A complete silence followed the utterance of the indiscreet speech of
Mrs. Oakley's, which, if it did not at once open the eyes of poor Tobias
to the real reason of the sudden journey, nothing would. All eyes were
bent upon the lad; and rising from the seat which Johanna had made him
take, he looked about him with dismay. "Oh, tell me, some one," he then said, "what does it all really mean? Believe me, my kind and dear friends, that I shall suffer less from the
truth than as if I were left to make myself mad by thought. Oh, tell me
all!" "You shall know all," said the colonel. "Oh, mother--mother," said Johanna. "Why did you--"

Mrs. Oakley sat looking the picture of dismay, and Colonel Jeffrey
added--

"This is an accident that I don't think is to be much lamented. Tobias
must have known at some time, and it is better that he should know now
that he is surrounded by his friends. Give me your hand, Tobias. You see
that I smile, so it cannot be of great moment after all." "Oh, tell me--tell me!" "I will. Todd has made his escape from Newgate, that is all; but he is
friendless and penniless, and it will be quite impossible that he can
remain many days at large, as Sir Richard Blunt is already upon his
track. Let me beg of you not to be in the least alarmed at this
intelligence. It ought not to alarm you. Todd will have too much to do
to look after his own affairs to enable him to give a thought to anybody
else." "You will save me?" said Tobias. "I will. We will all stand between you and any harm; but, I repeat, I do
not apprehend any danger to you." They all spoke to Tobias cheeringly, and in the course of half an hour
they got him into quite a different state of mind; and then, as he was
to form one of the party, it was quite a relief to them all that they
did not feel compelled to keep a guard upon their tongues in his
presence. In the evening of that day they were all at Brighton. [Illustration: Johanna And Company Leave Chelsea To Avoid The Vengeance
Of Todd.] CHAPTER CLII. TODD HAS SOME FURTHER ADVENTURES IN FLEET STREET. We left Todd in the pulpit of St. Dunstan's Church, while his old house
was rapidly burning down. A perilous position for Todd! Perhaps, if he had courage sufficient to have made the attempt, he might
have escaped at several junctures, but the dread of the consequences of
capture was so strong in his heart and brain, that while he felt that he
was undiscovered in the pulpit, he preferred remaining there to making
any precipitate means of escape. It will be remembered how the beadle had taken up several gentlemen to
the roof of the church, in order that they might get a good view of the
fire; and it was during that time that Todd thought of escaping, but the
rapid approach of daylight daunted him. "Oh, that I had remained in the wood at Hampstead, or anywhere but here
in London, where the hands of all men are raised against me! Oh, I was
mad--mad to come here. But I am not quite lost. If I thought that, my
senses would go from me this moment. Oh, no--no, I will be calm now
again; I will not believe that I am quite lost yet." Of a truth, Todd felt that if he really gave up in despair, that he
might commit some extravagance which would at once draw down upon him
his enemies; and there he lay in the pulpit, his gaunt form huddled up
so as completely to hide himself in it, and dreading to stay as much
almost as he dreaded to leave. He heard still the loud shouts of people at the fire, and at times he
thought he heard even the flames that were rapidly consuming the old den
of iniquity in which he had committed so many crimes. The regular clank,
clank, too, of the engine pumps came upon his ears, and he muttered--

"No, no, you may try your hardest, but you will not subdue that fire. It
will blaze on in spite of you. You will not--you cannot, I say, subdue
it. The house is too well prepared. I had a care for that before I left
home. It will burn to the very ground--ay, and below the ground, too;
and the spot of earth only will remain that held the foundation of my
old house. Would that all whom I hate were at this moment writhing in
the flames! Then I might feel some sort of satisfaction with myself, and
even this place of peril would be for the time quite tolerable to me." No doubt it would have been a vast satisfaction to Todd to have all that
he hated in the flames of his burning house; but as yet he could only
tell himself that the puny vengeance he had achieved had been upon the
most inferior tools of those who had wreaked his ruin, while the
principals remained untouched and most completely unscathed. What had he yet done to Sir Richard Blunt? What to Tobias? What to
Johanna? What even to the dog that had played no inconsiderable a part
in his final conviction of the murder of its master? Little, indeed; and
the thought that his revenges were all to do, scared his imagination,
and filled him full of rage as well as terror. He heard the sound of the footsteps of the people who had gone to the
roof of the church with the beadle to see the fire, coming down again,
and he shrunk still closer into the bottom of the pulpit. "Oh," he said, "if they could but for one moment guess that I was here,
what joy it would give them to drag me forth to the light of day! To
once again cast me into the condemned one's cell, and then to hoot me to
the gallows! But, no--no; I will not die a felon's death. Rather by my
own hands will I fall, if my fortune should reach such a wretched
extremity. Hush!--oh, hush! Why do I speak? They come--they come." "Well, gentlemen, as you say, the old house is gone at last," said the
beadle, "and I must say, though fires always gives me a turn, and, as a
parish authority perhaps I ought not to say it, I think it is a very
good job." "A good job, Mr. Beadle?" said one. "How do you make that out?" "Why, sir, who would have lived in it? Who would have paid rent, and
rates, and taxes, and given his Christmas-box to the beadle like a
Christian, in Todd's old house, I should like to know?" "Well, you are right there." "I know I is, sir. The fact is, that house would have been like a great
blot, sirs, in the middle of Fleet Street; no one would have taken it
for love or money; and it a very good thing as it's gone at last." "You reason the matter very well, Mr. Beadle," said another, "and I for
a certainty subscribe to your opinion, that it is a good thing it is
gone at last, and I only hope that its late owner will soon be in the
hands of justice. Somebody is trying the door of the church." The beadle went to it, and upon opening it two persons entered the
church. One of them spoke at once, saying--

"Is the beadle of St. Dunstan's in the church?" Todd knew the voice. It was Sir Richard Blunt, and he shook so that the
pulpit creaked again most ominously, so that if the attention of any one
had chanced to be directed towards it, they might have felt a kind of
suspicion that it was occupied.