Oliver Twist
IN WHICH A NOTABLE PLAN IS DISCUSSED AND DETERMINED ON
It was a chill, damp, night, when the Jew: his great-coat tight his body, and the up over his ears so as to the part of his face: from his den. He paused on the step as the door was locked and him; and having while the boys all secure, and until their were no longer audible, the as as he could.
The house to which Oliver had been conveyed, was in the neighborhood of Whitechapel. The Jew stopped for an at the of the street; and, round, the road, and off in the direction of the Spitalfields.
The thick upon the stones, and a black over the streets; the rain down, and cold and to the touch. It just the night when it such a being as the Jew to be abroad. As he along, the of the and doorways, the old man like some reptile, in the and through which he moved: forth, by night, in search of some rich for a meal.
He on his course, through many and narrow ways, until he Bethnal Green; then, off to the left, he soon in a of the and dirty which in that close and densely-populated quarter.
The Jew was too familiar with the ground he to be at all bewildered, either by the of the night, or the of the way. He through and streets, and at length into one, only by a single lamp at the end. At the door of a house in this street, he knocked; having a with the person who opened it, he walked upstairs.
A dog as he touched the of a room-door; and a man’s voice who was there.
“Only me, Bill; only me, my dear,” said the Jew looking in.
“Bring in your then,” said Sikes. “Lie down, you brute! Don’t you know the when he’s got a great-coat on?”
Apparently, the dog had been by Mr. Fagin’s garment; for as the Jew it, and it over the of a chair, he retired to the from which he had risen: his as he went, to that he was as well satisfied as it was in his nature to be.
“Well!” said Sikes.
“Well, my dear,” the Jew.—“Ah! Nancy.”
The was with just of to a of its reception; for Mr. Fagin and his friend had not met, since she had in of Oliver. All upon the subject, if he had any, were by the lady’s behaviour. She took her off the fender, pushed her chair, and Fagin up his, without saying more about it: for it was a cold night, and no mistake.
“It is cold, Nancy dear,” said the Jew, as he his hands over the fire. “It to go right through one,” added the old man, his side.
“It must be a piercer, if it its way through your heart,” said Mr. Sikes. “Give him something to drink, Nancy. Burn my body, make haste! It’s to turn a man ill, to see his old in that way, like a just rose from the grave.”
Nancy a bottle from a cupboard, in which there were many: which, to judge from the of their appearance, were with of liquids. Sikes out a of brandy, the Jew drink it off.
“Quite enough, quite, thankye, Bill,” the Jew, the after just setting his to it.
“What! You’re of our the of you, are you?” Sikes, his on the Jew. “Ugh!”
With a of contempt, Mr. Sikes the glass, and the of its into the ashes: as a to it again for himself: which he did at once.
The Jew the room, as his the second glassful; not in curiousity, for he had it often before; but in a and manner to him. It was a apartment, with nothing but the of the to the that its was anything but a man; and with no more articles to view than two or three which in a corner, and a “life-preserver” that over the chimney-piece.
“There,” said Sikes, his lips. “Now I’m ready.”
“For business?” the Jew.
“For business,” Sikes; “so say what you’ve got to say.”
“About the at Chertsey, Bill?” said the Jew, his chair forward, and speaking in a very low voice.
“Yes. Wot about it?” Sikes.
“Ah! you know what I mean, my dear,” said the Jew. “He what I mean, Nancy; don’t he?”
“No, he don’t,” Mr. Sikes. “Or he won’t, and that’s the same thing. Speak out, and call by their right names; don’t there, and blinking, and talking to me in hints, as if you warn’t the very that about the robbery. Wot d’ye mean?”
“Hush, Bill, hush!” said the Jew, who had in to stop this of indignation; “somebody will us, my dear. Somebody will us.”
“Let ’em hear!” said Sikes; “I don’t care.” But as Mr. Sikes did care, on reflection, he his voice as he said the words, and calmer.
“There, there,” said the Jew, coaxingly. “It was only my caution, nothing more. Now, my dear, about that at Chertsey; when is it to be done, Bill, eh? When is it to be done? Such plate, my dear, such plate!” said the Jew: his hands, and his in a of anticipation.
“Not at all,” Sikes coldly.
“Not to be done at all!” the Jew, in his chair.
“No, not at all,” Sikes. “At least it can’t be a put-up job, as we expected.”
“Then it hasn’t been properly gone about,” said the Jew, with anger. “Don’t tell me!”
“But I will tell you,” Sikes. “Who are you that’s not to be told? I tell you that Toby Crackit has been about the place for a fortnight, and he can’t one of the in line.”
“Do you to tell me, Bill,” said the Jew: as the other heated: “that neither of the two men in the house can be got over?”
