Чарльз Диккенс
Nicholas Nickleby
‘That’s the name,’ said Newman. ‘I remember it by lobster.’
‘Bobster!’ repeated Nicholas, more emphatically than before. ‘That must be the servant’s name.’
‘No, it an’t,’ said Newman, shaking his head with great positiveness. ‘Miss Cecilia Bobster.’
‘Cecilia, eh?’ returned Nicholas, muttering the two names together over and over again in every variety of tone, to try the effect. ‘Well, Cecilia is a pretty name.’
‘Very. And a pretty creature too,’ said Newman.
‘Who?’ said Nicholas.
‘Miss Bobster.’
‘Why, where have you seen her?’ demanded Nicholas.
‘Never mind, my dear boy,’ retorted Noggs, clapping him on the shoulder. ‘I have seen her. You shall see her. I’ve managed it all.’
‘My dear Newman,’ cried Nicholas, grasping his hand, ‘are you serious?’
‘I am,’ replied Newman. ‘I mean it all. Every word. You shall see her tomorrow night. She consents to hear you speak for yourself. I persuaded her. She is all affability, goodness, sweetness, and beauty.’
‘I know she is; I know she must be, Newman!’ said Nicholas, wringing his hand.
‘You are right,’ returned Newman.
‘Where does she live?’ cried Nicholas. ‘What have you learnt of her history? Has she a father – mother – any brothers – sisters? What did she say? How came you to see her? Was she not very much surprised? Did you say how passionately I have longed to speak to her? Did you tell her where I had seen her? Did you tell her how, and when, and where, and how long, and how often, I have thought of that sweet face which came upon me in my bitterest distress like a glimpse of some better world – did you, Newman – did you?’
Poor Noggs literally gasped for breath as this flood of questions rushed upon him, and moved spasmodically in his chair at every fresh inquiry, staring at Nicholas meanwhile with a most ludicrous expression of perplexity.
‘No,’ said Newman, ‘I didn’t tell her that.’
‘Didn’t tell her which?’ asked Nicholas.
‘About the glimpse of the better world,’ said Newman. ‘I didn’t tell her who you were, either, or where you’d seen her. I said you loved her to distraction.’
‘That’s true, Newman,’ replied Nicholas, with his characteristic vehemence. ‘Heaven knows I do!’
‘I said too, that you had admired her for a long time in secret,’ said Newman.
‘Yes, yes. What did she say to that?’ asked Nicholas.
‘Blushed,’ said Newman.
‘To be sure. Of course she would,’ said Nicholas approvingly. Newman then went on to say, that the young lady was an only child, that her mother was dead, that she resided with her father, and that she had been induced to allow her lover a secret interview, at the intercession of her servant, who had great influence with her. He further related how it required much moving and great eloquence to bring the young lady to this pass; how it was expressly understood that she merely afforded Nicholas an opportunity of declaring his passion; and how she by no means pledged herself to be favourably impressed with his attentions. The mystery of her visits to the brothers Cheeryble remained wholly unexplained, for Newman had not alluded to them, either in his preliminary conversations with the servant or his subsequent interview with the mistress, merely remarking that he had been instructed to watch the girl home and plead his young friend’s cause, and not saying how far he had followed her, or from what point. But Newman hinted that from what had fallen from the confidante, he had been led to suspect that the young lady led a very miserable and unhappy life, under the strict control of her only parent, who was of a violent and brutal temper; a circumstance which he thought might in some degree account, both for her having sought the protection and friendship of the brothers, and her suffering herself to be prevailed upon to grant the promised interview. The last he held to be a very logical deduction from the premises, inasmuch as it was but natural to suppose that a young lady, whose present condition was so unenviable, would be more than commonly desirous to change it.
