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Morning Song, 
 Hark—hark! the lark at heaven’s gate sings, 
 And Phoebus ’gins arise, 
 . His steeds to water at those springs 
 On chaliced flowers.that lies:  — 
 And waking Nary-buds begin 
 To ope their golden eyes; 
 With everything that pretty bin, 
 My lady sweet, arise, 
 Arise, arise! Shakespeare, 
 
 denny. 
 
 Jenny kiss’d me when we mef, 
 Jumping from the chair she sat in; 
 Time, you thief! who love to get 
 Sweets into your list, put that in, 
 Say Pm weary, say I’m sad: 
 Say that health and wealth have missed me; 
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OUR MUTUAL FRIEND, 
 
 CHARLES DICKENS. 
 
 GES Ores) 
 
 WITH FORTY-TWO ILLUSTRATIONS. 
 
 FROM DESIGNS BY MARCUS STONE, 
 
 PETERSONS UNIFORM EDITION OF DICKENS WORKS. 
 
 CONTAINING 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND, OLD CURIOSITY SHOP, 
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS, SKETCHES BY “ BOZ,” 
 LAMPLIGHTER’S STORY, OLIVER TWIST, 
 
 DAVID COPPERFIELD, LITTLE DORRITT, 
 DOMBEY AND SON, TALE OF TWO CITIES, 
 NICHOLAS NICKLEBY, | _-NEW YEARS’ STORIES, 
 PICKWICK PAPERS, DICKENS' SHORT STORIES, 
 CHRISTMAS STORIES, MESSAGE FROM THE SEA, 
 MARTIN CHUZZLEWIT, HOLIDAY STORIES, 
 BARNABY RUDGE, AMERICAN NOTES, 
 DICKENS’ NEW STORIES, PIC-NIC PAPERS. 
 
 BLEAK HOUSE, 
 
 Ree nnn nnn nnn 
 
 Philadselphia: 
 Te eBetPeneR SON & BROTHERS; 
 306 CHESTNUT STREET. 
 
* Rntered: according ne Act of Congress, in the Na 1865, te 
 
 T. B. PETERSON & BROTHERS, 
 In the Clerk’s Office of the District-Court of the United States, in aT tn Pee 
 
 ‘5 
 
 Eastern District of Pennsylvania. — . aes 
 ¥ mis ole 
 
 . 
 
THIS BOOK 
 IS INSCRIBED BY ITS‘AUTHOR 
 TO 
 
 SIR JAMES EMERSON TENNENT 
 AS 
 
 A MEMORIAL OF FRIENDSHIP. 
 
CONTENTS, 
 
 BOOK THE FIRST.—THE CUP AND THE LIP. 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 I.—On the Look Out........ Kvdesocheqssusesivedioswakrereeeys By sie este ee scasbews Rivliscvudisvesasesies vabacedeateid 
 TI.—The Man from Somewhere.....cooecsscsscessossceses Wededelencsedseausodecevavedscuespivwetohezeceuanetys 19 
 EET TUL INO TT OLET brn Veliviouscitsvbsicecudessstousededvavovetcowove daeideSacsnaiedeleais saliva velageseeadevseerverive 24 
 RA ME TITRA DUT BILLY soseshicssy ti crsnssveccredeesehores oeeedivectewshdeaden onccvudicseclayes eesussabeaees 29 
 V.—Boffin’s Bower........s0006 Peaeseedeiiipee Suede sauiuan ecsuanedier tis ehoedday Wig ecu qeaaleasnanads segs cane diets 34 
 RTL ARTEL Ge scvasinecvesvasasedscstheceucdscacs duceudicdc nines vetreacgouavedes sobesaesenseponcurscwemeaiey ties 40 
 Per ertary Wy OPe MOCKS After Himsellf,.....istcessseettecnneessotsssceucecovsacsesccscavcevesddssueiesoepencens Ag 
 Matha Mr. Bolin in Consultation........icc.cccsesecacyecossesccccesseevsesee dae sceetsetine, Ned onlays cu sian seo 51 
 ee ee RA NES, DOM, In Consultation... ...sccrserosqaierasacedesocesecnetevdgunes Uorondendeieverps 56 
 EMIT OETA OU oriss 6 (Su5b sacone acovas reocevncests cavenadusconcebenceaditabennecssensaseecaneditne 62 
 EE Ne Se A0s 8 sank acts f'n S's iba eds pond bode Va cae dinghens s440¥s velharwobosvonsedestnerdeatonens’ 68 
 See re weator afl Hondst. Man's Brow......<issccscssecscevccecceesceccss rected esciqcvreckescend sncves 75 
 ease Lracking the Bird of Prey,..........00..0cccsssscesessavcssetosrsnsscssne palbecoucsen sneess rector savees 81 
 SEG APG OF ELOY TOUCHE DOWD. 06.05... 0. cesecsadeccncscoucer sensseenscelsdeucreoneoescsenesacstaseseoss 85 
 AV.—Two New Servants.......ccsccvssecccecsrsesscrersssegeeecesssesseacavensosseecsecsscsesesescesecssaes cesses 89° 
 EERE ECLA AN ALO VIN LOTS iis v'es'osia 0 sale w xicdcdecwcispiandslecesesbawees edapieevsndesice ooepeceeeeveseeucewen 94 
 
