The Mysteries of the Court of London — page 274: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

244 THE COURT OF LONDON quitting his chair and extending his arms toward her, “ that I must and will have a kiss, even if I die for it.”’ And before Mrs. Brace could offer any resistance or even give utterance to a word of remonstrance, she was locked in the rude embrace of the herculean constable, and his coarse mouth was fastened to her own luscious lips. ‘“* Now will you leave me?”’ she said, in a rapid and excited tone, as he at length relinquished his hold upon her; and, trembling all over with rage and with a countenance that showed its deadly pallor even through the soft tint of rouge that was wont to render her cheeks so captivating with its roseate bloom, she clung to the mantelpiece for support. “Leave you! No, by Heaven, I won’t leave you till to- morrow morning,’’ exclaimed Grumley, maddened with the contact of the milliner’s lips, the sweets of which he had just enjoyed, and longing once more to feel the warm pressure of her glowing bosom against his chest. ‘“‘ This is an insolence, unsupportable, intolerable,’ gasped Mrs. Brace, her eyes actually becoming haggard with mingled alarm and horror as she read upon the countenance of the officer all the ferocity of those passions which were raging in his soul. Then all on a sudden, she extended her hand, with frantic desperation, toward the bell-pull. But Grumley, anticipating the movement, once more caught her in his arms; and, in spite of her desperate struggles, for she feared to alarm the whole house by shrieking for help, he succeeded in imprinting a dozen kisses upon her lips, that were now parched with rage, and on her cheeks, that were burning from the same emotion. Almost annihilated by the intolerable disgust arising from these odious caresses, and by the terrible apprehensions which the rabid lasciviousness of the monster’s manner and looks excited in her brain, the milliner sank, breathless and exhausted, upon a seat. “* Now, listen to me,’’ said the constable, speaking with the hot breath and parched tongue of a brutal lust. “ I’ve taken a fancy to you, and I’m determined to gratify my whim. [| know you ain’t overparticular yourself, and I also know that a strange man’s sleeping in your house won’t be any unusual thing. So, let us have no palaver — ”’ “ Ah!” ejaculated the miserable Mrs. Brace, her tongue unlocking through the very poignancy of her despair; ‘‘ that GonGcoook (CO