It appeared, on further questioning – for it was only by a very long and arduous process that all this could be got out of Newman Noggs – that Newman, in explanation of his shabby appearance, had represented himself as being, for certain wise and indispensable purposes connected with that intrigue, in disguise; and, being questioned how he had come to exceed his commission so far as to procure an interview, he responded, that the lady appearing willing to grant it, he considered himself bound, both in duty and gallantry, to avail himself of such a golden means of enabling Nicholas to prosecute his addresses. After these and all possible questions had been asked and answered twenty times over, they parted, undertaking to meet on the following night at half-past ten, for the purpose of fulfilling the appointment; which was for eleven o’clock.
‘Things come about very strangely!’ thought Nicholas, as he walked home. ‘I never contemplated anything of this kind; never dreamt of the possibility of it. To know something of the life of one in whom I felt such interest; to see her in the street, to pass the house in which she lived, to meet her sometimes in her walks, to hope that a day might come when I might be in a condition to tell her of my love, this was the utmost extent of my thoughts. Now, however – but I should be a fool, indeed, to repine at my own good fortune!’
Still, Nicholas was dissatisfied; and there was more in the dissatisfaction than mere revulsion of feeling. He was angry with the young lady for being so easily won, ‘because,’ reasoned Nicholas, ‘it is not as if she knew it was I, but it might have been anybody,’ – which was certainly not pleasant. The next moment, he was angry with himself for entertaining such thoughts, arguing that nothing but goodness could dwell in such a temple, and that the behaviour of the brothers sufficiently showed the estimation in which they held her. ‘The fact is, she’s a mystery altogether,’ said Nicholas. This was not more satisfactory than his previous course of reflection, and only drove him out upon a new sea of speculation and conjecture, where he tossed and tumbled, in great discomfort of mind, until the clock struck ten, and the hour of meeting drew nigh.
Nicholas had dressed himself with great care, and even Newman Noggs had trimmed himself up a little; his coat presenting the phenomenon of two consecutive buttons, and the supplementary pins being inserted at tolerably regular intervals. He wore his hat, too, in the newest taste, with a pocket-handkerchief in the crown, and a twisted end of it straggling out behind after the fashion of a pigtail, though he could scarcely lay claim to the ingenuity of inventing this latter decoration, inasmuch as he was utterly unconscious of it: being in a nervous and excited condition which rendered him quite insensible to everything but the great object of the expedition.
They traversed the streets in profound silence; and after walking at a round pace for some distance, arrived in one, of a gloomy appearance and very little frequented, near the Edgeware Road.
‘Number twelve,’ said Newman.
‘Oh!’ replied Nicholas, looking about him.
‘Good street?’ said Newman.
‘Yes,’ returned Nicholas. ‘Rather dull.’
Newman made no answer to this remark, but, halting abruptly, planted Nicholas with his back to some area railings, and gave him to understand that he was to wait there, without moving hand or foot, until it was satisfactorily ascertained that the coast was clear. This done, Noggs limped away with great alacrity; looking over his shoulder every instant, to make quite certain that Nicholas was obeying his directions; and, ascending the steps of a house some half-dozen doors off, was lost to view.
After a short delay, he reappeared, and limping back again, halted midway, and beckoned Nicholas to follow him.
‘Well?’ said Nicholas, advancing towards him on tiptoe.
‘All right,’ replied Newman, in high glee. ‘All ready; nobody at home. Couldn’t be better. Ha! ha!’
With this fortifying assurance, he stole past a street-door, on which Nicholas caught a glimpse of a brass plate, with ‘BOBSTER,’ in very large letters; and, stopping at the area-gate, which was open, signed to his young friend to descend.
‘What the devil!’ cried Nicholas, drawing back. ‘Are we to sneak into the kitchen, as if we came after the forks?’
‘Hush!’ replied Newman. ‘Old Bobster – ferocious Turk. He’d kill ‘em all – box the young lady’s ears – he does – often.’
