"Where did your son Tobias go after he left you to-night?"
"Lor! Mr. Todd, is it you? You are as good as a conjuror, sir, for he was here; but bless you, sir, I know no more where he is gone to, than the man in the moon. He said he was going to sea, but I am sure I should not have thought it, that I should not."
"To sea!—then the probability is that he would go down to the docks, but surely not to-night. Do you not expect him back here to sleep?"
"Well, sir, that's a very good thought of yours; and he may come back here to sleep, for all I know to the contrary."
"But you do not know it for a fact?"
"He didn't say so; but he may come, you know, sir, for all that."
"Did he tell you his reason for leaving me?"
"Indeed no, sir; he really did not, and he seemed to me to be a little bit out of his senses."
"Ah! Mrs. Ragg," said Sweeney Todd, "there you have it. From the first moment that he came into my service, I knew and felt confident that he was out of his senses. There was a strangeness of behaviour about him, which soon convinced me of that fact, and I am only anxious about him, in order that some effort may be made to cure him of such a malady, for it is a serious, and a dreadful one, and one which, unless taken in time, will be yet the death of Tobias."
These words were spoken with such solemn seriousness, that they had a wonderful effect upon Mrs. Ragg, who, like most ignorant persons, began immediately to confirm that which she most dreaded.