'Therefore, of course my brother Paul has done what was to be expected
of him, and what anybody might have foreseen he would do, if he entered the
marriage state again. I confess it takes me rather by surprise, however
gratifying; because when Paul went out of town I had no idea at all that he
would form any attachment out of town, and he certainly had no attachment
when he left here. However, it seems to be extremely desirable in every
point of view. I have no doubt the mother is a most genteel and elegant
creature, and I have no right whatever to dispute the policy of her living
with them: which is Paul's affair, not mine - and as to Paul's choice,
herself, I have only seen her picture yet, but that is beautiful indeed. Her
name is beautiful too,' said Mrs Chick, shaking her head with energy, and
arranging herself in her chair; 'Edith is at once uncommon, as it strikes
me, and distinguished. Consequently, Lucretia, I have no doubt you will be
happy to hear that the marriage is to take place immediately - of course,
you will:' great emphasis again: 'and that you are delighted with this
change in the condition of my brother, who has shown you a great deal of
pleasant attention at various times.'
Miss Tox made no verbal answer, but took up the little watering-pot
with a trembling hand, and looked vacantly round as if considering what
article of furniture would be improved by the contents. The room door
opening at this crisis of Miss Tox's feelings, she started, laughed aloud,
and fell into the arms of the person entering; happily insensible alike of
Mrs Chick's indignant countenance and of the Major at his window over the
way, who had his double-barrelled eye-glass in full action, and whose face
and figure were dilated with Mephistophelean joy.
Not so the expatriated Native, amazed supporter of Miss Tox's swooning
form, who, coming straight upstairs, with a polite inquiry touching Miss
Tox's health (in exact pursuance of the Major's malicious instructions), had
accidentally arrived in the very nick of time to catch the delicate burden
in his arms, and to receive the content' of the little watering-pot in his
shoe; both of which circumstances, coupled with his consciousness of being
closely watched by the wrathful Major, who had threatened the usual penalty
in regard of every bone in his skin in case of any failure, combined to
render him a moving spectacle of mental and bodily distress.
For some moments, this afflicted foreigner remained clasping Miss Tox
to his heart, with an energy of action in remarkable opposition to his
disconcerted face, while that poor lady trickled slowly down upon him the
very last sprinklings of the little watering-pot, as if he were a delicate
exotic (which indeed he was), and might be almost expected to blow while the
gentle rain descended. Mrs Chick, at length recovering sufficient presence
of mind to interpose, commanded him to drop Miss Tox upon the sofa and
withdraw; and the exile promptly obeying, she applied herself to promote
Miss Tox's recovery.
But none of that gentle concern which usually characterises the
daughters of Eve in their tending of each other; none of that freemasonry in
fainting, by which they are generally bound together In a mysterious bond of
sisterhood; was visible in Mrs Chick's demeanour. Rather like the
executioner who restores the victim to sensation previous to proceeding with
the torture (or was wont to do so, in the good old times for which all true
men wear perpetual mourning), did Mrs Chick administer the smelling-bottle,
the slapping on the hands, the dashing of cold water on the face, and the
other proved remedies. And when, at length, Miss Tox opened her eyes, and
gradually became restored to animation and consciousness, Mrs Chick drew off
as from a criminal, and reversing the precedent of the murdered king of
Denmark, regarded her more in anger than In sorrow.'
'Lucretia!' said Mrs Chick 'I will not attempt to disguise what I feel.
My eyes are opened, all at once. I wouldn't have believed this, if a Saint
had told it to me.
'I am foolish to give way to faintness,' Miss Tox faltered. 'I shall be
better presently.'
'You will be better presently, Lucretia!' repeated Mrs Chick, with
exceeding scorn. 'Do you suppose I am blind? Do you imagine I am in my
second childhood? No, Lucretia! I am obliged to you!'
Miss Tox directed an imploring, helpless kind of look towards her
friend, and put her handkerchief before her face.
'If anyone had told me this yesterday,' said Mrs Chick, with majesty,
'or even half-an-hour ago, I should have been tempted, I almost believe, to
strike them to the earth. Lucretia Tox, my eyes are opened to you all at
once. The scales:' here Mrs Chick cast down an imaginary pair, such as are
commonly used in grocers' shops: 'have fallen from my sight. The blindness
of my confidence is past, Lucretia. It has been abused and played, upon, and
evasion is quite out of the question now, I assure you.
'Oh! to what do you allude so cruelly, my love?' asked Miss Tox,
through her tears.
'Lucretia,' said Mrs Chick, 'ask your own heart. I must entreat you not
to address me by any such familiar term as you have just used, if you
please. I have some self-respect left, though you may think otherwise.'
'Oh, Louisa!' cried Miss Tox. 'How can you speak to me like that?'
'How can I speak to you like that?' retorted Mrs Chick, who, in default
of having any particular argument to sustain herself upon, relied
principally on such repetitions for her most withering effects. 'Like that!
You may well say like that, indeed!'
Miss Tox sobbed pitifully.
'The idea!' said Mrs Chick, 'of your having basked at my brother's
fireside, like a serpent, and wound yourself, through me, almost into his
confidence, Lucretia, that you might, in secret, entertain designs upon him,
and dare to aspire to contemplate the possibility of his uniting himself to
you! Why, it is an idea,' said Mrs Chick, with sarcastic dignity, 'the
absurdity of which almost relieves its treachery.'
'Pray, Louisa,' urged Miss Tox, 'do not say such dreadful things.'
'Dreadful things!' repeated Mrs Chick. 'Dreadful things! Is it not a
fact, Lucretia, that you have just now been unable to command your feelings
even before me, whose eyes you had so completely closed?'
'I have made no complaint,' sobbed Miss Tox. 'I have said nothing. If I
have been a little overpowered by your news, Louisa, and have ever had any
lingering thought that Mr Dombey was inclined to be particular towards me,
surely you will not condemn me.'
'She is going to say,' said Mrs Chick, addressing herself to the whole
of the furniture, in a comprehensive glance of resignation and appeal, 'She
is going to say - I know it - that I have encouraged her!'
'I don't wish to exchange reproaches, dear Louisa,' sobbed Miss Tox
'Nor do I wish to complain. But, in my own defence - '
'Yes,' cried Mrs Chick, looking round the room with a prophetic smile,
'that's what she's going to say. I knew it. You had better say it. Say it
openly! Be open, Lucretia Tox,' said Mrs Chick, with desperate sternness,
'whatever you are.'
'In my own defence,' faltered Miss Tox, 'and only In my own defence
against your unkind words, my dear Louisa, I would merely ask you if you
haven't often favoured such a fancy, and even said it might happen, for
anything we could tell?'
'There is a point,' said Mrs Chick, rising, not as if she were going to
stop at the floor, but as if she were about to soar up, high, into her
native skies, 'beyond which endurance becomes ridiculous, if not culpable. I
can bear much; but not too much. What spell was on me when I came into this
house this day, I don't know; but I had a presentiment - a dark
presentiment,' said Mrs Chick, with a shiver, 'that something was going to
happen. Well may I have had that foreboding, Lucretia, when my confidence of
many years is destroyed in an instant, when my eyes are opened all at once,
and when I find you revealed in your true colours. Lucretia, I have been
mistaken in you. It is better for us both that this subject should end here.
I wish you well, and I shall ever wish you well. But, as an individual who
desires to be true to herself in her own poor position, whatever that
position may be, or may not be - and as the sister of my brother - and as
the sister-in-law of my brother's wife - and as a connexion by marriage of
my brother's wife's mother - may I be permitted to add, as a Dombey? - I can
wish you nothing else but good morning.'
These words, delivered with cutting suavity, tempered and chastened by
a lofty air of moral rectitude, carried the speaker to the door. There she
inclined her head in a ghostly and statue-like manner, and so withdrew to
her carriage, to seek comfort and consolation in the arms of Mr Chick, her
lord.
Figuratively speaking, that is to say; for the arms of Mr Chick were
full of his newspaper. Neither did that gentleman address his eyes towards
his wife otherwise than by stealth. Neither did he offer any consolation
whatever. In short, he sat reading, and humming fag ends of tunes, and
sometimes glancing furtively at her without delivering himself of a word,
good, bad, or indifferent.
In the meantime Mrs Chick sat swelling and bridling, and tossing her
head, as if she were still repeating that solemn formula of farewell to
Lucretia Tox. At length, she said aloud, 'Oh the extent to which her eyes
had been opened that day!'
'To which your eyes have been opened, my dear!' repeated Mr Chick.
'Oh, don't talk to me!' said Mrs Chic 'if you can bear to see me in
this state, and not ask me what the matter is, you had better hold your
tongue for ever.'
'What is the matter, my dear?' asked Mr Chick
'To think,' said Mrs Chick, in a state of soliloquy, 'that she should
ever have conceived the base idea of connecting herself with our family by a
marriage with Paul! To think that when she was playing at horses with that
dear child who is now in his grave - I never liked it at the time - she
should have been hiding such a double-faced design! I wonder she was never
afraid that something would happen to her. She is fortunate if nothing
does.'
'I really thought, my dear,' said Mr Chick slowly, after rubbing the
bridge of his nose for some time with his newspaper, 'that you had gone on
the same tack yourself, all along, until this morning; and had thought it
would be a convenient thing enough, if it could have been brought about.'
Mrs Chick instantly burst into tears, and told Mr Chick that if he
wished to trample upon her with his boots, he had better do It.
'But with Lucretia Tox I have done,' said Mrs Chick, after abandoning
herself to her feelings for some minutes, to Mr Chick's great terror. 'I can
bear to resign Paul's confidence in favour of one who, I hope and trust, may
be deserving of it, and with whom he has a perfect right to replace poor
Fanny if he chooses; I can bear to be informed, In Paul's cool manner, of
such a change in his plans, and never to be consulted until all is settled
and determined; but deceit I can not bear, and with Lucretia Tox I have
done. It is better as it is,' said Mrs Chick, piously; 'much better. It
would have been a long time before I could have accommodated myself
comfortably with her, after this; and I really don't know, as Paul is going
to be very grand, and these are people of condition, that she would have
been quite presentable, and might not have compromised myself. There's a
providence in everything; everything works for the best; I have been tried
today but on the whole I do not regret it.'