‘What!’ cried Nicholas, in high wrath, ‘do you mean to tell me that any man would dare to box the ears of such a – ’
He had no time to sing the praises of his mistress, just then, for Newman gave him a gentle push which had nearly precipitated him to the bottom of the area steps. Thinking it best to take the hint in good part, Nicholas descended, without further remonstrance, but with a countenance bespeaking anything rather than the hope and rapture of a passionate lover. Newman followed – he would have followed head first, but for the timely assistance of Nicholas – and, taking his hand, led him through a stone passage, profoundly dark, into a back-kitchen or cellar, of the blackest and most pitchy obscurity, where they stopped.
‘Well!’ said Nicholas, in a discontented whisper, ‘this is not all, I suppose, is it?’
‘No, no,’ rejoined Noggs; ‘they’ll be here directly. It’s all right.’
‘I am glad to hear it,’ said Nicholas. ‘I shouldn’t have thought it, I confess.’
They exchanged no further words, and there Nicholas stood, listening to the loud breathing of Newman Noggs, and imagining that his nose seemed to glow like a red-hot coal, even in the midst of the darkness which enshrouded them. Suddenly the sound of cautious footsteps attracted his ear, and directly afterwards a female voice inquired if the gentleman was there.
‘Yes,’ replied Nicholas, turning towards the corner from which the voice proceeded. ‘Who is that?’
‘Only me, sir,’ replied the voice. ‘Now if you please, ma’am.’
A gleam of light shone into the place, and presently the servant girl appeared, bearing a light, and followed by her young mistress, who seemed to be overwhelmed by modesty and confusion.
At sight of the young lady, Nicholas started and changed colour; his heart beat violently, and he stood rooted to the spot. At that instant, and almost simultaneously with her arrival and that of the candle, there was heard a loud and furious knocking at the street-door, which caused Newman Noggs to jump up, with great agility, from a beer-barrel on which he had been seated astride, and to exclaim abruptly, and with a face of ashy paleness, ‘Bobster, by the Lord!’
The young lady shrieked, the attendant wrung her hands, Nicholas gazed from one to the other in apparent stupefaction, and Newman hurried to and fro, thrusting his hands into all his pockets successively, and drawing out the linings of every one in the excess of his irresolution. It was but a moment, but the confusion crowded into that one moment no imagination can exaggerate.
‘Leave the house, for Heaven’s sake! We have done wrong, we deserve it all,’ cried the young lady. ‘Leave the house, or I am ruined and undone for ever.’
‘Will you hear me say but one word?’ cried Nicholas. ‘Only one. I will not detain you. Will you hear me say one word, in explanation of this mischance?’
But Nicholas might as well have spoken to the wind, for the young lady, with distracted looks, hurried up the stairs. He would have followed her, but Newman, twisting his hand in his coat collar, dragged him towards the passage by which they had entered.
‘Let me go, Newman, in the Devil’s name!’ cried Nicholas. ‘I must speak to her. I will! I will not leave this house without.’
‘Reputation – character – violence – consider,’ said Newman, clinging round him with both arms, and hurrying him away. ‘Let them open the door. We’ll go, as we came, directly it’s shut. Come. This way. Here.’
Overpowered by the remonstrances of Newman, and the tears and prayers of the girl, and the tremendous knocking above, which had never ceased, Nicholas allowed himself to be hurried off; and, precisely as Mr. Bobster made his entrance by the street-door, he and Noggs made their exit by the area-gate.
They hurried away, through several streets, without stopping or speaking. At last, they halted and confronted each other with blank and rueful faces.
‘Never mind,’ said Newman, gasping for breath. ‘Don’t be cast down. It’s all right. More fortunate next time. It couldn’t be helped. I did my part.’
‘Excellently,’ replied Nicholas, taking his hand. ‘Excellently, and like the true and zealous friend you are. Only – mind, I am not disappointed, Newman, and feel just as much indebted to you – only it was the wrong lady.‘
‘Eh?’ cried Newman Noggs. ‘Taken in by the servant?’
‘Newman, Newman,’ said Nicholas, laying his hand upon his shoulder: ‘it was the wrong servant too.’
Newman’s under-jaw dropped, and he gazed at Nicholas, with his sound eye fixed fast and motionless in his head.
