RETURNS TO NEWGATE, AND THE PROCEEDINGS OF MRS. LOVETT.
While those persons, in whose happiness we and our readers, no doubt,
likewise feel a kindly interest, are thus in the happy society of each
other, compensating themselves for many of the mischances and deep
anxieties of the past, some events were taking place in Newgate of a
character well worth the recording.
Mrs. Lovett, when she found that her proposition to turn evidence
against Todd would not be listened to, but that it was the fixed
determination of the authorities to include her in the prosecution,
became deeply despondent. Upon being taken back to Newgate, she did not
say one word to any one; but when she was placed in her cell, she paced
to and fro in its narrow confines with that restless perturbed manner
which may be noticed in wild animals when caged.
After about an hour, then, she called to one of the attendants of the
prison, saying--
"I wish to speak to some one who has authority to hear what I may choose
to relate."
"The chaplain will come," was the reply.
"The chaplain!" repeated Mrs. Lovett with a burst of rage, "what do I
want with chaplains? Do I not know perfectly well that when a person is
found too idiotic for ordinary duties he is made a chaplain of a jail?
No! I will not speak to any of your chaplains."
"Well, I never!" said the turnkey. "Our chaplain for certain ain't a
conjuror, but I never heard afore that he was sent here on account of
being weak in the upper story. It's likely enough though for all that.
Perhaps Mrs. Lovett, you'd like to see the Governor?"
"Yes, he will do much better."
"Very good."
Such a prisoner as Mrs. Lovett could command an interview with the
Governor of Newgate at any reasonable period; and that functionary
having been apprised of her wish to see him, together with what she had
said of the chaplain, repaired to her cell with an ill-concealed smile
upon his face, for in his heart he perfectly agreed in Mrs. Lovett's
estimation of jail chaplains.
"Well, madam," he said. "What have you to say to me?"
"In the first place, sir, I am here without other clothing then that
which I now wear. Is it inconsistent with your regulations for me to
have a box of clothes brought me from my home?"
"Oh no--you can have them. I will get an order from the committing
magistrate for you to have your clothes brought here. Of course they
will be scrupulously examined before they reach you."
"What for?"
"It is our custom, that's all."
"You are afraid that I should escape?"
"Oh, no--no! No woman ever yet escaped from Newgate, and I don't think
any man ever will again."
"Perhaps not. For my part, I care not how many men escape, so that you
take good care Sweeney Todd does not."
"You may make yourself easy upon that score."
"Good--then when I get my clothes here, I will make a full confession of
all I know, regarding Todd's crimes."
"And your own?"
"Yes, if you like. And my own. Be it so. But mark me, I will have no
pettifogging, prying, canting parsons in the cell. If you bring your
chaplain here I am mute."
"Very well, I will say as much. Of course, if you are inclined to make a
confession, you can make it to whom you please."
"I should presume so."
With this, the Governor left Mrs. Lovett, and she commenced again her
uneasy pacing of the cell. In about two hours, a large box was brought
to her with nearly the whole of her clothes from her house in Bell Yard.
She selected a dress, with a number of heavy flounces, and put it on,
appearing to be much better satisfied than she had been.
"Ah," said the turnkey, "that's the way with women. Give them dress, and
even in Newgate they feel comfortable, but make 'em go shabby, and you
had much better hang them outright."
Another hour passed, and then the Governor, with a magistrate and
writing materials, came to the cell of the wretched woman.
"If Mrs. Lovett," he said, "you still think proper to persevere in your
intention of making a confession, this gentleman, who is a magistrate,
will in his official capacity receive it, and I will witness it; but you
do it entirely at your own risk and peril."
"I know it," replied Mrs. Lovett, "and I likewise do it to the risk of
the peril of Sweeney Todd."
"You can make what statement you please. How far it will be taken as
evidence against another, will depend entirely upon how it is in
essentials corroborated by others," said the magistrate.
"I am content. Now, sir, will you listen to me?"
"Most certainly."
The Governor arranged his writing materials, and while the magistrate
listened, Mrs. Lovett said in a calm clear voice--
"Believing that I am upon the brink of the grave, I make this statement.
Todd first connived the idea of that mutual guilt which we have both
since carried out. He bought the house in Bell Yard, as likewise the one
in Fleet Street, and by his own exertions, he excavated an underground
connection between the two, mining right under St. Dunstan's church, and
through the vaults of that building. When he had completed all his
arrangements, he came to me, and cautiously made his offer; but he did
not tell me that those arrangements were then complete, as that he
doubtless thought would have placed him too much in my power, in the
event of my refusing to co-operate with him in his iniquity. He need not
have given himself that amount of trouble; I was willing. The plan he
proposed was, that the pie-shop should be opened, for the sole purpose
of getting rid of the bodies of people, whom he might think proper to
murder, in or under his shop. He said that fearing nothing, and
believing nothing, he had come to the conclusion, that money was the
great thing to be desired in this world, inasmuch as to it he had found
that all people bowed down. He said that after the murder of any one, he
would take the flesh from the bones quickly, and convey to the shelves
of the bake-house in Bell Yard the pieces, as materials for the pies.
Minor arrangements he left to me. He murdered many. The business went on
and prospered, and we both grew rich. He refused me my share of the
spoil; and so I believe we both fell to our present state."
