Oliver Twist(雾都孤儿(孤星血泪))-52

“I’ll take it clean out, sir,” replied the man, winking to thecompany, “before you can come across the room to get it.Gentlemen all, observe the dark stain upon this gentleman’s hat,Charles Dickens ElecBook ClassicsOliver Twist 515no wider than a shilling, but thicker than a half-crown. Whether itis a wine-stain, fruit-stain, beer-stain, water-stain, paint-stain,pitch-stain, mud-stain, or blood-stain.”The man got no further, for Sikes with a hideous imprecationoverthrew the table, and tearing the hat from him, burst out of thehouse.With the same perversity of feeling and irresolution that hasfastened upon him, despite himself, all day, the murderer, findingthat he was not followed, and that they most probably consideredhim some drunken, sullen fellow, turned back up the town, andgetting out of the glare of the lamps of a stagecoach that wasstanding in the street, was walking past, when he recognised themail from London, and saw that it was standing at the little post-office. He almost knew what was to come; but he crossed over, andlistened.The guard was standing at the door, waiting for the letter-bag.A man, dressed like a gamekeeper, came up at the moment, andhe handed him a basket which lay ready on the pavement.“That’s for your people,” said the guard. “Now, look alive inthere, will you. Damn that ’ere bag, it warn’t ready night afore last;this won’t do, you know!”“Anything new up in town, Ben?” asked the gamekeeper,drawing back to the window-shutters, the better to admire thehorses.“No, nothing that I knows on,” replied the man, pulling on hisgloves. “Corn’s up a little. I heerd talk of a murder, too, downSpitalfields way, but I don’t reckon much upon it.”“Oh, that’s quite true,” said a gentleman inside, who waslooking out of the window. “And a dreadful murder it was.”Charles Dickens ElecBook ClassicsOliver Twist 516“Was it, sir?” rejoined the guard, touching his hat. “Man orwoman, pray, sir?”“A woman,” replied the gentleman. “It is supposed—”“Now, Ben,” replied the coachman impatiently.“Damn that ’ere bag,” said the guard; “are you gone to sleep inthere?”“Coming!” cried the office keeper, running out.“Coming,” growled the guard. “Ah, and so’s the young ‘oomanof property that’s going to take a fancy to me, but I don’t knowwhen. Here, give hold. All ri-right!”The horn sounded a few cheerful notes, and the coach wasgone.Sikes remained standing in the street, apparently unmoved bywhat he had just heard, and agitated by no stronger feeling than adoubt where to go. At length he went back again, and took theroad which leads from Hatfield to St. Albans.He went on doggedly; but as he left the town behind him, andplunged into the solitude and darkness of the road, he felt a dreadand awe creeping upon him which shook him to the core. Everyobject before him, substance or shadow, still or moving, took thesemblance of some fearful thing; but these fears were nothingcompared to the sense that haunted him of that morning’s ghastlyfigure following at his heels. He could trace its shadow in thegloom, supply the smallest item of the outline, and note how stiffand solemn it seemed to stalk along. He could hear its garmentsrustling in the leaves, and every breath of wind came laden withthat last low cry. If he stopped it did the same. If he ran, itfollowed—not running too, that would have been a relief, but like acorpse endowed with the mere machinery of life, and borne on oneCharles Dickens ElecBook ClassicsOliver Twist 517slow melancholy wind that never rose or fell.At times he turned, with desperate determination, resolved tobeat this phantom off, though it should look him dead; but the hairrose on his head, and his blood stood still, for it had turned withhim and was behind him then. He had kept it before him thatmorning, but it was behind now— always. He leaned his backagainst a bank, and felt that it stood above him, visibly out againstthe cold night-sky. He threw himself upon the road—on his backupon the road. At his head it stood, silent, erect, and still—a livinggravestone, with its epitaph in blood.Let no man talk of murderers escaping justice, and hint thatProvidence must sleep. There were twenty score of violent deathsin one long minute of that agony of fear.There was a shed in a field he passed, that offered shelter forthe night. Before the door, were three tall poplar-trees, whichmade it very dark within; and the wind moaned through themwith a dismal wail. He could not walk on, till daylight came again;and here he stretched himself close to the wall—to undergo newtorture.For now, a vision came before him, as constant and moreterrible than that from which he had escaped. Those widely-staring eyes, so lustreless and so glassy, that he had better borneto see them than think upon them, appeared in the midst of thedarkness—light in themselves, but giving light to nothing. Therewere but two, but they were everywhere. If he shut out the sight,there came the room with every well-known object—some, indeed,that he would have forgotten, if he had gone over its contents frommemory—each in its accustomed place. The body was in its place,and its eyes were as he saw them when he stole away. He got up,Charles Dickens ElecBook ClassicsOliver Twist 518and rushed into the field