‘Don’t take it to heart,’ said Nicholas; ‘it’s of no consequence; you see I don’t care about it; you followed the wrong person, that’s all.’
That was all. Whether Newman Noggs had looked round the pump, in a slanting direction, so long, that his sight became impaired; or whether, finding that there was time to spare, he had recruited himself with a few drops of something stronger than the pump could yield – by whatsoever means it had come to pass, this was his mistake. And Nicholas went home to brood upon it, and to meditate upon the charms of the unknown young lady, now as far beyond his reach as ever.
CHAPTER 41
Containing some Romantic Passages between Mrs. Nickleby and the Gentleman in the Small-clothes next Door
Ever since her last momentous conversation with her son, Mrs. Nickleby had begun to display unusual care in the adornment of her person, gradually superadding to those staid and matronly habiliments, which had, up to that time, formed her ordinary attire, a variety of embellishments and decorations, slight perhaps in themselves, but, taken together, and considered with reference to the subject of her disclosure, of no mean importance. Even her black dress assumed something of a deadly-lively air from the jaunty style in which it was worn; and, eked out as its lingering attractions were; by a prudent disposal, here and there, of certain juvenile ornaments of little or no value, which had, for that reason alone, escaped the general wreck and been permitted to slumber peacefully in odd corners of old drawers and boxes where daylight seldom shone, her mourning garments assumed quite a new character. From being the outward tokens of respect and sorrow for the dead, they became converted into signals of very slaughterous and killing designs upon the living.
Mrs. Nickleby might have been stimulated to this proceeding by a lofty sense of duty, and impulses of unquestionable excellence. She might, by this time, have become impressed with the sinfulness of long indulgence in unavailing woe, or the necessity of setting a proper example of neatness and decorum to her blooming daughter. Considerations of duty and responsibility apart, the change might have taken its rise in feelings of the purest and most disinterested charity. The gentleman next door had been vilified by Nicholas; rudely stigmatised as a dotard and an idiot; and for these attacks upon his understanding, Mrs. Nickleby was, in some sort, accountable. She might have felt that it was the act of a good Christian to show by all means in her power, that the abused gentleman was neither the one nor the other. And what better means could she adopt, towards so virtuous and laudable an end, than proving to all men, in her own person, that his passion was the most rational and reasonable in the world, and just the very result, of all others, which discreet and thinking persons might have foreseen, from her incautiously displaying her matured charms, without reserve, under the very eye, as it were, of an ardent and too-susceptible man?
‘Ah!’ said Mrs. Nickleby, gravely shaking her head; ‘if Nicholas knew what his poor dear papa suffered before we were engaged, when I used to hate him, he would have a little more feeling. Shall I ever forget the morning I looked scornfully at him when he offered to carry my parasol? Or that night, when I frowned at him? It was a mercy he didn’t emigrate. It very nearly drove him to it.’
Whether the deceased might not have been better off if he had emigrated in his bachelor days, was a question which his relict did not stop to consider; for Kate entered the room, with her workbox, in this stage of her reflections; and a much slighter interruption, or no interruption at all, would have diverted Mrs. Nickleby’s thoughts into a new channel at any time.
‘Kate, my dear,’ said Mrs. Nickleby; ‘I don’t know how it is, but a fine warm summer day like this, with the birds singing in every direction, always puts me in mind of roast pig, with sage and onion sauce, and made gravy.’
‘That’s a curious association of ideas, is it not, mama?’
