Through the evening Paul sat in his corner watching the dancing and
beaming with pride as he heard praise showered on Dombey's sister. They
all loved her--how could they help it, Paul had known beforehand that they
must and would, and few would have thought with what triumph and delight
he watched her. Thus little Paul sat musing, listening, looking on and
dreaming; and was very happy. Until the time came for taking leave, and
then indeed there was a sensation in the party. Every one took the
heartiest sort of leave of him.
"Good-bye, Doctor Blimber," said Paul, stretching out his hand.
"Good-bye, my little friend," returned the doctor.
"I'm very much obliged to you, sir," said Paul, looking innocently up into
his awful face. "Ask them to take care of Diogenes, if you please."
Diogenes was the dog who had never received a friend into his confidence,
before Paul. The doctor promised that every attention should be paid to
Diogenes in Paul's absence, and Paul having again thanked him, and shaken
hands with him, bade adieu to Mrs. Blimber and Cornelia. Cornelia, taking
both Paul's hands in hers said,--"Dombey, Dombey, you have always been my
favourite pupil. God bless you!" And it showed, Paul thought, how easily
one might do injustice to a person; for Miss Blimber meant it--although
she was a Forcer.
A buzz then went round among the young gentlemen, of "Dombey's going!
little Dombey's going!" and there was a general move after Paul and
Florence down the staircase and into the hall, in which the whole Blimber
family were included. The servants with the butler at their head had all
an interest in seeing Little Dombey go, and even the young man taking out
his books and trunks to the coach melted visibly. Nothing could restrain
them from taking quite a noisy leave of Paul; waving hats after him,
pressing downstairs to shake hands with him, crying individually "Dombey!
don't forget me!" Paul whispered to Florence, as she wrapped him up before
the door was opened. Did she hear them? Would she ever forget it? Was she
glad to know it? And a lively delight was in his eyes as he spoke to her.
Once for a last look he turned and gazed upon the faces thus addressed to
him, surprised to see how shining and how bright and how numerous they
were. They swam before him, as he looked, and next moment he was in the
dark coach outside holding close to Florence. From that time, whenever he
thought of Doctor Blimber's it came back as he had seen it in this last
view; and it never seemed a real place again, but always a dream, full of
eyes.
And so ended little Paul's school days at Doctor Blimber's, for once at
home again he never rose from his little bed. He lay there (listening to
the noises in the street), quite tranquilly, not caring much how the time
went, but watching it and everything about him with observing eyes. When
the sunbeams struck into his room through the rustling blinds, and
quivered on the opposite wall like golden water, he knew that evening was
coming on, and that the sky was red and beautiful. As the reflection died
away, and a gloom went creeping up the wall, he watched it deepen--deepen,
into night. Then he thought how the long streets were dotted with lamps,
and how the peaceful stars were shining overhead. His fancy had a strange
tendency to wander to the river, which he knew was flowing through the
great city; and now he thought how black it was and how deep it would look
reflecting the hosts of stars--and more than all, how steadily it rolled
away to meet the sea.
As it grew later in the night, and footsteps in the street became so rare
that he could hear their coming, count them as they passed, and lose them
in the hollow distance, he would lie and watch the many-coloured ring
about the candle, and wait patiently for day. When day began to dawn
again, he watched for the sun and when its cheerful light began to sparkle
in the room, he pictured to himself--pictured! he saw--the high church
towers rising up into the morning sky, the town reviving, waking, starting
into life once more, the river glistening as it rolled (but rolling fast
as ever), and the country bright with dew. Familiar sounds came by degrees
into the street below; the servants in the house were roused and busy;
faces looked in at the door, and voices asked his attendants softly how he
was. Paul always answered for himself, "I am better. I am a great deal
better, thank you. Tell papa so."
By little and little he got tired of the bustle of the day, the noise of
carriages and carts, and people passing and re-passing; and would fall
asleep, or be troubled with a restless, and uneasy sense again--the child
could hardly tell whether this were in his sleeping or his waking
moments--of that rushing river.
"Why will it never stop, Floy?" he would sometimes ask her. "It is bearing
me away I think."
But Floy could always soothe and reassure him: and it was his daily
delight to make her lay her head down on his pillow, and take some rest.
"You are always watching me, Floy, let me watch you now." They would prop
him up with cushions in a corner of his bed, and there he would recline
the while she lay beside him, bending forwards oftentimes to kiss her.
Thus the flush of the day in its heat and light, would gradually decline;
and again the golden water would be dancing on the wall.
He was visited by as many as three grave doctors--they used to assemble
downstairs and come up together--and the room was so quiet and Paul was so
observant of them (though he never asked of anybody what they said) that
he even knew the difference in the sound of their watches.
The people round him changed as unaccountably as on that first night at
Doctor Blimber's--except Florence; Florence never changed. Old Mrs.