In which Christian spirit, Mrs Chick dried her eyes and smoothed her
lap, and sat as became a person calm under a great wrong. Mr Chick feeling
his unworthiness no doubt, took an early opportunity of being set down at a
street corner and walking away whistling, with his shoulders very much
raised, and his hands in his pockets.
While poor excommunicated Miss Tox, who, if she were a fawner and
toad-eater, was at least an honest and a constant one, and had ever borne a
faithful friendship towards her impeacher and had been truly absorbed and
swallowed up in devotion to the magnificence of Mr Dombey - while poor
excommunicated Miss Tox watered her plants with her tears, and felt that it
was winter in Princess's Place.
The interval before the Marriage
Although the enchanted house was no more, and the working world had
broken into it, and was hammering and crashing and tramping up and down
stairs all day long keeping Diogenes in an incessant paroxysm of barking,
from sunrise to sunset - evidently convinced that his enemy had got the
better of him at last, and was then sacking the premises in triumphant
defiance - there was, at first, no other great change in the method of
Florence's life. At night, when the workpeople went away, the house was
dreary and deserted again; and Florence, listening to their voices echoing
through the hall and staircase as they departed, pictured to herself the
cheerful homes to which the were returning, and the children who were
waiting for them, and was glad to think that they were merry and well
pleased to go.
She welcomed back the evening silence as an old friend, but it came now
with an altered face, and looked more kindly on her. Fresh hope was in it.
The beautiful lady who had soothed and carressed her, in the very room in
which her heart had been so wrung, was a spirit of promise to her. Soft
shadows of the bright life dawning, when her father's affection should be
gradually won, and all, or much should be restored, of what she had lost on
the dark day when a mother's love had faded with a mother's last breath on
her cheek, moved about her in the twilight and were welcome company. Peeping
at the rosy children her neighbours, it was a new and precious sensation to
think that they might soon speak together and know each other; when she
would not fear, as of old, to show herself before them, lest they should be
grieved to see her in her black dress sitting there alone!
In her thoughts of her new mother, and in the love and trust
overflowing her pure heart towards her, Florence loved her own dead mother
more and more. She had no fear of setting up a rival in her breast. The new
flower sprang from the deep-planted and long-cherished root, she knew. Every
gentle word that had fallen from the lips of the beautiful lady, sounded to
Florence like an echo of the voice long hushed and silent. How could she
love that memory less for living tenderness, when it was her memory of all
parental tenderness and love!
Florence was, one day, sitting reading in her room, and thinking of the
lady and her promised visit soon - for her book turned on a kindred subject
- when, raising her eyes, she saw her standing in the doorway.
'Mama!' cried Florence, joyfully meeting her. 'Come again!'
'Not Mama yet,' returned the lady, with a serious smile, as she
encircled Florence's neck with her arm.
'But very soon to be,' cried Florence.
'Very soon now, Florence: very soon.
Edith bent her head a little, so as to press the blooming cheek of
Florence against her own, and for some few moments remained thus silent.
There was something so very tender in her manner, that Florence was even
more sensible of it than on the first occasion of their meeting.
She led Florence to a chair beside her, and sat down: Florence looking
in her face, quite wondering at its beauty, and willingly leaving her hand
In hers.
'Have you been alone, Florence, since I was here last?'
'Oh yes!' smiled Florence, hastily.
She hesitated and cast down her eyes; for her new Mama was very earnest
in her look, and the look was intently and thoughtfully fixed upon her face.
'I - I- am used to be alone,' said Florence. 'I don't mind it at all.
Di and I pass whole days together, sometimes.' Florence might have said,
whole weeks and months.
'Is Di your maid, love?'
'My dog, Mama,' said Florence, laughing. 'Susan is my maid.'
'And these are your rooms,' said Edith, looking round. 'I was not shown
these rooms the other day. We must have them improved, Florence. They shall
be made the prettiest in the house.'
'If I might change them, Mama,' returned Florence; 'there is one
upstairs I should like much better.'
'Is this not high enough, dear girl?' asked Edith, smiling.
'The other was my brother's room,' said Florence, 'and I am very fond
of it. I would have spoken to Papa about it when I came home, and found the
workmen here, and everything changing; but - '
Florence dropped her eyes, lest the same look should make her falter
again.
'but I was afraid it might distress him; and as you said you would be
here again soon, Mama, and are the mistress of everything, I determined to
take courage and ask you.'
Edith sat looking at her, with her brilliant eyes intent upon her face,
until Florence raising her own, she, in her turn, withdrew her gaze, and
turned it on the ground. It was then that Florence thought how different
this lady's beauty was, from what she had supposed. She had thought it of a
proud and lofty kind; yet her manner was so subdued and gentle, that if she
had been of Florence's own age and character, it scarcely could have invited
confidence more.
Except when a constrained and singular reserve crept over her; and then
she seemed (but Florence hardly understood this, though she could not choose
but notice it, and think about it) as if she were humbled before Florence,
and ill at ease. When she had said that she was not her Mama yet, and when
Florence had called her the mistress of everything there, this change in her
was quick and startling; and now, while the eyes of Florence rested on her
face, she sat as though she would have shrunk and hidden from her, rather
than as one about to love and cherish her, in right of such a near
connexion.
She gave Florence her ready promise, about her new room, and said she
would give directions about it herself. She then asked some questions
concerning poor Paul; and when they had sat in conversation for some time,
told Florence she had come to take her to her own home.
'We have come to London now, my mother and I,' said Edith, 'and you
shall stay with us until I am married. I wish that we should know and trust
each other, Florence.'
'You are very kind to me,' said Florence, 'dear Mama. How much I thank
you!'
'Let me say now, for it may be the best opportunity,' continued Edith,
looking round to see that they were quite alone, and speaking in a lower
voice, 'that when I am married, and have gone away for some weeks, I shall
be easier at heart if you will come home here. No matter who invites you to
stay elsewhere. Come home here. It is better to be alone than - what I would
say is,' she added, checking herself, 'that I know well you are best at
home, dear Florence.'
'I will come home on the very day, Mama'
'Do so. I rely on that promise. Now, prepare to come with me, dear
girl. You will find me downstairs when you are ready.'
Slowly and thoughtfully did Edith wander alone through the mansion of
which she was so soon to be the lady: and little heed took she of all the
elegance and splendour it began to display. The same indomitable haughtiness
of soul, the same proud scorn expressed in eye and lip, the same fierce
beauty, only tamed by a sense of its own little worth, and of the little
worth of everything around it, went through the grand saloons and halls,
that had got loose among the shady trees, and raged and rent themselves. The
mimic roses on the walls and floors were set round with sharp thorns, that
tore her breast; in every scrap of gold so dazzling to the eye, she saw some
hateful atom of her purchase-money; the broad high mirrors showed her, at
full length, a woman with a noble quality yet dwelling in her nature, who
was too false to her better self, and too debased and lost, to save herself.
She believed that all this was so plain, more or less, to all eyes, that she
had no resource or power of self-assertion but in pride: and with this
pride, which tortured her own heart night and day, she fought her fate out,
braved it, and defied it.
Was this the woman whom Florence - an innocent girl, strong only in her
earnestness and simple truth - could so impress and quell, that by her side
she was another creature, with her tempest of passion hushed, and her very
pride itself subdued? Was this the woman who now sat beside her in a
carriage, with her arms entwined, and who, while she courted and entreated
her to love and trust her, drew her fair head to nestle on her breast, and
would have laid down life to shield it from wrong or harm?
Oh, Edith! it were well to die, indeed, at such a time! Better and
happier far, perhaps, to die so, Edith, than to live on to the end!
The Honourable Mrs Skewton, who was thinking of anything rather than of
such sentiments - for, like many genteel persons who have existed at various
times, she set her face against death altogether, and objected to the
mention of any such low and levelling upstart - had borrowed a house in
Brook Street, Grosvenor Square, from a stately relative (one of the Feenix
brood), who was out of town, and who did not object to lending it, in the
handsomest manner, for nuptial purposes, as the loan implied his final
release and acquittance from all further loans and gifts to Mrs Skewton and
her daughter. It being necessary for the credit of the family to make a
handsome appearance at such a time, Mrs Skewton, with the assistance of an
accommodating tradesman resident In the parish of Mary-le-bone, who lent out
all sorts of articles to the nobility and gentry, from a service of plate to
an army of footmen, clapped into this house a silver-headed butler (who was
charged extra on that account, as having the appearnce of an ancient family
retainer), two very tall young men in livery, and a select staff of
kitchen-servants; so that a legend arose, downstairs, that Withers the page,
released at once from his numerous household duties, and from the propulsion
of the wheeled-chair (inconsistent with the metropolis), had been several
times observed to rub his eyes and pinch his limbs, as if he misdoubted his
having overslept himself at the Leamington milkman's, and being still in a
celestial dream. A variety of requisites in plate and china being also
conveyed to the same establishment from the same convenient source, with
several miscellaneous articles, including a neat chariot and a pair of bays,
Mrs Skewton cushioned herself on the principal sofa, in the Cleopatra
attitude, and held her court in fair state.
'And how,' said Mrs Skewton, on the entrance of her daughter and her
charge, 'is my charming Florence? You must come and kiss me, Florence, if
you please, my love.'
Florence was timidly stooping to pick out a place In the white part of
Mrs Skewton's face, when that lady presented her ear, and relieved her of
her difficulty.
'Edith, my dear,' said Mrs Skewton, 'positively, I - stand a little
more in the light, my sweetest Florence, for a moment.
Florence blushingly complied.
'You don't remember, dearest Edith,' said her mother, 'what you were
when you were about the same age as our exceedingly precious Florence, or a
few years younger?'
'I have long forgotten, mother.'
'For positively, my dear,' said Mrs Skewton, 'I do think that I see a
decided resemblance to what you were then, in our extremely fascinating
young friend. And it shows,' said Mrs Skewton, in a lower voice, which
conveyed her opinion that Florence was in a very unfinished state, 'what
cultivation will do.'
'It does, indeed,' was Edith's stern reply.
Her mother eyed her sharply for a moment, and feeling herself on unsafe
ground, said, as a diversion:
'My charming Florence, you must come and kiss me once more, if you
please, my love.'
Florence complied, of course, and again imprinted her lips on Mrs
Skewton's ear.
