Tobias did not forget, too, that on more than one occasion he had come
back quicker than he had been expected, and that he had caught Sweeney
Todd in some little confusion, and seen the hat, the stick, or perhaps
the umbrella of the last customer quietly waiting there, although the
customer had gone; and even if the glaring improbability of a man
leaving his hat behind him in a barber's shop was got over, why did he
not come back for it? This was a circumstance which was entitled to all
the weight which Tobias, during his mental cogitations, could give to
it, and there could be but one possible explanation of a man not coming
back for his hat, and that was that he had not the power to do so. "This house will be searched," thought Tobias, "and all those things,
which of course must have belonged to so many different people, will be
found, and then they will be identified, and he will be required to say
how he came by them, which, I think, will be a difficult task indeed for
Sweeney Todd to accomplish. What a relief it will be to me, to be sure,
when he is hanged, as I think he is tolerably sure to be!" "What a relief," muttered Sweeney Todd, as he slowly opened the door,
unseen by Tobias--"what a relief it will be to me when this boy is in
his grave, as he will be soon, or else I have forgotten all my moral
learning, and turned chicken-hearted--neither of them very likely
circumstances." CHAPTER XVIII. THE MISADVENTURE OF TOBIAS.--THE MAD-HOUSE ON PECKHAM-RYE. Sweeney Todd paused for a moment at the cupboard door, before he made up
his mind as to whether he should pounce upon poor Tobias at once, or
adopt a more creeping, cautious mode of operation. The latter course was
by far the most congenial to his mind, and so he adopted it in a moment
or so, and stole quietly from his place of concealment, and with so
little noise, that Tobias could not have the least suspicion that any
one was in the room but himself. Treading, as if each step might involve
some serious consequences, he thus at length got completely behind the
chair on which Tobias was sitting, and stood with folded arms, and such
a hideous smile upon his face, that they together formed no inapt
representation of the Mephistopheles of the German drama. "I shall at length," murmured Tobias, "be free from my present dreadful
state of mind, by thus accusing Todd. He is a murderer--of that I have
no doubt: it is but a duty of mine to stand forward as his accuser." Sweeney Todd stretched out his two brawny hands, and clutched Tobias by
the head, which he turned round till the boy could see him, and then he
said--

"Indeed, Tobias; and did it never strike you that Todd was not so easily
to be overcome as you would wish him, eh, Tobias?" The shock of this astonishing and sudden appearance of Sweeney Todd was
so great, that for a few moments Tobias was deprived of all power of
speech or action, and with his head so strangely twisted as to seem to
threaten the destruction of his neck. He glared in the triumphant and
malignant countenance of his persecutor, as he would into that of the
arch enemy of all mankind, which probably he now began to think the
barber really was. If one thing more than another was calculated to
delight such a man as Todd, it certainly was to perceive what a dreadful
effect his presence had upon Tobias, who remained for about a minute and
a half in this state before he ventured upon uttering a shriek, which,
however, when it did come, almost frightened Todd himself. It was one of
those cries which can only come from a heart in its utmost agony--a cry
which might have heralded the spirit to another world, and proclaimed,
as it very nearly did the destruction of the intellect for ever. The
barber staggered back a pace or two as he heard it, for it was too
terrific even for him, but it was for a very brief period that it had
that stunning effect upon him, and then, with a full consciousness of
the danger to which it subjected him, he sprang upon poor Tobias as a
tiger might be supposed to do upon a lamb, and clutched him by the
throat, exclaiming--

"Such another cry, and it is the last you ever live to utter, although
it cover me with difficulties to escape the charge of killing you. Peace! I say, peace!" This exhortation was quite needless, for Tobias could not have uttered a
word, had he been ever so much inclined to do so; the barber held his
throat with such an iron clutch, as if it had been in a vise. "Villain," growled Todd, "villain; so this is the way in which you have
dared to disregard my injunctions. But no matter, no matter!--you shall
have plenty of leisure to reflect upon what you have done for yourself. Fool! to think that you could cope with me--Sweeney Todd! Ha! ha!" He burst into a laugh, so much more hideous, than his ordinary efforts
in that way, that, had Tobias heard it--which he did not, for his head
had dropped upon his breast, and he had become insensible--it would have
terrified him almost as much as Sweeney Todd's sudden appearance had
done. "So," muttered the barber, "he has fainted, has he? Dull child, that is
all the better. For once in a way, Tobias, I will carry you--not to
oblige you, but to oblige myself. By all that's damnable, it was a
lively thought that brought me here to-night, or else I might, by the
dawn of the morning, have had some very troublesome inquiries made of
me." He took Tobias up as easily as if he had been an infant, and strode from
the chambers with him, leaving Mrs. Ragg to draw whatever inference she
chose from his absence; but feeling convinced that she was too much
under his controul, to take any steps of a nature to give him the
smallest amount of uneasiness. "The woman," he muttered to himself, "is a double-distilled ass, and can
be made to believe anything, so that I have no fear whatever of her. I
dare not kill Tobias, because it is necessary, in case of the matter
being at any other period mentioned, that his mother shall be in a
position to swear that she saw him after this night alive and well." The barber strode through the Temple, carrying the boy, who seemed not
at all in a hurry to recover from the nervous and partial state of
suffocation into which he had fallen. As they passed through the gate
opening into Fleet-street, the porter, who knew the barber well by
sight, said--

"Hilloa, Mr. Todd, is that you? Why, who are you carrying?" "Yes, it's I," said Todd, "and I am carrying my apprentice boy, Tobias
Ragg, poor fellow." "Poor fellow!--why, what's the matter with him?" "I can hardly tell you, but he seems to me and to his mother to have
gone out of his senses. Good night to you, good night. I'm looking for a
coach." "Good night, Mr. Todd; I don't think you'll get one nearer than the
market--what a kind thing now of him to carry the boy!