received a manual compliment on the head, which sent him staggering
against the wall; and Mrs. Todgers, dish in hand, stood indignantly
before him.
“Oh, you little villain!” said that lady. “Oh, you bad, false boy!”
“No worse than yerself,” retorted Bailey, guarding his head, in a
principle invented by Mr. Thomas Cribb. “Ah! Come now! Do that agin,
will yer!”
“He’s the most dreadful child,” said Mrs. Todgers, setting down the
dish, “I ever had to deal with. The gentlemen spoil him to that extent,
and teach him such things, that I’m afraid nothing but hanging will
ever do him any good.”
“Won’t it?” cried Bailey. “Oh! Yes! Wot do you go a lowerin’ the
table-beer for then, and destroying my constitooshun?”
“Go down-stairs, you vicious boy,” said Mrs. Todgers, holding the door
open. “Do you hear me? Go along!”
After two or three dexterous feints, he went, and was seen no more that
night, save once, when he brought up some tumblers and hot water, and
much disturbed the two Miss Pecksniffs by squinting hideously behind
the back of the unconscious Mrs. Todgers. Having done this justice
to his wounded feelings, he returned underground; whence, in company
with a swarm of black beetles and a kitchen candle, he employed his
faculties in cleaning boots and brushing clothes until the night was
far advanced.
* * * * *
But it was at the Sunday dinner that Bailey shone in glory. When the
hour drew near, he appeared in a complete suit of cast-off clothes
several times too large for him, and a clean shirt of extraordinary
size. This caused the boarders to call him “Collars.” Then Bailey would
announce joyfully: “The wittles is up.”
When all were seated, Bailey would stand behind the chair winking and
nodding with the greatest good humor. His idea of waiting on the table
was to stand with his hands in his pockets and his feet wide apart.
This was on the whole the best thing to do, for when a dish passed
through his hands it was quite likely to drop on the floor.
Mrs. Todgers was always scolding Bailey, who deserved it all, and
Bailey was always threatening to leave and be a soldier boy.
“There’s something gamey in that, ain’t there? I’d sooner be hit with
a cannon-ball than a rolling-pin, and she’s always a catching up
something of that sort and throwing it at me, when the gentlemen’s
appetites is good. But I ain’t going to have every rise in prices
wisited on me.”
Mrs. Todgers got rid of Bailey after a while, but the boarders never
got the same amount of amusement from his successor. The house always
seemed a little dull after he left.
THE DOMBEY CHILDREN
XVIII
THE DOMBEY CHILDREN
IN London there is a portion of the huge town that is called the City.
People do not live in the City--they do business there. That is where
the big banks are and the offices of the great merchants whose ships go
round the world. In the City the Lord Mayor of London rules, as he did
in the days when the gay apprentice, Dick Whittington, heard the bells
prophesying what he should be.
On one of the streets of the City was a building that had an ancient
sign, Dombey and Son. It had been there many years, since the time when
the original Dombey had taken his son into partnership. The Dombeys
owned a great many ships that sailed to the West Indies and the East
Indies, and wherever they could make money on their voyages. Up to this
time, each Dombey had been a good business man and had taught his son
how to save and how to venture wisely. So that the Dombeys had become
richer and richer. All had gone well with them; but there had come a
time when there was a Dombey who hadn’t any son. Mr. and Mrs. Dombey
had a daughter named Florence, who was a very nice little girl. Her
mother loved her dearly, but her father thought she didn’t amount to
much, because he couldn’t put on the sign on his office the words,
“Dombey and Daughter.” That wouldn’t have sounded right in the days of
good Queen Victoria. He wanted the name to be always Dombey and Son.
[Illustration:
_Copyright by Charles Scribner’s Sons_
PAUL DOMBEY AND FLORENCE ON THE BEACH AT BRIGHTON]
When at last a boy was born, Mr. Dombey was delighted. He dreamed of a
time when little Paul would grow up to be a man just like himself, and
would take his place in the office and make everybody afraid of him. He
should be the Prince while his father was King in the Kingdom of Dombey
and Son. All this was very pleasant to think about, and it seemed as
if the business in the City would go on forever. But while Mr. Dombey
dreamed of what his son would do when he was grown up, he didn’t do
anything to help him grow. Paul was a poor little rich boy, who lived
in a big, uncomfortable house, and was sent to school with other poor
little rich boys. I’m sorry for little Paul, but I don’t care to read
about him very much.
