OLIVER TWIST; OK, THE PARISH BOY'S PROGress. ILLUSTRATED RY GEORGE CRUIKSHANK. BOOK THE THIRD. CHAPTER THE FIFTH. AN OLD ACQUAINTANCE OF OLIVER'S, EXHIBITING DECIDED MARKS OF GENIUS, BECOMES A PUBLIC CHARACTER IN THE METROPOLIS. UPON the very same night when Nancy, having lulled Mr. Sikes to sleep, hurried on her self-imposed mission to Rose Maylie, there advanced towards London by the Great North Road two persons, upon whom it is expedient that this history should bestow some attention. They were a man and woman, or perhaps they would be better described as a male and female; for the former was one of those long-limbed, knock-kneed, shambling, bony figures, to whom it is difficult to assign any precise age,-looking as they do, when they are yet boys, like under-grown men, and when they are almost men, like overgrown boys. The woman was young, but of a robust and hardy make, as she need have been to bear the weight of the heavy bundle which was strapped to her back. Her companion was not encumbered with much luggage, as there merely dangled from a stick which he carried over his shoulder a small parcel wrapped in a common handkerchief, and apparently light enough. This circumstance, added to the length of his legs, which were of unusual extent, enabled him with much ease to keep some half dozen paces in advance of his companion, to whom he occasionally turned with an impatient jerk of the head, as if reproaching her tardiness, and urging her to greater exertion. Thus they toiled along the dusty road, taking little heed of any object within sight, save when they stepped aside to allow a wider passage for the mail-coaches which were whirling out of town, until they passed through Highgate archway, when the foremost traveller stopped and called impatiently to his companion, "Come on, can't yer ? What a lazybones yer are, Charlotte!" "It's a heavy load, I can tell you," said the female, coming up, almost breathless with fatigue. 66 Heavy! What are yer talking about ?—what are yer made for ?” rejoined the male traveller, changing his own little bundle as he spoke to the other shoulder. "Oh! there yer are, resting again! Well, if you ain't enough to tire anybody's patience out, I don't know what is. "Is it much farther?" asked the woman, resting herself on a bank, and looking up with the perspiration streaming from her face. "Much farther! Yer as good as there," said the long-legged tramper, pointing out before him. "Look there—those are the lights of London." "They're a good two mile off at least," said the woman despond. ingly. "Never mind whether they're two mile off or twenty," said Noah Claypole, for he it was; "but get up and come on, or I'll kick yer; and so I give yer notice." As Noah's red nose grew redder with anger, and as he crossed the road while speaking, as if fully prepared to put his threat into execution, the woman rose without any farther remark, and trudged onwards by his side. "Where do you mean to stop for the night, Noah?" she asked, after they had walked a few hundred yards. "How should I know?" replied Noah, whose temper had been considerably impaired by walking. "Near, I hope," said Charlotte. "No, not near," replied Mr. Claypole; "there-not near; so don't think it." "When I tell yer that I don't mean to do a thing, that's enough, without any why, or because either," replied Mr. Claypole with dig. nity. "Well, you needn't be so cross," said his companion. "A pretty thing it would be, wouldn't it, to go and stop at the very first public house outside the town, so that Sowerberry, if he come up after us, might poke in his old nose, and have us taken back in a cart with handcuffs on," said Mr. Claypole in a jeering tone. “No. I shall go and lose myself among the narrowest streets I can find, and not stop till we come to the very out-of-the-wayest house I can set eyes on. 'Cod, you may thank your stars I've got a head on; for if we hadn't gone at first the wrong road on purpose, and come back across country, you'd have been locked up hard and fast a week ago, my lady, and serve you right for being a fool." "I know I an't as cunning as you are," replied Charlotte; “but don't put all the blame on me, and say I should have been locked up. You would have been if I had been, any way." "Yer took the money from the till, yer know yer did," said Mr. Claypole. "I took it for you, Noah, dear," rejoined Charlotte. "Did I keep it ?" asked Mr. Claypole. "No; you trusted in me, and let me carry it like a dear, and so you are," said the lady chucking him under the chin, and drawing her arm through his. |