Oliver Twist. Volume 3 of 3

“Nothing,” replied Nancy.

“You will not persist in saying that,” rejoined the gentleman with a voice and emphasis of kindness that might have touched a much harder and more obdurate heart. “Think now. Tell me.”

“Nothing, sir,” rejoined the girl, weeping. “You can do nothing to help me. I am past all hope, indeed.”

“You put yourself beyond its pale,” said the gentleman; “the past has been a dreary waste with you, of youthful energies mis-spent, and such priceless treasures lavished as the Creator bestows but once and never grants again, but for the future you may hope. I do not say that it is in our power to offer you peace of heart and mind, for that must come as you seek it; but a quiet asylum, either in England, or, if you fear to remain here, in some foreign country, it is not only within the compass of our ability but our most anxious wish to secure to you. Before the dawn of morning, before this river wakes to the first glimpse of daylight, you shall be placed as entirely beyond the reach of your former associates, and leave as utter an absence of all traces behind you, as if you were to disappear from the earth this moment. Come. I would not have you go back to exchange one word with any old companion, or take one look at any old haunt, or breathe the very air which is pestilence and death to you. Quit them all, while there is time and opportunity.”

“She will be persuaded now,” cried the young lady. “She hesitates, I am sure.”

“I fear, not, my dear,” said the gentleman.

“No sir, I do not,” replied the girl after a short struggle. “I am chained to my old life. I loathe and hate it now, but I cannot leave it. I must have gone too far to turn back, – and yet I don’t know, for if you had spoken to me so some time ago, I should have laughed it off. But,” she said, looking hastily round, “this fear comes over me again. I must go home.”

“Home!” repeated the young lady, with great stress upon the word.

“Home, lady,” rejoined the girl. “To such a home as I have raised for myself with the work of my whole life. Let us part. I shall be watched or seen. Go, go. If I have done you any service, all I ask is, that you leave me, and let me go my way alone.”

“It is useless,” said the gentleman with a sigh. “We compromise her safety perhaps by staying here. We may have detained her longer than she expected already.”

“Yes, yes,” urged the girl. “You have.”

“What,” cried the young lady, “can be the end of this poor creature’s life?”

“What!” repeated the girl. “Look before you, lady. Look at that dark water. How many times do you read of such as we who spring into the tide, and leave no living thing to care for or bewail them. It may be years hence, or it may be only months, but I shall come to that at last.”

“Do not speak thus, pray,” returned the young lady, sobbing.

“It will never reach your ears, dear lady, and God forbid such horrors should!” – replied the girl. “Good night, good night.”

The gentleman turned away.

“This purse,” cried the young lady. “Take it for my sake, that you may have some resource in an hour of need and trouble.”

“No, no,” replied the girl. “I have not done this for money. Let me have that to think of. And yet – give me something that you have worn: I should like to have something – no, no, not a ring – your gloves or handkerchief – anything that I can keep as having belonged to you, sweet lady. There. Bless you – God bless you. Good night, good night.”

The violent agitation of the girl, and the apprehension of some discovery which would subject her to ill-usage and violence, seemed to determine the gentleman to leave her as she requested. The sound of retreating footsteps were audible, and the voices ceased.

The two figures of the young lady and her companion soon afterwards appeared upon the bridge. They stopped at the summit of the stairs.

“Hark!” cried the young lady, listening. “Did she call! I thought I heard her voice.”

“No, my love,” replied Mr. Brownlow, looking sadly back. “She has not moved, and will not till we are gone.”

Rose Maylie lingered, but the old gentleman drew her arm through his, and led her with gentle force away. As they disappeared, the girl sunk down nearly at her full length upon one of the stone stairs, and vented the anguish of her heart in bitter tears.

After a time she rose, and with feeble and tottering steps ascended to the street. The astonished listener remained motionless on his post for some minutes afterwards, and having ascertained with many cautious glances round him that he was again alone, crept slowly from his hiding-place, and returned, stealthily and in the shade of the wall, in the same manner as he had descended.

Peeping out more than once when he reached the top, to make sure that he was unobserved, Noah Claypole darted away at his utmost speed, and made for the Jew’s house as fast as his legs would carry him.

CHAPTER XLV

FATAL CONSEQUENCES

It was nearly two hours before daybreak – that time which in the autumn of the year may be truly called the dead of night, when the streets are silent and deserted, when even sound appears to slumber, and profligacy and riot have staggered home to dream – it was at this still and silent hour that the Jew sat watching in his old lair, with face so distorted and pale, and eyes so red and bloodshot, that he looked less like a man than like some hideous phantom, moist from the grave, and worried by an evil spirit.

