The Old Curiosity Shop

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Title: The Old Curiosity Shop
Author: Charles Dickens
Release Date: March 7, 2008 [EBook #700]
Last Updated: September 25, 2016
Language: English
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*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE OLD CURIOSITY SHOP ***
The Old Curiosity Shop
By Charles Dickens
CHAPTER 1
Although I am an old man, night is generally my time for walking. In the
summer I often leave home early in the morning, and roam about fields
and lanes all day, or even escape for days or weeks together; but,
saving in the country, I seldom go out until after dark, though, Heaven
be thanked, I love its light and feel the cheerfulness it sheds upon the
earth, as much as any creature living.
I have fallen insensibly into this habit, both because it favours my
infirmity and because it affords me greater opportunity of speculating
on the characters and occupations of those who fill the streets. The
glare and hurry of broad noon are not adapted to idle pursuits like
mine; a glimpse of passing faces caught by the light of a street-lamp
or a shop window is often better for my purpose than their full
revelation in the daylight; and, if I must add the truth, night is
kinder in this respect than day, which too often destroys an air-built
castle at the moment of its completion, without the least ceremony or
remorse.
That constant pacing to and fro, that never-ending restlessness, that
incessant tread of feet wearing the rough stones smooth and glossy--is
it not a wonder how the dwellers in narrows ways can bear to hear it!
Think of a sick man in such a place as Saint Martin’s Court, listening
to the footsteps, and in the midst of pain and weariness obliged,
despite himself (as though it were a task he must perform) to detect
the child’s step from the man’s, the slipshod beggar from the booted
exquisite, the lounging from the busy, the dull heel of the sauntering
outcast from the quick tread of an expectant pleasure-seeker--think of
the hum and noise always being present to his sense, and of the stream
of life that will not stop, pouring on, on, on, through all his
restless dreams, as if he were condemned to lie, dead but conscious, in
a noisy churchyard, and had no hope of rest for centuries to come.
Then, the crowds forever passing and repassing on the bridges (on
those which are free of toll at least), where many stop on fine evenings
looking listlessly down upon the water with some vague idea that by and
by it runs between green banks which grow wider and wider until at last
it joins the broad vast sea--where some halt to rest from heavy loads
and think as they look over the parapet that to smoke and lounge away
one’s life, and lie sleeping in the sun upon a hot tarpaulin, in a
dull, slow, sluggish barge, must be happiness unalloyed--and where
some, and a very different class, pause with heavier loads than they,
remembering to have heard or read in old time that drowning was not a
hard death, but of all means of suicide the easiest and best.
Covent Garden Market at sunrise too, in the spring or summer, when the
fragrance of sweet flowers is in the air, over-powering even the
unwholesome streams of last night’s debauchery, and driving the dusky
thrush, whose cage has hung outside a garret window all night long,
half mad with joy! Poor bird! the only neighbouring thing at all akin
to the other little captives, some of whom, shrinking from the hot
hands of drunken purchasers, lie drooping on the path already, while
others, soddened by close contact, await the time when they shall be
watered and freshened up to please more sober company, and make old
clerks who pass them on their road to business, wonder what has filled
their breasts with visions of the country.
But my present purpose is not to expatiate upon my walks. The story I
am about to relate, and to which I shall recur at intervals, arose out
of one of these rambles; and thus I have been led to speak of them by
way of preface.
One night I had roamed into the City, and was walking slowly on in my
usual way, musing upon a great many things, when I was arrested by an
inquiry, the purport of which did not reach me, but which seemed to be
addressed to myself, and was preferred in a soft sweet voice that
struck me very pleasantly. I turned hastily round and found at my elbow
a pretty little girl, who begged to be directed to a certain street at
a considerable distance, and indeed in quite another quarter of the
town.
‘It is a very long way from here,’ said I, ‘my child.’
‘I know that, sir,’ she replied timidly. ‘I am afraid it is a very long
way, for I came from there to-night.’
‘Alone?’ said I, in some surprise.
‘Oh, yes, I don’t mind that, but I am a little frightened now, for I
had lost my road.’
‘And what made you ask it of me? Suppose I should tell you wrong?’
‘I am sure you will not do that,’ said the little creature,’ you are
such a very old gentleman, and walk so slow yourself.’
I cannot describe how much I was impressed by this appeal and the
energy with which it was made, which brought a tear into the child’s
clear eye, and made her slight figure tremble as she looked up into my
face.
‘Come,’ said I, ‘I’ll take you there.’
She put her hand in mine as confidingly as if she had known me from her
cradle, and we trudged away together; the little creature accommodating
her pace to mine, and rather seeming to lead and take care of me than I
to be protecting her. I observed that every now and then she stole a
curious look at my face, as if to make quite sure that I was not
deceiving her, and that these glances (very sharp and keen they were
too) seemed to increase her confidence at every repetition.
For my part, my curiosity and interest were at least equal to the
child’s, for child she certainly was, although I thought it probably
from what I could make out, that her very small and delicate frame
imparted a peculiar youthfulness to her appearance. Though more
scantily attired than she might have been she was dressed with perfect
neatness, and betrayed no marks of poverty or neglect.
‘Who has sent you so far by yourself?’ said I.
‘Someone who is very kind to me, sir.’
‘And what have you been doing?’
‘That, I must not tell,’ said the child firmly.
There was something in the manner of this reply which caused me to look
at the little creature with an involuntary expression of surprise; for
I wondered what kind of errand it might be that occasioned her to be
prepared for questioning. Her quick eye seemed to read my thoughts, for
as it met mine she added that there was no harm in what she had been
doing, but it was a great secret--a secret which she did not even know
herself.
This was said with no appearance of cunning or deceit, but with an
unsuspicious frankness that bore the impress of truth. She walked on as
before, growing more familiar with me as we proceeded and talking
cheerfully by the way, but she said no more about her home, beyond
remarking that we were going quite a new road and asking if it were a
short one.
While we were thus engaged, I revolved in my mind a hundred different
explanations of the riddle and rejected them every one. I really felt
ashamed to take advantage of the ingenuousness or grateful feeling of
the child for the purpose of gratifying my curiosity. I love these
little people; and it is not a slight thing when they, who are so fresh
from God, love us. As I had felt pleased at first by her confidence I
determined to deserve it, and to do credit to the nature which had
prompted her to repose it in me.
There was no reason, however, why I should refrain from seeing the
person who had inconsiderately sent her to so great a distance by night
and alone, and as it was not improbable that if she found herself near
home she might take farewell of me and deprive me of the opportunity, I
avoided the most frequented ways and took the most intricate, and thus
it was not until we arrived in the street itself that she knew where we
were. Clapping her hands with pleasure and running on before me for a
short distance, my little acquaintance stopped at a door and remaining
on the step till I came up knocked at it when I joined her.
A part of this door was of glass unprotected by any shutter, which I
did not observe at first, for all was very dark and silent within, and
I was anxious (as indeed the child was also) for an answer to our
summons. When she had knocked twice or thrice there was a noise as if
some person were moving inside, and at length a faint light appeared
through the glass which, as it approached very slowly, the bearer
having to make his way through a great many scattered articles, enabled
me to see both what kind of person it was who advanced and what kind of
place it was through which he came.
It was an old man with long grey hair, whose face and figure as he held
the light above his head and looked before him as he approached, I
could plainly see. Though much altered by age, I fancied I could
recognize in his spare and slender form something of that delicate
mould which I had noticed in the child. Their bright blue eyes were
certainly alike, but his face was so deeply furrowed and so very full
of care, that here all resemblance ceased.
The place through which he made his way at leisure was one of those
receptacles for old and curious things which seem to crouch in odd
corners of this town and to hide their musty treasures from the public
eye in jealousy and distrust. There were suits of mail standing like
ghosts in armour here and there, fantastic carvings brought from
monkish cloisters, rusty weapons of various kinds, distorted figures in
china and wood and iron and ivory: tapestry and strange furniture that
might have been designed in dreams. The haggard aspect of the little
old man was wonderfully suited to the place; he might have groped among
old churches and tombs and deserted houses and gathered all the spoils
with his own hands. There was nothing in the whole collection but was
in keeping with himself nothing that looked older or more worn than he.
As he turned the key in the lock, he surveyed me with some astonishment
which was not diminished when he looked from me to my companion. The
door being opened, the child addressed him as grandfather, and told him
the little story of our companionship.
‘Why, bless thee, child,’ said the old man, patting her on the head,
‘how couldst thou miss thy way? What if I had lost thee, Nell!’
‘I would have found my way back to YOU, grandfather,’ said the child
boldly; ‘never fear.’
The old man kissed her, then turning to me and begging me to walk in, I
did so. The door was closed and locked. Preceding me with the light, he
led me through the place I had already seen from without, into a small
sitting-room behind, in which was another door opening into a kind of
closet, where I saw a little bed that a fairy might have slept in, it
looked so very small and was so prettily arranged. The child took a
candle and tripped into this little room, leaving the old man and me
together.
‘You must be tired, sir,’ said he as he placed a chair near the fire,
‘how can I thank you?’
‘By taking more care of your grandchild another time, my good friend,’
I replied.
‘More care!’ said the old man in a shrill voice, ‘more care of Nelly!
Why, who ever loved a child as I love Nell?’
He said this with such evident surprise that I was perplexed what
answer to make, and the more so because coupled with something feeble
and wandering in his manner, there were in his face marks of deep and
anxious thought which convinced me that he could not be, as I had been
at first inclined to suppose, in a state of dotage or imbecility.
‘I don’t think you consider--’ I began.
‘I don’t consider!’ cried the old man interrupting me, ‘I don’t
consider her! Ah, how little you know of the truth! Little Nelly,
little Nelly!’
It would be impossible for any man, I care not what his form of speech
might be, to express more affection than the dealer in curiosities did,
in these four words. I waited for him to speak again, but he rested his
chin upon his hand and shaking his head twice or thrice fixed his eyes
upon the fire.
While we were sitting thus in silence, the door of the closet opened,
and the child returned, her light brown hair hanging loose about her
neck, and her face flushed with the haste she had made to rejoin us.
She busied herself immediately in preparing supper, and while she was
thus engaged I remarked that the old man took an opportunity of
observing me more closely than he had done yet. I was surprised to see
that all this time everything was done by the child, and that there
appeared to be no other persons but ourselves in the house. I took
advantage of a moment when she was absent to venture a hint on this
point, to which the old man replied that there were few grown persons
as trustworthy or as careful as she.
‘It always grieves me,’ I observed, roused by what I took to be his
selfishness, ‘it always grieves me to contemplate the initiation of
children into the ways of life, when they are scarcely more than
infants. It checks their confidence and simplicity--two of the best
qualities that Heaven gives them--and demands that they share our
sorrows before they are capable of entering into our enjoyments.’
‘It will never check hers,’ said the old man looking steadily at me,
‘the springs are too deep. Besides, the children of the poor know but
few pleasures. Even the cheap delights of childhood must be bought and
paid for.’
‘But--forgive me for saying this--you are surely not so very
poor’--said I.
‘She is not my child, sir,’ returned the old man. ‘Her mother was, and
she was poor. I save nothing--not a penny--though I live as you see,
but’--he laid his hand upon my arm and leant forward to whisper--‘she
shall be rich one of these days, and a fine lady. Don’t you think ill
of me because I use her help. She gives it cheerfully as you see, and
it would break her heart if she knew that I suffered anybody else to do
for me what her little hands could undertake. I don’t consider!’--he
cried with sudden querulousness, ‘why, God knows that this one child is
the thought and object of my life, and yet he never prospers me--no,
never!’
At this juncture, the subject of our conversation again returned, and
the old man motioning to me to approach the table, broke off, and said
no more.
We had scarcely begun our repast when there was a knock at the door by
which I had entered, and Nell bursting into a hearty laugh, which I was
rejoiced to hear, for it was childlike and full of hilarity, said it
was no doubt dear old Kit coming back at last.
‘Foolish Nell!’ said the old man fondling with her hair. ‘She always
laughs at poor Kit.’
The child laughed again more heartily than before, and I could not help
smiling from pure sympathy. The little old man took up a candle and
went to open the door. When he came back, Kit was at his heels.
Kit was a shock-headed, shambling, awkward lad with an uncommonly wide
mouth, very red cheeks, a turned-up nose, and certainly the most
comical expression of face I ever saw. He stopped short at the door on
seeing a stranger, twirled in his hand a perfectly round old hat
without any vestige of a brim, and resting himself now on one leg and
now on the other and changing them constantly, stood in the doorway,
looking into the parlour with the most extraordinary leer I ever
beheld. I entertained a grateful feeling towards the boy from that
minute, for I felt that he was the comedy of the child’s life.
‘A long way, wasn’t it, Kit?’ said the little old man.
‘Why, then, it was a goodish stretch, master,’ returned Kit.
‘Of course you have come back hungry?’
‘Why, then, I do consider myself rather so, master,’ was the answer.
The lad had a remarkable manner of standing sideways as he spoke, and
thrusting his head forward over his shoulder, as if he could not get at
his voice without that accompanying action. I think he would have
amused one anywhere, but the child’s exquisite enjoyment of his oddity,
and the relief it was to find that there was something she associated
with merriment in a place that appeared so unsuited to her, were quite
irresistible. It was a great point too that Kit himself was flattered
by the sensation he created, and after several efforts to preserve his
gravity, burst into a loud roar, and so stood with his mouth wide open
and his eyes nearly shut, laughing violently.
The old man had again relapsed into his former abstraction and took no
notice of what passed, but I remarked that when her laugh was over, the
child’s bright eyes were dimmed with tears, called forth by the
fullness of heart with which she welcomed her uncouth favourite after
the little anxiety of the night. As for Kit himself (whose laugh had
been all the time one of that sort which very little would change into
a cry) he carried a large slice of bread and meat and a mug of beer
into a corner, and applied himself to disposing of them with great
voracity.
‘Ah!’ said the old man turning to me with a sigh, as if I had spoken to
him but that moment, ‘you don’t know what you say when you tell me that
I don’t consider her.’
‘You must not attach too great weight to a remark founded on first
appearances, my friend,’ said I.
‘No,’ returned the old man thoughtfully, ‘no. Come hither, Nell.’
The little girl hastened from her seat, and put her arm about his neck.
‘Do I love thee, Nell?’ said he. ‘Say--do I love thee, Nell, or no?’
The child only answered by her caresses, and laid her head upon his
breast.
‘Why dost thou sob?’ said the grandfather, pressing her closer to him
and glancing towards me. ‘Is it because thou know’st I love thee, and
dost not like that I should seem to doubt it by my question? Well,
well--then let us say I love thee dearly.’
‘Indeed, indeed you do,’ replied the child with great earnestness, ‘Kit
knows you do.’
Kit, who in despatching his bread and meat had been swallowing
two-thirds of his knife at every mouthful with the coolness of a
juggler, stopped short in his operations on being thus appealed to, and
bawled ‘Nobody isn’t such a fool as to say he doosn’t,’ after which he
incapacitated himself for further conversation by taking a most
prodigious sandwich at one bite.
‘She is poor now’--said the old man, patting the child’s cheek, ‘but I
say again that the time is coming when she shall be rich. It has been a
long time coming, but it must come at last; a very long time, but it
surely must come. It has come to other men who do nothing but waste and
riot. When WILL it come to me!’
‘I am very happy as I am, grandfather,’ said the child.
‘Tush, tush!’ returned the old man, ‘thou dost not know--how should’st
thou!’ then he muttered again between his teeth, ‘The time must come, I
am very sure it must. It will be all the better for coming late’; and
then he sighed and fell into his former musing state, and still holding
the child between his knees appeared to be insensible to everything
around him. By this time it wanted but a few minutes of midnight and I
rose to go, which recalled him to himself.
‘One moment, sir,’ he said, ‘Now, Kit--near midnight, boy, and you
still here! Get home, get home, and be true to your time in the
morning, for there’s work to do. Good night! There, bid him good night,
Nell, and let him be gone!’
‘Good night, Kit,’ said the child, her eyes lighting up with merriment
and kindness.
‘Good night, Miss Nell,’ returned the boy.
‘And thank this gentleman,’ interposed the old man, ‘but for whose care
I might have lost my little girl to-night.’
‘No, no, master,’ said Kit, ‘that won’t do, that won’t.’
‘What do you mean?’ cried the old man.
‘I’d have found her, master,’ said Kit, ‘I’d have found her. I’ll bet
that I’d find her if she was above ground, I would, as quick as
anybody, master. Ha, ha, ha!’
Once more opening his mouth and shutting his eyes, and laughing like a
stentor, Kit gradually backed to the door, and roared himself out.
Free of the room, the boy was not slow in taking his departure; when he
had gone, and the child was occupied in clearing the table, the old man
said:
‘I haven’t seemed to thank you, sir, for what you have done to-night,
but I do thank you humbly and heartily, and so does she, and her thanks
are better worth than mine. I should be sorry that you went away, and
thought I was unmindful of your goodness, or careless of her--I am not
indeed.’
I was sure of that, I said, from what I had seen. ‘But,’ I added, ‘may
I ask you a question?’
‘Ay, sir,’ replied the old man, ‘What is it?’
‘This delicate child,’ said I, ‘with so much beauty and
intelligence--has she nobody to care for her but you? Has she no other
companion or advisor?’
‘No,’ he returned, looking anxiously in my face, ‘no, and she wants no
other.’
‘But are you not fearful,’ said I, ‘that you may misunderstand a charge
so tender? I am sure you mean well, but are you quite certain that you
know how to execute such a trust as this? I am an old man, like you,
and I am actuated by an old man’s concern in all that is young and
promising. Do you not think that what I have seen of you and this
little creature to-night must have an interest not wholly free from
pain?’
‘Sir,’ rejoined the old man after a moment’s silence. ‘I have no right
to feel hurt at what you say. It is true that in many respects I am the
child, and she the grown person--that you have seen already. But waking
or sleeping, by night or day, in sickness or health, she is the one
object of my care, and if you knew of how much care, you would look on
me with different eyes, you would indeed. Ah! It’s a weary life for an
old man--a weary, weary life--but there is a great end to gain and that
I keep before me.’
Seeing that he was in a state of excitement and impatience, I turned to
put on an outer coat which I had thrown off on entering the room,
purposing to say no more. I was surprised to see the child standing
patiently by with a cloak upon her arm, and in her hand a hat, and
stick.
‘Those are not mine, my dear,’ said I.
‘No,’ returned the child, ‘they are grandfather’s.’
‘But he is not going out to-night.’
‘Oh, yes, he is,’ said the child, with a smile.
‘And what becomes of you, my pretty one?’
‘Me! I stay here of course. I always do.’
I looked in astonishment towards the old man, but he was, or feigned to
be, busied in the arrangement of his dress. From him I looked back to
the slight gentle figure of the child. Alone! In that gloomy place all
the long, dreary night.
She evinced no consciousness of my surprise, but cheerfully helped the
old man with his cloak, and when he was ready took a candle to light us
out. Finding that we did not follow as she expected, she looked back
with a smile and waited for us. The old man showed by his face that he
plainly understood the cause of my hesitation, but he merely signed to
me with an inclination of the head to pass out of the room before him,
and remained silent. I had no resource but to comply.
When we reached the door, the child setting down the candle, turned to
say good night and raised her face to kiss me. Then she ran to the old
man, who folded her in his arms and bade God bless her.
‘Sleep soundly, Nell,’ he said in a low voice, ‘and angels guard thy
bed! Do not forget thy prayers, my sweet.’
‘No, indeed,’ answered the child fervently, ‘they make me feel so
happy!’
‘That’s well; I know they do; they should,’ said the old man. ‘Bless
thee a hundred times! Early in the morning I shall be home.’
‘You’ll not ring twice,’ returned the child. ‘The bell wakes me, even
in the middle of a dream.’
With this, they separated. The child opened the door (now guarded by a
shutter which I had heard the boy put up before he left the house) and
with another farewell whose clear and tender note I have recalled a
thousand times, held it until we had passed out. The old man paused a
moment while it was gently closed and fastened on the inside, and
satisfied that this was done, walked on at a slow pace. At the
street-corner he stopped, and regarding me with a troubled countenance
said that our ways were widely different and that he must take his
leave. I would have spoken, but summoning up more alacrity than might
have been expected in one of his appearance, he hurried away. I could
see that twice or thrice he looked back as if to ascertain if I were
still watching him, or perhaps to assure himself that I was not
following at a distance. The obscurity of the night favoured his
disappearance, and his figure was soon beyond my sight.
I remained standing on the spot where he had left me, unwilling to
depart, and yet unknowing why I should loiter there. I looked wistfully
into the street we had lately quitted, and after a time directed my
steps that way. I passed and repassed the house, and stopped and
listened at the door; all was dark, and silent as the grave.
Yet I lingered about, and could not tear myself away, thinking of all
possible harm that might happen to the child--of fires and robberies
and even murder--and feeling as if some evil must ensue if I turned my
back upon the place. The closing of a door or window in the street
brought me before the curiosity-dealer’s once more; I crossed the road
and looked up at the house to assure myself that the noise had not come
from there. No, it was black, cold, and lifeless as before.
There were few passengers astir; the street was sad and dismal, and
pretty well my own. A few stragglers from the theatres hurried by, and
now and then I turned aside to avoid some noisy drunkard as he reeled
homewards, but these interruptions were not frequent and soon ceased.
The clocks struck one. Still I paced up and down, promising myself that
every time should be the last, and breaking faith with myself on some
new plea as often as I did so.
The more I thought of what the old man had said, and of his looks and
bearing, the less I could account for what I had seen and heard. I had
a strong misgiving that his nightly absence was for no good purpose. I
had only come to know the fact through the innocence of the child, and
though the old man was by at the time, and saw my undisguised surprise,
he had preserved a strange mystery upon the subject and offered no word
of explanation. These reflections naturally recalled again more
strongly than before his haggard face, his wandering manner, his
restless anxious looks. His affection for the child might not be
inconsistent with villany of the worst kind; even that very affection
was in itself an extraordinary contradiction, or how could he leave her
thus? Disposed as I was to think badly of him, I never doubted that his
love for her was real. I could not admit the thought, remembering what
had passed between us, and the tone of voice in which he had called her
by her name.
‘Stay here of course,’ the child had said in answer to my question, ‘I
always do!’ What could take him from home by night, and every night! I
called up all the strange tales I had ever heard of dark and secret
deeds committed in great towns and escaping detection for a long series
of years; wild as many of these stories were, I could not find one
adapted to this mystery, which only became the more impenetrable, in
proportion as I sought to solve it.
Occupied with such thoughts as these, and a crowd of others all tending
to the same point, I continued to pace the street for two long hours;
at length the rain began to descend heavily, and then over-powered by
fatigue though no less interested than I had been at first, I engaged
the nearest coach and so got home. A cheerful fire was blazing on the
hearth, the lamp burnt brightly, my clock received me with its old
familiar welcome; everything was quiet, warm and cheering, and in happy
contrast to the gloom and darkness I had quitted.
But all that night, waking or in my sleep, the same thoughts recurred
and the same images retained possession of my brain. I had ever before
me the old dark murky rooms--the gaunt suits of mail with their ghostly
silent air--the faces all awry, grinning from wood and stone--the dust
and rust and worm that lives in wood--and alone in the midst of all
this lumber and decay and ugly age, the beautiful child in her gentle
slumber, smiling through her light and sunny dreams.
CHAPTER 2
After combating, for nearly a week, the feeling which impelled me to
revisit the place I had quitted under the circumstances already
detailed, I yielded to it at length; and determining that this time I
would present myself by the light of day, bent my steps thither early
in the morning.
I walked past the house, and took several turns in the street, with
that kind of hesitation which is natural to a man who is conscious that
the visit he is about to pay is unexpected, and may not be very
acceptable. However, as the door of the shop was shut, and it did not
appear likely that I should be recognized by those within, if I
continued merely to pass up and down before it, I soon conquered this
irresolution, and found myself in the Curiosity Dealer’s warehouse.
The old man and another person were together in the back part, and
there seemed to have been high words between them, for their voices
which were raised to a very high pitch suddenly stopped on my entering,
and the old man advancing hastily towards me, said in a tremulous tone
that he was very glad I had come.
‘You interrupted us at a critical moment,’ said he, pointing to the man
whom I had found in company with him; ‘this fellow will murder me one
of these days. He would have done so, long ago, if he had dared.’
‘Bah! You would swear away my life if you could,’ returned the other,
after bestowing a stare and a frown on me; ‘we all know that!’
‘I almost think I could,’ cried the old man, turning feebly upon him.
‘If oaths, or prayers, or words, could rid me of you, they should. I
would be quit of you, and would be relieved if you were dead.’
‘I know it,’ returned the other. ‘I said so, didn’t I? But neither
oaths, or prayers, nor words, WILL kill me, and therefore I live, and
mean to live.’
‘And his mother died!’ cried the old man, passionately clasping his
hands and looking upward; ‘and this is Heaven’s justice!’
The other stood lounging with his foot upon a chair, and regarded him
with a contemptuous sneer. He was a young man of one-and-twenty or
thereabouts; well made, and certainly handsome, though the expression
of his face was far from prepossessing, having in common with his
manner and even his dress, a dissipated, insolent air which repelled
one.
‘Justice or no justice,’ said the young fellow, ‘here I am and here I
shall stop till such time as I think fit to go, unless you send for
assistance to put me out--which you won’t do, I know. I tell you again
that I want to see my sister.’
‘YOUR sister!’ said the old man bitterly.
‘Ah! You can’t change the relationship,’ returned the other. ‘If you
could, you’d have done it long ago. I want to see my sister, that you
keep cooped up here, poisoning her mind with your sly secrets and
pretending an affection for her that you may work her to death, and add
a few scraped shillings every week to the money you can hardly count. I
want to see her; and I will.’
‘Here’s a moralist to talk of poisoned minds! Here’s a generous spirit
to scorn scraped-up shillings!’ cried the old man, turning from him to
me. ‘A profligate, sir, who has forfeited every claim not only upon
those who have the misfortune to be of his blood, but upon society
which knows nothing of him but his misdeeds. A liar too,’ he added, in
a lower voice as he drew closer to me, ‘who knows how dear she is to
me, and seeks to wound me even there, because there is a stranger
nearby.’
‘Strangers are nothing to me, grandfather,’ said the young fellow
catching at the word, ‘nor I to them, I hope. The best they can do, is
to keep an eye to their business and leave me to mine. There’s a friend
of mine waiting outside, and as it seems that I may have to wait some
time, I’ll call him in, with your leave.’
Saying this, he stepped to the door, and looking down the street
beckoned several times to some unseen person, who, to judge from the
air of impatience with which these signals were accompanied, required a
great quantity of persuasion to induce him to advance. At length there
sauntered up, on the opposite side of the way--with a bad pretense of
passing by accident--a figure conspicuous for its dirty smartness,
which after a great many frowns and jerks of the head, in resistance of
the invitation, ultimately crossed the road and was brought into the
shop.
‘There. It’s Dick Swiveller,’ said the young fellow, pushing him in.
‘Sit down, Swiveller.’
‘But is the old min agreeable?’ said Mr Swiveller in an undertone.
Mr Swiveller complied, and looking about him with a propitiatory smile,
observed that last week was a fine week for the ducks, and this week
was a fine week for the dust; he also observed that whilst standing by
the post at the street-corner, he had observed a pig with a straw in
his mouth issuing out of the tobacco-shop, from which appearance he
augured that another fine week for the ducks was approaching, and that
rain would certainly ensue. He furthermore took occasion to apologize
for any negligence that might be perceptible in his dress, on the
ground that last night he had had ‘the sun very strong in his eyes’; by
which expression he was understood to convey to his hearers in the most
delicate manner possible, the information that he had been extremely
drunk.
‘But what,’ said Mr Swiveller with a sigh, ‘what is the odds so long as
the fire of soul is kindled at the taper of conwiviality, and the wing
of friendship never moults a feather! What is the odds so long as the
spirit is expanded by means of rosy wine, and the present moment is the
least happiest of our existence!’
‘You needn’t act the chairman here,’ said his friend, half aside.
‘Fred!’ cried Mr Swiveller, tapping his nose, ‘a word to the wise is
sufficient for them--we may be good and happy without riches, Fred.
Say not another syllable. I know my cue; smart is the word. Only one
little whisper, Fred--is the old min friendly?’
‘Never you mind,’ replied his friend.
‘Right again, quite right,’ said Mr Swiveller, ‘caution is the word,
and caution is the act.’ with that, he winked as if in preservation of
some deep secret, and folding his arms and leaning back in his chair,
looked up at the ceiling with profound gravity.
It was perhaps not very unreasonable to suspect from what had already
passed, that Mr Swiveller was not quite recovered from the effects of
the powerful sunlight to which he had made allusion; but if no such
suspicion had been awakened by his speech, his wiry hair, dull eyes,
and sallow face would still have been strong witnesses against him. His
attire was not, as he had himself hinted, remarkable for the nicest
arrangement, but was in a state of disorder which strongly induced the
idea that he had gone to bed in it. It consisted of a brown body-coat
with a great many brass buttons up the front and only one behind, a
bright check neckerchief, a plaid waistcoat, soiled white trousers, and
a very limp hat, worn with the wrong side foremost, to hide a hole in
the brim. The breast of his coat was ornamented with an outside pocket
from which there peeped forth the cleanest end of a very large and very
ill-favoured handkerchief; his dirty wristbands were pulled on as far
as possible and ostentatiously folded back over his cuffs; he displayed
no gloves, and carried a yellow cane having at the top a bone hand with
the semblance of a ring on its little finger and a black ball in its
grasp. With all these personal advantages (to which may be added a
strong savour of tobacco-smoke, and a prevailing greasiness of
appearance) Mr Swiveller leant back in his chair with his eyes fixed on
the ceiling, and occasionally pitching his voice to the needful key,
obliged the company with a few bars of an intensely dismal air, and
then, in the middle of a note, relapsed into his former silence.
The old man sat himself down in a chair, and with folded hands, looked
sometimes at his grandson and sometimes at his strange companion, as if
he were utterly powerless and had no resource but to leave them to do
as they pleased. The young man reclined against a table at no great
distance from his friend, in apparent indifference to everything that
had passed; and I--who felt the difficulty of any interference,
notwithstanding that the old man had appealed to me, both by words and
looks--made the best feint I could of being occupied in examining some
of the goods that were disposed for sale, and paying very little
attention to a person before me.
The silence was not of long duration, for Mr Swiveller, after favouring
us with several melodious assurances that his heart was in the
Highlands, and that he wanted but his Arab steed as a preliminary to
the achievement of great feats of valour and loyalty, removed his eyes
from the ceiling and subsided into prose again.
‘Fred,’ said Mr Swiveller stopping short, as if the idea had suddenly
occurred to him, and speaking in the same audible whisper as before,
‘is the old min friendly?’
‘What does it matter?’ returned his friend peevishly.
‘No, but IS he?’ said Dick.
‘Yes, of course. What do I care whether he is or not?’
Emboldened as it seemed by this reply to enter into a more general
conversation, Mr Swiveller plainly laid himself out to captivate our
attention.
He began by remarking that soda-water, though a good thing in the
abstract, was apt to lie cold upon the stomach unless qualified with
ginger, or a small infusion of brandy, which latter article he held to
be preferable in all cases, saving for the one consideration of
expense. Nobody venturing to dispute these positions, he proceeded to
observe that the human hair was a great retainer of tobacco-smoke, and
that the young gentlemen of Westminster and Eton, after eating vast
quantities of apples to conceal any scent of cigars from their anxious
friends, were usually detected in consequence of their heads possessing
this remarkable property; when he concluded that if the Royal Society
would turn their attention to the circumstance, and endeavour to find
in the resources of science a means of preventing such untoward
revelations, they might indeed be looked upon as benefactors to
mankind. These opinions being equally incontrovertible with those he
had already pronounced, he went on to inform us that Jamaica rum,
though unquestionably an agreeable spirit of great richness and
flavour, had the drawback of remaining constantly present to the taste
next day; and nobody being venturous enough to argue this point either,
he increased in confidence and became yet more companionable and
communicative.
‘It’s a devil of a thing, gentlemen,’ said Mr Swiveller, ‘when
relations fall out and disagree. If the wing of friendship should never
moult a feather, the wing of relationship should never be clipped, but
be always expanded and serene. Why should a grandson and grandfather
peg away at each other with mutual wiolence when all might be bliss and
concord. Why not jine hands and forgit it?’
‘Hold your tongue,’ said his friend.
‘Sir,’ replied Mr Swiveller, ‘don’t you interrupt the chair.
Gentlemen, how does the case stand, upon the present occasion? Here is
a jolly old grandfather--I say it with the utmost respect--and here is
a wild, young grandson. The jolly old grandfather says to the wild
young grandson, “I have brought you up and educated you, Fred; I have
put you in the way of getting on in life; you have bolted a little out
of course, as young fellows often do; and you shall never have another
chance, nor the ghost of half a one.” The wild young grandson makes
answer to this and says, “You’re as rich as rich can be; you have been
at no uncommon expense on my account, you’re saving up piles of money
for my little sister that lives with you in a secret, stealthy,
hugger-muggering kind of way and with no manner of enjoyment--why can’t
you stand a trifle for your grown-up relation?” The jolly old
grandfather unto this, retorts, not only that he declines to fork out
with that cheerful readiness which is always so agreeable and pleasant
in a gentleman of his time of life, but that he will bow up, and call
names, and make reflections whenever they meet. Then the plain question
is, an’t it a pity that this state of things should continue, and how
much better would it be for the gentleman to hand over a reasonable
amount of tin, and make it all right and comfortable?’
Having delivered this oration with a great many waves and flourishes of
the hand, Mr Swiveller abruptly thrust the head of his cane into his
mouth as if to prevent himself from impairing the effect of his speech
by adding one other word.
‘Why do you hunt and persecute me, God help me!’ said the old man
turning to his grandson. ‘Why do you bring your prolifigate companions
here? How often am I to tell you that my life is one of care and
self-denial, and that I am poor?’
‘How often am I to tell you,’ returned the other, looking coldly at
him, ‘that I know better?’
‘You have chosen your own path,’ said the old man. ‘Follow it. Leave
Nell and me to toil and work.’
‘Nell will be a woman soon,’ returned the other, ‘and, bred in your
faith, she’ll forget her brother unless he shows himself sometimes.’
‘Take care,’ said the old man with sparkling eyes, ‘that she does not
forget you when you would have her memory keenest. Take care that the
day don’t come when you walk barefoot in the streets, and she rides by
in a gay carriage of her own.’
‘You mean when she has your money?’ retorted the other. ‘How like a
poor man he talks!’
‘And yet,’ said the old man dropping his voice and speaking like one
who thinks aloud, ‘how poor we are, and what a life it is! The cause is
a young child’s guiltless of all harm or wrong, but nothing goes well
with it! Hope and patience, hope and patience!’
These words were uttered in too low a tone to reach the ears of the
young men. Mr Swiveller appeared to think that they implied some mental
struggle consequent upon the powerful effect of his address, for he
poked his friend with his cane and whispered his conviction that he had
administered ‘a clincher,’ and that he expected a commission on the
profits. Discovering his mistake after a while, he appeared to grow
rather sleepy and discontented, and had more than once suggested the
propriety of an immediate departure, when the door opened, and the
child herself appeared.
CHAPTER 3
The child was closely followed by an elderly man of remarkably hard
features and forbidding aspect, and so low in stature as to be quite a
dwarf, though his head and face were large enough for the body of a
giant. His black eyes were restless, sly, and cunning; his mouth and
chin, bristly with the stubble of a coarse hard beard; and his
complexion was one of that kind which never looks clean or wholesome.
But what added most to the grotesque expression of his face was a
ghastly smile, which, appearing to be the mere result of habit and to
have no connection with any mirthful or complacent feeling, constantly
revealed the few discoloured fangs that were yet scattered in his
mouth, and gave him the aspect of a panting dog. His dress consisted of
a large high-crowned hat, a worn dark suit, a pair of capacious shoes,
and a dirty white neckerchief sufficiently limp and crumpled to
disclose the greater portion of his wiry throat. Such hair as he had
was of a grizzled black, cut short and straight upon his temples, and
hanging in a frowzy fringe about his ears. His hands, which were of a
rough, coarse grain, were very dirty; his fingernails were crooked,
long, and yellow.
There was ample time to note these particulars, for besides that they
were sufficiently obvious without very close observation, some moments
elapsed before any one broke silence. The child advanced timidly
towards her brother and put her hand in his, the dwarf (if we may call
him so) glanced keenly at all present, and the curiosity-dealer, who
plainly had not expected his uncouth visitor, seemed disconcerted and
embarrassed.
‘Ah!’ said the dwarf, who with his hand stretched out above his eyes
had been surveying the young man attentively, ‘that should be your
grandson, neighbour!’
‘Say rather that he should not be,’ replied the old man. ‘But he is.’
‘And that?’ said the dwarf, pointing to Dick Swiveller.
‘Some friend of his, as welcome here as he,’ said the old man.
‘And that?’ inquired the dwarf, wheeling round and pointing straight at
me.
‘A gentleman who was so good as to bring Nell home the other night when
she lost her way, coming from your house.’
The little man turned to the child as if to chide her or express his
wonder, but as she was talking to the young man, held his peace, and
bent his head to listen.
‘Well, Nelly,’ said the young fellow aloud. ‘Do they teach you to hate
me, eh?’
‘No, no. For shame. Oh, no!’ cried the child.
‘To love me, perhaps?’ pursued her brother with a sneer.
‘To do neither,’ she returned. ‘They never speak to me about you.
Indeed they never do.’
‘I dare be bound for that,’ he said, darting a bitter look at the
grandfather. ‘I dare be bound for that Nell. Oh! I believe you there!’
‘But I love you dearly, Fred,’ said the child.
‘No doubt!’
‘I do indeed, and always will,’ the child repeated with great emotion,
‘but oh! If you would leave off vexing him and making him unhappy, then
I could love you more.’
‘I see!’ said the young man, as he stooped carelessly over the child,
and having kissed her, pushed her from him: ‘There--get you away now
you have said your lesson. You needn’t whimper. We part good friends
enough, if that’s the matter.’
He remained silent, following her with his eyes, until she had gained
her little room and closed the door; and then turning to the dwarf,
said abruptly,
‘Harkee, Mr--’
‘Meaning me?’ returned the dwarf. ‘Quilp is my name. You might
remember. It’s not a long one--Daniel Quilp.’
‘Harkee, Mr Quilp, then,’ pursued the other, ‘You have some influence
with my grandfather there.’
‘Some,’ said Mr Quilp emphatically.
‘And are in a few of his mysteries and secrets.’
‘A few,’ replied Quilp, with equal dryness.
‘Then let me tell him once for all, through you, that I will come into
and go out of this place as often as I like, so long as he keeps Nell
here; and that if he wants to be quit of me, he must first be quit of
her. What have I done to be made a bugbear of, and to be shunned and
dreaded as if I brought the plague? He’ll tell you that I have no
natural affection; and that I care no more for Nell, for her own sake,
than I do for him. Let him say so. I care for the whim, then, of coming
to and fro and reminding her of my existence. I WILL see her when I
please. That’s my point. I came here to-day to maintain it, and I’ll
come here again fifty times with the same object and always with the
same success. I said I would stop till I had gained it. I have done
so, and now my visit’s ended. Come Dick.’
‘Stop!’ cried Mr Swiveller, as his companion turned toward the door.
‘Sir!’
‘Sir, I am your humble servant,’ said Mr Quilp, to whom the
monosyllable was addressed.
‘Before I leave the gay and festive scene, and halls of dazzling light,
sir,’ said Mr Swiveller, ‘I will with your permission, attempt a slight
remark. I came here, sir, this day, under the impression that the old
min was friendly.’
‘Proceed, sir,’ said Daniel Quilp; for the orator had made a sudden
stop.
‘Inspired by this idea and the sentiments it awakened, sir, and feeling
as a mutual friend that badgering, baiting, and bullying, was not the
sort of thing calculated to expand the souls and promote the social
harmony of the contending parties, I took upon myself to suggest a
course which is THE course to be adopted to the present occasion. Will
you allow me to whisper half a syllable, sir?’
Without waiting for the permission he sought, Mr Swiveller stepped up
to the dwarf, and leaning on his shoulder and stooping down to get at
his ear, said in a voice which was perfectly audible to all present,
‘The watch-word to the old min is--fork.’
‘Is what?’ demanded Quilp.
‘Is fork, sir, fork,’ replied Mr Swiveller slapping his pocket. ‘You
are awake, sir?’
The dwarf nodded. Mr Swiveller drew back and nodded likewise, then drew
a little further back and nodded again, and so on. By these means he in
time reached the door, where he gave a great cough to attract the
dwarf’s attention and gain an opportunity of expressing in dumb show,
the closest confidence and most inviolable secrecy. Having performed
the serious pantomime that was necessary for the due conveyance of
these idea, he cast himself upon his friend’s track, and vanished.
‘Humph!’ said the dwarf with a sour look and a shrug of his shoulders,
‘so much for dear relations. Thank God I acknowledge none! Nor need you
either,’ he added, turning to the old man, ‘if you were not as weak as
a reed, and nearly as senseless.’
‘What would you have me do?’ he retorted in a kind of helpless
desperation. ‘It is easy to talk and sneer. What would you have me do?’
‘What would I do if I was in your case?’ said the dwarf.
‘Something violent, no doubt.’
‘You’re right there,’ returned the little man, highly gratified by the
compliment, for such he evidently considered it; and grinning like a
devil as he rubbed his dirty hands together. ‘Ask Mrs Quilp, pretty Mrs
Quilp, obedient, timid, loving Mrs Quilp. But that reminds me--I have
left her all alone, and she will be anxious and know not a moment’s
peace till I return. I know she’s always in that condition when I’m
away, thought she doesn’t dare to say so, unless I lead her on and tell
her she may speak freely and I won’t be angry with her. Oh!
well-trained Mrs Quilp.’
The creature appeared quite horrible with his monstrous head and little
body, as he rubbed his hands slowly round, and round, and round
again--with something fantastic even in his manner of performing this
slight action--and, dropping his shaggy brows and cocking his chin in
the air, glanced upward with a stealthy look of exultation that an imp
might have copied and appropriated to himself.
‘Here,’ he said, putting his hand into his breast and sidling up to the
old man as he spoke; ‘I brought it myself for fear of accidents, as,
being in gold, it was something large and heavy for Nell to carry in
her bag. She need be accustomed to such loads betimes though,
neighbor, for she will carry weight when you are dead.’
‘Heaven send she may! I hope so,’ said the old man with something like
a groan.
‘Hope so!’ echoed the dwarf, approaching close to his ear; ‘neighbour,
I would I knew in what good investment all these supplies are sunk. But
you are a deep man, and keep your secret close.’
‘My secret!’ said the other with a haggard look. ‘Yes, you’re
right--I--I--keep it close--very close.’
He said no more, but taking the money turned away with a slow,
uncertain step, and pressed his hand upon his head like a weary and
dejected man. The dwarf watched him sharply, while he passed into the
little sitting-room and locked it in an iron safe above the
chimney-piece; and after musing for a short space, prepared to take his
leave, observing that unless he made good haste, Mrs Quilp would
certainly be in fits on his return.
‘And so, neighbour,’ he added, ‘I’ll turn my face homewards, leaving my
love for Nelly and hoping she may never lose her way again, though her
doing so HAS procured me an honour I didn’t expect.’ With that he bowed
and leered at me, and with a keen glance around which seemed to
comprehend every object within his range of vision, however, small or
trivial, went his way.
I had several times essayed to go myself, but the old man had always
opposed it and entreated me to remain. As he renewed his entreaties on
our being left along, and adverted with many thanks to the former
occasion of our being together, I willingly yielded to his persuasions,
and sat down, pretending to examine some curious miniatures and a few
old medals which he placed before me. It needed no great pressing to
induce me to stay, for if my curiosity has been excited on the occasion
of my first visit, it certainly was not diminished now.
Nell joined us before long, and bringing some needle-work to the table,
sat by the old man’s side. It was pleasant to observe the fresh flowers
in the room, the pet bird with a green bough shading his little cage,
the breath of freshness and youth which seemed to rustle through the
old dull house and hover round the child. It was curious, but not so
pleasant, to turn from the beauty and grace of the girl, to the
stooping figure, care-worn face, and jaded aspect of the old man. As
he grew weaker and more feeble, what would become of this lonely little
creature; poor protector as he was, say that he died--what would be her
fate, then?
The old man almost answered my thoughts, as he laid his hand on hers,
and spoke aloud.
‘I’ll be of better cheer, Nell,’ he said; ‘there must be good fortune
in store for thee--I do not ask it for myself, but thee. Such miseries
must fall on thy innocent head without it, that I cannot believe but
that, being tempted, it will come at last!’
She looked cheerfully into his face, but made no answer.
‘When I think,’ said he, ‘of the many years--many in thy short
life--that thou has lived with me; of my monotonous existence, knowing
no companions of thy own age nor any childish pleasures; of the
solitude in which thou has grown to be what thou art, and in which thou
hast lived apart from nearly all thy kind but one old man; I sometimes
fear I have dealt hardly by thee, Nell.’
‘Grandfather!’ cried the child in unfeigned surprise.
‘Not in intention--no no,’ said he. ‘I have ever looked forward to the
time that should enable thee to mix among the gayest and prettiest, and
take thy station with the best. But I still look forward, Nell, I still
look forward, and if I should be forced to leave thee, meanwhile, how
have I fitted thee for struggles with the world? The poor bird yonder
is as well qualified to encounter it, and be turned adrift upon its
mercies--Hark! I hear Kit outside. Go to him, Nell, go to him.’
She rose, and hurrying away, stopped, turned back, and put her arms
about the old man’s neck, then left him and hurried away again--but
faster this time, to hide her falling tears.
‘A word in your ear, sir,’ said the old man in a hurried whisper. ‘I
have been rendered uneasy by what you said the other night, and can
only plead that I have done all for the best--that it is too late to
retract, if I could (though I cannot)--and that I hope to triumph yet.
All is for her sake. I have borne great poverty myself, and would spare
her the sufferings that poverty carries with it. I would spare her the
miseries that brought her mother, my own dear child, to an early grave.
I would leave her--not with resources which could be easily spent or
squandered away, but with what would place her beyond the reach of want
for ever. You mark me sir? She shall have no pittance, but a
fortune--Hush! I can say no more than that, now or at any other time,
and she is here again!’
The eagerness with which all this was poured into my ear, the trembling
of the hand with which he clasped my arm, the strained and starting
eyes he fixed upon me, the wild vehemence and agitation of his manner,
filled me with amazement. All that I had heard and seen, and a great
part of what he had said himself, led me to suppose that he was a
wealthy man. I could form no comprehension of his character, unless he
were one of those miserable wretches who, having made gain the sole end
and object of their lives and having succeeded in amassing great
riches, are constantly tortured by the dread of poverty, and beset by
fears of loss and ruin. Many things he had said which I had been at a
loss to understand, were quite reconcilable with the idea thus
presented to me, and at length I concluded that beyond all doubt he was
one of this unhappy race.
The opinion was not the result of hasty consideration, for which indeed
there was no opportunity at that time, as the child came directly, and
soon occupied herself in preparations for giving Kit a writing lesson,
of which it seemed he had a couple every week, and one regularly on
that evening, to the great mirth and enjoyment both of himself and his
instructress. To relate how it was a long time before his modesty could
be so far prevailed upon as it admit of his sitting down in the
parlour, in the presence of an unknown gentleman--how, when he did set
down, he tucked up his sleeves and squared his elbows and put his face
close to the copy-book and squinted horribly at the lines--how, from
the very first moment of having the pen in his hand, he began to wallow
in blots, and to daub himself with ink up to the very roots of his
hair--how, if he did by accident form a letter properly, he immediately
smeared it out again with his arm in his preparations to make
another--how, at every fresh mistake, there was a fresh burst of
merriment from the child and louder and not less hearty laugh from poor
Kit himself--and how there was all the way through, notwithstanding, a
gentle wish on her part to teach, and an anxious desire on his to
learn--to relate all these particulars would no doubt occupy more space
and time than they deserve. It will be sufficient to say that the
lesson was given--that evening passed and night came on--that the old
man again grew restless and impatient--that he quitted the house
secretly at the same hour as before--and that the child was once more
left alone within its gloomy walls.
And now that I have carried this history so far in my own character and
introduced these personages to the reader, I shall for the convenience
of the narrative detach myself from its further course, and leave those
who have prominent and necessary parts in it to speak and act for
themselves.
CHAPTER 4
Mr and Mrs Quilp resided on Tower Hill; and in her bower on Tower Hill
Mrs Quilp was left to pine the absence of her lord, when he quitted her
on the business which he had already seen to transact.
Mr Quilp could scarcely be said to be of any particular trade or
calling, though his pursuits were diversified and his occupations
numerous. He collected the rents of whole colonies of filthy streets
and alleys by the waterside, advanced money to the seamen and petty
officers of merchant vessels, had a share in the ventures of divers
mates of East Indiamen, smoked his smuggled cigars under the very nose
of the Custom House, and made appointments on ‘Change with men in
glazed hats and round jackets pretty well every day. On the Surrey side
of the river was a small rat-infested dreary yard called ‘Quilp’s
Wharf,’ in which were a little wooden counting-house burrowing all awry
in the dust as if it had fallen from the clouds and ploughed into the
ground; a few fragments of rusty anchors; several large iron rings;
some piles of rotten wood; and two or three heaps of old sheet copper,
crumpled, cracked, and battered. On Quilp’s Wharf, Daniel Quilp was a
ship-breaker, yet to judge from these appearances he must either have
been a ship-breaker on a very small scale, or have broken his ships up
very small indeed. Neither did the place present any extraordinary
aspect of life or activity, as its only human occupant was an
amphibious boy in a canvas suit, whose sole change of occupation was
from sitting on the head of a pile and throwing stones into the mud
when the tide was out, to standing with his hands in his pockets gazing
listlessly on the motion and on the bustle of the river at high-water.
The dwarf’s lodging on Tower hill comprised, besides the needful
accommodation for himself and Mrs Quilp, a small sleeping-closet for
that lady’s mother, who resided with the couple and waged perpetual war
with Daniel; of whom, notwithstanding, she stood in no slight dread.
Indeed, the ugly creature contrived by some means or other--whether by
his ugliness or his ferocity or his natural cunning is no great
matter--to impress with a wholesome fear of his anger, most of those
with whom he was brought into daily contact and communication. Over
nobody had he such complete ascendance as Mrs Quilp herself--a pretty
little, mild-spoken, blue-eyed woman, who having allied herself in
wedlock to the dwarf in one of those strange infatuations of which
examples are by no means scarce, performed a sound practical penance
for her folly, every day of her life.
It has been said that Mrs Quilp was pining in her bower. In her bower
she was, but not alone, for besides the old lady her mother of whom
mention has recently been made, there were present some half-dozen
ladies of the neighborhood who had happened by a strange accident (and
also by a little understanding among themselves) to drop in one after
another, just about tea-time. This being a season favourable to
conversation, and the room being a cool, shady, lazy kind of place,
with some plants at the open window shutting out the dust, and
interposing pleasantly enough between the tea table within and the old
Tower without, it is no wonder that the ladies felt an inclination to
talk and linger, especially when there are taken into account the
additional inducements of fresh butter, new bread, shrimps, and
watercresses.
Now, the ladies being together under these circumstances, it was
extremely natural that the discourse should turn upon the propensity of
mankind to tyrannize over the weaker sex, and the duty that developed
upon the weaker sex to resist that tyranny and assert their rights and
dignity. It was natural for four reasons: firstly, because Mrs Quilp
being a young woman and notoriously under the dominion of her husband
ought to be excited to rebel; secondly, because Mrs Quilp’s parent was
known to be laudably shrewish in her disposition and inclined to resist
male authority; thirdly, because each visitor wished to show for
herself how superior she was in this respect to the generality of her
sex; and fourthly, because the company being accustomed to scandalise
each other in pairs, were deprived of their usual subject of
conversation now that they were all assembled in close friendship, and
had consequently no better employment than to attack the common enemy.
Moved by these considerations, a stout lady opened the proceedings by
inquiring, with an air of great concern and sympathy, how Mr Quilp was;
whereunto Mr Quilp’s wife’s mother replied sharply, ‘Oh! He was well
enough--nothing much was every the matter with him--and ill weeds were
sure to thrive.’ All the ladies then sighed in concert, shook their
heads gravely, and looked at Mrs Quilp as a martyr.
‘Ah!’ said the spokeswoman, ‘I wish you’d give her a little of your
advice, Mrs Jiniwin’--Mrs Quilp had been a Miss Jiniwin it should be
observed--‘nobody knows better than you, ma’am, what us women owe to
ourselves.’
‘Owe indeed, ma’am!’ replied Mrs Jiniwin. ‘When my poor husband, her
dear father, was alive, if he had ever ventured a cross word to me, I’d
have--’ The good old lady did not finish the sentence, but she twisted
off the head of a shrimp with a vindictiveness which seemed to imply
that the action was in some degree a substitute for words. In this
light it was clearly understood by the other party, who immediately
replied with great approbation, ‘You quite enter into my feelings,
ma’am, and it’s jist what I’d do myself.’
‘But you have no call to do it,’ said Mrs Jiniwin. ‘Luckily for you,
you have no more occasion to do it than I had.’
‘No woman need have, if she was true to herself,’ rejoined the stout
lady.
‘Do you hear that, Betsy?’ said Mrs Jiniwin, in a warning voice. ‘How
often have I said the same words to you, and almost gone down my knees
when I spoke ‘em!’
Poor Mrs Quilp, who had looked in a state of helplessness from one face
of condolence to another, coloured, smiled, and shook her head
doubtfully. This was the signal for a general clamour, which beginning
in a low murmur gradually swelled into a great noise in which everybody
spoke at once, and all said that she being a young woman had no right
to set up her opinions against the experiences of those who knew so
much better; that it was very wrong of her not to take the advice of
people who had nothing at heart but her good; that it was next door to
being downright ungrateful to conduct herself in that manner; that if
she had no respect for herself she ought to have some for other women,
all of whom she compromised by her meekness; and that if she had no
respect for other women, the time would come when other women would
have no respect for her; and she would be very sorry for that, they
could tell her. Having dealt out these admonitions, the ladies fell to
a more powerful assault than they had yet made upon the mixed tea, new
bread, fresh butter, shrimps, and watercresses, and said that their
vexation was so great to see her going on like that, that they could
hardly bring themselves to eat a single morsel.
It’s all very fine to talk,’ said Mrs Quilp with much simplicity, ‘but
I know that if I was to die to-morrow, Quilp could marry anybody he
pleased--now that he could, I know!’
There was quite a scream of indignation at this idea. Marry whom he
pleased! They would like to see him dare to think of marrying any of
them; they would like to see the faintest approach to such a thing.
One lady (a widow) was quite certain she should stab him if he hinted
at it.
‘Very well,’ said Mrs Quilp, nodding her head, ‘as I said just now,
it’s very easy to talk, but I say again that I know--that I’m
sure--Quilp has such a way with him when he likes, that the best
looking woman here couldn’t refuse him if I was dead, and she was free,
and he chose to make love to her. Come!’
Everybody bridled up at this remark, as much as to say, ‘I know you
mean me. Let him try--that’s all.’ and yet for some hidden reason they
were all angry with the widow, and each lady whispered in her
neighbour’s ear that it was very plain that said widow thought herself
the person referred to, and what a puss she was!
‘Mother knows,’ said Mrs Quilp, ‘that what I say is quite correct, for
she often said so before we were married. Didn’t you say so, mother?’
This inquiry involved the respected lady in rather a delicate position,
for she certainly had been an active party in making her daughter Mrs
Quilp, and, besides, it was not supporting the family credit to
encourage the idea that she had married a man whom nobody else would
have. On the other hand, to exaggerate the captivating qualities of her
son-in-law would be to weaken the cause of revolt, in which all her
energies were deeply engaged. Beset by these opposing considerations,
Mrs Jiniwin admitted the powers of insinuation, but denied the right to
govern, and with a timely compliment to the stout lady brought back the
discussion to the point from which it had strayed.
‘Oh! It’s a sensible and proper thing indeed, what Mrs George has
said!’ exclaimed the old lady. ‘If women are only true to
themselves!--But Betsy isn’t, and more’s the shame and pity.’
‘Before I’d let a man order me about as Quilp orders her,’ said Mrs
George, ‘before I’d consent to stand in awe of a man as she does of
him, I’d--I’d kill myself, and write a letter first to say he did it!’
This remark being loudly commended and approved of, another lady (from
the Minories) put in her word:
‘Mr Quilp may be a very nice man,’ said this lady, ‘and I supposed
there’s no doubt he is, because Mrs Quilp says he is, and Mrs Jiniwin
says he is, and they ought to know, or nobody does. But still he is not
quite a--what one calls a handsome man, nor quite a young man neither,
which might be a little excuse for him if anything could be; whereas
his wife is young, and is good-looking, and is a woman--which is the
greatest thing after all.’
This last clause being delivered with extraordinary pathos, elicited a
corresponding murmer from the hearers, stimulated by which the lady
went on to remark that if such a husband was cross and unreasonable
with such a wife, then--
‘If he is!’ interposed the mother, putting down her tea-cup and
brushing the crumbs out of her lap, preparatory to making a solemn
declaration. ‘If he is! He is the greatest tyrant that every lived, she
daren’t call her soul her own, he makes her tremble with a word and
even with a look, he frightens her to death, and she hasn’t the spirit
to give him a word back, no, not a single word.’
Notwithstanding that the fact had been notorious beforehand to all the
tea-drinkers, and had been discussed and expatiated on at every
tea-drinking in the neighbourhood for the last twelve months, this
official communication was no sooner made than they all began to talk
at once and to vie with each other in vehemence and volubility. Mrs
George remarked that people would talk, that people had often said this
to her before, that Mrs Simmons then and there present had told her so
twenty times, that she had always said, ‘No, Henrietta Simmons, unless
I see it with my own eyes and hear it with my own ears, I never will
believe it.’ Mrs Simmons corroborated this testimony and added strong
evidence of her own. The lady from the Minories recounted a successful
course of treatment under which she had placed her own husband, who,
from manifesting one month after marriage unequivocal symptoms of the
tiger, had by this means become subdued into a perfect lamb. Another
lady recounted her own personal struggle and final triumph, in the
course whereof she had found it necessary to call in her mother and two
aunts, and to weep incessantly night and day for six weeks. A third,
who in the general confusion could secure no other listener, fastened
herself upon a young woman still unmarried who happened to be amongst
them, and conjured her, as she valued her own peace of mind and
happiness to profit by this solemn occasion, to take example from the
weakness of Mrs Quilp, and from that time forth to direct her whole
thoughts to taming and subduing the rebellious spirit of man. The noise
was at its height, and half the company had elevated their voices into
a perfect shriek in order to drown the voices of the other half, when
Mrs Jiniwin was seen to change colour and shake her forefinger
stealthily, as if exhorting them to silence. Then, and not until then,
Daniel Quilp himself, the cause and occasion of all this clamour, was
observed to be in the room, looking on and listening with profound
attention.
‘Go on, ladies, go on,’ said Daniel. ‘Mrs Quilp, pray ask the ladies to
stop to supper, and have a couple of lobsters and something light and
palatable.’
‘I--I--didn’t ask them to tea, Quilp,’ stammered his wife. ‘It’s quite
an accident.’
‘So much the better, Mrs Quilp; these accidental parties are always the
pleasantest,’ said the dwarf, rubbing his hands so hard that he seemed
to be engaged in manufacturing, of the dirt with which they were
encrusted, little charges for popguns. ‘What! Not going, ladies, you
are not going, surely!’
His fair enemies tossed their heads slightly as they sought their
respective bonnets and shawls, but left all verbal contention to Mrs
Jiniwin, who finding herself in the position of champion, made a faint
struggle to sustain the character.
‘And why not stop to supper, Quilp,’ said the old lady, ‘if my daughter
had a mind?’
‘To be sure,’ rejoined Daniel. ‘Why not?’
‘There’s nothing dishonest or wrong in a supper, I hope?’ said Mrs
Jiniwin.
‘Surely not,’ returned the dwarf. ‘Why should there be? Nor anything
unwholesome, either, unless there’s lobster-salad or prawns, which I’m
told are not good for digestion.’
‘And you wouldn’t like your wife to be attacked with that, or anything
else that would make her uneasy would you?’ said Mrs Jiniwin.
‘Not for a score of worlds,’ replied the dwarf with a grin. ‘Not even
to have a score of mothers-in-law at the same time--and what a blessing
that would be!’
‘My daughter’s your wife, Mr Quilp, certainly,’ said the old lady with
a giggle, meant for satirical and to imply that he needed to be
reminded of the fact; ‘your wedded wife.’
‘So she is, certainly. So she is,’ observed the dwarf.
‘And she has a right to do as she likes, I hope, Quilp,’ said the
old lady trembling, partly with anger and partly with a secret fear of
her impish son-in-law.
‘Hope she has!’ he replied. ‘Oh! Don’t you know she has? Don’t you know
she has, Mrs Jiniwin?
‘I know she ought to have, Quilp, and would have, if she was of my way
of thinking.’
‘Why an’t you of your mother’s way of thinking, my dear?’ said the
dwarf, turing round and addressing his wife, ‘why don’t you always
imitate your mother, my dear? She’s the ornament of her sex--your
father said so every day of his life. I am sure he did.’
‘Her father was a blessed creetur, Quilp, and worthy twenty thousand of
some people,’ said Mrs Jiniwin; ‘twenty hundred million thousand.’
‘I should like to have known him,’ remarked the dwarf. ‘I dare say he
was a blessed creature then; but I’m sure he is now. It was a happy
release. I believe he had suffered a long time?’
The old lady gave a gasp, but nothing came of it; Quilp resumed, with
the same malice in his eye and the same sarcastic politeness on his
tongue.
‘You look ill, Mrs Jiniwin; I know you have been exciting yourself too
much--talking perhaps, for it is your weakness. Go to bed. Do go to
bed.’
‘I shall go when I please, Quilp, and not before.’
‘But please to do now. Do please to go now,’ said the dwarf.
The old woman looked angrily at him, but retreated as he advanced, and
falling back before him, suffered him to shut the door upon her and
bolt her out among the guests, who were by this time crowding
downstairs. Being left along with his wife, who sat trembling in a
corner with her eyes fixed upon the ground, the little man planted
himself before her, and folding his arms looked steadily at her for a
long time without speaking.
‘Mrs Quilp,’ he said at last.
‘Yes, Quilp,’ she replead meekly.
Instead of pursuing the theme he had in his mind, Quilp folded his arms
again, and looked at her more sternly than before, while she averted
her eyes and kept them on the ground.
‘Mrs Quilp.’
‘Yes, Quilp.’
‘If ever you listen to these beldames again, I’ll bite you.’
With this laconic threat, which he accompanied with a snarl that gave
him the appearance of being particularly in earnest, Mr Quilp bade her
clear the teaboard away, and bring the rum. The spirit being set before
him in a huge case-bottle, which had originally come out of some ship’s
locker, he settled himself in an arm-chair with his large head and face
squeezed up against the back, and his little legs planted on the table.
‘Now, Mrs Quilp,’ he said; ‘I feel in a smoking humour, and shall
probably blaze away all night. But sit where you are, if you please, in
case I want you.’
His wife returned no other reply than the necessary ‘Yes, Quilp,’ and
the small lord of the creation took his first cigar and mixed his first
glass of grog. The sun went down and the stars peeped out, the Tower
turned from its own proper colours to grey and from grey to black, the
room became perfectly dark and the end of the cigar a deep fiery red,
but still Mr Quilp went on smoking and drinking in the same position,
and staring listlessly out of window with the doglike smile always on
his face, save when Mrs Quilp made some involuntary movement of
restlessness or fatigue; and then it expanded into a grin of delight.
CHAPTER 5
Whether Mr Quilp took any sleep by snatches of a few winks at a time,
or whether he sat with his eyes wide open all night long, certain it is
that he kept his cigar alight, and kindled every fresh one from the
ashes of that which was nearly consumed, without requiring the
assistance of a candle. Nor did the striking of the clocks, hour after
hour, appear to inspire him with any sense of drowsiness or any natural
desire to go to rest, but rather to increase his wakefulness, which he
showed, at every such indication of the progress of the night, by a
suppressed cackling in his throat, and a motion of his shoulders, like
one who laughs heartily but the same time slyly and by stealth.
At length the day broke, and poor Mrs Quilp, shivering with cold of
early morning and harassed by fatigue and want of sleep, was discovered
sitting patiently on her chair, raising her eyes at intervals in mute
appeal to the compassion and clemency of her lord, and gently reminding
him by an occasion cough that she was still unpardoned and that her
penance had been of long duration. But her dwarfish spouse still smoked
his cigar and drank his rum without heeding her; and it was not until
the sun had some time risen, and the activity and noise of city day
were rife in the street, that he deigned to recognize her presence by
any word or sign. He might not have done so even then, but for certain
impatient tapping at the door he seemed to denote that some pretty hard
knuckles were actively engaged upon the other side.
‘Why dear me!’ he said looking round with a malicious grin, ‘it’s day.
Open the door, sweet Mrs Quilp!’
His obedient wife withdrew the bolt, and her lady mother entered.
Now, Mrs Jiniwin bounced into the room with great impetuosity; for,
supposing her son-in-law to be still a-bed, she had come to relieve her
feelings by pronouncing a strong opinion upon his general conduct and
character. Seeing that he was up and dressed, and that the room
appeared to have been occupied ever since she quitted it on the
previous evening, she stopped short, in some embarrassment.
Nothing escaped the hawk’s eye of the ugly little man, who, perfectly
understanding what passed in the old lady’s mind, turned uglier still
in the fulness of his satisfaction, and bade her good morning, with a
leer or triumph.
‘Why, Betsy,’ said the old woman, ‘you haven’t been--you don’t mean to
say you’ve been a--’
‘Sitting up all night?’ said Quilp, supplying the conclusion of the
sentence. ‘Yes she has!’
‘All night?’ cried Mrs Jiniwin.
‘Ay, all night. Is the dear old lady deaf?’ said Quilp, with a smile of
which a frown was part. ‘Who says man and wife are bad company? Ha ha!
The time has flown.’
‘You’re a brute!’ exclaimed Mrs Jiniwin.
‘Come come,’ said Quilp, wilfully misunderstanding her, of course, ‘you
mustn’t call her names. She’s married now, you know. And though she did
beguile the time and keep me from my bed, you must not be so tenderly
careful of me as to be out of humour with her. Bless you for a dear
old lady. Here’s to your health!’
‘I am much obliged to you,’ returned the old woman, testifying by a
certain restlessness in her hands a vehement desire to shake her
matronly fist at her son-in-law. ‘Oh! I’m very much obliged to you!’
‘Grateful soul!’ cried the dwarf. ‘Mrs Quilp.’
‘Yes, Quilp,’ said the timid sufferer.
‘Help your mother to get breakfast, Mrs Quilp. I am going to the wharf
this morning--the earlier the better, so be quick.’
Mrs Jiniwin made a faint demonstration of rebellion by sitting down in
a chair near the door and folding her arms as if in a resolute
determination to do nothing. But a few whispered words from her
daughter, and a kind inquiry from her son-in-law whether she felt
faint, with a hint that there was abundance of cold water in the next
apartment, routed these symptoms effectually, and she applied herself
to the prescribed preparations with sullen diligence.
While they were in progress, Mr Quilp withdrew to the adjoining room,
and, turning back his coat-collar, proceeded to smear his countenance
with a damp towel of very unwholesome appearance, which made his
complexion rather more cloudy than it was before. But, while he was
thus engaged, his caution and inquisitiveness did not forsake him, for
with a face as sharp and cunning as ever, he often stopped, even in
this short process, and stood listening for any conversation in the
next room, of which he might be the theme.
‘Ah!’ he said after a short effort of attention, ‘it was not the towel
over my ears, I thought it wasn’t. I’m a little hunchy villain and a
monster, am I, Mrs Jiniwin? Oh!’
The pleasure of this discovery called up the old doglike smile in full
force. When he had quite done with it, he shook himself in a very
doglike manner, and rejoined the ladies.
Mr Quilp now walked up to front of a looking-glass, and was standing
there putting on his neckerchief, when Mrs Jiniwin happening to be
behind him, could not resist the inclination she felt to shake her fist
at her tyrant son-in-law. It was the gesture of an instant, but as she
did so and accompanied the action with a menacing look, she met his eye
in the glass, catching her in the very act. The same glance at the
mirror conveyed to her the reflection of a horribly grotesque and
distorted face with the tongue lolling out; and the next instant the
dwarf, turning about with a perfectly bland and placid look, inquired
in a tone of great affection.
‘How are you now, my dear old darling?’
Slight and ridiculous as the incident was, it made him appear such a
little fiend, and withal such a keen and knowing one, that the old
woman felt too much afraid of him to utter a single word, and suffered
herself to be led with extraordinary politeness to the breakfast-table.
Here he by no means diminished the impression he had just produced, for
he ate hard eggs, shell and all, devoured gigantic prawns with the
heads and tails on, chewed tobacco and water-cresses at the same time
and with extraordinary greediness, drank boiling tea without winking,
bit his fork and spoon till they bent again, and in short performed so
many horrifying and uncommon acts that the women were nearly frightened
out of their wits, and began to doubt if he were really a human
creature. At last, having gone through these proceedings and many
others which were equally a part of his system, Mr Quilp left them,
reduced to a very obedient and humbled state, and betook himself to the
river-side, where he took boat for the wharf on which he had bestowed
his name.
It was flood tide when Daniel Quilp sat himself down in the ferry to
cross to the opposite shore. A fleet of barges were coming lazily on,
some sideways, some head first, some stern first; all in a
wrong-headed, dogged, obstinate way, bumping up against the larger
craft, running under the bows of steamboats, getting into every kind of
nook and corner where they had no business, and being crunched on all
sides like so many walnut-shells; while each with its pair of long
sweeps struggling and splashing in the water looked like some lumbering
fish in pain. In some of the vessels at anchor all hands were busily
engaged in coiling ropes, spreading out sails to dry, taking in or
discharging their cargoes; in others no life was visible but two or
three tarry boys, and perhaps a barking dog running to and fro upon the
deck or scrambling up to look over the side and bark the louder for the
view. Coming slowly on through the forests of masts was a great
steamship, beating the water in short impatient strokes with her heavy
paddles as though she wanted room to breathe, and advancing in her huge
bulk like a sea monster among the minnows of the Thames. On either hand
were long black tiers of colliers; between them vessels slowly working
out of harbour with sails glistening in the sun, and creaking noise on
board, re-echoed from a hundred quarters. The water and all upon it was
in active motion, dancing and buoyant and bubbling up; while the old
grey Tower and piles of building on the shore, with many a church-spire
shooting up between, looked coldly on, and seemed to disdain their
chafing, restless neighbour.
Daniel Quilp, who was not much affected by a bright morning save in so
far as it spared him the trouble of carrying an umbrella, caused
himself to be put ashore hard by the wharf, and proceeded thither
through a narrow lane which, partaking of the amphibious character of
its frequenters, had as much water as mud in its composition, and a
very liberal supply of both. Arrived at his destination, the first
object that presented itself to his view was a pair of very imperfectly
shod feet elevated in the air with the soles upwards, which remarkable
appearance was referable to the boy, who being of an eccentric spirit
and having a natural taste for tumbling, was now standing on his head
and contemplating the aspect of the river under these uncommon
circumstances. He was speedily brought on his heels by the sound of his
master’s voice, and as soon as his head was in its right position, Mr
Quilp, to speak expressively in the absence of a better verb, ‘punched
it’ for him.
‘Come, you let me alone,’ said the boy, parrying Quilp’s hand with both
his elbows alternatively. ‘You’ll get something you won’t like if you
don’t and so I tell you.’
‘You dog,’ snarled Quilp, ‘I’ll beat you with an iron rod, I’ll scratch
you with a rusty nail, I’ll pinch your eyes, if you talk to me--I will.’
With these threats he clenched his hand again, and dexterously diving
in between the elbows and catching the boy’s head as it dodged from
side to side, gave it three or four good hard knocks. Having now
carried his point and insisted on it, he left off.
‘You won’t do it agin,’ said the boy, nodding his head and drawing
back, with the elbows ready in case of the worst; ‘now--’
‘Stand still, you dog,’ said Quilp. ‘I won’t do it again, because I’ve
done it as often as I want. Here. Take the key.’
‘Why don’t you hit one of your size?’ said the boy approaching very
slowly.
‘Where is there one of my size, you dog?’ returned Quilp. ‘Take the
key, or I’ll brain you with it’--indeed he gave him a smart tap with
the handle as he spoke. ‘Now, open the counting-house.’
The boy sulkily complied, muttering at first, but desisting when he
looked round and saw that Quilp was following him with a steady look.
And here it may be remarked, that between this boy and the dwarf there
existed a strange kind of mutual liking. How born or bred, and or
nourished upon blows and threats on one side, and retorts and defiances
on the other, is not to the purpose. Quilp would certainly suffer
nobody to contract him but the boy, and the boy would assuredly not
have submitted to be so knocked about by anybody but Quilp, when he had
the power to run away at any time he chose.
‘Now,’ said Quilp, passing into the wooden counting-house, ‘you mind
the wharf. Stand upon your head agin, and I’ll cut one of your feet
off.’
The boy made no answer, but directly Quilp had shut himself in, stood
on his head before the door, then walked on his hands to the back and
stood on his head there, and then to the opposite side and repeated the
performance. There were indeed four sides to the counting-house, but he
avoided that one where the window was, deeming it probable that Quilp
would be looking out of it. This was prudent, for in point of fact, the
dwarf, knowing his disposition, was lying in wait at a little distance
from the sash armed with a large piece of wood, which, being rough and
jagged and studded in many parts with broken nails, might possibly have
hurt him.
It was a dirty little box, this counting-house, with nothing in it but
an old ricketty desk and two stools, a hat-peg, an ancient almanack, an
inkstand with no ink, and the stump of one pen, and an eight-day clock
which hadn’t gone for eighteen years at least, and of which the
minute-hand had been twisted off for a tooth-pick. Daniel Quilp pulled
his hat over his brows, climbed on to the desk (which had a flat top)
and stretching his short length upon it went to sleep with ease of an
old practitioner; intending, no doubt, to compensate himself for the
deprivation of last night’s rest, by a long and sound nap.
Sound it might have been, but long it was not, for he had not been
asleep a quarter of an hour when the boy opened the door and thrust in
his head, which was like a bundle of badly-picked oakum. Quilp was a
light sleeper and started up directly.
‘Here’s somebody for you,’ said the boy.
‘Who?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Ask!’ said Quilp, seizing the trifle of wood before mentioned and
throwing it at him with such dexterity that it was well the boy
disappeared before it reached the spot on which he had stood. ‘Ask, you
dog.’
Not caring to venture within range of such missles again, the boy
discreetly sent in his stead the first cause of the interruption, who
now presented herself at the door.
‘What, Nelly!’ cried Quilp.
‘Yes,’ said the child, hesitating whether to enter or retreat, for the
dwarf just roused, with his dishevelled hair hanging all about him and
a yellow handkerchief over his head, was something fearful to behold;
it’s only me, sir.’
‘Come in,’ said Quilp, without getting off the desk. ‘Come in. Stay.
Just look out into the yard, and see whether there’s a boy standing on
his head.’
‘No, sir,’ replied Nell. ‘He’s on his feet.’
‘You’re sure he is?’ said Quilp. ‘Well. Now, come in and shut the door.
What’s your message, Nelly?’
The child handed him a letter. Mr Quilp, without changing his position
further than to turn over a little more on his side and rest his chin
on his hand, proceeded to make himself acquainted with its contents.
CHAPTER 6
Little Nell stood timidly by, with her eyes raised to the countenance
of Mr Quilp as he read the letter, plainly showing by her looks that
while she entertained some fear and distrust of the little man, she was
much inclined to laugh at his uncouth appearance and grotesque
attitude. And yet there was visible on the part of the child a painful
anxiety for his reply, and consciousness of his power to render it
disagreeable or distressing, which was strongly at variance with this
impulse and restrained it more effectually than she could possibly have
done by any efforts of her own.
That Mr Quilp was himself perplexed, and that in no small degree, by
the contents of the letter, was sufficiently obvious. Before he had got
through the first two or three lines he began to open his eyes very
wide and to frown most horribly, the next two or three caused him to
scratch his head in an uncommonly vicious manner, and when he came to
the conclusion he gave a long dismal whistle indicative of surprise and
dismay. After folding and laying it down beside him, he bit the nails
of all of his ten fingers with extreme voracity; and taking it up
sharply, read it again. The second perusal was to all appearance as
unsatisfactory as the first, and plunged him into a profound reverie
from which he awakened to another assault upon his nails and a long
stare at the child, who with her eyes turned towards the ground awaited
his further pleasure.
‘Halloa here!’ he said at length, in a voice, and with a suddenness,
which made the child start as though a gun had been fired off at her
ear. ‘Nelly!’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Do you know what’s inside this letter, Nell?’
‘No, sir!’
‘Are you sure, quite sure, quite certain, upon your soul?’
‘Quite sure, sir.’
‘Do you wish you may die if you do know, hey?’ said the dwarf.
‘Indeed I don’t know,’ returned the child.
‘Well!’ muttered Quilp as he marked her earnest look. ‘I believe you.
Humph! Gone already? Gone in four-and-twenty hours! What the devil has
he done with it, that’s the mystery!’
This reflection set him scratching his head and biting his nails once
more. While he was thus employed his features gradually relaxed into
what was with him a cheerful smile, but which in any other man would
have been a ghastly grin of pain, and when the child looked up again
she found that he was regarding her with extraordinary favour and
complacency.
‘You look very pretty to-day, Nelly, charmingly pretty. Are you tired,
Nelly?’
‘No, sir. I’m in a hurry to get back, for he will be anxious while I am
away.’
‘There’s no hurry, little Nell, no hurry at all,’ said Quilp. ‘How
should you like to be my number two, Nelly?’
‘To be what, sir?’
‘My number two, Nelly, my second, my Mrs Quilp,’ said the dwarf.
The child looked frightened, but seemed not to understand him, which Mr
Quilp observing, hastened to make his meaning more distinctly.
‘To be Mrs Quilp the second, when Mrs Quilp the first is dead, sweet
Nell,’ said Quilp, wrinkling up his eyes and luring her towards him
with his bent forefinger, ‘to be my wife, my little cherry-cheeked,
red-lipped wife. Say that Mrs Quilp lives five year, or only four,
you’ll be just the proper age for me. Ha ha! Be a good girl, Nelly, a
very good girl, and see if one of these days you don’t come to be Mrs
Quilp of Tower Hill.’
So far from being sustained and stimulated by this delightful prospect,
the child shrank from him in great agitation, and trembled violently.
Mr Quilp, either because frightening anybody afforded him a
constitutional delight, or because it was pleasant to contemplate the
death of Mrs Quilp number one, and the elevation of Mrs Quilp number
two to her post and title, or because he was determined from purposes
of his own to be agreeable and good-humoured at that particular time,
only laughed and feigned to take no heed of her alarm.
‘You shall come with me to Tower Hill and see Mrs Quilp that is,
directly,’ said the dwarf. ‘She’s very fond of you, Nell, though not so
fond as I am. You shall come home with me.’
‘I must go back indeed,’ said the child. ‘He told me to return directly
I had the answer.’
‘But you haven’t it, Nelly,’ retorted the dwarf, ‘and won’t have it,
and can’t have it, until I have been home, so you see that to do your
errand, you must go with me. Reach me yonder hat, my dear, and we’ll go
directly.’ With that, Mr Quilp suffered himself to roll gradually off
the desk until his short legs touched the ground, when he got upon them
and led the way from the counting-house to the wharf outside, when the
first objects that presented themselves were the boy who had stood on
his head and another young gentleman of about his own stature, rolling
in the mud together, locked in a tight embrace, and cuffing each other
with mutual heartiness.
‘It’s Kit!’ cried Nelly, clasping her hand, ‘poor Kit who came with me!
Oh, pray stop them, Mr Quilp!’
‘I’ll stop ‘em,’ cried Quilp, diving into the little counting-house and
returning with a thick stick, ‘I’ll stop ‘em. Now, my boys, fight away.
I’ll fight you both. I’ll take both of you, both together, both
together!’
With which defiances the dwarf flourished his cudgel, and dancing round
the combatants and treading upon them and skipping over them, in a kind
of frenzy, laid about him, now on one and now on the other, in a most
desperate manner, always aiming at their heads and dealing such blows
as none but the veriest little savage would have inflicted. This being
warmer work than they had calculated upon, speedily cooled the courage
of the belligerents, who scrambled to their feet and called for quarter.
‘I’ll beat you to a pulp, you dogs,’ said Quilp, vainly endeavoring to
get near either of them for a parting blow. ‘I’ll bruise you until
you’re copper-coloured, I’ll break your faces till you haven’t a
profile between you, I will.’
‘Come, you drop that stick or it’ll be worse for you,’ said his boy,
dodging round him and watching an opportunity to rush in; ‘you drop
that stick.’
‘Come a little nearer, and I’ll drop it on your skull, you dog,’ said
Quilp, with gleaming eyes; ‘a little nearer--nearer yet.’
But the boy declined the invitation until his master was apparently a
little off his guard, when he darted in and seizing the weapon tried to
wrest it from his grasp. Quilp, who was as strong as a lion, easily
kept his hold until the boy was tugging at it with his utmost power,
when he suddenly let it go and sent him reeling backwards, so that he
fell violently upon his head. The success of this manoeuvre tickled Mr
Quilp beyond description, and he laughed and stamped upon the ground as
at a most irresistible jest.
‘Never mind,’ said the boy, nodding his head and rubbing it at the same
time; ‘you see if ever I offer to strike anybody again because they say
you’re an uglier dwarf than can be seen anywheres for a penny, that’s
all.’
‘Do you mean to say, I’m not, you dog?’ returned Quilp.
‘No!’ retorted the boy.
‘Then what do you fight on my wharf for, you villain?’ said Quilp.
‘Because he said so,’ replied the boy, pointing to Kit, ‘not because you
an’t.’
‘Then why did he say,’ bawled Kit, ‘that Miss Nelly was ugly, and that
she and my master was obliged to do whatever his master liked? Why did
he say that?’
‘He said what he did because he’s a fool, and you said what you did
because you’re very wise and clever--almost too clever to live, unless
you’re very careful of yourself, Kit.’ said Quilp, with great suavity
in his manner, but still more of quiet malice about his eyes and mouth.
‘Here’s sixpence for you, Kit. Always speak the truth. At all times,
Kit, speak the truth. Lock the counting-house, you dog, and bring me
the key.’
The other boy, to whom this order was addressed, did as he was told,
and was rewarded for his partizanship in behalf of his master, by a
dexterous rap on the nose with the key, which brought the water into
his eyes. Then Mr Quilp departed with the child and Kit in a boat, and
the boy revenged himself by dancing on his head at intervals on the
extreme verge of the wharf, during the whole time they crossed the
river.
There was only Mrs Quilp at home, and she, little expecting the return
of her lord, was just composing herself for a refreshing slumber when
the sound of his footsteps roused her. She had barely time to seem to
be occupied in some needle-work, when he entered, accompanied by the
child; having left Kit downstairs.
‘Here’s Nelly Trent, dear Mrs Quilp,’ said her husband. ‘A glass of
wine, my dear, and a biscuit, for she has had a long walk. She’ll sit
with you, my soul, while I write a letter.’
Mrs Quilp looked tremblingly in her spouse’s face to know what this
unusual courtesy might portend, and obedient to the summons she saw in
his gesture, followed him into the next room.
‘Mind what I say to you,’ whispered Quilp. ‘See if you can get out of
her anything about her grandfather, or what they do, or how they live,
or what he tells her. I’ve my reasons for knowing, if I can. You women
talk more freely to one another than you do to us, and you have a soft,
mild way with you that’ll win upon her. Do you hear?’
‘Yes, Quilp.’
‘Go then. What’s the matter now?’
‘Dear Quilp,’ faltered his wife. ‘I love the child--if you could do
without making me deceive her--’
The dwarf muttering a terrible oath looked round as if for some weapon
with which to inflict condign punishment upon his disobedient wife. The
submissive little woman hurriedly entreated him not to be angry, and
promised to do as he bade her.
‘Do you hear me,’ whispered Quilp, nipping and pinching her arm; ‘worm
yourself into her secrets; I know you can. I’m listening, recollect. If
you’re not sharp enough, I’ll creak the door, and woe betide you if I
have to creak it much. Go!’
Mrs Quilp departed according to order, and her amiable husband,
ensconcing himself behind the partly opened door, and applying his ear
close to it, began to listen with a face of great craftiness and
attention.
Poor Mrs Quilp was thinking, however, in what manner to begin or what
kind of inquiries she could make; and it was not until the door,
creaking in a very urgent manner, warned her to proceed without further
consideration, that the sound of her voice was heard.
‘How very often you have come backwards and forwards lately to Mr
Quilp, my dear.’
‘I have said so to grandfather, a hundred times,’ returned Nell
innocently.
‘And what has he said to that?’
‘Only sighed, and dropped his head, and seemed so sad and wretched that
if you could have seen him I am sure you must have cried; you could not
have helped it more than I, I know. How that door creaks!’
‘It often does.’ returned Mrs Quilp, with an uneasy glance towards it.
‘But your grandfather--he used not to be so wretched?’
‘Oh, no!’ said the child eagerly, ‘so different! We were once so happy
and he so cheerful and contented! You cannot think what a sad change
has fallen on us since.’
‘I am very, very sorry, to hear you speak like this, my dear!’ said Mrs
Quilp. And she spoke the truth.
‘Thank you,’ returned the child, kissing her cheek, ‘you are always
kind to me, and it is a pleasure to talk to you. I can speak to no one
else about him, but poor Kit. I am very happy still, I ought to feel
happier perhaps than I do, but you cannot think how it grieves me
sometimes to see him alter so.’
‘He’ll alter again, Nelly,’ said Mrs Quilp, ‘and be what he was before.’
‘Oh, if God would only let that come about!’ said the child with
streaming eyes; ‘but it is a long time now, since he first began to--I
thought I saw that door moving!’
‘It’s the wind,’ said Mrs Quilp, faintly. ‘Began to--’
‘To be so thoughtful and dejected, and to forget our old way of
spending the time in the long evenings,’ said the child. ‘I used to
read to him by the fireside, and he sat listening, and when I stopped
and we began to talk, he told me about my mother, and how she once
looked and spoke just like me when she was a little child. Then he used
to take me on his knee, and try to make me understand that she was not
lying in her grave, but had flown to a beautiful country beyond the sky
where nothing died or ever grew old--we were very happy once!’
‘Nelly, Nelly!’ said the poor woman, ‘I can’t bear to see one as young
as you so sorrowful. Pray don’t cry.’
‘I do so very seldom,’ said Nell, ‘but I have kept this to myself a
long time, and I am not quite well, I think, for the tears come into my
eyes and I cannot keep them back. I don’t mind telling you my grief,
for I know you will not tell it to any one again.’
Mrs Quilp turned away her head and made no answer.
‘Then,’ said the child, ‘we often walked in the fields and among the
green trees, and when we came home at night, we liked it better for
being tired, and said what a happy place it was. And if it was dark and
rather dull, we used to say, what did it matter to us, for it only made
us remember our last walk with greater pleasure, and look forward to
our next one. But now we never have these walks, and though it is the
same house it is darker and much more gloomy than it used to be,
indeed!’
She paused here, but though the door creaked more than once, Mrs Quilp
said nothing.
‘Mind you don’t suppose,’ said the child earnestly, ‘that grandfather
is less kind to me than he was. I think he loves me better every day,
and is kinder and more affectionate than he was the day before. You do
not know how fond he is of me!’
‘I am sure he loves you dearly,’ said Mrs Quilp.
‘Indeed, indeed he does!’ cried Nell, ‘as dearly as I love him. But I
have not told you the greatest change of all, and this you must never
breathe again to any one. He has no sleep or rest, but that which he
takes by day in his easy chair; for every night and nearly all night
long he is away from home.’
‘Nelly!’
‘Hush!’ said the child, laying her finger on her lip and looking round.
‘When he comes home in the morning, which is generally just before day,
I let him in. Last night he was very late, and it was quite light. I
saw that his face was deadly pale, that his eyes were bloodshot, and
that his legs trembled as he walked. When I had gone to bed again, I
heard him groan. I got up and ran back to him, and heard him say,
before he knew that I was there, that he could not bear his life much
longer, and if it was not for the child, would wish to die. What shall
I do! Oh! What shall I do!’
The fountains of her heart were opened; the child, overpowered by the
weight of her sorrows and anxieties, by the first confidence she had
ever shown, and the sympathy with which her little tale had been
received, hid her face in the arms of her helpless friend, and burst
into a passion of tears.
In a few minutes Mr Quilp returned, and expressed the utmost surprise
to find her in this condition, which he did very naturally and with
admirable effect, for that kind of acting had been rendered familiar to
him by long practice, and he was quite at home in it.
‘She’s tired you see, Mrs Quilp,’ said the dwarf, squinting in a
hideous manner to imply that his wife was to follow his lead. ‘It’s a
long way from her home to the wharf, and then she was alarmed to see a
couple of young scoundrels fighting, and was timorous on the water
besides. All this together has been too much for her. Poor Nell!’
Mr Quilp unintentionally adopted the very best means he could have
devised for the recovery of his young visitor, by patting her on the
head. Such an application from any other hand might not have produced a
remarkable effect, but the child shrank so quickly from his touch and
felt such an instinctive desire to get out of his reach, that she rose
directly and declared herself ready to return.
‘But you’d better wait, and dine with Mrs Quilp and me.’ said the dwarf.
‘I have been away too long, sir, already,’ returned Nell, drying her
eyes.
‘Well,’ said Mr Quilp, ‘if you will go, you will, Nelly. Here’s the
note. It’s only to say that I shall see him to-morrow or maybe next
day, and that I couldn’t do that little business for him this morning.
Good-bye, Nelly. Here, you sir; take care of her, d’ye hear?’
Kit, who appeared at the summons, deigned to make no reply to so
needless an injunction, and after staring at Quilp in a threatening
manner, as if he doubted whether he might not have been the cause of
Nelly shedding tears, and felt more than half disposed to revenge the
fact upon him on the mere suspicion, turned about and followed his
young mistress, who had by this time taken her leave of Mrs Quilp and
departed.
‘You’re a keen questioner, an’t you, Mrs Quilp?’ said the dwarf,
turning upon her as soon as they were left alone.
‘What more could I do?’ returned his wife mildly.
‘What more could you do!’ sneered Quilp, ‘couldn’t you have done
something less? Couldn’t you have done what you had to do, without
appearing in your favourite part of the crocodile, you minx?’
‘I am very sorry for the child, Quilp,’ said his wife. ‘Surely I’ve
done enough. I’ve led her on to tell her secret she supposed we were
alone; and you were by, God forgive me.’
‘You led her on! You did a great deal truly!’ said Quilp. ‘What did I
tell you about making me creak the door? It’s lucky for you that from
what she let fall, I’ve got the clue I want, for if I hadn’t, I’d have
visited the failure upon you, I can tell you.’
Mrs Quilp being fully persuaded of this, made no reply. Her husband
added with some exultation,
‘But you may thank your fortunate stars--the same stars that made you
Mrs Quilp--you may thank them that I’m upon the old gentleman’s track,
and have got a new light. So let me hear no more about this matter now
or at any other time, and don’t get anything too nice for dinner, for I
shan’t be home to it.’
So saying, Mr Quilp put his hat on and took himself off, and Mrs Quilp,
who was afflicted beyond measure by the recollection of the part she
had just acted, shut herself up in her chamber, and smothering her head
in the bed-clothes bemoaned her fault more bitterly than many less
tender-hearted persons would have mourned a much greater offence; for,
in the majority of cases, conscience is an elastic and very flexible
article, which will bear a deal of stretching and adapt itself to a
great variety of circumstances. Some people by prudent management and
leaving it off piece by piece like a flannel waistcoat in warm weather,
even contrive, in time, to dispense with it altogether; but there be
others who can assume the garment and throw it off at pleasure; and
this, being the greatest and most convenient improvement, is the one
most in vogue.
CHAPTER 7
‘Fred,’ said Mr Swiveller, ‘remember the once popular melody of Begone
dull care; fan the sinking flame of hilarity with the wing of
friendship; and pass the rosy wine.’
Mr Richard Swiveller’s apartments were in the neighbourhood of Drury
Lane, and in addition to this convenience of situation had the
advantage of being over a tobacconist’s shop, so that he was enabled to
procure a refreshing sneeze at any time by merely stepping out upon the
staircase, and was saved the trouble and expense of maintaining a
snuff-box. It was in these apartments that Mr Swiveller made use of the
expressions above recorded for the consolation and encouragement of his
desponding friend; and it may not be uninteresting or improper to
remark that even these brief observations partook in a double sense of
the figurative and poetical character of Mr Swiveller’s mind, as the
rosy wine was in fact represented by one glass of cold gin-and-water,
which was replenished as occasion required from a bottle and jug upon
the table, and was passed from one to another, in a scarcity of
tumblers which, as Mr Swiveller’s was a bachelor’s establishment, may
be acknowledged without a blush. By a like pleasant fiction his single
chamber was always mentioned in a plural number. In its disengaged
times, the tobacconist had announced it in his window as ‘apartments’
for a single gentleman, and Mr Swiveller, following up the hint, never
failed to speak of it as his rooms, his lodgings, or his chambers,
conveying to his hearers a notion of indefinite space, and leaving
their imaginations to wander through long suites of lofty halls, at
pleasure.
In this flight of fancy, Mr Swiveller was assisted by a deceptive piece
of furniture, in reality a bedstead, but in semblance a bookcase, which
occupied a prominent situation in his chamber and seemed to defy
suspicion and challenge inquiry. There is no doubt that by day Mr
Swiveller firmly believed this secret convenience to be a bookcase and
nothing more; that he closed his eyes to the bed, resolutely denied the
existence of the blankets, and spurned the bolster from his thoughts.
No word of its real use, no hint of its nightly service, no allusion to
its peculiar properties, had ever passed between him and his most
intimate friends. Implicit faith in the deception was the first article
of his creed. To be the friend of Swiveller you must reject all
circumstantial evidence, all reason, observation, and experience, and
repose a blind belief in the bookcase. It was his pet weakness, and he
cherished it.
‘Fred!’ said Mr Swiveller, finding that his former adjuration had been
productive of no effect. ‘Pass the rosy.’
Young Trent with an impatient gesture pushed the glass towards him, and
fell again in the moody attitude from which he had been unwillingly
roused.
‘I’ll give you, Fred,’ said his friend, stirring the mixture, ‘a little
sentiment appropriate to the occasion. Here’s May the--’
‘Pshaw!’ interposed the other. ‘You worry me to death with your
chattering. You can be merry under any circumstances.’
‘Why, Mr Trent,’ returned Dick, ‘there is a proverb which talks about
being merry and wise. There are some people who can be merry and can’t
be wise, and some who can be wise (or think they can) and can’t be
merry. I’m one of the first sort. If the proverb’s a good ‘un, I
suppose it’s better to keep to half of it than none; at all events, I’d
rather be merry and not wise, than like you, neither one nor t’other.’
‘Bah!’ muttered his friend, peevishly.
‘With all my heart,’ said Mr Swiveller. ‘In the polite circles I
believe this sort of thing isn’t usually said to a gentleman in his own
apartments, but never mind that. Make yourself at home,’ adding to this
retort an observation to the effect that his friend appeared to be
rather ‘cranky’ in point of temper, Richard Swiveller finished the
rosy and applied himself to the composition of another glassful, in
which, after tasting it with great relish, he proposed a toast to an
imaginary company.
‘Gentlemen, I’ll give you, if you please, Success to the ancient family
of the Swivellers, and good luck to Mr Richard in particular--Mr
Richard, gentlemen,’ said Dick with great emphasis, ‘who spends all his
money on his friends and is Bah!’d for his pains. Hear, hear!’
‘Dick!’ said the other, returning to his seat after having paced the
room twice or thrice, ‘will you talk seriously for two minutes, if I
show you a way to make your fortune with very little trouble?’
‘You’ve shown me so many,’ returned Dick; ‘and nothing has come of any
one of ‘em but empty pockets--’
‘You’ll tell a different story of this one, before a very long time is
over,’ said his companion, drawing his chair to the table. ‘You saw my
sister Nell?’
‘What about her?’ returned Dick.
‘She has a pretty face, has she not?’
‘Why, certainly,’ replied Dick. ‘I must say for her that there’s not
any very strong family likeness between her and you.’
‘Has she a pretty face,’ repeated his friend impatiently.
‘Yes,’ said Dick, ‘she has a pretty face, a very pretty face. What of
that?’
‘I’ll tell you,’ returned his friend. ‘It’s very plain that the old man
and I will remain at daggers drawn to the end of our lives, and that I
have nothing to expect from him. You see that, I suppose?’
‘A bat might see that, with the sun shining,’ said Dick.
‘It’s equally plain that the money which the old flint--rot him--first
taught me to expect that I should share with her at his death, will all
be hers, is it not?’
‘I should said it was,’ replied Dick; ‘unless the way in which I put
the case to him, made an impression. It may have done so. It was
powerful, Fred. ‘Here is a jolly old grandfather’--that was strong, I
thought--very friendly and natural. Did it strike you in that way?’
‘It didn’t strike him,’ returned the other, ‘so we needn’t discuss it.
Now look here. Nell is nearly fourteen.’
‘Fine girl of her age, but small,’ observed Richard Swiveller
parenthetically.
‘If I am to go on, be quiet for one minute,’ returned Trent, fretting
at the slight interest the other appeared to take in the conversation.
‘Now I’m coming to the point.’
‘That’s right,’ said Dick.
‘The girl has strong affections, and brought up as she has been, may,
at her age, be easily influenced and persuaded. If I take her in hand,
I will be bound by a very little coaxing and threatening to bend her to
my will. Not to beat about the bush (for the advantages of the scheme
would take a week to tell) what’s to prevent your marrying her?’
Richard Swiveller, who had been looking over the rim of the tumbler
while his companion addressed the foregoing remarks to him with great
energy and earnestness of manner, no sooner heard these words than he
evinced the utmost consternation, and with difficulty ejaculated the
monosyllable:
‘What!’
‘I say, what’s to prevent,’ repeated the other with a steadiness of
manner, of the effect of which upon his companion he was well assured
by long experience, ‘what’s to prevent your marrying her?’
‘And she “nearly fourteen”!’ cried Dick.
‘I don’t mean marrying her now’--returned the brother angrily; ‘say in
two year’s time, in three, in four. Does the old man look like a
long-liver?’
‘He don’t look like it,’ said Dick shaking his head, ‘but these old
people--there’s no trusting them, Fred. There’s an aunt of mine down in
Dorsetshire that was going to die when I was eight years old, and
hasn’t kept her word yet. They’re so aggravating, so unprincipled, so
spiteful--unless there’s apoplexy in the family, Fred, you can’t
calculate upon ‘em, and even then they deceive you just as often as
not.’
‘Look at the worst side of the question then,’ said Trent as steadily
as before, and keeping his eyes upon his friend. ‘Suppose he lives.’
‘To be sure,’ said Dick. ‘There’s the rub.’
‘I say,’ resumed his friend, ‘suppose he lives, and I persuaded, or if
the word sounds more feasible, forced Nell to a secret marriage with
you. What do you think would come of that?’
‘A family and an annual income of nothing, to keep ‘em on,’ said
Richard Swiveller after some reflection.
‘I tell you,’ returned the other with an increased earnestness, which,
whether it were real or assumed, had the same effect on his companion,
‘that he lives for her, that his whole energies and thoughts are bound
up in her, that he would no more disinherit her for an act of
disobedience than he would take me into his favour again for any act of
obedience or virtue that I could possibly be guilty of. He could not do
it. You or any other man with eyes in his head may see that, if he
chooses.’
‘It seems improbable certainly,’ said Dick, musing.
‘It seems improbable because it is improbable,’ his friend returned.
‘If you would furnish him with an additional inducement to forgive you,
let there be an irreconcilable breach, a most deadly quarrel, between
you and me--let there be a pretense of such a thing, I mean, of
course--and he’ll do fast enough. As to Nell, constant dropping will
wear away a stone; you know you may trust to me as far as she is
concerned. So, whether he lives or dies, what does it come to? That
you become the sole inheritor of the wealth of this rich old hunks,
that you and I spend it together, and that you get into the bargain a
beautiful young wife.’
‘I suppose there’s no doubt about his being rich’--said Dick.
‘Doubt! Did you hear what he let fall the other day when we were
there? Doubt! What will you doubt next, Dick?’
It would be tedious to pursue the conversation through all its artful
windings, or to develope the gradual approaches by which the heart of
Richard Swiveller was gained. It is sufficient to know that vanity,
interest, poverty, and every spendthrift consideration urged him to
look upon the proposal with favour, and that where all other
inducements were wanting, the habitual carelessness of his disposition
stepped in and still weighed down the scale on the same side. To these
impulses must be added the complete ascendancy which his friend had
long been accustomed to exercise over him--an ascendancy exerted in the
beginning sorely at the expense of his friend’s vices, and was in nine
cases out of ten looked upon as his designing tempter when he was
indeed nothing but his thoughtless, light-headed tool.
The motives on the other side were something deeper than any which
Richard Swiveller entertained or understood, but these being left to
their own development, require no present elucidation. The negotiation
was concluded very pleasantly, and Mr Swiveller was in the act of
stating in flowery terms that he had no insurmountable objection to
marrying anybody plentifully endowed with money or moveables, who could
be induced to take him, when he was interrupted in his observations by
a knock at the door, and the consequent necessity of crying ‘Come in.’
The door was opened, but nothing came in except a soapy arm and a
strong gush of tobacco. The gush of tobacco came from the shop
downstairs, and the soapy arm proceeded from the body of a
servant-girl, who being then and there engaged in cleaning the stairs
had just drawn it out of a warm pail to take in a letter, which letter
she now held in her hand, proclaiming aloud with that quick perception
of surnames peculiar to her class that it was for Mister Snivelling.
Dick looked rather pale and foolish when he glanced at the direction,
and still more so when he came to look at the inside, observing that it
was one of the inconveniences of being a lady’s man, and that it was
very easy to talk as they had been talking, but he had quite forgotten
her.
‘Her. Who?’ demanded Trent.
‘Sophy Wackles,’ said Dick.
‘Who’s she?’
‘She’s all my fancy painted her, sir, that’s what she is,’ said Mr
Swiveller, taking a long pull at ‘the rosy’ and looking gravely at his
friend. ‘She’s lovely, she’s divine. You know her.’
‘I remember,’ said his companion carelessly. ‘What of her?’
‘Why, sir,’ returned Dick, ‘between Miss Sophia Wackles and the humble
individual who has now the honor to address you, warm and tender
sentiments have been engendered, sentiments of the most honourable and
inspiring kind. The Goddess Diana, sir, that calls aloud for the chase,
is not more particular in her behavior than Sophia Wackles; I can tell
you that.’
‘Am I to believe there’s anything real in what you say?’ demanded his
friend; ‘you don’t mean to say that any love-making has been going on?’
‘Love-making, yes. Promising, no,’ said Dick. ‘There can be no action
for breach, that’s one comfort. I’ve never committed myself in writing,
Fred.’
‘And what’s in the letter, pray?’
‘A reminder, Fred, for to-night--a small party of twenty, making two
hundred light fantastic toes in all, supposing every lady and gentleman
to have the proper complement. I must go, if it’s only to begin
breaking off the affair--I’ll do it, don’t you be afraid. I should like
to know whether she left this herself. If she did, unconscious of any
bar to her happiness, it’s affecting, Fred.’
To solve this question, Mr Swiveller summoned the handmaid and
ascertained that Miss Sophy Wackles had indeed left the letter with her
own hands; and that she had come accompanied, for decorum’s sake no
doubt, by a younger Miss Wackles; and that on learning that Mr
Swiveller was at home and being requested to walk upstairs, she was
extremely shocked and professed that she would rather die. Mr Swiveller
heard this account with a degree of admiration not altogether
consistent with the project in which he had just concurred, but his
friend attached very little importance to his behavior in this respect,
probably because he knew that he had influence sufficient to control
Richard Swiveller’s proceedings in this or any other matter, whenever
he deemed it necessary, for the advancement of his own purposes, to
exert it.
CHAPTER 8
Business disposed of, Mr Swiveller was inwardly reminded of its being
nigh dinner-time, and to the intent that his health might not be
endangered by longer abstinence, dispatched a message to the nearest
eating-house requiring an immediate supply of boiled beef and greens
for two. With this demand, however, the eating-house (having experience
of its customer) declined to comply, churlishly sending back for answer
that if Mr Swiveller stood in need of beef perhaps he would be so
obliging as to come there and eat it, bringing with him, as grace
before meat, the amount of a certain small account which had long been
outstanding. Not at all intimidated by this rebuff, but rather
sharpened in wits and appetite, Mr Swiveller forwarded the same message
to another and more distant eating-house, adding to it by way of rider
that the gentleman was induced to send so far, not only by the great
fame and popularity its beef had acquired, but in consequence of the
extreme toughness of the beef retailed at the obdurant cook’s shop,
which rendered it quite unfit not merely for gentlemanly food, but for
any human consumption. The good effect of this politic course was
demonstrated by the speedy arrival of a small pewter pyramid, curiously
constructed of platters and covers, whereof the boiled-beef-plates
formed the base, and a foaming quart-pot the apex; the structure being
resolved into its component parts afforded all things requisite and
necessary for a hearty meal, to which Mr Swiveller and his friend
applied themselves with great keenness and enjoyment.
‘May the present moment,’ said Dick, sticking his fork into a large
carbuncular potato, ‘be the worst of our lives! I like the plan of
sending ‘em with the peel on; there’s a charm in drawing a potato from
its native element (if I may so express it) to which the rich and
powerful are strangers. Ah! “Man wants but little here below, nor wants
that little long!” How true that is!--after dinner.’
‘I hope the eating-house keeper will want but little and that he may
not want that little long,’ returned his companion; but I suspect
you’ve no means of paying for this!’
‘I shall be passing present, and I’ll call,’ said Dick, winking his eye
significantly. ‘The waiter’s quite helpless. The goods are gone, Fred,
and there’s an end of it.’
In point of fact, it would seem that the waiter felt this wholesome
truth, for when he returned for the empty plates and dishes and was
informed by Mr Swiveller with dignified carelessness that he would call
and settle when he should be passing presently, he displayed some
perturbation of spirit and muttered a few remarks about ‘payment on
delivery’ and ‘no trust,’ and other unpleasant subjects, but was fain
to content himself with inquiring at what hour it was likely that the
gentleman would call, in order that being presently responsible for the
beef, greens, and sundries, he might take to be in the way at the time.
Mr Swiveller, after mentally calculating his engagements to a nicety,
replied that he should look in at from two minutes before six and seven
minutes past; and the man disappearing with this feeble consolation,
Richard Swiveller took a greasy memorandum-book from his pocket and
made an entry therein.
‘Is that a reminder, in case you should forget to call?’ said Trent
with a sneer.
‘Not exactly, Fred,’ replied the imperturbable Richard, continuing to
write with a businesslike air. ‘I enter in this little book the names
of the streets that I can’t go down while the shops are open. This
dinner today closes Long Acre. I bought a pair of boots in Great Queen
Street last week, and made that no throughfare too. There’s only one
avenue to the Strand left often now, and I shall have to stop up that
to-night with a pair of gloves. The roads are closing so fast in every
direction, that in a month’s time, unless my aunt sends me a
remittance, I shall have to go three or four miles out of town to get
over the way.’
‘There’s no fear of failing, in the end?’ said Trent.
‘Why, I hope not,’ returned Mr Swiveller, ‘but the average number of
letters it take to soften her is six, and this time we have got as far
as eight without any effect at all. I’ll write another to-morrow
morning. I mean to blot it a good deal and shake some water over it out
of the pepper-castor to make it look penitent. “I’m in such a state of
mind that I hardly know what I write”--blot--“if you could see me at
this minute shedding tears for my past misconduct”--pepper-castor--“my
hand trembles when I think”--blot again--if that don’t produce the
effect, it’s all over.’
By this time, Mr Swiveller had finished his entry, and he now replaced
his pencil in its little sheath and closed the book, in a perfectly
grave and serious frame of mind. His friend discovered that it was time
for him to fulfil some other engagement, and Richard Swiveller was
accordingly left alone, in company with the rosy wine and his own
meditations touching Miss Sophy Wackles.
‘It’s rather sudden,’ said Dick shaking his head with a look of
infinite wisdom, and running on (as he was accustomed to do) with
scraps of verse as if they were only prose in a hurry; ‘when the heart
of a man is depressed with fears, the mist is dispelled when Miss
Wackles appears; she’s a very nice girl. She’s like the red red rose
that’s newly sprung in June--there’s no denying that--she’s also like a
melody that’s sweetly played in tune. It’s really very sudden. Not that
there’s any need, on account of Fred’s little sister, to turn cool
directly, but its better not to go too far. If I begin to cool at all I
must begin at once, I see that. There’s the chance of an action for
breach, that’s another. There’s the chance of--no, there’s no chance of
that, but it’s as well to be on the safe side.’
This undeveloped was the possibility, which Richard Swiveller sought to
conceal even from himself, of his not being proof against the charms of
Miss Wackles, and in some unguarded moment, by linking his fortunes to
hers forever, of putting it out of his own power to further their
notable scheme to which he had so readily become a party. For all these
reasons, he decided to pick a quarrel with Miss Wackles without delay,
and casting about for a pretext determined in favour of groundless
jealousy. Having made up his mind on this important point, he
circulated the glass (from his right hand to left, and back again)
pretty freely, to enable him to act his part with the greater
discretion, and then, after making some slight improvements in his
toilet, bent his steps towards the spot hallowed by the fair object of
his meditations.
The spot was at Chelsea, for there Miss Sophia Wackles resided with her
widowed mother and two sisters, in conjunction with whom she maintained
a very small day-school for young ladies of proportionate dimensions; a
circumstance which was made known to the neighbourhood by an oval board
over the front first-floor windows, whereupon appeared in circumambient
flourishes the words ‘Ladies’ Seminary’; and which was further
published and proclaimed at intervals between the hours of half-past
nine and ten in the morning, by a straggling and solitary young lady of
tender years standing on the scraper on the tips of her toes and making
futile attempts to reach the knocker with a spelling-book. The several
duties of instruction in this establishment were thus discharged.
English grammar, composition, geography, and the use of the dumb-bells,
by Miss Melissa Wackles; writing, arithmetic, dancing, music, and
general fascination, by Miss Sophia Wackles; the art of needle-work,
marking, and samplery, by Miss Jane Wackles; corporal punishment,
fasting, and other tortures and terrors, by Mrs Wackles. Miss Melissa
Wackles was the eldest daughter, Miss Sophy the next, and Miss Jane the
youngest. Miss Melissa might have seen five-and-thirty summers or
thereabouts, and verged on the autumnal; Miss Sophy was a fresh, good
humoured, buxom girl of twenty; and Miss Jane numbered scarcely sixteen
years. Mrs Wackles was an excellent but rather venomous old lady of
three-score.
To this Ladies’ Seminary, then, Richard Swiveller hied, with designs
obnoxious to the peace of the fair Sophia, who, arrayed in virgin
white, embellished by no ornament but one blushing rose, received him
on his arrival, in the midst of very elegant not to say brilliant
preparations; such as the embellishment of the room with the little
flower-pots which always stood on the window-sill outside, save in
windy weather when they blew into the area; the choice attire of the
day-scholars who were allowed to grace the festival; the unwonted curls
of Miss Jane Wackles who had kept her head during the whole of the
preceding day screwed up tight in a yellow play-bill; and the solemn
gentility and stately bearing of the old lady and her eldest daughter,
which struck Mr Swiveller as being uncommon but made no further
impression upon him.
The truth is--and, as there is no accounting for tastes, even a taste
so strange as this may be recorded without being looked upon as a
wilful and malicious invention--the truth is that neither Mrs Wackles
nor her eldest daughter had at any time greatly favoured the
pretensions of Mr Swiveller, being accustomed to make slight mention of
him as ‘a gay young man’ and to sigh and shake their heads ominously
whenever his name was mentioned. Mr Swiveller’s conduct in respect to
Miss Sophy having been of that vague and dilatory kind which is usually
looked upon as betokening no fixed matrimonial intentions, the young
lady herself began in course of time to deem it highly desirable, that
it should be brought to an issue one way or other. Hence she had at
last consented to play off against Richard Swiveller a stricken
market-gardner known to be ready with his offer on the smallest
encouragement, and hence--as this occasion had been specially assigned
for the purpose--that great anxiety on her part for Richard Swiveller’s
presence which had occasioned her to leave the note he has been seen to
receive. ‘If he has any expectations at all or any means of keeping a
wife well,’ said Mrs Wackles to her eldest daughter, ‘he’ll state ‘em
to us now or never.’--‘If he really cares about me,’ thought Miss
Sophy, ‘he must tell me so, to-night.’
But all these sayings and doings and thinkings being unknown to Mr
Swiveller, affected him not in the least; he was debating in his mind
how he could best turn jealous, and wishing that Sophy were for that
occasion only far less pretty than she was, or that she were her own
sister, which would have served his turn as well, when the company
came, and among them the market-gardener, whose name was Cheggs. But Mr
Cheggs came not alone or unsupported, for he prudently brought along
with him his sister, Miss Cheggs, who making straight to Miss Sophy and
taking her by both hands, and kissing her on both cheeks, hoped in an
audible whisper that they had not come too early.
‘Too early, no!’ replied Miss Sophy.
‘Oh, my dear,’ rejoined Miss Cheggs in the same whisper as before,
‘I’ve been so tormented, so worried, that it’s a mercy we were not here
at four o’clock in the afternoon. Alick has been in such a state of
impatience to come! You’d hardly believe that he was dressed before
dinner-time and has been looking at the clock and teasing me ever
since. It’s all your fault, you naughty thing.’
Hereupon Miss Sophy blushed, and Mr Cheggs (who was bashful before
ladies) blushed too, and Miss Sophy’s mother and sisters, to prevent Mr
Cheggs from blushing more, lavished civilities and attentions upon him,
and left Richard Swiveller to take care of himself. Here was the very
thing he wanted, here was good cause reason and foundation for
pretending to be angry; but having this cause reason and foundation
which he had come expressly to seek, not expecting to find, Richard
Swiveller was angry in sound earnest, and wondered what the devil
Cheggs meant by his impudence.
However, Mr Swiveller had Miss Sophy’s hand for the first quadrille
(country-dances being low, were utterly proscribed) and so gained an
advantage over his rival, who sat despondingly in a corner and
contemplated the glorious figure of the young lady as she moved through
the mazy dance. Nor was this the only start Mr Swiveller had of the
market-gardener, for determining to show the family what quality of man
they trifled with, and influenced perhaps by his late libations, he
performed such feats of agility and such spins and twirls as filled the
company with astonishment, and in particular caused a very long
gentleman who was dancing with a very short scholar, to stand quite
transfixed by wonder and admiration. Even Mrs Wackles forgot for the
moment to snub three small young ladies who were inclined to be happy,
and could not repress a rising thought that to have such a dancer as
that in the family would be a pride indeed.
At this momentous crisis, Miss Cheggs proved herself a vigourous and
useful ally, for not confining herself to expressing by scornful smiles
a contempt for Mr Swiveller’s accomplishments, she took every
opportunity of whispering into Miss Sophy’s ear expressions of
condolence and sympathy on her being worried by such a ridiculous
creature, declaring that she was frightened to death lest Alick should
fall upon, and beat him, in the fulness of his wrath, and entreating
Miss Sophy to observe how the eyes of the said Alick gleamed with love
and fury; passions, it may be observed, which being too much for his
eyes rushed into his nose also, and suffused it with a crimson glow.
‘You must dance with Miss Cheggs,’ said Miss Sophy to Dick Swiviller,
after she had herself danced twice with Mr Cheggs and made great show
of encouraging his advances. ‘She’s a nice girl--and her brother’s
quite delightful.’
‘Quite delightful, is he?’ muttered Dick. ‘Quite delighted too, I
should say, from the manner in which he’s looking this way.’
Here Miss Jane (previously instructed for the purpose) interposed her
many curls and whispered her sister to observe how jealous Mr Cheggs
was.
‘Jealous! Like his impudence!’ said Richard Swiviller.
‘His impudence, Mr Swiviller!’ said Miss Jane, tossing her head. ‘Take
care he don’t hear you, sir, or you may be sorry for it.’
‘Oh, pray, Jane--’ said Miss Sophy.
‘Nonsense!’ replied her sister. ‘Why shouldn’t Mr Cheggs be jealous if
he likes? I like that, certainly. Mr Cheggs has a good a right to be
jealous as anyone else has, and perhaps he may have a better right soon
if he hasn’t already. You know best about that, Sophy!’
Though this was a concerted plot between Miss Sophy and her sister,
originating in humane intentions and having for its object the inducing
Mr Swiviller to declare himself in time, it failed in its effect; for
Miss Jane being one of those young ladies who are prematurely shrill
and shrewish, gave such undue importance to her part that Mr Swiviller
retired in dudgeon, resigning his mistress to Mr Cheggs and conveying a
defiance into his looks which that gentleman indignantly returned.
‘Did you speak to me, sir?’ said Mr Cheggs, following him into a
corner. ‘Have the kindness to smile, sir, in order that we may not be
suspected. Did you speak to me, sir’?
Mr Swiviller looked with a supercilious smile at Mr Chegg’s toes, then
raised his eyes from them to his ankles, from that to his shin, from
that to his knee, and so on very gradually, keeping up his right leg,
until he reached his waistcoat, when he raised his eyes from button to
button until he reached his chin, and travelling straight up the middle
of his nose came at last to his eyes, when he said abruptly,
‘No, sir, I didn’t.’
‘’Hem!’ said Mr Cheggs, glancing over his shoulder, ‘have the goodness
to smile again, sir. Perhaps you wished to speak to me, sir.’
‘No, sir, I didn’t do that, either.’
‘Perhaps you may have nothing to say to me now, sir,’ said Mr Cheggs
fiercely.
At these words Richard Swiviller withdrew his eyes from Mr Chegg’s
face, and travelling down the middle of his nose and down his waistcoat
and down his right leg, reached his toes again, and carefully surveyed
him; this done, he crossed over, and coming up the other leg, and
thence approaching by the waistcoat as before, said when had got to his
eyes, ‘No sir, I haven’t.’
‘Oh, indeed, sir!’ said Mr Cheggs. ‘I’m glad to hear it. You know where
I’m to be found, I suppose, sir, in case you should have anything to
say to me?’
‘I can easily inquire, sir, when I want to know.’
‘There’s nothing more we need say, I believe, sir?’
‘Nothing more, sir’--With that they closed the tremendous dialog by
frowning mutually. Mr Cheggs hastened to tender his hand to Miss Sophy,
and Mr Swiviller sat himself down in a corner in a very moody state.
Hard by this corner, Mrs Wackles and Miss Wackles were seated, looking
on at the dance; and unto Mrs and Miss Wackles, Miss Cheggs
occasionally darted when her partner was occupied with his share of the
figure, and made some remark or other which was gall and wormwood to
Richard Swiviller’s soul. Looking into the eyes of Mrs and Miss Wackles
for encouragement, and sitting very upright and uncomfortable on a
couple of hard stools, were two of the day-scholars; and when Miss
Wackles smiled, and Mrs Wackles smiled, the two little girls on the
stools sought to curry favour by smiling likewise, in gracious
acknowledgement of which attention the old lady frowned them down
instantly, and said that if they dared to be guilty of such an
impertinence again, they should be sent under convoy to their
respective homes. This threat caused one of the young ladies, she being
of a weak and trembling temperament, to shed tears, and for this
offense they were both filed off immediately, with a dreadful
promptitude that struck terror into the souls of all the pupils.
‘I’ve got such news for you,’ said Miss Cheggs approaching once more,
‘Alick has been saying such things to Sophy. Upon my word, you know,
it’s quite serious and in earnest, that’s clear.’
‘What’s he been saying, my dear?’ demanded Mrs Wackles.
‘All manner of things,’ replied Miss Cheggs, ‘you can’t think how out
he has been speaking!’
Richard Swiviller considered it advisable to hear no more, but taking
advantage of a pause in the dancing, and the approach of Mr Cheggs to
pay his court to the old lady, swaggered with an extremely careful
assumption of extreme carelessness toward the door, passing on the way
Miss Jane Wackles, who in all the glory of her curls was holding a
flirtation, (as good practice when no better was to be had) with a
feeble old gentleman who lodged in the parlour. Near the door sat Miss
Sophy, still fluttered and confused by the attentions of Mr Cheggs, and
by her side Richard Swiveller lingered for a moment to exchange a few
parting words.
‘My boat is on the shore and my bark is on the sea, but before I pass
this door I will say farewell to thee,’ murmured Dick, looking gloomily
upon her.
‘Are you going?’ said Miss Sophy, whose heart sank within her at the
result of her stratagem, but who affected a light indifference
notwithstanding.
‘Am I going!’ echoed Dick bitterly. ‘Yes, I am. What then?’
‘Nothing, except that it’s very early,’ said Miss Sophy; ‘but you are
your own master, of course.’
‘I would that I had been my own mistress too,’ said Dick, ‘before I had
ever entertained a thought of you. Miss Wackles, I believed you true,
and I was blest in so believing, but now I mourn that e’er I knew, a
girl so fair yet so deceiving.’
Miss Sophy bit her lip and affected to look with great interest after
Mr Cheggs, who was quaffing lemonade in the distance.
‘I came here,’ said Dick, rather oblivious of the purpose with which he
had really come, ‘with my bosom expanded, my heart dilated, and my
sentiments of a corresponding description. I go away with feelings that
may be conceived but cannot be described, feeling within myself that
desolating truth that my best affections have experienced this night a
stifler!’
‘I am sure I don’t know what you mean, Mr Swiviller,’ said Miss Sophy
with downcast eyes. ‘I’m very sorry if--’
‘Sorry, Ma’am!’ said Dick, ‘sorry in the possession of a Cheggs! But I
wish you a very good night, concluding with this slight remark, that
there is a young lady growing up at this present moment for me, who has
not only great personal attractions but great wealth, and who has
requested her next of kin to propose for my hand, which, having a
regard for some members of her family, I have consented to promise.
It’s a gratifying circumstance which you’ll be glad to hear, that a
young and lovely girl is growing into a woman expressly on my account,
and is now saving up for me. I thought I’d mention it. I have now
merely to apologize for trespassing so long upon your attention. Good
night.’
‘There’s one good thing springs out of all this,’ said Richard
Swiviller to himself when he had reached home and was hanging over the
candle with the extinguisher in his hand, ‘which is, that I now go
heart and soul, neck and heels, with Fred in all his scheme about
little Nelly, and right glad he’ll be to find me so strong upon it. He
shall know all about that to-morrow, and in the meantime, as it’s
rather late, I’ll try and get a wink of the balmy.’
‘The balmy’ came almost as soon as it was courted. In a very few
minutes Mr Swiviller was fast asleep, dreaming that he had married
Nelly Trent and come into the property, and that his first act of power
was to lay waste the market-garden of Mr Cheggs and turn it into a
brick-field.
CHAPTER 9
The child, in her confidence with Mrs Quilp, had but feebly described
the sadness and sorrow of her thoughts, or the heaviness of the cloud
which overhung her home, and cast dark shadows on its hearth. Besides
that it was very difficult to impart to any person not intimately
acquainted with the life she led, an adequate sense of its gloom and
loneliness, a constant fear of in some way committing or injuring the
old man to whom she was so tenderly attached, had restrained her, even
in the midst of her heart’s overflowing, and made her timid of allusion
to the main cause of her anxiety and distress.
For, it was not the monotonous days unchequered by variety and
uncheered by pleasant companionship, it was not the dark dreary
evenings or the long solitary nights, it was not the absence of every
slight and easy pleasure for which young hearts beat high, or the
knowing nothing of childhood but its weakness and its easily wounded
spirit, that had wrung such tears from Nell. To see the old man struck
down beneath the pressure of some hidden grief, to mark his wavering
and unsettled state, to be agitated at times with a dreadful fear that
his mind was wandering, and to trace in his words and looks the dawning
of despondent madness; to watch and wait and listen for confirmation of
these things day after day, and to feel and know that, come what might,
they were alone in the world with no one to help or advise or care
about them--these were causes of depression and anxiety that might have
sat heavily on an older breast with many influences at work to cheer
and gladden it, but how heavily on the mind of a young child to whom
they were ever present, and who was constantly surrounded by all that
could keep such thoughts in restless action!
And yet, to the old man’s vision, Nell was still the same. When he
could, for a moment, disengage his mind from the phantom that haunted
and brooded on it always, there was his young companion with the same
smile for him, the same earnest words, the same merry laugh, the same
love and care that, sinking deep into his soul, seemed to have been
present to him through his whole life. And so he went on, content to
read the book of her heart from the page first presented to him, little
dreaming of the story that lay hidden in its other leaves, and
murmuring within himself that at least the child was happy.
She had been once. She had gone singing through the dim rooms, and
moving with gay and lightsome step among their dusty treasures, making
them older by her young life, and sterner and more grim by her gay and
cheerful presence. But, now, the chambers were cold and gloomy, and
when she left her own little room to while away the tedious hours, and
sat in one of them, she was still and motionless as their inanimate
occupants, and had no heart to startle the echoes--hoarse from their
long silence--with her voice.
In one of these rooms, was a window looking into the street, where the
child sat, many and many a long evening, and often far into the night,
alone and thoughtful. None are so anxious as those who watch and wait;
at these times, mournful fancies came flocking on her mind, in crowds.
She would take her station here, at dusk, and watch the people as they
passed up and down the street, or appeared at the windows of the
opposite houses; wondering whether those rooms were as lonesome as that
in which she sat, and whether those people felt it company to see her
sitting there, as she did only to see them look out and draw in their
heads again. There was a crooked stack of chimneys on one of the
roofs, in which, by often looking at them, she had fancied ugly faces
that were frowning over at her and trying to peer into the room; and
she felt glad when it grew too dark to make them out, though she was
sorry too, when the man came to light the lamps in the street--for it
made it late, and very dull inside. Then, she would draw in her head
to look round the room and see that everything was in its place and
hadn’t moved; and looking out into the street again, would perhaps see
a man passing with a coffin on his back, and two or three others
silently following him to a house where somebody lay dead; which made
her shudder and think of such things until they suggested afresh the
old man’s altered face and manner, and a new train of fears and
speculations. If he were to die--if sudden illness had happened to
him, and he were never to come home again, alive--if, one night, he
should come home, and kiss and bless her as usual, and after she had
gone to bed and had fallen asleep and was perhaps dreaming pleasantly,
and smiling in her sleep, he should kill himself and his blood come
creeping, creeping, on the ground to her own bed-room door! These
thoughts were too terrible to dwell upon, and again she would have
recourse to the street, now trodden by fewer feet, and darker and more
silent than before. The shops were closing fast, and lights began to
shine from the upper windows, as the neighbours went to bed. By
degrees, these dwindled away and disappeared or were replaced, here and
there, by a feeble rush-candle which was to burn all night. Still,
there was one late shop at no great distance which sent forth a ruddy
glare upon the pavement even yet, and looked bright and companionable.
But, in a little time, this closed, the light was extinguished, and all
was gloomy and quiet, except when some stray footsteps sounded on the
pavement, or a neighbour, out later than his wont, knocked lustily at
his house-door to rouse the sleeping inmates.
When the night had worn away thus far (and seldom now until it had) the
child would close the window, and steal softly down stairs, thinking as
she went that if one of those hideous faces below, which often mingled
with her dreams, were to meet her by the way, rendering itself visible
by some strange light of its own, how terrified she would be. But
these fears vanished before a well-trimmed lamp and the familiar aspect
of her own room. After praying fervently, and with many bursting
tears, for the old man, and the restoration of his peace of mind and
the happiness they had once enjoyed, she would lay her head upon the
pillow and sob herself to sleep: often starting up again, before the
day-light came, to listen for the bell and respond to the imaginary
summons which had roused her from her slumber.
One night, the third after Nelly’s interview with Mrs Quilp, the old
man, who had been weak and ill all day, said he should not leave home.
The child’s eyes sparkled at the intelligence, but her joy subsided
when they reverted to his worn and sickly face.
‘Two days,’ he said, ‘two whole, clear, days have passed, and there is
no reply. What did he tell thee, Nell?’
‘Exactly what I told you, dear grandfather, indeed.’
‘True,’ said the old man, faintly. ‘Yes. But tell me again, Nell. My
head fails me. What was it that he told thee? Nothing more than that
he would see me to-morrow or next day? That was in the note.’
‘Nothing more,’ said the child. ‘Shall I go to him again to-morrow,
dear grandfather? Very early? I will be there and back, before
breakfast.’
The old man shook his head, and sighing mournfully, drew her towards
him.
‘’Twould be of no use, my dear, no earthly use. But if he deserts me,
Nell, at this moment--if he deserts me now, when I should, with his
assistance, be recompensed for all the time and money I have lost, and
all the agony of mind I have undergone, which makes me what you see, I
am ruined, and--worse, far worse than that--have ruined thee, for whom
I ventured all. If we are beggars--!’
