52

When Kit came downstairs from the single gentleman’s apartment, Mr. Sampson Brass was standing by the door. He was not singing as usual, nor was he seated at his desk.

“Is anything the matter, sir?” said Kit.

“Matter!” cried Brass. “No. Why anything the matter?”

“You are so very pale,” said Kit.

“I have been thinking, Kit…” said the lawyer, “You have a mother, I think? If I recollect right, you told me.”

“Oh yes, sir, yes certainly.”

“A widow I think? an industrious widow?”

“A harder-working woman or a better mother never lived sir.”

“Ah!” cried Brass. “That’s affecting, truly affecting. A poor widow struggling to maintain her orphans in decency and comfort, is a delicious picture of human goodness. Put down your hat, Kit.”

“Thank you, sir.”

“Put it down while you stay, at any rate,” said Brass, taking Kit’s hat from him. “I was thinking, Kit, that we have often houses to let. And we put people into those houses to take care of them. So why not employ this worthy woman, your mother? Now what do you think of that? Do you see any objection? My only desire is to serve you, Kit; therefore if you do, say so freely.”

As Brass spoke, he moved the hat twice or thrice, and shuffled among the papers.

“How can I see any objection to such a kind offer, sir?” replied Kit. “I don’t know how to thank you, sir.”

“Why then,” said Brass, suddenly turning upon him. “Why then, it’s done.”

“Oh!” sneered Sally. “Do you employ Kit, Sammy?”

“Yes!” replied Brass. “An honest fellow, a worthy fellow indeed! He has had my confidence, and he shall continue to have it; he why, where’s the…”

“What have you lost?” inquired Mr. Swiveller.

“Dear me!” said Brass, slapping all his pockets, one after another, and looking into his desk, and under it, and upon it, and wildly tossing the papers about, “the note, Mr. Richard sir, the five-pound note! I laid it clown here!”

“What?” cried Miss Sally, starting up, clapping her hands, and scattering the papers on the floor. “Gone! Now who’s right? Now who’s got it? Never mind five pounds, what’s five pounds? He’s honest, you know, quite honest. It’s mean to suspect him.”

“Kit,” said Sampson, “something of value is missing from the office. I hope you don’t know what.”

“Know what! good Heaven, Mr. Brass!” cried Kit, trembling from head to foot; “you don’t suppose…”

“No, no,” rejoined Brass quickly, “I don’t suppose anything. Don’t say I said you did. Or?”

“I am sure you’ll be sorry for having suspected me, sir,” replied Kit.

“Certainly!” cried Brass, “But we must examine you. It will be a comfortable and pleasant thing for all parties.”

“Search me,” said Kit, proudly holding up his arms. “But mind, sir, I know you’ll be sorry for this, to the last day of your life.”

“It is certainly a very painful occurrence,” said Brass with a sigh, as he dived into one of Kit’s pockets; “very painful. Nothing here, Mr. Richard, sir, all perfectly satisfactory. Nor here, sir. Nor in the waistcoat, Mr. Richard, nor in the coat-tails. So far, I am rejoiced, I am sure.”

Richard Swiveller, holding Kit’s hat in his hand, was watching the proceedings with great interest. Sampson turning hastily to him, bade him search the hat.

“Here’s a handkerchief,” said Dick.

“No harm in that sir,” rejoined Brass. “No harm in a handkerchief sir, whatever. And what is this?!”

Kit turned his head, and saw Dick standing with the bank-note in his hand.

“In the hat?” cried Brass in a sort of shriek.

“Under the handkerchief, and beneath the lining,” said Dick, aghast at the discovery.

Mr. Brass looked at him, at his sister, at the walls, at the ceiling, at the floor. Kit stood quite stupefied and motionless.

53

Kit stood with his eyes opened wide and fixed upon the ground. He remained in this posture, quite unresisting and passive, until Mr. Swiveller brought a policeman.

“But listen to me!” cried Kit, raising his eyes. “I am no more guilty than any one of you. Upon my soul I am not. I am a thief! Oh, Mr. Brass, you know me better. I am sure you know me better. This is not right of you, indeed.”

“I give you my oath, constable,” said Brass “that I had confidence in that lad.”

“Ask anybody,” cried Kit, “whether they have ever doubted me; whether I have ever wronged them of a farthing. Was I ever once dishonest when I was poor and hungry, and is it likely I would begin now? Oh consider what you do!”