‘Upon my word, my dear, I don’t know,’ replied Mrs. Nickleby. ‘Roast pig; let me see. On the day five weeks after you were christened, we had a roast – no, that couldn’t have been a pig, either, because I recollect there were a pair of them to carve, and your poor papa and I could never have thought of sitting down to two pigs – they must have been partridges. Roast pig! I hardly think we ever could have had one, now I come to remember, for your papa could never bear the sight of them in the shops, and used to say that they always put him in mind of very little babies, only the pigs had much fairer complexions; and he had a horror of little babies, too, because he couldn’t very well afford any increase to his family, and had a natural dislike to the subject. It’s very odd now, what can have put that in my head! I recollect dining once at Mrs. Bevan’s, in that broad street round the corner by the coachmaker’s, where the tipsy man fell through the cellar-flap of an empty house nearly a week before the quarter-day, and wasn’t found till the new tenant went in – and we had roast pig there. It must be that, I think, that reminds me of it, especially as there was a little bird in the room that would keep on singing all the time of dinner – at least, not a little bird, for it was a parrot, and he didn’t sing exactly, for he talked and swore dreadfully: but I think it must be that. Indeed I am sure it must. Shouldn’t you say so, my dear?’
‘I should say there was not a doubt about it, mama,’ returned Kate, with a cheerful smile.
‘No; but do you think so, Kate?’ said Mrs. Nickleby, with as much gravity as if it were a question of the most imminent and thrilling interest. ‘If you don’t, say so at once, you know; because it’s just as well to be correct, particularly on a point of this kind, which is very curious and worth settling while one thinks about it.’
Kate laughingly replied that she was quite convinced; and as her mama still appeared undetermined whether it was not absolutely essential that the subject should be renewed, proposed that they should take their work into the summer-house, and enjoy the beauty of the afternoon. Mrs. Nickleby readily assented, and to the summer-house they repaired, without further discussion.
‘Well, I will say,’ observed Mrs. Nickleby, as she took her seat, ‘that there never was such a good creature as Smike. Upon my word, the pains he has taken in putting this little arbour to rights, and training the sweetest flowers about it, are beyond anything I could have – I wish he wouldn’t put all the gravel on your side, Kate, my dear, though, and leave nothing but mould for me.’
‘Dear mama,’ returned Kate, hastily, ‘take this seat – do – to oblige me, mama.’
‘No, indeed, my dear. I shall keep my own side,’ said Mrs. Nickleby. ‘Well! I declare!’
Kate looked up inquiringly.
‘If he hasn’t been,’ said Mrs. Nickleby, ‘and got, from somewhere or other, a couple of roots of those flowers that I said I was so fond of, the other night, and asked you if you were not – no, that you said you were so fond of, the other night, and asked me if I wasn’t – it’s the same thing. Now, upon my word, I take that as very kind and attentive indeed! I don’t see,’ added Mrs. Nickleby, looking narrowly about her, ‘any of them on my side, but I suppose they grow best near the gravel. You may depend upon it they do, Kate, and that’s the reason they are all near you, and he has put the gravel there, because it’s the sunny side. Upon my word, that’s very clever now! I shouldn’t have had half as much thought myself!’
‘Mama,’ said Kate, bending over her work so that her face was almost hidden, ‘before you were married – ’
‘Dear me, Kate,’ interrupted Mrs. Nickleby, ‘what in the name of goodness graciousness makes you fly off to the time before I was married, when I’m talking to you about his thoughtfulness and attention to me? You don’t seem to take the smallest interest in the garden.’
‘Oh! mama,’ said Kate, raising her face again, ‘you know I do.’
‘Well then, my dear, why don’t you praise the neatness and prettiness with which it’s kept?’ said Mrs. Nickleby. ‘How very odd you are, Kate!’
‘I do praise it, mama,’ answered Kate, gently. ‘Poor fellow!’
‘I scarcely ever hear you, my dear,’ retorted Mrs. Nickleby; ‘that’s all I’ve got to say.’ By this time the good lady had been a long while upon one topic, so she fell at once into her daughter’s little trap, if trap it were, and inquired what she had been going to say.
‘About what, mama?’ said Kate, who had apparently quite forgotten her diversion.
‘Lor, Kate, my dear,’ returned her mother, ‘why, you’re asleep or stupid! About the time before I was married.’
‘Oh yes!’ said Kate, ‘I remember. I was going to ask, mama, before you were married, had you many suitors?’
