Bother about “then”—“now” was the time. In an hour or so the Ilford policemen would be growing uneasy about me, and there would probably be a search that must, if possible be evaded. I turned into Cutler Street, and wound in and out of a dozen of the narrowest and ugliest thorough-fares I could find, and finally anchored at a delightfully “slummy” soup-shop, where I invested fourpence of my shilling in food. The soup-shop keeper let beds at the rate of fourpence each, as I found on inquiry; so, with his permission, I sat in a corner until the evening, when, after having another pen’orth of soup for supper, I was shown upstairs and stowed away for the night.
I was tired enough to have dropped to sleep immediately, and I daresay I should have done so had my mind been as weary as my body, or even had I been beset by only one difficulty, whatever its magnitude. On the contrary, I was in a perfect adder’s nest of difficulties. I could not bring myself to believe in the terrible fix I was in, until, by a tremendous effort, I shut the gate of my mind, as it were, on my flock of troubles, and let them in again singly for review; and then they made themselves known to an extent that completely bewildered and stunned me. The most provoking part of the business was, that my difficulties had grown out of my “escapes.” I had escaped from the cart in the first instance, and thought myself lucky; I had escaped from Mr. Perks, when with murderous intent he was raging after me, which beyond question was matter for congratulation; I had escaped from the Ilford constabulary in the most extraordinarily fortunate manner; and, after all, how did my run of “good luck” leave me? Worse than it found me a hundred times. My father would be set on my track again; Mrs. Winkship, the only real friend I had in the world, would be justly incensed against me for betraying her; Mr. Belcher was at large, and hungering to catch me and serve me “as he said he would;” and the law—the last refuge for a fellow whom all the world are vengefully pursuing—was provoked against me, and would doubtless instruct its officers to lay violent hands on me wherever I might be met. Well, so things were, and what had best be done? What could be done? Nothing, absolutely nothing, but hide as I could, and wait and see.
With this thought I fell asleep, and with this thought I awoke next morning, and went down to the shop and spent my remaining threepence in some breakfast. With no other thought in my mind, I skulked about the live-long day, confining my walks to the lowest and shadiest parts, and avoiding the police with fear and trembling. This state of things of course could not last. So my old enemy, Hunger, suggested when, as the evening fell, he reminded me that I had not yet dined, and wasn’t likely to sup.
“It is ridiculous to talk about ‘waiting and seeing;’ you must do something,” said Hunger.
“How? How can I move without making matters worse?”
“Can they be made worse?”
“Jigger’d if I can see how they can be made much worse; I’m sick of this, anyhow. It’s bad enough to be afraid to turn a corner for fear a policeman should grab hold on me, without going hungry all the time. If I was near the market, bless’d if I would go hungry, neither. What do I care? Everybody’s agin me.”
Which simply meant that I was ripe and ready to better my circumstances at the expense of everybody or anybody, as well as I knew how. Had I known how to pick pockets I am afraid that it would not have been any consideration as to the enormity of the crime that would have stood in the way of my setting about it at once. But I did not know how; it was much too tremendous an undertaking for me. It was easy enough to snatch fruit from Covent Garden stalls, while the salesman was too far away to see you, or to catch you should you unluckily be detected in the act before you had time to get away; but the bare idea of going up to a lady or gentleman and inserting your hand in their pocket, take out and make off with whatever it might contain—whew! he must be a much pluckier boy than I was that attempted it. Of course, I knew that it was done—nay, I had had boys pointed out to me, while I lived under the arches, who picked pockets for a living, and I had likewise seen conjurors and people that could throw summersaults and swallow clasp knives, and one was as great a mystery to me as the other. Morality aside, had the two tasks been set before me—turning a summersault and picking a pocket—I certainly should have chosen the former as being the easiest. And reflecting more than ever before in my life on what a tremendous business picking pockets must be, I sauntered out of the slums, and shortly found myself in Aldgate, where the shops were all alight and gay, and the pavement was thronged with people who carried plenty of money with them.
Close by Fenchurch Street there was a grocer’s shop. It was a very splendid shop, not only on account of the plate-glass, and the great show of foreign fruits, and teas, and spices, and jars of pickles and preserves, but besides these, there were all sorts of Chinese figures in stoneware and carved and painted wood, such as I had never seen before, and which, indeed, seemed strange to most people, for hardly any one passed but gave a look in, and not a few stopped for a still closer look, so that there was quite a small mob round the window. I just got a peep, and being in no sort of hurry, thought I would wait till the people had cleared away a bit, and then I would see all about it.
There was a lamp-post, just facing the shop window, at the edge of the pavement, and I stood leaning against it, waiting. Among the people round the shop was an old lady whom you could not fail to see, because she was very fat and took up more room than any one else. There was something she wanted to see at the bottom pane, and she had to stoop, and push out a good bit to see it. Keeping my eye on the fat woman, and wondering when she would have enough of it and move off, I presently saw a boy a little bigger than I was, pressing close behind her, and moving as she moved. He wasn’t a very well-dressed boy, and I thought he was going to have a lark with the fat woman—to push her head against the window, or something. I thought so till I got a peep at his face, and then I saw that whatever he was after—and that he was after something more than was to be seen in the grocer’s window, I was boy enough of the world to see at a glance—it was not larking. Then, as I looked harder than ever, I saw him do a thing that made me catch my breath and hold on to the lamp-post as though the risk was my own. He put his hand down by the side of her silk dress, took it away again, and as he did so, somebody shifting from the window caused a streak of gas-light to fall on his hand, and on a purse he held in it, and on a bulge of white money showing through the silken chinks. Then he slipped off, no one taking the least notice of him, while the old woman, having finished her inspection, went the other way smiling and nodding her head as she thought of the funny mandarin in the window, making the whole business seem a little like a lark, after all.
But what a lark for the boy! That lovely silk purse with all that money in it! I had sold my boots and stockings for a shilling and about two pen’orth of bread; and I’ll be bound there was at least a dozen shillings in that purse—and that only in the end I had got a glimpse of!
“What a shocking thief!”
“What a lucky chap!”
“Don’t I wish I had that purse?”
These were the thoughts that came into my stupid head one after the other, and then came other thoughts, which were so sudden, and so powerfully wicked, that they made me look to the right and to the left of me as though I was afraid that somebody might hear them.