Nicholas Nickleby
night, no matter how tired you are; and taking so much pains with him,
and doing it all with as much delight and readiness as if you were
coining gold by it!’
‘He well deserves all the kindness I can show him, and a great deal
more,’ said Nicholas. ‘He is the most grateful, single-hearted,
affectionate creature that ever breathed.’
‘So odd, too,’ remarked Miss Snevellicci, ‘isn’t he?’
‘God help him, and those who have made him so; he is indeed,’ rejoined
Nicholas, shaking his head.
‘He is such a devilish close chap,’ said Mr. Folair, who had come up a
little before, and now joined in the conversation. ‘Nobody can ever get
anything out of him.’
‘What SHOULD they get out of him?’ asked Nicholas, turning round with
some abruptness.
‘Zooks! what a fire-eater you are, Johnson!’ returned Mr. Folair, pulling
up the heel of his dancing shoe. ‘I’m only talking of the natural
curiosity of the people here, to know what he has been about all his
life.’
‘Poor fellow! it is pretty plain, I should think, that he has not the
intellect to have been about anything of much importance to them or
anybody else,’ said Nicholas.
‘Ay,’ rejoined the actor, contemplating the effect of his face in a lamp
reflector, ‘but that involves the whole question, you know.’
‘What question?’ asked Nicholas.
‘Why, the who he is and what he is, and how you two, who are so
different, came to be such close companions,’ replied Mr. Folair,
delighted with the opportunity of saying something disagreeable. ‘That’s
in everybody’s mouth.’
‘The “everybody” of the theatre, I suppose?’ said Nicholas,
contemptuously.
‘In it and out of it too,’ replied the actor. ‘Why, you know, Lenville
says--’
‘I thought I had silenced him effectually,’ interrupted Nicholas,
reddening.
‘Perhaps you have,’ rejoined the immovable Mr. Folair; ‘if you have, he
said this before he was silenced: Lenville says that you’re a regular
stick of an actor, and that it’s only the mystery about you that has
caused you to go down with the people here, and that Crummles keeps
it up for his own sake; though Lenville says he don’t believe there’s
anything at all in it, except your having got into a scrape and run away
from somewhere, for doing something or other.’
‘Oh!’ said Nicholas, forcing a smile.
‘That’s a part of what he says,’ added Mr. Folair. ‘I mention it as the
friend of both parties, and in strict confidence. I don’t agree with
him, you know. He says he takes Digby to be more knave than fool; and
old Fluggers, who does the heavy business you know, HE says that when he
delivered messages at Covent Garden the season before last, there used
to be a pickpocket hovering about the coach-stand who had exactly the
face of Digby; though, as he very properly says, Digby may not be the
same, but only his brother, or some near relation.’
‘Oh!’ cried Nicholas again.
‘Yes,’ said Mr. Folair, with undisturbed calmness, ‘that’s what they say.
I thought I’d tell you, because really you ought to know. Oh! here’s
this blessed phenomenon at last. Ugh, you little imposition, I should
like to--quite ready, my darling,--humbug--Ring up, Mrs. G., and let the
favourite wake ‘em.’
Uttering in a loud voice such of the latter allusions as were
complimentary to the unconscious phenomenon, and giving the rest in a
confidential ‘aside’ to Nicholas, Mr. Folair followed the ascent of
the curtain with his eyes, regarded with a sneer the reception of Miss
Crummles as the Maiden, and, falling back a step or two to advance with
the better effect, uttered a preliminary howl, and ‘went on’ chattering
his teeth and brandishing his tin tomahawk as the Indian Savage.
‘So these are some of the stories they invent about us, and bandy from
mouth to mouth!’ thought Nicholas. ‘If a man would commit an inexpiable
offence against any society, large or small, let him be successful. They
will forgive him any crime but that.’
‘You surely don’t mind what that malicious creature says, Mr. Johnson?’
observed Miss Snevellicci in her most winning tones.
‘Not I,’ replied Nicholas. ‘If I were going to remain here, I might
think it worth my while to embroil myself. As it is, let them talk till
they are hoarse. But here,’ added Nicholas, as Smike approached, ‘here
comes the subject of a portion of their good-nature, so let he and I say
good night together.’
‘No, I will not let either of you say anything of the kind,’ returned
Miss Snevellicci. ‘You must come home and see mama, who only came to
Portsmouth today, and is dying to behold you. Led, my dear, persuade Mr
Johnson.’
‘Oh, I’m sure,’ returned Miss Ledrook, with considerable vivacity, ‘if
YOU can’t persuade him--’ Miss Ledrook said no more, but intimated, by
a dexterous playfulness, that if Miss Snevellicci couldn’t persuade him,
nobody could.
‘Mr. and Mrs. Lillyvick have taken lodgings in our house, and share our
sitting-room for the present,’ said Miss Snevellicci. ‘Won’t that induce
you?’
‘Surely,’ returned Nicholas, ‘I can require no possible inducement
beyond your invitation.’
‘Oh no! I dare say,’ rejoined Miss Snevellicci. And Miss Ledrook said,
‘Upon my word!’ Upon which Miss Snevellicci said that Miss Ledrook was a
giddy thing; and Miss Ledrook said that Miss Snevellicci needn’t colour
up quite so much; and Miss Snevellicci beat Miss Ledrook, and Miss
Ledrook beat Miss Snevellicci.
‘Come,’ said Miss Ledrook, ‘it’s high time we were there, or we shall
have poor Mrs. Snevellicci thinking that you have run away with her
daughter, Mr. Johnson; and then we should have a pretty to-do.’
‘My dear Led,’ remonstrated Miss Snevellicci, ‘how you do talk!’