‘Suitors, my dear!’ cried Mrs. Nickleby, with a smile of wonderful complacency. ‘First and last, Kate, I must have had a dozen at least.’
‘Mama!’ returned Kate, in a tone of remonstrance.
‘I had indeed, my dear,’ said Mrs. Nickleby; ‘not including your poor papa, or a young gentleman who used to go, at that time, to the same dancing school, and who would send gold watches and bracelets to our house in gilt-edged paper, (which were always returned,) and who afterwards unfortunately went out to Botany Bay in a cadet ship – a convict ship I mean – and escaped into a bush and killed sheep, (I don’t know how they got there,) and was going to be hung, only he accidentally choked himself, and the government pardoned him. Then there was young Lukin,’ said Mrs. Nickleby, beginning with her left thumb and checking off the names on her fingers – ‘Mogley – Tipslark – Cabbery – Smifser – ’
Having now reached her little finger, Mrs. Nickleby was carrying the account over to the other hand, when a loud ‘Hem!’ which appeared to come from the very foundation of the garden-wall, gave both herself and her daughter a violent start.
‘Mama! what was that?’ said Kate, in a low tone of voice.
‘Upon my word, my dear,’ returned Mrs. Nickleby, considerably startled, ‘unless it was the gentleman belonging to the next house, I don’t know what it could possibly – ’
‘A – hem!’ cried the same voice; and that, not in the tone of an ordinary clearing of the throat, but in a kind of bellow, which woke up all the echoes in the neighbourhood, and was prolonged to an extent which must have made the unseen bellower quite black in the face.
‘I understand it now, my dear,’ said Mrs. Nickleby, laying her hand on Kate’s; ‘don’t be alarmed, my love, it’s not directed to you, and is not intended to frighten anybody. Let us give everybody their due, Kate; I am bound to say that.’
So saying, Mrs. Nickleby nodded her head, and patted the back of her daughter’s hand, a great many times, and looked as if she could tell something vastly important if she chose, but had self-denial, thank Heaven; and wouldn’t do it.
‘What do you mean, mama?’ demanded Kate, in evident surprise.
‘Don’t be flurried, my dear,’ replied Mrs. Nickleby, looking towards the garden-wall, ‘for you see I’m not, and if it would be excusable in anybody to be flurried, it certainly would – under all the circumstances – be excusable in me, but I am not, Kate – not at all.’
‘It seems designed to attract our attention, mama,’ said Kate.
‘It is designed to attract our attention, my dear; at least,’ rejoined Mrs Nickleby, drawing herself up, and patting her daughter’s hand more blandly than before, ‘to attract the attention of one of us. Hem! you needn’t be at all uneasy, my dear.’
Kate looked very much perplexed, and was apparently about to ask for further explanation, when a shouting and scuffling noise, as of an elderly gentleman whooping, and kicking up his legs on loose gravel, with great violence, was heard to proceed from the same direction as the former sounds; and before they had subsided, a large cucumber was seen to shoot up in the air with the velocity of a sky-rocket, whence it descended, tumbling over and over, until it fell at Mrs. Nickleby’s feet.
This remarkable appearance was succeeded by another of a precisely similar description; then a fine vegetable marrow, of unusually large dimensions, was seen to whirl aloft, and come toppling down; then, several cucumbers shot up together; and, finally, the air was darkened by a shower of onions, turnip-radishes, and other small vegetables, which fell rolling and scattering, and bumping about, in all directions.
As Kate rose from her seat, in some alarm, and caught her mother’s hand to run with her into the house, she felt herself rather retarded than assisted in her intention; and following the direction of Mrs. Nickleby’s eyes, was quite terrified by the apparition of an old black velvet cap, which, by slow degrees, as if its wearer were ascending a ladder or pair of steps, rose above the wall dividing their garden from that of the next cottage, (which, like their own, was a detached building,) and was gradually followed by a very large head, and an old face, in which were a pair of most extraordinary grey eyes: very wild, very wide open, and rolling in their sockets, with a dull, languishing, leering look, most ugly to behold.
