Little Dorrit received a call that same evening from Mr Plornish, who,
having intimated that he wished to speak to her privately, in a series
of coughs so very noticeable as to favour the idea that her father, as
regarded her seamstress occupation, was an illustration of the axiom
that there are no such stone-blind men as those who will not see,
obtained an audience with her on the common staircase outside the door.
‘There’s been a lady at our place to-day, Miss Dorrit,’ Plornish
growled, ‘and another one along with her as is a old wixen if ever I met
with such. The way she snapped a person’s head off, dear me!’
The mild Plornish was at first quite unable to get his mind away from Mr
F.’s Aunt. ‘For,’ said he, to excuse himself, ‘she is, I do assure you,
the winegariest party.’
At length, by a great effort, he detached himself from the subject
sufficiently to observe:
‘But she’s neither here nor there just at present. The other lady, she’s
Mr Casby’s daughter; and if Mr Casby an’t well off, none better, it an’t
through any fault of Pancks. For, as to Pancks, he does, he really does,
he does indeed!’
Mr Plornish, after his usual manner, was a little obscure, but
conscientiously emphatic.
‘And what she come to our place for,’ he pursued, ‘was to leave word
that if Miss Dorrit would step up to that card--which it’s Mr Casby’s
house that is, and Pancks he has a office at the back, where he really
does, beyond belief--she would be glad for to engage her. She was a old
and a dear friend, she said particular, of Mr Clennam, and hoped for to
prove herself a useful friend to _his_ friend. Them was her words. Wishing
to know whether Miss Dorrit could come to-morrow morning, I said I would
see you, Miss, and inquire, and look round there to-night, to say yes,
or, if you was engaged to-morrow, when?’
‘I can go to-morrow, thank you,’ said Little Dorrit. ‘This is very kind
of you, but you are always kind.’
Mr Plornish, with a modest disavowal of his merits, opened the room door
for her readmission, and followed her in with such an exceedingly bald
pretence of not having been out at all, that her father might
have observed it without being very suspicious. In his affable
unconsciousness, however, he took no heed. Plornish, after a little
conversation, in which he blended his former duty as a Collegian with
his present privilege as a humble outside friend, qualified again by his
low estate as a plasterer, took his leave; making the tour of the prison
before he left, and looking on at a game of skittles with the mixed
feelings of an old inhabitant who had his private reasons for believing
that it might be his destiny to come back again.
Early in the morning, Little Dorrit, leaving Maggy in high domestic
trust, set off for the Patriarchal tent. She went by the Iron Bridge,
though it cost her a penny, and walked more slowly in that part of her
journey than in any other. At five minutes before eight her hand was on
the Patriarchal knocker, which was quite as high as she could reach.
She gave Mrs Finching’s card to the young woman who opened the door, and
the young woman told her that ‘Miss Flora’--Flora having, on her return
to the parental roof, reinvested herself with the title under which she
had lived there--was not yet out of her bedroom, but she was to please
to walk up into Miss Flora’s sitting-room. She walked up into
Miss Flora’s sitting-room, as in duty bound, and there found a
breakfast-table comfortably laid for two, with a supplementary tray
upon it laid for one. The young woman, disappearing for a few moments,
returned to say that she was to please to take a chair by the fire,
and to take off her bonnet and make herself at home. But Little Dorrit,
being bashful, and not used to make herself at home on such occasions,
felt at a loss how to do it; so she was still sitting near the door with
her bonnet on, when Flora came in in a hurry half an hour afterwards.
Flora was so sorry to have kept her waiting, and good gracious why did
she sit out there in the cold when she had expected to find her by the
fire reading the paper, and hadn’t that heedless girl given her the
message then, and had she really been in her bonnet all this time, and
pray for goodness sake let Flora take it off! Flora taking it off in the
best-natured manner in the world, was so struck with the face disclosed,
that she said, ‘Why, what a good little thing you are, my dear!’ and
pressed her face between her hands like the gentlest of women.
It was the word and the action of a moment. Little Dorrit had hardly
time to think how kind it was, when Flora dashed at the breakfast-table
full of business, and plunged over head and ears into loquacity.
