21

“Hem!” croaked a strange voice. “What’s that about six pound a year? What about six pound a year?” And as the voice made this inquiry, Daniel Quilp walked in with Richard Swiveller at his heels.

“Who said he would have six pound a year?” said Quilp, looking sharply round. “Did the old man say it, or did little Nell say it? And what’s he to have it for, and where are they, eh?”

The good woman was so much alarmed by the sudden apparition of this unknown ugly dwarf, that she hastily caught the baby from its cradle and retreated into the furthest corner of the room.

“Don’t be frightened, mistress,” said Quilp, after a pause. “Your son knows me; I don’t eat babies; I don’t like them. Now you Kit, why haven’t you come to me as you promised?”

“What should I come for?” retorted Kit. “I hadn’t any business with you, no more than you had with me.”

“Here, mistress,” said Quilp, turning quickly away, and appealing from Kit to his mother. “When did his old master come or send here last? Is he here now? If not, where’s he gone?”

“He has not been here at all,” she replied. “We don’t know where they have gone.”

Quilp glanced at Richard Swiveller, and assumed that he had come in search of some information of the fugitives. He supposed he was right?

“Yes,” said Dick, “that was the object of the present expedition.”

“You seem disappointed,” observed Quilp.

“It baffles description, sir, that’s all,” returned Dick.

The dwarf looked at Richard with a sarcastic smile, but Richard continued to deplore his fate with mournful and despondent looks.

“I am disappointed myself,” said Quilp, “I have friendly feeling for them; but you have real reasons, private reasons I have no doubt, for your disappointment, and therefore it comes heavier than mine.”

“Why, of course it does,” Dick observed, testily.

“Upon my word, I’m very sorry, very sorry. But as we are companions in adversity, shall we be companions in the surest way of forgetting it? If you had no particular business, now, to lead you in another direction,” urged Quilp, plucking him by the sleeve and looking slyly up into his face out of the corners of his eyes, “there is a house by the water-side where they have excellent gin. The landlord knows me. There’s a little summer-house overlooking the river, where we might take a glass of this delicious liquor, Mr. Swiveller, eh?”

As the dwarf spoke, Dick’s face relaxed into a compliant smile, and his brows slowly unbent. Off they went.

The summer-house of which Mr. Quilp had spoken was a rugged wooden box, rotten and bare to see, which overhung the river’s mud, and threatened to slide down into it. The tavern to which it belonged was a crazy building, undermined by the rats. The rooms were low and damp, the clammy walls were pierced with chinks and holes. To this inviting spot Mr. Quilp led Richard Swiveller.

22

Roads stretch a long, long way. The old man and the child passed, without stopping, two or three inconsiderable clusters of cottages, a public-house where they had some bread and cheese, and they were very weary and fatigued.

In the evening they arrived at a point where the road made a sharp turn and struck across a common. On the border of this common, and close to the hedge which divided it from the cultivated fields, a caravan was drawn up to rest.

It was not a shabby, dingy, dusty cart, but a smart little house upon wheels, with white dimity curtains festooning the windows. Neither was it a gypsy caravan, for at the open door sat a Christian lady, stout and comfortable to look upon, who wore a large bonnet trembling with bows. This lady was drinking tea. The tea-things, including a bottle and a cold knuckle of ham, were set forth upon a drum, covered with a white napkin.

It happened that at that moment the lady beheld an old man and a young child walking slowly by.

“Hey!” cried the lady of the caravan. “Yes, to be sure, who won the prize, child?”

“Won what, ma’am?” asked Nell.

“The prize, at the races, child.”

“I don’t know, ma’am.”

“Don’t know!” repeated the lady of the caravan; “why, you were there. I saw you with my own eyes.”

Nell was not a little alarmed to hear this.

“And very sorry I was,” said the lady of the caravan, “to see you in company with a Punch; a low, practical, vulgar wretch.”

“I was there by chance,” returned the child; “we didn’t know our way, and the two men were very kind to us, and let us travel with them. Do you do you know them, ma’am?”

“Know them, child!” cried the lady of the caravan in a sort of shriek. “Know them! But you’re young and inexperienced, and that’s your excuse for asking such a question.”

“Oh ma’am,” said the child, fearing she had committed some grievous fault. “I beg your pardon.”

It was granted immediately. The child then explained that they had left the races, and were travelling to the next town on that road, where they purposed to spend the night.

“Come nearer, nearer still,” said the lady of the caravan, “Are you hungry, child?”

“Not very, but we are tired, and it is a long way “

“Well, hungry or not, you had better have some tea,” rejoined her new acquaintance. “I suppose you are agreeable to that, old gentleman?”

The grandfather humbly pulled off his hat and thanked her. She handed down to them the tea-tray, the bread and butter, and the knuckle of ham. So they made a hearty meal and enjoyed it to the utmost.

The lady of the caravan alighted on the earth, and sat down upon the steps and called “George;” whereupon a man in a carter’s frock appeared.

“Yes, ma’am,” said George.

“How did you find the cold pie, George?”

“It wasn’t amiss, ma’am.”

“And the beer,” said the lady of the caravan, “is it passable, George?”

