BOOK THE SECOND: RICHES - CHAPTER 9 Appearance and Disappearance

'Arthur, my dear boy,' said Mr Meagles, on the evening of the

following day, 'Mother and I have been talking this over, and we

don't feel comfortable in remaining as we are. That elegant

connection of ours--that dear lady who was here yesterday--'

'I understand,' said Arthur.

'Even that affable and condescending ornament of society,' pursued

Mr Meagles, 'may misrepresent us, we are afraid. We could bear a

great deal, Arthur, for her sake; but we think we would rather not

bear that, if it was all the same to her.'

'Good,' said Arthur. 'Go on.'

'You see,' proceeded Mr Meagles 'it might put us wrong with our

son-in-law, it might even put us wrong with our daughter, and it

might lead to a great deal of domestic trouble. You see, don't

you?'

'Yes, indeed,' returned Arthur, 'there is much reason in what you

say.' He had glanced at Mrs Meagles, who was always on the good

and sensible side; and a petition had shone out of her honest face

that he would support Mr Meagles in his present inclinings.

'So we are very much disposed, are Mother and I,' said Mr Meagles,

'to pack up bags and baggage and go among the Allongers and

Marshongers once more. I mean, we are very much disposed to be

off, strike right through France into Italy, and see our Pet.'

'And I don't think,' replied Arthur, touched by the motherly

anticipation in the bright face of Mrs Meagles (she must have been

very like her daughter, once), 'that you could do better. And if

you ask me for my advice, it is that you set off to-morrow.'

'Is it really, though?' said Mr Meagles. 'Mother, this is being

backed in an idea!'

Mother, with a look which thanked Clennam in a manner very

agreeable to him, answered that it was indeed.

'The fact is, besides, Arthur,' said Mr Meagles, the old cloud

coming over his face, 'that my son-in-law is already in debt again,

and that I suppose I must clear him again. It may be as well, even

on this account, that I should step over there, and look him up in

a friendly way. Then again, here's Mother foolishly anxious (and

yet naturally too) about Pet's state of health, and that she should

not be left to feel lonesome at the present time. It's undeniably

a long way off, Arthur, and a strange place for the poor love under

all the circumstances. Let her be as well cared for as any lady in

that land, still it is a long way off. just as Home is Home though

it's never so Homely, why you see,' said Mr Meagles, adding a new

version to the proverb, 'Rome is Rome, though it's never so

Romely.'

'All perfectly true,' observed Arthur, 'and all sufficient reasons

for going.'

'I am glad you think so; it decides me. Mother, my dear, you may

get ready. We have lost our pleasant interpreter (she spoke three

foreign languages beautifully, Arthur; you have heard her many a

time), and you must pull me through it, Mother, as well as you can.

I require a deal of pulling through, Arthur,' said Mr Meagles,

shaking his head, 'a deal of pulling through. I stick at

everything beyond a noun-substantive--and I stick at him, if he's

at all a tight one.'

'Now I think of it,' returned Clennam, 'there's Cavalletto. He

shall go with you, if you like. I could not afford to lose him,

but you will bring him safe back.'

'Well! I am much obliged to you, my boy,' said Mr Meagles, turning

it over, 'but I think not. No, I think I'll be pulled through by

Mother. Cavallooro (I stick at his very name to start with, and it

sounds like the chorus to a comic song) is so necessary to you,

that I don't like the thought of taking him away. More than that,

there's no saying when we may come home again; and it would never

do to take him away for an indefinite time. The cottage is not

what it was. It only holds two little people less than it ever

did, Pet, and her poor unfortunate maid Tattycoram; but it seems

empty now. Once out of it, there's no knowing when we may come

back to it. No, Arthur, I'll be pulled through by Mother.'

They would do best by themselves perhaps, after all, Clennam

thought; therefore did not press his proposal.