‘Really so sorry that I should happen to be late on this morning of all
mornings because my intention and my wish was to be ready to meet you
when you came in and to say that any one that interested Arthur Clennam
half so much must interest me and that I gave you the heartiest welcome
and was so glad, instead of which they never called me and there I
still am snoring I dare say if the truth was known and if you don’t like
either cold fowl or hot boiled ham which many people don’t I dare say
besides Jews and theirs are scruples of conscience which we must all
respect though I must say I wish they had them equally strong when they
sell us false articles for real that certainly ain’t worth the money I
shall be quite vexed,’ said Flora.
Little Dorrit thanked her, and said, shyly, bread-and-butter and tea was
all she usually--
‘Oh nonsense my dear child I can never hear of that,’ said Flora,
turning on the urn in the most reckless manner, and making herself wink
by splashing hot water into her eyes as she bent down to look into the
teapot. ‘You are coming here on the footing of a friend and companion
you know if you will let me take that liberty and I should be ashamed
of myself indeed if you could come here upon any other, besides which
Arthur Clennam spoke in such terms--you are tired my dear.’
‘No, ma’am.’
‘You turn so pale you have walked too far before breakfast and I dare
say live a great way off and ought to have had a ride,’ said Flora,
‘dear dear is there anything that would do you good?’
‘Indeed I am quite well, ma’am. I thank you again and again, but I am
quite well.’
‘Then take your tea at once I beg,’ said Flora, ‘and this wing of fowl
and bit of ham, don’t mind me or wait for me, because I always carry in
this tray myself to Mr F.’s Aunt who breakfasts in bed and a charming
old lady too and very clever, Portrait of Mr F. behind the door and very
like though too much forehead and as to a pillar with a marble pavement
and balustrades and a mountain, I never saw him near it nor not likely
in the wine trade, excellent man but not at all in that way.’
Little Dorrit glanced at the portrait, very imperfectly following the
references to that work of art.
‘Mr F. was so devoted to me that he never could bear me out of his
sight,’ said Flora, ‘though of course I am unable to say how long that
might have lasted if he hadn’t been cut short while I was a new broom,
worthy man but not poetical manly prose but not romance.’
Little Dorrit glanced at the portrait again. The artist had given it a
head that would have been, in an intellectual point of view, top-heavy
for Shakespeare.
‘Romance, however,’ Flora went on, busily arranging Mr F.’s Aunt’s
toast, ‘as I openly said to Mr F. when he proposed to me and you will be
surprised to hear that he proposed seven times once in a hackney-coach
once in a boat once in a pew once on a donkey at Tunbridge Wells and the
rest on his knees, Romance was fled with the early days of Arthur
Clennam, our parents tore us asunder we became marble and stern reality
usurped the throne, Mr F. said very much to his credit that he was
perfectly aware of it and even preferred that state of things
accordingly the word was spoken the fiat went forth and such is life you
see my dear and yet we do not break but bend, pray make a good breakfast
while I go in with the tray.’
She disappeared, leaving Little Dorrit to ponder over the meaning of her
scattered words. She soon came back again; and at last began to take her
own breakfast, talking all the while.
‘You see, my dear,’ said Flora, measuring out a spoonful or two of some
brown liquid that smelt like brandy, and putting it into her tea, ‘I am
obliged to be careful to follow the directions of my medical man though
the flavour is anything but agreeable being a poor creature and it may
be have never recovered the shock received in youth from too much giving
way to crying in the next room when separated from Arthur, have you
known him long?’
As soon as Little Dorrit comprehended that she had been asked this
question--for which time was necessary, the galloping pace of her new
patroness having left her far behind--she answered that she had known Mr
Clennam ever since his return.
‘To be sure you couldn’t have known him before unless you had been in
China or had corresponded neither of which is likely,’ returned Flora,
‘for travelling-people usually get more or less mahogany and you are not
at all so and as to corresponding what about? that’s very true unless
tea, so it was at his mother’s was it really that you knew him first,
highly sensible and firm but dreadfully severe--ought to be the mother
of the man in the iron mask.’
‘Mrs Clennam has been kind to me,’ said Little Dorrit.