 Bev TiAl Dismal SWAMP i..csrrccececcesccesee vesevevoseves pabbeslevneelda vague GeWusdi cette ram tees sspaanuienyalgeanes 101 
 
 BOOK THE SECOND.—BIRDS OF A FEATHER. 
 
 CHAPTER . - PAGE 
 I.—Of an Educational Character............ssssossscsossscssceecene senses ceeses np Rewbk suena dwon eer ereauerts cad 103 
 Ue Py ack Sorina tc Wea yowaia conte vocde NEES e Radep oMbeegl ecgdedigdeedd cdsedensesevisasoneel 110 
 TIT.—A Piece of Work............c0ceeeee ed gdgdudagiadornastnentenay less neCid er ueMemmi ees on tonr ee eat atiens 115 
 TV.— Cupid Prompted...........sssccessscsecsscsecenssceeessssessrscessacsees Wpabea hoc pahie Peasaiavesacauns ceehine 119 
 V.—Mercury Prompting...... sibaesAkvassaausensted se meagenute sd Cebee detntouatea Wek sbnh Ladtievess¥annnenedtabe 124 
 RIG TV TEM OML BIIMATSWODis csc ss seccadees seek nssspeccdcvesdtedscuncewedscecedadaratsorcecagcacssoecns 131 
 VII.—In which a Friendly Move is Originated............scecosssseee cee sendy cncieseyerdeeanaae ko deew el eaes 136 
 VIII.—In which an Innocent Elopement Occurs......... pases Chasen viagwes sd vussurduseetdrssVeeshuavadeiaked 141 
 IX.—In which the Orphan Makcs his Will............ Lvdpek sec un aerten trans enisasutanet eas hes 'sseantea detent 147 
 K.—A Successor...scescccosccseesees PNdesais ution vexs ce cUNGs Waa ucwavewon ees melodies eel sai ceeaeicuvaatiededees the 151 
 XI.—Some Affairs of the Heart.......... SUsdlacaaudey Pass Meseslachnaeseccaeeahst sda eankcasmmbibes node baited eave 154 
 XIJI.—More Birds of Prey....... Sicdhsshdnpaede Misdeubeaki van ndaseuceurstieds tes leadsseivebesccny kreemente h saesrees 158 
 XITI.—A Solo and a Duett........... wi dhivd Se ueneddetacuntetuteveN@vesecierscaduttacedeseua vender cs an ASH 165 
 XIV.—Strong of Purpose.........seseeee DAL aden eneed Cise TN tare Uskh Jedsley eee ves rin bidied ote ceid dole Gonsgauad cheanas 171 
 XV.—The Whole Case so far........ sataess Ese oiNdes Ficedst sacVodeodoveeees ivecorbenubaanareccedesemanserentsdt 176 
 Be Ase AUTLVOTSRIY OCCASION ys sccssoc'sacsny stvcecses cvsvvcesesevidussesisccesdvsneccabavecocecccs easaunese PRAY Bo 
 
 (13) 
 
14 ‘ CONTENTS. 
 
