Nicholas Nickleby
by this sudden alteration, was wondering what it could portend, the
brothers rose together, and the one at the top of the table leaning
forward towards the other, and speaking in a low voice as if he were
addressing him individually, said:
‘Brother Charles, my dear fellow, there is another association connected
with this day which must never be forgotten, and never can be forgotten,
by you and me. This day, which brought into the world a most faithful
and excellent and exemplary fellow, took from it the kindest and very
best of parents, the very best of parents to us both. I wish that
she could have seen us in our prosperity, and shared it, and had the
happiness of knowing how dearly we loved her in it, as we did when we
were two poor boys; but that was not to be. My dear brother--The Memory
of our Mother.’
‘Good Lord!’ thought Nicholas, ‘and there are scores of people of their
own station, knowing all this, and twenty thousand times more, who
wouldn’t ask these men to dinner because they eat with their knives and
never went to school!’
But there was no time to moralise, for the joviality again became very
brisk, and the decanter of port being nearly out, brother Ned pulled the
bell, which was instantly answered by the apoplectic butler.
‘David,’ said brother Ned.
‘Sir,’ replied the butler.
‘A magnum of the double-diamond, David, to drink the health of Mr
Linkinwater.’
Instantly, by a feat of dexterity, which was the admiration of all the
company, and had been, annually, for some years past, the apoplectic
butler, bringing his left hand from behind the small of his back,
produced the bottle with the corkscrew already inserted; uncorked it at
a jerk; and placed the magnum and the cork before his master with the
dignity of conscious cleverness.
‘Ha!’ said brother Ned, first examining the cork and afterwards filling
his glass, while the old butler looked complacently and amiably on, as
if it were all his own property, but the company were quite welcome to
make free with it, ‘this looks well, David.’
‘It ought to, sir,’ replied David. ‘You’d be troubled to find such a
glass of wine as is our double-diamond, and that Mr. Linkinwater knows
very well. That was laid down when Mr. Linkinwater first come: that wine
was, gentlemen.’
‘Nay, David, nay,’ interposed brother Charles.
‘I wrote the entry in the cellar-book myself, sir, if you please,’ said
David, in the tone of a man, quite confident in the strength of his
facts. ‘Mr. Linkinwater had only been here twenty year, sir, when that
pipe of double-diamond was laid down.’
‘David is quite right, quite right, brother Charles,’ said Ned: ‘are the
people here, David?’
‘Outside the door, sir,’ replied the butler.
‘Show ‘em in, David, show ‘em in.’
At this bidding, the older butler placed before his master a small tray
of clean glasses, and opening the door admitted the jolly porters and
warehousemen whom Nicholas had seen below. They were four in all, and as
they came in, bowing, and grinning, and blushing, the housekeeper, and
cook, and housemaid, brought up the rear.
‘Seven,’ said brother Ned, filling a corresponding number of glasses
with the double-diamond, ‘and David, eight. There! Now, you’re all of
you to drink the health of your best friend Mr. Timothy Linkinwater, and
wish him health and long life and many happy returns of this day, both
for his own sake and that of your old masters, who consider him an
inestimable treasure. Tim Linkinwater, sir, your health. Devil take you,
Tim Linkinwater, sir, God bless you.’
With this singular contradiction of terms, brother Ned gave Tim
Linkinwater a slap on the back, which made him look, for the moment,
almost as apoplectic as the butler: and tossed off the contents of his
glass in a twinkling.
The toast was scarcely drunk with all honour to Tim Linkinwater, when
the sturdiest and jolliest subordinate elbowed himself a little
in advance of his fellows, and exhibiting a very hot and flushed
countenance, pulled a single lock of grey hair in the middle of his
forehead as a respectful salute to the company, and delivered himself
as follows--rubbing the palms of his hands very hard on a blue cotton
handkerchief as he did so:
‘We’re allowed to take a liberty once a year, gen’lemen, and if you
please we’ll take it now; there being no time like the present, and no
two birds in the hand worth one in the bush, as is well known--leastways
in a contrairy sense, which the meaning is the same. (A pause--the
butler unconvinced.) What we mean to say is, that there never
was (looking at the butler)--such--(looking at the cook)
noble--excellent--(looking everywhere and seeing nobody) free,
generous-spirited masters as them as has treated us so handsome
this day. And here’s thanking of ‘em for all their goodness as is so
constancy a diffusing of itself over everywhere, and wishing they may
live long and die happy!’
When the foregoing speech was over--and it might have been much more
elegant and much less to the purpose--the whole body of subordinates
under command of the apoplectic butler gave three soft cheers; which, to
that gentleman’s great indignation, were not very regular, inasmuch as
the women persisted in giving an immense number of little shrill hurrahs
among themselves, in utter disregard of the time. This done, they
withdrew; shortly afterwards, Tim Linkinwater’s sister withdrew; in
reasonable time after that, the sitting was broken up for tea and
coffee, and a round game of cards.