'And you have heard, no doubt, my darling pet,' said Mrs Skewton,
detaining her hand, 'that your Papa, whom we all perfectly adore and dote
upon, is to be married to my dearest Edith this day week.'
'I knew it would be very soon,' returned Florence, 'but not exactly
when.'
'My darling Edith,' urged her mother, gaily, 'is it possible you have
not told Florence?'
'Why should I tell Florence?' she returned, so suddenly and harshly,
that Florence could scarcely believe it was the same voice.
Mrs Skewton then told Florence, as another and safer diversion, that
her father was coming to dinner, and that he would no doubt be charmingly
surprised to see her; as he had spoken last night of dressing in the City,
and had known nothing of Edith's design, the execution of which, according
to Mrs Skewton's expectation, would throw him into a perfect ecstasy.
Florence was troubled to hear this; and her distress became so keen, as the
dinner-hour approached, that if she had known how to frame an entreaty to be
suffered to return home, without involving her father in her explanation,
she would have hurried back on foot, bareheaded, breathless, and alone,
rather than incur the risk of meeting his displeasure.
As the time drew nearer, she could hardly breathe. She dared not
approach a window, lest he should see her from the street. She dared not go
upstairs to hide her emotion, lest, in passing out at the door, she should
meet him unexpectedly; besides which dread, she felt as though she never
could come back again if she were summoned to his presence. In this conflict
of fears; she was sitting by Cleopatra's couch, endeavouring to understand
and to reply to the bald discourse of that lady, when she heard his foot
upon the stair.
'I hear him now!' cried Florence, starting. 'He is coming!'
Cleopatra, who in her juvenility was always playfully disposed, and who
in her self-engrossment did not trouble herself about the nature of this
agitation, pushed Florence behind her couch, and dropped a shawl over her,
preparatory to giving Mr Dombey a rapture of surprise. It was so quickly
done, that in a moment Florence heard his awful step in the room.
He saluted his intended mother-in-law, and his intended bride. The
strange sound of his voice thrilled through the whole frame of his child.
'My dear Dombey,' said Cleopatra, 'come here and tell me how your
pretty Florence is.'
'Florence is very well,' said Mr Dombey, advancing towards the couch.
'At home?'
'At home,' said Mr Dombey.
'My dear Dombey,' returned Cleopatra, with bewitching vivacity; 'now
are you sure you are not deceiving me? I don't know what my dearest Edith
will say to me when I make such a declaration, but upon my honour I am
afraid you are the falsest of men, my dear Dombey.'
Though he had been; and had been detected on the spot, in the most
enormous falsehood that was ever said or done; he could hardly have been
more disconcerted than he was, when Mrs Skewton plucked the shawl away, and
Florence, pale and trembling, rose before him like a ghost. He had not yet
recovered his presence of mind, when Florence had run up to him, clasped her
hands round his neck, kissed his face, and hurried out of the room. He
looked round as if to refer the matter to somebody else, but Edith had gone
after Florence, instantly.
'Now, confess, my dear Dombey,' said Mrs Skewton, giving him her hand,
'that you never were more surprised and pleased in your life.'
'I never was more surprised,' said Mr Dombey.
'Nor pleased, my dearest Dombey?' returned Mrs Skewton, holding up her
fan.
'I - yes, I am exceedingly glad to meet Florence here,' said Mr Dombey.
He appeared to consider gravely about it for a moment, and then said, more
decidedly, 'Yes, I really am very glad indeed to meet Florence here.'
'You wonder how she comes here?' said Mrs Skewton, 'don't you?'
'Edith, perhaps - ' suggested Mr Dombey.
'Ah! wicked guesser!' replied Cleopatra, shaking her head. 'Ah!
cunning, cunning man! One shouldn't tell these things; your sex, my dear
Dombey, are so vain, and so apt to abuse our weakness; but you know my open
soul - very well; immediately.'
This was addressed to one of the very tall young men who announced
dinner.
'But Edith, my dear Dombey,' she continued in a whisper, when she
cannot have you near her - and as I tell her, she cannot expect that always
- will at least have near her something or somebody belonging to you. Well,
how extremely natural that is! And in this spirit, nothing would keep her
from riding off to-day to fetch our darling Florence. Well, how excessively
charming that is!'
As she waited for an answer, Mr Dombey answered, 'Eminently so.
'Bless you, my dear Dombey, for that proof of heart!' cried Cleopatra,
squeezing his hand. 'But I am growing too serious! Take me downstairs, like
an angel, and let us see what these people intend to give us for dinner.
Bless you, dear Dombey!'
Cleopatra skipping off her couch with tolerable briskness, after the
last benediction, Mr Dombey took her arm in his and led her ceremoniously
downstairs; one of the very tall young men on hire, whose organ of
veneration was imperfectly developed, thrusting his tongue into his cheek,
for the entertainment of the other very tall young man on hire, as the
couple turned into the dining-room.
Florence and Edith were already there, and sitting side by side.
Florence would have risen when her father entered, to resign her chair to
him; but Edith openly put her hand upon her arm, and Mr Dombey took an
opposite place at the round table.
The conversation was almost entirely sustained by Mrs Skewton. Florence
hardly dared to raise her eyes, lest they should reveal the traces of tears;
far less dared to speak; and Edith never uttered one word, unless in answer
to a question. Verily, Cleopatra worked hard, for the establishment that was
so nearly clutched; and verily it should have been a rich one to reward her!
And so your preparations are nearly finished at last, my dear Dombey?'
said Cleopatra, when the dessert was put upon the table, and the
silver-headed butler had withdrawn. 'Even the lawyers' preparations!'
'Yes, madam,' replied Mr Dombey; 'the deed of settlement, the
professional gentlemen inform me, is now ready, and as I was mentioning to
you, Edith has only to do us the favour to suggest her own time for its
execution.'
Edith sat like a handsome statue; as cold, as silent, and as still.
'My dearest love,' said Cleopatra, 'do you hear what Mr Dombey says?
Ah, my dear Dombey!' aside to that gentleman, 'how her absence, as the time
approaches, reminds me of the days, when that most agreeable of creatures,
her Papa, was in your situation!'
'I have nothing to suggest. It shall be when you please,' said Edith,
scarcely looking over the table at Mr Dombey.
'To-morrow?' suggested Mr Dombey.
'If you please.'
'Or would next day,' said Mr Dombey, 'suit your engagements better?'
'I have no engagements. I am always at your disposal. Let it be when
you like.'
'No engagements, my dear Edith!' remonstrated her mother, 'when you are
in a most terrible state of flurry all day long, and have a thousand and one
appointments with all sorts of trades-people!'
'They are of your making,' returned Edith, turning on her with a slight
contraction of her brow. 'You and Mr Dombey can arrange between you.'
'Very true indeed, my love, and most considerate of you!' said
Cleopatra. 'My darling Florence, you must really come and kiss me once more,
if you please, my dear!'
Singular coincidence, that these gushes of interest In Florence hurried
Cleopatra away from almost every dialogue in which Edith had a share,
however trifling! Florence had certainly never undergone so much embracing,
and perhaps had never been, unconsciously, so useful in her life.
Mr Dombey was far from quarrelling, in his own breast, with the manner
of his beautiful betrothed. He had that good reason for sympathy with
haughtiness and coldness, which is found In a fellow-feeling. It flattered
him to think how these deferred to him, in Edith's case, and seemed to have
no will apart from his. It flattered him to picture to himself, this proud
and stately woman doing the honours of his house, and chilling his guests
after his own manner. The dignity of Dombey and Son would be heightened and
maintained, indeed, in such hands.
So thought Mr Dombey, when he was left alone at the dining-table, and
mused upon his past and future fortunes: finding no uncongeniality in an air
of scant and gloomy state that pervaded the room, in colour a dark brown,
with black hatchments of pictures blotching the walls, and twenty-four black
chairs, with almost as many nails in them as so many coffins, waiting like
mutes, upon the threshold of the Turkey carpet; and two exhausted negroes
holding up two withered branches of candelabra on the sideboard, and a musty
smell prevailing as if the ashes of ten thousand dinners were entombed in
the sarcophagus below it. The owner of the house lived much abroad; the air
of England seldom agreed long with a member of the Feenix family; and the
room had gradually put itself into deeper and still deeper mourning for him,
until it was become so funereal as to want nothing but a body in it to be
quite complete.
No bad representation of the body, for the nonce, in his unbending
form, if not in his attitude, Mr Dombey looked down into the cold depths of
the dead sea of mahogany on which the fruit dishes and decanters lay at
anchor: as if the subjects of his thoughts were rising towards the surface
one by one, and plunging down again. Edith was there In all her majesty of
brow and figure; and close to her came Florence, with her timid head turned
to him, as it had been, for an instant, when she left the room; and Edith's
eyes upon her, and Edith's hand put out protectingly. A little figure in a
low arm-chair came springing next into the light, and looked upon him
wonderingly, with its bright eyes and its old-young face, gleaming as in the
flickering of an evening fire. Again came Florence close upon it, and
absorbed his whole attention. Whether as a fore-doomed difficulty and
disappointment to him; whether as a rival who had crossed him in his way,
and might again; whether as his child, of whom, in his successful wooing, he
could stoop to think as claiming, at such a time, to be no more estranged;
or whether as a hint to him that the mere appearance of caring for his own
blood should be maintained in his new relations; he best knew. Indifferently
well, perhaps, at best; for marriage company and marriage altars, and
ambitious scenes - still blotted here and there with Florence - always
Florence - turned up so fast, and so confusedly, that he rose, and went
upstairs to escape them.
It was quite late at night before candles were brought; for at present
they made Mrs Skewton's head ache, she complained; and in the meantime
Florence and Mrs Skewton talked together (Cleopatra being very anxious to
keep her close to herself), or Florence touched the piano softly for Mrs
Skewton's delight; to make no mention of a few occasions in the course of
the evening, when that affectionate lady was impelled to solicit another
kiss, and which always happened after Edith had said anything. They were not
many, however, for Edith sat apart by an open window during the whole time
(in spite of her mother's fears that she would take cold), and remained
there until Mr Dombey took leave. He was serenely gracious to Florence when
he did so; and Florence went to bed in a room within Edith's, so happy and
hopeful, that she thought of her late self as if it were some other poor
deserted girl who was to be pitied for her sorrow; and in her pity, sobbed
herself to sleep.