 BOOK THE THIRD.—A LONG LANE. 
 
 CHAPTER — PAGE 
 I.—Lodgers in Queer Street..........ssseeseeeee rn pete eeehcss Teheeeen o<uhGawteiy vas) orecsosab sya cee 
 II.—A Respected Friend in a New Aspect......ccesscceccseeeeves petasyen rhwake ahh upsnabenedndeatseenennte 193 
 III.—The Samg Respected Friend in more Aspects than One...s.c.ccssssessssssesesces vesescssecsenees 198 
 IV.—A Happy Return of the Day.............0+ d's ducers scndepeens sone desstbdenshonesssaness dveensectinensaneeh 201 
 V.—The Golden Dustman Falls into Bad OM DAT Yay. p se res senses Sane choede.dwacp tinge cats vonren peeneaees 205 
 VI.—The Golden Dustman Falls into Worse Company...... MEECT spe va'iivn a gis So deted saowhavesegarelae thee 212 
 
 _ WII.—The Friendly Move takes up a Strong Position........ Aves soups y sae negpak sth coeeyehaparuviee sree 217 
 - VIII.—The End of a Long Journey............000 Geish dea nce on She's Appa de aseb diay € ae Reta ate penis Seuipias kanes 222 
 IX.—Somebody Becomes the Subject of a Prediction............scsscssscsescscceccessccsscescoecscenenens 227 
 
 Ke Pe GOULER ADEs v5.04) cane ceinphaddioneaia no tbedymun sow hinesinnneitind ap pied demenin de cpibduighnnste dant Aink voltestie due ete na 234 
 AXI.—In the Dark...........eceee debbenwiednd HvbeenseVenns csatabsencslsss ned susteckbeassteus avs sostahedees stieneene 239 
 gdh ce LORIN AN ISO LOL, , . 0 away ysis adie w nents ook pilans pou ag ba og th uRpeier <oaspy senswh ch cosaay es \eeun cine 243 
 mLLi.—Give.a Dogs. Bad Namo, and: Hang Himsa niccccescosnawnecvendoidacaongytinsveawne ts ovvssomsevepta 247 
 XIV.—Mr. Wegg Prepares a Grindstone for Mr. Boffin’s Nose........sscscsessesceecsecsecseccecsecsers 251 
 Vin The Golden Diptman at Eis, Worstenccssisesdveises uphaventavoe Wbags stvcedsscbdndebicedrecteroeren 256 
 XVI.—The Feast of the Three Hobgoblins.............:. elvis uansvcbeads S58 Sse sbak Sodtnedndg ty ake 100s FD 262 
 Pee ce OGIO L SM OU TUE Brids Gre (iS ok lace Pub SWks Kites é oracs guise sodesns cgvcceded ce coodsepat ais ab esvendepebs ret bees 269 
 