‘What if we are?’ said the child boldly. ‘Let us be beggars, and be
happy.’
‘Beggars--and happy!’ said the old man. ‘Poor child!’
‘Dear grandfather,’ cried the girl with an energy which shone in her
flushed face, trembling voice, and impassioned gesture, ‘I am not a
child in that I think, but even if I am, oh hear me pray that we may
beg, or work in open roads or fields, to earn a scanty living, rather
than live as we do now.’
‘Nelly!’ said the old man.
‘Yes, yes, rather than live as we do now,’ the child repeated, more
earnestly than before. ‘If you are sorrowful, let me know why and be
sorrowful too; if you waste away and are paler and weaker every day,
let me be your nurse and try to comfort you. If you are poor, let us
be poor together; but let me be with you, do let me be with you; do not
let me see such change and not know why, or I shall break my heart and
die. Dear grandfather, let us leave this sad place to-morrow, and beg
our way from door to door.’
The old man covered his face with his hands, and hid it in the pillow
of the couch on which he lay.
‘Let us be beggars,’ said the child passing an arm round his neck, ‘I
have no fear but we shall have enough, I am sure we shall. Let us walk
through country places, and sleep in fields and under trees, and never
think of money again, or anything that can make you sad, but rest at
nights, and have the sun and wind upon our faces in the day, and thank
God together! Let us never set foot in dark rooms or melancholy
houses, any more, but wander up and down wherever we like to go; and
when you are tired, you shall stop to rest in the pleasantest place
that we can find, and I will go and beg for both.’
The child’s voice was lost in sobs as she dropped upon the old man’s
neck; nor did she weep alone.
These were not words for other ears, nor was it a scene for other eyes.
And yet other ears and eyes were there and greedily taking in all that
passed, and moreover they were the ears and eyes of no less a person
than Mr Daniel Quilp, who, having entered unseen when the child first
placed herself at the old man’s side, refrained--actuated, no doubt, by
motives of the purest delicacy--from interrupting the conversation, and
stood looking on with his accustomed grin. Standing, however, being a
tiresome attitude to a gentleman already fatigued with walking, and the
dwarf being one of that kind of persons who usually make themselves at
home, he soon cast his eyes upon a chair, into which he skipped with
uncommon agility, and perching himself on the back with his feet upon
the seat, was thus enabled to look on and listen with greater comfort
to himself, besides gratifying at the same time that taste for doing
something fantastic and monkey-like, which on all occasions had strong
possession of him. Here, then, he sat, one leg cocked carelessly over
the other, his chin resting on the palm of his hand, his head turned a
little on one side, and his ugly features twisted into a complacent
grimace. And in this position the old man, happening in course of time
to look that way, at length chanced to see him: to his unbounded
astonishment.
The child uttered a suppressed shriek on beholding this agreeable
figure; in their first surprise both she and the old man, not knowing
what to say, and half doubting its reality, looked shrinkingly at it.
Not at all disconcerted by this reception, Daniel Quilp preserved the
same attitude, merely nodding twice or thrice with great condescension.
At length, the old man pronounced his name, and inquired how he came
there.
‘Through the door,’ said Quilp pointing over his shoulder with his
thumb. ‘I’m not quite small enough to get through key-holes. I wish I
was. I want to have some talk with you, particularly, and in private.
With nobody present, neighbour. Good-bye, little Nelly.’
Nell looked at the old man, who nodded to her to retire, and kissed her
cheek.
‘Ah!’ said the dwarf, smacking his lips, ‘what a nice kiss that
was--just upon the rosy part. What a capital kiss!’
Nell was none the slower in going away, for this remark. Quilp looked
after her with an admiring leer, and when she had closed the door, fell
to complimenting the old man upon her charms.
‘Such a fresh, blooming, modest little bud, neighbour,’ said Quilp,
nursing his short leg, and making his eyes twinkle very much; ‘such a
chubby, rosy, cosy, little Nell!’
The old man answered by a forced smile, and was plainly struggling with
a feeling of the keenest and most exquisite impatience. It was not
lost upon Quilp, who delighted in torturing him, or indeed anybody
else, when he could.
‘She’s so,’ said Quilp, speaking very slowly, and feigning to be quite
absorbed in the subject, ‘so small, so compact, so beautifully
modelled, so fair, with such blue veins and such a transparent skin,
and such little feet, and such winning ways--but bless me, you’re
nervous! Why neighbour, what’s the matter? I swear to you,’ continued
the dwarf dismounting from the chair and sitting down in it, with a
careful slowness of gesture very different from the rapidity with which
he had sprung up unheard, ‘I swear to you that I had no idea old blood
ran so fast or kept so warm. I thought it was sluggish in its course,
and cool, quite cool. I am pretty sure it ought to be. Yours must be
out of order, neighbour.’
‘I believe it is,’ groaned the old man, clasping his head with both
hands. ‘There’s burning fever here, and something now and then to
which I fear to give a name.’
The dwarf said never a word, but watched his companion as he paced
restlessly up and down the room, and presently returned to his seat.
Here he remained, with his head bowed upon his breast for some time,
and then suddenly raising it, said,
‘Once, and once for all, have you brought me any money?’
‘No!’ returned Quilp.
‘Then,’ said the old man, clenching his hands desperately, and looking
upwards, ‘the child and I are lost!’
‘Neighbour,’ said Quilp glancing sternly at him, and beating his hand
twice or thrice upon the table to attract his wandering attention, ‘let
me be plain with you, and play a fairer game than when you held all the
cards, and I saw but the backs and nothing more. You have no secret
from me now.’
The old man looked up, trembling.
‘You are surprised,’ said Quilp. ‘Well, perhaps that’s natural. You
have no secret from me now, I say; no, not one. For now, I know, that
all those sums of money, that all those loans, advances, and supplies
that you have had from me, have found their way to--shall I say the
word?’
‘Aye!’ replied the old man, ‘say it, if you will.’
‘To the gaming-table,’ rejoined Quilp, ‘your nightly haunt. This was
the precious scheme to make your fortune, was it; this was the secret
certain source of wealth in which I was to have sunk my money (if I had
been the fool you took me for); this was your inexhaustible mine of
gold, your El Dorado, eh?’
‘Yes,’ cried the old man, turning upon him with gleaming eyes, ‘it was.
It is. It will be, till I die.’
‘That I should have been blinded,’ said Quilp looking contemptuously at
him, ‘by a mere shallow gambler!’
‘I am no gambler,’ cried the old man fiercely. ‘I call Heaven to
witness that I never played for gain of mine, or love of play; that at
every piece I staked, I whispered to myself that orphan’s name and
called on Heaven to bless the venture;--which it never did. Whom did
it prosper? Who were those with whom I played? Men who lived by
plunder, profligacy, and riot; squandering their gold in doing ill, and
propagating vice and evil. My winnings would have been from them, my
winnings would have been bestowed to the last farthing on a young
sinless child whose life they would have sweetened and made happy.
What would they have contracted? The means of corruption,
wretchedness, and misery. Who would not have hoped in such a cause?
Tell me that! Who would not have hoped as I did?’
‘When did you first begin this mad career?’ asked Quilp, his taunting
inclination subdued, for a moment, by the old man’s grief and wildness.
‘When did I first begin?’ he rejoined, passing his hand across his
brow. ‘When was it, that I first began? When should it be, but when I
began to think how little I had saved, how long a time it took to save
at all, how short a time I might have at my age to live, and how she
would be left to the rough mercies of the world, with barely enough to
keep her from the sorrows that wait on poverty; then it was that I
began to think about it.’
‘After you first came to me to get your precious grandson packed off to
sea?’ said Quilp.
‘Shortly after that,’ replied the old man. ‘I thought of it a long
time, and had it in my sleep for months. Then I began. I found no
pleasure in it, I expected none. What has it ever brought me but
anxious days and sleepless nights; but loss of health and peace of
mind, and gain of feebleness and sorrow!’
‘You lost what money you had laid by, first, and then came to me.
While I thought you were making your fortune (as you said you were) you
were making yourself a beggar, eh? Dear me! And so it comes to pass
that I hold every security you could scrape together, and a bill of
sale upon the--upon the stock and property,’ said Quilp standing up and
looking about him, as if to assure himself that none of it had been
taken away. ‘But did you never win?’
‘Never!’ groaned the old man. ‘Never won back my loss!’
‘I thought,’ sneered the dwarf, ‘that if a man played long enough he
was sure to win at last, or, at the worst, not to come off a loser.’
‘And so he is,’ cried the old man, suddenly rousing himself from his
state of despondency, and lashed into the most violent excitement, ‘so
he is; I have felt that from the first, I have always known it, I’ve
seen it, I never felt it half so strongly as I feel it now. Quilp, I
have dreamed, three nights, of winning the same large sum, I never
could dream that dream before, though I have often tried. Do not
desert me, now I have this chance. I have no resource but you, give me
some help, let me try this one last hope.’
The dwarf shrugged his shoulders and shook his head.
‘See, Quilp, good tender-hearted Quilp,’ said the old man, drawing some
scraps of paper from his pocket with a trembling hand, and clasping the
dwarf’s arm, ‘only see here. Look at these figures, the result of long
calculation, and painful and hard experience. I MUST win. I only want
a little help once more, a few pounds, but two score pounds, dear
Quilp.’
‘The last advance was seventy,’ said the dwarf; ‘and it went in one
night.’
‘I know it did,’ answered the old man, ‘but that was the very worst
fortune of all, and the time had not come then. Quilp, consider,
consider,’ the old man cried, trembling so much the while, that the
papers in his hand fluttered as if they were shaken by the wind, ‘that
orphan child! If I were alone, I could die with gladness--perhaps even
anticipate that doom which is dealt out so unequally: coming, as it
does, on the proud and happy in their strength, and shunning the needy
and afflicted, and all who court it in their despair--but what I have
done, has been for her. Help me for her sake I implore you; not for
mine; for hers!’
‘I’m sorry I’ve got an appointment in the city,’ said Quilp, looking at
his watch with perfect self-possession, ‘or I should have been very
glad to have spent half an hour with you while you composed yourself,
very glad.’
‘Nay, Quilp, good Quilp,’ gasped the old man, catching at his skirts,
‘you and I have talked together, more than once, of her poor mother’s
story. The fear of her coming to poverty has perhaps been bred in me
by that. Do not be hard upon me, but take that into account. You are
a great gainer by me. Oh spare me the money for this one last hope!’
‘I couldn’t do it really,’ said Quilp with unusual politeness, ‘though
I tell you what--and this is a circumstance worth bearing in mind as
showing how the sharpest among us may be taken in sometimes--I was so
deceived by the penurious way in which you lived, alone with Nelly--’
‘All done to save money for tempting fortune, and to make her triumph
greater,’ cried the old man.
‘Yes, yes, I understand that now,’ said Quilp; ‘but I was going to say,
I was so deceived by that, your miserly way, the reputation you had
among those who knew you of being rich, and your repeated assurances
that you would make of my advances treble and quadruple the interest
you paid me, that I’d have advanced you, even now, what you want, on
your simple note of hand, if I hadn’t unexpectedly become acquainted
with your secret way of life.’
‘Who is it,’ retorted the old man desperately, ‘that, notwithstanding
all my caution, told you? Come. Let me know the name--the person.’
The crafty dwarf, bethinking himself that his giving up the child would
lead to the disclosure of the artifice he had employed, which, as
nothing was to be gained by it, it was well to conceal, stopped short
in his answer and said, ‘Now, who do you think?’
‘It was Kit, it must have been the boy; he played the spy, and you
tampered with him?’ said the old man.
‘How came you to think of him?’ said the dwarf in a tone of great
commiseration. ‘Yes, it was Kit. Poor Kit!’
So saying, he nodded in a friendly manner, and took his leave: stopping
when he had passed the outer door a little distance, and grinning with
extraordinary delight.
‘Poor Kit!’ muttered Quilp. ‘I think it was Kit who said I was an
uglier dwarf than could be seen anywhere for a penny, wasn’t it. Ha ha
ha! Poor Kit!’
And with that he went his way, still chuckling as he went.
CHAPTER 10
Daniel Quilp neither entered nor left the old man’s house, unobserved.
In the shadow of an archway nearly opposite, leading to one of the many
passages which diverged from the main street, there lingered one, who,
having taken up his position when the twilight first came on, still
maintained it with undiminished patience, and leaning against the wall
with the manner of a person who had a long time to wait, and being well
used to it was quite resigned, scarcely changed his attitude for the
hour together.
This patient lounger attracted little attention from any of those who
passed, and bestowed as little upon them. His eyes were constantly
directed towards one object; the window at which the child was
accustomed to sit. If he withdrew them for a moment, it was only to
glance at a clock in some neighbouring shop, and then to strain his
sight once more in the old quarter with increased earnestness and
attention.
It had been remarked that this personage evinced no weariness in his
place of concealment; nor did he, long as his waiting was. But as the
time went on, he manifested some anxiety and surprise, glancing at the
clock more frequently and at the window less hopefully than before. At
length, the clock was hidden from his sight by some envious shutters,
then the church steeples proclaimed eleven at night, then the quarter
past, and then the conviction seemed to obtrude itself on his mind that
it was no use tarrying there any longer.
That the conviction was an unwelcome one, and that he was by no means
willing to yield to it, was apparent from his reluctance to quit the
spot; from the tardy steps with which he often left it, still looking
over his shoulder at the same window; and from the precipitation with
which he as often returned, when a fancied noise or the changing and
imperfect light induced him to suppose it had been softly raised. At
length, he gave the matter up, as hopeless for that night, and suddenly
breaking into a run as though to force himself away, scampered off at
his utmost speed, nor once ventured to look behind him lest he should
be tempted back again.
Without relaxing his pace, or stopping to take breath, this mysterious
individual dashed on through a great many alleys and narrow ways until
he at length arrived in a square paved court, when he subsided into a
walk, and making for a small house from the window of which a light was
shining, lifted the latch of the door and passed in.
‘Bless us!’ cried a woman turning sharply round, ‘who’s that? Oh!
It’s you, Kit!’
‘Yes, mother, it’s me.’
‘Why, how tired you look, my dear!’
‘Old master an’t gone out to-night,’ said Kit; ‘and so she hasn’t been
at the window at all.’ With which words, he sat down by the fire and
looked very mournful and discontented.
The room in which Kit sat himself down, in this condition, was an
extremely poor and homely place, but with that air of comfort about it,
nevertheless, which--or the spot must be a wretched one
indeed--cleanliness and order can always impart in some degree. Late
as the Dutch clock showed it to be, the poor woman was still hard at
work at an ironing-table; a young child lay sleeping in a cradle near
the fire; and another, a sturdy boy of two or three years old, very
wide awake, with a very tight night-cap on his head, and a night-gown
very much too small for him on his body, was sitting bolt upright in a
clothes-basket, staring over the rim with his great round eyes, and
looking as if he had thoroughly made up his mind never to go to sleep
any more; which, as he had already declined to take his natural rest
and had been brought out of bed in consequence, opened a cheerful
prospect for his relations and friends. It was rather a queer-looking
family: Kit, his mother, and the children, being all strongly alike.
Kit was disposed to be out of temper, as the best of us are too
often--but he looked at the youngest child who was sleeping soundly,
and from him to his other brother in the clothes-basket, and from him
to their mother, who had been at work without complaint since morning,
and thought it would be a better and kinder thing to be good-humoured.
So he rocked the cradle with his foot; made a face at the rebel in the
clothes-basket, which put him in high good-humour directly; and stoutly
determined to be talkative and make himself agreeable.
‘Ah, mother!’ said Kit, taking out his clasp-knife, and falling upon a
great piece of bread and meat which she had had ready for him, hours
before, ‘what a one you are! There an’t many such as you, I know.’
‘I hope there are many a great deal better, Kit,’ said Mrs Nubbles;
‘and that there are, or ought to be, accordin’ to what the parson at
chapel says.’
‘Much he knows about it,’ returned Kit contemptuously. ‘Wait till he’s
a widder and works like you do, and gets as little, and does as much,
and keeps his spirit up the same, and then I’ll ask him what’s o’clock
and trust him for being right to half a second.’
‘Well,’ said Mrs Nubbles, evading the point, ‘your beer’s down there by
the fender, Kit.’
‘I see,’ replied her son, taking up the porter pot, ‘my love to you,
mother. And the parson’s health too if you like. I don’t bear him any
malice, not I!’
‘Did you tell me, just now, that your master hadn’t gone out to-night?’
inquired Mrs Nubbles.
‘Yes,’ said Kit, ‘worse luck!’
‘You should say better luck, I think,’ returned his mother, ‘because
Miss Nelly won’t have been left alone.’
‘Ah!’ said Kit, ‘I forgot that. I said worse luck, because I’ve been
watching ever since eight o’clock, and seen nothing of her.’
‘I wonder what she’d say,’ cried his mother, stopping in her work and
looking round, ‘if she knew that every night, when she--poor thing--is
sitting alone at that window, you are watching in the open street for
fear any harm should come to her, and that you never leave the place or
come home to your bed though you’re ever so tired, till such time as
you think she’s safe in hers.’
‘Never mind what she’d say,’ replied Kit, with something like a blush
on his uncouth face; ‘she’ll never know nothing, and consequently,
she’ll never say nothing.’
Mrs Nubbles ironed away in silence for a minute or two, and coming to
the fireplace for another iron, glanced stealthily at Kit while she
rubbed it on a board and dusted it with a duster, but said nothing
until she had returned to her table again: when, holding the iron at an
alarmingly short distance from her cheek, to test its temperature, and
looking round with a smile, she observed:
‘I know what some people would say, Kit--’
‘Nonsense,’ interposed Kit with a perfect apprehension of what was to
follow.
‘No, but they would indeed. Some people would say that you’d fallen in
love with her, I know they would.’
To this, Kit only replied by bashfully bidding his mother ‘get out,’
and forming sundry strange figures with his legs and arms, accompanied
by sympathetic contortions of his face. Not deriving from these means
the relief which he sought, he bit off an immense mouthful from the
bread and meat, and took a quick drink of the porter; by which
artificial aids he choked himself and effected a diversion of the
subject.
‘Speaking seriously though, Kit,’ said his mother, taking up the theme
afresh, after a time, ‘for of course I was only in joke just now, it’s
very good and thoughtful, and like you, to do this, and never let
anybody know it, though some day I hope she may come to know it, for
I’m sure she would be very grateful to you and feel it very much. It’s
a cruel thing to keep the dear child shut up there. I don’t wonder
that the old gentleman wants to keep it from you.’
‘He don’t think it’s cruel, bless you,’ said Kit, ‘and don’t mean it to
be so, or he wouldn’t do it--I do consider, mother, that he wouldn’t do
it for all the gold and silver in the world. No, no, that he wouldn’t.
I know him better than that.’
‘Then what does he do it for, and why does he keep it so close from
you?’ said Mrs Nubbles.
‘That I don’t know,’ returned her son. ‘If he hadn’t tried to keep it
so close though, I should never have found it out, for it was his
getting me away at night and sending me off so much earlier than he
used to, that first made me curious to know what was going on. Hark!
what’s that?’
‘It’s only somebody outside.’
‘It’s somebody crossing over here,’ said Kit, standing up to listen,
‘and coming very fast too. He can’t have gone out after I left, and
the house caught fire, mother!’
The boy stood, for a moment, really bereft, by the apprehension he had
conjured up, of the power to move. The footsteps drew nearer, the door
was opened with a hasty hand, and the child herself, pale and
breathless, and hastily wrapped in a few disordered garments, hurried
into the room.
‘Miss Nelly! What is the matter!’ cried mother and son together.
‘I must not stay a moment,’ she returned, ‘grandfather has been taken
very ill. I found him in a fit upon the floor--’
‘I’ll run for a doctor’--said Kit, seizing his brimless hat. ‘I’ll be
there directly, I’ll--’
‘No, no,’ cried Nell, ‘there is one there, you’re not wanted,
you--you--must never come near us any more!’
‘What!’ roared Kit.
‘Never again,’ said the child. ‘Don’t ask me why, for I don’t know.
Pray don’t ask me why, pray don’t be sorry, pray don’t be vexed with
me! I have nothing to do with it indeed!’
Kit looked at her with his eyes stretched wide; and opened and shut his
mouth a great many times; but couldn’t get out one word.
‘He complains and raves of you,’ said the child, ‘I don’t know what you
have done, but I hope it’s nothing very bad.’
‘I done!’ roared Kit.
‘He cried that you’re the cause of all his misery,’ returned the child
with tearful eyes; ‘he screamed and called for you; they say you must
not come near him or he will die. You must not return to us any more.
I came to tell you. I thought it would be better that I should come
than somebody quite strange. Oh, Kit, what have you done? You, in
whom I trusted so much, and who were almost the only friend I had!’
The unfortunate Kit looked at his young mistress harder and harder, and
with eyes growing wider and wider, but was perfectly motionless and
silent.
‘I have brought his money for the week,’ said the child, looking to the
woman and laying it on the table--‘and--and--a little more, for he was
always good and kind to me. I hope he will be sorry and do well
somewhere else and not take this to heart too much. It grieves me very
much to part with him like this, but there is no help. It must be
done. Good night!’
With the tears streaming down her face, and her slight figure trembling
with the agitation of the scene she had left, the shock she had
received, the errand she had just discharged, and a thousand painful
and affectionate feelings, the child hastened to the door, and
disappeared as rapidly as she had come.
The poor woman, who had no cause to doubt her son, but every reason for
relying on his honesty and truth, was staggered, notwithstanding, by
his not having advanced one word in his defence. Visions of gallantry,
knavery, robbery; and of the nightly absences from home for which he
had accounted so strangely, having been occasioned by some unlawful
pursuit; flocked into her brain and rendered her afraid to question
him. She rocked herself upon a chair, wringing her hands and weeping
bitterly, but Kit made no attempt to comfort her and remained quite
bewildered. The baby in the cradle woke up and cried; the boy in the
clothes-basket fell over on his back with the basket upon him, and was
seen no more; the mother wept louder yet and rocked faster; but Kit,
insensible to all the din and tumult, remained in a state of utter
stupefaction.
CHAPTER 11
Quiet and solitude were destined to hold uninterrupted rule no longer,
beneath the roof that sheltered the child. Next morning, the old man
was in a raging fever accompanied with delirium; and sinking under the
influence of this disorder he lay for many weeks in imminent peril of
his life. There was watching enough, now, but it was the watching of
strangers who made a greedy trade of it, and who, in the intervals in
their attendance upon the sick man huddled together with a ghastly
good-fellowship, and ate and drank and made merry; for disease and
death were their ordinary household gods.
Yet, in all the hurry and crowding of such a time, the child was more
alone than she had ever been before; alone in spirit, alone in her
devotion to him who was wasting away upon his burning bed; alone in her
unfeigned sorrow, and her unpurchased sympathy. Day after day, and
night after night, found her still by the pillow of the unconscious
sufferer, still anticipating his every want, still listening to those
repetitions of her name and those anxieties and cares for her, which
were ever uppermost among his feverish wanderings.
The house was no longer theirs. Even the sick chamber seemed to be
retained, on the uncertain tenure of Mr Quilp’s favour. The old man’s
illness had not lasted many days when he took formal possession of the
premises and all upon them, in virtue of certain legal powers to that
effect, which few understood and none presumed to call in question.
This important step secured, with the assistance of a man of law whom
he brought with him for the purpose, the dwarf proceeded to establish
himself and his coadjutor in the house, as an assertion of his claim
against all comers; and then set about making his quarters comfortable,
after his own fashion.
To this end, Mr Quilp encamped in the back parlour, having first put an
effectual stop to any further business by shutting up the shop. Having
looked out, from among the old furniture, the handsomest and most
commodious chair he could possibly find (which he reserved for his own
use) and an especially hideous and uncomfortable one (which he
considerately appropriated to the accommodation of his friend) he
caused them to be carried into this room, and took up his position in
great state. The apartment was very far removed from the old man’s
chamber, but Mr Quilp deemed it prudent, as a precaution against
infection from fever, and a means of wholesome fumigation, not only to
smoke, himself, without cessation, but to insist upon it that his legal
friend did the like. Moreover, he sent an express to the wharf for the
tumbling boy, who arriving with all despatch was enjoined to sit
himself down in another chair just inside the door, continually to
smoke a great pipe which the dwarf had provided for the purpose, and to
take it from his lips under any pretence whatever, were it only for one
minute at a time, if he dared. These arrangements completed, Mr Quilp
looked round him with chuckling satisfaction, and remarked that he
called that comfort.
The legal gentleman, whose melodious name was Brass, might have called
it comfort also but for two drawbacks: one was, that he could by no
exertion sit easy in his chair, the seat of which was very hard,
angular, slippery, and sloping; the other, that tobacco-smoke always
caused him great internal discomposure and annoyance. But as he was
quite a creature of Mr Quilp’s and had a thousand reasons for
conciliating his good opinion, he tried to smile, and nodded his
acquiescence with the best grace he could assume.
This Brass was an attorney of no very good repute, from Bevis Marks in
the city of London; he was a tall, meagre man, with a nose like a wen,
a protruding forehead, retreating eyes, and hair of a deep red. He
wore a long black surtout reaching nearly to his ankles, short black
trousers, high shoes, and cotton stockings of a bluish grey. He had a
cringing manner, but a very harsh voice; and his blandest smiles were
so extremely forbidding, that to have had his company under the least
repulsive circumstances, one would have wished him to be out of temper
that he might only scowl.
Quilp looked at his legal adviser, and seeing that he was winking very
much in the anguish of his pipe, that he sometimes shuddered when he
happened to inhale its full flavour, and that he constantly fanned the
smoke from him, was quite overjoyed and rubbed his hands with glee.
‘Smoke away, you dog,’ said Quilp, turning to the boy; ‘fill your pipe
again and smoke it fast, down to the last whiff, or I’ll put the
sealing-waxed end of it in the fire and rub it red hot upon your
tongue.’
Luckily the boy was case-hardened, and would have smoked a small
lime-kiln if anybody had treated him with it. Wherefore, he only
muttered a brief defiance of his master, and did as he was ordered.
‘Is it good, Brass, is it nice, is it fragrant, do you feel like the
Grand Turk?’ said Quilp.
Mr Brass thought that if he did, the Grand Turk’s feelings were by no
means to be envied, but he said it was famous, and he had no doubt he
felt very like that Potentate.
‘This is the way to keep off fever,’ said Quilp, ‘this is the way to
keep off every calamity of life! We’ll never leave off, all the time
we stop here--smoke away, you dog, or you shall swallow the pipe!’
‘Shall we stop here long, Mr Quilp?’ inquired his legal friend, when
the dwarf had given his boy this gentle admonition.
‘We must stop, I suppose, till the old gentleman up stairs is dead,’
returned Quilp.
‘He he he!’ laughed Mr Brass, ‘oh! very good!’
‘Smoke away!’ cried Quilp. ‘Never stop! You can talk as you smoke.
Don’t lose time.’
‘He he he!’ cried Brass faintly, as he again applied himself to the
odious pipe. ‘But if he should get better, Mr Quilp?’
‘Then we shall stop till he does, and no longer,’ returned the dwarf.
‘How kind it is of you, Sir, to wait till then!’ said Brass. ‘Some
people, Sir, would have sold or removed the goods--oh dear, the very
instant the law allowed ‘em. Some people, Sir, would have been all
flintiness and granite. Some people, sir, would have--’
‘Some people would have spared themselves the jabbering of such a
parrot as you,’ interposed the dwarf.
‘He he he!’ cried Brass. ‘You have such spirits!’
The smoking sentinel at the door interposed in this place, and without
taking his pipe from his lips, growled,
‘Here’s the gal a comin’ down.’
‘The what, you dog?’ said Quilp.
‘The gal,’ returned the boy. ‘Are you deaf?’
‘Oh!’ said Quilp, drawing in his breath with great relish as if he were
taking soup, ‘you and I will have such a settling presently; there’s
such a scratching and bruising in store for you, my dear young friend!
Aha! Nelly! How is he now, my duck of diamonds?’
‘He’s very bad,’ replied the weeping child.
‘What a pretty little Nell!’ cried Quilp.
‘Oh beautiful, sir, beautiful indeed,’ said Brass. ‘Quite charming.’
‘Has she come to sit upon Quilp’s knee,’ said the dwarf, in what he
meant to be a soothing tone, ‘or is she going to bed in her own little
room inside here? Which is poor Nelly going to do?’
‘What a remarkable pleasant way he has with children!’ muttered Brass,
as if in confidence between himself and the ceiling; ‘upon my word it’s
quite a treat to hear him.’
‘I’m not going to stay at all,’ faltered Nell. ‘I want a few things
out of that room, and then I--I--won’t come down here any more.’
‘And a very nice little room it is!’ said the dwarf looking into it as
the child entered. ‘Quite a bower! You’re sure you’re not going to
use it; you’re sure you’re not coming back, Nelly?’
‘No,’ replied the child, hurrying away, with the few articles of dress
she had come to remove; ‘never again! Never again.’
‘She’s very sensitive,’ said Quilp, looking after her. ‘Very
sensitive; that’s a pity. The bedstead is much about my size. I think
I shall make it MY little room.’
Mr Brass encouraging this idea, as he would have encouraged any other
emanating from the same source, the dwarf walked in to try the effect.
This he did, by throwing himself on his back upon the bed with his pipe
in his mouth, and then kicking up his legs and smoking violently. Mr
Brass applauding this picture very much, and the bed being soft and
comfortable, Mr Quilp determined to use it, both as a sleeping place by
night and as a kind of Divan by day; and in order that it might be
converted to the latter purpose at once, remained where he was, and
smoked his pipe out. The legal gentleman being by this time rather
giddy and perplexed in his ideas (for this was one of the operations of
the tobacco on his nervous system), took the opportunity of slinking
away into the open air, where, in course of time, he recovered
sufficiently to return with a countenance of tolerable composure. He
was soon led on by the malicious dwarf to smoke himself into a relapse,
and in that state stumbled upon a settee where he slept till morning.
Such were Mr Quilp’s first proceedings on entering upon his new
property. He was, for some days, restrained by business from
performing any particular pranks, as his time was pretty well occupied
between taking, with the assistance of Mr Brass, a minute inventory of
all the goods in the place, and going abroad upon his other concerns
which happily engaged him for several hours at a time. His avarice and
caution being, now, thoroughly awakened, however, he was never absent
from the house one night; and his eagerness for some termination, good
or bad, to the old man’s disorder, increasing rapidly, as the time
passed by, soon began to vent itself in open murmurs and exclamations
of impatience.
Nell shrank timidly from all the dwarf’s advances towards conversation,
and fled from the very sound of his voice; nor were the lawyer’s smiles
less terrible to her than Quilp’s grimaces. She lived in such
continual dread and apprehension of meeting one or other of them on the
stairs or in the passages if she stirred from her grandfather’s
chamber, that she seldom left it, for a moment, until late at night,
when the silence encouraged her to venture forth and breathe the purer
air of some empty room.
One night, she had stolen to her usual window, and was sitting there
very sorrowfully--for the old man had been worse that day--when she
thought she heard her name pronounced by a voice in the street.
Looking down, she recognised Kit, whose endeavours to attract her
attention had roused her from her sad reflections.
‘Miss Nell!’ said the boy in a low voice.
‘Yes,’ replied the child, doubtful whether she ought to hold any
communication with the supposed culprit, but inclining to her old
favourite still; ‘what do you want?’
‘I have wanted to say a word to you, for a long time,’ the boy replied,
‘but the people below have driven me away and wouldn’t let me see you.
You don’t believe--I hope you don’t really believe--that I deserve to
be cast off as I have been; do you, miss?’
‘I must believe it,’ returned the child. ‘Or why would grandfather
have been so angry with you?’
‘I don’t know,’ replied Kit. ‘I’m sure I never deserved it from him,
no, nor from you. I can say that, with a true and honest heart, any
way. And then to be driven from the door, when I only came to ask how
old master was--!’
‘They never told me that,’ said the child. ‘I didn’t know it indeed.
I wouldn’t have had them do it for the world.’
‘Thank’ee, miss,’ returned Kit, ‘it’s comfortable to hear you say that.
I said I never would believe that it was your doing.’
‘That was right!’ said the child eagerly.
‘Miss Nell,’ cried the boy coming under the window, and speaking in a
lower tone, ‘there are new masters down stairs. It’s a change for you.’
‘It is indeed,’ replied the child.
‘And so it will be for him when he gets better,’ said the boy, pointing
towards the sick room.
‘--If he ever does,’ added the child, unable to restrain her tears.
‘Oh, he’ll do that, he’ll do that,’ said Kit. ‘I’m sure he will. You
mustn’t be cast down, Miss Nell. Now don’t be, pray!’
These words of encouragement and consolation were few and roughly said,
but they affected the child and made her, for the moment, weep the more.
‘He’ll be sure to get better now,’ said the boy anxiously, ‘if you
don’t give way to low spirits and turn ill yourself, which would make
him worse and throw him back, just as he was recovering. When he does,
say a good word--say a kind word for me, Miss Nell!’
‘They tell me I must not even mention your name to him for a long, long
time,’ rejoined the child, ‘I dare not; and even if I might, what good
would a kind word do you, Kit? We shall be very poor. We shall
scarcely have bread to eat.’
‘It’s not that I may be taken back,’ said the boy, ‘that I ask the
favour of you. It isn’t for the sake of food and wages that I’ve been
waiting about so long in hopes to see you. Don’t think that I’d come
in a time of trouble to talk of such things as them.’
The child looked gratefully and kindly at him, but waited that he might
speak again.
‘No, it’s not that,’ said Kit hesitating, ‘it’s something very
different from that. I haven’t got much sense, I know, but if he could
be brought to believe that I’d been a faithful servant to him, doing
the best I could, and never meaning harm, perhaps he mightn’t--’
Here Kit faltered so long that the child entreated him to speak out,
and quickly, for it was very late, and time to shut the window.
‘Perhaps he mightn’t think it over venturesome of me to say--well then,
to say this,’ cried Kit with sudden boldness. ‘This home is gone from
you and him. Mother and I have got a poor one, but that’s better than
this with all these people here; and why not come there, till he’s had
time to look about, and find a better!’
The child did not speak. Kit, in the relief of having made his
proposition, found his tongue loosened, and spoke out in its favour
with his utmost eloquence.
‘You think,’ said the boy, ‘that it’s very small and inconvenient. So
it is, but it’s very clean. Perhaps you think it would be noisy, but
there’s not a quieter court than ours in all the town. Don’t be afraid
of the children; the baby hardly ever cries, and the other one is very
good--besides, I’d mind ‘em. They wouldn’t vex you much, I’m sure. Do
try, Miss Nell, do try. The little front room up stairs is very
pleasant. You can see a piece of the church-clock, through the
chimneys, and almost tell the time; mother says it would be just the
thing for you, and so it would, and you’d have her to wait upon you
both, and me to run of errands. We don’t mean money, bless you; you’re
not to think of that! Will you try him, Miss Nell? Only say you’ll
try him. Do try to make old master come, and ask him first what I have
done. Will you only promise that, Miss Nell?’
Before the child could reply to this earnest solicitation, the
street-door opened, and Mr Brass thrusting out his night-capped head
called in a surly voice, ‘Who’s there!’ Kit immediately glided away,
and Nell, closing the window softly, drew back into the room.
Before Mr Brass had repeated his inquiry many times, Mr Quilp, also
embellished with a night-cap, emerged from the same door and looked
carefully up and down the street, and up at all the windows of the
house, from the opposite side. Finding that there was nobody in sight,
he presently returned into the house with his legal friend, protesting
(as the child heard from the staircase), that there was a league and
plot against him; that he was in danger of being robbed and plundered
by a band of conspirators who prowled about the house at all seasons;
and that he would delay no longer but take immediate steps for
disposing of the property and returning to his own peaceful roof.
Having growled forth these, and a great many other threats of the same
nature, he coiled himself once more in the child’s little bed, and Nell
crept softly up the stairs.
It was natural enough that her short and unfinished dialogue with Kit
should leave a strong impression on her mind, and influence her dreams
that night and her recollections for a long, long time. Surrounded by
unfeeling creditors, and mercenary attendants upon the sick, and
meeting in the height of her anxiety and sorrow with little regard or
sympathy even from the women about her, it is not surprising that the
affectionate heart of the child should have been touched to the quick
by one kind and generous spirit, however uncouth the temple in which it
dwelt. Thank Heaven that the temples of such spirits are not made with
hands, and that they may be even more worthily hung with poor
patch-work than with purple and fine linen!
CHAPTER 12
At length, the crisis of the old man’s disorder was past, and he began
to mend. By very slow and feeble degrees his consciousness came back;
but the mind was weakened and its functions were impaired. He was
patient, and quiet; often sat brooding, but not despondently, for a
long space; was easily amused, even by a sun-beam on the wall or
ceiling; made no complaint that the days were long, or the nights
tedious; and appeared indeed to have lost all count of time, and every
sense of care or weariness. He would sit, for hours together, with
Nell’s small hand in his, playing with the fingers and stopping
sometimes to smooth her hair or kiss her brow; and, when he saw that
tears were glistening in her eyes, would look, amazed, about him for
the cause, and forget his wonder even while he looked.
The child and he rode out; the old man propped up with pillows, and the
child beside him. They were hand in hand as usual. The noise and
motion in the streets fatigued his brain at first, but he was not
surprised, or curious, or pleased, or irritated. He was asked if he
remembered this, or that. ‘O yes,’ he said, ‘quite well--why not?’
Sometimes he turned his head, and looked, with earnest gaze and
outstretched neck, after some stranger in the crowd, until he
disappeared from sight; but, to the question why he did this, he
answered not a word.
He was sitting in his easy chair one day, and Nell upon a stool beside
him, when a man outside the door inquired if he might enter. ‘Yes,’ he
said without emotion, ‘it was Quilp, he knew. Quilp was master there.
Of course he might come in.’ And so he did.
‘I’m glad to see you well again at last, neighbour,’ said the dwarf,
sitting down opposite him. ‘You’re quite strong now?’
‘Yes,’ said the old man feebly, ‘yes.’
‘I don’t want to hurry you, you know, neighbour,’ said the dwarf,
raising his voice, for the old man’s senses were duller than they had
been; ‘but, as soon as you can arrange your future proceedings, the
better.’
‘Surely,’ said the old man. ‘The better for all parties.’
‘You see,’ pursued Quilp after a short pause, ‘the goods being once
removed, this house would be uncomfortable; uninhabitable in fact.’
‘You say true,’ returned the old man. ‘Poor Nell too, what would she
do?’
‘Exactly,’ bawled the dwarf nodding his head; ‘that’s very well
observed. Then will you consider about it, neighbour?’
‘I will, certainly,’ replied the old man. ‘We shall not stop here.’
‘So I supposed,’ said the dwarf. ‘I have sold the things. They have
not yielded quite as much as they might have done, but pretty
well--pretty well. To-day’s Tuesday. When shall they be moved?
There’s no hurry--shall we say this afternoon?’
‘Say Friday morning,’ returned the old man.
‘Very good,’ said the dwarf. ‘So be it--with the understanding that I
can’t go beyond that day, neighbour, on any account.’
‘Good,’ returned the old man. ‘I shall remember it.’
Mr Quilp seemed rather puzzled by the strange, even spiritless way in
which all this was said; but as the old man nodded his head and
repeated ‘on Friday morning. I shall remember it,’ he had no excuse
for dwelling on the subject any further, and so took a friendly leave
with many expressions of good-will and many compliments to his friend
on his looking so remarkably well; and went below stairs to report
progress to Mr Brass.
All that day, and all the next, the old man remained in this state. He
wandered up and down the house and into and out of the various rooms,
as if with some vague intent of bidding them adieu, but he referred
neither by direct allusions nor in any other manner to the interview of
the morning or the necessity of finding some other shelter. An
indistinct idea he had, that the child was desolate and in want of
help; for he often drew her to his bosom and bade her be of good cheer,
saying that they would not desert each other; but he seemed unable to
contemplate their real position more distinctly, and was still the
listless, passionless creature that suffering of mind and body had left
him.
We call this a state of childishness, but it is the same poor hollow
mockery of it, that death is of sleep. Where, in the dull eyes of
doating men, are the laughing light and life of childhood, the gaiety
that has known no check, the frankness that has felt no chill, the hope
that has never withered, the joys that fade in blossoming? Where, in
the sharp lineaments of rigid and unsightly death, is the calm beauty
of slumber, telling of rest for the waking hours that are past, and
gentle hopes and loves for those which are to come? Lay death and
sleep down, side by side, and say who shall find the two akin. Send
forth the child and childish man together, and blush for the pride that
libels our own old happy state, and gives its title to an ugly and
distorted image.
Thursday arrived, and there was no alteration in the old man. But a
change came upon him that evening as he and the child sat silently
together.
In a small dull yard below his window, there was a tree--green and
flourishing enough, for such a place--and as the air stirred among its
leaves, it threw a rippling shadow on the white wall. The old man sat
watching the shadows as they trembled in this patch of light, until the
sun went down; and when it was night, and the moon was slowly rising,
he still sat in the same spot.
To one who had been tossing on a restless bed so long, even these few
green leaves and this tranquil light, although it languished among
chimneys and house-tops, were pleasant things. They suggested quiet
places afar off, and rest, and peace. The child thought, more than
once that he was moved: and had forborne to speak. But now he shed
tears--tears that it lightened her aching heart to see--and making as
though he would fall upon his knees, besought her to forgive him.
‘Forgive you--what?’ said Nell, interposing to prevent his purpose.
‘Oh grandfather, what should I forgive?’
‘All that is past, all that has come upon thee, Nell, all that was done
in that uneasy dream,’ returned the old man.
‘Do not talk so,’ said the child. ‘Pray do not. Let us speak of
something else.’
‘Yes, yes, we will,’ he rejoined. ‘And it shall be of what we talked
of long ago--many months--months is it, or weeks, or days? which is it
Nell?’
‘I do not understand you,’ said the child.
‘It has come back upon me to-day, it has all come back since we have
been sitting here. I bless thee for it, Nell!’
‘For what, dear grandfather?’
‘For what you said when we were first made beggars, Nell. Let us speak
softly. Hush! for if they knew our purpose down stairs, they would
cry that I was mad and take thee from me. We will not stop here
another day. We will go far away from here.’
‘Yes, let us go,’ said the child earnestly. ‘Let us begone from this
place, and never turn back or think of it again. Let us wander
barefoot through the world, rather than linger here.’
‘We will,’ answered the old man, ‘we will travel afoot through the
fields and woods, and by the side of rivers, and trust ourselves to God
in the places where He dwells. It is far better to lie down at night
beneath an open sky like that yonder--see how bright it is--than to
rest in close rooms which are always full of care and weary dreams.
Thou and I together, Nell, may be cheerful and happy yet, and learn to
forget this time, as if it had never been.’
‘We will be happy,’ cried the child. ‘We never can be here.’
‘No, we never can again--never again--that’s truly said,’ rejoined the
old man. ‘Let us steal away to-morrow morning--early and softly, that
we may not be seen or heard--and leave no trace or track for them to
follow by. Poor Nell! Thy cheek is pale, and thy eyes are heavy with
watching and weeping for me--I know--for me; but thou wilt be well
again, and merry too, when we are far away. To-morrow morning, dear,
we’ll turn our faces from this scene of sorrow, and be as free and
happy as the birds.’
And then the old man clasped his hands above her head, and said, in a
few broken words, that from that time forth they would wander up and
down together, and never part more until Death took one or other of the
twain.
The child’s heart beat high with hope and confidence. She had no
thought of hunger, or cold, or thirst, or suffering. She saw in this,
but a return of the simple pleasures they had once enjoyed, a relief
from the gloomy solitude in which she had lived, an escape from the
heartless people by whom she had been surrounded in her late time of
trial, the restoration of the old man’s health and peace, and a life of
tranquil happiness. Sun, and stream, and meadow, and summer days,
shone brightly in her view, and there was no dark tint in all the
sparkling picture.
The old man had slept, for some hours, soundly in his bed, and she was
yet busily engaged in preparing for their flight. There were a few
articles of clothing for herself to carry, and a few for him; old
garments, such as became their fallen fortunes, laid out to wear; and a
staff to support his feeble steps, put ready for his use. But this was
not all her task; for now she must visit the old rooms for the last
time.
And how different the parting with them was, from any she had expected,
and most of all from that which she had oftenest pictured to herself.
How could she ever have thought of bidding them farewell in triumph,
when the recollection of the many hours she had passed among them rose
to her swelling heart, and made her feel the wish a cruelty: lonely and
sad though many of those hours had been! She sat down at the window
where she had spent so many evenings--darker far than this--and every
thought of hope or cheerfulness that had occurred to her in that place
came vividly upon her mind, and blotted out all its dull and mournful
associations in an instant.
Her own little room too, where she had so often knelt down and prayed
at night--prayed for the time which she hoped was dawning now--the
little room where she had slept so peacefully, and dreamed such
pleasant dreams! It was hard not to be able to glance round it once
more, and to be forced to leave it without one kind look or grateful
tear. There were some trifles there--poor useless things--that she
would have liked to take away; but that was impossible.
This brought to mind her bird, her poor bird, who hung there yet. She
wept bitterly for the loss of this little creature--until the idea
occurred to her--she did not know how, or why, it came into her
head--that it might, by some means, fall into the hands of Kit who
would keep it for her sake, and think, perhaps, that she had left it
behind in the hope that he might have it, and as an assurance that she
was grateful to him. She was calmed and comforted by the thought, and
went to rest with a lighter heart.
From many dreams of rambling through light and sunny places, but with
some vague object unattained which ran indistinctly through them all,
she awoke to find that it was yet night, and that the stars were
shining brightly in the sky. At length, the day began to glimmer, and
the stars to grow pale and dim. As soon as she was sure of this, she
arose, and dressed herself for the journey.
The old man was yet asleep, and as she was unwilling to disturb him,
she left him to slumber on, until the sun rose. He was anxious that
they should leave the house without a minute’s loss of time, and was
soon ready.
The child then took him by the hand, and they trod lightly and
cautiously down the stairs, trembling whenever a board creaked, and
often stopping to listen. The old man had forgotten a kind of wallet
which contained the light burden he had to carry; and the going back a
few steps to fetch it seemed an interminable delay.
At last they reached the passage on the ground floor, where the snoring
of Mr Quilp and his legal friend sounded more terrible in their ears
than the roars of lions. The bolts of the door were rusty, and
difficult to unfasten without noise. When they were all drawn back, it
was found to be locked, and worst of all, the key was gone. Then the
child remembered, for the first time, one of the nurses having told her
that Quilp always locked both the house-doors at night, and kept the
keys on the table in his bedroom.
It was not without great fear and trepidation that little Nell slipped
off her shoes and gliding through the store-room of old curiosities,
where Mr Brass--the ugliest piece of goods in all the stock--lay
sleeping on a mattress, passed into her own little chamber.
Here she stood, for a few moments, quite transfixed with terror at the
sight of Mr Quilp, who was hanging so far out of bed that he almost
seemed to be standing on his head, and who, either from the uneasiness
of this posture, or in one of his agreeable habits, was gasping and
growling with his mouth wide open, and the whites (or rather the dirty
yellows) of his eyes distinctly visible. It was no time, however, to
ask whether anything ailed him; so, possessing herself of the key after
one hasty glance about the room, and repassing the prostrate Mr Brass,
she rejoined the old man in safety. They got the door open without
noise, and passing into the street, stood still.
‘Which way?’ said the child.
The old man looked, irresolutely and helplessly, first at her, then to
the right and left, then at her again, and shook his head. It was
plain that she was thenceforth his guide and leader. The child felt
it, but had no doubts or misgiving, and putting her hand in his, led
him gently away.
It was the beginning of a day in June; the deep blue sky unsullied by a
cloud, and teeming with brilliant light. The streets were, as yet,
nearly free from passengers, the houses and shops were closed, and the
healthy air of morning fell like breath from angels, on the sleeping
town.
The old man and the child passed on through the glad silence, elate
with hope and pleasure. They were alone together, once again; every
object was bright and fresh; nothing reminded them, otherwise than by
contrast, of the monotony and constraint they had left behind; church
towers and steeples, frowning and dark at other times, now shone in the
sun; each humble nook and corner rejoiced in light; and the sky, dimmed
only by excessive distance, shed its placid smile on everything beneath.
Forth from the city, while it yet slumbered, went the two poor
adventurers, wandering they knew not whither.
CHAPTER 13
Daniel Quilp of Tower Hill, and Sampson Brass of Bevis Marks in the
city of London, Gentleman, one of her Majesty’s attornies of the Courts
of the King’s Bench and Common Pleas at Westminster and a solicitor of
the High Court of Chancery, slumbered on, unconscious and unsuspicious
of any mischance, until a knocking on the street door, often repeated
and gradually mounting up from a modest single rap to a perfect battery
of knocks, fired in long discharges with a very short interval between,
caused the said Daniel Quilp to struggle into a horizontal position,
and to stare at the ceiling with a drowsy indifference, betokening that
he heard the noise and rather wondered at the same, and couldn’t be at
the trouble of bestowing any further thought upon the subject.
As the knocking, however, instead of accommodating itself to his lazy
state, increased in vigour and became more importunate, as if in
earnest remonstrance against his falling asleep again, now that he had
once opened his eyes, Daniel Quilp began by degrees to comprehend the
possibility of there being somebody at the door; and thus he gradually
came to recollect that it was Friday morning, and he had ordered Mrs
Quilp to be in waiting upon him at an early hour.
Mr Brass, after writhing about, in a great many strange attitudes, and
often twisting his face and eyes into an expression like that which is
usually produced by eating gooseberries very early in the season, was
by this time awake also. Seeing that Mr Quilp invested himself in his
every-day garments, he hastened to do the like, putting on his shoes
before his stockings, and thrusting his legs into his coat sleeves, and
making such other small mistakes in his toilet as are not uncommon to
those who dress in a hurry, and labour under the agitation of having
been suddenly roused.
While the attorney was thus engaged, the dwarf was groping under the
table, muttering desperate imprecations on himself, and mankind in
general, and all inanimate objects to boot, which suggested to Mr Brass
the question, ‘what’s the matter?’
‘The key,’ said the dwarf, looking viciously about him, ‘the
door-key--that’s the matter. D’ye know anything of it?’
‘How should I know anything of it, sir?’ returned Mr Brass.
‘How should you?’ repeated Quilp with a sneer. ‘You’re a nice lawyer,
an’t you? Ugh, you idiot!’
Not caring to represent to the dwarf in his present humour, that the
loss of a key by another person could scarcely be said to affect his
(Brass’s) legal knowledge in any material degree, Mr Brass humbly
suggested that it must have been forgotten over night, and was,
doubtless, at that moment in its native key-hole. Notwithstanding that
Mr Quilp had a strong conviction to the contrary, founded on his
recollection of having carefully taken it out, he was fain to admit
that this was possible, and therefore went grumbling to the door where,
sure enough, he found it.
Now, just as Mr Quilp laid his hand upon the lock, and saw with great
astonishment that the fastenings were undone, the knocking came again
with the most irritating violence, and the daylight which had been
shining through the key-hole was intercepted on the outside by a human
eye. The dwarf was very much exasperated, and wanting somebody to
wreak his ill-humour upon, determined to dart out suddenly, and favour
Mrs Quilp with a gentle acknowledgment of her attention in making that
hideous uproar.
With this view, he drew back the lock very silently and softly, and
opening the door all at once, pounced out upon the person on the other
side, who had at that moment raised the knocker for another
application, and at whom the dwarf ran head first: throwing out his
hands and feet together, and biting the air in the fulness of his
malice.
So far, however, from rushing upon somebody who offered no resistance
and implored his mercy, Mr Quilp was no sooner in the arms of the
individual whom he had taken for his wife than he found himself
complimented with two staggering blows on the head, and two more, of
the same quality, in the chest; and closing with his assailant, such a
shower of buffets rained down upon his person as sufficed to convince
him that he was in skilful and experienced hands. Nothing daunted by
this reception, he clung tight to his opponent, and bit and hammered
away with such good-will and heartiness, that it was at least a couple
of minutes before he was dislodged. Then, and not until then, Daniel
Quilp found himself, all flushed and dishevelled, in the middle of the
street, with Mr Richard Swiveller performing a kind of dance round him
and requiring to know ‘whether he wanted any more?’
‘There’s plenty more of it at the same shop,’ said Mr Swiveller, by
turns advancing and retreating in a threatening attitude, ‘a large and
extensive assortment always on hand--country orders executed with
promptitude and despatch--will you have a little more, Sir--don’t say
no, if you’d rather not.’
‘I thought it was somebody else,’ said Quilp, rubbing his shoulders,
‘why didn’t you say who you were?’
‘Why didn’t you say who YOU were?’ returned Dick, ‘instead of flying
out of the house like a Bedlamite?’
‘It was you that--that knocked,’ said the dwarf, getting up with a
short groan, ‘was it?’
‘Yes, I am the man,’ replied Dick. ‘That lady had begun when I came,
but she knocked too soft, so I relieved her.’ As he said this, he
pointed towards Mrs Quilp, who stood trembling at a little distance.
‘Humph!’ muttered the dwarf, darting an angry look at his wife, ‘I
thought it was your fault! And you, sir--don’t you know there has been
somebody ill here, that you knock as if you’d beat the door down?’
‘Damme!’ answered Dick, ‘that’s why I did it. I thought there was
somebody dead here.’
‘You came for some purpose, I suppose,’ said Quilp. ‘What is it you
want?’
‘I want to know how the old gentleman is,’ rejoined Mr Swiveller, ‘and
to hear from Nell herself, with whom I should like to have a little
talk. I’m a friend of the family, sir--at least I’m the friend of one
of the family, and that’s the same thing.’
‘You’d better walk in then,’ said the dwarf. ‘Go on, sir, go on. Now,
Mrs Quilp--after you, ma’am.’
Mrs Quilp hesitated, but Mr Quilp insisted. And it was not a contest
of politeness, or by any means a matter of form, for she knew very well
that her husband wished to enter the house in this order, that he might
have a favourable opportunity of inflicting a few pinches on her arms,
which were seldom free from impressions of his fingers in black and
blue colours. Mr Swiveller, who was not in the secret, was a little
surprised to hear a suppressed scream, and, looking round, to see Mrs
Quilp following him with a sudden jerk; but he did not remark on these
appearances, and soon forgot them.
‘Now, Mrs Quilp,’ said the dwarf when they had entered the shop, ‘go
you up stairs, if you please, to Nelly’s room, and tell her that she’s
wanted.’
‘You seem to make yourself at home here,’ said Dick, who was
unacquainted with Mr Quilp’s authority.
‘I AM at home, young gentleman,’ returned the dwarf.
Dick was pondering what these words might mean, and still more what the
presence of Mr Brass might mean, when Mrs Quilp came hurrying down
stairs, declaring that the rooms above were empty.
‘Empty, you fool!’ said the dwarf.
‘I give you my word, Quilp,’ answered his trembling wife, ‘that I have
been into every room and there’s not a soul in any of them.’
‘And that,’ said Mr Brass, clapping his hands once, with an emphasis,
‘explains the mystery of the key!’
Quilp looked frowningly at him, and frowningly at his wife, and
frowningly at Richard Swiveller; but, receiving no enlightenment from
any of them, hurried up stairs, whence he soon hurried down again,
confirming the report which had already been made.
‘It’s a strange way of going,’ he said, glancing at Swiveller, ‘very
strange not to communicate with me who am such a close and intimate
friend of his! Ah! he’ll write to me no doubt, or he’ll bid Nelly
write--yes, yes, that’s what he’ll do. Nelly’s very fond of me.
Pretty Nell!’
Mr Swiveller looked, as he was, all open-mouthed astonishment. Still
glancing furtively at him, Quilp turned to Mr Brass and observed, with
assumed carelessness, that this need not interfere with the removal of
the goods.
‘For indeed,’ he added, ‘we knew that they’d go away to-day, but not
that they’d go so early, or so quietly. But they have their reasons,
they have their reasons.’
‘Where in the devil’s name are they gone?’ said the wondering Dick.
Quilp shook his head, and pursed up his lips, in a manner which implied
that he knew very well, but was not at liberty to say.
‘And what,’ said Dick, looking at the confusion about him, ‘what do you
mean by moving the goods?’
‘That I have bought ‘em, Sir,’ rejoined Quilp. ‘Eh? What then?’
‘Has the sly old fox made his fortune then, and gone to live in a
tranquil cot in a pleasant spot with a distant view of the changing
sea?’ said Dick, in great bewilderment.
‘Keeping his place of retirement very close, that he may not be visited
too often by affectionate grandsons and their devoted friends, eh?’
added the dwarf, rubbing his hands hard; ‘I say nothing, but is that
your meaning?’
Richard Swiveller was utterly aghast at this unexpected alteration of
circumstances, which threatened the complete overthrow of the project
in which he bore so conspicuous a part, and seemed to nip his prospects
in the bud. Having only received from Frederick Trent, late on the
previous night, information of the old man’s illness, he had come upon
a visit of condolence and inquiry to Nell, prepared with the first
instalment of that long train of fascinations which was to fire her
heart at last. And here, when he had been thinking of all kinds of
graceful and insinuating approaches, and meditating on the fearful
retaliation which was slowly working against Sophy Wackles--here were
Nell, the old man, and all the money gone, melted away, decamped he
knew not whither, as if with a fore-knowledge of the scheme and a
resolution to defeat it in the very outset, before a step was taken.
In his secret heart, Daniel Quilp was both surprised and troubled by
the flight which had been made. It had not escaped his keen eye that
some indispensable articles of clothing were gone with the fugitives,
and knowing the old man’s weak state of mind, he marvelled what that
course of proceeding might be in which he had so readily procured the
concurrence of the child. It must not be supposed (or it would be a
gross injustice to Mr Quilp) that he was tortured by any disinterested
anxiety on behalf of either. His uneasiness arose from a misgiving
that the old man had some secret store of money which he had not
suspected; and the idea of its escaping his clutches, overwhelmed him
with mortification and self-reproach.
In this frame of mind, it was some consolation to him to find that
Richard Swiveller was, for different reasons, evidently irritated and
disappointed by the same cause. It was plain, thought the dwarf, that
he had come there, on behalf of his friend, to cajole or frighten the
old man out of some small fraction of that wealth of which they
supposed him to have an abundance. Therefore, it was a relief to vex
his heart with a picture of the riches the old man hoarded, and to
expatiate on his cunning in removing himself even beyond the reach of
importunity.
‘Well,’ said Dick, with a blank look, ‘I suppose it’s of no use my
staying here.’
‘Not the least in the world,’ rejoined the dwarf.
‘You’ll mention that I called, perhaps?’ said Dick.
Mr Quilp nodded, and said he certainly would, the very first time he
saw them.
‘And say,’ added Mr Swiveller, ‘say, sir, that I was wafted here upon
the pinions of concord; that I came to remove, with the rake of
friendship, the seeds of mutual violence and heart-burning, and to sow
in their place, the germs of social harmony. Will you have the
goodness to charge yourself with that commission, Sir?’
‘Certainly!’ rejoined Quilp.
‘Will you be kind enough to add to it, Sir,’ said Dick, producing a
very small limp card, ‘that that is my address, and that I am to be
found at home every morning. Two distinct knocks, sir, will produce
the slavey at any time. My particular friends, Sir, are accustomed to
sneeze when the door is opened, to give her to understand that they ARE
my friends and have no interested motives in asking if I’m at home. I
beg your pardon; will you allow me to look at that card again?’
‘Oh! by all means,’ rejoined Quilp.
‘By a slight and not unnatural mistake, sir,’ said Dick, substituting
another in its stead, ‘I had handed you the pass-ticket of a select
convivial circle called the Glorious Apollers of which I have the
honour to be Perpetual Grand. That is the proper document, Sir. Good
morning.’
Quilp bade him good day; the perpetual Grand Master of the Glorious
Apollers, elevating his hat in honour of Mrs Quilp, dropped it
carelessly on the side of his head again, and disappeared with a
flourish.
By this time, certain vans had arrived for the conveyance of the goods,
and divers strong men in caps were balancing chests of drawers and
other trifles of that nature upon their heads, and performing muscular
feats which heightened their complexions considerably. Not to be
behind-hand in the bustle, Mr Quilp went to work with surprising
vigour; hustling and driving the people about, like an evil spirit;
setting Mrs Quilp upon all kinds of arduous and impracticable tasks;
carrying great weights up and down, with no apparent effort; kicking
the boy from the wharf, whenever he could get near him; and inflicting,
with his loads, a great many sly bumps and blows on the shoulders of Mr
Brass, as he stood upon the door-steps to answer all the inquiries of
curious neighbours, which was his department. His presence and example
diffused such alacrity among the persons employed, that, in a few
hours, the house was emptied of everything, but pieces of matting,
empty porter-pots, and scattered fragments of straw.
Seated, like an African chief, on one of these pieces of matting, the
dwarf was regaling himself in the parlour, with bread and cheese and
beer, when he observed without appearing to do so, that a boy was
prying in at the outer door. Assured that it was Kit, though he saw
little more than his nose, Mr Quilp hailed him by his name; whereupon
Kit came in and demanded what he wanted.
‘Come here, you sir,’ said the dwarf. ‘Well, so your old master and
young mistress have gone?’
‘Where?’ rejoined Kit, looking round.
‘Do you mean to say you don’t know where?’ answered Quilp sharply.
‘Where have they gone, eh?’
‘I don’t know,’ said Kit.
‘Come,’ retorted Quilp, ‘let’s have no more of this! Do you mean to
say that you don’t know they went away by stealth, as soon as it was
light this morning?’
‘No,’ said the boy, in evident surprise.
‘You don’t know that?’ cried Quilp. ‘Don’t I know that you were
hanging about the house the other night, like a thief, eh? Weren’t you
told then?’
‘No,’ replied the boy.
‘You were not?’ said Quilp. ‘What were you told then; what were you
talking about?’
Kit, who knew no particular reason why he should keep the matter secret
now, related the purpose for which he had come on that occasion, and
the proposal he had made.
‘Oh!’ said the dwarf after a little consideration. ‘Then, I think
they’ll come to you yet.’
‘Do you think they will?’ cried Kit eagerly.
‘Aye, I think they will,’ returned the dwarf. ‘Now, when they do, let
me know; d’ye hear? Let me know, and I’ll give you something. I want
to do ‘em a kindness, and I can’t do ‘em a kindness unless I know where
they are. You hear what I say?’
Kit might have returned some answer which would not have been agreeable
to his irascible questioner, if the boy from the wharf, who had been
skulking about the room in search of anything that might have been left
about by accident, had not happened to cry, ‘Here’s a bird! What’s to
be done with this?’
‘Wring its neck,’ rejoined Quilp.
‘Oh no, don’t do that,’ said Kit, stepping forward. ‘Give it to me.’
‘Oh yes, I dare say,’ cried the other boy. ‘Come! You let the cage
alone, and let me wring its neck will you? He said I was to do it.
You let the cage alone will you.’
‘Give it here, give it to me, you dogs,’ roared Quilp. ‘Fight for it,
you dogs, or I’ll wring its neck myself!’
Without further persuasion, the two boys fell upon each other, tooth
and nail, while Quilp, holding up the cage in one hand, and chopping
the ground with his knife in an ecstasy, urged them on by his taunts
and cries to fight more fiercely. They were a pretty equal match, and
rolled about together, exchanging blows which were by no means child’s
play, until at length Kit, planting a well-directed hit in his
adversary’s chest, disengaged himself, sprung nimbly up, and snatching
the cage from Quilp’s hands made off with his prize.
He did not stop once until he reached home, where his bleeding face
occasioned great consternation, and caused the elder child to howl
dreadfully.
‘Goodness gracious, Kit, what is the matter, what have you been doing?’
cried Mrs Nubbles.
‘Never you mind, mother,’ answered her son, wiping his face on the
jack-towel behind the door. ‘I’m not hurt, don’t you be afraid for me.
I’ve been a fightin’ for a bird and won him, that’s all. Hold your
noise, little Jacob. I never see such a naughty boy in all my days!’
‘You have been fighting for a bird!’ exclaimed his mother.
‘Ah! Fightin’ for a bird!’ replied Kit, ‘and here he is--Miss Nelly’s
bird, mother, that they was agoin’ to wring the neck of! I stopped
that though--ha ha ha! They wouldn’t wring his neck and me by, no, no.
It wouldn’t do, mother, it wouldn’t do at all. Ha ha ha!’
Kit laughing so heartily, with his swoln and bruised face looking out
of the towel, made little Jacob laugh, and then his mother laughed, and
then the baby crowed and kicked with great glee, and then they all
laughed in concert: partly because of Kit’s triumph, and partly because
they were very fond of each other. When this fit was over, Kit
exhibited the bird to both children, as a great and precious rarity--it
was only a poor linnet--and looking about the wall for an old nail,
made a scaffolding of a chair and table and twisted it out with great
exultation.
‘Let me see,’ said the boy, ‘I think I’ll hang him in the winder,
because it’s more light and cheerful, and he can see the sky there, if
he looks up very much. He’s such a one to sing, I can tell you!’
So, the scaffolding was made again, and Kit, climbing up with the poker
for a hammer, knocked in the nail and hung up the cage, to the
immeasurable delight of the whole family. When it had been adjusted
and straightened a great many times, and he had walked backwards into
the fire-place in his admiration of it, the arrangement was pronounced
to be perfect.
‘And now, mother,’ said the boy, ‘before I rest any more, I’ll go out
and see if I can find a horse to hold, and then I can buy some
birdseed, and a bit of something nice for you, into the bargain.’
CHAPTER 14
As it was very easy for Kit to persuade himself that the old house was
in his way, his way being anywhere, he tried to look upon his passing
it once more as a matter of imperative and disagreeable necessity,
quite apart from any desire of his own, to which he could not choose
but yield. It is not uncommon for people who are much better fed and
taught than Christopher Nubbles had ever been, to make duties of their
inclinations in matters of more doubtful propriety, and to take great
credit for the self-denial with which they gratify themselves.
There was no need of any caution this time, and no fear of being
detained by having to play out a return match with Daniel Quilp’s boy.
The place was entirely deserted, and looked as dusty and dingy as if it
had been so for months. A rusty padlock was fastened on the door, ends
of discoloured blinds and curtains flapped drearily against the
half-opened upper windows, and the crooked holes cut in the closed
shutters below, were black with the darkness of the inside. Some of
the glass in the window he had so often watched, had been broken in the
rough hurry of the morning, and that room looked more deserted and dull
than any. A group of idle urchins had taken possession of the
door-steps; some were plying the knocker and listening with delighted
dread to the hollow sounds it spread through the dismantled house;
others were clustered about the keyhole, watching half in jest and half
in earnest for ‘the ghost,’ which an hour’s gloom, added to the mystery
that hung about the late inhabitants, had already raised. Standing all
alone in the midst of the business and bustle of the street, the house
looked a picture of cold desolation; and Kit, who remembered the
cheerful fire that used to burn there on a winter’s night and the no
less cheerful laugh that made the small room ring, turned quite
mournfully away.
It must be especially observed in justice to poor Kit that he was by no
means of a sentimental turn, and perhaps had never heard that adjective
in all his life. He was only a soft-hearted grateful fellow, and had
nothing genteel or polite about him; consequently, instead of going
home again, in his grief, to kick the children and abuse his mother
(for, when your finely strung people are out of sorts, they must have
everybody else unhappy likewise), he turned his thoughts to the vulgar
expedient of making them more comfortable if he could.
Bless us, what a number of gentlemen on horseback there were riding up
and down, and how few of them wanted their horses held! A good city
speculator or a parliamentary commissioner could have told to a
fraction, from the crowds that were cantering about, what sum of money
was realised in London, in the course of a year, by holding horses
alone. And undoubtedly it would have been a very large one, if only a
twentieth part of the gentlemen without grooms had had occasion to
alight; but they had not; and it is often an ill-natured circumstance
like this, which spoils the most ingenious estimate in the world.
Kit walked about, now with quick steps and now with slow; now lingering
as some rider slackened his horse’s pace and looked about him; and now
darting at full speed up a bye-street as he caught a glimpse of some
distant horseman going lazily up the shady side of the road, and
promising to stop, at every door. But on they all went, one after
another, and there was not a penny stirring. ‘I wonder,’ thought the
boy, ‘if one of these gentlemen knew there was nothing in the cupboard
at home, whether he’d stop on purpose, and make believe that he wanted
to call somewhere, that I might earn a trifle?’
He was quite tired out with pacing the streets, to say nothing of
repeated disappointments, and was sitting down upon a step to rest,
when there approached towards him a little clattering jingling
four-wheeled chaise, drawn by a little obstinate-looking rough-coated
pony, and driven by a little fat placid-faced old gentleman. Beside
the little old gentleman sat a little old lady, plump and placid like
himself, and the pony was coming along at his own pace and doing
exactly as he pleased with the whole concern. If the old gentleman
remonstrated by shaking the reins, the pony replied by shaking his
head. It was plain that the utmost the pony would consent to do, was
to go in his own way up any street that the old gentleman particularly
wished to traverse, but that it was an understanding between them that
he must do this after his own fashion or not at all.
As they passed where he sat, Kit looked so wistfully at the little
turn-out, that the old gentleman looked at him. Kit rising and putting
his hand to his hat, the old gentleman intimated to the pony that he
wished to stop, to which proposal the pony (who seldom objected to that
part of his duty) graciously acceded.
‘I beg your pardon, sir,’ said Kit. ‘I’m sorry you stopped, sir. I
only meant did you want your horse minded.’
‘I’m going to get down in the next street,’ returned the old gentleman.
‘If you like to come on after us, you may have the job.’
Kit thanked him, and joyfully obeyed. The pony ran off at a sharp
angle to inspect a lamp-post on the opposite side of the way, and then
went off at a tangent to another lamp-post on the other side. Having
satisfied himself that they were of the same pattern and materials, he
came to a stop apparently absorbed in meditation.
‘Will you go on, sir,’ said the old gentleman, gravely, ‘or are we to
wait here for you till it’s too late for our appointment?’
The pony remained immoveable.
‘Oh you naughty Whisker,’ said the old lady. ‘Fie upon you! I’m
ashamed of such conduct.’
The pony appeared to be touched by this appeal to his feelings, for he
trotted on directly, though in a sulky manner, and stopped no more
until he came to a door whereon was a brass plate with the words
‘Witherden--Notary.’ Here the old gentleman got out and helped out the
old lady, and then took from under the seat a nosegay resembling in
shape and dimensions a full-sized warming-pan with the handle cut short
off. This, the old lady carried into the house with a staid and
stately air, and the old gentleman (who had a club-foot) followed close
upon her.
They went, as it was easy to tell from the sound of their voices, into
the front parlour, which seemed to be a kind of office. The day being
very warm and the street a quiet one, the windows were wide open; and
it was easy to hear through the Venetian blinds all that passed inside.
At first there was a great shaking of hands and shuffling of feet,
succeeded by the presentation of the nosegay; for a voice, supposed by
the listener to be that of Mr Witherden the Notary, was heard to
exclaim a great many times, ‘oh, delicious!’ ‘oh, fragrant, indeed!’
and a nose, also supposed to be the property of that gentleman, was
heard to inhale the scent with a snuffle of exceeding pleasure.
‘I brought it in honour of the occasion, Sir,’ said the old lady.
‘Ah! an occasion indeed, ma’am, an occasion which does honour to me,
ma’am, honour to me,’ rejoined Mr Witherden, the notary. ‘I have had
many a gentleman articled to me, ma’am, many a one. Some of them are
now rolling in riches, unmindful of their old companion and friend,
ma’am, others are in the habit of calling upon me to this day and
saying, “Mr Witherden, some of the pleasantest hours I ever spent in my
life were spent in this office--were spent, Sir, upon this very stool”;
but there was never one among the number, ma’am, attached as I have
been to many of them, of whom I augured such bright things as I do of
your only son.’
‘Oh dear!’ said the old lady. ‘How happy you do make us when you tell
us that, to be sure!’
‘I tell you, ma’am,’ said Mr Witherden, ‘what I think as an honest man,
which, as the poet observes, is the noblest work of God. I agree with
the poet in every particular, ma’am. The mountainous Alps on the one
hand, or a humming-bird on the other, is nothing, in point of
workmanship, to an honest man--or woman--or woman.’
‘Anything that Mr Witherden can say of me,’ observed a small quiet
voice, ‘I can say, with interest, of him, I am sure.’
‘It’s a happy circumstance, a truly happy circumstance,’ said the
Notary, ‘to happen too upon his eight-and-twentieth birthday, and I
hope I know how to appreciate it. I trust, Mr Garland, my dear Sir,
that we may mutually congratulate each other upon this auspicious
occasion.’
To this the old gentleman replied that he felt assured they might.
There appeared to be another shaking of hands in consequence, and when
it was over, the old gentleman said that, though he said it who should
not, he believed no son had ever been a greater comfort to his parents
than Abel Garland had been to his.
‘Marrying as his mother and I did, late in life, sir, after waiting for
a great many years, until we were well enough off--coming together when
we were no longer young, and then being blessed with one child who has
always been dutiful and affectionate--why, it’s a source of great
happiness to us both, sir.’
‘Of course it is, I have no doubt of it,’ returned the Notary in a
sympathising voice. ‘It’s the contemplation of this sort of thing,
that makes me deplore my fate in being a bachelor. There was a young
lady once, sir, the daughter of an outfitting warehouse of the first
respectability--but that’s a weakness. Chuckster, bring in Mr Abel’s
articles.’
‘You see, Mr Witherden,’ said the old lady, ‘that Abel has not been
brought up like the run of young men. He has always had a pleasure in
our society, and always been with us. Abel has never been absent from
us, for a day; has he, my dear?’
‘Never, my dear,’ returned the old gentleman, ‘except when he went to
Margate one Saturday with Mr Tomkinley that had been a teacher at that
school he went to, and came back upon the Monday; but he was very ill
after that, you remember, my dear; it was quite a dissipation.’
‘He was not used to it, you know,’ said the old lady, ‘and he couldn’t
bear it, that’s the truth. Besides he had no comfort in being there
without us, and had nobody to talk to or enjoy himself with.’
‘That was it, you know,’ interposed the same small quiet voice that had
spoken once before. ‘I was quite abroad, mother, quite desolate, and
to think that the sea was between us--oh, I never shall forget what I
felt when I first thought that the sea was between us!’
‘Very natural under the circumstances,’ observed the Notary. ‘Mr
Abel’s feelings did credit to his nature, and credit to your nature,
ma’am, and his father’s nature, and human nature. I trace the same
current now, flowing through all his quiet and unobtrusive
proceedings.--I am about to sign my name, you observe, at the foot of
the articles which Mr Chuckster will witness; and placing my finger
upon this blue wafer with the vandyked corners, I am constrained to
remark in a distinct tone of voice--don’t be alarmed, ma’am, it is
merely a form of law--that I deliver this, as my act and deed. Mr Abel
will place his name against the other wafer, repeating the same
cabalistic words, and the business is over. Ha ha ha! You see how
easily these things are done!’
There was a short silence, apparently, while Mr Abel went through the
prescribed form, and then the shaking of hands and shuffling of feet
were renewed, and shortly afterwards there was a clinking of
wine-glasses and a great talkativeness on the part of everybody. In
about a quarter of an hour Mr Chuckster (with a pen behind his ear and
his face inflamed with wine) appeared at the door, and condescending to
address Kit by the jocose appellation of ‘Young Snob,’ informed him
that the visitors were coming out.
Out they came forthwith; Mr Witherden, who was short, chubby,
fresh-coloured, brisk, and pompous, leading the old lady with extreme
politeness, and the father and son following them, arm in arm. Mr
Abel, who had a quaint old-fashioned air about him, looked nearly of
the same age as his father, and bore a wonderful resemblance to him in
face and figure, though wanting something of his full, round,
cheerfulness, and substituting in its place a timid reserve. In all
other respects, in the neatness of the dress, and even in the
club-foot, he and the old gentleman were precisely alike.
Having seen the old lady safely in her seat, and assisted in the
arrangement of her cloak and a small basket which formed an
indispensable portion of her equipage, Mr Abel got into a little box
behind which had evidently been made for his express accommodation, and
smiled at everybody present by turns, beginning with his mother and
ending with the pony. There was then a great to-do to make the pony
hold up his head that the bearing-rein might be fastened; at last even
this was effected; and the old gentleman, taking his seat and the
reins, put his hand in his pocket to find a sixpence for Kit.
He had no sixpence, neither had the old lady, nor Mr Abel, nor the
Notary, nor Mr Chuckster. The old gentleman thought a shilling too
much, but there was no shop in the street to get change at, so he gave
it to the boy.
‘There,’ he said jokingly, ‘I’m coming here again next Monday at the
same time, and mind you’re here, my lad, to work it out.’
‘Thank you, Sir,’ said Kit. ‘I’ll be sure to be here.’
He was quite serious, but they all laughed heartily at his saying so,
especially Mr Chuckster, who roared outright and appeared to relish the
joke amazingly. As the pony, with a presentiment that he was going
home, or a determination that he would not go anywhere else (which was
the same thing) trotted away pretty nimbly, Kit had no time to justify
himself, and went his way also. Having expended his treasure in such
purchases as he knew would be most acceptable at home, not forgetting
some seed for the wonderful bird, he hastened back as fast as he could,
so elated with his success and great good fortune, that he more than
half expected Nell and the old man would have arrived before him.
CHAPTER 15
Often, while they were yet pacing the silent streets of the town on the
morning of their departure, the child trembled with a mingled sensation
of hope and fear as in some far-off figure imperfectly seen in the
clear distance, her fancy traced a likeness to honest Kit. But
although she would gladly have given him her hand and thanked him for
what he had said at their last meeting, it was always a relief to find,
when they came nearer to each other, that the person who approached was
not he, but a stranger; for even if she had not dreaded the effect
which the sight of him might have wrought upon her fellow-traveller,
she felt that to bid farewell to anybody now, and most of all to him
who had been so faithful and so true, was more than she could bear. It
was enough to leave dumb things behind, and objects that were
insensible both to her love and sorrow. To have parted from her only
other friend upon the threshold of that wild journey, would have wrung
her heart indeed.
Why is it that we can better bear to part in spirit than in body, and
while we have the fortitude to act farewell have not the nerve to say
it? On the eve of long voyages or an absence of many years, friends
who are tenderly attached will separate with the usual look, the usual
pressure of the hand, planning one final interview for the morrow,
while each well knows that it is but a poor feint to save the pain of
uttering that one word, and that the meeting will never be. Should
possibilities be worse to bear than certainties? We do not shun our
dying friends; the not having distinctly taken leave of one among them,
whom we left in all kindness and affection, will often embitter the
whole remainder of a life.
The town was glad with morning light; places that had shown ugly and
distrustful all night long, now wore a smile; and sparkling sunbeams
dancing on chamber windows, and twinkling through blind and curtain
before sleepers’ eyes, shed light even into dreams, and chased away the
shadows of the night. Birds in hot rooms, covered up close and dark,
felt it was morning, and chafed and grew restless in their little
cells; bright-eyed mice crept back to their tiny homes and nestled
timidly together; the sleek house-cat, forgetful of her prey, sat
winking at the rays of sun starting through keyhole and cranny in the
door, and longed for her stealthy run and warm sleek bask outside. The
nobler beasts confined in dens, stood motionless behind their bars and
gazed on fluttering boughs, and sunshine peeping through some little
window, with eyes in which old forests gleamed--then trod impatiently
the track their prisoned feet had worn--and stopped and gazed again.
Men in their dungeons stretched their cramp cold limbs and cursed the
stone that no bright sky could warm. The flowers that sleep by night,
opened their gentle eyes and turned them to the day. The light,
creation’s mind, was everywhere, and all things owned its power.
The two pilgrims, often pressing each other’s hands, or exchanging a
smile or cheerful look, pursued their way in silence. Bright and happy
as it was, there was something solemn in the long, deserted streets,
from which, like bodies without souls, all habitual character and
expression had departed, leaving but one dead uniform repose, that made
them all alike. All was so still at that early hour, that the few pale
people whom they met seemed as much unsuited to the scene, as the
sickly lamp which had been here and there left burning, was powerless
and faint in the full glory of the sun.
Before they had penetrated very far into the labyrinth of men’s abodes
which yet lay between them and the outskirts, this aspect began to melt
away, and noise and bustle to usurp its place. Some straggling carts
and coaches rumbling by, first broke the charm, then others came, then
others yet more active, then a crowd. The wonder was, at first, to see
a tradesman’s window open, but it was a rare thing soon to see one
closed; then, smoke rose slowly from the chimneys, and sashes were
thrown up to let in air, and doors were opened, and servant girls,
looking lazily in all directions but their brooms, scattered brown
clouds of dust into the eyes of shrinking passengers, or listened
disconsolately to milkmen who spoke of country fairs, and told of
waggons in the mews, with awnings and all things complete, and gallant
swains to boot, which another hour would see upon their journey.
This quarter passed, they came upon the haunts of commerce and great
traffic, where many people were resorting, and business was already
rife. The old man looked about him with a startled and bewildered
gaze, for these were places that he hoped to shun. He pressed his
finger on his lip, and drew the child along by narrow courts and
winding ways, nor did he seem at ease until they had left it far
behind, often casting a backward look towards it, murmuring that ruin
and self-murder were crouching in every street, and would follow if
they scented them; and that they could not fly too fast.
Again this quarter passed, they came upon a straggling neighbourhood,
where the mean houses parcelled off in rooms, and windows patched with
rags and paper, told of the populous poverty that sheltered there. The
shops sold goods that only poverty could buy, and sellers and buyers
were pinched and griped alike. Here were poor streets where faded
gentility essayed with scanty space and shipwrecked means to make its
last feeble stand, but tax-gatherer and creditor came there as
elsewhere, and the poverty that yet faintly struggled was hardly less
squalid and manifest than that which had long ago submitted and given
up the game.
This was a wide, wide track--for the humble followers of the camp of
wealth pitch their tents round about it for many a mile--but its
character was still the same. Damp rotten houses, many to let, many
yet building, many half-built and mouldering away--lodgings, where it
would be hard to tell which needed pity most, those who let or those
who came to take--children, scantily fed and clothed, spread over every
street, and sprawling in the dust--scolding mothers, stamping their
slipshod feet with noisy threats upon the pavement--shabby fathers,
hurrying with dispirited looks to the occupation which brought them
‘daily bread’ and little more--mangling-women, washer-women, cobblers,
tailors, chandlers, driving their trades in parlours and kitchens and
back room and garrets, and sometimes all of them under the same
roof--brick-fields skirting gardens paled with staves of old casks, or
timber pillaged from houses burnt down, and blackened and blistered by
the flames--mounds of dock-weed, nettles, coarse grass and
oyster-shells, heaped in rank confusion--small dissenting chapels to
teach, with no lack of illustration, the miseries of Earth, and plenty
of new churches, erected with a little superfluous wealth, to show the
way to Heaven.
At length these streets becoming more straggling yet, dwindled and
dwindled away, until there were only small garden patches bordering the
road, with many a summer house innocent of paint and built of old
timber or some fragments of a boat, green as the tough cabbage-stalks
that grew about it, and grottoed at the seams with toad-stools and
tight-sticking snails. To these succeeded pert cottages, two and two
with plots of ground in front, laid out in angular beds with stiff box
borders and narrow paths between, where footstep never strayed to make
the gravel rough. Then came the public-house, freshly painted in green
and white, with tea-gardens and a bowling green, spurning its old
neighbour with the horse-trough where the waggons stopped; then,
fields; and then, some houses, one by one, of goodly size with lawns,
some even with a lodge where dwelt a porter and his wife. Then came a
turnpike; then fields again with trees and hay-stacks; then, a hill,
and on the top of that, the traveller might stop, and--looking back at
old Saint Paul’s looming through the smoke, its cross peeping above the
cloud (if the day were clear), and glittering in the sun; and casting
his eyes upon the Babel out of which it grew until he traced it down to
the furthest outposts of the invading army of bricks and mortar whose
station lay for the present nearly at his feet--might feel at last that
he was clear of London.
Near such a spot as this, and in a pleasant field, the old man and his
little guide (if guide she were, who knew not whither they were bound)
sat down to rest. She had had the precaution to furnish her basket
with some slices of bread and meat, and here they made their frugal
breakfast.
The freshness of the day, the singing of the birds, the beauty of the
waving grass, the deep green leaves, the wild flowers, and the thousand
exquisite scents and sounds that floated in the air--deep joys to most
of us, but most of all to those whose life is in a crowd or who live
solitarily in great cities as in the bucket of a human well--sunk into
their breasts and made them very glad. The child had repeated her
artless prayers once that morning, more earnestly perhaps than she had
ever done in all her life, but as she felt all this, they rose to her
lips again. The old man took off his hat--he had no memory for the
words--but he said amen, and that they were very good.
There had been an old copy of the Pilgrim’s Progress, with strange
plates, upon a shelf at home, over which she had often pored whole
evenings, wondering whether it was true in every word, and where those
distant countries with the curious names might be. As she looked back
upon the place they had left, one part of it came strongly on her mind.
‘Dear grandfather,’ she said, ‘only that this place is prettier and a
great deal better than the real one, if that in the book is like it, I
feel as if we were both Christian, and laid down on this grass all the
cares and troubles we brought with us; never to take them up again.’
‘No--never to return--never to return’--replied the old man, waving his
hand towards the city. ‘Thou and I are free of it now, Nell. They
shall never lure us back.’
‘Are you tired?’ said the child, ‘are you sure you don’t feel ill from
this long walk?’
‘I shall never feel ill again, now that we are once away,’ was his
reply. ‘Let us be stirring, Nell. We must be further away--a long,
long way further. We are too near to stop, and be at rest. Come!’
There was a pool of clear water in the field, in which the child laved
her hands and face, and cooled her feet before setting forth to walk
again. She would have the old man refresh himself in this way too, and
making him sit down upon the grass, cast the water on him with her
hands, and dried it with her simple dress.
‘I can do nothing for myself, my darling,’ said the grandfather; ‘I
don’t know how it is, I could once, but the time’s gone. Don’t leave
me, Nell; say that thou’lt not leave me. I loved thee all the while,
indeed I did. If I lose thee too, my dear, I must die!’
He laid his head upon her shoulder and moaned piteously. The time had
been, and a very few days before, when the child could not have
restrained her tears and must have wept with him. But now she soothed
him with gentle and tender words, smiled at his thinking they could
ever part, and rallied him cheerfully upon the jest. He was soon
calmed and fell asleep, singing to himself in a low voice, like a
little child.
He awoke refreshed, and they continued their journey. The road was
pleasant, lying between beautiful pastures and fields of corn, about
which, poised high in the clear blue sky, the lark trilled out her
happy song. The air came laden with the fragrance it caught upon its
way, and the bees, upborne upon its scented breath, hummed forth their
drowsy satisfaction as they floated by.
They were now in the open country; the houses were very few and
scattered at long intervals, often miles apart. Occasionally they came
upon a cluster of poor cottages, some with a chair or low board put
across the open door to keep the scrambling children from the road,
others shut up close while all the family were working in the fields.
These were often the commencement of a little village: and after an
interval came a wheelwright’s shed or perhaps a blacksmith’s forge;
then a thriving farm with sleepy cows lying about the yard, and horses
peering over the low wall and scampering away when harnessed horses
passed upon the road, as though in triumph at their freedom. There
were dull pigs too, turning up the ground in search of dainty food, and
grunting their monotonous grumblings as they prowled about, or crossed
each other in their quest; plump pigeons skimming round the roof or
strutting on the eaves; and ducks and geese, far more graceful in their
own conceit, waddling awkwardly about the edges of the pond or sailing
glibly on its surface. The farm-yard passed, then came the little inn;
the humbler beer-shop; and the village tradesman’s; then the lawyer’s
and the parson’s, at whose dread names the beer-shop trembled; the
church then peeped out modestly from a clump of trees; then there were
a few more cottages; then the cage, and pound, and not unfrequently, on
a bank by the way-side, a deep old dusty well. Then came the
trim-hedged fields on either hand, and the open road again.
They walked all day, and slept that night at a small cottage where beds
were let to travellers. Next morning they were afoot again, and though
jaded at first, and very tired, recovered before long and proceeded
briskly forward.
They often stopped to rest, but only for a short space at a time, and
still kept on, having had but slight refreshment since the morning. It
was nearly five o’clock in the afternoon, when drawing near another
cluster of labourers’ huts, the child looked wistfully in each,
doubtful at which to ask for permission to rest awhile, and buy a
draught of milk.
It was not easy to determine, for she was timid and fearful of being
repulsed. Here was a crying child, and there a noisy wife. In this,
the people seemed too poor; in that, too many. At length she stopped
at one where the family were seated round the table--chiefly because
there was an old man sitting in a cushioned chair beside the hearth,
and she thought he was a grandfather and would feel for hers.
There were besides, the cottager and his wife, and three young sturdy
children, brown as berries. The request was no sooner preferred, than
granted. The eldest boy ran out to fetch some milk, the second dragged
two stools towards the door, and the youngest crept to his mother’s
gown, and looked at the strangers from beneath his sunburnt hand.
‘God save you, master,’ said the old cottager in a thin piping voice;
‘are you travelling far?’
‘Yes, Sir, a long way’--replied the child; for her grandfather appealed
to her.
‘From London?’ inquired the old man.
The child said yes.
Ah! He had been in London many a time--used to go there often once,
with waggons. It was nigh two-and-thirty year since he had been there
last, and he did hear say there were great changes. Like enough! He
had changed, himself, since then. Two-and-thirty year was a long time
and eighty-four a great age, though there was some he had known that
had lived to very hard upon a hundred--and not so hearty as he,
neither--no, nothing like it.
‘Sit thee down, master, in the elbow chair,’ said the old man, knocking
his stick upon the brick floor, and trying to do so sharply. ‘Take a
pinch out o’ that box; I don’t take much myself, for it comes dear, but
I find it wakes me up sometimes, and ye’re but a boy to me. I should
have a son pretty nigh as old as you if he’d lived, but they listed him
for a so’ger--he come back home though, for all he had but one poor
leg. He always said he’d be buried near the sun-dial he used to climb
upon when he was a baby, did my poor boy, and his words come true--you
can see the place with your own eyes; we’ve kept the turf up, ever
since.’
He shook his head, and looking at his daughter with watery eyes, said
she needn’t be afraid that he was going to talk about that, any more.
He didn’t wish to trouble nobody, and if he had troubled anybody by
what he said, he asked pardon, that was all.
The milk arrived, and the child producing her little basket, and
selecting its best fragments for her grandfather, they made a hearty
meal. The furniture of the room was very homely of course--a few rough
chairs and a table, a corner cupboard with their little stock of
crockery and delf, a gaudy tea-tray, representing a lady in bright red,
walking out with a very blue parasol, a few common, coloured scripture
subjects in frames upon the wall and chimney, an old dwarf
clothes-press and an eight-day clock, with a few bright saucepans and a
kettle, comprised the whole. But everything was clean and neat, and as
the child glanced round, she felt a tranquil air of comfort and content
to which she had long been unaccustomed.
‘How far is it to any town or village?’ she asked of the husband.
‘A matter of good five mile, my dear,’ was the reply, ‘but you’re not
going on to-night?’
‘Yes, yes, Nell,’ said the old man hastily, urging her too by signs.
‘Further on, further on, darling, further away if we walk till
midnight.’
‘There’s a good barn hard by, master,’ said the man, ‘or there’s
travellers’ lodging, I know, at the Plow an’ Harrer. Excuse me, but
you do seem a little tired, and unless you’re very anxious to get on--’
‘Yes, yes, we are,’ returned the old man fretfully. ‘Further away,
dear Nell, pray further away.’
‘We must go on, indeed,’ said the child, yielding to his restless wish.
‘We thank you very much, but we cannot stop so soon. I’m quite ready,
grandfather.’
But the woman had observed, from the young wanderer’s gait, that one of
her little feet was blistered and sore, and being a woman and a mother
too, she would not suffer her to go until she had washed the place and
applied some simple remedy, which she did so carefully and with such a
gentle hand--rough-grained and hard though it was, with work--that the
child’s heart was too full to admit of her saying more than a fervent
‘God bless you!’ nor could she look back nor trust herself to speak,
until they had left the cottage some distance behind. When she turned
her head, she saw that the whole family, even the old grandfather, were
standing in the road watching them as they went, and so, with many
waves of the hand, and cheering nods, and on one side at least not
without tears, they parted company.
They trudged forward, more slowly and painfully than they had done yet,
for another mile or thereabouts, when they heard the sound of wheels
behind them, and looking round observed an empty cart approaching
pretty briskly. The driver on coming up to them stopped his horse and
looked earnestly at Nell.
‘Didn’t you stop to rest at a cottage yonder?’ he said.
‘Yes, sir,’ replied the child.
‘Ah! They asked me to look out for you,’ said the man. ‘I’m going
your way. Give me your hand--jump up, master.’
This was a great relief, for they were very much fatigued and could
scarcely crawl along. To them the jolting cart was a luxurious
carriage, and the ride the most delicious in the world. Nell had
scarcely settled herself on a little heap of straw in one corner, when
she fell asleep, for the first time that day.
She was awakened by the stopping of the cart, which was about to turn
up a bye-lane. The driver kindly got down to help her out, and
pointing to some trees at a very short distance before them, said that
the town lay there, and that they had better take the path which they
would see leading through the churchyard. Accordingly, towards this
spot, they directed their weary steps.
CHAPTER 16
The sun was setting when they reached the wicket-gate at which the path
began, and, as the rain falls upon the just and unjust alike, it shed
its warm tint even upon the resting-places of the dead, and bade them
be of good hope for its rising on the morrow. The church was old and
grey, with ivy clinging to the walls, and round the porch. Shunning
the tombs, it crept about the mounds, beneath which slept poor humble
men: twining for them the first wreaths they had ever won, but wreaths
less liable to wither and far more lasting in their kind, than some
which were graven deep in stone and marble, and told in pompous terms
of virtues meekly hidden for many a year, and only revealed at last to
executors and mourning legatees.
The clergyman’s horse, stumbling with a dull blunt sound among the
graves, was cropping the grass; at once deriving orthodox consolation
from the dead parishioners, and enforcing last Sunday’s text that this
was what all flesh came to; a lean ass who had sought to expound it
also, without being qualified and ordained, was pricking his ears in an
empty pound hard by, and looking with hungry eyes upon his priestly
neighbour.
The old man and the child quitted the gravel path, and strayed among
the tombs; for there the ground was soft, and easy to their tired feet.
As they passed behind the church, they heard voices near at hand, and
presently came on those who had spoken.
They were two men who were seated in easy attitudes upon the grass, and
so busily engaged as to be at first unconscious of intruders. It was
not difficult to divine that they were of a class of itinerant
showmen--exhibitors of the freaks of Punch--for, perched cross-legged
upon a tombstone behind them, was a figure of that hero himself, his
nose and chin as hooked and his face as beaming as usual. Perhaps his
imperturbable character was never more strikingly developed, for he
preserved his usual equable smile notwithstanding that his body was
dangling in a most uncomfortable position, all loose and limp and
shapeless, while his long peaked cap, unequally balanced against his
exceedingly slight legs, threatened every instant to bring him toppling
down.
In part scattered upon the ground at the feet of the two men, and in
part jumbled together in a long flat box, were the other persons of the
Drama. The hero’s wife and one child, the hobby-horse, the doctor, the
foreign gentleman who not being familiar with the language is unable in
the representation to express his ideas otherwise than by the utterance
of the word ‘Shallabalah’ three distinct times, the radical neighbour
who will by no means admit that a tin bell is an organ, the
executioner, and the devil, were all here. Their owners had evidently
come to that spot to make some needful repairs in the stage
arrangements, for one of them was engaged in binding together a small
gallows with thread, while the other was intent upon fixing a new black
wig, with the aid of a small hammer and some tacks, upon the head of
the radical neighbour, who had been beaten bald.
They raised their eyes when the old man and his young companion were
close upon them, and pausing in their work, returned their looks of
curiosity. One of them, the actual exhibitor no doubt, was a little
merry-faced man with a twinkling eye and a red nose, who seemed to have
unconsciously imbibed something of his hero’s character. The
other--that was he who took the money--had rather a careful and
cautious look, which was perhaps inseparable from his occupation also.
The merry man was the first to greet the strangers with a nod; and
following the old man’s eyes, he observed that perhaps that was the
first time he had ever seen a Punch off the stage. (Punch, it may be
remarked, seemed to be pointing with the tip of his cap to a most
flourishing epitaph, and to be chuckling over it with all his heart.)
‘Why do you come here to do this?’ said the old man, sitting down
beside them, and looking at the figures with extreme delight.
‘Why you see,’ rejoined the little man, ‘we’re putting up for to-night
at the public-house yonder, and it wouldn’t do to let ‘em see the
present company undergoing repair.’
‘No!’ cried the old man, making signs to Nell to listen, ‘why not, eh?
why not?’
‘Because it would destroy all the delusion, and take away all the
interest, wouldn’t it?’ replied the little man. ‘Would you care a
ha’penny for the Lord Chancellor if you know’d him in private and
without his wig?--certainly not.’
‘Good!’ said the old man, venturing to touch one of the puppets, and
drawing away his hand with a shrill laugh. ‘Are you going to show ‘em
to-night? are you?’
‘That is the intention, governor,’ replied the other, ‘and unless I’m
much mistaken, Tommy Codlin is a calculating at this minute what we’ve
lost through your coming upon us. Cheer up, Tommy, it can’t be much.’
The little man accompanied these latter words with a wink, expressive
of the estimate he had formed of the travellers’ finances.
To this Mr Codlin, who had a surly, grumbling manner, replied, as he
twitched Punch off the tombstone and flung him into the box, ‘I don’t
care if we haven’t lost a farden, but you’re too free. If you stood in
front of the curtain and see the public’s faces as I do, you’d know
human natur’ better.’
‘Ah! it’s been the spoiling of you, Tommy, your taking to that branch,’
rejoined his companion. ‘When you played the ghost in the reg’lar
drama in the fairs, you believed in everything--except ghosts. But now
you’re a universal mistruster. I never see a man so changed.’
‘Never mind,’ said Mr Codlin, with the air of a discontented
philosopher. ‘I know better now, and p’raps I’m sorry for it.’
Turning over the figures in the box like one who knew and despised
them, Mr Codlin drew one forth and held it up for the inspection of his
friend:
‘Look here; here’s all this judy’s clothes falling to pieces again.
You haven’t got a needle and thread I suppose?’
The little man shook his head, and scratched it ruefully as he
contemplated this severe indisposition of a principal performer.
Seeing that they were at a loss, the child said timidly:
‘I have a needle, Sir, in my basket, and thread too. Will you let me
try to mend it for you? I think I could do it neater than you could.’
Even Mr Codlin had nothing to urge against a proposal so seasonable.
Nelly, kneeling down beside the box, was soon busily engaged in her
task, and accomplishing it to a miracle.
While she was thus engaged, the merry little man looked at her with an
interest which did not appear to be diminished when he glanced at her
helpless companion. When she had finished her work he thanked her, and
inquired whither they were travelling.
‘N--no further to-night, I think,’ said the child, looking towards her
grandfather.
‘If you’re wanting a place to stop at,’ the man remarked, ‘I should
advise you to take up at the same house with us. That’s it. The long,
low, white house there. It’s very cheap.’
The old man, notwithstanding his fatigue, would have remained in the
churchyard all night if his new acquaintances had remained there too.
As he yielded to this suggestion a ready and rapturous assent, they all
rose and walked away together; he keeping close to the box of puppets
in which he was quite absorbed, the merry little man carrying it slung
over his arm by a strap attached to it for the purpose, Nelly having
hold of her grandfather’s hand, and Mr Codlin sauntering slowly behind,
casting up at the church tower and neighbouring trees such looks as he
was accustomed in town-practice to direct to drawing-room and nursery
windows, when seeking for a profitable spot on which to plant the show.
The public-house was kept by a fat old landlord and landlady who made
no objection to receiving their new guests, but praised Nelly’s beauty
and were at once prepossessed in her behalf. There was no other
company in the kitchen but the two showmen, and the child felt very
thankful that they had fallen upon such good quarters. The landlady
was very much astonished to learn that they had come all the way from
London, and appeared to have no little curiosity touching their farther
destination. The child parried her inquiries as well as she could, and
with no great trouble, for finding that they appeared to give her pain,
the old lady desisted.
‘These two gentlemen have ordered supper in an hour’s time,’ she said,
taking her into the bar; ‘and your best plan will be to sup with them.
Meanwhile you shall have a little taste of something that’ll do you
good, for I’m sure you must want it after all you’ve gone through
to-day. Now, don’t look after the old gentleman, because when you’ve
drank that, he shall have some too.’
As nothing could induce the child to leave him alone, however, or to
touch anything in which he was not the first and greatest sharer, the
old lady was obliged to help him first. When they had been thus
refreshed, the whole house hurried away into an empty stable where the
show stood, and where, by the light of a few flaring candles stuck
round a hoop which hung by a line from the ceiling, it was to be
forthwith exhibited.
And now Mr Thomas Codlin, the misanthrope, after blowing away at the
Pan’s pipes until he was intensely wretched, took his station on one
side of the checked drapery which concealed the mover of the figures,
and putting his hands in his pockets prepared to reply to all questions
and remarks of Punch, and to make a dismal feint of being his most
intimate private friend, of believing in him to the fullest and most
unlimited extent, of knowing that he enjoyed day and night a merry and
glorious existence in that temple, and that he was at all times and
under every circumstance the same intelligent and joyful person that
the spectators then beheld him. All this Mr Codlin did with the air of
a man who had made up his mind for the worst and was quite resigned;
his eye slowly wandering about during the briskest repartee to observe
the effect upon the audience, and particularly the impression made upon
the landlord and landlady, which might be productive of very important
results in connexion with the supper.
Upon this head, however, he had no cause for any anxiety, for the whole
performance was applauded to the echo, and voluntary contributions were
showered in with a liberality which testified yet more strongly to the
general delight. Among the laughter none was more loud and frequent
than the old man’s. Nell’s was unheard, for she, poor child, with her
head drooping on his shoulder, had fallen asleep, and slept too soundly
to be roused by any of his efforts to awaken her to a participation in
his glee.
The supper was very good, but she was too tired to eat, and yet would
not leave the old man until she had kissed him in his bed. He, happily
insensible to every care and anxiety, sat listening with a vacant smile
and admiring face to all that his new friend said; and it was not until
they retired yawning to their room, that he followed the child up
stairs.
It was but a loft partitioned into two compartments, where they were to
rest, but they were well pleased with their lodging and had hoped for
none so good. The old man was uneasy when he had lain down, and begged
that Nell would come and sit at his bedside as she had done for so many
nights. She hastened to him, and sat there till he slept.
There was a little window, hardly more than a chink in the wall, in her
room, and when she left him, she opened it, quite wondering at the
silence. The sight of the old church, and the graves about it in the
moonlight, and the dark trees whispering among themselves, made her
more thoughtful than before. She closed the window again, and sitting
down upon the bed, thought of the life that was before them.
She had a little money, but it was very little, and when that was gone,
they must begin to beg. There was one piece of gold among it, and an
emergency might come when its worth to them would be increased a
hundred fold. It would be best to hide this coin, and never produce it
unless their case was absolutely desperate, and no other resource was
left them.
Her resolution taken, she sewed the piece of gold into her dress, and
going to bed with a lighter heart sunk into a deep slumber.
CHAPTER 17
Another bright day shining in through the small casement, and claiming
fellowship with the kindred eyes of the child, awoke her. At sight of
the strange room and its unaccustomed objects she started up in alarm,
wondering how she had been moved from the familiar chamber in which she
seemed to have fallen asleep last night, and whither she had been
conveyed. But, another glance around called to her mind all that had
lately passed, and she sprung from her bed, hoping and trustful.
It was yet early, and the old man being still asleep, she walked out
into the churchyard, brushing the dew from the long grass with her
feet, and often turning aside into places where it grew longer than in
others, that she might not tread upon the graves. She felt a curious
kind of pleasure in lingering among these houses of the dead, and read
the inscriptions on the tombs of the good people (a great number of
good people were buried there), passing on from one to another with
increasing interest.
It was a very quiet place, as such a place should be, save for the
cawing of the rooks who had built their nests among the branches of
some tall old trees, and were calling to one another, high up in the
air. First, one sleek bird, hovering near his ragged house as it swung
and dangled in the wind, uttered his hoarse cry, quite by chance as it
would seem, and in a sober tone as though he were but talking to
himself. Another answered, and he called again, but louder than
before; then another spoke and then another; and each time the first,
aggravated by contradiction, insisted on his case more strongly. Other
voices, silent till now, struck in from boughs lower down and higher up
and midway, and to the right and left, and from the tree-tops; and
others, arriving hastily from the grey church turrets and old belfry
window, joined the clamour which rose and fell, and swelled and dropped
again, and still went on; and all this noisy contention amidst a
skimming to and fro, and lighting on fresh branches, and frequent
change of place, which satirised the old restlessness of those who lay
so still beneath the moss and turf below, and the strife in which they
had worn away their lives.
Frequently raising her eyes to the trees whence these sounds came down,
and feeling as though they made the place more quiet than perfect
silence would have done, the child loitered from grave to grave, now
stopping to replace with careful hands the bramble which had started
from some green mound it helped to keep in shape, and now peeping
through one of the low latticed windows into the church, with its
worm-eaten books upon the desks, and baize of whitened-green mouldering
from the pew sides and leaving the naked wood to view. There were the
seats where the poor old people sat, worn spare, and yellow like
themselves; the rugged font where children had their names, the homely
altar where they knelt in after life, the plain black tressels that
bore their weight on their last visit to the cool old shady church.
Everything told of long use and quiet slow decay; the very bell-rope in
the porch was frayed into a fringe, and hoary with old age.
She was looking at a humble stone which told of a young man who had
died at twenty-three years old, fifty-five years ago, when she heard a
faltering step approaching, and looking round saw a feeble woman bent
with the weight of years, who tottered to the foot of that same grave
and asked her to read the writing on the stone. The old woman thanked
her when she had done, saying that she had had the words by heart for
many a long, long year, but could not see them now.
‘Were you his mother?’ said the child.
‘I was his wife, my dear.’
She the wife of a young man of three-and-twenty! Ah, true! It was
fifty-five years ago.
‘You wonder to hear me say that,’ remarked the old woman, shaking her
head. ‘You’re not the first. Older folk than you have wondered at the
same thing before now. Yes, I was his wife. Death doesn’t change us
more than life, my dear.’
‘Do you come here often?’ asked the child.
‘I sit here very often in the summer time,’ she answered, ‘I used to
come here once to cry and mourn, but that was a weary while ago, bless
God!’
‘I pluck the daisies as they grow, and take them home,’ said the old
woman after a short silence. ‘I like no flowers so well as these, and
haven’t for five-and-fifty years. It’s a long time, and I’m getting
very old.’
Then growing garrulous upon a theme which was new to one listener
though it were but a child, she told her how she had wept and moaned
and prayed to die herself, when this happened; and how when she first
came to that place, a young creature strong in love and grief, she had
hoped that her heart was breaking as it seemed to be. But that time
passed by, and although she continued to be sad when she came there,
still she could bear to come, and so went on until it was pain no
longer, but a solemn pleasure, and a duty she had learned to like. And
now that five-and-fifty years were gone, she spoke of the dead man as
if he had been her son or grandson, with a kind of pity for his youth,
growing out of her own old age, and an exalting of his strength and
manly beauty as compared with her own weakness and decay; and yet she
spoke about him as her husband too, and thinking of herself in
connexion with him, as she used to be and not as she was now, talked of
their meeting in another world, as if he were dead but yesterday, and
she, separated from her former self, were thinking of the happiness of
that comely girl who seemed to have died with him.
The child left her gathering the flowers that grew upon the grave, and
thoughtfully retraced her steps.
The old man was by this time up and dressed. Mr Codlin, still doomed
to contemplate the harsh realities of existence, was packing among his
linen the candle-ends which had been saved from the previous night’s
performance; while his companion received the compliments of all the
loungers in the stable-yard, who, unable to separate him from the
master-mind of Punch, set him down as next in importance to that merry
outlaw, and loved him scarcely less. When he had sufficiently
acknowledged his popularity he came in to breakfast, at which meal they
all sat down together.
‘And where are you going to-day?’ said the little man, addressing
himself to Nell.
‘Indeed I hardly know--we have not determined yet,’ replied the child.
‘We’re going on to the races,’ said the little man. ‘If that’s your
way and you like to have us for company, let us travel together. If
you prefer going alone, only say the word and you’ll find that we
shan’t trouble you.’
‘We’ll go with you,’ said the old man. ‘Nell--with them, with them.’
The child considered for a moment, and reflecting that she must shortly
beg, and could scarcely hope to do so at a better place than where
crowds of rich ladies and gentlemen were assembled together for
purposes of enjoyment and festivity, determined to accompany these men
so far. She therefore thanked the little man for his offer, and said,
glancing timidly towards his friend, that if there was no objection to
their accompanying them as far as the race town--
‘Objection!’ said the little man. ‘Now be gracious for once, Tommy,
and say that you’d rather they went with us. I know you would. Be
gracious, Tommy.’
‘Trotters,’ said Mr Codlin, who talked very slowly and ate very
greedily, as is not uncommon with philosophers and misanthropes;
‘you’re too free.’
‘Why what harm can it do?’ urged the other.
‘No harm at all in this particular case, perhaps,’ replied Mr Codlin;
‘but the principle’s a dangerous one, and you’re too free I tell you.’
‘Well, are they to go with us or not?’
‘Yes, they are,’ said Mr Codlin; ‘but you might have made a favour of
it, mightn’t you?’
The real name of the little man was Harris, but it had gradually merged
into the less euphonious one of Trotters, which, with the prefatory
adjective, Short, had been conferred upon him by reason of the small
size of his legs. Short Trotters however, being a compound name,
inconvenient of use in friendly dialogue, the gentleman on whom it had
been bestowed was known among his intimates either as ‘Short,’ or
‘Trotters,’ and was seldom accosted at full length as Short Trotters,
except in formal conversations and on occasions of ceremony.
Short, then, or Trotters, as the reader pleases, returned unto the
remonstrance of his friend Mr Thomas Codlin a jocose answer calculated
to turn aside his discontent; and applying himself with great relish to
the cold boiled beef, the tea, and bread and butter, strongly impressed
upon his companions that they should do the like. Mr Codlin indeed
required no such persuasion, as he had already eaten as much as he
could possibly carry and was now moistening his clay with strong ale,
whereof he took deep draughts with a silent relish and invited nobody
to partake--thus again strongly indicating his misanthropical turn of
mind.
Breakfast being at length over, Mr Codlin called the bill, and charging
the ale to the company generally (a practice also savouring of
misanthropy) divided the sum-total into two fair and equal parts,
assigning one moiety to himself and friend, and the other to Nelly and
her grandfather. These being duly discharged and all things ready for
their departure, they took farewell of the landlord and landlady and
resumed their journey.
And here Mr Codlin’s false position in society and the effect it
wrought upon his wounded spirit, were strongly illustrated; for whereas
he had been last night accosted by Mr Punch as ‘master,’ and had by
inference left the audience to understand that he maintained that
individual for his own luxurious entertainment and delight, here he
was, now, painfully walking beneath the burden of that same Punch’s
temple, and bearing it bodily upon his shoulders on a sultry day and
along a dusty road. In place of enlivening his patron with a constant
fire of wit or the cheerful rattle of his quarter-staff on the heads of
his relations and acquaintance, here was that beaming Punch utterly
devoid of spine, all slack and drooping in a dark box, with his legs
doubled up round his neck, and not one of his social qualities
remaining.
Mr Codlin trudged heavily on, exchanging a word or two at intervals
with Short, and stopping to rest and growl occasionally. Short led the
way; with the flat box, the private luggage (which was not extensive)
tied up in a bundle, and a brazen trumpet slung from his
shoulder-blade. Nell and her grandfather walked next him on either
hand, and Thomas Codlin brought up the rear.
When they came to any town or village, or even to a detached house of
good appearance, Short blew a blast upon the brazen trumpet and
carolled a fragment of a song in that hilarious tone common to Punches
and their consorts. If people hurried to the windows, Mr Codlin
pitched the temple, and hastily unfurling the drapery and concealing
Short therewith, flourished hysterically on the pipes and performed an
air. Then the entertainment began as soon as might be; Mr Codlin
having the responsibility of deciding on its length and of protracting
or expediting the time for the hero’s final triumph over the enemy of
mankind, according as he judged that the after-crop of half-pence would
be plentiful or scant. When it had been gathered in to the last
farthing, he resumed his load and on they went again.
Sometimes they played out the toll across a bridge or ferry, and once
exhibited by particular desire at a turnpike, where the collector,
being drunk in his solitude, paid down a shilling to have it to
himself. There was one small place of rich promise in which their
hopes were blighted, for a favourite character in the play having
gold-lace upon his coat and being a meddling wooden-headed fellow was
held to be a libel on the beadle, for which reason the authorities
enforced a quick retreat; but they were generally well received, and
seldom left a town without a troop of ragged children shouting at their
heels.
They made a long day’s journey, despite these interruptions, and were
yet upon the road when the moon was shining in the sky. Short beguiled
the time with songs and jests, and made the best of everything that
happened. Mr Codlin on the other hand, cursed his fate, and all the
hollow things of earth (but Punch especially), and limped along with
the theatre on his back, a prey to the bitterest chagrin.
They had stopped to rest beneath a finger-post where four roads met,
and Mr Codlin in his deep misanthropy had let down the drapery and
seated himself in the bottom of the show, invisible to mortal eyes and
disdainful of the company of his fellow creatures, when two monstrous
shadows were seen stalking towards them from a turning in the road by
which they had come. The child was at first quite terrified by the
sight of these gaunt giants--for such they looked as they advanced with
lofty strides beneath the shadow of the trees--but Short, telling her
there was nothing to fear, blew a blast upon the trumpet, which was
answered by a cheerful shout.
‘It’s Grinder’s lot, an’t it?’ cried Mr Short in a loud key.
‘Yes,’ replied a couple of shrill voices.
‘Come on then,’ said Short. ‘Let’s have a look at you. I thought it
was you.’
Thus invited, ‘Grinder’s lot’ approached with redoubled speed and soon
came up with the little party.
Mr Grinder’s company, familiarly termed a lot, consisted of a young
gentleman and a young lady on stilts, and Mr Grinder himself, who used
his natural legs for pedestrian purposes and carried at his back a
drum. The public costume of the young people was of the Highland kind,
but the night being damp and cold, the young gentleman wore over his
kilt a man’s pea jacket reaching to his ankles, and a glazed hat; the
young lady too was muffled in an old cloth pelisse and had a
handkerchief tied about her head. Their Scotch bonnets, ornamented
with plumes of jet black feathers, Mr Grinder carried on his instrument.
‘Bound for the races, I see,’ said Mr Grinder coming up out of breath.
‘So are we. How are you, Short?’ With that they shook hands in a very
friendly manner. The young people being too high up for the ordinary
salutations, saluted Short after their own fashion. The young
gentleman twisted up his right stilt and patted him on the shoulder,
and the young lady rattled her tambourine.
‘Practice?’ said Short, pointing to the stilts.
‘No,’ returned Grinder. ‘It comes either to walkin’ in ‘em or carryin’
of ‘em, and they like walkin’ in ‘em best. It’s wery pleasant for the
prospects. Which road are you takin’? We go the nighest.’
‘Why, the fact is,’ said Short, ‘that we are going the longest way,
because then we could stop for the night, a mile and a half on. But
three or four mile gained to-night is so many saved to-morrow, and if
you keep on, I think our best way is to do the same.’
‘Where’s your partner?’ inquired Grinder.
‘Here he is,’ cried Mr Thomas Codlin, presenting his head and face in
the proscenium of the stage, and exhibiting an expression of
countenance not often seen there; ‘and he’ll see his partner boiled
alive before he’ll go on to-night. That’s what he says.’
‘Well, don’t say such things as them, in a spear which is dewoted to
something pleasanter,’ urged Short. ‘Respect associations, Tommy, even
if you do cut up rough.’
‘Rough or smooth,’ said Mr Codlin, beating his hand on the little
footboard where Punch, when suddenly struck with the symmetry of his
legs and their capacity for silk stockings, is accustomed to exhibit
them to popular admiration, ‘rough or smooth, I won’t go further than
the mile and a half to-night. I put up at the Jolly Sandboys and
nowhere else. If you like to come there, come there. If you like to
go on by yourself, go on by yourself, and do without me if you can.’
So saying, Mr Codlin disappeared from the scene and immediately
presented himself outside the theatre, took it on his shoulders at a
jerk, and made off with most remarkable agility.
Any further controversy being now out of the question, Short was fain
to part with Mr Grinder and his pupils and to follow his morose
companion. After lingering at the finger-post for a few minutes to see
the stilts frisking away in the moonlight and the bearer of the drum
toiling slowly after them, he blew a few notes upon the trumpet as a
parting salute, and hastened with all speed to follow Mr Codlin. With
this view he gave his unoccupied hand to Nell, and bidding her be of
good cheer as they would soon be at the end of their journey for that
night, and stimulating the old man with a similar assurance, led them
at a pretty swift pace towards their destination, which he was the less
unwilling to make for, as the moon was now overcast and the clouds were
threatening rain.
CHAPTER 18
The Jolly Sandboys was a small road-side inn of pretty ancient date,
with a sign, representing three Sandboys increasing their jollity with
as many jugs of ale and bags of gold, creaking and swinging on its post
on the opposite side of the road. As the travellers had observed that
day many indications of their drawing nearer and nearer to the race
town, such as gipsy camps, carts laden with gambling booths and their
appurtenances, itinerant showmen of various kinds, and beggars and
trampers of every degree, all wending their way in the same direction,
Mr Codlin was fearful of finding the accommodations forestalled; this
fear increasing as he diminished the distance between himself and the
hostelry, he quickened his pace, and notwithstanding the burden he had
to carry, maintained a round trot until he reached the threshold. Here
he had the gratification of finding that his fears were without
foundation, for the landlord was leaning against the door-post looking
lazily at the rain, which had by this time begun to descend heavily,
and no tinkling of cracked bell, nor boisterous shout, nor noisy
chorus, gave note of company within.
‘All alone?’ said Mr Codlin, putting down his burden and wiping his
forehead.
‘All alone as yet,’ rejoined the landlord, glancing at the sky, ‘but we
shall have more company to-night I expect. Here one of you boys, carry
that show into the barn. Make haste in out of the wet, Tom; when it
came on to rain I told ‘em to make the fire up, and there’s a glorious
blaze in the kitchen, I can tell you.’
Mr Codlin followed with a willing mind, and soon found that the
landlord had not commended his preparations without good reason. A
mighty fire was blazing on the hearth and roaring up the wide chimney
with a cheerful sound, which a large iron cauldron, bubbling and
simmering in the heat, lent its pleasant aid to swell. There was a
deep red ruddy blush upon the room, and when the landlord stirred the
fire, sending the flames skipping and leaping up--when he took off the
lid of the iron pot and there rushed out a savoury smell, while the
bubbling sound grew deeper and more rich, and an unctuous steam came
floating out, hanging in a delicious mist above their heads--when he
did this, Mr Codlin’s heart was touched. He sat down in the
chimney-corner and smiled.
Mr Codlin sat smiling in the chimney-corner, eyeing the landlord as
with a roguish look he held the cover in his hand, and, feigning that
his doing so was needful to the welfare of the cookery, suffered the
delightful steam to tickle the nostrils of his guest. The glow of the
fire was upon the landlord’s bald head, and upon his twinkling eye, and
upon his watering mouth, and upon his pimpled face, and upon his round
fat figure. Mr Codlin drew his sleeve across his lips, and said in a
murmuring voice, ‘What is it?’
‘It’s a stew of tripe,’ said the landlord smacking his lips, ‘and
cow-heel,’ smacking them again, ‘and bacon,’ smacking them once more,
‘and steak,’ smacking them for the fourth time, ‘and peas,
cauliflowers, new potatoes, and sparrow-grass, all working up together
in one delicious gravy.’ Having come to the climax, he smacked his
lips a great many times, and taking a long hearty sniff of the
fragrance that was hovering about, put on the cover again with the air
of one whose toils on earth were over.
‘At what time will it be ready?’ asked Mr Codlin faintly.
‘It’ll be done to a turn,’ said the landlord looking up to the
clock--and the very clock had a colour in its fat white face, and
looked a clock for jolly Sandboys to consult--‘it’ll be done to a turn
at twenty-two minutes before eleven.’
‘Then,’ said Mr Codlin, ‘fetch me a pint of warm ale, and don’t let
nobody bring into the room even so much as a biscuit till the time
arrives.’
Nodding his approval of this decisive and manly course of procedure,
the landlord retired to draw the beer, and presently returning with it,
applied himself to warm the same in a small tin vessel shaped
funnel-wise, for the convenience of sticking it far down in the fire
and getting at the bright places. This was soon done, and he handed it
over to Mr Codlin with that creamy froth upon the surface which is one
of the happy circumstances attendant on mulled malt.
Greatly softened by this soothing beverage, Mr Codlin now bethought him
of his companions, and acquainted mine host of the Sandboys that their
arrival might be shortly looked for. The rain was rattling against the
windows and pouring down in torrents, and such was Mr Codlin’s extreme
amiability of mind, that he more than once expressed his earnest hope
that they would not be so foolish as to get wet.
At length they arrived, drenched with the rain and presenting a most
miserable appearance, notwithstanding that Short had sheltered the
child as well as he could under the skirts of his own coat, and they
were nearly breathless from the haste they had made. But their steps
were no sooner heard upon the road than the landlord, who had been at
the outer door anxiously watching for their coming, rushed into the
kitchen and took the cover off. The effect was electrical. They all
came in with smiling faces though the wet was dripping from their
clothes upon the floor, and Short’s first remark was, ‘What a delicious
smell!’
It is not very difficult to forget rain and mud by the side of a
cheerful fire, and in a bright room. They were furnished with slippers
and such dry garments as the house or their own bundles afforded, and
ensconcing themselves, as Mr Codlin had already done, in the warm
chimney-corner, soon forgot their late troubles or only remembered them
as enhancing the delights of the present time. Overpowered by the
warmth and comfort and the fatigue they had undergone, Nelly and the
old man had not long taken their seats here, when they fell asleep.
‘Who are they?’ whispered the landlord.
Short shook his head, and wished he knew himself.
‘Don’t you know?’ asked the host, turning to Mr Codlin.
‘Not I,’ he replied. ‘They’re no good, I suppose.’
‘They’re no harm,’ said Short. ‘Depend upon that. I tell you
what--it’s plain that the old man an’t in his right mind--’
‘If you haven’t got anything newer than that to say,’ growled Mr
Codlin, glancing at the clock, ‘you’d better let us fix our minds upon
the supper, and not disturb us.’
‘Hear me out, won’t you?’ retorted his friend. ‘It’s very plain to me,
besides, that they’re not used to this way of life. Don’t tell me that
that handsome child has been in the habit of prowling about as she’s
done these last two or three days. I know better.’
‘Well, who DOES tell you she has?’ growled Mr Codlin, again glancing at
the clock and from it to the cauldron, ‘can’t you think of anything
more suitable to present circumstances than saying things and then
contradicting ‘em?’
‘I wish somebody would give you your supper,’ returned Short, ‘for
there’ll be no peace till you’ve got it. Have you seen how anxious the
old man is to get on--always wanting to be furder away--furder away.
Have you seen that?’
‘Ah! what then?’ muttered Thomas Codlin.
‘This, then,’ said Short. ‘He has given his friends the slip. Mind
what I say--he has given his friends the slip, and persuaded this
delicate young creetur all along of her fondness for him to be his
guide and travelling companion--where to, he knows no more than the man
in the moon. Now I’m not a going to stand that.’
‘YOU’RE not a going to stand that!’ cried Mr Codlin, glancing at the
clock again and pulling his hair with both hands in a kind of frenzy,
but whether occasioned by his companion’s observation or the tardy pace
of Time, it was difficult to determine. ‘Here’s a world to live in!’
‘I,’ repeated Short emphatically and slowly, ‘am not a-going to stand
it. I am not a-going to see this fair young child a falling into bad
hands, and getting among people that she’s no more fit for, than they
are to get among angels as their ordinary chums. Therefore when they
dewelope an intention of parting company from us, I shall take measures
for detaining of ‘em, and restoring ‘em to their friends, who I dare
say have had their disconsolation pasted up on every wall in London by
this time.’
‘Short,’ said Mr Codlin, who with his head upon his hands, and his
elbows on his knees, had been shaking himself impatiently from side to
side up to this point and occasionally stamping on the ground, but who
now looked up with eager eyes; ‘it’s possible that there may be
uncommon good sense in what you’ve said. If there is, and there should
be a reward, Short, remember that we’re partners in everything!’
His companion had only time to nod a brief assent to this position, for
the child awoke at the instant. They had drawn close together during
the previous whispering, and now hastily separated and were rather
awkwardly endeavouring to exchange some casual remarks in their usual
tone, when strange footsteps were heard without, and fresh company
entered.
These were no other than four very dismal dogs, who came pattering in
one after the other, headed by an old bandy dog of particularly
mournful aspect, who, stopping when the last of his followers had got
as far as the door, erected himself upon his hind legs and looked round
at his companions, who immediately stood upon their hind legs, in a
grave and melancholy row. Nor was this the only remarkable
circumstance about these dogs, for each of them wore a kind of little
coat of some gaudy colour trimmed with tarnished spangles, and one of
them had a cap upon his head, tied very carefully under his chin, which
had fallen down upon his nose and completely obscured one eye; add to
this, that the gaudy coats were all wet through and discoloured with
rain, and that the wearers were splashed and dirty, and some idea may
be formed of the unusual appearance of these new visitors to the Jolly
Sandboys.
Neither Short nor the landlord nor Thomas Codlin, however, was in the
least surprised, merely remarking that these were Jerry’s dogs and that
Jerry could not be far behind. So there the dogs stood, patiently
winking and gaping and looking extremely hard at the boiling pot, until
Jerry himself appeared, when they all dropped down at once and walked
about the room in their natural manner. This posture it must be
confessed did not much improve their appearance, as their own personal
tails and their coat tails--both capital things in their way--did not
agree together.
Jerry, the manager of these dancing dogs, was a tall black-whiskered
man in a velveteen coat, who seemed well known to the landlord and his
guests and accosted them with great cordiality. Disencumbering himself
of a barrel organ which he placed upon a chair, and retaining in his
hand a small whip wherewith to awe his company of comedians, he came up
to the fire to dry himself, and entered into conversation.
‘Your people don’t usually travel in character, do they?’ said Short,
pointing to the dresses of the dogs. ‘It must come expensive if they
do?’
‘No,’ replied Jerry, ‘no, it’s not the custom with us. But we’ve been
playing a little on the road to-day, and we come out with a new
wardrobe at the races, so I didn’t think it worth while to stop to
undress. Down, Pedro!’
This was addressed to the dog with the cap on, who being a new member
of the company, and not quite certain of his duty, kept his unobscured
eye anxiously on his master, and was perpetually starting upon his hind
legs when there was no occasion, and falling down again.
‘I’ve got a animal here,’ said Jerry, putting his hand into the
capacious pocket of his coat, and diving into one corner as if he were
feeling for a small orange or an apple or some such article, ‘a animal
here, wot I think you know something of, Short.’
‘Ah!’ cried Short, ‘let’s have a look at him.’
‘Here he is,’ said Jerry, producing a little terrier from his pocket.
‘He was once a Toby of yours, warn’t he!’
In some versions of the great drama of Punch there is a small dog--a
modern innovation--supposed to be the private property of that
gentleman, whose name is always Toby. This Toby has been stolen in
youth from another gentleman, and fraudulently sold to the confiding
hero, who having no guile himself has no suspicion that it lurks in
others; but Toby, entertaining a grateful recollection of his old
master, and scorning to attach himself to any new patrons, not only
refuses to smoke a pipe at the bidding of Punch, but to mark his old
fidelity more strongly, seizes him by the nose and wrings the same with
violence, at which instance of canine attachment the spectators are
deeply affected. This was the character which the little terrier in
question had once sustained; if there had been any doubt upon the
subject he would speedily have resolved it by his conduct; for not only
did he, on seeing Short, give the strongest tokens of recognition, but
catching sight of the flat box he barked so furiously at the pasteboard
nose which he knew was inside, that his master was obliged to gather
him up and put him into his pocket again, to the great relief of the
whole company.
The landlord now busied himself in laying the cloth, in which process
Mr Codlin obligingly assisted by setting forth his own knife and fork
in the most convenient place and establishing himself behind them.
When everything was ready, the landlord took off the cover for the last
time, and then indeed there burst forth such a goodly promise of
supper, that if he had offered to put it on again or had hinted at
postponement, he would certainly have been sacrificed on his own hearth.
However, he did nothing of the kind, but instead thereof assisted a
stout servant girl in turning the contents of the cauldron into a large
tureen; a proceeding which the dogs, proof against various hot splashes
which fell upon their noses, watched with terrible eagerness. At
length the dish was lifted on the table, and mugs of ale having been
previously set round, little Nell ventured to say grace, and supper
began.
