The Old Curiosity Shop
The same room certainly, and still by candlelight; but with what
unbounded astonishment did he see all those bottles, and basins, and
articles of linen airing by the fire, and such-like furniture of a sick
chamber--all very clean and neat, but all quite different from anything
he had left there, when he went to bed! The atmosphere, too, filled
with a cool smell of herbs and vinegar; the floor newly sprinkled;
the--the what? The Marchioness?
Yes; playing cribbage with herself at the table. There she sat, intent
upon her game, coughing now and then in a subdued manner as if she
feared to disturb him--shuffling the cards, cutting, dealing, playing,
counting, pegging--going through all the mysteries of cribbage as if
she had been in full practice from her cradle! Mr Swiveller
contemplated these things for a short time, and suffering the curtain
to fall into its former position, laid his head on the pillow again.
‘I’m dreaming,’ thought Richard, ‘that’s clear. When I went to bed, my
hands were not made of egg-shells; and now I can almost see through
‘em. If this is not a dream, I have woke up, by mistake, in an Arabian
Night, instead of a London one. But I have no doubt I’m asleep. Not
the least.’
Here the small servant had another cough.
‘Very remarkable!’ thought Mr Swiveller. ‘I never dreamt such a real
cough as that before. I don’t know, indeed, that I ever dreamt either
a cough or a sneeze. Perhaps it’s part of the philosophy of dreams
that one never does. There’s another--and another--I say!--I’m
dreaming rather fast!’
For the purpose of testing his real condition, Mr Swiveller, after some
reflection, pinched himself in the arm.
‘Queerer still!’ he thought. ‘I came to bed rather plump than
otherwise, and now there’s nothing to lay hold of. I’ll take another
survey.’
The result of this additional inspection was, to convince Mr Swiveller
that the objects by which he was surrounded were real, and that he saw
them, beyond all question, with his waking eyes.
‘It’s an Arabian Night; that’s what it is,’ said Richard. ‘I’m in
Damascus or Grand Cairo. The Marchioness is a Genie, and having had a
wager with another Genie about who is the handsomest young man alive,
and the worthiest to be the husband of the Princess of China, has
brought me away, room and all, to compare us together. Perhaps,’ said
Mr Swiveller, turning languidly round on his pillow, and looking on
that side of his bed which was next the wall, ‘the Princess may be
still--No, she’s gone.’
Not feeling quite satisfied with this explanation, as, even taking it
to be the correct one, it still involved a little mystery and doubt, Mr
Swiveller raised the curtain again, determined to take the first
favourable opportunity of addressing his companion. An occasion
presented itself. The Marchioness dealt, turned up a knave, and
omitted to take the usual advantage; upon which Mr Swiveller called out
as loud as he could--‘Two for his heels!’
The Marchioness jumped up quickly and clapped her hands. ‘Arabian
Night, certainly,’ thought Mr Swiveller; ‘they always clap their hands
instead of ringing the bell. Now for the two thousand black slaves,
with jars of jewels on their heads!’
It appeared, however, that she had only clapped her hands for joy; for
directly afterward she began to laugh, and then to cry; declaring, not
in choice Arabic but in familiar English, that she was ‘so glad, she
didn’t know what to do.’
‘Marchioness,’ said Mr Swiveller, thoughtfully, ‘be pleased to draw
nearer. First of all, will you have the goodness to inform me where I
shall find my voice; and secondly, what has become of my flesh?’
The Marchioness only shook her head mournfully, and cried again;
whereupon Mr Swiveller (being very weak) felt his own eyes affected
likewise.
‘I begin to infer, from your manner, and these appearances,
Marchioness,’ said Richard after a pause, and smiling with a trembling
lip, ‘that I have been ill.’
‘You just have!’ replied the small servant, wiping her eyes. ‘And
haven’t you been a talking nonsense!’
‘Oh!’ said Dick. ‘Very ill, Marchioness, have I been?’
‘Dead, all but,’ replied the small servant. ‘I never thought you’d get
better. Thank Heaven you have!’
Mr Swiveller was silent for a long while. By and bye, he began to talk
again, inquiring how long he had been there.
‘Three weeks to-morrow,’ replied the servant.
‘Three what?’ said Dick.
‘Weeks,’ returned the Marchioness emphatically; ‘three long, slow
weeks.’
The bare thought of having been in such extremity, caused Richard to
fall into another silence, and to lie flat down again, at his full
length. The Marchioness, having arranged the bed-clothes more
comfortably, and felt that his hands and forehead were quite cool--a
discovery that filled her with delight--cried a little more, and then
applied herself to getting tea ready, and making some thin dry toast.
While she was thus engaged, Mr Swiveller looked on with a grateful
heart, very much astonished to see how thoroughly at home she made
herself, and attributing this attention, in its origin, to Sally Brass,
whom, in his own mind, he could not thank enough. When the Marchioness
had finished her toasting, she spread a clean cloth on a tray, and
brought him some crisp slices and a great basin of weak tea, with which
(she said) the doctor had left word he might refresh himself when he
awoke. She propped him up with pillows, if not as skilfully as if she
had been a professional nurse all her life, at least as tenderly; and
looked on with unutterable satisfaction while the patient--stopping
every now and then to shake her by the hand--took his poor meal with an
appetite and relish, which the greatest dainties of the earth, under
any other circumstances, would have failed to provoke. Having cleared
away, and disposed everything comfortably about him again, she sat down
at the table to take her own tea.
‘Marchioness,’ said Mr Swiveller, ‘how’s Sally?’
