Oliver Twist (54 page)

“Well, but I shall know him, I hope; don’t yer think so?” said Mr. Bolter.

“I’m doubtful about it,” replied Fagin, with a sigh. “If they don’t get any fresh evidence, it’ll only be a summary conviction, and we shall have him back again after six weeks or so; but, if they do, it’s a case of lagging. They know what a clever lad he is; he’ll be a lifer. They’ll make the Artful nothing less than a lifer.”

“What do yer mean by lagging and a lifer?” demanded Mr. Bolter. “What’s the good of talking in that way to me; why don’t yer speak so as I can understand yer?”

Fagin was about to translate these mysterious expressions into the vulgar tongue; and, being interpreted, Mr. Bolter would have been informed that they represented that combination of words, “transportation for life,” when the dialogue was cut shot by the entry of Master Bates, with his hands in his breeches-pockets, and his face twisted into a look of semi-comical woe.

“It’s all up, Fagin,” said Charley, when he and his new companion had been made known to each other.

“What do you mean?”

“They’ve found the gentleman as owns the box; two or three more’s a coming to ‘dentify him; and the Artful’s booked for a passage out,” replied Master Bates.“I must have a full suit of mourning, Fagin, and a hatband, to wisit him in, afore he sets out upon his travels. To think of Jack Dawkins—lummy Jack—the Dodger—the Artful Dodger—going abroad for a common twopenny-halfpenny sneeze-box! I never thought he’d a done it under a gold watch, chain, and seals, at the lowest. Oh, why didn’t he rob some rich old gentleman of all his walables, and go out as a gentleman, and not like a common prig, without no honour nor glory!”

With this expression of feeling for his unfortunate friend. Master Bates sat himself on the nearest chair with an aspect of chagrin and despondency.

“What do you talk about his having neither honour nor glory for!” exclaimed Fagin, darting an angry look at his pupil. “Wasn’t he always top-sawyer among you all! Is there one of you that could touch him or come near him on any scent! Eh?”

“Not one,” replied Master Bates, in a voice rendered husky by regret; “not one.”

“Then what do you talk of?” replied Fagin angrily; “what are you blubbering for?”

“‘Cause it isn’t on the rec-ord, is it?” said Charley, chafed into perfect defiance of his venerable friend by the current of his regrets; “’cause it can’t come out in the ‘dictment, cause nobody will never know half of what he was. How will he stand in the Newgate Calendar? P‘raps not be there at all. Oh. my eye, my eye, wot a blow it is!”

“Ha! ha!” cried Fagin extending his right hand, and turning to Mr. Bolter in a fit of chuckling which shook him as though he had the palsy; “see what a pride they take in their profession, my dear. Ain’t it beautiful?”

Mr. Bolter nodded assent; and Fagin, after contemplating the grief of Charley Bates for some seconds with evident satisfaction. stepped up to that young gentleman and patted him on the shoulder.

“Never mind, Charley,” said Fagin soothingly; “it’ll come out, it’ll be sure to come out. They’ll all know what a clever fellow he was; he’ll show it himself, and not disgrace his old pals and teachers. Think how young he is too! What a distinction, Charley, to be lagged at his time of-life!”

“Well, it is a honour that is!” said Charley, a little consoled.

“He shall have all he wants,” continued the Jew. “He shall be kept in the Stone Jug, Charley, like a gentleman. Like a gentleman! With his beer every day, and money in his pocket to pitch and toss with, if he can’t spend it.”

“No. shall he though?” cried Charley Bates.

“Ay, that he shall,” replied Fagin, “and we’ll have a big-. wig. Charley, one that’s got the greatest gift of the gab; to carry on his defence; and he shall make a speech for himself too, if he likes, and we’ll read it all in the papers—‘Artful Dodger—shrieks of laughter—here the court was convulsed’ —eh, Charley, eh?”

“Ha! ha!” laughed Master Bates, “what a lark that would be, wouldn’t it, Fagin? I say, how the Artful would bother ‘em, wouldn’t he?”

“Would!” cried Fagin. “He shall—he will!”

“Ah, to be sure, so he will,” repeated Charley, rubbing his hands.

“I think I see him now,” cried the Jew, bending his eyes upon his pupil.

