Of Ralph Nickleby and Newman Noggs, and some wise Precautions, the
success or failure of which will appear in the Sequel
In blissful unconsciousness that his nephew was hastening at the utmost
speed of four good horses towards his sphere of action, and that every
passing minute diminished the distance between them, Ralph Nickleby sat
that morning occupied in his customary avocations, and yet unable to
prevent his thoughts wandering from time to time back to the interview
which had taken place between himself and his niece on the previous
day. At such intervals, after a few moments of abstraction, Ralph
would mutter some peevish interjection, and apply himself with renewed
steadiness of purpose to the ledger before him, but again and again the
same train of thought came back despite all his efforts to prevent it,
confusing him in his calculations, and utterly distracting his attention
from the figures over which he bent. At length Ralph laid down his pen,
and threw himself back in his chair as though he had made up his mind to
allow the obtrusive current of reflection to take its own course, and,
by giving it full scope, to rid himself of it effectually.
‘I am not a man to be moved by a pretty face,’ muttered Ralph sternly.
‘There is a grinning skull beneath it, and men like me who look and work
below the surface see that, and not its delicate covering. And yet
I almost like the girl, or should if she had been less proudly and
squeamishly brought up. If the boy were drowned or hanged, and the
mother dead, this house should be her home. I wish they were, with all
my soul.’
Notwithstanding the deadly hatred which Ralph felt towards Nicholas,
and the bitter contempt with which he sneered at poor Mrs
Nickleby--notwithstanding the baseness with which he had behaved, and
was then behaving, and would behave again if his interest prompted
him, towards Kate herself--still there was, strange though it may seem,
something humanising and even gentle in his thoughts at that moment. He
thought of what his home might be if Kate were there; he placed her in
the empty chair, looked upon her, heard her speak; he felt again upon
his arm the gentle pressure of the trembling hand; he strewed his
costly rooms with the hundred silent tokens of feminine presence and
occupation; he came back again to the cold fireside and the silent
dreary splendour; and in that one glimpse of a better nature, born as
it was in selfish thoughts, the rich man felt himself friendless,
childless, and alone. Gold, for the instant, lost its lustre in his
eyes, for there were countless treasures of the heart which it could
never purchase.
A very slight circumstance was sufficient to banish such reflections
from the mind of such a man. As Ralph looked vacantly out across the
yard towards the window of the other office, he became suddenly aware of
the earnest observation of Newman Noggs, who, with his red nose almost
touching the glass, feigned to be mending a pen with a rusty fragment of
a knife, but was in reality staring at his employer with a countenance
of the closest and most eager scrutiny.
Ralph exchanged his dreamy posture for his accustomed business attitude:
the face of Newman disappeared, and the train of thought took to flight,
all simultaneously, and in an instant.
After a few minutes, Ralph rang his bell. Newman answered the summons,
and Ralph raised his eyes stealthily to his face, as if he almost feared
to read there, a knowledge of his recent thoughts.
There was not the smallest speculation, however, in the countenance of
Newman Noggs. If it be possible to imagine a man, with two eyes in his
head, and both wide open, looking in no direction whatever, and seeing
nothing, Newman appeared to be that man while Ralph Nickleby regarded
him.
‘How now?’ growled Ralph.
‘Oh!’ said Newman, throwing some intelligence into his eyes all at
once, and dropping them on his master, ‘I thought you rang.’ With which
laconic remark Newman turned round and hobbled away.
‘Stop!’ said Ralph.
Newman stopped; not at all disconcerted.
‘I did ring.’
‘I knew you did.’
‘Then why do you offer to go if you know that?’
‘I thought you rang to say you didn’t ring,’ replied Newman. ‘You often
do.’
‘How dare you pry, and peer, and stare at me, sirrah?’ demanded Ralph.
‘Stare!’ cried Newman, ‘at YOU! Ha, ha!’ which was all the explanation
Newman deigned to offer.
