OLIVER TWIST.
VOL. II.
[Illustration: _The Burglary._
London, Richard Bentley, Jany. 1, 1838.]
OLIVER TWIST.
BY CHARLES DICKENS. AUTHOR OF “THE PICKWICK PAPERS.”
SECOND EDITION.
IN THREE VOLUMES.
VOL. II.
LONDON:
RICHARD BENTLEY, NEW BURLINGTON STREET.
1839.
WHITING,
BEAUFORT HOUSE.
OLIVER TWIST.
CHAPTER XX.
WHEREIN OLIVER IS DELIVERED OVER TO MR. WILLIAM SIKES.
WHEN Oliver awoke in the morning he was a good deal surprised to find
that a new pair of shoes with strong thick soles had been placed at
his bedside, and that his old ones had been removed. At first he was
pleased with the discovery, hoping that it might be the forerunner of
his release; but such thoughts were quickly dispelled on his sitting
down to breakfast alone with the Jew, who told him, in a tone and
manner which increased his alarm, that he was to be taken to the
residence of Bill Sikes that night.
“To—to—stop there, sir?” asked Oliver, anxiously.
“No, no, my dear, not to stop there,” replied the Jew. “We shouldn’t
like to lose you. Don’t be afraid, Oliver, you shall come back to us
again. Ha! ha! ha! We wont be so cruel as to send you away, my dear. Oh
no, no!”
The old man, who was stooping over the fire toasting a piece of bread,
looked round as he bantered Oliver thus, and chuckled as if to shew
that he knew he would still be very glad to get away if he could.
“I suppose,” said the Jew, fixing his eyes on Oliver, “you want to know
what you’re going to Bill’s for—eh, my dear?”
Oliver coloured involuntarily to find that the old thief had been
reading his thoughts; but boldly said, “Yes, he did want to know.”
“Why, do you think?” inquired Fagin, parrying the question.
“Indeed I don’t know, sir,” replied Oliver.
“Bah!” said the Jew, turning away with a disappointed countenance from
a close perusal of the boy’s face. “Wait till Bill tells you, then.”
The Jew seemed much vexed by Oliver’s not expressing any greater
curiosity on the subject; but the truth is, that, although he felt very
anxious, he was too much confused by the earnest cunning of Fagin’s
looks, and his own speculations, to make any further inquiries just
then. He had no other opportunity; for the Jew remained very surly and
silent till night, when he prepared to go abroad.
“You may burn a candle,” said the Jew, putting one upon the table; “and
here’s a book for you to read till they come to fetch you. Good night!”
“Good night, sir!” replied Oliver, softly.
The Jew walked to the door, looking over his shoulder at the boy as he
went, and, suddenly stopping, called him by his name.
Oliver looked up; the Jew, pointing to the candle, motioned him to
light it. He did so; and, as he placed the candlestick upon the table,
saw that the Jew was gazing fixedly at him with lowering and contracted
brows from the dark end of the room.
“Take heed, Oliver! take heed!” said the old man, shaking his right
hand before him in a warning manner. “He’s a rough man, and thinks
nothing of blood when his own is up. Whatever falls out, say nothing,
and do what he bids you. Mind!” Placing a strong emphasis on the last
word, he suffered his features gradually to resolve themselves into a
ghastly grin; and, nodding his head, left the room.
Oliver leant his head upon his hand when the old man disappeared, and
pondered with a trembling heart on the words he had just heard. The
more he thought of the Jew’s admonition, the more he was at a loss to
divine its real purpose and meaning. He could think of no bad object
to be attained by sending him to Sikes which would not be equally
well answered by his remaining with Fagin; and after meditating for
a long time, concluded that he had been selected to perform some
ordinary menial offices for the housebreaker, until another boy better
suited for his purpose could be engaged. He was too well accustomed
to suffering, and had suffered too much where he was, to bewail the
prospect of a change very severely. He remained lost in thought for
some minutes, and then with a heavy sigh snuffed the candle, and taking
up the book which the Jew had left with him, began to read.
He turned over the leaves carelessly at first, but, lighting on a
passage which attracted his attention, soon became intent upon the
volume. It was a history of the lives and trials of great criminals,
and the pages were soiled and thumbed with use. Here, he read of
dreadful crimes that make the blood run cold; of secret murders that
had been committed by the lonely wayside, and bodies hidden from the
eye of man in deep pits and wells, which would not keep them down, deep
as they were, but had yielded them up at last, after many years, and so
maddened the murderers with the sight, that in their horror they had
confessed their guilt, and yelled for the gibbet to end their agony.
Here, too, he read of men who, lying in their beds at dead of night,
had been tempted and led on by their own bad thoughts to such dreadful
bloodshed as it made the flesh creep and the limbs quail to think of.
The terrible descriptions were so real and vivid, that the sallow pages
seemed to turn red with gore, and the words upon them to be sounded in
his ears as if they were whispered in hollow murmurs by the spirits of
the dead.
In a paroxysm of fear the boy closed the book and thrust it from him.
Then, falling upon his knees, he prayed Heaven to spare him from such
deeds, and rather to will that he should die at once, than be reserved
for crimes so fearful and appalling. By degrees he grew more calm, and
besought in a low and broken voice that he might be rescued from his
present dangers, and that if any aid were to be raised up for a poor
outcast boy, who had never known the love of friends or kindred, it
might come to him now, when, desolate and deserted, he stood alone in
the midst of wickedness and guilt.
He had concluded his prayer, but still remained with his head buried in
his hands, when a rustling noise aroused him.
“What’s that!” he cried, starting up, and catching sight of a figure
standing by the door. “Who’s there?”
“Me—only me,” replied a tremulous voice.
Oliver raised the candle above his head, and looked towards the door.
It was Nancy.
“Put down the light,” said the girl, turning away her head; “it hurts
my eyes.”
Oliver saw that she was very pale, and gently inquired if she were ill.
The girl threw herself into a chair, with her back towards him, and
wrung her hands; but made no reply.
“God forgive me!” she cried after a while, “I never thought of all
this.”
“Has anything happened?” asked Oliver, “Can I help you? I will if I
can; I will, indeed.”
She rocked herself to and fro, caught her throat, and, uttering a
gurgling sound, struggled and gasped for breath.
“Nancy!” cried Oliver, greatly alarmed, “What is it?”
The girl beat her hands upon her knees, and her feet upon the ground,
and, suddenly stopping, drew her shawl close round her, and shivered
with cold.
Oliver stirred the fire. Drawing her chair close to it, she sat there
for a little time without speaking, but at length she raised her head,
and looked round.
“I don’t know what comes over me sometimes,” said the girl, affecting
to busy herself in arranging her dress; “it’s this damp, dirty room, I
think. Now, Nolly, dear, are you ready?”
“Am I to go with you?” asked Oliver.
“Yes; I have come from Bill,” replied the girl. “You are to go with me.”
“What for?” said Oliver, recoiling.
“What for!” echoed the girl, raising her eyes, and averting them again
the moment they encountered the boy’s face. “Oh! for no harm.”
“I don’t believe it,” said Oliver, who had watched her closely.
“Have it your own way,” rejoined the girl, affecting to laugh. “For no
good, then.”
Oliver could see that he had some power over the girl’s better
feelings, and for an instant thought of appealing to her compassion on
his helpless state. But then the thought darted across his mind that
it was barely eleven o’clock, and that many people were still in the
streets, of whom surely some might be found to give credence to his
tale. As the reflection occurred to him, he stepped forward, and said
somewhat hastily that he was ready.
Neither his brief consideration nor its purport were lost upon his
companion. She eyed him narrowly while he spoke, and cast upon him a
look of intelligence which sufficiently shewed that she guessed what
had been passing in his thoughts.
“Hush!” said the girl, stooping over him, and pointing to the door as
she looked cautiously round. “You can’t help yourself. I have tried
hard for you, but all to no purpose. You are hedged round and round,
and if ever you are to get loose from here, this is not the time.”
Struck by the energy of her manner, Oliver looked up in her face with
great surprise. She seemed to speak the truth; her countenance was
white and agitated, and she trembled with very earnestness.
“I have saved you from being ill-used once, and I will again, and I do
now,” continued the girl aloud; “for those who would have fetched you,
if I had not, would have been far more rough than me. I have promised
for your being quiet and silent; if you are not, you will only do harm
to yourself and me too, and perhaps be my death. See here! I have borne
all this for you already, as true as God sees me shew it.”
She pointed hastily to some livid bruises upon her neck and arms, and
continued with great rapidity.
“Remember this, and don’t let me suffer more for you just now. If I
could help you I would, but I have not the power. They don’t mean to
harm you, and whatever they make you do, is no fault of yours. Hush!
every word from you is a blow for me. Give me your hand—make haste,
your hand!”
She caught the hand which Oliver instinctively placed in hers, and,
blowing out the light, drew him after her up the stairs. The door was
opened quickly by some one shrouded in the darkness, and as quickly
closed when they had passed out. A hackney-cabriolet was in waiting;
and, with the same vehemence which she had exhibited in addressing
Oliver, the girl pulled him in with her, and drew the curtains close.
The driver wanted no directions, but lashed his horse into full speed
without the delay of an instant.
The girl still held Oliver fast by the hand, and continued to pour into
his ear the warnings and assurances she had already imparted. All was
so quick and hurried that he had scarcely time to recollect where he
was, or how he came there, when the carriage stopped at the same house
to which the Jew’s steps had been directed on the previous evening.
For one brief moment Oliver cast a hurried glance along the empty
street, and a cry for help hung upon his lips. But the girl’s voice
was in his ear, beseeching him in such tones of agony to remember
her, that he had not the heart to utter it; while he hesitated, the
opportunity was gone, for he was already in the house, and the door was
shut.
“This way,” said the girl, releasing her hold for the first time.
“Bill!”
“Hallo!” replied Sikes, appearing at the head of the stairs with a
candle. “Oh! that’s the time of day. Come on!”
This was a very strong expression of approbation, and an uncommonly
hearty welcome from a person of Mr. Sikes’s temperament. Nancy,
appearing much gratified thereby, saluted him cordially.
“Bullseye’s gone home with Tom,” observed Sikes, as he lighted them up.
“He’d have been in the way.”
“That’s right,” rejoined Nancy.
“So you’ve got the kid,” said Sikes, when they had all reached the
room: closing the door as he spoke.
“Yes, here he is,” replied Nancy.
“Did he come quiet?” inquired Sikes.
“Like a lamb,” rejoined Nancy.
“I’m glad to hear it,” said Sikes, looking grimly at Oliver, “for the
sake of his young carcase, as would otherways have suffered for it.
Come here, young un, and let me read you a lectur’, which is as well
got over at once.”
Thus addressing his new _protégé_, Mr. Sikes pulled off his cap and
threw it into a corner; and then, taking him by the shoulder, sat
himself down by the table, and stood Oliver in front of him.
“Now first, do you know wot this is?” inquired Sikes, taking up a
pocket-pistol which lay on the table.
Oliver replied in the affirmative.
“Well then, look here,” continued Sikes. “This is powder, that ’ere’s a
bullet, and this is a little bit of a old hat for waddin’.”
Oliver murmured his comprehension of the different bodies referred
to, and Mr. Sikes proceeded to load the pistol with great nicety and
deliberation.
“Now it’s loaded,” said Mr. Sikes, when he had finished.
“Yes, I see it is, sir,” replied Oliver, trembling.
“Well,” said the robber, grasping Oliver’s wrist tightly, and putting
the barrel so close to his temple that they touched, at which moment
the boy could not repress a shriek; “if you speak a word when you’re
out o’doors with me, except when I speak to you, that loading will be
in your head without notice—so, if you _do_ make up your mind to speak
without leave, say your prayers first.”
Having bestowed a scowl upon the object of this warning, to increase
its effect, Mr. Sikes continued,—
“As near as I know, there is’nt anybody as would be asking very
partickler arter you, if you _was_ disposed of; so I needn’t take this
devil-and-all of trouble to explain matters to you if it warn’t for
your own good. D’ye hear me?”
“The short and the long of what you mean,” said Nancy, speaking very
emphatically, and slightly frowning at Oliver as if to bespeak his
serious attention to her words, “is, that if you’re crossed by him
in this job you have on hand, you’ll prevent his ever telling tales
afterwards by shooting him through the head, and take your chance of
swinging for it as you do for a great many other things in the way of
business every month of your life.”
“That’s it!” observed Mr. Sikes, approvingly; “women can always put
things in fewest words, except when it’s blowing up, and then they
lengthens it out. And now that he’s thoroughly up to it, let’s have
some supper, and get a snooze afore starting.”
In pursuance of this request, Nancy quickly laid the cloth, and,
disappearing for a few minutes, presently returned with a pot of
porter and a dish of sheep’s heads, which gave occasion to several
pleasant witticisms on the part of Mr. Sikes, founded upon the singular
coincidence of “jemmies” being a cant name common to them and an
ingenious implement much used in his profession. Indeed, the worthy
gentleman, stimulated perhaps by the immediate prospect of being in
active service, was in great spirits and good humour; in proof whereof
it may be here remarked that he humorously drank all the beer at a
draught, and did not utter, on a rough calculation, more than fourscore
oaths during the whole progress of the meal.
Supper being ended—it may be easily conceived that Oliver had no great
appetite for it—Mr. Sikes disposed of a couple of glasses of spirits
and water, and threw himself upon the bed, ordering Nancy, with many
imprecations in case of failure, to call him at five precisely. Oliver
stretched himself in his clothes, by command of the same authority, on
a mattress upon the floor; and the girl mending the fire, sat before
it, in readiness to rouse them at the appointed time.
For a long time Oliver lay awake, thinking it not impossible that Nancy
might seek that opportunity of whispering some further advice; but
the girl sat brooding over the fire without moving, save now and then
to trim the light. Weary with watching and anxiety, he at length fell
asleep.
