43

Mrs. Quilp sat in a tearful silence, meekly listening to the reproaches of her lord and master.

“So you thought I was dead and gone, did you?” said Quilp. “You thought you were a widow, eh? Ha, ha, ha, you jade!”

“Indeed, Quilp,” returned his wife. “I’m very sorry…”

“Who doubts it?” cried the dwarf. “You very sorry! To be sure you are. Who doubts that you’re very sorry?”

“I don’t mean sorry that you have come home again alive and well,” said his wife, “but sorry that I was deceived. I am glad to see you, Quilp; indeed I am. How could you go away so long, without saying a word to me or letting me hear of you or know anything about you?” asked the poor little woman, sobbing. “How could you be so cruel, Quilp?”

“How could I be so cruel? Cruel?” cried the dwarf. “Because I was in the humour. I’m in the humour now. I shall be cruel when I like. I’m going away again.”

“Not again!”

“Yes, again. I’m going away now. I’m off directly. I mean to go and live wherever I want! I’ll live at the wharf at the counting-house and be a jolly bachelor. You were a widow in your dreams,” screamed the dwarf, “I’ll be a bachelor in real life.”

“You can’t be serious, Quilp,” sobbed his wife.

“I tell you,” said the dwarf, exulting in his project, “that I’ll be a bachelor, a happy bachelor; and don’t approach my counting-house. The boy! Where’s the boy?”

“Here I am, master,” cried the voice of the boy, as Quilp threw up the window.

“Wait there, you dog,” returned the dwarf, “to carry a bachelor’s chest. Pack it up, Mrs. Quilp. Knock up the dear old lady to help; knock her up! Halloa there! Halloa!”

With these exclamations, Mr. Quilp caught up the poker, and hurrying to the door of the lady’s room, beat upon it therewith. After that the eccentric gentleman superintended the packing of his wardrobe, and added to it a plate, knife and fork, spoon, tea-cup and saucer.

Quilp led the way to the wharf, and reached it at between three and four o’clock in the morning.

“Wonderful” said Quilp, when he had opened the door of the wooden counting-house. “Beautiful!”

44

In the morning, Quilp made a fire in the yard of sundry pieces of old timber, and prepared some coffee for breakfast. In a few minutes a meal was smoking on the board. Having this substantial comfort, the dwarf was highly satisfied with this and gipsy mode of life.

“I’ve got a country house like Robinson Crusoe,” said the dwarf; “a solitary, sequestered, desolate-island, where I can be quite alone, and be secure from all spies and listeners. Nobody is near me here, but rats!”

The dwarf threw himself into a boat, and crossing to the other side of the river, and then reached Mr. Swiveller’s usual house of entertainment.

“Dick” said the dwarf, thrusting his head in at the door, “my pet, my pupil, the apple of my eye, hey, hey!”

“Oh you’re there, are you?” returned Mr. Swiveller; “How are you?”

“How’s Dick?” retorted Quilp. “How’s the best of clerks?”

“Why, rather sour, sir,” replied Mr. Swiveller.

“What’s the matter?” said the dwarf, advancing. “Is Sally unkind, Dick?”

“Certainly not,” replied Mr. Swiveller, eating his dinner with great gravity, “I don’t like the law, I have been thinking of running away.”

“Bah!” said the dwarf. “Where will you run to, Dick?”

“I don’t know,” returned Mr. Swiveller. “Towards nowhere, I suppose.”

Quilp looked at his companion, and patiently awaited his further words.

“That’s unfortunate,” said the dwarf, “for I came, in fact, to ask you about your friend.”

“Which friend?”

“In the first-floor. Why did I employ you as a clerk? To be near that gentleman, to watch him. To let me know every step of his!”

And they talked about the single gentleman. Dick told Quilp everything he knew about the lodger.

45

Mr. Quilp once more crossed the Thames, and shut himself up in his counting-house. He amused himself until nearly midnight, when he turned into the hammock with the utmost satisfaction.

The first sound that met his ears in the morning as he half opened his eyes, was that of a stifled sobbing and weeping in the room. Peeping cautiously over the side of his hammock, he saw Mrs. Quilp, to whom he suddenly yelled out:

“Halloa!”

“Oh, Quilp!” cried his poor little wife, looking up. “How you frightened me!”

“Ha ha, you jade,” returned the dwarf. “What do you want here? I’m dead, am not I?”

“Oh, please come home, do come home,” said Mrs. Quilp, sobbing; “after all, it was only a mistake that grew out of our anxiety.”