‘Really? I am sure I am glad to hear it because as Arthur’s mother it’s
naturally pleasant to my feelings to have a better opinion of her than
I had before, though what she thinks of me when I run on as I am certain
to do and she sits glowering at me like Fate in a go-cart--shocking
comparison really--invalid and not her fault--I never know or can
imagine.’
‘Shall I find my work anywhere, ma’am?’ asked Little Dorrit, looking
timidly about; ‘can I get it?’
‘You industrious little fairy,’ returned Flora, taking, in another cup
of tea, another of the doses prescribed by her medical man, ‘there’s
not the slightest hurry and it’s better that we should begin by being
confidential about our mutual friend--too cold a word for me at least
I don’t mean that, very proper expression mutual friend--than become
through mere formalities not you but me like the Spartan boy with the
fox biting him, which I hope you’ll excuse my bringing up for of all
the tiresome boys that will go tumbling into every sort of company that
boy’s the tiresomest.’
Little Dorrit, her face very pale, sat down again to listen. ‘Hadn’t I
better work the while?’ she asked. ‘I can work and attend too. I would
rather, if I may.’
Her earnestness was so expressive of her being uneasy without her work,
that Flora answered, ‘Well my dear whatever you like best,’ and produced
a basket of white handkerchiefs. Little Dorrit gladly put it by her
side, took out her little pocket-housewife, threaded the needle, and
began to hem.
‘What nimble fingers you have,’ said Flora, ‘but are you sure you are
well?’
‘Oh yes, indeed!’
Flora put her feet upon the fender, and settled herself for a thorough
good romantic disclosure. She started off at score, tossing her head,
sighing in the most demonstrative manner, making a great deal of use
of her eyebrows, and occasionally, but not often, glancing at the quiet
face that bent over the work.
‘You must know my dear,’ said Flora, ‘but that I have no doubt you know
already not only because I have already thrown it out in a general way
but because I feel I carry it stamped in burning what’s his names
upon my brow that before I was introduced to the late Mr F. I had
been engaged to Arthur Clennam--Mr Clennam in public where reserve is
necessary Arthur here--we were all in all to one another it was the
morning of life it was bliss it was frenzy it was everything else of
that sort in the highest degree, when rent asunder we turned to stone in
which capacity Arthur went to China and I became the statue bride of the
late Mr F.’
Flora, uttering these words in a deep voice, enjoyed herself immensely.
‘To paint,’ said she, ‘the emotions of that morning when all was marble
within and Mr F.’s Aunt followed in a glass-coach which it stands to
reason must have been in shameful repair or it never could have broken
down two streets from the house and Mr F.’s Aunt brought home like the
fifth of November in a rush-bottomed chair I will not attempt,
suffice it to say that the hollow form of breakfast took place in the
dining-room downstairs that papa partaking too freely of pickled salmon
was ill for weeks and that Mr F. and myself went upon a continental
tour to Calais where the people fought for us on the pier until they
separated us though not for ever that was not yet to be.’
The statue bride, hardly pausing for breath, went on, with the greatest
complacency, in a rambling manner sometimes incidental to flesh and
blood.
‘I will draw a veil over that dreamy life, Mr F. was in good spirits his
appetite was good he liked the cookery he considered the wine weak but
palatable and all was well, we returned to the immediate neighbourhood
of Number Thirty Little Gosling Street London Docks and settled down,
ere we had yet fully detected the housemaid in selling the feathers
out of the spare bed Gout flying upwards soared with Mr F. to another
sphere.’
His relict, with a glance at his portrait, shook her head and wiped her
eyes.
‘I revere the memory of Mr F. as an estimable man and most indulgent
husband, only necessary to mention Asparagus and it appeared or to hint
at any little delicate thing to drink and it came like magic in a pint
bottle it was not ecstasy but it was comfort, I returned to papa’s roof
and lived secluded if not happy during some years until one day papa
came smoothly blundering in and said that Arthur Clennam awaited me
below, I went below and found him ask me not what I found him except
that he was still unmarried still unchanged!’
The dark mystery with which Flora now enshrouded herself might have
stopped other fingers than the nimble fingers that worked near her.
They worked on without pause, and the busy head bent over them watching
the stitches.