The voice of the single gentleman was heard, demanding from above-stairs what was the matter, and what was the cause of all that noise and hurry. Sampson Brass ran out to tell the story in his own way.

“And he can hardly believe it, either,” said Sampson, when he returned, “But what to do?..”

The constable thrust Kit into the vehicle and followed himself. Miss Sally entered next; Sampson Brass got upon the box, and made the coachman drive on.

Poor Kit was looking out of the window, when all at once he saw the face of Quilp. Mr. Brass immediately stopped the coach. Dwarf pulled off his hat, and saluted the party with a hideous and grotesque politeness.

“Aha!” he cried. “Where now, Brass? where now? Sally with you too? Sweet Sally! And Dick? Pleasant Dick! And Kit? Honest Kit!”

“He’s extremely cheerful!” said Brass to the coachman. “Very much so! Ah sir a sad business! Never believe in honesty any more, sir.”

“Why not?” returned the dwarf. “Why not, why not?”

“Bank-note lost in our office sir,” said Brass, shaking his head. “Found in Kit’s hat, sir, no mistake.”

“What?” cried the dwarf. “Kit is a thief! Kit is a thief! Ha ha ha! Why, he’s an uglier-looking thief than can be seen anywhere for a penny. Eh Kit eh? Eh Kit, eh?” And with that, he burst into a yell of laughter.

“Ha ha ha ha!” cried the dwarf, rubbing his hands violently. “What a disappointment for little Jacob, and for his darling mother! Eh Kit, eh? Bye-bye Kit; all good go with you; keep up your spirits; my love to the Garlands, the dear old lady and gentleman. Blessings on them, on you, and on everybody, Kit. Blessings on all the world!”

When Quilp could see the coach no longer, he rolled upon the ground in an ecstasy of enjoyment.

At the justice-room, they found the single gentleman, who had gone straight there, and was expecting them with desperate impatience. But not fifty single gentlemen could have helped poor Kit.

54

A faint light, twinkling from the window of the counting-house on Quilp’s wharf, warned Mr. Sampson Brass, as he approached the wooden cabin with a cautious step, that the dwarf was inside. He looked doubtfully towards the light, and over his shoulder.

Brass went up to the wooden house, and knocked at the door.

“Come in!” cried the dwarf.

“How do you do tonight, sir?” said Sampson, peeping in. “Ha ha ha! How do you do, sir?”

“Come in, you fool!” returned the dwarf, “Come in, you false witness, you perjurer, you suborner of evidence, come in!”

“He has the richest humour!” cried Brass, shutting the door behind him; “the most amazing vein of comicality! But isn’t it rather injudicious sir?”

“What?” demanded Quilp. “What, Judas?”

“Judas!” cried Brass. “He has such extraordinary spirits! His humour is so extremely playful! Judas! Oh yes dear me, how very good! Ha ha ha!”

Sampson was rubbing his hands and staring at Quilp.

“You were asking, sir,” said Brass, “Sally told me, about our lodger. He has not returned sir.”

“No?” said Quilp, heating some rum in a little saucepan. “Why not? The lodger, what about him?”

“He is still, sir,” returned Brass, “stopping with the Garland family. He has only been home once, sir, since the day of the examination of that culprit. He informed Mr. Richard sir, that he couldn’t bear the house after what had taken place. A very excellent lodger sir. I hope we may not lose him.”

“Yah!” cried the dwarf. “But you may lose the clerk.”

“Discharge Mr. Richard sir?” cried Brass.

“Have you more than one clerk, you parrot, that you ask the question? Yes.”

“Upon my word sir,” said Brass, “I wasn’t prepared for this.”

“How could you be?” sneered the dwarf, “I brought him to you that I might always watch your lodger. This clerk and his precious friend believed the old man and grandchild rich, but in reality they were as poor as frozen rats.”

“I quite understood that sir,” rejoined Brass. “Thoroughly.”

“Well sir,” retorted Quilp, “and do you understand now, that they’re not poor that they can’t be, if they have such men as your lodger searching for them?”

“Of course I do, sir,” said Sampson.

“Of course you do,” retorted the dwarf, viciously snapping at his words. “This fellow is pigeon-hearted, and light-headed. I don’t want him any longer. Let him hang or drown, let him go to the devil.”

“By all means, sir,” returned Brass. “When would you wish him, sir, to – ha ha! – to make that little excursion?”

“When this trial’s over,” said Quilp. “As soon as that’s ended, send him away.”

“It will be done, sir,” returned Brass; “by all means, sir.”