Oliver Twist (28 page)

“If you’re going directly, I can,” replied the man, looking out of the pot. “Are you going to Halliford?”

“Going on to Shepperton,” replied Sikes.

“I’m your man, as far I go,” replied the other. “Is all paid, Becky?”

“Yes, the other gentleman’s paid,” replied the girl.

“I say!” said the man, with tipsy gravity; “that won’t do, you know.”

“Why not?” rejoined Sikes. “You’re a-going to accommodate us, and wot’s to prevent my standing treat for a pint or so, in return?”

The stranger reflected upon this argument, with a very profound face; having done so, he seized Sikes by the hand and declared he was a real good fellow. To which Mr. Sikes replied he was joking, as, if he had been sober, there would have been strong reason to suppose he was.

After the exchange of a few more compliments, they bade the company good night, and went out, the girl gathering up the pots and glasses as they did so, and lounging out to the door, with her hands full, to see the party start.

The horse, whose health had been drunk in his absence, was standing outside, ready harnessed to the cart. Oliver and Sikes got in without any further ceremony; and the man to whom he belonged, having lingered for a minute or two “to bear him up,” and to defy the hostler and the world to produce his equal, mounted also. Then the hostler was told to give the horse his head; and, his head being given him, he made a very unpleasant use of it, tossing it into the air with great disdain, and running into the parlour windows over the way; after performing those feats, and supporting himself for a short time on his hind-legs, he started off at a great speed, and rattled out of the town right gallantly.

The night was very dark. A damp mist rose from the river, and the marshy ground about, and spread itself over the dreary fields. It was piercing cold, too; all was gloomy and black. Not a word was spoken, for the driver had grown sleepy and Sikes was in no mood to lead him into conversation. Oliver sat huddled together in a corner of the cart, bewildered with alarm and apprehension, and figuring strange objects in the gaunt trees, whose branches waved grimly to and fro as if in some fantastic joy at the desolation of the scene.

As they passed Sunbury Church, the clock struck seven. There was a light in the ferry-house window opposite which streamed across the road and threw into more sombre shadow a dark yew-tree with graves beneath it. There was a dull sound of falling water not far off, and the leaves of the old tree stirred gently in the night wind. It seemed like quiet music for the repose of the dead.

Sunbury was passed through, and they came again into the lonely road. Two or three miles more, and the cart stopped. Sikes alighted, took Oliver by the hand, and they once again walked on.

They turned into no house at Shepperton, as the weary boy had expected, but still kept walking on, in mud and darkness, through gloomy lanes and over cold open wastes, until they came within sight of the lights of a town at no great distance. On looking intently forward, Oliver saw that the water was just below them, and that they were coming to the foot of a bridge.

Sikes kept straight on until they were close upon the bridge, then turned suddenly down a bank upon the left.

“The water!” thought Oliver, turning sick with fear. “He has brought me to this lonely place to murder me!”

He was about to throw himself on the ground, and make one struggle for his young life, when he saw that they stood before a solitary house, all ruinous and decayed. There was a window on each side of the dilapidated entrance, and one story above; but no light was visible. The house was dark, dismantled, and, to all appearance, uninhabited.

Sikes, with Oliver’s hand still in his, softly approached the low porch and raised the latch. The door yielded to the pressure, and they passed in together.

 

“HALLO!” CRIED A LOUD, HOARSE VOICE, AS SOON AS THEY SET foot in the passage.

“Don’t make such a row,” said Sikes, bolting the door. “Show a glim, Toby.”

“Aha! my pal!” cried the same voice. “A glim, Barney, a glim! Show the gentleman in, Barney ; wake up first, if convenient.”

The speaker appeared to throw a boot-jack, or some such article, at the person he addressed, to rouse him from his slumbers ; for the noise of a wooden body, falling violently, was heard, and then an indistinct muttering, as of a man between asleep and awake.

“Do you hear?” cried the same voice. “There’s Bill Sikes in the passage with nobody to do the civil to him, and you sleeping there as if you took laudanum with your meals, and nothing stronger. Are you any fresher now, or do you want the iron candlestick to wake you thoroughly?”

A pair of slipshod feet shuffled hastily across the bare floor of the room as this interrogatory was put; and there issued, from a door on the right hand: first a feeble candle, and next, the form of the same individual who has been heretofore described as labouring under the infirmity of speaking through his nose, and officiating as waiter at the public-house on Saffron Hill.