It’s a relief to meet the people who didn’t have any money, for they
seem so much more cheerful than any of the Dombeys. There was Toodles,
the husband of little Paul’s nurse. Mr. Dombey wanted to find out all
about him.
“Mr. What’s-your-name, you have a son, I believe.”
“Four on ’em, sir. Four hims and a her. All alive.”
“Why, it’s as much as you can afford to keep them!” said Mr. Dombey.
“I couldn’t afford but one thing in the world less, sir.”
“What is that?”
“To lose ’em, sir.”
“Can you read?” asked Mr. Dombey.
“Why, not partik’ler, sir.”
“Write?”
“With chalk, sir?”
“With anything.”
“I could make shift to chalk a bit, I think, if I were put to it,” said
Toodles after some reflection.
“And yet,” said Mr. Dombey, “you are two or three-and-thirty, I
suppose.”
“Thereabouts, I suppose, sir,” answered Toodles after more reflection.
“Then why don’t you learn?” asked Mr. Dombey.
“So I’m agoing to, sir. One of my little boys is agoing to learn me
when he’s old enough, and been to school himself.”
“Well!” said Mr. Dombey. It was all that he could say. It all seemed
so foolish. It would have surprised Mr. Dombey if he had been told
that Mr. Toodles’s children were more fortunate than his own, and that
they were having a great deal better time. But that was what Dickens
thought, and I agree with him.
Little Paul was so carefully looked after that he had no adventures.
But his sister Florence had better luck. One of her adventures was
quite exciting, for she was lost in one of the worst parts of London,
and was rescued by a young gentleman who felt the romance of it. At the
time Paul was a baby, and Mrs. Toodles had a longing to see her own
children. So without asking permission she took Paul and Florence with
her. They found their way to the poor part of town where her family
lived, and all the little Toodleses greeted their mother with shouts,
and there was a great celebration. On going home they fell in with a
noisy and pushing crowd. Mrs. Toodles of course looked after little
Paul, who was very important, but she forgot Florence for a moment.
When she looked for her she wasn’t there. What followed let Dickens
tell.
HOW FLORENCE DOMBEY WAS LOST IN LONDON
AS Susan Nipper and the two children were in the crowd, there came a
wild cry of “Mad bull!” With a wild confusion before her, of people
running up and down, and shouting, and wheels running over them, and
boys fighting, and mad bulls coming up, and the nurse in the midst of
all these dangers being torn to pieces, Florence screamed and ran.
She ran till she was exhausted, urging Susan to do the same; and
then, stopping and wringing her hands as she remembered they had left
the other nurse behind, found, with a sensation of terror not to be
described, that she was quite alone.
“Susan! Susan!” cried Florence, clapping her hands in the very ecstasy
of her alarm. “Oh, where are they! where are they!”
“Where are they?” said an old woman, coming hobbling across as fast as
she could from the opposite side of the way. “Why did you run away from
’em?”
“I was frightened,” answered Florence. “I didn’t know what I did. I
thought they were with me. Where are they?”
The old woman took her by the wrist, and said: “I’ll show you.”
She was a very ugly old woman, with red rims round her eyes, and a
mouth that mumbled and chattered of itself when she was not speaking.
She was miserably dressed, and carried some skins over her arm. She
seemed to have followed Florence some little way at all events, for
she had lost her breath; and this made her uglier still, as she stood
trying to regain it: working her shrivelled, yellow face and throat
into all sorts of contortions.
Florence was afraid of her, and looked, hesitating, up the street, of
which she had almost reached the bottom. It was a solitary place--more
a back road than a street--and there was no one in it but herself and
the old woman.
“You needn’t be frightened now,” said the old woman, still holding her
tight. “Come along with me.”
“I--I don’t know you. What’s your name?” asked Florence.
“Mrs. Brown,” said the old woman. “Good Mrs. Brown.”
“Are they near here?” asked Florence, beginning to be led away.
“Susan an’t far off,” said Good Mrs. Brown; “and the others are close
to her.”
“Is anybody hurt?” cried Florence.
“Not a bit of it,” said Good Mrs. Brown.
The child shed tears of delight on hearing this, and accompanied the
old woman willingly; though she could not help glancing at her face as
they went along--particularly at that industrious mouth--and wondering
whether Bad Mrs. Brown, if there were such a person, was at all like
her.
