Oliver Twist
sick families have been relieved with slices of cheese. That’s the rule
now, Mrs. Corney, all over the country. But, however,” said the beadle,
stopping to unpack his bundle, “these are official secrets, ma’am; not
to be spoken of; except, as I may say, among the porochial officers,
such as ourselves. This is the port wine, ma’am, that the board ordered
for the infirmary; real, fresh, genuine port wine; only out of the cask
this forenoon; clear as a bell, and no sediment!”
Having held the first bottle up to the light, and shaken it well to
test its excellence, Mr. Bumble placed them both on top of a chest of
drawers; folded the handkerchief in which they had been wrapped; put it
carefully in his pocket; and took up his hat, as if to go.
“You’ll have a very cold walk, Mr. Bumble,” said the matron.
“It blows, ma’am,” replied Mr. Bumble, turning up his coat-collar,
“enough to cut one’s ears off.”
The matron looked, from the little kettle, to the beadle, who was
moving towards the door; and as the beadle coughed, preparatory to
bidding her good-night, bashfully inquired whether—whether he wouldn’t
take a cup of tea?
Mr. Bumble instantaneously turned back his collar again; laid his hat
and stick upon a chair; and drew another chair up to the table. As he
slowly seated himself, he looked at the lady. She fixed her eyes upon
the little teapot. Mr. Bumble coughed again, and slightly smiled.
Mrs. Corney rose to get another cup and saucer from the closet. As she
sat down, her eyes once again encountered those of the gallant beadle;
she coloured, and applied herself to the task of making his tea. Again
Mr. Bumble coughed—louder this time than he had coughed yet.
“Sweet? Mr. Bumble?” inquired the matron, taking up the sugar-basin.
“Very sweet, indeed, ma’am,” replied Mr. Bumble. He fixed his eyes on
Mrs. Corney as he said this; and if ever a beadle looked tender, Mr.
Bumble was that beadle at that moment.
The tea was made, and handed in silence. Mr. Bumble, having spread a
handkerchief over his knees to prevent the crumbs from sullying the
splendour of his shorts, began to eat and drink; varying these
amusements, occasionally, by fetching a deep sigh; which, however, had
no injurious effect upon his appetite, but, on the contrary, rather
seemed to facilitate his operations in the tea and toast department.
“You have a cat, ma’am, I see,” said Mr. Bumble, glancing at one who,
in the centre of her family, was basking before the fire; “and kittens
too, I declare!”
“I am so fond of them, Mr. Bumble, you can’t think,” replied the
matron. “They’re _so_ happy, _so_ frolicsome, and _so_ cheerful, that
they are quite companions for me.”
“Very nice animals, ma’am,” replied Mr. Bumble, approvingly; “so very
domestic.”
“Oh, yes!” rejoined the matron with enthusiasm; “so fond of their home
too, that it’s quite a pleasure, I’m sure.”
“Mrs. Corney, ma’am,” said Mr. Bumble, slowly, and marking the time
with his teaspoon, “I mean to say this, ma’am; that any cat, or kitten,
that could live with you, ma’am, and _not_ be fond of its home, must be
a ass, ma’am.”
“Oh, Mr. Bumble!” remonstrated Mrs. Corney.
“It’s of no use disguising facts, ma’am,” said Mr. Bumble, slowly
flourishing the teaspoon with a kind of amorous dignity which made him
doubly impressive; “I would drown it myself, with pleasure.”
“Then you’re a cruel man,” said the matron vivaciously, as she held out
her hand for the beadle’s cup; “and a very hard-hearted man besides.”
“Hard-hearted, ma’am?” said Mr. Bumble. “Hard?” Mr. Bumble resigned his
cup without another word; squeezed Mrs. Corney’s little finger as she
took it; and inflicting two open-handed slaps upon his laced waistcoat,
gave a mighty sigh, and hitched his chair a very little morsel farther
from the fire.
It was a round table; and as Mrs. Corney and Mr. Bumble had been
sitting opposite each other, with no great space between them, and
fronting the fire, it will be seen that Mr. Bumble, in receding from
the fire, and still keeping at the table, increased the distance
between himself and Mrs. Corney; which proceeding, some prudent readers
will doubtless be disposed to admire, and to consider an act of great
heroism on Mr. Bumble’s part: he being in some sort tempted by time,
place, and opportunity, to give utterance to certain soft nothings,
which however well they may become the lips of the light and
thoughtless, do seem immeasurably beneath the dignity of judges of the
land, members of parliament, ministers of state, lord mayors, and other
great public functionaries, but more particularly beneath the
stateliness and gravity of a beadle: who (as is well known) should be
the sternest and most inflexible among them all.
Whatever were Mr. Bumble’s intentions, however (and no doubt they were
of the best): it unfortunately happened, as has been twice before
remarked, that the table was a round one; consequently Mr. Bumble,
moving his chair by little and little, soon began to diminish the
distance between himself and the matron; and, continuing to travel
round the outer edge of the circle, brought his chair, in time, close
to that in which the matron was seated.
Indeed, the two chairs touched; and when they did so, Mr. Bumble
stopped.
Now, if the matron had moved her chair to the right, she would have
been scorched by the fire; and if to the left, she must have fallen
into Mr. Bumble’s arms; so (being a discreet matron, and no doubt
foreseeing these consequences at a glance) she remained where she was,
and handed Mr. Bumble another cup of tea.
“Hard-hearted, Mrs. Corney?” said Mr. Bumble, stirring his tea, and
looking up into the matron’s face; “are _you_ hard-hearted, Mrs.
