immediately beneath the parlour, where a portion of the cellar went, there was a quantity of old lumber. perhaps if that lumber had been looked very carefully over, among it there might have been found some fragments of old, and some of new coffins from st. dunstan's; for with the rich, who had vaults of their own, it was the arrogant fashion to adorn the last sad and narrow home of humanity with silver plates and nails; and todd had despoiled the grave of some of those costly trappings.

upon the heap of rubbish he scrambled, and that just enabled him comfortably to reach the floor of that parlour. that portion of the floor went under a cupboard in one corner, and in the floor of it three or four coarse round holes had been drilled with a centre-bit. todd had had his own motives for drilling those holes in the cupboard floor.

he now put his finger through one of the holes, and when he did so, he gave a chuckle of delight, for he was convinced that the contents of that cupboard had not been in any way interfered with; and that, as a consequence, he should find no difficulty in firing the house completely.

"so," he said, "this is the cleverness of your much-vaunted sir richard blunt. he has left a cupboard as crammed with combustible materials as it well can be, to the mercy of the first accident that may set fire to them; and now the accident has come. ha!"

again todd listened attentively, and was still further satisfied that all was profoundly still in the parlour, although he heard the racket and the banging of doors in the upper part of the house.

"this is good," said todd. "this is capital. all is well now. the fire will have made most excellent progress before they will discover it, and i will warrant that if once it takes a firm hold of the wood-work of this old house, it is not a trifle that will stop its roaring progress."

with this, todd ignited one of his matches and thrust it alight through one of the holes in the floor of the cupboard.

a slight cracking noise ensued immediately.

"that will do," said todd, and he withdrew the match and cast it upon the ground. the crackling noise continued. he turned and fled from the place with precipitation.

in the lower portion of that cupboard there was a quantity of hay, upon which oil and turpentine had been poured liberally. high up upon a shelf was a wooden bowl, with eight pounds of gunpowder in it, and todd did not know a moment when the flames might reach it, when a terrific explosion would be sure to ensue.

"it is done now," he said. "it is done, and they do not know it. more revenge—more revenge! i shall have more revenge now, and there will be more death."

he knew that there was only one thing that could by any possibility prevent the gunpowder in the wooden bowl from becoming speedily ignited, and that that would be in consequence of the hay being packed too close to do more than smoulder for a little time before bursting into a flame; but that it must and would do so eventually, there could be no possible doubt, and it was in that hearty conviction that sweeney todd now most fully gloried.

and now, as he had done before, he kept his arms outstretched before him to prevent him from injuring himself against any of the walls or the abrupt turnings in the passages between his own house and old st. dunstan's. he stooped, likewise, in order that he might not strike his head against the roof at in places where it was very low, and rough, and rugged.

once only todd got a little bewildered, and did not well know his way, and then he ignited one of the matches, and by its small light he saw in a moment which way he was to go.

"all is well," he said, and he rushed on; but yet he began to be a little surprised that he heard no noise from the house—no sound of the explosion; and inclining his ear to the ground, he stopped in one of the old vaults to listen.

a low moaning sound came upon his ears like the muttering of distant thunder, and then a report as though some heavy piece of timber had fallen from a great height to the earth. he fancied that the vault in which he was shook a little, and in terror he rushed forward. the gunpowder had exploded in the cupboard, and todd's imagination was left to revel in the thought of the mischief which it had done to the house and to all within it.

in five minutes more he reached the foot of the little flight of stone-steps that led to the church. all was profoundly dark still, as he thought; but he had not got up above six of those steps when he became conscious that the light of early dawn had already found its way through the windows of the church, and was making everything within it dimly visible. todd recoiled at this. he and daylight were decidedly not upon good terms with each other by any means.

