Our readers have been aware for a long time past that Mrs. Lovett was no common, everyday, sort of woman, and what we are about to relate concerning her, will be further proof that way tending, if it should be by any sceptical person in any way required. To all appearance, Todd had seen the last of her on the river. But Todd was born to be deceived, and at the time he should have recollected an old adage, to the effect that, folks who are born to be hanged are very seldom drowned.
We shall see.
Mrs. Lovett did go down, but as fortune and the amazingly strong current of the river would have it, she came up again, with a barge between her and Todd, and involuntarily laying hold of the side of the barge, there she remained, too exhausted to cry out, until Todd was far off.
She was seen at last by a man who was at the window of a public-house, and in the course of ten minutes after Todd had began to congratulate himself upon the demise of Mrs. Lovett, she was in a warm bed at the public-house, and her clothes drying at the kitchen-fire.
She had scarcely been for a moment at all insensible; and as she lay in bed she had a most accurate perception of all that happened. The reader may suppose that the feelings of Mrs. Lovett towards Sweeney Todd, were by no means ameliorated by the morning's proceedings.
And yet how calculating she was in her rage!
As the effects of her submersion wore off, and her ordinary strength came back to her, her mind became intently fixed upon but one object, and that was how to be completely and bitterly revenged upon Todd.
"He shall hang," she said. "He shall hang, but I must think of the means, while I likewise take care to avoid the gallows myself; but he shall hang, let the consequences be what they may."
The landlady of the public-house was very assiduous in her attention to Mrs. Lovett, and while she was thus thinking of her revenge upon Todd, she (the landlady) made her appearance in the room with a steaming glass of mulled and spiced wine.
"I hope you are better," she said; "and if you will give me the name and address of your friends, I will send to them at once."
"Friends!" said Mrs. Lovett. "How came you to think that I had any friends?"
"Well, I hardly thought you were without. Don't most folks have friends of some sort or another?"
"Ah, I had forgotten. I have a friend with me—a very dear friend, who will not forsake me. I have more of them at home—for I have a home."
"Oh," thought the landlady, "she is raving."
"Bring me my stays," said Mrs. Lovett.
The stays, which, together with the rest of her apparel, now had got quite dry, was brought to her, and in a little secret pocket in them, Mrs. Lovett dived with her two fingers, and found a damp five pound note.
"Take that," she said, "for your trouble. I do not want any change. Only be so good now as to help me to dress, and tell me what the time is."
"Three o'clock," said the landlady, "and I'm sure you can't think how pleased I am that you are better. Do you really think you are strong enough to go home yet?"
"Yes. What I have to do at home will lend me strength, if I wanted it."
Mrs. Lovett was soon dressed, and at her request a coach was sent for; and in the course of half-an-hour from the time that the landlady had asked her if she should send for her friends, she, Mrs. Lovett, was bowling along the dense thoroughfares of the city to her home.
What pen could describe the dark and malignant thoughts that filled her brain as she proceeded? What language would be strong enough to depict the storm of passion that raged in the bosom of that imperious woman?
It must suffice, that she made herself a solemn promise of vengeance against Todd, let the risk or the actual consequences to herself be what they might. If with perfect safety to herself she could be revenged upon him—of course she would; but she resolved not to hesitate, even if it involved a self-sacrifice, so full of the very agony of rage was she.
"He shall hang—he shall hang!"
Such were the words she uttered as the lumbering hackney-coach reached Fleet Street.
For all she knew to the contrary, Todd might be looking from his door, for that he had gone home in great triumph at the thought of having got rid of her she did not doubt; and so as it was just then a great object with her to keep him in that pleasant delusion, she got quite down among the straw at the bottom of the hackney-coach.
But she kept her eyes—those bright metallic-looking eyes, which, with a questionable taste, had been so much admired by the lawyers' clerks of the Temple and Lincoln's Inn—she kept her eyes just on the edge of the coach window, so that she might have a passing glance at Todd's shop.
Todd was at the door.
How pleased and self-satisfied he looked! He was rubbing his huge hands slowly together, and a grim smile was on his horrible features.
Mrs. Lovett clinched her hands until her nails made marks in the palms of them that did not come out for hours, and in a harsh growling voice, she said—
"Ah, grin on, grin on, fiend—your hours from now shall be numbered. You shall hang, hang, and I shall hope to see you in your last agony. If any bribe can induce the hangman, by some common bungling to protract your pain, he has but to name his price and he shall have it."
The coach rolled on.
Mrs. Lovett rose up from among the straw with a shudder. The immersion in the river had not drowned her certainly, but it had done her no good; and she could not conceal from herself, that a serious illness might very probably result from her unexpected cold bath.
"Never mind!" she said. "Never mind! What care I so that I complete my revenge against Todd? If I die after that it will not much matter. I will have my revenge."
The coach stopped at the corner of Bell-yard.
"That will do," said Mrs. Lovett as she pulled the check-string. "That will do. I will alight here."
She paid the coachman double the amount of his fare, so he only muttered a few curses between his teeth, and drove off.
With quite a stagger............