without. The figure was behind him. Here-entered the shed, and shrank down once more. The eyes werethere, before he had laid himself along.And here he remained, in such terror as none but he can know,trembling in every limb, and the cold sweat starting from everypore, when suddenly there arose upon the night-wind the noise ofdistant shouting, and the roar of voices mingled in alarm andwonder. Any sound of men in that lonely place, even though itconveyed a real cause of alarm, was something to him. Heregained his strength and energy at the prospect of personaldanger; and, springing to his feet, rushed into the open air.The broad sky seemed on fire. Rising into the air with showersof sparks, and rolling one above the other, were sheets of flame,lighting the atmosphere for miles around, and driving clouds ofsmoke in the direction where he stood. The shouts grew louder asnew voices swelled the roar, and he could hear the cry of Fire!mingled with the ringing of an alarm-bell, the fall of heavy bodies,and the crackling of flames as they twined round some newobstacle and shot aloft as though refreshed by food. The noiseincreased as he looked. There were people there—men andwomen—light, bustle. It was like new life to him. He dartedonward—straight, headlong—dashing through brier and brake,and leaping gate and fence as madly as his dog, who careered withloud and sounding bark before him.He came upon the spot. There were half-dressed figures tearingto and fro, some endeavouring to drag the frightened horses fromthe stables, others driving the cattle from the yard and outhouses,and others coming laden from the burning pile, amidst a shower offalling sparks, and the tumbling down of red-hot beams. TheCharles Dickens ElecBook ClassicsOliver Twist 519apertures, where doors and windows stood an hour ago, discloseda mass of raging fire; walls rocked and crumbled into the burningwell; the molten lead and iron poured down, white-hot, upon theground. Women and children shrieked, and men encouraged eachother with noisy shouts and cheers. The clanking of the engine-pumps, and the spurting and hissing of the water as it fell uponthe blazing wood, added to the tremendous roar. He shouted, too,till he was hoarse; and, flying from memory and himself, plungedinto the thickest of the throng.Hither and thither he dived that night; now working at thepumps, and now hurrying through the smoke and flame, but neverceasing to engage himself wherever noise and men were thickest.Up and down the ladders, upon the roofs of buildings, over floorsthat quaked and trembled with his weight, under the lee of fallingbricks and stones, in every part of that great fire was he; but hebore a charmed life, and had neither scratch nor bruise, norweariness nor thought, till morning dawned again, and only smokeand blackened ruins remained.This mad excitement over, there returned, with tenfold force,the dreadful consciousness of his crime. He looked suspiciouslyabout him, for the men were conversing in groups, and he fearedto be the subject of their talk. The dog obeyed the significant beckof his finger, and they drew off, stealthily, together. He passednear an engine where some men were seated, and they called tohim to share in their refreshment. He took some bread and meat;and as he drank a draught of beer, heard the firemen, who werefrom London, talking about the murder. “He has gone toBirmingham, they say,” said one; “but they’ll have him yet, for thescouts are out, and by tomorrow night there’ll be a cry all throughCharles Dickens ElecBook ClassicsOliver Twist 520the country.”He hurried off, and walked till he almost dropped upon theground; then lay down in a lane, and had a long, but broken anduneasy sleep. He wandered on again, irresolute and undecided,and oppressed with the fear of another solitary night.Suddenly, he took the desperate resolution of going back toLondon.“There’s somebody to speak to there, at all events,” he thought.“A good hiding-place, too. They’ll never expect to nab me there,after this country scent. Why can’t I lay by for a week or so, and,forcing blunt from Fagin, get abroad to France? Damme, I’ll riskit.”He acted upon this impulse without delay, and choosing theleast frequented roads, began his journey back, resolved to lieconcealed within a short distance of the metropolis, and, enteringit at dusk, by a circuitous route, to proceed straight to that part ofit which he had fixed on for his destination.The dog, though. If any description of him were out, it wouldnot be forgotten that the dog was missing, and had probably gonewith him. This might lead to his apprehension as he passed alongthe streets. He resolved to drown him, and walked on, looking fora pond, and picking up a heavy stone and tying it to hishandkerchief as he went.The animal looked up into his master’s face while thesepreparations were making; and, whether his instinct apprehendedsomething of their purpose, or the robber’s sidelong look at himwas sterner than ordinary, he skulked a little farther in the rearthan usual, and cowered as he came more slowly along. When hismaster halted at the brink of a pool, and looked round to call him,Charles Dickens ElecBook ClassicsOliver Twist 521he stopped outright.