He sat crouching over a cold hearth, wrapped in an old torn coverlet, with his face turned towards a wasting candle that stood upon a table by his side. His right hand was raised to his lips, and as, absorbed in thought, he bit his long black nails, he disclosed among his toothless gums a few such fangs as should have been a dog’s or rat’s.

Stretched upon a mattress on the floor lay Noah Claypole fast asleep. Towards him the old man sometimes directed his eyes for an instant, then brought them back again to the candle, which, with long-burnt wick drooping almost double, and hot grease falling down in clots upon the table, plainly showed that his thoughts were busy elsewhere.

Indeed they were. Mortification at the overthrow of his notable scheme, hatred of the girl who had dared to palter with strangers, an utter distrust of the sincerity of her refusal to yield him up, bitter disappointment at the loss of his revenge on Sikes, the fear of detection and ruin and death, and a fierce and deadly rage kindled by all, – these were the passionate considerations that following close upon each other with rapid and ceaseless whirl shot through the brain of Fagin, as every evil thought and blackest purpose lay working at his heart.

He sat without changing his attitude in the least, or appearing to take the smallest heed of time, until his quick ear seemed to be attracted by a footstep in the street.

“At last,” muttered the Jew, wiping his dry and fevered mouth. “At last.”

The bell rang gently as he spoke. He crept up stairs to the door, and presently returned accompanied by a man muffled to the chin, who carried a bundle under one arm. Sitting down and throwing back his outer coat, the man displayed the burly frame of Sikes.

“There,” he said, laying the bundle on the table. “Take care of that, and do the most you can with it. It’s been trouble enough to get; I thought I should have been here three hours ago.”

Fagin laid his hand upon the bundle, and locking it in the cupboard, sat down again without speaking. But he did not take his eyes off the robber for an instant during this action, and now that they sat over against each other face to face, he looked fixedly at him, with his lips quivering so violently, and his face so altered by the emotions which had mastered him, that the housebreaker involuntarily drew back his chair, and surveyed him with a look of real affright.

“Wot now?” cried Sikes. “Wot do you look at a man so for? – Speak, will you?”

The Jew raised his right hand, and shook his trembling forefinger in the air, but his passion was so great, that the power of speech was for the moment gone.

“Damme!” said Sikes, feeling in his breast with a look of alarm. “He’s gone mad. I must look to myself here.”

“No, no,” rejoined Fagin, finding his voice. “It’s not – you’re not the person, Bill. I’ve no – no fault to find with you.”

“Oh, you haven’t, haven’t you?” said Sikes, looking sternly at him, and ostentatiously passing a pistol into a more convenient pocket. “That’s lucky – for one of us. Which one that is, don’t matter.”

“I’ve got that to tell you, Bill,” said the Jew, drawing his chair nearer, “will make you worse than me.”

“Aye?” returned the robber with an incredulous air. “Tell away. Look sharp, or Nance will think I’m lost.”

“Lost!” cried Fagin. “She has pretty well settled that in her own mind already.”

Sikes looked with an aspect of great perplexity into the Jew’s face, and reading no satisfactory explanation of the riddle there, clenched his coat collar in his huge hand, and shook him soundly.

“Speak, will you!” he said; “or if you don’t, it shall be for want of breath. Open your mouth and say wot you’ve got to say in plain words. Out with it, you thundering old cur, out with it.”

“Suppose that lad that’s lying there – ” Fagin began.

Sikes turned round to where Noah was sleeping as if he had not previously observed him. “Well,” he said, resuming his former position.

“Suppose that lad,” pursued the Jew, “was to peach – blow upon us all – first seeking out the right folks for the purpose, and then having a meeting with ’em in the street to paint our likenesses, describe every mark that they might know us by, and the crib where we might be most easily taken. Suppose he was to do all this, and besides to blow upon a plant we’ve all been in, more or less – of his own fancy; not grabbed, trapped, tried, earwigged by the parson and brought to it on bread and water, – but of his own fancy; to please his own taste; stealing out at nights to find those most interested against us, and peaching to them. Do you hear me?” cried the Jew, his eyes flashing with rage. “Suppose he did all this, what then?”

“What then!” replied Sikes with a tremendous oath. “If he was left alive till I came, I’d grind his skull under the iron heel of my boot into as many grains as there are hairs upon his head.”