Oliver Twist. Volume 3 of 3

“An old woman?” demanded Mr. Bolter.

“A young one,” replied Fagin.

“I can do that pretty well, I know,” said Bolter. “I was a regular cunning sneak when I was at school. What am I to dodge her for? not to – ”

“Not to do anything,” interrupted the Jew, “but to tell me where she goes to, who she sees, and, if possible, what she says; to remember the street, if it is a street, or the house, if it is a house, and to bring me back all the information you can.”

“What’ll yer give me?” asked Noah, setting down his cup, and looking his employer eagerly in the face.

“If you do it well, a pound, my dear – one pound,” said Fagin, wishing to interest him in the scent as much as possible. “And that’s what I never gave yet for any job of work where there wasn’t valuable consideration to be gained.”

“Who is she?” inquired Noah.

“One of us.”

“Oh Lor!” cried Noah, curling up his nose. “Yer doubtful of her, are yer?”

“She has found out some new friends, my dear, and I must know who they are,” replied the Jew.

“I see,” said Noah. “Just to have the pleasure of knowing them, if they’re respectable people, eh? – Ha! ha! ha! I’m your man.”

“I knew you would be,” cried Fagin, elated by the success of his proposal.

“Of course, of course,” replied Noah. “Where is she? Where am I to wait for her? When am I to go?”

“All that, my dear, you shall hear from me. I’ll point her out at the proper time,” said Fagin. “You keep ready, and leave the rest to me.”

That night, and the next, and the next again, the spy sat booted and equipped in his carter’s dress, ready to turn out at a word from Fagin. Six nights passed, – six long weary nights, – and on each Fagin came home with a disappointed face, and briefly intimated that it was not yet time. On the seventh he returned earlier, and with an exultation he could not conceal. It was Sunday.

“She goes abroad to-night,” said Fagin, “and on the right errand, I’m sure; for she has been alone all day, and the man she is afraid of will not be back much before daybreak. Come with me. Quick!”

Noah started up without saying a word, for the Jew was in a state of such intense excitement that it infected him. They left the house stealthily, and, hurrying through a labyrinth of streets, arrived at length before a public-house, which Noah recognised as the same in which he had slept on the night of his arrival in London.

It was past eleven o’clock, and the door was closed. It opened softly on its hinges as the Jew gave a low whistle. They entered without noise, and the door was closed behind them.

Scarcely venturing to whisper, but substituting dumb show for words, Fagin and the young Jew who had admitted them pointed out the pane of glass to Noah, and signed to him to climb up and observe the person in the adjoining room.

“Is that the woman?” he asked, scarcely above his breath.

The Jew nodded yes.

“I can’t see her face well,” whispered Noah. “She is looking down, and the candle is behind her.”

“Stay there,” whispered Fagin. He signed to Barney, who withdrew. In an instant the lad entered the room adjoining, and, under pretence of snuffing the candle, moved it into the required position, and, speaking to the girl, caused her to raise her face.

“I see her now,” cried the spy.

“Plainly?” asked the Jew.

“I should know her among a thousand.”

He hastily descended as the room-door opened, and the girl came out. Fagin drew him behind a small partition which was curtained off, and they held their breaths as she passed within a few feet of their place of concealment, and emerged by the door at which they had entered.

“Hist!” cried the lad who held the door. “Now.”

Noah exchanged a look with Fagin, and darted out.

“To the left,” whispered the lad; “take the left hand, and keep on the other side.”

He did so, and by the light of the lamps saw the girl’s retreating figure already at some distance before him. He advanced as near as he considered prudent, and kept on the opposite side of the street, the better to observe her motions. She looked nervously round twice or thrice, and once stopped to let two men who were following close behind her pass on. She seemed to gather courage as she advanced, and to walk with a steadier and firmer step. The spy preserved the same relative distance between them, and followed with his eye upon her.

CHAPTER XLIV

THE APPOINTMENT KEPT

The church clocks chimed three quarters past eleven as two figures emerged on London Bridge. One, which advanced with a swift and rapid step, was that of a woman, who looked eagerly about her as though in quest of some expected object; the other figure was that of a man, who slunk along in the deepest shadow he could find, and at some distance accommodated his pace to hers, stopping when she stopped, and, as she moved again, creeping stealthily on, but never allowing himself, in the ardour of his pursuit, to gain upon her footsteps. Thus they crossed the bridge from the Middlesex to the Surrey shore, when the woman, apparently disappointed in her anxious scrutiny of the foot-passengers, turned back. The movement was sudden, but he who watched her was not thrown off his guard by it, for shrinking into one of the recesses which surmount the piers of the bridge, and leaning over the parapet the better to conceal his figure, he suffered her to pass by on the opposite pavement, and when she was about the same distance in advance as she had been before, he slipped quietly down and followed her again. At nearly the centre of the bridge she stopped. The man stopped too.

