***the Project Gutenberg Etext Series By Charles Dickens. Copyright laws
are changing all over the world, be sure to check the copyright laws for
your country before posting these files!!
Please take a look at the important information in this header.
We encourage you to keep this file on your own disk, keeping an
electronic path open for the next readers. Do not remove this.
**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts**
**Etexts Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971**
*These Etexts Prepared By Hundreds of Volunteers and Donations*
Information on contacting Project Gutenberg to get Etexts, and
further information is included below. We need your donations.
Dombey and Son
by Charles Dickens
February, 1997 [Etext #821]
***The Project Gutenberg Etext of Dombey and Son, by Dickens***
*****This file should be named domby10.txt or domby10.zip******
Corrected EDITIONS of our etexts get a new NUMBER, domby11.txt.
VERSIONS based on separate sources get new LETTER, domby10a.txt.
Dombey and Son was contributed by:
Neil McLachlan, nmclachlan@delphi.com
and Ted Davis, 101515.3105@compuserve.com
on behalf of the Talking Newspaper of the UK (TNAUK).
A Kurzweil flatbed scanner and Xerox Discover software were used to
produce the raw text files, which were edited using the TSEJR ASCII
text editor, with a user lexicon specially developed for this purpose.
Words split at the end of lines have been re-united, maintaining
hyphenation where appropriate; except for the Prefaces, the text has
been reformatted to 70 columns.
We are now trying to release all our books one month in advance
of the official release dates, for time for better editing.
Please note: neither this list nor its contents are final till
midnight of the last day of the month of any such announcement.
The official release date of all Project Gutenberg Etexts is at
Midnight, Central Time, of the last day of the stated month. A
preliminary version may often be posted for suggestion, comment
and editing by those who wish to do so. To be sure you have an
up to date first edition [xxxxx10x.xxx] please check file sizes
in the first week of the next month. Since our ftp program has
a bug in it that scrambles the date [tried to fix and failed] a
look at the file size will have to do, but we will try to see a
new copy has at least one byte more or less.
Information about Project Gutenberg (one page)
We produce about two million dollars for each hour we work. The
fifty hours is one conservative estimate for how long it we take
to get any etext selected, entered, proofread, edited, copyright
searched and analyzed, the copyright letters written, etc. This
projected audience is one hundred million readers. If our value
per text is nominally estimated at one dollar then we produce $2
million dollars per hour this year as we release thirty-two text
files per month: or 400 more Etexts in 1996 for a total of 800.
If these reach just 10% of the computerized population, then the
total should reach 80 billion Etexts. We will try add 800 more,
during 1997, but it will take all the effort we can manage to do
the doubling of our library again this year, what with the other
massive requirements it is going to take to get incorporated and
establish something that will have some permanence.
The Goal of Project Gutenberg is to Give Away One Trillion Etext
Files by the December 31, 2001. [10,000 x 100,000,000=Trillion]
This is ten thousand titles each to one hundred million readers,
which is only 10% of the present number of computer users. 2001
should have at least twice as many computer users as that, so it
will require us reaching less than 5% of the users in 2001.
We need your donations more than ever!
All donations should be made to "Project Gutenberg"
For these and other matters, please mail to:
Project Gutenberg
P. O. Box 2782
Champaign, IL 61825
When all other email fails try our Executive Director:
Michael S. Hart
We would prefer to send you this information by email
(Internet, Bitnet, Compuserve, ATTMAIL or MCImail).
******
If you have an FTP program (or emulator), please
FTP directly to the Project Gutenberg archives:
[Mac users, do NOT point and click. . .type]
ftp uiarchive.cso.uiuc.edu
login: anonymous
password: your@login
cd etext/etext90 through /etext97
or cd etext/articles [get suggest gut for more information]
dir [to see files]
get or mget [to get files. . .set bin for zip files]
GET INDEX?00.GUT
for a list of books
and
GET NEW GUT for general information
and
MGET GUT* for newsletters.
**Information prepared by the Project Gutenberg legal advisor**
(Three Pages)
***START**THE SMALL PRINT!**FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN ETEXTS**START***
Why is this "Small Print!" statement here? You know: lawyers.
They tell us you might sue us if there is something wrong with
your copy of this etext, even if you got it for free from
someone other than us, and even if what's wrong is not our
fault. So, among other things, this "Small Print!" statement
disclaims most of our liability to you. It also tells you how
you can distribute copies of this etext if you want to.
*BEFORE!* YOU USE OR READ THIS ETEXT
By using or reading any part of this PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm
etext, you indicate that you understand, agree to and accept
this "Small Print!" statement. If you do not, you can receive
a refund of the money (if any) you paid for this etext by
sending a request within 30 days of receiving it to the person
you got it from. If you received this etext on a physical
medium (such as a disk), you must return it with your request.
ABOUT PROJECT GUTENBERG-TM ETEXTS
This PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm etext, like most PROJECT GUTENBERG-
tm etexts, is a "public domain" work distributed by Professor
Michael S. Hart through the Project Gutenberg (the "Project").
Among other things, this means that no one owns a United States
copyright on or for this work, so the Project (and you!) can copy
and distribute it in the United States without permission and
without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, set forth
below, apply if you wish to copy and distribute this etext
under the Project's "PROJECT GUTENBERG" trademark.
To create these etexts, the Project expends considerable
efforts to identify, transcribe and proofread public domain
works. Despite these efforts, the Project's etexts and any
medium they may be on may contain "Defects". Among other
things, Defects may take the form of incomplete, inaccurate or
corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other
intellectual property infringement, a defective or damaged
disk or other etext medium, a computer virus, or computer
codes that damage or cannot be read by your equipment.
LIMITED WARRANTY; DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES
But for the "Right of Replacement or Refund" described below,
[1] the Project (and any other party you may receive this
etext from as a PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm etext) disclaims all
liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including
legal fees, and [2] YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE OR
UNDER STRICT LIABILITY, OR FOR BREACH OF WARRANTY OR CONTRACT,
INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE
OR INCIDENTAL DAMAGES, EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE
POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES.
If you discover a Defect in this etext within 90 days of
receiving it, you can receive a refund of the money (if any)
you paid for it by sending an explanatory note within that
time to the person you received it from. If you received it
on a physical medium, you must return it with your note, and
such person may choose to alternatively give you a replacement
copy. If you received it electronically, such person may
choose to alternatively give you a second opportunity to
receive it electronically.
THIS ETEXT IS OTHERWISE PROVIDED TO YOU "AS-IS". NO OTHER
WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, ARE MADE TO YOU AS
TO THE ETEXT OR ANY MEDIUM IT MAY BE ON, INCLUDING BUT NOT
LIMITED TO WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR A
PARTICULAR PURPOSE.
Some states do not allow disclaimers of implied warranties or
the exclusion or limitation of consequential damages, so the
above disclaimers and exclusions may not apply to you, and you
may have other legal rights.
INDEMNITY
You will indemnify and hold the Project, its directors,
officers, members and agents harmless from all liability, cost
and expense, including legal fees, that arise directly or
indirectly from any of the following that you do or cause:
[1] distribution of this etext, [2] alteration, modification,
or addition to the etext, or [3] any Defect.
DISTRIBUTION UNDER "PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm"
You may distribute copies of this etext electronically, or by
disk, book or any other medium if you either delete this
"Small Print!" and all other references to Project Gutenberg,
or:
[1] Only give exact copies of it. Among other things, this
requires that you do not remove, alter or modify the
etext or this "small print!" statement. You may however,
if you wish, distribute this etext in machine readable
binary, compressed, mark-up, or proprietary form,
including any form resulting from conversion by word pro-
cessing or hypertext software, but only so long as
*EITHER*:
[*] The etext, when displayed, is clearly readable, and
does *not* contain characters other than those
intended by the author of the work, although tilde
(~), asterisk (*) and underline (_) characters may
be used to convey punctuation intended by the
author, and additional characters may be used to
indicate hypertext links; OR
[*] The etext may be readily converted by the reader at
no expense into plain ASCII, EBCDIC or equivalent
form by the program that displays the etext (as is
the case, for instance, with most word processors);
OR
[*] You provide, or agree to also provide on request at
no additional cost, fee or expense, a copy of the
etext in its original plain ASCII form (or in EBCDIC
or other equivalent proprietary form).
[2] Honor the etext refund and replacement provisions of this
"Small Print!" statement.
[3] Pay a trademark license fee to the Project of 20% of the
net profits you derive calculated using the method you
already use to calculate your applicable taxes. If you
don't derive profits, no royalty is due. Royalties are
payable to "Project Gutenberg Association within the 60
days following each date you prepare (or were legally
required to prepare) your annual (or equivalent periodic)
tax return.
WHAT IF YOU *WANT* TO SEND MONEY EVEN IF YOU DON'T HAVE TO?
The Project gratefully accepts contributions in money, time,
scanning machines, OCR software, public domain etexts, royalty
free copyright licenses, and every other sort of contribution
you can think of. Money should be paid to "Project Gutenberg
Association".
*END*THE SMALL PRINT! FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN ETEXTS*Ver.04.29.93*END*
Dombey and Son was contributed by:
Neil McLachlan, nmclachlan@delphi.com
and Ted Davis, 101515.3105@compuserve.com
on behalf of the Talking Newspaper of the UK (TNAUK).
Production:
A Kurzweil flatbed scanner and Xerox Discover software was used to
produce the raw text files, which were edited using the TSEJR ASCII
text editor, with a user lexicon specially developed for this purpose.
Words split at the end of lines have been re-united, maintaining
hyphenation where appropriate; except for the Prefaces, the text has
been reformatted to 70 columns.
Structure:
Contents
Chapters 1 to 62
Preface of 1848
Preface of 1867
Charles Dickens. Dombey and son
1. Dombey and Son
2. In which Timely Provision is made for an Emergency that
will sometimes arise in the best-regulated Families
3. In which Mr Dombey, as a Man and a Father, is seen at the
Head of the Home-Department
4. In which some more First Appearances are made on the
Stage of these Adventures
5. Paul's Progress and Christening
6. Paul's Second Deprivation
7. A Bird's-eye Glimpse of Miss Tox's Dwelling-place; also
of the State of Miss Tox's Affections
8. Paul's further Progress, Growth, and Character
9. In which the Wooden Midshipman gets into Trouble 10. Containing the
Sequel of the Midshipman's Disaster 11. Paul's Introduction to a New Scene
12. Paul's Education 13. Shipping Intelligence and Office Business 14. Paul
grows more and more Old-fashioned, and goes Home
for the holidays 15. Amazing Artfulness of Captain Cuttle, and a new
Pursuit
for Walter Gay 16. What the Waves were always saying 17. Captain Cuttle
does a little Business for the Young people 18. Father and Daughter 19.
Walter goes away 20. Mr Dombey goes upon a journey 21. New Faces 22. A
Trifle of Management by Mr Carker the Manager 23. Florence solitary, and the
Midshipman mysterious 24. The Study of a Loving Heart 25. Strange News of
Uncle Sol 26. Shadows of the Past and Future 27. Deeper shadows 28.
Alterations 29. The Opening of the Eyes of Mrs Chick 30. The Interval before
the Marriage 31. The Wedding 32. The Wooden Midshipman goes to Pieces 33.
Contrasts 34. Another Mother and Daughter 35. The Happy Pair 36.
Housewarming 37. More Warnings than One 38. Miss Tox improves an Old
Acquaintance 39. Further Adventures of Captain Edward Cuttle, Mariner 40.
Domestic Relations 41. New Voices in the Waves 42. Confidential and
Accidental 43. The Watches of the Night 44. A Separation 45. The Trusty
Agent 46. Recognizant and Reflective 47. The Thunderbolt 48. The Flight of
Florence 49. The Midshipman makes a Discovery 50. Mr Toots's Complaint 51.
Mr Dombey and the World 52. Secret Intelligence 53. More Intelligence 54.
The Fugitives 55. Rob the Grinder loses his Place 56. Several People
delighted, and the Game Chicken disgusted 57. Another Wedding 58. After a
Lapse 59. Retribution 60. Chiefly Matrimonial 61. Relenting 62. Final
Dombey and Son
Dombey sat in the corner of the darkened room in the great arm-chair by
the bedside, and Son lay tucked up warm in a little basket bedstead,
carefully disposed on a low settee immediately in front of the fire and
close to it, as if his constitution were analogous to that of a muffin, and
it was essential to toast him brown while he was very new.
Dombey was about eight-and-forty years of age. Son about
eight-and-forty minutes. Dombey was rather bald, rather red, and though a
handsome well-made man, too stern and pompous in appearance, to be
prepossessing. Son was very bald, and very red, and though (of course) an
undeniably fine infant, somewhat crushed and spotty in his general effect,
as yet. On the brow of Dombey, Time and his brother Care had set some marks,
as on a tree that was to come down in good time - remorseless twins they are
for striding through their human forests, notching as they go - while the
countenance of Son was crossed with a thousand little creases, which the
same deceitful Time would take delight in smoothing out and wearing away
with the flat part of his scythe, as a preparation of the surface for his
deeper operations.
Dombey, exulting in the long-looked-for event, jingled and jingled the
heavy gold watch-chain that depended from below his trim blue coat, whereof
the buttons sparkled phosphorescently in the feeble rays of the distant
fire. Son, with his little fists curled up and clenched, seemed, in his
feeble way, to be squaring at existence for having come upon him so
unexpectedly.
'The House will once again, Mrs Dombey,' said Mr Dombey, 'be not only
in name but in fact Dombey and Son;' and he added, in a tone of luxurious
satisfaction, with his eyes half-closed as if he were reading the name in a
device of flowers, and inhaling their fragrance at the same time; 'Dom-bey
and Son!'
The words had such a softening influence, that he appended a term of
endearment to Mrs Dombey's name (though not without some hesitation, as
being a man but little used to that form of address): and said, 'Mrs Dombey,
my - my dear.'
A transient flush of faint surprise overspread the sick lady's face as
she raised her eyes towards him.
'He will be christened Paul, my - Mrs Dombey - of course.'
She feebly echoed, 'Of course,' or rather expressed it by the motion of
her lips, and closed her eyes again.
'His father's name, Mrs Dombey, and his grandfather's! I wish his
grandfather were alive this day! There is some inconvenience in the
necessity of writing Junior,' said Mr Dombey, making a fictitious autograph
on his knee; 'but it is merely of a private and personal complexion. It
doesn't enter into the correspondence of the House. Its signature remains
the same.' And again he said 'Dombey and Son, in exactly the same tone as
before.
Those three words conveyed the one idea of Mr Dombey's life. The earth
was made for Dombey and Son to trade in, and the sun and moon were made to
give them light. Rivers and seas were formed to float their ships; rainbows
gave them promise of fair weather; winds blew for or against their
enterprises; stars and planets circled in their orbits, to preserve
inviolate a system of which they were the centre. Common abbreviations took
new meanings in his eyes, and had sole reference to them. A. D. had no
concern with Anno Domini, but stood for anno Dombey - and Son.
He had risen, as his father had before him, in the course of life and
death, from Son to Dombey, and for nearly twenty years had been the sole
representative of the Firm. Of those years he had been married, ten -
married, as some said, to a lady with no heart to give him; whose happiness
was in the past, and who was content to bind her broken spirit to the
dutiful and meek endurance of the present. Such idle talk was little likely
to reach the ears of Mr Dombey, whom it nearly concerned; and probably no
one in the world would have received it with such utter incredulity as he,
if it had reached him. Dombey and Son had often dealt in hides, but never in
hearts. They left that fancy ware to boys and girls, and boarding-schools
and books. Mr Dombey would have reasoned: That a matrimonial alliance with
himself must, in the nature of things, be gratifying and honourable to any
woman of common sense. That the hope of giving birth to a new partner in
such a House, could not fail to awaken a glorious and stirring ambition in
the breast of the least ambitious of her sex. That Mrs Dombey had entered on
that social contract of matrimony: almost necessarily part of a genteel and
wealthy station, even without reference to the perpetuation of family Firms:
with her eyes fully open to these advantages. That Mrs Dombey had had daily
practical knowledge of his position in society. That Mrs Dombey had always
sat at the head of his table, and done the honours of his house in a
remarkably lady-like and becoming manner. That Mrs Dombey must have been
happy. That she couldn't help it.
Or, at all events, with one drawback. Yes. That he would have allowed.
With only one; but that one certainly involving much. With the drawback of
hope deferred. That hope deferred, which, (as the Scripture very correctly
tells us, Mr Dombey would have added in a patronising way; for his highest
distinct idea even of Scripture, if examined, would have been found to be;
that as forming part of a general whole, of which Dombey and Son formed
another part, it was therefore to be commended and upheld) maketh the heart
sick. They had been married ten years, and until this present day on which
Mr Dombey sat jingling and jingling his heavy gold watch-chain in the great
arm-chair by the side of the bed, had had no issue.
- To speak of; none worth mentioning. There had been a girl some six
years before, and the child, who had stolen into the chamber unobserved, was
now crouching timidly, in a corner whence she could see her mother's face.
But what was a girl to Dombey and Son! In the capital of the House's name
and dignity, such a child was merely a piece of base coin that couldn't be
invested - a bad Boy - nothing more.
Mr Dombey's cup of satisfaction was so full at this moment, however,
that he felt he could afford a drop or two of its contents, even to sprinkle
on the dust in the by-path of his little daughter.
So he said, 'Florence, you may go and look at your pretty brother, if
you lIke, I daresay. Don't touch him!'
The child glanced keenly at the blue coat and stiff white cravat,
which, with a pair of creaking boots and a very loud ticking watch, embodied
her idea of a father; but her eyes returned to her mother's face
immediately, and she neither moved nor answered.
'Her insensibility is as proof against a brother as against every thing
else,' said Mr Dombey to himself He seemed so confirmed in a previous
opinion by the discovery, as to be quite glad of it'
Next moment, the lady had opened her eyes and seen the child; and the
child had run towards her; and, standing on tiptoe, the better to hide her
face in her embrace, had clung about her with a desperate affection very
much at variance with her years.
'Oh Lord bless me!' said Mr Dombey, rising testily. 'A very illadvised
and feverish proceeding this, I am sure. Please to ring there for Miss
Florence's nurse. Really the person should be more care-'
'Wait! I - had better ask Doctor Peps if he'll have the goodness to
step upstairs again perhaps. I'll go down. I'll go down. I needn't beg you,'
he added, pausing for a moment at the settee before the fire, 'to take
particular care of this young gentleman, Mrs - '
'Blockitt, Sir?' suggested the nurse, a simpering piece of faded
gentility, who did not presume to state her name as a fact, but merely
offered it as a mild suggestion.
'Of this young gentleman, Mrs Blockitt.'
'No, Sir, indeed. I remember when Miss Florence was born - '
'Ay, ay, ay,' said Mr Dombey, bending over the basket bedstead, and
slightly bending his brows at the same time. 'Miss Florence was all very
well, but this is another matter. This young gentleman has to accomplish a
destiny. A destiny, little fellow!' As he thus apostrophised the infant he
raised one of his hands to his lips, and kissed it; then, seeming to fear
that the action involved some compromise of his dignity, went, awkwardly
enough, away.
Doctor Parker Peps, one of the Court Physicians, and a man of immense
reputation for assisting at the increase of great families, was walking up
and down the drawing-room with his hands behind him, to the unspeakable
admiration of the family Surgeon, who had regularly puffed the case for the
last six weeks, among all his patients, friends, and acquaintances, as one
to which he was in hourly expectation day and night of being summoned, in
conjunction with Doctor Parker Pep.
'Well, Sir,' said Doctor Parker Peps in a round, deep, sonorous voice,
muffled for the occasion, like the knocker; 'do you find that your dear lady
is at all roused by your visit?'
'Stimulated as it were?' said the family practitioner faintly: bowing
at the same time to the Doctor, as much as to say, 'Excuse my putting in a
word, but this is a valuable connexion.'
Mr Dombey was quite discomfited by the question. He had thought so
little of the patient, that he was not in a condition to answer it. He said
that it would be a satisfaction to him, if Doctor Parker Peps would walk
upstairs again.
'Good! We must not disguise from you, Sir,' said Doctor Parker Peps,
'that there is a want of power in Her Grace the Duchess - I beg your pardon;
I confound names; I should say, in your amiable lady. That there is a
certain degree of languor, and a general absence of elasticity, which we
would rather - not -
'See,' interposed the family practitioner with another inclination of
the head.
'Quite so,' said Doctor Parker Peps,' which we would rather not see. It
would appear that the system of Lady Cankaby - excuse me: I should say of
Mrs Dombey: I confuse the names of cases - '
'So very numerous,' murmured the family practitioner - 'can't be
expected I'm sure - quite wonderful if otherwise - Doctor Parker Peps's
West-End practice - '
'Thank you,' said the Doctor, 'quite so. It would appear, I was
observing, that the system of our patient has sustained a shock, from which
it can only hope to rally by a great and strong - '
'And vigorous,' murmured the family practitioner.
'Quite so,' assented the Doctor - 'and vigorous effort. Mr Pilkins
here, who from his position of medical adviser in this family - no one
better qualified to fill that position, I am sure.'
'Oh!' murmured the family practitioner. '"Praise from Sir Hubert
Stanley!"'
'You are good enough,' returned Doctor Parker Peps, 'to say so. Mr
Pilkins who, from his position, is best acquainted with the patient's
constitution in its normal state (an acquaintance very valuable to us in
forming our opinions in these occasions), is of opinion, with me, that
Nature must be called upon to make a vigorous effort in this instance; and
that if our interesting friend the Countess of Dombey - I beg your pardon;
Mrs Dombey - should not be - '
'Able,' said the family practitioner.
'To make,' said Doctor Parker Peps.
'That effort,' said the family practitioner.
'Successfully,' said they both together.
'Then,' added Doctor Parker Peps, alone and very gravely, a crisis
might arise, which we should both sincerely deplore.'
With that, they stood for a few seconds looking at the ground. Then, on
the motion - made in dumb show - of Doctor Parker Peps, they went upstairs;
the family practitioner opening the room door for that distinguished
professional, and following him out, with most obsequious politeness.
To record of Mr Dombey that he was not in his way affected by this
intelligence, would be to do him an injustice. He was not a man of whom it
could properly be said that he was ever startled, or shocked; but he
certainly had a sense within him, that if his wife should sicken and decay,
he would be very sorry, and that he would find a something gone from among
his plate and furniture, and other household possessions, which was well
worth the having, and could not be lost without sincere regret. Though it
would be a cool,. business-like, gentlemanly, self-possessed regret, no
doubt.
His meditations on the subject were soon interrupted, first by the
rustling of garments on the staircase, and then by the sudden whisking into
the room of a lady rather past the middle age than otherwise but dressed in
a very juvenile manner, particularly as to the tightness of her bodice, who,
running up to him with a kind of screw in her face and carriage, expressive
of suppressed emotion, flung her arms around his neck, and said, in a
choking voice,
'My dear Paul! He's quite a Dombey!'
'Well, well!' returned her brother - for Mr Dombey was her brother - 'I
think he is like the family. Don't agitate yourself, Louisa.'
'It's very foolish of me,' said Louisa, sitting down, and taking out
her pocket~handkerchief, 'but he's - he's such a perfect Dombey!'
Mr Dombey coughed.
'It's so extraordinary,' said Louisa; smiling through her tears, which
indeed were not overpowering, 'as to be perfectly ridiculous. So completely
our family. I never saw anything like it in my life!'
'But what is this about Fanny, herself?' said Mr Dombey. 'How is
Fanny?'
'My dear Paul,' returned Louisa, 'it's nothing whatever. Take my word,
it's nothing whatever. There is exhaustion, certainly, but nothing like what
I underwent myself, either with George or Frederick. An effort is necessary.
That's all. If dear Fanny were a Dombey! - But I daresay she'll make it; I
have no doubt she'll make it. Knowing it to be required of her, as a duty,
of course she'll make it. My dear Paul, it's very weak and silly of me, I
know, to be so trembly and shaky from head to foot; but I am so very queer
that I must ask you for a glass of wine and a morsel of that cake.'
Mr Dombey promptly supplied her with these refreshments from a tray on
the table.
'I shall not drink my love to you, Paul,' said Louisa: 'I shall drink
to the little Dombey. Good gracious me! - it's the most astonishing thing I
ever knew in all my days, he's such a perfect Dombey.'
Quenching this expression of opinion in a short hysterical laugh which
terminated in tears, Louisa cast up her eyes, and emptied her glass.
'I know it's very weak and silly of me,' she repeated, 'to be so
trembly and shaky from head to foot, and to allow my feelings so completely
to get the better of me, but I cannot help it. I thought I should have
fallen out of the staircase window as I came down from seeing dear Fanny,
and that tiddy ickle sing.' These last words originated in a sudden vivid
reminiscence of the baby.
They were succeeded by a gentle tap at the door.
'Mrs Chick,' said a very bland female voice outside, 'how are you now,
my dear friend?'
'My dear Paul,' said Louisa in a low voice, as she rose from her seat,
'it's Miss Tox. The kindest creature! I never could have got here without
her! Miss Tox, my brother Mr Dombey. Paul, my dear, my very particular
friend Miss Tox.'
The lady thus specially presented, was a long lean figure, wearing such
a faded air that she seemed not to have been made in what linen-drapers call
'fast colours' originally, and to have, by little and little, washed out.
But for this she might have been described as the very pink of general
propitiation and politeness. From a long habit of listening admiringly to
everything that was said in her presence, and looking at the speakers as if
she were mentally engaged in taking off impressions of their images upon her
soul, never to part with the same but with life, her head had quite settled
on one side. Her hands had contracted a spasmodic habit of raising
themselves of their own accord as in involuntary admiration. Her eyes were
liable to a similar affection. She had the softest voice that ever was
heard; and her nose, stupendously aquiline, had a little knob in the very
centre or key-stone of the bridge, whence it tended downwards towards her
face, as in an invincible determination never to turn up at anything.
Miss Tox's dress, though perfectly genteel and good, had a certain
character of angularity and scantiness. She was accustomed to wear odd weedy
little flowers in her bonnets and caps. Strange grasses were sometimes
perceived in her hair; and it was observed by the curious, of all her
collars, frills, tuckers, wristbands, and other gossamer articles - indeed
of everything she wore which had two ends to it intended to unite - that the
two ends were never on good terms, and wouldn't quite meet without a
struggle. She had furry articles for winter wear, as tippets, boas, and
muffs, which stood up on end in rampant manner, and were not at all sleek.
She was much given to the carrying about of small bags with snaps to them,
that went off like little pistols when they were shut up; and when
full-dressed, she wore round her neck the barrenest of lockets, representing
a fishy old eye, with no approach to speculation in it. These and other
appearances of a similar nature, had served to propagate the opinion, that
Miss Tox was a lady of what is called a limited independence, which she
turned to the best account. Possibly her mincing gait encouraged the belief,
and suggested that her clipping a step of ordinary compass into two or
three, originated in her habit of making the most of everything.
'I am sure,' said Miss Tox, with a prodigious curtsey, 'that to have
the honour of being presented to Mr Dombey is a distinction which I have
long sought, but very little expected at the present moment. My dear Mrs
Chick - may I say Louisa!'
Mrs Chick took Miss Tox's hand in hers, rested the foot of her
wine-glass upon it, repressed a tear, and said in a low voice, 'God bless
you!'
'My dear Louisa then,' said Miss Tox, 'my sweet friend, how are you
now?'
'Better,' Mrs Chick returned. 'Take some wine. You have been almost as
anxious as I have been, and must want it, I am sure.'
Mr Dombey of course officiated, and also refilled his sister's glass,
which she (looking another way, and unconscious of his intention) held
straight and steady the while, and then regarded with great astonishment,
saying, 'My dear Paul, what have you been doing!'
'Miss Tox, Paul,' pursued Mrs Chick, still retaining her hand, 'knowing
how much I have been interested in the anticipation of the event of to-day,
and how trembly and shaky I have been from head to foot in expectation of
it, has been working at a little gift for Fanny, which I promised to
present. Miss Tox is ingenuity itself.'
'My dear Louisa,' said Miss Tox. 'Don't say so.
'It is only a pincushion for the toilette table, Paul,' resumed his
sister; 'one of those trifles which are insignificant to your sex in
general, as it's very natural they should be - we have no business to expect
they should be otherwise - but to which we attach some interest.
'Miss Tox is very good,' said Mr Dombey.
'And I do say, and will say, and must say,' pursued his sister,
pressing the foot of the wine-glass on Miss Tox's hand, at each of the three
clauses, 'that Miss Tox has very prettily adapted the sentiment to the
occasion. I call "Welcome little Dombey" Poetry, myself!'
'Is that the device?' inquired her brother.
'That is the device,' returned Louisa.
'But do me the justice to remember, my dear Louisa,' said Miss Toxin a
tone of low and earnest entreaty, 'that nothing but the - I have some
difficulty in expressing myself - the dubiousness of the result would have
induced me to take so great a liberty: "Welcome, Master Dombey," would have
been much more congenial to my feelings, as I am sure you know. But the
uncertainty attendant on angelic strangers, will, I hope, excuse what must
otherwise appear an unwarrantable familiarity.' Miss Tox made a graceful
bend as she spoke, in favour of Mr Dombey, which that gentleman graciously
acknowledged. Even the sort of recognition of Dombey and Son, conveyed in
the foregoing conversation, was so palatable to him, that his sister, Mrs
Chick - though he affected to consider her a weak good-natured person - had
perhaps more influence over him than anybody else.
'My dear Paul,' that lady broke out afresh, after silently
contemplating his features for a few moments, 'I don't know whether to laugh
or cry when I look at you, I declare, you do so remind me of that dear baby
upstairs.'
'Well!' said Mrs Chick, with a sweet smile, 'after this, I forgive
Fanny everything!'
It was a declaration in a Christian spirit, and Mrs Chick felt that it
did her good. Not that she had anything particular to forgive in her
sister-in-law, nor indeed anything at all, except her having married her
brother - in itself a species of audacity - and her having, in the course of
events, given birth to a girl instead of a boy: which, as Mrs Chick had
frequently observed, was not quite what she had expected of her, and was not
a pleasant return for all the attention and distinction she had met with.
Mr Dombey being hastily summoned out of the room at this moment, the
two ladies were left alone together. Miss Tox immediately became spasmodic.
'I knew you would admire my brother. I told you so beforehand, my
dear,' said Louisa. Miss Tox's hands and eyes expressed how much. 'And as to
his property, my dear!'
'Ah!' said Miss Tox, with deep feeling. 'Im-mense!'
'But his deportment, my dear Louisa!' said Miss Tox. 'His presence! His
dignity! No portrait that I have ever seen of anyone has been half so
replete with those qualities. Something so stately, you know: so
uncompromising: so very wide across the chest: so upright! A pecuniary Duke
of York, my love, and nothing short of it!' said Miss Tox. 'That's what I
should designate him.'
'Why, my dear Paul!' exclaimed his sister, as he returned, 'you look
quite pale! There's nothing the matter?'
'I am sorry to say, Louisa, that they tell me that Fanny - '
'Now, my dear Paul,' returned his sister rising, 'don't believe it. Do
not allow yourself to receive a turn unnecessarily. Remember of what
importance you are to society, and do not allow yourself to be worried by
what is so very inconsiderately told you by people who ought to know better.
Really I'm surprised at them.'
'I hope I know, Louisa,' said Mr Dombey, stiffly, 'how to bear myself
before the world.'
'Nobody better, my dear Paul. Nobody half so well. They would be
ignorant and base indeed who doubted it.'
'Ignorant and base indeed!' echoed Miss Tox softly.
'But,' pursued Louisa, 'if you have any reliance on my experience,
Paul, you may rest assured that there is nothing wanting but an effort on
Fanny's part. And that effort,' she continued, taking off her bonnet, and
adjusting her cap and gloves, in a business-like manner, 'she must be
encouraged, and really, if necessary, urged to make. Now, my dear Paul, come
upstairs with me.'
Mr Dombey, who, besides being generally influenced by his sister for
the reason already mentioned, had really faith in her as an experienced and
bustling matron, acquiesced; and followed her, at once, to the sick chamber.
The lady lay upon her bed as he had left her, clasping her little
daughter to her breast. The child clung close about her, with the same
intensity as before, and never raised her head, or moved her soft cheek from
her mother's face, or looked on those who stood around, or spoke, or moved,
or shed a tear.
'Restless without the little girl,' the Doctor whispered Mr Dombey. 'We
found it best to have her in again.'
'Can nothing be done?' asked Mr Dombey.
The Doctor shook his head. 'We can do no more.'
The windows stood open, and the twilight was gathering without.
The scent of the restoratives that had been tried was pungent in the
room, but had no fragrance in the dull and languid air the lady breathed.
There was such a solemn stillness round the bed; and the two medical
attendants seemed to look on the impassive form with so much compassion and
so little hope, that Mrs Chick was for the moment diverted from her purpose.
But presently summoning courage, and what she called presence of mind, she
sat down by the bedside, and said in the low precise tone of one who
endeavours to awaken a sleeper:
'Fanny! Fanny!'
There was no sound in answer but the loud ticking of Mr Dombey's watch
and Doctor Parker Peps's watch, which seemed in the silence to be running a
race.
'Fanny, my dear,' said Mrs Chick, with assumed lightness, 'here's Mr
Dombey come to see you. Won't you speak to him? They want to lay your little
boy - the baby, Fanny, you know; you have hardly seen him yet, I think - in
bed; but they can't till you rouse yourself a little. Don't you think it's
time you roused yourself a little? Eh?'
She bent her ear to the bed, and listened: at the same time looking
round at the bystanders, and holding up her finger.
'Eh?' she repeated, 'what was it you said, Fanny? I didn't hear you.'
No word or sound in answer. Mr Dombey's watch and Dr Parker Peps's
watch seemed to be racing faster.
'Now, really, Fanny my dear,' said the sister-in-law, altering her
position, and speaking less confidently, and more earnestly, in spite of
herself, 'I shall have to be quite cross with you, if you don't rouse
yourself. It's necessary for you to make an effort, and perhaps a very great
and painful effort which you are not disposed to make; but this is a world
of effort you know, Fanny, and we must never yield, when so much depends
upon us. Come! Try! I must really scold you if you don't!'
The race in the ensuing pause was fierce and furious. The watches
seemed to jostle, and to trip each other up.
'Fanny!' said Louisa, glancing round, with a gathering alarm. 'Only
look at me. Only open your eyes to show me that you hear and understand me;
will you? Good Heaven, gentlemen, what is to be done!'
The two medical attendants exchanged a look across the bed; and the
Physician, stooping down, whispered in the child's ear. Not having
understood the purport of his whisper, the little creature turned her
perfectly colourless face and deep dark eyes towards him; but without
loosening her hold in the least
The whisper was repeated.
'Mama!' said the child.
The little voice, familiar and dearly loved, awakened some show of
consciousness, even at that ebb. For a moment, the closed eye lids trembled,
and the nostril quivered, and the faintest shadow of a smile was seen.
'Mama!' cried the child sobbing aloud. 'Oh dear Mama! oh dear Mama!'
The Doctor gently brushed the scattered ringlets of the child, aside
from the face and mouth of the mother. Alas how calm they lay there; how
little breath there was to stir them!
Thus, clinging fast to that slight spar within her arms, the mother
drifted out upon the dark and unknown sea that rolls round all the world.
In which Timely Provision is made for an Emergency that will sometimes
arise in the best-regulated Families
'I shall never cease to congratulate myself,' said Mrs Chick,' on
having said, when I little thought what was in store for us, - really as if
I was inspired by something, - that I forgave poor dear Fanny everything.
Whatever happens, that must always be a comfort to me!'
Mrs Chick made this impressive observation in the drawing-room, after
having descended thither from the inspection of the mantua-makers upstairs,
who were busy on the family mourning. She delivered it for the behoof of Mr
Chick, who was a stout bald gentleman, with a very large face, and his hands
continually in his pockets, and who had a tendency in his nature to whistle
and hum tunes, which, sensible of the indecorum of such sounds in a house of
grief, he was at some pains to repress at present.
'Don't you over-exert yourself, Loo,' said Mr Chick, 'or you'll be laid
up with spasms, I see. Right tol loor rul! Bless my soul, I forgot! We're
here one day and gone the next!'
Mrs Chick contented herself with a glance of reproof, and then
proceeded with the thread of her discourse.
'I am sure,' she said, 'I hope this heart-rending occurrence will be a
warning to all of us, to accustom ourselves to rouse ourselves, and to make
efforts in time where they're required of us. There's a moral in everything,
if we would only avail ourselves of it. It will be our own faults if we lose
sight of this one.'
Mr Chick invaded the grave silence which ensued on this remark with the
singularly inappropriate air of 'A cobbler there was;' and checking himself,
in some confusion, observed, that it was undoubtedly our own faults if we
didn't improve such melancholy occasions as the present.
'Which might be better improved, I should think, Mr C.,' retorted his
helpmate, after a short pause, 'than by the introduction, either of the
college hornpipe, or the equally unmeaning and unfeeling remark of
rump-te-iddity, bow-wow-wow!' - which Mr Chick had indeed indulged in, under
his breath, and which Mrs Chick repeated in a tone of withering scorn.
'Merely habit, my dear,' pleaded Mr Chick.
'Nonsense! Habit!' returned his wife. 'If you're a rational being,
don't make such ridiculous excuses. Habit! If I was to get a habit (as you
call it) of walking on the ceiling, like the flies, I should hear enough of
it, I daresay.
It appeared so probable that such a habit might be attended with some
degree of notoriety, that Mr Chick didn't venture to dispute the position.
'Bow-wow-wow!' repeated Mrs Chick with an emphasis of blighting
contempt on the last syllable. 'More like a professional singer with the
hydrophobia, than a man in your station of life!'
'How's the Baby, Loo?' asked Mr Chick: to change the subject.
'What Baby do you mean?' answered Mrs Chick.
'The poor bereaved little baby,' said Mr Chick. 'I don't know of any
other, my dear.'
'You don't know of any other,'retorted Mrs Chick. 'More shame for you,
I was going to say.
Mr Chick looked astonished.
'I am sure the morning I have had, with that dining-room downstairs,
one mass of babies, no one in their senses would believe.'
'One mass of babies!' repeated Mr Chick, staring with an alarmed
expression about him.
'It would have occurred to most men,' said Mrs Chick, 'that poor dear
Fanny being no more, - those words of mine will always be a balm and comfort
to me,' here she dried her eyes; 'it becomes necessary to provide a Nurse.'
'Oh! Ah!' said Mr Chick. 'Toor-ru! - such is life, I mean. I hope you
are suited, my dear.'
'Indeed I am not,' said Mrs Chick; 'nor likely to be, so far as I can
see, and in the meantime the poor child seems likely to be starved to death.
Paul is so very particular - naturally so, of course, having set his whole
heart on this one boy - and there are so many objections to everybody that
offers, that I don't see, myself, the least chance of an arrangement.
Meanwhile, of course, the child is - '
'Going to the Devil,' said Mr Chick, thoughtfully, 'to be sure.'
Admonished, however, that he had committed himself, by the indignation
expressed in Mrs Chick's countenance at the idea of a Dombey going there;
and thinking to atone for his misconduct by a bright suggestion, he added:
'Couldn't something temporary be done with a teapot?'
If he had meant to bring the subject prematurely to a close, he could
not have done it more effectually. After looking at him for some moments in
silent resignation, Mrs Chick said she trusted he hadn't said it in
aggravation, because that would do very little honour to his heart. She
trusted he hadn't said it seriously, because that would do very little
honour to his head. As in any case, he couldn't, however sanguine his
disposition, hope to offer a remark that would be a greater outrage on human
nature in general, we would beg to leave the discussion at that point.
Mrs Chick then walked majestically to the window and peeped through the
blind, attracted by the sound of wheels. Mr Chick, finding that his destiny
was, for the time, against him, said no more, and walked off. But it was not
always thus with Mr Chick. He was often in the ascendant himself, and at
those times punished Louisa roundly. In their matrimonial bickerings they
were, upon the whole, a well-matched, fairly-balanced, give-and-take couple.
It would have been, generally speaking, very difficult to have betted on the
winner. Often when Mr Chick seemed beaten, he would suddenly make a start,
turn the tables, clatter them about the ears of Mrs Chick, and carry all
before him. Being liable himself to similar unlooked for checks from Mrs
Chick, their little contests usually possessed a character of uncertainty
that was very animating.
Miss Tox had arrived on the wheels just now alluded to, and came
running into the room in a breathless condition. 'My dear Louisa,'said Miss
Tox, 'is the vacancy still unsupplied?'
'You good soul, yes,' said Mrs Chick.
'Then, my dear Louisa,' returned Miss Tox, 'I hope and believe - but in
one moment, my dear, I'll introduce the party.'
Running downstairs again as fast as she had run up, Miss Tox got the
party out of the hackney-coach, and soon returned with it under convoy.
It then appeared that she had used the word, not in its legal or
business acceptation, when it merely expresses an individual, but as a noun
of multitude, or signifying many: for Miss Tox escorted a plump rosy-cheeked
wholesome apple-faced young woman, with an infant in her arms; a younger
woman not so plump, but apple-faced also, who led a plump and apple-faced
child in each hand; another plump and also apple-faced boy who walked by
himself; and finally, a plump and apple-faced man, who carried in his arms
another plump and apple-faced boy, whom he stood down on the floor, and
admonished, in a husky whisper, to 'kitch hold of his brother Johnny.'
'My dear Louisa,' said Miss Tox, 'knowing your great anxiety, and
wishing to relieve it, I posted off myself to the Queen Charlotte's Royal
Married Females,' which you had forgot, and put the question, Was there
anybody there that they thought would suit? No, they said there was not.
When they gave me that answer, I do assure you, my dear, I was almost driven
to despair on your account. But it did so happen, that one of the Royal
Married Females, hearing the inquiry, reminded the matron of another who had
gone to her own home, and who, she said, would in all likelihood be most
satisfactory. The moment I heard this, and had it corroborated by the matron
- excellent references and unimpeachable character - I got the address, my
dear, and posted off again.'
'Like the dear good Tox, you are!' said Louisa.
'Not at all,' returned Miss Tox. 'Don't say so. Arriving at the house
(the cleanest place, my dear! You might eat your dinner off the floor), I
found the whole family sitting at table; and feeling that no account of them
could be half so comfortable to you and Mr Dombey as the sight of them all
together, I brought them all away. This gentleman,' said Miss Tox, pointing
out the apple-faced man, 'is the father. Will you have the goodness to come
a little forward, Sir?'
The apple-faced man having sheepishly complied with this request, stood
chuckling and grinning in a front row.
'This is his wife, of course,' said Miss Tox, singling out the young
woman with the baby. 'How do you do, Polly?'
'I'm pretty well, I thank you, Ma'am,' said Polly.
By way of bringing her out dexterously, Miss Tox had made the inquiry
as in condescension to an old acquaintance whom she hadn't seen for a
fortnight or so.
'I'm glad to hear it,' said Miss Tox. 'The other young woman is her
unmarried sister who lives with them, and would take care of her children.
Her name's Jemima. How do you do, Jemima?'
'I'm pretty well, I thank you, Ma'am,' returned Jemima.
'I'm very glad indeed to hear it,' said Miss Tox. 'I hope you'll keep
so. Five children. Youngest six weeks. The fine little boy with the blister
on his nose is the eldest The blister, I believe,' said Miss Tox, looking
round upon the family, 'is not constitutional, but accidental?'
The apple-faced man was understood to growl, 'Flat iron.
'I beg your pardon, Sir,' said Miss Tox, 'did you?
'Flat iron,' he repeated.
'Oh yes,' said Miss Tox. 'Yes! quite true. I forgot. The little
creature, in his mother's absence, smelt a warm flat iron. You're quite
right, Sir. You were going to have the goodness to inform me, when we
arrived at the door that you were by trade a - '
'Stoker,' said the man.
'A choker!' said Miss Tox, quite aghast.
'Stoker,' said the man. 'Steam ingine.'
'Oh-h! Yes!' returned Miss Tox, looking thoughtfully at him, and
seeming still to have but a very imperfect understanding of his meaning.
'And how do you like it, Sir?'
'Which, Mum?' said the man.
'That,' replied Miss Tox. 'Your trade.'
'Oh! Pretty well, Mum. The ashes sometimes gets in here;' touching his
chest: 'and makes a man speak gruff, as at the present time. But it is
ashes, Mum, not crustiness.'
Miss Tox seemed to be so little enlightened by this reply, as to find a
difficulty in pursuing the subject. But Mrs Chick relieved her, by entering
into a close private examination of Polly, her children, her marriage
certificate, testimonials, and so forth. Polly coming out unscathed from
this ordeal, Mrs Chick withdrew with her report to her brother's room, and
as an emphatic comment on it, and corroboration of it, carried the two
rosiest little Toodles with her. Toodle being the family name of the
apple-faced family.
Mr Dombey had remained in his own apartment since the death of his
wife, absorbed in visions of the youth, education, and destination of his
baby son. Something lay at the bottom of his cool heart, colder and heavier
than its ordinary load; but it was more a sense of the child's loss than his
own, awakening within him an almost angry sorrow. That the life and progress
on which he built such hopes, should be endangered in the outset by so mean
a want; that Dombey and Son should be tottering for a nurse, was a sore
humiliation. And yet in his pride and jealousy, he viewed with so much
bitterness the thought of being dependent for the very first step towards
the accomplishment of his soul's desire, on a hired serving-woman who would
be to the child, for the time, all that even his alliance could have made
his own wife, that in every new rejection of a candidate he felt a secret
pleasure. The time had now come, however, when he could no longer be divided
between these two sets of feelings. The less so, as there seemed to be no
flaw in the title of Polly Toodle after his sister had set it forth, with
many commendations on the indefatigable friendship of Miss Tox.
'These children look healthy,' said Mr Dombey. 'But my God, to think of
their some day claiming a sort of relationship to Paul!'
' But what relationship is there!' Louisa began -
'Is there!' echoed Mr Dombey, who had not intended his sister to
participate in the thought he had unconsciously expressed. 'Is there, did
you say, Louisa!'
'Can there be, I mean - '
'Why none,' said Mr Dombey, sternly. 'The whole world knows that, I
presume. Grief has not made me idiotic, Louisa. Take them away, Louisa! Let
me see this woman and her husband.'
Mrs Chick bore off the tender pair of Toodles, and presently returned
with that tougher couple whose presence her brother had commanded.
'My good woman,' said Mr Dombey, turning round in his easy chair, as
one piece, and not as a man with limbs and joints, 'I understand you are
poor, and wish to earn money by nursing the little boy, my son, who has been
so prematurely deprived of what can never be replaced. I have no objection
to your adding to the comforts of your family by that means. So far as I can
tell, you seem to be a deserving object. But I must impose one or two
conditions on you, before you enter my house in that capacity. While you are
here, I must stipulate that you are always known as - say as Richards - an
ordinary name, and convenient. Have you any objection to be known as
Richards? You had better consult your husband.'
'Well?' said Mr Dombey, after a pretty long pause. 'What does your
husband say to your being called Richards?'
As the husband did nothing but chuckle and grin, and continually draw
his right hand across his mouth, moistening the palm, Mrs Toodle, after
nudging him twice or thrice in vain, dropped a curtsey and replied 'that
perhaps if she was to be called out of her name, it would be considered in
the wages.'
'Oh, of course,' said Mr Dombey. 'I desire to make it a question of
wages, altogether. Now, Richards, if you nurse my bereaved child, I wish you
to remember this always. You will receive a liberal stipend in return for
the discharge of certain duties, in the performance of which, I wish you to
see as little of your family as possible. When those duties cease to be
required and rendered, and the stipend ceases to be paid, there is an end of
all relations between us. Do you understand me?'
Mrs Toodle seemed doubtful about it; and as to Toodle himself, he had
evidently no doubt whatever, that he was all abroad.
'You have children of your own,' said Mr Dombey. 'It is not at all in
this bargain that you need become attached to my child, or that my child
need become attached to you. I don't expect or desire anything of the kind.
Quite the reverse. When you go away from here, you will have concluded what
is a mere matter of bargain and sale, hiring and letting: and will stay
away. The child will cease to remember you; and you will cease, if you
please, to remember the child.'
Mrs Toodle, with a little more colour in her cheeks than she had had
before, said 'she hoped she knew her place.'
'I hope you do, Richards,' said Mr Dombey. 'I have no doubt you know it
very well. Indeed it is so plain and obvious that it could hardly be
otherwise. Louisa, my dear, arrange with Richards about money, and let her
have it when and how she pleases. Mr what's-your name, a word with you, if
you please!'
Thus arrested on the threshold as he was following his wife out of the
room, Toodle returned and confronted Mr Dombey alone. He was a strong,
loose, round-shouldered, shuffling, shaggy fellow, on whom his clothes sat
negligently: with a good deal of hair and whisker, deepened in its natural
tint, perhaps by smoke and coal-dust: hard knotty hands: and a square
forehead, as coarse in grain as the bark of an oak. A thorough contrast in
all respects, to Mr Dombey, who was one of those close-shaved close-cut
moneyed gentlemen who are glossy and crisp like new bank-notes, and who seem
to be artificially braced and tightened as by the stimulating action of
golden showerbaths.
'You have a son, I believe?' said Mr Dombey.
'Four on 'em, Sir. Four hims and a her. All alive!'
'Why, it's as much as you can afford to keep them!' said Mr Dombey.
'I couldn't hardly afford but one thing in the world less, Sir.'
'What is that?'
'To lose 'em, Sir.'
'Can you read?' asked Mr Dombey.
'Why, not partick'ler, Sir.'
'Write?'
'With chalk, Sir?'
'With anything?'
'I could make shift to chalk a little bit, I think, if I was put to
it,' said Toodle after some reflection.
'And yet,' said Mr Dombey, 'you are two or three and thirty, I
suppose?'
'Thereabouts, I suppose, Sir,' answered Toodle, after more reflection
'Then why don't you learn?' asked Mr Dombey.
'So I'm a going to, Sir. One of my little boys is a going to learn me,
when he's old enough, and been to school himself.'
'Well,' said Mr Dombey, after looking at him attentively, and with no
great favour, as he stood gazing round the room (principally round the
ceiling) and still drawing his hand across and across his mouth. 'You heard
what I said to your wife just now?'
'Polly heerd it,' said Toodle, jerking his hat over his shoulder in the
direction of the door, with an air of perfect confidence in his better half.
'It's all right.'
'But I ask you if you heard it. You did, I suppose, and understood it?'
pursued Mr Dombey.
'I heerd it,' said Toodle, 'but I don't know as I understood it rightly
Sir, 'account of being no scholar, and the words being - ask your pardon -
rayther high. But Polly heerd it. It's all right.'
'As you appear to leave everything to her,' said Mr Dombey, frustrated
in his intention of impressing his views still more distinctly on the
husband, as the stronger character, 'I suppose it is of no use my saying
anything to you.'
'Not a bit,' said Toodle. 'Polly heerd it. She's awake, Sir.'
'I won't detain you any longer then,' returned Mr Dombey, disappointed.
'Where have you worked all your life?'
'Mostly underground, Sir, 'till I got married. I come to the level
then. I'm a going on one of these here railroads when they comes into full
play.'
As he added in one of his hoarse whispers, 'We means to bring up little
Biler to that line,' Mr Dombey inquired haughtily who little Biler was.
'The eldest on 'em, Sir,' said Toodle, with a smile. 'It ain't a common
name. Sermuchser that when he was took to church the gen'lm'n said, it wam't
a chris'en one, and he couldn't give it. But we always calls him Biler just
the same. For we don't mean no harm. Not we.
'Do you mean to say, Man,' inquired Mr Dombey; looking at him with
marked displeasure, 'that you have called a child after a boiler?'
'No, no, Sir,' returned Toodle, with a tender consideration for his
mistake. 'I should hope not! No, Sir. Arter a BILER Sir. The Steamingine was
a'most as good as a godfather to him, and so we called him Biler, don't you
see!'
As the last straw breaks the laden camel's back, this piece of
information crushed the sinking spirits of Mr Dombey. He motioned his
child's foster-father to the door, who departed by no means unwillingly: and
then turning the key, paced up and down the room in solitary wretchedness.
It would be harsh, and perhaps not altogether true, to say of him that
he felt these rubs and gratings against his pride more keenly than he had
felt his wife's death: but certainly they impressed that event upon him with
new force, and communicated to it added weight and bitterness. It was a rude
shock to his sense of property in his child, that these people - the mere
dust of the earth, as he thought them - should be necessary to him; and it
was natural that in proportion as he felt disturbed by it, he should deplore
the occurrence which had made them so. For all his starched, impenetrable
dignity and composure, he wiped blinding tears from his eyes as he paced up
and down his room; and often said, with an emotion of which he would not,
for the world, have had a witness, 'Poor little fellow!'
It may have been characteristic of Mr Dombey's pride, that he pitied
himself through the child. Not poor me. Not poor widower, confiding by
constraint in the wife of an ignorant Hind who has been working 'mostly
underground' all his life, and yet at whose door Death had never knocked,
and at whose poor table four sons daily sit - but poor little fellow!
Those words being on his lips, it occurred to him - and it is an
instance of the strong attraction with which his hopes and fears and all his
thoughts were tending to one centre - that a great temptation was being
placed in this woman's way. Her infant was a boy too. Now, would it be
possIble for her to change them?
Though he was soon satisfied that he had dismissed the idea as romantic
and unlikely - though possible, there was no denying - he could not help
pursuing it so far as to entertain within himself a picture of what his
condition would be, if he should discover such an imposture when he was
grown old. Whether a man so situated would be able to pluck away the result
of so many years of usage, confidence, and belief, from the impostor, and
endow a stranger with it?
But it was idle speculating thus. It couldn't happen. In a moment
afterwards he determined that it could, but that such women were constantly
observed, and had no opportunity given them for the accomplishment of such a
design, even when they were so wicked as to entertain it. In another moment,
he was remembering how few such cases seemed to have ever happened. In
another moment he was wondering whether they ever happened and were not
found out.
As his unusual emotion subsided, these misgivings gradually melted
away, though so much of their shadow remained behind, that he was constant
in his resolution to look closely after Richards himself, without appearing
to do so. Being now in an easier frame of mind, he regarded the woman's
station as rather an advantageous circumstance than otherwise, by placing,
in itself, a broad distance between her and the child, and rendering their
separation easy and natural. Thence he passed to the contemplation of the
future glories of Dombey and Son, and dismissed the memory of his wife, for
the time being, with a tributary sigh or two.
Meanwhile terms were ratified and agreed upon between Mrs Chick and
Richards, with the assistance of Miss Tox; and Richards being with much
ceremony invested with the Dombey baby, as if it were an Order, resigned her
own, with many tears and kisses, to Jemima. Glasses of wine were then
produced, to sustain the drooping spirits of the family; and Miss Tox,
busying herself in dispensing 'tastes' to the younger branches, bred them up
to their father's business with such surprising expedition, that she made
chokers of four of them in a quarter of a minute.
'You'll take a glass yourself, Sir, won't you?' said Miss Tox, as
Toodle appeared.
'Thankee, Mum,' said Toodle, 'since you are suppressing.'
'And you're very glad to leave your dear good wife in such a
comfortable home, ain't you, Sir?'said Miss Tox, nodding and winking at him
stealthily.
'No, Mum,' said Toodle. 'Here's wishing of her back agin.'
Polly cried more than ever at this. So Mrs Chick, who had her matronly
apprehensions that this indulgence in grief might be prejudicial to the
little Dombey ('acid, indeed,' she whispered Miss Tox), hastened to the
rescue.
'Your little child will thrive charmingly with your sister Jemima,
Richards,' said Mrs Chick; 'and you have only to make an effort - this is a
world of effort, you know, Richards - to be very happy indeed. You have been
already measured for your mourning, haven't you, Richards?'
'Ye - es, Ma'am,' sobbed Polly.
'And it'll fit beautifully. I know,' said Mrs Chick, 'for the same
young person has made me many dresses. The very best materials, too!'
'Lor, you'll be so smart,' said Miss Tox, 'that your husband won't know
you; will you, Sir?'
'I should know her,' said Toodle, gruffly, 'anyhows and anywheres.'
Toodle was evidently not to be bought over.
'As to living, Richards, you know,' pursued Mrs Chick, 'why, the very
best of everything will be at your disposal. You will order your little
dinner every day; and anything you take a fancy to, I'm sure will be as
readily provided as if you were a Lady.'
'Yes to be sure!' said Miss Tox, keeping up the ball with great
sympathy. 'And as to porter! - quite unlimited, will it not, Louisa?'
'Oh, certainly!' returned Mrs Chick in the same tone. 'With a little
abstinence, you know, my dear, in point of vegetables.'
'And pickles, perhaps,' suggested Miss Tox.
'With such exceptions,' said Louisa, 'she'll consult her choice
entirely, and be under no restraint at all, my love.'
'And then, of course, you know,' said Miss Tox, 'however fond she is of
her own dear little child - and I'm sure, Louisa, you don't blame her for
being fond of it?'
'Oh no!' cried Mrs Chick, benignantly.
'Still,' resumed Miss Tox, 'she naturally must be interested in her
young charge, and must consider it a privilege to see a little cherub
connected with the superior classes, gradually unfolding itself from day to
day at one common fountain- is it not so, Louisa?'
'Most undoubtedly!' said Mrs Chick. 'You see, my love, she's already
quite contented and comfortable, and means to say goodbye to her sister
Jemima and her little pets, and her good honest husband, with a light heart
and a smile; don't she, my dear?'
'Oh yes!' cried Miss Tox. 'To be sure she does!'
Notwithstanding which, however, poor Polly embraced them all round in
great distress, and coming to her spouse at last, could not make up her mind
to part from him, until he gently disengaged himself, at the close of the
following allegorical piece of consolation:
'Polly, old 'ooman, whatever you do, my darling, hold up your head and
fight low. That's the only rule as I know on, that'll carry anyone through
life. You always have held up your head and fought low, Polly. Do it now, or
Bricks is no longer so. God bless you, Polly! Me and J'mima will do your
duty by you; and with relating to your'n, hold up your head and fight low,
Polly, and you can't go wrong!'
Fortified by this golden secret, Folly finally ran away to avoid any
more particular leave-taking between herself and the children. But the
stratagem hardly succeeded as well as it deserved; for the smallest boy but
one divining her intent, immediately began swarming upstairs after her - if
that word of doubtful etymology be admissible - on his arms and legs; while
the eldest (known in the family by the name of Biler, in remembrance of the
steam engine) beat a demoniacal tattoo with his boots, expressive of grief;
in which he was joined by the rest of the family.
A quantity of oranges and halfpence thrust indiscriminately on each
young Toodle, checked the first violence of their regret, and the family
were speedily transported to their own home, by means of the hackney-coach
kept in waiting for that purpose. The children, under the guardianship of
Jemima, blocked up the window, and dropped out oranges and halfpence all the
way along. Mr Toodle himself preferred to ride behind among the spikes, as
being the mode of conveyance to which he was best accustomed.
In which Mr Dombey, as a Man and a Father, is seen at the Head of the
Home-Department
The funeral of the deceased lady having been 'performed to the entire
satisfaction of the undertaker, as well as of the neighbourhood at large,
which is generally disposed to be captious on such a point, and is prone to
take offence at any omissions or short-comings in the ceremonies, the
various members of Mr Dombey's household subsided into their several places
in the domestic system. That small world, like the great one out of doors,
had the capacity of easily forgetting its dead; and when the cook had said
she was a quiet-tempered lady, and the house-keeper had said it was the
common lot, and the butler had said who'd have thought it, and the housemaid
had said she couldn't hardly believe it, and the footman had said it seemed
exactly like a dream, they had quite worn the subject out, and began to
think their mourning was wearing rusty too.
On Richards, who was established upstairs in a state of honourable
captivity, the dawn of her new life seemed to break cold and grey. Mr
Dombey's house was a large one, on the shady side of a tall, dark,
dreadfully genteel street in the region between Portland Place and
Bryanstone Square.' It was a corner house, with great wide areas containing
cellars frowned upon by barred windows, and leered at by crooked-eyed doors
leading to dustbins. It was a house of dismal state, with a circular back to
it, containing a whole suite of drawing-rooms looking upon a gravelled yard,
where two gaunt trees, with blackened trunks and branches, rattled rather
than rustled, their leaves were so smoked-dried. The summer sun was never on
the street, but in the morning about breakfast-time, when it came with the
water-carts and the old clothes men, and the people with geraniums, and the
umbrella-mender, and the man who trilled the little bell of the Dutch clock
as he went along. It was soon gone again to return no more that day; and the
bands of music and the straggling Punch's shows going after it, left it a
prey to the most dismal of organs, and white mice; with now and then a
porcupine, to vary the entertainments; until the butlers whose families were
dining out, began to stand at the house-doors in the twilight, and the
lamp-lighter made his nightly failure in attempting to brighten up the
street with gas.
It was as blank a house inside as outside. When the funeral was over,
Mr Dombey ordered the furniture to be covered up - perhaps to preserve it
for the son with whom his plans were all associated - and the rooms to be
ungarnished, saving such as he retained for himself on the ground floor.
Accordingly, mysterious shapes were made of tables and chairs, heaped
together in the middle of rooms, and covered over with great winding-sheets.
Bell-handles, window-blinds, and looking-glasses, being papered up in
journals, daily and weekly, obtruded fragmentary accounts of deaths and
dreadful murders. Every chandelier or lustre, muffled in holland, looked
like a monstrous tear depending from the ceiling's eye. Odours, as from
vaults and damp places, came out of the chimneys. The dead and buried lady
was awful in a picture-frame of ghastly bandages. Every gust of wind that
rose, brought eddying round the corner from the neighbouring mews, some
fragments of the straw that had been strewn before the house when she was
ill, mildewed remains of which were still cleaving to the neighbourhood: and
these, being always drawn by some invisible attraction to the threshold of
the dirty house to let immediately opposite, addressed a dismal eloquence to
Mr Dombey's windows.
The apartments which Mr Dombey reserved for his own inhabiting, were
attainable from the hall, and consisted of a sitting-room; a library, which
was in fact a dressing-room, so that the smell of hot-pressed paper, vellum,
morocco, and Russia leather, contended in it with the smell of divers pairs
of boots; and a kind of conservatory or little glass breakfast-room beyond,
commanding a prospect of the trees before mentioned, and, generally
speaking, of a few prowling cats. These three rooms opened upon one another.
In the morning, when Mr Dombey was at his breakfast in one or other of the
two first-mentioned of them, as well as in the afternoon when he came home
to dinner, a bell was rung for Richards to repair to this glass chamber, and
there walk to and fro with her young charge. From the glimpses she caught of
Mr Dombey at these times, sitting in the dark distance, looking out towards
the infant from among the dark heavy furniture - the house had been
inhabited for years by his father, and in many of its appointments was
old-fashioned and grim - she began to entertain ideas of him in his solitary
state, as if he were a lone prisoner in a cell, or a strange apparition that
was not to be accosted or understood. Mr Dombey came to be, in the course of
a few days, invested in his own person, to her simple thinking, with all the
mystery and gloom of his house. As she walked up and down the glass room, or
sat hushing the baby there - which she very often did for hours together,
when the dusk was closing in, too - she would sometimes try to pierce the
gloom beyond, and make out how he was looking and what he was doing.
Sensible that she was plainly to be seen by him' however, she never dared to
pry in that direction but very furtively and for a moment at a time.
Consequently she made out nothing, and Mr Dombey in his den remained a very
shade.
Little Paul Dombey's foster-mother had led this life herself, and had
carried little Paul through it for some weeks; and had returned upstairs one
day from a melancholy saunter through the dreary rooms of state (she never
went out without Mrs Chick, who called on fine mornings, usually accompanied
by Miss Tox, to take her and Baby for an airing - or in other words, to
march them gravely up and down the pavement, like a walking funeral); when,
as she was sitting in her own room, the door was slowly and quietly opened,
and a dark-eyed little girl looked in.
'It's Miss Florence come home from her aunt's, no doubt,' thought
Richards, who had never seen the child before. 'Hope I see you well, Miss.'
'Is that my brother?' asked the child, pointing to the Baby.
'Yes, my pretty,' answered Richards. 'Come and kiss him.'
But the child, instead of advancing, looked her earnestly in the face,
and said:
'What have you done with my Mama?'
'Lord bless the little creeter!' cried Richards, 'what a sad question!
I done? Nothing, Miss.'
'What have they done with my Mama?' inquired the child, with exactly
the same look and manner.
'I never saw such a melting thing in all my life!' said Richards, who
naturally substituted 'for this child one of her own, inquiring for herself
in like circumstances. 'Come nearer here, my dear Miss! Don't be afraid of
me.'
'I am not afraid of you,' said the child, drawing nearer. 'But I want
to know what they have done with my Mama.'
Her heart swelled so as she stood before the woman, looking into her
eyes, that she was fain to press her little hand upon her breast and hold it
there. Yet there was a purpose in the child that prevented both her slender
figure and her searching gaze from faltering.
'My darling,' said Richards, 'you wear that pretty black frock in
remembrance of your Mama.'
'I can remember my Mama,' returned the child, with tears springing to
her eyes, 'in any frock.'
'But people put on black, to remember people when they're gone.'
'Where gone?' asked the child.
'Come and sit down by me,' said Richards, 'and I'll tell you a story.'
With a quick perception that it was intended to relate to what she had
asked, little Florence laid aside the bonnet she had held in her hand until
now, and sat down on a stool at the Nurse's feet, looking up into her face.
'Once upon a time,' said Richards, 'there was a lady - a very good
lady, and her little daughter dearly loved her.'
'A very good lady and her little daughter dearly loved her,' repeated
the child.
'Who, when God thought it right that it should be so, was taken ill and
died.'
The child shuddered.
'Died, never to be seen again by anyone on earth, and was buried in the
ground where the trees grow.
'The cold ground?' said the child, shuddering again. 'No! The warm
ground,' returned Polly, seizing her advantage, 'where the ugly little seeds
turn into beautiful flowers, and into grass, and corn, and I don't know what
all besides. Where good people turn into bright angels, and fly away to
Heaven!'
The child, who had dropped her head, raised it again, and sat looking
at her intently.
'So; let me see,' said Polly, not a little flurried between this
earnest scrutiny, her desire to comfort the child, her sudden success, and
her very slight confidence in her own powers.' So, when this lady died,
wherever they took her, or wherever they put her, she went to GOD! and she
prayed to Him, this lady did,' said Polly, affecting herself beyond measure;
being heartily in earnest, 'to teach her little daughter to be sure of that
in her heart: and to know that she was happy there and loved her still: and
to hope and try - Oh, all her life - to meet her there one day, never,
never, never to part any more.'
'It was my Mama!' exclaimed the child, springing up, and clasping her
round the neck.
'And the child's heart,' said Polly, drawing her to her breast: 'the
little daughter's heart was so full of the truth of this, that even when she
heard it from a strange nurse that couldn't tell it right, but was a poor
mother herself and that was all, she found a comfort in it - didn't feel so
lonely - sobbed and cried upon her bosom - took kindly to the baby lying in
her lap - and - there, there, there!' said Polly, smoothing the child's
curls and dropping tears upon them. 'There, poor dear!'
'Oh well, Miss Floy! And won't your Pa be angry neither!' cried a quick
voice at the door, proceeding from a short, brown, womanly girl of fourteen,
with a little snub nose, and black eyes like jet beads. 'When it was
'tickerlerly given out that you wasn't to go and worrit the wet nurse.
'She don't worry me,' was the surprised rejoinder of Polly. 'I am very
fond of children.'
'Oh! but begging your pardon, Mrs Richards, that don't matter, you
know,' returned the black-eyed girl, who was so desperately sharp and biting
that she seemed to make one's eyes water. 'I may be very fond of
pennywinkles, Mrs Richards, but it don't follow that I'm to have 'em for
tea. 'Well, it don't matter,' said Polly. 'Oh, thank'ee, Mrs Richards, don't
it!' returned the sharp girl. 'Remembering, however, if you'll be so good,
that Miss Floy's under my charge, and Master Paul's under your'n.'
'But still we needn't quarrel,' said Polly.
'Oh no, Mrs Richards,' rejoined Spitfire. 'Not at all, I don't wish it,
we needn't stand upon that footing, Miss Floy being a permanency, Master
Paul a temporary.' Spitfire made use of none but comma pauses; shooting out
whatever she had to say in one sentence, and in one breath, if possible.
'Miss Florence has just come home, hasn't she?' asked Polly.
'Yes, Mrs Richards, just come, and here, Miss Floy, before you've been
in the house a quarter of an hour, you go a smearing your wet face against
the expensive mourning that Mrs Richards is a wearing for your Ma!' With
this remonstrance, young Spitfire, whose real name was Susan Nipper,
detached the child from her new friend by a wrench - as if she were a tooth.
But she seemed to do it, more in the excessively sharp exercise of her
official functions, than with any deliberate unkindness.
'She'll be quite happy, now she has come home again,' said Polly,
nodding to her with an encouraging smile upon her wholesome face, 'and will
be so pleased to see her dear Papa to-night.'
'Lork, Mrs Richards!' cried Miss Nipper, taking up her words with a
jerk. 'Don't. See her dear Papa indeed! I should like to see her do it!'
'Won't she then?' asked Polly.
'Lork, Mrs Richards, no, her Pa's a deal too wrapped up in somebody
else, and before there was a somebody else to be wrapped up in she never was
a favourite, girls are thrown away in this house, Mrs Richards, I assure
you.
The child looked quickly from one nurse to the other, as if she
understood and felt what was said.
'You surprise me!' cried Folly. 'Hasn't Mr Dombey seen her since - '
'No,' interrupted Susan Nipper. 'Not once since, and he hadn't hardly
set his eyes upon her before that for months and months, and I don't think
he'd have known her for his own child if he had met her in the streets, or
would know her for his own child if he was to meet her in the streets
to-morrow, Mrs Richards, as to me,' said Spitfire, with a giggle, 'I doubt
if he's aweer of my existence.'
'Pretty dear!' said Richards; meaning, not Miss Nipper, but the little
Florence.
'Oh! there's a Tartar within a hundred miles of where we're now in
conversation, I can tell you, Mrs Richards, present company always excepted
too,' said Susan Nipper; 'wish you good morning, Mrs Richards, now Miss
Floy, you come along with me, and don't go hanging back like a naughty
wicked child that judgments is no example to, don't!'
In spite of being thus adjured, and in spite also of some hauling on
the part of Susan Nipper, tending towards the dislocation of her right
shoulder, little Florence broke away, and kissed her new friend,
affectionately.
'Oh dear! after it was given out so 'tickerlerly, that Mrs Richards
wasn't to be made free with!' exclaimed Susan. 'Very well, Miss Floy!'
'God bless the sweet thing!' said Richards, 'Good-bye, dear!'
'Good-bye!' returned the child. 'God bless you! I shall come to see you
again soon, and you'll come to see me? Susan will let us. Won't you, Susan?'
Spitfire seemed to be in the main a good-natured little body, although
a disciple of that school of trainers of the young idea which holds that
childhood, like money, must be shaken and rattled and jostled about a good
deal to keep it bright. For, being thus appealed to with some endearing
gestures and caresses, she folded her small arms and shook her head, and
conveyed a relenting expression into her very-wide-open black eyes.
'It ain't right of you to ask it, Miss Floy, for you know I can't
refuse you, but Mrs Richards and me will see what can be done, if Mrs
Richards likes, I may wish, you see, to take a voyage to Chaney, Mrs
Richards, but I mayn't know how to leave the London Docks.'
Richards assented to the proposition.
'This house ain't so exactly ringing with merry-making,' said Miss
Nipper, 'that one need be lonelier than one must be. Your Toxes and your
Chickses may draw out my two front double teeth, Mrs Richards, but that's no
reason why I need offer 'em the whole set.'
This proposition was also assented to by Richards, as an obvious one.
'So I'm able, I'm sure,'said Susan Nipper, 'to live friendly, Mrs
Richards, while Master Paul continues a permanency, if the means can be
planned out without going openly against orders, but goodness gracious Miss
Floy, you haven't got your things off yet, you naughty child, you haven't,
come along!'
With these words, Susan Nipper, in a transport of coercion, made a
charge at her young ward, and swept her out of the room.
The child, in her grief and neglect, was so gentle, so quiet, and
uncomplaining; was possessed of so much affection that no one seemed to care
to have, and so much sorrowful intelligence that no one seemed to mind or
think about the wounding of, that Polly's heart was sore when she was left
alone again. In the simple passage that had taken place between herself and
the motherless little girl, her own motherly heart had been touched no less
than the child's; and she felt, as the child did, that there was something
of confidence and interest between them from that moment.
Notwithstanding Mr Toodle's great reliance on Polly, she was perhaps in
point of artificial accomplishments very little his superior. She had been
good-humouredly working and drudging for her life all her life, and was a
sober steady-going person, with matter-of-fact ideas about the butcher and
baker, and the division of pence into farthings. But she was a good plain
sample of a nature that is ever, in the mass, better, truer, higher, nobler,
quicker to feel, and much more constant to retain, all tenderness and pity,
self-denial and devotion, than the nature of men. And, perhaps, unlearned as
she was, she could have brought a dawning knowledge home to Mr Dombey at
that early day, which would not then have struck him in the end like
lightning.
But this is from the purpose. Polly only thought, at that time, of
improving on her successful propitiation of Miss Nipper, and devising some
means of having little Florence aide her, lawfully, and without rebellion.
An opening happened to present itself that very night.
She had been rung down into the glass room as usual, and had walked
about and about it a long time, with the baby in her arms, when, to her
great surprise and dismay, Mr Dombey - whom she had seen at first leaning on
his elbow at the table, and afterwards walking up and down the middle room,
drawing, each time, a little nearer, she thought, to the open folding doors
- came out, suddenly, and stopped before her.
'Good evening, Richards.'
Just the same austere, stiff gentleman, as he had appeared to her on
that first day. Such a hard-looking gentleman, that she involuntarily
dropped her eyes and her curtsey at the same time.
'How is Master Paul, Richards?'
'Quite thriving, Sir, and well.'
'He looks so,' said Mr Dombey, glancing with great interest at the tiny
face she uncovered for his observation, and yet affecting to be half
careless of it. 'They give you everything you want, I hope?'
'Oh yes, thank you, Sir.'
She suddenly appended such an obvious hesitation to this reply,
however, that Mr Dombey, who had turned away; stopped, and turned round
again, inquiringly.
'If you please, Sir, the child is very much disposed to take notice of
things,' said Richards, with another curtsey, 'and - upstairs is a little
dull for him, perhaps, Sir.'
'I begged them to take you out for airings, constantly,' said Mr
Dombey. 'Very well! You shall go out oftener. You're quite right to mention
it.'
'I beg your pardon, Sir,' faltered Polly, 'but we go out quite plenty
Sir, thank you.'
'What would you have then?' asked Mr Dombey.
'Indeed Sir, I don't exactly know,' said Polly, 'unless - '
'Yes?'
'I believe nothing is so good for making children lively and cheerful,
Sir, as seeing other children playing about 'em,' observed Polly, taking
courage.
'I think I mentioned to you, Richards, when you came here,' said Mr
Dombey, with a frown, 'that I wished you to see as little of your family as
possible.'
'Oh dear yes, Sir, I wasn't so much as thinking of that.'
'I am glad of it,' said Mr Dombey hastily. 'You can continue your walk
if you please.'
With that, he disappeared into his inner room; and Polly had the
satisfaction of feeling that he had thoroughly misunderstood her object, and
that she had fallen into disgrace without the least advancement of her
purpose.
Next night, she found him walking about the conservatory when she came
down. As she stopped at the door, checked by this unusual sight, and
uncertain whether to advance or retreat, he called her in. His mind was too
much set on Dombey and Son, it soon appeared, to admit of his having
forgotten her suggestion.
'If you really think that sort of society is good for the child,' he
said sharply, as if there had been no interval since she proposed it,
'where's Miss Florence?'
'Nothing could be better than Miss Florence, Sir,' said Polly eagerly,
'but I understood from her maid that they were not to - '
Mr Dombey rang the bell, and walked till it was answered.
'Tell them always to let Miss Florence be with Richards when she
chooses, and go out with her, and so forth. Tell them to let the children be
together, when Richards wishes it.'
The iron was now hot, and Richards striking on it boldly - it was a
good cause and she bold in it, though instinctively afraid of Mr Dombey -
requested that Miss Florence might be sent down then and there, to make
friends with her little brother.
She feigned to be dandling the child as the servant retired on this
errand, but she thought that she saw Mr Dombey's colour changed; that the
expression of his face quite altered; that he turned, hurriedly, as if to
gainsay what he had said, or she had said, or both, and was only deterred by
very shame.
And she was right. The last time he had seen his slighted child, there
had been that in the sad embrace between her and her dying mother, which was
at once a revelation and a reproach to him. Let him be absorbed as he would
in the Son on whom he built such high hopes, he could not forget that
closing scene. He could not forget that he had had no part in it. That, at
the bottom of its clear depths of tenderness and truth' lay those two
figures clasped in each other's arms, while he stood on the bank above them,
looking down a mere spectator - not a sharer with them - quite shut out.
Unable to exclude these things from his remembrance, or to keep his
mind free from such imperfect shapes of the meaning with which they were
fraught, as were able to make themselves visible to him through the mist of
his pride, his previous feeling of indifference towards little Florence
changed into an uneasiness of an extraordinary kind. Young as she was, and
possessing in any eyes but his (and perhaps in his too) even more than the
usual amount of childish simplicity and confidence, he almost felt as if she
watched and distrusted him. As if she held the clue to something secret in
his breast, of the nature of which he was hardly informed himself. As if she
had an innate knowledge of one jarring and discordant string within him, and
her very breath could sound it.
His feeling about the child had been negative from her birth. He had
never conceived an aversion to her: it had not been worth his while or in
his humour. She had never been a positively disagreeable object to him. But
now he was ill at ease about her. She troubled his peace. He would have
preferred to put her idea aside altogether, if he had known how. Perhaps -
who shall decide on such mysteries! - he was afraid that he might come to
hate her.
When little Florence timidly presented herself, Mr Dombey stopped in
his pacing up and down and looked towards her. Had he looked with greater
interest and with a father's eye, he might have read in her keen glance the
impulses and fears that made her waver; the passionate desire to run
clinging to him, crying, as she hid her face in his embrace, 'Oh father, try
to love me! there's no one else!' the dread of a repulse; the fear of being
too bold, and of offending him; the pitiable need in which she stood of some
assurance and encouragement; and how her overcharged young heart was
wandering to find some natural resting-place, for its sorrow and affection.
But he saw nothing of this. He saw her pause irresolutely at the door
and look towards him; and he saw no more.
'Come in,' he said, 'come in: what is the child afraid of?'
She came in; and after glancing round her for a moment with an
uncertain air, stood pressing her small hands hard together, close within
the door.
'Come here, Florence,' said her father, coldly. 'Do you know who I am?'
'Yes, Papa.'
'Have you nothing to say to me?'
The tears that stood in her eyes as she raised them quickly to his
face, were frozen by the expression it wore. She looked down again, and put
out her trembling hand.
Mr Dombey took it loosely in his own, and stood looking down upon her
for a moment, as if he knew as little as the child, what to say or do.
'There! Be a good girl,' he said, patting her on the head, and
regarding her as it were by stealth with a disturbed and doubtful look. 'Go
to Richards! Go!'
His little daughter hesitated for another instant as though she would
have clung about him still, or had some lingering hope that he might raise
her in his arms and kiss her. She looked up in his face once more. He
thought how like her expression was then, to what it had been when she
looked round at the Doctor - that night - and instinctively dropped her hand
and turned away.
It was not difficult to perceive that Florence was at a great
disadvantage in her father's presence. It was not only a constraint upon the
child's mind, but even upon the natural grace and freedom of her actions. As
she sported and played about her baby brother that night, her manner was
seldom so winning and so pretty as it naturally was, and sometimes when in
his pacing to and fro, he came near her (she had, perhaps, for the moment,
forgotten him) it changed upon the instant and became forced and
embarrassed.
Still, Polly persevered with all the better heart for seeing this; and,
judging of Mr Dombey by herself, had great confidence in the mute appeal of
poor little Florence's mourning dress.' It's hard indeed,' thought Polly,
'if he takes only to one little motherless child, when he has another, and
that a girl, before his eyes.'
So, Polly kept her before his eyes, as long as she could, and managed
so well with little Paul, as to make it very plain that he was all the
livelier for his sister's company. When it was time to withdraw upstairs
again, she would have sent Florence into the inner room to say good-night to
her father, but the child was timid and drew back; and when she urged her
again, said, spreading her hands before her eyes, as if to shut out her own
unworthiness, 'Oh no, no! He don't want me. He don't want me!'
The little altercation between them had attracted the notice of Mr
Dombey, who inquired from the table where he was sitting at his wine, what
the matter was.
'Miss Florence was afraid of interrupting, Sir, if she came in to say
good-night,' said Richards.
'It doesn't matter,' returned Mr Dombey. 'You can let her come and go
without regarding me.'
The child shrunk as she listened - and was gone, before her humble
friend looked round again.
However, Polly triumphed not a little in the success of her
well-intentioned scheme, and in the address with which she had brought it to
bear: whereof she made a full disclosure to Spitfire when she was once more
safely entrenched upstairs. Miss Nipper received that proof of her
confidence, as well as the prospect of their free association for the
future, rather coldly, and was anything but enthusiastic in her
demonstrations of joy.
'I thought you would have been pleased,' said Polly.
'Oh yes, Mrs Richards, I'm very well pleased, thank you,' returned
Susan, who had suddenly become so very upright that she seemed to have put
an additional bone in her stays.
'You don't show it,' said Polly.
'Oh! Being only a permanency I couldn't be expected to show it like a
temporary,' said Susan Nipper. 'Temporaries carries it all before 'em here,
I find, but though there's a excellent party-wall between this house and the
next, I mayn't exactly like to go to it, Mrs Richards, notwithstanding!'
In which some more First Appearances are made on the Stage of these
Adventures
Though the offices of Dombey and Son were within the liberties of the
City of London, and within hearing of Bow Bells, when their clashing voices
were not drowned by the uproar in the streets, yet were there hints of
adventurous and romantic story to be observed in some of the adjacent
objects. Gog and Magog held their state within ten minutes' walk; the Royal
Exchange was close at hand; the Bank of England, with its vaults of gold and
silver 'down among the dead men' underground, was their magnificent
neighbour. Just round the corner stood the rich East India House, teeming
with suggestions of precious stuffs and stones, tigers, elephants, howdahs,
hookahs, umbrellas, palm trees, palanquins, and gorgeous princes of a brown
complexion sitting on carpets, with their slippers very much turned up at
the toes. Anywhere in the immediate vicinity there might be seen pictures of
ships speeding away full sail to all parts of the world; outfitting
warehouses ready to pack off anybody anywhere, fully equipped in half an
hour; and little timber midshipmen in obsolete naval uniforms, eternally
employed outside the shop doors of nautical Instrument-makers in taking
observations of the hackney carriages.
Sole master and proprietor of one of these effigies - of that which
might be called, familiar!y, the woodenest - of that which thrust itself out
above the pavement, right leg foremost, with a suavity the least endurable,
and had the shoe buckles and flapped waistcoat the least reconcileable to
human reason, and bore at its right eye the most offensively
disproportionate piece of machinery - sole master and proprietor of that
Midshipman, and proud of him too, an elderly gentleman in a Welsh wig had
paid house-rent, taxes, rates, and dues, for more years than many a
full-grown midshipman of flesh and blood has numbered in his life; and
midshipmen who have attained a pretty green old age, have not been wanting
in the English Navy.
The stock-in-trade of this old gentleman comprised chronometers,
barometers, telescopes, compasses, charts, maps, sextants, quadrants, and
specimens of every kind of instrument used in the working of a ship's
course, or the keeping of a ship's reckoning, or the prosecuting of a ship's
discoveries. Objects in brass and glass were in his drawers and on his
shelves, which none but the initiated could have found the top of, or
guessed the use of, or having once examined, could have ever got back again
into their mahogany nests without assistance. Everything was jammed into the
tightest cases, fitted into the narrowest corners, fenced up behind the most
impertinent cushions, and screwed into the acutest angles, to prevent its
philosophical composure from being disturbed by the rolling of the sea. Such
extraordinary precautions were taken in every instance to save room, and
keep the thing compact; and so much practical navigation was fitted, and
cushioned, and screwed into every box (whether the box was a mere slab, as
some were, or something between a cocked hat and a star-fish, as others
were, and those quite mild and modest boxes as compared with others); that
the shop itself, partaking of the general infection, seemed almost to become
a snug, sea-going, ship-shape concern, wanting only good sea-room, in the
event of an unexpected launch, to work its way securely to any desert island
in the world.
Many minor incidents in the household life of the Ships'
Instrument-maker who was proud of his little Midshipman, assisted and
bore out this fancy. His acquaintance lying chiefly among ship-chandlers and
so forth, he had always plenty of the veritable ships' biscuit on his table.
It was familiar with dried meats and tongues, possessing an extraordinary
flavour of rope yarn. Pickles were produced upon it, in great wholesale
jars, with 'dealer in all kinds of Ships' Provisions' on the label; spirits
were set forth in case bottles with no throats. Old prints of ships with
alphabetical references to their various mysteries, hung in frames upon the
walls; the Tartar Frigate under weigh, was on the plates; outlandish shells,
seaweeds, and mosses, decorated the chimney-piece; the little wainscotted
back parlour was lighted by a sky-light, like a cabin.
Here he lived too, in skipper-like state, all alone with his nephew
Walter: a boy of fourteen who looked quite enough like a midshipman, to
carry out the prevailing idea. But there it ended, for Solomon Gills himself
(more generally called old Sol) was far from having a maritime appearance.
To say nothing of his Welsh wig, which was as plain and stubborn a Welsh wig
as ever was worn, and in which he looked like anything but a Rover, he was a
slow, quiet-spoken, thoughtful old fellow, with eyes as red as if they had
been small suns looking at you through a fog; and a newly-awakened manner,
such as he might have acquired by having stared for three or four days
successively through every optical instrument in his shop, and suddenly came
back to the world again, to find it green. The only change ever known in his
outward man, was from a complete suit of coffee-colour cut very square, and
ornamented with glaring buttons, to the same suit of coffee-colour minus the
inexpressibles, which were then of a pale nankeen. He wore a very precise
shirt-frill, and carried a pair of first-rate spectacles on his forehead,
and a tremendous chronometer in his fob, rather than doubt which precious
possession, he would have believed in a conspiracy against it on part of all
the clocks and watches in the City, and even of the very Sun itself. Such as
he was, such he had been in the shop and parlour behind the little
Midshipman, for years upon years; going regularly aloft to bed every night
in a howling garret remote from the lodgers, where, when gentlemen of
England who lived below at ease had little or no idea of the state of the
weather, it often blew great guns.
It is half-past five o'clock, and an autumn afternoon, when the reader
and Solomon Gills become acquainted. Solomon Gills is in the act of seeing
what time it is by the unimpeachable chronometer. The usual daily clearance
has been making in the City for an hour or more; and the human tide is still
rolling westward. 'The streets have thinned,' as Mr Gills says, 'very much.'
It threatens to be wet to-night. All the weatherglasses in the shop are in
low spirits, and the rain already shines upon the cocked hat of the wooden
Midshipman.
'Where's Walter, I wonder!' said Solomon Gills, after he had carefully
put up the chronometer again. 'Here's dinner been ready, half an hour, and
no Walter!'
Turning round upon his stool behind the counter, Mr Gills looked out
among the instruments in the window, to see if his nephew might be crossing
the road. No. He was not among the bobbing umbrellas, and he certainly was
not the newspaper boy in the oilskin cap who was slowly working his way
along the piece of brass outside, writing his name over Mr Gills's name with
his forefinger.
'If I didn't know he was too fond of me to make a run of it, and go and
enter himself aboard ship against my wishes, I should begin to be fidgetty,'
said Mr Gills, tapping two or three weather-glasses with his knuckles. 'I
really should. All in the Downs, eh! Lots of moisture! Well! it's wanted.'
I believe,' said Mr Gills, blowing the dust off the glass top of a
compass-case, 'that you don't point more direct and due to the back parlour
than the boy's inclination does after all. And the parlour couldn't bear
straighter either. Due north. Not the twentieth part of a point either way.'
'Halloa, Uncle Sol!'
'Halloa, my boy!' cried the Instrument-maker, turning briskly round.
'What! you are here, are you?'
A cheerful looking, merry boy, fresh with running home in the rain;
fair-faced, bright-eyed, and curly-haired.
'Well, Uncle, how have you got on without me all day? Is dinner ready?
I'm so hungry.'
'As to getting on,' said Solomon good-naturedly, 'it would be odd if I
couldn't get on without a young dog like you a great deal better than with
you. As to dinner being ready, it's been ready this half hour and waiting
for you. As to being hungry, I am!'
'Come along then, Uncle!' cried the boy. 'Hurrah for the admiral!'
'Confound the admiral!' returned Solomon Gills. 'You mean the Lord
Mayor.'
'No I don't!' cried the boy. 'Hurrah for the admiral! Hurrah for the
admiral! For-ward!'
At this word of command, the Welsh wig and its wearer were borne
without resistance into the back parlour, as at the head of a boarding party
of five hundred men; and Uncle Sol and his nephew were speedily engaged on a
fried sole with a prospect of steak to follow.
'The Lord Mayor, Wally,' said Solomon, 'for ever! No more admirals. The
Lord Mayor's your admiral.'
'Oh, is he though!' said the boy, shaking his head. 'Why, the Sword
Bearer's better than him. He draws his sword sometimes.
'And a pretty figure he cuts with it for his pains,' returned the
Uncle. 'Listen to me, Wally, listen to me. Look on the mantelshelf.'
'Why who has cocked my silver mug up there, on a nail?' exclaimed the
boy.
I have,' said his Uncle. 'No more mugs now. We must begin to drink out
of glasses to-day, Walter. We are men of business. We belong to the City. We
started in life this morning.
'Well, Uncle,' said the boy, 'I'll drink out of anything you like, so
long as I can drink to you. Here's to you, Uncle Sol, and Hurrah for the
'Lord Mayor,' interrupted the old man.
'For the Lord Mayor, Sheriffs, Common Council, and Livery,' said the
boy. 'Long life to 'em!'
The uncle nodded his head with great satisfaction. 'And now,' he said,
'let's hear something about the Firm.'
'Oh! there's not much to be told about the Firm, Uncle,' said the boy,
plying his knife and fork.' It's a precious dark set of offices, and in the
room where I sit, there's a high fender, and an iron safe, and some cards
about ships that are going to sail, and an almanack, and some desks and
stools, and an inkbottle, and some books, and some boxes, and a lot of
cobwebs, and in one of 'em, just over my head, a shrivelled-up blue-bottle
that looks as if it had hung there ever so long.'
'Nothing else?' said the Uncle.
'No, nothing else, except an old birdcage (I wonder how that ever came
there!) and a coal-scuttle.'
'No bankers' books, or cheque books, or bills, or such tokens of wealth
rolling in from day to day?' said old Sol, looking wistfully at his nephew
out of the fog that always seemed to hang about him, and laying an unctuous
emphasis upon the words.
'Oh yes, plenty of that I suppose,' returned his nephew carelessly;
'but all that sort of thing's in Mr Carker's room, or Mr Morfin's, or MR
Dombey's.'
'Has Mr Dombey been there to-day?' inquired the Uncle.
'Oh yes! In and out all day.'
'He didn't take any notice of you, I suppose?'.
'Yes he did. He walked up to my seat, - I wish he wasn't so solemn and
stiff, Uncle, - and said, "Oh! you are the son of Mr Gills the Ships'
Instrument-maker." "Nephew, Sir," I said. "I said nephew, boy," said he. But
I could take my oath he said son, Uncle.'
'You're mistaken I daresay. It's no matter.
'No, it's no matter, but he needn't have been so sharp, I thought.
There was no harm in it though he did say son. Then he told me that you had
spoken to him about me, and that he had found me employment in the House
accordingly, and that I was expected to be attentive and punctual, and then
he went away. I thought he didn't seem to like me much.'
'You mean, I suppose,' observed the Instrument-maker, 'that you didn't
seem to like him much?'
'Well, Uncle,' returned the boy, laughing. 'Perhaps so; I never thought
of that.'
Solomon looked a little graver as he finished his dinner, and glanced
from time to time at the boy's bright face. When dinner was done, and the
cloth was cleared away (the entertainment had been brought from a
neighbouring eating-house), he lighted a candle, and went down below into a
little cellar, while his nephew, standing on the mouldy staircase, dutifully
held the light. After a moment's groping here and there, he presently
returned with a very ancient-looking bottle, covered with dust and dirt.
'Why, Uncle Sol!' said the boy, 'what are you about? that's the
wonderful Madeira! - there's only one more bottle!'
Uncle Sol nodded his head, implying that he knew very well what he was
about; and having drawn the cork in solemn silence, filled two glasses and
set the bottle and a third clean glass on the table.
'You shall drink the other bottle, Wally,' he said, 'when you come to
good fortune; when you are a thriving, respected, happy man; when the start
in life you have made to-day shall have brought you, as I pray Heaven it
may! - to a smooth part of the course you have to run, my child. My love to
you!'
Some of the fog that hung about old Sol seemed to have got into his
throat; for he spoke huskily. His hand shook too, as he clinked his glass
against his nephew's. But having once got the wine to his lips, he tossed it
off like a man, and smacked them afterwards.
'Dear Uncle,' said the boy, affecting to make light of it, while the
tears stood in his eyes, 'for the honour you have done me, et cetera, et
cetera. I shall now beg to propose Mr Solomon Gills with three times three
and one cheer more. Hurrah! and you'll return thanks, Uncle, when we drink
the last bottle together; won't you?'
They clinked their glasses again; and Walter, who was hoarding his
wine, took a sip of it, and held the glass up to his eye with as critical an
air as he could possibly assume.
His Uncle sat looking at him for some time in silence. When their eyes
at last met, he began at once to pursue the theme that had occupied his
thoughts, aloud, as if he had been speaking all the time.
'You see, Walter,' he said, 'in truth this business is merely a habit
with me. I am so accustomed to the habit that I could hardly live if I
relinquished it: but there's nothing doing, nothing doing. When that uniform
was worn,' pointing out towards the little Midshipman, 'then indeed,
fortunes were to be made, and were made. But competition, competition - new
invention, new invention - alteration, alteration - the world's gone past
me. I hardly know where I am myself, much less where my customers are.
'Never mind 'em, Uncle!'
'Since you came home from weekly boarding-school at Peckham, for
instance - and that's ten days,' said Solomon, 'I don't remember more than
one person that has come into the shop.'
'Two, Uncle, don't you recollect? There was the man who came to ask for
change for a sovereign - '
'That's the one,' said Solomon.
'Why Uncle! don't you call the woman anybody, who came to ask the way
to Mile-End Turnpike?'
'Oh! it's true,' said Solomon, 'I forgot her. Two persons.'
'To be sure, they didn't buy anything,' cried the boy.
'No. They didn't buy anything,' said Solomon, quietly.
'Nor want anything,' cried the boy.
'No. If they had, they'd gone to another shop,' said Solomon, in the
same tone.
'But there were two of 'em, Uncle,' cried the boy, as if that were a
great triumph. 'You said only one.'
'Well, Wally,' resumed the old man, after a short pause: 'not being
like the Savages who came on Robinson Crusoe's Island, we can't live on a
man who asks for change for a sovereign, and a woman who inquires the way to
Mile-End Turnpike. As I said just now, the world has gone past me. I don't
blame it; but I no longer understand it. Tradesmen are not the same as they
used to be, apprentices are not the same, business is not the same, business
commodities are not the same. Seven-eighths of my stock is old-fashioned. I
am an old-fashioned man in an old-fashioned shop, in a street that is not
the same as I remember it. I have fallen behind the time, and am too old to
catch it again. Even the noise it makes a long way ahead, confuses me.'
Walter was going to speak, but his Uncle held up his hand.
'Therefore, Wally - therefore it is that I am anxious you should be
early in the busy world, and on the world's track. I am only the ghost of
this business - its substance vanished long ago; and when I die, its ghost
will be laid. As it is clearly no inheritance for you then, I have thought
it best to use for your advantage, almost the only fragment of the old
connexion that stands by me, through long habit. Some people suppose me to
be wealthy. I wish for your sake they were right. But whatever I leave
behind me, or whatever I can give you, you in such a House as Dombey's are
in the road to use well and make the most of. Be diligent, try to like it,
my dear boy, work for a steady independence, and be happy!'
'I'll do everything I can, Uncle, to deserve your affection. Indeed I
will,' said the boy, earnestly
'I know it,' said Solomon. 'I am sure of it,' and he applied himself to
a second glass of the old Madeira, with increased relish. 'As to the Sea,'
he pursued, 'that's well enough in fiction, Wally, but it won't do in fact:
it won't do at all. It's natural enough that you should think about it,
associating it with all these familiar things; but it won't do, it won't
do.'
Solomon Gills rubbed his hands with an air of stealthy enjoyment, as he
talked of the sea, though; and looked on the seafaring objects about him
with inexpressible complacency.
'Think of this wine for instance,' said old Sol, 'which has been to the
East Indies and back, I'm not able to say how often, and has been once round
the world. Think of the pitch-dark nights, the roaring winds, and rolling
seas:'
'The thunder, lightning, rain, hail, storm of all kinds,' said the boy.
'To be sure,' said Solomon, - 'that this wine has passed through. Think
what a straining and creaking of timbers and masts: what a whistling and
howling of the gale through ropes and rigging:'
'What a clambering aloft of men, vying with each other who shall lie
out first upon the yards to furl the icy sails, while the ship rolls and
pitches, like mad!' cried his nephew.
'Exactly so,' said Solomon: 'has gone on, over the old cask that held
this wine. Why, when the Charming Sally went down in the - '
'In the Baltic Sea, in the dead of night; five-and-twenty minutes past
twelve when the captain's watch stopped in his pocket; he lying dead against
the main-mast - on the fourteenth of February, seventeen forty-nine!' cried
Walter, with great animation.
'Ay, to be sure!' cried old Sol, 'quite right! Then, there were five
hundred casks of such wine aboard; and all hands (except the first mate,
first lieutenant, two seamen, and a lady, in a leaky boat) going to work to
stave the casks, got drunk and died drunk, singing "Rule Britannia", when
she settled and went down, and ending with one awful scream in chorus.'
'But when the George the Second drove ashore, Uncle, on the coast of
Cornwall, in a dismal gale, two hours before daybreak, on the fourth of
March, 'seventy-one, she had near two hundred horses aboard; and the horses
breaking loose down below, early in the gale, and tearing to and fro, and
trampling each other to death, made such noises, and set up such human
cries, that the crew believing the ship to be full of devils, some of the
best men, losing heart and head, went overboard in despair, and only two
were left alive, at last, to tell the tale.'
'And when,' said old Sol, 'when the Polyphemus - '
'Private West India Trader, burden three hundred and fifty tons,
Captain, John Brown of Deptford. Owners, Wiggs and Co.,' cried Walter.
'The same,' said Sol; 'when she took fire, four days' sail with a fair
wind out of Jamaica Harbour, in the night - '
'There were two brothers on board,' interposed his nephew, speaking
very fast and loud, 'and there not being room for both of them in the only
boat that wasn't swamped, neither of them would consent to go, until the
elder took the younger by the waist, and flung him in. And then the younger,
rising in the boat, cried out, "Dear Edward, think of your promised wife at
home. I'm only a boy. No one waits at home for me. Leap down into my place!"
and flung himself in the sea!'
The kindling eye and heightened colour of the boy, who had risen from
his seat in the earnestness of what he said and felt, seemed to remind old
Sol of something he had forgotten, or that his encircling mist had hitherto
shut out. Instead of proceeding with any more anecdotes, as he had evidently
intended but a moment before, he gave a short dry cough, and said, 'Well!
suppose we change the subject.'
The truth was, that the simple-minded Uncle in his secret attraction
towards the marvellous and adventurous - of which he was, in some sort, a
distant relation, by his trade - had greatly encouraged the same attraction
in the nephew; and that everything that had ever been put before the boy to
deter him from a life of adventure, had had the usual unaccountable effect
of sharpening his taste for it. This is invariable. It would seem as if
there never was a book written, or a story told, expressly with the object
of keeping boys on shore, which did not lure and charm them to the ocean, as
a matter of course.
But an addition to the little party now made its appearance, in the
shape of a gentleman in a wide suit of blue, with a hook instead of a hand
attached to his right wrist; very bushy black eyebrows; and a thick stick in
his left hand, covered all over (like his nose) with knobs. He wore a loose
black silk handkerchief round his neck, and such a very large coarse shirt
collar, that it looked like a small sail. He was evidently the person for
whom the spare wine-glass was intended, and evidently knew it; for having
taken off his rough outer coat, and hung up, on a particular peg behind the
door, such a hard glazed hat as a sympathetic person's head might ache at
the sight of, and which left a red rim round his own forehead as if he had
been wearing a tight basin, he brought a chair to where the clean glass was,
and sat himself down behind it. He was usually addressed as Captain, this
visitor; and had been a pilot, or a skipper, or a privateersman, or all
three perhaps; and was a very salt-looking man indeed.
His face, remarkable for a brown solidity, brightened as he shook hands
with Uncle and nephew; but he seemed to be of a laconic disposition, and
merely said:
'How goes it?'
'All well,' said Mr Gills, pushing the bottle towards him.
He took it up, and having surveyed and smelt it, said with
extraordinary expression:
'The?'
'The,' returned the Instrument-maker.
Upon that he whistled as he filled his glass, and seemed to think they
were making holiday indeed.
'Wal'r!' he said, arranging his hair (which was thin) with his hook,
and then pointing it at the Instrument-maker, 'Look at him! Love! Honour!
And Obey! Overhaul your catechism till you find that passage, and when found
turn the leaf down. Success, my boy!'
He was so perfectly satisfied both with his quotation and his reference
to it, that he could not help repeating the words again in a low voice, and
saying he had forgotten 'em these forty year.
'But I never wanted two or three words in my life that I didn't know
where to lay my hand upon 'em, Gills,' he observed. 'It comes of not wasting
language as some do.'
The reflection perhaps reminded him that he had better, like young
Norval's father, '"ncrease his store." At any rate he became silent, and
remained so, until old Sol went out into the shop to light it up, when he
turned to Walter, and said, without any introductory remark:
'I suppose he could make a clock if he tried?'
'I shouldn't wonder, Captain Cuttle,' returned the boy.
'And it would go!' said Captain Cuttle, making a species of serpent in
the air with his hook. 'Lord, how that clock would go!'
For a moment or two he seemed quite lost in contemplating the pace of
this ideal timepiece, and sat looking at the boy as if his face were the
dial.
'But he's chockful of science,' he observed, waving his hook towards
the stock-in-trade. 'Look'ye here! Here's a collection of 'em. Earth, air,
or water. It's all one. Only say where you'll have it. Up in a balloon?
There you are. Down in a bell? There you are. D'ye want to put the North
Star in a pair of scales and weigh it? He'll do it for you.'
It may be gathered from these remarks that Captain Cuttle's reverence
for the stock of instruments was profound, and that his philosophy knew
little or no distinction between trading in it and inventing it.
'Ah!' he said, with a sigh, 'it's a fine thing to understand 'em. And
yet it's a fine thing not to understand 'em. I hardly know which is best.
It's so comfortable to sit here and feel that you might be weighed,
measured, magnified, electrified, polarized, played the very devil with: and
never know how.'
Nothing short of the wonderful Madeira, combined with the occasion
(which rendered it desirable to improve and expand Walter's mind), could
have ever loosened his tongue to the extent of giving utterance to this
prodigious oration. He seemed quite amazed himself at the manner in which it
opened up to view the sources of the taciturn delight he had had in eating
Sunday dinners in that parlour for ten years. Becoming a sadder and a wiser
man, he mused and held his peace.
'Come!' cried the subject of this admiration, returning. 'Before you
have your glass of grog, Ned, we must finish the bottle.'
'Stand by!' said Ned, filling his glass. 'Give the boy some more.'
'No more, thank'e, Uncle!'
'Yes, yes,' said Sol, 'a little more. We'll finish the bottle, to the
House, Ned - Walter's House. Why it may be his House one of these days, in
part. Who knows? Sir Richard Whittington married his master's daughter.'
'"Turn again Whittington, Lord Mayor of London, and when you are old
you will never depart from it,"' interposed the Captain. 'Wal'r! Overhaul
the book, my lad.'
'And although Mr Dombey hasn't a daughter,' Sol began.
'Yes, yes, he has, Uncle,' said the boy, reddening and laughing.
'Has he?' cried the old man. 'Indeed I think he has too.
'Oh! I know he has,' said the boy. 'Some of 'em were talking about it
in the office today. And they do say, Uncle and Captain Cuttle,' lowering
his voice, 'that he's taken a dislike to her, and that she's left,
unnoticed, among the servants, and that his mind's so set all the while upon
having his son in the House, that although he's only a baby now, he is going
to have balances struck oftener than formerly, and the books kept closer
than they used to be, and has even been seen (when he thought he wasn't)
walking in the Docks, looking at his ships and property and all that, as if
he was exulting like, over what he and his son will possess together. That's
what they say. Of course, I don't know.
'He knows all about her already, you see,' said the instrument-maker.
'Nonsense, Uncle,' cried the boy, still reddening and laughing,
boy-like. 'How can I help hearing what they tell me?'
'The Son's a little in our way at present, I'm afraid, Ned,' said the
old man, humouring the joke.
'Very much,' said the Captain.
'Nevertheless, we'll drink him,' pursued Sol. 'So, here's to Dombey and
Son.'
'Oh, very well, Uncle,' said the boy, merrily. 'Since you have
introduced the mention of her, and have connected me with her and have said
that I know all about her, I shall make bold to amend the toast. So here's
to Dombey - and Son - and Daughter!'
Paul's Progress and Christening
Little Paul, suffering no contamination from the blood of the Toodles,
grew stouter and stronger every day. Every day, too, he was more and more
ardently cherished by Miss Tox, whose devotion was so far appreciated by Mr
Dombey that he began to regard her as a woman of great natural good sense,
whose feelings did her credit and deserved encouragement. He was so lavish
of this condescension, that he not only bowed to her, in a particular
manner, on several occasions, but even entrusted such stately recognitions
of her to his sister as 'pray tell your friend, Louisa, that she is very
good,' or 'mention to Miss Tox, Louisa, that I am obliged to
her;'specialities which made a deep impression on the lady thus
distinguished.
Whether Miss Tox conceived that having been selected by the Fates to
welcome the little Dombey before he was born, in Kirby, Beard and Kirby's
Best Mixed Pins, it therefore naturally devolved upon her to greet him with
all other forms of welcome in all other early stages of his existence - or
whether her overflowing goodness induced her to volunteer into the domestic
militia as a substitute in some sort for his deceased Mama - or whether she
was conscious of any other motives - are questions which in this stage of
the Firm's history herself only could have solved. Nor have they much
bearing on the fact (of which there is no doubt), that Miss Tox's constancy
and zeal were a heavy discouragement to Richards, who lost flesh hourly
under her patronage, and was in some danger of being superintended to death.
Miss Tox was often in the habit of assuring Mrs Chick, that nothing
could exceed her interest in all connected with the development of that
sweet child;' and an observer of Miss Tox's proceedings might have inferred
so much without declaratory confirmation. She would preside over the
innocent repasts of the young heir, with ineffable satisfaction, almost with
an air of joint proprietorship with Richards in the entertainment. At the
little ceremonies of the bath and toilette, she assisted with enthusiasm.
The administration of infantine doses of physic awakened all the active
sympathy of her character; and being on one occasion secreted in a cupboard
(whither she had fled in modesty), when Mr Dombey was introduced into the
nursery by his sister, to behold his son, in the course of preparation for
bed, taking a short walk uphill over Richards's gown, in a short and airy
linen jacket, Miss Tox was so transported beyond the ignorant present as to
be unable to refrain from crying out, 'Is he not beautiful Mr Dombey! Is he
not a Cupid, Sir!' and then almost sinking behind the closet door with
confusion and blushes.
'Louisa,' said Mr Dombey, one day, to his sister, 'I really think I
must present your friend with some little token, on the occasion of Paul's
christening. She has exerted herself so warmly in the child's behalf from
the first, and seems to understand her position so thoroughly (a very rare
merit in this world, I am sorry to say), that it would really be agreeable
to me to notice her.'
Let it be no detraction from the merits of Miss Tox, to hint that in Mr
Dombey's eyes, as in some others that occasionally see the light, they only
achieved that mighty piece of knowledge, the understanding of their own
position, who showed a fitting reverence for his. It was not so much their
merit that they knew themselves, as that they knew him, and bowed low before
him.
'My dear Paul,' returned his sister, 'you do Miss Tox but justice, as a
man of your penetration was sure, I knew, to do. I believe if there are
three words in the English language for which she has a respect amounting
almost to veneration, those words are, Dombey and Son.'
