Страница:
condescending, but extremely kind.
'And as you've known me for a long time, you know,' said Mr Toots, 'let
me assure you that she is one of the most remarkable women that ever lived.'
'My dear!' remonstrated Mrs Toots.
'Upon my word and honour she is,' said Mr Toots. 'I - I assure you, Mrs
Blimber, she's a most extraordinary woman.'
Mrs Toots laughed merrily, and Mrs Blimber led her to Cornelia. Mr
Toots having paid his respects in that direction and having saluted his old
preceptor, who said, in allusion to his conjugal state, 'Well, Toots, well,
Toots! So you are one of us, are you, Toots?' - retired with Mr Feeder,
B.A., into a window.
Mr Feeder, B.A., being in great spirits, made a spar at Mr Toots, and
tapped him skilfully with the back of his hand on the breastbone.
'Well, old Buck!' said Mr Feeder with a laugh. 'Well! Here we are!
Taken in and done for. Eh?'
'Feeder,' returned Mr Toots. 'I give you joy. If you're as - as- as
perfectly blissful in a matrimonial life, as I am myself, you'll have
nothing to desire.'
'I don't forget my old friends, you see,' said Mr Feeder. 'I ask em to
my wedding, Toots.'
'Feeder,' replied Mr Toots gravely, 'the fact is, that there were
several circumstances which prevented me from communicating with you until
after my marriage had been solemnised. In the first place, I had made a
perfect Brute of myself to you, on the subject of Miss Dombey; and I felt
that if you were asked to any wedding of mine, you would naturally expect
that it was with Miss Dombey, which involved explanations, that upon my word
and honour, at that crisis, would have knocked me completely over. In the
second place, our wedding was strictly private; there being nobody present
but one friend of myself and Mrs Toots's, who is a Captain in - I don't
exactly know in what,' said Mr Toots, 'but it's of no consequence. I hope,
Feeder, that in writing a statement of what had occurred before Mrs Toots
and myself went abroad upon our foreign tour, I fully discharged the offices
of friendship.'
'Toots, my boy,' said Mr Feeder, shaking his hands, 'I was joking.'
'And now, Feeder,' said Mr Toots, 'I should be glad to know what you
think of my union.'
'Capital!' returned Mr Feeder.
'You think it's capital, do you, Feeder?'said Mr Toots solemnly. 'Then
how capital must it be to Me! For you can never know what an extraordinary
woman that is.'
Mr Feeder was willing to take it for granted. But Mr Toots shook his
head, and wouldn't hear of that being possible.
'You see,' said Mr Toots, 'what I wanted in a wife was - in short, was
sense. Money, Feeder, I had. Sense I - I had not, particularly.'
Mr Feeder murmured, 'Oh, yes, you had, Toots!' But Mr Toots said:
'No, Feeder, I had not. Why should I disguise it? I had not. I knew
that sense was There,' said Mr Toots, stretching out his hand towards his
wife, 'in perfect heaps. I had no relation to object or be offended, on the
score of station; for I had no relation. I have never had anybody belonging
to me but my guardian, and him, Feeder, I have always considered as a Pirate
and a Corsair. Therefore, you know it was not likely,' said Mr Toots, 'that
I should take his opinion.'
'No,' said Mr Feeder.
'Accordingly,' resumed Mr Toots, 'I acted on my own. Bright was the day
on which I did so! Feeder! Nobody but myself can tell what the capacity of
that woman's mind is. If ever the Rights of Women, and all that kind of
thing, are properly attended to, it will be through her powerful intellect -
Susan, my dear!' said Mr Toots, looking abruptly out of the windows 'pray do
not exert yourself!'
'My dear,' said Mrs Toots, 'I was only talking.'
'But, my love,' said Mr Toots, 'pray do not exert yourself. You really
must be careful. Do not, my dear Susan, exert yourself. She's so easily
excited,' said Mr Toots, apart to Mrs Blimber, 'and then she forgets the
medical man altogether.'
Mrs Blimber was impressing on Mrs Toots the necessity of caution, when
Mr Feeder, B.A., offered her his arm, and led her down to the carriages that
were waiting to go to church. Doctor Blimber escorted Mrs Toots. Mr Toots
escorted the fair bride, around whose lambent spectacles two gauzy little
bridesmaids fluttered like moths. Mr Feeder's brother, Mr Alfred Feeder,
M.A., had already gone on, in advance, to assume his official functions.
The ceremony was performed in an admirable manner. Cornelia, with her
crisp little curls, 'went in,' as the Chicken might have said, with great
composure; and Doctor Blimber gave her away, like a man who had quite made
up his mind to it. The gauzy little bridesmaids appeared to suffer most. Mrs
Blimber was affected, but gently so; and told the Reverend Mr Alfred Feeder,
M.A., on the way home, that if she could only have seen Cicero in his
retirement at Tusculum, she would not have had a wish, now, ungratified.
There was a breakfast afterwards, limited to the same small party; at
which the spirits of Mr Feeder, B.A., were tremendous, and so communicated
themselves to Mrs Toots that Mr Toots was several times heard to observe,
across the table, 'My dear Susan, don't exert yourself!' The best of it was,
that Mr Toots felt it incunbent on him to make a speech; and in spite of a
whole code of telegraphic dissuasions from Mrs Toots, appeared on his legs
for the first time in his life.
'I really,' said Mr Toots, 'in this house, where whatever was done to
me in the way of - of any mental confusion sometimes - which is of no
consequence and I impute to nobody - I was always treated like one of Doctor
Blimber's family, and had a desk to myself for a considerable period - can -
not - allow - my friend Feeder to be - '
Mrs Toots suggested 'married.'
'It may not be inappropriate to the occasion, or altogether
uninteresting,' said Mr Toots with a delighted face, 'to observe that my
wife is a most extraordinary woman, and would do this much better than
myself - allow my friend Feeder to be married - especially to - '
Mrs Toots suggested 'to Miss Blimber.'
'To Mrs Feeder, my love!' said Mr Toots, in a subdued tone of private
discussion: "'whom God hath joined," you know, "let no man" - don't you
know? I cannot allow my friend Feeder to be married - especially to Mrs
Feeder - without proposing their - their - Toasts; and may,' said Mr Toots,
fixing his eyes on his wife, as if for inspiration in a high flight, 'may
the torch of Hymen be the beacon of joy, and may the flowers we have this
day strewed in their path, be the - the banishers of- of gloom!'
Doctor Blimber, who had a taste for metaphor, was pleased with this,
and said, 'Very good, Toots! Very well said, indeed, Toots!' and nodded his
head and patted his hands. Mr Feeder made in reply, a comic speech chequered
with sentiment. Mr Alfred Feeder, M.A, was afterwards very happy on Doctor
and Mrs Blimber; Mr Feeder, B.A., scarcely less so, on the gauzy little
bridesmaids. Doctor Blimber then, in a sonorous voice, delivered a few
thoughts in the pastoral style, relative to the rushes among which it was
the intention of himself and Mrs Blimber to dwell, and the bee that would
hum around their cot. Shortly after which, as the Doctor's eyes were
twinkling in a remarkable manner, and his son-in-law had already observed
that time was made for slaves, and had inquired whether Mrs Toots sang, the
discreet Mrs Blimber dissolved the sitting, and sent Cornelia away, very
cool and comfortable, in a post-chaise, with the man of her heart
Mr and Mrs Toots withdrew to the Bedford (Mrs Toots had been there
before in old times, under her maiden name of Nipper), and there found a
letter, which it took Mr Toots such an enormous time to read, that Mrs Toots
was frightened.
'My dear Susan,' said Mr Toots, 'fright is worse than exertion. Pray be
calm!'
'Who is it from?' asked Mrs Toots.
'Why, my love,' said Mr Toots, 'it's from Captain Gills. Do not excite
yourself. Walters and Miss Dombey are expected home!'
'My dear,' said Mrs Toots, raising herself quickly from the sofa, very
pale, 'don't try to deceive me, for it's no use, they're come home - I see
it plainly in your face!'
'She's a most extraordinary woman!' exclaimed Mr Toots, in rapturous
admiration. 'You're perfectly right, my love, they have come home. Miss
Dombey has seen her father, and they are reconciled!'
'Reconciled!' cried Mrs Toots, clapping her hands.
'My dear,' said Mr Toots; 'pray do not exert yourself. Do remember the
medical man! Captain Gills says - at least he don't say, but I imagine, from
what I can make out, he means - that Miss Dombey has brought her unfortunate
father away from his old house, to one where she and Walters are living;
that he is lying very ill there - supposed to be dying; and that she attends
upon him night and day.'
Mrs Toots began to cry quite bitterly.
'My dearest Susan,' replied Mr Toots, 'do, do, if you possibly can,
remember the medical man! If you can't, it's of no consequence - but do
endeavour to!'
His wife, with her old manner suddenly restored, so pathetically
entreated him to take her to her precious pet, her little mistress, her own
darling, and the like, that Mr Toots, whose sympathy and admiration were of
the strongest kind, consented from his very heart of hearts; and they agreed
to depart immediately, and present themselves in answer to the Captain's
letter.
