Oliver Twist
“We heard her try to tell you what she’d done, and saw you take a paper
from her hand, and watched you too, next day, to the pawnbroker’s
shop,” said the first.
“Yes,” added the second, “and it was a ‘locket and gold ring.’ We found
out that, and saw it given you. We were by. Oh! we were by.”
“And we know more than that,” resumed the first, “for she told us
often, long ago, that the young mother had told her that, feeling she
should never get over it, she was on her way, at the time that she was
taken ill, to die near the grave of the father of the child.”
“Would you like to see the pawnbroker himself?” asked Mr. Grimwig with
a motion towards the door.
“No,” replied the woman; “if he”—she pointed to Monks—“has been coward
enough to confess, as I see he has, and you have sounded all these hags
till you have found the right ones, I have nothing more to say. I _did_
sell them, and they’re where you’ll never get them. What then?”
“Nothing,” replied Mr. Brownlow, “except that it remains for us to take
care that neither of you is employed in a situation of trust again. You
may leave the room.”
“I hope,” said Mr. Bumble, looking about him with great ruefulness, as
Mr. Grimwig disappeared with the two old women: “I hope that this
unfortunate little circumstance will not deprive me of my porochial
office?”
“Indeed it will,” replied Mr. Brownlow. “You may make up your mind to
that, and think yourself well off besides.”
“It was all Mrs. Bumble. She _would_ do it,” urged Mr. Bumble; first
looking round to ascertain that his partner had left the room.
“That is no excuse,” replied Mr. Brownlow. “You were present on the
occasion of the destruction of these trinkets, and indeed are the more
guilty of the two, in the eye of the law; for the law supposes that
your wife acts under your direction.”
“If the law supposes that,” said Mr. Bumble, squeezing his hat
emphatically in both hands, “the law is a ass—a idiot. If that’s the
eye of the law, the law is a bachelor; and the worst I wish the law is,
that his eye may be opened by experience—by experience.”
Laying great stress on the repetition of these two words, Mr. Bumble
fixed his hat on very tight, and putting his hands in his pockets,
followed his helpmate downstairs.
“Young lady,” said Mr. Brownlow, turning to Rose, “give me your hand.
Do not tremble. You need not fear to hear the few remaining words we
have to say.”
“If they have—I do not know how they can, but if they have—any
reference to me,” said Rose, “pray let me hear them at some other time.
I have not strength or spirits now.”
“Nay,” returned the old gentleman, drawing her arm through his; “you
have more fortitude than this, I am sure. Do you know this young lady,
sir?”
“Yes,” replied Monks.
“I never saw you before,” said Rose faintly.
“I have seen you often,” returned Monks.
“The father of the unhappy Agnes had _two_ daughters,” said Mr.
Brownlow. “What was the fate of the other—the child?”
“The child,” replied Monks, “when her father died in a strange place,
in a strange name, without a letter, book, or scrap of paper that
yielded the faintest clue by which his friends or relatives could be
traced—the child was taken by some wretched cottagers, who reared it as
their own.”
“Go on,” said Mr. Brownlow, signing to Mrs. Maylie to approach. “Go
on!”
“You couldn’t find the spot to which these people had repaired,” said
Monks, “but where friendship fails, hatred will often force a way. My
mother found it, after a year of cunning search—ay, and found the
child.”
“She took it, did she?”
“No. The people were poor and began to sicken—at least the man did—of
their fine humanity; so she left it with them, giving them a small
present of money which would not last long, and promised more, which
she never meant to send. She didn’t quite rely, however, on their
discontent and poverty for the child’s unhappiness, but told the
history of the sister’s shame, with such alterations as suited her;
bade them take good heed of the child, for she came of bad blood; and
told them she was illegitimate, and sure to go wrong at one time or
other. The circumstances countenanced all this; the people believed it;
and there the child dragged on an existence, miserable enough even to
satisfy us, until a widow lady, residing, then, at Chester, saw the
girl by chance, pitied her, and took her home. There was some cursed
spell, I think, against us; for in spite of all our efforts she
remained there and was happy. I lost sight of her, two or three years
ago, and saw her no more until a few months back.”
“Do you see her now?”
“Yes. Leaning on your arm.”
“But not the less my niece,” cried Mrs. Maylie, folding the fainting
girl in her arms; “not the less my dearest child. I would not lose her
now, for all the treasures of the world. My sweet companion, my own
dear girl!”
“The only friend I ever had,” cried Rose, clinging to her. “The
kindest, best of friends. My heart will burst. I cannot bear all this.”
“You have borne more, and have been, through all, the best and gentlest
creature that ever shed happiness on every one she knew,” said Mrs.
Maylie, embracing her tenderly. “Come, come, my love, remember who this
is who waits to clasp you in his arms, poor child! See here—look, look,
my dear!”
“Not aunt,” cried Oliver, throwing his arms about her neck; “I’ll never
call her aunt—sister, my own dear sister, that something taught my
heart to love so dearly from the first! Rose, dear, darling Rose!”
Let the tears which fell, and the broken words which were exchanged in
the long close embrace between the orphans, be sacred. A father,
sister, and mother, were gained, and lost, in that one moment. Joy and
grief were mingled in the cup; but there were no bitter tears: for even
grief itself arose so softened, and clothed in such sweet and tender
recollections, that it became a solemn pleasure, and lost all character
of pain.