The week fled fast. There were drives to milliners, dressmakers,
jewellers, lawyers, florists, pastry-cooks; and Florence was always of the
party. Florence was to go to the wedding. Florence was to cast off her
mourning, and to wear a brilliant dress on the occasion. The milliner's
intentions on the subject of this dress - the milliner was a Frenchwoman,
and greatly resembled Mrs Skewton - were so chaste and elegant, that Mrs
Skewton bespoke one like it for herself. The milliner said it would become
her to admiration, and that all the world would take her for the young
lady's sister.
The week fled faster. Edith looked at nothing and cared for nothing.
Her rich dresses came home, and were tried on, and were loudly commended by
Mrs Skewton and the milliners, and were put away without a word from her.
Mrs Skewton made their plans for every day, and executed them. Sometimes
Edith sat in the carriage when they went to make purchases; sometimes, when
it was absolutely necessary, she went into the shops. But Mrs Skewton
conducted the whole business, whatever it happened to be; and Edith looked
on as uninterested and with as much apparent indifference as if she had no
concern in it. Florence might perhaps have thought she was haughty and
listless, but that she was never so to her. So Florence quenched her wonder
in her gratitude whenever it broke out, and soon subdued it.
The week fled faster. It had nearly winged its flight away. The last
night of the week, the night before the marriage, was come. In the dark room
- for Mrs Skewton's head was no better yet, though she expected to recover
permanently to-morrow - were that lady, Edith, and Mr Dombey. Edith was at
her open window looking out into the street; Mr Dombey and Cleopatra were
talking softly on the sofa. It was growing late; and Florence, being
fatigued, had gone to bed.
'My dear Dombey,' said Cleopatra, 'you will leave me Florence
to-morrow, when you deprive me of my sweetest Edith.'
Mr Dombey said he would, with pleasure.
'To have her about me, here, while you are both at Paris, and to think
at her age, I am assisting in the formation of her mind, my dear Dombey,'
said Cleopatra, 'will be a perfect balm to me in the extremely shattered
state to which I shall be reduced.'
Edith turned her head suddenly. Her listless manner was exchanged, in a
moment, to one of burning interest, and, unseen in the darkness, she
attended closely to their conversation.
Mr Dombey would be delighted to leave Florence in such admirable
guardianship.
'My dear Dombey,' returned Cleopatra, 'a thousand thanks for your good
opinion. I feared you were going, with malice aforethought' as the dreadful
lawyers say - those horrid proses! - to condemn me to utter solitude;'
'Why do me so great an injustice, my dear madam?' said Mr Dombey.
'Because my charming Florence tells me so positively she must go home
tomorrow, returned Cleopatra, that I began to be afraid, my dearest Dombey,
you were quite a Bashaw.'
'I assure you, madam!' said Mr Dombey, 'I have laid no commands on
Florence; and if I had, there are no commands like your wish.'
'My dear Dombey,' replied Cleopatra, what a courtier you are! Though
I'll not say so, either; for courtiers have no heart, and yours pervades
your farming life and character. And are you really going so early, my dear
Dombey!'
Oh, indeed! it was late, and Mr Dombey feared he must.
'Is this a fact, or is it all a dream!' lisped Cleopatra. 'Can I
believe, my dearest Dombey, that you are coming back tomorrow morning to
deprive me of my sweet companion; my own Edith!'
Mr Dombey, who was accustomed to take things literally, reminded Mrs
Skewton that they were to meet first at the church.
'The pang,' said Mrs Skewton, 'of consigning a child, even to you, my
dear Dombey, is one of the most excruciating imaginable, and combined with a
naturally delicate constitution, and the extreme stupidity of the
pastry-cook who has undertaken the breakfast, is almost too much for my poor
strength. But I shall rally, my dear Dombey, In the morning; do not fear for
me, or be uneasy on my account. Heaven bless you! My dearest Edith!' she
cried archly. 'Somebody is going, pet.'
Edith, who had turned her head again towards the window, and whose
interest in their conversation had ceased, rose up in her place, but made no
advance towards him, and said nothing. Mr Dombey, with a lofty gallantry
adapted to his dignity and the occasion, betook his creaking boots towards
her, put her hand to his lips, said, 'Tomorrow morning I shall have the
happiness of claiming this hand as Mrs Dombey's,' and bowed himself solemnly
out.
Mrs Skewton rang for candles as soon as the house-door had closed upon
him. With the candles appeared her maid, with the juvenile dress that was to
delude the world to-morrow. The dress had savage retribution in it, as such
dresses ever have, and made her infinitely older and more hideous than her
greasy flannel gown. But Mrs Skewton tried it on with mincing satisfaction;
smirked at her cadaverous self in the glass, as she thought of its killing
effect upon the Major; and suffering her maid to take it off again, and to
prepare her for repose, tumbled into ruins like a house of painted cards.
All this time, Edith remained at the dark window looking out into the
street. When she and her mother were at last left alone, she moved from it
for the first time that evening, and came opposite to her. The yawning,
shaking, peevish figure of the mother, with her eyes raised to confront the
proud erect form of the daughter, whose glance of fire was bent downward
upon her, had a conscious air upon it, that no levity or temper could
conceal.
'I am tired to death,' said she. 'You can't be trusted for a moment.
You are worse than a child. Child! No child would be half so obstinate and
undutiful.'
'Listen to me, mother,' returned Edith, passing these words by with a
scorn that would not descend to trifle with them. 'You must remain alone
here until I return.'
'Must remain alone here, Edith, until you return!' repeated her mother.
'Or in that name upon which I shall call to-morrow to witness what I
do, so falsely: and so shamefully, I swear I will refuse the hand of this
man in the church. If I do not, may I fall dead upon the pavement!'
The mother answered with a look of quick alarm, in no degree diminished
by the look she met.
'It is enough,' said Edith, steadily, 'that we are what we are. I will
have no youth and truth dragged down to my level. I will have no guileless
nature undermined, corrupted, and perverted, to amuse the leisure of a world
of mothers. You know my meaning. Florence must go home.'
'You are an idiot, Edith,' cried her angry mother. 'Do you expect there
can ever be peace for you in that house, till she is married, and away?'
'Ask me, or ask yourself, if I ever expect peace in that house,' said
her daughter, 'and you know the answer.
'And am I to be told to-night, after all my pains and labour, and when
you are going, through me, to be rendered independent,' her mother almost
shrieked in her passion, while her palsied head shook like a leaf, 'that
there is corruption and contagion in me, and that I am not fit company for a
girl! What are you, pray? What are you?'
'I have put the question to myself,' said Edith, ashy pale, and
pointing to the window, 'more than once when I have been sitting there, and
something in the faded likeness of my sex has wandered past outside; and God
knows I have met with my reply. Oh mother, mother, if you had but left me to
my natural heart when I too was a girl - a younger girl than Florence - how
different I might have been!'
Sensible that any show of anger was useless here, her mother restrained
herself, and fell a whimpering, and bewailed that she had lived too long,
and that her only child had cast her off, and that duty towards parents was
forgotten in these evil days, and that she had heard unnatural taunts, and
cared for life no longer.
'If one is to go on living through continual scenes like this,' she
whined,'I am sure it would be much better for me to think of some means of
putting an end to my existence. Oh! The idea of your being my daughter,
Edith, and addressing me in such a strain!'
'Between us, mother,' returned Edith, mournfully, 'the time for mutual
reproaches is past.
'Then why do you revive it?' whimpered her mother. 'You know that you
are lacerating me in the cruellest manner. You know how sensitive I am to
unkindness. At such a moment, too, when I have so much to think of, and am
naturally anxious to appear to the best advantage! I wonder at you, Edith.
To make your mother a fright upon your wedding-day!'
Edith bent the same fixed look upon her, as she sobbed and rubbed her
eyes; and said in the same low steady voice, which had neither risen nor
fallen since she first addressed her, 'I have said that Florence must go
home.'
'Let her go!' cried the afflicted and affrighted parent, hastily. 'I am
sure I am willing she should go. What is the girl to me?'
'She is so much to me, that rather than communicate, or suffer to be
communicated to her, one grain of the evil that is in my breast, mother, I
would renounce you, as I would (if you gave me cause) renounce him in the
church to-morrow,' replied Edith. 'Leave her alone. She shall not, while I
can interpose, be tampered with and tainted by the lessons I have learned.
This is no hard condition on this bitter night.'
'If you had proposed it in a filial manner, Edith,' whined her mother,
'perhaps not; very likely not. But such extremely cutting words - '
'They are past and at an end between us now,' said Edith. 'Take your
own way, mother; share as you please in what you have gained; spend, enjoy,
make much of it; and be as happy as you will. The object of our lives is
won. Henceforth let us wear it silently. My lips are closed upon the past
from this hour. I forgive you your part in to-morrow's wickedness. May God
forgive my own!'
Without a tremor in her voice, or frame, and passing onward with a foot
that set itself upon the neck of every soft emotion, she bade her mother
good-night, and repaired to her own room.
But not to rest; for there was no rest in the tumult of her agitation
when alone to and fro, and to and fro, and to and fro again, five hundred
times, among the splendid preparations for her adornment on the morrow; with
her dark hair shaken down, her dark eyes flashing with a raging light, her
broad white bosom red with the cruel grasp of the relentless hand with which
she spurned it from her, pacing up and down with an averted head, as if she
would avoid the sight of her own fair person, and divorce herself from its
companionship. Thus, In the dead time of the night before her bridal, Edith
Granger wrestled with her unquiet spirit, tearless, friendless, silent,
proud, and uncomplaining.
At length it happened that she touched the open door which led into the
room where Florence lay.
She started, stopped, and looked in.
A light was burning there, and showed her Florence in her bloom of
innocence and beauty, fast asleep. Edith held her breath, and felt herself
drawn on towards her.
Drawn nearer, nearer, nearer yet; at last, drawn so near, that stooping
down, she pressed her lips to the gentle hand that lay outside the bed, and
put it softly to her neck. Its touch was like the prophet's rod of old upon
the rock. Her tears sprung forth beneath it, as she sunk upon her knees, and
laid her aching head and streaming hair upon the pillow by its side.