Now some hidden sympathies of things, or some coincidences, had that
day brought the Captain himself (toward whom Mr and Mrs Toots were soon
journeying) into the flowery train of wedlock; not as a principal, but as an
accessory. It happened accidentally, and thus:
The Captain, having seen Florence and her baby for a moment, to his
unbounded content, and having had a long talk with Walter, turned out for a
walk; feeling it necessary to have some solitary meditation on the changes
of human affairs, and to shake his glazed hat profoundly over the fall of Mr
Dombey, for whom the generosity and simplicity of his nature were awakened
in a lively manner. The Captain would have been very low, indeed, on the
unhappy gentleman's account, but for the recollection of the baby; which
afforded him such intense satisfaction whenever it arose, that he laughed
aloud as he went along the street, and, indeed, more than once, in a sudden
impulse of joy, threw up his glazed hat and caught it again; much to the
amazement of the spectators. The rapid alternations of light and shade to
which these two conflicting subjects of reflection exposed the Captain, were
so very trying to his spirits, that he felt a long walk necessary to his
composure; and as there is a great deal in the influence of harmonious
associations, he chose, for the scene of this walk, his old neighbourhood,
down among the mast, oar, and block makers, ship-biscuit bakers,
coal-whippers, pitch-kettles, sailors, canals, docks, swing-bridges, and
other soothing objects.
These peaceful scenes, and particularly the region of Limehouse Hole
and thereabouts, were so influential in calming the Captain, that he walked
on with restored tranquillity, and was, in fact, regaling himself, under his
breath, with the ballad of Lovely Peg, when, on turning a corner, he was
suddenly transfixed and rendered speechless by a triumphant procession that
he beheld advancing towards him.
This awful demonstration was headed by that determined woman Mrs
MacStinger, who, preserving a countenance of inexorable resolution, and
wearing conspicuously attached to her obdurate bosom a stupendous watch and
appendages, which the Captain recognised at a glance as the property of
Bunsby, conducted under her arm no other than that sagacious mariner; he,
with the distraught and melancholy visage of a captive borne into a foreign
land, meekly resigning himself to her will. Behind them appeared the young
MacStingers, in a body, exulting. Behind them, M~ two ladies of a terrible
and steadfast aspect, leading between them a short gentleman in a tall hat,
who likewise exulted. In the wake, appeared Bunsby's boy, bearing umbrellas.
The whole were in good marching order; and a dreadful smartness that
pervaded the party would have sufficiently announced, if the intrepid
countenances of the ladies had been wanting, that it was a procession of
sacrifice, and that the victim was Bunsby.
The first impulse of the Captain was to run away. This also appeared to
be the first impulse of Bunsby, hopeless as its execution must have proved.
But a cry of recognition proceeding from the party, and Alexander MacStinger
running up to the Captain with open arms, the Captain struck.
'Well, Cap'en Cuttle!' said Mrs MacStinger. 'This is indeed a meeting!
I bear no malice now, Cap'en Cuttle - you needn't fear that I'm a going to
cast any reflections. I hope to go to the altar in another spirit.' Here Mrs
MacStinger paused, and drawing herself up, and inflating her bosom with a
long breath, said, in allusion to the victim, 'My 'usband, Cap'en Cuttle!'
The abject Bunsby looked neither to the right nor to the left, nor at
his bride, nor at his friend, but straight before him at nothing. The
Captain putting out his hand, Bunsby put out his; but, in answer to the
Captain's greeting, spake no word.
'Cap'en Cuttle,' said Mrs MacStinger, 'if you would wish to heal up
past animosities, and to see the last of your friend, my 'usband, as a
single person, we should be 'appy of your company to chapel. Here is a lady
here,' said Mrs MacStinger, turning round to the more intrepid of the two,
'my bridesmaid, that will be glad of your protection, Cap'en Cuttle.'
The short gentleman in the tall hat, who it appeared was the husband of
the other lady, and who evidently exulted at the reduction of a fellow
creature to his own condition, gave place at this, and resigned the lady to
Captain Cuttle. The lady immediately seized him, and, observing that there
was no time to lose, gave the word, in a strong voice, to advance.
The Captain's concern for his friend, not unmingled, at first, with
some concern for himself - for a shadowy terror that he might be married by
violence, possessed him, until his knowledge of the service came to his
relief, and remembering the legal obligation of saying, 'I will,' he felt
himself personally safe so long as he resolved, if asked any question,
distinctly to reply I won't' - threw him into a profuse perspiration; and
rendered him, for a time, insensible to the movements of the procession, of
which he now formed a feature, and to the conversation of his fair
companion. But as he became less agitated, he learnt from this lady that she
was the widow of a Mr Bokum, who had held an employment in the Custom House;
that she was the dearest friend of Mrs MacStinger, whom she considered a
pattern for her sex; that she had often heard of the Captain, and now hoped
he had repented of his past life; that she trusted Mr Bunsby knew what a
blessing he had gained, but that she feared men seldom did know what such
blessings were, until they had lost them; with more to the same purpose.
All this time, the Captain could not but observe that Mrs Bokum kept
her eyes steadily on the bridegroom, and that whenever they came near a
court or other narrow turning which appeared favourable for flight, she was
on the alert to cut him off if he attempted escape. The other lady, too, as
well as her husband, the short gentleman with the tall hat, were plainly on
guard, according to a preconcerted plan; and the wretched man was so secured
by Mrs MacStinger, that any effort at self-preservation by flight was
rendered futile. This, indeed, was apparent to the mere populace, who
expressed their perception of the fact by jeers and cries; to all of which,
the dread MacStinger was inflexibly indifferent, while Bunsby himself
appeared in a state of unconsciousness.
The Captain made many attempts to accost the philosopher, if only in a
monosyllable or a signal; but always failed, in consequence of the vigilance
of the guard, and the difficulty, at all times peculiar to Bunsby's
constitution, of having his attention aroused by any outward and visible
sign whatever. Thus they approached the chapel, a neat whitewashed edifice,
recently engaged by the Reverend Melchisedech Howler, who had consented, on
very urgent solicitation, to give the world another two years of existence,
but had informed his followers that, then, it must positively go.
While the Reverend Melchisedech was offering up some extemporary
orisons, the Captain found an opportunity of growling in the bridegroom's
ear:
'What cheer, my lad, what cheer?'
To which Bunsby replied, with a forgetfulness of the Reverend
Melchisedech, which nothing but his desperate circumstances could have
excused:
'D-----d bad,'
'Jack Bunsby,' whispered the Captain, 'do you do this here, of your own
free will?'
Mr Bunsby answered 'No.'
'Why do you do it, then, my lad?' inquired the Captain, not
unnaturally.
Bunsby, still looking, and always looking with an immovable
countenance, at the opposite side of the world, made no reply.
'Why not sheer off?' said the Captain. 'Eh?' whispered Bunsby, with a
momentary gleam of hope. 'Sheer off,' said the Captain.
'Where's the good?' retorted the forlorn sage. 'She'd capter me agen.
'Try!' replied the Captain. 'Cheer up! Come! Now's your time. Sheer
off, Jack Bunsby!'
Jack Bunsby, however, instead of profiting by the advice, said in a
doleful whisper:
'It all began in that there chest o' yourn. Why did I ever conwoy her
into port that night?'
'My lad,' faltered the Captain, 'I thought as you had come over her;
not as she had come over you. A man as has got such opinions as you have!'
Mr Bunsby merely uttered a suppressed groan.
'Come!' said the Captain, nudging him with his elbow, 'now's your time!
Sheer off! I'll cover your retreat. The time's a flying. Bunsby! It's for
liberty. Will you once?'
Bunsby was immovable. 'Bunsby!' whispered the Captain, 'will you twice
?' Bunsby wouldn't twice.
'Bunsby!' urged the Captain, 'it's for liberty; will you three times?
Now or never!'
Bunsby didn't then, and didn't ever; for Mrs MacStinger immediately
afterwards married him.
One of the most frightful circumstances of the ceremony to the Captain,
was the deadly interest exhibited therein by Juliana MacStinger; and the
fatal concentration of her faculties, with which that promising child,
already the image of her parent, observed the whole proceedings. The Captain
saw in this a succession of man-traps stretching out infinitely; a series of
ages of oppression and coercion, through which the seafaring line was
doomed. It was a more memorable sight than the unflinching steadiness of Mrs
Bokum and the other lady, the exultation of the short gentleman in the tall
hat, or even the fell inflexibility of Mrs MacStinger. The Master
MacStingers understood little of what was going on, and cared less; being
chiefly engaged, during the ceremony, in treading on one another's
half-boots; but the contrast afforded by those wretched infants only set off
and adorned the precocious woman in Juliana. Another year or two, the
Captain thought, and to lodge where that child was, would be destruction.
The ceremony was concluded by a general spring of the young family on
Mr Bunsby, whom they hailed by the endearing name of father, and from whom
they solicited half-pence. These gushes of affection over, the procession
was about to issue forth again, when it was delayed for some little time by
an unexpected transport on the part of Alexander MacStinger. That dear
child, it seemed, connecting a chapel with tombstones, when it was entered
for any purpose apart from the ordinary religious exercises, could not be
persuaded but that his mother was now to be decently interred, and lost to
him for ever. In the anguish of this conviction, he screamed with
astonishing force, and turned black in the face. However touching these
marks of a tender disposition were to his mother, it was not in the
character of that remarkable woman to permit her recognition of them to
degenerate into weakness. Therefore, after vainly endeavouring to convince
his reason by shakes, pokes, bawlings-out, and similar applications to his
head, she led him into the air, and tried another method; which was
manifested to the marriage party by a quick succession of sharp sounds,
resembling applause, and subsequently, by their seeing Alexander in contact
with the coolest paving-stone in the court, greatly flushed, and loudly
lamenting.
The procession being then in a condition to form itself once more, and
repair to Brig Place, where a marriage feast was in readiness, returned as
it had come; not without the receipt, by Bunsby, of many humorous
congratulations from the populace on his recently-acquired happiness. The
Captain accompanied it as far as the house-door, but, being made uneasy by
the gentler manner of Mrs Bokum, who, now that she was relieved from her
engrossing duty - for the watchfulness and alacrity of the ladies sensibly
diminished when the bridegroom was safely married - had greater leisure to
show an interest in his behalf, there left it and the captive; faintly
pleading an appointment, and promising to return presently. The Captain had
another cause for uneasiness, in remorsefully reflecting that he had been
the first means of Bunsby's entrapment, though certainly without intending
it, and through his unbounded faith in the resources of that philosopher.
