Our Mutual Friend
‘My dear Bella,’ replied the cherub, still pathetically scared, ‘and my
dear John Rokesmith, if you will allow me so to call you—’
‘Yes do, Pa, do!’ urged Bella. ‘I allow you, and my will is his law.
Isn’t it—dear John Rokesmith?’
There was an engaging shyness in Bella, coupled with an engaging
tenderness of love and confidence and pride, in thus first calling him
by name, which made it quite excusable in John Rokesmith to do what he
did. What he did was, once more to give her the appearance of vanishing
as aforesaid.
‘I think, my dears,’ observed the cherub, ‘that if you could make it
convenient to sit one on one side of me, and the other on the other, we
should get on rather more consecutively, and make things rather
plainer. John Rokesmith mentioned, a while ago, that he had no present
occupation.’
‘None,’ said Rokesmith.
‘No, Pa, none,’ said Bella.
‘From which I argue,’ proceeded the cherub, ‘that he has left Mr
Boffin?’
‘Yes, Pa. And so—’
‘Stop a bit, my dear. I wish to lead up to it by degrees. And that Mr
Boffin has not treated him well?’
‘Has treated him most shamefully, dear Pa!’ cried Bella with a flashing
face.
‘Of which,’ pursued the cherub, enjoining patience with his hand, ‘a
certain mercenary young person distantly related to myself, could not
approve? Am I leading up to it right?’
‘Could not approve, sweet Pa,’ said Bella, with a tearful laugh and a
joyful kiss.
‘Upon which,’ pursued the cherub, ‘the certain mercenary young person
distantly related to myself, having previously observed and mentioned
to myself that prosperity was spoiling Mr Boffin, felt that she must not
sell her sense of what was right and what was wrong, and what was true
and what was false, and what was just and what was unjust, for any
price that could be paid to her by any one alive? Am I leading up to it
right?’
With another tearful laugh Bella joyfully kissed him again.
‘And therefore—and therefore,’ the cherub went on in a glowing voice,
as Bella’s hand stole gradually up his waistcoat to his neck, ‘this
mercenary young person distantly related to myself, refused the
price, took off the splendid fashions that were part of it, put on the
comparatively poor dress that I had last given her, and trusting to my
supporting her in what was right, came straight to me. Have I led up to
it?’
Bella’s hand was round his neck by this time, and her face was on it.
‘The mercenary young person distantly related to myself,’ said her
good father, ‘did well! The mercenary young person distantly related
to myself, did not trust to me in vain! I admire this mercenary young
person distantly related to myself, more in this dress than if she had
come to me in China silks, Cashmere shawls, and Golconda diamonds. I
love this young person dearly. I say to the man of this young person’s
heart, out of my heart and with all of it, “My blessing on this
engagement betwixt you, and she brings you a good fortune when she
brings you the poverty she has accepted for your sake and the honest
truth’s!”’
The stanch little man’s voice failed him as he gave John Rokesmith his
hand, and he was silent, bending his face low over his daughter. But,
not for long. He soon looked up, saying in a sprightly tone:
‘And now, my dear child, if you think you can entertain John Rokesmith
for a minute and a half, I’ll run over to the Dairy, and fetch HIM a
cottage loaf and a drink of milk, that we may all have tea together.’
It was, as Bella gaily said, like the supper provided for the three
nursery hobgoblins at their house in the forest, without their
thunderous low growlings of the alarming discovery, ‘Somebody’s been
drinking MY milk!’ It was a delicious repast; by far the most delicious
that Bella, or John Rokesmith, or even R. Wilfer had ever made. The
uncongenial oddity of its surroundings, with the two brass knobs of the
iron safe of Chicksey, Veneering, and Stobbles staring from a corner,
like the eyes of some dull dragon, only made it the more delightful.
‘To think,’ said the cherub, looking round the office with unspeakable
enjoyment, ‘that anything of a tender nature should come off here, is
what tickles me. To think that ever I should have seen my Bella folded
in the arms of her future husband, HERE, you know!’
It was not until the cottage loaves and the milk had for some time
disappeared, and the foreshadowings of night were creeping over Mincing
Lane, that the cherub by degrees became a little nervous, and said to
Bella, as he cleared his throat:
‘Hem!—Have you thought at all about your mother, my dear?’
‘Yes, Pa.’
‘And your sister Lavvy, for instance, my dear?’
‘Yes, Pa. I think we had better not enter into particulars at home. I
think it will be quite enough to say that I had a difference with Mr
Boffin, and have left for good.’
‘John Rokesmith being acquainted with your Ma, my love,’ said her
father, after some slight hesitation, ‘I need have no delicacy in
hinting before him that you may perhaps find your Ma a little wearing.’
‘A little, patient Pa?’ said Bella with a tuneful laugh: the tune fuller
for being so loving in its tone.
‘Well! We’ll say, strictly in confidence among ourselves, wearing;
we won’t qualify it,’ the cherub stoutly admitted. ‘And your sister’s
temper is wearing.’
‘I don’t mind, Pa.’
‘And you must prepare yourself you know, my precious,’ said her father,
with much gentleness, ‘for our looking very poor and meagre at home, and
being at the best but very uncomfortable, after Mr Boffin’s house.’
‘I don’t mind, Pa. I could bear much harder trials—for John.’
The closing words were not so softly and blushingly said but that John
heard them, and showed that he heard them by again assisting Bella to
another of those mysterious disappearances.
‘Well!’ said the cherub gaily, and not expressing disapproval, ‘when
you—when you come back from retirement, my love, and reappear on the
surface, I think it will be time to lock up and go.’