At this juncture the poor dogs were standing on their hind legs quite
surprisingly; the child, having pity on them, was about to cast some
morsels of food to them before she tasted it herself, hungry though she
was, when their master interposed.
‘No, my dear, no, not an atom from anybody’s hand but mine if you
please. That dog,’ said Jerry, pointing out the old leader of the
troop, and speaking in a terrible voice, ‘lost a halfpenny to-day. He
goes without his supper.’
The unfortunate creature dropped upon his fore-legs directly, wagged
his tail, and looked imploringly at his master.
‘You must be more careful, Sir,’ said Jerry, walking coolly to the
chair where he had placed the organ, and setting the stop. ‘Come here.
Now, Sir, you play away at that, while we have supper, and leave off if
you dare.’
The dog immediately began to grind most mournful music. His master
having shown him the whip resumed his seat and called up the others,
who, at his directions, formed in a row, standing upright as a file of
soldiers.
‘Now, gentlemen,’ said Jerry, looking at them attentively. ‘The dog
whose name’s called, eats. The dogs whose names an’t called, keep
quiet. Carlo!’
The lucky individual whose name was called, snapped up the morsel
thrown towards him, but none of the others moved a muscle. In this
manner they were fed at the discretion of their master. Meanwhile the
dog in disgrace ground hard at the organ, sometimes in quick time,
sometimes in slow, but never leaving off for an instant. When the
knives and forks rattled very much, or any of his fellows got an
unusually large piece of fat, he accompanied the music with a short
howl, but he immediately checked it on his master looking round, and
applied himself with increased diligence to the Old Hundredth.
CHAPTER 19
Supper was not yet over, when there arrived at the Jolly Sandboys two
more travellers bound for the same haven as the rest, who had been
walking in the rain for some hours, and came in shining and heavy with
water. One of these was the proprietor of a giant, and a little lady
without legs or arms, who had jogged forward in a van; the other, a
silent gentleman who earned his living by showing tricks upon the
cards, and who had rather deranged the natural expression of his
countenance by putting small leaden lozenges into his eyes and bringing
them out at his mouth, which was one of his professional
accomplishments. The name of the first of these newcomers was Vuffin;
the other, probably as a pleasant satire upon his ugliness, was called
Sweet William. To render them as comfortable as he could, the landlord
bestirred himself nimbly, and in a very short time both gentlemen were
perfectly at their ease.
‘How’s the Giant?’ said Short, when they all sat smoking round the fire.
‘Rather weak upon his legs,’ returned Mr Vuffin. ‘I begin to be afraid
he’s going at the knees.’
‘That’s a bad look-out,’ said Short.
‘Aye! Bad indeed,’ replied Mr Vuffin, contemplating the fire with a
sigh. ‘Once get a giant shaky on his legs, and the public care no more
about him than they do for a dead cabbage stalk.’
‘What becomes of old giants?’ said Short, turning to him again after a
little reflection.
‘They’re usually kept in carawans to wait upon the dwarfs,’ said Mr
Vuffin.
‘The maintaining of ‘em must come expensive, when they can’t be shown,
eh?’ remarked Short, eyeing him doubtfully.
‘It’s better that, than letting ‘em go upon the parish or about the
streets,’ said Mr Vuffin. ‘Once make a giant common and giants will
never draw again. Look at wooden legs. If there was only one man with
a wooden leg what a property he’d be!’
‘So he would!’ observed the landlord and Short both together. ‘That’s
very true.’
‘Instead of which,’ pursued Mr Vuffin, ‘if you was to advertise
Shakspeare played entirely by wooden legs, it’s my belief you wouldn’t
draw a sixpence.’
‘I don’t suppose you would,’ said Short. And the landlord said so too.
‘This shows, you see,’ said Mr Vuffin, waving his pipe with an
argumentative air, ‘this shows the policy of keeping the used-up giants
still in the carawans, where they get food and lodging for nothing, all
their lives, and in general very glad they are to stop there. There
was one giant--a black ‘un--as left his carawan some year ago and took
to carrying coach-bills about London, making himself as cheap as
crossing-sweepers. He died. I make no insinuation against anybody in
particular,’ said Mr Vuffin, looking solemnly round, ‘but he was
ruining the trade;--and he died.’
The landlord drew his breath hard, and looked at the owner of the dogs,
who nodded and said gruffly that he remembered.
‘I know you do, Jerry,’ said Mr Vuffin with profound meaning. ‘I know
you remember it, Jerry, and the universal opinion was, that it served
him right. Why, I remember the time when old Maunders as had
three-and-twenty wans--I remember the time when old Maunders had in his
cottage in Spa Fields in the winter time, when the season was over,
eight male and female dwarfs setting down to dinner every day, who was
waited on by eight old giants in green coats, red smalls, blue cotton
stockings, and high-lows: and there was one dwarf as had grown elderly
and wicious who whenever his giant wasn’t quick enough to please him,
used to stick pins in his legs, not being able to reach up any higher.
I know that’s a fact, for Maunders told it me himself.’
‘What about the dwarfs when they get old?’ inquired the landlord.
‘The older a dwarf is, the better worth he is,’ returned Mr Vuffin; ‘a
grey-headed dwarf, well wrinkled, is beyond all suspicion. But a giant
weak in the legs and not standing upright!--keep him in the carawan,
but never show him, never show him, for any persuasion that can be
offered.’
While Mr Vuffin and his two friends smoked their pipes and beguiled the
time with such conversation as this, the silent gentleman sat in a warm
corner, swallowing, or seeming to swallow, sixpennyworth of halfpence
for practice, balancing a feather upon his nose, and rehearsing other
feats of dexterity of that kind, without paying any regard whatever to
the company, who in their turn left him utterly unnoticed. At length
the weary child prevailed upon her grandfather to retire, and they
withdrew, leaving the company yet seated round the fire, and the dogs
fast asleep at a humble distance.
After bidding the old man good night, Nell retired to her poor garret,
but had scarcely closed the door, when it was gently tapped at. She
opened it directly, and was a little startled by the sight of Mr Thomas
Codlin, whom she had left, to all appearance, fast asleep down stairs.
‘What is the matter?’ said the child.
‘Nothing’s the matter, my dear,’ returned her visitor. ‘I’m your
friend. Perhaps you haven’t thought so, but it’s me that’s your
friend--not him.’
‘Not who?’ the child inquired.
‘Short, my dear. I tell you what,’ said Codlin, ‘for all his having a
kind of way with him that you’d be very apt to like, I’m the real,
open-hearted man. I mayn’t look it, but I am indeed.’
The child began to be alarmed, considering that the ale had taken
effect upon Mr Codlin, and that this commendation of himself was the
consequence.
‘Short’s very well, and seems kind,’ resumed the misanthrope, ‘but he
overdoes it. Now I don’t.’
Certainly if there were any fault in Mr Codlin’s usual deportment, it
was that he rather underdid his kindness to those about him, than
overdid it. But the child was puzzled, and could not tell what to say.
‘Take my advice,’ said Codlin: ‘don’t ask me why, but take it. As long
as you travel with us, keep as near me as you can. Don’t offer to
leave us--not on any account--but always stick to me and say that I’m
your friend. Will you bear that in mind, my dear, and always say that
it was me that was your friend?’
‘Say so where--and when?’ inquired the child innocently.
‘O, nowhere in particular,’ replied Codlin, a little put out as it
seemed by the question; ‘I’m only anxious that you should think me so,
and do me justice. You can’t think what an interest I have in you.
Why didn’t you tell me your little history--that about you and the poor
old gentleman? I’m the best adviser that ever was, and so interested
in you--so much more interested than Short. I think they’re breaking
up down stairs; you needn’t tell Short, you know, that we’ve had this
little talk together. God bless you. Recollect the friend. Codlin’s
the friend, not Short. Short’s very well as far as he goes, but the
real friend is Codlin--not Short.’
Eking out these professions with a number of benevolent and protecting
looks and great fervour of manner, Thomas Codlin stole away on tiptoe,
leaving the child in a state of extreme surprise. She was still
ruminating upon his curious behaviour, when the floor of the crazy
stairs and landing cracked beneath the tread of the other travellers
who were passing to their beds. When they had all passed, and the
sound of their footsteps had died away, one of them returned, and after
a little hesitation and rustling in the passage, as if he were doubtful
what door to knock at, knocked at hers.
‘Yes,’ said the child from within.
‘It’s me--Short’--a voice called through the keyhole. ‘I only wanted
to say that we must be off early to-morrow morning, my dear, because
unless we get the start of the dogs and the conjuror, the villages
won’t be worth a penny. You’ll be sure to be stirring early and go
with us? I’ll call you.’
The child answered in the affirmative, and returning his ‘good night’
heard him creep away. She felt some uneasiness at the anxiety of these
men, increased by the recollection of their whispering together down
stairs and their slight confusion when she awoke, nor was she quite
free from a misgiving that they were not the fittest companions she
could have stumbled on. Her uneasiness, however, was nothing, weighed
against her fatigue; and she soon forgot it in sleep.
Very early next morning, Short fulfilled his promise, and knocking
softly at her door, entreated that she would get up directly, as the
proprietor of the dogs was still snoring, and if they lost no time they
might get a good deal in advance both of him and the conjuror, who was
talking in his sleep, and from what he could be heard to say, appeared
to be balancing a donkey in his dreams. She started from her bed
without delay, and roused the old man with so much expedition that they
were both ready as soon as Short himself, to that gentleman’s
unspeakable gratification and relief.
After a very unceremonious and scrambling breakfast, of which the
staple commodities were bacon and bread, and beer, they took leave of
the landlord and issued from the door of the jolly Sandboys. The
morning was fine and warm, the ground cool to the feet after the late
rain, the hedges gayer and more green, the air clear, and everything
fresh and healthful. Surrounded by these influences, they walked on
pleasantly enough.
They had not gone very far, when the child was again struck by the
altered behaviour of Mr Thomas Codlin, who instead of plodding on
sulkily by himself as he had heretofore done, kept close to her, and
when he had an opportunity of looking at her unseen by his companion,
warned her by certain wry faces and jerks of the head not to put any
trust in Short, but to reserve all confidences for Codlin. Neither did
he confine himself to looks and gestures, for when she and her
grandfather were walking on beside the aforesaid Short, and that little
man was talking with his accustomed cheerfulness on a variety of
indifferent subjects, Thomas Codlin testified his jealousy and distrust
by following close at her heels, and occasionally admonishing her
ankles with the legs of the theatre in a very abrupt and painful manner.
All these proceedings naturally made the child more watchful and
suspicious, and she soon observed that whenever they halted to perform
outside a village alehouse or other place, Mr Codlin while he went
through his share of the entertainments kept his eye steadily upon her
and the old man, or with a show of great friendship and consideration
invited the latter to lean upon his arm, and so held him tight until
the representation was over and they again went forward. Even Short
seemed to change in this respect, and to mingle with his good-nature
something of a desire to keep them in safe custody. This increased the
child’s misgivings, and made her yet more anxious and uneasy.
Meanwhile, they were drawing near the town where the races were to
begin next day; for, from passing numerous groups of gipsies and
trampers on the road, wending their way towards it, and straggling out
from every by-way and cross-country lane, they gradually fell into a
stream of people, some walking by the side of covered carts, others
with horses, others with donkeys, others toiling on with heavy loads
upon their backs, but all tending to the same point. The public-houses
by the wayside, from being empty and noiseless as those in the remoter
parts had been, now sent out boisterous shouts and clouds of smoke;
and, from the misty windows, clusters of broad red faces looked down
upon the road. On every piece of waste or common ground, some small
gambler drove his noisy trade, and bellowed to the idle passersby to
stop and try their chance; the crowd grew thicker and more noisy; gilt
gingerbread in blanket-stalls exposed its glories to the dust; and
often a four-horse carriage, dashing by, obscured all objects in the
gritty cloud it raised, and left them, stunned and blinded, far behind.
It was dark before they reached the town itself, and long indeed the
few last miles had been. Here all was tumult and confusion; the
streets were filled with throngs of people--many strangers were there,
it seemed, by the looks they cast about--the church-bells rang out
their noisy peals, and flags streamed from windows and house-tops. In
the large inn-yards waiters flitted to and fro and ran against each
other, horses clattered on the uneven stones, carriage steps fell
rattling down, and sickening smells from many dinners came in a heavy
lukewarm breath upon the sense. In the smaller public-houses, fiddles
with all their might and main were squeaking out the tune to staggering
feet; drunken men, oblivious of the burden of their song, joined in a
senseless howl, which drowned the tinkling of the feeble bell and made
them savage for their drink; vagabond groups assembled round the doors
to see the stroller woman dance, and add their uproar to the shrill
flageolet and deafening drum.
Through this delirious scene, the child, frightened and repelled by all
she saw, led on her bewildered charge, clinging close to her conductor,
and trembling lest in the press she should be separated from him and
left to find her way alone. Quickening their steps to get clear of all
the roar and riot, they at length passed through the town and made for
the race-course, which was upon an open heath, situated on an eminence,
a full mile distant from its furthest bounds.
Although there were many people here, none of the best favoured or best
clad, busily erecting tents and driving stakes in the ground, and
hurrying to and fro with dusty feet and many a grumbled oath--although
there were tired children cradled on heaps of straw between the wheels
of carts, crying themselves to sleep--and poor lean horses and donkeys
just turned loose, grazing among the men and women, and pots and
kettles, and half-lighted fires, and ends of candles flaring and
wasting in the air--for all this, the child felt it an escape from the
town and drew her breath more freely. After a scanty supper, the
purchase of which reduced her little stock so low, that she had only a
few halfpence with which to buy a breakfast on the morrow, she and the
old man lay down to rest in a corner of a tent, and slept, despite the
busy preparations that were going on around them all night long.
And now they had come to the time when they must beg their bread. Soon
after sunrise in the morning she stole out from the tent, and rambling
into some fields at a short distance, plucked a few wild roses and such
humble flowers, purposing to make them into little nosegays and offer
them to the ladies in the carriages when the company arrived. Her
thoughts were not idle while she was thus employed; when she returned
and was seated beside the old man in one corner of the tent, tying her
flowers together, while the two men lay dozing in another corner, she
plucked him by the sleeve, and slightly glancing towards them, said, in
a low voice--
‘Grandfather, don’t look at those I talk of, and don’t seem as if I
spoke of anything but what I am about. What was that you told me
before we left the old house? That if they knew what we were going to
do, they would say that you were mad, and part us?’
The old man turned to her with an aspect of wild terror; but she
checked him by a look, and bidding him hold some flowers while she tied
them up, and so bringing her lips closer to his ear, said--
‘I know that was what you told me. You needn’t speak, dear. I
recollect it very well. It was not likely that I should forget it.
Grandfather, these men suspect that we have secretly left our friends,
and mean to carry us before some gentleman and have us taken care of
and sent back. If you let your hand tremble so, we can never get away
from them, but if you’re only quiet now, we shall do so, easily.’
‘How?’ muttered the old man. ‘Dear Nelly, how? They will shut me up
in a stone room, dark and cold, and chain me up to the wall, Nell--flog
me with whips, and never let me see thee more!’
‘You’re trembling again,’ said the child. ‘Keep close to me all day.
Never mind them, don’t look at them, but me. I shall find a time when
we can steal away. When I do, mind you come with me, and do not stop
or speak a word. Hush! That’s all.’
‘Halloa! what are you up to, my dear?’ said Mr Codlin, raising his
head, and yawning. Then observing that his companion was fast asleep,
he added in an earnest whisper, ‘Codlin’s the friend, remember--not
Short.’
‘Making some nosegays,’ the child replied; ‘I am going to try and sell
some, these three days of the races. Will you have one--as a present I
mean?’
Mr Codlin would have risen to receive it, but the child hurried towards
him and placed it in his hand. He stuck it in his buttonhole with an
air of ineffable complacency for a misanthrope, and leering exultingly
at the unconscious Short, muttered, as he laid himself down again, ‘Tom
Codlin’s the friend, by G--!’
As the morning wore on, the tents assumed a gayer and more brilliant
appearance, and long lines of carriages came rolling softly on the
turf. Men who had lounged about all night in smock-frocks and leather
leggings, came out in silken vests and hats and plumes, as jugglers or
mountebanks; or in gorgeous liveries as soft-spoken servants at
gambling booths; or in sturdy yeoman dress as decoys at unlawful games.
Black-eyed gipsy girls, hooded in showy handkerchiefs, sallied forth to
tell fortunes, and pale slender women with consumptive faces lingered
upon the footsteps of ventriloquists and conjurors, and counted the
sixpences with anxious eyes long before they were gained. As many of
the children as could be kept within bounds, were stowed away, with all
the other signs of dirt and poverty, among the donkeys, carts, and
horses; and as many as could not be thus disposed of ran in and out in
all intricate spots, crept between people’s legs and carriage wheels,
and came forth unharmed from under horses’ hoofs. The dancing-dogs,
the stilts, the little lady and the tall man, and all the other
attractions, with organs out of number and bands innumerable, emerged
from the holes and corners in which they had passed the night, and
flourished boldly in the sun.
Along the uncleared course, Short led his party, sounding the brazen
trumpet and revelling in the voice of Punch; and at his heels went
Thomas Codlin, bearing the show as usual, and keeping his eye on Nelly
and her grandfather, as they rather lingered in the rear. The child
bore upon her arm the little basket with her flowers, and sometimes
stopped, with timid and modest looks, to offer them at some gay
carriage; but alas! there were many bolder beggars there, gipsies who
promised husbands, and other adepts in their trade, and although some
ladies smiled gently as they shook their heads, and others cried to the
gentlemen beside them ‘See, what a pretty face!’ they let the pretty
face pass on, and never thought that it looked tired or hungry.
There was but one lady who seemed to understand the child, and she was
one who sat alone in a handsome carriage, while two young men in
dashing clothes, who had just dismounted from it, talked and laughed
loudly at a little distance, appearing to forget her, quite. There
were many ladies all around, but they turned their backs, or looked
another way, or at the two young men (not unfavourably at them), and
left her to herself. She motioned away a gipsy-woman urgent to tell
her fortune, saying that it was told already and had been for some
years, but called the child towards her, and taking her flowers put
money into her trembling hand, and bade her go home and keep at home
for God’s sake.
Many a time they went up and down those long, long lines, seeing
everything but the horses and the race; when the bell rang to clear the
course, going back to rest among the carts and donkeys, and not coming
out again until the heat was over. Many a time, too, was Punch
displayed in the full zenith of his humour, but all this while the eye
of Thomas Codlin was upon them, and to escape without notice was
impracticable.
At length, late in the day, Mr Codlin pitched the show in a convenient
spot, and the spectators were soon in the very triumph of the scene.
The child, sitting down with the old man close behind it, had been
thinking how strange it was that horses who were such fine honest
creatures should seem to make vagabonds of all the men they drew about
them, when a loud laugh at some extemporaneous witticism of Mr Short’s,
having allusion to the circumstances of the day, roused her from her
meditation and caused her to look around.
If they were ever to get away unseen, that was the very moment. Short
was plying the quarter-staves vigorously and knocking the characters in
the fury of the combat against the sides of the show, the people were
looking on with laughing faces, and Mr Codlin had relaxed into a grim
smile as his roving eye detected hands going into waistcoat pockets and
groping secretly for sixpences. If they were ever to get away unseen,
that was the very moment. They seized it, and fled.
They made a path through booths and carriages and throngs of people,
and never once stopped to look behind. The bell was ringing and the
course was cleared by the time they reached the ropes, but they dashed
across it insensible to the shouts and screeching that assailed them
for breaking in upon its sanctity, and creeping under the brow of the
hill at a quick pace, made for the open fields.
CHAPTER 20
Day after day as he bent his steps homeward, returning from some new
effort to procure employment, Kit raised his eyes to the window of the
little room he had so much commended to the child, and hoped to see
some indication of her presence. His own earnest wish, coupled with
the assurance he had received from Quilp, filled him with the belief
that she would yet arrive to claim the humble shelter he had offered,
and from the death of each day’s hope another hope sprung up to live
to-morrow.
‘I think they must certainly come to-morrow, eh mother?’ said Kit,
laying aside his hat with a weary air and sighing as he spoke. ‘They
have been gone a week. They surely couldn’t stop away more than a
week, could they now?’
The mother shook her head, and reminded him how often he had been
disappointed already.
‘For the matter of that,’ said Kit, ‘you speak true and sensible
enough, as you always do, mother. Still, I do consider that a week is
quite long enough for ‘em to be rambling about; don’t you say so?’
‘Quite long enough, Kit, longer than enough, but they may not come back
for all that.’
Kit was for a moment disposed to be vexed by this contradiction, and
not the less so from having anticipated it in his own mind and knowing
how just it was. But the impulse was only momentary, and the vexed
look became a kind one before it had crossed the room.
‘Then what do you think, mother, has become of ‘em? You don’t think
they’ve gone to sea, anyhow?’
‘Not gone for sailors, certainly,’ returned the mother with a smile.
‘But I can’t help thinking that they have gone to some foreign country.’
‘I say,’ cried Kit with a rueful face, ‘don’t talk like that, mother.’
‘I am afraid they have, and that’s the truth,’ she said. ‘It’s the
talk of all the neighbours, and there are some even that know of their
having been seen on board ship, and can tell you the name of the place
they’ve gone to, which is more than I can, my dear, for it’s a very
hard one.’
‘I don’t believe it,’ said Kit. ‘Not a word of it. A set of idle
chatterboxes, how should they know!’
‘They may be wrong of course,’ returned the mother, ‘I can’t tell about
that, though I don’t think it’s at all unlikely that they’re in the
right, for the talk is that the old gentleman had put by a little money
that nobody knew of, not even that ugly little man you talk to me
about--what’s his name--Quilp; and that he and Miss Nell have gone to
live abroad where it can’t be taken from them, and they will never be
disturbed. That don’t seem very far out of the way now, do it?’
Kit scratched his head mournfully, in reluctant admission that it did
not, and clambering up to the old nail took down the cage and set
himself to clean it and to feed the bird. His thoughts reverting from
this occupation to the little old gentleman who had given him the
shilling, he suddenly recollected that that was the very day--nay,
nearly the very hour--at which the little old gentleman had said he
should be at the Notary’s house again. He no sooner remembered this,
than he hung up the cage with great precipitation, and hastily
explaining the nature of his errand, went off at full speed to the
appointed place.
It was some two minutes after the time when he reached the spot, which
was a considerable distance from his home, but by great good luck the
little old gentleman had not yet arrived; at least there was no
pony-chaise to be seen, and it was not likely that he had come and gone
again in so short a space. Greatly relieved to find that he was not
too late, Kit leant against a lamp-post to take breath, and waited the
advent of the pony and his charge.
Sure enough, before long the pony came trotting round the corner of the
street, looking as obstinate as pony might, and picking his steps as if
he were spying about for the cleanest places, and would by no means
dirty his feet or hurry himself inconveniently. Behind the pony sat
the little old gentleman, and by the old gentleman’s side sat the
little old lady, carrying just such a nosegay as she had brought before.
The old gentleman, the old lady, the pony, and the chaise, came up the
street in perfect unanimity, until they arrived within some half a
dozen doors of the Notary’s house, when the pony, deceived by a
brass-plate beneath a tailor’s knocker, came to a halt, and maintained
by a sturdy silence, that that was the house they wanted.
‘Now, Sir, will you ha’ the goodness to go on; this is not the place,’
said the old gentleman.
The pony looked with great attention into a fire-plug which was near
him, and appeared to be quite absorbed in contemplating it.
‘Oh dear, such a naughty Whisker!’ cried the old lady. ‘After being so
good too, and coming along so well! I am quite ashamed of him. I
don’t know what we are to do with him, I really don’t.’
The pony having thoroughly satisfied himself as to the nature and
properties of the fire-plug, looked into the air after his old enemies
the flies, and as there happened to be one of them tickling his ear at
that moment he shook his head and whisked his tail, after which he
appeared full of thought but quite comfortable and collected. The old
gentleman having exhausted his powers of persuasion, alighted to lead
him; whereupon the pony, perhaps because he held this to be a
sufficient concession, perhaps because he happened to catch sight of
the other brass-plate, or perhaps because he was in a spiteful humour,
darted off with the old lady and stopped at the right house, leaving
the old gentleman to come panting on behind.
It was then that Kit presented himself at the pony’s head, and touched
his hat with a smile.
‘Why, bless me,’ cried the old gentleman, ‘the lad is here! My dear,
do you see?’
‘I said I’d be here, Sir,’ said Kit, patting Whisker’s neck. ‘I hope
you’ve had a pleasant ride, sir. He’s a very nice little pony.’
‘My dear,’ said the old gentleman. ‘This is an uncommon lad; a good
lad, I’m sure.’
‘I’m sure he is,’ rejoined the old lady. ‘A very good lad, and I am
sure he is a good son.’
Kit acknowledged these expressions of confidence by touching his hat
again and blushing very much. The old gentleman then handed the old
lady out, and after looking at him with an approving smile, they went
into the house--talking about him as they went, Kit could not help
feeling. Presently Mr Witherden, smelling very hard at the nosegay,
came to the window and looked at him, and after that Mr Abel came and
looked at him, and after that the old gentleman and lady came and
looked at him again, and after that they all came and looked at him
together, which Kit, feeling very much embarrassed by, made a pretence
of not observing. Therefore he patted the pony more and more; and this
liberty the pony most handsomely permitted.
The faces had not disappeared from the window many moments, when Mr
Chuckster in his official coat, and with his hat hanging on his head
just as it happened to fall from its peg, appeared upon the pavement,
and telling him he was wanted inside, bade him go in and he would mind
the chaise the while. In giving him this direction Mr Chuckster
remarked that he wished that he might be blessed if he could make out
whether he (Kit) was ‘precious raw’ or ‘precious deep,’ but intimated
by a distrustful shake of the head, that he inclined to the latter
opinion.
Kit entered the office in a great tremor, for he was not used to going
among strange ladies and gentlemen, and the tin boxes and bundles of
dusty papers had in his eyes an awful and venerable air. Mr Witherden
too was a bustling gentleman who talked loud and fast, and all eyes
were upon him, and he was very shabby.
‘Well, boy,’ said Mr Witherden, ‘you came to work out that
shilling;--not to get another, hey?’
‘No indeed, sir,’ replied Kit, taking courage to look up. ‘I never
thought of such a thing.’
‘Father alive?’ said the Notary.
‘Dead, sir.’
‘Mother?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Married again--eh?’
Kit made answer, not without some indignation, that she was a widow
with three children, and that as to her marrying again, if the
gentleman knew her he wouldn’t think of such a thing. At this reply Mr
Witherden buried his nose in the flowers again, and whispered behind
the nosegay to the old gentleman that he believed the lad was as honest
a lad as need be.
‘Now,’ said Mr Garland when they had made some further inquiries of
him, ‘I am not going to give you anything--’
‘Thank you, sir,’ Kit replied; and quite seriously too, for this
announcement seemed to free him from the suspicion which the Notary had
hinted.
‘--But,’ resumed the old gentleman, ‘perhaps I may want to know
something more about you, so tell me where you live, and I’ll put it
down in my pocket-book.’
Kit told him, and the old gentleman wrote down the address with his
pencil. He had scarcely done so, when there was a great uproar in the
street, and the old lady hurrying to the window cried that Whisker had
run away, upon which Kit darted out to the rescue, and the others
followed.
It seemed that Mr Chuckster had been standing with his hands in his
pockets looking carelessly at the pony, and occasionally insulting him
with such admonitions as ‘Stand still,’--‘Be quiet,’--‘Woa-a-a,’ and the
like, which by a pony of spirit cannot be borne. Consequently, the
pony being deterred by no considerations of duty or obedience, and not
having before him the slightest fear of the human eye, had at length
started off, and was at that moment rattling down the street--Mr
Chuckster, with his hat off and a pen behind his ear, hanging on in the
rear of the chaise and making futile attempts to draw it the other way,
to the unspeakable admiration of all beholders. Even in running away,
however, Whisker was perverse, for he had not gone very far when he
suddenly stopped, and before assistance could be rendered, commenced
backing at nearly as quick a pace as he had gone forward. By these
means Mr Chuckster was pushed and hustled to the office again, in a
most inglorious manner, and arrived in a state of great exhaustion and
discomfiture.
The old lady then stepped into her seat, and Mr Abel (whom they had
come to fetch) into his. The old gentleman, after reasoning with the
pony on the extreme impropriety of his conduct, and making the best
amends in his power to Mr Chuckster, took his place also, and they
drove away, waving a farewell to the Notary and his clerk, and more
than once turning to nod kindly to Kit as he watched them from the road.
CHAPTER 21
Kit turned away and very soon forgot the pony, and the chaise, and the
little old lady, and the little old gentleman, and the little young
gentleman to boot, in thinking what could have become of his late
master and his lovely grandchild, who were the fountain-head of all his
meditations. Still casting about for some plausible means of
accounting for their non-appearance, and of persuading himself that
they must soon return, he bent his steps towards home, intending to
finish the task which the sudden recollection of his contract had
interrupted, and then to sally forth once more to seek his fortune for
the day.
When he came to the corner of the court in which he lived, lo and
behold there was the pony again! Yes, there he was, looking more
obstinate than ever; and alone in the chaise, keeping a steady watch
upon his every wink, sat Mr Abel, who, lifting up his eyes by chance
and seeing Kit pass by, nodded to him as though he would have nodded
his head off.
Kit wondered to see the pony again, so near his own home too, but it
never occurred to him for what purpose the pony might have come there,
or where the old lady and the old gentleman had gone, until he lifted
the latch of the door, and walking in, found them seated in the room in
conversation with his mother, at which unexpected sight he pulled off
his hat and made his best bow in some confusion.
‘We are here before you, you see, Christopher,’ said Mr Garland smiling.
‘Yes, sir,’ said Kit; and as he said it, he looked towards his mother
for an explanation of the visit.
‘The gentleman’s been kind enough, my dear,’ said she, in reply to this
mute interrogation, ‘to ask me whether you were in a good place, or in
any place at all, and when I told him no, you were not in any, he was
so good as to say that--’
‘--That we wanted a good lad in our house,’ said the old gentleman and
the old lady both together, ‘and that perhaps we might think of it, if
we found everything as we would wish it to be.’
As this thinking of it, plainly meant the thinking of engaging Kit, he
immediately partook of his mother’s anxiety and fell into a great
flutter; for the little old couple were very methodical and cautious,
and asked so many questions that he began to be afraid there was no
chance of his success.
‘You see, my good woman,’ said Mrs Garland to Kit’s mother, ‘that it’s
necessary to be very careful and particular in such a matter as this,
for we’re only three in family, and are very quiet regular folks, and
it would be a sad thing if we made any kind of mistake, and found
things different from what we hoped and expected.’
To this, Kit’s mother replied, that certainly it was quite true, and
quite right, and quite proper, and Heaven forbid that she should
shrink, or have cause to shrink, from any inquiry into her character or
that of her son, who was a very good son though she was his mother, in
which respect, she was bold to say, he took after his father, who was
not only a good son to HIS mother, but the best of husbands and the
best of fathers besides, which Kit could and would corroborate she
knew, and so would little Jacob and the baby likewise if they were old
enough, which unfortunately they were not, though as they didn’t know
what a loss they had had, perhaps it was a great deal better that they
should be as young as they were; and so Kit’s mother wound up a long
story by wiping her eyes with her apron, and patting little Jacob’s
head, who was rocking the cradle and staring with all his might at the
strange lady and gentleman.
When Kit’s mother had done speaking, the old lady struck in again, and
said that she was quite sure she was a very honest and very respectable
person or she never would have expressed herself in that manner, and
that certainly the appearance of the children and the cleanliness of
the house deserved great praise and did her the utmost credit, whereat
Kit’s mother dropped a curtsey and became consoled. Then the good
woman entered in a long and minute account of Kit’s life and history
from the earliest period down to that time, not omitting to make
mention of his miraculous fall out of a back-parlour window when an
infant of tender years, or his uncommon sufferings in a state of
measles, which were illustrated by correct imitations of the plaintive
manner in which he called for toast and water, day and night, and said,
‘don’t cry, mother, I shall soon be better;’ for proof of which
statements reference was made to Mrs Green, lodger, at the
cheesemonger’s round the corner, and divers other ladies and gentlemen
in various parts of England and Wales (and one Mr Brown who was
supposed to be then a corporal in the East Indies, and who could of
course be found with very little trouble), within whose personal
knowledge the circumstances had occurred. This narration ended, Mr
Garland put some questions to Kit respecting his qualifications and
general acquirements, while Mrs Garland noticed the children, and
hearing from Kit’s mother certain remarkable circumstances which had
attended the birth of each, related certain other remarkable
circumstances which had attended the birth of her own son, Mr Abel,
from which it appeared that both Kit’s mother and herself had been,
above and beyond all other women of what condition or age soever,
peculiarly hemmed in with perils and dangers. Lastly, inquiry was made
into the nature and extent of Kit’s wardrobe, and a small advance being
made to improve the same, he was formally hired at an annual income of
Six Pounds, over and above his board and lodging, by Mr and Mrs
Garland, of Abel Cottage, Finchley.
It would be difficult to say which party appeared most pleased with
this arrangement, the conclusion of which was hailed with nothing but
pleasant looks and cheerful smiles on both sides. It was settled that
Kit should repair to his new abode on the next day but one, in the
morning; and finally, the little old couple, after bestowing a bright
half-crown on little Jacob and another on the baby, took their leaves;
being escorted as far as the street by their new attendant, who held
the obdurate pony by the bridle while they took their seats, and saw
them drive away with a lightened heart.
‘Well, mother,’ said Kit, hurrying back into the house, ‘I think my
fortune’s about made now.’
‘I should think it was indeed, Kit,’ rejoined his mother. ‘Six pound a
year! Only think!’
‘Ah!’ said Kit, trying to maintain the gravity which the consideration
of such a sum demanded, but grinning with delight in spite of himself.
‘There’s a property!’
Kit drew a long breath when he had said this, and putting his hands
deep into his pockets as if there were one year’s wages at least in
each, looked at his mother, as though he saw through her, and down an
immense perspective of sovereigns beyond.
‘Please God we’ll make such a lady of you for Sundays, mother! such a
scholar of Jacob, such a child of the baby, such a room of the one up
stairs! Six pound a year!’
‘Hem!’ croaked a strange voice. ‘What’s that about six pound a year?
What about six pound a year?’ And as the voice made this inquiry,
Daniel Quilp walked in with Richard Swiveller at his heels.
‘Who said he was to have six pound a year?’ said Quilp, looking sharply
round. ‘Did the old man say it, or did little Nell say it? And what’s
he to have it for, and where are they, eh!’
The good woman was so much alarmed by the sudden apparition of this
unknown piece of ugliness, that she hastily caught the baby from its
cradle and retreated into the furthest corner of the room; while little
Jacob, sitting upon his stool with his hands on his knees, looked full
at him in a species of fascination, roaring lustily all the time.
Richard Swiveller took an easy observation of the family over Mr Quilp’s
head, and Quilp himself, with his hands in his pockets, smiled in an
exquisite enjoyment of the commotion he occasioned.
‘Don’t be frightened, mistress,’ said Quilp, after a pause. ‘Your son
knows me; I don’t eat babies; I don’t like ‘em. It will be as well to
stop that young screamer though, in case I should be tempted to do him
a mischief. Holloa, sir! Will you be quiet?’
Little Jacob stemmed the course of two tears which he was squeezing out
of his eyes, and instantly subsided into a silent horror.
‘Mind you don’t break out again, you villain,’ said Quilp, looking
sternly at him, ‘or I’ll make faces at you and throw you into fits, I
will. Now you sir, why haven’t you been to me as you promised?’
‘What should I come for?’ retorted Kit. ‘I hadn’t any business with
you, no more than you had with me.’
‘Here, mistress,’ said Quilp, turning quickly away, and appealing from
Kit to his mother. ‘When did his old master come or send here last?
Is he here now? If not, where’s he gone?’
‘He has not been here at all,’ she replied. ‘I wish we knew where they
have gone, for it would make my son a good deal easier in his mind, and
me too. If you’re the gentleman named Mr Quilp, I should have thought
you’d have known, and so I told him only this very day.’
‘Humph!’ muttered Quilp, evidently disappointed to believe that this
was true. ‘That’s what you tell this gentleman too, is it?’
‘If the gentleman comes to ask the same question, I can’t tell him
anything else, sir; and I only wish I could, for our own sakes,’ was
the reply.
Quilp glanced at Richard Swiveller, and observed that having met him on
the threshold, he assumed that he had come in search of some
intelligence of the fugitives. He supposed he was right?
‘Yes,’ said Dick, ‘that was the object of the present expedition. I
fancied it possible--but let us go ring fancy’s knell. I’ll begin it.’
‘You seem disappointed,’ observed Quilp.
‘A baffler, Sir, a baffler, that’s all,’ returned Dick. ‘I have
entered upon a speculation which has proved a baffler; and a Being of
brightness and beauty will be offered up a sacrifice at Cheggs’s altar.
That’s all, sir.’
The dwarf eyed Richard with a sarcastic smile, but Richard, who had
been taking a rather strong lunch with a friend, observed him not, and
continued to deplore his fate with mournful and despondent looks.
Quilp plainly discerned that there was some secret reason for this
visit and his uncommon disappointment, and, in the hope that there
might be means of mischief lurking beneath it, resolved to worm it out.
He had no sooner adopted this resolution, than he conveyed as much
honesty into his face as it was capable of expressing, and sympathised
with Mr Swiveller exceedingly.
‘I am disappointed myself,’ said Quilp, ‘out of mere friendly feeling
for them; but you have real reasons, private reasons I have no doubt,
for your disappointment, and therefore it comes heavier than mine.’
‘Why, of course it does,’ Dick observed, testily.
‘Upon my word, I’m very sorry, very sorry. I’m rather cast down
myself. As we are companions in adversity, shall we be companions in
the surest way of forgetting it? If you had no particular business,
now, to lead you in another direction,’ urged Quilp, plucking him by
the sleeve and looking slyly up into his face out of the corners of his
eyes, ‘there is a house by the water-side where they have some of the
noblest Schiedam--reputed to be smuggled, but that’s between
ourselves--that can be got in all the world. The landlord knows me.
There’s a little summer-house overlooking the river, where we might
take a glass of this delicious liquor with a whiff of the best
tobacco--it’s in this case, and of the rarest quality, to my certain
knowledge--and be perfectly snug and happy, could we possibly contrive
it; or is there any very particular engagement that peremptorily takes
you another way, Mr Swiveller, eh?’
As the dwarf spoke, Dick’s face relaxed into a compliant smile, and his
brows slowly unbent. By the time he had finished, Dick was looking
down at Quilp in the same sly manner as Quilp was looking up at him,
and there remained nothing more to be done but to set out for the house
in question. This they did, straightway. The moment their backs were
turned, little Jacob thawed, and resumed his crying from the point
where Quilp had frozen him.
The summer-house of which Mr Quilp had spoken was a rugged wooden box,
rotten and bare to see, which overhung the river’s mud, and threatened
to slide down into it. The tavern to which it belonged was a crazy
building, sapped and undermined by the rats, and only upheld by great
bars of wood which were reared against its walls, and had propped it up
so long that even they were decaying and yielding with their load, and
of a windy night might be heard to creak and crack as if the whole
fabric were about to come toppling down. The house stood--if anything
so old and feeble could be said to stand--on a piece of waste ground,
blighted with the unwholesome smoke of factory chimneys, and echoing
the clank of iron wheels and rush of troubled water. Its internal
accommodations amply fulfilled the promise of the outside. The rooms
were low and damp, the clammy walls were pierced with chinks and holes,
the rotten floors had sunk from their level, the very beams started
from their places and warned the timid stranger from their
neighbourhood.
To this inviting spot, entreating him to observe its beauties as they
passed along, Mr Quilp led Richard Swiveller, and on the table of the
summer-house, scored deep with many a gallows and initial letter, there
soon appeared a wooden keg, full of the vaunted liquor. Drawing it off
into the glasses with the skill of a practised hand, and mixing it with
about a third part of water, Mr Quilp assigned to Richard Swiveller his
portion, and lighting his pipe from an end of a candle in a very old
and battered lantern, drew himself together upon a seat and puffed away.
‘Is it good?’ said Quilp, as Richard Swiveller smacked his lips, ‘is it
strong and fiery? Does it make you wink, and choke, and your eyes
water, and your breath come short--does it?’
‘Does it?’ cried Dick, throwing away part of the contents of his glass,
and filling it up with water, ‘why, man, you don’t mean to tell me that
you drink such fire as this?’
‘No!’ rejoined Quilp, ‘Not drink it! Look here. And here. And here
again. Not drink it!’
As he spoke, Daniel Quilp drew off and drank three small glassfuls of
the raw spirit, and then with a horrible grimace took a great many
pulls at his pipe, and swallowing the smoke, discharged it in a heavy
cloud from his nose. This feat accomplished he drew himself together
in his former position, and laughed excessively.
‘Give us a toast!’ cried Quilp, rattling on the table in a dexterous
manner with his fist and elbow alternately, in a kind of tune, ‘a
woman, a beauty. Let’s have a beauty for our toast and empty our
glasses to the last drop. Her name, come!’
‘If you want a name,’ said Dick, ‘here’s Sophy Wackles.’
‘Sophy Wackles,’ screamed the dwarf, ‘Miss Sophy Wackles that is--Mrs
Richard Swiveller that shall be--that shall be--ha ha ha!’
‘Ah!’ said Dick, ‘you might have said that a few weeks ago, but it
won’t do now, my buck. Immolating herself upon the shrine of Cheggs--’
‘Poison Cheggs, cut Cheggs’s ears off,’ rejoined Quilp. ‘I won’t hear
of Cheggs. Her name is Swiveller or nothing. I’ll drink her health
again, and her father’s, and her mother’s; and to all her sisters and
brothers--the glorious family of the Wackleses--all the Wackleses in
one glass--down with it to the dregs!’
‘Well,’ said Richard Swiveller, stopping short in the act of raising
the glass to his lips and looking at the dwarf in a species of stupor
as he flourished his arms and legs about: ‘you’re a jolly fellow, but
of all the jolly fellows I ever saw or heard of, you have the queerest
and most extraordinary way with you, upon my life you have.’
This candid declaration tended rather to increase than restrain Mr
Quilp’s eccentricities, and Richard Swiveller, astonished to see him in
such a roystering vein, and drinking not a little himself, for
company--began imperceptibly to become more companionable and
confiding, so that, being judiciously led on by Mr Quilp, he grew at
last very confiding indeed. Having once got him into this mood, and
knowing now the key-note to strike whenever he was at a loss, Daniel
Quilp’s task was comparatively an easy one, and he was soon in
possession of the whole details of the scheme contrived between the
easy Dick and his more designing friend.
‘Stop!’ said Quilp. ‘That’s the thing, that’s the thing. It can be
brought about, it shall be brought about. There’s my hand upon it; I
am your friend from this minute.’
‘What! do you think there’s still a chance?’ inquired Dick, in surprise
at this encouragement.
‘A chance!’ echoed the dwarf, ‘a certainty! Sophy Wackles may become a
Cheggs or anything else she likes, but not a Swiveller. Oh you lucky
dog! He’s richer than any Jew alive; you’re a made man. I see in you
now nothing but Nelly’s husband, rolling in gold and silver. I’ll help
you. It shall be done. Mind my words, it shall be done.’
‘But how?’ said Dick.
‘There’s plenty of time,’ rejoined the dwarf, ‘and it shall be done.
We’ll sit down and talk it over again all the way through. Fill your
glass while I’m gone. I shall be back directly--directly.’
With these hasty words, Daniel Quilp withdrew into a dismantled skittle-
ground behind the public-house, and, throwing himself upon the ground
actually screamed and rolled about in uncontrollable delight.
‘Here’s sport!’ he cried, ‘sport ready to my hand, all invented and
arranged, and only to be enjoyed. It was this shallow-pated fellow who
made my bones ache t’other day, was it? It was his friend and
fellow-plotter, Mr Trent, that once made eyes at Mrs Quilp, and leered
and looked, was it? After labouring for two or three years in their
precious scheme, to find that they’ve got a beggar at last, and one of
them tied for life. Ha ha ha! He shall marry Nell. He shall have
her, and I’ll be the first man, when the knot’s tied hard and fast, to
tell ‘em what they’ve gained and what I’ve helped ‘em to. Here will be
a clearing of old scores, here will be a time to remind ‘em what a
capital friend I was, and how I helped them to the heiress. Ha ha ha!’
In the height of his ecstasy, Mr Quilp had like to have met with a
disagreeable check, for rolling very near a broken dog-kennel, there
leapt forth a large fierce dog, who, but that his chain was of the
shortest, would have given him a disagreeable salute. As it was, the
dwarf remained upon his back in perfect safety, taunting the dog with
hideous faces, and triumphing over him in his inability to advance
another inch, though there were not a couple of feet between them.
‘Why don’t you come and bite me, why don’t you come and tear me to
pieces, you coward?’ said Quilp, hissing and worrying the animal till
he was nearly mad. ‘You’re afraid, you bully, you’re afraid, you know
you are.’
The dog tore and strained at his chain with starting eyes and furious
bark, but there the dwarf lay, snapping his fingers with gestures of
defiance and contempt. When he had sufficiently recovered from his
delight, he rose, and with his arms a-kimbo, achieved a kind of
demon-dance round the kennel, just without the limits of the chain,
driving the dog quite wild. Having by this means composed his spirits
and put himself in a pleasant train, he returned to his unsuspicious
companion, whom he found looking at the tide with exceeding gravity,
and thinking of that same gold and silver which Mr Quilp had mentioned.
CHAPTER 22
The remainder of that day and the whole of the next were a busy time
for the Nubbles family, to whom everything connected with Kit’s outfit
and departure was matter of as great moment as if he had been about to
penetrate into the interior of Africa, or to take a cruise round the
world. It would be difficult to suppose that there ever was a box
which was opened and shut so many times within four-and-twenty hours,
as that which contained his wardrobe and necessaries; and certainly
there never was one which to two small eyes presented such a mine of
clothing, as this mighty chest with its three shirts and proportionate
allowance of stockings and pocket-handkerchiefs, disclosed to the
astonished vision of little Jacob. At last it was conveyed to the
carrier’s, at whose house at Finchley Kit was to find it next day; and
the box being gone, there remained but two questions for consideration:
firstly, whether the carrier would lose, or dishonestly feign to lose,
the box upon the road; secondly, whether Kit’s mother perfectly
understood how to take care of herself in the absence of her son.
‘I don’t think there’s hardly a chance of his really losing it, but
carriers are under great temptation to pretend they lose things, no
doubt,’ said Mrs Nubbles apprehensively, in reference to the first
point.
‘No doubt about it,’ returned Kit, with a serious look; ‘upon my word,
mother, I don’t think it was right to trust it to itself. Somebody
ought to have gone with it, I’m afraid.’
‘We can’t help it now,’ said his mother; ‘but it was foolish and wrong.
People oughtn’t to be tempted.’
Kit inwardly resolved that he would never tempt a carrier any more,
save with an empty box; and having formed this Christian determination,
he turned his thoughts to the second question.
‘_You_ know you must keep up your spirits, mother, and not be lonesome
because I’m not at home. I shall very often be able to look in when I
come into town I dare say, and I shall send you a letter sometimes, and
when the quarter comes round, I can get a holiday of course; and then
see if we don’t take little Jacob to the play, and let him know what
oysters means.’
‘I hope plays mayn’t be sinful, Kit, but I’m a’most afraid,’ said Mrs
Nubbles.
‘I know who has been putting that in your head,’ rejoined her son
disconsolately; ‘that’s Little Bethel again. Now I say, mother, pray
don’t take to going there regularly, for if I was to see your
good-humoured face that has always made home cheerful, turned into a
grievous one, and the baby trained to look grievous too, and to call
itself a young sinner (bless its heart) and a child of the devil (which
is calling its dead father names); if I was to see this, and see little
Jacob looking grievous likewise, I should so take it to heart that I’m
sure I should go and list for a soldier, and run my head on purpose
against the first cannon-ball I saw coming my way.’
‘Oh, Kit, don’t talk like that.’
‘I would, indeed, mother, and unless you want to make me feel very
wretched and uncomfortable, you’ll keep that bow on your bonnet, which
you’d more than half a mind to pull off last week. Can you suppose
there’s any harm in looking as cheerful and being as cheerful as our
poor circumstances will permit? Do I see anything in the way I’m made,
which calls upon me to be a snivelling, solemn, whispering chap,
sneaking about as if I couldn’t help it, and expressing myself in a
most unpleasant snuffle? on the contrary, don’t I see every reason why
I shouldn’t? just hear this! Ha ha ha! An’t that as nat’ral as
walking, and as good for the health? Ha ha ha! An’t that as nat’ral
as a sheep’s bleating, or a pig’s grunting, or a horse’s neighing, or a
bird’s singing? Ha ha ha! Isn’t it, mother?’
There was something contagious in Kit’s laugh, for his mother, who had
looked grave before, first subsided into a smile, and then fell to
joining in it heartily, which occasioned Kit to say that he knew it was
natural, and to laugh the more. Kit and his mother, laughing together
in a pretty loud key, woke the baby, who, finding that there was
something very jovial and agreeable in progress, was no sooner in its
mother’s arms than it began to kick and laugh, most vigorously. This
new illustration of his argument so tickled Kit, that he fell backward
in his chair in a state of exhaustion, pointing at the baby and shaking
his sides till he rocked again. After recovering twice or thrice, and
as often relapsing, he wiped his eyes and said grace; and a very
cheerful meal their scanty supper was.
With more kisses, and hugs, and tears, than many young gentlemen who
start upon their travels, and leave well-stocked homes behind them,
would deem within the bounds of probability (if matter so low could be
herein set down), Kit left the house at an early hour next morning, and
set out to walk to Finchley; feeling a sufficient pride in his
appearance to have warranted his excommunication from Little Bethel
from that time forth, if he had ever been one of that mournful
congregation.
Lest anybody should feel a curiosity to know how Kit was clad, it may
be briefly remarked that he wore no livery, but was dressed in a coat
of pepper-and-salt with waistcoat of canary colour, and nether garments
of iron-grey; besides these glories, he shone in the lustre of a new
pair of boots and an extremely stiff and shiny hat, which on being
struck anywhere with the knuckles, sounded like a drum. And in this
attire, rather wondering that he attracted so little attention, and
attributing the circumstance to the insensibility of those who got up
early, he made his way towards Abel Cottage.
Without encountering any more remarkable adventure on the road, than
meeting a lad in a brimless hat, the exact counterpart of his old one,
on whom he bestowed half the sixpence he possessed, Kit arrived in
course of time at the carrier’s house, where, to the lasting honour of
human nature, he found the box in safety. Receiving from the wife of
this immaculate man, a direction to Mr Garland’s, he took the box upon
his shoulder and repaired thither directly.
To be sure, it was a beautiful little cottage with a thatched roof and
little spires at the gable-ends, and pieces of stained glass in some of
the windows, almost as large as pocket-books. On one side of the house
was a little stable, just the size for the pony, with a little room
over it, just the size for Kit. White curtains were fluttering, and
birds in cages that looked as bright as if they were made of gold, were
singing at the windows; plants were arranged on either side of the
path, and clustered about the door; and the garden was bright with
flowers in full bloom, which shed a sweet odour all round, and had a
charming and elegant appearance. Everything within the house and
without, seemed to be the perfection of neatness and order. In the
garden there was not a weed to be seen, and to judge from some dapper
gardening-tools, a basket, and a pair of gloves which were lying in one
of the walks, old Mr Garland had been at work in it that very morning.
Kit looked about him, and admired, and looked again, and this a great
many times before he could make up his mind to turn his head another
way and ring the bell. There was abundance of time to look about him
again though, when he had rung it, for nobody came, so after ringing it
twice or thrice he sat down upon his box, and waited.
He rang the bell a great many times, and yet nobody came. But at last,
as he was sitting upon the box thinking about giants’ castles, and
princesses tied up to pegs by the hair of their heads, and dragons
bursting out from behind gates, and other incidents of the like nature,
common in story-books to youths of low degree on their first visit to
strange houses, the door was gently opened, and a little servant-girl,
very tidy, modest, and demure, but very pretty too, appeared.
‘I suppose you’re Christopher, sir,’ said the servant-girl.
Kit got off the box, and said yes, he was.
‘I’m afraid you’ve rung a good many times perhaps,’ she rejoined, ‘but
we couldn’t hear you, because we’ve been catching the pony.’
Kit rather wondered what this meant, but as he couldn’t stop there,
asking questions, he shouldered the box again and followed the girl
into the hall, where through a back-door he descried Mr Garland leading
Whisker in triumph up the garden, after that self-willed pony had (as
he afterwards learned) dodged the family round a small paddock in the
rear, for one hour and three quarters.
The old gentleman received him very kindly and so did the old lady,
whose previous good opinion of him was greatly enhanced by his wiping
his boots on the mat until the soles of his feet burnt again. He was
then taken into the parlour to be inspected in his new clothes; and
when he had been surveyed several times, and had afforded by his
appearance unlimited satisfaction, he was taken into the stable (where
the pony received him with uncommon complaisance); and thence into the
little chamber he had already observed, which was very clean and
comfortable: and thence into the garden, in which the old gentleman
told him he would be taught to employ himself, and where he told him,
besides, what great things he meant to do to make him comfortable, and
happy, if he found he deserved it. All these kindnesses, Kit
acknowledged with various expressions of gratitude, and so many touches
of the new hat, that the brim suffered considerably. When the old
gentleman had said all he had to say in the way of promise and advice,
and Kit had said all he had to say in the way of assurance and
thankfulness, he was handed over again to the old lady, who, summoning
the little servant-girl (whose name was Barbara) instructed her to take
him down stairs and give him something to eat and drink, after his walk.
Down stairs, therefore, Kit went; and at the bottom of the stairs there
was such a kitchen as was never before seen or heard of out of a
toy-shop window, with everything in it as bright and glowing, and as
precisely ordered too, as Barbara herself. And in this kitchen, Kit
sat himself down at a table as white as a tablecloth, to eat cold meat,
and drink small ale, and use his knife and fork the more awkwardly,
because there was an unknown Barbara looking on and observing him.
It did not appear, however, that there was anything remarkably
tremendous about this strange Barbara, who having lived a very quiet
life, blushed very much and was quite as embarrassed and uncertain what
she ought to say or do, as Kit could possibly be. When he had sat for
some little time, attentive to the ticking of the sober clock, he
ventured to glance curiously at the dresser, and there, among the
plates and dishes, were Barbara’s little work-box with a sliding lid to
shut in the balls of cotton, and Barbara’s prayer-book, and Barbara’s
hymn-book, and Barbara’s Bible. Barbara’s little looking-glass hung in
a good light near the window, and Barbara’s bonnet was on a nail behind
the door. From all these mute signs and tokens of her presence, he
naturally glanced at Barbara herself, who sat as mute as they, shelling
peas into a dish; and just when Kit was looking at her eyelashes and
wondering--quite in the simplicity of his heart--what colour her eyes
might be, it perversely happened that Barbara raised her head a little
to look at him, when both pair of eyes were hastily withdrawn, and Kit
leant over his plate, and Barbara over her pea-shells, each in extreme
confusion at having been detected by the other.
CHAPTER 23
Mr Richard Swiveller wending homeward from the Wilderness (for such was
the appropriate name of Quilp’s choice retreat), after a sinuous and
corkscrew fashion, with many checks and stumbles; after stopping
suddenly and staring about him, then as suddenly running forward for a
few paces, and as suddenly halting again and shaking his head; doing
everything with a jerk and nothing by premeditation;--Mr Richard
Swiveller wending his way homeward after this fashion, which is
considered by evil-minded men to be symbolical of intoxication, and is
not held by such persons to denote that state of deep wisdom and
reflection in which the actor knows himself to be, began to think that
possibly he had misplaced his confidence and that the dwarf might not
be precisely the sort of person to whom to entrust a secret of such
delicacy and importance. And being led and tempted on by this
remorseful thought into a condition which the evil-minded class before
referred to would term the maudlin state or stage of drunkenness, it
occurred to Mr Swiveller to cast his hat upon the ground, and moan,
crying aloud that he was an unhappy orphan, and that if he had not been
an unhappy orphan things had never come to this.
‘Left an infant by my parents, at an early age,’ said Mr Swiveller,
bewailing his hard lot, ‘cast upon the world in my tenderest period,
and thrown upon the mercies of a deluding dwarf, who can wonder at my
weakness! Here’s a miserable orphan for you. Here,’ said Mr Swiveller
raising his voice to a high pitch, and looking sleepily round, ‘is a
miserable orphan!’
‘Then,’ said somebody hard by, ‘let me be a father to you.’
Mr Swiveller swayed himself to and fro to preserve his balance, and,
looking into a kind of haze which seemed to surround him, at last
perceived two eyes dimly twinkling through the mist, which he observed
after a short time were in the neighbourhood of a nose and mouth.
Casting his eyes down towards that quarter in which, with reference to
a man’s face, his legs are usually to be found, he observed that the
face had a body attached; and when he looked more intently he was
satisfied that the person was Mr Quilp, who indeed had been in his
company all the time, but whom he had some vague idea of having left a
mile or two behind.
‘You have deceived an orphan, Sir,’ said Mr Swiveller solemnly.’
‘I! I’m a second father to you,’ replied Quilp.
‘You my father, Sir!’ retorted Dick. ‘Being all right myself, Sir, I
request to be left alone--instantly, Sir.’
‘What a funny fellow you are!’ cried Quilp.
‘Go, Sir,’ returned Dick, leaning against a post and waving his hand.
‘Go, deceiver, go, some day, Sir, p’r’aps you’ll waken, from pleasure’s
dream to know, the grief of orphans forsaken. Will you go, Sir?’
The dwarf taking no heed of this adjuration, Mr Swiveller advanced with
the view of inflicting upon him condign chastisement. But forgetting
his purpose or changing his mind before he came close to him, he seized
his hand and vowed eternal friendship, declaring with an agreeable
frankness that from that time forth they were brothers in everything
but personal appearance. Then he told his secret over again, with the
addition of being pathetic on the subject of Miss Wackles, who, he gave
Mr Quilp to understand, was the occasion of any slight incoherency he
might observe in his speech at that moment, which was attributable
solely to the strength of his affection and not to rosy wine or other
fermented liquor. And then they went on arm-in-arm, very lovingly
together.
‘I’m as sharp,’ said Quilp to him, at parting, ‘as sharp as a ferret,
and as cunning as a weazel. You bring Trent to me; assure him that I’m
his friend though I fear he a little distrusts me (I don’t know why, I
have not deserved it); and you’ve both of you made your fortunes--in
perspective.’
‘That’s the worst of it,’ returned Dick. ‘These fortunes in
perspective look such a long way off.’
‘But they look smaller than they really are, on that account,’ said
Quilp, pressing his arm. ‘You’ll have no conception of the value of
your prize until you draw close to it. Mark that.’
‘D’ye think not?’ said Dick.
‘Aye, I do; and I am certain of what I say, that’s better,’ returned
the dwarf. ‘You bring Trent to me. Tell him I am his friend and
yours--why shouldn’t I be?’
‘There’s no reason why you shouldn’t, certainly,’ replied Dick, ‘and
perhaps there are a great many why you should--at least there would be
nothing strange in your wanting to be my friend, if you were a choice
spirit, but then you know you’re not a choice spirit.’
‘I not a choice spirit?’ cried Quilp.
‘Devil a bit, sir,’ returned Dick. ‘A man of your appearance couldn’t
be. If you’re any spirit at all, sir, you’re an evil spirit. Choice
spirits,’ added Dick, smiting himself on the breast, ‘are quite a
different looking sort of people, you may take your oath of that, sir.’
Quilp glanced at his free-spoken friend with a mingled expression of
cunning and dislike, and wringing his hand almost at the same moment,
declared that he was an uncommon character and had his warmest esteem.
With that they parted; Mr Swiveller to make the best of his way home
and sleep himself sober; and Quilp to cogitate upon the discovery he
had made, and exult in the prospect of the rich field of enjoyment and
reprisal it opened to him.
It was not without great reluctance and misgiving that Mr Swiveller,
next morning, his head racked by the fumes of the renowned Schiedam,
repaired to the lodging of his friend Trent (which was in the roof of
an old house in an old ghostly inn), and recounted by very slow degrees
what had yesterday taken place between him and Quilp. Nor was it
without great surprise and much speculation on Quilp’s probable
motives, nor without many bitter comments on Dick Swiveller’s folly,
that his friend received the tale.
‘I don’t defend myself, Fred,’ said the penitent Richard; ‘but the
fellow has such a queer way with him and is such an artful dog, that
first of all he set me upon thinking whether there was any harm in
telling him, and while I was thinking, screwed it out of me. If you
had seen him drink and smoke, as I did, you couldn’t have kept anything
from him. He’s a Salamander you know, that’s what he is.’
Without inquiring whether Salamanders were of necessity good
confidential agents, or whether a fire-proof man was as a matter of
course trustworthy, Frederick Trent threw himself into a chair, and,
burying his head in his hands, endeavoured to fathom the motives which
had led Quilp to insinuate himself into Richard Swiveller’s
confidence;--for that the disclosure was of his seeking, and had not
been spontaneously revealed by Dick, was sufficiently plain from
Quilp’s seeking his company and enticing him away.
The dwarf had twice encountered him when he was endeavouring to obtain
intelligence of the fugitives. This, perhaps, as he had not shown any
previous anxiety about them, was enough to awaken suspicion in the
breast of a creature so jealous and distrustful by nature, setting
aside any additional impulse to curiosity that he might have derived
from Dick’s incautious manner. But knowing the scheme they had
planned, why should he offer to assist it? This was a question more
difficult of solution; but as knaves generally overreach themselves by
imputing their own designs to others, the idea immediately presented
itself that some circumstances of irritation between Quilp and the old
man, arising out of their secret transactions and not unconnected
perhaps with his sudden disappearance, now rendered the former desirous
of revenging himself upon him by seeking to entrap the sole object of
his love and anxiety into a connexion of which he knew he had a dread
and hatred. As Frederick Trent himself, utterly regardless of his
sister, had this object at heart, only second to the hope of gain, it
seemed to him the more likely to be Quilp’s main principle of action.
Once investing the dwarf with a design of his own in abetting them,
which the attainment of their purpose would serve, it was easy to
believe him sincere and hearty in the cause; and as there could be no
doubt of his proving a powerful and useful auxiliary, Trent determined
to accept his invitation and go to his house that night, and if what he
said and did confirmed him in the impression he had formed, to let him
share the labour of their plan, but not the profit.
Having revolved these things in his mind and arrived at this
conclusion, he communicated to Mr Swiveller as much of his meditations
as he thought proper (Dick would have been perfectly satisfied with
less), and giving him the day to recover himself from his late
salamandering, accompanied him at evening to Mr Quilp’s house.
Mighty glad Mr Quilp was to see them, or mightily glad he seemed to be;
and fearfully polite Mr Quilp was to Mrs Quilp and Mrs Jiniwin; and
very sharp was the look he cast on his wife to observe how she was
affected by the recognition of young Trent. Mrs Quilp was as innocent
as her own mother of any emotion, painful or pleasant, which the sight
of him awakened, but as her husband’s glance made her timid and
confused, and uncertain what to do or what was required of her, Mr
Quilp did not fail to assign her embarrassment to the cause he had in
his mind, and while he chuckled at his penetration was secretly
exasperated by his jealousy.
Nothing of this appeared, however. On the contrary, Mr Quilp was all
blandness and suavity, and presided over the case-bottle of rum with
extraordinary open-heartedness.
‘Why, let me see,’ said Quilp. ‘It must be a matter of nearly two
years since we were first acquainted.’
‘Nearer three, I think,’ said Trent.
‘Nearer three!’ cried Quilp. ‘How fast time flies. Does it seem as
long as that to you, Mrs Quilp?’
‘Yes, I think it seems full three years, Quilp,’ was the unfortunate
reply.
‘Oh indeed, ma’am,’ thought Quilp, ‘you have been pining, have you?
Very good, ma’am.’
‘It seems to me but yesterday that you went out to Demerara in the Mary
Anne,’ said Quilp; ‘but yesterday, I declare. Well, I like a little
wildness. I was wild myself once.’
Mr Quilp accompanied this admission with such an awful wink, indicative
of old rovings and backslidings, that Mrs Jiniwin was indignant, and
could not forbear from remarking under her breath that he might at
least put off his confessions until his wife was absent; for which act
of boldness and insubordination Mr Quilp first stared her out of
countenance and then drank her health ceremoniously.
‘I thought you’d come back directly, Fred. I always thought that,’
said Quilp setting down his glass. ‘And when the Mary Anne returned
with you on board, instead of a letter to say what a contrite heart you
had, and how happy you were in the situation that had been provided for
you, I was amused--exceedingly amused. Ha ha ha!’
The young man smiled, but not as though the theme was the most
agreeable one that could have been selected for his entertainment; and
for that reason Quilp pursued it.
‘I always will say,’ he resumed, ‘that when a rich relation having two
young people--sisters or brothers, or brother and sister--dependent on
him, attaches himself exclusively to one, and casts off the other, he
does wrong.’
The young man made a movement of impatience, but Quilp went on as
calmly as if he were discussing some abstract question in which nobody
present had the slightest personal interest.
‘It’s very true,’ said Quilp, ‘that your grandfather urged repeated
forgiveness, ingratitude, riot, and extravagance, and all that; but as
I told him “these are common faults.” “But he’s a scoundrel,” said he.
“Granting that,” said I (for the sake of argument of course), “a great
many young noblemen and gentlemen are scoundrels too!” But he wouldn’t
be convinced.’
‘I wonder at that, Mr Quilp,’ said the young man sarcastically.
‘Well, so did I at the time,’ returned Quilp, ‘but he was always
obstinate. He was in a manner a friend of mine, but he was always
obstinate and wrong-headed. Little Nell is a nice girl, a charming
girl, but you’re her brother, Frederick. You’re her brother after all;
as you told him the last time you met, he can’t alter that.’
‘He would if he could, confound him for that and all other kindnesses,’
said the young man impatiently. ‘But nothing can come of this subject
now, and let us have done with it in the Devil’s name.’
‘Agreed,’ returned Quilp, ‘agreed on my part readily. Why have I
alluded to it? Just to show you, Frederick, that I have always stood
your friend. You little knew who was your friend, and who your foe;
now did you? You thought I was against you, and so there has been a
coolness between us; but it was all on your side, entirely on your
side. Let’s shake hands again, Fred.’
With his head sunk down between his shoulders, and a hideous grin
over-spreading his face, the dwarf stood up and stretched his short arm
across the table. After a moment’s hesitation, the young man stretched
out his to meet it; Quilp clutched his fingers in a grip that for the
moment stopped the current of the blood within them, and pressing his
other hand upon his lip and frowning towards the unsuspicious Richard,
released them and sat down.
This action was not lost upon Trent, who, knowing that Richard
Swiveller was a mere tool in his hands and knew no more of his designs
than he thought proper to communicate, saw that the dwarf perfectly
understood their relative position, and fully entered into the
character of his friend. It is something to be appreciated, even in
knavery. This silent homage to his superior abilities, no less than a
sense of the power with which the dwarf’s quick perception had already
invested him, inclined the young man towards that ugly worthy, and
determined him to profit by his aid.
It being now Mr Quilp’s cue to change the subject with all convenient
expedition, lest Richard Swiveller in his heedlessness should reveal
anything which it was inexpedient for the women to know, he proposed a
game at four-handed cribbage, and partners being cut for, Mrs Quilp
fell to Frederick Trent, and Dick himself to Quilp. Mrs Jiniwin being
very fond of cards was carefully excluded by her son-in-law from any
participation in the game, and had assigned to her the duty of
occasionally replenishing the glasses from the case-bottle; Mr Quilp
from that moment keeping one eye constantly upon her, lest she should
by any means procure a taste of the same, and thereby tantalising the
wretched old lady (who was as much attached to the case-bottle as the
cards) in a double degree and most ingenious manner.
But it was not to Mrs Jiniwin alone that Mr Quilp’s attention was
restricted, as several other matters required his constant vigilance.
Among his various eccentric habits he had a humorous one of always
cheating at cards, which rendered necessary on his part, not only a
close observance of the game, and a sleight-of-hand in counting and
scoring, but also involved the constant correction, by looks, and
frowns, and kicks under the table, of Richard Swiveller, who being
bewildered by the rapidity with which his cards were told, and the rate
at which the pegs travelled down the board, could not be prevented from
sometimes expressing his surprise and incredulity. Mrs Quilp too was
the partner of young Trent, and for every look that passed between
them, and every word they spoke, and every card they played, the dwarf
had eyes and ears; not occupied alone with what was passing above the
table, but with signals that might be exchanging beneath it, which he
laid all kinds of traps to detect; besides often treading on his wife’s
toes to see whether she cried out or remained silent under the
infliction, in which latter case it would have been quite clear that
Trent had been treading on her toes before. Yet, in the most of all
these distractions, the one eye was upon the old lady always, and if
she so much as stealthily advanced a tea-spoon towards a neighbouring
glass (which she often did), for the purpose of abstracting but one sup
of its sweet contents, Quilp’s hand would overset it in the very moment
of her triumph, and Quilp’s mocking voice implore her to regard her
precious health. And in any one of these his many cares, from first to
last, Quilp never flagged nor faltered.
At length, when they had played a great many rubbers and drawn pretty
freely upon the case-bottle, Mr Quilp warned his lady to retire to
rest, and that submissive wife complying, and being followed by her
indignant mother, Mr Swiveller fell asleep. The dwarf beckoning his
remaining companion to the other end of the room, held a short
conference with him in whispers.
‘It’s as well not to say more than one can help before our worthy
friend,’ said Quilp, making a grimace towards the slumbering Dick. ‘Is
it a bargain between us, Fred? Shall he marry little rosy Nell
by-and-by?’
‘You have some end of your own to answer, of course,’ returned the
other.
‘Of course I have, dear Fred,’ said Quilp, grinning to think how little
he suspected what the real end was. ‘It’s retaliation perhaps; perhaps
whim. I have influence, Fred, to help or oppose. Which way shall I
use it? There are a pair of scales, and it goes into one.’
‘Throw it into mine then,’ said Trent.
‘It’s done, Fred,’ rejoined Quilp, stretching out his clenched hand and
opening it as if he had let some weight fall out. ‘It’s in the scale
from this time, and turns it, Fred. Mind that.’
‘Where have they gone?’ asked Trent.
Quilp shook his head, and said that point remained to be discovered,
which it might be, easily. When it was, they would begin their
preliminary advances. He would visit the old man, or even Richard
Swiveller might visit him, and by affecting a deep concern in his
behalf, and imploring him to settle in some worthy home, lead to the
child’s remembering him with gratitude and favour. Once impressed to
this extent, it would be easy, he said, to win her in a year or two,
for she supposed the old man to be poor, as it was a part of his
jealous policy (in common with many other misers) to feign to be so, to
those about him.
‘He has feigned it often enough to me, of late,’ said Trent.
‘Oh! and to me too!’ replied the dwarf. ‘Which is more extraordinary,
as I know how rich he really is.’
‘I suppose you should,’ said Trent.
‘I think I should indeed,’ rejoined the dwarf; and in that, at least,
he spoke the truth.
After a few more whispered words, they returned to the table, and the
young man rousing Richard Swiveller informed him that he was waiting to
depart. This was welcome news to Dick, who started up directly. After
a few words of confidence in the result of their project had been
exchanged, they bade the grinning Quilp good night.
Quilp crept to the window as they passed in the street below, and
listened. Trent was pronouncing an encomium upon his wife, and they
were both wondering by what enchantment she had been brought to marry
such a misshapen wretch as he. The dwarf after watching their
retreating shadows with a wider grin than his face had yet displayed,
stole softly in the dark to bed.
In this hatching of their scheme, neither Trent nor Quilp had had one
thought about the happiness or misery of poor innocent Nell. It would
have been strange if the careless profligate, who was the butt of both,
had been harassed by any such consideration; for his high opinion of
his own merits and deserts rendered the project rather a laudable one
than otherwise; and if he had been visited by so unwonted a guest as
reflection, he would--being a brute only in the gratification of his
appetites--have soothed his conscience with the plea that he did not
mean to beat or kill his wife, and would therefore, after all said and
done, be a very tolerable, average husband.
CHAPTER 24
It was not until they were quite exhausted and could no longer maintain
the pace at which they had fled from the race-ground, that the old man
and the child ventured to stop, and sit down to rest upon the borders
of a little wood. Here, though the course was hidden from their view,
they could yet faintly distinguish the noise of distant shouts, the hum
of voices, and the beating of drums. Climbing the eminence which lay
between them and the spot they had left, the child could even discern
the fluttering flags and white tops of booths; but no person was
approaching towards them, and their resting-place was solitary and
still.
Some time elapsed before she could reassure her trembling companion, or
restore him to a state of moderate tranquillity. His disordered
imagination represented to him a crowd of persons stealing towards them
beneath the cover of the bushes, lurking in every ditch, and peeping
from the boughs of every rustling tree. He was haunted by
apprehensions of being led captive to some gloomy place where he would
be chained and scourged, and worse than all, where Nell could never
come to see him, save through iron bars and gratings in the wall. His
terrors affected the child. Separation from her grandfather was the
greatest evil she could dread; and feeling for the time as though, go
where they would, they were to be hunted down, and could never be safe
but in hiding, her heart failed her, and her courage drooped.
In one so young, and so unused to the scenes in which she had lately
moved, this sinking of the spirit was not surprising. But, Nature
often enshrines gallant and noble hearts in weak bosoms--oftenest, God
bless her, in female breasts--and when the child, casting her tearful
eyes upon the old man, remembered how weak he was, and how destitute
and helpless he would be if she failed him, her heart swelled within
her, and animated her with new strength and fortitude.
‘We are quite safe now, and have nothing to fear indeed, dear
grandfather,’ she said.
‘Nothing to fear!’ returned the old man. ‘Nothing to fear if they took
me from thee! Nothing to fear if they parted us! Nobody is true to
me. No, not one. Not even Nell!’
‘Oh! do not say that,’ replied the child, ‘for if ever anybody was true
at heart, and earnest, I am. I am sure you know I am.’
‘Then how,’ said the old man, looking fearfully round, ‘how can you
bear to think that we are safe, when they are searching for me
everywhere, and may come here, and steal upon us, even while we’re
talking?’
‘Because I’m sure we have not been followed,’ said the child. ‘Judge
for yourself, dear grandfather: look round, and see how quiet and still
it is. We are alone together, and may ramble where we like. Not safe!
Could I feel easy--did I feel at ease--when any danger threatened you?’
‘True, too,’ he answered, pressing her hand, but still looking
anxiously about. ‘What noise was that?’
‘A bird,’ said the child, ‘flying into the wood, and leading the way
for us to follow.’ You remember that we said we would walk in woods
and fields, and by the side of rivers, and how happy we would be--you
remember that? But here, while the sun shines above our heads, and
everything is bright and happy, we are sitting sadly down, and losing
time. See what a pleasant path; and there’s the bird--the same
bird--now he flies to another tree, and stays to sing. Come!’
When they rose up from the ground, and took the shady track which led
them through the wood, she bounded on before, printing her tiny
footsteps in the moss, which rose elastic from so light a pressure and
gave it back as mirrors throw off breath; and thus she lured the old
man on, with many a backward look and merry beck, now pointing
stealthily to some lone bird as it perched and twittered on a branch
that strayed across their path, now stopping to listen to the songs
that broke the happy silence, or watch the sun as it trembled through
the leaves, and stealing in among the ivied trunks of stout old trees,
opened long paths of light. As they passed onward, parting the boughs
that clustered in their way, the serenity which the child had first
assumed, stole into her breast in earnest; the old man cast no longer
fearful looks behind, but felt at ease and cheerful, for the further
they passed into the deep green shade, the more they felt that the
tranquil mind of God was there, and shed its peace on them.
At length the path becoming clearer and less intricate, brought them to
the end of the wood, and into a public road. Taking their way along it
for a short distance, they came to a lane, so shaded by the trees on
either hand that they met together over-head, and arched the narrow
way. A broken finger-post announced that this led to a village three
miles off; and thither they resolved to bend their steps.
The miles appeared so long that they sometimes thought they must have
missed their road. But at last, to their great joy, it led downwards
in a steep descent, with overhanging banks over which the footpaths
led; and the clustered houses of the village peeped from the woody
hollow below.
It was a very small place. The men and boys were playing at cricket on
the green; and as the other folks were looking on, they wandered up and
down, uncertain where to seek a humble lodging. There was but one old
man in the little garden before his cottage, and him they were timid of
approaching, for he was the schoolmaster, and had ‘School’ written up
over his window in black letters on a white board. He was a pale,
simple-looking man, of a spare and meagre habit, and sat among his
flowers and beehives, smoking his pipe, in the little porch before his
door.
‘Speak to him, dear,’ the old man whispered.
‘I am almost afraid to disturb him,’ said the child timidly. ‘He does
not seem to see us. Perhaps if we wait a little, he may look this way.’
They waited, but the schoolmaster cast no look towards them, and still
sat, thoughtful and silent, in the little porch. He had a kind face.
In his plain old suit of black, he looked pale and meagre. They
fancied, too, a lonely air about him and his house, but perhaps that
was because the other people formed a merry company upon the green, and
he seemed the only solitary man in all the place.
They were very tired, and the child would have been bold enough to
address even a schoolmaster, but for something in his manner which
seemed to denote that he was uneasy or distressed. As they stood
hesitating at a little distance, they saw that he sat for a few minutes
at a time like one in a brown study, then laid aside his pipe and took
a few turns in his garden, then approached the gate and looked towards
the green, then took up his pipe again with a sigh, and sat down
thoughtfully as before.
As nobody else appeared and it would soon be dark, Nell at length took
courage, and when he had resumed his pipe and seat, ventured to draw
near, leading her grandfather by the hand. The slight noise they made
in raising the latch of the wicket-gate, caught his attention. He
looked at them kindly but seemed disappointed too, and slightly shook
his head.
Nell dropped a curtsey, and told him they were poor travellers who
sought a shelter for the night which they would gladly pay for, so far
as their means allowed. The schoolmaster looked earnestly at her as
she spoke, laid aside his pipe, and rose up directly.
‘If you could direct us anywhere, sir,’ said the child, ‘we should take
it very kindly.’
‘You have been walking a long way,’ said the schoolmaster.
‘A long way, Sir,’ the child replied.
‘You’re a young traveller, my child,’ he said, laying his hand gently
on her head. ‘Your grandchild, friend?’
‘Aye, Sir,’ cried the old man, ‘and the stay and comfort of my life.’
‘Come in,’ said the schoolmaster.
Without further preface he conducted them into his little school-room,
which was parlour and kitchen likewise, and told them that they were
welcome to remain under his roof till morning. Before they had done
thanking him, he spread a coarse white cloth upon the table, with
knives and platters; and bringing out some bread and cold meat and a
jug of beer, besought them to eat and drink.
The child looked round the room as she took her seat. There were a
couple of forms, notched and cut and inked all over; a small deal desk
perched on four legs, at which no doubt the master sat; a few
dog’s-eared books upon a high shelf; and beside them a motley
collection of peg-tops, balls, kites, fishing-lines, marbles,
half-eaten apples, and other confiscated property of idle urchins.
Displayed on hooks upon the wall in all their terrors, were the cane
and ruler; and near them, on a small shelf of its own, the dunce’s cap,
made of old newspapers and decorated with glaring wafers of the largest
size. But, the great ornaments of the walls were certain moral
sentences fairly copied in good round text, and well-worked sums in
simple addition and multiplication, evidently achieved by the same
hand, which were plentifully pasted all round the room: for the double
purpose, as it seemed, of bearing testimony to the excellence of the
school, and kindling a worthy emulation in the bosoms of the scholars.
‘Yes,’ said the old schoolmaster, observing that her attention was
caught by these latter specimens. ‘That’s beautiful writing, my dear.’
‘Very, Sir,’ replied the child modestly, ‘is it yours?’
‘Mine!’ he returned, taking out his spectacles and putting them on, to
have a better view of the triumphs so dear to his heart. ‘I couldn’t
write like that, now-a-days. No. They’re all done by one hand; a
little hand it is, not so old as yours, but a very clever one.’
As the schoolmaster said this, he saw that a small blot of ink had been
thrown on one of the copies, so he took a penknife from his pocket, and
going up to the wall, carefully scraped it out. When he had finished,
he walked slowly backward from the writing, admiring it as one might
contemplate a beautiful picture, but with something of sadness in his
voice and manner which quite touched the child, though she was
unacquainted with its cause.
‘A little hand indeed,’ said the poor schoolmaster. ‘Far beyond all
his companions, in his learning and his sports too, how did he ever
come to be so fond of me! That I should love him is no wonder, but
that he should love me--’ and there the schoolmaster stopped, and took
off his spectacles to wipe them, as though they had grown dim.
‘I hope there is nothing the matter, sir,’ said Nell anxiously.
‘Not much, my dear,’ returned the schoolmaster. ‘I hoped to have seen
him on the green to-night. He was always foremost among them. But
he’ll be there to-morrow.’
‘Has he been ill?’ asked the child, with a child’s quick sympathy.
‘Not very. They said he was wandering in his head yesterday, dear boy,
and so they said the day before. But that’s a part of that kind of
disorder; it’s not a bad sign--not at all a bad sign.’
The child was silent. He walked to the door, and looked wistfully out.
The shadows of night were gathering, and all was still.
‘If he could lean upon anybody’s arm, he would come to me, I know,’ he
said, returning into the room. ‘He always came into the garden to say
good night. But perhaps his illness has only just taken a favourable
turn, and it’s too late for him to come out, for it’s very damp and
there’s a heavy dew. It’s much better he shouldn’t come to-night.’
The schoolmaster lighted a candle, fastened the window-shutter, and
closed the door. But after he had done this, and sat silent a little
time, he took down his hat, and said he would go and satisfy himself,
if Nell would sit up till he returned. The child readily complied, and
he went out.
She sat there half-an-hour or more, feeling the place very strange and
lonely, for she had prevailed upon the old man to go to bed, and there
was nothing to be heard but the ticking of an old clock, and the
whistling of the wind among the trees. When he returned, he took his
seat in the chimney corner, but remained silent for a long time. At
length he turned to her, and speaking very gently, hoped she would say
a prayer that night for a sick child.
‘My favourite scholar!’ said the poor schoolmaster, smoking a pipe he
had forgotten to light, and looking mournfully round upon the walls.
‘It is a little hand to have done all that, and waste away with
sickness. It is a very, very little hand!’
CHAPTER 25
After a sound night’s rest in a chamber in the thatched roof, in which
it seemed the sexton had for some years been a lodger, but which he had
lately deserted for a wife and a cottage of his own, the child rose
early in the morning and descended to the room where she had supped
last night. As the schoolmaster had already left his bed and gone out,
she bestirred herself to make it neat and comfortable, and had just
finished its arrangement when the kind host returned.
He thanked her many times, and said that the old dame who usually did
such offices for him had gone to nurse the little scholar whom he had
told her of. The child asked how he was, and hoped he was better.
‘No,’ rejoined the schoolmaster shaking his head sorrowfully, ‘no
better. They even say he is worse.’
‘I am very sorry for that, Sir,’ said the child.
The poor schoolmaster appeared to be gratified by her earnest manner,
but yet rendered more uneasy by it, for he added hastily that anxious
people often magnified an evil and thought it greater than it was; ‘for
my part,’ he said, in his quiet, patient way, ‘I hope it’s not so. I
don’t think he can be worse.’
The child asked his leave to prepare breakfast, and her grandfather
coming down stairs, they all three partook of it together. While the
meal was in progress, their host remarked that the old man seemed much
fatigued, and evidently stood in need of rest.
‘If the journey you have before you is a long one,’ he said, ‘and don’t
press you for one day, you’re very welcome to pass another night here.
I should really be glad if you would, friend.’
He saw that the old man looked at Nell, uncertain whether to accept or
decline his offer; and added,
‘I shall be glad to have your young companion with me for one day. If
you can do a charity to a lone man, and rest yourself at the same time,
do so. If you must proceed upon your journey, I wish you well through
it, and will walk a little way with you before school begins.’
‘What are we to do, Nell?’ said the old man irresolutely, ‘say what
we’re to do, dear.’
It required no great persuasion to induce the child to answer that they
had better accept the invitation and remain. She was happy to show her
gratitude to the kind schoolmaster by busying herself in the
performance of such household duties as his little cottage stood in
need of. When these were done, she took some needle-work from her
basket, and sat herself down upon a stool beside the lattice, where the
honeysuckle and woodbine entwined their tender stems, and stealing into
the room filled it with their delicious breath. Her grandfather was
basking in the sun outside, breathing the perfume of the flowers, and
idly watching the clouds as they floated on before the light summer
wind.
As the schoolmaster, after arranging the two forms in due order, took
his seat behind his desk and made other preparations for school, the
child was apprehensive that she might be in the way, and offered to
withdraw to her little bedroom. But this he would not allow, and as he
seemed pleased to have her there, she remained, busying herself with
her work.
‘Have you many scholars, sir?’ she asked.
The poor schoolmaster shook his head, and said that they barely filled
the two forms.
‘Are the others clever, sir?’ asked the child, glancing at the trophies
on the wall.
‘Good boys,’ returned the schoolmaster, ‘good boys enough, my dear, but
they’ll never do like that.’
A small white-headed boy with a sunburnt face appeared at the door
while he was speaking, and stopping there to make a rustic bow, came in
and took his seat upon one of the forms. The white-headed boy then put
an open book, astonishingly dog’s-eared upon his knees, and thrusting
his hands into his pockets began counting the marbles with which they
were filled; displaying in the expression of his face a remarkable
capacity of totally abstracting his mind from the spelling on which his
eyes were fixed. Soon afterwards another white-headed little boy came
straggling in, and after him a red-headed lad, and after him two more
with white heads, and then one with a flaxen poll, and so on until the
forms were occupied by a dozen boys or thereabouts, with heads of every
colour but grey, and ranging in their ages from four years old to
fourteen years or more; for the legs of the youngest were a long way
from the floor when he sat upon the form, and the eldest was a heavy
good-tempered foolish fellow, about half a head taller than the
schoolmaster.
At the top of the first form--the post of honour in the school--was the
vacant place of the little sick scholar, and at the head of the row of
pegs on which those who came in hats or caps were wont to hang them up,
one was left empty. No boy attempted to violate the sanctity of seat
or peg, but many a one looked from the empty spaces to the
schoolmaster, and whispered his idle neighbour behind his hand.
Then began the hum of conning over lessons and getting them by heart,
the whispered jest and stealthy game, and all the noise and drawl of
school; and in the midst of the din sat the poor schoolmaster, the very
image of meekness and simplicity, vainly attempting to fix his mind
upon the duties of the day, and to forget his little friend. But the
tedium of his office reminded him more strongly of the willing scholar,
and his thoughts were rambling from his pupils--it was plain.
None knew this better than the idlest boys, who, growing bolder with
impunity, waxed louder and more daring; playing odd-or-even under the
master’s eye, eating apples openly and without rebuke, pinching each
other in sport or malice without the least reserve, and cutting their
autographs in the very legs of his desk. The puzzled dunce, who stood
beside it to say his lesson out of book, looked no longer at the
ceiling for forgotten words, but drew closer to the master’s elbow and
boldly cast his eye upon the page; the wag of the little troop squinted
and made grimaces (at the smallest boy of course), holding no book
before his face, and his approving audience knew no constraint in their
delight. If the master did chance to rouse himself and seem alive to
what was going on, the noise subsided for a moment and no eyes met his
but wore a studious and a deeply humble look; but the instant he
relapsed again, it broke out afresh, and ten times louder than before.
Oh! how some of those idle fellows longed to be outside, and how they
looked at the open door and window, as if they half meditated rushing
violently out, plunging into the woods, and being wild boys and savages
from that time forth. What rebellious thoughts of the cool river, and
some shady bathing-place beneath willow trees with branches dipping in
the water, kept tempting and urging that sturdy boy, who, with his
shirt-collar unbuttoned and flung back as far as it could go, sat
fanning his flushed face with a spelling-book, wishing himself a whale,
or a tittlebat, or a fly, or anything but a boy at school on that hot,
broiling day! Heat! ask that other boy, whose seat being nearest to
the door gave him opportunities of gliding out into the garden and
driving his companions to madness by dipping his face into the bucket
of the well and then rolling on the grass--ask him if there were ever
such a day as that, when even the bees were diving deep down into the
cups of flowers and stopping there, as if they had made up their minds
to retire from business and be manufacturers of honey no more. The day
was made for laziness, and lying on one’s back in green places, and
staring at the sky till its brightness forced one to shut one’s eyes
and go to sleep; and was this a time to be poring over musty books in a
dark room, slighted by the very sun itself? Monstrous!
Nell sat by the window occupied with her work, but attentive still to
all that passed, though sometimes rather timid of the boisterous boys.
The lessons over, writing time began; and there being but one desk and
that the master’s, each boy sat at it in turn and laboured at his
crooked copy, while the master walked about. This was a quieter time;
for he would come and look over the writer’s shoulder, and tell him
mildly to observe how such a letter was turned in such a copy on the
wall, praise such an up-stroke here and such a down-stroke there, and
bid him take it for his model. Then he would stop and tell them what
the sick child had said last night, and how he had longed to be among
them once again; and such was the poor schoolmaster’s gentle and
affectionate manner, that the boys seemed quite remorseful that they
had worried him so much, and were absolutely quiet; eating no apples,
cutting no names, inflicting no pinches, and making no grimaces, for
full two minutes afterwards.
‘I think, boys,’ said the schoolmaster when the clock struck twelve,
‘that I shall give an extra half-holiday this afternoon.’
At this intelligence, the boys, led on and headed by the tall boy,
raised a great shout, in the midst of which the master was seen to
speak, but could not be heard. As he held up his hand, however, in
token of his wish that they should be silent, they were considerate
enough to leave off, as soon as the longest-winded among them were
quite out of breath.
‘You must promise me first,’ said the schoolmaster, ‘that you’ll not be
noisy, or at least, if you are, that you’ll go away and be so--away out
of the village I mean. I’m sure you wouldn’t disturb your old playmate
and companion.’
There was a general murmur (and perhaps a very sincere one, for they
were but boys) in the negative; and the tall boy, perhaps as sincerely
as any of them, called those about him to witness that he had only
shouted in a whisper.
‘Then pray don’t forget, there’s my dear scholars,’ said the
schoolmaster, ‘what I have asked you, and do it as a favour to me. Be
as happy as you can, and don’t be unmindful that you are blessed with
health. Good-bye all!’
‘Thank’ee, Sir,’ and ‘good-bye, Sir,’ were said a good many times in a
variety of voices, and the boys went out very slowly and softly. But
there was the sun shining and there were the birds singing, as the sun
only shines and the birds only sing on holidays and half-holidays;
there were the trees waving to all free boys to climb and nestle among
their leafy branches; the hay, entreating them to come and scatter it
to the pure air; the green corn, gently beckoning towards wood and
stream; the smooth ground, rendered smoother still by blending lights
and shadows, inviting to runs and leaps, and long walks God knows
whither. It was more than boy could bear, and with a joyous whoop the
whole cluster took to their heels and spread themselves about, shouting
and laughing as they went.
‘It’s natural, thank Heaven!’ said the poor schoolmaster, looking after
them. ‘I’m very glad they didn’t mind me!’
It is difficult, however, to please everybody, as most of us would have
discovered, even without the fable which bears that moral, and in the
course of the afternoon several mothers and aunts of pupils looked in
to express their entire disapproval of the schoolmaster’s proceeding.
A few confined themselves to hints, such as politely inquiring what
red-letter day or saint’s day the almanack said it was; a few (these
were the profound village politicians) argued that it was a slight to
the throne and an affront to church and state, and savoured of
revolutionary principles, to grant a half-holiday upon any lighter
occasion than the birthday of the Monarch; but the majority expressed
their displeasure on private grounds and in plain terms, arguing that
to put the pupils on this short allowance of learning was nothing but
an act of downright robbery and fraud: and one old lady, finding that
she could not inflame or irritate the peaceable schoolmaster by talking
to him, bounced out of his house and talked at him for half-an-hour
outside his own window, to another old lady, saying that of course he
would deduct this half-holiday from his weekly charge, or of course he
would naturally expect to have an opposition started against him; there
was no want of idle chaps in that neighbourhood (here the old lady
raised her voice), and some chaps who were too idle even to be
schoolmasters, might soon find that there were other chaps put over
their heads, and so she would have them take care, and look pretty
sharp about them. But all these taunts and vexations failed to elicit
one word from the meek schoolmaster, who sat with the child by his
side--a little more dejected perhaps, but quite silent and
uncomplaining.
Towards night an old woman came tottering up the garden as speedily as
she could, and meeting the schoolmaster at the door, said he was to go
to Dame West’s directly, and had best run on before her. He and the
child were on the point of going out together for a walk, and without
relinquishing her hand, the schoolmaster hurried away, leaving the
messenger to follow as she might.
They stopped at a cottage-door, and the schoolmaster knocked softly at
it with his hand. It was opened without loss of time. They entered a
room where a little group of women were gathered about one, older than
the rest, who was crying very bitterly, and sat wringing her hands and
rocking herself to and fro.
‘Oh, dame!’ said the schoolmaster, drawing near her chair, ‘is it so
bad as this?’
‘He’s going fast,’ cried the old woman; ‘my grandson’s dying. It’s all
along of you. You shouldn’t see him now, but for his being so earnest
on it. This is what his learning has brought him to. Oh dear, dear,
dear, what can I do!’
‘Do not say that I am in any fault,’ urged the gentle school-master.
‘I am not hurt, dame. No, no. You are in great distress of mind, and
don’t mean what you say. I am sure you don’t.’
‘I do,’ returned the old woman. ‘I mean it all. If he hadn’t been
poring over his books out of fear of you, he would have been well and
merry now, I know he would.’
The schoolmaster looked round upon the other women as if to entreat
some one among them to say a kind word for him, but they shook their
heads, and murmured to each other that they never thought there was
much good in learning, and that this convinced them. Without saying a
word in reply, or giving them a look of reproach, he followed the old
woman who had summoned him (and who had now rejoined them) into another
room, where his infant friend, half-dressed, lay stretched upon a bed.
He was a very young boy; quite a little child. His hair still hung in
curls about his face, and his eyes were very bright; but their light
was of Heaven, not earth. The schoolmaster took a seat beside him, and
stooping over the pillow, whispered his name. The boy sprung up,
stroked his face with his hand, and threw his wasted arms round his
neck, crying out that he was his dear kind friend.
‘I hope I always was. I meant to be, God knows,’ said the poor
schoolmaster.
‘Who is that?’ said the boy, seeing Nell. ‘I am afraid to kiss her,
lest I should make her ill. Ask her to shake hands with me.’
The sobbing child came closer up, and took the little languid hand in
hers. Releasing his again after a time, the sick boy laid him gently
down.
‘You remember the garden, Harry,’ whispered the schoolmaster, anxious
to rouse him, for a dulness seemed gathering upon the child, ‘and how
pleasant it used to be in the evening time? You must make haste to
visit it again, for I think the very flowers have missed you, and are
less gay than they used to be. You will come soon, my dear, very soon
now--won’t you?’
The boy smiled faintly--so very, very faintly--and put his hand upon
his friend’s grey head. He moved his lips too, but no voice came from
them; no, not a sound.
In the silence that ensued, the hum of distant voices borne upon the
evening air came floating through the open window. ‘What’s that?’ said
the sick child, opening his eyes.
‘The boys at play upon the green.’
He took a handkerchief from his pillow, and tried to wave it above his
head. But the feeble arm dropped powerless down.
‘Shall I do it?’ said the schoolmaster.
‘Please wave it at the window,’ was the faint reply. ‘Tie it to the
lattice. Some of them may see it there. Perhaps they’ll think of me,
and look this way.’
He raised his head, and glanced from the fluttering signal to his idle
bat, that lay with slate and book and other boyish property upon a
table in the room. And then he laid him softly down once more, and
asked if the little girl were there, for he could not see her.
She stepped forward, and pressed the passive hand that lay upon the
coverlet. The two old friends and companions--for such they were,
though they were man and child--held each other in a long embrace, and
then the little scholar turned his face towards the wall, and fell
asleep.
The poor schoolmaster sat in the same place, holding the small cold
hand in his, and chafing it. It was but the hand of a dead child. He
felt that; and yet he chafed it still, and could not lay it down.
CHAPTER 26
Almost broken-hearted, Nell withdrew with the schoolmaster from the
bedside and returned to his cottage. In the midst of her grief and
tears she was yet careful to conceal their real cause from the old man,
for the dead boy had been a grandchild, and left but one aged relative
to mourn his premature decay.
She stole away to bed as quickly as she could, and when she was alone,
gave free vent to the sorrow with which her breast was overcharged.
But the sad scene she had witnessed, was not without its lesson of
content and gratitude; of content with the lot which left her health
and freedom; and gratitude that she was spared to the one relative and
friend she loved, and to live and move in a beautiful world, when so
many young creatures--as young and full of hope as she--were stricken
down and gathered to their graves. How many of the mounds in that old
churchyard where she had lately strayed, grew green above the graves of
children! And though she thought as a child herself, and did not
perhaps sufficiently consider to what a bright and happy existence
those who die young are borne, and how in death they lose the pain of
seeing others die around them, bearing to the tomb some strong
affection of their hearts (which makes the old die many times in one
long life), still she thought wisely enough, to draw a plain and easy
moral from what she had seen that night, and to store it, deep in her
mind.
Her dreams were of the little scholar: not coffined and covered up, but
mingling with angels, and smiling happily. The sun darting his
cheerful rays into the room, awoke her; and now there remained but to
take leave of the poor schoolmaster and wander forth once more.
By the time they were ready to depart, school had begun. In the
darkened room, the din of yesterday was going on again: a little
sobered and softened down, perhaps, but only a very little, if at all.
The schoolmaster rose from his desk and walked with them to the gate.
It was with a trembling and reluctant hand, that the child held out to
him the money which the lady had given her at the races for her
flowers: faltering in her thanks as she thought how small the sum was,
and blushing as she offered it. But he bade her put it up, and
stooping to kiss her cheek, turned back into his house.
They had not gone half-a-dozen paces when he was at the door again; the
old man retraced his steps to shake hands, and the child did the same.
‘Good fortune and happiness go with you!’ said the poor schoolmaster.
‘I am quite a solitary man now. If you ever pass this way again,
you’ll not forget the little village-school.’
‘We shall never forget it, sir,’ rejoined Nell; ‘nor ever forget to be
grateful to you for your kindness to us.’
‘I have heard such words from the lips of children very often,’ said
the schoolmaster, shaking his head, and smiling thoughtfully, ‘but they
were soon forgotten. I had attached one young friend to me, the better
friend for being young--but that’s over--God bless you!’
They bade him farewell very many times, and turned away, walking slowly
and often looking back, until they could see him no more. At length
they had left the village far behind, and even lost sight of the smoke
among the trees. They trudged onward now, at a quicker pace, resolving
to keep the main road, and go wherever it might lead them.
But main roads stretch a long, long way. With the exception of two or
three inconsiderable clusters of cottages which they passed, without
stopping, and one lonely road-side public-house where they had some
bread and cheese, this highway had led them to nothing--late in the
afternoon--and still lengthened out, far in the distance, the same
dull, tedious, winding course, that they had been pursuing all day. As
they had no resource, however, but to go forward, they still kept on,
though at a much slower pace, being very weary and fatigued.
The afternoon had worn away into a beautiful evening, when they arrived
at a point where the road made a sharp turn and struck across a common.
On the border of this common, and close to the hedge which divided it
from the cultivated fields, a caravan was drawn up to rest; upon which,
by reason of its situation, they came so suddenly that they could not
have avoided it if they would.
It was not a shabby, dingy, dusty cart, but a smart little house upon
wheels, with white dimity curtains festooning the windows, and
window-shutters of green picked out with panels of a staring red, in
which happily-contrasted colours the whole concern shone brilliant.
Neither was it a poor caravan drawn by a single donkey or emaciated
horse, for a pair of horses in pretty good condition were released from
the shafts and grazing on the frouzy grass. Neither was it a gipsy
caravan, for at the open door (graced with a bright brass knocker) sat
a Christian lady, stout and comfortable to look upon, who wore a large
bonnet trembling with bows. And that it was not an unprovided or
destitute caravan was clear from this lady’s occupation, which was the
very pleasant and refreshing one of taking tea. The tea-things,
including a bottle of rather suspicious character and a cold knuckle of
ham, were set forth upon a drum, covered with a white napkin; and
there, as if at the most convenient round-table in all the world, sat
this roving lady, taking her tea and enjoying the prospect.
It happened that at that moment the lady of the caravan had her cup
(which, that everything about her might be of a stout and comfortable
kind, was a breakfast cup) to her lips, and that having her eyes lifted
to the sky in her enjoyment of the full flavour of the tea, not
unmingled possibly with just the slightest dash or gleam of something
out of the suspicious bottle--but this is mere speculation and not
distinct matter of history--it happened that being thus agreeably
engaged, she did not see the travellers when they first came up. It
was not until she was in the act of getting down the cup, and drawing a
long breath after the exertion of causing its contents to disappear,
that the lady of the caravan beheld an old man and a young child
walking slowly by, and glancing at her proceedings with eyes of modest
but hungry admiration.
‘Hey!’ cried the lady of the caravan, scooping the crumbs out of her
lap and swallowing the same before wiping her lips. ‘Yes, to be
sure--Who won the Helter-Skelter Plate, child?’
‘Won what, ma’am?’ asked Nell.
‘The Helter-Skelter Plate at the races, child--the plate that was run
for on the second day.’
‘On the second day, ma’am?’
‘Second day! Yes, second day,’ repeated the lady with an air of
impatience. ‘Can’t you say who won the Helter-Skelter Plate when
you’re asked the question civilly?’
‘I don’t know, ma’am.’
‘Don’t know!’ repeated the lady of the caravan; ‘why, you were there.
I saw you with my own eyes.’
Nell was not a little alarmed to hear this, supposing that the lady
might be intimately acquainted with the firm of Short and Codlin; but
what followed tended to reassure her.
‘And very sorry I was,’ said the lady of the caravan, ‘to see you in
company with a Punch; a low, practical, wulgar wretch, that people
should scorn to look at.’
‘I was not there by choice,’ returned the child; ‘we didn’t know our
way, and the two men were very kind to us, and let us travel with them.
Do you--do you know them, ma’am?’
‘Know ‘em, child!’ cried the lady of the caravan in a sort of shriek.
‘Know them! But you’re young and inexperienced, and that’s your excuse
for asking sich a question. Do I look as if I know’d ‘em, does the
caravan look as if it know’d ‘em?’
‘No, ma’am, no,’ said the child, fearing she had committed some
grievous fault. ‘I beg your pardon.’
It was granted immediately, though the lady still appeared much ruffled
and discomposed by the degrading supposition. The child then explained
that they had left the races on the first day, and were travelling to
the next town on that road, where they purposed to spend the night. As
the countenance of the stout lady began to clear up, she ventured to
inquire how far it was. The reply--which the stout lady did not come
to, until she had thoroughly explained that she went to the races on
the first day in a gig, and as an expedition of pleasure, and that her
presence there had no connexion with any matters of business or
profit--was, that the town was eight miles off.
This discouraging information a little dashed the child, who could
scarcely repress a tear as she glanced along the darkening road. Her
grandfather made no complaint, but he sighed heavily as he leaned upon
his staff, and vainly tried to pierce the dusty distance.
The lady of the caravan was in the act of gathering her tea equipage
together preparatory to clearing the table, but noting the child’s
anxious manner she hesitated and stopped. The child curtseyed, thanked
her for her information, and giving her hand to the old man had already
got some fifty yards or so away, when the lady of the caravan called to
her to return.
‘Come nearer, nearer still,’ said she, beckoning to her to ascend the
steps. ‘Are you hungry, child?’
‘Not very, but we are tired, and it’s--it IS a long way.’
‘Well, hungry or not, you had better have some tea,’ rejoined her new
acquaintance. ‘I suppose you are agreeable to that, old gentleman?’
The grandfather humbly pulled off his hat and thanked her. The lady of
the caravan then bade him come up the steps likewise, but the drum
proving an inconvenient table for two, they descended again, and sat
upon the grass, where she handed down to them the tea-tray, the bread
and butter, the knuckle of ham, and in short everything of which she
had partaken herself, except the bottle which she had already embraced
an opportunity of slipping into her pocket.
‘Set ‘em out near the hind wheels, child, that’s the best place,’ said
their friend, superintending the arrangements from above. ‘Now hand up
the teapot for a little more hot water, and a pinch of fresh tea, and
then both of you eat and drink as much as you can, and don’t spare
anything; that’s all I ask of you.’
They might perhaps have carried out the lady’s wish, if it had been
less freely expressed, or even if it had not been expressed at all.
But as this direction relieved them from any shadow of delicacy or
uneasiness, they made a hearty meal and enjoyed it to the utmost.
While they were thus engaged, the lady of the caravan alighted on the
earth, and with her hands clasped behind her, and her large bonnet
trembling excessively, walked up and down in a measured tread and very
stately manner, surveying the caravan from time to time with an air of
calm delight, and deriving particular gratification from the red panels
and the brass knocker. When she had taken this gentle exercise for
some time, she sat down upon the steps and called ‘George’; whereupon a
man in a carter’s frock, who had been so shrouded in a hedge up to this
time as to see everything that passed without being seen himself,
parted the twigs that concealed him, and appeared in a sitting
attitude, supporting on his legs a baking-dish and a half-gallon stone
bottle, and bearing in his right hand a knife, and in his left a fork.
‘Yes, Missus,’ said George.
‘How did you find the cold pie, George?’
‘It warn’t amiss, mum.’
‘And the beer,’ said the lady of the caravan, with an appearance of
being more interested in this question than the last; ‘is it passable,
George?’
‘It’s more flatterer than it might be,’ George returned, ‘but it an’t
so bad for all that.’
To set the mind of his mistress at rest, he took a sip (amounting in
quantity to a pint or thereabouts) from the stone bottle, and then
smacked his lips, winked his eye, and nodded his head. No doubt with
the same amiable desire, he immediately resumed his knife and fork, as
a practical assurance that the beer had wrought no bad effect upon his
appetite.
The lady of the caravan looked on approvingly for some time, and then
said,
‘Have you nearly finished?’
‘Wery nigh, mum.’ And indeed, after scraping the dish all round with
his knife and carrying the choice brown morsels to his mouth, and after
taking such a scientific pull at the stone bottle that, by degrees
almost imperceptible to the sight, his head went further and further
back until he lay nearly at his full length upon the ground, this
gentleman declared himself quite disengaged, and came forth from his
retreat.
‘I hope I haven’t hurried you, George,’ said his mistress, who appeared
to have a great sympathy with his late pursuit.
‘If you have,’ returned the follower, wisely reserving himself for any
favourable contingency that might occur, ‘we must make up for it next
time, that’s all.’
‘We are not a heavy load, George?’
‘That’s always what the ladies say,’ replied the man, looking a long
way round, as if he were appealing to Nature in general against such
monstrous propositions. ‘If you see a woman a driving, you’ll always
perceive that she never will keep her whip still; the horse can’t go
fast enough for her. If cattle have got their proper load, you never
can persuade a woman that they’ll not bear something more. What is the
cause of this here?’
‘Would these two travellers make much difference to the horses, if we
took them with us?’ asked his mistress, offering no reply to the
philosophical inquiry, and pointing to Nell and the old man, who were
painfully preparing to resume their journey on foot.
‘They’d make a difference in course,’ said George doggedly.
‘Would they make much difference?’ repeated his mistress. ‘They can’t
be very heavy.’
‘The weight o’ the pair, mum,’ said George, eyeing them with the look
of a man who was calculating within half an ounce or so, ‘would be a
trifle under that of Oliver Cromwell.’
Nell was very much surprised that the man should be so accurately
acquainted with the weight of one whom she had read of in books as
having lived considerably before their time, but speedily forgot the
subject in the joy of hearing that they were to go forward in the
caravan, for which she thanked its lady with unaffected earnestness.
She helped with great readiness and alacrity to put away the tea-things
and other matters that were lying about, and, the horses being by that
time harnessed, mounted into the vehicle, followed by her delighted
grandfather. Their patroness then shut the door and sat herself down
by her drum at an open window; and, the steps being struck by George
and stowed under the carriage, away they went, with a great noise of
flapping and creaking and straining, and the bright brass knocker,
which nobody ever knocked at, knocking one perpetual double knock of
its own accord as they jolted heavily along.
CHAPTER 27
When they had travelled slowly forward for some short distance, Nell
ventured to steal a look round the caravan and observe it more closely.
One half of it--that moiety in which the comfortable proprietress was
then seated--was carpeted, and so partitioned off at the further end as
to accommodate a sleeping-place, constructed after the fashion of a
berth on board ship, which was shaded, like the little windows, with
fair white curtains, and looked comfortable enough, though by what kind
of gymnastic exercise the lady of the caravan ever contrived to get
into it, was an unfathomable mystery. The other half served for a
kitchen, and was fitted up with a stove whose small chimney passed
through the roof. It held also a closet or larder, several chests, a
great pitcher of water, and a few cooking-utensils and articles of
crockery. These latter necessaries hung upon the walls, which, in that
portion of the establishment devoted to the lady of the caravan, were
ornamented with such gayer and lighter decorations as a triangle and a
couple of well-thumbed tambourines.
The lady of the caravan sat at one window in all the pride and poetry
of the musical instruments, and little Nell and her grandfather sat at
the other in all the humility of the kettle and saucepans, while the
machine jogged on and shifted the darkening prospect very slowly. At
first the two travellers spoke little, and only in whispers, but as
they grew more familiar with the place they ventured to converse with
greater freedom, and talked about the country through which they were
passing, and the different objects that presented themselves, until the
old man fell asleep; which the lady of the caravan observing, invited
Nell to come and sit beside her.
‘Well, child,’ she said, ‘how do you like this way of travelling?’
Nell replied that she thought it was very pleasant indeed, to which the
lady assented in the case of people who had their spirits. For
herself, she said, she was troubled with a lowness in that respect
which required a constant stimulant; though whether the aforesaid
stimulant was derived from the suspicious bottle of which mention has
been already made or from other sources, she did not say.
‘That’s the happiness of you young people,’ she continued. ‘You don’t
know what it is to be low in your feelings. You always have your
appetites too, and what a comfort that is.’
Nell thought that she could sometimes dispense with her own appetite
very conveniently; and thought, moreover, that there was nothing either
in the lady’s personal appearance or in her manner of taking tea, to
lead to the conclusion that her natural relish for meat and drink had
at all failed her. She silently assented, however, as in duty bound,
to what the lady had said, and waited until she should speak again.
Instead of speaking, however, she sat looking at the child for a long
time in silence, and then getting up, brought out from a corner a large
roll of canvas about a yard in width, which she laid upon the floor and
spread open with her foot until it nearly reached from one end of the
caravan to the other.
‘There, child,’ she said, ‘read that.’
Nell walked down it, and read aloud, in enormous black letters, the
inscription, ‘JARLEY’S WAX-WORK.’
‘Read it again,’ said the lady, complacently.
‘Jarley’s Wax-Work,’ repeated Nell.
‘That’s me,’ said the lady. ‘I am Mrs Jarley.’
Giving the child an encouraging look, intended to reassure her and let
her know, that, although she stood in the presence of the original
Jarley, she must not allow herself to be utterly overwhelmed and borne
down, the lady of the caravan unfolded another scroll, whereon was the
inscription, ‘One hundred figures the full size of life,’ and then
another scroll, on which was written, ‘The only stupendous collection
of real wax-work in the world,’ and then several smaller scrolls with
such inscriptions as ‘Now exhibiting within’--‘The genuine and only
Jarley’--‘Jarley’s unrivalled collection’--‘Jarley is the delight of
the Nobility and Gentry’--‘The Royal Family are the patrons of Jarley.’
When she had exhibited these leviathans of public announcement to the
astonished child, she brought forth specimens of the lesser fry in the
shape of hand-bills, some of which were couched in the form of parodies
on popular melodies, as ‘Believe me if all Jarley’s wax-work so
rare’--‘I saw thy show in youthful prime’--‘Over the water to Jarley;’
while, to consult all tastes, others were composed with a view to the
lighter and more facetious spirits, as a parody on the favourite air of
‘If I had a donkey,’ beginning,
If I know’d a donkey wot wouldn’t go
To see Mrs JARLEY’S wax-work show,
Do you think I’d acknowledge him? Oh no no!
Then run to Jarley’s--
--besides several compositions in prose, purporting to be dialogues
between the Emperor of China and an oyster, or the Archbishop of
Canterbury and a dissenter on the subject of church-rates, but all
having the same moral, namely, that the reader must make haste to
Jarley’s, and that children and servants were admitted at half-price.
When she had brought all these testimonials of her important position
in society to bear upon her young companion, Mrs Jarley rolled them up,
and having put them carefully away, sat down again, and looked at the
child in triumph.
‘Never go into the company of a filthy Punch any more,’ said Mrs
Jarley, ‘after this.’
‘I never saw any wax-work, ma’am,’ said Nell. ‘Is it funnier than
Punch?’
‘Funnier!’ said Mrs Jarley in a shrill voice. ‘It is not funny at all.’
‘Oh!’ said Nell, with all possible humility.
‘It isn’t funny at all,’ repeated Mrs Jarley. ‘It’s calm and--what’s
that word again--critical?--no--classical, that’s it--it’s calm and
classical. No low beatings and knockings about, no jokings and
squeakings like your precious Punches, but always the same, with a
constantly unchanging air of coldness and gentility; and so like life,
that if wax-work only spoke and walked about, you’d hardly know the
difference. I won’t go so far as to say, that, as it is, I’ve seen
wax-work quite like life, but I’ve certainly seen some life that was
exactly like wax-work.’
‘Is it here, ma’am?’ asked Nell, whose curiosity was awakened by this
description.
‘Is what here, child?’
‘The wax-work, ma’am.’
‘Why, bless you, child, what are you thinking of? How could such a
collection be here, where you see everything except the inside of one
little cupboard and a few boxes? It’s gone on in the other wans to the
assembly-rooms, and there it’ll be exhibited the day after to-morrow.
You are going to the same town, and you’ll see it I dare say. It’s
natural to expect that you’ll see it, and I’ve no doubt you will. I
suppose you couldn’t stop away if you was to try ever so much.’
‘I shall not be in the town, I think, ma’am,’ said the child.
‘Not there!’ cried Mrs Jarley. ‘Then where will you be?’
‘I--I--don’t quite know. I am not certain.’
‘You don’t mean to say that you’re travelling about the country without
knowing where you’re going to?’ said the lady of the caravan. ‘What
curious people you are! What line are you in? You looked to me at the
races, child, as if you were quite out of your element, and had got
there by accident.’
‘We were there quite by accident,’ returned Nell, confused by this
abrupt questioning. ‘We are poor people, ma’am, and are only wandering
about. We have nothing to do;--I wish we had.’
‘You amaze me more and more,’ said Mrs Jarley, after remaining for some
time as mute as one of her own figures. ‘Why, what do you call
yourselves? Not beggars?’
‘Indeed, ma’am, I don’t know what else we are,’ returned the child.
‘Lord bless me,’ said the lady of the caravan. ‘I never heard of such
a thing. Who’d have thought it!’
She remained so long silent after this exclamation, that Nell feared
she felt her having been induced to bestow her protection and
conversation upon one so poor, to be an outrage upon her dignity that
nothing could repair. This persuasion was rather confirmed than
otherwise by the tone in which she at length broke silence and said,
‘And yet you can read. And write too, I shouldn’t wonder?’
‘Yes, ma’am,’ said the child, fearful of giving new offence by the
confession.
‘Well, and what a thing that is,’ returned Mrs Jarley. ‘I can’t!’
Nell said ‘indeed’ in a tone which might imply, either that she was
reasonably surprised to find the genuine and only Jarley, who was the
delight of the Nobility and Gentry and the peculiar pet of the Royal
Family, destitute of these familiar arts; or that she presumed so great
a lady could scarcely stand in need of such ordinary accomplishments.
In whatever way Mrs Jarley received the response, it did not provoke
her to further questioning, or tempt her into any more remarks at the
time, for she relapsed into a thoughtful silence, and remained in that
state so long that Nell withdrew to the other window and rejoined her
grandfather, who was now awake.
At length the lady of the caravan shook off her fit of meditation, and,
summoning the driver to come under the window at which she was seated,
held a long conversation with him in a low tone of voice, as if she
were asking his advice on an important point, and discussing the pros
and cons of some very weighty matter. This conference at length
concluded, she drew in her head again, and beckoned Nell to approach.
‘And the old gentleman too,’ said Mrs Jarley; ‘for I want to have a
word with him. Do you want a good situation for your grand-daughter,
master? If you do, I can put her in the way of getting one. What do
you say?’
‘I can’t leave her,’ answered the old man. ‘We can’t separate. What
would become of me without her?’
‘I should have thought you were old enough to take care of yourself, if
you ever will be,’ retorted Mrs Jarley sharply.
‘But he never will be,’ said the child in an earnest whisper. ‘I fear
he never will be again. Pray do not speak harshly to him. We are very
thankful to you,’ she added aloud; ‘but neither of us could part from
the other if all the wealth of the world were halved between us.’
Mrs Jarley was a little disconcerted by this reception of her proposal,
and looked at the old man, who tenderly took Nell’s hand and detained
it in his own, as if she could have very well dispensed with his
company or even his earthly existence. After an awkward pause, she
thrust her head out of the window again, and had another conference
with the driver upon some point on which they did not seem to agree
quite so readily as on their former topic of discussion; but they
concluded at last, and she addressed the grandfather again.
‘If you’re really disposed to employ yourself,’ said Mrs Jarley, ‘there
would be plenty for you to do in the way of helping to dust the
figures, and take the checks, and so forth. What I want your
grand-daughter for, is to point ‘em out to the company; they would be
soon learnt, and she has a way with her that people wouldn’t think
unpleasant, though she does come after me; for I’ve been always
accustomed to go round with visitors myself, which I should keep on
doing now, only that my spirits make a little ease absolutely
necessary. It’s not a common offer, bear in mind,’ said the lady,
rising into the tone and manner in which she was accustomed to address
her audiences; ‘it’s Jarley’s wax-work, remember. The duty’s very
light and genteel, the company particularly select, the exhibition
takes place in assembly-rooms, town-halls, large rooms at inns, or
auction galleries. There is none of your open-air wagrancy at
Jarley’s, recollect; there is no tarpaulin and sawdust at Jarley’s,
remember. Every expectation held out in the handbills is realised to
the utmost, and the whole forms an effect of imposing brilliancy
hitherto unrivalled in this kingdom. Remember that the price of
admission is only sixpence, and that this is an opportunity which may
never occur again!’
Descending from the sublime when she had reached this point, to the
details of common life, Mrs Jarley remarked that with reference to
salary she could pledge herself to no specific sum until she had
sufficiently tested Nell’s abilities, and narrowly watched her in the
performance of her duties. But board and lodging, both for her and her
grandfather, she bound herself to provide, and she furthermore passed
her word that the board should always be good in quality, and in
quantity plentiful.
Nell and her grandfather consulted together, and while they were so
engaged, Mrs Jarley with her hands behind her walked up and down the
caravan, as she had walked after tea on the dull earth, with uncommon
dignity and self-esteem. Nor will this appear so slight a circumstance
as to be unworthy of mention, when it is remembered that the caravan
was in uneasy motion all the time, and that none but a person of great
natural stateliness and acquired grace could have forborne to stagger.
‘Now, child?’ cried Mrs Jarley, coming to a halt as Nell turned towards
her.
‘We are very much obliged to you, ma’am,’ said Nell, ‘and thankfully
accept your offer.’
‘And you’ll never be sorry for it,’ returned Mrs Jarley. ‘I’m pretty
sure of that. So as that’s all settled, let us have a bit of supper.’
In the meanwhile, the caravan blundered on as if it too had been
drinking strong beer and was drowsy, and came at last upon the paved
streets of a town which were clear of passengers, and quiet, for it was
by this time near midnight, and the townspeople were all abed. As it
was too late an hour to repair to the exhibition room, they turned
aside into a piece of waste ground that lay just within the old
town-gate, and drew up there for the night, near to another caravan,
which, notwithstanding that it bore on the lawful panel the great name
of Jarley, and was employed besides in conveying from place to place
the wax-work which was its country’s pride, was designated by a
grovelling stamp-office as a ‘Common Stage Waggon,’ and numbered
too--seven thousand odd hundred--as though its precious freight were
mere flour or coals!
This ill-used machine being empty (for it had deposited its burden at
the place of exhibition, and lingered here until its services were
again required) was assigned to the old man as his sleeping-place for
the night; and within its wooden walls, Nell made him up the best bed
she could, from the materials at hand. For herself, she was to sleep
in Mrs Jarley’s own travelling-carriage, as a signal mark of that
lady’s favour and confidence.
She had taken leave of her grandfather and was returning to the other
waggon, when she was tempted by the coolness of the night to linger for
a little while in the air. The moon was shining down upon the old
gateway of the town, leaving the low archway very black and dark; and
with a mingled sensation of curiosity and fear, she slowly approached
the gate, and stood still to look up at it, wondering to see how dark,
and grim, and old, and cold, it looked.
There was an empty niche from which some old statue had fallen or been
carried away hundreds of years ago, and she was thinking what strange
people it must have looked down upon when it stood there, and how many
hard struggles might have taken place, and how many murders might have
been done, upon that silent spot, when there suddenly emerged from the
black shade of the arch, a man. The instant he appeared, she
recognised him--Who could have failed to recognise, in that instant,
the ugly misshapen Quilp!
The street beyond was so narrow, and the shadow of the houses on one
side of the way so deep, that he seemed to have risen out of the earth.
But there he was. The child withdrew into a dark corner, and saw him
pass close to her. He had a stick in his hand, and, when he had got
clear of the shadow of the gateway, he leant upon it, looked
back--directly, as it seemed, towards where she stood--and beckoned.
To her? oh no, thank God, not to her; for as she stood, in an
extremity of fear, hesitating whether to scream for help, or come from
her hiding-place and fly, before he should draw nearer, there issued
slowly forth from the arch another figure--that of a boy--who carried
on his back a trunk.
‘Faster, sirrah!’ cried Quilp, looking up at the old gateway, and
showing in the moonlight like some monstrous image that had come down
from its niche and was casting a backward glance at its old house,
‘faster!’
‘It’s a dreadful heavy load, Sir,’ the boy pleaded. ‘I’ve come on very
fast, considering.’
‘_You_ have come fast, considering!’ retorted Quilp; ‘you creep, you dog,
you crawl, you measure distance like a worm. There are the chimes now,
half-past twelve.’
He stopped to listen, and then turning upon the boy with a suddenness
and ferocity that made him start, asked at what hour that London coach
passed the corner of the road. The boy replied, at one.
‘Come on then,’ said Quilp, ‘or I shall be too late. Faster--do you
hear me? Faster.’
The boy made all the speed he could, and Quilp led onward, constantly
turning back to threaten him, and urge him to greater haste. Nell did
not dare to move until they were out of sight and hearing, and then
hurried to where she had left her grandfather, feeling as if the very
passing of the dwarf so near him must have filled him with alarm and
terror. But he was sleeping soundly, and she softly withdrew.
As she was making her way to her own bed, she determined to say nothing
of this adventure, as upon whatever errand the dwarf had come (and she
feared it must have been in search of them) it was clear by his inquiry
about the London coach that he was on his way homeward, and as he had
passed through that place, it was but reasonable to suppose that they
were safer from his inquiries there, than they could be elsewhere.
These reflections did not remove her own alarm, for she had been too
much terrified to be easily composed, and felt as if she were hemmed in
by a legion of Quilps, and the very air itself were filled with them.
The delight of the Nobility and Gentry and the patronised of Royalty
had, by some process of self-abridgment known only to herself, got into
her travelling bed, where she was snoring peacefully, while the large
bonnet, carefully disposed upon the drum, was revealing its glories by
the light of a dim lamp that swung from the roof. The child’s bed was
already made upon the floor, and it was a great comfort to her to hear
the steps removed as soon as she had entered, and to know that all easy
communication between persons outside and the brass knocker was by this
means effectually prevented. Certain guttural sounds, too, which from
time to time ascended through the floor of the caravan, and a rustling
of straw in the same direction, apprised her that the driver was
couched upon the ground beneath, and gave her an additional feeling of
security.
Notwithstanding these protections, she could get none but broken sleep
by fits and starts all night, for fear of Quilp, who throughout her
uneasy dreams was somehow connected with the wax-work, or was wax-work
himself, or was Mrs Jarley and wax-work too, or was himself, Mrs
Jarley, wax-work, and a barrel organ all in one, and yet not exactly
any of them either. At length, towards break of day, that deep sleep
came upon her which succeeds to weariness and over-watching, and which
has no consciousness but one of overpowering and irresistible enjoyment.
CHAPTER 28
Sleep hung upon the eyelids of the child so long, that, when she awoke,
Mrs Jarley was already decorated with her large bonnet, and actively
engaged in preparing breakfast. She received Nell’s apology for being
so late with perfect good humour, and said that she should not have
roused her if she had slept on until noon.
‘Because it does you good,’ said the lady of the caravan, ‘when you’re
tired, to sleep as long as ever you can, and get the fatigue quite off;
and that’s another blessing of your time of life--you can sleep so very
sound.’
‘Have you had a bad night, ma’am?’ asked Nell.
‘I seldom have anything else, child,’ replied Mrs Jarley, with the air
of a martyr. ‘I sometimes wonder how I bear it.’
Remembering the snores which had proceeded from that cleft in the
caravan in which the proprietress of the wax-work passed the night,
Nell rather thought she must have been dreaming of lying awake.
However, she expressed herself very sorry to hear such a dismal account
of her state of health, and shortly afterwards sat down with her
grandfather and Mrs Jarley to breakfast. The meal finished, Nell
assisted to wash the cups and saucers, and put them in their proper
places, and these household duties performed, Mrs Jarley arrayed
herself in an exceedingly bright shawl for the purpose of making a
progress through the streets of the town.
‘The wan will come on to bring the boxes,’ said Mrs Jarley, and you had
better come in it, child. I am obliged to walk, very much against my
will; but the people expect it of me, and public characters can’t be
their own masters and mistresses in such matters as these. How do I
look, child?’
Nell returned a satisfactory reply, and Mrs Jarley, after sticking a
great many pins into various parts of her figure, and making several
abortive attempts to obtain a full view of her own back, was at last
satisfied with her appearance, and went forth majestically.
The caravan followed at no great distance. As it went jolting through
the streets, Nell peeped from the window, curious to see in what kind
of place they were, and yet fearful of encountering at every turn the
dreaded face of Quilp. It was a pretty large town, with an open square
which they were crawling slowly across, and in the middle of which was
the Town-Hall, with a clock-tower and a weather-cock. There were
houses of stone, houses of red brick, houses of yellow brick, houses of
lath and plaster; and houses of wood, many of them very old, with
withered faces carved upon the beams, and staring down into the street.
These had very little winking windows, and low-arched doors, and, in
some of the narrower ways, quite overhung the pavement. The streets
were very clean, very sunny, very empty, and very dull. A few idle men
lounged about the two inns, and the empty market-place, and the
tradesmen’s doors, and some old people were dozing in chairs outside an
alms-house wall; but scarcely any passengers who seemed bent on going
anywhere, or to have any object in view, went by; and if perchance some
straggler did, his footsteps echoed on the hot bright pavement for
minutes afterwards. Nothing seemed to be going on but the clocks, and
they had such drowzy faces, such heavy lazy hands, and such cracked
voices that they surely must have been too slow. The very dogs were
all asleep, and the flies, drunk with moist sugar in the grocer’s shop,
forgot their wings and briskness, and baked to death in dusty corners
of the window.
Rumbling along with most unwonted noise, the caravan stopped at last at
the place of exhibition, where Nell dismounted amidst an admiring group
of children, who evidently supposed her to be an important item of the
curiosities, and were fully impressed with the belief that her
grandfather was a cunning device in wax. The chests were taken out
with all convenient despatch, and taken in to be unlocked by Mrs
Jarley, who, attended by George and another man in velveteen shorts and
a drab hat ornamented with turnpike tickets, were waiting to dispose
their contents (consisting of red festoons and other ornamental devices
in upholstery work) to the best advantage in the decoration of the room.
They all got to work without loss of time, and very busy they were. As
the stupendous collection were yet concealed by cloths, lest the
envious dust should injure their complexions, Nell bestirred herself to
assist in the embellishment of the room, in which her grandfather also
was of great service. The two men being well used to it, did a great
deal in a short time; and Mrs Jarley served out the tin tacks from a
linen pocket like a toll-collector’s which she wore for the purpose,
and encouraged her assistants to renewed exertion.
While they were thus employed, a tallish gentleman with a hook nose and
black hair, dressed in a military surtout very short and tight in the
sleeves, and which had once been frogged and braided all over, but was
now sadly shorn of its garniture and quite threadbare--dressed too in
ancient grey pantaloons fitting tight to the leg, and a pair of pumps
in the winter of their existence--looked in at the door and smiled
affably. Mrs Jarley’s back being then towards him, the military
gentleman shook his forefinger as a sign that her myrmidons were not to
apprise her of his presence, and stealing up close behind her, tapped
her on the neck, and cried playfully ‘Boh!’
