Oliver Twist
course, in twenty years, though whether that is recommendation or not,
you must determine for yourselves.”
“I have no objection to your calling in your friend if I may call in
mine,” said the doctor.
“We must put it to the vote,” replied Mr. Brownlow, “who may he be?”
“That lady’s son, and this young lady’s—very old friend,” said the
doctor, motioning towards Mrs. Maylie, and concluding with an
expressive glance at her niece.
Rose blushed deeply, but she did not make any audible objection to this
motion (possibly she felt in a hopeless minority); and Harry Maylie and
Mr. Grimwig were accordingly added to the committee.
“We stay in town, of course,” said Mrs. Maylie, “while there remains
the slightest prospect of prosecuting this inquiry with a chance of
success. I will spare neither trouble nor expense in behalf of the
object in which we are all so deeply interested, and I am content to
remain here, if it be for twelve months, so long as you assure me that
any hope remains.”
“Good!” rejoined Mr. Brownlow. “And as I see on the faces about me, a
disposition to inquire how it happened that I was not in the way to
corroborate Oliver’s tale, and had so suddenly left the kingdom, let me
stipulate that I shall be asked no questions until such time as I may
deem it expedient to forestall them by telling my own story. Believe
me, I make this request with good reason, for I might otherwise excite
hopes destined never to be realised, and only increase difficulties and
disappointments already quite numerous enough. Come! Supper has been
announced, and young Oliver, who is all alone in the next room, will
have begun to think, by this time, that we have wearied of his company,
and entered into some dark conspiracy to thrust him forth upon the
world.”
With these words, the old gentleman gave his hand to Mrs. Maylie, and
escorted her into the supper-room. Mr. Losberne followed, leading Rose;
and the council was, for the present, effectually broken up.
CHAPTER XLII.
AN OLD ACQUAINTANCE OF OLIVER’S, EXHIBITING DECIDED MARKS OF GENIUS,
BECOMES A PUBLIC CHARACTER IN THE METROPOLIS
Upon the night when Nancy, having lulled Mr. Sikes to sleep, hurried on
her self-imposed mission to Rose Maylie, there advanced towards London,
by the Great North Road, two persons, upon whom it is expedient that
this history should bestow some attention.
They were a man and woman; or perhaps they would be better described as
a male and female: for the former was one of those long-limbed,
knock-kneed, shambling, bony people, to whom it is difficult to assign
any precise age,—looking as they do, when they are yet boys, like
undergrown men, and when they are almost men, like overgrown boys. The
woman was young, but of a robust and hardy make, as she need have been
to bear the weight of the heavy bundle which was strapped to her back.
Her companion was not encumbered with much luggage, as there merely
dangled from a stick which he carried over his shoulder, a small parcel
wrapped in a common handkerchief, and apparently light enough. This
circumstance, added to the length of his legs, which were of unusual
extent, enabled him with much ease to keep some half-dozen paces in
advance of his companion, to whom he occasionally turned with an
impatient jerk of the head: as if reproaching her tardiness, and urging
her to greater exertion.
Thus, they had toiled along the dusty road, taking little heed of any
object within sight, save when they stepped aside to allow a wider
passage for the mail-coaches which were whirling out of town, until
they passed through Highgate archway; when the foremost traveller
stopped and called impatiently to his companion,
“Come on, can’t yer? What a lazybones yer are, Charlotte.”
“It’s a heavy load, I can tell you,” said the female, coming up, almost
breathless with fatigue.
“Heavy! What are yer talking about? What are yer made for?” rejoined
the male traveller, changing his own little bundle as he spoke, to the
other shoulder. “Oh, there yer are, resting again! Well, if yer ain’t
enough to tire anybody’s patience out, I don’t know what is!”
“Is it much farther?” asked the woman, resting herself against a bank,
and looking up with the perspiration streaming from her face.
“Much farther! Yer as good as there,” said the long-legged tramper,
pointing out before him. “Look there! Those are the lights of London.”
“They’re a good two mile off, at least,” said the woman despondingly.
“Never mind whether they’re two mile off, or twenty,” said Noah
Claypole; for he it was; “but get up and come on, or I’ll kick yer, and
so I give yer notice.”
As Noah’s red nose grew redder with anger, and as he crossed the road
while speaking, as if fully prepared to put his threat into execution,
the woman rose without any further remark, and trudged onward by his
side.
“Where do you mean to stop for the night, Noah?” she asked, after they
had walked a few hundred yards.
“How should I know?” replied Noah, whose temper had been considerably
impaired by walking.
“Near, I hope,” said Charlotte.
“No, not near,” replied Mr. Claypole. “There! Not near; so don’t think
it.”
“Why not?”
“When I tell yer that I don’t mean to do a thing, that’s enough,
without any why or because either,” replied Mr. Claypole with dignity.
“Well, you needn’t be so cross,” said his companion.
“A pretty thing it would be, wouldn’t it to go and stop at the very
first public-house outside the town, so that Sowerberry, if he come up
after us, might poke in his old nose, and have us taken back in a cart
with handcuffs on,” said Mr. Claypole in a jeering tone. “No! I shall
go and lose myself among the narrowest streets I can find, and not stop
till we come to the very out-of-the-wayest house I can set eyes on.