‘Be careful, sir,’ said Ralph, looking steadily at him. ‘Let me have no
drunken fooling here. Do you see this parcel?’
‘It’s big enough,’ rejoined Newman.
‘Carry it into the city; to Cross, in Broad Street, and leave it
there--quick. Do you hear?’
Newman gave a dogged kind of nod to express an affirmative reply, and,
leaving the room for a few seconds, returned with his hat. Having made
various ineffective attempts to fit the parcel (which was some two feet
square) into the crown thereof, Newman took it under his arm, and
after putting on his fingerless gloves with great precision and nicety,
keeping his eyes fixed upon Mr. Ralph Nickleby all the time, he adjusted
his hat upon his head with as much care, real or pretended, as if it
were a bran-new one of the most expensive quality, and at last departed
on his errand.
He executed his commission with great promptitude and dispatch, only
calling at one public-house for half a minute, and even that might be
said to be in his way, for he went in at one door and came out at the
other; but as he returned and had got so far homewards as the Strand,
Newman began to loiter with the uncertain air of a man who has not quite
made up his mind whether to halt or go straight forwards. After a
very short consideration, the former inclination prevailed, and making
towards the point he had had in his mind, Newman knocked a modest double
knock, or rather a nervous single one, at Miss La Creevy’s door.
It was opened by a strange servant, on whom the odd figure of the
visitor did not appear to make the most favourable impression possible,
inasmuch as she no sooner saw him than she very nearly closed it, and
placing herself in the narrow gap, inquired what he wanted. But Newman
merely uttering the monosyllable ‘Noggs,’ as if it were some cabalistic
word, at sound of which bolts would fly back and doors open, pushed
briskly past and gained the door of Miss La Creevy’s sitting-room,
before the astonished servant could offer any opposition.
‘Walk in if you please,’ said Miss La Creevy in reply to the sound of
Newman’s knuckles; and in he walked accordingly.
‘Bless us!’ cried Miss La Creevy, starting as Newman bolted in; ‘what
did you want, sir?’
‘You have forgotten me,’ said Newman, with an inclination of the head.
‘I wonder at that. That nobody should remember me who knew me in other
days, is natural enough; but there are few people who, seeing me once,
forget me NOW.’ He glanced, as he spoke, at his shabby clothes and
paralytic limb, and slightly shook his head.
‘I did forget you, I declare,’ said Miss La Creevy, rising to receive
Newman, who met her half-way, ‘and I am ashamed of myself for doing so;
for you are a kind, good creature, Mr. Noggs. Sit down and tell me all
about Miss Nickleby. Poor dear thing! I haven’t seen her for this many a
week.’
‘How’s that?’ asked Newman.
‘Why, the truth is, Mr. Noggs,’ said Miss La Creevy, ‘that I have been
out on a visit--the first visit I have made for fifteen years.’
‘That is a long time,’ said Newman, sadly.
‘So it is a very long time to look back upon in years, though, somehow
or other, thank Heaven, the solitary days roll away peacefully and
happily enough,’ replied the miniature painter. ‘I have a brother, Mr
Noggs--the only relation I have--and all that time I never saw him once.
Not that we ever quarrelled, but he was apprenticed down in the country,
and he got married there; and new ties and affections springing up about
him, he forgot a poor little woman like me, as it was very reasonable
he should, you know. Don’t suppose that I complain about that, because I
always said to myself, “It is very natural; poor dear John is making his
way in the world, and has a wife to tell his cares and troubles to, and
children now to play about him, so God bless him and them, and send we
may all meet together one day where we shall part no more.” But what
do you think, Mr. Noggs,’ said the miniature painter, brightening up and
clapping her hands, ‘of that very same brother coming up to London at
last, and never resting till he found me out; what do you think of his
coming here and sitting down in that very chair, and crying like a child
because he was so glad to see me--what do you think of his insisting on
taking me down all the way into the country to his own house (quite a
sumptuous place, Mr. Noggs, with a large garden and I don’t know how many
fields, and a man in livery waiting at table, and cows and horses and
pigs and I don’t know what besides), and making me stay a whole month,
and pressing me to stop there all my life--yes, all my life--and so did
his wife, and so did the children--and there were four of them, and one,
the eldest girl of all, they--they had named her after me eight good
years before, they had indeed. I never was so happy; in all my life I
never was!’ The worthy soul hid her face in her handkerchief, and sobbed
aloud; for it was the first opportunity she had had of unburdening her
heart, and it would have its way.