‘Ask me not,’ said Flora, ‘if I love him still or if he still loves me
or what the end is to be or when, we are surrounded by watchful eyes and
it may be that we are destined to pine asunder it may be never more to
be reunited not a word not a breath not a look to betray us all must
be secret as the tomb wonder not therefore that even if I should seem
comparatively cold to Arthur or Arthur should seem comparatively cold to
me we have fatal reasons it is enough if we understand them hush!’
All of which Flora said with so much headlong vehemence as if she really
believed it. There is not much doubt that when she worked herself into
full mermaid condition, she did actually believe whatever she said in
it.
‘Hush!’ repeated Flora, ‘I have now told you all, confidence is
established between us hush, for Arthur’s sake I will always be a friend
to you my dear girl and in Arthur’s name you may always rely upon me.’
The nimble fingers laid aside the work, and the little figure rose and
kissed her hand. ‘You are very cold,’ said Flora, changing to her own
natural kind-hearted manner, and gaining greatly by the change. ‘Don’t
work to-day. I am sure you are not well I am sure you are not strong.’
‘It is only that I feel a little overcome by your kindness, and by Mr
Clennam’s kindness in confiding me to one he has known and loved so
long.’
‘Well really my dear,’ said Flora, who had a decided tendency to be
always honest when she gave herself time to think about it, ‘it’s as
well to leave that alone now, for I couldn’t undertake to say after all,
but it doesn’t signify lie down a little!’
‘I have always been strong enough to do what I want to do, and I shall
be quite well directly,’ returned Little Dorrit, with a faint smile.
‘You have overpowered me with gratitude, that’s all. If I keep near the
window for a moment I shall be quite myself.’
Flora opened a window, sat her in a chair by it, and considerately
retired to her former place. It was a windy day, and the air stirring
on Little Dorrit’s face soon brightened it. In a very few minutes she
returned to her basket of work, and her nimble fingers were as nimble as
ever.
Quietly pursuing her task, she asked Flora if Mr Clennam had told her
where she lived? When Flora replied in the negative, Little Dorrit said
that she understood why he had been so delicate, but that she felt sure
he would approve of her confiding her secret to Flora, and that
she would therefore do so now with Flora’s permission. Receiving an
encouraging answer, she condensed the narrative of her life into a few
scanty words about herself and a glowing eulogy upon her father; and
Flora took it all in with a natural tenderness that quite understood it,
and in which there was no incoherence.
When dinner-time came, Flora drew the arm of her new charge through
hers, and led her down-stairs, and presented her to the Patriarch and Mr
Pancks, who were already in the dining-room waiting to begin. (Mr F.’s
Aunt was, for the time, laid up in ordinary in her chamber.) By those
gentlemen she was received according to their characters; the Patriarch
appearing to do her some inestimable service in saying that he was glad
to see her, glad to see her; and Mr Pancks blowing off his favourite
sound as a salute.
In that new presence she would have been bashful enough under any
circumstances, and particularly under Flora’s insisting on her
drinking a glass of wine and eating of the best that was there; but her
constraint was greatly increased by Mr Pancks. The demeanour of that
gentleman at first suggested to her mind that he might be a taker of
likenesses, so intently did he look at her, and so frequently did he
glance at the little note-book by his side. Observing that he made no
sketch, however, and that he talked about business only, she began to
have suspicions that he represented some creditor of her father’s, the
balance due to whom was noted in that pocket volume. Regarded from this
point of view Mr Pancks’s puffings expressed injury and impatience, and
each of his louder snorts became a demand for payment.
But here again she was undeceived by anomalous and incongruous conduct
on the part of Mr Pancks himself. She had left the table half an hour,
and was at work alone. Flora had ‘gone to lie down’ in the next room,
concurrently with which retirement a smell of something to drink
had broken out in the house. The Patriarch was fast asleep, with his
philanthropic mouth open under a yellow pocket-handkerchief in the
dining-room. At this quiet time, Mr Pancks softly appeared before her,
urbanely nodding.
‘Find it a little dull, Miss Dorrit?’ inquired Pancks in a low voice.
‘No, thank you, sir,’ said Little Dorrit.