“It’s not bad, ma’am” George returned, “not bad at all.”

“We are not a heavy load, George?”

“That’s always what the ladies say,” replied the man. “What is the cause of this here?”

“Would these two travellers make much difference to the horses, if we took them with us?” asked his mistress, pointing to Nell and the old man, who were painfully preparing to resume their journey on foot.

“They’d make a difference in course,” said George doggedly.

“Would they make much difference?” repeated his mistress. “They can’t be very heavy.”

“The weight of the pair, mum!” said George.

After these words of George the lady offered the old man and the child to go forward in the caravan. Nell thanked her with unaffected earnestness. Their patroness then shut the door and sat herself down at an open window. So away they went, with a great noise of flapping and creaking and straining.

23

The lady of the caravan sat at one window in all the pride, and little Nell and her grandfather sat at the other in all the humility. At first the two travellers spoke little, and only in whispers, but as they grew more familiar with the place they conversed with greater freedom, and talked about the country through which they were passing, until the old man fell asleep. The lady of the caravan invited Nell to come and sit beside her.

“Well, child,” she said, “how do you like this way of travelling?”

Nell replied that she thought it was very pleasant indeed. The lady sat got up and brought out from a corner a large roll of canvas about a yard in width, which she laid upon the floor and spread open with her foot.

“There, child,” she said, “read that.”

Nell walked down it, and read aloud, in enormous black letters, the inscription. “JARLEY’S WAX-WORK.”

“Read it again,” said the lady, complacently.

“Jarley’s Wax-Work,” repeated Nell.

“That’s me,” said the lady. “I am Mrs. Jarley.”

Mrs. Jarley unfolded another scroll, where was the inscription, “One hundred figures the full size of life,” and then another scroll, on which was written, “The only stupendous collection of real wax-work in the world,” and then several smaller scrolls with such inscriptions as “Now exhibiting within”, “The genuine and only Jarley”, “Jarley’s unrivalled collection”, “Jarley is the delight of the Nobility and Gentry”, “The Royal Family are the patrons of Jarley.”

“Never go into the company of a filthy Punch any more,” said Mrs. Jarley, “after this.”

“I never saw any wax-work, ma’am,” said Nell. “Is it funnier than Punch?”

“Funnier!” said Mrs. Jarley in a shrill voice. “It is not funny at all.”

“Oh!” said Nell, with all possible humility.

“It isn’t funny at all,” repeated Mrs. Jarley. “It’s calm and classical. No low beatings, no jokings and squeakings like your precious Punches!”

“Is it here, ma’am?” asked Nell.

“Is what here, child?”

“The wax-work, ma’am.”

“Why, bless you, child, what are you thinking of? How could such a collection be here, where you see everything except the inside of one little cupboard and a few boxes? It’s in the other wans, and there it’ll be exhibited the day after tomorrow. You are going to the same town, and you’ll see it I dare say.”

“I shall not be in the town, I think, ma’am,” said the child.

“Not there?” cried Mrs. Jarley. “Then where will you be?”

“I don’t quite know. I am not certain.”

“You don’t mean to say that you’re travelling about the country without knowing where you’re going to?” said the lady of the caravan. “What curious people you are!”

“We are poor people, ma’am,” returned Nell, “and are only wandering about. We have nothing to do; I wish we had.”

“You amaze me more and more,” said Mrs. Jarley. “Why, what do you call yourselves? Not beggars?”

“Indeed, ma’am, I don’t know what else we are,” returned the child.

“Lord bless me,” said the lady of the caravan. “I never heard of such a thing!”

She remained silent after this exclamation. Then she said:

“And yet you can read. And write too, I wonder?”

“Yes, ma’am,” said the child.

“Well, and what a thing that is,” returned Mrs. Jarley. “I can’t!”

Mrs. Jarley relapsed into a thoughtful silence, and remained in that state so long that Nell withdrew to the other window and rejoined her grandfather, who was now awake.

At length the lady of the caravan summoned the driver to come under the window at which she was seated, held a long conversation with him in a low tone of voice, and then beckoned Nell to approach.

“And the old gentleman too,” said Mrs. Jarley; “for I want to have a word with him. Do you want a good situation for your granddaughter, master? If you do, I can make it. What do you say?”

“I can’t leave her,” answered the old man. “We can’t separate. What will become of me without her?”

“I think you can take care of yourself,” retorted Mrs. Jarley sharply.

“Pray do not speak harshly to him,” said the child in an earnest whisper. “We are very thankful to you, but neither of us could part from the other.”

Mrs. Jarley looked at the old man, who tenderly took Nell’s hand and detained it in his own.

“If you want to employ yourself,” said Mrs. Jarley, “there is much work for you, too: to dust the figures, and take the checks, and so forth. What I want your granddaughter for, is to point them out to the people. It’s not a common offer, bear in mind, it’s Jarley’s wax-work, remember. This is an opportunity which may never occur again! Now, child?” cried Mrs. Jarley, as Nell turned towards her.

“We are very much obliged to you, ma’am,” said Nell,” and thankfully accept your offer.”

“And you’ll never be sorry for it,” returned Mrs. Jarley. “I’m pretty sure of that. So let us have a bit of supper.”