“Yes, I do to tell you so,” Sikes. “The old lady has had ’em these twenty years; and if you were to give ’em five hundred pound, they wouldn’t be in it.”
“But do you to say, my dear,” the Jew, “that the can’t be got over?”
“Not a of it,” Sikes.
“Not by Toby Crackit?” said the Jew incredulously. “Think what are, Bill,”
“No; not by Toby Crackit,” Sikes. “He says he’s whiskers, and a waistcoat, the whole time he’s been there, and it’s all of no use.”
“He should have and a pair of trousers, my dear,” said the Jew.
“So he did,” Sikes, “and they warn’t of no more use than the other plant.”
The Jew looked blank at this information. After for some minutes with his on his breast, he his and said, with a sigh, that if Toby Crackit reported aright, he the game was up.
“And yet,” said the old man, his hands on his knees, “it’s a sad thing, my dear, to so much when we had set our upon it.”
“So it is,” said Mr. Sikes. “Worse luck!”
A long ensued; which the Jew was in thought, with his into an of perfectly demoniacal. Sikes him from time to time. Nancy, of the housebreaker, sat with her upon the fire, as if she had been to all that passed.
“Fagin,” said Sikes, the that prevailed; “is it fifty extra, if it’s safely done from the outside?”
“Yes,” said the Jew, as himself.
“Is it a bargain?” Sikes.
“Yes, my dear, yes,” the Jew; his glistening, and every in his working, with the that the had awakened.
“Then,” said Sikes, the Jew’s hand, with some disdain, “let it come off as soon as you like. Toby and me were over the garden-wall the night last, the panels of the door and shutters. The crib’s up at night like a jail; but there’s one part we can crack, safe and softly.”
“Which is that, Bill?” asked the Jew eagerly.
“Why,” Sikes, “as you the lawn—”
“Yes?” said the Jew, his forward, with his almost starting out of it.
“Umph!” Sikes, stopping short, as the girl, moving her head, looked round, and pointed for an to the Jew’s face. “Never mind which part it is. You can’t do it without me, I know; but it’s best to be on the safe when one with you.”
“As you like, my dear, as you like” the Jew. “Is there no help wanted, but yours and Toby’s?”
“None,” said Sikes. “Cept a centre-bit and a boy. The we’ve got; the second you must us.”
“A boy!” the Jew. “Oh! then it’s a panel, eh?”
“Never mind it is!” Sikes. “I want a boy, and he musn’t be a big ’un. Lord!” said Mr. Sikes, reflectively, “if I’d only got that boy of Ned, the chimbley-sweeper’s! He him small on purpose, and let him out by the job. But the father lagged; and then the Juvenile Delinquent Society comes, and takes the boy away from a where he was earning money, teaches him to read and write, and in time makes a ’prentice of him. And so they go on,” said Mr. Sikes, his with the of his wrongs, “so they go on; and, if they’d got money (which it’s a Providence they haven’t,) we shouldn’t have a dozen boys left in the whole trade, in a year or two.”
“No more we should,” the Jew, who had been this speech, and had only the last sentence. “Bill!”
“What now?” Sikes.
The Jew his Nancy, who was still at the fire; and intimated, by a sign, that he would have her told to the room. Sikes his impatiently, as if he the unnecessary; but complied, nevertheless, by Miss Nancy to him a of beer.
“You don’t want any beer,” said Nancy, her arms, and her seat very composedly.
“I tell you I do!” Sikes.
“Nonsense,” the girl coolly, “Go on, Fagin. I know what he’s going to say, Bill; he needn’t mind me.”
The Jew still hesitated. Sikes looked from one to the other in some surprise.
“Why, you don’t mind the old girl, do you, Fagin?” he asked at length. “You’ve her long to trust her, or the Devil’s in it. She ain’t one to blab. Are you Nancy?”
“I should think not!” the lady: her chair up to the table, and her upon it.
“No, no, my dear, I know you’re not,” said the Jew; “but—” and again the old man paused.
“But wot?” Sikes.
“I didn’t know she mightn’t p’r’aps be out of sorts, you know, my dear, as she was the other night,” the Jew.
At this confession, Miss Nancy into a loud laugh; and, a of brandy, her with an air of defiance, and into of “Keep the game a-going!” “Never say die!” and the like. These to have the of re-assuring gentlemen; for the Jew his with a satisfied air, and his seat: as did Mr. Sikes likewise.
“Now, Fagin,” said Nancy with a laugh. “Tell Bill at once, about Oliver!”
“Ha! you’re a one, my dear: the girl I saw!” said the Jew, her on the neck. “It was about Oliver I was going to speak, sure enough. Ha! ha! ha!”
“What about him?” Sikes.
“He’s the boy for you, my dear,” the Jew in a whisper; his on the of his nose, and frightfully.