“Bister Sikes!” exclaimed Barney, with real or counterfeit joy; “cub id, sir; cub id.”

“Here! you get on first,” said Sikes, putting Oliver in front of him. “Quicker! or I shall tread upon your heels.”

Muttering a curse upon his tardiness, Sikes pushed Oliver before him; and they entered a low dark room with a smoky fire, two or three broken chairs, a table, and a very old couch, on which, with his legs much higher than his head, a man was reposing at full length, smoking a long clay pipe. He was dressed in a smartly cut snuff-coloured coat with large brass buttons; an orange neckerchief; a coarse, staring, shawl-pattern waistcoat; and drab breeches. Mr. Crackit (for he it was) had no very great quantity of hair, either upon his head or face; but what he had was of a reddish dye, and tortured into long corkscrew curls, through which he occasionally thrust some very dirty fingers, ornamented with large common rings. He was a trifle above the middle size, and apparently rather weak in the legs; but this circumstance by no means detracted from his.own admiration of his top-boots, which he contemplated, in their elevated situation, with lively satisfaction.

“Bill, my boy!” said this figure, turning his head towards the door, “I’m glad to see you. I was almost afraid you’d given it up, in which case I should have made a personal wentur. Hallo!”

Uttering this exclamation in a tone of great surprise, as his eye rested on Oliver, Mr. Toby Crackit brought himself into a sitting posture, and demanded who that was.

“The boy. Only the boy!” replied Sikes, drawing a chair towards the fire.

“Wud of Bister Fagid’s lad,” exclaimed Barney, with a grin.

“Fagin‘s, eh!” exclaimed Toby, looking at Oliver. “Wot an inwalable boy that’ll make, for the old ladies’ pockets in chapels! His mug is a fortun’ to him.”

“There—there’s enough of that,” interposed Sikes, impatiently; and stooping over his recumbent friend, he whispered a few words in his ear, at which Mr. Crackit laughed immensely, and honoured Oliver with a long stare of astonishment.

“Now,” said Sikes, as he resumed his seat, “if you’ll give us something to eat and drink while we’re waiting, you’ll put some heart in us, or in me, at all events. Sit down by the fire, younker, and rest yourself; for you’ll have to go out with us again tonight, though not very far off.”

Oliver looked at Sikes in mute and timid wonder, and drawing a stool to the fire, sat with his aching head upon his hands, scarcely knowing where he was, or what was passing around him.

“Here,” said Toby, as the young Jew placed some fragments of food, and a bottle upon the table. “Success to the crack!” He rose to honour the toast and, carefully depositing his empty pipe in a corner, advanced to the table, filled a glass with spirits, and drank off its contents. Mr. Sikes did the same.

“A drain for the boy,” said Toby, half-filling a wine glass. “Down with it, innocence.”

“Indeed,” Said Oliver, looking piteously up into the man’s face; “indeed, I—”

“Down with it!” echoed Toby. “Do you think I don’t know what’s good for you? Tell him to drink it, Bill.”

“He had better!” said Sikes, clapping his hand upon his pocket. “Burn my body, if he isn’t more trouble than a whole family of Dodgers. Drink it, you perwerse imp; drink it!”

Frightened by the menacing gestures of the two men, Oliver hastily swallowed the contents of the glass and immediately fell into a violent fit of coughing, which delighted Toby Crackit and Barney and even drew a smile from the surly Mr. Sikes.

This done, and Sikes having satisfied his appetite (Oliver could eat nothing but a small crust of bread which they made him swallow), the two men laid themselves down on chairs for a short nap. Oliver retained his stool by the fire; Barney, wrapped in a blanket, stretched himself on the floor, close outside the fender.

They slept, or appeared to sleep, for some time, nobody stirring but Barney, who rose once or twice to throw coals upon the fire. Oliver fell into a heavy doze, imagining himself straying along the gloomy lanes or wandering about the dark churchyard, or retracing some one or other of the scenes of the past day, when he was roused by Toby Crackit jumping up and declaring it was half-past one.

In an instant the other two were on their legs, and all were actively engaged in busy preparation. Sikes and his companion enveloped their necks and chins in large dark shawls, and drew on their greatcoats; Barney, opening a cupboard, brought forth several articles which he hastily crammed into the pockets.

