CHAPTER XXXVIII. INTRODUCES SOME RESPECTABLE CHARACTERS WITH WHOM THE READER IS ALREADY ACQUAINTED, AND SHOWS HOW MONKS AND THE JEW LAID THEIR WORTHY HEADS TOGETHER.

It was about two hours earlier on the evening following that upon which the three worthies mentioned in the last chapter disposed of their little matter of business as therein narrated, when Mr. William Sikes, awakening from a nap, drowsily growled forth an inquiry what time of night it was.

The room in which Mr. Sikes propounded this question was not one of those he had tenanted previous to the Chertsey expedition, although it was in the same quarter of the town, and was situated at no great distance from his former lodgings. It was not in appearance so desirable a habitation as his old quarters, being a mean and badly-furnished apartment of very limited size, lighted only by one small window in the shelving roof, and abutting upon a close and dirty lane. Nor were there wanting other indications of the good gentleman’s having gone down in the world of late; for a great scarcity of furniture, and total absence of comfort, together with the disappearance of all such small moveables as spare clothes and linen, bespoke a state of extreme poverty, while the meager and attenuated condition of Mr. Sikes himself would have fully confirmed these symptoms if they had stood in need of corroboration.

The housebreaker was lying on the bed wrapped in his white great-coat, by way of dressing-gown, and displaying a set of features in no degree improved by the cadaverous hue of illness, and the addition of a soiled nightcap, and a stiff, black beard of a week’s growth. The dog sat at the bedside, now eyeing his master with a wistful look, and now pricking his ears, and uttering a low growl as some noise in the street, or in the lower part of the house, attracted his attention. Seated by the window, busily engaged in patching an old waistcoat which formed a portion of the robber’s ordinary dress, was a female, so pale and reduced with watching and privation that there would have been considerable difficulty in recognising her as the same Nancy who has already figured in this tale, but for the voice in which she replied to Mr. Sikes’s question.

“Not long gone seven,” said the girl. “How do you feel to-night, Bill?”

“As weak as water,” replied Mr. Sikes, with an imprecation on his eyes and limbs. “Here; lend us a hand, and let me get off this thundering bed, anyhow.”

Illness had not improved Mr. Sikes’s temper, for, as the girl raised him up, and led him to a chair, he muttered various curses upon her awkwardness, and struck her.

“Whining, are you?” said Sikes. “Come; don’t stand snivelling there. If you can’t do any thing better than that, cut off altogether. D’ye hear me?”

“I hear you,” replied the girl, turning her face aside, and forcing a laugh. “What fancy have you got in your head now?”

“Oh! you’ve thought better of it, have you?” growled Sikes, marking the tear which trembled in her eye. “All the better for you, you have.”

“Why, you don’t mean to say you’d be hard upon me to-night, Bill,” said the girl, laying her hand upon his shoulder.

“No!” cried Mr. Sikes. “Why not?”

“Such a number of nights,” said the girl, with a touch of woman’s tenderness, which communicated something like sweetness of tone even to her voice,—“such a number of nights as I’ve been patient with you, nursing and caring for you, as if you had been a child, and this the first that I’ve seen you like yourself; you wouldn’t have served me as you did just now, if you’d thought of that, would you? Come, come; say you wouldn’t.”

“Well, then,” rejoined Mr. Sikes. “I wouldn’t. Why, damme, now, the girl’s whining again!”

“It’s nothing,” said the girl, throwing herself into a chair. “Don’t you seem to mind me, and it’ll soon be over.”

“What’ll be over?” demanded Mr. Sikes in a savage voice. “What foolery are you up to now again? Get up, and bustle about, and don’t come over me with your woman’s nonsense.”

At any other time this remonstrance, and the tone in which it was delivered, would have had the desired effect; but the girl being really weak and exhausted, dropped her head over the back of the chair, and fainted, before Mr. Sikes could get out a few of the appropriate oaths with which on similar occasions he was accustomed to garnish his threats. Not knowing very well what to do in this uncommon emergency, for Miss Nancy’s hysterics were usually of that violent kind which the patient fights and struggles out of without much assistance, Mr. Sikes tried a little blasphemy, and finding that mode of treatment wholly ineffectual, called for assistance.

“What’s the matter here, my dear?” said the Jew, looking in.

“Lend a hand to the girl, can’t you?” replied Sikes impatiently, “and don’t stand chattering and grinning at me!”

With an exclamation of surprise Fagin hastened to the girl’s assistance, while Mr. John Dawkins (otherwise the Artful Dodger), who had followed his venerable friend into the room, hastily deposited on the floor a bundle with which he was laden, and, snatching a bottle from the grasp of Master Charles Bates who came close at his heels, uncorked it in a twinkling with his teeth, and poured a portion of its contents down the patient’s throat; previously taking a taste himself to prevent mistakes.