When he awoke, the table was covered with tea-things, and Sikes was
thrusting various articles into the pockets of his great-coat, which
hung over the back of a chair, while Nancy was busily engaged in
preparing breakfast. It was not yet daylight, for the candle was still
burning, and it was quite dark outside. A sharp rain, too, was beating
against the window-panes, and the sky looked black and cloudy.
“Now, then!” growled Sikes, as Oliver started up; “half-past five! Look
sharp, or you’ll get no breakfast, for it’s late as it is.”
Oliver was not long in making his toilet; and, having taken some
breakfast, replied to a surly inquiry from Sikes, by saying that he was
quite ready.
Nancy, scarcely looking at the boy, threw him a handkerchief to tie
round his throat, and Sikes gave him a large rough cape to button over
his shoulders. Thus attired, he gave his hand to the robber, who,
merely pausing to shew him, with a menacing gesture, that he had the
pistol in a side pocket of his great-coat, clasped it firmly in his,
and, exchanging a farewell with Nancy, led him away.
Oliver turned for an instant when they reached the door, in the hope of
meeting a look from the girl. But she had resumed her old seat in front
of the fire, and sat perfectly motionless before it.
CHAPTER XXI.
THE EXPEDITION.
IT was a cheerless morning when they got into the street, blowing and
raining hard, and the clouds looking dull and stormy. The night had
been very wet, for large pools of water had collected in the road and
the kennels were overflowing. There was a faint glimmering of the
coming day in the sky, but it rather aggravated than relieved the gloom
of the scene, the sombre light only serving to pale that which the
street-lamps afforded, without shedding any warmer or brighter tints
upon the wet housetops and dreary streets. There appeared to be nobody
stirring in that quarter of the town, for the windows of the houses
were all closely shut, and the streets through which they passed were
noiseless and empty.
By the time they had turned into the Bethnal Green road, the day had
fairly begun to break. Many of the lamps were already extinguished;
a few country waggons were slowly toiling on towards London; and now
and then a stagecoach, covered with mud, rattled briskly by, the
driver bestowing, as he passed, an admonitory lash upon the heavy
waggoner who, by keeping on the wrong side of the road, had endangered
his arriving at the office a quarter of a minute after his time. The
public-houses, with gas-lights burning inside, were already open. By
degrees other shops began to be unclosed, and a few scattered people
were met with. Then came straggling groups of labourers going to their
work; then men and women with fish-baskets on their heads; donkey-carts
laden with vegetables, chaise-carts filled with live-stock or whole
carcasses of meat; milkwomen with pails; and an unbroken concourse of
people trudging out with various supplies to the eastern suburbs of the
town. As they approached the City, the noise and traffic gradually
increased; and when they threaded the streets between Shoreditch and
Smithfield, it had swelled into a roar of sound and bustle. It was as
light as it was likely to be till night came on again, and the busy
morning of half the London population had begun.
Turning down Sun-street and Crown-street, and crossing Finsbury-square,
Mr. Sikes struck, by way of Chiswell-street, into Barbican, thence into
Long-lane, and so into Smithfield, from which latter place arose a
tumult of discordant sounds that filled Oliver Twist with surprise and
amazement.
It was market-morning. The ground was covered nearly ankle-deep with
filth and mire; and a thick steam perpetually rising from the reeking
bodies of the cattle, and mingling with the fog, which seemed to rest
upon the chimney-tops, hung heavily above. All the pens in the centre
of the large area, and as many temporary ones as could be crowded
into the vacant space, were filled with sheep; and tied up to posts
by the gutter side were long lines of beasts and oxen three or four
deep. Countrymen, butchers, drovers, hawkers, boys, thieves, idlers,
and vagabonds of every low grade, were mingled together in a dense
mass; the whistling of drovers, the barking of dogs, the bellowing and
plunging of beasts, the bleating of sheep, and grunting and squeaking
of pigs; the cries of hawkers, the shouts, oaths, and quarrelling on
all sides; the ringing of bells and roar of voices that issued from
every public-house; the crowding, pushing, driving, beating, whooping,
and yelling; the hideous and discordant din that resounded from every
corner of the market; and the unwashed, unshaven, squalid, and dirty
figures constantly running to and fro, and bursting in and out of the
throng, rendered it a stunning and bewildering scene, which quite
confounded the senses.
Mr. Sikes, dragging Oliver after him, elbowed his way through the
thickest of the crowd, and bestowed very little attention upon the
numerous sights and sounds which so astonished the boy. He nodded twice
or thrice to a passing friend, and, resisting as many invitations to
take a morning dram, pressed steadily onward until they were clear of
the turmoil, and had made their way through Hosier-lane into Holborn.
“Now, young un!” said Sikes surlily, looking up at the clock of St.
Andrew’s church, “hard upon seven! you must step out. Come, don’t lag
behind already, Lazy-legs!”
Mr. Sikes accompanied this speech with a fierce jerk at his little
companion’s wrist; and Oliver, quickening his pace into a kind of trot,
between a fast walk and a run, kept up with the rapid strides of the
housebreaker as well as he could.
They kept on their course at this rate until they had passed Hyde Park
corner, and were on their way to Kensington, when Sikes relaxed his
pace until an empty cart which was at some little distance behind, came
up: when, seeing “Hounslow” written upon it, he asked the driver, with
as much civility as he could assume, if he would give them a lift as
far as Isleworth.
“Jump up,” said the man. “Is that your boy?”
“Yes; he’s my boy,” replied Sikes, looking hard at Oliver, and putting
his hand abstractedly into the pocket where the pistol was.
“Your father walks rather too quick for you, don’t he, my man?”
inquired the driver, seeing that Oliver was out of breath.
“Not a bit of it,” replied Sikes, interposing. “He’s used to it. Here,
take hold of my hand, Ned. In with you!”
Thus addressing Oliver, he helped him into the cart; and the driver,
pointing to a heap of sacks, told him to lie down there, and rest
himself.
As they passed the different milestones, Oliver wondered more and
more where his companion meant to take him. Kensington, Hammersmith,
Chiswick, Kew Bridge, Brentford, were all passed; and yet they kept
on as steadily as if they had only begun their journey. At length
they came to a public-house called the Coach and Horses, a little way
beyond which another road appeared to turn off. And here the cart
stopped.
Sikes dismounted with great precipitation, holding Oliver by the hand
all the while; and, lifting him down directly, bestowed a furious
look upon him, and rapped the side-pocket with his fist in a very
significant manner.
“Good-bye, boy,” said the man.
“He’s sulky,” replied Sikes, giving him a shake; “he’s sulky,—a young
dog! Don’t mind him.”
“Not I!” rejoined the other, getting into his cart. “It’s a fine day,
after all.” And he drove away.
Sikes waited till he had fairly gone, and then, telling Oliver he might
look about him if he wanted, once again led him forward on his journey.
They turned round to the left a short way past the public-house, and
then, taking a right-hand road, walked on for a long time, passing many
large gardens and gentlemen’s houses on both sides of the way, and
stopping for nothing but a little beer, until they reached a town, in
which, against the wall of a house, Oliver saw written up in pretty
large letters, “Hampton.” Here they lingered about in the fields for
some hours. At length, they came back into the town, and keeping on,
past a public-house which bore the sign of the Red Lion, and by the
river-side for a short distance, they came to an old public-house with
a defaced sign-board, and ordered some dinner by the kitchen fire.
The kitchen was an old, low-roofed room, with a great beam across the
middle of the ceiling, and benches with high backs to them by the fire,
on which were seated several rough men in smock-frocks, drinking and
smoking. They took no notice of Oliver, and very little of Sikes; and,
as Sikes took very little notice of them, he and his young comrade sat
in a corner by themselves, without being much troubled by the company.
They had some cold meat for dinner, and sat here so long after it,
while Mr. Sikes indulged himself with three or four pipes, that Oliver
began to feel quite certain they were not going any further. Being
much tired with the walk and getting up so early, he dozed a little
at first, and then, quite overpowered by fatigue and the fumes of the
tobacco, fell fast asleep.
It was quite dark when he was awakened by a push from Sikes. Rousing
himself sufficiently to sit up and look about him, he found that worthy
in close fellowship and communication with a labouring man, over a pint
of ale.
“So, you’re going on to Lower Halliford, are you?” inquired Sikes.
“Yes, I am,” replied the man, who seemed a little the worse—or better,
as the case might be—for drinking; “and not slow about it neither. My
horse hasn’t got a load behind him going back, as he had coming up in
the mornin’, and he wont be long a-doing of it. Here’s luck to him!
Ecod! he’s a good un!”
“Could you give my boy and me a lift as far as there?” demanded Sikes,
pushing the ale towards his new friend.
“If you’re going directly, I can,” replied the man, looking out of the
pot. “Are you going to Halliford?”
“Going on to Shepperton,” replied Sikes.
“I’m your man as far as I go,” replied the other. “Is all paid, Becky?”
“Yes, the other gentleman’s paid,” replied the girl.
“I say!” said the man, with tipsy gravity, “that wont do, you know.”
“Why not?” rejoined Sikes. “You’re a-going to accommodate us, and wot’s
to prevent my standing treat for a pint or so, in return?”
The stranger reflected upon this argument with a very profound face,
and having done so, seized Sikes by the hand, and declared he was a
real good fellow. To which Mr. Sikes replied, he was joking;—as if he
had been sober, there would have been strong reason to suppose he was.
After the exchange of a few more compliments, they bade the company
good night, and went out, the girl gathering up the pots and glasses as
they did so, and lounging out to the door, with her hands full, to see
the party start.
The horse, whose health had been drunk in his absence, was standing
outside, ready harnessed to the cart. Oliver and Sikes got in without
any further ceremony, and the man, to whom he belonged, having lingered
a minute or two “to bear him up,” and to defy the hostler and the
world to produce his equal, mounted also. Then the hostler was told to
give the horse his head, and, his head being given him, he made a very
unpleasant use of it, tossing it into the air with great disdain, and
running into the parlour windows over the way; after performing which
feats, and supporting himself for a short time on his hind-legs, he
started off at great speed, and rattled out of the town right gallantly.
The night was very dark. A damp mist rose from the river and the
marshy ground about, and spread itself over the dreary fields. It was
piercing cold, too; all was gloomy and black. Not a word was spoken,
for the driver had grown sleepy, and Sikes was in no mood to lead him
into conversation. Oliver sat huddled together in a corner of the cart,
bewildered with alarm and apprehension, and figuring strange objects in
the gaunt trees, whose branches waved grimly to and fro, as if in some
fantastic joy at the desolation of the scene.
As they passed Sunbury church, the clock struck seven. There was a
light in the ferry-house window opposite, which streamed across the
road, and threw into more sombre shadow a dark yew-tree with graves
beneath it. There was a dull sound of falling water not far off, and
the leaves of the old tree stirred gently in the night wind. It seemed
like quiet music for the repose of the dead.
Sunbury was passed through, and they came again into the lonely road.
Two or three miles more, and the cart stopped. Sikes alighted, and,
taking Oliver by the hand, they once again walked on.
They turned into no house at Shepperton, as the weary boy had expected,
but still kept walking on, in mud and darkness, through gloomy lanes
and over cold open wastes, until they came within sight of the lights
of a town at no great distance. On looking intently forward, Oliver saw
that the water was just below them, and that they were coming to the
foot of a bridge.
Sikes kept straight on till they were close upon the bridge, and then
turned suddenly down a bank upon the left. “The water!” thought Oliver,
turning sick with fear. “He has brought me to this lonely place to
murder me!”
He was about to throw himself on the ground, and make one struggle
for his young life, when he saw that they stood before a solitary
house, all ruinous and decayed. There was a window on each side of the
dilapidated entrance, and one story above; but no light was visible. It
was dark, dismantled, and, to all appearance, uninhabited.
Sikes, with Oliver’s hand still in his, softly approached the low
porch, and raised the latch. The door yielded to the pressure, and they
passed in together.
CHAPTER XXII.
THE BURGLARY.
“HALLO!” cried a loud, hoarse voice, directly they had set foot in the
passage.
“Don’t make such a row,” said Sikes, bolting the door. “Shew a glim,
Toby.”
“Aha! my pal,” cried the same voice; “a glim, Barney, a glim! Shew the
gentleman in, Barney; and wake up first, if convenient.”
The speaker appeared to throw a boot-jack, or some such article, at
the person he addressed, to rouse him from his slumbers; for the noise
of a wooden body falling violently was heard, and then an indistinct
muttering, as of a man between asleep and awake.
“Do you hear?” cried the same voice. “There’s Bill Sikes in the
passage with nobody to do the civil to him; and you sleeping there,
as if you took laudanum with your meals, and nothing stronger. Are
you any fresher now, or do you want the iron candlestick to wake you
thoroughly?”
A pair of slipshod feet shuffled hastily across the bare floor of the
room as this interrogatory was put; and there issued from a door on
the right hand, first a feeble candle, and next, the form of the same
individual who has been heretofore described as labouring under the
infirmity of speaking through his nose, and officiating as waiter at
the public-house on Saffron Hill.
“Bister Sikes!” exclaimed Barney, with real or counterfeit joy; “cub
id, sir; cub id.”
“Here! you get on first,” said Sikes, putting Oliver in front of him.
“Quicker! or I shall tread upon your heels.”
Muttering a curse upon his tardiness, Sikes pushed Oliver before him,
and they entered a low dark room with a smoky fire, two or three broken
chairs, a table, and a very old couch, on which, with his legs much
higher than his head, a man was reposing at full length, smoking a
long clay pipe. He was dressed in a smartly-cut snuff-coloured coat,
with large brass buttons, an orange neckerchief, a coarse, staring,
shawl-pattern waistcoat, and drab breeches. Mr. Crackit (for he it
was) had no very great quantity of hair, either upon his head or face,
but what he had was of a reddish dye, and tortured into long corkscrew
curls, through which he occasionally thrust some very dirty fingers,
ornamented with large common rings. He was a trifle above the middle
size, and apparently rather weak in the legs; but this circumstance by
no means detracted from his own admiration of his top-boots, which he
contemplated in their elevated situation with lively satisfaction.