‘Busy, I see,’ observed Mr Pancks, stealing into the room by inches.
‘What are those now, Miss Dorrit?’
‘Handkerchiefs.’
‘Are they, though!’ said Pancks. ‘I shouldn’t have thought it.’ Not in
the least looking at them, but looking at Little Dorrit. ‘Perhaps you
wonder who I am. Shall I tell you? I am a fortune-teller.’
Little Dorrit now began to think he was mad.
‘I belong body and soul to my proprietor,’ said Pancks; ‘you saw my
proprietor having his dinner below. But I do a little in the other way,
sometimes; privately, very privately, Miss Dorrit.’
Little Dorrit looked at him doubtfully, and not without alarm. ‘I wish
you’d show me the palm of your hand,’ said Pancks. ‘I should like to
have a look at it. Don’t let me be troublesome.’
He was so far troublesome that he was not at all wanted there, but she
laid her work in her lap for a moment, and held out her left hand with
her thimble on it.
‘Years of toil, eh?’ said Pancks, softly, touching it with his blunt
forefinger. ‘But what else are we made for? Nothing. Hallo!’ looking
into the lines. ‘What’s this with bars? It’s a College! And what’s this
with a grey gown and a black velvet cap? it’s a father! And what’s this
with a clarionet? It’s an uncle! And what’s this in dancing-shoes? It’s
a sister! And what’s this straggling about in an idle sort of a way?
It’s a brother! And what’s this thinking for ‘em all? Why, this is you,
Miss Dorrit!’
Her eyes met his as she looked up wonderingly into his face, and she
thought that although his were sharp eyes, he was a brighter and
gentler-looking man than she had supposed at dinner. His eyes were on
her hand again directly, and her opportunity of confirming or correcting
the impression was gone.
‘Now, the deuce is in it,’ muttered Pancks, tracing out a line in her
hand with his clumsy finger, ‘if this isn’t me in the corner here! What
do I want here? What’s behind me?’
He carried his finger slowly down to the wrist, and round the wrist, and
affected to look at the back of the hand for what was behind him.
‘Is it any harm?’ asked Little Dorrit, smiling.
‘Deuce a bit!’ said Pancks. ‘What do you think it’s worth?’
‘I ought to ask you that. I am not the fortune-teller.’
‘True,’ said Pancks. ‘What’s it worth? You shall live to see, Miss
Dorrit.’
Releasing the hand by slow degrees, he drew all his fingers through his
prongs of hair, so that they stood up in their most portentous manner;
and repeated slowly, ‘Remember what I say, Miss Dorrit. You shall live
to see.’
She could not help showing that she was much surprised, if it were only
by his knowing so much about her.
‘Ah! That’s it!’ said Pancks, pointing at her. ‘Miss Dorrit, not that,
ever!’
More surprised than before, and a little more frightened, she looked to
him for an explanation of his last words.
‘Not that,’ said Pancks, making, with great seriousness, an imitation
of a surprised look and manner that appeared to be unintentionally
grotesque. ‘Don’t do that. Never on seeing me, no matter when, no matter
where. I am nobody. Don’t take on to mind me. Don’t mention me. Take no
notice. Will you agree, Miss Dorrit?’
‘I hardly know what to say,’ returned Little Dorrit, quite astounded.
‘Why?’
‘Because I am a fortune-teller. Pancks the gipsy. I haven’t told you so
much of your fortune yet, Miss Dorrit, as to tell you what’s behind
me on that little hand. I have told you you shall live to see. Is it
agreed, Miss Dorrit?’
‘Agreed that I--am--to--’
‘To take no notice of me away from here, unless I take on first. Not
to mind me when I come and go. It’s very easy. I am no loss, I am not
handsome, I am not good company, I am only my proprietors grubber.
You need do no more than think, “Ah! Pancks the gipsy at his
fortune-telling--he’ll tell the rest of my fortune one day--I shall live
to know it.” Is it agreed, Miss Dorrit?’
‘Ye-es,’ faltered Little Dorrit, whom he greatly confused, ‘I suppose
so, while you do no harm.’