“He!” Sikes.
“Have him, Bill!” said Nancy. “I would, if I was in your place. He mayn’t be so much up, as any of the others; but that’s not what you want, if he’s only to open a door for you. Depend upon it he’s a safe one, Bill.”
“I know he is,” Fagin. “He’s been in good these last weeks, and it’s time he to work for his bread. Besides, the others are all too big.”
“Well, he is just the size I want,” said Mr. Sikes, ruminating.
“And will do you want, Bill, my dear,” the Jew; “he can’t help himself. That is, if you him enough.”
“Frighten him!” Sikes. “It’ll be no frightening, mind you. If there’s anything about him when we once into the work; in for a penny, in for a pound. You won’t see him alive again, Fagin. Think of that, you send him. Mark my words!” said the robber, a crowbar, which he had from under the bedstead.
“I’ve of it all,” said the Jew with energy. “I’ve—I’ve had my upon him, my dears, close—close. Once let him that he is one of us; once his mind with the idea that he has been a thief; and he’s ours! Ours for his life. Oho! It couldn’t have come about better!” The old man his arms upon his breast; and, his and into a heap, himself for joy.
“Ours!” said Sikes. “Yours, you mean.”
“Perhaps I do, my dear,” said the Jew, with a chuckle. “Mine, if you like, Bill.”
“And wot,” said Sikes, on his friend, “wot makes you take so much pains about one chalk-faced kid, when you know there are fifty boys about Common Garden every night, as you might and choose from?”
“Because they’re of no use to me, my dear,” the Jew, with some confusion, “not the taking. Their looks ’em when they into trouble, and I ’em all. With this boy, properly managed, my dears, I do what I couldn’t with twenty of them. Besides,” said the Jew, his self-possession, “he has us now if he only give us leg-bail again; and he must be in the same with us. Never mind how he came there; it’s for my power over him that he was in a robbery; that’s all I want. Now, how much this is, than being to put the boy out of the way—which would be dangerous, and we should by it besides.”
“When is it to be done?” asked Nancy, stopping some on the part of Mr. Sikes, of the with which he Fagin’s of humanity.
“Ah, to be sure,” said the Jew; “when is it to be done, Bill?”
“I planned with Toby, the night to-morrow,” Sikes in a voice, “if he nothing from me to the contrairy.”
“Good,” said the Jew; “there’s no moon.”
“No,” Sikes.
“It’s all about off the swag, is it?” asked the Jew.
Sikes nodded.
“And about—”
“Oh, ah, it’s all planned,” Sikes, him. “Never mind particulars. You’d the boy here to-morrow night. I shall off the an hour daybreak. Then you your tongue, and keep the melting-pot ready, and that’s all you’ll have to do.”
After some discussion, in which all three took an active part, it was that Nancy should repair to the Jew’s next when the night had set in, and Oliver away with her; Fagin observing, that, if he any to the task, he would be more to the girl who had so in his behalf, than else. It was also that Oliver should, for the purposes of the expedition, be to the and of Mr. William Sikes; and further, that the said Sikes should with him as he fit; and should not be by the Jew for any or that might be necessary to visit him: it being that, to the in this respect binding, any by Mr. Sikes on his return should be to be and corroborated, in all particulars, by the of Toby Crackit.
These adjusted, Mr. Sikes to drink at a rate, and to the in an manner; forth, at the same time, most of song, with wild execrations. At length, in a fit of professional enthusiasm, he upon producing his box of tools: which he had no sooner in with, and opened for the purpose of the nature and properties of the it contained, and the of their construction, than he over the box upon the floor, and to sleep where he fell.
“Good-night, Nancy,” said the Jew, himself up as before.
“Good-night.”
Their met, and the Jew her, narrowly. There was no about the girl. She was as true and in the as Toby Crackit himself be.
The Jew again her good-night, and, a upon the of Mr. Sikes while her was turned, downstairs.
“Always the way!” the Jew to himself as he homeward. “The of these is, that a very little thing to call up some long-forgotten feeling; and, the best of them is, that it lasts. Ha! ha! The man against the child, for a of gold!”
Beguiling the time with these reflections, Mr. Fagin his way, through and mire, to his abode: where the Dodger was up, his return.
“Is Oliver a-bed? I want to speak to him,” was his as they the stairs.
“Hours ago,” the Dodger, open a door. “Here he is!”
The boy was lying, fast asleep, on a upon the floor; so with anxiety, and sadness, and the of his prison, that he looked like death; not death as it in and coffin, but in the it when life has just departed; when a and has, but an instant, to Heaven, and the air of the world has not had time to breathe upon the it hallowed.
“Not now,” said the Jew, away. “To-morrow. To-morrow.”