The small servant screwed her face into an expression of the very
uttermost entanglement of slyness, and shook her head.
‘What, haven’t you seen her lately?’ said Dick.
‘Seen her!’ cried the small servant. ‘Bless you, I’ve run away!’
Mr Swiveller immediately laid himself down again quite flat, and so
remained for about five minutes. By slow degrees he resumed his
sitting posture after that lapse of time, and inquired:
‘And where do you live, Marchioness?’
‘Live!’ cried the small servant. ‘Here!’
‘Oh!’ said Mr Swiveller.
And with that he fell down flat again, as suddenly as if he had been
shot. Thus he remained, motionless and bereft of speech, until she had
finished her meal, put everything in its place, and swept the hearth;
when he motioned her to bring a chair to the bedside, and, being
propped up again, opened a farther conversation.
‘And so,’ said Dick, ‘you have run away?’
‘Yes,’ said the Marchioness, ‘and they’ve been a tizing of me.’
‘Been--I beg your pardon,’ said Dick--‘what have they been doing?’
‘Been a tizing of me--tizing you know--in the newspapers,’ rejoined the
Marchioness.
‘Aye, aye,’ said Dick, ‘advertising?’
The small servant nodded, and winked. Her eyes were so red with waking
and crying, that the Tragic Muse might have winked with greater
consistency. And so Dick felt.
‘Tell me,’ said he, ‘how it was that you thought of coming here.’
‘Why, you see,’ returned the Marchioness, ‘when you was gone, I hadn’t
any friend at all, because the lodger he never come back, and I didn’t
know where either him or you was to be found, you know. But one
morning, when I was--’
‘Was near a keyhole?’ suggested Mr Swiveller, observing that she
faltered.
‘Well then,’ said the small servant, nodding; ‘when I was near the
office keyhole--as you see me through, you know--I heard somebody
saying that she lived here, and was the lady whose house you lodged at,
and that you was took very bad, and wouldn’t nobody come and take care
of you. Mr Brass, he says, “It’s no business of mine,” he says; and
Miss Sally, she says, “He’s a funny chap, but it’s no business of
mine;” and the lady went away, and slammed the door to, when she went
out, I can tell you. So I run away that night, and come here, and told
‘em you was my brother, and they believed me, and I’ve been here ever
since.’
‘This poor little Marchioness has been wearing herself to death!’ cried
Dick.
‘No I haven’t,’ she returned, ‘not a bit of it. Don’t you mind about
me. I like sitting up, and I’ve often had a sleep, bless you, in one
of them chairs. But if you could have seen how you tried to jump out
o’ winder, and if you could have heard how you used to keep on singing
and making speeches, you wouldn’t have believed it--I’m so glad you’re
better, Mr Liverer.’
‘Liverer indeed!’ said Dick thoughtfully. ‘It’s well I am a liverer.
I strongly suspect I should have died, Marchioness, but for you.’
At this point, Mr Swiveller took the small servant’s hand in his again,
and being, as we have seen, but poorly, might in struggling to express
his thanks have made his eyes as red as hers, but that she quickly
changed the theme by making him lie down, and urging him to keep very
quiet.
‘The doctor,’ she told him, ‘said you was to be kept quite still, and
there was to be no noise nor nothing. Now, take a rest, and then we’ll
talk again. I’ll sit by you, you know. If you shut your eyes, perhaps
you’ll go to sleep. You’ll be all the better for it, if you do.’
The Marchioness, in saying these words, brought a little table to the
bedside, took her seat at it, and began to work away at the concoction
of some cooling drink, with the address of a score of chemists.
Richard Swiveller being indeed fatigued, fell into a slumber, and
waking in about half an hour, inquired what time it was.
‘Just gone half after six,’ replied his small friend, helping him to
sit up again.
‘Marchioness,’ said Richard, passing his hand over his forehead and
turning suddenly round, as though the subject but that moment flashed
upon him, ‘what has become of Kit?’
He had been sentenced to transportation for a great many years, she
said.
‘Has he gone?’ asked Dick--‘his mother--how is she,--what has become of
her?’
His nurse shook her head, and answered that she knew nothing about
them. ‘But, if I thought,’ said she, very slowly, ‘that you’d keep
quiet, and not put yourself into another fever, I could tell you--but
I won’t now.’
‘Yes, do,’ said Dick. ‘It will amuse me.’
‘Oh! would it though!’ rejoined the small servant, with a horrified
look. ‘I know better than that. Wait till you’re better and then I’ll
tell you.’
Dick looked very earnestly at his little friend: and his eyes, being
large and hollow from illness, assisted the expression so much, that
she was quite frightened, and besought him not to think any more about
it. What had already fallen from her, however, had not only piqued his
curiosity, but seriously alarmed him, wherefore he urged her to tell
him the worst at once.
‘Oh there’s no worst in it,’ said the small servant. ‘It hasn’t
anything to do with you.’
‘Has it anything to do with--is it anything you heard through chinks or
keyholes--and that you were not intended to hear?’ asked Dick, in a
breathless state.
‘Yes,’ replied the small servant.
‘In--in Bevis Marks?’ pursued Dick hastily. ‘Conversations between
Brass and Sally?’
‘Yes,’ cried the small servant again.
Richard Swiveller thrust his lank arm out of bed, and, gripping her by
the wrist and drawing her close to him, bade her out with it, and
freely too, or he would not answer for the consequences; being wholly
unable to endure the state of excitement and expectation. She, seeing