“Bill, my boy!” said this figure, turning his head towards the door,
“I’m glad to see you. I was almost afraid you’d given it up, in which
case I should have made a personal wentur. Hallo!”
Uttering this exclamation in a tone of great surprise, as his eyes
rested on Oliver, Mr. Toby Crackit brought himself into a sitting
posture and demanded who that was.
“The boy—only the boy!” replied Sikes, drawing a chair towards the
fire.
“Wud of Bister Fagid’s lads,” exclaimed Barney, with a grin.
“Fagin’s, eh!” exclaimed Toby, looking at Oliver. “Wot an inwalable
boy that’ll make for the old ladies’ pockets in chapels. His mug is a
fortun’ to him.”
“There—there’s enough of that,” interposed Sikes, impatiently, and
stooping over his recumbent friend he whispered a few words in his ear,
at which Mr. Crackit laughed immensely, and honoured Oliver with a long
stare of astonishment.
“Now,” said Sikes, as he resumed his seat, “if you’ll give us something
to eat and drink while we’re waiting, you’ll put some heart in us,—or
in me, at all events. Sit down by the fire, younker, and rest yourself;
for you’ll have to go out with us again to-night, though not very far
off.”
Oliver looked at Sikes in mute and timid wonder, and drawing a stool
to the fire, sat with his aching head upon his hands, scarcely knowing
where he was, or what was passing around him.
“Here,” said Toby, as the young Jew placed some fragments of food and
a bottle upon the table, “Success to the crack!” He rose to honour the
toast, and, carefully depositing his empty pipe in a corner, advanced
to the table, filled a glass with spirits, and drank off its contents.
Mr. Sikes did the same.
“A drain for the boy,” said Toby, half filling a wine-glass. “Down with
it, innocence.”
“Indeed,” said Oliver, looking piteously up into the man’s face;
“indeed, I——”
“Down with it!” echoed Toby. “Do you think I don’t know what’s good for
you? Tell him to drink it, Bill.”
“He had better,” said Sikes, clapping his hand upon his pocket. “Burn
my body, if he isn’t more trouble than a whole family of Dodgers. Drink
it, you perwerse imp; drink it!”
Frightened by the menacing gestures of the two men, Oliver hastily
swallowed the contents of the glass, and immediately fell into a
violent fit of coughing, which delighted Toby Crackit and Barney, and
even drew a smile from the surly Mr. Sikes.
This done, and Sikes having satisfied his appetite (Oliver could eat
nothing but a small crust of bread which they made him swallow), the
two men laid themselves down on chairs for a short nap. Oliver retained
his stool by the fire; and Barney, wrapped in a blanket, stretched
himself on the floor, close outside the fender.
They slept, or appeared to sleep, for some time; nobody stirring but
Barney, who rose once or twice to throw coals upon the fire. Oliver
fell into a heavy doze, imagining himself straying along through the
gloomy lanes, or wandering about the dark churchyard, or retracing some
one or other of the scenes of the past day, when he was roused by Toby
Crackit jumping up and declaring it was half-past one.
In an instant the other two were on their legs, and all were actively
engaged in busy preparation. Sikes and his companion enveloped their
necks and chins in large dark shawls, and drew on their great-coats,
while Barney, opening a cupboard, brought forth several articles, which
he hastily crammed into the pockets.
“Barkers for me, Barney,” said Toby Crackit.
“Here they are,” replied Barney, producing a pair of pistols. “You
loaded them yourself.”
“All right!” replied Toby, stowing them away. “The persuaders?”
“I’ve got ’em,” replied Sikes.
“Crape, keys, centre-bits, darkies—nothing forgotten?” inquired Toby,
fastening a small crowbar to a loop inside the skirt of his coat.
“All right,” rejoined his companion. “Bring them bits of timber,
Barney: that’s the time of day.”
With these words he took a thick stick from Barney’s hands, who, having
delivered another to Toby, busied himself in fastening on Oliver’s
cape.
“Now then!” said Sikes, holding out his hand.
Oliver, who was completely stupified by the unwonted exercise, and
the air, and the drink which had been forced upon him, put his hand
mechanically into that which Sikes extended for the purpose.
“Take his other hand, Toby,” said Sikes. “Look out, Barney.”
The man went to the door, and returned to announce that all was quiet.
The two robbers issued forth with Oliver between them; and Barney,
having made all fast, rolled himself up as before, and was soon asleep
again.
It was now intensely dark. The fog was much heavier than it had been
in the early part of the night, and the atmosphere was so damp that,
although no rain fell, Oliver’s hair and eyebrows, within a few minutes
after leaving the house, had become stiff with the half-frozen moisture
that was floating about. They crossed the bridge, and kept on towards
the lights which he had seen before. They were at no great distance
off; and, as they walked pretty briskly, they soon arrived at Chertsey.
“Slap through the town,” whispered Sikes; “there’ll be nobody in the
way to-night to see us.”
Toby acquiesced; and they hurried through the main street of the little
town, which at that late hour was wholly deserted. A dim light shone
at intervals from some bedroom-window, and the hoarse barking of dogs
occasionally broke the silence of the night; but there was nobody
abroad, and they had cleared the town as the church bell struck two.
Quickening their pace, they turned up a road upon the left hand. After
walking about a quarter of a mile, they stopped before a detached
house surrounded by a wall, to the top of which Toby Crackit, scarcely
pausing to take breath, climbed in a twinkling.
“The boy next,” said Toby. “Hoist him up: I’ll catch hold of him.”
Before Oliver had time to look round, Sikes had caught him under the
arms, and in three or four seconds he and Toby were lying on the grass
on the other side. Sikes followed directly, and they stole cautiously
towards the house.
And now, for the first time, Oliver, well nigh mad with grief and
terror, saw that housebreaking and robbery, if not murder, were
the objects of the expedition. He clasped his hands together, and
involuntarily uttered a subdued exclamation of horror. A mist came
before his eyes, the cold sweat stood upon his ashy face, his limbs
failed him, and he sunk upon his knees.
“Get up!” murmured Sikes, trembling with rage, and drawing the pistol
from his pocket; “get up, or I’ll strew your brains upon the grass.”
“Oh! for God’s sake let me go!” cried Oliver; “let me run away and die
in the fields. I will never come near London; never, never! Oh! pray
have mercy upon me, and do not make me steal. For the love of all the
bright angels that rest in heaven, have mercy upon me!”
The man to whom this appeal was made swore a dreadful oath, and had
cocked the pistol, when Toby, striking it from his grasp, placed his
hand upon the boy’s mouth and dragged him to the house.
“Hush!” cried the man; “it wont answer here. Say another word, and
I’ll do your business myself with a crack on the head that makes no
noise, and is quite as certain and more genteel. Here, Bill, wrench the
shutter open. He’s game enough, now, I’ll engage. I’ve seen older hands
of his age took the same way for a minute or two on a cold night.”
Sikes, invoking terrific imprecations upon Fagin’s head for sending
Oliver on such an errand, plied the crowbar vigorously, but with little
noise; after some delay, and some assistance from Toby, the shutter to
which he had referred swung open on its hinges.
It was a little lattice window, about five feet and a half above the
ground, at the back of the house, which belonged to a scullery, or
small brewing-place, at the end of the passage: the aperture was so
small that the inmates had probably not thought it worth while to
defend it more securely; but it was large enough to admit a boy of
Oliver’s size nevertheless. A very brief exercise of Mr. Sikes’s art
sufficed to overcome the fastening of the lattice, and it soon stood
wide open also.
“Now listen, you young limb,” whispered Sikes, drawing a dark lantern
from his pocket, and throwing the glare full on Oliver’s face; “I’m
a going to put you through there. Take this light, go softly up the
steps straight afore you, and along the little hall to the street-door:
unfasten it, and let us in.”
“There’s a bolt at the top you wont be able to reach,” interposed Toby.
“Stand upon one of the hall chairs. There are three there, Bill, with a
jolly large blue unicorn and a gold pitchfork on ’em, which is the old
lady’s arms.”
“Keep quiet, can’t you?” replied Sikes, with a threatening look. “The
room-door is open, is it?”
“Wide,” replied Toby, after peeping in to satisfy himself. “The game
of that is that they always leave it open with a catch, so that the
dog, who’s got a bed in here, may walk up and down the passage when he
feels wakeful. Ha! ha! Barney ’ticed him away to-night, so neat.”
Although Mr. Crackit spoke in a scarcely audible whisper, and laughed
without noise, Sikes imperiously commanded him to be silent, and to get
to work. Toby complied by first producing his lantern, and placing it
on the ground; and then planting himself firmly with his head against
the wall beneath the window, and his hands upon his knees, so as to
make a step of his back. This was no sooner done than Sikes, mounting
upon him, put Oliver gently through the window with his feet first;
and, without leaving hold of his collar, planted him safely on the
floor inside.
“Take this lantern,” said Sikes, looking into the room. “You see the
stairs afore you?”
Oliver, more dead than alive, gasped out, “Yes;” and Sikes, pointing
to the street-door with the pistol-barrel, briefly advised him to take
notice that he was within shot all the way, and that if he faltered he
would fall dead that instant.
“It’s done in a minute,” said Sikes, in the same low whisper. “Directly
I leave go of you, do your work. Hark!”
“What’s that?” whispered the other man.
They listened intently.
“Nothing,” said Sikes, releasing his hold of Oliver. “Now!”
In the short time he had had to collect his senses, the boy had firmly
resolved that, whether he died in the attempt or not, he would make one
effort to dart up stairs from the hall and alarm the family. Filled
with this idea, he advanced at once, but stealthily.
“Come back!” suddenly cried Sikes aloud. “Back! back!”
Scared by the sudden breaking of the dead stillness of the place, and a
loud cry which followed it, Oliver let his lantern fall, and knew not
whether to advance or fly.
The cry was repeated—a light appeared—a vision of two terrified
half-dressed men at the top of the stairs swam before his eyes—a
flash—a loud noise—a smoke—a crash somewhere, but where he knew
not,—and he staggered back.
Sikes had disappeared for an instant; but he was up again, and had
him by the collar before the smoke had cleared away. He fired his own
pistol after the men who were already retreating, and dragged the boy
up.
“Clasp your arm tighter,” said Sikes, as he drew him through the
window. “Give me a shawl here. They’ve hit him. Quick! Damnation, how
the boy bleeds!”
Then came the loud ringing of a bell, mingled with the noise of
fire-arms and the shouts of men, and the sensation of being carried
over uneven ground at a rapid pace. And then the noises grew confused
in the distance, and a cold deadly feeling crept over the boy’s heart,
and he saw or heard no more.
CHAPTER XXIII.
WHICH CONTAINS THE SUBSTANCE OF A PLEASANT CONVERSATION
BETWEEN MR. BUMBLE AND A LADY; AND SHEWS THAT EVEN A BEADLE
MAY BE SUSCEPTIBLE ON SOME POINTS.
THE night was bitter cold. The snow lay upon the ground frozen into a
hard thick crust, so that only the heaps that had drifted into byways
and corners were affected by the sharp wind that howled abroad, which,
as if expending increased fury on such prey as it found, caught it
savagely up in clouds, and, whirling it into a thousand misty eddies,
scattered it in air. Bleak, dark, and piercing cold, it was a night
for the well-housed and fed to draw round the bright fire and thank
God they were at home, and for the homeless starving wretch to lay him
down and die. Many hunger-worn outcasts close their eyes in our bare
streets at such times, who, let their crimes have been what they may,
can hardly open them in a more bitter world.
Such was the aspect of out-of-doors affairs when Mrs. Corney, the
matron of the workhouse, to which our readers have been already
introduced as the birthplace of Oliver Twist, sat herself down before
a cheerful fire in her own little room, and glanced with no small
degree of complacency at a small round table, on which stood a tray of
corresponding size, furnished with all necessary materials for the most
grateful meal that matrons enjoy. In fact, Mrs. Corney was about to
solace herself with a cup of tea: and as she glanced from the table to
the fireplace, where the smallest of all possible kettles was singing
a small song in a small voice, her inward satisfaction evidently
increased,—so much so, indeed, that Mrs. Corney smiled.
“Well,” said the matron, leaning her elbow on the table, and looking
reflectively at the fire, “I’m sure we have all on us a great deal to
be grateful for—a great deal, if we did but know it. Ah!”
Mrs. Corney shook her head mournfully, as if deploring the mental
blindness of those paupers who did not know it, and thrusting a silver
spoon (private property) into the inmost recesses of a two-ounce tin
tea-caddy, proceeded to make the tea.
How slight a thing will disturb the equanimity of our frail minds! The
black teapot, being very small and easily filled, ran over while Mrs.
Corney was moralizing, and the water slightly scalded Mrs. Corney’s
hand.
“Drat the pot!” said the worthy matron, setting it down very hastily on
the hob; “a little stupid thing, that only holds a couple of cups! What
use is it of to any body?—except,” said Mrs. Corney, pausing,—“except
to a poor desolate creature like me. Oh dear!”
With these words the matron dropped into her chair, and, once more
resting her elbow on the table, thought of her solitary fate. The small
teapot and the single cup had awakened in her mind sad recollections
of Mr. Corney (who had not been dead more than five-and-twenty years),
and she was overpowered.
“I shall never get another!” said Mrs. Corney, pettishly; “I shall
never get another—like him.”
Whether this remark bore reference to the husband or the teapot is
uncertain. It might have been the latter; for Mrs. Corney looked at it
as she spoke, and took it up afterwards. She had just tasted her first
cup, when she was disturbed by a soft tap at the room-door.
