Chapter 1

God in Heaven, DIE!

or

Toby Is Hit With A Rolling Pin

"…sleep now…the untroubled sleep of the angels…"

Creak.

Sweeney Todd's nerves jumped to alert at the small sound, his hard eyes lifting from the dripping silver razor and turning over his shoulder to the chest lying against the wall. Calmly, sternly, he took up his thin silver friend from the seat of the barber chair and stood. Small drops of blood dripped and pattered softly on the floor. Judge Turpin's blood was drying and hardening on him by the second, stiffening his face and his fingers. He crossed the room and flung open the chest. He felt no change within him…no quickening of his heart, no sharpness of his breath, nothing…when his eyes fell on the terrified looking youth huddled inside it. Sweeney smiled.

"Come for a shave, have you lad?"

Before the boy could answer, Sweeney seized him by the neck of his clothes and dragged him, stumbling, across the floor, throwing him into the chair. The boy instantly drew his knees up and gripped the armrests, his head sinking fearfully into his shoulders. His mouth was shut, but his eyes were wide and alert and shaking with fear. Sweeney regarded him silently, for a moment. There was something missing, something he should have felt but didn't. It was the thrill; the exhilarated rush he was supposed to have whenever a victim looked up helplessly from his chair. He searched for the relish, the ecstasy, but found nothing. His face was still and blank as he leaned forward, lifting the blood-covered razor to the boy's face. The lad opened his mouth to speak, but Sweeney interrupted.

"Nonsense," he whispered, his mouth again slipping into a coy smile. "Everybody needs a good shave."

The boy's eyes shone with terror. Sweeney lifted the razor high in the air, preparing to slice another throat in the wide world of throats waiting to be slit….and stopped. He froze as a piercing scream rent the air from somewhere far below. It echoed like a distant siren, frenzied and hysterical. It seared in his mind, a burning recognition…

Mrs. Lovett.

He again regarded the boy. The fair-skinned lad's eyes had fixed on the dripping razor poised high above him. Sweeney looked at it, then the boy, then it, then down at the floor. His face hardened, his teeth clenched, and he lowered his silver friend. He rose to leave, but not before leaning in and putting his white, blood-covered faced inches from the boy, who recoiled in petrified stillness. Sweeney muttered gruffly beneath his breath, and the boy trembled with every word.

"Forget my face."

And he stormed from the room, leaving the youth curled in the barber chair. The boy would run away, of course. It didn't matter. He had seen it in the lad's terrified eyes; he would never speak of what had happened to anyone. He would never pose any kind of threat. Not to Sweeney Todd.

"DIE! God in heaven, DIE!"

Nellie Lovett screamed and pulled furiously at her long skirt, fighting to rip it free of the clenching fingers of Judge Turpin. The judge gasped and sputtered, making low gurgling noises in his opened throat. Blood spurted and dribbled from the cut and from his open mouth. Nellie screamed and pulled again, but the judge had a death grip on her hem; she tripped and fell backwards onto the hard, dirty floor of the bake house, the blazing golden light from the oven casting their long, tossing shadows on the cobblestones. The judge murmured and garbled, his dying eyes pleading and pitiful. Nellie cried out and kicked her feet, but achieved nothing other than to tangle herself up in the loose folds of fabric. The judge grabbed hold of her ankle with his sticky hand, and she screamed in terror and disgust.

Suddenly the heavy iron door to the bake house was thrown open, slamming against the wall with a deafening bang. Nellie looked and saw the tall, lean body of Mr. Todd filling the doorway, his wild hair sprayed out even further than usual and his dark, staring eyes narrowed beneath his furrowed brow. His right sleeve was red from shoulder to wrist, and he was covered in dried sprays of blood. In the half-light of the fire he glowed like a red demon.

Todd swooped down on the judge without so much as pausing. Nellie caught a glimpse of his pale, red-spattered face as he dropped to his knees beside them, and she felt an uncommon twinge of fear at the murderous glare in his eye. In the past weeks, she had seen him commit horror upon horror-horrors she herself was his accomplice in-she had seen him walk into her pie shop, his arms and his hands running with blood-she had seen the demonic gleam, the ceaseless hungering for vengeance in his eyes-and never before had she been truly afraid of him. But at that moment, as his razor gleamed in blind fury, she was afraid. She cried out and squeezed her eyes shut.

