Newman Noggs inducts Mrs. and Miss Nickleby into their New Dwelling in
the City
Miss Nickleby’s reflections, as she wended her way homewards, were of
that desponding nature which the occurrences of the morning had been
sufficiently calculated to awaken. Her uncle’s was not a manner likely
to dispel any doubts or apprehensions she might have formed, in the
outset, neither was the glimpse she had had of Madame Mantalini’s
establishment by any means encouraging. It was with many gloomy
forebodings and misgivings, therefore, that she looked forward, with a
heavy heart, to the opening of her new career.
If her mother’s consolations could have restored her to a pleasanter and
more enviable state of mind, there were abundance of them to produce the
effect. By the time Kate reached home, the good lady had called to mind
two authentic cases of milliners who had been possessed of considerable
property, though whether they had acquired it all in business, or had
had a capital to start with, or had been lucky and married to advantage,
she could not exactly remember. However, as she very logically remarked,
there must have been SOME young person in that way of business who had
made a fortune without having anything to begin with, and that being
taken for granted, why should not Kate do the same? Miss La Creevy, who
was a member of the little council, ventured to insinuate some doubts
relative to the probability of Miss Nickleby’s arriving at this happy
consummation in the compass of an ordinary lifetime; but the good lady
set that question entirely at rest, by informing them that she had a
presentiment on the subject--a species of second-sight with which she
had been in the habit of clenching every argument with the deceased
Mr. Nickleby, and, in nine cases and three-quarters out of every ten,
determining it the wrong way.
‘I am afraid it is an unhealthy occupation,’ said Miss La Creevy. ‘I
recollect getting three young milliners to sit to me, when I first began
to paint, and I remember that they were all very pale and sickly.’
‘Oh! that’s not a general rule by any means,’ observed Mrs. Nickleby;
‘for I remember, as well as if it was only yesterday, employing one that
I was particularly recommended to, to make me a scarlet cloak at the
time when scarlet cloaks were fashionable, and she had a very red
face--a very red face, indeed.’
‘Perhaps she drank,’ suggested Miss La Creevy.
‘I don’t know how that may have been,’ returned Mrs. Nickleby: ‘but I
know she had a very red face, so your argument goes for nothing.’
In this manner, and with like powerful reasoning, did the worthy matron
meet every little objection that presented itself to the new scheme of
the morning. Happy Mrs. Nickleby! A project had but to be new, and it
came home to her mind, brightly varnished and gilded as a glittering
toy.
This question disposed of, Kate communicated her uncle’s desire about
the empty house, to which Mrs. Nickleby assented with equal readiness,
characteristically remarking, that, on the fine evenings, it would be a
pleasant amusement for her to walk to the West end to fetch her daughter
home; and no less characteristically forgetting, that there were such
things as wet nights and bad weather to be encountered in almost every
week of the year.
‘I shall be sorry--truly sorry to leave you, my kind friend,’ said Kate,
on whom the good feeling of the poor miniature painter had made a deep
impression.
‘You shall not shake me off, for all that,’ replied Miss La Creevy, with
as much sprightliness as she could assume. ‘I shall see you very often,
and come and hear how you get on; and if, in all London, or all the wide
world besides, there is no other heart that takes an interest in your
welfare, there will be one little lonely woman that prays for it night
and day.’
With this, the poor soul, who had a heart big enough for Gog, the
guardian genius of London, and enough to spare for Magog to boot, after
making a great many extraordinary faces which would have secured her an
ample fortune, could she have transferred them to ivory or canvas, sat
down in a corner, and had what she termed ‘a real good cry.’
But no crying, or talking, or hoping, or fearing, could keep off the
dreaded Saturday afternoon, or Newman Noggs either; who, punctual to his
time, limped up to the door, and breathed a whiff of cordial gin through
the keyhole, exactly as such of the church clocks in the neighbourhood
as agreed among themselves about the time, struck five. Newman waited
for the last stroke, and then knocked.
‘From Mr. Ralph Nickleby,’ said Newman, announcing his errand, when he
got upstairs, with all possible brevity.
‘We shall be ready directly,’ said Kate. ‘We have not much to carry, but
I fear we must have a coach.’
‘I’ll get one,’ replied Newman.
‘Indeed you shall not trouble yourself,’ said Mrs. Nickleby.
‘I will,’ said Newman.
‘I can’t suffer you to think of such a thing,’ said Mrs. Nickleby.
‘You can’t help it,’ said Newman.
‘Not help it!’
‘No; I thought of it as I came along; but didn’t get one, thinking you
mightn’t be ready. I think of a great many things. Nobody can prevent
that.’
‘Oh yes, I understand you, Mr. Noggs,’ said Mrs. Nickleby. ‘Our thoughts
are free, of course. Everybody’s thoughts are their own, clearly.’
‘They wouldn’t be, if some people had their way,’ muttered Newman.
‘Well, no more they would, Mr. Noggs, and that’s very true,’ rejoined Mrs
Nickleby. ‘Some people to be sure are such--how’s your master?’
Newman darted a meaning glance at Kate, and replied with a strong
emphasis on the last word of his answer, that Mr. Ralph Nickleby was
well, and sent his LOVE.
‘I am sure we are very much obliged to him,’ observed Mrs. Nickleby.
‘Very,’ said Newman. ‘I’ll tell him so.’