'If you would come down and stay here for a change, when it

wouldn't trouble you,' Mr Meagles resumed, 'I should be glad to

think--and so would Mother too, I know--that you were brightening

up the old place with a bit of life it was used to when it was

full, and that the Babies on the wall there had a kind eye upon

them sometimes. You so belong to the spot, and to them, Arthur,

and we should every one of us have been so happy if it had fallen

out--but, let us see--how's the weather for travelling now?' Mr

Meagles broke off, cleared his throat, and got up to look out of

the window.

They agreed that the weather was of high promise; and Clennam kept

the talk in that safe direction until it had become easy again,

when he gently diverted it to Henry Gowan and his quick sense and

agreeable qualities when he was delicately dealt With; he likewise

dwelt on the indisputable affection he entertained for his wife.

Clennam did not fail of his effect upon good Mr Meagles, whom these

commendations greatly cheered; and who took Mother to witness that

the single and cordial desire of his heart in reference to their

daughter's husband, was harmoniously to exchange friendship for

friendship, and confidence for confidence. Within a few hours the

cottage furniture began to be wrapped up for preservation in the

family absence--or, as Mr Meagles expressed it, the house began to

put its hair in papers--and within a few days Father and Mother

were gone, Mrs Tickit and Dr Buchan were posted, as of yore, behind

the parlour blind, and Arthur's solitary feet were rustling among

the dry fallen leaves in the garden walks.

As he had a liking for the spot, he seldom let a week pass without

paying a visit. Sometimes, he went down alone from Saturday to

Monday; sometimes his partner accompanied him; sometimes, he merely

strolled for an hour or two about the house and garden, saw that

all was right, and returned to London again. At all times, and

under all circumstances, Mrs Tickit, with her dark row of curls,

and Dr Buchan, sat in the parlour window, looking out for the

family return.

On one of his visits Mrs Tickit received him with the words, 'I

have something to tell you, Mr Clennam, that will surprise you.'

So surprising was the something in question, that it actually

brought Mrs Tickit out of the parlour window and produced her in

the garden walk, when Clennam went in at the gate on its being

opened for him.

'What is it, Mrs Tickit?' said he.

'Sir,' returned that faithful housekeeper, having taken him into

the parlour and closed the door; 'if ever I saw the led away and

deluded child in my life, I saw her identically in the dusk of

yesterday evening.'

'You don't mean Tatty--'

'Coram yes I do!' quoth Mrs Tickit, clearing the disclosure at a

leap.

'Where?'

'Mr Clennam,' returned Mrs Tickit, 'I was a little heavy in my

eyes, being that I was waiting longer than customary for my cup of

tea which was then preparing by Mary Jane. I was not sleeping, nor

what a person would term correctly, dozing. I was more what a

person would strictly call watching with my eyes closed.'

Without entering upon an inquiry into this curious abnormal

condition, Clennam said, 'Exactly. Well?'

'Well, sir,' proceeded Mrs Tickit, 'I was thinking of one thing and

thinking of another. just as you yourself might. just as anybody

might.'

'Precisely so,' said Clennam. 'Well?'

'And when I do think of one thing and do think of another,' pursued

Mrs Tickit, 'I hardly need to tell you, Mr Clennam, that I think of

the family. Because, dear me! a person's thoughts,' Mrs Tickit

said this with an argumentative and philosophic air, 'however they

may stray, will go more or less on what is uppermost in their

minds. They will do it, sir, and a person can't prevent them.'

Arthur subscribed to this discovery with a nod.

'You find it so yourself, sir, I'll be bold to say,' said Mrs

Tickit, 'and we all find it so. It an't our stations in life that

changes us, Mr Clennam; thoughts is free!--As I was saying, I was

thinking of one thing and thinking of another, and thinking very

much of the family. Not of the family in the present times only,

but in the past times too. For when a person does begin thinking

of one thing and thinking of another in that manner, as it's

getting dark, what I say is, that all times seem to be present, and

a person must get out of that state and consider before they can

say which is which.'

He nodded again; afraid to utter a word, lest it should present any

new opening to Mrs Tickit's conversational powers.

