_
CHAPTER 66
On awaking in the morning, Richard Swiveller became conscious, by
slow degrees, of whispering voices in his room. Looking out
between the curtains, he espied Mr Garland, Mr Abel, the notary,
and the single gentleman, gathered round the Marchioness, and
talking to her with great earnestness but in very subdued tones--
fearing, no doubt, to disturb him. He lost no time in letting them
know that this precaution was unnecessary, and all four gentlemen
directly approached his bedside. Old Mr Garland was the first to
stretch out his hand, and inquire how he felt.
Dick was about to answer that he felt much better, though still as
weak as need be, when his little nurse, pushing the visitors aside
and pressing up to his pillow as if in jealousy of their
interference, set his breakfast before him, and insisted on his
taking it before he underwent the fatigue of speaking or of being
spoken to. Mr Swiveller, who was perfectly ravenous, and had had,
all night, amazingly distinct and consistent dreams of mutton
chops, double stout, and similar delicacies, felt even the weak tea
and dry toast such irresistible temptations, that he consented to
eat and drink on one condition.
'And that is,' said Dick, returning the pressure of Mr Garland's
hand, 'that you answer me this question truly, before I take a bit
or drop. Is it too late?'
'For completing the work you began so well last night?' returned
the old gentleman. 'No. Set your mind at rest on that point. It
is not, I assure you.'
Comforted by this intelligence, the patient applied himself to his
food with a keen appetite, though evidently not with a greater zest
in the eating than his nurse appeared to have in seeing him eat.
The manner of this meal was this:--Mr Swiveller, holding the slice
of toast or cup of tea in his left hand, and taking a bite or
drink, as the case might be, constantly kept, in his right, one
palm of the Marchioness tight locked; and to shake, or even to kiss
this imprisoned hand, he would stop every now and then, in the very
act of swallowing, with perfect seriousness of intention, and the
utmost gravity. As often as he put anything into his mouth,
whether for eating or drinking, the face of the Marchioness lighted
up beyond all description; but whenever he gave her one or other of
these tokens of recognition, her countenance became overshadowed,
and she began to sob. Now, whether she was in her laughing joy, or
in her crying one, the Marchioness could not help turning to the
visitors with an appealing look, which seemed to say, 'You see this
fellow--can I help this?'--and they, being thus made, as it were,
parties to the scene, as regularly answered by another look, 'No.
Certainly not.' This dumb-show, taking place during the whole time
of the invalid's breakfast, and the invalid himself, pale and
emaciated, performing no small part in the same, it may be fairly
questioned whether at any meal, where no word, good or bad, was
spoken from beginning to end, so much was expressed by gestures in
themselves so slight and unimportant.
At length--and to say the truth before very long--Mr Swiveller
had despatched as much toast and tea as in that stage of his
recovery it was discreet to let him have. But the cares of the
Marchioness did not stop here; for, disappearing for an instant and
presently returning with a basin of fair water, she laved his face
and hands, brushed his hair, and in short made him as spruce and
smart as anybody under such circumstances could be made; and all
this, in as brisk and business-like a manner, as if he were a very
little boy, and she his grown-up nurse. To these various
attentions, Mr Swiveller submitted in a kind of grateful
astonishment beyond the reach of language. When they were at last
brought to an end, and the Marchioness had withdrawn into a distant
corner to take her own poor breakfast (cold enough by that time),
he turned his face away for some few moments, and shook hands
heartily with the air.
'Gentlemen,' said Dick, rousing himself from this pause, and
turning round again, 'you'll excuse me. Men who have been brought
so low as I have been, are easily fatigued. I am fresh again now,
and fit for talking. We're short of chairs here, among other
trifles, but if you'll do me the favour to sit upon the bed--'
'What can we do for you?' said Mr Garland, kindly.
'if you could make the Marchioness yonder, a Marchioness, in real,
sober earnest,' returned Dick, 'I'd thank you to get it done
off-hand. But as you can't, and as the question is not what you
will do for me, but what you will do for somebody else who has a
better claim upon you, pray sir let me know what you intend doing.'
