The String of Pearls (1850), p. 156

feel the sun of a happier clime than, this fanning my cheek. Oh, liberty, liberty, what a precious boon art thou!"
Tingle! tingle! tingle! He started from his dream of joy. The pies are wanted; Mrs. Lovett knew well enough how long they took in doing, and that by this time they should be ready to be placed upon the ascending trap. Down it came. Open went the oven door, and in another minute the note was in the
shop. The cook placed his hand upon his heart to still its tumultuous beating as he listened intently. He could hear the sound of feet above—only dimly though, through that double roof. Once he thought he heard high words, but all died away again, and nothing came of it.—All was profoundly still. The batch of pies surely were sold now, and in a paper bag he told himself his pie,
par excellence, had gone perhaps to the chambers of some attorney, who would be rejoiced to have a finger in it; or to some briefless barrister, who would be rejoiced to get his name in the papers, even if it were only connected with a story of a pie. Yes, the dream of freedom still clung to the imagination of the cook, and he waited, with every nerve thrilling with expectation, the result of his plan. One, two, three hours had passed away, and nothing came of the pie or the letter. All was as quiet and as calm as though the malignant fates had determined that there he was to spend his days for ever, and gradually as in a frigid situation the narrow column of mercury in a thermometer will sink, sank his spirits—down—down—down!
"No—no," he said. "No hope. Timidity or incredulity has consigned my letter to the flames, perhaps, or some wide-mouthed, stupid idiot has actually swallowed it. Oh that it had choked him by the way. Oh that it had actually stuck in his throat.—It is over, I have lost hope again. This horrible place will be my charnel-house—my family vault! Curses!—No—no. What is the use
of swearing? My despair is past that—far past that—"
"Cook!" said a voice.
He sprang up, and looked to the wicket. There was Mrs. Lovett gazing in at him.
"Cook!"
"Well—well.—Fiend in female shape, what would you with me? Did you not expect to find me dead?"
"Certainly not. Here is a letter for you."
"A—a—letter?"
"Yes. Perhaps it is an answer to the one you sent in the pie, you know."
The unfortunate grasped his head, and gave a yell of despair. The letter—for indeed Mrs. Lovett had one—was dropped upon the ground floor from the opening through which she conversed with her prisoner, and then, without another word, she withdrew from the little orifice, and left him to his meditation.
"Lost!—lost!—lost!" he cried. "All is lost. God, is this enchantment? Or am I mad, and the inmate of some cell in an abode of lunacy, and all this about pies and letters merely the delusion of my overwrought fancy? Is
there really a pie—a Mrs. Lovett—a Bell Yard—a letter—a—a—a—damn it, is there such a wretch as I myself, in this vast bustling world, or is all a wild and fathomless delusion?"
He cast himself upon the ground, as though from that moment he gave up all hope and desire to save himself. It seemed as though he could have said—
"Let death come in any shape he may, he will find me an unresisting victim. I have fougnt with fate, and am, like thousands who have preceded me in such
a contest—beaten!"
A kind of stupor came over him, and there he lay for more than two hours; but youth will overcome much, and the mind, like some depressed spring, will, in the spring of life, soon recover its rebound; so it was with the unhappy cook.
After a time he rose and looked about him.
"No," he said, "it is no dream. It is no dream!"
He then saw the letter lying upon the ground, which Mrs. Lovett had with such irony cast unto him.