The Old Curiosity Shop
some sideways, some head first, some stern first; all in a
wrong-headed, dogged, obstinate way, bumping up against the larger
craft, running under the bows of steamboats, getting into every kind of
nook and corner where they had no business, and being crunched on all
sides like so many walnut-shells; while each with its pair of long
sweeps struggling and splashing in the water looked like some lumbering
fish in pain. In some of the vessels at anchor all hands were busily
engaged in coiling ropes, spreading out sails to dry, taking in or
discharging their cargoes; in others no life was visible but two or
three tarry boys, and perhaps a barking dog running to and fro upon the
deck or scrambling up to look over the side and bark the louder for the
view. Coming slowly on through the forests of masts was a great
steamship, beating the water in short impatient strokes with her heavy
paddles as though she wanted room to breathe, and advancing in her huge
bulk like a sea monster among the minnows of the Thames. On either hand
were long black tiers of colliers; between them vessels slowly working
out of harbour with sails glistening in the sun, and creaking noise on
board, re-echoed from a hundred quarters. The water and all upon it was
in active motion, dancing and buoyant and bubbling up; while the old
grey Tower and piles of building on the shore, with many a church-spire
shooting up between, looked coldly on, and seemed to disdain their
chafing, restless neighbour.
Daniel Quilp, who was not much affected by a bright morning save in so
far as it spared him the trouble of carrying an umbrella, caused
himself to be put ashore hard by the wharf, and proceeded thither
through a narrow lane which, partaking of the amphibious character of
its frequenters, had as much water as mud in its composition, and a
very liberal supply of both. Arrived at his destination, the first
object that presented itself to his view was a pair of very imperfectly
shod feet elevated in the air with the soles upwards, which remarkable
appearance was referable to the boy, who being of an eccentric spirit
and having a natural taste for tumbling, was now standing on his head
and contemplating the aspect of the river under these uncommon
circumstances. He was speedily brought on his heels by the sound of his
master’s voice, and as soon as his head was in its right position, Mr
Quilp, to speak expressively in the absence of a better verb, ‘punched
it’ for him.
‘Come, you let me alone,’ said the boy, parrying Quilp’s hand with both
his elbows alternatively. ‘You’ll get something you won’t like if you
don’t and so I tell you.’
‘You dog,’ snarled Quilp, ‘I’ll beat you with an iron rod, I’ll scratch
you with a rusty nail, I’ll pinch your eyes, if you talk to me--I will.’
With these threats he clenched his hand again, and dexterously diving
in between the elbows and catching the boy’s head as it dodged from
side to side, gave it three or four good hard knocks. Having now
carried his point and insisted on it, he left off.
‘You won’t do it agin,’ said the boy, nodding his head and drawing
back, with the elbows ready in case of the worst; ‘now--’
‘Stand still, you dog,’ said Quilp. ‘I won’t do it again, because I’ve
done it as often as I want. Here. Take the key.’
‘Why don’t you hit one of your size?’ said the boy approaching very
slowly.
‘Where is there one of my size, you dog?’ returned Quilp. ‘Take the
key, or I’ll brain you with it’--indeed he gave him a smart tap with
the handle as he spoke. ‘Now, open the counting-house.’
The boy sulkily complied, muttering at first, but desisting when he
looked round and saw that Quilp was following him with a steady look.
And here it may be remarked, that between this boy and the dwarf there
existed a strange kind of mutual liking. How born or bred, and or
nourished upon blows and threats on one side, and retorts and defiances
on the other, is not to the purpose. Quilp would certainly suffer
nobody to contract him but the boy, and the boy would assuredly not
have submitted to be so knocked about by anybody but Quilp, when he had
the power to run away at any time he chose.
‘Now,’ said Quilp, passing into the wooden counting-house, ‘you mind
the wharf. Stand upon your head agin, and I’ll cut one of your feet
off.’
The boy made no answer, but directly Quilp had shut himself in, stood
on his head before the door, then walked on his hands to the back and
stood on his head there, and then to the opposite side and repeated the
performance. There were indeed four sides to the counting-house, but he
avoided that one where the window was, deeming it probable that Quilp
would be looking out of it. This was prudent, for in point of fact, the
dwarf, knowing his disposition, was lying in wait at a little distance
from the sash armed with a large piece of wood, which, being rough and
jagged and studded in many parts with broken nails, might possibly have
hurt him.
It was a dirty little box, this counting-house, with nothing in it but
an old ricketty desk and two stools, a hat-peg, an ancient almanack, an
inkstand with no ink, and the stump of one pen, and an eight-day clock
which hadn’t gone for eighteen years at least, and of which the
minute-hand had been twisted off for a tooth-pick. Daniel Quilp pulled
his hat over his brows, climbed on to the desk (which had a flat top)
and stretching his short length upon it went to sleep with ease of an
old practitioner; intending, no doubt, to compensate himself for the
deprivation of last night’s rest, by a long and sound nap.
Sound it might have been, but long it was not, for he had not been
asleep a quarter of an hour when the boy opened the door and thrust in
his head, which was like a bundle of badly-picked oakum. Quilp was a
light sleeper and started up directly.
‘Here’s somebody for you,’ said the boy.
‘Who?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Ask!’ said Quilp, seizing the trifle of wood before mentioned and
throwing it at him with such dexterity that it was well the boy
disappeared before it reached the spot on which he had stood. ‘Ask, you
dog.’
