A good supper Oliver had that night, and a heavy sleep, and a hearty breakfast next morning.

When the breakfast was cleared away, Fagin, who was quite a merry old gentleman, and the Dodger and another boy named Charley Bates, played at a very curious game.  The merry old gentleman, placing a snuffbox in one pocket of his trousers, a note-book in the other, and a watch in his waistcoat, and sticking a mock diamond pin in his shirt, and spectacle-case and handkerchief in his coat-pocket, trotted up and down the room in imitation of the manner in which old gentlemen walk about the streets; while the Dodger and Charley Bates had to get all these things out of his pockets without being observed.  It was so very funny that Oliver laughed till the tears ran down his face.

A few days later, and he understood the full meaning of the game.

The Dodger and Charley Bates had taken Oliver out for a walk, and after sauntering along, they suddenly pulled up short on Clerkenwell Green, at the sight of an old gentleman reading at a bookstall.  So intent was he over his book that he might have been sitting in an easy chair in his study.

To Oliver’s horror, the Dodger plunged his hand into the gentleman’s pocket, drew out a handkerchief, and handed it to Bates.  Then both boys ran away round the corner at full speed.  Oliver, frightened at what he had seen, ran off, too; the old gentleman, at the same moment missing his handkerchief, and seeing Oliver scudding off, concluded he was the thief, and gave chase, still holding his book in his hand.

The cry of “Stop thief!” was raised.  Oliver was knocked down, captured, and taken to the police-station by a constable.

The magistrate was still sitting, and Oliver would have been convicted there and then but for the arrival of the bookseller.

“Stop, stop!  Don’t take him away!  I saw it all!  I keep the bookstall,” cried the man.  “I saw three boys, two others, and the prisoner here.  The robbery was committed by another boy.  I saw that this one was amazed by it.”

Oliver was acquitted.  But he had fainted.  Mr. Brownlow, for that was the name of the old gentleman, shocked and moved at the boy’s deathly whiteness, straightway carried the boy off in a cab to his own house in a quiet, shady street near Pentonville.

III.—­Back in Fagin’s Den

For many days Oliver remained insensible to the goodness of his new friends.  But all that careful nursing could do was done, and he slowly and surely recovered.  Mr. Brownlow, a kind-hearted old bachelor, took the greatest interest in his protege, and Oliver implored him not to turn him out of doors to wander in the streets.

“My dear child,” said the old gentleman, moved by the warmth of Oliver’s appeal, “you need not be afraid of my deserting you.  I have been deceived before in people I have endeavored to benefit, but I feel strongly disposed to trust you, nevertheless; and I am more interested in your behalf than I can well account for.  Let me hear your story; speak the truth to me, and you shall not be friendless while I am alive.”