Oldal 100 [100]
OCR
through the heavy mist, which thickened every moment, and shrouded the streets and houses in gloom, rendering the strange place still stranger in Oliver's eyes, and making his uncertainty the more dismal and depressing. They had hurried on a few paces, when a deep church-bell struck the hour. With its first stroke his two conductors stopped, whence the sound proceeded. “ Kight o’clock, Bill,” said Nancy, when the bell ceased. *‘'What’s the good of telling me that; I can hear, can’t I?" replied Sikes. “| wonder whether they can hear it,” said Nancy. “Of course they can,” replied Sikes. * It was Bartlemy time when I was shopped, and there warn’t a penny trumpet in the fair as I couldn’t hear the squeaking on. Arter I was locked up for the night, the row and din outside made the thundering old jail so silent, that I could almost have beat my brains out against the iron plates of the door.” “ Poor fellows!” said Nancy, who still had her face turned towards the quarter in which the bell had sounded. "Oh, 6 Yes; that’s all you women think of,” answered Sikes. " Fine young chaps! Well, they "re as good as dead ; so it don’t much matter.” With this consolation Mr. Sikes appeared to repress a rising tendency to jealousy, and, clasping Oliver’s wrist more firmly, told him to step out again. “ Wait a minute,” said the girl; “I coming out to be hung the next time eight o’clock struck, Bill. I’d walk round and round the place till I dropped, if the snow was on the ground, and I hadn’t a shawl “And what good would that do?” inquired the unsentimental Mr. Sikes. “ Unless you could pitch over a file and twenty yards of good stout rope, you might as well be walking fifty miles off, or not walking at all, for all the it would do me. Come on, will you, and don’t stand preaching there.” The girl burst into a laugh, drew her shawl more closely round her, and they walked away. But Oliver felt her hand tremble; and, looking up in her face as they passed a gas-lamp, saw that it had turned a deadly white. They walked on by little-frequented and dirty ways, for u full halfhour, meeting very few people, for it now rained heavily, and those they did meet appear. ing from their looks to hold much the same position in society as Mr. Sikes him- . self. At length they turned into a very filthy narrow street, nearly full of oldclothes shops; and, the dog running forward as if conscious that there was no further occasion of his keeping on guard, stopped before the door of a shop which was closed and apparently untenanted, for the house was in a ruinous condition, and upon the door was nailed a board in timatine that it was to let, which looked as if it had hung there for many years. “All right,” said Sikes, looking cau tiously about. Nancy stooped below the shutters, and Oliver heard the sound of a bell. They crossed to the opposite side of the street, and stood for a few moments under a lam A noise, as if a sash-window were gently raised, was heard, and soon afterwards the door softly opened; upon which Mr. Sikes seized the terrified boy by the col lar with very little ceremony, and all three were quickly inside the house. The passage was perfectly dark, and they waited while the person who had let them in, chained and barred thedoor. “ Anybody here?" inquired Sikes. “No,” replied a voice, which Oliver thought he had heard before. sc Is the old "un here ?" asked the robber. “ Yes,” replied the voice; "and precious down in the mouth he has been. Won’t he be glad to see you? Oh, no.” The style of this reply, as well as the voice that delivered it, seemed familiar to Oliver’s ears; but it was impossible to distinguish even the form of the speaker in the darkness. 6 Let’s have a glim,” said Sikes, “ or we shall go breaking our necks, or treading on the dog. Look after your legs if you do, that’s all.” “ Stand still a moment, and I "11 get you one,” replied the voice. ‘The recedin footsteps of the speaker were heard, an in another minute the form of Mr. John Dawkins, otherwise the artful Dodger, appeared, bearing in his right hand a tallow candle stuck in the end of a cleft stick, The young gentleman did not stop ta bestow any other mark of recognition upon Oliver than a humorous grin; but, turning away, beckoned the visitors to follow him down a flight of stairs. They crossed an empty kitchen, and, opening the door of a low earthy-smellmg room, which seemed to have been built in a small back-yard, were received with a
