The String of Pearls (1850), p. 245

OverviewTranscribeVersionsHelp

Facsimile

Transcription

Status: Complete

Todd came to his door.
"Good God, he is here!" said Arabella. "Come away. Come!"
"Never. No! Perhaps this is providential. I will, I must look at this man, happen what may."
Todd glared at the two young girls like some ogre intent upon their destruction, and as Johanna looked at him, a painter who loved contrast, might
have indeed found a study, from the wonderful difference between those two
human countenances. They neither spoke for some few moments, and it was
reserved for Todd to break the silence.
"What do you want here?" he cried, in a hoarse rough voice. "Be off
with you. What do you mean by knocking at the window of an honest
tradesman? I don't want to have anything to say to such as you."
"He---he did it!" gasped Johanna.
"Did what?" said Todd, advancing in a menacing attitude, while his face
assumed a most diabolical expression of concealed hatred. "Did what?"
"Stop him! Stop him!" cried a voice from the other side of the street.
"Stop Pison, he's given me the slip, and I'm blessed if he won't pitch into that ere barber. Stop him. Pison! Pison! Come here, boy. Come here!
Oh, lor, he's nabbed him. I knew'd he would, as sure as a horse's hind leg
ain't a gammon o' bacon. My eyes, won't there be a row---he's nabbed the
barber, like ninepence."
Before the ostler at the Bullfinch, for it was from his lips this speech came, could get one half of it uttered, the dog---who is known to the readers by the name of Hector, as well as his new name of Pison---dashed over the road, apparently infuriated at the sight of Todd, and rushing upon him, seized him with his teeth. Todd gave a howl of rage and pain, and fell to the ground.
The whole street was in an uproar in a moment, but the ostler rushing over
the way, seized the dog by the throat, and made him release Todd, who crawled
upon all fours into his own shop. In another moment he rushed out with a
razor in his hand.
"Where's the dog?" he cried, "Where's the fiend in the shape of a
dog?"
"Hold hard!" said the ostler, who held Hector between his knees. "Hold
hard. I have got him, old chap."
"Get out of the way. I'll have his life."
"No you won't."
"Humph!" cried a butcher's boy who was passing. "Why that's the same
dog as said the barber had done for his master, and collected never such a lot of
halfpence in his hat to pay the expenses of burying of him."
"You villain!" cried Todd.
"Go to blazes!" said the boy. "Who killed the dog's master? Ah, ah!
Who did it? Ah, ah!"
The people began to laugh.
"I insist upon killing that dog!" cried Todd.
"Do you?" said the ostler; "now, this here dog is a partickler friend of mine, so you see I can't have it done. What do you say to that now, old stick-in-the-mud ? If you walk into him, you must walk through me first. Only
just put down that razor, and I'll give you such a wolloping, big as you are, that
you'll recollect for some time."
"Down with the razor! Down with the razor!" cried the mob, who was
now every moment increasing.
Johanna stood like one transfixed for a few moments in the middle of all this
tumult, and then she said with a shudder---
"What ought I to do?"
"Come away at once, I implore you," said Arabella Wilmot. "Come away,
I implore you, Johanna, for my sake as well as for your own. You have already
done all that can be done. Oh, Johanna, are you distracted?"
"No---no. I will come---I will come."

Notes and Questions

Please sign in to write a note for this page

Raburger

I would tag Arabella, Todd, ogre, countenances, Pison, ere, lor, a horse's hind leg ain't a gammon o' bacon, my eyes won't there be a row-- he's nabbed the barber like ninepence, ostler, Bullfinch, Hector, halfpence, go to blazes, partickler, old stick-in-the-mud, tumult

nesvetr

great. let's do in oxygen Tuesday.