Hard Times
the stones of the street. Sissy recommended that, to avoid making
inquiries and attracting attention in the town, they should present
themselves to pay at the door. If Mr. Sleary were taking the money, he
would be sure to know her, and would proceed with discretion. If he were
not, he would be sure to see them inside; and, knowing what he had done
with the fugitive, would proceed with discretion still.
Therefore, they repaired, with fluttering hearts, to the well-remembered
booth. The flag with the inscription SLEARY’S HORSE-RIDING was there;
and the Gothic niche was there; but Mr. Sleary was not there. Master
Kidderminster, grown too maturely turfy to be received by the wildest
credulity as Cupid any more, had yielded to the invincible force of
circumstances (and his beard), and, in the capacity of a man who made
himself generally useful, presided on this occasion over the
exchequer—having also a drum in reserve, on which to expend his leisure
moments and superfluous forces. In the extreme sharpness of his look out
for base coin, Mr. Kidderminster, as at present situated, never saw
anything but money; so Sissy passed him unrecognised, and they went in.
The Emperor of Japan, on a steady old white horse stencilled with black
spots, was twirling five wash-hand basins at once, as it is the favourite
recreation of that monarch to do. Sissy, though well acquainted with his
Royal line, had no personal knowledge of the present Emperor, and his
reign was peaceful. Miss Josephine Sleary, in her celebrated graceful
Equestrian Tyrolean Flower Act, was then announced by a new clown (who
humorously said Cauliflower Act), and Mr. Sleary appeared, leading her
in.
Mr. Sleary had only made one cut at the Clown with his long whip-lash,
and the Clown had only said, ‘If you do it again, I’ll throw the horse at
you!’ when Sissy was recognised both by father and daughter. But they
got through the Act with great self-possession; and Mr. Sleary, saving
for the first instant, conveyed no more expression into his locomotive
eye than into his fixed one. The performance seemed a little long to
Sissy and Louisa, particularly when it stopped to afford the Clown an
opportunity of telling Mr. Sleary (who said ‘Indeed, sir!’ to all his
observations in the calmest way, and with his eye on the house) about two
legs sitting on three legs looking at one leg, when in came four legs,
and laid hold of one leg, and up got two legs, caught hold of three legs,
and threw ’em at four legs, who ran away with one leg. For, although an
ingenious Allegory relating to a butcher, a three-legged stool, a dog,
and a leg of mutton, this narrative consumed time; and they were in great
suspense. At last, however, little fair-haired Josephine made her
curtsey amid great applause; and the Clown, left alone in the ring, had
just warmed himself, and said, ‘Now _I_’ll have a turn!’ when Sissy was
touched on the shoulder, and beckoned out.
She took Louisa with her; and they were received by Mr. Sleary in a very
little private apartment, with canvas sides, a grass floor, and a wooden
ceiling all aslant, on which the box company stamped their approbation,
as if they were coming through. ‘Thethilia,’ said Mr. Sleary, who had
brandy and water at hand, ‘it doth me good to thee you. You wath alwayth
a favourite with uth, and you’ve done uth credith thinth the old timeth
I’m thure. You mutht thee our people, my dear, afore we thpeak of
bithnith, or they’ll break their hearth—ethpethially the women. Here’th
Jothphine hath been and got married to E. W. B. Childerth, and thee hath
got a boy, and though he’th only three yearth old, he thtickth on to any
pony you can bring againtht him. He’th named The Little Wonder of
Thcolathtic Equitation; and if you don’t hear of that boy at Athley’th,
you’ll hear of him at Parith. And you recollect Kidderminthter, that
wath thought to be rather thweet upon yourthelf? Well. He’th married
too. Married a widder. Old enough to be hith mother. Thee wath
Tightrope, thee wath, and now thee’th nothing—on accounth of fat.
They’ve got two children, tho we’re thtrong in the Fairy bithnith and the
Nurthery dodge. If you wath to thee our Children in the Wood, with their
father and mother both a dyin’ on a horthe—their uncle a retheiving of
’em ath hith wardth, upon a horthe—themthelvth both a goin’ a
black-berryin’ on a horthe—and the Robinth a coming in to cover ’em with
leavth, upon a horthe—you’d thay it wath the completetht thing ath ever
you thet your eyeth on! And you remember Emma Gordon, my dear, ath wath
a’motht a mother to you? Of courthe you do; I needn’t athk. Well!
Emma, thee lotht her huthband. He wath throw’d a heavy back-fall off a
Elephant in a thort of a Pagoda thing ath the Thultan of the Indieth, and
he never got the better of it; and thee married a thecond time—married a
Cheethemonger ath fell in love with her from the front—and he’th a
Overtheer and makin’ a fortun.’
These various changes, Mr. Sleary, very short of breath now, related with
great heartiness, and with a wonderful kind of innocence, considering
what a bleary and brandy-and-watery old veteran he was. Afterwards he
brought in Josephine, and E. W. B. Childers (rather deeply lined in the
jaws by daylight), and the Little Wonder of Scholastic Equitation, and in
a word, all the company. Amazing creatures they were in Louisa’s eyes,
so white and pink of complexion, so scant of dress, and so demonstrative
of leg; but it was very agreeable to see them crowding about Sissy, and
very natural in Sissy to be unable to refrain from tears.
‘There! Now Thethilia hath kithd all the children, and hugged all the
women, and thaken handth all round with all the men, clear, every one of
you, and ring in the band for the thecond part!’