‘What, Mr Slum!’ cried the lady of the wax-work. ‘Lot! who’d have
thought of seeing you here!’
‘’Pon my soul and honour,’ said Mr Slum, ‘that’s a good remark. ‘Pon
my soul and honour that’s a wise remark. Who would have thought it!
George, my faithful feller, how are you?’
George received this advance with a surly indifference, observing that
he was well enough for the matter of that, and hammering lustily all
the time.
‘I came here,’ said the military gentleman turning to Mrs Jarley--‘’pon
my soul and honour I hardly know what I came here for. It would
puzzle me to tell you, it would by Gad. I wanted a little inspiration,
a little freshening up, a little change of ideas, and-- ‘Pon my soul
and honour,’ said the military gentleman, checking himself and looking
round the room, ‘what a devilish classical thing this is! by Gad, it’s
quite Minervian.’
‘It’ll look well enough when it comes to be finished,’ observed Mrs
Jarley.
‘Well enough!’ said Mr Slum. ‘Will you believe me when I say it’s the
delight of my life to have dabbled in poetry, when I think I’ve
exercised my pen upon this charming theme? By the way--any orders? Is
there any little thing I can do for you?’
‘It comes so very expensive, sir,’ replied Mrs Jarley, ‘and I really
don’t think it does much good.’
‘Hush! No, no!’ returned Mr Slum, elevating his hand. ‘No fibs. I’ll
not hear it. Don’t say it don’t do good. Don’t say it. I know
better!’
‘I don’t think it does,’ said Mrs Jarley.
‘Ha, ha!’ cried Mr Slum, ‘you’re giving way, you’re coming down. Ask
the perfumers, ask the blacking-makers, ask the hatters, ask the old
lottery-office-keepers--ask any man among ‘em what my poetry has done
for him, and mark my words, he blesses the name of Slum. If he’s an
honest man, he raises his eyes to heaven, and blesses the name of
Slum--mark that! You are acquainted with Westminster Abbey, Mrs
Jarley?’
‘Yes, surely.’
‘Then upon my soul and honour, ma’am, you’ll find in a certain angle of
that dreary pile, called Poets’ Corner, a few smaller names than Slum,’
retorted that gentleman, tapping himself expressively on the forehead
to imply that there was some slight quantity of brain behind it. ‘I’ve
got a little trifle here, now,’ said Mr Slum, taking off his hat which
was full of scraps of paper, ‘a little trifle here, thrown off in the
heat of the moment, which I should say was exactly the thing you wanted
to set this place on fire with. It’s an acrostic--the name at this
moment is Warren, and the idea’s a convertible one, and a positive
inspiration for Jarley. Have the acrostic.’
‘I suppose it’s very dear,’ said Mrs Jarley.
‘Five shillings,’ returned Mr Slum, using his pencil as a toothpick.
‘Cheaper than any prose.’
‘I couldn’t give more than three,’ said Mrs Jarley.
‘--And six,’ retorted Slum. ‘Come. Three-and-six.’
Mrs Jarley was not proof against the poet’s insinuating manner, and Mr
Slum entered the order in a small note-book as a three-and-sixpenny
one. Mr Slum then withdrew to alter the acrostic, after taking a most
affectionate leave of his patroness, and promising to return, as soon
as he possibly could, with a fair copy for the printer.
As his presence had not interfered with or interrupted the
preparations, they were now far advanced, and were completed shortly
after his departure. When the festoons were all put up as tastily as
they might be, the stupendous collection was uncovered, and there were
displayed, on a raised platform some two feet from the floor, running
round the room and parted from the rude public by a crimson rope breast
high, divers sprightly effigies of celebrated characters, singly and in
groups, clad in glittering dresses of various climes and times, and
standing more or less unsteadily upon their legs, with their eyes very
wide open, and their nostrils very much inflated, and the muscles of
their legs and arms very strongly developed, and all their countenances
expressing great surprise. All the gentlemen were very pigeon-breasted
and very blue about the beards; and all the ladies were miraculous
figures; and all the ladies and all the gentlemen were looking
intensely nowhere, and staring with extraordinary earnestness at
nothing.
When Nell had exhausted her first raptures at this glorious sight, Mrs
Jarley ordered the room to be cleared of all but herself and the child,
and, sitting herself down in an arm-chair in the centre, formally
invested Nell with a willow wand, long used by herself for pointing out
the characters, and was at great pains to instruct her in her duty.
‘That,’ said Mrs Jarley in her exhibition tone, as Nell touched a
figure at the beginning of the platform, ‘is an unfortunate Maid of
Honour in the Time of Queen Elizabeth, who died from pricking her
finger in consequence of working upon a Sunday. Observe the blood
which is trickling from her finger; also the gold-eyed needle of the
period, with which she is at work.’
All this, Nell repeated twice or thrice: pointing to the finger and the
needle at the right times: and then passed on to the next.
‘That, ladies and gentlemen,’ said Mrs Jarley, ‘is Jasper Packlemerton
of atrocious memory, who courted and married fourteen wives, and
destroyed them all, by tickling the soles of their feet when they were
sleeping in the consciousness of innocence and virtue. On being
brought to the scaffold and asked if he was sorry for what he had done,
he replied yes, he was sorry for having let ‘em off so easy, and hoped
all Christian husbands would pardon him the offence. Let this be a
warning to all young ladies to be particular in the character of the
gentlemen of their choice. Observe that his fingers are curled as if
in the act of tickling, and that his face is represented with a wink,
as he appeared when committing his barbarous murders.’
When Nell knew all about Mr Packlemerton, and could say it without
faltering, Mrs Jarley passed on to the fat man, and then to the thin
man, the tall man, the short man, the old lady who died of dancing at a
hundred and thirty-two, the wild boy of the woods, the woman who
poisoned fourteen families with pickled walnuts, and other historical
characters and interesting but misguided individuals. And so well did
Nell profit by her instructions, and so apt was she to remember them,
that by the time they had been shut up together for a couple of hours,
she was in full possession of the history of the whole establishment,
and perfectly competent to the enlightenment of visitors.
Mrs Jarley was not slow to express her admiration at this happy result,
and carried her young friend and pupil to inspect the remaining
arrangements within doors, by virtue of which the passage had been
already converted into a grove of green-baize hung with the inscription
she had already seen (Mr Slum’s productions), and a highly ornamented
table placed at the upper end for Mrs Jarley herself, at which she was
to preside and take the money, in company with his Majesty King George
the Third, Mr Grimaldi as clown, Mary Queen of Scots, an anonymous
gentleman of the Quaker persuasion, and Mr Pitt holding in his hand a
correct model of the bill for the imposition of the window duty. The
preparations without doors had not been neglected either; a nun of
great personal attractions was telling her beads on the little portico
over the door; and a brigand with the blackest possible head of hair,
and the clearest possible complexion, was at that moment going round
the town in a cart, consulting the miniature of a lady.
It now only remained that Mr Slum’s compositions should be judiciously
distributed; that the pathetic effusions should find their way to all
private houses and tradespeople; and that the parody commencing ‘If I
know’d a donkey,’ should be confined to the taverns, and circulated
only among the lawyers’ clerks and choice spirits of the place. When
this had been done, and Mrs Jarley had waited upon the boarding-schools
in person, with a handbill composed expressly for them, in which it was
distinctly proved that wax-work refined the mind, cultivated the taste,
and enlarged the sphere of the human understanding, that indefatigable
lady sat down to dinner, and drank out of the suspicious bottle to a
flourishing campaign.
CHAPTER 29
Unquestionably Mrs Jarley had an inventive genius. In the midst of the
various devices for attracting visitors to the exhibition, little Nell
was not forgotten. The light cart in which the Brigand usually made
his perambulations being gaily dressed with flags and streamers, and
the Brigand placed therein, contemplating the miniature of his beloved
as usual, Nell was accommodated with a seat beside him, decorated with
artificial flowers, and in this state and ceremony rode slowly through
the town every morning, dispersing handbills from a basket, to the
sound of drum and trumpet. The beauty of the child, coupled with her
gentle and timid bearing, produced quite a sensation in the little
country place. The Brigand, heretofore a source of exclusive interest
in the streets, became a mere secondary consideration, and to be
important only as a part of the show of which she was the chief
attraction. Grown-up folks began to be interested in the bright-eyed
girl, and some score of little boys fell desperately in love, and
constantly left enclosures of nuts and apples, directed in small-text,
at the wax-work door.
This desirable impression was not lost on Mrs Jarley, who, lest Nell
should become too cheap, soon sent the Brigand out alone again, and
kept her in the exhibition room, where she described the figures every
half-hour to the great satisfaction of admiring audiences. And these
audiences were of a very superior description, including a great many
young ladies’ boarding-schools, whose favour Mrs Jarley had been at
great pains to conciliate, by altering the face and costume of Mr
Grimaldi as clown to represent Mr Lindley Murray as he appeared when
engaged in the composition of his English Grammar, and turning a
murderess of great renown into Mrs Hannah More--both of which
likenesses were admitted by Miss Monflathers, who was at the head of
the head Boarding and Day Establishment in the town, and who
condescended to take a Private View with eight chosen young ladies, to
be quite startling from their extreme correctness. Mr Pitt in a
nightcap and bedgown, and without his boots, represented the poet
Cowper with perfect exactness; and Mary Queen of Scots in a dark wig,
white shirt-collar, and male attire, was such a complete image of Lord
Byron that the young ladies quite screamed when they saw it. Miss
Monflathers, however, rebuked this enthusiasm, and took occasion to
reprove Mrs Jarley for not keeping her collection more select:
observing that His Lordship had held certain opinions quite
incompatible with wax-work honours, and adding something about a Dean
and Chapter, which Mrs Jarley did not understand.
Although her duties were sufficiently laborious, Nell found in the lady
of the caravan a very kind and considerate person, who had not only a
peculiar relish for being comfortable herself, but for making everybody
about her comfortable also; which latter taste, it may be remarked, is,
even in persons who live in much finer places than caravans, a far more
rare and uncommon one than the first, and is not by any means its
necessary consequence. As her popularity procured her various little
fees from the visitors on which her patroness never demanded any toll,
and as her grandfather too was well-treated and useful, she had no
cause of anxiety in connexion with the wax-work, beyond that which
sprung from her recollection of Quilp, and her fears that he might
return and one day suddenly encounter them.
Quilp indeed was a perpetual night-mare to the child, who was
constantly haunted by a vision of his ugly face and stunted figure.
She slept, for their better security, in the room where the wax-work
figures were, and she never retired to this place at night but she
tortured herself--she could not help it--with imagining a resemblance,
in some one or other of their death-like faces, to the dwarf, and this
fancy would sometimes so gain upon her that she would almost believe he
had removed the figure and stood within the clothes. Then there were
so many of them with their great glassy eyes--and, as they stood one
behind the other all about her bed, they looked so like living
creatures, and yet so unlike in their grim stillness and silence, that
she had a kind of terror of them for their own sakes, and would often
lie watching their dusky figures until she was obliged to rise and
light a candle, or go and sit at the open window and feel a
companionship in the bright stars. At these times, she would recall
the old house and the window at which she used to sit alone; and then
she would think of poor Kit and all his kindness, until the tears came
into her eyes, and she would weep and smile together.
Often and anxiously at this silent hour, her thoughts reverted to her
grandfather, and she would wonder how much he remembered of their
former life, and whether he was ever really mindful of the change in
their condition and of their late helplessness and destitution. When
they were wandering about, she seldom thought of this, but now she
could not help considering what would become of them if he fell sick,
or her own strength were to fail her. He was very patient and willing,
happy to execute any little task, and glad to be of use; but he was in
the same listless state, with no prospect of improvement--a mere
child--a poor, thoughtless, vacant creature--a harmless fond old man,
susceptible of tender love and regard for her, and of pleasant and
painful impressions, but alive to nothing more. It made her very sad
to know that this was so--so sad to see it that sometimes when he sat
idly by, smiling and nodding to her when she looked round, or when he
caressed some little child and carried it to and fro, as he was fond of
doing by the hour together, perplexed by its simple questions, yet
patient under his own infirmity, and seeming almost conscious of it
too, and humbled even before the mind of an infant--so sad it made her
to see him thus, that she would burst into tears, and, withdrawing into
some secret place, fall down upon her knees and pray that he might be
restored.
But, the bitterness of her grief was not in beholding him in this
condition, when he was at least content and tranquil, nor in her
solitary meditations on his altered state, though these were trials for
a young heart. Cause for deeper and heavier sorrow was yet to come.
One evening, a holiday night with them, Nell and her grandfather went
out to walk. They had been rather closely confined for some days, and
the weather being warm, they strolled a long distance. Clear of the
town, they took a footpath which struck through some pleasant fields,
judging that it would terminate in the road they quitted and enable
them to return that way. It made, however, a much wider circuit than
they had supposed, and thus they were tempted onward until sunset, when
they reached the track of which they were in search, and stopped to
rest.
It had been gradually getting overcast, and now the sky was dark and
lowering, save where the glory of the departing sun piled up masses of
gold and burning fire, decaying embers of which gleamed here and there
through the black veil, and shone redly down upon the earth. The wind
began to moan in hollow murmurs, as the sun went down carrying glad day
elsewhere; and a train of dull clouds coming up against it, menaced
thunder and lightning. Large drops of rain soon began to fall, and, as
the storm clouds came sailing onward, others supplied the void they
left behind and spread over all the sky. Then was heard the low
rumbling of distant thunder, then the lightning quivered, and then the
darkness of an hour seemed to have gathered in an instant.
Fearful of taking shelter beneath a tree or hedge, the old man and the
child hurried along the high road, hoping to find some house in which
they could seek a refuge from the storm, which had now burst forth in
earnest, and every moment increased in violence. Drenched with the
pelting rain, confused by the deafening thunder, and bewildered by the
glare of the forked lightning, they would have passed a solitary house
without being aware of its vicinity, had not a man, who was standing at
the door, called lustily to them to enter.
‘Your ears ought to be better than other folks’ at any rate, if you
make so little of the chance of being struck blind,’ he said,
retreating from the door and shading his eyes with his hands as the
jagged lightning came again. ‘What were you going past for, eh?’ he
added, as he closed the door and led the way along a passage to a room
behind.
‘We didn’t see the house, sir, till we heard you calling,’ Nell replied.
‘No wonder,’ said the man, ‘with this lightning in one’s eyes,
by-the-by. You had better stand by the fire here, and dry yourselves a
bit. You can call for what you like if you want anything. If you
don’t want anything, you are not obliged to give an order. Don’t be
afraid of that. This is a public-house, that’s all. The Valiant
Soldier is pretty well known hereabouts.’
‘Is this house called the Valiant Soldier, Sir?’ asked Nell.
‘I thought everybody knew that,’ replied the landlord. ‘Where have you
come from, if you don’t know the Valiant Soldier as well as the church
catechism? This is the Valiant Soldier, by James Groves--Jem
Groves--honest Jem Groves, as is a man of unblemished moral character,
and has a good dry skittle-ground. If any man has got anything to say
again Jem Groves, let him say it TO Jem Groves, and Jem Groves can
accommodate him with a customer on any terms from four pound a side to
forty.
With these words, the speaker tapped himself on the waistcoat to
intimate that he was the Jem Groves so highly eulogized; sparred
scientifically at a counterfeit Jem Groves, who was sparring at society
in general from a black frame over the chimney-piece; and, applying a
half-emptied glass of spirits and water to his lips, drank Jem Groves’s
health.
The night being warm, there was a large screen drawn across the room,
for a barrier against the heat of the fire. It seemed as if somebody
on the other side of this screen had been insinuating doubts of Mr
Groves’s prowess, and had thereby given rise to these egotistical
expressions, for Mr Groves wound up his defiance by giving a loud knock
upon it with his knuckles and pausing for a reply from the other side.
‘There an’t many men,’ said Mr Groves, no answer being returned, ‘who
would ventur’ to cross Jem Groves under his own roof. There’s only one
man, I know, that has nerve enough for that, and that man’s not a
hundred mile from here neither. But he’s worth a dozen men, and I let
him say of me whatever he likes in consequence--he knows that.’
In return for this complimentary address, a very gruff hoarse voice
bade Mr Groves ‘hold his noise and light a candle.’ And the same voice
remarked that the same gentleman ‘needn’t waste his breath in brag, for
most people knew pretty well what sort of stuff he was made of.’
‘Nell, they’re--they’re playing cards,’ whispered the old man, suddenly
interested. ‘Don’t you hear them?’
‘Look sharp with that candle,’ said the voice; ‘it’s as much as I can
do to see the pips on the cards as it is; and get this shutter closed
as quick as you can, will you? Your beer will be the worse for
to-night’s thunder I expect.--Game! Seven-and-sixpence to me, old
Isaac. Hand over.’
‘Do you hear, Nell, do you hear them?’ whispered the old man again,
with increased earnestness, as the money chinked upon the table.
‘I haven’t seen such a storm as this,’ said a sharp cracked voice of
most disagreeable quality, when a tremendous peal of thunder had died
away, ‘since the night when old Luke Withers won thirteen times running
on the red. We all said he had the Devil’s luck and his own, and as it
was the kind of night for the Devil to be out and busy, I suppose he
was looking over his shoulder, if anybody could have seen him.’
‘Ah!’ returned the gruff voice; ‘for all old Luke’s winning through
thick and thin of late years, I remember the time when he was the
unluckiest and unfortunatest of men. He never took a dice-box in his
hand, or held a card, but he was plucked, pigeoned, and cleaned out
completely.’
‘Do you hear what he says?’ whispered the old man. ‘Do you hear that,
Nell?’
The child saw with astonishment and alarm that his whole appearance had
undergone a complete change. His face was flushed and eager, his eyes
were strained, his teeth set, his breath came short and thick, and the
hand he laid upon her arm trembled so violently that she shook beneath
its grasp.
‘Bear witness,’ he muttered, looking upward, ‘that I always said it;
that I knew it, dreamed of it, felt it was the truth, and that it must
be so! What money have we, Nell? Come! I saw you with money
yesterday. What money have we? Give it to me.’
‘No, no, let me keep it, grandfather,’ said the frightened child. ‘Let
us go away from here. Do not mind the rain. Pray let us go.’
‘Give it to me, I say,’ returned the old man fiercely. ‘Hush, hush,
don’t cry, Nell. If I spoke sharply, dear, I didn’t mean it. It’s for
thy good. I have wronged thee, Nell, but I will right thee yet, I will
indeed. Where is the money?’
‘Do not take it,’ said the child. ‘Pray do not take it, dear. For
both our sakes let me keep it, or let me throw it away--better let me
throw it away, than you take it now. Let us go; do let us go.’
‘Give me the money,’ returned the old man, ‘I must have it.
There--there--that’s my dear Nell. I’ll right thee one day, child,
I’ll right thee, never fear!’
She took from her pocket a little purse. He seized it with the same
rapid impatience which had characterised his speech, and hastily made
his way to the other side of the screen. It was impossible to restrain
him, and the trembling child followed close behind.
The landlord had placed a light upon the table, and was engaged in
drawing the curtain of the window. The speakers whom they had heard
were two men, who had a pack of cards and some silver money between
them, while upon the screen itself the games they had played were
scored in chalk. The man with the rough voice was a burly fellow of
middle age, with large black whiskers, broad cheeks, a coarse wide
mouth, and bull neck, which was pretty freely displayed as his shirt
collar was only confined by a loose red neckerchief. He wore his hat,
which was of a brownish-white, and had beside him a thick knotted
stick. The other man, whom his companion had called Isaac, was of a
more slender figure--stooping, and high in the shoulders--with a very
ill-favoured face, and a most sinister and villainous squint.
‘Now old gentleman,’ said Isaac, looking round. ‘Do you know either of
us? This side of the screen is private, sir.’
‘No offence, I hope,’ returned the old man.
‘But by G--, sir, there is offence,’ said the other, interrupting him,
‘when you intrude yourself upon a couple of gentlemen who are
particularly engaged.’
‘I had no intention to offend,’ said the old man, looking anxiously at
the cards. ‘I thought that--’
‘But you had no right to think, sir,’ retorted the other. ‘What the
devil has a man at your time of life to do with thinking?’
‘Now bully boy,’ said the stout man, raising his eyes from his cards
for the first time, ‘can’t you let him speak?’
The landlord, who had apparently resolved to remain neutral until he
knew which side of the question the stout man would espouse, chimed in
at this place with ‘Ah, to be sure, can’t you let him speak, Isaac
List?’
‘Can’t I let him speak,’ sneered Isaac in reply, mimicking as nearly as
he could, in his shrill voice, the tones of the landlord. ‘Yes, I can
let him speak, Jemmy Groves.’
‘Well then, do it, will you?’ said the landlord.
Mr List’s squint assumed a portentous character, which seemed to
threaten a prolongation of this controversy, when his companion, who
had been looking sharply at the old man, put a timely stop to it.
‘Who knows,’ said he, with a cunning look, ‘but the gentleman may have
civilly meant to ask if he might have the honour to take a hand with
us!’
‘I did mean it,’ cried the old man. ‘That is what I mean. That is
what I want now!’
‘I thought so,’ returned the same man. ‘Then who knows but the
gentleman, anticipating our objection to play for love, civilly desired
to play for money?’
The old man replied by shaking the little purse in his eager hand, and
then throwing it down upon the table, and gathering up the cards as a
miser would clutch at gold.
‘Oh! That indeed,’ said Isaac; ‘if that’s what the gentleman meant, I
beg the gentleman’s pardon. Is this the gentleman’s little purse? A
very pretty little purse. Rather a light purse,’ added Isaac, throwing
it into the air and catching it dexterously, ‘but enough to amuse a
gentleman for half an hour or so.’
‘We’ll make a four-handed game of it, and take in Groves,’ said the
stout man. ‘Come, Jemmy.’
The landlord, who conducted himself like one who was well used to such
little parties, approached the table and took his seat. The child, in
a perfect agony, drew her grandfather aside, and implored him, even
then, to come away.
‘Come; and we may be so happy,’ said the child.
‘We WILL be happy,’ replied the old man hastily. ‘Let me go, Nell.
The means of happiness are on the cards and the dice. We must rise
from little winnings to great. There’s little to be won here; but
great will come in time. I shall but win back my own, and it’s all for
thee, my darling.’
‘God help us!’ cried the child. ‘Oh! what hard fortune brought us
here?’
‘Hush!’ rejoined the old man laying his hand upon her mouth, ‘Fortune
will not bear chiding. We must not reproach her, or she shuns us; I
have found that out.’
‘Now, mister,’ said the stout man. ‘If you’re not coming yourself,
give us the cards, will you?’
‘I am coming,’ cried the old man. ‘Sit thee down, Nell, sit thee down
and look on. Be of good heart, it’s all for thee--all--every penny.
I don’t tell them, no, no, or else they wouldn’t play, dreading the
chance that such a cause must give me. Look at them. See what they
are and what thou art. Who doubts that we must win!’
‘The gentleman has thought better of it, and isn’t coming,’ said Isaac,
making as though he would rise from the table. ‘I’m sorry the
gentleman’s daunted--nothing venture, nothing have--but the gentleman
knows best.’
‘Why I am ready. You have all been slow but me,’ said the old man. ‘I
wonder who is more anxious to begin than I.’
As he spoke he drew a chair to the table; and the other three closing
round it at the same time, the game commenced.
The child sat by, and watched its progress with a troubled mind.
Regardless of the run of luck, and mindful only of the desperate
passion which had its hold upon her grandfather, losses and gains were
to her alike. Exulting in some brief triumph, or cast down by a
defeat, there he sat so wild and restless, so feverishly and intensely
anxious, so terribly eager, so ravenous for the paltry stakes, that she
could have almost better borne to see him dead. And yet she was the
innocent cause of all this torture, and he, gambling with such a savage
thirst for gain as the most insatiable gambler never felt, had not one
selfish thought!
On the contrary, the other three--knaves and gamesters by their
trade--while intent upon their game, were yet as cool and quiet as if
every virtue had been centered in their breasts. Sometimes one would
look up to smile to another, or to snuff the feeble candle, or to
glance at the lightning as it shot through the open window and
fluttering curtain, or to listen to some louder peal of thunder than
the rest, with a kind of momentary impatience, as if it put him out;
but there they sat, with a calm indifference to everything but their
cards, perfect philosophers in appearance, and with no greater show of
passion or excitement than if they had been made of stone.
The storm had raged for full three hours; the lightning had grown
fainter and less frequent; the thunder, from seeming to roll and break
above their heads, had gradually died away into a deep hoarse distance;
and still the game went on, and still the anxious child was quite
forgotten.
CHAPTER 30
At length the play came to an end, and Mr Isaac List rose the only
winner. Mat and the landlord bore their losses with professional
fortitude. Isaac pocketed his gains with the air of a man who had
quite made up his mind to win, all along, and was neither surprised nor
pleased.
Nell’s little purse was exhausted; but although it lay empty by his
side, and the other players had now risen from the table, the old man
sat poring over the cards, dealing them as they had been dealt before,
and turning up the different hands to see what each man would have held
if they had still been playing. He was quite absorbed in this
occupation, when the child drew near and laid her hand upon his
shoulder, telling him it was near midnight.
‘See the curse of poverty, Nell,’ he said, pointing to the packs he had
spread out upon the table. ‘If I could have gone on a little longer,
only a little longer, the luck would have turned on my side. Yes, it’s
as plain as the marks upon the cards. See here--and there--and here
again.’
‘Put them away,’ urged the child. ‘Try to forget them.’
‘Try to forget them!’ he rejoined, raising his haggard face to hers,
and regarding her with an incredulous stare. ‘To forget them! How are
we ever to grow rich if I forget them?’
The child could only shake her head.
‘No, no, Nell,’ said the old man, patting her cheek; ‘they must not be
forgotten. We must make amends for this as soon as we can.
Patience--patience, and we’ll right thee yet, I promise thee. Lose
to-day, win to-morrow. And nothing can be won without anxiety and
care--nothing. Come, I am ready.’
‘Do you know what the time is?’ said Mr Groves, who was smoking with
his friends. ‘Past twelve o’clock--’
‘--And a rainy night,’ added the stout man.
‘The Valiant Soldier, by James Groves. Good beds. Cheap entertainment
for man and beast,’ said Mr Groves, quoting his sign-board. ‘Half-past
twelve o’clock.’
‘It’s very late,’ said the uneasy child. ‘I wish we had gone before.
What will they think of us! It will be two o’clock by the time we get
back. What would it cost, sir, if we stopped here?’
‘Two good beds, one-and-sixpence; supper and beer one shilling; total
two shillings and sixpence,’ replied the Valiant Soldier.
Now, Nell had still the piece of gold sewn in her dress; and when she
came to consider the lateness of the hour, and the somnolent habits of
Mrs Jarley, and to imagine the state of consternation in which they
would certainly throw that good lady by knocking her up in the middle
of the night--and when she reflected, on the other hand, that if they
remained where they were, and rose early in the morning, they might get
back before she awoke, and could plead the violence of the storm by
which they had been overtaken, as a good apology for their absence--she
decided, after a great deal of hesitation, to remain. She therefore
took her grandfather aside, and telling him that she had still enough
left to defray the cost of their lodging, proposed that they should
stay there for the night.
‘If I had had but that money before--If I had only known of it a few
minutes ago!’ muttered the old man.
‘We will decide to stop here if you please,’ said Nell, turning hastily
to the landlord.
‘I think that’s prudent,’ returned Mr Groves. ‘You shall have your
suppers directly.’
Accordingly, when Mr Groves had smoked his pipe out, knocked out the
ashes, and placed it carefully in a corner of the fire-place, with the
bowl downwards, he brought in the bread and cheese, and beer, with many
high encomiums upon their excellence, and bade his guests fall to, and
make themselves at home. Nell and her grandfather ate sparingly, for
both were occupied with their own reflections; the other gentlemen, for
whose constitutions beer was too weak and tame a liquid, consoled
themselves with spirits and tobacco.
As they would leave the house very early in the morning, the child was
anxious to pay for their entertainment before they retired to bed. But
as she felt the necessity of concealing her little hoard from her
grandfather, and had to change the piece of gold, she took it secretly
from its place of concealment, and embraced an opportunity of following
the landlord when he went out of the room, and tendered it to him in
the little bar.
‘Will you give me the change here, if you please?’ said the child.
Mr James Groves was evidently surprised, and looked at the money, and
rang it, and looked at the child, and at the money again, as though he
had a mind to inquire how she came by it. The coin being genuine,
however, and changed at his house, he probably felt, like a wise
landlord, that it was no business of his. At any rate, he counted out
the change, and gave it her. The child was returning to the room where
they had passed the evening, when she fancied she saw a figure just
gliding in at the door. There was nothing but a long dark passage
between this door and the place where she had changed the money, and,
being very certain that no person had passed in or out while she stood
there, the thought struck her that she had been watched.
But by whom? When she re-entered the room, she found its inmates
exactly as she had left them. The stout fellow lay upon two chairs,
resting his head on his hand, and the squinting man reposed in a
similar attitude on the opposite side of the table. Between them sat
her grandfather, looking intently at the winner with a kind of hungry
admiration, and hanging upon his words as if he were some superior
being. She was puzzled for a moment, and looked round to see if any
else were there. No. Then she asked her grandfather in a whisper
whether anybody had left the room while she was absent. ‘No,’ he said,
‘nobody.’
It must have been her fancy then; and yet it was strange, that, without
anything in her previous thoughts to lead to it, she should have
imagined this figure so very distinctly. She was still wondering and
thinking of it, when a girl came to light her to bed.
The old man took leave of the company at the same time, and they went
up stairs together. It was a great, rambling house, with dull
corridors and wide staircases which the flaring candles seemed to make
more gloomy. She left her grandfather in his chamber, and followed her
guide to another, which was at the end of a passage, and approached by
some half-dozen crazy steps. This was prepared for her. The girl
lingered a little while to talk, and tell her grievances. She had not
a good place, she said; the wages were low, and the work was hard. She
was going to leave it in a fortnight; the child couldn’t recommend her
to another, she supposed? Instead she was afraid another would be
difficult to get after living there, for the house had a very
indifferent character; there was far too much card-playing, and such
like. She was very much mistaken if some of the people who came there
oftenest were quite as honest as they might be, but she wouldn’t have
it known that she had said so, for the world. Then there were some
rambling allusions to a rejected sweetheart, who had threatened to go a
soldiering--a final promise of knocking at the door early in the
morning--and ‘Good night.’
The child did not feel comfortable when she was left alone. She could
not help thinking of the figure stealing through the passage down
stairs; and what the girl had said did not tend to reassure her. The
men were very ill-looking. They might get their living by robbing and
murdering travellers. Who could tell?
Reasoning herself out of these fears, or losing sight of them for a
little while, there came the anxiety to which the adventures of the
night gave rise. Here was the old passion awakened again in her
grandfather’s breast, and to what further distraction it might tempt
him Heaven only knew. What fears their absence might have occasioned
already! Persons might be seeking for them even then. Would they be
forgiven in the morning, or turned adrift again! Oh! why had they
stopped in that strange place? It would have been better, under any
circumstances, to have gone on!
At last, sleep gradually stole upon her--a broken, fitful sleep,
troubled by dreams of falling from high towers, and waking with a start
and in great terror. A deeper slumber followed this--and then--What!
That figure in the room.
A figure was there. Yes, she had drawn up the blind to admit the light
when it should be dawn, and there, between the foot of the bed and the
dark casement, it crouched and slunk along, groping its way with
noiseless hands, and stealing round the bed. She had no voice to cry
for help, no power to move, but lay still, watching it.
On it came--on, silently and stealthily, to the bed’s head. The breath
so near her pillow, that she shrunk back into it, lest those wandering
hands should light upon her face. Back again it stole to the
window--then turned its head towards her.
The dark form was a mere blot upon the lighter darkness of the room,
but she saw the turning of the head, and felt and knew how the eyes
looked and the ears listened. There it remained, motionless as she.
At length, still keeping the face towards her, it busied its hands in
something, and she heard the chink of money.
Then, on it came again, silent and stealthy as before, and replacing
the garments it had taken from the bedside, dropped upon its hands and
knees, and crawled away. How slowly it seemed to move, now that she
could hear but not see it, creeping along the floor! It reached the
door at last, and stood upon its feet. The steps creaked beneath its
noiseless tread, and it was gone.
The first impulse of the child was to fly from the terror of being by
herself in that room--to have somebody by--not to be alone--and then
her power of speech would be restored. With no consciousness of having
moved, she gained the door.
There was the dreadful shadow, pausing at the bottom of the steps.
She could not pass it; she might have done so, perhaps, in the darkness
without being seized, but her blood curdled at the thought. The figure
stood quite still, and so did she; not boldly, but of necessity; for
going back into the room was hardly less terrible than going on.
The rain beat fast and furiously without, and ran down in plashing
streams from the thatched roof. Some summer insect, with no escape
into the air, flew blindly to and fro, beating its body against the
walls and ceiling, and filling the silent place with murmurs. The
figure moved again. The child involuntarily did the same. Once in her
grandfather’s room, she would be safe.
It crept along the passage until it came to the very door she longed so
ardently to reach. The child, in the agony of being so near, had
almost darted forward with the design of bursting into the room and
closing it behind her, when the figure stopped again.
The idea flashed suddenly upon her--what if it entered there, and had a
design upon the old man’s life! She turned faint and sick. It did.
It went in. There was a light inside. The figure was now within the
chamber, and she, still dumb--quite dumb, and almost senseless--stood
looking on.
The door was partly open. Not knowing what she meant to do, but
meaning to preserve him or be killed herself, she staggered forward and
looked in. What sight was that which met her view!
The bed had not been lain on, but was smooth and empty. And at a table
sat the old man himself; the only living creature there; his white face
pinched and sharpened by the greediness which made his eyes unnaturally
bright--counting the money of which his hands had robbed her.
CHAPTER 31
With steps more faltering and unsteady than those with which she had
approached the room, the child withdrew from the door, and groped her
way back to her own chamber. The terror she had lately felt was
nothing compared with that which now oppressed her. No strange robber,
no treacherous host conniving at the plunder of his guests, or stealing
to their beds to kill them in their sleep, no nightly prowler, however
terrible and cruel, could have awakened in her bosom half the dread
which the recognition of her silent visitor inspired. The grey-headed
old man gliding like a ghost into her room and acting the thief while
he supposed her fast asleep, then bearing off his prize and hanging
over it with the ghastly exultation she had witnessed, was
worse--immeasurably worse, and far more dreadful, for the moment, to
reflect upon--than anything her wildest fancy could have suggested.
If he should return--there was no lock or bolt upon the door, and if,
distrustful of having left some money yet behind, he should come back
to seek for more--a vague awe and horror surrounded the idea of his
slinking in again with stealthy tread, and turning his face toward the
empty bed, while she shrank down close at his feet to avoid his touch,
which was almost insupportable. She sat and listened. Hark! A
footstep on the stairs, and now the door was slowly opening. It was
but imagination, yet imagination had all the terrors of reality; nay,
it was worse, for the reality would have come and gone, and there an
end, but in imagination it was always coming, and never went away.
The feeling which beset the child was one of dim uncertain horror. She
had no fear of the dear old grandfather, in whose love for her this
disease of the brain had been engendered; but the man she had seen that
night, wrapt in the game of chance, lurking in her room, and counting
the money by the glimmering light, seemed like another creature in his
shape, a monstrous distortion of his image, a something to recoil from,
and be the more afraid of, because it bore a likeness to him, and kept
close about her, as he did. She could scarcely connect her own
affectionate companion, save by his loss, with this old man, so like
yet so unlike him. She had wept to see him dull and quiet. How much
greater cause she had for weeping now!
The child sat watching and thinking of these things, until the phantom
in her mind so increased in gloom and terror, that she felt it would be
a relief to hear the old man’s voice, or, if he were asleep, even to
see him, and banish some of the fears that clustered round his image.
She stole down the stairs and passage again. The door was still ajar
as she had left it, and the candle burning as before.
She had her own candle in her hand, prepared to say, if he were waking,
that she was uneasy and could not rest, and had come to see if his were
still alight. Looking into the room, she saw him lying calmly on his
bed, and so took courage to enter.
Fast asleep. No passion in the face, no avarice, no anxiety, no wild
desire; all gentle, tranquil, and at peace. This was not the gambler,
or the shadow in her room; this was not even the worn and jaded man
whose face had so often met her own in the grey morning light; this was
her dear old friend, her harmless fellow-traveller, her good, kind
grandfather.
She had no fear as she looked upon his slumbering features, but she had
a deep and weighty sorrow, and it found its relief in tears.
‘God bless him!’ said the child, stooping softly to kiss his placid
cheek. ‘I see too well now, that they would indeed part us if they
found us out, and shut him up from the light of the sun and sky. He
has only me to help him. God bless us both!’
Lighting her candle, she retreated as silently as she had come, and,
gaining her own room once more, sat up during the remainder of that
long, long, miserable night.
At last the day turned her waning candle pale, and she fell asleep.
She was quickly roused by the girl who had shown her up to bed; and, as
soon as she was dressed, prepared to go down to her grandfather. But
first she searched her pocket and found that her money was all
gone--not a sixpence remained.
The old man was ready, and in a few seconds they were on their road.
The child thought he rather avoided her eye, and appeared to expect
that she would tell him of her loss. She felt she must do that, or he
might suspect the truth.
‘Grandfather,’ she said in a tremulous voice, after they had walked
about a mile in silence, ‘do you think they are honest people at the
house yonder?’
‘Why?’ returned the old man trembling. ‘Do I think them honest--yes,
they played honestly.’
‘I’ll tell you why I ask,’ rejoined Nell. ‘I lost some money last
night--out of my bedroom, I am sure. Unless it was taken by somebody
in jest--only in jest, dear grandfather, which would make me laugh
heartily if I could but know it--’
‘Who would take money in jest?’ returned the old man in a hurried
manner. ‘Those who take money, take it to keep. Don’t talk of jest.’
‘Then it was stolen out of my room, dear,’ said the child, whose last
hope was destroyed by the manner of this reply.
‘But is there no more, Nell?’ said the old man; ‘no more anywhere? Was
it all taken--every farthing of it--was there nothing left?’
‘Nothing,’ replied the child.
‘We must get more,’ said the old man, ‘we must earn it, Nell, hoard it
up, scrape it together, come by it somehow. Never mind this loss.
Tell nobody of it, and perhaps we may regain it. Don’t ask how;--we
may regain it, and a great deal more;--but tell nobody, or trouble may
come of it. And so they took it out of thy room, when thou wert
asleep!’ he added in a compassionate tone, very different from the
secret, cunning way in which he had spoken until now. ‘Poor Nell, poor
little Nell!’
The child hung down her head and wept. The sympathising tone in which
he spoke, was quite sincere; she was sure of that. It was not the
lightest part of her sorrow to know that this was done for her.
‘Not a word about it to any one but me,’ said the old man, ‘no, not
even to me,’ he added hastily, ‘for it can do no good. All the losses
that ever were, are not worth tears from thy eyes, darling. Why should
they be, when we will win them back?’
‘Let them go,’ said the child looking up. ‘Let them go, once and for
ever, and I would never shed another tear if every penny had been a
thousand pounds.’
‘Well, well,’ returned the old man, checking himself as some impetuous
answer rose to his lips, ‘she knows no better. I ought to be thankful
of it.’
‘But listen to me,’ said the child earnestly, ‘will you listen to me?’
‘Aye, aye, I’ll listen,’ returned the old man, still without looking at
her; ‘a pretty voice. It has always a sweet sound to me. It always
had when it was her mother’s, poor child.’
‘Let me persuade you, then--oh, do let me persuade you,’ said the
child, ‘to think no more of gains or losses, and to try no fortune but
the fortune we pursue together.’
‘We pursue this aim together,’ retorted her grandfather, still looking
away and seeming to confer with himself. ‘Whose image sanctifies the
game?’
‘Have we been worse off,’ resumed the child, ‘since you forgot these
cares, and we have been travelling on together? Have we not been much
better and happier without a home to shelter us, than ever we were in
that unhappy house, when they were on your mind?’
‘She speaks the truth,’ murmured the old man in the same tone as
before. ‘It must not turn me, but it is the truth; no doubt it is.’
‘Only remember what we have been since that bright morning when we
turned our backs upon it for the last time,’ said Nell, ‘only remember
what we have been since we have been free of all those miseries--what
peaceful days and quiet nights we have had--what pleasant times we have
known--what happiness we have enjoyed. If we have been tired or
hungry, we have been soon refreshed, and slept the sounder for it.
Think what beautiful things we have seen, and how contented we have
felt. And why was this blessed change?’
He stopped her with a motion of his hand, and bade her talk to him no
more just then, for he was busy. After a time he kissed her cheek,
still motioning her to silence, and walked on, looking far before him,
and sometimes stopping and gazing with a puckered brow upon the ground,
as if he were painfully trying to collect his disordered thoughts.
Once she saw tears in his eyes. When he had gone on thus for some
time, he took her hand in his as he was accustomed to do, with nothing
of the violence or animation of his late manner; and so, by degrees so
fine that the child could not trace them, he settled down into his
usual quiet way, and suffered her to lead him where she would.
When they presented themselves in the midst of the stupendous
collection, they found, as Nell had anticipated, that Mrs Jarley was
not yet out of bed, and that, although she had suffered some uneasiness
on their account overnight, and had indeed sat up for them until past
eleven o’clock, she had retired in the persuasion, that, being
overtaken by storm at some distance from home, they had sought the
nearest shelter, and would not return before morning. Nell immediately
applied herself with great assiduity to the decoration and preparation
of the room, and had the satisfaction of completing her task, and
dressing herself neatly, before the beloved of the Royal Family came
down to breakfast.
‘We haven’t had,’ said Mrs Jarley when the meal was over, ‘more than
eight of Miss Monflathers’s young ladies all the time we’ve been here,
and there’s twenty-six of ‘em, as I was told by the cook when I asked
her a question or two and put her on the free-list. We must try ‘em
with a parcel of new bills, and you shall take it, my dear, and see
what effect that has upon ‘em.’
The proposed expedition being one of paramount importance, Mrs Jarley
adjusted Nell’s bonnet with her own hands, and declaring that she
certainly did look very pretty, and reflected credit on the
establishment, dismissed her with many commendations, and certain
needful directions as to the turnings on the right which she was to
take, and the turnings on the left which she was to avoid. Thus
instructed, Nell had no difficulty in finding out Miss Monflathers’s
Boarding and Day Establishment, which was a large house, with a high
wall, and a large garden-gate with a large brass plate, and a small
grating through which Miss Monflathers’s parlour-maid inspected all
visitors before admitting them; for nothing in the shape of a man--no,
not even a milkman--was suffered, without special license, to pass that
gate. Even the tax-gatherer, who was stout, and wore spectacles and a
broad-brimmed hat, had the taxes handed through the grating. More
obdurate than gate of adamant or brass, this gate of Miss Monflathers’s
frowned on all mankind. The very butcher respected it as a gate of
mystery, and left off whistling when he rang the bell.
As Nell approached the awful door, it turned slowly upon its hinges
with a creaking noise, and, forth from the solemn grove beyond, came a
long file of young ladies, two and two, all with open books in their
hands, and some with parasols likewise. And last of the goodly
procession came Miss Monflathers, bearing herself a parasol of lilac
silk, and supported by two smiling teachers, each mortally envious of
the other, and devoted unto Miss Monflathers.
Confused by the looks and whispers of the girls, Nell stood with
downcast eyes and suffered the procession to pass on, until Miss
Monflathers, bringing up the rear, approached her, when she curtseyed
and presented her little packet; on receipt whereof Miss Monflathers
commanded that the line should halt.
‘You’re the wax-work child, are you not?’ said Miss Monflathers.
‘Yes, ma’am,’ replied Nell, colouring deeply, for the young ladies had
collected about her, and she was the centre on which all eyes were
fixed.
‘And don’t you think you must be a very wicked little child,’ said Miss
Monflathers, who was of rather uncertain temper, and lost no
opportunity of impressing moral truths upon the tender minds of the
young ladies, ‘to be a wax-work child at all?’
Poor Nell had never viewed her position in this light, and not knowing
what to say, remained silent, blushing more deeply than before.
‘Don’t you know,’ said Miss Monflathers, ‘that it’s very naughty and
unfeminine, and a perversion of the properties wisely and benignantly
transmitted to us, with expansive powers to be roused from their
dormant state through the medium of cultivation?’
The two teachers murmured their respectful approval of this
home-thrust, and looked at Nell as though they would have said that
there indeed Miss Monflathers had hit her very hard. Then they smiled
and glanced at Miss Monflathers, and then, their eyes meeting, they
exchanged looks which plainly said that each considered herself smiler
in ordinary to Miss Monflathers, and regarded the other as having no
right to smile, and that her so doing was an act of presumption and
impertinence.
‘Don’t you feel how naughty it is of you,’ resumed Miss Monflathers,
‘to be a wax-work child, when you might have the proud consciousness of
assisting, to the extent of your infant powers, the manufactures of
your country; of improving your mind by the constant contemplation of
the steam-engine; and of earning a comfortable and independent
subsistence of from two-and-ninepence to three shillings per week?
Don’t you know that the harder you are at work, the happier you are?’
‘“How doth the little--“’ murmured one of the teachers, in quotation
from Doctor Watts.
‘Eh?’ said Miss Monflathers, turning smartly round. ‘Who said that?’
Of course the teacher who had not said it, indicated the rival who had,
whom Miss Monflathers frowningly requested to hold her peace; by that
means throwing the informing teacher into raptures of joy.
‘The little busy bee,’ said Miss Monflathers, drawing herself up, ‘is
applicable only to genteel children.
“In books, or work, or healthful play”
is quite right as far as they are concerned; and the work means
painting on velvet, fancy needle-work, or embroidery. In such cases as
these,’ pointing to Nell, with her parasol, ‘and in the case of all
poor people’s children, we should read it thus:
“In work, work, work. In work alway
Let my first years be past,
That I may give for ev’ry day
Some good account at last.”’
A deep hum of applause rose not only from the two teachers, but from
all the pupils, who were equally astonished to hear Miss Monflathers
improvising after this brilliant style; for although she had been long
known as a politician, she had never appeared before as an original
poet. Just then somebody happened to discover that Nell was crying,
and all eyes were again turned towards her.
There were indeed tears in her eyes, and drawing out her handkerchief
to brush them away, she happened to let it fall. Before she could
stoop to pick it up, one young lady of about fifteen or sixteen, who
had been standing a little apart from the others, as though she had no
recognised place among them, sprang forward and put it in her hand.
She was gliding timidly away again, when she was arrested by the
governess.
‘It was Miss Edwards who did that, I KNOW,’ said Miss Monflathers
predictively. ‘Now I am sure that was Miss Edwards.’
It was Miss Edwards, and everybody said it was Miss Edwards, and Miss
Edwards herself admitted that it was.
‘Is it not,’ said Miss Monflathers, putting down her parasol to take a
severer view of the offender, ‘a most remarkable thing, Miss Edwards,
that you have an attachment to the lower classes which always draws you
to their sides; or, rather, is it not a most extraordinary thing that
all I say and do will not wean you from propensities which your
original station in life have unhappily rendered habitual to you, you
extremely vulgar-minded girl?’
‘I really intended no harm, ma’am,’ said a sweet voice. ‘It was a
momentary impulse, indeed.’
‘An impulse!’ repeated Miss Monflathers scornfully. ‘I wonder that you
presume to speak of impulses to me’--both the teachers assented--‘I am
astonished’--both the teachers were astonished--‘I suppose it is an
impulse which induces you to take the part of every grovelling and
debased person that comes in your way’--both the teachers supposed so
too.
‘But I would have you know, Miss Edwards,’ resumed the governess in a
tone of increased severity, ‘that you cannot be permitted--if it be
only for the sake of preserving a proper example and decorum in this
establishment--that you cannot be permitted, and that you shall not be
permitted, to fly in the face of your superiors in this exceedingly
gross manner. If you have no reason to feel a becoming pride before
wax-work children, there are young ladies here who have, and you must
either defer to those young ladies or leave the establishment, Miss
Edwards.’
This young lady, being motherless and poor, was apprenticed at the
school--taught for nothing--teaching others what she learnt, for
nothing--boarded for nothing--lodged for nothing--and set down and
rated as something immeasurably less than nothing, by all the dwellers
in the house. The servant-maids felt her inferiority, for they were
better treated; free to come and go, and regarded in their stations
with much more respect. The teachers were infinitely superior, for
they had paid to go to school in their time, and were paid now. The
pupils cared little for a companion who had no grand stories to tell
about home; no friends to come with post-horses, and be received in all
humility, with cake and wine, by the governess; no deferential servant
to attend and bear her home for the holidays; nothing genteel to talk
about, and nothing to display. But why was Miss Monflathers always
vexed and irritated with the poor apprentice--how did that come to pass?
Why, the gayest feather in Miss Monflathers’s cap, and the brightest
glory of Miss Monflathers’s school, was a baronet’s daughter--the real
live daughter of a real live baronet--who, by some extraordinary
reversal of the Laws of Nature, was not only plain in features but dull
in intellect, while the poor apprentice had both a ready wit, and a
handsome face and figure. It seems incredible. Here was Miss Edwards,
who only paid a small premium which had been spent long ago, every day
outshining and excelling the baronet’s daughter, who learned all the
extras (or was taught them all) and whose half-yearly bill came to
double that of any other young lady’s in the school, making no account
of the honour and reputation of her pupilage. Therefore, and because
she was a dependent, Miss Monflathers had a great dislike to Miss
Edwards, and was spiteful to her, and aggravated by her, and, when she
had compassion on little Nell, verbally fell upon and maltreated her as
we have already seen.
‘You will not take the air to-day, Miss Edwards,’ said Miss
Monflathers. ‘Have the goodness to retire to your own room, and not to
leave it without permission.’
The poor girl was moving hastily away, when she was suddenly, in
nautical phrase, ‘brought to’ by a subdued shriek from Miss Monflathers.
‘She has passed me without any salute!’ cried the governess, raising
her eyes to the sky. ‘She has actually passed me without the slightest
acknowledgment of my presence!’
The young lady turned and curtsied. Nell could see that she raised her
dark eyes to the face of her superior, and that their expression, and
that of her whole attitude for the instant, was one of mute but most
touching appeal against this ungenerous usage. Miss Monflathers only
tossed her head in reply, and the great gate closed upon a bursting
heart.
‘As for you, you wicked child,’ said Miss Monflathers, turning to Nell,
‘tell your mistress that if she presumes to take the liberty of sending
to me any more, I will write to the legislative authorities and have
her put in the stocks, or compelled to do penance in a white sheet; and
you may depend upon it that you shall certainly experience the
treadmill if you dare to come here again. Now ladies, on.’
The procession filed off, two and two, with the books and parasols, and
Miss Monflathers, calling the Baronet’s daughter to walk with her and
smooth her ruffled feelings, discarded the two teachers--who by this
time had exchanged their smiles for looks of sympathy--and left them
to bring up the rear, and hate each other a little more for being
obliged to walk together.
CHAPTER 32
Mrs Jarley’s wrath on first learning that she had been threatened with
the indignity of Stocks and Penance, passed all description. The
genuine and only Jarley exposed to public scorn, jeered by children,
and flouted by beadles! The delight of the Nobility and Gentry shorn
of a bonnet which a Lady Mayoress might have sighed to wear, and
arrayed in a white sheet as a spectacle of mortification and humility!
And Miss Monflathers, the audacious creature who presumed, even in the
dimmest and remotest distance of her imagination, to conjure up the
degrading picture, ‘I am a’most inclined,’ said Mrs Jarley, bursting
with the fulness of her anger and the weakness of her means of revenge,
‘to turn atheist when I think of it!’
But instead of adopting this course of retaliation, Mrs Jarley, on
second thoughts, brought out the suspicious bottle, and ordering
glasses to be set forth upon her favourite drum, and sinking into a
chair behind it, called her satellites about her, and to them several
times recounted, word for word, the affronts she had received. This
done, she begged them in a kind of deep despair to drink; then laughed,
then cried, then took a little sip herself, then laughed and cried
again, and took a little more; and so, by degrees, the worthy lady went
on, increasing in smiles and decreasing in tears, until at last she
could not laugh enough at Miss Monflathers, who, from being an object
of dire vexation, became one of sheer ridicule and absurdity.
‘For which of us is best off, I wonder,’ quoth Mrs Jarley, ‘she or me!
It’s only talking, when all is said and done, and if she talks of me in
the stocks, why I can talk of her in the stocks, which is a good deal
funnier if we come to that. Lord, what does it matter, after all!’
Having arrived at this comfortable frame of mind (to which she had been
greatly assisted by certain short interjectional remarks of the
philosophical George), Mrs Jarley consoled Nell with many kind words,
and requested as a personal favour that whenever she thought of Miss
Monflathers, she would do nothing else but laugh at her, all the days
of her life.
So ended Mrs Jarley’s wrath, which subsided long before the going down
of the sun. Nell’s anxieties, however, were of a deeper kind, and the
checks they imposed upon her cheerfulness were not so easily removed.
That evening, as she had dreaded, her grandfather stole away, and did
not come back until the night was far spent. Worn out as she was, and
fatigued in mind and body, she sat up alone, counting the minutes,
until he returned--penniless, broken-spirited, and wretched, but still
hotly bent upon his infatuation.
‘Get me money,’ he said wildly, as they parted for the night. ‘I must
have money, Nell. It shall be paid thee back with gallant interest one
day, but all the money that comes into thy hands, must be mine--not for
myself, but to use for thee. Remember, Nell, to use for thee!’
What could the child do with the knowledge she had, but give him every
penny that came into her hands, lest he should be tempted on to rob
their benefactress? If she told the truth (so thought the child) he
would be treated as a madman; if she did not supply him with money, he
would supply himself; supplying him, she fed the fire that burnt him
up, and put him perhaps beyond recovery. Distracted by these thoughts,
borne down by the weight of the sorrow which she dared not tell,
tortured by a crowd of apprehensions whenever the old man was absent,
and dreading alike his stay and his return, the colour forsook her
cheek, her eye grew dim, and her heart was oppressed and heavy. All
her old sorrows had come back upon her, augmented by new fears and
doubts; by day they were ever present to her mind; by night they
hovered round her pillow, and haunted her in dreams.
It was natural that, in the midst of her affliction, she should often
revert to that sweet young lady of whom she had only caught a hasty
glance, but whose sympathy, expressed in one slight brief action, dwelt
in her memory like the kindnesses of years. She would often think, if
she had such a friend as that to whom to tell her griefs, how much
lighter her heart would be--that if she were but free to hear that
voice, she would be happier. Then she would wish that she were
something better, that she were not quite so poor and humble, that she
dared address her without fearing a repulse; and then feel that there
was an immeasurable distance between them, and have no hope that the
young lady thought of her any more.
It was now holiday-time at the schools, and the young ladies had gone
home, and Miss Monflathers was reported to be flourishing in London,
and damaging the hearts of middle-aged gentlemen, but nobody said
anything about Miss Edwards, whether she had gone home, or whether she
had any home to go to, whether she was still at the school, or anything
about her. But one evening, as Nell was returning from a lonely walk,
she happened to pass the inn where the stage-coaches stopped, just as
one drove up, and there was the beautiful girl she so well remembered,
pressing forward to embrace a young child whom they were helping down
from the roof.
Well, this was her sister, her little sister, much younger than Nell,
whom she had not seen (so the story went afterwards) for five years,
and to bring whom to that place on a short visit, she had been saving
her poor means all that time. Nell felt as if her heart would break
when she saw them meet. They went a little apart from the knot of
people who had congregated about the coach, and fell upon each other’s
neck, and sobbed, and wept with joy. Their plain and simple dress, the
distance which the child had come alone, their agitation and delight,
and the tears they shed, would have told their history by themselves.
They became a little more composed in a short time, and went away, not
so much hand in hand as clinging to each other. ‘Are you sure you’re
happy, sister?’ said the child as they passed where Nell was standing.
‘Quite happy now,’ she answered. ‘But always?’ said the child. ‘Ah,
sister, why do you turn away your face?’
Nell could not help following at a little distance. They went to the
house of an old nurse, where the elder sister had engaged a bed-room
for the child. ‘I shall come to you early every morning,’ she said,
‘and we can be together all the day.’
‘Why not at night-time too? Dear sister, would they be angry with you
for that?’
Why were the eyes of little Nell wet, that night, with tears like those
of the two sisters? Why did she bear a grateful heart because they had
met, and feel it pain to think that they would shortly part? Let us
not believe that any selfish reference--unconscious though it might
have been--to her own trials awoke this sympathy, but thank God that
the innocent joys of others can strongly move us, and that we, even in
our fallen nature, have one source of pure emotion which must be prized
in Heaven!
By morning’s cheerful glow, but oftener still by evening’s gentle
light, the child, with a respect for the short and happy intercourse of
these two sisters which forbade her to approach and say a thankful
word, although she yearned to do so, followed them at a distance in
their walks and rambles, stopping when they stopped, sitting on the
grass when they sat down, rising when they went on, and feeling it a
companionship and delight to be so near them. Their evening walk was
by a river’s side. Here, every night, the child was too, unseen by
them, unthought of, unregarded; but feeling as if they were her
friends, as if they had confidences and trusts together, as if her load
were lightened and less hard to bear; as if they mingled their sorrows,
and found mutual consolation. It was a weak fancy perhaps, the
childish fancy of a young and lonely creature; but night after night,
and still the sisters loitered in the same place, and still the child
followed with a mild and softened heart.
She was much startled, on returning home one night, to find that Mrs
Jarley had commanded an announcement to be prepared, to the effect that
the stupendous collection would only remain in its present quarters one
day longer; in fulfilment of which threat (for all announcements
connected with public amusements are well known to be irrevocable and
most exact), the stupendous collection shut up next day.
‘Are we going from this place directly, ma’am?’ said Nell.
‘Look here, child,’ returned Mrs Jarley. ‘That’ll inform you.’ And so
saying Mrs Jarley produced another announcement, wherein it was stated,
that, in consequence of numerous inquiries at the wax-work door, and in
consequence of crowds having been disappointed in obtaining admission,
the Exhibition would be continued for one week longer, and would
re-open next day.
‘For now that the schools are gone, and the regular sight-seers
exhausted,’ said Mrs Jarley, ‘we come to the General Public, and they
want stimulating.’
Upon the following day at noon, Mrs Jarley established herself behind
the highly-ornamented table, attended by the distinguished effigies
before mentioned, and ordered the doors to be thrown open for the
readmission of a discerning and enlightened public. But the first
day’s operations were by no means of a successful character, inasmuch
as the general public, though they manifested a lively interest in Mrs
Jarley personally, and such of her waxen satellites as were to be seen
for nothing, were not affected by any impulses moving them to the
payment of sixpence a head. Thus, notwithstanding that a great many
people continued to stare at the entry and the figures therein
displayed; and remained there with great perseverance, by the hour at a
time, to hear the barrel-organ played and to read the bills; and
notwithstanding that they were kind enough to recommend their friends
to patronise the exhibition in the like manner, until the door-way was
regularly blockaded by half the population of the town, who, when they
went off duty, were relieved by the other half; it was not found that
the treasury was any the richer, or that the prospects of the
establishment were at all encouraging.
In this depressed state of the classical market, Mrs Jarley made
extraordinary efforts to stimulate the popular taste, and whet the
popular curiosity. Certain machinery in the body of the nun on the
leads over the door was cleaned up and put in motion, so that the
figure shook its head paralytically all day long, to the great
admiration of a drunken, but very Protestant, barber over the way, who
looked upon the said paralytic motion as typical of the degrading
effect wrought upon the human mind by the ceremonies of the Romish
Church and discoursed upon that theme with great eloquence and
morality. The two carters constantly passed in and out of the
exhibition-room, under various disguises, protesting aloud that the
sight was better worth the money than anything they had beheld in all
their lives, and urging the bystanders, with tears in their eyes, not
to neglect such a brilliant gratification. Mrs Jarley sat in the
pay-place, chinking silver moneys from noon till night, and solemnly
calling upon the crowd to take notice that the price of admission was
only sixpence, and that the departure of the whole collection, on a
short tour among the Crowned Heads of Europe, was positively fixed for
that day week.
‘So be in time, be in time, be in time,’ said Mrs Jarley at the close
of every such address. ‘Remember that this is Jarley’s stupendous
collection of upwards of One Hundred Figures, and that it is the only
collection in the world; all others being imposters and deceptions. Be
in time, be in time, be in time!’
CHAPTER 33
As the course of this tale requires that we should become acquainted,
somewhere hereabouts, with a few particulars connected with the
domestic economy of Mr Sampson Brass, and as a more convenient place
than the present is not likely to occur for that purpose, the historian
takes the friendly reader by the hand, and springing with him into the
air, and cleaving the same at a greater rate than ever Don Cleophas
Leandro Perez Zambullo and his familiar travelled through that pleasant
region in company, alights with him upon the pavement of Bevis Marks.
The intrepid aeronauts alight before a small dark house, once the
residence of Mr Sampson Brass.
In the parlour window of this little habitation, which is so close upon
the footway that the passenger who takes the wall brushes the dim glass
with his coat sleeve--much to its improvement, for it is very dirty--in
this parlour window in the days of its occupation by Sampson Brass,
there hung, all awry and slack, and discoloured by the sun, a curtain
of faded green, so threadbare from long service as by no means to
intercept the view of the little dark room, but rather to afford a
favourable medium through which to observe it accurately. There was
not much to look at. A rickety table, with spare bundles of papers,
yellow and ragged from long carriage in the pocket, ostentatiously
displayed upon its top; a couple of stools set face to face on opposite
sides of this crazy piece of furniture; a treacherous old chair by the
fire-place, whose withered arms had hugged full many a client and
helped to squeeze him dry; a second-hand wig box, used as a depository
for blank writs and declarations and other small forms of law, once the
sole contents of the head which belonged to the wig which belonged to
the box, as they were now of the box itself; two or three common books
of practice; a jar of ink, a pounce box, a stunted hearth-broom, a
carpet trodden to shreds but still clinging with the tightness of
desperation to its tacks--these, with the yellow wainscot of the walls,
the smoke-discoloured ceiling, the dust and cobwebs, were among the
most prominent decorations of the office of Mr Sampson Brass.
But this was mere still-life, of no greater importance than the plate,
‘BRASS, Solicitor,’ upon the door, and the bill, ‘First floor to let to
a single gentleman,’ which was tied to the knocker. The office
commonly held two examples of animated nature, more to the purpose of
this history, and in whom it has a stronger interest and more
particular concern.
Of these, one was Mr Brass himself, who has already appeared in these
pages. The other was his clerk, assistant, housekeeper, secretary,
confidential plotter, adviser, intriguer, and bill of cost increaser,
Miss Brass--a kind of amazon at common law, of whom it may be desirable
to offer a brief description.
Miss Sally Brass, then, was a lady of thirty-five or thereabouts, of a
gaunt and bony figure, and a resolute bearing, which if it repressed
the softer emotions of love, and kept admirers at a distance, certainly
inspired a feeling akin to awe in the breasts of those male strangers
who had the happiness to approach her. In face she bore a striking
resemblance to her brother, Sampson--so exact, indeed, was the likeness
between them, that had it consorted with Miss Brass’s maiden modesty
and gentle womanhood to have assumed her brother’s clothes in a frolic
and sat down beside him, it would have been difficult for the oldest
friend of the family to determine which was Sampson and which Sally,
especially as the lady carried upon her upper lip certain reddish
demonstrations, which, if the imagination had been assisted by her
attire, might have been mistaken for a beard. These were, however, in
all probability, nothing more than eyelashes in a wrong place, as the
eyes of Miss Brass were quite free from any such natural
impertinencies. In complexion Miss Brass was sallow--rather a dirty
sallow, so to speak--but this hue was agreeably relieved by the healthy
glow which mantled in the extreme tip of her laughing nose. Her voice
was exceedingly impressive--deep and rich in quality, and, once heard,
not easily forgotten. Her usual dress was a green gown, in colour not
unlike the curtain of the office window, made tight to the figure, and
terminating at the throat, where it was fastened behind by a peculiarly
large and massive button. Feeling, no doubt, that simplicity and
plainness are the soul of elegance, Miss Brass wore no collar or
kerchief except upon her head, which was invariably ornamented with a
brown gauze scarf, like the wing of the fabled vampire, and which,
twisted into any form that happened to suggest itself, formed an easy
and graceful head-dress.
Such was Miss Brass in person. In mind, she was of a strong and
vigorous turn, having from her earliest youth devoted herself with
uncommon ardour to the study of law; not wasting her speculations upon
its eagle flights, which are rare, but tracing it attentively through
all the slippery and eel-like crawlings in which it commonly pursues
its way. Nor had she, like many persons of great intellect, confined
herself to theory, or stopped short where practical usefulness begins;
inasmuch as she could ingross, fair-copy, fill up printed forms with
perfect accuracy, and, in short, transact any ordinary duty of the
office down to pouncing a skin of parchment or mending a pen. It is
difficult to understand how, possessed of these combined attractions,
she should remain Miss Brass; but whether she had steeled her heart
against mankind, or whether those who might have wooed and won her,
were deterred by fears that, being learned in the law, she might have
too near her fingers’ ends those particular statutes which regulate
what are familiarly termed actions for breach, certain it is that she
was still in a state of celibacy, and still in daily occupation of her
old stool opposite to that of her brother Sampson. And equally certain
it is, by the way, that between these two stools a great many people
had come to the ground.
One morning Mr Sampson Brass sat upon his stool copying some legal
process, and viciously digging his pen deep into the paper, as if he
were writing upon the very heart of the party against whom it was
directed; and Miss Sally Brass sat upon her stool making a new pen
preparatory to drawing out a little bill, which was her favourite
occupation; and so they sat in silence for a long time, until Miss
Brass broke silence.
‘Have you nearly done, Sammy?’ said Miss Brass; for in her mild and
feminine lips, Sampson became Sammy, and all things were softened down.
‘No,’ returned her brother. ‘It would have been all done though, if
you had helped at the right time.’
‘Oh yes, indeed,’ cried Miss Sally; ‘you want my help, don’t you?--YOU,
too, that are going to keep a clerk!’
‘Am I going to keep a clerk for my own pleasure, or because of my own
wish, you provoking rascal!’ said Mr Brass, putting his pen in his
mouth, and grinning spitefully at his sister. ‘What do you taunt me
about going to keep a clerk for?’
It may be observed in this place, lest the fact of Mr Brass calling a
lady a rascal, should occasion any wonderment or surprise, that he was
so habituated to having her near him in a man’s capacity, that he had
gradually accustomed himself to talk to her as though she were really a
man. And this feeling was so perfectly reciprocal, that not only did
Mr Brass often call Miss Brass a rascal, or even put an adjective
before the rascal, but Miss Brass looked upon it as quite a matter of
course, and was as little moved as any other lady would be by being
called an angel.
‘What do you taunt me, after three hours’ talk last night, with going
to keep a clerk for?’ repeated Mr Brass, grinning again with the pen in
his mouth, like some nobleman’s or gentleman’s crest. ‘Is it my fault?’
‘All I know is,’ said Miss Sally, smiling drily, for she delighted in
nothing so much as irritating her brother, ‘that if every one of your
clients is to force us to keep a clerk, whether we want to or not, you
had better leave off business, strike yourself off the roll, and get
taken in execution, as soon as you can.’
‘Have we got any other client like him?’ said Brass. ‘Have we got
another client like him now--will you answer me that?’
‘Do you mean in the face!’ said his sister.
‘Do I mean in the face!’ sneered Sampson Brass, reaching over to take
up the bill-book, and fluttering its leaves rapidly. ‘Look
here--Daniel Quilp, Esquire--Daniel Quilp, Esquire--Daniel Quilp,
Esquire--all through. Whether should I take a clerk that he
recommends, and says, “this is the man for you,” or lose all this, eh?’
Miss Sally deigned to make no reply, but smiled again, and went on with
her work.
‘But I know what it is,’ resumed Brass after a short silence. ‘You’re
afraid you won’t have as long a finger in the business as you’ve been
used to have. Do you think I don’t see through that?’
‘The business wouldn’t go on very long, I expect, without me,’ returned
his sister composedly. ‘Don’t you be a fool and provoke me, Sammy, but
mind what you’re doing, and do it.’
Sampson Brass, who was at heart in great fear of his sister, sulkily
bent over his writing again, and listened as she said:
‘If I determined that the clerk ought not to come, of course he
wouldn’t be allowed to come. You know that well enough, so don’t talk
nonsense.’
Mr Brass received this observation with increased meekness, merely
remarking, under his breath, that he didn’t like that kind of joking,
and that Miss Sally would be ‘a much better fellow’ if she forbore to
aggravate him. To this compliment Miss Sally replied, that she had a
relish for the amusement, and had no intention to forego its
gratification. Mr Brass not caring, as it seemed, to pursue the
subject any further, they both plied their pens at a great pace, and
there the discussion ended.
While they were thus employed, the window was suddenly darkened, as by
some person standing close against it. As Mr Brass and Miss Sally
looked up to ascertain the cause, the top sash was nimbly lowered from
without, and Quilp thrust in his head.
‘Hallo!’ he said, standing on tip-toe on the window-sill, and looking
down into the room. ‘Is there anybody at home? Is there any of the
Devil’s ware here? Is Brass at a premium, eh?’
‘Ha, ha, ha!’ laughed the lawyer in an affected ecstasy. ‘Oh, very
good, Sir! Oh, very good indeed! Quite eccentric! Dear me, what
humour he has!’
‘Is that my Sally?’ croaked the dwarf, ogling the fair Miss Brass. ‘Is
it Justice with the bandage off her eyes, and without the sword and
scales? Is it the Strong Arm of the Law? Is it the Virgin of Bevis?’
‘What an amazing flow of spirits!’ cried Brass. ‘Upon my word, it’s
quite extraordinary!’
‘Open the door,’ said Quilp, ‘I’ve got him here. Such a clerk for you,
Brass, such a prize, such an ace of trumps. Be quick and open the
door, or if there’s another lawyer near and he should happen to look
out of window, he’ll snap him up before your eyes, he will.’
It is probable that the loss of the phoenix of clerks, even to a rival
practitioner, would not have broken Mr Brass’s heart; but, pretending
great alacrity, he rose from his seat, and going to the door, returned,
introducing his client, who led by the hand no less a person than Mr
Richard Swiveller.
‘There she is,’ said Quilp, stopping short at the door, and wrinkling
up his eyebrows as he looked towards Miss Sally; ‘there is the woman I
ought to have married--there is the beautiful Sarah--there is the
female who has all the charms of her sex and none of their weaknesses.
Oh Sally, Sally!’
To this amorous address Miss Brass briefly responded ‘Bother!’
‘Hard-hearted as the metal from which she takes her name,’ said Quilp.
‘Why don’t she change it--melt down the brass, and take another name?’
‘Hold your nonsense, Mr Quilp, do,’ returned Miss Sally, with a grim
smile. ‘I wonder you’re not ashamed of yourself before a strange young
man.’
‘The strange young man,’ said Quilp, handing Dick Swiveller forward,
‘is too susceptible himself not to understand me well. This is Mr
Swiveller, my intimate friend--a gentleman of good family and great
expectations, but who, having rather involved himself by youthful
indiscretion, is content for a time to fill the humble station of a
clerk--humble, but here most enviable. What a delicious atmosphere!’
If Mr Quilp spoke figuratively, and meant to imply that the air
breathed by Miss Sally Brass was sweetened and rarefied by that dainty
creature, he had doubtless good reason for what he said. But if he
spoke of the delights of the atmosphere of Mr Brass’s office in a
literal sense, he had certainly a peculiar taste, as it was of a close
and earthy kind, and, besides being frequently impregnated with strong
whiffs of the second-hand wearing apparel exposed for sale in Duke’s
Place and Houndsditch, had a decided flavour of rats and mice, and a
taint of mouldiness. Perhaps some doubts of its pure delight presented
themselves to Mr Swiveller, as he gave vent to one or two short abrupt
sniffs, and looked incredulously at the grinning dwarf.
‘Mr Swiveller,’ said Quilp, ‘being pretty well accustomed to the
agricultural pursuits of sowing wild oats, Miss Sally, prudently
considers that half a loaf is better than no bread. To be out of
harm’s way he prudently thinks is something too, and therefore he
accepts your brother’s offer. Brass, Mr Swiveller is yours.’
‘I am very glad, Sir,’ said Mr Brass, ‘very glad indeed. Mr Swiveller,
Sir, is fortunate enough to have your friendship. You may be very
proud, Sir, to have the friendship of Mr Quilp.’
Dick murmured something about never wanting a friend or a bottle to
give him, and also gasped forth his favourite allusion to the wing of
friendship and its never moulting a feather; but his faculties appeared
to be absorbed in the contemplation of Miss Sally Brass, at whom he
stared with blank and rueful looks, which delighted the watchful dwarf
beyond measure. As to the divine Miss Sally herself, she rubbed her
hands as men of business do, and took a few turns up and down the
office with her pen behind her ear.
‘I suppose,’ said the dwarf, turning briskly to his legal friend, ‘that
Mr Swiveller enters upon his duties at once? It’s Monday morning.’
‘At once, if you please, Sir, by all means,’ returned Brass.
‘Miss Sally will teach him law, the delightful study of the law,’ said
Quilp; ‘she’ll be his guide, his friend, his companion, his Blackstone,
his Coke upon Littleton, his Young Lawyer’s Best Companion.’
‘He is exceedingly eloquent,’ said Brass, like a man abstracted, and
looking at the roofs of the opposite houses, with his hands in his
pockets; ‘he has an extraordinary flow of language. Beautiful, really.’
‘With Miss Sally,’ Quilp went on, ‘and the beautiful fictions of the
law, his days will pass like minutes. Those charming creations of the
poet, John Doe and Richard Roe, when they first dawn upon him, will
open a new world for the enlargement of his mind and the improvement of
his heart.’
‘Oh, beautiful, beautiful! Beau-ti-ful indeed!’ cried Brass. ‘It’s a
treat to hear him!’
‘Where will Mr Swiveller sit?’ said Quilp, looking round.
‘Why, we’ll buy another stool, sir,’ returned Brass. ‘We hadn’t any
thoughts of having a gentleman with us, sir, until you were kind enough
to suggest it, and our accommodation’s not extensive. We’ll look about
for a second-hand stool, sir. In the meantime, if Mr Swiveller will
take my seat, and try his hand at a fair copy of this ejectment, as I
shall be out pretty well all the morning--’
‘Walk with me,’ said Quilp. ‘I have a word or two to say to you on
points of business. Can you spare the time?’
‘Can I spare the time to walk with you, sir? You’re joking, sir,
you’re joking with me,’ replied the lawyer, putting on his hat. ‘I’m
ready, sir, quite ready. My time must be fully occupied indeed, sir,
not to leave me time to walk with you. It’s not everybody, sir, who
has an opportunity of improving himself by the conversation of Mr
Quilp.’
The dwarf glanced sarcastically at his brazen friend, and, with a short
dry cough, turned upon his heel to bid adieu to Miss Sally. After a
very gallant parting on his side, and a very cool and gentlemanly sort
of one on hers, he nodded to Dick Swiveller, and withdrew with the
attorney.
Dick stood at the desk in a state of utter stupefaction, staring with
all his might at the beauteous Sally, as if she had been some curious
animal whose like had never lived. When the dwarf got into the street,
he mounted again upon the window-sill, and looked into the office for a
moment with a grinning face, as a man might peep into a cage. Dick
glanced upward at him, but without any token of recognition; and long
after he had disappeared, still stood gazing upon Miss Sally Brass,
seeing or thinking of nothing else, and rooted to the spot.
Miss Brass being by this time deep in the bill of costs, took no notice
whatever of Dick, but went scratching on, with a noisy pen, scoring
down the figures with evident delight, and working like a steam-engine.
There stood Dick, gazing now at the green gown, now at the brown
head-dress, now at the face, and now at the rapid pen, in a state of
stupid perplexity, wondering how he got into the company of that
strange monster, and whether it was a dream and he would ever wake. At
last he heaved a deep sigh, and began slowly pulling off his coat.
Mr Swiveller pulled off his coat, and folded it up with great
elaboration, staring at Miss Sally all the time; then put on a blue
jacket with a double row of gilt buttons, which he had originally
ordered for aquatic expeditions, but had brought with him that morning
for office purposes; and, still keeping his eye upon her, suffered
himself to drop down silently upon Mr Brass’s stool. Then he underwent
a relapse, and becoming powerless again, rested his chin upon his hand,
and opened his eyes so wide, that it appeared quite out of the question
that he could ever close them any more.
When he had looked so long that he could see nothing, Dick took his
eyes off the fair object of his amazement, turned over the leaves of
the draft he was to copy, dipped his pen into the inkstand, and at
last, and by slow approaches, began to write. But he had not written
half-a-dozen words when, reaching over to the inkstand to take a fresh
dip, he happened to raise his eyes. There was the intolerable brown
head-dress--there was the green gown--there, in short, was Miss Sally
Brass, arrayed in all her charms, and more tremendous than ever.
This happened so often, that Mr Swiveller by degrees began to feel
strange influences creeping over him--horrible desires to annihilate
this Sally Brass--mysterious promptings to knock her head-dress off and
try how she looked without it. There was a very large ruler on the
table; a large, black, shining ruler. Mr Swiveller took it up and
began to rub his nose with it.
From rubbing his nose with the ruler, to poising it in his hand and
giving it an occasional flourish after the tomahawk manner, the
transition was easy and natural. In some of these flourishes it went
close to Miss Sally’s head; the ragged edges of the head-dress
fluttered with the wind it raised; advance it but an inch, and that
great brown knot was on the ground: yet still the unconscious maiden
worked away, and never raised her eyes.
Well, this was a great relief. It was a good thing to write doggedly
and obstinately until he was desperate, and then snatch up the ruler
and whirl it about the brown head-dress with the consciousness that he
could have it off if he liked. It was a good thing to draw it back,
and rub his nose very hard with it, if he thought Miss Sally was going
to look up, and to recompense himself with more hardy flourishes when
he found she was still absorbed. By these means Mr Swiveller calmed
the agitation of his feelings, until his applications to the ruler
became less fierce and frequent, and he could even write as many as
half-a-dozen consecutive lines without having recourse to it--which was
a great victory.
CHAPTER 34
In course of time, that is to say, after a couple of hours or so, of
diligent application, Miss Brass arrived at the conclusion of her task,
and recorded the fact by wiping her pen upon the green gown, and taking
a pinch of snuff from a little round tin box which she carried in her
pocket. Having disposed of this temperate refreshment, she arose from
her stool, tied her papers into a formal packet with red tape, and
taking them under her arm, marched out of the office.
Mr Swiveller had scarcely sprung off his seat and commenced the
performance of a maniac hornpipe, when he was interrupted, in the
fulness of his joy at being again alone, by the opening of the door,
and the reappearance of Miss Sally’s head.
‘I am going out,’ said Miss Brass.
‘Very good, ma’am,’ returned Dick. ‘And don’t hurry yourself on my
account to come back, ma’am,’ he added inwardly.
‘If anybody comes on office business, take their messages, and say that
the gentleman who attends to that matter isn’t in at present, will
you?’ said Miss Brass.
‘I will, ma’am,’ replied Dick.
‘I shan’t be very long,’ said Miss Brass, retiring.
‘I’m sorry to hear it, ma’am,’ rejoined Dick when she had shut the
door. ‘I hope you may be unexpectedly detained, ma’am. If you could
manage to be run over, ma’am, but not seriously, so much the better.’
Uttering these expressions of good-will with extreme gravity, Mr
Swiveller sat down in the client’s chair and pondered; then took a few
turns up and down the room and fell into the chair again.
‘So I’m Brass’s clerk, am I?’ said Dick. ‘Brass’s clerk, eh? And the
clerk of Brass’s sister--clerk to a female Dragon. Very good, very
good! What shall I be next? Shall I be a convict in a felt hat and a
grey suit, trotting about a dockyard with my number neatly embroidered
on my uniform, and the order of the garter on my leg, restrained from
chafing my ankle by a twisted belcher handkerchief? Shall I be that?
Will that do, or is it too genteel? Whatever you please, have it your
own way, of course.’
As he was entirely alone, it may be presumed that, in these remarks, Mr
Swiveller addressed himself to his fate or destiny, whom, as we learn
by the precedents, it is the custom of heroes to taunt in a very bitter
and ironical manner when they find themselves in situations of an
unpleasant nature. This is the more probable from the circumstance of
Mr Swiveller directing his observations to the ceiling, which these
bodily personages are usually supposed to inhabit--except in theatrical
cases, when they live in the heart of the great chandelier.
‘Quilp offers me this place, which he says he can insure me,’ resumed
Dick after a thoughtful silence, and telling off the circumstances of
his position, one by one, upon his fingers; ‘Fred, who, I could have
taken my affidavit, would not have heard of such a thing, backs Quilp
to my astonishment, and urges me to take it also--staggerer, number
one! My aunt in the country stops the supplies, and writes an
affectionate note to say that she has made a new will, and left me out
of it--staggerer, number two. No money; no credit; no support from
Fred, who seems to turn steady all at once; notice to quit the old
lodgings--staggerers, three, four, five, and six! Under an
accumulation of staggerers, no man can be considered a free agent. No
man knocks himself down; if his destiny knocks him down, his destiny
must pick him up again. Then I’m very glad that mine has brought all
this upon itself, and I shall be as careless as I can, and make myself
quite at home to spite it. So go on my buck,’ said Mr Swiveller,
taking his leave of the ceiling with a significant nod, ‘and let us see
which of us will be tired first!’
Dismissing the subject of his downfall with these reflections, which
were no doubt very profound, and are indeed not altogether unknown in
certain systems of moral philosophy, Mr Swiveller shook off his
despondency and assumed the cheerful ease of an irresponsible clerk.
As a means towards his composure and self-possession, he entered into a
more minute examination of the office than he had yet had time to make;
looked into the wig-box, the books, and ink-bottle; untied and
inspected all the papers; carved a few devices on the table with a
sharp blade of Mr Brass’s penknife; and wrote his name on the inside of
the wooden coal-scuttle. Having, as it were, taken formal possession
of his clerkship in virtue of these proceedings, he opened the window
and leaned negligently out of it until a beer-boy happened to pass,
whom he commanded to set down his tray and to serve him with a pint of
mild porter, which he drank upon the spot and promptly paid for, with
the view of breaking ground for a system of future credit and opening a
correspondence tending thereto, without loss of time. Then, three or
four little boys dropped in, on legal errands from three or four
attorneys of the Brass grade: whom Mr Swiveller received and dismissed
with about as professional a manner, and as correct and comprehensive
an understanding of their business, as would have been shown by a clown
in a pantomime under similar circumstances. These things done and
over, he got upon his stool again and tried his hand at drawing
caricatures of Miss Brass with a pen and ink, whistling very cheerfully
all the time.
He was occupied in this diversion when a coach stopped near the door,
and presently afterwards there was a loud double-knock. As this was no
business of Mr Swiveller’s, the person not ringing the office bell, he
pursued his diversion with perfect composure, notwithstanding that he
rather thought there was nobody else in the house.
In this, however, he was mistaken; for, after the knock had been
repeated with increased impatience, the door was opened, and somebody
with a very heavy tread went up the stairs and into the room above. Mr
Swiveller was wondering whether this might be another Miss Brass, twin
sister to the Dragon, when there came a rapping of knuckles at the
office door.
‘Come in!’ said Dick. ‘Don’t stand upon ceremony. The business will
get rather complicated if I’ve many more customers. Come in!’
‘Oh, please,’ said a little voice very low down in the doorway, ‘will
you come and show the lodgings?’
Dick leant over the table, and descried a small slipshod girl in a
dirty coarse apron and bib, which left nothing of her visible but her
face and feet. She might as well have been dressed in a violin-case.
‘Why, who are you?’ said Dick.
To which the only reply was, ‘Oh, please will you come and show the
lodgings?’
There never was such an old-fashioned child in her looks and manner.
She must have been at work from her cradle. She seemed as much afraid
of Dick, as Dick was amazed at her.
‘I hav’n’t got anything to do with the lodgings,’ said Dick. ‘Tell ‘em
to call again.’
‘Oh, but please will you come and show the lodgings,’ returned the
girl; ‘It’s eighteen shillings a week and us finding plate and linen.
Boots and clothes is extra, and fires in winter-time is eightpence a
day.’
‘Why don’t you show ‘em yourself? You seem to know all about ‘em,’
said Dick.
‘Miss Sally said I wasn’t to, because people wouldn’t believe the
attendance was good if they saw how small I was first.’
‘Well, but they’ll see how small you are afterwards, won’t they?’ said
Dick.
‘Ah! But then they’ll have taken ‘em for a fortnight certain,’ replied
the child with a shrewd look; ‘and people don’t like moving when
they’re once settled.’
‘This is a queer sort of thing,’ muttered Dick, rising. ‘What do you
mean to say you are--the cook?’
‘Yes, I do plain cooking;’ replied the child. ‘I’m housemaid too; I do
all the work of the house.’
‘I suppose Brass and the Dragon and I do the dirtiest part of it,’
thought Dick. And he might have thought much more, being in a doubtful
and hesitating mood, but that the girl again urged her request, and
certain mysterious bumping sounds on the passage and staircase seemed
to give note of the applicant’s impatience. Richard Swiveller,
therefore, sticking a pen behind each ear, and carrying another in his
mouth as a token of his great importance and devotion to business,
hurried out to meet and treat with the single gentleman.
He was a little surprised to perceive that the bumping sounds were
occasioned by the progress up-stairs of the single gentleman’s trunk,
which, being nearly twice as wide as the staircase, and exceedingly
heavy withal, it was no easy matter for the united exertions of the
single gentleman and the coachman to convey up the steep ascent. But
there they were, crushing each other, and pushing and pulling with all
their might, and getting the trunk tight and fast in all kinds of
impossible angles, and to pass them was out of the question; for which
sufficient reason, Mr Swiveller followed slowly behind, entering a new
protest on every stair against the house of Mr Sampson Brass being thus
taken by storm.
To these remonstrances, the single gentleman answered not a word, but
when the trunk was at last got into the bed-room, sat down upon it and
wiped his bald head and face with his handkerchief. He was very warm,
and well he might be; for, not to mention the exertion of getting the
trunk up stairs, he was closely muffled in winter garments, though the
thermometer had stood all day at eighty-one in the shade.
‘I believe, sir,’ said Richard Swiveller, taking his pen out of his
mouth, ‘that you desire to look at these apartments. They are very
charming apartments, sir. They command an uninterrupted view of--of
over the way, and they are within one minute’s walk of--of the corner
of the street. There is exceedingly mild porter, sir, in the immediate
vicinity, and the contingent advantages are extraordinary.’
‘What’s the rent?’ said the single gentleman.
‘One pound per week,’ replied Dick, improving on the terms.
‘I’ll take ‘em.’
‘The boots and clothes are extras,’ said Dick; ‘and the fires in winter
time are--’
‘Are all agreed to,’ answered the single gentleman.
‘Two weeks certain,’ said Dick, ‘are the--’
‘Two weeks!’ cried the single gentleman gruffly, eyeing him from top to
toe. ‘Two years. I shall live here for two years. Here. Ten pounds
down. The bargain’s made.’
‘Why you see,’ said Dick, ‘my name is not Brass, and--’
‘Who said it was? My name’s not Brass. What then?’
‘The name of the master of the house is,’ said Dick.
‘I’m glad of it,’ returned the single gentleman; ‘it’s a good name for
a lawyer. Coachman, you may go. So may you, Sir.’
Mr Swiveller was so much confounded by the single gentleman riding
roughshod over him at this rate, that he stood looking at him almost as
hard as he had looked at Miss Sally. The single gentleman, however,
was not in the slightest degree affected by this circumstance, but
proceeded with perfect composure to unwind the shawl which was tied
round his neck, and then to pull off his boots. Freed of these
encumbrances, he went on to divest himself of his other clothing, which
he folded up, piece by piece, and ranged in order on the trunk. Then,
he pulled down the window-blinds, drew the curtains, wound up his
watch, and, quite leisurely and methodically, got into bed.
‘Take down the bill,’ were his parting words, as he looked out from
between the curtains; ‘and let nobody call me till I ring the bell.’
With that the curtains closed, and he seemed to snore immediately.
‘This is a most remarkable and supernatural sort of house!’ said Mr
Swiveller, as he walked into the office with the bill in his hand.
‘She-dragons in the business, conducting themselves like professional
gentlemen; plain cooks of three feet high appearing mysteriously from
under ground; strangers walking in and going to bed without leave or
licence in the middle of the day! If he should be one of the
miraculous fellows that turn up now and then, and has gone to sleep for
two years, I shall be in a pleasant situation. It’s my destiny,
however, and I hope Brass may like it. I shall be sorry if he don’t.
But it’s no business of mine--I have nothing whatever to do with it!’
CHAPTER 35
Mr Brass on returning home received the report of his clerk with much
complacency and satisfaction, and was particular in inquiring after the
ten-pound note, which, proving on examination to be a good and lawful
note of the Governor and Company of the Bank of England, increased his
good-humour considerably. Indeed he so overflowed with liberality and
condescension, that, in the fulness of his heart, he invited Mr
Swiveller to partake of a bowl of punch with him at that remote and
indefinite period which is currently denominated ‘one of these days,’
and paid him many handsome compliments on the uncommon aptitude for
business which his conduct on the first day of his devotion to it had
so plainly evinced.
It was a maxim with Mr Brass that the habit of paying compliments kept
a man’s tongue oiled without any expense; and, as that useful member
ought never to grow rusty or creak in turning on its hinges in the case
of a practitioner of the law, in whom it should be always glib and
easy, he lost few opportunities of improving himself by the utterance
of handsome speeches and eulogistic expressions. And this had passed
into such a habit with him, that, if he could not be correctly said to
have his tongue at his fingers’ ends, he might certainly be said to
have it anywhere but in his face: which being, as we have already seen,
of a harsh and repulsive character, was not oiled so easily, but
frowned above all the smooth speeches--one of nature’s beacons, warning
off those who navigated the shoals and breakers of the World, or of
that dangerous strait the Law, and admonishing them to seek less
treacherous harbours and try their fortune elsewhere.
While Mr Brass by turns overwhelmed his clerk with compliments and
inspected the ten-pound note, Miss Sally showed little emotion and that
of no pleasurable kind, for as the tendency of her legal practice had
been to fix her thoughts on small gains and gripings, and to whet and
sharpen her natural wisdom, she was not a little disappointed that the
single gentleman had obtained the lodgings at such an easy rate,
arguing that when he was seen to have set his mind upon them, he should
have been at the least charged double or treble the usual terms, and
that, in exact proportion as he pressed forward, Mr Swiveller should
have hung back. But neither the good opinion of Mr Brass, nor the
dissatisfaction of Miss Sally, wrought any impression upon that young
gentleman, who, throwing the responsibility of this and all other acts
and deeds thereafter to be done by him, upon his unlucky destiny, was
quite resigned and comfortable: fully prepared for the worst, and
philosophically indifferent to the best.
‘Good morning, Mr Richard,’ said Brass, on the second day of Mr
Swiveller’s clerkship. ‘Sally found you a second-hand stool, Sir,
yesterday evening, in Whitechapel. She’s a rare fellow at a bargain, I
can tell you, Mr Richard. You’ll find that a first-rate stool, Sir,
take my word for it.’
‘It’s rather a crazy one to look at,’ said Dick.
‘You’ll find it a most amazing stool to sit down upon, you may depend,’
returned Mr Brass. ‘It was bought in the open street just opposite the
hospital, and as it has been standing there a month of two, it has got
rather dusty and a little brown from being in the sun, that’s all.’
‘I hope it hasn’t got any fevers or anything of that sort in it,’ said
Dick, sitting himself down discontentedly, between Mr Sampson and the
chaste Sally. ‘One of the legs is longer than the others.’
‘Then we get a bit of timber in, Sir,’ retorted Brass. ‘Ha, ha, ha!
We get a bit of timber in, Sir, and that’s another advantage of my
sister’s going to market for us. Miss Brass, Mr Richard is the--’
‘Will you keep quiet?’ interrupted the fair subject of these remarks,
looking up from her papers. ‘How am I to work if you keep on
chattering?’
‘What an uncertain chap you are!’ returned the lawyer. ‘Sometimes
you’re all for a chat. At another time you’re all for work. A man
never knows what humour he’ll find you in.’
‘I’m in a working humour now,’ said Sally, ‘so don’t disturb me, if you
please. And don’t take him,’ Miss Sally pointed with the feather of
her pen to Richard, ‘off his business. He won’t do more than he can
help, I dare say.’
Mr Brass had evidently a strong inclination to make an angry reply, but
was deterred by prudent or timid considerations, as he only muttered
something about aggravation and a vagabond; not associating the terms
with any individual, but mentioning them as connected with some
abstract ideas which happened to occur to him. They went on writing
for a long time in silence after this--in such a dull silence that Mr
Swiveller (who required excitement) had several times fallen asleep,
and written divers strange words in an unknown character with his eyes
shut, when Miss Sally at length broke in upon the monotony of the
office by pulling out the little tin box, taking a noisy pinch of
snuff, and then expressing her opinion that Mr Richard Swiveller had
‘done it.’
‘Done what, ma’am?’ said Richard.
‘Do you know,’ returned Miss Brass, ‘that the lodger isn’t up yet--
that nothing has been seen or heard of him since he went to bed
yesterday afternoon?’
‘Well, ma’am,’ said Dick, ‘I suppose he may sleep his ten pound out, in
peace and quietness, if he likes.’
‘Ah! I begin to think he’ll never wake,’ observed Miss Sally.
‘It’s a very remarkable circumstance,’ said Brass, laying down his pen;
‘really, very remarkable. Mr Richard, you’ll remember, if this
gentleman should be found to have hung himself to the bed-post, or any
unpleasant accident of that kind should happen--you’ll remember, Mr
Richard, that this ten pound note was given to you in part payment of
two years’ rent? You’ll bear that in mind, Mr Richard; you had better
make a note of it, sir, in case you should ever be called upon to give
evidence.’
Mr Swiveller took a large sheet of foolscap, and with a countenance of
profound gravity, began to make a very small note in one corner.
‘We can never be too cautious,’ said Mr Brass. ‘There is a deal of
wickedness going about the world, a deal of wickedness. Did the
gentleman happen to say, Sir--but never mind that at present, sir;
finish that little memorandum first.’
Dick did so, and handed it to Mr Brass, who had dismounted from his
stool, and was walking up and down the office.
‘Oh, this is the memorandum, is it?’ said Brass, running his eye over
the document. ‘Very good. Now, Mr Richard, did the gentleman say
anything else?’
‘No.’
‘Are you sure, Mr Richard,’ said Brass, solemnly, ‘that the gentleman
said nothing else?’
‘Devil a word, Sir,’ replied Dick.
‘Think again, Sir,’ said Brass; ‘it’s my duty, Sir, in the position in
which I stand, and as an honourable member of the legal profession--the
first profession in this country, Sir, or in any other country, or in
any of the planets that shine above us at night and are supposed to be
inhabited--it’s my duty, Sir, as an honourable member of that
profession, not to put to you a leading question in a matter of this
delicacy and importance. Did the gentleman, Sir, who took the first
floor of you yesterday afternoon, and who brought with him a box of
property--a box of property--say anything more than is set down in this
memorandum?’
‘Come, don’t be a fool,’ said Miss Sally.
Dick looked at her, and then at Brass, and then at Miss Sally again,
and still said ‘No.’
‘Pooh, pooh! Deuce take it, Mr Richard, how dull you are!’ cried
Brass, relaxing into a smile. ‘Did he say anything about his
property?--there!’
‘That’s the way to put it,’ said Miss Sally, nodding to her brother.
‘Did he say, for instance,’ added Brass, in a kind of comfortable, cozy
tone--‘I don’t assert that he did say so, mind; I only ask you, to
refresh your memory--did he say, for instance, that he was a stranger
in London--that it was not his humour or within his ability to give any
references--that he felt we had a right to require them--and that, in
case anything should happen to him, at any time, he particularly
desired that whatever property he had upon the premises should be
considered mine, as some slight recompense for the trouble and
annoyance I should sustain--and were you, in short,’ added Brass, still
more comfortably and cozily than before, ‘were you induced to accept
him on my behalf, as a tenant, upon those conditions?’
‘Certainly not,’ replied Dick.
‘Why then, Mr Richard,’ said Brass, darting at him a supercilious and
reproachful look, ‘it’s my opinion that you’ve mistaken your calling,
and will never make a lawyer.’
‘Not if you live a thousand years,’ added Miss Sally. Whereupon the
brother and sister took each a noisy pinch of snuff from the little tin
box, and fell into a gloomy thoughtfulness.
Nothing further passed up to Mr Swiveller’s dinner-time, which was at
three o’clock, and seemed about three weeks in coming. At the first
stroke of the hour, the new clerk disappeared. At the last stroke of
five, he reappeared, and the office, as if by magic, became fragrant
with the smell of gin and water and lemon-peel.
‘Mr Richard,’ said Brass, ‘this man’s not up yet. Nothing will wake
him, sir. What’s to be done?’
‘I should let him have his sleep out,’ returned Dick.
‘Sleep out!’ cried Brass; ‘why he has been asleep now, six-and-twenty
hours. We have been moving chests of drawers over his head, we have
knocked double knocks at the street-door, we have made the servant-girl
fall down stairs several times (she’s a light weight, and it don’t hurt
her much,) but nothing wakes him.’
‘Perhaps a ladder,’ suggested Dick, ‘and getting in at the first-floor
window--’
‘But then there’s a door between; besides, the neighbours would be up
in arms,’ said Brass.
‘What do you say to getting on the roof of the house through the
trap-door, and dropping down the chimney?’ suggested Dick.
‘That would be an excellent plan,’ said Brass, ‘if anybody would be--’
and here he looked very hard at Mr Swiveller--‘would be kind, and
friendly, and generous enough, to undertake it. I dare say it would
not be anything like as disagreeable as one supposes.’
Dick had made the suggestion, thinking that the duty might possibly
fall within Miss Sally’s department. As he said nothing further, and
declined taking the hint, Mr Brass was fain to propose that they should
go up stairs together, and make a last effort to awaken the sleeper by
some less violent means, which, if they failed on this last trial, must
positively be succeeded by stronger measures. Mr Swiveller, assenting,
armed himself with his stool and the large ruler, and repaired with his
employer to the scene of action, where Miss Brass was already ringing a
hand-bell with all her might, and yet without producing the smallest
effect upon their mysterious lodger.
‘There are his boots, Mr Richard!’ said Brass.
‘Very obstinate-looking articles they are too,’ quoth Richard
Swiveller. And truly, they were as sturdy and bluff a pair of boots as
one would wish to see; as firmly planted on the ground as if their
owner’s legs and feet had been in them; and seeming, with their broad
soles and blunt toes, to hold possession of their place by main force.
‘I can’t see anything but the curtain of the bed,’ said Brass, applying
his eye to the keyhole of the door. ‘Is he a strong man, Mr Richard?’
‘Very,’ answered Dick.
‘It would be an extremely unpleasant circumstance if he was to bounce
out suddenly,’ said Brass. ‘Keep the stairs clear. I should be more
than a match for him, of course, but I’m the master of the house, and
the laws of hospitality must be respected.--Hallo there! Hallo, hallo!’
While Mr Brass, with his eye curiously twisted into the keyhole,
uttered these sounds as a means of attracting the lodger’s attention,
and while Miss Brass plied the hand-bell, Mr Swiveller put his stool
close against the wall by the side of the door, and mounting on the top
and standing bolt upright, so that if the lodger did make a rush, he
would most probably pass him in its onward fury, began a violent
battery with the ruler upon the upper panels of the door. Captivated
with his own ingenuity, and confident in the strength of his position,
which he had taken up after the method of those hardy individuals who
open the pit and gallery doors of theatres on crowded nights, Mr
Swiveller rained down such a shower of blows, that the noise of the
bell was drowned; and the small servant, who lingered on the stairs
below, ready to fly at a moment’s notice, was obliged to hold her ears
lest she should be rendered deaf for life.
Suddenly the door was unlocked on the inside, and flung violently open.
The small servant flew to the coal-cellar; Miss Sally dived into her
own bed-room; Mr Brass, who was not remarkable for personal courage,
ran into the next street, and finding that nobody followed him, armed
with a poker or other offensive weapon, put his hands in his pockets,
walked very slowly all at once, and whistled.
Meanwhile, Mr Swiveller, on the top of the stool, drew himself into as
flat a shape as possible against the wall, and looked, not
unconcernedly, down upon the single gentleman, who appeared at the door
growling and cursing in a very awful manner, and, with the boots in his
hand, seemed to have an intention of hurling them down stairs on
speculation. This idea, however, he abandoned. He was turning into
his room again, still growling vengefully, when his eyes met those of
the watchful Richard.
‘Have YOU been making that horrible noise?’ said the single gentleman.
‘I have been helping, sir,’ returned Dick, keeping his eye upon him,
and waving the ruler gently in his right hand, as an indication of what
the single gentleman had to expect if he attempted any violence.
‘How dare you then,’ said the lodger, ‘Eh?’
To this, Dick made no other reply than by inquiring whether the lodger
held it to be consistent with the conduct and character of a gentleman
to go to sleep for six-and-twenty hours at a stretch, and whether the
peace of an amiable and virtuous family was to weigh as nothing in the
balance.
‘Is my peace nothing?’ said the single gentleman.
‘Is their peace nothing, sir?’ returned Dick. ‘I don’t wish to hold
out any threats, sir--indeed the law does not allow of threats, for to
threaten is an indictable offence--but if ever you do that again, take
care you’re not sat upon by the coroner and buried in a cross road
before you wake. We have been distracted with fears that you were
dead, Sir,’ said Dick, gently sliding to the ground, ‘and the short and
the long of it is, that we cannot allow single gentlemen to come into
this establishment and sleep like double gentlemen without paying extra
for it.’
‘Indeed!’ cried the lodger.
‘Yes, Sir, indeed,’ returned Dick, yielding to his destiny and saying
whatever came uppermost; ‘an equal quantity of slumber was never got
out of one bed and bedstead, and if you’re going to sleep in that way,
you must pay for a double-bedded room.’
Instead of being thrown into a greater passion by these remarks, the
lodger lapsed into a broad grin and looked at Mr Swiveller with
twinkling eyes. He was a brown-faced sun-burnt man, and appeared
browner and more sun-burnt from having a white nightcap on. As it was
clear that he was a choleric fellow in some respects, Mr Swiveller was
relieved to find him in such good humour, and, to encourage him in it,
smiled himself.
The lodger, in the testiness of being so rudely roused, had pushed his
nightcap very much on one side of his bald head. This gave him a
rakish eccentric air which, now that he had leisure to observe it,
charmed Mr Swiveller exceedingly; therefore, by way of propitiation, he
expressed his hope that the gentleman was going to get up, and further
that he would never do so any more.
‘Come here, you impudent rascal!’ was the lodger’s answer as he
re-entered his room.
Mr Swiveller followed him in, leaving the stool outside, but reserving
the ruler in case of a surprise. He rather congratulated himself on
his prudence when the single gentleman, without notice or explanation
of any kind, double-locked the door.
‘Can you drink anything?’ was his next inquiry.
Mr Swiveller replied that he had very recently been assuaging the pangs
of thirst, but that he was still open to ‘a modest quencher,’ if the
materials were at hand. Without another word spoken on either side,
the lodger took from his great trunk, a kind of temple, shining as of
polished silver, and placed it carefully on the table.
Greatly interested in his proceedings, Mr Swiveller observed him
closely. Into one little chamber of this temple, he dropped an egg;
into another some coffee; into a third a compact piece of raw steak
from a neat tin case; into a fourth, he poured some water. Then, with
the aid of a phosphorus-box and some matches, he procured a light and
applied it to a spirit-lamp which had a place of its own below the
temple; then, he shut down the lids of all the little chambers; then he
opened them; and then, by some wonderful and unseen agency, the steak
was done, the egg was boiled, the coffee was accurately prepared, and
his breakfast was ready.
‘Hot water--’ said the lodger, handing it to Mr Swiveller with as much
coolness as if he had a kitchen fire before him--‘extraordinary
rum--sugar--and a travelling glass. Mix for yourself. And make haste.’
Dick complied, his eyes wandering all the time from the temple on the
table, which seemed to do everything, to the great trunk which seemed
to hold everything. The lodger took his breakfast like a man who was
used to work these miracles, and thought nothing of them.
‘The man of the house is a lawyer, is he not?’ said the lodger.
Dick nodded. The rum was amazing.
‘The woman of the house--what’s she?’
‘A dragon,’ said Dick.
The single gentleman, perhaps because he had met with such things in
his travels, or perhaps because he WAS a single gentleman, evinced no
surprise, but merely inquired ‘Wife or sister?’--‘Sister,’ said
Dick.--‘So much the better,’ said the single gentleman, ‘he can get rid
of her when he likes.’
‘I want to do as I like, young man,’ he added after a short silence;
‘to go to bed when I like, get up when I like, come in when I like, go
out when I like--to be asked no questions and be surrounded by no
spies. In this last respect, servants are the devil. There’s only one
here.’
‘And a very little one,’ said Dick.
‘And a very little one,’ repeated the lodger. ‘Well, the place will
suit me, will it?’
‘Yes,’ said Dick.
‘Sharks, I suppose?’ said the lodger.
Dick nodded assent, and drained his glass.
‘Let them know my humour,’ said the single gentleman, rising. ‘If they
disturb me, they lose a good tenant. If they know me to be that, they
know enough. If they try to know more, it’s a notice to quit. It’s
better to understand these things at once. Good day.’
‘I beg your pardon,’ said Dick, halting in his passage to the door,
which the lodger prepared to open. ‘When he who adores thee has left
but the name--’
‘What do you mean?’
‘--But the name,’ said Dick--‘has left but the name--in case of letters
or parcels--’
‘I never have any,’ returned the lodger.
‘Or in the case anybody should call.’
‘Nobody ever calls on me.’
‘If any mistake should arise from not having the name, don’t say it was
my fault, Sir,’ added Dick, still lingering.--‘Oh blame not the bard--’
‘I’ll blame nobody,’ said the lodger, with such irascibility that in a
moment Dick found himself on the staircase, and the locked door between
them.
Mr Brass and Miss Sally were lurking hard by, having been, indeed, only
routed from the keyhole by Mr Swiveller’s abrupt exit. As their utmost
exertions had not enabled them to overhear a word of the interview,
however, in consequence of a quarrel for precedence, which, though
limited of necessity to pushes and pinches and such quiet pantomime,
had lasted the whole time, they hurried him down to the office to hear
his account of the conversation.
This Mr Swiveller gave them--faithfully as regarded the wishes and
character of the single gentleman, and poetically as concerned the
great trunk, of which he gave a description more remarkable for
brilliancy of imagination than a strict adherence to truth; declaring,
with many strong asseverations, that it contained a specimen of every
kind of rich food and wine, known in these times, and in particular
that it was of a self-acting kind and served up whatever was required,
as he supposed by clock-work. He also gave them to understand that the
cooking apparatus roasted a fine piece of sirloin of beef, weighing
about six pounds avoir-dupoise, in two minutes and a quarter, as he had
himself witnessed, and proved by his sense of taste; and further, that,
however the effect was produced, he had distinctly seen water boil and
bubble up when the single gentleman winked; from which facts he (Mr
Swiveller) was led to infer that the lodger was some great conjuror or
chemist, or both, whose residence under that roof could not fail at
some future days to shed a great credit and distinction on the name of
Brass, and add a new interest to the history of Bevis Marks.
There was one point which Mr Swiveller deemed it unnecessary to enlarge
upon, and that was the fact of the modest quencher, which, by reason of
its intrinsic strength and its coming close upon the heels of the
temperate beverage he had discussed at dinner, awakened a slight degree
of fever, and rendered necessary two or three other modest quenchers at
the public-house in the course of the evening.
CHAPTER 36
As the single gentleman after some weeks’ occupation of his lodgings,
still declined to correspond, by word or gesture, either with Mr Brass
or his sister Sally, but invariably chose Richard Swiveller as his
channel of communication; and as he proved himself in all respects a
highly desirable inmate, paying for everything beforehand, giving very
little trouble, making no noise, and keeping early hours; Mr Richard
imperceptibly rose to an important position in the family, as one who
had influence over this mysterious lodger, and could negotiate with
him, for good or evil, when nobody else durst approach his person.
If the truth must be told, even Mr Swiveller’s approaches to the single
gentleman were of a very distant kind, and met with small
encouragement; but, as he never returned from a monosyllabic conference
with the unknown, without quoting such expressions as ‘Swiveller, I
know I can rely upon you,’--‘I have no hesitation in saying, Swiveller,
that I entertain a regard for you,’--‘Swiveller, you are my friend, and
will stand by me I am sure,’ with many other short speeches of the same
familiar and confiding kind, purporting to have been addressed by the
single gentleman to himself, and to form the staple of their ordinary
discourse, neither Mr Brass nor Miss Sally for a moment questioned the
extent of his influence, but accorded to him their fullest and most
unqualified belief.
But quite apart from, and independent of, this source of popularity, Mr
Swiveller had another, which promised to be equally enduring, and to
lighten his position considerably.
He found favour in the eyes of Miss Sally Brass. Let not the light
scorners of female fascination erect their ears to listen to a new tale
of love which shall serve them for a jest; for Miss Brass, however
accurately formed to be beloved, was not of the loving kind. That
amiable virgin, having clung to the skirts of the Law from her earliest
youth; having sustained herself by their aid, as it were, in her first
running alone, and maintained a firm grasp upon them ever since; had
passed her life in a kind of legal childhood. She had been remarkable,
when a tender prattler for an uncommon talent in counterfeiting the
walk and manner of a bailiff: in which character she had learned to tap
her little playfellows on the shoulder, and to carry them off to
imaginary sponging-houses, with a correctness of imitation which was
the surprise and delight of all who witnessed her performances, and
which was only to be exceeded by her exquisite manner of putting an
execution into her doll’s house, and taking an exact inventory of the
chairs and tables. These artless sports had naturally soothed and
cheered the decline of her widowed father: a most exemplary gentleman
(called ‘old Foxey’ by his friends from his extreme sagacity,) who
encouraged them to the utmost, and whose chief regret, on finding that
he drew near to Houndsditch churchyard, was, that his daughter could
not take out an attorney’s certificate and hold a place upon the roll.
Filled with this affectionate and touching sorrow, he had solemnly
confided her to his son Sampson as an invaluable auxiliary; and from
the old gentleman’s decease to the period of which we treat, Miss Sally
Brass had been the prop and pillar of his business.
It is obvious that, having devoted herself from infancy to this one
pursuit and study, Miss Brass could know but little of the world,
otherwise than in connection with the law; and that from a lady gifted
with such high tastes, proficiency in those gentler and softer arts in
which women usually excel, was scarcely to be looked for. Miss Sally’s
accomplishments were all of a masculine and strictly legal kind. They
began with the practice of an attorney and they ended with it. She was
in a state of lawful innocence, so to speak. The law had been her
nurse. And, as bandy-legs or such physical deformities in children are
held to be the consequence of bad nursing, so, if in a mind so
beautiful any moral twist or handiness could be found, Miss Sally
Brass’s nurse was alone to blame.
It was upon this lady, then, that Mr Swiveller burst in full freshness as
something new and hitherto undreamed of, lighting up the office with
scraps of song and merriment, conjuring with inkstands and boxes of
wafers, catching three oranges in one hand, balancing stools upon his
chin and penknives on his nose, and constantly performing a hundred
other feats with equal ingenuity; for with such unbendings did Richard,
in Mr Brass’s absence, relieve the tedium of his confinement. These
social qualities, which Miss Sally first discovered by accident,
gradually made such an impression upon her, that she would entreat Mr
Swiveller to relax as though she were not by, which Mr Swiveller,
nothing loth, would readily consent to do. By these means a friendship
sprung up between them. Mr Swiveller gradually came to look upon her
as her brother Sampson did, and as he would have looked upon any other
clerk. He imparted to her the mystery of going the odd man or plain
Newmarket for fruit, ginger-beer, baked potatoes, or even a modest
quencher, of which Miss Brass did not scruple to partake. He would
often persuade her to undertake his share of writing in addition to her
own; nay, he would sometimes reward her with a hearty slap on the back,
and protest that she was a devilish good fellow, a jolly dog, and so
forth; all of which compliments Miss Sally would receive in entire good
part and with perfect satisfaction.
One circumstance troubled Mr Swiveller’s mind very much, and that was
that the small servant always remained somewhere in the bowels of the
earth under Bevis Marks, and never came to the surface unless the
single gentleman rang his bell, when she would answer it and
immediately disappear again. She never went out, or came into the
office, or had a clean face, or took off the coarse apron, or looked
out of any one of the windows, or stood at the street-door for a breath
of air, or had any rest or enjoyment whatever. Nobody ever came to see
her, nobody spoke of her, nobody cared about her. Mr Brass had said
once, that he believed she was a ‘love-child’ (which means anything but
a child of love), and that was all the information Richard Swiveller
could obtain.
‘It’s of no use asking the dragon,’ thought Dick one day, as he sat
contemplating the features of Miss Sally Brass. ‘I suspect if I asked
any questions on that head, our alliance would be at an end. I wonder
whether she is a dragon by-the-bye, or something in the mermaid way.
She has rather a scaly appearance. But mermaids are fond of looking at
themselves in the glass, which she can’t be. And they have a habit of
combing their hair, which she hasn’t. No, she’s a dragon.’
‘Where are you going, old fellow?’ said Dick aloud, as Miss Sally wiped
her pen as usual on the green dress, and uprose from her seat.
‘To dinner,’ answered the dragon.
‘To dinner!’ thought Dick, ‘that’s another circumstance. I don’t
believe that small servant ever has anything to eat.’
‘Sammy won’t be home,’ said Miss Brass. ‘Stop till I come back. I
sha’n’t be long.’
Dick nodded, and followed Miss Brass--with his eyes to the door, and
with his ears to a little back parlour, where she and her brother took
their meals.
‘Now,’ said Dick, walking up and down with his hands in his pockets,
‘I’d give something--if I had it--to know how they use that child, and
where they keep her. My mother must have been a very inquisitive
woman; I have no doubt I’m marked with a note of interrogation
somewhere. My feelings I smother, but thou hast been the cause of this
anguish, my--upon my word,’ said Mr Swiveller, checking himself and
falling thoughtfully into the client’s chair, ‘I should like to know
how they use her!’
After running on, in this way, for some time, Mr Swiveller softly
opened the office door, with the intention of darting across the street
for a glass of the mild porter. At that moment he caught a parting
glimpse of the brown head-dress of Miss Brass flitting down the kitchen
stairs. ‘And by Jove!’ thought Dick, ‘she’s going to feed the small
servant. Now or never!’
First peeping over the handrail and allowing the head-dress to
disappear in the darkness below, he groped his way down, and arrived at
the door of a back kitchen immediately after Miss Brass had entered the
same, bearing in her hand a cold leg of mutton. It was a very dark
miserable place, very low and very damp: the walls disfigured by a
thousand rents and blotches. The water was trickling out of a leaky
butt, and a most wretched cat was lapping up the drops with the sickly
eagerness of starvation. The grate, which was a wide one, was wound
and screwed up tight, so as to hold no more than a little thin sandwich
of fire. Everything was locked up; the coal-cellar, the candle-box,
the salt-box, the meat-safe, were all padlocked. There was nothing
that a beetle could have lunched upon. The pinched and meagre aspect
of the place would have killed a chameleon. He would have known, at
the first mouthful, that the air was not eatable, and must have given up
the ghost in despair. The small servant stood with humility in presence
of Miss Sally, and hung her head.
‘Are you there?’ said Miss Sally.
‘Yes, ma’am,’ was the answer in a weak voice.
‘Go further away from the leg of mutton, or you’ll be picking it, I
know,’ said Miss Sally.
The girl withdrew into a corner, while Miss Brass took a key from her
pocket, and opening the safe, brought from it a dreary waste of cold
potatoes, looking as eatable as Stonehenge. This she placed before the
small servant, ordering her to sit down before it, and then, taking up
a great carving-knife, made a mighty show of sharpening it upon the
carving-fork.
‘Do you see this?’ said Miss Brass, slicing off about two square inches
of cold mutton, after all this preparation, and holding it out on the
point of the fork.
The small servant looked hard enough at it with her hungry eyes to see
every shred of it, small as it was, and answered, ‘yes.’
‘Then don’t you ever go and say,’ retorted Miss Sally, ‘that you hadn’t
meat here. There, eat it up.’
This was soon done. ‘Now, do you want any more?’ said Miss Sally.
The hungry creature answered with a faint ‘No.’ They were evidently
going through an established form.
‘You’ve been helped once to meat,’ said Miss Brass, summing up the
facts; ‘you have had as much as you can eat, you’re asked if you want
any more, and you answer, ‘no!’ Then don’t you ever go and say you were
allowanced, mind that.’
With those words, Miss Sally put the meat away and locked the safe, and
then drawing near to the small servant, overlooked her while she
finished the potatoes.
It was plain that some extraordinary grudge was working in Miss Brass’s
gentle breast, and that it was that which impelled her, without the
smallest present cause, to rap the child with the blade of the knife,
now on her hand, now on her head, and now on her back, as if she found
it quite impossible to stand so close to her without administering a
few slight knocks. But Mr Swiveller was not a little surprised to see
his fellow-clerk, after walking slowly backwards towards the door, as
if she were trying to withdraw herself from the room but could not
accomplish it, dart suddenly forward, and falling on the small servant
give her some hard blows with her clenched hand. The victim cried, but
in a subdued manner as if she feared to raise her voice, and Miss
Sally, comforting herself with a pinch of snuff, ascended the stairs,
just as Richard had safely reached the office.
CHAPTER 37
The single gentleman among his other peculiarities--and he had a very
plentiful stock, of which he every day furnished some new
specimen--took a most extraordinary and remarkable interest in the
exhibition of Punch. If the sound of a Punch’s voice, at ever so
remote a distance, reached Bevis Marks, the single gentleman, though in
bed and asleep, would start up, and, hurrying on his clothes, make for
the spot with all speed, and presently return at the head of a long
procession of idlers, having in the midst the theatre and its
proprietors. Straightway, the stage would be set up in front of Mr
Brass’s house; the single gentleman would establish himself at the
first floor window; and the entertainment would proceed, with all its
exciting accompaniments of fife and drum and shout, to the excessive
consternation of all sober votaries of business in that silent
thoroughfare. It might have been expected that when the play was done,
both players and audience would have dispersed; but the epilogue was as
bad as the play, for no sooner was the Devil dead, than the manager of
the puppets and his partner were summoned by the single gentleman to
his chamber, where they were regaled with strong waters from his
private store, and where they held with him long conversations, the
purport of which no human being could fathom. But the secret of these
discussions was of little importance. It was sufficient to know that
while they were proceeding, the concourse without still lingered round
the house; that boys beat upon the drum with their fists, and imitated
Punch with their tender voices; that the office-window was rendered
opaque by flattened noses, and the key-hole of the street-door luminous
with eyes; that every time the single gentleman or either of his guests
was seen at the upper window, or so much as the end of one of their
noses was visible, there was a great shout of execration from the
excluded mob, who remained howling and yelling, and refusing
consolation, until the exhibitors were delivered up to them to be
attended elsewhere. It was sufficient, in short, to know that Bevis
Marks was revolutionised by these popular movements, and that peace and
quietness fled from its precincts.
Nobody was rendered more indignant by these proceedings than Mr Sampson
Brass, who, as he could by no means afford to lose so profitable an
inmate, deemed it prudent to pocket his lodger’s affront along with his
cash, and to annoy the audiences who clustered round his door by such
imperfect means of retaliation as were open to him, and which were
confined to the trickling down of foul water on their heads from unseen
watering pots, pelting them with fragments of tile and mortar from the
roof of the house, and bribing the drivers of hackney cabriolets to
come suddenly round the corner and dash in among them precipitately.
It may, at first sight, be matter of surprise to the thoughtless few
that Mr Brass, being a professional gentleman, should not have legally
indicted some party or parties, active in the promotion of the
nuisance, but they will be good enough to remember, that as Doctors
seldom take their own prescriptions, and Divines do not always practise
what they preach, so lawyers are shy of meddling with the Law on their
own account: knowing it to be an edged tool of uncertain application,
very expensive in the working, and rather remarkable for its properties
of close shaving, than for its always shaving the right person.
‘Come,’ said Mr Brass one afternoon, ‘this is two days without a Punch.
I’m in hopes he has run through ‘em all, at last.’
‘Why are you in hopes?’ returned Miss Sally. ‘What harm do they do?’
‘Here’s a pretty sort of a fellow!’ cried Brass, laying down his pen in
despair. ‘Now here’s an aggravating animal!’
‘Well, what harm do they do?’ retorted Sally.
‘What harm!’ cried Brass. ‘Is it no harm to have a constant hallooing
and hooting under one’s very nose, distracting one from business, and
making one grind one’s teeth with vexation? Is it no harm to be
blinded and choked up, and have the king’s highway stopped with a set
of screamers and roarers whose throats must be made of--of--’
‘Brass,’ suggested Mr Swiveller.
‘Ah! of brass,’ said the lawyer, glancing at his clerk, to assure
himself that he had suggested the word in good faith and without any
sinister intention. ‘Is that no harm?’
The lawyer stopped short in his invective, and listening for a moment,
and recognising the well-known voice, rested his head upon his hand,
raised his eyes to the ceiling, and muttered faintly, ‘There’s another!’
Up went the single gentleman’s window directly.
‘There’s another,’ repeated Brass; ‘and if I could get a break and four
blood horses to cut into the Marks when the crowd is at its thickest,
I’d give eighteen-pence and never grudge it!’
The distant squeak was heard again. The single gentleman’s door burst
open. He ran violently down the stairs, out into the street, and so
past the window, without any hat, towards the quarter whence the sound
proceeded--bent, no doubt, upon securing the strangers’ services
directly.
‘I wish I only knew who his friends were,’ muttered Sampson, filling
his pocket with papers; ‘if they’d just get up a pretty little
Commission de lunatico at the Gray’s Inn Coffee House and give me the
job, I’d be content to have the lodgings empty for one while, at all
events.’
With which words, and knocking his hat over his eyes as if for the
purpose of shutting out even a glimpse of the dreadful visitation, Mr
Brass rushed from the house and hurried away.
As Mr Swiveller was decidedly favourable to these performances, upon
the ground that looking at a Punch, or indeed looking at anything out
of window, was better than working; and as he had been, for this
reason, at some pains to awaken in his fellow clerk a sense of their
beauties and manifold deserts; both he and Miss Sally rose as with one
accord and took up their positions at the window: upon the sill
whereof, as in a post of honour, sundry young ladies and gentlemen who
were employed in the dry nurture of babies, and who made a point of
being present, with their young charges, on such occasions, had already
established themselves as comfortably as the circumstances would allow.
The glass being dim, Mr Swiveller, agreeably to a friendly custom which
he had established between them, hitched off the brown head-dress from
Miss Sally’s head, and dusted it carefully therewith. By the time he
had handed it back, and its beautiful wearer had put it on again (which
she did with perfect composure and indifference), the lodger returned
with the show and showmen at his heels, and a strong addition to the
body of spectators. The exhibitor disappeared with all speed behind
the drapery; and his partner, stationing himself by the side of the
Theatre, surveyed the audience with a remarkable expression of
melancholy, which became more remarkable still when he breathed a
hornpipe tune into that sweet musical instrument which is popularly
termed a mouth-organ, without at all changing the mournful expression
of the upper part of his face, though his mouth and chin were, of
necessity, in lively spasms.
The drama proceeded to its close, and held the spectators enchained in
the customary manner. The sensation which kindles in large assemblies,
when they are relieved from a state of breathless suspense and are
again free to speak and move, was yet rife, when the lodger, as usual,
summoned the men up stairs.
‘Both of you,’ he called from the window; for only the actual
exhibitor--a little fat man--prepared to obey the summons. ‘I want to
talk to you. Come both of you!’
‘Come, Tommy,’ said the little man.
‘I an’t a talker,’ replied the other. ‘Tell him so. What should I go
and talk for?’
‘Don’t you see the gentleman’s got a bottle and glass up there?’
returned the little man.
‘And couldn’t you have said so at first?’ retorted the other with
sudden alacrity. ‘Now, what are you waiting for? Are you going to
keep the gentleman expecting us all day? haven’t you no manners?’
With this remonstrance, the melancholy man, who was no other than Mr
Thomas Codlin, pushed past his friend and brother in the craft, Mr
Harris, otherwise Short or Trotters, and hurried before him to the
single gentleman’s apartment.
‘Now, my men,’ said the single gentleman; ‘you have done very well.
What will you take? Tell that little man behind, to shut the door.’
‘Shut the door, can’t you?’ said Mr Codlin, turning gruffly to his
friend. ‘You might have knowed that the gentleman wanted the door
shut, without being told, I think.’
Mr Short obeyed, observing under his breath that his friend seemed
unusually ‘cranky,’ and expressing a hope that there was no dairy in
the neighbourhood, or his temper would certainly spoil its contents.
The gentleman pointed to a couple of chairs, and intimated by an
emphatic nod of his head that he expected them to be seated. Messrs
Codlin and Short, after looking at each other with considerable doubt
and indecision, at length sat down--each on the extreme edge of the
chair pointed out to him--and held their hats very tight, while the
single gentleman filled a couple of glasses from a bottle on the table
beside him, and presented them in due form.
‘You’re pretty well browned by the sun, both of you,’ said their
entertainer. ‘Have you been travelling?’
Mr Short replied in the affirmative with a nod and a smile. Mr Codlin
added a corroborative nod and a short groan, as if he still felt the
weight of the Temple on his shoulders.
‘To fairs, markets, races, and so forth, I suppose?’ pursued the single
gentleman.
‘Yes, sir,’ returned Short, ‘pretty nigh all over the West of England.’
‘I have talked to men of your craft from North, East, and South,’
returned their host, in rather a hasty manner; ‘but I never lighted on
any from the West before.’
‘It’s our reg’lar summer circuit is the West, master,’ said Short;
‘that’s where it is. We takes the East of London in the spring and
winter, and the West of England in the summer time. Many’s the hard
day’s walking in rain and mud, and with never a penny earned, we’ve had
down in the West.’
‘Let me fill your glass again.’
‘Much obleeged to you sir, I think I will,’ said Mr Codlin, suddenly
thrusting in his own and turning Short’s aside. ‘I’m the sufferer,
sir, in all the travelling, and in all the staying at home. In town or
country, wet or dry, hot or cold, Tom Codlin suffers. But Tom Codlin
isn’t to complain for all that. Oh, no! Short may complain, but if
Codlin grumbles by so much as a word--oh dear, down with him, down
with him directly. It isn’t his place to grumble. That’s quite out of
the question.’
‘Codlin an’t without his usefulness,’ observed Short with an arch look,
‘but he don’t always keep his eyes open. He falls asleep sometimes,
you know. Remember them last races, Tommy.’
‘Will you never leave off aggravating a man?’ said Codlin. ‘It’s very
like I was asleep when five-and-tenpence was collected, in one round,
isn’t it? I was attending to my business, and couldn’t have my eyes in
twenty places at once, like a peacock, no more than you could. If I
an’t a match for an old man and a young child, you an’t neither, so
don’t throw that out against me, for the cap fits your head quite as
correct as it fits mine.’
‘You may as well drop the subject, Tom,’ said Short. ‘It isn’t
particular agreeable to the gentleman, I dare say.’
‘Then you shouldn’t have brought it up,’ returned Mr Codlin; ‘and I ask
the gentleman’s pardon on your account, as a giddy chap that likes to
hear himself talk, and don’t much care what he talks about, so that he
does talk.’
Their entertainer had sat perfectly quiet in the beginning of this
dispute, looking first at one man and then at the other, as if he were
lying in wait for an opportunity of putting some further question, or
reverting to that from which the discourse had strayed. But, from the
point where Mr Codlin was charged with sleepiness, he had shown an
increasing interest in the discussion: which now attained a very high
pitch.
‘You are the two men I want,’ he said, ‘the two men I have been looking
for, and searching after! Where are that old man and that child you
speak of?’
‘Sir?’ said Short, hesitating, and looking towards his friend.
‘The old man and his grandchild who travelled with you--where are they?
It will be worth your while to speak out, I assure you; much better
worth your while than you believe. They left you, you say--at those
races, as I understand. They have been traced to that place, and there
lost sight of. Have you no clue, can you suggest no clue, to their
recovery?’
‘Did I always say, Thomas,’ cried Short, turning with a look of
amazement to his friend, ‘that there was sure to be an inquiry after
them two travellers?’
‘YOU said!’ returned Mr Codlin. ‘Did I always say that that ‘ere
blessed child was the most interesting I ever see? Did I always say I
loved her, and doated on her? Pretty creetur, I think I hear her now.
“Codlin’s my friend,” she says, with a tear of gratitude a trickling
down her little eye; “Codlin’s my friend,” she says--“not Short.