‘Mama!’ cried Kate, really terrified for the moment, ‘why do you stop, why do you lose an instant? Mama, pray come in!’
‘Kate, my dear,’ returned her mother, still holding back, ‘how can you be so foolish? I’m ashamed of you. How do you suppose you are ever to get through life, if you’re such a coward as this? What do you want, sir?’ said Mrs. Nickleby, addressing the intruder with a sort of simpering displeasure. ‘How dare you look into this garden?’
‘Queen of my soul,’ replied the stranger, folding his hands together, ‘this goblet sip!’
‘Nonsense, sir,’ said Mrs. Nickleby. ‘Kate, my love, pray be quiet.’
‘Won’t you sip the goblet?’ urged the stranger, with his head imploringly on one side, and his right hand on his breast. ‘Oh, do sip the goblet!’
‘I shall not consent to do anything of the kind, sir,’ said Mrs. Nickleby. ‘Pray, begone.’
‘Why is it,’ said the old gentleman, coming up a step higher, and leaning his elbows on the wall, with as much complacency as if he were looking out of window, ‘why is it that beauty is always obdurate, even when admiration is as honourable and respectful as mine?’ Here he smiled, kissed his hand, and made several low bows. ‘Is it owing to the bees, who, when the honey season is over, and they are supposed to have been killed with brimstone, in reality fly to Barbary and lull the captive Moors to sleep with their drowsy songs? Or is it,’ he added, dropping his voice almost to a whisper, ‘in consequence of the statue at Charing Cross having been lately seen, on the Stock Exchange at midnight, walking arm-in-arm with the Pump from Aldgate, in a riding-habit?’
‘Mama,’ murmured Kate, ‘do you hear him?’
‘Hush, my dear!’ replied Mrs. Nickleby, in the same tone of voice, ‘he is very polite, and I think that was a quotation from the poets. Pray, don’t worry me so – you’ll pinch my arm black and blue. Go away, sir!’
‘Quite away?’ said the gentleman, with a languishing look. ‘Oh! quite away?’
‘Yes,’ returned Mrs. Nickleby, ‘certainly. You have no business here. This is private property, sir; you ought to know that.’
‘I do know,’ said the old gentleman, laying his finger on his nose, with an air of familiarity, most reprehensible, ‘that this is a sacred and enchanted spot, where the most divine charms’ – here he kissed his hand and bowed again – ‘waft mellifluousness over the neighbours’ gardens, and force the fruit and vegetables into premature existence. That fact I am acquainted with. But will you permit me, fairest creature, to ask you one question, in the absence of the planet Venus, who has gone on business to the Horse Guards, and would otherwise – jealous of your superior charms – interpose between us?’
‘Kate,’ observed Mrs. Nickleby, turning to her daughter, ‘it’s very awkward, positively. I really don’t know what to say to this gentleman. One ought to be civil, you know.’
‘Dear mama,’ rejoined Kate, ‘don’t say a word to him, but let us run away as fast as we can, and shut ourselves up till Nicholas comes home.’
Mrs. Nickleby looked very grand, not to say contemptuous, at this humiliating proposal; and, turning to the old gentleman, who had watched them during these whispers with absorbing eagerness, said:
‘If you will conduct yourself, sir, like the gentleman I should imagine you to be, from your language and – and – appearance, (quite the counterpart of your grandpapa, Kate, my dear, in his best days,) and will put your question to me in plain words, I will answer it.’
If Mrs. Nickleby’s excellent papa had borne, in his best days, a resemblance to the neighbour now looking over the wall, he must have been, to say the least, a very queer-looking old gentleman in his prime. Perhaps Kate thought so, for she ventured to glance at his living portrait with some attention, as he took off his black velvet cap, and, exhibiting a perfectly bald head, made a long series of bows, each accompanied with a fresh kiss of the hand. After exhausting himself, to all appearance, with this fatiguing performance, he covered his head once more, pulled the cap very carefully over the tips of his ears, and resuming his former attitude, said,