“Oh, come in with you!” said Mrs. Corney, sharply. “Some of the old
women dying, I suppose;—they always die when I’m at meals. Don’t stand
there, letting the cold air in, don’t. What’s amiss now, eh?”
“Nothing, ma’am, nothing,” replied a man’s voice.
“Dear me!” exclaimed the matron, in a much sweeter tone, “is that Mr.
Bumble?”
“At your service, ma’am,” said Mr. Bumble, who had been stopping
outside to rub his shoes clean, and shake the snow off his coat, and
who now made his appearance, bearing the cocked-hat in one hand and a
bundle in the other. “Shall I shut the door, ma’am?”
The lady modestly hesitated to reply, lest there should be any
impropriety in holding an interview with Mr. Bumble with closed doors.
Mr. Bumble, taking advantage of the hesitation, and being very cold
himself, shut it without farther permission.
“Hard weather, Mr. Bumble,” said the matron.
“Hard, indeed, ma’am,” replied the beadle. “Anti-porochial weather
this, ma’am. We have given away, Mrs. Corney,—we have given away a
matter of twenty quartern loaves and a cheese and a half this very
blessed afternoon; and yet them paupers are not contented.”
“Of course not. When would they be, Mr. Bumble?” said the matron,
sipping her tea.
“When, indeed, ma’am!” rejoined Mr. Bumble. “Why, here’s one man that,
in consideration of his wife and large family, has a quartern loaf and
a good pound of cheese, full weight. Is he grateful, ma’am,—is he
grateful? Not a copper farthing’s worth of it! What does he do, ma’am,
but ask for a few coals, if it’s only a pocket-handkerchief full, he
says! Coals!—what would he do with coals?—Toast his cheese with
’em, and then come back for more. That’s the way with these people,
ma’am;—give ’em a apron full of coals to-day, and they’ll came back
for another the day after to-morrow, as brazen as alabaster.”
The matron expressed her entire concurrence in this intelligible
simile, and the beadle went on.
“I never,” said Mr. Bumble, “see anything like the pitch it’s got
to. The day afore yesterday, a man—you have been a married woman,
ma’am, and I may mention it to you—a man, with hardly a rag upon his
back (here Mrs. Corney looked at the floor), goes to our overseer’s
door when he has got company coming to dinner, and says, he must be
relieved, Mrs. Corney. As he wouldn’t go away, and shocked the company
very much, our overseer sent him out a pound of potatoes and half
a pint of oatmeal. ‘My God!’ says the ungrateful villain, ‘what’s
the use of _this_ to me? You might as well give me a pair of iron
spectacles ‘Very good,’ says our overseer, taking ’em away again, ‘you
wont get anything else here.’—‘Then I’ll die in the streets!’ says the
vagrant.—‘Oh no, you wont,’ says our overseer.”
“Ha! ha!—that was very good!—so like Mr. Grannet, wasn’t it?”
interposed the matron. “Well, Mr. Bumble?”
“Well, ma’am,” rejoined the beadle, “he went away and _did_ die in the
streets. There’s a obstinate pauper for you!”
“It beats anything I could have believed,” observed the matron,
emphatically. “But don’t you think out-of-door relief a very bad thing
any way, Mr. Bumble? You’re a gentleman of experience, and ought to
know. Come.”
“Mrs. Corney,” said the beadle, smiling as men smile who are
conscious of superior information, “out-of-door relief, properly
managed,—properly managed, ma’am,—is the porochial safeguard. The
great principle of out-of-door relief is to give the paupers exactly
what they don’t want, and then they get tired of coming.”
“Dear me!” exclaimed Mrs. Corney. “Well, that is a good one, too!”
“Yes. Betwixt you and me, ma’am,” returned Mr. Bumble, “that’s the
great principle; and that’s the reason why, if you look at any cases
that get into them owdacious newspapers, you’ll always observe that
sick families have been relieved with slices of cheese. That’s the
rule now, Mrs. Corney, all over the country.—But, however,” said the
beadle, stooping to unpack his bundle, “these are official secrets,
ma’am; not to be spoken of except, as I may say, among the porochial
officers, such as ourselves. This is the port wine, ma’am, that the
board ordered for the infirmary,—real, fresh, genuine port wine, only
out of the cask this afternoon,—clear as a bell, and no sediment.”
Having held the first bottle up to the light, and shaken it well to
test its excellence, Mr. Bumble placed them both on the top of a chest
of drawers, folded the handkerchief in which they had been wrapped,
put it carefully in his pocket, and took up his hat as if to go.
“You’ll have a very cold walk, Mr. Bumble,” said the matron.
“It blows, ma’am,” replied Mr. Bumble, turning up his coat-collar,
“enough to cut one’s ears off.”
The matron looked from the little kettle to the beadle who was moving
towards the door, and as the beadle coughed, preparatory to bidding her
good night, bashfully inquired whether—whether he wouldn’t take a cup
of tea?
Mr. Bumble instantaneously turned back his collar again, laid his hat
and stick upon a chair, and drew another chair up to the table. As he
slowly seated himself, he looked at the lady. She fixed her eyes upon
the little teapot. Mr. Bumble coughed again, and slightly smiled.
Mrs. Corney rose to get another cup and saucer from the closet. As she
sat down, her eyes once again encountered those of the gallant beadle;
she coloured, and applied herself to the task of making his tea. Again
Mr. Bumble coughed,—louder this time than he had coughed yet.
“Sweet? Mr. Bumble,” inquired the matron, taking up the sugar-basin.
“Very sweet, indeed, ma’am,” replied Mr. Bumble. He fixed his eyes on
Mrs. Corney as he said this; and if ever a beadle looked tender, Mr.
Bumble was that beadle at that moment.
The tea was made, and handed in silence. Mr. Bumble, having spread
a handkerchief over his knees to prevent the crumbs from sullying
the splendour of his shorts, began to eat and drink; varying these
amusements occasionally by fetching a deep sigh, which, however, had no
injurious effect upon his appetite, but, on the contrary, rather seemed
to facilitate his operations in the tea and toast department.
“You have a cat, ma’am, I see,” said Mr. Bumble, glancing at one, who,
in the centre of her family, was basking before the fire; “and kittens
too, I declare!”
“I am so fond of them, Mr. Bumble, you can’t think,” replied the
matron. “They’re _so_ happy, _so_ frolicsome, and _so_ cheerful, that
they are quite companions for me.”
“Very nice animals, ma’am,” replied Mr. Bumble, approvingly; “so very
domestic.”
“Oh, yes!” rejoined the matron, with enthusiasm; “so fond of their home
too, that it’s quite a pleasure, I’m sure.”
“Mrs. Corney, ma’am,” said Mr. Bumble, slowly, and marking the time
with his teaspoon, “I mean to say this, ma’am, that any cat or kitten
that could live with you, ma’am, and _not_ be fond of its home, must be
a ass, ma’am.”
“Oh, Mr. Bumble!” remonstrated Mrs. Corney.
“It’s no use disguising facts, ma’am,” said Mr. Bumble, slowly
flourishing the teaspoon with a kind of amorous dignity that made him
doubly impressive; “I would drown it myself with pleasure.”
“Then you’re a cruel man,” said the matron vivaciously, as she held out
her hand for the beadle’s cup, “and a very hard-hearted man besides.”
“Hard-hearted, ma’am,” said Mr. Bumble, “hard!” Mr. Bumble resigned
his cup without another word, squeezed Mrs. Corney’s little finger
as she took it, and inflicting two open-handed slaps upon his laced
waistcoat, gave a mighty sigh, and hitched his chair a very little
morsel farther from the fire.
It was a round table; and as Mrs. Corney and Mr. Bumble had been
sitting opposite each other, with no great space between them, and
fronting the fire, it will be seen that Mr. Bumble, in receding from
the fire, and still keeping at the table, increased the distance
between himself and Mrs. Corney; which proceeding some prudent
readers will doubtless be disposed to admire, and to consider an act
of great heroism on Mr. Bumble’s part, he being in some sort tempted
by time, place, and opportunity, to give utterance to certain soft
nothings, which, however well they may become the lips of the light
and thoughtless, do seem immeasurably beneath the dignity of judges of
the land, members of parliament, ministers of state, lord-mayors, and
other great public functionaries, but more particularly beneath the
stateliness and gravity of a beadle, who (as is well known) should be
the sternest and most inflexible among them all.
[Illustration: _Mr. Bumble and Mrs. Corney taking tea._]
Whatever were Mr. Bumble’s intentions, however,—and no doubt they
were of the best,—whatever they were, it unfortunately, happened,
as has been twice before remarked, that the table was a round one;
consequently, Mr. Bumble, moving his chair by little and little, soon
began to diminish the distance between himself and the matron, and,
continuing to travel round the outer edge of the circle, brought his
chair in time close to that in which the matron was seated. Indeed, the
two chairs touched; and when they did so, Mr. Bumble stopped.
Now, if the matron had moved her chair to the right, she would have
been scorched by the fire, and if to the left, she must have fallen
into Mr. Bumble’s arms; so (being a discreet matron, and no doubt
foreseeing these consequences at a glance) she remained where she
was, and handed Mr. Bumble another cup of tea.
“Hard-hearted, Mrs. Corney?” said Mr. Bumble, stirring his tea, and
looking up into the matron’s face; “are _you_ hard-hearted, Mrs.
Corney?”
“Dear me!” exclaimed the matron, “what a very curious question from a
single man. What can you want to know for, Mr. Bumble?”
The beadle drank his tea to the last drop, finished a piece of toast,
whisked the crumbs off his knees, wiped his lips, and deliberately
kissed the matron.
“Mr. Bumble,” cried that discreet lady in a whisper, for the fright
was so great that she had quite lost her voice, “Mr. Bumble, I shall
scream!” Mr. Bumble made no reply, but in a slow and dignified manner
put his arm round the matron’s waist.
As the lady had stated her intention of screaming, of course she would
have screamed at this additional boldness, but that the exertion
was rendered unnecessary by a hasty knocking at the door, which
was no sooner heard than Mr. Bumble darted with much agility to the
wine-bottles, and began dusting them with great violence, while the
matron sharply demanded who was there. It is worthy of remark, as a
curious physical instance of the efficacy of a sudden surprise in
counteracting the effects of extreme fear, that her voice had quite
recovered all its official asperity.
“If you please, mistress,” said a withered old female pauper, hideously
ugly, putting her head in at the door, “Old Sally is a-going fast.”
“Well, what’s that to me?” angrily demanded the matron. “I can’t keep
her alive, can I?”
“No, no, mistress,” replied the old woman; “nobody can; she’s far
beyond the reach of help. I’ve seen a many people die, little babes
and great strong men, and I know when death’s a-coming well enough.
But she’s troubled in her mind; and when the fits are not on her,—and
that’s not often, for she is dying very hard,—she says she has got
something to tell which you must hear. She’ll never die quiet till you
come, mistress.”
At this intelligence the worthy Mrs. Corney muttered a variety of
invectives against old women who couldn’t even die without purposely
annoying their betters; and, muffling herself in a thick shawl which
she hastily caught up, briefly requested Mr. Bumble to stop till she
came back, lest anything particular should occur, and bidding the
messenger walk fast, and not be all night hobbling up the stairs,
followed her from the room with a very ill grace, scolding all the way.
Mr. Bumble’s conduct on being left to himself was rather inexplicable.
He opened the closet, counted the tea-spoons, weighed the sugar-tongs,
closely inspected a silver milk-pot to ascertain that it was of the
genuine metal; and, having satisfied his curiosity upon these points,
put on his cocked-hat corner-wise, and danced with much gravity
four distinct times round the table. Having gone through this very
extraordinary performance, he took off the cocked-hat again, and,
spreading himself before the fire with his back towards it, seemed to
be mentally engaged in taking an exact inventory of the furniture.
CHAPTER XXIV.
TREATS OF A VERY POOR SUBJECT, BUT IS A SHORT ONE, AND MAY BE FOUND OF
IMPORTANCE IN THIS HISTORY.
IT was no unfit messenger of death that had disturbed the quiet of
the matron’s room. Her body was bent by age, her limbs trembled with
palsy, and her face, distorted into a mumbling leer, resembled more the
grotesque shaping of some wild pencil than the work of Nature’s hand.
Alas! how few of Nature’s faces there are to gladden us with their
beauty! The cares, and sorrows, and hungerings of the world change them
as they change hearts, and it is only when those passions sleep, and
have lost their hold for ever, that the troubled clouds pass off, and
leave heaven’s surface clear. It is a common thing for the countenances
of the dead, even in that fixed and rigid state, to subside into the
long-forgotten expression of sleeping infancy, and settle into the very
look of early life; so calm, so peaceful do they grow again, that those
who knew them in their happy childhood kneel by the coffin’s side in
awe, and see the angel even upon earth.
The old crone tottered along the passages and up the stairs, muttering
some indistinct answers to the chidings of her companion; and being at
length compelled to pause for breath, gave the light into her hand, and
remained behind to follow as she might, while the more nimble superior
made her way to the room where the sick woman lay.
It was a bare garret-room, with a dim light burning at the farther
end. There was another old woman watching by the bed, and the parish
apothecary’s apprentice was standing by the fire, making a toothpick
out of a quill.
“Cold night, Mrs. Corney,” said this young gentleman, as the matron
entered.
“Very cold indeed, sir,” replied the mistress, in her most civil
tones, and dropping a curtsey as she spoke.
“You should get better coals out of your contractors,” said the
apothecary’s deputy, breaking a lump on the top of the fire with the
rusty poker; “these are not at all the sort of thing for a cold night.”
“They’re the board’s choosing, sir,” returned the matron. “The least
they could do would be to keep us pretty warm, for our places are hard
enough.”
The conversation was here interrupted by a moan from the sick woman.
“Oh!” said the young man, turning his face towards the bed, as if he
had previously quite forgotten the patient, “it’s all U. P. there, Mrs.