Cod, yer may thanks yer stars I’ve got a head; for if we hadn’t gone,
at first, the wrong road a purpose, and come back across country, yer’d
have been locked up hard and fast a week ago, my lady. And serve yer
right for being a fool.”
“I know I ain’t as cunning as you are,” replied Charlotte; “but don’t
put all the blame on me, and say I should have been locked up. You
would have been if I had been, any way.”
“Yer took the money from the till, yer know yer did,” said Mr.
Claypole.
“I took it for you, Noah, dear,” rejoined Charlotte.
“Did I keep it?” asked Mr. Claypole.
“No; you trusted in me, and let me carry it like a dear, and so you
are,” said the lady, chucking him under the chin, and drawing her arm
through his.
This was indeed the case; but as it was not Mr. Claypole’s habit to
repose a blind and foolish confidence in anybody, it should be
observed, in justice to that gentleman, that he had trusted Charlotte
to this extent, in order that, if they were pursued, the money might be
found on her: which would leave him an opportunity of asserting his
innocence of any theft, and would greatly facilitate his chances of
escape. Of course, he entered at this juncture, into no explanation of
his motives, and they walked on very lovingly together.
In pursuance of this cautious plan, Mr. Claypole went on, without
halting, until he arrived at the Angel at Islington, where he wisely
judged, from the crowd of passengers and numbers of vehicles, that
London began in earnest. Just pausing to observe which appeared the
most crowded streets, and consequently the most to be avoided, he
crossed into Saint John’s Road, and was soon deep in the obscurity of
the intricate and dirty ways, which, lying between Gray’s Inn Lane and
Smithfield, render that part of the town one of the lowest and worst
that improvement has left in the midst of London.
Through these streets, Noah Claypole walked, dragging Charlotte after
him; now stepping into the kennel to embrace at a glance the whole
external character of some small public-house; now jogging on again, as
some fancied appearance induced him to believe it too public for his
purpose. At length, he stopped in front of one, more humble in
appearance and more dirty than any he had yet seen; and, having crossed
over and surveyed it from the opposite pavement, graciously announced
his intention of putting up there, for the night.
“So give us the bundle,” said Noah, unstrapping it from the woman’s
shoulders, and slinging it over his own; “and don’t yer speak, except
when yer spoke to. What’s the name of the house—t-h-r—three what?”
“Cripples,” said Charlotte.
“Three Cripples,” repeated Noah, “and a very good sign too. Now, then!
Keep close at my heels, and come along.” With these injunctions, he
pushed the rattling door with his shoulder, and entered the house,
followed by his companion.
There was nobody in the bar but a young Jew, who, with his two elbows
on the counter, was reading a dirty newspaper. He stared very hard at
Noah, and Noah stared very hard at him.
If Noah had been attired in his charity-boy’s dress, there might have
been some reason for the Jew opening his eyes so wide; but as he had
discarded the coat and badge, and wore a short smock-frock over his
leathers, there seemed no particular reason for his appearance exciting
so much attention in a public-house.
“Is this the Three Cripples?” asked Noah.
“That is the dabe of this ’ouse,” replied the Jew.
“A gentleman we met on the road, coming up from the country,
recommended us here,” said Noah, nudging Charlotte, perhaps to call her
attention to this most ingenious device for attracting respect, and
perhaps to warn her to betray no surprise. “We want to sleep here
tonight.”
“I’b dot certaid you cad,” said Barney, who was the attendant sprite;
“but I’ll idquire.”
“Show us the tap, and give us a bit of cold meat and a drop of beer
while yer inquiring, will yer?” said Noah.
Barney complied by ushering them into a small back-room, and setting
the required viands before them; having done which, he informed the
travellers that they could be lodged that night, and left the amiable
couple to their refreshment.
Now, this back-room was immediately behind the bar, and some steps
lower, so that any person connected with the house, undrawing a small
curtain which concealed a single pane of glass fixed in the wall of the
last-named apartment, about five feet from its flooring, could not only
look down upon any guests in the back-room without any great hazard of
being observed (the glass being in a dark angle of the wall, between
which and a large upright beam the observer had to thrust himself), but
could, by applying his ear to the partition, ascertain with tolerable
distinctness, their subject of conversation. The landlord of the house
had not withdrawn his eye from this place of espial for five minutes,
and Barney had only just returned from making the communication above
related, when Fagin, in the course of his evening’s business, came into
the bar to inquire after some of his young pupils.
“Hush!” said Barney: “stradegers id the next roob.”
“Strangers!” repeated the old man in a whisper.
“Ah! Ad rub uds too,” added Barney. “Frob the cuttry, but subthig in
your way, or I’b bistaked.”
Fagin appeared to receive this communication with great interest.
Mounting a stool, he cautiously applied his eye to the pane of glass,
from which secret post he could see Mr. Claypole taking cold beef from
the dish, and porter from the pot, and administering homeopathic doses
of both to Charlotte, who sat patiently by, eating and drinking at his
pleasure.
“Aha!” he whispered, looking round to Barney, “I like that fellow’s
looks. He’d be of use to us; he knows how to train the girl already.
Don’t make as much noise as a mouse, my dear, and let me hear ’em
talk—let me hear ’em.”
He again applied his eye to the glass, and turning his ear to the