'In consequence of which,' said Mrs Tickit, 'when I quivered my

eyes and saw her actual form and figure looking in at the gate, I

let them close again without so much as starting, for that actual

form and figure came so pat to the time when it belonged to the

house as much as mine or your own, that I never thought at the

moment of its having gone away. But, sir, when I quivered my eyes

again, and saw that it wasn't there, then it all flooded upon me

with a fright, and I jumped up.'

'You ran out directly?' said Clennam.

'I ran out,' assented Mrs Tickit, 'as fast as ever my feet would

carry me; and if you'll credit it, Mr Clennam, there wasn't in the

whole shining Heavens, no not so much as a finger of that young

woman.'

Passing over the absence from the firmament of this novel

constellation, Arthur inquired of Mrs Tickit if she herself went

beyond the gate?

'Went to and fro, and high and low,' said Mrs Tickit, 'and saw no

sign of her!'

He then asked Mrs Tickit how long a space of time she supposed

there might have been between the two sets of ocular quiverings she

had experienced? Mrs Tickit, though minutely circumstantial in her

reply, had no settled opinion between five seconds and ten minutes.

She was so plainly at sea on this part of the case, and had so

clearly been startled out of slumber, that Clennam was much

disposed to regard the appearance as a dream. Without hurting Mrs

Tickit's feelings with that infidel solution of her mystery, he

took it away from the cottage with him; and probably would have

retained it ever afterwards if a circumstance had not soon happened

to change his opinion.

He was passing at nightfall along the Strand, and the lamp-lighter

was going on before him, under whose hand the street-lamps, blurred

by the foggy air, burst out one after another, like so many blazing

sunflowers coming into full-blow all at once,--when a stoppage on

the pavement, caused by a train of coal-waggons toiling up from the

wharves at the river-side, brought him to a stand-still. He had

been walking quickly, and going with some current of thought, and

the sudden check given to both operations caused him to look

freshly about him, as people under such circumstances usually do.

Immediately, he saw in advance--a few people intervening, but still

so near to him that he could have touched them by stretching out

his arm--Tattycoram and a strange man of a remarkable appearance:

a swaggering man, with a high nose, and a black moustache as false

in its colour as his eyes were false in their expression, who wore

his heavy cloak with the air of a foreigner. His dress and general

appearance were those of a man on travel, and he seemed to have

very recently joined the girl. In bending down (being much taller

than she was), listening to whatever she said to him, he looked

over his shoulder with the suspicious glance of one who was not

unused to be mistrustful that his footsteps might be dogged. It

was then that Clennam saw his face; as his eyes lowered on the

people behind him in the aggregate, without particularly resting

upon Clennam's face or any other.

He had scarcely turned his head about again, and it was still bent

down, listening to the girl, when the stoppage ceased, and the

obstructed stream of people flowed on. Still bending his head and

listening to the girl, he went on at her side, and Clennam followed

them, resolved to play this unexpected play out, and see where they

went.

He had hardly made the determination (though he was not long about

it), when he was again as suddenly brought up as he had been by the

stoppage. They turned short into the Adelphi,--the girl evidently

leading,--and went straight on, as if they were going to the

Terrace which overhangs the river.

There is always, to this day, a sudden pause in that place to the

roar of the great thoroughfare. The many sounds become so deadened

that the change is like putting cotton in the ears, or having the

head thickly muffled. At that time the contrast was far greater;

there being no small steam-boats on the river, no landing places

but slippery wooden stairs and foot-causeways, no railroad on the

opposite bank, no hanging bridge or fish-market near at hand, no

traffic on the nearest bridge of stone, nothing moving on the

stream but watermen's wherries and coal-lighters. Long and broad

black tiers of the latter, moored fast in the mud as if they were

never to move again, made the shore funereal and silent after dark;

and kept what little water-movement there was, far out towards mid-

stream. At any hour later than sunset, and not least at that hour

when most of the people who have anything to eat at home are going

home to eat it, and when most of those who have nothing have hardly

yet slunk out to beg or steal, it was a deserted place and looked

on a deserted scene.

