then he shuddered, and his teeth chattered, at the idea that he found himself in the presence of the terrible Barney the Burker. | ‘“ Now, genelmen, just keep your tongues quiet,” said the Burker, hastily, ‘“‘ and it will be all the better for you as well as for me. I’m just what you take me for, but here’s the thirty pound you say you want and that you don’t care a rap whence it comes from. In return for this, what I require is your assistance to help me to escape.”’ Limber sank with a hollow moan upon a chair, the toma- hawk dropping from his hand on one side, the Roman pipkin on the other. He looked aghast. But Bealby was by no means affected in the same sense, and he hastened to say, “Don’t be a fool, Limber. What is it to us who this fellow is? There’s the blunt, and that’s all we care for. Come, Ben,” he added, going straight up to his friend and clutching EOMINGIOOKS (CO)