‘But bless my life,’ said Miss La Creevy, wiping her eyes after a short
pause, and cramming her handkerchief into her pocket with great bustle
and dispatch; ‘what a foolish creature I must seem to you, Mr. Noggs! I
shouldn’t have said anything about it, only I wanted to explain to you
how it was I hadn’t seen Miss Nickleby.’
‘Have you seen the old lady?’ asked Newman.
‘You mean Mrs. Nickleby?’ said Miss La Creevy. ‘Then I tell you what, Mr
Noggs, if you want to keep in the good books in that quarter, you had
better not call her the old lady any more, for I suspect she wouldn’t be
best pleased to hear you. Yes, I went there the night before last, but
she was quite on the high ropes about something, and was so grand and
mysterious, that I couldn’t make anything of her: so, to tell you the
truth, I took it into my head to be grand too, and came away in state. I
thought she would have come round again before this, but she hasn’t been
here.’
‘About Miss Nickleby--’ said Newman.
‘Why, she was here twice while I was away,’ returned Miss La Creevy. ‘I
was afraid she mightn’t like to have me calling on her among those great
folks in what’s-its-name Place, so I thought I’d wait a day or two, and
if I didn’t see her, write.’
‘Ah!’ exclaimed Newman, cracking his fingers.
‘However, I want to hear all the news about them from you,’ said Miss La
Creevy. ‘How is the old rough and tough monster of Golden Square? Well,
of course; such people always are. I don’t mean how is he in health, but
how is he going on: how is he behaving himself?’
‘Damn him!’ cried Newman, dashing his cherished hat on the floor; ‘like
a false hound.’
‘Gracious, Mr. Noggs, you quite terrify me!’ exclaimed Miss La Creevy,
turning pale.
‘I should have spoilt his features yesterday afternoon if I could have
afforded it,’ said Newman, moving restlessly about, and shaking his fist
at a portrait of Mr. Canning over the mantelpiece. ‘I was very near it.
I was obliged to put my hands in my pockets, and keep ‘em there very
tight. I shall do it some day in that little back-parlour, I know I
shall. I should have done it before now, if I hadn’t been afraid of
making bad worse. I shall double-lock myself in with him and have it out
before I die, I’m quite certain of it.’
‘I shall scream if you don’t compose yourself, Mr. Noggs,’ said Miss La
Creevy; ‘I’m sure I shan’t be able to help it.’
‘Never mind,’ rejoined Newman, darting violently to and fro. ‘He’s
coming up tonight: I wrote to tell him. He little thinks I know; he
little thinks I care. Cunning scoundrel! he don’t think that. Not
he, not he. Never mind, I’ll thwart him--I, Newman Noggs. Ho, ho, the
rascal!’
Lashing himself up to an extravagant pitch of fury, Newman Noggs jerked
himself about the room with the most eccentric motion ever beheld in a
human being: now sparring at the little miniatures on the wall, and
now giving himself violent thumps on the head, as if to heighten the
delusion, until he sank down in his former seat quite breathless and
exhausted.
‘There,’ said Newman, picking up his hat; ‘that’s done me good. Now I’m
better, and I’ll tell you all about it.’