“Give her a whiff of fresh air with the bellows, Charley,” said Mr. Dawkins; “and you slap her hands, Fagin, while Bill undoes the petticuts.”

These united restoratives, administered with great energy, especially that department consigned to Master Bates, who appeared to consider his share in the proceeding a piece of unexampled pleasantry, were not long in producing the desired effect. The girl gradually recovered her senses, and, staggering to a chair by the bedside, hid her face upon the pillow, leaving Mr. Sikes to confront the new-comers, in some astonishment at their unlooked-for appearance.

“Why, what evil wind has blowed you here?” he asked of Fagin.

“No evil wind at all, my dear,” replied the Jew; “for ill winds blow nobody any good, and I’ve brought something good with me that you’ll be glad to see. Dodger, my dear, open the bundle, and give Bill the little trifles that we spent all our money on this morning.”

In compliance with Mr. Fagin’s request, the Artful untied his bundle, which was of large size, and formed of an old tablecloth, and handed the articles it contained, one by one, to Charley Bates, who placed them on the table, with various encomiums on their rarity and excellence.

“Sitch a rabbit pie, Bill!” exclaimed that young gentleman, disclosing to view a huge pasty; “sitch delicate creeturs, with sitch tender limbs, Bill, that the wery bones melt in your mouth, and there’s no occasion to pick ’em; half a pound of seven and sixpenny green, so precious strong that if you mix it with boiling water, it’ll go nigh to blow the lid of the teapot off; a pound and a half of moist sugar that the niggers didn’t work at all at afore they got it to sitch a pitch of goodness,—oh no! two half-quartern brans; pound of best fresh; piece of double Glo’ster; and, to wind up all, some of the richest sort you ever lushed.” Uttering this last panegyric, Master Bates produced from one of his extensive pockets a full-sized wine-bottle, carefully corked, while Mr. Dawkins at the same instant poured out a wine glassful of raw spirits from the bottle he carried, which the invalid tossed down his throat without a moment’s hesitation.

“Ah!” said the Jew, rubbing his hands with great satisfaction. “You’ll do, Bill; you’ll do now.”

“Do!” exclaimed Mr. Sikes; “I might have been done for twenty times over, afore you’d have done any thing to help me. What do you mean by leaving a man in this state three weeks and more, you false-hearted wagabond?”

“Only hear him, boys!” said the Jew, shrugging his shoulders; “and us come to bring him all these beautiful things.”

“The things is well enough in their way,” observed Mr. Sikes, a little soothed as he glanced over the table; “but what have you got to say for yourself why you should leave me here, down in the mouth, health, blunt, and every thing else, and take no more notice of me all this mortal time than if I was that ’ere dog.—Drive him down, Charley.”

“I never see such a jolly dog as that,” cried Master Bates, doing as he was desired. “Smelling the grub like a old lady a-going to market! He’d make his fortun on the stage that dog would, and rewive the drayma besides.”

“Hold your din,” cried Sikes, as the dog retreated under the bed, still growling angrily. “And what have you got to say for yourself, you withered old fence, eh?”

“I was away from London a week and more, my dear, on a plant,” replied the Jew.

“And what about the other fortnight?” demanded Sikes. “What about the other fortnight that you’ve left me lying here, like a sick rat in his hole?”

“I couldn’t help it, Bill,” replied the Jew. “I can’t go into a long explanation before company; but I couldn’t help it, upon my honour.”

“Upon your what?” growled Sikes with excessive disgust. “Here, cut me off a piece of the pie, one of you boys, to take the taste of that out of my mouth, or it’ll choke me dead.”

“Don’t be out of temper, my dear,” urged the Jew submissively. “I have never forgot you, Bill; never once.”

“No, I’ll pound it, that you han’t,” replied Sikes with a bitter grin. “You’ve been scheming and plotting away every hour that I’ve laid shivering and burning here; and Bill was to do this, and Bill was to do that, and Bill was to do it all dirt cheap, as soon as he got well, and was quite poor enough for your work. If it hadn’t been for the girl, I might have died.”

“There now, Bill,” remonstrated the Jew, eagerly catching at the word. “If it hadn’t been for the girl! Who was the means of your having such a handy girl about you but me?”

“He says true enough there, God knows!” said Nancy, coming hastily forward. “Let him be, let him be.”