“So do!.” cried Charley Bates. “Ha! ha! ha! so,do I. I see it all afore. me, upon my soul I do, Fagin. What a game! What a regular game! All the big-wigs trying to look solemn, and Jack Dawkins addressing of ‘em as intimate and comfortable as if he was the judge’s own son making a speech after dinner—ha! ha! ha!”

In fact, Mr. Fagin had so well humoured his young friend’s eccentric disposition that Master Bates, who had at first been disposed to consider the imprisoned Dodger rather in the light of a victim, now looked upon him as the chief actor in a scene of most uncommon and exquisite humour, and felt quite impatient for the arrival of the time when his old companion should have so favourable an opportunity of displaying his abilities.

“We must know how he gets on today, by some handy means or other,” said Fagin. “Let me think.”

“Shall I go?” asked Charley.

“Not for the world,” replied Fagin. “Are you mad, my dear, stark mad, that you’d walk into the very place where—No, Charley, no. One is enough to lose at a time.”

“You don’t mean to go yourself, I suppose?” said Charley with a humorous leer.

“That wouldn’t quite fit,” replied Fagin, shaking his head.

“Then why don’t you send this new cove?” asked Master Bates, laying his hand on Noah’s arm. “Nobody knows him.”

“Why, if he didn’t mind—” observed Fagin.

“Mind!” interposed Charley. “What should he have to mind?”

“Really nothing, my dear,” said Fagin, turning to Mr. Bolter, “really nothing.”

“Oh, I dare say about that, yer know,” observed Noah, backing towards the door, and shaking his head with a kind of sober alarm. “No, no—none of that. It’s not in my department, that ain’t.”

“Wot department has he got, Fagin?” inquired Master Bates, surveying Noah’s lank form with much disgust. “The cutting away when there’s anything wrong, and the eating all the wittles when there’s everything right; is that his branch?”

“Never mind,” retorted Mr. Bolter; “and don’t yer take liberties with yer superiors, little boy, or yer’ll find yerself in the wrong shop.”

Master Bates laughed so vehemently at this magnificent threat, that it was some time before Fagin could interpose, and represent to Mr. Bolter that he incurred no possible danger in visiting the police office; that, inasmuch as no account of the little affair in which he had been engaged, nor any description of his person, had yet been forwarded to the metropolis, it was very probable that he was not even suspected of having restored to it for- shelter; and that, if he were properly disguised, it would be as safe a spot for him to visit as any in London, inasmuch as it would be, of all places, the very last to which he could be supposed likely to resort of his own free will.

Persuaded, in part, by these representations, but overborne in a much greater degree by his fear of Fagin, Mr. Bolter at length consented, with a very bad grace, to undertake the expedition. By Fagin’s directions, he immediately substituted for his own attire a wagoner’s frock, velveteen breeches, and leather leggings, all of which articles the Jew had at hand. He was likewise furnished with a felt hat well garnished with turnpike tickets, and a carter’s whip. Thus equipped, he was to saunter into the office, as some country fellow from Covent Garden market might be supposed to do for the gratification of his curiosity; and as he was as awkward, ungainly, and raw-boned a fellow as need be, Mr. Fagin had no fear but that he would look the part to perfection.

These arrangements completed, he was informed of the necessary signs and tokens by which to recognize the Artful Dodger, and was conveyed by Master Bates through dark and, winding ways to within a very short distance of Bow Street. Having described the precise situation of the office, and accompanied it with copious directions how he was to walk straight up the passage, and when he got into the yard take the door up the steps on the right-hand side, and pull off his hat,as he went into the room, Charley Bates bade him hurry on alone, and promised to bide his return on the spot of their parting.

Noah Claypole, or Morris Bolter as the reader pleases, punctually followed the directions he had received, which—Master Bates being pretty well acquainted with the locality—were so exact that he was enabled to gain the magisterial presence without asking any questions, or meeting with any interruption by the way. He found himself jostled among a crowd of people, chiefly women, who were huddled together in a dirty frowsy room, at the upper end of which was a raised platform railed off from the rest, with a dock for the prisoners on the left hand against the wall, a box for the witnesses in the middle, and a desk for the magistrates on the right, the awful locality last named being screened off by a partition which concealed the bench from the common gaze, and left the vulgar to imagine (if they could) the full majesty of justice.

