HIS NEW ASSOCIATES; AND PURCHASES EXPERIENCE AT A HIGH PRICE. BEING
A SHORT, BUT VERY IMPORTANT CHAPTER, IN THIS HISTORY
For many days, Oliver remained in the Jew’s room, picking the
marks out of the pocket-handkerchief, (of which a great number
were brought home,) and sometimes taking part in the game already
described: which the two boys and the Jew played, regularly, every
morning. At length, he began to languish for fresh air, and took
many occasions of earnestly entreating the old gentleman to allow
him to go out to work with his two companions.
Oliver was rendered the more anxious to be actively employed,
by what he had seen of the stern morality of the old gentleman’s
character. Whenever the Dodger or Charley Bates came home at night,
empty-handed, he would expatiate with great vehemence on the misery
of idle and lazy habits; and would enforce upon them the necessity
of an active life, by sending them supperless to bed. On one
occasion, indeed, he even went so far as to knock them both down a
flight of stairs; but this was carrying out his virtuous precepts to
an unusual extent.
At length, one morning, Oliver obtained the permission he had so
eagerly sought. There had been no handkerchiefs to work upon, for
two or three days, and the dinners had been rather meagre. Perhaps
these were reasons for the old gentleman’s giving his assent; but,
whether they were or no, he told Oliver he might go, and placed him
under the joint guardianship of Charley Bates, and his friend the
Dodger.
The three boys sallied out; the Dodger with his coat-sleeves tucked
up, and his hat cocked, as usual; Master Bates sauntering along with
his hands in his pockets; and Oliver between them, wondering
where they were going, and what branch of manufacture he would be
instructed in, first.
The pace at which they went, was such a very lazy, ill-looking
saunter, that Oliver soon began to think his companions were going
to deceive the old gentleman, by not going to work at all. The
Dodger had a vicious propensity, too, of pulling the caps from the
heads of small boys and tossing them down areas; while Charley Bates
exhibited some very loose notions concerning the rights of property,
by pilfering divers apples and onions from the stalls at the kennel
sides, and thrusting them into pockets which were so surprisingly
capacious, that they seemed to undermine his whole suit of clothes
in every direction. These things looked so bad, that Oliver was on
the point of declaring his intention of seeking his way back, in
the best way he could; when his thoughts were suddenly directed into
another channel, by a very mysterious change of behaviour on the
part of the Dodger.
They were just emerging from a narrow court not far from the
open square in Clerkenwell, which is yet called, by some strange
perversion of terms, ‘The Green’: when the Dodger made a sudden
stop; and, laying his finger on his lip, drew his companions back
again, with the greatest caution and circumspection.
‘What’s the matter?’ demanded Oliver.
‘Hush!’ replied the Dodger. ‘Do you see that old cove at the
book-stall?’
‘The old gentleman over the way?’ said Oliver. ‘Yes, I see him.’
‘He’ll do,’ said the Dodger.
‘A prime plant,’ observed Master Charley Bates.
Oliver looked from one to the other, with the greatest surprise; but
he was not permitted to make any inquiries; for the two boys walked
stealthily across the road, and slunk close behind the old gentleman
towards whom his attention had been directed. Oliver walked a few
paces after them; and, not knowing whether to advance or retire,
stood looking on in silent amazement.
The old gentleman was a very respectable-looking personage, with a
powdered head and gold spectacles. He was dressed in a bottle-green
coat with a black velvet collar; wore white trousers; and carried
a smart bamboo cane under his arm. He had taken up a book from the
stall, and there he stood, reading away, as hard as if he were
in his elbow-chair, in his own study. It is very possible that
he fancied himself there, indeed; for it was plain, from his
abstraction, that he saw not the book-stall, nor the street, nor
the boys, nor, in short, anything but the book itself: which he was
reading straight through: turning over the leaf when he got to the
bottom of a page, beginning at the top line of the next one, and
going regularly on, with the greatest interest and eagerness.
What was Oliver’s horror and alarm as he stood a few paces off,
looking on with his eyelids as wide open as they would possibly go,
to see the Dodger plunge his hand into the old gentleman’s pocket,
and draw from thence a handkerchief! To see him hand the same to
Charley Bates; and finally to behold them, both running away round
the corner at full speed!
In an instant the whole mystery of the hankerchiefs, and the
watches, and the jewels, and the Jew, rushed upon the boy’s mind.
He stood, for a moment, with the blood so tingling through all his
veins from terror, that he felt as if he were in a burning fire;
then, confused and frightened, he took to his heels; and, not
knowing what he did, made off as fast as he could lay his feet to
the ground.