Nancy’s appearance gave a new turn to the conversation, for the boys, receiving a sly wink from the wary old Jew, began to ply her with liquor, of which, however, she partook very sparingly; while Fagin, assuming an unusual flow of spirits, gradually brought Mr. Sikes into a better temper, by affecting to regard his threats as a little pleasant banter, and, moreover, laughing very heartily at one or two rough jokes, which, after repeated applications to the spirit-bottle, he condescended to make.

“It’s all very well,” said Mr. Sikes; “but I must have some blunt from you to-night.”

“I haven’t a piece of coin about me,” replied the Jew.

“Then you’ve got lots at home,” retorted Sikes, “and I must have some from there.”

“Lots!” cried the Jew, holding up his hands. “I haven’t so much as would——”

“I don’t know how much you’ve got, and I dare say you hardly know yourself, as it would take a pretty long time to count it,” said Sikes; “but I must have some to-night, and that’s flat.”

“Well, well,” said the Jew, with a sigh, “I’ll send the Artful round presently.”

“You won’t do nothing of the kind,” rejoined Mr. Sikes. “The Artful’s a deal too artful, and would forget to come, or lose his way, or get dodged by traps and so be perwented, or any thing for an excuse, if you put him up to it. Nancy shall go to the ken and fetch it, to make all sure, and I’ll lie down and have a snooze while she’s gone.”

After a great deal of haggling and squabbling, the Jew beat down the amount of the required advance from five pounds to three pounds four and sixpence, protesting with many solemn asseverations that that would only leave him eighteenpence to keep house with; Mr. Sikes sullenly remarking that if he couldn’t get any more he must be content with that, Nancy prepared to accompany him home; while the Dodger and Master Bates put the eatables in the cupboard. The Jew then, taking leave of his affectionate friend, returned homewards, attended by Nancy and the boys, Mr. Sikes meanwhile flinging himself on the bed, and composing himself to sleep away the time until the young lady’s return.

In due time they arrived at the Jew’s abode, where they found Toby Crackit and Mr. Chitling intent upon their fifteenth game at cribbage, which it is scarcely necessary to say the latter gentleman lost, and with it his fifteenth and last sixpence, much to the amusement of his young friends. Mr. Crackit, apparently somewhat ashamed at being found relaxing himself with a gentleman so much his inferior in station and mental endowments, yawned, and, inquiring after Sikes, took up his hat to go.

“Has nobody been, Toby?” asked the Jew.

“Not a living leg,” answered Mr. Crackit, pulling up his collar: “it’s been as dull as swipes. You ought to stand something handsome, Fagin, to recompense me for keeping house so long. Damme, I’m as flat as a jury-man, and should have gone to sleep as fast as Newgate, if I hadn’t had the good natur’ to amuse this youngster. Horrid dull, I’m blessed if I an’t.”

With these and other ejaculations of the same kind, Mr. Toby Crackit swept up his winnings, and crammed them into his waistcoat pocket with a haughty air, as though such small pieces of silver were wholly beneath the consideration of a man of his figure, and swaggered out of the room with so much elegance and gentility, that Mr. Chitling, bestowing numerous admiring glances on his legs and boots till they were out of sight, assured the company that he considered his acquaintance cheap at fifteen sixpences an interview, and that he didn’t value his losses the snap of a little finger.

“Wot a rum chap you are, Tom!” said Master Bates, highly amused by this declaration.

“Not a bit of it,” replied Mr. Chitling: “am I, Fagin?”

“A very clever fellow, my dear,” said the Jew, patting him on the shoulder, and winking to his other pupils.

“And Mr. Crackit is a heavy swell, an’t he, Fagin?” asked Tom.

“No doubt at all of that, my dear,” replied the Jew.

“And it is a creditable thing to have his acquaintance, an’t it, Fagin?” pursued Tom.

“Very much so, indeed, my dear,” replied the Jew. “They’re only jealous, Tom, because he won’t give it to them.”

“Ah!” cried Tom, triumphantly, “that’s where it is. He has cleaned me out; but I can go and earn some more when I like,—can’t I, Fagin?”

“To be sure you can,” replied the Jew; “and the sooner you go, the better, Tom; so make up your loss at once, and don’t lose any more time. Dodger, Charley, it’s time you were on the lay:—come, it’s near ten, and nothing done yet.”

In obedience to this hint, the boys, nodding to Nancy, took up their hats and left the room; the Dodger and his vivacious friend indulging as they went in many witticisms at the expense of Mr. Chitling, in whose conduct, it is but justice to say, there was nothing very conspicuous or peculiar, inasmuch as there are a great number of spirited young bloods upon town who pay a much higher price than Mr. Chitling for being seen in good society, and a great number of fine gentlemen (composing the good society aforesaid) who establish their reputation upon very much the same footing as flash Toby Crackit.

