Charles Dickens

“ The persons on whom I have bestowed my dearest love lie deep in their graves; but, although the happiness and delight of my life lie buried there too, I have not made a coffin of my heart, and sealed it up for ever on my best affections. Deep affliction has only made them stronger; it ought, I think, for it should refine our nature.”
As the old gentleman said this in a low voice, more to himself than to his companion, and remained silent for a short time afterwards, Oliver sat quite still, almost afraid to breathe. ”

“ I wish some well-fed philosopher, whose meat and drink turn to gall within him, whose blood is ice, and whose heart is iron, could have seen Oliver Twist clutching at the dainty viands that the dog had neglected, and witnessed the horrible avidity with which he tore the bits asunder with all the ferocity of famine:—there is only one thing I should like better, and that would be to see him making the same sort of meal himself, with the same relish. ”

“ In the obscure parlour of a low public-house, situate in the filthiest part of Little Saffron-Hill,—a dark and gloomy den, where a flaring gaslight burnt all day in the winter-time, and where no ray of sun ever shone in the summer,—there sat, brooding over a little pewter measure and a small glass, strongly impregnated with the smell of liquor, a man in a velveteen coat, drab shorts, half-boots, and stockings, whom, even by that dim light, no experienced agent of police would have hesitated for one instant to recognise as Mr. William Sikes. ”

“ I want to speak to him,” was his first remark as they descended the stairs.
“Hours ago,” replied the Dodger, throwing open a door. “Here he is!”
The boy was lying fast asleep on a rude bed upon the floor: so pale with anxiety and sadness, and the closeness of his prison, that he looked like death; not death as it shows in shroud and coffin, but in the guise it wears when life has [331] just departed; when a young and gentle spirit has but an instant fled to heaven, and the gross air of the world has not had time to breathe upon the changing dust it hallowed. ”

“ Early on the seventh morning after he had left his native place, Oliver limped slowly into the little town of Barnet. The window-shutters were closed, the street was empty, not a soul had awakened to the business of the day. The sun was rising in all his splendid beauty, but the light only served to show the boy his own lonesomeness and desolation as he sat with bleeding feet and covered with dust upon a cold door-step.
By degrees the shutters were opened, the window-blinds were drawn up, and people [122] began passing to and fro. ”

“ The noise of footsteps on the creaking stairs a few minutes after the occurrence of this conversation roused the merry old gentleman as he sat over the fire with a saveloy and a small loaf in his left hand, a pocket knife in his right, and a pewter pot on the trivet. There was a rascally smile on his white face as he turned round, and, looking sharply out from under his thick red eyebrows, bent his ear towards the door and listened intently.
“Why, how’s this?” muttered the Jew, changing countenance; “only two of ’em! Where’s the third? They can’t have got into trouble. Hark!” ”

“ Bumble. “The kind and blessed gentlemen which is so many parents to you, Oliver, when you have none of your own, are a-going to ’prentice you, and to set you up in life, and make a man of you, although the expense to the parish is three pound ten!—three pound ten, Oliver!—seventy shillin’s!—one hundred and forty sixpences!—and all for a naughty orphan which nobody can’t love.” ”

“ At such times, a mortal knows just enough of what his mind is doing to form some glimmering conception of its mighty powers, its bounding from earth and spurning time and space, when freed from the restraint of its corporeal associate.
Oliver was precisely in this condition. He saw the Jew with his half-closed eyes, heard his low whistling, and recognised the sound of the spoon grating against the saucepan’s sides; and yet the self-same senses were mentally engaged at the same time in busy action with almost everybody he had ever known. ”

“ From this day Oliver was seldom left alone, but was placed in almost constant communication with the two boys, who played the old game with the Jew every day,—whether for their own improvement or Oliver’s, Mr. Fagin best knew. At other times the old man would tell them stories of robberies he had committed in his younger days, mixed up with so much that was droll and curious, that Oliver could not help laughing heartily, and showing that he was amused in spite of all his better feelings. ”

“ I’m an orphan; I live at Pentonville.”
“Oh, only hear him, how he braves it out!” cried the young woman.
“Why, it’s Nancy!” exclaimed Oliver, who now saw her face for the first time, and started back in irrepressible astonishment.
“You see he knows me,” cried Nancy, appealing to the by-standers. “He can’t help himself. Make him come home, there’s good people, or he’ll kill his dear mother and father, and break my heart!”
“What the devil’s this?” said a man, bursting out of a beer-shop, with a white dog at his heels; “young Oliver! Come home to your poor mother, you young dog! ”

“ There is a passion for hunting something deeply implanted in the human breast. One wretched breathless child, panting with exhaustion, terror in his looks, agony in his eye, large drops of perspiration streaming down his face, strains every nerve to make head upon his pursuers; and as they follow on his track, and gain upon him every instant, they hail his decreasing strength with still louder shouts, and whoop and scream with joy “Stop thief!”—Ay, stop him for God’s sake, were it only in mercy! ”

“ For instance, when Sowerberry had an order for the burial of some rich old lady or gentleman, who was surrounded by a great number of nephews and nieces, who had been perfectly inconsolable during the previous illness, and whose grief had been wholly irrepressible even on the most public occasions, they would be as happy among themselves as need be—quite cheerful and contented, conversing together with as much freedom and gaiety as if nothing whatever had happened to disturb them. Husbands, too, bore the loss of their wives with the most heroic calmness ”