It took some little time to reassure Miss La Creevy, who had been almost
frightened out of her senses by this remarkable demonstration; but that
done, Newman faithfully related all that had passed in the interview
between Kate and her uncle, prefacing his narrative with a statement
of his previous suspicions on the subject, and his reasons for forming
them; and concluding with a communication of the step he had taken in
secretly writing to Nicholas.
Though little Miss La Creevy’s indignation was not so singularly
displayed as Newman’s, it was scarcely inferior in violence and
intensity. Indeed, if Ralph Nickleby had happened to make his appearance
in the room at that moment, there is some doubt whether he would not
have found Miss La Creevy a more dangerous opponent than even Newman
Noggs himself.
‘God forgive me for saying so,’ said Miss La Creevy, as a wind-up to all
her expressions of anger, ‘but I really feel as if I could stick this
into him with pleasure.’
It was not a very awful weapon that Miss La Creevy held, it being in
fact nothing more nor less than a black-lead pencil; but discovering her
mistake, the little portrait painter exchanged it for a mother-of-pearl
fruit knife, wherewith, in proof of her desperate thoughts, she made a
lunge as she spoke, which would have scarcely disturbed the crumb of a
half-quartern loaf.
‘She won’t stop where she is after tonight,’ said Newman. ‘That’s a
comfort.’
‘Stop!’ cried Miss La Creevy, ‘she should have left there, weeks ago.’
‘--If we had known of this,’ rejoined Newman. ‘But we didn’t. Nobody
could properly interfere but her mother or brother. The mother’s
weak--poor thing--weak. The dear young man will be here tonight.’
‘Heart alive!’ cried Miss La Creevy. ‘He will do something desperate, Mr
Noggs, if you tell him all at once.’
Newman left off rubbing his hands, and assumed a thoughtful look.
‘Depend upon it,’ said Miss La Creevy, earnestly, ‘if you are not very
careful in breaking out the truth to him, he will do some violence upon
his uncle or one of these men that will bring some terrible calamity
upon his own head, and grief and sorrow to us all.’
‘I never thought of that,’ rejoined Newman, his countenance falling more
and more. ‘I came to ask you to receive his sister in case he brought
her here, but--’
‘But this is a matter of much greater importance,’ interrupted Miss La
Creevy; ‘that you might have been sure of before you came, but the end
of this, nobody can foresee, unless you are very guarded and careful.’
‘What CAN I do?’ cried Newman, scratching his head with an air of great
vexation and perplexity. ‘If he was to talk of pistoling ‘em all, I
should be obliged to say, “Certainly--serve ‘em right.”’
Miss La Creevy could not suppress a small shriek on hearing this, and
instantly set about extorting a solemn pledge from Newman that he would
use his utmost endeavours to pacify the wrath of Nicholas; which, after
some demur, was conceded. They then consulted together on the safest and
surest mode of communicating to him the circumstances which had rendered
his presence necessary.
‘He must have time to cool before he can possibly do anything,’ said
Miss La Creevy. ‘That is of the greatest consequence. He must not be
told until late at night.’
‘But he’ll be in town between six and seven this evening,’ replied
Newman. ‘I can’t keep it from him when he asks me.’
‘Then you must go out, Mr. Noggs,’ said Miss La Creevy. ‘You can easily
have been kept away by business, and must not return till nearly
midnight.’
‘Then he will come straight here,’ retorted Newman.
‘So I suppose,’ observed Miss La Creevy; ‘but he won’t find me at home,
for I’ll go straight to the city the instant you leave me, make up
matters with Mrs. Nickleby, and take her away to the theatre, so that he
may not even know where his sister lives.’
Upon further discussion, this appeared the safest and most feasible mode
of proceeding that could possibly be adopted. Therefore it was finally
determined that matters should be so arranged, and Newman, after
listening to many supplementary cautions and entreaties, took his leave
of Miss La Creevy and trudged back to Golden Square; ruminating as
he went upon a vast number of possibilities and impossibilities which
crowded upon his brain, and arose out of the conversation that had just
terminated.