“What do you think of the old ladies?” asked the Jew. “There’s a good deal of money made in snatching their bags and parcels, and running round the corner.”
“Don’t they holler out a good deal, and scratch sometimes?” asked Noah, shaking his head. “I don’t think that would answer my purpose. Ain’t there any other line open?”
“Stop,” said the Jew, laying his hand on Noah’s knee. “The kinchin lay.”
“What’s that?” demanded Mr. Claypole.
“The kinchins, my dear,” said the Jew, “is the young children that’s sent on errands by their mothers, with sixpences and shillings, and the lay is just to take their money away—they’ve always got it ready in their hands,—and then knock ’em into the kennel, and walk off very slow, as if there was nothing else the matter but a child fallen down and hurt itself. Ha! ha! ha!”
“Ha! ha!” roared Mr. Claypole, kicking up his legs in an ecstasy. “Lord, that’s the very thing!”
“To be sure it is,” replied Fagin; “and you can have a few good beats chalked out in Camden-town, and Battle-bridge, and neighbourhoods like that, where they’re always going errands, and upset as many kinchins as you want any hour in the day. Ha! ha! ha!”
With this Fagin poked Mr. Claypole in the side, and they joined in a burst of laughter both long and loud.
“Well, that’s all right!” said Noah, when he had recovered himself, and Charlotte had returned. “What time to-morrow shall we say?”