Nellie heard a sickening sucking noise and a garbled cry. She opened her eyes and felt her stomach turn and her heart pound as she saw Mr. Todd wrenching his razor from Judge Turpin's streaming eye socket. The judge's hands grew stiff and motionless in the hem of her skirt, and with a final gasp he fell still and cold on the floor, dead at last. Nellie lost no time in disentangling herself from his lifeless grasp; she scrambled to her feet and backed away, breathing heavily and staring down at the red scene before her.

Sweeney Todd kneeled beside the bodies of Judge Turpin and Beadle Bamford, his shoulders slack and his gaze fixed dully down at the floor. A long moment of silence passed in the dungeon bake house, with no sound but the constant crackling of the burning wood in the oven. At last, Mr. Todd lifted his head and regarded her.

"Where is the boy?" he asked. His voice was dead and gravelly.

Nellie looked around her at the four walls of the empty bake house.

"He's gone," she panted, her whole body trembling from the shock of the encounter.

Mr. Todd slowly rose to his feet, his gaze trolling around the room.

"Find him," he growled.

Nellie Lovett felt her breath catching in her chest, and, unbidden, her eyes began to blur and fill with tears. She closed her mouth and nodded, turning away. She heard Mr. Todd's footsteps as he slowly made his way around the opposite end of the room. She stifled a gasp with the back of her hand and struggled to slow her pounding heart.

Oh, leave the boy alone, she had said.

Send him up, Sweeney Todd had snarled.

No, not Toby. Please, not her Toby…

A single tear streaked down her face, and she inhaled sharply. Too sharply; she made an audible cry. The silence was palpable as Mr. T's footsteps stopped.

"What?" he demanded in his harsh voice.

Forcing herself into composure, Nellie turned and shook her head. "Nothin', nothin' love. Jus' a bit shook up, bloody judge grabbin' onto me skirts n' all. Never you mind. Go round and look be'ind the wood piles, there…'e…'e may be hiding."

Mr. Todd looked at her with cold, suspicious eyes, but he obeyed. Nellie Lovett stifled another despairing gasp and began walking in slow circles, her wet eyes scanning the room.

"Toby," she called, her voice light and sweet, but wavering with the effort of masking her urge to sob. "Toby! Come out, come out, wherever you are!"

"Toby," Mr. Todd's deep voice called out, sinister in his attempt to sound pleasant.

"T-o-o-by! Where are you, love? Toby?"

"Toby?"

Nellie's throat ached with the catch of her pent up sobs. More tears streamed from her eyes as she passed by a table covered in flour and baking pans; she took up a wooden rolling pin and held it poised at arm's level. She opened her mouth and began to sing softly.

"Nothing's going to harm you…not while I'm around…"

"Toby!"

"Nothing's going to harm you, darling, not while I'm around…"

Suddenly, there was a sharp clanking sound of metal on metal, and Nellie's eyes shot to the round grate sunk into the floor as the lid was pushed aside and the small, skinny, dark-haired little boy scrambled out.

She opened her mouth without thinking. "Toby!"

The boy immediately ran to her, seizing her by the arm and pulling her toward the door.

"Hurry mum! Hurry! We've got to get out! He's evil, he's a demon, he's…"

Mr. Todd appeared, standing between them and the door. His eyes were dark and his lip curled, staring at Toby with a look that Nellie knew all too well. Toby stood protectively in front of her, his arms to each side as if to shield her, but at the same time he was shaking with fear.

"Stay away!" he shouted fiercely, pushing Nellie back. "It's 'im, mum, I know it's been 'im this whole time! 'E's got you under…under 'is spell, mum! 'E's evil, 'e's the devil 'imself!"

Mr. Todd smiled, a smile that even in its murderous throes had always made Nellie want to melt; but now it struck her with a horrible stab of misery.