Corney?”
“Dear me!” exclaimed the matron, “what a very curious question from a
single man. What can you want to know for, Mr. Bumble?”
The beadle drank his tea to the last drop; finished a piece of toast;
whisked the crumbs off his knees; wiped his lips; and deliberately
kissed the matron.
“Mr. Bumble!” cried that discreet lady in a whisper; for the fright was
so great, that she had quite lost her voice, “Mr. Bumble, I shall
scream!” Mr. Bumble made no reply; but in a slow and dignified manner,
put his arm round the matron’s waist.
As the lady had stated her intention of screaming, of course she would
have screamed at this additional boldness, but that the exertion was
rendered unnecessary by a hasty knocking at the door: which was no
sooner heard, than Mr. Bumble darted, with much agility, to the wine
bottles, and began dusting them with great violence: while the matron
sharply demanded who was there.
It is worthy of remark, as a curious physical instance of the efficacy
of a sudden surprise in counteracting the effects of extreme fear, that
her voice had quite recovered all its official asperity.
“If you please, mistress,” said a withered old female pauper, hideously
ugly: putting her head in at the door, “Old Sally is a-going fast.”
“Well, what’s that to me?” angrily demanded the matron. “I can’t keep
her alive, can I?”
“No, no, mistress,” replied the old woman, “nobody can; she’s far
beyond the reach of help. I’ve seen a many people die; little babes and
great strong men; and I know when death’s a-coming, well enough. But
she’s troubled in her mind: and when the fits are not on her,—and
that’s not often, for she is dying very hard,—she says she has got
something to tell, which you must hear. She’ll never die quiet till you
come, mistress.”
At this intelligence, the worthy Mrs. Corney muttered a variety of
invectives against old women who couldn’t even die without purposely
annoying their betters; and, muffling herself in a thick shawl which
she hastily caught up, briefly requested Mr. Bumble to stay till she
came back, lest anything particular should occur. Bidding the messenger
walk fast, and not be all night hobbling up the stairs, she followed
her from the room with a very ill grace, scolding all the way.
Mr. Bumble’s conduct on being left to himself, was rather inexplicable.
He opened the closet, counted the teaspoons, weighed the sugar-tongs,
closely inspected a silver milk-pot to ascertain that it was of the
genuine metal, and, having satisfied his curiosity on these points, put
on his cocked hat corner-wise, and danced with much gravity four
distinct times round the table.
Having gone through this very extraordinary performance, he took off
the cocked hat again, and, spreading himself before the fire with his
back towards it, seemed to be mentally engaged in taking an exact
inventory of the furniture.
CHAPTER XXIV.
TREATS ON A VERY POOR SUBJECT, BUT IS A SHORT ONE, AND MAY BE FOUND OF
IMPORTANCE IN THIS HISTORY
It was no unfit messenger of death, who had disturbed the quiet of the
matron’s room. Her body was bent by age; her limbs trembled with palsy;
her face, distorted into a mumbling leer, resembled more the grotesque
shaping of some wild pencil, than the work of Nature’s hand.
Alas! How few of Nature’s faces are left alone to gladden us with their
beauty! The cares, and sorrows, and hungerings, of the world, change
them as they change hearts; and it is only when those passions sleep,
and have lost their hold for ever, that the troubled clouds pass off,
and leave Heaven’s surface clear. It is a common thing for the
countenances of the dead, even in that fixed and rigid state, to
subside into the long-forgotten expression of sleeping infancy, and
settle into the very look of early life; so calm, so peaceful, do they
grow again, that those who knew them in their happy childhood, kneel by
the coffin’s side in awe, and see the Angel even upon earth.
The old crone tottered along the passages, and up the stairs, muttering
some indistinct answers to the chidings of her companion; being at
length compelled to pause for breath, she gave the light into her hand,
and remained behind to follow as she might: while the more nimble
superior made her way to the room where the sick woman lay.
It was a bare garret-room, with a dim light burning at the farther end.
There was another old woman watching by the bed; the parish
apothecary’s apprentice was standing by the fire, making a toothpick
out of a quill.
“Cold night, Mrs. Corney,” said this young gentleman, as the matron
entered.
“Very cold, indeed, sir,” replied the mistress, in her most civil
tones, and dropping a curtsey as she spoke.
“You should get better coals out of your contractors,” said the
apothecary’s deputy, breaking a lump on the top of the fire with the
rusty poker; “these are not at all the sort of thing for a cold night.”
“They’re the board’s choosing, sir,” returned the matron. “The least
they could do, would be to keep us pretty warm: for our places are hard
enough.”
The conversation was here interrupted by a moan from the sick woman.
“Oh!” said the young man, turning his face towards the bed, as if he
had previously quite forgotten the patient, “it’s all U.P. there, Mrs.
Corney.”
“It is, is it, sir?” asked the matron.
“If she lasts a couple of hours, I shall be surprised,” said the
apothecary’s apprentice, intent upon the toothpick’s point. “It’s a
break-up of the system altogether. Is she dozing, old lady?”
The attendant stooped over the bed, to ascertain; and nodded in the
affirmative.
“Then perhaps she’ll go off in that way, if you don’t make a row,” said
the young man. “Put the light on the floor. She won’t see it there.”
The attendant did as she was told: shaking her head meanwhile, to
intimate that the woman would not die so easily; having done so, she
resumed her seat by the side of the other nurse, who had by this time
returned. The mistress, with an expression of impatience, wrapped
herself in her shawl, and sat at the foot of the bed.