To go back to old Sol Gills at the wooden Midshipman's, and not first
go round to ask how Mr Dombey was - albeit the house where he lay was out of
London, and away on the borders of a fresh heath - was quite out of the
Captain's course. So he got a lift when he was tired, and made out the
journey gaily.
The blinds were pulled down, and the house so quiet, that the Captain
was almost afraid to knock; but listening at the door, he heard low voices
within, very near it, and, knocking softly, was admitted by Mr Toots. Mr
Toots and his wife had, in fact, just arrived there; having been at the
Midshipman's to seek him, and having there obtained the address.
They were not so recently arrived, but that Mrs Toots had caught the
baby from somebody, taken it in her arms, and sat down on the stairs,
hugging and fondling it. Florence was stooping down beside her; and no one
could have said which Mrs Toots was hugging and fondling most, the mother or
the child, or which was the tenderer, Florence of Mrs Toots, or Mrs Toots of
her, or both of the baby; it was such a little group of love and agitation.
'And is your Pa very ill, my darling dear Miss Floy?' asked Susan.
'He is very, very ill,' said Florence. 'But, Susan, dear, you must not
speak to me as you used to speak. And what's this?' said Florence, touching
her clothes, in amazement. 'Your old dress, dear? Your old cap, curls, and
all?'
Susan burst into tears, and showered kisses on the little hand that had
touched her so wonderingly.
'My dear Miss Dombey,' said Mr Toots, stepping forward, 'I'll explain.
She's the most extraordinary woman. There are not many to equal her! She has
always said - she said before we were married, and has said to this day -
that whenever you came home, she'd come to you in no dress but the dress she
used to serve you in, for fear she might seem strange to you, and you might
like her less. I admire the dress myself,' said Mr Toots, 'of all things. I
adore her in it! My dear Miss Dombey, she'll be your maid again, your nurse,
all that she ever was, and more. There's no change in her. But, Susan, my
dear,' said Mr Toots, who had spoken with great feeling and high admiration,
'all I ask is, that you'll remember the medical man, and not exert yourself
too much!'
Relenting
Florence had need of help. Her father's need of it was sore, and made
the aid of her old friend invaluable. Death stood at his pillow. A shade,
already, of what he had been, shattered in mind, and perilously sick in
body, he laid his weary head down on the bed his daughter's hands prepared
for him, and had never raised it since.
She was always with him. He knew her, generally; though, in the
wandering of his brain, he often confused the circumstances under which he
spoke to her. Thus he would address her, sometimes, as if his boy were newly
dead; and would tell her, that although he had said nothing of her
ministering at the little bedside, yet he had seen it - he had seen it; and
then would hide his face and sob, and put out his worn hand. Sometimes he
would ask her for herself. 'Where is Florence?' 'I am here, Papa, I am
here.' 'I don't know her!' he would cry. 'We have been parted so long, that
I don't know her!' and then a staring dread would he upon him, until she
could soothe his perturbation; and recall the tears she tried so hard, at
other times, to dry.
He rambled through the scenes of his old pursuits - through many where
Florence lost him as she listened - sometimes for hours. He would repeat
that childish question, 'What is money?' and ponder on it, and think about
it, and reason with himself, more or less connectedly, for a good answer; as
if it had never been proposed to him until that moment. He would go on with
a musing repetition of the title of his old firm twenty thousand times, and
at every one of them, would turn his head upon his pillow. He would count
his children - one - two - stop, and go back, and begin again in the same
way.
But this was when his mind was in its most distracted state. In all the
other phases of its illness, and in those to which it was most constant, it
always turned on Florence. What he would oftenest do was this: he would
recall that night he had so recently remembered, the night on which she came
down to his room, and would imagine that his heart smote him, and that he
went out after her, and up the stairs to seek her. Then, confounding that
time with the later days of the many footsteps, he would be amazed at their
number, and begin to count them as he followed her. Here, of a sudden, was a
bloody footstep going on among the others; and after it there began to be,
at intervals, doors standing open, through which certain terrible pictures
were seen, in mirrors, of haggard men, concealing something in their
breasts. Still, among the many footsteps and the bloody footsteps here and
there, was the step of Florence. Still she was going on before. Still the
restless mind went, following and counting, ever farther, ever higher, as to
the summit of a mighty tower that it took years to climb.
One day he inquired if that were not Susan who had spoken a long while
ago.
Florence said 'Yes, dear Papa;' and asked him would he like to see her?
He said 'very much.' And Susan, with no little trepidation, showed
herself at his bedside.
It seemed a great relief to him. He begged her not to go; to understand
that he forgave her what she had said; and that she was to stay. Florence
and he were very different now, he said, and very happy. Let her look at
this! He meant his drawing the gentle head down to his pillow, and laying it
beside him.
He remained like this for days and weeks. At length, lying, the faint
feeble semblance of a man, upon his bed, and speaking in a voice so low that
they could only hear him by listening very near to his lips, he became
quiet. It was dimly pleasant to him now, to lie there, with the window open,
looking out at the summer sky and the trees: and, in the evening, at the
sunset. To watch the shadows of the clouds and leaves, and seem to feel a
sympathy with shadows. It was natural that he should. To him, life and the
world were nothing else.
He began to show now that he thought of Florence's fatigue: and often
taxed his weakness to whisper to her, 'Go and walk, my dearest, in the sweet
air. Go to your good husband!' One time when Walter was in his room, he
beckoned him to come near, and to stoop down; and pressing his hand,
whispered an assurance to him that he knew he could trust him with his child
when he was dead.
It chanced one evening, towards sunset, when Florence and Walter were
sitting in his room together, as he liked to see them, that Florence, having
her baby in her arms, began in a low voice to sing to the little fellow, and
sang the old tune she had so often sung to the dead child: He could not bear
it at the time; he held up his trembling hand, imploring her to stop; but
next day he asked her to repeat it, and to do so often of an evening: which
she did. He listening, with his face turned away.
Florence was sitting on a certain time by his window, with her
work-basket between her and her old attendant, who was still her faithful
companion. He had fallen into a doze. It was a beautiful evening, with two
hours of light to come yet; and the tranquillity and quiet made Florence
very thoughtful. She was lost to everything for the moment, but the occasion
when the so altered figure on the bed had first presented her to her
beautiful Mama; when a touch from Walter leaning on the back of her chair,
made her start.
'My dear,' said Walter, 'there is someone downstairs who wishes to
speak to you.
She fancied Walter looked grave, and asked him if anything had
happened.
'No, no, my love!' said Walter. 'I have seen the gentleman myself, and
spoken with him. Nothing has happened. Will you come?'
Florence put her arm through his; and confiding her father to the
black-eyed Mrs Toots, who sat as brisk and smart at her work as black-eyed
woman could, accompanied her husband downstairs. In the pleasant little
parlour opening on the garden, sat a gentleman, who rose to advance towards
her when she came in, but turned off, by reason of some peculiarity in his
legs, and was only stopped by the table.
Florence then remembered Cousin Feenix, whom she had not at first
recognised in the shade of the leaves. Cousin Feenix took her hand, and
congratulated her upon her marriage.
'I could have wished, I am sure,' said Cousin Feenix, sitting down as
Florence sat, to have had an earlier opportunity of offering my
congratulations; but, in point of fact, so many painful occurrences have
happened, treading, as a man may say, on one another's heels, that I have
been in a devil of a state myself, and perfectly unfit for every description
of society. The only description of society I have kept, has been my own;
and it certainly is anything but flattering to a man's good opinion of his
own sources, to know that, in point of fact, he has the capacity of boring
himself to a perfectly unlimited extent.'
Florence divined, from some indefinable constraint and anxiety in this
gentleman's manner - which was always a gentleman's, in spite of the
harmless little eccentricities that attached to it - and from Walter's
manner no less, that something more immediately tending to some object was
to follow this.
'I have been mentioning to my friend Mr Gay, if I may be allowed to
have the honour of calling him so,' said Cousin Feenix, 'that I am rejoiced
to hear that my friend Dombey is very decidedly mending. I trust my friend
Dombey will not allow his mind to be too much preyed upon, by any mere loss
of fortune. I cannot say that I have ever experienced any very great loss of
fortune myself: never having had, in point of fact, any great amount of
fortune to lose. But as much as I could lose, I have lost; and I don't find
that I particularly care about it. I know my friend Dombey to be a devilish
honourable man; and it's calculated to console my friend Dombey very much,
to know, that this is the universal sentiment. Even Tommy Screwzer, - a man
of an extremely bilious habit, with whom my friend Gay is probably
acquainted - cannot say a syllable in disputation of the fact.'
Florence felt, more than ever, that there was something to come; and
looked earnestly for it. So earnestly, that Cousin Feenix answered, as if
she had spoken.