 BOOK THE FOURTH—A TURNING, 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE. 
 Pe SOBEL EAPEvipaccivacss bosses conse onodeconvane sivcandnaces creas ooaseudobetgope ge bbakPubsant tadegae raneataeel 274 
 ET et ne Glas) LB G68 BD Lattle. >.< s.5)0c0se sass eacanteeie’sannamenceees fies'8 pith ly en oe 279 
 #A0T,——Trevaaimen, Dustman. Binks A gain..,....eierseseccentscosses>sescyasoeep aileasthalsen Rieiuen oe 282 
 Bee As ReDaway, MAGCD as iasieviesesvearsyxsosneaccadpapbasupsonneecsn gee dnage taken Gah eas cia tata: Renae 286 
 V.—Concerning the Mendicant’s Bride.............++ pemasehe dapnsinns saocengangebpeunaed ike benenaretae tae 291 
 Os A rrr fer EE OE 522 DiS is kiwi b's onpad'ea. dens vpas gas noi vn’ bone t4aasinig thc dguaseealody sauce MOM RE seat saa 297 
 Wik Letter to. he Abel than Calvin. 1. ...<0s90caceds vhaanaclvermmisedaste seueres ovine em ssk dos ltumwe serawetraveb ees 303 
 VIII.—A Few Grains of Pepper...............06. SOE ATES See eer Tr a F Br Aa OV ee ey 308 
 IX.—Two Places Vacated......... RATE Peewee sob ars Sout SeQciviesevecad spate Ma wwEMLeeee teens bvante coon ee 312 
 *.—'TheDolreDrosemaker Discovers BW Odi. ..s 00.05 shes sncesccectausocesseste peakieuel es ccedeceeal 317 
 XI.—Effect is given to the Doll’s Dressmaker’s Discovery............sccessssseeessceseceeees ice wehnt Cokes 319 
 te DP Pam tnie: BiadOwelt ivi ssisitence tigeped dabvcevoodiveapeadaties! ERE Re Ors. ae 324 
 XIII.—Showing how the Golden Dustman Helped to Scatter Dust...............cseceesscceeeeeseesenaes 331 
 XIV.—Checkmate to the Friendly. Move....c...ccc.sissuscceseetesseseascaceess RpAdA TOMAAR eRe sas Rid ebcuys eee 334 
 XV.—What was Caught in the Traps that were Set....... i 6 nts adobe Coals cacaeins aed tae ad eal hgh ee kere acke 3 oan 
 XVi.—Persons and Things in Gemeral....i. .ciscsese casavecceconsevscesecscqescsstasensevepiossse ehsdn els poRG ee 346. 
 CHAPTER THE LAST.—The Voice of Society............ gd cghewdi yal sagan cep ebulgsWaedsaotadet. aR 2 350 
 
 POSTSCRIPT.—In Lieu of a IPreruee at cas base nha dno av'dvacheh eotawcbaauduveyeine teece eecece @eececcces oe 353 
 
ILLUSTRATIONS. 
 
 PORTRAIT OF CHARLES DICKENS, SQ... ccsccevescvenceccsvsseses 10 Face Mile. 
 BERET © PPUEAPAGH: clyccccscescbecewemasscceacvescscersseer LACE POrtrau 
 I re Ls a al veins Fem piasecwnpehegedmeneladoeeceeecagas 
 Tree PE TMIENT (2, ius oa mess cd vieccste whee cute deus eacadcetawes cht 
 EN he Nee aS ML e's b's we ccie ees eles caelec Ge Leda ebon ee ewe ues 
 Mr. Venus SURROUNDED BY THE 'l'ROPHIES OF HIS ART..0. ccacccccccccccccee 
 SUPT ROG REES 1 occ tds oak o's Wes Wield be cela teed enc vediiee ss 
 Ne OTE ay ilk coca dieie ee eh CM ee Gin WRlelelel whl W brevis wgtaturate 
 RR ea San eo iano. ay. Cen oe Sawidie sets ese we'd bie (alemeigdtores 
 MET LE PUR) < ¢6/s o's 04 cls o.c's,0.0/4 5 0.0.00 0'4 bed Weed beedcneues 
 DURES ORE REY ISROUGHT: L)OWN..ccee-s eves cece sets dcusisecav cpelediados 
 Mes ISORPIN, DISCOVERS AN ORPHAN. Si s2 ccc cece cece csebeacetcce 
 Tue PrrRson OF THE House AND THE BaD CHILD.... 2.22. cece cece 
 EI TOO arog Sn G din b wide wie'e e ateiate mie.o o:6 alera vinle cvbiamei gr e's « 
 ras cas was een bee eke upe scwctdlsls neletleete uetales's 
 MTG LIGMESTIC VIRTUES... . coc. voce cece cuscccecscctedececucas site’ ons 
 IGE AND LA'S LAUGHTER... 60.00. scss even ccssosaesbesicces seeensees 
 eT Tee ec oa else boca ches seeeceee Cees hes calvlseneacde eosed 
 IAT TLOUE Ss oe sie sce nas Scceecse cust cceonssectecceecteseucwan 
 TIES NEG CTR! 51s 'G fs cate laws wa o'6 45.4 8 S'd'co 'e'b'e bie Go's SS e Skea wows cdasibiee 
 ES RIMS 2. kc eele/sd wwe ows a's wu dae eae ee ES OS SPE 
 8) i Aig 's ww o'r ciple cle eejeee ede Gerdes bela dmcjew cowl beet siecle 
 SPONGMON FOR THE. DOLLS’ DRESSMAKER...<)..c0c00cecd esse cece coe scea bane 
 REM IINEHRHOOD LLIMSELE AGAIN... sare c'c0c'slnSie since sceupesasse die ebeteeee Goes 
 RTA OM OTHE GOUDEN LIUSTMAN.. . occcscclec caledeccincctoenevesedecdieiees 
 Tae Evin Genius OF THE HOUSE OF BOFFIN 2... .seccececcceccccccsesccecees 
 