Short’s very well,” she says; “I’ve no quarrel with Short; he means
kind, I dare say; but Codlin,” she says, “has the feelings for my
money, though he mayn’t look it.”’
Repeating these words with great emotion, Mr Codlin rubbed the bridge
of his nose with his coat-sleeve, and shaking his head mournfully from
side to side, left the single gentleman to infer that, from the moment
when he lost sight of his dear young charge, his peace of mind and
happiness had fled.
‘Good Heaven!’ said the single gentleman, pacing up and down the room,
‘have I found these men at last, only to discover that they can give me
no information or assistance! It would have been better to have lived
on, in hope, from day to day, and never to have lighted on them, than
to have my expectations scattered thus.’
‘Stay a minute,’ said Short. ‘A man of the name of Jerry--you know
Jerry, Thomas?’
‘Oh, don’t talk to me of Jerrys,’ replied Mr Codlin. ‘How can I care a
pinch of snuff for Jerrys, when I think of that ‘ere darling child?
“Codlin’s my friend,” she says, “dear, good, kind Codlin, as is always
a devising pleasures for me! I don’t object to Short,” she says, “but
I cotton to Codlin.” Once,’ said that gentleman reflectively, ‘she
called me Father Codlin. I thought I should have bust!’
‘A man of the name of Jerry, sir,’ said Short, turning from his selfish
colleague to their new acquaintance, ‘wot keeps a company of dancing
dogs, told me, in a accidental sort of way, that he had seen the old
gentleman in connexion with a travelling wax-work, unbeknown to him.
As they’d given us the slip, and nothing had come of it, and this was
down in the country that he’d been seen, I took no measures about it,
and asked no questions--But I can, if you like.’
‘Is this man in town?’ said the impatient single gentleman. ‘Speak
faster.’
‘No he isn’t, but he will be to-morrow, for he lodges in our house,’
replied Mr Short rapidly.
‘Then bring him here,’ said the single gentleman. ‘Here’s a sovereign
a-piece. If I can find these people through your means, it is but a
prelude to twenty more. Return to me to-morrow, and keep your own
counsel on this subject--though I need hardly tell you that; for you’ll
do so for your own sakes. Now, give me your address, and leave me.’
The address was given, the two men departed, the crowd went with them,
and the single gentleman for two mortal hours walked in uncommon
agitation up and down his room, over the wondering heads of Mr
Swiveller and Miss Sally Brass.
CHAPTER 38
Kit--for it happens at this juncture, not only that we have breathing
time to follow his fortunes, but that the necessities of these
adventures so adapt themselves to our ease and inclination as to call
upon us imperatively to pursue the track we most desire to take--Kit,
while the matters treated of in the last fifteen chapters were yet in
progress, was, as the reader may suppose, gradually familiarising
himself more and more with Mr and Mrs Garland, Mr Abel, the pony, and
Barbara, and gradually coming to consider them one and all as his
particular private friends, and Abel Cottage, Finchley, as his own
proper home.
Stay--the words are written, and may go, but if they convey any notion
that Kit, in the plentiful board and comfortable lodging of his new
abode, began to think slightingly of the poor fare and furniture of his
old dwelling, they do their office badly and commit injustice. Who so
mindful of those he left at home--albeit they were but a mother and two
young babies--as Kit? What boastful father in the fulness of his heart
ever related such wonders of his infant prodigy, as Kit never wearied
of telling Barbara in the evening time, concerning little Jacob? Was
there ever such a mother as Kit’s mother, on her son’s showing; or was
there ever such comfort in poverty as in the poverty of Kit’s family,
if any correct judgment might be arrived at, from his own glowing
account!
And let me linger in this place, for an instant, to remark that if ever
household affections and loves are graceful things, they are graceful
in the poor. The ties that bind the wealthy and the proud to home may
be forged on earth, but those which link the poor man to his humble
hearth are of the truer metal and bear the stamp of Heaven. The man of
high descent may love the halls and lands of his inheritance as part of
himself: as trophies of his birth and power; his associations with them
are associations of pride and wealth and triumph; the poor man’s
attachment to the tenements he holds, which strangers have held before,
and may to-morrow occupy again, has a worthier root, struck deep into a
purer soil. His household gods are of flesh and blood, with no alloy
of silver, gold, or precious stone; he has no property but in the
affections of his own heart; and when they endear bare floors and
walls, despite of rags and toil and scanty fare, that man has his love
of home from God, and his rude hut becomes a solemn place.
Oh! if those who rule the destinies of nations would but remember
this--if they would but think how hard it is for the very poor to have
engendered in their hearts, that love of home from which all domestic
virtues spring, when they live in dense and squalid masses where social
decency is lost, or rather never found--if they would but turn aside
from the wide thoroughfares and great houses, and strive to improve the
wretched dwellings in bye-ways where only Poverty may walk--many low
roofs would point more truly to the sky, than the loftiest steeple that
now rears proudly up from the midst of guilt, and crime, and horrible
disease, to mock them by its contrast. In hollow voices from
Workhouse, Hospital, and jail, this truth is preached from day to day,
and has been proclaimed for years. It is no light matter--no outcry
from the working vulgar--no mere question of the people’s health and
comforts that may be whistled down on Wednesday nights. In love of
home, the love of country has its rise; and who are the truer patriots
or the better in time of need--those who venerate the land, owning its
wood, and stream, and earth, and all that they produce? or those who
love their country, boasting not a foot of ground in all its wide
domain!
Kit knew nothing about such questions, but he knew that his old home
was a very poor place, and that his new one was very unlike it, and yet
he was constantly looking back with grateful satisfaction and
affectionate anxiety, and often indited square-folded letters to his
mother, enclosing a shilling or eighteenpence or such other small
remittance, which Mr Abel’s liberality enabled him to make. Sometimes
being in the neighbourhood, he had leisure to call upon her, and then
great was the joy and pride of Kit’s mother, and extremely noisy the
satisfaction of little Jacob and the baby, and cordial the
congratulations of the whole court, who listened with admiring ears to
the accounts of Abel Cottage, and could never be told too much of its
wonders and magnificence.
Although Kit was in the very highest favour with the old lady and
gentleman, and Mr Abel, and Barbara, it is certain that no member of
the family evinced such a remarkable partiality for him as the
self-willed pony, who, from being the most obstinate and opinionated
pony on the face of the earth, was, in his hands, the meekest and most
tractable of animals. It is true that in exact proportion as he became
manageable by Kit he became utterly ungovernable by anybody else (as if
he had determined to keep him in the family at all risks and hazards),
and that, even under the guidance of his favourite, he would sometimes
perform a great variety of strange freaks and capers, to the extreme
discomposure of the old lady’s nerves; but as Kit always represented
that this was only his fun, or a way he had of showing his attachment
to his employers, Mrs Garland gradually suffered herself to be
persuaded into the belief, in which she at last became so strongly
confirmed, that if, in one of these ebullitions, he had overturned the
chaise, she would have been quite satisfied that he did it with the
very best intentions.
Besides becoming in a short time a perfect marvel in all stable
matters, Kit soon made himself a very tolerable gardener, a handy
fellow within doors, and an indispensable attendant on Mr Abel, who
every day gave him some new proof of his confidence and approbation.
Mr Witherden the notary, too, regarded him with a friendly eye; and
even Mr Chuckster would sometimes condescend to give him a slight nod,
or to honour him with that peculiar form of recognition which is called
‘taking a sight,’ or to favour him with some other salute combining
pleasantry with patronage.
One morning Kit drove Mr Abel to the Notary’s office, as he sometimes
did, and having set him down at the house, was about to drive off to a
livery stable hard by, when this same Mr Chuckster emerged from the
office door, and cried ‘Woa-a-a-a-a-a!’--dwelling upon the note a long
time, for the purpose of striking terror into the pony’s heart, and
asserting the supremacy of man over the inferior animals.
‘Pull up, Snobby,’ cried Mr Chuckster, addressing himself to Kit.
‘You’re wanted inside here.’
‘Has Mr Abel forgotten anything, I wonder?’ said Kit as he dismounted.
‘Ask no questions, Snobby,’ returned Mr Chuckster, ‘but go and see.
Woa-a-a then, will you? If that pony was mine, I’d break him.’
‘You must be very gentle with him, if you please,’ said Kit, ‘or you’ll
find him troublesome. You’d better not keep on pulling his ears,
please. I know he won’t like it.’
To this remonstrance Mr Chuckster deigned no other answer, than
addressing Kit with a lofty and distant air as ‘young feller,’ and
requesting him to cut and come again with all speed. The ‘young
feller’ complying, Mr Chuckster put his hands in his pockets, and tried
to look as if he were not minding the pony, but happened to be lounging
there by accident.
Kit scraped his shoes very carefully (for he had not yet lost his
reverence for the bundles of papers and the tin boxes,) and tapped at
the office-door, which was quickly opened by the Notary himself.
‘Oh! come in, Christopher,’ said Mr Witherden.
‘Is that the lad?’ asked an elderly gentleman, but of a stout, bluff
figure--who was in the room.
‘That’s the lad,’ said Mr Witherden. ‘He fell in with my client, Mr
Garland, sir, at this very door. I have reason to think he is a good
lad, sir, and that you may believe what he says. Let me introduce Mr
Abel Garland, sir--his young master; my articled pupil, sir, and most
particular friend:--my most particular friend, sir,’ repeated the
Notary, drawing out his silk handkerchief and flourishing it about his
face.
‘Your servant, sir,’ said the stranger gentleman.
‘Yours, sir, I’m sure,’ replied Mr Abel mildly. ‘You were wishing to
speak to Christopher, sir?’
‘Yes, I was. Have I your permission?’
‘By all means.’
‘My business is no secret; or I should rather say it need be no secret
here,’ said the stranger, observing that Mr Abel and the Notary were
preparing to retire. ‘It relates to a dealer in curiosities with whom
he lived, and in whom I am earnestly and warmly interested. I have
been a stranger to this country, gentlemen, for very many years, and if
I am deficient in form and ceremony, I hope you will forgive me.’
‘No forgiveness is necessary, sir;--none whatever,’ replied the Notary.
And so said Mr Abel.
‘I have been making inquiries in the neighbourhood in which his old
master lived,’ said the stranger, ‘and I learn that he was served by
this lad. I have found out his mother’s house, and have been directed
by her to this place as the nearest in which I should be likely to find
him. That’s the cause of my presenting myself here this morning.’
‘I am very glad of any cause, sir,’ said the Notary, ‘which procures me
the honour of this visit.’
‘Sir,’ retorted the stranger, ‘you speak like a mere man of the world,
and I think you something better. Therefore, pray do not sink your
real character in paying unmeaning compliments to me.’
‘Hem!’ coughed the Notary. ‘You’re a plain speaker, sir.’
‘And a plain dealer,’ returned the stranger. ‘It may be my long
absence and inexperience that lead me to the conclusion; but if plain
speakers are scarce in this part of the world, I fancy plain dealers
are still scarcer. If my speaking should offend you, sir, my dealing,
I hope, will make amends.’
Mr Witherden seemed a little disconcerted by the elderly gentleman’s
mode of conducting the dialogue; and as for Kit, he looked at him in
open-mouthed astonishment: wondering what kind of language he would
address to him, if he talked in that free and easy way to a Notary. It
was with no harshness, however, though with something of constitutional
irritability and haste, that he turned to Kit and said:
‘If you think, my lad, that I am pursuing these inquiries with any
other view than that of serving and reclaiming those I am in search of,
you do me a very great wrong, and deceive yourself. Don’t be deceived,
I beg of you, but rely upon my assurance. The fact is, gentlemen,’ he
added, turning again to the Notary and his pupil, ‘that I am in a very
painful and wholly unexpected position. I came to this city with a
darling object at my heart, expecting to find no obstacle or difficulty
in the way of its attainment. I find myself suddenly checked and
stopped short, in the execution of my design, by a mystery which I
cannot penetrate. Every effort I have made to penetrate it, has only
served to render it darker and more obscure; and I am afraid to stir
openly in the matter, lest those whom I anxiously pursue, should fly
still farther from me. I assure you that if you could give me any
assistance, you would not be sorry to do so, if you knew how greatly I
stand in need of it, and what a load it would relieve me from.’
There was a simplicity in this confidence which occasioned it to find a
quick response in the breast of the good-natured Notary, who replied,
in the same spirit, that the stranger had not mistaken his desire, and
that if he could be of service to him, he would, most readily.
Kit was then put under examination and closely questioned by the
unknown gentleman, touching his old master and the child, their lonely
way of life, their retired habits, and strict seclusion. The nightly
absence of the old man, the solitary existence of the child at those
times, his illness and recovery, Quilp’s possession of the house, and
their sudden disappearance, were all the subjects of much questioning
and answer. Finally, Kit informed the gentleman that the premises were
now to let, and that a board upon the door referred all inquirers to Mr
Sampson Brass, Solicitor, of Bevis Marks, from whom he might perhaps
learn some further particulars.
‘Not by inquiry,’ said the gentleman shaking his head. ‘I live there.’
‘Live at Brass’s the attorney’s!’ cried Mr Witherden in some surprise:
having professional knowledge of the gentleman in question.
‘Aye,’ was the reply. ‘I entered on his lodgings t’other day, chiefly
because I had seen this very board. It matters little to me where I
live, and I had a desperate hope that some intelligence might be cast
in my way there, which would not reach me elsewhere. Yes, I live at
Brass’s--more shame for me, I suppose?’
‘That’s a mere matter of opinion,’ said the Notary, shrugging his
shoulders. ‘He is looked upon as rather a doubtful character.’
‘Doubtful?’ echoed the other. ‘I am glad to hear there’s any doubt
about it. I supposed that had been thoroughly settled, long ago. But
will you let me speak a word or two with you in private?’
Mr Witherden consenting, they walked into that gentleman’s private
closet, and remained there, in close conversation, for some quarter of
an hour, when they returned into the outer office. The stranger had
left his hat in Mr Witherden’s room, and seemed to have established
himself in this short interval on quite a friendly footing.
‘I’ll not detain you any longer now,’ he said, putting a crown into
Kit’s hand, and looking towards the Notary. ‘You shall hear from me
again. Not a word of this, you know, except to your master and
mistress.’
‘Mother, sir, would be glad to know--’ said Kit, faltering.
‘Glad to know what?’
‘Anything--so that it was no harm--about Miss Nell.’
‘Would she? Well then, you may tell her if she can keep a secret. But
mind, not a word of this to anybody else. Don’t forget that. Be
particular.’
‘I’ll take care, sir,’ said Kit. ‘Thankee, sir, and good morning.’
Now, it happened that the gentleman, in his anxiety to impress upon Kit
that he was not to tell anybody what had passed between them, followed
him out to the door to repeat his caution, and it further happened that
at that moment the eyes of Mr Richard Swiveller were turned in that
direction, and beheld his mysterious friend and Kit together.
It was quite an accident, and the way in which it came about was this.
Mr Chuckster, being a gentleman of a cultivated taste and refined
spirit, was one of that Lodge of Glorious Apollos whereof Mr Swiveller
was Perpetual Grand. Mr Swiveller, passing through the street in the
execution of some Brazen errand, and beholding one of his Glorious
Brotherhood intently gazing on a pony, crossed over to give him that
fraternal greeting with which Perpetual Grands are, by the very
constitution of their office, bound to cheer and encourage their
disciples. He had scarcely bestowed upon him his blessing, and
followed it with a general remark touching the present state and
prospects of the weather, when, lifting up his eyes, he beheld the
single gentleman of Bevis Marks in earnest conversation with
Christopher Nubbles.
‘Hallo!’ said Dick, ‘who is that?’
‘He called to see my Governor this morning,’ replied Mr Chuckster;
‘beyond that, I don’t know him from Adam.’
‘At least you know his name?’ said Dick.
To which Mr Chuckster replied, with an elevation of speech becoming a
Glorious Apollo, that he was ‘everlastingly blessed’ if he did.
‘All I know, my dear feller,’ said Mr Chuckster, running his fingers
through his hair, ‘is, that he is the cause of my having stood here
twenty minutes, for which I hate him with a mortal and undying hatred,
and would pursue him to the confines of eternity if I could afford the
time.’
While they were thus discoursing, the subject of their conversation
(who had not appeared to recognise Mr Richard Swiveller) re-entered the
house, and Kit came down the steps and joined them; to whom Mr
Swiveller again propounded his inquiry with no better success.
‘He is a very nice gentleman, Sir,’ said Kit, ‘and that’s all I know
about him.’
Mr Chuckster waxed wroth at this answer, and without applying the
remark to any particular case, mentioned, as a general truth, that it
was expedient to break the heads of Snobs, and to tweak their noses.
Without expressing his concurrence in this sentiment, Mr Swiveller
after a few moments of abstraction inquired which way Kit was driving,
and, being informed, declared it was his way, and that he would
trespass on him for a lift. Kit would gladly have declined the
proffered honour, but as Mr Swiveller was already established in the
seat beside him, he had no means of doing so, otherwise than by a
forcible ejectment, and therefore, drove briskly off--so briskly
indeed, as to cut short the leave-taking between Mr Chuckster and his
Grand Master, and to occasion the former gentleman some inconvenience
from having his corns squeezed by the impatient pony.
As Whisker was tired of standing, and Mr Swiveller was kind enough to
stimulate him by shrill whistles, and various sporting cries, they
rattled off at too sharp a pace to admit of much conversation:
especially as the pony, incensed by Mr Swiveller’s admonitions, took a
particular fancy for the lamp-posts and cart-wheels, and evinced a
strong desire to run on the pavement and rasp himself against the brick
walls. It was not, therefore, until they had arrived at the stable,
and the chaise had been extricated from a very small doorway, into
which the pony dragged it under the impression that he could take it
along with him into his usual stall, that Mr Swiveller found time to
talk.
‘It’s hard work,’ said Richard. ‘What do you say to some beer?’
Kit at first declined, but presently consented, and they adjourned to
the neighbouring bar together.
‘We’ll drink our friend what’s-his-name,’ said Dick, holding up the
bright frothy pot; ‘--that was talking to you this morning, you know--I
know him--a good fellow, but eccentric--very--here’s what’s-his-name!’
Kit pledged him.
‘He lives in my house,’ said Dick; ‘at least in the house occupied by
the firm in which I’m a sort of a--of a managing partner--a difficult
fellow to get anything out of, but we like him--we like him.’
‘I must be going, sir, if you please,’ said Kit, moving away.
‘Don’t be in a hurry, Christopher,’ replied his patron, ‘we’ll drink
your mother.’
‘Thank you, sir.’
‘An excellent woman that mother of yours, Christopher,’ said Mr
Swiveller. ‘Who ran to catch me when I fell, and kissed the place to
make it well? My mother. A charming woman. He’s a liberal sort of
fellow. We must get him to do something for your mother. Does he know
her, Christopher?’
Kit shook his head, and glancing slyly at his questioner, thanked him,
and made off before he could say another word.
‘Humph!’ said Mr Swiveller pondering, ‘this is queer. Nothing but
mysteries in connection with Brass’s house. I’ll keep my own counsel,
however. Everybody and anybody has been in my confidence as yet, but
now I think I’ll set up in business for myself. Queer--very queer!’
After pondering deeply and with a face of exceeding wisdom for some
time, Mr Swiveller drank some more of the beer, and summoning a small
boy who had been watching his proceedings, poured forth the few
remaining drops as a libation on the gravel, and bade him carry the
empty vessel to the bar with his compliments, and above all things to
lead a sober and temperate life, and abstain from all intoxicating and
exciting liquors. Having given him this piece of moral advice for his
trouble (which, as he wisely observed, was far better than half-pence)
the Perpetual Grand Master of the Glorious Apollos thrust his hands
into his pockets and sauntered away: still pondering as he went.
CHAPTER 39
All that day, though he waited for Mr Abel until evening, Kit kept
clear of his mother’s house, determined not to anticipate the pleasures
of the morrow, but to let them come in their full rush of delight; for
to-morrow was the great and long looked-for epoch in his
life--to-morrow was the end of his first quarter--the day of receiving,
for the first time, one fourth part of his annual income of Six Pounds
in one vast sum of Thirty Shillings--to-morrow was to be a half-holiday
devoted to a whirl of entertainments, and little Jacob was to know what
oysters meant, and to see a play.
All manner of incidents combined in favour of the occasion: not only
had Mr and Mrs Garland forewarned him that they intended to make no
deduction for his outfit from the great amount, but to pay it him
unbroken in all its gigantic grandeur; not only had the unknown
gentleman increased the stock by the sum of five shillings, which was a
perfect god-send and in itself a fortune; not only had these things
come to pass which nobody could have calculated upon, or in their
wildest dreams have hoped; but it was Barbara’s quarter too--Barbara’s
quarter, that very day--and Barbara had a half-holiday as well as Kit,
and Barbara’s mother was going to make one of the party, and to take
tea with Kit’s mother, and cultivate her acquaintance.
To be sure Kit looked out of his window very early that morning to see
which way the clouds were flying, and to be sure Barbara would have
been at hers too, if she had not sat up so late over-night, starching
and ironing small pieces of muslin, and crimping them into frills, and
sewing them on to other pieces to form magnificent wholes for next
day’s wear. But they were both up very early for all that, and had
small appetites for breakfast and less for dinner, and were in a state
of great excitement when Barbara’s mother came in, with astonishing
accounts of the fineness of the weather out of doors (but with a very
large umbrella notwithstanding, for people like Barbara’s mother seldom
make holiday without one), and when the bell rang for them to go up
stairs and receive their quarter’s money in gold and silver.
Well, wasn’t Mr Garland kind when he said ‘Christopher, here’s your
money, and you have earned it well;’ and wasn’t Mrs Garland kind when
she said ‘Barbara, here’s yours, and I’m much pleased with you;’ and
didn’t Kit sign his name bold to his receipt, and didn’t Barbara sign
her name all a trembling to hers; and wasn’t it beautiful to see how
Mrs Garland poured out Barbara’s mother a glass of wine; and didn’t
Barbara’s mother speak up when she said ‘Here’s blessing you, ma’am, as
a good lady, and you, sir, as a good gentleman, and Barbara, my love to
you, and here’s towards you, Mr Christopher;’ and wasn’t she as long
drinking it as if it had been a tumblerful; and didn’t she look
genteel, standing there with her gloves on; and wasn’t there plenty of
laughing and talking among them as they reviewed all these things upon
the top of the coach, and didn’t they pity the people who hadn’t got a
holiday!
But Kit’s mother, again--wouldn’t anybody have supposed she had come of
a good stock and been a lady all her life! There she was, quite ready
to receive them, with a display of tea-things that might have warmed
the heart of a china-shop; and little Jacob and the baby in such a
state of perfection that their clothes looked as good as new, though
Heaven knows they were old enough! Didn’t she say before they had sat
down five minutes that Barbara’s mother was exactly the sort of lady
she expected, and didn’t Barbara’s mother say that Kit’s mother was the
very picture of what she had expected, and didn’t Kit’s mother
compliment Barbara’s mother on Barbara, and didn’t Barbara’s mother
compliment Kit’s mother on Kit, and wasn’t Barbara herself quite
fascinated with little Jacob, and did ever a child show off when he was
wanted, as that child did, or make such friends as he made!
‘And we are both widows too!’ said Barbara’s mother. ‘We must have
been made to know each other.’
‘I haven’t a doubt about it,’ returned Mrs Nubbles. ‘And what a pity
it is we didn’t know each other sooner.’
‘But then, you know, it’s such a pleasure,’ said Barbara’s mother, ‘to
have it brought about by one’s son and daughter, that it’s fully made
up for. Now, an’t it?’
To this, Kit’s mother yielded her full assent, and tracing things back
from effects to causes, they naturally reverted to their deceased
husbands, respecting whose lives, deaths, and burials, they compared
notes, and discovered sundry circumstances that tallied with wonderful
exactness; such as Barbara’s father having been exactly four years and
ten months older than Kit’s father, and one of them having died on a
Wednesday and the other on a Thursday, and both of them having been of
a very fine make and remarkably good-looking, with other extraordinary
coincidences. These recollections being of a kind calculated to cast a
shadow on the brightness of the holiday, Kit diverted the conversation
to general topics, and they were soon in great force again, and as
merry as before. Among other things, Kit told them about his old
place, and the extraordinary beauty of Nell (of whom he had talked to
Barbara a thousand times already); but the last-named circumstance
failed to interest his hearers to anything like the extent he had
supposed, and even his mother said (looking accidentally at Barbara at
the same time) that there was no doubt Miss Nell was very pretty, but
she was but a child after all, and there were many young women quite as
pretty as she; and Barbara mildly observed that she should think so,
and that she never could help believing Mr Christopher must be under a
mistake--which Kit wondered at very much, not being able to conceive
what reason she had for doubting him. Barbara’s mother too, observed
that it was very common for young folks to change at about fourteen or
fifteen, and whereas they had been very pretty before, to grow up quite
plain; which truth she illustrated by many forcible examples,
especially one of a young man, who, being a builder with great
prospects, had been particular in his attentions to Barbara, but whom
Barbara would have nothing to say to; which (though everything happened
for the best) she almost thought was a pity. Kit said he thought so
too, and so he did honestly, and he wondered what made Barbara so
silent all at once, and why his mother looked at him as if he shouldn’t
have said it.
However, it was high time now to be thinking of the play; for which
great preparation was required, in the way of shawls and bonnets, not
to mention one handkerchief full of oranges and another of apples,
which took some time tying up, in consequence of the fruit having a
tendency to roll out at the corners. At length, everything was ready,
and they went off very fast; Kit’s mother carrying the baby, who was
dreadfully wide awake, and Kit holding little Jacob in one hand, and
escorting Barbara with the other--a state of things which occasioned
the two mothers, who walked behind, to declare that they looked quite
family folks, and caused Barbara to blush and say, ‘Now don’t, mother!’
But Kit said she had no call to mind what they said; and indeed she
need not have had, if she had known how very far from Kit’s thoughts
any love-making was. Poor Barbara!
At last they got to the theatre, which was Astley’s: and in some two
minutes after they had reached the yet unopened door, little Jacob was
squeezed flat, and the baby had received divers concussions, and
Barbara’s mother’s umbrella had been carried several yards off and
passed back to her over the shoulders of the people, and Kit had hit a
man on the head with the handkerchief of apples for ‘scrowdging’ his
parent with unnecessary violence, and there was a great uproar. But,
when they were once past the pay-place and tearing away for very life
with their checks in their hands, and, above all, when they were fairly
in the theatre, and seated in such places that they couldn’t have had
better if they had picked them out, and taken them beforehand, all this
was looked upon as quite a capital joke, and an essential part of the
entertainment.
Dear, dear, what a place it looked, that Astley’s; with all the paint,
gilding, and looking-glass; the vague smell of horses suggestive of
coming wonders; the curtain that hid such gorgeous mysteries; the clean
white sawdust down in the circus; the company coming in and taking
their places; the fiddlers looking carelessly up at them while they
tuned their instruments, as if they didn’t want the play to begin, and
knew it all beforehand! What a glow was that, which burst upon them
all, when that long, clear, brilliant row of lights came slowly up; and
what the feverish excitement when the little bell rang and the music
began in good earnest, with strong parts for the drums, and sweet
effects for the triangles! Well might Barbara’s mother say to Kit’s
mother that the gallery was the place to see from, and wonder it wasn’t
much dearer than the boxes; well might Barbara feel doubtful whether to
laugh or cry, in her flutter of delight.
Then the play itself! the horses which little Jacob believed from the
first to be alive, and the ladies and gentlemen of whose reality he
could be by no means persuaded, having never seen or heard anything at
all like them--the firing, which made Barbara wink--the forlorn lady,
who made her cry--the tyrant, who made her tremble--the man who sang
the song with the lady’s-maid and danced the chorus, who made her
laugh--the pony who reared up on his hind legs when he saw the
murderer, and wouldn’t hear of walking on all fours again until he was
taken into custody--the clown who ventured on such familiarities with
the military man in boots--the lady who jumped over the nine-and-twenty
ribbons and came down safe upon the horse’s back--everything was
delightful, splendid, and surprising! Little Jacob applauded till his
hands were sore; Kit cried ‘an-kor’ at the end of everything, the
three-act piece included; and Barbara’s mother beat her umbrella on the
floor, in her ecstasies, until it was nearly worn down to the gingham.
In the midst of all these fascinations, Barbara’s thoughts seemed to
have been still running on what Kit had said at tea-time; for, when
they were coming out of the play, she asked him, with an hysterical
simper, if Miss Nell was as handsome as the lady who jumped over the
ribbons.
‘As handsome as her?’ said Kit. ‘Double as handsome.’
‘Oh Christopher! I’m sure she was the beautifullest creature ever was,’
said Barbara.
‘Nonsense!’ returned Kit. ‘She was well enough, I don’t deny that; but
think how she was dressed and painted, and what a difference that made.
Why YOU are a good deal better looking than her, Barbara.’
‘Oh Christopher!’ said Barbara, looking down.
‘You are, any day,’ said Kit, ‘--and so’s your mother.’
Poor Barbara!
What was all this though--even all this--to the extraordinary
dissipation that ensued, when Kit, walking into an oyster-shop as bold
as if he lived there, and not so much as looking at the counter or the
man behind it, led his party into a box--a private box, fitted up with
red curtains, white table-cloth, and cruet-stand complete--and ordered
a fierce gentleman with whiskers, who acted as waiter and called him,
him Christopher Nubbles, ‘sir,’ to bring three dozen of his
largest-sized oysters, and to look sharp about it! Yes, Kit told this
gentleman to look sharp, and he not only said he would look sharp, but
he actually did, and presently came running back with the newest
loaves, and the freshest butter, and the largest oysters, ever seen.
Then said Kit to this gentleman, ‘a pot of beer’--just so--and the
gentleman, instead of replying, ‘Sir, did you address that language to
me?’ only said, ‘Pot o’ beer, sir? Yes, sir,’ and went off and fetched
it, and put it on the table in a small decanter-stand, like those which
blind-men’s dogs carry about the streets in their mouths, to catch the
half-pence in; and both Kit’s mother and Barbara’s mother declared as
he turned away that he was one of the slimmest and gracefullest young
men she had ever looked upon.
Then they fell to work upon the supper in earnest; and there was
Barbara, that foolish Barbara, declaring that she could not eat more
than two, and wanting more pressing than you would believe before she
would eat four: though her mother and Kit’s mother made up for it
pretty well, and ate and laughed and enjoyed themselves so thoroughly
that it did Kit good to see them, and made him laugh and eat likewise
from strong sympathy. But the greatest miracle of the night was little
Jacob, who ate oysters as if he had been born and bred to the
business--sprinkled the pepper and the vinegar with a discretion beyond
his years--and afterwards built a grotto on the table with the shells.
There was the baby too, who had never closed an eye all night, but had
sat as good as gold, trying to force a large orange into his mouth, and
gazing intently at the lights in the chandelier--there he was, sitting
up in his mother’s lap, staring at the gas without winking, and making
indentations in his soft visage with an oyster-shell, to that degree
that a heart of iron must have loved him! In short, there never was a
more successful supper; and when Kit ordered in a glass of something
hot to finish with, and proposed Mr and Mrs Garland before sending it
round, there were not six happier people in all the world.
But all happiness has an end--hence the chief pleasure of its next
beginning--and as it was now growing late, they agreed it was time to
turn their faces homewards. So, after going a little out of their way
to see Barbara and Barbara’s mother safe to a friend’s house where they
were to pass the night, Kit and his mother left them at the door, with
an early appointment for returning to Finchley next morning, and a
great many plans for next quarter’s enjoyment. Then, Kit took little
Jacob on his back, and giving his arm to his mother, and a kiss to the
baby, they all trudged merrily home together.
CHAPTER 40
Full of that vague kind of penitence which holidays awaken next
morning, Kit turned out at sunrise, and, with his faith in last night’s
enjoyments a little shaken by cool daylight and the return to every-day
duties and occupations, went to meet Barbara and her mother at the
appointed place. And being careful not to awaken any of the little
household, who were yet resting from their unusual fatigues, Kit left
his money on the chimney-piece, with an inscription in chalk calling
his mother’s attention to the circumstance, and informing her that it
came from her dutiful son; and went his way, with a heart something
heavier than his pockets, but free from any very great oppression
notwithstanding.
Oh these holidays! why will they leave us some regret? why cannot we
push them back, only a week or two in our memories, so as to put them
at once at that convenient distance whence they may be regarded either
with a calm indifference or a pleasant effort of recollection! why will
they hang about us, like the flavour of yesterday’s wine, suggestive of
headaches and lassitude, and those good intentions for the future,
which, under the earth, form the everlasting pavement of a large
estate, and, upon it, usually endure until dinner-time or thereabouts!
Who will wonder that Barbara had a headache, or that Barbara’s mother
was disposed to be cross, or that she slightly underrated Astley’s, and
thought the clown was older than they had taken him to be last night?
Kit was not surprised to hear her say so--not he. He had already had a
misgiving that the inconstant actors in that dazzling vision had been
doing the same thing the night before last, and would do it again that
night, and the next, and for weeks and months to come, though he would
not be there. Such is the difference between yesterday and today. We
are all going to the play, or coming home from it.
However, the Sun himself is weak when he first rises, and gathers
strength and courage as the day gets on. By degrees, they began to
recall circumstances more and more pleasant in their nature, until,
what between talking, walking, and laughing, they reached Finchley in
such good heart, that Barbara’s mother declared she never felt less
tired or in better spirits. And so said Kit. Barbara had been silent
all the way, but she said so too. Poor little Barbara! She was very
quiet.
They were at home in such good time that Kit had rubbed down the pony
and made him as spruce as a race-horse, before Mr Garland came down to
breakfast; which punctual and industrious conduct the old lady, and the
old gentleman, and Mr Abel, highly extolled. At his usual hour (or
rather at his usual minute and second, for he was the soul of
punctuality) Mr Abel walked out, to be overtaken by the London coach,
and Kit and the old gentleman went to work in the garden.
This was not the least pleasant of Kit’s employments. On a fine day
they were quite a family party; the old lady sitting hard by with her
work-basket on a little table; the old gentleman digging, or pruning,
or clipping about with a large pair of shears, or helping Kit in some
way or other with great assiduity; and Whisker looking on from his
paddock in placid contemplation of them all. To-day they were to trim
the grape-vine, so Kit mounted half-way up a short ladder, and began to
snip and hammer away, while the old gentleman, with a great interest in
his proceedings, handed up the nails and shreds of cloth as he wanted
them. The old lady and Whisker looked on as usual.
‘Well, Christopher,’ said Mr Garland, ‘and so you have made a new
friend, eh?’
‘I beg your pardon, Sir?’ returned Kit, looking down from the ladder.
‘You have made a new friend, I hear from Mr Abel,’ said the old
gentleman, ‘at the office!’
‘Oh! Yes Sir, yes. He behaved very handsome, Sir.’
‘I’m glad to hear it,’ returned the old gentlemen with a smile. ‘He is
disposed to behave more handsomely still, though, Christopher.’
‘Indeed, Sir! It’s very kind in him, but I don’t want him to, I’m
sure,’ said Kit, hammering stoutly at an obdurate nail.
‘He is rather anxious,’ pursued the old gentleman, ‘to have you in his
own service--take care what you’re doing, or you will fall down and
hurt yourself.’
‘To have me in his service, Sir?’ cried Kit, who had stopped short in
his work and faced about on the ladder like some dexterous tumbler.
‘Why, Sir, I don’t think he can be in earnest when he says that.’
‘Oh! But he is indeed,’ said Mr Garland. ‘And he has told Mr Abel so.’
‘I never heard of such a thing!’ muttered Kit, looking ruefully at his
master and mistress. ‘I wonder at him; that I do.’
‘You see, Christopher,’ said Mr Garland, ‘this is a point of much
importance to you, and you should understand and consider it in that
light. This gentleman is able to give you more money than I--not, I
hope, to carry through the various relations of master and servant,
more kindness and confidence, but certainly, Christopher, to give you
more money.’
‘Well,’ said Kit, ‘after that, Sir--’
‘Wait a moment,’ interposed Mr Garland. ‘That is not all. You were a
very faithful servant to your old employers, as I understand, and
should this gentleman recover them, as it is his purpose to attempt
doing by every means in his power, I have no doubt that you, being in
his service, would meet with your reward. Besides,’ added the old
gentleman with stronger emphasis, ‘besides having the pleasure of being
again brought into communication with those to whom you seem to be very
strongly and disinterestedly attached. You must think of all this,
Christopher, and not be rash or hasty in your choice.’
Kit did suffer one twinge, one momentary pang, in keeping the
resolution he had already formed, when this last argument passed
swiftly into his thoughts, and conjured up the realization of all his
hopes and fancies. But it was gone in a minute, and he sturdily
rejoined that the gentleman must look out for somebody else, as he did
think he might have done at first.
‘He has no right to think that I’d be led away to go to him, sir,’ said
Kit, turning round again after half a minute’s hammering. ‘Does he
think I’m a fool?’
‘He may, perhaps, Christopher, if you refuse his offer,’ said Mr
Garland gravely.
‘Then let him, sir,’ retorted Kit; ‘what do I care, sir, what he
thinks? why should I care for his thinking, sir, when I know that I
should be a fool, and worse than a fool, sir, to leave the kindest
master and mistress that ever was or can be, who took me out of the
streets a very poor and hungry lad indeed--poorer and hungrier perhaps
than even you think for, sir--to go to him or anybody? If Miss Nell
was to come back, ma’am,’ added Kit, turning suddenly to his mistress,
‘why that would be another thing, and perhaps if she wanted me, I might
ask you now and then to let me work for her when all was done at home.
But when she comes back, I see now that she’ll be rich as old master
always said she would, and being a rich young lady, what could she want
of me? No, no,’ added Kit, shaking his head sorrowfully, ‘she’ll never
want me any more, and bless her, I hope she never may, though I should
like to see her too!’
Here Kit drove a nail into the wall, very hard--much harder than was
necessary--and having done so, faced about again.
‘There’s the pony, sir,’ said Kit--‘Whisker, ma’am (and he knows so
well I’m talking about him that he begins to neigh directly,
Sir)--would he let anybody come near him but me, ma’am? Here’s the
garden, sir, and Mr Abel, ma’am. Would Mr Abel part with me, Sir, or
is there anybody that could be fonder of the garden, ma’am? It would
break mother’s heart, Sir, and even little Jacob would have sense
enough to cry his eyes out, ma’am, if he thought that Mr Abel could
wish to part with me so soon, after having told me, only the other day,
that he hoped we might be together for years to come--’
There is no telling how long Kit might have stood upon the ladder,
addressing his master and mistress by turns, and generally turning
towards the wrong person, if Barbara had not at that moment come
running up to say that a messenger from the office had brought a note,
which, with an expression of some surprise at Kit’s oratorical
appearance, she put into her master’s hand.
‘Oh!’ said the old gentleman after reading it, ‘ask the messenger to
walk this way.’ Barbara tripping off to do as she was bid, he turned
to Kit and said that they would not pursue the subject any further, and
that Kit could not be more unwilling to part with them, than they would
be to part with Kit; a sentiment which the old lady very generously
echoed.
‘At the same time, Christopher,’ added Mr Garland, glancing at the note
in his hand, ‘if the gentleman should want to borrow you now and then
for an hour or so, or even a day or so, at a time, we must consent to
lend you, and you must consent to be lent.--Oh! here is the young
gentleman. How do you do, Sir?’
This salutation was addressed to Mr Chuckster, who, with his hat
extremely on one side, and his hair a long way beyond it, came
swaggering up the walk.
‘Hope I see you well sir,’ returned that gentleman. ‘Hope I see YOU
well, ma’am. Charming box this, sir. Delicious country to be sure.’
‘You want to take Kit back with you, I find?’ observed Mr Garland.
‘I have got a chariot-cab waiting on purpose,’ replied the clerk. ‘A
very spanking grey in that cab, sir, if you’re a judge of horse-flesh.’
Declining to inspect the spanking grey, on the plea that he was but
poorly acquainted with such matters, and would but imperfectly
appreciate his beauties, Mr Garland invited Mr Chuckster to partake of
a slight repast in the way of lunch. That gentleman readily
consenting, certain cold viands, flanked with ale and wine, were
speedily prepared for his refreshment.
At this repast, Mr Chuckster exerted his utmost abilities to enchant
his entertainers, and impress them with a conviction of the mental
superiority of those who dwelt in town; with which view he led the
discourse to the small scandal of the day, in which he was justly
considered by his friends to shine prodigiously. Thus, he was in a
condition to relate the exact circumstances of the difference between
the Marquis of Mizzler and Lord Bobby, which it appeared originated in
a disputed bottle of champagne, and not in a pigeon-pie, as erroneously
reported in the newspapers; neither had Lord Bobby said to the Marquis
of Mizzler, ‘Mizzler, one of us two tells a lie, and I’m not the man,’
as incorrectly stated by the same authorities; but ‘Mizzler, you know
where I’m to be found, and damme, sir, find me if you want me’--which,
of course, entirely changed the aspect of this interesting question,
and placed it in a very different light. He also acquainted them with
the precise amount of the income guaranteed by the Duke of Thigsberry
to Violetta Stetta of the Italian Opera, which it appeared was payable
quarterly, and not half-yearly, as the public had been given to
understand, and which was EXclusive, and not INclusive (as had been
monstrously stated,) of jewellery, perfumery, hair-powder for five
footmen, and two daily changes of kid-gloves for a page. Having
entreated the old lady and gentleman to set their minds at rest on
these absorbing points, for they might rely on his statement being the
correct one, Mr Chuckster entertained them with theatrical chit-chat
and the court circular; and so wound up a brilliant and fascinating
conversation which he had maintained alone, and without any assistance
whatever, for upwards of three-quarters of an hour.
‘And now that the nag has got his wind again,’ said Mr Chuckster rising
in a graceful manner, ‘I’m afraid I must cut my stick.’
Neither Mr nor Mrs Garland offered any opposition to his tearing
himself away (feeling, no doubt, that such a man could ill be spared
from his proper sphere of action), and therefore Mr Chuckster and Kit
were shortly afterwards upon their way to town; Kit being perched upon
the box of the cabriolet beside the driver, and Mr Chuckster seated in
solitary state inside, with one of his boots sticking out at each of
the front windows.
When they reached the Notary’s house, Kit followed into the office, and
was desired by Mr Abel to sit down and wait, for the gentleman who
wanted him had gone out, and perhaps might not return for some time.
This anticipation was strictly verified, for Kit had had his dinner,
and his tea, and had read all the lighter matter in the Law-List, and
the Post-Office Directory, and had fallen asleep a great many times,
before the gentleman whom he had seen before, came in; which he did at
last in a very great hurry.
He was closeted with Mr Witherden for some little time, and Mr Abel had
been called in to assist at the conference, before Kit, wondering very
much what he was wanted for, was summoned to attend them.
‘Christopher,’ said the gentleman, turning to him directly he entered
the room, ‘I have found your old master and young mistress.’
‘No, Sir! Have you, though?’ returned Kit, his eyes sparkling with
delight. ‘Where are they, Sir? How are they, Sir? Are they--are they
near here?’
‘A long way from here,’ returned the gentleman, shaking his head. ‘But
I am going away to-night to bring them back, and I want you to go with
me.’
‘Me, Sir?’ cried Kit, full of joy and surprise.
‘The place,’ said the strange gentleman, turning thoughtfully to the
Notary, ‘indicated by this man of the dogs, is--how far from
here--sixty miles?’
‘From sixty to seventy.’
‘Humph! If we travel post all night, we shall reach there in good time
to-morrow morning. Now, the only question is, as they will not know
me, and the child, God bless her, would think that any stranger
pursuing them had a design upon her grandfather’s liberty--can I do
better than take this lad, whom they both know and will readily
remember, as an assurance to them of my friendly intentions?’
‘Certainly not,’ replied the Notary. ‘Take Christopher by all means.’
‘I beg your pardon, Sir,’ said Kit, who had listened to this discourse
with a lengthening countenance, ‘but if that’s the reason, I’m afraid I
should do more harm than good--Miss Nell, Sir, she knows me, and would
trust in me, I am sure; but old master--I don’t know why, gentlemen;
nobody does--would not bear me in his sight after he had been ill, and
Miss Nell herself told me that I must not go near him or let him see me
any more. I should spoil all that you were doing if I went, I’m
afraid. I’d give the world to go, but you had better not take me, Sir.’
‘Another difficulty!’ cried the impetuous gentleman. ‘Was ever man so
beset as I? Is there nobody else that knew them, nobody else in whom
they had any confidence? Solitary as their lives were, is there no one
person who would serve my purpose?’
‘IS there, Christopher?’ said the Notary.
‘Not one, Sir,’ replied Kit.--‘Yes, though--there’s my mother.’
‘Did they know her?’ said the single gentleman.
‘Know her, Sir! why, she was always coming backwards and forwards.
They were as kind to her as they were to me. Bless you, Sir, she
expected they’d come back to her house.’
‘Then where the devil is the woman?’ said the impatient gentleman,
catching up his hat. ‘Why isn’t she here? Why is that woman always
out of the way when she is most wanted?’
In a word, the single gentleman was bursting out of the office, bent
upon laying violent hands on Kit’s mother, forcing her into a
post-chaise, and carrying her off, when this novel kind of abduction
was with some difficulty prevented by the joint efforts of Mr Abel and
the Notary, who restrained him by dint of their remonstrances, and
persuaded him to sound Kit upon the probability of her being able and
willing to undertake such a journey on so short a notice.
This occasioned some doubts on the part of Kit, and some violent
demonstrations on that of the single gentleman, and a great many
soothing speeches on that of the Notary and Mr Abel. The upshot of the
business was, that Kit, after weighing the matter in his mind and
considering it carefully, promised, on behalf of his mother, that she
should be ready within two hours from that time to undertake the
expedition, and engaged to produce her in that place, in all respects
equipped and prepared for the journey, before the specified period had
expired.
Having given this pledge, which was rather a bold one, and not
particularly easy of redemption, Kit lost no time in sallying forth,
and taking measures for its immediate fulfilment.
CHAPTER 41
Kit made his way through the crowded streets, dividing the stream of
people, dashing across the busy road-ways, diving into lanes and
alleys, and stopping or turning aside for nothing, until he came in
front of the Old Curiosity Shop, when he came to a stand; partly from
habit and partly from being out of breath.
It was a gloomy autumn evening, and he thought the old place had never
looked so dismal as in its dreary twilight. The windows broken, the
rusty sashes rattling in their frames, the deserted house a dull
barrier dividing the glaring lights and bustle of the street into two
long lines, and standing in the midst, cold, dark, and empty--presented
a cheerless spectacle which mingled harshly with the bright prospects
the boy had been building up for its late inmates, and came like a
disappointment or misfortune. Kit would have had a good fire roaring
up the empty chimneys, lights sparkling and shining through the
windows, people moving briskly to and fro, voices in cheerful
conversation, something in unison with the new hopes that were astir.
He had not expected that the house would wear any different aspect--had
known indeed that it could not--but coming upon it in the midst of
eager thoughts and expectations, it checked the current in its flow,
and darkened it with a mournful shadow.
Kit, however, fortunately for himself, was not learned enough or
contemplative enough to be troubled with presages of evil afar off,
and, having no mental spectacles to assist his vision in this respect,
saw nothing but the dull house, which jarred uncomfortably upon his
previous thoughts. So, almost wishing that he had not passed it,
though hardly knowing why, he hurried on again, making up by his
increased speed for the few moments he had lost.
‘Now, if she should be out,’ thought Kit, as he approached the poor
dwelling of his mother, ‘and I not able to find her, this impatient
gentleman would be in a pretty taking. And sure enough there’s no
light, and the door’s fast. Now, God forgive me for saying so, but if
this is Little Bethel’s doing, I wish Little Bethel was--was farther
off,’ said Kit checking himself, and knocking at the door.
A second knock brought no reply from within the house; but caused a
woman over the way to look out and inquire who that was, awanting Mrs
Nubbles.
‘Me,’ said Kit. ‘She’s at--at Little Bethel, I suppose?’--getting out
the name of the obnoxious conventicle with some reluctance, and laying
a spiteful emphasis upon the words.
The neighbour nodded assent.
‘Then pray tell me where it is,’ said Kit, ‘for I have come on a
pressing matter, and must fetch her out, even if she was in the pulpit.’
It was not very easy to procure a direction to the fold in question, as
none of the neighbours were of the flock that resorted thither, and few
knew anything more of it than the name. At last, a gossip of Mrs
Nubbles’s, who had accompanied her to chapel on one or two occasions
when a comfortable cup of tea had preceded her devotions, furnished the
needful information, which Kit had no sooner obtained than he started
off again.
Little Bethel might have been nearer, and might have been in a
straighter road, though in that case the reverend gentleman who
presided over its congregation would have lost his favourite allusion
to the crooked ways by which it was approached, and which enabled him
to liken it to Paradise itself, in contradistinction to the parish
church and the broad thoroughfare leading thereunto. Kit found it, at
last, after some trouble, and pausing at the door to take breath that
he might enter with becoming decency, passed into the chapel.
It was not badly named in one respect, being in truth a particularly
little Bethel--a Bethel of the smallest dimensions--with a small
number of small pews, and a small pulpit, in which a small gentleman
(by trade a Shoemaker, and by calling a Divine) was delivering in a by
no means small voice, a by no means small sermon, judging of its
dimensions by the condition of his audience, which, if their gross
amount were but small, comprised a still smaller number of hearers, as
the majority were slumbering.
Among these was Kit’s mother, who, finding it matter of extreme
difficulty to keep her eyes open after the fatigues of last night, and
feeling their inclination to close strongly backed and seconded by the
arguments of the preacher, had yielded to the drowsiness that
overpowered her, and fallen asleep; though not so soundly but that she
could, from time to time, utter a slight and almost inaudible groan, as
if in recognition of the orator’s doctrines. The baby in her arms was
as fast asleep as she; and little Jacob, whose youth prevented him from
recognising in this prolonged spiritual nourishment anything half as
interesting as oysters, was alternately very fast asleep and very wide
awake, as his inclination to slumber, or his terror of being personally
alluded to in the discourse, gained the mastery over him.
‘And now I’m here,’ thought Kit, gliding into the nearest empty pew
which was opposite his mother’s, and on the other side of the little
aisle, ‘how am I ever to get at her, or persuade her to come out! I
might as well be twenty miles off. She’ll never wake till it’s all
over, and there goes the clock again! If he would but leave off for a
minute, or if they’d only sing!’
But there was little encouragement to believe that either event would
happen for a couple of hours to come. The preacher went on telling
them what he meant to convince them of before he had done, and it was
clear that if he only kept to one-half of his promises and forgot the
other, he was good for that time at least.
In his desperation and restlessness Kit cast his eyes about the chapel,
and happening to let them fall upon a little seat in front of the
clerk’s desk, could scarcely believe them when they showed him--Quilp!
He rubbed them twice or thrice, but still they insisted that Quilp was
there, and there indeed he was, sitting with his hands upon his knees,
and his hat between them on a little wooden bracket, with the
accustomed grin on his dirty face, and his eyes fixed upon the ceiling.
He certainly did not glance at Kit or at his mother, and appeared
utterly unconscious of their presence; still Kit could not help
feeling, directly, that the attention of the sly little fiend was
fastened upon them, and upon nothing else.
But, astounded as he was by the apparition of the dwarf among the
Little Bethelites, and not free from a misgiving that it was the
forerunner of some trouble or annoyance, he was compelled to subdue his
wonder and to take active measures for the withdrawal of his parent, as
the evening was now creeping on, and the matter grew serious.
Therefore, the next time little Jacob woke, Kit set himself to attract
his wandering attention, and this not being a very difficult task (one
sneeze effected it), he signed to him to rouse his mother.
Ill-luck would have it, however, that, just then, the preacher, in a
forcible exposition of one head of his discourse, leaned over upon the
pulpit-desk so that very little more of him than his legs remained
inside; and, while he made vehement gestures with his right hand, and
held on with his left, stared, or seemed to stare, straight into little
Jacob’s eyes, threatening him by his strained look and attitude--so it
appeared to the child--that if he so much as moved a muscle, he, the
preacher, would be literally, and not figuratively, ‘down upon him’
that instant. In this fearful state of things, distracted by the
sudden appearance of Kit, and fascinated by the eyes of the preacher,
the miserable Jacob sat bolt upright, wholly incapable of motion,
strongly disposed to cry but afraid to do so, and returning his
pastor’s gaze until his infant eyes seemed starting from their sockets.
‘If I must do it openly, I must,’ thought Kit. With that he walked
softly out of his pew and into his mother’s, and as Mr Swiveller would
have observed if he had been present, ‘collared’ the baby without
speaking a word.
‘Hush, mother!’ whispered Kit. ‘Come along with me, I’ve got something
to tell you.’
‘Where am I?’ said Mrs Nubbles.
‘In this blessed Little Bethel,’ returned her son, peevishly.
‘Blessed indeed!’ cried Mrs Nubbles, catching at the word. ‘Oh,
Christopher, how have I been edified this night!’
‘Yes, yes, I know,’ said Kit hastily; ‘but come along, mother,
everybody’s looking at us. Don’t make a noise--bring Jacob--that’s
right!’
‘Stay, Satan, stay!’ cried the preacher, as Kit was moving off.
‘This gentleman says you’re to stay, Christopher,’ whispered his mother.
‘Stay, Satan, stay!’ roared the preacher again. ‘Tempt not the woman
that doth incline her ear to thee, but harken to the voice of him that
calleth. He hath a lamb from the fold!’ cried the preacher, raising
his voice still higher and pointing to the baby. ‘He beareth off a
lamb, a precious lamb! He goeth about, like a wolf in the night
season, and inveigleth the tender lambs!’
Kit was the best-tempered fellow in the world, but considering this
strong language, and being somewhat excited by the circumstances in
which he was placed, he faced round to the pulpit with the baby in his
arms, and replied aloud, ‘No, I don’t. He’s my brother.’
‘He’s MY brother!’ cried the preacher.
‘He isn’t,’ said Kit indignantly. ‘How can you say such a thing? And
don’t call me names if you please; what harm have I done? I shouldn’t
have come to take ‘em away, unless I was obliged, you may depend upon
that. I wanted to do it very quiet, but you wouldn’t let me. Now, you
have the goodness to abuse Satan and them, as much as you like, Sir,
and to let me alone if you please.’
So saying, Kit marched out of the chapel, followed by his mother and
little Jacob, and found himself in the open air, with an indistinct
recollection of having seen the people wake up and look surprised, and
of Quilp having remained, throughout the interruption, in his old
attitude, without moving his eyes from the ceiling, or appearing to
take the smallest notice of anything that passed.
‘Oh Kit!’ said his mother, with her handkerchief to her eyes, ‘what
have you done! I never can go there again--never!’
‘I’m glad of it, mother. What was there in the little bit of pleasure
you took last night that made it necessary for you to be low-spirited
and sorrowful tonight? That’s the way you do. If you’re happy or
merry ever, you come here to say, along with that chap, that you’re
sorry for it. More shame for you, mother, I was going to say.’
‘Hush, dear!’ said Mrs Nubbles; ‘you don’t mean what you say I know,
but you’re talking sinfulness.’
‘Don’t mean it? But I do mean it!’ retorted Kit. ‘I don’t believe,
mother, that harmless cheerfulness and good humour are thought greater
sins in Heaven than shirt-collars are, and I do believe that those
chaps are just about as right and sensible in putting down the one as
in leaving off the other--that’s my belief. But I won’t say anything
more about it, if you’ll promise not to cry, that’s all; and you take
the baby that’s a lighter weight, and give me little Jacob; and as we
go along (which we must do pretty quick) I’ll give you the news I
bring, which will surprise you a little, I can tell you. There--that’s
right. Now you look as if you’d never seen Little Bethel in all your
life, as I hope you never will again; and here’s the baby; and little
Jacob, you get atop of my back and catch hold of me tight round the
neck, and whenever a Little Bethel parson calls you a precious lamb or
says your brother’s one, you tell him it’s the truest things he’s said
for a twelvemonth, and that if he’d got a little more of the lamb
himself, and less of the mint-sauce--not being quite so sharp and sour
over it--I should like him all the better. That’s what you’ve got to
say to him, Jacob.’
Talking on in this way, half in jest and half in earnest, and cheering
up his mother, the children, and himself, by the one simple process of
determining to be in a good humour, Kit led them briskly forward; and
on the road home, he related what had passed at the Notary’s house, and
the purpose with which he had intruded on the solemnities of Little
Bethel.
His mother was not a little startled on learning what service was
required of her, and presently fell into a confusion of ideas, of which
the most prominent were that it was a great honour and dignity to ride
in a post-chaise, and that it was a moral impossibility to leave the
children behind. But this objection, and a great many others, founded
on certain articles of dress being at the wash, and certain other
articles having no existence in the wardrobe of Mrs Nubbles, were
overcome by Kit, who opposed to each and every of them, the pleasure of
recovering Nell, and the delight it would be to bring her back in
triumph.
‘There’s only ten minutes now, mother,’ said Kit when they reached
home. ‘There’s a bandbox. Throw in what you want, and we’ll be off
directly.’
To tell how Kit then hustled into the box all sorts of things which
could, by no remote contingency, be wanted, and how he left out
everything likely to be of the smallest use; how a neighbour was
persuaded to come and stop with the children, and how the children at
first cried dismally, and then laughed heartily on being promised all
kinds of impossible and unheard-of toys; how Kit’s mother wouldn’t
leave off kissing them, and how Kit couldn’t make up his mind to be
vexed with her for doing it; would take more time and room than you and
I can spare. So, passing over all such matters, it is sufficient to
say that within a few minutes after the two hours had expired, Kit and
his mother arrived at the Notary’s door, where a post-chaise was
already waiting.
‘With four horses I declare!’ said Kit, quite aghast at the
preparations. ‘Well you ARE going to do it, mother! Here she is, Sir.
Here’s my mother. She’s quite ready, sir.’
‘That’s well,’ returned the gentleman. ‘Now, don’t be in a flutter,
ma’am; you’ll be taken great care of. Where’s the box with the new
clothing and necessaries for them?’
‘Here it is,’ said the Notary. ‘In with it, Christopher.’
‘All right, Sir,’ replied Kit. ‘Quite ready now, sir.’
‘Then come along,’ said the single gentleman. And thereupon he gave
his arm to Kit’s mother, handed her into the carriage as politely as
you please, and took his seat beside her.
Up went the steps, bang went the door, round whirled the wheels, and
off they rattled, with Kit’s mother hanging out at one window waving a
damp pocket-handkerchief and screaming out a great many messages to
little Jacob and the baby, of which nobody heard a word.
Kit stood in the middle of the road, and looked after them with tears
in his eyes--not brought there by the departure he witnessed, but by
the return to which he looked forward. ‘They went away,’ he thought,
‘on foot with nobody to speak to them or say a kind word at parting,
and they’ll come back, drawn by four horses, with this rich gentleman
for their friend, and all their troubles over! She’ll forget that she
taught me to write--’
Whatever Kit thought about after this, took some time to think of, for
he stood gazing up the lines of shining lamps, long after the chaise
had disappeared, and did not return into the house until the Notary and
Mr Abel, who had themselves lingered outside till the sound of the
wheels was no longer distinguishable, had several times wondered what
could possibly detain him.
CHAPTER 42
It behoves us to leave Kit for a while, thoughtful and expectant, and
to follow the fortunes of little Nell; resuming the thread of the
narrative at the point where it was left, some chapters back.
In one of those wanderings in the evening time, when, following the two
sisters at a humble distance, she felt, in her sympathy with them and
her recognition in their trials of something akin to her own loneliness
of spirit, a comfort and consolation which made such moments a time of
deep delight, though the softened pleasure they yielded was of that
kind which lives and dies in tears--in one of those wanderings at the
quiet hour of twilight, when sky, and earth, and air, and rippling
water, and sound of distant bells, claimed kindred with the emotions of
the solitary child, and inspired her with soothing thoughts, but not of
a child’s world or its easy joys--in one of those rambles which had now
become her only pleasure or relief from care, light had faded into
darkness and evening deepened into night, and still the young creature
lingered in the gloom; feeling a companionship in Nature so serene and
still, when noise of tongues and glare of garish lights would have been
solitude indeed.
The sisters had gone home, and she was alone. She raised her eyes to
the bright stars, looking down so mildly from the wide worlds of air,
and, gazing on them, found new stars burst upon her view, and more
beyond, and more beyond again, until the whole great expanse sparkled
with shining spheres, rising higher and higher in immeasurable space,
eternal in their numbers as in their changeless and incorruptible
existence. She bent over the calm river, and saw them shining in the
same majestic order as when the dove beheld them gleaming through the
swollen waters, upon the mountain tops down far below, and dead
mankind, a million fathoms deep.
The child sat silently beneath a tree, hushed in her very breath by the
stillness of the night, and all its attendant wonders. The time and
place awoke reflection, and she thought with a quiet hope--less hope,
perhaps, than resignation--on the past, and present, and what was yet
before her. Between the old man and herself there had come a gradual
separation, harder to bear than any former sorrow. Every evening, and
often in the day-time too, he was absent, alone; and although she well
knew where he went, and why--too well from the constant drain upon her
scanty purse and from his haggard looks--he evaded all inquiry,
maintained a strict reserve, and even shunned her presence.
She sat meditating sorrowfully upon this change, and mingling it, as it
were, with everything about her, when the distant church-clock bell
struck nine. Rising at the sound, she retraced her steps, and turned
thoughtfully towards the town.
She had gained a little wooden bridge, which, thrown across the stream,
led into a meadow in her way, when she came suddenly upon a ruddy
light, and looking forward more attentively, discerned that it
proceeded from what appeared to be an encampment of gipsies, who had
made a fire in one corner at no great distance from the path, and were
sitting or lying round it. As she was too poor to have any fear of
them, she did not alter her course (which, indeed, she could not have
done without going a long way round), but quickened her pace a little,
and kept straight on.
A movement of timid curiosity impelled her, when she approached the
spot, to glance towards the fire. There was a form between it and her,
the outline strongly developed against the light, which caused her to
stop abruptly. Then, as if she had reasoned with herself and were
assured that it could not be, or had satisfied herself that it was not
that of the person she had supposed, she went on again.
But at that instant the conversation, whatever it was, which had been
carrying on near this fire was resumed, and the tones of the voice that
spoke--she could not distinguish words--sounded as familiar to her as
her own.
She turned, and looked back. The person had been seated before, but
was now in a standing posture, and leaning forward on a stick on which
he rested both hands. The attitude was no less familiar to her than
the tone of voice had been. It was her grandfather.
Her first impulse was to call to him; her next to wonder who his
associates could be, and for what purpose they were together. Some
vague apprehension succeeded, and, yielding to the strong inclination
it awakened, she drew nearer to the place; not advancing across the
open field, however, but creeping towards it by the hedge.
In this way she advanced within a few feet of the fire, and standing
among a few young trees, could both see and hear, without much danger
of being observed.
There were no women or children, as she had seen in other gipsy camps
they had passed in their wayfaring, and but one gipsy--a tall athletic
man, who stood with his arms folded, leaning against a tree at a little
distance off, looking now at the fire, and now, under his black
eyelashes, at three other men who were there, with a watchful but
half-concealed interest in their conversation. Of these, her
grandfather was one; the others she recognised as the first
card-players at the public-house on the eventful night of the
storm--the man whom they had called Isaac List, and his gruff
companion. One of the low, arched gipsy-tents, common to that people,
was pitched hard by, but it either was, or appeared to be, empty.
‘Well, are you going?’ said the stout man, looking up from the ground
where he was lying at his ease, into her grandfather’s face. ‘You were
in a mighty hurry a minute ago. Go, if you like. You’re your own
master, I hope?’
‘Don’t vex him,’ returned Isaac List, who was squatting like a frog on
the other side of the fire, and had so screwed himself up that he
seemed to be squinting all over; ‘he didn’t mean any offence.’
‘You keep me poor, and plunder me, and make a sport and jest of me
besides,’ said the old man, turning from one to the other. ‘Ye’ll
drive me mad among ye.’
The utter irresolution and feebleness of the grey-haired child,
contrasted with the keen and cunning looks of those in whose hands he
was, smote upon the little listener’s heart. But she constrained
herself to attend to all that passed, and to note each look and word.
‘Confound you, what do you mean?’ said the stout man rising a little,
and supporting himself on his elbow. ‘Keep you poor! You’d keep us
poor if you could, wouldn’t you? That’s the way with you whining,
puny, pitiful players. When you lose, you’re martyrs; but I don’t find
that when you win, you look upon the other losers in that light. As to
plunder!’ cried the fellow, raising his voice--‘Damme, what do you
mean by such ungentlemanly language as plunder, eh?’
The speaker laid himself down again at full length, and gave one or two
short, angry kicks, as if in further expression of his unbounded
indignation. It was quite plain that he acted the bully, and his
friend the peacemaker, for some particular purpose; or rather, it would
have been to any one but the weak old man; for they exchanged glances
quite openly, both with each other and with the gipsy, who grinned his
approval of the jest until his white teeth shone again.
The old man stood helplessly among them for a little time, and then
said, turning to his assailant:
‘You yourself were speaking of plunder just now, you know. Don’t be so
violent with me. You were, were you not?’
‘Not of plundering among present company! Honour among--among
gentlemen, Sir,’ returned the other, who seemed to have been very near
giving an awkward termination to the sentence.
‘Don’t be hard upon him, Jowl,’ said Isaac List. ‘He’s very sorry for
giving offence. There--go on with what you were saying--go on.’
‘I’m a jolly old tender-hearted lamb, I am,’ cried Mr Jowl, ‘to be
sitting here at my time of life giving advice when I know it won’t be
taken, and that I shall get nothing but abuse for my pains. But that’s
the way I’ve gone through life. Experience has never put a chill upon
my warm-heartedness.’
‘I tell you he’s very sorry, don’t I?’ remonstrated Isaac List, ‘and
that he wishes you’d go on.’
‘Does he wish it?’ said the other.
‘Ay,’ groaned the old man sitting down, and rocking himself to and fro.
‘Go on, go on. It’s in vain to fight with it; I can’t do it; go on.’
‘I go on then,’ said Jowl, ‘where I left off, when you got up so quick.
If you’re persuaded that it’s time for luck to turn, as it certainly
is, and find that you haven’t means enough to try it (and that’s where
it is, for you know, yourself, that you never have the funds to keep on
long enough at a sitting), help yourself to what seems put in your way
on purpose. Borrow it, I say, and, when you’re able, pay it back
again.’
‘Certainly,’ Isaac List struck in, ‘if this good lady as keeps the
wax-works has money, and does keep it in a tin box when she goes to
bed, and doesn’t lock her door for fear of fire, it seems a easy thing;
quite a Providence, I should call it--but then I’ve been religiously
brought up.’
‘You see, Isaac,’ said his friend, growing more eager, and drawing
himself closer to the old man, while he signed to the gipsy not to come
between them; ‘you see, Isaac, strangers are going in and out every
hour of the day; nothing would be more likely than for one of these
strangers to get under the good lady’s bed, or lock himself in the
cupboard; suspicion would be very wide, and would fall a long way from
the mark, no doubt. I’d give him his revenge to the last farthing he
brought, whatever the amount was.’
‘But could you?’ urged Isaac List. ‘Is your bank strong enough?’
‘Strong enough!’ answered the other, with assumed disdain. ‘Here, you
Sir, give me that box out of the straw!’
This was addressed to the gipsy, who crawled into the low tent on all
fours, and after some rummaging and rustling returned with a cash-box,
which the man who had spoken opened with a key he wore about his person.
‘Do you see this?’ he said, gathering up the money in his hand and
letting it drop back into the box, between his fingers, like water.
‘Do you hear it? Do you know the sound of gold? There, put it
back--and don’t talk about banks again, Isaac, till you’ve got one of
your own.’
Isaac List, with great apparent humility, protested that he had never
doubted the credit of a gentleman so notorious for his honourable
dealing as Mr Jowl, and that he had hinted at the production of the
box, not for the satisfaction of his doubts, for he could have none,
but with a view to being regaled with a sight of so much wealth, which,
though it might be deemed by some but an unsubstantial and visionary
pleasure, was to one in his circumstances a source of extreme delight,
only to be surpassed by its safe depository in his own personal
pockets. Although Mr List and Mr Jowl addressed themselves to each
other, it was remarkable that they both looked narrowly at the old man,
who, with his eyes fixed upon the fire, sat brooding over it, yet
listening eagerly--as it seemed from a certain involuntary motion of
the head, or twitching of the face from time to time--to all they said.
‘My advice,’ said Jowl, lying down again with a careless air, ‘is
plain--I have given it, in fact. I act as a friend. Why should I help
a man to the means perhaps of winning all I have, unless I considered
him my friend? It’s foolish, I dare say, to be so thoughtful of the
welfare of other people, but that’s my constitution, and I can’t help
it; so don’t blame me, Isaac List.’
‘I blame you!’ returned the person addressed; ‘not for the world, Mr
Jowl. I wish I could afford to be as liberal as you; and, as you say,
he might pay it back if he won--and if he lost--’
‘You’re not to take that into consideration at all,’ said Jowl.
‘But suppose he did (and nothing’s less likely, from all I know of
chances), why, it’s better to lose other people’s money than one’s own,
I hope?’
‘Ah!’ cried Isaac List rapturously, ‘the pleasures of winning! The
delight of picking up the money--the bright, shining yellow-boys--and
sweeping ‘em into one’s pocket! The deliciousness of having a triumph
at last, and thinking that one didn’t stop short and turn back, but
went half-way to meet it! The--but you’re not going, old gentleman?’
‘I’ll do it,’ said the old man, who had risen and taken two or three
hurried steps away, and now returned as hurriedly. ‘I’ll have it,
every penny.’
‘Why, that’s brave,’ cried Isaac, jumping up and slapping him on the
shoulder; ‘and I respect you for having so much young blood left. Ha,
ha, ha! Joe Jowl’s half sorry he advised you now. We’ve got the laugh
against him. Ha, ha, ha!’
‘He gives me my revenge, mind,’ said the old man, pointing to him
eagerly with his shrivelled hand: ‘mind--he stakes coin against coin,
down to the last one in the box, be there many or few. Remember that!’
‘I’m witness,’ returned Isaac. ‘I’ll see fair between you.’
‘I have passed my word,’ said Jowl with feigned reluctance, ‘and I’ll
keep it. When does this match come off? I wish it was over.--To-night?’
‘I must have the money first,’ said the old man; ‘and that I’ll have
to-morrow--’
‘Why not to-night?’ urged Jowl.
‘It’s late now, and I should be flushed and flurried,’ said the old
man. ‘It must be softly done. No, to-morrow night.’
‘Then to-morrow be it,’ said Jowl. ‘A drop of comfort here. Luck to
the best man! Fill!’
The gipsy produced three tin cups, and filled them to the brim with
brandy. The old man turned aside and muttered to himself before he
drank. Her own name struck upon the listener’s ear, coupled with some
wish so fervent, that he seemed to breathe it in an agony of
supplication.
‘God be merciful to us!’ cried the child within herself, ‘and help us
in this trying hour! What shall I do to save him!’
The remainder of their conversation was carried on in a lower tone of
voice, and was sufficiently concise; relating merely to the execution
of the project, and the best precautions for diverting suspicion. The
old man then shook hands with his tempters, and withdrew.
They watched his bowed and stooping figure as it retreated slowly, and
when he turned his head to look back, which he often did, waved their
hands, or shouted some brief encouragement. It was not until they had
seen him gradually diminish into a mere speck upon the distant road,
that they turned to each other, and ventured to laugh aloud.
‘So,’ said Jowl, warming his hands at the fire, ‘it’s done at last. He
wanted more persuading than I expected. It’s three weeks ago, since we
first put this in his head. What’ll he bring, do you think?’
‘Whatever he brings, it’s halved between us,’ returned Isaac List.
The other man nodded. ‘We must make quick work of it,’ he said, ‘and
then cut his acquaintance, or we may be suspected. Sharp’s the word.’
List and the gipsy acquiesced. When they had all three amused
themselves a little with their victim’s infatuation, they dismissed the
subject as one which had been sufficiently discussed, and began to talk
in a jargon which the child did not understand. As their discourse
appeared to relate to matters in which they were warmly interested,
however, she deemed it the best time for escaping unobserved; and crept
away with slow and cautious steps, keeping in the shadow of the hedges,
or forcing a path through them or the dry ditches, until she could
emerge upon the road at a point beyond their range of vision. Then she
fled homeward as quickly as she could, torn and bleeding from the
wounds of thorns and briars, but more lacerated in mind, and threw
herself upon her bed, distracted.
The first idea that flashed upon her mind was flight, instant flight;
dragging him from that place, and rather dying of want upon the
roadside, than ever exposing him again to such terrible temptations.
Then, she remembered that the crime was not to be committed until next
night, and there was the intermediate time for thinking, and resolving
what to do. Then, she was distracted with a horrible fear that he
might be committing it at that moment; with a dread of hearing shrieks
and cries piercing the silence of the night; with fearful thoughts of
what he might be tempted and led on to do, if he were detected in the
act, and had but a woman to struggle with. It was impossible to bear
such torture. She stole to the room where the money was, opened the
door, and looked in. God be praised! He was not there, and she was
sleeping soundly.
She went back to her own room, and tried to prepare herself for bed.
But who could sleep--sleep! who could lie passively down, distracted by
such terrors? They came upon her more and more strongly yet. Half
undressed, and with her hair in wild disorder, she flew to the old
man’s bedside, clasped him by the wrist, and roused him from his sleep.
‘What’s this!’ he cried, starting up in bed, and fixing his eyes upon
her spectral face.
‘I have had a dreadful dream,’ said the child, with an energy that
nothing but such terrors could have inspired. ‘A dreadful, horrible
dream. I have had it once before. It is a dream of grey-haired men
like you, in darkened rooms by night, robbing sleepers of their gold.
Up, up!’
The old man shook in every joint, and folded his hands like one who
prays.
‘Not to me,’ said the child, ‘not to me--to Heaven, to save us from
such deeds! This dream is too real. I cannot sleep, I cannot stay
here, I cannot leave you alone under the roof where such dreams come.
Up! We must fly.’
He looked at her as if she were a spirit--she might have been for all
the look of earth she had--and trembled more and more.
‘There is no time to lose; I will not lose one minute,’ said the child.
‘Up! and away with me!’
‘To-night?’ murmured the old man.
‘Yes, to-night,’ replied the child. ‘To-morrow night will be too late.
The dream will have come again. Nothing but flight can save us. Up!’
The old man rose from his bed: his forehead bedewed with the cold sweat
of fear: and, bending before the child as if she had been an angel
messenger sent to lead him where she would, made ready to follow her.
She took him by the hand and led him on. As they passed the door of the
room he had proposed to rob, she shuddered and looked up into his
face. What a white face was that, and with what a look did he meet
hers!
She took him to her own chamber, and, still holding him by the hand as
if she feared to lose him for an instant, gathered together the little
stock she had, and hung her basket on her arm. The old man took his
wallet from her hands and strapped it on his shoulders--his staff,
too, she had brought away--and then she led him forth.
Through the strait streets, and narrow crooked outskirts, their
trembling feet passed quickly. Up the steep hill too, crowned by the
old grey castle, they toiled with rapid steps, and had not once looked
behind.
But as they drew nearer the ruined walls, the moon rose in all her
gentle glory, and, from their venerable age, garlanded with ivy, moss,
and waving grass, the child looked back upon the sleeping town, deep in
the valley’s shade: and on the far-off river with its winding track of
light: and on the distant hills; and as she did so, she clasped the
hand she held, less firmly, and bursting into tears, fell upon the old
man’s neck.
CHAPTER 43
Her momentary weakness past, the child again summoned the resolution
which had until now sustained her, and, endeavouring to keep steadily
in her view the one idea that they were flying from disgrace and crime,
and that her grandfather’s preservation must depend solely on her
firmness, unaided by one word of advice or any helping hand, urged him
onward and looked back no more.
While he, subdued and abashed, seemed to crouch before her, and to
shrink and cower down, as if in the presence of some superior creature,
the child herself was sensible of a new feeling within her, which
elevated her nature, and inspired her with an energy and confidence she
had never known. There was no divided responsibility now; the whole
burden of their two lives had fallen upon her, and henceforth she must
think and act for both. ‘I have saved him,’ she thought. ‘In all
dangers and distresses, I will remember that.’
At any other time, the recollection of having deserted the friend who
had shown them so much homely kindness, without a word of
justification--the thought that they were guilty, in appearance, of
treachery and ingratitude--even the having parted from the two
sisters--would have filled her with sorrow and regret. But now, all
other considerations were lost in the new uncertainties and anxieties
of their wild and wandering life; and the very desperation of their
condition roused and stimulated her.
In the pale moonlight, which lent a wanness of its own to the delicate
face where thoughtful care already mingled with the winning grace and
loveliness of youth, the too bright eye, the spiritual head, the lips
that pressed each other with such high resolve and courage of the
heart, the slight figure firm in its bearing and yet so very weak, told
their silent tale; but told it only to the wind that rustled by, which,
taking up its burden, carried, perhaps to some mother’s pillow, faint
dreams of childhood fading in its bloom, and resting in the sleep that
knows no waking.
The night crept on apace, the moon went down, the stars grew pale and
dim, and morning, cold as they, slowly approached. Then, from behind a
distant hill, the noble sun rose up, driving the mists in phantom
shapes before it, and clearing the earth of their ghostly forms till
darkness came again. When it had climbed higher into the sky, and
there was warmth in its cheerful beams, they laid them down to sleep,
upon a bank, hard by some water.
But Nell retained her grasp upon the old man’s arm, and long after he
was slumbering soundly, watched him with untiring eyes. Fatigue stole
over her at last; her grasp relaxed, tightened, relaxed again, and they
slept side by side.
A confused sound of voices, mingling with her dreams, awoke her. A man
of very uncouth and rough appearance was standing over them, and two of
his companions were looking on, from a long heavy boat which had come
close to the bank while they were sleeping. The boat had neither oar
nor sail, but was towed by a couple of horses, who, with the rope to
which they were harnessed slack and dripping in the water, were resting
on the path.
‘Holloa!’ said the man roughly. ‘What’s the matter here?’
‘We were only asleep, Sir,’ said Nell. ‘We have been walking all
night.’
‘A pair of queer travellers to be walking all night,’ observed the man
who had first accosted them. ‘One of you is a trifle too old for that
sort of work, and the other a trifle too young. Where are you going?’
Nell faltered, and pointed at hazard towards the West, upon which the
man inquired if she meant a certain town which he named. Nell, to
avoid more questioning, said ‘Yes, that was the place.’
‘Where have you come from?’ was the next question; and this being an
easier one to answer, Nell mentioned the name of the village in which
their friend the schoolmaster dwelt, as being less likely to be known
to the men or to provoke further inquiry.
‘I thought somebody had been robbing and ill-using you, might be,’ said
the man. ‘That’s all. Good day.’
Returning his salute and feeling greatly relieved by his departure,
Nell looked after him as he mounted one of the horses, and the boat
went on. It had not gone very far, when it stopped again, and she saw
the men beckoning to her.
‘Did you call to me?’ said Nell, running up to them.
‘You may go with us if you like,’ replied one of those in the boat.
‘We’re going to the same place.’
The child hesitated for a moment. Thinking, as she had thought with
great trepidation more than once before, that the men whom she had seen
with her grandfather might, perhaps, in their eagerness for the booty,
follow them, and regaining their influence over him, set hers at
nought; and that if they went with these men, all traces of them must
surely be lost at that spot; determined to accept the offer. The boat
came close to the bank again, and before she had had any more time for
consideration, she and her grandfather were on board, and gliding
smoothly down the canal.
The sun shone pleasantly on the bright water, which was sometimes
shaded by trees, and sometimes open to a wide extent of country,
intersected by running streams, and rich with wooded hills, cultivated
land, and sheltered farms. Now and then, a village with its modest
spire, thatched roofs, and gable-ends, would peep out from among the
trees; and, more than once, a distant town, with great church towers
looming through its smoke, and high factories or workshops rising above
the mass of houses, would come in view, and, by the length of time it
lingered in the distance, show them how slowly they travelled. Their
way lay, for the most part, through the low grounds, and open plains;
and except these distant places, and occasionally some men working in
the fields, or lounging on the bridges under which they passed, to see
them creep along, nothing encroached on their monotonous and secluded
track.
Nell was rather disheartened, when they stopped at a kind of wharf late
in the afternoon, to learn from one of the men that they would not
reach their place of destination until next day, and that, if she had
no provision with her, she had better buy it there. She had but a few
pence, having already bargained with them for some bread, but even of
these it was necessary to be very careful, as they were on their way to
an utterly strange place, with no resource whatever. A small loaf and
a morsel of cheese, therefore, were all she could afford, and with
these she took her place in the boat again, and, after half an hour’s
delay during which the men were drinking at the public-house, proceeded
on the journey.
They brought some beer and spirits into the boat with them, and what
with drinking freely before, and again now, were soon in a fair way of
being quarrelsome and intoxicated. Avoiding the small cabin,
therefore, which was very dark and filthy, and to which they often
invited both her and her grandfather, Nell sat in the open air with the
old man by her side: listening to their boisterous hosts with a
palpitating heart, and almost wishing herself safe on shore again
though she should have to walk all night.
They were, in truth, very rugged, noisy fellows, and quite brutal among
themselves, though civil enough to their two passengers. Thus, when a
quarrel arose between the man who was steering and his friend in the
cabin, upon the question who had first suggested the propriety of
offering Nell some beer, and when the quarrel led to a scuffle in which
they beat each other fearfully, to her inexpressible terror, neither
visited his displeasure upon her, but each contented himself with
venting it on his adversary, on whom, in addition to blows, he bestowed
a variety of compliments, which, happily for the child, were conveyed
in terms, to her quite unintelligible. The difference was finally
adjusted, by the man who had come out of the cabin knocking the other
into it head first, and taking the helm into his own hands, without
evincing the least discomposure himself, or causing any in his friend,
who, being of a tolerably strong constitution and perfectly inured to
such trifles, went to sleep as he was, with his heels upwards, and in a
couple of minutes or so was snoring comfortably.
By this time it was night again, and though the child felt cold, being
but poorly clad, her anxious thoughts were far removed from her own
suffering or uneasiness, and busily engaged in endeavouring to devise
some scheme for their joint subsistence. The same spirit which had
supported her on the previous night, upheld and sustained her now. Her
grandfather lay sleeping safely at her side, and the crime to which his
madness urged him, was not committed. That was her comfort.
How every circumstance of her short, eventful life, came thronging into
her mind, as they travelled on! Slight incidents, never thought of or
remembered until now; faces, seen once and ever since forgotten; words
scarcely heeded at the time; scenes, of a year ago and those of
yesterday, mixing up and linking themselves together; familiar places
shaping themselves out in the darkness from things which, when
approached, were, of all others, the most remote and most unlike them;
sometimes, a strange confusion in her mind relative to the occasion of
her being there, and the place to which she was going, and the people
she was with; and imagination suggesting remarks and questions which
sounded so plainly in her ears, that she would start, and turn, and be
almost tempted to reply;--all the fancies and contradictions common in
watching and excitement and restless change of place, beset the child.
She happened, while she was thus engaged, to encounter the face of the
man on deck, in whom the sentimental stage of drunkenness had now
succeeded to the boisterous, and who, taking from his mouth a short
pipe, quilted over with string for its longer preservation, requested
that she would oblige him with a song.
‘You’ve got a very pretty voice, a very soft eye, and a very strong
memory,’ said this gentleman; ‘the voice and eye I’ve got evidence for,
and the memory’s an opinion of my own. And I’m never wrong. Let me
hear a song this minute.’
‘I don’t think I know one, sir,’ returned Nell.
‘You know forty-seven songs,’ said the man, with a gravity which
admitted of no altercation on the subject. ‘Forty-seven’s your number.
Let me hear one of ‘em--the best. Give me a song this minute.’
Not knowing what might be the consequences of irritating her friend,
and trembling with the fear of doing so, poor Nell sang him some little
ditty which she had learned in happier times, and which was so
agreeable to his ear, that on its conclusion he in the same peremptory
manner requested to be favoured with another, to which he was so
obliging as to roar a chorus to no particular tune, and with no words
at all, but which amply made up in its amazing energy for its
deficiency in other respects. The noise of this vocal performance
awakened the other man, who, staggering upon deck and shaking his late
opponent by the hand, swore that singing was his pride and joy and
chief delight, and that he desired no better entertainment. With a
third call, more imperative than either of the two former, Nell felt
obliged to comply, and this time a chorus was maintained not only by
the two men together, but also by the third man on horseback, who being
by his position debarred from a nearer participation in the revels of
the night, roared when his companions roared, and rent the very air.
In this way, with little cessation, and singing the same songs again
and again, the tired and exhausted child kept them in good humour all
that night; and many a cottager, who was roused from his soundest sleep
by the discordant chorus as it floated away upon the wind, hid his head
beneath the bed-clothes and trembled at the sounds.
At length the morning dawned. It was no sooner light than it began to
rain heavily. As the child could not endure the intolerable vapours of
the cabin, they covered her, in return for her exertions, with some
pieces of sail-cloth and ends of tarpaulin, which sufficed to keep her
tolerably dry and to shelter her grandfather besides. As the day
advanced the rain increased. At noon it poured down more hopelessly
and heavily than ever without the faintest promise of abatement.
They had, for some time, been gradually approaching the place for which
they were bound. The water had become thicker and dirtier; other
barges, coming from it, passed them frequently; the paths of coal-ash
and huts of staring brick, marked the vicinity of some great
manufacturing town; while scattered streets and houses, and smoke from
distant furnaces, indicated that they were already in the outskirts.
Now, the clustered roofs, and piles of buildings, trembling with the
working of engines, and dimly resounding with their shrieks and
throbbings; the tall chimneys vomiting forth a black vapour, which hung
in a dense ill-favoured cloud above the housetops and filled the air
with gloom; the clank of hammers beating upon iron, the roar of busy
streets and noisy crowds, gradually augmenting until all the various
sounds blended into one and none was distinguishable for itself,
announced the termination of their journey.
The boat floated into the wharf to which it belonged. The men were
occupied directly. The child and her grandfather, after waiting in
vain to thank them or ask them whither they should go, passed through a
dirty lane into a crowded street, and stood, amid its din and tumult,
and in the pouring rain, as strange, bewildered, and confused, as if
they had lived a thousand years before, and were raised from the dead
and placed there by a miracle.
CHAPTER 44
The throng of people hurried by, in two opposite streams, with no
symptom of cessation or exhaustion; intent upon their own affairs; and
undisturbed in their business speculations, by the roar of carts and
waggons laden with clashing wares, the slipping of horses’ feet upon
the wet and greasy pavement, the rattling of the rain on windows and
umbrella-tops, the jostling of the more impatient passengers, and all
the noise and tumult of a crowded street in the high tide of its
occupation: while the two poor strangers, stunned and bewildered by the
hurry they beheld but had no part in, looked mournfully on; feeling,
amidst the crowd, a solitude which has no parallel but in the thirst of
the shipwrecked mariner, who, tost to and fro upon the billows of a
mighty ocean, his red eyes blinded by looking on the water which hems
him in on every side, has not one drop to cool his burning tongue.
They withdrew into a low archway for shelter from the rain, and watched
the faces of those who passed, to find in one among them a ray of
encouragement or hope. Some frowned, some smiled, some muttered to
themselves, some made slight gestures, as if anticipating the
conversation in which they would shortly be engaged, some wore the
cunning look of bargaining and plotting, some were anxious and eager,
some slow and dull; in some countenances, were written gain; in others,
loss. It was like being in the confidence of all these people to stand
quietly there, looking into their faces as they flitted past. In busy
places, where each man has an object of his own, and feels assured that
every other man has his, his character and purpose are written broadly
in his face. In the public walks and lounges of a town, people go to
see and to be seen, and there the same expression, with little variety,
is repeated a hundred times. The working-day faces come nearer to the
truth, and let it out more plainly.
Falling into that kind of abstraction which such a solitude awakens,
the child continued to gaze upon the passing crowd with a wondering
interest, amounting almost to a temporary forgetfulness of her own
condition. But cold, wet, hunger, want of rest, and lack of any place
in which to lay her aching head, soon brought her thoughts back to the
point whence they had strayed. No one passed who seemed to notice
them, or to whom she durst appeal. After some time, they left their
place of refuge from the weather, and mingled with the concourse.
Evening came on. They were still wandering up and down, with fewer
people about them, but with the same sense of solitude in their own
breasts, and the same indifference from all around. The lights in the
streets and shops made them feel yet more desolate, for with their
help, night and darkness seemed to come on faster. Shivering with the
cold and damp, ill in body, and sick to death at heart, the child
needed her utmost firmness and resolution even to creep along.
Why had they ever come to this noisy town, when there were peaceful
country places, in which, at least, they might have hungered and
thirsted, with less suffering than in its squalid strife! They were
but an atom, here, in a mountain heap of misery, the very sight of
which increased their hopelessness and suffering.
The child had not only to endure the accumulated hardships of their
destitute condition, but to bear the reproaches of her grandfather, who
began to murmur at having been led away from their late abode, and
demand that they should return to it. Being now penniless, and no
relief or prospect of relief appearing, they retraced their steps
through the deserted streets, and went back to the wharf, hoping to
find the boat in which they had come, and to be allowed to sleep on
board that night. But here again they were disappointed, for the gate
was closed, and some fierce dogs, barking at their approach, obliged
them to retreat.
‘We must sleep in the open air to-night, dear,’ said the child in a
weak voice, as they turned away from this last repulse; ‘and to-morrow
we will beg our way to some quiet part of the country, and try to earn
our bread in very humble work.’
‘Why did you bring me here?’ returned the old man fiercely. ‘I cannot
bear these close eternal streets. We came from a quiet part. Why did
you force me to leave it?’
‘Because I must have that dream I told you of, no more,’ said the
child, with a momentary firmness that lost itself in tears; ‘and we
must live among poor people, or it will come again. Dear grandfather,
you are old and weak, I know; but look at me. I never will complain if
you will not, but I have some suffering indeed.’
‘Ah! poor, houseless, wandering, motherless child!’ cried the old man,
clasping his hands and gazing as if for the first time upon her anxious
face, her travel-stained dress, and bruised and swollen feet; ‘has all
my agony of care brought her to this at last! Was I a happy man once,
and have I lost happiness and all I had, for this!’
‘If we were in the country now,’ said the child, with assumed
cheerfulness, as they walked on looking about them for a shelter, we
should find some good old tree, stretching out his green arms as if he
loved us, and nodding and rustling as if he would have us fall asleep,
thinking of him while he watched. Please God, we shall be there
soon--to-morrow or next day at the farthest--and in the meantime let us
think, dear, that it was a good thing we came here; for we are lost in
the crowd and hurry of this place, and if any cruel people should
pursue us, they could surely never trace us further. There’s comfort
in that. And here’s a deep old doorway--very dark, but quite dry, and
warm too, for the wind don’t blow in here--What’s that!’
Uttering a half shriek, she recoiled from a black figure which came
suddenly out of the dark recess in which they were about to take
refuge, and stood still, looking at them.
‘Speak again,’ it said; ‘do I know the voice?’
‘No,’ replied the child timidly; ‘we are strangers, and having no money
for a night’s lodging, were going to rest here.’
There was a feeble lamp at no great distance; the only one in the
place, which was a kind of square yard, but sufficient to show how poor
and mean it was. To this, the figure beckoned them; at the same time
drawing within its rays, as if to show that it had no desire to conceal
itself or take them at an advantage. The form was that of a man,
miserably clad and begrimed with smoke, which, perhaps by its contrast
with the natural colour of his skin, made him look paler than he really
was. That he was naturally of a very wan and pallid aspect, however,
his hollow cheeks, sharp features, and sunken eyes, no less than a
certain look of patient endurance, sufficiently testified. His voice
was harsh by nature, but not brutal; and though his face, besides
possessing the characteristics already mentioned, was overshadowed by a
quantity of long dark hair, its expression was neither ferocious nor
bad.
‘How came you to think of resting there?’ he said. ‘Or how,’ he added,
looking more attentively at the child, ‘do you come to want a place of
rest at this time of night?’
‘Our misfortunes,’ the grandfather answered, ‘are the cause.’
‘Do you know,’ said the man, looking still more earnestly at Nell, ‘how
wet she is, and that the damp streets are not a place for her?’
‘I know it well, God help me,’ he replied. ‘What can I do!’
The man looked at Nell again, and gently touched her garments, from
which the rain was running off in little streams. ‘I can give you
warmth,’ he said, after a pause; ‘nothing else. Such lodging as I
have, is in that house,’ pointing to the doorway from which he had
emerged, ‘but she is safer and better there than here. The fire is in
a rough place, but you can pass the night beside it safely, if you’ll
trust yourselves to me. You see that red light yonder?’
They raised their eyes, and saw a lurid glare hanging in the dark sky;
the dull reflection of some distant fire.
‘It’s not far,’ said the man. ‘Shall I take you there? You were going
to sleep upon cold bricks; I can give you a bed of warm ashes--nothing
better.’
Without waiting for any further reply than he saw in their looks, he
took Nell in his arms, and bade the old man follow.
Carrying her as tenderly, and as easily too, as if she had been an
infant, and showing himself both swift and sure of foot, he led the way
through what appeared to be the poorest and most wretched quarter of
the town; and turning aside to avoid the overflowing kennels or running
waterspouts, but holding his course, regardless of such obstructions,
and making his way straight through them. They had proceeded thus, in
silence, for some quarter of an hour, and had lost sight of the glare
to which he had pointed, in the dark and narrow ways by which they had
come, when it suddenly burst upon them again, streaming up from the
high chimney of a building close before them.
‘This is the place,’ he said, pausing at a door to put Nell down and
take her hand. ‘Don’t be afraid. There’s nobody here will harm you.’
It needed a strong confidence in this assurance to induce them to
enter, and what they saw inside did not diminish their apprehension and
alarm. In a large and lofty building, supported by pillars of iron,
with great black apertures in the upper walls, open to the external
air; echoing to the roof with the beating of hammers and roar of
furnaces, mingled with the hissing of red-hot metal plunged in water,
and a hundred strange unearthly noises never heard elsewhere; in this
gloomy place, moving like demons among the flame and smoke, dimly and
fitfully seen, flushed and tormented by the burning fires, and wielding
great weapons, a faulty blow from any one of which must have crushed
some workman’s skull, a number of men laboured like giants. Others,
reposing upon heaps of coals or ashes, with their faces turned to the
black vault above, slept or rested from their toil. Others again,
opening the white-hot furnace-doors, cast fuel on the flames, which
came rushing and roaring forth to meet it, and licked it up like oil.
Others drew forth, with clashing noise, upon the ground, great sheets
of glowing steel, emitting an insupportable heat, and a dull deep light
like that which reddens in the eyes of savage beasts.
Through these bewildering sights and deafening sounds, their conductor
led them to where, in a dark portion of the building, one furnace burnt
by night and day--so, at least, they gathered from the motion of his
lips, for as yet they could only see him speak: not hear him. The man
who had been watching this fire, and whose task was ended for the
present, gladly withdrew, and left them with their friend, who,
spreading Nell’s little cloak upon a heap of ashes, and showing her
where she could hang her outer-clothes to dry, signed to her and the
old man to lie down and sleep. For himself, he took his station on a
rugged mat before the furnace-door, and resting his chin upon his
hands, watched the flame as it shone through the iron chinks, and the
white ashes as they fell into their bright hot grave below.
The warmth of her bed, hard and humble as it was, combined with the
great fatigue she had undergone, soon caused the tumult of the place to
fall with a gentler sound upon the child’s tired ears, and was not long
in lulling her to sleep. The old man was stretched beside her, and
with her hand upon his neck she lay and dreamed.
It was yet night when she awoke, nor did she know how long, or for how
short a time, she had slept. But she found herself protected, both
from any cold air that might find its way into the building, and from
the scorching heat, by some of the workmen’s clothes; and glancing at
their friend saw that he sat in exactly the same attitude, looking with
a fixed earnestness of attention towards the fire, and keeping so very
still that he did not even seem to breathe. She lay in the state
between sleeping and waking, looking so long at his motionless figure
that at length she almost feared he had died as he sat there; and
softly rising and drawing close to him, ventured to whisper in his ear.
He moved, and glancing from her to the place she had lately occupied,
as if to assure himself that it was really the child so near him,
looked inquiringly into her face.
‘I feared you were ill,’ she said. ‘The other men are all in motion,
and you are so very quiet.’
‘They leave me to myself,’ he replied. ‘They know my humour. They
laugh at me, but don’t harm me in it. See yonder there--that’s my
friend.’
‘The fire?’ said the child.
‘It has been alive as long as I have,’ the man made answer. ‘We talk
and think together all night long.’
The child glanced quickly at him in her surprise, but he had turned his
eyes in their former direction, and was musing as before.
‘It’s like a book to me,’ he said--‘the only book I ever learned to
read; and many an old story it tells me. It’s music, for I should know
its voice among a thousand, and there are other voices in its roar. It
has its pictures too. You don’t know how many strange faces and
different scenes I trace in the red-hot coals. It’s my memory, that
fire, and shows me all my life.’
The child, bending down to listen to his words, could not help
remarking with what brightened eyes he continued to speak and muse.
‘Yes,’ he said, with a faint smile, ‘it was the same when I was quite a
baby, and crawled about it, till I fell asleep. My father watched it
then.’
‘Had you no mother?’ asked the child.
‘No, she was dead. Women work hard in these parts. She worked herself
to death they told me, and, as they said so then, the fire has gone on
saying the same thing ever since. I suppose it was true. I have
always believed it.’
‘Were you brought up here, then?’ said the child.
‘Summer and winter,’ he replied. ‘Secretly at first, but when they
found it out, they let him keep me here. So the fire nursed me--the
same fire. It has never gone out.’
‘You are fond of it?’ said the child.
‘Of course I am. He died before it. I saw him fall down--just there,
where those ashes are burning now--and wondered, I remember, why it
didn’t help him.’
‘Have you been here ever since?’ asked the child.
‘Ever since I came to watch it; but there was a while between, and a
very cold dreary while it was. It burned all the time though, and
roared and leaped when I came back, as it used to do in our play days.
You may guess, from looking at me, what kind of child I was, but for
all the difference between us I was a child, and when I saw you in the
street to-night, you put me in mind of myself, as I was after he died,
and made me wish to bring you to the fire. I thought of those old
times again, when I saw you sleeping by it. You should be sleeping
now. Lie down again, poor child, lie down again!’
With that, he led her to her rude couch, and covering her with the
clothes with which she had found herself enveloped when she woke,
returned to his seat, whence he moved no more unless to feed the
furnace, but remained motionless as a statue. The child continued to
watch him for a little time, but soon yielded to the drowsiness that
came upon her, and, in the dark strange place and on the heap of ashes,
slept as peacefully as if the room had been a palace chamber, and the
bed, a bed of down.
When she awoke again, broad day was shining through the lofty openings
in the walls, and, stealing in slanting rays but midway down, seemed to
make the building darker than it had been at night. The clang and
tumult were still going on, and the remorseless fires were burning
fiercely as before; for few changes of night and day brought rest or
quiet there.
Her friend parted his breakfast--a scanty mess of coffee and some
coarse bread--with the child and her grandfather, and inquired whither
they were going. She told him that they sought some distant country
place remote from towns or even other villages, and with a faltering
tongue inquired what road they would do best to take.
‘I know little of the country,’ he said, shaking his head, ‘for such as
I, pass all our lives before our furnace doors, and seldom go forth to
breathe. But there are such places yonder.’
‘And far from here?’ said Nell.
‘Aye surely. How could they be near us, and be green and fresh? The
road lies, too, through miles and miles, all lighted up by fires like
ours--a strange black road, and one that would frighten you by night.’
‘We are here and must go on,’ said the child boldly; for she saw that
the old man listened with anxious ears to this account.
‘Rough people--paths never made for little feet like yours--a dismal
blighted way--is there no turning back, my child?’
‘There is none,’ cried Nell, pressing forward. ‘If you can direct us,
do. If not, pray do not seek to turn us from our purpose. Indeed you
do not know the danger that we shun, and how right and true we are in
flying from it, or you would not try to stop us, I am sure you would
not.’
‘God forbid, if it is so!’ said their uncouth protector, glancing from
the eager child to her grandfather, who hung his head and bent his eyes
upon the ground. ‘I’ll direct you from the door, the best I can. I
wish I could do more.’
He showed them, then, by which road they must leave the town, and what
course they should hold when they had gained it. He lingered so long
on these instructions, that the child, with a fervent blessing, tore
herself away, and stayed to hear no more.
But, before they had reached the corner of the lane, the man came
running after them, and, pressing her hand, left something in it--two
old, battered, smoke-encrusted penny pieces. Who knows but they shone
as brightly in the eyes of angels, as golden gifts that have been
chronicled on tombs?
And thus they separated; the child to lead her sacred charge farther
from guilt and shame; the labourer to attach a fresh interest to the
spot where his guests had slept, and read new histories in his furnace
fire.
CHAPTER 45
In all their journeying, they had never longed so ardently, they had
never so pined and wearied, for the freedom of pure air and open
country, as now. No, not even on that memorable morning, when,
deserting their old home, they abandoned themselves to the mercies of a
strange world, and left all the dumb and senseless things they had
known and loved, behind--not even then, had they so yearned for the
fresh solitudes of wood, hillside, and field, as now, when the noise
and dirt and vapour, of the great manufacturing town reeking with lean
misery and hungry wretchedness, hemmed them in on every side, and
seemed to shut out hope, and render escape impossible.
‘Two days and nights!’ thought the child. ‘He said two days and nights
we should have to spend among such scenes as these. Oh! if we live to
reach the country once again, if we get clear of these dreadful places,
though it is only to lie down and die, with what a grateful heart I
shall thank God for so much mercy!’
With thoughts like this, and with some vague design of travelling to a
great distance among streams and mountains, where only very poor and
simple people lived, and where they might maintain themselves by very
humble helping work in farms, free from such terrors as that from which
they fled--the child, with no resource but the poor man’s gift, and no
encouragement but that which flowed from her own heart, and its sense
of the truth and right of what she did, nerved herself to this last
journey and boldly pursued her task.
‘We shall be very slow to-day, dear,’ she said, as they toiled
painfully through the streets; ‘my feet are sore, and I have pains in
all my limbs from the wet of yesterday. I saw that he looked at us and
thought of that, when he said how long we should be upon the road.’
‘It was a dreary way he told us of,’ returned her grandfather,
piteously. ‘Is there no other road? Will you not let me go some other
way than this?’
‘Places lie beyond these,’ said the child, firmly, ‘where we may live
in peace, and be tempted to do no harm. We will take the road that
promises to have that end, and we would not turn out of it, if it were
a hundred times worse than our fears lead us to expect. We would not,
dear, would we?’
‘No,’ replied the old man, wavering in his voice, no less than in his
manner. ‘No. Let us go on. I am ready. I am quite ready, Nell.’
The child walked with more difficulty than she had led her companion to
expect, for the pains that racked her joints were of no common
severity, and every exertion increased them. But they wrung from her
no complaint, or look of suffering; and, though the two travellers
proceeded very slowly, they did proceed. Clearing the town in course
of time, they began to feel that they were fairly on their way.
A long suburb of red brick houses--some with patches of garden-ground,
where coal-dust and factory smoke darkened the shrinking leaves, and
coarse rank flowers, and where the struggling vegetation sickened and
sank under the hot breath of kiln and furnace, making them by its
presence seem yet more blighting and unwholesome than in the town
itself--a long, flat, straggling suburb passed, they came, by slow
degrees, upon a cheerless region, where not a blade of grass was seen
to grow, where not a bud put forth its promise in the spring, where
nothing green could live but on the surface of the stagnant pools,
which here and there lay idly sweltering by the black road-side.
Advancing more and more into the shadow of this mournful place, its
dark depressing influence stole upon their spirits, and filled them
with a dismal gloom. On every side, and far as the eye could see into
the heavy distance, tall chimneys, crowding on each other, and
presenting that endless repetition of the same dull, ugly form, which
is the horror of oppressive dreams, poured out their plague of smoke,
obscured the light, and made foul the melancholy air. On mounds of
ashes by the wayside, sheltered only by a few rough boards, or rotten
pent-house roofs, strange engines spun and writhed like tortured
creatures; clanking their iron chains, shrieking in their rapid whirl
from time to time as though in torment unendurable, and making the
ground tremble with their agonies. Dismantled houses here and there
appeared, tottering to the earth, propped up by fragments of others
that had fallen down, unroofed, windowless, blackened, desolate, but
yet inhabited. Men, women, children, wan in their looks and ragged in
attire, tended the engines, fed their tributary fire, begged upon the
road, or scowled half-naked from the doorless houses. Then came more
of the wrathful monsters, whose like they almost seemed to be in their
wildness and their untamed air, screeching and turning round and round
again; and still, before, behind, and to the right and left, was the
same interminable perspective of brick towers, never ceasing in their
black vomit, blasting all things living or inanimate, shutting out the
face of day, and closing in on all these horrors with a dense dark
cloud.
But night-time in this dreadful spot!--night, when the smoke was
changed to fire; when every chimney spirited up its flame; and places,
that had been dark vaults all day, now shone red-hot, with figures
moving to and fro within their blazing jaws, and calling to one another
with hoarse cries--night, when the noise of every strange machine was
aggravated by the darkness; when the people near them looked wilder and
more savage; when bands of unemployed labourers paraded the roads, or
clustered by torch-light round their leaders, who told them, in stern
language, of their wrongs, and urged them on to frightful cries and
threats; when maddened men, armed with sword and firebrand, spurning
the tears and prayers of women who would restrain them, rushed forth on
errands of terror and destruction, to work no ruin half so surely as
their own--night, when carts came rumbling by, filled with rude
coffins (for contagious disease and death had been busy with the living
crops); when orphans cried, and distracted women shrieked and followed
in their wake--night, when some called for bread, and some for drink to
drown their cares, and some with tears, and some with staggering feet,
and some with bloodshot eyes, went brooding home--night, which, unlike
the night that Heaven sends on earth, brought with it no peace, nor
quiet, nor signs of blessed sleep--who shall tell the terrors of the
night to the young wandering child!
And yet she lay down, with nothing between her and the sky; and, with
no fear for herself, for she was past it now, put up a prayer for the
poor old man. So very weak and spent, she felt, so very calm and
unresisting, that she had no thought of any wants of her own, but
prayed that God would raise up some friend for him. She tried to
recall the way they had come, and to look in the direction where the
fire by which they had slept last night was burning. She had forgotten
to ask the name of the poor man, their friend, and when she had
remembered him in her prayers, it seemed ungrateful not to turn one
look towards the spot where he was watching.
A penny loaf was all they had had that day. It was very little, but
even hunger was forgotten in the strange tranquillity that crept over
her senses. She lay down, very gently, and, with a quiet smile upon
her face, fell into a slumber. It was not like sleep--and yet it must
have been, or why those pleasant dreams of the little scholar all night
long! Morning came. Much weaker, diminished powers even of sight and
hearing, and yet the child made no complaint--perhaps would have made
none, even if she had not had that inducement to be silent, travelling
by her side. She felt a hopelessness of their ever being extricated
together from that forlorn place; a dull conviction that she was very
ill, perhaps dying; but no fear or anxiety.
A loathing of food that she was not conscious of until they expended
their last penny in the purchase of another loaf, prevented her
partaking even of this poor repast. Her grandfather ate greedily,
which she was glad to see.
Their way lay through the same scenes as yesterday, with no variety or
improvement. There was the same thick air, difficult to breathe; the
same blighted ground, the same hopeless prospect, the same misery and
distress. Objects appeared more dim, the noise less, the path more
rugged and uneven, for sometimes she stumbled, and became roused, as it
were, in the effort to prevent herself from falling. Poor child! the
cause was in her tottering feet.
Towards the afternoon, her grandfather complained bitterly of hunger.
She approached one of the wretched hovels by the way-side, and knocked
with her hand upon the door.
‘What would you have here?’ said a gaunt man, opening it.
‘Charity. A morsel of bread.’
‘Do you see that?’ returned the man hoarsely, pointing to a kind of
bundle on the ground. ‘That’s a dead child. I and five hundred other
men were thrown out of work, three months ago. That is my third dead
child, and last. Do you think I have charity to bestow, or a morsel of
bread to spare?’
The child recoiled from the door, and it closed upon her. Impelled by
strong necessity, she knocked at another: a neighbouring one, which,
yielding to the slight pressure of her hand, flew open.
It seemed that a couple of poor families lived in this hovel, for two
women, each among children of her own, occupied different portions of
the room. In the centre, stood a grave gentleman in black who appeared
to have just entered, and who held by the arm a boy.
‘Here, woman,’ he said, ‘here’s your deaf and dumb son. You may thank
me for restoring him to you. He was brought before me, this morning,
charged with theft; and with any other boy it would have gone hard, I
assure you. But, as I had compassion on his infirmities, and thought
he might have learnt no better, I have managed to bring him back to
you. Take more care of him for the future.’
‘And won’t you give me back MY son!’ said the other woman, hastily
rising and confronting him. ‘Won’t you give me back MY son, Sir, who
was transported for the same offence!’
‘Was he deaf and dumb, woman?’ asked the gentleman sternly.
‘Was he not, Sir?’
‘You know he was not.’
‘He was,’ cried the woman. ‘He was deaf, dumb, and blind, to all that
was good and right, from his cradle. Her boy may have learnt no
better! where did mine learn better? where could he? who was there to
teach him better, or where was it to be learnt?’
‘Peace, woman,’ said the gentleman, ‘your boy was in possession of all
his senses.’
‘He was,’ cried the mother; ‘and he was the more easy to be led astray
because he had them. If you save this boy because he may not know
right from wrong, why did you not save mine who was never taught the
difference? You gentlemen have as good a right to punish her boy, that
God has kept in ignorance of sound and speech, as you have to punish
mine, that you kept in ignorance yourselves. How many of the girls and
boys--ah, men and women too--that are brought before you and you don’t
pity, are deaf and dumb in their minds, and go wrong in that state, and
are punished in that state, body and soul, while you gentlemen are
quarrelling among yourselves whether they ought to learn this or
that?--Be a just man, Sir, and give me back my son.’
‘You are desperate,’ said the gentleman, taking out his snuff-box, ‘and
I am sorry for you.’
‘I AM desperate,’ returned the woman, ‘and you have made me so. Give
me back my son, to work for these helpless children. Be a just man,
Sir, and, as you have had mercy upon this boy, give me back my son!’
The child had seen and heard enough to know that this was not a place
at which to ask for alms. She led the old man softly from the door,
and they pursued their journey.
With less and less of hope or strength, as they went on, but with an
undiminished resolution not to betray by any word or sigh her sinking
state, so long as she had energy to move, the child, throughout the
remainder of that hard day, compelled herself to proceed: not even
stopping to rest as frequently as usual, to compensate in some measure
for the tardy pace at which she was obliged to walk. Evening was
drawing on, but had not closed in, when--still travelling among the
same dismal objects--they came to a busy town.
Faint and spiritless as they were, its streets were insupportable.
After humbly asking for relief at some few doors, and being repulsed,
they agreed to make their way out of it as speedily as they could, and
try if the inmates of any lone house beyond, would have more pity on
their exhausted state.
They were dragging themselves along through the last street, and the
child felt that the time was close at hand when her enfeebled powers
would bear no more. There appeared before them, at this juncture,
going in the same direction as themselves, a traveller on foot, who,
with a portmanteau strapped to his back, leaned upon a stout stick as
he walked, and read from a book which he held in his other hand.
It was not an easy matter to come up with him, and beseech his aid, for
he walked fast, and was a little distance in advance. At length, he
stopped, to look more attentively at some passage in his book.
Animated with a ray of hope, the child shot on before her grandfather,
and, going close to the stranger without rousing him by the sound of
her footsteps, began, in a few faint words, to implore his help.
He turned his head. The child clapped her hands together, uttered a
wild shriek, and fell senseless at his feet.
CHAPTER 46
It was the poor schoolmaster. No other than the poor schoolmaster.
Scarcely less moved and surprised by the sight of the child than she
had been on recognising him, he stood, for a moment, silent and
confounded by this unexpected apparition, without even the presence of
mind to raise her from the ground.
But, quickly recovering his self-possession, he threw down his stick
and book, and dropping on one knee beside her, endeavoured, by such
simple means as occurred to him, to restore her to herself; while her
grandfather, standing idly by, wrung his hands, and implored her with
many endearing expressions to speak to him, were it only a word.
‘She is quite exhausted,’ said the schoolmaster, glancing upward into
his face. ‘You have taxed her powers too far, friend.’
‘She is perishing of want,’ rejoined the old man. ‘I never thought how
weak and ill she was, till now.’
Casting a look upon him, half-reproachful and half-compassionate, the
schoolmaster took the child in his arms, and, bidding the old man
gather up her little basket and follow him directly, bore her away at
his utmost speed.
There was a small inn within sight, to which, it would seem, he had
been directing his steps when so unexpectedly overtaken. Towards this
place he hurried with his unconscious burden, and rushing into the
kitchen, and calling upon the company there assembled to make way for
God’s sake, deposited it on a chair before the fire.
The company, who rose in confusion on the schoolmaster’s entrance, did
as people usually do under such circumstances. Everybody called for
his or her favourite remedy, which nobody brought; each cried for more
air, at the same time carefully excluding what air there was, by
closing round the object of sympathy; and all wondered why somebody
else didn’t do what it never appeared to occur to them might be done by
themselves.
The landlady, however, who possessed more readiness and activity than
any of them, and who had withal a quicker perception of the merits of
the case, soon came running in, with a little hot brandy and water,
followed by her servant-girl, carrying vinegar, hartshorn,
smelling-salts, and such other restoratives; which, being duly
administered, recovered the child so far as to enable her to thank them
in a faint voice, and to extend her hand to the poor schoolmaster, who
stood, with an anxious face, hard by. Without suffering her to speak
another word, or so much as to stir a finger any more, the women
straightway carried her off to bed; and, having covered her up warm,
bathed her cold feet, and wrapped them in flannel, they despatched a
messenger for the doctor.
The doctor, who was a red-nosed gentleman with a great bunch of seals
dangling below a waistcoat of ribbed black satin, arrived with all
speed, and taking his seat by the bedside of poor Nell, drew out his
watch, and felt her pulse. Then he looked at her tongue, then he felt
her pulse again, and while he did so, he eyed the half-emptied
wine-glass as if in profound abstraction.
‘I should give her,’ said the doctor at length, ‘a tea-spoonful, every
now and then, of hot brandy and water.’
‘Why, that’s exactly what we’ve done, sir!’ said the delighted landlady.
‘I should also,’ observed the doctor, who had passed the foot-bath on
the stairs, ‘I should also,’ said the doctor, in the voice of an
oracle, ‘put her feet in hot water, and wrap them up in flannel. I
should likewise,’ said the doctor with increased solemnity, ‘give her
something light for supper--the wing of a roasted fowl now--’
‘Why, goodness gracious me, sir, it’s cooking at the kitchen fire this
instant!’ cried the landlady. And so indeed it was, for the
schoolmaster had ordered it to be put down, and it was getting on so
well that the doctor might have smelt it if he had tried; perhaps he
did.
‘You may then,’ said the doctor, rising gravely, ‘give her a glass of
hot mulled port wine, if she likes wine--’
‘And a toast, Sir?’ suggested the landlady.
‘Ay,’ said the doctor, in the tone of a man who makes a dignified
concession. ‘And a toast--of bread. But be very particular to make it
of bread, if you please, ma’am.’
With which parting injunction, slowly and portentously delivered, the
doctor departed, leaving the whole house in admiration of that wisdom
which tallied so closely with their own. Everybody said he was a very
shrewd doctor indeed, and knew perfectly what people’s constitutions
were; which there appears some reason to suppose he did.
While her supper was preparing, the child fell into a refreshing sleep,
from which they were obliged to rouse her when it was ready. As she
evinced extraordinary uneasiness on learning that her grandfather was
below stairs, and as she was greatly troubled at the thought of their
being apart, he took his supper with her. Finding her still very
restless on this head, they made him up a bed in an inner room, to
which he presently retired. The key of this chamber happened by good
fortune to be on that side of the door which was in Nell’s room; she
turned it on him when the landlady had withdrawn, and crept to bed
again with a thankful heart.
The schoolmaster sat for a long time smoking his pipe by the kitchen
fire, which was now deserted, thinking, with a very happy face, on the
fortunate chance which had brought him so opportunely to the child’s
assistance, and parrying, as well as in his simple way he could, the
inquisitive cross-examination of the landlady, who had a great
curiosity to be made acquainted with every particular of Nell’s life
and history. The poor schoolmaster was so open-hearted, and so little
versed in the most ordinary cunning or deceit, that she could not have
failed to succeed in the first five minutes, but that he happened to be
unacquainted with what she wished to know; and so he told her. The
landlady, by no means satisfied with this assurance, which she
considered an ingenious evasion of the question, rejoined that he had
his reasons of course. Heaven forbid that she should wish to pry into
the affairs of her customers, which indeed were no business of hers,
who had so many of her own. She had merely asked a civil question, and
to be sure she knew it would meet with a civil answer. She was quite
satisfied--quite. She had rather perhaps that he would have said at
once that he didn’t choose to be communicative, because that would have
been plain and intelligible. However, she had no right to be offended
of course. He was the best judge, and had a perfect right to say what
he pleased; nobody could dispute that for a moment. Oh dear, no!
‘I assure you, my good lady,’ said the mild schoolmaster, ‘that I have
told you the plain truth. As I hope to be saved, I have told you the
truth.’
‘Why then, I do believe you are in earnest,’ rejoined the landlady,
with ready good-humour, ‘and I’m very sorry I have teazed you. But
curiosity you know is the curse of our sex, and that’s the fact.’
The landlord scratched his head, as if he thought the curse sometimes
involved the other sex likewise; but he was prevented from making any
remark to that effect, if he had it in contemplation to do so, by the
schoolmaster’s rejoinder.
‘You should question me for half-a-dozen hours at a sitting, and
welcome, and I would answer you patiently for the kindness of heart you
have shown to-night, if I could,’ he said. ‘As it is, please to take
care of her in the morning, and let me know early how she is; and to
understand that I am paymaster for the three.’
So, parting with them on most friendly terms (not the less cordial
perhaps for this last direction), the schoolmaster went to his bed, and
the host and hostess to theirs.
The report in the morning was, that the child was better, but was
extremely weak, and would at least require a day’s rest, and careful
nursing, before she could proceed upon her journey. The schoolmaster
received this communication with perfect cheerfulness, observing that
he had a day to spare--two days for that matter--and could very well
afford to wait. As the patient was to sit up in the evening, he
appointed to visit her in her room at a certain hour, and rambling out
with his book, did not return until the hour arrived.
Nell could not help weeping when they were left alone; whereat, and at
sight of her pale face and wasted figure, the simple schoolmaster shed
a few tears himself, at the same time showing in very energetic
language how foolish it was to do so, and how very easily it could be
avoided, if one tried.
‘It makes me unhappy even in the midst of all this kindness’ said the
child, ‘to think that we should be a burden upon you. How can I ever
thank you? If I had not met you so far from home, I must have died,
and he would have been left alone.’
‘We’ll not talk about dying,’ said the schoolmaster; ‘and as to
burdens, I have made my fortune since you slept at my cottage.’
‘Indeed!’ cried the child joyfully.
‘Oh yes,’ returned her friend. ‘I have been appointed clerk and
schoolmaster to a village a long way from here--and a long way from the
old one as you may suppose--at five-and-thirty pounds a year.
Five-and-thirty pounds!’
‘I am very glad,’ said the child, ‘so very, very glad.’
‘I am on my way there now,’ resumed the schoolmaster. ‘They allowed me
the stage-coach-hire--outside stage-coach-hire all the way. Bless you,
they grudge me nothing. But as the time at which I am expected there,
left me ample leisure, I determined to walk instead. How glad I am, to
think I did so!’
‘How glad should we be!’
‘Yes, yes,’ said the schoolmaster, moving restlessly in his chair,
‘certainly, that’s very true. But you--where are you going, where are
you coming from, what have you been doing since you left me, what had
you been doing before? Now, tell me--do tell me. I know very little
of the world, and perhaps you are better fitted to advise me in its
affairs than I am qualified to give advice to you; but I am very
sincere, and I have a reason (you have not forgotten it) for loving
you. I have felt since that time as if my love for him who died, had
been transferred to you who stood beside his bed. If this,’ he added,
looking upwards, ‘is the beautiful creation that springs from ashes,
let its peace prosper with me, as I deal tenderly and compassionately
by this young child!’
The plain, frank kindness of the honest schoolmaster, the affectionate
earnestness of his speech and manner, the truth which was stamped upon
his every word and look, gave the child a confidence in him, which the
utmost arts of treachery and dissimulation could never have awakened in
her breast. She told him all--that they had no friend or
relative--that she had fled with the old man, to save him from a
madhouse and all the miseries he dreaded--that she was flying now, to
save him from himself--and that she sought an asylum in some remote
and primitive place, where the temptation before which he fell would
never enter, and her late sorrows and distresses could have no place.
The schoolmaster heard her with astonishment. ‘This child!’--he
thought--‘Has this child heroically persevered under all doubts and
dangers, struggled with poverty and suffering, upheld and sustained by
strong affection and the consciousness of rectitude alone! And yet the
world is full of such heroism. Have I yet to learn that the hardest
and best-borne trials are those which are never chronicled in any
earthly record, and are suffered every day! And should I be surprised
to hear the story of this child!’
What more he thought or said, matters not. It was concluded that Nell
and her grandfather should accompany him to the village whither he was
bound, and that he should endeavour to find them some humble occupation
by which they could subsist. ‘We shall be sure to succeed,’ said the
schoolmaster, heartily. ‘The cause is too good a one to fail.’
They arranged to proceed upon their journey next evening, as a
stage-waggon, which travelled for some distance on the same road as
they must take, would stop at the inn to change horses, and the driver
for a small gratuity would give Nell a place inside. A bargain was
soon struck when the waggon came; and in due time it rolled away; with
the child comfortably bestowed among the softer packages, her
grandfather and the schoolmaster walking on beside the driver, and the
landlady and all the good folks of the inn screaming out their good
wishes and farewells.
What a soothing, luxurious, drowsy way of travelling, to lie inside
that slowly-moving mountain, listening to the tinkling of the horses’
bells, the occasional smacking of the carter’s whip, the smooth rolling
of the great broad wheels, the rattle of the harness, the cheery
good-nights of passing travellers jogging past on little short-stepped
horses--all made pleasantly indistinct by the thick awning, which
seemed made for lazy listening under, till one fell asleep! The very
going to sleep, still with an indistinct idea, as the head jogged to
and fro upon the pillow, of moving onward with no trouble or fatigue,
and hearing all these sounds like dreamy music, lulling to the
senses--and the slow waking up, and finding one’s self staring out
through the breezy curtain half-opened in the front, far up into the
cold bright sky with its countless stars, and downward at the driver’s
lantern dancing on like its namesake Jack of the swamps and marshes,
and sideways at the dark grim trees, and forward at the long bare road
rising up, up, up, until it stopped abruptly at a sharp high ridge as
if there were no more road, and all beyond was sky--and the stopping at
the inn to bait, and being helped out, and going into a room with fire
and candles, and winking very much, and being agreeably reminded that
the night was cold, and anxious for very comfort’s sake to think it
colder than it was!--What a delicious journey was that journey in the
waggon.
Then the going on again--so fresh at first, and shortly afterwards so
sleepy. The waking from a sound nap as the mail came dashing past like
a highway comet, with gleaming lamps and rattling hoofs, and visions of
a guard behind, standing up to keep his feet warm, and of a gentleman
in a fur cap opening his eyes and looking wild and stupefied--the
stopping at the turnpike where the man was gone to bed, and knocking at
the door until he answered with a smothered shout from under the
bed-clothes in the little room above, where the faint light was
burning, and presently came down, night-capped and shivering, to throw
the gate wide open, and wish all waggons off the road except by day.
The cold sharp interval between night and morning--the distant streak
of light widening and spreading, and turning from grey to white, and
from white to yellow, and from yellow to burning red--the presence of
day, with all its cheerfulness and life--men and horses at the
plough--birds in the trees and hedges, and boys in solitary fields,
frightening them away with rattles. The coming to a town--people busy
in the markets; light carts and chaises round the tavern yard;
tradesmen standing at their doors; men running horses up and down the
street for sale; pigs plunging and grunting in the dirty distance,
getting off with long strings at their legs, running into clean
chemists’ shops and being dislodged with brooms by ‘prentices; the
night coach changing horses--the passengers cheerless, cold, ugly, and
discontented, with three months’ growth of hair in one night--the
coachman fresh as from a band-box, and exquisitely beautiful by
contrast:--so much bustle, so many things in motion, such a variety of
incidents--when was there a journey with so many delights as that
journey in the waggon!
Sometimes walking for a mile or two while her grandfather rode inside,
and sometimes even prevailing upon the schoolmaster to take her place
and lie down to rest, Nell travelled on very happily until they came to
a large town, where the waggon stopped, and where they spent a night.
They passed a large church; and in the streets were a number of old
houses, built of a kind of earth or plaster, crossed and re-crossed in
a great many directions with black beams, which gave them a remarkable
and very ancient look. The doors, too, were arched and low, some with
oaken portals and quaint benches, where the former inhabitants had sat
on summer evenings. The windows were latticed in little diamond panes,
that seemed to wink and blink upon the passengers as if they were dim
of sight. They had long since got clear of the smoke and furnaces,
except in one or two solitary instances, where a factory planted among
fields withered the space about it, like a burning mountain. When they
had passed through this town, they entered again upon the country, and
began to draw near their place of destination.
It was not so near, however, but that they spent another night upon the
road; not that their doing so was quite an act of necessity, but that
the schoolmaster, when they approached within a few miles of his
village, had a fidgety sense of his dignity as the new clerk, and was
unwilling to make his entry in dusty shoes, and travel-disordered
dress. It was a fine, clear, autumn morning, when they came upon the
scene of his promotion, and stopped to contemplate its beauties.
‘See--here’s the church!’ cried the delighted schoolmaster in a low
voice; ‘and that old building close beside it, is the schoolhouse, I’ll
be sworn. Five-and-thirty pounds a-year in this beautiful place!’
They admired everything--the old grey porch, the mullioned windows, the
venerable gravestones dotting the green churchyard, the ancient tower,
the very weathercock; the brown thatched roofs of cottage, barn, and
homestead, peeping from among the trees; the stream that rippled by the
distant water-mill; the blue Welsh mountains far away. It was for such
a spot the child had wearied in the dense, dark, miserable haunts of
labour. Upon her bed of ashes, and amidst the squalid horrors through
which they had forced their way, visions of such scenes--beautiful
indeed, but not more beautiful than this sweet reality--had been always
present to her mind. They had seemed to melt into a dim and airy
distance, as the prospect of ever beholding them again grew fainter;
but, as they receded, she had loved and panted for them more.
‘I must leave you somewhere for a few minutes,’ said the schoolmaster,
at length breaking the silence into which they had fallen in their
gladness. ‘I have a letter to present, and inquiries to make, you
know. Where shall I take you? To the little inn yonder?’
‘Let us wait here,’ rejoined Nell. ‘The gate is open. We will sit in
the church porch till you come back.’
‘A good place too,’ said the schoolmaster, leading the way towards it,
disencumbering himself of his portmanteau, and placing it on the stone
seat. ‘Be sure that I come back with good news, and am not long gone!’
So, the happy schoolmaster put on a bran-new pair of gloves which he
had carried in a little parcel in his pocket all the way, and hurried
off, full of ardour and excitement.
The child watched him from the porch until the intervening foliage hid
him from her view, and then stepped softly out into the old
churchyard--so solemn and quiet that every rustle of her dress upon the
fallen leaves, which strewed the path and made her footsteps noiseless,
seemed an invasion of its silence. It was a very aged, ghostly place;
the church had been built many hundreds of years ago, and had once had
a convent or monastery attached; for arches in ruins, remains of oriel
windows, and fragments of blackened walls, were yet standing; while
other portions of the old building, which had crumbled away and fallen
down, were mingled with the churchyard earth and overgrown with grass,
as if they too claimed a burying-place and sought to mix their ashes
with the dust of men. Hard by these gravestones of dead years, and
forming a part of the ruin which some pains had been taken to render
habitable in modern times, were two small dwellings with sunken windows
and oaken doors, fast hastening to decay, empty and desolate.
Upon these tenements, the attention of the child became exclusively
riveted. She knew not why. The church, the ruin, the antiquated
graves, had equal claims at least upon a stranger’s thoughts, but from
the moment when her eyes first rested on these two dwellings, she could
turn to nothing else. Even when she had made the circuit of the
enclosure, and, returning to the porch, sat pensively waiting for their
friend, she took her station where she could still look upon them, and
felt as if fascinated towards that spot.
CHAPTER 47
Kit’s mother and the single gentleman--upon whose track it is expedient
to follow with hurried steps, lest this history should be chargeable
with inconstancy, and the offence of leaving its characters in
situations of uncertainty and doubt--Kit’s mother and the single
gentleman, speeding onward in the post-chaise-and-four whose departure
from the Notary’s door we have already witnessed, soon left the town
behind them, and struck fire from the flints of the broad highway.
