The String of Pearls (1850), p. 405

over at once. I think you thoroughly understand what you have to do—and if Todd asks you where you lodged, you had better say that the servants here offered to let you sleep by the kitchen fire, and you accepted the offer—for he may be watching for you now, and see you come out of this house, for all we know to the contrary. And now remember, without any reference to my plans or what I would rather do, if you feel yourself, or fancy you feel yourself in the least danger, take the means I have pointed out to you of summoning aid, and aid will come to you."
"I will," said Johanna.
"Heaven speed you, then! This will be the last day, I think, of the career of that bold bad man. I intend to make such an effort to get under his house to-day, as I hope and expect will enable me to come at the grand secret, namely, of how he disposes of his victims so quickly—for that there is some wonderful jugglery in it, I am certain."
Johanna took a kind leave of the fruiterer's daughter, who had lavished upon her all those attentions which, in Johanna's position, became so precious from one of her own sex; and then, assuming a careless manner, with her hat put on in a boyish slovenly sort of way, she boldly crossed the road to Sweeney Todd's. He had been watching through a hole in the upper part of one of the shutters. In a moment all sorts of ugly suspicions took possession of his mind. What could Charley Green, his errand-boy from Oxford, who knew no one, and was unknown to all London, doing at a tradesman's house in Fleet Street at such an hour in the morning? How came he to know the people of that house? How came he to dream of going there?
Todd was boiling with anger and curiosity when he opened the door and admitted Johanna, a thing that he, w r as unmindful enough to do before she knocked
for admission, which alone would have been amply sufficient to point out to her that she had been watched from some peep-hole in the house.
He stretched out his hand and dragged her in. He controlled his temper sufficiently to enable him to gratify his curiosity. He made quite certain that Charley Green would tell him some story of were he had been, which should not convict the fruiterer. By the light of a miserable candle that Todd had burning in the dark closed shop, he glared at Johanna.
"Well—well," he said. "A good night's rest, Charley?"
"Tolerable, sir!"
"Humph! ha! And did you find a place to sleep at cheaply and decently, my good lad, eh?"
"I was very fortunate indeed, sir."
"Oh, you were very fortunate indeed?"
"Yes, sir. I am, through being country bred I suppose, fond of fruit, so when I left you last night, I bought an apple at a shop opposite."
"Oh, at Mr. a—a—"
"I don't know the name, sir," said Johanna, "but I can run out and ascertain, I dare say."
Todd gave a low sort of growl. He did not know if he were being foiled by innocence or by art. With an impatient gesture, he added—
"Nevermind the apples, I wish to know where you slept, Charley, that I may judge if it was a proper place, there are so many wicked people in London."
"Are there, sir?"
"Bah! Go on. Where did you sleep?"
"Well, sir, as there was a kind tempered-looking servant in the fruiterer's shop, I thought she might be able to tell me of some place where I could lodge, and when she had heard my story—"
"Story—story? What story?"
"How destitute I was, sir, and how kind you had been to employ me without a character, and how happy and contented I was in your service, sir. So