Todd seized Johanna by the arm, and dragged her into the shop. He locked the door, and then confronting her, he said--
"How kind it was of your friend, to take down the shutters for you, Charley Green."
"My friend, sir?"
"Yes, your friend who declined being shaved, you know, because you told him last night that he had better go to some other shop."
"Really, sir," said Johanna, "I don't know what you mean."
"Come, come, Charley, confess that you do know some one in London, as well as you know me. Confess, now, that people are so fond of interfering in other folk's affairs, that you have been set on to watch me. I shall not be at all angry, indeed, I shall not, I assure you. Not the least; only tell me the truth. That is all I ask of you, my boy, and you will find that it is no bad thing to make a friend of Sweeney Todd."
"If I had, sir, anything to confess," replied Johanna, "except that at times I do feel that I wish I had not run away from my mother-in-law at Oxford, I should soon tell it all to you."
"And so that is all, Charley?"
"All at present, sir."
"What a good lad. What an exemplary lad. Light the shop fire, if you please, Charley. Humph! I am wrong," muttered Todd to himself; "but yet I will cut his throat before I leave to-night. It will be safer and more satisfactory to do so, and besides, he has given me some uneasiness, and I hate him for his quiet gentle ways. I hate everybody. I would cut the throats of all the world if I could. Light the fire quickly, you young hound, will you?"
Johanna trembled. She felt that anything but a blow from Todd she could put up with, but in her pocket she kept a jagged piece of flint stone, which would go through the window in a moment; and she felt that through she must throw it, if he only so much as raised his hand against her.
The fire blazed up, and Todd at that moment had no further excuse for abusing Charley. With a sulky growl, he said--
"You can call me out if any one comes," and then he retired to his back parlour, closing and locking the door as usual.
The morning felt rather raw, and Johanna was glad to warm her hands at the fire in the shop, which soon burnt brightly; but she did not venture upon keeping up a bright blaze for long. Todd's mode of managing the fire, was always to keep a dry turf smouldering upon the top of it, from which ample heat enough was emitted to keep the shaving-pot upon the simmer. She now placed upon the fire one of those turfs, a small pile of which were always ready in the corner of the shop.
She had scarcely done so, when the shop door opened, and a man walked in.
"Is Mr. Todd in, my little man?" he said.
"Yes, sir. Do you wish to see him?" Johanna wished, if it were possible, to discourage visitors, but the man sat down at once in the shaving chair, and placed his hat upon the floor, adding as he did so--
"Yes, a right down good shave I want. As good as if St. Dunstan himself wanted one."
The manner in which the man pronounced the words St. Dunstan was so marked that Johanna felt convinced at once he was a friend, and she felt quite a gush of pleasure at the thought that Sir Richard Blunt had such a continual supervising eye upon her safety.
She felt that she must not look at this man otherwise than as a stranger. She felt that the least word of recognition might be fatal both to him and to her. She knew that Todd had some small orifice through which from his parlour he peeped into the shop, and that his eye was now upon her she did not doubt.
"I will call Mr. Todd, sir," she said in a moment. "He is close at hand."
"Thank you," replied the man. "I sit here as comfortable as St. Dunstan."
"Yes," said Johanna, as she heard the watch-word of safety and friendship once more uttered by that man who was in truth one of Sir Richard's most confidential and trustworthy officers.
She at once now proceeded to the door of the parlour, and tapped at it until Todd opened it, and popped his head out with a grim smile.
"Oh, Charley my dear," he said, "does a gentleman want me?"
"Yes, sir."
"A-hem! Good morning, sir," added Todd, as he advanced, tying on his apron. "A shave, I presume, sir? A close shave, sir? I do think of all the luxuries in life, sir, a good close shave--what I call a regular polish off, sir--is one of the greatest in a small way. Charley, ain't it near breakfast time, my good lad?"
"Yes, sir," said Johanna. "I daresay it is."
"Very good. The hot-water. Thank you my dear--you will take two pence from the till, Charley, and get yourself somewhere about the market a--Well now?"
A thin man in a cloak made his appearance at the door of the shop, and taking off his hat, made a bow, as he said--
"I believe I have the pleasure of speaking to the pious Mr. Todd?"
"My name is Todd, sir. What is it?"
"I am truly delighted," said the tall thin man sitting down upon the nearest seat, and placing his hat upon his knees. "I am truly delighted to see you. Pray go on shaving that gentleman, as I shall be some time."
"Some time about what?" almost screamed Todd.
"Finding the tract, from which I purpose reading to you a few extracts upon the all-important subject of the election of grace, and the insufficiency of works."
Todd stropped a razor, and glared at the intruder, who, fitting on his nose with great precision a pair of blue spectacles, began rummaging in his hat.
"Humph! this is it. No--this is not it. Well, I thought I had it here, and so I have. This is--no. This is an imaginary and highly religious discourse upon saints, and St. Dunstan in particular."