'The fact is,' said Cousin Feenix, 'that my friend Gay and myself have
been discussing the propriety of entreating a favour at your hands; and that
I have the consent of my friend Gay - who has met me in an exceedingly kind
and open manner, for which I am very much indebted to him - to solicit it. I
am sensible that so amiable a lady as the lovely and accomplished daughter
of my friend Dombey will not require much urging; but I am happy to know,
that I am supported by my friend Gay's influence and approval. As in my
parliamentary time, when a man had a motion to make of any sort - which
happened seldom in those days, for we were kept very tight in hand, the
leaders on both sides being regular Martinets, which was a devilish good
thing for the rank and file, like myself, and prevented our exposing
ourselves continually, as a great many of us had a feverish anxiety to do -
as' in my parliamentary time, I was about to say, when a man had leave to
let off any little private popgun, it was always considered a great point
for him to say that he had the happiness of believing that his sentiments
were not without an echo in the breast of Mr Pitt; the pilot, in point of
fact, who had weathered the storm. Upon which, a devilish large number of
fellows immediately cheered, and put him in spirits. Though the fact is,
that these fellows, being under orders to cheer most excessively whenever Mr
Pitt's name was mentioned, became so proficient that it always woke 'em. And
they were so entirely innocent of what was going on, otherwise, that it used
to be commonly said by Conversation Brown - four-bottle man at the Treasury
Board, with whom the father of my friend Gay was probably acquainted, for it
was before my friend Gay's time - that if a man had risen in his place, and
said that he regretted to inform the house that there was an Honourable
Member in the last stage of convulsions in the Lobby, and that the
Honourable Member's name was Pitt, the approbation would have been
vociferous.'
This postponement of the point, put Florence in a flutter; and she
looked from Cousin Feenix to Walter, in increasing agitatioN
'My love,' said Walter, 'there is nothing the matter.
'There is nothing the matter, upon my honour,' said Cousin Feenix; 'and
I am deeply distressed at being the means of causing you a moment's
uneasiness. I beg to assure you that there is nothing the matter. The favour
that I have to ask is, simply - but it really does seem so exceedingly
singular, that I should be in the last degree obliged to my friend Gay if he
would have the goodness to break the - in point of fact, the ice,' said
Cousin Feenix.
Walter thus appealed to, and appealed to no less in the look that
Florence turned towards him, said:
'My dearest, it is no more than this. That you will ride to London with
this gentleman, whom you know.
'And my friend Gay, also - I beg your pardon!' interrupted Cousin
Feenix.
And with me - and make a visit somewhere.'
'To whom?' asked Florence, looking from one to the other.
'If I might entreat,' said Cousin Feenix, 'that you would not press for
an answer to that question, I would venture to take the liberty of making
the request.'
'Do you know, Walter?'
'Yes.'
'And think it right?'
'Yes. Only because I am sure that you would too. Though there may be
reasons I very well understand, which make it better that nothing more
should be said beforehand.'
'If Papa is still asleep, or can spare me if he is awake, I will go
immediately,' said Florence. And rising quietly, and glancing at them with a
look that was a little alarmed but perfectly confiding, left the room.
When she came back, ready to bear them company, they were talking
together, gravely, at the window; and Florence could not but wonder what the
topic was, that had made them so well acquainted in so short a time. She did
not wonder at the look of pride and love with which her husband broke off as
she entered; for she never saw him, but that rested on her.
'I will leave,' said Cousin Feenix, 'a card for my friend Dombey,
sincerely trusting that he will pick up health and strength with every
returning hour. And I hope my friend Dombey will do me the favour to
consider me a man who has a devilish warm admiration of his character, as,
in point of fact, a British merchant and a devilish upright gentleman. My
place in the country is in a most confounded state of dilapidation, but if
my friend Dombey should require a change of air, and would take up his
quarters there, he would find it a remarkably healthy spot - as it need be,
for it's amazingly dull. If my friend Dombey suffers from bodily weakness,
and would allow me to recommend what has frequently done myself good, as a
man who has been extremely queer at times, and who lived pretty freely in
the days when men lived very freely, I should say, let it be in point of
fact the yolk of an egg, beat up with sugar and nutmeg, in a glass of
sherry, and taken in the morning with a slice of dry toast. Jackson, who
kept the boxing-rooms in Bond Street - man of very superior qualifications,
with whose reputation my friend Gay is no doubt acquainted - used to mention
that in training for the ring they substituted rum for sherry. I should
recommend sherry in this case, on account of my friend Dombey being in an
invalided condition; which might occasion rum to fly - in point of fact to
his head - and throw him into a devil of a state.'
Of all this, Cousin Feenix delivered himself with an obviously nervous
and discomposed air. Then, giving his arm to Florence, and putting the
strongest possible constraint upon his wilful legs, which seemed determined
to go out into the garden, he led her to the door, and handed her into a
carriage that was ready for her reception.
Walter entered after him, and they drove away.
Their ride was six or eight miles long. When they drove through certain
dull and stately streets, lying westward in London, it was growing dusk.
Florence had, by this time, put her hand in Walter's; and was looking very
earnestly, and with increasing agitation, into every new street into which
they turned.
When the carriage stopped, at last, before that house in Brook Street,
where her father's unhappy marriage had been celebrated, Florence said,
'Walter, what is this? Who is here?' Walter cheering her, and not replying,
she glanced up at the house-front, and saw that all the windows were shut,
as if it were uninhabited. Cousin Feenix had by this time alighted, and was
offering his hand.
'Are you not coming, Walter?'
'No, I will remain here. Don't tremble there is nothing to fear,
dearest Florence.'
'I know that, Walter, with you so near. I am sure of that, but - '
The door was softly opened, without any knock, and Cousin Feenix led
her out of the summer evening air into the close dull house. More sombre and
brown than ever, it seemed to have been shut up from the wedding-day, and to
have hoarded darkness and sadness ever since.
Florence ascended the dusky staircase, trembling; and stopped, with her
conductor, at the drawing-room door. He opened it, without speaking, and
signed an entreaty to her to advance into the inner room, while he remained
there. Florence, after hesitating an instant, complied.
Sitting by the window at a table, where she seemed to have been writing
or drawing, was a lady, whose head, turned away towards the dying light, was
resting on her hand. Florence advancing, doubtfully, all at once stood
still, as if she had lost the power of motion. The lady turned her head.
'Great Heaven!' she said, 'what is this?'
'No, no!' cried Florence, shrinking back as she rose up and putting out
her hands to keep her off. 'Mama!'
They stood looking at each other. Passion and pride had worn it, but it
was the face of Edith, and beautiful and stately yet. It was the face of
Florence, and through all the terrified avoidance it expressed, there was
pity in it, sorrow, a grateful tender memory. On each face, wonder and fear
were painted vividly; each so still and silent, looking at the other over
the black gulf of the irrevocable past.
Florence was the first to change. Bursting into tears, she said from
her full heart, 'Oh, Mama, Mama! why do we meet like this? Why were you ever
kind to me when there was no one else, that we should meet like this?'
Edith stood before her, dumb and motionless. Her eyes were fixed upon
her face.
'I dare not think of that,' said Florence, 'I am come from Papa's sick
bed. We are never asunder now; we never shall be' any more. If you would
have me ask his pardon, I will do it, Mama. I am almost sure he will grant
it now, if I ask him. May Heaven grant it to you, too, and comfort you!'
She answered not a word.
'Walter - I am married to him, and we have a son,' said Florence,
timidly - 'is at the door, and has brought me here. I will tell him that you
are repentant; that you are changed,' said Florence, looking mournfully upon
her; 'and he will speak to Papa with me, I know. Is there anything but this
that I can do?'
Edith, breaking her silence, without moving eye or limb, answered
slowly:
'The stain upon your name, upon your husband's, on your child's. Will
that ever be forgiven, Florence?'
'Will it ever be, Mama? It is! Freely, freely, both by Walter and by
me. If that is any consolation to you, there is nothing that you may believe
more certainly. You do not - you do not,' faltered Florence, 'speak of Papa;
but I am sure you wish that I should ask him for his forgiveness. I am sure
you do.'
She answered not a word.
'I will!' said Florence. 'I will bring it you, if you will let me; and
then, perhaps, we may take leave of each other, more like what we used to be
to one another. I have not,' said Florence very gently, and drawing nearer
to her, 'I have not shrunk back from you, Mama, because I fear you, or
because I dread to be disgraced by you. I only wish to do my duty to Papa. I
am very dear to him, and he is very dear to me. But I never can forget that
you were very good to me. Oh, pray to Heaven,' cried Florence, falling on
her bosom, 'pray to Heaven, Mama, to forgive you all this sin and shame, and
to forgive me if I cannot help doing this (if it is wrong), when I remember
what you used to be!'
Edith, as if she fell beneath her touch, sunk down on her knees, and
caught her round the neck.
'Florence!' she cried. 'My better angel! Before I am mad again, before
my stubbornness comes back and strikes me dumb, believe me, upon my soul I
am innocent!'
'Mama!'
'Guilty of much! Guilty of that which sets a waste between us evermore.
Guilty of what must separate me, through the whole remainder of my life,
from purity and innocence - from you, of all the earth. Guilty of a blind
and passionate resentment, of which I do not, cannot, will not, even now,
repent; but not guilty with that dead man. Before God!'
Upon her knees upon the ground, she held up both her hands, and swore
it.
'Florence!' she said, 'purest and best of natures, - whom I love - who
might have changed me long ago, and did for a time work some change even in
the woman that I am, - believe me, I am innocent of that; and once more, on
my desolate heart, let me lay this dear head, for the last time!'
She was moved and weeping. Had she been oftener thus in older days, she
had been happier now.
'There is nothing else in all the world,' she said, 'that would have
wrung denial from me. No love, no hatred, no hope, no threat. I said that I
would die, and make no sign. I could have done so, and I would, if we had
never met, Florence.
'I trust,' said Cousin Feenix, ambling in at the door, and speaking,
half in the room, and half out of it, 'that my lovely and accomplished
relative will excuse my having, by a little stratagem, effected this
meeting. I cannot say that I was, at first, wholly incredulous as to the
possibility of my lovely and accomplished relative having, very
unfortunately, committed herself with the deceased person with white teeth;
because in point of fact, one does see, in this world - which is remarkable
'And as you've known me for a long time, you know,' said Mr Toots, 'let
me assure you that she is one of the most remarkable women that ever lived.'
