body-guard, entered the room in such breathless haste and violent agitation, as seemed to betoken some new cause of alarm.
“What makes you look so flurried?” asked Rose, advancing to meet him. “Speak to me, Oliver.”
“I hardly know how; I feel as if I should be choked,” replied the boy. “Oh dear! to think that I should see him at last, and you should be able to know that I have told you all the truth!”
“I never thought you had told us any thing but the truth, dear,” said Rose, soothing him. “But what is this? – of whom do you speak?”
“I have seen the gentleman,” replied Oliver, scarcely able to articulate, “the gentleman who was so good to me – Mr. Brownlow, that we have so often talked about.”
“Where?” asked Rose.
“Getting out of a coach,” replied Oliver, shedding tears of delight, “and going into a house. I didn’t speak to him – I couldn’t speak to him, for he didn’t see me, and I trembled so, that I was not able to go up to him. But Giles asked for me whether he lived there, and they said he did. Look here,” said Oliver, opening a scrap of paper, “here it is; here’s where he lives – I’m going there directly. Oh, dear me, dear me! what shall I do when I come to see him and hear him speak again!”
With her attention not a little distracted by these and a great many other incoherent exclamations of joy, Rose read the address, which was Craven-street, in the Strand, and very soon determined upon turning the discovery to account.
“Quick!” she said, “tell them to fetch a hackney-coach, and be ready to go with me. I will take you there directly, without a minute’s loss of time. I will only tell my aunt that we are going out for an hour, and be ready as soon as you are.”
Oliver needed no prompting to despatch, and in little more than five minutes they were on their way to Craven-street. When they arrived there, Rose left Oliver in the coach under pretence of preparing the old gentleman to receive him, and sending up her card by the servant, requested to see Mr. Brownlow on very pressing business. The servant soon returned to beg that she would walk up stairs, and, following him into an upper room, Miss Maylie was presented to an elderly gentleman of benevolent appearance, in a bottle-green coat; at no great distance from whom was seated another old gentleman, in nankeen breeches and gaiters, who did not look particularly benevolent, and who was sitting with his hands clasped on the top of a thick stick, and his chin propped thereupon.
“Dear me,” said the gentleman, in the bottle-green coat, hastily rising with great politeness, “I beg your pardon, young lady – I imagined it was some importunate person who – I beg you will excuse me. Be seated, pray.”
“Mr. Brownlow, I believe, sir?” said Rose, glancing from the other gentleman to the one who had spoken.
“That is my name,” said the old gentleman. “This is my friend, Mr. Grimwig. Grimwig, will you leave us for a few minutes?”
“I believe,” interposed Miss Maylie, “that at this period of our interview I need not give that gentleman the trouble of going away. If I am correctly informed, he is cognizant of the business on which I wish to speak to you.”
Mr. Brownlow inclined his head, and Mr. Grimwig, who had made one very stiff bow, and risen from his chair, made another very stiff bow, and dropped into it again.
“I shall surprise you very much, I have no doubt,” said Rose, naturally embarrassed; “but you once showed great benevolence and goodness to a very dear young friend of mine, and I am sure you will take an interest in hearing of him again.”
“Indeed!” said Mr. Brownlow. “May I ask his name?”
“Oliver Twist you knew him as,” replied Rose.
The words no sooner escaped her lips than Mr. Grimwig, who had been affecting to dip into a large book that lay on the table, upset it with a great crash, and falling back in his chair, discharged from his features every expression but one of the most unmitigated wonder, and indulged in a prolonged and vacant stare; then, as if ashamed of having betrayed so much emotion, he jerked himself, as it were, by a convulsion into his former attitude, and looking out straight before him emitted a long, deep whistle, which seemed at last not to be discharged on empty air, but to die away in the inmost recesses of his stomach.
Mr. Brownlow was no less surprised, although his astonishment was not expressed in the same eccentric manner. He drew his chair nearer to Miss Maylie’s, and said,
Конец ознакомительного фрагмента.
Текст предоставлен ООО «ЛитРес».
Прочитайте эту книгу целиком, купив полную легальную версию на ЛитРес.
Безопасно оплатить книгу можно банковской картой Visa, MasterCard, Maestro, со счета мобильного телефона, с платежного терминала, в салоне МТС или Связной, через PayPal, WebMoney, Яндекс.Деньги, QIWI Кошелек, бонусными картами или другим удобным Вам способом.
