OLIVER TWIST
NOAH CLAYPOLE
Noah Claypole, one of Fagin’s gang of thieves, tells here how Bill Sikes, a
villainous murderer, met his end.
Period : 1830’s
They’ve got Sikes. They’ve got Sikes. On Jacob’s Island. I’ve run
straight from there now. Dead. Dead. Yes, he’s dead… He came to us at
the warehouse on Jacob’s Island. Charlie Bates saw him and screamed his
name from the windows. Soon the island was a seething river of people.
The noise grew louder and louder until Sikes, maddened by the sound cried
out, “Damn you all. Do your worst. I’ll cheat you yet.” Suddenly he
seemed to have the strength of twenty devils. He grabbed a rope lying in
the corner of the room and with it over his shoulder, heaved himself through
the skylight on to the roof-tops by the chimney stack. I watched him as he
made his way along the parapet until he was over the river. But the tide was
out, Fagin. The tide was out, and only a muddy swamp below. Just then
the crowd broke into the warehouse and stormed their way up the stairs.
Sikes could hear them, shouting and yelling and screaming for his blood. In
an instant he fastened one end of the rope round the chimney stack and with
the other made a strong running noose to put round his waist so that he could
lower himself to the river mud. And then, just as he was putting the rope
over his head he turned and seemed to see something staring at him through
the black of the night. For he lifted his hands and cried out, “The eyes. The
eyes again!” then staggered and lost his balance and tumbled headlong over
the parapet, the rope still around his neck. He fell swift as an arrow for
fully thirty feet. Then there was a sudden jerk, a terrific shaking of his body
– and there he hung, whilst from the crowd there came a tremendous
cheer…
BRIAN WAY