'Well,' said Mr Dombey, 'I believe it. It does Miss Tox credit.'
'And as to anything in the shape of a token, my dear Paul,' pursued his
sister, 'all I can say is that anything you give Miss Tox will be hoarded
and prized, I am sure, like a relic. But there is a way, my dear Paul, of
showing your sense of Miss Tox's friendliness in a still more flattering and
acceptable manner, if you should be so inclined.'
'How is that?' asked Mr Dombey.
'Godfathers, of course,' continued Mrs Chick, 'are important in point
of connexion and influence.'
'I don't know why they should be, to my son, said Mr Dombey, coldly.
'Very true, my dear Paul,' retorted Mrs Chick, with an extraordinary
show of animation, to cover the suddenness of her conversion; 'and spoken
like yourself. I might have expected nothing else from you. I might have
known that such would have been your opinion. Perhaps;' here Mrs Chick
faltered again, as not quite comfortably feeling her way; 'perhaps that is a
reason why you might have the less objection to allowing Miss Tox to be
godmother to the dear thing, if it were only as deputy and proxy for someone
else. That it would be received as a great honour and distinction, Paul, I
need not say.
'Louisa,' said Mr Dombey, after a short pause, 'it is not to be
supposed - '
'Certainly not,' cried Mrs Chick, hastening to anticipate a refusal, 'I
never thought it was.'
Mr Dombey looked at her impatiently.
'Don't flurry me, my dear Paul,' said his sister; 'for that destroys
me. I am far from strong. I have not been quite myself, since poor dear
Fanny departed.'
Mr Dombey glanced at the pocket-handkerchief which his sister applied
to her eyes, and resumed:
'It is not be supposed, I say 'And I say,' murmured Mrs Chick, 'that I
never thought it was.'
'Good Heaven, Louisa!' said Mr Dombey.
'No, my dear Paul,' she remonstrated with tearful dignity, 'I must
really be allowed to speak. I am not so clever, or so reasoning, or so
eloquent, or so anything, as you are. I know that very well. So much the
worse for me. But if they were the last words I had to utter - and last
words should be very solemn to you and me, Paul, after poor dear Fanny - I
would still say I never thought it was. And what is more,' added Mrs Chick
with increased dignity, as if she had withheld her crushing argument until
now, 'I never did think it was.' Mr Dombey walked to the window and back
again.
'It is not to be supposed, Louisa,' he said (Mrs Chick had nailed her
colours to the mast, and repeated 'I know it isn't,' but he took no notice
of it), 'but that there are many persons who, supposing that I recognised
any claim at all in such a case, have a claim upon me superior to Miss
Tox's. But I do not. I recognise no such thing. Paul and myself will be
able, when the time comes, to hold our own - the House, in other words, will
be able to hold its own, and maintain its own, and hand down its own of
itself, and without any such common-place aids. The kind of foreign help
which people usually seek for their children, I can afford to despise; being
above it, I hope. So that Paul's infancy and childhood pass away well, and I
see him becoming qualified without waste of time for the career on which he
is destined to enter, I am satisfied. He will make what powerful friends he
pleases in after-life, when he is actively maintaining - and extending, if
that is possible - the dignity and credit of the Firm. Until then, I am
enough for him, perhaps, and all in all. I have no wish that people should
step in between us. I would much rather show my sense of the obliging
conduct of a deserving person like your friend. Therefore let it be so; and
your husband and myself will do well enough for the other sponsors, I
daresay.'
In the course of these remarks, delivered with great majesty and
grandeur, Mr Dombey had truly revealed the secret feelings of his breast. An
indescribable distrust of anybody stepping in between himself and his son; a
haughty dread of having any rival or partner in the boy's respect and
deference; a sharp misgiving, recently acquired, that he was not infallible
in his power of bending and binding human wills; as sharp a jealousy of any
second check or cross; these were, at that time the master keys of his soul.
In all his life, he had never made a friend. His cold and distant nature had
neither sought one, nor found one. And now, when that nature concentrated
its whole force so strongly on a partial scheme of parental interest and
ambition, it seemed as if its icy current, instead of being released by this
influence, and running clear and free, had thawed for but an instant to
admit its burden, and then frozen with it into one unyielding block.
Elevated thus to the godmothership of little Paul, in virtue of her
insignificance, Miss Tox was from that hour chosen and appointed to office;
and Mr Dombey further signified his pleasure that the ceremony, already long
delayed, should take place without further postponement. His sister, who had
been far from anticipating so signal a success, withdrew as soon as she
could, to communicate it to her best of friends; and Mr Dombey was left
alone in his library. He had already laid his hand upon the bellrope to
convey his usual summons to Richards, when his eye fell upon a writing-desk,
belonging to his deceased wife, which had been taken, among other things,
from a cabinet in her chamber. It was not the first time that his eye had
lighted on it He carried the key in his pocket; and he brought it to his
table and opened it now - having previously locked the room door - with a
well-accustomed hand.
From beneath a leaf of torn and cancelled scraps of paper, he took one
letter that remained entire. Involuntarily holding his breath as he opened
this document, and 'bating in the stealthy action something of his arrogant
demeanour, he s at down, resting his head upon one hand, and read it
through.
He read it slowly and attentively, and with a nice particularity to
every syllable. Otherwise than as his great deliberation seemed unnatural,
and perhaps the result of an effort equally great, he allowed no sign of
emotion to escape him. When he had read it through, he folded and refolded
it slowly several times, and tore it carefully into fragments. Checking his
hand in the act of throwing these away, he put them in his pocket, as if
unwilling to trust them even to the chances of being re-united and
deciphered; and instead of ringing, as usual, for little Paul, he sat
solitary, all the evening, in his cheerless room.
There was anything but solitude in the nursery; for there, Mrs Chick
and Miss Tox were enjoying a social evening, so much to the disgust of Miss
Susan Nipper, that that young lady embraced every opportunity of making wry
faces behind the door. Her feelings were so much excited on the occasion,
that she found it indispensable to afford them this relief, even without
having the comfort of any audience or sympathy whatever. As the
knight-errants of old relieved their minds by carving their mistress's names
in deserts, and wildernesses, and other savage places where there was no
probability of there ever being anybody to read them, so did Miss Susan
Nipper curl her snub nose into drawers and wardrobes, put away winks of
disparagement in cupboards, shed derisive squints into stone pitchers, and
contradict and call names out in the passage.
The two interlopers, however, blissfully unconscious of the young
lady's sentiments, saw little Paul safe through all the stages of
undressing, airy exercise, supper and bed; and then sat down to tea before
the fire. The two children now lay, through the good offices of Polly, in
one room; and it was not until the ladies were established at their
tea-table that, happening to look towards the little beds, they thought of
Florence.
'How sound she sleeps!' said Miss Tox.
'Why, you know, my dear, she takes a great deal of exercise in the
course of the day,' returned Mrs Chick, 'playing about little Paul so much.'
'She is a curious child,' said Miss Tox.
'My dear,' retorted Mrs Chick, in a low voice: 'Her Mama, all over!'
'In deed!' said Miss Tox. 'Ah dear me!'
A tone of most extraordinary compassion Miss Tox said it in, though she
had no distinct idea why, except that it was expected of her.
'Florence will never, never, never be a Dombey,'said Mrs Chick, 'not if
she lives to be a thousand years old.'
Miss Tox elevated her eyebrows, and was again full of
commiseration.
'I quite fret and worry myself about her,' said Mrs Chick, with a sigh
of modest merit. 'I really don't see what is to become of her when she grows
older, or what position she is to take. She don't gain on her Papa in the
least. How can one expect she should, when she is so very unlike a Dombey?'
Miss Tox looked as if she saw no way out of such a cogent argument as
that, at all.
'And the child, you see,' said Mrs Chick, in deep confidence, 'has poor
dear Fanny's nature. She'll never make an effort in after-life, I'll venture
to say. Never! She'll never wind and twine herself about her Papa's heart
like - '
'Like the ivy?' suggested Miss Tox.
'Like the ivy,' Mrs Chick assented. 'Never! She'll never glide and
nestle into the bosom of her Papa's affections like - the - '
'Startled fawn?' suggested Miss Tox.
'Like the startled fawn,' said Mrs Chick. 'Never! Poor Fanny! Yet, how
I loved her!'
'You must not distress yourself, my dear,' said Miss Tox, in a soothing
voice. 'Now really! You have too much feeling.'
'We have all our faults,' said Mrs Chick, weeping and shaking her head.
'I daresay we have. I never was blind to hers. I never said I was. Far from
it. Yet how I loved her!'
What a satisfaction it was to Mrs Chick - a common-place piece of folly
enough, compared with whom her sister-in-law had been a very angel of
womanly intelligence and gentleness - to patronise and be tender to the
memory of that lady: in exact pursuance of her conduct to her in her
lifetime: and to thoroughly believe herself, and take herself in, and make
herself uncommonly comfortable on the strength of her toleration! What a
mighty pleasant virtue toleration should be when we are right, to be so very
pleasant when we are wrong, and quite unable to demonstrate how we come to
be invested with the privilege of exercising it!
Mrs Chick was yet drying her eyes and shaking her head, when Richards
made bold to caution her that Miss Florence was awake and sitting in her
bed. She had risen, as the nurse said, and the lashes of her eyes were wet
with tears. But no one saw them glistening save Polly. No one else leant
over her, and whispered soothing words to her, or was near enough to hear
the flutter of her beating heart.
'Oh! dear nurse!' said the child, looking earnestly up in her face,
'let me lie by my brother!'
'Why, my pet?' said Richards.
'Oh! I think he loves me,' cried the child wildly. 'Let me lie by him.
Pray do!'
Mrs Chick interposed with some motherly words about going to sleep like
a dear, but Florence repeated her supplication, with a frightened look, and
in a voice broken by sobs and tears.
'I'll not wake him,' she said, covering her face and hanging down her
head. 'I'll only touch him with my hand, and go to sleep. Oh, pray, pray,
let me lie by my brother to-night, for I believe he's fond of me!'
Richards took her without a word, and carrying her to the little bed in
which the infant was sleeping, laid her down by his side. She crept as near
him as she could without disturbing his rest; and stretching out one arm so
that it timidly embraced his neck, and hiding her face on the other, over
which her damp and scattered hair fell loose, lay motionless.
'Poor little thing,' said Miss Tox; 'she has been dreaming, I daresay.'
Dreaming, perhaps, of loving tones for ever silent, of loving eyes for
ever closed, of loving arms again wound round her, and relaxing in that
dream within the dam which no tongue can relate. Seeking, perhaps - in
dreams - some natural comfort for a heart, deeply and sorely wounded, though
so young a child's: and finding it, perhaps, in dreams, if not in waking,
cold, substantial truth. This trivial incident had so interrupted the
current of conversation, that it was difficult of resumption; and Mrs Chick
moreover had been so affected by the contemplation of her own tolerant
nature, that she was not in spirits. The two friends accordingly soon made
an end of their tea, and a servant was despatched to fetch a hackney
cabriolet for Miss Tox. Miss Tox had great experience in hackney cabs, and
her starting in one was generally a work of time, as she was systematic in
the preparatory arrangements.
'Have the goodness, if you please, Towlinson,' said Miss Tox, 'first of
all, to carry out a pen and ink and take his number legibly.'
'Yes, Miss,' said Towlinson.
'Then, if you please, Towlinson,'said Miss Tox, 'have the goodness
to turn the cushion. Which,' said Miss Tox apart to Mrs Chick, 'is
generally damp, my dear.'
'Yes, Miss,' said Towlinson.
'I'll trouble you also, if you please, Towlinson,' said Miss Tox, 'with
this card and this shilling. He's to drive to the card, and is to understand
that he will not on any account have more than the shilling.'
'No, Miss,' said Towlinson.
'And - I'm sorry to give you so much trouble, Towlinson,' said Miss
Tox, looking at him pensively.
'Not at all, Miss,' said Towlinson.
'Mention to the man, then, if you please, Towlinson,' said Miss Tox,
'that the lady's uncle is a magistrate, and that if he gives her any of his
impertinence he will be punished terribly. You can pretend to say that, if
you please, Towlinson, in a friendly way, and because you know it was done
to another man, who died.'
'Certainly, Miss,' said Towlinson.
'And now good-night to my sweet, sweet, sweet, godson,' said Miss Tox,
with a soft shower of kisses at each repetition of the adjective; 'and
Louisa, my dear friend, promise me to take a little something warm before
you go to bed, and not to distress yourself!'
It was with extreme difficulty that Nipper, the black-eyed, who looked
on steadfastly, contained herself at this crisis, and until the subsequent
departure of Mrs Chick. But the nursery being at length free of visitors,
she made herself some recompense for her late restraint.
'You might keep me in a strait-waistcoat for six weeks,' said Nipper,
'and when I got it off I'd only be more aggravated, who ever heard the like
of them two Griffins, Mrs Richards?'
'And then to talk of having been dreaming, poor dear!' said Polly.
'Oh you beauties!' cried Susan Nipper, affecting to salute the door by
which the ladies had departed. 'Never be a Dombey won't she? It's to be
hoped she won't, we don't want any more such, one's enough.'
'Don't wake the children, Susan dear,' said Polly.
'I'm very much beholden to you, Mrs Richards,' said Susan, who was not
by any means discriminating in her wrath, 'and really feel it as a honour to
receive your commands, being a black slave and a mulotter. Mrs Richards, if
there's any other orders, you can give me, pray mention 'em.'
'Nonsense; orders,' said Polly.
'Oh! bless your heart, Mrs Richards,' cried Susan, 'temporaries always
orders permanencies here, didn't you know that, why wherever was you born,
Mrs Richards? But wherever you was born, Mrs Richards,' pursued Spitfire,
shaking her head resolutely, 'and whenever, and however (which is best known
to yourself), you may bear in mind, please, that it's one thing to give
orders, and quite another thing to take 'em. A person may tell a person to
dive off a bridge head foremost into five-and-forty feet of water, Mrs
Richards, but a person may be very far from diving.'
'There now,' said Polly, 'you're angry because you're a good little
thing, and fond of Miss Florence; and yet you turn round on me, because
there's nobody else.'
'It's very easy for some to keep their tempers, and be soft-spoken, Mrs
Richards,' returned Susan, slightly mollified, 'when their child's made as
much of as a prince, and is petted and patted till it wishes its friends
further, but when a sweet young pretty innocent, that never ought to have a
cross word spoken to or of it, is rundown, the case is very different
indeed. My goodness gracious me, Miss Floy, you naughty, sinful child, if
you don't shut your eyes this minute, I'll call in them hobgoblins that
lives in the cock-loft to come and eat you up alive!'
Here Miss Nipper made a horrible lowing, supposed to issue from a
conscientious goblin of the bull species, impatient to discharge the severe
duty of his position. Having further composed her young charge by covering
her head with the bedclothes, and making three or four angry dabs at the
pillow, she folded her arms, and screwed up her mouth, and sat looking at
the fire for the rest of the evening.
Though little Paul was said, in nursery phrase, 'to take a deal of
notice for his age,' he took as little notice of all this as of the
preparations for his christening on the next day but one; which nevertheless
went on about him, as to his personal apparel, and that of his sister and
the two nurses, with great activity. Neither did he, on the arrival of the
appointed morning, show any sense of its importance; being, on the contrary,
unusually inclined to sleep, and unusually inclined to take it ill in his
attendants that they dressed him to go out.
It happened to be an iron-grey autumnal day, with a shrewd east wind
blowing - a day in keeping with the proceedings. Mr Dombey represented in
himself the wind, the shade, and the autumn of the christening. He stood in
his library to receive the company, as hard and cold as the weather; and
when he looked out through the glass room, at the trees in the little
garden, their brown and yellow leaves came fluttering down, as if he
blighted them.
Ugh! They were black, cold rooms; and seemed to be in mourning, like
the inmates of the house. The books precisely matched as to size, and drawn
up in line, like soldiers, looked in their cold, hard, slippery uniforms, as
if they had but one idea among them, and that was a freezer. The bookcase,
glazed and locked, repudiated all familiarities. Mr Pitt, in bronze, on the
top, with no trace of his celestial origin' about him, guarded the
unattainable treasure like an enchanted Moor. A dusty urn at each high
corner, dug up from an ancient tomb, preached desolation and decay, as from
two pulpits; and the chimney-glass, reflecting Mr Dombey and his portrait at
one blow, seemed fraught with melancholy meditations.
The stiff and stark fire-irons appeared to claim a nearer relationship
than anything else there to Mr Dombey, with his buttoned coat, his white
cravat, his heavy gold watch-chain, and his creaking boots.
But this was before the arrival of Mr and Mrs Chick, his lawful
relatives, who soon presented themselves.
'My dear Paul,' Mrs Chick murmured, as she embraced him, 'the
beginning, I hope, of many joyful days!'
'Thank you, Louisa,' said Mr Dombey, grimly. 'How do you do, Mr John?'
'How do you do, Sir?' said Chick.
He gave Mr Dombey his hand, as if he feared it might electrify him. Mr
Dombey tool: it as if it were a fish, or seaweed, or some such clammy
substance, and immediately returned it to him with exalted politeness.
'Perhaps, Louisa,' said Mr Dombey, slightly turning his head in his
cravat, as if it were a socket, 'you would have preferred a fire?'
'Oh, my dear Paul, no,' said Mrs Chick, who had much ado to keep her
teeth from chattering; 'not for me.'
'Mr John,' said Mr Dombey, 'you are not sensible of any chill?'
Mr John, who had already got both his hands in his pockets over the
wrists, and was on the very threshold of that same canine chorus which had
given Mrs Chick so much offence on a former occasion, protested that he was
perfectly comfortable.
He added in a low voice, 'With my tiddle tol toor rul' - when he was
providentially stopped by Towlinson, who announced:
'Miss Tox!'
And enter that fair enslaver, with a blue nose and indescribably frosty
face, referable to her being very thinly clad in a maze of fluttering odds
and ends, to do honour to the ceremony.
'How do you do, Miss Tox?' said Mr Dombey.
Miss Tox, in the midst of her spreading gauzes, went down altogether
like an opera-glass shutting-up; she curtseyed so low, in acknowledgment of
Mr Dombey's advancing a step or two to meet her.
'I can never forget this occasion, Sir,' said Miss Tox, softly. ''Tis
impossible. My dear Louisa, I can hardly believe the evidence of my senses.'
If Miss Tox could believe the evidence of one of her senses, it was a
very cold day. That was quite clear. She took an early opportunity of
promoting the circulation in the tip of her nose by secretly chafing it with
her pocket handkerchief, lest, by its very low temperature, it should
disagreeably astonish the baby when she came to kiss it.
The baby soon appeared, carried in great glory by Richards; while
Florence, in custody of that active young constable, Susan Nipper, brought
up the rear. Though the whole nursery party were dressed by this time in
lighter mourning than at first, there was enough in the appearance of the
bereaved children to make the day no brighter. The baby too - it might have
been Miss Tox's nose - began to cry. Thereby, as it happened, preventing Mr
Chick from the awkward fulfilment of a very honest purpose he had; which
was, to make much of Florence. For this gentleman, insensible to the
superior claims of a perfect Dombey (perhaps on account of having the honour
to be united to a Dombey himself, and being familiar with excellence),
really liked her, and showed that he liked her, and was about to show it in
his own way now, when Paul cried, and his helpmate stopped him short
'Now Florence, child!' said her aunt, briskly, 'what are you doing,
love? Show yourself to him. Engage his attention, my dear!'
The atmosphere became or might have become colder and colder, when Mr
Dombey stood frigidly watching his little daughter, who, clapping her hands,
and standing On tip-toe before the throne of his son and heir, lured him to
bend down from his high estate, and look at her. Some honest act of
Richards's may have aided the effect, but he did look down, and held his
peace. As his sister hid behind her nurse, he followed her with his eyes;
and when she peeped out with a merry cry to him, he sprang up and crowed
lustily - laughing outright when she ran in upon him; and seeming to fondle
her curls with his tiny hands, while she smothered him with kisses.
Was Mr Dombey pleased to see this? He testified no pleasure by the
relaxation of a nerve; but outward tokens of any kind of feeling were
unusual with him. If any sunbeam stole into the room to light the children
at their play, it never reached his face. He looked on so fixedly and
coldly, that the warm light vanished even from the laughing eyes of little
Florence, when, at last, they happened to meet his.
It was a dull, grey, autumn day indeed, and in a minute's pause and
silence that took place, the leaves fell sorrowfully.
'Mr John,' said Mr Dombey, referring to his watch, and assuming his hat
and gloves. 'Take my sister, if you please: my arm today is Miss Tox's. You
had better go first with Master Paul, Richards. Be very careful.'
In Mr Dombey's carriage, Dombey and Son, Miss Tox, Mrs Chick, Richards,
and Florence. In a little carriage following it, Susan Nipper and the owner
Mr Chick. Susan looking out of window, without intermission, as a relief
from the embarrassment of confronting the large face of that gentleman, and
thinking whenever anything rattled that he was putting up in paper an
appropriate pecuniary compliment for herself.
Once upon the road to church, Mr Dombey clapped his hands for the
amusement of his son. At which instance of parental enthusiasm Miss Tox was
enchanted. But exclusive of this incident, the chief difference between the
christening party and a party in a mourning coach consisted in the colours
of the carriage and horses.
Arrived at the church steps, they were received by a portentous
beadle.' Mr Dombey dismounting first to help the ladies out, and standing
near him at the church door, looked like another beadle. A beadle less
gorgeous but more dreadful; the beadle of private life; the beadle of our
business and our bosoms.
Miss Tox's hand trembled as she slipped it through Mr Dombey's arm, and
felt herself escorted up the steps, preceded by a cocked hat and a
Babylonian collar. It seemed for a moment like that other solemn
institution, 'Wilt thou have this man, Lucretia?' 'Yes, I will.'
'Please to bring the child in quick out of the air there,' whispered
the beadle, holding open the inner door of the church.
Little Paul might have asked with Hamlet 'into my grave?' so chill and
earthy was the place. The tall shrouded pulpit and reading desk; the dreary
perspective of empty pews stretching away under the galleries, and empty
benches mounting to the roof and lost in the shadow of the great grim organ;
the dusty matting and cold stone slabs; the grisly free seats' in the
aisles; and the damp corner by the bell-rope, where the black trestles used
for funerals were stowed away, along with some shovels and baskets, and a
coil or two of deadly-looking rope; the strange, unusual, uncomfortable
smell, and the cadaverous light; were all in unison. It was a cold and
dismal scene.
'There's a wedding just on, Sir,' said the beadle, 'but it'll be over
directly, if you'll walk into the westry here.
Before he turned again to lead the way, he gave Mr Dombey a bow and a
half smile of recognition, importing that he (the beadle) remembered to have
had the pleasure of attending on him when he buried his wife, and hoped he
had enjoyed himself since.
The very wedding looked dismal as they passed in front of the altar.
The bride was too old and the bridegroom too young, and a superannuated beau
with one eye and an eyeglass stuck in its blank companion, was giving away
the lady, while the friends were shivering. In the vestry the fire was
smoking; and an over-aged and over-worked and under-paid attorney's clerk,
'making a search,' was running his forefinger down the parchment pages of an
immense register (one of a long series of similar volumes) gorged with
burials. Over the fireplace was a ground-plan of the vaults underneath the
church; and Mr Chick, skimming the literary portion of it aloud, by way of
enlivening the company, read the reference to Mrs Dombey's tomb in full,
before he could stop himself.
After another cold interval, a wheezy little pew-opener afflicted with
an asthma, appropriate to the churchyard, if not to the church, summoned
them to the font - a rigid marble basin which seemed to have been playing a
churchyard game at cup and ball with its matter of fact pedestal, and to
have been just that moment caught on the top of it. Here they waited some
little time while the marriage party enrolled themselves; and meanwhile the
wheezy little pew-opener - partly in consequence of her infirmity, and
partly that the marriage party might not forget her - went about the
building coughing like a grampus.
Presently the clerk (the only cheerful-looking object there, and he was
an undertaker) came up with a jug of warm water, and said something, as he
poured it into the font, about taking the chill off; which millions of
gallons boiling hot could not have done for the occasion. Then the
clergyman, an amiable and mild-looking young curate, but obviously afraid of
the baby, appeared like the principal character in a ghost-story, 'a tall
figure all in white;' at sight of whom Paul rent the air with his cries, and
never left off again till he was taken out black in the face.
Even when that event had happened, to the great relief of everybody, he
was heard under the portico, during the rest of the ceremony, now fainter,
now louder, now hushed, now bursting forth again with an irrepressible sense
of his wrongs. This so distracted the attention of the two ladies, that Mrs
Chick was constantly deploying into the centre aisle, to send out messages
by the pew-opener, while Miss Tox kept her Prayer-book open at the Gunpowder
Plot, and occasionally read responses from that service.
During the whole of these proceedings, Mr Dombey remained as impassive
and gentlemanly as ever, and perhaps assisted in making it so cold, that the
young curate smoked at the mouth as he read. The only time that he unbent
his visage in the least, was when the clergyman, in delivering (very
unaffectedly and simply) the closing exhortation, relative to the future
examination of the child by the sponsors, happened to rest his eye on Mr
Chick; and then Mr Dombey might have been seen to express by a majestic
look, that he would like to catch him at it.
It might have been well for Mr Dombey, if he had thought of his own
dignity a little less; and had thought of the great origin and purpose of
the ceremony in which he took so formal and so stiff a part, a little more.
His arrogance contrasted strangely with its history.
When it was all over, he again gave his arm to Miss Tox, and conducted
her to the vestry, where he informed the clergyman how much pleasure it
would have given him to have solicited the honour of his company at dinner,
but for the unfortunate state of his household affairs. The register signed,
and the fees paid, and the pew-opener (whose cough was very bad again)
remembered, and the beadle gratified, and the sexton (who was accidentally
on the doorsteps, looking with great interest at the weather) not forgotten,
they got into the carriage again, and drove home in the same bleak
fellowship.
There they found Mr Pitt turning up his nose at a cold collation, set
forth in a cold pomp of glass and silver, and looking more like a dead
dinner lying in state than a social refreshment. On their arrival Miss Tox
produced a mug for her godson, and Mr Chick a knife and fork and spoon in a
case. Mr Dombey also produced a bracelet for Miss Tox; and, on the receipt
of this token, Miss Tox was tenderly affected.
'Mr John,' said Mr Dombey, 'will you take the bottom of the table, if
you please? What have you got there, Mr John?'
'I have got a cold fillet of veal here, Sir,' replied Mr Chick, rubbing
his numbed hands hard together. 'What have you got there, Sir?'
'This,' returned Mr Dombey, 'is some cold preparation of calf's head, I
think. I see cold fowls - ham - patties - salad - lobster. Miss Tox will do
me the honour of taking some wine? Champagne to Miss Tox.'
There was a toothache in everything. The wine was so bitter cold that
it forced a little scream from Miss Tox, which she had great difficulty in
turning into a 'Hem!' The veal had come from such an airy pantry, that the
first taste of it had struck a sensation as of cold lead to Mr Chick's
extremities. Mr Dombey alone remained unmoved. He might have been hung up
for sale at a Russian fair as a specimen of a frozen gentleman.
The prevailing influence was too much even for his sister. She made no
effort at flattery or small talk, and directed all her efforts to looking as
warm as she could.
'Well, Sir,' said Mr Chick, making a desperate plunge, after a long
silence, and filling a glass of sherry; 'I shall drink this, if you'll allow
me, Sir, to little Paul.'
'Bless him!' murmured Miss Tox, taking a sip of wine.
'Dear little Dombey!' murmured Mrs Chick.
'Mr John,' said Mr Dombey, with severe gravity, 'my son would feel and
express himself obliged to you, I have no doubt, if he could appreciate the
favour you have done him. He will prove, in time to come, I trust, equal to
any responsibility that the obliging disposition of his relations and
friends, in private, or the onerous nature of our position, in public, may
impose upon him.'
The tone in which this was said admitting of nothing more, Mr Chick
relapsed into low spirits and silence. Not so Miss Tox, who, having listened
to Mr Dombey with even a more emphatic attention than usual, and with a more
expressive tendency of her head to one side, now leant across the table, and
said to Mrs Chick softly:
'Louisa!'
'My dear,' said Mrs Chick.
'Onerous nature of our position in public may - I have forgotten
the exact term.'
'Expose him to,' said Mrs Chick.
'Pardon me, my dear,' returned Miss Tox, 'I think not. It was more
rounded and flowing. Obliging disposition of relations and friends in
private, or onerous nature of position in public - may - impose upon him!'
'Impose upon him, to be sure,' said Mrs Chick.
Miss Tox struck her delicate hands together lightly, in triumph; and
added, casting up her eyes, 'eloquence indeed!'
Mr Dombey, in the meanwhile, had issued orders for the attendance of
Richards, who now entered curtseying, but without the baby; Paul being
asleep after the fatigues of the morning. Mr Dombey, having delivered a
glass of wine to this vassal, addressed her in the following words: Miss Tox
previously settling her head on one side, and making other little
arrangements for engraving them on her heart.
'During the six months or so, Richards, which have seen you an inmate
of this house, you have done your duty. Desiring to connect some little
service to you with this occasion, I considered how I could best effect that
object, and I also advised with my sister, Mrs - '
'Chick,' interposed the gentleman of that name.
'Oh, hush if you please!' said Miss Tox.
'I was about to say to you, Richards,' resumed Mr Dombey, with an
appalling glance at Mr John, 'that I was further assisted in my decision, by
the recollection of a conversation I held with your husband in this room, on
the occasion of your being hired, when he disclosed to me the melancholy
fact that your family, himself at the head, were sunk and steeped in
ignorance.
Richards quailed under the magnificence of the reproof.
'I am far from being friendly,' pursued Mr Dombey, 'to what is called
by persons of levelling sentiments, general education. But it is necessary
that the inferior classes should continue to be taught to know their
position, and to conduct themselves properly. So far I approve of schools.
Having the power of nominating a child on the foundation of an ancient
establishment, called (from a worshipful company) the Charitable Grinders;
where not only is a wholesome education bestowed upon the scholars, but
where a dress and badge is likewise provided for them; I have (first
communicating, through Mrs Chick, with your family) nominated your eldest
son to an existing vacancy; and he has this day, I am informed, assumed the
habit. The number of her son, I believe,' said Mr Dombey, turning to his
sister and speaking of the child as if he were a hackney-coach, is one
hundred and forty-seven. Louisa, you can tell her.'
'One hundred and forty-seven,' said Mrs Chick 'The dress, Richards, is
a nice, warm, blue baize tailed coat and cap, turned up with orange coloured
binding; red worsted stockings; and very strong leather small-clothes. One
might wear the articles one's self,' said Mrs Chick, with enthusiasm, 'and
be grateful.'
'There, Richards!' said Miss Tox. 'Now, indeed, you may be proud. The
Charitable Grinders!'
'I am sure I am very much obliged, Sir,' returned Richards faintly,
'and take it very kind that you should remember my little ones.' At the same
time a vision of Biler as a Charitable Grinder, with his very small legs
encased in the serviceable clothing described by Mrs Chick, swam before
Richards's eyes, and made them water.
'I am very glad to see you have so much feeling, Richards,' said Miss
Tox.
'It makes one almost hope, it really does,' said Mrs Chick, who prided
herself on taking trustful views of human nature, 'that there may yet be
some faint spark of gratitude and right feeling in the world.'
Richards deferred to these compliments by curtseying and murmuring
her thanks; but finding it quite impossible to recover her spirits from
the disorder into which they had been thrown by the image of her son in his
precocious nether garments, she gradually approached the door and was
heartily relieved to escape by it.
Such temporary indications of a partial thaw that had appeared with
her, vanished with her; and the frost set in again, as cold and hard as
ever. Mr Chick was twice heard to hum a tune at the bottom of the table, but
on both occasions it was a fragment of the Dead March in Saul. The party
seemed to get colder and colder, and to be gradually resolving itself into a
congealed and solid state, like the collation round which it was assembled.
At length Mrs Chick looked at Miss Tox, and Miss Tox returned the look, and
they both rose and said it was really time to go. Mr Dombey receiving this
announcement with perfect equanimity, they took leave of that gentleman, and
presently departed under the protection of Mr Chick; who, when they had
turned their backs upon the house and left its master in his usual solitary
state, put his hands in his pockets, threw himself back in the carriage, and
whistled 'With a hey ho chevy!' all through; conveying into his face as he
did so, an expression of such gloomy and terrible defiance, that Mrs Chick
dared not protest, or in any way molest him.
Richards, though she had little Paul on her lap, could not forget her
own first-born. She felt it was ungrateful; but the influence of the day
fell even on the Charitable Grinders, and she could hardly help regarding
his pewter badge, number one hundred and forty-seven, as, somehow, a part of
its formality and sternness. She spoke, too, in the nursery, of his 'blessed
legs,' and was again troubled by his spectre in uniform.
'I don't know what I wouldn't give,' said Polly, 'to see the poor
little dear before he gets used to 'em.'
'Why, then, I tell you what, Mrs Richards,' retorted Nipper, who had
been admitted to her confidence, 'see him and make your mind easy.'
'Mr Dombey wouldn't like it,' said Polly.
'Oh, wouldn't he, Mrs Richards!' retorted Nipper, 'he'd like it very
much, I think when he was asked.'
'You wouldn't ask him, I suppose, at all?' said Polly.
'No, Mrs Richards, quite contrairy,' returned Susan, 'and them two
inspectors Tox and Chick, not intending to be on duty tomorrow, as I heard
'em say, me and Mid Floy will go along with you tomorrow morning, and
welcome, Mrs Richards, if you like, for we may as well walk there as up and
down a street, and better too.'
Polly rejected the idea pretty stoutly at first; but by little and
little she began to entertain it, as she entertained more and more
distinctly the forbidden pictures of her children, and her own home. At
length, arguing that there could be no great harm in calling for a moment at
the door, she yielded to the Nipper proposition.
The matter being settled thus, little Paul began to cry most piteously,
as if he had a foreboding that no good would come of it.
'What's the matter with the child?' asked Susan.
'He's cold, I think,' said Polly, walking with him to and fro, and
hushing him.
It was a bleak autumnal afternoon indeed; and as she walked, and
hushed, and, glancing through the dreary windows, pressed the little fellow
closer to her breast, the withered leaves came showering down.
Paul's Second Deprivation
Polly was beset by so many misgivings in the morning, that but for the
incessant promptings of her black-eyed companion, she would have abandoned
all thoughts of the expedition, and formally petitioned for leave to see
number one hundred and forty-seven, under the awful shadow of Mr Dombey's
roof. But Susan who was personally disposed in favour of the excursion, and
who (like Tony Lumpkin), if she could bear the disappointments of other
people with tolerable fortitude, could not abide to disappoint herself,
threw so many ingenious doubts in the way of this second thought, and
stimulated the original intention with so many ingenious arguments, that
almost as soon as Mr Dombey's stately back was turned, and that gentleman
was pursuing his daily road towards the City, his unconscious son was on his
way to Staggs's Gardens.
This euphonious locality was situated in a suburb, known by the
inhabitants of Staggs's Gardens by the name of Camberling Town; a
designation which the Strangers' Map of London, as printed (with a view to
pleasant and commodious reference) on pocket handkerchiefs, condenses, with
some show of reason, into Camden Town. Hither the two nurses bent their
steps, accompanied by their charges; Richards carrying Paul, of course, and
Susan leading little Florence by the hand, and giving her such jerks and
pokes from time to time, as she considered it wholesome to administer.
The first shock of a great earthquake had, just at that period, rent
the whole neighbourhood to its centre. Traces of its course were visible on
every side. Houses were knocked down; streets broken through and stopped;
deep pits and trenches dug in the ground; enormous heaps of earth and clay
thrown up; buildings that were undermined and shaking, propped by great
beams of wood. Here, a chaos of carts, overthrown and jumbled together, lay
topsy-turvy at the bottom of a steep unnatural hill; there, confused
treasures of iron soaked and rusted in something that had accidentally
become a pond. Everywhere were bridges that led nowhere; thoroughfares that
were wholly impassable; Babel towers of chimneys, wanting half their height;
temporary wooden houses and enclosures, in the most unlikely situations;
carcases of ragged tenements, and fragments of unfinished walls and arches,
and piles of scaffolding, and wildernesses of bricks, and giant forms of
cranes, and tripods straddling above nothing. There were a hundred thousand
shapes and substances of incompleteness, wildly mingled out of their places,
upside down, burrowing in the earth, aspiring in the air, mouldering in the
water, and unintelligible as any dream. Hot springs and fiery eruptions, the
usual attendants upon earthquakes, lent their contributions of confusion to
the scene. Boiling water hissed and heaved within dilapidated walls; whence,
also, the glare and roar of flames came issuing forth; and mounds of ashes
blocked up rights of way, and wholly changed the law and custom of the
neighbourhood.
In short, the yet unfinished and unopened Railroad was in progress;
and, from the very core of all this dire disorder, trailed smoothly away,
upon its mighty course of civilisation and improvement.
But as yet, the neighbourhood was shy to own the Railroad. One or two
bold speculators had projected streets; and one had built a little, but had
stopped among the mud and ashes to consider farther of it. A bran-new
Tavern, redolent of fresh mortar and size, and fronting nothing at all, had
taken for its sign The Railway Arms; but that might be rash enterprise - and
then it hoped to sell drink to the workmen. So, the Excavators' House of
Call had sprung up from a beer-shop; and the old-established Ham and Beef
Shop had become the Railway Eating House, with a roast leg of pork daily,
through interested motives of a similar immediate and popular description.
Lodging-house keepers were favourable in like manner; and for the like
reasons were not to be trusted. The general belief was very slow. There were
frowzy fields, and cow-houses, and dunghills, and dustheaps, and ditches,
and gardens, and summer-houses, and carpet-beating grounds, at the very door
of the Railway. Little tumuli of oyster shells in the oyster season, and of
lobster shells in the lobster season, and of broken crockery and faded
cabbage leaves in all seasons, encroached upon its high places. Posts, and
rails, and old cautions to trespassers, and backs of mean houses, and
patches of wretched vegetation, stared it out of countenance. Nothing was
the better for it, or thought of being so. If the miserable waste ground
lying near it could have laughed, it would have laughed it to scorn, like
many of the miserable neighbours.
Staggs's Gardens was uncommonly incredulous. It was a little row of
houses, with little squalid patches of ground before them, fenced off with
old doors, barrel staves, scraps of tarpaulin, and dead bushes; with
bottomless tin kettles and exhausted iron fenders, thrust into the gaps.
Here, the Staggs's Gardeners trained scarlet beans, kept fowls and rabbits,
erected rotten summer-houses (one was an old boat), dried clothes, and
smoked pipes. Some were of opinion that Staggs's Gardens derived its name
from a deceased capitalist, one Mr Staggs, who had built it for his
delectation. Others, who had a natural taste for the country, held that it
dated from those rural times when the antlered herd, under the familiar
denomination of Staggses, had resorted to its shady precincts. Be this as it
may, Staggs's Gardens was regarded by its population as a sacred grove not
to be withered by Railroads; and so confident were they generally of its
long outliving any such ridiculous inventions, that the master
chimney-sweeper at the corner, who was understood to take the lead in the
local politics of the Gardens, had publicly declared that on the occasion of
the Railroad opening, if ever it did open, two of his boys should ascend the
flues of his dwelling, with instructions to hail the failure with derisive
cheers from the chimney-pots.
To this unhallowed spot, the very name of which had hitherto been
carefully concealed from Mr Dombey by his sister, was little Paul now borne
by Fate and Richards
'That's my house, Susan,' said Polly, pointing it out.
'Is it, indeed, Mrs Richards?' said Susan, condescendingly.
'And there's my sister Jemima at the door, I do declare' cried Polly,
'with my own sweet precious baby in her arms!'
The sight added such an extensive pair of wings to Polly's impatience,
that she set off down the Gardens at a run, and bouncing on Jemima, changed
babies with her in a twinkling; to the unutterable astonishment of that
young damsel, on whom the heir of the Dombeys seemed to have fallen from the
clouds.
'Why, Polly!' cried Jemima. 'You! what a turn you have given me! who'd
have thought it! come along in Polly! How well you do look to be sure! The
children will go half wild to see you Polly, that they will.'
That they did, if one might judge from the noise they made, and the way
in which they dashed at Polly and dragged her to a low chair in the chimney
corner, where her own honest apple face became immediately the centre of a
bunch of smaller pippins, all laying their rosy cheeks close to it, and all
evidently the growth of the same tree. As to Polly, she was full as noisy
and vehement as the children; and it was not until she was quite out of
breath, and her hair was hanging all about her flushed face, and her new
christening attire was very much dishevelled, that any pause took place in
the confusion. Even then, the smallest Toodle but one remained in her lap,
holding on tight with both arms round her neck; while the smallest Toodle
but two mounted on the back of the chair, and made desperate efforts, with
one leg in the air, to kiss her round the corner.
'Look! there's a pretty little lady come to see you,' said Polly; 'and
see how quiet she is! what a beautiful little lady, ain't she?'
This reference to Florence, who had been standing by the door not
unobservant of what passed, directed the attention of the younger branches
towards her; and had likewise the happy effect of leading to the formal
recognition of Miss Nipper, who was not quite free from a misgiving that she
had been already slighted.
'Oh do come in and sit down a minute, Susan, please,' said Polly. 'This
is my sister Jemima, this is. Jemima, I don't know what I should ever do
with myself, if it wasn't for Susan Nipper; I shouldn't be here now but for
her.'
'Oh do sit down, Miss Nipper, if you please,' quoth Jemima.
Susan took the extreme corner of a chair, with a stately and
ceremonious aspect.
'I never was so glad to see anybody in all my life; now really I never
was, Miss Nipper,' said Jemima.
Susan relaxing, took a little more of the chair, and smiled graciously.
'Do untie your bonnet-strings, and make yourself at home, Miss Nipper,
please,' entreated Jemima. 'I am afraid it's a poorer place than you're used
to; but you'll make allowances, I'm sure.'
The black-eyed was so softened by this deferential behaviour, that she
caught up little Miss Toodle who was running past, and took her to Banbury
Cross immediately.
'But where's my pretty boy?' said Polly. 'My poor fellow? I came all
this way to see him in his new clothes.'
'Ah what a pity!' cried Jemima. 'He'll break his heart, when he hears
his mother has been here. He's at school, Polly.'
'Gone already!'
'Yes. He went for the first time yesterday, for fear he should lose any
learning. But it's half-holiday, Polly: if you could only stop till he comes
home - you and Miss Nipper, leastways,' said Jemima, mindful in good time of
the dignity of the black-eyed.
'And how does he look, Jemima, bless him!' faltered Polly.
'Well, really he don't look so bad as you'd suppose,' returned Jemima.
'Ah!' said Polly, with emotion, 'I knew his legs must be too short.'
His legs is short,' returned Jemima; 'especially behind; but they'll
get longer, Polly, every day.'
It was a slow, prospective kind of consolation; but the cheerfulness
and good nature with which it was administered, gave it a value it did not
intrinsically possess. After a moment's silence, Polly asked, in a more
sprightly manner:
'And where's Father, Jemima dear?' - for by that patriarchal
appellation, Mr Toodle was generally known in the family.
'There again!' said Jemima. 'What a pity! Father took his dinner with
him this morning, and isn't coming home till night. But he's always talking
of you, Polly, and telling the children about you; and is the peaceablest,
patientest, best-temperedest soul in the world, as he always was and will
be!'
'Thankee, Jemima,' cried the simple Polly; delighted by the speech, and
disappointed by the absence.
'Oh you needn't thank me, Polly,' said her sister, giving her a
sounding kiss upon the cheek, and then dancing little Paul cheerfully. 'I
say the same of you sometimes, and think it too.'
In spite of the double disappointment, it was impossible to regard in
the light of a failure a visit which was greeted with such a reception; so
the sisters talked hopefully about family matters, and about Biler, and
about all his brothers and sisters: while the black-eyed, having performed
several journeys to Banbury Cross and back, took sharp note of the
furniture, the Dutch clock, the cupboard, the castle on the mantel-piece
with red and green windows in it, susceptible of illumination by a
candle-end within; and the pair of small black velvet kittens, each with a
lady's reticule in its mouth; regarded by the Staggs's Gardeners as
prodigies of imitative art. The conversation soon becoming general lest the
black-eyed should go off at score and turn sarcastic, that young lady
related to Jemima a summary of everything she knew concerning Mr Dombey, his
prospects, family, pursuits, and character. Also an exact inventory of her
personal wardrobe, and some account of her principal relations and friends.
Having relieved her mind of these disclosures, she partook of shrimps and
porter, and evinced a disposition to swear eternal friendship.
Little Florence herself was not behind-hand in improving the occasion;
for, being conducted forth by the young Toodles to inspect some toad-stools
and other curiosities of the Gardens, she entered with them, heart and soul,
on the formation of a temporary breakwater across a small green pool that
had collected in a corner. She was still busily engaged in that labour, when
sought and found by Susan; who, such was her sense of duty, even under the
humanizing influence of shrimps, delivered a moral address to her
(punctuated with thumps) on her degenerate nature, while washing her face
and hands; and predicted that she would bring the grey hairs of her family
in general, with sorrow to the grave. After some delay, occasioned by a
pretty long confidential interview above stairs on pecuniary subjects,
between Polly and Jemima, an interchange of babies was again effected - for
Polly had all this timeretained her own child, and Jemima little Paul - and
the visitors took leave.
But first the young Toodles, victims of a pious fraud, were deluded
into repairing in a body to a chandler's shop in the neighbourhood, for the
ostensible purpose of spending a penny; and when the coast was quite clear,
Polly fled: Jemima calling after her that if they could only go round
towards the City Road on their way back, they would be sure to meet little
Biler coming from school.
'Do you think that we might make time to go a little round in that
direction, Susan?' inquired Polly, when they halted to take breath.
'Why not, Mrs Richards?' returned Susan.
'It's getting on towards our dinner time you know,' said Polly.
But lunch had rendered her companion more than indifferent to this
grave consideration, so she allowed no weight to it, and they resolved to go
'a little round.'
Now, it happened that poor Biler's life had been, since yesterday
morning, rendered weary by the costume of the Charitable Grinders. The youth
of the streets could not endure it. No young vagabond could be brought to
bear its contemplation for a moment, without throwing himself upon the
unoffending wearer, and doing him a mischief. His social existence had been
more like that of an early Christian, than an innocent child of the
nineteenth century. He had been stoned in the streets. He had been
overthrown into gutters; bespattered with mud; violently flattened against
posts. Entire strangers to his person had lifted his yellow cap off his
head, and cast it to the winds. His legs had not only undergone verbal
criticisms and revilings, but had been handled and pinched. That very
morning, he had received a perfectly unsolicited black eye on his way to the
Grinders' establishment, and had been punished for it by the master: a
superannuated old Grinder of savage disposition, who had been appointed
schoolmaster because he didn't know anything, and wasn't fit for anything,
and for whose cruel cane all chubby little boys had a perfect fascination.'
Thus it fell out that Biler, on his way home, sought unfrequented
paths; and slunk along by narrow passages and back streets, to avoid his
tormentors. Being compelled to emerge into the main road, his ill fortune
brought him at last where a small party of boys, headed by a ferocious young
butcher, were lying in wait for any means of pleasurable excitement that
might happen. These, finding a Charitable Grinder in the midst of them -
unaccountably delivered over, as it were, into their hands - set up a
general yell and rushed upon him.
But it so fell out likewise, that, at the same time, Polly, looking
hopelessly along the road before her, after a good hour's walk, had said it
was no use going any further, when suddenly she saw this sight. She no
sooner saw it than, uttering a hasty exclamation, and giving Master Dombey
to the black-eyed, she started to the rescue of her unhappy little son.
Surprises, like misfortunes, rarely come alone. The astonished Susan
Nipper and her two young charges were rescued by the bystanders from under
the very wheels of a passing carriage before they knew what had happened;
and at that moment (it was market day) a thundering alarm of 'Mad Bull!' was
raised.
With a wild confusion before her, of people running up and down, and
shouting, and wheels running over them, and boys fighting, and mad bulls
coming up, and the nurse in the midst of all these dangers being torn to
pieces, Florence screamed and ran. She ran till she was exhausted, urging
Susan to do the same; and then, stopping and wringing her hands as she
remembered they had left the other nurse behind, found, with a sensation of
terror not to be described, that she was quite alone.
'Susan! Susan!' cried Florence, clapping her hands in the very ecstasy
of her alarm. 'Oh, where are they? where are they?'
'Where are they?' said an old woman, coming hobbling across as fast as
she could from the opposite side of the way. 'Why did you run away from
'em?'
'I was frightened,' answered Florence. 'I didn't know what I did. I
thought they were with me. Where are they?'
The old woman took her by the wrist, and said, 'I'll show you.'
She was a very ugly old woman, with red rims round her eyes, and a
mouth that mumbled and chattered of itself when she was not speaking. She
was miserably dressed, and carried some skins over her arm. She seemed to
have followed Florence some little way at all events, for she had lost her
breath; and this made her uglier still, as she stood trying to regain it:
working her shrivelled yellow face and throat into all sorts of contortions.
Florence was afraid of her, and looked, hesitating, up the street, of
which she had almost reached the bottom. It was a solitary place - more a
back road than a street - and there was no one in it but her- self and the
old woman.
'You needn't be frightened now,' said the old woman, still holding her
tight. 'Come along with me.'
'I - I don't know you. What's your name?' asked Florence.
'Mrs Brown,' said the old woman. 'Good Mrs Brown.'
'Are they near here?' asked Florence, beginning to be led away.
'Susan ain't far off,' said Good Mrs Brown; 'and the others are close
to her.'
'Is anybody hurt?' cried Florence.
'Not a bit of it,' said Good Mrs Brown.
The child shed tears of delight on hearing this, and accompanied the
old woman willingly; though she could not help glancing at her face as they
went along - particularly at that industrious mouth - and wondering whether
Bad Mrs Brown, if there were such a person, was at all like her.
They had not gone far, but had gone by some very uncomfortable places,
such as brick-fields and tile-yards, when the old woman turned down a dirty
lane, where the mud lay in deep black ruts in the middle of the road. She
stopped before a shabby little house, as closely shut up as a house that was
full of cracks and crevices could be. Opening the door with a key she took
out of her bonnet, she pushed the child before her into a back room, where
there was a great heap of rags of different colours lying on the floor; a
heap of bones, and a heap of sifted dust or cinders; but there was no
furniture at all, and the walls and ceiling were quite black.
The child became so terrified the she was stricken speechless, and
looked as though about to swoon.
'Now don't be a young mule,' said Good Mrs Brown, reviving her with a
shake. 'I'm not a going to hurt you. Sit upon the rags.'
Florence obeyed her, holding out her folded hands, in mute
supplication.
'I'm not a going to keep you, even, above an hour,' said Mrs Brown.
'D'ye understand what I say?'
The child answered with great difficulty, 'Yes.'
'Then,' said Good Mrs Brown, taking her own seat on the bones, 'don't
vex me. If you don't, I tell you I won't hurt you. But if you do, I'll kill
you. I could have you killed at any time - even if you was in your own bed
at home. Now let's know who you are, and what you are, and all about it.'
The old woman's threats and promises; the dread of giving her offence;
and the habit, unusual to a child, but almost natural to Florence now, of
being quiet, and repressing what she felt, and feared, and hoped; enabled
her to do this bidding, and to tell her little history, or what she knew of
it. Mrs Brown listened attentively, until she had finished.
'So your name's Dombey, eh?' said Mrs Brown.
'I want that pretty frock, Miss Dombey,' said Good Mrs Brown, 'and that
little bonnet, and a petticoat or two, and anything else you can spare.
Come! Take 'em off.'
Florence obeyed, as fast as her trembling hands would allow; keeping,
all the while, a frightened eye on Mrs Brown. When she had divested herself
of all the articles of apparel mentioned by that lady, Mrs B. examined them
at leisure, and seemed tolerably well satisfied with their quality and
value.
'Humph!' she said, running her eyes over the child's slight figure, 'I
don't see anything else - except the shoes. I must have the shoes, Miss
Dombey.'
Poor little Florence took them off with equal alacrity, only too glad
to have any more means of conciliation about her. The old woman then
produced some wretched substitutes from the bottom of the heap of rags,
which she turned up for that purpose; together with a girl's cloak, quite
worn out and very old; and the crushed remains of a bonnet that had probably
been picked up from some ditch or dunghill. In this dainty raiment, she
instructed Florence to dress herself; and as such preparation seemed a
prelude to her release, the child complied with increased readiness, if
possible.
In hurriedly putting on the bonnet, if that may be called a bonnet
which was more like a pad to carry loads on, she caught it in her hair which
grew luxuriantly, and could not immediately disentangle it. Good Mrs Brown
whipped out a large pair of scissors, and fell into an unaccountable state
of excitement.
'Why couldn't you let me be!' said Mrs Brown, 'when I was contented?
You little fool!'
'I beg your pardon. I don't know what I have done,' panted Florence. 'I
couldn't help it.'
'Couldn't help it!' cried Mrs Brown. 'How do you expect I can help it?
Why, Lord!' said the old woman, ruffling her curls with a furious pleasure,
'anybody but me would have had 'em off, first of all.' Florence was so
relieved to find that it was only her hair and not her head which Mrs Brown
coveted, that she offered no resistance or entreaty, and merely raised her
mild eyes towards the face of that good soul.
'If I hadn't once had a gal of my own - beyond seas now- that was proud
of her hair,' said Mrs Brown, 'I'd have had every lock of it. She's far
away, she's far away! Oho! Oho!'
Mrs Brown's was not a melodious cry, but, accompanied with a wild
tossing up of her lean arms, it was full of passionate grief, and thrilled
to the heart of Florence, whom it frightened more than ever. It had its
part, perhaps, in saving her curls; for Mrs Brown, after hovering about her
with the scissors for some moments, like a new kind of butterfly, bade her
hide them under the bonnet and let no trace of them escape to tempt her.
Having accomplished this victory over herself, Mrs Brown resumed her seat on
the bones, and smoked a very short black pipe, mowing and mumbling all the
time, as if she were eating the stem.
When the pipe was smoked out, she gave the child a rabbit-skin to
carry, that she might appear the more like her ordinary companion, and told
her that she was now going to lead her to a public street whence she could
inquire her way to her friends. But she cautioned her, with threats of
summary and deadly vengeance in case of disobedience, not to talk to
strangers, nor to repair to her own home (which may have been too near for
Mrs Brown's convenience), but to her father's office in the City; also to
wait at the street corner where she would be left, until the clock struck
three. These directions Mrs Brown enforced with assurances that there would
be potent eyes and ears in her employment cognizant of all she did; and
these directions Florence promised faithfully and earnestly to observe.
At length, Mrs Brown, issuing forth, conducted her changed and ragged
little friend through a labyrinth of narrow streets and lanes and alleys,
which emerged, after a long time, upon a stable yard, with a gateway at the
end, whence the roar of a great thoroughfare made itself audible. Pointing
out this gateway, and informing Florence that when the clocks struck three
she was to go to the left, Mrs Brown, after making a parting grasp at her
hair which seemed involuntary and quite beyond her own control, told her she
knew what to do, and bade her go and do it: remembering that she was
watched.
With a lighter heart, but still sore afraid, Florence felt herself
released, and tripped off to the corner. When she reached it, she looked
back and saw the head of Good Mrs Brown peeping out of the low wooden
passage, where she had issued her parting injunctions; likewise the fist of
Good Mrs Brown shaking towards her. But though she often looked back
afterwards - every minute, at least, in her nervous recollection of the old
woman - she could not see her again.
Florence remained there, looking at the bustle in the street, and more
and more bewildered by it; and in the meanwhile the clocks appeared to have
made up their minds never to strike three any more. At last the steeples
rang out three o'clock; there was one close by, so she couldn't be mistaken;
and - after often looking over her shoulder, and often going a little way,
and as often coming back again, lest the all-powerful spies of Mrs Brown
should take offence - she hurried off, as fast as she could in her slipshod
shoes, holding the rabbit-skin tight in her hand.
All she knew of her father's offices was that they belonged to Dombey
and Son, and that that was a great power belonging to the City. So she could
only ask the way to Dombey and Son's in the City; and as she generally made
inquiry of children - being afraid to ask grown people - she got very little
satisfaction indeed. But by dint of asking her way to the City after a
while, and dropping the rest of her inquiry for the present, she really did
advance, by slow degrees, towards the heart of that great region which is
governed by the terrible Lord Mayor.
Tired of walking, repulsed and pushed about, stunned by the noise and
confusion, anxious for her brother and the nurses, terrified by what she had
undergone, and the prospect of encountering her angry father in such an
altered state; perplexed and frightened alike by what had passed, and what
was passing, and what was yet before her; Florence went upon her weary way
with tearful eyes, and once or twice could not help stopping to ease her
bursting heart by crying bitterly. But few people noticed her at those
times, in the garb she wore: or if they did, believed that she was tutored
to excite compassion, and passed on. Florence, too, called to her aid all
the firmness and self-reliance of a character that her sad experience had
prematurely formed and tried: and keeping the end she had in view steadily
before her, steadily pursued it.
It was full two hours later in the afternoon than when she had started
on this strange adventure, when, escaping from the clash and clangour of a
narrow street full of carts and waggons, she peeped into a kind of wharf or
landing-place upon the river-side, where there were a great many packages,
casks, and boxes, strewn about; a large pair of wooden scales; and a little
wooden house on wheels, outside of which, looking at the neighbouring masts
and boats, a stout man stood whistling, with his pen behind his ear, and his
hands in his pockets, as if his day's work were nearly done.
'Now then! 'said this man, happening to turn round. 'We haven't got
anything for you, little girl. Be off!'
'If you please, is this the City?' asked the trembling daughter of the
Dombeys.
'Ah! It's the City. You know that well enough, I daresay. Be off! We
haven't got anything for you.'
'I don't want anything, thank you,' was the timid answer. 'Except to
know the way to Dombey and Son's.'
The man who had been strolling carelessly towards her, seemed surprised
by this reply, and looking attentively in her face, rejoined:
'Why, what can you want with Dombey and Son's?'
'To know the way there, if you please.'
The man looked at her yet more curiously, and rubbed the back of his
head so hard in his wonderment that he knocked his own hat off.
'Joe!' he called to another man - a labourer- as he picked it up and
put it on again.
'Joe it is!' said Joe.
'Where's that young spark of Dombey's who's been watching the shipment
of them goods?'
'Just gone, by t'other gate,' said Joe.
'Call him back a minute.'
Joe ran up an archway, bawling as he went, and very soon returned
with a blithe-looking boy.
'You're Dombey's jockey, ain't you?' said the first man.
'I'm in Dombey's House, Mr Clark,' returned the boy.
'Look'ye here, then,' said Mr Clark.
Obedient to the indication of Mr Clark's hand, the boy approached
towards Florence, wondering, as well he might, what he had to do with her.
But she, who had heard what passed, and who, besides the relief of so
suddenly considering herself safe at her journey's end, felt reassured
beyond all measure by his lively youthful face and manner, ran eagerly up to
him, leaving one of the slipshod shoes upon the ground and caught his hand
in both of hers.
'I am lost, if you please!' said Florence.
'Lost!' cried the boy.
'Yes, I was lost this morning, a long way from here - and I have had my
clothes taken away, since - and I am not dressed in my own now - and my name
is Florence Dombey, my little brother's only sister - and, oh dear, dear,
take care of me, if you please!' sobbed Florence, giving full vent to the
childish feelings she had so long suppressed, and bursting into tears. At
the same time her miserable bonnet falling off, her hair came tumbling down
about her face: moving to speechless admiration and commiseration, young
Walter, nephew of Solomon Gills, Ships' Instrument-maker in general.
Mr Clark stood rapt in amazement: observing under his breath, I never
saw such a start on this wharf before. Walter picked up the shoe, and put it
on the little foot as the Prince in the story might have fitted Cinderella's
slipper on. He hung the rabbit-skin over his left arm; gave the right to
Florence; and felt, not to say like Richard Whittington - that is a tame
comparison - but like Saint George of England, with the dragon lying dead
before him.
'Don't cry, Miss Dombey,' said Walter, in a transport of
enthusiasm.
'What a wonderful thing for me that I am here! You are as safe now as
if you were guarded by a whole boat's crew of picked men from a man-of-war.
Oh, don't cry.'
'I won't cry any more,' said Florence. 'I am only crying for joy.'
'Crying for joy!' thought Walter, 'and I'm the cause of it! Come along,
Miss Dombey. There's the other shoe off now! Take mine, Miss Dombey.'
'No, no, no,' said Florence, checking him in the act of impetuously
pulling off his own. 'These do better. These do very well.'
'Why, to be sure,' said Walter, glancing at her foot, 'mine are a mile
too large. What am I thinking about! You never could walk in mine! Come
along, Miss Dombey. Let me see the villain who will dare molest you now.'
So Walter, looking immensely fierce, led off Florence, looking very
happy; and they went arm-in-arm along the streets, perfectly indifferent to
any astonishment that their appearance might or did excite by the way.
It was growing dark and foggy, and beginning to rain too; but they
cared nothing for this: being both wholly absorbed in the late adventures of
Florence, which she related with the innocent good faith and confidence of
her years, while Walter listened as if, far from the mud and grease of
Thames Street, they were rambling alone among the broad leaves and tall
trees of some desert island in the tropics - as he very likely fancied, for
the time, they were.
'Have we far to go?' asked Florence at last, lilting up her eyes to her
companion's face.
'Ah! By-the-bye,' said Walter, stopping, 'let me see; where are we? Oh!
I know. But the offices are shut up now, Miss Dombey. There's nobody there.
Mr Dombey has gone home long ago. I suppose we must go home too? or, stay.
Suppose I take you to my Uncle's, where I live - it's very near here - and
go to your house in a coach to tell them you are safe, and bring you back
some clothes. Won't that be best?'
'I think so,' answered Florence. 'Don't you? What do you think?'
As they stood deliberating in the street, a man passed them, who
glanced quickly at Walter as he went by, as if he recognised him; but
seeming to correct that first impression, he passed on without stopping.
'Why, I think it's Mr Carker,' said Walter. 'Carker in our House. Not
Carker our Manager, Miss Dombey - the other Carker; the Junior - Halloa! Mr
Carker!'
'Is that Walter Gay?' said the other, stopping and returning. 'I
couldn't believe it, with such a strange companion.
As he stood near a lamp, listening with surprise to Walter's hurried
explanation, he presented a remarkable contrast to the two youthful figures
arm-in-arm before him. He was not old, but his hair was white; his body was
bent, or bowed as if by the weight of some great trouble: and there were
deep lines in his worn and melancholy face. The fire of his eyes, the
expression of his features, the very voice in which he spoke, were all
subdued and quenched, as if the spirit within him lay in ashes. He was
respectably, though very plainly dressed, in black; but his clothes, moulded
to the general character of his figure, seemed to shrink and abase
themselves upon him, and to join in the sorrowful solicitation which the
whole man from head to foot expressed, to be left unnoticed, and alone in
his humility.
And yet his interest in youth and hopefulness was not extinguished with
the other embers of his soul, for he watched the boy's earnest countenance
as he spoke with unusual sympathy, though with an inexplicable show of
trouble and compassion, which escaped into his looks, however hard he strove
to hold it prisoner. When Walter, in conclusion, put to him the question he
had put to Florence, he still stood glancing at him with the same
expression, as if he had read some fate upon his face, mournfully at
variance with its present brightness.
'What do you advise, Mr Carker?' said Walter, smiling. 'You always give
me good advice, you know, when you do speak to me. That's not often,
though.'
'I think your own idea is the best,' he answered: looking from Florence
to Walter, and back again.
'Mr Carker,' said Walter, brightening with a generous thought, 'Come!
Here's a chance for you. Go you to Mr Dombey's, and be the messenger of good
news. It may do you some good, Sir. I'll remain at home. You shall go.'
'I!' returned the other.
'Yes. Why not, Mr Carker?' said the boy.
He merely shook him by the hand in answer; he seemed in a manner
ashamed and afraid even to do that; and bidding him good-night, and advising
him to make haste, turned away.
'Come, Miss Dombey,' said Walter, looking after him as they turned away
also, 'we'll go to my Uncle's as quick as we can. Did you ever hear Mr
Dombey speak of Mr Carker the Junior, Miss Florence?'
'No,' returned the child, mildly, 'I don't often hear Papa speak.'
'Ah! true! more shame for him,' thought Walter. After a minute's pause,
during which he had been looking down upon the gentle patient little face
moving on at his side, he said, 'The strangest man, Mr Carker the Junior is,
Miss Florence, that ever you heard of. If you could understand what an
extraordinary interest he takes in me, and yet how he shuns me and avoids
me; and what a low place he holds in our office, and how he is never
advanced, and never complains, though year after year he sees young men
passed over his head, and though his brother (younger than he is), is our
head Manager, you would be as much puzzled about him as I am.'
As Florence could hardly be expected to understand much about it,
Walter bestirred himself with his accustomed boyish animation and
restlessness to change the subject; and one of the unfortunate shoes coming
off again opportunely, proposed to carry Florence to his uncle's in his
arms. Florence, though very tired, laughingly declined the proposal, lest he
should let her fall; and as they were already near the wooden Midshipman,
and as Walter went on to cite various precedents, from shipwrecks and other
moving accidents, where younger boys than he had triumphantly rescued and
carried off older girls than Florence, they were still in full conversation
about it when they arrived at the Instrument-maker's door.
'Holloa, Uncle Sol!' cried Walter, bursting into the shop, and speaking
incoherently and out of breath, from that time forth, for the rest of the
evening. 'Here's a wonderful adventure! Here's Mr Dombey's daughter lost in
the streets, and robbed of her clothes by an old witch of a woman - found by
me - brought home to our parlour to rest - look here!'
'Good Heaven!' said Uncle Sol, starting back against his favourite
compass-case. 'It can't be! Well, I - '
'No, nor anybody else,' said Walter, anticipating the rest. 'Nobody
would, nobody could, you know. Here! just help me lift the little sofa near
the fire, will you, Uncle Sol - take care of the plates - cut some dinner
for her, will you, Uncle - throw those shoes under the grate. Miss Florence
- put your feet on the fender to dry - how damp they are - here's an
adventure, Uncle, eh? - God bless my soul, how hot I am!'
Solomon Gills was quite as hot, by sympathy, and in excessive
bewilderment. He patted Florence's head, pressed her to eat, pressed her to
drink, rubbed the soles of her feet with his pocket-handkerchief heated at
the fire, followed his locomotive nephew with his eyes, and ears, and had no
clear perception of anything except that he was being constantly knocked
against and tumbled over by that excited young gentleman, as he darted about
the room attempting to accomplish twenty things at once, and doing nothing
at all.
'Here, wait a minute, Uncle,' he continued, catching up a candle, 'till
I run upstairs, and get another jacket on, and then I'll be off. I say,
Uncle, isn't this an adventure?'
'My dear boy,' said Solomon, who, with his spectacles on his forehead
and the great chronometer in his pocket, was incessantly oscillating between
Florence on the sofa, and his nephew in all parts of the parlour, 'it's the
most extraordinary - '
'No, but do, Uncle, please - do, Miss Florence - dinner, you know,
Uncle.'
'Yes, yes, yes,' cried Solomon, cutting instantly into a leg of mutton,
as if he were catering for a giant. 'I'll take care of her, Wally! I
understand. Pretty dear! Famished, of course. You go and get ready. Lord
bless me! Sir Richard Whittington thrice Lord Mayor of London.'
Walter was not very long in mounting to his lofty garret and descending
from it, but in the meantime Florence, overcome by fatigue, had sunk into a
doze before the fire. The short interval of quiet, though only a few minutes
in duration, enabled Solomon Gills so far to collect his wits as to make
some little arrangements for her comfort, and to darken the room, and to
screen her from the blaze. Thus, when the boy returned, she was sleeping
peacefully.
'That's capital!' he whispered, giving Solomon such a hug that it
squeezed a new expression into his face. 'Now I'm off. I'll just take a
crust of bread with me, for I'm very hungry - and don't wake her, Uncle
Sol.'
'No, no,' said Solomon. 'Pretty child.'
'Pretty, indeed!' cried Walter. 'I never saw such a face, Uncle Sol.
Now I'm off.'
'That's right,' said Solomon, greatly relieved.
'I say, Uncle Sol,' cried Walter, putting his face in at the door.
'Here he is again,' said Solomon.
'How does she look now?'
'Quite happy,' said Solomon.
'That's famous! now I'm off.'
'I hope you are,' said Solomon to himself.
'I say, Uncle Sol,' cried Walter, reappearing at the door.
'Here he is again!' said Solomon.
'We met Mr Carker the Junior in the street, queerer than ever. He bade
me good-bye, but came behind us here - there's an odd thing! - for when we
reached the shop door, I looked round, and saw him going quietly away, like
a servant who had seen me home, or a faithful dog. How does she look now,
Uncle?'
'Pretty much the same as before, Wally,' replied Uncle Sol.
'That's right. Now I am off!'
And this time he really was: and Solomon Gills, with no appetite for
dinner, sat on the opposite side of the fire, watching Florence in her
slumber, building a great many airy castles of the most fantastic
architecture; and looking, in the dim shade, and in the close vicinity of
all the instruments, like a magician disguised in a Welsh wig and a suit of
coffee colour, who held the child in an enchanted sleep.
In the meantime, Walter proceeded towards Mr Dombey's house at a pace
seldom achieved by a hack horse from the stand; and yet with his head out of
window every two or three minutes, in impatient remonstrance with the
driver. Arriving at his journey's end, he leaped out, and breathlessly
announcing his errand to the servant, followed him straight into the
library, we there was a great confusion of tongues, and where Mr Dombey, his
sister, and Miss Tox, Richards, and Nipper, were all congregated together.
'Oh! I beg your pardon, Sir,' said Walter, rushing up to him, 'but I'm
happy to say it's all right, Sir. Miss Dombey's found!'
The boy with his open face, and flowing hair, and sparkling eyes,
panting with pleasure and excitement, was wonderfully opposed to Mr Dombey,
as he sat confronting him in his library chair.
'I told you, Louisa, that she would certainly be found,' said Mr
Dombey, looking slightly over his shoulder at that lady, who wept in company
with Miss Tox. 'Let the servants know that no further steps are necessary.
This boy who brings the information, is young Gay, from the office. How was
my daughter found, Sir? I know how she was lost.' Here he looked
majestically at Richards. 'But how was she found? Who found her?'
'Why, I believe I found Miss Dombey, Sir,' said Walter modestly, 'at
least I don't know that I can claim the merit of having exactly found her,
Sir, but I was the fortunate instrument of - '
'What do you mean, Sir,' interrupted Mr Dombey, regarding the boy's
evident pride and pleasure in his share of the transaction with an
instinctive dislike, 'by not having exactly found my daughter, and by being
a fortunate instrument? Be plain and coherent, if you please.'
It was quite out of Walter's power to be coherent; but he rendered
himself as explanatory as he could, in his breathless state, and stated why
he had come alone.
'You hear this, girl?' said Mr Dombey sternly to the black-eyed. 'Take
what is necessary, and return immediately with this young man to fetch Miss
Florence home. Gay, you will be rewarded to-morrow.
'Oh! thank you, Sir,' said Walter. 'You are very kind. I'm sure I was
not thinking of any reward, Sir.'
'You are a boy,' said Mr Dombey, suddenly and almost fiercely; 'and
what you think of, or affect to think of, is of little consequence. You have
done well, Sir. Don't undo it. Louisa, please to give the lad some wine.'
Mr Dombey's glance followed Walter Gay with sharp disfavour, as he left
the room under the pilotage of Mrs Chick; and it may be that his mind's eye
followed him with no greater relish, as he rode back to his Uncle's with
Miss Susan Nipper.
There they found that Florence, much refreshed by sleep, had dined, and
greatly improved the acquaintance of Solomon Gills, with whom she was on
terms of perfect confidence and ease. The black-eyed (who had cried so much
that she might now be called the red-eyed, and who was very silent and
depressed) caught her in her arms without a word of contradiction or
reproach, and made a very hysterical meeting of it. Then converting the
parlour, for the nonce, into a private tiring room, she dressed her, with
great care, in proper clothes; and presently led her forth, as like a Dombey
as her natural disqualifications admitted of her being made.
'Good-night!' said Florence, running up to Solomon. 'You have been very
good to me.
Old Sol was quite delighted, and kissed her like her grand-father.
'Good-night, Walter! Good-bye!' said Florence.
'Good-bye!' said Walter, giving both his hands.
'I'll never forget you,' pursued Florence. 'No! indeed I never will.
Good-bye, Walter!' In the innocence of her grateful heart, the child lifted
up her face to his. Walter, bending down his own, raised it again, all red
and burning; and looked at Uncle Sol, quite sheepishly.
'Where's Walter?' 'Good-night, Walter!' 'Good-bye, Walter!' 'Shake
hands once more, Walter!' This was still Florence's cry, after she was shut
up with her little maid, in the coach. And when the coach at length moved
off, Walter on the door-step gaily turned the waving of her handkerchief,
while the wooden Midshipman behind him seemed, like himself, intent upon
that coach alone, excluding all the other passing coaches from his
observation.
In good time Mr Dombey's mansion was gained again, and again there was
a noise of tongues in the library. Again, too, the coach was ordered to wait
- 'for Mrs Richards,' one of Susan's fellow-servants ominously whispered, as
she passed with Florence.
The entrance of the lost child made a slight sensation, but not much.
Mr Dombey, who had never found her, kissed her once upon the forehead, and
cautioned her not to run away again, or wander anywhere with treacherous
attendants. Mrs Chick stopped in her lamentations on the corruption of human
nature, even when beckoned to the paths of virtue by a Charitable Grinder;
and received her with a welcome something short of the reception due to none
but perfect Dombeys. Miss Tox regulated her feelings by the models before
her. Richards, the culprit Richards, alone poured out her heart in broken
words of welcome, and bowed herself over the little wandering head as if she
really loved it.
'Ah, Richards!' said Mrs Chick, with a sigh. 'It would have been much
more satisfactory to those who wish to think well of their fellow creatures,
and much more becoming in you, if you had shown some proper feeling, in
time, for the little child that is now going to be prematurely deprived of
its natural nourishment.
'Cut off,' said Miss Tox, in a plaintive whisper, 'from one common
fountain!'
'If it was ungrateful case,' said Mrs Chick, solemnly, 'and I had your
reflections, Richards, I should feel as if the Charitable Grinders' dress
would blight my child, and the education choke him.'
For the matter of that - but Mrs Chick didn't know it - he had been
pretty well blighted by the dress already; and as to the education, even its
retributive effect might be produced in time, for it was a storm of sobs and
blows.
'Louisa!' said Mr Dombey. 'It is not necessary to prolong these
observations. The woman is discharged and paid. You leave this house,
Richards, for taking my son - my son,' said Mr Dombey, emphatically
repeating these two words, 'into haunts and into society which are not to be
thought of without a shudder. As to the accident which befel Miss Florence
this morning, I regard that as, in one great sense, a happy and fortunate
circumstance; inasmuch as, but for that occurrence, I never could have known
- and from your own lips too - of what you had been guilty. I think, Louisa,
the other nurse, the young person,' here Miss Nipper sobbed aloud, 'being so
much younger, and necessarily influenced by Paul's nurse, may remain. Have
the goodness to direct that this woman's coach is paid to' - Mr Dombey
stopped and winced - 'to Staggs's Gardens.'
Polly moved towards the door, with Florence holding to her dress, and
crying to her in the most pathetic manner not to go away. It was a dagger in
the haughty father's heart, an arrow in his brain, to see how the flesh and
blood he could not disown clung to this obscure stranger, and he sitting by.
Not that he cared to whom his daughter turned, or from whom turned away. The
swift sharp agony struck through him, as he thought of what his son might
do.
His son cried lustily that night, at all events. Sooth to say, poor
Paul had better reason for his tears than sons of that age often have, for
he had lost his second mother - his first, so far as he knew - by a stroke
as sudden as that natural affliction which had darkened the beginning of his
life. At the same blow, his sister too, who cried herself to sleep so
mournfully, had lost as good and true a friend. But that is quite beside the
question. Let us waste no words about it.
A Bird's-eye Glimpse of Miss Tox's Dwelling-place: also of the State of
Miss Tox's Affections
Miss Tox inhabited a dark little house that had been squeezed, at some
remote period of English History, into a fashionable neighbourhood at the
west end of the town, where it stood in the shade like a poor relation of
the great street round the corner, coldly looked down upon by mighty
mansions. It was not exactly in a court, and it was not exactly in a yard;
but it was in the dullest of No-Thoroughfares, rendered anxious and haggard
by distant double knocks. The name of this retirement, where grass grew
between the chinks in the stone pavement, was Princess's Place; and in
Princess's Place was Princess's Chapel, with a tinkling bell, where
sometimes as many as five-and-twenty people attended service on a Sunday.
The Princess's Arms was also there, and much resorted to by splendid
footmen. A sedan chair was kept inside the railing before the Princess's
Arms, but it had never come out within the memory of man; and on fine
mornings, the top of every rail (there were eight-and-forty, as Miss Tox had
often counted) was decorated with a pewter-pot.
There was another private house besides Miss Tox's in Princess's Place:
not to mention an immense Pair of gates, with an immense pair of lion-headed
knockers on them, which were never opened by any chance, and were supposed
to constitute a disused entrance to somebody's stables. Indeed, there was a
smack of stabling in the air of Princess's Place; and Miss Tox's bedroom
(which was at the back) commanded a vista of Mews, where hostlers, at
whatever sort of work engaged, were continually accompanying themselves with
effervescent noises; and where the most domestic and confidential garments
of coachmen and their wives and families, usually hung, like Macbeth's
banners, on the outward walls.'
At this other private house in Princess's Place, tenanted by a retired
butler who had married a housekeeper, apartments were let Furnished, to a
single gentleman: to wit, a wooden-featured, blue-faced Major, with his eyes
starting out of his head, in whom Miss Tox recognised, as she herself
expressed it, 'something so truly military;' and between whom and herself,
an occasional interchange of newspapers and pamphlets, and such Platonic
dalliance, was effected through the medium of a dark servant of the Major's
who Miss Tox was quite content to classify as a 'native,' without connecting
him with any geographical idea whatever.
Perhaps there never was a smaller entry and staircase, than the entry
and staircase of Miss Tox's house. Perhaps, taken altogether, from top to
bottom, it was the most inconvenient little house in England, and the
crookedest; but then, Miss Tox said, what a situation! There was very little
daylight to be got there in the winter: no sun at the best of times: air was
out of the question, and traffic was walled out. Still Miss Tox said, think
of the situation! So said the blue-faced Major, whose eyes were starting out
of his head: who gloried in Princess's Place: and who delighted to turn the
conversation at his club, whenever he could, to something connected with
some of the great people in the great street round the corner, that he might
have the satisfaction of saying they were his neighbours.
In short, with Miss Tox and the blue-faced Major, it was enough for
Princess's Place - as with a very small fragment of society, it is enough
for many a little hanger-on of another sort - to be well connected, and to
have genteel blood in its veins. It might be poor, mean, shabby, stupid,
dull. No matter. The great street round the corner trailed off into
Princess's Place; and that which of High Holborn would have become a
choleric word, spoken of Princess's Place became flat blasphemy.
The dingy tenement inhabited by Miss Tox was her own; having been
devised and bequeathed to her by the deceased owner of the fishy eye in the
locket, of whom a miniature portrait, with a powdered head and a pigtail,
balanced the kettle-holder on opposite sides of the parlour fireplace. The
greater part of the furniture was of the powdered-head and pig-tail period:
comprising a plate-warmer, always languishing and sprawling its four
attenuated bow legs in somebody's way; and an obsolete harpsichord,
illuminated round the maker's name with a painted garland of sweet peas. In
any part of the house, visitors were usually cognizant of a prevailing
mustiness; and in warm weather Miss Tox had been seen apparently writing in
sundry chinks and crevices of the wainscoat with the the wrong end of a pen
dipped in spirits of turpentine.
Although Major Bagstock had arrived at what is called in polite
literature, the grand meridian of life, and was proceeding on his journey
downhill with hardly any throat, and a very rigid pair of jaw-bones, and
long-flapped elephantine ears, and his eyes and complexion in the state of
artificial excitement already mentioned, he was mightily proud of awakening
an interest in Miss Tox, and tickled his vanity with the fiction that she
was a splendid woman who had her eye on him. This he had several times
hinted at the club: in connexion with little jocularities, of which old Joe
Bagstock, old Joey Bagstock, old J. Bagstock, old Josh Bagstock, or so
forth, was the perpetual theme: it being, as it were, the Major's stronghold
and donjon-keep of light humour, to be on the most familiar terms with his
own name.
'Joey B., Sir,'the Major would say, with a flourish of his
walking-stick, 'is worth a dozen of you. If you had a few more of the
Bagstock breed among you, Sir, you'd be none the worse for it. Old Joe, Sir,
needn't look far for a wile even now, if he was on the look-out; but he's
hard-hearted, Sir, is Joe - he's tough, Sir, tough, and de-vilish sly!'
After such a declaration, wheezing sounds would be heard; and the Major's
blue would deepen into purple, while his eyes strained and started
convulsively.
Notwithstanding his very liberal laudation of himself, however, the
Major was selfish. It may be doubted whether there ever was a more entirely
selfish person at heart; or at stomach is perhaps a better expression,
seeing that he was more decidedly endowed with that latter organ than with
the former. He had no idea of being overlooked or slighted by anybody; least
of all, had he the remotest comprehension of being overlooked and slighted
by Miss Tox.
And yet, Miss Tox, as it appeared, forgot him - gradually forgot him.
She began to forget him soon after her discovery of the Toodle family. She
continued to forget him up to the time of the christening. She went on
forgetting him with compound interest after that. Something or somebody had
superseded him as a source of interest.
'Good morning, Ma'am,' said the Major, meeting Miss Tox in Princess's
Place, some weeks after the changes chronicled in the last chapter.
'Good morning, Sir,' said Miss Tox; very coldly.
'Joe Bagstock, Ma'am,' observed the Major, with his usual gallantry,
'has not had the happiness of bowing to you at your window, for a
considerable period. Joe has been hardly used, Ma'am. His sun has been
behind a cloud.'
Miss Tox inclined her head; but very coldly indeed.
'Joe's luminary has been out of town, Ma'am, perhaps,' inquired the
Major.
'I? out of town? oh no, I have not been out of town,' said Miss Tox. 'I
have been much engaged lately. My time is nearly all devoted to some very
intimate friends. I am afraid I have none to spare, even now. Good morning,
Sir!'
As Miss Tox, with her most fascinating step and carriage, disappeared
from Princess's Place, the Major stood looking after her with a bluer face
than ever: muttering and growling some not at all complimentary remarks.
'Why, damme, Sir,' said the Major, rolling his lobster eyes round and
round Princess's Place, and apostrophizing its fragrant air, 'six months
ago, the woman loved the ground Josh Bagstock walked on. What's the meaning
of it?'
The Major decided, after some consideration, that it meant mantraps;
that it meant plotting and snaring; that Miss Tox was digging pitfalls. 'But
you won't catch Joe, Ma'am,' said the Major. 'He's tough, Ma'am, tough, is
J.B. Tough, and de-vilish sly!' over which reflection he chuckled for the
rest of the day.
But still, when that day and many other days were gone and past, it
seemed that Miss Tox took no heed whatever of the Major, and thought nothing
at all about him. She had been wont, once upon a time, to look out at one of
her little dark windows by accident, and blushingly return the Major's
greeting; but now, she never gave the Major a chance, and cared nothing at
all whether he looked over the way or not. Other changes had come to pass
too. The Major, standing in the shade of his own apartment, could make out
that an air of greater smartness had recently come over Miss Tox's house;
that a new cage with gilded wires had been provided for the ancient little
canary bird; that divers ornaments, cut out of coloured card-boards and
paper, seemed to decorate the chimney-piece and tables; that a plant or two
had suddenly sprung up in the windows; that Miss Tox occasionally practised
on the harpsichord, whose garland of sweet peas was always displayed
ostentatiously, crowned with the Copenhagen and Bird Waltzes in a Music Book
of Miss Tox's own copying.
Over and above all this, Miss Tox had long been dressed with uncommon
care and elegance in slight mourning. But this helped the Major out of his
difficulty; and be determined within himself that she had come into a small
legacy, and grown proud.
It was on the very next day after he had eased his mind by arriving at
this decision, that the Major, sitting at his breakfast, saw an apparition
so tremendous and wonderful in Miss Tox's little drawing-room, that he
remained for some time rooted to his chair; then, rushing into the next
room, returned with a double-barrelled opera-glass, through which he
surveyed it intently for some minutes.
'It's a Baby, Sir,' said the Major, shutting up the glass again, 'for
fifty thousand pounds!'
The Major couldn't forget it. He could do nothing but whistle, and
stare to that extent, that his eyes, compared with what they now became, had
been in former times quite cavernous and sunken. Day after day, two, three,
four times a week, this Baby reappeared. The Major continued to stare and
whistle. To all other intents and purposes he was alone in Princess's Place.
Miss Tox had ceased to mind what he did. He might have been black as well as
blue, and it would have been of no consequence to her.
The perseverance with which she walked out of Princess's Place to fetch
this baby and its nurse, and walked back with them, and walked home with
them again, and continually mounted guard over them; and the perseverance
with which she nursed it herself, and fed it, and played with it, and froze
its young blood with airs upon the harpsichord, was extraordinary. At about
this same period too, she was seized with a passion for looking at a certain
bracelet; also with a passion for looking at the moon, of which she would
take long observations from her chamber window. But whatever she looked at;
sun, moon, stars, or bracelet; she looked no more at the Major. And the
Major whistled, and stared, and wondered, and dodged about his room, and
could make nothing of it.
'You'll quite win my brother Paul's heart, and that's the truth, my
dear,' said Mrs Chick, one day.
Miss Tox turned pale.
'He grows more like Paul every day,' said Mrs Chick.
Miss Tox returned no other reply than by taking the little Paul in her
arms, and making his cockade perfectly flat and limp with her caresses.
'His mother, my dear,' said Miss Tox, 'whose acquaintance I was to have
made through you, does he at all resemble her?'
'Not at all,' returned Louisa
'She was - she was pretty, I believe?' faltered Miss Tox.
'Why, poor dear Fanny was interesting,' said Mrs Chick, after some
judicial consideration. 'Certainly interesting. She had not that air of
commanding superiority which one would somehow expect, almost as a matter of
course, to find in my brother's wife; nor had she that strength and vigour
of mind which such a man requires.'
Miss Tox heaved a deep sigh.
'But she was pleasing:' said Mrs Chick: 'extremely so. And she meant! -
oh, dear, how well poor Fanny meant!'
'You Angel!' cried Miss Tox to little Paul. 'You Picture of your own
Papa!'
If the Major could have known how many hopes and ventures, what a
multitude of plans and speculations, rested on that baby head; and could
have seen them hovering, in all their heterogeneous confusion and disorder,
round the puckered cap of the unconscious little Paul; he might have stared
indeed. Then would he have recognised, among the crowd, some few ambitious
motes and beams belonging to Miss Tox; then would he perhaps have understood
the nature of that lady's faltering investment in the Dombey Firm.
If the child himself could have awakened in the night, and seen,
gathered about his cradle-curtains, faint reflections of the dreams that
other people had of him, they might have scared him, with good reason. But
he slumbered on, alike unconscious of the kind intentions of Miss Tox, the
wonder of the Major, the early sorrows of his sister, and the stern visions
of his father; and innocent that any spot of earth contained a Dombey or a
Son.
Paul's Further Progress, Growth and Character
Beneath the watching and attentive eyes of Time - so far another Major
- Paul's slumbers gradually changed. More and more light broke in upon them;
distincter and distincter dreams disturbed them; an accumulating crowd of
objects and impressions swarmed about his rest; and so he passed from
babyhood to childhood, and became a talking, walking, wondering Dombey.
On the downfall and banishment of Richards, the nursery may be said to
have been put into commission: as a Public Department is sometimes, when no
individual Atlas can be found to support it The Commissioners were, of
course, Mrs Chick and Miss Tox: who devoted themselves to their duties with
such astonishing ardour that Major Bagstock had every day some new reminder
of his being forsaken, while Mr Chick, bereft of domestic supervision, cast
himself upon the gay world, dined at clubs and coffee-houses, smelt of smoke
on three different occasions, went to the play by himself, and in short,
loosened (as Mrs Chick once told him) every social bond, and moral
obligation.
Yet, in spite of his early promise, all this vigilance and care could
not make little Paul a thriving boy. Naturally delicate, perhaps, he pined
and wasted after the dismissal of his nurse, and, for a long time, seemed
but to wait his opportunity of gliding through their hands, and seeking his
lost mother. This dangerous ground in his steeple-chase towards manhood
passed, he still found it very rough riding, and was grievously beset by all
the obstacles in his course. Every tooth was a break-neck fence, and every
pimple in the measles a stone wall to him. He was down in every fit of the
hooping-cough, and rolled upon and crushed by a whole field of small
diseases, that came trooping on each other's heels to prevent his getting up
again. Some bird of prey got into his throat instead of the thrush; and the
very chickens turning ferocious - if they have anything to do with that
infant malady to which they lend their name - worried him like tiger-cats.
The chill of Paul's christening had struck home, perhaps to some
sensitive part of his nature, which could not recover itself in the cold
shade of his father; but he was an unfortunate child from that day. Mrs
Wickam often said she never see a dear so put upon.
Mrs Wickam was a waiter's wife - which would seem equivalent to being
any other man's widow - whose application for an engagement in Mr Dombey's
service had been favourably considered, on account of the apparent
impossibility of her having any followers, or anyone to follow; and who,
from within a day or two of Paul's sharp weaning, had been engaged as his
nurse. Mrs Wickam was a meek woman, of a fair complexion, with her eyebrows
always elevated, and her head always drooping; who was always ready to pity
herself, or to be pitied, or to pity anybody else; and who had a surprising
natural gift of viewing all subjects in an utterly forlorn and pitiable
light, and bringing dreadful precedents to bear upon them, and deriving the
greatest consolation from the exercise of that talent.
It is hardly necessary to observe, that no touch of this quality ever
reached the magnificent knowledge of Mr Dombey. It would have been
remarkable, indeed, if any had; when no one in the house - not even Mrs
Chick or Miss Tox - dared ever whisper to him that there had, on any one
occasion, been the least reason for uneasiness in reference to little Paul.
He had settled, within himself, that the child must necessarily pass through
a certain routine of minor maladies, and that the sooner he did so the
better. If he could have bought him off, or provided a substitute, as in the
case of an unlucky drawing for the militia, he would have been glad to do
so, on liberal terms. But as this was not feasible, he merely wondered, in
his haughty-manner, now and then, what Nature meant by it; and comforted
himself with the reflection that there was another milestone passed upon the
road, and that the great end of the journey lay so much the nearer. For the
feeling uppermost in his mind, now and constantly intensifying, and
increasing in it as Paul grew older, was impatience. Impatience for the time
to come, when his visions of their united consequence and grandeur would be
triumphantly realized.
Some philosophers tell us that selfishness is at the root of our best
loves and affections.' Mr Dombey's young child was, from the beginning, so
distinctly important to him as a part of his own greatness, or (which is the
same thing) of the greatness of Dombey and Son, that there is no doubt his
parental affection might have been easily traced, like many a goodly
superstructure of fair fame, to a very low foundation. But he loved his son
with all the love he had. If there were a warm place in his frosty heart,
his son occupied it; if its very hard surface could receive the impression
of any image, the image of that son was there; though not so much as an
infant, or as a boy, but as a grown man - the 'Son' of the Firm. Therefore
he was impatient to advance into the future, and to hurry over the
intervening passages of his history. Therefore he had little or no anxiety'
about them, in spite of his love; feeling as if the boy had a charmed life,
and must become the man with whom he held such constant communication in his
thoughts, and for whom he planned and projected, as for an existing reality,
every day.
Thus Paul grew to be nearly five years old. He was a pretty little
fellow; though there was something wan and wistful in his small face, that
gave occasion to many significant shakes of Mrs Wickam's head, and many
long-drawn inspirations of Mrs Wickam's breath. His temper gave abundant
promise of being imperious in after-life; and he had as hopeful an
apprehension of his own importance, and the rightful subservience of all
other things and persons to it, as heart could desire. He was childish and
sportive enough at times, and not of a sullen disposition; but he had a
strange, old-fashioned, thoughtful way, at other times, of sitting brooding
in his miniature arm-chair, when he looked (and talked) like one of those
terrible little Beings in the Fairy tales, who, at a hundred and fifty or
two hundred years of age, fantastically represent the children for whom they
have been substituted. He would frequently be stricken with this precocious
mood upstairs in the nursery; and would sometimes lapse into it suddenly,
exclaiming that he was tired: even while playing with Florence, or driving
Miss Tox in single harness. But at no time did he fall into it so surely, as
when, his little chair being carried down into his father's room, he sat
there with him after dinner, by the fire. They were the strangest pair at
such a time that ever firelight shone upon. Mr Dombey so erect and solemn,
gazing at the blare; his little image, with an old, old face, peering into
the red perspective with the fixed and rapt attention of a sage. Mr Dombey
entertaining complicated worldly schemes and plans; the little image
entertaining Heaven knows what wild fancies, half-formed thoughts, and
wandering speculations. Mr Dombey stiff with starch and arrogance; the
little image by inheritance, and in unconscious imitation. The two so very
much alike, and yet so monstrously contrasted.
On one of these occasions, when they had both been perfectly quiet for
a long time, and Mr Dombey only knew that the child was awake by
occasionally glancing at his eye, where the bright fire was sparkling like a
jewel, little Paul broke silence thus:
'Papa! what's money?'
The abrupt question had such immediate reference to the subject of Mr
Dombey's thoughts, that Mr Dombey was quite disconcerted.
'What is money, Paul?' he answered. 'Money?'
'Yes,' said the child, laying his hands upon the elbows of his little
chair, and turning the old face up towards Mr Dombey's; 'what is money?'
Mr Dombey was in a difficulty. He would have liked to give him some
explanation involving the terms circulating-medium, currency, depreciation
of currency', paper, bullion, rates of exchange, value of precious metals in
the market, and so forth; but looking down at the little chair, and seeing
what a long way down it was, he answered: 'Gold, and silver, and copper.
Guineas, shillings, half-pence. You know what they are?'
'Oh yes, I know what they are,' said Paul. 'I don't mean that, Papa. I
mean what's money after all?'
Heaven and Earth, how old his face was as he turned it up again towards
his father's!
'What is money after all!' said Mr Dombey, backing his chair a little,
that he might the better gaze in sheer amazement at the presumptuous atom
that propounded such an inquiry.
'I mean, Papa, what can it do?' returned Paul, folding his arms (they
were hardly long enough to fold), and looking at the fire, and up at him,
and at the fire, and up at him again.
Mr Dombey drew his chair back to its former place, and patted him on
the head. 'You'll know better by-and-by, my man,' he said. 'Money, Paul, can
do anything.' He took hold of the little hand, and beat it softly against
one of his own, as he said so.
But Paul got his hand free as soon as he could; and rubbing it gently
to and fro on the elbow of his chair, as if his wit were in the palm, and he
were sharpening it - and looking at the fire again, as though the fire had
been his adviser and prompter - repeated, after a short pause:
'Anything, Papa?'
'Yes. Anything - almost,' said Mr Dombey.
'Anything means everything, don't it, Papa?' asked his son: not
observing, or possibly not understanding, the qualification.
'It includes it: yes,' said Mr Dombey.
'Why didn't money save me my Mama?' returned the child. 'It isn't
cruel, is it?'
'Cruel!' said Mr Dombey, settling his neckcloth, and seeming to resent
the idea. 'No. A good thing can't be cruel.'
'If it's a good thing, and can do anything,' said the little fellow,
thoughtfully, as he looked back at the fire, 'I wonder why it didn't save me
my Mama.'
He didn't ask the question of his father this time. Perhaps he had
seen, with a child's quickness, that it had already made his father
uncomfortable. But he repeated the thought aloud, as if it were quite an old
one to him, and had troubled him very much; and sat with his chin resting on
his hand, still cogitating and looking for an explanation in the fire.
Mr Dombey having recovered from his surprise, not to say his alarm (for
it was the very first occasion on which the child had ever broached the
subject of his mother to him, though he had had him sitting by his side, in
this same manner, evening after evening), expounded to him how that money,
though a very potent spirit, never to be disparaged on any account whatever,
could not keep people alive whose time was come to die; and how that we must
all die, unfortunately, even in the City, though we were never so rich. But
how that money caused us to be honoured, feared, respected, courted, and
admired, and made us powerful and glorious in the eyes of all men; and how
that it could, very often, even keep off death, for a long time together.
How, for example, it had secured to his Mama the services of Mr Pilkins, by
which be, Paul, had often profited himself; likewise of the great Doctor
Parker Peps, whom he had never known. And how it could do all, that could be
done. This, with more to the same purpose, Mr Dombey instilled into the mind
of his son, who listened attentively, and seemed to understand the greater
part of what was said to him.
'It can't make me strong and quite well, either, Papa; can it?' asked
Paul, after a short silence; rubbing his tiny hands.
'Why, you are strong and quite well,' returned Mr Dombey. 'Are you
not?'
Oh! the age of the face that was turned up again, with an expression,
half of melancholy, half of slyness, on it!
'You are as strong and well as such little people usually are? Eh?'
said Mr Dombey.
'Florence is older than I am, but I'm not as strong and well as
Florence, 'I know,' returned the child; 'and I believe that when Florence
was as little as me, she could play a great deal longer at a time without
tiring herself. I am so tired sometimes,' said little Paul, warming his
hands, and looking in between the bars of the grate, as if some ghostly
puppet-show were performing there, 'and my bones ache so (Wickam says it's
my bones), that I don't know what to do.'
'Ay! But that's at night,' said Mr Dombey, drawing his own chair closer
to his son's, and laying his hand gently on his back; 'little people should
be tired at night, for then they sleep well.'
'Oh, it's not at night, Papa,' returned the child, 'it's in the day;
and I lie down in Florence's lap, and she sings to me. At night I dream
about such cu-ri-ous things!'
And he went on, warming his hands again, and thinking about them, like
an old man or a young goblin.
Mr Dombey was so astonished, and so uncomfortable, and so perfectly at
a loss how to pursue the conversation, that he could only sit looking at his
son by the light of the fire, with his hand resting on his back, as if it
were detained there by some magnetic attraction. Once he advanced his other
hand, and turned the contemplative face towards his own for a moment. But it
sought the fire again as soon as he released it; and remained, addressed
towards the flickering blaze, until the nurse appeared, to summon him to
bed.
'I want Florence to come for me,' said Paul.
'Won't you come with your poor Nurse Wickam, Master Paul?' inquired
that attendant, with great pathos.
'No, I won't,' replied Paul, composing himself in his arm-chair again,
like the master of the house.
Invoking a blessing upon his innocence, Mrs Wickam withdrew, and
presently Florence appeared in her stead. The child immediately started up
with sudden readiness and animation, and raised towards his father in
bidding him good-night, a countenance so much brighter, so much younger, and
so much more child-like altogether, that Mr Dombey, while he felt greatly
reassured by the change, was quite amazed at it.
After they had left the room together, he thought he heard a soft voice
singing; and remembering that Paul had said his sister sung to him, he had
the curiosity to open the door and listen, and look after them. She was
toiling up the great, wide, vacant staircase, with him in her arms; his head
was lying on her shoulder, one of his arms thrown negligently round her
neck. So they went, toiling up; she singing all the way, and Paul sometimes
crooning out a feeble accompaniment. Mr Dombey looked after them until they
reached the top of the staircase - not without halting to rest by the way -
and passed out of his sight; and then he still stood gazing upwards, until
the dull rays of the moon, glimmering in a melancholy manner through the dim
skylight, sent him back to his room.
Mrs Chick and Miss Tox were convoked in council at dinner next day; and
when the cloth was removed, Mr Dombey opened the proceedings by requiring to
be informed, without any gloss or reservation, whether there was anything
the matter with Paul, and what Mr Pilkins said about him.
'For the child is hardly,' said Mr Dombey, 'as stout as I could wish.'
'My dear Paul,' returned Mrs Chick, 'with your usual happy
discrimination, which I am weak enough to envy you, every time I am in your
company; and so I think is Miss Tox
'Oh my dear!' said Miss Tox, softly, 'how could it be otherwise?
Presumptuous as it is to aspire to such a level; still, if the bird of night
may - but I'll not trouble Mr Dombey with the sentiment. It merely relates
to the Bulbul.'
Mr Dombey bent his head in stately recognition of the Bulbuls as an
old-established body.
'With your usual happy discrimination, my dear Paul,' resumed Mrs
Chick, 'you have hit the point at once. Our darling is altogether as stout
as we could wish. The fact is, that his mind is too much for him. His soul
is a great deal too large for his frame. I am sure the way in which that
dear child talks!'said Mrs Chick, shaking her head; 'no one would believe.
His expressions, Lucretia, only yesterday upon the subject of Funerals!
'I am afraid,' said Mr Dombey, interrupting her testily, 'that some of
those persons upstairs suggest improper subjects to the child. He was
speaking to me last night about his - about his Bones,' said Mr Dombey,
laying an irritated stress upon the word. 'What on earth has anybody to do
with the - with the - Bones of my son? He is not a living skeleton, I
suppose.
'Very far from it,' said Mrs Chick, with unspeakable expression.
'I hope so,' returned her brother. 'Funerals again! who talks to the
child of funerals? We are not undertakers, or mutes, or grave-diggers, I
believe.'
'Very far from it,' interposed Mrs Chick, with the same profound
expression as before.
'Then who puts such things into his head?' said Mr Dombey. 'Really I
was quite dismayed and shocked last night. Who puts such things into his
head, Louisa?'
'My dear Paul,' said Mrs Chick, after a moment's silence, 'it is of no
use inquiring. I do not think, I will tell you candidly that Wickam is a
person of very cheerful spirit, or what one would call a - '
'A daughter of Momus,' Miss Tox softly suggested.
'Exactly so,' said Mrs Chick; 'but she is exceedingly attentive and
useful, and not at all presumptuous; indeed I never saw a more biddable
woman. I would say that for her, if I was put upon my trial before a Court
of Justice.'
'Well! you are not put upon your trial before a Court of Justice, at
present, Louisa,' returned Mr Dombey, chafing,' and therefore it don't
matter.
'My dear Paul,' said Mrs Chick, in a warning voice, 'I must be spoken
to kindly, or there is an end of me,' at the same time a premonitory redness
developed itself in Mrs Chick's eyelids which was an invariable sign of
rain, unless the weather changed directly.
'I was inquiring, Louisa,' observed Mr Dombey, in an altered voice, and
after a decent interval, 'about Paul's health and actual state.
'If the dear child,' said Mrs Chick, in the tone of one who was summing
up what had been previously quite agreed upon, instead of saying it all for
the first time, 'is a little weakened by that last attack, and is not in
quite such vigorous health as we could wish; and if he has some temporary
weakness in his system, and does occasionally seem about to lose, for the
moment, the use of his - '
Mrs Chick was afraid to say limbs, after Mr Dombey's recent objection
to bones, and therefore waited for a suggestion from Miss Tox, who, true to
her office, hazarded 'members.'
'Members!' repeated Mr Dombey.
'I think the medical gentleman mentioned legs this morning, my dear
Louisa, did he not?' said Miss Tox.
'Why, of course he did, my love,' retorted Mrs Chick, mildly
reproachful. 'How can you ask me? You heard him. I say, if our dear Paul
should lose, for the moment, the use of his legs, these are casualties
common to many children at his time of life, and not to be prevented by any
care or caution. The sooner you understand that, Paul, and admit that, the
better. If you have any doubt as to the amount of care, and caution, and
affection, and self-sacrifice, that has been bestowed upon little Paul, I
should wish to refer the question to your medical attendant, or to any of
your dependants in this house. Call Towlinson,' said Mrs Chick, 'I believe
he has no prejudice in our favour; quite the contrary. I should wish to hear
what accusation Towlinson can make!'
'Surely you must know, Louisa,' observed Mr Dombey, 'that I don't
question your natural devotion to, and regard for, the future head of my
house.'
'I am glad to hear it, Paul,' said Mrs Chick; 'but really you are very
odd, and sometimes talk very strangely, though without meaning it, I know.
If your dear boy's soul is too much for his body, Paul, you should remember
whose fault that is - who he takes after, I mean - and make the best of it.
He's as like his Papa as he can be. People have noticed it in the streets.
The very beadle, I am informed, observed it, so long ago as at his
christening. He's a very respectable man, with children of his own. He ought
to know.'
'Mr Pilkins saw Paul this morning, I believe?' said Mr Dombey.
'Yes, he did,' returned his sister. 'Miss Tox and myself were present.
Miss Tox and myself are always present. We make a point of it. Mr Pilkins
has seen him for some days past, and a very clever man I believe him to be.
He says it is nothing to speak of; which I can confirm, if that is any
consolation; but he recommended, to-day, sea-air. Very wisely, Paul, I feel
convinced.'
'Sea-air,' repeated Mr Dombey, looking at his sister.
'There is nothing to be made uneasy by, in that,'said Mrs Chick. 'My
George and Frederick were both ordered sea-air, when they were about his
age; and I have been ordered it myself a great many times. I quite agree
with you, Paul, that perhaps topics may be incautiously mentioned upstairs
before him, which it would be as well for his little mind not to expatiate
upon; but I really don't see how that is to be helped, in the case of a
child of his quickness. If he were a common child, there would be nothing in
it. I must say I think, with Miss Tox, that a short absence from this house,
the air of Brighton, and the bodily and mental training of so judicious a
person as Mrs Pipchin for instance - '
'Who is Mrs Pipchin, Louisa?' asked Mr Dombey; aghast at this familiar
introduction of a name he had never heard before.
'Mrs Pipchin, my dear Paul,' returned his sister, 'is an elderly lady -
Miss Tox knows her whole history - who has for some time devoted all the
energies of her mind, with the greatest success, to the study and treatment
of infancy, and who has been extremely well connected. Her husband broke his
heart in - how did you say her husband broke his heart, my dear? I forget
the precise circumstances.
'In pumping water out of the Peruvian Mines,' replied Miss Tox.
'Not being a Pumper himself, of course,' said Mrs Chick, glancing at
her brother; and it really did seem necessary to offer the explanation, for
Miss Tox had spoken of him as if he had died at the handle; 'but having
invested money in the speculation, which failed. I believe that Mrs
Pipchin's management of children is quite astonishing. I have heard it
commended in private circles ever since I was - dear me - how high!' Mrs
Chick's eye wandered about the bookcase near the bust of Mr Pitt, which was
about ten feet from the ground.
'Perhaps I should say of Mrs Pipchin, my dear Sir,' observed Miss Tox,
with an ingenuous blush, 'having been so pointedly referred to, that the
encomium which has been passed upon her by your sweet sister is well
merited. Many ladies and gentleman, now grown up to be interesting members
of society, have been indebted to her care. The humble individual who
addresses you was once under her charge. I believe juvenile nobility itself
is no stranger to her establishment.'
'Do I understand that this respectable matron keeps an establishment,
Miss Tox?' the Mr Dombey, condescendingly.
'Why, I really don't know,' rejoined that lady, 'whether I am justified
in calling it so. It is not a Preparatory School by any means. Should I
express my meaning,' said Miss Tox, with peculiar sweetness,'if I designated
it an infantine Boarding-House of a very select description?'
'On an exceedingly limited and particular scale,' suggested Mrs Chick,
with a glance at her brother.
'Oh! Exclusion itself!' said Miss Tox.
There was something in this. Mrs Pipchin's husband having broken his
heart of the Peruvian mines was good. It had a rich sound. Besides, Mr
Dombey was in a state almost amounting to consternation at the idea of Paul
remaining where he was one hour after his removal had been recommended by
the medical practitioner. It was a stoppage and delay upon the road the
child must traverse, slowly at the best, before the goal was reached. Their
recommendation of Mrs Pipchin had great weight with him; for he knew that
they were jealous of any interference with their charge, and he never for a
moment took it into account that they might be solicitous to divide a
responsibility, of which he had, as shown just now, his own established
views. Broke his heart of the Peruvian mines, mused Mr Dombey. Well! a very
respectable way of doing It.
'Supposing we should decide, on to-morrow's inquiries, to send Paul
down to Brighton to this lady, who would go with him?' inquired Mr Dombey,
after some reflection.
'I don't think you could send the child anywhere at present without
Florence, my dear Paul,' returned his sister, hesitating. 'It's quite an
infatuation with him. He's very young, you know, and has his fancies.'
Mr Dombey turned his head away, and going slowly to the bookcase, and
unlocking it, brought back a book to read.
'Anybody else, Louisa?' he said, without looking up, and turning over
the leaves.
'Wickam, of course. Wickam would be quite sufficient, I should say,'
returned his sister. 'Paul being in such hands as Mrs Pipchin's, you could
hardly send anybody who would be a further check upon her. You would go down
yourself once a week at least, of course.'
