Oliver Twist
Oliver’s colour rose as he said this; he breathed quickly; and there
was a curious working of the mouth and nostrils, which Mr. Claypole
thought must be the immediate precursor of a violent fit of crying.
Under this impression he returned to the charge.
“What did she die of, Work’us?” said Noah.
“Of a broken heart, some of our old nurses told me,” replied Oliver:
more as if he were talking to himself, than answering Noah. “I think I
know what it must be to die of that!”
“Tol de rol lol lol, right fol lairy, Work’us,” said Noah, as a tear
rolled down Oliver’s cheek. “What’s set you a snivelling now?”
“Not _you_,” replied Oliver, sharply. “There; that’s enough. Don’t say
anything more to me about her; you’d better not!”
“Better not!” exclaimed Noah. “Well! Better not! Work’us, don’t be
impudent. _Your_ mother, too! She was a nice ’un, she was. Oh, Lor!”
And here, Noah nodded his head expressively; and curled up as much of
his small red nose as muscular action could collect together, for the
occasion.
“Yer know, Work’us,” continued Noah, emboldened by Oliver’s silence,
and speaking in a jeering tone of affected pity: of all tones the most
annoying: “Yer know, Work’us, it can’t be helped now; and of course yer
couldn’t help it then; and I am very sorry for it; and I’m sure we all
are, and pity yer very much. But yer must know, Work’us, yer mother was
a regular right-down bad ’un.”
“What did you say?” inquired Oliver, looking up very quickly.
“A regular right-down bad ’un, Work’us,” replied Noah, coolly. “And
it’s a great deal better, Work’us, that she died when she did, or else
she’d have been hard labouring in Bridewell, or transported, or hung;
which is more likely than either, isn’t it?”
Crimson with fury, Oliver started up; overthrew the chair and table;
seized Noah by the throat; shook him, in the violence of his rage, till
his teeth chattered in his head; and collecting his whole force into
one heavy blow, felled him to the ground.
A minute ago, the boy had looked the quiet child, mild, dejected
creature that harsh treatment had made him. But his spirit was roused
at last; the cruel insult to his dead mother had set his blood on fire.
His breast heaved; his attitude was erect; his eye bright and vivid;
his whole person changed, as he stood glaring over the cowardly
tormentor who now lay crouching at his feet; and defied him with an
energy he had never known before.
“He’ll murder me!” blubbered Noah. “Charlotte! missis! Here’s the new
boy a murdering of me! Help! help! Oliver’s gone mad! Char—lotte!”
Noah’s shouts were responded to, by a loud scream from Charlotte, and a
louder from Mrs. Sowerberry; the former of whom rushed into the kitchen
by a side-door, while the latter paused on the staircase till she was
quite certain that it was consistent with the preservation of human
life, to come further down.
“Oh, you little wretch!” screamed Charlotte: seizing Oliver with her
utmost force, which was about equal to that of a moderately strong man
in particularly good training. “Oh, you little un-grate-ful,
mur-de-rous, hor-rid villain!” And between every syllable, Charlotte
gave Oliver a blow with all her might: accompanying it with a scream,
for the benefit of society.
Charlotte’s fist was by no means a light one; but, lest it should not
be effectual in calming Oliver’s wrath, Mrs. Sowerberry plunged into
the kitchen, and assisted to hold him with one hand, while she
scratched his face with the other. In this favourable position of
affairs, Noah rose from the ground, and pommelled him behind.
This was rather too violent exercise to last long. When they were all
wearied out, and could tear and beat no longer, they dragged Oliver,
struggling and shouting, but nothing daunted, into the dust-cellar, and
there locked him up. This being done, Mrs. Sowerberry sunk into a
chair, and burst into tears.
“Bless her, she’s going off!” said Charlotte. “A glass of water, Noah,
dear. Make haste!”
“Oh! Charlotte,” said Mrs. Sowerberry: speaking as well as she could,
through a deficiency of breath, and a sufficiency of cold water, which
Noah had poured over her head and shoulders. “Oh! Charlotte, what a
mercy we have not all been murdered in our beds!”
“Ah! mercy indeed, ma’am,” was the reply. “I only hope this’ll teach
master not to have any more of these dreadful creatures, that are born
to be murderers and robbers from their very cradle. Poor Noah! He was
all but killed, ma’am, when I came in.”
“Poor fellow!” said Mrs. Sowerberry, looking piteously on the
charity-boy.
Noah, whose top waistcoat-button might have been somewhere on a level
with the crown of Oliver’s head, rubbed his eyes with the inside of his
wrists while this commiseration was bestowed upon him, and performed
some affecting tears and sniffs.
“What’s to be done!” exclaimed Mrs. Sowerberry. “Your master’s not at
home; there’s not a man in the house, and he’ll kick that door down in
ten minutes.” Oliver’s vigorous plunges against the bit of timber in
question, rendered this occurance highly probable.
“Dear, dear! I don’t know, ma’am,” said Charlotte, “unless we send for
the police-officers.”
“Or the millingtary,” suggested Mr. Claypole.
“No, no,” said Mrs. Sowerberry: bethinking herself of Oliver’s old
friend. “Run to Mr. Bumble, Noah, and tell him to come here directly,
and not to lose a minute; never mind your cap! Make haste! You can hold
a knife to that black eye, as you run along. It’ll keep the swelling
down.”
Noah stopped to make no reply, but started off at his fullest speed;
and very much it astonished the people who were out walking, to see a
charity-boy tearing through the streets pell-mell, with no cap on his
head, and a clasp-knife at his eye.
CHAPTER VII.