"it is morning—it is morning!" he exclaimed. "what will become of me now? it is light."

he staggered right back into the vaults again, and there gave himself to painful thought for awhile; as he did so, he heard loud shouts in the streets—shouts that awakened echoes in the old church; and if anything could have given to todd, at such a time as that, very great satisfaction, it was to hear that those shouts were all commingled with the one prevailing cry of—"fire—fire—fire!" that was a joy, indeed, to him.

"it burns—it burns!" he said; "but i am here a prisoner; i dare not go out into the daylight; but the old house, with all that it contains, is wrapped in flames, and that is much—much! it is now everything. oh, that i could hear the cries of those who find themselves wrapped up in the unappeasable element, and have no means of escape! they would, indeed, be music to my ears."

this state of mental exultation passed away very quickly, as it was sure to do, and gave place to the most lively fears for his own personal safety; for, after all, that was the great thing with todd—at least it was while any portion of his deep revenges remained yet to be accomplished.

"what shall i do?" that was the question that he kept repeating to himself. "what shall i do?" he advanced now right up the steps into the body of the church. there, at least, he knew that he was safe for the present; and as he stood and listened, he thought that in the bustle and in the confusion that men's minds were in regarding the fire, he might emerge from the church and no one notice him, and fairly get away without observation. if he only got a few streets off it would be sufficient, and he should be able to tell himself that he had indeed and in truth escaped.

with these thoughts and feelings, he approached the church door.

the nearer he got to the old doors of st. dunstan, the more appallingly and distinctly there came upon his ears the cries and the shouts of the people who were hurrying to the fire, and he muttered to himself—

"ah, it must be blazing briskly now—very briskly. it must be quite a sight to the whole of london to see the old den burning so bravely."

an engine came rattling on, and with a roar and a crash went past the church door.

"capital!" said todd. "upon my word this is capital!"

another engine, with the horses at a mad gallop, went by, and todd quite rubbed his hands at the idea of the scene of confusion that he had by his own unaided efforts succeed in making in old fleet street.

"they did not think," he said, "when they closed the gates of the old prison upon me, and told me i should die, that there was one half the mischief in me yet that they now find there is. ay, and there is much more yet, that they dream not of, but which they shall know some day."

he laid his hand upon the lock of the church door. a long ray of the faint early gray light of dawn streamed through the massive keyhole, and at the moment todd laid his hand upon the lock that ray of light vanished. it was obstructed by some one on the outside. he recoiled several steps, and then from the outside he heard a voice say—

"lor bless us, yes, it's that old villain todd's house, gentlemen, in course. it's come to a bad end, like its master will come to, if he hasn't. when i saw the flames and heard 'em a-roaring, i said to my missus 'conwulsions!' says i, 'if that ain't todd's house in a blaze.'"

"you are right, mr. beadle," said a voice in reply.

"yes, gentlemen, perhaps i says it as oughtn't to say it, but i is commonly right in my way, you know, gentlemen; and so, as i says, 'conwulsions! it's todd's house a fire.'"

"and you think," said another voice, "we shall get a good view of it from the old church tower?"

"yes, gentlemen," replied the beadle, whom the reader will not fail to recognise as our old acquaintance. "yes, gentlemen. i'll warrant as you will get a capital view from the top of the old tower, where i will take you. lor a mussy, how it is a roorin, that fire! i know'd it was todd's house, and i said to my missus, 'conwulsions!' says i, 'that's old villanous todd's house a-fire!'"

todd ground his teeth together with rage as he listened to this; but he felt that if he would provide for his own safety, there was indeed now no time to lose, and he rapidly retreated into the body of the church.

his first thought was to hide himself in one of the pews, but the divisions between them were not so high as to prevent a person of very moderate height indeed from looking over one of them, and there was quite light enough now for any one in such a case to have seen him, if they had chosen to glance into the pew in which he might take shelter. the case was urgent, however, and he had not much time for thought, so being close to the pulpit he ran up its steps, opened the little door, and ensconced himself within it in a moment.

there, at all events, he felt that he was hidden securely from any merely casual observation.

the church door was opened almost before he could get the pulpit door shut; but he did manage to close it, and he was satisfied that he had done so without exciting the attention of those who were entering the church. todd could, of course, from where he was, hear, with the greatest clearness and precision, every word that they said to each other, as they walked up the aisle.

todd sets fire to his house, then hides himself in st. dunstan's pulpit.

todd sets fire to his house, then hides himself in st. dunstan's pulpit.

one of the persons who were coming with the beadle to view the fire from the tower of the church went on speaking to his companions.