Such was the hour when Clennam stopped at the corner, observing the

girl and the strange man as they went down the street. The man's

footsteps were so noisy on the echoing stones that he was unwilling

to add the sound of his own. But when they had passed the turning

and were in the darkness of the dark corner leading to the terrace,

he made after them with such indifferent appearance of being a

casual passenger on his way, as he could assume.

When he rounded the dark corner, they were walking along the

terrace towards a figure which was coming towards them. If he had

seen it by itself, under such conditions of gas-lamp, mist, and

distance, he might not have known it at first sight, but with the

figure of the girl to prompt him, he at once recognised Miss Wade.

He stopped at the corner, seeming to look back expectantly up the

street as if he had made an appointment with some one to meet him

there; but he kept a careful eye on the three. When they came

together, the man took off his hat, and made Miss Wade a bow. The

girl appeared to say a few words as though she presented him, or

accounted for his being late, or early, or what not; and then fell

a pace or so behind, by herself. Miss Wade and the man then began

to walk up and down; the man having the appearance of being

extremely courteous and complimentary in manner; Miss Wade having

the appearance of being extremely haughty.

When they came down to the corner and turned, she was saying,

'If I pinch myself for it, sir, that is my business. Confine

yourself to yours, and ask me no question.'

'By Heaven, ma'am!' he replied, making her another bow. 'It was my

profound respect for the strength of your character, and my

admiration of your beauty.'

'I want neither the one nor the other from any one,' said she, 'and

certainly not from you of all creatures. Go on with your report.'

'Am I pardoned?' he asked, with an air of half abashed gallantry.

'You are paid,' she said, 'and that is all you want.'

Whether the girl hung behind because she was not to hear the

business, or as already knowing enough about it, Clennam could not

determine. They turned and she turned. She looked away at the

river, as she walked with her hands folded before her; and that was

all he could make of her without showing his face. There happened,

by good fortune, to be a lounger really waiting for some one; and

he sometimes looked over the railing at the water, and sometimes

came to the dark corner and looked up the street, rendering Arthur

less conspicuous.

When Miss Wade and the man came back again, she was saying, 'You

must wait until to-morrow.'

'A thousand pardons?' he returned. 'My faith! Then it's not

convenient to-night?'

'No. I tell you I must get it before I can give it to you.'

She stopped in the roadway, as if to put an end to the conference.

He of course stopped too. And the girl stopped.

'It's a little inconvenient,' said the man. 'A little. But, Holy

Blue! that's nothing in such a service. I am without money to-

night, by chance. I have a good banker in this city, but I would

not wish to draw upon the house until the time when I shall draw

for a round sum.'

'Harriet,' said Miss Wade, 'arrange with him--this gentleman here--

for sending him some money to-morrow.' She said it with a slur of

the word gentleman which was more contemptuous than any emphasis,

and walked slowly on.

The man bent his head again, and the girl spoke to him as they both

followed her. Clennam ventured to look at the girl as they Moved

away. He could note that her rich black eyes were fastened upon

the man with a scrutinising expression, and that she kept at a

little distance from him, as they walked side by side to the

further end of the terrace.

A loud and altered clank upon the pavement warned him, before he

could discern what was passing there, that the man was coming back

alone. Clennam lounged into the road, towards the railing; and the

man passed at a quick swing, with the end of his cloak thrown over

his shoulder, singing a scrap of a French song.

The whole vista had no one in it now but himself. The lounger had

lounged out of view, and Miss Wade and Tattycoram were gone. More

than ever bent on seeing what became of them, and on having some

information to give his good friend, Mr Meagles, he went out at the

further end of the terrace, looking cautiously about him. He

rightly judged that, at first at all events, they would go in a

contrary direction from their late companion. He soon saw them in

a neighbouring bye-street, which was not a thoroughfare, evidently

allowing time for the man to get well out of their way. They

walked leisurely arm-in-arm down one side of the street, and

returned on the opposite side. When they came back to the street-

corner, they changed their pace for the pace of people with an

object and a distance before them, and walked steadily away.

Clennam, no less steadily, kept them in sight.