‘Good!’ Mr Pancks glanced at the wall of the adjoining room, and stooped
forward. ‘Honest creature, woman of capital points, but heedless and
a loose talker, Miss Dorrit.’ With that he rubbed his hands as if the
interview had been very satisfactory to him, panted away to the door,
and urbanely nodded himself out again.
If Little Dorrit were beyond measure perplexed by this curious conduct
on the part of her new acquaintance, and by finding herself involved
in this singular treaty, her perplexity was not diminished by ensuing
circumstances. Besides that Mr Pancks took every opportunity afforded
him in Mr Casby’s house of significantly glancing at her and snorting
at her--which was not much, after what he had done already--he began to
pervade her daily life. She saw him in the street, constantly. When she
went to Mr Casby’s, he was always there. When she went to Mrs Clennam’s,
he came there on any pretence, as if to keep her in his sight. A week
had not gone by, when she found him to her astonishment in the Lodge one
night, conversing with the turnkey on duty, and to all appearance one
of his familiar companions. Her next surprise was to find him equally at
his ease within the prison; to hear of his presenting himself among
the visitors at her father’s Sunday levee; to see him arm in arm with
a Collegiate friend about the yard; to learn, from Fame, that he had
greatly distinguished himself one evening at the social club that held
its meetings in the Snuggery, by addressing a speech to the members
of the institution, singing a song, and treating the company to five
gallons of ale--report madly added a bushel of shrimps. The effect on
Mr Plornish of such of these phenomena as he became an eye-witness of in
his faithful visits, made an impression on Little Dorrit only second to
that produced by the phenomena themselves. They seemed to gag and bind
him. He could only stare, and sometimes weakly mutter that it wouldn’t
be believed down Bleeding Heart Yard that this was Pancks; but he never
said a word more, or made a sign more, even to Little Dorrit. Mr Pancks
crowned his mysteries by making himself acquainted with Tip in some
unknown manner, and taking a Sunday saunter into the College on that
gentleman’s arm. Throughout he never took any notice of Little Dorrit,
save once or twice when he happened to come close to her and there
was no one very near; on which occasions, he said in passing,
with a friendly look and a puff of encouragement, ‘Pancks the
gipsy--fortune-telling.’
Little Dorrit worked and strove as usual, wondering at all this, but
keeping her wonder, as she had from her earliest years kept many heavier
loads, in her own breast. A change had stolen, and was stealing yet,
over the patient heart. Every day found her something more retiring
than the day before. To pass in and out of the prison unnoticed, and
elsewhere to be overlooked and forgotten, were, for herself, her chief
desires.
To her own room too, strangely assorted room for her delicate youth
and character, she was glad to retreat as often as she could without
desertion of any duty. There were afternoon times when she was
unemployed, when visitors dropped in to play a hand at cards with her
father, when she could be spared and was better away. Then she would
flit along the yard, climb the scores of stairs that led to her room,
and take her seat at the window. Many combinations did those spikes
upon the wall assume, many light shapes did the strong iron weave itself
into, many golden touches fell upon the rust, while Little Dorrit sat
there musing. New zig-zags sprung into the cruel pattern sometimes, when
she saw it through a burst of tears; but beautified or hardened still,
always over it and under it and through it, she was fain to look in her
solitude, seeing everything with that ineffaceable brand.
A garret, and a Marshalsea garret without compromise, was Little
Dorrit’s room. Beautifully kept, it was ugly in itself, and had little
but cleanliness and air to set it off; for what embellishment she had
ever been able to buy, had gone to her father’s room. Howbeit, for this
poor place she showed an increasing love; and to sit in it alone became
her favourite rest.
Insomuch, that on a certain afternoon during the Pancks mysteries, when
she was seated at her window, and heard Maggy’s well-known step coming
up the stairs, she was very much disturbed by the apprehension of being
summoned away. As Maggy’s step came higher up and nearer, she trembled
and faltered; and it was as much as she could do to speak, when Maggy at
length appeared.
‘Please, Little Mother,’ said Maggy, panting for breath, ‘you must come
down and see him. He’s here.’
‘Who, Maggy?’
‘Who, o’ course Mr Clennam. He’s in your father’s room, and he says to
me, Maggy, will you be so kind and go and say it’s only me.’