As soon as they were gone, he continued in a low tone. ‘Now, Thethilia,
I don’t athk to know any thecreth, but I thuppothe I may conthider thith
to be Mith Thquire.’
‘This is his sister. Yes.’
‘And t’other on’th daughter. That’h what I mean. Hope I thee you well,
mith. And I hope the Thquire’th well?’
‘My father will be here soon,’ said Louisa, anxious to bring him to the
point. ‘Is my brother safe?’
‘Thafe and thound!’ he replied. ‘I want you jutht to take a peep at the
Ring, mith, through here. Thethilia, you know the dodgeth; find a
thpy-hole for yourthelf.’
They each looked through a chink in the boards.
‘That’h Jack the Giant Killer—piethe of comic infant bithnith,’ said
Sleary. ‘There’th a property-houthe, you thee, for Jack to hide in;
there’th my Clown with a thauthepan-lid and a thpit, for Jack’th
thervant; there’th little Jack himthelf in a thplendid thoot of armour;
there’th two comic black thervanth twithe ath big ath the houthe, to
thtand by it and to bring it in and clear it; and the Giant (a very
ecthpenthive bathket one), he an’t on yet. Now, do you thee ’em all?’
‘Yes,’ they both said.
‘Look at ’em again,’ said Sleary, ‘look at ’em well. You thee em all?
Very good. Now, mith;’ he put a form for them to sit on; ‘I have my
opinionth, and the Thquire your father hath hith. I don’t want to know
what your brother’th been up to; ith better for me not to know. All I
thay ith, the Thquire hath thtood by Thethilia, and I’ll thtand by the
Thquire. Your brother ith one them black thervanth.’
Louisa uttered an exclamation, partly of distress, partly of
satisfaction.
‘Ith a fact,’ said Sleary, ‘and even knowin’ it, you couldn’t put your
finger on him. Let the Thquire come. I thall keep your brother here
after the performanth. I thant undreth him, nor yet wath hith paint off.
Let the Thquire come here after the performanth, or come here yourthelf
after the performanth, and you thall find your brother, and have the
whole plathe to talk to him in. Never mind the lookth of him, ath long
ath he’th well hid.’
Louisa, with many thanks and with a lightened load, detained Mr. Sleary
no longer then. She left her love for her brother, with her eyes full of
tears; and she and Sissy went away until later in the afternoon.
Mr. Gradgrind arrived within an hour afterwards. He too had encountered
no one whom he knew; and was now sanguine with Sleary’s assistance, of
getting his disgraced son to Liverpool in the night. As neither of the
three could be his companion without almost identifying him under any
disguise, he prepared a letter to a correspondent whom he could trust,
beseeching him to ship the bearer off at any cost, to North or South
America, or any distant part of the world to which he could be the most
speedily and privately dispatched.
This done, they walked about, waiting for the Circus to be quite vacated;
not only by the audience, but by the company and by the horses. After
watching it a long time, they saw Mr. Sleary bring out a chair and sit
down by the side-door, smoking; as if that were his signal that they
might approach.
‘Your thervant, Thquire,’ was his cautious salutation as they passed in.
‘If you want me you’ll find me here. You muthn’t mind your thon having a
comic livery on.’
They all three went in; and Mr. Gradgrind sat down forlorn, on the
Clown’s performing chair in the middle of the ring. On one of the back
benches, remote in the subdued light and the strangeness of the place,
sat the villainous whelp, sulky to the last, whom he had the misery to
call his son.
In a preposterous coat, like a beadle’s, with cuffs and flaps exaggerated
to an unspeakable extent; in an immense waistcoat, knee-breeches, buckled
shoes, and a mad cocked hat; with nothing fitting him, and everything of
coarse material, moth-eaten and full of holes; with seams in his black
face, where fear and heat had started through the greasy composition
daubed all over it; anything so grimly, detestably, ridiculously shameful
as the whelp in his comic livery, Mr. Gradgrind never could by any other
means have believed in, weighable and measurable fact though it was. And
one of his model children had come to this!
At first the whelp would not draw any nearer, but persisted in remaining
up there by himself. Yielding at length, if any concession so sullenly
made can be called yielding, to the entreaties of Sissy—for Louisa he
disowned altogether—he came down, bench by bench, until he stood in the
sawdust, on the verge of the circle, as far as possible, within its
limits from where his father sat.
‘How was this done?’ asked the father.
‘How was what done?’ moodily answered the son.
‘This robbery,’ said the father, raising his voice upon the word.
‘I forced the safe myself over night, and shut it up ajar before I went
away. I had had the key that was found, made long before. I dropped it
that morning, that it might be supposed to have been used. I didn’t take
the money all at once. I pretended to put my balance away every night,
but I didn’t. Now you know all about it.’
‘If a thunderbolt had fallen on me,’ said the father, ‘it would have
shocked me less than this!’
‘I don’t see why,’ grumbled the son. ‘So many people are employed in
situations of trust; so many people, out of so many, will be dishonest.
I have heard you talk, a hundred times, of its being a law. How can _I_
help laws? You have comforted others with such things, father. Comfort
yourself!’
The father buried his face in his hands, and the son stood in his
disgraceful grotesqueness, biting straw: his hands, with the black partly
worn away inside, looking like the hands of a monkey. The evening was
fast closing in; and from time to time, he turned the whites of his eyes
restlessly and impatiently towards his father. They were the only parts
of his face that showed any life or expression, the pigment upon it was
so thick.
‘You must be got to Liverpool, and sent abroad.’