“Barkers for me, Barney,” said Toby Crackit.

“Here they are,” replied Barney, producing a pair of pistols. “You loaded them yourself.”

“All right!” replied Toby, stowing them away. “The per suaders?”

“I’ve got ‘em,” replied Sikes.

“Crape, keys, centre-bits, darkies—nothing forgotten?” inquired Toby, fastening a small crowbar to a loop inside the skirt of his coat.

“All right,” rejoined his companion. “Bring them bits of timber. Barney. That’s the time of day.”

With these words, he took a thick stick from Barney’s hands, who, having delivered another to Toby, busied himself in fastening on Oliver’s cape.

“Now then!” said Sikes, holding out his hand.

Oliver, who was completely stupefied by the unwonted exercise, and the air, and the drink which had been forced upon him, put his hand mechanically into that which Sikes extended for the purpose.

“Take his other hand, Toby,” said. Sikes. “Look out, Barney.”

The man went to the door, and returned to announce that all was quiet. The two robbers issued forth with Oliver between them. Barney, having made all fast, rolled himself up as before, and was soon asleep again.

It was now intensely dark. The fog was much heavier than it had been in the early part of the night; and the atmosphere was so damp, that, although no rain fell, Oliver’s hair and eyebrows, within a few minutes after leaving the house, had become stiff with the half-frozen moisture that was floating about. They crossed the bridge, and kept on towards the lights which he had seen before. They were at no great distance off; and, as they walked pretty briskly, they soon arrived at Chertsey.

“Slap through the town,” whispered Sikes; “there’ll be nobody in the way to-night to see us.”

Toby acquiesced; and they hurried through the main street of the little town, which at that late hour was wholly deserted. A dim light shone at intervals from some bedroom window, and the hoarse barking of dogs occasionally broke the silence of the night. But there was nobody abroad. They had cleared the town, as the churchbell struck two.

Quickening their pace, they turned up a road upon the left hand. After walking about a quarter of a mile, they stopped before a detached house surrounded by a wall, to the top of which, Toby Crackit, scarcely pausing to take breath, climbed in a twinkling.

“The boy next,” said Toby. “Hoist him up; I’ll catch hold of him.”

Before Oliver had time to look round, Sikes had caught him under the arms; and in three or four seconds he and Toby were lying on the grass on the other side. Sikes followed directly. And they stole cautiously towards the house.

And now, for the first time, Oliver, well-nigh mad with grief and terror, saw that housebreaking and robbery, if not murder, were the objects of the expedition. He clasped his hands together, and involuntarily uttered a subdued exclamation of horror. A mist came before his eyes; the cold sweat stood upon his ashy face; his limbs failed him; and he sank upon his knees.

“Get up
^!
” murmured Sikes, trembling with rage, and drawing the pistol from his pocket; “Get up, or I’ll strew your brains upon the grass.”

“Oh! for God’s sake let me go!” cried Oliver; “let me run away and die in the fields. I will never come near London; never, never! Oh! pray have mercy on me, and do not make me steal. For the love of all the bright Angels that rest in Heaven, have mercy upon me!”

The man to whom this appeal was made, swore a dreadful oath, and had cocked the pistol when Toby, striking it from his grasp, placed his hands upon the boy’s mouth and dragged him to the house.

“Hush!” cried the man; “it won’t answer here. Say another word, and I’ll do your business myself with a crack on the head. That makes no noise, and is quite as certain, and more genteel. Here, Bill, wrench the shutter open. He’s game enough now, I’ll engage. I’ve seen older hands of his age took the same way, for a minute or two, on a cold night.”

Sikes, invoking terrific imprecations upon Fagin’s head for sending Oliver on such an errand, plied the crowbar vigorously, but with little noise. After some delay, and some assistance from Toby, the shutter to which he had referred swung open on its hinges.

It was a little lattice window, about five feet and a half above the ground, at the back of the house, which belonged to a scullery, or small brewing-place, at the end of the passage. The aperture was so small that the inmates had probably not thought it worth while to defend it more securely; but it was large enough to admit a boy of Oliver’s size, nevertheless. A very brief exercise of Mr. Sikes’s art sufficed to overcome the fastening of the lattice, and it soon stood wide open also.