If the counting-house of Chicksey, Veneering, and Stobbles had ever been
shut up by three happier people, glad as most people were to shut it up,
they must have been superlatively happy indeed. But first Bella mounted
upon Rumty’s Perch, and said, ‘Show me what you do here all day long,
dear Pa. Do you write like this?’ laying her round cheek upon her plump
left arm, and losing sight of her pen in waves of hair, in a highly
unbusiness-like manner. Though John Rokesmith seemed to like it.
So, the three hobgoblins, having effaced all traces of their feast, and
swept up the crumbs, came out of Mincing Lane to walk to Holloway; and
if two of the hobgoblins didn’t wish the distance twice as long as it
was, the third hobgoblin was much mistaken. Indeed, that modest spirit
deemed himself so much in the way of their deep enjoyment of the
journey, that he apologetically remarked: ‘I think, my dears, I’ll take
the lead on the other side of the road, and seem not to belong to you.’
Which he did, cherubically strewing the path with smiles, in the absence
of flowers.
It was almost ten o’clock when they stopped within view of Wilfer
Castle; and then, the spot being quiet and deserted, Bella began a
series of disappearances which threatened to last all night.
‘I think, John,’ the cherub hinted at last, ‘that if you can spare me
the young person distantly related to myself, I’ll take her in.’
‘I can’t spare her,’ answered John, ‘but I must lend her to you.—My
Darling!’ A word of magic which caused Bella instantly to disappear
again.
‘Now, dearest Pa,’ said Bella, when she became visible, ‘put your hand
in mine, and we’ll run home as fast as ever we can run, and get it over.
Now, Pa. Once!—’
‘My dear,’ the cherub faltered, with something of a craven air, ‘I was
going to observe that if your mother—’
‘You mustn’t hang back, sir, to gain time,’ cried Bella, putting out her
right foot; ‘do you see that, sir? That’s the mark; come up to the mark,
sir. Once! Twice! Three times and away, Pa!’ Off she skimmed, bearing
the cherub along, nor ever stopped, nor suffered him to stop, until she
had pulled at the bell. ‘Now, dear Pa,’ said Bella, taking him by both
ears as if he were a pitcher, and conveying his face to her rosy lips,
‘we are in for it!’
Miss Lavvy came out to open the gate, waited on by that attentive
cavalier and friend of the family, Mr George Sampson. ‘Why, it’s never
Bella!’ exclaimed Miss Lavvy starting back at the sight. And then
bawled, ‘Ma! Here’s Bella!’
This produced, before they could get into the house, Mrs Wilfer. Who,
standing in the portal, received them with ghostly gloom, and all her
other appliances of ceremony.
‘My child is welcome, though unlooked for,’ said she, at the time
presenting her cheek as if it were a cool slate for visitors to enrol
themselves upon. ‘You too, R. W., are welcome, though late. Does the
male domestic of Mrs Boffin hear me there?’ This deep-toned inquiry was
cast forth into the night, for response from the menial in question.
‘There is no one waiting, Ma, dear,’ said Bella.
‘There is no one waiting?’ repeated Mrs Wilfer in majestic accents.
‘No, Ma, dear.’
A dignified shiver pervaded Mrs Wilfer’s shoulders and gloves, as
who should say, ‘An Enigma!’ and then she marched at the head of the
procession to the family keeping-room, where she observed:
‘Unless, R. W.:’ who started on being solemnly turned upon: ‘you have
taken the precaution of making some addition to our frugal supper on
your way home, it will prove but a distasteful one to Bella. Cold neck
of mutton and a lettuce can ill compete with the luxuries of Mr Boffin’s
board.’
‘Pray don’t talk like that, Ma dear,’ said Bella; ‘Mr Boffin’s board is
nothing to me.’
But, here Miss Lavinia, who had been intently eyeing Bella’s bonnet,
struck in with ‘Why, Bella!’
‘Yes, Lavvy, I know.’
The Irrepressible lowered her eyes to Bella’s dress, and stooped to look
at it, exclaiming again: ‘Why, Bella!’
‘Yes, Lavvy, I know what I have got on. I was going to tell Ma when you
interrupted. I have left Mr Boffin’s house for good, Ma, and I have come
home again.’
Mrs Wilfer spake no word, but, having glared at her offspring for a
minute or two in an awful silence, retired into her corner of state
backward, and sat down: like a frozen article on sale in a Russian
market.
‘In short, dear Ma,’ said Bella, taking off the depreciated bonnet and
shaking out her hair, ‘I have had a very serious difference with Mr
Boffin on the subject of his treatment of a member of his household, and
it’s a final difference, and there’s an end of all.’
‘And I am bound to tell you, my dear,’ added R. W., submissively, ‘that
Bella has acted in a truly brave spirit, and with a truly right feeling.
And therefore I hope, my dear, you’ll not allow yourself to be greatly
disappointed.’
‘George!’ said Miss Lavvy, in a sepulchral, warning voice, founded on
her mother’s; ‘George Sampson, speak! What did I tell you about those
Boffins?’
Mr Sampson perceiving his frail bark to be labouring among shoals and
breakers, thought it safest not to refer back to any particular thing
that he had been told, lest he should refer back to the wrong thing.
With admirable seamanship he got his bark into deep water by murmuring
‘Yes indeed.’
‘Yes! I told George Sampson, as George Sampson tells you,’ said Miss
Lavvy, ‘that those hateful Boffins would pick a quarrel with Bella, as
soon as her novelty had worn off. Have they done it, or have they not?
Was I right, or was I wrong? And what do you say to us, Bella, of your
Boffins now?’
‘Lavvy and Ma,’ said Bella, ‘I say of Mr and Mrs Boffin what I always
have said; and I always shall say of them what I always have said. But
nothing will induce me to quarrel with any one to-night. I hope you