There were only a couple of women in the dock, who were nodding to their admiring friends, while the clerk read some depositions to a couple of policemen and a man in plain clothes who leant over the table. A jailer stood reclining against the dock-rail, tapping his nose listlessly with a large key, except when he repressed an undue tendency to conversation among the idlers by proclaiming silence, or looked sternly up to bid some woman “Take the baby out,” when the gravity of justice was disturbed by feeble cries, half-smothered in the mother’s shawl, from some meagre infant. The room smelt close and unwholesome; the walls were dirt-discoloured, and the ceiling blackened. There was an old smoky bust over the mantel-shelf, and a dusty clock above the dock—the only thing present that seemed to go on as it ought; for depravity, or poverty, or an habitual acquaintance with both, had left a taint on all the animate matter, hardly less unpleasant than the thick greasy scum on every inanimate object that frowned upon it.

Noah looked eagerly about him for the Dodger; but although there were several woman who would have done very well for that distinguished character’s mother or sister, and more than one man who might be supposed to bear a strong resemblance to his father, nobody at all answering the description given him of Mr. Dawkins was to be seen. He waited in a state of much suspense and uncertainty until the women being committed for trial went flaunting out, and then was quickly relieved by the appearance of another prisoner who he felt at once could be no other than the object of his visit.

It was indeed Mr. Dawkins, who, shuffling into the office with the big coat sleeves tucked up as usual, his left hand in his pocket, and his hat in his right hand, preceded the jailer, with a rolling gait altogether indescribable, and, taking his place in the dock, requested in an audible voice to know what he was placed in that ‘ere disgraceful sitivation for.

“Hold your tongue, will you?” said the jailer.

“I’m an Englishman, ain’t I?” rejoined the Dodger. “Where are my priwileges?”

“You’ll get your privileges soon enough,” retorted the jailer, “and pepper with ‘em.”

“We’ll see wot the Secretary of State for the Home. Affairs had got to say to the beaks, if I don‘t,” replied Mr. Dawkins. “Now then! Wot is this here business? I shall thank the madg’strates to dispose of this here little affair, and not to keep me while they read the paper, for I’ve got an appointment with a genelman in the City, and as I‘in a man of my world and wery punctual in business matters, he’ll go away if I ain’t there-to my time, and then pr’aps there won’t be an action for damage against them as kep me away. Oh no, certainly not!”

At this point, the Dodger, with a show of being very particular with a view to proceedings to be had thereafter, desired the jailer to communicate “the names of them two files as was on the bench.” Which so tickled the spectators, that they laughed almost as heartily as Master Bates could have done if he had heard the request.

“Silence there!” cried the jailer.

“What is this?” inquired one of the magistrates.

“A pick-pocketing case. your worship.”

“Has the boy ever been here before?”

“He ought to have been, a many times,” replied the jailer. “He has been pretty well everywhere else.
I
know him well, your worship.”

“Oh! you know me, do you?” cried the Artful, making a note of the statement. “Wery good. That’s a case of deformation of character, anyway.”

Here there was another laugh, and another cry of silence.

“Now then, where are the witnesses?” said the clerk.

“Ah! that’s right,” added the Dodger. “Where are they? I should like to see ‘em.”

This wish was immediately gratified, for a policeman stepped forward who had seen the prisoner attempt the pocket of an unknown gentleman in a crowd, and indeed take a handkerchief therefrom, which, being a very old one, he deliberately put back again, after trying it on his own countenance. For this reason, he took the Dodger into custody as soon as he could get near him, and the said Dodger, being searched, had upon his person a silver snuff-box with the owner’s name engraved upon the lid. This gentleman had been discovered on reference to the Court Guide, and being then and there present, swore that the snuff-box was his, and that he had missed it on the previous day, the moment he had disengaged himself from the crowd before referred to. He had also remarked a young gentleman in the throng particularly active in making his way about, and that young gentleman was the prisoner before him.

“Have you anything to ask this witness, boy?” said the magistrate.

“I wouldn’t abase myself by descending to hold no conversation with him,” replied the Dodger.

“Have you anything to say at all?”

“Do you hear his worship ask if you’ve anything to say?”‘ inquired the jailer, nudging the silent Dodger with his elbow.