"Oh, is that all?" "All? And enough too." "Phoo! She was sure to do that. Don't you know the old adage, that--

    "Woman's nay still stands for nought." "Why, man, No comes as naturally to the tip of a young girl's tongue
when she means Yes, as Don't when she expects to be kissed. I tell you,
she loves you. She adores the very ground you walk on." "And yet she taunted me with my passion for Johanna, and called me a
second-hand lover." "Did she, though? Ha! ha! ha! ha! Upon my life that was good--was it
not?" CHAPTER LXXVII. MRS. LOVETT VISITS THE BANK. Mrs. Lovett, Mrs. Lovett, we are neglecting you! Excuse us, fascinating
piece of wickedness. We are now in Bell-yard again. It will be
recollected what a mental ferment the appearance of Ben, and Arabella,
and Sir Richard Blunt, at the window of her shop had put her in. Not
that she knew any of those parties--nor that she connected any of them
in any way with her feelings, except so far as their attitudes might at
that moment lead her to suppose. The attitudes certainly were such as to
create suspicion. All this, joined to the previous state of mind of Mrs.
Lovett, did not tend to produce that heavenly calm, which philosophers
tell us is such a remarkably nice thing. On the contrary, the mind of
Mrs. Lovett rather resembled a raging torrent, boiling and bubbling to
some destruction which was afar off, and which could only be reached
through the perils and dangers of some stormy passage. She was sighing
for peace. She had begun to sicken for the results of her life of
iniquity--not those results which an indignant and outraged public would
have visited her with, but those results which she and all persons, who
deliberately and systematically commence a career of guilt, picture to
themselves. Criminality is never engaged in for its own sake. There is
always some ultimate object in view, which makes the retrospect less
horrible, and the prospect dim and dubious, though it may be yet a thing
of pleasurable anticipation. Of course, we are only reasoning upon those
minds that reflect. There are many who lead a life of criminality, who
do so as the manifestation of an intellect that can picture nothing
else. But the reader knows that Mrs. Lovett was not of such an order. She was to some extent an educated, and to a considerable extent a
clever woman. Hence, then, she had always pictured to herself wealth and
retirement, respect and power, as the ends for which she was striving
with such unscrupulous means. But of late, with a shuddering horror, she
had begun to dread that all she had hoped for was getting only more
distant. She had contracted a strong notion of the bad faith of Todd,
and if such were really the case, all was indeed lost. If he allowed his
cupidity just to induce him to commit the crime that would be one too
many, destruction must fall upon them both. If likewise he instantly
made an effort to take to himself all the profits of the unholy traffic
that they were mutually engaged in, all would be lost to both; for was
she a likely woman to crouch down in silence under such a blow? No! the
scaffold prepared by her instrumentality for Todd, would be scarcely
less a triumph to her that she herself would share it with him. He ought
to have known better than he did. How clear and long-sighted we find
people upon subjects that from this distance may be supposed to present
difficulties, and yet how shallow they are upon what is close to them. One would have thought that such a man as Todd could easily have said to
himself, with regard to Mrs. Lovett, "I dare not tamper with the objects
of that woman," and he would have said it with truth; but on the
contrary, he only looked upon her as a convenient tool, which was to be
thrown aside when it had served all the purposes for which he intended
it. There could not have been a more fatal mistake upon the part of Todd
as concerned his safety. But to return to Mrs. Lovett. The brandy she
had promised to the prisoner was quite forgotten. She sat revolving in
her mind, how she could put an end to the state of horrible doubt and
perplexity in which she was. There were some little difficulties in the
way of Mrs. Lovett emerging from her present condition. It has been
before hinted at, that Todd and the fair lady of the pie-shop had
between them accumulated a large sum of money, and that the money was
duly deposited in the hands of a stock-broker, who was by no means to
part with it to either of them, except upon an order signed by both. So
far all looked fair enough; and as they were likewise bound together by
such a bond of mutual guilt, it did not look likely that either would
make an endeavour to get the better of the other. Suppose there was
£40,000 in the hands of the stock-broker, it did not seem, we say, under
all the circumstances likely that Todd--being fairly entitled as between
them, to £20,000--would peril the safety of both their necks, by getting
up a quarrel about the division equitably of the spoil. The same
reasoning will apply to Mrs. Lovett. But these unlikely things are the
very things that do come to pass to upset the finest plans. Todd never
from the first--whenever that was--meant that Mrs. Lovett should share
with him; no, he thought that he, as the superior genius, the greater
villain, would manage to cheat her, and that she would, for her own
safety's sake, be obliged to put up with what he chose to give her. That
would have been only such a pittance, as to keep her constantly in a
state of dependance upon him. Now, to do Mrs. Lovett justice upon the
old equitable principle of giving the devil his due, she never had any
intention, until she saw symptoms of bad faith in Todd, of attempting to
act otherwise than fairly by him. She loathed him; and all she meant to
do, was when the division of the spoil should take place, to ascertain
where he was going, and then to get as far off him as possible. Of late,
however, finding that Todd was getting lucky, and feeling quite
convinced that he aimed at her life, other views had dawned upon her, as
we are already well aware. She did not so much care for all the money as
she would have liked in her retirement, wherever it was, to have felt
sure that Todd was not

    "An inhabitant of the earth;"

and hence she had taken the pains, all of which had been frustrated, to
put him into another world. But a feeling, superstitiously consequent
upon her failure, had started up in her mind that he bore a charmed
life; and hence she bethought herself of flying from England; but the
money--how was she to get the money to do so? How was she, without his
cognisance, to get her share of the funds which had been placed in the
hands of a stock-broker? Now, since she had begun to feel uncomfortable
regarding the faith of Todd, Mrs. Lovett had kept what cash she saved at
home; therefore some weeks had elapsed since she had paid a monetary
visit to the city. If she had gone as usual, she might have got some
news.