'It's chiefly on that account that we have come just now,' said the
single gentleman, 'for you will have another visitor presently. We
feared you would be anxious unless you knew from ourselves what
steps we intended to take, and therefore came to you before we
stirred in the matter.'
'Gentlemen,' returned Dick, 'I thank you. Anybody in the helpless
state that you see me in, is naturally anxious. Don't let me
interrupt you, sir.'
'Then, you see, my good fellow,' said the single gentleman, 'that
while we have no doubt whatever of the truth of this disclosure,
which has so providentially come to light--'
'Meaning hers?' said Dick, pointing towards the Marchioness.
'--Meaning hers, of course. While we have no doubt of that, or
that a proper use of it would procure the poor lad's immediate
pardon and liberation, we have a great doubt whether it would, by
itself, enable us to reach Quilp, the chief agent in this villany.
I should tell you that this doubt has been confirmed into something
very nearly approaching certainty by the best opinions we have been
enabled, in this short space of time, to take upon the subject.
You'll agree with us, that to give him even the most distant chance
of escape, if we could help it, would be monstrous. You say with
us, no doubt, if somebody must escape, let it be any one but he.'
'Yes,' returned Dick, 'certainly. That is if somebody must--but
upon my word, I'm unwilling that Anybody should. Since laws were
made for every degree, to curb vice in others as well as in me--
and so forth you know--doesn't it strike you in that light?'
The single gentleman smiled as if the light in which Mr Swiveller
had put the question were not the clearest in the world, and
proceeded to explain that they contemplated proceeding by stratagem
in the first instance; and that their design was to endeavour to
extort a confession from the gentle Sarah.
'When she finds how much we know, and how we know it,' he said,
'and that she is clearly compromised already, we are not without
strong hopes that we may be enabled through her means to punish the
other two effectually. If we could do that, she might go scot-free
for aught I cared.'
Dick received this project in anything but a gracious manner,
representing with as much warmth as he was then capable of showing,
that they would find the old buck (meaning Sarah) more difficult to
manage than Quilp himself--that, for any tampering, terrifying, or
cajolery, she was a very unpromising and unyielding subject--that
she was of a kind of brass not easily melted or moulded into shape--
in short, that they were no match for her, and would be signally
defeated. But it was in vain to urge them to adopt some other
course. The single gentleman has been described as explaining
their joint intentions, but it should have been written that they
all spoke together; that if any one of them by chance held his
peace for a moment, he stood gasping and panting for an opportunity
to strike in again: in a word, that they had reached that pitch of
impatience and anxiety where men can neither be persuaded nor
reasoned with; and that it would have been as easy to turn the most
impetuous wind that ever blew, as to prevail on them to reconsider
their determination. So, after telling Mr Swiveller how they had
not lost sight of Kit's mother and the children; how they had never
once even lost sight of Kit himself, but had been unremitting in
their endeavours to procure a mitigation of his sentence; how they
had been perfectly distracted between the strong proofs of his
guilt, and their own fading hopes of his innocence; and how he,
Richard Swiveller, might keep his mind at rest, for everything
should be happily adjusted between that time and night;--after
telling him all this, and adding a great many kind and cordial
expressions, personal to himself, which it is unnecessary to
recite, Mr Garland, the notary, and the single gentleman, took
their leaves at a very critical time, or Richard Swiveller must
assuredly have been driven into another fever, whereof the results
might have been fatal.
Mr Abel remained behind, very often looking at his watch and at the
room door, until Mr Swiveller was roused from a short nap, by the
setting-down on the landing-place outside, as from the shoulders of
a porter, of some giant load, which seemed to shake the house, and
made the little physic bottles on the mantel-shelf ring again.
Directly this sound reached his ears, Mr Abel started up, and
hobbled to the door, and opened it; and behold! there stood a
strong man, with a mighty hamper, which, being hauled into the room
and presently unpacked, disgorged such treasures as tea, and
coffee, and wine, and rusks, and oranges, and grapes, and fowls
ready trussed for boiling, and calves'-foot jelly, and arrow-root,
and sago, and other delicate restoratives, that the small servant,
who had never thought it possible that such things could be, except
in shops, stood rooted to the spot in her one shoe, with her mouth
and eyes watering in unison, and her power of speech quite gone.