'Of course,' said Mr Dombey; and sat looking at one page for an hour
afterwards, without reading one word.
This celebrated Mrs Pipchin was a marvellous ill-favoured,
ill-conditioned old lady, of a stooping figure, with a mottled face, like
bad marble, a hook nose, and a hard grey eye, that looked as if it might
have been hammered at on an anvil without sustaining any injury. Forty years
at least had elapsed since the Peruvian mines had been the death of Mr
Pipchin; but his relict still wore black bombazeen, of such a lustreless,
deep, dead, sombre shade, that gas itself couldn't light her up after dark,
and her presence was a quencher to any number of candles. She was generally
spoken of as 'a great manager' of children; and the secret of her management
was, to give them everything that they didn't like, and nothing that they
did - which was found to sweeten their dispositions very much. She was such
a bitter old lady, that one was tempted to believe there had been some
mistake in the application of the Peruvian machinery, and that all her
waters of gladness and milk of human kindness, had been pumped out dry,
instead of the mines.
The Castle of this ogress and child-queller was in a steep by-street at
Brighton; where the soil was more than usually chalky, flinty, and sterile,
and the houses were more than usually brittle and thin; where the small
front-gardens had the unaccountable property of producing nothing but
marigolds, whatever was sown in them; and where snails were constantly
discovered holding on to the street doors, and other public places they were
not expected to ornament, with the tenacity of cupping-glasses. In the
winter time the air couldn't be got out of the Castle, and in the summer
time it couldn't be got in. There was such a continual reverberation of wind
in it, that it sounded like a great shell, which the inhabitants were
obliged to hold to their ears night and day, whether they liked it or no. It
was not, naturally, a fresh-smelling house; and in the window of the front
parlour, which was never opened, Mrs Pipchin kept a collection of plants in
pots, which imparted an earthy flavour of their own to the establishment.
However choice examples of their kind, too, these plants were of a kind
peculiarly adapted to the embowerment of Mrs Pipchin. There were
half-a-dozen specimens of the cactus, writhing round bits of lath, like
hairy serpents; another specimen shooting out broad claws, like a green
lobster; several creeping vegetables, possessed of sticky and adhesive
leaves; and one uncomfortable flower-pot hanging to the ceiling, which
appeared to have boiled over, and tickling people underneath with its long
green ends, reminded them of spiders - in which Mrs Pipchin's dwelling was
uncommonly prolific, though perhaps it challenged competition still more
proudly, in the season, in point of earwigs.
Mrs Pipchin's scale of charges being high, however, to all who could
afford to pay, and Mrs Pipchin very seldom sweetening the equable acidity of
her nature in favour of anybody, she was held to be an old 'lady of
remarkable firmness, who was quite scientific in her knowledge of the
childish character.' On this reputation, and on the broken heart of Mr
Pipchin, she had contrived, taking one year with another, to eke out a
tolerable sufficient living since her husband's demise. Within three days
after Mrs Chick's first allusion to her, this excellent old lady had the
satisfaction of anticipating a handsome addition to her current receipts,
from the pocket of Mr Dombey; and of receiving Florence and her little
brother Paul, as inmates of the Castle.
Mrs Chick and Miss Tox, who had brought them down on the previous night
(which they all passed at an Hotel), had just driven away from the door, on
their journey home again; and Mrs Pipchin, with her back to the fire, stood,
reviewing the new-comers, like an old soldier. Mrs Pipchin's middle-aged
niece, her good-natured and devoted slave, but possessing a gaunt and
iron-bound aspect, and much afflicted with boils on her nose, was divesting
Master Bitherstone of the clean collar he had worn on parade. Miss Pankey,
the only other little boarder at present, had that moment been walked off to
the Castle Dungeon (an empty apartment at the back, devoted to correctional
purposes), for having sniffed thrice, in the presence of visitors.
'Well, Sir,' said Mrs Pipchin to Paul, 'how do you think you shall like
me?'
'I don't think I shall like you at all,' replied Paul. 'I want to go
away. This isn't my house.'
'No. It's mine,' retorted Mrs Pipchin.
'It's a very nasty one,' said Paul.
'There's a worse place in it than this though,' said Mrs Pipchin,
'where we shut up our bad boys.'
'Has he ever been in it?' asked Paul: pointing out Master Bitherstone.
Mrs Pipchin nodded assent; and Paul had enough to do, for the rest of
that day, in surveying Master Bitherstone from head to foot, and watching
all the workings of his countenance, with the interest attaching to a boy of
mysterious and terrible experiences.
At one o'clock there was a dinner, chiefly of the farinaceous and
vegetable kind, when Miss Pankey (a mild little blue-eyed morsel of a child,
who was shampoo'd every morning, and seemed in danger of being rubbed away,
altogether) was led in from captivity by the ogress herself, and instructed
that nobody who sniffed before visitors ever went to Heaven. When this great
truth had been thoroughly impressed upon her, she was regaled with rice; and
subsequently repeated the form of grace established in the Castle, in which
there was a special clause, thanking Mrs Pipchin for a good dinner. Mrs
Pipchin's niece, Berinthia, took cold pork. Mrs Pipchin, whose constitution
required warm nourishment, made a special repast of mutton-chops, which were
brought in hot and hot, between two plates, and smelt very nice.
As it rained after dinner, and they couldn't go out walking on the
beach, and Mrs Pipchin's constitution required rest after chops, they went
away with Berry (otherwise Berinthia) to the Dungeon; an empty room looking
out upon a chalk wall and a water-butt, and made ghastly by a ragged
fireplace without any stove in it. Enlivened by company, however, this was
the best place after all; for Berry played with them there, and seemed to
enjoy a game at romps as much as they did; until Mrs Pipchin knocking
angrily at the wall, like the Cock Lane Ghost' revived, they left off, and
Berry told them stories in a whisper until twilight.
For tea there was plenty of milk and water, and bread and butter, with
a little black tea-pot for Mrs Pipchin and Berry, and buttered toast
unlimited for Mrs Pipchin, which was brought in, hot and hot, like the
chops. Though Mrs Pipchin got very greasy, outside, over this dish, it
didn't seem to lubricate her internally, at all; for she was as fierce as
ever, and the hard grey eye knew no softening.
After tea, Berry brought out a little work-box, with the Royal Pavilion
on the lid, and fell to working busily; while Mrs Pipchin, having put on her
spectacles and opened a great volume bound in green baize, began to nod. And
whenever Mrs Pipchin caught herself falling forward into the fire, and woke
up, she filliped Master Bitherstone on the nose for nodding too.
At last it was the children's bedtime, and after prayers they went to
bed. As little Miss Pankey was afraid of sleeping alone in the dark, Mrs
Pipchin always made a point of driving her upstairs herself, like a sheep;
and it was cheerful to hear Miss Pankey moaning long afterwards, in the
least eligible chamber, and Mrs Pipchin now and then going in to shake her.
At about half-past nine o'clock the odour of a warm sweet-bread (Mrs
Pipchin's constitution wouldn't go to sleep without sweet-bread) diversified
the prevailing fragrance of the house, which Mrs Wickam said was 'a smell of
building;' and slumber fell upon the Castle shortly after.
The breakfast next morning was like the tea over night, except that Mrs
Pipchin took her roll instead of toast, and seemed a little more irate when
it was over. Master Bitherstone read aloud to the rest a pedigree from
Genesis judiciously selected by Mrs Pipchin), getting over the names with
the ease and clearness of a person tumbling up the treadmill. That done,
Miss Pankey was borne away to be shampoo'd; and Master Bitherstone to have
something else done to him with salt water, from which he always returned
very blue and dejected. Paul and Florence went out in the meantime on the
beach with Wickam - who was constantly in tears - and at about noon Mrs
Pipchin presided over some Early Readings. It being a part of Mrs Pipchin's
system not to encourage a child's mind to develop and expand itself like a
young flower, but to open it by force like an oyster, the moral of these
lessons was usually of a violent and stunning character: the hero - a
naughty boy - seldom, in the mildest catastrophe, being finished off
anything less than a lion, or a bear.
Such was life at Mrs Pipchin's. On Saturday Mr Dombey came down; and
Florence and Paul would go to his Hotel, and have tea They passed the whole
of Sunday with him, and generally rode out before dinner; and on these
occasions Mr Dombey seemed to grow, like Falstaff's assailants, and instead
of being one man in buckram, to become a dozen. Sunday evening was the most
melancholy evening in the week; for Mrs Pipchin always made a point of being
particularly cross on Sunday nights. Miss Pankey was generally brought back
from an aunt's at Rottingdean, in deep distress; and Master Bitherstone,
whose relatives were all in India, and who was required to sit, between the
services, in an erect position with his head against the parlour wall,
neither moving hand nor foot, suffered so acutely in his young spirits that
he once asked Florence, on a Sunday night, if she could give him any idea of
the way back to Bengal.
But it was generally said that Mrs Pipchin was a woman of system with
children; and no doubt she was. Certainly the wild ones went home tame
enough, after sojourning for a few months beneath her hospitable roof. It
was generally said, too, that it was highly creditable of Mrs Pipchin to
have devoted herself to this way of life, and to have made such a sacrifice
of her feelings, and such a resolute stand against her troubles, when Mr
Pipchin broke his heart in the Peruvian mines.
At this exemplary old lady, Paul would sit staring in his little
arm-chair by the fire, for any length of time. He never seemed to know what
weariness was, when he was looking fixedly at Mrs Pipchin. He was not fond
of her; he was not afraid of her; but in those old, old moods of his, she
seemed to have a grotesque attraction for him. There he would sit, looking
at her, and warming his hands, and looking at her, until he sometimes quite
confounded Mrs Pipchin, Ogress as she was. Once she asked him, when they
were alone, what he was thinking about.
'You,' said Paul, without the least reserve.
'And what are you thinking about me?' asked Mrs Pipchin.
'I'm thinking how old you must be,' said Paul.
'You mustn't say such things as that, young gentleman,' returned the
dame. 'That'll never do.'
'Why not?' asked Paul.
'Because it's not polite,' said Mrs Pipchin, snappishly.
'Not polite?' said Paul.
'No.'
'It's not polite,' said Paul, innocently, 'to eat all the mutton chops
and toast, Wickam says.
'Wickam,' retorted Mrs Pipchin, colouring, 'is a wicked, impudent,
bold-faced hussy.'
'What's that?' inquired Paul.
'Never you mind, Sir,' retorted Mrs Pipchin. 'Remember the story of the
little boy that was gored to death by a mad bull for asking questions.'
'If the bull was mad,' said Paul, 'how did he know that the boy had
asked questions? Nobody can go and whisper secrets to a mad bull. I don't
believe that story.
'You don't believe it, Sir?' repeated Mrs Pipchin, amazed.
'No,' said Paul.
'Not if it should happen to have been a tame bull, you little Infidel?'
said Mrs Pipchin.
As Paul had not considered the subject in that light, and had founded
his conclusions on the alleged lunacy of the bull, he allowed himself to be
put down for the present. But he sat turning it over in his mind, with such
an obvious intention of fixing Mrs Pipchin presently, that even that hardy
old lady deemed it prudent to retreat until he should have forgotten the
subject.
From that time, Mrs Pipchin appeared to have something of the same odd
kind of attraction towards Paul, as Paul had towards her. She would make him
move his chair to her side of the fire, instead of sitting opposite; and
there he would remain in a nook between Mrs Pipchin and the fender, with all
the light of his little face absorbed into the black bombazeen drapery,
studying every line and wrinkle of her countenance, and peering at the hard
grey eye, until Mrs Pipchin was sometimes fain to shut it, on pretence of
dozing. Mrs Pipchin had an old black cat, who generally lay coiled upon the
centre foot of the fender, purring egotistically, and winking at the fire
until the contracted pupils of his eyes were like two notes of admiration.
The good old lady might have been - not to record it disrespectfully - a
witch, and Paul and the cat her two familiars, as they all sat by the fire
together. It would have been quite in keeping with the appearance of the
party if they had all sprung up the chimney in a high wind one night, and
never been heard of any more.
This, however, never came to pass. The cat, and Paul, and Mrs Pipchin,
were constantly to be found in their usual places after dark; and Paul,
eschewing the companionship of Master Bitherstone, went on studying Mrs
Pipchin, and the cat, and the fire, night after night, as if they were a
book of necromancy, in three volumes.
Mrs Wickam put her own construction on Paul's eccentricities; and being
confirmed in her low spirits by a perplexed view of chimneys from the room
where she was accustomed to sit, and by the noise of the wind, and by the
general dulness (gashliness was Mrs Wickam's strong expression) of her
present life, deduced the most dismal reflections from the foregoing
premises. It was a part of Mrs Pipchin's policy to prevent her own 'young
hussy' - that was Mrs Pipchin's generic name for female servant - from
communicating with Mrs Wickam: to which end she devoted much of her time to
concealing herself behind doors, and springing out on that devoted maiden,
whenever she made an approach towards Mrs Wickam's apartment. But Berry was
free to hold what converse she could in that quarter, consistently with the
discharge of the multifarious duties at which she toiled incessantly from
morning to night; and to Berry Mrs Wickam unburdened her mind.
'What a pretty fellow he is when he's asleep!' said Berry, stopping to
look at Paul in bed, one night when she took up Mrs Wickam's supper.
'Ah!' sighed Mrs Wickam. 'He need be.'
'Why, he's not ugly when he's awake,' observed Berry.
'No, Ma'am. Oh, no. No more was my Uncle's Betsey Jane,' said Mrs
Wickam.
Berry looked as if she would like to trace the connexion of ideas
between Paul Dombey and Mrs Wickam's Uncle's Betsey Jane
'My Uncle's wife,' Mrs Wickam went on to say, 'died just like his Mama.
My Uncle's child took on just as Master Paul do.'
'Took on! You don't think he grieves for his Mama, sure?' argued Berry,
sitting down on the side of the bed. 'He can't remember anything about her,
you know, Mrs Wickam. It's not possible.'
'No, Ma'am,' said Mrs Wickam 'No more did my Uncle's child. But my
Uncle's child said very strange things sometimes, and looked very strange,
and went on very strange, and was very strange altogether. My Uncle's child
made people's blood run cold, some times, she did!'
'How?' asked Berry.
'I wouldn't have sat up all night alone with Betsey Jane!' said Mrs
Wickam, 'not if you'd have put Wickam into business next morning for
himself. I couldn't have done it, Miss Berry.
Miss Berry naturally asked why not? But Mrs Wickam, agreeably to the
usage of some ladies in her condition, pursued her own branch of the
subject, without any compunction.
'Betsey Jane,' said Mrs Wickam, 'was as sweet a child as I could wish
to see. I couldn't wish to see a sweeter. Everything that a child could have
in the way of illnesses, Betsey Jane had come through. The cramps was as
common to her,' said Mrs Wickam, 'as biles is to yourself, Miss Berry.' Miss
Berry involuntarily wrinkled her nose.
'But Betsey Jane,' said Mrs Wickam, lowering her voice, and looking
round the room, and towards Paul in bed, 'had been minded, in her cradle, by
her departed mother. I couldn't say how, nor I couldn't say when, nor I
couldn't say whether the dear child knew it or not, but Betsey Jane had been
watched by her mother, Miss Berry!' and Mrs Wickam, with a very white face,
and with watery eyes, and with a tremulous voice, again looked fearfully
round the room, and towards Paul in bed.
'Nonsense!' cried Miss Berry - somewhat resentful of the idea.
'You may say nonsense! I ain't offended, Miss. I hope you may be able
to think in your own conscience that it is nonsense; you'll find your
spirits all the better for it in this - you'll excuse my being so free - in
this burying-ground of a place; which is wearing of me down. Master Paul's a
little restless in his sleep. Pat his back, if you please.'
'Of course you think,' said Berry, gently doing what she was asked,
'that he has been nursed by his mother, too?'
'Betsey Jane,' returned Mrs Wickam in her most solemn tones, 'was put
upon as that child has been put upon, and changed as that child has changed.
I have seen her sit, often and often, think, think, thinking, like him. I
have seen her look, often and often, old, old, old, like him. I have heard
her, many a time, talk just like him. I consider that child and Betsey Jane
on the same footing entirely, Miss Berry.'
'Is your Uncle's child alive?' asked Berry.
'Yes, Miss, she is alive,' returned Mrs Wickam with an air of triumph,
for it was evident. Miss Berry expected the reverse; 'and is married to a
silver-chaser. Oh yes, Miss, SHE is alive,' said Mrs Wickam, laying strong
stress on her nominative case.
It being clear that somebody was dead, Mrs Pipchin's niece inquired who
it was.
'I wouldn't wish to make you uneasy,' returned Mrs Wickam, pursuing her
supper. Don't ask me.'
This was the surest way of being asked again. Miss Berry repeated her
question, therefore; and after some resistance, and reluctance, Mrs Wickam
laid down her knife, and again glancing round the room and at Paul in bed,
replied:
'She took fancies to people; whimsical fancies, some of them; others,
affections that one might expect to see - only stronger than common. They
all died.'
This was so very unexpected and awful to Mrs Pipchin's niece, that she
sat upright on the hard edge of the bedstead, breathing short, and surveying
her informant with looks of undisguised alarm.
Mrs Wickam shook her left fore-finger stealthily towards the bed where
Florence lay; then turned it upside down, and made several emphatic points
at the floor; immediately below which was the parlour in which Mrs Pipchin
habitually consumed the toast.
'Remember my words, Miss Berry,' said Mrs Wickam, 'and be thankful that
Master Paul is not too fond of you. I am, that he's not too fond of me, I
assure you; though there isn't much to live for - you'll excuse my being so
free - in this jail of a house!'
Miss Berry's emotion might have led to her patting Paul too hard on the
back, or might have produced a cessation of that soothing monotony, but he
turned in his bed just now, and, presently awaking, sat up in it with his
hair hot and wet from the effects of some childish dream, and asked for
Florence.
She was out of her own bed at the first sound of his voice; and bending
over his pillow immediately, sang him to sleep again. Mrs Wickam shaking her
head, and letting fall several tears, pointed out the little group to Berry,
and turned her eyes up to the ceiling.
'He's asleep now, my dear,' said Mrs Wickam after a pause, 'you'd
better go to bed again. Don't you feel cold?'
'No, nurse,' said Florence, laughing. 'Not at all.'
'Ah!' sighed Mrs Wickam, and she shook her head again, expressing to
the watchful Berry, 'we shall be cold enough, some of us, by and by!'
Berry took the frugal supper-tray, with which Mrs Wickam had by this
time done, and bade her good-night.
'Good-night, Miss!' returned Wickam softly. 'Good-night! Your aunt is
an old lady, Miss Berry, and it's what you must have looked for, often.'
This consolatory farewell, Mrs Wickam accompanied with a look of
heartfelt anguish; and being left alone with the two children again, and
becoming conscious that the wind was blowing mournfully, she indulged in
melancholy - that cheapest and most accessible of luxuries - until she was
overpowered by slumber.
Although the niece of Mrs Pipchin did not expect to find that exemplary
dragon prostrate on the hearth-rug when she went downstairs, she was
relieved to find her unusually fractious and severe, and with every present
appearance of intending to live a long time to be a comfort to all who knew
her. Nor had she any symptoms of declining, in the course of the ensuing
week, when the constitutional viands still continued to disappear in regular
succession, notwithstanding that Paul studied her as attentively as ever,
and occupied his usual seat between the black skirts and the fender, with
unwavering constancy.
But as Paul himself was no stronger at the expiration of that time than
he had been on his first arrival, though he looked much healthier in the
face, a little carriage was got for him, in which he could lie at his ease,
with an alphabet and other elementary works of reference, and be wheeled
down to the sea-side. Consistent in his odd tastes, the child set aside a
ruddy-faced lad who was proposed as the drawer of this carriage, and
selected, instead, his grandfather - a weazen, old, crab-faced man, in a
suit of battered oilskin, who had got tough and stringy from long pickling
in salt water, and who smelt like a weedy sea-beach when the tide is out.
With this notable attendant to pull him along, and Florence always
walking by his side, and the despondent Wickam bringing up the rear, he went
down to the margin of the ocean every day; and there he would sit or lie in
his carriage for hours together: never so distressed as by the company of
children - Florence alone excepted, always.
'Go away, if you please,' he would say to any child who came to bear
him company. Thank you, but I don't want you.'
Some small voice, near his ear, would ask him how he was, perhaps.
'I am very well, I thank you,' he would answer. 'But you had better go
and play, if you please.'
Then he would turn his head, and watch the child away, and say to
Florence, 'We don't want any others, do we? Kiss me, Floy.'
He had even a dislike, at such times, to the company of Wickam, and was
well pleased when she strolled away, as she generally did, to pick up shells
and acquaintances. His favourite spot was quite a lonely one, far away from
most loungers; and with Florence sitting by his side at work, or reading to
him, or talking to him, and the wind blowing on his face, and the water
coming up among the wheels of his bed, he wanted nothing more.
'Floy,' he said one day, 'where's India, where that boy's friends
live?'
'Oh, it's a long, long distance off,' said Florence, raising her eyes
from her work.
'Weeks off?' asked Paul.
'Yes dear. Many weeks' journey, night and day.'
'If you were in India, Floy,' said Paul, after being silent for a
minute, 'I should - what is it that Mama did? I forget.'
'Loved me!' answered Florence.
'No, no. Don't I love you now, Floy? What is it? - Died. in you were in
India, I should die, Floy.'
She hurriedly put her work aside, and laid her head down on his pillow,
caressing him. And so would she, she said, if he were there. He would be
better soon.
'Oh! I am a great deal better now!' he answered. 'I don't mean that. I
mean that I should die of being so sorry and so lonely, Floy!'
Another time, in the same place, he fell asleep, and slept quietly for
a long time. Awaking suddenly, he listened, started up, and sat listening.
Florence asked him what he thought he heard.
'I want to know what it says,' he answered, looking steadily in her
face. 'The sea' Floy, what is it that it keeps on saying?'
She told him that it was only the noise of the rolling waves.
'Yes, yes,' he said. 'But I know that they are always saying something.
Always the same thing. What place is over there?' He rose up, looking
eagerly at the horizon.
She told him that there was another country opposite, but he said he
didn't mean that: he meant further away - farther away!
Very often afterwards, in the midst of their talk, he would break off,
to try to understand what it was that the waves were always saying; and
would rise up in his couch to look towards that invisible region, far away.
In which the Wooden Midshipman gets into Trouble
That spice of romance and love of the marvellous, of which there was a
pretty strong infusion in the nature of young Walter Gay, and which the
guardianship of his Uncle, old Solomon Gills, had not very much weakened by
the waters of stern practical experience, was the occasion of his attaching
an uncommon and delightful interest to the adventure of Florence with Good
Mrs Brown. He pampered and cherished it in his memory, especially that part
of it with which he had been associated: until it became the spoiled child
of his fancy, and took its own way, and did what it liked with it.
The recollection of those incidents, and his own share in them, may
have been made the more captivating, perhaps, by the weekly dreamings of old
Sol and Captain Cuttle on Sundays. Hardly a Sunday passed, without
mysterious references being made by one or other of those worthy chums to
Richard Whittington; and the latter gentleman had even gone so far as to
purchase a ballad of considerable antiquity, that had long fluttered among
many others, chiefly expressive of maritime sentiments, on a dead wall in
the Commercial Road: which poetical performance set forth the courtship and
nuptials of a promising young coal-whipper with a certain 'lovely Peg,' the
accomplished daughter of the master and part-owner of a Newcastle collier.
In this stirring legend, Captain Cuttle descried a profound metaphysical
bearing on the case of Walter and Florence; and it excited him so much, that
on very festive occasions, as birthdays and a few other non-Dominical
holidays, he would roar through the whole song in the little back parlour;
making an amazing shake on the word Pe-e-eg, with which every verse
concluded, in compliment to the heroine of the piece.
But a frank, free-spirited, open-hearted boy, is not much given to
analysing the nature of his own feelings, however strong their hold upon
him: and Walter would have found it difficult to decide this point. He had a
great affection for the wharf where he had encountered Florence, and for the
streets (albeit not enchanting in themselves) by which they had come home.
The shoes that had so often tumbled off by the way, he preserved in his own
room; and, sitting in the little back parlour of an evening, he had drawn a
whole gallery of fancy portraits of Good Mrs Brown. It may be that he became
a little smarter in his dress after that memorable occasion; and he
certainly liked in his leisure time to walk towards that quarter of the town
where Mr Dombey's house was situated, on the vague chance of passing little
Florence in the street. But the sentiment of all this was as boyish and
innocent as could be. Florence was very pretty, and it is pleasant to admire
a pretty face. Florence was defenceless and weak, and it was a proud thought
that he had been able to render her any protection and assistance. Florence
was the most grateful little creature in the world, and it was delightful to
see her bright gratitude beaming in her face. Florence was neglected and
coldly looked upon, and his breast was full of youthful interest for the
slighted child in her dull, stately home.
Thus it came about that, perhaps some half-a-dozen times in the course
of the year, Walter pulled off his hat to Florence in the street, and
Florence would stop to shake hands. Mrs Wickam (who, with a characteristic
alteration of his name, invariably spoke of him as 'Young Graves') was so
well used to this, knowing the story of their acquaintance, that she took no
heed of it at all. Miss Nipper, on the other hand, rather looked out for
these occasions: her sensitive young heart being secretly propitiated by
Walter's good looks, and inclining to the belief that its sentiments were
responded to.
In this way, Walter, so far from forgetting or losing sight of his
acquaintance with Florence, only remembered it better and better. As to its
adventurous beginning, and all those little circumstances which gave it a
distinctive character and relish, he took them into account, more as a
pleasant story very agreeable to his imagination, and not to be dismissed
from it, than as a part of any matter of fact with which he was concerned.
They set off Florence very much, to his fancy; but not himself. Sometimes he
thought (and then he walked very fast) what a grand thing it would have been
for him to have been going to sea on the day after that first meeting, and
to have gone, and to have done wonders there, and to have stopped away a
long time, and to have come back an Admiral of all the colours of the
dolphin, or at least a Post-Captain with epaulettes of insupportable
brightness, and have married Florence (then a beautiful young woman) in
spite of Mr Dombey's teeth, cravat, and watch-chain, and borne her away to
the blue shores of somewhere or other, triumphantly. But these flights of
fancy seldom burnished the brass plate of Dombey and Son's Offices into a
tablet of golden hope, or shed a brilliant lustre on their dirty skylights;
and when the Captain and Uncle Sol talked about Richard Whittington and
masters' daughters, Walter felt that he understood his true position at
Dombey and Son's, much better than they did.
So it was that he went on doing what he had to do from day to day, in a
cheerful, pains-taking, merry spirit; and saw through the sanguine
complexion of Uncle Sol and Captain Cuttle; and yet entertained a thousand
indistinct and visionary fancies of his own, to which theirs were work-a-day
probabilities. Such was his condition at the Pipchin period, when he looked
a little older than of yore, but not much; and was the same light-footed,
light-hearted, light-headed lad, as when he charged into the parlour at the
head of Uncle Sol and the imaginary boarders, and lighted him to bring up
the Madeira.
'Uncle Sol,' said Walter, 'I don't think you're well. You haven't eaten
any breakfast. I shall bring a doctor to you, if you go on like this.'
'He can't give me what I want, my boy,' said Uncle Sol. 'At least he is
in good practice if he can - and then he wouldn't.'
'What is it, Uncle? Customers?'
'Ay,' returned Solomon, with a sigh. 'Customers would do.'
'Confound it, Uncle!' said Walter, putting down his breakfast cup with
a clatter, and striking his hand on the table: 'when I see the people going
up and down the street in shoals all day, and passing and re-passing the
shop every minute, by scores, I feel half tempted to rush out, collar
somebody, bring him in, and make him buy fifty pounds' worth of instruments
for ready money. What are you looking in at the door for? - ' continued
Walter, apostrophizing an old gentleman with a powdered head (inaudibly to
him of course), who was staring at a ship's telescope with all his might and
main. 'That's no use. I could do that. Come in and buy it!'
The old gentleman, however, having satiated his curiosity, walked
calmly away.
'There he goes!' said Walter. 'That's the way with 'em all. But, Uncle
- I say, Uncle Sol' - for the old man was meditating and had not responded
to his first appeal. 'Don't be cast down. Don't be out of spirits, Uncle.
When orders do come, they'll come in such a crowd, you won't be able to
execute 'em.'
'I shall be past executing 'em, whenever they come, my boy,' returned
Solomon Gills. 'They'll never come to this shop again, till I am out of t.'
'I say, Uncle! You musn't really, you know!' urged Walter. 'Don't!'
Old Sol endeavoured to assume a cheery look, and smiled across the
little table at him as pleasantly as he could.
'There's nothing more than usual the matter; is there, Uncle?' said
Walter, leaning his elbows on the tea tray, and bending over, to speak the
more confidentially and kindly. 'Be open with me, Uncle, if there is, and
tell me all about it.'
'No, no, no,' returned Old Sol. 'More than usual? No, no. What should
there be the matter more than usual?'
Walter answered with an incredulous shake of his head. 'That's what I
want to know,' he said, 'and you ask me! I'll tell you what, Uncle, when I
see you like this, I am quite sorry that I live with you.'
Old Sol opened his eyes involuntarily.
'Yes. Though nobody ever was happier than I am and always have been
with you, I am quite sorry that I live with you, when I see you with
anything in your mind.'
'I am a little dull at such times, I know,' observed Solomon, meekly
rubbing his hands.
'What I mean, Uncle Sol,' pursued Walter, bending over a little more to
pat him on the shoulder, 'is, that then I feel you ought to have, sitting
here and pouring out the tea instead of me, a nice little dumpling of a
wife, you know, - a comfortable, capital, cosy old lady, who was just a
match for you, and knew how to manage you, and keep you in good heart. Here
am I, as loving a nephew as ever was (I am sure I ought to be!) but I am
only a nephew, and I can't be such a companion to you when you're low and
out of sorts as she would have made herself, years ago, though I'm sure I'd
give any money if I could cheer you up. And so I say, when I see you with
anything on your mind, that I feel quite sorry you haven't got somebody
better about you than a blundering young rough-and-tough boy like me, who
has got the will to console you, Uncle, but hasn't got the way - hasn't got
the way,' repeated Walter, reaching over further yet, to shake his Uncle by
the hand.
'Wally, my dear boy,' said Solomon, 'if the cosy little old lady had
taken her place in this parlour five and forty years ago, I never could have
been fonder of her than I am of you.'
'I know that, Uncle Sol,' returned Walter. 'Lord bless you, I know
that. But you wouldn't have had the whole weight of any uncomfortable
secrets if she had been with you, because she would have known how to
relieve you of 'em, and I don't.'
'Yes, yes, you do,' returned the Instrument-maker.
'Well then, what's the matter, Uncle Sol?' said Walter, coaxingly.
'Come! What's the matter?'
Solomon Gills persisted that there was nothing the matter; and
maintained it so resolutely, that his nephew had no resource but to make a
very indifferent imitation of believing him.
'All I can say is, Uncle Sol, that if there is - '
'But there isn't,' said Solomon.
'Very well,, said Walter. 'Then I've no more to say; and that's lucky,
for my time's up for going to business. I shall look in by-and-by when I'm
out, to see how you get on, Uncle. And mind, Uncle! I'll never believe you
again, and never tell you anything more about Mr Carker the Junior, if I
find out that you have been deceiving me!'
Solomon Gills laughingly defied him to find out anything of the kind;
and Walter, revolving in his thoughts all sorts of impracticable ways of
making fortunes and placing the wooden Midshipman in a position of
independence, betook himself to the offices of Dombey and Son with a heavier
countenance than he usually carried there.
There lived in those days, round the corner - in Bishopsgate Street
Without - one Brogley, sworn broker and appraiser, who kept a shop where
every description of second-hand furniture was exhibited in the most
uncomfortable aspect, and under circumstances and in combinations the most
completely foreign to its purpose. Dozens of chairs hooked on to
washing-stands, which with difficulty poised themselves on the shoulders of
sideboards, which in their turn stood upon the wrong side of dining-tables,
gymnastic with their legs upward on the tops of other dining-tables, were
among its most reasonable arrangements. A banquet array of dish-covers,
wine-glasses, and decanters was generally to be seen, spread forth upon the
bosom of a four-post bedstead, for the entertainment of such genial company
as half-a-dozen pokers, and a hall lamp. A set of window curtains with no
windows belonging to them, would be seen gracefully draping a barricade of
chests of drawers, loaded with little jars from chemists' shops; while a
homeless hearthrug severed from its natural companion the fireside, braved
the shrewd east wind in its adversity, and trembled in melancholy accord
with the shrill complainings of a cabinet piano, wasting away, a string a
day, and faintly resounding to the noises of the street in its jangling and
distracted brain. Of motionless clocks that never stirred a finger, and
seemed as incapable of being successfully wound up, as the pecuniary affairs
of their former owners, there was always great choice in Mr Brogley's shop;
and various looking-glasses, accidentally placed at compound interest of
reflection and refraction, presented to the eye an eternal perspective of
bankruptcy and ruin.
Mr Brogley himself was a moist-eyed, pink-complexioned, crisp-haired
man, of a bulky figure and an easy temper - for that class of Caius Marius
who sits upon the ruins of other people's Carthages, can keep up his spirits
well enough. He had looked in at Solomon's shop sometimes, to ask a question
about articles in Solomon's way of business; and Walter knew him
sufficiently to give him good day when they met in the street. But as that
was the extent of the broker's acquaintance with Solomon Gills also, Walter
was not a little surprised when he came back in the course of the forenoon,
agreeably to his promise, to find Mr Brogley sitting in the back parlour
with his hands in his pockets, and his hat hanging up behind the door.
'Well, Uncle Sol!' said Walter. The old man was sitting ruefully on the
opposite side of the table, with his spectacles over his eyes, for a wonder,
instead of on his forehead. 'How are you now?'
Solomon shook his head, and waved one hand towards the broker, as
introducing him.
'Is there anything the matter?' asked Walter, with a catching in his
breath.
'No, no. There's nothing the matter, said Mr Brogley. 'Don't let it put
you out of the way.' Walter looked from the broker to his Uncle in mute
amazement. 'The fact is,' said Mr Brogley, 'there's a little payment on a
bond debt - three hundred and seventy odd, overdue: and I'm in possession.'
'In possession!' cried Walter, looking round at the shop.
'Ah!' said Mr Brogley, in confidential assent, and nodding his head as
if he would urge the advisability of their all being comfortable together.
'It's an execution. That's what it is. Don't let it put you out of the way.
I come myself, because of keeping it quiet and sociable. You know me. It's
quite private.'
'Uncle Sol!' faltered Walter.
'Wally, my boy,' returned his uncle. 'It's the first time. Such a
calamity never happened to me before. I'm an old man to begin.' Pushing up
his spectacles again (for they were useless any longer to conceal his
emotion), he covered his face with his hand, and sobbed aloud, and his tears
fell down upon his coffee-coloured waistcoat.
'Uncle Sol! Pray! oh don't!' exclaimed Walter, who really felt a thrill
of terror in seeing the old man weep. 'For God's sake don't do that. Mr
Brogley, what shall I do?'
'I should recommend you looking up a friend or so,' said Mr Brogley,
'and talking it over.'
'To be sure!' cried Walter, catching at anything. 'Certainly! Thankee.
Captain Cuttle's the man, Uncle. Wait till I run to Captain Cuttle. Keep
your eye upon my Uncle, will you, Mr Brogley, and make him as comfortable as
you can while I am gone? Don't despair, Uncle Sol. Try and keep a good
heart, there's a dear fellow!'
Saying this with great fervour, and disregarding the old man's broken
remonstrances, Walter dashed out of the shop again as hard as he could go;
and, having hurried round to the office to excuse himself on the plea of his
Uncle's sudden illness, set off, full speed, for Captain Cuttle's residence.
Everything seemed altered as he ran along the streets. There were the
usual entanglement and noise of carts, drays, omnibuses, waggons, and foot
passengers, but the misfortune that had fallen on the wooden Midshipman made
it strange and new. Houses and shops were different from what they used to
be, and bore Mr Brogley's warrant on their fronts in large characters. The
broker seemed to have got hold of the very churches; for their spires rose
into the sky with an unwonted air. Even the sky itself was changed, and had
an execution in it plainly.
Captain Cuttle lived on the brink of a little canal near the India
Docks, where there was a swivel bridge which opened now and then to let some
wandering monster of a ship come roamIng up the street like a stranded
leviathan. The gradual change from land to water, on the approach to Captain
Cuttle's lodgings, was curious. It began with the erection of flagstaffs, as
appurtenances to public-houses; then came slop-sellers' shops, with Guernsey
shirts, sou'wester hats, and canvas pantaloons, at once the tightest and the
loosest of their order, hanging up outside. These were succeeded by anchor
and chain-cable forges, where sledgehammers were dinging upon iron all day
long. Then came rows of houses, with little vane-surmounted masts uprearing
themselves from among the scarlet beans. Then, ditches. Then, pollard
willows. Then, more ditches. Then, unaccountable patches of dirty water,
hardly to be descried, for the ships that covered them. Then, the air was
perfumed with chips; and all other trades were swallowed up in mast, oar,
and block-making, and boatbuilding. Then, the ground grew marshy and
unsettled. Then, there was nothing to be smelt but rum and sugar. Then,
Captain Cuttle's lodgings - at once a first floor and a top storey, in Brig
Place - were close before you.
The Captain was one of those timber-looking men, suits of oak as well
as hearts, whom it is almost impossible for the liveliest imagination to
separate from any part of their dress, however insignificant. Accordingly,
when Walter knocked at the door, and the Captain instantly poked his head
out of one of his little front windows, and hailed him, with the hard glared
hat already on it, and the shirt-collar like a sail, and the wide suit of
blue, all standing as usual, Walter was as fully persuaded that he was
always in that state, as if the Captain had been a bird and those had been
his feathers.
'Wal'r, my lad!'said Captain Cuttle. 'Stand by and knock again. Hard!
It's washing day.'
Walter, in his impatience, gave a prodigious thump with the knocker.
'Hard it is!' said Captain Cuttle, and immediately drew in his head, as
if he expected a squall.
Nor was he mistaken: for a widow lady, with her sleeves rolled up to
her shoulders, and her arms frothy with soap-suds and smoking with hot
water, replied to the summons with startling rapidity. Before she looked at
Walter she looked at the knocker, and then, measuring him with her eyes from
head to foot, said she wondered he had left any of it.
'Captain Cuttle's at home, I know,' said Walter with a conciliatory
smile.
'Is he?' replied the widow lady. 'In-deed!'
'He has just been speaking to me,' said Walter, in breathless
explanation.
'Has he?' replied the widow lady. 'Then p'raps you'll give him Mrs
MacStinger's respects, and say that the next time he lowers himself and his
lodgings by talking out of the winder she'll thank him to come down and open
the door too.' Mrs MacStinger spoke loud, and listened for any observations
that might be offered from the first floor.
'I'll mention it,' said Walter, 'if you'll have the goodness to let me
in, Ma'am.'
For he was repelled by a wooden fortification extending across the
doorway, and put there to prevent the little MacStingers in their moments of
recreation from tumbling down the steps.
'A boy that can knock my door down,' said Mrs MacStinger,
contemptuously, 'can get over that, I should hope!' But Walter, taking this
as a permission to enter, and getting over it, Mrs MacStinger immediately
demanded whether an Englishwoman's house was her castle or not; and whether
she was to be broke in upon by 'raff.' On these subjects her thirst for
information was still very importunate, when Walter, having made his way up
the little staircase through an artificial fog occasioned by the washing,
which covered the banisters with a clammy perspiration, entered Captain
Cuttle's room, and found that gentleman in ambush behind the door.
'Never owed her a penny, Wal'r,' said Captain Cuttle, in a low voice,
and with visible marks of trepidation on his countenance. 'Done her a world
of good turns, and the children too. Vixen at times, though. Whew!'
'I should go away, Captain Cuttle,' said Walter.
'Dursn't do it, Wal'r,' returned the Captain. 'She'd find me out,
wherever I went. Sit down. How's Gills?'
The Captain was dining (in his hat) off cold loin of mutton, porter,
and some smoking hot potatoes, which he had cooked himself, and took out of
a little saucepan before the fire as he wanted them. He unscrewed his hook
at dinner-time, and screwed a knife into its wooden socket instead, with
which he had already begun to peel one of these potatoes for Walter. His
rooms were very small, and strongly impregnated with tobacco-smoke, but snug
enough: everything being stowed away, as if there were an earthquake
regularly every half-hour.
'How's Gills?' inquired the Captain.
Walter, who had by this time recovered his breath, and lost his spirits
- or such temporary spirits as his rapid journey had given him - looked at
his questioner for a moment, said 'Oh, Captain Cuttle!' and burst into
tears.
No words can describe the Captain's consternation at this sight Mrs
MacStinger faded into nothing before it. He dropped the potato and the fork
- and would have dropped the knife too if he could - and sat gazing at the
boy, as if he expected to hear next moment that a gulf had opened in the
City, which had swallowed up his old friend, coffee-coloured suit, buttons,
chronometer, spectacles, and all.
But when Walter told him what was really the matter, Captain Cuttle,
after a moment's reflection, started up into full activity. He emptied out
of a little tin canister on the top shelf of the cupboard, his whole stock
of ready money (amounting to thirteen pounds and half-a-crown), which he
transferred to one of the pockets of his square blue coat; further enriched
that repository with the contents of his plate chest, consisting of two
withered atomies of tea-spoons, and an obsolete pair of knock-knee'd
sugar-tongs; pulled up his immense double-cased silver watch from the depths
in which it reposed, to assure himself that that valuable was sound and
whole; re-attached the hook to his right wrist; and seizing the stick
covered over with knobs, bade Walter come along.
Remembering, however, in the midst of his virtuous excitement, that Mrs
MacStinger might be lying in wait below, Captain Cuttle hesitated at last,
not without glancing at the window, as if he had some thoughts of escaping
by that unusual means of egress, rather than encounter his terrible enemy.
He decided, however, in favour of stratagem.
'Wal'r,' said the Captain, with a timid wink, 'go afore, my lad. Sing
out, "good-bye, Captain Cuttle," when you're in the passage, and shut the
door. Then wait at the corner of the street 'till you see me.
These directions were not issued without a previous knowledge of the
enemy's tactics, for when Walter got downstairs, Mrs MacStinger glided out
of the little back kitchen, like an avenging spirit. But not gliding out
upon the Captain, as she had expected, she merely made a further allusion to
the knocker, and glided in again.
Some five minutes elapsed before Captain Cuttle could summon courage to
attempt his escape; for Walter waited so long at the street corner, looking
back at the house, before there were any symptoms of the hard glazed hat. At
length the Captain burst out of the door with the suddenness of an
explosion, and coming towards him at a great pace, and never once looking
over his shoulder, pretended, as soon as they were well out of the street,
to whistle a tune.
'Uncle much hove down, Wal'r?' inquired the Captain, as they were
walking along.
'I am afraid so. If you had seen him this morning, you would never have
forgotten it.'
'Walk fast, Wal'r, my lad,' returned the Captain, mending his pace;
'and walk the same all the days of your life. Overhaul the catechism for
that advice, and keep it!'
The Captain was too busy with his own thoughts of Solomon Gills,
mingled perhaps with some reflections on his late escape from Mrs
MacStinger, to offer any further quotations on the way for Walter's moral
improvement They interchanged no other word until they arrived at old Sol's
door, where the unfortunate wooden Midshipman, with his instrument at his
eye, seemed to be surveying the whole horizon in search of some friend to
help him out of his difficulty.
'Gills!' said the Captain, hurrying into the back parlour, and taking
him by the hand quite tenderly. 'Lay your head well to the wind, and we'll
fight through it. All you've got to do,' said the Captain, with the
solemnity of a man who was delivering himself of one of the most precious
practical tenets ever discovered by human wisdom, 'is to lay your head well
to the wind, and we'll fight through it!'
Old Sol returned the pressure of his hand, and thanked him.
Captain Cuttle, then, with a gravity suitable to the nature of the
occasion, put down upon the table the two tea-spoons and the sugar-tongs,
the silver watch, and the ready money; and asked Mr Brogley, the broker,
what the damage was.
'Come! What do you make of it?' said Captain Cuttle.
'Why, Lord help you!' returned the broker; 'you don't suppose that
property's of any use, do you?'
'Why not?' inquired the Captain.
'Why? The amount's three hundred and seventy, odd,' replied the broker.
'Never mind,' returned the Captain, though he was evidently dismayed by
the figures: 'all's fish that comes to your net, I suppose?'
'Certainly,' said Mr Brogley. 'But sprats ain't whales, you know.'
The philosophy of this observation seemed to strike the Captain. He
ruminated for a minute; eyeing the broker, meanwhile, as a deep genius; and
then called the Instrument-maker aside.
'Gills,' said Captain Cuttle, 'what's the bearings of this business?
Who's the creditor?'
'Hush!' returned the old man. 'Come away. Don't speak before Wally.
It's a matter of security for Wally's father - an old bond. I've paid a good
deal of it, Ned, but the times are so bad with me that I can't do more just
now. I've foreseen it, but I couldn't help it. Not a word before Wally, for
all the world.'
'You've got some money, haven't you?' whispered the Captain.
'Yes, yes - oh yes- I've got some,' returned old Sol, first putting his
hands into his empty pockets, and then squeezing his Welsh wig between them,
as if he thought he might wring some gold out of it; 'but I - the little I
have got, isn't convertible, Ned; it can't be got at. I have been trying to
do something with it for Wally, and I'm old fashioned, and behind the time.
It's here and there, and - and, in short, it's as good as nowhere,' said the
old man, looking in bewilderment about him.
He had so much the air of a half-witted person who had been hiding his
money in a variety of places, and had forgotten where, that the Captain
followed his eyes, not without a faint hope that he might remember some few
hundred pounds concealed up the chimney, or down in the cellar. But Solomon
Gills knew better than that.
'I'm behind the time altogether, my dear Ned,' said Sol, in resigned
despair, 'a long way. It's no use my lagging on so far behind it. The stock
had better be sold - it's worth more than this debt - and I had better go
and die somewhere, on the balance. I haven't any energy left. I don't
understand things. This had better be the end of it. Let 'em sell the stock
and take him down,' said the old man, pointing feebly to the wooden
Midshipman, 'and let us both be broken up together.'
'And what d'ye mean to do with Wal'r?'said the Captain. 'There, there!
Sit ye down, Gills, sit ye down, and let me think o' this. If I warn't a man
on a small annuity, that was large enough till to-day, I hadn't need to
think of it. But you only lay your head well to the wind,' said the Captain,
again administering that unanswerable piece of consolation, 'and you're all
right!'
Old Sol thanked him from his heart, and went and laid it against the
back parlour fire-place instead.
Captain Cuttle walked up and down the shop for some time, cogitating
profoundly, and bringing his bushy black eyebrows to bear so heavily on his
nose, like clouds setting on a mountain, that Walter was afraid to offer any
interruption to the current of his reflections. Mr Brogley, who was averse
to being any constraint upon the party, and who had an ingenious cast of
mind, went, softly whistling, among the stock; rattling weather-glasses,
shaking compasses as if they were physic, catching up keys with loadstones,
looking through telescopes, endeavouring to make himself acquainted with the
use of the globes, setting parallel rulers astride on to his nose, and
amusing himself with other philosophical transactions.
'Wal'r!' said the Captain at last. 'I've got it.'
'Have you, Captain Cuttle?' cried Walter, with great animation.
'Come this way, my lad,' said the Captain. 'The stock's the security.
I'm another. Your governor's the man to advance money.'
'Mr Dombey!' faltered Walter.
The Captain nodded gravely. 'Look at him,' he said. 'Look at Gills. If
they was to sell off these things now, he'd die of it. You know he would. We
mustn't leave a stone unturned - and there's a stone for you.'
'A stone! - Mr Dombey!' faltered Walter.
'You run round to the office, first of all, and see if he's there,'
said Captain Cuttle, clapping him on the back. 'Quick!'
Walter felt he must not dispute the command - a glance at his Uncle
would have determined him if he had felt otherwise - and disappeared to
execute it. He soon returned, out of breath, to say that Mr Dombey was not
there. It was Saturday, and he had gone to Brighton.
'I tell you what, Wal'r!' said the Captain, who seemed to have prepared
himself for this contingency in his absence. 'We'll go to Brighton. I'll
back you, my boy. I'll back you, Wal'r. We'll go to Brighton by the
afternoon's coach.'
If the application must be made to Mr Dombey at all, which was awful to
think of, Walter felt that he would rather prefer it alone and unassisted,
than backed by the personal influence of Captain Cuttle, to which he hardly
thought Mr Dombey would attach much weight. But as the Captain appeared to
be of quite another opinion, and was bent upon it, and as his friendship was
too zealous and serious to be trifled with by one so much younger than
himself, he forbore to hint the least objection. Cuttle, therefore, taking a
hurried leave of Solomon Gills, and returning the ready money, the
teaspoons, the sugar-tongs, and the silver watch, to his pocket - with a
view, as Walter thought, with horror, to making a gorgeous impression on Mr
Dombey - bore him off to the coach-office, with- out a minute's delay, and
repeatedly assured him, on the road, that he would stick by him to the last.
Containing the Sequel of the Midshipman's Disaster
Major Bagstock, after long and frequent observation of Paul, across
Princess's Place, through his double-barrelled opera-glass; and after
receiving many minute reports, daily, weekly, and monthly, on that subject,
from the native who kept himself in constant communication with Miss Tox's
maid for that purpose; came to the conclusion that Dombey, Sir, was a man to
be known, and that J. B. was the boy to make his acquaintance.
Miss Tox, however, maintaining her reserved behaviour, and frigidly
declining to understand the Major whenever he called (which he often did) on
any little fishing excursion connected with this project, the Major, in
spite of his constitutional toughness and slyness, was fain to leave the
accomplishment of his desire in some measure to chance, 'which,' as he was
used to observe with chuckles at his club, 'has been fifty to one in favour
of Joey B., Sir, ever since his elder brother died of Yellow Jack in the
West Indies.'
It was some time coming to his aid in the present instance, but it
befriended him at last. When the dark servant, with full particulars,
reported Miss Tox absent on Brighton service, the Major was suddenly touched
with affectionate reminiscences of his friend Bill Bitherstone of Bengal,
who had written to ask him, if he ever went that way, to bestow a call upon
his only son. But when the same dark servant reported Paul at Mrs Pipchin's,
and the Major, referring to the letter favoured by Master Bitherstone on his
arrival in England - to which he had never had the least idea of paying any
attention - saw the opening that presented itself, he was made so rabid by
the gout, with which he happened to be then laid up, that he threw a
footstool at the dark servant in return for his intelligence, and swore he
would be the death of the rascal before he had done with him: which the dark
servant was more than half disposed to believe.
At length the Major being released from his fit, went one Saturday
growling down to Brighton, with the native behind him; apostrophizing Miss
Tox all the way, and gloating over the prospect of carrying by storm the
distinguished friend to whom she attached so much mystery, and for whom she
had deserted him,
'Would you, Ma'am, would you!' said the Major, straining with
vindictiveness, and swelling every already swollen vein in his head. 'Would
you give Joey B. the go-by, Ma'am? Not yet, Ma'am, not yet! Damme, not yet,
Sir. Joe is awake, Ma'am. Bagstock is alive, Sir. J. B. knows a move or two,
Ma'am. Josh has his weather-eye open, Sir. You'll find him tough, Ma'am.
Tough, Sir, tough is Joseph. Tough, and de-vilish sly!'
And very tough indeed Master Bitherstone found him, when he took that
young gentleman out for a walk. But the Major, with his complexion like a
Stilton cheese, and his eyes like a prawn's, went roving about, perfectly
indifferent to Master Bitherstone's amusement, and dragging Master
Bitherstone along, while he looked about him high and low, for Mr Dombey and
his children.
In good time the Major, previously instructed by Mrs Pipchin, spied out
Paul and Florence, and bore down upon them; there being a stately gentleman
(Mr Dombey, doubtless) in their company. Charging with Master Bitherstone
into the very heart of the little squadron, it fell out, of course, that
Master Bitherstone spoke to his fellow-sufferers. Upon that the Major
stopped to notice and admire them; remembered with amazement that he had
seen and spoken to them at his friend Miss Tox's in Princess's Place; opined
that Paul was a devilish fine fellow, and his own little friend; inquired if
he remembered Joey B. the Major; and finally, with a sudden recollection of
the conventionalities of life, turned and apologised to Mr Dombey.
'But my little friend here, Sir,' said the Major, 'makes a boy of me
again: An old soldier, Sir - Major Bagstock, at your service - is not
ashamed to confess it.' Here the Major lifted his hat. 'Damme, Sir,' cried
the Major with sudden warmth, 'I envy you.' Then he recollected himself, and
added, 'Excuse my freedom.'
Mr Dombey begged he wouldn't mention it.
'An old campaigner, Sir,' said the Major, 'a smoke-dried, sun-burnt,
used-up, invalided old dog of a Major, Sir, was not afraid of being
condemned for his whim by a man like Mr Dombey. I have the honour of
addressing Mr Dombey, I believe?'
'I am the present unworthy representative of that name, Major,'
returned Mr Dombey.
'By G-, Sir!' said the Major, 'it's a great name. It's a name, Sir,'
said the Major firmly, as if he defied Mr Dombey to contradict him, and
would feel it his painful duty to bully him if he did, 'that is known and
honoured in the British possessions abroad. It is a name, Sir, that a man is
proud to recognise. There is nothing adulatory in Joseph Bagstock, Sir. His
Royal Highness the Duke of York observed on more than one occasion, "there
is no adulation in Joey. He is a plain old soldier is Joe. He is tough to a
fault is Joseph:" but it's a great name, Sir. By the Lord, it's a great
name!' said the Major, solemnly.
'You are good enough to rate it higher than it deserves, perhaps,
Major,' returned Mr Dombey.
'No, Sir,' said the Major, in a severe tone. No, Mr Dombey, let us
understand each other. That is not the Bagstock vein, Sir. You don't know
Joseph B. He is a blunt old blade is Josh. No flattery in him, Sir. Nothing
like it.'
Mr Dombey inclined his head, and said he believed him to be in earnest,
and that his high opinion was gratifying.
'My little friend here, Sir,' croaked the Major, looking as amiably as
he could, on Paul, 'will certify for Joseph Bagstock that he is a
thorough-going, down-right, plain-spoken, old Trump, Sir, and nothing more.
That boy, Sir,' said the Major in a lower tone, 'will live in history. That
boy, Sir, is not a common production. Take care of him, Mr Dombey.'
Mr Dombey seemed to intimate that he would endeavour to do so.
'Here is a boy here, Sir,' pursued the Major, confidentially, and
giving him a thrust with his cane. 'Son of Bitherstone of Bengal. Bill
Bitherstone formerly of ours. That boy's father and myself, Sir, were sworn
friends. Wherever you went, Sir, you heard of nothing but Bill Bitherstone
and Joe Bagstock. Am I blind to that boy's defects? By no means. He's a
fool, Sir.'
Mr Dombey glanced at the libelled Master Bitherstone, of whom he knew
at least as much as the Major did, and said, in quite a complacent manner,
'Really?'
'That is what he is, sir,' said the Major. 'He's a fool. Joe Bagstock
never minces matters. The son of my old friend Bill Bitherstone, of Bengal,
is a born fool, Sir.' Here the Major laughed till he was almost black. 'My
little friend is destined for a public school,' I' presume, Mr Dombey?' said
the Major when he had recovered.
'I am not quite decided,' returned Mr Dombey. 'I think not. He is
delicate.'
'If he's delicate, Sir,' said the Major, 'you are right. None but the
tough fellows could live through it, Sir, at Sandhurst. We put each other to
the torture there, Sir. We roasted the new fellows at a slow fire, and hung
'em out of a three pair of stairs window, with their heads downwards. Joseph
Bagstock, Sir, was held out of the window by the heels of his boots, for
thirteen minutes by the college clock'
The Major might have appealed to his countenance in corroboration of
this story. It certainly looked as if he had hung out a little too long.
'But it made us what we were, Sir,' said the Major, settling his shirt
frill. 'We were iron, Sir, and it forged us. Are you remaining here, Mr
Dombey?'
'I generally come down once a week, Major,' returned that gentleman. 'I
stay at the Bedford.'
'I shall have the honour of calling at the Bedford, Sir, if you'll
permit me,' said the Major. 'Joey B., Sir, is not in general a calling man,
but Mr Dombey's is not a common name. I am much indebted to my little
friend, Sir, for the honour of this introduction.'
Mr Dombey made a very gracious reply; and Major Bagstock, having patted
Paul on the head, and said of Florence that her eyes would play the Devil
with the youngsters before long - 'and the oldsters too, Sir, if you come to
that,' added the Major, chuckling very much - stirred up Master Bitherstone
with his walking-stick, and departed with that young gentleman, at a kind of
half-trot; rolling his head and coughing with great dignity, as he staggered
away, with his legs very wide asunder.
In fulfilment of his promise, the Major afterwards called on Mr Dombey;
and Mr Dombey, having referred to the army list, afterwards called on the
Major. Then the Major called at Mr Dombey's house in town; and came down
again, in the same coach as Mr Dombey. In short, Mr Dombey and the Major got
on uncommonly well together, and uncommonly fast: and Mr Dombey observed of
the Major, to his sister, that besides being quite a military man he was
really something more, as he had a very admirable idea of the importance of
things unconnected with his own profession.
At length Mr Dombey, bringing down Miss Tox and Mrs Chick to see the
children, and finding the Major again at Brighton, invited him to dinner at
the Bedford, and complimented Miss Tox highly, beforehand, on her neighbour
and acquaintance.
'My dearest Louisa,' said Miss Tox to Mrs Chick, when they were alone
together, on the morning of the appointed day, 'if I should seem at all
reserved to Major Bagstock, or under any constraint with him, promise me not
to notice it.'
'My dear Lucretia,' returned Mrs Chick, 'what mystery is involved in
this remarkable request? I must insist upon knowing.'
'Since you are resolved to extort a confession from me, Louisa,' said
Miss Tox instantly, 'I have no alternative but to confide to you that the
Major has been particular.'
'Particular!' repeated Mrs Chick.
'The Major has long been very particular indeed, my love, in his
attentions,' said Miss Tox, 'occasionally they have been so very marked,
that my position has been one of no common difficulty.'
'Is he in good circumstances?' inquired Mrs Chick.
'I have every reason to believe, my dear - indeed I may say I know,'
returned Miss Tox, 'that he is wealthy. He is truly military, and full of
anecdote. I have been informed that his valour, when he was in active
service, knew no bounds. I am told that he did all sorts of things in the
Peninsula, with every description of fire-arm; and in the East and West
Indies, my love, I really couldn't undertake to say what he did not do.'
'Very creditable to him indeed,' said Mrs Chick, 'extremely so; and you
have given him no encouragement, my dear?'
'If I were to say, Louisa,' replied Miss Tox, with every demonstration
of making an effort that rent her soul, 'that I never encouraged Major
Bagstock slightly, I should not do justice to the friendship which exists
between you and me. It is, perhaps, hardly in the nature of woman to receive
such attentions as the Major once lavished upon myself without betraying
some sense of obligation. But that is past - long past. Between the Major
and me there is now a yawning chasm, and I will not feign to give
encouragement, Louisa, where I cannot give my heart. My affections,' said
Miss Tox - 'but, Louisa, this is madness!' and departed from the room.
All this Mrs Chick communicated to her brother before dinner: and it by
no means indisposed Mr Dombey to receive the Major with unwonted cordiality.
The Major, for his part, was in a state of plethoric satisfaction that knew
no bounds: and he coughed, and choked, and chuckled, and gasped, and
swelled, until the waiters seemed positively afraid of him.
'Your family monopolises Joe's light, Sir,' said the Major, when he had
saluted Miss Tox. 'Joe lives in darkness. Princess's Place is changed into
Kamschatka in the winter time. There is no ray of sun, Sir, for Joey B.,
now.'
'Miss Tox is good enough to take a great deal of interest in Paul,
Major,' returned Mr Dombey on behalf of that blushing virgin.
'Damme Sir,' said the Major, 'I'm jealous of my little friend. I'm
pining away Sir. The Bagstock breed is degenerating in the forsaken person
of old Joe.' And the Major, becoming bluer and bluer and puffing his cheeks
further and further over the stiff ridge of his tight cravat, stared at Miss
Tox, until his eyes seemed as if he were at that moment being overdone
before the slow fire at the military college.
Notwithstanding the palpitation of the heart which these allusions
occasioned her, they were anything but disagreeable to Miss Tox, as they
enabled her to be extremely interesting, and to manifest an occasional
incoherence and distraction which she was not at all unwilling to display.
The Major gave her abundant opportunities of exhibiting this emotion: being
profuse in his complaints, at dinner, of her desertion of him and Princess's
Place: and as he appeared to derive great enjoyment from making them, they
all got on very well.
None the worse on account of the Major taking charge of the whole
conversation, and showing as great an appetite in that respect as in regard
of the various dainties on the table, among which he may be almost said to
have wallowed: greatly to the aggravation of his inflammatory tendencies. Mr
Dombey's habitual silence and reserve yielding readily to this usurpation,
the Major felt that he was coming out and shining: and in the flow of
spirits thus engendered, rang such an infinite number of new changes on his
own name that he quite astonished himself. In a word, they were all very
well pleased. The Major was considered to possess an inexhaustible fund of
conversation; and when he took a late farewell, after a long rubber, Mr
Dombey again complimented the blushing Miss Tox on her neighbour and
acquaintance.
But all the way home to his own hotel, the Major incessantly said to
himself, and of himself, 'Sly, Sir - sly, Sir - de-vil-ish sly!' And when he
got there, sat down in a chair, and fell into a silent fit of laughter, with
which he was sometimes seized, and which was always particularly awful. It
held him so long on this occasion that the dark servant, who stood watching
him at a distance, but dared not for his life approach, twice or thrice gave
him over for lost. His whole form, but especially his face and head, dilated
beyond all former experience; and presented to the dark man's view, nothing
but a heaving mass of indigo. At length he burst into a violent paroxysm of
coughing, and when that was a little better burst into such ejaculations as
the following:
'Would you, Ma'am, would you? Mrs Dombey, eh, Ma'am? I think not,
Ma'am. Not while Joe B. can put a spoke in your wheel, Ma'am. J. B.'s even
with you now, Ma'am. He isn't altogether bowled out, yet, Sir, isn't
Bagstock. She's deep, Sir, deep, but Josh is deeper. Wide awake is old Joe -
broad awake, and staring, Sir!' There was no doubt of this last assertion
being true, and to a very fearful extent; as it continued to be during the
greater part of that night, which the Major chiefly passed in similar
exclamations, diversified with fits of coughing and choking that startled
the whole house.
It was on the day after this occasion (being Sunday) when, as Mr
Dombey, Mrs Chick, and Miss Tox were sitting at breakfast, still eulogising
the Major, Florence came running in: her face suffused with a bright colour,
and her eyes sparkling joyfully: and cried,
'Papa! Papa! Here's Walter! and he won't come in.'
'Who?' cried Mr Dombey. 'What does she mean? What is this?'
'Walter, Papa!' said Florence timidly; sensible of having approached
the presence with too much familiarity. 'Who found me when I was lost.'
'Does she mean young Gay, Louisa?' inquired Mr Dombey, knitting his
brows. 'Really, this child's manners have become very boisterous. She cannot
mean young Gay, I think. See what it is, will you?'
Mrs Chick hurried into the passage, and returned with the information
that it was young Gay, accompanied by a very strange-looking person; and
that young Gay said he would not take the liberty of coming in, hearing Mr
Dombey was at breakfast, but would wait until Mr Dombey should signify that
he might approach.
'Tell the boy to come in now,' said Mr Dombey. 'Now, Gay, what is the
matter? Who sent you down here? Was there nobody else to come?'
'I beg your pardon, Sir,' returned Walter. 'I have not been sent. I
have been so bold as to come on my own account, which I hope you'll pardon
when I mention the cause.
But Mr Dombey, without attending to what he said, was looking
impatiently on either side of him (as if he were a pillar in his way) at
some object behind.
'What's that?' said Mr Dombey. 'Who is that? I think you have made some
mistake in the door, Sir.'
'Oh, I'm very sorry to intrude with anyone, Sir,' cried Walter,
hastily: 'but this is - this is Captain Cuttle, Sir.'
'Wal'r, my lad,' observed the Captain in a deep voice: 'stand by!'
At the same time the Captain, coming a little further in, brought out
his wide suit of blue, his conspicuous shirt-collar, and his knobby nose in
full relief, and stood bowing to Mr Dombey, and waving his hook politely to
the ladies, with the hard glazed hat in his one hand, and a red equator
round his head which it had newly imprinted there.
Mr Dombey regarded this phenomenon with amazement and indignation, and
seemed by his looks to appeal to Mrs Chick and Miss Tox against it. Little
Paul, who had come in after Florence, backed towards Miss Tox as the Captain
waved his book, and stood on the defensive.
'Now, Gay,' said Mr Dombey. 'What have you got to say to me?'
Again the Captain observed, as a general opening of the conversation
that could not fail to propitiate all parties, 'Wal'r, standby!'
'I am afraid, Sir,' began Walter, trembling, and looking down at the
ground, 'that I take a very great liberty in coming - indeed, I am sure I
do. I should hardly have had the courage to ask to see you, Sir, even after
coming down, I am afraid, if I had not overtaken Miss Dombey, and - '
'Well!' said Mr Dombey, following his eyes as he glanced at the
attentive Florence, and frowning unconsciously as she encouraged him with a
smile. 'Go on, if you please.'
'Ay, ay,' observed the Captain, considering it incumbent on him, as a
point of good breeding, to support Mr Dombey. 'Well said! Go on, Wal'r.'
Captain Cuttle ought to have been withered by the look which Mr Dombey
bestowed upon him in acknowledgment of his patronage. But quite innocent of
this, he closed one eye in reply, and gave Mr Dombey to understand, by
certain significant motions of his hook, that Walter was a little bashful at
first, and might be expected to come out shortly.
'It is entirely a private and personal matter, that has brought me
here, Sir,' continued Walter, faltering, 'and Captain Cuttle
'Here!' interposed the Captain, as an assurance that he was at hand,
and might be relied upon.
'Who is a very old friend of my poor Uncle's, and a most excellent man,
Sir,' pursued Walter, raising his eyes with a look of entreaty in the
Captain's behalf, 'was so good as to offer to come with me, which I could
hardly refuse.'
'No, no, no;' observed the Captain complacently. 'Of course not. No
call for refusing. Go on, Wal'r.'
'And therefore, Sir,' said Walter, venturing to meet Mr Dombey's eye,
and proceeding with better courage in the very desperation of the case, now
that there was no avoiding it, 'therefore I have come, with him, Sir, to say
that my poor old Uncle is in very great affliction and distress. That,
through the gradual loss of his business, and not being able to make a
payment, the apprehension of which has weighed very heavily upon his mind,
months and months, as indeed I know, Sir, he has an execution in his house,
and is in danger of losing all he has, and breaking his heart. And that if
you would, in your kindness, and in your old knowledge of him as a
respectable man, do anything to help him out of his difficulty, Sir, we
never could thank you enough for it.'
Walter's eyes filled with tears as he spoke; and so did those of
Florence. Her father saw them glistening, though he appeared to look at
Walter only.
'It is a very large sum, Sir,' said Walter. 'More than three hundred
pounds. My Uncle is quite beaten down by his misfortune, it lies so heavy on
him; and is quite unable to do anything for his own relief. He doesn't even
know yet, that I have come to speak to you. You would wish me to say, Sir,'
added Walter, after a moment's hesitation, 'exactly what it is I want. I
really don't know, Sir. There is my Uncle's stock, on which I believe I may
say, confidently, there are no other demands, and there is Captain Cuttle,
who would wish to be security too. I - I hardly like to mention,' said
Walter, 'such earnings as mine; but if you would allow them - accumulate -
payment - advance - Uncle - frugal, honourable, old man.' Walter trailed
off, through these broken sentences, into silence: and stood with downcast
head, before his employer.
Considering this a favourable moment for the display of the valuables,
Captain Cuttle advanced to the table; and clearing a space among the
breakfast-cups at Mr Dombey's elbow, produced the silver watch, the ready
money, the teaspoons, and the sugar-tongs; and piling them up into a heap
that they might look as precious as possible, delivered himself of these
words:
'Half a loaf's better than no bread, and the same remark holds good
with crumbs. There's a few. Annuity of one hundred pound premium also ready
to be made over. If there is a man chock full of science in the world, it's
old Sol Gills. If there is a lad of promise - one flowing,' added the
Captain, in one of his happy quotations, 'with milk and honey - it's his
nevy!'
The Captain then withdrew to his former place, where he stood arranging
his scattered locks with the air of a man who had given the finishing touch
to a difficult performance.
When Walter ceased to speak, Mr Dombey's eyes were attracted to little
Paul, who, seeing his sister hanging down her head and silently weeping in
her commiseration for the distress she had heard described, went over to
her, and tried to comfort her: looking at Walter and his father as he did
so, with a very expressive face. After the momentary distraction of Captain
Cuttle's address, which he regarded with lofty indifference, Mr Dombey again
turned his eyes upon his son, and sat steadily regarding the child, for some
moments, in silence.
'What was this debt contracted for?' asked Mr Dombey, at length. 'Who
is the creditor?'
'He don't know,' replied the Captain, putting his hand on Walter's
shoulder. 'I do. It came of helping a man that's dead now, and that's cost
my friend Gills many a hundred pound already. More particulars in private,
if agreeable.'
'People who have enough to do to hold their own way,' said Mr Dombey,
unobservant of the Captain's mysterious signs behind Walter, and still
looking at his son, 'had better be content with their own obligations and
difficulties, and not increase them by engaging for other men. It is an act
of dishonesty and presumption, too,' said Mr Dombey, sternly; 'great
presumption; for the wealthy could do no more. Paul, come here!'
The child obeyed: and Mr Dombey took him on his knee.
'If you had money now - ' said Mr Dombey. 'Look at me!'
Paul, whose eyes had wandered to his sister, and to Walter, looked his
father in the face.
'If you had money now,' said Mr Dombey; 'as much money as young Gay has
talked about; what would you do?'
'Give it to his old Uncle,' returned Paul.
'Lend it to his old Uncle, eh?' retorted Mr Dombey. 'Well! When you are
old enough, you know, you will share my money, and we shall use it
together.'
'Dombey and Son,' interrupted Paul, who had been tutored early in the
phrase.
'Dombey and Son,' repeated his father. 'Would you like to begin to be
Dombey and Son, now, and lend this money to young Gay's Uncle?'
'Oh! if you please, Papa!' said Paul: 'and so would Florence.'
'Girls,' said Mr Dombey, 'have nothing to do with Dombey and Son. Would
you like it?'
'Yes, Papa, yes!'
'Then you shall do it,' returned his father. 'And you see, Paul,' he
added, dropping his voice, 'how powerful money is, and how anxious people
are to get it. Young Gay comes all this way to beg for money, and you, who
are so grand and great, having got it, are going to let him have it, as a
great favour and obligation.'
Paul turned up the old face for a moment, in which there was a sharp
understanding of the reference conveyed in these words: but it was a young
and childish face immediately afterwards, when he slipped down from his
father's knee, and ran to tell Florence not to cry any more, for he was
going to let young Gay have the money.
Mr Dombey then turned to a side-table, and wrote a note and sealed it.
During the interval, Paul and Florence whispered to Walter, and Captain
Cuttle beamed on the three, with such aspiring and ineffably presumptuous
thoughts as Mr Dombey never could have believed in. The note being finished,
Mr Dombey turned round to his former place, and held it out to Walter.
'Give that,' he said, 'the first thing to-morrow morning, to Mr Carker.
He will immediately take care that one of my people releases your Uncle from
his present position, by paying the amount at issue; and that such
arrangements are made for its repayment as may be consistent with your
Uncle's circumstances. You will consider that this is done for you by Master
Paul.'
Walter, in the emotion of holding in his hand the means of releasing
his good Uncle from his trouble, would have endeavoured to express something
of his gratitude and joy. But Mr Dombey stopped him short.
'You will consider that it is done,' he repeated, 'by Master Paul. I
have explained that to him, and he understands it. I wish no more to be
said.'
As he motioned towards the door, Walter could only bow his head and
retire. Miss Tox, seeing that the Captain appeared about to do the same,
interposed.
'My dear Sir,' she said, addressing Mr Dombey, at whose munificence
both she and Mrs Chick were shedding tears copiously; 'I think you have
overlooked something. Pardon me, Mr Dombey, I think, in the nobility of your
character, and its exalted scope, you have omitted a matter of detail.'
'Indeed, Miss Tox!' said Mr Dombey.
'The gentleman with the - Instrument,' pursued Miss Tox, glancing at
Captain Cuttle, 'has left upon the table, at your elbow - '
'Good Heaven!' said Mr Dombey, sweeping the Captain's property from
him, as if it were so much crumb indeed. 'Take these things away. I am
obliged to you, Miss Tox; it is like your usual discretion. Have the
goodness to take these things away, Sir!'
Captain Cuttle felt he had no alternative but to comply. But he was so
much struck by the magnanimity of Mr Dombey, in refusing treasures lying
heaped up to his hand, that when he had deposited the teaspoons and
sugar-tongs in one pocket, and the ready money in another, and had lowered
the great watch down slowly into its proper vault, he could not refrain from
seizing that gentleman's right hand in his own solitary left, and while he
held it open with his powerful fingers, bringing the hook down upon its palm
in a transport of admiration. At this touch of warm feeling and cold iron,
Mr Dombey shivered all over.
Captain Cuttle then kissed his hook to the ladies several times, with
great elegance and gallantry; and having taken a particular leave of Paul
and Florence, accompanied Walter out of the room. Florence was running after
them in the earnestness of her heart, to send some message to old Sol, when
Mr Dombey called her back, and bade her stay where she was.
'Will you never be a Dombey, my dear child!' said Mrs Chick, with
pathetic reproachfulness.
'Dear aunt,' said Florence. 'Don't be angry with me. I am so thankful
to Papa!'
She would have run and thrown her arms about his neck if she had dared;
but as she did not dare, she glanced with thankful eyes towards him, as he
sat musing; sometimes bestowing an uneasy glance on her, but, for the most
part, watching Paul, who walked about the room with the new-blown dignity of
having let young Gay have the money.
And young Gay - Walter- what of him?
He was overjoyed to purge the old man's hearth from bailiffs and
brokers, and to hurry back to his Uncle with the good tidings. He was
overjoyed to have it all arranged and settled next day before noon; and to
sit down at evening in the little back parlour with old Sol and Captain
Cuttle; and to see the Instrument-maker already reviving, and hopeful for
the future, and feeling that the wooden Midshipman was his own again. But
without the least impeachment of his gratitude to Mr Dombey, it must be
confessed that Walter was humbled and cast down. It is when our budding
hopes are nipped beyond recovery by some rough wind, that we are the most
disposed to picture to ourselves what flowers they might have borne, if they
had flourished; and now, when Walter found himself cut off from that great
Dombey height, by the depth of a new and terrible tumble, and felt that all
his old wild fancies had been scattered to the winds in the fall, he began
to suspect that they might have led him on to harmless visions of aspiring
to Florence in the remote distance of time.
The Captain viewed the subject in quite a different light. He appeared
to entertain a belief that the interview at which he had assisted was so
very satisfactory and encouraging, as to be only a step or two removed from
a regular betrothal of Florence to Walter; and that the late transaction had
immensely forwarded, if not thoroughly established, the Whittingtonian
hopes. Stimulated by this conviction, and by the improvement in the spirits
of his old friend, and by his own consequent gaiety, he even attempted, in
favouring them with the ballad of 'Lovely Peg' for the third time in one
evening, to make an extemporaneous substitution of the name 'Florence;' but
finding this difficult, on account of the word Peg invariably rhyming to leg
(in which personal beauty the original was described as having excelled all
competitors), he hit upon the happy thought of changing it to Fle-e-eg;
which he accordingly did, with an archness almost supernatural, and a voice
quite vociferous, notwithstanding that the time was close at band when he
must seek the abode of the dreadful Mrs MacStinger.
That same evening the Major was diffuse at his club, on the subject of
his friend Dombey in the City. 'Damme, Sir,' said the Major, 'he's a prince,
is my friend Dombey in the City. I tell you what, Sir. If you had a few more
men among you like old Joe Bagstock and my friend Dombey in the City, Sir,
you'd do!'
Paul's Introduction to a New Scene
Mrs Pipchin's constitution was made of such hard metal, in spite of its
liability to the fleshly weaknesses of standing in need of repose after
chops, and of requiring to be coaxed to sleep by the soporific agency of
sweet-breads, that it utterly set at naught the predictions of Mrs Wickam,
and showed no symptoms of decline. Yet, as Paul's rapt interest in the old
lady continued unbated, Mrs Wickam would not budge an inch from the position
she had taken up. Fortifying and entrenching herself on the strong ground of
her Uncle's Betsey Jane, she advised Miss Berry, as a friend, to prepare
herself for the worst; and forewarned her that her aunt might, at any time,
be expected to go off suddenly, like a powder-mill.
'I hope, Miss Berry,' Mrs Wickam would observe, 'that you'll come into
whatever little property there may be to leave. You deserve it, I am sure,
for yours is a trying life. Though there don't seem much worth coming into -
you'll excuse my being so open - in this dismal den.'
Poor Berry took it all in good part, and drudged and slaved away as
usual; perfectly convinced that Mrs Pipchin was one of the most meritorious
persons in the world, and making every day innumerable sacrifices of herself
upon the altar of that noble old woman. But all these immolations of Berry
were somehow carried to the credit of Mrs Pipchin by Mrs Pipchin's friends
and admirers; and were made to harmonise with, and carry out, that
melancholy fact of the deceased Mr Pipchin having broken his heart in the
Peruvian mines.
For example, there was an honest grocer and general dealer in the
retail line of business, between whom and Mrs Pipchin there was a small
memorandum book, with a greasy red cover, perpetually in question, and
concerning which divers secret councils and conferences were continually
being held between the parties to that register, on the mat in the passage,
and with closed doors in the parlour. Nor were there wanting dark hints from
Master Bitherstone (whose temper had been made revengeful by the solar heats
of India acting on his blood), of balances unsettled, and of a failure, on
one occasion within his memory, in the supply of moist sugar at tea-time.
This grocer being a bachelor and not a man who looked upon the surface for
beauty, had once made honourable offers for the hand of Berry, which Mrs
Pipchin had, with contumely and scorn, rejected. Everybody said how laudable
this was in Mrs Pipchin, relict of a man who had died of the Peruvian mines;
and what a staunch, high, independent spirit the old lady had. But nobody
said anything about poor Berry, who cried for six weeks (being soundly rated
by her good aunt all the time), and lapsed into a state of hopeless
spinsterhood.
'Berry's very fond of you, ain't she?' Paul once asked Mrs Pipchin when
they were sitting by the fire with the cat.
'Yes,' said Mrs Pipchin.
'Why?' asked Paul.
'Why!' returned the disconcerted old lady. 'How can you ask such
things, Sir! why are you fond of your sister Florence?'
'Because she's very good,' said Paul. 'There's nobody like Florence.'
'Well!' retorted Mrs Pipchin, shortly, 'and there's nobody like me, I
suppose.'
'Ain't there really though?' asked Paul, leaning forward in his chair,
and looking at her very hard.
'No,' said the old lady.
'I am glad of that,' observed Paul, rubbing his hands thoughtfully.
'That's a very good thing.'
Mrs Pipchin didn't dare to ask him why, lest she should receive some
perfectly annihilating answer. But as a compensation to her wounded
feelings, she harassed Master Bitherstone to that extent until bed-time,
that he began that very night to make arrangements for an overland return to
India, by secreting from his supper a quarter of a round of bread and a
fragment of moist Dutch cheese, as the beginning of a stock of provision to
support him on the voyage.
Mrs Pipchin had kept watch and ward over little Paul and his sister for
nearly twelve months. They had been home twice, but only for a few days; and
had been constant in their weekly visits to Mr Dombey at the hotel. By
little and little Paul had grown stronger, and had become able to dispense
with his carriage; though he still looked thin and delicate; and still
remained the same old, quiet, dreamy child that he had been when first
consigned to Mrs Pipchin's care. One Saturday afternoon, at dusk, great
consternation was occasioned in the Castle by the unlooked-for announcement
of Mr Dombey as a visitor to Mrs Pipchin. The population of the parlour was
immediately swept upstairs as on the wings of a whirlwind, and after much
slamming of bedroom doors, and trampling overhead, and some knocking about
of Master Bitherstone by Mrs Pipchin, as a relief to the perturbation of her
spirits, the black bombazeen garments of the worthy old lady darkened the
audience-chamber where Mr Dombey was contemplating the vacant arm-chair of
his son and heir.
'Mrs Pipchin,' said Mr Dombey, 'How do you do?'
'Thank you, Sir,' said Mrs Pipchin, 'I am pretty well, considering.'
Mrs Pipchin always used that form of words. It meant, considering her
virtues, sacrifices, and so forth.
'I can't expect, Sir, to be very well,' said Mrs Pipchin, taking a
chair and fetching her breath; 'but such health as I have, I am grateful
for.'
Mr Dombey inclined his head with the satisfied air of a patron, who
felt that this was the sort of thing for which he paid so much a quarter.
After a moment's silence he went on to say:
'Mrs Pipchin, I have taken the liberty of calling, to consult you in
reference to my son. I have had it in my mind to do so for some time past;
but have deferred it from time to time, in order that his health might be
thoroughly re-established. You have no misgivings on that subject, Mrs
Pipchin?'
'Brighton has proved very beneficial, Sir,' returned Mrs Pipchin. 'Very
beneficial, indeed.'
'I purpose,' said Mr Dombey, 'his remaining at Brighton.'
Mrs Pipchin rubbed her hands, and bent her grey eyes on the fire.
'But,' pursued Mr Dombey, stretching out his forefinger, 'but possibly
that he should now make a change, and lead a different kind of life here. In
short, Mrs Pipchin, that is the object of my visit. My son is getting on,
Mrs Pipchin. Really, he is getting on.'
There was something melancholy in the triumphant air with which Mr
Dombey said this. It showed how long Paul's childish life had been to him,
and how his hopes were set upon a later stage of his existence. Pity may
appear a strange word to connect with anyone so haughty and so cold, and yet
he seemed a worthy subject for it at that moment.
'Six years old!' said Mr Dombey, settling his neckcloth - perhaps to
hide an irrepressible smile that rather seemed to strike upon the surface of
his face and glance away, as finding no resting-place, than to play there
for an instant. 'Dear me, six will be changed to sixteen, before we have
time to look about us.'
'Ten years,' croaked the unsympathetic Pipchin, with a frosty
glistening of her hard grey eye, and a dreary shaking of her bent head, 'is
a long time.'
'It depends on circumstances, returned Mr Dombey; 'at all events, Mrs
Pipchin, my son is six years old, and there is no doubt, I fear, that in his
studies he is behind many children of his age - or his youth,' said Mr
Dombey, quickly answering what he mistrusted was a shrewd twinkle of the
frosty eye, 'his youth is a more appropriate expression. Now, Mrs Pipchin,
instead of being behind his peers, my son ought to be before them; far
before them. There is an eminence ready for him to mount upon. There is
nothing of chance or doubt in the course before my son. His way in life was
clear and prepared, and marked out before he existed. The education of such
a young gentleman must not be delayed. It must not be left imperfect. It
must be very steadily and seriously undertaken, Mrs Pipchin.'
'Well, Sir,' said Mrs Pipchin, 'I can say nothing to the contrary.'
'I was quite sure, Mrs Pipchin,' returned Mr Dombey, approvingly, 'that
a person of your good sense could not, and would not.'
'There is a great deal of nonsense - and worse - talked about young
people not being pressed too hard at first, and being tempted on, and all
the rest of it, Sir,' said Mrs Pipchin, impatiently rubbing her hooked nose.
'It never was thought of in my time, and it has no business to be thought of
now. My opinion is "keep 'em at it".'
'My good madam,' returned Mr Dombey, 'you have not acquired your
reputation undeservedly; and I beg you to believe, Mrs Pipchin, that I am
more than satisfied with your excellent system of management, and shall have
the greatest pleasure in commending it whenever my poor commendation - ' Mr
Dombey's loftiness when he affected to disparage his own importance, passed
all bounds - 'can be of any service. I have been thinking of Doctor
Blimber's, Mrs Pipchin.'
'My neighbour, Sir?' said Mrs Pipchin. 'I believe the Doctor's is an
excellent establishment. I've heard that it's very strictly conducted, and
there is nothing but learning going on from morning to night.'
'And it's very expensive,' added Mr Dombey.
'And it's very expensive, Sir,' returned Mrs Pipchin, catching at the
fact, as if in omitting that, she had omitted one of its leading merits.
'I have had some communication with the Doctor, Mrs Pipchin,' said Mr
Dombey, hitching his chair anxiously a little nearer to the fire, 'and he
does not consider Paul at all too young for his purpose. He mentioned
several instances of boys in Greek at about the same age. If I have any
little uneasiness in my own mind, Mrs Pipchin, on the subject of this
change, it is not on that head. My son not having known a mother has
gradually concentrated much - too much - of his childish affection on his
sister. Whether their separation - ' Mr Dombey said no more, but sat silent.
'Hoity-toity!' exclaimed Mrs Pipchin, shaking out her black bombazeen
skirts, and plucking up all the ogress within her. 'If she don't like it, Mr
Dombey, she must be taught to lump it.' The good lady apologised immediately
afterwards for using so common a figure of speech, but said (and truly) that
that was the way she reasoned with 'em.
Mr Dombey waited until Mrs Pipchin had done bridling and shaking her
head, and frowning down a legion of Bitherstones and Pankeys; and then said
quietly, but correctively, 'He, my good madam, he.'
Mrs Pipchin's system would have applied very much the same mode of cure
to any uneasiness on the part of Paul, too; but as the hard grey eye was
sharp enough to see that the recipe, however Mr Dombey might admit its
efficacy in the case of the daughter, was not a sovereign remedy for the
son, she argued the point; and contended that change, and new society, and
the different form of life he would lead at Doctor Blimber's, and the
studies he would have to master, would very soon prove sufficient
alienations. As this chimed in with Mr Dombey's own hope and belief, it gave
that gentleman a still higher opinion of Mrs Pipchin's understanding; and as
Mrs Pipchin, at the same time, bewailed the loss of her dear little friend
(which was not an overwhelming shock to her, as she had long expected it,
and had not looked, in the beginning, for his remaining with her longer than
three months), he formed an equally good opinion of Mrs Pipchin's
disinterestedness. It was plain that he had given the subject anxious
consideration, for he had formed a plan, which he announced to the ogress,
of sending Paul to the Doctor's as a weekly boarder for the first half year,
during which time Florence would remain at the Castle, that she might
receive her brother there, on Saturdays. This would wean him by degrees, Mr
Dombey said; possibly with a recollection of his not having been weaned by
degrees on a former occasion.
Mr Dombey finished the interview by expressing his hope that Mrs
Pipchin would still remain in office as general superintendent and overseer
of his son, pending his studies at Brighton; and having kissed Paul, and
shaken hands with Florence, and beheld Master Bitherstone in his collar of
state, and made Miss Pankey cry by patting her on the head (in which region
she was uncommonly tender, on account of a habit Mrs Pipchin had of sounding
it with her knuckles, like a cask), he withdrew to his hotel and dinner:
resolved that Paul, now that he was getting so old and well, should begin a
vigorous course of education forthwith, to qualify him for the position in
which he was to shine; and that Doctor Blimber should take him in hand
immediately.
Whenever a young gentleman was taken in hand by Doctor Blimber, he
might consider himself sure of a pretty tight squeeze. The Doctor only
undertook the charge of ten young gentlemen, but he had, always ready, a
supply of learning for a hundred, on the lowest estimate; and it was at once
the business and delight of his life to gorge the unhappy ten with it.
In fact, Doctor Blimber's establishment was a great hot-house, in which
there was a forcing apparatus incessantly at work. All the boys blew before
their time. Mental green-peas were produced at Christmas, and intellectual
asparagus all the year round. Mathematical gooseberries (very sour ones too)
were common at untimely seasons, and from mere sprouts of bushes, under
Doctor Blimber's cultivation. Every description of Greek and Latin vegetable
was got off the driest twigs of boys, under the frostiest circumstances.
Nature was of no consequence at all. No matter what a young gentleman was
intended to bear, Doctor Blimber made him bear to pattern, somehow or other.
This was all very pleasant and ingenious, but the system of forcing was
attended with its usual disadvantages. There was not the right taste about
the premature productions, and they didn't keep well. Moreover, one young
gentleman, with a swollen nose and an excessively large head (the oldest of
the ten who had 'gone through' everything), suddenly left off blowing one
day, and remained in the establishment a mere stalk. And people did say that
the Doctor had rather overdone it with young Toots, and that when he began
to have whiskers he left off having brains.
There young Toots was, at any rate; possessed of the gruffest of voices
and the shrillest of minds; sticking ornamental pins into his shirt, and
keeping a ring in his waistcoat pocket to put on his little finger by
stealth, when the pupils went out walking; constantly falling in love by
sight with nurserymaids, who had no idea of his existence; and looking at
the gas-lighted world over the little iron bars in the left-hand corner
window of the front three pairs of stairs, after bed-time, like a greatly
overgrown cherub who had sat up aloft much too long.
The Doctor was a portly gentleman in a suit of black, with strings at
his knees, and stockings below them. He had a bald head, highly polished; a
deep voice; and a chin so very double, that it was a wonder how he ever
managed to shave into the creases. He had likewise a pair of little eyes
that were always half shut up, and a mouth that was always half expanded
into a grin, as if he had, that moment, posed a boy, and were waiting to
convict him from his own lips. Insomuch, that when the Doctor put his right
hand into the breast of his coat, and with his other hand behind him, and a
fly perceptible wag of his head, made the commonest observation to a nervous
stranger, it was like a sentiment from the sphynx, and settled his business.
The Doctor's was a mighty fine house, fronting the sea. Not a joyful
style of house within, but quite the contrary. Sad-coloured curtains, whose
proportions were spare and lean, hid themselves despondently behind the
windows. The tables and chairs were put away in rows, like figures in a sum;
fires were so rarely lighted in the rooms of ceremony, that they felt like
wells, and a visitor represented the bucket; the dining-room seemed the last
place in the world where any eating or drinking was likely to occur; there
was no sound through all the house but the ticking of a great clock in the
hall, which made itself audible in the very garrets; and sometimes a dull
cooing of young gentlemen at their lessons, like the murmurings of an
assemblage of melancholy pigeons.
Miss Blimber, too, although a slim and graceful maid, did no soft
violence to the gravity of the house. There was no light nonsense about Miss
Blimber. She kept her hair short and crisp, and wore spectacles. She was dry
and sandy with working in the graves of deceased languages. None of your
live languages for Miss Blimber. They must be dead - stone dead - and then
Miss Blimber dug them up like a Ghoul.
Mrs Blimber, her Mama, was not learned herself, but she pretended to
be, and that did quite as well. She said at evening parties, that if she
could have known Cicero, she thought she could have died contented. It was
the steady joy of her life to see the Doctor's young gentlemen go out
walking, unlike all other young gentlemen, in the largest possible
shirt-collars, and the stiffest possible cravats. It was so classical, she
said.
As to Mr Feeder, B.A., Doctor Blimber's assistant, he was a kind of
human barrel-organ, with a little list of tunes at which he was continually
working, over and over again, without any variation. He might have been
fitted up with a change of barrels, perhaps, in early life, if his destiny
had been favourable; but it had not been; and he had only one, with which,
in a monotonous round, it was his occupation to bewilder the young ideas of
Doctor Blimber's young gentlemen. The young gentlemen were prematurely full
of carking anxieties. They knew no rest from the pursuit of stony-hearted
verbs, savage noun-substantives, inflexible syntactic passages, and ghosts
of exercises that appeared to them in their dreams. Under the forcing
system, a young gentleman usually took leave of his spirits in three weeks.
He had all the cares of the world on his head in three months. He conceived
bitter sentiments against his parents or guardians in four; he was an old
misanthrope, in five; envied Curtius that blessed refuge in the earth, in
six; and at the end of the first twelvemonth had arrived at the conclusion,
from which he never afterwards departed, that all the fancies of the poets,
and lessons of the sages, were a mere collection of words and grammar, and
had no other meaning in the world.
But he went on blow, blow, blowing, in the Doctor's hothouse, all the
time; and the Doctor's glory and reputation were great, when he took his
wintry growth home to his relations and friends.
Upon the Doctor's door-steps one day, Paul stood with a fluttering
heart, and with his small right hand in his father's. His other hand was
locked in that of Florence. How tight the tiny pressure of that one; and how
loose and cold the other!
Mrs Pipchin hovered behind the victim, with her sable plumage and her
hooked beak, like a bird of ill-omen. She was out of breath - for Mr Dombey,
full of great thoughts, had walked fast - and she croaked hoarsely as she
waited for the opening of the door.
'Now, Paul,' said Mr Dombey, exultingly. 'This is the way indeed to be
Dombey and Son, and have money. You are almost a man already.'
'Almost,' returned the child.
Even his childish agitation could not master the sly and quaint yet
touching look, with which he accompanied the reply.
It brought a vague expression of dissatisfaction into Mr Dombey's face;
but the door being opened, it was quickly gone
'Doctor Blimber is at home, I believe?' said Mr Dombey.
The man said yes; and as they passed in, looked at Paul as if he were a
little mouse, and the house were a trap. He was a weak-eyed young man, with
the first faint streaks or early dawn of a grin on his countenance. It was
mere imbecility; but Mrs Pipchin took it into her head that it was
impudence, and made a snap at him directly.
'How dare you laugh behind the gentleman's back?' said Mrs Pipchin.
'And what do you take me for?'
'I ain't a laughing at nobody, and I'm sure I don't take you for
nothing, Ma'am,' returned the young man, in consternation.
'A pack of idle dogs!' said Mrs Pipchin, 'only fit to be turnspits. Go
and tell your master that Mr Dombey's here, or it'll be worse for you!'
The weak-eyed young man went, very meekly, to discharge himself of this
commission; and soon came back to invite them to the Doctor's study.
'You're laughing again, Sir,' said Mrs Pipchin, when it came to her
turn, bringing up the rear, to pass him in the hall.
'I ain't,' returned the young man, grievously oppressed. 'I never see
such a thing as this!'
'What is the matter, Mrs Pipchin?' said Mr Dombey, looking round.
'Softly! Pray!'
Mrs Pipchin, in her deference, merely muttered at the young man as she
passed on, and said, 'Oh! he was a precious fellow' - leaving the young man,
who was all meekness and incapacity, affected even to tears by the incident.
But Mrs Pipchin had a way of falling foul of all meek people; and her
friends said who could wonder at it, after the Peruvian mines!
The Doctor was sitting in his portentous study, with a globe at each
knee, books all round him, Homer over the door, and Minerva on the
mantel-shelf. 'And how do you do, Sir?' he said to Mr Dombey, 'and how is my
little friend?' Grave as an organ was the Doctor's speech; and when he
ceased, the great clock in the hall seemed (to Paul at least) to take him
up, and to go on saying, 'how, is, my, lit, tle, friend? how, is, my, lit,
tle, friend?' over and over and over again.
The little friend being something too small to be seen at all from
where the Doctor sat, over the books on his table, the Doctor made several
futile attempts to get a view of him round the legs; which Mr Dombey
perceiving, relieved the Doctor from his embarrassment by taking Paul up in
his arms, and sitting him on another little table, over against the Doctor,
in the middle of the room.
'Ha!' said the Doctor, leaning back in his chair with his hand in his
breast. 'Now I see my little friend. How do you do, my little friend?'
The clock in the hall wouldn't subscribe to this alteration in the form
of words, but continued to repeat how, is, my, lit, tle, friend? how, is,
my, lit, tle, friend?'
'Very well, I thank you, Sir,' returned Paul, answering the clock quite
as much as the Doctor.
'Ha!' said Doctor Blimber. 'Shall we make a man of him?'
'Do you hear, Paul?' added Mr Dombey; Paul being silent.
'Shall we make a man of him?' repeated the Doctor.
'I had rather be a child,' replied Paul.
'Indeed!' said the Doctor. 'Why?'
The child sat on the table looking at him, with a curious expression of
suppressed emotion in his face, and beating one hand proudly on his knee as
if he had the rising tears beneath it, and crushed them. But his other hand
strayed a little way the while, a little farther - farther from him yet -
until it lighted on the neck of Florence. 'This is why,' it seemed to say,
and then the steady look was broken up and gone; the working lip was
loosened; and the tears came streaming forth.
'Mrs Pipchin,' said his father, in a querulous manner, 'I am really
very sorry to see this.'
'Come away from him, do, Miss Dombey,' quoth the matron.
'Never mind,' said the Doctor, blandly nodding his head, to keep Mrs
Pipchin back. 'Never mind; we shall substitute new cares and new
impressions, Mr Dombey, very shortly. You would still wish my little friend
to acquire - '
'Everything, if you please, Doctor,' returned Mr Dombey, firmly.
'Yes,' said the Doctor, who, with his half-shut eyes, and his usual
smile, seemed to survey Paul with the sort of interest that might attach to
some choice little animal he was going to stuff. 'Yes, exactly. Ha! We shall
impart a great variety of information to our little friend, and bring him
quickly forward, I daresay. I daresay. Quite a virgin soil, I believe you
said, Mr Dombey?'
'Except some ordinary preparation at home, and from this lady,' replied
Mr Dombey, introducing Mrs Pipchin, who instantly communicated a rigidity to
her whole muscular system, and snorted defiance beforehand, in case the
Doctor should disparage her; 'except so far, Paul has, as yet, applied
himself to no studies at all.'
Doctor Blimber inclined his head, in gentle tolerance of such
insignificant poaching as Mrs Pipchin's, and said he was glad to hear it. It
was much more satisfactory, he observed, rubbing his hands, to begin at the
foundation. And again he leered at Paul, as if he would have liked to tackle
him with the Greek alphabet, on the spot.
'That circumstance, indeed, Doctor Blimber,' pursued Mr Dombey,
glancing at his little son, 'and the interview I have already had the
pleasure of holding with you, renders any further explanation, and
consequently, any further intrusion on your valuable time, so unnecessary,
that - '
'Now, Miss Dombey!' said the acid Pipchin.
'Permit me,' said the Doctor, 'one moment. Allow me to present Mrs
Blimber and my daughter; who will be associated with the domestic life of
our young Pilgrim to Parnassus Mrs Blimber,' for the lady, who had perhaps
been in waiting, opportunely entered, followed by her daughter, that fair
Sexton in spectacles, 'Mr Dombey. My daughter Cornelia, Mr Dombey. Mr
Dombey, my love,' pursued the Doctor, turning to his wife, 'is so confiding
as to - do you see our little friend?'
Mrs Blimber, in an excess of politeness, of which Mr Dombey was the
object, apparently did not, for she was backing against the little friend,
and very much endangering his position on the table. But, on this hint, she
turned to admire his classical and intellectual lineaments, and turning
again to Mr Dombey, said, with a sigh, that she envied his dear son.
'Like a bee, Sir,' said Mrs Blimber, with uplifted eyes, 'about to
plunge into a garden of the choicest flowers, and sip the sweets for the
first time Virgil, Horace, Ovid, Terence, Plautus, Cicero. What a world of
honey have we here. It may appear remarkable, Mr Dombey, in one who is a
wife - the wife of such a husband - '
'Hush, hush,' said Doctor Blimber. 'Fie for shame.'
'Mr Dombey will forgive the partiality of a wife,' said Mrs Blimber,
with an engaging smile.
Mr Dombey answered 'Not at all:' applying those words, it is to be
presumed, to the partiality, and not to the forgiveness.
'And it may seem remarkable in one who is a mother also,' resumed Mrs
Blimber.
'And such a mother,' observed Mr Dombey, bowing with some confused idea
of being complimentary to Cornelia.
'But really,' pursued Mrs Blimber, 'I think if I could have known
Cicero, and been his friend, and talked with him in his retirement at
Tusculum (beau-ti-ful Tusculum!), I could have died contented.'
A learned enthusiasm is so very contagious, that Mr Dombey half
believed this was exactly his case; and even Mrs Pipchin, who was not, as we
have seen, of an accommodating disposition generally, gave utterance to a
little sound between a groan and a sigh, as if she would have said that
nobody but Cicero could have proved a lasting consolation under that failure
of the Peruvian MInes, but that he indeed would have been a very Davy-lamp
of refuge.
Cornelia looked at Mr Dombey through her spectacles, as if she would
have liked to crack a few quotations with him from the authority in
question. But this design, if she entertained it, was frustrated by a knock
at the room-door.
'Who is that?' said the Doctor. 'Oh! Come in, Toots; come in. Mr
Dombey, Sir.' Toots bowed. 'Quite a coincidence!' said Doctor Blimber. 'Here
we have the beginning and the end. Alpha and Omega Our head boy, Mr Dombey.'
The Doctor might have called him their head and shoulders boy, for he
was at least that much taller than any of the rest. He blushed very much at
finding himself among strangers, and chuckled aloud.
'An addition to our little Portico, Toots,' said the Doctor; 'Mr
Dombey's son.'
Young Toots blushed again; and finding, from a solemn silence which
prevailed, that he was expected to say something, said to Paul, 'How are
you?' in a voice so deep, and a manner so sheepish, that if a lamb had
roared it couldn't have been more surprising.
'Ask Mr Feeder, if you please, Toots,' said the Doctor, 'to prepare a
few introductory volumes for Mr Dombey's son, and to allot him a convenient
seat for study. My dear, I believe Mr Dombey has not seen the dormitories.'
'If Mr Dombey will walk upstairs,' said Mrs Blimber, 'I shall be more
than proud to show him the dominions of the drowsy god.'
With that, Mrs Blimber, who was a lady of great suavity, and a wiry
figure, and who wore a cap composed of sky-blue materials, pied upstairs
with Mr Dombey and Cornelia; Mrs Pipchin following, and looking out sharp
for her enemy the footman.
While they were gone, Paul sat upon the table, holding Florence by the
hand, and glancing timidly from the Doctor round and round the room, while
the Doctor, leaning back in his chair, with his hand in his breast as usual,
held a book from him at arm's length, and read. There was something very
awful in this manner of reading. It was such a determined, unimpassioned,
inflexible, cold-blooded way of going to work. It left the Doctor's
countenance exposed to view; and when the Doctor smiled suspiciously at his
author, or knit his brows, or shook his head and made wry faces at him, as
much as to say, 'Don't tell me, Sir; I know better,' it was terrific.
Toots, too, had no business to be outside the door, ostentatiously
examining the wheels in his watch, and counting his half-crowns. But that
didn't last long; for Doctor Blimber, happening to change the position of
his tight plump legs, as if he were going to get up, Toots swiftly vanished,
and appeared no more.
Mr Dombey and his conductress were soon heard coming downstairs again,
talking all the way; and presently they re-entered the Doctor's study.
'I hope, Mr Dombey,' said the Doctor, laying down his book, 'that the
arrangements meet your approval.'
'They are excellent, Sir,' said Mr Dombey.
'Very fair, indeed,' said Mrs Pipchin, in a low voice; never disposed
to give too much encouragement.
'Mrs Pipchin,' said Mr Dombey, wheeling round, 'will, with your
permission, Doctor and Mrs Blimber, visit Paul now and then.'
'Whenever Mrs Pipchin pleases,' observed the Doctor.
'Always happy to see her,' said Mrs Blimber.
'I think,' said Mr Dombey, 'I have given all the trouble I need, and
may take my leave. Paul, my child,' he went close to him, as he sat upon the
table. 'Good-bye.'
'Good-bye, Papa.'
The limp and careless little hand that Mr Dombey took in his, was
singularly out of keeping with the wistful face. But he had no part in its
sorrowful expression. It was not addressed to him. No, no. To Florence - all
to Florence.
If Mr Dombey in his insolence of wealth, had ever made an enemy, hard
to appease and cruelly vindictive in his hate, even such an enemy might have
received the pang that wrung his proud heart then, as compensation for his
injury.
He bent down, over his boy, and kissed him. If his sight were dimmed as
he did so, by something that for a moment blurred the little face, and made
it indistinct to him, his mental vision may have been, for that short time,
the clearer perhaps.
'I shall see you soon, Paul. You are free on Saturdays and Sundays, you
know.'
'Yes, Papa,' returned Paul: looking at his sister. 'On Saturdays and
Sundays.'
'And you'll try and learn a great deal here, and be a clever man,' said
Mr Dombey; 'won't you?'
'I'll try,' returned the child, wearily.
'And you'll soon be grown up now!' said Mr Dombey.
'Oh! very soon!' replied the child. Once more the old, old look passed
rapidly across his features like a strange light. It fell on Mrs Pipchin,
and extinguished itself in her black dress. That excellent ogress stepped
forward to take leave and to bear off Florence, which she had long been
thirsting to do. The move on her part roused Mr Dombey, whose eyes were
fixed on Paul. After patting him on the head, and pressing his small hand
again, he took leave of Doctor Blimber, Mrs Blimber, and Miss Blimber, with
his usual polite frigidity, and walked out of the study.
Despite his entreaty that they would not think of stirring, Doctor
Blimber, Mrs Blimber, and Miss Blimber all pressed forward to attend him to
the hall; and thus Mrs Pipchin got into a state of entanglement with Miss
Blimber and the Doctor, and was crowded out of the study before she could
clutch Florence. To which happy accident Paul stood afterwards indebted for
the dear remembrance, that Florence ran back to throw her arms round his
neck, and that hers was the last face in the doorway: turned towards him
with a smile of encouragement, the brighter for the tears through which it
beamed.
It made his childish bosom heave and swell when it was gone; and sent
the globes, the books, blind Homer and Minerva, swimming round the room. But
they stopped, all of a sudden; and then he heard the loud clock in the hall
still gravely inquiring 'how, is, my, lit, tle, friend? how, is, my, lit,
tle, friend?' as it had done before.
He sat, with folded hands, upon his pedestal, silently listening. But
he might have answered 'weary, weary! very lonely, very sad!' And there,
with an aching void in his young heart, and all outside so cold, and bare,
and strange, Paul sat as if he had taken life unfurnished, and the
upholsterer were never coming.
Paul's Education
After the lapse of some minutes, which appeared an immense time to
little Paul Dombey on the table, Doctor Blimber came back. The Doctor's walk
was stately, and calculated to impress the juvenile mind with solemn
feelings. It was a sort of march; but when the Doctor put out his right
foot, he gravely turned upon his axis, with a semi-circular sweep towards
the left; and when he put out his left foot, he turned in the same manner
towards the right. So that he seemed, at every stride he took, to look about
him as though he were saying, 'Can anybody have the goodness to indicate any
subject, in any direction, on which I am uninformed? I rather think not'
Mrs Blimber and Miss Blimber came back in the Doctor's company; and the
Doctor, lifting his new pupil off the table, delivered him over to Miss
Blimber.
'Cornelia,' said the Doctor, 'Dombey will be your charge at first.
Bring him on, Cornelia, bring him on.'
Miss Blimber received her young ward from the Doctor's hands; and Paul,
feeling that the spectacles were surveying him, cast down his eyes.
'How old are you, Dombey?' said Miss Blimber.
'Six,' answered Paul, wondering, as he stole a glance at the young
lady, why her hair didn't grow long like Florence's, and why she was like a
boy.
'How much do you know of your Latin Grammar, Dombey?' said Miss
Blimber.
'None of it,' answered Paul. Feeling that the answer was a shock to
Miss Blimber's sensibility, he looked up at the three faces that were
looking down at him, and said:
'I have'n't been well. I have been a weak child. I couldn't learn a
Latin Grammar when I was out, every day, with old Glubb. I wish you'd tell
old Glubb to come and see me, if you please.'
'What a dreadfully low name' said Mrs Blimber. 'Unclassical to a
degree! Who is the monster, child?'
'What monster?' inquired Paul.
'Glubb,' said Mrs Blimber, with a great disrelish.
'He's no more a monster than you are,' returned Paul.
'What!' cried the Doctor, in a terrible voice. 'Ay, ay, ay? Aha! What's
that?'
Paul was dreadfully frightened; but still he made a stand for the
absent Glubb, though he did it trembling.
'He's a very nice old man, Ma'am,' he said. 'He used to draw my couch.
He knows all about the deep sea, and the fish that are in it, and the great
monsters that come and lie on rocks in the sun, and dive into the water
again when they're startled, blowing and splashing so, that they can be
heard for miles. There are some creatures, said Paul, warming with his
subject, 'I don't know how many yards long, and I forget their names, but
Florence knows, that pretend to be in distress; and when a man goes near
them, out of compassion, they open their great jaws, and attack him. But all
he has got to do,' said Paul, boldly tendering this information to the very
Doctor himself, 'is to keep on turning as he runs away, and then, as they
turn slowly, because they are so long, and can't bend, he's sure to beat
them. And though old Glubb don't know why the sea should make me think of my
Mama that's dead, or what it is that it is always saying - always saying! he
knows a great deal about it. And I wish,' the child concluded, with a sudden
falling of his countenance, and failing in his animation, as he looked like
one forlorn, upon the three strange faces, 'that you'd let old Glubb come
here to see me, for I know him very well, and he knows me.