Thus Edith Granger passed the night before her bridal. Thus the sun
found her on her bridal morning.
of him, and what anybody might have foreseen he would do, if he entered the
marriage state again. I confess it takes me rather by surprise, however
gratifying; because when Paul went out of town I had no idea at all that he
would form any attachment out of town, and he certainly had no attachment
when he left here. However, it seems to be extremely desirable in every
point of view. I have no doubt the mother is a most genteel and elegant
creature, and I have no right whatever to dispute the policy of her living
with them: which is Paul's affair, not mine - and as to Paul's choice,
herself, I have only seen her picture yet, but that is beautiful indeed. Her
name is beautiful too,' said Mrs Chick, shaking her head with energy, and
arranging herself in her chair; 'Edith is at once uncommon, as it strikes
me, and distinguished. Consequently, Lucretia, I have no doubt you will be
happy to hear that the marriage is to take place immediately - of course,
you will:' great emphasis again: 'and that you are delighted with this
change in the condition of my brother, who has shown you a great deal of
pleasant attention at various times.'
Miss Tox made no verbal answer, but took up the little watering-pot
with a trembling hand, and looked vacantly round as if considering what
article of furniture would be improved by the contents. The room door
opening at this crisis of Miss Tox's feelings, she started, laughed aloud,
and fell into the arms of the person entering; happily insensible alike of
Mrs Chick's indignant countenance and of the Major at his window over the
way, who had his double-barrelled eye-glass in full action, and whose face
and figure were dilated with Mephistophelean joy.
Not so the expatriated Native, amazed supporter of Miss Tox's swooning
form, who, coming straight upstairs, with a polite inquiry touching Miss
Tox's health (in exact pursuance of the Major's malicious instructions), had
accidentally arrived in the very nick of time to catch the delicate burden
in his arms, and to receive the content' of the little watering-pot in his
shoe; both of which circumstances, coupled with his consciousness of being
closely watched by the wrathful Major, who had threatened the usual penalty
in regard of every bone in his skin in case of any failure, combined to
render him a moving spectacle of mental and bodily distress.
For some moments, this afflicted foreigner remained clasping Miss Tox
to his heart, with an energy of action in remarkable opposition to his
disconcerted face, while that poor lady trickled slowly down upon him the
very last sprinklings of the little watering-pot, as if he were a delicate
exotic (which indeed he was), and might be almost expected to blow while the
gentle rain descended. Mrs Chick, at length recovering sufficient presence
of mind to interpose, commanded him to drop Miss Tox upon the sofa and
withdraw; and the exile promptly obeying, she applied herself to promote
Miss Tox's recovery.
But none of that gentle concern which usually characterises the
daughters of Eve in their tending of each other; none of that freemasonry in
fainting, by which they are generally bound together In a mysterious bond of
sisterhood; was visible in Mrs Chick's demeanour. Rather like the
executioner who restores the victim to sensation previous to proceeding with
the torture (or was wont to do so, in the good old times for which all true
men wear perpetual mourning), did Mrs Chick administer the smelling-bottle,
the slapping on the hands, the dashing of cold water on the face, and the
other proved remedies. And when, at length, Miss Tox opened her eyes, and
gradually became restored to animation and consciousness, Mrs Chick drew off
as from a criminal, and reversing the precedent of the murdered king of
Denmark, regarded her more in anger than In sorrow.'
'Lucretia!' said Mrs Chick 'I will not attempt to disguise what I feel.
My eyes are opened, all at once. I wouldn't have believed this, if a Saint
had told it to me.
'I am foolish to give way to faintness,' Miss Tox faltered. 'I shall be
better presently.'
'You will be better presently, Lucretia!' repeated Mrs Chick, with
exceeding scorn. 'Do you suppose I am blind? Do you imagine I am in my
second childhood? No, Lucretia! I am obliged to you!'
Miss Tox directed an imploring, helpless kind of look towards her
friend, and put her handkerchief before her face.
'If anyone had told me this yesterday,' said Mrs Chick, with majesty,
'or even half-an-hour ago, I should have been tempted, I almost believe, to
strike them to the earth. Lucretia Tox, my eyes are opened to you all at
once. The scales:' here Mrs Chick cast down an imaginary pair, such as are
commonly used in grocers' shops: 'have fallen from my sight. The blindness
of my confidence is past, Lucretia. It has been abused and played, upon, and
evasion is quite out of the question now, I assure you.
'Oh! to what do you allude so cruelly, my love?' asked Miss Tox,
through her tears.
'Lucretia,' said Mrs Chick, 'ask your own heart. I must entreat you not
to address me by any such familiar term as you have just used, if you
please. I have some self-respect left, though you may think otherwise.'
'Oh, Louisa!' cried Miss Tox. 'How can you speak to me like that?'
'How can I speak to you like that?' retorted Mrs Chick, who, in default
of having any particular argument to sustain herself upon, relied
principally on such repetitions for her most withering effects. 'Like that!
You may well say like that, indeed!'
Miss Tox sobbed pitifully.
'The idea!' said Mrs Chick, 'of your having basked at my brother's
fireside, like a serpent, and wound yourself, through me, almost into his
confidence, Lucretia, that you might, in secret, entertain designs upon him,
and dare to aspire to contemplate the possibility of his uniting himself to
you! Why, it is an idea,' said Mrs Chick, with sarcastic dignity, 'the
absurdity of which almost relieves its treachery.'
'Pray, Louisa,' urged Miss Tox, 'do not say such dreadful things.'
'Dreadful things!' repeated Mrs Chick. 'Dreadful things! Is it not a
fact, Lucretia, that you have just now been unable to command your feelings
even before me, whose eyes you had so completely closed?'
'I have made no complaint,' sobbed Miss Tox. 'I have said nothing. If I
have been a little overpowered by your news, Louisa, and have ever had any
lingering thought that Mr Dombey was inclined to be particular towards me,
surely you will not condemn me.'
'She is going to say,' said Mrs Chick, addressing herself to the whole
of the furniture, in a comprehensive glance of resignation and appeal, 'She
is going to say - I know it - that I have encouraged her!'
'I don't wish to exchange reproaches, dear Louisa,' sobbed Miss Tox
'Nor do I wish to complain. But, in my own defence - '
'Yes,' cried Mrs Chick, looking round the room with a prophetic smile,
'that's what she's going to say. I knew it. You had better say it. Say it
openly! Be open, Lucretia Tox,' said Mrs Chick, with desperate sternness,
'whatever you are.'
'In my own defence,' faltered Miss Tox, 'and only In my own defence
against your unkind words, my dear Louisa, I would merely ask you if you
haven't often favoured such a fancy, and even said it might happen, for
anything we could tell?'
'There is a point,' said Mrs Chick, rising, not as if she were going to
stop at the floor, but as if she were about to soar up, high, into her
native skies, 'beyond which endurance becomes ridiculous, if not culpable. I
can bear much; but not too much. What spell was on me when I came into this
house this day, I don't know; but I had a presentiment - a dark
presentiment,' said Mrs Chick, with a shiver, 'that something was going to
happen. Well may I have had that foreboding, Lucretia, when my confidence of
many years is destroyed in an instant, when my eyes are opened all at once,
and when I find you revealed in your true colours. Lucretia, I have been
mistaken in you. It is better for us both that this subject should end here.
I wish you well, and I shall ever wish you well. But, as an individual who
desires to be true to herself in her own poor position, whatever that
position may be, or may not be - and as the sister of my brother - and as
the sister-in-law of my brother's wife - and as a connexion by marriage of
my brother's wife's mother - may I be permitted to add, as a Dombey? - I can
wish you nothing else but good morning.'
These words, delivered with cutting suavity, tempered and chastened by
a lofty air of moral rectitude, carried the speaker to the door. There she
inclined her head in a ghostly and statue-like manner, and so withdrew to
her carriage, to seek comfort and consolation in the arms of Mr Chick, her
lord.
Figuratively speaking, that is to say; for the arms of Mr Chick were
full of his newspaper. Neither did that gentleman address his eyes towards
his wife otherwise than by stealth. Neither did he offer any consolation
whatever. In short, he sat reading, and humming fag ends of tunes, and
sometimes glancing furtively at her without delivering himself of a word,
good, bad, or indifferent.
In the meantime Mrs Chick sat swelling and bridling, and tossing her
head, as if she were still repeating that solemn formula of farewell to
Lucretia Tox. At length, she said aloud, 'Oh the extent to which her eyes
had been opened that day!'
'To which your eyes have been opened, my dear!' repeated Mr Chick.
'Oh, don't talk to me!' said Mrs Chic 'if you can bear to see me in
this state, and not ask me what the matter is, you had better hold your
tongue for ever.'
'What is the matter, my dear?' asked Mr Chick
'To think,' said Mrs Chick, in a state of soliloquy, 'that she should
ever have conceived the base idea of connecting herself with our family by a
marriage with Paul! To think that when she was playing at horses with that
dear child who is now in his grave - I never liked it at the time - she
should have been hiding such a double-faced design! I wonder she was never
afraid that something would happen to her. She is fortunate if nothing
does.'
'I really thought, my dear,' said Mr Chick slowly, after rubbing the
bridge of his nose for some time with his newspaper, 'that you had gone on
the same tack yourself, all along, until this morning; and had thought it
would be a convenient thing enough, if it could have been brought about.'
Mrs Chick instantly burst into tears, and told Mr Chick that if he
wished to trample upon her with his boots, he had better do It.
'But with Lucretia Tox I have done,' said Mrs Chick, after abandoning
herself to her feelings for some minutes, to Mr Chick's great terror. 'I can
bear to resign Paul's confidence in favour of one who, I hope and trust, may
be deserving of it, and with whom he has a perfect right to replace poor
Fanny if he chooses; I can bear to be informed, In Paul's cool manner, of
such a change in his plans, and never to be consulted until all is settled
and determined; but deceit I can not bear, and with Lucretia Tox I have
done. It is better as it is,' said Mrs Chick, piously; 'much better. It
would have been a long time before I could have accommodated myself
comfortably with her, after this; and I really don't know, as Paul is going
to be very grand, and these are people of condition, that she would have
been quite presentable, and might not have compromised myself. There's a
providence in everything; everything works for the best; I have been tried
today but on the whole I do not regret it.'