Johanna knew in a moment that this other man was a friend likewise. He, too, had pronounced the words St. Dunstan in a peculiar manner.
Todd suddenly became quite calm.
"Sir," he said, "I take it as a very particular favour, indeed, that you should have called here upon such an errand, and I only beg that you will not hurry yourself in the least; I can go on shaving this gentleman, and perhaps when he is gone, you will permit me the honour of operating upon you?"
"With great pleasure," replied the man. "Dear me, where can the tract be? Is this it? No--this is about the pious milkmaid, who always put up a prayer for the milking-pail, to prevent the cow from kicking it over. Dear me, where can it be? Oh, is this it? No--this is the story of the pious barber's boy, who, when he had an opportunity, went over the way and found his father there! Dear me, where can it be?"
Johanna started.
"The barber's boy," she thought, "who went over the way and found his father there? Those words are for me."
She was now in quite a fever of anxiety to leave the shop, for she did not doubt but that by some means her father had heard of her position, and she felt that then nothing but the actual sight of her in perfect health and safety would satisfy him. But she dared not show the anxiety she felt. She bent over the fire, and affected to be stirring the turf.
"You can go and get your breakfast, Charley," said Todd.
"Thank you, sir."
Johanna would not betray any haste, but she shook with agitation as she neared the door; and then she recollected that she had not taken the twopence from the till as she had been told to do, and that the circumstance of not doing so might create suspicion.
She crept back and possessed herself of the pence. Todd watched her with the eyes of a demon.
"Are you going, my dear Charley?" he said.
"Yes, sir."
She left the shop, and then her first impulse would have induced her to hurry over the road to the fruiterer's shop, but her eyes fell upon the figure of Sir Richard Blunt standing in the fruiterer's doorway. He moved his hand signifying that she should go towards the market, and she did so. He quickly followed her.
She did not look behind her, until she was quite in the old Fleet-market; and then, just as she looked round, Sir Richard Blunt touched her arm.
"You understood my message?" he said.
"Yes. My father."
"Exactly. It is concerning him. It appears that some busy-body, a man I understand named Lupin, has seen you in your present disguise, and informed him of it."
"I know the man. He is one of those saintly hypocrites, who make religion the cloak for their vices."
"Yes, there are not a few of them," said Sir Richard. "They revel in vice, and daily try to make the Almighty an accomplice in their offences against society. Well, then, Johanna, this man has tortured your father with an account of your being in this disguise."
"It would torture him."
"Naturally, without he knew all the reasons for it; but it appears that he went to the house of Miss Wilmot, and after some trouble saw her, when she, finding that he knew quite enough to make him wretched, and not enough to explain your position, frankly told him all, and brought him to me."
"It was the best."
"Most decidedly it was, and I need only say that he is anxiously waiting to see you, at our friend the fruiterer's house; but as it would not do for you to go direct from Todd's door to there, I have intercepted you, you see, to take you by a safer route."
"How good, and kind, and considerate you are to me," said Johanna, as she looked up in the face of the magistrate, while tears started to her eyes. "Without you how miserably I must have failed in this adventure. Todd would no doubt before this have discovered me, and taken my life."
"Don't say a word about that," replied Sir Richard. "Recollect that after all it was my duty to protect you; and if I have been a little more anxious than usual in the performance of that duty, it is because I admire your heroic constancy and courage, and hope to see you happy yet."
"Alas! the sun of my happiness has set for ever. I can only now pray to Heaven, that it will endow me with patience to bear its decrees with serenity."
"Well," added Sir Richard, "we will say no more upon that subject, just now. Come with me, and I will take you to your father by a safer way than just crossing the road from Todd's shop to the fruiterer's."
He led her down a court in Bridge-street, and thence through a complete labyrinth of passages, some of which still exist at the back of Fleet Street, and some of which have been swept away, until they reached a door in a dingy-looking wall, at which he paused.
"This is the back of the fruiterer's house," he said, "and I dare say some one is waiting for me."
He tapped three times distinctly at the door, and then it was opened immediately by the fruiterer's daughter, who with a smile clasped Johanna in her arms.
"Welcome," she said. "Welcome once again."
"Ah, my dear friend," said Johanna, "I shall learn to bless the circumstances, commencing in affliction as they did, that have brought me acquainted with such kind hearts."
They all three now crossed a little paved yard, and were soon in the fruiterer's house.
"Where is my dear father?" said Johanna. "Where is he?"
"This way," said the young girl, who took so great an interest in the fate of Johanna. "This way, dear. He is in our room up stairs, and will be no less delighted to see you, then you will be delighted to see him."
"I am sure of that," said Johanna.
She ran up the stairs with more speed that the fruiterer's daughter could make, and in another moment was in her father's arms.