At half-past ten--late hours for the square--there appeared a little
tray of sandwiches and a bowl of bishop, which bishop coming on the top
of the double-diamond, and other excitements, had such an effect
upon Tim Linkinwater, that he drew Nicholas aside, and gave him to
understand, confidentially, that it was quite true about the uncommonly
handsome spinster, and that she was to the full as good-looking as she
had been described--more so, indeed--but that she was in too much of a
hurry to change her condition, and consequently, while Tim was courting
her and thinking of changing his, got married to somebody else. ‘After
all, I dare say it was my fault,’ said Tim. ‘I’ll show you a print
I have got upstairs, one of these days. It cost me five-and-twenty
shillings. I bought it soon after we were cool to each other. Don’t
mention it, but it’s the most extraordinary accidental likeness you ever
saw--her very portrait, sir!’
By this time it was past eleven o’clock; and Tim Linkinwater’s sister
declaring that she ought to have been at home a full hour ago, a coach
was procured, into which she was handed with great ceremony by brother
Ned, while brother Charles imparted the fullest directions to the
coachman, and besides paying the man a shilling over and above his fare,
in order that he might take the utmost care of the lady, all but choked
him with a glass of spirits of uncommon strength, and then nearly
knocked all the breath out of his body in his energetic endeavours to
knock it in again.
At length the coach rumbled off, and Tim Linkinwater’s sister being now
fairly on her way home, Nicholas and Tim Linkinwater’s friend took
their leaves together, and left old Tim and the worthy brothers to their
repose.
As Nicholas had some distance to walk, it was considerably past midnight
by the time he reached home, where he found his mother and Smike sitting
up to receive him. It was long after their usual hour of retiring, and
they had expected him, at the very latest, two hours ago; but the time
had not hung heavily on their hands, for Mrs. Nickleby had entertained
Smike with a genealogical account of her family by the mother’s side,
comprising biographical sketches of the principal members, and Smike had
sat wondering what it was all about, and whether it was learnt from
a book, or said out of Mrs. Nickleby’s own head; so that they got on
together very pleasantly.
Nicholas could not go to bed without expatiating on the excellences and
munificence of the brothers Cheeryble, and relating the great success
which had attended his efforts that day. But before he had said a dozen
words, Mrs. Nickleby, with many sly winks and nods, observed, that she
was sure Mr. Smike must be quite tired out, and that she positively must
insist on his not sitting up a minute longer.
‘A most biddable creature he is, to be sure,’ said Mrs. Nickleby, when
Smike had wished them good-night and left the room. ‘I know you’ll
excuse me, Nicholas, my dear, but I don’t like to do this before a third
person; indeed, before a young man it would not be quite proper, though
really, after all, I don’t know what harm there is in it, except that
to be sure it’s not a very becoming thing, though some people say it is
very much so, and really I don’t know why it should not be, if it’s
well got up, and the borders are small-plaited; of course, a good deal
depends upon that.’
With which preface, Mrs. Nickleby took her nightcap from between the
leaves of a very large prayer-book where it had been folded up small,
and proceeded to tie it on: talking away in her usual discursive manner,
all the time.
‘People may say what they like,’ observed Mrs. Nickleby, ‘but there’s
a great deal of comfort in a nightcap, as I’m sure you would confess,
Nicholas my dear, if you would only have strings to yours, and wear it
like a Christian, instead of sticking it upon the very top of your head
like a blue-coat boy. You needn’t think it an unmanly or quizzical thing
to be particular about your nightcap, for I have often heard your poor
dear papa, and the Reverend Mr. What’s-his-name, who used to read prayers
in that old church with the curious little steeple that the weathercock
was blown off the night week before you were born,--I have often heard
them say, that the young men at college are uncommonly particular about
their nightcaps, and that the Oxford nightcaps are quite celebrated
for their strength and goodness; so much so, indeed, that the young men
never dream of going to bed without ‘em, and I believe it’s admitted on
all hands that THEY know what’s good, and don’t coddle themselves.’
Nicholas laughed, and entering no further into the subject of this
lengthened harangue, reverted to the pleasant tone of the little
birthday party. And as Mrs. Nickleby instantly became very curious
respecting it, and made a great number of inquiries touching what they
had had for dinner, and how it was put on table, and whether it was
overdone or underdone, and who was there, and what ‘the Mr. Cherrybles’
said, and what Nicholas said, and what the Mr. Cherrybles said when he
said that; Nicholas described the festivities at full length, and also
the occurrences of the morning.
‘Late as it is,’ said Nicholas, ‘I am almost selfish enough to wish
that Kate had been up to hear all this. I was all impatience, as I came
along, to tell her.’
‘Why, Kate,’ said Mrs. Nickleby, putting her feet upon the fender, and
drawing her chair close to it, as if settling herself for a long
talk. ‘Kate has been in bed--oh! a couple of hours--and I’m very glad,
Nicholas my dear, that I prevailed upon her not to sit up, for I wished
very much to have an opportunity of saying a few words to you. I am
naturally anxious about it, and of course it’s a very delightful and
consoling thing to have a grown-up son that one can put confidence in,
and advise with; indeed I don’t know any use there would be in having
sons at all, unless people could put confidence in them.’
Nicholas stopped in the middle of a sleepy yawn, as his mother began to
speak: and looked at her with fixed attention.
‘There was a lady in our neighbourhood,’ said Mrs. Nickleby, ‘speaking
of sons puts me in mind of it--a lady in our neighbourhood when we lived