 emeene0882808 
 @eesaneeeeee8 
 
 Tre ORES Dilele'e wis Mekis ocices e@@eeoeoeoeeeeeeee Pm eeGeoeeeseene gpeeseeeseeeeoeeF eevee e208 
 
 MRR MN ORTH LUM oa 05 cv cei cso cic ccteges Seve acbabsarpecebensceeasons 
 Mr. Fiepaesy Departs ON HIS HRRAND OF MERCY.......e0e cecceccscccccces 
 Mr. Wece Prepares aA GRINDSTONE FoR Mr. Borrin’s NOSE.........eceeeee 
 PeeeGe IMGHTIND BY'THE GOLDEN DUSTMAN.... ..csccevccsccsertecveess cues 
 Tne Lovery Woman HAS HER FORTUNE TOLD... .ccece scene cececscseecseces 
 PEE URUIOKKEEPER S\TIOUSE. oS SS ob. ee elsn ee cles becbeccectouuesestecesbe 
 Comer Webbine Dinnur ar GReunwich ...0cede cca Uso d Voeluwe ce ecddeccucswuee 
 TMG BY PHI |TV ER, (21 5\e 4 'e. o:aic'slneve olssete ogs c'slelale's wiel¥ ie wetbe mes Gorn oe)be 
 - Berrer TO BE ABEL THAN CAIN. ..ccceccen cscs cess ctccccen sens cccccccenseres 
 EEN (UTX MS: NSF UNWAL: oo she's'a’e, eles de eae aa ee'e cts ada tee ce se'e Mees cosine 
 RE TIST IG aici 53s. aio) scale a width oS. m oem ole sb 0d pine aie eign eidieig isle u's's o MEMES wee 
 I IEMER MORN TOMEI TH cla a's ale c-yid  agdia,e SR erg Se efel eo cikale 4 Ghlewadie eee cane wa etrag es 
 Mr. Borrin Dors tHe Honors or THE NURSERY DOOR......cccccccccccccccs 
 NEE Pr TP ee ed Ne RE aS ee a tlbie's ew vis hdeneedcuseuuunnts 
 eS STU NADP a's dia ieicalels ale era bale sae cle ed's cce's'y 6 8 -eaiabes wise oc aelsleleen 
 : (15) 
 
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 129 
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OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 au four Books. 
 
 , BOOK L—THE CUP AND THE LIP, 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 ON THE LOOK-OUT. 
 
 ‘In these times of ours, though concerning the 
 exact year there is no need to be precise, a boat 
 of dirty and disreputable appearance, with two 
 figures in it, floated on the Thames, between 
 Southwark Bridge which is of iron, and London 
 Bridge whieh is of stone, as an autumn evening 
 was closing in. 
 