In which Christian spirit, Mrs Chick dried her eyes and smoothed her
lap, and sat as became a person calm under a great wrong. Mr Chick feeling
his unworthiness no doubt, took an early opportunity of being set down at a
street corner and walking away whistling, with his shoulders very much
raised, and his hands in his pockets.
While poor excommunicated Miss Tox, who, if she were a fawner and
toad-eater, was at least an honest and a constant one, and had ever borne a
faithful friendship towards her impeacher and had been truly absorbed and
swallowed up in devotion to the magnificence of Mr Dombey - while poor
excommunicated Miss Tox watered her plants with her tears, and felt that it
was winter in Princess's Place.
The interval before the Marriage
Although the enchanted house was no more, and the working world had
broken into it, and was hammering and crashing and tramping up and down
stairs all day long keeping Diogenes in an incessant paroxysm of barking,
from sunrise to sunset - evidently convinced that his enemy had got the
better of him at last, and was then sacking the premises in triumphant
defiance - there was, at first, no other great change in the method of
Florence's life. At night, when the workpeople went away, the house was
dreary and deserted again; and Florence, listening to their voices echoing
through the hall and staircase as they departed, pictured to herself the
cheerful homes to which the were returning, and the children who were
waiting for them, and was glad to think that they were merry and well
pleased to go.
She welcomed back the evening silence as an old friend, but it came now
with an altered face, and looked more kindly on her. Fresh hope was in it.
The beautiful lady who had soothed and carressed her, in the very room in
which her heart had been so wrung, was a spirit of promise to her. Soft
shadows of the bright life dawning, when her father's affection should be
gradually won, and all, or much should be restored, of what she had lost on
the dark day when a mother's love had faded with a mother's last breath on
her cheek, moved about her in the twilight and were welcome company. Peeping
at the rosy children her neighbours, it was a new and precious sensation to
think that they might soon speak together and know each other; when she
would not fear, as of old, to show herself before them, lest they should be
grieved to see her in her black dress sitting there alone!
In her thoughts of her new mother, and in the love and trust
overflowing her pure heart towards her, Florence loved her own dead mother
more and more. She had no fear of setting up a rival in her breast. The new
flower sprang from the deep-planted and long-cherished root, she knew. Every
gentle word that had fallen from the lips of the beautiful lady, sounded to
Florence like an echo of the voice long hushed and silent. How could she
love that memory less for living tenderness, when it was her memory of all
parental tenderness and love!
Florence was, one day, sitting reading in her room, and thinking of the
lady and her promised visit soon - for her book turned on a kindred subject
- when, raising her eyes, she saw her standing in the doorway.
'Mama!' cried Florence, joyfully meeting her. 'Come again!'
'Not Mama yet,' returned the lady, with a serious smile, as she
encircled Florence's neck with her arm.
'But very soon to be,' cried Florence.
'Very soon now, Florence: very soon.
Edith bent her head a little, so as to press the blooming cheek of
Florence against her own, and for some few moments remained thus silent.
There was something so very tender in her manner, that Florence was even
more sensible of it than on the first occasion of their meeting.
She led Florence to a chair beside her, and sat down: Florence looking
in her face, quite wondering at its beauty, and willingly leaving her hand
In hers.
'Have you been alone, Florence, since I was here last?'
'Oh yes!' smiled Florence, hastily.
She hesitated and cast down her eyes; for her new Mama was very earnest
in her look, and the look was intently and thoughtfully fixed upon her face.
'I - I- am used to be alone,' said Florence. 'I don't mind it at all.
Di and I pass whole days together, sometimes.' Florence might have said,
whole weeks and months.
'Is Di your maid, love?'
'My dog, Mama,' said Florence, laughing. 'Susan is my maid.'
'And these are your rooms,' said Edith, looking round. 'I was not shown
these rooms the other day. We must have them improved, Florence. They shall
be made the prettiest in the house.'
'If I might change them, Mama,' returned Florence; 'there is one
upstairs I should like much better.'
'Is this not high enough, dear girl?' asked Edith, smiling.
'The other was my brother's room,' said Florence, 'and I am very fond
of it. I would have spoken to Papa about it when I came home, and found the
workmen here, and everything changing; but - '
Florence dropped her eyes, lest the same look should make her falter
again.
'but I was afraid it might distress him; and as you said you would be
here again soon, Mama, and are the mistress of everything, I determined to
take courage and ask you.'
Edith sat looking at her, with her brilliant eyes intent upon her face,
until Florence raising her own, she, in her turn, withdrew her gaze, and
turned it on the ground. It was then that Florence thought how different
this lady's beauty was, from what she had supposed. She had thought it of a
proud and lofty kind; yet her manner was so subdued and gentle, that if she
had been of Florence's own age and character, it scarcely could have invited
confidence more.
Except when a constrained and singular reserve crept over her; and then
she seemed (but Florence hardly understood this, though she could not choose
but notice it, and think about it) as if she were humbled before Florence,
and ill at ease. When she had said that she was not her Mama yet, and when
Florence had called her the mistress of everything there, this change in her
was quick and startling; and now, while the eyes of Florence rested on her
face, she sat as though she would have shrunk and hidden from her, rather
than as one about to love and cherish her, in right of such a near
connexion.
She gave Florence her ready promise, about her new room, and said she
would give directions about it herself. She then asked some questions
concerning poor Paul; and when they had sat in conversation for some time,
told Florence she had come to take her to her own home.
'We have come to London now, my mother and I,' said Edith, 'and you
shall stay with us until I am married. I wish that we should know and trust
each other, Florence.'
'You are very kind to me,' said Florence, 'dear Mama. How much I thank
you!'
'Let me say now, for it may be the best opportunity,' continued Edith,
looking round to see that they were quite alone, and speaking in a lower
voice, 'that when I am married, and have gone away for some weeks, I shall
be easier at heart if you will come home here. No matter who invites you to
stay elsewhere. Come home here. It is better to be alone than - what I would
say is,' she added, checking herself, 'that I know well you are best at
home, dear Florence.'
'I will come home on the very day, Mama'
'Do so. I rely on that promise. Now, prepare to come with me, dear
girl. You will find me downstairs when you are ready.'
Slowly and thoughtfully did Edith wander alone through the mansion of
which she was so soon to be the lady: and little heed took she of all the
elegance and splendour it began to display. The same indomitable haughtiness
of soul, the same proud scorn expressed in eye and lip, the same fierce
beauty, only tamed by a sense of its own little worth, and of the little
worth of everything around it, went through the grand saloons and halls,
that had got loose among the shady trees, and raged and rent themselves. The
mimic roses on the walls and floors were set round with sharp thorns, that
tore her breast; in every scrap of gold so dazzling to the eye, she saw some
hateful atom of her purchase-money; the broad high mirrors showed her, at
full length, a woman with a noble quality yet dwelling in her nature, who
was too false to her better self, and too debased and lost, to save herself.
She believed that all this was so plain, more or less, to all eyes, that she
had no resource or power of self-assertion but in pride: and with this
pride, which tortured her own heart night and day, she fought her fate out,
braved it, and defied it.
Was this the woman whom Florence - an innocent girl, strong only in her
earnestness and simple truth - could so impress and quell, that by her side
she was another creature, with her tempest of passion hushed, and her very
pride itself subdued? Was this the woman who now sat beside her in a
carriage, with her arms entwined, and who, while she courted and entreated
her to love and trust her, drew her fair head to nestle on her breast, and
would have laid down life to shield it from wrong or harm?
Oh, Edith! it were well to die, indeed, at such a time! Better and
happier far, perhaps, to die so, Edith, than to live on to the end!
The Honourable Mrs Skewton, who was thinking of anything rather than of
such sentiments - for, like many genteel persons who have existed at various
times, she set her face against death altogether, and objected to the
mention of any such low and levelling upstart - had borrowed a house in
Brook Street, Grosvenor Square, from a stately relative (one of the Feenix
brood), who was out of town, and who did not object to lending it, in the
handsomest manner, for nuptial purposes, as the loan implied his final
release and acquittance from all further loans and gifts to Mrs Skewton and
her daughter. It being necessary for the credit of the family to make a
handsome appearance at such a time, Mrs Skewton, with the assistance of an
accommodating tradesman resident In the parish of Mary-le-bone, who lent out
all sorts of articles to the nobility and gentry, from a service of plate to
an army of footmen, clapped into this house a silver-headed butler (who was
charged extra on that account, as having the appearnce of an ancient family
retainer), two very tall young men in livery, and a select staff of
kitchen-servants; so that a legend arose, downstairs, that Withers the page,
released at once from his numerous household duties, and from the propulsion
of the wheeled-chair (inconsistent with the metropolis), had been several
times observed to rub his eyes and pinch his limbs, as if he misdoubted his
having overslept himself at the Leamington milkman's, and being still in a
celestial dream. A variety of requisites in plate and china being also
conveyed to the same establishment from the same convenient source, with
several miscellaneous articles, including a neat chariot and a pair of bays,
Mrs Skewton cushioned herself on the principal sofa, in the Cleopatra
attitude, and held her court in fair state.
'And how,' said Mrs Skewton, on the entrance of her daughter and her
charge, 'is my charming Florence? You must come and kiss me, Florence, if
you please, my love.'
Florence was timidly stooping to pick out a place In the white part of
Mrs Skewton's face, when that lady presented her ear, and relieved her of
her difficulty.
'Edith, my dear,' said Mrs Skewton, 'positively, I - stand a little
more in the light, my sweetest Florence, for a moment.
Florence blushingly complied.
'You don't remember, dearest Edith,' said her mother, 'what you were
when you were about the same age as our exceedingly precious Florence, or a
few years younger?'
'I have long forgotten, mother.'
'For positively, my dear,' said Mrs Skewton, 'I do think that I see a
decided resemblance to what you were then, in our extremely fascinating
young friend. And it shows,' said Mrs Skewton, in a lower voice, which
conveyed her opinion that Florence was in a very unfinished state, 'what
cultivation will do.'
'It does, indeed,' was Edith's stern reply.
Her mother eyed her sharply for a moment, and feeling herself on unsafe
ground, said, as a diversion:
'My charming Florence, you must come and kiss me once more, if you
please, my love.'
Florence complied, of course, and again imprinted her lips on Mrs
Skewton's ear.