'Ha!' said the Doctor, shaking his head; 'this is bad, but study will
do much.'
Mrs Blimber opined, with something like a shiver, that he was an
unaccountable child; and, allowing for the difference of visage, looked at
him pretty much as Mrs Pipchin had been used to do.
'Take him round the house, Cornelia,' said the Doctor, 'and familiarise
him with his new sphere. Go with that young lady, Dombey.'
Dombey obeyed; giving his hand to the abstruse Cornelia, and looking at
her sideways, with timid curiosity, as they went away together. For her
spectacles, by reason of the glistening of the glasses, made her so
mysterious, that he didn't know where she was looking, and was not indeed
quite sure that she had any eyes at all behind them.
Cornelia took him first to the schoolroom, which was situated at the
back of the hall, and was approached through two baize doors, which deadened
and muffled the young gentlemen's voices. Here, there were eight young
gentlemen in various stages of mental prostration, all very hard at work,
and very grave indeed. Toots, as an old hand, had a desk to himself in one
corner: and a magnificent man, of immense age, he looked, in Paul's young
eyes, behind it.
Mr Feeder, B.A., who sat at another little desk, had his Virgil stop
on, and was slowly grinding that tune to four young gentlemen. Of the
remaining four, two, who grasped their foreheads convulsively, were engaged
in solving mathematical problems; one with his face like a dirty window,
from much crying, was endeavouring to flounder through a hopeless number of
lines before dinner; and one sat looking at his task in stony stupefaction
and despair - which it seemed had been his condition ever since breakfast
time.
The appearance of a new boy did not create the sensation that might
have been expected. Mr Feeder, B.A. (who was in the habit of shaving his
head for coolness, and had nothing but little bristles on it), gave him a
bony hand, and told him he was glad to see him - which Paul would have been
very glad to have told him, if he could have done so with the least
sincerity. Then Paul, instructed by Cornelia, shook hands with the four
young gentlemen at Mr Feeder's desk; then with the two young gentlemen at
work on the problems, who were very feverish; then with the young gentleman
at work against time, who was very inky; and lastly with the young gentleman
in a state of stupefaction, who was flabby and quite cold.
Paul having been already introduced to Toots, that pupil merely
chuckled and breathed hard, as his custom was, and pursued the occupation in
which he was engaged. It was not a severe one; for on account of his having
'gone through' so much (in more senses than one), and also of his having, as
before hinted, left off blowing in his prime, Toots now had licence to
pursue his own course of study: which was chiefly to write long letters to
himself from persons of distinction, adds 'P. Toots, Esquire, Brighton,
Sussex,' and to preserve them in his desk with great care.
These ceremonies passed, Cornelia led Paul upstairs to the top of the
house; which was rather a slow journey, on account of Paul being obliged to
land both feet on every stair, before he mounted another. But they reached
their journey's end at last; and there, in a front room, looking over the
wild sea, Cornelia showed him a nice little bed with white hangings, close
to the window, on which there was already beautifully written on a card in
round text - down strokes very thick, and up strokes very fine - DOMBEY;
while two other little bedsteads in the same room were announced, through
like means, as respectively appertaining unto BRIGGS and TOZER.
Just as they got downstairs again into the hall, Paul saw the weak-eyed
young man who had given that mortal offence to Mrs Pipchin, suddenly seize a
very large drumstick, and fly at a gong that was hanging up, as if he had
gone mad, or wanted vengeance. Instead of receiving warning, however, or
being instantly taken into custody, the young man left off unchecked, after
having made a dreadful noise. Then Cornelia Blimber said to Dombey that
dinner would be ready in a quarter of an hour, and perhaps he had better go
into the schoolroom among his 'friends.'
So Dombey, deferentially passing the great clock which was still as
anxious as ever to know how he found himself, opened the schoolroom door a
very little way, and strayed in like a lost boy: shutting it after him with
some difficulty. His friends were all dispersed about the room except the
stony friend, who remained immoveable. Mr Feeder was stretching himself in
his grey gown, as if, regardless of expense, he were resolved to pull the
sleeves off.
'Heigh ho hum!' cried Mr Feeder, shaking himself like a cart-horse. 'Oh
dear me, dear me! Ya-a-a-ah!'
Paul was quite alarmed by Mr Feeder's yawning; it was done on such a
great scale, and he was so terribly in earnest. All the boys too (Toots
excepted) seemed knocked up, and were getting ready for dinner - some newly
tying their neckcloths, which were very stiff indeed; and others washing
their hands or brushing their hair, in an adjoining ante-chamber - as if
they didn't think they should enjoy it at all.
Young Toots who was ready beforehand, and had therefore nothing to do,
and had leisure to bestow upon Paul, said, with heavy good nature:
'Sit down, Dombey.'
'Thank you, Sir,' said Paul.
His endeavouring to hoist himself on to a very high window-seat, and
his slipping down again, appeared to prepare Toots's mind for the reception
of a discovery.
'You're a very small chap;' said Mr Toots.
'Yes, Sir, I'm small,' returned Paul. 'Thank you, Sir.'
For Toots had lifted him into the seat, and done it kindly too.
'Who's your tailor?' inquired Toots, after looking at him for some
moments.
'It's a woman that has made my clothes as yet,' said Paul. 'My sister's
dressmaker.'
'My tailor's Burgess and Co.,' said Toots. 'Fash'nable. But very dear.'
Paul had wit enough to shake his head, as if he would have said it was
easy to see that; and indeed he thought so.
'Your father's regularly rich, ain't he?' inquired Mr Toots.
'Yes, Sir,' said Paul. 'He's Dombey and Son.'
'And which?' demanded Toots.
'And Son, Sir,' replied Paul.
Mr Toots made one or two attempts, in a low voice, to fix the Firm in
his mind; but not quite succeeding, said he would get Paul to mention the
name again to-morrow morning, as it was rather important. And indeed he
purposed nothing less than writing himself a private and confidential letter
from Dombey and Son immediately.
By this time the other pupils (always excepting the stony boy) gathered
round. They were polite, but pale; and spoke low; and they were so depressed
in their spirits, that in comparison with the general tone of that company,
Master Bitherstone was a perfect Miller, or complete Jest Book.' And yet he
had a sense of injury upon him, too, had Bitherstone.
'You sleep in my room, don't you?' asked a solemn young gentleman,
whose shirt-collar curled up the lobes of his ears.
'Master Briggs?' inquired Paul.
'Tozer,' said the young gentleman.
Paul answered yes; and Tozer pointing out the stony pupil, said that
was Briggs. Paul had already felt certain that it must be either Briggs or
Tozer, though he didn't know why.
'Is yours a strong constitution?' inquired Tozer.
Paul said he thought not. Tozer replied that he thought not also,
judging from Paul's looks, and that it was a pity, for it need be. He then
asked Paul if he were going to begin with Cornelia; and on Paul saying
'yes,' all the young gentlemen (Briggs excepted) gave a low groan.
It was drowned in the tintinnabulation of the gong, which sounding
again with great fury, there was a general move towards the dining-room;
still excepting Briggs the stony boy, who remained where he was, and as he
was; and on its way to whom Paul presently encountered a round of bread,
genteelly served on a plate and napkin, and with a silver fork lying
crosswise on the top of it.
Doctor Blimber was already in his place in the dining-room, at the top
of the table, with Miss Blimber and Mrs Blimber on either side of him. Mr
Feeder in a black coat was at the bottom. Paul's chair was next to Miss
Blimber; but it being found, when he sat in it, that his eyebrows were not
much above the level of the table-cloth, some books were brought in from the
Doctor's study, on which he was elevated, and on which he always sat from
that time - carrying them in and out himself on after occasions, like a
little elephant and castle.'
Grace having been said by the Doctor, dinner began. There was some nice
soup; also roast meat, boiled meat, vegetables, pie, and cheese. Every young
gentleman had a massive silver fork, and a napkin; and all the arrangements
were stately and handsome. In particular, there was a butler in a blue coat
and bright buttons, who gave quite a winey flavour to the table beer; he
poured it out so superbly.
Nobody spoke, unless spoken to, except Doctor Blimber, Mrs Blimber, and
Miss Blimber, who conversed occasionally. Whenever a young gentleman was not
actually engaged with his knife and fork or spoon, his eye, with an
irresistible attraction, sought the eye of Doctor Blimber, Mrs Blimber, or
Miss Blimber, and modestly rested there. Toots appeared to be the only
exception to this rule. He sat next Mr Feeder on Paul's side of the table,
and frequently looked behind and before the intervening boys to catch a
glimpse of Paul.
Only once during dinner was there any conversation that included the
young gentlemen. It happened at the epoch of the cheese, when the Doctor,
having taken a glass of port wine, and hemmed twice or thrice, said:
'It is remarkable, Mr Feeder, that the Romans - '
At the mention of this terrible people, their implacable enemies, every
young gentleman fastened his gaze upon the Doctor, with an assumption of the
deepest interest. One of the number who happened to be drinking, and who
caught the Doctor's eye glaring at him through the side of his tumbler, left
off so hastily that he was convulsed for some moments, and in the sequel
ruined Doctor Blimber's point.
'It is remarkable, Mr Feeder,' said the Doctor, beginning again slowly,
'that the Romans, in those gorgeous and profuse entertainments of which we
read in the days of the Emperors, when luxury had attained a height unknown
before or since, and when whole provinces were ravaged to supply the
splendid means of one Imperial Banquet - '
Here the offender, who had been swelling and straining, and waiting in
vain for a full stop, broke out violently.
'Johnson,' said Mr Feeder, in a low reproachful voice, 'take some
water.'
The Doctor, looking very stern, made a pause until the water was
brought, and then resumed:
'And when, Mr Feeder - '
But Mr Feeder, who saw that Johnson must break out again, and who knew
that the Doctor would never come to a period before the young gentlemen
until he had finished all he meant to say, couldn't keep his eye off
Johnson; and thus was caught in the fact of not looking at the Doctor, who
consequently stopped.
'I beg your pardon, Sir,' said Mr Feeder, reddening. 'I beg your
pardon, Doctor Blimber.'
'And when,' said the Doctor, raising his voice, 'when, Sir, as we read,
and have no reason to doubt - incredible as it may appear to the vulgar - of
our time - the brother of Vitellius prepared for him a feast, in which were
served, of fish, two thousand dishes - '
'Take some water, Johnson - dishes, Sir,' said Mr Feeder.
'Of various sorts of fowl, five thousand dishes.'
'Or try a crust of bread,' said Mr Feeder.
'And one dish,' pursued Doctor Blimber, raising his voice still higher
as he looked all round the table, 'called, from its enormous dimensions, the
Shield of Minerva, and made, among other costly ingredients, of the brains
of pheasants - '
'Ow, ow, ow!' (from Johnson.)
'Woodcocks - '
'Ow, ow, ow!'
'The sounds of the fish called scari - '
'You'll burst some vessel in your head,' said Mr Feeder. 'You had
better let it come.'
'And the spawn of the lamprey, brought from the Carpathian Sea,'
pursued the Doctor, in his severest voice; 'when we read of costly
entertainments such as these, and still remember, that we have a Titus - '
'What would be your mother's feelings if you died of apoplexy!' said Mr
Feeder.
'A Domitian - '
'And you're blue, you know,' said Mr Feeder.
'A Nero, a Tiberius, a Caligula, a Heliogabalus, and many more, pursued
the Doctor; 'it is, Mr Feeder - if you are doing me the honour to attend -
remarkable; VERY remarkable, Sir - '
But Johnson, unable to suppress it any longer, burst at that moment
into such an overwhelming fit of coughing, that although both his immediate
neighbours thumped him on the back, and Mr Feeder himself held a glass of
water to his lips, and the butler walked him up and down several times
between his own chair and the sideboard, like a sentry, it was a full five
minutes before he was moderately composed. Then there was a profound
silence.
'Gentlemen,' said Doctor Blimber, 'rise for Grace! Cornelia, lift
Dombey down' - nothing of whom but his scalp was accordingly seen above the
tablecloth. 'Johnson will repeat to me tomorrow morning before breakfast,
without book, and from the Greek Testament, the first chapter of the Epistle
of Saint Paul to the Ephesians. We will resume our studies, Mr Feeder, in
half-an-hour.'
The young gentlemen bowed and withdrew. Mr Feeder did likewise. During
the half-hour, the young gentlemen, broken into pairs, loitered arm-in-arm
up and down a small piece of ground behind the house, or endeavoured to
kindle a spark of animation in the breast of Briggs. But nothing happened so
vulgar as play. Punctually at the appointed time, the gong was sounded, and
the studies, under the joint auspices of Doctor Blimber and Mr Feeder, were
resumed.
As the Olympic game of lounging up and down had been cut shorter than
usual that day, on Johnson's account, they all went out for a walk before
tea. Even Briggs (though he hadn't begun yet) partook of this dissipation;
in the enjoyment of which he looked over the cliff two or three times
darkly. Doctor Blimber accompanied them; and Paul had the honour of being
taken in tow by the Doctor himself: a distinguished state of things, in
which he looked very little and feeble.
Tea was served in a style no less polite than the dinner; and after
tea, the young gentlemen rising and bowing as before, withdrew to fetch up
the unfinished tasks of that day, or to get up the already looming tasks of
to-morrow. In the meantime Mr Feeder withdrew to his own room; and Paul sat
in a corner wondering whether Florence was thinking of him, and what they
were all about at Mrs Pipchin's.
Mr Toots, who had been detained by an important letter from the Duke of
Wellington, found Paul out after a time; and having looked at him for a long
while, as before, inquired if he was fond of waistcoats.
Paul said 'Yes, Sir.'
'So am I,' said Toots.
No word more spoke Toots that night; but he stood looking at Paul as if
he liked him; and as there was company in that, and Paul was not inclined to
talk, it answered his purpose better than conversation.
At eight o'clock or so, the gong sounded again for prayers in the
dining-room, where the butler afterwards presided over a side-table, on
which bread and cheese and beer were spread for such young gentlemen as
desired to partake of those refreshments. The ceremonies concluded by the
Doctor's saying, 'Gentlemen, we will resume our studies at seven to-morrow;'
and then, for the first time, Paul saw Cornelia Blimber's eye, and saw that
it was upon him. When the Doctor had said these words, 'Gentlemen, we will
resume our studies at seven tomorrow,' the pupils bowed again, and went to
bed.
In the confidence of their own room upstairs, Briggs said his head
ached ready to split, and that he should wish himself dead if it wasn't for
his mother, and a blackbird he had at home Tozer didn't say much, but he
sighed a good deal, and told Paul to look out, for his turn would come
to-morrow. After uttering those prophetic words, he undressed himself
moodily, and got into bed. Briggs was in his bed too, and Paul in his bed
too, before the weak-eyed young man appeared to take away the candle, when
he wished them good-night and pleasant dreams. But his benevolent wishes
were in vain, as far as Briggs and Tozer were concerned; for Paul, who lay
awake for a long while, and often woke afterwards, found that Briggs was
ridden by his lesson as a nightmare: and that Tozer, whose mind was affected
in his sleep by similar causes, in a minor degree talked unknown tongues, or
scraps of Greek and Latin - it was all one to Paul- which, in the silence of
night, had an inexpressibly wicked and guilty effect.
Paul had sunk into a sweet sleep, and dreamed that he was walking hand
in hand with Florence through beautiful gardens, when they came to a large
sunflower which suddenly expanded itself into a gong, and began to sound.
Opening his eyes, he found that it was a dark, windy morning, with a
drizzling rain: and that the real gong was giving dreadful note of
preparation, down in the hall.
So he got up directly, and found Briggs with hardly any eyes, for
nightmare and grief had made his face puffy, putting his boots on: while
Tozer stood shivering and rubbing his shoulders in a very bad humour. Poor
Paul couldn't dress himself easily, not being used to it, and asked them if
they would have the goodness to tie some strings for him; but as Briggs
merely said 'Bother!' and Tozer, 'Oh yes!' he went down when he was
otherwise ready, to the next storey, where he saw a pretty young woman in
leather gloves, cleaning a stove. The young woman seemed surprised at his
appearance, and asked him where his mother was. When Paul told her she was
dead, she took her gloves off, and did what he wanted; and furthermore
rubbed his hands to warm them; and gave him a kiss; and told him whenever he
wanted anything of that sort - meaning in the dressing way - to ask for
'Melia; which Paul, thanking her very much, said he certainly would. He then
proceeded softly on his journey downstairs, towards the room in which the
young gentlemen resumed their studies, when, passing by a door that stood
ajar, a voice from within cried, 'Is that Dombey?' On Paul replying, 'Yes,
Ma'am:' for he knew the voice to be Miss Blimber's: Miss Blimber said, 'Come
in, Dombey.' And in he went. Miss Blimber presented exactly the appearance
she had presented yesterday, except that she wore a shawl. Her little light
curls were as crisp as ever, and she had already her spectacles on, which
made Paul wonder whether she went to bed in them. She had a cool little
sitting-room of her own up there, with some books in it, and no fire But
Miss Blimber was never cold, and never sleepy.
Now, Dombey,' said Miss Blimber, 'I am going out for a constitutional.'
Paul wondered what that was, and why she didn't send the footman out to
get it in such unfavourable weather. But he made no observation on the
subject: his attention being devoted to a little pile of new books, on which
Miss Blimber appeared to have been recently engaged.
'These are yours, Dombey,' said Miss Blimber.
'All of 'em, Ma'am?' said Paul.
'Yes,' returned Miss Blimber; 'and Mr Feeder will look you out some
more very soon, if you are as studious as I expect you will be, Dombey.'
'Thank you, Ma'am,' said Paul.
'I am going out for a constitutional,' resumed Miss Blimber; 'and while
I am gone, that is to say in the interval between this and breakfast,
Dombey, I wish you to read over what I have marked in these books, and to
tell me if you quite understand what you have got to learn. Don't lose time,
Dombey, for you have none to spare, but take them downstairs, and begin
directly.'
'Yes, Ma'am,' answered Paul.
There were so many of them, that although Paul put one hand under the
bottom book and his other hand and his chin on the top book, and hugged them
all closely, the middle book slipped out before he reached the door, and
then they all tumbled down on the floor. Miss Blimber said, 'Oh, Dombey,
Dombey, this is really very careless!' and piled them up afresh for him; and
this time, by dint of balancing them with great nicety, Paul got out of the
room, and down a few stairs before two of them escaped again. But he held
the rest so tight, that he only left one more on the first floor, and one in
the passage; and when he had got the main body down into the schoolroom, he
set off upstairs again to collect the stragglers. Having at last amassed the
whole library, and climbed into his place, he fell to work, encouraged by a
remark from Tozer to the effect that he 'was in for it now;' which was the
only interruption he received till breakfast time. At that meal, for which
he had no appetite, everything was quite as solemn and genteel as at the
others; and when it was finished, he followed Miss Blimber upstairs.
'Now, Dombey,' said Miss Blimber. 'How have you got on with those
books?'
They comprised a little English, and a deal of Latin - names of things,
declensions of articles and substantives, exercises thereon, and preliminary
rules - a trifle of orthography, a glance at ancient history, a wink or two
at modern ditto, a few tables, two or three weights and measures, and a
little general information. When poor Paul had spelt out number two, he
found he had no idea of number one; fragments whereof afterwards obtruded
themselves into number three, which slided into number four, which grafted
itself on to number two. So that whether twenty Romuluses made a Remus, or
hic haec hoc was troy weight, or a verb always agreed with an ancient
Briton, or three times four was Taurus a bull, were open questions with him.
'Oh, Dombey, Dombey!' said Miss Blimber, 'this is very shocking.'
'If you please,' said Paul, 'I think if I might sometimes talk a little
to old Glubb, I should be able to do better.'
'Nonsense, Dombey,' said Miss Blimber. 'I couldn't hear of it. This is
not the place for Glubbs of any kind. You must take the books down, I
suppose, Dombey, one by one, and perfect yourself in the day's instalment of
subject A, before you turn at all to subject B. I am sorry to say, Dombey,
that your education appears to have been very much neglected.'
'So Papa says,' returned Paul; 'but I told you - I have been a weak
child. Florence knows I have. So does Wickam.'
'Who is Wickam?' asked Miss Blimber.
'She has been my nurse,' Paul answered.
'I must beg you not to mention Wickam to me, then,' said Miss
Blimber.'I couldn't allow it'.
'You asked me who she was,' said Paul.
'Very well,' returned Miss Blimber; 'but this is all very different
indeed from anything of that sort, Dombey, and I couldn't think of
permitting it. As to having been weak, you must begin to be strong. And now
take away the top book, if you please, Dombey, and return when you are
master of the theme.'
Miss Blimber expressed her opinions on the subject of Paul's
uninstructed state with a gloomy delight, as if she had expected this
result, and were glad to find that they must be in constant communication.
Paul withdrew with the top task, as he was told, and laboured away at it,
down below: sometimes remembering every word of it, and sometimes forgetting
it all, and everything else besides: until at last he ventured upstairs
again to repeat the lesson, when it was nearly all driven out of his head
before he began, by Miss Blimber's shutting up the book, and saying, 'Good,
Dombey!' a proceeding so suggestive of the knowledge inside of her, that
Paul looked upon the young lady with consternation, as a kind of learned Guy
Faux, or artificial Bogle, stuffed full of scholastic straw.
He acquitted himself very well, nevertheless; and Miss Blimber,
commending him as giving promise of getting on fast, immediately provided
him with subject B; from which he passed to C, and even D before dinner. It
was hard work, resuming his studies, soon after dinner; and he felt giddy
and confused and drowsy and dull. But all the other young gentlemen had
similar sensations, and were obliged to resume their studies too, if there
were any comfort in that. It was a wonder that the great clock in the hall,
instead of being constant to its first inquiry, never said, 'Gentlemen, we
will now resume our studies,' for that phrase was often enough repeated in
its neighbourhood. The studies went round like a mighty wheel, and the young
gentlemen were always stretched upon it.
After tea there were exercises again, and preparations for next day by
candlelight. And in due course there was bed; where, but for that resumption
of the studies which took place in dreams, were rest and sweet
forgetfulness.
Oh Saturdays! Oh happy Saturdays, when Florence always came at noon,
and never would, in any weather, stay away, though Mrs Pipchin snarled and
growled, and worried her bitterly. Those Saturdays were Sabbaths for at
least two little Christians among all the Jews, and did the holy Sabbath
work of strengthening and knitting up a brother's and a sister's love.
Not even Sunday nights - the heavy Sunday nights, whose shadow darkened
the first waking burst of light on Sunday mornings - could mar those
precious Saturdays. Whether it was the great sea-shore, where they sat, and
strolled together; or whether it was only Mrs Pipchin's dull back room, in
which she sang to him so softly, with his drowsy head upon her arm; Paul
never cared. It was Florence. That was all he thought of. So, on Sunday
nights, when the Doctor's dark door stood agape to swallow him up for
another week, the time was come for taking leave of Florence; no one else.
Mrs Wickam had been drafted home to the house in town, and Miss Nipper,
now a smart young woman, had come down. To many a single combat with Mrs
Pipchin, did Miss Nipper gallantly devote herself, and if ever Mrs Pipchin
in all her life had found her match, she had found it now. Miss Nipper threw
away the scabbard the first morning she arose in Mrs Pipchin's house. She
asked and gave no quarter. She said it must be war, and war it was; and Mrs
Pipchin lived from that time in the midst of surprises, harassings, and
defiances, and skirmishing attacks that came bouncing in upon her from the
passage, even in unguarded moments of chops, and carried desolation to her
very toast.
Miss Nipper had returned one Sunday night with Florence, from walking
back with Paul to the Doctor's, when Florence took from her bosom a little
piece of paper, on which she had pencilled down some words.
'See here, Susan,' she said. 'These are the names of the little books
that Paul brings home to do those long exercises with, when he is so tired.
I copied them last night while he was writing.'
'Don't show 'em to me, Miss Floy, if you please,' returned Nipper, 'I'd
as soon see Mrs Pipchin.'
'I want you to buy them for me, Susan, if you will, tomorrow morning. I
have money enough,' said Florence.
'Why, goodness gracious me, Miss Floy,' returned Miss Nipper, 'how can
you talk like that, when you have books upon books already, and masterses
and mississes a teaching of you everything continual, though my belief is
that your Pa, Miss Dombey, never would have learnt you nothing, never would
have thought of it, unless you'd asked him - when be couldn't well refuse;
but giving consent when asked, and offering when unasked, Miss, is quite two
things; I may not have my objections to a young man's keeping company with
me, and when he puts the question, may say "yes," but that's not saying
"would you be so kind as like me."'
'But you can buy me the books, Susan; and you will, when you know why I
want them.'
'Well, Miss, and why do you want 'em?' replied Nipper; adding, in a
lower voice, 'If it was to fling at Mrs Pipchin's head, I'd buy a
cart-load.'
'Paul has a great deal too much to do, Susan,' said Florence, 'I am
sure of it.'
'And well you may be, Miss,' returned her maid, 'and make your mind
quite easy that the willing dear is worked and worked away. If those is
Latin legs,' exclaimed Miss Nipper, with strong feeling - in allusion to
Paul's; 'give me English ones.'
'I am afraid he feels lonely and lost at Doctor Blimber's, Susan,'
pursued Florence, turning away her face.
'Ah,' said Miss Nipper, with great sharpness, 'Oh, them "Blimbers"'
'Don't blame anyone,' said Florence. 'It's a mistake.'
'I say nothing about blame, Miss,' cried Miss Nipper, 'for I know that
you object, but I may wish, Miss, that the family was set to work to make
new roads, and that Miss Blimber went in front and had the pickaxe.'
After this speech, Miss Nipper, who was perfectly serious, wiped her
eyes.
'I think I could perhaps give Paul some help, Susan, if I had these
books,' said Florence, 'and make the coming week a little easier to him. At
least I want to try. So buy them for me, dear, and I will never forget how
kind it was of you to do it!'
It must have been a harder heart than Susan Nipper's that could have
rejected the little purse Florence held out with these words, or the gentle
look of entreaty with which she seconded her petition. Susan put the purse
in her pocket without reply, and trotted out at once upon her errand.
The books were not easy to procure; and the answer at several shops
was, either that they were just out of them, or that they never kept them,
or that they had had a great many last month, or that they expected a great
many next week But Susan was not easily baffled in such an enterprise; and
having entrapped a white-haired youth, in a black calico apron, from a
library where she was known, to accompany her in her quest, she led him such
a life in going up and down, that he exerted himself to the utmost, if it
were only to get rid of her; and finally enabled her to return home in
triumph.
With these treasures then, after her own daily lessons were over,
Florence sat down at night to track Paul's footsteps through the thorny ways
of learning; and being possessed of a naturally quick and sound capacity,
and taught by that most wonderful of masters, love, it was not long before
she gained upon Paul's heels, and caught and passed him.
Not a word of this was breathed to Mrs Pipchin: but many a night when
they were all in bed, and when Miss Nipper, with her hair in papers and
herself asleep in some uncomfortable attitude, reposed unconscious by her
side; and when the chinking ashes in the grate were cold and grey; and when
the candles were burnt down and guttering out; - Florence tried so hard to
be a substitute for one small Dombey, that her fortitude and perseverance
might have almost won her a free right to bear the name herself.
And high was her reward, when one Saturday evening, as little Paul was
sitting down as usual to 'resume his studies,' she sat down by his side, and
showed him all that was so rough, made smooth, and all that was so dark,
made clear and plain, before him. It was nothing but a startled look in
Paul's wan face - a flush - a smile - and then a close embrace - but God
knows how her heart leapt up at this rich payment for her trouble.
'Oh, Floy!' cried her brother, 'how I love you! How I love you, Floy!'
'And I you, dear!'
'Oh! I am sure of that, Floy.'
He said no more about it, but all that evening sat close by her, very
quiet; and in the night he called out from his little room within hers,
three or four times, that he loved her.
Regularly, after that, Florence was prepared to sit down with Paul on
Saturday night, and patiently assist him through so much as they could
anticipate together of his next week's work. The cheering thought that he
was labouring on where Florence had just toiled before him, would, of
itself, have been a stimulant to Paul in the perpetual resumption of his
studies; but coupled with the actual lightening of his load, consequent on
this assistance, it saved him, possibly, from sinking underneath the burden
which the fair Cornelia Blimber piled upon his back.
It was not that Miss Blimber meant to be too hard upon him, or that
Doctor Blimber meant to bear too heavily on the young gentlemen in general.
Cornelia merely held the faith in which she had been bred; and the Doctor,
in some partial confusion of his ideas, regarded the young gentlemen as if
they were all Doctors, and were born grown up. Comforted by the applause of
the young gentlemen's nearest relations, and urged on by their blind vanity
and ill-considered haste, it would have been strange if Doctor Blimber had
discovered his mistake, or trimmed his swelling sails to any other tack.
Thus in the case of Paul. When Doctor Blimber said he made great
progress and was naturally clever, Mr Dombey was more bent than ever on his
being forced and crammed. In the case of Briggs, when Doctor Blimber
reported that he did not make great progress yet, and was not naturally
clever, Briggs senior was inexorable in the same purpose. In short, however
high and false the temperature at which the Doctor kept his hothouse, the
owners of the plants were always ready to lend a helping hand at the
bellows, and to stir the fire.
Such spirits as he had in the outset, Paul soon lost of course. But he
retained all that was strange, and old, and thoughtful in his character: and
under circumstances so favourable to the development of those tendencies,
became even more strange, and old, and thoughtful, than before.
The only difference was, that he kept his character to himself. He grew
more thoughtful and reserved, every day; and had no such curiosity in any
living member of the Doctor's household, as he had had in Mrs Pipchin. He
loved to be alone; and in those short intervals when he was not occupied
with his books, liked nothing so well as wandering about the house by
himself, or sitting on the stairs, listening to the great clock in the hall.
He was intimate with all the paperhanging in the house; saw things that no
one else saw in the patterns; found out miniature tigers and lions running
up the bedroom walls, and squinting faces leering in the squares and
diamonds of the floor-cloth.
The solitary child lived on, surrounded by this arabesque work of his
musing fancy, and no one understood him. Mrs Blimber thought him 'odd,' and
sometimes the servants said among themselves that little Dombey 'moped;' but
that was all.
Unless young Toots had some idea on the subject, to the expression of
which he was wholly unequal. Ideas, like ghosts (according to the common
notion of ghosts), must be spoken to a little before they will explain
themselves; and Toots had long left off asking any questions of his own
mind. Some mist there may have been, issuing from that leaden casket, his
cranium, which, if it could have taken shape and form, would have become a
genie; but it could not; and it only so far followed the example of the
smoke in the Arabian story, as to roll out in a thick cloud, and there hang
and hover. But it left a little figure visible upon a lonely shore, and
Toots was always staring at it.
'How are you?' he would say to Paul, fifty times a day. 'Quite well,
Sir, thank you,' Paul would answer. 'Shake hands,' would be Toots's next
advance.
Which Paul, of course, would immediately do. Mr Toots generally said
again, after a long interval of staring and hard breathing, 'How are you?'
To which Paul again replied, 'Quite well, Sir, thank you.'
One evening Mr Toots was sitting at his desk, oppressed by
correspondence, when a great purpose seemed to flash upon him. He laid down
his pen, and went off to seek Paul, whom he found at last, after a long
search, looking through the window of his little bedroom.
'I say!' cried Toots, speaking the moment he entered the room, lest he
should forget it; 'what do you think about?'
'Oh! I think about a great many things,' replied Paul.
'Do you, though?' said Toots, appearing to consider that fact in itself
surprising. 'If you had to die,' said Paul, looking up into his face - Mr
Toots started, and seemed much disturbed.
'Don't you think you would rather die on a moonlight night, when the
sky was quite clear, and the wind blowing, as it did last night?'
Mr Toots said, looking doubtfully at Paul, and shaking his head, that
he didn't know about that.
'Not blowing, at least,' said Paul, 'but sounding in the air like the
sea sounds in the shells. It was a beautiful night. When I had listened to
the water for a long time, I got up and looked out. There was a boat over
there, in the full light of the moon; a boat with a sail.'
The child looked at him so steadfastly, and spoke so earnestly, that Mr
Toots, feeling himself called upon to say something about this boat, said,
'Smugglers.' But with an impartial remembrance of there being two sides to
every question, he added, 'or Preventive.'
'A boat with a sail,' repeated Paul, 'in the full light of the moon.
The sail like an arm, all silver. It went away into the distance, and what
do you think it seemed to do as it moved with the waves?'
'Pitch,' said Mr Toots.
'It seemed to beckon,' said the child, 'to beckon me to come! - There
she is! There she is!'
Toots was almost beside himself with dismay at this sudden exclamation,
after what had gone before, and cried 'Who?'
'My sister Florence!' cried Paul, 'looking up here, and waving her
hand. She sees me - she sees me! Good-night, dear, good-night, good-night.'
His quick transition to a state of unbounded pleasure, as he stood at
his window, kissing and clapping his hands: and the way in which the light
retreated from his features as she passed out of his view, and left a
patient melancholy on the little face: were too remarkable wholly to escape
even Toots's notice. Their interview being interrupted at this moment by a
visit from Mrs Pipchin, who usually brought her black skirts to bear upon
Paul just before dusk, once or twice a week, Toots had no opportunity of
improving the occasion: but it left so marked an impression on his mind that
he twice returned, after having exchanged the usual salutations, to ask Mrs
Pipchin how she did. This the irascible old lady conceived to be a deeply
devised and long-meditated insult, originating in the diabolical invention
of the weak-eyed young man downstairs, against whom she accordingly lodged a
formal complaint with Doctor Blimber that very night; who mentioned to the
young man that if he ever did it again, he should be obliged to part with
him.
The evenings being longer now, Paul stole up to his window every
evening to look out for Florence. She always passed and repassed at a
certain time, until she saw him; and their mutual recognition was a gleam of
sunshine in Paul's daily life. Often after dark, one other figure walked
alone before the Doctor's house. He rarely joined them on the Saturdays now.
He could not bear it. He would rather come unrecognised, and look up at the
windows where his son was qualifying for a man; and wait, and watch, and
plan, and hope.
Oh! could he but have seen, or seen as others did, the slight spare boy
above, watching the waves and clouds at twilight, with his earnest eyes, and
breasting the window of his solitary cage when birds flew by, as if he would
have emulated them, and soared away!
Shipping Intelligence and Office Business
Mr Dombey's offices were in a court where there was an old-established
stall of choice fruit at the corner: where perambulating merchants, of both
sexes, offered for sale at any time between the hours of ten and five,
slippers, pocket-books, sponges, dogs' collars, and Windsor soap; and
sometimes a pointer or an oil-painting.
The pointer always came that way, with a view to the Stock Exchange,
where a sporting taste (originating generally in bets of new hats) is much
in vogue. The other commodities were addressed to the general public; but
they were never offered by the vendors to Mr Dombey. When he appeared, the
dealers in those wares fell off respectfully. The principal slipper and
dogs' collar man - who considered himself a public character, and whose
portrait was screwed on to an artist's door in Cheapside - threw up his
forefinger to the brim of his hat as Mr Dombey went by. The ticket-porter,
if he were not absent on a job, always ran officiously before, to open Mr
Dombey's office door as wide as possible, and hold it open, with his hat
off, while he entered.
The clerks within were not a whit behind-hand in their demonstrations
of respect. A solemn hush prevailed, as Mr Dombey passed through the outer
office. The wit of the Counting-House became in a moment as mute as the row
of leathern fire-buckets hanging up behind him. Such vapid and flat daylight
as filtered through the ground-glass windows and skylights, leaving a black
sediment upon the panes, showed the books and papers, and the figures
bending over them, enveloped in a studious gloom, and as much abstracted in
appearance, from the world without, as if they were assembled at the bottom
of the sea; while a mouldy little strong room in the obscure perspective,
where a shaded lamp was always burning, might have represented the cavern of
some ocean monster, looking on with a red eye at these mysteries of the
deep.
When Perch the messenger, whose place was on a little bracket, like a
timepiece, saw Mr Dombey come in - or rather when he felt that he was
coming, for he had usually an instinctive sense of his approach - he hurried
into Mr Dombey's room, stirred the fire, carried fresh coals from the bowels
of the coal-box, hung the newspaper to air upon the fender, put the chair
ready, and the screen in its place, and was round upon his heel on the
instant of Mr Dombey's entrance, to take his great-coat and hat, and hang
them up. Then Perch took the newspaper, and gave it a turn or two in his
hands before the fire, and laid it, deferentially, at Mr Dombey's elbow. And
so little objection had Perch to being deferential in the last degree, that
if he might have laid himself at Mr Dombey's feet, or might have called him
by some such title as used to be bestowed upon the Caliph Haroun Alraschid,
he would have been all the better pleased.
As this honour would have been an innovation and an experiment, Perch
was fain to content himself by expressing as well as he could, in his
manner, You are the light of my Eyes. You are the Breath of my Soul. You are
the commander of the Faithful Perch! With this imperfect happiness to cheer
him, he would shut the door softly, walk away on tiptoe, and leave his great
chief to be stared at, through a dome-shaped window in the leads, by ugly
chimney-pots and backs of houses, and especially by the bold window of a
hair-cutting saloon on a first floor, where a waxen effigy, bald as a
Mussulman in the morning, and covered, after eleven o'clock in the day, with
luxuriant hair and whiskers in the latest Christian fashion, showed him the
wrong side of its head for ever.
Between Mr Dombey and the common world, as it was accessible through
the medium of the outer office - to which Mr Dombey's presence in his own
room may be said to have struck like damp, or cold air - there were two
degrees of descent. Mr Carker in his own office was the first step; Mr
Morfin, in his own office, was the second. Each of these gentlemen occupied
a little chamber like a bath-room, opening from the passage outside Mr
Dombey's door. Mr Carker, as Grand Vizier, inhabited the room that was
nearest to the Sultan. Mr Morfin, as an officer of inferior state, inhabited
the room that was nearest to the clerks.
The gentleman last mentioned was a cheerful-looking, hazel-eyed elderly
bachelor: gravely attired, as to his upper man, in black; and as to his
legs, in pepper-and-salt colour. His dark hair was just touched here and
there with specks of gray, as though the tread of Time had splashed it; and
his whiskers were already white. He had a mighty respect for Mr Dombey, and
rendered him due homage; but as he was of a genial temper himself, and never
wholly at his ease in that stately presence, he was disquieted by no
jealousy of the many conferences enjoyed by Mr Carker, and felt a secret
satisfaction in having duties to discharge, which rarely exposed him to be
singled out for such distinction. He was a great musical amateur in his way
- after business; and had a paternal affection for his violoncello, which
was once in every week transported from Islington, his place of abode, to a
certain club-room hard by the Bank, where quartettes of the most tormenting
and excruciating nature were executed every Wednesday evening by a private
party.
Mr Carker was a gentleman thirty-eight or forty years old, of a florid
complexion, and with two unbroken rows of glistening teeth, whose regularity
and whiteness were quite distressing. It was impossible to escape the
observation of them, for he showed them whenever he spoke; and bore so wide
a smile upon his countenance (a smile, however, very rarely, indeed,
extending beyond his mouth), that there was something in it like the snarl
of a cat. He affected a stiff white cravat, after the example of his
principal, and was always closely buttoned up and tightly dressed. His
manner towards Mr Dombey was deeply conceived and perfectly expressed. He
was familiar with him, in the very extremity of his sense of the distance
between them. 'Mr Dombey, to a man in your position from a man in mine,
there is no show of subservience compatible with the transaction of business
between us, that I should think sufficient. I frankly tell you, Sir, I give
it up altogether. I feel that I could not satisfy my own mind; and Heaven
knows, Mr Dombey, you can afford to dispense with the endeavour.' If he had
carried these words about with him printed on a placard, and had constantly
offered it to Mr Dombey's perusal on the breast of his coat, he could not
have been more explicit than he was.
This was Carker the Manager. Mr Carker the Junior, Walter's friend, was
his brother; two or three years older than he, but widely removed in
station. The younger brother's post was on the top of the official ladder;
the elder brother's at the bottom. The elder brother never gained a stave,
or raised his foot to mount one. Young men passed above his head, and rose
and rose; but he was always at the bottom. He was quite resigned to occupy
that low condition: never complained of it: and certainly never hoped to
escape from it.
'How do you do this morning?' said Mr Carker the Manager, entering Mr
Dombey's room soon after his arrival one day: with a bundle of papers in his
hand.
'How do you do, Carker?' said Mr Dombey.
'Coolish!' observed Carker, stirring the fire.
'Rather,' said Mr Dombey.
'Any news of the young gentleman who is so important to us all?' asked
Carker, with his whole regiment of teeth on parade.
'Yes - not direct news- I hear he's very well,' said Mr Dombey. Who had
come from Brighton over-night. But no one knew It.
'Very well, and becoming a great scholar, no doubt?' observed the
Manager.
'I hope so,' returned Mr Dombey.
'Egad!' said Mr Carker, shaking his head, 'Time flies!'
'I think so, sometimes,' returned Mr Dombey, glancing at his newspaper.
'Oh! You! You have no reason to think so,' observed Carker. 'One who
sits on such an elevation as yours, and can sit there, unmoved, in all
seasons - hasn't much reason to know anything about the flight of time. It's
men like myself, who are low down and are not superior in circumstances, and
who inherit new masters in the course of Time, that have cause to look about
us. I shall have a rising sun to worship, soon.'
'Time enough, time enough, Carker!' said Mr Dombey, rising from his
chair, and standing with his back to the fire. 'Have you anything there for
me?'
'I don't know that I need trouble you,' returned Carker, turning over
the papers in his hand. 'You have a committee today at three, you know.'
'And one at three, three-quarters,' added Mr Dombey.
'Catch you forgetting anything!' exclaimed Carker, still turning over
his papers. 'If Mr Paul inherits your memory, he'll be a troublesome
customer in the House. One of you is enough'
'You have an accurate memory of your own,' said Mr Dombey.
'Oh! I!' returned the manager. 'It's the only capital of a man like
me.'
Mr Dombey did not look less pompous or at all displeased, as he stood
leaning against the chimney-piece, surveying his (of course unconscious)
clerk, from head to foot. The stiffness and nicety of Mr Carker's dress, and
a certain arrogance of manner, either natural to him or imitated from a
pattern not far off, gave great additional effect to his humility. He seemed
a man who would contend against the power that vanquished him, if he could,
but who was utterly borne down by the greatness and superiority of Mr
Dombey.
'Is Morfin here?' asked Mr Dombey after a short pause, during which Mr
Carker had been fluttering his papers, and muttering little abstracts of
their contents to himself.
'Morfin's here,' he answered, looking up with his widest and almost
sudden smile; 'humming musical recollections - of his last night's quartette
party, I suppose - through the walls between us, and driving me half mad. I
wish he'd make a bonfire of his violoncello, and burn his music-books in
it.'
'You respect nobody, Carker, I think,' said Mr Dombey.
'No?' inquired Carker, with another wide and most feline show of his
teeth. 'Well! Not many people, I believe. I wouldn't answer perhaps,' he
murmured, as if he were only thinking it, 'for more than one.'
A dangerous quality, if real; and a not less dangerous one, if feigned.
But Mr Dombey hardly seemed to think so, as he still stood with his back to
the fire, drawn up to his full height, and looking at his head-clerk with a
dignified composure, in which there seemed to lurk a stronger latent sense
of power than usual.
'Talking of Morfin,' resumed Mr Carker, taking out one paper from the
rest, 'he reports a junior dead in the agency at Barbados, and proposes to
reserve a passage in the Son and Heir - she'll sail in a month or so - for
the successor. You don't care who goes, I suppose? We have nobody of that
sort here.'
Mr Dombey shook his head with supreme indifference.
'It's no very precious appointment,' observed Mr Carker, taking up a
pen, with which to endorse a memorandum on the back of the paper. 'I hope he
may bestow it on some orphan nephew of a musical friend. It may perhaps stop
his fiddle-playing, if he has a gift that way. Who's that? Come in!'
'I beg your pardon, Mr Carker. I didn't know you were here, Sir,'
answered Walter; appearing with some letters in his hand, unopened, and
newly arrived. 'Mr Carker the junior, Sir - '
At the mention of this name, Mr Carker the Manager was or affected to
be, touched to the quick with shame and humiliation. He cast his eyes full
on Mr Dombey with an altered and apologetic look, abased them on the ground,
and remained for a moment without speaking.
'I thought, Sir,' he said suddenly and angrily, turning on Walter,
'that you had been before requested not to drag Mr Carker the Junior into
your conversation.'
'I beg your pardon,' returned Walter. 'I was only going to say that Mr
Carker the Junior had told me he believed you were gone out, or I should not
have knocked at the door when you were engaged with Mr Dombey. These are
letters for Mr Dombey, Sir.'
'Very well, Sir,' returned Mr Carker the Manager, plucking them sharply
from his hand. 'Go about your business.'
But in taking them with so little ceremony, Mr Carker dropped one on
the floor, and did not see what he had done; neither did Mr Dombey observe
the letter lying near his feet. Walter hesitated for a moment, thinking that
one or other of them would notice it; but finding that neither did, he
stopped, came back, picked it up, and laid it himself on Mr Dombey's desk.
The letters were post-letters; and it happened that the one in question was
Mrs Pipchin's regular report, directed as usual - for Mrs Pipchin was but an
indifferent penwoman - by Florence. Mr Dombey, having his attention silently
called to this letter by Walter, started, and looked fiercely at him, as if
he believed that he had purposely selected it from all the rest.
'You can leave the room, Sir!' said Mr Dombey, haughtily.
He crushed the letter in his hand; and having watched Walter out at the
door, put it in his pocket without breaking the seal.
'These continual references to Mr Carker the Junior,' Mr Carker the
Manager began, as soon as they were alone, 'are, to a man in my position,
uttered before one in yours, so unspeakably distressing - '
'Nonsense, Carker,' Mr Dombey interrupted. 'You are too sensitive.'
'I am sensitive,' he returned. 'If one in your position could by any
possibility imagine yourself in my place: which you cannot: you would be so
too.'
As Mr Dombey's thoughts were evidently pursuing some other subject, his
discreet ally broke off here, and stood with his teeth ready to present to
him, when he should look up.
'You want somebody to send to the West Indies, you were saying,'
observed Mr Dombey, hurriedly.
'Yes,' replied Carker.
'Send young Gay.'
'Good, very good indeed. Nothing easier,' said Mr Carker, without any
show of surprise, and taking up the pen to re-endorse the letter, as coolly
as he had done before. '"Send young Gay."'
'Call him back,' said Mr Dombey.
Mr Carker was quick to do so, and Walter was quick to return.
'Gay,' said Mr Dombey, turning a little to look at him over his
shoulder. 'Here is a -
'An opening,' said Mr Carker, with his mouth stretched to the utmost.
'In the West Indies. At Barbados. I am going to send you,' said Mr
Dombey, scorning to embellish the bare truth, 'to fill a junior situation in
the counting-house at Barbados. Let your Uncle know from me, that I have
chosen you to go to the West Indies.'
Walter's breath was so completely taken away by his astonishment, that
he could hardly find enough for the repetition of the words 'West Indies.'
'Somebody must go,' said Mr Dombey, 'and you are young and healthy, and
your Uncle's circumstances are not good. Tell your Uncle that you are
appointed. You will not go yet. There will be an interval of a month - or
two perhaps.'
'Shall I remain there, Sir?' inquired Walter.
'Will you remain there, Sir!' repeated Mr Dombey, turning a little more
round towards him. 'What do you mean? What does he mean, Carker?'
'Live there, Sir,' faltered Walter.
'Certainly,' returned Mr Dombey.
Walter bowed.
'That's all,' said Mr Dombey, resuming his letters. 'You will explain
to him in good time about the usual outfit and so forth, Carker, of course.
He needn't wait, Carker.'
'You needn't wait, Gay,' observed Mr Carker: bare to the gums.
'Unless,' said Mr Dombey, stopping in his reading without looking off
the letter, and seeming to listen. 'Unless he has anything to say.'
'No, Sir,' returned Walter, agitated and confused, and almost stunned,
as an infinite variety of pictures presented themselves to his mind; among
which Captain Cuttle, in his glazed hat, transfixed with astonishment at Mrs
MacStinger's, and his uncle bemoaning his loss in the little back parlour,
held prominent places. 'I hardly know - I - I am much obliged, Sir.'
'He needn't wait, Carker,' said Mr Dombey.
And as Mr Carker again echoed the words, and also collected his papers
as if he were going away too, Walter felt that his lingering any longer
would be an unpardonable intrusion - especially as he had nothing to say -
and therefore walked out quite confounded.
Going along the passage, with the mingled consciousness and
helplessness of a dream, he heard Mr Dombey's door shut again, as Mr Carker
came out: and immediately afterwards that gentleman called to him.
'Bring your friend Mr Carker the Junior to my room, Sir, if you
please.'
Walter went to the outer office and apprised Mr Carker the Junior of
his errand, who accordingly came out from behind a partition where he sat
alone in one corner, and returned with him to the room of Mr Carker the
Manager.
That gentleman was standing with his back to the fire, and his hands
under his coat-tails, looking over his white cravat, as unpromisingly as Mr
Dombey himself could have looked. He received them without any change in his
attitude or softening of his harsh and black expression: merely signing to
Walter to close the door.
'John Carker,' said the Manager, when this was done, turning suddenly
upon his brother, with his two rows of teeth bristling as if he would have
bitten him, 'what is the league between you and this young man, in virtue of
which I am haunted and hunted by the mention of your name? Is it not enough
for you, John Carker, that I am your near relation, and can't detach myself
from that - '
'Say disgrace, James,' interposed the other in a low voice, finding
that he stammered for a word. 'You mean it, and have reason, say disgrace.'
'From that disgrace,' assented his brother with keen emphasis, 'but is
the fact to be blurted out and trumpeted, and proclaimed continually in the
presence of the very House! In moments of confidence too? Do you think your
name is calculated to harmonise in this place with trust and confidence,
John Carker?'
'No,' returned the other. 'No, James. God knows I have no such
thought.'
'What is your thought, then?' said his brother, 'and why do you thrust
yourself in my way? Haven't you injured me enough already?'
'I have never injured you, James, wilfully.'
'You are my brother,' said the Manager. 'That's injury enough.'
'I wish I could undo it, James.'
'I wish you could and would.'
During this conversation, Walter had looked from one brother to the
other, with pain and amazement. He who was the Senior in years, and Junior
in the House, stood, with his eyes cast upon the ground, and his head bowed,
humbly listening to the reproaches of the other. Though these were rendered
very bitter by the tone and look with which they were accompanied, and by
the presence of Walter whom they so much surprised and shocked, he entered
no other protest against them than by slightly raising his right hand in a
deprecatory manner, as if he would have said, 'Spare me!' So, had they been
blows, and he a brave man, under strong constraint, and weakened by bodily
suffering, he might have stood before the executioner.
Generous and quick in all his emotions, and regarding himself as the
innocent occasion of these taunts, Walter now struck in, with all the
earnestness he felt.
'Mr Carker,' he said, addressing himself to the Manager. 'Indeed,
indeed, this is my fault solely. In a kind of heedlessness, for which I
cannot blame myself enough, I have, I have no doubt, mentioned Mr Carker the
Junior much oftener than was necessary; and have allowed his name sometimes
to slip through my lips, when it was against your expressed wish. But it has
been my own mistake, Sir. We have never exchanged one word upon the subject
- very few, indeed, on any subject. And it has not been,' added Walter,
after a moment's pause, 'all heedlessness on my part, Sir; for I have felt
an interest in Mr Carker ever since I have been here, and have hardly been
able to help speaking of him sometimes, when I have thought of him so much!'
Walter said this from his soul, and with the very breath of honour. For
he looked upon the bowed head, and the downcast eyes, and upraised hand, and
thought, 'I have felt it; and why should I not avow it in behalf of this
unfriended, broken man!'
Mr Carker the Manager looked at him, as he spoke, and when he had
finished speaking, with a smile that seemed to divide his face into two
parts.
'You are an excitable youth, Gay,' he said; 'and should endeavour to
cool down a little now, for it would be unwise to encourage feverish
predispositions. Be as cool as you can, Gay. Be as cool as you can. You
might have asked Mr John Carker himself (if you have not done so) whether he
claims to be, or is, an object of such strong interest.'
'James, do me justice,' said his brother. 'I have claimed nothing; and
I claim nothing. Believe me, on my -
'Honour?' said his brother, with another smile, as he warmed himself
before the fire.
'On my Me - on my fallen life!' returned the other, in the same low
voice, but with a deeper stress on his words than he had yet seemed capable
of giving them. 'Believe me, I have held myself aloof, and kept alone. This
has been unsought by me. I have avoided him and everyone.
'Indeed, you have avoided me, Mr Carker,' said Walter, with the tears
rising to his eyes; so true was his compassion. 'I know it, to my
disappointment and regret. When I first came here, and ever since, I am sure
I have tried to be as much your friend, as one of my age could presume to
be; but it has been of no use.
'And observe,' said the Manager, taking him up quickly, 'it will be of
still less use, Gay, if you persist in forcing Mr John Carker's name on
people's attention. That is not the way to befriend Mr John Carker. Ask him
if he thinks it is.'
'It is no service to me,' said the brother. 'It only leads to such a
conversation as the present, which I need not say I could have well spared.
No one can be a better friend to me:' he spoke here very distinctly, as if
he would impress it upon Walter: 'than in forgetting me, and leaving me to
go my way, unquestioned and unnoticed.'
'Your memory not being retentive, Gay, of what you are told by others,'
said Mr Carker the Manager, warming himself with great and increased
satisfaction, 'I thought it well that you should be told this from the best
authority,' nodding towards his brother. 'You are not likely to forget it
now, I hope. That's all, Gay. You can go.
Walter passed out at the door, and was about to close it after him,
when, hearing the voices of the brothers again, and also the mention of his
own name, he stood irresolutely, with his hand upon the lock, and the door
ajar, uncertain whether to return or go away. In this position he could not
help overhearing what followed.
'Think of me more leniently, if you can, James,' said John Carker,
'when I tell you I have had - how could I help having, with my history,
written here' - striking himself upon the breast - 'my whole heart awakened
by my observation of that boy, Walter Gay. I saw in him when he first came
here, almost my other self.'
'Your other self!' repeated the Manager, disdainfully.
'Not as I am, but as I was when I first came here too; as sanguine,
giddy, youthful, inexperienced; flushed with the same restless and
adventurous fancies; and full of the same qualities, fraught with the same
capacity of leading on to good or evil.'
'I hope not,' said his brother, with some hidden and sarcastic meaning
in his tone.
'You strike me sharply; and your hand is steady, and your thrust is
very deep,' returned the other, speaking (or so Walter thought) as if some
cruel weapon actually stabbed him as he spoke. 'I imagined all this when he
was a boy. I believed it. It was a truth to me. I saw him lightly walking on
the edge of an unseen gulf where so many others walk with equal gaiety, and
from which
'The old excuse,' interrupted his brother, as he stirred the fire. 'So
many. Go on. Say, so many fall.'
'From which ONE traveller fell,' returned the other, 'who set forward,
on his way, a boy like him, and missed his footing more and more, and
slipped a little and a little lower; and went on stumbling still, until he
fell headlong and found himself below a shattered man. Think what I
suffered, when I watched that boy.'
'You have only yourself to thank for it,' returned the brother.
'Only myself,' he assented with a sigh. 'I don't seek to divide the
blame or shame.'
'You have divided the shame,' James Carker muttered through his teeth.
And, through so many and such close teeth, he could mutter well.
'Ah, James,' returned his brother, speaking for the first time in an
accent of reproach, and seeming, by the sound of his voice, to have covered
his face with his hands, 'I have been, since then, a useful foil to you. You
have trodden on me freely in your climbing up. Don't spurn me with your
heel!'
A silence ensued. After a time, Mr Carker the Manager was heard
rustling among his papers, as if he had resolved to bring the interview to a
conclusion. At the same time his brother withdrew nearer to the door.
'That's all,' he said. 'I watched him with such trembling and such
fear, as was some little punishment to me, until he passed the place where I
first fell; and then, though I had been his father, I believe I never could
have thanked God more devoutly. I didn't dare to warn him, and advise him;
but if I had seen direct cause, I would have shown him my example. I was
afraid to be seen speaking with him, lest it should be thought I did him
harm, and tempted him to evil, and corrupted him: or lest I really should.
There may be such contagion in me; I don't know. Piece out my history, in
connexion with young Walter Gay, and what he has made me feel; and think of
me more leniently, James, if you can.
With these words he came out to where Walter was standing. He turned a
little paler when he saw him there, and paler yet when Walter caught him by
the hand, and said in a whisper:
'Mr Carker, pray let me thank you! Let me say how much I feel for you!
How sorry I am, to have been the unhappy cause of all this! How I almost
look upon you now as my protector and guardian! How very, very much, I feel
obliged to you and pity you!' said Walter, squeezing both his hands, and
hardly knowing, in his agitation, what he did or said.
Mr Morfin's room being close at hand and empty, and the door wide open,
they moved thither by one accord: the passage being seldom free from someone
passing to or fro. When they were there, and Walter saw in Mr Carker's face
some traces of the emotion within, he almost felt as if he had never seen
the face before; it was so greatly changed.
'Walter,' he said, laying his hand on his shoulder. 'I am far removed
from you, and may I ever be. Do you know what I am?'
'What you are!' appeared to hang on Walter's lips, as he regarded him
attentively.
'It was begun,' said Carker, 'before my twenty-first birthday - led up
to, long before, but not begun till near that time. I had robbed them when I
came of age. I robbed them afterwards. Before my twenty-second birthday, it
was all found out; and then, Walter, from all men's society, I died.'
Again his last few words hung trembling upon Walter's lips, but he
could neither utter them, nor any of his own.
'The House was very good to me. May Heaven reward the old man for his
forbearance! This one, too, his son, who was then newly in the Firm, where I
had held great trust! I was called into that room which is now his - I have
never entered it since - and came out, what you know me. For many years I
sat in my present seat, alone as now, but then a known and recognised
example to the rest. They were all merciful to me, and I lived. Time has
altered that part of my poor expiation; and I think, except the three heads
of the House, there is no one here who knows my story rightly. Before the
little boy grows up, and has it told to him, my corner may be vacant. I
would rather that it might be so! This is the only change to me since that
day, when I left all youth, and hope, and good men's company, behind me in
that room. God bless you, Walter! Keep you, and all dear to you, in honesty,
or strike them dead!'
Some recollection of his trembling from head to foot, as if with
excessive cold, and of his bursting into tears, was all that Walter could
add to this, when he tried to recall exactly what had passed between them.
When Walter saw him next, he was bending over his desk in his old
silent, drooping, humbled way. Then, observing him at his work, and feeling
how resolved he evidently was that no further intercourse should arise
between them, and thinking again and again on all he had seen and heard that
morning in so short a time, in connexion with the history of both the
Carkers, Walter could hardly believe that he was under orders for the West
Indies, and would soon be lost to Uncle Sol, and Captain Cuttle, and to
glimpses few and far between of Florence Dombey - no, he meant Paul - and to
all he loved, and liked, and looked for, in his daily life.
But it was true, and the news had already penetrated to the outer
office; for while he sat with a heavy heart, pondering on these things, and
resting his head upon his arm, Perch the messenger, descending from his
mahogany bracket, and jogging his elbow, begged his pardon, but wished to
say in his ear, Did he think he could arrange to send home to England a jar
of preserved Ginger, cheap, for Mrs Perch's own eating, in the course of her
recovery from her next confinement?
Paul grows more and more Old-fashioned, and goes Home for the Holidays
When the Midsummer vacation approached, no indecent manifestations of
joy were exhibited by the leaden-eyed young gentlemen assembled at Doctor
Blimber's. Any such violent expression as 'breaking up,' would have been
quite inapplicable to that polite establishment. The young gentlemen oozed
away, semi-annually, to their own homes; but they never broke up. They would
have scorned the action.
Tozer, who was constantly galled and tormented by a starched white
cambric neckerchief, which he wore at the express desire of Mrs Tozer, his
parent, who, designing him for the Church, was of opinion that he couldn't
be in that forward state of preparation too soon - Tozer said, indeed, that
choosing between two evils, he thought he would rather stay where he was,
than go home. However inconsistent this declaration might appear with that
passage in Tozer's Essay on the subject, wherein he had observed 'that the
thoughts of home and all its recollections, awakened in his mind the most
pleasing emotions of anticipation and delight,' and had also likened himself
to a Roman General, flushed with a recent victory over the Iceni, or laden
with Carthaginian spoil, advancing within a few hours' march of the Capitol,
presupposed, for the purposes of the simile, to be the dwelling-place of Mrs
Tozer, still it was very sincerely made. For it seemed that Tozer had a
dreadful Uncle, who not only volunteered examinations of him, in the
holidays, on abstruse points, but twisted innocent events and things, and
wrenched them to the same fell purpose. So that if this Uncle took him to
the Play, or, on a similar pretence of kindness, carried him to see a Giant,
or a Dwarf, or a Conjuror, or anything, Tozer knew he had read up some
classical allusion to the subject beforehand, and was thrown into a state of
mortal apprehension: not foreseeing where he might break out, or what
authority he might not quote against him.
As to Briggs, his father made no show of artifice about it. He never
would leave him alone. So numerous and severe were the mental trials of that
unfortunate youth in vacation time, that the friends of the family (then
resident near Bayswater, London) seldom approached the ornamental piece of
water in Kensington Gardens,' without a vague expectation of seeing Master
Briggs's hat floating on the surface, and an unfinished exercise lying on
the bank. Briggs, therefore, was not at all sanguine on the subject of
holidays; and these two sharers of little Paul's bedroom were so fair a
sample of the young gentlemen in general, that the most elastic among them
contemplated the arrival of those festive periods with genteel resignation.
It was far otherwise with little Paul. The end of these first holidays
was to witness his separation from Florence, but who ever looked forward to
the end of holidays whose beginning was not yet come! Not Paul, assuredly.
As the happy time drew near, the lions and tigers climbing up the bedroom
walls became quite tame and frolicsome. The grim sly faces in the squares
and diamonds of the floor-cloth, relaxed and peeped out at him with less
wicked eyes. The grave old clock had more of personal interest in the tone
of its formal inquiry; and the restless sea went rolling on all night, to
the sounding of a melancholy strain - yet it was pleasant too - that rose
and fell with the waves, and rocked him, as it were, to sleep.
Mr Feeder, B.A., seemed to think that he, too, would enjoy the holidays
very much. Mr Toots projected a life of holidays from that time forth; for,
as he regularly informed Paul every day, it was his 'last half' at Doctor
Blimber's, and he was going to begin to come into his property directly.
It was perfectly understood between Paul and Mr Toots, that they were
intimate friends, notwithstanding their distance in point of years and
station. As the vacation approached, and Mr Toots breathed harder and stared
oftener in Paul's society, than he had done before, Paul knew that he meant
he was sorry they were going to lose sight of each other, and felt very much
obliged to him for his patronage and good opinion.
It was even understood by Doctor Blimber, Mrs Blimber, and Miss
Blimber, as well as by the young gentlemen in general, that Toots had
somehow constituted himself protector and guardian of Dombey, and the
circumstance became so notorious, even to Mrs Pipchin, that the good old
creature cherished feelings of bitterness and jealousy against Toots; and,
in the sanctuary of her own home, repeatedly denounced him as a
'chuckle-headed noodle.' Whereas the innocent Toots had no more idea of
awakening Mrs Pipchin's wrath, than he had of any other definite possibility
or proposition. On the contrary, he was disposed to consider her rather a
remarkable character, with many points of interest about her. For this
reason he smiled on her with so much urbanity, and asked her how she did, so
often, in the course of her visits to little Paul, that at last she one
night told him plainly, she wasn't used to it, whatever he might think; and
she could not, and she would not bear it, either from himself or any other
puppy then existing: at which unexpected acknowledgment of his civilities,
Mr Toots was so alarmed that he secreted himself in a retired spot until she
had gone. Nor did he ever again face the doughty Mrs Pipchin, under Doctor
Blimber's roof.
They were within two or three weeks of the holidays, when, one day,
Cornelia Blimber called Paul into her room, and said, 'Dombey, I am going to
send home your analysis.'
'Thank you, Ma'am,' returned Paul.
'You know what I mean, do you, Dombey?' inquired Miss Blimber, looking
hard at him, through the spectacles.
'No, Ma'am,' said Paul.
'Dombey, Dombey,' said Miss Blimber, 'I begin to be afraid you are a
sad boy. When you don't know the meaning of an expression, why don't you
seek for information?'
'Mrs Pipchin told me I wasn't to ask questions,' returned Paul.
'I must beg you not to mention Mrs Pipchin to me, on any account,
Dombey,' returned Miss Blimber. 'I couldn't think of allowing it. The course
of study here, is very far removed from anything of that sort. A repetition
of such allusions would make it necessary for me to request to hear, without
a mistake, before breakfast-time to-morrow morning, from Verbum personale
down to simillimia cygno.'
'I didn't mean, Ma'am - ' began little Paul.
'I must trouble you not to tell me that you didn't mean, if you please,
Dombey,' said Miss Blimber, who preserved an awful politeness in her
admonitions. 'That is a line of argument I couldn't dream of permitting.'
Paul felt it safest to say nothing at all, so he only looked at Miss
Blimber's spectacles. Miss Blimber having shaken her head at him gravely,
referred to a paper lying before her.
'"Analysis of the character of P. Dombey." If my recollection serves
me,' said Miss Blimber breaking off, 'the word analysis as opposed to
synthesis, is thus defined by Walker. "The resolution of an object, whether
of the senses or of the intellect, into its first elements." As opposed to
synthesis, you observe. Now you know what analysis is, Dombey.'
Dombey didn't seem to be absolutely blinded by the light let in upon
his intellect, but he made Miss Blimber a little bow.
'"Analysis,"' resumed Miss Blimber, casting her eye over the paper,
'"of the character of P. Dombey." I find that the natural capacity of Dombey
is extremely good; and that his general disposition to study may be stated
in an equal ratio. Thus, taking eight as our standard and highest number, I
find these qualities in Dombey stated each at six three-fourths!'
Miss Blimber paused to see how Paul received this news. Being undecided
whether six three-fourths meant six pounds fifteen, or sixpence three
farthings, or six foot three, or three quarters past six, or six somethings
that he hadn't learnt yet, with three unknown something elses over, Paul
rubbed his hands and looked straight at Miss Blimber. It happened to answer
as well as anything else he could have done; and Cornelia proceeded.
'"Violence two. Selfishness two. Inclination to low company, as evinced
in the case of a person named Glubb, originally seven, but since reduced.
Gentlemanly demeanour four, and improving with advancing years." Now what I
particularly wish to call your attention to, Dombey, is the general
observation at the close of this analysis.'
Paul set himself to follow it with great care.
'"It may be generally observed of Dombey,"' said Miss Blimber, reading
in a loud voice, and at every second word directing her spectacles towards
the little figure before her: '"that his abilities and inclinations are
good, and that he has made as much progress as under the circumstances could
have been expected. But it is to be lamented of this young gentleman that he
is singular (what is usually termed old-fashioned) in his character and
conduct, and that, without presenting anything in either which distinctly
calls for reprobation, he is often very unlike other young gentlemen of his
age and social position." Now, Dombey,' said Miss Blimber, laying down the
paper, 'do you understand that?'
'I think I do, Ma'am,' said Paul.
'This analysis, you see, Dombey,' Miss Blimber continued, 'is going to
be sent home to your respected parent. It will naturally be very painful to
him to find that you are singular in your character and conduct. It is
naturally painful to us; for we can't like you, you know, Dombey, as well as
we could wish.'
She touched the child upon a tender point. He had secretly become more
and more solicitous from day to day, as the time of his departure drew more
near, that all the house should like him. From some hidden reason, very
imperfectly understood by himself - if understood at all - he felt a
gradually increasing impulse of affection, towards almost everything and
everybody in the place. He could not bear to think that they would be quite
indifferent to him when he was gone. He wanted them to remember him kindly;
and he had made it his business even to conciliate a great hoarse shaggy
dog, chained up at the back of the house, who had previously been the terror
of his life: that even he might miss him when he was no longer there.
Little thinking that in this, he only showed again the difference
between himself and his compeers, poor tiny Paul set it forth to Miss
Blimber as well as he could, and begged her, in despite of the official
analysis, to have the goodness to try and like him. To Mrs Blimber, who had
joined them, he preferred the same petition: and when that lady could not
forbear, even in his presence, from giving utterance to her often-repeated
opinion, that he was an odd child, Paul told her that he was sure she was
quite right; that he thought it must be his bones, but he didn't know; and
that he hoped she would overlook it, for he was fond of them all.
'Not so fond,' said Paul, with a mixture of timidity and perfect
frankness, which was one of the most peculiar and most engaging qualities of
the child, 'not so fond as I am of Florence, of course; that could never be.
You couldn't expect that, could you, Ma'am?'
'Oh! the old-fashioned little soul!' cried Mrs Blimber, in a whisper.
'But I like everybody here very much,' pursued Paul, 'and I should
grieve to go away, and think that anyone was glad that I was gone, or didn't
care.'
Mrs Blimber was now quite sure that Paul was the oddest child in the
world; and when she told the Doctor what had passed, the Doctor did not
controvert his wife's opinion. But he said, as he had said before, when Paul
first came, that study would do much; and he also said, as he had said on
that occasion, 'Bring him on, Cornelia! Bring him on!'
Cornelia had always brought him on as vigorously as she could; and Paul
had had a hard life of it. But over and above the getting through his tasks,
he had long had another purpose always present to him, and to which he still
held fast. It was, to be a gentle, useful, quiet little fellow, always
striving to secure the love and attachment of the rest; and though he was
yet often to be seen at his old post on the stairs, or watching the waves
and clouds from his solitary window, he was oftener found, too, among the
other boys, modestly rendering them some little voluntary service. Thus it
came to pass, that even among those rigid and absorbed young anchorites, who
mortified themselves beneath the roof of Doctor Blimber, Paul was an object
of general interest; a fragile little plaything that they all liked, and
that no one would have thought of treating roughly. But he could not change
his nature, or rewrite the analysis; and so they all agreed that Dombey was
old-fashioned.
There were some immunities, however, attaching to the character enjoyed
by no one else. They could have better spared a newer-fashioned child, and
that alone was much. When the others only bowed to Doctor Blimber and family
on retiring for the night, Paul would stretch out his morsel of a hand, and
boldly shake the Doctor's; also Mrs Blimber's; also Cornelia's. If anybody
was to be begged off from impending punishment, Paul was always the
delegate. The weak-eyed young man himself had once consulted him, in
reference to a little breakage of glass and china. And it was darKly
rumoured that the butler, regarding him with favour such as that stern man
had never shown before to mortal boy, had sometimes mingled porter with his
table-beer to make him strong.
Over and above these extensive privileges, Paul had free right of entry
to Mr Feeder's room, from which apartment he had twice led Mr Toots into the
open air in a state of faintness, consequent on an unsuccessful attempt to
smoke a very blunt cigar: one of a bundle which that young gentleman had
covertly purchased on the shingle from a most desperate smuggler, who had
acknowledged, in confidence, that two hundred pounds was the price set upon
his head, dead or alive, by the Custom House. It was a snug room, Mr
Feeder's, with his bed in another little room inside of it; and a flute,
which Mr Feeder couldn't play yet, but was going to make a point of
learning, he said, hanging up over the fireplace. There were some books in
it, too, and a fishing-rod; for Mr Feeder said he should certainly make a
point of learning to fish, when he could find time. Mr Feeder had amassed,
with similar intentions, a beautiful little curly secondhand key-bugle, a
chess-board and men, a Spanish Grammar, a set of sketching materials, and a
pair of boxing-gloves. The art of self-defence Mr Feeder said he should
undoubtedly make a point of learning, as he considered it the duty of every
man to do; for it might lead to the protection of a female in distress. But
Mr Feeder's great possession was a large green jar of snuff, which Mr Toots
had brought down as a present, at the close of the last vacation; and for
which he had paid a high price, having been the genuine property of the
Prince Regent. Neither Mr Toots nor Mr Feeder could partake of this or any
other snuff, even in the most stinted and moderate degree, without being
seized with convulsions of sneezing. Nevertheless it was their great delight
to moisten a box-full with cold tea, stir it up on a piece of parchment with
a paper-knife, and devote themselves to its consumption then and there. In
the course of which cramming of their noses, they endured surprising
torments with the constancy of martyrs: and, drinking table-beer at
intervals, felt all the glories of dissipation.
To little Paul sitting silent in their company, and by the side of his
chief patron, Mr Toots, there was a dread charm in these reckless occasions:
and when Mr Feeder spoke of the dark mysteries of London, and told Mr Toots
that he was going to observe it himself closely in all its ramifications in
the approaching holidays, and for that purpose had made arrangements to
board with two old maiden ladies at Peckham, Paul regarded him as if he were
the hero of some book of travels or wild adventure, and was almost afraid of
such a slashing person.
Going into this room one evening, when the holidays were very near,
Paul found Mr Feeder filling up the blanks in some printed letters, while
some others, already filled up and strewn before him, were being folded and
sealed by Mr Toots. Mr Feeder said, 'Aha, Dombey, there you are, are you?' -
for they were always kind to him, and glad to see him - and then said,
tossing one of the letters towards him, 'And there you are, too, Dombey.
That's yours.'
'Mine, Sir?' said Paul.
'Your invitation,' returned Mr Feeder.
Paul, looking at it, found, in copper-plate print, with the exception
of his own name and the date, which were in Mr Feeder's penmanship, that
Doctor and Mrs Blimber requested the pleasure of Mr P. Dombey's company at
an early party on Wednesday Evening the Seventeenth Instant; and that the
hour was half-past seven o'clock; and that the object was Quadrilles. Mr
Toots also showed him, by holding up a companion sheet of paper, that Doctor
and Mrs Blimber requested the pleasure of Mr Toots's company at an early
party on Wednesday Evening the Seventeenth Instant, when the hour was
half-past seven o'clock, and when the object was Quadrilles. He also found,
on glancing at the table where Mr Feeder sat, that the pleasure of Mr
Briggs's company, and of Mr Tozer's company, and of every young gentleman's
company, was requested by Doctor and Mrs Blimber on the same genteel
Occasion.
Mr Feeder then told him, to his great joy, that his sister was invited,
and that it was a half-yearly event, and that, as the holidays began that
day, he could go away with his sister after the party, if he liked, which
Paul interrupted him to say he would like, very much. Mr Feeder then gave
him to understand that he would be expected to inform Doctor and Mrs
Blimber, in superfine small-hand, that Mr P. Dombey would be happy to have
the honour of waiting on them, in accordance with their polite invitation.
Lastly, Mr Feeder said, he had better not refer to the festive occasion, in
the hearing of Doctor and Mrs Blimber; as these preliminaries, and the whole
of the arrangements, were conducted on principles of classicality and high
breeding; and that Doctor and Mrs Blimber on the one hand, and the young
gentlemen on the other, were supposed, in their scholastic capacities, not
to have the least idea of what was in the wind.
Paul thanked Mr Feeder for these hints, and pocketing his invitation,
sat down on a stool by the side of Mr Toots, as usual. But Paul's head,
which had long been ailing more or less, and was sometimes very heavy and
painful, felt so uneasy that night, that he was obliged to support it on his
hand. And yet it dropped so, that by little and little it sunk on Mr Toots's
knee, and rested there, as if it had no care to be ever lifted up again.
That was no reason why he should be deaf; but he must have been, he
thought, for, by and by, he heard Mr Feeder calling in his ear, and gently
shaking him to rouse his attention. And when he raised his head, quite
scared, and looked about him, he found that Doctor Blimber had come into the
room; and that the window was open, and that his forehead was wet with
sprinkled water; though how all this had been done without his knowledge,
was very curious indeed.
'Ah! Come, come! That's well! How is my little friend now?' said Doctor
Blimber, encouragingly.
'Oh, quite well, thank you, Sir,' said Paul.
But there seemed to be something the matter with the floor, for he
couldn't stand upon it steadily; and with the walls too, for they were
inclined to turn round and round, and could only be stopped by being looked
at very hard indeed. Mr Toots's head had the appearance of being at once
bigger and farther off than was quite natural; and when he took Paul in his
arms, to carry him upstairs, Paul observed with astonishment that the door
was in quite a different place from that in which he had expected to find
it, and almost thought, at first, that Mr Toots was going to walk straight
up the chimney.
It was very kind of Mr Toots to carry him to the top of the house so
tenderly; and Paul told him that it was. But Mr Toots said he would do a
great deal more than that, if he could; and indeed he did more as it was:
for he helped Paul to undress, and helped him to bed, in the kindest manner
possible, and then sat down by the bedside and chuckled very much; while Mr
Feeder, B.A., leaning over the bottom of the bedstead, set all the little
bristles on his head bolt upright with his bony hands, and then made believe
to spar at Paul with great science, on account of his being all right again,
which was so uncommonly facetious, and kind too in Mr Feeder, that Paul, not
being able to make up his mind whether it was best to laugh or cry at him,
did both at once.
How Mr Toots melted away, and Mr Feeder changed into Mrs Pipchin, Paul
never thought of asking; neither was he at all curious to know; but when he
saw Mrs Pipchin standing at the bottom of the bed, instead of Mr Feeder, he
cried out, 'Mrs Pipchin, don't tell Florence!'
'Don't tell Florence what, my little Paul?' said Mrs Pipchin, coming
round to the bedside, and sitting down in the chair.
'About me,' said Paul.
'No, no,' said Mrs Pipchin.
'What do you think I mean to do when I grow up, Mrs Pipchin?' inquired
Paul, turning his face towards her on his pillow, and resting his chin
wistfully on his folded hands.
Mrs Pipchin couldn't guess.
'I mean,' said Paul, 'to put my money all together in one Bank, never
try to get any more, go away into the country with my darling Florence, have
a beautiful garden, fields, and woods, and live there with her all my life!'
'Indeed!' cried Mrs Pipchin.
'Yes,' said Paul. 'That's what I mean to do, when I - ' He stopped, and
pondered for a moment.
Mrs Pipchin's grey eye scanned his thoughtful face.
'If I grow up,' said Paul. Then he went on immediately to tell Mrs
Pipchin all about the party, about Florence's invitation, about the pride he
would have in the admiration that would be felt for her by all the boys,
about their being so kind to him and fond of him, about his being so fond of
them, and about his being so glad of it. Then he told Mrs Pipchin about the
analysis, and about his being certainly old-fashioned, and took Mrs
Pipchin's opinion on that point, and whether she knew why it was, and what
it meant. Mrs Pipchin denied the fact altogether, as the shortest way of
getting out of the difficulty; but Paul was far from satisfied with that
reply, and looked so searchingly at Mrs Pipchin for a truer answer, that she
was obliged to get up and look out of the window to avoid his eyes.
There was a certain calm Apothecary, 'who attended at the establishment
when any of the young gentlemen were ill, and somehow he got into the room
and appeared at the bedside, with Mrs Blimber. How they came there, or how
long they had been there, Paul didn't know; but when he saw them, he sat up
in bed, and answered all the Apothecary's questions at full length, and
whispered to him that Florence was not to know anything about it, if he
pleased, and that he had set his mind upon her coming to the party. He was
very chatty with the Apothecary, and they parted excellent friends. Lying
down again with his eyes shut, he heard the Apothecary say, out of the room
and quite a long way off - or he dreamed it - that there was a want of vital
power (what was that, Paul wondered!) and great constitutional weakness.
That as the little fellow had set his heart on parting with his school-mates
on the seventeenth, it would be better to indulge the fancy if he grew no
worse. That he was glad to hear from Mrs Pipchin, that the little fellow
would go to his friends in London on the eighteenth. That he would write to
Mr Dombey, when he should have gained a better knowledge of the case, and
before that day. That there was no immediate cause for - what? Paul lost
that word And that the little fellow had a fine mind, but was an
old-fashioned boy.
What old fashion could that be, Paul wondered with a palpitating heart,
that was so visibly expressed in him; so plainly seen by so many people!
He could neither make it out, nor trouble himself long with the effort.
Mrs Pipchin was again beside him, if she had ever been away (he thought she
had gone out with the Doctor, but it was all a dream perhaps), and presently
a bottle and glass got into her hands magically, and she poured out the
contents for him. After that, he had some real good jelly, which Mrs Blimber
brought to him herself; and then he was so well, that Mrs Pipchin went home,
at his urgent solicitation, and Briggs and Tozer came to bed. Poor Briggs
grumbled terribly about his own analysis, which could hardly have
discomposed him more if it had been a chemical process; but he was very good
to Paul, and so was Tozer, and so were all the rest, for they every one
looked in before going to bed, and said, 'How are you now, Dombey?' 'Cheer
up, little Dombey!' and so forth. After Briggs had got into bed, he lay
awake for a long time, still bemoaning his analysis, and saying he knew it
was all wrong, and they couldn't have analysed a murderer worse, and - how
would Doctor Blimber like it if his pocket-money depended on it? It was very
easy, Briggs said, to make a galley-slave of a boy all the half-year, and
then score him up idle; and to crib two dinners a-week out of his board, and
then score him up greedy; but that wasn't going to be submitted to, he
believed, was it? Oh! Ah!
Before the weak-eyed young man performed on the gong next morning, he
came upstairs to Paul and told him he was to lie still, which Paul very
gladly did. Mrs Pipchin reappeared a little before the Apothecary, and a
little after the good young woman whom Paul had seen cleaning the stove on
that first morning (how long ago it seemed now!) had brought him his
breakfast. There was another consultation a long way off, or else Paul
dreamed it again; and then the Apothecary, coming back with Doctor and Mrs
Blimber, said:
'Yes, I think, Doctor Blimber, we may release this young gentleman from
his books just now; the vacation being so very near at hand.'
'By all means,' said Doctor Blimber. 'My love, you will inform
Cornelia, if you please.'
'Assuredly,' said Mrs Blimber.
The Apothecary bending down, looked closely into Paul's eyes, and felt
his head, and his pulse, and his heart, with so much interest and care, that
Paul said, 'Thank you, Sir.'
'Our little friend,' observed Doctor Blimber, 'has never complained.'
'Oh no!' replied the Apothecary. 'He was not likely to complain.'
'You find him greatly better?' said Doctor Blimber.
'Oh! he is greatly better, Sir,' returned the Apothecary.
Paul had begun to speculate, in his own odd way, on the subject that
might occupy the Apothecary's mind just at that moment; so musingly had he
answered the two questions of Doctor Blimber. But the Apothecary happening
to meet his little patient's eyes, as the latter set off on that mental
expedition, and coming instantly out of his abstraction with a cheerful
smile, Paul smiled in return and abandoned it.
He lay in bed all that day, dozing and dreaming, and looking at Mr
Toots; but got up on the next, and went downstairs. Lo and behold, there was
something the matter with the great clock; and a workman on a pair of steps
had taken its face off, and was poking instruments into the works by the
light of a candle! This was a great event for Paul, who sat down on the
bottom stair, and watched the operation attentively: now and then glancing
at the clock face, leaning all askew, against the wall hard by, and feeling
a little confused by a suspicion that it was ogling him.
The workman on the steps was very civil; and as he said, when he
observed Paul, 'How do you do, Sir?' Paul got into conversation with him,
and told him he hadn't been quite well lately. The ice being thus broken,
Paul asked him a multitude of questions about chimes and clocks: as, whether
people watched up in the lonely church steeples by night to make them
strike, and how the bells were rung when people died, and whether those were
different bells from wedding bells, or only sounded dismal in the fancies of
the living. Finding that his new acquaintance was not very well informed on
the subject of the Curfew Bell of ancient days, Paul gave him an account of
that institution; and also asked him, as a practical man, what he thought
about King Alfred's idea of measuring time by the burning of candles; to
which the workman replied, that he thought it would be the ruin of the clock
trade if it was to come up again. In fine, Paul looked on, until the clock
had quite recovered its familiar aspect, and resumed its sedate inquiry;
when the workman, putting away his tools in a long basket, bade him good
day, and went away. Though not before he had whispered something, on the
door-mat, to the footman, in which there was the phrase 'old-fashioned' -
for Paul heard it. What could that old fashion be, that seemed to make the
people sorry! What could it be!
Having nothing to learn now, he thought of this frequently; though not
so often as he might have done, if he had had fewer things to think of. But
he had a great many; and was always thinking, all day long.
First, there was Florence coming to the party. Florence would see that
the boys were fond of him; and that would make her happy. This was his great
theme. Let Florence once be sure that they were gentle and good to him, and
that he had become a little favourite among them, and then the would always
think of the time he had passed there, without being very sorry. Florence
might be all the happier too for that, perhaps, when he came back.
When he came back! Fifty times a day, his noiseless little feet went up
the stairs to his own room, as he collected every book, and scrap, and
trifle that belonged to him, and put them all together there, down to the
minutest thing, for taking home! There was no shade of coming back on little
Paul; no preparation for it, or other reference to it, grew out of anything
he thought or did, except this slight one in connexion with his sister. On
the contrary, he had to think of everything familiar to him, in his
contemplative moods and in his wanderings about the house, as being to be
parted with; and hence the many things he had to think of, all day long.
He had to peep into those rooms upstairs, and think how solitary they
would be when he was gone, and wonder through how many silent days, weeks,
months, and years, they would continue just as grave and undisturbed. He had
to think - would any other child (old-fashioned, like himself stray there at
any time, to whom the same grotesque distortions of pattern and furniture
would manifest themselves; and would anybody tell that boy of little Dombey,
who had been there once? He had to think of a portrait on the stairs, which
always looked earnestly after him as he went away, eyeing it over his
shoulder; and which, when he passed it in the company of anyone, still
seemed to gaze at him, and not at his companion. He had much to think of, in
association with a print that hung up in another place, where, in the centre
of a wondering group, one figure that he knew, a figure with a light about
its head - benignant, mild, and merciful - stood pointing upward.
At his own bedroom window, there were crowds of thoughts that mixed
with these, and came on, one upon another, like the rolling waves. Where
those wild birds lived, that were always hovering out at sea in troubled
weather; where the clouds rose and first began; whence the wind issued on
its rushing flight, and where it stopped; whether the spot where he and
Florence had so often sat, and watched, and talked about these things, could
ever be exactly as it used to be without them; whether it could ever be the
same to Florence, if he were in some distant place, and she were sitting
there alone.
He had to think, too, of Mr Toots, and Mr Feeder, B.A., of all the
boys; and of Doctor Blimber, Mrs Blimber, and Miss Blimber; of home, and of
his aunt and Miss Tox; of his father; Dombey and Son, Walter with the poor
old Uncle who had got the money he wanted, and that gruff-voiced Captain
with the iron hand. Besides all this, he had a number of little visits to
pay, in the course of the day; to the schoolroom, to Doctor Blimber's study,
to Mrs Blimber's private apartment, to Miss Blimber's, and to the dog. For
he was free of the whole house now, to range it as he chose; and, in his
desire to part with everybody on affectionate terms, he attended, in his
way, to them all. Sometimes he found places in books for Briggs, who was
always losing them; sometimes he looked up words in dictionaries for other
young gentlemen who were in extremity; sometimes he held skeins of silk for
Mrs Blimber to wind; sometimes he put Cornelia's desk to rights; sometimes
he would even creep into the Doctor's study, and, sitting on the carpet near
his learned feet, turn the globes softly, and go round the world, or take a
flight among the far-off stars.
In those days immediately before the holidays, in short, when the other
young gentlemen were labouring for dear life through a general resumption of
the studies of the whole half-year, Paul was such a privileged pupil as had
never been seen in that house before. He could hardly believe it himself;
but his liberty lasted from hour to hour, and from day to day; and little
Dombey was caressed by everyone. Doctor Blimber was so particular about him,
that he requested Johnson to retire from the dinner-table one day, for
having thoughtlessly spoken to him as 'poor little Dombey;' which Paul
thought rather hard and severe, though he had flushed at the moment, and
wondered why Johnson should pity him. It was the more questionable justice,
Paul thought, in the Doctor, from his having certainly overheard that great
authority give his assent on the previous evening, to the proposition
(stated by Mrs Blimber) that poor dear little Dombey was more old-fashioned
than ever. And now it was that Paul began to think it must surely be
old-fashioned to be very thin, and light, and easily tired, and soon
disposed to lie down anywhere and rest; for he couldn't help feeling that
these were more and more his habits every day.
At last the party-day arrived; and Doctor Blimber said at breakfast,
'Gentlemen, we will resume our studies on the twenty-fifth of next month.'
Mr Toots immediately threw off his allegiance, and put on his ring: and
mentioning the Doctor in casual conversation shortly afterwards, spoke of
him as 'Blimber'! This act of freedom inspired the older pupils with
admiration and envy; but the younger spirits were appalled, and seemed to
marvel that no beam fell down and crushed him.
Not the least allusion was made to the ceremonies of the evening,
either at breakfast or at dinner; but there was a bustle in the house all
day, and in the course of his perambulations, Paul made acquaintance with
various strange benches and candlesticks, and met a harp in a green
greatcoat standing on the landing outside the drawing-room door. There was
something queer, too, about Mrs Blimber's head at dinner-time, as if she had
screwed her hair up too tight; and though Miss Blimber showed a graceful
bunch of plaited hair on each temple, she seemed to have her own little
curls in paper underneath, and in a play-bill too; for Paul read 'Theatre
Royal' over one of her sparkling spectacles, and 'Brighton' over the other.
There was a grand array of white waistcoats and cravats in the young
gentlemen's bedrooms as evening approached; and such a smell of singed hair,
that Doctor Blimber sent up the footman with his compliments, and wished to
know if the house was on fire. But it was only the hairdresser curling the
young gentlemen, and over-heating his tongs in the ardour of business.
When Paul was dressed - which was very soon done, for he felt unwell
and drowsy, and was not able to stand about it very long - he went down into
the drawing-room; where he found Doctor Blimber pacing up and down the room
full dressed, but with a dignified and unconcerned demeanour, as if he
thought it barely possible that one or two people might drop in by and by.
Shortly afterwards, Mrs Blimber appeared, looking lovely, Paul thought; and
attired in such a number of skirts that it was quite an excursion to walk
round her. Miss Blimber came down soon after her Mama; a little squeezed in
appearance, but very charming.
Mr Toots and Mr Feeder were the next arrivals. Each of these gentlemen
brought his hat in his hand, as if he lived somewhere else; and when they
were announced by the butler, Doctor Blimber said, 'Ay, ay, ay! God bless my
soul!' and seemed extremely glad to see them. Mr Toots was one blaze of
jewellery and buttons; and he felt the circumstance so strongly, that when
he had shaken hands with the Doctor, and had bowed to Mrs Blimber and Miss
Blimber, he took Paul aside, and said, 'What do you think of this, Dombey?'
But notwithstanding this modest confidence in himself, Mr Toots
appeared to be involved in a good deal of uncertainty whether, on the whole,
it was judicious to button the bottom button of his waistcoat, and whether,
on a calm revision of all the circumstances, it was best to wear his
waistbands turned up or turned down. Observing that Mr Feeder's were turned
up, Mr Toots turned his up; but the waistbands of the next arrival being
turned down, Mr Toots turned his down. The differences in point of
waistcoat-buttoning, not only at the bottom, but at the top too, became so
numerous and complicated as the arrivals thickened, that Mr Toots was
continually fingering that article of dress, as if he were performing on
some instrument; and appeared to find the incessant execution it demanded,
quite bewildering. All the young gentlemen, tightly cravatted, curled, and
pumped, and with their best hats in their hands, having been at different
times announced and introduced, Mr Baps, the dancing-master, came,
accompanied by Mrs Baps, to whom Mrs Blimber was extremely kind and
condescending. Mr Baps was a very grave gentleman, with a slow and measured
manner of speaking; and before he had stood under the lamp five minutes, he
began to talk to Toots (who had been silently comparing pumps with him)
about what you were to do with your raw materials when they came into your
ports in return for your drain of gold. Mr Toots, to whom the question
seemed perplexing, suggested 'Cook 'em.' But Mr Baps did not appear to think
that would do.
Paul now slipped away from the cushioned corner of a sofa, which had
been his post of observation, and went downstairs into the tea-room to be
ready for Florence, whom he had not seen for nearly a fortnight, as he had
remained at Doctor Blimber's on the previous Saturday and Sunday, lest he
should take cold. Presently she came: looking so beautiful in her simple
ball dress, with her fresh flowers in her hand, that when she knelt down on
the ground to take Paul round the neck and kiss him (for there was no one
there, but his friend and another young woman waiting to serve out the tea),
he could hardly make up his mind to let her go again, or to take away her
bright and loving eyes from his face.
'But what is the matter, Floy?' asked Paul, almost sure that he saw a
tear there.
'Nothing, darling; nothing,' returned Florence.
Paul touched her cheek gently with his finger - and it was a tear!
'Why, Floy!' said he.
'We'll go home together, and I'll nurse you, love,' said Florence.
'Nurse me!' echoed Paul.
Paul couldn't understand what that had to do with it, nor why the two
young women looked on so seriously, nor why Florence turned away her face
for a moment, and then turned it back, lighted up again with smiles.
'Floy,' said Paul, holding a ringlet of her dark hair in his hand.
'Tell me, dear, Do you think I have grown old-fashioned?'
His sister laughed, and fondled him, and told him 'No.'
'Because I know they say so,' returned Paul, 'and I want to know what
they mean, Floy.' But a loud double knock coming at the door, and Florence
hurrying to the table, there was no more said between them. Paul wondered
again when he saw his friend whisper to Florence, as if she were comforting
her; but a new arrival put that out of his head speedily.
It was Sir Barnet Skettles, Lady Skettles, and Master Skettles. Master
Skettles was to be a new boy after the vacation, and Fame had been busy, in
Mr Feeder's room, with his father, who was in the House of Commons, and of
whom Mr Feeder had said that when he did catch the Speaker's eye (which he
had been expected to do for three or four years), it was anticipated that he
would rather touch up the Radicals.
'And what room is this now, for instance?' said Lady Skettles to Paul's
friend, 'Melia.
'Doctor Blimber's study, Ma'am,' was the reply.
Lady Skettles took a panoramic survey of it through her glass, and said
to Sir Barnet Skettles, with a nod of approval, 'Very good.' Sir Barnet
assented, but Master Skettles looked suspicious and doubtful.
'And this little creature, now,' said Lady Skettles, turning to Paul.
'Is he one of the
'Young gentlemen, Ma'am; yes, Ma'am,' said Paul's friend.
'And what is your name, my pale child?' said Lady Skettles.
'Dombey,' answered Paul.
Sir Barnet Skettles immediately interposed, and said that he had had
the honour of meeting Paul's father at a public dinner, and that he hoped he
was very well. Then Paul heard him say to Lady Skettles, 'City - very rich -
most respectable - Doctor mentioned it.' And then he said to Paul, 'Will you
tell your good Papa that Sir Barnet Skettles rejoiced to hear that he was
very well, and sent him his best compliments?'
'Yes, Sir,' answered Paul.
'That is my brave boy,' said Sir Barnet Skettles. 'Barnet,' to Master
Skettles, who was revenging himself for the studies to come, on the
plum-cake, 'this is a young gentleman you ought to know. This is a young
gentleman you may know, Barnet,' said Sir Barnet Skettles, with an emphasis
on the permission.
'What eyes! What hair! What a lovely face!' exclaimed Lady Skettles
softly, as she looked at Florence through her glass. 'My sister,' said Paul,
presenting her.
The satisfaction of the Skettleses was now complex And as Lady Skettles
had conceived, at first sight, a liking for Paul, they all went upstairs
together: Sir Barnet Skettles taking care of Florence, and young Barnet
following.
Young Barnet did not remain long in the background after they had
reached the drawing-room, for Dr Blimber had him out in no time, dancing
with Florence. He did not appear to Paul to be particularly happy, or
particularly anything but sulky, or to care much what he was about; but as
Paul heard Lady Skettles say to Mrs Blimber, while she beat time with her
fan, that her dear boy was evidently smitten to death by that angel of a
child, Miss Dombey, it would seem that Skettles Junior was in a state of
bliss, without showing it.
Little Paul thought it a singular coincidence that nobody had occupied
his place among the pillows; and that when he came into the room again, they
should all make way for him to go back to it, remembering it was his. Nobody
stood before him either, when they observed that he liked to see Florence
dancing, but they left the space in front quite clear, so that he might
follow her with his eyes. They were so kind, too, even the strangers, of
whom there were soon a great many, that they came and spoke to him every now
and then, and asked him how he was, and if his head ached, and whether he
was tired. He was very much obliged to them for all their kindness and
attention, and reclining propped up in his corner, with Mrs Blimber and Lady
Skettles on the same sofa, and Florence coming and sitting by his side as
soon as every dance was ended, he looked on very happily indeed.
Florence would have sat by him all night, and would not have danced at
all of her own accord, but Paul made her, by telling her how much it pleased
him. And he told her the truth, too; for his small heart swelled, and his
face glowed, when he saw how much they all admired her, and how she was the
beautiful little rosebud of the room.
From his nest among the pillows, Paul could see and hear almost
everything that passed as if the whole were being done for his amusement.
Among other little incidents that he observed, he observed Mr Baps the
dancing-master get into conversation with Sir Barnet Skettles, and very soon
ask him, as he had asked Mr Toots, what you were to do with your raw
materials, when they came into your ports in return for your drain of gold -
which was such a mystery to Paul that he was quite desirous to know what
ought to be done with them. Sir Barnet Skettles had much to say upon the
question, and said it; but it did not appear to solve the question, for Mr
Baps retorted, Yes, but supposing Russia stepped in with her tallows; which
struck Sir Barnet almost dumb, for he could only shake his head after that,
and say, Why then you must fall back upon your cottons, he supposed.
Sir Barnet Skettles looked after Mr Baps when he went to cheer up Mrs
Baps (who, being quite deserted, was pretending to look over the music-book
of the gentleman who played the harp), as if he thought him a remarkable
kind of man; and shortly afterwards he said so in those words to Doctor
Blimber, and inquired if he might take the liberty of asking who he was, and
whether he had ever been in the Board of Trade. Doctor Blimber answered no,
he believed not; and that in fact he was a Professor of - '
'Of something connected with statistics, I'll swear?' observed Sir
Barnet Skettles.
'Why no, Sir Barnet,' replied Doctor Blimber, rubbing his chin. 'No,
not exactly.'
'Figures of some sort, I would venture a bet,' said Sir Barnet
Skettles.
'Why yes,' said Doctor Blimber, yes, but not of that sort. Mr Baps is a
very worthy sort of man, Sir Barnet, and - in fact he's our Professor of
dancing.'
Paul was amazed to see that this piece of information quite altered Sir
Barnet Skettles's opinion of Mr Baps, and that Sir Barnet flew into a
perfect rage, and glowered at Mr Baps over on the other side of the room. He
even went so far as to D Mr Baps to Lady Skettles, in telling her what had
happened, and to say that it was like his most con-sum-mate and con-foun-ded
impudence.
There was another thing that Paul observed. Mr Feeder, after imbibing
several custard-cups of negus, began to enjoy himself. The dancing in
general was ceremonious, and the music rather solemn - a little like church
music in fact - but after the custard-cups, Mr Feeder told Mr Toots that he
was going to throw a little spirit into the thing. After that, Mr Feeder not
only began to dance as if he meant dancing and nothing else, but secretly to
stimulate the music to perform wild tunes. Further, he became particular in
his attentions to the ladies; and dancing with Miss Blimber, whispered to
her - whispered to her! - though not so softly but that Paul heard him say
this remarkable poetry,
'Had I a heart for falsehood framed,
I ne'er could injure You!' This, Paul heard him repeat to four young
ladies, in succession. Well might Mr Feeder say to Mr Toots, that he was
afraid he should be the worse for it to-morrow!
Mrs Blimber was a little alarmed by this - comparatively speaking -
profligate behaviour; and especially by the alteration in the character of
the music, which, beginning to comprehend low melodies that were popular in
the streets, might not unnaturally be supposed to give offence to Lady
Skettles. But Lady Skettles was so very kind as to beg Mrs Blimber not to
mention it; and to receive her explanation that Mr Feeder's spirits
sometimes betrayed him into excesses on these occasions, with the greatest
courtesy and politeness; observing, that he seemed a very nice sort of
person for his situation, and that she particularly liked the unassuming
style of his hair - which (as already hinted) was about a quarter of an inch
long.
Once, when there was a pause in the dancing, Lady Skettles told Paul
that he seemed very fond of music. Paul replied, that he was; and if she was
too, she ought to hear his sister, Florence, sing. Lady Skettles presently
discovered that she was dying with anxiety to have that gratification; and
though Florence was at first very much frightened at being asked to sing
before so many people, and begged earnestly to be excused, yet, on Paul
calling her to him, and saying, 'Do, Floy! Please! For me, my dear!' she
went straight to the piano, and began. When they all drew a little away,
that Paul might see her; and when he saw her sitting there all alone, so
young, and good, and beautiful, and kind to him; and heard her thrilling
voice, so natural and sweet, and such a golden link between him and all his
life's love and happiness, rising out of the silence; he turned his face
away, and hid his tears. Not, as he told them when they spoke to him, not
that the music was too plaintive or too sorrowful, but it was so dear to
him.
They all loved Florence. How could they help it! Paul had known
beforehand that they must and would; and sitting in his cushioned corner,
with calmly folded hands; and one leg loosely doubled under him, few would
have thought what triumph and delight expanded his childish bosom while he
watched her, or what a sweet tranquillity he felt. Lavish encomiums on
'Dombey's sister' reached his ears from all the boys: admiration of the
self-possessed and modest little beauty was on every lip: reports of her
intelligence and accomplishments floated past him, constantly; and, as if
borne in upon the air of the summer night, there was a half intelligible
sentiment diffused around, referring to Florence and himself, and breathing
sympathy for both, that soothed and touched him.
He did not know why. For all that the child observed, and felt, and
thought, that night - the present and the absent; what was then and what had
been - were blended like the colours in the rainbow, or in the plumage of
rich birds when the sun is shining on them, or in the softening sky when the
same sun is setting. The many things he had had to think of lately, passed
before him in the music; not as claiming his attention over again, or as
likely evermore to occupy it, but as peacefully disposed of and gone. A
solitary window, gazed through years ago, looked out upon an ocean, miles
and miles away; upon its waters, fancies, busy with him only yesterday, were
hushed and lulled to rest like broken waves. The same mysterious murmur he
had wondered at, when lying on his couch upon the beach, he thought he still
heard sounding through his sister's song, and through the hum of voices, and
the tread of feet, and having some part in the faces flitting by, and even
in the heavy gentleness of Mr Toots, who frequently came up to shake him by
the hand. Through the universal kindness he still thought he heard it,
speaking to him; and even his old-fashioned reputation seemed to be allied
to it, he knew not how. Thus little Paul sat musing, listening, looking on,
and dreaming; and was very happy.
Until the time arrived for taking leave: and then, indeed, there was a
sensation in the party. Sir Barnet Skettles brought up Skettles Junior to
shake hands with him, and asked him if he would remember to tell his good
Papa, with his best compliments, that he, Sir Barnet Skettles, had said he
hoped the two young gentlemen would become intimately acquainted. Lady
Skettles kissed him, and patted his hair upon his brow, and held him in her
arms; and even Mrs Baps - poor Mrs Baps! Paul was glad of that - came over
from beside the music-book of the gentleman who played the harp, and took
leave of him quite as heartily as anybody in the room.
'Good-bye, Doctor Blimber,' said Paul, stretching out his hand.
'Good-bye, my little friend,' returned the Doctor.
'I'm very much obliged to you, Sir,' said Paul, looking innocently up
into his awful face. 'Ask them to take care of Diogenes, if you please.'
Diogenes was the dog: who had never in his life received a friend into
his confidence, before Paul. The Doctor promised that every attention should
he paid to Diogenes in Paul's absence, and Paul having again thanked him,
and shaken hands with him, bade adieu to Mrs Blimber and Cornelia with such
heartfelt earnestness that Mrs Blimber forgot from that moment to mention
Cicero to Lady Skettles, though she had fully intended it all the evening.
Cornelia, taking both Paul's hands in hers, said,'Dombey, Dombey, you have
always been my favourite pupil. God bless you!' And it showed, Paul thought,
how easily one might do injustice to a person; for Miss Blimber meant it -
though she was a Forcer - and felt it.
A boy then went round among the young gentlemen, of 'Dombey's going!'
'Little Dombey's going!' and there was a general move after Paul and
Florence down the staircase and into the hall, in which the whole Blimber
family were included. Such a circumstance, Mr Feeder said aloud, as had
never happened in the case of any former young gentleman within his
experience; but it would be difficult to say if this were sober fact or
custard-cups. The servants, with the butler at their head, had all an
interest in seeing Little Dombey go; and even the weak-eyed young man,
taking out his books and trunks to the coach that was to carry him and
Florence to Mrs Pipchin's for the night, melted visibly.
Not even the influence of the softer passion on the young gentlemen -
and they all, to a boy, doted on Florence - could restrain them from taking
quite a noisy leave of Paul; waving hats after him, pressing downstairs to
shake hands with him, crying individually 'Dombey, don't forget me!' and
indulging in many such ebullitions of feeling, uncommon among those young
Chesterfields. Paul whispered Florence, as she wrapped him up before the
door was opened, Did she hear them? Would she ever forget it? Was she glad
to know it? And a lively delight was in his eyes as he spoke to her.
Once, for a last look, he turned and gazed upon the faces thus
addressed to him, surprised to see how shining and how bright, and numerous
they were, and how they were all piled and heaped up, as faces are at
crowded theatres. They swam before him as he looked, like faces in an
agitated glass; and next moment he was in the dark coach outside, holding
close to Florence. From that time, whenever he thought of Doctor Blimber's,
it came back as he had seen it in this last view; and it never seemed to be
a real place again, but always a dream, full of eyes.
This was not quite the last of Doctor Blimber's, however. There was
something else. There was Mr Toots. Who, unexpectedly letting down one of
the coach-windows, and looking in, said, with a most egregious chuckle, 'Is
Dombey there?' and immediately put it up again, without waiting for an
answer. Nor was this quite the last of Mr Toots, even; for before the
coachman could drive off, he as suddenly let down the other window, and
looking in with a precisely similar chuckle, said in a precisely similar
tone of voice, 'Is Dombey there?' and disappeared precisely as before.
How Florence laughed! Paul often remembered it, and laughed himself
whenever he did so.
But there was much, soon afterwards - next day, and after that - which
Paul could only recollect confusedly. As, why they stayed at Mrs Pipchin's
days and nights, instead of going home; why he lay in bed, with Florence
sitting by his side; whether that had been his father in the room, or only a
tall shadow on the wall; whether he had heard his doctor say, of someone,
that if they had removed him before the occasion on which he had built up
fancies, strong in proportion to his own weakness, it was very possible he
might have pined away.
He could not even remember whether he had often said to Florence, 'Oh
Floy, take me home, and never leave me!' but he thought he had. He fancied
sometimes he had heard himself repeating, 'Take me home, Floy! take me
home!'
But he could remember, when he got home, and was carried up the
well-remembered stairs, that there had been the rumbling of a coach for many
hours together, while he lay upon the seat, with Florence still beside him,
and old Mrs Pipchin sitting opposite. He remembered his old bed too, when
they laid him down in it: his aunt, Miss Tox, and Susan: but there was
something else, and recent too, that still perplexed him.
'I want to speak to Florence, if you please,' he said. 'To Florence by
herself, for a moment!'
She bent down over him, and the others stood away.
'Floy, my pet, wasn't that Papa in the hall, when they brought me from
the coach?'
'Yes, dear.'
'He didn't cry, and go into his room, Floy, did he, when he saw me
coming in?'
Florence shook her head, and pressed her lips against his cheek.
'I'm very glad he didn't cry,' said little Paul. 'I thought he did.
Don't tell them that I asked.'
Amazing Artfulness of Captain Cuttle, and a new Pursuit for Walter Gay
Walter could not, for several days, decide what to do in the Barbados
business; and even cherished some faint hope that Mr Dombey might not have
meant what he had said, or that he might change his mind, and tell him he
was not to go. But as nothing occurred to give this idea (which was
sufficiently improbable in itself) any touch of confirmation, and as time
was slipping by, and he had none to lose, he felt that he must act, without
hesitating any longer.
Walter's chief difficulty was, how to break the change in his affairs
to Uncle Sol, to whom he was sensible it would he a terrible blow. He had
the greater difficulty in dashing Uncle Sol's spirits with such an
astounding piece of intelligence, because they had lately recovered very
much, and the old man had become so cheerful, that the little back parlour
was itself again. Uncle Sol had paid the first appointed portion of the debt
to Mr Dombey, and was hopeful of working his way through the rest; and to
cast him down afresh, when he had sprung up so manfully from his troubles,
was a very distressing necessity.
