Nicholas Nickleby
coming in of every year that brings this cursed world nearer to its end.
No bell or book for me! Throw me on a dunghill, and let me rot there, to
infect the air!’
With a wild look around, in which frenzy, hatred, and despair were
horribly mingled, he shook his clenched hand at the sky above him, which
was still dark and threatening, and closed the window.
The rain and hail pattered against the glass; the chimneys quaked and
rocked; the crazy casement rattled with the wind, as though an impatient
hand inside were striving to burst it open. But no hand was there, and
it opened no more.
‘How’s this?’ cried one. ‘The gentleman say they can’t make anybody
hear, and have been trying these two hours.’
‘And yet he came home last night,’ said another; ‘for he spoke to
somebody out of that window upstairs.’
They were a little knot of men, and, the window being mentioned, went
out into the road to look up at it. This occasioned their observing that
the house was still close shut, as the housekeeper had said she had left
it on the previous night, and led to a great many suggestions: which
terminated in two or three of the boldest getting round to the back, and
so entering by a window, while the others remained outside, in impatient
expectation.
They looked into all the rooms below: opening the shutters as they went,
to admit the fading light: and still finding nobody, and everything
quiet and in its place, doubted whether they should go farther. One man,
however, remarking that they had not yet been into the garret, and that
it was there he had been last seen, they agreed to look there too, and
went up softly; for the mystery and silence made them timid.
After they had stood for an instant, on the landing, eyeing each other,
he who had proposed their carrying the search so far, turned the handle
of the door, and, pushing it open, looked through the chink, and fell
back directly.
‘It’s very odd,’ he whispered, ‘he’s hiding behind the door! Look!’
They pressed forward to see; but one among them thrusting the others
aside with a loud exclamation, drew a clasp-knife from his pocket, and
dashing into the room, cut down the body.
He had torn a rope from one of the old trunks, and hung himself on an
iron hook immediately below the trap-door in the ceiling--in the very
place to which the eyes of his son, a lonely, desolate, little creature,
had so often been directed in childish terror, fourteen years before.
CHAPTER 63
The Brothers Cheeryble make various Declarations for themselves and
others. Tim Linkinwater makes a Declaration for himself
Some weeks had passed, and the first shock of these events had subsided.
Madeline had been removed; Frank had been absent; and Nicholas and Kate
had begun to try in good earnest to stifle their own regrets, and to
live for each other and for their mother--who, poor lady, could in
nowise be reconciled to this dull and altered state of affairs--when
there came one evening, per favour of Mr. Linkinwater, an invitation from
the brothers to dinner on the next day but one: comprehending, not only
Mrs. Nickleby, Kate, and Nicholas, but little Miss La Creevy, who was
most particularly mentioned.
‘Now, my dears,’ said Mrs. Nickleby, when they had rendered becoming
honour to the bidding, and Tim had taken his departure, ‘what does THIS
mean?’
‘What do YOU mean, mother?’ asked Nicholas, smiling.
‘I say, my dear,’ rejoined that lady, with a face of unfathomable
mystery, ‘what does this invitation to dinner mean? What is its
intention and object?’
‘I conclude it means, that on such a day we are to eat and drink in
their house, and that its intent and object is to confer pleasure upon
us,’ said Nicholas.
‘And that’s all you conclude it is, my dear?’
‘I have not yet arrived at anything deeper, mother.’
‘Then I’ll just tell you one thing,’ said Mrs. Nickleby, you’ll find
yourself a little surprised; that’s all. You may depend upon it that
this means something besides dinner.’
‘Tea and supper, perhaps,’ suggested Nicholas.
‘I wouldn’t be absurd, my dear, if I were you,’ replied Mrs. Nickleby,
in a lofty manner, ‘because it’s not by any means becoming, and doesn’t
suit you at all. What I mean to say is, that the Mr. Cheerybles don’t ask
us to dinner with all this ceremony for nothing. Never mind; wait and
see. You won’t believe anything I say, of course. It’s much better to
wait; a great deal better; it’s satisfactory to all parties, and there
can be no disputing. All I say is, remember what I say now, and when I
say I said so, don’t say I didn’t.’
With this stipulation, Mrs. Nickleby, who was troubled, night and day,
with a vision of a hot messenger tearing up to the door to announce that
Nicholas had been taken into partnership, quitted that branch of the
subject, and entered upon a new one.
‘It’s a very extraordinary thing,’ she said, ‘a most extraordinary
thing, that they should have invited Miss La Creevy. It quite astonishes
me, upon my word it does. Of course it’s very pleasant that she should
be invited, very pleasant, and I have no doubt that she’ll conduct
herself extremely well; she always does. It’s very gratifying to think
that we should have been the means of introducing her into such society,
and I’m quite glad of it--quite rejoiced--for she certainly is an
exceedingly well-behaved and good-natured little person. I could wish
that some friend would mention to her how very badly she has her cap
trimmed, and what very preposterous bows those are, but of course that’s
impossible, and if she likes to make a fright of herself, no doubt she
has a perfect right to do so. We never see ourselves--never do, and
never did--and I suppose we never shall.’
