The Birmingham age-herald., 1908-11-22
HE SEIZED Ills DOG bY THE COLLAR AND RAN fROn THE ROOh

 fully. dragged the boy to the house. Wielding his crowbar vigorously but noiselessly, he soon managed to open small lattice window just large enough for a diminutive boy to crawl through.
 Sikes told him in a whisper that he would be lifted in at the window and that he was to go straight to the front door and unlock it. You're in range of my shot all the wayl" said he. If you so much as stop a second, you'll fall dead that second"
 The next instant Oliver was swung through the window and lowered by the collar to the floor inside. With his legs trembling under him. he advanced, but almost insens.ble from terror though he was, he was determined not to open the door to the housebreakers, but to make an effort to dart upstairs and alarm the inmates.
 Come back! Back" cried Sikes aloud before Oliver had gone ten feet. There came a flash, loud noise, and he fell to the floor.
 Once more fate, that seemed on the point of abandoning him, had turned in his favor. The house which Sikes and Crackit had attempted to rob was inhab- ited by two women whose sympathy was enlisted the moment they saw the boy; and when Oliver recovered from his wound sufficiently to tell his story. they decided to keep and educate him.
 Olivers new friends were Mrs. Maylie, a wealthy old lady, and her companion Rose, who passed for her niece. Rose was little more than IT. cast in slight and exquisite mold and with a face as beautiful as 1t was pure and good. She became a great friend of Oliver and in the months of peace and simple quiet that followed she became his teacher as well as his friend, till he loved the very ground that she trod.
 As soon as Oliver was able to speak he had begged them to write to MT. Brown low, but that gentleman had gone abroad. That this, his first benefactor, should be left to believe him dishonest was the one sorrow that the lad felt now.
 When Sikes and Crackit returned with out the boy Fagins rage was so great
  bewilderment. They perceived othat he had a stronger reason for wanting the lad than merely his pretended fear that he would betray them. Of that, indeed, there was little danger, for Divers pro- tectors could not set the police on the track of his enemies without rendering him liable to arrest and examination as fn
 One night while Nancy was in the house alone Fagin entered quietly with a tall, dark faced. haggard man. whose eyes were deeply sunken and whose dissipated face was withered and worn like that of an old man, though he was evidently not more than 25 or 2e.
 The two went into room at the top of the house and Nancy followed silently They talked long while, and when they were done Nancy had learned something that awoke anew in her the one last poor remnant of better feeling that had fared up when she rescued Oliver from the beating Degraded, lost, miserable, this melancholy shade of life still had in her distorted soul touch of what God plants in all His creatures.
 Late that night she appeared at the hotel where the Maylies were lodging and asked for Miss Rose Maylie. Hurriedly she explained that she had heard her name and address mentioned that night and then she went on wildly to tell her story.
 The dark man who had conferred with Fagin. she said, was a man who passed under the name of Monks. Until that night she hod not known what his busi- ness with Fagin was Her curiosity had | led her to a strange discovery. Monks had referred to Oliver Twist as his brother, and he and Fagin had dis cussed the failure of ther plans to make thief of him, which Monks, for some reason, seemed bent on accomplishing. It appeared from his talk that he had seen Oliver accidentally when he was taken to the police office, and struck by his resem- blance to his father, had traced him back to the workhouse.
 He had learned that the ring and the loc]<et stolen by the old hag, had been recovered by the matron of the place, who had since married Rumble. By brib- ing the precious couple he had obtained the trinkets and had dropped them into the rivr.s
 ''So the only proofs of the boys iden- tity lie at the bottom of the river" said he.
 As he went on, said Nancy, he became quite violent. Indeed, he had some sort of fit. He said something about will. and cried: Though I suppose have his