The good woman, being not a little embarrassed by the novelty of her
situation, and certain material apprehensions that perhaps by this time
little Jacob, or the baby, or both, had fallen into the fire, or
tumbled down stairs, or had been squeezed behind doors, or had scalded
their windpipes in endeavouring to allay their thirst at the spouts of
tea-kettles, preserved an uneasy silence; and meeting from the window
the eyes of turnpike-men, omnibus-drivers, and others, felt in the new
dignity of her position like a mourner at a funeral, who, not being
greatly afflicted by the loss of the departed, recognizes his every-day
acquaintance from the window of the mourning coach, but is constrained
to preserve a decent solemnity, and the appearance of being indifferent
to all external objects.
To have been indifferent to the companionship of the single gentleman
would have been tantamount to being gifted with nerves of steel. Never
did chaise inclose, or horses draw, such a restless gentleman as he.
He never sat in the same position for two minutes together, but was
perpetually tossing his arms and legs about, pulling up the sashes and
letting them violently down, or thrusting his head out of one window to
draw it in again and thrust it out of another. He carried in his
pocket, too, a fire-box of mysterious and unknown construction; and as
sure as ever Kit’s mother closed her eyes, so surely--whisk, rattle,
fizz--there was the single gentleman consulting his watch by a flame of
fire, and letting the sparks fall down among the straw as if there were
no such thing as a possibility of himself and Kit’s mother being
roasted alive before the boys could stop their horses. Whenever they
halted to change, there he was--out of the carriage without letting
down the steps, bursting about the inn-yard like a lighted cracker,
pulling out his watch by lamp-light and forgetting to look at it before
he put it up again, and in short committing so many extravagances that
Kit’s mother was quite afraid of him. Then, when the horses were to,
in he came like a Harlequin, and before they had gone a mile, out came
the watch and the fire-box together, and Kit’s mother as wide awake
again, with no hope of a wink of sleep for that stage.
‘Are you comfortable?’ the single gentleman would say after one of
these exploits, turning sharply round.
‘Quite, Sir, thank you.’
‘Are you sure? An’t you cold?’
‘It is a little chilly, Sir,’ Kit’s mother would reply.
‘I knew it!’ cried the single gentleman, letting down one of the front
glasses. ‘She wants some brandy and water! Of course she does. How
could I forget it? Hallo! Stop at the next inn, and call out for a
glass of hot brandy and water.’
It was in vain for Kit’s mother to protest that she stood in need of
nothing of the kind. The single gentleman was inexorable; and whenever
he had exhausted all other modes and fashions of restlessness, it
invariably occurred to him that Kit’s mother wanted brandy and water.
In this way they travelled on until near midnight, when they stopped to
supper, for which meal the single gentleman ordered everything eatable
that the house contained; and because Kit’s mother didn’t eat
everything at once, and eat it all, he took it into his head that she
must be ill.
‘You’re faint,’ said the single gentleman, who did nothing himself but
walk about the room. ‘I see what’s the matter with you, ma’am. You’re
faint.’
‘Thank you, sir, I’m not indeed.’
‘I know you are. I’m sure of it. I drag this poor woman from the
bosom of her family at a minute’s notice, and she goes on getting
fainter and fainter before my eyes. I’m a pretty fellow! How many
children have you got, ma’am?’
‘Two, sir, besides Kit.’
‘Boys, ma’am?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Are they christened?’
‘Only half baptised as yet, sir.’
‘I’m godfather to both of ‘em. Remember that, if you please, ma’am.
You had better have some mulled wine.’
‘I couldn’t touch a drop indeed, sir.’
‘You must,’ said the single gentleman. ‘I see you want it. I ought to
have thought of it before.’
Immediately flying to the bell, and calling for mulled wine as
impetuously as if it had been wanted for instant use in the recovery of
some person apparently drowned, the single gentleman made Kit’s mother
swallow a bumper of it at such a high temperature that the tears ran
down her face, and then hustled her off to the chaise again, where--not
impossibly from the effects of this agreeable sedative--she soon became
insensible to his restlessness, and fell fast asleep. Nor were the
happy effects of this prescription of a transitory nature, as,
notwithstanding that the distance was greater, and the journey longer,
than the single gentleman had anticipated, she did not awake until it
was broad day, and they were clattering over the pavement of a town.
‘This is the place!’ cried her companion, letting down all the glasses.
‘Drive to the wax-work!’
The boy on the wheeler touched his hat, and setting spurs to his horse,
to the end that they might go in brilliantly, all four broke into a
smart canter, and dashed through the streets with a noise that brought
the good folks wondering to their doors and windows, and drowned the
sober voices of the town-clocks as they chimed out half-past eight.
They drove up to a door round which a crowd of persons were collected,
and there stopped.
‘What’s this?’ said the single gentleman thrusting out his head. ‘Is
anything the matter here?’
‘A wedding Sir, a wedding!’ cried several voices. ‘Hurrah!’
The single gentleman, rather bewildered by finding himself the centre
of this noisy throng, alighted with the assistance of one of the
postilions, and handed out Kit’s mother, at sight of whom the populace
cried out, ‘Here’s another wedding!’ and roared and leaped for joy.
‘The world has gone mad, I think,’ said the single gentleman, pressing
through the concourse with his supposed bride. ‘Stand back here, will
you, and let me knock.’
Anything that makes a noise is satisfactory to a crowd. A score of
dirty hands were raised directly to knock for him, and seldom has a
knocker of equal powers been made to produce more deafening sounds than
this particular engine on the occasion in question. Having rendered
these voluntary services, the throng modestly retired a little,
preferring that the single gentleman should bear their consequences
alone.
‘Now, sir, what do you want!’ said a man with a large white bow at his
button-hole, opening the door, and confronting him with a very stoical
aspect.
‘Who has been married here, my friend?’ said the single gentleman.
‘I have.’
‘You! and to whom in the devil’s name?’
‘What right have you to ask?’ returned the bridegroom, eyeing him from
top to toe.
‘What right!’ cried the single gentleman, drawing the arm of Kit’s
mother more tightly through his own, for that good woman evidently had
it in contemplation to run away. ‘A right you little dream of. Mind,
good people, if this fellow has been marrying a minor--tut, tut, that
can’t be. Where is the child you have here, my good fellow. You call
her Nell. Where is she?’
As he propounded this question, which Kit’s mother echoed, somebody in
a room near at hand, uttered a great shriek, and a stout lady in a
white dress came running to the door, and supported herself upon the
bridegroom’s arm.
‘Where is she!’ cried this lady. ‘What news have you brought me? What
has become of her?’
The single gentleman started back, and gazed upon the face of the late
Mrs Jarley (that morning wedded to the philosophic George, to the
eternal wrath and despair of Mr Slum the poet), with looks of
conflicting apprehension, disappointment, and incredulity. At length
he stammered out,
‘I ask YOU where she is? What do you mean?’
‘Oh sir!’ cried the bride, ‘If you have come here to do her any good,
why weren’t you here a week ago?’
‘She is not--not dead?’ said the person to whom she addressed herself,
turning very pale.
‘No, not so bad as that.’
‘I thank God!’ cried the single gentleman feebly. ‘Let me come in.’
They drew back to admit him, and when he had entered, closed the door.
‘You see in me, good people,’ he said, turning to the newly-married
couple, ‘one to whom life itself is not dearer than the two persons
whom I seek. They would not know me. My features are strange to them,
but if they or either of them are here, take this good woman with you,
and let them see her first, for her they both know. If you deny them
from any mistaken regard or fear for them, judge of my intentions by
their recognition of this person as their old humble friend.’
‘I always said it!’ cried the bride, ‘I knew she was not a common
child! Alas, sir! we have no power to help you, for all that we could
do, has been tried in vain.’
With that, they related to him, without disguise or concealment, all
that they knew of Nell and her grandfather, from their first meeting
with them, down to the time of their sudden disappearance; adding
(which was quite true) that they had made every possible effort to
trace them, but without success; having been at first in great alarm
for their safety, as well as on account of the suspicions to which they
themselves might one day be exposed in consequence of their abrupt
departure. They dwelt upon the old man’s imbecility of mind, upon the
uneasiness the child had always testified when he was absent, upon the
company he had been supposed to keep, and upon the increased depression
which had gradually crept over her and changed her both in health and
spirits. Whether she had missed the old man in the night, and knowing
or conjecturing whither he had bent his steps, had gone in pursuit, or
whether they had left the house together, they had no means of
determining. Certain they considered it, that there was but slender
prospect left of hearing of them again, and that whether their flight
originated with the old man, or with the child, there was now no hope
of their return. To all this, the single gentleman listened with the
air of a man quite borne down by grief and disappointment. He shed
tears when they spoke of the grandfather, and appeared in deep
affliction.
Not to protract this portion of our narrative, and to make short work
of a long story, let it be briefly written that before the interview
came to a close, the single gentleman deemed he had sufficient evidence
of having been told the truth, and that he endeavoured to force upon
the bride and bridegroom an acknowledgment of their kindness to the
unfriended child, which, however, they steadily declined accepting. In
the end, the happy couple jolted away in the caravan to spend their
honeymoon in a country excursion; and the single gentleman and Kit’s
mother stood ruefully before their carriage-door.
‘Where shall we drive you, sir?’ said the post-boy.
‘You may drive me,’ said the single gentleman, ‘to the--’ He was not
going to add ‘inn,’ but he added it for the sake of Kit’s mother; and
to the inn they went.
Rumours had already got abroad that the little girl who used to show
the wax-work, was the child of great people who had been stolen from
her parents in infancy, and had only just been traced. Opinion was
divided whether she was the daughter of a prince, a duke, an earl, a
viscount, or a baron, but all agreed upon the main fact, and that the
single gentleman was her father; and all bent forward to catch a
glimpse, though it were only of the tip of his noble nose, as he rode
away, desponding, in his four-horse chaise.
What would he have given to know, and what sorrow would have been saved
if he had only known, that at that moment both child and grandfather
were seated in the old church porch, patiently awaiting the
schoolmaster’s return!
CHAPTER 48
Popular rumour concerning the single gentleman and his errand,
travelling from mouth to mouth, and waxing stronger in the marvellous
as it was bandied about--for your popular rumour, unlike the rolling
stone of the proverb, is one which gathers a deal of moss in its
wanderings up and down--occasioned his dismounting at the inn-door to
be looked upon as an exciting and attractive spectacle, which could
scarcely be enough admired; and drew together a large concourse of
idlers, who having recently been, as it were, thrown out of employment
by the closing of the wax-work and the completion of the nuptial
ceremonies, considered his arrival as little else than a special
providence, and hailed it with demonstrations of the liveliest joy.
Not at all participating in the general sensation, but wearing the
depressed and wearied look of one who sought to meditate on his
disappointment in silence and privacy, the single gentleman alighted,
and handed out Kit’s mother with a gloomy politeness which impressed
the lookers-on extremely. That done, he gave her his arm and escorted
her into the house, while several active waiters ran on before as a
skirmishing party, to clear the way and to show the room which was
ready for their reception.
‘Any room will do,’ said the single gentleman. ‘Let it be near at
hand, that’s all.’
‘Close here, sir, if you please to walk this way.’
‘Would the gentleman like this room?’ said a voice, as a little
out-of-the-way door at the foot of the well staircase flew briskly open
and a head popped out. ‘He’s quite welcome to it. He’s as welcome as
flowers in May, or coals at Christmas. Would you like this room, sir?
Honour me by walking in. Do me the favour, pray.’
‘Goodness gracious me!’ cried Kit’s mother, falling back in extreme
surprise, ‘only think of this!’
She had some reason to be astonished, for the person who proffered the
gracious invitation was no other than Daniel Quilp. The little door
out of which he had thrust his head was close to the inn larder; and
there he stood, bowing with grotesque politeness; as much at his ease
as if the door were that of his own house; blighting all the legs of
mutton and cold roast fowls by his close companionship, and looking
like the evil genius of the cellars come from underground upon some
work of mischief.
‘Would you do me the honour?’ said Quilp.
‘I prefer being alone,’ replied the single gentleman.
‘Oh!’ said Quilp. And with that, he darted in again with one jerk and
clapped the little door to, like a figure in a Dutch clock when the
hour strikes.
‘Why it was only last night, sir,’ whispered Kit’s mother, ‘that I left
him in Little Bethel.’
‘Indeed!’ said her fellow-passenger. ‘When did that person come here,
waiter?’
‘Come down by the night-coach, this morning, sir.’
‘Humph! And when is he going?’
‘Can’t say, sir, really. When the chambermaid asked him just now if he
should want a bed, sir, he first made faces at her, and then wanted to
kiss her.’
‘Beg him to walk this way,’ said the single gentleman. ‘I should be
glad to exchange a word with him, tell him. Beg him to come at once,
do you hear?’
The man stared on receiving these instructions, for the single
gentleman had not only displayed as much astonishment as Kit’s mother
at sight of the dwarf, but, standing in no fear of him, had been at
less pains to conceal his dislike and repugnance. He departed on his
errand, however, and immediately returned, ushering in its object.
‘Your servant, sir,’ said the dwarf, ‘I encountered your messenger
half-way. I thought you’d allow me to pay my compliments to you. I
hope you’re well. I hope you’re very well.’
There was a short pause, while the dwarf, with half-shut eyes and
puckered face, stood waiting for an answer. Receiving none, he turned
towards his more familiar acquaintance.
‘Christopher’s mother!’ he cried. ‘Such a dear lady, such a worthy
woman, so blest in her honest son! How is Christopher’s mother? Have
change of air and scene improved her? Her little family too, and
Christopher? Do they thrive? Do they flourish? Are they growing into
worthy citizens, eh?’
Making his voice ascend in the scale with every succeeding question, Mr
Quilp finished in a shrill squeak, and subsided into the panting look
which was customary with him, and which, whether it were assumed or
natural, had equally the effect of banishing all expression from his
face, and rendering it, as far as it afforded any index to his mood or
meaning, a perfect blank.
‘Mr Quilp,’ said the single gentleman.
The dwarf put his hand to his great flapped ear, and counterfeited the
closest attention.
‘We two have met before--’
‘Surely,’ cried Quilp, nodding his head. ‘Oh surely, sir. Such an
honour and pleasure--it’s both, Christopher’s mother, it’s both--is
not to be forgotten so soon. By no means!’
‘You may remember that the day I arrived in London, and found the house
to which I drove, empty and deserted, I was directed by some of the
neighbours to you, and waited upon you without stopping for rest or
refreshment?’
‘How precipitate that was, and yet what an earnest and vigorous
measure!’ said Quilp, conferring with himself, in imitation of his
friend Mr Sampson Brass.
‘I found,’ said the single gentleman, ‘you most unaccountably, in
possession of everything that had so recently belonged to another man,
and that other man, who up to the time of your entering upon his
property had been looked upon as affluent, reduced to sudden beggary,
and driven from house and home.’
‘We had warrant for what we did, my good sir,’ rejoined Quilp, ‘we had
our warrant. Don’t say driven either. He went of his own
accord--vanished in the night, sir.’
‘No matter,’ said the single gentleman angrily. ‘He was gone.’
‘Yes, he was gone,’ said Quilp, with the same exasperating composure.
‘No doubt he was gone. The only question was, where. And it’s a
question still.’
‘Now, what am I to think,’ said the single gentleman, sternly regarding
him, ‘of you, who, plainly indisposed to give me any information
then--nay, obviously holding back, and sheltering yourself with all
kinds of cunning, trickery, and evasion--are dogging my footsteps now?’
‘I dogging!’ cried Quilp.
‘Why, are you not?’ returned his questioner, fretted into a state of
the utmost irritation. ‘Were you not a few hours since, sixty miles
off, and in the chapel to which this good woman goes to say her
prayers?’
‘She was there too, I think?’ said Quilp, still perfectly unmoved. ‘I
might say, if I was inclined to be rude, how do I know but you are
dogging MY footsteps. Yes, I was at chapel. What then? I’ve read in
books that pilgrims were used to go to chapel before they went on
journeys, to put up petitions for their safe return. Wise men!
journeys are very perilous--especially outside the coach. Wheels come
off, horses take fright, coachmen drive too fast, coaches overturn. I
always go to chapel before I start on journeys. It’s the last thing I
do on such occasions, indeed.’
That Quilp lied most heartily in this speech, it needed no very great
penetration to discover, although for anything that he suffered to
appear in his face, voice, or manner, he might have been clinging to
the truth with the quiet constancy of a martyr.
‘In the name of all that’s calculated to drive one crazy, man,’ said
the unfortunate single gentleman, ‘have you not, for some reason of
your own, taken upon yourself my errand? don’t you know with what
object I have come here, and if you do know, can you throw no light
upon it?’
‘You think I’m a conjuror, sir,’ replied Quilp, shrugging up his
shoulders. ‘If I was, I should tell my own fortune--and make it.’
‘Ah! we have said all we need say, I see,’ returned the other, throwing
himself impatiently upon a sofa. ‘Pray leave us, if you please.’
‘Willingly,’ returned Quilp. ‘Most willingly. Christopher’s mother,
my good soul, farewell. A pleasant journey--back, sir. Ahem!’
With these parting words, and with a grin upon his features altogether
indescribable, but which seemed to be compounded of every monstrous
grimace of which men or monkeys are capable, the dwarf slowly retreated
and closed the door behind him.
‘Oho!’ he said when he had regained his own room, and sat himself down
in a chair with his arms akimbo. ‘Oho! Are you there, my friend?
In-deed!’
Chuckling as though in very great glee, and recompensing himself for
the restraint he had lately put upon his countenance by twisting it
into all imaginable varieties of ugliness, Mr Quilp, rocking himself to
and fro in his chair and nursing his left leg at the same time, fell
into certain meditations, of which it may be necessary to relate the
substance.
First, he reviewed the circumstances which had led to his repairing to
that spot, which were briefly these. Dropping in at Mr Sampson Brass’s
office on the previous evening, in the absence of that gentleman and
his learned sister, he had lighted upon Mr Swiveller, who chanced at
the moment to be sprinkling a glass of warm gin and water on the dust
of the law, and to be moistening his clay, as the phrase goes, rather
copiously. But as clay in the abstract, when too much moistened,
becomes of a weak and uncertain consistency, breaking down in
unexpected places, retaining impressions but faintly, and preserving no
strength or steadiness of character, so Mr Swiveller’s clay, having
imbibed a considerable quantity of moisture, was in a very loose and
slippery state, insomuch that the various ideas impressed upon it were
fast losing their distinctive character, and running into each other.
It is not uncommon for human clay in this condition to value itself
above all things upon its great prudence and sagacity; and Mr
Swiveller, especially prizing himself upon these qualities, took
occasion to remark that he had made strange discoveries in connection
with the single gentleman who lodged above, which he had determined to
keep within his own bosom, and which neither tortures nor cajolery
should ever induce him to reveal. Of this determination Mr Quilp
expressed his high approval, and setting himself in the same breath to
goad Mr Swiveller on to further hints, soon made out that the single
gentleman had been seen in communication with Kit, and that this was
the secret which was never to be disclosed.
Possessed of this piece of information, Mr Quilp directly supposed that
the single gentleman above stairs must be the same individual who had
waited on him, and having assured himself by further inquiries that
this surmise was correct, had no difficulty in arriving at the
conclusion that the intent and object of his correspondence with Kit
was the recovery of his old client and the child. Burning with
curiosity to know what proceedings were afoot, he resolved to pounce
upon Kit’s mother as the person least able to resist his arts, and
consequently the most likely to be entrapped into such revelations as
he sought; so taking an abrupt leave of Mr Swiveller, he hurried to her
house. The good woman being from home, he made inquiries of a
neighbour, as Kit himself did soon afterwards, and being directed to
the chapel be took himself there, in order to waylay her, at the
conclusion of the service.
He had not sat in the chapel more than a quarter of an hour, and with
his eyes piously fixed upon the ceiling was chuckling inwardly over the
joke of his being there at all, when Kit himself appeared. Watchful as
a lynx, one glance showed the dwarf that he had come on business.
Absorbed in appearance, as we have seen, and feigning a profound
abstraction, he noted every circumstance of his behaviour, and when he
withdrew with his family, shot out after him. In fine, he traced them
to the notary’s house; learnt the destination of the carriage from one
of the postilions; and knowing that a fast night-coach started for the
same place, at the very hour which was on the point of striking, from a
street hard by, darted round to the coach-office without more ado, and
took his seat upon the roof. After passing and repassing the carriage
on the road, and being passed and repassed by it sundry times in the
course of the night, according as their stoppages were longer or
shorter; or their rate of travelling varied, they reached the town
almost together. Quilp kept the chaise in sight, mingled with the
crowd, learnt the single gentleman’s errand, and its failure, and
having possessed himself of all that it was material to know, hurried
off, reached the inn before him, had the interview just now detailed,
and shut himself up in the little room in which he hastily reviewed all
these occurrences.
‘You are there, are you, my friend?’ he repeated, greedily biting his
nails. ‘I am suspected and thrown aside, and Kit’s the confidential
agent, is he? I shall have to dispose of him, I fear. If we had come
up with them this morning,’ he continued, after a thoughtful pause, ‘I
was ready to prove a pretty good claim. I could have made my profit.
But for these canting hypocrites, the lad and his mother, I could get
this fiery gentleman as comfortably into my net as our old friend--our
mutual friend, ha! ha!--and chubby, rosy Nell. At the worst, it’s a
golden opportunity, not to be lost. Let us find them first, and I’ll
find means of draining you of some of your superfluous cash, sir, while
there are prison bars, and bolts, and locks, to keep your friend or
kinsman safely. I hate your virtuous people!’ said the dwarf, throwing
off a bumper of brandy, and smacking his lips, ‘ah! I hate ‘em every
one!’
This was not a mere empty vaunt, but a deliberate avowal of his real
sentiments; for Mr Quilp, who loved nobody, had by little and little
come to hate everybody nearly or remotely connected with his ruined
client:--the old man himself, because he had been able to deceive him
and elude his vigilance--the child, because she was the object of Mrs
Quilp’s commiseration and constant self-reproach--the single gentleman,
because of his unconcealed aversion to himself--Kit and his mother,
most mortally, for the reasons shown. Above and beyond that general
feeling of opposition to them, which would have been inseparable from
his ravenous desire to enrich himself by these altered circumstances,
Daniel Quilp hated them every one.
In this amiable mood, Mr Quilp enlivened himself and his hatreds with
more brandy, and then, changing his quarters, withdrew to an obscure
alehouse, under cover of which seclusion he instituted all possible
inquiries that might lead to the discovery of the old man and his
grandchild. But all was in vain. Not the slightest trace or clue
could be obtained. They had left the town by night; no one had seen
them go; no one had met them on the road; the driver of no coach, cart,
or waggon, had seen any travellers answering their description; nobody
had fallen in with them, or heard of them. Convinced at last that for
the present all such attempts were hopeless, he appointed two or three
scouts, with promises of large rewards in case of their forwarding him
any intelligence, and returned to London by next day’s coach.
It was some gratification to Mr Quilp to find, as he took his place
upon the roof, that Kit’s mother was alone inside; from which
circumstance he derived in the course of the journey much cheerfulness
of spirit, inasmuch as her solitary condition enabled him to terrify
her with many extraordinary annoyances; such as hanging over the side
of the coach at the risk of his life, and staring in with his great
goggle eyes, which seemed in hers the more horrible from his face being
upside down; dodging her in this way from one window to another;
getting nimbly down whenever they changed horses and thrusting his head
in at the window with a dismal squint: which ingenious tortures had
such an effect upon Mrs Nubbles, that she was quite unable for the time
to resist the belief that Mr Quilp did in his own person represent and
embody that Evil Power, who was so vigorously attacked at Little
Bethel, and who, by reason of her backslidings in respect of Astley’s
and oysters, was now frolicsome and rampant.
Kit, having been apprised by letter of his mother’s intended return,
was waiting for her at the coach-office; and great was his surprise
when he saw, leering over the coachman’s shoulder like some familiar
demon, invisible to all eyes but his, the well-known face of Quilp.
‘How are you, Christopher?’ croaked the dwarf from the coach-top. ‘All
right, Christopher. Mother’s inside.’
‘Why, how did he come here, mother?’ whispered Kit.
‘I don’t know how he came or why, my dear,’ rejoined Mrs Nubbles,
dismounting with her son’s assistance, ‘but he has been a terrifying of
me out of my seven senses all this blessed day.’
‘He has?’ cried Kit.
‘You wouldn’t believe it, that you wouldn’t,’ replied his mother, ‘but
don’t say a word to him, for I really don’t believe he’s human. Hush!
Don’t turn round as if I was talking of him, but he’s a squinting at me
now in the full blaze of the coach-lamp, quite awful!’
In spite of his mother’s injunction, Kit turned sharply round to look.
Mr Quilp was serenely gazing at the stars, quite absorbed in celestial
contemplation.
‘Oh, he’s the artfullest creetur!’ cried Mrs Nubbles. ‘But come away.
Don’t speak to him for the world.’
‘Yes I will, mother. What nonsense. I say, sir--’
Mr Quilp affected to start, and looked smilingly round.
‘You let my mother alone, will you?’ said Kit. ‘How dare you tease a
poor lone woman like her, making her miserable and melancholy as if she
hadn’t got enough to make her so, without you. An’t you ashamed of
yourself, you little monster?’
‘Monster!’ said Quilp inwardly, with a smile. ‘Ugliest dwarf that
could be seen anywhere for a penny--monster--ah!’
‘You show her any of your impudence again,’ resumed Kit, shouldering
the bandbox, ‘and I tell you what, Mr Quilp, I won’t bear with you any
more. You have no right to do it; I’m sure we never interfered with
you. This isn’t the first time; and if ever you worry or frighten her
again, you’ll oblige me (though I should be very sorry to do it, on
account of your size) to beat you.’
Quilp said not a word in reply, but walking so close to Kit as to bring
his eyes within two or three inches of his face, looked fixedly at him,
retreated a little distance without averting his gaze, approached
again, again withdrew, and so on for half-a-dozen times, like a head in
a phantasmagoria. Kit stood his ground as if in expectation of an
immediate assault, but finding that nothing came of these gestures,
snapped his fingers and walked away; his mother dragging him off as
fast as she could, and, even in the midst of his news of little Jacob
and the baby, looking anxiously over her shoulder to see if Quilp were
following.
CHAPTER 49
Kit’s mother might have spared herself the trouble of looking back so
often, for nothing was further from Mr Quilp’s thoughts than any
intention of pursuing her and her son, or renewing the quarrel with
which they had parted. He went his way, whistling from time to time
some fragments of a tune; and with a face quite tranquil and composed,
jogged pleasantly towards home; entertaining himself as he went with
visions of the fears and terrors of Mrs Quilp, who, having received no
intelligence of him for three whole days and two nights, and having had
no previous notice of his absence, was doubtless by that time in a
state of distraction, and constantly fainting away with anxiety and
grief.
This facetious probability was so congenial to the dwarf’s humour, and
so exquisitely amusing to him, that he laughed as he went along until
the tears ran down his cheeks; and more than once, when he found
himself in a bye-street, vented his delight in a shrill scream, which
greatly terrifying any lonely passenger, who happened to be walking on
before him expecting nothing so little, increased his mirth, and made
him remarkably cheerful and light-hearted.
In this happy flow of spirits, Mr Quilp reached Tower Hill, when,
gazing up at the window of his own sitting-room, he thought he descried
more light than is usual in a house of mourning. Drawing nearer, and
listening attentively, he could hear several voices in earnest
conversation, among which he could distinguish, not only those of his
wife and mother-in-law, but the tongues of men.
‘Ha!’ cried the jealous dwarf, ‘What’s this! Do they entertain
visitors while I’m away!’
A smothered cough from above, was the reply. He felt in his pockets
for his latch-key, but had forgotten it. There was no resource but to
knock at the door.
‘A light in the passage,’ said Quilp, peeping through the keyhole. ‘A
very soft knock; and, by your leave, my lady, I may yet steal upon you
unawares. Soho!’
A very low and gentle rap received no answer from within. But after a
second application to the knocker, no louder than the first, the door
was softly opened by the boy from the wharf, whom Quilp instantly
gagged with one hand, and dragged into the street with the other.
‘You’ll throttle me, master,’ whispered the boy. ‘Let go, will you.’
‘Who’s up stairs, you dog?’ retorted Quilp in the same tone. ‘Tell me.
And don’t speak above your breath, or I’ll choke you in good earnest.’
The boy could only point to the window, and reply with a stifled
giggle, expressive of such intense enjoyment, that Quilp clutched him
by the throat and might have carried his threat into execution, or at
least have made very good progress towards that end, but for the boy’s
nimbly extricating himself from his grasp, and fortifying himself
behind the nearest post, at which, after some fruitless attempts to
catch him by the hair of the head, his master was obliged to come to a
parley.
‘Will you answer me?’ said Quilp. ‘What’s going on, above?’
‘You won’t let one speak,’ replied the boy. ‘They--ha, ha, ha!--they
think you’re--you’re dead. Ha ha ha!’
‘Dead!’ cried Quilp, relaxing into a grim laugh himself. ‘No. Do
they? Do they really, you dog?’
‘They think you’re--you’re drowned,’ replied the boy, who in his
malicious nature had a strong infusion of his master. ‘You was last
seen on the brink of the wharf, and they think you tumbled over. Ha
ha!’
The prospect of playing the spy under such delicious circumstances, and
of disappointing them all by walking in alive, gave more delight to
Quilp than the greatest stroke of good fortune could possibly have
inspired him with. He was no less tickled than his hopeful assistant,
and they both stood for some seconds, grinning and gasping and wagging
their heads at each other, on either side of the post, like an
unmatchable pair of Chinese idols.
‘Not a word,’ said Quilp, making towards the door on tiptoe. ‘Not a
sound, not so much as a creaking board, or a stumble against a cobweb.
Drowned, eh, Mrs Quilp! Drowned!’
So saying, he blew out the candle, kicked off his shoes, and groped his
way up stairs; leaving his delighted young friend in an ecstasy of
summersets on the pavement.
The bedroom-door on the staircase being unlocked, Mr Quilp slipped in,
and planted himself behind the door of communication between that
chamber and the sitting-room, which standing ajar to render both more
airy, and having a very convenient chink (of which he had often availed
himself for purposes of espial, and had indeed enlarged with his
pocket-knife), enabled him not only to hear, but to see distinctly,
what was passing.
Applying his eye to this convenient place, he descried Mr Brass seated
at the table with pen, ink, and paper, and the case-bottle of rum--his
own case-bottle, and his own particular Jamaica--convenient to his
hand; with hot water, fragrant lemons, white lump sugar, and all things
fitting; from which choice materials, Sampson, by no means insensible
to their claims upon his attention, had compounded a mighty glass of
punch reeking hot; which he was at that very moment stirring up with a
teaspoon, and contemplating with looks in which a faint assumption of
sentimental regret, struggled but weakly with a bland and comfortable
joy. At the same table, with both her elbows upon it, was Mrs Jiniwin;
no longer sipping other people’s punch feloniously with teaspoons, but
taking deep draughts from a jorum of her own; while her daughter--not
exactly with ashes on her head, or sackcloth on her back, but
preserving a very decent and becoming appearance of sorrow
nevertheless--was reclining in an easy chair, and soothing her grief
with a smaller allowance of the same glib liquid. There were also
present, a couple of water-side men, bearing between them certain
machines called drags; even these fellows were accommodated with a
stiff glass a-piece; and as they drank with a great relish, and were
naturally of a red-nosed, pimple-faced, convivial look, their presence
rather increased than detracted from that decided appearance of
comfort, which was the great characteristic of the party.
‘If I could poison that dear old lady’s rum and water,’ murmured Quilp,
‘I’d die happy.’
‘Ah!’ said Mr Brass, breaking the silence, and raising his eyes to the
ceiling with a sigh, ‘Who knows but he may be looking down upon us now!
Who knows but he may be surveying of us from--from somewheres or
another, and contemplating us with a watchful eye! Oh Lor!’
Here Mr Brass stopped to drink half his punch, and then resumed;
looking at the other half, as he spoke, with a dejected smile.
‘I can almost fancy,’ said the lawyer shaking his head, ‘that I see his
eye glistening down at the very bottom of my liquor. When shall we
look upon his like again? Never, never!’ One minute we are
here’--holding his tumbler before his eyes--‘the next we are
there’--gulping down its contents, and striking himself emphatically a
little below the chest--‘in the silent tomb. To think that I should be
drinking his very rum! It seems like a dream.’
With the view, no doubt, of testing the reality of his position, Mr
Brass pushed his tumbler as he spoke towards Mrs Jiniwin for the
purpose of being replenished; and turned towards the attendant mariners.
‘The search has been quite unsuccessful then?’
‘Quite, master. But I should say that if he turns up anywhere, he’ll
come ashore somewhere about Grinidge to-morrow, at ebb tide, eh, mate?’
The other gentleman assented, observing that he was expected at the
Hospital, and that several pensioners would be ready to receive him
whenever he arrived.
‘Then we have nothing for it but resignation,’ said Mr Brass; ‘nothing
but resignation and expectation. It would be a comfort to have his
body; it would be a dreary comfort.’
‘Oh, beyond a doubt,’ assented Mrs Jiniwin hastily; ‘if we once had
that, we should be quite sure.’
‘With regard to the descriptive advertisement,’ said Sampson Brass,
taking up his pen. ‘It is a melancholy pleasure to recall his traits.
Respecting his legs now--?’
‘Crooked, certainly,’ said Mrs Jiniwin. ‘Do you think they WERE
crooked?’ said Brass, in an insinuating tone. ‘I think I see them now
coming up the street very wide apart, in nankeen’ pantaloons a little
shrunk and without straps. Ah! what a vale of tears we live in. Do we
say crooked?’
‘I think they were a little so,’ observed Mrs Quilp with a sob.
‘Legs crooked,’ said Brass, writing as he spoke. ‘Large head, short
body, legs crooked--’
‘Very crooked,’ suggested Mrs Jiniwin.
‘We’ll not say very crooked, ma’am,’ said Brass piously. ‘Let us not
bear hard upon the weaknesses of the deceased. He is gone, ma’am, to
where his legs will never come in question.--We will content ourselves
with crooked, Mrs Jiniwin.’
‘I thought you wanted the truth,’ said the old lady. ‘That’s all.’
‘Bless your eyes, how I love you,’ muttered Quilp. ‘There she goes
again. Nothing but punch!’
‘This is an occupation,’ said the lawyer, laying down his pen and
emptying his glass, ‘which seems to bring him before my eyes like the
Ghost of Hamlet’s father, in the very clothes that he wore on
work-a-days. His coat, his waistcoat, his shoes and stockings, his
trousers, his hat, his wit and humour, his pathos and his umbrella, all
come before me like visions of my youth. His linen!’ said Mr Brass
smiling fondly at the wall, ‘his linen which was always of a particular
colour, for such was his whim and fancy--how plain I see his linen now!’
‘You had better go on, sir,’ said Mrs Jiniwin impatiently.
‘True, ma’am, true,’ cried Mr Brass. ‘Our faculties must not freeze
with grief. I’ll trouble you for a little more of that, ma’am. A
question now arises, with relation to his nose.’
‘Flat,’ said Mrs Jiniwin.
‘Aquiline!’ cried Quilp, thrusting in his head, and striking the
feature with his fist. ‘Aquiline, you hag. Do you see it? Do you
call this flat? Do you? Eh?’
‘Oh capital, capital!’ shouted Brass, from the mere force of habit.
‘Excellent! How very good he is! He’s a most remarkable man--so
extremely whimsical! Such an amazing power of taking people by
surprise!’
Quilp paid no regard whatever to these compliments, nor to the dubious
and frightened look into which the lawyer gradually subsided, nor to
the shrieks of his wife and mother-in-law, nor to the latter’s running
from the room, nor to the former’s fainting away. Keeping his eye
fixed on Sampson Brass, he walked up to the table, and beginning with
his glass, drank off the contents, and went regularly round until he
had emptied the other two, when he seized the case-bottle, and hugging
it under his arm, surveyed him with a most extraordinary leer.
‘Not yet, Sampson,’ said Quilp. ‘Not just yet!’
‘Oh very good indeed!’ cried Brass, recovering his spirits a little.
‘Ha ha ha! Oh exceedingly good! There’s not another man alive who
could carry it off like that. A most difficult position to carry off.
But he has such a flow of good-humour, such an amazing flow!’
‘Good night,’ said the dwarf, nodding expressively.
‘Good night, sir, good night,’ cried the lawyer, retreating backwards
towards the door. ‘This is a joyful occasion indeed, extremely joyful.
Ha ha ha! oh very rich, very rich indeed, remarkably so!’
Waiting until Mr Brass’s ejaculations died away in the distance (for he
continued to pour them out, all the way down stairs), Quilp advanced
towards the two men, who yet lingered in a kind of stupid amazement.
‘Have you been dragging the river all day, gentlemen?’ said the dwarf,
holding the door open with great politeness.
‘And yesterday too, master.’
‘Dear me, you’ve had a deal of trouble. Pray consider everything yours
that you find upon the--upon the body. Good night!’
The men looked at each other, but had evidently no inclination to argue
the point just then, and shuffled out of the room. The speedy
clearance effected, Quilp locked the doors; and still embracing the
case-bottle with shrugged-up shoulders and folded arms, stood looking
at his insensible wife like a dismounted nightmare.
CHAPTER 50
Matrimonial differences are usually discussed by the parties concerned
in the form of dialogue, in which the lady bears at least her full half
share. Those of Mr and Mrs Quilp, however, were an exception to the
general rule; the remarks which they occasioned being limited to a long
soliloquy on the part of the gentleman, with perhaps a few deprecatory
observations from the lady, not extending beyond a trembling
monosyllable uttered at long intervals, and in a very submissive and
humble tone. On the present occasion, Mrs Quilp did not for a long
time venture even on this gentle defence, but when she had recovered
from her fainting-fit, sat in a tearful silence, meekly listening to
the reproaches of her lord and master.
Of these Mr Quilp delivered himself with the utmost animation and
rapidity, and with so many distortions of limb and feature, that even
his wife, although tolerably well accustomed to his proficiency in
these respects, was well-nigh beside herself with alarm. But the
Jamaica rum, and the joy of having occasioned a heavy disappointment,
by degrees cooled Mr Quilp’s wrath; which from being at savage heat,
dropped slowly to the bantering or chuckling point, at which it
steadily remained.
‘So you thought I was dead and gone, did you?’ said Quilp. ‘You
thought you were a widow, eh? Ha, ha, ha, you jade.’
‘Indeed, Quilp,’ returned his wife. ‘I’m very sorry--’
‘Who doubts it!’ cried the dwarf. ‘You very sorry! to be sure you are.
Who doubts that you’re VERY sorry!’
‘I don’t mean sorry that you have come home again alive and well,’ said
his wife, ‘but sorry that I should have been led into such a belief. I
am glad to see you, Quilp; indeed I am.’
In truth Mrs Quilp did seem a great deal more glad to behold her lord
than might have been expected, and did evince a degree of interest in
his safety which, all things considered, was rather unaccountable.
Upon Quilp, however, this circumstance made no impression, farther than
as it moved him to snap his fingers close to his wife’s eyes, with
divers grins of triumph and derision.
‘How could you go away so long, without saying a word to me or letting
me hear of you or know anything about you?’ asked the poor little
woman, sobbing. ‘How could you be so cruel, Quilp?’
‘How could I be so cruel! cruel!’ cried the dwarf. ‘Because I was in
the humour. I’m in the humour now. I shall be cruel when I like. I’m
going away again.’
‘Not again!’
‘Yes, again. I’m going away now. I’m off directly. I mean to go and
live wherever the fancy seizes me--at the wharf--at the
counting-house--and be a jolly bachelor. You were a widow in
anticipation. Damme,’ screamed the dwarf, ‘I’ll be a bachelor in
earnest.’
‘You can’t be serious, Quilp,’ sobbed his wife.
‘I tell you,’ said the dwarf, exulting in his project, ‘that I’ll be a
bachelor, a devil-may-care bachelor; and I’ll have my bachelor’s hall
at the counting-house, and at such times come near it if you dare. And
mind too that I don’t pounce in upon you at unseasonable hours again,
for I’ll be a spy upon you, and come and go like a mole or a weazel.
Tom Scott--where’s Tom Scott?’
‘Here I am, master,’ cried the voice of the boy, as Quilp threw up the
window.
‘Wait there, you dog,’ returned the dwarf, ‘to carry a bachelor’s
portmanteau. Pack it up, Mrs Quilp. Knock up the dear old lady to
help; knock her up. Halloa there! Halloa!’
With these exclamations, Mr Quilp caught up the poker, and hurrying to
the door of the good lady’s sleeping-closet, beat upon it therewith
until she awoke in inexpressible terror, thinking that her amiable
son-in-law surely intended to murder her in justification of the legs
she had slandered. Impressed with this idea, she was no sooner fairly
awake than she screamed violently, and would have quickly precipitated
herself out of the window and through a neighbouring skylight, if her
daughter had not hastened in to undeceive her, and implore her
assistance. Somewhat reassured by her account of the service she was
required to render, Mrs Jiniwin made her appearance in a flannel
dressing-gown; and both mother and daughter, trembling with terror and
cold--for the night was now far advanced--obeyed Mr Quilp’s directions
in submissive silence. Prolonging his preparations as much as
possible, for their greater comfort, that eccentric gentleman
superintended the packing of his wardrobe, and having added to it with
his own hands, a plate, knife and fork, spoon, teacup and saucer, and
other small household matters of that nature, strapped up the
portmanteau, took it on his shoulders, and actually marched off without
another word, and with the case-bottle (which he had never once put
down) still tightly clasped under his arm. Consigning his heavier
burden to the care of Tom Scott when he reached the street, taking a
dram from the bottle for his own encouragement, and giving the boy a
rap on the head with it as a small taste for himself, Quilp very
deliberately led the way to the wharf, and reached it at between three
and four o’clock in the morning.
‘Snug!’ said Quilp, when he had groped his way to the wooden
counting-house, and opened the door with a key he carried about with
him. ‘Beautifully snug! Call me at eight, you dog.’
With no more formal leave-taking or explanation, he clutched the
portmanteau, shut the door on his attendant, and climbing on the desk,
and rolling himself up as round as a hedgehog, in an old boat-cloak,
fell fast asleep.
Being roused in the morning at the appointed time, and roused with
difficulty, after his late fatigues, Quilp instructed Tom Scott to make
a fire in the yard of sundry pieces of old timber, and to prepare some
coffee for breakfast; for the better furnishing of which repast he
entrusted him with certain small moneys, to be expended in the purchase
of hot rolls, butter, sugar, Yarmouth bloaters, and other articles of
housekeeping; so that in a few minutes a savoury meal was smoking on
the board. With this substantial comfort, the dwarf regaled himself to
his heart’s content; and being highly satisfied with this free and
gipsy mode of life (which he had often meditated, as offering, whenever
he chose to avail himself of it, an agreeable freedom from the
restraints of matrimony, and a choice means of keeping Mrs Quilp and
her mother in a state of incessant agitation and suspense), bestirred
himself to improve his retreat, and render it more commodious and
comfortable.
With this view, he issued forth to a place hard by, where sea-stores
were sold, purchased a second-hand hammock, and had it slung in
seamanlike fashion from the ceiling of the counting-house. He also
caused to be erected, in the same mouldy cabin, an old ship’s stove
with a rusty funnel to carry the smoke through the roof; and these
arrangements completed, surveyed them with ineffable delight.
‘I’ve got a country-house like Robinson Crusoe,’ said the dwarf, ogling
the accommodations; ‘a solitary, sequestered, desolate-island sort of
spot, where I can be quite alone when I have business on hand, and be
secure from all spies and listeners. Nobody near me here, but rats,
and they are fine stealthy secret fellows. I shall be as merry as a
grig among these gentry. I’ll look out for one like Christopher, and
poison him--ha, ha, ha! Business though--business--we must be mindful
of business in the midst of pleasure, and the time has flown this
morning, I declare.’
Enjoining Tom Scott to await his return, and not to stand upon his
head, or throw a summerset, or so much as walk upon his hands
meanwhile, on pain of lingering torments, the dwarf threw himself into
a boat, and crossing to the other side of the river, and then speeding
away on foot, reached Mr Swiveller’s usual house of entertainment in
Bevis Marks, just as that gentleman sat down alone to dinner in its
dusky parlour.
‘Dick,’ said the dwarf, thrusting his head in at the door, ‘my pet, my
pupil, the apple of my eye, hey, hey!’
‘Oh you’re there, are you?’ returned Mr Swiveller; ‘how are you?’
‘How’s Dick?’ retorted Quilp. ‘How’s the cream of clerkship, eh?’
‘Why, rather sour, sir,’ replied Mr Swiveller. ‘Beginning to border
upon cheesiness, in fact.’
‘What’s the matter?’ said the dwarf, advancing. ‘Has Sally proved
unkind. “Of all the girls that are so smart, there’s none like--” eh,
Dick!’
‘Certainly not,’ replied Mr Swiveller, eating his dinner with great
gravity, ‘none like her. She’s the sphynx of private life, is Sally B.’
‘You’re out of spirits,’ said Quilp, drawing up a chair. ‘What’s the
matter?’
‘The law don’t agree with me,’ returned Dick. ‘It isn’t moist enough,
and there’s too much confinement. I have been thinking of running
away.’
‘Bah!’ said the dwarf. ‘Where would you run to, Dick?’
‘I don’t know’ returned Mr Swiveller. ‘Towards Highgate, I suppose.
Perhaps the bells might strike up “Turn again Swiveller, Lord Mayor of
London.” Whittington’s name was Dick. I wish cats were scarcer.’
Quilp looked at his companion with his eyes screwed up into a comical
expression of curiosity, and patiently awaited his further explanation;
upon which, however, Mr Swiveller appeared in no hurry to enter, as he
ate a very long dinner in profound silence, finally pushed away his
plate, threw himself back into his chair, folded his arms, and stared
ruefully at the fire, in which some ends of cigars were smoking on
their own account, and sending up a fragrant odour.
‘Perhaps you’d like a bit of cake’--said Dick, at last turning to the
dwarf. ‘You’re quite welcome to it. You ought to be, for it’s of your
making.’
‘What do you mean?’ said Quilp.
Mr Swiveller replied by taking from his pocket a small and very greasy
parcel, slowly unfolding it, and displaying a little slab of plum-cake
extremely indigestible in appearance, and bordered with a paste of
white sugar an inch and a half deep.
‘What should you say this was?’ demanded Mr Swiveller.
‘It looks like bride-cake,’ replied the dwarf, grinning.
‘And whose should you say it was?’ inquired Mr Swiveller, rubbing the
pastry against his nose with a dreadful calmness. ‘Whose?’
‘Not--’
‘Yes,’ said Dick, ‘the same. You needn’t mention her name. There’s no
such name now. Her name is Cheggs now, Sophy Cheggs. Yet loved I as
man never loved that hadn’t wooden legs, and my heart, my heart is
breaking for the love of Sophy Cheggs.’
With this extemporary adaptation of a popular ballad to the distressing
circumstances of his own case, Mr Swiveller folded up the parcel again,
beat it very flat between the palms of his hands, thrust it into his
breast, buttoned his coat over it, and folded his arms upon the whole.
‘Now, I hope you’re satisfied, sir,’ said Dick; ‘and I hope Fred’s
satisfied. You went partners in the mischief, and I hope you like it.
This is the triumph I was to have, is it? It’s like the old
country-dance of that name, where there are two gentlemen to one lady,
and one has her, and the other hasn’t, but comes limping up behind to
make out the figure. But it’s Destiny, and mine’s a crusher.’
Disguising his secret joy in Mr Swiveller’s defeat, Daniel Quilp
adopted the surest means of soothing him, by ringing the bell, and
ordering in a supply of rosy wine (that is to say, of its usual
representative), which he put about with great alacrity, calling upon
Mr Swiveller to pledge him in various toasts derisive of Cheggs, and
eulogistic of the happiness of single men. Such was their impression
on Mr Swiveller, coupled with the reflection that no man could oppose
his destiny, that in a very short space of time his spirits rose
surprisingly, and he was enabled to give the dwarf an account of the
receipt of the cake, which, it appeared, had been brought to Bevis
Marks by the two surviving Miss Wackleses in person, and delivered at
the office door with much giggling and joyfulness.
‘Ha!’ said Quilp. ‘It will be our turn to giggle soon. And that
reminds me--you spoke of young Trent--where is he?’
Mr Swiveller explained that his respectable friend had recently
accepted a responsible situation in a locomotive gaming-house, and was
at that time absent on a professional tour among the adventurous
spirits of Great Britain.
‘That’s unfortunate,’ said the dwarf, ‘for I came, in fact, to ask you
about him. A thought has occurred to me, Dick; your friend over the
way--’
‘Which friend?’
‘In the first floor.’
‘Yes?’
‘Your friend in the first floor, Dick, may know him.’
‘No, he don’t,’ said Mr Swiveller, shaking his head.
‘Don’t! No, because he has never seen him,’ rejoined Quilp; ‘but if we
were to bring them together, who knows, Dick, but Fred, properly
introduced, would serve his turn almost as well as little Nell or her
grandfather--who knows but it might make the young fellow’s fortune,
and, through him, yours, eh?’
‘Why, the fact is, you see,’ said Mr Swiveller, ‘that they HAVE been
brought together.’
‘Have been!’ cried the dwarf, looking suspiciously at his companion.
‘Through whose means?’
‘Through mine,’ said Dick, slightly confused. ‘Didn’t I mention it to
you the last time you called over yonder?’
‘You know you didn’t,’ returned the dwarf.
‘I believe you’re right,’ said Dick. ‘No. I didn’t, I recollect. Oh
yes, I brought ‘em together that very day. It was Fred’s suggestion.’
‘And what came of it?’
‘Why, instead of my friend’s bursting into tears when he knew who Fred
was, embracing him kindly, and telling him that he was his grandfather,
or his grandmother in disguise (which we fully expected), he flew into
a tremendous passion; called him all manner of names; said it was in a
great measure his fault that little Nell and the old gentleman had ever
been brought to poverty; didn’t hint at our taking anything to drink;
and--and in short rather turned us out of the room than otherwise.’
‘That’s strange,’ said the dwarf, musing.
‘So we remarked to each other at the time,’ returned Dick coolly, ‘but
quite true.’
Quilp was plainly staggered by this intelligence, over which he brooded
for some time in moody silence, often raising his eyes to Mr
Swiveller’s face, and sharply scanning its expression. As he could
read in it, however, no additional information or anything to lead him
to believe he had spoken falsely; and as Mr Swiveller, left to his own
meditations, sighed deeply, and was evidently growing maudlin on the
subject of Mrs Cheggs; the dwarf soon broke up the conference and took
his departure, leaving the bereaved one to his melancholy ruminations.
‘Have been brought together, eh?’ said the dwarf as he walked the
streets alone. ‘My friend has stolen a march upon me. It led him to
nothing, and therefore is no great matter, save in the intention. I’m
glad he has lost his mistress. Ha ha! The blockhead mustn’t leave the
law at present. I’m sure of him where he is, whenever I want him for
my own purposes, and, besides, he’s a good unconscious spy on Brass,
and tells, in his cups, all that he sees and hears. You’re useful to
me, Dick, and cost nothing but a little treating now and then. I am
not sure that it may not be worth while, before long, to take credit
with the stranger, Dick, by discovering your designs upon the child;
but for the present we’ll remain the best friends in the world, with
your good leave.’
Pursuing these thoughts, and gasping as he went along, after his own
peculiar fashion, Mr Quilp once more crossed the Thames, and shut
himself up in his Bachelor’s Hall, which, by reason of its
newly-erected chimney depositing the smoke inside the room and carrying
none of it off, was not quite so agreeable as more fastidious people
might have desired. Such inconveniences, however, instead of
disgusting the dwarf with his new abode, rather suited his humour; so,
after dining luxuriously from the public-house, he lighted his pipe,
and smoked against the chimney until nothing of him was visible through
the mist but a pair of red and highly inflamed eyes, with sometimes a
dim vision of his head and face, as, in a violent fit of coughing, he
slightly stirred the smoke and scattered the heavy wreaths by which
they were obscured. In the midst of this atmosphere, which must
infallibly have smothered any other man, Mr Quilp passed the evening
with great cheerfulness; solacing himself all the time with the pipe
and the case-bottle; and occasionally entertaining himself with a
melodious howl, intended for a song, but bearing not the faintest
resemblance to any scrap of any piece of music, vocal or instrumental,
ever invented by man. Thus he amused himself until nearly midnight,
when he turned into his hammock with the utmost satisfaction.
The first sound that met his ears in the morning--as he half opened his
eyes, and, finding himself so unusually near the ceiling, entertained a
drowsy idea that he must have been transformed into a fly or
blue-bottle in the course of the night,--was that of a stifled sobbing
and weeping in the room. Peeping cautiously over the side of his
hammock, he descried Mrs Quilp, to whom, after contemplating her for
some time in silence, he communicated a violent start by suddenly
yelling out--‘Halloa!’
‘Oh, Quilp!’ cried his poor little wife, looking up. ‘How you
frightened me!’
‘I meant to, you jade,’ returned the dwarf. ‘What do you want here?
I’m dead, an’t I?’
‘Oh, please come home, do come home,’ said Mrs Quilp, sobbing; ‘we’ll
never do so any more, Quilp, and after all it was only a mistake that
grew out of our anxiety.’
‘Out of your anxiety,’ grinned the dwarf. ‘Yes, I know that--out of
your anxiety for my death. I shall come home when I please, I tell
you. I shall come home when I please, and go when I please. I’ll be a
Will o’ the Wisp, now here, now there, dancing about you always,
starting up when you least expect me, and keeping you in a constant
state of restlessness and irritation. Will you begone?’
Mrs Quilp durst only make a gesture of entreaty.
‘I tell you no,’ cried the dwarf. ‘No. If you dare to come here again
unless you’re sent for, I’ll keep watch-dogs in the yard that’ll growl
and bite--I’ll have man-traps, cunningly altered and improved for
catching women--I’ll have spring guns, that shall explode when you
tread upon the wires, and blow you into little pieces. Will you
begone?’
‘Do forgive me. Do come back,’ said his wife, earnestly.
‘No-o-o-o-o!’ roared Quilp. ‘Not till my own good time, and then I’ll
return again as often as I choose, and be accountable to nobody for my
goings or comings. You see the door there. Will you go?’
Mr Quilp delivered this last command in such a very energetic voice,
and moreover accompanied it with such a sudden gesture, indicative of
an intention to spring out of his hammock, and, night-capped as he was,
bear his wife home again through the public streets, that she sped away
like an arrow. Her worthy lord stretched his neck and eyes until she
had crossed the yard, and then, not at all sorry to have had this
opportunity of carrying his point, and asserting the sanctity of his
castle, fell into an immoderate fit of laughter, and laid himself down
to sleep again.
CHAPTER 51
The bland and open-hearted proprietor of Bachelor’s Hall slept on
amidst the congenial accompaniments of rain, mud, dirt, damp, fog, and
rats, until late in the day; when, summoning his valet Tom Scott to
assist him to rise, and to prepare breakfast, he quitted his couch, and
made his toilet. This duty performed, and his repast ended, he again
betook himself to Bevis Marks.
This visit was not intended for Mr Swiveller, but for his friend and
employer Mr Sampson Brass. Both gentlemen however were from home, nor
was the life and light of law, Miss Sally, at her post either. The
fact of their joint desertion of the office was made known to all
comers by a scrap of paper in the hand-writing of Mr Swiveller, which
was attached to the bell-handle, and which, giving the reader no clue
to the time of day when it was first posted, furnished him with the
rather vague and unsatisfactory information that that gentleman would
‘return in an hour.’
‘There’s a servant, I suppose,’ said the dwarf, knocking at the
house-door. ‘She’ll do.’
After a sufficiently long interval, the door was opened, and a small
voice immediately accosted him with, ‘Oh please will you leave a card
or message?’
‘Eh?’ said the dwarf, looking down, (it was something quite new to him)
upon the small servant.
To this, the child, conducting her conversation as upon the occasion of
her first interview with Mr Swiveller, again replied, ‘Oh please will
you leave a card or message?’
‘I’ll write a note,’ said the dwarf, pushing past her into the office;
‘and mind your master has it directly he comes home.’ So Mr Quilp
climbed up to the top of a tall stool to write the note, and the small
servant, carefully tutored for such emergencies, looked on with her
eyes wide open, ready, if he so much as abstracted a wafer, to rush
into the street and give the alarm to the police.
As Mr Quilp folded his note (which was soon written: being a very short
one) he encountered the gaze of the small servant. He looked at her,
long and earnestly.
‘How are you?’ said the dwarf, moistening a wafer with horrible
grimaces.
The small servant, perhaps frightened by his looks, returned no audible
reply; but it appeared from the motion of her lips that she was
inwardly repeating the same form of expression concerning the note or
message.
‘Do they use you ill here? is your mistress a Tartar?’ said Quilp with
a chuckle.
In reply to the last interrogation, the small servant, with a look of
infinite cunning mingled with fear, screwed up her mouth very tight and
round, and nodded violently. Whether there was anything in the
peculiar slyness of her action which fascinated Mr Quilp, or anything
in the expression of her features at the moment which attracted his
attention for some other reason; or whether it merely occurred to him
as a pleasant whim to stare the small servant out of countenance;
certain it is, that he planted his elbows square and firmly on the
desk, and squeezing up his cheeks with his hands, looked at her fixedly.
‘Where do you come from?’ he said after a long pause, stroking his chin.
‘I don’t know.’
‘What’s your name?’
‘Nothing.’
‘Nonsense!’ retorted Quilp. ‘What does your mistress call you when she
wants you?’
‘A little devil,’ said the child.
She added in the same breath, as if fearful of any further questioning,
‘But please will you leave a card or message?’
These unusual answers might naturally have provoked some more
inquiries. Quilp, however, without uttering another word, withdrew his
eyes from the small servant, stroked his chin more thoughtfully than
before, and then, bending over the note as if to direct it with
scrupulous and hair-breadth nicety, looked at her, covertly but very
narrowly, from under his bushy eyebrows. The result of this secret
survey was, that he shaded his face with his hands, and laughed slyly
and noiselessly, until every vein in it was swollen almost to bursting.
Pulling his hat over his brow to conceal his mirth and its effects, he
tossed the letter to the child, and hastily withdrew.
Once in the street, moved by some secret impulse, he laughed, and held
his sides, and laughed again, and tried to peer through the dusty area
railings as if to catch another glimpse of the child, until he was
quite tired out. At last, he travelled back to the Wilderness, which
was within rifle-shot of his bachelor retreat, and ordered tea in the
wooden summer-house that afternoon for three persons; an invitation to
Miss Sally Brass and her brother to partake of that entertainment at
that place, having been the object both of his journey and his note.
It was not precisely the kind of weather in which people usually take
tea in summer-houses, far less in summer-houses in an advanced state of
decay, and overlooking the slimy banks of a great river at low water.
Nevertheless, it was in this choice retreat that Mr Quilp ordered a
cold collation to be prepared, and it was beneath its cracked and leaky
roof that he, in due course of time, received Mr Sampson and his sister
Sally.
‘You’re fond of the beauties of nature,’ said Quilp with a grin. ‘Is
this charming, Brass? Is it unusual, unsophisticated, primitive?’
‘It’s delightful indeed, sir,’ replied the lawyer.
‘Cool?’ said Quilp.
‘N-not particularly so, I think, sir,’ rejoined Brass, with his teeth
chattering in his head.
‘Perhaps a little damp and ague-ish?’ said Quilp.
‘Just damp enough to be cheerful, sir,’ rejoined Brass. ‘Nothing more,
sir, nothing more.’
‘And Sally?’ said the delighted dwarf. ‘Does she like it?’
‘She’ll like it better,’ returned that strong-minded lady, ‘when she
has tea; so let us have it, and don’t bother.’
‘Sweet Sally!’ cried Quilp, extending his arms as if about to embrace
her. ‘Gentle, charming, overwhelming Sally.’
‘He’s a very remarkable man indeed!’ soliloquised Mr Brass. ‘He’s
quite a Troubadour, you know; quite a Troubadour!’
These complimentary expressions were uttered in a somewhat absent and
distracted manner; for the unfortunate lawyer, besides having a bad
cold in his head, had got wet in coming, and would have willingly borne
some pecuniary sacrifice if he could have shifted his present raw
quarters to a warm room, and dried himself at a fire. Quilp,
however--who, beyond the gratification of his demon whims, owed Sampson
some acknowledgment of the part he had played in the mourning scene of
which he had been a hidden witness, marked these symptoms of uneasiness
with a delight past all expression, and derived from them a secret joy
which the costliest banquet could never have afforded him.
It is worthy of remark, too, as illustrating a little feature in the
character of Miss Sally Brass, that, although on her own account she
would have borne the discomforts of the Wilderness with a very ill
grace, and would probably, indeed, have walked off before the tea
appeared, she no sooner beheld the latent uneasiness and misery of her
brother than she developed a grim satisfaction, and began to enjoy
herself after her own manner. Though the wet came stealing through the
roof and trickling down upon their heads, Miss Brass uttered no
complaint, but presided over the tea equipage with imperturbable
composure. While Mr Quilp, in his uproarious hospitality, seated
himself upon an empty beer-barrel, vaunted the place as the most
beautiful and comfortable in the three kingdoms, and elevating his
glass, drank to their next merry-meeting in that jovial spot; and Mr
Brass, with the rain plashing down into his tea-cup, made a dismal
attempt to pluck up his spirits and appear at his ease; and Tom Scott,
who was in waiting at the door under an old umbrella, exulted in his
agonies, and bade fair to split his sides with laughing; while all this
was passing, Miss Sally Brass, unmindful of the wet which dripped down
upon her own feminine person and fair apparel, sat placidly behind the
tea-board, erect and grizzly, contemplating the unhappiness of her
brother with a mind at ease, and content, in her amiable disregard of
self, to sit there all night, witnessing the torments which his
avaricious and grovelling nature compelled him to endure and forbade
him to resent. And this, it must be observed, or the illustration
would be incomplete, although in a business point of view she had the
strongest sympathy with Mr Sampson, and would have been beyond measure
indignant if he had thwarted their client in any one respect.
In the height of his boisterous merriment, Mr Quilp, having on some
pretence dismissed his attendant sprite for the moment, resumed his
usual manner all at once, dismounted from his cask, and laid his hand
upon the lawyer’s sleeve.
‘A word,’ said the dwarf, ‘before we go farther. Sally, hark’ee for a
minute.’
Miss Sally drew closer, as if accustomed to business conferences with
their host which were the better for not having air.
‘Business,’ said the dwarf, glancing from brother to sister. ‘Very
private business. Lay your heads together when you’re by yourselves.’
‘Certainly, sir,’ returned Brass, taking out his pocket-book and
pencil. ‘I’ll take down the heads if you please, sir. Remarkable
documents,’ added the lawyer, raising his eyes to the ceiling, ‘most
remarkable documents. He states his points so clearly that it’s a
treat to have ‘em! I don’t know any act of parliament that’s equal to
him in clearness.’
‘I shall deprive you of a treat,’ said Quilp. ‘Put up your book. We
don’t want any documents. So. There’s a lad named Kit--’
Miss Sally nodded, implying that she knew of him.
‘Kit!’ said Mr Sampson.--‘Kit! Ha! I’ve heard the name before, but I
don’t exactly call to mind--I don’t exactly--’
‘You’re as slow as a tortoise, and more thick-headed than a
rhinoceros,’ returned his obliging client with an impatient gesture.
‘He’s extremely pleasant!’ cried the obsequious Sampson. ‘His
acquaintance with Natural History too is surprising. Quite a Buffoon,
quite!’
There is no doubt that Mr Brass intended some compliment or other; and
it has been argued with show of reason that he would have said Buffon,
but made use of a superfluous vowel. Be this as it may, Quilp gave him
no time for correction, as he performed that office himself by more
than tapping him on the head with the handle of his umbrella.
‘Don’t let’s have any wrangling,’ said Miss Sally, staying his hand.
‘I’ve showed you that I know him, and that’s enough.’
‘She’s always foremost!’ said the dwarf, patting her on the back and
looking contemptuously at Sampson. ‘I don’t like Kit, Sally.’
‘Nor I,’ rejoined Miss Brass.
‘Nor I,’ said Sampson.
‘Why, that’s right!’ cried Quilp. ‘Half our work is done already.
This Kit is one of your honest people; one of your fair characters; a
prowling prying hound; a hypocrite; a double-faced, white-livered,
sneaking spy; a crouching cur to those that feed and coax him, and a
barking yelping dog to all besides.’
‘Fearfully eloquent!’ cried Brass with a sneeze. ‘Quite appalling!’
‘Come to the point,’ said Miss Sally, ‘and don’t talk so much.’
‘Right again!’ exclaimed Quilp, with another contemptuous look at
Sampson, ‘always foremost! I say, Sally, he is a yelping, insolent dog
to all besides, and most of all, to me. In short, I owe him a grudge.’
‘That’s enough, sir,’ said Sampson.
‘No, it’s not enough, sir,’ sneered Quilp; ‘will you hear me out?
Besides that I owe him a grudge on that account, he thwarts me at this
minute, and stands between me and an end which might otherwise prove a
golden one to us all. Apart from that, I repeat that he crosses my
humour, and I hate him. Now, you know the lad, and can guess the rest.
Devise your own means of putting him out of my way, and execute them.
Shall it be done?’
‘It shall, sir,’ said Sampson.
‘Then give me your hand,’ retorted Quilp. ‘Sally, girl, yours. I rely
as much, or more, on you than him. Tom Scott comes back. Lantern,
pipes, more grog, and a jolly night of it!’
No other word was spoken, no other look exchanged, which had the
slightest reference to this, the real occasion of their meeting. The
trio were well accustomed to act together, and were linked to each
other by ties of mutual interest and advantage, and nothing more was
needed. Resuming his boisterous manner with the same ease with which
he had thrown it off, Quilp was in an instant the same uproarious,
reckless little savage he had been a few seconds before. It was ten
o’clock at night before the amiable Sally supported her beloved and
loving brother from the Wilderness, by which time he needed the utmost
support her tender frame could render; his walk being from some unknown
reason anything but steady, and his legs constantly doubling up in
unexpected places.
Overpowered, notwithstanding his late prolonged slumbers, by the
fatigues of the last few days, the dwarf lost no time in creeping to
his dainty house, and was soon dreaming in his hammock. Leaving him to
visions, in which perhaps the quiet figures we quitted in the old
church porch were not without their share, be it our task to rejoin
them as they sat and watched.
CHAPTER 52
After a long time, the schoolmaster appeared at the wicket-gate of the
churchyard, and hurried towards them, tingling in his hand, as he came
along, a bundle of rusty keys. He was quite breathless with pleasure
and haste when he reached the porch, and at first could only point
towards the old building which the child had been contemplating so
earnestly.
‘You see those two old houses,’ he said at last.
‘Yes, surely,’ replied Nell. ‘I have been looking at them nearly all
the time you have been away.’
‘And you would have looked at them more curiously yet, if you could
have guessed what I have to tell you,’ said her friend. ‘One of those
houses is mine.’
Without saying any more, or giving the child time to reply, the
schoolmaster took her hand, and, his honest face quite radiant with
exultation, led her to the place of which he spoke.
They stopped before its low arched door. After trying several of the
keys in vain, the schoolmaster found one to fit the huge lock, which
turned back, creaking, and admitted them into the house.
The room into which they entered was a vaulted chamber once nobly
ornamented by cunning architects, and still retaining, in its beautiful
groined roof and rich stone tracery, choice remnants of its ancient
splendour. Foliage carved in the stone, and emulating the mastery of
Nature’s hand, yet remained to tell how many times the leaves outside
had come and gone, while it lived on unchanged. The broken figures
supporting the burden of the chimney-piece, though mutilated, were
still distinguishable for what they had been--far different from the
dust without--and showed sadly by the empty hearth, like creatures who
had outlived their kind, and mourned their own too slow decay.
In some old time--for even change was old in that old place--a wooden
partition had been constructed in one part of the chamber to form a
sleeping-closet, into which the light was admitted at the same period
by a rude window, or rather niche, cut in the solid wall. This screen,
together with two seats in the broad chimney, had at some forgotten
date been part of the church or convent; for the oak, hastily
appropriated to its present purpose, had been little altered from its
former shape, and presented to the eye a pile of fragments of rich
carving from old monkish stalls.
An open door leading to a small room or cell, dim with the light that
came through leaves of ivy, completed the interior of this portion of
the ruin. It was not quite destitute of furniture. A few strange
chairs, whose arms and legs looked as though they had dwindled away
with age; a table, the very spectre of its race: a great old chest that
had once held records in the church, with other quaintly-fashioned
domestic necessaries, and store of fire-wood for the winter, were
scattered around, and gave evident tokens of its occupation as a
dwelling-place at no very distant time.
The child looked around her, with that solemn feeling with which we
contemplate the work of ages that have become but drops of water in the
great ocean of eternity. The old man had followed them, but they were
all three hushed for a space, and drew their breath softly, as if they
feared to break the silence even by so slight a sound.
‘It is a very beautiful place!’ said the child, in a low voice.
‘I almost feared you thought otherwise,’ returned the schoolmaster.
‘You shivered when we first came in, as if you felt it cold or gloomy.’
‘It was not that,’ said Nell, glancing round with a slight shudder.
‘Indeed I cannot tell you what it was, but when I saw the outside, from
the church porch, the same feeling came over me. It is its being so
old and grey perhaps.’
‘A peaceful place to live in, don’t you think so?’ said her friend.
‘Oh yes,’ rejoined the child, clasping her hands earnestly. ‘A quiet,
happy place--a place to live and learn to die in!’ She would have said
more, but that the energy of her thoughts caused her voice to falter,
and come in trembling whispers from her lips.
‘A place to live, and learn to live, and gather health of mind and body
in,’ said the schoolmaster; ‘for this old house is yours.’
‘Ours!’ cried the child.
‘Ay,’ returned the schoolmaster gaily, ‘for many a merry year to come,
I hope. I shall be a close neighbour--only next door--but this house
is yours.’
Having now disburdened himself of his great surprise, the schoolmaster
sat down, and drawing Nell to his side, told her how he had learnt that
ancient tenement had been occupied for a very long time by an old
person, nearly a hundred years of age, who kept the keys of the church,
opened and closed it for the services, and showed it to strangers; how
she had died not many weeks ago, and nobody had yet been found to fill
the office; how, learning all this in an interview with the sexton, who
was confined to his bed by rheumatism, he had been bold to make mention
of his fellow-traveller, which had been so favourably received by that
high authority, that he had taken courage, acting on his advice, to
propound the matter to the clergyman. In a word, the result of his
exertions was, that Nell and her grandfather were to be carried before
the last-named gentleman next day; and, his approval of their conduct
and appearance reserved as a matter of form, that they were already
appointed to the vacant post.
‘There’s a small allowance of money,’ said the schoolmaster. ‘It is
not much, but still enough to live upon in this retired spot. By
clubbing our funds together, we shall do bravely; no fear of that.’
‘Heaven bless and prosper you!’ sobbed the child.
‘Amen, my dear,’ returned her friend cheerfully; ‘and all of us, as it
will, and has, in leading us through sorrow and trouble to this
tranquil life. But we must look at MY house now. Come!’
They repaired to the other tenement; tried the rusty keys as before; at
length found the right one; and opened the worm-eaten door. It led
into a chamber, vaulted and old, like that from which they had come,
but not so spacious, and having only one other little room attached.
It was not difficult to divine that the other house was of right the
schoolmaster’s, and that he had chosen for himself the least
commodious, in his care and regard for them. Like the adjoining
habitation, it held such old articles of furniture as were absolutely
necessary, and had its stack of fire-wood.
To make these dwellings as habitable and full of comfort as they could,
was now their pleasant care. In a short time, each had its cheerful
fire glowing and crackling on the hearth, and reddening the pale old
wall with a hale and healthy blush. Nell, busily plying her needle,
repaired the tattered window-hangings, drew together the rents that
time had worn in the threadbare scraps of carpet, and made them whole
and decent. The schoolmaster swept and smoothed the ground before the
door, trimmed the long grass, trained the ivy and creeping plants which
hung their drooping heads in melancholy neglect; and gave to the outer
walls a cheery air of home. The old man, sometimes by his side and
sometimes with the child, lent his aid to both, went here and there on
little patient services, and was happy. Neighbours, too, as they came
from work, proffered their help; or sent their children with such small
presents or loans as the strangers needed most. It was a busy day; and
night came on, and found them wondering that there was yet so much to
do, and that it should be dark so soon.
They took their supper together, in the house which may be henceforth
called the child’s; and, when they had finished their meal, drew round
the fire, and almost in whispers--their hearts were too quiet and glad
for loud expression--discussed their future plans. Before they
separated, the schoolmaster read some prayers aloud; and then, full of
gratitude and happiness, they parted for the night.
At that silent hour, when her grandfather was sleeping peacefully in
his bed, and every sound was hushed, the child lingered before the
dying embers, and thought of her past fortunes as if they had been a
dream And she only now awoke. The glare of the sinking flame,
reflected in the oaken panels whose carved tops were dimly seen in the
dusky roof--the aged walls, where strange shadows came and went with
every flickering of the fire--the solemn presence, within, of that
decay which falls on senseless things the most enduring in their
nature: and, without, and round about on every side, of Death--filled
her with deep and thoughtful feelings, but with none of terror or
alarm. A change had been gradually stealing over her, in the time of
her loneliness and sorrow. With failing strength and heightening
resolution, there had sprung up a purified and altered mind; there had
grown in her bosom blessed thoughts and hopes, which are the portion of
few but the weak and drooping. There were none to see the frail,
perishable figure, as it glided from the fire and leaned pensively at
the open casement; none but the stars, to look into the upturned face
and read its history. The old church bell rang out the hour with a
mournful sound, as if it had grown sad from so much communing with the
dead and unheeded warning to the living; the fallen leaves rustled; the
grass stirred upon the graves; all else was still and sleeping.
Some of those dreamless sleepers lay close within the shadow of the
church--touching the wall, as if they clung to it for comfort and
protection. Others had chosen to lie beneath the changing shade of
trees; others by the path, that footsteps might come near them; others,
among the graves of little children. Some had desired to rest beneath
the very ground they had trodden in their daily walks; some, where the
setting sun might shine upon their beds; some, where its light would
fall upon them when it rose. Perhaps not one of the imprisoned souls
had been able quite to separate itself in living thought from its old
companion. If any had, it had still felt for it a love like that which
captives have been known to bear towards the cell in which they have
been long confined, and, even at parting, hung upon its narrow bounds
affectionately.
It was long before the child closed the window, and approached her bed.
Again something of the same sensation as before--an involuntary
chill--a momentary feeling akin to fear--but vanishing directly, and
leaving no alarm behind. Again, too, dreams of the little scholar; of
the roof opening, and a column of bright faces, rising far away into
the sky, as she had seen in some old scriptural picture once, and
looking down on her, asleep. It was a sweet and happy dream. The
quiet spot, outside, seemed to remain the same, saving that there was
music in the air, and a sound of angels’ wings. After a time the
sisters came there, hand in hand, and stood among the graves. And then
the dream grew dim, and faded.
With the brightness and joy of morning, came the renewal of yesterday’s
labours, the revival of its pleasant thoughts, the restoration of its
energies, cheerfulness, and hope. They worked gaily in ordering and
arranging their houses until noon, and then went to visit the clergyman.
He was a simple-hearted old gentleman, of a shrinking, subdued spirit,
accustomed to retirement, and very little acquainted with the world,
which he had left many years before to come and settle in that place.
His wife had died in the house in which he still lived, and he had long
since lost sight of any earthly cares or hopes beyond it.
He received them very kindly, and at once showed an interest in Nell;
asking her name, and age, her birthplace, the circumstances which had
led her there, and so forth. The schoolmaster had already told her
story. They had no other friends or home to leave, he said, and had
come to share his fortunes. He loved the child as though she were his
own.
‘Well, well,’ said the clergyman. ‘Let it be as you desire. She is
very young.’
‘Old in adversity and trial, sir,’ replied the schoolmaster.
‘God help her. Let her rest, and forget them,’ said the old gentleman.
‘But an old church is a dull and gloomy place for one so young as you,
my child.’
‘Oh no, sir,’ returned Nell. ‘I have no such thoughts, indeed.’
‘I would rather see her dancing on the green at nights,’ said the old
gentleman, laying his hand upon her head, and smiling sadly, ‘than have
her sitting in the shadow of our mouldering arches. You must look to
this, and see that her heart does not grow heavy among these solemn
ruins. Your request is granted, friend.’
After more kind words, they withdrew, and repaired to the child’s
house; where they were yet in conversation on their happy fortune, when
another friend appeared.
This was a little old gentleman, who lived in the parsonage-house, and
had resided there (so they learnt soon afterwards) ever since the death
of the clergyman’s wife, which had happened fifteen years before. He
had been his college friend and always his close companion; in the
first shock of his grief he had come to console and comfort him; and
from that time they had never parted company. The little old gentleman
was the active spirit of the place, the adjuster of all differences,
the promoter of all merry-makings, the dispenser of his friend’s
bounty, and of no small charity of his own besides; the universal
mediator, comforter, and friend. None of the simple villagers had
cared to ask his name, or, when they knew it, to store it in their
memory. Perhaps from some vague rumour of his college honours which
had been whispered abroad on his first arrival, perhaps because he was
an unmarried, unencumbered gentleman, he had been called the bachelor.
The name pleased him, or suited him as well as any other, and the
Bachelor he had ever since remained. And the bachelor it was, it may
be added, who with his own hands had laid in the stock of fuel which
the wanderers had found in their new habitation.
The bachelor, then--to call him by his usual appellation--lifted the
latch, showed his little round mild face for a moment at the door, and
stepped into the room like one who was no stranger to it.
‘You are Mr Marton, the new schoolmaster?’ he said, greeting Nell’s
kind friend.
‘I am, sir.’
‘You come well recommended, and I am glad to see you. I should have
been in the way yesterday, expecting you, but I rode across the country
to carry a message from a sick mother to her daughter in service some
miles off, and have but just now returned. This is our young
church-keeper? You are not the less welcome, friend, for her sake, or
for this old man’s; nor the worse teacher for having learnt humanity.’
‘She has been ill, sir, very lately,’ said the schoolmaster, in answer
to the look with which their visitor regarded Nell when he had kissed
her cheek.
‘Yes, yes. I know she has,’ he rejoined. ‘There have been suffering
and heartache here.’
‘Indeed there have, sir.’
The little old gentleman glanced at the grandfather, and back again at
the child, whose hand he took tenderly in his, and held.
‘You will be happier here,’ he said; ‘we will try, at least, to make
you so. You have made great improvements here already. Are they the
work of your hands?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘We may make some others--not better in themselves, but with better
means perhaps,’ said the bachelor. ‘Let us see now, let us see.’
Nell accompanied him into the other little rooms, and over both the
houses, in which he found various small comforts wanting, which he
engaged to supply from a certain collection of odds and ends he had at
home, and which must have been a very miscellaneous and extensive one,
as it comprehended the most opposite articles imaginable. They all
came, however, and came without loss of time; for the little old
gentleman, disappearing for some five or ten minutes, presently
returned, laden with old shelves, rugs, blankets, and other household
gear, and followed by a boy bearing a similar load. These being cast
on the floor in a promiscuous heap, yielded a quantity of occupation in
arranging, erecting, and putting away; the superintendence of which
task evidently afforded the old gentleman extreme delight, and engaged
him for some time with great briskness and activity. When nothing more
was left to be done, he charged the boy to run off and bring his
schoolmates to be marshalled before their new master, and solemnly
reviewed.
‘As good a set of fellows, Marton, as you’d wish to see,’ he said,
turning to the schoolmaster when the boy was gone; ‘but I don’t let ‘em
know I think so. That wouldn’t do, at all.’
The messenger soon returned at the head of a long row of urchins, great
and small, who, being confronted by the bachelor at the house door,
fell into various convulsions of politeness; clutching their hats and
caps, squeezing them into the smallest possible dimensions, and making
all manner of bows and scrapes, which the little old gentleman
contemplated with excessive satisfaction, and expressed his approval of
by a great many nods and smiles. Indeed, his approbation of the boys
was by no means so scrupulously disguised as he had led the
schoolmaster to suppose, inasmuch as it broke out in sundry loud
whispers and confidential remarks which were perfectly audible to them
every one.
‘This first boy, schoolmaster,’ said the bachelor, ‘is John
Owen; a lad of good parts, sir, and frank, honest temper; but too
thoughtless, too playful, too light-headed by far. That boy, my good
sir, would break his neck with pleasure, and deprive his parents of
their chief comfort--and between ourselves, when you come to see him at
hare and hounds, taking the fence and ditch by the finger-post, and
sliding down the face of the little quarry, you’ll never forget it.
It’s beautiful!’
John Owen having been thus rebuked, and being in perfect possession of
the speech aside, the bachelor singled out another boy.
‘Now, look at that lad, sir,’ said the bachelor. ‘You see that fellow?
Richard Evans his name is, sir. An amazing boy to learn, blessed with
a good memory, and a ready understanding, and moreover with a good
voice and ear for psalm-singing, in which he is the best among us.
Yet, sir, that boy will come to a bad end; he’ll never die in his bed;
he’s always falling asleep in sermon-time--and to tell you the truth,
Mr Marton, I always did the same at his age, and feel quite certain
that it was natural to my constitution and I couldn’t help it.’
This hopeful pupil edified by the above terrible reproval, the bachelor
turned to another.
‘But if we talk of examples to be shunned,’ said he, ‘if we come to
boys that should be a warning and a beacon to all their fellows, here’s
the one, and I hope you won’t spare him. This is the lad, sir; this
one with the blue eyes and light hair. This is a swimmer, sir, this
fellow--a diver, Lord save us! This is a boy, sir, who had a fancy for
plunging into eighteen feet of water, with his clothes on, and bringing
up a blind man’s dog, who was being drowned by the weight of his chain
and collar, while his master stood wringing his hands upon the bank,
bewailing the loss of his guide and friend. I sent the boy two guineas
anonymously, sir,’ added the bachelor, in his peculiar whisper,
‘directly I heard of it; but never mention it on any account, for he
hasn’t the least idea that it came from me.’
Having disposed of this culprit, the bachelor turned to another, and
from him to another, and so on through the whole array, laying, for
their wholesome restriction within due bounds, the same cutting
emphasis on such of their propensities as were dearest to his heart and
were unquestionably referrable to his own precept and example.
Thoroughly persuaded, in the end, that he had made them miserable by
his severity, he dismissed them with a small present, and an admonition
to walk quietly home, without any leapings, scufflings, or turnings out
of the way; which injunction, he informed the schoolmaster in the same
audible confidence, he did not think he could have obeyed when he was a
boy, had his life depended on it.
Hailing these little tokens of the bachelor’s disposition as so many
assurances of his own welcome course from that time, the schoolmaster
parted from him with a light heart and joyous spirits, and deemed
himself one of the happiest men on earth. The windows of the two old
houses were ruddy again, that night, with the reflection of the
cheerful fires that burnt within; and the bachelor and his friend,
pausing to look upon them as they returned from their evening walk,
spoke softly together of the beautiful child, and looked round upon the
churchyard with a sigh.
CHAPTER 53
Nell was stirring early in the morning, and having discharged her
household tasks, and put everything in order for the good schoolmaster
(though sorely against his will, for he would have spared her the
pains), took down, from its nail by the fireside, a little bundle of
keys with which the bachelor had formally invested her on the previous
day, and went out alone to visit the old church.
The sky was serene and bright, the air clear, perfumed with the fresh
scent of newly fallen leaves, and grateful to every sense. The
neighbouring stream sparkled, and rolled onward with a tuneful sound;
the dew glistened on the green mounds, like tears shed by Good Spirits
over the dead. Some young children sported among the tombs, and hid
from each other, with laughing faces. They had an infant with them,
and had laid it down asleep upon a child’s grave, in a little bed of
leaves. It was a new grave--the resting-place, perhaps, of some little
creature, who, meek and patient in its illness, had often sat and
watched them, and now seemed, to their minds, scarcely changed.
She drew near and asked one of them whose grave it was. The child
answered that that was not its name; it was a garden--his brother’s.
It was greener, he said, than all the other gardens, and the birds
loved it better because he had been used to feed them. When he had
done speaking, he looked at her with a smile, and kneeling down and
nestling for a moment with his cheek against the turf, bounded merrily
away.
She passed the church, gazing upward at its old tower, went through the
wicket gate, and so into the village. The old sexton, leaning on a
crutch, was taking the air at his cottage door, and gave her good
morrow.
‘You are better?’ said the child, stopping to speak with him.
‘Ay surely,’ returned the old man. ‘I’m thankful to say, much better.’
‘_You_ will be quite well soon.’
‘With Heaven’s leave, and a little patience. But come in, come in!’
The old man limped on before, and warning her of the downward step,
which he achieved himself with no small difficulty, led the way into
his little cottage.
‘It is but one room you see. There is another up above, but the stair
has got harder to climb o’ late years, and I never use it. I’m
thinking of taking to it again, next summer, though.’
The child wondered how a grey-headed man like him--one of his trade
too--could talk of time so easily. He saw her eyes wandering to the
tools that hung upon the wall, and smiled.
‘I warrant now,’ he said, ‘that you think all those are used in making
graves.’
‘Indeed, I wondered that you wanted so many.’
‘And well you might. I am a gardener. I dig the ground, and plant
things that are to live and grow. My works don’t all moulder away, and
rot in the earth. You see that spade in the centre?’
‘The very old one--so notched and worn? Yes.’
‘That’s the sexton’s spade, and it’s a well-used one, as you see.
We’re healthy people here, but it has done a power of work. If it
could speak now, that spade, it would tell you of many an unexpected
job that it and I have done together; but I forget ‘em, for my memory’s
a poor one.--That’s nothing new,’ he added hastily. ‘It always was.’
‘There are flowers and shrubs to speak to your other work,’ said the
child.
‘Oh yes. And tall trees. But they are not so separate from the
sexton’s labours as you think.’
‘No!’
‘Not in my mind, and recollection--such as it is,’ said the old man.
‘Indeed they often help it. For say that I planted such a tree for
such a man. There it stands, to remind me that he died. When I look
at its broad shadow, and remember what it was in his time, it helps me
to the age of my other work, and I can tell you pretty nearly when I
made his grave.’
‘But it may remind you of one who is still alive,’ said the child.
‘Of twenty that are dead, in connexion with that one who lives, then,’
rejoined the old man; ‘wife, husband, parents, brothers, sisters,
children, friends--a score at least. So it happens that the sexton’s
spade gets worn and battered. I shall need a new one--next summer.’
The child looked quickly towards him, thinking that he jested with his
age and infirmity: but the unconscious sexton was quite in earnest.
‘Ah!’ he said, after a brief silence. ‘People never learn. They never
learn. It’s only we who turn up the ground, where nothing grows and
everything decays, who think of such things as these--who think of
them properly, I mean. You have been into the church?’
‘I am going there now,’ the child replied.
‘There’s an old well there,’ said the sexton, ‘right underneath the
belfry; a deep, dark, echoing well. Forty year ago, you had only to
let down the bucket till the first knot in the rope was free of the
windlass, and you heard it splashing in the cold dull water. By little
and little the water fell away, so that in ten year after that, a
second knot was made, and you must unwind so much rope, or the bucket
swung tight and empty at the end. In ten years’ time, the water fell
again, and a third knot was made. In ten years more, the well dried
up; and now, if you lower the bucket till your arms are tired, and let
out nearly all the cord, you’ll hear it, of a sudden, clanking and
rattling on the ground below; with a sound of being so deep and so far
down, that your heart leaps into your mouth, and you start away as if
you were falling in.’
‘A dreadful place to come on in the dark!’ exclaimed the child, who had
followed the old man’s looks and words until she seemed to stand upon
its brink.
‘What is it but a grave!’ said the sexton. ‘What else! And which of
our old folks, knowing all this, thought, as the spring subsided, of
their own failing strength, and lessening life? Not one!’
‘Are you very old yourself?’ asked the child, involuntarily.
‘I shall be seventy-nine--next summer.’
‘You still work when you are well?’
‘Work! To be sure. You shall see my gardens hereabout. Look at the
window there. I made, and have kept, that plot of ground entirely with
my own hands. By this time next year I shall hardly see the sky, the
boughs will have grown so thick. I have my winter work at night
besides.’
He opened, as he spoke, a cupboard close to where he sat, and produced
some miniature boxes, carved in a homely manner and made of old wood.
‘Some gentlefolks who are fond of ancient days, and what belongs to
them,’ he said, ‘like to buy these keepsakes from our church and ruins.
Sometimes, I make them of scraps of oak, that turn up here and there;
sometimes of bits of coffins which the vaults have long preserved. See
here--this is a little chest of the last kind, clasped at the edges
with fragments of brass plates that had writing on ‘em once, though it
would be hard to read it now. I haven’t many by me at this time of
year, but these shelves will be full--next summer.’
The child admired and praised his work, and shortly afterwards
departed; thinking, as she went, how strange it was, that this old man,
drawing from his pursuits, and everything around him, one stern moral,
never contemplated its application to himself; and, while he dwelt upon
the uncertainty of human life, seemed both in word and deed to deem
himself immortal. But her musings did not stop here, for she was wise
enough to think that by a good and merciful adjustment this must be
human nature, and that the old sexton, with his plans for next summer,
was but a type of all mankind.
Full of these meditations, she reached the church. It was easy to find
the key belonging to the outer door, for each was labelled on a scrap
of yellow parchment. Its very turning in the lock awoke a hollow
sound, and when she entered with a faltering step, the echoes that it
raised in closing, made her start.
If the peace of the simple village had moved the child more strongly,
because of the dark and troubled ways that lay beyond, and through
which she had journeyed with such failing feet, what was the deep
impression of finding herself alone in that solemn building, where the
very light, coming through sunken windows, seemed old and grey, and the
air, redolent of earth and mould, seemed laden with decay, purified by
time of all its grosser particles, and sighing through arch and aisle,
and clustered pillars, like the breath of ages gone! Here was the
broken pavement, worn, so long ago, by pious feet, that Time, stealing
on the pilgrims’ steps, had trodden out their track, and left but
crumbling stones. Here were the rotten beam, the sinking arch, the
sapped and mouldering wall, the lowly trench of earth, the stately tomb
on which no epitaph remained--all--marble, stone, iron, wood, and
dust--one common monument of ruin. The best work and the worst, the
plainest and the richest, the stateliest and the least imposing--both
of Heaven’s work and Man’s--all found one common level here, and told
one common tale.
Some part of the edifice had been a baronial chapel, and here were
effigies of warriors stretched upon their beds of stone with folded
hands--cross-legged, those who had fought in the Holy Wars--girded
with their swords, and cased in armour as they had lived. Some of
these knights had their own weapons, helmets, coats of mail, hanging
upon the walls hard by, and dangling from rusty hooks. Broken and
dilapidated as they were, they yet retained their ancient form, and
something of their ancient aspect. Thus violent deeds live after men
upon the earth, and traces of war and bloodshed will survive in
mournful shapes long after those who worked the desolation are but
atoms of earth themselves.
The child sat down, in this old, silent place, among the stark figures
on the tombs--they made it more quiet there, than elsewhere, to her
fancy--and gazing round with a feeling of awe, tempered with a calm
delight, felt that now she was happy, and at rest. She took a Bible
from the shelf, and read; then, laying it down, thought of the summer
days and the bright springtime that would come--of the rays of sun that
would fall in aslant, upon the sleeping forms--of the leaves that would
flutter at the window, and play in glistening shadows on the
pavement--of the songs of birds, and growth of buds and blossoms out of
doors--of the sweet air, that would steal in, and gently wave the
tattered banners overhead. What if the spot awakened thoughts of
death! Die who would, it would still remain the same; these sights and
sounds would still go on, as happily as ever. It would be no pain to
sleep amidst them.
She left the chapel--very slowly and often turning back to gaze
again--and coming to a low door, which plainly led into the tower,
opened it, and climbed the winding stair in darkness; save where she
looked down, through narrow loopholes, on the place she had left, or
caught a glimmering vision of the dusty bells. At length she gained
the end of the ascent and stood upon the turret top.
Oh! the glory of the sudden burst of light; the freshness of the fields
and woods, stretching away on every side, and meeting the bright blue
sky; the cattle grazing in the pasturage; the smoke, that, coming from
among the trees, seemed to rise upward from the green earth; the
children yet at their gambols down below--all, everything, so beautiful
and happy! It was like passing from death to life; it was drawing
nearer Heaven.
The children were gone, when she emerged into the porch, and locked the
door. As she passed the school-house she could hear the busy hum of
voices. Her friend had begun his labours only on that day. The noise
grew louder, and, looking back, she saw the boys come trooping out and
disperse themselves with merry shouts and play. ‘It’s a good thing,’
thought the child, ‘I am very glad they pass the church.’ And then she
stopped, to fancy how the noise would sound inside, and how gently it
would seem to die away upon the ear.
Again that day, yes, twice again, she stole back to the old chapel, and
in her former seat read from the same book, or indulged the same quiet
train of thought. Even when it had grown dusk, and the shadows of
coming night made it more solemn still, the child remained, like one
rooted to the spot, and had no fear or thought of stirring.
They found her there, at last, and took her home. She looked pale but
very happy, until they separated for the night; and then, as the poor
schoolmaster stooped down to kiss her cheek, he thought he felt a tear
upon his face.
CHAPTER 54
The bachelor, among his various occupations, found in the old church a
constant source of interest and amusement. Taking that pride in it
which men conceive for the wonders of their own little world, he had
made its history his study; and many a summer day within its walls, and
many a winter’s night beside the parsonage fire, had found the bachelor
still poring over, and adding to, his goodly store of tale and legend.
As he was not one of those rough spirits who would strip fair Truth of
every little shadowy vestment in which time and teeming fancies love to
array her--and some of which become her pleasantly enough, serving,
like the waters of her well, to add new graces to the charms they half
conceal and half suggest, and to awaken interest and pursuit rather
than languor and indifference--as, unlike this stern and obdurate
class, he loved to see the goddess crowned with those garlands of wild
flowers which tradition wreathes for her gentle wearing, and which are
often freshest in their homeliest shapes--he trod with a light step and
bore with a light hand upon the dust of centuries, unwilling to
demolish any of the airy shrines that had been raised above it, if any
good feeling or affection of the human heart were hiding thereabouts.
Thus, in the case of an ancient coffin of rough stone, supposed, for
many generations, to contain the bones of a certain baron, who, after
ravaging, with cut, and thrust, and plunder, in foreign lands, came
back with a penitent and sorrowing heart to die at home, but which had
been lately shown by learned antiquaries to be no such thing, as the
baron in question (so they contended) had died hard in battle, gnashing
his teeth and cursing with his latest breath--the bachelor stoutly
maintained that the old tale was the true one; that the baron,
repenting him of the evil, had done great charities and meekly given up
the ghost; and that, if ever baron went to heaven, that baron was then
at peace. In like manner, when the aforesaid antiquaries did argue and
contend that a certain secret vault was not the tomb of a grey-haired
lady who had been hanged and drawn and quartered by glorious Queen Bess
for succouring a wretched priest who fainted of thirst and hunger at
her door, the bachelor did solemnly maintain, against all comers, that
the church was hallowed by the said poor lady’s ashes; that her remains
had been collected in the night from four of the city’s gates, and
thither in secret brought, and there deposited; and the bachelor did
further (being highly excited at such times) deny the glory of Queen
Bess, and assert the immeasurably greater glory of the meanest woman in
her realm, who had a merciful and tender heart. As to the assertion
that the flat stone near the door was not the grave of the miser who
had disowned his only child and left a sum of money to the church to
buy a peal of bells, the bachelor did readily admit the same, and that
the place had given birth to no such man. In a word, he would have had
every stone, and plate of brass, the monument only of deeds whose
memory should survive. All others he was willing to forget. They
might be buried in consecrated ground, but he would have had them
buried deep, and never brought to light again.
It was from the lips of such a tutor, that the child learnt her easy
task. Already impressed, beyond all telling, by the silent building
and the peaceful beauty of the spot in which it stood--majestic age
surrounded by perpetual youth--it seemed to her, when she heard these
things, sacred to all goodness and virtue. It was another world, where
sin and sorrow never came; a tranquil place of rest, where nothing evil
entered.
When the bachelor had given her in connection with almost every tomb
and flat grave-stone some history of its own, he took her down into the
old crypt, now a mere dull vault, and showed her how it had been
lighted up in the time of the monks, and how, amid lamps depending from
the roof, and swinging censers exhaling scented odours, and habits
glittering with gold and silver, and pictures, and precious stuffs, and
jewels all flashing and glistening through the low arches, the chaunt
of aged voices had been many a time heard there, at midnight, in old
days, while hooded figures knelt and prayed around, and told their
rosaries of beads. Thence, he took her above ground again, and showed
her, high up in the old walls, small galleries, where the nuns had been
wont to glide along--dimly seen in their dark dresses so far off--or
to pause like gloomy shadows, listening to the prayers. He showed her
too, how the warriors, whose figures rested on the tombs, had worn
those rotting scraps of armour up above--how this had been a helmet,
and that a shield, and that a gauntlet--and how they had wielded the
great two-handed swords, and beaten men down, with yonder iron mace.
All that he told the child she treasured in her mind; and sometimes,
when she awoke at night from dreams of those old times, and rising from
her bed looked out at the dark church, she almost hoped to see the
windows lighted up, and hear the organ’s swell, and sound of voices, on
the rushing wind.
The old sexton soon got better, and was about again. From him the
child learnt many other things, though of a different kind. He was not
able to work, but one day there was a grave to be made, and he came to
overlook the man who dug it. He was in a talkative mood; and the
child, at first standing by his side, and afterwards sitting on the
grass at his feet, with her thoughtful face raised towards his, began
to converse with him.
Now, the man who did the sexton’s duty was a little older than he,
though much more active. But he was deaf; and when the sexton (who
peradventure, on a pinch, might have walked a mile with great
difficulty in half-a-dozen hours) exchanged a remark with him about his
work, the child could not help noticing that he did so with an
impatient kind of pity for his infirmity, as if he were himself the
strongest and heartiest man alive.
‘I’m sorry to see there is this to do,’ said the child when she
approached. ‘I heard of no one having died.’
‘She lived in another hamlet, my dear,’ returned the sexton. ‘Three
mile away.’
‘Was she young?’
‘Ye-yes’ said the sexton; not more than sixty-four, I think. David,
was she more than sixty-four?’
David, who was digging hard, heard nothing of the question. The
sexton, as he could not reach to touch him with his crutch, and was too
infirm to rise without assistance, called his attention by throwing a
little mould upon his red nightcap.
‘What’s the matter now?’ said David, looking up.
‘How old was Becky Morgan?’ asked the sexton.
‘Becky Morgan?’ repeated David.
‘Yes,’ replied the sexton; adding in a half compassionate, half
irritable tone, which the old man couldn’t hear, ‘you’re getting very
deaf, Davy, very deaf to be sure!’
The old man stopped in his work, and cleansing his spade with a piece
of slate he had by him for the purpose--and scraping off, in the
process, the essence of Heaven knows how many Becky Morgans--set
himself to consider the subject.
‘Let me think’ quoth he. ‘I saw last night what they had put upon the
coffin--was it seventy-nine?’
‘No, no,’ said the sexton.
‘Ah yes, it was though,’ returned the old man with a sigh. ‘For I
remember thinking she was very near our age. Yes, it was seventy-nine.’
‘Are you sure you didn’t mistake a figure, Davy?’ asked the sexton,
with signs of some emotion.
‘What?’ said the old man. ‘Say that again.’
‘He’s very deaf. He’s very deaf indeed,’ cried the sexton petulantly;
‘are you sure you’re right about the figures?’
‘Oh quite,’ replied the old man. ‘Why not?’
‘He’s exceedingly deaf,’ muttered the sexton to himself. ‘I think he’s
getting foolish.’
The child rather wondered what had led him to this belief, as, to say
the truth, the old man seemed quite as sharp as he, and was infinitely
more robust. As the sexton said nothing more just then, however, she
forgot it for the time, and spoke again.
‘You were telling me,’ she said, ‘about your gardening. Do you ever
plant things here?’
‘In the churchyard?’ returned the sexton, ‘Not I.’
‘I have seen some flowers and little shrubs about,’ the child rejoined;
‘there are some over there, you see. I thought they were of your
rearing, though indeed they grow but poorly.’
‘They grow as Heaven wills,’ said the old man; ‘and it kindly ordains
that they shall never flourish here.’
‘I do not understand you.’
‘Why, this it is,’ said the sexton. ‘They mark the graves of those who
had very tender, loving friends.’
‘I was sure they did!’ the child exclaimed. ‘I am very glad to know
they do!’
‘Aye,’ returned the old man, ‘but stay. Look at them. See how they
hang their heads, and droop, and wither. Do you guess the reason?’
‘No,’ the child replied.
‘Because the memory of those who lie below, passes away so soon. At
first they tend them, morning, noon, and night; they soon begin to come
less frequently; from once a day, to once a week; from once a week to
once a month; then, at long and uncertain intervals; then, not at all.
Such tokens seldom flourish long. I have known the briefest summer
flowers outlive them.’
‘I grieve to hear it,’ said the child.
‘Ah! so say the gentlefolks who come down here to look about them,’
returned the old man, shaking his head, ‘but I say otherwise. “It’s a
pretty custom you have in this part of the country,” they say to me
sometimes, “to plant the graves, but it’s melancholy to see these
things all withering or dead.” I crave their pardon and tell them that,
as I take it, ‘tis a good sign for the happiness of the living. And so
it is. It’s nature.’
‘Perhaps the mourners learn to look to the blue sky by day, and to the
stars by night, and to think that the dead are there, and not in
graves,’ said the child in an earnest voice.
‘Perhaps so,’ replied the old man doubtfully. ‘It may be.’
‘Whether it be as I believe it is, or no,’ thought the child within
herself, ‘I’ll make this place my garden. It will be no harm at least
to work here day by day, and pleasant thoughts will come of it, I am
sure.’
Her glowing cheek and moistened eye passed unnoticed by the sexton, who
turned towards old David, and called him by his name. It was plain
that Becky Morgan’s age still troubled him; though why, the child could
scarcely understand.
The second or third repetition of his name attracted the old man’s
attention. Pausing from his work, he leant on his spade, and put his
hand to his dull ear.
‘Did you call?’ he said.
‘I have been thinking, Davy,’ replied the sexton, ‘that she,’ he
pointed to the grave, ‘must have been a deal older than you or me.’
‘Seventy-nine,’ answered the old man with a shake of the head, ‘I tell
you that I saw it.’
‘Saw it?’ replied the sexton; ‘aye, but, Davy, women don’t always tell
the truth about their age.’
‘That’s true indeed,’ said the other old man, with a sudden sparkle in
his eye. ‘She might have been older.’
‘I’m sure she must have been. Why, only think how old she looked. You
and I seemed but boys to her.’
‘She did look old,’ rejoined David. ‘You’re right. She did look old.’
‘Call to mind how old she looked for many a long, long year, and say if
she could be but seventy-nine at last--only our age,’ said the sexton.
‘Five year older at the very least!’ cried the other.
‘Five!’ retorted the sexton. ‘Ten. Good eighty-nine. I call to mind
the time her daughter died. She was eighty-nine if she was a day, and
tries to pass upon us now, for ten year younger. Oh! human vanity!’
The other old man was not behindhand with some moral reflections on
this fruitful theme, and both adduced a mass of evidence, of such
weight as to render it doubtful--not whether the deceased was of the
age suggested, but whether she had not almost reached the patriarchal
term of a hundred. When they had settled this question to their mutual
satisfaction, the sexton, with his friend’s assistance, rose to go.
‘It’s chilly, sitting here, and I must be careful--till the summer,’ he
said, as he prepared to limp away.
‘What?’ asked old David.
‘He’s very deaf, poor fellow!’ cried the sexton. ‘Good-bye!’
‘Ah!’ said old David, looking after him. ‘He’s failing very fast.
He ages every day.’
And so they parted; each persuaded that the other had less life in him
than himself; and both greatly consoled and comforted by the little
fiction they had agreed upon, respecting Becky Morgan, whose decease
was no longer a precedent of uncomfortable application, and would be no
business of theirs for half a score of years to come.
The child remained, for some minutes, watching the deaf old man as he
threw out the earth with his shovel, and, often stopping to cough and
fetch his breath, still muttered to himself, with a kind of sober
chuckle, that the sexton was wearing fast. At length she turned away,
and walking thoughtfully through the churchyard, came unexpectedly upon
the schoolmaster, who was sitting on a green grave in the sun, reading.
‘Nell here?’ he said cheerfully, as he closed his book. ‘It does me
good to see you in the air and light. I feared you were again in the
church, where you so often are.’
‘Feared!’ replied the child, sitting down beside him. ‘Is it not a
good place?’
‘Yes, yes,’ said the schoolmaster. ‘But you must be gay
sometimes--nay, don’t shake your head and smile so sadly.’
‘Not sadly, if you knew my heart. Do not look at me as if you thought
me sorrowful. There is not a happier creature on earth, than I am now.’
Full of grateful tenderness, the child took his hand, and folded it
between her own. ‘It’s God’s will!’ she said, when they had been
silent for some time.
‘What?’
‘All this,’ she rejoined; ‘all this about us. But which of us is sad
now? You see that I am smiling.’
‘And so am I,’ said the schoolmaster; ‘smiling to think how often we
shall laugh in this same place. Were you not talking yonder?’
‘Yes,’ the child rejoined.
‘Of something that has made you sorrowful?’
There was a long pause.
‘What was it?’ said the schoolmaster, tenderly. ‘Come. Tell me what
it was.’
‘I rather grieve--I _do_ rather grieve to think,’ said the child,
bursting into tears, ‘that those who die about us, are so soon
forgotten.’
‘And do you think,’ said the schoolmaster, marking the glance she had
thrown around, ‘that an unvisited grave, a withered tree, a faded
flower or two, are tokens of forgetfulness or cold neglect? Do you
think there are no deeds, far away from here, in which these dead may
be best remembered? Nell, Nell, there may be people busy in the world,
at this instant, in whose good actions and good thoughts these very
graves--neglected as they look to us--are the chief instruments.’
‘Tell me no more,’ said the child quickly. ‘Tell me no more. I feel,
I know it. How could I be unmindful of it, when I thought of you?’
‘There is nothing,’ cried her friend, ‘no, nothing innocent or good,
that dies, and is forgotten. Let us hold to that faith, or none. An
infant, a prattling child, dying in its cradle, will live again in the
better thoughts of those who loved it, and will play its part, through
them, in the redeeming actions of the world, though its body be burnt
to ashes or drowned in the deepest sea. There is not an angel added to
the Host of Heaven but does its blessed work on earth in those that
loved it here. Forgotten! oh, if the good deeds of human creatures
could be traced to their source, how beautiful would even death appear;
for how much charity, mercy, and purified affection, would be seen to
have their growth in dusty graves!’
‘Yes,’ said the child, ‘it is the truth; I know it is. Who should feel
its force so much as I, in whom your little scholar lives again! Dear,
dear, good friend, if you knew the comfort you have given me!’
The poor schoolmaster made her no answer, but bent over her in silence;
for his heart was full.
They were yet seated in the same place, when the grandfather
approached. Before they had spoken many words together, the church
clock struck the hour of school, and their friend withdrew.
‘A good man,’ said the grandfather, looking after him; ‘a kind man.
Surely he will never harm us, Nell. We are safe here, at last, eh? We
will never go away from here?’
The child shook her head and smiled.
‘She needs rest,’ said the old man, patting her cheek; ‘too pale--too
pale. She is not like what she was.’
‘When?’ asked the child.
‘Ha!’ said the old man, ‘to be sure--when? How many weeks ago? Could
I count them on my fingers? Let them rest though; they’re better
gone.’
‘Much better, dear,’ replied the child. ‘We will forget them;
or, if we ever call them to mind, it shall be only as some uneasy dream
that has passed away.’
‘Hush!’ said the old man, motioning hastily to her with his hand and
looking over his shoulder; ‘no more talk of the dream, and all the
miseries it brought. There are no dreams here. ‘Tis a quiet place,
and they keep away. Let us never think about them, lest they should
pursue us again. Sunken eyes and hollow cheeks--wet, cold, and
famine--and horrors before them all, that were even worse--we must
forget such things if we would be tranquil here.’
‘Thank Heaven!’ inwardly exclaimed the child, ‘for this most happy
change!’
‘I will be patient,’ said the old man, ‘humble, very thankful, and
obedient, if you will let me stay. But do not hide from me; do not
steal away alone; let me keep beside you. Indeed, I will be very true
and faithful, Nell.’
‘I steal away alone! why that,’ replied the child, with assumed gaiety,
‘would be a pleasant jest indeed. See here, dear grandfather, we’ll
make this place our garden--why not! It is a very good one--and
to-morrow we’ll begin, and work together, side by side.’
‘It is a brave thought!’ cried her grandfather. ‘Mind, darling--we
begin to-morrow!’
Who so delighted as the old man, when they next day began their labour!
Who so unconscious of all associations connected with the spot, as he!
They plucked the long grass and nettles from the tombs, thinned the
poor shrubs and roots, made the turf smooth, and cleared it of the
leaves and weeds. They were yet in the ardour of their work, when the
child, raising her head from the ground over which she bent, observed
that the bachelor was sitting on the stile close by, watching them in
silence.
‘A kind office,’ said the little gentleman, nodding to Nell as she
curtseyed to him. ‘Have you done all that, this morning?’
‘It is very little, sir,’ returned the child, with downcast eyes, ‘to
what we mean to do.’
‘Good work, good work,’ said the bachelor. ‘But do you only labour at
the graves of children, and young people?’
‘We shall come to the others in good time, sir,’ replied Nell, turning
her head aside, and speaking softly.
It was a slight incident, and might have been design or accident, or
the child’s unconscious sympathy with youth. But it seemed to strike
upon her grandfather, though he had not noticed it before. He looked
in a hurried manner at the graves, then anxiously at the child, then
pressed her to his side, and bade her stop to rest. Something he had
long forgotten, appeared to struggle faintly in his mind. It did not
pass away, as weightier things had done; but came uppermost again, and
yet again, and many times that day, and often afterwards. Once, while
they were yet at work, the child, seeing that he often turned and
looked uneasily at her, as though he were trying to resolve some
painful doubts or collect some scattered thoughts, urged him to tell
the reason. But he said it was nothing--nothing--and, laying her head
upon his arm, patted her fair cheek with his hand, and muttered that
she grew stronger every day, and would be a woman, soon.
CHAPTER 55
From that time, there sprung up in the old man’s mind, a solicitude
about the child which never slept or left him. There are chords in the
human heart--strange, varying strings--which are only struck by
accident; which will remain mute and senseless to appeals the most
passionate and earnest, and respond at last to the slightest casual
touch. In the most insensible or childish minds, there is some train
of reflection which art can seldom lead, or skill assist, but which
will reveal itself, as great truths have done, by chance, and when the
discoverer has the plainest end in view. From that time, the old man
never, for a moment, forgot the weakness and devotion of the child;
from the time of that slight incident, he who had seen her toiling by
his side through so much difficulty and suffering, and had scarcely
thought of her otherwise than as the partner of miseries which he felt
severely in his own person, and deplored for his own sake at least as
much as hers, awoke to a sense of what he owed her, and what those
miseries had made her. Never, no, never once, in one unguarded moment
from that time to the end, did any care for himself, any thought of his
own comfort, any selfish consideration or regard distract his thoughts
from the gentle object of his love.
He would follow her up and down, waiting till she should tire and lean
upon his arm--he would sit opposite to her in the chimney-corner,
content to watch, and look, until she raised her head and smiled upon
him as of old--he would discharge by stealth, those household duties
which tasked her powers too heavily--he would rise, in the cold dark
nights, to listen to her breathing in her sleep, and sometimes crouch
for hours by her bedside only to touch her hand. He who knows all, can
only know what hopes, and fears, and thoughts of deep affection, were
in that one disordered brain, and what a change had fallen on the poor
old man. Sometimes--weeks had crept on, then--the child, exhausted,
though with little fatigue, would pass whole evenings on a couch beside
the fire. At such times, the schoolmaster would bring in books, and
read to her aloud; and seldom an evening passed, but the bachelor came
in, and took his turn of reading. The old man sat and listened--with
little understanding for the words, but with his eyes fixed upon the
child--and if she smiled or brightened with the story, he would say it
was a good one, and conceive a fondness for the very book. When, in
their evening talk, the bachelor told some tale that pleased her (as
his tales were sure to do), the old man would painfully try to store it
in his mind; nay, when the bachelor left them, he would sometimes slip
out after him, and humbly beg that he would tell him such a part again,
that he might learn to win a smile from Nell.
But these were rare occasions, happily; for the child yearned to be out
of doors, and walking in her solemn garden. Parties, too, would come
to see the church; and those who came, speaking to others of the child,
sent more; so even at that season of the year they had visitors almost
daily. The old man would follow them at a little distance through the
building, listening to the voice he loved so well; and when the
strangers left, and parted from Nell, he would mingle with them to
catch up fragments of their conversation; or he would stand for the
same purpose, with his grey head uncovered, at the gate as they passed
through.
They always praised the child, her sense and beauty, and he was proud
to hear them! But what was that, so often added, which wrung his
heart, and made him sob and weep alone, in some dull corner! Alas!
even careless strangers--they who had no feeling for her, but the
interest of the moment--they who would go away and forget next week
that such a being lived--even they saw it--even they pitied her--even
they bade him good day compassionately, and whispered as they passed.
The people of the village, too, of whom there was not one but grew to
have a fondness for poor Nell; even among them, there was the same
feeling; a tenderness towards her--a compassionate regard for her,
increasing every day. The very schoolboys, light-hearted and
thoughtless as they were, even they cared for her. The roughest among
them was sorry if he missed her in the usual place upon his way to
school, and would turn out of the path to ask for her at the latticed
window. If she were sitting in the church, they perhaps might peep in
softly at the open door; but they never spoke to her, unless she rose
and went to speak to them. Some feeling was abroad which raised the
child above them all.
So, when Sunday came. They were all poor country people in the church,
for the castle in which the old family had lived, was an empty ruin,
and there were none but humble folks for seven miles around. There, as
elsewhere, they had an interest in Nell. They would gather round her
in the porch, before and after service; young children would cluster at
her skirts; and aged men and women forsake their gossips, to give her
kindly greeting. None of them, young or old, thought of passing the
child without a friendly word. Many who came from three or four miles
distant, brought her little presents; the humblest and rudest had good
wishes to bestow.
She had sought out the young children whom she first saw playing in the
churchyard. One of these--he who had spoken of his brother--was her
little favourite and friend, and often sat by her side in the church,
or climbed with her to the tower-top. It was his delight to help her,
or to fancy that he did so, and they soon became close companions.
It happened, that, as she was reading in the old spot by herself one
day, this child came running in with his eyes full of tears, and after
holding her from him, and looking at her eagerly for a moment, clasped
his little arms passionately about her neck.
‘What now?’ said Nell, soothing him. ‘What is the matter?’
‘She is not one yet!’ cried the boy, embracing her still more closely.
‘No, no. Not yet.’
She looked at him wonderingly, and putting his hair back from his face,
and kissing him, asked what he meant.
‘You must not be one, dear Nell,’ cried the boy. ‘We can’t see them.
They never come to play with us, or talk to us. Be what you are. You
are better so.’
‘I do not understand you,’ said the child. ‘Tell me what you mean.’
‘Why, they say,’ replied the boy, looking up into her face, that you
will be an Angel, before the birds sing again. But you won’t be, will
you? Don’t leave us Nell, though the sky is bright. Do not leave us!’
The child dropped her head, and put her hands before her face.
‘She cannot bear the thought!’ cried the boy, exulting through his
tears. ‘You will not go. You know how sorry we should be. Dear Nell,
tell me that you’ll stay amongst us. Oh! Pray, pray, tell me that you
will.’
The little creature folded his hands, and knelt down at her feet.
‘Only look at me, Nell,’ said the boy, ‘and tell me that you’ll stop,
and then I shall know that they are wrong, and will cry no more. Won’t
you say yes, Nell?’
Still the drooping head and hidden face, and the child quite
silent--save for her sobs.
‘After a time,’ pursued the boy, trying to draw away her hand, ‘the kind
angels will be glad to think that you are not among them, and that you
stayed here to be with us. Willy went away, to join them; but if he
had known how I should miss him in our little bed at night, he never
would have left me, I am sure.’
Yet the child could make him no answer, and sobbed as though her heart
were bursting. ‘Why would you go, dear Nell? I know you would not be
happy when you heard that we were crying for your loss. They say that
Willy is in Heaven now, and that it’s always summer there, and yet I’m
sure he grieves when I lie down upon his garden bed, and he cannot turn
to kiss me. But if you do go, Nell,’ said the boy, caressing her, and
pressing his face to hers, ‘be fond of him for my sake. Tell him how I
love him still, and how much I loved you; and when I think that you two
are together, and are happy, I’ll try to bear it, and never give you
pain by doing wrong--indeed I never will!’
The child suffered him to move her hands, and put them round his neck.
There was a tearful silence, but it was not long before she looked upon
him with a smile, and promised him, in a very gentle, quiet voice, that
she would stay, and be his friend, as long as Heaven would let her. He
clapped his hands for joy, and thanked her many times; and being
charged to tell no person what had passed between them, gave her an
earnest promise that he never would.
Nor did he, so far as the child could learn; but was her quiet
companion in all her walks and musings, and never again adverted to the
theme, which he felt had given her pain, although he was unconscious of
its cause. Something of distrust lingered about him still; for he
would often come, even in the dark evenings, and call in a timid voice
outside the door to know if she were safe within; and being answered
yes, and bade to enter, would take his station on a low stool at her
feet, and sit there patiently until they came to seek, and take him
home. Sure as the morning came, it found him lingering near the house
to ask if she were well; and, morning, noon, or night, go where she
would, he would forsake his playmates and his sports to bear her
company.
‘And a good little friend he is, too,’ said the old sexton to her once.
‘When his elder brother died--elder seems a strange word, for he was
only seven years old--I remember this one took it sorely to heart.’
The child thought of what the schoolmaster had told her, and felt how
its truth was shadowed out even in this infant.
‘It has given him something of a quiet way, I think,’ said the old man,
‘though for that he is merry enough at times. I’d wager now that you
and he have been listening by the old well.’
‘Indeed we have not,’ the child replied. ‘I have been afraid to go
near it; for I am not often down in that part of the church, and do not
know the ground.’
‘Come down with me,’ said the old man. ‘I have known it from a boy.
Come!’
They descended the narrow steps which led into the crypt, and paused
among the gloomy arches, in a dim and murky spot.
‘This is the place,’ said the old man. ‘Give me your hand while you
throw back the cover, lest you should stumble and fall in. I am too
old--I mean rheumatic--to stoop, myself.’
‘A black and dreadful place!’ exclaimed the child.
‘Look in,’ said the old man, pointing downward with his finger.
The child complied, and gazed down into the pit.
‘It looks like a grave itself,’ said the old man.
‘It does,’ replied the child.
‘I have often had the fancy,’ said the sexton, ‘that it might have been
dug at first to make the old place more gloomy, and the old monks more
religious. It’s to be closed up, and built over.’
The child still stood, looking thoughtfully into the vault.
‘We shall see,’ said the sexton, ‘on what gay heads other earth will
have closed, when the light is shut out from here. God knows! They’ll
close it up, next spring.’
‘The birds sing again in spring,’ thought the child, as she leaned at
her casement window, and gazed at the declining sun. ‘Spring! a
beautiful and happy time!’
CHAPTER 56
A day or two after the Quilp tea-party at the Wilderness, Mr Swiveller
walked into Sampson Brass’s office at the usual hour, and being alone
in that Temple of Probity, placed his hat upon the desk, and taking
from his pocket a small parcel of black crape, applied himself to
folding and pinning the same upon it, after the manner of a hatband.
Having completed the construction of this appendage, he surveyed his
work with great complacency, and put his hat on again--very much over
one eye, to increase the mournfulness of the effect. These
arrangements perfected to his entire satisfaction, he thrust his hands
into his pockets, and walked up and down the office with measured steps.
‘It has always been the same with me,’ said Mr Swiveller, ‘always.
‘Twas ever thus--from childhood’s hour I’ve seen my fondest hopes
decay, I never loved a tree or flower but ‘twas the first to fade away;
I never nursed a dear Gazelle, to glad me with its soft black eye, but
when it came to know me well, and love me, it was sure to marry a
market-gardener.’
Overpowered by these reflections, Mr Swiveller stopped short at the
clients’ chair, and flung himself into its open arms.
‘And this,’ said Mr Swiveller, with a kind of bantering composure, ‘is
life, I believe. Oh, certainly. Why not! I’m quite satisfied. I
shall wear,’ added Richard, taking off his hat again and looking hard
at it, as if he were only deterred by pecuniary considerations from
spurning it with his foot, ‘I shall wear this emblem of woman’s
perfidy, in remembrance of her with whom I shall never again thread the
windings of the mazy; whom I shall never more pledge in the rosy; who,
during the short remainder of my existence, will murder the balmy. Ha,
ha, ha!’
It may be necessary to observe, lest there should appear any
incongruity in the close of this soliloquy, that Mr Swiveller did not
wind up with a cheerful hilarious laugh, which would have been
undoubtedly at variance with his solemn reflections, but that, being in
a theatrical mood, he merely achieved that performance which is
designated in melodramas ‘laughing like a fiend,’--for it seems that
your fiends always laugh in syllables, and always in three syllables,
never more nor less, which is a remarkable property in such gentry, and
one worthy of remembrance.
The baleful sounds had hardly died away, and Mr Swiveller was still
sitting in a very grim state in the clients’ chair, when there came a
ring--or, if we may adapt the sound to his then humour, a knell--at
the office bell. Opening the door with all speed, he beheld the
expressive countenance of Mr Chuckster, between whom and himself a
fraternal greeting ensued.
‘You’re devilish early at this pestiferous old slaughter-house,’ said
that gentleman, poising himself on one leg, and shaking the other in an
easy manner.
‘Rather,’ returned Dick.
‘Rather!’ retorted Mr Chuckster, with that air of graceful trifling
which so well became him. ‘I should think so. Why, my good feller, do
you know what o’clock it is--half-past nine a.m. in the morning?’
‘Won’t you come in?’ said Dick. ‘All alone. Swiveller solus. “‘Tis
now the witching--“’
‘“Hour of night!”’
‘“When churchyards yawn,”’
‘“And graves give up their dead.”’
At the end of this quotation in dialogue, each gentleman struck an
attitude, and immediately subsiding into prose walked into the office.
Such morsels of enthusiasm are common among the Glorious Apollos, and
were indeed the links that bound them together, and raised them above
the cold dull earth.
‘Well, and how are you my buck?’ said Mr Chuckster, taking a stool. ‘I
was forced to come into the City upon some little private matters of my
own, and couldn’t pass the corner of the street without looking in, but
upon my soul I didn’t expect to find you. It is so everlastingly
early.’
Mr Swiveller expressed his acknowledgments; and it appearing on further
conversation that he was in good health, and that Mr Chuckster was in
the like enviable condition, both gentlemen, in compliance with a
solemn custom of the ancient Brotherhood to which they belonged, joined
in a fragment of the popular duet of ‘All’s Well,’ with a long shake
at the end.
‘And what’s the news?’ said Richard.
‘The town’s as flat, my dear feller,’ replied Mr Chuckster, ‘as the
surface of a Dutch oven. There’s no news. By-the-bye, that lodger of
yours is a most extraordinary person. He quite eludes the most
vigorous comprehension, you know. Never was such a feller!’
‘What has he been doing now?’ said Dick.
‘By Jove, Sir,’ returned Mr Chuckster, taking out an oblong snuff-box,
the lid whereof was ornamented with a fox’s head curiously carved in
brass, ‘that man is an unfathomable. Sir, that man has made friends
with our articled clerk. There’s no harm in him, but he is so
amazingly slow and soft. Now, if he wanted a friend, why couldn’t he
have one that knew a thing or two, and could do him some good by his
manners and conversation. I have my faults, sir,’ said Mr Chuckster--
‘No, no,’ interposed Mr Swiveller.
‘Oh yes I have, I have my faults, no man knows his faults better than I
know mine. But,’ said Mr Chuckster, ‘I’m not meek. My worst
enemies--every man has his enemies, Sir, and I have mine--never
accused me of being meek. And I tell you what, Sir, if I hadn’t more
of these qualities that commonly endear man to man, than our articled
clerk has, I’d steal a Cheshire cheese, tie it round my neck, and drown
myself. I’d die degraded, as I had lived. I would upon my honour.’
Mr Chuckster paused, rapped the fox’s head exactly on the nose with the
knuckle of the fore-finger, took a pinch of snuff, and looked steadily
at Mr Swiveller, as much as to say that if he thought he was going to
sneeze, he would find himself mistaken.
‘Not contented, Sir,’ said Mr Chuckster, ‘with making friends with
Abel, he has cultivated the acquaintance of his father and mother.
Since he came home from that wild-goose chase, he has been there--
actually been there. He patronises young Snobby besides; you’ll find,
Sir, that he’ll be constantly coming backwards and forwards to this
place: yet I don’t suppose that beyond the common forms of civility, he
has ever exchanged half-a-dozen words with me. Now, upon my soul, you
know,’ said Mr Chuckster, shaking his head gravely, as men are wont to
do when they consider things are going a little too far, ‘this is
altogether such a low-minded affair, that if I didn’t feel for the
governor, and know that he could never get on without me, I should be
obliged to cut the connection. I should have no alternative.’
Mr Swiveller, who sat on another stool opposite to his friend, stirred
the fire in an excess of sympathy, but said nothing.
‘As to young Snob, sir,’ pursued Mr Chuckster with a prophetic look,
‘you’ll find he’ll turn out bad. In our profession we know something
of human nature, and take my word for it, that the feller that came
back to work out that shilling, will show himself one of these days in
his true colours. He’s a low thief, sir. He must be.’
Mr Chuckster being roused, would probably have pursued this subject
further, and in more emphatic language, but for a tap at the door,
which seeming to announce the arrival of somebody on business, caused
him to assume a greater appearance of meekness than was perhaps quite
consistent with his late declaration. Mr Swiveller, hearing the same
sound, caused his stool to revolve rapidly on one leg until it brought
him to his desk, into which, having forgotten in the sudden flurry of
his spirits to part with the poker, he thrust it as he cried ‘Come in!’
Who should present himself but that very Kit who had been the theme of
Mr Chuckster’s wrath! Never did man pluck up his courage so quickly,
or look so fierce, as Mr Chuckster when he found it was he. Mr
Swiveller stared at him for a moment, and then leaping from his stool,
and drawing out the poker from its place of concealment, performed the
broad-sword exercise with all the cuts and guards complete, in a
species of frenzy.
‘Is the gentleman at home?’ said Kit, rather astonished by this
uncommon reception.
Before Mr Swiveller could make any reply, Mr Chuckster took occasion to
enter his indignant protest against this form of inquiry; which he held
to be of a disrespectful and snobbish tendency, inasmuch as the
inquirer, seeing two gentlemen then and there present, should have
spoken of the other gentleman; or rather (for it was not impossible
that the object of his search might be of inferior quality) should have
mentioned his name, leaving it to his hearers to determine his degree
as they thought proper. Mr Chuckster likewise remarked, that he had
some reason to believe this form of address was personal to himself,
and that he was not a man to be trifled with--as certain snobs (whom he
did not more particularly mention or describe) might find to their cost.
‘I mean the gentleman up-stairs,’ said Kit, turning to Richard
Swiveller. ‘Is he at home?’
‘Why?’ rejoined Dick.
‘Because if he is, I have a letter for him.’
‘From whom?’ said Dick.
‘From Mr Garland.’
‘Oh!’ said Dick, with extreme politeness. ‘Then you may hand it over,
Sir. And if you’re to wait for an answer, Sir, you may wait in the
passage, Sir, which is an airy and well-ventilated apartment, sir.’
‘Thank you,’ returned Kit. ‘But I am to give it to himself, if you
please.’
The excessive audacity of this retort so overpowered Mr Chuckster, and
so moved his tender regard for his friend’s honour, that he declared,
if he were not restrained by official considerations, he must certainly
have annihilated Kit upon the spot; a resentment of the affront which
he did consider, under the extraordinary circumstances of aggravation
attending it, could but have met with the proper sanction and approval
of a jury of Englishmen, who, he had no doubt, would have returned a
verdict of justifiable Homicide, coupled with a high testimony to the
morals and character of the Avenger. Mr Swiveller, without being quite
so hot upon the matter, was rather shamed by his friend’s excitement,
and not a little puzzled how to act (Kit being quite cool and
good-humoured), when the single gentleman was heard to call violently
down the stairs.
‘Didn’t I see somebody for me, come in?’ cried the lodger.
‘Yes, Sir,’ replied Dick. ‘Certainly, Sir.’
‘Then where is he?’ roared the single gentleman.