'My dear!' remonstrated Mrs Toots.
'Upon my word and honour she is,' said Mr Toots. 'I - I assure you, Mrs
Blimber, she's a most extraordinary woman.'
Mrs Toots laughed merrily, and Mrs Blimber led her to Cornelia. Mr
Toots having paid his respects in that direction and having saluted his old
preceptor, who said, in allusion to his conjugal state, 'Well, Toots, well,
Toots! So you are one of us, are you, Toots?' - retired with Mr Feeder,
B.A., into a window.
Mr Feeder, B.A., being in great spirits, made a spar at Mr Toots, and
tapped him skilfully with the back of his hand on the breastbone.
'Well, old Buck!' said Mr Feeder with a laugh. 'Well! Here we are!
Taken in and done for. Eh?'
'Feeder,' returned Mr Toots. 'I give you joy. If you're as - as- as
perfectly blissful in a matrimonial life, as I am myself, you'll have
nothing to desire.'
'I don't forget my old friends, you see,' said Mr Feeder. 'I ask em to
my wedding, Toots.'
'Feeder,' replied Mr Toots gravely, 'the fact is, that there were
several circumstances which prevented me from communicating with you until
after my marriage had been solemnised. In the first place, I had made a
perfect Brute of myself to you, on the subject of Miss Dombey; and I felt
that if you were asked to any wedding of mine, you would naturally expect
that it was with Miss Dombey, which involved explanations, that upon my word
and honour, at that crisis, would have knocked me completely over. In the
second place, our wedding was strictly private; there being nobody present
but one friend of myself and Mrs Toots's, who is a Captain in - I don't
exactly know in what,' said Mr Toots, 'but it's of no consequence. I hope,
Feeder, that in writing a statement of what had occurred before Mrs Toots
and myself went abroad upon our foreign tour, I fully discharged the offices
of friendship.'
'Toots, my boy,' said Mr Feeder, shaking his hands, 'I was joking.'
'And now, Feeder,' said Mr Toots, 'I should be glad to know what you
think of my union.'
'Capital!' returned Mr Feeder.
'You think it's capital, do you, Feeder?'said Mr Toots solemnly. 'Then
how capital must it be to Me! For you can never know what an extraordinary
woman that is.'
Mr Feeder was willing to take it for granted. But Mr Toots shook his
head, and wouldn't hear of that being possible.
'You see,' said Mr Toots, 'what I wanted in a wife was - in short, was
sense. Money, Feeder, I had. Sense I - I had not, particularly.'
Mr Feeder murmured, 'Oh, yes, you had, Toots!' But Mr Toots said:
'No, Feeder, I had not. Why should I disguise it? I had not. I knew
that sense was There,' said Mr Toots, stretching out his hand towards his
wife, 'in perfect heaps. I had no relation to object or be offended, on the
score of station; for I had no relation. I have never had anybody belonging
to me but my guardian, and him, Feeder, I have always considered as a Pirate
and a Corsair. Therefore, you know it was not likely,' said Mr Toots, 'that
I should take his opinion.'
'No,' said Mr Feeder.
'Accordingly,' resumed Mr Toots, 'I acted on my own. Bright was the day
on which I did so! Feeder! Nobody but myself can tell what the capacity of
that woman's mind is. If ever the Rights of Women, and all that kind of
thing, are properly attended to, it will be through her powerful intellect -
Susan, my dear!' said Mr Toots, looking abruptly out of the windows 'pray do
not exert yourself!'
'My dear,' said Mrs Toots, 'I was only talking.'
'But, my love,' said Mr Toots, 'pray do not exert yourself. You really
must be careful. Do not, my dear Susan, exert yourself. She's so easily
excited,' said Mr Toots, apart to Mrs Blimber, 'and then she forgets the
medical man altogether.'
Mrs Blimber was impressing on Mrs Toots the necessity of caution, when
Mr Feeder, B.A., offered her his arm, and led her down to the carriages that
were waiting to go to church. Doctor Blimber escorted Mrs Toots. Mr Toots
escorted the fair bride, around whose lambent spectacles two gauzy little
bridesmaids fluttered like moths. Mr Feeder's brother, Mr Alfred Feeder,
M.A., had already gone on, in advance, to assume his official functions.
The ceremony was performed in an admirable manner. Cornelia, with her
crisp little curls, 'went in,' as the Chicken might have said, with great
composure; and Doctor Blimber gave her away, like a man who had quite made
up his mind to it. The gauzy little bridesmaids appeared to suffer most. Mrs
Blimber was affected, but gently so; and told the Reverend Mr Alfred Feeder,
M.A., on the way home, that if she could only have seen Cicero in his
retirement at Tusculum, she would not have had a wish, now, ungratified.
There was a breakfast afterwards, limited to the same small party; at
which the spirits of Mr Feeder, B.A., were tremendous, and so communicated
themselves to Mrs Toots that Mr Toots was several times heard to observe,
across the table, 'My dear Susan, don't exert yourself!' The best of it was,
that Mr Toots felt it incunbent on him to make a speech; and in spite of a
whole code of telegraphic dissuasions from Mrs Toots, appeared on his legs
for the first time in his life.
'I really,' said Mr Toots, 'in this house, where whatever was done to
me in the way of - of any mental confusion sometimes - which is of no
consequence and I impute to nobody - I was always treated like one of Doctor
Blimber's family, and had a desk to myself for a considerable period - can -
not - allow - my friend Feeder to be - '
Mrs Toots suggested 'married.'
'It may not be inappropriate to the occasion, or altogether
uninteresting,' said Mr Toots with a delighted face, 'to observe that my
wife is a most extraordinary woman, and would do this much better than
myself - allow my friend Feeder to be married - especially to - '
Mrs Toots suggested 'to Miss Blimber.'
'To Mrs Feeder, my love!' said Mr Toots, in a subdued tone of private
discussion: "'whom God hath joined," you know, "let no man" - don't you
know? I cannot allow my friend Feeder to be married - especially to Mrs
Feeder - without proposing their - their - Toasts; and may,' said Mr Toots,
fixing his eyes on his wife, as if for inspiration in a high flight, 'may
the torch of Hymen be the beacon of joy, and may the flowers we have this
day strewed in their path, be the - the banishers of- of gloom!'
Doctor Blimber, who had a taste for metaphor, was pleased with this,
and said, 'Very good, Toots! Very well said, indeed, Toots!' and nodded his
head and patted his hands. Mr Feeder made in reply, a comic speech chequered
with sentiment. Mr Alfred Feeder, M.A, was afterwards very happy on Doctor
and Mrs Blimber; Mr Feeder, B.A., scarcely less so, on the gauzy little
bridesmaids. Doctor Blimber then, in a sonorous voice, delivered a few
thoughts in the pastoral style, relative to the rushes among which it was
the intention of himself and Mrs Blimber to dwell, and the bee that would
hum around their cot. Shortly after which, as the Doctor's eyes were
twinkling in a remarkable manner, and his son-in-law had already observed
that time was made for slaves, and had inquired whether Mrs Toots sang, the
discreet Mrs Blimber dissolved the sitting, and sent Cornelia away, very
cool and comfortable, in a post-chaise, with the man of her heart
Mr and Mrs Toots withdrew to the Bedford (Mrs Toots had been there
before in old times, under her maiden name of Nipper), and there found a
letter, which it took Mr Toots such an enormous time to read, that Mrs Toots
was frightened.
'My dear Susan,' said Mr Toots, 'fright is worse than exertion. Pray be
calm!'
'Who is it from?' asked Mrs Toots.
'Why, my love,' said Mr Toots, 'it's from Captain Gills. Do not excite
yourself. Walters and Miss Dombey are expected home!'
'My dear,' said Mrs Toots, raising herself quickly from the sofa, very
pale, 'don't try to deceive me, for it's no use, they're come home - I see
it plainly in your face!'
'She's a most extraordinary woman!' exclaimed Mr Toots, in rapturous
admiration. 'You're perfectly right, my love, they have come home. Miss
Dombey has seen her father, and they are reconciled!'
'Reconciled!' cried Mrs Toots, clapping her hands.
'My dear,' said Mr Toots; 'pray do not exert yourself. Do remember the
medical man! Captain Gills says - at least he don't say, but I imagine, from
what I can make out, he means - that Miss Dombey has brought her unfortunate
father away from his old house, to one where she and Walters are living;
that he is lying very ill there - supposed to be dying; and that she attends
upon him night and day.'
Mrs Toots began to cry quite bitterly.
'My dearest Susan,' replied Mr Toots, 'do, do, if you possibly can,
remember the medical man! If you can't, it's of no consequence - but do
endeavour to!'
His wife, with her old manner suddenly restored, so pathetically
entreated him to take her to her precious pet, her little mistress, her own
darling, and the like, that Mr Toots, whose sympathy and admiration were of
the strongest kind, consented from his very heart of hearts; and they agreed
to depart immediately, and present themselves in answer to the Captain's
letter.