Corney.”
“It is, is it, sir?” asked the matron.
“If she lasts a couple of hours, I shall be surprised,” said the
apothecary’s apprentice, intent upon the toothpick’s point. “It’s a
break-up of the system altogether. Is she dozing, old lady?”
The attendant stooped over the bed to ascertain, and nodded in the
affirmative.
“Then perhaps she’ll go off in that way, if you don’t make a row,” said
the young man. “Put the light on the floor,—she wont see it there.”
The attendant did as she was bidden, shaking her head meanwhile to
intimate that the woman would not die so easily; and having done so,
resumed her seat by the side of the other nurse, who had by this time
returned. The mistress, with an expression of impatience, wrapped
herself in her shawl and sat at the foot of the bed.
The apothecary’s apprentice, having completed the manufacture of the
toothpick, planted himself in front of the fire and made good use of it
for ten minutes or so, when, apparently growing rather dull, he wished
Mrs. Corney joy of her job, and took himself off on tiptoe.
When they had sat in silence for some time the two old women rose from
the bed, and crouching over the fire, held out their withered hands to
catch the heat. The flame threw a ghastly light on their shrivelled
faces, and made their ugliness appear perfectly terrible, as in this
position they began to converse in a low voice.
“Did she say any more, Anny dear, while I was gone?” inquired the
messenger.
“Not a word,” replied the other. “She plucked and tore at her arms for
a little time; but I held her hands, and she soon dropped off. She
hasn’t much strength in her, so I easily kept her quiet. I ain’t so
weak for an old woman, although I am on parish allowance;—no, no!”
“Did she drink the hot wine the doctor said she was to have?” demanded
the first.
“I tried to get it down,” rejoined the other; “but her teeth were tight
set, and she clenched the mug so hard that it was as much as I could do
to get it back again. So _I_ drank it, and it did me good.”
Looking cautiously round to ascertain that they were not overheard, the
two hags cowered nearer to the fire, and chuckled heartily.
“I mind the time,” said the first speaker, “when she would have done
the same, and made rare fun of it afterwards.”
“Ay, that she would,” rejoined the other; “she had a merry heart. A
many many beautiful corpses she laid out, as nice and neat as wax-work.
My old eyes have seen them—ay, and these old hands touched them too;
for I have helped her scores of times.”
Stretching forth her trembling fingers as she spoke, the old creature
shook them exultingly before her face, and fumbling in her pocket
brought out an old time-discoloured tin snuff-box, from which she shook
a few grains into the outstretched palm of her companion, and a few
more into her own. While they were thus employed, the matron, who had
been impatiently watching until the dying woman should awaken from her
stupor, joined them by the fire, and sharply asked how long she was to
wait.
“Not long, mistress,” replied the second woman, looking up into her
face. “We have none of us long to wait for Death. Patience, patience!
he’ll be here soon enough for us all.”
“Hold your tongue, you doting idiot!” said the matron, sternly. “You,
Martha, tell me; has she been in this way before?”
“Often,” answered the first woman.
“But will never be again,” added the second one; “that is, she’ll never
wake again but once—and mind, mistress, that wont be for long.”
“Long or short,” said the matron, snappishly, “she wont find me here
when she does, and take care, both of you, how you worry me again for
nothing. It’s no part of my duty to see all the old women in the house
die, and I wont—that’s more. Mind that, you impudent old harridans. If
you make a fool of me again, I’ll soon cure you, I warrant you!”
She was bouncing away, when a cry from the two women, who had turned
towards the bed, caused her to look round. The sick woman had raised
herself upright, and was stretching her arms towards them.
“Who’s that?” she cried, in a hollow voice.
“Hush, hush!” said one of the women, stooping over her—“lie down, lie
down!”
“I’ll never lie down again alive!” said the woman, struggling. “I
_will_ tell her! Come here—nearer. Let me whisper in your ear.”
She clutched the matron by the arm, and forcing her into a chair by the
bedside was about to speak, when looking round, she caught sight of the
two old women bending forward in the attitude of eager listeners.
“Turn them away,” said the woman, drowsily; “make haste—make haste!”
The two old crones, chiming in together, began pouring out many piteous
lamentations that the poor dear was too far gone to know her best
friends, and uttering sundry protestations that they would never leave
her, when the superior pushed them from the room, closed the door, and
returned to the bedside. On being excluded, the old ladies changed
their tone, and cried through the keyhole that old Sally was drunk;
which, indeed, was not unlikely, since, in addition to a moderate
dose of opium prescribed by the apothecary, she was labouring under
the effects of a final taste of gin and water which had been privily
administered in the openness of their hearts by the worthy old ladies
themselves.
“Now listen to me,” said the dying woman, aloud, as if making a great
effort to revive one latent spark of energy. “In this very room—in
this very bed—I once nursed a pretty young creetur’, that was brought
into the house with her feet cut and bruised with walking, and all
soiled with dust and blood. She gave birth to a boy, and died. Let me
think—what was the year again?”
“Never mind the year,” said the impatient auditor; “what about her?”
“Ay,” murmured the sick woman, relapsing into her former drowsy state,
“what about her?—what about—I know!” she cried, jumping fiercely up:
her face flushed, and her eyes starting from her head—“I robbed her,
so I did! She wasn’t cold—I tell you she wasn’t cold, when I stole it!”
“Stole what, for God’s sake?” cried the matron, with a gesture as if
she would call for help.
“_It!_” replied the woman, laying her hand over the other’s mouth—“the
only thing she had. She wanted clothes to keep her warm, and food to
eat; but she had kept it safe, and had it in her bosom. It was gold, I
tell you!—rich gold, that might have saved her life!”
“Gold!” echoed the matron, bending eagerly over the woman as she fell
back. “Go on, go on—yes—what of it? Who was the mother?—when was it?”
“She charged me to keep it safe,” replied the woman, with a groan, “and
trusted me as the only woman about her. I stole it in my heart when
she first shewed it me hanging round her neck; and the child’s death,
perhaps, is on me besides! They would have treated him better if they
had known it all!”
“Known what?” asked the other. “Speak!”
“The boy grew so like his mother,” said the woman, rambling on, and
not heeding the question, “that I could never forget it when I saw
his face. Poor girl! poor girl!—she was so young, too!—such a gentle
lamb!—Wait; there’s more to tell. I have not told you all, have I?”
“No, no,” replied the matron, inclining her head to catch the words as
they came more faintly from the dying woman.—“Be quick, or it may be
too late!”
“The mother,” said the woman, making a more violent effort than
before—“the mother, when the pains of death first came upon her,
whispered in my ear that if her baby was born alive, and thrived, the
day might come when it would not feel so much disgraced to hear its
poor young mother named. ‘And oh, my God!’ she said, folding her thin
hands together, ‘whether it be boy or girl, raise up some friends for
it in this troubled world, and take pity upon a lonely, desolate child,
abandoned to its mercy!’”
“The boy’s name?” demanded the matron.
“They _called_ him Oliver,” replied the woman, feebly. “The gold I
stole was——”
“Yes, yes—what?” cried the other.
She was bending eagerly over the woman to hear her reply, but drew
back instinctively as she once again rose slowly and stiffly into a
sitting posture, and, clutching the coverlid with both hands, muttered
some indistinct sounds in her throat, and fell lifeless on the bed.
* * * * *
“Stone dead!” said one of the old women, hurrying in as soon as the
door was opened.
“And nothing to tell, after all,” rejoined the matron, walking
carelessly away.
The two crones were, to all appearance, too busily occupied in the
preparations for their dreadful duties to make any reply, and were left
alone hovering about the body.
CHAPTER XXV.
WHEREIN THIS HISTORY REVERTS TO MR. FAGIN AND COMPANY.
WHILE these things were passing in the country workhouse, Mr. Fagin
sat in the old den—the same from which Oliver had been removed by the
girl—brooding over a dull smoky fire. He held a pair of bellows upon
his knee, with which he had apparently been endeavouring to rouse it
into more cheerful action; but he had fallen into deep thought, and
with his arms folded upon them, and his chin resting on his thumbs,
fixed his eyes abstractedly on the rusty bars.
At a table behind him sat the Artful Dodger, Master Charles Bates,
and Mr. Chitling, all intent upon a game of whist; the Artful taking
dummy against Master Bates and Mr. Chitling. The countenance of the
first-named gentleman, peculiarly intelligent at all times, acquired
great additional interest from his close observance of the game, and
his attentive perusal of Mr. Chitling’s hand, upon which, from time to
time, as occasion served, he bestowed a variety of earnest glances,
wisely regulating his own play by the result of his observations upon
his neighbour’s cards. It being a cold night, the Dodger wore his hat,
as, indeed, was often his custom within doors. He also sustained a
clay pipe between his teeth, which he only removed for a brief space
when he deemed it necessary to apply for refreshment to a quart-pot
upon the table, which stood ready filled with gin and water for the
accommodation of the company.
Master Bates was also attentive to the play; but being of a more
excitable nature than his accomplished friend, it was observable that
he more frequently applied himself to the gin and water, and moreover
indulged in many jests and irrelevant remarks, all highly unbecoming
a scientific rubber. Indeed, the Artful, presuming upon their close
attachment, more than once took occasion to reason gravely with his
companion upon these improprieties: all of which remonstrances Master
Bates took in extremely good part, merely requesting his friend to be
“blowed,” or to insert his head in a sack, or replying with some other
neatly-turned witticism of a similar kind, the happy application of
which excited considerable admiration in the mind of Mr. Chitling. It
was remarkable that the latter gentleman and his partner invariably
lost, and that the circumstance, so far from angering Master Bates,
appeared to afford him the highest amusement, inasmuch as he laughed
most uproariously at the end of every deal, and protested that he had
never seen such a jolly game in all his born days.
“That’s two doubles and the rub,” said Mr. Chitling, with a very long
face, as he drew half-a-crown from his waistcoat-pocket “I never see
such a feller as you, Jack; you win every thing. Even when we’ve good
cards, Charley and I can’t make nothing of ’em.”
Either the matter or manner of this remark, which was made very
ruefully, delighted Charley Bates so much, that his consequent shout
of laughter roused the Jew from his reverie, and induced him to
inquire what was the matter.
“Matter, Fagin!” cried Charley. “I wish you had watched a play. Tommy
Chitling hasn’t won the point, and I went partners with him against the
Artful and dum.”
“Ay, ay!” said the Jew, with a grin, which sufficiently demonstrated
that he was at no loss to understand the reason. “Try ’em again, Tom;
try ’em again.”
“No more of it for me, thankee, Fagin,” replied Mr. Chitling; “I’ve
had enough. That ’ere Dodger has such a run of luck that there’s no
standing again’ him.”
“Ha! ha! my dear,” replied the Jew, “you must get up very early in the
morning to win against the Dodger.”
“Morning!” said Charley Bates; “you must put your boots on overnight,
and have a telescope at each eye, and a opera-glass between your
shoulders, if you want to come over him.”
Mr. Dawkins received these handsome compliments with much philosophy,
and offered to cut any gentleman in company for the first
picture-card, at a shilling a time. Nobody accepting the challenge, and
his pipe being by this time smoked out, he proceeded to amuse himself
by sketching a ground-plan of Newgate on the table with the piece of
chalk which had served him in lieu of counters; whistling meantime with
peculiar shrillness.
“How precious dull you are, Tommy!” said the Dodger, stopping short
when there had been a long silence, and addressing Mr. Chitling. “What
do you think he’s thinking of, Fagin?”
“How should I know, my dear?” replied the Jew, looking round as he
plied the bellows. “About his losses, maybe; or the little retirement
in the country that he’s just left, eh?—Ha! ha! Is that it, my dear?”
“Not a bit of it,” replied the Dodger, stopping the subject of
discourse as Mr. Chitling was about to reply. “What do _you_ say,
Charley?”
“_I_ should say,” replied Master Bates, with a grin, “that he was
uncommon sweet upon Betsy. See how he’s a-blushing! Oh, my eye! here’s
a merry-go-rounder!—Tommy Chitling’s in love!—Oh, Fagin, Fagin! what
a spree!”
Thoroughly overpowered with the notion of Mr. Chitling being the victim
of the tender passion, Master Bates threw himself back in his chair
with such violence that he lost his balance, and pitched over upon the
floor, where (the accident abating nothing of his merriment) he lay
at full length till his laugh was over, when he resumed his former
position and began another.
“Never mind him, my dear,” said the Jew, winking at Mr. Dawkins, and
giving Master Bates a reproving tap with the nozzle of the bellows.
“Betsy’s a fine girl. Stick up to her, Tom: stick up to her.”
“What I mean to say, Fagin,” replied Mr. Chitling, very red in the
face, “is, that that isn’t anything to anybody here.”
“No more it is,” replied the Jew “Charley will talk. Don’t mind him, my
dear; don’t mind him. Betsy’s a fine girl. Do as she bids you, Tom, and
you’ll make your fortune.”
“So I _do_ do as she bids me,” replied Mr. Chitling; “I shouldn’t have
been milled if it hadn’t been for her advice. But it turned out a good
job for you, didn’t it, Fagin? And what’s six weeks of it? It must come
some time or another; and why not in the winter time when you don’t
want to go out a-walking so much; eh, Fagin?”
“Ah, to be sure, my dear,” replied the Jew.
“You wouldn’t mind it again, Tom, would you,” asked the Dodger, winking
upon Charley and the Jew, “if Bet was all right?”
“I mean to say that I shouldn’t,” replied Tom, angrily; “there, now!
Ah! Who’ll say as much as that, I should like to know; eh, Fagin?”
“Nobody, my dear,” replied the Jew; “not a soul, Tom. I don’t know one
of ’em that would do it besides you; not one of ’em, my dear.”
“I might have got clear off if I’d split upon her; mighn’t I, Fagin?”
angrily pursued the poor half-witted dupe. “A word from me would have
done it; wouldn’t it, Fagin?”
