Page 105 [105]
OCR
69 ing her head from side to side, with a poor ‘assumption of indifference. . 66 Well, then, a Sikes with a growl like that he was accustomed to use when addressing his dog, s or I’ll quiet you for a good long time to come." The girl laughed again, even less comovina than before, and, darting a hasty ook at Sikes, turned her face aside, and bit her lip till the blood came. * You re a nice one,” added Sikes, as he surveyed her with a contemptuous air, “to take up the humane and genteel side! A pretty subject for the child, as you call him, to make a friend of !” ss God Almighty help me, Iam!” cried the girl passionately ; “and I wish I had been struck dead in the street, or changed places with them we passed so near tonight, before Í had lent a hand in bringng him here. He’s a thief, a liar, a devil, all that’s bad, from this night forth; isn’t that enough for the old wretch without blows?” “Come, come, Sikes,” said the Jew, appealing to him in a remonstratory tone, and motioning towards the boys, who were eagerly attentive to all that passed; “we must have civil words,—civil words, Bill!" “Civil words!” cried the girl, whose passion was frightful to see. “Civil words, you villain! Yes; you deserve ’em from me. I thieved for you when I was a child not half as old as this (pointing to Oliver). I have been in the same trade, and the same service, for twelve years since; don’t you know it? Speak out! don’t you know it ?” “ Well, well!” replied*the Jew, with an attempt at pacification; “and if you have, it’s your living!" “Ah, it is!” returned the girl, not speaking, but pouring out the words in one continuous and vehement scream. “ It is my living, and the cold, wet, dirty streets are my home; and you're the wretch that drove me to them long ago, and that ’ll keep me there day and night, day and night, till I die !” “1 shall do you a mischief !” interposed the Jew, goaded by these reproaches; “a mischief worse than that, if you say much more !" . The girl said nothing more; but tearing her hair and dress in a transport of phrensy, made such a rush at the Jew as would probably have left signal marks of her revenge upon him, had not her wrists been seized by Sikes at the right moment; upon which she made a few ineffectual struggles, and fainted. “She’s all right now,” said Sikes, lay“She’s unup in this way.” The Jew wiped his forehead, and smiled, as if it were a relief to have the disturb ance over; but neither he, nor Sikes, nor the dog, nor the boys, seemed to consider it in any other light than a common occurrence incidental to business. “Tt’s the worst of having to do with women,” said the Jew, replacing the club; “ but they ’re clever, and we can’t get on in our line without ’em.—Charley, show Oliver to bed.” “I suppose he’d better not wear his best clothes to-morrow, Fagin, had he?” inquired Charley Bates. “ Certainly not,” replied the Jew, reciprocating the grin with which Charley put the question. Master Bates, apparently much delighted with his commission, took the cleft stick, and led Oliver into an adjacent kitchen, where there were two or three of the beds on which he had slept before ; and here, with many uncontrollable bursts of laughter, he produced the identical old suit of clothes which Oliver had so much congratulated himself upon leaving off at Mr. Brownlow’s, and the accidental display of which to Fagin by the Jew who purchased them, had been the very first clue received of his whereabout. ‘“ Pull off the smart ones,” said Charley, sand I’ll give Jem to Fagin to take care of. What fun it is!” Poor Oliver unwillingly complied ; and Master Bates, rolling up the new clothes under his arm, departed from the room, leaving Oliver in the dark, and locking the door behind him. The noise of Charley’s laughter, and the voice of Miss Betsy, who opportunely arrived to throw water over her friend, and perform other feminine offices for the promotion of her recovery, might have kept many people awake under more happy circumstances than those in which Oliver was placed; but he was sick and weary, and soon fell sound asleep. CHAPTER THE SEVENTEENTH. Oliver’s destiny continuing unpropitious, brings a great man to London to injure his reputation. Ir is the custom on the stage in all good, murderous melo-dramas, to present the tragic and the comic scenes in as regular alternation as the layers of red