They crossed the Strand, and passed through Covent Garden (under

the windows of his old lodging where dear Little Dorrit had come

that night), and slanted away north-east, until they passed the

great building whence Tattycoram derived her name, and turned into

the Gray's Inn Road. Clennam was quite at home here, in right of

Flora, not to mention the Patriarch and Pancks, and kept them in

view with ease. He was beginning to wonder where they might be

going next, when that wonder was lost in the greater wonder with

which he saw them turn into the Patriarchal street. That wonder

was in its turn swallowed up on the greater wonder with which he

saw them stop at the Patriarchal door. A low double knock at the

bright brass knocker, a gleam of light into the road from the

opened door, a brief pause for inquiry and answer and the door was

shut, and they were housed.

After looking at the surrounding objects for assurance that he was

not in an odd dream, and after pacing a little while before the

house, Arthur knocked at the door. It was opened by the usual

maid-servant, and she showed him up at once, with her usual

alacrity, to Flora's sitting-room.

There was no one with Flora but Mr F.'s Aunt, which respectable

gentlewoman, basking in a balmy atmosphere of tea and toast, was

ensconced in an easy-chair by the fireside, with a little table at

her elbow, and a clean white handkerchief spread over her lap on

which two pieces of toast at that moment awaited consumption.

Bending over a steaming vessel of tea, and looking through the

steam, and breathing forth the steam, like a malignant Chinese

enchantress engaged in the performance of unholy rites, Mr F.'s

Aunt put down her great teacup and exclaimed, 'Drat him, if he an't

come back again!'

It would seem from the foregoing exclamation that this

uncompromising relative of the lamented Mr F., measuring time by

the acuteness of her sensations and not by the clock, supposed

Clennam to have lately gone away; whereas at least a quarter of a

year had elapsed since he had had the temerity to present himself

before her.

'My goodness Arthur!' cried Flora, rising to give him a cordial

reception, 'Doyce and Clennam what a start and a surprise for

though not far from the machinery and foundry business and surely

might be taken sometimes if at no other time about mid-day when a

glass of sherry and a humble sandwich of whatever cold meat in the

larder might not come amiss nor taste the worse for being friendly

for you know you buy it somewhere and wherever bought a profit must

be made or they would never keep the place it stands to reason

without a motive still never seen and learnt now not to be

expected, for as Mr F. himself said if seeing is believing not

seeing is believing too and when you don't see you may fully

believe you're not remembered not that I expect you Arthur Doyce

and Clennam to remember me why should I for the days are gone but

bring another teacup here directly and tell her fresh toast and

pray sit near the fire.'

Arthur was in the greatest anxiety to explain the object of his

visit; but was put off for the moment, in spite of himself, by what

he understood of the reproachful purport of these words, and by the

genuine pleasure she testified in seeing him.

'And now pray tell me something all you know,' said Flora, drawing

her chair near to his, 'about the good dear quiet little thing and

all the changes of her fortunes carriage people now no doubt and

horses without number most romantic, a coat of arms of course and

wild beasts on their hind legs showing it as if it was a copy they

had done with mouths from ear to ear good gracious, and has she her

health which is the first consideration after all for what is

wealth without it Mr F. himself so often saying when his twinges

came that sixpence a day and find yourself and no gout so much

preferable, not that he could have lived on anything like it being

the last man or that the previous little thing though far too

familiar an expression now had any tendency of that sort much too

slight and small but looked so fragile bless her?'

Mr F.'s Aunt, who had eaten a piece of toast down to the crust,

here solemnly handed the crust to Flora, who ate it for her as a

matter of business. Mr F.'s Aunt then moistened her ten fingers in

slow succession at her lips, and wiped them in exactly the same

order on the white handkerchief; then took the other piece of

toast, and fell to work upon it. While pursuing this routine, she

looked at Clennam with an expression of such intense severity that

he felt obliged to look at her in return, against his personal

inclinations.

'She is in Italy, with all her family, Flora,' he said, when the

dreaded lady was occupied again.