It was a very dark night. The day had been unfavourable, and at that hour and place there were few people stirring. Such as there were hurried quickly past, very possibly without seeing, but certainly without noticing, either the woman or the man who kept her in view. Their appearance was not calculated to attract the importunate regards of such of London’s destitute population, as chanced to take their way over the bridge that night in search of some cold arch or doorless hovel wherein to lay their heads; they stood there in silence, neither speaking nor spoken to by any one who passed.

A mist hung over the river, deepening the red glare of the fires that burnt upon the small craft moored off the different wharfs, and rendering darker and more indistinct the mirky buildings on the banks. The old smoke-stained storehouses on either side rose heavy and dull from the dense mass of roofs and gables, and frowned sternly upon water too black to reflect even their lumbering shapes. The tower of old Saint Saviour’s church, and the spire of Saint Magnus, so long the giant-warders of the ancient bridge, were visible in the gloom; but the forest of shipping below bridge, and the thickly scattered spires of churches above, were nearly all hidden from the sight.

The girl had taken a few restless turns to and fro – closely watched meanwhile by her hidden observer – when the heavy bell of St. Paul’s tolled for the death of another day. Midnight had come upon the crowded city. The palace, the night-cellar, the jail, the madhouse; the chambers of birth and death, of health and sickness; the rigid face of the corpse and the calm sleep of the child – midnight was upon them all.

The hour had not struck two minutes, when a young lady, accompanied by a grey-haired gentleman, alighted from a hackney-carriage within a short distance of the bridge, and, having dismissed the vehicle, walked straight towards it. They had scarcely set foot upon its pavement when the girl started, and immediately made towards them.

They walked onwards, looking about them with the air of persons who entertained some very slight expectation which had little chance of being realised, when they were suddenly joined by this new associate. They halted with an exclamation of surprise, but suppressed it immediately, for a man in the garments of a countryman came close up – brushed against them, indeed – at that precise moment.

“Not here,” said Nancy hurriedly. “I am afraid to speak to you here. Come away – out of the public road – down the steps yonder.”

As she uttered these words, and indicated with her hand the direction in which she wished them to proceed, the countryman looked round, and roughly asking what they took up the whole pavement for, passed on.

The steps to which the girl had pointed were those which, on the Surrey bank, and on the same side of the bridge as Saint Saviour’s church, form a landing-stairs from the river. To this spot the man bearing the appearance of a countryman hastened unobserved; and after a moment’s survey of the place, he began to descend.

These stairs are a part of the bridge; they consist of three flights. Just below the end of the second, going down, the stone wall on the left terminates in an ornamental pier, or pedestal, facing towards the Thames. At this point the lower steps widen, so that a person turning that angle of the wall is necessarily unseen by any others on the stairs who chance to be above him, if only a step. The countryman looked hastily round when he reached this point, and as there seemed no better place of concealment, and the tide being out there was plenty of room, he slipped aside, with his back to the pier, and there waited, pretty certain that they would come no lower, and that even if he could not hear what was said, he could follow them again with safety.

So tardily stole the time in this lonely place, and so eager was the spy to penetrate the motives of an interview so different from what he had been led to expect, that he more than once gave the matter up for lost, and persuaded himself either that they had stopped far above, or resorted to some entirely different spot to hold their mysterious conversation. He was on the very point of emerging from his hiding-place, and regaining the road above, when he heard the sound of footsteps, and directly afterwards of voices, almost close at his ear.

He drew himself straight upright against the wall, and, scarcely breathing, listened attentively.

“This is far enough,” said a voice, which was evidently that of the gentleman. “I will not suffer this young lady to go any further. Many people would have distrusted you too much to have come even so far, but you see I am willing to humour you.”

“To humour me!” cried the voice of the girl whom he had followed. “You’re considerate, indeed, sir. To humour me! Well, well, it’s no matter.”

“Why, for what,” said the gentleman in a kinder tone, “for what purpose can you have brought us to this strange place? Why not have let me speak to you above there, where it is light, and there is something stirring, instead of bringing us to this dark and dismal hole?”

“I told you before,” replied Nancy, “that I was afraid to speak to you there. I don’t know why it is,” said the girl, shuddering, “but I have such a fear and dread upon me to-night that I can hardly stand.”

“A fear of what?” asked the gentleman, who seemed to pity her.