“ “My dear child,” said the old gentleman, moved by the warmth of Oliver’s sudden appeal, “you need not be afraid of my deserting you, unless you give me cause.”
“I never, never will, sir,” interposed Oliver.
“I hope not,” rejoined the old gentleman; “I do not think you ever will. I have been deceived before, in the objects whom I have [221] endeavoured to benefit; but I feel strongly disposed to trust you, nevertheless, and more interested in your behalf than I can well account for, even to myself. The persons on whom I have bestowed my dearest love lie deep in their graves; ”

“ Bumble, sir?” said Mrs. Mann, thrusting her head out of the window in well-affected ecstasies of [13] joy. “ (Susan, take Oliver and them two brats up stairs, and wash ’em directly.) —My heart alive! Mr. Bumble, how glad I am to see you, sure-ly!”
Now Mr. Bumble was a fat man, and a choleric one; so, instead of responding to this open-hearted salutation in a kindred spirit, he gave the little wicket a tremendous shake, and then bestowed upon it a kick which could have emanated from no leg but a beadle’s. ”

“ 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. ”

“ Oliver walked a few paces after them, and, not knowing whether to advance or retire, stood looking on in silent amazement.
The old gentleman was a very respectable-looking personage, with a powdered head and gold spectacles; dressed in a bottle-green coat [152] with a black velvet collar, and white trousers, with a smart bamboo cane under his arm. He had taken up a book from the stall, and there he stood, reading away as hard as if he were in his elbow-chair in his own study. It was very possible that he fancied himself there, indeed ”

“ 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 [314] ill to see his lean old carcase shivering in that way, like a ugly ghost just rose from the grave.” ”

“ For a second or two Oliver glanced up the street, and down the street, and over the way, impressed with the belief that the unknown, who had addressed him through the key-hole, had walked a few paces off to warm himself, for nobody did he see but a big charity-boy sitting on a post in front of the house, eating a slice of bread and butter, which he cut into wedges, the size of his mouth, with a clasp-knife, and then consumed with great dexterity. ”

“ Once let him feel that he is one of us; once fill his mind with the idea that he has been a thief, and he’s ours,—ours for his life! Oho! It couldn’t have come about better!” The old man crossed his arms upon his breast, and, drawing his head and shoulders into a heap, literally hugged himself for joy.
“Ours!” said Sikes. “Yours, you mean.”
“Perhaps I do, my dear,” said the Jew with a shrill chuckle. “Mine, if you like, Bill.” ”

“ Mr. Brownlow paced the room to and fro for some minutes, evidently so much disturbed by the beadle’s tale, that even Mr. Grimwig forbore to vex him further. At length he stopped, and rang the bell violently.
“Mrs. Bedwin,” said Mr. Brownlow when the housekeeper appeared, “that boy, Oliver, is an impostor.”
“It can’t be, sir; it cannot be,” said the old lady energetically.
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“I tell you he is,” retorted the old gentleman sharply. “What do you mean by ‘can’t be’? We have just heard a full account of him from his birth, and he has been a thorough-paced little villain all his life.” ”

“ Oliver was frightened at the sight of so many gentlemen, which made him tremble; and the beadle gave him another tap behind, which made him cry; and these two causes made him answer in a very low and hesitating voice; whereupon a gentleman in a white waistcoat said he was a fool, which was a capital way of raising his spirits, and putting him quite at his ease.
“Boy,” said the gentleman in the high chair, “listen to me. You know you’re an orphan, I suppose?” ”

“ Bumble—could ever find him there. He had often heard the old men in the workhouse, too, say that no lad of spirit need want in London, and that there were ways of living in that vast city which those who had been bred up in country parts had no idea of. It was the very place for a homeless boy, who must die in the streets unless some one helped him. ”

“ All I have to live upon in my old age. The folks call me a miser, my dear—only a miser; that’s all.”
Oliver thought the old gentleman must be a decided miser to live in such a dirty place, with so many watches; but, thinking that perhaps his fondness for the Dodger and the other boys cost him a good deal of money, he only cast a deferential look at the Jew, and asked if he might get up. ”

“ Oliver held up the bottom of the pocket with one hand as he had seen the Dodger hold it, and drew the handkerchief lightly out of it with the other.
“Is it gone?” cried the Jew.
“Here it is, sir,” said Oliver, showing it in his hand.
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“You’re a clever boy, my dear,” said the playful old gentleman, patting Oliver on the head approvingly; “I never saw a sharper lad. Here’s a shilling for you. If you go on in this way, you’ll be the greatest man of the time. And now come here, and I’ll show you how to take the marks out of the handkerchiefs.” ”

“ Bumble produced some silver money, rolled up in paper, from his pocket-book, and requested a receipt, which Mrs. Mann wrote.
“It’s very much blotted, sir,” said the farmer of infants; “but it’s formal enough, I dare say. Thank you, Mr. Bumble, sir; I am very much obliged to you, I’m sure.”
Mr. Bumble nodded blandly in acknowledgment of Mrs. Mann’s curtsey, and inquired how the children were.
“Bless their dear little hearts!” said Mrs. Mann with emotion, “they’re as well as can be, the dears! Of course, except the two that died last week, and little Dick.” ”

“ Pretty creetur! what would his mother feel if she had sat by him as I have, and could see him now!”
“Perhaps she does see me,” whispered Oliver, folding his hands together; “perhaps she has sat by me, ma’am. I almost feel as if she had.”
“That was the fever, my dear,” said the old lady mildly.
“I suppose it was,” replied Oliver thoughtfully, [178] “because heaven is a long way off, and they are too happy there to come down to the bedside of a poor boy. But if she knew I was ill, she must have pitied me even there, for she was very ill herself before she died. ”