But, not so Mr Abel; or the strong man who emptied the hamper, big
as it was, in a twinkling; and not so the nice old lady, who
appeared so suddenly that she might have come out of the hamper too
(it was quite large enough), and who, bustling about on tiptoe and
without noise--now here, now there, now everywhere at once--began
to fill out the jelly in tea-cups, and to make chicken broth in
small saucepans, and to peel oranges for the sick man and to cut
them up in little pieces, and to ply the small servant with glasses
of wine and choice bits of everything until more substantial meat
could be prepared for her refreshment. The whole of which
appearances were so unexpected and bewildering, that Mr Swiveller,
when he had taken two oranges and a little jelly, and had seen the
strong man walk off with the empty basket, plainly leaving all that
abundance for his use and benefit, was fain to lie down and fall
asleep again, from sheer inability to entertain such wonders in his
mind.
Meanwhile, the single gentleman, the Notary, and Mr Garland,
repaired to a certain coffee-house, and from that place indited and
sent a letter to Miss Sally Brass, requesting her, in terms
mysterious and brief, to favour an unknown friend who wished to
consult her, with her company there, as speedily as possible. The
communication performed its errand so well, that within ten minutes
of the messenger's return and report of its delivery, Miss Brass
herself was announced.
'Pray ma'am,' said the single gentleman, whom she found alone in
the room, 'take a chair.'
Miss Brass sat herself down, in a very stiff and frigid state, and
seemed--as indeed she was--not a little astonished to find that
the lodger and her mysterious correspondent were one and the same
person.
'You did not expect to see me?' said the single gentleman.
'I didn't think much about it,' returned the beauty. 'I supposed
it was business of some kind or other. If it's about the
apartments, of course you'll give my brother regular notice, you
know--or money. That's very easily settled. You're a responsible
party, and in such a case lawful money and lawful notice are pretty
much the same.'
'I am obliged to you for your good opinion,' retorted the single
gentleman, 'and quite concur in these sentiments. But that is not
the subject on which I wish to speak with you.'
'Oh!' said Sally. 'Then just state the particulars, will you? I
suppose it's professional business?'
'Why, it is connected with the law, certainly.'
'Very well,' returned Miss Brass. 'My brother and I are just the
same. I can take any instructions, or give you any advice.'
'As there are other parties interested besides myself,' said the
single gentleman, rising and opening the door of an inner room, 'we
had better confer together. Miss Brass is here, gentlemen.'
Mr Garland and the Notary walked in, looking very grave; and,
drawing up two chairs, one on each side of the single gentleman,
formed a kind of fence round the gentle Sarah, and penned her into
a corner. Her brother Sampson under such circumstances would
certainly have evinced some confusion or anxiety, but she--all
composure--pulled out the tin box, and calmly took a pinch of
snuff.
'Miss Brass,' said the Notary, taking the word at this crisis, 'we
professional people understand each other, and, when we choose, can
say what we have to say, in very few words. You advertised a
runaway servant, the other day?'
'Well,' returned Miss Sally, with a sudden flush overspreading her
features, 'what of that?'
'She is found, ma'am,' said the Notary, pulling out his pocket-
handkerchief with a flourish. 'She is found.'
'Who found her?' demanded Sarah hastily.
'We did, ma'am--we three. Only last night, or you would have
heard from us before.'
'And now I have heard from you,' said Miss Brass, folding her arms
as though she were about to deny something to the death, 'what have
you got to say? Something you have got into your heads about her,
of course. Prove it, will you--that's all. Prove it. You have
found her, you say. I can tell you (if you don't know it) that you
have found the most artful, lying, pilfering, devilish little minx
that was ever born.--Have you got her here?' she added, looking
sharply round.
'No, she is not here at present,' returned the Notary. 'But she is
quite safe.'