"Now, Toby," he said quietly, advancing with his razor held at his side. "Why would you say such a thing of your old friend Sweeney? Come, Toby, we're the men of the house, you and I."

"Stay back!" Toby screamed.

"Let's you and me have a nice chat…a heart to heart…like gentlemen. Shall we, son? Darling boy? Let's, Toby, do let's."

"Stay BACK!"

Mr. Todd looked up and caught Nellie's eye. He glared at her and inclined his head, and his gaze went through her like fire and her eyes welled with fresh tears. She could contain it no longer; she gasped and cried softly, shaking, her heart aching and her breath catching. But she had no choice. Before he knew what was happening she had seized Toby in her arms, holding him pinned against her. He yelped in surprise and wriggled and kicked, but his thrashing was in vain. He was trapped, helpless. Mr. Todd grinned as he moved slowly forward. Nellie's chest heaved, her eyes wide as she watched him. He lifted the razor, the thin blade pressed against Toby's throat. The boy grew still and silent, holding his breath as the knife drew closer. Suddenly, she heard his small voice uttering, barely above a whisper…

"Mum…please…"

Mr. Todd's eyes gleamed. Nellie burst.

"NO!"

She pulled him away just as the razor sliced the air. Mr. Todd stared for an instant in shock, then growled furiously.

"Hold him!" he barked.

"No!"

"Hold him I say!"

"NO!"

Nellie sobbed loudly, turning Toby to face her and embracing him, covering his head with her arms. The rolling pin hung stiffly in her hand.

"Please," she cried. "Please, Mr. T….not 'im, not the boy."

"He knows," Sweeney Todd snarled lowly.

"'E won't tell no one, I swear it, Mr. T…"

"He knows."

"'E's just a boy, just a little thing, Mr. T., please, can't we…"

"No! He knows! He'll go running to the law the moment he's free, and it'll be your head as well as mine, Mrs. Lovett!"

Nellie sobbed and buried her mouth in Toby's hair. The boy peered out, wide-eyed and frightened, from the gap between her arms.

"'E won't, Mr. T, 'e won't, I promise! Please let 'im be! 'E's my boy, Mr. Todd, my little Toby."

Mr. Todd suddenly stopped in his advances. The oven crackled. The thick, hot stench of decaying human carcasses that filled the bake house was palpable; it filled the silence in a thick, noxious fume. Nellie and Mr. Todd stared at each other, she with tears in her eyes and he with quizzical blankness in his.

"Your boy," the barber muttered.

Nellie nodded, sniffling. "He is, sir. 'E's like my own."

Mr. Todd turned away. He lifted his silver razor to eye level, turning it and watching his reflection through the congealing lines of blood.

"Your own…"

Suddenly, Nellie gasped in shock as Toby tore from her grasp in one great burst of force. The boy shouted furiously as he leapt at Mr. Todd and took hold of the wrist that grasped the razor in both hands. Sweeney was caught off guard…for an instant his face was wide-eyed and vulnerable with a look of surprise as uncommon to him as the sun to the nighttime…but in a flash he was scowling again, his teeth bared and his dark eyes wild. The boy was scrawny and weak, but he held on for his life as the two struggled for the razor, pushing against each other with all their might. Slowly, Toby began to give way; Mr. Todd was forcing his arms back, the deadly sharp blade inching closer and closer to the boy's throat.

Nellie's heart raced. She cast about wildly, desperately wondering what to do; and she abruptly remembered the weight of the blunt piece of wood in her hand. Just as Mr. Todd was about to drive the razor into Toby's neck, she dashed forward, raised the rolling pin high over her head, and brought it down with all her might…CRACK!…over Toby's skull. The boy grew stiff, then his grip slid from Mr. Todd's wrist and his body collapsed limply on the floor.

Nellie and Mr. Todd looked at each other, then down at Toby. He was alive, but unconscious. Nellie lowered slowly to her knees and touched his forehead, cupping his face and ruffling his hair. She sniffled and a tear dripped from her chin as she whispered.

"Nothing's going to harm you, darling…not while I'm around…"