“Out of your anxiety,” grinned the dwarf. “I shall come home when I please, I tell you. I shall come home when I please, and go when I please. Will you go out?”

“Do forgive me! Do come back!” said his wife, earnestly.

“No-o-o-o-o!” roared Quilp. “You see the door there. Will you go?”

46

Quilp slept on amidst the congenial accompaniments of rain, mud, dirt, damp, fog, and rats, until late in the day. Then he quitted his couch, and made his toilet, and went to his friend and employer, Mr. Sampson Brass. Both gentlemen however were not at home.

“There’s a servant, I suppose,” said the dwarf, knocking at the house-door. “I’ll talk to her.”

After a sufficiently long interval, the door was opened, and a small voice sounded,

“Oh please will you leave a card or message?”

“Eh?” said the dwarf, looking down (it was something quite new to him) upon the small servant.

To this, the child again replied, “Oh please will you leave a card or message?”

“I’ll write a note,” said the dwarf, pushing past her into the office; “and mind your master has it directly he comes home.”

So Mr. Quilp climbed up to the top of a tall stool to write the note, and the small servant looked on with her eyes wide open, ready to rush into the street and give the alarm to the police.

Mr. Quilp looked at the small servant long and earnestly.

“How are you?” said the dwarf.

The small servant, perhaps frightened by his looks, was silent. Quilp looked at her fixedly.

“Where do you come from?” he said, after a long pause, stroking his chin.

“I don’t know.”

“What’s your name?”

“Nothing.”

“Nonsense!” retorted Quilp. “What does your mistress call you when she wants you?”

“A little devil,” said the child. She added:

“But please will you leave a card or message?”

Quilp tossed the letter to the child, and hastily withdrew.

In the street, moved by some secret impulse, he laughed, and held his sides, and laughed again.

47

Mr. and Mrs. Brass read the invitation left by Quilp and came to his counting-house.

“You’re fond of the beauties of nature,” said Quilp with a grin. “Is this charming, Brass? Is it unusual, unsophisticated, primitive?”

“It’s delightful indeed, sir,” replied the lawyer.

“Cool?” said Quilp.

“Not particularly so, I think, sir,” rejoined Brass.

“Perhaps a little damp?” said Quilp.

“Just damp enough to be cheerful, sir,” rejoined Brass. “Nothing more, sir, nothing more.”

“And Sally?” said the delighted dwarf. “Does she like it?”

“She’ll like it better,” returned that strong-minded lady, “when she has tea; so let us have it, and don’t bother.”

“Sweet Sally!” cried Quilp, extending his arms as if to embrace her. “Gentle, charming, overwhelming Sally!”

“He’s a very remarkable man indeed!” soliloquised Mr. Brass. “He’s quite a Troubadour, you know; quite a Troubadour!”

“A word,” said the dwarf, “before we go farther. Sally, wait a minute.”

Miss Sally drew closer.

“Business,” said the dwarf, glancing from brother to sister. “Very private business.”

“Certainly, sir,” returned Brass, taking out his pocket-book and pencil. “I’ll take down everything, sir.”

“Close your book,” said Quilp. “We don’t want any documents. So. There’s a lad named Kit.”

Miss Sally nodded.

“Kit!” said Mr. Sampson. “Kit! Ha! I’ve heard the name before, but I don’t exactly remember him.”

“I’ve showed you that I know him,” said Miss Sally. “and that’s enough.”

“She’s always foremost!” said the dwarf, patting her on the back and looking contemptuously at Sampson. “I don’t like Kit, Sally.”

“Nor I,” rejoined Miss Brass.

“Nor I,” said Sampson.

“Why, that’s right!” cried Quilp. “Half our work is done already. This Kit is one of the honest people; one of the fair characters; a prowling prying hound; a hypocrite; a double-faced, sneaking spy.”

“Fearfully eloquent!” cried Brass with a sneeze. “Quite appalling!”

“Come to the point,” said Miss Sally, “and don’t talk so much.”

“Right again!” exclaimed Quilp, with another contemptuous look at Sampson, “always foremost! I say, Sally, he is a yelping, insolent dog to all, and most of all, to me.”

“That’s enough, sir,” said Sampson.

“No, it’s not enough, sir,” sneered Quilp; “will you hear me out? He thwarts me at the moment, and stands between me and our business. I hate him. Now, you know the lad, and can guess the rest. Put him out of my way.”

“We will, sir,” said Sampson.

“Then give me your hand,” retorted Quilp. “Sally, girl, yours. I rely as much, or more, on you than him.”