'Ha!' cried Sally, twitching a pinch of snuff out of her box, as
spitefully as if she were in the very act of wrenching off the
small servant's nose; 'she shall be safe enough from this time, I
warrant you.'
'I hope so,' replied the Notary. 'Did it occur to you for the
first time, when you found she had run away, that there were two
keys to your kitchen door?'
Miss Sally took another pinch, and putting her head on one side,
looked at her questioner, with a curious kind of spasm about her
mouth, but with a cunning aspect of immense expression.
'Two keys,' repeated the Notary; 'one of which gave her the
opportunities of roaming through the house at nights when you
supposed her fast locked up, and of overhearing confidential
consultations--among others, that particular conference, to be
described to-day before a justice, which you will have an
opportunity of hearing her relate; that conference which you and Mr
Brass held together, on the night before that most unfortunate and
innocent young man was accused of robbery, by a horrible device of
which I will only say that it may be characterised by the epithets
which you have applied to this wretched little witness, and by a
few stronger ones besides.'
Sally took another pinch. Although her face was wonderfully
composed, it was apparent that she was wholly taken by surprise,
and that what she had expected to be taxed with, in connection with
her small servant, was something very different from this.
'Come, come, Miss Brass,' said the Notary, 'you have great command
of feature, but you feel, I see, that by a chance which never
entered your imagination, this base design is revealed, and two of
its plotters must be brought to justice. Now, you know the pains
and penalties you are liable to, and so I need not dilate upon
them, but I have a proposal to make to you. You have the honour of
being sister to one of the greatest scoundrels unhung; and, if I
may venture to say so to a lady, you are in every respect quite
worthy of him. But connected with you two is a third party, a
villain of the name of Quilp, the prime mover of the whole
diabolical device, who I believe to be worse than either. For his
sake, Miss Brass, do us the favour to reveal the whole history of
this affair. Let me remind you that your doing so, at our
instance, will place you in a safe and comfortable position--your
present one is not desirable--and cannot injure your brother; for
against him and you we have quite sufficient evidence (as you hear)
already. I will not say to you that we suggest this course in
mercy (for, to tell you the truth, we do not entertain any regard
for you), but it is a necessity to which we are reduced, and I
recommend it to you as a matter of the very best policy. Time,'
said Mr Witherden, pulling out his watch, 'in a business like this,
is exceedingly precious. Favour us with your decision as speedily
as possible, ma'am.'
With a smile upon her face, and looking at each of the three by
turns, Miss Brass took two or three more pinches of snuff, and
having by this time very little left, travelled round and round the
box with her forefinger and thumb, scraping up another. Having
disposed of this likewise and put the box carefully in her pocket,
she said,--
'I am to accept or reject at once, am I?'
'Yes,' said Mr Witherden.
The charming creature was opening her lips to speak in reply, when
the door was hastily opened too, and the head of Sampson Brass was
thrust into the room.
'Excuse me,' said the gentleman hastily. 'Wait a bit!'
So saying, and quite indifferent to the astonishment his presence
occasioned, he crept in, shut the door, kissed his greasy glove as
servilely as if it were the dust, and made a most abject bow.
'Sarah,' said Brass, 'hold your tongue if you please, and let me
speak. Gentlemen, if I could express the pleasure it gives me to
see three such men in a happy unity of feeling and concord of
sentiment, I think you would hardly believe me. But though I am
unfortunate--nay, gentlemen, criminal, if we are to use harsh
expressions in a company like this--still, I have my feelings like
other men. I have heard of a poet, who remarked that feelings were
the common lot of all. If he could have been a pig, gentlemen, and
have uttered that sentiment, he would still have been immortal.'
'If you're not an idiot,' said Miss Brass harshly, 'hold your
peace.'