Now some hidden sympathies of things, or some coincidences, had that
day brought the Captain himself (toward whom Mr and Mrs Toots were soon
journeying) into the flowery train of wedlock; not as a principal, but as an
accessory. It happened accidentally, and thus:
The Captain, having seen Florence and her baby for a moment, to his
unbounded content, and having had a long talk with Walter, turned out for a
walk; feeling it necessary to have some solitary meditation on the changes
of human affairs, and to shake his glazed hat profoundly over the fall of Mr
Dombey, for whom the generosity and simplicity of his nature were awakened
in a lively manner. The Captain would have been very low, indeed, on the
unhappy gentleman's account, but for the recollection of the baby; which
afforded him such intense satisfaction whenever it arose, that he laughed
aloud as he went along the street, and, indeed, more than once, in a sudden
impulse of joy, threw up his glazed hat and caught it again; much to the
amazement of the spectators. The rapid alternations of light and shade to
which these two conflicting subjects of reflection exposed the Captain, were
so very trying to his spirits, that he felt a long walk necessary to his
composure; and as there is a great deal in the influence of harmonious
associations, he chose, for the scene of this walk, his old neighbourhood,
down among the mast, oar, and block makers, ship-biscuit bakers,
coal-whippers, pitch-kettles, sailors, canals, docks, swing-bridges, and
other soothing objects.
These peaceful scenes, and particularly the region of Limehouse Hole
and thereabouts, were so influential in calming the Captain, that he walked
on with restored tranquillity, and was, in fact, regaling himself, under his
breath, with the ballad of Lovely Peg, when, on turning a corner, he was
suddenly transfixed and rendered speechless by a triumphant procession that
he beheld advancing towards him.
This awful demonstration was headed by that determined woman Mrs
MacStinger, who, preserving a countenance of inexorable resolution, and
wearing conspicuously attached to her obdurate bosom a stupendous watch and
appendages, which the Captain recognised at a glance as the property of
Bunsby, conducted under her arm no other than that sagacious mariner; he,
with the distraught and melancholy visage of a captive borne into a foreign
land, meekly resigning himself to her will. Behind them appeared the young
MacStingers, in a body, exulting. Behind them, M~ two ladies of a terrible
and steadfast aspect, leading between them a short gentleman in a tall hat,
who likewise exulted. In the wake, appeared Bunsby's boy, bearing umbrellas.
The whole were in good marching order; and a dreadful smartness that
pervaded the party would have sufficiently announced, if the intrepid
countenances of the ladies had been wanting, that it was a procession of
sacrifice, and that the victim was Bunsby.
The first impulse of the Captain was to run away. This also appeared to
be the first impulse of Bunsby, hopeless as its execution must have proved.
But a cry of recognition proceeding from the party, and Alexander MacStinger
running up to the Captain with open arms, the Captain struck.
'Well, Cap'en Cuttle!' said Mrs MacStinger. 'This is indeed a meeting!
I bear no malice now, Cap'en Cuttle - you needn't fear that I'm a going to
cast any reflections. I hope to go to the altar in another spirit.' Here Mrs
MacStinger paused, and drawing herself up, and inflating her bosom with a
long breath, said, in allusion to the victim, 'My 'usband, Cap'en Cuttle!'
The abject Bunsby looked neither to the right nor to the left, nor at
his bride, nor at his friend, but straight before him at nothing. The
Captain putting out his hand, Bunsby put out his; but, in answer to the
Captain's greeting, spake no word.
'Cap'en Cuttle,' said Mrs MacStinger, 'if you would wish to heal up
past animosities, and to see the last of your friend, my 'usband, as a
single person, we should be 'appy of your company to chapel. Here is a lady
here,' said Mrs MacStinger, turning round to the more intrepid of the two,
'my bridesmaid, that will be glad of your protection, Cap'en Cuttle.'
The short gentleman in the tall hat, who it appeared was the husband of
the other lady, and who evidently exulted at the reduction of a fellow
creature to his own condition, gave place at this, and resigned the lady to
Captain Cuttle. The lady immediately seized him, and, observing that there
was no time to lose, gave the word, in a strong voice, to advance.
The Captain's concern for his friend, not unmingled, at first, with
some concern for himself - for a shadowy terror that he might be married by
violence, possessed him, until his knowledge of the service came to his
relief, and remembering the legal obligation of saying, 'I will,' he felt
himself personally safe so long as he resolved, if asked any question,
distinctly to reply I won't' - threw him into a profuse perspiration; and
rendered him, for a time, insensible to the movements of the procession, of
which he now formed a feature, and to the conversation of his fair
companion. But as he became less agitated, he learnt from this lady that she
was the widow of a Mr Bokum, who had held an employment in the Custom House;
that she was the dearest friend of Mrs MacStinger, whom she considered a
pattern for her sex; that she had often heard of the Captain, and now hoped
he had repented of his past life; that she trusted Mr Bunsby knew what a
blessing he had gained, but that she feared men seldom did know what such
blessings were, until they had lost them; with more to the same purpose.
All this time, the Captain could not but observe that Mrs Bokum kept
her eyes steadily on the bridegroom, and that whenever they came near a
court or other narrow turning which appeared favourable for flight, she was
on the alert to cut him off if he attempted escape. The other lady, too, as
well as her husband, the short gentleman with the tall hat, were plainly on
guard, according to a preconcerted plan; and the wretched man was so secured
by Mrs MacStinger, that any effort at self-preservation by flight was
rendered futile. This, indeed, was apparent to the mere populace, who
expressed their perception of the fact by jeers and cries; to all of which,
the dread MacStinger was inflexibly indifferent, while Bunsby himself
appeared in a state of unconsciousness.
The Captain made many attempts to accost the philosopher, if only in a
monosyllable or a signal; but always failed, in consequence of the vigilance
of the guard, and the difficulty, at all times peculiar to Bunsby's
constitution, of having his attention aroused by any outward and visible
sign whatever. Thus they approached the chapel, a neat whitewashed edifice,
recently engaged by the Reverend Melchisedech Howler, who had consented, on
very urgent solicitation, to give the world another two years of existence,
but had informed his followers that, then, it must positively go.
While the Reverend Melchisedech was offering up some extemporary
orisons, the Captain found an opportunity of growling in the bridegroom's
ear:
'What cheer, my lad, what cheer?'
To which Bunsby replied, with a forgetfulness of the Reverend
Melchisedech, which nothing but his desperate circumstances could have
excused:
'D-----d bad,'
'Jack Bunsby,' whispered the Captain, 'do you do this here, of your own
free will?'
Mr Bunsby answered 'No.'
'Why do you do it, then, my lad?' inquired the Captain, not
unnaturally.
Bunsby, still looking, and always looking with an immovable
countenance, at the opposite side of the world, made no reply.
'Why not sheer off?' said the Captain. 'Eh?' whispered Bunsby, with a
momentary gleam of hope. 'Sheer off,' said the Captain.
'Where's the good?' retorted the forlorn sage. 'She'd capter me agen.
'Try!' replied the Captain. 'Cheer up! Come! Now's your time. Sheer
off, Jack Bunsby!'
Jack Bunsby, however, instead of profiting by the advice, said in a
doleful whisper:
'It all began in that there chest o' yourn. Why did I ever conwoy her
into port that night?'
'My lad,' faltered the Captain, 'I thought as you had come over her;
not as she had come over you. A man as has got such opinions as you have!'
Mr Bunsby merely uttered a suppressed groan.
'Come!' said the Captain, nudging him with his elbow, 'now's your time!
Sheer off! I'll cover your retreat. The time's a flying. Bunsby! It's for
liberty. Will you once?'
Bunsby was immovable. 'Bunsby!' whispered the Captain, 'will you twice
?' Bunsby wouldn't twice.
'Bunsby!' urged the Captain, 'it's for liberty; will you three times?
Now or never!'
Bunsby didn't then, and didn't ever; for Mrs MacStinger immediately
afterwards married him.
One of the most frightful circumstances of the ceremony to the Captain,
was the deadly interest exhibited therein by Juliana MacStinger; and the
fatal concentration of her faculties, with which that promising child,
already the image of her parent, observed the whole proceedings. The Captain
saw in this a succession of man-traps stretching out infinitely; a series of
ages of oppression and coercion, through which the seafaring line was
doomed. It was a more memorable sight than the unflinching steadiness of Mrs
Bokum and the other lady, the exultation of the short gentleman in the tall
hat, or even the fell inflexibility of Mrs MacStinger. The Master
MacStingers understood little of what was going on, and cared less; being
chiefly engaged, during the ceremony, in treading on one another's
half-boots; but the contrast afforded by those wretched infants only set off
and adorned the precocious woman in Juliana. Another year or two, the
Captain thought, and to lodge where that child was, would be destruction.
The ceremony was concluded by a general spring of the young family on
Mr Bunsby, whom they hailed by the endearing name of father, and from whom
they solicited half-pence. These gushes of affection over, the procession
was about to issue forth again, when it was delayed for some little time by
an unexpected transport on the part of Alexander MacStinger. That dear
child, it seemed, connecting a chapel with tombstones, when it was entered
for any purpose apart from the ordinary religious exercises, could not be
persuaded but that his mother was now to be decently interred, and lost to
him for ever. In the anguish of this conviction, he screamed with
astonishing force, and turned black in the face. However touching these
marks of a tender disposition were to his mother, it was not in the
character of that remarkable woman to permit her recognition of them to
degenerate into weakness. Therefore, after vainly endeavouring to convince
his reason by shakes, pokes, bawlings-out, and similar applications to his
head, she led him into the air, and tried another method; which was
manifested to the marriage party by a quick succession of sharp sounds,
resembling applause, and subsequently, by their seeing Alexander in contact
with the coolest paving-stone in the court, greatly flushed, and loudly
lamenting.
The procession being then in a condition to form itself once more, and
repair to Brig Place, where a marriage feast was in readiness, returned as
it had come; not without the receipt, by Bunsby, of many humorous
congratulations from the populace on his recently-acquired happiness. The
Captain accompanied it as far as the house-door, but, being made uneasy by
the gentler manner of Mrs Bokum, who, now that she was relieved from her
engrossing duty - for the watchfulness and alacrity of the ladies sensibly
diminished when the bridegroom was safely married - had greater leisure to
show an interest in his behalf, there left it and the captive; faintly
pleading an appointment, and promising to return presently. The Captain had
another cause for uneasiness, in remorsefully reflecting that he had been
the first means of Bunsby's entrapment, though certainly without intending
it, and through his unbounded faith in the resources of that philosopher.