“Do you hear me call? Come here!” cried Sikes.The animal came up from the very force of habit; but as Sikesstooped to attach the handkerchief to his throat, he uttered a lowgrowl and started back.“Come back!” said the robber.The dog wagged his tail, but moved not. Sikes made a running-noose and called him again.The dog advanced, retreated, paused an instant, turned, andscoured away at his hardest speed.The man whistled again and again, and sat down and waited inthe expectation that he would return. But no dog appeared, and atlength he resumed his journey.Charles Dickens ElecBook ClassicsOliver Twist 522Chapter 49Monks And Mr. Brownlow At Length Meet—TheirConversation, And The Intelligence That InterruptsIt.The twilight was beginning to close in, when Mr. Brownlowalighted from a hackney-coach at his own door andknocked softly. The door being opened, a sturdy man gotout of the coach and stationed himself on one side of the steps,while another man, who had been seated on the box, dismountedtoo, and stood upon the other side. At a sign from Mr. Brownlow,they helped out a third man, and taking him between them,hurried him into the house. This man was Monks.They walked in the same manner up the stairs withoutspeaking, and Mr. Brownlow, preceding them, led the way into aback room. At the door of this apartment, Monks, who hadascended with evident reluctance, stopped. The two men looked tothe old gentleman as if for instructions.“He knows the alternative,” said Mr. Brownlow. “If he hesitatesor moves a finger but as you bid him, drag him into the street, callfor the aid of the police, and impeach him as a felon in my name.”“How dare you say this of me?” asked Monks.“How dare you urge me to it, young man?” replied Mr.Brownlow, confronting him with a steady look. “Are you madenough to leave this house? Unhand him. There, sir. You are freeto go, and we to follow. But I warn you, by all I hold most solemnand most sacred, that the instant you set foot in the street, thatCharles Dickens ElecBook ClassicsOliver Twist 523instant will I have you apprehended on a charge of fraud androbbery. I am resolute and immovable. If you are determined to bethe same, your blood be upon your own head!”“By what authority am I kidnapped in the street, and broughthere by these dogs?” asked Monks, looking from one to the otherof the men who stood beside him.“By mine,” replied Mr. Brownlow. “Those persons areindemnified by me. If you complain of being deprived of yourliberty—you had power and opportunity to retrieve t as you camealong, but you deemed it advisable to remain quiet—I say again,throw yourself for protection on the law. I will appeal to the lawtoo; but when you have gone too far to recede, do not sue to me forleniency, when the power will have passed into other hands; anddo not say I plunged you down the gulf into which you rushedyourself.”Monks was plainly disconcerted, and alarmed besides. Hehesitated.“You will decide quickly,” said Mr. Brownlow, with perfectfirmness and composure. “If you wish me to prefer my chargespublicly, and consign you to a punishment the extent of which,although I can, with a shudder, foresee, I cannot control, oncemore, I say, you know the way. If not, and you appeal to myforbearance, and the mercy of those you have deeply injured, seatyourself, without a word, in that chair. It has waited for you twowhole days.”Monks muttered some unintelligible words, but wavered still.“You will be prompt,” said Mr. Brownlow. “A word from me,and the alternative has gone for ever.”Still the man hesitated.Charles Dickens ElecBook ClassicsOliver Twist 524“I have not the inclination to parley,” said Mr. Brownlow, “and,as I advocate the dearest interests of others, I have not the right.”“Is there,” demanded Monks, with a faltering tongue—“isthere—no middle course?”“None.”Monks looked at the old gentleman with an anxious eye; but,reading in his countenance nothing but severity anddetermination, walked into the room, and, shrugging hisshoulders, sat down.“Lock the door on the outside,” said Mr Brownlow to theattendants, “and come when I ring.”The men obeyed, and the two were left alone together.“This is pretty treatment, sir,” said Monks, throwing down hishat and cloak, “from my father’s oldest friend.”“It is because I was your father’s oldest friend, young man,”returned Mr. Brownlow; “it is because the hopes and wishes ofyoung and happy years were bound up with him, and that faircreature of his blood and kindred who rejoined her God in youth,and left me here a solitary, lonely man; it is because he knelt withme beside his only sister’s deathbed when he was yet a boy, on themorning that would—but Heaven willed otherwise—have madeher my young wife; it is because my seared heart clung to him,from that time forth, through all his trials and errors, till he died; itis because old recollections and associations filled my heart, andeven the sight of you brings with it old thoughts of him; it isbecause of all these things that I am moved to treat you gentlynow—yes, Edward Leeford, even now—and blush for yourunworthiness who bear the name.”“What has the name to do with it?” asked the other, afterCharles Dickens ElecBook ClassicsOliver Twist 525contemplating, half in silence, and half in dogged wonder, theagitation of his companion. “What is the name to me?”