Bleak House
which she lay and enclosed to me in another from her husband, in
which he seconded her entreaty with much solicitude. Caddy was now
the mother, and I the godmother, of such a poor little baby—such a
tiny old-faced mite, with a countenance that seemed to be scarcely
anything but cap-border, and a little lean, long-fingered hand,
always clenched under its chin. It would lie in this attitude all
day, with its bright specks of eyes open, wondering (as I used to
imagine) how it came to be so small and weak. Whenever it was moved
it cried, but at all other times it was so patient that the sole
desire of its life appeared to be to lie quiet and think. It had
curious little dark veins in its face and curious little dark marks
under its eyes like faint remembrances of poor Caddy’s inky days, and
altogether, to those who were not used to it, it was quite a piteous
little sight.
But it was enough for Caddy that SHE was used to it. The projects
with which she beguiled her illness, for little Esther’s education,
and little Esther’s marriage, and even for her own old age as the
grandmother of little Esther’s little Esthers, was so prettily
expressive of devotion to this pride of her life that I should be
tempted to recall some of them but for the timely remembrance that I
am getting on irregularly as it is.
To return to the letter. Caddy had a superstition about me which had
been strengthening in her mind ever since that night long ago when
she had lain asleep with her head in my lap. She almost—I think I
must say quite—believed that I did her good whenever I was near her.
Now although this was such a fancy of the affectionate girl’s that I
am almost ashamed to mention it, still it might have all the force of
a fact when she was really ill. Therefore I set off to Caddy, with my
guardian’s consent, post-haste; and she and Prince made so much of me
that there never was anything like it.
Next day I went again to sit with her, and next day I went again. It
was a very easy journey, for I had only to rise a little earlier in
the morning, and keep my accounts, and attend to housekeeping matters
before leaving home.
But when I had made these three visits, my guardian said to me, on my
return at night, “Now, little woman, little woman, this will never
do. Constant dropping will wear away a stone, and constant coaching
will wear out a Dame Durden. We will go to London for a while and
take possession of our old lodgings.”
“Not for me, dear guardian,” said I, “for I never feel tired,” which
was strictly true. I was only too happy to be in such request.
“For me then,” returned my guardian, “or for Ada, or for both of us.
It is somebody’s birthday to-morrow, I think.”
“Truly I think it is,” said I, kissing my darling, who would be
twenty-one to-morrow.
“Well,” observed my guardian, half pleasantly, half seriously,
“that’s a great occasion and will give my fair cousin some necessary
business to transact in assertion of her independence, and will make
London a more convenient place for all of us. So to London we will
go. That being settled, there is another thing—how have you left
Caddy?”
“Very unwell, guardian. I fear it will be some time before she
regains her health and strength.”
“What do you call some time, now?” asked my guardian thoughtfully.
“Some weeks, I am afraid.”
“Ah!” He began to walk about the room with his hands in his pockets,
showing that he had been thinking as much. “Now, what do you say
about her doctor? Is he a good doctor, my love?”
I felt obliged to confess that I knew nothing to the contrary but
that Prince and I had agreed only that evening that we would like his
opinion to be confirmed by some one.
“Well, you know,” returned my guardian quickly, “there’s Woodcourt.”
I had not meant that, and was rather taken by surprise. For a moment
all that I had had in my mind in connexion with Mr. Woodcourt seemed
to come back and confuse me.
“You don’t object to him, little woman?”
“Object to him, guardian? Oh no!”
“And you don’t think the patient would object to him?”
So far from that, I had no doubt of her being prepared to have a
great reliance on him and to like him very much. I said that he was
no stranger to her personally, for she had seen him often in his kind
attendance on Miss Flite.
“Very good,” said my guardian. “He has been here to-day, my dear, and
I will see him about it to-morrow.”
I felt in this short conversation—though I did not know how, for she
was quiet, and we interchanged no look—that my dear girl well
remembered how merrily she had clasped me round the waist when no
other hands than Caddy’s had brought me the little parting token.
This caused me to feel that I ought to tell her, and Caddy too, that
I was going to be the mistress of Bleak House and that if I avoided
that disclosure any longer I might become less worthy in my own eyes
of its master’s love. Therefore, when we went upstairs and had waited
listening until the clock struck twelve in order that only I might be
the first to wish my darling all good wishes on her birthday and to
take her to my heart, I set before her, just as I had set before
myself, the goodness and honour of her cousin John and the happy life
that was in store for me. If ever my darling were fonder of me at
one time than another in all our intercourse, she was surely fondest
of me that night. And I was so rejoiced to know it and so comforted
by the sense of having done right in casting this last idle
reservation away that I was ten times happier than I had been before.
I had scarcely thought it a reservation a few hours ago, but now that
it was gone I felt as if I understood its nature better.