"and so," he said, "i think, if no one be hurt, and the fire can be kept just within the limits of todd's house, it will be no bad thing to have a place that is such a continual reminder of atrocious guilt, swept from the face of the earth."

"yes," said the other, "the only pity is, that sweeney todd is not in it to go with it. then the good thing would be complete."

"it would, gentlemen," said the beadle. "oh, when you comes to think of what he did and what he might have done—oh, it makes my hair stand o' end, and my parochial blood curdle, to think of what he might have done, gentlemen."

"he could not do worse than he did."

"not wus? not wus? oh,—oh!"

"how is it possible? he committed a number of murders, and if you can find me anything worse he could have done, i shall indeed be very much surprised."

"gentlemen, he might have polished me off. that's what he might have done, for he has actually had me hold of by the nose. oh, conwulsions! if i had only then thought that there was a chance of his polishing off, as he used to call it, a parochial authority, i should have—i should have—"

"what, mr. beadle?"

"flewed through the window, sir, that's what i should have done, and told the world at large what had happened."

"well, certainly, that would have been something."

"everything," said the other gentleman, in a tone of voice that showed how much he was inclined to enjoy a joke at the expense of the beadle. "it would have been everything. but how plain you can hear the roaring of the flames now, even in this church, with the door shut."

"you can, indeed," said the other. "ah, there dashes past another engine. come, mr. beadle, the sooner we get on this tower the better."

"in a minute, gentlemen; but now as you is here arter the blessed old church has been shut up all night, i jest ask you to say if it has the orrid smell as it used to have, which offended the holy nose of the bishop when he came to confirm the people."

"i smell nothing."

"nor i."

"very good; then that's so far satisfactory. cos you see, sirs, only yesterday sir christopher wren and two gentlemen come and left in the church a pailful of chemists, for the express purpose of taking away the smell."

"a what?"

"a pailful of chemists."

"of chemicals, you mean, i suppose, although that would be a singularly inappropriate term. but come on, mr. beadle, we are very anxious to get on the tower."

"this way, gentlemen, if you pleases. this will lead you nicely and fairly up those little stairs and right on. oh, what a world we does live in, to be sure!"

with this general philosophical remark, the beadle, opening a little door at the extremity of the south aisle, pushed his friends up a narrow staircase that led to the top of the tower of old st. dunstan's, and from which certainly a very good view of the surrounding streets and of the temple could be obtained; and in the clear light of early morning, before the million fires in london were lighted, that view was seen to be a tolerably distinct one.

todd muttered the bitterest maledictions upon them, as he heard them go up the little stairs.

there he was, certainly, to all appearance, safe enough; and he might, for all he knew, be safe enough until the next sunday; but how was he to live in a pulpit even for the whole of a day? it might be that he would have to wait there until the dim shadows of the night should come again, and wrap up the whole church in gloom; but how many weary hours must pass before that time would come, and what infinite danger there was, that he might drop into sleep after all his fatigues, and so forget his caution, and discover himself!

already the great fatigues he had passed through, and the many hours he had been debarred from rest, began to tell upon him; and it was with difficulty that he kept himself from dropping into slumber. he began to get fearfully alarmed at his situation.

"what shall i do?" he said, "i must escape—escape! yes. how the fire roars! i will not sleep. oh, no—no! it is done now; the old house is gone—gone!"

todd fell fast asleep in the pulpit.