“Now,” said the Jew, when they had left the room, “I’ll go and get you that cash, Nancy. This is only the key of a little cupboard where I keep a few odd things the boys get, my dear. I never lock up my money, for I’ve got none to lock up, my dear—ha! ha! ha!—none to lock. It’s a poor trade, Nancy, and no thanks; but I’m fond of seeing the young people about me, and I bear it all; I bear it all. Hush!” he said, hastily concealing the key in his breast; “who’s that? Listen!”

The girl, who was sitting at the table with her arms folded, appeared in no way interested in the arrival, or to care whether the person, whoever he was, came or went, until the murmur of a man’s voice reached her ears. The instant she caught the sound she tore off her bonnet and shawl with the rapidity of lightning, and thrust them under the table. The Jew turning round immediately afterwards, she muttered a complaint of the heat in a tone of languor that contrasted very remarkably with the extreme haste and violence of this action, which, however, had been unobserved by Fagin, who had his back towards her at the time.

“Bah!” whispered the Jew, as though nettled by the interruption; “it’s the man I expected before; he’s coming down stairs. Not a word about the money while he’s here, Nance. He won’t stop long—not ten minutes, my dear.”

Laying his skinny forefinger upon his lip, the Jew carried a candle to the door as a man’s step was heard upon the stairs without, and reached it at the same moment as the visiter, who coming hastily into the room, was close upon the girl before he observed her.

It was Monks.

“Only one of my young people,” said the Jew, observing that Monks drew back on beholding a stranger. “Don’t move, Nancy.”

The girl drew closer to the table, and glancing at Monks with an air of careless levity, withdrew her eyes; but as he turned his towards the Jew, she stole another look, so keen and searching, and full of purpose, that if there had been any bystander to observe the change he could hardly have believed the two looks to have proceeded from the same person.

“Any news?” inquired the Jew.

“Great.”

“And—and—good?” asked the Jew hesitatingly, as though he feared to vex the other man by being too sanguine.

“Not bad any way,” replied Monks with a smile. “I have been prompt enough this time. Let me have a word with you.”

The girl drew closer to the table, and made no offer to leave the room, although she could see that Monks was pointing to her. The Jew—perhaps fearing that she might say something aloud about the money, if he endeavoured to get rid of her—pointed upwards, and took Monks out of the room.

“Not that infernal hole we were in before,” she could hear the man say as they went up stairs. The Jew laughed, and making some reply which did not reach her, seemed by the creaking of the boards to lead his companion to the second story.

Before the sound of their footsteps had ceased to echo through the house, the girl had slipped off her shoes, and drawing her gown loosely over her head, and muffling her arms in it, stood at the door listening with breathless interest. The moment the noise ceased she glided from the room, ascended the stairs with incredible softness and silence, and was lost in the gloom above.

The room remained deserted for a quarter of an hour or more; the girl glided back with the same unearthly tread; and immediately afterwards the two men were heard descending. Monks went at once into the street, and the Jew crawled up stairs again for the money. When he returned, the girl was adjusting her shawl and bonnet, as if preparing to be gone.

“Why, Nance,” exclaimed the Jew, starting back as he put down the candle, “how pale you are!”

“Pale!” echoed the girl, shading her eyes with her hands as if to look steadily at him.

“Quite horrible,” said the Jew. “What have you been doing to yourself?”

“Nothing that I know of, except sitting in this close place for I don’t know how long and all,” replied the girl carelessly. “Come, let me get back; that’s a dear.”

With a sigh for every piece of money, Fagin told the amount into her hand, and they parted without more conversation than interchanging a “good-night.”

When the girl got into the open street she sat down upon a door-step, and seemed for a few moments wholly bewildered and unable to pursue her way. Suddenly she arose, and hurrying on in a direction quite opposite to that in which Sikes was awaiting her return, quickened her pace, until it gradually resolved into a violent run. After completely exhausting herself, she stopped to take breath, and, as if suddenly recollecting herself, and deploring her inability to do something she was bent upon, wrung her hands, and burst into tears.

It might be that her tears relieved her, or that she felt the full hopelessness of her condition; but she turned back, and hurrying with nearly as great rapidity in the contrary direction, partly to recover lost time, and partly to keep pace with the violent current of her own thoughts, soon reached the dwelling where she had left the housebreaker.

If she betrayed any agitation by the time she presented herself to Mr. Sikes, he did not observe it; for merely inquiring if she had brought the money, and receiving a reply in the affirmative, he uttered a growl of satisfaction, and replacing his head upon his pillow, resumed the slumbers which her arrival had interrupted.

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