Next day we went to London. We found our old lodging vacant, and in
half an hour were quietly established there, as if we had never gone
away. Mr. Woodcourt dined with us to celebrate my darling’s birthday,
and we were as pleasant as we could be with the great blank among us
that Richard’s absence naturally made on such an occasion. After that
day I was for some weeks—eight or nine as I remember—very much with
Caddy, and thus it fell out that I saw less of Ada at this time than
any other since we had first come together, except the time of my own
illness. She often came to Caddy’s, but our function there was to
amuse and cheer her, and we did not talk in our usual confidential
manner. Whenever I went home at night we were together, but Caddy’s
rest was broken by pain, and I often remained to nurse her.
With her husband and her poor little mite of a baby to love and their
home to strive for, what a good creature Caddy was! So self-denying,
so uncomplaining, so anxious to get well on their account, so afraid
of giving trouble, and so thoughtful of the unassisted labours of her
husband and the comforts of old Mr. Turveydrop; I had never known the
best of her until now. And it seemed so curious that her pale face
and helpless figure should be lying there day after day where dancing
was the business of life, where the kit and the apprentices began
early every morning in the ball-room, and where the untidy little boy
waltzed by himself in the kitchen all the afternoon.
At Caddy’s request I took the supreme direction of her apartment,
trimmed it up, and pushed her, couch and all, into a lighter and more
airy and more cheerful corner than she had yet occupied; then, every
day, when we were in our neatest array, I used to lay my small small
namesake in her arms and sit down to chat or work or read to her. It
was at one of the first of these quiet times that I told Caddy about
Bleak House.
We had other visitors besides Ada. First of all we had Prince, who in
his hurried intervals of teaching used to come softly in and sit
softly down, with a face of loving anxiety for Caddy and the very
little child. Whatever Caddy’s condition really was, she never failed
to declare to Prince that she was all but well—which I, heaven
forgive me, never failed to confirm. This would put Prince in such
good spirits that he would sometimes take the kit from his pocket and
play a chord or two to astonish the baby, which I never knew it to do
in the least degree, for my tiny namesake never noticed it at all.
Then there was Mrs. Jellyby. She would come occasionally, with her
usual distraught manner, and sit calmly looking miles beyond her
grandchild as if her attention were absorbed by a young Borrioboolan
on its native shores. As bright-eyed as ever, as serene, and as
untidy, she would say, “Well, Caddy, child, and how do you do
to-day?” And then would sit amiably smiling and taking no notice of
the reply or would sweetly glide off into a calculation of the number
of letters she had lately received and answered or of the
coffee-bearing power of Borrioboola-Gha. This she would always do
with a serene contempt for our limited sphere of action, not to be
disguised.
Then there was old Mr. Turveydrop, who was from morning to night and
from night to morning the subject of innumerable precautions. If the
baby cried, it was nearly stifled lest the noise should make him
uncomfortable. If the fire wanted stirring in the night, it was
surreptitiously done lest his rest should be broken. If Caddy
required any little comfort that the house contained, she first
carefully discussed whether he was likely to require it too. In
return for this consideration he would come into the room once a day,
all but blessing it—showing a condescension, and a patronage, and a
grace of manner in dispensing the light of his high-shouldered
presence from which I might have supposed him (if I had not known
better) to have been the benefactor of Caddy’s life.
“My Caroline,” he would say, making the nearest approach that he
could to bending over her. “Tell me that you are better to-day.”
“Oh, much better, thank you, Mr. Turveydrop,” Caddy would reply.
“Delighted! Enchanted! And our dear Miss Summerson. She is not quite
prostrated by fatigue?” Here he would crease up his eyelids and kiss
his fingers to me, though I am happy to say he had ceased to be
particular in his attentions since I had been so altered.
“Not at all,” I would assure him.
“Charming! We must take care of our dear Caroline, Miss Summerson. We
must spare nothing that will restore her. We must nourish her. My
dear Caroline”—he would turn to his daughter-in-law with infinite
generosity and protection—“want for nothing, my love. Frame a wish
and gratify it, my daughter. Everything this house contains,
everything my room contains, is at your service, my dear. Do not,” he
would sometimes add in a burst of deportment, “even allow my simple
requirements to be considered if they should at any time interfere
with your own, my Caroline. Your necessities are greater than mine.”
He had established such a long prescriptive right to this deportment
(his son’s inheritance from his mother) that I several times knew
both Caddy and her husband to be melted to tears by these
affectionate self-sacrifices.
“Nay, my dears,” he would remonstrate; and when I saw Caddy’s thin
arm about his fat neck as he said it, I would be melted too, though
not by the same process. “Nay, nay! I have promised never to leave
ye. Be dutiful and affectionate towards me, and I ask no other
return. Now, bless ye! I am going to the Park.”
He would take the air there presently and get an appetite for his
hotel dinner. I hope I do old Mr. Turveydrop no wrong, but I never
saw any better traits in him than these I faithfully record, except
that he certainly conceived a liking for Peepy and would take the
child out walking with great pomp, always on those occasions sending
him home before he went to dinner himself, and occasionally with a
halfpenny in his pocket. But even this disinterestedness was attended