They were a long, long time alone. A soft tap at the door, at length
announced that some one was without. Oliver opened it, glided away, and
gave place to Harry Maylie.
“I know it all,” he said, taking a seat beside the lovely girl. “Dear
Rose, I know it all.”
“I am not here by accident,” he added after a lengthened silence; “nor
have I heard all this tonight, for I knew it yesterday—only yesterday.
Do you guess that I have come to remind you of a promise?”
“Stay,” said Rose. “You _do_ know all.”
“All. You gave me leave, at any time within a year, to renew the
subject of our last discourse.”
“I did.”
“Not to press you to alter your determination,” pursued the young man,
“but to hear you repeat it, if you would. I was to lay whatever of
station or fortune I might possess at your feet, and if you still
adhered to your former determination, I pledged myself, by no word or
act, to seek to change it.”
“The same reasons which influenced me then, will influence me now,”
said Rose firmly. “If I ever owed a strict and rigid duty to her, whose
goodness saved me from a life of indigence and suffering, when should I
ever feel it, as I should tonight? It is a struggle,” said Rose, “but
one I am proud to make; it is a pang, but one my heart shall bear.”
“The disclosure of tonight,”—Harry began.
“The disclosure of tonight,” replied Rose softly, “leaves me in the
same position, with reference to you, as that in which I stood before.”
“You harden your heart against me, Rose,” urged her lover.
“Oh Harry, Harry,” said the young lady, bursting into tears; “I wish I
could, and spare myself this pain.”
“Then why inflict it on yourself?” said Harry, taking her hand. “Think,
dear Rose, think what you have heard tonight.”
“And what have I heard! What have I heard!” cried Rose. “That a sense
of his deep disgrace so worked upon my own father that he shunned
all—there, we have said enough, Harry, we have said enough.”
“Not yet, not yet,” said the young man, detaining her as she rose. “My
hopes, my wishes, prospects, feeling: every thought in life except my
love for you: have undergone a change. I offer you, now, no distinction
among a bustling crowd; no mingling with a world of malice and
detraction, where the blood is called into honest cheeks by aught but
real disgrace and shame; but a home—a heart and home—yes, dearest Rose,
and those, and those alone, are all I have to offer.”
“What do you mean!” she faltered.
“I mean but this—that when I left you last, I left you with a firm
determination to level all fancied barriers between yourself and me;
resolved that if my world could not be yours, I would make yours mine;
that no pride of birth should curl the lip at you, for I would turn
from it. This I have done. Those who have shrunk from me because of
this, have shrunk from you, and proved you so far right. Such power and
patronage: such relatives of influence and rank: as smiled upon me
then, look coldly now; but there are smiling fields and waving trees in
England’s richest county; and by one village church—mine, Rose, my
own!—there stands a rustic dwelling which you can make me prouder of,
than all the hopes I have renounced, measured a thousandfold. This is
my rank and station now, and here I lay it down!”
“It’s a trying thing waiting supper for lovers,” said Mr. Grimwig,
waking up, and pulling his pocket-handkerchief from over his head.
Truth to tell, the supper had been waiting a most unreasonable time.
Neither Mrs. Maylie, nor Harry, nor Rose (who all came in together),
could offer a word in extenuation.
“I had serious thoughts of eating my head tonight,” said Mr. Grimwig,
“for I began to think I should get nothing else. I’ll take the liberty,
if you’ll allow me, of saluting the bride that is to be.”
Mr. Grimwig lost no time in carrying this notice into effect upon the
blushing girl; and the example, being contagious, was followed both by
the doctor and Mr. Brownlow: some people affirm that Harry Maylie had
been observed to set it, originally, in a dark room adjoining; but the
best authorities consider this downright scandal: he being young and a
clergyman.
“Oliver, my child,” said Mrs. Maylie, “where have you been, and why do
you look so sad? There are tears stealing down your face at this
moment. What is the matter?”
It is a world of disappointment: often to the hopes we most cherish,
and hopes that do our nature the greatest honour.
Poor Dick was dead!
CHAPTER LII.
FAGIN’S LAST NIGHT ALIVE
The court was paved, from floor to roof, with human faces. Inquisitive
and eager eyes peered from every inch of space. From the rail before
the dock, away into the sharpest angle of the smallest corner in the
galleries, all looks were fixed upon one man—Fagin. Before him and
behind: above, below, on the right and on the left: he seemed to stand
surrounded by a firmament, all bright with gleaming eyes.
He stood there, in all this glare of living light, with one hand
resting on the wooden slab before him, the other held to his ear, and
his head thrust forward to enable him to catch with greater
distinctness every word that fell from the presiding judge, who was
delivering his charge to the jury. At times, he turned his eyes sharply
upon them to observe the effect of the slightest featherweight in his
favour; and when the points against him were stated with terrible
distinctness, looked towards his counsel, in mute appeal that he would,
even then, urge something in his behalf. Beyond these manifestations of
anxiety, he stirred not hand or foot. He had scarcely moved since the
trial began; and now that the judge ceased to speak, he still remained
in the same strained attitude of close attention, with his gaze bent on
him, as though he listened still.
A slight bustle in the court, recalled him to himself. Looking round,