The Gift of the Sailor: The String of Pearls & Sweeney Todd, the Demon Barber of Fleet Street — page 187: what you’re looking at

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

She sank upon a chair that was by the bed-side, and sobbed. “This will never do,” said the surgeon. “Wait—oh, wait a little,” she whispered, “Only wait a little —I shall be better soon.” The surgeon nodded; and then stepping back to the colonel and the captain, he said— “This burst of grief must have its way, or it will mar all. We must have patience.” They all hid themselves behind the folds of the bed furniture, and Mrs. Ragg sat down in an obscure corner of the room, working her knee up and down, as though she were nursing an imaginary baby. Gradually the sobs of Minna Gray subsided, until all was still. She then gently took one of the thin wasted hands of poor Tobias in her own, and looked at it. Oh, how changed it was. She then bent over him, and looked in his face. What permeative lines of care were there, battling with rounded muscles of early youth! Then she summoned all her courage to speak. She placed her lips close to his ear, and in the soft sweet accents that had long before sank deep into his heart, she said— “Tobias!—my Tobias!” The boy started. “Dear Tobias, it is I. Minna!” He opened his eyes, which had been closed and seemingly cemented by tears. “Tobias! Tobias, dear!” A smile—a heavenly smile. It was the first that had played upon his lips since he set foot in the shop of Sweeney Todd, now broke like a sunbeam over his face. “T am mad—mad!” he said, gently, “or that is the voice of my Minna.” “Tt is your Minna. It is—it is, Tobias; look at me.” He rose up in the bed—he cast one glance at the well-known and dearly remembered face, and then, with a gasping sob of joy, he clasped her in his arms. “Tt’s done,” said the surgeon. “Thank God!” said Colonel Jeffery. Mrs. Ragg drew her breath so hard through her nose that she made a noise like some wild animal in the agonies of suffocation. “You really know me, Tobias?” “Know you, dear? Oh, why should I not know you, Minna? God bless you!” “May He bless you, Tobias.” They wept together; Minna forgot that there was anybody in the world but herself and Tobias, and parting the long straggling masses of his hair from before his face, she kissed him. “For my sake, Tobias, now you will take care of yourself, and recover quickly.” “Dear—dear Minna.” He seemed never tired of holding her hands and kissing them. Suddenly the surgeon stepped forward with a small vial in his hand. “Now, Tobias,” he said, “you are much better, but you must take this.” The look of surprise and consternation with which Tobias regarded him was beyond description. Then he glanced at the bedstead and the rich hangings! and he said— “Oh, Minna, what is all this? Where am I? Is it a dream?” “Give it to him,” said the surgeon, handing the vial to Minna. She placed the neck of it to his lips. “Drink, Tobias.” Had it been deadly poison she had offered him, Tobias would have taken it. The vial was drained. He looked in her face again with a smile. “Tf this is indeed a dream, my Minna, may I never awaken—dear—dear—one |—I—” He fell back upon the pillow. The smile still lingered upon his face, but the narcotic which the surgeon had had administered to him had produced its effect, and the enfeebled Tobias fell into deep sleep. Minna Gray looked rather alarmed at this sudden falling off of Tobias from waking to sleeping, but the surgeon quieted her fears. “All is right,” he said. “He will awaken in some hours wonderfully refreshed, and I have the pleasure of now predicting his perfect cure.” “You do not know,” said Colonel Jeffery, “what pleasure that assurance gives me.” “And me,” said the captain. Minna looked all that she thought, but she could not speak, and Mrs. Ragg still kept up the mysterious noise she produced by hard breathing with her mouth close shut. “Now, madam,” said the surgeon to her, “our young friend must be left alone for some hours. It is now six o’clock, and I do not expect he will awaken until twelve. When he does so, I am very much mistaken if you do not all of you find him perfectly restored and composed, although very weak.” “T will take care to be at hand,” said the colonel. “Miss Gray, perhaps you will call and see how he is to-morrow, and all I can say is, that you will be quite welcome to my house whenever you think proper, but let me impress upon you one thing.” CORniclooo S CO)