there the matter will rest; there must be circumstances in Oliver’s
little history which it would be painful to drag before the public
eye, and if the truth is once elicited, they shall go scot-free.”
“And if it is not?” suggested the girl.
“Then,” pursued the gentleman, “this Fagin shall not be
brought to justice without your consent. In such a case I could
show you reasons, I think, which would induce you to yield it.”
“Have I the lady’s promise for that?” asked the girl.
“You have,” replied Rose. “My true and faithful pledge.”
“Monks would never learn how you know what you do?” said
the girl, after a short pause.
“Never,” replied the gentleman. “The intelligence should be so
brought to bear upon him, that he could never even guess.”
“I have been a liar, and among liars from a little child,” said the
girl, after another interval of silence, “but I will take your words.”
After receiving an assurance from both, that she might safely do
so, she proceeded in a voice so low that it was often difficult for the
listener to discover even the import of what she said, to describe,
by name and situation, the public-house whence she had been
followed that night. From the manner in which she occasionally
paused, it appeared as if the gentleman were making some hasty
notes of the information she communicated. When she had
thoroughly explained the localities of the place, the best position
from which to watch it without exciting observation, and the night
and hour on which Monks was most in the habit of frequenting it,
she seemed to consider for a few moments, for the purpose of
recalling his features and appearance more forcibly to her
recollection.
“He is tall,” said the girl, “and a strongly-made man, but not
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stout; he has a lurking walk; and as he walks, constantly looks over
his shoulder, first on one side, and then on the other. Don’t forget
that, for his eyes are sunk in his head so much deeper than any
other man’s, that you might almost tell him by that alone. His face
is dark, like his hair and eyes; and, although he can’t be more than
six or eight-and-twenty, withered and haggard. His lips are often
discoloured and disfigured with the marks of teeth; for he has
desperate fits, and sometimes even bites his hands and covers
them with wounds.—Why did you start?” said the girl, stopping
suddenly.
The gentleman replied, in a hurried manner, that he was not
conscious of having done so, and begged her to proceed.
“Part of this,” said the girl, “I’ve drawn out from other people at
the house I tell you of, for I have only seen him twice, and both
times he was covered up in a large cloak. I think that’s all I can
give you to know him by. Stay, though,” she added. “Upon his
throat, so high that you can see a part of it below his neckerchief
when he turns his face, there is—”
“A broad red mark, like a burn or scald?” cried the gentleman.
“How’s this?” said the girl. “You know him!”
The young lady uttered a cry of surprise, and for a few
moments they were so still that the listener could distinctly hear
them breathe.
“I think I do,” said the gentleman, breaking silence. “I should
by your description. We shall see. Many people are singularly like
each other. It may not be the same.”
As he expressed himself to this effect, with assumed
carelessness, he took a step or two nearer the concealed spy, as
the latter could tell from the distinctness with which he heard him
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mutter, “It must be he!”
“Now,” he said, returning, so it seemed by the sound, to the
spot where he had stood before, “you have given us most valuable
assistance, young woman, and I wish you to be the better for it.
What can I do to serve you?”
“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
misspent, 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 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 trace 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
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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 I 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.
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“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!” 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! 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 sank 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 arose, 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
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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.
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Chapter 47
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 sounds
appear to slumber, and profligacy and riot have staggered home to
dream; it was at this still and silent hour, that Fagin 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, and then brought them back again to the candle; which
was a 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
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of detection, and ruin, and death; and a fierce and deadly rage
kindled by all; these were the passionate considerations which,
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,” he muttered, wiping his dry and fevered mouth. “At
last!”
The bell rang gently as he spoke. He crept upstairs 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?”
Fagin raised his right hand, and shook his trembling forefinger
in the air; but his passion was so great, that the power of speech
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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 Fagin, 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 won’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 Fagin, “was to peach—to 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
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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, ear-
wigged 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.”
“What if I did it!” cried Fagin, almost in a yell. “I, that know so
much, and could hang so many besides myself!”
“I don’t know,” replied Sikes, clenching his teeth, and turning
white at the mere suggestion. “I’d do something in the jail that ’ud
get me put in irons; and if I was tried along with you, I’d fall upon
you with them in the open court, and beat your brains out afore
the people. I should have such strength,” muttered the robber,
poising his brawny arm, “that I could smash your head as if a
loaded wagon had gone over it.”
“You would?”
“Would I!” said the housebreaker. “Try me.”
“If it was Charley, or the Dodger, or Bet, or—”
“I don’t care who,” replied Sikes impatiently. “Whoever it was,
I’d serve them the same.”
Fagin looked hard at the robber; and, motioning him to be
silent, stooped over the bed upon the floor, and shook the sleeper
to rouse him. Sikes leaned forward in his chair, looking on with his
hands upon his knees, as if wondering much what all this
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questioning and preparation was to end in.