'And you have heard, no doubt, my darling pet,' said Mrs Skewton,
detaining her hand, 'that your Papa, whom we all perfectly adore and dote
upon, is to be married to my dearest Edith this day week.'
'I knew it would be very soon,' returned Florence, 'but not exactly
when.'
'My darling Edith,' urged her mother, gaily, 'is it possible you have
not told Florence?'
'Why should I tell Florence?' she returned, so suddenly and harshly,
that Florence could scarcely believe it was the same voice.
Mrs Skewton then told Florence, as another and safer diversion, that
her father was coming to dinner, and that he would no doubt be charmingly
surprised to see her; as he had spoken last night of dressing in the City,
and had known nothing of Edith's design, the execution of which, according
to Mrs Skewton's expectation, would throw him into a perfect ecstasy.
Florence was troubled to hear this; and her distress became so keen, as the
dinner-hour approached, that if she had known how to frame an entreaty to be
suffered to return home, without involving her father in her explanation,
she would have hurried back on foot, bareheaded, breathless, and alone,
rather than incur the risk of meeting his displeasure.
As the time drew nearer, she could hardly breathe. She dared not
approach a window, lest he should see her from the street. She dared not go
upstairs to hide her emotion, lest, in passing out at the door, she should
meet him unexpectedly; besides which dread, she felt as though she never
could come back again if she were summoned to his presence. In this conflict
of fears; she was sitting by Cleopatra's couch, endeavouring to understand
and to reply to the bald discourse of that lady, when she heard his foot
upon the stair.
'I hear him now!' cried Florence, starting. 'He is coming!'
Cleopatra, who in her juvenility was always playfully disposed, and who
in her self-engrossment did not trouble herself about the nature of this
agitation, pushed Florence behind her couch, and dropped a shawl over her,
preparatory to giving Mr Dombey a rapture of surprise. It was so quickly
done, that in a moment Florence heard his awful step in the room.
He saluted his intended mother-in-law, and his intended bride. The
strange sound of his voice thrilled through the whole frame of his child.
'My dear Dombey,' said Cleopatra, 'come here and tell me how your
pretty Florence is.'
'Florence is very well,' said Mr Dombey, advancing towards the couch.
'At home?'
'At home,' said Mr Dombey.
'My dear Dombey,' returned Cleopatra, with bewitching vivacity; 'now
are you sure you are not deceiving me? I don't know what my dearest Edith
will say to me when I make such a declaration, but upon my honour I am
afraid you are the falsest of men, my dear Dombey.'
Though he had been; and had been detected on the spot, in the most
enormous falsehood that was ever said or done; he could hardly have been
more disconcerted than he was, when Mrs Skewton plucked the shawl away, and
Florence, pale and trembling, rose before him like a ghost. He had not yet
recovered his presence of mind, when Florence had run up to him, clasped her
hands round his neck, kissed his face, and hurried out of the room. He
looked round as if to refer the matter to somebody else, but Edith had gone
after Florence, instantly.
'Now, confess, my dear Dombey,' said Mrs Skewton, giving him her hand,
'that you never were more surprised and pleased in your life.'
'I never was more surprised,' said Mr Dombey.
'Nor pleased, my dearest Dombey?' returned Mrs Skewton, holding up her
fan.
'I - yes, I am exceedingly glad to meet Florence here,' said Mr Dombey.
He appeared to consider gravely about it for a moment, and then said, more
decidedly, 'Yes, I really am very glad indeed to meet Florence here.'
'You wonder how she comes here?' said Mrs Skewton, 'don't you?'
'Edith, perhaps - ' suggested Mr Dombey.
'Ah! wicked guesser!' replied Cleopatra, shaking her head. 'Ah!
cunning, cunning man! One shouldn't tell these things; your sex, my dear
Dombey, are so vain, and so apt to abuse our weakness; but you know my open
soul - very well; immediately.'
This was addressed to one of the very tall young men who announced
dinner.
'But Edith, my dear Dombey,' she continued in a whisper, when she
cannot have you near her - and as I tell her, she cannot expect that always
- will at least have near her something or somebody belonging to you. Well,
how extremely natural that is! And in this spirit, nothing would keep her
from riding off to-day to fetch our darling Florence. Well, how excessively
charming that is!'
As she waited for an answer, Mr Dombey answered, 'Eminently so.
'Bless you, my dear Dombey, for that proof of heart!' cried Cleopatra,
squeezing his hand. 'But I am growing too serious! Take me downstairs, like
an angel, and let us see what these people intend to give us for dinner.
Bless you, dear Dombey!'
Cleopatra skipping off her couch with tolerable briskness, after the
last benediction, Mr Dombey took her arm in his and led her ceremoniously
downstairs; one of the very tall young men on hire, whose organ of
veneration was imperfectly developed, thrusting his tongue into his cheek,
for the entertainment of the other very tall young man on hire, as the
couple turned into the dining-room.
Florence and Edith were already there, and sitting side by side.
Florence would have risen when her father entered, to resign her chair to
him; but Edith openly put her hand upon her arm, and Mr Dombey took an
opposite place at the round table.
The conversation was almost entirely sustained by Mrs Skewton. Florence
hardly dared to raise her eyes, lest they should reveal the traces of tears;
far less dared to speak; and Edith never uttered one word, unless in answer
to a question. Verily, Cleopatra worked hard, for the establishment that was
so nearly clutched; and verily it should have been a rich one to reward her!
And so your preparations are nearly finished at last, my dear Dombey?'
said Cleopatra, when the dessert was put upon the table, and the
silver-headed butler had withdrawn. 'Even the lawyers' preparations!'
'Yes, madam,' replied Mr Dombey; 'the deed of settlement, the
professional gentlemen inform me, is now ready, and as I was mentioning to
you, Edith has only to do us the favour to suggest her own time for its
execution.'
Edith sat like a handsome statue; as cold, as silent, and as still.
'My dearest love,' said Cleopatra, 'do you hear what Mr Dombey says?
Ah, my dear Dombey!' aside to that gentleman, 'how her absence, as the time
approaches, reminds me of the days, when that most agreeable of creatures,
her Papa, was in your situation!'
'I have nothing to suggest. It shall be when you please,' said Edith,
scarcely looking over the table at Mr Dombey.
'To-morrow?' suggested Mr Dombey.
'If you please.'
'Or would next day,' said Mr Dombey, 'suit your engagements better?'
'I have no engagements. I am always at your disposal. Let it be when
you like.'
'No engagements, my dear Edith!' remonstrated her mother, 'when you are
in a most terrible state of flurry all day long, and have a thousand and one
appointments with all sorts of trades-people!'
'They are of your making,' returned Edith, turning on her with a slight
contraction of her brow. 'You and Mr Dombey can arrange between you.'
'Very true indeed, my love, and most considerate of you!' said
Cleopatra. 'My darling Florence, you must really come and kiss me once more,
if you please, my dear!'
Singular coincidence, that these gushes of interest In Florence hurried
Cleopatra away from almost every dialogue in which Edith had a share,
however trifling! Florence had certainly never undergone so much embracing,
and perhaps had never been, unconsciously, so useful in her life.
Mr Dombey was far from quarrelling, in his own breast, with the manner
of his beautiful betrothed. He had that good reason for sympathy with
haughtiness and coldness, which is found In a fellow-feeling. It flattered
him to think how these deferred to him, in Edith's case, and seemed to have
no will apart from his. It flattered him to picture to himself, this proud
and stately woman doing the honours of his house, and chilling his guests
after his own manner. The dignity of Dombey and Son would be heightened and
maintained, indeed, in such hands.
So thought Mr Dombey, when he was left alone at the dining-table, and
mused upon his past and future fortunes: finding no uncongeniality in an air
of scant and gloomy state that pervaded the room, in colour a dark brown,
with black hatchments of pictures blotching the walls, and twenty-four black
chairs, with almost as many nails in them as so many coffins, waiting like
mutes, upon the threshold of the Turkey carpet; and two exhausted negroes
holding up two withered branches of candelabra on the sideboard, and a musty
smell prevailing as if the ashes of ten thousand dinners were entombed in
the sarcophagus below it. The owner of the house lived much abroad; the air
of England seldom agreed long with a member of the Feenix family; and the
room had gradually put itself into deeper and still deeper mourning for him,
until it was become so funereal as to want nothing but a body in it to be
quite complete.
No bad representation of the body, for the nonce, in his unbending
form, if not in his attitude, Mr Dombey looked down into the cold depths of
the dead sea of mahogany on which the fruit dishes and decanters lay at
anchor: as if the subjects of his thoughts were rising towards the surface
one by one, and plunging down again. Edith was there In all her majesty of
brow and figure; and close to her came Florence, with her timid head turned
to him, as it had been, for an instant, when she left the room; and Edith's
eyes upon her, and Edith's hand put out protectingly. A little figure in a
low arm-chair came springing next into the light, and looked upon him
wonderingly, with its bright eyes and its old-young face, gleaming as in the
flickering of an evening fire. Again came Florence close upon it, and
absorbed his whole attention. Whether as a fore-doomed difficulty and
disappointment to him; whether as a rival who had crossed him in his way,
and might again; whether as his child, of whom, in his successful wooing, he
could stoop to think as claiming, at such a time, to be no more estranged;
or whether as a hint to him that the mere appearance of caring for his own
blood should be maintained in his new relations; he best knew. Indifferently
well, perhaps, at best; for marriage company and marriage altars, and
ambitious scenes - still blotted here and there with Florence - always
Florence - turned up so fast, and so confusedly, that he rose, and went
upstairs to escape them.
It was quite late at night before candles were brought; for at present
they made Mrs Skewton's head ache, she complained; and in the meantime
Florence and Mrs Skewton talked together (Cleopatra being very anxious to
keep her close to herself), or Florence touched the piano softly for Mrs
Skewton's delight; to make no mention of a few occasions in the course of
the evening, when that affectionate lady was impelled to solicit another
kiss, and which always happened after Edith had said anything. They were not
many, however, for Edith sat apart by an open window during the whole time
(in spite of her mother's fears that she would take cold), and remained
there until Mr Dombey took leave. He was serenely gracious to Florence when
he did so; and Florence went to bed in a room within Edith's, so happy and
hopeful, that she thought of her late self as if it were some other poor
deserted girl who was to be pitied for her sorrow; and in her pity, sobbed
herself to sleep.