'Sarah, my dear,' returned her brother, 'thank you. But I know
what I am about, my love, and will take the liberty of expressing
myself accordingly. Mr Witherden, Sir, your handkerchief is
hanging out of your pocket--would you allow me to--,
As Mr Brass advanced to remedy this accident, the Notary shrunk
from him with an air of disgust. Brass, who over and above his
usual prepossessing qualities, had a scratched face, a green shade
over one eye, and a hat grievously crushed, stopped short, and
looked round with a pitiful smile.
'He shuns me,' said Sampson, 'even when I would, as I may say, heap
coals of fire upon his head. Well! Ah! But I am a falling house,
and the rats (if I may be allowed the expression in reference to a
gentleman I respect and love beyond everything) fly from me!
Gentlemen--regarding your conversation just now, I happened to see
my sister on her way here, and, wondering where she could be going
to, and being--may I venture to say?--naturally of a suspicious
turn, followed her. Since then, I have been listening.'
'If you're not mad,' interposed Miss Sally, 'stop there, and say no
more.'
'Sarah, my dear,' rejoined Brass with undiminished politeness, 'I
thank you kindly, but will still proceed. Mr Witherden, sir, as we
have the honour to be members of the same profession--to say
nothing of that other gentleman having been my lodger, and having
partaken, as one may say, of the hospitality of my roof--I think
you might have given me the refusal of this offer in the first
instance. I do indeed. Now, my dear Sir,' cried Brass, seeing
that the Notary was about to interrupt him, 'suffer me to speak, I
beg.'
Mr Witherden was silent, and Brass went on.
'If you will do me the favour,' he said, holding up the green
shade, and revealing an eye most horribly discoloured, 'to look at
this, you will naturally inquire, in your own minds, how did I get
it. If you look from that, to my face, you will wonder what could
have been the cause of all these scratches. And if from them to my
hat, how it came into the state in which you see it. Gentlemen,'
said Brass, striking the hat fiercely with his clenched hand, 'to
all these questions I answer--Quilp!'
The three gentlemen looked at each other, but said nothing.
'I say,' pursued Brass, glancing aside at his sister, as though he
were talking for her information, and speaking with a snarling
malignity, in violent contrast to his usual smoothness, 'that I
answer to all these questions,--Quilp--Quilp, who deludes me into
his infernal den, and takes a delight in looking on and chuckling
while I scorch, and burn, and bruise, and maim myself--Quilp, who
never once, no never once, in all our communications together, has
treated me otherwise than as a dog--Quilp, whom I have always
hated with my whole heart, but never so much as lately. He gives
me the cold shoulder on this very matter as if he had had nothing
to do with it, instead of being the first to propose it. I can't
trust him. In one of his howling, raving, blazing humours, I
believe he'd let it out, if it was murder, and never think of
himself so long as he could terrify me. Now,' said Brass, picking
up his hat again and replacing the shade over his eye, and actually
crouching down, in the excess of his servility, 'What does all this
lead to?--what should you say it led me to, gentlemen?--could you
guess at all near the mark?'
Nobody spoke. Brass stood smirking for a little while, as if he
had propounded some choice conundrum; and then said:
'To be short with you, then, it leads me to this. If the truth has
come out, as it plainly has in a manner that there's no standing up
against--and a very sublime and grand thing is Truth, gentlemen,
in its way, though like other sublime and grand things, such as
thunder-storms and that, we're not always over and above glad to
see it--I had better turn upon this man than let this man turn
upon me. It's clear to me that I am done for. Therefore, if
anybody is to split, I had better be the person and have the
advantage of it. Sarah, my dear, comparatively speaking you're
safe. I relate these circumstances for my own profit.'
With that, Mr Brass, in a great hurry, revealed the whole story;
bearing as heavily as possible on his amiable employer, and making
himself out to be rather a saint-like and holy character, though
subject--he acknowledged--to human weaknesses. He concluded
thus:
'Now, gentlemen, I am not a man who does things by halves. Being
in for a penny, I am ready, as the saying is, to be in for a pound.
You must do with me what you please, and take me where you please.
If you wish to have this in writing, we'll reduce it into
manuscript immediately. You will be tender with me, I am sure. I
am quite confident you will be tender with me. You are men of
honour, and have feeling hearts. I yielded from necessity to
Quilp, for though necessity has no law, she has her lawyers. I
yield to you from necessity too; from policy besides; and because
of feelings that have been a pretty long time working within me.