OLIVER CONTINUES REFRACTORY
Noah Claypole ran along the streets at his swiftest pace, and paused
not once for breath, until he reached the workhouse-gate. Having rested
here, for a minute or so, to collect a good burst of sobs and an
imposing show of tears and terror, he knocked loudly at the wicket; and
presented such a rueful face to the aged pauper who opened it, that
even he, who saw nothing but rueful faces about him at the best of
times, started back in astonishment.
“Why, what’s the matter with the boy!” said the old pauper.
“Mr. Bumble! Mr. Bumble!” cried Noah, with well-affected dismay, and in
tones so loud and agitated, that they not only caught the ear of Mr.
Bumble himself, who happened to be hard by, but alarmed him so much
that he rushed into the yard without his cocked hat,—which is a very
curious and remarkable circumstance, as showing that even a beadle,
acted upon a sudden and powerful impulse, may be afflicted with a
momentary visitation of loss of self-possession, and forgetfulness of
personal dignity.
“Oh, Mr. Bumble, sir!” said Noah: “Oliver, sir,—Oliver has—”
“What? What?” interposed Mr. Bumble: with a gleam of pleasure in his
metallic eyes. “Not run away; he hasn’t run away, has he, Noah?”
“No, sir, no. Not run away, sir, but he’s turned wicious,” replied
Noah. “He tried to murder me, sir; and then he tried to murder
Charlotte; and then missis. Oh! what dreadful pain it is! Such agony,
please, sir!” And here, Noah writhed and twisted his body into an
extensive variety of eel-like positions; thereby giving Mr. Bumble to
understand that, from the violent and sanguinary onset of Oliver Twist,
he had sustained severe internal injury and damage, from which he was
at that moment suffering the acutest torture.
When Noah saw that the intelligence he communicated perfectly paralysed
Mr. Bumble, he imparted additional effect thereunto, by bewailing his
dreadful wounds ten times louder than before; and when he observed a
gentleman in a white waistcoat crossing the yard, he was more tragic in
his lamentations than ever: rightly conceiving it highly expedient to
attract the notice, and rouse the indignation, of the gentleman
aforesaid.
The gentleman’s notice was very soon attracted; for he had not walked
three paces, when he turned angrily round, and inquired what that young
cur was howling for, and why Mr. Bumble did not favour him with
something which would render the series of vocular exclamations so
designated, an involuntary process?
“It’s a poor boy from the free-school, sir,” replied Mr. Bumble, “who
has been nearly murdered—all but murdered, sir,—by young Twist.”
“By Jove!” exclaimed the gentleman in the white waistcoat, stopping
short. “I knew it! I felt a strange presentiment from the very first,
that that audacious young savage would come to be hung!”
“He has likewise attempted, sir, to murder the female servant,” said
Mr. Bumble, with a face of ashy paleness.
“And his missis,” interposed Mr. Claypole.
“And his master, too, I think you said, Noah?” added Mr. Bumble.
“No! he’s out, or he would have murdered him,” replied Noah. “He said
he wanted to.”
“Ah! Said he wanted to, did he, my boy?” inquired the gentleman in the
white waistcoat.
“Yes, sir,” replied Noah. “And please, sir, missis wants to know
whether Mr. Bumble can spare time to step up there, directly, and flog
him—’cause master’s out.”
“Certainly, my boy; certainly,” said the gentleman in the white
waistcoat: smiling benignly, and patting Noah’s head, which was about
three inches higher than his own. “You’re a good boy—a very good boy.
Here’s a penny for you. Bumble, just step up to Sowerberry’s with your
cane, and see what’s best to be done. Don’t spare him, Bumble.”
“No, I will not, sir,” replied the beadle. And the cocked hat and cane
having been, by this time, adjusted to their owner’s satisfaction, Mr.
Bumble and Noah Claypole betook themselves with all speed to the
undertaker’s shop.
Here the position of affairs had not at all improved. Sowerberry had
not yet returned, and Oliver continued to kick, with undiminished
vigour, at the cellar-door. The accounts of his ferocity as related by
Mrs. Sowerberry and Charlotte, were of so startling a nature, that Mr.
Bumble judged it prudent to parley, before opening the door. With this
view he gave a kick at the outside, by way of prelude; and, then,
applying his mouth to the keyhole, said, in a deep and impressive tone:
“Oliver!”
“Come; you let me out!” replied Oliver, from the inside.
“Do you know this here voice, Oliver?” said Mr. Bumble.
“Yes,” replied Oliver.
“Ain’t you afraid of it, sir? Ain’t you a-trembling while I speak,
sir?” said Mr. Bumble.
“No!” replied Oliver, boldly.
An answer so different from the one he had expected to elicit, and was
in the habit of receiving, staggered Mr. Bumble not a little. He
stepped back from the keyhole; drew himself up to his full height; and
looked from one to another of the three by-standers, in mute
astonishment.
“Oh, you know, Mr. Bumble, he must be mad,” said Mrs. Sowerberry.
“No boy in half his senses could venture to speak so to you.”
“It’s not madness, ma’am,” replied Mr. Bumble, after a few moments of
deep meditation. “It’s meat.”
“What?” exclaimed Mrs. Sowerberry.
“Meat, ma’am, meat,” replied Bumble, with stern emphasis. “You’ve
overfed him, ma’am. You’ve raised a artificial soul and spirit in him,
ma’am unbecoming a person of his condition: as the board, Mrs.
Sowerberry, who are practical philosophers, will tell you. What have
paupers to do with soul or spirit? It’s quite enough that we let ’em
have live bodies. If you had kept the boy on gruel, ma’am, this would
never have happened.”
“Dear, dear!” ejaculated Mrs. Sowerberry, piously raising her eyes to
the kitchen ceiling: “this comes of being liberal!”
The liberality of Mrs. Sowerberry to Oliver, had consisted of a profuse
bestowal upon him of all the dirty odds and ends which nobody else