Pipchin dozing in an easy chair, often changed to someone else and Paul
was quite content to shut his eyes again and see what happened next,
without emotion. But one figure with its head upon its hand returned so
often and remained so long, and sat so still and solemn, never speaking,
never being spoken to, and rarely lifting up its face, that Paul began to
wonder languidly if it were real.
"Floy," he said, "what is that?"
"Where, dearest?"
"There, at the bottom of the bed."
"There's nothing there except papa."
The figure lifted up its head, and rose, and coming to the bedside said:
"My own boy! Don't you know me?"
Paul looked it in the face and thought, was this his father? But the face
so altered to his thinking, thrilled while he gazed, as if it were in
pain; and before he could reach out both his hands to take it between them
and draw it towards him, the figure turned away quickly from the little
bed, and went out at the door. The next time he observed the figure
sitting at the bottom of the bed, he called to it:
"Don't be so sorry for me, dear papa. Indeed, I am quite happy."
His father coming and bending down to him, which he did quickly, Paul held
him round the neck and repeated those words to him several times and very
earnestly. This was the beginning of his always saying in the morning that
he was a great deal better, and that they were to tell his father so.
How many times the golden water danced on the wall; how many nights the
dark, dark river rolled away towards the sea in spite of him, Paul never
counted, never sought to know. If their kindness could have increased, or
his sense of it, they were more kind, and he more grateful every day; but
whether they were many days or few appeared of little moment now to the
gentle boy.
One night he had been thinking of his mother and her picture in the
drawing-room downstairs. The train of thought suggested to him to inquire
if he had ever seen his mother; for he could not remember whether they had
told him yes or no, the river running very fast and confusing his mind.
"Floy, did I ever see mama?"
"No, darling; why?"
"Did I ever see any kind face like mama's looking at me when I was a baby,
Floy?"
"Oh yes, dear."
"Whose, Floy?"
"Your old nurse's, often."
"And where is my old nurse?" said Paul. "Is she dead, too? Floy are we all
dead except you?"
There was a hurry in the room for an instant--longer perhaps--then all was
still again, and Florence, with her face quite colourless but smiling,
held his head upon her arm. Her arm trembled very much.
"Show me that old nurse, Floy, if you please."
"She is not here, darling; she shall come to-morrow."
"Thank you, Floy."
Paul closed his eyes with these words and fell asleep. When he awoke the
sun was high and the broad day was clear and warm. He lay a little,
looking at the windows, which were open, and the curtains rustling in the
air, and waving to and fro, then he said, "Floy, is it to-morrow? Is she
come?" The next thing that happened was a noise of footsteps on the
stairs, and then Paul woke--woke mind and body--and sat upright in his
bed. He saw them now about him. There was no gray mist before them as
there had been some time in the night. He knew them every one and called
them by their names.
"And who is this? Is this my old nurse?" said the child, regarding with a
radiant smile a figure coming in.
Yes, yes. No other stranger would have shed those tears at sight of him,
and called him her dear boy, her pretty boy, her own poor blighted child.
No other woman would have stooped down by his bed, and taken up his wasted
hand, and put it to her lips and breast, as one who had some right to
fondle it.
"Floy, this is a kind, good face," said Paul. "I am glad to see it again.
Don't go away, old nurse. Stay here."
"Good-bye, my child," cried Mrs. Pipchin, hurrying to his bed's head. "Not
good-bye?"
For an instant Paul looked at her with the wistful face with which he had
so often gazed upon her in his corner by the fire.
"Ah, yes," he said, placidly, "good-bye. Where is papa?"
He felt his father's breath upon his cheek before the words had parted
from his lips.
"Now lay me down," he said, "and, Floy, come close to me, and let me see
you."
Sister and brother wound their arms around each other, and the golden
light came streaming in, and fell upon them, locked together.
"How fast the river runs, between its green banks and the rushes, Floy.
But it's very near the sea. I hear the waves."
Presently he told her that the motion of the boat upon the stream was
lulling him to rest. How near the banks were now. How bright the flowers
growing on them, and how tall the rushes. Now the boat was out at sea but
gliding smoothly on. And now there was a shore before him. Who stood on
the bank?
He put his hands together as he had been used to do at his prayers. He did
not remove his arms to do it, but they saw him fold them so, behind her
neck,
"Mama is like you, Floy. I know her by the face. But tell them that the
print upon the stairs at school is not divine enough. The light about the
head is shining on me as I go."
The golden ripple on the wall came back again, and nothing else stirred in
the room. The old, old fashion. The fashion that came in with our first
garments, and will last unchanged until our race has run its course, and
the wide firmament is rolled up like a scroll. The old, old
fashion--Death.
Oh, thank God for that older fashion yet,--of Immortality!