The week fled fast. There were drives to milliners, dressmakers,
jewellers, lawyers, florists, pastry-cooks; and Florence was always of the
party. Florence was to go to the wedding. Florence was to cast off her
mourning, and to wear a brilliant dress on the occasion. The milliner's
intentions on the subject of this dress - the milliner was a Frenchwoman,
and greatly resembled Mrs Skewton - were so chaste and elegant, that Mrs
Skewton bespoke one like it for herself. The milliner said it would become
her to admiration, and that all the world would take her for the young
lady's sister.
The week fled faster. Edith looked at nothing and cared for nothing.
Her rich dresses came home, and were tried on, and were loudly commended by
Mrs Skewton and the milliners, and were put away without a word from her.
Mrs Skewton made their plans for every day, and executed them. Sometimes
Edith sat in the carriage when they went to make purchases; sometimes, when
it was absolutely necessary, she went into the shops. But Mrs Skewton
conducted the whole business, whatever it happened to be; and Edith looked
on as uninterested and with as much apparent indifference as if she had no
concern in it. Florence might perhaps have thought she was haughty and
listless, but that she was never so to her. So Florence quenched her wonder
in her gratitude whenever it broke out, and soon subdued it.
The week fled faster. It had nearly winged its flight away. The last
night of the week, the night before the marriage, was come. In the dark room
- for Mrs Skewton's head was no better yet, though she expected to recover
permanently to-morrow - were that lady, Edith, and Mr Dombey. Edith was at
her open window looking out into the street; Mr Dombey and Cleopatra were
talking softly on the sofa. It was growing late; and Florence, being
fatigued, had gone to bed.
'My dear Dombey,' said Cleopatra, 'you will leave me Florence
to-morrow, when you deprive me of my sweetest Edith.'
Mr Dombey said he would, with pleasure.
'To have her about me, here, while you are both at Paris, and to think
at her age, I am assisting in the formation of her mind, my dear Dombey,'
said Cleopatra, 'will be a perfect balm to me in the extremely shattered
state to which I shall be reduced.'
Edith turned her head suddenly. Her listless manner was exchanged, in a
moment, to one of burning interest, and, unseen in the darkness, she
attended closely to their conversation.
Mr Dombey would be delighted to leave Florence in such admirable
guardianship.
'My dear Dombey,' returned Cleopatra, 'a thousand thanks for your good
opinion. I feared you were going, with malice aforethought' as the dreadful
lawyers say - those horrid proses! - to condemn me to utter solitude;'
'Why do me so great an injustice, my dear madam?' said Mr Dombey.
'Because my charming Florence tells me so positively she must go home
tomorrow, returned Cleopatra, that I began to be afraid, my dearest Dombey,
you were quite a Bashaw.'
'I assure you, madam!' said Mr Dombey, 'I have laid no commands on
Florence; and if I had, there are no commands like your wish.'
'My dear Dombey,' replied Cleopatra, what a courtier you are! Though
I'll not say so, either; for courtiers have no heart, and yours pervades
your farming life and character. And are you really going so early, my dear
Dombey!'
Oh, indeed! it was late, and Mr Dombey feared he must.
'Is this a fact, or is it all a dream!' lisped Cleopatra. 'Can I
believe, my dearest Dombey, that you are coming back tomorrow morning to
deprive me of my sweet companion; my own Edith!'
Mr Dombey, who was accustomed to take things literally, reminded Mrs
Skewton that they were to meet first at the church.
'The pang,' said Mrs Skewton, 'of consigning a child, even to you, my
dear Dombey, is one of the most excruciating imaginable, and combined with a
naturally delicate constitution, and the extreme stupidity of the
pastry-cook who has undertaken the breakfast, is almost too much for my poor
strength. But I shall rally, my dear Dombey, In the morning; do not fear for
me, or be uneasy on my account. Heaven bless you! My dearest Edith!' she
cried archly. 'Somebody is going, pet.'
Edith, who had turned her head again towards the window, and whose
interest in their conversation had ceased, rose up in her place, but made no
advance towards him, and said nothing. Mr Dombey, with a lofty gallantry
adapted to his dignity and the occasion, betook his creaking boots towards
her, put her hand to his lips, said, 'Tomorrow morning I shall have the
happiness of claiming this hand as Mrs Dombey's,' and bowed himself solemnly
out.
Mrs Skewton rang for candles as soon as the house-door had closed upon
him. With the candles appeared her maid, with the juvenile dress that was to
delude the world to-morrow. The dress had savage retribution in it, as such
dresses ever have, and made her infinitely older and more hideous than her
greasy flannel gown. But Mrs Skewton tried it on with mincing satisfaction;
smirked at her cadaverous self in the glass, as she thought of its killing
effect upon the Major; and suffering her maid to take it off again, and to
prepare her for repose, tumbled into ruins like a house of painted cards.
All this time, Edith remained at the dark window looking out into the
street. When she and her mother were at last left alone, she moved from it
for the first time that evening, and came opposite to her. The yawning,
shaking, peevish figure of the mother, with her eyes raised to confront the
proud erect form of the daughter, whose glance of fire was bent downward
upon her, had a conscious air upon it, that no levity or temper could
conceal.
'I am tired to death,' said she. 'You can't be trusted for a moment.
You are worse than a child. Child! No child would be half so obstinate and
undutiful.'
'Listen to me, mother,' returned Edith, passing these words by with a
scorn that would not descend to trifle with them. 'You must remain alone
here until I return.'
'Must remain alone here, Edith, until you return!' repeated her mother.
'Or in that name upon which I shall call to-morrow to witness what I
do, so falsely: and so shamefully, I swear I will refuse the hand of this
man in the church. If I do not, may I fall dead upon the pavement!'
The mother answered with a look of quick alarm, in no degree diminished
by the look she met.
'It is enough,' said Edith, steadily, 'that we are what we are. I will
have no youth and truth dragged down to my level. I will have no guileless
nature undermined, corrupted, and perverted, to amuse the leisure of a world
of mothers. You know my meaning. Florence must go home.'
'You are an idiot, Edith,' cried her angry mother. 'Do you expect there
can ever be peace for you in that house, till she is married, and away?'
'Ask me, or ask yourself, if I ever expect peace in that house,' said
her daughter, 'and you know the answer.
'And am I to be told to-night, after all my pains and labour, and when
you are going, through me, to be rendered independent,' her mother almost
shrieked in her passion, while her palsied head shook like a leaf, 'that
there is corruption and contagion in me, and that I am not fit company for a
girl! What are you, pray? What are you?'
'I have put the question to myself,' said Edith, ashy pale, and
pointing to the window, 'more than once when I have been sitting there, and
something in the faded likeness of my sex has wandered past outside; and God
knows I have met with my reply. Oh mother, mother, if you had but left me to
my natural heart when I too was a girl - a younger girl than Florence - how
different I might have been!'
Sensible that any show of anger was useless here, her mother restrained
herself, and fell a whimpering, and bewailed that she had lived too long,
and that her only child had cast her off, and that duty towards parents was
forgotten in these evil days, and that she had heard unnatural taunts, and
cared for life no longer.
'If one is to go on living through continual scenes like this,' she
whined,'I am sure it would be much better for me to think of some means of
putting an end to my existence. Oh! The idea of your being my daughter,
Edith, and addressing me in such a strain!'
'Between us, mother,' returned Edith, mournfully, 'the time for mutual
reproaches is past.
'Then why do you revive it?' whimpered her mother. 'You know that you
are lacerating me in the cruellest manner. You know how sensitive I am to
unkindness. At such a moment, too, when I have so much to think of, and am
naturally anxious to appear to the best advantage! I wonder at you, Edith.
To make your mother a fright upon your wedding-day!'
Edith bent the same fixed look upon her, as she sobbed and rubbed her
eyes; and said in the same low steady voice, which had neither risen nor
fallen since she first addressed her, 'I have said that Florence must go
home.'
'Let her go!' cried the afflicted and affrighted parent, hastily. 'I am
sure I am willing she should go. What is the girl to me?'
'She is so much to me, that rather than communicate, or suffer to be
communicated to her, one grain of the evil that is in my breast, mother, I
would renounce you, as I would (if you gave me cause) renounce him in the
church to-morrow,' replied Edith. 'Leave her alone. She shall not, while I
can interpose, be tampered with and tainted by the lessons I have learned.
This is no hard condition on this bitter night.'
'If you had proposed it in a filial manner, Edith,' whined her mother,
'perhaps not; very likely not. But such extremely cutting words - '
'They are past and at an end between us now,' said Edith. 'Take your
own way, mother; share as you please in what you have gained; spend, enjoy,
make much of it; and be as happy as you will. The object of our lives is
won. Henceforth let us wear it silently. My lips are closed upon the past
from this hour. I forgive you your part in to-morrow's wickedness. May God
forgive my own!'
Without a tremor in her voice, or frame, and passing onward with a foot
that set itself upon the neck of every soft emotion, she bade her mother
good-night, and repaired to her own room.
But not to rest; for there was no rest in the tumult of her agitation
when alone to and fro, and to and fro, and to and fro again, five hundred
times, among the splendid preparations for her adornment on the morrow; with
her dark hair shaken down, her dark eyes flashing with a raging light, her
broad white bosom red with the cruel grasp of the relentless hand with which
she spurned it from her, pacing up and down with an averted head, as if she
would avoid the sight of her own fair person, and divorce herself from its
companionship. Thus, In the dead time of the night before her bridal, Edith
Granger wrestled with her unquiet spirit, tearless, friendless, silent,
proud, and uncomplaining.
At length it happened that she touched the open door which led into the
room where Florence lay.
She started, stopped, and looked in.
A light was burning there, and showed her Florence in her bloom of
innocence and beauty, fast asleep. Edith held her breath, and felt herself
drawn on towards her.
Drawn nearer, nearer, nearer yet; at last, drawn so near, that stooping
down, she pressed her lips to the gentle hand that lay outside the bed, and
put it softly to her neck. Its touch was like the prophet's rod of old upon
the rock. Her tears sprung forth beneath it, as she sunk upon her knees, and
laid her aching head and streaming hair upon the pillow by its side.
Thus Edith Granger passed the night before her bridal. Thus the sun
found her on her bridal morning.