They had not gone very far, but had gone by some very uncomfortable
places, such as brick-fields and tile-yards, when the old woman turned
down a dirty lane, where the mud lay in deep black ruts in the middle
of the road. She stopped before a shabby little house, as closely shut
up as a house that was full of cracks and crevices could be. Opening
the door with a key she took out of her bonnet, she pushed the child
before her into a back room, where there was a great heap of rags of
different colors lying on the floor; a heap of bones, and a heap of
sifted dust or cinders; but there was no furniture at all, and the
walls and ceiling were quite black.
The child became so terrified that she was stricken speechless, and
looked as though about to swoon.
“Now don’t be a young mule,” said Good Mrs. Brown, reviving her with a
shake. “I’m not a going to hurt you. Sit upon the rags.”
Florence obeyed her, holding out her folded hands, in mute supplication.
“I’m not a going to keep you, even, above an hour,” said Mrs. Brown.
“D’ye understand what I say?”
The child answered with great difficulty, “Yes.”
“Then,” said Good Mrs. Brown, taking her own seat on the bones, “don’t
vex me. If you don’t, I tell you I won’t hurt you. But if you do, I’ll
kill you. I could have you killed at any time--even if you was in your
own bed at home. Now let’s know who you are, and what you are, and all
about it.”
The old woman’s threats and promises; the dread of giving her offense;
and the habit, unusual to a child, but almost natural to Florence now,
of being quiet, and repressing what she felt, and feared, and hoped,
enabled her to do this bidding, and to tell her little history, or what
she knew of it. Mrs. Brown listened attentively, until she had finished.
“So your name’s Dombey, eh?” said Mrs. Brown.
“Yes, ma’am.”
“I want that pretty frock, Miss Dombey,” said Good Mrs. Brown, “and
that little bonnet, and a petticoat or two, and anything else you can
spare. Come! Take ’em off.”
Florence obeyed, as fast as her trembling hands would allow; keeping,
all the while, a frightened eye on Mrs. Brown. When she had divested
herself of all the articles of apparel mentioned by that lady, Mrs.
B. examined them at leisure, and seemed tolerably well satisfied with
their quality and value.
“Humph!” she said, running her eyes over the child’s slight figure. “I
don’t see anything else--except the shoes. I must have the shoes, Miss
Dombey.”
Poor little Florence took them off with equal alacrity, only too glad
to have any more means of conciliation about her. The old woman then
produced some wretched substitutes from the bottom of the heap of
rags, which she turned up for that purpose; together with a girl’s
cloak, quite worn out and very old; and the crushed remains of a bonnet
that had probably been picked up from some ditch or dunghill. In this
dainty raiment, she instructed Florence to dress herself; and as such
preparation seemed a prelude to her release, the child complied with
increased readiness, if possible.
In hurriedly putting on the bonnet, if that may be called a bonnet
which was more like a pad to carry loads on, she caught it in her hair
which grew luxuriantly, and could not immediately disentangle it. Good
Mrs. Brown whipped out a large pair of scissors, and fell into an
unaccountable state of excitement.
“Why couldn’t you let me be!” said Mrs. Brown “when I was contented.
You little fool!”
“I beg your pardon. I don’t know what I have done,” panted Florence. “I
couldn’t help it.”
“Couldn’t help it!” cried Mrs. Brown. “How do you expect I can help
it? Why, Lord!” said the old woman, ruffling her curls with a furious
pleasure, “anybody but me would have had ’em off, first of all.”
Florence was so relieved to find that it was only her hair and not
her head which Mrs. Brown coveted, that she offered no resistance or
entreaty, and merely raised her mild eyes toward the face of that good
soul.
“If I hadn’t once had a gal of my own--beyond seas now--that was proud
of her hair,” said Mrs. Brown, “I’d have had every lock of it. She’s
far away, she’s far away! Oho! Oho!”
Mrs. Brown’s was not a melodious cry, but, accompanied with a wild
tossing up of her lean arms, it was full of passionate grief, and
thrilled to the heart of Florence, whom it frightened more than ever.
It had its part, perhaps, in saving her curls; for Mrs. Brown, after
hovering about her with the scissors for some moments, like a new kind
of butterfly, bade her hide them under the bonnet and let no trace
of them escape to tempt her. Having accomplished this victory over
herself, Mrs. Brown resumed her seat on the bones, and smoked a very
short black pipe, moving and mumbling all the time, as if she were
eating the stem.
When the pipe was smoked out, she gave the child a rabbit-skin to
carry, that she might appear the more like her ordinary companion, and
told her that she was now going to lead her to a public street, whence
she could inquire her way to her friends. But she cautioned her, with
threats of summary and deadly vengeance in case of disobedience, not to
talk to strangers, nor to repair to her own home (which may have been
too near for Mrs. Brown’s convenience), but to her father’s office in
the City; also to wait at the street corner where she would be left,
until the clock struck three. These directions Mrs. Brown enforced with
assurances that there would be potent eyes and ears in her employment
cognizant of all she did; and these directions Florence promised
faithfully and earnestly to observe.
