Nicholas Nickleby
you will find me awkward and embarrassed.’
‘Oh no,’ said Ralph; ‘come when you like, in a hackney coach--I’ll pay
for it. Good-night--a--a--God bless you.’
The blessing seemed to stick in Mr. Ralph Nickleby’s throat, as if it
were not used to the thoroughfare, and didn’t know the way out. But it
got out somehow, though awkwardly enough; and having disposed of it, he
shook hands with his two relatives, and abruptly left them.
‘What a very strongly marked countenance your uncle has!’ said Mrs
Nickleby, quite struck with his parting look. ‘I don’t see the slightest
resemblance to his poor brother.’
‘Mama!’ said Kate reprovingly. ‘To think of such a thing!’
‘No,’ said Mrs. Nickleby, musing. ‘There certainly is none. But it’s a
very honest face.’
The worthy matron made this remark with great emphasis and elocution,
as if it comprised no small quantity of ingenuity and research; and,
in truth, it was not unworthy of being classed among the extraordinary
discoveries of the age. Kate looked up hastily, and as hastily looked
down again.
‘What has come over you, my dear, in the name of goodness?’ asked Mrs
Nickleby, when they had walked on, for some time, in silence.
‘I was only thinking, mama,’ answered Kate.
‘Thinking!’ repeated Mrs. Nickleby. ‘Ay, and indeed plenty to think
about, too. Your uncle has taken a strong fancy to you, that’s quite
clear; and if some extraordinary good fortune doesn’t come to you, after
this, I shall be a little surprised, that’s all.’
With this she launched out into sundry anecdotes of young ladies, who
had had thousand-pound notes given them in reticules, by eccentric
uncles; and of young ladies who had accidentally met amiable gentlemen
of enormous wealth at their uncles’ houses, and married them, after
short but ardent courtships; and Kate, listening first in apathy, and
afterwards in amusement, felt, as they walked home, something of her
mother’s sanguine complexion gradually awakening in her own bosom, and
began to think that her prospects might be brightening, and that better
days might be dawning upon them. Such is hope, Heaven’s own gift to
struggling mortals; pervading, like some subtle essence from the
skies, all things, both good and bad; as universal as death, and more
infectious than disease!
The feeble winter’s sun--and winter’s suns in the city are very feeble
indeed--might have brightened up, as he shone through the dim windows
of the large old house, on witnessing the unusual sight which one
half-furnished room displayed. In a gloomy corner, where, for years, had
stood a silent dusty pile of merchandise, sheltering its colony of mice,
and frowning, a dull and lifeless mass, upon the panelled room, save
when, responding to the roll of heavy waggons in the street without,
it quaked with sturdy tremblings and caused the bright eyes of its tiny
citizens to grow brighter still with fear, and struck them motionless,
with attentive ear and palpitating heart, until the alarm had passed
away--in this dark corner, was arranged, with scrupulous care, all
Kate’s little finery for the day; each article of dress partaking of
that indescribable air of jauntiness and individuality which empty
garments--whether by association, or that they become moulded, as
it were, to the owner’s form--will take, in eyes accustomed to, or
picturing, the wearer’s smartness. In place of a bale of musty goods,
there lay the black silk dress: the neatest possible figure in itself.
The small shoes, with toes delicately turned out, stood upon the very
pressure of some old iron weight; and a pile of harsh discoloured
leather had unconsciously given place to the very same little pair
of black silk stockings, which had been the objects of Mrs. Nickleby’s
peculiar care. Rats and mice, and such small gear, had long ago been
starved, or had emigrated to better quarters: and, in their stead,
appeared gloves, bands, scarfs, hair-pins, and many other little
devices, almost as ingenious in their way as rats and mice themselves,
for the tantalisation of mankind. About and among them all, moved Kate
herself, not the least beautiful or unwonted relief to the stern, old,
gloomy building.
In good time, or in bad time, as the reader likes to take it--for Mrs
Nickleby’s impatience went a great deal faster than the clocks at that
end of the town, and Kate was dressed to the very last hair-pin a full
hour and a half before it was at all necessary to begin to think about
it--in good time, or in bad time, the toilet was completed; and it being
at length the hour agreed upon for starting, the milkman fetched a coach
from the nearest stand, and Kate, with many adieux to her mother, and
many kind messages to Miss La Creevy, who was to come to tea, seated
herself in it, and went away in state, if ever anybody went away in
state in a hackney coach yet. And the coach, and the coachman, and the
horses, rattled, and jangled, and whipped, and cursed, and swore, and
tumbled on together, until they came to Golden Square.
The coachman gave a tremendous double knock at the door, which was
opened long before he had done, as quickly as if there had been a man
behind it, with his hand tied to the latch. Kate, who had expected no
more uncommon appearance than Newman Noggs in a clean shirt, was not a
little astonished to see that the opener was a man in handsome livery,
and that there were two or three others in the hall. There was no doubt
about its being the right house, however, for there was the name upon
the door; so she accepted the laced coat-sleeve which was tendered her,
and entering the house, was ushered upstairs, into a back drawing-room,
where she was left alone.
If she had been surprised at the apparition of the footman, she was
perfectly absorbed in amazement at the richness and splendour of the
furniture. The softest and most elegant carpets, the most exquisite
pictures, the costliest mirrors; articles of richest ornament, quite
dazzling from their beauty and perplexing from the prodigality with
which they were scattered around; encountered her on every side. The
very staircase nearly down to the hall-door, was crammed with beautiful
and luxurious things, as though the house were brimful of riches, which,
with a very trifling addition, would fairly run over into the street.
