"Yes, yes—my honour. Touch my honour, even in regard of a pie, and touch my life.—I put two guineas in one end of my purse, to pay my glover in the Strand, and at the other end are some small coins—where the deuce—can—I—have—put—it."
The major made an affectation of feeling in all his pockets for his lost purse, and then, with a serio-comic look, he said—
"By Jove, some rascal has picked my pocket."
"Never mind me," said Mrs. Lovett, "I don't want payment for the pies."
"Well, but—the—the glover. Poor devil, and I promised him his money this morning. For a soldier and a man of honour to break his word is death. What shall I do?—Mrs. L., could you lend me a couple of guineas until I have the happiness of seeing you again?"
"Certainly, major, certainly I can."
The gallant son of Mars pocketed the coins, and after saluting Mrs. Lovett some half score of times—and she, the beast, liked it—he left the shop and went chuckling into the Strand, where in a few minutes he was in a pot-house, from whence he emerged not until he had liquidated one of the guineas. Was Mrs. Lovett taken in by the major? Did she believe his title, or his wealth, and his common honesty? Did she believe in the story of the purse and of the two guineas that were to be paid to the poor glover because he wanted them? No—no—certainly not. But for all that, she admired the major.—He was her beau ideal of a fine man! That was sufficient. Moreover, being what he was—a rogue, cheat, and common swindler—she could exercise, so she thought, a species of control over him which no decent man would put up with, and so in her own mind she had determined to marry the major and fly; but as she said—"There was a little something to be done first." Did that relate to the disposal of Todd? We shall see. If she calculated upon the major putting Sweeney Todd out of the way, she sadly miscalculated; but the wisest heads will blunder. Compared to Todd, the major was indeed a poor creature; but Mrs. Lovett, in the stern courage of her own intellect, could not conceive the possibility of the great, puffy, bloated, fierce Major Bounce being as arrant a coward as ever was kicked. He was so, though, for all that. After he had left her, Mrs. Lovett sat for a long time in a profound reverie, and as it happened that no one came into the shop; the current of her evil thoughts was uninterrupted.
"I have sufficient," she said; "and before it gets too late, I will leave this mode of life. Why did I—tempted by the fiend Todd—undertake it, but that I might make wealth by it, and so assume a position that my heart panted for. I will not delay until it is too late, or I may lose the enjoyment that I have sacrificed so much to find the means of getting. I live in this world but for the gratification of the senses, and finding that I could not gratify them without abundant means, I fell upon this plan. I—ah—that is he—"
Suddenly the swaggering companion, the redoubtable Major Bounce, rushed past the shop-window, without so much as looking in for a single moment, and made his way towards Carey Street. Mrs. Lovett started up and made her way into the front shop. Major Bounce was out of sight, but from Fleet Street came a poor, draggled, miserable looking woman, making vain efforts at a speed which her weakness prevented her from keeping up.—She called aloud—
"Stop! stop!—only a moment, Flukes! Only a moment, John. Stop!—stop!"