Not caring to venture within range of such missles again, the boy
discreetly sent in his stead the first cause of the interruption, who
now presented herself at the door.
‘What, Nelly!’ cried Quilp.
‘Yes,’ said the child, hesitating whether to enter or retreat, for the
dwarf just roused, with his dishevelled hair hanging all about him and
a yellow handkerchief over his head, was something fearful to behold;
it’s only me, sir.’
‘Come in,’ said Quilp, without getting off the desk. ‘Come in. Stay.
Just look out into the yard, and see whether there’s a boy standing on
his head.’
‘No, sir,’ replied Nell. ‘He’s on his feet.’
‘You’re sure he is?’ said Quilp. ‘Well. Now, come in and shut the door.
What’s your message, Nelly?’
The child handed him a letter. Mr Quilp, without changing his position
further than to turn over a little more on his side and rest his chin
on his hand, proceeded to make himself acquainted with its contents.
CHAPTER 6
Little Nell stood timidly by, with her eyes raised to the countenance
of Mr Quilp as he read the letter, plainly showing by her looks that
while she entertained some fear and distrust of the little man, she was
much inclined to laugh at his uncouth appearance and grotesque
attitude. And yet there was visible on the part of the child a painful
anxiety for his reply, and consciousness of his power to render it
disagreeable or distressing, which was strongly at variance with this
impulse and restrained it more effectually than she could possibly have
done by any efforts of her own.
That Mr Quilp was himself perplexed, and that in no small degree, by
the contents of the letter, was sufficiently obvious. Before he had got
through the first two or three lines he began to open his eyes very
wide and to frown most horribly, the next two or three caused him to
scratch his head in an uncommonly vicious manner, and when he came to
the conclusion he gave a long dismal whistle indicative of surprise and
dismay. After folding and laying it down beside him, he bit the nails
of all of his ten fingers with extreme voracity; and taking it up
sharply, read it again. The second perusal was to all appearance as
unsatisfactory as the first, and plunged him into a profound reverie
from which he awakened to another assault upon his nails and a long
stare at the child, who with her eyes turned towards the ground awaited
his further pleasure.
‘Halloa here!’ he said at length, in a voice, and with a suddenness,
which made the child start as though a gun had been fired off at her
ear. ‘Nelly!’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Do you know what’s inside this letter, Nell?’
‘No, sir!’
‘Are you sure, quite sure, quite certain, upon your soul?’
‘Quite sure, sir.’
‘Do you wish you may die if you do know, hey?’ said the dwarf.
‘Indeed I don’t know,’ returned the child.
‘Well!’ muttered Quilp as he marked her earnest look. ‘I believe you.
Humph! Gone already? Gone in four-and-twenty hours! What the devil has
he done with it, that’s the mystery!’
This reflection set him scratching his head and biting his nails once
more. While he was thus employed his features gradually relaxed into
what was with him a cheerful smile, but which in any other man would
have been a ghastly grin of pain, and when the child looked up again
she found that he was regarding her with extraordinary favour and
complacency.
‘You look very pretty to-day, Nelly, charmingly pretty. Are you tired,
Nelly?’
‘No, sir. I’m in a hurry to get back, for he will be anxious while I am
away.’
‘There’s no hurry, little Nell, no hurry at all,’ said Quilp. ‘How
should you like to be my number two, Nelly?’
‘To be what, sir?’
‘My number two, Nelly, my second, my Mrs Quilp,’ said the dwarf.
The child looked frightened, but seemed not to understand him, which Mr
Quilp observing, hastened to make his meaning more distinctly.
‘To be Mrs Quilp the second, when Mrs Quilp the first is dead, sweet
Nell,’ said Quilp, wrinkling up his eyes and luring her towards him
with his bent forefinger, ‘to be my wife, my little cherry-cheeked,
red-lipped wife. Say that Mrs Quilp lives five year, or only four,
you’ll be just the proper age for me. Ha ha! Be a good girl, Nelly, a
very good girl, and see if one of these days you don’t come to be Mrs
Quilp of Tower Hill.’
So far from being sustained and stimulated by this delightful prospect,
the child shrank from him in great agitation, and trembled violently.
Mr Quilp, either because frightening anybody afforded him a
constitutional delight, or because it was pleasant to contemplate the
death of Mrs Quilp number one, and the elevation of Mrs Quilp number
two to her post and title, or because he was determined from purposes
of his own to be agreeable and good-humoured at that particular time,
only laughed and feigned to take no heed of her alarm.
‘You shall come with me to Tower Hill and see Mrs Quilp that is,
directly,’ said the dwarf. ‘She’s very fond of you, Nell, though not so
fond as I am. You shall come home with me.’
‘I must go back indeed,’ said the child. ‘He told me to return directly
I had the answer.’
‘But you haven’t it, Nelly,’ retorted the dwarf, ‘and won’t have it,
and can’t have it, until I have been home, so you see that to do your
errand, you must go with me. Reach me yonder hat, my dear, and we’ll go
directly.’ With that, Mr Quilp suffered himself to roll gradually off
the desk until his short legs touched the ground, when he got upon them
and led the way from the counting-house to the wharf outside, when the
first objects that presented themselves were the boy who had stood on
his head and another young gentleman of about his own stature, rolling