This was all done in a minute’s space. In the very instant when
Oliver began to run, the old gentleman, putting his hand to his
pocket, and missing his handkerchief, turned sharp round. Seeing the
boy scudding away at such a rapid pace, he very naturally concluded
him to be the depredator; and shouting ‘Stop thief!’ with all his
might, made off after him, book in hand.
But the old gentleman was not the only person who raised the
hue-and-cry. The Dodger and Master Bates, unwilling to attract
public attention by running down the open street, had merely retired
into the very first doorway round the corner. They no sooner heard
the cry, and saw Oliver running, than, guessing exactly how the
matter stood, they issued forth with great promptitude; and,
shouting ‘Stop thief!’ too, joined in the pursuit like good
citizens.
Although Oliver had been brought up by philosophers, he was
not theoretically acquainted with the beautiful axiom that
self-preservation is the first law of nature. If he had been,
perhaps he would have been prepared for this. Not being prepared,
however, it alarmed him the more; so away he went like the wind,
with the old gentleman and the two boys roaring and shouting behind
him.
‘Stop thief! Stop thief!’ There is a magic in the sound. The
tradesman leaves his counter, and the car-man his waggon; the
butcher throws down his tray; the baker his basket; the milkman his
pail; the errand-boy his parcels; the school-boy his marbles;
the paviour his pickaxe; the child his battledore. Away they run,
pell-mell, helter-skelter, slap-dash: tearing, yelling, screaming,
knocking down the passengers as they turn the corners, rousing
up the dogs, and astonishing the fowls: and streets, squares, and
courts, re-echo with the sound.
‘Stop thief! Stop thief!’ The cry is taken up by a hundred voices,
and the crowd accumulate at every turning. Away they fly, splashing
through the mud, and rattling along the pavements: up go the
windows, out run the people, onward bear the mob, a whole audience
desert Punch in the very thickest of the plot, and, joining the
rushing throng, swell the shout, and lend fresh vigour to the cry,
‘Stop thief! Stop thief!’
‘Stop thief! Stop thief!’ There is a passion for _hunting_
_something_ deeply implanted in the human breast. One wretched
breathless child, panting with exhaustion; terror in his looks;
agony in his eyes; large drops of perspiration streaming down his
face; strains every nerve to make head upon his pursuers; and as
they follow on his track, and gain upon him every instant, they hail
his decreasing strength with joy. ‘Stop thief!’ Ay, stop him for
God’s sake, were it only in mercy!
Stopped at last! A clever blow. He is down upon the pavement; and
the crowd eagerly gather round him: each new comer, jostling and
struggling with the others to catch a glimpse. ‘Stand aside!’ ‘Give
him a little air!’ ‘Nonsense! he don’t deserve it.’ ‘Where’s the
gentleman?’ ‘Here his is, coming down the street.’ ‘Make room there
for the gentleman!’ ‘Is this the boy, sir!’ ‘Yes.’
Oliver lay, covered with mud and dust, and bleeding from the mouth,
looking wildly round upon the heap of faces that surrounded him,
when the old gentleman was officiously dragged and pushed into the
circle by the foremost of the pursuers.
‘Yes,’ said the gentleman, ‘I am afraid it is the boy.’
‘Afraid!’ murmured the crowd. ‘That’s a good ‘un!’
‘Poor fellow!’ said the gentleman, ‘he has hurt himself.’
‘_I_ did that, sir,’ said a great lubberly fellow, stepping forward;
‘and preciously I cut my knuckle agin’ his mouth. I stopped him,
sir.’
The fellow touched his hat with a grin, expecting something for
his pains; but, the old gentleman, eyeing him with an expression of
dislike, look anxiously round, as if he contemplated running away
himself: which it is very possible he might have attempted to do,
and thus have afforded another chase, had not a police officer (who
is generally the last person to arrive in such cases) at that moment
made his way through the crowd, and seized Oliver by the collar.
‘Come, get up,’ said the man, roughly.
‘It wasn’t me indeed, sir. Indeed, indeed, it was two other boys,’
said Oliver, clasping his hands passionately, and looking round.
‘They are here somewhere.’
‘Oh no, they ain’t,’ said the officer. He meant this to be ironical,
but it was true besides; for the Dodger and Charley Bates had filed
off down the first convenient court they came to.
‘Come, get up!’
‘Don’t hurt him,’ said the old gentleman, compassionately.
‘Oh no, I won’t hurt him,’ replied the officer, tearing his jacket
half off his back, in proof thereof. ‘Come, I know you; it won’t do.
Will you stand upon your legs, you young devil?’
Oliver, who could hardly stand, made a shift to raise himself on his
feet, and was at once lugged along the streets by the jacket-collar,
at a rapid pace. The gentleman walked on with them by the officer’s
side; and as many of the crowd as could achieve the feat, got a
little ahead, and stared back at Oliver from time to time. The boys
shouted in triumph; and on they went.