‘I am not very well, Maggy. I had better not go. I am going to lie down.
See! I lie down now, to ease my head. Say, with my grateful regard, that
you left me so, or I would have come.’
‘Well, it an’t very polite though, Little Mother,’ said the staring
Maggy, ‘to turn your face away, neither!’
Maggy was very susceptible to personal slights, and very ingenious in
inventing them. ‘Putting both your hands afore your face too!’ she went
on. ‘If you can’t bear the looks of a poor thing, it would be better to
tell her so at once, and not go and shut her out like that, hurting her
feelings and breaking her heart at ten year old, poor thing!’
‘It’s to ease my head, Maggy.’
‘Well, and if you cry to ease your head, Little Mother, let me cry too.
Don’t go and have all the crying to yourself,’ expostulated Maggy, ‘that
an’t not being greedy.’ And immediately began to blubber.
It was with some difficulty that she could be induced to go back with
the excuse; but the promise of being told a story--of old her great
delight--on condition that she concentrated her faculties upon the
errand and left her little mistress to herself for an hour longer,
combined with a misgiving on Maggy’s part that she had left her good
temper at the bottom of the staircase, prevailed. So away she went,
muttering her message all the way to keep it in her mind, and, at the
appointed time, came back.
‘He was very sorry, I can tell you,’ she announced, ‘and wanted to send
a doctor. And he’s coming again to-morrow he is and I don’t think he’ll
have a good sleep to-night along o’ hearing about your head, Little
Mother. Oh my! Ain’t you been a-crying!’
‘I think I have, a little, Maggy.’
‘A little! Oh!’
‘But it’s all over now--all over for good, Maggy. And my head is much
better and cooler, and I am quite comfortable. I am very glad I did not
go down.’
Her great staring child tenderly embraced her; and having smoothed her
hair, and bathed her forehead and eyes with cold water (offices in which
her awkward hands became skilful), hugged her again, exulted in her
brighter looks, and stationed her in her chair by the window. Over
against this chair, Maggy, with apoplectic exertions that were not
at all required, dragged the box which was her seat on story-telling
occasions, sat down upon it, hugged her own knees, and said, with a
voracious appetite for stories, and with widely-opened eyes:
‘Now, Little Mother, let’s have a good ‘un!’
‘What shall it be about, Maggy?’
‘Oh, let’s have a princess,’ said Maggy, ‘and let her be a reg’lar one.
Beyond all belief, you know!’
Little Dorrit considered for a moment; and with a rather sad smile upon
her face, which was flushed by the sunset, began:
‘Maggy, there was once upon a time a fine King, and he had everything he
could wish for, and a great deal more. He had gold and silver, diamonds
and rubies, riches of every kind. He had palaces, and he had--’
‘Hospitals,’ interposed Maggy, still nursing her knees. ‘Let him have
hospitals, because they’re so comfortable. Hospitals with lots of
Chicking.’
‘Yes, he had plenty of them, and he had plenty of everything.’
‘Plenty of baked potatoes, for instance?’ said Maggy.
‘Plenty of everything.’
‘Lor!’ chuckled Maggy, giving her knees a hug. ‘Wasn’t it prime!’
‘This King had a daughter, who was the wisest and most beautiful
Princess that ever was seen. When she was a child she understood all her
lessons before her masters taught them to her; and when she was grown
up, she was the wonder of the world. Now, near the Palace where this
Princess lived, there was a cottage in which there was a poor little
tiny woman, who lived all alone by herself.’
‘An old woman,’ said Maggy, with an unctuous smack of her lips.
‘No, not an old woman. Quite a young one.’
‘I wonder she warn’t afraid,’ said Maggy. ‘Go on, please.’
‘The Princess passed the cottage nearly every day, and whenever she went
by in her beautiful carriage, she saw the poor tiny woman spinning at
her wheel, and she looked at the tiny woman, and the tiny woman looked
at her. So, one day she stopped the coachman a little way from the
cottage, and got out and walked on and peeped in at the door, and there,
as usual, was the tiny woman spinning at her wheel, and she looked at
the Princess, and the Princess looked at her.’