“To be sure it would, my dear,” replied the Jew.
“But I didn’t blab it, did I, Fagin?” demanded Tom, pouring question
upon question with great volubility.
“No, no, to be sure,” replied the Jew; “you were too stout-hearted for
that,—a deal too stout, my dear.”
“Perhaps I was,” rejoined Tom, looking round; “and if I was, what’s to
laugh at in that; eh, Fagin?”
The Jew, perceiving that Mr. Chitling was considerably roused, hastened
to assure him that nobody was laughing, and, to prove the gravity of
the company, appealed to Master Bates, the principal offender; but
unfortunately Charley, in opening his mouth to reply that he was never
more serious in his life, was unable to prevent the escape of such a
violent roar that the abused Mr. Chitling, without any preliminary
ceremonies rushed across the room, and aimed a blow at the offender,
who, being skilful in evading pursuit, ducked to avoid it, and chose
his time so well that it lighted on the chest of the merry old
gentleman, and caused him to stagger to the wall, where he stood
panting for breath, while Mr. Chitling looked on in intense dismay.
“Hark!” cried the Dodger at this moment, “I heard the tinkler.”
Catching up the light, he crept softly up stairs.
The bell rang again with some impatience while the party were in
darkness. After a short pause, the Dodger reappeared, and whispered
Fagin mysteriously.
“What!” cried the Jew, “alone?”
The Dodger nodded in the affirmative, and, shading the flame of the
candle with his hand, gave Charley Bates a private intimation in dumb
show that he had better not be funny just then. Having performed this
friendly office, he fixed his eyes on the Jew’s face and awaited his
directions.
The old man bit his yellow fingers, and meditated for some seconds; his
face working with agitation the while, as if he dreaded something, and
feared to know the worst. At length he raised his head.
“Where is he?” he asked.
The Dodger pointed to the floor above, and made a gesture as if to
leave the room.
“Yes,” said the Jew, answering the mute inquiry; “bring him down.
Hush!—Quiet, Charley!—gently, Tom! Scarce, scarce!”
This brief direction to Charley Bates and his recent antagonist to
retire, was softly and immediately obeyed. There was no sound of their
whereabout when the Dodger descended the stairs bearing the light in
his hand, and followed by a man in a coarse smock-frock, who, after
casting a hurried glance round the room, pulled off a large wrapper
which had concealed the lower portion of his face, and disclosed—all
haggard, unwashed, and unshaven, the features of flash Toby Crackit.
“How are you, Fagey?” said the worthy, nodding to the Jew. “Pop that
shawl away in my castor, Dodger, so that I may know where to find it
when I cut; that’s the time of day! You’ll be a fine young cracksman
afore the old file now.”
With these words he pulled up the smock-frock, and, winding it round
his middle, drew a chair to the fire, and placed his feet upon the hob.
“See there, Fagey,” he said, pointing disconsolately to his top-boots;
“not a drop of Day and Martin since you know when; not a bubble of
blacking, by ——! but don’t look at me in that way, man. All in good
time; I can’t talk about business till I’ve eat and drank, so produce
the sustainance, and let’s have a quiet fill-out for the first time
these three days!”
The Jew motioned to the Dodger to place what eatables there were upon
the table; and, seating himself opposite the housebreaker, waited his
leisure.
To judge from appearances, Toby was by no means in a hurry to open
the conversation. At first the Jew contented himself with patiently
watching his countenance, as if to gain from its expression some clue
to the intelligence he brought; but in vain. He looked tired and worn,
but there was the same complacent repose upon his features that they
always wore, and through dirt, and beard, and whisker, there still
shone unimpaired the self-satisfied smirk of flash Toby Crackit. Then
the Jew in an agony of impatience watched every morsel he put into
his mouth, pacing up and down the room meanwhile in irrepressible
excitement. It was all of no use. Toby continued to eat with the utmost
outward indifference until he could eat no more; and then, ordering the
Dodger out, closed the door, mixed a glass of spirits and water, and
composed himself for talking.
“First and foremost, Fagey,” said Toby.
“Yes, yes!” interposed the Jew, drawing up his chair.
Mr. Crackit stopped to take a draught of spirits and water, and to
declare that the gin was excellent; and then, placing his feet against
the low mantelpiece, so as to bring his boots to about the level of his
eye, quietly resumed.
“First and foremost, Fagey,” said the housebreaker, “how’s Bill?”
“What!” screamed the Jew, starting from his seat.
“Why, you don’t mean to say——” began Toby, turning pale.
“Mean!” cried the Jew, stamping furiously on the ground. “Where are
they?—Sikes and the boy—where are they?—where have they been?—where
are they hiding?—why have they not been here?”
“The crack failed,” said Toby, faintly.
“I know it,” replied the Jew, tearing a newspaper from his pocket, and
pointing to it. “What more?”
“They fired and hit the boy. We cut over the fields at the back with
him between us—straight as the crow flies—through hedge and ditch.
They gave chase. D—me! the whole country was awake, and the dogs upon
us.”
“The boy!” gasped the Jew.
“Bill had him on his back, and scudded like the wind. We stopped to
take him again between us; his head hung down, and he was cold. They
were close upon our heels: every man for himself, and each from the
gallows. We parted company, and left the youngster lying in a ditch.
Alive or dead, that’s all I know of him.”
The Jew stopped to hear no more; but uttering a loud yell, and twining
his hands in his hair, rushed from the room and from the house.
CHAPTER XXVI.
IN WHICH A MYSTERIOUS CHARACTER APPEARS UPON THE SCENE,
AND MANY THINGS INSEPARABLE FROM THIS HISTORY ARE DONE AND
PERFORMED.
THE old man had gained the street corner before he began to recover
the effect of Toby Crackit’s intelligence. He had relaxed nothing of
his unusual speed, but was still pressing onward in the same wild and
disordered manner, when the sudden dashing past of a carriage, and a
boisterous cry from the foot-passengers, who saw his danger, drove
him back upon the pavement. Avoiding as much as possible all the main
streets, and skulking only through the byways and alleys, he at length
emerged on Snow Hill. Here he walked even faster than before; nor did
he linger until he had again turned into a court, when, as if conscious
that he was now in his proper element, he fell into his usual
shuffling pace, and seemed to breathe more freely.
Near to the spot on which Snow Hill and Holborn Hill meet, there
opens, upon the right hand as you come out of the city, a narrow and
dismal alley leading to Saffron Hill. In its filthy shops are exposed
for sale huge bunches of second-hand silk handkerchiefs, of all sizes
and patterns—for here reside the traders who purchase them from
pickpockets. Hundreds of these handkerchiefs hang dangling from pegs
outside the windows, or flaunting from the door-posts; and the shelves
within are piled with them. Confined as the limits of Field Lane are,
it has its barber, its coffee-shop, its beer-shop, and its fried-fish
warehouse. It is a commercial colony of itself, the emporium of petty
larceny, visited at early morning and setting-in of dusk by silent
merchants, who traffic in dark back-parlours, and go as strangely as
they come. Here the clothesman, the shoe-vamper, and the rag-merchant,
display their goods as sign-boards to the petty thief; and stores of
old iron and bones, and heaps of mildewy fragments of woollen-stuff and
linen, rust and rot in the grimy cellars.
It was into this place that the Jew turned. He was well known to the
sallow denizens of the lane, for such of them as were on the lookout to
buy or sell nodded familiarly as he passed along. He replied to their
salutations in the same way, but bestowed no closer recognition until
he reached the further end of the alley, when he stopped to address a
salesman of small stature, who had squeezed as much of his person into
a child’s chair as the chair would hold, and was smoking a pipe at his
warehouse door.
“Why, the sight of you, Mr. Fagin, would cure the hoptalmy!” said this
respectable trader, in acknowledgment of the Jew’s inquiry after his
health.
“The neighbourhood was a little too hot, Lively,” said Fagin, elevating
his eyebrows, and crossing his hands upon his shoulders.
“Well! I’ve heerd that complaint of it once or twice before,” replied
the trader; “but it soon cools down again; don’t you find it so?”
Fagin nodded in the affirmative, and pointing in the direction of
Saffron Hill, inquired whether any one was up yonder to-night.
“At the Cripples?” inquired the man.
The Jew nodded.
“Let me see,” pursued the merchant, reflecting. “Yes; there’s some
half-dozen of ’em gone in that I knows. I don’t think your friend’s
there.”
“Sikes is not, I suppose?” inquired the Jew, with a disappointed
countenance.
“_Non istwentus_, as the lawyers say,” replied the little man, shaking
his head, and looking amazingly sly. “Have you got anything in my line
to-night?”
“Nothing to-night,” said the Jew, turning away.
“Are you going up to the Cripples, Fagin?” cried the little man,
calling after him. “Stop! I don’t mind if I have a drop there with
you!”
But as the Jew, looking back, waved his hand to intimate that he
preferred being alone; and, moreover, as the little man could not very
easily disengage himself from the chair, the sign of the Cripples was,
for a time, bereft of the advantage of Mr. Lively’s presence. By the
time he had got upon his legs the Jew had disappeared; so Mr. Lively,
after ineffectually standing on tiptoe, in the hope of catching sight
of him, again forced himself into the little chair, and, exchanging a
shake of the head with a lady in the opposite shop, in which doubt and
mistrust were plainly mingled, resumed his pipe with a grave demeanour.
The Three Cripples, or rather the Cripples, which was the sign by
which the establishment was familiarly known to its patrons, was the
same public-house in which Mr. Sikes and his dog have already figured.
Merely making a sign to a man in the bar, Fagin walked straight up
stairs, and opening the door of a room, and softly insinuating himself
into the chamber, looked anxiously about, shading his eyes with his
hand, as if in search of some particular person.
The room was illuminated by two gas-lights, the glare of which was
prevented by the barred shutters and closely-drawn curtains of faded
red from being visible outside. The ceiling was blackened to prevent
its colour being injured by the flaring of the lamps; and the place was
so full of dense tobacco-smoke, that at first it was scarcely possible
to discern anything further. By degrees, however, as some of it cleared
away through the open door, an assemblage of heads, as confused as the
noises that greeted the ear, might be made out; and as the eye grew
more accustomed to the scene, the spectator gradually became aware of
the presence of a numerous company, male and female, crowded round a
long table, at the upper end of which sat a chairman with a hammer of
office in his hand, while a professional gentleman, with a bluish nose
and his face tied up for the benefit of a toothache, presided at a
jingling piano in a remote corner.
As Fagin stepped softly in, the professional gentleman, running over
the keys by way of prelude, occasioned a general cry of order for
a song; which having subsided, a young lady proceeded to entertain
the company with a ballad in four verses, between each of which the
accompanyist played the melody all through as loud as he could.
When this was over, the chairman gave a sentiment; after which, the
professional gentlemen on the chairman’s right and left volunteered a
duet, and sang it with great applause.
It was curious to observe some faces which stood out prominently from
among the group. There was the chairman himself, (the landlord of the
house,) a coarse, rough, heavy-built fellow, who, while the songs
were proceeding, rolled his eyes hither and, thither, and, seeming
to give himself up to joviality, had an eye for every thing that was
done, and an ear for everything that was said—and sharp ones, too.
Near him were the singers, receiving, with professional indifference,
the compliments of the company, and applying themselves in turn to a
dozen proffered glasses of spirits and water tendered by their more
boisterous admirers, whose countenances, expressive of almost every
vice in almost every grade, irresistibly attracted the attention by
their very repulsiveness. Cunning, ferocity, and drunkenness in all its
stages, were there in their strongest aspects; and women—some with
the last lingering tinge of their early freshness almost fading as
you looked, and others with every mark and stamp of their sex utterly
beaten out, and presenting but one loathsome blank of profligacy and
crime—some mere girls, others but young women, and none past the prime
of life—formed the darkest and saddest portion of this dreary picture.
Fagin, troubled by no grave emotions, looked eagerly from face to face
while these proceedings were in progress, but, apparently, without
meeting that of which he was in search. Succeeding, at length, in
catching the eye of the man who occupied the chair, he beckoned to him
slightly, and left the room as quietly as he had entered it.
“What can I do for you, Mr. Fagin?” inquired the man, as he followed
him out to the landing. “Wont you join us? They’ll be delighted, every
one of ’em.”
The Jew shook his head impatiently, and said in a whisper, “Is _he_
here?”
“No,” replied the man.
“And no news of Barney?” inquired Fagin.
“None,” replied the landlord of the Cripples; for it was he. “He wont
stir till it’s all safe. Depend on it that they’re on the scent down
there, and that if he moved he’d blow upon the thing at once. He’s all
right enough, Barney is, else I should have heard of him. I’ll pound it
that Barney’s managing properly. Let him alone for that.”
“Will _he_ be here to-night?” asked the Jew, laying the same emphasis
on the pronoun as before.
“Monks, do you mean?” inquired the landlord, hesitating.
“Hush!” said the Jew. “Yes.”
“Certain,” replied the man, drawing a gold watch from his fob; “I
expected him here before now. If you’ll wait ten minutes, he’ll be——”
“No, no,” said the Jew, hastily, as though, however desirous he might
be to see the person in question, he was nevertheless relieved by his
absence. “Tell him I came here to see him, and that he must come to me
to-night; no, say to-morrow. As he is not here, to-morrow will be time
enough.”
“Good!” said the man. “Nothing more?”
“Not a word now,” said the Jew, descending the stairs.
“I say,” said the other, looking over the rails, and speaking in a
hoarse whisper; “what a time this would be for a sell! I’ve got Phil
Barker here, so drunk that a boy might take him.”
“Aha! But it’s not Phil Barker’s time,” said the Jew, looking up. “Phil
has something more to do before we can afford to part with him; so go
back to the company, my dear, and tell them to lead merry lives—_while
they last_. Ha! ha! ha!”