'In Italy is she really?' said Flora, 'with the grapes growing

everywhere and lava necklaces and bracelets too that land of poetry

with burning mountains picturesque beyond belief though if the

organ-boys come away from the neighbourhood not to be scorched

nobody can wonder being so young and bringing their white mice with

them most humane, and is she really in that favoured land with

nothing but blue about her and dying gladiators and Belvederes

though Mr F. himself did not believe for his objection when in

spirits was that the images could not be true there being no medium

between expensive quantities of linen badly got up and all in

creases and none whatever, which certainly does not seem probable

though perhaps in consequence of the extremes of rich and poor

which may account for it.'

Arthur tried to edge a word in, but Flora hurried on again.

'Venice Preserved too,' said she, 'I think you have been there is

it well or ill preserved for people differ so and Maccaroni if they

really eat it like the conjurors why not cut it shorter, you are

acquainted Arthur--dear Doyce and Clennam at least not dear and

most assuredly not Doyce for I have not the pleasure but pray

excuse me--acquainted I believe with Mantua what has it got to do

with Mantua-making for I never have been able to conceive?'

'I believe there is no connection, Flora, between the two,' Arthur

was beginning, when she caught him up again.

'Upon your word no isn't there I never did but that's like me I run

away with an idea and having none to spare I keep it, alas there

was a time dear Arthur that is to say decidedly not dear nor Arthur

neither but you understand me when one bright idea gilded the

what's-his-name horizon of et cetera but it is darkly clouded now

and all is over.'

Arthur's increasing wish to speak of something very different was

by this time so plainly written on his face, that Flora stopped in

a tender look, and asked him what it was?

'I have the greatest desire, Flora, to speak to some one who is now

in this house--with Mr Casby no doubt. Some one whom I saw come

in, and who, in a misguided and deplorable way, has deserted the

house of a friend of mine.'

'Papa sees so many and such odd people,' said Flora, rising, 'that

I shouldn't venture to go down for any one but you Arthur but for

you I would willingly go down in a diving-bell much more a dining-

room and will come back directly if you'll mind and at the same

time not mind Mr F.'s Aunt while I'm gone.'

With those words and a parting glance, Flora bustled out, leaving

Clennam under dreadful apprehension of this terrible charge.

The first variation which manifested itself in Mr F.'s Aunt's

demeanour when she had finished her piece of toast, was a loud and

prolonged sniff. Finding it impossible to avoid construing this

demonstration into a defiance of himself, its gloomy significance

being unmistakable, Clennam looked plaintively at the excellent

though prejudiced lady from whom it emanated, in the hope that she

might be disarmed by a meek submission.

'None of your eyes at me,' said Mr F.'s Aunt, shivering with

hostility. 'Take that.'

'That' was the crust of the piece of toast. Clennam accepted the

boon with a look of gratitude, and held it in his hand under the

pressure of a little embarrassment, which was not relieved when Mr

F.'s Aunt, elevating her voice into a cry of considerable power,

exclaimed, 'He has a proud stomach, this chap! He's too proud a

chap to eat it!' and, coming out of her chair, shook her venerable

fist so very close to his nose as to tickle the surface. But for

the timely return of Flora, to find him in this difficult

situation, further consequences might have ensued. Flora, without

the least discomposure or surprise, but congratulating the old lady

in an approving manner on being 'very lively to-night', handed her

back to her chair.

'He has a proud stomach, this chap,' said Mr F.'s relation, on

being reseated. 'Give him a meal of chaff!'

'Oh! I don't think he would like that, aunt,' returned Flora.

'Give him a meal of chaff, I tell you,' said Mr F.'s Aunt, glaring

round Flora on her enemy. 'It's the only thing for a proud

stomach. Let him eat up every morsel. Drat him, give him a meal

of chaff!'

Under a general pretence of helping him to this refreshment, Flora

got him out on the staircase; Mr F.'s Aunt even then constantly

reiterating, with inexpressible bitterness, that he was 'a chap,'

and had a 'proud stomach,' and over and over again insisting on

that equine provision being made for him which she had already so

strongly prescribed.