It was no very easy matter to mistake Newman Noggs, after having once
seen him, and as Kate, attracted by the singularity of his manner (in
which on this occasion, however, there was something respectful and even
delicate, notwithstanding the abruptness of his speech), looked at him
more closely, she recollected having caught a passing glimpse of that
strange figure before.
‘Excuse my curiosity,’ she said, ‘but did I not see you in the
coachyard, on the morning my brother went away to Yorkshire?’
Newman cast a wistful glance on Mrs. Nickleby and said ‘No,’ most
unblushingly.
‘No!’ exclaimed Kate, ‘I should have said so anywhere.’
‘You’d have said wrong,’ rejoined Newman. ‘It’s the first time I’ve been
out for three weeks. I’ve had the gout.’
Newman was very, very far from having the appearance of a gouty subject,
and so Kate could not help thinking; but the conference was cut short by
Mrs. Nickleby’s insisting on having the door shut, lest Mr. Noggs should
take cold, and further persisting in sending the servant girl for a
coach, for fear he should bring on another attack of his disorder. To
both conditions, Newman was compelled to yield. Presently, the coach
came; and, after many sorrowful farewells, and a great deal of running
backwards and forwards across the pavement on the part of Miss La
Creevy, in the course of which the yellow turban came into violent
contact with sundry foot-passengers, it (that is to say the coach,
not the turban) went away again, with the two ladies and their luggage
inside; and Newman, despite all Mrs. Nickleby’s assurances that it would
be his death--on the box beside the driver.
They went into the city, turning down by the river side; and, after a
long and very slow drive, the streets being crowded at that hour with
vehicles of every kind, stopped in front of a large old dingy house in
Thames Street: the door and windows of which were so bespattered with
mud, that it would have appeared to have been uninhabited for years.
The door of this deserted mansion Newman opened with a key which he took
out of his hat--in which, by-the-bye, in consequence of the dilapidated
state of his pockets, he deposited everything, and would most
likely have carried his money if he had had any--and the coach being
discharged, he led the way into the interior of the mansion.
Old, and gloomy, and black, in truth it was, and sullen and dark were
the rooms, once so bustling with life and enterprise. There was a
wharf behind, opening on the Thames. An empty dog-kennel, some bones of
animals, fragments of iron hoops, and staves of old casks, lay strewn
about, but no life was stirring there. It was a picture of cold, silent
decay.
‘This house depresses and chills one,’ said Kate, ‘and seems as if some
blight had fallen on it. If I were superstitious, I should be almost
inclined to believe that some dreadful crime had been perpetrated within
these old walls, and that the place had never prospered since. How
frowning and how dark it looks!’
‘Lord, my dear,’ replied Mrs. Nickleby, ‘don’t talk in that way, or
you’ll frighten me to death.’
‘It is only my foolish fancy, mama,’ said Kate, forcing a smile.
‘Well, then, my love, I wish you would keep your foolish fancy to
yourself, and not wake up MY foolish fancy to keep it company,’ retorted
Mrs. Nickleby. ‘Why didn’t you think of all this before--you are so
careless--we might have asked Miss La Creevy to keep us company or
borrowed a dog, or a thousand things--but it always was the way, and
was just the same with your poor dear father. Unless I thought of
everything--’ This was Mrs. Nickleby’s usual commencement of a general
lamentation, running through a dozen or so of complicated sentences
addressed to nobody in particular, and into which she now launched until
her breath was exhausted.
Newman appeared not to hear these remarks, but preceded them to a couple
of rooms on the first floor, which some kind of attempt had been made to
render habitable. In one, were a few chairs, a table, an old hearth-rug,
and some faded baize; and a fire was ready laid in the grate. In the
other stood an old tent bedstead, and a few scanty articles of chamber
furniture.
‘Well, my dear,’ said Mrs. Nickleby, trying to be pleased, ‘now isn’t
this thoughtful and considerate of your uncle? Why, we should not have
had anything but the bed we bought yesterday, to lie down upon, if it
hadn’t been for his thoughtfulness!’
‘Very kind, indeed,’ replied Kate, looking round.
Newman Noggs did not say that he had hunted up the old furniture they
saw, from attic and cellar; or that he had taken in the halfpennyworth
of milk for tea that stood upon a shelf, or filled the rusty kettle on
the hob, or collected the woodchips from the wharf, or begged the coals.
But the notion of Ralph Nickleby having directed it to be done, tickled
his fancy so much, that he could not refrain from cracking all his ten
fingers in succession: at which performance Mrs. Nickleby was rather
startled at first, but supposing it to be in some remote manner
connected with the gout, did not remark upon.
‘We need detain you no longer, I think,’ said Kate.
‘Is there nothing I can do?’ asked Newman.
‘Nothing, thank you,’ rejoined Miss Nickleby.
‘Perhaps, my dear, Mr. Noggs would like to drink our healths,’ said Mrs
Nickleby, fumbling in her reticule for some small coin.
‘I think, mama,’ said Kate hesitating, and remarking Newman’s averted
face, ‘you would hurt his feelings if you offered it.’
Newman Noggs, bowing to the young lady more like a gentleman than
the miserable wretch he seemed, placed his hand upon his breast, and,
pausing for a moment, with the air of a man who struggles to speak but
is uncertain what to say, quitted the room.
As the jarring echoes of the heavy house-door, closing on its latch,
reverberated dismally through the building, Kate felt half tempted to
call him back, and beg him to remain a little while; but she was ashamed
to own her fears, and Newman Noggs was on his road homewards.