Yet it would never do to run away from him. He must know of it
beforehand; and how to tell him was the point. As to the question of going
or not going, Walter did not consider that he had any power of choice in the
matter. Mr Dombey had truly told him that he was young, and that his Uncle's
circumstances were not good; and Mr Dombey had plainly expressed, in the
glance with which he had accompanied that reminder, that if he declined to
go he might stay at home if he chose, but not in his counting-house. His
Uncle and he lay under a great obligation to Mr Dombey, which was of
Walter's own soliciting. He might have begun in secret to despair of ever
winning that gentleman's favour, and might have thought that he was now and
then disposed to put a slight upon him, which was hardly just. But what
would have been duty without that, was still duty with it - or Walter
thought so- and duty must be done.
When Mr Dombey had looked at him, and told him he was young, and that
his Uncle's circumstances were not good, there had been an expression of
disdain in his face; a contemptuous and disparaging assumption that he would
be quite content to live idly on a reduced old man, which stung the boy's
generous soul. Determined to assure Mr Dombey, in so far as it was possible
to give him the assurance without expressing it in words, that indeed he
mistook his nature, Walter had been anxious to show even more cheerfulness
and activity after the West Indian interview than he had shown before: if
that were possible, in one of his quick and zealous disposition. He was too
young and inexperienced to think, that possibly this very quality in him was
not agreeable to Mr Dombey, and that it was no stepping-stone to his good
opinion to be elastic and hopeful of pleasing under the shadow of his
powerful displeasure, whether it were right or wrong. But it may have been -
it may have been- that the great man thought himself defied in this new
exposition of an honest spirit, and purposed to bring it down.
'Well! at last and at least, Uncle Sol must be told,' thought Walter,
with a sigh. And as Walter was apprehensive that his voice might perhaps
quaver a little, and that his countenance might not be quite as hopeful as
he could wish it to be, if he told the old man himself, and saw the first
effects of his communication on his wrinkled face, he resolved to avail
himself of the services of that powerful mediator, Captain Cuttle. Sunday
coming round, he set off therefore, after breakfast, once more to beat up
Captain Cuttle's quarters.
It was not unpleasant to remember, on the way thither, that Mrs
MacStinger resorted to a great distance every Sunday morning, to attend the
ministry of the Reverend Melchisedech Howler, who, having been one day
discharged from the West India Docks on a false suspicion (got up expressly
against him by the general enemy) of screwing gimlets into puncheons, and
applying his lips to the orifice, had announced the destruction of the world
for that day two years, at ten in the morning, and opened a front parlour
for the reception of ladies and gentlemen of the Ranting persuasion, upon
whom, on the first occasion of their assemblage, the admonitions of the
Reverend Melchisedech had produced so powerful an effect, that, in their
rapturous performance of a sacred jig, which closed the service, the whole
flock broke through into a kitchen below, and disabled a mangle belonging to
one of the fold.
This the Captain, in a moment of uncommon conviviality, had confided to
Walter and his Uncle, between the repetitions of lovely Peg, on the night
when Brogley the broker was paid out. The Captain himself was punctual in
his attendance at a church in his own neighbourhood, which hoisted the Union
Jack every Sunday morning; and where he was good enough - the lawful beadle
being infirm - to keep an eye upon the boys, over whom he exercised great
power, in virtue of his mysterious hook. Knowing the regularity of the
Captain's habits, Walter made all the haste he could, that he might
anticipate his going out; and he made such good speed, that he had the
pleasure, on turning into Brig Place, to behold the broad blue coat and
waistcoat hanging out of the Captain's oPen window, to air in the sun.
It appeared incredible that the coat and waistcoat could be seen by
mortal eyes without the Captain; but he certainly was not in them, otherwise
his legs - the houses in Brig Place not being lofty- would have obstructed
the street door, which was perfectly clear. Quite wondering at this
discovery, Walter gave a single knock.
'Stinger,' he distinctly heard the Captain say, up in his room, as if
that were no business of his. Therefore Walter gave two knocks.
'Cuttle,' he heard the Captain say upon that; and immediately
afterwards the Captain, in his clean shirt and braces, with his neckerchief
hanging loosely round his throat like a coil of rope, and his glazed hat on,
appeared at the window, leaning out over the broad blue coat and waistcoat.
'Wal'r!' cried the Captain, looking down upon him in amazement.
'Ay, ay, Captain Cuttle,' returned Walter, 'only me'
'What's the matter, my lad?' inquired the Captain, with great concern.
'Gills an't been and sprung nothing again?'
'No, no,' said Walter. 'My Uncle's all right, Captain Cuttle.'
The Captain expressed his gratification, and said he would come down
below and open the door, which he did.
'Though you're early, Wal'r,' said the Captain, eyeing him still
doubtfully, when they got upstairs:
'Why, the fact is, Captain Cuttle,' said Walter, sitting down, 'I was
afraid you would have gone out, and I want to benefit by your friendly
counsel.'
'So you shall,' said the Captain; 'what'll you take?'
'I want to take your opinion, Captain Cuttle,' returned Walter,
smiling. 'That's the only thing for me.'
'Come on then,' said the Captain. 'With a will, my lad!'
Walter related to him what had happened; and the difficulty in which he
felt respecting his Uncle, and the relief it would be to him if Captain
Cuttle, in his kindness, would help him to smooth it away; Captain Cuttle's
infinite consternation and astonishment at the prospect unfolded to him,
gradually swallowing that gentleman up, until it left his face quite vacant,
and the suit of blue, the glazed hat, and the hook, apparently without an
owner.
'You see, Captain Cuttle,' pursued Walter, 'for myself, I am young, as
Mr Dombey said, and not to be considered. I am to fight my way through the
world, I know; but there are two points I was thinking, as I came along,
that I should be very particular about, in respect to my Uncle. I don't mean
to say that I deserve to be the pride and delight of his life - you believe
me, I know - but I am. Now, don't you think I am?'
The Captain seemed to make an endeavour to rise from the depths of his
astonishment, and get back to his face; but the effort being ineffectual,
the glazed hat merely nodded with a mute, unutterable meaning.
'If I live and have my health,' said Walter, 'and I am not afraid of
that, still, when I leave England I can hardly hope to see my Uncle again.
He is old, Captain Cuttle; and besides, his life is a life of custom - '
'Steady, Wal'r! Of a want of custom?' said the Captain, suddenly
reappearing.
'Too true,' returned Walter, shaking his head: 'but I meant a life of
habit, Captain Cuttle - that sort of custom. And if (as you very truly said,
I am sure) he would have died the sooner for the loss of the stock, and all
those objects to which he has been accustomed for so many years, don't you
think he might die a little sooner for the loss of - '
'Of his Nevy,' interposed the Captain. 'Right!'
'Well then,' said Walter, trying to speak gaily, 'we must do our best
to make him believe that the separation is but a temporary one, after all;
but as I know better, or dread that I know better, Captain Cuttle, and as I
have so many reasons for regarding him with affection, and duty, and honour,
I am afraid I should make but a very poor hand at that, if I tried to
persuade him of it. That's my great reason for wishing you to break it out
to him; and that's the first point.'
'Keep her off a point or so!' observed the Captain, in a comtemplative
voice.
'What did you say, Captain Cuttle?' inquired Walter.
'Stand by!' returned the Captain, thoughtfully.
Walter paused to ascertain if the Captain had any particular
information to add to this, but as he said no more, went on.
'Now, the second point, Captain Cuttle. I am sorry to say, I am not a
favourite with Mr Dombey. I have always tried to do my best, and I have
always done it; but he does not like me. He can't help his likings and
dislikings, perhaps. I say nothing of that. I only say that I am certain he
does not like me. He does not send me to this post as a good one; he
disclaims to represent it as being better than it is; and I doubt very much
if it will ever lead me to advancement in the House - whether it does not,
on the contrary, dispose of me for ever, and put me out of the way. Now, we
must say nothing of this to my Uncle, Captain Cuttle, but must make it out
to be as favourable and promising as we can; and when I tell you what it
really is, I only do so, that in case any means should ever arise of lending
me a hand, so far off, I may have one friend at home who knows my real
situation.
'Wal'r, my boy,' replied the Captain, 'in the Proverbs of Solomon you
will find the following words, "May we never want a friend in need, nor a
bottle to give him!" When found, make a note of.'
Here the Captain stretched out his hand to Walter, with an air of
downright good faith that spoke volumes; at the same time repeating (for he
felt proud of the accuracy and pointed application of his quotation), 'When
found, make a note of.'
'Captain Cuttle,' said Walter, taking the immense fist extended to him
by the Captain in both his hands, which it completely filled, next to my
Uncle Sol, I love you. There is no one on earth in whom I can more safely
trust, I am sure. As to the mere going away, Captain Cuttle, I don't care
for that; why should I care for that! If I were free to seek my own fortune
- if I were free to go as a common sailor - if I were free to venture on my
own account to the farthest end of the world - I would gladly go! I would
have gladly gone, years ago, and taken my chance of what might come of it.
But it was against my Uncle's wishes, and against the plans he had formed
for me; and there was an end of that. But what I feel, Captain Cuttle, is
that we have been a little mistaken all along, and that, so far as any
improvement in my prospects is concerned, I am no better off now than I was
when I first entered Dombey's House - perhaps a little worse, for the House
may have been kindly inclined towards me then, and it certainly is not now.'
'Turn again, Whittington,' muttered the disconsolate Captain, after
looking at Walter for some time.
'Ay,' replied Walter, laughing, 'and turn a great many times, too,
Captain Cuttle, I'm afraid, before such fortune as his ever turns up again.
Not that I complain,' he added, in his lively, animated, energetic way. 'I
have nothing to complain of. I am provided for. I can live. When I leave my
Uncle, I leave him to you; and I can leave him to no one better, Captain
Cuttle. I haven't told you all this because I despair, not I; it's to
convince you that I can't pick and choose in Dombey's House, and that where
I am sent, there I must go, and what I am offered, that I must take. It's
better for my Uncle that I should be sent away; for Mr Dombey is a valuable
friend to him, as he proved himself, you know when, Captain Cuttle; and I am
persuaded he won't be less valuable when he hasn't me there, every day, to
awaken his dislike. So hurrah for the West Indies, Captain Cuttle! How does
that tune go that the sailors sing?
'For the Port of Barbados, Boys!
Cheerily!
Leaving old England behind us, Boys!
Cheerily!' Here the Captain roared in chorus -
'Oh cheerily, cheerily!
Oh cheer-i-ly!'
The last line reaching the quick ears of an ardent skipper not quite
sober, who lodged opposite, and who instantly sprung out of bed, threw up
his window, and joined in, across the street, at the top of his voice,
produced a fine effect. When it was impossible to sustain the concluding
note any longer, the skipper bellowed forth a terrific 'ahoy!' intended in
part as a friendly greeting, and in part to show that he was not at all
breathed. That done, he shut down his window, and went to bed again.
'And now, Captain Cuttle,' said Walter, handing him the blue coat and
waistcoat, and bustling very much, 'if you'll come and break the news to
Uncle Sol (which he ought to have known, days upon days ago, by rights),
I'll leave you at the door, you know, and walk about until the afternoon.'
The Captain, however, scarcely appeared to relish the commission, or to
be by any means confident of his powers of executing it. He had arranged the
future life and adventures of Walter so very differently, and so entirely to
his own satisfaction; he had felicitated himself so often on the sagacity
and foresight displayed in that arrangement, and had found it so complete
and perfect in all its parts; that to suffer it to go to pieces all at once,
and even to assist in breaking it up, required a great effort of his
resolution. The Captain, too, found it difficult to unload his old ideas
upon the subject, and to take a perfectly new cargo on board, with that
rapidity which the circumstances required, or without jumbling and
confounding the two. Consequently, instead of putting on his coat and
waistcoat with anything like the impetuosity that could alone have kept pace
with Walter's mood, he declined to invest himself with those garments at all
at present; and informed Walter that on such a serious matter, he must be
allowed to 'bite his nails a bit'
'It's an old habit of mine, Wal'r,' said the Captain, 'any time these
fifty year. When you see Ned Cuttle bite his nails, Wal'r, then you may know
that Ned Cuttle's aground.'
Thereupon the Captain put his iron hook between his teeth, as if it
were a hand; and with an air of wisdom and profundity that was the very
concentration and sublimation of all philosophical reflection and grave
inquiry, applied himself to the consideration of the subject in its various
branches.
'There's a friend of mine,' murmured the Captain, in an absent manner,
'but he's at present coasting round to Whitby, that would deliver such an
opinion on this subject, or any other that could be named, as would give
Parliament six and beat 'em. Been knocked overboard, that man,' said the
Captain, 'twice, and none the worse for it. Was beat in his apprenticeship,
for three weeks (off and on), about the head with a ring-bolt. And yet a
clearer-minded man don't walk.'
Despite of his respect for Captain Cuttle, Walter could not help
inwardly rejoicing at the absence of this sage, and devoutly hoping that his
limpid intellect might not be brought to bear on his difficulties until they
were quite settled.
'If you was to take and show that man the buoy at the Nore,' said
Captain Cuttle in the same tone, 'and ask him his opinion of it, Wal'r, he'd
give you an opinion that was no more like that buoy than your Uncle's
buttons are. There ain't a man that walks - certainly not on two legs - that
can come near him. Not near him!'
'What's his name, Captain Cuttle?' inquired Walter, determined to be
interested in the Captain's friend.
'His name's Bunsby, said the Captain. 'But Lord, it might be anything
for the matter of that, with such a mind as his!'
The exact idea which the Captain attached to this concluding piece of
praise, he did not further elucidate; neither did Walter seek to draw it
forth. For on his beginning to review, with the vivacity natural to himself
and to his situation, the leading points in his own affairs, he soon
discovered that the Captain had relapsed into his former profound state of
mind; and that while he eyed him steadfastly from beneath his bushy
eyebrows, he evidently neither saw nor heard him, but remained immersed in
cogitation.
In fact, Captain Cuttle was labouring with such great designs, that far
from being aground, he soon got off into the deepest of water, and could
find no bottom to his penetration. By degrees it became perfectly plain to
the Captain that there was some mistake here; that it was undoubtedly much
more likely to be Walter's mistake than his; that if there were really any
West India scheme afoot, it was a very different one from what Walter, who
was young and rash, supposed; and could only be some new device for making
his fortune with unusual celerity. 'Or if there should be any little hitch
between 'em,' thought the Captain, meaning between Walter and Mr Dombey, 'it
only wants a word in season from a friend of both parties, to set it right
and smooth, and make all taut again.' Captain Cuttle's deduction from these
considerations was, that as he already enjoyed the pleasure of knowing Mr
Dombey, from having spent a very agreeable half-hour in his company at
Brighton (on the morning when they borrowed the money); and that, as a
couple of men of the world, who understood each other, and were mutually
disposed to make things comfortable, could easily arrange any little
difficulty of this sort, and come at the real facts; the friendly thing for
him to do would be, without saying anything about it to Walter at present,
just to step up to Mr Dombey's house - say to the servant 'Would ye be so
good, my lad, as report Cap'en Cuttle here?' - meet Mr Dombey in a
confidential spirit- hook him by the button-hole - talk it over - make it
all right - and come away triumphant!
As these reflections presented themselves to the Captain's mind, and by
slow degrees assumed this shape and form, his visage cleared like a doubtful
morning when it gives place to a bright noon. His eyebrows, which had been
in the highest degree portentous, smoothed their rugged bristling aspect,
and became serene; his eyes, which had been nearly closed in the severity of
his mental exercise, opened freely; a smile which had been at first but
three specks - one at the right-hand corner of his mouth, and one at the
corner of each eye - gradually overspread his whole face, and, rippling up
into his forehead, lifted the glazed hat: as if that too had been aground
with Captain Cuttle, and were now, like him, happily afloat again.
Finally, the Captain left off biting his nails, and said, 'Now, Wal'r,
my boy, you may help me on with them slops.' By which the Captain meant his
coat and waistcoat.
Walter little imagined why the Captain was so particular in the
arrangement of his cravat, as to twist the pendent ends into a sort of
pigtail, and pass them through a massive gold ring with a picture of a tomb
upon it, and a neat iron railing, and a tree, in memory of some deceased
friend. Nor why the Captain pulled up his shirt-collar to the utmost limits
allowed by the Irish linen below, and by so doing decorated himself with a
complete pair of blinkers; nor why he changed his shoes, and put on an
unparalleled pair of ankle-jacks, which he only wore on extraordinary
occasions. The Captain being at length attired to his own complete
satisfaction, and having glanced at himself from head to foot in a
shaving-glass which he removed from a nail for that purpose, took up his
knotted stick, and said he was ready.
The Captain's walk was more complacent than usual when they got out
into the street; but this Walter supposed to be the effect of the
ankle-jacks, and took little heed of. Before they had gone very far, they
encountered a woman selling flowers; when the Captain stopping short, as if
struck by a happy idea, made a purchase of the largest bundle in her basket:
a most glorious nosegay, fan-shaped, some two feet and a half round, and
composed of all the jolliest-looking flowers that blow.
Armed with this little token which he designed for Mr Dombey, Captain
Cuttle walked on with Walter until they reached the Instrument-maker's door,
before which they both paused.
'You're going in?' said Walter.
'Yes,' returned the Captain, who felt that Walter must be got rid of
before he proceeded any further, and that he had better time his projected
visit somewhat later in the day.
'And you won't forget anything?'
'No,' returned the Captain.
'I'll go upon my walk at once,' said Walter, 'and then I shall be out
of the way, Captain Cuttle.'
'Take a good long 'un, my lad!' replied the Captain, calling after him.
Walter waved his hand in assent, and went his way.
His way was nowhere in particular; but he thought he would go out into
the fields, where he could reflect upon the unknown life before him, and
resting under some tree, ponder quietly. He knew no better fields than those
near Hampstead, and no better means of getting at them than by passing Mr
Dombey's house.
It was as stately and as dark as ever, when he went by and glanced up
at its frowning front. The blinds were all pulled down, but the upper
windows stood wide open, and the pleasant air stirring those curtains and
waving them to and fro was the only sign of animation in the whole exterior.
Walter walked softly as he passed, and was glad when he had left the house a
door or two behind.
He looked back then; with the interest he had always felt for the place
since the adventure of the lost child, years ago; and looked especially at
those upper windows. While he was thus engaged, a chariot drove to the door,
and a portly gentleman in black, with a heavy watch-chain, alighted, and
went in. When he afterwards remembered this gentleman and his equipage
together, Walter had no doubt be was a physician; and then he wondered who
was ill; but the discovery did not occur to him until he had walked some
distance, thinking listlessly of other things.
Though still, of what the house had suggested to him; for Walter
pleased hImself with thinking that perhaps the time might come, when the
beautiful child who was his old friend and had always been so grateful to
him and so glad to see him since, might interest her brother in his behalf
and influence his fortunes for the better. He liked to imagine this - more,
at that moment, for the pleasure of imagining her continued remembrance of
him, than for any worldly profit he might gain: but another and more sober
fancy whispered to him that if he were alive then, he would be beyond the
sea and forgotten; she married, rich, proud, happy. There was no more reason
why she should remember him with any interest in such an altered state of
things, than any plaything she ever had. No, not so much.
Yet Walter so idealised the pretty child whom he had found wandering in
the rough streets, and so identified her with her innocent gratitude of that
night and the simplicity and truth of its expression, that he blushed for
himself as a libeller when he argued that she could ever grow proud. On the
other hand, his meditations were of that fantastic order that it seemed
hardly less libellous in him to imagine her grown a woman: to think of her
as anything but the same artless, gentle, winning little creature, that she
had been in the days of Good Mrs Brown. In a word, Walter found out that to
reason with himself about Florence at all, was to become very unreasonable
indeed; and that he could do no better than preserve her image in his mind
as something precious, unattainable, unchangeable, and indefinite -
indefinite in all but its power of giving him pleasure, and restraining him
like an angel's hand from anything unworthy.
It was a long stroll in the fields that Walter took that day, listening
to the birds, and the Sunday bells, and the softened murmur of the town -
breathing sweet scents; glancing sometimes at the dim horizon beyond which
his voyage and his place of destination lay; then looking round on the green
English grass and the home landscape. But he hardly once thought, even of
going away, distinctly; and seemed to put off reflection idly, from hour to
hour, and from minute to minute, while he yet went on reflecting all the
time.
Walter had left the fields behind him, and was plodding homeward in the
same abstracted mood, when he heard a shout from a man, and then a woman's
voice calling to him loudly by name. Turning quickly in his surprise, he saw
that a hackney-coach, going in the contrary direction, had stopped at no
great distance; that the coachman was looking back from his box and making
signals to him with his whip; and that a young woman inside was leaning out
of the window, and beckoning with immense energy. Running up to this coach,
he found that the young woman was Miss Nipper, and that Miss Nipper was in
such a flutter as to be almost beside herself.
'Staggs's Gardens, Mr Walter!' said Miss Nipper; 'if you please, oh
do!'
'Eh?' cried Walter; 'what is the matter?'
'Oh, Mr Walter, Staggs's Gardens, if you please!' said Susan.
'There!' cried the coachman, appealing to Walter, with a sort of
exalting despair; 'that's the way the young lady's been a goin' on for
up'ards of a mortal hour, and me continivally backing out of no
thoroughfares, where she would drive up. I've had a many fares in this
coach, first and last, but never such a fare as her.'
'Do you want to go to Staggs's Gardens, Susan?' inquired Walter.
'Ah! She wants to go there! WHERE IS IT?' growled the coachman.
'I don't know where it is!' exclaimed Susan, wildly. 'Mr Walter, I was
there once myself, along with Miss Floy and our poor darling Master Paul, on
the very day when you found Miss Floy in the City, for we lost her coming
home, Mrs Richards and me, and a mad bull, and Mrs Richards's eldest, and
though I went there afterwards, I can't remember where it is, I think it's
sunk into the ground. Oh, Mr Walter, don't desert me, Staggs's Gardens, if
you please! Miss Floy's darling - all our darlings - little, meek, meek
Master Paul! Oh Mr Walter!'
'Good God!' cried Walter. 'Is he very ill?'
'The pretty flower!' cried Susan, wringing her hands, 'has took the
fancy that he'd like to see his old nurse, and I've come to bring her to his
bedside, Mrs Staggs, of Polly Toodle's Gardens, someone pray!'
Greatly moved by what he heard, and catching Susan's earnestness
immediately, Walter, now that he understood the nature of her errand, dashed
into it with such ardour that the coachman had enough to do to follow
closely as he ran before, inquiring here and there and everywhere, the way
to Staggs's Gardens.
There was no such place as Staggs's Gardens. It had vanished from the
earth. Where the old rotten summer-houses once had stood, palaces now reared
their heads, and granite columns of gigantic girth opened a vista to the
railway world beyond. The miserable waste ground, where the refuse-matter
had been heaped of yore, was swallowed up and gone; and in its frowsy stead
were tiers of warehouses, crammed with rich goods and costly merchandise.
The old by-streets now swarmed with passengers and vehicles of every kind:
the new streets that had stopped disheartened in the mud and waggon-ruts,
formed towns within themselves, originating wholesome comforts and
conveniences belonging to themselves, and never tried nor thought of until
they sprung into existence. Bridges that had led to nothing, led to villas,
gardens, churches, healthy public walks. The carcasses of houses, and
beginnings of new thoroughfares, had started off upon the line at steam's
own speed, and shot away into the country in a monster train.'
As to the neighbourhood which had hesitated to acknowledge the railroad
in its straggling days, that had grown wise and penitent, as any Christian
might in such a case, and now boasted of its powerful and prosperous
relation. There were railway patterns in its drapers' shops, and railway
journals in the windows of its newsmen. There were railway hotels,
office-houses, lodging-houses, boarding-houses; railway plans, maps, views,
wrappers, bottles, sandwich-boxes, and time-tables; railway hackney-coach
and stands; railway omnibuses, railway streets and buildings, railway
hangers-on and parasites, and flatterers out of all calculation. There was
even railway time observed in clocks, as if the sun itself had given in.
Among the vanquished was the master chimney-sweeper, whilom incredulous at
Staggs's Gardens, who now lived in a stuccoed house three stories high, and
gave himself out, with golden flourishes upon a varnished board, as
contractor for the cleansing of railway chimneys by machinery.
To and from the heart of this great change, all day and night,
throbbing currents rushed and returned incessantly like its life's blood.
Crowds of people and mountains of goods, departing and arriving scores upon
scores of times in every four-and-twenty hours, produced a fermentation in
the place that was always in action. The very houses seemed disposed to pack
up and take trips. Wonderful Members of Parliament, who, little more than
twenty years before, had made themselves merry with the wild railroad
theories of engineers, and given them the liveliest rubs in
cross-examination, went down into the north with their watches in their
hands, and sent on messages before by the electric telegraph, to say that
they were coming. Night and day the conquering engines rumbled at their
distant work, or, advancing smoothly to their journey's end, and gliding
like tame dragons into the allotted corners grooved out to the inch for
their reception, stood bubbling and trembling there, making the walls quake,
as if they were dilating with the secret knowledge of great powers yet
unsuspected in them, and strong purposes not yet achieved.
But Staggs's Gardens had been cut up root and branch. Oh woe the day
when 'not a rood of English ground' - laid out in Staggs's Gardens - is
secure!
At last, after much fruitless inquiry, Walter, followed by the coach
and Susan, found a man who had once resided in that vanished land, and who
was no other than the master sweep before referred to, grown stout, and
knocking a double knock at his own door. He knowed Toodle, he said, well.
Belonged to the Railroad, didn't he?
'Yes' sir, yes!' cried Susan Nipper from the coach window.
Where did he live now? hastily inquired Walter.
He lived in the Company's own Buildings, second turning to the right,
down the yard, cross over, and take the second on the right again. It was
number eleven; they couldn't mistake it; but if they did, they had only to
ask for Toodle, Engine Fireman, and any one would show them which was his
house. At this unexpected stroke of success Susan Nipper dismounted from the
coach with all speed, took Walter's arm, and set off at a breathless pace on
foot; leaving the coach there to await their return.
'Has the little boy been long ill, Susan?' inquired Walter, as they
hurried on.
'Ailing for a deal of time, but no one knew how much,' said Susan;
adding, with excessive sharpness, 'Oh, them Blimbers!'
'Blimbers?' echoed Walter.
'I couldn't forgive myself at such a time as this, Mr Walter,' said
Susan, 'and when there's so much serious distress to think about, if I
rested hard on anyone, especially on them that little darling Paul speaks
well of, but I may wish that the family was set to work in a stony soil to
make new roads, and that Miss Blimber went in front, and had the pickaxe!'
Miss Nipper then took breath, and went on faster than before, as if
this extraordinary aspiration had relieved her. Walter, who had by this time
no breath of his own to spare, hurried along without asking any more
questions; and they soon, in their impatience, burst in at a little door and
came into a clean parlour full of children.
'Where's Mrs Richards?' exclaimed Susan Nipper, looking round. 'Oh Mrs
Richards, Mrs Richards, come along with me, my dear creetur!'
'Why, if it ain't Susan!' cried Polly, rising with her honest face and
motherly figure from among the group, in great surprIse.
'Yes, Mrs Richards, it's me,' said Susan, 'and I wish it wasn't, though
I may not seem to flatter when I say so, but little Master Paul is very ill,
and told his Pa today that he would like to see the face of his old nurse,
and him and Miss Floy hope you'll come along with me - and Mr Walter, Mrs
Richards - forgetting what is past, and do a kindness to the sweet dear that
is withering away. Oh, Mrs Richards, withering away!' Susan Nipper crying,
Polly shed tears to see her, and to hear what she had said; and all the
children gathered round (including numbers of new babies); and Mr Toodle,
who had just come home from Birmingham, and was eating his dinner out of a
basin, laid down his knife and fork, and put on his wife's bonnet and shawl
for her, which were hanging up behind the door; then tapped her on the back;
and said, with more fatherly feeling than eloquence, 'Polly! cut away!'
So they got back to the coach, long before the coachman expected them;
and Walter, putting Susan and Mrs Richards inside, took his seat on the box
himself that there might be no more mistakes, and deposited them safely in
the hall of Mr Dombey's house - where, by the bye, he saw a mighty nosegay
lying, which reminded him of the one Captain Cuttle had purchased in his
company that morning. He would have lingered to know more of the young
invalid, or waited any length of time to see if he could render the least
service; but, painfully sensible that such conduct would be looked upon by
Mr Dombey as presumptuous and forward, he turned slowly, sadly, anxiously,
away.
He had not gone five minutes' walk from the door, when a man came
running after him, and begged him to return. Walter retraced his steps as
quickly as he could, and entered the gloomy house with a sorrowful
foreboding.
What the Waves were always saying
Paul had never risen from his little bed. He lay there, listening to
the noises in the street, quite tranquilly; not caring much how the time
went, but watching it and watching everything about him with observing eyes.
When the sunbeams struck into his room through the rustling blinds, and
quivered on the opposite wall like golden water, he knew that evening was
coming on, and that the sky was red and beautiful. As the reflection died
away, and a gloom went creeping up the wall, he watched it deepen, deepen,
deepen, into night. Then he thought how the long streets were dotted with
lamps, and how the peaceful stars were shining overhead. His fancy had a
strange tendency to wander to the river, which he knew was flowing through
the great city; and now he thought how black it was, and how deep it would
look, reflecting the hosts of stars - and more than all, how steadily it
rolled away to meet the sea.
As it grew later in the night, and footsteps in the street became so
rare that he could hear them coming, count them as they passed, and lose
them in the hollow distance, he would lie and watch the many-coloured ring
about the candle, and wait patiently for day. His only trouble was, the
swift and rapid river. He felt forced, sometimes, to try to stop it - to
stem it with his childish hands - or choke its way with sand - and when he
saw it coming on, resistless, he cried out! But a word from Florence, who
was always at his side, restored him to himself; and leaning his poor head
upon her breast, he told Floy of his dream, and smiled.
When day began to dawn again, he watched for the sun; and when its
cheerful light began to sparkle in the room, he pictured to himself -
pictured! he saw - the high church towers rising up into the morning sky,
the town reviving, waking, starting into life once more, the river
glistening as it rolled (but rolling fast as ever), and the country bright
with dew. Familiar sounds and cries came by degrees into the street below;
the servants in the house were roused and busy; faces looked in at the door,
and voices asked his attendants softly how he was. Paul always answered for
himself, 'I am better. I am a great deal better, thank you! Tell Papa so!'
By little and little, he got tired of the bustle of the day, the noise
of carriages and carts, and people passing and repassing; and would fall
asleep, or be troubled with a restless and uneasy sense again - the child
could hardly tell whether this were in his sleeping or his waking moments -
of that rushing river. 'Why, will it never stop, Floy?' he would sometimes
ask her. 'It is bearing me away, I think!'
But Floy could always soothe and reassure him; and it was his daily
delight to make her lay her head down on his pillow, and take some rest.
'You are always watching me, Floy, let me watch you, now!' They would
prop him up with cushions in a corner of his bed, and there he would recline
the while she lay beside him: bending forward oftentimes to kiss her, and
whispering to those who were near that she was tired, and how she had sat up
so many nights beside him.
Thus, the flush of the day, in its heat and light, would gradually
decline; and again the golden water would be dancing on the wall.
He was visited by as many as three grave doctors - they used to
assemble downstairs, and come up together - and the room was so quiet, and
Paul was so observant of them (though he never asked of anybody what they
said), that he even knew the difference in the sound of their watches. But
his interest centred in Sir Parker Peps, who always took his seat on the
side of the bed. For Paul had heard them say long ago, that that gentleman
had been with his Mama when she clasped Florence in her arms, and died. And
he could not forget it, now. He liked him for it. He was not afraid.
The people round him changed as unaccountably as on that first night at
Doctor Blimber's - except Florence; Florence never changed - and what had
been Sir Parker Peps, was now his father, sitting with his head upon his
hand. Old Mrs Pipchin dozing in an easy chair, often changed to Miss Tox, or
his aunt; and Paul was quite content to shut his eyes again, and see what
happened next, without emotion. But this figure with its head upon its hand
returned so often, and remained so long, and sat so still and solemn, never
speaking, never being spoken to, and rarely lifting up its face, that Paul
began to wonder languidly, if it were real; and in the night-time saw it
sitting there, with fear.
'Floy!' he said. 'What is that?'
'Where, dearest?'
'There! at the bottom of the bed.'
'There's nothing there, except Papa!'
The figure lifted up its head, and rose, and coming to the bedside,
said:
'My own boy! Don't you know me?'
Paul looked it in the face, and thought, was this his father? But the
face so altered to his thinking, thrilled while he gazed, as if it were in
pain; and before he could reach out both his hands to take it between them,
and draw it towards him, the figure turned away quickly from the little bed,
and went out at the door.
Paul looked at Florence with a fluttering heart, but he knew what she
was going to say, and stopped her with his face against her lips. The next
time he observed the figure sitting at the bottom of the bed, he called to
it.
'Don't be sorry for me, dear Papa! Indeed I am quite happy!'
His father coming and bending down to him - which he did quickly, and
without first pausing by the bedside - Paul held him round the neck, and
repeated those words to him several times, and very earnestly; and Paul
never saw him in his room again at any time, whether it were day or night,
but he called out, 'Don't be sorry for me! Indeed I am quite happy!' This
was the beginning of his always saying in the morning that he was a great
deal better, and that they were to tell his father so.
How many times the golden water danced upon the wall; how many nights
the dark, dark river rolled towards the sea in spite of him; Paul never
counted, never sought to know. If their kindness, or his sense of it, could
have increased, they were more kind, and he more grateful every day; but
whether they were many days or few, appeared of little moment now, to the
gentle boy.
One night he had been thinking of his mother, and her picture in the
drawing-room downstairs, and thought she must have loved sweet Florence
better than his father did, to have held her in her arms when she felt that
she was dying - for even he, her brother, who had such dear love for her,
could have no greater wish than that. The train of thought suggested to him
to inquire if he had ever seen his mother? for he could not remember whether
they had told him, yes or no, the river running very fast, and confusing his
mind.
'Floy, did I ever see Mama?'
'No, darling, why?'
'Did I ever see any kind face, like Mama's, looking at me when I was a
baby, Floy?'
He asked, incredulously, as if he had some vision of a face before him.
'Oh yes, dear!'
'Whose, Floy?'
'Your old nurse's. Often.'
'And where is my old nurse?' said Paul. 'Is she dead too? Floy, are we
all dead, except you?'
There was a hurry in the room, for an instant - longer, perhaps; but it
seemed no more - then all was still again; and Florence, with her face quite
colourless, but smiling, held his head upon her arm. Her arm trembled very
much.
'Show me that old nurse, Floy, if you please!'
'She is not here, darling. She shall come to-morrow.'
'Thank you, Floy!'
Paul closed his eyes with those words, and fell asleep. When he awoke,
the sun was high, and the broad day was clear and He lay a little, looking
at the windows, which were open, and the curtains rustling in the air, and
waving to and fro: then he said, 'Floy, is it tomorrow? Is she come?'
Someone seemed to go in quest of her. Perhaps it was Susan. Paul
thought he heard her telling him when he had closed his eyes again, that she
would soon be back; but he did not open them to see. She kept her word -
perhaps she had never been away - but the next thing that happened was a
noise of footsteps on the stairs, and then Paul woke - woke mind and body -
and sat upright in his bed. He saw them now about him. There was no grey
mist before them, as there had been sometimes in the night. He knew them
every one, and called them by their names.
'And who is this? Is this my old nurse?' said the child, regarding with
a radiant smile, a figure coming in.
Yes, yes. No other stranger would have shed those tears at sight of
him, and called him her dear boy, her pretty boy, her own poor blighted
child. No other woman would have stooped down by his bed, and taken up his
wasted hand, and put it to her lips and breast, as one who had some right to
fondle it. No other woman would have so forgotten everybody there but him
and Floy, and been so full of tenderness and pity.
'Floy! this is a kind good face!' said Paul. 'I am glad to see it
again. Don't go away, old nurse! Stay here.'
His senses were all quickened, and he heard a name he knew.
'Who was that, who said "Walter"?' he asked, looking round. 'Someone
said Walter. Is he here? I should like to see him very much.'
Nobody replied directly; but his father soon said to Susan, 'Call him
back, then: let him come up!' Alter a short pause of expectation, during
which he looked with smiling interest and wonder, on his nurse, and saw that
she had not forgotten Floy, Walter was brought into the room. His open face
and manner, and his cheerful eyes, had always made him a favourite with
Paul; and when Paul saw him' he stretched Out his hand, and said 'Good-bye!'
'Good-bye, my child!' said Mrs Pipchin, hurrying to his bed's head.
'Not good-bye?'
For an instant, Paul looked at her with the wistful face with which he
had so often gazed upon her in his corner by the fire. 'Yes,' he said
placidly, 'good-bye! Walter dear, good-bye!' - turning his head to where he
stood, and putting out his hand again. 'Where is Papa?'
He felt his father's breath upon his cheek, before the words had parted
from his lips.
'Remember Walter, dear Papa,' he whispered, looking in his face.
'Remember Walter. I was fond of Walter!' The feeble hand waved in the air,
as if it cried 'good-bye!' to Walter once again.
'Now lay me down,' he said, 'and, Floy, come close to me, and let me
see you!'
Sister and brother wound their arms around each other, and the golden
light came streaming in, and fell upon them, locked together.
'How fast the river runs, between its green banks and the rushes,
'Floy! But it's very near the sea. I hear the waves! They always said so!'
Presently he told her the motion of the boat upon the stream was
lulling him to rest. How green the banks were now, how bright the flowers
growing on them, and how tall the rushes! Now the boat was out at sea, but
gliding smoothly on. And now there was a shore before him. Who stood on the
bank! -
He put his hands together, as he had been used to do at his prayers. He
did not remove his arms to do it; but they saw him fold them so, behind her
neck.
'Mama is like you, Floy. I know her by the face! But tell them that the
print upon the stairs at school is not divine enough. The light about the
head is shining on me as I go!'
The golden ripple on the wall came back again, and nothing else stirred
in the room. The old, old fashion! The fashion that came in with our first
garments, and will last unchanged until our race has run its course, and the
wide firmament is rolled up like a scroll. The old, old fashion - Death!
Oh thank GOD, all who see it, for that older fashion yet, of
Immortality! And look upon us, angels of young children, with regards not
quite estranged, when the swift river bears us to the ocean!
'Dear me, dear me! To think,' said Miss Tox, bursting out afresh that
night, as if her heart were broken, 'that Dombey and Son should be a
Daughter after all!'
Captain Cuttle does a little Business for the Young People
Captain Cuttle, in the exercise of that surprising talent for deep-laid
and unfathomable scheming, with which (as is not unusual in men of
transparent simplicity) he sincerely believed himself to be endowed by
nature, had gone to Mr Dombey's house on the eventful Sunday, winking all
the way as a vent for his superfluous sagacity, and had presented himself in
the full lustre of the ankle-jacks before the eyes of Towlinson. Hearing
from that individual, to his great concern, of the impending calamity,
Captain Cuttle, in his delicacy, sheered off again confounded; merely
handing in the nosegay as a small mark of his solicitude, and leaving his
respectful compliments for the family in general, which he accompanied with
an expression of his hope that they would lay their heads well to the wind
under existing circumstances, and a friendly intimation that he would 'look
up again' to-morrow.
The Captain's compliments were never heard of any more. The Captain's
nosegay, after lying in the hall all night, was swept into the dust-bin next
morning; and the Captain's sly arrangement, involved in one catastrophe with
greater hopes and loftier designs, was crushed to pieces. So, when an
avalanche bears down a mountain-forest, twigs and bushes suffer with the
trees, and all perish together.
When Walter returned home on the Sunday evening from his long walk, and
its memorable close, he was too much occupied at first by the tidings he had
to give them, and by the emotions naturally awakened in his breast by the
scene through which he had passed, to observe either that his Uncle was
evidently unacquainted with the intelligence the Captain had undertaken to
impart, or that the Captain made signals with his hook, warning him to avoid
the subject. Not that the Captain's signals were calculated to have proved
very comprehensible, however attentively observed; for, like those Chinese
sages who are said in their conferences to write certain learned words in
the air that are wholly impossible of pronunciation, the Captain made such
waves and flourishes as nobody without a previous knowledge of his mystery,
would have been at all likely to understand.
Captain Cuttle, however, becoming cognisant of what had happened,
relinquished these attempts, as he perceived the slender chance that now
existed of his being able to obtain a little easy chat with Mr Dombey before
the period of Walter's departure. But in admitting to himself, with a
disappointed and crestfallen countenance, that Sol Gills must be told, and
that Walter must go - taking the case for the present as he found it, and
not having it enlightened or improved beforehand by the knowing management
of a friend - the Captain still felt an unabated confidence that he, Ned
Cuttle, was the man for Mr Dombey; and that, to set Walter's fortunes quite
square, nothing was wanted but that they two should come together. For the
Captain never could forget how well he and Mr Dombey had got on at Brighton;
with what nicety each of them had put in a word when it was wanted; how
exactly they had taken one another's measure; nor how Ned Cuttle had pointed
out that resources in the first extremity, and had brought the interview to
the desired termination. On all these grounds the Captain soothed himself
with thinking that though Ned Cuttle was forced by the pressure of events to
'stand by' almost useless for the present, Ned would fetch up with a wet
sail in good time, and carry all before him.
Under the influence of this good-natured delusion, Captain Cuttle even
went so far as to revolve in his own bosom, while he sat looking at Walter
and listening with a tear on his shirt-collar to what he related, whether it
might not be at once genteel and politic to give Mr Dombey a verbal
invitation, whenever they should meet, to come and cut his mutton in Brig
Place on some day of his own naming, and enter on the question of his young
friend's prospects over a social glass. But the uncertain temper of Mrs
MacStinger, and the possibility of her setting up her rest in the passage
during such an entertainment, and there delivering some homily of an
uncomplimentary nature, operated as a check on the Captain's hospitable
thoughts, and rendered him timid of giving them encouragement.
One fact was quite clear to the Captain, as Walter, sitting
thoughtfully over his untasted dinner, dwelt on all that had happened;
namely, that however Walter's modesty might stand in the way of his
perceiving it himself, he was, as one might say, a member of Mr Dombey's
family. He had been, in his own person, connected with the incident he so
pathetically described; he had been by name remembered and commended in
close association with it; and his fortunes must have a particular interest
in his employer's eyes. If the Captain had any lurking doubt whatever of his
own conclusions, he had not the least doubt that they were good conclusions
for the peace of mind of the Instrument-maker. Therefore he availed himself
of so favourable a moment for breaking the West Indian intelligence to his
friend, as a piece of extraordinary preferment; declaring that for his part
he would freely give a hundred thousand pounds (if he had it) for Walter's
gain in the long-run, and that he had no doubt such an investment would
yield a handsome premium.
Solomon Gills was at first stunned by the communication, which fell
upon the little back-parlour like a thunderbolt, and tore up the hearth
savagely. But the Captain flashed such golden prospects before his dim
sight: hinted so mysteriously at 'Whittingtonian consequences; laid such
emphasis on what Walter had just now told them: and appealed to it so
confidently as a corroboration of his predictions, and a great advance
towards the realisation of the romantic legend of Lovely Peg: that he
bewildered the old man. Walter, for his part, feigned to be so full of hope
and ardour, and so sure of coming home again soon, and backed up the Captain
with such expressive shakings of his head and rubbings of his hands, that
Solomon, looking first at him then at Captain Cuttle, began to think he
ought to be transported with joy.
'But I'm behind the time, you understand,' he observed in apology,
passing his hand nervously down the whole row of bright buttons on his coat,
and then up again, as if they were beads and he were telling them twice
over: 'and I would rather have my dear boy here. It's an old-fashioned
notion, I daresay. He was always fond of the sea He's' - and he looked
wistfully at Walter - 'he's glad to go.'
'Uncle Sol!' cried Walter, quickly, 'if you say that, I won't go. No,
Captain Cuttle, I won't. If my Uncle thinks I could be glad to leave him,
though I was going to be made Governor of all the Islands in the West
Indies, that's enough. I'm a fixture.'
'Wal'r, my lad,' said the Captain. 'Steady! Sol Gills, take an
observation of your nevy.
Following with his eyes the majestic action of the Captain's hook, the
old man looked at Walter.
'Here is a certain craft,' said the Captain, with a magnificent sense
of the allegory into which he was soaring, 'a-going to put out on a certain
voyage. What name is wrote upon that craft indelibly? Is it The Gay? or,'
said the Captain, raising his voice as much as to say, observe the point of
this, 'is it The Gills?'
'Ned,' said the old man, drawing Walter to his side, and taking his arm
tenderly through his, 'I know. I know. Of course I know that Wally considers
me more than himself always. That's in my mind. When I say he is glad to go,
I mean I hope he is. Eh? look you, Ned and you too, Wally, my dear, this is
new and unexpected to me; and I'm afraid my being behind the time, and poor,
is at the bottom of it. Is it really good fortune for him, do you tell me,
now?' said the old man, looking anxiously from one to the other. 'Really and
truly? Is it? I can reconcile myself to almost anything that advances Wally,
but I won't have Wally putting himself at any disadvantage for me, or
keeping anything from me. You, Ned Cuttle!' said the old man, fastening on
the Captain, to the manifest confusion of that diplomatist; 'are you dealing
plainly by your old friend? Speak out, Ned Cuttle. Is there anything behind?
Ought he to go? How do you know it first, and why?'
As it was a contest of affection and self-denial, Walter struck in with
infinite effect, to the Captain's relief; and between them they tolerably
reconciled old Sol Gills, by continued talking, to the project; or rather so
confused him, that nothing, not even the pain of separation, was distinctly
clear to his mind.
He had not much time to balance the matter; for on the very next day,
Walter received from Mr Carker the Manager, the necessary credentials for
his passage and outfit, together with the information that the Son and Heir
would sail in a fortnight, or within a day or two afterwards at latest. In
the hurry of preparation: which Walter purposely enhanced as much as
possible: the old man lost what little selfpossession he ever had; and so
the time of departure drew on rapidly.
The Captain, who did not fail to make himself acquainted with all that
passed, through inquiries of Walter from day to day, found the time still
tending on towards his going away, without any occasion offering itself, or
seeming likely to offer itself, for a better understanding of his position.
It was after much consideration of this fact, and much pondering over such
an unfortunate combination of circumstances, that a bright idea occurred to
the Captain. Suppose he made a call on Mr Carker, and tried to find out from
him how the land really lay!
Captain Cuttle liked this idea very much. It came upon him in a moment
of inspiration, as he was smoking an early pipe in Brig Place after
breakfast; and it was worthy of the tobacco. It would quiet his conscience,
which was an honest one, and was made a little uneasy by what Walter had
confided to him, and what Sol Gills had said; and it would be a deep, shrewd
act of friendship. He would sound Mr Carker carefully, and say much or
little, just as he read that gentleman's character, and discovered that they
got on well together or the reverse.
Accordingly, without the fear of Walter before his eyes (who he knew
was at home packing), Captain Cuttle again assumed his ankle-jacks and
mourning brooch, and issued forth on this second expedition. He purchased no
propitiatory nosegay on the present occasion, as he was going to a place of
business; but he put a small sunflower in his button-hole to give himself an
agreeable relish of the country; and with this, and the knobby stick, and
the glazed hat, bore down upon the offices of Dombey and Son.
After taking a glass of warm rum-and-water at a tavern close by, to
collect his thoughts, the Captain made a rush down the court, lest its good
effects should evaporate, and appeared suddenly to Mr Perch.
'Matey,' said the Captain, in persuasive accents. 'One of your
Governors is named Carker.' Mr Perch admitted it; but gave him to
understand, as in official duty bound, that all his Governors were engaged,
and never expected to be disengaged any more.
'Look'ee here, mate,' said the Captain in his ear; 'my name's Cap'en
Cuttle.'
The Captain would have hooked Perch gently to him, but Mr Perch eluded
the attempt; not so much in design, as in starting at the sudden thought
that such a weapon unexpectedly exhibited to Mrs Perch might, in her then
condition, be destructive to that lady's hopes.
'If you'll be so good as just report Cap'en Cuttle here, when you get a
chance,' said the Captain, 'I'll wait.'
Saying which, the Captain took his seat on Mr Perch's bracket, and
drawing out his handkerchief from the crown of the glazed hat which he
jammed between his knees (without injury to its shape, for nothing human
could bend it), rubbed his head well all over, and appeared refreshed. He
subsequently arranged his hair with his hook, and sat looking round the
office, contemplating the clerks with a serene respect.
The Captain's equanimity was so impenetrable, and he was altogether so
mysterious a being, that Perch the messenger was daunted.
'What name was it you said?' asked Mr Perch, bending down over him as
he sat on the bracket.
'Cap'en,' in a deep hoarse whisper.
'Yes,' said Mr Perch, keeping time with his head.
'Cuttle.'
'Oh!' said Mr Perch, in the same tone, for he caught it, and couldn't
help it; the Captain, in his diplomacy, was so impressive. 'I'll see if he's
disengaged now. I don't know. Perhaps he may be for a minute.'
'Ay, ay, my lad, I won't detain him longer than a minute,' said the
Captain, nodding with all the weighty importance that he felt within him.
Perch, soon returning, said, 'Will Captain Cuttle walk this way?'
Mr Carker the Manager, standing on the hearth-rug before the empty
fireplace, which was ornamented with a castellated sheet of brown paper,
looked at the Captain as he came in, with no very special encouragement.
'Mr Carker?' said Captain Cuttle.
'I believe so,' said Mr Carker, showing all his teeth.
The Captain liked his answering with a smile; it looked pleasant. 'You
see,' began the Captain, rolling his eyes slowly round the little room, and
taking in as much of it as his shirt-collar permitted; 'I'm a seafaring man
myself, Mr Carker, and Wal'r, as is on your books here, is almost a son of
mine.'
'Walter Gay?' said Mr Carker, showing all his teeth again.
'Wal'r Gay it is,' replied the Captain, 'right!' The Captain's manner
expressed a warm approval of Mr Carker's quickness of perception. 'I'm a
intimate friend of his and his Uncle's. Perhaps,' said the Captain, 'you may
have heard your head Governor mention my name? - Captain Cuttle.'
'No!' said Mr Carker, with a still wider demonstration than before.
'Well,' resumed the Captain, 'I've the pleasure of his acquaintance. I
waited upon him down on the Sussex coast there, with my young friend Wal'r,
when - in short, when there was a little accommodation wanted.' The Captain
nodded his head in a manner that was at once comfortable, easy, and
expressive. 'You remember, I daresay?'
'I think,' said Mr Carker, 'I had the honour of arranging the
business.'
'To be sure!' returned the Captain. 'Right again! you had. Now I've
took the liberty of coming here -
'Won't you sit down?' said Mr Carker, smiling.
'Thank'ee,' returned the Captain, availing himself of the offer. 'A man
does get more way upon himself, perhaps, in his conversation, when he sits
down. Won't you take a cheer yourself?'
'No thank you,' said the Manager, standing, perhaps from the force of
winter habit, with his back against the chimney-piece, and looking down upon
the Captain with an eye in every tooth and gum. 'You have taken the liberty,
you were going to say - though it's none - '
'Thank'ee kindly, my lad,' returned the Captain: 'of coming here, on
account of my friend Wal'r. Sol Gills, his Uncle, is a man of science, and
in science he may be considered a clipper; but he ain't what I should
altogether call a able seaman - not man of practice. Wal'r is as trim a lad
as ever stepped; but he's a little down by the head in one respect, and that
is, modesty. Now what I should wish to put to you,' said the Captain,
lowering his voice, and speaking in a kind of confidential growl, 'in a
friendly way, entirely between you and me, and for my own private reckoning,
'till your head Governor has wore round a bit, and I can come alongside of
him, is this - Is everything right and comfortable here, and is Wal'r
out'ard bound with a pretty fair wind?'
'What do you think now, Captain Cuttle?' returned Carker, gathering up
his skirts and settling himself in his position. 'You are a practical man;
what do you think?'
The acuteness and the significance of the Captain's eye as he cocked it
in reply, no words short of those unutterable Chinese words before referred
to could describe.
'Come!' said the Captain, unspeakably encouraged, 'what do you say? Am
I right or wrong?'
So much had the Captain expressed in his eye, emboldened and incited by
Mr Carker's smiling urbanity, that he felt himself in as fair a condition to
put the question, as if he had expressed his sentiments with the utmost
elaboration.
'Right,' said Mr Carker, 'I have no doubt.'
'Out'ard bound with fair weather, then, I say,' cried Captain Cuttle.
Mr Carker smiled assent.
'Wind right astarn, and plenty of it,' pursued the Captain.
Mr Carker smiled assent again.
'Ay, ay!' said Captain Cuttle, greatly relieved and pleased. 'I know'd
how she headed, well enough; I told Wal'r so. Thank'ee, thank'ee.'
'Gay has brilliant prospects,' observed Mr Carker, stretching his mouth
wider yet: 'all the world before him.'
'All the world and his wife too, as the saying is,' returned the
delighted Captain.
At the word 'wife' (which he had uttered without design), the Captain
stopped, cocked his eye again, and putting the glazed hat on the top of the
knobby stick, gave it a twirl, and looked sideways at his always smiling
friend.
'I'd bet a gill of old Jamaica,' said the Captain, eyeing him
attentively, 'that I know what you're a smiling at.'
Mr Carker took his cue, and smiled the more.
'It goes no farther?' said the Captain, making a poke at the door with
the knobby stick to assure himself that it was shut.
'Not an inch,' said Mr Carker.
'You're thinking of a capital F perhaps?' said the Captain.
Mr Carker didn't deny it.
'Anything about a L,' said the Captain, 'or a O?'
Mr Carker still smiled.
'Am I right, again?' inquired the Captain in a whisper, with the
scarlet circle on his forehead swelling in his triumphant joy.
Mr Carker, in reply, still smiling, and now nodding assent, Captain
Cuttle rose and squeezed him by the hand, assuring him, warmly, that they
were on the same tack, and that as for him (Cuttle) he had laid his course
that way all along. 'He know'd her first,' said the Captain, with all the
secrecy and gravity that the subject demanded, 'in an uncommon manner - you
remember his finding her in the street when she was a'most a babby - he has
liked her ever since, and she him, as much as two youngsters can. We've
always said, Sol Gills and me, that they was cut out for each other.'
A cat, or a monkey, or a hyena, or a death's-head, could not have shown
the Captain more teeth at one time, than Mr Carker showed him at this period
of their interview.
'There's a general indraught that way,' observed the happy Captain.
'Wind and water sets in that direction, you see. Look at his being present
t'other day!'
'Most favourable to his hopes,' said Mr Carker.
'Look at his being towed along in the wake of that day!' pursued the
Captain. 'Why what can cut him adrift now?'
'Nothing,' replied Mr Carker.
'You're right again,' returned the Captain, giving his hand another
squeeze. 'Nothing it is. So! steady! There's a son gone: pretty little
creetur. Ain't there?'
'Yes, there's a son gone,' said the acquiescent Carker.
'Pass the word, and there's another ready for you,' quoth the Captain.
'Nevy of a scientific Uncle! Nevy of Sol Gills! Wal'r! Wal'r, as is already
in your business! And' - said the Captain, rising gradually to a quotation
he was preparing for a final burst, 'who - comes from Sol Gills's daily, to
your business, and your buzzums.' The Captain's complacency as he gently
jogged Mr Carker with his elbow, on concluding each of the foregoing short
sentences, could be surpassed by nothing but the exultation with which he
fell back and eyed him when he had finished this brilliant display of
eloquence and sagacity; his great blue waistcoat heaving with the throes of
such a masterpiece, and his nose in a state of violent inflammation from the
same cause.
'Am I right?' said the Captain.
'Captain Cuttle,' said Mr Carker, bending down at the knees, for a
moment, in an odd manner, as if he were falling together to hug the whole of
himself at once, 'your views in reference to Walter Gay are thoroughly and
accurately right. I understand that we speak together in confidence.
'Honour!' interposed the Captain. 'Not a word.'
'To him or anyone?' pursued the Manager.
Captain Cuttle frowned and shook his head.
'But merely for your own satisfaction and guidance - and guidance, of
course,' repeated Mr Carker, 'with a view to your future proceedings.'
'Thank'ee kindly, I am sure,' said the Captain, listening with great
attention.
'I have no hesitation in saying, that's the fact. You have hit the
probabilities exactly.'
'And with regard to your head Governor,' said the Captain, 'why an
interview had better come about nat'ral between us. There's time enough.'
Mr Carker, with his mouth from ear to ear, repeated, 'Time enough.' Not
articulating the words, but bowing his head affably, and forming them with
his tongue and lips.
'And as I know - it's what I always said- that Wal'r's in a way to make
his fortune,' said the Captain.
'To make his fortune,' Mr Carker repeated, in the same dumb manner.
'And as Wal'r's going on this little voyage is, as I may say, in his
day's work, and a part of his general expectations here,' said the Captain.
'Of his general expectations here,' assented Mr Carker, dumbly as
before.
'Why, so long as I know that,' pursued the Captain, 'there's no hurry,
and my mind's at ease.
Mr Carker still blandly assenting in the same voiceless manner, Captain
Cuttle was strongly confirmed in his opinion that he was one of the most
agreeable men he had ever met, and that even Mr Dombey might improve himself
on such a model. With great heartiness, therefore, the Captain once again
extended his enormous hand (not unlike an old block in colour), and gave him
a grip that left upon his smoother flesh a proof impression of the chinks
and crevices with which the Captain's palm was liberally tattooed.
'Farewell!' said the Captain. 'I ain't a man of many words, but I take
it very kind of you to be so friendly, and above-board. You'll excuse me if
I've been at all intruding, will you?' said the Captain.
'Not at all,' returned the other.
'Thank'ee. My berth ain't very roomy,' said the Captain, turning back
again, 'but it's tolerably snug; and if you was to find yourself near Brig
Place, number nine, at any time - will you make a note of it? - and would
come upstairs, without minding what was said by the person at the door, I
should be proud to see you.
With that hospitable invitation, the Captain said 'Good day!' and
walked out and shut the door; leaving Mr Carker still reclining against the
chimney-piece. In whose sly look and watchful manner; in whose false mouth,
stretched but not laughing; in whose spotless cravat and very whiskers; even
in whose silent passing of his soft hand over his white linen and his smooth
face; there was something desperately cat-like.
The unconscious Captain walked out in a state of self-glorification
that imparted quite a new cut to the broad blue suit. 'Stand by, Ned!' said
the Captain to himself. 'You've done a little business for the youngsters
today, my lad!'
In his exultation, and in his familiarity, present and prospective,
with the House, the Captain, when he reached the outer office, could not
refrain from rallying Mr Perch a little, and asking him whether he thought
everybody was still engaged. But not to be bitter on a man who had done his
duty, the Captain whispered in his ear, that if he felt disposed for a glass
of rum-and-water, and would follow, he would be happy to bestow the same
upon him.
Before leaving the premises, the Captain, somewhat to the astonishment
of the clerks, looked round from a central point of view, and took a general
survey of the officers part and parcel of a project in which his young
friend was nearly interested. The strong-room excited his especial
admiration; but, that he might not appear too particular, he limited himself
to an approving glance, and, with a graceful recognition of the clerks as a
body, that was full of politeness and patronage, passed out into the court.
Being promptly joined by Mr Perch, he conveyed that gentleman to the tavern,
and fulfilled his pledge - hastily, for Perch's time was precious.
'I'll give you for a toast,' said the Captain, 'Wal'r!'
'Who?' submitted Mr Perch.
'Wal'r!' repeated the Captain, in a voice of thunder.
Mr Perch, who seemed to remember having heard in infancy that there was
once a poet of that name, made no objection; but he was much astonished at
the Captain's coming into the City to propose a poet; indeed, if he had
proposed to put a poet's statue up - say Shakespeare's for example - in a
civic thoroughfare, he could hardly have done a greater outrage to Mr
Perch's experience. On the whole, he was such a mysterious and
incomprehensible character, that Mr Perch decided not to mention him to Mrs
Perch at all, in case of giving rise to any disagreeable consequences.
Mysterious and incomprehensible, the Captain, with that lively sense
upon him of having done a little business for the youngsters, remained all
day, even to his most intimate friends; and but that Walter attributed his
winks and grins, and other such pantomimic reliefs of himself, to his
satisfaction in the success of their innocent deception upon old Sol Gills,
he would assuredly have betrayed himself before night. As it was, however,
he kept his own secret; and went home late from the Instrument-maker's
house, wearing the glazed hat so much on one side, and carrying such a
beaming expression in his eyes, that Mrs MacStinger (who might have been
brought up at Doctor Blimber's, she was such a Roman matron) fortified
herself, at the first glimpse of him, behind the open street door, and
refused to come out to the contemplation of her blessed infants, until he
was securely lodged in his own room.
Father and Daughter
There is a hush through Mr Dombey's house. Servants gliding up and down
stairs rustle, but make no sound of footsteps. They talk together
constantly, and sit long at meals, making much of their meat and drink, and
enjoying themselves after a grim unholy fashion. Mrs Wickam, with her eyes
suffused with tears, relates melancholy anecdotes; and tells them how she
always said at Mrs Pipchin's that it would be so, and takes more table-ale
than usual, and is very sorry but sociable. Cook's state of mind is similar.
She promises a little fry for supper, and struggles about equally against
her feelings and the onions. Towlinson begins to think there's a fate in it,
and wants to know if anybody can tell him ofany good that ever came of
living in a corner house. It seems to all of them as having happened a long
time ago; though yet the child lies, calm and beautiful, upon his little
bed.
After dark there come some visitors - noiseless visitors, with shoes of
felt - who have been there before; and with them comes that bed of rest
which is so strange a one for infant sleepers. All this time, the bereaved
father has not been seen even by his attendant; for he sits in an inner
corner of his own dark room when anyone is there, and never seems to move at
other times, except to pace it to and fro. But in the morning it is
whispered among the household that he was heard to go upstairs in the dead
night, and that he stayed there - in the room - until the sun was shining.
At the offices in the City, the ground-glass windows are made more dim
by shutters; and while the lighted lamps upon the desks are half
extinguished by the day that wanders in, the day is half extinguished by the
lamps, and an unusual gloom prevails. There is not much business done. The
clerks are indisposed to work; and they make assignations to eat chops in
the afternoon, and go up the river. Perch, the messenger, stays long upon
his errands; and finds himself in bars of public-houses, invited thither by
friends, and holding forth on the uncertainty of human affairs. He goes home
to Ball's Pond earlier in the evening than usual, and treats Mrs Perch to a
veal cutlet and Scotch ale. Mr Carker the Manager treats no one; neither is
he treated; but alone in his own room he shows his teeth all day; and it
would seem that there is something gone from Mr Carker's path - some
obstacle removed - which clears his way before him.
Now the rosy children living opposite to Mr Dombey's house, peep from
their nursery windows down into the street; for there are four black horses
at his door, with feathers on their heads; and feathers tremble on the
carriage that they draw; and these, and an array of men with scarves and
staves, attract a crowd. The juggler who was going to twirl the basin, puts
his loose coat on again over his fine dress; and his trudging wife,
one-sided with her heavy baby in her arms, loiters to see the company come
out. But closer to her dingy breast she presses her baby, when the burden
that is so easily carried is borne forth; and the youngest of the rosy
children at the high window opposite, needs no restraining hand to check her
in her glee, when, pointing with her dimpled finger, she looks into her
nurse's face, and asks 'What's that?'
And now, among the knot of servants dressed in mourning, and the
weeping women, Mr Dombey passes through the hall to the other carriage that
is waiting to receive him. He is not 'brought down,' these observers think,
by sorrow and distress of mind. His walk is as erect, his bearing is as
stiff as ever it has been. He hides his face behind no handkerchief, and
looks before him. But that his face is something sunk and rigid, and is
pale, it bears the same expression as of old. He takes his place within the
carriage, and three other gentlemen follow. Then the grand funeral moves
slowly down the street. The feathers are yet nodding in the distance, when
the juggler has the basin spinning on a cane, and has the same crowd to
admire it. But the juggler's wife is less alert than usual with the
money-box, for a child's burial has set her thinking that perhaps the baby
underneath her shabby shawl may not grow up to be a man, and wear a sky-blue
fillet round his head, and salmon-coloured worsted drawers, and tumble in
the mud.
The feathers wind their gloomy way along the streets, and come within
the sound of a church bell. In this same church, the pretty boy received all
that will soon be left of him on earth - a name. All of him that is dead,
they lay there, near the perishable substance of his mother. It is well.
Their ashes lie where Florence in her walks - oh lonely, lonely walks! - may
pass them any day.
The service over, and the clergyman withdrawn, Mr Dombey looks round,
demanding in a low voice, whether the person who has been requested to
attend to receive instructions for the tablet, is there?
Someone comes forward, and says 'Yes.'
Mr Dombey intimates where he would have it placed; and shows him, with
his hand upon the wall, the shape and size; and how it is to follow the
memorial to the mother. Then, with his pencil, he writes out the
inscription, and gives it to him: adding, 'I wish to have it done at once.
'It shall be done immediately, Sir.'
'There is really nothing to inscribe but name and age, you see.'
The man bows, glancing at the paper, but appears to hesitate. Mr Dombey
not observing his hesitation, turns away, and leads towards the porch.
'I beg your pardon, Sir;' a touch falls gently on his mourning cloak;
'but as you wish it done immediately, and it may be put in hand when I get
back - '
'Well?'
'Will you be so good as read it over again? I think there's a mistake.'
'Where?'
The statuary gives him back the paper, and points out, with his pocket
rule, the words, 'beloved and only child.'
'It should be, "son," I think, Sir?'
'You are right. Of course. Make the correction.'
The father, with a hastier step, pursues his way to the coach. When the
other three, who follow closely, take their seats, his face is hidden for
the first time - shaded by his cloak. Nor do they see it any more that day.
He alights first, and passes immediately into his own room. The other
mourners (who are only Mr Chick, and two of the medical attendants) proceed
upstairs to the drawing-room, to be received by Mrs Chick and Miss Tox. And
what the face is, in the shut-up chamber underneath: or what the thoughts
are: what the heart is, what the contest or the suffering: no one knows.
The chief thing that they know, below stairs, in the kitchen, is that
'it seems like Sunday.' They can hardly persuade themselves but that there
is something unbecoming, if not wicked, in the conduct of the people out of
doors, who pursue their ordinary occupations, and wear their everyday
attire. It is quite a novelty to have the blinds up, and the shutters open;
and they make themselves dismally comfortable over bottles of wine, which
are freely broached as on a festival. They are much inclined to moralise. Mr
Towlinson proposes with a sigh, 'Amendment to us all!' for which, as Cook
says with another sigh, 'There's room enough, God knows.' In the evening,
Mrs Chick and Miss Tox take to needlework again. In the evening also, Mr
Towlinson goes out to take the air, accompanied by the housemaid, who has
not yet tried her mourning bonnet. They are very tender to each other at
dusky street-corners, and Towlinson has visions of leading an altered and
blameless existence as a serious greengrocer in Oxford Market.
There is sounder sleep and deeper rest in Mr Dombey's house tonight,
than there has been for many nights. The morning sun awakens the old
household, settled down once more in their old ways. The rosy children
opposite run past with hoops. There is a splendid wedding in the church. The
juggler's wife is active with the money-box in another quarter of the town.
The mason sings and whistles as he chips out P-A-U-L in the marble slab
before him.
And can it be that in a world so full and busy, the loss of one weak
creature makes a void in any heart, so wide and deep that nothing but the
width and depth of vast eternity can fill it up! Florence, in her innocent
affliction, might have answered, 'Oh my brother, oh my dearly loved and
loving brother! Only friend and companion of my slighted childhood! Could
any less idea shed the light already dawning on your early grave, or give
birth to the softened sorrow that is springing into life beneath this rain
of tears!'
'My dear child,' said Mrs Chick, who held it as a duty incumbent on
her, to improve the occasion, 'when you are as old as I am - '
'Which will be the prime of life,' observed Miss Tox.
'You will then,' pursued Mrs Chick, gently squeezing Miss Tox's hand in
acknowledgment of her friendly remark, 'you will then know that all grief is
unavailing, and that it is our duty to submit.'
'I will try, dear aunt I do try,' answered Florence, sobbing.
'I am glad to hear it,' said Mrs Chick, 'because; my love, as our dear
Miss Tox - of whose sound sense and excellent judgment, there cannot
possibly be two opinions - '
'My dear Louisa, I shall really be proud, soon,' said Miss Tox
- 'will tell you, and confirm by her experience,' pursued Mrs Chick,
'we are called upon on all occasions to make an effort It is required of us.
If any - my dear,' turning to Miss Tox, 'I want a word. Mis- Mis-'
'Demeanour?' suggested Miss Tox.
'No, no, no,' said Mrs Chic 'How can you! Goodness me, it's on, the end
of my tongue. Mis-'
Placed affection?' suggested Miss Tox, timidly.
'Good gracious, Lucretia!' returned Mrs Chick 'How very monstrous!
Misanthrope, is the word I want. The idea! Misplaced affection! I say, if
any misanthrope were to put, in my presence, the question "Why were we
born?" I should reply, "To make an effort"'
'Very good indeed,' said Miss Tox, much impressed by the originality of
the sentiment 'Very good.'
'Unhappily,' pursued Mrs Chick, 'we have a warning under our own eyes.
We have but too much reason to suppose, my dear child, that if an effort had
been made in time, in this family, a train of the most trying and
distressing circumstances might have been avoided. Nothing shall ever
persuade me,' observed the good matron, with a resolute air, 'but that if
that effort had been made by poor dear Fanny, the poor dear darling child
would at least have had a stronger constitution.'
Mrs Chick abandoned herself to her feelings for half a moment; but, as
a practical illustration of her doctrine, brought herself up short, in the
middle of a sob, and went on again.
'Therefore, Florence, pray let us see that you have some strength of
mind, and do not selfishly aggravate the distress in which your poor Papa is
plunged.'
'Dear aunt!' said Florence, kneeling quickly down before her, that she
might the better and more earnestly look into her face. 'Tell me more about
Papa. Pray tell me about him! Is he quite heartbroken?'
Miss Tox was of a tender nature, and there was something in this appeal
that moved her very much. Whether she saw it in a succession, on the part of
the neglected child, to the affectionate concern so often expressed by her
dead brother - or a love that sought to twine itself about the heart that
had loved him, and that could not bear to be shut out from sympathy with
such a sorrow, in such sad community of love and grief - or whether the only
recognised the earnest and devoted spirit which, although discarded and
repulsed, was wrung with tenderness long unreturned, and in the waste and
solitude of this bereavement cried to him to seek a comfort in it, and to
give some, by some small response - whatever may have been her understanding
of it, it moved Miss Tox. For the moment she forgot the majesty of Mrs
Chick, and, patting Florence hastily on the cheek, turned aside and suffered
the tears to gush from her eyes, without waiting for a lead from that wise
matron.
Mrs Chick herself lost, for a moment, the presence of mind on which she
so much prided herself; and remained mute, looking on the beautiful young
face that had so long, so steadily, and patiently, been turned towards the
little bed. But recovering her voice - which was synonymous with her
presence of mind, indeed they were one and the same thing - she replied with
dignity:
'Florence, my dear child, your poor Papa is peculiar at times; and to
question me about him, is to question me upon a subject which I really do
not pretend to understand. I believe I have as much influence with your Papa
as anybody has. Still, all I can say is, that he has said very little to me;
and that I have only seen him once or twice for a minute at a time, and
indeed have hardly seen him then, for his room has been dark. I have said to
your Papa, "Paul!" - that is the exact expression I used - "Paul! why do you
not take something stimulating?" Your Papa's reply has always been, "Louisa,
have the goodness to leave me. I want nothing. I am better by myself." If I
was to be put upon my oath to-morrow, Lucretia, before a magistrate,' said
Mrs Chick, 'I have no doubt I could venture to swear to those identical
words.'
Miss Tox expressed her admiration by saying, 'My Louisa is ever
methodical!'
'In short, Florence,' resumed her aunt, 'literally nothing has passed
between your poor Papa and myself, until to-day; when I mentioned to your
Papa that Sir Barnet and Lady Skettles had written exceedingly kind notes -
our sweet boy! Lady Skettles loved him like a - where's my pocket
handkerchief?'
Miss Tox produced one.
'Exceedingly kind notes, proposing that you should visit them for
change of scene. Mentioning to your Papa that I thought Miss Tox and myself
might now go home (in which he quite agreed), I inquired if he had any
objection to your accepting this invitation. He said, "No, Louisa, not the
least!"' Florence raised her tearful eye
'At the same time, if you would prefer staying here, Florence, to
paying this visit at present, or to going home with me - '
'I should much prefer it, aunt,' was the faint rejoinder.
'Why then, child,'said Mrs Chick, 'you can. It's a strange choice, I
must say. But you always were strange. Anybody else at your time of life,
and after what has passed - my dear Miss Tox, I have lost my pocket
handkerchief again - would be glad to leave here, one would suppose.
'I should not like to feel,' said Florence, 'as if the house was
avoided. I should not like to think that the - his - the rooms upstairs were
quite empty and dreary, aunt. I would rather stay here, for the present. Oh
my brother! oh my brother!'
It was a natural emotion, not to be suppressed; and it would make way
even between the fingers of the hands with which she covered up her face.
The overcharged and heavy-laden breast must some times have that vent, or
the poor wounded solitary heart within it would have fluttered like a bird
with broken wings, and sunk down in the dust'
'Well, child!' said Mrs Chick, after a pause 'I wouldn't on any account
say anything unkind to you, and that I'm sure you know. You will remain
here, then, and do exactly as you like. No one will interfere with you,
Florence, or wish to interfere with you, I'm sure.
Florence shook her head in sad assent'
'I had no sooner begun to advise your poor Papa that he really ought to
seek some distraction and restoration in a temporary change,' said Mrs
Chick, 'than he told me he had already formed the intention of going into
the country for a short time. I'm sure I hope he'll go very soon. He can't
go too soon. But I suppose there are some arrangements connected with his
private papers and so forth, consequent on the affliction that has tried us
all so much - I can't think what's become of mine: Lucretia, lend me yours,
my dear - that may occupy him for one or two evenings in his own room. Your
Papa's a Dombey, child, if ever there was one,' said Mrs Chick, drying both
her eyes at once with great care on opposite corners of Miss Tox's
handkerchief 'He'll make an effort. There's no fear of him.'
'Is there nothing, aunt,' said Florence, trembling, 'I might do to -
'Lord, my dear child,' interposed Mrs Chick, hastily, 'what are you
talking about? If your Papa said to Me - I have given you his exact words,
"Louisa, I want nothing; I am better by myself" - what do you think he'd say
to you? You mustn't show yourself to him, child. Don't dream of such a
thing.'
'Aunt,' said Florence, 'I will go and lie down on my bed.'
Mrs Chick approved of this resolution, and dismissed her with a kiss.
But Miss Tox, on a faint pretence of looking for the mislaid handkerchief,
went upstairs after her; and tried in a few stolen minutes to comfort her,
in spite of great discouragement from Susan Nipper. For Miss Nipper, in her
burning zeal, disparaged Miss Tox as a crocodile; yet her sympathy seemed
genuine, and had at least the vantage-ground of disinterestedness - there
was little favour to be won by it.
And was there no one nearer and dearer than Susan, to uphold the
striving heart in its anguish? Was there no other neck to clasp; no other
face to turn to? no one else to say a soothing word to such deep sorrow? Was
Florence so alone in the bleak world that nothing else remained to her?
Nothing. Stricken motherless and brotherless at once - for in the loss of
little Paul, that first and greatest loss fell heavily upon her - this was
the only help she had. Oh, who can tell how much she needed help at first!
At first, when the house subsided into its accustomed course, and they
had all gone away, except the servants, and her father shut up in his own
rooms, Florence could do nothing but weep, and wander up and down, and
sometimes, in a sudden pang of desolate remembrance, fly to her own chamber,
wring her hands, lay her face down on her bed, and know no consolation:
nothing but the bitterness and cruelty of grief. This commonly ensued upon
the recognition of some spot or object very tenderly dated with him; and it
made the ale house, at first, a place of agony.
But it is not in the nature of pure love to burn so fiercely and
unkindly long. The flame that in its grosser composition has the taint of
earth may prey upon the breast that gives it shelter; but the fire from
heaven is as gentle in the heart, as when it rested on the heads of the
assembled twelve, and showed each man his brother, brightened and unhurt.
The image conjured up, there soon returned the placid face, the softened
voice, the loving looks, the quiet trustfulness and peace; and Florence,
though she wept still, wept more tranquilly, and courted the remembrance.
It was not very long before the golden water, dancing on the wall, in
the old place, at the old serene time, had her calm eye fixed upon it as it
ebbed away. It was not very long before that room again knew her, often;
sitting there alone, as patient and as mild as when she had watched beside
the little bed. When any sharp sense of its being empty smote upon her, she
could kneel beside it, and pray GOD - it was the pouring out of her full
heart - to let one angel love her and remember her.
It was not very long before, in the midst of the dismal house so wide
and dreary, her low voice in the twilight, slowly and stopping sometimes,
touched the old air to which he had so often listened, with his drooping
head upon her arm. And after that, and when it was quite dark, a little
strain of music trembled in the room: so softly played and sung, that it was
more lIke the mournful recollection of what she had done at his request on
that last night, than the reality repeated. But it was repeated, often -
very often, in the shadowy solitude; and broken murmurs of the strain still
trembled on the keys, when the sweet voice was hushed in tears.
Thus she gained heart to look upon the work with which her fingers had
been busy by his side on the sea-shore; and thus it was not very long before
she took to it again - with something of a human love for it, as if it had
been sentient and had known him; and, sitting in a window, near her mother's
picture, in the unused room so long deserted, wore away the thoughtful
hours.
Why did the dark eyes turn so often from this work to where the rosy
children lived? They were not immediate!y suggestive of her loss; for they
were all girls: four little sisters. But they were motherless like her - and
had a father.
It was easy to know when he had gone out and was expected home, for the
elder child was always dressed and waiting for him at the drawing-room
window, or n the balcony; and when he appeared, her expectant face lighted
up with joy, while the others at the high window, and always on the watch
too, clapped their hands, and drummed them on the sill, and called to him.
The elder child would come down to the hall, and put her hand in his, and
lead him up the stairs; and Florence would see her afterwards sitting by his
side, or on his knee, or hanging coaxingly about his neck and talking to
him: and though they were always gay together, he would often watch her face
as if he thought her like her mother that was dead. Florence would sometimes
look no more at this, and bursting into tears would hide behind the curtain
as if she were frightened, or would hurry from the window. Yet she could not
help returning; and her work would soon fall unheeded from her hands again.
It was the house that had been empty, years ago. It had remained so for
a long time. At last, and while she had been away from home, this family had
taken it; and it was repaired and newly painted; and there were birds and
flowers about it; and it looked very different from its old self. But she
never thought of the house. The children and their father were all in all.
When he had dined, she could see them, through the open windows, go
down with their governess or nurse, and cluster round the table; and in the
still summer weather, the sound of their childish voices and clear laughter
would come ringing across the street, into the drooping air of the room in
which she sat. Then they would climb and clamber upstairs with him, and romp
about him on the sofa, or group themselves at his knee, a very nosegay of
little faces, while he seemed to tell them some story. Or they would come
running out into the balcony; and then Florence would hide herself quickly,
lest it should check them in their joy, to see her in her black dress,
sitting there alone.
The elder child remained with her father when the rest had gone away,
and made his tea for him - happy little house-keeper she was then! - and sat
conversing with him, sometimes at the window, sometimes in the room, until
the candles came. He made her his companion, though she was some years
younger than Florence; and she could be as staid and pleasantly demure, with
her little book or work-box, as a woman. When they had candles, Florence
from her own dark room was not afraid to look again. But when the time came
for the child to say 'Good-night, Papa,' and go to bed, Florence would sob
and tremble as she raised her face to him, and could look no more.
Though still she would turn, again and again, before going to bed
herself from the simple air that had lulled him to rest so often, long ago,
and from the other low soft broken strain of music, back to that house. But
that she ever thought of it, or watched it, was a secret which she kept
within her own young breast.
And did that breast of Florence - Florence, so ingenuous and true - so
worthy of the love that he had borne her, and had whispered in his last
faint words - whose guileless heart was mirrored in the beauty of her face,
and breathed in every accent of her gentle voice - did that young breast
hold any other secret? Yes. One more.
When no one in the house was stirring, and the lights were all
extinguished, she would softly leave her own room, and with noiseless feet
descend the staircase, and approach her father's door. Against it, scarcely
breathing, she would rest her face and head, and press her lips, in the
yearning of her love. She crouched upon the cold stone floor outside it,
every night, to listen even for his breath; and in her one absorbing wish to
be allowed to show him some affection, to be a consolation to him, to win
him over to the endurance of some tenderness from her, his solitary child,
she would have knelt down at his feet, if she had dared, in humble
supplication.
No one knew it' No one thought of it. The door was ever closed, and he
shut up within. He went out once or twice, and it was said in the house that
he was very soon going on his country journey; but he lived in those rooms,
and lived alone, and never saw her, or inquired for her. Perhaps he did not
even know that she was in the house.
One day, about a week after the funeral, Florence was sitting at her
work, when Susan appeared, with a face half laughing and half crying, to
announce a visitor.
'A visitor! To me, Susan!' said Florence, looking up in astonishment.
'Well, it is a wonder, ain't it now, Miss Floy?' said Susan; 'but I
wish you had a many visitors, I do, indeed, for you'd be all the better for
it, and it's my opinion that the sooner you and me goes even to them old
Skettleses, Miss, the better for both, I may not wish to live in crowds,
Miss Floy, but still I'm not a oyster.'
To do Miss Nipper justice, she spoke more for her young mistress than
herself; and her face showed it.
'But the visitor, Susan,' said Florence.
Susan, with an hysterical explosion that was as much a laugh as a sob,
and as much a sob as a laugh, answered,
'Mr Toots!'
The smile that appeared on Florence's face passed from it in a moment,
and her eyes filled with tears. But at any rate it was a smile, and that
gave great satisfaction to Miss Nipper.
'My own feelings exactly, Miss Floy,' said Susan, putting her apron to
her eyes, and shaking her head. 'Immediately I see that Innocent in the
Hall, Miss Floy, I burst out laughing first, and then I choked.'
Susan Nipper involuntarily proceeded to do the like again on the spot.
In the meantime Mr Toots, who had come upstairs after her, all unconscious
of the effect he produced, announced himself with his knuckles on the door,
and walked in very brisKly.
'How d'ye do, Miss Dombey?' said Mr Toots. 'I'm very well, I thank you;
how are you?'
Mr Toots - than whom there were few better fellows in the world, though
there may have been one or two brighter spirits - had laboriously invented
this long burst of discourse with the view of relieving the feelings both of
Florence and himself. But finding that he had run through his property, as
it were, in an injudicious manner, by squandering the whole before taking a
chair, or before Florence had uttered a word, or before he had well got in
at the door, he deemed it advisable to begin again.
'How d'ye do, Miss Dombey?' said Mr Toots. 'I'm very well, I thank you;
how are you?'
Florence gave him her hand, and said she was very well.
'I'm very well indeed,' said Mr Toots, taking a chair. 'Very well
indeed, I am. I don't remember,' said Mr Toots, after reflecting a little,
'that I was ever better, thank you.'
'It's very kind of you to come,' said Florence, taking up her work, 'I
am very glad to see you.'
Mr Toots responded with a chuckle. Thinking that might be too lively,
he corrected it with a sigh. Thinking that might be too melancholy, he
corrected it with a chuckle. Not thoroughly pleasing himself with either
mode of reply, he breathed hard.
'You were very kind to my dear brother,' said Florence, obeying her own
natural impulse to relieve him by saying so. 'He often talked to me about
you.'
'Oh it's of no consequence,' said Mr Toots hastily. 'Warm, ain't it?'
'It is beautiful weather,' replied Florence.
'It agrees with me!' said Mr Toots. 'I don't think I ever was so well
as I find myself at present, I'm obliged to you.
After stating this curious and unexpected fact, Mr Toots fell into a
deep well of silence.
'You have left Dr Blimber's, I think?' said Florence, trying to help
him out.
'I should hope so,' returned Mr Toots. And tumbled in again.
He remained at the bottom, apparently drowned, for at least ten
minutes. At the expiration of that period, he suddenly floated, and said,
'Well! Good morning, Miss Dombey.'
'Are you going?' asked Florence, rising.
'I don't know, though. No, not just at present,' said Mr Toots, sitting
down again, most unexpectedly. 'The fact is - I say, Miss Dombey!'
'Don't be afraid to speak to me,' said Florence, with a quiet smile, 'I
should he very glad if you would talk about my brother.'
'Would you, though?' retorted Mr Toots, with sympathy in every fibre of
his otherwise expressionless face. 'Poor Dombey! I'm sure I never thought
that Burgess and Co. - fashionable tailors (but very dear), that we used to
talk about - would make this suit of clothes for such a purpose.' Mr Toots
was dressed in mourning. 'Poor Dombey! I say! Miss Dombey!' blubbered Toots.
'Yes,' said Florence.
'There's a friend he took to very much at last. I thought you'd lIke to
have him, perhaps, as a sort of keepsake. You remember his remembering
Diogenes?'
'Oh yes! oh yes' cried Florence.
'Poor Dombey! So do I,' said Mr Toots.
Mr Toots, seeing Florence in tears, had great difficulty in getting
beyond this point, and had nearly tumbled into the well again. But a chucKle
saved him on the brink.
'I say,' he proceeded, 'Miss Dombey! I could have had him stolen for
ten shillings, if they hadn't given him up: and I would: but they were glad
to get rid of him, I think. If you'd like to have him, he's at the door. I
brought him on purpose for you. He ain't a lady's dog, you know,' said Mr
Toots, 'but you won't mind that, will you?'
In fact, Diogenes was at that moment, as they presently ascertained
from looking down into the street, staring through the window of a hackney
cabriolet, into which, for conveyance to that spot, he had been ensnared, on
a false pretence of rats among the straw. Sooth to say, he was as unlike a
lady's dog as might be; and in his gruff anxiety to get out, presented an
appearance sufficiently unpromising, as he gave short yelps out of one side
of his mouth, and overbalancing himself by the intensity of every one of
those efforts, tumbled down into the straw, and then sprung panting up
again, putting out his tongue, as if he had come express to a Dispensary to
be examined for his health.
But though Diogenes was as ridiculous a dog as one would meet with on a
summer's day; a blundering, ill-favoured, clumsy, bullet-headed dog,
continually acting on a wrong idea that there was an enemy in the
neighbourhood, whom it was meritorious to bark at; and though he was far
from good-tempered, and certainly was not clever, and had hair all over his
eyes, and a comic nose, and an inconsistent tail, and a gruff voice; he was
dearer to Florence, in virtue of that parting remembrance of him, and that
request that he might be taken care of, than the most valuable and beautiful
of his kind. So dear, indeed, was this same ugly Diogenes, and so welcome to
her, that she took the jewelled hand of Mr Toots and kissed it in her
gratitude. And when Diogenes, released, came tearing up the stairs and
bouncing into the room (such a business as there was, first, to get him out
of the cabriolet!), dived under all the furniture, and wound a long iron
chain, that dangled from his neck, round legs of chairs and tables, and then
tugged at it until his eyes became unnaturally visible, in consequence of
their nearly starting out of his head; and when he growled at Mr Toots, who
affected familiarity; and went pell-mell at Towlinson, morally convinced
that he was the enemy whom he had barked at round the corner all his life
and had never seen yet; Florence was as pleased with him as if he had been a
miracle of discretion.
Mr Toots was so overjoyed by the success of his present, and was so
delighted to see Florence bending down over Diogenes, smoothing his coarse
back with her little delicate hand - Diogenes graciously allowing it from
the first moment of their acquaintance - that he felt it difficult to take
leave, and would, no doubt, have been a much longer time in making up his
mind to do so, if he had not been assisted by Diogenes himself, who suddenly
took it into his head to bay Mr Toots, and to make short runs at him with
his mouth open. Not exactly seeing his way to the end of these
demonstrations, and sensible that they placed the pantaloons constructed by
the art of Burgess and Co. in jeopardy, Mr Toots, with chuckles, lapsed out
at the door: by which, after looking in again two or three times, without
any object at all, and being on each occasion greeted with a fresh run from
Diogenes, he finally took himself off and got away.
'Come, then, Di! Dear Di! Make friends with your new mistress. Let us
love each other, Di!'said Florence, fondling his shaggy head. And Di, the
rough and gruff, as if his hairy hide were pervious to the tear that dropped
upon it, and his dog's heart melted as it fell, put his nose up to her face,
and swore fidelity.
Diogenes the man did not speak plainer to Alexander the Great than
Diogenes the dog spoke to Florence.' He subscribed to the offer of his
little mistress cheerfully, and devoted himself to her service. A banquet
was immediately provided for him in a corner; and when he had eaten and
drunk his fill, he went to the window where Florence was sitting, looking
on, rose up on his hind legs, with his awkward fore paws on her shoulders,
licked her face and hands, nestled his great head against her heart, and
wagged his tail till he was tired. Finally, Diogenes coiled himself up at
her feet and went to sleep.
Although Miss Nipper was nervous in regard of dogs, and felt it
necessary to come into the room with her skirts carefully collected about
her, as if she were crossing a brook on stepping-stones; also to utter
little screams and stand up on chairs when Diogenes stretched himself, she
was in her own manner affected by the kindness of Mr Toots, and could not
see Florence so alive to the attachment and society of this rude friend of
little Paul's, without some mental comments thereupon that brought the water
to her eyes. Mr Dombey, as a part of her reflections, may have been, in the
association of ideas, connected with the dog; but, at any rate, after
observing Diogenes and his mistress all the evening, and after exerting
herself with much good-will to provide Diogenes a bed in an ante-chamber
outside his mistress's door, she said hurriedly to Florence, before leaving
her for the night:
'Your Pa's a going off, Miss Floy, tomorrow morning.'
'To-morrow morning, Susan?'
'Yes, Miss; that's the orders. Early.'
'Do you know,' asked Florence, without looking at her, 'where Papa is
going, Susan?'
'Not exactly, Miss. He's going to meet that precious Major first, and I
must say if I was acquainted with any Major myself (which Heavens forbid),
it shouldn't be a blue one!'
'Hush, Susan!' urged Florence gently.
'Well, Miss Floy,' returned Miss Nipper, who was full of burning
indignation, and minded her stops even less than usual. 'I can't help it,
blue he is, and while I was a Christian, although humble, I would have
natural-coloured friends, or none.'
It appeared from what she added and had gleaned downstairs, that Mrs
Chick had proposed the Major for Mr Dombey's companion, and that Mr Dombey,
after some hesitation, had invited him.
'Talk of him being a change, indeed!' observed Miss Nipper to herself
with boundless contempt. 'If he's a change, give me a constancy.
'Good-night, Susan,' said Florence.
'Good-night, my darling dear Miss Floy.'
Her tone of commiseration smote the chord so often roughly touched, but
never listened to while she or anyone looked on. Florence left alone, laid
her head upon her hand, and pressing the other over her swelling heart, held
free communication with her sorrows.
It was a wet night; and the melancholy rain fell pattering and dropping
with a weary sound. A sluggish wind was blowing, and went moaning round the
house, as if it were in pain or grief. A shrill noise quivered through the
trees. While she sat weeping, it grew late, and dreary midnight tolled out
from the steeples.
Florence was little more than a child in years - not yet fourteen- and
the loneliness and gloom of such an hour in the great house where Death had
lately made its own tremendous devastation, might have set an older fancy
brooding on vague terrors. But her innocent imagination was too full of one
theme to admit them. Nothing wandered in her thoughts but love - a wandering
love, indeed, and castaway - but turning always to her father. There was
nothing in the dropping of the rain, the moaning of the wind, the shuddering
of the trees, the striking of the solemn clocks, that shook this one
thought, or diminished its interest' Her recollections of the dear dead boy
- and they were never absent - were itself, the same thing. And oh, to be
shut out: to be so lost: never to have looked into her father's face or
touched him, since that hour!
She could not go to bed, poor child, and never had gone yet, since
then, without making her nightly pilgrimage to his door. It would have been
a strange sad sight, to see her' now, stealing lightly down the stairs
through the thick gloom, and stopping at it with a beating heart, and
blinded eyes, and hair that fell down loosely and unthought of; and touching
it outside with her wet cheek. But the night covered it, and no one knew.
The moment that she touched the door on this night, Florence found that
it was open. For the first time it stood open, though by but a
hair's-breadth: and there was a light within. The first impulse of the timid
child - and she yielded to it - was to retire swiftly. Her next, to go back,
and to enter; and this second impulse held her in irresolution on the
staircase.
In its standing open, even by so much as that chink, there seemed to be
hope. There was encouragement in seeing a ray of light from within, stealing
through the dark stern doorway, and falling in a thread upon the marble
floor. She turned back, hardly knowing what she did, but urged on by the
love within her, and the trial they had undergone together, but not shared:
and with her hands a little raised and trembling, glided in.
Her father sat at his old table in the middle room. He had been
arranging some papers, and destroying others, and the latter lay in fragile
ruins before him. The rain dripped heavily upon the glass panes in the outer
room, where he had so often watched poor Paul, a baby; and the low
complainings of the wind were heard without.
But not by him. He sat with his eyes fixed on the table, so immersed in
thought, that a far heavier tread than the light foot of his child could
make, might have failed to rouse him. His face was turned towards her. By
the waning lamp, and at that haggard hour, it looked worn and dejected; and
in the utter loneliness surrounding him, there was an appeal to Florence
that struck home.
'Papa! Papa! speak to me, dear Papa!'
He started at her voice, and leaped up from his seat. She was close
before him' with extended arms, but he fell back.
'What is the matter?' he said, sternly. 'Why do you come here? What has
frightened you?'
If anything had frightened her, it was the face he turned upon her. The
glowing love within the breast of his young daughter froze before it, and
she stood and looked at him as if stricken into stone.
There was not one touch of tenderness or pity in it. There was not one
gleam of interest, parental recognition, or relenting in it. There was a
change in it, but not of that kind. The old indifference and cold constraint
had given place to something: what, she never thought and did not dare to
think, and yet she felt it in its force, and knew it well without a name:
that as it looked upon her, seemed to cast a shadow on her head.
Did he see before him the successful rival of his son, in health and
life? Did he look upon his own successful rival in that son's affection? Did
a mad jealousy and withered pride, poison sweet remembrances that should
have endeared and made her precious to him? Could it be possible that it was
gall to him to look upon her in her beauty and her promise: thinking of his
infant boy!
Florence had no such thoughts. But love is quick to know when it is
spurned and hopeless: and hope died out of hers, as she stood looking in her
father's face.
'I ask you, Florence, are you frightened? Is there anything the matter,
that you come here?'
'I came, Papa - '
'Against my wishes. Why?'
She saw he knew why: it was written broadly on his face: and dropped
her head upon her hands with one prolonged low cry.
Let him remember it in that room, years to come. It has faded from the
air, before he breaks the silence. It may pass as quickly from his brain, as
he believes, but it is there. Let him remember it in that room, years to
come!
He took her by the arm. His hand was cold, and loose, and scarcely
closed upon her.
'You are tired, I daresay,' he said, taking up the light, and leading
her towards the door, 'and want rest. We all want rest. Go, Florence. You
have been dreaming.'
The dream she had had, was over then, God help her! and she felt that
it could never more come back
'I will remain here to light you up the stairs. The whole house is
yours above there,' said her father, slowly. 'You are its mistress now.
Good-night!'
Still covering her face, she sobbed, and answered 'Good-night, dear
Papa,' and silently ascended. Once she looked back as if she would have
returned to him, but for fear. It was a mommentary thought, too hopeless to
encourage; and her father stood there with the light - hard, unresponsive,
motionless - until the fluttering dress of his fair child was lost in the
darkness.
Let him remember it in that room, years to come. The rain that falls
upon the roof: the wind that mourns outside the door: may have foreknowledge
in their melancholy sound. Let him remember it in that room, years to come!
The last time he had watched her, from the same place, winding up those
stairs, she had had her brother in her arms. It did not move his heart
towards her now, it steeled it: but he went into his room, and locked his
door, and sat down in his chair, and cried for his lost boy.
Diogenes was broad awake upon his post, and waiting for his little
mistress.
'Oh, Di! Oh, dear Di! Love me for his sake!'
Diogenes already loved her for her own, and didn't care how much he
showed it. So he made himself vastly ridiculous by performing a variety of
uncouth bounces in the ante-chamber, and concluded, when poor Florence was
at last asleep, and dreaming of the rosy children opposite, by scratching
open her bedroom door: rolling up his bed into a pillow: lying down on the
boards, at the full length of his tether, with his head towards her: and
looking lazily at her, upside down, out of the tops of his eyes, until from
winking and winking he fell asleep himself, and dreamed, with gruff barks,
of his enemy.
Walter goes away
The wooden Midshipman at the Instrument-maker's door, like the
hard-hearted little Midshipman he was, remained supremely indifferent to
Walter's going away, even when the very last day of his sojourn in the back
parlour was on the decline. With his quadrant at his round black knob of an
eye, and his figure in its old attitude of indomitable alacrity, the
Midshipman displayed his elfin small-clothes to the best advantage, and,
absorbed in scientific pursuits, had no sympathy with worldly concerns. He
was so far the creature of circumstances, that a dry day covered him with
dust, and a misty day peppered him with little bits of soot, and a wet day
brightened up his tarnished uniform for the moment, and a very hot day
blistered him; but otherwise he was a callous, obdurate, conceited
Midshipman, intent on his own discoveries, and caring as little for what
went on about him, terrestrially, as Archimedes at the taking of Syracuse.
Such a Midshipman he seemed to be, at least, in the then position of
domestic affairs. Walter eyed him kindly many a time in passing in and out;
and poor old Sol, when Walter was not there, would come and lean against the
doorpost, resting his weary wig as near the shoe-buckles of the guardian
genius of his trade and shop as he could. But no fierce idol with a mouth
from ear to ear, and a murderous visage made of parrot's feathers, was ever
more indifferent to the appeals of its savage votaries, than was the
Midshipman to these marks of attachment.
Walter's heart felt heavy as he looked round his old bedroom, up among
the parapets and chimney-pots, and thought that one more night already
darkening would close his acquaintance with it, perhaps for ever. Dismantled
of his little stock of books and pictures, it looked coldly and
reproachfully on him for his desertion, and had already a foreshadowing upon
it of its coming strangeness. 'A few hours more,' thought Walter, 'and no
dream I ever had here when I was a schoolboy will be so little mine as this
old room. The dream may come back in my sleep, and I may return waking to
this place, it may be: but the dream at least will serve no other master,
and the room may have a score, and every one of them may change, neglect,
misuse it.'
But his Uncle was not to be left alone in the little back parlour,
where he was then sitting by himself; for Captain Cuttle, considerate in his
roughness, stayed away against his will, purposely that they should have
some talk together unobserved: so Walter, newly returned home from his last
day's bustle, descended briskly, to bear him company.
'Uncle,' he said gaily, laying his hand upon the old man's shoulder,
'what shall I send you home from Barbados?'
'Hope, my dear Wally. Hope that we shall meet again, on this side of
the grave. Send me as much of that as you can.'
'So I will, Uncle: I have enough and to spare, and I'll not be chary of
it! And as to lively turtles, and limes for Captain Cuttle's punch, and
preserves for you on Sundays, and all that sort of thing, why I'll send you
ship-loads, Uncle: when I'm rich enough.'
Old Sol wiped his spectacles, and faintly smiled.
'That's right, Uncle!' cried Walter, merrily, and clapping him half a
dozen times more upon the shoulder. 'You cheer up me! I'll cheer up you!
We'll be as gay as larks to-morrow morning, Uncle, and we'll fly as high! As
to my anticipations, they are singing out of sight now.
'Wally, my dear boy,' returned the old man, 'I'll do my best, I'll do
my best.'
'And your best, Uncle,' said Walter, with his pleasant laugh, 'is the
best best that I know. You'll not forget what you're to send me, Uncle?'
'No, Wally, no,' replied the old man; 'everything I hear about Miss
Dombey, now that she is left alone, poor lamb, I'll write. I fear it won't
be much though, Wally.'
'Why, I'll tell you what, Uncle,' said Walter, after a moment's
hesitation, 'I have just been up there.'
'Ay, ay, ay?' murmured the old man, raising his eyebrows, and his
spectacles with them.
'Not to see her,' said Walter, 'though I could have seen her, I
daresay, if I had asked, Mr Dombey being out of town: but to say a parting
word to Susan. I thought I might venture to do that, you know, under the
circumstances, and remembering when I saw Miss Dombey last.'
'Yes, my boy, yes,' replied his Uncle, rousing himself from a temporary
abstraction.
'So I saw her,' pursued Walter, 'Susan, I mean: and I told her I was
off and away to-morrow. And I said, Uncle, that you had always had an
interest in Miss Dombey since that night when she was here, and always
wished her well and happy, and always would be proud and glad to serve her
in the least: I thought I might say that, you know, under the circumstances.
Don't you think so ?'
'Yes, my boy, yes,' replied his Uncle, in the tone as before.
'And I added,' pursued Walter, 'that if she - Susan, I mean - could
ever let you know, either through herself, or Mrs Richards, or anybody else
who might be coming this way, that Miss Dombey was well and happy, you would
take it very kindly, and would write so much to me, and I should take it
very kindly too. There! Upon my word, Uncle,' said Walter, 'I scarcely slept
all last night through thinking of doing this; and could not make up my mind
when I was out, whether to do it or not; and yet I am sure it is the true
feeling of my heart, and I should have been quite miserable afterwards if I
had not relieved it.'
His honest voice and manner corroborated what he said, and quite
established its ingenuousness.
'So, if you ever see her, Uncle,' said Walter, 'I mean Miss Dombey now
- and perhaps you may, who knows! - tell her how much I felt for her; how
much I used to think of her when I was here; how I spoke of her, with the
tears in my eyes, Uncle, on this last night before I went away. Tell her
that I said I never could forget her gentle manner, or her beautiful face,
or her sweet kind disposition that was better than all. And as I didn't take
them from a woman's feet, or a young lady's: only a little innocent
child's,' said Walter: 'tell her, if you don't mind, Uncle, that I kept
those shoes - she'll remember how often they fell off, that night - and took
them away with me as a remembrance!'
They were at that very moment going out at the door in one of Walter's
trunks. A porter carrying off his baggage on a truck for shipment at the
docks on board the Son and Heir, had got possession of them; and wheeled
them away under the very eye of the insensible Midshipman before their owner
had well finished speaking.
But that ancient mariner might have been excused his insensibility to
the treasure as it rolled away. For, under his eye at the same moment,
accurately within his range of observation, coming full into the sphere of
his startled and intensely wide-awake look-out, were Florence and Susan
Nipper: Florence looking up into his face half timidly, and receiving the
whole shock of his wooden ogling!
More than this, they passed into the shop, and passed in at the parlour
door before they were observed by anybody but the Midshipman. And Walter,
having his back to the door, would have known nothing of their apparition
even then, but for seeing his Uncle spring out of his own chair, and nearly
tumble over another.
'Why, Uncle!' exclaimed Walter. 'What's the matter?'
Old Solomon replied, 'Miss Dombey!'
'Is it possible?' cried Walter, looking round and starting up in his
turn. 'Here!'
Why, It was so possible and so actual, that, while the words were on
his lips, Florence hurried past him; took Uncle Sol's snuff-coloured lapels,
one in each hand; kissed him on the cheek; and turning, gave her hand to
Walter with a simple truth and earnestness that was her own, and no one
else's in the world!
'Going away, Walter!' said Florence.
'Yes, Miss Dombey,' he replied, but not so hopefully as he endeavoured:
'I have a voyage before me.'
'And your Uncle,' said Florence, looking back at Solomon. 'He is sorry
you are going, I am sure. Ah! I see he is! Dear Walter, I am very sorry
too.'
'Goodness knows,' exclaimed Miss Nipper, 'there's a many we could spare
instead, if numbers is a object, Mrs Pipchin as a overseer would come cheap
at her weight in gold, and if a knowledge of black slavery should be
required, them Blimbers is the very people for the sitiwation.'
With that Miss Nipper untied her bonnet strings, and alter looking
vacantly for some moments into a little black teapot that was set forth with
the usual homely service on the table, shook her head and a tin canister,
and began unasked to make the tea.
In the meantime Florence had turned again to the Instrument-maker, who
was as full of admiration as surprise. 'So grown!' said old Sol. 'So
improved! And yet not altered! Just the same!'
'Indeed!' said Florence.
'Ye - yes,' returned old Sol, rubbing his hands slowly, and considering
the matter half aloud, as something pensive in the bright eyes looking at
him arrested his attention. 'Yes, that expression was in the younger face,
too!'
'You remember me,' said Florence with a smile, 'and what a little
creature I was then?'
'My dear young lady,' returned the Instrument-maker, 'how could I
forget you, often as I have thought of you and heard of you since! At the
very moment, indeed, when you came in, Wally was talking about you to me,
and leaving messages for you, and - '
'Was he?' said Florence. 'Thank you, Walter! Oh thank you, Walter! I
was afraid you might be going away and hardly thinking of me;' and again she
gave him her little hand so freely and so faithfully that Walter held it for
some moments in his own, and could not bear to let it go.
Yet Walter did not hold it as he might have held it once, nor did its
touch awaken those old day-dreams of his boyhood that had floated past him
sometimes even lately, and confused him with their indistinct and broken
shapes. The purity and innocence of her endearing manner, and its perfect
trustfulness, and the undisguised regard for him that lay so deeply seated
in her constant eyes, and glowed upon her fair face through the smile that
shaded - for alas! it was a smile too sad to brighten - it, were not of
their romantic race. They brought back to his thoughts the early death-bed
he had seen her tending, and the love the child had borne her; and on the
wings of such remembrances she seemed to rise up, far above his idle
fancies, into clearer and serener air.
'I - I am afraid I must call you Walter's Uncle, Sir,' said Florence to
the old man, 'if you'll let me.'
'My dear young lady,' cried old Sol. 'Let you! Good gracious!'
'We always knew you by that name, and talked of you,' said Florence,
glancing round, and sighing gently. 'The nice old parlour! Just the same!
How well I recollect it!'
Old Sol looked first at her, then at his nephew, and then rubbed his
hands, and rubbed his spectacles, and said below his breath, 'Ah! time,
time, time!'
There was a short silence; during which Susan Nipper skilfully
impounded two extra cups and saucers from the cupboard, and awaited the
drawing of the tea with a thoughtful air.
'I want to tell Walter's Uncle,' said Florence, laying her hand timidly
upon the old man's as it rested on the table, to bespeak his attention,
'something that I am anxious about. He is going to be left alone, and if he
will allow me - not to take Walter's place, for that I couldn't do, but to
be his true friend and help him if I ever can while Walter is away, I shall
be very much obliged to him indeed. Will you? May I, Walter's Uncle?'
The Instrument-maker, without speaking, put her hand to his lips, and
Susan Nipper, leaning back with her arms crossed, in the chair of presidency
into which she had voted herself, bit one end of her bonnet strings, and
heaved a gentle sigh as she looked up at the skylight.
'You will let me come to see you,' said Florence, 'when I can; and you
will tell me everything about yourself and Walter; and you will have no
secrets from Susan when she comes and I do not, but will confide in us, and
trust us, and rely upon us. And you'll try to let us be a comfort to you?
Will you, Walter's Uncle?'
The sweet face looking into his, the gentle pleading eyes, the soft
voice, and the light touch on his arm made the more winning by a child's
respect and honour for his age, that gave to all an air of graceful doubt
and modest hesitation - these, and her natural earnestness, so overcame the
poor old Instrument-maker, that he only answered:
'Wally! say a word for me, my dear. I'm very grateful.'
'No, Walter,' returned Florence with her quiet smile. 'Say nothing for
him, if you please. I understand him very well, and we must learn to talk
together without you, dear Walter.'
The regretful tone in which she said these latter words, touched Walter
more than all the rest.
'Miss Florence,' he replied, with an effort to recover the cheerful
manner he had preserved while talking with his Uncle, 'I know no more than
my Uncle, what to say in acknowledgment of such kindness, I am sure. But
what could I say, after all, if I had the power of talking for an hour,
except that it is like you?'
Susan Nipper began upon a new part of her bonnet string, and nodded at
the skylight, in approval of the sentiment expressed.
'Oh! but, Walter,' said Florence, 'there is something that I wish to
say to you before you go away, and you must call me Florence, if you please,
and not speak like a stranger.'
'Like a stranger!' returned Walter, 'No. I couldn't speak so. I am
sure, at least, I couldn't feel like one.'