To go back to old Sol Gills at the wooden Midshipman's, and not first
go round to ask how Mr Dombey was - albeit the house where he lay was out of
London, and away on the borders of a fresh heath - was quite out of the
Captain's course. So he got a lift when he was tired, and made out the
journey gaily.
The blinds were pulled down, and the house so quiet, that the Captain
was almost afraid to knock; but listening at the door, he heard low voices
within, very near it, and, knocking softly, was admitted by Mr Toots. Mr
Toots and his wife had, in fact, just arrived there; having been at the
Midshipman's to seek him, and having there obtained the address.
They were not so recently arrived, but that Mrs Toots had caught the
baby from somebody, taken it in her arms, and sat down on the stairs,
hugging and fondling it. Florence was stooping down beside her; and no one
could have said which Mrs Toots was hugging and fondling most, the mother or
the child, or which was the tenderer, Florence of Mrs Toots, or Mrs Toots of
her, or both of the baby; it was such a little group of love and agitation.
'And is your Pa very ill, my darling dear Miss Floy?' asked Susan.
'He is very, very ill,' said Florence. 'But, Susan, dear, you must not
speak to me as you used to speak. And what's this?' said Florence, touching
her clothes, in amazement. 'Your old dress, dear? Your old cap, curls, and
all?'
Susan burst into tears, and showered kisses on the little hand that had
touched her so wonderingly.
'My dear Miss Dombey,' said Mr Toots, stepping forward, 'I'll explain.
She's the most extraordinary woman. There are not many to equal her! She has
always said - she said before we were married, and has said to this day -
that whenever you came home, she'd come to you in no dress but the dress she
used to serve you in, for fear she might seem strange to you, and you might
like her less. I admire the dress myself,' said Mr Toots, 'of all things. I
adore her in it! My dear Miss Dombey, she'll be your maid again, your nurse,
all that she ever was, and more. There's no change in her. But, Susan, my
dear,' said Mr Toots, who had spoken with great feeling and high admiration,
'all I ask is, that you'll remember the medical man, and not exert yourself
too much!'
Relenting
Florence had need of help. Her father's need of it was sore, and made
the aid of her old friend invaluable. Death stood at his pillow. A shade,
already, of what he had been, shattered in mind, and perilously sick in
body, he laid his weary head down on the bed his daughter's hands prepared
for him, and had never raised it since.
She was always with him. He knew her, generally; though, in the
wandering of his brain, he often confused the circumstances under which he
spoke to her. Thus he would address her, sometimes, as if his boy were newly
dead; and would tell her, that although he had said nothing of her
ministering at the little bedside, yet he had seen it - he had seen it; and
then would hide his face and sob, and put out his worn hand. Sometimes he
would ask her for herself. 'Where is Florence?' 'I am here, Papa, I am
here.' 'I don't know her!' he would cry. 'We have been parted so long, that
I don't know her!' and then a staring dread would he upon him, until she
could soothe his perturbation; and recall the tears she tried so hard, at
other times, to dry.
He rambled through the scenes of his old pursuits - through many where
Florence lost him as she listened - sometimes for hours. He would repeat
that childish question, 'What is money?' and ponder on it, and think about
it, and reason with himself, more or less connectedly, for a good answer; as
if it had never been proposed to him until that moment. He would go on with
a musing repetition of the title of his old firm twenty thousand times, and
at every one of them, would turn his head upon his pillow. He would count
his children - one - two - stop, and go back, and begin again in the same
way.
But this was when his mind was in its most distracted state. In all the
other phases of its illness, and in those to which it was most constant, it
always turned on Florence. What he would oftenest do was this: he would
recall that night he had so recently remembered, the night on which she came
down to his room, and would imagine that his heart smote him, and that he
went out after her, and up the stairs to seek her. Then, confounding that
time with the later days of the many footsteps, he would be amazed at their
number, and begin to count them as he followed her. Here, of a sudden, was a
bloody footstep going on among the others; and after it there began to be,
at intervals, doors standing open, through which certain terrible pictures
were seen, in mirrors, of haggard men, concealing something in their
breasts. Still, among the many footsteps and the bloody footsteps here and
there, was the step of Florence. Still she was going on before. Still the
restless mind went, following and counting, ever farther, ever higher, as to
the summit of a mighty tower that it took years to climb.
One day he inquired if that were not Susan who had spoken a long while
ago.
Florence said 'Yes, dear Papa;' and asked him would he like to see her?
He said 'very much.' And Susan, with no little trepidation, showed
herself at his bedside.
It seemed a great relief to him. He begged her not to go; to understand
that he forgave her what she had said; and that she was to stay. Florence
and he were very different now, he said, and very happy. Let her look at
this! He meant his drawing the gentle head down to his pillow, and laying it
beside him.
He remained like this for days and weeks. At length, lying, the faint
feeble semblance of a man, upon his bed, and speaking in a voice so low that
they could only hear him by listening very near to his lips, he became
quiet. It was dimly pleasant to him now, to lie there, with the window open,
looking out at the summer sky and the trees: and, in the evening, at the
sunset. To watch the shadows of the clouds and leaves, and seem to feel a
sympathy with shadows. It was natural that he should. To him, life and the
world were nothing else.
He began to show now that he thought of Florence's fatigue: and often
taxed his weakness to whisper to her, 'Go and walk, my dearest, in the sweet
air. Go to your good husband!' One time when Walter was in his room, he
beckoned him to come near, and to stoop down; and pressing his hand,
whispered an assurance to him that he knew he could trust him with his child
when he was dead.
It chanced one evening, towards sunset, when Florence and Walter were
sitting in his room together, as he liked to see them, that Florence, having
her baby in her arms, began in a low voice to sing to the little fellow, and
sang the old tune she had so often sung to the dead child: He could not bear
it at the time; he held up his trembling hand, imploring her to stop; but
next day he asked her to repeat it, and to do so often of an evening: which
she did. He listening, with his face turned away.
Florence was sitting on a certain time by his window, with her
work-basket between her and her old attendant, who was still her faithful
companion. He had fallen into a doze. It was a beautiful evening, with two
hours of light to come yet; and the tranquillity and quiet made Florence
very thoughtful. She was lost to everything for the moment, but the occasion
when the so altered figure on the bed had first presented her to her
beautiful Mama; when a touch from Walter leaning on the back of her chair,
made her start.
'My dear,' said Walter, 'there is someone downstairs who wishes to
speak to you.
She fancied Walter looked grave, and asked him if anything had
happened.
'No, no, my love!' said Walter. 'I have seen the gentleman myself, and
spoken with him. Nothing has happened. Will you come?'
Florence put her arm through his; and confiding her father to the
black-eyed Mrs Toots, who sat as brisk and smart at her work as black-eyed
woman could, accompanied her husband downstairs. In the pleasant little
parlour opening on the garden, sat a gentleman, who rose to advance towards
her when she came in, but turned off, by reason of some peculiarity in his
legs, and was only stopped by the table.
Florence then remembered Cousin Feenix, whom she had not at first
recognised in the shade of the leaves. Cousin Feenix took her hand, and
congratulated her upon her marriage.
'I could have wished, I am sure,' said Cousin Feenix, sitting down as
Florence sat, to have had an earlier opportunity of offering my
congratulations; but, in point of fact, so many painful occurrences have
happened, treading, as a man may say, on one another's heels, that I have
been in a devil of a state myself, and perfectly unfit for every description
of society. The only description of society I have kept, has been my own;
and it certainly is anything but flattering to a man's good opinion of his
own sources, to know that, in point of fact, he has the capacity of boring
himself to a perfectly unlimited extent.'
Florence divined, from some indefinable constraint and anxiety in this
gentleman's manner - which was always a gentleman's, in spite of the
harmless little eccentricities that attached to it - and from Walter's
manner no less, that something more immediately tending to some object was
to follow this.
'I have been mentioning to my friend Mr Gay, if I may be allowed to
have the honour of calling him so,' said Cousin Feenix, 'that I am rejoiced
to hear that my friend Dombey is very decidedly mending. I trust my friend
Dombey will not allow his mind to be too much preyed upon, by any mere loss
of fortune. I cannot say that I have ever experienced any very great loss of
fortune myself: never having had, in point of fact, any great amount of
fortune to lose. But as much as I could lose, I have lost; and I don't find
that I particularly care about it. I know my friend Dombey to be a devilish
honourable man; and it's calculated to console my friend Dombey very much,
to know, that this is the universal sentiment. Even Tommy Screwzer, - a man
of an extremely bilious habit, with whom my friend Gay is probably
acquainted - cannot say a syllable in disputation of the fact.'
Florence felt, more than ever, that there was something to come; and
looked earnestly for it. So earnestly, that Cousin Feenix answered, as if
she had spoken.