Punish Quilp, gentlemen. Weigh heavily upon him. Grind him down.
Tread him under foot. He has done as much by me, for many and many
a day.'
Having now arrived at the conclusion of his discourse, Sampson
checked the current of his wrath, kissed his glove again, and
smiled as only parasites and cowards can.
'And this,' said Miss Brass, raising her head, with which she had
hitherto sat resting on her hands, and surveying him from head to
foot with a bitter sneer, 'this is my brother, is it! This is my
brother, that I have worked and toiled for, and believed to have
had something of the man in him!'
'Sarah, my dear,' returned Sampson, rubbing his hands feebly; you
disturb our friends. Besides you--you're disappointed, Sarah,
and, not knowing what you say, expose yourself.'
'Yes, you pitiful dastard,' retorted the lovely damsel, 'I
understand you. You feared that I should be beforehand with you.
But do you think that I would have been enticed to say a word! I'd
have scorned it, if they had tried and tempted me for twenty
years.'
'He he!' simpered Brass, who, in his deep debasement, really seemed
to have changed sexes with his sister, and to have made over to her
any spark of manliness he might have possessed. 'You think so,
Sarah, you think so perhaps; but you would have acted quite
different, my good fellow. You will not have forgotten that it was
a maxim with Foxey--our revered father, gentlemen--"Always
suspect everybody." That's the maxim to go through life with! If
you were not actually about to purchase your own safety when I
showed myself, I suspect you'd have done it by this time. And
therefore I've done it myself, and spared you the trouble as well
as the shame. The shame, gentlemen,' added Brass, allowing himself
to be slightly overcome, 'if there is any, is mine. It's better
that a female should be spared it.'
With deference to the better opinion of Mr Brass, and more
particularly to the authority of his Great Ancestor, it may be
doubted, with humility, whether the elevating principle laid down
by the latter gentleman, and acted upon by his descendant, is
always a prudent one, or attended in practice with the desired
results. This is, beyond question, a bold and presumptuous doubt,
inasmuch as many distinguished characters, called men of the world,
long-headed customers, knowing dogs, shrewd fellows, capital hands
at business, and the like, have made, and do daily make, this axiom
their polar star and compass. Still, the doubt may be gently
insinuated. And in illustration it may be observed, that if Mr
Brass, not being over-suspicious, had, without prying and
listening, left his sister to manage the conference on their joint
behalf, or prying and listening, had not been in such a mighty
hurry to anticipate her (which he would not have been, but for his
distrust and jealousy), he would probably have found himself much
better off in the end. Thus, it will always happen that these men
of the world, who go through it in armour, defend themselves from
quite as much good as evil; to say nothing of the inconvenience and
absurdity of mounting guard with a microscope at all times, and of
wearing a coat of mail on the most innocent occasions.
The three gentlemen spoke together apart, for a few moments. At
the end of their consultation, which was very brief, the Notary
pointed to the writing materials on the table, and informed Mr
Brass that if he wished to make any statement in writing, he had
the opportunity of doing so. At the same time he felt bound to
tell him that they would require his attendance, presently, before
a justice of the peace, and that in what he did or said, he was
guided entirely by his own discretion.
'Gentlemen,' said Brass, drawing off his glove, and crawling in
spirit upon the ground before them, 'I will justify the tenderness
with which I know I shall be treated; and as, without tenderness,
I should, now that this discovery has been made, stand in the worst
position of the three, you may depend upon it I will make a clean
breast. Mr Witherden, sir, a kind of faintness is upon my spirits--
if you would do me the favour to ring the bell and order up a
glass of something warm and spicy, I shall, notwithstanding what
has passed, have a melancholy pleasure in drinking your good
health. I had hoped,' said Brass, looking round with a mournful
smile, 'to have seen you three gentlemen, one day or another, with
your legs under the mahogany in my humble parlour in the Marks.