At length, Mrs. Brown, issuing forth, conducted her changed and ragged
little friend through a labyrinth of narrow streets and lanes and
alleys, which emerged, after a long time, upon a stable-yard, with a
gateway at the end, whence the roar of a great thoroughfare made itself
audible. Pointing out this gateway, and informing Florence that when
the clocks struck three she was to go to the left, Mrs. Brown, after
making a parting grasp at her hair which seemed involuntary and quite
beyond her own control, told her she knew what to do, and bade her go
and do it: remembering that she was watched.
With a lighter heart, but still sore afraid, Florence felt herself
released, and tripped off to the corner. When she reached it, she
looked back and saw the head of Good Mrs. Brown peeping out of the
low wooden passage, where she had issued her parting injunctions;
likewise the fist of Good Mrs. Brown shaking toward her. But though she
often looked back afterward--every minute, at least, in her nervous
recollection of the old woman--she could not see her again.
Florence remained there, looking at the bustle in the street, and more
and more bewildered by it; and in the meanwhile the clocks appeared
to have made up their minds never to strike three any more. At last
the steeples rang out three o’clock; there was one close by, so she
couldn’t be mistaken; and--after often looking over her shoulder, and
often going a little way, and as often coming back again, lest the
all-powerful spies of Mrs. Brown should take offense--she hurried off,
as fast as she could in her slipshod shoes, holding the rabbit-skin
tight in her hand.
All she knew of her father’s offices was that they belonged to Dombey
and Son, and that that was a great power belonging to the City. So
she could only ask the way to Dombey and Son’s in the City; and as
she generally made inquiry of children--being afraid to ask grown
people--she got very little satisfaction indeed. But by dint of asking
her way to the City after a while, and dropping the rest of her inquiry
for the present, she really did advance, by slow degrees, toward the
heart of that great region which is governed by the terrible Lord Mayor.
Tired of walking, repulsed and pushed about, stunned by the noise and
confusion, anxious for her brother and the nurses, terrified by what
she had undergone, and the prospect of encountering her angry father
in such an altered state; perplexed and frightened alike by what had
passed, and what was passing, and what was yet before her, Florence
went upon her weary way with tearful eyes, and once or twice could not
help stopping to ease her bursting heart by crying bitterly. But few
people noticed her at those times, in the garb she wore; or if they
did, believed that she was tutored to excite compassion, and passed on.
Florence, too, called to her aid all the firmness and self-reliance of
a character that her sad experience had prematurely formed and tried;
and keeping the end she had in view steadily before her, steadily
pursued it.
It was full two hours later in the afternoon than when she had started
on this strange adventure, when, escaping from the clash and clangor
of a narrow street full of carts and wagons, she peeped into a kind of
wharf or landing-place upon the riverside, where there were a great
many packages, casks, and boxes strewn about; a large pair of wooden
scales; and a little wooden house on wheels, outside of which, looking
at the neighboring masts and boats, a stout man stood whistling, with
his pen behind his ear, and his hands in his pockets, as if his day’s
work were nearly done.
“Now then!” said this man, happening to turn round. “We haven’t got
anything for you, little girl. Be off!”
“If you please, is this the City?” asked the trembling daughter of the
Dombeys.
“Ah! it’s the City. You know that well enough, I dare say. Be off! We
haven’t got anything for you.”
“I don’t want anything, thank you,” was the timid answer. “Except to
know the way to Dombey and Son’s.”
The man who had been strolling carelessly toward her, seemed surprised
by this reply, and looking attentively in her face, rejoined:
“Why, what can _you_ want with Dombey and Son’s?”
“To know the way there, if you please.”
The man looked at her yet more curiously, and rubbed the back of his
head so hard in his wonderment that he knocked his own hat off.
“Joe!” he called to another man--a laborer--as he picked it up and put
it on again.
“Joe it is!” said Joe.
“Where’s that young spark of Dombey’s who’s been watching the shipment
of them goods?”
“Just gone, by the t’other gate,” said Joe.
“Call him back a minute.”
Joe ran up an archway, bawling as he went, and very soon returned with
a blithe-looking boy.
“You’re Dombey’s jockey, an’t you?” said the first man.
