When once he had gained that back room, Todd considered that his design against the peace of mind of the two men was all but accomplished; and it was with great difficulty that he kept himself from giving a hideous chuckle, that would at once have opened their ears to the fact that some one was close at hand, who, whether of this world or the next, was a proficient in horrid noises. He controlled this ebullition of ill-timed mirth, however, and listened attentively.
"There don't seem much else beside lots of clothes," said one of the men, "and hats, and sticks, and umbrellas."
"Ah!" said the other, "and they all belong to the murdered men that Todd cut up to make pies of!"
"Horrible!—horrible!"
"You may say that, old friend. It's only a great pity that Sir Richard has so expressly forbid anything to be touched in the old crib, or else there's some nice enough things here, I should say, that would make a fellow warm and comfortable in the winter nights."
"Not a doubt of that. Here's a cloak, now!"
"A beauty—quite a beauty, I say. He can't know what is really here. Do you think he can?"
"What, Sir Richard?"
"Yes."
"Oh, don't he. I wouldn't venture to touch so much as an old hat here, for I should feel, as sure as fate, he'd find it out."
"Oh, nonsense, he couldn't; and as for the ghosts, they don't seem at all likely to interfere in the matter, for there's not one of them to be seen or heard of to-night."
"No, I defy the ghosts—a-hem! I begin to think, do you know, that ghosts are all a sham. Why here we are, two men as brave as lions, or we should not have come here, and yet the deuce a ghost is to be seen. I tell you what I'd do if one was to come. I'd say, 'Old fellow, was this your cloak?' and then if he said 'yes,' I'd say, 'well, old fellow, it's of no use to you now, you know; will you give it to me?'"
"Ha!—ha! Capital! Why you have quite got over all your fears."
"Fears? Rubbish! I was only amusing myself to hear what you would say."
"Was you, though? Only acting, after all?"
"Precisely."
"Well, then, I must say you did it remarkably well, and if you take to the stage you will make your fortune. Oh, here's a nice brown suit now, that would be just my size. I should feel inclined to say to the ghosts what you would say about the cloak."
"Well, let's say it, and if nobody says anything to the contrary, we will take it for granted. I will take the cloak, and you the brown suit; Sir Richard will be none the wiser, and we shall be a little the richer, you know. 'Mr. Ghost, may I have this cloak, if you please, as you can't possibly want it?'"
"Upon my life you are a funny fellow," said the other; and then holding up the brown suit, he said, "Mr. Ghost who once owned this, may I have this brown suit, as it is of no use to you now?"
It was at this moment that Todd dashed open the two folding doors, and with one of the most frightful, fiendish yells that ever came from the throat of man, he made one bound into the front room.
The effect of this appearance, and the sound that accompanied it, was all that Todd could possibly wish or expect. The two men were almost driven to madness. They dropped the light, and with shrieks of dismay they rushed to the door—they tore it open, and then they both fell headlong down the staircase to the passage below, where they lay in a state of insensibility that was highly amusing to Todd.
Todd Alarms The Two Bow Street Officers.
Todd Alarms The Two Bow Street Officers.
"Ha! ha!" he laughed, as he stood at the head of the stairs; "Ha! ha!"
He listened, but not so much as a groan came from either of the men, and then he clapped his huge hands together with a report like the discharge of a pistol, and laughed again. Todd had not been so well pleased since his escape from Newgate.
He slowly descended the stairs, and more than once he stopped to laugh again. The passage was intensely dark, so that when he reached it he trod upon one of the men, but that rather amused him, and he jumped violently upon the body.
"Good," he said. "Perhaps they are both dead. Well, let them both die. It will be a lesson to others how far they interfere with me. Society and I are now fairly at war, and I will win as many battles as I can. They can't say but this is a well-fought one, two to one. Ha! They ought to make me a Field-Marshal. Ha!"
Making the most hideous faces, just for the fun of the thing, Todd made his way to the parlour, and taking from a corner, where he knew to lay his hands upon them in a moment, a couple of old newspapers, he twisted them up into a kind of torch, and lighting it then at the fire, he went with it flaming in his hand to the passage.
The two men lay profoundly still. Terror and the fall they had had, combined to throw them quite into a swooning state, from which probably it would be hours before they would recover.
"This is capital," said Todd. "Lie there, both of you, until I have transacted the business in this house that brought me here. Then I will, perhaps, think of some amusing way of finishing you both off—ha!"
Still carrying the flaming papers in his hand, Todd now made his way to the first-floor, and found the candle that the men had dropped. That he lighted, as it would be much more convenient to him than the papers; and then he trod them out, for he did not wish any great light as yet to appear from the windows of that house, and perchance awaken the attention of some passing traveller or curious neighbour.
Shading the light with his hand, and looking like some grim ogre, Todd took his way to the second-floor. As he went, he every now and then muttered his satisfaction to himself, or gave utterance to one of his unearthly laughs; for in the whole of that night's adventure there was much to please him.
In the first place, he hoped, and fully expected, to get enough booty from the house to place him a little at his ease as regarded money matters, provided that with it he should be fortunate enough to get away from England. Then, again, it was no small satisfaction to Todd to do anything which looked like a triumph over Sir Richard Blunt, and this not only looked like it, but really was.
"A good step," he muttered, "a capital step, and a bold one, too; but bold steps are always good ones. Who knows but that from some place o............