‘He’s here, sir,’ rejoined Mr Swiveller. ‘Now young man, don’t you
hear you’re to go up-stairs? Are you deaf?’
Kit did not appear to think it worth his while to enter into any
altercation, but hurried off and left the Glorious Apollos gazing at
each other in silence.
‘Didn’t I tell you so?’ said Mr Chuckster. ‘What do you think of that?’
Mr Swiveller being in the main a good-natured fellow, and not
perceiving in the conduct of Kit any villany of enormous magnitude,
scarcely knew what answer to return. He was relieved from his
perplexity, however, by the entrance of Mr Sampson and his sister,
Sally, at sight of whom Mr Chuckster precipitately retired.
Mr Brass and his lovely companion appeared to have been holding a
consultation over their temperate breakfast, upon some matter of great
interest and importance. On the occasion of such conferences, they
generally appeared in the office some half an hour after their usual
time, and in a very smiling state, as though their late plots and
designs had tranquillised their minds and shed a light upon their
toilsome way. In the present instance, they seemed particularly gay;
Miss Sally’s aspect being of a most oily kind, and Mr Brass rubbing his
hands in an exceedingly jocose and light-hearted manner.
‘Well, Mr Richard,’ said Brass. ‘How are we this morning? Are we
pretty fresh and cheerful sir--eh, Mr Richard?’
‘Pretty well, sir,’ replied Dick.
‘That’s well,’ said Brass. ‘Ha ha! We should be as gay as larks, Mr
Richard--why not? It’s a pleasant world we live in sir, a very
pleasant world. There are bad people in it, Mr Richard, but if there
were no bad people, there would be no good lawyers. Ha ha! Any
letters by the post this morning, Mr Richard?’
Mr Swiveller answered in the negative.
‘Ha!’ said Brass, ‘no matter. If there’s little business to-day,
there’ll be more to-morrow. A contented spirit, Mr Richard, is the
sweetness of existence. Anybody been here, sir?’
‘Only my friend’--replied Dick. ‘May we ne’er want a--’
‘Friend,’ Brass chimed in quickly, ‘or a bottle to give him. Ha ha!
That’s the way the song runs, isn’t it? A very good song, Mr Richard,
very good. I like the sentiment of it. Ha ha! Your friend’s the
young man from Witherden’s office I think--yes--May we ne’er want a--
Nobody else at all, been, Mr Richard?’
‘Only somebody to the lodger,’ replied Mr Swiveller.
‘Oh indeed!’ cried Brass. ‘Somebody to the lodger eh? Ha ha! May we
ne’er want a friend, or a---- Somebody to the lodger, eh, Mr Richard?’
‘Yes,’ said Dick, a little disconcerted by the excessive buoyancy of
spirits which his employer displayed. ‘With him now.’
‘With him now!’ cried Brass; ‘Ha ha! There let ‘em be, merry and free,
toor rul lol le. Eh, Mr Richard? Ha ha!’
‘Oh certainly,’ replied Dick.
‘And who,’ said Brass, shuffling among his papers, ‘who is the lodger’s
visitor--not a lady visitor, I hope, eh, Mr Richard? The morals of the
Marks you know, sir--“when lovely women stoops to folly”--and all
that--eh, Mr Richard?’
‘Another young man, who belongs to Witherden’s too, or half belongs
there,’ returned Richard. ‘Kit, they call him.’
‘Kit, eh!’ said Brass. ‘Strange name--name of a dancing-master’s
fiddle, eh, Mr Richard? Ha ha! Kit’s there, is he? Oh!’
Dick looked at Miss Sally, wondering that she didn’t check this
uncommon exuberance on the part of Mr Sampson; but as she made no
attempt to do so, and rather appeared to exhibit a tacit acquiescence
in it, he concluded that they had just been cheating somebody, and
receiving the bill.
‘Will you have the goodness, Mr Richard,’ said Brass, taking a letter
from his desk, ‘just to step over to Peckham Rye with that? There’s no
answer, but it’s rather particular and should go by hand. Charge the
office with your coach-hire back, you know; don’t spare the office; get
as much out of it as you can--clerk’s motto--Eh, Mr Richard? Ha ha!’
Mr Swiveller solemnly doffed the aquatic jacket, put on his coat, took
down his hat from its peg, pocketed the letter, and departed. As soon
as he was gone, up rose Miss Sally Brass, and smiling sweetly at her
brother (who nodded and smote his nose in return) withdrew also.
Sampson Brass was no sooner left alone, than he set the office-door
wide open, and establishing himself at his desk directly opposite, so
that he could not fail to see anybody who came down-stairs and passed
out at the street door, began to write with extreme cheerfulness and
assiduity; humming as he did so, in a voice that was anything but
musical, certain vocal snatches which appeared to have reference to the
union between Church and State, inasmuch as they were compounded of the
Evening Hymn and God save the King.
Thus, the attorney of Bevis Marks sat, and wrote, and hummed, for a
long time, except when he stopped to listen with a very cunning face,
and hearing nothing, went on humming louder, and writing slower than
ever. At length, in one of these pauses, he heard his lodger’s door
opened and shut, and footsteps coming down the stairs. Then, Mr Brass
left off writing entirely, and, with his pen in his hand, hummed his
very loudest; shaking his head meanwhile from side to side, like a man
whose whole soul was in the music, and smiling in a manner quite
seraphic.
It was towards this moving spectacle that the staircase and the sweet
sounds guided Kit; on whose arrival before his door, Mr Brass stopped
his singing, but not his smiling, and nodded affably: at the same time
beckoning to him with his pen.
‘Kit,’ said Mr Brass, in the pleasantest way imaginable, ‘how do you
do?’
Kit, being rather shy of his friend, made a suitable reply, and had his
hand upon the lock of the street door when Mr Brass called him softly
back.
‘You are not to go, if you please, Kit,’ said the attorney in a
mysterious and yet business-like way. ‘You are to step in here, if you
please. Dear me, dear me! When I look at you,’ said the lawyer,
quitting his stool, and standing before the fire with his back towards
it, ‘I am reminded of the sweetest little face that ever my eyes
beheld. I remember your coming there, twice or thrice, when we were in
possession. Ah Kit, my dear fellow, gentleman in my profession have
such painful duties to perform sometimes, that you needn’t envy us--you
needn’t indeed!’
‘I don’t, sir,’ said Kit, ‘though it isn’t for the like of me to judge.’
‘Our only consolation, Kit,’ pursued the lawyer, looking at him in a
sort of pensive abstraction, ‘is, that although we cannot turn away the
wind, we can soften it; we can temper it, if I may say so, to the shorn
lambs.’
‘Shorn indeed!’ thought Kit. ‘Pretty close!’ But he didn’t say _so_.
‘On that occasion, Kit,’ said Mr Brass, ‘on that occasion that I have
just alluded to, I had a hard battle with Mr Quilp (for Mr Quilp is a
very hard man) to obtain them the indulgence they had. It might have
cost me a client. But suffering virtue inspired me, and I prevailed.’
‘He’s not so bad after all,’ thought honest Kit, as the attorney pursed
up his lips and looked like a man who was struggling with his better
feelings.
‘I respect you, Kit,’ said Brass with emotion. ‘I saw enough of your
conduct, at that time, to respect you, though your station is humble,
and your fortune lowly. It isn’t the waistcoat that I look at. It is
the heart. The checks in the waistcoat are but the wires of the cage.
But the heart is the bird. Ah! How many sich birds are perpetually
moulting, and putting their beaks through the wires to peck at all
mankind!’
This poetic figure, which Kit took to be in a special allusion to his
own checked waistcoat, quite overcame him; Mr Brass’s voice and manner
added not a little to its effect, for he discoursed with all the mild
austerity of a hermit, and wanted but a cord round the waist of his
rusty surtout, and a skull on the chimney-piece, to be completely set
up in that line of business.
‘Well, well,’ said Sampson, smiling as good men smile when they
compassionate their own weakness or that of their fellow-creatures,
‘this is wide of the bull’s-eye. You’re to take that, if you please.’
As he spoke, he pointed to a couple of half-crowns on the desk.
Kit looked at the coins, and then at Sampson, and hesitated.
‘For yourself,’ said Brass. ‘From--’
‘No matter about the person they came from,’ replied the lawyer. ‘Say
me, if you like. We have eccentric friends overhead, Kit, and we
mustn’t ask questions or talk too much--you understand? You’re to take
them, that’s all; and between you and me, I don’t think they’ll be the
last you’ll have to take from the same place. I hope not. Good bye,
Kit. Good bye!’
With many thanks, and many more self-reproaches for having on such
slight grounds suspected one who in their very first conversation
turned out such a different man from what he had supposed, Kit took the
money and made the best of his way home. Mr Brass remained airing
himself at the fire, and resumed his vocal exercise, and his seraphic
smile, simultaneously.
‘May I come in?’ said Miss Sally, peeping.
‘Oh yes, you may come in,’ returned her brother.
‘Ahem!’ coughed Miss Brass interrogatively.
‘Why, yes,’ returned Sampson, ‘I should say as good as done.’
CHAPTER 57
Mr Chuckster’s indignant apprehensions were not without foundation.
Certainly the friendship between the single gentleman and Mr Garland
was not suffered to cool, but had a rapid growth and flourished
exceedingly. They were soon in habits of constant intercourse and
communication; and the single gentleman labouring at this time under a
slight attack of illness--the consequence most probably of his late
excited feelings and subsequent disappointment--furnished a reason for
their holding yet more frequent correspondence; so that some one of the
inmates of Abel Cottage, Finchley, came backwards and forwards between
that place and Bevis Marks, almost every day.
As the pony had now thrown off all disguise, and without any mincing of
the matter or beating about the bush, sturdily refused to be driven by
anybody but Kit, it generally happened that whether old Mr Garland
came, or Mr Abel, Kit was of the party. Of all messages and inquiries,
Kit was, in right of his position, the bearer; thus it came about that,
while the single gentleman remained indisposed, Kit turned into Bevis
Marks every morning with nearly as much regularity as the General
Postman.
Mr Sampson Brass, who no doubt had his reasons for looking sharply
about him, soon learnt to distinguish the pony’s trot and the clatter
of the little chaise at the corner of the street. Whenever the sound
reached his ears, he would immediately lay down his pen and fall to
rubbing his hands and exhibiting the greatest glee.
‘Ha ha!’ he would cry. ‘Here’s the pony again! Most remarkable pony,
extremely docile, eh, Mr Richard, eh sir?’
Dick would return some matter-of-course reply, and Mr Brass standing on
the bottom rail of his stool, so as to get a view of the street over
the top of the window-blind, would take an observation of the visitors.
‘The old gentleman again!’ he would exclaim, ‘a very prepossessing old
gentleman, Mr Richard--charming countenance, sir--extremely
calm--benevolence in every feature, sir. He quite realises my idea of
King Lear, as he appeared when in possession of his kingdom, Mr
Richard--the same good humour, the same white hair and partial
baldness, the same liability to be imposed upon. Ah! A sweet subject
for contemplation, sir, very sweet!’
Then Mr Garland having alighted and gone up-stairs, Sampson would nod
and smile to Kit from the window, and presently walk out into the
street to greet him, when some such conversation as the following would
ensue.
‘Admirably groomed, Kit’--Mr Brass is patting the pony--‘does you great
credit--amazingly sleek and bright to be sure. He literally looks as
if he had been varnished all over.’
Kit touches his hat, smiles, pats the pony himself, and expresses his
conviction, ‘that Mr Brass will not find many like him.’
‘A beautiful animal indeed!’ cries Brass. ‘Sagacious too?’
‘Bless you!’ replies Kit, ‘he knows what you say to him as well as a
Christian does.’
‘Does he indeed!’ cries Brass, who has heard the same thing in the same
place from the same person in the same words a dozen times, but is
paralysed with astonishment notwithstanding. ‘Dear me!’
‘I little thought the first time I saw him, Sir,’ says Kit, pleased
with the attorney’s strong interest in his favourite, ‘that I should
come to be as intimate with him as I am now.’
‘Ah!’ rejoins Mr Brass, brim-full of moral precepts and love of virtue.
‘A charming subject of reflection for you, very charming. A subject of
proper pride and congratulation, Christopher. Honesty is the best
policy.--I always find it so myself. I lost forty-seven pound ten by
being honest this morning. But it’s all gain, it’s gain!’
Mr Brass slyly tickles his nose with his pen, and looks at Kit with the
water standing in his eyes. Kit thinks that if ever there was a good
man who belied his appearance, that man is Sampson Brass.
‘A man,’ says Sampson, ‘who loses forty-seven pound ten in one morning
by his honesty, is a man to be envied. If it had been eighty pound,
the luxuriousness of feeling would have been increased. Every pound
lost, would have been a hundredweight of happiness gained. The still
small voice, Christopher,’ cries Brass, smiling, and tapping himself on
the bosom, ‘is a-singing comic songs within me, and all is happiness
and joy!’
Kit is so improved by the conversation, and finds it go so completely
home to his feelings, that he is considering what he shall say, when Mr
Garland appears. The old gentleman is helped into the chaise with
great obsequiousness by Mr Sampson Brass; and the pony, after shaking
his head several times, and standing for three or four minutes with all
his four legs planted firmly on the ground, as if he had made up his
mind never to stir from that spot, but there to live and die, suddenly
darts off, without the smallest notice, at the rate of twelve English
miles an hour. Then, Mr Brass and his sister (who has joined him at
the door) exchange an odd kind of smile--not at all a pleasant one in
its expression--and return to the society of Mr Richard Swiveller,
who, during their absence, has been regaling himself with various feats
of pantomime, and is discovered at his desk, in a very flushed and
heated condition, violently scratching out nothing with half a penknife.
Whenever Kit came alone, and without the chaise, it always happened
that Sampson Brass was reminded of some mission, calling Mr Swiveller,
if not to Peckham Rye again, at all events to some pretty distant place
from which he could not be expected to return for two or three hours,
or in all probability a much longer period, as that gentleman was not,
to say the truth, renowned for using great expedition on such
occasions, but rather for protracting and spinning out the time to the
very utmost limit of possibility. Mr Swiveller out of sight, Miss
Sally immediately withdrew. Mr Brass would then set the office-door
wide open, hum his old tune with great gaiety of heart, and smile
seraphically as before. Kit coming down-stairs would be called in;
entertained with some moral and agreeable conversation; perhaps
entreated to mind the office for an instant while Mr Brass stepped over
the way; and afterwards presented with one or two half-crowns as the
case might be. This occurred so often, that Kit, nothing doubting but
that they came from the single gentleman who had already rewarded his
mother with great liberality, could not enough admire his generosity;
and bought so many cheap presents for her, and for little Jacob, and
for the baby, and for Barbara to boot, that one or other of them was
having some new trifle every day of their lives.
While these acts and deeds were in progress in and out of the office of
Sampson Brass, Richard Swiveller, being often left alone therein, began
to find the time hang heavy on his hands. For the better preservation
of his cheerfulness therefore, and to prevent his faculties from
rusting, he provided himself with a cribbage-board and pack of cards,
and accustomed himself to play at cribbage with a dummy, for twenty,
thirty, or sometimes even fifty thousand pounds aside, besides many
hazardous bets to a considerable amount.
As these games were very silently conducted, notwithstanding the
magnitude of the interests involved, Mr Swiveller began to think that
on those evenings when Mr and Miss Brass were out (and they often went
out now) he heard a kind of snorting or hard-breathing sound in the
direction of the door, which it occurred to him, after some reflection,
must proceed from the small servant, who always had a cold from damp
living. Looking intently that way one night, he plainly distinguished
an eye gleaming and glistening at the keyhole; and having now no doubt
that his suspicions were correct, he stole softly to the door, and
pounced upon her before she was aware of his approach.
‘Oh! I didn’t mean any harm indeed, upon my word I didn’t,’ cried the
small servant, struggling like a much larger one. ‘It’s so very dull,
down-stairs, Please don’t you tell upon me, please don’t.’
‘Tell upon you!’ said Dick. ‘Do you mean to say you were looking
through the keyhole for company?’
‘Yes, upon my word I was,’ replied the small servant.
‘How long have you been cooling your eye there?’ said Dick.
‘Oh ever since you first began to play them cards, and long before.’
Vague recollections of several fantastic exercises with which he had
refreshed himself after the fatigues of business, and to all of which,
no doubt, the small servant was a party, rather disconcerted Mr
Swiveller; but he was not very sensitive on such points, and recovered
himself speedily.
‘Well--come in’--he said, after a little consideration. ‘Here--sit
down, and I’ll teach you how to play.’
‘Oh! I durstn’t do it,’ rejoined the small servant; ‘Miss Sally ‘ud
kill me, if she know’d I come up here.’
‘Have you got a fire down-stairs?’ said Dick.
‘A very little one,’ replied the small servant.
‘Miss Sally couldn’t kill me if she know’d I went down there, so I’ll
come,’ said Richard, putting the cards into his pocket. ‘Why, how thin
you are! What do you mean by it?’
‘It ain’t my fault.’
‘Could you eat any bread and meat?’ said Dick, taking down his hat.
‘Yes? Ah! I thought so. Did you ever taste beer?’
‘I had a sip of it once,’ said the small servant.
‘Here’s a state of things!’ cried Mr Swiveller, raising his eyes to the
ceiling. ‘She never tasted it--it can’t be tasted in a sip! Why, how
old are you?’
‘I don’t know.’
Mr Swiveller opened his eyes very wide, and appeared thoughtful for a
moment; then, bidding the child mind the door until he came back,
vanished straightway.
Presently, he returned, followed by the boy from the public-house, who
bore in one hand a plate of bread and beef, and in the other a great
pot, filled with some very fragrant compound, which sent forth a
grateful steam, and was indeed choice purl, made after a particular
recipe which Mr Swiveller had imparted to the landlord, at a period
when he was deep in his books and desirous to conciliate his
friendship. Relieving the boy of his burden at the door, and charging
his little companion to fasten it to prevent surprise, Mr Swiveller
followed her into the kitchen.
‘There!’ said Richard, putting the plate before her. ‘First of all
clear that off, and then you’ll see what’s next.’
The small servant needed no second bidding, and the plate was soon
empty.
‘Next,’ said Dick, handing the purl, ‘take a pull at that; but moderate
your transports, you know, for you’re not used to it. Well, is it
good?’
‘Oh! isn’t it?’ said the small servant.
Mr Swiveller appeared gratified beyond all expression by this reply,
and took a long draught himself, steadfastly regarding his companion
while he did so. These preliminaries disposed of, he applied himself
to teaching her the game, which she soon learnt tolerably well, being
both sharp-witted and cunning.
‘Now,’ said Mr Swiveller, putting two sixpences into a saucer, and
trimming the wretched candle, when the cards had been cut and dealt,
‘those are the stakes. If you win, you get ‘em all. If I win, I get
‘em. To make it seem more real and pleasant, I shall call you the
Marchioness, do you hear?’
The small servant nodded.
‘Then, Marchioness,’ said Mr Swiveller, ‘fire away!’
The Marchioness, holding her cards very tight in both hands, considered
which to play, and Mr Swiveller, assuming the gay and fashionable air
which such society required, took another pull at the tankard, and
waited for her lead.
CHAPTER 58
Mr Swiveller and his partner played several rubbers with varying
success, until the loss of three sixpences, the gradual sinking of the
purl, and the striking of ten o’clock, combined to render that
gentleman mindful of the flight of Time, and the expediency of
withdrawing before Mr Sampson and Miss Sally Brass returned.
‘With which object in view, Marchioness,’ said Mr Swiveller gravely, ‘I
shall ask your ladyship’s permission to put the board in my pocket, and
to retire from the presence when I have finished this tankard; merely
observing, Marchioness, that since life like a river is flowing, I care
not how fast it rolls on, ma’am, on, while such purl on the bank still
is growing, and such eyes light the waves as they run. Marchioness,
your health. You will excuse my wearing my hat, but the palace is
damp, and the marble floor is--if I may be allowed the
expression--sloppy.’
As a precaution against this latter inconvenience, Mr Swiveller had
been sitting for some time with his feet on the hob, in which attitude
he now gave utterance to these apologetic observations, and slowly
sipped the last choice drops of nectar.
‘The Baron Sampsono Brasso and his fair sister are (you tell me) at the
Play?’ said Mr Swiveller, leaning his left arm heavily upon the table,
and raising his voice and his right leg after the manner of a
theatrical bandit.
The Marchioness nodded.
‘Ha!’ said Mr Swiveller, with a portentous frown. ‘’Tis well.
Marchioness!--but no matter. Some wine there. Ho!’ He illustrated
these melodramatic morsels by handing the tankard to himself with great
humility, receiving it haughtily, drinking from it thirstily, and
smacking his lips fiercely.
The small servant, who was not so well acquainted with theatrical
conventionalities as Mr Swiveller (having indeed never seen a play, or
heard one spoken of, except by chance through chinks of doors and in
other forbidden places), was rather alarmed by demonstrations so novel
in their nature, and showed her concern so plainly in her looks, that
Mr Swiveller felt it necessary to discharge his brigand manner for one
more suitable to private life, as he asked,
‘Do they often go where glory waits ‘em, and leave you here?’
‘Oh, yes; I believe you they do,’ returned the small servant. ‘Miss
Sally’s such a one-er for that, she is.’
‘Such a what?’ said Dick.
‘Such a one-er,’ returned the Marchioness.
After a moment’s reflection, Mr Swiveller determined to forego his
responsible duty of setting her right, and to suffer her to talk on; as
it was evident that her tongue was loosened by the purl, and her
opportunities for conversation were not so frequent as to render a
momentary check of little consequence.
‘They sometimes go to see Mr Quilp,’ said the small servant with a
shrewd look; ‘they go to a many places, bless you!’
‘Is Mr Brass a wunner?’ said Dick.
‘Not half what Miss Sally is, he isn’t,’ replied the small servant,
shaking her head. ‘Bless you, he’d never do anything without her.’
‘Oh! He wouldn’t, wouldn’t he?’ said Dick.
‘Miss Sally keeps him in such order,’ said the small servant; ‘he
always asks her advice, he does; and he catches it sometimes. Bless
you, you wouldn’t believe how much he catches it.’
‘I suppose,’ said Dick, ‘that they consult together, a good deal, and
talk about a great many people--about me for instance, sometimes, eh,
Marchioness?’
The Marchioness nodded amazingly.
‘Complimentary?’ said Mr Swiveller.
The Marchioness changed the motion of her head, which had not yet left
off nodding, and suddenly began to shake it from side to side, with a
vehemence which threatened to dislocate her neck.
‘Humph!’ Dick muttered. ‘Would it be any breach of confidence,
Marchioness, to relate what they say of the humble individual who has
now the honour to--?’
‘Miss Sally says you’re a funny chap,’ replied his friend.
‘Well, Marchioness,’ said Mr Swiveller, ‘that’s not uncomplimentary.
Merriment, Marchioness, is not a bad or a degrading quality. Old King
Cole was himself a merry old soul, if we may put any faith in the pages
of history.’
‘But she says,’ pursued his companion, ‘that you an’t to be trusted.’
‘Why, really Marchioness,’ said Mr Swiveller, thoughtfully; ‘several
ladies and gentlemen--not exactly professional persons, but
tradespeople, ma’am, tradespeople--have made the same remark. The
obscure citizen who keeps the hotel over the way, inclined strongly to
that opinion to-night when I ordered him to prepare the banquet. It’s
a popular prejudice, Marchioness; and yet I am sure I don’t know why,
for I have been trusted in my time to a considerable amount, and I can
safely say that I never forsook my trust until it deserted me--never.
Mr Brass is of the same opinion, I suppose?’
His friend nodded again, with a cunning look which seemed to hint that
Mr Brass held stronger opinions on the subject than his sister; and
seeming to recollect herself, added imploringly, ‘But don’t you ever
tell upon me, or I shall be beat to death.’
‘Marchioness,’ said Mr Swiveller, rising, ‘the word of a gentleman is
as good as his bond--sometimes better, as in the present case, where
his bond might prove but a doubtful sort of security. I am your
friend, and I hope we shall play many more rubbers together in this
same saloon. But, Marchioness,’ added Richard, stopping in his way to
the door, and wheeling slowly round upon the small servant, who was
following with the candle; ‘it occurs to me that you must be in the
constant habit of airing your eye at keyholes, to know all this.’
‘I only wanted,’ replied the trembling Marchioness, ‘to know where the
key of the safe was hid; that was all; and I wouldn’t have taken much,
if I had found it--only enough to squench my hunger.’
‘You didn’t find it then?’ said Dick. ‘But of course you didn’t, or
you’d be plumper. Good night, Marchioness. Fare thee well, and if for
ever, then for ever fare thee well--and put up the chain, Marchioness,
in case of accidents.’
With this parting injunction, Mr Swiveller emerged from the house; and
feeling that he had by this time taken quite as much to drink as
promised to be good for his constitution (purl being a rather strong
and heady compound), wisely resolved to betake himself to his lodgings,
and to bed at once. Homeward he went therefore; and his apartments
(for he still retained the plural fiction) being at no great distance
from the office, he was soon seated in his own bed-chamber, where,
having pulled off one boot and forgotten the other, he fell into deep
cogitation.
‘This Marchioness,’ said Mr Swiveller, folding his arms, ‘is a very
extraordinary person--surrounded by mysteries, ignorant of the taste of
beer, unacquainted with her own name (which is less remarkable), and
taking a limited view of society through the keyholes of doors--can
these things be her destiny, or has some unknown person started an
opposition to the decrees of fate? It is a most inscrutable and
unmitigated staggerer!’
When his meditations had attained this satisfactory point, he became
aware of his remaining boot, of which, with unimpaired solemnity he
proceeded to divest himself; shaking his head with exceeding gravity
all the time, and sighing deeply.
‘These rubbers,’ said Mr Swiveller, putting on his nightcap in exactly
the same style as he wore his hat, ‘remind me of the matrimonial
fireside. Cheggs’s wife plays cribbage; all-fours likewise. She rings
the changes on ‘em now. From sport to sport they hurry her to banish
her regrets, and when they win a smile from her, they think that she
forgets--but she don’t. By this time, I should say,’ added Richard,
getting his left cheek into profile, and looking complacently at the
reflection of a very little scrap of whisker in the looking-glass; ‘by
this time, I should say, the iron has entered into her soul. It serves
her right!’
Melting from this stern and obdurate, into the tender and pathetic
mood, Mr Swiveller groaned a little, walked wildly up and down, and
even made a show of tearing his hair, which, however, he thought better
of, and wrenched the tassel from his nightcap instead. At last,
undressing himself with a gloomy resolution, he got into bed.
Some men in his blighted position would have taken to drinking; but as
Mr Swiveller had taken to that before, he only took, on receiving the
news that Sophy Wackles was lost to him for ever, to playing the flute;
thinking after mature consideration that it was a good, sound, dismal
occupation, not only in unison with his own sad thoughts, but
calculated to awaken a fellow-feeling in the bosoms of his neighbours.
In pursuance of this resolution, he now drew a little table to his
bedside, and arranging the light and a small oblong music-book to the
best advantage, took his flute from its box, and began to play most
mournfully.
The air was ‘Away with melancholy’--a composition, which, when it is
played very slowly on the flute, in bed, with the further disadvantage
of being performed by a gentleman but imperfectly acquainted with the
instrument, who repeats one note a great many times before he can find
the next, has not a lively effect. Yet, for half the night, or more,
Mr Swiveller, lying sometimes on his back with his eyes upon the
ceiling, and sometimes half out of bed to correct himself by the book,
played this unhappy tune over and over again; never leaving off, save
for a minute or two at a time to take breath and soliloquise about the
Marchioness, and then beginning again with renewed vigour. It was not
until he had quite exhausted his several subjects of meditation, and
had breathed into the flute the whole sentiment of the purl down to its
very dregs, and had nearly maddened the people of the house, and at
both the next doors, and over the way--that he shut up the music-book,
extinguished the candle, and finding himself greatly lightened and
relieved in his mind, turned round and fell asleep.
He awoke in the morning, much refreshed; and having taken half an
hour’s exercise at the flute, and graciously received a notice to quit
from his landlady, who had been in waiting on the stairs for that
purpose since the dawn of day, repaired to Bevis Marks; where the
beautiful Sally was already at her post, bearing in her looks a
radiance, mild as that which beameth from the virgin moon.
Mr Swiveller acknowledged her presence by a nod, and exchanged his coat
for the aquatic jacket; which usually took some time fitting on, for in
consequence of a tightness in the sleeves, it was only to be got into
by a series of struggles. This difficulty overcome, he took his seat
at the desk.
‘I say’--quoth Miss Brass, abruptly breaking silence, ‘you haven’t seen
a silver pencil-case this morning, have you?’
‘I didn’t meet many in the street,’ rejoined Mr Swiveller. ‘I saw
one--a stout pencil-case of respectable appearance--but as he was in
company with an elderly penknife, and a young toothpick with whom he
was in earnest conversation, I felt a delicacy in speaking to him.’
‘No, but have you?’ returned Miss Brass. ‘Seriously, you know.’
‘What a dull dog you must be to ask me such a question seriously,’ said
Mr Swiveller. ‘Haven’t I this moment come?’
‘Well, all I know is,’ replied Miss Sally, ‘that it’s not to be found,
and that it disappeared one day this week, when I left it on the desk.’
‘Halloa!’ thought Richard, ‘I hope the Marchioness hasn’t been at work
here.’
‘There was a knife too,’ said Miss Sally, ‘of the same pattern. They
were given to me by my father, years ago, and are both gone. You
haven’t missed anything yourself, have you?’
Mr Swiveller involuntarily clapped his hands to the jacket to be quite
sure that it WAS a jacket and not a skirted coat; and having satisfied
himself of the safety of this, his only moveable in Bevis Marks, made
answer in the negative.
‘It’s a very unpleasant thing, Dick,’ said Miss Brass, pulling out the
tin box and refreshing herself with a pinch of snuff; ‘but between you
and me--between friends you know, for if Sammy knew it, I should never
hear the last of it--some of the office-money, too, that has been left
about, has gone in the same way. In particular, I have missed three
half-crowns at three different times.’
‘You don’t mean that?’ cried Dick. ‘Be careful what you say, old boy,
for this is a serious matter. Are you quite sure? Is there no
mistake?’
‘It is so, and there can’t be any mistake at all,’ rejoined Miss Brass
emphatically.
‘Then by Jove,’ thought Richard, laying down his pen, ‘I am afraid the
Marchioness is done for!’
The more he discussed the subject in his thoughts, the more probable it
appeared to Dick that the miserable little servant was the culprit.
When he considered on what a spare allowance of food she lived, how
neglected and untaught she was, and how her natural cunning had been
sharpened by necessity and privation, he scarcely doubted it. And yet
he pitied her so much, and felt so unwilling to have a matter of such
gravity disturbing the oddity of their acquaintance, that he thought,
and thought truly, that rather than receive fifty pounds down, he would
have the Marchioness proved innocent.
While he was plunged in very profound and serious meditation upon this
theme, Miss Sally sat shaking her head with an air of great mystery and
doubt; when the voice of her brother Sampson, carolling a cheerful
strain, was heard in the passage, and that gentleman himself, beaming
with virtuous smiles, appeared.
‘Mr Richard, sir, good morning! Here we are again, sir, entering upon
another day, with our bodies strengthened by slumber and breakfast, and
our spirits fresh and flowing. Here we are, Mr Richard, rising with
the sun to run our little course--our course of duty, sir--and, like
him, to get through our day’s work with credit to ourselves and
advantage to our fellow-creatures. A charming reflection sir, very
charming!’
While he addressed his clerk in these words, Mr Brass was, somewhat
ostentatiously, engaged in minutely examining and holding up against
the light a five-pound bank note, which he had brought in, in his hand.
Mr Richard not receiving his remarks with anything like enthusiasm, his
employer turned his eyes to his face, and observed that it wore a
troubled expression.
‘You’re out of spirits, sir,’ said Brass. ‘Mr Richard, sir, we should
fall to work cheerfully, and not in a despondent state. It becomes us,
Mr Richard, sir, to--’
Here the chaste Sarah heaved a loud sigh.
‘Dear me!’ said Mr Sampson, ‘you too! Is anything the matter? Mr
Richard, sir--’
Dick, glancing at Miss Sally, saw that she was making signals to him,
to acquaint her brother with the subject of their recent conversation.
As his own position was not a very pleasant one until the matter was
set at rest one way or other, he did so; and Miss Brass, plying her
snuff-box at a most wasteful rate, corroborated his account.
The countenance of Sampson fell, and anxiety overspread his features.
Instead of passionately bewailing the loss of his money, as Miss Sally
had expected, he walked on tiptoe to the door, opened it, looked
outside, shut it softly, returned on tiptoe, and said in a whisper,
‘This is a most extraordinary and painful circumstance--Mr Richard,
sir, a most painful circumstance. The fact is, that I myself have
missed several small sums from the desk, of late, and have refrained
from mentioning it, hoping that accident would discover the offender;
but it has not done so--it has not done so. Sally--Mr Richard,
sir--this is a particularly distressing affair!’
As Sampson spoke, he laid the bank-note upon the desk among some
papers, in an absent manner, and thrust his hands into his pockets.
Richard Swiveller pointed to it, and admonished him to take it up.
‘No, Mr Richard, sir,’ rejoined Brass with emotion, ‘I will not take it
up. I will let it lie there, sir. To take it up, Mr Richard, sir,
would imply a doubt of you; and in you, sir, I have unlimited
confidence. We will let it lie there, Sir, if you please, and we will
not take it up by any means.’ With that, Mr Brass patted him twice or
thrice on the shoulder, in a most friendly manner, and entreated him to
believe that he had as much faith in his honesty as he had in his own.
Although at another time Mr Swiveller might have looked upon this as a
doubtful compliment, he felt it, under the then-existing circumstances,
a great relief to be assured that he was not wrongfully suspected.
When he had made a suitable reply, Mr Brass wrung him by the hand, and
fell into a brown study, as did Miss Sally likewise. Richard too
remained in a thoughtful state; fearing every moment to hear the
Marchioness impeached, and unable to resist the conviction that she
must be guilty.
When they had severally remained in this condition for some minutes,
Miss Sally all at once gave a loud rap upon the desk with her clenched
fist, and cried, ‘I’ve hit it!’--as indeed she had, and chipped a piece
out of it too; but that was not her meaning.
‘Well,’ cried Brass anxiously. ‘Go on, will you!’
‘Why,’ replied his sister with an air of triumph, ‘hasn’t there been
somebody always coming in and out of this office for the last three or
four weeks; hasn’t that somebody been left alone in it
sometimes--thanks to you; and do you mean to tell me that that somebody
isn’t the thief!’
‘What somebody?’ blustered Brass.
‘Why, what do you call him--Kit.’
‘Mr Garland’s young man?’
‘To be sure.’
‘Never!’ cried Brass. ‘Never. I’ll not hear of it. Don’t tell
me’--said Sampson, shaking his head, and working with both his hands as
if he were clearing away ten thousand cobwebs. ‘I’ll never believe it
of him. Never!’
‘I say,’ repeated Miss Brass, taking another pinch of snuff, ‘that he’s
the thief.’
‘I say,’ returned Sampson violently, ‘that he is not. What do you
mean? How dare you? Are characters to be whispered away like this?
Do you know that he’s the honestest and faithfullest fellow that ever
lived, and that he has an irreproachable good name? Come in, come in!’
These last words were not addressed to Miss Sally, though they partook
of the tone in which the indignant remonstrances that preceded them had
been uttered. They were addressed to some person who had knocked at
the office-door; and they had hardly passed the lips of Mr Brass, when
this very Kit himself looked in.
‘Is the gentleman up-stairs, sir, if you please?’
‘Yes, Kit,’ said Brass, still fired with an honest indignation, and
frowning with knotted brows upon his sister; ‘Yes Kit, he is. I am
glad to see you Kit, I am rejoiced to see you. Look in again, as you
come down-stairs, Kit. That lad a robber!’ cried Brass when he had
withdrawn, ‘with that frank and open countenance! I’d trust him with
untold gold. Mr Richard, sir, have the goodness to step directly to
Wrasp and Co.’s in Broad Street, and inquire if they have had
instructions to appear in Carkem and Painter. THAT lad a robber,’
sneered Sampson, flushed and heated with his wrath. ‘Am I blind, deaf,
silly; do I know nothing of human nature when I see it before me? Kit
a robber! Bah!’
Flinging this final interjection at Miss Sally with immeasurable scorn
and contempt, Sampson Brass thrust his head into his desk, as if to
shut the base world from his view, and breathed defiance from under its
half-closed lid.
CHAPTER 59
When Kit, having discharged his errand, came down-stairs from the
single gentleman’s apartment after the lapse of a quarter of an hour or
so, Mr Sampson Brass was alone in the office. He was not singing as
usual, nor was he seated at his desk. The open door showed him
standing before the fire with his back towards it, and looking so very
strange that Kit supposed he must have been suddenly taken ill.
‘Is anything the matter, sir?’ said Kit.
‘Matter!’ cried Brass. ‘No. Why anything the matter?’
‘You are so very pale,’ said Kit, ‘that I should hardly have known you.’
‘Pooh pooh! mere fancy,’ cried Brass, stooping to throw up the cinders.
‘Never better, Kit, never better in all my life. Merry too. Ha ha!
How’s our friend above-stairs, eh?’
‘A great deal better,’ said Kit.
‘I’m glad to hear it,’ rejoined Brass; ‘thankful, I may say. An
excellent gentleman--worthy, liberal, generous, gives very little
trouble--an admirable lodger. Ha ha! Mr Garland--he’s well I hope,
Kit--and the pony--my friend, my particular friend you know. Ha ha!’
Kit gave a satisfactory account of all the little household at Abel
Cottage. Mr Brass, who seemed remarkably inattentive and impatient,
mounted on his stool, and beckoning him to come nearer, took him by the
button-hole.
‘I have been thinking, Kit,’ said the lawyer, ‘that I could throw some
little emoluments in your mother’s way--You have a mother, I think? If
I recollect right, you told me--’
‘Oh yes, Sir, yes certainly.’
‘A widow, I think? an industrious widow?’
‘A harder-working woman or a better mother never lived, Sir.’
‘Ah!’ cried Brass. ‘That’s affecting, truly affecting. A poor widow
struggling to maintain her orphans in decency and comfort, is a
delicious picture of human goodness.--Put down your hat, Kit.’
‘Thank you Sir, I must be going directly.’
‘Put it down while you stay, at any rate,’ said Brass, taking it from
him and making some confusion among the papers, in finding a place for
it on the desk. ‘I was thinking, Kit, that we have often houses to let
for people we are concerned for, and matters of that sort. Now you
know we’re obliged to put people into those houses to take care of
‘em--very often undeserving people that we can’t depend upon. What’s
to prevent our having a person that we CAN depend upon, and enjoying
the delight of doing a good action at the same time? I say, what’s to
prevent our employing this worthy woman, your mother? What with one
job and another, there’s lodging--and good lodging too--pretty well
all the year round, rent free, and a weekly allowance besides, Kit,
that would provide her with a great many comforts she don’t at present
enjoy. Now what do you think of that? Do you see any objection? My
only desire is to serve you, Kit; therefore if you do, say so freely.’
As Brass spoke, he moved the hat twice or thrice, and shuffled among
the papers again, as if in search of something.
‘How can I see any objection to such a kind offer, sir?’ replied Kit
with his whole heart. ‘I don’t know how to thank you sir, I don’t
indeed.’
‘Why then,’ said Brass, suddenly turning upon him and thrusting his
face close to Kit’s with such a repulsive smile that the latter, even
in the very height of his gratitude, drew back, quite startled. ‘Why
then, it’s done.’
Kit looked at him in some confusion.
‘Done, I say,’ added Sampson, rubbing his hands and veiling himself
again in his usual oily manner. ‘Ha ha! and so you shall find Kit, so
you shall find. But dear me,’ said Brass, ‘what a time Mr Richard is
gone! A sad loiterer to be sure! Will you mind the office one minute,
while I run up-stairs? Only one minute. I’ll not detain you an
instant longer, on any account, Kit.’
Talking as he went, Mr Brass bustled out of the office, and in a very
short time returned. Mr Swiveller came back, almost at the same
instant; and as Kit was leaving the room hastily, to make up for lost
time, Miss Brass herself encountered him in the doorway.
‘Oh!’ sneered Sally, looking after him as she entered. ‘There goes
your pet, Sammy, eh?’
‘Ah! There he goes,’ replied Brass. ‘My pet, if you please. An
honest fellow, Mr Richard, sir--a worthy fellow indeed!’
‘Hem!’ coughed Miss Brass.
‘I tell you, you aggravating vagabond,’ said the angry Sampson, ‘that
I’d stake my life upon his honesty. Am I never to hear the last of
this? Am I always to be baited, and beset, by your mean suspicions?
Have you no regard for true merit, you malignant fellow? If you come
to that, I’d sooner suspect your honesty than his.’
Miss Sally pulled out the tin snuff-box, and took a long, slow pinch,
regarding her brother with a steady gaze all the time.
‘She drives me wild, Mr Richard, sir,’ said Brass, ‘she exasperates me
beyond all bearing. I am heated and excited, sir, I know I am. These
are not business manners, sir, nor business looks, but she carries me
out of myself.’
‘Why don’t you leave him alone?’ said Dick.
‘Because she can’t, sir,’ retorted Brass; ‘because to chafe and vex me
is a part of her nature, Sir, and she will and must do it, or I don’t
believe she’d have her health. But never mind,’ said Brass, ‘never
mind. I’ve carried my point. I’ve shown my confidence in the lad. He
has minded the office again. Ha ha! Ugh, you viper!’
The beautiful virgin took another pinch, and put the snuff-box in her
pocket; still looking at her brother with perfect composure.
‘He has minded the office again,’ said Brass triumphantly; ‘he has had
my confidence, and he shall continue to have it; he--why, where’s the--’
‘What have you lost?’ inquired Mr Swiveller.
‘Dear me!’ said Brass, slapping all his pockets, one after another, and
looking into his desk, and under it, and upon it, and wildly tossing
the papers about, ‘the note, Mr Richard, sir, the five-pound note--what
can have become of it? I laid it down here--God bless me!’
‘What!’ cried Miss Sally, starting up, clapping her hands, and
scattering the papers on the floor. ‘Gone! Now who’s right? Now
who’s got it? Never mind five pounds--what’s five pounds? He’s
honest, you know, quite honest. It would be mean to suspect him.
Don’t run after him. No, no, not for the world!’
‘Is it really gone though?’ said Dick, looking at Brass with a face as
pale as his own.
‘Upon my word, Mr Richard, Sir,’ replied the lawyer, feeling in all his
pockets with looks of the greatest agitation, ‘I fear this is a black
business. It’s certainly gone, Sir. What’s to be done?’
‘Don’t run after him,’ said Miss Sally, taking more snuff. ‘Don’t run
after him on any account. Give him time to get rid of it, you know.
It would be cruel to find him out!’
Mr Swiveller and Sampson Brass looked from Miss Sally to each other, in
a state of bewilderment, and then, as by one impulse, caught up their
hats and rushed out into the street--darting along in the middle of the
road, and dashing aside all obstructions, as though they were running
for their lives.
It happened that Kit had been running too, though not so fast, and
having the start of them by some few minutes, was a good distance
ahead. As they were pretty certain of the road he must have taken,
however, and kept on at a great pace, they came up with him, at the
very moment when he had taken breath, and was breaking into a run again.
‘Stop!’ cried Sampson, laying his hand on one shoulder, while Mr
Swiveller pounced upon the other. ‘Not so fast sir. You’re in a
hurry?’
‘Yes, I am,’ said Kit, looking from one to the other in great surprise.
‘I--I--can hardly believe it,’ panted Sampson, ‘but something of value
is missing from the office. I hope you don’t know what.’
‘Know what! good Heaven, Mr Brass!’ cried Kit, trembling from head to
foot; ‘you don’t suppose--’
‘No, no,’ rejoined Brass quickly, ‘I don’t suppose anything. Don’t say
I said you did. You’ll come back quietly, I hope?’
‘Of course I will,’ returned Kit. ‘Why not?’
‘To be sure!’ said Brass. ‘Why not? I hope there may turn out to be
no why not. If you knew the trouble I’ve been in, this morning,
through taking your part, Christopher, you’d be sorry for it.’
‘And I am sure you’ll be sorry for having suspected me sir,’ replied
Kit. ‘Come. Let us make haste back.’
‘Certainly!’ cried Brass, ‘the quicker, the better. Mr Richard--have
the goodness, sir, to take that arm. I’ll take this one. It’s not
easy walking three abreast, but under these circumstances it must be
done, sir; there’s no help for it.’
Kit did turn from white to red, and from red to white again, when they
secured him thus, and for a moment seemed disposed to resist. But,
quickly recollecting himself, and remembering that if he made any
struggle, he would perhaps be dragged by the collar through the public
streets, he only repeated, with great earnestness and with the tears
standing in his eyes, that they would be sorry for this--and suffered
them to lead him off. While they were on the way back, Mr Swiveller,
upon whom his present functions sat very irksomely, took an opportunity
of whispering in his ear that if he would confess his guilt, even by so
much as a nod, and promise not to do so any more, he would connive at
his kicking Sampson Brass on the shins and escaping up a court; but Kit
indignantly rejecting this proposal, Mr Richard had nothing for it, but
to hold him tight until they reached Bevis Marks, and ushered him into
the presence of the charming Sarah, who immediately took the precaution
of locking the door.
‘Now, you know,’ said Brass, ‘if this is a case of innocence, it is a
case of that description, Christopher, where the fullest disclosure is
the best satisfaction for everybody. Therefore if you’ll consent to an
examination,’ he demonstrated what kind of examination he meant by
turning back the cuffs of his coat, ‘it will be a comfortable and
pleasant thing for all parties.’
‘Search me,’ said Kit, proudly holding up his arms. ‘But mind, sir--I
know you’ll be sorry for this, to the last day of your life.’
‘It is certainly a very painful occurrence,’ said Brass with a sigh, as
he dived into one of Kit’s pockets, and fished up a miscellaneous
collection of small articles; ‘very painful. Nothing here, Mr Richard,
Sir, all perfectly satisfactory. Nor here, sir. Nor in the waistcoat,
Mr Richard, nor in the coat tails. So far, I am rejoiced, I am sure.’
Richard Swiveller, holding Kit’s hat in his hand, was watching the
proceedings with great interest, and bore upon his face the slightest
possible indication of a smile, as Brass, shutting one of his eyes,
looked with the other up the inside of one of the poor fellow’s sleeves
as if it were a telescope--when Sampson turning hastily to him, bade
him search the hat.
‘Here’s a handkerchief,’ said Dick.
‘No harm in that sir,’ rejoined Brass, applying his eye to the other
sleeve, and speaking in the voice of one who was contemplating an
immense extent of prospect. ‘No harm in a handkerchief Sir, whatever.
The faculty don’t consider it a healthy custom, I believe, Mr Richard,
to carry one’s handkerchief in one’s hat--I have heard that it keeps
the head too warm--but in every other point of view, its being there,
is extremely satisfactory--extremely so.’
An exclamation, at once from Richard Swiveller, Miss Sally, and Kit
himself, cut the lawyer short. He turned his head, and saw Dick
standing with the bank-note in his hand.
‘In the hat?’ cried Brass in a sort of shriek.
‘Under the handkerchief, and tucked beneath the lining,’ said Dick,
aghast at the discovery.
Mr Brass looked at him, at his sister, at the walls, at the ceiling, at
the floor--everywhere but at Kit, who stood quite stupefied and
motionless.
‘And this,’ cried Sampson, clasping his hands, ‘is the world that turns
upon its own axis, and has Lunar influences, and revolutions round
Heavenly Bodies, and various games of that sort! This is human natur,
is it! Oh natur, natur! This is the miscreant that I was going to
benefit with all my little arts, and that, even now, I feel so much
for, as to wish to let him go! But,’ added Mr Brass with greater
fortitude, ‘I am myself a lawyer, and bound to set an example in
carrying the laws of my happy country into effect. Sally my dear,
forgive me, and catch hold of him on the other side. Mr Richard, sir,
have the goodness to run and fetch a constable. The weakness is past
and over sir, and moral strength returns. A constable, sir, if you
please!’
CHAPTER 60
Kit stood as one entranced, with his eyes opened wide and fixed upon
the ground, regardless alike of the tremulous hold which Mr Brass
maintained on one side of his cravat, and of the firmer grasp of Miss
Sally upon the other; although this latter detention was in itself no
small inconvenience, as that fascinating woman, besides screwing her
knuckles inconveniently into his throat from time to time, had fastened
upon him in the first instance with so tight a grip that even in the
disorder and distraction of his thoughts he could not divest himself of
an uneasy sense of choking. Between the brother and sister he remained
in this posture, quite unresisting and passive, until Mr Swiveller
returned, with a police constable at his heels.
This functionary, being, of course, well used to such scenes; looking
upon all kinds of robbery, from petty larceny up to housebreaking or
ventures on the highway, as matters in the regular course of business;
and regarding the perpetrators in the light of so many customers coming
to be served at the wholesale and retail shop of criminal law where he
stood behind the counter; received Mr Brass’s statement of facts with
about as much interest and surprise, as an undertaker might evince if
required to listen to a circumstantial account of the last illness of a
person whom he was called in to wait upon professionally; and took Kit
into custody with a decent indifference.
‘We had better,’ said this subordinate minister of justice, ‘get to the
office while there’s a magistrate sitting. I shall want you to come
along with us, Mr Brass, and the--’ he looked at Miss Sally as if in
some doubt whether she might not be a griffin or other fabulous monster.
‘The lady, eh?’ said Sampson.
‘Ah!’ replied the constable. ‘Yes--the lady. Likewise the young man
that found the property.’
‘Mr Richard, Sir,’ said Brass in a mournful voice. ‘A sad necessity.
But the altar of our country sir--’
‘You’ll have a hackney-coach, I suppose?’ interrupted the constable,
holding Kit (whom his other captors had released) carelessly by the
arm, a little above the elbow. ‘Be so good as send for one, will you?’
‘But, hear me speak a word,’ cried Kit, raising his eyes and looking
imploringly about him. ‘Hear me speak a word. I am no more guilty
than any one of you. Upon my soul I am not. I a thief! Oh, Mr Brass,
you know me better. I am sure you know me better. This is not right
of you, indeed.’
‘I give you my word, constable--’ said Brass. But here the constable
interposed with the constitutional principle ‘words be blowed;’
observing that words were but spoon-meat for babes and sucklings, and
that oaths were the food for strong men.
‘Quite true, constable,’ assented Brass in the same mournful tone.
‘Strictly correct. I give you my oath, constable, that down to a few
minutes ago, when this fatal discovery was made, I had such confidence
in that lad, that I’d have trusted him with--a hackney-coach, Mr
Richard, sir; you’re very slow, Sir.’
‘Who is there that knows me,’ cried Kit, ‘that would not trust me--
that does not? ask anybody whether they have ever doubted me; whether I
have ever wronged them of a farthing. Was I ever once dishonest when I
was poor and hungry, and is it likely I would begin now! Oh consider
what you do. How can I meet the kindest friends that ever human
creature had, with this dreadful charge upon me!’
Mr Brass rejoined that it would have been well for the prisoner if he
had thought of that before and was about to make some other gloomy
observations when the voice of the single gentleman was heard,
demanding from above-stairs what was the matter, and what was the cause
of all that noise and hurry. Kit made an involuntary start towards the
door in his anxiety to answer for himself, but being speedily detained
by the constable, had the agony of seeing Sampson Brass run out alone
to tell the story in his own way.
‘And he can hardly believe it, either,’ said Sampson, when he returned,
‘nor nobody will. I wish I could doubt the evidence of my senses, but
their depositions are unimpeachable. It’s of no use cross-examining my
eyes,’ cried Sampson, winking and rubbing them, ‘they stick to their
first account, and will. Now, Sarah, I hear the coach in the Marks;
get on your bonnet, and we’ll be off. A sad errand! a moral funeral,
quite!’
‘Mr Brass,’ said Kit. ‘Do me one favour. Take me to Mr Witherden’s
first.’
Sampson shook his head irresolutely.
‘Do,’ said Kit. ‘My master’s there. For Heaven’s sake, take me there,
first.’
‘Well, I don’t know,’ stammered Brass, who perhaps had his reasons for
wishing to show as fair as possible in the eyes of the notary. ‘How do
we stand in point of time, constable, eh?’
The constable, who had been chewing a straw all this while with great
philosophy, replied that if they went away at once they would have time
enough, but that if they stood shilly-shallying there, any longer, they
must go straight to the Mansion House; and finally expressed his
opinion that that was where it was, and that was all about it.
Mr Richard Swiveller having arrived inside the coach, and still
remaining immoveable in the most commodious corner with his face to the
horses, Mr Brass instructed the officer to remove his prisoner, and
declared himself quite ready. Therefore, the constable, still holding
Kit in the same manner, and pushing him on a little before him, so as
to keep him at about three-quarters of an arm’s length in advance
(which is the professional mode), thrust him into the vehicle and
followed himself. Miss Sally entered next; and there being now four
inside, Sampson Brass got upon the box, and made the coachman drive on.
Still completely stunned by the sudden and terrible change which had
taken place in his affairs, Kit sat gazing out of the coach window,
almost hoping to see some monstrous phenomenon in the streets which
might give him reason to believe he was in a dream. Alas! Everything
was too real and familiar: the same succession of turnings, the same
houses, the same streams of people running side by side in different
directions upon the pavement, the same bustle of carts and carriages in
the road, the same well-remembered objects in the shop windows: a
regularity in the very noise and hurry which no dream ever mirrored.
Dream-like as the story was, it was true. He stood charged with
robbery; the note had been found upon him, though he was innocent in
thought and deed; and they were carrying him back, a prisoner.
Absorbed in these painful ruminations, thinking with a drooping heart
of his mother and little Jacob, feeling as though even the
consciousness of innocence would be insufficient to support him in the
presence of his friends if they believed him guilty, and sinking in
hope and courage more and more as they drew nearer to the notary’s,
poor Kit was looking earnestly out of the window, observant of
nothing,--when all at once, as though it had been conjured up by magic,
he became aware of the face of Quilp.
And what a leer there was upon the face! It was from the open window
of a tavern that it looked out; and the dwarf had so spread himself
over it, with his elbows on the window-sill and his head resting on
both his hands, that what between this attitude and his being swoln
with suppressed laughter, he looked puffed and bloated into twice his
usual breadth. Mr Brass, on recognising him, immediately stopped the
coach. As it came to a halt directly opposite to where he stood, the
dwarf pulled off his hat, and saluted the party with a hideous and
grotesque politeness.
‘Aha!’ he cried. ‘Where now, Brass? where now? Sally with you too?
Sweet Sally! And Dick? Pleasant Dick! And Kit! Honest Kit!’
‘He’s extremely cheerful!’ said Brass to the coachman. ‘Very much so!
Ah, sir--a sad business! Never believe in honesty any more, sir.’
‘Why not?’ returned the dwarf. ‘Why not, you rogue of a lawyer, why
not?’
‘Bank-note lost in our office sir,’ said Brass, shaking his head.
‘Found in his hat sir--he previously left alone there--no mistake at
all sir--chain of evidence complete--not a link wanting.’
‘What!’ cried the dwarf, leaning half his body out of window. ‘Kit a
thief! Kit a thief! Ha ha ha! Why, he’s an uglier-looking thief than
can be seen anywhere for a penny. Eh, Kit--eh? Ha ha ha! Have you
taken Kit into custody before he had time and opportunity to beat me!
Eh, Kit, eh?’ And with that, he burst into a yell of laughter,
manifestly to the great terror of the coachman, and pointed to a dyer’s
pole hard by, where a dangling suit of clothes bore some resemblance to
a man upon a gibbet.
‘Is it coming to that, Kit!’ cried the dwarf, rubbing his hands
violently. ‘Ha ha ha ha! What a disappointment for little Jacob, and
for his darling mother! Let him have the Bethel minister to comfort
and console him, Brass. Eh, Kit, eh? Drive on coachey, drive on. Bye
bye, Kit; all good go with you; keep up your spirits; my love to the
Garlands--the dear old lady and gentleman. Say I inquired after ‘em,
will you? Blessings on ‘em, on you, and on everybody, Kit. Blessings
on all the world!’
With such good wishes and farewells, poured out in a rapid torrent
until they were out of hearing, Quilp suffered them to depart; and when
he could see the coach no longer, drew in his head, and rolled upon the
ground in an ecstacy of enjoyment.
When they reached the notary’s, which they were not long in doing, for
they had encountered the dwarf in a bye street at a very little
distance from the house, Mr Brass dismounted; and opening the coach
door with a melancholy visage, requested his sister to accompany him
into the office, with the view of preparing the good people within, for
the mournful intelligence that awaited them. Miss Sally complying, he
desired Mr Swiveller to accompany them. So, into the office they went;
Mr Sampson and his sister arm-in-arm; and Mr Swiveller following, alone.
The notary was standing before the fire in the outer office, talking to
Mr Abel and the elder Mr Garland, while Mr Chuckster sat writing at the
desk, picking up such crumbs of their conversation as happened to fall
in his way. This posture of affairs Mr Brass observed through the
glass-door as he was turning the handle, and seeing that the notary
recognised him, he began to shake his head and sigh deeply while that
partition yet divided them.
‘Sir,’ said Sampson, taking off his hat, and kissing the two
fore-fingers of his right hand beaver glove, ‘my name is Brass--Brass
of Bevis Marks, Sir. I have had the honour and pleasure, Sir, of being
concerned against you in some little testamentary matters. How do you
do, sir?’
‘My clerk will attend to any business you may have come upon, Mr
Brass,’ said the notary, turning away.
‘Thank you Sir,’ said Brass, ‘thank you, I am sure. Allow me, Sir, to
introduce my sister--quite one of us Sir, although of the weaker
sex--of great use in my business Sir, I assure you. Mr Richard, sir,
have the goodness to come foward if you please--No really,’ said Brass,
stepping between the notary and his private office (towards which he
had begun to retreat), and speaking in the tone of an injured man,
‘really Sir, I must, under favour, request a word or two with you,
indeed.’
‘Mr Brass,’ said the other, in a decided tone, ‘I am engaged. You see
that I am occupied with these gentlemen. If you will communicate your
business to Mr Chuckster yonder, you will receive every attention.’
‘Gentlemen,’ said Brass, laying his right hand on his waistcoat, and
looking towards the father and son with a smooth smile--‘Gentlemen, I
appeal to you--really, gentlemen--consider, I beg of you. I am of the
law. I am styled “gentleman” by Act of Parliament. I maintain the
title by the annual payment of twelve pound sterling for a certificate.
I am not one of your players of music, stage actors, writers of books,
or painters of pictures, who assume a station that the laws of their
country don’t recognise. I am none of your strollers or vagabonds. If
any man brings his action against me, he must describe me as a
gentleman, or his action is null and void. I appeal to you--is this
quite respectful? Really gentlemen--’
‘Well, will you have the goodness to state your business then, Mr
Brass?’ said the notary.
‘Sir,’ rejoined Brass, ‘I will. Ah Mr Witherden! you little know
the--but I will not be tempted to travel from the point, sir, I believe
the name of one of these gentlemen is Garland.’
‘Of both,’ said the notary.
‘In-deed!’ rejoined Brass, cringing excessively. ‘But I might have
known that, from the uncommon likeness. Extremely happy, I am sure, to
have the honour of an introduction to two such gentlemen, although the
occasion is a most painful one. One of you gentlemen has a servant
called Kit?’
‘Both,’ replied the notary.
‘Two Kits?’ said Brass smiling. ‘Dear me!’
‘One Kit, sir,’ returned Mr Witherden angrily, ‘who is employed by both
gentlemen. What of him?’
‘This of him, sir,’ rejoined Brass, dropping his voice impressively.
‘That young man, sir, that I have felt unbounded and unlimited
confidence in, and always behaved to as if he was my equal--that young
man has this morning committed a robbery in my office, and been taken
almost in the fact.’
‘This must be some falsehood!’ cried the notary.
‘It is not possible,’ said Mr Abel.
‘I’ll not believe one word of it,’ exclaimed the old gentleman.
Mr Brass looked mildly round upon them, and rejoined,
‘Mr Witherden, sir, YOUR words are actionable, and if I was a man of
low and mean standing, who couldn’t afford to be slandered, I should
proceed for damages. Hows’ever, sir, being what I am, I merely scorn
such expressions. The honest warmth of the other gentleman I respect,
and I’m truly sorry to be the messenger of such unpleasant news. I
shouldn’t have put myself in this painful position, I assure you, but
that the lad himself desired to be brought here in the first instance,
and I yielded to his prayers. Mr Chuckster, sir, will you have the
goodness to tap at the window for the constable that’s waiting in the
coach?’
The three gentlemen looked at each other with blank faces when these
words were uttered, and Mr Chuckster, doing as he was desired, and
leaping off his stool with something of the excitement of an inspired
prophet whose foretellings had in the fulness of time been realised,
held the door open for the entrance of the wretched captive.
Such a scene as there was, when Kit came in, and bursting into the rude
eloquence with which Truth at length inspired him, called Heaven to
witness that he was innocent, and that how the property came to be
found upon him he knew not! Such a confusion of tongues, before the
circumstances were related, and the proofs disclosed! Such a dead
silence when all was told, and his three friends exchanged looks of
doubt and amazement!
‘Is it not possible,’ said Mr Witherden, after a long pause, ‘that this
note may have found its way into the hat by some accident,--such as
the removal of papers on the desk, for instance?’
But this was clearly shown to be quite impossible. Mr Swiveller,
though an unwilling witness, could not help proving to demonstration,
from the position in which it was found, that it must have been
designedly secreted.
‘It’s very distressing,’ said Brass, ‘immensely distressing, I am sure.
When he comes to be tried, I shall be very happy to recommend him to
mercy on account of his previous good character. I did lose money
before, certainly, but it doesn’t quite follow that he took it. The
presumption’s against him--strongly against him--but we’re Christians,
I hope?’
‘I suppose,’ said the constable, looking round, ‘that no gentleman here
can give evidence as to whether he’s been flush of money of late, Do
you happen to know, Sir?’
‘He has had money from time to time, certainly,’ returned Mr Garland,
to whom the man had put the question. ‘But that, as he always told me,
was given him by Mr Brass himself.’
‘Yes to be sure,’ said Kit eagerly. ‘You can bear me out in that, Sir?’
‘Eh?’ cried Brass, looking from face to face with an expression of
stupid amazement.
‘The money you know, the half-crowns, that you gave me--from the
lodger,’ said Kit.
‘Oh dear me!’ cried Brass, shaking his head and frowning heavily.
‘This is a bad case, I find; a very bad case indeed.’
‘What! Did you give him no money on account of anybody, Sir?’ asked Mr
Garland, with great anxiety.
‘I give him money, Sir!’ returned Sampson. ‘Oh, come you know, this is
too barefaced. Constable, my good fellow, we had better be going.’
‘What!’ shrieked Kit. ‘Does he deny that he did? ask him, somebody,
pray. Ask him to tell you whether he did or not!’
‘Did you, sir?’ asked the notary.
‘I tell you what, gentlemen,’ replied Brass, in a very grave manner,
‘he’ll not serve his case this way, and really, if you feel any
interest in him, you had better advise him to go upon some other tack.
Did I, sir? Of course I never did.’
‘Gentlemen,’ cried Kit, on whom a light broke suddenly, ‘Master, Mr
Abel, Mr Witherden, every one of you--he did it! What I have done to
offend him, I don’t know, but this is a plot to ruin me. Mind,
gentlemen, it’s a plot, and whatever comes of it, I will say with my
dying breath that he put that note in my hat himself! Look at him,
gentlemen! see how he changes colour. Which of us looks the guilty
person--he, or I?’
‘You hear him, gentlemen?’ said Brass, smiling, ‘you hear him. Now,
does this case strike you as assuming rather a black complexion, or
does it not? Is it at all a treacherous case, do you think, or is it
one of mere ordinary guilt? Perhaps, gentlemen, if he had not said
this in your presence and I had reported it, you’d have held this to be
impossible likewise, eh?’
With such pacific and bantering remarks did Mr Brass refute the foul
aspersion on his character; but the virtuous Sarah, moved by stronger
feelings, and having at heart, perhaps, a more jealous regard for the
honour of her family, flew from her brother’s side, without any
previous intimation of her design, and darted at the prisoner with the
utmost fury. It would undoubtedly have gone hard with Kit’s face, but
that the wary constable, foreseeing her design, drew him aside at the
critical moment, and thus placed Mr Chuckster in circumstances of some
jeopardy; for that gentleman happening to be next the object of Miss
Brass’s wrath; and rage being, like love and fortune, blind; was
pounced upon by the fair enslaver, and had a false collar plucked up by
the roots, and his hair very much dishevelled, before the exertions of
the company could make her sensible of her mistake.
The constable, taking warning by this desperate attack, and thinking
perhaps that it would be more satisfactory to the ends of justice if
the prisoner were taken before a magistrate, whole, rather than in
small pieces, led him back to the hackney-coach without more ado, and
moreover insisted on Miss Brass becoming an outside passenger; to which
proposal the charming creature, after a little angry discussion,
yielded her consent; and so took her brother Sampson’s place upon the
box: Mr Brass with some reluctance agreeing to occupy her seat inside.
These arrangements perfected, they drove to the justice-room with all
speed, followed by the notary and his two friends in another coach. Mr
Chuckster alone was left behind--greatly to his indignation; for he
held the evidence he could have given, relative to Kit’s returning to
work out the shilling, to be so very material as bearing upon his
hypocritical and designing character, that he considered its
suppression little better than a compromise of felony.
At the justice-room, they found the single gentleman, who had gone
straight there, and was expecting them with desperate impatience. But
not fifty single gentlemen rolled into one could have helped poor Kit,
who in half an hour afterwards was committed for trial, and was assured
by a friendly officer on his way to prison that there was no occasion
to be cast down, for the sessions would soon be on, and he would, in
all likelihood, get his little affair disposed of, and be comfortably
transported, in less than a fortnight.
CHAPTER 61
Let moralists and philosophers say what they may, it is very
questionable whether a guilty man would have felt half as much misery
that night, as Kit did, being innocent. The world, being in the
constant commission of vast quantities of injustice, is a little too
apt to comfort itself with the idea that if the victim of its falsehood
and malice have a clear conscience, he cannot fail to be sustained
under his trials, and somehow or other to come right at last; ‘in which
case,’ say they who have hunted him down, ‘--though we certainly don’t
expect it--nobody will be better pleased than we.’ Whereas, the world
would do well to reflect, that injustice is in itself, to every
generous and properly constituted mind, an injury, of all others the
most insufferable, the most torturing, and the most hard to bear; and
that many clear consciences have gone to their account elsewhere, and
many sound hearts have broken, because of this very reason; the
knowledge of their own deserts only aggravating their sufferings, and
rendering them the less endurable.
The world, however, was not in fault in Kit’s case. But Kit was
innocent; and knowing this, and feeling that his best friends deemed
him guilty--that Mr and Mrs Garland would look upon him as a monster of
ingratitude--that Barbara would associate him with all that was bad and
criminal--that the pony would consider himself forsaken--and that even
his own mother might perhaps yield to the strong appearances against
him, and believe him to be the wretch he seemed--knowing and feeling
all this, he experienced, at first, an agony of mind which no words can
describe, and walked up and down the little cell in which he was locked
up for the night, almost beside himself with grief.
Even when the violence of these emotions had in some degree subsided,
and he was beginning to grow more calm, there came into his mind a new
thought, the anguish of which was scarcely less. The child--the bright
star of the simple fellow’s life--she, who always came back upon him
like a beautiful dream--who had made the poorest part of his existence,
the happiest and best--who had ever been so gentle, and considerate,
and good--if she were ever to hear of this, what would she think! As
this idea occurred to him, the walls of the prison seemed to melt away,
and the old place to reveal itself in their stead, as it was wont to be
on winter nights--the fireside, the little supper table, the old man’s
hat, and coat, and stick--the half-opened door, leading to her little
room--they were all there. And Nell herself was there, and he--both
laughing heartily as they had often done--and when he had got as far as
this, Kit could go no farther, but flung himself upon his poor bedstead
and wept.
It was a long night, which seemed as though it would have no end; but
he slept too, and dreamed--always of being at liberty, and roving
about, now with one person and now with another, but ever with a vague
dread of being recalled to prison; not that prison, but one which was
in itself a dim idea--not of a place, but of a care and sorrow: of
something oppressive and always present, and yet impossible to define.
At last, the morning dawned, and there was the jail itself--cold,
black, and dreary, and very real indeed.
He was left to himself,
however, and there was comfort in that. He had liberty to walk in a
small paved yard at a certain hour, and learnt from the turnkey, who
came to unlock his cell and show him where to wash, that there was a
regular time for visiting, every day, and that if any of his friends
came to see him, he would be fetched down to the grate. When he had
given him this information, and a tin porringer containing his
breakfast, the man locked him up again; and went clattering along the
stone passage, opening and shutting a great many other doors, and
raising numberless loud echoes which resounded through the building for
a long time, as if they were in prison too, and unable to get out.
This turnkey had given him to understand that he was lodged, like some
few others in the jail, apart from the mass of prisoners; because he
was not supposed to be utterly depraved and irreclaimable, and had
never occupied apartments in that mansion before. Kit was thankful for
this indulgence, and sat reading the church catechism very attentively
(though he had known it by heart from a little child), until he heard
the key in the lock, and the man entered again.
‘Now then,’ he said, ‘come on!’
‘Where to, Sir?’ asked Kit.
The man contented himself by briefly replying ‘Wisitors;’ and taking
him by the arm in exactly the same manner as the constable had done the
day before, led him, through several winding ways and strong gates,
into a passage, where he placed him at a grating and turned upon his
heel. Beyond this grating, at the distance of about four or five feet,
was another exactly like it. In the space between, sat a turnkey
reading a newspaper, and outside the further railing, Kit saw, with a
palpitating heart, his mother with the baby in her arms; Barbara’s
mother with her never-failing umbrella; and poor little Jacob, staring
in with all his might, as though he were looking for the bird, or the
wild beast, and thought the men were mere accidents with whom the bars
could have no possible concern.
But when little Jacob saw his brother, and, thrusting his arms between
the rails to hug him, found that he came no nearer, but still stood
afar off with his head resting on the arm by which he held to one of
the bars, he began to cry most piteously; whereupon, Kit’s mother and
Barbara’s mother, who had restrained themselves as much as possible,
burst out sobbing and weeping afresh. Poor Kit could not help joining
them, and not one of them could speak a word. During this melancholy
pause, the turnkey read his newspaper with a waggish look (he had
evidently got among the facetious paragraphs) until, happening to take
his eyes off for an instant, as if to get by dint of contemplation at
the very marrow of some joke of a deeper sort than the rest, it
appeared to occur to him, for the first time, that somebody was crying.
‘Now, ladies, ladies,’ he said, looking round with surprise, ‘I’d
advise you not to waste time like this. It’s allowanced here, you
know. You mustn’t let that child make that noise either. It’s against
all rules.’
‘I’m his poor mother, sir,’--sobbed Mrs Nubbles, curtseying humbly,
‘and this is his brother, sir. Oh dear me, dear me!’
‘Well!’ replied the turnkey, folding his paper on his knee, so as to
get with greater convenience at the top of the next column. ‘It can’t
be helped you know. He ain’t the only one in the same fix. You
mustn’t make a noise about it!’
With that he went on reading. The man was not unnaturally cruel or
hard-hearted. He had come to look upon felony as a kind of disorder,
like the scarlet fever or erysipelas: some people had it--some
hadn’t--just as it might be.
‘Oh! my darling Kit,’ said his mother, whom Barbara’s mother had
charitably relieved of the baby, ‘that I should see my poor boy here!’
‘You don’t believe that I did what they accuse me of, mother dear?’
cried Kit, in a choking voice.
‘I believe it!’ exclaimed the poor woman, ‘I that never knew you tell a
lie, or do a bad action from your cradle--that have never had a
moment’s sorrow on your account, except it was the poor meals that you
have taken with such good humour and content, that I forgot how little
there was, when I thought how kind and thoughtful you were, though you
were but a child!--I believe it of the son that’s been a comfort to me
from the hour of his birth until this time, and that I never laid down
one night in anger with! I believe it of you Kit!--’
‘Why then, thank God!’ said Kit, clutching the bars with an earnestness
that shook them, ‘and I can bear it, mother! Come what may, I shall
always have one drop of happiness in my heart when I think that you
said that.’
At this the poor woman fell a-crying again, and Barbara’s mother too.
And little Jacob, whose disjointed thoughts had by this time resolved
themselves into a pretty distinct impression that Kit couldn’t go out
for a walk if he wanted, and that there were no birds, lions, tigers or
other natural curiosities behind those bars--nothing indeed, but a
caged brother--added his tears to theirs with as little noise as
possible.
Kit’s mother, drying her eyes (and moistening them, poor soul, more
than she dried them), now took from the ground a small basket, and
submissively addressed herself to the turnkey, saying, would he please
to listen to her for a minute? The turnkey, being in the very crisis
and passion of a joke, motioned to her with his hand to keep silent one
minute longer, for her life. Nor did he remove his hand into its
former posture, but kept it in the same warning attitude until he had
finished the paragraph, when he paused for a few seconds, with a smile
upon his face, as who should say ‘this editor is a comical blade--a
funny dog,’ and then asked her what she wanted.
‘I have brought him a little something to eat,’ said the good woman.
‘If you please, Sir, might he have it?’
‘Yes,--he may have it. There’s no rule against that. Give it to me
when you go, and I’ll take care he has it.’
‘No, but if you please sir--don’t be angry with me sir--I am his
mother, and you had a mother once--if I might only see him eat a little
bit, I should go away, so much more satisfied that he was all
comfortable.’
And again the tears of Kit’s mother burst forth, and of Barbara’s
mother, and of little Jacob. As to the baby, it was crowing and
laughing with its might--under the idea, apparently, that the whole
scene had been invented and got up for its particular satisfaction.
The turnkey looked as if he thought the request a strange one and
rather out of the common way, but nevertheless he laid down his paper,
and coming round where Kit’s mother stood, took the basket from her,
and after inspecting its contents, handed it to Kit, and went back to
his place. It may be easily conceived that the prisoner had no great
appetite, but he sat down on the ground, and ate as hard as he could,
while, at every morsel he put into his mouth, his mother sobbed and
wept afresh, though with a softened grief that bespoke the satisfaction
the sight afforded her.
While he was thus engaged, Kit made some anxious inquiries about his
employers, and whether they had expressed any opinion concerning him;
but all he could learn was that Mr Abel had himself broken the
intelligence to his mother, with great kindness and delicacy, late on
the previous night, but had himself expressed no opinion of his
innocence or guilt. Kit was on the point of mustering courage to ask
Barbara’s mother about Barbara, when the turnkey who had conducted him,
reappeared, a second turnkey appeared behind his visitors, and the
third turnkey with the newspaper cried ‘Time’s up!’--adding in the same
breath ‘Now for the next party!’ and then plunging deep into his
newspaper again. Kit was taken off in an instant, with a blessing from
his mother, and a scream from little Jacob, ringing in his ears. As he
was crossing the next yard with the basket in his hand, under the
guidance of his former conductor, another officer called to them to
stop, and came up with a pint pot of porter in his hand.
‘This is Christopher Nubbles, isn’t it, that come in last night for
felony?’ said the man.
His comrade replied that this was the chicken in question.
‘Then here’s your beer,’ said the other man to Christopher. ‘What are
you looking at? There an’t a discharge in it.’
‘I beg your pardon,’ said Kit. ‘Who sent it me?’
‘Why, your friend,’ replied the man. ‘You’re to have it every day, he
says. And so you will, if he pays for it.’
‘My friend!’ repeated Kit.
‘You’re all abroad, seemingly,’ returned the other man. ‘There’s his
letter. Take hold!’
Kit took it, and when he was locked up again, read as follows.
‘Drink of this cup, you’ll find there’s a spell in its every drop
‘gainst the ills of mortality. Talk of the cordial that sparkled for
Helen! HER cup was a fiction, but this is reality (Barclay and
Co.’s).--If they ever send it in a flat state, complain to the
Governor. Yours, R. S.’
‘R. S.!’ said Kit, after some consideration. ‘It must be Mr Richard
Swiveller. Well, its very kind of him, and I thank him heartily.’
CHAPTER 62
A faint light, twinkling from the window of the counting-house on
Quilp’s wharf, and looking inflamed and red through the night-fog, as
though it suffered from it like an eye, forewarned Mr Sampson Brass, as
he approached the wooden cabin with a cautious step, that the excellent
proprietor, his esteemed client, was inside, and probably waiting with
his accustomed patience and sweetness of temper the fulfilment of the
appointment which now brought Mr Brass within his fair domain.
‘A treacherous place to pick one’s steps in, of a dark night,’ muttered
Sampson, as he stumbled for the twentieth time over some stray lumber,
and limped in pain. ‘I believe that boy strews the ground differently
every day, on purpose to bruise and maim one; unless his master does it
with his own hands, which is more than likely. I hate to come to this
place without Sally. She’s more protection than a dozen men.’
As he paid this compliment to the merit of the absent charmer, Mr Brass
came to a halt; looking doubtfully towards the light, and over his
shoulder.
‘What’s he about, I wonder?’ murmured the lawyer, standing on tiptoe,
and endeavouring to obtain a glimpse of what was passing inside, which
at that distance was impossible--‘drinking, I suppose,--making himself
more fiery and furious, and heating his malice and mischievousness till
they boil. I’m always afraid to come here by myself, when his
account’s a pretty large one. I don’t believe he’d mind throttling me,
and dropping me softly into the river when the tide was at its
strongest, any more than he’d mind killing a rat--indeed I don’t know
whether he wouldn’t consider it a pleasant joke. Hark! Now he’s
singing!’
Mr Quilp was certainly entertaining himself with vocal exercise, but it
was rather a kind of chant than a song; being a monotonous repetition
of one sentence in a very rapid manner, with a long stress upon the
last word, which he swelled into a dismal roar. Nor did the burden of
this performance bear any reference to love, or war, or wine, or
loyalty, or any other, the standard topics of song, but to a subject
not often set to music or generally known in ballads; the words being
these:--‘The worthy magistrate, after remarking that the prisoner would
find some difficulty in persuading a jury to believe his tale,
committed him to take his trial at the approaching sessions; and
directed the customary recognisances to be entered into for the
pros-e-cu-tion.’
Every time he came to this concluding word, and had exhausted all
possible stress upon it, Quilp burst into a shriek of laughter, and
began again.
‘He’s dreadfully imprudent,’ muttered Brass, after he had listened to
two or three repetitions of the chant. ‘Horribly imprudent. I wish he
was dumb. I wish he was deaf. I wish he was blind. Hang him,’ cried
Brass, as the chant began again. ‘I wish he was dead!’
Giving utterance to these friendly aspirations in behalf of his client,
Mr Sampson composed his face into its usual state of smoothness, and
waiting until the shriek came again and was dying away, went up to the
wooden house, and knocked at the door.
‘Come in!’ cried the dwarf.
‘How do you do to-night sir?’ said Sampson, peeping in. ‘Ha ha ha!
How do you do sir? Oh dear me, how very whimsical! Amazingly
whimsical to be sure!’
‘Come in, you fool!’ returned the dwarf, ‘and don’t stand there shaking
your head and showing your teeth. Come in, you false witness, you
perjurer, you suborner of evidence, come in!’
‘He has the richest humour!’ cried Brass, shutting the door behind him;
‘the most amazing vein of comicality! But isn’t it rather injudicious,
sir--?’
‘What?’ demanded Quilp. ‘What, Judas?’
‘Judas!’ cried Brass. ‘He has such extraordinary spirits! His humour
is so extremely playful! Judas! Oh yes--dear me, how very good! Ha
ha ha!’
All this time, Sampson was rubbing his hands, and staring, with
ludicrous surprise and dismay, at a great, goggle-eyed, blunt-nosed
figure-head of some old ship, which was reared up against the wall in a
corner near the stove, looking like a goblin or hideous idol whom the
dwarf worshipped. A mass of timber on its head, carved into the dim
and distant semblance of a cocked hat, together with a representation
of a star on the left breast and epaulettes on the shoulders, denoted
that it was intended for the effigy of some famous admiral; but,
without those helps, any observer might have supposed it the authentic
portrait of a distinguished merman, or great sea-monster. Being
originally much too large for the apartment which it was now employed
to decorate, it had been sawn short off at the waist. Even in this
state it reached from floor to ceiling; and thrusting itself forward,
with that excessively wide-awake aspect, and air of somewhat obtrusive
politeness, by which figure-heads are usually characterised, seemed to
reduce everything else to mere pigmy proportions.
‘Do you know it?’ said the dwarf, watching Sampson’s eyes. ‘Do you see
the likeness?’
‘Eh?’ said Brass, holding his head on one side, and throwing it a
little back, as connoisseurs do. ‘Now I look at it again, I fancy I
see a--yes, there certainly is something in the smile that reminds me
of--and yet upon my word I--’
Now, the fact was, that Sampson, having never seen anything in the
smallest degree resembling this substantial phantom, was much
perplexed; being uncertain whether Mr Quilp considered it like himself,
and had therefore bought it for a family portrait; or whether he was
pleased to consider it as the likeness of some enemy. He was not very
long in doubt; for, while he was surveying it with that knowing look
which people assume when they are contemplating for the first time
portraits which they ought to recognise but don’t, the dwarf threw down
the newspaper from which he had been chanting the words already quoted,
and seizing a rusty iron bar, which he used in lieu of poker, dealt the
figure such a stroke on the nose that it rocked again.
‘Is it like Kit--is it his picture, his image, his very self?’ cried
the dwarf, aiming a shower of blows at the insensible countenance, and
covering it with deep dimples. ‘Is it the exact model and counterpart
of the dog--is it--is it--is it?’ And with every repetition of the
question, he battered the great image, until the perspiration streamed
down his face with the violence of the exercise.
Although this might have been a very comical thing to look at from a
secure gallery, as a bull-fight is found to be a comfortable spectacle
by those who are not in the arena, and a house on fire is better than a
play to people who don’t live near it, there was something in the
earnestness of Mr Quilp’s manner which made his legal adviser feel that
the counting-house was a little too small, and a deal too lonely, for
the complete enjoyment of these humours. Therefore, he stood as far
off as he could, while the dwarf was thus engaged; whimpering out but
feeble applause; and when Quilp left off and sat down again from pure
exhaustion, approached with more obsequiousness than ever.
‘Excellent indeed!’ cried Brass. ‘He he! Oh, very good Sir. You
know,’ said Sampson, looking round as if in appeal to the bruised
animal, ‘he’s quite a remarkable man--quite!’
‘Sit down,’ said the dwarf. ‘I bought the dog yesterday. I’ve been
screwing gimlets into him, and sticking forks in his eyes, and cutting
my name on him. I mean to burn him at last.’
‘Ha ha!’ cried Brass. ‘Extremely entertaining, indeed!’
‘Come here,’ said Quilp, beckoning him to draw near. ‘What’s
injudicious, hey?’
‘Nothing Sir--nothing. Scarcely worth mentioning Sir; but I thought
that song--admirably humorous in itself you know--was perhaps rather--’
‘Yes,’ said Quilp, ‘rather what?’
‘Just bordering, or as one may say remotely verging, upon the confines
of injudiciousness perhaps, Sir,’ returned Brass, looking timidly at
the dwarf’s cunning eyes, which were turned towards the fire and
reflected its red light.
‘Why?’ inquired Quilp, without looking up.
‘Why, you know, sir,’ returned Brass, venturing to be more familiar:
‘--the fact is, sir, that any allusion to these little combinings
together, of friends, for objects in themselves extremely laudable, but
which the law terms conspiracies, are--you take me, sir?--best kept
snug and among friends, you know.’
‘Eh!’ said Quilp, looking up with a perfectly vacant countenance.
‘What do you mean?’
‘Cautious, exceedingly cautious, very right and proper!’ cried Brass,
nodding his head. ‘Mum, sir, even here--my meaning, sir, exactly.’
‘YOUR meaning exactly, you brazen scarecrow,--what’s your meaning?’
retorted Quilp. ‘Why do you talk to me of combining together? Do I
combine? Do I know anything about your combinings?’
‘No no, sir--certainly not; not by any means,’ returned Brass.
‘If you so wink and nod at me,’ said the dwarf, looking about him as if
for his poker, ‘I’ll spoil the expression of your monkey’s face, I
will.’
‘Don’t put yourself out of the way I beg, sir,’ rejoined Brass,
checking himself with great alacrity. ‘You’re quite right, sir, quite
right. I shouldn’t have mentioned the subject, sir. It’s much better
not to. You’re quite right, sir. Let us change it, if you please.
You were asking, sir, Sally told me, about our lodger. He has not
returned, sir.’
‘No?’ said Quilp, heating some rum in a little saucepan, and watching
it to prevent its boiling over. ‘Why not?’
‘Why, sir,’ returned Brass, ‘he--dear me, Mr Quilp, sir--’
‘What’s the matter?’ said the dwarf, stopping his hand in the act of
carrying the saucepan to his mouth.
‘You have forgotten the water, sir,’ said Brass. ‘And--excuse me,
sir--but it’s burning hot.’
Deigning no other than a practical answer to this remonstrance, Mr
Quilp raised the hot saucepan to his lips, and deliberately drank off
all the spirit it contained, which might have been in quantity about
half a pint, and had been but a moment before, when he took it off the
fire, bubbling and hissing fiercely. Having swallowed this gentle
stimulant, and shaken his fist at the admiral, he bade Mr Brass proceed.
‘But first,’ said Quilp, with his accustomed grin, ‘have a drop
yourself--a nice drop--a good, warm, fiery drop.’
‘Why, sir,’ replied Brass, ‘if there was such a thing as a mouthful of
water that could be got without trouble--’
‘There’s no such thing to be had here,’ cried the dwarf. ‘Water for
lawyers! Melted lead and brimstone, you mean, nice hot blistering
pitch and tar--that’s the thing for them--eh, Brass, eh?’
‘Ha ha ha!’ laughed Mr Brass. ‘Oh very biting! and yet it’s like being
tickled--there’s a pleasure in it too, sir!’
‘Drink that,’ said the dwarf, who had by this time heated some more.
‘Toss it off, don’t leave any heeltap, scorch your throat and be happy!’
The wretched Sampson took a few short sips of the liquor, which
immediately distilled itself into burning tears, and in that form came
rolling down his cheeks into the pipkin again, turning the colour of
his face and eyelids to a deep red, and giving rise to a violent fit of
coughing, in the midst of which he was still heard to declare, with the
constancy of a martyr, that it was ‘beautiful indeed!’ While he was
yet in unspeakable agonies, the dwarf renewed their conversation.
‘The lodger,’ said Quilp, ‘--what about him?’
‘He is still, sir,’
returned Brass, with intervals of coughing, ‘stopping with the Garland
family. He has only been home once, Sir, since the day of the
examination of that culprit. He informed Mr Richard, sir, that he
couldn’t bear the house after what had taken place; that he was
wretched in it; and that he looked upon himself as being in a certain
kind of way the cause of the occurrence.--A very excellent lodger Sir.
I hope we may not lose him.’
‘Yah!’ cried the dwarf. ‘Never thinking of anybody but yourself--why
don’t you retrench then--scrape up, hoard, economise, eh?’
‘Why, sir,’ replied Brass, ‘upon my word I think Sarah’s as good an
economiser as any going. I do indeed, Mr Quilp.’
‘Moisten your clay, wet the other eye, drink, man!’ cried the dwarf.
‘You took a clerk to oblige me.’
‘Delighted, sir, I am sure, at any time,’ replied Sampson. ‘Yes, Sir,
I did.’
‘Then now you may discharge him,’ said Quilp. ‘There’s a means of
retrenchment for you at once.’
‘Discharge Mr Richard, sir?’ cried Brass.
‘Have you more than one clerk, you parrot, that you ask the question?
Yes.’
‘Upon my word, Sir,’ said Brass, ‘I wasn’t prepared for this--’
‘How could you be?’ sneered the dwarf, ‘when I wasn’t? How often am I
to tell you that I brought him to you that I might always have my eye
on him and know where he was--and that I had a plot, a scheme, a little
quiet piece of enjoyment afoot, of which the very cream and essence
was, that this old man and grandchild (who have sunk underground I
think) should be, while he and his precious friend believed them rich,
in reality as poor as frozen rats?’
‘I quite understood that, sir,’ rejoined Brass. ‘Thoroughly.’
‘Well, Sir,’ retorted Quilp, ‘and do you understand now, that they’re
not poor--that they can’t be, if they have such men as your lodger
searching for them, and scouring the country far and wide?’
‘Of course I do, Sir,’ said Sampson.
‘Of course you do,’ retorted the dwarf, viciously snapping at his
words. ‘Of course do you understand then, that it’s no matter what
comes of this fellow? of course do you understand that for any other
purpose he’s no man for me, nor for you?’
‘I have frequently said to Sarah, sir,’ returned Brass, ‘that he was of
no use at all in the business. You can’t put any confidence in him,
sir. If you’ll believe me I’ve found that fellow, in the commonest
little matters of the office that have been trusted to him, blurting
out the truth, though expressly cautioned. The aggravation of that
chap sir, has exceeded anything you can imagine, it has indeed.
Nothing but the respect and obligation I owe to you, sir--’
As it was plain that Sampson was bent on a complimentary harangue,
unless he received a timely interruption, Mr Quilp politely tapped him
on the crown of his head with the little saucepan, and requested that
he would be so obliging as to hold his peace.
‘Practical, sir, practical,’ said Brass, rubbing the place and smiling;
‘but still extremely pleasant--immensely so!’
‘Hearken to me, will you?’ returned Quilp, ‘or I’ll be a little more
pleasant, presently. There’s no chance of his comrade and friend
returning. The scamp has been obliged to fly, as I learn, for some
knavery, and has found his way abroad. Let him rot there.’
‘Certainly, sir. Quite proper.--Forcible!’ cried Brass, glancing at
the admiral again, as if he made a third in company. ‘Extremely
forcible!’
‘I hate him,’ said Quilp between his teeth, ‘and have always hated him,
for family reasons. Besides, he was an intractable ruffian; otherwise
he would have been of use. This fellow is pigeon-hearted and
light-headed. I don’t want him any longer. Let him hang or
drown--starve--go to the devil.’
‘By all means, sir,’ returned Brass. ‘When would you wish him, sir,
to--ha, ha!--to make that little excursion?’
‘When this trial’s over,’ said Quilp. ‘As soon as that’s ended, send
him about his business.’
‘It shall be done, sir,’ returned Brass; ‘by all means. It will be
rather a blow to Sarah, sir, but she has all her feelings under
control. Ah, Mr Quilp, I often think, sir, if it had only pleased
Providence to bring you and Sarah together, in earlier life, what
blessed results would have flowed from such a union! You never saw our
dear father, sir?--A charming gentleman. Sarah was his pride and joy,
sir. He would have closed his eyes in bliss, would Foxey, Mr Quilp, if
he could have found her such a partner. You esteem her, sir?’
‘I love her,’ croaked the dwarf.
‘You’re very good, Sir,’ returned Brass, ‘I am sure. Is there any
other order, sir, that I can take a note of, besides this little matter
of Mr Richard?’
‘None,’ replied the dwarf, seizing the saucepan. ‘Let us drink the
lovely Sarah.’
‘If we could do it in something, sir, that wasn’t quite boiling,’
suggested Brass humbly, ‘perhaps it would be better. I think it will
be more agreeable to Sarah’s feelings, when she comes to hear from me
of the honour you have done her, if she learns it was in liquor rather
cooler than the last, Sir.’
But to these remonstrances, Mr Quilp turned a deaf ear. Sampson Brass,
who was, by this time, anything but sober, being compelled to take
further draughts of the same strong bowl, found that, instead of at all
contributing to his recovery, they had the novel effect of making the
counting-house spin round and round with extreme velocity, and causing
the floor and ceiling to heave in a very distressing manner. After a
brief stupor, he awoke to a consciousness of being partly under the
table and partly under the grate. This position not being the most
comfortable one he could have chosen for himself, he managed to stagger
to his feet, and, holding on by the admiral, looked round for his host.
Mr Brass’s first impression was, that his host was gone and had left
him there alone--perhaps locked him in for the night. A strong smell
of tobacco, however, suggested a new train of ideas, he looked upward,
and saw that the dwarf was smoking in his hammock.
‘Good bye, Sir,’ cried Brass faintly. ‘Good bye, Sir.’
‘Won’t you stop all night?’ said the dwarf, peeping out. ‘Do stop all
night!’
‘I couldn’t indeed, Sir,’ replied Brass, who was almost dead from
nausea and the closeness of the room. ‘If you’d have the goodness to
show me a light, so that I may see my way across the yard, sir--’
Quilp was out in an instant; not with his legs first, or his head
first, or his arms first, but bodily--altogether.
‘To be sure,’ he said, taking up a lantern, which was now the only
light in the place. ‘Be careful how you go, my dear friend. Be sure
to pick your way among the timber, for all the rusty nails are upwards.
There’s a dog in the lane. He bit a man last night, and a woman the
night before, and last Tuesday he killed a child--but that was in play.
Don’t go too near him.’
‘Which side of the road is he, sir?’ asked Brass, in great dismay.
‘He lives on the right hand,’ said Quilp, ‘but sometimes he hides on
the left, ready for a spring. He’s uncertain in that respect. Mind
you take care of yourself. I’ll never forgive you if you don’t.
There’s the light out--never mind--you know the way--straight on!’
Quilp had slily shaded the light by holding it against his breast, and
now stood chuckling and shaking from head to foot in a rapture of
delight, as he heard the lawyer stumbling up the yard, and now and then
falling heavily down. At length, however, he got quit of the place,
and was out of hearing.
The dwarf shut himself up again, and sprang once more into his hammock.
CHAPTER 63
The professional gentleman who had given Kit the consolatory piece of
information relative to the settlement of his trifle of business at the
Old Bailey, and the probability of its being very soon disposed of,
turned out to be quite correct in his prognostications. In eight days’
time, the sessions commenced. In one day afterwards, the Grand Jury
found a True Bill against Christopher Nubbles for felony; and in two
days from that finding, the aforesaid Christopher Nubbles was called
upon to plead Guilty or Not Guilty to an Indictment for that he the
said Christopher did feloniously abstract and steal from the
dwelling-house and office of one Sampson Brass, gentleman, one Bank
Note for Five Pounds issued by the Governor and Company of the Bank of
England; in contravention of the Statutes in that case made and
provided, and against the peace of our Sovereign Lord the King, his
crown and dignity.
To this indictment, Christopher Nubbles, in a low and trembling voice,
pleaded Not Guilty; and here, let those who are in the habit of forming
hasty judgments from appearances, and who would have had Christopher,
if innocent, speak out very strong and loud, observe, that confinement
and anxiety will subdue the stoutest hearts; and that to one who has
been close shut up, though it be only for ten or eleven days, seeing
but stone walls and a very few stony faces, the sudden entrance into a
great hall filled with life, is a rather disconcerting and startling
circumstance. To this, it must be added, that life in a wig is to a
large class of people much more terrifying and impressive than life
with its own head of hair; and if, in addition to these considerations,
there be taken into account Kit’s natural emotion on seeing the two Mr
Garlands and the little Notary looking on with pale and anxious faces,
it will perhaps seem matter of no very great wonder that he should have
been rather out of sorts, and unable to make himself quite at home.
Although he had never seen either of the Mr Garlands, or Mr Witherden,
since the time of his arrest, he had been given to understand that they
had employed counsel for him. Therefore, when one of the gentlemen in
wigs got up and said ‘I am for the prisoner, my Lord,’ Kit made him a
bow; and when another gentleman in a wig got up and said ‘And I’m
against him, my Lord,’ Kit trembled very much, and bowed to him too.
And didn’t he hope in his own heart that his gentleman was a match for
the other gentleman, and would make him ashamed of himself in no time!
The gentleman who was against him had to speak first, and being in
dreadfully good spirits (for he had, in the last trial, very nearly
procured the acquittal of a young gentleman who had had the misfortune
to murder his father) he spoke up, you may be sure; telling the jury
that if they acquitted this prisoner they must expect to suffer no less
pangs and agonies than he had told the other jury they would certainly
undergo if they convicted that prisoner. And when he had told them all
about the case, and that he had never known a worse case, he stopped a
little while, like a man who had something terrible to tell them, and
then said that he understood an attempt would be made by his learned
friend (and here he looked sideways at Kit’s gentleman) to impeach the
testimony of those immaculate witnesses whom he should call before
them; but he did hope and trust that his learned friend would have a
greater respect and veneration for the character of the prosecutor;
than whom, as he well knew, there did not exist, and never had existed,
a more honourable member of that most honourable profession to which he
was attached. And then he said, did the jury know Bevis Marks? And if
they did know Bevis Marks (as he trusted for their own character, they
did) did they know the historical and elevating associations connected
with that most remarkable spot? Did they believe that a man like Brass
could reside in a place like Bevis Marks, and not be a virtuous and
most upright character? And when he had said a great deal to them on
this point, he remembered that it was an insult to their understandings
to make any remarks on what they must have felt so strongly without
him, and therefore called Sampson Brass into the witness-box,
straightway.
Then up comes Mr Brass, very brisk and fresh; and, having bowed to the
judge, like a man who has had the pleasure of seeing him before, and
who hopes he has been pretty well since their last meeting, folds his
arms, and looks at his gentleman as much as to say ‘Here I am--full of
evidence--Tap me!’ And the gentleman does tap him presently, and with
great discretion too; drawing off the evidence by little and little,
and making it run quite clear and bright in the eyes of all present.
Then, Kit’s gentleman takes him in hand, but can make nothing of him;
and after a great many very long questions and very short answers, Mr
Sampson Brass goes down in glory.
To him succeeds Sarah, who in like manner is easy to be managed by Mr
Brass’s gentleman, but very obdurate to Kit’s. In short, Kit’s
gentleman can get nothing out of her but a repetition of what she has
said before (only a little stronger this time, as against his client),
and therefore lets her go, in some confusion. Then, Mr Brass’s
gentleman calls Richard Swiveller, and Richard Swiveller appears
accordingly.
Now, Mr Brass’s gentleman has it whispered in his ear that this witness
is disposed to be friendly to the prisoner--which, to say the truth, he
is rather glad to hear, as his strength is considered to lie in what is
familiarly termed badgering. Wherefore, he begins by requesting the
officer to be quite sure that this witness kisses the book, then goes
to work at him, tooth and nail.
‘Mr Swiveller,’ says this gentleman to Dick, when he had told his tale
with evident reluctance and a desire to make the best of it: ‘Pray sir,
where did you dine yesterday?’--‘Where did I dine yesterday?’--‘Aye,
sir, where did you dine yesterday--was it near here, sir?’--‘Oh to be
sure--yes--just over the way.’--‘To be sure. Yes. Just over the way,’
repeats Mr Brass’s gentleman, with a glance at the court.--‘Alone,
sir?’--‘I beg your pardon,’ says Mr Swiveller, who has not caught the
question--‘Alone, sir?’ repeats Mr Brass’s gentleman in a voice of
thunder, ‘did you dine alone? Did you treat anybody, sir? Come!’--‘Oh
yes, to be sure--yes, I did,’ says Mr Swiveller with a smile.--‘Have
the goodness to banish a levity, sir, which is very ill-suited to the
place in which you stand (though perhaps you have reason to be thankful
that it’s only that place),’ says Mr Brass’s gentleman, with a nod of
the head, insinuating that the dock is Mr Swiveller’s legitimate sphere
of action; ‘and attend to me. You were waiting about here, yesterday,
in expectation that this trial was coming on. You dined over the way.
You treated somebody. Now, was that somebody brother to the prisoner
at the bar?’--Mr Swiveller is proceeding to explain--‘Yes or No, sir,’
cries Mr Brass’s gentleman--‘But will you allow me--’--‘Yes or No,
sir’--‘Yes it was, but--’--‘Yes it was,’ cries the gentleman, taking
him up short. ‘And a very pretty witness YOU are!’
Down sits Mr Brass’s gentleman. Kit’s gentleman, not knowing how the
matter really stands, is afraid to pursue the subject. Richard
Swiveller retires abashed. Judge, jury and spectators have visions of
his lounging about, with an ill-looking, large-whiskered, dissolute
young fellow of six feet high. The reality is, little Jacob, with the
calves of his legs exposed to the open air, and himself tied up in a
shawl. Nobody knows the truth; everybody believes a falsehood; and all
because of the ingenuity of Mr Brass’s gentleman.
Then come the witnesses to character, and here Mr Brass’s gentleman
shines again. It turns out that Mr Garland has had no character with
Kit, no recommendation of him but from his own mother, and that he was
suddenly dismissed by his former master for unknown reasons. ‘Really
Mr Garland,’ says Mr Brass’s gentleman, ‘for a person who has arrived
at your time of life, you are, to say the least of it, singularly
indiscreet, I think.’ The jury think so too, and find Kit guilty. He
is taken off, humbly protesting his innocence. The spectators settle
themselves in their places with renewed attention, for there are
several female witnesses to be examined in the next case, and it has
been rumoured that Mr Brass’s gentleman will make great fun in
cross-examining them for the prisoner.
Kit’s mother, poor woman, is waiting at the grate below stairs,
accompanied by Barbara’s mother (who, honest soul! never does anything
but cry, and hold the baby), and a sad interview ensues. The
newspaper-reading turnkey has told them all. He don’t think it will be
transportation for life, because there’s time to prove the good
character yet, and that is sure to serve him. He wonders what he did
it for. ‘He never did it!’ cries Kit’s mother. ‘Well,’ says the
turnkey, ‘I won’t contradict you. It’s all one, now, whether he did it
or not.’
Kit’s mother can reach his hand through the bars, and she clasps it--
God, and those to whom he has given such tenderness, only know in how
much agony. Kit bids her keep a good heart, and, under pretence of
having the children lifted up to kiss him, prays Barbara’s mother in a
whisper to take her home.
‘Some friend will rise up for us, mother,’ cried Kit, ‘I am sure. If
not now, before long. My innocence will come out, mother, and I shall
be brought back again; I feel confidence in that. You must teach
little Jacob and the baby how all this was, for if they thought I had
ever been dishonest, when they grew old enough to understand, it would
break my heart to know it, if I was thousands of miles away.--Oh! is
there no good gentleman here, who will take care of her!’
The hand slips out of his, for the poor creature sinks down upon the
earth, insensible. Richard Swiveller comes hastily up, elbows the
bystanders out of the way, takes her (after some trouble) in one arm
after the manner of theatrical ravishers, and, nodding to Kit, and
commanding Barbara’s mother to follow, for he has a coach waiting,
bears her swiftly off.
Well; Richard took her home. And what astonishing absurdities in the
way of quotation from song and poem he perpetrated on the road, no man
knows. He took her home, and stayed till she was recovered; and,
having no money to pay the coach, went back in state to Bevis Marks,
bidding the driver (for it was Saturday night) wait at the door while
he went in for ‘change.’
‘Mr Richard, sir,’ said Brass cheerfully, ‘Good evening!’
Monstrous as Kit’s tale had appeared, at first, Mr Richard did, that
night, half suspect his affable employer of some deep villany. Perhaps
it was but the misery he had just witnessed which gave his careless
nature this impulse; but, be that as it may, it was very strong upon
him, and he said in as few words as possible, what he wanted.
‘Money?’ cried Brass, taking out his purse. ‘Ha ha! To be sure, Mr
Richard, to be sure, sir. All men must live. You haven’t change for a
five-pound note, have you sir?’
‘No,’ returned Dick, shortly.
‘Oh!’ said Brass, ‘here’s the very sum. That saves trouble. You’re
very welcome I’m sure.--Mr Richard, sir--’
Dick, who had by this time reached the door, turned round.
‘You needn’t,’ said Brass, ‘trouble yourself to come back any more,
Sir.’
‘Eh?’
‘You see, Mr Richard,’ said Brass, thrusting his hands in his pockets,
and rocking himself to and fro on his stool, ‘the fact is, that a man
of your abilities is lost, Sir, quite lost, in our dry and mouldy line.
It’s terrible drudgery--shocking. I should say, now, that the stage,
or the--or the army, Mr Richard--or something very superior in the
licensed victualling way--was the kind of thing that would call out the
genius of such a man as you. I hope you’ll look in to see us now and
then. Sally, Sir, will be delighted I’m sure. She’s extremely sorry
to lose you, Mr Richard, but a sense of her duty to society reconciles
her. An amazing creature that, sir! You’ll find the money quite
correct, I think. There’s a cracked window sir, but I’ve not made any
deduction on that account. Whenever we part with friends, Mr Richard,
let us part liberally. A delightful sentiment, sir!’
To all these rambling observations, Mr Swiveller answered not one word,
but, returning for the aquatic jacket, rolled it into a tight round
ball: looking steadily at Brass meanwhile as if he had some intention
of bowling him down with it. He only took it under his arm, however,
and marched out of the office in profound silence. When he had closed
the door, he re-opened it, stared in again for a few moments with the
same portentous gravity, and nodding his head once, in a slow and
ghost-like manner, vanished.
He paid the coachman, and turned his back on Bevis Marks, big with
great designs for the comforting of Kit’s mother and the aid of Kit
himself.
But the lives of gentlemen devoted to such pleasures as Richard
Swiveller, are extremely precarious. The spiritual excitement of the
last fortnight, working upon a system affected in no slight degree by
the spirituous excitement of some years, proved a little too much for
him. That very night, Mr Richard was seized with an alarming illness,
and in twenty-four hours was stricken with a raging fever.
CHAPTER 64
Tossing to and fro upon his hot, uneasy bed; tormented by a fierce
thirst which nothing could appease; unable to find, in any change of
posture, a moment’s peace or ease; and rambling, ever, through deserts
of thought where there was no resting-place, no sight or sound
suggestive of refreshment or repose, nothing but a dull eternal
weariness, with no change but the restless shiftings of his miserable
body, and the weary wandering of his mind, constant still to one
ever-present anxiety--to a sense of something left undone, of some
fearful obstacle to be surmounted, of some carking care that would not
be driven away, and which haunted the distempered brain, now in this
form, now in that, always shadowy and dim, but recognisable for the
same phantom in every shape it took: darkening every vision like an
evil conscience, and making slumber horrible--in these slow tortures
of his dread disease, the unfortunate Richard lay wasting and consuming
inch by inch, until, at last, when he seemed to fight and struggle to
rise up, and to be held down by devils, he sank into a deep sleep, and
dreamed no more.
He awoke. With a sensation of most blissful rest, better than sleep
itself, he began gradually to remember something of these sufferings,
and to think what a long night it had been, and whether he had not been
delirious twice or thrice. Happening, in the midst of these
cogitations, to raise his hand, he was astonished to find how heavy it
seemed, and yet how thin and light it really was. Still, he felt
indifferent and happy; and having no curiosity to pursue the subject,
remained in the same waking slumber until his attention was attracted
by a cough. This made him doubt whether he had locked his door last
night, and feel a little surprised at having a companion in the room.
Still, he lacked energy to follow up this train of thought; and
unconsciously fell, in a luxury of repose, to staring at some green
stripes on the bed-furniture, and associating them strangely with
patches of fresh turf, while the yellow ground between made
gravel-walks, and so helped out a long perspective of trim gardens.
He was rambling in imagination on these terraces, and had quite lost
himself among them indeed, when he heard the cough once more. The
walks shrunk into stripes again at the sound, and raising himself a
little in the bed, and holding the curtain open with one hand, he
looked out.
The same room certainly, and still by candlelight; but with what
unbounded astonishment did he see all those bottles, and basins, and
articles of linen airing by the fire, and such-like furniture of a sick
chamber--all very clean and neat, but all quite different from anything
he had left there, when he went to bed! The atmosphere, too, filled
with a cool smell of herbs and vinegar; the floor newly sprinkled;
the--the what? The Marchioness?
Yes; playing cribbage with herself at the table. There she sat, intent
upon her game, coughing now and then in a subdued manner as if she
feared to disturb him--shuffling the cards, cutting, dealing, playing,
counting, pegging--going through all the mysteries of cribbage as if
she had been in full practice from her cradle! Mr Swiveller
contemplated these things for a short time, and suffering the curtain
to fall into its former position, laid his head on the pillow again.
‘I’m dreaming,’ thought Richard, ‘that’s clear. When I went to bed, my
hands were not made of egg-shells; and now I can almost see through
‘em. If this is not a dream, I have woke up, by mistake, in an Arabian
Night, instead of a London one. But I have no doubt I’m asleep. Not
the least.’
Here the small servant had another cough.
‘Very remarkable!’ thought Mr Swiveller. ‘I never dreamt such a real
cough as that before. I don’t know, indeed, that I ever dreamt either
a cough or a sneeze. Perhaps it’s part of the philosophy of dreams
that one never does. There’s another--and another--I say!--I’m
dreaming rather fast!’
For the purpose of testing his real condition, Mr Swiveller, after some
reflection, pinched himself in the arm.
‘Queerer still!’ he thought. ‘I came to bed rather plump than
otherwise, and now there’s nothing to lay hold of. I’ll take another
survey.’
The result of this additional inspection was, to convince Mr Swiveller
that the objects by which he was surrounded were real, and that he saw
them, beyond all question, with his waking eyes.
‘It’s an Arabian Night; that’s what it is,’ said Richard. ‘I’m in
Damascus or Grand Cairo. The Marchioness is a Genie, and having had a
wager with another Genie about who is the handsomest young man alive,
and the worthiest to be the husband of the Princess of China, has
brought me away, room and all, to compare us together. Perhaps,’ said
Mr Swiveller, turning languidly round on his pillow, and looking on
that side of his bed which was next the wall, ‘the Princess may be
still--No, she’s gone.’
Not feeling quite satisfied with this explanation, as, even taking it
to be the correct one, it still involved a little mystery and doubt, Mr
Swiveller raised the curtain again, determined to take the first
favourable opportunity of addressing his companion. An occasion
presented itself. The Marchioness dealt, turned up a knave, and
omitted to take the usual advantage; upon which Mr Swiveller called out
as loud as he could--‘Two for his heels!’
The Marchioness jumped up quickly and clapped her hands. ‘Arabian
Night, certainly,’ thought Mr Swiveller; ‘they always clap their hands
instead of ringing the bell. Now for the two thousand black slaves,
with jars of jewels on their heads!’
It appeared, however, that she had only clapped her hands for joy; for
directly afterward she began to laugh, and then to cry; declaring, not
in choice Arabic but in familiar English, that she was ‘so glad, she
didn’t know what to do.’
‘Marchioness,’ said Mr Swiveller, thoughtfully, ‘be pleased to draw
nearer. First of all, will you have the goodness to inform me where I
shall find my voice; and secondly, what has become of my flesh?’
The Marchioness only shook her head mournfully, and cried again;
whereupon Mr Swiveller (being very weak) felt his own eyes affected
likewise.
‘I begin to infer, from your manner, and these appearances,
Marchioness,’ said Richard after a pause, and smiling with a trembling
lip, ‘that I have been ill.’
‘You just have!’ replied the small servant, wiping her eyes. ‘And
haven’t you been a talking nonsense!’
‘Oh!’ said Dick. ‘Very ill, Marchioness, have I been?’
‘Dead, all but,’ replied the small servant. ‘I never thought you’d get
better. Thank Heaven you have!’
Mr Swiveller was silent for a long while. By and bye, he began to talk
again, inquiring how long he had been there.
‘Three weeks to-morrow,’ replied the servant.
‘Three what?’ said Dick.
‘Weeks,’ returned the Marchioness emphatically; ‘three long, slow
weeks.’
The bare thought of having been in such extremity, caused Richard to
fall into another silence, and to lie flat down again, at his full
length. The Marchioness, having arranged the bed-clothes more
comfortably, and felt that his hands and forehead were quite cool--a
discovery that filled her with delight--cried a little more, and then
applied herself to getting tea ready, and making some thin dry toast.
While she was thus engaged, Mr Swiveller looked on with a grateful
heart, very much astonished to see how thoroughly at home she made
herself, and attributing this attention, in its origin, to Sally Brass,
whom, in his own mind, he could not thank enough. When the Marchioness
had finished her toasting, she spread a clean cloth on a tray, and
brought him some crisp slices and a great basin of weak tea, with which
(she said) the doctor had left word he might refresh himself when he
awoke. She propped him up with pillows, if not as skilfully as if she
had been a professional nurse all her life, at least as tenderly; and
looked on with unutterable satisfaction while the patient--stopping
every now and then to shake her by the hand--took his poor meal with an
appetite and relish, which the greatest dainties of the earth, under
any other circumstances, would have failed to provoke. Having cleared
away, and disposed everything comfortably about him again, she sat down
at the table to take her own tea.
‘Marchioness,’ said Mr Swiveller, ‘how’s Sally?’
The small servant screwed her face into an expression of the very
uttermost entanglement of slyness, and shook her head.
‘What, haven’t you seen her lately?’ said Dick.
‘Seen her!’ cried the small servant. ‘Bless you, I’ve run away!’
Mr Swiveller immediately laid himself down again quite flat, and so
remained for about five minutes. By slow degrees he resumed his
sitting posture after that lapse of time, and inquired:
‘And where do you live, Marchioness?’
‘Live!’ cried the small servant. ‘Here!’
‘Oh!’ said Mr Swiveller.
And with that he fell down flat again, as suddenly as if he had been
shot. Thus he remained, motionless and bereft of speech, until she had
finished her meal, put everything in its place, and swept the hearth;
when he motioned her to bring a chair to the bedside, and, being
propped up again, opened a farther conversation.
‘And so,’ said Dick, ‘you have run away?’
‘Yes,’ said the Marchioness, ‘and they’ve been a tizing of me.’
‘Been--I beg your pardon,’ said Dick--‘what have they been doing?’
‘Been a tizing of me--tizing you know--in the newspapers,’ rejoined the
Marchioness.
‘Aye, aye,’ said Dick, ‘advertising?’
The small servant nodded, and winked. Her eyes were so red with waking
and crying, that the Tragic Muse might have winked with greater
consistency. And so Dick felt.
‘Tell me,’ said he, ‘how it was that you thought of coming here.’
‘Why, you see,’ returned the Marchioness, ‘when you was gone, I hadn’t
any friend at all, because the lodger he never come back, and I didn’t
know where either him or you was to be found, you know. But one
morning, when I was--’
‘Was near a keyhole?’ suggested Mr Swiveller, observing that she
faltered.
‘Well then,’ said the small servant, nodding; ‘when I was near the
office keyhole--as you see me through, you know--I heard somebody
saying that she lived here, and was the lady whose house you lodged at,
and that you was took very bad, and wouldn’t nobody come and take care
of you. Mr Brass, he says, “It’s no business of mine,” he says; and
Miss Sally, she says, “He’s a funny chap, but it’s no business of
mine;” and the lady went away, and slammed the door to, when she went
out, I can tell you. So I run away that night, and come here, and told
‘em you was my brother, and they believed me, and I’ve been here ever
since.’
‘This poor little Marchioness has been wearing herself to death!’ cried
Dick.
‘No I haven’t,’ she returned, ‘not a bit of it. Don’t you mind about
me. I like sitting up, and I’ve often had a sleep, bless you, in one
of them chairs. But if you could have seen how you tried to jump out
o’ winder, and if you could have heard how you used to keep on singing
and making speeches, you wouldn’t have believed it--I’m so glad you’re
better, Mr Liverer.’
‘Liverer indeed!’ said Dick thoughtfully. ‘It’s well I am a liverer.
I strongly suspect I should have died, Marchioness, but for you.’
At this point, Mr Swiveller took the small servant’s hand in his again,
and being, as we have seen, but poorly, might in struggling to express
his thanks have made his eyes as red as hers, but that she quickly
changed the theme by making him lie down, and urging him to keep very
quiet.
‘The doctor,’ she told him, ‘said you was to be kept quite still, and
there was to be no noise nor nothing. Now, take a rest, and then we’ll
talk again. I’ll sit by you, you know. If you shut your eyes, perhaps
you’ll go to sleep. You’ll be all the better for it, if you do.’
The Marchioness, in saying these words, brought a little table to the
bedside, took her seat at it, and began to work away at the concoction
of some cooling drink, with the address of a score of chemists.
Richard Swiveller being indeed fatigued, fell into a slumber, and
waking in about half an hour, inquired what time it was.
‘Just gone half after six,’ replied his small friend, helping him to
sit up again.
‘Marchioness,’ said Richard, passing his hand over his forehead and
turning suddenly round, as though the subject but that moment flashed
upon him, ‘what has become of Kit?’
He had been sentenced to transportation for a great many years, she
said.
‘Has he gone?’ asked Dick--‘his mother--how is she,--what has become of
her?’
His nurse shook her head, and answered that she knew nothing about
them. ‘But, if I thought,’ said she, very slowly, ‘that you’d keep
quiet, and not put yourself into another fever, I could tell you--but
I won’t now.’
‘Yes, do,’ said Dick. ‘It will amuse me.’
‘Oh! would it though!’ rejoined the small servant, with a horrified
look. ‘I know better than that. Wait till you’re better and then I’ll
tell you.’
Dick looked very earnestly at his little friend: and his eyes, being
large and hollow from illness, assisted the expression so much, that
she was quite frightened, and besought him not to think any more about
it. What had already fallen from her, however, had not only piqued his
curiosity, but seriously alarmed him, wherefore he urged her to tell
him the worst at once.
‘Oh there’s no worst in it,’ said the small servant. ‘It hasn’t
anything to do with you.’
‘Has it anything to do with--is it anything you heard through chinks or
keyholes--and that you were not intended to hear?’ asked Dick, in a
breathless state.
‘Yes,’ replied the small servant.
‘In--in Bevis Marks?’ pursued Dick hastily. ‘Conversations between
Brass and Sally?’
‘Yes,’ cried the small servant again.
Richard Swiveller thrust his lank arm out of bed, and, gripping her by
the wrist and drawing her close to him, bade her out with it, and
freely too, or he would not answer for the consequences; being wholly
unable to endure the state of excitement and expectation. She, seeing
that he was greatly agitated, and that the effects of postponing her
revelation might be much more injurious than any that were likely to
ensue from its being made at once, promised compliance, on condition
that the patient kept himself perfectly quiet, and abstained from
starting up or tossing about.
‘But if you begin to do that,’ said the small servant, ‘I’ll leave off.
And so I tell you.’
‘You can’t leave off, till you have gone on,’ said Dick. ‘And do go
on, there’s a darling. Speak, sister, speak. Pretty Polly say. Oh
tell me when, and tell me where, pray Marchioness, I beseech you!’
Unable to resist these fervent adjurations, which Richard Swiveller
poured out as passionately as if they had been of the most solemn and
tremendous nature, his companion spoke thus:
‘Well! Before I run away, I used to sleep in the kitchen--where we
played cards, you know. Miss Sally used to keep the key of the kitchen
door in her pocket, and she always come down at night to take away the
candle and rake out the fire. When she had done that, she left me to
go to bed in the dark, locked the door on the outside, put the key in
her pocket again, and kept me locked up till she come down in the
morning--very early I can tell you--and let me out. I was terrible
afraid of being kept like this, because if there was a fire, I thought
they might forget me and only take care of themselves you know. So,
whenever I see an old rusty key anywhere, I picked it up and tried if
it would fit the door, and at last I found in the dust cellar a key
that did fit it.’
Here, Mr Swiveller made a violent demonstration with his legs. But the
small servant immediately pausing in her talk, he subsided again, and
pleading a momentary forgetfulness of their compact, entreated her to
proceed.
‘They kept me very short,’ said the small servant. ‘Oh! you can’t
think how short they kept me! So I used to come out at night after
they’d gone to bed, and feel about in the dark for bits of biscuit, or
sangwitches that you’d left in the office, or even pieces of orange
peel to put into cold water and make believe it was wine. Did you ever
taste orange peel and water?’
Mr Swiveller replied that he had never tasted that ardent liquor; and
once more urged his friend to resume the thread of her narrative.
‘If you make believe very much, it’s quite nice,’ said the small
servant, ‘but if you don’t, you know, it seems as if it would bear a
little more seasoning, certainly. Well, sometimes I used to come out
after they’d gone to bed, and sometimes before, you know; and one or
two nights before there was all that precious noise in the office--when
the young man was took, I mean--I come upstairs while Mr Brass and Miss
Sally was a-sittin’ at the office fire; and I tell you the truth, that
I come to listen again, about the key of the safe.’
Mr Swiveller gathered up his knees so as to make a great cone of the
bedclothes, and conveyed into his countenance an expression of the
utmost concern. But the small servant pausing, and holding up her
finger, the cone gently disappeared, though the look of concern did not.
‘There was him and her,’ said the small servant, ‘a-sittin’ by the
fire, and talking softly together. Mr Brass says to Miss Sally, “Upon
my word,” he says “it’s a dangerous thing, and it might get us into a
world of trouble, and I don’t half like it.” She says--you know her
way--she says, “You’re the chickenest-hearted, feeblest, faintest man I
ever see, and I think,” she says, “that I ought to have been the
brother, and you the sister. Isn’t Quilp,” she says, “our principal
support?” “He certainly is,” says Mr Brass, “And an’t we,” she says,
“constantly ruining somebody or other in the way of business?” “We
certainly are,” says Mr Brass. “Then does it signify,” she says,
“about ruining this Kit when Quilp desires it?” “It certainly does not
signify,” says Mr Brass. Then they whispered and laughed for a long
time about there being no danger if it was well done, and then Mr Brass
pulls out his pocket-book, and says, “Well,” he says, “here it
is--Quilp’s own five-pound note. We’ll agree that way, then,” he says.
“Kit’s coming to-morrow morning, I know. While he’s up-stairs, you’ll
get out of the way, and I’ll clear off Mr Richard. Having Kit alone,
I’ll hold him in conversation, and put this property in his hat. I’ll
manage so, besides,” he says, “that Mr Richard shall find it there, and
be the evidence. And if that don’t get Christopher out of Mr Quilp’s
way, and satisfy Mr Quilp’s grudges,” he says, “the Devil’s in it.”
Miss Sally laughed, and said that was the plan, and as they seemed to
be moving away, and I was afraid to stop any longer, I went down-stairs
again.--There!’
The small servant had gradually worked herself into as much agitation
as Mr Swiveller, and therefore made no effort to restrain him when he
sat up in bed and hastily demanded whether this story had been told to
anybody.
‘How could it be?’ replied his nurse. ‘I was almost afraid to think
about it, and hoped the young man would be let off. When I heard ‘em
say they had found him guilty of what he didn’t do, you was gone, and
so was the lodger--though I think I should have been frightened to tell
him, even if he’d been there. Ever since I come here, you’ve been out
of your senses, and what would have been the good of telling you then?’
‘Marchioness,’ said Mr Swiveller, plucking off his nightcap and
flinging it to the other end of the room; ‘if you’ll do me the favour
to retire for a few minutes and see what sort of a night it is, I’ll
get up.’
‘You mustn’t think of such a thing,’ cried his nurse.
‘I must indeed,’ said the patient, looking round the room.
‘Whereabouts are my clothes?’
‘Oh, I’m so glad--you haven’t got any,’ replied the Marchioness.
‘Ma’am!’ said Mr Swiveller, in great astonishment.
‘I’ve been obliged to sell them, every one, to get the things that was
ordered for you. But don’t take on about that,’ urged the Marchioness,
as Dick fell back upon his pillow. ‘You’re too weak to stand, indeed.’
‘I am afraid,’ said Richard dolefully, ‘that you’re right. What ought
I to do! what is to be done!’
It naturally occurred to him on very little reflection, that the first
step to take would be to communicate with one of the Mr Garlands
instantly. It was very possible that Mr Abel had not yet left the
office. In as little time as it takes to tell it, the small servant
had the address in pencil on a piece of paper; a verbal description of
father and son, which would enable her to recognise either, without
difficulty; and a special caution to be shy of Mr Chuckster, in
consequence of that gentleman’s known antipathy to Kit. Armed with
these slender powers, she hurried away, commissioned to bring either
old Mr Garland or Mr Abel, bodily, to that apartment.
‘I suppose,’ said Dick, as she closed the door slowly, and peeped into
the room again, to make sure that he was comfortable, ‘I suppose
there’s nothing left--not so much as a waistcoat even?’
‘No, nothing.’
‘It’s embarrassing,’ said Mr Swiveller, ‘in case of fire--even an
umbrella would be something--but you did quite right, dear Marchioness.
I should have died without you!’
CHAPTER 65
It was well for the small servant that she was of a sharp, quick
nature, or the consequence of sending her out alone, from the very
neighbourhood in which it was most dangerous for her to appear, would
probably have been the restoration of Miss Sally Brass to the supreme
authority over her person. Not unmindful of the risk she ran, however,
the Marchioness no sooner left the house than she dived into the first
dark by-way that presented itself, and, without any present reference
to the point to which her journey tended, made it her first business to
put two good miles of brick and mortar between herself and Bevis Marks.
When she had accomplished this object, she began to shape her course
for the notary’s office, to which--shrewdly inquiring of apple-women
and oyster-sellers at street-corners, rather than in lighted shops or
of well-dressed people, at the hazard of attracting notice--she easily
procured a direction. As carrier-pigeons, on being first let loose in
a strange place, beat the air at random for a short time before darting
off towards the spot for which they are designed, so did the
Marchioness flutter round and round until she believed herself in
safety, and then bear swiftly down upon the port for which she was
bound.
She had no bonnet--nothing on her head but a great cap which, in some
old time, had been worn by Sally Brass, whose taste in head-dresses
was, as we have seen, peculiar--and her speed was rather retarded than
assisted by her shoes, which, being extremely large and slipshod, flew
off every now and then, and were difficult to find again, among the
crowd of passengers. Indeed, the poor little creature experienced so
much trouble and delay from having to grope for these articles of dress
in mud and kennel, and suffered in these researches so much jostling,
pushing, squeezing and bandying from hand to hand, that by the time she
reached the street in which the notary lived, she was fairly worn out
and exhausted, and could not refrain from tears.
But to have got there at last was a great comfort, especially as there
were lights still burning in the office window, and therefore some hope
that she was not too late. So the Marchioness dried her eyes with the
backs of her hands, and, stealing softly up the steps, peeped in
through the glass door.
Mr Chuckster was standing behind the lid of his desk, making such
preparations towards finishing off for the night, as pulling down his
wristbands and pulling up his shirt-collar, settling his neck more
gracefully in his stock, and secretly arranging his whiskers by the aid
of a little triangular bit of looking glass. Before the ashes of the
fire stood two gentlemen, one of whom she rightly judged to be the
notary, and the other (who was buttoning his great-coat and was
evidently about to depart immediately) Mr Abel Garland.
Having made these observations, the small spy took counsel with
herself, and resolved to wait in the street until Mr Abel came out, as
there would be then no fear of having to speak before Mr Chuckster, and
less difficulty in delivering her message. With this purpose she
slipped out again, and crossing the road, sat down upon a door-step
just opposite.
She had hardly taken this position, when there came dancing up the
street, with his legs all wrong, and his head everywhere by turns, a
pony. This pony had a little phaeton behind him, and a man in it; but
neither man nor phaeton seemed to embarrass him in the least, as he
reared up on his hind legs, or stopped, or went on, or stood still
again, or backed, or went side-ways, without the smallest reference to
them--just as the fancy seized him, and as if he were the freest animal
in creation. When they came to the notary’s door, the man called out
in a very respectful manner, ‘Woa then’--intimating that if he might
venture to express a wish, it would be that they stopped there. The
pony made a moment’s pause; but, as if it occurred to him that to stop
when he was required might be to establish an inconvenient and
dangerous precedent, he immediately started off again, rattled at a
fast trot to the street corner, wheeled round, came back, and then
stopped of his own accord.
‘Oh! you’re a precious creatur!’ said the man--who didn’t venture by
the bye to come out in his true colours until he was safe on the
pavement. ‘I wish I had the rewarding of you--I do.’
‘What has he been doing?’ said Mr Abel, tying a shawl round his neck as
he came down the steps.
‘He’s enough to fret a man’s heart out,’ replied the hostler. ‘He is
the most wicious rascal--Woa then, will you?’
‘He’ll never stand still, if you call him names,’ said Mr Abel, getting
in, and taking the reins. ‘He’s a very good fellow if you know how to
manage him. This is the first time he has been out, this long while,
for he has lost his old driver and wouldn’t stir for anybody else, till
this morning. The lamps are right, are they? That’s well. Be here to
take him to-morrow, if you please. Good night!’
And, after one or two strange plunges, quite of his own invention, the
pony yielded to Mr Abel’s mildness, and trotted gently off.
All this time Mr Chuckster had been standing at the door, and the small
servant had been afraid to approach. She had nothing for it now,
therefore, but to run after the chaise, and to call to Mr Abel to stop.
Being out of breath when she came up with it, she was unable to make
him hear. The case was desperate; for the pony was quickening his
pace. The Marchioness hung on behind for a few moments, and, feeling
that she could go no farther, and must soon yield, clambered by a
vigorous effort into the hinder seat, and in so doing lost one of the
shoes for ever.
Mr Abel being in a thoughtful frame of mind, and having quite enough to
do to keep the pony going, went jogging on without looking round:
little dreaming of the strange figure that was close behind him, until
the Marchioness, having in some degree recovered her breath, and the
loss of her shoe, and the novelty of her position, uttered close into
his ear, the words--‘I say, Sir’--
He turned his head quickly enough then, and stopping the pony, cried,
with some trepidation, ‘God bless me, what is this!’