‘Like trying to stare one another out,’ said Maggy. ‘Please go on,
Little Mother.’
‘The Princess was such a wonderful Princess that she had the power of
knowing secrets, and she said to the tiny woman, Why do you keep it
there? This showed her directly that the Princess knew why she lived
all alone by herself spinning at her wheel, and she kneeled down at
the Princess’s feet, and asked her never to betray her. So the Princess
said, I never will betray you. Let me see it. So the tiny woman closed
the shutter of the cottage window and fastened the door, and trembling
from head to foot for fear that any one should suspect her, opened a
very secret place and showed the Princess a shadow.’
‘Lor!’ said Maggy.
‘It was the shadow of Some one who had gone by long before: of Some one
who had gone on far away quite out of reach, never, never to come back.
It was bright to look at; and when the tiny woman showed it to the
Princess, she was proud of it with all her heart, as a great, great
treasure. When the Princess had considered it a little while, she said
to the tiny woman, And you keep watch over this every day? And she cast
down her eyes, and whispered, Yes. Then the Princess said, Remind me
why. To which the other replied, that no one so good and kind had ever
passed that way, and that was why in the beginning. She said, too, that
nobody missed it, that nobody was the worse for it, that Some one had
gone on, to those who were expecting him--’
‘Some one was a man then?’ interposed Maggy.
Little Dorrit timidly said Yes, she believed so; and resumed:
‘--Had gone on to those who were expecting him, and that this
remembrance was stolen or kept back from nobody. The Princess made
answer, Ah! But when the cottager died it would be discovered there. The
tiny woman told her No; when that time came, it would sink quietly into
her own grave, and would never be found.’
‘Well, to be sure!’ said Maggy. ‘Go on, please.’
‘The Princess was very much astonished to hear this, as you may suppose,
Maggy.’
[‘And well she might be,’ said Maggy.)
‘So she resolved to watch the tiny woman, and see what came of it. Every
day she drove in her beautiful carriage by the cottage-door, and there
she saw the tiny woman always alone by herself spinning at her wheel,
and she looked at the tiny woman, and the tiny woman looked at her. At
last one day the wheel was still, and the tiny woman was not to be seen.
When the Princess made inquiries why the wheel had stopped, and where
the tiny woman was, she was informed that the wheel had stopped because
there was nobody to turn it, the tiny woman being dead.’
[‘They ought to have took her to the Hospital,’ said Maggy, and then
she’d have got over it.’)
‘The Princess, after crying a very little for the loss of the tiny
woman, dried her eyes and got out of her carriage at the place where
she had stopped it before, and went to the cottage and peeped in at the
door. There was nobody to look at her now, and nobody for her to look
at, so she went in at once to search for the treasured shadow. But there
was no sign of it to be found anywhere; and then she knew that the tiny
woman had told her the truth, and that it would never give anybody any
trouble, and that it had sunk quietly into her own grave, and that she
and it were at rest together.
‘That’s all, Maggy.’
The sunset flush was so bright on Little Dorrit’s face when she came
thus to the end of her story, that she interposed her hand to shade it.
‘Had she got to be old?’ Maggy asked.
‘The tiny woman?’
‘Ah!’
‘I don’t know,’ said Little Dorrit. ‘But it would have been just the
same if she had been ever so old.’
‘Would it raly!’ said Maggy. ‘Well, I suppose it would though.’ And sat
staring and ruminating.
She sat so long with her eyes wide open, that at length Little Dorrit,
to entice her from her box, rose and looked out of window. As she
glanced down into the yard, she saw Pancks come in and leer up with the
corner of his eye as he went by.
‘Who’s he, Little Mother?’ said Maggy. She had joined her at the window
and was leaning on her shoulder. ‘I see him come in and out often.’
‘I have heard him called a fortune-teller,’ said Little Dorrit. ‘But I
doubt if he could tell many people even their past or present fortunes.’
‘Couldn’t have told the Princess hers?’ said Maggy.
Little Dorrit, looking musingly down into the dark valley of the prison,
shook her head.
‘Nor the tiny woman hers?’ said Maggy.
‘No,’ said Little Dorrit, with the sunset very bright upon her. ‘But let
us come away from the window.’