The landlord reciprocated the old man’s laugh, and returned to his
guests. The Jew was no sooner alone, than his countenance resumed its
former expression of anxiety and thought. After a brief reflection,
he called a hack-cabriolet, and bade the man drive towards Bethnal
Green. He dismissed him within some quarter of a mile of Mr. Sikes’s
residence, and performed the short remainder of the distance on foot.
“Now,” muttered the Jew, as he knocked at the door, “if there is any
deep play here, I shall have it out of you, my girl, cunning as you
are.”
She was in her room, the woman said; so Fagin crept softly up stairs,
and entered it without any previous ceremony. The girl was alone, lying
with her head upon the table, and her hair straggling over it.
“She has been drinking,” thought the Jew, coolly, “or perhaps she is
only miserable.”
The old man turned to close the door as he made this reflection, and
the noise thus occasioned roused the girl. She eyed his crafty face
narrowly, as she inquired whether there was any news, and listened to
his recital of Toby Crackit’s story. When it was concluded, she sunk
into her former attitude, but spoke not a word. She pushed the candle
impatiently away, and once or twice, as she feverishly changed her
position, shuffled her feet upon the ground; but this was all.
During this silence, the Jew looked restlessly about the room, as if to
assure himself that there were no appearances of Sikes having covertly
returned. Apparently satisfied with his inspection, he coughed twice or
thrice, and made as many efforts to open a conversation; but the girl
heeded him no more than if he had been made of stone. At length he made
another attempt, and, rubbing his hands together, said, in his most
conciliatory tone,
“And where should you think Bill was now, my dear—eh?”
The girl moaned out some scarcely intelligible reply, that she could
not tell, and seemed, from the half-smothered noise that escaped her,
to be crying.
“And the boy, too,” said the Jew, straining his eyes to catch a glimpse
of her face. “Poor leetle child!—left in a ditch, Nance; only think!”
“The child,” said the girl, suddenly looking up, “is better where he
is than among us: and if no harm comes to Bill from it, I hope he lies
dead in the ditch, and that his young bones may rot there.”
“What!” cried the Jew, in amazement.
“Ay, I do,” returned the girl, meeting his gaze. “I shall be glad to
have him away from my eyes, and to know that the worst is over. I can’t
bear to have him about me. The sight of him turns me against myself and
all of you.”
“Pooh!” said the Jew, scornfully. “You’re drunk, girl.”
“Am I?” cried the girl, bitterly. “It’s no fault of yours if I am
not! you’d never have me anything else if you had your will, except
now;—the humour doesn’t suit you, doesn’t it?”
“No!” rejoined the Jew, furiously. “It does not.”
“Change it, then!” responded the girl, with a laugh.
“Change it!” exclaimed the Jew, exasperated beyond all bounds by his
companion’s unexpected obstinacy, and the vexation of the night, “I
will change it! Listen to me, you drab! listen to me, who with six
words can strangle Sikes as surely as if I had his bull’s throat
between my fingers now. If he comes back, and leaves that boy behind
him,—if he gets off free, and, dead or alive, fails to restore him to
me, murder him yourself if you would have him escape Jack Ketch, and do
it the moment he sets foot in this room, or, mind me, it will be too
late!”
“What is all this?” cried the girl, involuntarily.
“What is it?” pursued Fagin, mad with rage. “This—When the boy’s worth
hundreds of pounds to me, am I to lose what chance threw me in the way
of getting safely, through the whims of a drunken gang that I could
whistle away the lives of,—and me bound, too, to a born devil that
only wants the will, and has got the power to, to——”
Panting for breath, the old man stammered for a word, and in that
one instant checked the torrent of his wrath, and changed his whole
demeanour. A moment before, his clenched hands grasped the air, his
eyes had dilated, and his face grown livid with passion; but now
he shrunk into a chair, and, cowering together, trembled with the
apprehension of having himself disclosed some hidden villany. After a
short silence, he ventured to look round at his companion, and appeared
somewhat reassured on beholding her in the same listless attitude from
which he had first roused her.
“Nancy, dear!” croaked the Jew, in his usual voice. “Did you mind me,
dear?”
“Don’t worry me, now, Fagin!” replied the girl, raising her head
languidly. “If Bill has not done it this time, he will another. He has
done many a good job for you, and will do many more when he can; and
when he can’t, he wont; so no more about that.”
“Regarding this boy, my dear?” said the Jew, rubbing the palms of his
hands nervously together.
“The boy must take his chance with the rest,” interrupted Nancy,
hastily; “and I say again, I hope he is dead, and out of harm’s way,
and out of yours,—that is, if Bill comes to no harm, and if Toby got
clear off, he’s pretty sure to, for he’s worth two of him any time.”
“And about what I was saying, my dear?” observed the Jew, keeping his
glistening eye steadily upon her.
“You must say it all over again if it’s any thing you want me to do,”
rejoined Nancy: “and if it is, you had better wait till to-morrow. You
put me up for a minute, but now I’m stupid again.”
Fagin put several other questions, all with the same drift of
ascertaining whether the girl had profited by his unguarded hints; but
she answered them so readily, and was withal so utterly unmoved by his
searching looks, that his original impression of her being more than a
trifle in liquor was fully confirmed. Nancy, indeed, was not exempt
from a failing which was very common among the Jew’s female pupils, and
in which, in their tenderer years, they were rather encouraged than
checked. Her disordered appearance, and a wholesale perfume of Geneva
which pervaded the apartment, afforded strong confirmatory evidence
of the justice of the Jew’s supposition; and when, after indulging
in the temporary display of violence above described, she subsided,
first into dulness, and afterwards into a compound of feelings, under
the influence of which she shed tears one minute, and in the next
gave utterance to various exclamations of “Never say die!” and divers
calculations as to what might be the amount of the odds so long as
a lady or gentleman were happy, Mr. Fagin, who had had considerable
experience of such matters in his time, saw, with great satisfaction,
that she was very far gone indeed.
Having eased his mind by this discovery, and accomplished his twofold
object of imparting to the girl what he had that night heard, and
ascertaining with his own eyes that Sikes had not returned, Mr. Fagin
again turned his face homeward, leaving his young friend asleep with
her head upon the table.
It was within an hour of midnight, and the weather being dark and
piercing cold, he had no great temptation to loiter. The sharp wind
that scoured the streets seemed to have cleared them of passengers
as of dust and mud, for few people were abroad, and they were to all
appearance hastening fast home. It blew from the right quarter for the
Jew, however, and straight before it he went, trembling and shivering
as every fresh gust drove him rudely on his way.
He had reached the corner of his own street, and was already fumbling
in his pocket for the door-key, when a dark figure emerged from a
projecting entrance which lay in deep shadow, and, crossing the road,
glided up to him unperceived.
“Fagin!” whispered a voice close to his ear.
“Ah!” said the Jew, turning quickly round, “is that——”
“Yes!” interrupted the stranger, harshly. “I have been lingering here
these two hours. Where the devil have you been?”
“On your business, my dear,” replied the Jew, glancing uneasily at his
companion, and slackening his pace as he spoke. “On your business all
night.”
“Oh, of course!” said the stranger, with a sneer. “Well; and what’s
come of it?”
“Nothing good,” said the Jew.
“Nothing bad, I hope?” said the stranger, stopping short, and turning a
startled look upon his companion.
The Jew shook his head, and was about to reply, when the stranger,
interrupting him, motioned to the house before which they had by this
time arrived, and remarked, that he had better say what he had got to
say under cover, for his blood was chilled with standing about so long,
and the wind blew through him.
Fagin looked as if he could have willingly excused himself from taking
home a visiter at that unseasonable hour, and muttered something
about having no fire; but his companion repeating his request in a
peremptory manner, he unlocked the door, and requested him to close it
softly, while he got a light.
“It’s as dark as the grave,” said the man, groping forward a few steps.
“Make haste. I hate this!”
“Shut the door,” whispered Fagin from the end of the passage. As he
spoke, it closed with a loud noise.
“That wasn’t my doing,” said the other man, feeling his way. “The wind
blew it to, or it shut of its own accord; one or the other. Look sharp
with the light, or I shall knock my brains out against something in
this confounded hole.”
Fagin stealthily descended the kitchen stairs, and, after a short
absence, returned with a lighted candle, and the intelligence that Toby
Crackit was asleep in the back-room below, and the boys in the front
one. Beckoning the other man to follow him, he led the way up stairs.
“We can say the few words we’ve got to say in here, my dear,” said the
Jew, throwing open a door on the first floor; “and as there are holes
in the shutters, and we never shew lights to our neighbours, we’ll set
the candle on the stairs. There!”
With these words, the Jew, stooping down, placed the candle on an
upper flight of stairs, exactly opposite the room door, and led the
way into the apartment, which was destitute of all moveables save a
broken arm-chair, and an old couch or sofa without covering, which
stood behind the door. Upon this piece of furniture the stranger
flung himself with the air of a weary man, and the Jew drawing up the
arm-chair opposite, they sat face to face. It was not quite dark, for
the door was partially open, and the candle outside threw a feeble
reflection on the opposite wall.
They conversed for some time in whispers; although nothing of the
conversation was distinguishable beyond a few disjointed words here and
there; a listener might easily have perceived that Fagin appeared to be
defending himself against some remarks of the stranger, and that the
latter was in a state of considerable irritation. They might have been
talking thus for a quarter of an hour or more, when Monks—by which
name the Jew had designated the strange man several times in the course
of their colloquy—said, raising his voice a little,
“I tell you again it was badly planned. Why not have kept him here
among the rest, and made a sneaking, snivelling pickpocket of him at
once?”
“Only hear him!” exclaimed the Jew, shrugging his shoulders.
“Why, do you mean to say you couldn’t have done it if you had chosen?”
demanded Monks, sternly. “Haven’t you done it with other boys scores of
times? If you had had patience for a twelvemonth, at most, couldn’t you
have got him convicted and sent safely out of the kingdom, perhaps for
life?”
“Whose turn would that have served, my dear?” inquired the Jew, humbly.
“Mine,” replied Monks.
“But not mine,” said the Jew, submissively. “He might have become
of use to me. When there are two parties to a bargain, it is only
reasonable that the interest of both should be consulted; is it, my
good friend?”
“What then?” demanded Monks, sulkily. “I saw it was not easy to train
him to the business,” replied the Jew; “he was not like other boys in
the same circumstances.”
“Curse him, no!” muttered the man, “or he would have been a thief long
ago.”
“I had no hold upon him to make him worse,” pursued the Jew, anxiously
watching the countenance of his companion. “His hand was not in; I
had nothing to frighten him with, which we always must have in the
beginning, or we labour in vain. What could I do? Send him out with the
Dodger and Charley? We had enough of that at first, my dear; I trembled
for us all.”
“_That_ was not my doing,” observed Monks.
“No, no, my dear!” renewed the Jew, “and I don’t quarrel with it now,
because, if it had never happened, you might never have clapped eyes
upon the boy to notice him, and so led to the discovery that it was him
you were looking for. Well; I got him back for you by means of the
girl, and then _she_ begins to favour him.”
“Throttle the girl!” said Monks, impatiently.
“Why, we can’t afford to do that just now, my dear,” replied the Jew,
smiling; “and, besides, that sort of thing is not in our way, or one
of these days I might be glad to have it done. I know what these girls
are, Monks, well. As soon as the boy begins to harden, she’ll care no
more for him than for a block of wood. You want him made a thief: if
he is alive, I can make him one from this time; and if—if—” said the
Jew, drawing nearer to the other,—“it’s not likely, mind,—but if the
worst comes to the worst, and he is dead——”
“It’s no fault of mine if he is!” interposed the other man, with a look
of terror, and clasping the Jew’s arm with trembling hands. “Mind that,
Fagin; I had no hand in it. Anything but his death, I told you from
the first. I wont shed blood; it’s always found out, and haunts a man
besides. If they shot him dead, I was not the cause; do you hear me?
Fire this infernal den!—what’s that?”
“What!” cried the Jew, grasping the coward round the body with both
arms as he sprung to his feet. “Where?”
“Yonder!” replied the man, glaring at the opposite wall. “The shadow—I
saw the shadow of a woman, in a cloak and bonnet, pass along the
wainscot like a breath!”
The Jew released his hold, and they rushed tumultuously from the room.
The candle, wasted by the draught, was standing where it had been
placed, and shewed them the empty staircase, and their own white faces.
They listened intently, but a profound silence reigned throughout the
house.
“It’s your fancy,” said the Jew, taking up the light, and turning to
his companion.
“I’ll swear I saw it!” replied Monks, trembling violently. “It was
bending forward when I saw it first, and when I spoke it darted away.”
The Jew glanced contemptuously at the pale face of his associate,
and, telling him he could follow if he pleased, ascended the stairs.
They looked into all the rooms; they were cold, bare, and empty. They
descended into the passage, and thence into the cellars below. The
green damp hung upon the low walls, and the tracks of the snail and
slug glistened in the light; but all was still as death.
“What do you think now?” said the Jew, when they had regained the
passage. “Besides ourselves, there’s not a creature in the house except
Toby and the boys, and they’re safe enough. See here!”
As a proof of the fact, the Jew drew forth two keys from his pocket;
and explained, that when he first went down stairs he had locked them
in, to prevent any intrusion on the conference.
This accumulated testimony effectually staggered Mr. Monks. His
protestations had gradually become less and less vehement as they
proceeded in their search without making any discovery; and now he
gave vent to several very grim laughs, and confessed it could only
have been his excited imagination. He declined any renewal of the
conversation, however, for that night, suddenly remembering that it was
past one o’clock: and so the amiable couple parted.
CHAPTER XXVI.
ATONES FOR THE UNPOLITENESS OF A FORMER CHAPTER, WHICH DESERTED A LADY
MOST UNCEREMONIOUSLY.
