"Frighten him!" echoed Sikes. "It'll be no sham frightening, mind you. If there's anything queer about him when we once get into the work,—in for a penny, in for a pound,—you won't see him alive again, Fagin. Think of that before you send him. Mark my words," said the robber, poising a heavy crowbar which he had drawn from under the bedstead.
"I've thought of it all," said the Jew with energy. "I've—I've had my eye upon him, my dears, close—close. Once let him feel that he is one of us; once fill his mind with the idea that he has been a thief, and he's ours,—ours for his life! Oho! It couldn't have come about better!" The old man crossed his arms upon his breast, and, drawing his head and shoulders into a heap, literally hugged himself for joy.
"Ours!" said Sikes. "Yours, you mean."
"Perhaps I do, my dear," said the Jew with a shrill chuckle. "Mine, if you like, Bill."
"And wot," said Sikes, scowling fiercely on