Miss Ledrook made no answer, but taking Smike’s arm in hers, left her
friend and Nicholas to follow at their pleasure; which it pleased them,
or rather pleased Nicholas, who had no great fancy for a TETE-A-TETE
under the circumstances, to do at once.
There were not wanting matters of conversation when they reached the
street, for it turned out that Miss Snevellicci had a small basket to
carry home, and Miss Ledrook a small bandbox, both containing such minor
articles of theatrical costume as the lady performers usually carried to
and fro every evening. Nicholas would insist upon carrying the basket,
and Miss Snevellicci would insist upon carrying it herself, which
gave rise to a struggle, in which Nicholas captured the basket and
the bandbox likewise. Then Nicholas said, that he wondered what could
possibly be inside the basket, and attempted to peep in, whereat Miss
Snevellicci screamed, and declared that if she thought he had seen,
she was sure she should faint away. This declaration was followed by a
similar attempt on the bandbox, and similar demonstrations on the part
of Miss Ledrook, and then both ladies vowed that they wouldn’t move a
step further until Nicholas had promised that he wouldn’t offer to peep
again. At last Nicholas pledged himself to betray no further curiosity,
and they walked on: both ladies giggling very much, and declaring
that they never had seen such a wicked creature in all their born
days--never.
Lightening the way with such pleasantry as this, they arrived at the
tailor’s house in no time; and here they made quite a little party,
there being present besides Mr. Lillyvick and Mrs. Lillyvick, not only
Miss Snevellicci’s mama, but her papa also. And an uncommonly fine man
Miss Snevellicci’s papa was, with a hook nose, and a white forehead, and
curly black hair, and high cheek bones, and altogether quite a handsome
face, only a little pimply as though with drinking. He had a very
broad chest had Miss Snevellicci’s papa, and he wore a threadbare blue
dress-coat buttoned with gilt buttons tight across it; and he no sooner
saw Nicholas come into the room, than he whipped the two forefingers of
his right hand in between the two centre buttons, and sticking his other
arm gracefully a-kimbo seemed to say, ‘Now, here I am, my buck, and what
have you got to say to me?’
Such was, and in such an attitude sat Miss Snevellicci’s papa, who had
been in the profession ever since he had first played the ten-year-old
imps in the Christmas pantomimes; who could sing a little, dance a
little, fence a little, act a little, and do everything a little, but
not much; who had been sometimes in the ballet, and sometimes in the
chorus, at every theatre in London; who was always selected in virtue
of his figure to play the military visitors and the speechless noblemen;
who always wore a smart dress, and came on arm-in-arm with a smart lady
in short petticoats,--and always did it too with such an air that people
in the pit had been several times known to cry out ‘Bravo!’ under the
impression that he was somebody. Such was Miss Snevellicci’s papa, upon
whom some envious persons cast the imputation that he occasionally beat
Miss Snevellicci’s mama, who was still a dancer, with a neat little
figure and some remains of good looks; and who now sat, as she
danced,--being rather too old for the full glare of the foot-lights,--in
the background.
To these good people Nicholas was presented with much formality. The
introduction being completed, Miss Snevellicci’s papa (who was scented
with rum-and-water) said that he was delighted to make the acquaintance
of a gentleman so highly talented; and furthermore remarked, that there
hadn’t been such a hit made--no, not since the first appearance of his
friend Mr. Glavormelly, at the Coburg.
‘You have seen him, sir?’ said Miss Snevellicci’s papa.
‘No, really I never did,’ replied Nicholas.
‘You never saw my friend Glavormelly, sir!’ said Miss Snevellicci’s
papa. ‘Then you have never seen acting yet. If he had lived--’
‘Oh, he is dead, is he?’ interrupted Nicholas.
‘He is,’ said Mr. Snevellicci, ‘but he isn’t in Westminster Abbey, more’s
the shame. He was a--. Well, no matter. He is gone to that bourne from
whence no traveller returns. I hope he is appreciated THERE.’
So saying Miss Snevellicci’s papa rubbed the tip of his nose with a very
yellow silk handkerchief, and gave the company to understand that these
recollections overcame him.
‘Well, Mr. Lillyvick,’ said Nicholas, ‘and how are you?’
‘Quite well, sir,’ replied the collector. ‘There is nothing like the
married state, sir, depend upon it.’
‘Indeed!’ said Nicholas, laughing.
‘Ah! nothing like it, sir,’ replied Mr. Lillyvick solemnly. ‘How do you
think,’ whispered the collector, drawing him aside, ‘how do you think
she looks tonight?’
‘As handsome as ever,’ replied Nicholas, glancing at the late Miss
Petowker.
‘Why, there’s air about her, sir,’ whispered the collector, ‘that I
never saw in anybody. Look at her now she moves to put the kettle on.
There! Isn’t it fascination, sir?’
‘You’re a lucky man,’ said Nicholas.
‘Ha, ha, ha!’ rejoined the collector. ‘No. Do you think I am though,
eh? Perhaps I may be, perhaps I may be. I say, I couldn’t have done much
better if I had been a young man, could I? You couldn’t have done much
better yourself, could you--eh--could you?’ With such inquires, and
many more such, Mr. Lillyvick jerked his elbow into Nicholas’s side, and
chuckled till his face became quite purple in the attempt to keep down
his satisfaction.
By this time the cloth had been laid under the joint superintendence of
all the ladies, upon two tables put together, one being high and narrow,
and the other low and broad. There were oysters at the top, sausages
at the bottom, a pair of snuffers in the centre, and baked potatoes
wherever it was most convenient to put them. Two additional chairs were
brought in from the bedroom: Miss Snevellicci sat at the head of the
table, and Mr. Lillyvick at the foot; and Nicholas had not only
the honour of sitting next Miss Snevellicci, but of having Miss