AS it would be by no means seemly in an humble author to keep so mighty
a personage as a beadle waiting with his back to the fire, and the
skirts of his coat gathered up under his arms, until such time as it
might suit his pleasure to relieve him; and as it would still less
become his station, or his gallantry, to involve in the same neglect
a lady on whom that beadle had looked with an eye of tenderness and
affection, and in whose ear he had whispered sweet words, which, coming
from such a quarter, might well thrill the bosom of maid or matron of
whatsoever degree; the faithful historian whose pen traces these words,
trusting that he knows his place, and entertains a becoming reverence
for those upon earth to whom high and important authority is delegated,
hastens to pay them that respect which their position demands, and to
treat them with all that duteous ceremony which their exalted rank
and (by consequence) great virtues imperatively claim at his hands.
Towards this end, indeed, he had purposed to introduce in this place
a dissertation touching the divine right of beadles, and elucidative
of the position, that a beadle can do no wrong, which could not fail
to have been both pleasurable and profitable to the right-minded
reader, but which he is unfortunately compelled, by want of time and
space, to postpone to some more convenient and fitting opportunity;
on the arrival of which, he will be prepared to shew, that a beadle
properly constituted,—that is to say, a parochial beadle, attached
to a parochial workhouse, and attending in his official capacity the
parochial church,—is, in right and virtue of his office, possessed of
all the excellences and best qualities of humanity; and that to none
of those excellences can mere companies’ beadles, or court-of-law
beadles, or even chapel-of-ease beadles (save the last, and they in a
very lowly and inferior degree), lay the remotest sustainable claim.
Mr. Bumble had recounted the tea-spoons, re-weighed the sugar-tongs,
made a closer inspection of the milk-pot, and ascertained to a nicety
the exact condition of the furniture down to the very horse-hair seats
of the chairs; and had repeated each process full half-a-dozen times,
before he began to think that it was time for Mrs. Corney to return.
Thinking begets thinking; and, as there were no sounds of Mrs. Corney’s
approach, it occurred to Mr. Bumble that it would be an innocent and
virtuous way of spending the time, if he were further to allay his
curiosity by a cursory glance at the interior of Mrs. Corney’s chest of
drawers.
Having listened at the keyhole to assure himself that nobody was
approaching the chamber, Mr. Bumble, beginning at the bottom, proceeded
to make himself acquainted with the contents of the three long drawers,
which, being filled with various garments of good fashion and texture,
carefully preserved between two layers of old newspapers, speckled
with dried lavender, seemed to yield him exceeding satisfaction.
Arriving, in course of time, at the right-hand corner drawer (in which
was the key), and beholding therein a small padlocked box, which, being
shaken, gave forth a pleasant sound, as of the chinking of coin, Mr.
Bumble returned with a stately walk to the fireplace, and, resuming
his old attitude, said, with a grave and determined air, “I’ll do it!”
He followed up this remarkable declaration by shaking his head in a
waggish manner for ten minutes, as though he were remonstrating with
himself for being such a pleasant dog, and then took a view of his legs
in profile with much seeming pleasure and interest.
He was still placidly engaged in this latter survey, when Mrs. Corney,
hurrying into the room, threw herself, in a breathless state, on a
chair by the fireside, and covering her eyes with one hand, placed the
other over her heart, and gasped for breath.
“Mrs. Corney,” said Mr. Bumble, stooping over the matron, “what
is this, ma’am? has anything happened, ma’am? Pray answer me; I’m
on—on—” Mr. Bumble, in his alarm, could not immediately think of the
word “tenterhooks,” so he said, “broken bottles.”
“Oh, Mr. Bumble!” cried the lady, “I have been so dreadfully put out!”
“Put out, ma’am!” exclaimed Mr. Bumble; “who has dared to—? I know!”
said Mr. Bumble, checking himself, with native majesty, “this is them
wicious paupers!”
“It’s dreadful to think of!” said the lady, shuddering.
“Then _don’t_ think of it, ma’am,” rejoined Mr. Bumble.
“I can’t help it,” whimpered the lady.
“Then take something, ma’am,” said Mr. Bumble, soothingly. “A little of
the wine?”
“Not for the world!” replied Mrs. Corney. “I couldn’t,—oh! The top
shelf in the right-hand corner—oh!” Uttering these words, the good
lady pointed distractedly to the cupboard, and underwent a convulsion
from internal spasms. Mr. Bumble rushed to the closet, and, snatching
a pint green-glass bottle from the shelf, thus incoherently indicated,
filled a tea-cup with its contents, and held it to the lady’s lips.
“I’m better now,” said Mrs. Corney, falling back, after drinking half
of it.
Mr. Bumble raised his eyes piously to the ceiling in thankfulness, and,
bringing them down again to the brim of the cup, lifted it to his nose.
“Peppermint,” explained Mrs. Corney, in a faint voice, smiling gently
on the beadle as she spoke. “Try it; there’s a little—a little
something else in it.”
Mr. Bumble tasted the medicine with a doubtful look; smacked his lips,
took another taste, and put the cup down empty.
“It is very comforting,” said Mrs. Corney.
“Very much so indeed, ma’am,” said the beadle. As he spoke, he drew a
chair beside the matron, and tenderly inquired what had happened to
distress her.
“Nothing,” replied Mrs. Corney. “I am a foolish, excitable, weak
creetur.”
“Not weak, ma’am,” retorted Mr. Bumble, drawing his chair a little
closer. “Are you a weak creetur, Mrs. Corney?”
“We are all weak creeturs,” said Mrs. Corney, laying down a general
principle.
“So we are,” said the beadle.
Nothing was said on either side for a minute or two afterwards; and by
the expiration of that time, Mr. Bumble had illustrated the position by
removing his left arm from the back of Mrs. Corney’s chair, where it
had previously rested, to Mrs. Corney’s apron-string, round which it
gradually became intwined.
“We are all weak creeturs,” said Mr. Bumble.
Mrs. Corney sighed.
“Dont sigh, Mrs. Corney,” said Mr. Bumble.
“I can’t help it,” said Mrs. Corney. And she sighed again.
“This is a very comfortable room, ma’am,” said Mr. Bumble, looking
round. “Another room and this, ma’am, would be a complete thing.”
“It would be too much for one,” murmured the lady.
“But not for two, ma’am,” rejoined Mr. Bumble, in soft accents. “Eh,
Mrs. Corney?”
Mrs. Corney drooped her head when the beadle said this, and the beadle
drooped his to get a view of Mrs. Corney’s face. Mrs. Corney, with
great propriety, turned her head away, and released her hand to get
at her pocket-handkerchief, but insensibly replaced it in that of Mr.
Bumble.
“The board allow you coals, don’t they, Mrs. Corney?” inquired the
beadle, affectionately pressing her hand.
“And candles,” replied Mrs. Corney, slightly returning the pressure.
“Coals, candles, and house-rent free,” said Mr. Bumble. “Oh, Mrs.
Corney, what a angel you are!”
The lady was not proof against this burst of feeling. She sunk into
Mr. Bumble’s arms; and that gentleman, in his agitation, imprinted a
passionate kiss upon her chaste nose.
“Such porochial perfection!” exclaimed Mr. Bumble, rapturously. “You
know that Mr. Slout is worse to-night, my fascinator?”
“Yes,” replied Mrs. Corney, bashfully.
“He can’t live a week, the doctor says,” pursued, Mr. Bumble. “He is
the master of this establishment; his death will cause a wacancy; that
wacancy must be filled up. Oh Mrs. Corney, what a prospect this opens!
What a opportunity for a joining of hearts and housekeeping!”
Mrs. Corney sobbed.
“The little word?” said Mr. Bumble, bending over the bashful
beauty—“the one little, little, little word, my blessed Corney?”
“Ye—ye—yes!” sighed out the matron.
“One more,” pursued the beadle; “compose your darling feelings for only
one more. When is it to come off?”
Mrs. Corney twice essayed to speak, and twice failed. At length,
summoning up courage, she threw her arms round Mr. Bumble’s neck,
and said, it might be as soon as ever he pleased, and that he was “a
irresistible duck.”
Matters being thus amicably and satisfactorily arranged, the contract
was solemnly ratified in another tea-cupful of the peppermint mixture,
which was rendered the more necessary by the flutter and agitation of
the lady’s spirits. While it was being disposed of, she acquainted Mr.
Bumble with the old woman’s decease.
“Very good,” said that gentleman, sipping his peppermint “I’ll call at
Sowerberry’s as I go home, and tell him to send to-morrow morning. Was
it that as frightened you, love?”
“It wasn’t anything particular, dear,” said the lady, evasively.
“It must have been something, love,” urged Mr. Bumble. “Wont you tell
your own B.?”
“Not now,” rejoined the lady; “one of these days,—after we’re married,
dear.”
“After we’re married!” exclaimed Mr. Bumble. “It wasn’t any impudence
from any of them male paupers as——”
“No, no, love!” interposed the lady, hastily.
“If I thought it was,” continued Mr. Bumble,—“if I thought any one of
’em had dared to lift his wulgar eyes to that lovely countenance——”
“They wouldn’t have dared to do it, love,” responded the lady.
“They had better not!” said Mr. Bumble, clenching his fist. “Let me see
any man, porochial, or extra-porochial, as would presume to do it, and
I can tell him that he wouldn’t do it a second time!”
Unembellished by any violence of gesticulation, this might have sounded
as no very high compliment to the lady’s charms; but, as Mr. Bumble
accompanied the threat with many warlike gestures, she was much touched
with this proof of his devotion, and protested, with great admiration,
that he was indeed a dove.
The dove then turned up his coat-collar, and put on his cocked-hat,
and having exchanged a long and affectionate embrace with his future
partner, once again braved the cold wind of the night; merely pausing
for a few minutes in the male paupers’ ward to abuse them a little,
with the view of satisfying himself that he could fill the office of
workhouse-master with needful acerbity. Assured of his qualifications,
Mr. Bumble left the building with a light heart and bright visions of
his future promotion, which served to occupy his mind until he reached
the shop of the undertaker.
Now, Mr. and Mrs. Sowerberry having gone out to tea and supper, and
Noah Claypole not being at any time disposed to take upon himself a
greater amount of physical exertion than is necessary to a convenient
performance of the two functions of eating and drinking, the shop
was not closed, although it was past the usual hour of shutting-up.
Mr. Bumble tapped with his cane on the counter several times; but,
attracting no attention, and beholding a light shining through the
glass-window of the little parlour, at the back of the shop, he made
bold to peep in and see what was going forward; and, when he saw what
_was_ going forward, he was not a little surprised.
The cloth was laid for supper, and the table was covered with bread
and butter, plates, and glasses, a porter-pot, and a wine-bottle.
At the upper end of the table, Mr. Noah Claypole lolled negligently
in an easy-chair, with his legs thrown over one of the arms, an open
clasp-knife in one hand, and a mass of buttered bread in the other;
close beside him stood Charlotte, opening oysters from a barrel, which
Mr. Claypole condescended to swallow with remarkable avidity. A more
than ordinary redness in the region of the young gentleman’s nose, and
a kind of fixed wink in his right eye, denoted that he was in a slight
degree intoxicated; and these symptoms were confirmed by the intense
relish with which he took his oysters, for which nothing but a strong
appreciation of their cooling properties, in cases of internal fever,
could have sufficiently accounted.
[Illustration: _Mr. Claypole as he appeared when his master was out._
London, Richard Bentley, March 1, 1838.]
“Here’s a delicious fat one, Noah, dear!” said Charlotte; “try him, do;
only this one.”
“What a delicious thing is a oyster!” remarked Mr. Claypole, after he
had swallowed it. “What a pity it is a number of ’em should ever make
you feel uncomfortable, isn’t it, Charlotte?”
“It’s quite a cruelty,” said Charlotte.
“So it is,” acquiesced Mr. Claypole. “A’n’t yer fond of oysters?”
“Not overmuch,” replied Charlotte. “I like to see you eat ’em, Noah
dear, better than eating them myself.”
“Lor’!” said Noah, reflectively; “how queer!”
“Have another,” said Charlotte. “Here’s one with such a beautiful,
delicate beard!”
“I can’t manage any more,” said Noah. “I’m very sorry. Come here,
Charlotte, and I’ll kiss yer.”
“What!” said Mr. Bumble, bursting into the room. “Say that again, sir.”
Charlotte uttered a scream, and hid her face in her apron; while Mr.
Claypole, without making any further change in his position than
suffering his legs to reach the ground, gazed at the beadle in drunken
terror.
“Say it again, you vile, owdacious fellow!” said Mr. Bumble. “How dare
you mention such a thing, sir? And how dare you encourage him, you
insolent minx? Kiss her!” exclaimed Mr. Bumble, in strong indignation.
“Faugh!”
“I didn’t mean to do it!” said Noah, blubbering. “She’s always
a-kissing of me, whether I like it, or not.”
“Oh, Noah!” cried Charlotte, reproachfully.
“Yer are, yer know yer are!” retorted Noah. “She’s always a-doing of
it, Mr. Bumble, sir; she chucks me under the chin, please sir, and
makes all manner of love!”
“Silence!” cried Mr. Bumble, sternly. “Take yourself down stairs,
ma’am. Noah, you shut up the shop, and say another word till your
master comes home at your peril; and, when he does come home, tell him
that Mr. Bumble said he was to send a old woman’s shell after breakfast
to-morrow morning. Do you hear, sir? Kissing!” cried Mr. Bumble,
holding up his hands. “The sin and wickedness of the lower orders in
this porochial district is frightful; if parliament don’t take their
abominable courses under consideration, this country’s ruined, and the
character of the peasantry gone for ever!” With these words, the beadle
strode, with a lofty and gloomy air, from the undertaker’s premises.
And now that we have accompanied him so far on his road home, and have
made all necessary preparations for the old woman’s funeral, let us set
on foot a few inquiries after young Oliver Twist, and ascertain whether
he be still lying in the ditch where Toby Crackit left him.