But hopes are fleeting. Dear me!'
Mr Brass found himself so exceedingly affected, at this point, that
he could say or do nothing more until some refreshment arrived.
Having partaken of it, pretty freely for one in his agitated state,
he sat down to write.
The lovely Sarah, now with her arms folded, and now with her hands
clasped behind her, paced the room with manly strides while her
brother was thus employed, and sometimes stopped to pull out her
snuff-box and bite the lid. She continued to pace up and down
until she was quite tired, and then fell asleep on a chair near the
door.
It has been since supposed, with some reason, that this slumber was
a sham or feint, as she contrived to slip away unobserved in the
dusk of the afternoon. Whether this was an intentional and waking
departure, or a somnambulistic leave-taking and walking in her
sleep, may remain a subject of contention; but, on one point (and
indeed the main one) all parties are agreed. In whatever state she
walked away, she certainly did not walk back again.
Mention having been made of the dusk of the afternoon, it will be
inferred that Mr Brass's task occupied some time in the completion.
It was not finished until evening; but, being done at last, that
worthy person and the three friends adjourned in a hackney-coach to
the private office of a justice, who, giving Mr Brass a warm
reception and detaining him in a secure place that he might insure
to himself the pleasure of seeing him on the morrow, dismissed the
others with the cheering assurance that a warrant could not fail to
be granted next day for the apprehension of Mr Quilp, and that a
proper application and statement of all the circumstances to the
secretary of state (who was fortunately in town), would no doubt
procure Kit's free pardon and liberation without delay.
And now, indeed, it seemed that Quilp's malignant career was
drawing to a close, and that retribution, which often travels
slowly--especially when heaviest--had tracked his footsteps with
a sure and certain scent and was gaining on him fast. Unmindful of
her stealthy tread, her victim holds his course in fancied triumph.
Still at his heels she comes, and once afoot, is never turned
aside!
Their business ended, the three gentlemen hastened back to the
lodgings of Mr Swiveller, whom they found progressing so favourably
in his recovery as to have been able to sit up for half an hour,
and to have conversed with cheerfulness. Mrs Garland had gone home
some time since, but Mr Abel was still sitting with him. After
telling him all they had done, the two Mr Garlands and the single
gentleman, as if by some previous understanding, took their leaves
for the night, leaving the invalid alone with the Notary and the
small servant.
'As you are so much better,' said Mr Witherden, sitting down at the
bedside, 'I may venture to communicate to you a piece of news which
has come to me professionally.'
The idea of any professional intelligence from a gentleman
connected with legal matters, appeared to afford Richard any-thing
but a pleasing anticipation. Perhaps he connected it in his own
mind with one or two outstanding accounts, in reference to which he
had already received divers threatening letters. His countenance
fell as he replied,
'Certainly, sir. I hope it's not anything of a very disagreeable
nature, though?'
'if I thought it so, I should choose some better time for
communicating it,' replied the Notary. 'Let me tell you, first,
that my friends who have been here to-day, know nothing of it, and
that their kindness to you has been quite spontaneous and with no
hope of return. It may do a thoughtless, careless man, good, to
know that.'
Dick thanked him, and said he hoped it would.
'I have been making some inquiries about you,' said Mr Witherden,
'little thinking that I should find you under such circumstances as
those which have brought us together. You are the nephew of
Rebecca Swiveller, spinster, deceased, of Cheselbourne in
Dorsetshire.'
'Deceased!' cried Dick.
'Deceased. If you had been another sort of nephew, you would have
come into possession (so says the will, and I see no reason to
doubt it) of five-and-twenty thousand pounds. As it is, you have
fallen into an annuity of one hundred and fifty pounds a year; but
I think I may congratulate you even upon that.'
'Sir,' said Dick, sobbing and laughing together, 'you may. For,
please God, we'll make a scholar of the poor Marchioness yet! And
she shall walk in silk attire, and siller have to spare, or may I
never rise from this bed again!'
Content of CHAPTER 66 [Charles Dickens' novel: The Old Curiosity Shop]
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