[Illustration: Mrs. Lovett Makes Her Confession To The Governor Of
Newgate.]
"Have you any more to add?" said the magistrate.
"Nothing. But I will answer you any question you may choose to ask of me
upon the subject."
"No. It is not my province to ask anything. This is clearly a voluntary
statement and confession. No questions need be, or ought to be, asked
concerning it at all."
"Very well."
"You are aware that it will be used against you."
"And against Todd?"
"Yes, it is a strong corroboration of the evidence against him; and as
such, if there had been any doubt, would have gone far towards making
his conviction certain."
"Then I am satisfied, sir."
The magistrate slightly inclined his head and left the cell with the
Governor. When they were outside he said to the latter--
"I would advise you to keep a sharp watch upon that woman. My firm
opinion is, that she contemplates suicide, and that this statement is
merely made for the purpose of damaging Todd as much as possible."
"No doubt, sir. You may depend upon our keeping a good watch upon her.
It is quite impossible she can do herself a mischief. There is literally
nothing in the cell for her to convert to any such use; besides, I doubt
if really great criminals ever have the courage to die by their own
hands."
"Well, it may be so; of course your experience of these people is very
considerable. I only tell you my impression."
"For which, sir, I am much obliged, and will be doubly cautious."
Mrs. Lovett, when she was once more alone, paced her cell in the same
restless manner that she had done before. It was not then so much as it
is now the custom in Newgate to keep such a strict watch upon prisoners
before conviction, and with the exception that there was a man in the
passage close at hand, boxed up in a sentry-box, and whose duty it was
now and then to open the small square wicket in the cell door, and see
that the prisoner was all right, Mrs. Lovett had no surveillance over
her.
As she paced to and fro, she muttered to herself--
"Yes, I will do it. They think that I would go through the formal parade
of a trial. They think that I will stand in one of their courts
shrinking before a jury; but I will not--I will not. Oh no, Todd may do
all that. It is fitting that he should; but I, having failed in my one
great enterprise, will bid adieu to life."
She paused, for the man was at the wicket.
"Do you want anything?" he said.
"No, my friend. Only the poor privilege of being alone."
"Humph! I thought I heard you speaking."
"I was only rehearsing my defence."
"Oh, well; that's a new dodge anyhow. You take it easy, Ma'am Lovett, if
anybody ever did."
"Innocence, my friend, should be composed."
The turnkey stared at her through the little bars that crossed even that
small orifice in the door, and then closed it without another word. He
was scarcely used to such an amount of cool effrontery as he found
exhibited by Mrs. Lovett.
"Alone again," she said. "Alone again. I must be cautious, or they will
suspect my purpose. I must only converse with myself in faint whispers.
I would not be thwarted willingly in this my last and boldest act; and I
am resolved that I will not live to look upon the light of another day.
I am resolved, and wound up to my purpose. Oh, what poor fools they are
to fancy they can prevent such a one as I am from dying when and how I
wish! They have unwittingly supplied me with the ready means of death
to-day."
These words were spoken so low, that if the turnkey had been listening
with all his might on the other side of the door he could not possibly
have overheard them. The recent visit of that functionary, if the peep
through the little opening in the door could be called a visit, had
taught Mrs. Lovett to be more cautious how she trusted the air of her
cell with the secret resolves of her teeming brain.
But now that she had really and truly made up her mind to commit
suicide, all the worst passions of her nature seemed to be up in arms
and to wage wild war in her heart and brain; while amid them all was the
intense hatred of Todd, and the hope that she should be revenged upon
him, by his being brought to death upon the scaffold, triumphant over
every other.
"I had hoped," she said; "oh, how I had hoped, that I might have had the
satisfaction of witnessing such a scene--but that is past now. I must go
before him; but still it is with the conviction that die he must. I
feel, I know that he will not have the courage to do as I am about to
do, and if he had, I am certain he has not provided himself with the
means of success as I have provided myself."
These last words she scarcely whispered to herself, so very fearful was
she that they might be overheard by the turnkey who was so close at
hand.
And now a fear came over her that he was watching her through some
little hole or crevice of the door, and the very thought was sufficient
to make her wonderfully uneasy. If it were so, there was quite
sufficient reflected light in the cell to make every one of her actions
easily observable, and so her cherished design of taking her own life
would be defeated completely.
In lieu of a piece of whalebone in the back of her dress, there was a
small tin tube, soldered perfectly tight against the escape of any
fluid, and made fast at each end. That tin tube had been in the dress
she now selected for many months, and it was filled with a subtle liquid
poison, a very few drops of which would prove certainly fatal.
She dreaded that she should be observed to take this ingenious
contrivance from her dress and pounced upon before she could break it
open and make use of its contents.
She sat down on the miserable kind of bench which served as a bed, and
in a very low whisper to herself she said--
"I must wait till night--yes, I must wait till night!"
She knew well that the indulgence of a light would be denied to her, and
she smiled to herself, as she thought how that mistaken piece of prison
policy would enable her to free herself from what now was the bitter
encumbrance of existence.
"The twilight," she muttered, "will soon creep into this gloomy place,
and it will be my twilight, too--the twilight of my life before, and
only just before, the night of death begins. That night will know no
dawn--that long, long sleep which will know no waking! Yea, I will then
escape from this strong prison!"