Bleak House
present company excepted, has plotted against Mrs. Snagsby’s peace.
There is Mr. Guppy, clerk to Kenge and Carboy, who was at first as
open as the sun at noon, but who suddenly shut up as close as
midnight, under the influence—no doubt—of Mr. Snagsby’s suborning
and tampering. There is Mr. Weevle, friend of Mr. Guppy, who lived
mysteriously up a court, owing to the like coherent causes. There was
Krook, deceased; there was Nimrod, deceased; and there was Jo,
deceased; and they were “all in it.” In what, Mrs. Snagsby does not
with particularity express, but she knows that Jo was Mr. Snagsby’s
son, “as well as if a trumpet had spoken it,” and she followed Mr.
Snagsby when he went on his last visit to the boy, and if he was not
his son why did he go? The one occupation of her life has been, for
some time back, to follow Mr. Snagsby to and fro, and up and down,
and to piece suspicious circumstances together—and every
circumstance that has happened has been most suspicious; and in this
way she has pursued her object of detecting and confounding her false
husband, night and day. Thus did it come to pass that she brought the
Chadbands and Mr. Tulkinghorn together, and conferred with Mr.
Tulkinghorn on the change in Mr. Guppy, and helped to turn up the
circumstances in which the present company are interested, casually,
by the wayside, being still and ever on the great high road that is
to terminate in Mr. Snagsby’s full exposure and a matrimonial
separation. All this, Mrs. Snagsby, as an injured woman, and the
friend of Mrs. Chadband, and the follower of Mr. Chadband, and the
mourner of the late Mr. Tulkinghorn, is here to certify under the
seal of confidence, with every possible confusion and involvement
possible and impossible, having no pecuniary motive whatever, no
scheme or project but the one mentioned, and bringing here, and
taking everywhere, her own dense atmosphere of dust, arising from the
ceaseless working of her mill of jealousy.
While this exordium is in hand—and it takes some time—Mr. Bucket,
who has seen through the transparency of Mrs. Snagsby’s vinegar at a
glance, confers with his familiar demon and bestows his shrewd
attention on the Chadbands and Mr. Smallweed. Sir Leicester Dedlock
remains immovable, with the same icy surface upon him, except that he
once or twice looks towards Mr. Bucket, as relying on that officer
alone of all mankind.
“Very good,” says Mr. Bucket. “Now I understand you, you know, and
being deputed by Sir Leicester Dedlock, Baronet, to look into this
little matter,” again Sir Leicester mechanically bows in confirmation
of the statement, “can give it my fair and full attention. Now I
won’t allude to conspiring to extort money or anything of that sort,
because we are men and women of the world here, and our object is to
make things pleasant. But I tell you what I DO wonder at; I am
surprised that you should think of making a noise below in the hall.
It was so opposed to your interests. That’s what I look at.”
“We wanted to get in,” pleads Mr. Smallweed.
“Why, of course you wanted to get in,” Mr. Bucket asserts with
cheerfulness; “but for a old gentleman at your time of life—what I
call truly venerable, mind you!—with his wits sharpened, as I have
no doubt they are, by the loss of the use of his limbs, which
occasions all his animation to mount up into his head, not to
consider that if he don’t keep such a business as the present as
close as possible it can’t be worth a mag to him, is so curious! You
see your temper got the better of you; that’s where you lost ground,”
says Mr. Bucket in an argumentative and friendly way.
“I only said I wouldn’t go without one of the servants came up to Sir
Leicester Dedlock,” returns Mr. Smallweed.
“That’s it! That’s where your temper got the better of you. Now, you
keep it under another time and you’ll make money by it. Shall I ring
for them to carry you down?”
“When are we to hear more of this?” Mrs. Chadband sternly demands.
“Bless your heart for a true woman! Always curious, your delightful
sex is!” replies Mr. Bucket with gallantry. “I shall have the
pleasure of giving you a call to-morrow or next day—not forgetting
Mr. Smallweed and his proposal of two fifty.”
“Five hundred!” exclaims Mr. Smallweed.
“All right! Nominally five hundred.” Mr. Bucket has his hand on the
bell-rope. “SHALL I wish you good day for the present on the part of
myself and the gentleman of the house?” he asks in an insinuating
tone.
Nobody having the hardihood to object to his doing so, he does it,
and the party retire as they came up. Mr. Bucket follows them to the
door, and returning, says with an air of serious business, “Sir
Leicester Dedlock, Baronet, it’s for you to consider whether or not
to buy this up. I should recommend, on the whole, it’s being bought
up myself; and I think it may be bought pretty cheap. You see, that
little pickled cowcumber of a Mrs. Snagsby has been used by all sides
of the speculation and has done a deal more harm in bringing odds and
ends together than if she had meant it. Mr. Tulkinghorn, deceased, he
held all these horses in his hand and could have drove ’em his own
way, I haven’t a doubt; but he was fetched off the box head-foremost,
and now they have got their legs over the traces, and are all
dragging and pulling their own ways. So it is, and such is life. The
cat’s away, and the mice they play; the frost breaks up, and the
water runs. Now, with regard to the party to be apprehended.”
Sir Leicester seems to wake, though his eyes have been wide open, and
he looks intently at Mr. Bucket as Mr. Bucket refers to his watch.
“The party to be apprehended is now in this house,” proceeds Mr.
Bucket, putting up his watch with a steady hand and with rising
spirits, “and I’m about to take her into custody in your presence.
Sir Leicester Dedlock, Baronet, don’t you say a word nor yet stir.