'Such an inconvenient staircase and so many corner-stairs Arthur,'

whispered Flora, 'would you object to putting your arm round me

under my pelerine?'

With a sense of going down-stairs in a highly-ridiculous manner,

Clennam descended in the required attitude, and only released his

fair burden at the dining-room door; indeed, even there she was

rather difficult to be got rid of, remaining in his embrace to

murmur, 'Arthur, for mercy's sake, don't breathe it to papa!'

She accompanied Arthur into the room, where the Patriarch sat

alone, with his list shoes on the fender, twirling his thumbs as if

he had never left off. The youthful Patriarch, aged ten, looked

out of his picture-frame above him with no calmer air than he.

Both smooth heads were alike beaming, blundering, and bumpy.

'Mr Clennam, I am glad to see you. I hope you are well, sir, I

hope you are well. Please to sit down, please to sit down.'

'I had hoped, sir,' said Clennam, doing so, and looking round with

a face of blank disappointment, 'not to find you alone.'

'Ah, indeed?' said the Patriarch, sweetly. 'Ah, indeed?'

'I told you so you know papa,' cried Flora.

'Ah, to be sure!' returned the Patriarch. 'Yes, just so. Ah, to

be sure!'

'Pray, sir,'demanded Clennam, anxiously, 'is Miss Wade gone?'

'Miss--? Oh, you call her Wade,' returned Mr Casby. 'Highly

proper.'

Arthur quickly returned, 'What do you call her?'

'Wade,' said Mr Casby. 'Oh, always Wade.'

After looking at the philanthropic visage and the long silky white

hair for a few seconds, during which Mr Casby twirled his thumbs,

and smiled at the fire as if he were benevolently wishing it to

burn him that he might forgive it, Arthur began:

'I beg your pardon, Mr Casby--'

'Not so, not so,' said the Patriarch, 'not so.'

'--But, Miss Wade had an attendant with her--a young woman brought

up by friends of mine, over whom her influence is not considered

very salutary, and to whom I should be glad to have the opportunity

of giving the assurance that she has not yet forfeited the interest

of those protectors.'

'Really, really?' returned the Patriarch.

'Will you therefore be so good as to give me the address of Miss

Wade?'

'Dear, dear, dear!' said the Patriarch, 'how very unfortunate! If

you had only sent in to me when they were here! I observed the

young woman, Mr Clennam. A fine full-coloured young woman, Mr

Clennam, with very dark hair and very dark eyes. If I mistake not,

if I mistake not?'

Arthur assented, and said once more with new expression, 'If you

would be so good as to give me the address.'

'Dear, dear, dear!' exclaimed the Patriarch in sweet regret. 'Tut,

tut, tut! what a pity, what a pity! I have no address, sir. Miss

Wade mostly lives abroad, Mr Clennam. She has done so for some

years, and she is (if I may say so of a fellow-creature and a lady)

fitful and uncertain to a fault, Mr Clennam. I may not see her

again for a long, long time. I may never see her again. What a

pity, what a pity!'

Clennam saw now, that he had as much hope of getting assistance out

of the Portrait as out of the Patriarch; but he said nevertheless:

'Mr Casby, could you, for the satisfaction of the friends I have

mentioned, and under any obligation of secrecy that you may

consider it your duty to impose, give me any information at all

touching Miss Wade? I have seen her abroad, and I have seen her at

home, but I know nothing of her. Could you give me any account of

her whatever?'

'None,' returned the Patriarch, shaking his big head with his

utmost benevolence. 'None at all. Dear, dear, dear! What a real

pity that she stayed so short a time, and you delayed! As

confidential agency business, agency business, I have occasionally

paid this lady money; but what satisfaction is it to you, sir, to

know that?'

'Truly, none at all,' said Clennam.

'Truly,' assented the Patriarch, with a shining face as he

philanthropically smiled at the fire, 'none at all, sir. You hit

the wise answer, Mr Clennam. Truly, none at all, sir.'