'Ay, but that is not enough, and is not what I mean. For, Walter,'
added Florence, bursting into tears, 'he liked you very much, and said
before he died that he was fond of you, and said "Remember Walter!" and if
you'll be a brother to me, Walter, now that he is gone and I have none on
earth, I'll be your sister all my life, and think of you like one wherever
we may be! This is what I wished to say, dear Walter, but I cannot say it as
I would, because my heart is full.'
And in its fulness and its sweet simplicity, she held out both her
hands to him. Walter taking them, stooped down and touched the tearful face
that neither shrunk nor turned away, nor reddened as he did so, but looked
up at him with confidence and truth. In that one moment, every shadow of
doubt or agitation passed away from Walter's soul. It seemed to him that he
responded to her innocent appeal, beside the dead child's bed: and, in the
solemn presence he had seen there, pledged himself to cherish and protect
her very image, in his banishment, with brotherly regard; to garner up her
simple faith, inviolate; and hold himself degraded if he breathed upon it
any thought that was not in her own breast when she gave it to him.
Susan Nipper, who had bitten both her bonnet strings at once, and
imparted a great deal of private emotion to the skylight, during this
transaction, now changed the subject by inquiring who took milk and who took
sugar; and being enlightened on these points, poured out the tea. They all
four gathered socially about the little table, and took tea under that young
lady's active superintendence; and the presence of Florence in the back
parlour, brightened the Tartar frigate on the wall.
Half an hour ago Walter, for his life, would have hardly called her by
her name. But he could do so now when she entreated him. He could think of
her being there, without a lurking misgiving that it would have been better
if she had not come. He could calmly think how beautiful she was, how full
of promise, what a home some happy man would find in such a heart one day.
He could reflect upon his own place in that heart, with pride; and with a
brave determination, if not to deserve it - he still thought that far above
him - never to deserve it less
Some fairy influence must surely have hovered round the hands of Susan
Nipper when she made the tea, engendering the tranquil air that reigned in
the back parlour during its discussion. Some counter-influence must surely
have hovered round the hands of Uncle Sol's chronometer, and moved them
faster than the Tartar frigate ever went before the wind. Be this as it may,
the visitors had a coach in waiting at a quiet corner not far off; and the
chronometer, on being incidentally referred to, gave such a positive opinion
that it had been waiting a long time, that it was impossible to doubt the
fact, especially when stated on such unimpeachable authority. If Uncle Sol
had been going to be hanged by his own time, he never would have allowed
that the chronometer was too fast, by the least fraction of a second.
Florence at parting recapitulated to the old man all that she had said
before, and bound him to the compact. Uncle Sol attended her lovingly to the
legs of the wooden Midshipman, and there resigned her to Walter, who was
ready to escort her and Susan Nipper to the coach.
'Walter,' said Florence by the way, 'I have been afraid to ask before
your Uncle. Do you think you will be absent very long?'
'Indeed,' said Walter, 'I don't know. I fear so. Mr Dombey signified as
much, I thought, when he appointed me.'
'Is it a favour, Walter?' inquired Florence, after a moment's
hesitation, and looking anxiously in his face.
'The appointment?' returned Walter.
'Yes.'
Walter would have given anything to have answered in the affirmative,
but his face answered before his lips could, and Florence was too attentive
to it not to understand its reply.
'I am afraid you have scarcely been a favourite with Papa,' she said,
timidly.
'There is no reason,' replied Walter, smiling, 'why I should be.'
'No reason, Walter!'
'There was no reason,' said Walter, understanding what she meant.
'There are many people employed in the House. Between Mr Dombey and a young
man like me, there's a wide space of separation. If I do my duty, I do what
I ought, and do no more than all the rest.'
Had Florence any misgiving of which she was hardly conscious: any
misgiving that had sprung into an indistinct and undefined existence since
that recent night when she had gone down to her father's room: that Walter's
accidental interest in her, and early knowledge of her, might have involved
him in that powerful displeasure and dislike? Had Walter any such idea, or
any sudden thought that it was in her mind at that moment? Neither of them
hinted at it. Neither of them spoke at all, for some short time. Susan,
walking on the other side of Walter, eyed them both sharply; and certainly
Miss Nipper's thoughts travelled in that direction, and very confidently
too.
'You may come back very soon,' said Florence, 'perhaps, Walter.'
'I may come back,' said Walter, 'an old man, and find you an old lady.
But I hope for better things.'
'Papa,' said Florence, after a moment, 'will - will recover from his
grief, and - speak more freely to me one day, perhaps; and if he should, I
will tell him how much I wish to see you back again, and ask him to recall
you for my sake.'
There was a touching modulation in these words about her father, that
Walter understood too well.
The coach being close at hand, he would have left her without speaking,
for now he felt what parting was; but Florence held his hand when she was
seated, and then he found there was a little packet in her own.
'Walter,' she said, looking full upon him with her affectionate eyes,
'like you, I hope for better things. I will pray for them, and believe that
they will arrive. I made this little gift for Paul. Pray take it with my
love, and do not look at it until you are gone away. And now, God bless you,
Walter! never forget me. You are my brother, dear!'
He was glad that Susan Nipper came between them, or he might have left
her with a sorrowful remembrance of him. He was glad too that she did not
look out of the coach again, but waved the little hand to him instead, as
long as he could see it.
In spite of her request, he could not help opening the packet that
night when he went to bed. It was a little purse: and there was was money in
it.
Bright rose the sun next morning, from his absence in strange countries
and up rose Walter with it to receive the Captain, who was already at the
door: having turned out earlier than was necessary, in order to get under
weigh while Mrs MacStinger was still slumbering. The Captain pretended to be
in tip-top spirits, and brought a very smoky tongue in one of the pockets of
the of the broad blue coat for breakfast.
'And, Wal'r,' said the Captain, when they took their seats at table, if
your Uncle's the man I think him, he'll bring out the last bottle of the
Madeira on the present occasion.'
'No, no, Ned,' returned the old man. 'No! That shall be opened when
Walter comes home again.'
'Well said!' cried the Captain. 'Hear him!'
'There it lies,' said Sol Gills, 'down in the little cellar, covered
with dirt and cobwebs. There may be dirt and cobwebs over you and me
perhaps, Ned, before it sees the light.'
'Hear him! 'cried the Captain. 'Good morality! Wal'r, my lad. Train up
a fig-tree in the way it should go, and when you are old sit under the shade
on it. Overhaul the - Well,' said the Captain on second thoughts, 'I ain't
quite certain where that's to be found, but when found, make a note of. Sol
Gills, heave ahead again!'
'But there or somewhere, it shall lie, Ned, until Wally comes back to
claim it,' said the old man. 'That's all I meant to say.'
'And well said too,' returned the Captain; 'and if we three don't crack
that bottle in company, I'll give you two leave to.'
Notwithstanding the Captain's excessive joviality, he made but a poor
hand at the smoky tongue, though he tried very hard, when anybody looked at
him, to appear as if he were eating with a vast apetite. He was terribly
afraid, likewise, of being left alone with either Uncle or nephew; appearing
to consider that his only chance of safety as to keeping up appearances, was
in there being always three together. This terror on the part of the
Captain, reduced him to such ingenious evasions as running to the door, when
Solomon went to put his coat on, under pretence of having seen an
extraordinary hackney-coach pass: and darting out into the road when Walter
went upstairs to take leave of the lodgers, on a feint of smelling fire in a
neighbouring chimney. These artifices Captain Cuttle deemed inscrutable by
any uninspired observer.
Walter was coming down from his parting expedition upstairs, and was
crossing the shop to go back to the little parlour, when he saw a faded face
he knew, looking in at the door, and darted towards it.
'Mr Carker!' cried Walter, pressing the hand of John Carker the Junior.
'Pray come in! This is kind of you, to be here so early to say good-bye to
me. You knew how glad it would make me to shake hands with you, once, before
going away. I cannot say how glad I am to have this opportunity. Pray come
in.'
'It is not likely that we may ever meet again, Walter,' returned the
other, gently resisting his invitation, 'and I am glad of this opportunity
too. I may venture to speak to you, and to take you by the hand, on the eve
of separation. I shall not have to resist your frank approaches, Walter, any
more.
There was a melancholy in his smile as he said it, that showed he had
found some company and friendship for his thoughts even in that.
'Ah, Mr Carker!' returned Walter. 'Why did you resist them? You could
have done me nothing but good, I am very sure.
He shook his head. 'If there were any good,' he said, 'I could do on
this earth, I would do it, Walter, for you. The sight of you from day to
day, has been at once happiness and remorse to me. But the pleasure has
outweighed the pain. I know that, now, by knowing what I lose.'
'Come in, Mr Carker, and make acquaintance with my good old Uncle,'
urged Walter. 'I have often talked to him about you, and he will be glad to
tell you all he hears from me. I have not,' said Walter, noticing his
hesitation, and speaking with embarrassment himself: 'I have not told him
anything about our last conversation, Mr Carker; not even him, believe me.
The grey Junior pressed his hand, and tears rose in his eyes.
'If I ever make acquaintance with him, Walter,' he returned, 'it will
be that I may hear tidings of you. Rely on my not wronging your forbearance
and consideration. It would be to wrong it, not to tell him all the truth,
before I sought a word of confidence from him. But I have no friend or
acquaintance except you: and even for your sake, am little likely to make
any.'
'I wish,' said Walter, 'you had suffered me to be your friend indeed. I
always wished it, Mr Carker, as you know; but never half so much as now,
when we are going to part'
'It is enough replied the other, 'that you have been the friend of my
own breast, and that when I have avoided you most, my heart inclined the
most towards you, and was fullest of you. Walter, good-bye!'
'Good-bye, Mr Carker. Heaven be with you, Sir!' cried Walter with
emotion.
'If,' said the other, retaining his hand while he spoke; 'if when you
come back, you miss me from my old corner, and should hear from anyone where
I am lying, come and look upon my grave. Think that I might have been as
honest and as happy as you! And let me think, when I know time is coming on,
that some one like my former self may stand there, for a moment, and
remember me with pity and forgiveness! Walter, good-bye!'
His figure crept like a shadow down the bright, sun-lighted street, so
cheerful yet so solemn in the early summer morning; and slowly passed away.
The relentless chronometer at last announced that Walter must turn his
back upon the wooden Midshipman: and away they went, himself, his Uncle, and
the Captain, in a hackney-coach to a wharf, where they were to take
steam-boat for some Reach down the river, the name of which, as the Captain
gave it out, was a hopeless mystery to the ears of landsmen. Arrived at this
Reach (whither the ship had repaired by last night's tide), they were
boarded by various excited watermen, and among others by a dirty Cyclops of
the Captain's acquaintance, who, with his one eye, had made the Captain out
some mile and a half off, and had been exchanging unintelligible roars with
him ever since. Becoming the lawful prize of this personage, who was
frightfully hoarse and constitutionally in want of shaving, they were all
three put aboard the Son and Heir. And the Son and Heir was in a pretty
state of confusion, with sails lying all bedraggled on the wet decks, loose
ropes tripping people up, men in red shirts running barefoot to and fro,
casks blockading every foot of space, and, in the thickest of the fray, a
black cook in a black caboose up to his eyes in vegetables and blinded with
smoke.
The Captain immediately drew Walter into a corner, and with a great
effort, that made his face very red, pulled up the silver watch, which was
so big, and so tight in his pocket, that it came out like a bung.
'Wal'r,' said the Captain, handing it over, and shaking him heartily by
the hand, 'a parting gift, my lad. Put it back half an hour every morning,
and about another quarter towards the arternoon, and it's a watch that'll do
you credit.'
'Captain Cuttle! I couldn't think of it!' cried Walter, detaining him,
for he was running away. 'Pray take it back. I have one already.'
'Then, Wal'r,' said the Captain, suddenly diving into one of his
pockets and bringing up the two teaspoons and the sugar-tongs, with which he
had armed himself to meet such an objection, 'take this here trifle of
plate, instead.'
'No, no, I couldn't indeed!' cried Walter, 'a thousand thanks! Don't
throw them away, Captain Cuttle!' for the Captain was about to jerk them
overboard. 'They'll be of much more use to you than me. Give me your stick.
I have often thought I should like to have it. There! Good-bye, Captain
Cuttle! Take care of my Uncle! Uncle Sol, God bless you!'
They were over the side in the confusion, before Walter caught another
glimpse of either; and when he ran up to the stern, and looked after them,
he saw his Uncle hanging down his head in the boat, and Captain Cuttle
rapping him on the back with the great silver watch (it must have been very
painful), and gesticulating hopefully with the teaspoons and sugar-tongs.
Catching sight of Walter, Captain Cuttle dropped the property into the
bottom of the boat with perfect unconcern, being evidently oblivious of its
existence, and pulling off the glazed hat hailed him lustily. The glazed hat
made quite a show in the sun with its glistening, and the Captain continued
to wave it until he could be seen no longer. Then the confusion on board,
which had been rapidly increasing, reached its height; two or three other
boats went away with a cheer; the sails shone bright and full above, as
Walter watched them spread their surface to the favourable breeze; the water
flew in sparkles from the prow; and off upon her voyage went the Son and
Heir, as hopefully and trippingly as many another son and heir, gone down,
had started on his way before her.
Day after day, old Sol and Captain Cuttle kept her reckoning in the
little hack parlour and worked out her course, with the chart spread before
them on the round table. At night, when old Sol climbed upstairs, so lonely,
to the attic where it sometimes blew great guns, he looked up at the stars
and listened to the wind, and kept a longer watch than would have fallen to
his lot on board the ship. The last bottle of the old Madeira, which had had
its cruising days, and known its dangers of the deep, lay silently beneath
its dust and cobwebs, in the meanwhile, undisturbed.
Mr Dombey goes upon a Journey
'Mr Dombey, Sir,' said Major Bagstock, 'Joee' B. is not in general a
man of sentiment, for Joseph is tough. But Joe has his feelings, Sir, and
when they are awakened - Damme, Mr Dombey,? cried the Major with sudden
ferocity, 'this is weakness, and I won't submit to it]'
Major Bagstock delivered himself of these expressions on receiving Mr
Dombey as his guest at the head of his own staircase in Princess's Place. Mr
Dombey had come to breakfast with the Major, previous to their setting forth
on their trip; and the ill-starved Native had already undergone a world of
misery arising out of the muffins, while, in connexion with the general
question of boiled eggs, life was a burden to him.
'It is not for an old soldier of the Bagstock breed,' observed the
Major, relapsing into a mild state, 'to deliver himself up, a prey to his
own emotions; but - damme, Sir,' cried the Major, in another spasm of
ferocity, 'I condole with you!'
The Major's purple visage deepened in its hue, and the Major's lobster
eyes stood out in bolder relief, as he shook Mr Dombey by the hand,
imparting to that peaceful action as defiant a character as if it had been
the prelude to his immediately boxing Mr Dombey for a thousand pounds a side
and the championship of England. With a rotatory motion of his head, and a
wheeze very like the cough of a horse, the Major then conducted his visitor
to the sitting-room, and there welcomed him (having now composed his
feelings) with the freedom and frankness ofa travelling companion.
'Dombey,' said the Major, 'I'm glad to see you. I'm proud to see you.
There are not many men in Europe to whom J. Bagstock would say that - for
Josh is blunt. Sir: it's his nature - but Joey B. is proud to see you,
Dombey.'
'Major,' returned Mr Dombey, 'you are very obliging.'
'No, Sir,' said the Major, 'Devil a bit! That's not my character. If
that had been Joe's character, Joe might have been, by this time,
Lieutenant-General Sir Joseph Bagstock, K.C.B., and might have received you
in very different quarters. You don't know old Joe yet, I find. But this
occasion, being special, is a source of pride to me. By the Lord, Sir,' said
the Major resolutely, 'it's an honour to me!'
Mr Dombey, in his estimation of himself and his money, felt that this
was very true, and therefore did not dispute the point. But the instinctive
recognition of such a truth by the Major, and his plain avowal of it, were
very able. It was a confirmation to Mr Dombey, if he had required any, of
his not being mistaken in the Major. It was an assurance to him that his
power extended beyond his own immediate sphere; and that the Major, as an
officer and a gentleman, had a no less becoming sense of it, than the beadle
of the Royal Exchange.
And if it were ever consolatory to know this, or the like of this, it
was consolatory then, when the impotence of his will, the instability of his
hopes, the feebleness of wealth, had been so direfully impressed upon him.
What could it do, his boy had asked him. Sometimes, thinking of the baby
question, he could hardly forbear inquiring, himself, what could it do
indeed: what had it done?
But these were lonely thoughts, bred late at night in the sullen
despondency and gloom of his retirement, and pride easily found its
reassurance in many testimonies to the truth, as unimpeachable and precious
as the Major's. Mr Dombey, in his friendlessness, inclined to the Major. It
cannot be said that he warmed towards him, but he thawed a little, The Major
had had some part - and not too much - in the days by the seaside. He was a
man of the world, and knew some great people. He talked much, and told
stories; and Mr Dombey was disposed to regard him as a choice spirit who
shone in society, and who had not that poisonous ingredient of poverty with
which choice spirits in general are too much adulterated. His station was
undeniable. Altogether the Major was a creditable companion, well accustomed
to a life of leisure, and to such places as that they were about to visit,
and having an air of gentlemanly ease about him that mixed well enough with
his own City character, and did not compete with it at all. If Mr Dombey had
any lingering idea that the Major, as a man accustomed, in the way of his
calling, to make light of the ruthless hand that had lately crushed his
hopes, might unconsciously impart some useful philosophy to him, and scare
away his weak regrets, he hid it from himself, and left it lying at the
bottom of his pride, unexamined.
'Where is my scoundrel?' said the Major, looking wrathfully round the
room.
The Native, who had no particular name, but answered to any
vituperative epithet, presented himself instantly at the door and ventured
to come no nearer.
'You villain!' said the choleric Major, 'where's the breakfast?'
The dark servant disappeared in search of it, and was quickly heard
reascending the stairs in such a tremulous state, that the plates and dishes
on the tray he carried, trembling sympathetically as he came, rattled again,
all the way up.
'Dombey,' said the Major, glancing at the Native as he arranged the
table, and encouraging him with an awful shake of his fist when he upset a
spoon, 'here is a devilled grill, a savoury pie, a dish of kidneys, and so
forth. Pray sit down. Old Joe can give you nothing but camp fare, you see.
'Very excellent fare, Major,' replied his guest; and not in mere
politeness either; for the Major always took the best possible care of
himself, and indeed ate rather more of rich meats than was good for him,
insomuch that his Imperial complexion was mainly referred by the faculty to
that circumstance.
'You have been looking over the way, Sir,' observed the Major. 'Have
you seen our friend?'
'You mean Miss Tox,' retorted Mr Dombey. 'No.'
'Charming woman, Sir,' said the Major, with a fat laugh rising in his
short throat, and nearly suffocating him.
'Miss Tox is a very good sort of person, I believe,' replied Mr Dombey.
The haughty coldness of the reply seemed to afford Major Bagstock
infinite delight. He swelled and swelled, exceedingly: and even laid down
his knife and fork for a moment, to rub his hands.
'Old Joe, Sir,' said the Major, 'was a bit ofa favourite in that
quarter once. But Joe has had his day. J. Bagstock is extinguished -
outrivalled - floored, Sir.'
'I should have supposed,' Mr Dombey replied, 'that the lady's day for
favourites was over: but perhaps you are jesting, Major.'
'Perhaps you are jesting, Dombey?' was the Major's rejoinder.
There never was a more unlikely possiblity. It was so clearly expressed
in Mr Dombey's face, that the Major apologised.
'I beg your pardon,' he said. 'I see you are in earnest. I tell you
what, Dombey.' The Major paused in his eating, and looked mysteriously
indignant. 'That's a de-vilish ambitious woman, Sir.'
Mr Dombey said 'Indeed?' with frigid indifference: mingled perhaps with
some contemptuous incredulity as to Miss Tox having the presumption to
harbour such a superior quality.
'That woman, Sir,' said the Major, 'is, in her way, a Lucifer. Joey B.
has had his day, Sir, but he keeps his eyes. He sees, does Joe. His Royal
Highness the late Duke of York observed of Joey, at a levee, that he saw.'
The Major accompanied this with such a look, and, between eating,
drinking, hot tea, devilled grill, muffins, and meaning, was altogether so
swollen and inflamed about the head, that even Mr Dombey showed some anxiety
for him.
'That ridiculous old spectacle, Sir,' pursued the Major, 'aspires. She
aspires sky-high, Sir. Matrimonially, Dombey.'
'I am sorry for her,' said Mr Dombey.
'Don't say that, Dombey,' returned the Major in a warning voice.
'Why should I not, Major?' said Mr Dombey.
The Major gave no answer but the horse's cough, and went on eating
vigorously.
'She has taken an interest in your household,' said the Major, stopping
short again, 'and has been a frequent visitor at your house for some time
now.'
'Yes,' replied Mr Dombey with great stateliness, 'Miss Tox was
originally received there, at the time of Mrs Dombey's death, as a friend of
my sister's; and being a well-behaved person, and showing a liking for the
poor infant, she was permitted - may I say encouraged - to repeat her visits
with my sister, and gradually to occupy a kind of footing of familiarity in
the family. I have,' said Mr Dombey, in the tone of a man who was making a
great and valuable concession, 'I have a respect for Miss Tox. She his been
so obliging as to render many little services in my house: trifling and
insignificant services perhaps, Major, but not to be disparaged on that
account: and I hope I have had the good fortune to be enabled to acknowledge
them by such attention and notice as it has been in my power to bestow. I
hold myself indebted to Miss Tox, Major,' added Mr Dombey, with a slight
wave of his hand, 'for the pleasure of your acquaintance.'
'Dombey,' said the Major, warmly: 'no! No, Sir! Joseph Bagstock can
never permit that assertion to pass uncontradicted. Your knowledge of old
Joe, Sir, such as he is, and old Joe's knowledge of you, Sir, had its origin
in a noble fellow, Sir - in a great creature, Sir. Dombey!' said the Major,
with a struggle which it was not very difficult to parade, his whole life
being a struggle against all kinds of apoplectic symptoms, 'we knew each
other through your boy.'
Mr Dombey seemed touched, as it is not improbable the Major designed he
should be, by this allusion. He looked down and sighed: and the Major,
rousing himself fiercely, again said, in reference to the state of mind into
which he felt himself in danger of falling, that this was weakness, and
nothing should induce him to submit to it.
'Our friend had a remote connexion with that event,' said the Major,
'and all the credit that belongs to her, J. B. is willing to give her, Sir.
Notwithstanding which, Ma'am,' he added, raising his eyes from his plate,
and casting them across Princess's Place, to where Miss Tox was at that
moment visible at her window watering her flowers, 'you're a scheming jade,
Ma'am, and your ambition is a piece of monstrous impudence. If it only made
yourself ridiculous, Ma'am,' said the Major, rolling his head at the
unconscious Miss Tox, while his starting eyes appeared to make a leap
towards her, 'you might do that to your heart's content, Ma'am, without any
objection, I assure you, on the part of Bagstock.' Here the Major laughed
frightfully up in the tips of his ears and in the veins of his head. 'But
when, Ma'am,' said the Major, 'you compromise other people, and generous,
unsuspicious people too, as a repayment for their condescension, you stir
the blood of old Joe in his body.'
'Major,' said Mr Dombey, reddening, 'I hope you do not hint at anything
so absurd on the part of Miss Tox as - '
'Dombey,' returned the Major, 'I hint at nothing. But Joey B. has lived
in the world, Sir: lived in the world with his eyes open, Sir, and his ears
cocked: and Joe tells you, Dombey, that there's a devilish artful and
ambitious woman over the way.'
Mr Dombey involuntarily glanced over the way; and an angry glance he
sent in that direction, too.
'That's all on such a subject that shall pass the lips of Joseph
Bagstock,' said the Major firmly. 'Joe is not a tale-bearer, but there are
times when he must speak, when he will speak! - confound your arts, Ma'am,'
cried the Major, again apostrophising his fair neighbour, with great ire, -
'when the provocation is too strong to admit of his remaining silent.'
The emotion of this outbreak threw the Major into a paroxysm of horse's
coughs, which held him for a long time. On recovering he added:
'And now, Dombey, as you have invited Joe - old Joe, who has no other
merit, Sir, but that he is tough and hearty - to be your guest and guide at
Leamington, command him in any way you please, and he is wholly yours. I
don't know, Sir,' said the Major, wagging his double chin with a jocose air,
'what it is you people see in Joe to make you hold him in such great
request, all of you; but this I know, Sir, that if he wasn't pretty tough,
and obstinate in his refusals, you'd kill him among you with your
invitations and so forth, in double-quick time.'
Mr Dombey, in a few words, expressed his sense of the preference he
received over those other distinguished members of society who were
clamouring for the possession of Major Bagstock. But the Major cut him short
by giving him to understand that he followed his own inclinations, and that
they had risen up in a body and said with one accord, 'J. B., Dombey is the
man for you to choose as a friend.'
The Major being by this time in a state of repletion, with essence of
savoury pie oozing out at the corners of his eyes, and devilled grill and
kidneys tightening his cravat: and the time moreover approaching for the
departure of the railway train to Birmingham, by which they were to leave
town: the Native got him into his great-coat with immense difficulty, and
buttoned him up until his face looked staring and gasping, over the top of
that garment, as if he were in a barrel. The Native then handed him
separately, and with a decent interval between each supply, his washleather
gloves, his thick stick, and his hat; which latter article the Major wore
with a rakish air on one side of his head, by way of toning down his
remarkable visage. The Native had previously packed, in all possible and
impossible parts of Mr Dombey's chariot, which was in waiting, an unusual
quantity of carpet-bags and small portmanteaus, no less apoplectic in
appearance than the Major himself: and having filled his own pockets with
Seltzer water, East India sherry, sandwiches, shawls, telescopes, maps, and
newspapers, any or all of which light baggage the Major might require at any
instant of the journey, he announced that everything was ready. To complete
the equipment of this unfortunate foreigner (currently believed to be a
prince in his own country), when he took his seat in the rumble by the side
of Mr Towlinson, a pile of the Major's cloaks and great-coats was hurled
upon him by the landlord, who aimed at him from the pavement with those
great missiles like a Titan, and so covered him up, that he proceeded, in a
living tomb, to the railroad station.
But before the carriage moved away, and while the Native was in the act
of sepulture, Miss Tox appearing at her window, waved a lilywhite
handkerchief. Mr Dombey received this parting salutation very coldly - very
coldly even for him - and honouring her with the slightest possible
inclination of his head, leaned back in the carriage with a very
discontented look. His marked behaviour seemed to afford the Major (who was
all politeness in his recognition of Miss Tox) unbounded satisfaction; and
he sat for a long time afterwards, leering, and choking, like an over-fed
Mephistopheles.
During the bustle of preparation at the railway, Mr Dombey and the
Major walked up and down the platform side by side; the former taciturn and
gloomy, and the latter entertaining him, or entertaining himself, with a
variety of anecdotes and reminiscences, in most of which Joe Bagstock was
the principal performer. Neither of the two observed that in the course of
these walks, they attracted the attention of a working man who was standing
near the engine, and who touched his hat every time they passed; for Mr
Dombey habitually looked over the vulgar herd, not at them; and the Major
was looking, at the time, into the core of one of his stories. At length,
however, this man stepped before them as they turned round, and pulling his
hat off, and keeping it off, ducked his head to Mr Dombey.
'Beg your pardon, Sir,' said the man, 'but I hope you're a doin' pretty
well, Sir.'
He was dressed in a canvas suit abundantly besmeared with coal-dust and
oil, and had cinders in his whiskers, and a smell of half-slaked ashes all
over him. He was not a bad-looking fellow, nor even what could be fairly
called a dirty-looking fellow, in spite of this; and, in short, he was Mr
Toodle, professionally clothed.
'I shall have the honour of stokin' of you down, Sir,' said Mr Toodle.
'Beg your pardon, Sir. - I hope you find yourself a coming round?'
Mr Dombey looked at him, in return for his tone of interest, as if a
man like that would make his very eyesight dirty.
''Scuse the liberty, Sir,' said Toodle, seeing he was not clearly
remembered, 'but my wife Polly, as was called Richards in your family - '
A change in Mr Dombey's face, which seemed to express recollection of
him, and so it did, but it expressed in a much stronger degree an angry
sense of humiliation, stopped Mr Toodle short.
'Your wife wants money, I suppose,' said Mr Dombey, putting his hand in
his pocket, and speaking (but that he always did) haughtily.
'No thank'ee, Sir,' returned Toodle, 'I can't say she does. I don't.'
Mr Dombey was stopped short now in his turn: and awkwardly: with his
hand in his pocket.
'No, Sir,' said Toodle, turning his oilskin cap round and round; 'we're
a doin' pretty well, Sir; we haven't no cause to complain in the worldly
way, Sir. We've had four more since then, Sir, but we rubs on.'
Mr Dombey would have rubbed on to his own carriage, though in so doing
he had rubbed the stoker underneath the wheels; but his attention was
arrested by something in connexion with the cap still going slowly round and
round in the man's hand.
'We lost one babby,' observed Toodle, 'there's no denyin'.'
'Lately,' added Mr Dombey, looking at the cap.
'No, Sir, up'ard of three years ago, but all the rest is hearty. And in
the matter o readin', Sir,' said Toodle, ducking again, as if to remind Mr
Dombey of what had passed between them on that subject long ago, 'them boys
o' mine, they learned me, among 'em, arter all. They've made a wery
tolerable scholar of me, Sir, them boys.'
'Come, Major!' said Mr Dombey.
'Beg your pardon, Sir,' resumed Toodle, taking a step before them and
deferentially stopping them again, still cap in hand: 'I wouldn't have
troubled you with such a pint except as a way of gettin' in the name of my
son Biler - christened Robin - him as you was so good as to make a
Charitable Grinder on.'
'Well, man,' said Mr Dombey in his severest manner. 'What about him?'
'Why, Sir,' returned Toodle, shaking his head with a face of great
anxiety and distress, 'I'm forced to say, Sir, that he's gone wrong.
'He has gone wrong, has he?' said Mr Dombey, with a hard kind of
satisfaction.
'He has fell into bad company, you see, genelmen,' pursued the father,
looking wistfully at both, and evidently taking the Major into the
conversation with the hope of having his sympathy. 'He has got into bad
ways. God send he may come to again, genelmen, but he's on the wrong track
now! You could hardly be off hearing of it somehow, Sir,' said Toodle, again
addressing Mr Dombey individually; 'and it's better I should out and say my
boy's gone rather wrong. Polly's dreadful down about it, genelmen,' said
Toodle with the same dejected look, and another appeal to the Major.
'A son of this man's whom I caused to be educated, Major,' said Mr
Dombey, giving him his arm. 'The usual return!'
'Take advice from plain old Joe, and never educate that sort of people,
Sir,' returned the Major. 'Damme, Sir, it never does! It always fails!'
The simple father was beginning to submit that he hoped his son, the
quondam Grinder, huffed and cuffed, and flogged and badged, and taught, as
parrots are, by a brute jobbed into his place of schoolmaster with as much
fitness for it as a hound, might not have been educated on quite a right
plan in some undiscovered respect, when Mr Dombey angrily repeating 'The
usual return!' led the Major away. And the Major being heavy to hoist into
Mr Dombey's carriage, elevated in mid-air, and having to stop and swear that
he would flay the Native alive, and break every bone in his skin, and visit
other physical torments upon him, every time he couldn't get his foot on the
step, and fell back on that dark exile, had barely time before they started
to repeat hoarsely that it would never do: that it always failed: and that
if he were to educate 'his own vagabond,' he would certainly be hanged.
Mr Dombey assented bitterly; but there was something more in his
bitterness, and in his moody way of falling back in the carriage, and
looking with knitted brows at the changing objects without, than the failure
of that noble educational system administered by the Grinders' Company. He
had seen upon the man's rough cap a piece of new crape, and he had assured
himself, from his manner and his answers, that he wore it for his son.
So] from high to low, at home or abroad, from Florence in his great
house to the coarse churl who was feeding the fire then smoking before them,
everyone set up some claim or other to a share in his dead boy, and was a
bidder against him! Could he ever forget how that woman had wept over his
pillow, and called him her own child! or how he, waking from his sleep, had
asked for her, and had raised himself in his bed and brightened when she
carne in!
To think of this presumptuous raker among coals and ashes going on
before there, with his sign of mourning! To think that he dared to enter,
even by a common show like that, into the trial and disappointrnent of a
proud gentleman's secret heart! To think that this lost child, who was to
have divided with him his riches, and his projects, and his power, and
allied with whom he was to have shut out all the world as with a double door
of gold, should have let in such a herd to insult him with their knowledge
of his defeated hopes, and their boasts of claiming community of feeling
with himself, so far removed: if not of having crept into the place wherein
he would have lorded it, alone!
He found no pleasure or relief in the journey. Tortured by these
thoughts he carried monotony with him, through the rushing landscape, and
hurried headlong, not through a rich and varied country, but a wilderness of
blighted plans and gnawing jealousies. The very speed at which the train was
whirled along, mocked the swift course of the young life that had been borne
away so steadily and so inexorably to its foredoomed end. The power that
forced itself upon its iron way - its own - defiant of all paths and roads,
piercing through the heart of every obstacle, and dragging living creatures
of all classes, ages, and degrees behind it, was a type of the triumphant
monster, Death.
Away, with a shriek, and a roar, and a rattle, from the town, burrowmg
among the dwellings of men and making the streets hum, flashing out into the
meadows for a moment, mining in through the damp earth, booming on in
darkness and heavy air, bursting out again into the sunny day so bright and
wide; away, with a shriek, and a roar, and a rattle, through the fields,
through the woods, through the corn, through the hay, through the chalk,
through the mould, through the clay, through the rock, among objects close
at hand and almost in the grasp, ever flying from the traveller, and a
deceitful distance ever moving slowly within him: like as in the track of
the remorseless monster, Death!
Through the hollow, on the height, by the heath, by the orchard, by the
park, by the garden, over the canal, across the river, where the sheep are
feeding, where the mill is going, where the barge is floating, where the
dead are lying, where the factory is smoking, where the stream is running,
where the village clusters, where the great cathedral rises, where the bleak
moor lies, and the wild breeze smooths or ruffles it at its inconstant will;
away, with a shriek, and a roar, and a rattle, and no trace to leave behind
but dust and vapour: like as in the track of the remorseless monster, Death!
Breasting the wind and light, the shower and sunshine, away, and still
away, it rolls and roars, fierce and rapid, smooth and certain, and great
works and massive bridges crossing up above, fall like a beam of shadow an
inch broad, upon the eye, and then are lost. Away, and still away, onward
and onward ever: glimpses of cottage-homes, of houses, mansions, rich
estates, of husbandry and handicraft, of people, of old roads and paths that
look deserted, small, and insignificant as they are left behind: and so they
do, and what else is there but such glimpses, in the track of the
indomitable monster, Death!
Away, with a shriek, and a roar, and a rattle, plunging down into the
earth again, and working on in such a storm of energy and perseverance, that
amidst the darkness and whirlwind the motion seems reversed, and to tend
furiously backward, until a ray of light upon the Wet wall shows its surface
flying past like a fierce stream, Away once more into the day, and through
the day, with a shrill yell of exultation, roaring, rattling, tearing on,
spurning everything with its dark breath, sometimes pausing for a minute
where a crowd of faces are, that in a minute more are not; sometimes lapping
water greedily, and before the spout at which it drinks' has ceased to drip
upon the ground, shrieking, roaring, rattling through the purple distance!
Louder and louder yet, it shrieks and cries as it comes tearing on
resistless to the goal: and now its way, still like the way of Death, is
strewn with ashes thickly. Everything around is blackened. There are dark
pools of water, muddy lanes, and miserable habitations far below. There are
jagged walls and falling houses close at hand, and through the battered
roofs and broken windows, wretched rooms are seen, where 'want and fever
hide themselves in many wretched shapes, while smoke and crowded gables, and
distorted chimneys, and deformity of brick and mortar penning up deformity
of mind and body, choke the murky distance. As Mr Dombey looks out of his
carriage window, it is never in his thoughts that the monster who has
brought him there has let the light of day in on these things: not made or
caused them. It was the journey's fitting end, and might have been the end
of everything; it was so ruinous and dreary.'
So, pursuing the one course of thought, he had the one relentless
monster still before him. All things looked black, and cold, and deadly upon
him, and he on them. He found a likeness to his misfortune everywhere. There
was a remorseless triumph going on about him, and it galled and stung him in
his pride and jealousy, whatever form it took: though most of all when it
divided with him the love and memory of his lost boy.
There was a face - he had looked upon it, on the previous night, and it
on him with eyes that read his soul, though they were dim with tears, and
hidden soon behind two quivering hands - that often had attended him in
fancy, on this ride. He had seen it, with the expression of last night,
timidly pleading to him. It was not reproachful, but there was something of
doubt, almost of hopeful incredulity in it, which, as he once more saw that
fade away into a desolate certainty of his dislike, was like reproach. It
was a trouble to him to think of this face of Florence.
Because he felt any new compunction towards it? No. Because the feeling
it awakened in him - of which he had had some old foreshadowing in older
times - was full-formed now, and spoke out plainly, moving him too much, and
threatening to grow too strong for his composure. Because the face was
abroad, in the expression of defeat and persecution that seemed to encircle
him like the air. Because it barbed the arrow of that cruel and remorseless
enemy on which his thoughts so ran, and put into its grasp a double-handed
sword. Because he knew full well, in his own breast, as he stood there,
tinging the scene of transition before him with the morbid colours of his
own mind, and making it a ruin and a picture of decay, instead of hopeful
change, and promise of better things, that life had quite as much to do with
his complainings as death. One child was gone, and one child left. Why was
the object of his hope removed instead of her?
The sweet, calm, gentle presence in his fancy, moved him to no
reflection but that. She had been unwelcome to him from the first; she was
an aggravation of his bitterness now. If his son had been his only child,
and the same blow had fallen on him, it would have been heavy to bear; but
infinitely lighter than now, when it might have fallen on her (whom he could
have lost, or he believed it, without a pang), and had not. Her loving and
innocent face rising before him, had no softening or winning influence. He
rejected the angel, and took up with the tormenting spirit crouching in his
bosom. Her patience, goodness, youth, devotion, love, were as so many atoms
in the ashes upon which he set his heel. He saw her image in the blight and
blackness all around him, not irradiating but deepening the gloom. More than
once upon this journey, and now again as he stood pondering at this
journey's end, tracing figures in the dust with his stick, the thought came
into his mind, what was there he could interpose between himself and it?
The Major, who had been blowing and panting all the way down, like
another engine, and whose eye had often wandered from his newspaper to leer
at the prospect, as if there were a procession of discomfited Miss Toxes
pouring out in the smoke of the train, and flying away over the fields to
hide themselves in any place of refuge, aroused his friends by informing him
that the post-horses were harnessed and the carriage ready.
'Dombey,' said the Major, rapping him on the arm with his cane, 'don't
be thoughtful. It's a bad habit, Old Joe, Sir, wouldn't be as tough as you
see him, if he had ever encouraged it. You are too great a man, Dombey, to
be thoughtful. In your position, Sir, you're far above that kind of thing.'
The Major even in his friendly remonstrrnces, thus consulting the
dignity and honour of Mr Dombey, and showing a lively sense of their
importance, Mr Dombey felt more than ever disposed to defer to a gentleman
possessing so much good sense and such a well-regulated mind; acoordingly he
made an effort to listen to the Major's stories, as they trotted along the
turnpike road; and the Major, finding both the pace and the road a great
deal better adapted to his conversational powers than the mode of travelling
they had just relinquished, came out of his entertainment,
But still the Major, blunt and tough as he was, and as he so very often
said he was, administered some palatable catering to his companion's
appetite. He related, or rather suffered it to escape him, accidentally, and
as one might say, grudgingly and against his will, how there was great
curiosity and excitement at the club, in regard of his friend Dombey. How he
was suffocated with questions, Sir. How old Joe Bagstock was a greater man
than ever, there, on the strength of Dombey. How they said, 'Bagstock, your
friend Dombey now, what is the view he takes of such and such a question?
Though, by the Rood, Sir,' said the Major, with a broad stare, 'how they
discovered that J. B. ever came to know you, is a mystery!'
In this flow of spirits and conversation, only interrupted by his usual
plethoric symptoms, and by intervals of lunch, and from time to time by some
violent assault upon the Native, who wore a pair of ear-rings in his
dark-brown ears, and on whom his European clothes sat with an outlandish
impossibility of adjustment - being, of their own accord, and without any
reference to the tailor's art, long where they ought to be short, short
where they ought to be long, tight where they ought to be loose, and loose
where they ought to be tight - and to which he imparted a new grace,
whenever the Major attacked him, by shrinking into them like a shrivelled
nut, or a cold monkey - in this flow of spirits and conversation, the Major
continued all day: so that when evening came on, and found them trotting
through the green and leafy road near Leamington, the Major's voice, what
with talking and eating and chuckling and choking, appeared to be in the box
under the rumble, or in some neighbouring hay-stack. Nor did the Major
improve it at the Royal Hotel, where rooms and dinner had been ordered, and
where he so oppressed his organs of speech by eating and drinking, that when
he retired to bed he had no voice at all, except to cough with, and could
only make himself intelligible to the dark servant by gasping at him.
He not only rose next morning, however, like a giant refreshed, but
conducted himself, at breakfast like a giant refreshing. At this meal they
arranged their daily habits. The Major was to take the responsibility of
ordering evrything to eat and drink; and they were to have a late breakfast
together every morning, and a late dinner together every day. Mr Dombey
would prefer remaining in his own room, or walking in the country by
himself, on that first day of their sojourn at Leamington; but next morning
he would be happy to accompany the Major to the Pump-room, and about the
town. So they parted until dinner-time. Mr Dombey retired to nurse his
wholesome thoughts in his own way. The Major, attended by the Native
carrying a camp-stool, a great-coat, and an umbrella, swaggered up and down
through all the public places: looking into subscription books to find out
who was there, looking up old ladies by whom he was much admired, reporting
J. B. tougher than ever, and puffing his rich friend Dombey wherever he
went. There never was a man who stood by a friend more staunchly than the
Major, when in puffing him, he puffed himself.
It was surprising how much new conversation the Major had to let off at
dinner-time, and what occasion he gave Mr Dombey to admire his social
qualities. At breakfast next morning, he knew the contents of the latest
newspapers received; and mentioned several subjects in connexion with them,
on which his opinion had recently been sought by persons of such power and
might, that they were only to be obscurely hinted at. Mr Dombey, who had
been so long shut up within himself, and who had rarely, at any time,
overstepped the enchanted circle within which the operations of Dombey and
Son were conducted, began to think this an improvement on his solitary life;
and in place of excusing himself for another day, as he had thought of doing
when alone, walked out with the Major arm-in-arm.
New Faces
The MAJOR, more blue-faced and staring - more over-ripe, as it were,
than ever - and giving vent, every now and then, to one of the horse's
coughs, not so much of necessity as in a spontaneous explosion of
importance, walked arm-in-arm with Mr Dombey up the sunny side of the way,
with his cheeks swelling over his tight stock, his legs majestically wide
apart, and his great head wagging from side to side, as if he were
remonstrating within himself for being such a captivating object. They had
not walked many yards, before the Major encountered somebody he knew, nor
many yards farther before the Major encountered somebody else he knew, but
he merely shook his fingers at them as he passed, and led Mr Dombey on:
pointing out the localities as they went, and enlivening the walk with any
current scandal suggested by them.
In this manner the Major and Mr Dombey were walking arm-in-arm, much to
their own satisfaction, when they beheld advancing towards them, a wheeled
chair, in which a lady was seated, indolently steering her carriage by a
kind of rudder in front, while it was propelled by some unseen power in the
rear. Although the lady was not young, she was very blooming in the face -
quite rosy- and her dress and attitude were perfectly juvenile. Walking by
the side of the chair, and carrying her gossamer parasol with a proud and
weary air, as if so great an effort must be soon abandoned and the parasol
dropped, sauntered a much younger lady, very handsome, very haughty, very
wilful, who tossed her head and drooped her eyelids, as though, if there
were anything in all the world worth looking into, save a mirror, it
certainly was not the earth or sky.
'Why, what the devil have we here, Sir!' cried the Major, stopping as
this little cavalcade drew near.
'My dearest Edith!' drawled the lady in the chair, 'Major Bagstock!'
The Major no sooner heard the voice, than he relinquished Mr Dombey's
arm, darted forward, took the hand of the lady in the chair and pressed it
to his lips. With no less gallantry, the Major folded both his gloves upon
his heart, and bowed low to the other lady. And now, the chair having
stopped, the motive power became visible in the shape of a flushed page
pushing behind, who seemed to have in part outgrown and in part out-pushed
his strength, for when he stood upright he was tall, and wan, and thin, and
his plight appeared the more forlorn from his having injured the shape of
his hat, by butting at the carriage with his head to urge it forward, as is
sometimes done by elephants in Oriental countries.
'Joe Bagstock,' said the Major to both ladies, 'is a proud and happy
man for the rest of his life.'
'You false creature! said the old lady in the chair, insipidly. 'Where
do you come from? I can't bear you.'
'Then suffer old Joe to present a friend, Ma'am,' said the Major,
promptly, 'as a reason for being tolerated. Mr Dombey, Mrs Skewton.' The
lady in the chair was gracious. 'Mr Dombey, Mrs Granger.' The lady with the
parasol was faintly conscious of Mr Dombey's taking off his hat, and bowing
low. 'I am delighted, Sir,' said the Major, 'to have this opportunity.'
The Major seemed in earnest, for he looked at all the three, and leered
in his ugliest manner.
'Mrs Skewton, Dombey,' said the Major, 'makes havoc in the heart of old
Josh.'
Mr Dombey signified that he didn't wonder at it.
'You perfidious goblin,' said the lady in the chair, 'have done! How
long have you been here, bad man?'
'One day,' replied the Major.
'And can you be a day, or even a minute,' returned the lady, slightly
settling her false curls and false eyebrows with her fan, and showing her
false teeth, set off by her false complexion, 'in the garden of
what's-its-name
'Eden, I suppose, Mama,' interrupted the younger lady, scornfully.
'My dear Edith,' said the other, 'I cannot help it. I never can
remember those frightful names - without having your whole Soul and Being
inspired by the sight of Nature; by the perfume,' said Mrs Skewton, rustling
a handkerchief that was faint and sickly with essences, 'of her artless
breath, you creature!'
The discrepancy between Mrs Skewton's fresh enthusiasm of words, and
forlornly faded manner, was hardly less observable than that between her
age, which was about seventy, and her dress, which would have been youthful
for twenty-seven. Her attitude in the wheeled chair (which she never varied)
was one in which she had been taken in a barouche, some fifty years before,
by a then fashionable artist who had appended to his published sketch the
name of Cleopatra: in consequence of a discovery made by the critics of the
time, that it bore an exact resemblance to that Princess as she reclined on
board her galley. Mrs Skewton was a beauty then, and bucks threw
wine-glasses over their heads by dozens in her honour. The beauty and the
barouche had both passed away, but she still preserved the attitude, and for
this reason expressly, maintained the wheeled chair and the butting page:
there being nothing whatever, except the attitude, to prevent her from
walking.
'Mr Dombey is devoted to Nature, I trust?' said Mrs Skewton, settling
her diamond brooch. And by the way, she chiefly lived upon the reputation of
some diamonds, and her family connexions.
'My friend Dombey, Ma'am,' returned the Major, 'may be devoted to her
in secret, but a man who is paramount in the greatest city in the universe -
'No one can be a stranger,' said Mrs Skewton, 'to Mr Dombey's immense
influence.'
As Mr Dombey acknowledged the compliment with a bend of his head, the
younger lady glancing at him, met his eyes.
'You reside here, Madam?' said Mr Dombey, addressing her.
'No, we have been to a great many places. To Harrogate and Scarborough,
and into Devonshire. We have been visiting, and resting here and there. Mama
likes change.'
'Edith of course does not,' said Mrs Skewton, with a ghastly archness.
'I have not found that there is any change in such places,' was the
answer, delivered with supreme indifference.
'They libel me. There is only one change, Mr Dombey,' observed Mrs
Skewton, with a mincing sigh, 'for which I really care, and that I fear I
shall never be permitted to enjoy. People cannot spare one. But seclusion
and contemplation are my what-his-name - '
'If you mean Paradise, Mama, you had better say so, to render yourself
intelligible,' said the younger lady.
'My dearest Edith,' returned Mrs Skewton, 'you know that I am wholly
dependent upon you for those odious names. I assure you, Mr Dombey, Nature
intended me for an Arcadian. I am thrown away in society. Cows are my
passion. What I have ever sighed for, has been to retreat to a Swiss farm,
and live entirely surrounded by cows - and china.'
This curious association of objects, suggesting a remembrance of the
celebrated bull who got by mistake into a crockery shop, was received with
perfect gravity by Mr Dombey, who intimated his opinion that Nature was, no
doubt, a very respectable institution.
'What I want,' drawled Mrs Skewton, pinching her shrivelled throat, 'is
heart.' It was frightfully true in one sense, if not in that in which she
used the phrase. 'What I want, is frankness, confidence, less
conventionality, and freer play of soul. We are so dreadfully artificial.'
We were, indeed.
'In short,' said Mrs Skewton, 'I want Nature everywhere. It would be so
extremely charming.'
'Nature is inviting us away now, Mama, if you are ready,' said the
younger lady, curling her handsome lip. At this hint, the wan page, who had
been surveying the party over the top of the chair, vanished behind it, as
if the ground had swallowed him up.
'Stop a moment, Withers!' said Mrs Skewton, as the chair began to move;
calling to the page with all the languid dignity with which she had called
in days of yore to a coachman with a wig, cauliflower nosegay, and silk
stockings. 'Where are you staying, abomination?' The Major was staying at
the Royal Hotel, with his friend Dombey.
'You may come and see us any evening when you are good,' lisped Mrs
Skewton. 'If Mr Dombey will honour us, we shall be happy. Withers, go on!'
The Major again pressed to his blue lips the tips of the fingers that
were disposed on the ledge of the wheeled chair with careful carelessness,
after the Cleopatra model: and Mr Dombey bowed. The elder lady honoured them
both with a very gracious smile and a girlish wave of her hand; the younger
lady with the very slightest inclination of her head that common courtesy
allowed.
The last glimpse of the wrinkled face of the mother, with that patched
colour on it which the sun made infinitely more haggard and dismal than any
want of colour could have been, and of the proud beauty of the daughter with
her graceful figure and erect deportment, engendered such an involuntary
disposition on the part of both the Major and Mr Dombey to look after them,
that they both turned at the same moment. The Page, nearly as much aslant as
his own shadow, was toiling after the chair, uphill, like a slow
battering-ram; the top of Cleopatra's bonnet was fluttering in exactly the
same corner to the inch as before; and the Beauty, loitering by herself a
little in advance, expressed in all her elegant form, from head to foot, the
same supreme disregard of everything and everybody.
'I tell you what, Sir,' said the Major, as they resumed their walk
again. 'If Joe Bagstock were a younger man, there's not a woman in the world
whom he'd prefer for Mrs Bagstock to that woman. By George, Sir!' said the
Major, 'she's superb!'
'Do you mean the daughter?' inquired Mr Dombey.
'Is Joey B. a turnip, Dombey,' said the Major, 'that he should mean the
mother?'
'You were complimentary to the mother,' returned Mr Dombey.
'An ancient flame, Sir,' chuckled Major Bagstock. 'Devilish ancient. I
humour her.'
'She impresses me as being perfectly genteel,' said Mr Dombey.
'Genteel, Sir,' said the Major, stopping short, and staring in his
companion's face. 'The Honourable Mrs Skewton, Sir, is sister to the late
Lord Feenix, and aunt to the present Lord. The family are not wealthy -
they're poor, indeed - and she lives upon a small jointure; but if you come
to blood, Sir!' The Major gave a flourish with his stick and walked on
again, in despair of being able to say what you came to, if you came to
that.
'You addressed the daughter, I observed,' said Mr Dombey, after a short
pause, 'as Mrs Granger.'
'Edith Skewton, Sir,' returned the Major, stopping short again, and
punching a mark in the ground with his cane, to represent her, 'married (at
eighteen) Granger of Ours;' whom the Major indicated by another punch.
'Granger, Sir,' said the Major, tapping the last ideal portrait, and rolling
his head emphatically, 'was Colonel of Ours; a de-vilish handsome fellow,
Sir, of forty-one. He died, Sir, in the second year of his marriage.' The
Major ran the representative of the deceased Granger through and through the
body with his walking-stick, and went on again, carrying his stick over his
shoulder.
'How long is this ago?' asked Mr Dombey, making another halt.
'Edith Granger, Sir,' replied the Major, shutting one eye, putting his
head on one side, passing his cane into his left hand, and smoothing his
shirt-frill with his right, 'is, at this present time, not quite thirty. And
damme, Sir,' said the Major, shouldering his stick once more, and walking on
again, 'she's a peerless woman!'
'Was there any family?' asked Mr Dombey presently.
'Yes, Sir,' said the Major. 'There was a boy.'
Mr Dombey's eyes sought the ground, and a shade came over his face.
'Who was drowned, Sir,' pursued the Major. 'When a child of four or
five years old.'
'Indeed?' said Mr Dombey, raising his head.
'By the upsetting of a boat in which his nurse had no business to have
put him,' said the Major. 'That's his history. Edith Granger is Edith
Granger still; but if tough old Joey B., Sir, were a little younger and a
little richer, the name of that immortal paragon should be Bagstock.'
The Major heaved his shoulders, and his cheeks, and laughed more like
an over-fed Mephistopheles than ever, as he said the words.
'Provided the lady made no objection, I suppose?' said Mr Dombey
coldly.
'By Gad, Sir,' said the Major, 'the Bagstock breed are not accustomed
to that sort of obstacle. Though it's true enough that Edith might have
married twenty times, but for being proud, Sir, proud.'
Mr Dombey seemed, by his face, to think no worse of her for that.
'It's a great quality after all,' said the Major. 'By the Lord, it's a
high quality! Dombey! You are proud yourself, and your friend, Old Joe,
respects you for it, Sir.'
With this tribute to the character of his ally, which seemed to be
wrung from him by the force of circumstances and the irresistible tendency
of their conversation, the Major closed the subject, and glided into a
general exposition of the extent to which he had been beloved and doted on
by splendid women and brilliant creatures.
On the next day but one, Mr Dombey and the Major encountered the
Honourable Mrs Skewton and her daughter in the Pump-room; on the day after,
they met them again very near the place where they had met them first. After
meeting them thus, three or four times in all, it became a point of mere
civility to old acquaintances that the Major should go there one evening. Mr
Dombey had not originally intended to pay visits, but on the Major
announcing this intention, he said he would have the pleasure of
accompanying him. So the Major told the Native to go round before dinner,
and say, with his and Mr Dombey's compliments, that they would have the
honour of visiting the ladies that same evening, if the ladies were alone.
In answer to which message, the Native brought back a very small note with a
very large quantity of scent about it, indited by the Honourable Mrs Skewton
to Major Bagstock, and briefly saying, 'You are a shocking bear and I have a
great mind not to forgive you, but if you are very good indeed,' which was
underlined, 'you may come. Compliments (in which Edith unites) to Mr
Dombey.'
The Honourable Mrs Skewton and her daughter, Mrs Granger, resided,
while at Leamington, in lodgings that were fashionable enough and dear
enough, but rather limited in point of space and conveniences; so that the
Honourable Mrs Skewton, being in bed, had her feet in the window and her
head in the fireplace, while the Honourable Mrs Skewton's maid was quartered
in a closet within the drawing-room, so extremely small, that, to avoid
developing the whole of its accommodations, she was obliged to writhe in and
out of the door like a beautiful serpent. Withers, the wan page, slept out
of the house immediately under the tiles at a neighbouring milk-shop; and
the wheeled chair, which was the stone of that young Sisyphus, passed the
night in a shed belonging to the same dairy, where new-laid eggs were
produced by the poultry connected with the establishment, who roosted on a
broken donkey-cart, persuaded, to all appearance, that it grew there, and
was a species of tree.
Mr Dombey and the Major found Mrs Skewton arranged, as Cleopatra, among
the cushions of a sofa: very airily dressed; and certainly not resembling
Shakespeare's Cleopatra, whom age could not wither. On their way upstairs
they had heard the sound of a harp, but it had ceased on their being
announced, and Edith now stood beside it handsomer and haughtier than ever.
It was a remarkable characteristic of this lady's beauty that it appeared to
vaunt and assert itself without her aid, and against her will. She knew that
she was beautiful: it was impossible that it could be otherwise: but she
seemed with her own pride to defy her very self.
Whether she held cheap attractions that could only call forth
admiration that was worthless to her, or whether she designed to render them
more precious to admirers by this usage of them, those to whom they were
precious seldom paused to consider.
'I hope, Mrs Granger,' said Mr Dombey, advancing a step towards her,
'we are not the cause of your ceasing to play?'
'You! oh no!'
'Why do you not go on then, my dearest Edith?' said Cleopatra.
'I left off as I began - of my own fancy.'
The exquisite indifference of her manner in saying this: an
indifference quite removed from dulness or insensibility, for it was pointed
with proud purpose: was well set off by the carelessness with which she drew
her hand across the strings, and came from that part of the room.
'Do you know, Mr Dombey,' said her languishing mother, playing with a
hand-screen, 'that occasionally my dearest Edith and myself actually almost
differ - '
'Not quite, sometimes, Mama?' said Edith.
'Oh never quite, my darling! Fie, fie, it would break my heart,'
returned her mother, making a faint attempt to pat her with the screen,
which Edith made no movement to meet, ' - about these old conventionalities
of manner that are observed in little things? Why are we not more natural?
Dear me! With all those yearnings, and gushings, and impulsive throbbings
that we have implanted in our souls, and which are so very charming, why are
we not more natural?'
Mr Dombey said it was very true, very true.
'We could be more natural I suppose if we tried?' said Mrs Skewton.
Mr Dombey thought it possible.
'Devil a bit, Ma'am,' said the Major. 'We couldn't afford it. Unless
the world was peopled with J.B.'s - tough and blunt old Joes, Ma'am, plain
red herrings with hard roes, Sir - we couldn't afford it. It wouldn't do.'
'You naughty Infidel,' said Mrs Skewton, 'be mute.'
'Cleopatra commands,' returned the Major, kissing his hand, 'and Antony
Bagstock obeys.'
'The man has no sensitiveness,' said Mrs Skewton, cruelly holding up
the hand-screen so as to shut the Major out. 'No sympathy. And what do we
live for but sympathy! What else is so extremely charming! Without that
gleam of sunshine on our cold cold earth,' said Mrs Skewton, arranging her
lace tucker, and complacently observing the effect of her bare lean arm,
looking upward from the wrist, 'how could we possibly bear it? In short,
obdurate man!' glancing at the Major, round the screen, 'I would have my
world all heart; and Faith is so excessively charming, that I won't allow
you to disturb it, do you hear?'
The Major replied that it was hard in Cleopatra to require the world to
be all heart, and yet to appropriate to herself the hearts of all the world;
which obliged Cleopatra to remind him that flattery was insupportable to
her, and that if he had the boldness to address her in that strain any more,
she would positively send him home.
Withers the Wan, at this period, handing round the tea, Mr Dombey again
addressed himself to Edith.
'There is not much company here, it would seem?' said Mr Dombey, in his
own portentous gentlemanly way.
'I believe not. We see none.'
'Why really,' observed Mrs Skewton fom her couch, 'there are no people
here just now with whom we care to associate.'
'They have not enough heart,' said Edith, with a smile. The very
twilight of a smile: so singularly were its light and darkness blended.
'My dearest Edith rallies me, you see!' said her mother, shaking her
head: which shook a little of itself sometimes, as if the palsy Bed now and
then in opposition to the diamonds. 'Wicked one!'
'You have been here before, if I am not mistaken?' said Mr Dombey.
Still to Edith.
'Oh, several times. I think we have been everywhere.'
'A beautiful country!'
'I suppose it is. Everybody says so.'
'Your cousin Feenix raves about it, Edith,' interposed her mother from
her couch.
The daughter slightly turned her graceful head, and raising her
eyebrows by a hair's-breadth, as if her cousin Feenix were of all the mortal
world the least to be regarded, turned her eyes again towards Mr Dombey.
'I hope, for the credit of my good taste, that I am tired of the
neighbourhood,' she said.
'You have almost reason to be, Madam,' he replied, glancing at a
variety of landscape drawings, of which he had already recognised several as
representing neighbouring points of view, and which were strewn abundantly
about the room, 'if these beautiful productions are from your hand.'
She gave him no reply, but sat in a disdainful beauty, quite amazing.
'Have they that interest?' said Mr Dombey. 'Are they yours?'
'Yes.'
'And you play, I already know.'
'Yes.'
'And sing?'
'Yes.'
She answered all these questions with a strange reluctance; and with
that remarkable air of opposition to herself, already noticed as belonging
to her beauty. Yet she was not embarrassed, but wholly self-possessed.
Neither did she seem to wish to avoid the conversation, for she addressed
her face, and - so far as she could - her manner also, to him; and continued
to do so, when he was silent.
'You have many resources against weariness at least,' said Mr Dombey.
'Whatever their efficiency may be,' she returned, 'you know them all
now. I have no more.
'May I hope to prove them all?' said Mr Dombey, with solemn gallantry,
laying down a drawing he had held, and motioning towards the harp.
'Oh certainly] If you desire it!'
She rose as she spoke, and crossing by her mother's couch, and
directing a stately look towards her, which was instantaneous in its
duration, but inclusive (if anyone had seen it) of a multitude of
expressions, among which that of the twilight smile, without the smile
itself, overshadowed all the rest, went out of the room.
The Major, who was quite forgiven by this time, had wheeled a little
table up to Cleopatra, and was sitting down to play picquet with her. Mr
Dombey, not knowing the game, sat down to watch them for his edification
until Edith should return.
'We are going to have some music, Mr Dombey, I hope?' said Cleopatra.
'Mrs Granger has been kind enough to promise so,' said Mr Dombey.
'Ah! That's very nice. Do you propose, Major?'
'No, Ma'am,' said the Major. 'Couldn't do it.'
'You're a barbarous being,' replied the lady, 'and my hand's destroyed.
You are fond of music, Mr Dombey?'
'Eminently so,' was Mr Dombey's answer.
'Yes. It's very nice,' said Cleopatra, looking at her cards. 'So much
heart in it - undeveloped recollections of a previous state of existence' -
and all that - which is so truly charming. Do you know,' simpered Cleopatra,
reversing the knave of clubs, who had come into her game with his heels
uppermost, 'that if anything could tempt me to put a period to my life, it
would be curiosity to find out what it's all about, and what it means; there
are so many provoking mysteries, really, that are hidden from us. Major, you
to play.'
The Major played; and Mr Dombey, looking on for his instruction, would
soon have been in a state of dire confusion, but that he gave no attention
to the game whatever, and sat wondering instead when Edith would come back.
She came at last, and sat down to her harp, and Mr Dombey rose and
stood beside her, listening. He had little taste for music, and no knowledge
of the strain she played, but he saw her bending over it, and perhaps he
heard among the sounding strings some distant music of his own, that tamed
the monster of the iron road, and made it less inexorable.
Cleopatra had a sharp eye, verily, at picquet. It glistened like a
bird's, and did not fix itself upon the game, but pierced the room from end
to end, and gleamed on harp, performer, listener, everything.
When the haughty beauty had concluded, she arose, and receiving Mr
Dombey's thanks and compliments in exactly the same manner as before, went
with scarcely any pause to the piano, and began there.
Edith Granger, any song but that! Edith Granger, you are very handsome,
and your touch upon the keys is brilliant, and your voice is deep and rich;
but not the air that his neglected daughter sang to his dead son]
Alas, he knows it not; and if he did, what air of hers would stir him,
rigid man! Sleep, lonely Florence, sleep! Peace in thy dreams, although the
night has turned dark, and the clouds are gathering, and threaten to
discharge themselves in hail!
A Trifle of Management by Mr Carker the Manager
Mr Carker the Manager sat at his desk, smooth and soft as usual,
reading those letters which were reserved for him to open, backing them
occasionally with such memoranda and references as their business purport
required, and parcelling them out into little heaps for distribution through
the several departments of the House. The post had come in heavy that
morning, and Mr Carker the Manager had a good deal to do.
The general action of a man so engaged - pausing to look over a bundle
of papers in his hand, dealing them round in various portions, taking up
another bundle and examining its contents with knitted brows and pursed-out
lips - dealing, and sorting, and pondering by turns - would easily suggest
some whimsical resemblance to a player at cards. The face of Mr Carker the
Manager was in good keeping with such a fancy. It was the face of a man who
studied his play, warily: who made himself master of all the strong and weak
points of the game: who registered the cards in his mind as they fell about
him, knew exactly what was on them, what they missed, and what they made:
who was crafty to find out what the other players held, and who never
betrayed his own hand.
The letters were in various languages, but Mr Carker the Manager read
them all. If there had been anything in the offices of Dombey and Son that
he could read, there would have been a card wanting in the pack. He read
almost at a glance, and made combinations of one letter with another and one
business with another as he went on, adding new matter to the heaps - much
as a man would know the cards at sight, and work out their combinations in
his mind after they were turned. Something too deep for a partner, and much
too deep for an adversary, Mr Carker the Manager sat in the rays of the sun
that came down slanting on him through the skylight, playing his game alone.
And although it is not among the instincts wild or domestic of the cat
tribe to play at cards, feline from sole to crown was Mr Carker the Manager,
as he basked in the strip of summer-light and warmth that shone upon his
table and the ground as if they were a crooked dial-plate, and himself the
only figure on it. With hair and whiskers deficient in colour at all times,
but feebler than common in the rich sunshine, and more like the coat of a
sandy tortoise-shell cat; with long nails, nicely pared and sharpened; with
a natural antipathy to any speck of dirt, which made him pause sometimes and
watch the falling motes of dust, and rub them off his smooth white hand or
glossy linen: Mr Carker the Manager, sly of manner, sharp of tooth, soft of
foot, watchful of eye, oily of tongue, cruel of heart, nice of habit, sat
with a dainty steadfastness and patience at his work, as if he were waiting
at a mouse's hole.
At length the letters were disposed of, excepting one which he reserved
for a particular audience. Having locked the more confidential
correspondence in a drawer, Mr Carker the Manager rang his bell.
'Why do you answer it?' was his reception of his brother.
'The messenger is out, and I am the next,' was the submissive reply.
'You are the next?' muttered the Manager. 'Yes! Creditable to me!
There!'
Pointing to the heaps of opened letters, he turned disdainfully away,
in his elbow-chair, and broke the seal of that one which he held in his
hand.
'I am sorry to trouble you, James,' said the brother, gathering them
up, 'but - '
'Oh! you have something to say. I knew that. Well?'
Mr Carker the Manager did not raise his eyes or turn them on his
brother, but kept them on his letter, though without opening it.
'Well?' he repeated sharply.
'I am uneasy about Harriet.'
'Harriet who? what Harriet? I know nobody of that name.'
'She is not well, and has changed very much of late.'
'She changed very much, a great many years ago,' replied the Manager;
'and that is all I have to say.
'I think if you would hear me -
'Why should I hear you, Brother John?' returned the Manager, laying a
sarcastic emphasis on those two words, and throwing up his head, but not
lifting his eyes. 'I tell you, Harriet Carker made her choice many years ago
between her two brothers. She may repent it, but she must abide by it.'
'Don't mistake me. I do not say she does repent it. It would be black
ingratitude in me to hint at such a thing,' returned the other. 'Though
believe me, James, I am as sorry for her sacrifice as you.'
'As I?' exclaimed the Manager. 'As I?'
'As sorry for her choice - for what you call her choice - as you are
angry at it,' said the Junior.
'Angry?' repeated the other, with a wide show of his teeth.
'Displeased. Whatever word you like best. You know my meaning. There is
no offence in my intention.'
'There is offence in everything you do,' replied his brother, glancing
at him with a sudden scowl, which in a moment gave place to a wider smile
than the last. 'Carry those papers away, if you please. I am busy.
His politeness was so much more cutting than his wrath, that the Junior
went to the door. But stopping at it, and looking round, he said:
'When Harriet tried in vain to plead for me with you, on your first
just indignation, and my first disgrace; and when she left you, James, to
follow my broken fortunes, and devote herself, in her mistaken affection, to
a ruined brother, because without her he had no one, and was lost; she was
young and pretty. I think if you could see her now - if you would go and see
her - she would move your admiration and compassion.'
The Manager inclined his head, and showed his teeth, as who should say,
in answer to some careless small-talk, 'Dear me! Is that the case?' but said
never a word.
'We thought in those days: you and I both: that she would marry young,
and lead a happy and light-hearted life,' pursued the other. 'Oh if you knew
how cheerfully she cast those hopes away; how cheerfully she has gone
forward on the path she took, and never once looked back; you never could
say again that her name was strange in your ears. Never!'
Again the Manager inclined his head and showed his teeth, and seemed to
say, 'Remarkable indeed! You quite surprise me!' And again he uttered never
a word.
'May I go on?' said John Carker, mildly.
'On your way?' replied his smiling brother. 'If you will have the
goodness.
John Carker, with a sigh, was passing slowly out at the door, when his
brother's voice detained him for a moment on the threshold.
'If she has gone, and goes, her own way cheerfully,' he said, throwing
the still unfolded letter on his desk, and putting his hands firmly in his
pockets, 'you may tell her that I go as cheerfully on mine. If she has never
once looked back, you may tell her that I have, sometimes, to recall her
taking part with you, and that my resolution is no easier to wear away;' he
smiled very sweetly here; 'than marble.'
'I tell her nothing of you. We never speak about you. Once a year, on
your birthday, Harriet says always, "Let us remember James by name, and wish
him happy," but we say no more'
'Tell it then, if you please,' returned the other, 'to yourself. You
can't repeat it too often, as a lesson to you to avoid the subject in
speaking to me. I know no Harriet Carker. There is no such person. You may
have a sister; make much of her. I have none.'
Mr Carker the Manager took up the letter again, and waved it with a
smile of mock courtesy towards the door. Unfolding it as his brother
withdrew, and looking darkly aiter him as he left the room, he once more
turned round in his elbow-chair, and applied himself to a diligent perusal
of its contents.
It was in the writing of his great chief, Mr Dombey, and dated from
Leamington. Though he was a quick reader of all other letters, Mr Carker
read this slowly; weighing the words as he went, and bringing every tooth in
his head to bear upon them. When he had read it through once, he turned it
over again, and picked out these passages. 'I find myself benefited by the
change, and am not yet inclined to name any time for my return.' 'I wish,
Carker, you would arrange to come down once and see me here, and let me know
how things are going on, in person.' 'I omitted to speak to you about young
Gay. If not gone per Son and Heir, or if Son and Heir still lying in the
Docks, appoint some other young man and keep him in the City for the
present. I am not decided.' 'Now that's unfortunate!' said Mr Carker the
Manager, expanding his mouth, as if it were made of India-rubber: 'for he's
far away.'
Still that passage, which was in a postscript, attracted his attention
and his teeth, once more.
'I think,' he said, 'my good friend Captain Cuttle mentioned something
about being towed along in the wake of that day. What a pity he's so far
away!'
He refolded the letter, and was sitting trifling with it, standing it
long-wise and broad-wise on his table, and turning it over and over on all
sides - doing pretty much the same thing, perhaps, by its contents - when Mr
Perch the messenger knocked softly at the door, and coming in on tiptoe,
bending his body at every step as if it were the delight of his life to bow,
laid some papers on the table.
'Would you please to be engaged, Sir?' asked Mr Perch, rubbing his
hands, and deferentially putting his head on one side, like a man who felt
he had no business to hold it up in such a presence, and would keep it as
much out of the way as possible.
'Who wants me?'
'Why, Sir,' said Mr Perch, in a soft voice, 'really nobody, Sir, to
speak of at present. Mr Gills the Ship's Instrument-maker, Sir, has looked
in, about a little matter of payment, he says: but I mentioned to him, Sir,
that you was engaged several deep; several deep.'
Mr Perch coughed once behind his hand, and waited for further orders.
'Anybody else?'
'Well, Sir,' said Mr Perch, 'I wouldn't of my own self take the liberty
of mentioning, Sir, that there was anybody else; but that same young lad
that was here yesterday, Sir, and last week, has been hanging about the
place; and it looks, Sir,' added Mr Perch, stopping to shut the door,
'dreadful unbusiness-like to see him whistling to the sparrows down the
court, and making of 'em answer him.'
'You said he wanted something to do, didn't you, Perch?' asked Mr
Carker, leaning back in his chair and looking at that officer.
'Why, Sir,' said Mr Perch, coughing behind his hand again, 'his
expression certainly were that he was in wants of a sitiwation, and that he
considered something might be done for him about the Docks, being used to
fishing with a rod and line: but - ' Mr Perch shook his head very dubiously
indeed.
'What does he say when he comes?' asked Mr Carker.
'Indeed, Sir,' said Mr Perch, coughing another cough behind his hand,
which was always his resource as an expression of humility when nothing else
occurred to him, 'his observation generally air that he would humbly wish to
see one of the gentlemen, and that he wants to earn a living. But you see,
Sir,' added Perch, dropping his voice to a whisper, and turning, in the
inviolable nature of his confidence, to give the door a thrust with his hand
and knee, as if that would shut it any more when it was shut already, 'it's
hardly to be bore, Sir, that a common lad like that should come a prowling
here, and saying that his mother nursed our House's young gentleman, and
that he hopes our House will give him a chance on that account. I am sure,
Sir,' observed Mr Perch, 'that although Mrs Perch was at that time nursing
as thriving a little girl, Sir, as we've ever took the liberty of adding to
our family, I wouldn't have made so free as drop a hint of her being capable
of imparting nourishment, not if it was never so!'
Mr Carker grinned at him like a shark, but in an absent, thoughtful
manner.
'Whether,' submitted Mr Perch, after a short silence, and another
cough, 'it mightn't be best for me to tell him, that if he was seen here any
more he would be given into custody; and to keep to it! With respect to
bodily fear,' said Mr Perch, 'I'm so timid, myself, by nature, Sir, and my
nerves is so unstrung by Mrs Perch's state, that I could take my affidavit
easy.'
'Let me see this fellow, Perch,' said Mr Carker. 'Bring him in!'
'Yes, Sir. Begging your pardon, Sir,' said Mr Perch, hesitating at the
door, 'he's rough, Sir, in appearance.'
'Never mind. If he's there, bring him in. I'll see Mr Gills directly.
Ask him to wait.'
Mr Perch bowed; and shutting the door, as precisely and carefully as if
he were not coming back for a week, went on his quest among the sparrows in
the court. While he was gone, Mr Carker assumed his favourite attitude
before the fire-place, and stood looking at the door; presenting, with his
under lip tucked into the smile that showed his whole row of upper teeth, a
singularly crouching apace.
The messenger was not long in returning, followed by a pair of heavy
boots that came bumping along the passage like boxes. With the unceremonious
words 'Come along with you!' - a very unusual form of introduction from his
lips - Mr Perch then ushered into the presence a strong-built lad of
fifteen, with a round red face, a round sleek head, round black eyes, round
limbs, and round body, who, to carry out the general rotundity of his
appearance, had a round hat in his hand, without a particle of brim to it.
Obedient to a nod from Mr Carker, Perch had no sooner confronted the
visitor with that gentleman than he withdrew. The moment they were face to
face alone, Mr Carker, without a word of preparation, took him by the
throat, and shook him until his head seemed loose upon his shoulders.
The boy, who in the midst of his astonishment could not help staring
wildly at the gentleman with so many white teeth who was choking him, and at
the office walls, as though determined, if he were choked, that his last
look should be at the mysteries for his intrusion into which he was paying
such a severe penalty, at last contrived to utter -
'Come, Sir! You let me alone, will you!'
'Let you alone!' said Mr Carker. 'What! I have got you, have I?' There
was no doubt of that, and tightly too. 'You dog,' said Mr Carker, through
his set jaws, 'I'll strangle you!'
Biler whimpered, would he though? oh no he wouldn't - and what was he
doing of - and why didn't he strangle some- body of his own size and not
him: but Biler was quelled by the extraordinary nature of his reception,
and, as his head became stationary, and he looked the gentleman in the face,
or rather in the teeth, and saw him snarling at him, he so far forgot his
manhood as to cry.
'I haven't done nothing to you, Sir,' said Biler, otherwise Rob,
otherwise Grinder, and always Toodle.
'You young scoundrel!' replied Mr Carker, slowly releasing him, and
moving back a step into his favourite position. 'What do you mean by daring
to come here?'
'I didn't mean no harm, Sir,' whimpered Rob, putting one hand to his
throat, and the knuckles of the other to his eyes. 'I'll never come again,
Sir. I only wanted work.'
'Work, young Cain that you are!' repeated Mr Carker, eyeing him
narrowly. 'Ain't you the idlest vagabond in London?'
The impeachment, while it much affected Mr Toodle Junior, attached to
his character so justly, that he could not say a word in denial. He stood
looking at the gentleman, therefore, with a frightened, self-convicted, and
remorseful air. As to his looking at him, it may be observed that he was
fascinated by Mr Carker, and never took his round eyes off him for an
instant.
'Ain't you a thief?' said Mr Carker, with his hands behind him in his
pockets.
'No, sir,' pleaded Rob.
'You are!' said Mr Carker.
'I ain't indeed, Sir,' whimpered Rob. 'I never did such a thing as
thieve, Sir, if you'll believe me. I know I've been a going wrong, Sir, ever
since I took to bird-catching' and walking-matching. I'm sure a cove might
think,' said Mr Toodle Junior, with a burst of penitence, 'that singing
birds was innocent company, but nobody knows what harm is in them little
creeturs and what they brings you down to.'
They seemed to have brought him down to a velveteen jacket and trousers
very much the worse for wear, a particularly small red waistcoat like a
gorget, an interval of blue check, and the hat before mentioned.
'I ain't been home twenty times since them birds got their will of me,'
said Rob, 'and that's ten months. How can I go home when everybody's
miserable to see me! I wonder,' said Biler, blubbering outright, and
smearing his eyes with his coat-cuff, 'that I haven't been and drownded
myself over and over again.'
All of which, including his expression of surprise at not having
achieved this last scarce performance, the boy said, just as if the teeth of
Mr Carker drew it out ofhim, and he had no power of concealing anything with
that battery of attraction in full play.
'You're a nice young gentleman!' said Mr Carker, shaking his head at
him. 'There's hemp-seed sown for you, my fine fellow!'
'I'm sure, Sir,' returned the wretched Biler, blubbering again, and
again having recourse to his coat-cuff: 'I shouldn't care, sometimes, if it
was growed too. My misfortunes all began in wagging, Sir; but what could I
do, exceptin' wag?'
'Excepting what?' said Mr Carker.
'Wag, Sir. Wagging from school.'
'Do you mean pretending to go there, and not going?' said Mr Carker.
'Yes, Sir, that's wagging, Sir,' returned the quondam Grinder, much
affected. 'I was chivied through the streets, Sir, when I went there, and
pounded when I got there. So I wagged, and hid myself, and that began it.'
'And you mean to tell me,' said Mr Carker, taking him by the throat
again, holding him out at arm's-length, and surveying him in silence for
some moments, 'that you want a place, do you?'
'I should be thankful to be tried, Sir,' returned Toodle Junior,
faintly.
Mr Carker the Manager pushed him backward into a corner - the boy
submitting quietly, hardly venturing to breathe, and never once removing his
eyes from his face - and rang the bell.
'Tell Mr Gills to come here.'
Mr Perch was too deferential to express surprise or recognition of the
figure in the corner: and Uncle Sol appeared immediately.
'Mr Gills!' said Carker, with a smile, 'sit down. How do you do? You
continue to enjoy your health, I hope?'
'Thank you, Sir,' returned Uncle Sol, taking out his pocket-book, and
handing over some notes as he spoke. 'Nothing ails me in body but old age.
Twenty-five, Sir.'
'You are as punctual and exact, Mr Gills,' replied the smiling Manager,
taking a paper from one of his many drawers, and making an endorsement on
it, while Uncle Sol looked over him, 'as one of your own chronometers. Quite
right.'
'The Son and Heir has not been spoken, I find by the list, Sir,' said
Uncle Sol, with a slight addition to the usual tremor in his voice.
'The Son and Heir has not been spoken,' returned Carker. 'There seems
to have been tempestuous weather, Mr Gills, and she has probably been driven
out of her course.'
'She is safe, I trust in Heaven!' said old Sol.
'She is safe, I trust in Heaven!' assented Mr Carker in that voiceless
manner of his: which made the observant young Toodle trernble again. 'Mr
Gills,' he added aloud, throwing himself back in his chair, 'you must miss
your nephew very much?'
Uncle Sol, standing by him, shook his head and heaved a deep sigh.
'Mr Gills,' said Carker, with his soft hand playing round his mouth,
and looking up into the Instrument-maker's face, 'it would be company to you
to have a young fellow in your shop just now, and it would be obliging me if
you would give one house-room for the present. No, to be sure,' he added
quickly, in anticipation of what the old man was going to say, 'there's not
much business doing there, I know; but you can make him clean the place out,
polish up the instruments; drudge, Mr Gills. That's the lad!'
Sol Gills pulled down his spectacles from his forehead to his eyes, and
looked at Toodle Junior standing upright in the corner: his head presenting
the appearance (which it always did) of having been newly drawn out of a
bucket of cold water; his small waistcoat rising and falling quickly in the
play of his emotions; and his eyes intently fixed on Mr Carker, without the
least reference to his proposed master.
'Will you give him house-room, Mr Gills?' said the Manager.
Old Sol, without being quite enthusiastic on the subject, replied that
he was glad of any opportunity, however slight, to oblige Mr Carker, whose
wish on such a point was a command: and that the wooden Midshipman would
consider himself happy to receive in his berth any visitor of Mr Carker's
selecting.
Mr Carker bared himself to the tops and bottoms of his gums: making the
watchful Toodle Junior tremble more and more: and acknowledged the
Instrument-maker's politeness in his most affable manner.
'I'll dispose of him so, then, Mr Gills,' he answered, rising, and
shaking the old man by the hand, 'until I make up my mind what to do with
him, and what he deserves. As I consider myself responsible for him, Mr
Gills,' here he smiled a wide smile at Rob, who shook before it: 'I shall be
glad if you'll look sharply after him, and report his behaviour to me. I'll
ask a question or two of his parents as I ride home this afternoon -
respectable people - to confirm some particulars in his own account of
himself; and that done, Mr Gills, I'll send him round to you to-morrow
morning. Goodbye!'
His smile at parting was so full of teeth, that it confused old Sol,
and made him vaguely uncomfortable. He went home, thinking of raging seas,
foundering ships, drowning men, an ancient bottle of Madeira never brought
to light, and other dismal matters.
'Now, boy!' said Mr Carker, putting his hand on young Toodle's
shoulder, and bringing him out into the middle of the room. 'You have heard
me?'
Rob said, 'Yes, Sir.'
'Perhaps you understand,' pursued his patron, 'that if you ever deceive
or play tricks with me, you had better have drowned yourself, indeed, once
for all, before you came here?'
There was nothing in any branch of mental acquisition that Rob seemed
to understand better than that.
'If you have lied to me,' said Mr Carker, 'in anything, never come in
my way again. If not, you may let me find you waiting for me somewhere near
your mother's house this afternoon. I shall leave this at five o'clock, and
ride there on horseback. Now, give me the address.'
Rob repeated it slowly, as Mr Carker wrote it down. Rob even spelt it
over a second time, letter by letter, as if he thought that the omission of
a dot or scratch would lead to his destruction. Mr Carker then handed him
out of the room; and Rob, keeping his round eyes fixed upon his patron to
the last, vanished for the time being.
Mr Carker the Manager did a great deal of business in the course of the
day, and stowed his teeth upon a great many people. In the office, in the
court, in the street, and on 'Change, they glistened and bristled to a
terrible extent. Five o'clock arriving, and with it Mr Carker's bay horse,
they got on horseback, and went gleaming up Cheapside.
As no one can easily ride fast, even if inclined to do so, through the
press and throng of the City at that hour, and as Mr Carker was not
inclined, he went leisurely along, picking his way among the carts and
carriages, avoiding whenever he could the wetter and more dirty places in
the over-watered road, and taking infinite pains to keep himself and his
steed clean. Glancing at the passersby while he was thus ambling on his way,
he suddenly encountered the round eyes of the sleek-headed Rob intently
fixed upon his face as if they had never been taken off, while the boy
himself, with a pocket-handkerchief twisted up like a speckled eel and
girded round his waist, made a very conspicuous demonstration of being
prepared to attend upon him, at whatever pace he might think proper to go.
This attention, however flattering, being one of an unusual kind, and
attracting some notice from the other passengers, Mr Carker took advantage
of a clearer thoroughfare and a cleaner road, and broke into a trot. Rob
immediately did the same. Mr Carker presently tried a canter; Rob Was still
in attendance. Then a short gallop; it Was all one to the boy. Whenever Mr
Carker turned his eyes to that side of the road, he still saw Toodle Junior
holding his course, apparently without distress, and working himself along
by the elbows after the most approved manner of professional gentlemen who
get over the ground for wagers.
Ridiculous as this attendance was, it was a sign of an influence
established over the boy, and therefore Mr Carker, affecting not to notice
it, rode away into the neighbourhood of Mr Toodle's house. On his slackening
his pace here, Rob appeared before him to point out the turnings; and when
he called to a man at a neighbouring gateway to hold his horse, pending his
visit to the buildings that had succeeded Staggs's Gardens, Rob dutifully
held the stirrup, while the Manager dismounted.
'Now, Sir,' said Mr Carker, taking him by the shoulder, 'come along!'
The prodigal son was evidently nervous of visiting the parental abode;
but Mr Carker pushing him on before, he had nothing for it but to open the
right door, and suffer himself to be walked into the midst of his brothers
and sisters, mustered in overwhelming force round the family tea-table. At
sight of the prodigal in the grasp of a stranger, these tender relations
united in a general howl, which smote upon the prodigal's breast so sharply
when he saw his mother stand up among them, pale and trembling, with the
baby in her arms, that he lent his own voice to the chorus.
Nothing doubting now that the stranger, if not Mr Ketch' in person, was
one of that company, the whole of the young family wailed the louder, while
its more infantine members, unable to control the transports of emotion
appertaining to their time of life, threw themselves on their backs like
young birds when terrified by a hawk, and kicked violently. At length, poor
Polly making herself audible, said, with quivering lips, 'Oh Rob, my poor
boy, what have you done at last!'
'Nothing, mother,' cried Rob, in a piteous voice, 'ask the gentleman!'
'Don't be alarmed,' said Mr Carker, 'I want to do him good.'
At this announcement, Polly, who had not cried yet, began to do so. The
elder Toodles, who appeared to have been meditating a rescue, unclenched
their fists. The younger Toodles clustered round their mother's gown, and
peeped from under their own chubby arms at their desperado brother and his
unknown friend. Everybody blessed the gentleman with the beautiful teeth,
who wanted to do good.
'This fellow,' said Mr Carker to Polly, giving him a gentle shake, 'is
your son, eh, Ma'am?'
'Yes, Sir,' sobbed Polly, with a curtsey; 'yes, Sir.'
'A bad son, I am afraid?' said Mr Carker.
'Never a bad son to me, Sir,' returned Polly.
'To whom then?' demanded Mr Carker.
'He has been a little wild, Sir,' returned Polly, checking the baby,
who was making convulsive efforts with his arms and legs to launch himself
on Biler, through the ambient air, 'and has gone with wrong companions: but
I hope he has seen the misery of that, Sir, and will do well again.'
Mr Carker looked at Polly, and the clean room, and the clean children,
and the simple Toodle face, combined of father and mother, that was
reflected and repeated everywhere about him - and seemed to have achieved
the real purpose of his visit.
'Your husband, I take it, is not at home?' he said.
'No, Sir,' replied Polly. 'He's down the line at present.'
The prodigal Rob seemed very much relieved to hear it: though still in
the absorption of all his faculties in his patron, he hardly took his eyes
from Mr Carker's face, unless for a moment at a time to steal a sorrowful
glance at his mother.
'Then,' said Mr Carker, 'I'll tell you how I have stumbled on this boy
of yours, and who I am, and what I am going to do for him.'
This Mr Carker did, in his own way; saying that he at first intended to
have accumulated nameless terrors on his presumptuous head, for coming to
the whereabout of Dombey and Son. That he had relented, in consideration of
his youth, his professed contrition, and his friends. That he was afraid he
took a rash step in doing anything for the boy, and one that might expose
him to the censure of the prudent; but that he did it of himself and for
himself, and risked the consequences single-handed; and that his mother's
past connexion with Mr Dombey's family had nothing to do with it, and that
Mr Dombey had nothing to do with it, but that he, Mr Carker, was the be-all
and the end-all of this business. Taking great credit to himself for his
goodness, and receiving no less from all the family then present, Mr Carker
signified, indirectly but still pretty plainly, that Rob's implicit
fidelity, attachment, and devotion, were for evermore his due, and the least
homage he could receive. And with this great truth Rob himself was so
impressed, that, standing gazing on his patron with tears rolling down his
cheeks, he nodded his shiny head until it seemed almost as loose as it had
done under the same patron's hands that morning.
Polly, who had passed Heaven knows how many sleepless nights on account
of this her dissipated firstborn, and had not seen him for weeks and weeks,
could have almost kneeled to Mr Carker the Manager, as to a Good Spirit - in
spite of his teeth. But Mr Carker rising to depart, she only thanked him
with her mother's prayers and blessings; thanks so rich when paid out of the
Heart's mint, especially for any service Mr Carker had rendered, that he
might have given back a large amount of change, and yet been overpaid.
As that gentleman made his way among the crowding children to the door,
Rob retreated on his mother, and took her and the baby in the same repentant
hug.
'I'll try hard, dear mother, now. Upon my soul I will!' said Rob.
'Oh do, my dear boy! I am sure you will, for our sakes and your own!'
cried Polly, kissing him. 'But you're coming back to speak to me, when you
have seen the gentleman away?'
'I don't know, mother.' Rob hesitated, and looked down. 'Father -
when's he coming home?'
'Not till two o'clock to-morrow morning.'
'I'll come back, mother dear!' cried Rob. And passing through the
shrill cry of his brothers and sisters in reception of this promise, he
followed Mr Carker out.
'What!' said Mr Carker, who had heard this. 'You have a bad father,
have you?'
'No, Sir!' returned Rob, amazed. 'There ain't a better nor a kinder
father going, than mine is.'
'Why don't you want to see him then?' inquired his patron.
'There's such a difference between a father and a mother, Sir,' said
Rob, after faltering for a moment. 'He couldn't hardly believe yet that I
was doing to do better - though I know he'd try to but a mother - she always
believes what's,' good, Sir; at least I know my mother does, God bless her!'
Mr Carker's mouth expanded, but he said no more until he was mounted on
his horse, and had dismissed the man who held it, when, looking down from
the saddle steadily into the attentive and watchful face of the boy, he
said:
'You'll come to me tomorrow morning, and you shall be shown where that
old gentleman lives; that old gentleman who was with me this morning; where
you are going, as you heard me say.'
'Yes, Sir,' returned Rob.
'I have a great interest in that old gentleman, and in serving him, you
serve me, boy, do you understand? Well,' he added, interrupting him, for he
saw his round face brighten when he was told that: 'I see you do. I want to
know all about that old gentleman, and how he goes on from day to day - for
I am anxious to be of service to him - and especially who comes there to see
him. Do you understand?'
Rob nodded his steadfast face, and said 'Yes, Sir,' again.
'I should like to know that he has friends who are attentive to him,
and that they don't desert him - for he lives very much alone now, poor
fellow; but that they are fond of him, and of his nephew who has gone
abroad. There is a very young lady who may perhaps come to see him. I want
particularly to know all about her.'
'I'll take care, Sir,' said the boy.
'And take care,' returned his patron, bending forward to advance his
grinning face closer to the boy's, and pat him on the shoulder with the
handle of his whip: 'take care you talk about affairs of mine to nobody but
me.'
'To nobody in the world, Sir,' replied Rob, shaking his head.
'Neither there,' said Mr CarHer, pointing to the place they had just
left, 'nor anywhere else. I'll try how true and grateful you can be. I'll
prove you!' Making this, by his display of teeth and by the action of his
head, as much a threat as a promise, he turned from Rob's eyes, which were
nailed upon him as if he had won the boy by a charm, body and soul, and rode
away. But again becoming conscious, after trotting a short distance, that
his devoted henchman, girt as before, was yielding him the same attendance,
to the great amusement of sundry spectators, he reined up, and ordered him
off. To ensure his obedience, he turned in the saddle and watched him as he
retired. It was curious to see that even then Rob could not keep his eyes
wholly averted from his patron's face, but, constantly turning and turning
again to look after him' involved himself in a tempest of buffetings and
jostlings from the other passengers in the street: of which, in the pursuit
of the one paramount idea, he was perfectly heedless.
Mr Carker the Manager rode on at a foot-pace, with the easy air of one
who had performed all the business of the day in a satisfactory manner, and
got it comfortably off his mind. Complacent and affable as man could be, Mr
Carker picked his way along the streets and hummed a soft tune as he went He
seemed to purr, he was so glad.
And in some sort, Mr Carker, in his fancy, basked upon a hearth too.
Coiled up snugly at certain feet, he was ready for a spring, Or for a tear,
or for a scratch, or for a velvet touch, as the humour took him and occasion
served. Was there any bird in a cage, that came in for a share ofhis
regards?
'A very young lady!' thought Mr Carker the Manager, through his song.
'Ay! when I saw her last, she was a little child. With dark eyes and hair, I
recollect, and a good face; a very good face! I daresay she's pretty.'
More affable and pleasant yet, and humming his song until his many
teeth vibrated to it, Mr Carker picked his way along, and turned at last
into the shady street where Mr Dombey's house stood. He had been so busy,
winding webs round good faces, and obscuring them with meshes, that he
hardly thought of being at this point of his ride, until, glancing down the
cold perspective of tall houses, he reined in his horse quickly within a few
yards of the door. But to explain why Mr Carker reined in his horse quickly,
and what he looked at in no small surprise, a few digressive words are
necessary.
Mr Toots, emancipated from the Blimber thraldom and coming into the
possession of a certain portion of his wordly wealth, 'which,' as he had
been wont, during his last half-year's probation, to communicate to Mr
Feeder every evening as a new discovery, 'the executors couldn't keep him
out of' had applied himself with great diligence, to the science of Life.
Fired with a noble emulation to pursue a brilliant and distinguished career,
Mr Toots had furnished a choice set of apartments; had established among
them a sporting bower, embellished with the portraits of winning horses, in
which he took no particle of interest; and a divan, which made him poorly.
In this delicious abode, Mr Toots devoted himself to the cultivation of
those gentle arts which refine and humanise existence, his chief instructor
in which was an interesting character called the Game Chicken, who was
always to be heard of at the bar of the Black Badger, wore a shaggy white
great-coat in the warmest weather, and knocked Mr Toots about the head three
times a week, for the small consideration of ten and six per visit.
The Game Chicken, who was quite the Apollo of Mr Toots's Pantheon, had
introduced to him a marker who taught billiards, a Life Guard who taught
fencing, a jobmaster who taught riding, a Cornish gentleman who was up to
anything in the athletic line, and two or three other friends connected no
less intimately with the fine arts. Under whose auspices Mr Toots could
hardly fail to improve apace, and under whose tuition he went to work.
But however it came about, it came to pass, even while these gentlemen
had the gloss of novelty upon them, that Mr Toots felt, he didn't know how,
unsettled and uneasy. There were husks in his corn, that even Game Chickens
couldn't peck up; gloomy giants in his leisure, that even Game Chickens
couldn't knock down. Nothing seemed to do Mr Toots so much good as
incessantly leaving cards at Mr Dombey's door. No taxgatherer in the British
Dominions - that wide-spread territory on which the sun never sets, and
where the tax-gatherer never goes to bed - was more regular and persevering
in his calls than Mr Toots.
Mr Toots never went upstairs; and always performed the same ceremonies,
richly dressed for the purpose, at the hall door.
'Oh! Good morning!' would be Mr Toots's first remark to the servant.
'For Mr Dombey,' would be Mr Toots's next remark, as he handed in a card.
'For Miss Dombey,' would be his next, as he handed in another.
Mr Toots would then turn round as if to go away; but the man knew him
by this time, and knew he wouldn't.
'Oh, I beg your pardon,' Mr Toots would say, as if a thought had
suddenly descended on him. 'Is the young woman at home?'
The man would rather think she was;, but wouldn't quite know. Then he
would ring a bell that rang upstairs, and would look up the staircase, and
would say, yes, she was at home, and was coming down. Then Miss Nipper would
appear, and the man would retire.
'Oh! How de do?' Mr Toots would say, with a chuckle and a blush.
Susan would thank him, and say she was very well.
'How's Diogenes going on?' would be Mr Toots's second interrogation.
Very well indeed. Miss Florence was fonder and fonder of him every day.
Mr Toots was sure to hail this with a burst of chuckles, like the opening of
a bottle of some effervescent beverage.
'Miss Florence is quite well, Sir,' Susan would add.
Oh, it's of no consequence, thank'ee,' was the invariable reply of Mr
Toots; and when he had said so, he always went away very fast.
Now it is certain that Mr Toots had a filmy something in his mind,
which led him to conclude that if he could aspire successfully in the
fulness of time, to the hand of Florence, he would be fortunate and blest.
It is certain that Mr Toots, by some remote and roundabout road, had got to
that point, and that there he made a stand. His heart was wounded; he was
touched; he was in love. He had made a desperate attempt, one night, and had
sat up all night for the purpose, to write an acrostic on Florence, which
affected him to tears in the conception. But he never proceeded in the
execution further than the words 'For when I gaze,' - the flow of
imagination in which he had previously written down the initial letters of
the other seven lines, deserting him at that point.
Beyond devising that very artful and politic measure of leaving a card
for Mr Dombey daily, the brain of Mr Toots had not worked much in reference
to the subject that held his feelings prisoner. But deep consideration at
length assured Mr Toots that an important step to gain, was, the
conciliation of Miss Susan Nipper, preparatory to giving her some inkling of
his state of mind.
A little light and playful gallantry towards this lady seemed the means
to employ in that early chapter of the history, for winning her to his
interests. Not being able quite to make up his mind about it, he consulted
the Chicken - without taking that gentleman into his confidence; merely
informing him that a friend in Yorkshire had written to him (Mr Toots) for
his opinion on such a question. The Chicken replying that his opinion always
was, 'Go in and win,' and further, 'When your man's before you and your work
cut out, go in and do it,' Mr Toots considered this a figurative way of
supporting his own view of the case, and heroically resolved to kiss Miss
Nipper next day.
Upon the next day, therefore, Mr Toots, putting into requisition some
of the greatest marvels that Burgess and Co. had ever turned out, went off
to Mr Dotnbey's upon this design. But his heart failed him so much as he
approached the scene of action, that, although he arrived on the ground at
three o'clock in the afternoon, it was six before he knocked at the door.
Everything happened as usual, down to the point where Susan said her
young mistress was well, and Mr Toots said it was ofno consequence. To her
amazement, Mr Toots, instead of going off, like a rocket, after that
observation, lingered and chuckled.
'Perhaps you'd like to walk upstairs, Sir!' said Susan.
'Well, I think I will come in!' said Mr Toots.
But instead of walking upstairs, the bold Toots made an awkward plunge
at Susan when the door was shut, and embracing that fair creature, kissed
her on the cheek
'Go along with you!~ cried Susan, 'or Ill tear your eyes out.'
'Just another!' said Mr Toots.
'Go along with you!' exclaimed Susan, giving him a push 'Innocents like
you, too! Who'll begin next? Go along, Sir!'
Susan was not in any serious strait, for she could hardly speak for
laughing; but Diogenes, on the staircase, hearing a rustling against the
wall, and a shuffling of feet, and seeing through the banisters that there
was some contention going on, and foreign invasion in the house, formed a
different opinion, dashed down to the rescue, and in the twinkling of an eye
had Mr Toots by the leg.
Susan screamed, laughed, opened the street-door, and ran downstairs;
the bold Toots tumbled staggering out into the street, with Diogenes holding
on to one leg of his pantaioons, as if Burgess and Co. were his cooks, and
had provided that dainty morsel for his holiday entertainment; Diogenes
shaken off, rolled over and over in the dust, got up' again, whirled round
the giddy Toots and snapped at him: and all this turmoil Mr Carker, reigning
up his horse and sitting a little at a distance, saw to his amazement, issue
from the stately house of Mr Dombey.
Mr Carker remained watching the discomfited Toots, when Diogenes was
called in, and the door shut: and while that gentleman, taking refuge in a
doorway near at hand, bound up the torn leg of his pantaloons with a costly
silk handkerchief that had formed part of his expensive outfit for the
advent
'I beg your pardon, Sir,' said Mr Carker, riding up, with his most
propitiatory smile. 'I hope you are not hurt?'
'Oh no, thank you,' replied Mr Toots, raising his flushed face, 'it's
of no consequence' Mr Toots would have signified, if he could, that he liked
it very much.
'If the dog's teeth have entered the leg, Sir - ' began Carker, with a
display of his own'
'No, thank you,' said Mr Toots, 'it's all quite right. It's very
comfortable, thank you.'
'I have the pleasure of knowing Mr Dombey,' observed Carker.
'Have you though?' rejoined the blushing Took
'And you will allow me, perhaps, to apologise, in his absence,' said Mr
Carker, taking off his hat, 'for such a misadventure, and to wonder how it
can possibly have happened.'
Mr Toots is so much gratified by this politeness, and the lucky chance
of making frends with a friend of Mr Dombey, that he pulls out his card-case
which he never loses an opportunity of using, and hands his name and address
to Mr Carker: who responds to that courtesy by giving him his own, and with
that they part.
As Mr Carker picks his way so softly past the house, looking up at the
windows, and trying to make out the pensive face behind the curtain looking
at the children opposite, the rough head of Diogenes came clambering up
close by it, and the dog, regardless of all soothing, barks and growls, and
makes at him from that height, as ifhe would spring down and tear him limb
from limb.
Well spoken, Di, so near your Mistress! Another, and another with your
head up, your eyes flashing, and your vexed mouth worrying itself, for want
of him! Another, as he picks his way along! You have a good scent, Di, -
cats, boy, cats!
Florence solitary, and the Midshipman mysterious
Florence lived alone in the great dreary house, and day succeeded day,
and still she lived alone; and the blank walls looked down upon her with a
vacant stare, as if they had a Gorgon-like mind to stare her youth and
beauty into stone.
No magic dwelling-place in magic story, shut up in the heart of a thick
wood, was ever more solitary and deserted to the fancy, than was her
father's mansion in its grim reality, as it stood lowering on the street:
always by night, when lights were shining from neighbouring windows, a blot
upon its scanty brightness; always by day, a frown upon its never-smiling
face.
There were not two dragon sentries keeping ward before the gate of this
above, as in magic legend are usually found on duty over the wronged
innocence imprisoned; but besides a glowering visage, with its thin lips
parted wickedly, that surveyed all comers from above the archway of the
door, there was a monstrous fantasy of rusty iron, curling and twisting like
a petrifaction of an arbour over threshold, budding in spikes and corkscrew
points, and bearing, one on either side, two ominous extinguishers, that
seemed to say, 'Who enter here, leave light behind!' There were no
talismanic characters engraven on the portal, but the house was now so
neglected in appearance, that boys chalked the railings and the pavement -
particularly round the corner where the side wall was - and drew ghosts on
the stable door; and being sometimes driven off by Mr Towlinson, made
portraits of him, in return, with his ears growing out horizontally from
under his hat. Noise ceased to be, within the shadow of the roof. The brass
band that came into the street once a week, in the morning, never brayed a
note in at those windows; but all such company, down to a poor little piping
organ of weak intellect, with an imbecile party of automaton dancers,
waltzing in and out at folding-doors, fell off from it with one accord, and
shunned it as a hopeless place.
The spell upon it was more wasting than the spell that used to set
enchanted houses sleeping once upon a time, but left their waking freshness
unimpaired. The passive desolation of disuse was everywhere silently
manifest about it. Within doors, curtains, drooping heavily, lost their old
folds and shapes, and hung like cumbrous palls. Hecatombs of furniture,
still piled and covered up, shrunk like imprisoned and forgotten men, and
changed insensibly. Mirrors were dim as with the breath of years. Patterns
of carpets faded and became perplexed and faint, like the memory of those
years' trifling incidents. Boards, starting at unwonted footsteps, creaked
and shook. Keys rusted in the locks of doors. Damp started on the walls, and
as the stains came out, the pictures seemed to go in and secrete themselves.
Mildew and mould began to lurk in closets. Fungus trees grew in corners of
the cellars. Dust accumulated, nobody knew whence nor how; spiders, moths,
and grubs were heard of every day. An exploratory blackbeetle now and then
was found immovable upon the stairs, or in an upper room, as wondering how
he got there. Rats began to squeak and scuffle in the night time, through
dark galleries they mined behind the panelling.
The dreary magnificence of the state rooms, seen imperfectly by the
doubtful light admitted through closed shutters, would have answered well
enough for an enchanted abode. Such as the tarnished paws of gilded lions,
stealthily put out from beneath their wrappers; the marble lineaments of
busts on pedestals, fearfully revealing themselves through veils; the clocks
that never told the time, or, if wound up by any chance, told it wrong, and
struck unearthly numbers, which are not upon the dial; the accidental
tinklings among the pendant lustres, more startling than alarm-bells; the
softened sounds and laggard air that made their way among these objects, and
a phantom crowd of others, shrouded and hooded, and made spectral of shape.
But, besides, there was the great staircase, where the lord of the place so
rarely set his foot, and by which his little child had gone up to Heaven.
There were other staircases and passages where no one went for weeks
together; there were two closed rooms associated with dead members of the
family, and with whispered recollections of them; and to all the house but
Florence, there was a gentle figure moving through the solitude and gloom,
that gave to every lifeless thing a touch of present human interest and
wonder,
For Florence lived alone in the deserted house, and day succeeded day,
and still she lived alone, and the cold walls looked down upon her with a
vacant stare, as if they had a Gorgon-like mind to stare her youth and
beauty into stone
The grass began to grow upon the roof, and in the crevices of the
basement paving. A scaly crumbling vegetation sprouted round the
window-sills. Fragments of mortar lost their hold upon the insides of the
unused chimneys, and came dropping down. The two trees with the smoky trunks
were blighted high up, and the withered branches domineered above the
leaves, Through the whole building white had turned yellow, yellow nearly
black; and since the time when the poor lady died, it had slowly become a
dark gap in the long monotonous street.
But Florence bloomed there, like the king's fair daughter in the story.
Her books, her music, and her daily teachers, were her only real companions,
Susan Nipper and Diogenes excepted: of whom the former, in her attendance on
the studies of her young mistress, began to grow quite learned herself,
while the latter, softened possibly by the same influences, would lay his
head upon the window-ledge, and placidly open and shut his eyes upon the
street, all through a summer morning; sometimes pricking up his head to look
with great significance after some noisy dog in a cart, who was barking his
way along, and sometimes, with an exasperated and unaccountable recollection
of his supposed enemy in the neighbourhood, rushing to the door, whence,
after a deafening disturbance, he would come jogging back with a ridiculous
complacency that belonged to him, and lay his jaw upon the window-ledge
again, with the air of a dog who had done a public service.
So Florence lived in her wilderness of a home, within the circle of her
innocent pursuits and thoughts, and nothing harmed her. She could go down to
her father's rooms now, and think of him, and suffer her loving heart humbly
to approach him, without fear of repulse. She could look upon the objects
that had surrounded him in his sorrow, and could nestle near his chair, and
not dread the glance that she so well remembered. She could render him such
little tokens of her duty and service' as putting everything in order for
him with her own hands, binding little nosegays for table, changing them as
one by one they withered and he did not come back, preparing something for
him every' day, and leaving some timid mark of her presence near his usual
seat. To-day, it was a little painted stand for his watch; tomorrow she
would be afraid to leave it, and would substitute some other trifle of her
making not so likely to attract his eye. Waking in the night, perhaps, she
would tremble at the thought of his coming home and angrily rejecting it,
and would hurry down with slippered feet and quickly beating heart, and
bring it away. At another time, she would only lay her face upon his desk,
and leave a kiss there, and a tear.
Still no one knew of this. Unless the household found it out when she
was not there - and they all held Mr Dombey's rooms in awe - it was as deep
a secret in her breast as what had gone before it. Florence stole into those
rooms at twilight, early in the morning, and at times when meals were served
downstairs. And although they were in every nook the better and the brighter
for her care, she entered and passed out as quietly as any sunbeam, opting
that she left her light behind.