This moral reflection reminding her of the necessity of being peculiarly
smart on the occasion, so as to counterbalance Miss La Creevy, and be
herself an effectual set-off and atonement, led Mrs. Nickleby into a
consultation with her daughter relative to certain ribbons, gloves, and
trimmings: which, being a complicated question, and one of paramount
importance, soon routed the previous one, and put it to flight.
The great day arriving, the good lady put herself under Kate’s hands an
hour or so after breakfast, and, dressing by easy stages, completed
her toilette in sufficient time to allow of her daughter’s making hers,
which was very simple, and not very long, though so satisfactory that
she had never appeared more charming or looked more lovely. Miss La
Creevy, too, arrived with two bandboxes (whereof the bottoms fell out as
they were handed from the coach) and something in a newspaper, which a
gentleman had sat upon, coming down, and which was obliged to be ironed
again, before it was fit for service. At last, everybody was dressed,
including Nicholas, who had come home to fetch them, and they went away
in a coach sent by the brothers for the purpose: Mrs. Nickleby wondering
very much what they would have for dinner, and cross-examining Nicholas
as to the extent of his discoveries in the morning; whether he had smelt
anything cooking at all like turtle, and if not, what he had smelt; and
diversifying the conversation with reminiscences of dinners to which she
had gone some twenty years ago, concerning which she particularised not
only the dishes but the guests, in whom her hearers did not feel a very
absorbing interest, as not one of them had ever chanced to hear their
names before.
The old butler received them with profound respect and many smiles,
and ushered them into the drawing-room, where they were received by
the brothers with so much cordiality and kindness that Mrs. Nickleby was
quite in a flutter, and had scarcely presence of mind enough, even to
patronise Miss La Creevy. Kate was still more affected by the reception:
for, knowing that the brothers were acquainted with all that had passed
between her and Frank, she felt her position a most delicate and trying
one, and was trembling on the arm of Nicholas, when Mr. Charles took her
in his, and led her to another part of the room.
‘Have you seen Madeline, my dear,’ he said, ‘since she left your house?’
‘No, sir!’ replied Kate. ‘Not once.’
‘And not heard from her, eh? Not heard from her?’
‘I have only had one letter,’ rejoined Kate, gently. ‘I thought she
would not have forgotten me quite so soon.’
‘Ah,’ said the old man, patting her on the head, and speaking as
affectionately as if she had been his favourite child. ‘Poor dear! what
do you think of this, brother Ned? Madeline has only written to her
once, only once, Ned, and she didn’t think she would have forgotten her
quite so soon, Ned.’
‘Oh! sad, sad; very sad!’ said Ned.
The brothers interchanged a glance, and looking at Kate for a little
time without speaking, shook hands, and nodded as if they were
congratulating each other on something very delightful.
‘Well, well,’ said brother Charles, ‘go into that room, my dear--that
door yonder--and see if there’s not a letter for you from her. I think
there’s one upon the table. You needn’t hurry back, my love, if there
is, for we don’t dine just yet, and there’s plenty of time. Plenty of
time.’
Kate retired as she was directed. Brother Charles, having followed her
graceful figure with his eyes, turned to Mrs. Nickleby, and said:
‘We took the liberty of naming one hour before the real dinner-time,
ma’am, because we had a little business to speak about, which would
occupy the interval. Ned, my dear fellow, will you mention what we
agreed upon? Mr. Nickleby, sir, have the goodness to follow me.’
Without any further explanation, Mrs. Nickleby, Miss La Creevy, and
brother Ned, were left alone together, and Nicholas followed brother
Charles into his private room; where, to his great astonishment, he
encountered Frank, whom he supposed to be abroad.
‘Young men,’ said Mr. Cheeryble, ‘shake hands!’
‘I need no bidding to do that,’ said Nicholas, extending his.
‘Nor I,’ rejoined Frank, as he clasped it heartily.
The old gentleman thought that two handsomer or finer young fellows
could scarcely stand side by side than those on whom he looked with so
much pleasure. Suffering his eyes to rest upon them, for a short time in
silence, he said, while he seated himself at his desk:
‘I wish to see you friends--close and firm friends--and if I thought
you otherwise, I should hesitate in what I am about to say. Frank, look
here! Mr. Nickleby, will you come on the other side?’
The young men stepped up on either hand of brother Charles, who produced
a paper from his desk, and unfolded it.
‘This,’ he said, ‘is a copy of the will of Madeline’s maternal
grandfather, bequeathing her the sum of twelve thousand pounds, payable
either upon her coming of age or marrying. It would appear that this
gentleman, angry with her (his only relation) because she would not put
herself under his protection, and detach herself from the society of her
father, in compliance with his repeated overtures, made a will leaving
this property (which was all he possessed) to a charitable institution.
He would seem to have repented this determination, however, for three
weeks afterwards, and in the same month, he executed this. By some
fraud, it was abstracted immediately after his decease, and the
other--the only will found--was proved and administered. Friendly
negotiations, which have only just now terminated, have been proceeding
since this instrument came into our hands, and, as there is no doubt
of its authenticity, and the witnesses have been discovered (after some
trouble), the money has been refunded. Madeline has therefore obtained
her right, and is, or will be, when either of the contingencies which I
have mentioned has arisen, mistress of this fortune. You understand me?’