‘Don’t be frightened, Sir,’ replied the still panting messenger. ‘Oh
I’ve run such a way after you!’
‘What do you want with me?’ said Mr Abel. ‘How did you come here?’
‘I got in behind,’ replied the Marchioness. ‘Oh please drive on,
sir--don’t stop--and go towards the City, will you? And oh do please
make haste, because it’s of consequence. There’s somebody wants to see
you there. He sent me to say would you come directly, and that he
knowed all about Kit, and could save him yet, and prove his innocence.’
‘What do you tell me, child?’
‘The truth, upon my word and honour I do. But please to drive on--
quick, please! I’ve been such a time gone, he’ll think I’m lost.’
Mr Abel involuntarily urged the pony forward. The pony, impelled by
some secret sympathy or some new caprice, burst into a great pace, and
neither slackened it, nor indulged in any eccentric performances, until
they arrived at the door of Mr Swiveller’s lodging, where, marvellous
to relate, he consented to stop when Mr Abel checked him.
‘See! It’s the room up there,’ said the Marchioness, pointing to one
where there was a faint light. ‘Come!’
Mr Abel, who was one of the simplest and most retiring creatures in
existence, and naturally timid withal, hesitated; for he had heard of
people being decoyed into strange places to be robbed and murdered,
under circumstances very like the present, and, for anything he knew to
the contrary, by guides very like the Marchioness. His regard for Kit,
however, overcame every other consideration. So, entrusting Whisker to
the charge of a man who was lingering hard by in expectation of the
job, he suffered his companion to take his hand, and to lead him up the
dark and narrow stairs.
He was not a little surprised to find himself conducted into a
dimly-lighted sick chamber, where a man was sleeping tranquilly in bed.
‘An’t it nice to see him lying there so quiet?’ said his guide, in an
earnest whisper. ‘Oh! you’d say it was, if you had only seen him two
or three days ago.’
Mr Abel made no answer, and, to say the truth, kept a long way from the
bed and very near the door. His guide, who appeared to understand his
reluctance, trimmed the candle, and taking it in her hand, approached
the bed. As she did so, the sleeper started up, and he recognised in
the wasted face the features of Richard Swiveller.
‘Why, how is this?’ said Mr Abel kindly, as he hurried towards him.
‘You have been ill?’
‘Very,’ replied Dick. ‘Nearly dead. You might have chanced to hear of
your Richard on his bier, but for the friend I sent to fetch you.
Another shake of the hand, Marchioness, if you please. Sit down, Sir.’
Mr Abel seemed rather astonished to hear of the quality of his guide,
and took a chair by the bedside.
‘I have sent for you, Sir,’ said Dick--‘but she told you on what
account?’
‘She did. I am quite bewildered by all this. I really don’t know what
to say or think,’ replied Mr Abel.
‘You’ll say that presently,’ retorted Dick. ‘Marchioness, take a seat
on the bed, will you? Now, tell this gentleman all that you told me;
and be particular. Don’t you speak another word, Sir.’
The story was repeated; it was, in effect, exactly the same as before,
without any deviation or omission. Richard Swiveller kept his eyes
fixed on his visitor during its narration, and directly it was
concluded, took the word again.
‘You have heard it all, and you’ll not forget it. I’m too giddy and
too queer to suggest anything; but you and your friends will know what
to do. After this long delay, every minute is an age. If ever you
went home fast in your life, go home fast to-night. Don’t stop to say
one word to me, but go. She will be found here, whenever she’s wanted;
and as to me, you’re pretty sure to find me at home, for a week or two.
There are more reasons than one for that. Marchioness, a light! If
you lose another minute in looking at me, sir, I’ll never forgive you!’
Mr Abel needed no more remonstrance or persuasion. He was gone in an
instant; and the Marchioness, returning from lighting him down-stairs,
reported that the pony, without any preliminary objection whatever, had
dashed away at full gallop.
‘That’s right!’ said Dick; ‘and hearty of him; and I honour him from
this time. But get some supper and a mug of beer, for I am sure you
must be tired. Do have a mug of beer. It will do me as much good to
see you take it as if I might drink it myself.’
Nothing but this assurance could have prevailed upon the small nurse to
indulge in such a luxury. Having eaten and drunk to Mr Swiveller’s
extreme contentment, given him his drink, and put everything in neat
order, she wrapped herself in an old coverlet and lay down upon the rug
before the fire.
Mr Swiveller was by that time murmuring in his sleep, ‘Strew then, oh
strew, a bed of rushes. Here will we stay, till morning blushes. Good
night, Marchioness!’
CHAPTER 66
On awaking in the morning, Richard Swiveller became conscious, by slow
degrees, of whispering voices in his room. Looking out between the
curtains, he espied Mr Garland, Mr Abel, the notary, and the single
gentleman, gathered round the Marchioness, and talking to her with
great earnestness but in very subdued tones--fearing, no doubt, to
disturb him. He lost no time in letting them know that this precaution
was unnecessary, and all four gentlemen directly approached his
bedside. Old Mr Garland was the first to stretch out his hand, and
inquire how he felt.
Dick was about to answer that he felt much better, though still as weak
as need be, when his little nurse, pushing the visitors aside and
pressing up to his pillow as if in jealousy of their interference, set
his breakfast before him, and insisted on his taking it before he
underwent the fatigue of speaking or of being spoken to. Mr Swiveller,
who was perfectly ravenous, and had had, all night, amazingly distinct
and consistent dreams of mutton chops, double stout, and similar
delicacies, felt even the weak tea and dry toast such irresistible
temptations, that he consented to eat and drink on one condition.
‘And that is,’ said Dick, returning the pressure of Mr Garland’s hand,
‘that you answer me this question truly, before I take a bit or drop.
Is it too late?’
‘For completing the work you began so well last night?’ returned the
old gentleman. ‘No. Set your mind at rest on that point. It is not,
I assure you.’
Comforted by this intelligence, the patient applied himself to his food
with a keen appetite, though evidently not with a greater zest in the
eating than his nurse appeared to have in seeing him eat. The manner
of this meal was this:--Mr Swiveller, holding the slice of toast or cup
of tea in his left hand, and taking a bite or drink, as the case might
be, constantly kept, in his right, one palm of the Marchioness tight
locked; and to shake, or even to kiss this imprisoned hand, he would
stop every now and then, in the very act of swallowing, with perfect
seriousness of intention, and the utmost gravity. As often as he put
anything into his mouth, whether for eating or drinking, the face of
the Marchioness lighted up beyond all description; but whenever he gave
her one or other of these tokens of recognition, her countenance became
overshadowed, and she began to sob. Now, whether she was in her
laughing joy, or in her crying one, the Marchioness could not help
turning to the visitors with an appealing look, which seemed to say,
‘You see this fellow--can I help this?’--and they, being thus made, as
it were, parties to the scene, as regularly answered by another look,
‘No. Certainly not.’ This dumb-show, taking place during the whole
time of the invalid’s breakfast, and the invalid himself, pale and
emaciated, performing no small part in the same, it may be fairly
questioned whether at any meal, where no word, good or bad, was spoken
from beginning to end, so much was expressed by gestures in themselves
so slight and unimportant.
At length--and to say the truth before very long--Mr Swiveller had
despatched as much toast and tea as in that stage of his recovery it
was discreet to let him have. But the cares of the Marchioness did not
stop here; for, disappearing for an instant and presently returning
with a basin of fair water, she laved his face and hands, brushed his
hair, and in short made him as spruce and smart as anybody under such
circumstances could be made; and all this, in as brisk and
business-like a manner, as if he were a very little boy, and she his
grown-up nurse. To these various attentions, Mr Swiveller submitted in
a kind of grateful astonishment beyond the reach of language. When
they were at last brought to an end, and the Marchioness had withdrawn
into a distant corner to take her own poor breakfast (cold enough by
that time), he turned his face away for some few moments, and shook
hands heartily with the air.
‘Gentlemen,’ said Dick, rousing himself from this pause, and turning
round again, ‘you’ll excuse me. Men who have been brought so low as I
have been, are easily fatigued. I am fresh again now, and fit for
talking. We’re short of chairs here, among other trifles, but if
you’ll do me the favour to sit upon the bed--’
‘What can we do for you?’ said Mr Garland, kindly.
‘If you could make the Marchioness yonder, a Marchioness, in real,
sober earnest,’ returned Dick, ‘I’d thank you to get it done off-hand.
But as you can’t, and as the question is not what you will do for me,
but what you will do for somebody else who has a better claim upon you,
pray sir let me know what you intend doing.’
‘It’s chiefly on that account that we have come just now,’ said the
single gentleman, ‘for you will have another visitor presently. We
feared you would be anxious unless you knew from ourselves what steps
we intended to take, and therefore came to you before we stirred in the
matter.’
‘Gentlemen,’ returned Dick, ‘I thank you. Anybody in the helpless
state that you see me in, is naturally anxious. Don’t let me interrupt
you, sir.’
‘Then, you see, my good fellow,’ said the single gentleman, ‘that while
we have no doubt whatever of the truth of this disclosure, which has so
providentially come to light--’
‘Meaning hers?’ said Dick, pointing towards the Marchioness.
‘--Meaning hers, of course. While we have no doubt of that, or that a
proper use of it would procure the poor lad’s immediate pardon and
liberation, we have a great doubt whether it would, by itself, enable
us to reach Quilp, the chief agent in this villany. I should tell you
that this doubt has been confirmed into something very nearly
approaching certainty by the best opinions we have been enabled, in
this short space of time, to take upon the subject. You’ll agree with
us, that to give him even the most distant chance of escape, if we
could help it, would be monstrous. You say with us, no doubt, if
somebody must escape, let it be any one but he.’
‘Yes,’ returned Dick, ‘certainly. That is if somebody must--but upon
my word, I’m unwilling that anybody should. Since laws were made for
every degree, to curb vice in others as well as in me--and so forth
you know--doesn’t it strike you in that light?’
The single gentleman smiled as if the light in which Mr Swiveller had
put the question were not the clearest in the world, and proceeded to
explain that they contemplated proceeding by stratagem in the first
instance; and that their design was to endeavour to extort a confession
from the gentle Sarah.
‘When she finds how much we know, and how we know it,’ he said, ‘and
that she is clearly compromised already, we are not without strong
hopes that we may be enabled through her means to punish the other two
effectually. If we could do that, she might go scot-free for aught I
cared.’
Dick received this project in anything but a gracious manner,
representing with as much warmth as he was then capable of showing,
that they would find the old buck (meaning Sarah) more difficult to
manage than Quilp himself--that, for any tampering, terrifying, or
cajolery, she was a very unpromising and unyielding subject--that she
was of a kind of brass not easily melted or moulded into shape--in
short, that they were no match for her, and would be signally defeated.
But it was in vain to urge them to adopt some other course. The single
gentleman has been described as explaining their joint intentions, but
it should have been written that they all spoke together; that if any
one of them by chance held his peace for a moment, he stood gasping and
panting for an opportunity to strike in again: in a word, that they had
reached that pitch of impatience and anxiety where men can neither be
persuaded nor reasoned with; and that it would have been as easy to
turn the most impetuous wind that ever blew, as to prevail on them to
reconsider their determination. So, after telling Mr Swiveller how
they had not lost sight of Kit’s mother and the children; how they had
never once even lost sight of Kit himself, but had been unremitting in
their endeavours to procure a mitigation of his sentence; how they had
been perfectly distracted between the strong proofs of his guilt, and
their own fading hopes of his innocence; and how he, Richard Swiveller,
might keep his mind at rest, for everything should be happily adjusted
between that time and night;--after telling him all this, and adding a
great many kind and cordial expressions, personal to himself, which it
is unnecessary to recite, Mr Garland, the notary, and the single
gentleman, took their leaves at a very critical time, or Richard
Swiveller must assuredly have been driven into another fever, whereof
the results might have been fatal.
Mr Abel remained behind, very often looking at his watch and at the
room door, until Mr Swiveller was roused from a short nap, by the
setting-down on the landing-place outside, as from the shoulders of a
porter, of some giant load, which seemed to shake the house, and made
the little physic bottles on the mantel-shelf ring again. Directly
this sound reached his ears, Mr Abel started up, and hobbled to the
door, and opened it; and behold! there stood a strong man, with a
mighty hamper, which, being hauled into the room and presently
unpacked, disgorged such treasures as tea, and coffee, and wine, and
rusks, and oranges, and grapes, and fowls ready trussed for boiling,
and calves’-foot jelly, and arrow-root, and sago, and other delicate
restoratives, that the small servant, who had never thought it possible
that such things could be, except in shops, stood rooted to the spot in
her one shoe, with her mouth and eyes watering in unison, and her power
of speech quite gone. But, not so Mr Abel; or the strong man who
emptied the hamper, big as it was, in a twinkling; and not so the nice
old lady, who appeared so suddenly that she might have come out of the
hamper too (it was quite large enough), and who, bustling about on
tiptoe and without noise--now here, now there, now everywhere at
once--began to fill out the jelly in tea-cups, and to make chicken
broth in small saucepans, and to peel oranges for the sick man and to
cut them up in little pieces, and to ply the small servant with glasses
of wine and choice bits of everything until more substantial meat could
be prepared for her refreshment. The whole of which appearances were
so unexpected and bewildering, that Mr Swiveller, when he had taken two
oranges and a little jelly, and had seen the strong man walk off with
the empty basket, plainly leaving all that abundance for his use and
benefit, was fain to lie down and fall asleep again, from sheer
inability to entertain such wonders in his mind.
Meanwhile, the single gentleman, the Notary, and Mr Garland, repaired
to a certain coffee-house, and from that place indited and sent a
letter to Miss Sally Brass, requesting her, in terms mysterious and
brief, to favour an unknown friend who wished to consult her, with her
company there, as speedily as possible. The communication performed
its errand so well, that within ten minutes of the messenger’s return
and report of its delivery, Miss Brass herself was announced.
‘Pray ma’am,’ said the single gentleman, whom she found alone in the
room, ‘take a chair.’
Miss Brass sat herself down, in a very stiff and frigid state, and
seemed--as indeed she was--not a little astonished to find that the
lodger and her mysterious correspondent were one and the same person.
‘You did not expect to see me?’ said the single gentleman.
‘I didn’t think much about it,’ returned the beauty. ‘I supposed it
was business of some kind or other. If it’s about the apartments, of
course you’ll give my brother regular notice, you know--or money.
That’s very easily settled. You’re a responsible party, and in such a
case lawful money and lawful notice are pretty much the same.’
‘I am obliged to you for your good opinion,’ retorted the single
gentleman, ‘and quite concur in these sentiments. But that is not the
subject on which I wish to speak with you.’
‘Oh!’ said Sally. ‘Then just state the particulars, will you? I
suppose it’s professional business?’
‘Why, it is connected with the law, certainly.’
‘Very well,’ returned Miss Brass. ‘My brother and I are just the same.
I can take any instructions, or give you any advice.’
‘As there are other parties interested besides myself,’ said the single
gentleman, rising and opening the door of an inner room, ‘we had better
confer together. Miss Brass is here, gentlemen.’
Mr Garland and the Notary walked in, looking very grave; and, drawing up
two chairs, one on each side of the single gentleman, formed a kind of
fence round the gentle Sarah, and penned her into a corner. Her brother
Sampson under such circumstances would certainly have evinced some
confusion or anxiety, but she--all composure--pulled out the tin box,
and calmly took a pinch of snuff.
‘Miss Brass,’ said the Notary, taking the word at this crisis, ‘we
professional people understand each other, and, when we choose, can say
what we have to say, in very few words. You advertised a runaway
servant, the other day?’
‘Well,’ returned Miss Sally, with a sudden flush overspreading her
features, ‘what of that?’
‘She is found, ma’am,’ said the Notary, pulling out his
pocket-handkerchief with a flourish. ‘She is found.’
‘Who found her?’ demanded Sarah hastily.
‘We did, ma’am--we three. Only last night, or you would have heard
from us before.’
‘And now I have heard from you,’ said Miss Brass, folding her arms as
though she were about to deny something to the death, ‘what have you
got to say? Something you have got into your heads about her, of
course. Prove it, will you--that’s all. Prove it. You have found
her, you say. I can tell you (if you don’t know it) that you have
found the most artful, lying, pilfering, devilish little minx that was
ever born.--Have you got her here?’ she added, looking sharply round.
‘No, she is not here at present,’ returned the Notary. ‘But she is
quite safe.’
‘Ha!’ cried Sally, twitching a pinch of snuff out of her box, as
spitefully as if she were in the very act of wrenching off the small
servant’s nose; ‘she shall be safe enough from this time, I warrant
you.’
‘I hope so,’ replied the Notary. ‘Did it occur to you for the first
time, when you found she had run away, that there were two keys to your
kitchen door?’
Miss Sally took another pinch, and putting her head on one side, looked
at her questioner, with a curious kind of spasm about her mouth, but
with a cunning aspect of immense expression.
‘Two keys,’ repeated the Notary; ‘one of which gave her the
opportunities of roaming through the house at nights when you supposed
her fast locked up, and of overhearing confidential
consultations--among others, that particular conference, to be
described to-day before a justice, which you will have an opportunity
of hearing her relate; that conference which you and Mr Brass held
together, on the night before that most unfortunate and innocent young
man was accused of robbery, by a horrible device of which I will only
say that it may be characterised by the epithets which you have applied
to this wretched little witness, and by a few stronger ones besides.’
Sally took another pinch. Although her face was wonderfully composed,
it was apparent that she was wholly taken by surprise, and that what
she had expected to be taxed with, in connection with her small
servant, was something very different from this.
‘Come, come, Miss Brass,’ said the Notary, ‘you have great command of
feature, but you feel, I see, that by a chance which never entered your
imagination, this base design is revealed, and two of its plotters must
be brought to justice. Now, you know the pains and penalties you are
liable to, and so I need not dilate upon them, but I have a proposal to
make to you. You have the honour of being sister to one of the
greatest scoundrels unhung; and, if I may venture to say so to a lady,
you are in every respect quite worthy of him. But connected with you
two is a third party, a villain of the name of Quilp, the prime mover
of the whole diabolical device, who I believe to be worse than either.
For his sake, Miss Brass, do us the favour to reveal the whole history
of this affair. Let me remind you that your doing so, at our instance,
will place you in a safe and comfortable position--your present one is
not desirable--and cannot injure your brother; for against him and you
we have quite sufficient evidence (as you hear) already. I will not
say to you that we suggest this course in mercy (for, to tell you the
truth, we do not entertain any regard for you), but it is a necessity
to which we are reduced, and I recommend it to you as a matter of the
very best policy. Time,’ said Mr Witherden, pulling out his watch, ‘in
a business like this, is exceedingly precious. Favour us with your
decision as speedily as possible, ma’am.’
With a smile upon her face, and looking at each of the three by turns,
Miss Brass took two or three more pinches of snuff, and having by this
time very little left, travelled round and round the box with her
forefinger and thumb, scraping up another. Having disposed of this
likewise and put the box carefully in her pocket, she said,--
‘I am to accept or reject at once, am I?’
‘Yes,’ said Mr Witherden.
The charming creature was opening her lips to speak in reply, when the
door was hastily opened too, and the head of Sampson Brass was thrust
into the room.
‘Excuse me,’ said the gentleman hastily. ‘Wait a bit!’
So saying, and quite indifferent to the astonishment his presence
occasioned, he crept in, shut the door, kissed his greasy glove as
servilely as if it were the dust, and made a most abject bow.
‘Sarah,’ said Brass, ‘hold your tongue if you please, and let me speak.
Gentlemen, if I could express the pleasure it gives me to see three
such men in a happy unity of feeling and concord of sentiment, I think
you would hardly believe me. But though I am unfortunate--nay,
gentlemen, criminal, if we are to use harsh expressions in a company
like this--still, I have my feelings like other men. I have heard of a
poet, who remarked that feelings were the common lot of all. If he
could have been a pig, gentlemen, and have uttered that sentiment, he
would still have been immortal.’
‘If you’re not an idiot,’ said Miss Brass harshly, ‘hold your peace.’
‘Sarah, my dear,’ returned her brother, ‘thank you. But I know what I
am about, my love, and will take the liberty of expressing myself
accordingly. Mr Witherden, Sir, your handkerchief is hanging out of
your pocket--would you allow me to--,
As Mr Brass advanced to remedy this accident, the Notary shrunk from
him with an air of disgust. Brass, who over and above his usual
prepossessing qualities, had a scratched face, a green shade over one
eye, and a hat grievously crushed, stopped short, and looked round with
a pitiful smile.
‘He shuns me,’ said Sampson, ‘even when I would, as I may say, heap
coals of fire upon his head. Well! Ah! But I am a falling house, and
the rats (if I may be allowed the expression in reference to a
gentleman I respect and love beyond everything) fly from me!
Gentlemen--regarding your conversation just now, I happened to see my
sister on her way here, and, wondering where she could be going to, and
being--may I venture to say?--naturally of a suspicious turn, followed
her. Since then, I have been listening.’
‘If you’re not mad,’ interposed Miss Sally, ‘stop there, and say no
more.’
‘Sarah, my dear,’ rejoined Brass with undiminished politeness, ‘I thank
you kindly, but will still proceed. Mr Witherden, sir, as we have the
honour to be members of the same profession--to say nothing of that
other gentleman having been my lodger, and having partaken, as one may
say, of the hospitality of my roof--I think you might have given me the
refusal of this offer in the first instance. I do indeed. Now, my
dear Sir,’ cried Brass, seeing that the Notary was about to interrupt
him, ‘suffer me to speak, I beg.’
Mr Witherden was silent, and Brass went on.
‘If you will do me the favour,’ he said, holding up the green shade,
and revealing an eye most horribly discoloured, ‘to look at this, you
will naturally inquire, in your own minds, how did I get it. If you
look from that, to my face, you will wonder what could have been the
cause of all these scratches. And if from them to my hat, how it came
into the state in which you see it. Gentlemen,’ said Brass, striking
the hat fiercely with his clenched hand, ‘to all these questions I
answer--Quilp!’
The three gentlemen looked at each other, but said nothing.
‘I say,’ pursued Brass, glancing aside at his sister, as though he were
talking for her information, and speaking with a snarling malignity, in
violent contrast to his usual smoothness, ‘that I answer to all these
questions,--Quilp--Quilp, who deludes me into his infernal den, and
takes a delight in looking on and chuckling while I scorch, and burn,
and bruise, and maim myself--Quilp, who never once, no never once, in
all our communications together, has treated me otherwise than as a
dog--Quilp, whom I have always hated with my whole heart, but never so
much as lately. He gives me the cold shoulder on this very matter as
if he had had nothing to do with it, instead of being the first to
propose it. I can’t trust him. In one of his howling, raving, blazing
humours, I believe he’d let it out, if it was murder, and never think
of himself so long as he could terrify me. Now,’ said Brass, picking
up his hat again and replacing the shade over his eye, and actually
crouching down, in the excess of his servility, ‘what does all this
lead to?--what should you say it led me to, gentlemen?--could you guess
at all near the mark?’
Nobody spoke. Brass stood smirking for a little while, as if he had
propounded some choice conundrum; and then said:
‘To be short with you, then, it leads me to this. If the truth has
come out, as it plainly has in a manner that there’s no standing up
against--and a very sublime and grand thing is Truth, gentlemen, in its
way, though like other sublime and grand things, such as thunder-storms
and that, we’re not always over and above glad to see it--I had better
turn upon this man than let this man turn upon me. It’s clear to me
that I am done for. Therefore, if anybody is to split, I had better be
the person and have the advantage of it. Sarah, my dear, comparatively
speaking you’re safe. I relate these circumstances for my own profit.’
With that, Mr Brass, in a great hurry, revealed the whole story;
bearing as heavily as possible on his amiable employer, and making
himself out to be rather a saint-like and holy character, though
subject--he acknowledged--to human weaknesses. He concluded thus:
‘Now, gentlemen, I am not a man who does things by halves. Being in
for a penny, I am ready, as the saying is, to be in for a pound. You
must do with me what you please, and take me where you please. If you
wish to have this in writing, we’ll reduce it into manuscript
immediately. You will be tender with me, I am sure. I am quite
confident you will be tender with me. You are men of honour, and have
feeling hearts. I yielded from necessity to Quilp, for though
necessity has no law, she has her lawyers. I yield to you from
necessity too; from policy besides; and because of feelings that have
been a pretty long time working within me. Punish Quilp, gentlemen.
Weigh heavily upon him. Grind him down. Tread him under foot. He has
done as much by me, for many and many a day.’
Having now arrived at the conclusion of his discourse, Sampson checked
the current of his wrath, kissed his glove again, and smiled as only
parasites and cowards can.
‘And this,’ said Miss Brass, raising her head, with which she had
hitherto sat resting on her hands, and surveying him from head to foot
with a bitter sneer, ‘this is my brother, is it! This is my brother,
that I have worked and toiled for, and believed to have had something
of the man in him!’
‘Sarah, my dear,’ returned Sampson, rubbing his hands feebly; ‘you
disturb our friends. Besides you--you’re disappointed, Sarah, and, not
knowing what you say, expose yourself.’
‘Yes, you pitiful dastard,’ retorted the lovely damsel, ‘I understand
you. You feared that I should be beforehand with you. But do you
think that I would have been enticed to say a word! I’d have scorned
it, if they had tried and tempted me for twenty years.’
‘He he!’ simpered Brass, who, in his deep debasement, really seemed to
have changed sexes with his sister, and to have made over to her any
spark of manliness he might have possessed. ‘You think so, Sarah, you
think so perhaps; but you would have acted quite different, my good
fellow. You will not have forgotten that it was a maxim with
Foxey--our revered father, gentlemen--“Always suspect everybody.”
That’s the maxim to go through life with! If you were not actually
about to purchase your own safety when I showed myself, I suspect you’d
have done it by this time. And therefore I’ve done it myself, and
spared you the trouble as well as the shame. The shame, gentlemen,’
added Brass, allowing himself to be slightly overcome, ‘if there is
any, is mine. It’s better that a female should be spared it.’
With deference to the better opinion of Mr Brass, and more particularly
to the authority of his Great Ancestor, it may be doubted, with
humility, whether the elevating principle laid down by the latter
gentleman, and acted upon by his descendant, is always a prudent one,
or attended in practice with the desired results. This is, beyond
question, a bold and presumptuous doubt, inasmuch as many distinguished
characters, called men of the world, long-headed customers, knowing
dogs, shrewd fellows, capital hands at business, and the like, have
made, and do daily make, this axiom their polar star and compass.
Still, the doubt may be gently insinuated. And in illustration it may
be observed, that if Mr Brass, not being over-suspicious, had, without
prying and listening, left his sister to manage the conference on their
joint behalf, or prying and listening, had not been in such a mighty
hurry to anticipate her (which he would not have been, but for his
distrust and jealousy), he would probably have found himself much
better off in the end. Thus, it will always happen that these men of
the world, who go through it in armour, defend themselves from quite as
much good as evil; to say nothing of the inconvenience and absurdity of
mounting guard with a microscope at all times, and of wearing a coat of
mail on the most innocent occasions.
The three gentlemen spoke together apart, for a few moments. At the
end of their consultation, which was very brief, the Notary pointed to
the writing materials on the table, and informed Mr Brass that if he
wished to make any statement in writing, he had the opportunity of
doing so. At the same time he felt bound to tell him that they would
require his attendance, presently, before a justice of the peace, and
that in what he did or said, he was guided entirely by his own
discretion.
‘Gentlemen,’ said Brass, drawing off his glove, and crawling in spirit
upon the ground before them, ‘I will justify the tenderness with which
I know I shall be treated; and as, without tenderness, I should, now
that this discovery has been made, stand in the worst position of the
three, you may depend upon it I will make a clean breast. Mr
Witherden, sir, a kind of faintness is upon my spirits--if you would
do me the favour to ring the bell and order up a glass of something
warm and spicy, I shall, notwithstanding what has passed, have a
melancholy pleasure in drinking your good health. I had hoped,’ said
Brass, looking round with a mournful smile, ‘to have seen you three
gentlemen, one day or another, with your legs under the mahogany in my
humble parlour in the Marks. But hopes are fleeting. Dear me!’
Mr Brass found himself so exceedingly affected, at this point, that he
could say or do nothing more until some refreshment arrived. Having
partaken of it, pretty freely for one in his agitated state, he sat
down to write.
The lovely Sarah, now with her arms folded, and now with her hands
clasped behind her, paced the room with manly strides while her brother
was thus employed, and sometimes stopped to pull out her snuff-box and
bite the lid. She continued to pace up and down until she was quite
tired, and then fell asleep on a chair near the door.
It has been since supposed, with some reason, that this slumber was a
sham or feint, as she contrived to slip away unobserved in the dusk of
the afternoon. Whether this was an intentional and waking departure,
or a somnambulistic leave-taking and walking in her sleep, may remain a
subject of contention; but, on one point (and indeed the main one) all
parties are agreed. In whatever state she walked away, she certainly
did not walk back again.
Mention having been made of the dusk of the afternoon, it will be
inferred that Mr Brass’s task occupied some time in the completion. It
was not finished until evening; but, being done at last, that worthy
person and the three friends adjourned in a hackney-coach to the
private office of a justice, who, giving Mr Brass a warm reception and
detaining him in a secure place that he might insure to himself the
pleasure of seeing him on the morrow, dismissed the others with the
cheering assurance that a warrant could not fail to be granted next day
for the apprehension of Mr Quilp, and that a proper application and
statement of all the circumstances to the secretary of state (who was
fortunately in town), would no doubt procure Kit’s free pardon and
liberation without delay.
And now, indeed, it seemed that Quilp’s malignant career was drawing to
a close, and that retribution, which often travels slowly--especially
when heaviest--had tracked his footsteps with a sure and certain scent
and was gaining on him fast. Unmindful of her stealthy tread, her
victim holds his course in fancied triumph. Still at his heels she
comes, and once afoot, is never turned aside!
Their business ended, the three gentlemen hastened back to the lodgings
of Mr Swiveller, whom they found progressing so favourably in his
recovery as to have been able to sit up for half an hour, and to have
conversed with cheerfulness. Mrs Garland had gone home some time
since, but Mr Abel was still sitting with him. After telling him all
they had done, the two Mr Garlands and the single gentleman, as if by
some previous understanding, took their leaves for the night, leaving
the invalid alone with the Notary and the small servant.
‘As you are so much better,’ said Mr Witherden, sitting down at the
bedside, ‘I may venture to communicate to you a piece of news which has
come to me professionally.’
The idea of any professional intelligence from a gentleman connected
with legal matters, appeared to afford Richard any-thing but a pleasing
anticipation. Perhaps he connected it in his own mind with one or two
outstanding accounts, in reference to which he had already received
divers threatening letters. His countenance fell as he replied,
‘Certainly, sir. I hope it’s not anything of a very disagreeable
nature, though?’
‘If I thought it so, I should choose some better time for communicating
it,’ replied the Notary. ‘Let me tell you, first, that my friends who
have been here to-day, know nothing of it, and that their kindness to
you has been quite spontaneous and with no hope of return. It may do a
thoughtless, careless man, good, to know that.’
Dick thanked him, and said he hoped it would.
‘I have been making some inquiries about you,’ said Mr Witherden,
‘little thinking that I should find you under such circumstances as
those which have brought us together. You are the nephew of Rebecca
Swiveller, spinster, deceased, of Cheselbourne in Dorsetshire.’
‘Deceased!’ cried Dick.
‘Deceased. If you had been another sort of nephew, you would have come
into possession (so says the will, and I see no reason to doubt it) of
five-and-twenty thousand pounds. As it is, you have fallen into an
annuity of one hundred and fifty pounds a year; but I think I may
congratulate you even upon that.’
‘Sir,’ said Dick, sobbing and laughing together, ‘you may. For, please
God, we’ll make a scholar of the poor Marchioness yet! And she shall
walk in silk attire, and siller have to spare, or may I never rise from
this bed again!’
CHAPTER 67
Unconscious of the proceedings faithfully narrated in the last chapter,
and little dreaming of the mine which had been sprung beneath him (for,
to the end that he should have no warning of the business a-foot, the
profoundest secrecy was observed in the whole transaction), Mr Quilp
remained shut up in his hermitage, undisturbed by any suspicion, and
extremely well satisfied with the result of his machinations. Being
engaged in the adjustment of some accounts--an occupation to which the
silence and solitude of his retreat were very favourable--he had not
strayed from his den for two whole days. The third day of his devotion
to this pursuit found him still hard at work, and little disposed to
stir abroad.
It was the day next after Mr Brass’s confession, and consequently, that
which threatened the restriction of Mr Quilp’s liberty, and the abrupt
communication to him of some very unpleasant and unwelcome facts.
Having no intuitive perception of the cloud which lowered upon his
house, the dwarf was in his ordinary state of cheerfulness; and, when
he found he was becoming too much engrossed by business with a due
regard to his health and spirits, he varied its monotonous routine with
a little screeching, or howling, or some other innocent relaxation of
that nature.
He was attended, as usual, by Tom Scott, who sat crouching over the
fire after the manner of a toad, and, from time to time, when his
master’s back was turned, imitating his grimaces with a fearful
exactness. The figure-head had not yet disappeared, but remained in
its old place. The face, horribly seared by the frequent application
of the red-hot poker, and further ornamented by the insertion, in the
tip of the nose, of a tenpenny nail, yet smiled blandly in its less
lacerated parts, and seemed, like a sturdy martyr, to provoke its
tormentor to the commission of new outrages and insults.
The day, in the highest and brightest quarters of the town, was damp,
dark, cold and gloomy. In that low and marshy spot, the fog filled
every nook and corner with a thick dense cloud. Every object was
obscure at one or two yards’ distance. The warning lights and fires
upon the river were powerless beneath this pall, and, but for a raw and
piercing chillness in the air, and now and then the cry of some
bewildered boatman as he rested on his oars and tried to make out where
he was, the river itself might have been miles away.
The mist, though sluggish and slow to move, was of a keenly searching
kind. No muffling up in furs and broadcloth kept it out. It seemed to
penetrate into the very bones of the shrinking wayfarers, and to rack
them with cold and pains. Everything was wet and clammy to the touch.
The warm blaze alone defied it, and leaped and sparkled merrily. It
was a day to be at home, crowding about the fire, telling stories of
travellers who had lost their way in such weather on heaths and moors;
and to love a warm hearth more than ever.
The dwarf’s humour, as we know, was to have a fireside to himself; and
when he was disposed to be convivial, to enjoy himself alone. By no
means insensible to the comfort of being within doors, he ordered Tom
Scott to pile the little stove with coals, and, dismissing his work for
that day, determined to be jovial.
To this end, he lighted up fresh candles and heaped more fuel on the
fire; and having dined off a beefsteak, which he cooked himself in
somewhat of a savage and cannibal-like manner, brewed a great bowl of
hot punch, lighted his pipe, and sat down to spend the evening.
At this moment, a low knocking at the cabin-door arrested his
attention. When it had been twice or thrice repeated, he softly opened
the little window, and thrusting his head out, demanded who was there.
‘Only me, Quilp,’ replied a woman’s voice.
‘Only you!’ cried the dwarf, stretching his neck to obtain a better
view of his visitor. ‘And what brings you here, you jade? How dare
you approach the ogre’s castle, eh?’
‘I have come with some news,’ rejoined his spouse. ‘Don’t be angry
with me.’
‘Is it good news, pleasant news, news to make a man skip and snap his
fingers?’ said the dwarf. ‘Is the dear old lady dead?’
‘I don’t know what news it is, or whether it’s good or bad,’ rejoined
his wife.
‘Then she’s alive,’ said Quilp, ‘and there’s nothing the matter with
her. Go home again, you bird of evil note, go home!’
‘I have brought a letter,’ cried the meek little woman.
‘Toss it in at the window here, and go your ways,’ said Quilp,
interrupting her, ‘or I’ll come out and scratch you.’
‘No, but please, Quilp--do hear me speak,’ urged his submissive wife,
in tears. ‘Please do!’
‘Speak then,’ growled the dwarf with a malicious grin. ‘Be quick and
short about it. Speak, will you?’
‘It was left at our house this afternoon,’ said Mrs Quilp, trembling,
‘by a boy who said he didn’t know from whom it came, but that it was
given to him to leave, and that he was told to say it must be brought
on to you directly, for it was of the very greatest consequence.--But
please,’ she added, as her husband stretched out his hand for it,
‘please let me in. You don’t know how wet and cold I am, or how many
times I have lost my way in coming here through this thick fog. Let me
dry myself at the fire for five minutes. I’ll go away directly you
tell me to, Quilp. Upon my word I will.’
Her amiable husband hesitated for a few moments; but, bethinking
himself that the letter might require some answer, of which she could
be the bearer, closed the window, opened the door, and bade her enter.
Mrs Quilp obeyed right willingly, and, kneeling down before the fire to
warm her hands, delivered into his a little packet.
‘I’m glad you’re wet,’ said Quilp, snatching it, and squinting at her.
‘I’m glad you’re cold. I’m glad you lost your way. I’m glad your eyes
are red with crying. It does my heart good to see your little nose so
pinched and frosty.’
‘Oh Quilp!’ sobbed his wife. ‘How cruel it is of you!’
‘Did she think I was dead?’ said Quilp, wrinkling his face into a most
extraordinary series of grimaces. ‘Did she think she was going to have
all the money, and to marry somebody she liked? Ha ha ha! Did she?’
These taunts elicited no reply from the poor little woman, who remained
on her knees, warming her hands, and sobbing, to Mr Quilp’s great
delight. But, just as he was contemplating her, and chuckling
excessively, he happened to observe that Tom Scott was delighted too;
wherefore, that he might have no presumptuous partner in his glee, the
dwarf instantly collared him, dragged him to the door, and after a
short scuffle, kicked him into the yard. In return for this mark of
attention, Tom immediately walked upon his hands to the window, and--if
the expression be allowable--looked in with his shoes: besides
rattling his feet upon the glass like a Banshee upside down. As a
matter of course, Mr Quilp lost no time in resorting to the infallible
poker, with which, after some dodging and lying in ambush, he paid his
young friend one or two such unequivocal compliments that he vanished
precipitately, and left him in quiet possession of the field.
‘So! That little job being disposed of,’ said the dwarf, coolly, ‘I’ll
read my letter. Humph!’ he muttered, looking at the direction. ‘I
ought to know this writing. Beautiful Sally!’
Opening it, he read, in a fair, round, legal hand, as follows:
‘Sammy has been practised upon, and has broken confidence. It has all
come out. You had better not be in the way, for strangers are going to
call upon you. They have been very quiet as yet, because they mean to
surprise you. Don’t lose time. I didn’t. I am not to be found
anywhere. If I was you, I wouldn’t either. S. B., late of B. M.’
To describe the changes that passed over Quilp’s face, as he read this
letter half-a-dozen times, would require some new language: such, for
power of expression, as was never written, read, or spoken. For a long
time he did not utter one word; but, after a considerable interval,
during which Mrs Quilp was almost paralysed with the alarm his looks
engendered, he contrived to gasp out,
‘If I had him here. If I only had him here--’
‘Oh Quilp!’ said his wife, ‘what’s the matter? Who are you angry with?’
‘--I should drown him,’ said the dwarf, not heeding her. ‘Too easy a
death, too short, too quick--but the river runs close at hand. Oh! if
I had him here! just to take him to the brink coaxingly and
pleasantly,--holding him by the button-hole--joking with him,--and,
with a sudden push, to send him splashing down! Drowning men come to
the surface three times they say. Ah! To see him those three times,
and mock him as his face came bobbing up,--oh, what a rich treat that
would be!’
‘Quilp!’ stammered his wife, venturing at the same time to touch him on
the shoulder: ‘what has gone wrong?’
She was so terrified by the relish with which he pictured this pleasure
to himself that she could scarcely make herself intelligible.
‘Such a bloodless cur!’ said Quilp, rubbing his hands very slowly, and
pressing them tight together. ‘I thought his cowardice and servility
were the best guarantee for his keeping silence. Oh Brass, Brass--my
dear, good, affectionate, faithful, complimentary, charming friend--if
I only had you here!’
His wife, who had retreated lest she should seem to listen to these
mutterings, ventured to approach him again, and was about to speak,
when he hurried to the door, and called Tom Scott, who, remembering his
late gentle admonition, deemed it prudent to appear immediately.
‘There!’ said the dwarf, pulling him in. ‘Take her home. Don’t come
here to-morrow, for this place will be shut up. Come back no more till
you hear from me or see me. Do you mind?’
Tom nodded sulkily, and beckoned Mrs Quilp to lead the way.
‘As for you,’ said the dwarf, addressing himself to her, ‘ask no
questions about me, make no search for me, say nothing concerning me.
I shall not be dead, mistress, and that’ll comfort you. He’ll take
care of you.’
‘But, Quilp? What is the matter? Where are you going? Do say
something more?’
‘I’ll say that,’ said the dwarf, seizing her by the arm, ‘and do that
too, which undone and unsaid would be best for you, unless you go
directly.’
‘Has anything happened?’ cried his wife. ‘Oh! Do tell me that?’
‘Yes,’ snarled the dwarf. ‘No. What matter which? I have told you
what to do. Woe betide you if you fail to do it, or disobey me by a
hair’s breadth. Will you go!’
‘I am going, I’ll go directly; but,’ faltered his wife, ‘answer me one
question first. Has this letter any connexion with dear little Nell?
I must ask you that--I must indeed, Quilp. You cannot think what days
and nights of sorrow I have had through having once deceived that
child. I don’t know what harm I may have brought about, but, great or
little, I did it for you, Quilp. My conscience misgave me when I did
it. Do answer me this question, if you please?’
The exasperated dwarf returned no answer, but turned round and caught
up his usual weapon with such vehemence, that Tom Scott dragged his
charge away, by main force, and as swiftly as he could. It was well he
did so, for Quilp, who was nearly mad with rage, pursued them to the
neighbouring lane, and might have prolonged the chase but for the dense
mist which obscured them from his view and appeared to thicken every
moment.
‘It will be a good night for travelling anonymously,’ he said, as he
returned slowly, being pretty well breathed with his run. ‘Stay. We
may look better here. This is too hospitable and free.’
By a great exertion of strength, he closed the two old gates, which
were deeply sunken in the mud, and barred them with a heavy beam. That
done, he shook his matted hair from about his eyes, and tried
them.--Strong and fast.
‘The fence between this wharf and the next is easily climbed,’ said the
dwarf, when he had taken these precautions. ‘There’s a back lane, too,
from there. That shall be my way out. A man need know his road well,
to find it in this lovely place to-night. I need fear no unwelcome
visitors while this lasts, I think.’
Almost reduced to the necessity of groping his way with his hands (it
had grown so dark and the fog had so much increased), he returned to
his lair; and, after musing for some time over the fire, busied himself
in preparations for a speedy departure.
While he was collecting a few necessaries and cramming them into his
pockets, he never once ceased communing with himself in a low voice, or
unclenched his teeth, which he had ground together on finishing Miss
Brass’s note.
‘Oh Sampson!’ he muttered, ‘good worthy creature--if I could but hug
you! If I could only fold you in my arms, and squeeze your ribs, as I
COULD squeeze them if I once had you tight--what a meeting there would
be between us! If we ever do cross each other again, Sampson, we’ll
have a greeting not easily to be forgotten, trust me. This time,
Sampson, this moment when all had gone on so well, was so nicely
chosen! It was so thoughtful of you, so penitent, so good. Oh, if we
were face to face in this room again, my white-livered man of law, how
well contented one of us would be!’
There he stopped; and raising the bowl of punch to his lips, drank a
long deep draught, as if it were fair water and cooling to his parched
mouth. Setting it down abruptly, and resuming his preparations, he
went on with his soliloquy.
‘There’s Sally,’ he said, with flashing eyes; ‘the woman has spirit,
determination, purpose--was she asleep, or petrified? She could have
stabbed him--poisoned him safely. She might have seen this coming on.
Why does she give me notice when it’s too late? When he sat
there,--yonder there, over there,--with his white face, and red head,
and sickly smile, why didn’t I know what was passing in his heart? It
should have stopped beating, that night, if I had been in his secret,
or there are no drugs to lull a man to sleep, or no fire to burn him!’
Another draught from the bowl; and, cowering over the fire with a
ferocious aspect, he muttered to himself again.
‘And this, like every other trouble and anxiety I have had of late
times, springs from that old dotard and his darling child--two wretched
feeble wanderers! I’ll be their evil genius yet. And you, sweet Kit,
honest Kit, virtuous, innocent Kit, look to yourself. Where I hate, I
bite. I hate you, my darling fellow, with good cause, and proud as you
are to-night, I’ll have my turn.----What’s that?’
A knocking at the gate he had closed. A loud and violent knocking.
Then, a pause; as if those who knocked had stopped to listen. Then,
the noise again, more clamorous and importunate than before.
‘So soon!’ said the dwarf. ‘And so eager! I am afraid I shall disappoint
you. It’s well I’m quite prepared. Sally, I thank you!’
As he spoke, he extinguished the candle. In his impetuous attempts to
subdue the brightness of the fire, he overset the stove, which came
tumbling forward, and fell with a crash upon the burning embers it had
shot forth in its descent, leaving the room in pitchy darkness. The
noise at the gate still continuing, he felt his way to the door, and
stepped into the open air.
At that moment the knocking ceased. It was about eight o’clock; but
the dead of the darkest night would have been as noon-day in comparison
with the thick cloud which then rested upon the earth, and shrouded
everything from view. He darted forward for a few paces, as if into
the mouth of some dim, yawning cavern; then, thinking he had gone
wrong, changed the direction of his steps; then stood still, not
knowing where to turn.
‘If they would knock again,’ said Quilp, trying to peer into the gloom
by which he was surrounded, ‘the sound might guide me! Come! Batter
the gate once more!’
He stood listening intently, but the noise was not renewed. Nothing
was to be heard in that deserted place, but, at intervals, the distant
barkings of dogs. The sound was far away--now in one quarter, now
answered in another--nor was it any guide, for it often came from
shipboard, as he knew.
‘If I could find a wall or fence,’ said the dwarf, stretching out his
arms, and walking slowly on, ‘I should know which way to turn. A good,
black, devil’s night this, to have my dear friend here! If I had but
that wish, it might, for anything I cared, never be day again.’
As the word passed his lips, he staggered and fell--and next moment was
fighting with the cold dark water!
For all its bubbling up and rushing in his ears, he could hear the
knocking at the gate again--could hear a shout that followed it--could
recognise the voice. For all his struggling and plashing, he could
understand that they had lost their way, and had wandered back to the
point from which they started; that they were all but looking on, while
he was drowned; that they were close at hand, but could not make an
effort to save him; that he himself had shut and barred them out. He
answered the shout--with a yell, which seemed to make the hundred fires
that danced before his eyes tremble and flicker, as if a gust of wind
had stirred them. It was of no avail. The strong tide filled his
throat, and bore him on, upon its rapid current.
Another mortal struggle, and he was up again, beating the water with
his hands, and looking out, with wild and glaring eyes that showed him
some black object he was drifting close upon. The hull of a ship! He
could touch its smooth and slippery surface with his hand. One loud
cry, now--but the resistless water bore him down before he could give
it utterance, and, driving him under it, carried away a corpse.
It toyed and sported with its ghastly freight, now bruising it against
the slimy piles, now hiding it in mud or long rank grass, now dragging
it heavily over rough stones and gravel, now feigning to yield it to
its own element, and in the same action luring it away, until, tired of
the ugly plaything, it flung it on a swamp--a dismal place where
pirates had swung in chains through many a wintry night--and left it
there to bleach.
And there it lay alone. The sky was red with flame, and the water that
bore it there had been tinged with the sullen light as it flowed along.
The place the deserted carcass had left so recently, a living man, was
now a blazing ruin. There was something of the glare upon its face.
The hair, stirred by the damp breeze, played in a kind of mockery of
death--such a mockery as the dead man himself would have delighted in
when alive--about its head, and its dress fluttered idly in the night
wind.
CHAPTER 68
Lighted rooms, bright fires, cheerful faces, the music of glad voices,
words of love and welcome, warm hearts, and tears of happiness--what a
change is this! But it is to such delights that Kit is hastening.
They are awaiting him, he knows. He fears he will die of joy, before
he gets among them.
They have prepared him for this, all day. He is not to be carried off
to-morrow with the rest, they tell him first. By degrees they let him
know that doubts have arisen, that inquiries are to be made, and
perhaps he may be pardoned after all. At last, the evening being come,
they bring him to a room where some gentlemen are assembled. Foremost
among them is his good old master, who comes and takes him by the hand.
He hears that his innocence is established, and that he is pardoned.
He cannot see the speaker, but he turns towards the voice, and in
trying to answer, falls down insensible.
They recover him again, and tell him he must be composed, and bear this
like a man. Somebody says he must think of his poor mother. It is
because he does think of her so much, that the happy news had
overpowered him. They crowd about him, and tell him that the truth has
gone abroad, and that all the town and country ring with sympathy for
his misfortunes. He has no ears for this. His thoughts, as yet, have
no wider range than home. Does she know it? what did she say? who
told her? He can speak of nothing else.
They make him drink a little wine, and talk kindly to him for a while,
until he is more collected, and can listen, and thank them. He is free
to go. Mr Garland thinks, if he feels better, it is time they went
away. The gentlemen cluster round him, and shake hands with him. He
feels very grateful to them for the interest they have in him, and for
the kind promises they make; but the power of speech is gone again, and
he has much ado to keep his feet, even though leaning on his master’s
arm.
As they come through the dismal passages, some officers of the jail who
are in waiting there, congratulate him, in their rough way, on his
release. The newsmonger is of the number, but his manner is not quite
hearty--there is something of surliness in his compliments. He looks
upon Kit as an intruder, as one who has obtained admission to that
place on false pretences, who has enjoyed a privilege without being
duly qualified. He may be a very good sort of young man, he thinks,
but he has no business there, and the sooner he is gone, the better.
The last door shuts behind them. They have passed the outer wall, and
stand in the open air--in the street he has so often pictured to
himself when hemmed in by the gloomy stones, and which has been in all
his dreams. It seems wider and more busy than it used to be. The
night is bad, and yet how cheerful and gay in his eyes! One of the
gentlemen, in taking leave of him, pressed some money into his hand.
He has not counted it; but when they have gone a few paces beyond the
box for poor Prisoners, he hastily returns and drops it in.
Mr Garland has a coach waiting in a neighbouring street, and, taking
Kit inside with him, bids the man drive home. At first, they can only
travel at a foot pace, and then with torches going on before, because
of the heavy fog. But, as they get farther from the river, and leave
the closer portions of the town behind, they are able to dispense with
this precaution and to proceed at a brisker rate. On the road, hard
galloping would be too slow for Kit; but, when they are drawing near
their journey’s end, he begs they may go more slowly, and, when the
house appears in sight, that they may stop--only for a minute or two,
to give him time to breathe.
But there is no stopping then, for the old gentleman speaks stoutly to
him, the horses mend their pace, and they are already at the
garden-gate. Next minute, they are at the door. There is a noise of
tongues, and tread of feet, inside. It opens. Kit rushes in, and
finds his mother clinging round his neck.
And there, too, is the ever faithful Barbara’s mother, still holding
the baby as if she had never put it down since that sad day when they
little hoped to have such joy as this--there she is, Heaven bless her,
crying her eyes out, and sobbing as never woman sobbed before; and
there is little Barbara--poor little Barbara, so much thinner and so
much paler, and yet so very pretty--trembling like a leaf and
supporting herself against the wall; and there is Mrs Garland, neater
and nicer than ever, fainting away stone dead with nobody to help her;
and there is Mr Abel, violently blowing his nose, and wanting to
embrace everybody; and there is the single gentleman hovering round
them all, and constant to nothing for an instant; and there is that
good, dear, thoughtful little Jacob, sitting all alone by himself on
the bottom stair, with his hands on his knees like an old man, roaring
fearfully without giving any trouble to anybody; and each and all of
them are for the time clean out of their wits, and do jointly and
severally commit all manner of follies.
And even when the rest have in some measure come to themselves again,
and can find words and smiles, Barbara--that soft-hearted, gentle,
foolish little Barbara--is suddenly missed, and found to be in a swoon
by herself in the back parlour, from which swoon she falls into
hysterics, and from which hysterics into a swoon again, and is, indeed,
so bad, that despite a mortal quantity of vinegar and cold water she is
hardly a bit better at last than she was at first. Then, Kit’s mother
comes in and says, will he come and speak to her; and Kit says ‘Yes,’
and goes; and he says in a kind voice ‘Barbara!’ and Barbara’s mother
tells her that ‘it’s only Kit;’ and Barbara says (with her eyes closed
all the time) ‘Oh! but is it him indeed?’ and Barbara’s mother says ‘To
be sure it is, my dear; there’s nothing the matter now.’ And in
further assurance that he’s safe and sound, Kit speaks to her again;
and then Barbara goes off into another fit of laughter, and then into
another fit of crying; and then Barbara’s mother and Kit’s mother nod
to each other and pretend to scold her--but only to bring her to
herself the faster, bless you!--and being experienced matrons, and
acute at perceiving the first dawning symptoms of recovery, they
comfort Kit with the assurance that ‘she’ll do now,’ and so dismiss him
to the place from whence he came.
Well! In that place (which is the next room) there are decanters of
wine, and all that sort of thing, set out as grand as if Kit and his
friends were first-rate company; and there is little Jacob, walking, as
the popular phrase is, into a home-made plum-cake, at a most surprising
pace, and keeping his eye on the figs and oranges which are to follow,
and making the best use of his time, you may believe. Kit no sooner
comes in, than that single gentleman (never was such a busy gentleman)
charges all the glasses--bumpers--and drinks his health, and tells him
he shall never want a friend while he lives; and so does Mr Garland,
and so does Mrs Garland, and so does Mr Abel. But even this honour and
distinction is not all, for the single gentleman forthwith pulls out of
his pocket a massive silver watch--going hard, and right to half a
second--and upon the back of this watch is engraved Kit’s name, with
flourishes all over; and in short it is Kit’s watch, bought expressly
for him, and presented to him on the spot. You may rest assured that
Mr and Mrs Garland can’t help hinting about their present, in store,
and that Mr Abel tells outright that he has his; and that Kit is the
happiest of the happy.
There is one friend he has not seen yet, and as he cannot be
conveniently introduced into the family circle, by reason of his being
an iron-shod quadruped, Kit takes the first opportunity of slipping
away and hurrying to the stable. The moment he lays his hand upon the
latch, the pony neighs the loudest pony’s greeting; before he has
crossed the threshold, the pony is capering about his loose box (for he
brooks not the indignity of a halter), mad to give him welcome; and
when Kit goes up to caress and pat him, the pony rubs his nose against
his coat, and fondles him more lovingly than ever pony fondled man. It
is the crowning circumstance of his earnest, heartfelt reception; and
Kit fairly puts his arm round Whisker’s neck and hugs him.
But how comes Barbara to trip in there? and how smart she is again!
she has been at her glass since she recovered. How comes Barbara in
the stable, of all places in the world? Why, since Kit has been away,
the pony would take his food from nobody but her, and Barbara, you see,
not dreaming that Christopher was there, and just looking in, to see
that everything was right, has come upon him unawares. Blushing little
Barbara!
It may be that Kit has caressed the pony enough; it may be that there
are even better things to caress than ponies. He leaves him for
Barbara at any rate, and hopes she is better. Yes. Barbara is a great
deal better. She is afraid--and here Barbara looks down and blushes
more--that he must have thought her very foolish. ‘Not at all,’ says
Kit. Barbara is glad of that, and coughs--Hem!--just the slightest
cough possible--not more than that.
What a discreet pony when he chooses! He is as quiet now as if he were
of marble. He has a very knowing look, but that he always has. ‘We
have hardly had time to shake hands, Barbara,’ says Kit. Barbara gives
him hers. Why, she is trembling now! Foolish, fluttering Barbara!
Arm’s length? The length of an arm is not much. Barbara’s was not a
long arm, by any means, and besides, she didn’t hold it out straight,
but bent a little. Kit was so near her when they shook hands, that he
could see a small tiny tear, yet trembling on an eyelash. It was
natural that he should look at it, unknown to Barbara. It was natural
that Barbara should raise her eyes unconsciously, and find him out.
Was it natural that at that instant, without any previous impulse or
design, Kit should kiss Barbara? He did it, whether or no. Barbara
said ‘for shame,’ but let him do it too--twice. He might have done it
thrice, but the pony kicked up his heels and shook his head, as if he
were suddenly taken with convulsions of delight, and Barbara being
frightened, ran away--not straight to where her mother and Kit’s mother
were, though, lest they should see how red her cheeks were, and should
ask her why. Sly little Barbara!
When the first transports of the whole party had subsided, and Kit and
his mother, and Barbara and her mother, with little Jacob and the baby
to boot, had had their suppers together--which there was no hurrying
over, for they were going to stop there all night--Mr Garland called
Kit to him, and taking him into a room where they could be alone, told
him that he had something yet to say, which would surprise him greatly.
Kit looked so anxious and turned so pale on hearing this, that the old
gentleman hastened to add, he would be agreeably surprised; and asked
him if he would be ready next morning for a journey.
‘For a journey, sir!’ cried Kit.
‘In company with me and my friend in the next room. Can you guess its
purpose?’
Kit turned paler yet, and shook his head.
‘Oh yes. I think you do already,’ said his master. ‘Try.’
Kit murmured something rather rambling and unintelligible, but he
plainly pronounced the words ‘Miss Nell,’ three or four times--shaking
his head while he did so, as if he would add that there was no hope of
that.
But Mr Garland, instead of saying ‘Try again,’ as Kit had made sure he
would, told him very seriously, that he had guessed right.
‘The place of their retreat is indeed discovered,’ he said, ‘at last.
And that is our journey’s end.’
Kit faltered out such questions as, where was it, and how had it been
found, and how long since, and was she well and happy?
‘Happy she is, beyond all doubt,’ said Mr Garland. ‘And well, I--I
trust she will be soon. She has been weak and ailing, as I learn, but
she was better when I heard this morning, and they were full of hope.
Sit you down, and you shall hear the rest.’
Scarcely venturing to draw his breath, Kit did as he was told. Mr
Garland then related to him, how he had a brother (of whom he would
remember to have heard him speak, and whose picture, taken when he was
a young man, hung in the best room), and how this brother lived a long
way off, in a country-place, with an old clergyman who had been his
early friend. How, although they loved each other as brothers should,
they had not met for many years, but had communicated by letter from
time to time, always looking forward to some period when they would
take each other by the hand once more, and still letting the Present
time steal on, as it was the habit for men to do, and suffering the
Future to melt into the Past. How this brother, whose temper was very
mild and quiet and retiring--such as Mr Abel’s--was greatly beloved by
the simple people among whom he dwelt, who quite revered the Bachelor
(for so they called him), and had every one experienced his charity and
benevolence. How even those slight circumstances had come to his
knowledge, very slowly and in course of years, for the Bachelor was one
of those whose goodness shuns the light, and who have more pleasure in
discovering and extolling the good deeds of others, than in trumpeting
their own, be they never so commendable. How, for that reason, he
seldom told them of his village friends; but how, for all that, his
mind had become so full of two among them--a child and an old man, to
whom he had been very kind--that, in a letter received a few days
before, he had dwelt upon them from first to last, and had told such a
tale of their wandering, and mutual love, that few could read it
without being moved to tears. How he, the recipient of that letter,
was directly led to the belief that these must be the very wanderers
for whom so much search had been made, and whom Heaven had directed to
his brother’s care. How he had written for such further information as
would put the fact beyond all doubt; how it had that morning arrived;
had confirmed his first impression into a certainty; and was the
immediate cause of that journey being planned, which they were to take
to-morrow.
‘In the meantime,’ said the old gentleman rising, and laying his hand
on Kit’s shoulder, ‘you have a great need of rest; for such a day as
this would wear out the strongest man. Good night, and Heaven send our
journey may have a prosperous ending!’
CHAPTER 69
Kit was no sluggard next morning, but, springing from his bed some time
before day, began to prepare for his welcome expedition. The hurry of
spirits consequent upon the events of yesterday, and the unexpected
intelligence he had heard at night, had troubled his sleep through the
long dark hours, and summoned such uneasy dreams about his pillow that
it was best to rise.
But, had it been the beginning of some great labour with the same end
in view--had it been the commencement of a long journey, to be
performed on foot in that inclement season of the year, to be pursued
under very privation and difficulty, and to be achieved only with great
distress, fatigue, and suffering--had it been the dawn of some painful
enterprise, certain to task his utmost powers of resolution and
endurance, and to need his utmost fortitude, but only likely to end, if
happily achieved, in good fortune and delight to Nell--Kit’s cheerful
zeal would have been as highly roused: Kit’s ardour and impatience
would have been, at least, the same.
Nor was he alone excited and eager. Before he had been up a quarter of
an hour the whole house were astir and busy. Everybody hurried to do
something towards facilitating the preparations. The single gentleman,
it is true, could do nothing himself, but he overlooked everybody else
and was more locomotive than anybody. The work of packing and making
ready went briskly on, and by daybreak every preparation for the
journey was completed. Then Kit began to wish they had not been quite
so nimble; for the travelling-carriage which had been hired for the
occasion was not to arrive until nine o’clock, and there was nothing
but breakfast to fill up the intervening blank of one hour and a half.
Yes there was, though. There was Barbara. Barbara was busy, to be
sure, but so much the better--Kit could help her, and that would pass
away the time better than any means that could be devised. Barbara had
no objection to this arrangement, and Kit, tracking out the idea which
had come upon him so suddenly overnight, began to think that surely
Barbara was fond of him, and surely he was fond of Barbara.
Now, Barbara, if the truth must be told--as it must and ought to
be--Barbara seemed, of all the little household, to take least pleasure
in the bustle of the occasion; and when Kit, in the openness of his
heart, told her how glad and overjoyed it made him, Barbara became more
downcast still, and seemed to have even less pleasure in it than before!
‘You have not been home so long, Christopher,’ said Barbara--and it is
impossible to tell how carelessly she said it--‘You have not been home
so long, that you need to be glad to go away again, I should think.’
‘But for such a purpose,’ returned Kit. ‘To bring back Miss Nell! To
see her again! Only think of that! I am so pleased too, to think that
you will see her, Barbara, at last.’
Barbara did not absolutely say that she felt no gratification on this
point, but she expressed the sentiment so plainly by one little toss of
her head, that Kit was quite disconcerted, and wondered, in his
simplicity, why she was so cool about it.
‘You’ll say she has the sweetest and beautifullest face you ever saw, I
know,’ said Kit, rubbing his hands. ‘I’m sure you’ll say that.’
Barbara tossed her head again.
‘What’s the matter, Barbara?’ said Kit.
‘Nothing,’ cried Barbara. And Barbara pouted--not sulkily, or in an
ugly manner, but just enough to make her look more cherry-lipped than
ever.
There is no school in which a pupil gets on so fast, as that in which
Kit became a scholar when he gave Barbara the kiss. He saw what
Barbara meant now--he had his lesson by heart all at once--she was the
book--there it was before him, as plain as print.
‘Barbara,’ said Kit, ‘you’re not cross with me?’
Oh dear no! Why should Barbara be cross? And what right had she to be
cross? And what did it matter whether she was cross or not? Who
minded her!
‘Why, I do,’ said Kit. ‘Of course I do.’
Barbara didn’t see why it was of course, at all.
Kit was sure she must. Would she think again?
Certainly, Barbara would think again. No, she didn’t see why it was of
course. She didn’t understand what Christopher meant. And besides she
was sure they wanted her up stairs by this time, and she must go,
indeed--
‘No, but Barbara,’ said Kit, detaining her gently, ‘let us part
friends. I was always thinking of you, in my troubles. I should have
been a great deal more miserable than I was, if it hadn’t been for you.’
Goodness gracious, how pretty Barbara was when she coloured--and when
she trembled, like a little shrinking bird!
‘I am telling you the truth, Barbara, upon my word, but not half so
strong as I could wish,’ said Kit. ‘When I want you to be pleased to
see Miss Nell, it’s only because I like you to be pleased with what
pleases me--that’s all. As to her, Barbara, I think I could almost die
to do her service, but you would think so too, if you knew her as I do.
I am sure you would.’
Barbara was touched, and sorry to have appeared indifferent.
‘I have been used, you see,’ said Kit, ‘to talk and think of her,
almost as if she was an angel. When I look forward to meeting her
again, I think of her smiling as she used to do, and being glad to see
me, and putting out her hand and saying, “It’s my own old Kit,” or some
such words as those--like what she used to say. I think of seeing her
happy, and with friends about her, and brought up as she deserves, and
as she ought to be. When I think of myself, it’s as her old servant,
and one that loved her dearly, as his kind, good, gentle mistress; and
who would have gone--yes, and still would go--through any harm to serve
her. Once, I couldn’t help being afraid that if she came back with
friends about her she might forget, or be ashamed of having known, a
humble lad like me, and so might speak coldly, which would have cut me,
Barbara, deeper than I can tell. But when I came to think again, I
felt sure that I was doing her wrong in this; and so I went on, as I
did at first, hoping to see her once more, just as she used to be.
Hoping this, and remembering what she was, has made me feel as if I
would always try to please her, and always be what I should like to
seem to her if I was still her servant. If I’m the better for
that--and I don’t think I’m the worse--I am grateful to her for it, and
love and honour her the more. That’s the plain honest truth, dear
Barbara, upon my word it is!’
Little Barbara was not of a wayward or capricious nature, and, being
full of remorse, melted into tears. To what more conversation this
might have led, we need not stop to inquire; for the wheels of the
carriage were heard at that moment, and, being followed by a smart ring
at the garden gate, caused the bustle in the house, which had laid
dormant for a short time, to burst again into tenfold life and vigour.
Simultaneously with the travelling equipage, arrived Mr Chuckster in a
hackney cab, with certain papers and supplies of money for the single
gentleman, into whose hands he delivered them. This duty discharged,
he subsided into the bosom of the family; and, entertaining himself
with a strolling or peripatetic breakfast, watched, with genteel
indifference, the process of loading the carriage.
‘Snobby’s in this, I see, Sir?’ he said to Mr Abel Garland. ‘I thought
he wasn’t in the last trip because it was expected that his presence
wouldn’t be acceptable to the ancient buffalo.’
‘To whom, Sir?’ demanded Mr Abel.
‘To the old gentleman,’ returned Mr Chuckster, slightly abashed.
‘Our client prefers to take him now,’ said Mr Abel, drily. ‘There is
no longer any need for that precaution, as my father’s relationship to
a gentleman in whom the objects of his search have full confidence,
will be a sufficient guarantee for the friendly nature of their errand.’
‘Ah!’ thought Mr Chuckster, looking out of window, ‘anybody but me!
Snobby before me, of course. He didn’t happen to take that particular
five-pound note, but I have not the smallest doubt that he’s always up
to something of that sort. I always said it, long before this came
out. Devilish pretty girl that! ‘Pon my soul, an amazing little
creature!’
Barbara was the subject of Mr Chuckster’s commendations; and as she was
lingering near the carriage (all being now ready for its departure),
that gentleman was suddenly seized with a strong interest in the
proceedings, which impelled him to swagger down the garden, and take up
his position at a convenient ogling distance. Having had great
experience of the sex, and being perfectly acquainted with all those
little artifices which find the readiest road to their hearts, Mr
Chuckster, on taking his ground, planted one hand on his hip, and with
the other adjusted his flowing hair. This is a favourite attitude in
the polite circles, and, accompanied with a graceful whistling, has
been known to do immense execution.
Such, however, is the difference between town and country, that nobody
took the smallest notice of this insinuating figure; the wretches being
wholly engaged in bidding the travellers farewell, in kissing hands to
each other, waving handkerchiefs, and the like tame and vulgar
practices. For now the single gentleman and Mr Garland were in the
carriage, and the post-boy was in the saddle, and Kit, well wrapped and
muffled up, was in the rumble behind; and Mrs Garland was there, and Mr
Abel was there, and Kit’s mother was there, and little Jacob was there,
and Barbara’s mother was visible in remote perspective, nursing the
ever-wakeful baby; and all were nodding, beckoning, curtseying, or
crying out, ‘Good bye!’ with all the energy they could express. In
another minute, the carriage was out of sight; and Mr Chuckster
remained alone on the spot where it had lately been, with a vision of
Kit standing up in the rumble waving his hand to Barbara, and of
Barbara in the full light and lustre of his eyes--his
eyes--Chuckster’s--Chuckster the successful--on whom ladies of quality
had looked with favour from phaetons in the parks on Sundays--waving
hers to Kit!
How Mr Chuckster, entranced by this monstrous fact, stood for some time
rooted to the earth, protesting within himself that Kit was the Prince
of felonious characters, and very Emperor or Great Mogul of Snobs, and
how he clearly traced this revolting circumstance back to that old
villany of the shilling, are matters foreign to our purpose; which is
to track the rolling wheels, and bear the travellers company on their
cold, bleak journey.
It was a bitter day. A keen wind was blowing, and rushed against them
fiercely: bleaching the hard ground, shaking the white frost from the
trees and hedges, and whirling it away like dust. But little cared Kit
for weather. There was a freedom and freshness in the wind, as it came
howling by, which, let it cut never so sharp, was welcome. As it swept
on with its cloud of frost, bearing down the dry twigs and boughs and
withered leaves, and carrying them away pell-mell, it seemed as though
some general sympathy had got abroad, and everything was in a hurry,
like themselves. The harder the gusts, the better progress they
appeared to make. It was a good thing to go struggling and fighting
forward, vanquishing them one by one; to watch them driving up,
gathering strength and fury as they came along; to bend for a moment,
as they whistled past; and then to look back and see them speed away,
their hoarse noise dying in the distance, and the stout trees cowering
down before them.
All day long, it blew without cessation. The night was clear and
starlit, but the wind had not fallen, and the cold was piercing.
Sometimes--towards the end of a long stage--Kit could not help wishing
it were a little warmer: but when they stopped to change horses, and he
had had a good run, and what with that, and the bustle of paying the
old postilion, and rousing the new one, and running to and fro again
until the horses were put to, he was so warm that the blood tingled and
smarted in his fingers’ ends--then, he felt as if to have it one
degree less cold would be to lose half the delight and glory of the
journey: and up he jumped again, right cheerily, singing to the merry
music of the wheels as they rolled away, and, leaving the townspeople
in their warm beds, pursued their course along the lonely road.
Meantime the two gentlemen inside, who were little disposed to sleep,
beguiled the time with conversation. As both were anxious and
expectant, it naturally turned upon the subject of their expedition, on
the manner in which it had been brought about, and on the hopes and
fears they entertained respecting it. Of the former they had many, of
the latter few--none perhaps beyond that indefinable uneasiness which
is inseparable from suddenly awakened hope, and protracted expectation.
In one of the pauses of their discourse, and when half the night had
worn away, the single gentleman, who had gradually become more and more
silent and thoughtful, turned to his companion and said abruptly:
‘Are you a good listener?’
‘Like most other men, I suppose,’ returned Mr Garland, smiling. ‘I can
be, if I am interested; and if not interested, I should still try to
appear so. Why do you ask?’
‘I have a short narrative on my lips,’ rejoined his friend, ‘and will
try you with it. It is very brief.’
Pausing for no reply, he laid his hand on the old gentleman’s sleeve,
and proceeded thus:
‘There were once two brothers, who loved each other dearly. There was
a disparity in their ages--some twelve years. I am not sure but they
may insensibly have loved each other the better for that reason. Wide
as the interval between them was, however, they became rivals too soon.
The deepest and strongest affection of both their hearts settled upon
one object.
‘The youngest--there were reasons for his being sensitive and
watchful--was the first to find this out. I will not tell you what
misery he underwent, what agony of soul he knew, how great his mental
struggle was. He had been a sickly child. His brother, patient and
considerate in the midst of his own high health and strength, had many
and many a day denied himself the sports he loved, to sit beside his
couch, telling him old stories till his pale face lighted up with an
unwonted glow; to carry him in his arms to some green spot, where he
could tend the poor pensive boy as he looked upon the bright summer
day, and saw all nature healthy but himself; to be, in any way, his
fond and faithful nurse. I may not dwell on all he did, to make the
poor, weak creature love him, or my tale would have no end. But when
the time of trial came, the younger brother’s heart was full of those
old days. Heaven strengthened it to repay the sacrifices of
inconsiderate youth by one of thoughtful manhood. He left his brother
to be happy. The truth never passed his lips, and he quitted the
country, hoping to die abroad.
‘The elder brother married her. She was in Heaven before long, and
left him with an infant daughter.
‘If you have seen the picture-gallery of any one old family, you will
remember how the same face and figure--often the fairest and slightest
of them all--come upon you in different generations; and how you trace
the same sweet girl through a long line of portraits--never growing
old or changing--the Good Angel of the race--abiding by them in all
reverses--redeeming all their sins--
‘In this daughter the mother lived again. You may judge with what
devotion he who lost that mother almost in the winning, clung to this
girl, her breathing image. She grew to womanhood, and gave her heart
to one who could not know its worth. Well! Her fond father could not
see her pine and droop. He might be more deserving than he thought
him. He surely might become so, with a wife like her. He joined their
hands, and they were married.
‘Through all the misery that followed this union; through all the cold
neglect and undeserved reproach; through all the poverty he brought
upon her; through all the struggles of their daily life, too mean and
pitiful to tell, but dreadful to endure; she toiled on, in the deep
devotion of her spirit, and in her better nature, as only women can.
Her means and substance wasted; her father nearly beggared by her
husband’s hand, and the hourly witness (for they lived now under one
roof) of her ill-usage and unhappiness,--she never, but for him,
bewailed her fate. Patient, and upheld by strong affection to the
last, she died a widow of some three weeks’ date, leaving to her
father’s care two orphans; one a son of ten or twelve years old; the
other a girl--such another infant child--the same in helplessness, in
age, in form, in feature--as she had been herself when her young mother
died.
‘The elder brother, grandfather to these two children, was now a broken
man; crushed and borne down, less by the weight of years than by the
heavy hand of sorrow. With the wreck of his possessions, he began to
trade--in pictures first, and then in curious ancient things. He had
entertained a fondness for such matters from a boy, and the tastes he
had cultivated were now to yield him an anxious and precarious
subsistence.
‘The boy grew like his father in mind and person; the girl so like her
mother, that when the old man had her on his knee, and looked into her
mild blue eyes, he felt as if awakening from a wretched dream, and his
daughter were a little child again. The wayward boy soon spurned the
shelter of his roof, and sought associates more congenial to his taste.
The old man and the child dwelt alone together.
‘It was then, when the love of two dead people who had been nearest and
dearest to his heart, was all transferred to this slight creature; when
her face, constantly before him, reminded him, from hour to hour, of
the too early change he had seen in such another--of all the
sufferings he had watched and known, and all his child had undergone;
when the young man’s profligate and hardened course drained him of
money as his father’s had, and even sometimes occasioned them temporary
privation and distress; it was then that there began to beset him, and
to be ever in his mind, a gloomy dread of poverty and want. He had no
thought for himself in this. His fear was for the child. It was a
spectre in his house, and haunted him night and day.
‘The younger brother had been a traveller in many countries, and had
made his pilgrimage through life alone. His voluntary banishment had
been misconstrued, and he had borne (not without pain) reproach and
slight for doing that which had wrung his heart, and cast a mournful
shadow on his path. Apart from this, communication between him and the
elder was difficult, and uncertain, and often failed; still, it was not
so wholly broken off but that he learnt--with long blanks and gaps
between each interval of information--all that I have told you now.
‘Then, dreams of their young, happy life--happy to him though laden
with pain and early care--visited his pillow yet oftener than before;
and every night, a boy again, he was at his brother’s side. With the
utmost speed he could exert, he settled his affairs; converted into
money all the goods he had; and, with honourable wealth enough for
both, with open heart and hand, with limbs that trembled as they bore
him on, with emotion such as men can hardly bear and live, arrived one
evening at his brother’s door!’
The narrator, whose voice had faltered lately, stopped.
‘The rest,’ said Mr Garland, pressing his hand after a pause, ‘I know.’
‘Yes,’ rejoined his friend, ‘we may spare ourselves the sequel. You
know the poor result of all my search. Even when by dint of such
inquiries as the utmost vigilance and sagacity could set on foot, we
found they had been seen with two poor travelling showmen--and in time
discovered the men themselves--and in time, the actual place of their
retreat; even then, we were too late. Pray God, we are not too late
again!’
‘We cannot be,’ said Mr Garland. ‘This time we must succeed.’
‘I have believed and hoped so,’ returned the other. ‘I try to believe
and hope so still. But a heavy weight has fallen on my spirits, my
good friend, and the sadness that gathers over me, will yield to
neither hope nor reason.’
‘That does not surprise me,’ said Mr Garland; ‘it is a natural
consequence of the events you have recalled; of this dreary time and
place; and above all, of this wild and dismal night. A dismal night,
indeed! Hark! how the wind is howling!’
CHAPTER 70
Day broke, and found them still upon their way. Since leaving home,
they had halted here and there for necessary refreshment, and had
frequently been delayed, especially in the night time, by waiting for
fresh horses. They had made no other stoppages, but the weather
continued rough, and the roads were often steep and heavy. It would be
night again before they reached their place of destination.
Kit, all bluff and hardened with the cold, went on manfully; and,
having enough to do to keep his blood circulating, to picture to
himself the happy end of this adventurous journey, and to look about
him and be amazed at everything, had little spare time for thinking of
discomforts. Though his impatience, and that of his fellow-travellers,
rapidly increased as the day waned, the hours did not stand still. The
short daylight of winter soon faded away, and it was dark again when
they had yet many miles to travel.
As it grew dusk, the wind fell; its distant moanings were more low and
mournful; and, as it came creeping up the road, and rattling covertly
among the dry brambles on either hand, it seemed like some great
phantom for whom the way was narrow, whose garments rustled as it
stalked along. By degrees it lulled and died away, and then it came on
to snow.
The flakes fell fast and thick, soon covering the ground some inches
deep, and spreading abroad a solemn stillness. The rolling wheels were
noiseless, and the sharp ring and clatter of the horses’ hoofs, became
a dull, muffled tramp. The life of their progress seemed to be slowly
hushed, and something death-like to usurp its place.
Shading his eyes from the falling snow, which froze upon their lashes
and obscured his sight, Kit often tried to catch the earliest glimpse
of twinkling lights, denoting their approach to some not distant town.
He could descry objects enough at such times, but none correctly. Now,
a tall church spire appeared in view, which presently became a tree, a
barn, a shadow on the ground, thrown on it by their own bright lamps.
Now, there were horsemen, foot-passengers, carriages, going on before,
or meeting them in narrow ways; which, when they were close upon them,
turned to shadows too. A wall, a ruin, a sturdy gable end, would rise
up in the road; and, when they were plunging headlong at it, would be
the road itself. Strange turnings too, bridges, and sheets of water,
appeared to start up here and there, making the way doubtful and
uncertain; and yet they were on the same bare road, and these things,
like the others, as they were passed, turned into dim illusions.
He descended slowly from his seat--for his limbs were numbed--when
they arrived at a lone posting-house, and inquired how far they had to
go to reach their journey’s end. It was a late hour in such by-places,
and the people were abed; but a voice answered from an upper window,
Ten miles. The ten minutes that ensued appeared an hour; but at the
end of that time, a shivering figure led out the horses they required,
and after another brief delay they were again in motion.
It was a cross-country road, full, after the first three or four miles,
of holes and cart-ruts, which, being covered by the snow, were so many
pitfalls to the trembling horses, and obliged them to keep a footpace.
As it was next to impossible for men so much agitated as they were by
this time, to sit still and move so slowly, all three got out and
plodded on behind the carriage. The distance seemed interminable, and
the walk was most laborious. As each was thinking within himself that
the driver must have lost his way, a church bell, close at hand, struck
the hour of midnight, and the carriage stopped. It had moved softly
enough, but when it ceased to crunch the snow, the silence was as
startling as if some great noise had been replaced by perfect stillness.
‘This is the place, gentlemen,’ said the driver, dismounting from his
horse, and knocking at the door of a little inn. ‘Halloa! Past twelve
o’clock is the dead of night here.’
The knocking was loud and long, but it failed to rouse the drowsy
inmates. All continued dark and silent as before. They fell back a
little, and looked up at the windows, which were mere black patches in
the whitened house front. No light appeared. The house might have
been deserted, or the sleepers dead, for any air of life it had about
it.
They spoke together with a strange inconsistency, in whispers;
unwilling to disturb again the dreary echoes they had just now raised.
‘Let us go on,’ said the younger brother, ‘and leave this good fellow
to wake them, if he can. I cannot rest until I know that we are not
too late. Let us go on, in the name of Heaven!’
They did so, leaving the postilion to order such accommodation as the
house afforded, and to renew his knocking. Kit accompanied them with a
little bundle, which he had hung in the carriage when they left home,
and had not forgotten since--the bird in his old cage--just as she had
left him. She would be glad to see her bird, he knew.
The road wound gently downward. As they proceeded, they lost sight of
the church whose clock they had heard, and of the small village
clustering round it. The knocking, which was now renewed, and which in
that stillness they could plainly hear, troubled them. They wished the
man would forbear, or that they had told him not to break the silence
until they returned.
The old church tower, clad in a ghostly garb of pure cold white, again
rose up before them, and a few moments brought them close beside it. A
venerable building--grey, even in the midst of the hoary landscape. An
ancient sun-dial on the belfry wall was nearly hidden by the
snow-drift, and scarcely to be known for what it was. Time itself
seemed to have grown dull and old, as if no day were ever to displace
the melancholy night.
A wicket gate was close at hand, but there was more than one path
across the churchyard to which it led, and, uncertain which to take,
they came to a stand again.
The village street--if street that could be called which was an
irregular cluster of poor cottages of many heights and ages, some with
their fronts, some with their backs, and some with gable ends towards
the road, with here and there a signpost, or a shed encroaching on the
path--was close at hand. There was a faint light in a chamber window
not far off, and Kit ran towards that house to ask their way.
His first shout was answered by an old man within, who presently
appeared at the casement, wrapping some garment round his throat as a
protection from the cold, and demanded who was abroad at that
unseasonable hour, wanting him.
‘’Tis hard weather this,’ he grumbled, ‘and not a night to call me up
in. My trade is not of that kind that I need be roused from bed. The
business on which folks want me, will keep cold, especially at this
season. What do you want?’
‘I would not have roused you, if I had known you were old and ill,’
said Kit.
‘Old!’ repeated the other peevishly. ‘How do you know I am old? Not
so old as you think, friend, perhaps. As to being ill, you will find
many young people in worse case than I am. More’s the pity that it
should be so--not that I should be strong and hearty for my years, I
mean, but that they should be weak and tender. I ask your pardon
though,’ said the old man, ‘if I spoke rather rough at first. My eyes
are not good at night--that’s neither age nor illness; they never
were--and I didn’t see you were a stranger.’
‘I am sorry to call you from your bed,’ said Kit, ‘but those gentlemen
you may see by the churchyard gate, are strangers too, who have just
arrived from a long journey, and seek the parsonage-house. You can
direct us?’
‘I should be able to,’ answered the old man, in a trembling voice,
‘for, come next summer, I have been sexton here, good fifty years. The
right hand path, friend, is the road.--There is no ill news for our
good gentleman, I hope?’
Kit thanked him, and made him a hasty answer in the negative; he was
turning back, when his attention was caught by the voice of a child.
Looking up, he saw a very little creature at a neighbouring window.
‘What is that?’ cried the child, earnestly. ‘Has my dream come true?
Pray speak to me, whoever that is, awake and up.’
‘Poor boy!’ said the sexton, before Kit could answer, ‘how goes it,
darling?’
‘Has my dream come true?’ exclaimed the child again, in a
voice so fervent that it might have thrilled to the heart of any
listener. ‘But no, that can never be! How could it be--Oh! how could
it!’
‘I guess his meaning,’ said the sexton. ‘To bed again, poor boy!’
‘Ay!’ cried the child, in a burst of despair. ‘I knew it could never
be, I felt too sure of that, before I asked! But, all to-night, and
last night too, it was the same. I never fall asleep, but that cruel
dream comes back.’
‘Try to sleep again,’ said the old man, soothingly. ‘It will go in
time.’
‘No no, I would rather that it staid--cruel as it is, I would rather
that it staid,’ rejoined the child. ‘I am not afraid to have it in my
sleep, but I am so sad--so very, very sad.’
The old man blessed him, the child in tears replied Good night, and Kit
was again alone.
He hurried back, moved by what he had heard, though more by the child’s
manner than by anything he had said, as his meaning was hidden from
him. They took the path indicated by the sexton, and soon arrived
before the parsonage wall. Turning round to look about them when they
had got thus far, they saw, among some ruined buildings at a distance,
one single solitary light.
It shone from what appeared to be an old oriel window, and being
surrounded by the deep shadows of overhanging walls, sparkled like a
star. Bright and glimmering as the stars above their heads, lonely and
motionless as they, it seemed to claim some kindred with the eternal
lamps of Heaven, and to burn in fellowship with them.
‘What light is that!’ said the younger brother.
‘It is surely,’ said Mr Garland, ‘in the ruin where they live. I see
no other ruin hereabouts.’
‘They cannot,’ returned the brother hastily, ‘be waking at this late
hour--’
Kit interposed directly, and begged that, while they rang and waited at
the gate, they would let him make his way to where this light was
shining, and try to ascertain if any people were about. Obtaining the
permission he desired, he darted off with breathless eagerness, and,
still carrying the birdcage in his hand, made straight towards the spot.
It was not easy to hold that pace among the graves, and at another time
he might have gone more slowly, or round by the path. Unmindful of all
obstacles, however, he pressed forward without slackening his speed,
and soon arrived within a few yards of the window. He approached as
softly as he could, and advancing so near the wall as to brush the
whitened ivy with his dress, listened. There was no sound inside. The
church itself was not more quiet. Touching the glass with his cheek,
he listened again. No. And yet there was such a silence all around,
that he felt sure he could have heard even the breathing of a sleeper,
if there had been one there.
A strange circumstance, a light in such a place at that time of night,
with no one near it.
A curtain was drawn across the lower portion of the window, and he
could not see into the room. But there was no shadow thrown upon it
from within. To have gained a footing on the wall and tried to look in
from above, would have been attended with some danger--certainly with
some noise, and the chance of terrifying the child, if that really were
her habitation. Again and again he listened; again and again the same
wearisome blank.
Leaving the spot with slow and cautious steps, and skirting the ruin
for a few paces, he came at length to a door. He knocked. No answer.
But there was a curious noise inside. It was difficult to determine
what it was. It bore a resemblance to the low moaning of one in pain,
but it was not that, being far too regular and constant. Now it seemed
a kind of song, now a wail--seemed, that is, to his changing fancy, for
the sound itself was never changed or checked. It was unlike anything
he had ever heard; and in its tone there was something fearful,
chilling, and unearthly.
The listener’s blood ran colder now than ever it had done in frost and
snow, but he knocked again. There was no answer, and the sound went on
without any interruption. He laid his hand softly upon the latch, and
put his knee against the door. It was secured on the inside, but
yielded to the pressure, and turned upon its hinges. He saw the
glimmering of a fire upon the old walls, and entered.
CHAPTER 71
The dull, red glow of a wood fire--for no lamp or candle burnt within
the room--showed him a figure, seated on the hearth with its back
towards him, bending over the fitful light. The attitude was that of
one who sought the heat. It was, and yet was not. The stooping
posture and the cowering form were there, but no hands were stretched
out to meet the grateful warmth, no shrug or shiver compared its luxury
with the piercing cold outside. With limbs huddled together, head
bowed down, arms crossed upon the breast, and fingers tightly clenched,
it rocked to and fro upon its seat without a moment’s pause,
accompanying the action with the mournful sound he had heard.
The heavy door had closed behind him on his entrance, with a crash that
made him start. The figure neither spoke, nor turned to look, nor gave
in any other way the faintest sign of having heard the noise. The form
was that of an old man, his white head akin in colour to the mouldering
embers upon which he gazed. He, and the failing light and dying fire,
the time-worn room, the solitude, the wasted life, and gloom, were all
in fellowship. Ashes, and dust, and ruin!
Kit tried to speak, and did pronounce some words, though what they were
he scarcely knew. Still the same terrible low cry went on--still the
same rocking in the chair--the same stricken figure was there,
unchanged and heedless of his presence.
He had his hand upon the latch, when something in the form--distinctly
seen as one log broke and fell, and, as it fell, blazed up--arrested
it. He returned to where he had stood before--advanced a
pace--another--another still. Another, and he saw the face. Yes!
Changed as it was, he knew it well.
‘Master!’ he cried, stooping on one knee and catching at his hand.
‘Dear master. Speak to me!’
The old man turned slowly towards him; and muttered in a hollow voice,
‘This is another!--How many of these spirits there have been to-night!’
‘No spirit, master. No one but your old servant. You know me now, I
am sure? Miss Nell--where is she--where is she?’
‘They all say that!’ cried the old man. ‘They all ask the same
question. A spirit!’
‘Where is she?’ demanded Kit. ‘Oh tell me but that,--but that, dear
master!’
‘She is asleep--yonder--in there.’
‘Thank God!’
‘Aye! Thank God!’ returned the old man. ‘I have prayed to Him, many,
and many, and many a livelong night, when she has been asleep, He
knows. Hark! Did she call?’
‘I heard no voice.’
‘You did. You hear her now. Do you tell me that you don’t hear THAT?’
He started up, and listened again.
‘Nor that?’ he cried, with a triumphant smile, ‘Can any body know that
voice so well as I? Hush! Hush!’
Motioning to him to be silent, he stole away into another chamber.
After a short absence (during which he could be heard to speak in a
softened soothing tone) he returned, bearing in his hand a lamp.
‘She is still asleep,’ he whispered. ‘You were right. She did not
call--unless she did so in her slumber. She has called to me in her
sleep before now, sir; as I have sat by, watching, I have seen her lips
move, and have known, though no sound came from them, that she spoke of
me. I feared the light might dazzle her eyes and wake her, so I
brought it here.’
He spoke rather to himself than to the visitor, but when he had put the
lamp upon the table, he took it up, as if impelled by some momentary
recollection or curiosity, and held it near his face. Then, as if
forgetting his motive in the very action, he turned away and put it
down again.
‘She is sleeping soundly,’ he said; ‘but no wonder. Angel hands have
strewn the ground deep with snow, that the lightest footstep may be
lighter yet; and the very birds are dead, that they may not wake her.
She used to feed them, Sir. Though never so cold and hungry, the timid
things would fly from us. They never flew from her!’
Again he stopped to listen, and scarcely drawing breath, listened for a
long, long time. That fancy past, he opened an old chest, took out
some clothes as fondly as if they had been living things, and began to
smooth and brush them with his hand.
‘Why dost thou lie so idle there, dear Nell,’ he murmured, ‘when there
are bright red berries out of doors waiting for thee to pluck them!
Why dost thou lie so idle there, when thy little friends come creeping
to the door, crying “where is Nell--sweet Nell?”--and sob, and weep,
because they do not see thee. She was always gentle with children.
The wildest would do her bidding--she had a tender way with them,
indeed she had!’
Kit had no power to speak. His eyes were filled with tears.
‘Her little homely dress,--her favourite!’ cried the old man, pressing
it to his breast, and patting it with his shrivelled hand. ‘She will
miss it when she wakes. They have hid it here in sport, but she shall
have it--she shall have it. I would not vex my darling, for the wide
world’s riches. See here--these shoes--how worn they are--she kept
them to remind her of our last long journey. You see where the little
feet went bare upon the ground. They told me, afterwards, that the
stones had cut and bruised them. She never told me that. No, no, God
bless her! and, I have remembered since, she walked behind me, sir,
that I might not see how lame she was--but yet she had my hand in hers,
and seemed to lead me still.’
He pressed them to his lips, and having carefully put them back again,
went on communing with himself--looking wistfully from time to time
towards the chamber he had lately visited.
‘She was not wont to be a lie-abed; but she was well then. We must
have patience. When she is well again, she will rise early, as she
used to do, and ramble abroad in the healthy morning time. I often
tried to track the way she had gone, but her small footstep left no
print upon the dewy ground, to guide me. Who is that? Shut the door.
Quick!--Have we not enough to do to drive away that marble cold, and
keep her warm!’
The door was indeed opened, for the entrance of Mr Garland and his
friend, accompanied by two other persons. These were the schoolmaster,
and the bachelor. The former held a light in his hand. He had, it
seemed, but gone to his own cottage to replenish the exhausted lamp, at
the moment when Kit came up and found the old man alone.
He softened again at sight of these two friends, and, laying aside the
angry manner--if to anything so feeble and so sad the term can be
applied--in which he had spoken when the door opened, resumed his
former seat, and subsided, by little and little into the old action,
and the old, dull, wandering sound.
Of the strangers, he took no heed whatever. He had seen them, but
appeared quite incapable of interest or curiosity. The younger brother
stood apart. The bachelor drew a chair towards the old man, and sat
down close beside him. After a long silence, he ventured to speak.
‘Another night, and not in bed!’ he said softly; ‘I hoped you would be
more mindful of your promise to me. Why do you not take some rest?’
‘Sleep has left me,’ returned the old man. ‘It is all with her!’
‘It would pain her very much to know that you were watching thus,’ said
the bachelor. ‘You would not give her pain?’
‘I am not so sure of that, if it would only rouse her. She has slept
so very long. And yet I am rash to say so. It is a good and happy
sleep--eh?’
‘Indeed it is,’ returned the bachelor. ‘Indeed, indeed, it is!’
‘That’s well!--and the waking--’ faltered the old man.
‘Happy too. Happier than tongue can tell, or heart of man conceive.’
They watched him as he rose and stole on tiptoe to the other chamber
where the lamp had been replaced. They listened as he spoke again
within its silent walls. They looked into the faces of each other, and
no man’s cheek was free from tears. He came back, whispering that she
was still asleep, but that he thought she had moved. It was her hand,
he said--a little--a very, very little--but he was pretty sure she had
moved it--perhaps in seeking his. He had known her do that, before
now, though in the deepest sleep the while. And when he had said this,
he dropped into his chair again, and clasping his hands above his head,
uttered a cry never to be forgotten.
The poor schoolmaster motioned to the bachelor that he would come on
the other side, and speak to him. They gently unlocked his fingers,
which he had twisted in his grey hair, and pressed them in their own.
‘He will hear me,’ said the schoolmaster, ‘I am sure. He will hear
either me or you if we beseech him. She would, at all times.’
‘I will hear any voice she liked to hear,’ cried the old man. ‘I love
all she loved!’
‘I know you do,’ returned the schoolmaster. ‘I am certain of it.
Think of her; think of all the sorrows and afflictions you have shared
together; of all the trials, and all the peaceful pleasures, you have
jointly known.’
‘I do. I do. I think of nothing else.’
‘I would have you think of nothing else to-night--of nothing but those
things which will soften your heart, dear friend, and open it to old
affections and old times. It is so that she would speak to you
herself, and in her name it is that I speak now.’
‘You do well to speak softly,’ said the old man. ‘We will not wake
her. I should be glad to see her eyes again, and to see her smile.
There is a smile upon her young face now, but it is fixed and
changeless. I would have it come and go. That shall be in Heaven’s
good time. We will not wake her.’
‘Let us not talk of her in her sleep, but as she used to be when you
were journeying together, far away--as she was at home, in the old
house from which you fled together--as she was, in the old cheerful
time,’ said the schoolmaster.
‘She was always cheerful--very cheerful,’ cried the old man, looking
steadfastly at him. ‘There was ever something mild and quiet about
her, I remember, from the first; but she was of a happy nature.’
‘We have heard you say,’ pursued the schoolmaster, ‘that in this and in
all goodness, she was like her mother. You can think of, and remember
her?’
He maintained his steadfast look, but gave no answer.
‘Or even one before her,’ said the bachelor. ‘It is many years ago,
and affliction makes the time longer, but you have not forgotten her
whose death contributed to make this child so dear to you, even before
you knew her worth or could read her heart? Say, that you could carry
back your thoughts to very distant days--to the time of your early
life--when, unlike this fair flower, you did not pass your youth alone.
Say, that you could remember, long ago, another child who loved you
dearly, you being but a child yourself. Say, that you had a brother,
long forgotten, long unseen, long separated from you, who now, at last,
in your utmost need came back to comfort and console you--’
‘To be to you what you were once to him,’ cried the younger, falling on
his knee before him; ‘to repay your old affection, brother dear, by
constant care, solicitude, and love; to be, at your right hand, what he
has never ceased to be when oceans rolled between us; to call to
witness his unchanging truth and mindfulness of bygone days, whole
years of desolation. Give me but one word of recognition, brother--and
never--no never, in the brightest moment of our youngest days, when,
poor silly boys, we thought to pass our lives together--have we been
half as dear and precious to each other as we shall be from this time
hence!’
The old man looked from face to face, and his lips moved; but no sound
came from them in reply.
‘If we were knit together then,’ pursued the younger brother, ‘what
will be the bond between us now! Our love and fellowship began in
childhood, when life was all before us, and will be resumed when we
have proved it, and are but children at the last. As many restless
spirits, who have hunted fortune, fame, or pleasure through the world,
retire in their decline to where they first drew breath, vainly seeking
to be children once again before they die, so we, less fortunate than
they in early life, but happier in its closing scenes, will set up our
rest again among our boyish haunts, and going home with no hope
realised, that had its growth in manhood--carrying back nothing that
we brought away, but our old yearnings to each other--saving no
fragment from the wreck of life, but that which first endeared it--may
be, indeed, but children as at first. And even,’ he added in an
altered voice, ‘even if what I dread to name has come to pass--even if
that be so, or is to be (which Heaven forbid and spare us!)--still,
dear brother, we are not apart, and have that comfort in our great
affliction.’
By little and little, the old man had drawn back towards the inner
chamber, while these words were spoken. He pointed there, as he
replied, with trembling lips.
‘You plot among you to wean my heart from her. You never will do
that--never while I have life. I have no relative or friend but her--I
never had--I never will have. She is all in all to me. It is too late
to part us now.’
Waving them off with his hand, and calling softly to her as he went, he
stole into the room. They who were left behind, drew close together,
and after a few whispered words--not unbroken by emotion, or easily
uttered--followed him. They moved so gently, that their footsteps made
no noise; but there were sobs from among the group, and sounds of grief
and mourning.
For she was dead. There, upon her little bed, she lay at rest. The
solemn stillness was no marvel now.
She was dead. No sleep so beautiful and calm, so free from trace of
pain, so fair to look upon. She seemed a creature fresh from the hand
of God, and waiting for the breath of life; not one who had lived and
suffered death.
Her couch was dressed with here and there some winter berries and green
leaves, gathered in a spot she had been used to favour. ‘When I die,
put near me something that has loved the light, and had the sky above
it always.’ Those were her words.
She was dead. Dear, gentle, patient, noble Nell was dead. Her little
bird--a poor slight thing the pressure of a finger would have
crushed--was stirring nimbly in its cage; and the strong heart of its
child mistress was mute and motionless for ever.
Where were the traces of her early cares, her sufferings, and fatigues?
All gone. Sorrow was dead indeed in her, but peace and perfect
happiness were born; imaged in her tranquil beauty and profound repose.
And still her former self lay there, unaltered in this change. Yes.
The old fireside had smiled upon that same sweet face; it had passed,
like a dream, through haunts of misery and care; at the door of the
poor schoolmaster on the summer evening, before the furnace fire upon
the cold wet night, at the still bedside of the dying boy, there had
been the same mild lovely look. So shall we know the angels in their
majesty, after death.
The old man held one languid arm in his, and had the small hand tight
folded to his breast, for warmth. It was the hand she had stretched
out to him with her last smile--the hand that had led him on, through
all their wanderings. Ever and anon he pressed it to his lips; then
hugged it to his breast again, murmuring that it was warmer now; and,
as he said it, he looked, in agony, to those who stood around, as if
imploring them to help her.
She was dead, and past all help, or need of it. The ancient rooms she
had seemed to fill with life, even while her own was waning fast--the
garden she had tended--the eyes she had gladdened--the noiseless haunts
of many a thoughtful hour--the paths she had trodden as it were but
yesterday--could know her never more.
‘It is not,’ said the schoolmaster, as he bent down to kiss her on the
cheek, and gave his tears free vent, ‘it is not on earth that Heaven’s
justice ends. Think what earth is, compared with the World to which
her young spirit has winged its early flight; and say, if one
deliberate wish expressed in solemn terms above this bed could call her
back to life, which of us would utter it!’
CHAPTER 72
When morning came, and they could speak more calmly on the subject of
their grief, they heard how her life had closed.
She had been dead two days. They were all about her at the time,
knowing that the end was drawing on. She died soon after daybreak.
They had read and talked to her in the earlier portion of the night,
but as the hours crept on, she sunk to sleep. They could tell, by what
she faintly uttered in her dreams, that they were of her journeyings
with the old man; they were of no painful scenes, but of people who had
helped and used them kindly, for she often said ‘God bless you!’ with
great fervour. Waking, she never wandered in her mind but once, and
that was of beautiful music which she said was in the air. God knows.
It may have been.
Opening her eyes at last, from a very quiet sleep, she begged that they
would kiss her once again. That done, she turned to the old man with a
lovely smile upon her face--such, they said, as they had never seen,
and never could forget--and clung with both her arms about his neck.
They did not know that she was dead, at first.
She had spoken very often of the two sisters, who, she said, were like
dear friends to her. She wished they could be told how much she
thought about them, and how she had watched them as they walked
together, by the river side at night. She would like to see poor Kit,
she had often said of late. She wished there was somebody to take her
love to Kit. And, even then, she never thought or spoke about him, but
with something of her old, clear, merry laugh.
For the rest, she had never murmured or complained; but with a quiet
mind, and manner quite unaltered--save that she every day became more
earnest and more grateful to them--faded like the light upon a summer’s
evening.
The child who had been her little friend came there, almost as soon as
it was day, with an offering of dried flowers which he begged them to
lay upon her breast. It was he who had come to the window overnight
and spoken to the sexton, and they saw in the snow traces of small
feet, where he had been lingering near the room in which she lay,
before he went to bed. He had a fancy, it seemed, that they had left
her there alone; and could not bear the thought.
He told them of his dream again, and that it was of her being restored
to them, just as she used to be. He begged hard to see her, saying
that he would be very quiet, and that they need not fear his being
alarmed, for he had sat alone by his young brother all day long when he
was dead, and had felt glad to be so near him. They let him have his
wish; and indeed he kept his word, and was, in his childish way, a
lesson to them all.
Up to that time, the old man had not spoken once--except to her--or
stirred from the bedside. But, when he saw her little favourite, he
was moved as they had not seen him yet, and made as though he would
have him come nearer. Then, pointing to the bed, he burst into tears
for the first time, and they who stood by, knowing that the sight of
this child had done him good, left them alone together.
Soothing him with his artless talk of her, the child persuaded him to
take some rest, to walk abroad, to do almost as he desired him. And
when the day came on, which must remove her in her earthly shape from
earthly eyes for ever, he led him away, that he might not know when she
was taken from him.
They were to gather fresh leaves and berries for her bed. It was
Sunday--a bright, clear, wintry afternoon--and as they traversed the
village street, those who were walking in their path drew back to make
way for them, and gave them a softened greeting. Some shook the old
man kindly by the hand, some stood uncovered while he tottered by, and
many cried ‘God help him!’ as he passed along.
‘Neighbour!’ said the old man, stopping at the cottage where his young
guide’s mother dwelt, ‘how is it that the folks are nearly all in black
to-day? I have seen a mourning ribbon or a piece of crape on almost
every one.’
She could not tell, the woman said.
‘Why, you yourself--you wear the colour too?’ he said. ‘Windows are
closed that never used to be by day. What does this mean?’
Again the woman said she could not tell.
‘We must go back,’ said the old man, hurriedly. ‘We must see what this
is.’
‘No, no,’ cried the child, detaining him. ‘Remember what you promised.
Our way is to the old green lane, where she and I so often were, and
where you found us, more than once, making those garlands for her
garden. Do not turn back!’
‘Where is she now?’ said the old man. ‘Tell me that.’
‘Do you not know?’ returned the child. ‘Did we not leave her, but just
now?’
‘True. True. It was her we left--was it?’
He pressed his hand upon his brow, looked vacantly round, and as if
impelled by a sudden thought, crossed the road, and entered the
sexton’s house. He and his deaf assistant were sitting before the
fire. Both rose up, on seeing who it was.
The child made a hasty sign to them with his hand. It was the action
of an instant, but that, and the old man’s look, were quite enough.
‘Do you--do you bury any one to-day?’ he said, eagerly.
‘No, no! Who should we bury, Sir?’ returned the sexton.
‘Aye, who indeed! I say with you, who indeed!’
‘It is a holiday with us, good Sir,’ returned the sexton mildly. ‘We
have no work to do to-day.’
‘Why then, I’ll go where you will,’ said the old man, turning to the
child. ‘You’re sure of what you tell me? You would not deceive me? I
am changed, even in the little time since you last saw me.’
‘Go thy ways with him, Sir,’ cried the sexton, ‘and Heaven be with ye
both!’
‘I am quite ready,’ said the old man, meekly. ‘Come, boy, come--’ and
so submitted to be led away.
And now the bell--the bell she had so often heard, by night and day,
and listened to with solemn pleasure almost as a living voice--rung
its remorseless toll, for her, so young, so beautiful, so good.
Decrepit age, and vigorous life, and blooming youth, and helpless
infancy, poured forth--on crutches, in the pride of strength and
health, in the full blush of promise, in the mere dawn of life--to
gather round her tomb. Old men were there, whose eyes were dim and
senses failing--grandmothers, who might have died ten years ago, and
still been old--the deaf, the blind, the lame, the palsied, the living
dead in many shapes and forms, to see the closing of that early grave.
What was the death it would shut in, to that which still could crawl
and creep above it!
Along the crowded path they bore her now; pure as the newly-fallen snow
that covered it; whose day on earth had been as fleeting. Under the
porch, where she had sat when Heaven in its mercy brought her to that
peaceful spot, she passed again; and the old church received her in its
quiet shade.
They carried her to one old nook, where she had many and many a time
sat musing, and laid their burden softly on the pavement. The light
streamed on it through the coloured window--a window, where the boughs
of trees were ever rustling in the summer, and where the birds sang
sweetly all day long. With every breath of air that stirred among
those branches in the sunshine, some trembling, changing light, would
fall upon her grave.
Earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust! Many a young hand
dropped in its little wreath, many a stifled sob was heard. Some--and
they were not a few--knelt down. All were sincere and truthful in
their sorrow.
The service done, the mourners stood apart, and the villagers closed
round to look into the grave before the pavement-stone should be
replaced. One called to mind how he had seen her sitting on that very
spot, and how her book had fallen on her lap, and she was gazing with a
pensive face upon the sky. Another told, how he had wondered much that
one so delicate as she, should be so bold; how she had never feared to
enter the church alone at night, but had loved to linger there when all
was quiet, and even to climb the tower stair, with no more light than
that of the moon rays stealing through the loopholes in the thick old
wall. A whisper went about among the oldest, that she had seen and
talked with angels; and when they called to mind how she had looked,
and spoken, and her early death, some thought it might be so, indeed.
Thus, coming to the grave in little knots, and glancing down, and
giving place to others, and falling off in whispering groups of three
or four, the church was cleared in time, of all but the sexton and the
mourning friends.
They saw the vault covered, and the stone fixed down. Then, when the
dusk of evening had come on, and not a sound disturbed the sacred
stillness of the place--when the bright moon poured in her light on
tomb and monument, on pillar, wall, and arch, and most of all (it
seemed to them) upon her quiet grave--in that calm time, when outward
things and inward thoughts teem with assurances of immortality, and
worldly hopes and fears are humbled in the dust before them--then, with
tranquil and submissive hearts they turned away, and left the child
with God.
Oh! it is hard to take to heart the lesson that such deaths will teach,
but let no man reject it, for it is one that all must learn, and is a
mighty, universal Truth. When Death strikes down the innocent and
young, for every fragile form from which he lets the panting spirit
free, a hundred virtues rise, in shapes of mercy, charity, and love, to
walk the world, and bless it. Of every tear that sorrowing mortals
shed on such green graves, some good is born, some gentler nature
comes. In the Destroyer’s steps there spring up bright creations that
defy his power, and his dark path becomes a way of light to Heaven.
It was late when the old man came home. The boy had led him to his own
dwelling, under some pretence, on their way back; and, rendered drowsy
by his long ramble and late want of rest, he had sunk into a deep sleep
by the fireside. He was perfectly exhausted, and they were careful not
to rouse him. The slumber held him a long time, and when he at length
awoke the moon was shining.
The younger brother, uneasy at his protracted absence, was watching at
the door for his coming, when he appeared in the pathway with his
little guide. He advanced to meet them, and tenderly obliging the old
man to lean upon his arm, conducted him with slow and trembling steps
towards the house.
He repaired to her chamber, straight. Not finding what he had left
there, he returned with distracted looks to the room in which they were
assembled. From that, he rushed into the schoolmaster’s cottage,
calling her name. They followed close upon him, and when he had vainly
searched it, brought him home.
With such persuasive words as pity and affection could suggest, they
prevailed upon him to sit among them and hear what they should tell
him. Then endeavouring by every little artifice to prepare his mind
for what must come, and dwelling with many fervent words upon the happy
lot to which she had been removed, they told him, at last, the truth.
The moment it had passed their lips, he fell down among them like a
murdered man.
For many hours, they had little hope of his surviving; but grief is
strong, and he recovered.
If there be any who have never known the blank that follows death--the
weary void--the sense of desolation that will come upon the strongest
minds, when something familiar and beloved is missed at every turn--the
connection between inanimate and senseless things, and the object of
recollection, when every household god becomes a monument and every
room a grave--if there be any who have not known this, and proved it by
their own experience, they can never faintly guess how, for many days,
the old man pined and moped away the time, and wandered here and there
as seeking something, and had no comfort.
Whatever power of thought or memory he retained, was all bound up in
her. He never understood, or seemed to care to understand, about his
brother. To every endearment and attention he continued listless. If
they spoke to him on this, or any other theme--save one--he would hear
them patiently for awhile, then turn away, and go on seeking as before.
On that one theme, which was in his and all their minds, it was
impossible to touch. Dead! He could not hear or bear the word. The
slightest hint of it would throw him into a paroxysm, like that he had
had when it was first spoken. In what hope he lived, no man could
tell; but that he had some hope of finding her again--some faint and
shadowy hope, deferred from day to day, and making him from day to day
more sick and sore at heart--was plain to all.
They bethought them of a removal from the scene of this last sorrow; of
trying whether change of place would rouse or cheer him. His brother
sought the advice of those who were accounted skilful in such matters,
and they came and saw him. Some of the number staid upon the spot,
conversed with him when he would converse, and watched him as he
wandered up and down, alone and silent. Move him where they might,
they said, he would ever seek to get back there. His mind would run
upon that spot. If they confined him closely, and kept a strict guard
upon him, they might hold him prisoner, but if he could by any means
escape, he would surely wander back to that place, or die upon the road.
The boy, to whom he had submitted at first, had no longer any influence
with him. At times he would suffer the child to walk by his side, or
would even take such notice of his presence as giving him his hand, or
would stop to kiss his cheek, or pat him on the head. At other times,
he would entreat him--not unkindly--to be gone, and would not brook him
near. But, whether alone, or with this pliant friend, or with those
who would have given him, at any cost or sacrifice, some consolation or
some peace of mind, if happily the means could have been devised; he
was at all times the same--with no love or care for anything in life--a
broken-hearted man.
At length, they found, one day, that he had risen early, and, with his
knapsack on his back, his staff in hand, her own straw hat, and little
basket full of such things as she had been used to carry, was gone. As
they were making ready to pursue him far and wide, a frightened
schoolboy came who had seen him, but a moment before, sitting in the
church--upon her grave, he said.
They hastened there, and going softly to the door, espied him in the
attitude of one who waited patiently. They did not disturb him then,
but kept a watch upon him all that day. When it grew quite dark, he
rose and returned home, and went to bed, murmuring to himself, ‘She
will come to-morrow!’
Upon the morrow he was there again from sunrise until night; and still
at night he laid him down to rest, and murmured, ‘She will come
to-morrow!’
And thenceforth, every day, and all day long, he waited at her grave,
for her. How many pictures of new journeys over pleasant country, of
resting-places under the free broad sky, of rambles in the fields and
woods, and paths not often trodden--how many tones of that one
well-remembered voice, how many glimpses of the form, the fluttering
dress, the hair that waved so gaily in the wind--how many visions of
what had been, and what he hoped was yet to be--rose up before him, in
the old, dull, silent church! He never told them what he thought, or
where he went. He would sit with them at night, pondering with a
secret satisfaction, they could see, upon the flight that he and she
would take before night came again; and still they would hear him
whisper in his prayers, ‘Lord! Let her come to-morrow!’
The last time was on a genial day in spring. He did not return at the
usual hour, and they went to seek him. He was lying dead upon the
stone.
They laid him by the side of her whom he had loved so well; and, in the
church where they had often prayed, and mused, and lingered hand in
hand, the child and the old man slept together.
CHAPTER 73
The magic reel, which, rolling on before, has led the chronicler thus
far, now slackens in its pace, and stops. It lies before the goal; the
pursuit is at an end.
It remains but to dismiss the leaders of the little crowd who have
borne us company upon the road, and so to close the journey.
Foremost among them, smooth Sampson Brass and Sally, arm in arm, claim
our polite attention.
Mr Sampson, then, being detained, as already has been shown, by the
justice upon whom he called, and being so strongly pressed to protract
his stay that he could by no means refuse, remained under his
protection for a considerable time, during which the great attention of
his entertainer kept him so extremely close, that he was quite lost to
society, and never even went abroad for exercise saving into a small
paved yard. So well, indeed, was his modest and retiring temper
understood by those with whom he had to deal, and so jealous were they
of his absence, that they required a kind of friendly bond to be
entered into by two substantial housekeepers, in the sum of fifteen
hundred pounds a-piece, before they would suffer him to quit their
hospitable roof--doubting, it appeared, that he would return, if once
let loose, on any other terms. Mr Brass, struck with the humour of
this jest, and carrying out its spirit to the utmost, sought from his
wide connection a pair of friends whose joint possessions fell some
halfpence short of fifteen pence, and proffered them as bail--for that
was the merry word agreed upon both sides. These gentlemen being
rejected after twenty-four hours’ pleasantry, Mr Brass consented to
remain, and did remain, until a club of choice spirits called a Grand
jury (who were in the joke) summoned him to a trial before twelve other
wags for perjury and fraud, who in their turn found him guilty with a
most facetious joy,--nay, the very populace entered into the whim, and
when Mr Brass was moving in a hackney-coach towards the building where
these wags assembled, saluted him with rotten eggs and carcases of
kittens, and feigned to wish to tear him into shreds, which greatly
increased the comicality of the thing, and made him relish it the more,
no doubt.
To work this sportive vein still further, Mr Brass, by his counsel,
moved in arrest of judgment that he had been led to criminate himself,
by assurances of safety and promises of pardon, and claimed the
leniency which the law extends to such confiding natures as are thus
deluded. After solemn argument, this point (with others of a technical
nature, whose humorous extravagance it would be difficult to
exaggerate) was referred to the judges for their decision, Sampson
being meantime removed to his former quarters. Finally, some of the
points were given in Sampson’s favour, and some against him; and the
upshot was, that, instead of being desired to travel for a time in
foreign parts, he was permitted to grace the mother country under
certain insignificant restrictions.
These were, that he should, for a term of years, reside in a spacious
mansion where several other gentlemen were lodged and boarded at the
public charge, who went clad in a sober uniform of grey turned up with
yellow, had their hair cut extremely short, and chiefly lived on gruel
and light soup. It was also required of him that he should partake of
their exercise of constantly ascending an endless flight of stairs;
and, lest his legs, unused to such exertion, should be weakened by it,
that he should wear upon one ankle an amulet or charm of iron. These
conditions being arranged, he was removed one evening to his new abode,
and enjoyed, in common with nine other gentlemen, and two ladies, the
privilege of being taken to his place of retirement in one of Royalty’s
own carriages.
Over and above these trifling penalties, his name was erased and
blotted out from the roll of attorneys; which erasure has been always
held in these latter times to be a great degradation and reproach, and
to imply the commission of some amazing villany--as indeed it would
seem to be the case, when so many worthless names remain among its
better records, unmolested.
Of Sally Brass, conflicting rumours went abroad. Some said with
confidence that she had gone down to the docks in male attire, and had
become a female sailor; others darkly whispered that she had enlisted
as a private in the second regiment of Foot Guards, and had been seen
in uniform, and on duty, to wit, leaning on her musket and looking out
of a sentry-box in St James’s Park, one evening. There were many such
whispers as these in circulation; but the truth appears to be that,
after the lapse of some five years (during which there is no direct
evidence of her having been seen at all), two wretched people were more
than once observed to crawl at dusk from the inmost recesses of St
Giles’s, and to take their way along the streets, with shuffling steps
and cowering shivering forms, looking into the roads and kennels as
they went in search of refuse food or disregarded offal. These forms
were never beheld but in those nights of cold and gloom, when the
terrible spectres, who lie at all other times in the obscene
hiding-places of London, in archways, dark vaults and cellars, venture
to creep into the streets; the embodied spirits of Disease, and Vice,
and Famine. It was whispered by those who should have known, that
these were Sampson and his sister Sally; and to this day, it is said,
they sometimes pass, on bad nights, in the same loathsome guise, close
at the elbow of the shrinking passenger.
The body of Quilp being found--though not until some days had
elapsed--an inquest was held on it near the spot where it had been
washed ashore. The general supposition was that he had committed
suicide, and, this appearing to be favoured by all the circumstances of
his death, the verdict was to that effect. He was left to be buried
with a stake through his heart in the centre of four lonely roads.
It was rumoured afterwards that this horrible and barbarous ceremony
had been dispensed with, and that the remains had been secretly given
up to Tom Scott. But even here, opinion was divided; for some said Tom
dug them up at midnight, and carried them to a place indicated to him
by the widow. It is probable that both these stories may have had
their origin in the simple fact of Tom’s shedding tears upon the
inquest--which he certainly did, extraordinary as it may appear. He
manifested, besides, a strong desire to assault the jury; and being
restrained and conducted out of court, darkened its only window by
standing on his head upon the sill, until he was dexterously tilted
upon his feet again by a cautious beadle.
Being cast upon the world by his master’s death, he determined to go
through it upon his head and hands, and accordingly began to tumble for
his bread. Finding, however, his English birth an insurmountable
obstacle to his advancement in this pursuit (notwithstanding that his
art was in high repute and favour), he assumed the name of an Italian
image lad, with whom he had become acquainted; and afterwards tumbled
with extraordinary success, and to overflowing audiences.
Little Mrs Quilp never quite forgave herself the one deceit that lay so
heavy on her conscience, and never spoke or thought of it but with
bitter tears. Her husband had no relations, and she was rich. He had
made no will, or she would probably have been poor. Having married the
first time at her mother’s instigation, she consulted in her second
choice nobody but herself. It fell upon a smart young fellow enough;
and as he made it a preliminary condition that Mrs Jiniwin should be
thenceforth an out-pensioner, they lived together after marriage with no
more than the average amount of quarrelling, and led a merry life upon
the dead dwarf’s money.
Mr and Mrs Garland, and Mr Abel, went out as usual (except that there
was a change in their household, as will be seen presently), and in due
time the latter went into partnership with his friend the notary, on
which occasion there was a dinner, and a ball, and great extent of
dissipation. Unto this ball there happened to be invited the most
bashful young lady that was ever seen, with whom Mr Abel happened to
fall in love. HOW it happened, or how they found it out, or which of
them first communicated the discovery to the other, nobody knows. But
certain it is that in course of time they were married; and equally
certain it is that they were the happiest of the happy; and no less
certain it is that they deserved to be so. And it is pleasant to write
down that they reared a family; because any propagation of goodness and
benevolence is no small addition to the aristocracy of nature, and no
small subject of rejoicing for mankind at large.
The pony preserved his character for independence and principle down to
the last moment of his life; which was an unusually long one, and
caused him to be looked upon, indeed, as the very Old Parr of ponies.
He often went to and fro with the little phaeton between Mr Garland’s
and his son’s, and, as the old people and the young were frequently
together, had a stable of his own at the new establishment, into which
he would walk of himself with surprising dignity. He condescended to
play with the children, as they grew old enough to cultivate his
friendship, and would run up and down the little paddock with them like
a dog; but though he relaxed so far, and allowed them such small
freedoms as caresses, or even to look at his shoes or hang on by his
tail, he never permitted any one among them to mount his back or drive
him; thus showing that even their familiarity must have its limits, and
that there were points between them far too serious for trifling.
He was not unsusceptible of warm attachments in his later life, for
when the good bachelor came to live with Mr Garland upon the
clergyman’s decease, he conceived a great friendship for him, and
amiably submitted to be driven by his hands without the least
resistance. He did no work for two or three years before he died, but
lived in clover; and his last act (like a choleric old gentleman) was
to kick his doctor.
Mr Swiveller, recovering very slowly from his illness, and entering
into the receipt of his annuity, bought for the Marchioness a handsome
stock of clothes, and put her to school forthwith, in redemption of the
vow he had made upon his fevered bed. After casting about for some
time for a name which should be worthy of her, he decided in favour of
Sophronia Sphynx, as being euphonious and genteel, and furthermore
indicative of mystery. Under this title the Marchioness repaired, in
tears, to the school of his selection, from which, as she soon
distanced all competitors, she was removed before the lapse of many
quarters to one of a higher grade. It is but bare justice to Mr
Swiveller to say, that, although the expenses of her education kept him
in straitened circumstances for half a dozen years, he never slackened
in his zeal, and always held himself sufficiently repaid by the
accounts he heard (with great gravity) of her advancement, on his
monthly visits to the governess, who looked upon him as a literary
gentleman of eccentric habits, and of a most prodigious talent in
quotation.
In a word, Mr Swiveller kept the Marchioness at this establishment
until she was, at a moderate guess, full nineteen years of age--
good-looking, clever, and good-humoured; when he began to consider
seriously what was to be done next. On one of his periodical visits,
while he was revolving this question in his mind, the Marchioness came
down to him, alone, looking more smiling and more fresh than ever.
Then, it occurred to him, but not for the first time, that if she would
marry him, how comfortable they might be! So Richard asked her;
whatever she said, it wasn’t No; and they were married in good earnest
that day week. Which gave Mr Swiveller frequent occasion to remark at
divers subsequent periods that there had been a young lady saving up
for him after all.
A little cottage at Hampstead being to let, which had in its garden a
smoking-box, the envy of the civilised world, they agreed to become its
tenants, and, when the honey-moon was over, entered upon its
occupation. To this retreat Mr Chuckster repaired regularly every
Sunday to spend the day--usually beginning with breakfast--and here he
was the great purveyor of general news and fashionable intelligence.
For some years he continued a deadly foe to Kit, protesting that he had
a better opinion of him when he was supposed to have stolen the
five-pound note, than when he was shown to be perfectly free of the
crime; inasmuch as his guilt would have had in it something daring and
bold, whereas his innocence was but another proof of a sneaking and
crafty disposition. By slow degrees, however, he was reconciled to him
in the end; and even went so far as to honour him with his patronage,
as one who had in some measure reformed, and was therefore to be
forgiven. But he never forgot or pardoned that circumstance of the
shilling; holding that if he had come back to get another he would have
done well enough, but that his returning to work out the former gift
was a stain upon his moral character which no penitence or contrition
could ever wash away.
Mr Swiveller, having always been in some measure of a philosophic and
reflective turn, grew immensely contemplative, at times, in the
smoking-box, and was accustomed at such periods to debate in his own
mind the mysterious question of Sophronia’s parentage. Sophronia
herself supposed she was an orphan; but Mr Swiveller, putting various
slight circumstances together, often thought Miss Brass must know
better than that; and, having heard from his wife of her strange
interview with Quilp, entertained sundry misgivings whether that
person, in his lifetime, might not also have been able to solve the
riddle, had he chosen. These speculations, however, gave him no
uneasiness; for Sophronia was ever a most cheerful, affectionate, and
provident wife to him; and Dick (excepting for an occasional outbreak
with Mr Chuckster, which she had the good sense rather to encourage
than oppose) was to her an attached and domesticated husband. And they
played many hundred thousand games of cribbage together. And let it be
added, to Dick’s honour, that, though we have called her Sophronia, he
called her the Marchioness from first to last; and that upon every
anniversary of the day on which he found her in his sick room, Mr
Chuckster came to dinner, and there was great glorification.
The gamblers, Isaac List and Jowl, with their trusty confederate Mr
James Groves of unimpeachable memory, pursued their course with varying
success, until the failure of a spirited enterprise in the way of their
profession, dispersed them in various directions, and caused their
career to receive a sudden check from the long and strong arm of the
law. This defeat had its origin in the untoward detection of a new
associate--young Frederick Trent--who thus became the unconscious
instrument of their punishment and his own.
For the young man himself, he rioted abroad for a brief term, living by
his wits--which means by the abuse of every faculty that worthily
employed raises man above the beasts, and so degraded, sinks him far
below them. It was not long before his body was recognised by a
stranger, who chanced to visit that hospital in Paris where the drowned
are laid out to be owned; despite the bruises and disfigurements which
were said to have been occasioned by some previous scuffle. But the
stranger kept his own counsel until he returned home, and it was never
claimed or cared for.
The younger brother, or the single gentleman, for that designation is
more familiar, would have drawn the poor schoolmaster from his lone
retreat, and made him his companion and friend. But the humble village
teacher was timid of venturing into the noisy world, and had become
fond of his dwelling in the old churchyard. Calmly happy in his
school, and in the spot, and in the attachment of Her little mourner,
he pursued his quiet course in peace; and was, through the righteous
gratitude of his friend--let this brief mention suffice for that--a
POOR school-master no more.
That friend--single gentleman, or younger brother, which you will--had
at his heart a heavy sorrow; but it bred in him no misanthropy or
monastic gloom. He went forth into the world, a lover of his kind.
For a long, long time, it was his chief delight to travel in the steps
of the old man and the child (so far as he could trace them from her
last narrative), to halt where they had halted, sympathise where they
had suffered, and rejoice where they had been made glad. Those who had
been kind to them, did not escape his search. The sisters at the
school--they who were her friends, because themselves so
friendless--Mrs Jarley of the wax-work, Codlin, Short--he found them
all; and trust me, the man who fed the furnace fire was not forgotten.
Kit’s story having got abroad, raised him up a host of friends, and
many offers of provision for his future life. He had no idea at first
of ever quitting Mr Garland’s service; but, after serious remonstrance
and advice from that gentleman, began to contemplate the possibility of
such a change being brought about in time. A good post was procured
for him, with a rapidity which took away his breath, by some of the
gentlemen who had believed him guilty of the offence laid to his
charge, and who had acted upon that belief. Through the same kind
agency, his mother was secured from want, and made quite happy. Thus,
as Kit often said, his great misfortune turned out to be the source of
all his subsequent prosperity.
Did Kit live a single man all his days, or did he marry? Of course he
married, and who should be his wife but Barbara? And the best of it
was, he married so soon that little Jacob was an uncle, before the
calves of his legs, already mentioned in this history, had ever been
encased in broadcloth pantaloons,--though that was not quite the best
either, for of necessity the baby was an uncle too. The delight of
Kit’s mother and of Barbara’s mother upon the great occasion is past
all telling; finding they agreed so well on that, and on all other
subjects, they took up their abode together, and were a most harmonious
pair of friends from that time forth. And hadn’t Astley’s cause to
bless itself for their all going together once a quarter--to the
pit--and didn’t Kit’s mother always say, when they painted the outside,
that Kit’s last treat had helped to that, and wonder what the manager
would feel if he but knew it as they passed his house!
When Kit had children six and seven years old, there was a Barbara
among them, and a pretty Barbara she was. Nor was there wanting an
exact facsimile and copy of little Jacob, as he appeared in those
remote times when they taught him what oysters meant. Of course there
was an Abel, own godson to the Mr Garland of that name; and there was a
Dick, whom Mr Swiveller did especially favour. The little group would
often gather round him of a night and beg him to tell again that story
of good Miss Nell who died. This, Kit would do; and when they cried to
hear it, wishing it longer too, he would teach them how she had gone to
Heaven, as all good people did; and how, if they were good, like her,
they might hope to be there too, one day, and to see and know her as he
had done when he was quite a boy. Then, he would relate to them how
needy he used to be, and how she had taught him what he was otherwise
too poor to learn, and how the old man had been used to say ‘she always
laughs at Kit;’ at which they would brush away their tears, and laugh
themselves to think that she had done so, and be again quite merry.
He sometimes took them to the street where she had lived; but new
improvements had altered it so much, it was not like the same. The old
house had been long ago pulled down, and a fine broad road was in its
place. At first he would draw with his stick a square upon the ground
to show them where it used to stand. But he soon became uncertain of
the spot, and could only say it was thereabouts, he thought, and these
alterations were confusing.
Such are the changes which a few years bring about, and so do things
pass away, like a tale that is told!
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