There’ll be no noise and no disturbance at all. I’ll come back in the
course of the evening, if agreeable to you, and endeavour to meet
your wishes respecting this unfortunate family matter and the
nobbiest way of keeping it quiet. Now, Sir Leicester Dedlock,
Baronet, don’t you be nervous on account of the apprehension at
present coming off. You shall see the whole case clear, from first to
last.”
Mr. Bucket rings, goes to the door, briefly whispers Mercury, shuts
the door, and stands behind it with his arms folded. After a suspense
of a minute or two the door slowly opens and a Frenchwoman enters.
Mademoiselle Hortense.
The moment she is in the room Mr. Bucket claps the door to and puts
his back against it. The suddenness of the noise occasions her to
turn, and then for the first time she sees Sir Leicester Dedlock in
his chair.
“I ask you pardon,” she mutters hurriedly. “They tell me there was no
one here.”
Her step towards the door brings her front to front with Mr. Bucket.
Suddenly a spasm shoots across her face and she turns deadly pale.
“This is my lodger, Sir Leicester Dedlock,” says Mr. Bucket, nodding
at her. “This foreign young woman has been my lodger for some weeks
back.”
“What do Sir Leicester care for that, you think, my angel?” returns
mademoiselle in a jocular strain.
“Why, my angel,” returns Mr. Bucket, “we shall see.”
Mademoiselle Hortense eyes him with a scowl upon her tight face,
which gradually changes into a smile of scorn, “You are very
mysterieuse. Are you drunk?”
“Tolerable sober, my angel,” returns Mr. Bucket.
“I come from arriving at this so detestable house with your wife.
Your wife have left me since some minutes. They tell me downstairs
that your wife is here. I come here, and your wife is not here. What
is the intention of this fool’s play, say then?” mademoiselle
demands, with her arms composedly crossed, but with something in her
dark cheek beating like a clock.
Mr. Bucket merely shakes the finger at her.
“Ah, my God, you are an unhappy idiot!” cries mademoiselle with a
toss of her head and a laugh. “Leave me to pass downstairs, great
pig.” With a stamp of her foot and a menace.
“Now, mademoiselle,” says Mr. Bucket in a cool determined way, “you
go and sit down upon that sofy.”
“I will not sit down upon nothing,” she replies with a shower of
nods.
“Now, mademoiselle,” repeats Mr. Bucket, making no demonstration
except with the finger, “you sit down upon that sofy.”
“Why?”
“Because I take you into custody on a charge of murder, and you don’t
need to be told it. Now, I want to be polite to one of your sex and a
foreigner if I can. If I can’t, I must be rough, and there’s rougher
ones outside. What I am to be depends on you. So I recommend you, as
a friend, afore another half a blessed moment has passed over your
head, to go and sit down upon that sofy.”
Mademoiselle complies, saying in a concentrated voice while that
something in her cheek beats fast and hard, “You are a devil.”
“Now, you see,” Mr. Bucket proceeds approvingly, “you’re comfortable
and conducting yourself as I should expect a foreign young woman of
your sense to do. So I’ll give you a piece of advice, and it’s this,
don’t you talk too much. You’re not expected to say anything here,
and you can’t keep too quiet a tongue in your head. In short, the
less you PARLAY, the better, you know.” Mr. Bucket is very complacent
over this French explanation.
Mademoiselle, with that tigerish expansion of the mouth and her black
eyes darting fire upon him, sits upright on the sofa in a rigid
state, with her hands clenched—and her feet too, one might
suppose—muttering, “Oh, you Bucket, you are a devil!”
“Now, Sir Leicester Dedlock, Baronet,” says Mr. Bucket, and from this
time forth the finger never rests, “this young woman, my lodger, was
her ladyship’s maid at the time I have mentioned to you; and this
young woman, besides being extraordinary vehement and passionate
against her ladyship after being discharged—”
“Lie!” cries mademoiselle. “I discharge myself.”
“Now, why don’t you take my advice?” returns Mr. Bucket in an
impressive, almost in an imploring, tone. “I’m surprised at the
indiscreetness you commit. You’ll say something that’ll be used
against you, you know. You’re sure to come to it. Never you mind what
I say till it’s given in evidence. It is not addressed to you.”
“Discharge, too,” cries mademoiselle furiously, “by her ladyship! Eh,
my faith, a pretty ladyship! Why, I r-r-r-ruin my character by
remaining with a ladyship so infame!”
“Upon my soul I wonder at you!” Mr. Bucket remonstrates. “I thought
the French were a polite nation, I did, really. Yet to hear a female
going on like that before Sir Leicester Dedlock, Baronet!”
“He is a poor abused!” cries mademoiselle. “I spit upon his house,
upon his name, upon his imbecility,” all of which she makes the
carpet represent. “Oh, that he is a great man! Oh, yes, superb! Oh,
heaven! Bah!”
“Well, Sir Leicester Dedlock,” proceeds Mr. Bucket, “this intemperate
foreigner also angrily took it into her head that she had established
a claim upon Mr. Tulkinghorn, deceased, by attending on the occasion
I told you of at his chambers, though she was liberally paid for her
time and trouble.”
“Lie!” cries mademoiselle. “I ref-use his money all togezzer.”
“If you WILL PARLAY, you know,” says Mr. Bucket parenthetically, “you
must take the consequences. Now, whether she became my lodger, Sir
Leicester Dedlock, with any deliberate intention then of doing this
deed and blinding me, I give no opinion on; but she lived in my house
in that capacity at the time that she was hovering about the chambers
of the deceased Mr. Tulkinghorn with a view to a wrangle, and
likewise persecuting and half frightening the life out of an
unfortunate stationer.”
“Lie!” cries mademoiselle. “All lie!”