Toby Crackit and Sikes

Toby Crackit and Bill Sikes are criminal partners in Charles Dickens's Oliver Twist, bound by mutual self-interest, shared risk, and a volatile dynamic of dominance and dependence. Their partnership is defined by Sikes's brutal authority and Crackit's flashy but subordinate role, most prominently in the planning and execution of the Chertsey burglary, a scheme that ultimately unravels with catastrophic consequences for both men.

Nature of the Partnership

Toby Crackit and Bill Sikes operate as professional housebreakers, their relationship grounded in a pragmatic calculus of profit and survival rather than friendship or loyalty. Crackit is the more flamboyant of the two, described as a man of about the middle size, dressed in a smartly-cut snuff-coloured coat with large brass buttons, an orange neckerchief, and a coarse, staring shawl-pattern waistcoat. He wears his hair in long corkscrew curls and contemplates his top-boots with lively satisfaction. Sikes, by contrast, is a stoutly-built fellow of about five-and-thirty, in a black velveteen coat and very soiled drab breeches, with a broad heavy countenance and two scowling eyes, one of which displays various parti-coloured symptoms of having been recently damaged by a blow. Their partnership is mediated by Fagin, who acts as the fence and coordinator of their criminal enterprises. When Sikes and Crackit meet at the Three Cripples public-house, Sikes addresses Crackit with a familiar "Aha! my pal!" and Crackit responds with "Bill, my boy! I'm glad to see you." This surface cordiality masks a deeper tension: Sikes is the dominant partner, and Crackit knows his place.

The Chertsey Burglary: Planning and Execution

The most significant joint enterprise of Sikes and Crackit is the planned burglary of a house in Chertsey, which is discussed in detail at Sikes's lodgings. Fagin raises the subject, speaking of "the crib at Chertsey" and rubbing his hands in a rapture of anticipation over the plate he expects to steal. Sikes, however, reports that Crackit has been "hanging about the place for a fortnight" and cannot get any of the servants to cooperate. The old lady who owns the house has had her servants for twenty years, and even Crackit's attempts at disguise—wearing sham whiskers and a canary waistcoat, then trying mustachios and a pair of military trousers—have been of no use. Fagin, disappointed, fears "the game was up." But Sikes proposes an alternative: breaking in from the outside, for an extra fifty shiners. He reveals that he and Crackit were "over the garden-wall the night afore last, sounding the panels of the door and shutters" and have identified one part they can crack "safe and softly." The plan requires a boy small enough to enter through a window, and Sikes insists that Fagin provide one. When Nancy suggests Oliver Twist, Sikes agrees, noting that Oliver is "just the size I want." The burglary itself is executed with Crackit and Sikes working together. They arrive at a solitary, ruinous house near the river, where Crackit is already waiting, smoking a long clay pipe with his legs much higher than his head. He greets Sikes with "Bill, my boy! I'm glad to see you. I was almost afraid you'd given it up." When Oliver is presented, Crackit examines him with amusement, calling him "an inwalable boy" for the old ladies' pockets in chapels. The two men prepare for the job, equipping themselves with pistols, crowbars, centre-bits, and dark lanterns. Crackit climbs the wall of the target house in a twinkling, and Sikes hoists Oliver up to him. They work together to wrench open a shutter and force a lattice window, through which Oliver is sent to unlock the street door. When the alarm is raised and shots are fired, Sikes drags Oliver back through the window, and the two men flee across the fields with the wounded boy between them.

The Aftermath: Flight and Betrayal

After the failed burglary, the partnership fractures under the pressure of pursuit and fear. As they run, Sikes shouts at Crackit to "bear a hand with the boy" and "come back," but Crackit, making the best use of his long legs, is already ahead. When Sikes threatens him with a pistol, Crackit replies, "It's all up, Bill! Drop the kid, and show 'em your heels," and then "fairly turned tail, and darted off at full speed." Sikes is left alone with the wounded Oliver, whom he abandons in a ditch. Crackit later reappears at Fagin's den, having escaped the pursuit. He arrives disguised in a coarse smock-frock, with a large wrapper concealing the lower portion of his face. He is haggard, unwashed, and unshorn. When Fagin frantically demands news of Sikes and the boy, Crackit reports that "the crack failed," that they were fired upon and hit the boy, and that they cut over the fields "straight as the crow flies—through hedge and ditch." He describes how Sikes had the boy on his back and "scudded like the wind," but when they stopped to take him between them, his head hung down and he was cold. With the pursuers close upon their heels, they parted company, leaving the youngster lying in a ditch. "Alive or dead, that's all I know about him," Crackit concludes. Fagin, upon hearing this, rushes from the room in a frenzy. Crackit later appears at Jacob's Island, where he and Kags and Tom Chitling are hiding after the gang's collapse. When Sikes's dog arrives alone, Crackit is alarmed, and when Sikes himself appears, a ghost of his former self, Crackit reluctantly allows him to stay, but only after hesitation. The partnership, born of mutual interest, ends in mutual abandonment and fear.