'The fact is,' said Cousin Feenix, 'that my friend Gay and myself have
been discussing the propriety of entreating a favour at your hands; and that
I have the consent of my friend Gay - who has met me in an exceedingly kind
and open manner, for which I am very much indebted to him - to solicit it. I
am sensible that so amiable a lady as the lovely and accomplished daughter
of my friend Dombey will not require much urging; but I am happy to know,
that I am supported by my friend Gay's influence and approval. As in my
parliamentary time, when a man had a motion to make of any sort - which
happened seldom in those days, for we were kept very tight in hand, the
leaders on both sides being regular Martinets, which was a devilish good
thing for the rank and file, like myself, and prevented our exposing
ourselves continually, as a great many of us had a feverish anxiety to do -
as' in my parliamentary time, I was about to say, when a man had leave to
let off any little private popgun, it was always considered a great point
for him to say that he had the happiness of believing that his sentiments
were not without an echo in the breast of Mr Pitt; the pilot, in point of
fact, who had weathered the storm. Upon which, a devilish large number of
fellows immediately cheered, and put him in spirits. Though the fact is,
that these fellows, being under orders to cheer most excessively whenever Mr
Pitt's name was mentioned, became so proficient that it always woke 'em. And
they were so entirely innocent of what was going on, otherwise, that it used
to be commonly said by Conversation Brown - four-bottle man at the Treasury
Board, with whom the father of my friend Gay was probably acquainted, for it
was before my friend Gay's time - that if a man had risen in his place, and
said that he regretted to inform the house that there was an Honourable
Member in the last stage of convulsions in the Lobby, and that the
Honourable Member's name was Pitt, the approbation would have been
vociferous.'
This postponement of the point, put Florence in a flutter; and she
looked from Cousin Feenix to Walter, in increasing agitatioN
'My love,' said Walter, 'there is nothing the matter.
'There is nothing the matter, upon my honour,' said Cousin Feenix; 'and
I am deeply distressed at being the means of causing you a moment's
uneasiness. I beg to assure you that there is nothing the matter. The favour
that I have to ask is, simply - but it really does seem so exceedingly
singular, that I should be in the last degree obliged to my friend Gay if he
would have the goodness to break the - in point of fact, the ice,' said
Cousin Feenix.
Walter thus appealed to, and appealed to no less in the look that
Florence turned towards him, said:
'My dearest, it is no more than this. That you will ride to London with
this gentleman, whom you know.
'And my friend Gay, also - I beg your pardon!' interrupted Cousin
Feenix.
And with me - and make a visit somewhere.'
'To whom?' asked Florence, looking from one to the other.
'If I might entreat,' said Cousin Feenix, 'that you would not press for
an answer to that question, I would venture to take the liberty of making
the request.'
'Do you know, Walter?'
'Yes.'
'And think it right?'
'Yes. Only because I am sure that you would too. Though there may be
reasons I very well understand, which make it better that nothing more
should be said beforehand.'
'If Papa is still asleep, or can spare me if he is awake, I will go
immediately,' said Florence. And rising quietly, and glancing at them with a
look that was a little alarmed but perfectly confiding, left the room.
When she came back, ready to bear them company, they were talking
together, gravely, at the window; and Florence could not but wonder what the
topic was, that had made them so well acquainted in so short a time. She did
not wonder at the look of pride and love with which her husband broke off as
she entered; for she never saw him, but that rested on her.
'I will leave,' said Cousin Feenix, 'a card for my friend Dombey,
sincerely trusting that he will pick up health and strength with every
returning hour. And I hope my friend Dombey will do me the favour to
consider me a man who has a devilish warm admiration of his character, as,
in point of fact, a British merchant and a devilish upright gentleman. My
place in the country is in a most confounded state of dilapidation, but if
my friend Dombey should require a change of air, and would take up his
quarters there, he would find it a remarkably healthy spot - as it need be,
for it's amazingly dull. If my friend Dombey suffers from bodily weakness,
and would allow me to recommend what has frequently done myself good, as a
man who has been extremely queer at times, and who lived pretty freely in
the days when men lived very freely, I should say, let it be in point of
fact the yolk of an egg, beat up with sugar and nutmeg, in a glass of
sherry, and taken in the morning with a slice of dry toast. Jackson, who
kept the boxing-rooms in Bond Street - man of very superior qualifications,
with whose reputation my friend Gay is no doubt acquainted - used to mention
that in training for the ring they substituted rum for sherry. I should
recommend sherry in this case, on account of my friend Dombey being in an
invalided condition; which might occasion rum to fly - in point of fact to
his head - and throw him into a devil of a state.'
Of all this, Cousin Feenix delivered himself with an obviously nervous
and discomposed air. Then, giving his arm to Florence, and putting the
strongest possible constraint upon his wilful legs, which seemed determined
to go out into the garden, he led her to the door, and handed her into a
carriage that was ready for her reception.
Walter entered after him, and they drove away.
Their ride was six or eight miles long. When they drove through certain
dull and stately streets, lying westward in London, it was growing dusk.
Florence had, by this time, put her hand in Walter's; and was looking very
earnestly, and with increasing agitation, into every new street into which
they turned.
When the carriage stopped, at last, before that house in Brook Street,
where her father's unhappy marriage had been celebrated, Florence said,
'Walter, what is this? Who is here?' Walter cheering her, and not replying,
she glanced up at the house-front, and saw that all the windows were shut,
as if it were uninhabited. Cousin Feenix had by this time alighted, and was
offering his hand.
'Are you not coming, Walter?'
'No, I will remain here. Don't tremble there is nothing to fear,
dearest Florence.'
'I know that, Walter, with you so near. I am sure of that, but - '
The door was softly opened, without any knock, and Cousin Feenix led
her out of the summer evening air into the close dull house. More sombre and
brown than ever, it seemed to have been shut up from the wedding-day, and to
have hoarded darkness and sadness ever since.
Florence ascended the dusky staircase, trembling; and stopped, with her
conductor, at the drawing-room door. He opened it, without speaking, and
signed an entreaty to her to advance into the inner room, while he remained
there. Florence, after hesitating an instant, complied.
Sitting by the window at a table, where she seemed to have been writing
or drawing, was a lady, whose head, turned away towards the dying light, was
resting on her hand. Florence advancing, doubtfully, all at once stood
still, as if she had lost the power of motion. The lady turned her head.
'Great Heaven!' she said, 'what is this?'
'No, no!' cried Florence, shrinking back as she rose up and putting out
her hands to keep her off. 'Mama!'
They stood looking at each other. Passion and pride had worn it, but it
was the face of Edith, and beautiful and stately yet. It was the face of
Florence, and through all the terrified avoidance it expressed, there was
pity in it, sorrow, a grateful tender memory. On each face, wonder and fear
were painted vividly; each so still and silent, looking at the other over
the black gulf of the irrevocable past.
Florence was the first to change. Bursting into tears, she said from
her full heart, 'Oh, Mama, Mama! why do we meet like this? Why were you ever
kind to me when there was no one else, that we should meet like this?'
Edith stood before her, dumb and motionless. Her eyes were fixed upon
her face.
'I dare not think of that,' said Florence, 'I am come from Papa's sick
bed. We are never asunder now; we never shall be' any more. If you would
have me ask his pardon, I will do it, Mama. I am almost sure he will grant
it now, if I ask him. May Heaven grant it to you, too, and comfort you!'
She answered not a word.
'Walter - I am married to him, and we have a son,' said Florence,
timidly - 'is at the door, and has brought me here. I will tell him that you
are repentant; that you are changed,' said Florence, looking mournfully upon
her; 'and he will speak to Papa with me, I know. Is there anything but this
that I can do?'
Edith, breaking her silence, without moving eye or limb, answered
slowly:
'The stain upon your name, upon your husband's, on your child's. Will
that ever be forgiven, Florence?'
'Will it ever be, Mama? It is! Freely, freely, both by Walter and by
me. If that is any consolation to you, there is nothing that you may believe
more certainly. You do not - you do not,' faltered Florence, 'speak of Papa;
but I am sure you wish that I should ask him for his forgiveness. I am sure
you do.'
She answered not a word.
'I will!' said Florence. 'I will bring it you, if you will let me; and
then, perhaps, we may take leave of each other, more like what we used to be
to one another. I have not,' said Florence very gently, and drawing nearer
to her, 'I have not shrunk back from you, Mama, because I fear you, or
because I dread to be disgraced by you. I only wish to do my duty to Papa. I
am very dear to him, and he is very dear to me. But I never can forget that
you were very good to me. Oh, pray to Heaven,' cried Florence, falling on
her bosom, 'pray to Heaven, Mama, to forgive you all this sin and shame, and
to forgive me if I cannot help doing this (if it is wrong), when I remember
what you used to be!'
Edith, as if she fell beneath her touch, sunk down on her knees, and
caught her round the neck.
'Florence!' she cried. 'My better angel! Before I am mad again, before
my stubbornness comes back and strikes me dumb, believe me, upon my soul I
am innocent!'
'Mama!'
'Guilty of much! Guilty of that which sets a waste between us evermore.
Guilty of what must separate me, through the whole remainder of my life,
from purity and innocence - from you, of all the earth. Guilty of a blind
and passionate resentment, of which I do not, cannot, will not, even now,
repent; but not guilty with that dead man. Before God!'
Upon her knees upon the ground, she held up both her hands, and swore
it.
'Florence!' she said, 'purest and best of natures, - whom I love - who
might have changed me long ago, and did for a time work some change even in
the woman that I am, - believe me, I am innocent of that; and once more, on
my desolate heart, let me lay this dear head, for the last time!'
She was moved and weeping. Had she been oftener thus in older days, she
had been happier now.
'There is nothing else in all the world,' she said, 'that would have
wrung denial from me. No love, no hatred, no hope, no threat. I said that I
would die, and make no sign. I could have done so, and I would, if we had
never met, Florence.
'I trust,' said Cousin Feenix, ambling in at the door, and speaking,
half in the room, and half out of it, 'that my lovely and accomplished
relative will excuse my having, by a little stratagem, effected this
meeting. I cannot say that I was, at first, wholly incredulous as to the
possibility of my lovely and accomplished relative having, very
unfortunately, committed herself with the deceased person with white teeth;
because in point of fact, one does see, in this world - which is remarkable