 The figures in this boat were those of a strong 
 man with ragged grizzled hair and a sun-brown- 
 ed face, and a dark girl of nineteen or twenty, 
 sufficiently like him to be recognizable as his 
 daughter. ‘The girl rowed, pulling a pair of 
 sculls very easily; the man, with the rudder- 
 lines slack in his hands, and his hands loose in 
 his waistband, kept an eager look-out. He had 
 no net, hook, or line, and he could not be a fish- 
 erman; his boat had no cushion for a sitter, no 
 paint, no inscription, no appliance beyond a rusty 
 boat-hook and a coil of rope, and he could not 
 be a waterman; his boat was too crazy and too 
 small to take in cargo for delivery, and he could 
 not be a lighterman or river-carrier; there was 
 no clew to what he looked for, but he looked for 
 something, with a most intent and searching 
 gaze. ‘The tide, which had turned an hour be- 
 fore, was running down, and his eyes watched 
 every little race and eddy in its broad sweep, as 
 the boat made slight headway against it, or drove 
 stern foremost before it, according as he directed 
 his daughter by a movement of his head. She 
 watched his face as earnestly as he watched the 
 river. But, in the intensity of her look there 
 was a touch of dread or horror. 
 
 Allied to the bottom of the river rather than 
 the surface, by reason of the slime and ooze with 
 which it was covered, and its sodden state, this 
 boat and the two figures in it obviously were do- 
 ing something that they often did, and were seek- 
 ing what they often sought. Half savage as the 
 man showed, with no covering on his matted 
 head, with his brown arms bare to between the 
 elbow and the shoulder, with the loose knot of a 
 looser kerchief lying low on his bare breast in a 
 wilderness of beard and whisker, with such dress 
 as he wore seeming to be made out of the mud 
 that begrimed his boat, still there was business- 
 like usage in his steady gaze. So with every 
 lithe action of the girl, with every turn of her 
 wrist, perhaps most of all with her look of dread 
 or horror ; they were things of usage. 
 
 ‘‘Keep her out, Lizzie. Tide runs strong 
 here. Keep her well afore the sweep of it.” 
 
 Trusting to the girl’s skill and making no use 
 of 'the rudder, he eyed the coming tide with an 
 absorbed attention. Sothe girleyedhim. But, 
 it happened now, that a slant of light from the 
 setting sun glanced into the bottom of the boat, 
 and, touching a rotten stain there which bore 
 some resemblance to the outline of-a-mufiled hiu- 
 man form, colored it as though with diluted 
 blood. “This caught the girls €yé, and she shiv- 
 ered. 
 
 “* What ails you?” said the man, immediately 
 aware of it, though so intent on the advancing 
 waters; ‘‘I see nothing afloat.” 
 
 The red light was gone, the shudder was gone, 
 and his gaze, which had come back to the boat 
 for a moment, traveled away again. Whereso- 
 ever the strong tide met with an impediment, hig 
 gaze paused for an instant. At every mooring- 
 chain and rope, at every stationary boat or barge 
 that. split the current into a broad arrow-head, at 
 the offsets from the piers of Southwark Bridge, 
 at the paddles of the river steamboats as they 
 beat. the filthy water, at the floating logs of tim- 
 ber lashed together lying off certain wharves, his 
 shining, eyes darted a hungry look. After a 
 darkening hour or so, suddenly the rudder-lines 
 tightened in his hold, and he steered hard toward 
 the, Surrey shore. 
 
 Always watching his face, the girl instantly 
 answered to the action in her sculling; presently 
 the boat swung round, quivered as from a sudden 
 jerk, and the upper half of the man was stretch- 
 ed out over the stern. 
 
 The girl pulled the hood of a cloak she wore, 
 over her head and over her face, and, looking 
 backward so that the front folds of this hood 
 were turned down the river, kept the boat in that 
 direction going before the tide. Until now, the 
 boat had barely held her own, and had hovered 
 
 |about one spot; but now, the banks changed 
 
 swiftly, and the deepening shadows and the kin- 
 dling lights of London Bridge were passed, and 
 the tiers of shipping lay on either hand. 
 