His turning of his smooth thumbs over one another as he sat there,

was so typical to Clennam of the way in which he would make the

subject revolve if it were pursued, never showing any new part of

it nor allowing it to make the smallest advance, that it did much

to help to convince him of his labour having been in vain. He

might have taken any time to think about it, for Mr Casby, well

accustomed to get on anywhere by leaving everything to his bumps

and his white hair, knew his strength to lie in silence. So there

Casby sat, twirling and twirling, and making his polished head and

forehead look largely benevolent in every knob.

With this spectacle before him, Arthur had risen to go, when from

the inner Dock where the good ship Pancks was hove down when out in

no cruising ground, the noise was heard of that steamer labouring

towards him. It struck Arthur that the noise began demonstratively

far off, as though Mr Pancks sought to impress on any one who might

happen to think about it, that he was working on from out of

hearing.

Mr Pancks and he shook hands, and the former brought his employer

a letter or two to sign. Mr Pancks in shaking hands merely

scratched his eyebrow with his left forefinger and snorted once,

but Clennam, who understood him better now than of old,

comprehended that he had almost done for the evening and wished to

say a word to him outside. Therefore, when he had taken his leave

of Mr Casby, and (which was a more difficult process) of Flora, he

sauntered in the neighbourhood on Mr Pancks's line of road.

He had waited but a short time when Mr Pancks appeared. Mr Pancks

shaking hands again with another expressive snort, and taking off

his hat to put his hair up, Arthur thought he received his cue to

speak to him as one who knew pretty well what had just now passed.

Therefore he said, without any preface:

'I suppose they were really gone, Pancks?'

'Yes,' replied Pancks. 'They were really gone.'

'Does he know where to find that lady?'

'Can't say. I should think so.'

Mr Pancks did not? No, Mr Pancks did not. Did Mr Pancks know

anything about her?

'I expect,' rejoined that worthy, 'I know as much about her as she

knows about herself. She is somebody's child--anybody's--nobody's.

Put her in a room in London here with any six people old enough to

be her parents, and her parents may be there for anything she

knows. They may be in any house she sees, they may be in any

churchyard she passes, she may run against 'em in any street, she

may make chance acquaintance of 'em at any time; and never know it.

She knows nothing about 'em. She knows nothing about any relative

whatever. Never did. Never will.'

'Mr Casby could enlighten her, perhaps?'

'May be,' said Pancks. 'I expect so, but don't know. He has long

had money (not overmuch as I make out) in trust to dole out to her

when she can't do without it. Sometimes she's proud and won't

touch it for a length of time; sometimes she's so poor that she

must have it. She writhes under her life. A woman more angry,

passionate, reckless, and revengeful never lived. She came for

money to-night. Said she had peculiar occasion for it.'

'I think,' observed Clennam musing, 'I by chance know what

occasion--I mean into whose pocket the money is to go.'

'Indeed?' said Pancks. 'If it's a compact, I recommend that party

to be exact in it. I wouldn't trust myself to that woman, young

and handsome as she is, if I had wronged her; no, not for twice my

proprietor's money! Unless,' Pancks added as a saving clause, 'I

had a lingering illness on me, and wanted to get it over.'

Arthur, hurriedly reviewing his own observation of her, found it to

tally pretty nearly with Mr Pancks's view.

'The wonder is to me,' pursued Pancks, 'that she has never done for

my proprietor, as the only person connected with her story she can

lay hold of. Mentioning that, I may tell you, between ourselves,

that I am sometimes tempted to do for him myself.'

Arthur started and said, 'Dear me, Pancks, don't say that!'

'Understand me,' said Pancks, extending five cropped coaly finger-

nails on Arthur's arm; 'I don't mean, cut his throat. But by all

that's precious, if he goes too far, I'll cut his hair!'

Having exhibited himself in the new light of enunciating this

tremendous threat, Mr Pancks, with a countenance of grave import,

snorted several times and steamed away.

Read next: BOOK THE SECOND: RICHES#CHAPTER 10 The Dreams of Mrs Flintwinch thicken

Read previous: BOOK THE SECOND: RICHES#CHAPTER 8 The Dowager Mrs Gowan is reminded that 'It Never Does'

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