“I’m in Dombey’s House, Mr. Clark,” returned the boy.
“Look ye here, then,” said Mr. Clark.
Obedient to the indication of Mr. Clark’s hand, the boy approached
toward Florence, wondering, as well he might, what he had to do with
her. But she, who had heard what passed, and who, besides the relief
of so suddenly considering herself safe at her journey’s end, felt
reassured beyond all measure by his lively youthful face and manner,
ran eagerly up to him, leaving one of the slipshod shoes upon the
ground and caught his hand in both of hers.
“I am lost, if you please!” said Florence.
“Lost!” cried the boy.
“Yes, I was lost this morning, a long way from here--and I have had my
clothes taken away, since--and I am not dressed in my own now--and my
name is Florence Dombey, my little brother’s only sister--and, oh dear,
dear, take care of me, if you please!” sobbed Florence, giving full
vent to the childish feelings she had so long suppressed, and bursting
into tears. At the same time her miserable bonnet falling off, her hair
came tumbling down about her face: moving to speechless admiration
and commiseration, young Walter, nephew of Solomon Gills, ships’
instrument-maker in general.
Mr. Clark stood rapt in amazement: observing under his breath, _I_
never saw such a start on _this_ wharf before. Walter picked up
the shoe, and put it on the little foot as the Prince in the story
might have fitted Cinderella’s slipper on. He hung the rabbit-skin over
his left arm; gave the right to Florence; and felt, not to say like
Richard Whittington--that is a tame comparison--but like Saint George
of England, with the dragon lying dead before him.
“Don’t cry, Miss Dombey,” said Walter, in a transport of enthusiasm.
“What a wonderful thing for me that I am here. You are as safe now
as if you were guarded by a whole boat’s crew of picked men from a
man-of-war. Oh, don’t cry.”
“I won’t cry any more,” said Florence. “I am only crying for joy.”
“Crying for joy!” thought Walter, “and I’m the cause of it! Come along,
Miss Dombey. There’s the other shoe off now! Take mine, Miss Dombey.”
“No, no, no,” said Florence, checking him in the act of impetuously
pulling off his own. “These do better. These do very well.”
“Why, to be sure,” said Walter, glancing at her foot, “mine are a
mile too large. What am I thinking about! You never could walk in
_mine_! Come along, Miss Dombey. Let me see the villain who will
dare molest you now.”
So Walter, looking immensely fierce, led off Florence, looking
very happy; and they went arm in arm along the streets, perfectly
indifferent to any astonishment that their appearance might or did
excite by the way.
* * * * *
Then, though it was growing dark and foggy, Florence was perfectly
happy, and Walter felt that he was a knight escorting a princess to her
father’s castle.
PAUL DOMBEY AT BRIGHTON
LITTLE Paul Dombey was only six and very small for his age, when his
father sent him to a boarding-school at Brighton. The head master’s
name was Blimber, and he prided himself on giving information to his
pupils at all times. Here is a scene at the dinner table.
* * * * *
Doctor Blimber was already in his place in the dining-room, at the top
of the table, with Miss Blimber and Mrs. Blimber on either side of him.
Mr. Feeder in a black coat was at the bottom. Paul’s chair was next to
Miss Blimber; but it being found, when he sat in it, that his eyebrows
were not much above the level of the table-cloth, some books were
brought in from the Doctor’s study, on which he was elevated, and on
which he always sat from that time--carrying them in and out himself on
after occasions, like a little elephant and castle.
Grace having been said by the Doctor, dinner began. There was some
nice soup; also roast meat, boiled meat, vegetables, pie, and cheese.
Every young gentleman had a massive silver fork, and a napkin; and all
the arrangements were stately and handsome. In particular, there was
a butler in a blue coat and bright buttons, who gave quite a winey
flavor to the table beer; he poured it out so superbly.
Nobody spoke, unless spoken to, except Doctor Blimber, Mrs. Blimber,
and Miss Blimber, who conversed occasionally. Whenever a young
gentleman was not actually engaged with his knife and fork or spoon,
his eye, with an irresistible attraction, sought the eye of Doctor
Blimber, Mrs. Blimber, or Miss Blimber, and modestly rested there.
Toots appeared to be the only exception to this rule. He sat next Mr.
Feeder on Paul’s side of the table, and frequently looked behind and
before the intervening boys to catch a glimpse of Paul.
Only once during dinner was there any conversation that included the
young gentlemen. It happened at the epoch of the cheese, when the
Doctor, having taken a glass of port wine and hemmed twice or thrice,
said: