We return to Todd. After he had put up his own shutters, and properly secured his doors for the night, he lit the lamp in his parlour, and glancing curiously around him, he muttered— "Yes. This will assuredly be the last night here. How I hate the look of anything, and how eagerly I shall banish from my mind all kind of remembrance of this place when I am in another land, as I shall be shortly. Let me see: I will embrace the catholic religion, and I will be most devout. The regularity of my religious exercises shall do much for me. Indeed, I do not think I could have remained so long in London, if I had not had the prudence to be regular at the church. It is true that of late I have neglected all that, but then I am going soon, and it does not matter."
Todd sat down, and looked over the memoranda of things he had to do that he had made. He felt tolerably satisfied with the condition of affairs. That Colonel Jeffery and that others suspected him, he could not doubt; but he felt quite confident that he should be far off, before those suspicions repaired into anything dangerous to him.
He still clung to the idea that they knew nothing, or else they would arrest him; and while such did not ensue, he considered himself as in a tolerably safe position.
He then set about the preparations for firing his house. We need not follow him through those preparations. We need not state how he soaked clothes in turpentine and oil, and how he placed them in such positions, combined with small packages of gunpowder, and lumps of rosin, that if a torch were to be applied at the lower part of the house, the whole would be in a few moments in a blaze. Suffice it to say, that Todd worked hard for the next two hours, and that by the time they had gone, he had got everything ready for the perpetration of that last crime which he intended to commit, before he crossed the threshold of his house upon the following night, to leave it for ever.
Todd Preparing Combustibles To Fire His House.
Todd Preparing Combustibles To Fire His House.
More than once during these two hours he drank brandy. The ardent spirit had become necessary to the existence of Todd now; and when he took a draught at the conclusion of his labours, he smiled grimly as he said—
"Charley Green will have quite a funeral of flame. He shall die, and his body shall be consumed in the blazing fragments of this house, and it will go hard but this side of Fleet Street suffers. Oh, if the flames would only spread to the old church, I should rejoice much at that, and they may do so.—Yes, they may do so. Ha! ha! I shall be remembered in London."
As he spoke, a dull heavy sort of sound at the outer door of his house came upon his ears. It was as though something heavy had been thrown against it. With fear expressed upon every feature of his face, Todd listened for a repetition of the sound.
It did not come again.
Todd began to breathe a little more freely, and yet he kept asking himself—"What was it?"—and the utmost powers of his imagination could return him no feasible answer to the interesting inquiry. But nothing was more easy than to go to the door and see if any one was there, or if anything had happened to it. Should he open it for such a purpose? Should he unbar and unbolt at the risk of he knew not what? No: he would, from the first floor balcony, and there was a frail one, reconnoitre the street. He should then be easily able to see if there were any danger.
He had no sooner made this determination, than he carried it out, by ascending the dark blackened staircase, conducting to the upper part of his house, that staircase which was now so completely covered by combustible materials.
At every few steps he took he listened attentively. He thought there might yet be a repetition of the sound; but no—all was still; and by the time he reached his first floor, he was in some sort recovered from his first fright. That was something. He left his light upon the stair-head, for he had no wish to point himself out to the chance passengers in Fleet Street, or perhaps to some enemy, by going into that room with a light in his hand. No, Todd was much too acute for that; so carefully closing the door, so that no ray of light got in from the staircase, he crept to the window.
The shutters had to be unfastened, for Todd's house was always carefully closed up like the Duke of Wellington's at the present day. He very quickly unclosed one of the long-disused windows, and opening it gently, looked out over the edge of the little crazy balcony into the street.
Something big and black was against his door.
The more Todd bent his gaze upon this object, the more a kind of undefined terror took possession of him, and the more puzzled he was to give a name to the dark mass that had been laid upon his threshold. There was no lamp very near his house, or else, miserable as was the light from those old oil apologies for illuminators, some few rays might have fallen upon the dark mass, and told Todd what it was.
But no—all was dark and dubious, and he strained his eyes in vain to penetrate the mystery.
"I must go down," he said; "I must open the door. Yes, I cannot live and not know what this is. I must open the door, however reluctantly, and ascertain precisely. Ah!"
While Todd was talking, and still keeping his eyes fixed upon the mysterious object at his door, he saw suddenly in the midst of it a bright luminous spark, as if something connected with it was of a red heat, and slowly smouldering on fire.
If he was before puzzled to account for the phenomen............