Shadowy company attended Florence up and down the echoing house, and
sat with her in the dismantled rooms. As if her life were an enchanted
vision, there arose out of her solitude ministering thoughts, that made it
fanciful and unreal. She imagined so often what her life would have been if
her father could have loved her and she had been a favourite child, that
sometimes, for the moment, she almost believed it was so, and, borne on by
the current of that pensive fiction, seemed to remember how they had watched
her brother in his grave together; how they had freely shared his heart
between them; how they were united in the dear remembrance of him; how they
often spoke about him yet; and her kind father, looking at her gently, told
her of their common hope and trust in God. At other times she pictured to
herself her mother yet alive. And oh the happiness of falling on her neck,
and clinging to her with the love and confidence of all her soul! And oh the
desolation of the solitary house again, with evening coming on, and no one
there!
But there was one thought, scarcely shaped out to herself, yet fervent
and strong within her, that upheld Florence when she strove and filled her
true young heart, so sorely tried, with constancy of purpose. Into her mind,
as 'into all others contending with the great affliction of our mortal
nature, there had stolen solemn wonderings and hopes, arising in the dim
world beyond the present life, and murmuring, like faint music, of
recognition in the far-off land between her brother and her mother: of some
present consciousness in both of her: some love and commiseration for her:
and some knowledge of her as she went her way upon the earth. It was a
soothing consolation to Florence to give shelter to these thoughts, until
one day - it was soon after she had last seen her father in his own room,
late at night - the fancy came upon her, that, in weeping for his alienated
heart, she might stir the spirits of the dead against him' Wild, weak,
childish, as it may have been to think so, and to tremble at the half-formed
thought, it was the impulse of her loving nature; and from that hour
Florence strove against the cruel wound in her breast, and tried to think of
him whose hand had made it, only with hope.
Her father did not know - she held to it from that time - how much she
loved him. She was very young, and had no mother, and had never learned, by
some fault or misfortune, how to express to him that she loved him. She
would be patient, and would try to gain that art in time, and win him to a
better knowledge of his only child.
This became the purpose of her life. The morning sun shone down upon
the faded house, and found the resolution bright and fresh within the bosom
of its solitary mistress, Through all the duties of the day, it animated
her; for Florence hoped that the more she knew, and the more accomplished
she became, the more glad he would be when he came to know and like her.
Sometimes she wondered, with a swelling heart and rising tear, whether she
was proficient enough in anything to surprise him when they should become
companions. Sometimes she tried to think if there were any kind of knowledge
that would bespeak his interest more readily than another. Always: at her
books, her music, and her work: in her morning walks, and in her nightly
prayers: she had her engrossing aim in view. Strange study for a child, to
learn the road to a hard parent's heart!
There were many careless loungers through the street, as the summer
evening deepened into night, who glanced across the road at the sombre
house, and saw the youthful figure at the window, such a contrast to it,
looking upward at the stars as they began to shine, who would have slept the
worse if they had known on what design she mused so steady. The reputation
of the mansion as a haunted house, would not have been the gayer with some
humble dwellers elsewhere, who were struck by its external gloom in passing
and repassing on their daily avocations, and so named it, if they could have
read its story in the darkening face. But Florence held her sacred purpose,
unsuspected and unaided: and studied only how to bring her father to the
understanding that she loved him, and made no appeal against him in any
wandering thought.
Thus Florence lived alone in the deserted house, and day succeeded day,
and still she lived alone, and the monotonous walls looked down upon her
with a stare, as if they had a Gorgon-like intent to stare her youth and
beauty into stone.
Susan Nipper stood opposite to her young mistress one morning, as she
folded and sealed a note she had been writing: and showed in her looks an
approving knowledge of its contents.
'Better late than never, dear Miss Floy,' said Susan, 'and I do say,
that even a visit to them old Skettleses will be a Godsend.'
'It is very good of Sir Barnet and Lady Skettles, Susan,' returned
Florence, with a mild correction of that young lady's familiar mention of
the family in question, 'to repeat their invitation so kindly.'
Miss Nipper, who was perhaps the most thoroughgoing partisan on the
face of the earth, and who carried her partisanship into all matters great
or small, and perpetually waged war with it against society, screwed up her
lips and shook her head, as a protest against any recognition of
disinterestedness in the Skettleses, and a plea in bar that they would have
valuable consideration for their kindness, in the company of Florence.
'They know what they're about, if ever people did,' murmured Miss
Nipper, drawing in her breath 'oh! trust them Skettleses for that!'
'I am not very anxious to go to Fulham, Susan, I confess,' said
Florence thoughtfully: 'but it will be right to go. I think it will be
better.'
'Much better,' interposed Susan, with another emphatic shake of her
head.
'And so,' said Florence, 'though I would prefer to have gone when there
was no one there, instead of in this vacation time, when it seems there are
some young people staying in the house, I have thankfully said yes.'
'For which I say, Miss Floy, Oh be joyful!' returned Susan, 'Ah!
This last ejaculation, with which Miss Nipper frequently wound up a
sentence, at about that epoch of time, was supposed below the level of the
hall to have a general reference to Mr Dombey, and to be expressive of a
yearning in Miss Nipper to favour that gentleman with a piece of her mind.
But she never explained it; and it had, in consequence, the charm of
mystery, in addition to the advantage of the sharpest expression.
'How long it is before we have any news of Walter, Susan!' observed
Florence, after a moment's silence.
'Long indeed, Miss Floy!' replied her maid. 'And Perch said, when he
came just now to see for letters - but what signifies what he says!'
exclaimed Susan, reddening and breaking off. 'Much he knows about it!'
Florence raised her eyes quickly, and a flush overspread her face.
'If I hadn't,' said Susan Nipper, evidently struggling with some latent
anxiety and alarm, and looking full at her young mistress, while
endeavouring to work herself into a state of resentment with the unoffending
Mr Perch's image, 'if I hadn't more manliness than that insipidest of his
sex, I'd never take pride in my hair again, but turn it up behind my ears,
and wear coarse caps, without a bit of border, until death released me from
my insignificance. I may not be a Amazon, Miss Floy, and wouldn't so demean
myself by such disfigurement, but anyways I'm not a giver up, I hope'
'Give up! What?' cried Florence, with a face of terror.
'Why, nothing, Miss,' said Susan. 'Good gracious, nothing! It's only
that wet curl-paper of a man, Perch, that anyone might almost make away
with, with a touch, and really it would be a blessed event for all parties
if someone would take pity on him, and would have the goodness!'
'Does he give up the ship, Susan?' inquired Florence, very pale.
'No, Miss,' returned Susan, 'I should like to see' him make so bold as
do it to my face! No, Miss, but he goes 'on about some bothering ginger that
Mr Walter was to send to Mrs Perch, and shakes his dismal head, and says he
hopes it may be coming; anyhow, he says, it can't come now in time for the
intended occasion, but may do for next, which really,' said Miss Nipper,
with aggravated scorn, 'puts me out of patience with the man, for though I
can bear a great deal, I am not a camel, neither am I,' added Susan, after a
moment's consideration, 'if I know myself, a dromedary neither.'
'What else does he say, Susan?' inquired Florence, earnestly. 'Won't
you tell me?'
'As if I wouldn't tell you anything, Miss Floy, and everything!' said
Susan. 'Why, nothing Miss, he says that there begins to be a general talk
about the ship, and that they have never had a ship on that voyage half so
long unheard of, and that the Captain's wife was at the office yesterday,
and seemed a little put out about it, but anyone could say that, we knew
nearly that before.'
'I must visit Walter's uncle,' said Florence, hurriedly, 'before I
leave home. I will go and see him this morning. Let us walk there, directly,
Susan.
Miss Nipper having nothing to urge against the proposal, but being
perfectly acquiescent, they were soon equipped, and in the streets, and on
their way towards the little Midshipman.
The state of mind in which poor Walter had gone to Captain Cuttle's, on
the day when Brogley the broker came into possession, and when there seemed
to him to be an execution in the very steeples, was pretty much the same as
that in which Florence now took her way to Uncle Sol's; with this
difference, that Florence suffered the added pain of thinking that she had
been, perhaps, the innocent occasion of involving Walter in peril, and all
to whom he was dear, herself included, in an agony of suspense. For the
rest, uncertainty and danger seemed written upon everything. The
weathercocks on spires and housetops were mysterious with hints of stormy
wind, and pointed, like so many ghostly fingers, out to dangerous seas,
where fragments of great wrecks were drifting, perhaps, and helpless men
were rocked upon them into a sleep as deep as the unfathomable waters. When
Florence came into the City, and passed gentlemen who were talking together,
she dreaded to hear them speaking of the ship, an'd saying it was lost.
Pictures and prints of vessels fighting with the rolling waves filled her
with alarm. The smoke and clouds, though moving gently, moved too fast for
her apprehensions, and made her fear there was a tempest blowing at that
moment on the ocean.
Susan Nipper may or may not have been affected similarly, but having
her attention much engaged in struggles with boys, whenever there was any
press of people - for, between that grade of human kind and herself, there
was some natural animosity that invariably broke out, whenever they came
together - it would seem that she had not much leisure on the road for
intellectual operations,
Arriving in good time abreast of the wooden Midshipman on the opposite
side of the way, and waiting for an opportunity to cross the street, they
were a little surprised at first to see, at the Instrument-maker's door, a
round-headed lad, with his chubby face addressed towards the sky, who, as
they looked at him, suddenly thrust into his capacious mouth two fingers of
each hand, and with the assistance of that machinery whistled, with
astonishing shrillness, to some pigeons at a considerable elevation in the
air.
'Mrs Richards's eldest, Miss!' said Susan, 'and the worrit of Mrs
Richards's life!'
As Polly had been to tell Florence of the resuscitated prospects of her
son and heir, Florence was prepared for the meeting: so, a favourable moment
presenting itself, they both hastened across, without any further
contemplation of Mrs Richards's bane' That sporting character, unconscious
of their approach, again whistled with his utmost might, and then yelled in
a rapture of excitement, 'Strays! Whip! Strays!' which identification had
such an effect upon the conscience-stricken pigeons, that instead of going
direct to some town in the North of England, as appeared to have been their
original intention, they began to wheel and falter; whereupon Mrs Richards's
first born pierced them with another whistle, and again yelled, in a voice
that rose above the turmoil of the street, 'Strays! Who~oop! Strays!'
From this transport, he was abruptly recalled to terrestrial objects,
by a poke from Miss Nipper, which sent him into the shop,
'Is this the way you show your penitence, when Mrs Richards has been
fretting for you months and months?' said Susan, following the poke.
'Where's Mr Gills?'
Rob, who smoothed his first rebellious glance at Miss Nipper when he
saw Florence following, put his knuckles to his hair, in honour of the
latter, and said to the former, that Mr Gills was out'
Fetch him home,' said Miss Nipper, with authority, 'and say that my
young lady's here.'
'I don't know where he's gone,' said Rob.
'Is that your penitence?' cried Susan, with stinging sharpness.
'Why how can I go and fetch him when I don't know where to go?'
whimpered the baited Rob. 'How can you be so unreasonable?'
'Did Mr Gills say when he should be home?' asked Florence.
'Yes, Miss,' replied Rob, with another application of his knuckles to
his hair. 'He said he should be home early in the afternoon; in about a
couple of hours from now, Miss.'
'Is he very anxious about his nephew?' inquired Susan.
'Yes, Miss,' returned Rob, preferring to address himself to Florence
and slighting Nipper; 'I should say he was, very much so. He ain't indoors,
Miss, not a quarter of an hour together. He can't settle in one place five
minutes. He goes about, like a - just like a stray,' said Rob, stooping to
get a glimpse of the pigeons through the window, and checking himself, with
his fingers half-way to his mouth, on the verge of another whistle.
'Do you know a friend of Mr Gills, called Captain Cuttle?' inquired
Florence, after a moment's reflection.
'Him with a hook, Miss?' rejoined Rob, with an illustrative twist of
his left hand. Yes, Miss. He was here the day before yesterday.'
'Has he not been here since?' asked Susan.
'No, Miss,' returned Rob, still addressing his reply to Florence.
'Perhaps Walter's Uncle has gone there, Susan,' observed Florence,
turning to her.
'To Captain Cuttle's, Miss?' interposed Rob; 'no, he's not gone there,
Miss. Because he left particular word that if Captain Cuttle called, I
should tell him how surprised he was, not to have seen him yesterday, and
should make him stop till he came back'
'Do you know where Captain Cuttle lives?' asked Florence.
Rob replied in the affirmative, and turning to a greasy parchment book
on the shop desk, read the address aloud.
Florence again turned to her maid and took counsel with her in a low
voice, while Rob the round-eyed, mindful of his patron's secret charge,
looked on and listened. Florence proposed that they kould go to Captain
Cuttle's house; hear from his own lips, what he thought of the absence of
any tidings ofthe Son and Heir; and bring him, if they could, to comfort
Uncle Sol. Susan at first objected slightly, on the score of distance; but a
hackney-coach being mentioned by her mistress, withdrew that opposition, and
gave in her assent. There were some minutes of discussion between them
before they came to this conclusion, during which the staring Rob paid close
attention to both speakers, and inclined his ear to each by turns, as if he
were appointed arbitrator of the argument.
In time, Rob was despatched for a coach, the visitors keeping shop
meanwhile; and when he brought it, they got into it, leaving word for Uncle
Sol that they would be sure to call again, on their way back. Rob having
stared after the coach until it was as invisible as the pigeons had now
become, sat down behind the desk with a most assiduous demeanour; and in
order that he might forget nothing of what had transpired, made notes of it
on various small scraps of paper, with a vast expenditure of ink. There was
no danger of these documents betraying anything, if accidentally lost; for
long before a word was dry, it became as profound a mystery to Rob, as if he
had had no part whatever in its production.
While he was yet busy with these labours, the hackney-coach, after
encountering unheard-of difficulties from swivel-bridges, soft roads,
impassable canals, caravans of casks, settlements of scarlet-beans and
little wash-houses, and many such obstacles abounding in that country,
stopped at the corner of Brig Place. Alighting here, Florence and Susan
Nipper walked down the street, and sought out the abode of Captain Cuttle.
It happened by evil chance to be one of Mrs MacStinger's great cleaning
days. On these occasions, Mrs MacStinger was knocked up by the policeman at
a quarter before three in the morning, and rarely such before twelve o'clock
next night. The chief object of this institution appeared to be, that Mrs
MacStinger should move all the furniture into the back garden at early dawn,
walk about the house in pattens all day, and move the furniture back again
after dark. These ceremonies greatly fluttered those doves the young
MacStingers, who were not only unable at such times to find any
resting-place for the soles of their feet, but generally came in for a good
deal of pecking from the maternal bird during the progress of the
solemnities.
At the moment when Florence and Susan Nipper presented themselves at
Mrs MacStinger's door, that worthy but redoubtable female was in the act of
conveying Alexander MacStinger, aged two years and three months, along the
passage, for forcible deposition in a sitting posture on the street
pavement: Alexander being black in the face with holding his breath after
punishment, and a cool paving-stone being usually found to act as a powerful
restorative in such cases.
The feelings of Mrs MacStinger, as a woman and a mother, were outraged
by the look of pity for Alexander which she observed on Florence's face.
Therefore, Mrs MacStinger asserting those finest emotions of our nature, in
preference to weakly gratifying her curiosity, shook and buffeted Alexander
both before and during the application of the paving-stone, and took no
further notice of the strangers.
'I beg your pardon, Ma'am,' said Florence, when the child had found his
breath again, and was using it. 'Is this Captain Cuttle's house?'
'No,' said Mrs MacStinger.
'Not Number Nine?' asked Florence, hesitating.
'Who said it wasn't Number Nine?' said Mrs MacStinger.
Susan Nipper instantly struck in, and begged to inquire what Mrs
MacStinger meant by that, and if she knew whom she was talking to.
Mrs MacStinger in retort, looked at her all over. 'What do you want
with Captain Cuttle, I should wish to know?' said Mrs MacStinger.
'Should you? Then I'm sorry that you won't be satisfied,' returned Miss
Nipper.
'Hush, Susan! If you please!' said Florence. 'Perhaps you can have the
goodness to tell us where Captain Cutlle lives, Ma'am as he don't live
here.'
'Who says he don't live here?' retorted the implacable MacStinger. 'I
said it wasn't Cap'en Cuttle's house - and it ain't his house -and forbid
it, that it ever should be his house - for Cap'en Cuttle don't know how to
keep a house - and don't deserve to have a house - it's my house - and when
I let the upper floor to Cap'en Cuttle, oh I do a thankless thing, and cast
pearls before swine!'
Mrs MacStinger pitched her voice for the upper windows in offering
these remarks, and cracked off each clause sharply by itself as if from a
rifle possessing an infinity of barrels. After the last shot, the Captain's
voice was heard to say, in feeble remonstrance from his own room, 'Steady
below!'
'Since you want Cap'en Cuttle, there he is!' said Mrs MacStinger, with
an angry motion of her hand. On Florence making bold to enter, without any
more parley, and on Susan following, Mrs MacStinger recommenced her
pedestrian exercise in pattens, and Alexander MacStinger (still on the
paving-stone), who had stopped in his crying to attend to the conversation,
began to wail again, entertaining himself during that dismal performance,
which was quite mechanical, with a general survey of the prospect,
terminating in the hackney-coach.
The Captain in his own apartment was sitting with his hands in his
pockets and his legs drawn up under his chair, on a very small desolate
island, lying about midway in an ocean of soap and water. The Captain's
windows had been cleaned, the walls had been cleaned, the stove had been
cleaned, and everything the stove excepted, was wet, and shining with soft
soap and sand: the smell of which dry-saltery impregnated the air. In the
midst of the dreary scene, the Captain, cast away upon his island, looked
round on the waste of waters with a rueful countenance, and seemed waiting
for some friendly bark to come that way, and take him off.
But when the Captain, directing his forlorn visage towards the door,
saw Florence appear with her maid, no words can describe his astonishment.
Mrs MacStinger's eloquence having rendered all other sounds but imperfectly
distinguishable, he had looked for no rarer visitor than the potboy or the
milkman; wherefore, when Florence appeared, and coming to the confines of
the island, put her hand in his, the Captain stood up, aghast, as if he
supposed her, for the moment, to be some young member of the Flying
Dutchman's family.'
Instantly recovering his self-possession, however, the Captain's first
care was to place her on dry land, which he happily accomplished, with one
motion of his arm. Issuing forth, then, upon the main, Captain Cuttle took
Miss Nipper round the waist, and bore her to the island also. Captain
Cuttle, then, with great respect and admiration, raised the hand of Florence
to his lips, and standing off a little(for the island was not large enough
for three), beamed on her from the soap and water like a new description of
Triton.
'You are amazed to see us, I am sure,'said Florence, with a smile.
The inexpressibly gratified Captain kissed his hook in reply, and
growled, as if a choice and delicate compliment were included in the words,
'Stand by! Stand by!'
'But I couldn't rest,' said Florence, 'without coming to ask you what
you think about dear Walter - who is my brother now- and whether there is
anything to fear, and whether you will not go and console his poor Uncle
every day, until we have some intelligence of him?'
At these words Captain Cuttle, as by an involuntary gesture, clapped
his hand to his head, on which the hard glazed hat was not, and looked
discomfited.
'Have you any fears for Walter's safety?' inquired Florence, from whose
face the Captain (so enraptured he was with it) could not take his eyes:
while she, in her turn, looked earnestly at him, to be assured of the
sincerity of his reply.
'No, Heart's-delight,' said Captain Cuttle, 'I am not afeard. Wal'r is
a lad as'll go through a deal o' hard weather. Wal'r is a lad as'll bring as
much success to that 'ere brig as a lad is capable on. Wal'r,' said the
Captain, his eyes glistening with the praise of his young friend, and his
hook raised to announce a beautiful quotation, 'is what you may call a
out'ard and visible sign of an in'ard and spirited grasp, and when found
make a note of.'
Florence, who did not quite understand this, though the Captain
evidentllty thought it full of meaning, and highly satisfactory, mildly
looked to him for something more.
'I am not afeard, my Heart's-delight,' resumed the Captain, 'There's
been most uncommon bad weather in them latitudes, there's no denyin', and
they have drove and drove and been beat off, may be t'other side the world.
But the ship's a good ship, and the lad's a good lad; and it ain't easy,
thank the Lord,' the Captain made a little bow, 'to break up hearts of oak,
whether they're in brigs or buzzums. Here we have 'em both ways, which is
bringing it up with a round turn, and so I ain't a bit afeard as yet.'
'As yet?' repeated Florence.
'Not a bit,' returned the Captain, kissing his iron hand; 'and afore I
begin to be, my Hearts-delight, Wal'r will have wrote home from the island,
or from some port or another, and made all taut and shipsahape'And with
regard to old Sol Gills, here the Captain became solemn, 'who I'll stand by,
and not desert until death do us part, and when the stormy winds do blow, do
blow, do blow - overhaul the Catechism,' said the Captain parenthetically,
'and there you'll find them expressions - if it would console Sol Gills to
have the opinion of a seafaring man as has got a mind equal to any
undertaking that he puts it alongside of, and as was all but smashed in
his'prenticeship, and of which the name is Bunsby, that 'ere man shall give
him such an opinion in his own parlour as'll stun him. Ah!' said Captain
Cuttle, vauntingly, 'as much as if he'd gone and knocked his head again a
door!'
'Let us take this ~gentleman to see him, and let us hear what he says,'
cried Florence. 'Will you go with us now? We have a coach here.'
Again the Captain clapped his hand to his head, on which the hard
glazed hat was not, and looked discomfited. But at this instant a most
remarkable phenomenon occurred. The door opening, without any note of
preparation, and apparently of itself, the hard glazed hat in question
skimmed into the room like a bird, and alighted heavily at the Captain's
feet. The door then shut as violently as it had opened, and nothIng ensued
in explanation of the prodigy.
Captain Cuttle picked up his hat, and having turned it over with a look
of interest and welcome, began to polish it on his sleeve' While doing so,
the Captain eyed his visitors intently, and said in a low voice
'You see I should have bore down on Sol Gills yesterday, and this
morning, but she - she took it away and kep it. That's the long and short
ofthe subject.'
'Who did, for goodness sake?' asked Susan Nipper.
'The lady of the house, my dear,'returned the Captain, in a gruff
whisper, and making signals of secrecy.'We had some words about the swabbing
of these here planks, and she - In short,' said the Captain, eyeing the
door, and relieving himself with a long breath, 'she stopped my liberty.'
'Oh! I wish she had me to deal with!' said Susan, reddening with the
energy of the wish. 'I'd stop her!'
'Would you, do you, my dear?' rejoined the Captain, shaking his head
doubtfully, but regarding the desperate courage of the fair aspirant with
obvious admiration. 'I don't know. It's difficult navigation. She's very
hard to carry on with, my dear. You never can tell how she'll head, you see.
She's full one minute, and round upon you next. And when she in a tartar,'
said the Captain, with the perspiration breaking out upon his forehead.
There was nothing but a whistle emphatic enough for the conclusion of the
sentence, so the Captain whistled tremulously. After which he again shook
his head, and recurring to his admiration of Miss Nipper's devoted bravery,
timidly repeated, 'Would you, do you think, my dear?'
Susan only replied with a bridling smile, but that was so very full of
defiance, that there is no knowing how long Captain Cuttle might have stood
entranced in its contemplation, if Florence in her anxiety had not again
proposed their immediately resorting to the oracular Bunsby. Thus reminded
of his duty, Captain Cuttle Put on the glazed hat firmly, took up another
knobby stick, with which he had supplied the place of that one given to
Walter, and offering his arm to Florence, prepared to cut his way through
the enemy.
It turned out, however, that Mrs MacStinger had already changed her
course, and that she headed, as the Captain had remarked she often did, in
quite a new direction. For when they got downstairs, they found that
exemplary woman beating the mats on the doorsteps, with Alexander, still
upon the paving-stone, dimly looming through a fog of dust; and so absorbed
was Mrs MacStinger in her household occupation, that when Captain Cuttle and
his visitors passed, she beat the harder, and neither by word nor gesture
showed any consciousness of their vicinity. The Captain was so well pleased
with this easy escape - although the effect of the door-mats on him was like
a copious administration of snuff, and made him sneeze until the tears ran
down his face - that he could hardly believe his good fortune; but more than
once, between the door and the hackney-coach, looked over his shoulder, with
an obvious apprehension of Mrs MacStinger's giving chase yet.
However, they got to the corner of Brig Place without any molestation
from that terrible fire-ship; and the Captain mounting the coach-box - for
his gallantry would not allow him to ride inside with the ladies, though
besought to do so - piloted the driver on his course for Captain Bunsby's
vessel, which was called the Cautious Clara, and was lying hard by
Ratcliffe.
Arrived at the wharf off which this great commander's ship was jammed
in among some five hundred companions, whose tangled rigging looked like
monstrous cobwebs half swept down, Captain Cuttle appeared at the
coach-window, and invited Florence and Miss Nipper to accompany him on
board; observing that Bunsby was to the last degree soft-hearted in respect
of ladies, and that nothing would so much tend to bring his expansive
intellect into a state of harmony as their presentation to the Cautious
Clara.
Florence readily consented; and the Captain, taking her little hand in
his prodigious palm, led her, with a mixed expression of patronage,
paternity, pride, and ceremony, that was pleasant to see, over several very
dirty decks, until, coming to the Clara, they found that cautious craft
(which lay outside the tier) with her gangway removed, and half-a-dozen feet
of river interposed between herself and her nearest neighbour. It appeared,
from Captain Cuttle's explanation, that the great Bunsby, like himself, was
cruelly treated by his landlady, and that when her usage of him for the time
being was so hard that he could bear it no longer, he set this gulf between
them as a last resource.
'Clara a-hoy!' cried the Captain, putting a hand to each side of his
mouth.
'A-hoy!' cried a boy, like the Captain's echo, tumbling up from below.
'Bunsby aboard?' cried the Captain, hailing the boy in a stentorian
voice, as if he were half-a-mile off instead of two yards.
'Ay, ay!' cried the boy, in the same tone.
The boy then shoved out a plank to Captain Cuttle, who adjusted it
carefully, and led Florence across: returning presently for Miss Nipper. So
they stood upon the deck of the Cautious Clara, in whose standing rigging,
divers fluttering articles of dress were curing, in company with a few
tongues and some mackerel.
Immediately there appeared, coming slowly up above the bulk-head of the
cabin, another bulk-head 'human, and very large - with one stationary eye in
the mahogany face, and one revolving one, on the principle of some
lighthouses. This head was decorated with shaggy hair, like oakum,' which
had no governing inclination towards the north, east, west, or south, but
inclined to all four quarters of the compass, and to every point upon it.
The head was followed by a perfect desert of chin, and by a shirt-collar and
neckerchief, and by a dreadnought pilot-coat, and by a pair of dreadnought
pilot-trousers, whereof the waistband was so very broad and high, that it
became a succedaneum for a waistcoat: being ornamented near the wearer's
breastbone with some massive wooden buttons, like backgammon men. As the
lower portions of these pantaloons became revealed, Bunsby stood confessed;
his hands in their pockets, which were of vast size; and his gaze directed,
not to Captain Cuttle or the ladies, but the mast-head.
The profound appearance of this philosopher, who was bulky and strong,
and on whose extremely red face an expression of taciturnity sat enthroned,
not inconsistent with his character, in which that quality was proudly
conspicuous, almost daunted Captain Cuttle, though on familiar terms with
him. Whispering to Florence that Bunsby had never in his life expressed
surprise, and was considered not to know what it meant, the Captain watched
him as he eyed his mast-head, and afterwards swept the horizon; and when the
revolving eye seemed to be coming round in his direction, said:
'Bunsby, my lad, how fares it?'
A deep, gruff, husky utterance, which seemed to have no connexion with
Bunsby, and certainly had not the least effect upon his face, replied, 'Ay,
ay, shipmet, how goes it?' At the same time Bunsby's right hand and arm,
emerging from a pocket, shook the Captain's, and went back again.
'Bunsby,' said the Captain, striking home at once, 'here you are; a man
of mind, and a man as can give an opinion. Here's a young lady as wants to
take that opinion, in regard of my friend Wal'r; likewise my t'other friend,
Sol Gills, which is a character for you to come within hail of, being a man
of science, which is the mother of inwention, and knows no law. Bunsby, will
you wear, to oblige me, and come along with us?'
The great commander, who seemed by expression of his visage to be
always on the look-out for something in the extremest distance' and to have
no ocular knowledge of any anng' within ten miles, made no reply whatever.
'Here is a man,' said the Captain, addressing himself to his fair
auditors, and indicating the commander with his outstretched hook, 'that has
fell down, more than any man alive; that has had more accidents happen to
his own self than the Seamen's Hospital to all hands; that took as many
spars and bars and bolts about the outside of his head when he was young, as
you'd want a order for on Chatham-yard to build a pleasure yacht with; and
yet that his opinions in that way, it's my belief, for there ain't nothing
like 'em afloat or ashore.'
The stolid commander appeared by a very slight vibration in his elbows,
to express some satisfitction in this encomium; but if his face had been as
distant as his gaze was, it could hardIy have enlightened the beholders less
in reference to anything that was passing in his thoughts.
'Shipmate,' said Bunsby, all of a sudden, and stooping down to look out
under some interposing spar, 'what'll the ladies drink?'
Captain Cuttle, whose delicacy was shocked by such an inquiry in
connection with Florence, drew the sage aside, and seeming to explain in his
ear, accompanied him below; where, that he might not take offence, the
Captain drank a dram himself' which Florence and Susan, glancing down the
open skylight, saw the sage, with difficulty finding room for himself
between his berth and a very little brass fireplace, serve out for self and
friend. They soon reappeared on deck, and Captain Cuttle, triumphing in the
success of his enterprise, conducted Florence back to the coach, while
Bunsby followed, escorting Miss Nipper, whom he hugged upon the way (much to
that young lady's indignation) with his pilot-coated arm, like a blue bear.
The Captain put his oracle inside, and gloried so much in having
secured him, and having got that mind into a hackney-coach, that he could
not refrain from often peeping in at Florence through the little window
behind the driver, and testifiing his delight in smiles, and also in taps
upon his forehead, to hint to her that the brain of Bunsby was hard at it'
In the meantime, Bunsby, still hugging Miss Nipper (for his friend, the
Captain, had not exaggerated the softness of his heart), uniformily
preserved his gravity of deportment, and showed no other consciousness of
her or anything.
Uncle Sol, who had come home, received them at the door, and ushered
them immediately into the little back parlour: strangely altered by the
absence of Walter. On the table, and about the room, were the charts and
maps on which the heavy-hearted Instrument-maker had again and again tracked
the missing vessel across the sea, and on which, with a pair of compasses
that he still had in his hand, he had been measuring, a minute before, how
far she must have driven, to have driven here or there: and trying to
demonstrate that a long time must elapse before hope was exhausted.
'Whether she can have run,' said Uncle Sol, looking wistfully over the
chart; 'but no, that's almost impossible or whether she can have been forced
by stress of weather, - but that's not reasonably likely. Or whether there
is any hope she so far changed her course as - but even I can hardly hope
that!' With such broken suggestions, poor old Uncle Sol roamed over the
great sheet before him, and could not find a speck of hopeful probability in
it large enough to set one small point of the compasses upon.
Florence saw immediately - it would have been difficult to help seeing
- that there was a singular, indescribable change in the old man, and that
while his manner was far more restless and unsettled than usual, there was
yet a curious, contradictory decision in it, that perplexed her very much.
She fancied once that he spoke wildly, and at random; for on her saying she
regretted not to have seen him when she had been there before that morning,
he at first replied that he had been to see her, and directly afterwards
seemed to wish to recall that answer.
'You have been to see me?' said Florence. 'To-day?'
'Yes, my dear young lady,' returned Uncle Sol, looking at her and away
from her in a confused manner. 'I wished to see you with my own eyes, and to
hear you with my own ears, once more before - ' There he stopped.
'Before when? Before what?' said Florence, putting her hand upon his
arm.
'Did I say "before?"' replied old Sol. 'If I did, I must have meant
before we should have news of my dear boy.'
'You are not well,' said Florence, tenderly. 'You have been so very
anxious I am sure you are not well.'
'I am as well,' returned the old man, shutting up his right hand, and
holding it out to show her: 'as well and firm as any man at my time of life
can hope to be. See! It's steady. Is its master not as capable of resolution
and fortitude as many a younger man? I think so. We shall see.'
There was that in his manner more than in his words, though they
remained with her too, which impressed Florence so much, that she would have
confided her uneasiness to Captain Cuttle at that moment, if the Captain had
not seized that moment for expounding the state of circumstance, on which
the opinion of the sagacious Bunsby was requested, and entreating that
profound authority to deliver the same.
Bunsby, whose eye continued to be addressed to somewhere about the
half-way house between London and Gravesend, two or three times put out his
rough right arm, as seeking to wind it for inspiration round the fair form
of Miss Nipper; but that young female having withdrawn herself, in
displeasure, to the opposite side of the table, the soft heart of the
Commander of the Cautious Clara met with no response to its impulses. After
sundry failures in this wise, the Commander, addressing himself to nobody,
thus spake; or rather the voice within him said of its own accord, and quite
independent of himself, as if he were possessed by a gruff spirit:
'My name's Jack Bunsby!'
'He was christened John,' cried the delighted Captain Cuttle. 'Hear
him!'
'And what I says,' pursued the voice, after some deliberation, 'I
stands to.
The Captain, with Florence on his arm, nodded at the auditory, and
seemed to say, 'Now he's coming out. This is what I meant when I brought
him.'
'Whereby,' proceeded the voice, 'why not? If so, what odds? Can any man
say otherwise? No. Awast then!'
When it had pursued its train of argument to this point, the voice
stopped, and rested. It then proceeded very slowly, thus:
'Do I believe that this here Son and Heir's gone down, my lads? Mayhap.
Do I say so? Which? If a skipper stands out by Sen' George's Channel, making
for the Downs, what's right ahead of him? The Goodwins. He isn't foroed to
run upon the Goodwins, but he may. The bearings of this observation lays in
the application on it. That ain't no part of my duty. Awast then, keep a
bright look-out for'ard, and good luck to you!'
The voice here went out of the back parlour and into the street, taking
the Commander of the Cautious Clara with it, and accompanying him on board
again with all convenient expedition, where he immediately turned in, and
refreshed his mind with a nap.
The students of the sage's precepts, left to their own application of
his wisdom - upon a principle which was the main leg of the Bunsby tripod,
as it is perchance of some other oracular stools - looked upon one another
in a little uncertainty; while Rob the Grinder, who had taken the innocent
freedom of peering in, and listening, through the skylight in the roof, came
softly down from the leads, in a state of very dense confusion. Captain
Cuttle, however, whose admiration of Bunsby was, if possible, enhanced by
the splendid manner in which he had justified his reputation and come
through this solemn reference, proceeded to explain that Bunsby meant
nothing but confidence; that Bunsby had no misgivings; and that such an
opinion as that man had given, coming from such a mind as his, was Hope's
own anchor, with good roads to cast it in. Florence endeavoured to believe
that the Captain was right; but the Nipper, with her arms tight folded,
shook her head in resolute denial, and had no more trust m Bunsby than in Mr
Perch himself.
The philosopher seemed to have left Uncle Sol pretty much where he had
found him, for he still went roaming about the watery world, compasses in
hand, and discovering no rest for them. It was in pursuance of a whisper in
his ear from Florence, while the old man was absorbed in this pursuit, that
Captain Cuttle laid his heavy hand upon his shoulder.
'What cheer, Sol Gills?' cried the Captain, heartily.
'But so-so, Ned,' returned the Instrument-maker. 'I have been
remembering, all this afternoon, that on the very day when my boy entered
Dombey's House, and came home late to dinner, sitting just there where you
stand, we talked of storm and shipwreck, and I could hardly turn him from
the subject'
But meeting the eyes of Florence, which were fixed with earnest
scrutiny upon his face, the old man stopped and smiled.
'Stand by, old friend!' cried the Captain. 'Look alive! I tell you
what, Sol Gills; arter I've convoyed Heart's-delight safe home,' here the
Captain kissed his hook to Florence, 'I'll come back and take you in tow for
the rest of this blessed day. You'll come and eat your dinner along with me,
Sol, somewheres or another.'
'Not to-day, Ned!' said the old man quickly, and appearing to be
unaccountably startled by the proposition. 'Not to-day. I couldn't do it!'
'Why not?' returned the Captain, gazing at him in astonishment.
'I - I have so much to do. I - I mean to think of, and arrange. I
couldn't do it, Ned, indeed. I must go out again, and be alone, and turn my
mind to many things to-day.'
The Captain looked at the Instrument-maker, and looked at Florence, and
again at the Instrument-maker. 'To-morrow, then,' he suggested, at last.
'Yes, yes. To-morrow,' said the old man. 'Think of me to-morrow. Say
to-morrow.'
'I shall come here early, mind, Sol Gills,' stipulated the Captain.
'Yes, yes. The first thing tomorrow morning,' said old Sol; 'and now
good-bye, Ned Cuttle, and God bless you!'
Squeezing both the Captain's hands, with uncommon fervour, as he said
it, the old man turned to Florence, folded hers in his own, and put them to
his lips; then hurried her out to the coach with very singular
precipitation. Altogether, he made such an effect on Captain Cuttle that the
Captain lingered behind, and instructed Rob to be particularly gentle and
attentive to his master until the morning: which injunction he strengthened
with the payment of one shilling down, and the promise of another sixpence
before noon next day. This kind office performed, Captain Cuttle, who
considered himself the natural and lawful body-guard of Florence, mounted
the box with a mighty sense of his trust, and escorted her home. At parting,
he assured her that he would stand by Sol Gills, close and true; and once
again inquired of Susan Nipper, unable to forget her gallant words in
reference to Mrs MacStinger, 'Would you, do you think my dear, though?'
When the desolate house had closed upon the two, the Captain's thoughts
reverted to the old Instrument-maker, and he felt uncomfortable. Therefore,
instead of going home, he walked up and down the street several times, and,
eking out his leisure until evening, dined late at a certain angular little
tavern in the City, with a public parlour like a wedge, to which glazed hats
much resorted. The Captain's principal intention was to pass Sol Gills's,
after dark, and look in through the window: which he did, The parlour door
stood open, and he could see his old friend writing busily and steadily at
the table within, while the little Midshipman, already sheltered from the
night dews, watched him from the counter; under which Rob the Grinder made
his own bed, preparatory to shutting the shop. Reassured by the tranquillity
that reigned within the precincts of the wooden mariner, the Captain headed
for Brig Place, resolving to weigh anchor betimes in the morning.
The Study of a Loving Heart
Sir Barnet and Lady Skettles, very good people, resided in a pretty
villa at Fulham, on the banks of the Thames; which was one of the most
desirable residences in the world when a rowing-match happened to be going
past, but had its little inconveniences at other times, among which may be
enumerated the occasional appearance of the river in the drawing-room, and
the contemporaneous disappearance of the lawn and shrubbery.
Sir Barnet Skettles expressed his personal consequence chiefly through
an antique gold snuffbox, and a ponderous silk pocket-kerchief, which he had
an imposing manner of drawing out of his pocket like a banner and using with
both hands at once. Sir Barnet's object in life was constantly to extend the
range of his acquaintance. Like a heavy body dropped into water - not to
disparage so worthy a gentleman by the comparison - it was in the nature of
things that Sir Barnet must spread an ever widening circle about him, until
there was no room left. Or, like a sound in air, the vibration of which,
according to the speculation of an ingenious modern philosopher, may go on
travelling for ever through the interminable fields of space, nothing but
coming to the end of his moral tether could stop Sir Barnet Skettles in his
voyage of discovery through the social system.
Sir Barnet was proud of making people acquainted with people. He liked
the thing for its own sake, and it advanced his favourite object too. For
example, if Sir Barnet had the good fortune to get hold of a law recruit, or
a country gentleman, and ensnared him to his hospitable villa, Sir Barnet
would say to him, on the morning after his arrival, 'Now, my dear Sir, is
there anybody you would like to know? Who is there you would wish to meet?
Do you take any interest in writing people, or in painting or sculpturing
people, or in acting people, or in anything of that sort?' Possibly the
patient answered yes, and mentioned somebody, of whom Sir Barnet had no more
personal knowledge than of Ptolemy the Great. Sir Barnet replied, that
nothing on earth was easier, as he knew him very well: immediately called on
the aforesaid somebody, left his card, wrote a short note, - 'My dear Sir -
penalty of your eminent position - friend at my house naturally desirous -
Lady Skettles and myself participate - trust that genius being superior to
ceremonies, you will do us the distinguished favour of giving us the
pleasure,' etc, etc. - and so killed a brace of birds with one stone, dead
as door-nails.
With the snuff-box and banner in full force, Sir Barnet Skettles
propounded his usual inquiry to Florence on the first morning of her visit.
When Florence thanked him, and said there was no one in particular whom she
desired to see, it was natural she should think with a pang, of poor lost
Walter. When Sir Barnet Skettles, urging his kind offer, said, 'My dear Miss
Dombey, are you sure you can remember no one whom your good Papa - to whom I
beg you present the best compliments of myself and Lady Skettles when you
write - might wish you to know?' it was natural, perhaps, that her poor head
should droop a little, and that her voice should tremble as it softly
answered in the negative.
Skettles Junior, much stiffened as to his cravat, and sobered down as
to his spirits' was at home for the holidays, and appeared to feel himself
aggrieved by the solicitude of his excellent mother that he should be
attentive to Florence. Another and a deeper injury under which the soul of
young Barnet chafed, was the company of Dr and Mrs Blimber, who had been
invited on a visit to the paternal roof-tree, and of whom the young
gentleman often said he would have preferred their passing the vacation at
Jericho.
'Is there anybody you can suggest now, Doctor Blimber?' said Sir Barnet
Skettles, turning to that gentleman.
'You are very kind, Sir Barnet,' returned Doctor Blimber. 'Really I am
not aware that there is, in particular. I like to know my fellow-men in
general, Sir Barnet. What does Terence say? Anyone who is the parent of a
son is interesting to me.
'Has Mrs Blimber any wish to see any remarkable person?' asked Sir
Barnet, courteously.
Mrs Blimber replied, with a sweet smile and a shake of her sky-blue
cap, that if Sir Barnet could have made her known to Cicero, she would have
troubled him; but such an introduction not being feasible, and she already
enjoying the friendship of himself and his amiable lady, and possessing with
the Doctor her husband their joint confidence in regard to their dear son -
here young Barnet was observed to curl his nose - she asked no more.
Sir Barnet was fain, under these circumstances, to content himself for
the time with the company assembled. Florence was glad of that; for she had
a study to pursue among them, and it lay too near her heart, and was too
precious and momentous, to yield to any other interest.
There were some children staying in the house. Children who were as
frank and happy with fathers and with mothers as those rosy faces opposite
home. Children who had no restraint upon their love. and freely showed it.
Florence sought to learn their secret; sought to find out what it was she
had missed; what simple art they knew, and she knew not; how she could be
taught by them to show her father that she loved him, and to win his love
again.
Many a day did Florence thoughtfully observe these children. On many a
bright morning did she leave her bed when the glorious sun rose, and walking
up and down upon the river's bank' before anyone in the house was stirring,
look up at the windows of their rooms, and think of them, asleep, so gently
tended and affectionately thought of. Florence would feel more lonely then,
than in the great house all alone; and would think sometimes that she was
better there than here, and that there was greater peace in hiding herself
than in mingling with others of her age, and finding how unlike them all she
was. But attentive to her study, though it touched her to the quick at every
little leaf she turned in the hard book, Florence remained among them, and
tried with patient hope, to gain the knowledge that she wearied for.
Ah! how to gain it! how to know the charm in its beginning! There were
daughters here, who rose up in the morning, and lay down to rest at night,
possessed of fathers' hearts already. They had no repulse to overcome, no
coldness to dread, no frown to smooth away. As the morning advanced, and the
windows opened one by one, and the dew began to dry upon the flowers and and
youthful feet began to move upon the lawn, Florence, glancing round at the
bright faces, thought what was there she could learn from these children? It
was too late to learn from them; each could approach her father fearlessly,
and put up her lips to meet the ready kiss, and wind her arm about the neck
that bent down to caress her. She could not begin by being so bold. Oh!
could it be that there was less and less hope as she studied more and more!
She remembered well, that even the old woman who had robbed her when a
little child - whose image and whose house, and all she had said and done,
were stamped upon her recollection, with the enduring sharpness of a fearful
impression made at that early period of life - had spoken fondly of her
daughter, and how terribly even she had cried out in the pain of hopeless
separation from her child But her own mother, she would think again, when
she recalled this, had loved her well. Then, sometimes, when her thoughts
reverted swiftly to the void between herself and her father, Florence would
tremble, and the tears would start upon her face, as she pictured to herself
her mother living on, and coming also to dislike her, because of her wanting
the unknown grace that should conciliate that father naturally, and had
never done so from her cradle She knew that this imagination did wrong to
her mother's memory, and had no truth in it, or base to rest upon; and yet
she tried so hard to justify him, and to find the whole blame in herself,
that she could not resist its passing, like a wild cloud, through the
distance of her mind.
There came among the other visitors, soon after Florence, one beautiful
girl, three or four years younger than she, who was an orphan child, and who
was accompanied by her aunt, a grey-haired lady, who spoke much to Florence,
and who greatly liked (but that they all did) to hear her sing of an
evening, and would always sit near her at that time, with motherly interest.
They had only been two days in the house, when Florence, being in an arbour
in the garden one warm morning, musingly observant of a youthful group upon
the turf, through some intervening boughs, - and wreathing flowers for the
head of one little creature among them who was the pet and plaything of the
rest, heard this same lady and her niece, in pacing up and down a sheltered
nook close by, speak of herself.
'Is Florence an orphan like me, aunt?' said the child.
'No, my love. She has no mother, but her father is living.'
'Is she in mourning for her poor Mama, now?' inquired the child
quickly.
'No; for her only brother.'
'Has she no other brother?'
'None.'
'No sister?'
'None,'
'I am very, very sorry!' said the little girL
As they stopped soon afterwards to watch some boats, and had been
silent in the meantime, Florence, who had risen when she heard her name, and
had gathered up her flowers to go and meet them, that they might know of her
being within hearing, resumed her seat and work, expecting to hear no more;
but the conversation recommenced next moment.
'Florence is a favourite with everyone here, and deserves to be, I am
sure,' said the child, earnestly. 'Where is her Papa?'
The aunt replied, after a moment's pause, that she did not know. Her
tone of voice arrested Florence, who had started from her seat again; and
held her fastened to the spot, with her work hastily caught up to her bosom,
and her two hands saving it from being scattered on the ground.
'He is in England, I hope, aunt?' said the child.
'I believe so. Yes; I know he is, indeed.'
'Has he ever been here?'
'I believe not. No.'
'Is he coming here to see her?'
'I believe not.
'Is he lame, or blind, or ill, aunt?' asked the child.
The flowers that Florence held to her breast began to fall when she
heard those words, so wonderingly spoke She held them closer; and her face
hung down upon them'
'Kate,' said the lady, after another moment of silence, 'I will tell
you the whole truth about Florence as I have heard it, and believe it to be.
Tell no one else, my dear, because it may be little known here, and your
doing so would give her pain.'
'I never will!' exclaimed the child.
'I know you never will,' returned the lady. 'I can trust you as myself.
I fear then, Kate, that Florence's father cares little for her, very seldom
sees her, never was kind to her in her life, and now quite shuns her and
avoids her. She would love him dearly if he would suffer her, but he will
not - though for no fault of hers; and she is greatly to be loved and pitied
by all gentle hearts.'
More of the flowers that Florence held fell scattering on the ground;
those that remained were wet, but not with dew; and her face dropped upon
her laden hands.
'Poor Florence! Dear, good Florence!' cried the child.
'Do you know why I have told you this, Kate?' said the lady.
'That I may be very kind to her, and take great care to try to please
her. Is that the reason, aunt?'
'Partly,' said the lady, 'but not all. Though we see her so cheerful;
with a pleasant smile for everyone; ready to oblige us all, and bearing her
part in every amusement here: she can hardly be quite happy, do you think
she can, Kate?'
'I am afraid not,' said the little girl.
'And you can understand,' pursued the lady, 'why her observation of
children who have parents who are fond of them, and proud of them - like
many here, just now - should make her sorrowful in secret?'
'Yes, dear aunt,' said the child, 'I understand that very well. Poor
Florence!'
More flowers strayed upon the ground, and those she yet held to her
breast trembled as if a wintry wind were rustling them.
'My Kate,' said the lady, whose voice was serious, but very calm and
sweet, and had so impressed Florence from the first moment of her hearing
it, 'of all the youthful people here, you are her natural and harmless
friend; you have not the innocent means, that happier children have - '
'There are none happier, aunt!' exclaimed the child, who seemed to
cling about her.
'As other children have, dear Kate, of reminding her of her misfortune.
Therefore I would have you, when you try to be her little friend, try all
the more for that, and feel that the bereavement you sustained - thank
Heaven! before you knew its weight- gives you claim and hold upon poor
Florence.'
'But I am not without a parent's love, aunt, and I never have been,'
said the child, 'with you.'
'However that may be, my dear,' returned the lady, 'your misfortune is
a lighter one than Florence's; for not an orphan in the wide world can be so
deserted as the child who is an outcast from a living parent's love.'
The flowers were scattered on the ground like dust; the empty hands
were spread upon the face; and orphaned Florence, shrinking down upon the
ground, wept long and bitterly.
But true of heart and resolute in her good purpose, Florence held to it
as her dying mother held by her upon the day that gave Paul life. He did not
know how much she loved him. However long the time in coming, and however
slow the interval, she must try to bring that knowledge to her father's
heart one day or other. Meantime she must be careful in no thoughtless word,
or look, or burst of feeling awakened by any chance circumstance, to
complain against him, or to give occasion for these whispers to his
prejudice.
Even in the response she made the orphan child, to whom she was
attracted strongly, and whom she had such occasion to remember, Florence was
mindful of him' If she singled her out too plainly (Florence thought) from
among the rest, she would confirm - in one mind certainly: perhaps in more -
the belief that he was cruel and unnatural. Her own delight was no set-off
to this, 'What she had overheard was a reason, not for soothing herself, but
for saving him; and Florence did it, in pursuance of the study of her heart.
She did so always. If a book were read aloud, and there were anything
in the story that pointed at an unkind father, she was in pain for their
application of it to him; not for herself. So with any trifle of an
interlude that was acted, or picture that was shown, or game that was
played, among them. The occasions for such tenderness towards him were so
many, that her mind misgave her often, it would indeed be better to go back
to the old house, and live again within the shadow of its dull walls,
undisturbed. How few who saw sweet Florence, in her spring of womanhood, the
modest little queen of those small revels, imagined what a load of sacred
care lay heavy in her breast! How few of those who stiffened in her father's
freezing atmosphere, suspected what a heap of fiery coals was piled upon his
head!
Florence pursued her study patiently, and, failing to acquire the
secret of the nameless grace she sought, among the youthful company who were
assembled in the house, often walked out alone, in the early morning, among
the children of the poor. But still she found them all too far advanced to
learn from. They had won their household places long ago, and did not stand
without, as she did, with a bar across the door.
There was one man whom she several times observed at work very early,
and often with a girl of about her own age seated near him' He was a very
poor man, who seemed to have no regular employment, but now went roaming
about the banks of the river when the tide was low, looking out for bits and
scraps in the mud; and now worked at the unpromising little patch of
garden-ground before his cottage; and now tinkered up a miserable old boat
that belonged to him; or did some job of that kind for a neighbour, as
chance occurred. Whatever the man's labour, the girl was never employed; but
sat, when she was with him, in a listless, moping state, and idle.
Florence had often wished to speak to this man; yet she had never taken
courage to do so, as he made no movement towards her. But one morning when
she happened to come upon him suddenly, from a by-path among some pollard
willows which terminated in the little shelving piece of stony ground that
lay between his dwelling and the water, where he was bending over a fire he
had made to caulk the old boat which was lying bottom upwards, close by, he
raised his head at the sound of her footstep, and gave her Good morning.
'Good morning,' said Florence, approaching nearer, 'you are at work
early.'
'I'd be glad to be often at work earlier, Miss, if I had work to do.'
'Is it so hard to get?' asked Florence.
'I find it so,' replied the man.
Florence glanced to where the girl was sitting, drawn together, with
her elbows on her knees, and her chin on her hands, and said:
'Is that your daughter?'
He raised his head quickly, and looking towards the girl with a
brightened face, nodded to her, and said 'Yes,' Florence looked towards her
too, and gave her a kind salutation; the girl muttered something in return,
ungraciously and sullenly.
'Is she in want of employment also?' said Florence.
The man shook his head. 'No, Miss,' he said. 'I work for both,'
'Are there only you two, then?' inquired Florence.
'Only us two,' said the man. 'Her mother his been dead these ten year.
Martha!' lifted up his head again, and whistled to her) 'won't you say a
word to the pretty young lady?'
The girl made an impatient gesture with her cowering shoulders, and
turned her head another way. Ugly, misshapen, peevish, ill-conditioned,
ragged, dirty - but beloved! Oh yes! Florence had seen her father's look
towards her, and she knew whose look it had no likeness to.
'I'm afraid she's worse this morning, my poor girl!' said the man,
suspending his work, and contemplating his ill-favoured child, with a
compassion that was the more tender for being rougher.
'She is ill, then!' said Florence,
The man drew a deep sigh 'I don't believe my Martha's had five short
days' good health,' he answered, looking at her still, 'in as many long
years'
'Ay! and more than that, John,' said a neighbour, who had come down to
help him with the boat.
'More than that, you say, do you?' cried the other, pushing back his
battered hat, and drawing his hand across his forehead. 'Very like. It seems
a long, long time.'
'And the more the time,' pursued the neighbour, 'the more you've
favoured and humoured her, John, till she's got to be a burden to herself,
and everybody else'
'Not to me,' said her father, falling to his work. 'Not to me.'
Florence could feel - who better? - how truly he spoke. She drew a
little closer to him, and would have been glad to touch his rugged hand, and
thank him for his goodness to the miserable object that he looked upon with
eyes so different from any other man's.
'Who would favour my poor girl - to call it favouring - if I didn't?'
said the father.
'Ay, ay,' cried the neighbour. 'In reason, John. But you! You rob
yourself to give to her. You bind yourself hand and foot on her account. You
make your life miserable along of her. And what does she care! You don't
believe she knows it?'
The father lifted up his head again, and whistled to her. Martha made
the same impatient gesture with her crouching shoulders, in reply; and he
was glad and happy.
'Only for that, Miss,' said the neighbour, with a smile, in which there
was more of secret sympathy than he expressed; 'only to get that, he never
lets her out of his sight!'
'Because the day'll come, and has been coming a long while,' observed
the other, bending low over his work, 'when to get half as much from that
unfort'nate child of mine - to get the trembling of a finger, or the waving
of a hair - would be to raise the dead.'
Florence softly put some money near his hand on the old boat, and left
him.
And now Florence began to think, if she were to fall ill, if she were
to fade like her dear brother, would he then know that she had loved him;
would she then grow dear to him; would he come to her bedside, when she was
weak and dim of sight, and take her into his embrace, and cancel all the
past? Would he so forgive her, in that changed condition, for not having
been able to lay open her childish heart to him, as to make it easy to
relate with what emotions she had gone out of his room that night; what she
had meant to say if she had had the courage; and how she had endeavoured,
afterwards, to learn the way she never knew in infancy?
Yes, she thought if she were dying, he would relent. She thought, that
if she lay, serene and not unwilling to depart, upon the bed that was
curtained round with recollections of their darling boy, he would be touched
home, and would say, 'Dear Florence, live for me, and we will love each
other as we might have done, and be as happy as we might have been these
many years!' She thought that if she heard such words from him, and had her
arms clasped round him' she could answer with a smile, 'It is too late for
anything but this; I never could be happier, dear father!' and so leave him,
with a blessing on her lips.
The golden water she remembered on the wall, appeared to Florence, in
the light of such reflections, only as a current flowing on to rest, and to
a region where the dear ones, gone before, were waiting, hand in hand; and
often when she looked upon the darker river rippling at her feet, she
thought with awful wonder, but not terror, of that river which her brother
had so often said was bearing him away.
The father and his sick daughter were yet fresh in Florence's mind,
and, indeed, that incident was not a week old, when Sir Barnet and his lady
going out walking in the lanes one afternoon, proposed to her to bear them
company. Florence readily consenting, Lady Skettles ordered out young Barnet
as a matter of course. For nothing delighted Lady Skettles so much, as
beholding her eldest son with Florence on his arm.
Barnet, to say the truth, appeared to entertain an opposite sentiment
on the subject, and on such occasions frequently expressed himself audibly,
though indefinitely, in reference to 'a parcel of girls.' As it was not easy
to ruffle her sweet temper, however, Florence generally reconciled the young
gentleman to his fate after a few minutes, and they strolled on amicably:
Lady Skettles and Sir Barnet following, in a state of perfect complacency
and high gratification.
This was the order of procedure on the afternoon in question; and
Florence had almost succeeded in overruling the present objections of
Skettles Junior to his destiny, when a gentleman on horseback came riding
by, looked at them earnestly as he passed, drew in his rein, wheeled round,
and came riding back again, hat in hand.
The gentleman had looked particularly at Florence; and when the little
party stopped, on his riding back, he bowed to her, before saluting Sir
Barnet and his lady. Florence had no remembrance of having ever seen him,
but she started involuntarily when he came near her, and drew back.
'My horse is perfectly quiet, I assure you,' said the gentleman.
It was not that, but something in the gentleman himself - Florence
could not have said what - that made her recoil as if she had been stung.
'I have the honour to address Miss Dombey, I believe?' said the
gentleman, with a most persuasive smile. On Florence inclining her head, he
added, 'My name is Carker. I can hardly hope to be remembered by Miss
Dombey, except by name. Carker.'
Florence, sensible of a strange inclination to shiver, though the day
was hot, presented him to her host and hostess; by whom he was very
graciously received.
'I beg pardon,' said Mr Carker, 'a thousand times! But I am going down
tomorrow morning to Mr Dombey, at Leamington, and if Miss Dombey can entrust
me with any commission, need I say how very happy I shall be?'
Sir Barnet immediately divining that Florence would desire to write a
letter to her father, proposed to return, and besought Mr Carker to come
home and dine in his riding gear. Mr Carker had the misfortune to be engaged
to dinner, but if Miss Dombey wished to write, nothing would delight him
more than to accompany them back, and to be her faithful slave in waiting as
long as she pleased. As he said this with his widest smile, and bent down
close to her to pat his horse's neck, Florence meeting his eyes, saw, rather
than heard him say, 'There is no news of the ship!'
Confused, frightened, shrinking from him, and not even sure that he had
said those words, for he seemed to have shown them to her in some
extraordinary manner through his smile, instead of uttering them, Florence
faintly said that she was obliged to him, but she would not write; she had
nothing to say.
'Nothing to send, Miss Dombey?' said the man of teeth.
'Nothing,' said Florence, 'but my - but my dear love- if you please.'
Disturbed as Florence was, she raised her eyes to his face with an
imploring and expressive look, that plainly besought him, if he knew - which
he as plainly did - that any message between her and her father was an
uncommon charge, but that one most of all, to spare her. Mr Carker smiled
and bowed low, and being charged by Sir Barnet with the best compliments of
himself and Lady Skettles, took his leave, and rode away: leaving a
favourable impression on that worthy couple. Florence was seized with such a
shudder as he went, that Sir Barnet, adopting the popular superstition,
supposed somebody was passing over her grave. Mr Carker turning a corner, on
the instant, looked back, and bowed, and disappeared, as if he rode off to
the churchyard straight, to do it.
Strange News of Uncle Sol
Captain Cuttle, though no sluggard, did not turn out so early on the
morning after he had seen Sol Gills, through the shop-window, writing in the
parlour, with the Midshipman upon the counter, and Rob the Grinder making up
his bed below it, but that the clocks struck six as he raised himself on his
elbow, and took a survey of his little chamber. The Captain's eyes must have
done severe duty, if he usually opened them as wide on awaking as he did
that morning; and were but roughly rewarded for their vigilance, if he
generally rubbed them half as hard. But the occasion was no common one, for
Rob the Grinder had certainly never stood in the doorway of Captain Cuttle's
room before, and in it he stood then, panting at the Captain, with a flushed
and touzled air of Bed about him, that greatly heightened both his colour
and expression.
'Holloa!' roared the Captain. 'What's the matter?'
Before Rob could stammer a word in answer, Captain Cuttle turned out,
all in a heap, and covered the boy's mouth with his hand.
'Steady, my lad,' said the Captain, 'don't ye speak a word to me as
yet!'
The Captain, looking at his visitor in great consternation, gently
shouldered him into the next room, after laying this injunction upon him;
and disappearing for a few moments, forthwith returned in the blue suit.
Holding up his hand in token of the injunction not yet being taken off,
Captain Cuttle walked up to the cupboard, and poured himself out a dram; a
counterpart of which he handed to the messenger. The Captain then stood
himself up in a corner, against the wall, as if to forestall the possibility
of being knocked backwards by the communication that was to be made to him;
and having swallowed his liquor, with his eyes fixed on the messenger, and
his face as pale as his face could be, requested him to 'heave ahead.'
'Do you mean, tell you, Captain?' asked Rob, who had been greatly
impressed by these precautions
'Ay!' said the Captain.
'Well, Sir,' said Rob, 'I ain't got much to tell. But look here!'
Rob produced a bundle of keys. The Captain surveyed them, remained in
his corner, and surveyed the messenger.
'And look here!' pursued Rob.
The boy produced a sealed packet, which Captain Cuttle stared at as he
had stared at the keys.
'When I woke this morning, Captain,' said Rob, 'which was about a
quarter after five, I found these on my pillow. The shop-door was unbolted
and unlocked, and Mr Gills gone.'
'Gone!' roared the Captain.
'Flowed, Sir,' returned Rob.
The Captain's voice was so tremendous, and he came out of his corner
with such way on him, that Rob retreated before him into another corner:
holding out the keys and packet, to prevent himself from being run down.
'"For Captain Cuttle," Sir,' cried Rob, 'is on the keys, and on the
packet too. Upon my word and honour, Captain Cuttle, I don't know anything
more about it. I wish I may die if I do! Here's a sitiwation for a lad
that's just got a sitiwation,' cried the unfortunate Grinder, screwing his
cuff into his face: 'his master bolted with his place, and him blamed for
it!'
These lamentations had reference to Captain Cuttle's gaze, or rather
glare, which was full of vague suspicions, threatenings, and denunciations.
Taking the proffered packet from his hand, the Captain opened it and read as
follows:-
'My dear Ned Cuttle. Enclosed is my will!' The Captain turned it over,
with a doubtful look - 'and Testament - Where's the Testament?' said the
Captain, instantly impeaching the ill-fated Grinder. 'What have you done
with that, my lad?'
'I never see it,' whimpered Rob. 'Don't keep on suspecting an innocent
lad, Captain. I never touched the Testament.'
Captain Cuttle shook his head, implying that somebody must be made
answerable for it; and gravely proceeded:
'Which don't break open for a year, or until you have decisive
intelligence of my dear Walter, who is dear to you, Ned, too, I am sure.'
The Captain paused and shook his head in some emotion; then, as a
re-establishment of his dignity in this trying position, looked with
exceeding sternness at the Grinder. 'If you should never hear of me, or see
me more, Ned, remember an old friend as he will remember you to the last -
kindly; and at least until the period I have mentioned has expired, keep a
home in the old place for Walter. There are no debts, the loan from Dombey's
House is paid off and all my keys I send with this. Keep this quiet, and
make no inquiry for me; it is useless. So no more, dear Ned, from your true
friend, Solomon Gills.' The Captain took a long breath, and then read these
words written below: '"The boy Rob, well recommended, as I told you, from
Dombey's House. If all else should come to the hammer, take care, Ned, of
the little Midshipman."'
To convey to posterity any idea of the manner in which the Captain,
after turning this letter over and over, and reading it a score of times,
sat down in his chair, and held a court-martial on the subject in his own
mind, would require the united genius of all the great men, who, discarding
their own untoward days, have determined to go down to posterity, and have
never got there. At first the Captain was too much confounded and distressed
to think of anything but the letter itself; and even when his thoughts began
to glance upon the various attendant facts, they might, perhaps, as well
have occupied themselves with their former theme, for any light they
reflected on them. In this state of mind, Captain Cuttle having the Grinder
before the court, and no one else, found it a great relief to decide,
generally, that he was an object of suspicion: which the Captain so clearly
expressed in his visage, that Rob remonstrated.
'Oh, don't, Captain!' cried the Grinder. 'I wonder how you can! what
have I done to be looked at, like that?'
'My lad,' said Captain Cuttle, 'don't you sing out afore you're hurt.
And don't you commit yourself, whatever you do.'
'I haven't been and committed nothing, Captain!' answered Rob.
'Keep her free, then,' said the Captain, impressively, 'and ride easy.
With a deep sense of the responsibility imposed upon him' and the
necessity of thoroughly fathoming this mysterious affair as became a man in
his relations with the parties, Captain Cuttle resolved to go down and
examine the premises, and to keep the Grinder with him. Considering that
youth as under arrest at present, the Captain was in some doubt whether it
might not be expedient to handcuff him, or tie his ankles together, or
attach a weight to his legs; but not being clear as to the legality of such
formalities, the Captain decided merely to hold him by the shoulder all the
way, and knock him down if he made any objection.
However, he made none, and consequently got to the Instrument-maker's
house without being placed under any more stringent restraint. As the
shutters were not yet taken down, the Captain's first care was to have the
shop opened; and when the daylight was freely admitted, he proceeded, with
its aid, to further investigation.
The Captain's first care was to establish himself in a chair in the
shop, as President of the solemn tribunal that was sitting within him; and
to require Rob to lie down in his bed under the counter, show exactly where
he discovered the keys and packet when he awoke, how he found the door when
he went to try it, how he started off to Brig Place - cautiously preventing
the latter imitation from being carried farther than the threshold - and so
on to the end of the chapter. When all this had been done several times, the
Captain shook his head and seemed to think the matter had a bad look.
Next, the Captain, with some indistinct idea of finding a body,
instituted a strict search over the whole house; groping in the cellars with
a lighted candle, thrusting his hook behind doors, bringing his head into
violent contact with beams, and covering himself with cobwebs. Mounting up
to the old man's bed-room, they found that he had not been in bed on the
previous night, but had merely lain down on the coverlet, as was evident
from the impression yet remaining there.
'And I think, Captain,' said Rob, looking round the room, 'that when Mr
Gills was going in and out so often, these last few days, he was taking
little things away, piecemeal, not to attract attention.'
'Ay!' said the Captain, mysteriously. 'Why so, my lad?'
'Why,' returned Rob, looking about, 'I don't see his shaving tackle.
Nor his brushes, Captain. Nor no shirts. Nor yet his shoes.'
As each of these articles was mentioned, Captain Cuttle took particular
notice of the corresponding department of the Grinder, lest he should appear
to have been in recent use, or should prove to be in present possession
thereof. But Rob had no occasion to shave, was not brushed, and wore the
clothes he had on for a long time past, beyond all possibility of a mistake.
'And what should you say,' said the Captain - 'not committing yourself
- about his time of sheering off? Hey?'
'Why, I think, Captain,' returned Rob, 'that he must have gone pretty
soon after I began to snore.'
'What o'clock was that?' said the Captain, prepared to be very
particular about the exact time.
'How can I tell, Captain!' answered Rob. 'I only know that I'm a heavy
sleeper at first, and a light one towards morning; and if Mr Gills had come
through the shop near daybreak, though ever so much on tiptoe, I'm pretty
sure I should have heard him shut the door at all events.
On mature consideration of this evidence, Captain Cuttle began to think
that the Instrument-maker must have vanished of his own accord; to which
logical conclusion he was assisted by the letter addressed to himself,
which, as being undeniably in the old man's handwriting, would seem, with no
great forcing, to bear the construction, that he arranged of his own will to
go, and so went. The Captain had next to consider where and why? and as
there was no way whatsoever that he saw to the solution of the first
difficulty, he confined his meditations to the second.
Remembering the old man's curious manner, and the farewell he had taken
of him; unaccountably fervent at the time, but quite intelligible now: a
terrible apprehension strengthened on the Captain, that, overpowered by his
anxieties and regrets for Walter, he had been driven to commit suicide.
Unequal to the wear and tear of daily life, as he had often professed
himself to be, and shaken as he no doubt was by the uncertainty and deferred
hope he had undergone, it seemed no violently strained misgiving, but only
too probable. Free from debt, and with no fear for his personal liberty, or
the seizure of his goods, what else but such a state of madness could have
hurried him away alone and secretly? As to his carrying some apparel with
him, if he had really done so - and they were not even sure of that - he
might have done so, the Captain argued, to prevent inquiry, to distract
attention from his probable fate, or to ease the very mind that was now
revolving all these possibilities. Such, reduced into plain language, and
condensed within a small compass, was the final result and substance of
Captain Cuttle's deliberations: which took a long time to arrive at this
pass, and were, like some more public deliberations, very discursive and
disorderly.
Dejected and despondent in the extreme, Captain Cuttle felt it just to
release Rob from the arrest in which he had placed him, and to enlarge him,
subject to a kind of honourable inspection which he still resolved to
exercise; and having hired a man, from Brogley the Broker, to sit in the
shop during their absence, the Captain, taking Rob with him, issued forth
upon a dismal quest after the mortal remains of Solomon Gills.
Not a station-house, or bone-house, or work-house in the metropolis
escaped a visitation from the hard glazed hat. Along the wharves, among the
shipping on the bank-side, up the river, down the river, here, there,
everywhere, it went gleaming where men were thickest, like the hero's helmet
in an epic battle. For a whole week the Captain read of all the found and
missing people in all the newspapers and handbills, and went forth on
expeditions at all hours of the day to identify Solomon Gills, in poor
little ship-boys who had fallen overboard, and in tall foreigners with dark
beards who had taken poison - 'to make sure,' Captain Cuttle said, 'that it
wam't him.' It is a sure thing that it never was, and that the good Captain
had no other satisfaction.
Captain Cuttle at last abandoned these attempts as hopeless, and set
himself to consider what was to be done next. After several new perusals of
his poor friend's letter, he considered that the maintenance of' a home in
the old place for Walter' was the primary duty imposed upon him. Therefore,
the Captain's decision was, that he would keep house on the premises of
Solomon Gills himself, and would go into the instrument-business, and see
what came of it.
But as this step involved the relinquishment of his apartments at Mrs
MacStinger's, and he knew that resolute woman would never hear of his
deserting them, the Captain took the desperate determination of running
away.
'Now, look ye here, my lad,' said the Captain to Rob, when he had
matured this notable scheme, 'to-morrow, I shan't be found in this here
roadstead till night - not till arter midnight p'rhaps. But you keep watch
till you hear me knock, and the moment you do, turn-to, and open the door.'
'Very good, Captain,' said Rob.
'You'll continue to be rated on these here books,' pursued the Captain
condescendingly, 'and I don't say but what you may get promotion, if you and
me should pull together with a will. But the moment you hear me knock
to-morrow night, whatever time it is, turn-to and show yourself smart with
the door.'
'I'll be sure to do it, Captain,' replied Rob.
'Because you understand,' resumed the Captain, coming back again to
enforce this charge upon his mind, 'there may be, for anything I can say, a
chase; and I might be took while I was waiting, if you didn't show yourself
smart with the door.'
Rob again assured the Captain that he would be prompt and wakeful; and
the Captain having made this prudent arrangement, went home to Mrs
MacStinger's for the last time.
The sense the Captain had of its being the last time, and of the awful
purpose hidden beneath his blue waistcoat, inspired him with such a mortal
dread of Mrs MacStinger, that the sound of that lady's foot downstairs at
any time of the day, was sufficient to throw him into a fit of trembling. It
fell out, too, that Mrs MacStinger was in a charming temper - mild and
placid as a house- lamb; and Captain Cuttle's conscience suffered terrible
twinges, when she came up to inquire if she could cook him nothing for his
dinner.
'A nice small kidney-pudding now, Cap'en Cuttle,' said his landlady:
'or a sheep's heart. Don't mind my trouble.'
'No thank'ee, Ma'am,' returned the Captain.
'Have a roast fowl,' said Mrs MacStinger, 'with a bit of weal stuffing
and some egg sauce. Come, Cap'en Cuttle! Give yourself a little treat!'
'No thank'ee, Ma'am,' returned the Captain very humbly.
'I'm sure you're out of sorts, and want to be stimulated,' said Mrs
MacStinger. 'Why not have, for once in a way, a bottle of sherry wine?'
'Well, Ma'am,' rejoined the Captain, 'if you'd be so good as take a
glass or two, I think I would try that. Would you do me the favour, Ma'am,'
said the Captain, torn to pieces by his conscience, 'to accept a quarter's
rent ahead?'
'And why so, Cap'en Cuttle?' retorted Mrs MacStinger - sharply, as the
Captain thought.
The Captain was frightened to dead 'If you would Ma'am,' he said with
submission, 'it would oblige me. I can't keep my money very well. It pays
itself out. I should take it kind if you'd comply.'
'Well, Cap'en Cuttle,' said the unconscious MacStinger, rubbing her
hands, 'you can do as you please. It's not for me, with my family, to
refuse, no more than it is to ask'
'And would you, Ma'am,' said the Captain, taking down the tin canister
in which he kept his cash' from the top shelf of the cupboard, 'be so good
as offer eighteen-pence a-piece to the little family all round? If you could
make it convenient, Ma'am, to pass the word presently for them children to
come for'ard, in a body, I should be glad to see 'em'
These innocent MacStingers were so many daggers to the Captain's
breast, when they appeared in a swarm, and tore at him with the confiding
trustfulness he so little deserved. The eye of Alexander MacStinger, who had
been his favourite, was insupportable to the Captain; the voice of Juliana
MacStinger, who was the picture of her mother, made a coward of him.
Captain Cuttle kept up appearances, nevertheless, tolerably well, and
for an hour or two was very hardly used and roughly handled by the young
MacStingers: who in their childish frolics, did a little damage also to the
glazed hat, by sitting in it, two at a time, as in a nest, and drumming on
the inside of the crown with their shoes. At length the Captain sorrowfully
dismissed them: taking leave of these cherubs with the poignant remorse and
grief of a man who was going to execution.
In the silence of night, the Captain packed up his heavier property in
a chest, which he locked, intending to leave it there, in all probability
for ever, but on the forlorn chance of one day finding a man sufficiently
bold and desperate to come and ask for it. Of his lighter necessaries, the
Captain made a bundle; and disposed his plate about his person, ready for
flight. At the hour of midnight, when Brig Place was buried in slumber, and
Mrs MacStinger was lulled in sweet oblivion, with her infants around her,
the guilty Captain, stealing down on tiptoe, in the dark, opened the door,
closed it softly after him, and took to his heels
Pursued by the image of Mrs MacStinger springing out of bed, and,
regardless of costume, following and bringing him back; pursued also by a
consciousness of his enormous crime; Captain Cuttle held on at a great pace,
and allowed no grass to grow under his feet, between Brig Place and the
Instrument-maker's door. It opened when he knocked - for Rob was on the
watch - and when it was bolted and locked behind him, Captain Cuttle felt
comparatively safe.
'Whew!' cried the Captain, looking round him. 'It's a breather!'
'Nothing the matter, is there, Captain?' cried the gaping Rob.
'No, no!' said Captain Cuttle, after changing colour, and listening to
a passing footstep in the street. 'But mind ye, my lad; if any lady, except
either of them two as you see t'other day, ever comes and asks for Cap'en
Cuttle, be sure to report no person of that name known, nor never heard of
here; observe them orders, will you?'
'I'll take care, Captain,' returned Rob.
'You might say - if you liked,' hesitated the Captain, 'that you'd read
in the paper that a Cap'en of that name was gone to Australia, emigrating,
along with a whole ship's complement of people as had all swore never to
come back no more.
Rob nodded his understanding of these instructions; and Captain Cuttle
promising to make a man of him, if he obeyed orders, dismissed him, yawning,
to his bed under the counter, and went aloft to the chamber of Solomon
Gills.
What the Captain suffered next day, whenever a bonnet passed, or how
often he darted out of the shop to elude imaginary MacStingers, and sought
safety in the attic, cannot be told. But to avoid the fatigues attendant on
this means of self-preservation, the Captain curtained the glass door of
communication between the shop and parlour, on the inside; fitted a key to
it from the bunch that had been sent to him; and cut a small hole of espial
in the wall. The advantage of this fortification is obvious. On a bonnet
appearing, the Captain instantly slipped into his garrison, locked himself
up, and took a secret observation of the enemy. Finding it a false alarm,
the Captain instantly slipped out again. And the bonnets in the street were
so very numerous, and alarms were so inseparable from their appearance, that
the Captain was almost incessantly slipping in and out all day long.
Captain Cuttle found time, however, in the midst of this fatiguing
service to inspect the stock; in connexion with which he had the general
idea (very laborious to Rob) that too much friction could not be bestowed
upon it, and that it could not be made too bright. He also ticketed a few
attractive-looking articles at a venture, at prices ranging from ten
shillings to fifty pounds, and exposed them in the window to the great
astonishment of the public.
After effecting these improvements, Captain Cuttle, surrounded by the
instruments, began to feel scientific: and looked up at the stars at night,
through the skylight, when he was smoking his pipe in the little back
parlour before going to bed, as if he had established a kind of property in
them. As a tradesman in the City, too, he began to have an interest in the
Lord Mayor, and the Sheriffs, and in Public Companies; and felt bound to
read the quotations of the Funds every day, though he was unable to make
out, on any principle of navigation, what the figures meant, and could have
very well dispensed with the fractions. Florence, the Captain waited on,
with his strange news of Uncle Sol, immediately after taking possession of
the Midshipman; but she was away from home. So the Captain sat himself down
in his altered station of life, with no company but Rob the Grinder; and
losing count of time, as men do when great changes come upon them, thought
musingly of Walter, and of Solomon Gills, and even of Mrs MacStinger
herself, as among the things that had been.
Shadows of the Past and Future
'Your most obedient, Sir,' said the Major. 'Damme, Sir, a friend of my
friend Dombey's is a friend of mine, and I'm glad to see you!'
'I am infinitely obliged, Carker,' explained Mr Dombey, 'to Major
Bagstock, for his company and conversation. 'Major Bagstock has rendered me
great service, Carker.'
Mr Carker the Manager, hat in hand, just arrived at Leamington, and
just introduced to the Major, showed the Major his whole double range of
teeth, and trusted he might take the liberty of thanking him with all his
heart for having effected so great an Improvement in Mr Dombey's looks and
spirits'
'By Gad, Sir,' said the Major, in reply, 'there are no thanks due to
me, for it's a give and take affair. A great creature like our friend
Dombey, Sir,' said the Major, lowering his voice, but not lowering it so
much as to render it inaudible to that gentleman, 'cannot help improving and
exalting his friends. He strengthens and invigorates a man, Sir, does
Dombey, in his moral nature.'
Mr Carker snapped at the expression. In his moral nature. Exactly. The
very words he had been on the point of suggesting.
'But when my friend Dombey, Sir,' added the Major, 'talks to you of
Major Bagstock, I must crave leave to set him and you right. He means plain
Joe, Sir - Joey B. - Josh. Bagstock - Joseph- rough and tough Old J., Sir.
At your service.'
Mr Carker's excessively friendly inclinations towards the Major, and Mr
Carker's admiration of his roughness, toughness, and plainness, gleamed out
of every tooth in Mr Carker's head.
'And now, Sir,' said the Major, 'you and Dombey have the devil's own
amount of business to talk over.'
'By no means, Major,' observed Mr Dombey.
'Dombey,' said the Major, defiantly, 'I know better; a man of your mark
- the Colossus of commerce - is not to be interrupted. Your moments are
precious. We shall meet at dinner-time. In the interval, old Joseph will be
scarce. The dinner-hour is a sharp seven, Mr Carker.'
With that, the Major, greatly swollen as to his face, withdrew; but
immediately putting in his head at the door again, said:
'I beg your pardon. Dombey, have you any message to 'em?'
Mr Dombey in some embarrassment, and not without a glance at the
courteous keeper of his business confidence, entrusted the Major with his
compliments.
'By the Lord, Sir,' said the Major, 'you must make it something warmer
than that, or old Joe will be far from welcome.'
'Regards then, if you will, Major,' returned Mr Dombey.
'Damme, Sir,' said the Major, shaking his shoulders and his great
cheeks jocularly: 'make it something warmer than that.'
'What you please, then, Major,' observed Mr Dombey.
'Our friend is sly, Sir, sly, Sir, de-vilish sly,' said the Major,
staring round the door at Carker. 'So is Bagstock.' But stopping in the
midst of a chuckle, and drawing himself up to his full height, the Major
solemnly exclaimed, as he struck himself on the chest, 'Dombey! I envy your
feelings. God bless you!' and withdrew.
'You must have found the gentleman a great resource,' said Carker,
following him with his teeth.
'Very great indeed,' said Mr Dombey.
'He has friends here, no doubt,' pursued Carker. 'I perceive, from what
he has said, that you go into society here. Do you know,' smiling horribly,
'I am so very glad that you go into society!'
Mr Dombey acknowledged this display of interest on the part of his
second in command, by twirling his watch-chain, and slightly moving his
head.
'You were formed for society,' said Carker. 'Of all the men I know, you
are the best adapted, by nature and by position, for society. Do you know I
have been frequently amazed that you should have held it at arm's length so
long!'
'I have had my reasons, Carker. I have been alone, and indifferent to
it. But you have great social qualifications yourself, and are the more
likely to have been surprised.'
'Oh! I!' returned the other, with ready self-disparagement. 'It's quite
another matter in the case of a man like me. I don't come into comparison
with you.'
Mr Dombey put his hand to his neckcloth, settled his chin in it,
coughed, and stood looking at his faithful friend and servant for a few
moments in silence.
'I shall have the pleasure, Carker,' said Mr Dombey at length: making
as if he swallowed something a little too large for his throat: 'to present
you to my - to the Major's friends. Highly agreeable people.'
'Ladies among them, I presume?' insinuated the smooth Manager.
'They are all - that is to say, they are both - ladies,' replied Mr
Dombey.
'Only two?' smiled Carker.
'They are only two. I have confined my visits to their residence, and
have made no other acquaintance here.'
'Sisters, perhaps?' quoth Carker.
'Mother and daughter,' replied Mr Dombey.
As Mr Dombey dropped his eyes, and adjusted his neckcloth again, the
smiling face of Mr Carker the Manager became in a moment, and without any
stage of transition, transformed into a most intent and frowning face,
scanning his closely, and with an ugly sneer. As Mr Dombey raised his eyes,
it changed back, no less quickly, to its old expression, and showed him
every gum of which it stood possessed.
'You are very kind,' said Carker, 'I shall be delighted to know them.
Speaking of daughters, I have seen Miss Dombey.'
There was a sudden rush of blood to Mr Dombey's face.
'I took the liberty of waiting on her,' said Carker, 'to inquire if she
could charge me with any little commission. I am not so fortunate as to be
the bearer of any but her - but her dear love.'
Wolf's face that it was then, with even the hot tongue revealing itself
through the stretched mouth, as the eyes encountered Mr Dombey's!
'What business intelligence is there?' inquired the latter gentleman,
after a silence, during which Mr Carker had produced some memoranda and
other papers.
'There is very little,' returned Carker. 'Upon the whole we have not
had our usual good fortune of late, but that is of little moment to you. At
Lloyd's, they give up the Son and Heir for lost. Well, she was insured, from
her keel to her masthead.'
'Carker,' said Mr Dombey, taking a chair near him, 'I cannot say that
young man, Gay, ever impressed me favourably
'Nor me,' interposed the Manager.
'But I wish,' said Mr Dombey, without heeding the interruption, 'he had
never gone on board that ship. I wish he had never been sent out.
'It is a pity you didn't say so, in good time, is it not?' retorted
Carker, coolly. 'However, I think it's all for the best. I really, think
it's all for the best. Did I mention that there was something like a little
confidence between Miss Dombey and myself?'
'No,' said Mr Dombey, sternly.
'I have no doubt,' returned Mr Carker, after an impressive pause, 'that
wherever Gay is, he is much better where he is, than at home here. If I
were, or could be, in your place, I should be satisfied of that. I am quite
satisfied of it myself. Miss Dombey is confiding and young - perhaps hardly
proud enough, for your daughter - if she have a fault. Not that that is much
though, I am sure. Will you check these balances with me?'
Mr Dombey leaned back in his chair, instead of bending over the papers
that were laid before him, and looked the Manager steadily in the face. The
Manager, with his eyelids slightly raised, affected to be glancing at his
figures, and to await the leisure of his principal. He showed that he
affected this, as if from great delicacy, and with a design to spare Mr
Dombey's feelings; and the latter, as he looked at him, was cognizant of his
intended consideration, and felt that but for it, this confidential Carker
would have said a great deal more, which he, Mr Dombey, was too proud to ask
for. It was his way in business, often. Little by little, Mr Dombey's gaze
relaxed, and his attention became diverted to the papers before him; but
while busy with the occupation they afforded him, he frequently stopped, and
looked at Mr Carker again. Whenever he did so, Mr Carker was demonstrative,
as before, in his delicacy, and impressed it on his great chief more and
more.
While they were thus engaged; and under the skilful culture of the
Manager, angry thoughts in reference to poor Florence brooded and bred in Mr
Dombey's breast, usurping the place of the cold dislike that generally
reigned there; Major Bagstock, much admired by the old ladies of Leamington,
and followed by the Native, carrying the usual amount of light baggage,
straddled along the shady side of the way, to make a morning call on Mrs
Skewton. It being midday when the Major reached the bower of Cleopatra, he
had the good fortune to find his Princess on her usual sofa, languishing
over a cup of coffee, with the room so darkened and shaded for her more
luxurious repose, that Withers, who was in attendance on her, loomed like a
phantom page.
'What insupportable creature is this, coming in?' said Mrs Skewton, 'I
cannot hear it. Go away, whoever you are!'
'You have not the heart to banish J. B., Ma'am!' said the Major halting
midway, to remonstrate, with his cane over his shoulder.
'Oh it's you, is it? On second thoughts, you may enter,' observed
Cleopatra.
The Major entered accordingly, and advancing to the sofa pressed her
charming hand to his lips.
'Sit down,' said Cleopatra, listlessly waving her fan, 'a long way off.
Don't come too near me, for I am frightfully faint and sensitive this
morning, and you smell of the Sun. You are absolutely tropical.'
'By George, Ma'am,' said the Major, 'the time has been when Joseph
Bagstock has been grilled and blistered by the Sun; then time was, when he
was forced, Ma'am, into such full blow, by high hothouse heat in the West
Indies, that he was known as the Flower. A man never heard of Bagstock,
Ma'am, in those days; he heard of the Flower - the Flower of Ours. The
Flower may have faded, more or less, Ma'am,' observed the Major, dropping
into a much nearer chair than had been indicated by his cruel Divinity, 'but
it is a tough plant yet, and constant as the evergreen.'
Here the Major, under cover of the dark room, shut up one eye, rolled
his head like a Harlequin, and, in his great self-satisfaction, perhaps went
nearer to the confines of apoplexy than he had ever gone before.
'Where is Mrs Granger?' inquired Cleopatra of her page.
Withers believed she was in her own room.
'Very well,' said Mrs Skewton. 'Go away, and shut the door. I am
engaged.'
As Withers disappeared, Mrs Skewton turned her head languidly towards
the Major, without otherwise moving, and asked him how his friend was.
'Dombey, Ma'am,' returned the Major, with a facetious gurgling in his
throat, 'is as well as a man in his condition can be. His condition is a
desperate one, Ma'am. He is touched, is Dombey! Touched!' cried the Major.
'He is bayonetted through the body.'
Cleopatra cast a sharp look at the Major, that contrasted forcibly with
the affected drawl in which she presently said:
'Major Bagstock, although I know but little of the world, - nor can I
really regret my experience, for I fear it is a false place, full of
withering conventionalities: where Nature is but little regarded, and where
the music of the heart, and the gushing of the soul, and all that sort of
thing, which is so truly poetical, is seldom heard, - I cannot misunderstand
your meaning. There is an allusion to Edith - to my extremely dear child,'
said Mrs Skewton, tracing the outline of her eyebrows with her forefinger,
'in your words, to which the tenderest of chords vibrates excessively.'
'Bluntness, Ma'am,' returned the Major, 'has ever been the
characteristic of the Bagstock breed. You are right. Joe admits it.'
'And that allusion,' pursued Cleopatra, 'would involve one of the most
- if not positively the most - touching, and thrilling, and sacred emotions
of which our sadly-fallen nature is susceptible, I conceive.'
The Major laid his hand upon his lips, and wafted a kiss to Cleopatra,
as if to identify the emotion in question.
'I feel that I am weak. I feel that I am wanting in that energy, which
should sustain a Mama: not to say a parent: on such a subject,' said Mrs
Skewton, trimming her lips with the laced edge of her pocket-handkerchief;
'but I can hardly approach a topic so excessively momentous to my dearest
Edith without a feeling of faintness. Nevertheless, bad man, as you have
boldly remarked upon it, and as it has occasioned me great anguish:' Mrs
Skewton touched her left side with her fan: 'I will not shrink from my
duty.'
The Major, under cover of the dimness, swelled, and swelled, and rolled
his purple face about, and winked his lobster eye, until he fell into a fit
of wheezing, which obliged him to rise and take a turn or two about the
room, before his fair friend could proceed.
'Mr Dombey,' said Mrs Skewton, when she at length resumed, 'was
obliging enough, now many weeks ago, to do us the honour of visiting us
here; in company, my dear Major, with yourself. I acknowledge - let me be
open - that it is my failing to be the creature of impulse, and to wear my
heart as it were, outside. I know my failing full well. My enemy cannot know
it better. But I am not penitent; I would rather not be frozen by the
heartless world, and am content to bear this imputation justly.'
Mrs Skewton arranged her tucker, pinched her wiry throat to give it a
soft surface, and went on, with great complacency.
'It gave me (my dearest Edith too, I am sure) infinite pleasure to
receive Mr Dombey. As a friend of yours, my dear Major, we were naturally
disposed to be prepossessed in his favour; and I fancied that I observed an
amount of Heart in Mr Dombey, that was excessively refreshing.'
'There is devilish little heart in Dombey now, Ma'am,' said the Major.
'Wretched man!' cried Mrs Skewton, looking at him languidly, 'pray be
silent.'
'J. B. is dumb, Ma'am,' said the Major.
'Mr Dombey,' pursued Cleopatra, smoothing the rosy hue upon her cheeks,
'accordingly repeated his visit; and possibly finding some attraction in the
simplicity and primitiveness of our tastes - for there is always a charm in
nature - it is so very sweet - became one of our little circle every
evening. Little did I think of the awful responsibility into which I plunged
when I encouraged Mr Dombey - to -
'To beat up these quarters, Ma'am,' suggested Major Bagstock.
'Coarse person! 'said Mrs Skewton, 'you anticipate my meaning, though
in odious language.
Here Mrs Skewton rested her elbow on the little table at her side, and
suffering her wrist to droop in what she considered a graceful and becoming
manner, dangled her fan to and fro, and lazily admired her hand while
speaking.
'The agony I have endured,' she said mincingly, 'as the truth has by
degrees dawned upon me, has been too exceedingly terrific to dilate upon. My
whole existence is bound up in my sweetest Edith; and to see her change from
day to day - my beautiful pet, who has positively garnered up her heart
since the death of that most delightful creature, Granger - is the most
affecting thing in the world.'
Mrs Skewton's world was not a very trying one, if one might judge of it
by the influence of its most affecting circumstance upon her; but this by
the way.
'Edith,' simpered Mrs Skewton, 'who is the perfect pearl of my life, is
said to resemble me. I believe we are alike.'
'There is one man in the world who never will admit that anyone
resembles you, Ma'am,' said the Major; 'and that man's name is Old Joe
Bagstock.'
Cleopatra made as if she would brain the flatterer with her fan, but
relenting, smiled upon him and proceeded:
'If my charming girl inherits any advantages from me, wicked one!': the
Major was the wicked one: 'she inherits also my foolish nature. She has
great force of character - mine has been said to be immense, though I don't
believe it - but once moved, she is susceptible and sensitive to the last
extent. What are my feelings when I see her pining! They destroy me.
The Major advancing his double chin, and pursing up his blue lips into
a soothing expression, affected the profoundest sympathy.
'The confidence,' said Mrs Skewton, 'that has subsisted between us -
the free development of soul, and openness of sentiment - is touching to
think of. We have been more like sisters than Mama and child.'
'J. B.'s own sentiment,' observed the Major, 'expressed by J. B. fifty
thousand times!'
'Do not interrupt, rude man!' said Cleopatra. 'What are my feelings,
then, when I find that there is one subject avoided by us! That there is a
what's-his-name - a gulf - opened between us. That my own artless Edith is
changed to me! They are of the most poignant description, of course.'
The Major left his chair, and took one nearer to the little table.
'From day to day I see this, my dear Major,' proceeded Mrs Skewton.
'From day to day I feel this. From hour to hour I reproach myself for that
excess of faith and trustfulness which has led to such distressing
consequences; and almost from minute to minute, I hope that Mr Dombey may
explain himself, and relieve the torture I undergo, which is extremely
wearing. But nothing happens, my dear Major; I am the slave of remorse -
take care of the coffee-cup: you are so very awkward - my darling Edith is
an altered being; and I really don't see what is to be done, or what good
creature I can advise with.'
Major Bagstock, encouraged perhaps by the softened and confidential
tone into which Mrs Skewton, after several times lapsing into it for a
moment, seemed now to have subsided for good, stretched out his hand across
the little table, and said with a leer,
'Advise with Joe, Ma'am.'
'Then, you aggravating monster,' said Cleopatra, giving one hand to the
Major, and tapping his knuckles with her fan, which she held in the other:
'why don't you talk to me? you know what I mean. Why don't you tell me
something to the purpose?'
The Major laughed, and kissed the hand she had bestowed upon him, and
laughed again immensely.
'Is there as much Heart in Mr Dombey as I gave him credit for?'
languished Cleopatra tenderly. 'Do you think he is in earnest, my dear
Major? Would you recommend his being spoken to, or his being left alone? Now
tell me, like a dear man, what would you advise.'
'Shall we marry him to Edith Granger, Ma'am?' chuckled the Major,
hoarsely.
'Mysterious creature!' returned Cleopatra, bringing her fan to bear
upon the Major's nose. 'How can we marry him?'
'Shall we marry him to Edith Granger, Ma'am, I say?' chuckled the Major
again.
Mrs Skewton returned no answer in words, but smiled upon the Major with
so much archness and vivacity, that that gallant officer considering himself
challenged, would have imprinted a kiss on her exceedingly red lips, but for
her interposing the fan with a very winning and juvenile dexterity. It might
have been in modesty; it might have been in apprehension of some danger to
their bloom.
'Dombey, Ma'am,' said the Major, 'is a great catch.'
'Oh, mercenary wretch!' cried Cleopatra, with a little shriek, 'I am
shocked.'
'And Dombey, Ma'am,' pursued the Major, thrusting forward his head, and
distending his eyes, 'is in earnest. Joseph says it; Bagstock knows it; J.
B. keeps him to the mark. Leave Dombey to himself, Ma'am. Dombey is safe,
Ma'am. Do as you have done; do no more; and trust to J. B. for the end.'
'You really think so, my dear Major?' returned Cleopatra, who had eyed
him very cautiously, and very searchingly, in spite of her listless bearing.
'Sure of it, Ma'am,' rejoined the Major. 'Cleopatra the peerless, and
her Antony Bagstock, will often speak of this, triumphantly, when sharing
the elegance and wealth of Edith Dombey's establishment. Dombey's right-hand
man, Ma'am,' said the Major, stopping abruptly in a chuckle, and becoming
serious, 'has arrived.'
'This morning?' said Cleopatra.
'This morning, Ma'am,' returned the Major. 'And Dombey's anxiety for
his arrival, Ma'am, is to be referred - take J. B.'s word for this; for Joe
is devilish sly' - the Major tapped his nose, and screwed up one of his eyes
tight: which did not enhance his native beauty - 'to his desire that what is
in the wind should become known to him' without Dombey's telling and
consulting him. For Dombey is as proud, Ma'am,' said the Major, 'as
Lucifer.'
'A charming quality,' lisped Mrs Skewton; 'reminding one of dearest
Edith.'
'Well, Ma'am,' said the Major. 'I have thrown out hints already, and
the right-hand man understands 'em; and I'll throw out more, before the day
is done. Dombey projected this morning a ride to Warwick Castle, and to
Kenilworth, to-morrow, to be preceded by a breakfast with us. I undertook
the delivery of this invitation. Will you honour us so far, Ma'am?' said the
Major, swelling with shortness of breath and slyness, as he produced a note,
addressed to the Honourable Mrs Skewton, by favour of Major Bagstock,
wherein hers ever faithfully, Paul Dombey, besought her and her amiable and
accomplished daughter to consent to the proposed excursion; and in a
postscript unto which, the same ever faithfully Paul Dombey entreated to be
recalled to the remembrance of Mrs Granger.
'Hush!' said Cleopatra, suddenly, 'Edith!'
The loving mother can scarcely be described as resuming her insipid and
affected air when she made this exclamation; for she had never cast it off;
nor was it likely that she ever would or could, in any other place than in
the grave. But hurriedly dismissing whatever shadow of earnestness, or faint
confession of a purpose, laudable or wicked, that her face, or voice, or
manner: had, for the moment, betrayed, she lounged upon the couch, her most
insipid and most languid self again, as Edith entered the room.
Edith, so beautiful and stately, but so cold and so repelling. Who,
slightly acknowledging the presence of Major Bagstock, and directing a keen
glance at her mother, drew back the from a window, and sat down there,
looking out.
'My dearest Edith,' said Mrs Skewton, 'where on earth have you been? I
have wanted you, my love, most sadly.'
'You said you were engaged, and I stayed away,' she answered, without
turning her head.
'It was cruel to Old Joe, Ma'am,' said the Major in his gallantry.
'It was very cruel, I know,' she said, still looking out - and said
with such calm disdain, that the Major was discomfited, and could think of
nothing in reply.
'Major Bagstock, my darling Edith,' drawled her mother, 'who is
generally the most useless and disagreeable creature in the world: as you
know - '
'It is surely not worthwhile, Mama,' said Edith, looking round, 'to
observe these forms of speech. We are quite alone. We know each other.'
The quiet scorn that sat upon her handsome face - a scorn that
evidently lighted on herself, no less than them - was so intense and deep,
that her mother's simper, for the instant, though of a hardy constitution,
drooped before it.
'My darling girl,' she began again.
'Not woman yet?' said Edith, with a smile.
'How very odd you are to-day, my dear! Pray let me say, my love, that
Major Bagstock has brought the kindest of notes from Mr Dombey, proposing
that we should breakfast with him to-morrow, and ride to Warwick and
Kenilworth. Will you go, Edith?'
'Will I go!' she repeated, turning very red, and breathing quickly as
she looked round at her mother.
'I knew you would, my own, observed the latter carelessly. 'It is, as
you say, quite a form to ask. Here is Mr Dombey's letter, Edith.'
'Thank you. I have no desire to read it,' was her answer.
'Then perhaps I had better answer it myself,' said Mrs Skewton, 'though
I had thought of asking you to be my secretary, darling.' As Edith made no
movement, and no answer, Mrs Skewton begged the Major to wheel her little
table nearer, and to set open the desk it contained, and to take out pen and
paper for her; all which congenial offices of gallantry the Major
discharged, with much submission and devotion.
'Your regards, Edith, my dear?' said Mrs Skewton, pausing, pen in hand,
at the postscript.
'What you will, Mama,' she answered, without turning her head, and with
supreme indifference.
Mrs Skewton wrote what she would, without seeking for any more explicit
directions, and handed her letter to the Major, who receiving it as a
precious charge, made a show of laying it near his heart, but was fain to
put it in the pocket of his pantaloons on account of the insecurity of his
waistcoat The Major then took a very polished and chivalrous farewell of
both ladies, which the elder one acknowledged in her usual manner, while the
younger, sitting with her face addressed to the window, bent her head so
slightly that it would have been a greater compliment to the Major to have
made no sign at all, and to have left him to infer that he had not been
heard or thought of.
'As to alteration in her, Sir,' mused the Major on his way back; on
which expedition - the afternoon being sunny and hot - he ordered the Native
and the light baggage to the front, and walked in the shadow of that
expatriated prince: 'as to alteration, Sir, and pining, and so forth, that
won't go down with Joseph Bagstock, None of that, Sir. It won't do here. But
as to there being something of a division between 'em - or a gulf as the
mother calls it - damme, Sir, that seems true enough. And it's odd enough!
Well, Sir!' panted the Major, 'Edith Granger and Dombey are well matched;
let 'em fight it out! Bagstock backs the winner!'
The Major, by saying these latter words aloud, in the vigour of his
thoughts, caused the unhappy Native to stop, and turn round, in the belief
that he was personally addressed. Exasperated to the last degree by this act
of insubordination, the Major (though he was swelling with enjoyment of his
own humour, at the moment of its occurrence instantly thrust his cane among
the Native's ribs, and continued to stir him up, at short intervals, all the
way to the hotel.
Nor was the Major less exasperated as he dressed for dinner, during
which operation the dark servant underwent the pelting of a shower of
miscellaneous objects, varying in size from a boot to a hairbrush, and
including everything that came within his master's reach. For the Major
plumed himself on having the Native in a perfect state of drill, and visited
the least departure from strict discipline with this kind of fatigue duty.
Add to this, that he maintained the Native about his person as a
counter-irritant against the gout, and all other vexations, mental as well
as bodily; and the Native would appear to have earned his pay - which was
not large.
At length, the Major having disposed of all the missiles that were
convenient to his hand, and having called the Native so many new names as
must have given him great occasion to marvel at the resources of the English
language, submitted to have his cravat put on; and being dressed, and
finding himself in a brisk flow of spirits after this exercise, went
downstairs to enliven 'Dombey' and his right-hand man.
Dombey was not yet in the room, but the right-hand man was there, and
his dental treasures were, as usual, ready for the Major.
'Well, Sir!' said the Major. 'How have you passed the time since I had
the happiness of meeting you? Have you walked at all?'
'A saunter of barely half an hour's duration,' returned Carker. 'We
have been so much occupied.'
'Business, eh?' said the Major.
'A variety of little matters necessary to be gone through,' replied
Carker. 'But do you know - this is quite unusual with me, educated in a
distrustful school, and who am not generally disposed to be communicative,'
he said, breaking off, and speaking in a charming tone of frankness - 'but I
feel quite confidential with you, Major Bagstock.'
'You do me honour, Sir,' returned the Major. 'You may be.'
'Do you know, then,' pursued Carker, 'that I have not found my friend -
our friend, I ought rather to call him - '
'Meaning Dombey, Sir?' cried the Major. 'You see me, Mr Carker,
standing here! J. B.?'
He was puffy enough to see, and blue enough; and Mr Carker intimated
the he had that pleasure.
'Then you see a man, Sir, who would go through fire and water to serve
Dombey,' returned Major Bagstock.
Mr Carker smiled, and said he was sure of it. 'Do you know, Major,' he
proceeded: 'to resume where I left off' that I have not found our friend so
attentive to business today, as usual?'
'No?' observed the delighted Major.
'I have found him a little abstracted, and with his attention disposed
to wander,' said Carker.
'By Jove, Sir,' cried the Major, 'there's a lady in the case.'
'Indeed, I begin to believe there really is,' returned Carker; 'I
thought you might be jesting when you seemed to hint at it; for I know you
military men -
The Major gave the horse's cough, and shook his head and shoulders, as
much as to say, 'Well! we are gay dogs, there's no denying.' He then seized
Mr Carker by the button-hole, and with starting eyes whispered in his ear,
that she was a woman of extraordinary charms, Sir. That she was a young
widow, Sir. That she was of a fine family, Sir. That Dombey was over head
and ears in love with her, Sir, and that it would be a good match on both
sides; for she had beauty, blood, and talent, and Dombey had fortune; and
what more could any couple have? Hearing Mr Dombey's footsteps without, the
Major cut himself short by saying, that Mr Carker would see her tomorrow
morning, and would judge for himself; and between his mental excitement, and
the exertion of saying all this in wheezy whispers, the Major sat gurgling
in the throat and watering at the eyes, until dinner was ready.
The Major, like some other noble animals, exhibited himself to great
advantage at feeding-time. On this occasion, he shone resplendent at one end
of the table, supported by the milder lustre of Mr Dombey at the other;
while Carker on one side lent his ray to either light, or suffered it to
merge into both, as occasion arose.
During the first course or two, the Major was usually grave; for the
Native, in obedience to general orders, secretly issued, collected every
sauce and cruet round him, and gave him a great deal to do, in taking out
the stoppers, and mixing up the contents in his plate. Besides which, the
Native had private zests and flavours on a side-table, with which the Major
daily scorched himself; to say nothing of strange machines out of which he
spirited unknown liquids into the Major's drink. But on this occasion, Major
Bagstock, even amidst these many occupations, found time to be social; and
his sociality consisted in excessive slyness for the behoof of Mr Carker,
and the betrayal of Mr Dombey's state of mind.
'Dombey,' said the Major, 'you don't eat; what's the matter?'
'Thank you,' returned the gentleman, 'I am doing very well; I have no
great appetite today.'
'Why, Dombey, what's become of it?' asked the Major. 'Where's it gone?
You haven't left it with our friends, I'll swear, for I can answer for their
having none to-day at luncheon. I can answer for one of 'em, at least: I
won't say which.'
Then the Major winked at Carker, and became so frightfully sly, that
his dark attendant was obliged to pat him on the back, without orders, or he
would probably have disappeared under the table.
In a later stage of the dinner: that is to say, when the Native stood
at the Major's elbow ready to serve the first bottle of champagne: the Major
became still slyer.
'Fill this to the brim, you scoundrel,' said the Major, holding up his
glass. 'Fill Mr Carker's to the brim too. And Mr Dombey's too. By Gad,
gentlemen,' said the Major, winking at his new friend, while Mr Dombey
looked into his plate with a conscious air, 'we'll consecrate this glass of
wine to a Divinity whom Joe is proud to know, and at a distance humbly and
reverently to admire. Edith,' said the Major, 'is her name; angelic Edith!'
'To angelic Edith!' cried the smiling Carker.
'Edith, by all means,' said Mr Dombey.
The entrance of the waiters with new dishes caused the Major to be
slyer yet, but in a more serious vein. 'For though among ourselves, Joe
Bagstock mingles jest and earnest on this subject, Sir,' said the Major,
laying his finger on his lips, and speaking half apart to Carker, 'he holds
that name too sacred to be made the property of these fellows, or of any
fellows. Not a word!, Sir' while they are here!'
This was respectful and becoming on the Major's part, and Mr Dombey
plainly felt it so. Although embarrassed in his own frigid way, by the
Major's allusions, Mr Dombey had no objection to such rallying, it was
clear, but rather courted it. Perhaps the Major had been pretty near the
truth, when he had divined that morning that the great man who was too
haughty formally to consult with, or confide in his prime minister, on such
a matter, yet wished him to be fully possessed of it. Let this be how it
may, he often glanced at Mr Carker while the Major plied his light
artillery, and seemed watchful of its effect upon him.
But the Major, having secured an attentive listener, and a smiler who
had not his match in all the world - 'in short, a devilish intelligent and
able fellow,' as he often afterwards declared - was not going to let him off
with a little slyness personal to Mr Dombey. Therefore, on the removal of
the cloth, the Major developed himself as a choice spirit in the broader and
more comprehensive range of narrating regimental stories, and cracking
regimental jokes, which he did with such prodigal exuberance, that Carker
was (or feigned to be) quite exhausted with laughter and admiration: while
Mr Dombey looked on over his starched cravat, like the Major's proprietor,
or like a stately showman who was glad to see his bear dancing well.
When the Major was too hoarse with meat and drink, and the display of
his social powers, to render himself intelligible any longer, they adjourned
to coffee. After which, the Major inquired of Mr Carker the Manager, with
little apparent hope of an answer in the affirmative, if he played picquet.
'Yes, I play picquet a little,' said Mr Carker.
'Backgammon, perhaps?' observed the Major, hesitating.
'Yes, I play backgammon a little too,' replied the man of teeth.
'Carker plays at all games, I believe,' said Mr Dombey, laying himself
on a sofa like a man of wood, without a hinge or a joint in him; 'and plays
them well.'
In sooth, he played the two in question, to such perfection, that the
Major was astonished, and asked him, at random, if he played chess.
'Yes, I play chess a little,' answered Carker. 'I have sometimes
played, and won a game - it's a mere trick - without seeing the board.'
'By Gad, Sir!' said the Major, staring, 'you are a contrast to Dombey,
who plays nothing.'
'Oh! He!' returned the Manager. 'He has never had occasion to acquire
such little arts. To men like me, they are sometimes useful. As at present,
Major Bagstock, when they enable me to take a hand with you.'