Presently, she heard a series of loud double knocks at the street-door,
and after every knock some new voice in the next room; the tones of Mr
Ralph Nickleby were easily distinguishable at first, but by degrees
they merged into the general buzz of conversation, and all she could
ascertain was, that there were several gentlemen with no very musical
voices, who talked very loud, laughed very heartily, and swore more
than she would have thought quite necessary. But this was a question of
taste.
At length, the door opened, and Ralph himself, divested of his boots,
and ceremoniously embellished with black silks and shoes, presented his
crafty face.
‘I couldn’t see you before, my dear,’ he said, in a low tone, and
pointing, as he spoke, to the next room. ‘I was engaged in receiving
them. Now--shall I take you in?’
‘Pray, uncle,’ said Kate, a little flurried, as people much more
conversant with society often are, when they are about to enter a room
full of strangers, and have had time to think of it previously, ‘are
there any ladies here?’
‘No,’ said Ralph, shortly, ‘I don’t know any.’
‘Must I go in immediately?’ asked Kate, drawing back a little.
‘As you please,’ said Ralph, shrugging his shoulders. ‘They are all
come, and dinner will be announced directly afterwards--that’s all.’
Kate would have entreated a few minutes’ respite, but reflecting that
her uncle might consider the payment of the hackney-coach fare a sort
of bargain for her punctuality, she suffered him to draw her arm through
his, and to lead her away.
Seven or eight gentlemen were standing round the fire when they went in,
and, as they were talking very loud, were not aware of their entrance
until Mr. Ralph Nickleby, touching one on the coat-sleeve, said in a
harsh emphatic voice, as if to attract general attention--
‘Lord Frederick Verisopht, my niece, Miss Nickleby.’
The group dispersed, as if in great surprise, and the gentleman
addressed, turning round, exhibited a suit of clothes of the most
superlative cut, a pair of whiskers of similar quality, a moustache, a
head of hair, and a young face.
‘Eh!’ said the gentleman. ‘What--the--deyvle!’
With which broken ejaculations, he fixed his glass in his eye, and
stared at Miss Nickleby in great surprise.
‘My niece, my lord,’ said Ralph.
‘Then my ears did not deceive me, and it’s not wa-a-x work,’ said his
lordship. ‘How de do? I’m very happy.’ And then his lordship turned
to another superlative gentleman, something older, something stouter,
something redder in the face, and something longer upon town, and said
in a loud whisper that the girl was ‘deyvlish pitty.’
‘Introduce me, Nickleby,’ said this second gentleman, who was lounging
with his back to the fire, and both elbows on the chimneypiece.
‘Sir Mulberry Hawk,’ said Ralph.
‘Otherwise the most knowing card in the pa-ack, Miss Nickleby,’ said
Lord Frederick Verisopht.
‘Don’t leave me out, Nickleby,’ cried a sharp-faced gentleman, who was
sitting on a low chair with a high back, reading the paper.
‘Mr. Pyke,’ said Ralph.
‘Nor me, Nickleby,’ cried a gentleman with a flushed face and a flash
air, from the elbow of Sir Mulberry Hawk.
‘Mr. Pluck,’ said Ralph. Then wheeling about again, towards a gentleman
with the neck of a stork and the legs of no animal in particular, Ralph
introduced him as the Honourable Mr. Snobb; and a white-headed person
at the table as Colonel Chowser. The colonel was in conversation with
somebody, who appeared to be a make-weight, and was not introduced at
all.
There were two circumstances which, in this early stage of the party,
struck home to Kate’s bosom, and brought the blood tingling to her face.
One was the flippant contempt with which the guests evidently regarded
her uncle, and the other, the easy insolence of their manner towards
herself. That the first symptom was very likely to lead to the
aggravation of the second, it needed no great penetration to foresee.
And here Mr. Ralph Nickleby had reckoned without his host; for however
fresh from the country a young lady (by nature) may be, and however
unacquainted with conventional behaviour, the chances are, that she will
have quite as strong an innate sense of the decencies and proprieties of
life as if she had run the gauntlet of a dozen London seasons--possibly
a stronger one, for such senses have been known to blunt in this
improving process.
When Ralph had completed the ceremonial of introduction, he led his
blushing niece to a seat. As he did so, he glanced warily round as
though to assure himself of the impression which her unlooked-for
appearance had created.
‘An unexpected playsure, Nickleby,’ said Lord Frederick Verisopht,
taking his glass out of his right eye, where it had, until now, done
duty on Kate, and fixing it in his left, to bring it to bear on Ralph.
‘Designed to surprise you, Lord Frederick,’ said Mr. Pluck.
‘Not a bad idea,’ said his lordship, ‘and one that would almost warrant
the addition of an extra two and a half per cent.’
‘Nickleby,’ said Sir Mulberry Hawk, in a thick coarse voice, ‘take the
hint, and tack it on the other five-and-twenty, or whatever it is, and
give me half for the advice.’
Sir Mulberry garnished this speech with a hoarse laugh, and terminated
it with a pleasant oath regarding Mr. Nickleby’s limbs, whereat Messrs
Pyke and Pluck laughed consumedly.
These gentlemen had not yet quite recovered the jest, when dinner was