Oliver Twist. Volume 1 of 3

The mud lay thick upon the stones, and a black mist hung over the streets; the rain fell sluggishly down, and everything felt cold and clammy to the touch. It seemed just the night when it befitted such a being as the Jew to be abroad. As he glided stealthily along, creeping beneath the shelter of the walls and doorways, the hideous old man seemed like some loathsome reptile, engendered in the slime and darkness through which he moved, crawling forth by night in search of some rich offal for a meal.

He kept on his course through many winding and narrow ways until he reached Bethnal Green; then, turning suddenly off to the left, he soon became involved in a maze of the mean and dirty streets which abound in that close and densely-populated quarter.

The Jew was evidently too familiar with the ground he traversed, however, to be at all bewildered either by the darkness of the night or the intricacies of the way. He hurried through several alleys and streets, and at length turned into one lighted only by a single lamp at the farther end. At the door of a house in this street he knocked, and having exchanged a few muttered words with the person who opened the door, walked up stairs.

A dog growled as he touched the handle of a door, and a man’s voice demanded who was there.

“Only me, Bill; only me, my dear,” said the Jew, looking in.

“Bring in your body,” said Sikes. “Lie down, you stupid brute. Don’t you know the devil when he’s got a great-coat on?”

Apparently the dog had been somewhat deceived by Mr. Fagin’s outer garment; for as the Jew unbuttoned it, and threw it over the back of a chair, he retired to the corner from which he had risen, wagging his tail as he went, to show that he was as well satisfied as it was in his nature to be.

“Well!” said Sikes.

“Well, my dear,” replied the Jew. “Ah! Nancy.”

The latter recognition was uttered with just enough of embarrassment to imply a doubt of its reception; for Mr. Fagin and his young friend had not met since she had interfered in behalf of Oliver. All doubts upon the subject, if he had any, were speedily removed by the young lady’s behaviour. She took her feet off the fender, pushed back her chair, and bade Fagin draw up his, without saying any more about it, for it was a cold night, and no mistake.

“It is cold, Nancy dear,” said the Jew, as he warmed his skinny hands over the fire. “It seems to go right through one,” added the old man, touching his left side.

“It must be a piercer if it finds its way through your heart,” said Mr. Sikes. “Give him something to drink, Nancy. Burn my body, make haste. It’s enough to turn a man ill to see his lean old carcase shivering in that way, like a ugly ghost just rose from the grave.”

Nancy quickly brought a bottle from a cupboard in which there were many, which, to judge from the diversity of their appearance, were filled with several kinds of liquids; and Sikes, pouring out a glass of brandy, bade the Jew drink it off.

“Quite enough, quite, thankye, Bill,” replied the Jew, putting down the glass after just setting his lips to it.

“What! you’re afraid of our getting the better of you, are you?” inquired Sikes, fixing his eyes on the Jew: “ugh!”

With a hoarse grunt of contempt Mr. Sikes seized the glass and threw the remainder of its contents into the ashes, as a preparatory ceremony to filling it again for himself, which he did at once.

The Jew glanced round the room as his companion tossed down the second glassful; not in curiosity, for he had seen it often before, but in a restless and suspicious manner which was habitual to him. It was a meanly furnished apartment, with nothing but the contents of the closet to induce the belief that its occupier was anything but a working man; and with no more suspicious articles displayed to view than two or three heavy bludgeons which stood in a corner, and a “life-preserver” that hung over the mantelpiece.

“There,” said Sikes, smacking his lips. “Now I’m ready.”

“For business – eh?” inquired the Jew.

“For business,” replied Sikes; “so say what you’ve got to say.”

“About the crib at Chertsey, Bill?” said the Jew, drawing his chair forward, and speaking in a very low voice.

“Yes. Wot about it?” inquired Sikes.

“Ah! you know what I mean, my dear,” said the Jew. “He knows what I mean, Nancy; don’t he?”

“No, he don’t,” sneered Mr. Sikes, “or he won’t, and that’s the same thing. Speak out, and call things by their right names; don’t sit there winking and blinking, and talking to me in hints, as if you warn’t the very first that thought about the robbery. D – your eyes! wot d’ye mean?”

“Hush, Bill, hush!” said the Jew, who had in vain attempted to stop this burst of indignation; “somebody will hear us, my dear; somebody will hear us.”

“Let ’em hear!” said Sikes; “I don’t care.” But as Mr. Sikes did care, upon reflection he dropped his voice as he said the words, and grew calmer.

“There, there,” said the Jew coaxingly. “It was only my caution – nothing more. Now, my dear, about that crib at Chertsey, when is it to be done, Bill, eh? – when is it to be done? Such plate, my dears, such plate!” said the Jew, rubbing his hands, and elevating his eyebrows in a rapture of anticipation.

“Not at all,” replied Sikes coldly.

“Not to be done at all!” echoed the Jew, leaning back in his chair.

“No, not at all,” rejoined Sikes; “at least it can’t be a put-up job, as we expected.”

“Then it hasn’t been properly gone about,” said the Jew, turning pale with anger. “Don’t tell me.”

“But I will tell you,” retorted Sikes. “Who are you that’s not to be told? I tell you that Toby Crackit has been hanging about the place for a fortnight, and he can’t get one of the servants into a line.”

“Do you mean to tell me, Bill,” said the Jew, softening as the other grew heated, “that neither of the two men in the house can be got over?”

“Yes, I do mean to tell you so,” replied Sikes. “The old lady has had ’em these twenty year; and, if you were to give ’em five hundred pound, they wouldn’t be in it.”

“But do you mean to say, my dear,” remonstrated the Jew, “that the women can’t be got over?”

“Not a bit of it,” replied Sikes.

“Not by flash Toby Crackit?” said the Jew incredulously. “Think what women are, Bill.”

“No; not even by flash Toby Crackit,” replied Sikes. “He says he’s worn sham whiskers and a canary waistcoat the whole blessed time he’s been loitering down there, and it’s all of no use.”

“He should have tried mustachios and a pair of military trousers, my dear,” said the Jew, after a few moments’ reflection.

“So he did,” rejoined Sikes, “and they warn’t of no more use than the other plant.”

The Jew looked very blank at this information, and, after ruminating for some minutes with his chin sunk on his breast, raised his head, and said with a deep sigh that, if flash Toby Crackit reported aright, he feared the game was up.

“And yet,” said the old man, dropping his hands on his knees, “it’s a sad thing, my dear, to lose so much when we had set our hearts upon it.”

“So it is,” said Mr. Sikes; “worse luck!”

A long silence ensued, during which the Jew was plunged in deep thought, with his face wrinkled into an expression of villany perfectly demoniacal. Sikes eyed him furtively from time to time; and Nancy, apparently fearful of irritating the housebreaker, sat with her eyes fixed upon the fire, as if she had been deaf to all that passed.

“Fagin,” said Sikes, abruptly breaking the stillness that prevailed, “is it worth fifty shiners extra, if it’s safely done from the outside?”

“Yes,” said the Jew, suddenly rousing himself, as if from a trance.

“Is it a bargain?” inquired Sikes.

“Yes, my dear, yes,” rejoined the Jew, grasping the other’s hand, his eyes glistening, and every muscle in his face working with the excitement that the inquiry had awakened.

“Then,” said Sikes, thrusting aside the Jew’s hand with some disdain, “let it come off as soon as you like. Toby and I were over the garden-wall the night afore last, sounding the panels of the door and shutters: the crib’s barred up at night like a jail, but there’s one part we can crack, safe and softly.”

“Which is that, Bill?” asked the Jew eagerly.