It might be only the false mouth, so smooth and wide; and yet there
seemed to lurk beneath the humility and subserviency of this short speech, a
something like a snarl; and, for a moment, one might have thought that the
white teeth were prone to bite the hand they fawned upon. But the Major
thought nothing about it; and Mr Dombey lay meditating with his eyes half
shut, during the whole of the play, which lasted until bed-time.
By that time, Mr Carker, though the winner, had mounted high into the
Major's good opinion, insomuch that when he left the Major at his own room
before going to bed, the Major as a special attention, sent the Native - who
always rested on a mattress spread upon the ground at his master's door -
along the gallery, to light him to his room in state.
There was a faint blur on the surface of the mirror in Mr Carker's
chamber, and its reflection was, perhaps, a false one. But it showed, that
night, the image of a man, who saw, in his fancy, a crowd of people
slumbering on the ground at his feet, like the poor Native at his master's
door: who picked his way among them: looking down, maliciously enough: but
trod upon no upturned face - as yet.
Deeper Shadows
Mr Carker the Manager rose with the lark, and went out, walking in the
summer day. His meditations - and he meditated with contracted brows while
he strolled along - hardly seemed to soar as high as the lark, or to mount
in that direction; rather they kept close to their nest upon the earth, and
looked about, among the dust and worms. But there was not a bird in the air,
singing unseen, farther beyond the reach of human eye than Mr Carker's
thoughts. He had his face so perfectly under control, that few could say
more, in distinct terms, of its expression, than that it smiled or that it
pondered. It pondered now, intently. As the lark rose higher, he sank deeper
in thought. As the lark poured out her melody clearer and stronger, he fell
into a graver and profounder silence. At length, when the lark came headlong
down, with an accumulating stream of song, and dropped among the green wheat
near him, rippling in the breath of the morning like a river, he sprang up
from his reverie, and looked round with a sudden smile, as courteous and as
soft as if he had had numerous observers to propitiate; nor did he relapse,
after being thus awakened; but clearing his face, like one who bethought
himself that it might otherwise wrinkle and tell tales, went smiling on, as
if for practice.
Perhaps with an eye to first impressions, Mr Carker was very carefully
and trimly dressed, that morning. Though always somewhat formal, in his
dress, in imitation of the great man whom he served, he stopped short of the
extent of Mr Dombey's stiffness: at once perhaps because he knew it to be
ludicrous, and because in doing so he found another means of expressing his
sense of the difference and distance between them. Some people quoted him
indeed, in this respect, as a pointed commentary, and not a flattering one,
on his icy patron - but the world is prone to misconstruction, and Mr Carker
was not accountable for its bad propensity.
Clean and florid: with his light complexion, fading as it were, in the
sun, and his dainty step enhancing the softness of the turf: Mr Carker the
Manager strolled about meadows, and green lanes, and glided among avenues of
trees, until it was time to return to breakfast. Taking a nearer way back,
Mr Carker pursued it, airing his teeth, and said aloud as he did so, 'Now to
see the second Mrs Dombey!'
He had strolled beyond the town, and re-entered it by a pleasant walk,
where there was a deep shade of leafy trees, and where there were a few
benches here and there for those who chose to rest. It not being a place of
general resort at any hour, and wearing at that time of the still morning
the air of being quite deserted and retired, Mr Carker had it, or thought he
had it, all to himself. So, with the whim of an idle man, to whom there yet
remained twenty minutes for reaching a destination easily able in ten, Mr
Carker threaded the great boles of the trees, and went passing in and out,
before this one and behind that, weaving a chain of footsteps on the dewy
ground.
But he found he was mistaken in supposing there was no one in the
grove, for as he softly rounded the trunk of one large tree, on which the
obdurate bark was knotted and overlapped like the hide of a rhinoceros or
some kindred monster of the ancient days before the Flood, he saw an
unexpected figure sitting on a bench near at hand, about which, in another
moment, he would have wound the chain he was making.
It was that of a lady, elegantly dressed and very handsome, whose dark
proud eyes were fixed upon the ground, and in whom some passion or struggle
was raging. For as she sat looking down, she held a corner of her under lip
within her mouth, her bosom heaved, her nostril quivered, her head trembled,
indignant tears were on her cheek, and her foot was set upon the moss as
though she would have crushed it into nothing. And yet almost the self-same
glance that showed him this, showed him the self-same lady rising with a
scornful air of weariness and lassitude, and turning away with nothing
expressed in face or figure but careless beauty and imperious disdain.
A withered and very ugly old woman, dressed not so much like a gipsy as
like any of that medley race of vagabonds who tramp about the country,
begging, and stealing, and tinkering, and weaving rushes, by turns, or all
together, had been observing the lady, too; for, as she rose, this second
figure strangely confronting the first, scrambled up from the ground - out
of it, it almost appeared - and stood in the way.
'Let me tell your fortune, my pretty lady,' said the old woman,
munching with her jaws, as if the Death's Head beneath her yellow skin were
impatient to get out.
'I can tell it for myself,' was the reply.
'Ay, ay, pretty lady; but not right. You didn't tell it right when you
were sitting there. I see you! Give me a piece of silver, pretty lady, and
I'll tell your fortune true. There's riches, pretty lady, in your face.'
'I know,' returned the lady, passing her with a dark smile, and a proud
step. 'I knew it before.
'What! You won't give me nothing?' cried the old woman. 'You won't give
me nothing to tell your fortune, pretty lady? How much will you give me to
tell it, then? Give me something, or I'll call it after you!' croaked the
old woman, passionately.
Mr Carker, whom the lady was about to pass close, slinking against his
tree as she crossed to gain the path, advanced so as to meet her, and
pulling off his hat as she went by, bade the old woman hold her peace. The
lady acknowledged his interference with an inclination of the head, and went
her way.
'You give me something then, or I'll call it after her!' screamed the
old woman, throwing up her arms, and pressing forward against his
outstretched hand. 'Or come,' she added, dropping her voice suddenly,
looking at him earnestly, and seeming in a moment to forget the object of
her wrath, 'give me something, or I'll call it after you! '
'After me, old lady!' returned the Manager, putting his hand in his
pocket.
'Yes,' said the woman, steadfast in her scrutiny, and holding out her
shrivelled hand. 'I know!'
'What do you know?' demanded Carker, throwing her a shilling. 'Do you
know who the handsome lady is?'
Munching like that sailor's wife of yore, who had chestnuts In her lap,
and scowling like the witch who asked for some in vain, the old woman picked
the shilling up, and going backwards, like a crab, or like a heap of crabs:
for her alternately expanding and contracting hands might have represented
two of that species, and her creeping face, some half-a-dozen more: crouched
on the veinous root of an old tree, pulled out a short black pipe from
within the crown of her bonnet, lighted it with a match, and smoked in
silence, looking fixedly at her questioner.
Mr Carker laughed, and turned upon his heel.
'Good!' said the old woman. 'One child dead, and one child living: one
wife dead, and one wife coming. Go and meet her!'
In spite of himself, the Manager looked round again, and stopped. The
old woman, who had not removed her pipe, and was munching and mumbling while
she smoked, as if in conversation with an invisible familiar, pointed with
her finger in the direction he was going, and laughed.
'What was that you said, Beldamite?' he demanded.
The woman mumbled, and chattered, and smoked, and still pointed before
him; but remained silent Muttering a farewell that was not complimentary, Mr
Carker pursued his way; but as he turned out of that place, and looked over
his shoulder at the root of the old tree, he could yet see the finger
pointing before him, and thought he heard the woman screaming, 'Go and meet
her!'
Preparations for a choice repast were completed, he found, at the
hotel; and Mr Dombey, and the Major, and the breakfast, were awaiting the
ladies. Individual constitution has much to do with the development of such
facts, no doubt; but in this case, appetite carried it hollow over the
tender passion; Mr Dombey being very cool and collected, and the Major
fretting and fuming in a state of violent heat and irritation. At length the
door was thrown open by the Native, and, after a pause, occupied by her
languishing along the gallery, a very blooming, but not very youthful lady,
appeared.
'My dear Mr Dombey,' said the lady, 'I am afraid we are late, but Edith
has been out already looking for a favourable point of view for a sketch,
and kept me waiting for her. Falsest of Majors,' giving him her little
finger, 'how do you do?'
'Mrs Skewton,' said Mr Dombey, 'let me gratify my friend Carker:' Mr
Dombey unconsciously emphasised the word friend, as saying "no really; I do
allow him to take credit for that distinction:" 'by presenting him to you.
You have heard me mention Mr Carker.'
'I am charmed, I am sure,' said Mrs Skewton, graciously.
Mr Carker was charmed, of course. Would he have been more charmed on Mr
Dombey's behalf, if Mrs Skewton had been (as he at first supposed her) the
Edith whom they had toasted overnight?
'Why, where, for Heaven's sake, is Edith?' exclaimed Mrs Skewton,
looking round. 'Still at the door, giving Withers orders about the mounting
of those drawings! My dear Mr Dombey, will you have the kindness -
Mr Dombey was already gone to seek her. Next moment he returned,
bearing on his arm the same elegantly dressed and very handsome lady whom Mr
Carker had encountered underneath the trees.
'Carker - ' began Mr Dombey. But their recognition of each other was so
manifest, that Mr Dombey stopped surprised.
'I am obliged to the gentleman,' said Edith, with a stately bend, 'for
sparing me some annoyance from an importunate beggar just now.'
'I am obliged to my good fortune,' said Mr Carker, bowing low, 'for the
opportunity of rendering so slight a service to one whose servant I am proud
to be.'
As her eye rested on him for an instant, and then lighted on the
ground, he saw in its bright and searching glance a suspicion that he had
not come up at the moment of his interference, but had secretly observed her
sooner. As he saw that, she saw in his eye that her distrust was not without
foundation.
'Really,' cried Mrs Skewton, who had taken this opportunity of
inspecting Mr Carker through her glass, and satisfying herself (as she
lisped audibly to the Major) that he was all heart; 'really now, this is one
of the most enchanting coincidences that I ever heard of. The idea! My
dearest Edith, there is such an obvious destiny in it, that really one might
almost be induced to cross one's arms upon one's frock, and say, like those
wicked Turks, there is no What's-his-name but Thingummy, and
What-you-may-call-it is his prophet!'
Edith designed no revision of this extraordinary quotation from the
Koran, but Mr Dombey felt it necessary to offer a few polite remarks.
'It gives me great pleasure,' said Mr Dombey, with cumbrous gallantry,
'that a gentleman so nearly connected with myself as Carker is, should have
had the honour and happiness of rendering the least assistance to Mrs
Granger.' Mr Dombey bowed to her. 'But it gives me some pain, and it
occasions me to be really envious of Carker;' he unconsciously laid stress
on these words, as sensible that they must appear to involve a very
surprising proposition; 'envious of Carker, that I had not that honour and
that happiness myself.' Mr Dombey bowed again. Edith, saving for a curl of
her lip, was motionless.
'By the Lord, Sir,' cried the Major, bursting into speech at sight of
the waiter, who was come to announce breakfast, 'it's an extraordinary thing
to me that no one can have the honour and happiness of shooting all such
beggars through the head without being brought to book for it. But here's an
arm for Mrs Granger if she'll do J. B. the honour to accept it; and the
greatest service Joe can render you, Ma'am, just now, is, to lead you into
table!'
With this, the Major gave his arm to Edith; Mr Dombey led the way with
Mrs Skewton; Mrs Carker went last, smiling on the party.
'I am quite rejoiced, Mr Carker,' said the lady-mother, at breakfast,
after another approving survey of him through her glass, 'that you have
timed your visit so happily, as to go with us to-day. It is the most
enchanting expedition!'
'Any expedition would be enchanting in such society,' returned Carker;
'but I believe it is, in itself, full of interest.'
'Oh!' cried Mrs Skewton, with a faded little scream of rapture, 'the
Castle is charming! - associations of the Middle Ages - and all that - which
is so truly exquisite. Don't you dote upon the Middle Ages, Mr Carker?'
'Very much, indeed,' said Mr Carker.
'Such charming times!' cried Cleopatra. 'So full of faith! So vigorous
and forcible! So picturesque! So perfectly removed from commonplace! Oh
dear! If they would only leave us a little more of the poetry of existence
in these terrible days!'
Mrs Skewton was looking sharp after Mr Dombey all the time she said
this, who was looking at Edith: who was listening, but who never lifted up
her eyes.
'We are dreadfully real, Mr Carker,' said Mrs Skewton; 'are we not?'
Few people had less reason to complain of their reality than Cleopatra,
who had as much that was false about her as could well go to the composition
of anybody with a real individual existence. But Mr Carker commiserated our
reality nevertheless, and agreed that we were very hardly used in that
regard.
'Pictures at the Castle, quite divine!' said Cleopatra. 'I hope you
dote upon pictures?'
'I assure you, Mrs Skewton,' said Mr Dombey, with solemn encouragement
of his Manager, 'that Carker has a very good taste for pictures; quite a
natural power of appreciating them. He is a very creditable artist himself.
He will be delighted, I am sure, with Mrs Granger's taste and skill.'
'Damme, Sir!' cried Major Bagstock, 'my opinion is, that you're the
admirable Carker, and can do anything.'
'Oh!' smiled Carker, with humility, 'you are much too sanguine, Major
Bagstock. I can do very little. But Mr Dombey is so generous in his
estimation of any trivial accomplishment a man like myself may find it
almost necessary to acquire, and to which, in his very different sphere, he
is far superior, that - ' Mr Carker shrugged his shoulders, deprecating
further praise, and said no more.
All this time, Edith never raised her eyes, unless to glance towards
her mother when that lady's fervent spirit shone forth in words. But as
Carker ceased, she looked at Mr Dombey for a moment. For a moment only; but
with a transient gleam of scornful wonder on her face, not lost on one
observer, who was smiling round the board.
Mr Dombey caught the dark eyelash in its descent, and took the
opportunity of arresting it.
'You have been to Warwick often, unfortunately?' said Mr Dombey.
'Several times.'
'The visit will be tedious to you, I am afraid.'
'Oh no; not at all.'
'Ah! You are like your cousin Feenix, my dearest Edith,' said Mrs
Skewton. 'He has been to Warwick Castle fifty times, if he has been there
once; yet if he came to Leamington to-morrow - I wish he would, dear angel!
- he would make his fifty-second visit next day.'
'We are all enthusiastic, are we not, Mama?' said Edith, with a cold
smile.
'Too much so, for our peace, perhaps, my dear,' returned her mother;
'but we won't complain. Our own emotions are our recompense. If, as your
cousin Feenix says, the sword wears out the what's-its-name
'The scabbard, perhaps,' said Edith.
'Exactly - a little too fast, it is because it is bright and glowing,
you know, my dearest love.'
Mrs Skewton heaved a gentle sigh, supposed to cast a shadow on the
surface of that dagger of lath, whereof her susceptible bosom was the
sheath: and leaning her head on one side, in the Cleopatra manner, looked
with pensive affection on her darling child.
Edith had turned her face towards Mr Dombey when he first addressed
her, and had remained in that attitude, while speaking to her mother, and
while her mother spoke to her, as though offering him her attention, if he
had anything more to say. There was something in the manner of this simple
courtesy: almost defiant, and giving it the character of being rendered on
compulsion, or as a matter of traffic to which she was a reluctant party
again not lost upon that same observer who was smiling round the board. It
set him thinking of her as he had first seen her, when she had believed
herself to be alone among the trees.
Mr Dombey having nothing else to say, proposed - the breakfast being
now finished, and the Major gorged, like any Boa Constrictor - that they
should start. A barouche being in waiting, according to the orders of that
gentleman, the two ladies, the Major and himself, took their seats in it;
the Native and the wan page mounted the box, Mr Towlinson being left behind;
and Mr Carker, on horseback, brought up the rear. Mr Carker cantered behind
the carriage. at the distance of a hundred yards or so, and watched it,
during all the ride, as if he were a cat, indeed, and its four occupants,
mice. Whether he looked to one side of the road, or to the other - over
distant landscape, with its smooth undulations, wind-mills, corn, grass,
bean fields, wild-flowers, farm-yards, hayricks, and the spire among the
wood - or upwards in the sunny air, where butterflies were sporting round
his head, and birds were pouring out their songs - or downward, where the
shadows of the branches interlaced, and made a trembling carpet on the road
- or onward, where the overhanging trees formed aisles and arches, dim with
the softened light that steeped through leaves - one corner of his eye was
ever on the formal head of Mr Dombey, addressed towards him, and the feather
in the bonnet, drooping so neglectfully and scornfully between them; much as
he had seen the haughty eyelids droop; not least so, when the face met that
now fronting it. Once, and once only, did his wary glance release these
objects; and that was, when a leap over a low hedge, and a gallop across a
field, enabled him to anticipate the carriage coming by the road, and to be
standing ready, at the journey's end, to hand the ladies out. Then, and but
then, he met her glance for an instant in her first surprise; but when he
touched her, in alighting, with his soft white hand, it overlooked him
altogether as before.
Mrs Skewton was bent on taking charge of Mr Carker herself, and showing
him the beauties of the Castle. She was determined to have his arm, and the
Major's too. It would do that incorrigible creature: who was the most
barbarous infidel in point of poetry: good to be in such company. This
chance arrangement left Mr Dombey at liberty to escort Edith: which he did:
stalking before them through the apartments with a gentlemanly solemnity.
'Those darling byegone times, Mr Carker,' said Cleopatra, 'with their
delicious fortresses, and their dear old dungeons, and their delightful
places of torture, and their romantic vengeances, and their picturesque
assaults and sieges, and everything that makes life truly charming! How
dreadfully we have degenerated!'
'Yes, we have fallen off deplorably,' said Mr Carker.
The peculiarity of their conversation was, that Mrs Skewton, in spite
of her ecstasies, and Mr Carker, in spite of his urbanity, were both intent
on watching Mr Dombey and Edith. With all their conversational endowments,
they spoke somewhat distractedly, and at random, in consequence.
'We have no Faith left, positively,' said Mrs Skewton, advancing her
shrivelled ear; for Mr Dombey was saying something to Edith. 'We have no
Faith in the dear old Barons, who were the most delightful creatures - or in
the dear old Priests, who were the most warlike of men - or even in the days
of that inestimable Queen Bess, upon the wall there, which were so extremely
golden. Dear creature! She was all Heart And that charming father of hers! I
hope you dote on Harry the Eighth!'
'I admire him very much,' said Carker.
'So bluff!' cried Mrs Skewton, 'wasn't he? So burly. So truly English.
Such a picture, too, he makes, with his dear little peepy eyes, and his
benevolent chin!'
'Ah, Ma'am!' said Carker, stopping short; 'but if you speak of
pictures, there's a composition! What gallery in the world can produce the
counterpart of that?'
As the smiling gentleman thus spake, he pointed through a doorway to
where Mr Dombey and Edith were standing alone in the centre of another room.
They were not interchanging a word or a look. Standing together, arm in
arm, they had the appearance of being more divided than if seas had rolled
between them. There was a difference even in the pride of the two, that
removed them farther from each other, than if one had been the proudest and
the other the humblest specimen of humanity in all creation. He,
self-important, unbending, formal, austere. She, lovely and graceful, in an
uncommon degree, but totally regardless of herself and him and everything
around, and spurning her own attractions with her haughty brow and lip, as
if they were a badge or livery she hated. So unmatched were they, and
opposed, so forced and linked together by a chain which adverse hazard and
mischance had forged: that fancy might have imagined the pictures on the
walls around them, startled by the unnatural conjunction, and observant of
it in their several expressions. Grim knights and warriors looked scowling
on them. A churchman, with his hand upraised, denounced the mockery of such
a couple coming to God's altar. Quiet waters in landscapes, with the sun
reflected in their depths, asked, if better means of escape were not at
hand, was there no drowning left? Ruins cried, 'Look here, and see what We
are, wedded to uncongenial Time!' Animals, opposed by nature, worried one
another, as a moral to them. Loves and Cupids took to flight afraid, and
Martyrdom had no such torment in its painted history of suffering.
Nevertheless, Mrs Skewton was so charmed by the sight to which Mr
Carker invoked her attention, that she could not refraIn from saying, half
aloud, how sweet, how very full of soul it was! Edith, overhearing, looked
round, and flushed indignant scarlet to her hair.
'My dearest Edith knows I was admiring her!' said Cleopatra, tapping
her, almost timidly, on the back with her parasol. 'Sweet pet!'
Again Mr Carker saw the strife he had witnessed so unexpectedly among
the trees. Again he saw the haughty languor and indifference come over it,
and hide it like a cloud.
She did not raise her eyes to him; but with a slight peremptory motion
of them, seemed to bid her mother come near. Mrs Skewton thought it
expedient to understand the hint, and advancing quickly, with her two
cavaliers, kept near her daughter from that time,
Mr Carker now, having nothing to distract his attention, began to
discourse upon the pictures and to select the best, and point them out to Mr
Dombey: speaking with his usual familiar recognition of Mr Dombey's
greatness, and rendering homage by adjusting his eye-glass for him, or
finding out the right place in his catalogue, or holding his stick, or the
like. These services did not so much originate with Mr Carker, in truth, as
with Mr Dombey himself, who was apt to assert his chieftainship by saying,
with subdued authority, and in an easy way - for him - 'Here, Carker, have
the goodness to assist me, will you?' which the smiling gentleman always did
with pleasure.
They made the tour of the pictures, the walls, crow's nest, and so
forth; and as they were still one little party, and the Major was rather in
the shade: being sleepy during the process of digestion: Mr Carker became
communicative and agreeable. At first, he addressed himself for the most
part to Mrs Skewton; but as that sensitive lady was in such ecstasies with
the works of art, after the first quarter of an hour, that she could do
nothing but yawn (they were such perfect inspirations, she observed as a
reason for that mark of rapture), he transferred his attentions to Mr
Dombey. Mr Dombey said little beyond an occasional 'Very true, Carker,' or
'Indeed, Carker,' but he tacitly encouraged Carker to proceed, and inwardly
approved of his behaviour very much: deeming it as well that somebody should
talk, and thinking that his remarks, which were, as one might say, a branch
of the parent establishment, might amuse Mrs Granger. Mr Carker, who
possessed an excellent discretion, never took the liberty of addressing that
lady, direct; but she seemed to listen, though she never looked at him; and
once or twice, when he was emphatic in his peculiar humility, the twilight
smile stole over her face, not as a light, but as a deep black shadow.
Warwick Castle being at length pretty well exhausted, and the Major
very much so: to say nothing of Mrs Skewton, whose peculiar demonstrations
of delight had become very frequent Indeed: the carriage was again put In
requisition, and they rode to several admired points of view In the
neighbourhood. Mr Dombey ceremoniously observed of one of these, that a
sketch, however slight, from the fair hand of Mrs Granger, would be a
remembrance to him of that agreeable day: though he wanted no artificial
remembrance, he was sure (here Mr Dombey made another of his bows), which he
must always highly value. Withers the lean having Edith's sketch-book under
his arm, was immediately called upon by Mrs Skewton to produce the same: and
the carriage stopped, that Edith might make the drawing, which Mr Dombey was
to put away among his treasures.
'But I am afraid I trouble you too much,' said Mr Dombey.
'By no means. Where would you wish it taken from?' she answered,
turning to him with the same enforced attention as before.
Mr Dombey, with another bow, which cracked the starch in his cravat,
would beg to leave that to the Artist.
'I would rather you chose for yourself,' said Edith.
'Suppose then,' said Mr Dombey, 'we say from here. It appears a good
spot for the purpose, or - Carker, what do you think?'
There happened to be in the foreground, at some little distance, a
grove of trees, not unlike that In which Mr Carker had made his chain of
footsteps in the morning, and with a seat under one tree, greatly
resembling, in the general character of its situation, the point where his
chain had broken.
'Might I venture to suggest to Mrs Granger,' said Carker, 'that that is
an interesting - almost a curious - point of view?'
She followed the direction of his riding-whip with her eyes, and raised
them quickly to his face. It was the second glance they had exchanged since
their introduction; and would have been exactly like the first, but that its
expression was plainer.
'Will you like that?' said Edith to Mr Dombey.
'I shall be charmed,' said Mr Dombey to Edith.
Therefore the carriage was driven to the spot where Mr Dombey was to be
charmed; and Edith, without moving from her seat, and openIng her
sketch-book with her usual proud indifference, began to sketch.
'My pencils are all pointless,' she said, stopping and turning them
over.
'Pray allow me,' said Mr Dombey. 'Or Carker will do it better, as he
understands these things. Carker, have the goodness to see to these pencils
for Mrs Granger.
Mr Carker rode up close to the carriage-door on Mrs Granger's side, and
letting the rein fall on his horse's neck, took the pencils from her hand
with a smile and a bow, and sat in the saddle leisurely mending them. Having
done so, he begged to be allowed to hold them, and to hand them to her as
they were required; and thus Mr Carker, with many commendations of Mrs
Granger's extraordinary skill - especially in trees - remained - close at
her side, looking over the drawing as she made it. Mr Dombey in the meantime
stood bolt upright in the carriage like a highly respectable ghost, looking
on too; while Cleopatra and the Major dallied as two ancient doves might do.
'Are you satisfied with that, or shall I finish it a little more?' said
Edith, showing the sketch to Mr Dombey.
Mr Dombey begged that it might not be touched; it was perfection.
'It is most extraordinary,' said Carker, bringing every one of his red
gums to bear upon his praise. 'I was not prepared for anything so beautiful,
and so unusual altogether.'
This might have applied to the sketcher no less than to the sketch; but
Mr Carker's manner was openness itself - not as to his mouth alone, but as
to his whole spirit. So it continued to be while the drawing was laid aside
for Mr Dombey, and while the sketching materials were put up; then he handed
in the pencils (which were received with a distant acknowledgment of his
help, but without a look), and tightening his rein, fell back, and followed
the carriage again.
Thinking, perhaps, as he rode, that even this trivial sketch had been
made and delivered to its owner, as if it had been bargained for and bought.
Thinking, perhaps, that although she had assented with such perfect
readiness to his request, her haughty face, bent over the drawing, or
glancing at the distant objects represented in it, had been the face of a
proud woman, engaged in a sordid and miserable transaction. Thinking,
perhaps, of such things: but smiling certainly, and while he seemed to look
about him freely, in enjoyment of the air and exercise, keeping always that
sharp corner of his eye upon the carriage.
A stroll among the haunted ruins of Kenilworth, and more rides to more
points of view: most of which, Mrs Skewton reminded Mr Dombey, Edith had
already sketched, as he had seen in looking over her drawings: brought the
day's expedition to a close. Mrs Skewton and Edith were driven to their own
lodgings; Mr Carker was graciously invited by Cleopatra to return thither
with Mr Dombey and the Major, in the evening, to hear some of Edith's music;
and the three gentlemen repaired to their hotel to dinner.
The dinner was the counterpart of yesterday's, except that the Major
was twenty-four hours more triumphant and less mysterious. Edith was toasted
again. Mr Dombey was again agreeably embarrassed. And Mr Carker was full of
interest and praise.
There were no other visitors at Mrs Skewton's. Edith's drawings were
strewn about the room, a little more abundantly than usual perhaps; and
Withers, the wan page, handed round a little stronger tea. The harp was
there; the piano was there; and Edith sang and played. But even the music
was played by Edith to Mr Dombey's order, as it were, in the same
uncompromising way. As thus.
'Edith, my dearest love,' said Mrs Skewton, half an hour after tea, 'Mr
Dombey is dying to hear you, I know.'
'Mr Dombey has life enough left to say so for himself, Mama, I have no
doubt.'
'I shall be immensely obliged,' said Mr Dombey.
'What do you wish?'
'Piano?' hesitated Mr Dombey.
'Whatever you please. You have only to choose.
Accordingly, she began with the piano. It was the same with the harp;
the same with her singing; the same with the selection of the pieces that
she sang and played. Such frigid and constrained, yet prompt and pointed
acquiescence with the wishes he imposed upon her, and on no one else, was
sufficiently remarkable to penetrate through all the mysteries of picquet,
and impress itself on Mr Carker's keen attention. Nor did he lose sight of
the fact that Mr Dombey was evidently proud of his power, and liked to show
it.
Nevertheless, Mr Carker played so well - some games with the Major, and
some with Cleopatra, whose vigilance of eye in respect of Mr Dombey and
Edith no lynx could have surpassed - that he even heightened his position in
the lady-mother's good graces; and when on taking leave he regretted that he
would be obliged to return to London next morning, Cleopatra trusted:
community of feeling not being met with every day: that it was far from
being the last time they would meet.
'I hope so,' said Mr Carker, with an expressive look at the couple in
the distance, as he drew towards the door, following the Major. 'I think
so.'
Mr Dombey, who had taken a stately leave of Edith, bent, or made some
approach to a bend, over Cleopatra's couch, and said, in a low voice:
'I have requested Mrs Granger's permission to call on her to-morrow
morning - for a purpose - and she has appointed twelve o'clock. May I hope
to have the pleasure of finding you at home, Madam, afterwards?'
Cleopatra was so much fluttered and moved, by hearing this, of course,
incomprehensible speech, that she could only shut her eyes, and shake her
head, and give Mr Dombey her hand; which Mr Dombey, not exactly knowing what
to do with, dropped.
'Dombey, come along!' cried the Major, looking in at the door. 'Damme,
Sir, old Joe has a great mind to propose an alteration in the name of the
Royal Hotel, and that it should be called the Three Jolly Bachelors, in
honour of ourselves and Carker.' With this, the Major slapped Mr Dombey on
the back, and winking over his shoulder at the ladies, with a frightful
tendency of blood to the head, carried him off.
Mrs Skewton reposed on her sofa, and Edith sat apart, by her harp, in
silence. The mother, trifling with her fan, looked stealthily at the
daughter more than once, but the daughter, brooding gloomily with downcast
eyes, was not to be disturbed.
Thus they remained for a long hour, without a word, until Mrs Skewton's
maid appeared, according to custom, to prepare her gradually for night. At
night, she should have been a skeleton, with dart and hour-glass, rather
than a woman, this attendant; for her touch was as the touch of Death. The
painted object shrivelled underneath her hand; the form collapsed, the hair
dropped off, the arched dark eyebrows changed to scanty tufts of grey; the
pale lips shrunk, the skin became cadaverous and loose; an old, worn,
yellow, nodding woman, with red eyes, alone remained in Cleopatra's place,
huddled up, like a slovenly bundle, in a greasy flannel gown.
The very voice was changed, as it addressed Edith, when they were alone
again.
'Why don't you tell me,' it said sharply, 'that he is coming here
to-morrow by appointment?'
'Because you know it,' returned Edith, 'Mother.'
The mocking emphasis she laid on that one word!
'You know he has bought me,' she resumed. 'Or that he will, to-morrow.
He has considered of his bargain; he has shown it to his friend; he is even
rather proud of it; he thinks that it will suit him, and may be had
sufficiently cheap; and he will buy to-morrow. God, that I have lived for
this, and that I feel it!'
Compress into one handsome face the conscious self-abasement, and the
burning indignation of a hundred women, strong in passion and in pride; and
there it hid itself with two white shuddering arms.
'What do you mean?' returned the angry mother. 'Haven't you from a
child - '
'A child!' said Edith, looking at her, 'when was I a child? What
childhood did you ever leave to me? I was a woman - artful, designing,
mercenary, laying snares for men - before I knew myself, or you, or even
understood the base and wretched aim of every new display I learnt You gave
birth to a woman. Look upon her. She is in her pride tonight'
And as she spoke, she struck her hand upon her beautiful bosom, as
though she would have beaten down herself
'Look at me,' she said, 'who have never known what it is to have an
honest heart, and love. Look at me, taught to scheme and plot when children
play; and married in my youth - an old age of design - to one for whom I had
no feeling but indifference. Look at me, whom he left a widow, dying before
his inheritance descended to him - a judgment on you! well deserved! - and
tell me what has been my life for ten years since.'
'We have been making every effort to endeavour to secure to you a good
establishment,' rejoined her mother. 'That has been your life. And now you
have got it.'
'There is no slave in a market: there is no horse in a fair: so shown
and offered and examined and paraded, Mother, as I have been, for ten
shameful years,' cried Edith, with a burning brow, and the same bitter
emphasis on the one word. 'Is it not so? Have I been made the bye-word of
all kinds of men? Have fools, have profligates, have boys, have dotards,
dangled after me, and one by one rejected me, and fallen off, because you
were too plain with all your cunning: yes, and too true, with all those
false pretences: until we have almost come to be notorious? The licence of
look and touch,' she said, with flashing eyes, 'have I submitted to it, in
half the places of resort upon the map of England? Have I been hawked and
vended here and there, until the last grain of self-respect is dead within
me, and I loathe myself? Has been my late childhood? I had none before. Do
not tell me that I had, tonight of all nights in my life!'
'You might have been well married,' said her mother, 'twenty times at
least, Edith, if you had given encouragement enough.'
'No! Who takes me, refuse that I am, and as I well deserve to be,' she
answered, raising her head, and trembling in her energy of shame and stormy
pride, 'shall take me, as this man does, with no art of mine put forth to
lure him. He sees me at the auction, and he thinks it well to buy me. Let
him! When he came to view me - perhaps to bid - he required to see the roll
of my accomplishments. I gave it to him. When he would have me show one of
them, to justify his purchase to his men, I require of him to say which he
demands, and I exhibit it. I will do no more. He makes the purchase of his
own will, and with his own sense of its worth, and the power of his money;
and I hope it may never disappoint him. I have not vaunted and pressed the
bargain; neither have you, so far as I have been able to prevent you.
'You talk strangely to-night, Edith, to your own Mother.'
'It seems so to me; stranger to me than you,' said Edith. 'But my
education was completed long ago. I am too old now, and have fallen too low,
by degrees, to take a new course, and to stop yours, and to help myself. The
germ of all that purifies a woman's breast, and makes it true and good, has
never stirred in mine, and I have nothing else to sustain me when I despise
myself.' There had been a touching sadness in her voice, but it was gone,
when she went on to say, with a curled lip, 'So, as we are genteel and poor,
I am content that we should be made rich by these means; all I say is, I
have kept the only purpose I have had the strength to form - I had almost
said the power, with you at my side, Mother - and have not tempted this man
on.'
'This man! You speak,' said her mother, 'as if you hated him.'
'And you thought I loved him, did you not?' she answered, stopping on
her way across the room, and looking round. 'Shall I tell you,' she
continued, with her eyes fixed on her mother, 'who already knows us
thoroughly, and reads us right, and before whom I have even less of
self-respect or confidence than before my own inward self; being so much
degraded by his knowledge of me?'
'This is an attack, I suppose,' returned her mother coldly, 'on poor,
unfortunate what's-his-name - Mr Carker! Your want of self-respect and
confidence, my dear, in reference to that person (who is very agreeable, it
strikes me), is not likely to have much effect on your establishment. Why do
you look at me so hard? Are you ill?'
Edith suddenly let fall her face, as if it had been stung, and while
she pressed her hands upon it, a terrible tremble crept over her whole
frame. It was quickly gone; and with her usual step, she passed out of the
room.
The maid who should have been a skeleton, then reappeared, and giving
one arm to her mistress, who appeared to have taken off her manner with her
charms, and to have put on paralysis with her flannel gown, collected the
ashes of Cleopatra, and carried them away in the other, ready for tomorrow's
revivification.
Alterations
'So the day has come at length, Susan,' said Florence to the excellent
Nipper, 'when we are going back to our quiet home!'
Susan drew in her breath with an amount of expression not easily
described, further relieving her feelings with a smart cough, answered,
'Very quiet indeed, Miss Floy, no doubt. Excessive so.'
'When I was a child,' said Florence, thoughtfully, and after musing for
some moments, 'did you ever see that gentleman who has taken the trouble to
ride down here to speak to me, now three times - three times, I think,
Susan?'
'Three times, Miss,' returned the Nipper. 'Once when you was out a
walking with them Sket- '
Florence gently looked at her, and Miss Nipper checked herself.
'With Sir Barnet and his lady, I mean to say, Miss, and the young
gentleman. And two evenings since then.'
'When I was a child, and when company used to come to visit Papa, did
you ever see that gentleman at home, Susan?' asked Florence.
'Well, Miss,' returned her maid, after considering, 'I really couldn't
say I ever did. When your poor dear Ma died, Miss Floy, I was very new in
the family, you see, and my element:' the Nipper bridled, as opining that
her merits had been always designedly extinguished by Mr Dombey: 'was the
floor below the attics.'
'To be sure,' said Florence, still thoughtfully; 'you are not likely to
have known who came to the house. I quite forgot.'
'Not, Miss, but what we talked about the family and visitors,' said
Susan, 'and but what I heard much said, although the nurse before Mrs
Richards make unpleasant remarks when I was in company, and hint at little
Pitchers, but that could only be attributed, poor thing,' observed Susan,
with composed forbearance, 'to habits of intoxication, for which she was
required to leave, and did.'
Florence, who was seated at her chamber window, with her face resting
on her hand, sat looking out, and hardly seemed to hear what Susan said, she
was so lost in thought.
'At all events, Miss,' said Susan, 'I remember very well that this same
gentleman, Mr Carker, was almost, if not quite, as great a gentleman with
your Papa then, as he is now. It used to be said in the house then, Miss,
that he was at the head of all your Pa's affairs in the City, and managed
the whole, and that your Pa minded him more than anybody, which, begging
your pardon, Miss Floy, he might easy do, for he never minded anybody else.
I knew that, Pitcher as I might have been.'
Susan Nipper, with an injured remembrance of the nurse before Mrs
Richards, emphasised 'Pitcher' strongly.
'And that Mr Carker has not fallen off, Miss,' she pursued, 'but has
stood his ground, and kept his credit with your Pa, I know from what is
always said among our people by that Perch, whenever he comes to the house;
and though he's the weakest weed in the world, Miss Floy, and no one can
have a moment's patience with the man, he knows what goes on in the City
tolerable well, and says that your Pa does nothing without Mr Carker, and
leaves all to Mr Carker, and acts according to Mr Carker, and has Mr Carker
always at his elbow, and I do believe that he believes (that washiest of
Perches!) that after your Pa, the Emperor of India is the child unborn to Mr
Carker.'
Not a word of this was lost on Florence, who, with an awakened interest
in Susan's speech, no longer gazed abstractedly on the prospect without, but
looked at her, and listened with attention.
'Yes, Susan,' she said, when that young lady had concluded. 'He is in
Papa's confidence, and is his friend, I am sure.'
Florence's mind ran high on this theme, and had done for some days. Mr
Carker, in the two visits with which he had followed up his first one, had
assumed a confidence between himself and her - a right on his part to be
mysterious and stealthy, in telling her that the ship was still unheard of -
a kind of mildly restrained power and authority over her - that made her
wonder, and caused her great uneasiness. She had no means of repelling it,
or of freeing herself from the web he was gradually winding about her; for
that would have required some art and knowledge of the world, opposed to
such address as his; and Florence had none. True, he had said no more to her
than that there was no news of the ship, and that he feared the worst; but
how he came to know that she was interested in the ship, and why he had the
right to signify his knowledge to her, so insidiously and darkly, troubled
Florence very much.
This conduct on the part of Mr Carker, and her habit of often
considering it with wonder and uneasiness, began to invest him with an
uncomfortable fascination in Florence's thoughts. A more distinct
remembrance of his features, voice, and manner: which she sometimes courted,
as a means of reducing him to the level of a real personage, capable of
exerting no greater charm over her than another: did not remove the vague
impression. And yet he never frowned, or looked upon her with an air of
dislike or animosity, but was always smiling and serene.
Again, Florence, in pursuit of her strong purpose with reference to her
father, and her steady resolution to believe that she was herself
unwittingly to blame for their so cold and distant relations, would recall
to mind that this gentleman was his confidential friend, and would think,
with an anxious heart, could her struggling tendency to dislike and fear him
be a part of that misfortune in her, which had turned her father's love
adrift, and left her so alone? She dreaded that it might be; sometimes
believed it was: then she resolved that she would try to conquer this wrong
feeling; persuaded herself that she was honoured and encouraged by the
notice of her father's friend; and hoped that patient observation of him and
trust in him would lead her bleeding feet along that stony road which ended
in her father's heart.
Thus, with no one to advise her - for she could advise with no one
without seeming to complain against him - gentle Florence tossed on an
uneasy sea of doubt and hope; and Mr Carker, like a scaly monster of the
deep, swam down below, and kept his shining eye upon her. Florence had a new
reason in all this for wishing to be at home again. Her lonely life was
better suited to her course of timid hope and doubt; and she feared
sometimes, that in her absence she might miss some hopeful chance of
testifying her affection for her father. Heaven knows, she might have set
her mind at rest, poor child! on this last point; but her slighted love was
fluttering within her, and, even in her sleep, it flew away in dreams, and
nestled, like a wandering bird come home, upon her father's neck.
Of Walter she thought often. Ah! how often, when the night was gloomy,
and the wind was blowing round the house! But hope was strong in her breast.
It is so difficult for the young and ardent, even with such experience as
hers, to imagine youth and ardour quenched like a weak flame, and the bright
day of life merging into night, at noon, that hope was strong yet. Her tears
fell frequently for Walter's sufferings; but rarely for his supposed death,
and never long.
She had written to the old Instrument-maker, but had received no answer
to her note: which indeed required none. Thus matters stood with Florence on
the morning when she was going home, gladly, to her old secluded life.
Doctor and Mrs Blimber, accompanied (much against his will) by their
valued charge, Master Barnet, were already gone back to Brighton, where that
young gentleman and his fellow-pilgrims to Parnassus were then, no doubt, in
the continual resumption of their studies. The holiday time was past and
over; most of the juvenile guests at the villa had taken their departure;
and Florence's long visit was come to an end.
There was one guest, however, albeit not resident within the house, who
had been very constant in his attentions to the family, and who still
remained devoted to them. This was Mr Toots, who after renewing, some weeks
ago, the acquaintance he had had the happiness of forming with Skettles
Junior, on the night when he burst the Blimberian bonds and soared into
freedom with his ring on, called regularly every other day, and left a
perfect pack of cards at the hall-door; so many indeed, that the ceremony
was quite a deal on the part of Mr Toots, and a hand at whist on the part of
the servant.
Mr Toots, likewise, with the bold and happy idea of preventing the
family from forgetting him (but there is reason to suppose that this
expedient originated in the teeming brain of the Chicken), had established a
six-oared cutter, manned by aquatic friends of the Chicken's and steered by
that illustrious character in person, who wore a bright red fireman's coat
for the purpose, and concealed the perpetual black eye with which he was
afflicted, beneath a green shade. Previous to the institution of this
equipage, Mr Toots sounded the Chicken on a hypothetical case, as, supposing
the Chicken to be enamoured of a young lady named Mary, and to have
conceived the intention of starting a boat of his own, what would he call
that boat? The Chicken replied, with divers strong asseverations, that he
would either christen it Poll or The Chicken's Delight. Improving on this
idea, Mr Toots, after deep study and the exercise of much invention,
resolved to call his boat The Toots's Joy, as a delicate compliment to
Florence, of which no man knowing the parties, could possibly miss the
appreciation.
Stretched on a crimson cushion in his gallant bark, with his shoes in
the air, Mr Toots, in the exercise of his project, had come up the river,
day after day, and week after week, and had flitted to and fro, near Sir
Barnet's garden, and had caused his crew to cut across and across the river
at sharp angles, for his better exhibition to any lookers-out from Sir
Barnet's windows, and had had such evolutions performed by the Toots's Joy
as had filled all the neighbouring part of the water-side with astonishment.
But whenever he saw anyone in Sir Barnet's garden on the brink of the river,
Mr Toots always feigned to be passing there, by a combination of
coincidences of the most singular and unlikely description.
'How are you, Toots?' Sir Barnet would say, waving his hand from the
lawn, while the artful Chicken steered close in shore.
'How de do, Sir Barnet?' Mr Toots would answer, What a surprising thing
that I should see you here!'
Mr Toots, in his sagacity, always said this, as if, instead of that
being Sir Barnet's house, it were some deserted edifice on the banks of the
Nile, or Ganges.
'I never was so surprised!' Mr Toots would exclaim. - 'Is Miss Dombey
there?'
Whereupon Florence would appear, perhaps.
'Oh, Diogenes is quite well, Miss Dombey,' Toots would cry. 'I called
to ask this morning.'
'Thank you very much!' the pleasant voice of Florence would reply.
'Won't you come ashore, Toots?' Sir Barnet would say then. 'Come!
you're in no hurry. Come and see us.'
'Oh, it's of no consequence, thank you!' Mr Toots would blushingly
rejoin. 'I thought Miss Dombey might like to know, that's all. Good-bye!'
And poor Mr Toots, who was dying to accept the invitation, but hadn't the
courage to do it, signed to the Chicken, with an aching heart, and away went
the Joy, cleaving the water like an arrow.
The Joy was lying in a state of extraordinary splendour, at the garden
steps, on the morning of Florence's departure. When she went downstairs to
take leave, after her talk with Susan, she found Mr Toots awaiting her in
the drawing-room.
'Oh, how de do, Miss Dombey?' said the stricken Toots, always
dreadfully disconcerted when the desire of his heart was gained, and he was
speaking to her; 'thank you, I'm very well indeed, I hope you're the same,
so was Diogenes yesterday.'
'You are very kind,' said Florence.
'Thank you, it's of no consequence,' retorted Mr Toots. 'I thought
perhaps you wouldn't mind, in this fine weather, coming home by water, Miss
Dombey. There's plenty of room in the boat for your maid.'
'I am very much obliged to you,' said Florence, hesitating. 'I really
am - but I would rather not.'
'Oh, it's of no consequence,' retorted Mr Toots. 'Good morning.'
'Won't you wait and see Lady Skettles?' asked Florence, kindly.
'Oh no, thank you,' returned Mr Toots, 'it's of no consequence at all.'
So shy was Mr Toots on such occasions, and so flurried! But Lady
Skettles entering at the moment, Mr Toots was suddenly seized with a passion
for asking her how she did, and hoping she was very well; nor could Mr Toots
by any possibility leave off shaking hands with her, until Sir Barnet
appeared: to whom he immediately clung with the tenacity of desperation.
'We are losing, today, Toots,' said Sir Barnet, turning towards
Florence, 'the light of our house, I assure you'
'Oh, it's of no conseq - I mean yes, to be sure,' faltered the
embarrassed Mr Toots. 'Good morning!'
Notwithstanding the emphatic nature of this farewell, Mr Toots, instead
of going away, stood leering about him, vacantly. Florence, to relieve him,
bade adieu, with many thanks, to Lady Skettles, and gave her arm to Sir
Barnet.
'May I beg of you, my dear Miss Dombey,' said her host, as he conducted
her to the carriage, 'to present my best compliments to your dear Papa?'
It was distressing to Florence to receive the commission, for she felt
as if she were imposing on Sir Barnet by allowing him to believe that a
kindness rendered to her, was rendered to her father. As she could not
explain, however, she bowed her head and thanked him; and again she thought
that the dull home, free from such embarrassments, and such reminders of her
sorrow, was her natural and best retreat.
Such of her late friends and companions as were yet remaining at the
villa, came running from within, and from the garden, to say good-bye. They
were all attached to her, and very earnest in taking leave of her. Even the
household were sorry for her going, and the servants came nodding and
curtseying round the carriage door. As Florence looked round on the kind
faces, and saw among them those of Sir Barnet and his lady, and of Mr Toots,
who was chuckling and staring at her from a distance, she was reminded of
the night when Paul and she had come from Doctor Blimber's: and when the
carriage drove away, her face was wet with tears.
Sorrowful tears, but tears of consolation, too; for all the softer
memories connected with the dull old house to which she was returning made
it dear to her, as they rose up. How long it seemed since she had wandered
through the silent rooms: since she had last crept, softly and afraid, into
those her father occupied: since she had felt the solemn but yet soothing
influence of the beloved dead in every action of her daily life! This new
farewell reminded her, besides, of her parting with poor Walter: of his
looks and words that night: and of the gracious blending she had noticed in
him, of tenderness for those he left behind, with courage and high spirit.
His little history was associated with the old house too, and gave it a new
claim and hold upon her heart. Even Susan Nipper softened towards the home
of so many years, as they were on their way towards it. Gloomy as it was,
and rigid justice as she rendered to its gloom, she forgave it a great deal.
'I shall be glad to see it again, I don't deny, Miss,' said the Nipper.
'There ain't much in it to boast of, but I wouldn't have it burnt or pulled
down, neither!'
'You'll be glad to go through the old rooms, won't you, Susan?' said
Florence, smiling.
'Well, Miss,' returned the Nipper, softening more and more towards the
house, as they approached it nearer, 'I won't deny but what I shall, though
I shall hate 'em again, to-morrow, very likely.'
Florence felt that, for her, there was greater peace within it than
elsewhere. It was better and easier to keep her secret shut up there, among
the tall dark walls, than to carry it abroad into the light, and try to hide
it from a crowd of happy eyes. It was better to pursue the study of her
loving heart, alone, and find no new discouragements in loving hearts about
her. It was easier to hope, and pray, and love on, all uncared for, yet with
constancy and patience, in the tranquil sanctuary of such remembrances:
although it mouldered, rusted, and decayed about her: than in a new scene,
let its gaiety be what it would. She welcomed back her old enchanted dream
of life, and longed for the old dark door to close upon her, once again.
Full of such thoughts, they turned into the long and sombre street.
Florence was not on that side of the carriage which was nearest to her home,
and as the distance lessened between them and it, she looked out of her
window for the children over the way.
She was thus engaged, when an exclamation from Susan caused her to turn
quickly round.
'Why, Gracious me!' cried Susan, breathless, 'where's our house!'
'Our house!' said Florence.
Susan, drawing in her head from the window, thrust it out again, drew
it in again as the carriage stopped, and stared at her mistress in
amazement.
There was a labyrinth of scaffolding raised all round the house, from
the basement to the roof. Loads of bricks and stones, and heaps of mortar,
and piles of wood, blocked up half the width and length of the broad street
at the side. Ladders were raised against the walls; labourers were climbing
up and down; men were at work upon the steps of the scaffolding; painters
and decorators were busy inside; great rolls of ornamental paper were being
delivered from a cart at the door; an upholsterer's waggon also stopped the
way; no furniture was to be seen through the gaping and broken windows in
any of the rooms; nothing but workmen, and the implements of their several
trades, swarming from the kitchens to the garrets. Inside and outside alike:
bricklayers, painters, carpenters, masons: hammer, hod, brush, pickaxe, saw,
and trowel: all at work together, in full chorus!
Florence descended from the coach, half doubting if it were, or could
be the right house, until she recognised Towlinson, with a sun-burnt face,
standing at the door to receive her.
'There is nothing the matter?' inquired Florence.
'Oh no, Miss.'
'There are great alterations going on.'
'Yes, Miss, great alterations,' said Towlinson.
Florence passed him as if she were in a dream, and hurried upstairs.
The garish light was in the long-darkened drawing-room and there were steps
and platforms, and men In paper caps, in the high places. Her mother's
picture was gone with the rest of the moveables, and on the mark where it
had been, was scrawled in chalk, 'this room in panel. Green and gold.' The
staircase was a labyrinth of posts and planks like the outside of the house,
and a whole Olympus of plumbers and glaziers was reclining in various
attitudes, on the skylight. Her own room was not yet touched within, but
there were beams and boards raised against it without, baulking the
daylight. She went up swiftly to that other bedroom, where the little bed
was; and a dark giant of a man with a pipe in his mouth, and his head tied
up in a pocket-handkerchief, was staring in at the window.
It was here that Susan Nipper, who had been in quest of Florence, found
her, and said, would she go downstairs to her Papa, who wished to speak to
her.
'At home! and wishing to speak to me!' cried Florence, trembling.
Susan, who was infinitely more distraught than Florence herself,
repeated her errand; and Florence, pale and agitated, hurried down again,
without a moment's hesitation. She thought upon the way down, would she dare
to kiss him? The longing of her heart resolved her, and she thought she
would.
Her father might have heard that heart beat, when it came into his
presence. One instant, and it would have beat against his breast.
But he was not alone. There were two ladies there; and Florence
stopped. Striving so hard with her emotion, that if her brute friend Di had
not burst in and overwhelmed her with his caresses as a welcome home - at
which one of the ladies gave a little scream, and that diverted her
attention from herself - she would have swooned upon the floor.
'Florence,' said her father, putting out his hand: so stiffly that it
held her off: 'how do you do?'
Florence took the hand between her own, and putting it timidly to her
lips, yielded to its withdrawal. It touched the door in shutting it, with
quite as much endearment as it had touched her.
'What dog is that?' said Mr Dombey, displeased.
'It is a dog, Papa - from Brighton.'
'Well!' said Mr Dombey; and a cloud passed over his face, for he
understood her.
'He is very good-tempered,' said Florence, addressing herself with her
natural grace and sweetness to the two lady strangers. 'He is only glad to
see me. Pray forgive him.'
She saw in the glance they interchanged, that the lady who had
screamed, and who was seated, was old; and that the other lady, who stood
near her Papa, was very beautiful, and of an elegant figure.
'Mrs Skewton,' said her father, turning to the first, and holding out
his hand, 'this is my daughter Florence.'
'Charming, I am sure,' observed the lady, putting up her glass. 'So
natural! My darling Florence, you must kiss me, if you please.'
Florence having done so, turned towards the other lady, by whom her
father stood waiting.
'Edith,' said Mr Dombey, 'this is my daughter Florence. Florence, this
lady will soon be your Mama.'
Florence started, and looked up at the beautiful face in a conflict of
emotions, among which the tears that name awakened, struggled for a moment
with surprise, interest, admiration, and an indefinable sort of fear. Then
she cried out, 'Oh, Papa, may you be happy! may you be very, very happy all
your life!' and then fell weeping on the lady's bosom.
There was a short silence. The beautiful lady, who at first had seemed
to hesitate whether or no she should advance to Florence, held her to her
breast, and pressed the hand with which she clasped her, close about her
waist, as if to reassure her and comfort her. Not one word passed the lady's
lips. She bent her head down over Florence, and she kissed her on the cheek,
but she said no word.
'Shall we go on through the rooms,' said Mr Dombey, 'and see how our
workmen are doing? Pray allow me, my dear madam.'
He said this in offering his arm to Mrs Skewton, who had been looking
at Florence through her glass, as though picturing to herself what she might
be made, by the infusion - from her own copious storehouse, no doubt - of a
little more Heart and Nature. Florence was still sobbing on the lady's
breast, and holding to her, when Mr Dombey was heard to say from the
Conservatory:
'Let us ask Edith. Dear me, where is she?'
'Edith, my dear!' cried Mrs Skewton, 'where are you? Looking for Mr
Dombey somewhere, I know. We are here, my love.'
The beautiful lady released her hold of Florence, and pressing her lips
once more upon her face, withdrew hurriedly, and joined them. Florence
remained standing In the same place: happy, sorry, joyful, and in tears, she
knew not how, or how long, but all at once: when her new Mama came back, and
took her in her arms again.
'Florence,' said the lady, hurriedly, and looking into her face with
great earnestness. 'You will not begin by hating me?'
'By hating you, Mama?' cried Florence, winding her arm round her neck,
and returning the look.
'Hush! Begin by thinking well of me,' said the beautiful lady. 'Begin
by believing that I will try to make you happy, and that I am prepared to
love you, Florence. Good-bye. We shall meet again soon. Good-bye! Don't stay
here, now.'
Again she pressed her to her breast she had spoken in a rapid manner,
but firmly - and Florence saw her rejoin them in the other room. And now
Florence began to hope that she would learn from her new and beautiful Mama,
how to gaIn her father's love; and in her sleep that night, in her lost old
home, her own Mama smiled radiantly upon the hope, and blessed it. Dreaming
Florence!
The Opening of the Eyes of Mrs Chick
Miss Tox, all unconscious of any such rare appearances in connexion
with Mr Dombey's house, as scaffoldings and ladders, and men with their
heads tied up in pocket-handkerchiefs, glaring in at the windows like flying
genii or strange birds, - having breakfasted one morning at about this
eventful period of time, on her customary viands; to wit, one French roll
rasped, one egg new laid (or warranted to be), and one little pot of tea,
wherein was infused one little silver scoopful of that herb on behalf of
Miss Tox, and one little silver scoopful on behalf of the teapot - a flight
of fancy in which good housekeepers delight; went upstairs to set forth the
bird waltz on the harpsichord, to water and arrange the plants, to dust the
nick-nacks, and, according to her daily custom, to make her little
drawing-room the garland of Princess's Place.
Miss Tox endued herself with a pair of ancient gloves, like dead
leaves, in which she was accustomed to perform these avocations - hidden
from human sight at other times in a table drawer - and went methodically to
work; beginning with the bird waltz; passing, by a natural association of
ideas, to her bird - a very high-shouldered canary, stricken in years, and
much rumpled, but a piercing singer, as Princess's Place well knew; taking,
next in order, the little china ornaments, paper fly-cages, and so forth;
and coming round, in good time, to the plants, which generally required to
be snipped here and there with a pair of scissors, for some botanical reason
that was very powerful with Miss Tox. Miss Tox was slow in coming to the
plants, this morning. The weather was warm, the wind southerly; and there
was a sigh of the summer-time In Princess's Place, that turned Miss Tox's
thoughts upon the country. The pot-boy attached to the Princess's Arms had
come out with a can and trickled water, in a flowering pattern, all over
Princess's Place, and it gave the weedy ground a fresh scent - quite a
growing scent, Miss Tox said. There was a tiny blink of sun peeping in from
the great street round the corner, and the smoky sparrows hopped over it and
back again, brightening as they passed: or bathed in it, like a stream, and
became glorified sparrows, unconnected with chimneys. Legends in praise of
Ginger-Beer, with pictorial representations of thirsty customers submerged
in the effervescence, or stunned by the flying corks, were conspicuous in
the window of the Princess's Arms. They were making late hay, somewhere out
of town; and though the fragrance had a long way to come, and many counter
fragrances to contend with among the dwellings of the poor (may God reward
the worthy gentlemen who stickle for the Plague as part and parcel of the
wisdom of our ancestors, and who do their little best to keep those
dwellings miserable!), yet it was wafted faintly into Princess's Place,
whispering of Nature and her wholesome air, as such things will, even unto
prisoners and captives, and those who are desolate and oppressed, in very
spite of aldermen and knights to boot: at whose sage nod - and how they nod!
- the rolling world stands still!
Miss Tox sat down upon the window-seat, and thought of her good Papa
deceased - Mr Tox, of the Customs Department of the public service; and of
her childhood, passed at a seaport, among a considerable quantity of cold
tar, and some rusticity. She fell into a softened remembrance of meadows, in
old time, gleaming with buttercups, like so many inverted firmaments of
golden stars; and how she had made chains of dandelion-stalks for youthful
vowers of eternal constancy, dressed chiefly in nankeen; and how soon those
fetters had withered and broken.
Sitting on the window-seat, and looking out upon the sparrows and the
blink of sun, Miss Tox thought likewise of her good Mama deceased - sister
to the owner of the powdered head and pigtail - of her virtues and her
rheumatism. And when a man with bulgy legs, and a rough voice, and a heavy
basket on his head that crushed his hat into a mere black muffin, came
crying flowers down Princess's Place, making his timid little roots of
daisies shudder in the vibration of every yell he gave, as though he had
been an ogre, hawking little children, summer recollections were so strong
upon Miss Tox, that she shook her head, and murmured she would be
comparatively old before she knew it - which seemed likely.
In her pensive mood, Miss Tox's thoughts went wandering on Mr Dombey's
track; probably because the Major had returned home to his lodgings
opposite, and had just bowed to her from his window. What other reason could
Miss Tox have for connecting Mr Dombey with her summer days and dandelion
fetters? Was he more cheerful? thought Miss Tox. Was he reconciled to the
decrees of fate? Would he ever marry again? and if yes, whom? What sort of
person now!
A flush - it was warm weather - overspread Miss Tox's face, as, while
entertaining these meditations, she turned her head, and was surprised by
the reflection of her thoughtful image In the chimney-glass. Another flush
succeeded when she saw a little carriage drive into Princess's Place, and
make straight for her own door. Miss Tox arose, took up her scissors
hastily, and so coming, at last, to the plants, was very busy with them when
Mrs Chick entered the room.
'How is my sweetest friend!' exclaimed Miss Tox, with open arms.
A little stateliness was mingled with Miss Tox's sweetest friend's
demeanour, but she kissed Miss Tox, and said, 'Lucretia, thank you, I am
pretty well. I hope you are the same. Hem!'
Mrs Chick was labouring under a peculiar little monosyllabic cough; a
sort of primer, or easy introduction to the art of coughing.
'You call very early, and how kind that is, my dear!' pursued Miss Tox.
'Now, have you breakfasted?'
'Thank you, Lucretia,' said Mrs Chick, 'I have. I took an early
breakfast' - the good lady seemed curious on the subject of Princess's
Place, and looked all round it as she spoke - 'with my brother, who has come
home.'
'He is better, I trust, my love,' faltered Miss Tox.
'He is greatly better, thank you. Hem!'
'My dear Louisa must be careful of that cough' remarked Miss Tox.
'It's nothing,' returned Mrs Chic 'It's merely change of weather. We
must expect change.'
'Of weather?' asked Miss Tox, in her simplicity.
'Of everything' returned Mrs Chick 'Of course we must. It's a world of
change. Anyone would surprise me very much, Lucretia, and would greatly
alter my opinion of their understanding, if they attempted to contradict or
evade what is so perfectly evident. Change!' exclaimed Mrs Chick, with
severe philosophy. 'Why, my gracious me, what is there that does not change!
even the silkworm, who I am sure might be supposed not to trouble itself
about such subjects, changes into all sorts of unexpected things
continually.'
'My Louisa,' said the mild Miss Tox, 'is ever happy in her
illustrations.'
'You are so kind, Lucretia,' returned Mrs Chick, a little softened, 'as
to say so, and to think so, I believe. I hope neither of us may ever have
any cause to lessen our opinion of the other, Lucretia.'
'I am sure of it,' returned Miss Tox.
Mrs Chick coughed as before, and drew lines on the carpet with the
ivory end of her parasol. Miss Tox, who had experience of her fair friend,
and knew that under the pressure of any slight fatigue or vexation she was
prone to a discursive kind of irritability, availed herself of the pause, to
change the subject.
'Pardon me, my dear Louisa,' said Miss Tox, 'but have I caught sight of
the manly form of Mr Chick in the carriage?'
'He is there,' said Mrs Chick, 'but pray leave him there. He has his
newspaper, and would be quite contented for the next two hours. Go on with
your flowers, Lucretia, and allow me to sit here and rest.'
'My Louisa knows,' observed Miss Tox, 'that between friends like
ourselves, any approach to ceremony would be out of the question. Therefore
- ' Therefore Miss Tox finished the sentence, not in words but action; and
putting on her gloves again, which she had taken off, and arming herself
once more with her scissors, began to snip and clip among the leaves with
microscopic industry.
'Florence has returned home also,' said Mrs Chick, after sitting silent
for some time, with her head on one side, and her parasol sketching on the
floor; 'and really Florence is a great deal too old now, to continue to lead
that solitary life to which she has been accustomed. Of course she is. There
can be no doubt about it. I should have very little respect, indeed, for
anybody who could advocate a different opinion. Whatever my wishes might be,
I could not respect them. We cannot command our feelings to such an extent
as that.'
Miss Tox assented, without being particular as to the intelligibility
of the proposition.
'If she's a strange girl,' said Mrs Chick, 'and if my brother Paul
cannot feel perfectly comfortable in her society, after all the sad things
that have happened, and all the terrible disappointments that have been
undergone, then, what is the reply? That he must make an effort. That he is
bound to make an effort. We have always been a family remarkable for effort.
Paul is at the head of the family; almost the only representative of it left
- for what am I - I am of no consequence - '
'My dearest love,' remonstrated Miss Tox.
Mrs Chick dried her eyes, which were, for the moment, overflowing; and
proceeded:
'And consequently he is more than ever bound to make an effort. And
though his having done so, comes upon me with a sort of shock - for mine is
a very weak and foolish nature; which is anything but a blessing I am sure;
I often wish my heart was a marble slab, or a paving-stone -
'My sweet Louisa,' remonstrated Miss Tox again.
'Still, it is a triumph to me to know that he is so true to himself,
and to his name of Dombey; although, of course, I always knew he would be. I
only hope,' said Mrs Chick, after a pause, 'that she may be worthy of the
name too.
Miss Tox filled a little green watering-pot from a jug, and happening
to look up when she had done so, was so surprised by the amount of
expression Mrs Chick had conveyed into her face, and was bestowing upon her,
that she put the little watering-pot on the table for the present, and sat
down near it.
'My dear Louisa,' said Miss Tox, 'will it be the least satisfaction to
you, if I venture to observe in reference to that remark, that I, as a
humble individual, think your sweet niece in every way most promising?~
'What do you mean, Lucretia?' returned Mrs Chick, with increased stateliness
of manner. 'To what remark of mine, my dear, do you refer?'
'Her being worthy of her name, my love,' replied Miss Tox.
'If,' said Mrs Chick, with solemn patience, 'I have not expressed
myself with clearness, Lucretia, the fault of course is mine. There is,
perhaps, no reason why I should express myself at all, except the intimacy
that has subsisted between us, and which I very much hope, Lucretia -
confidently hope - nothing will occur to disturb. Because, why should I do
anything else? There is no reason; it would be absurd. But I wish to express
myself clearly, Lucretia; and therefore to go back to that remark, I must
beg to say that it was not intended to relate to Florence, in any way.'
'Indeed!' returned Miss Tox.
'No,' said Mrs Chick shortly and decisively.
'Pardon me, my dear,' rejoined her meek friend; 'but I cannot have
understood it. I fear I am dull.'
Mrs Chick looked round the room and over the way; at the plants, at the
bird, at the watering-pot, at almost everything within view, except Miss
Tox; and finally dropping her glance upon Miss Tox, for a moment, on its way
to the ground, said, looking meanwhile with elevated eyebrows at the carpet:
'When I speak, Lucretia, of her being worthy of the name, I speak of my
brother Paul's second wife. I believe I have already said, in effect, if not
in the very words I now use, that it is his intention to marry a second
wife.'
Miss Tox left her seat in a hurry, and returned to her plants; clipping
among the stems and leaves, with as little favour as a barber working at so
many pauper heads of hair.
'Whether she will be fully sensible of the distinction conferred upon
her,' said Mrs Chick, in a lofty tone, 'is quite another question. I hope
she may be. We are bound to think well of one another in this world, and I
hope she may be. I have not been advised with myself If I had been advised
with, I have no doubt my advice would have been cavalierly received, and
therefore it is infinitely better as it is. I much prefer it as it is.'
Miss Tox, with head bent down, still clipped among the plants. Mrs
Chick, with energetic shakings of her own head from time to time, continued
to hold forth, as if in defiance of somebody. 'If my brother Paul had
consulted with me, which he sometimes does - or rather, sometimes used to
do; for he will naturally do that no more now, and this is a circumstance
which I regard as a relief from responsibility,' said Mrs Chick,
hysterically, 'for I thank Heaven I am not jealous - ' here Mrs Chick again
shed tears: 'if my brother Paul had come to me, and had said, "Louisa, what
kind of qualities would you advise me to look out for, in a wife?" I should
certainly have answered, "Paul, you must have family, you must have beauty,
you must have dignity, you must have connexion." Those are the words I
should have used. You might have led me to the block immediately
afterwards,' said Mrs Chick, as if that consequence were highly probable,
'but I should have used them. I should have said, "Paul! You to marry a
second time without family! You to marry without beauty! You to marry
without dignity! You to marry without connexion! There is nobody in the
world, not mad, who could dream of daring to entertain such a preposterous
idea!"'
Miss Tox stopped clipping; and with her head among the plants, listened
attentively. Perhaps Miss Tox thought there was hope in this exordium, and
the warmth of Mrs Chick.
I should have adopted this course of argument,' pursued the discreet
lady, 'because I trust I am not a fool. I make no claim to be considered a
person of superior intellect - though I believe some people have been
extraordinary enough to consider me so; one so little humoured as I am,
would very soon be disabused of any such notion; but I trust I am not a
downright fool. And to tell ME,' said Mrs Chick with ineffable disdain,
'that my brother Paul Dombey could ever contemplate the possibility of
uniting himself to anybody - I don't care who' - she was more sharp and
emphatic in that short clause than in any other part of her discourse - 'not
possessing these requisites, would be to insult what understanding I have
got, as much as if I was to be told that I was born and bred an elephant,
which I may be told next,' said Mrs Chick, with resignation. 'It wouldn't
surprise me at all. I expect it.'
In the moment's silence that ensued, Miss Tox's scissors gave a feeble
clip or two; but Miss Tox's face was still invisible, and Miss Tox's morning
gown was agitated. Mrs Chick looked sideways at her, through the intervening
plants, and went on to say, in a tone of bland conviction, and as one
dwelling on a point of fact that hardly required to be stated:
'Therefore, of course my brother Paul has done what was to be expected
of him, and what anybody might have foreseen he would do, if he entered the
marriage state again. I confess it takes me rather by surprise, however
gratifying; because when Paul went out of town I had no idea at all that he
would form any attachment out of town, and he certainly had no attachment
when he left here. However, it seems to be extremely desirable in every
point of view. I have no doubt the mother is a most genteel and elegant
creature, and I have no right whatever to dispute the policy of her living
with them: which is Paul's affair, not mine - and as to Paul's choice,
herself, I have only seen her picture yet, but that is beautiful indeed. Her
name is beautiful too,' said Mrs Chick, shaking her head with energy, and
arranging herself in her chair; 'Edith is at once uncommon, as it strikes
me, and distinguished. Consequently, Lucretia, I have no doubt you will be
happy to hear that the marriage is to take place immediately - of course,
you will:' great emphasis again: 'and that you are delighted with this
change in the condition of my brother, who has shown you a great deal of
pleasant attention at various times.'
Miss Tox made no verbal answer, but took up the little watering-pot
with a trembling hand, and looked vacantly round as if considering what
article of furniture would be improved by the contents. The room door
opening at this crisis of Miss Tox's feelings, she started, laughed aloud,
and fell into the arms of the person entering; happily insensible alike of
Mrs Chick's indignant countenance and of the Major at his window over the
way, who had his double-barrelled eye-glass in full action, and whose face
and figure were dilated with Mephistophelean joy.
Not so the expatriated Native, amazed supporter of Miss Tox's swooning
form, who, coming straight upstairs, with a polite inquiry touching Miss
Tox's health (in exact pursuance of the Major's malicious instructions), had
accidentally arrived in the very nick of time to catch the delicate burden
in his arms, and to receive the content' of the little watering-pot in his
shoe; both of which circumstances, coupled with his consciousness of being
closely watched by the wrathful Major, who had threatened the usual penalty
in regard of every bone in his skin in case of any failure, combined to
render him a moving spectacle of mental and bodily distress.
For some moments, this afflicted foreigner remained clasping Miss Tox
to his heart, with an energy of action in remarkable opposition to his
disconcerted face, while that poor lady trickled slowly down upon him the
very last sprinklings of the little watering-pot, as if he were a delicate
exotic (which indeed he was), and might be almost expected to blow while the
gentle rain descended. Mrs Chick, at length recovering sufficient presence
of mind to interpose, commanded him to drop Miss Tox upon the sofa and
withdraw; and the exile promptly obeying, she applied herself to promote
Miss Tox's recovery.
But none of that gentle concern which usually characterises the
daughters of Eve in their tending of each other; none of that freemasonry in
fainting, by which they are generally bound together In a mysterious bond of
sisterhood; was visible in Mrs Chick's demeanour. Rather like the
executioner who restores the victim to sensation previous to proceeding with
the torture (or was wont to do so, in the good old times for which all true
men wear perpetual mourning), did Mrs Chick administer the smelling-bottle,
the slapping on the hands, the dashing of cold water on the face, and the
other proved remedies. And when, at length, Miss Tox opened her eyes, and
gradually became restored to animation and consciousness, Mrs Chick drew off
as from a criminal, and reversing the precedent of the murdered king of
Denmark, regarded her more in anger than In sorrow.'
'Lucretia!' said Mrs Chick 'I will not attempt to disguise what I feel.
My eyes are opened, all at once. I wouldn't have believed this, if a Saint
had told it to me.
'I am foolish to give way to faintness,' Miss Tox faltered. 'I shall be
better presently.'
'You will be better presently, Lucretia!' repeated Mrs Chick, with
exceeding scorn. 'Do you suppose I am blind? Do you imagine I am in my
second childhood? No, Lucretia! I am obliged to you!'
Miss Tox directed an imploring, helpless kind of look towards her
friend, and put her handkerchief before her face.
'If anyone had told me this yesterday,' said Mrs Chick, with majesty,
'or even half-an-hour ago, I should have been tempted, I almost believe, to
strike them to the earth. Lucretia Tox, my eyes are opened to you all at
once. The scales:' here Mrs Chick cast down an imaginary pair, such as are
commonly used in grocers' shops: 'have fallen from my sight. The blindness
of my confidence is past, Lucretia. It has been abused and played, upon, and
evasion is quite out of the question now, I assure you.
'Oh! to what do you allude so cruelly, my love?' asked Miss Tox,
through her tears.
'Lucretia,' said Mrs Chick, 'ask your own heart. I must entreat you not
to address me by any such familiar term as you have just used, if you
please. I have some self-respect left, though you may think otherwise.'
'Oh, Louisa!' cried Miss Tox. 'How can you speak to me like that?'
'How can I speak to you like that?' retorted Mrs Chick, who, in default
of having any particular argument to sustain herself upon, relied
principally on such repetitions for her most withering effects. 'Like that!
You may well say like that, indeed!'
Miss Tox sobbed pitifully.
'The idea!' said Mrs Chick, 'of your having basked at my brother's
fireside, like a serpent, and wound yourself, through me, almost into his
confidence, Lucretia, that you might, in secret, entertain designs upon him,
and dare to aspire to contemplate the possibility of his uniting himself to
you! Why, it is an idea,' said Mrs Chick, with sarcastic dignity, 'the
absurdity of which almost relieves its treachery.'
'Pray, Louisa,' urged Miss Tox, 'do not say such dreadful things.'
'Dreadful things!' repeated Mrs Chick. 'Dreadful things! Is it not a
fact, Lucretia, that you have just now been unable to command your feelings
even before me, whose eyes you had so completely closed?'
'I have made no complaint,' sobbed Miss Tox. 'I have said nothing. If I
have been a little overpowered by your news, Louisa, and have ever had any
lingering thought that Mr Dombey was inclined to be particular towards me,
surely you will not condemn me.'
'She is going to say,' said Mrs Chick, addressing herself to the whole
of the furniture, in a comprehensive glance of resignation and appeal, 'She
is going to say - I know it - that I have encouraged her!'
'I don't wish to exchange reproaches, dear Louisa,' sobbed Miss Tox
'Nor do I wish to complain. But, in my own defence - '
'Yes,' cried Mrs Chick, looking round the room with a prophetic smile,
'that's what she's going to say. I knew it. You had better say it. Say it
openly! Be open, Lucretia Tox,' said Mrs Chick, with desperate sternness,
'whatever you are.'
'In my own defence,' faltered Miss Tox, 'and only In my own defence
against your unkind words, my dear Louisa, I would merely ask you if you
haven't often favoured such a fancy, and even said it might happen, for
anything we could tell?'
'There is a point,' said Mrs Chick, rising, not as if she were going to
stop at the floor, but as if she were about to soar up, high, into her
native skies, 'beyond which endurance becomes ridiculous, if not culpable. I
can bear much; but not too much. What spell was on me when I came into this
house this day, I don't know; but I had a presentiment - a dark
presentiment,' said Mrs Chick, with a shiver, 'that something was going to
happen. Well may I have had that foreboding, Lucretia, when my confidence of
many years is destroyed in an instant, when my eyes are opened all at once,
and when I find you revealed in your true colours. Lucretia, I have been
mistaken in you. It is better for us both that this subject should end here.
I wish you well, and I shall ever wish you well. But, as an individual who
desires to be true to herself in her own poor position, whatever that
position may be, or may not be - and as the sister of my brother - and as
the sister-in-law of my brother's wife - and as a connexion by marriage of
my brother's wife's mother - may I be permitted to add, as a Dombey? - I can
wish you nothing else but good morning.'
These words, delivered with cutting suavity, tempered and chastened by
a lofty air of moral rectitude, carried the speaker to the door. There she
inclined her head in a ghostly and statue-like manner, and so withdrew to
her carriage, to seek comfort and consolation in the arms of Mr Chick, her
lord.
Figuratively speaking, that is to say; for the arms of Mr Chick were
full of his newspaper. Neither did that gentleman address his eyes towards
his wife otherwise than by stealth. Neither did he offer any consolation
whatever. In short, he sat reading, and humming fag ends of tunes, and
sometimes glancing furtively at her without delivering himself of a word,
good, bad, or indifferent.
In the meantime Mrs Chick sat swelling and bridling, and tossing her
head, as if she were still repeating that solemn formula of farewell to
Lucretia Tox. At length, she said aloud, 'Oh the extent to which her eyes
had been opened that day!'
'To which your eyes have been opened, my dear!' repeated Mr Chick.
'Oh, don't talk to me!' said Mrs Chic 'if you can bear to see me in
this state, and not ask me what the matter is, you had better hold your
tongue for ever.'
'What is the matter, my dear?' asked Mr Chick
'To think,' said Mrs Chick, in a state of soliloquy, 'that she should
ever have conceived the base idea of connecting herself with our family by a
marriage with Paul! To think that when she was playing at horses with that
dear child who is now in his grave - I never liked it at the time - she
should have been hiding such a double-faced design! I wonder she was never
afraid that something would happen to her. She is fortunate if nothing
does.'
'I really thought, my dear,' said Mr Chick slowly, after rubbing the
bridge of his nose for some time with his newspaper, 'that you had gone on
the same tack yourself, all along, until this morning; and had thought it
would be a convenient thing enough, if it could have been brought about.'
Mrs Chick instantly burst into tears, and told Mr Chick that if he
wished to trample upon her with his boots, he had better do It.
'But with Lucretia Tox I have done,' said Mrs Chick, after abandoning
herself to her feelings for some minutes, to Mr Chick's great terror. 'I can
bear to resign Paul's confidence in favour of one who, I hope and trust, may
be deserving of it, and with whom he has a perfect right to replace poor
Fanny if he chooses; I can bear to be informed, In Paul's cool manner, of
such a change in his plans, and never to be consulted until all is settled
and determined; but deceit I can not bear, and with Lucretia Tox I have
done. It is better as it is,' said Mrs Chick, piously; 'much better. It
would have been a long time before I could have accommodated myself
comfortably with her, after this; and I really don't know, as Paul is going
to be very grand, and these are people of condition, that she would have
been quite presentable, and might not have compromised myself. There's a
providence in everything; everything works for the best; I have been tried
today but on the whole I do not regret it.'
In which Christian spirit, Mrs Chick dried her eyes and smoothed her
lap, and sat as became a person calm under a great wrong. Mr Chick feeling
his unworthiness no doubt, took an early opportunity of being set down at a
street corner and walking away whistling, with his shoulders very much
raised, and his hands in his pockets.
While poor excommunicated Miss Tox, who, if she were a fawner and
toad-eater, was at least an honest and a constant one, and had ever borne a
faithful friendship towards her impeacher and had been truly absorbed and
swallowed up in devotion to the magnificence of Mr Dombey - while poor
excommunicated Miss Tox watered her plants with her tears, and felt that it
was winter in Princess's Place.
The interval before the Marriage
Although the enchanted house was no more, and the working world had
broken into it, and was hammering and crashing and tramping up and down
stairs all day long keeping Diogenes in an incessant paroxysm of barking,
from sunrise to sunset - evidently convinced that his enemy had got the
better of him at last, and was then sacking the premises in triumphant
defiance - there was, at first, no other great change in the method of
Florence's life. At night, when the workpeople went away, the house was
dreary and deserted again; and Florence, listening to their voices echoing
through the hall and staircase as they departed, pictured to herself the
cheerful homes to which the were returning, and the children who were
waiting for them, and was glad to think that they were merry and well
pleased to go.
She welcomed back the evening silence as an old friend, but it came now
with an altered face, and looked more kindly on her. Fresh hope was in it.
The beautiful lady who had soothed and carressed her, in the very room in
which her heart had been so wrung, was a spirit of promise to her. Soft
shadows of the bright life dawning, when her father's affection should be
gradually won, and all, or much should be restored, of what she had lost on
the dark day when a mother's love had faded with a mother's last breath on
her cheek, moved about her in the twilight and were welcome company. Peeping
at the rosy children her neighbours, it was a new and precious sensation to
think that they might soon speak together and know each other; when she
would not fear, as of old, to show herself before them, lest they should be
grieved to see her in her black dress sitting there alone!
In her thoughts of her new mother, and in the love and trust
overflowing her pure heart towards her, Florence loved her own dead mother
more and more. She had no fear of setting up a rival in her breast. The new
flower sprang from the deep-planted and long-cherished root, she knew. Every
gentle word that had fallen from the lips of the beautiful lady, sounded to
Florence like an echo of the voice long hushed and silent. How could she
love that memory less for living tenderness, when it was her memory of all
parental tenderness and love!
Florence was, one day, sitting reading in her room, and thinking of the
lady and her promised visit soon - for her book turned on a kindred subject
- when, raising her eyes, she saw her standing in the doorway.
'Mama!' cried Florence, joyfully meeting her. 'Come again!'
'Not Mama yet,' returned the lady, with a serious smile, as she
encircled Florence's neck with her arm.
'But very soon to be,' cried Florence.
'Very soon now, Florence: very soon.
Edith bent her head a little, so as to press the blooming cheek of
Florence against her own, and for some few moments remained thus silent.
There was something so very tender in her manner, that Florence was even
more sensible of it than on the first occasion of their meeting.
She led Florence to a chair beside her, and sat down: Florence looking
in her face, quite wondering at its beauty, and willingly leaving her hand
In hers.
'Have you been alone, Florence, since I was here last?'
'Oh yes!' smiled Florence, hastily.
She hesitated and cast down her eyes; for her new Mama was very earnest
in her look, and the look was intently and thoughtfully fixed upon her face.
'I - I- am used to be alone,' said Florence. 'I don't mind it at all.
Di and I pass whole days together, sometimes.' Florence might have said,
whole weeks and months.
'Is Di your maid, love?'
'My dog, Mama,' said Florence, laughing. 'Susan is my maid.'
'And these are your rooms,' said Edith, looking round. 'I was not shown
these rooms the other day. We must have them improved, Florence. They shall
be made the prettiest in the house.'
'If I might change them, Mama,' returned Florence; 'there is one
upstairs I should like much better.'
'Is this not high enough, dear girl?' asked Edith, smiling.
'The other was my brother's room,' said Florence, 'and I am very fond
of it. I would have spoken to Papa about it when I came home, and found the
workmen here, and everything changing; but - '
Florence dropped her eyes, lest the same look should make her falter
again.
'but I was afraid it might distress him; and as you said you would be
here again soon, Mama, and are the mistress of everything, I determined to
take courage and ask you.'
Edith sat looking at her, with her brilliant eyes intent upon her face,
until Florence raising her own, she, in her turn, withdrew her gaze, and
turned it on the ground. It was then that Florence thought how different
this lady's beauty was, from what she had supposed. She had thought it of a
proud and lofty kind; yet her manner was so subdued and gentle, that if she
had been of Florence's own age and character, it scarcely could have invited
confidence more.
Except when a constrained and singular reserve crept over her; and then
she seemed (but Florence hardly understood this, though she could not choose
but notice it, and think about it) as if she were humbled before Florence,
and ill at ease. When she had said that she was not her Mama yet, and when
Florence had called her the mistress of everything there, this change in her
was quick and startling; and now, while the eyes of Florence rested on her
face, she sat as though she would have shrunk and hidden from her, rather
than as one about to love and cherish her, in right of such a near
connexion.
She gave Florence her ready promise, about her new room, and said she
would give directions about it herself. She then asked some questions
concerning poor Paul; and when they had sat in conversation for some time,
told Florence she had come to take her to her own home.
'We have come to London now, my mother and I,' said Edith, 'and you
shall stay with us until I am married. I wish that we should know and trust
each other, Florence.'
'You are very kind to me,' said Florence, 'dear Mama. How much I thank
you!'
'Let me say now, for it may be the best opportunity,' continued Edith,
looking round to see that they were quite alone, and speaking in a lower
voice, 'that when I am married, and have gone away for some weeks, I shall
be easier at heart if you will come home here. No matter who invites you to
stay elsewhere. Come home here. It is better to be alone than - what I would
say is,' she added, checking herself, 'that I know well you are best at
home, dear Florence.'
'I will come home on the very day, Mama'
'Do so. I rely on that promise. Now, prepare to come with me, dear
girl. You will find me downstairs when you are ready.'
Slowly and thoughtfully did Edith wander alone through the mansion of
which she was so soon to be the lady: and little heed took she of all the
elegance and splendour it began to display. The same indomitable haughtiness
of soul, the same proud scorn expressed in eye and lip, the same fierce
beauty, only tamed by a sense of its own little worth, and of the little
worth of everything around it, went through the grand saloons and halls,
that had got loose among the shady trees, and raged and rent themselves. The
mimic roses on the walls and floors were set round with sharp thorns, that
tore her breast; in every scrap of gold so dazzling to the eye, she saw some
hateful atom of her purchase-money; the broad high mirrors showed her, at
full length, a woman with a noble quality yet dwelling in her nature, who
was too false to her better self, and too debased and lost, to save herself.
She believed that all this was so plain, more or less, to all eyes, that she
had no resource or power of self-assertion but in pride: and with this
pride, which tortured her own heart night and day, she fought her fate out,
braved it, and defied it.
Was this the woman whom Florence - an innocent girl, strong only in her
earnestness and simple truth - could so impress and quell, that by her side
she was another creature, with her tempest of passion hushed, and her very
pride itself subdued? Was this the woman who now sat beside her in a
carriage, with her arms entwined, and who, while she courted and entreated
her to love and trust her, drew her fair head to nestle on her breast, and
would have laid down life to shield it from wrong or harm?
Oh, Edith! it were well to die, indeed, at such a time! Better and
happier far, perhaps, to die so, Edith, than to live on to the end!
The Honourable Mrs Skewton, who was thinking of anything rather than of
such sentiments - for, like many genteel persons who have existed at various
times, she set her face against death altogether, and objected to the
mention of any such low and levelling upstart - had borrowed a house in
Brook Street, Grosvenor Square, from a stately relative (one of the Feenix
brood), who was out of town, and who did not object to lending it, in the
handsomest manner, for nuptial purposes, as the loan implied his final
release and acquittance from all further loans and gifts to Mrs Skewton and
her daughter. It being necessary for the credit of the family to make a
handsome appearance at such a time, Mrs Skewton, with the assistance of an
accommodating tradesman resident In the parish of Mary-le-bone, who lent out
all sorts of articles to the nobility and gentry, from a service of plate to
an army of footmen, clapped into this house a silver-headed butler (who was
charged extra on that account, as having the appearnce of an ancient family
retainer), two very tall young men in livery, and a select staff of
kitchen-servants; so that a legend arose, downstairs, that Withers the page,
released at once from his numerous household duties, and from the propulsion
of the wheeled-chair (inconsistent with the metropolis), had been several
times observed to rub his eyes and pinch his limbs, as if he misdoubted his
having overslept himself at the Leamington milkman's, and being still in a
celestial dream. A variety of requisites in plate and china being also
conveyed to the same establishment from the same convenient source, with
several miscellaneous articles, including a neat chariot and a pair of bays,
Mrs Skewton cushioned herself on the principal sofa, in the Cleopatra
attitude, and held her court in fair state.
'And how,' said Mrs Skewton, on the entrance of her daughter and her
charge, 'is my charming Florence? You must come and kiss me, Florence, if
you please, my love.'
Florence was timidly stooping to pick out a place In the white part of
Mrs Skewton's face, when that lady presented her ear, and relieved her of
her difficulty.
'Edith, my dear,' said Mrs Skewton, 'positively, I - stand a little
more in the light, my sweetest Florence, for a moment.
Florence blushingly complied.
'You don't remember, dearest Edith,' said her mother, 'what you were
when you were about the same age as our exceedingly precious Florence, or a
few years younger?'
'I have long forgotten, mother.'
'For positively, my dear,' said Mrs Skewton, 'I do think that I see a
decided resemblance to what you were then, in our extremely fascinating
young friend. And it shows,' said Mrs Skewton, in a lower voice, which
conveyed her opinion that Florence was in a very unfinished state, 'what
cultivation will do.'
'It does, indeed,' was Edith's stern reply.
Her mother eyed her sharply for a moment, and feeling herself on unsafe
ground, said, as a diversion:
'My charming Florence, you must come and kiss me once more, if you
please, my love.'
Florence complied, of course, and again imprinted her lips on Mrs
Skewton's ear.
'And you have heard, no doubt, my darling pet,' said Mrs Skewton,
detaining her hand, 'that your Papa, whom we all perfectly adore and dote
upon, is to be married to my dearest Edith this day week.'
'I knew it would be very soon,' returned Florence, 'but not exactly
when.'
'My darling Edith,' urged her mother, gaily, 'is it possible you have
not told Florence?'
'Why should I tell Florence?' she returned, so suddenly and harshly,
that Florence could scarcely believe it was the same voice.
Mrs Skewton then told Florence, as another and safer diversion, that
her father was coming to dinner, and that he would no doubt be charmingly
surprised to see her; as he had spoken last night of dressing in the City,
and had known nothing of Edith's design, the execution of which, according
to Mrs Skewton's expectation, would throw him into a perfect ecstasy.
Florence was troubled to hear this; and her distress became so keen, as the
dinner-hour approached, that if she had known how to frame an entreaty to be
suffered to return home, without involving her father in her explanation,
she would have hurried back on foot, bareheaded, breathless, and alone,
rather than incur the risk of meeting his displeasure.
As the time drew nearer, she could hardly breathe. She dared not
approach a window, lest he should see her from the street. She dared not go
upstairs to hide her emotion, lest, in passing out at the door, she should
meet him unexpectedly; besides which dread, she felt as though she never
could come back again if she were summoned to his presence. In this conflict
of fears; she was sitting by Cleopatra's couch, endeavouring to understand
and to reply to the bald discourse of that lady, when she heard his foot
upon the stair.
'I hear him now!' cried Florence, starting. 'He is coming!'
Cleopatra, who in her juvenility was always playfully disposed, and who
in her self-engrossment did not trouble herself about the nature of this
agitation, pushed Florence behind her couch, and dropped a shawl over her,
preparatory to giving Mr Dombey a rapture of surprise. It was so quickly
done, that in a moment Florence heard his awful step in the room.
He saluted his intended mother-in-law, and his intended bride. The
strange sound of his voice thrilled through the whole frame of his child.
'My dear Dombey,' said Cleopatra, 'come here and tell me how your
pretty Florence is.'
'Florence is very well,' said Mr Dombey, advancing towards the couch.
'At home?'
'At home,' said Mr Dombey.
'My dear Dombey,' returned Cleopatra, with bewitching vivacity; 'now
are you sure you are not deceiving me? I don't know what my dearest Edith
will say to me when I make such a declaration, but upon my honour I am
afraid you are the falsest of men, my dear Dombey.'
Though he had been; and had been detected on the spot, in the most
enormous falsehood that was ever said or done; he could hardly have been
more disconcerted than he was, when Mrs Skewton plucked the shawl away, and
Florence, pale and trembling, rose before him like a ghost. He had not yet
recovered his presence of mind, when Florence had run up to him, clasped her
hands round his neck, kissed his face, and hurried out of the room. He
looked round as if to refer the matter to somebody else, but Edith had gone
after Florence, instantly.
'Now, confess, my dear Dombey,' said Mrs Skewton, giving him her hand,
'that you never were more surprised and pleased in your life.'
'I never was more surprised,' said Mr Dombey.
'Nor pleased, my dearest Dombey?' returned Mrs Skewton, holding up her
fan.
'I - yes, I am exceedingly glad to meet Florence here,' said Mr Dombey.
He appeared to consider gravely about it for a moment, and then said, more
decidedly, 'Yes, I really am very glad indeed to meet Florence here.'
'You wonder how she comes here?' said Mrs Skewton, 'don't you?'
'Edith, perhaps - ' suggested Mr Dombey.
'Ah! wicked guesser!' replied Cleopatra, shaking her head. 'Ah!
cunning, cunning man! One shouldn't tell these things; your sex, my dear
Dombey, are so vain, and so apt to abuse our weakness; but you know my open
soul - very well; immediately.'
This was addressed to one of the very tall young men who announced
dinner.
'But Edith, my dear Dombey,' she continued in a whisper, when she
cannot have you near her - and as I tell her, she cannot expect that always
- will at least have near her something or somebody belonging to you. Well,
how extremely natural that is! And in this spirit, nothing would keep her
from riding off to-day to fetch our darling Florence. Well, how excessively
charming that is!'
As she waited for an answer, Mr Dombey answered, 'Eminently so.
'Bless you, my dear Dombey, for that proof of heart!' cried Cleopatra,
squeezing his hand. 'But I am growing too serious! Take me downstairs, like
an angel, and let us see what these people intend to give us for dinner.
Bless you, dear Dombey!'
Cleopatra skipping off her couch with tolerable briskness, after the
last benediction, Mr Dombey took her arm in his and led her ceremoniously
downstairs; one of the very tall young men on hire, whose organ of
veneration was imperfectly developed, thrusting his tongue into his cheek,
for the entertainment of the other very tall young man on hire, as the
couple turned into the dining-room.
Florence and Edith were already there, and sitting side by side.
Florence would have risen when her father entered, to resign her chair to
him; but Edith openly put her hand upon her arm, and Mr Dombey took an
opposite place at the round table.
The conversation was almost entirely sustained by Mrs Skewton. Florence
hardly dared to raise her eyes, lest they should reveal the traces of tears;
far less dared to speak; and Edith never uttered one word, unless in answer
to a question. Verily, Cleopatra worked hard, for the establishment that was
so nearly clutched; and verily it should have been a rich one to reward her!
And so your preparations are nearly finished at last, my dear Dombey?'
said Cleopatra, when the dessert was put upon the table, and the
silver-headed butler had withdrawn. 'Even the lawyers' preparations!'
'Yes, madam,' replied Mr Dombey; 'the deed of settlement, the
professional gentlemen inform me, is now ready, and as I was mentioning to
you, Edith has only to do us the favour to suggest her own time for its
execution.'
Edith sat like a handsome statue; as cold, as silent, and as still.
'My dearest love,' said Cleopatra, 'do you hear what Mr Dombey says?
Ah, my dear Dombey!' aside to that gentleman, 'how her absence, as the time
approaches, reminds me of the days, when that most agreeable of creatures,
her Papa, was in your situation!'
'I have nothing to suggest. It shall be when you please,' said Edith,
scarcely looking over the table at Mr Dombey.
'To-morrow?' suggested Mr Dombey.
'If you please.'
'Or would next day,' said Mr Dombey, 'suit your engagements better?'
'I have no engagements. I am always at your disposal. Let it be when
you like.'
'No engagements, my dear Edith!' remonstrated her mother, 'when you are
in a most terrible state of flurry all day long, and have a thousand and one
appointments with all sorts of trades-people!'
'They are of your making,' returned Edith, turning on her with a slight
contraction of her brow. 'You and Mr Dombey can arrange between you.'
'Very true indeed, my love, and most considerate of you!' said
Cleopatra. 'My darling Florence, you must really come and kiss me once more,
if you please, my dear!'
Singular coincidence, that these gushes of interest In Florence hurried
Cleopatra away from almost every dialogue in which Edith had a share,
however trifling! Florence had certainly never undergone so much embracing,
and perhaps had never been, unconsciously, so useful in her life.
Mr Dombey was far from quarrelling, in his own breast, with the manner
of his beautiful betrothed. He had that good reason for sympathy with
haughtiness and coldness, which is found In a fellow-feeling. It flattered
him to think how these deferred to him, in Edith's case, and seemed to have
no will apart from his. It flattered him to picture to himself, this proud
and stately woman doing the honours of his house, and chilling his guests
after his own manner. The dignity of Dombey and Son would be heightened and
maintained, indeed, in such hands.
So thought Mr Dombey, when he was left alone at the dining-table, and
mused upon his past and future fortunes: finding no uncongeniality in an air
of scant and gloomy state that pervaded the room, in colour a dark brown,
with black hatchments of pictures blotching the walls, and twenty-four black
chairs, with almost as many nails in them as so many coffins, waiting like
mutes, upon the threshold of the Turkey carpet; and two exhausted negroes
holding up two withered branches of candelabra on the sideboard, and a musty
smell prevailing as if the ashes of ten thousand dinners were entombed in
the sarcophagus below it. The owner of the house lived much abroad; the air
of England seldom agreed long with a member of the Feenix family; and the
room had gradually put itself into deeper and still deeper mourning for him,
until it was become so funereal as to want nothing but a body in it to be
quite complete.
No bad representation of the body, for the nonce, in his unbending
form, if not in his attitude, Mr Dombey looked down into the cold depths of
the dead sea of mahogany on which the fruit dishes and decanters lay at
anchor: as if the subjects of his thoughts were rising towards the surface
one by one, and plunging down again. Edith was there In all her majesty of
brow and figure; and close to her came Florence, with her timid head turned
to him, as it had been, for an instant, when she left the room; and Edith's
eyes upon her, and Edith's hand put out protectingly. A little figure in a
low arm-chair came springing next into the light, and looked upon him
wonderingly, with its bright eyes and its old-young face, gleaming as in the
flickering of an evening fire. Again came Florence close upon it, and
absorbed his whole attention. Whether as a fore-doomed difficulty and
disappointment to him; whether as a rival who had crossed him in his way,
and might again; whether as his child, of whom, in his successful wooing, he
could stoop to think as claiming, at such a time, to be no more estranged;
or whether as a hint to him that the mere appearance of caring for his own
blood should be maintained in his new relations; he best knew. Indifferently
well, perhaps, at best; for marriage company and marriage altars, and
ambitious scenes - still blotted here and there with Florence - always
Florence - turned up so fast, and so confusedly, that he rose, and went
upstairs to escape them.
It was quite late at night before candles were brought; for at present
they made Mrs Skewton's head ache, she complained; and in the meantime
Florence and Mrs Skewton talked together (Cleopatra being very anxious to
keep her close to herself), or Florence touched the piano softly for Mrs
Skewton's delight; to make no mention of a few occasions in the course of
the evening, when that affectionate lady was impelled to solicit another
kiss, and which always happened after Edith had said anything. They were not
many, however, for Edith sat apart by an open window during the whole time
(in spite of her mother's fears that she would take cold), and remained
there until Mr Dombey took leave. He was serenely gracious to Florence when
he did so; and Florence went to bed in a room within Edith's, so happy and
hopeful, that she thought of her late self as if it were some other poor
deserted girl who was to be pitied for her sorrow; and in her pity, sobbed
herself to sleep.
The week fled fast. There were drives to milliners, dressmakers,
jewellers, lawyers, florists, pastry-cooks; and Florence was always of the
party. Florence was to go to the wedding. Florence was to cast off her
mourning, and to wear a brilliant dress on the occasion. The milliner's
intentions on the subject of this dress - the milliner was a Frenchwoman,
and greatly resembled Mrs Skewton - were so chaste and elegant, that Mrs
Skewton bespoke one like it for herself. The milliner said it would become
her to admiration, and that all the world would take her for the young
lady's sister.
The week fled faster. Edith looked at nothing and cared for nothing.
Her rich dresses came home, and were tried on, and were loudly commended by
Mrs Skewton and the milliners, and were put away without a word from her.
Mrs Skewton made their plans for every day, and executed them. Sometimes
Edith sat in the carriage when they went to make purchases; sometimes, when
it was absolutely necessary, she went into the shops. But Mrs Skewton
conducted the whole business, whatever it happened to be; and Edith looked
on as uninterested and with as much apparent indifference as if she had no
concern in it. Florence might perhaps have thought she was haughty and
listless, but that she was never so to her. So Florence quenched her wonder
in her gratitude whenever it broke out, and soon subdued it.
The week fled faster. It had nearly winged its flight away. The last
night of the week, the night before the marriage, was come. In the dark room
- for Mrs Skewton's head was no better yet, though she expected to recover
permanently to-morrow - were that lady, Edith, and Mr Dombey. Edith was at
her open window looking out into the street; Mr Dombey and Cleopatra were
talking softly on the sofa. It was growing late; and Florence, being
fatigued, had gone to bed.
'My dear Dombey,' said Cleopatra, 'you will leave me Florence
to-morrow, when you deprive me of my sweetest Edith.'
Mr Dombey said he would, with pleasure.
'To have her about me, here, while you are both at Paris, and to think
at her age, I am assisting in the formation of her mind, my dear Dombey,'
said Cleopatra, 'will be a perfect balm to me in the extremely shattered
state to which I shall be reduced.'
Edith turned her head suddenly. Her listless manner was exchanged, in a
moment, to one of burning interest, and, unseen in the darkness, she
attended closely to their conversation.
Mr Dombey would be delighted to leave Florence in such admirable
guardianship.
'My dear Dombey,' returned Cleopatra, 'a thousand thanks for your good
opinion. I feared you were going, with malice aforethought' as the dreadful
lawyers say - those horrid proses! - to condemn me to utter solitude;'
'Why do me so great an injustice, my dear madam?' said Mr Dombey.
'Because my charming Florence tells me so positively she must go home
tomorrow, returned Cleopatra, that I began to be afraid, my dearest Dombey,
you were quite a Bashaw.'
'I assure you, madam!' said Mr Dombey, 'I have laid no commands on
Florence; and if I had, there are no commands like your wish.'
'My dear Dombey,' replied Cleopatra, what a courtier you are! Though
I'll not say so, either; for courtiers have no heart, and yours pervades
your farming life and character. And are you really going so early, my dear
Dombey!'
Oh, indeed! it was late, and Mr Dombey feared he must.
'Is this a fact, or is it all a dream!' lisped Cleopatra. 'Can I
believe, my dearest Dombey, that you are coming back tomorrow morning to
deprive me of my sweet companion; my own Edith!'
Mr Dombey, who was accustomed to take things literally, reminded Mrs
Skewton that they were to meet first at the church.
'The pang,' said Mrs Skewton, 'of consigning a child, even to you, my
dear Dombey, is one of the most excruciating imaginable, and combined with a
naturally delicate constitution, and the extreme stupidity of the
pastry-cook who has undertaken the breakfast, is almost too much for my poor
strength. But I shall rally, my dear Dombey, In the morning; do not fear for
me, or be uneasy on my account. Heaven bless you! My dearest Edith!' she
cried archly. 'Somebody is going, pet.'
Edith, who had turned her head again towards the window, and whose
interest in their conversation had ceased, rose up in her place, but made no
advance towards him, and said nothing. Mr Dombey, with a lofty gallantry
adapted to his dignity and the occasion, betook his creaking boots towards
her, put her hand to his lips, said, 'Tomorrow morning I shall have the
happiness of claiming this hand as Mrs Dombey's,' and bowed himself solemnly
out.
Mrs Skewton rang for candles as soon as the house-door had closed upon
him. With the candles appeared her maid, with the juvenile dress that was to
delude the world to-morrow. The dress had savage retribution in it, as such
dresses ever have, and made her infinitely older and more hideous than her
greasy flannel gown. But Mrs Skewton tried it on with mincing satisfaction;
smirked at her cadaverous self in the glass, as she thought of its killing
effect upon the Major; and suffering her maid to take it off again, and to
prepare her for repose, tumbled into ruins like a house of painted cards.
All this time, Edith remained at the dark window looking out into the
street. When she and her mother were at last left alone, she moved from it
for the first time that evening, and came opposite to her. The yawning,
shaking, peevish figure of the mother, with her eyes raised to confront the
proud erect form of the daughter, whose glance of fire was bent downward
upon her, had a conscious air upon it, that no levity or temper could
conceal.
'I am tired to death,' said she. 'You can't be trusted for a moment.
You are worse than a child. Child! No child would be half so obstinate and
undutiful.'
'Listen to me, mother,' returned Edith, passing these words by with a
scorn that would not descend to trifle with them. 'You must remain alone
here until I return.'
'Must remain alone here, Edith, until you return!' repeated her mother.
'Or in that name upon which I shall call to-morrow to witness what I
do, so falsely: and so shamefully, I swear I will refuse the hand of this
man in the church. If I do not, may I fall dead upon the pavement!'
The mother answered with a look of quick alarm, in no degree diminished
by the look she met.
'It is enough,' said Edith, steadily, 'that we are what we are. I will
have no youth and truth dragged down to my level. I will have no guileless
nature undermined, corrupted, and perverted, to amuse the leisure of a world
of mothers. You know my meaning. Florence must go home.'
'You are an idiot, Edith,' cried her angry mother. 'Do you expect there
can ever be peace for you in that house, till she is married, and away?'
'Ask me, or ask yourself, if I ever expect peace in that house,' said
her daughter, 'and you know the answer.
'And am I to be told to-night, after all my pains and labour, and when
you are going, through me, to be rendered independent,' her mother almost
shrieked in her passion, while her palsied head shook like a leaf, 'that
there is corruption and contagion in me, and that I am not fit company for a
girl! What are you, pray? What are you?'
'I have put the question to myself,' said Edith, ashy pale, and
pointing to the window, 'more than once when I have been sitting there, and
something in the faded likeness of my sex has wandered past outside; and God
knows I have met with my reply. Oh mother, mother, if you had but left me to
my natural heart when I too was a girl - a younger girl than Florence - how
different I might have been!'
Sensible that any show of anger was useless here, her mother restrained
herself, and fell a whimpering, and bewailed that she had lived too long,
and that her only child had cast her off, and that duty towards parents was
forgotten in these evil days, and that she had heard unnatural taunts, and
cared for life no longer.
'If one is to go on living through continual scenes like this,' she
whined,'I am sure it would be much better for me to think of some means of
putting an end to my existence. Oh! The idea of your being my daughter,
Edith, and addressing me in such a strain!'
'Between us, mother,' returned Edith, mournfully, 'the time for mutual
reproaches is past.
'Then why do you revive it?' whimpered her mother. 'You know that you
are lacerating me in the cruellest manner. You know how sensitive I am to
unkindness. At such a moment, too, when I have so much to think of, and am
naturally anxious to appear to the best advantage! I wonder at you, Edith.
To make your mother a fright upon your wedding-day!'
Edith bent the same fixed look upon her, as she sobbed and rubbed her
eyes; and said in the same low steady voice, which had neither risen nor
fallen since she first addressed her, 'I have said that Florence must go
home.'
'Let her go!' cried the afflicted and affrighted parent, hastily. 'I am
sure I am willing she should go. What is the girl to me?'
'She is so much to me, that rather than communicate, or suffer to be
communicated to her, one grain of the evil that is in my breast, mother, I
would renounce you, as I would (if you gave me cause) renounce him in the
church to-morrow,' replied Edith. 'Leave her alone. She shall not, while I
can interpose, be tampered with and tainted by the lessons I have learned.
This is no hard condition on this bitter night.'
'If you had proposed it in a filial manner, Edith,' whined her mother,
'perhaps not; very likely not. But such extremely cutting words - '
'They are past and at an end between us now,' said Edith. 'Take your
own way, mother; share as you please in what you have gained; spend, enjoy,
make much of it; and be as happy as you will. The object of our lives is
won. Henceforth let us wear it silently. My lips are closed upon the past
from this hour. I forgive you your part in to-morrow's wickedness. May God
forgive my own!'
Without a tremor in her voice, or frame, and passing onward with a foot
that set itself upon the neck of every soft emotion, she bade her mother
good-night, and repaired to her own room.
But not to rest; for there was no rest in the tumult of her agitation
when alone to and fro, and to and fro, and to and fro again, five hundred
times, among the splendid preparations for her adornment on the morrow; with
her dark hair shaken down, her dark eyes flashing with a raging light, her
broad white bosom red with the cruel grasp of the relentless hand with which
she spurned it from her, pacing up and down with an averted head, as if she
would avoid the sight of her own fair person, and divorce herself from its
companionship. Thus, In the dead time of the night before her bridal, Edith
Granger wrestled with her unquiet spirit, tearless, friendless, silent,
proud, and uncomplaining.
At length it happened that she touched the open door which led into the
room where Florence lay.
She started, stopped, and looked in.
A light was burning there, and showed her Florence in her bloom of
innocence and beauty, fast asleep. Edith held her breath, and felt herself
drawn on towards her.
Drawn nearer, nearer, nearer yet; at last, drawn so near, that stooping
down, she pressed her lips to the gentle hand that lay outside the bed, and
put it softly to her neck. Its touch was like the prophet's rod of old upon
the rock. Her tears sprung forth beneath it, as she sunk upon her knees, and
laid her aching head and streaming hair upon the pillow by its side.
Thus Edith Granger passed the night before her bridal. Thus the sun
found her on her bridal morning.
Популярность: 62, Last-modified: Wed, 20 Mar 2002 15:39:13 GmT