 It was not until now that the upper half of the 
 man came back into the boat. His arms were ~ 
 wet and dirty, and he washed them over the 
 side. In his right hand he held something, and 
 he washed that in the river too. It was moncy. 
 He chinked it once, and he-blew upon it once, 
 and he spat upon it once—‘ for luck,” he hoarse- 
 
 | ly said—before he put it in his pocket. 
 
 27) a 
 
a 
 yee 
 18 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 “te: 
 Ss 
 eS 
 I 
 oa 
 fs 
 fo) 
 a 
 3 
 4 
 S 
 = 
 = 
 “ Lizzie!” He was moving toward her to change places, 
 The girl turned her face toward him with a | but her terrified expostulation stopped him and 
 start, and rowed in silence. Her face was very | he resumed his seat. 
 pale, He was a hook-nosed man, and with that} ‘‘ What hurt can it do you?” 
 and his bright eyes and his ruffled head, bore a] | ‘‘None, none. But I can not bear it.” 
 _ certain likeness to a roused bird of prey. ‘*{t’s my belief you hate the sight of the very 
 ‘‘'Take that thing off your face.” river.” 
 She put it back. ‘*T—I do not like it, father.” ; 
 “Here! and give me hold of the sculls. I'll} ‘As if it wasn’t your living! As if it wasn’t 
 %» take the rest of the spell.” meat and drink to you!” 
 
 ‘‘No, no, father! No! Ican’t indeed. Fa-| At these latter words the girl shivered again, 
 ther !—I can not sit so near it!” and for a moment paused in her rowing, seem- 
 
 NN cneryecpn eR pts sacl 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 ing to turn deadly faint. It escaped his atten- 
 tion, for he was glancing over the stern at some- 
 thing the boat had in tow. 
 
 a n_you be so thankless to your best 
 friend, Lizzie? ‘The very fi Varmed you 
 
 whén you were-a-babby, was picked out 6 
 _ river alongside the coal barges. ‘The very basket 
 
 that you slept in, the tide washed ashore. The 
 very rockers that I put it upon to make a cradle 
 of it, I cut out of a piece of wood that drifted 
 _ from some ship or another.” 
 
 Lizzie took*her right hand from the scull it 
 held, and touched her lips with it, and’for a 
 moment held it out lovingly toward him; then, 
 without speaking, she resumed her rowing, as 
 another boat of similar appearance; though in 
 rather better trim, came out from a dark place 
 and dropped softly alongside. 
 
 _‘*In luck again, Gaffer?” said a man with a 
 squinting leer, who sculled her and who was 
 alone. ‘‘I know’d you was in luck again, by 
 your wake as you come down.” 
 
 ‘¢ Ah!” replied the other, dryly. 
 out, are you?” 
 
 ‘¢Yes, pardner.” 
 
 There was now a tender yellow moonlight on 
 the river, and the new-comer, keeping half his 
 boat’s length astern of the other boat, looked 
 hard at its track. 
 
 “*T says to myself,” he went on, ‘directly 
 you hove in view, Yonder’s Gaffer, and in luck 
 
 again, by George if lie aint! Scull it 1s, pard- 
 
 erate fret poerect=t didn’t touch him.” 
 ' This was in answer to a quick impatient move- 
 ment on the part of Gaffer: the speaker at the 
 same time unshipping his scull on that side, and 
 _ laying his hand on the gunwale of Gaffer’s boat 
 and holding to it. 
 
 ‘*He’s had touches enough not to want no 
 more, as well as I make him out, Gaffer! Been 
 a knocking about with a pretty many tides, ain’t 
 he pardner? Such is my out-of-luck ways, you 
 see! He must have passed me when he went 
 up last time, for I was on the look-out below 
 bridge here. I a’most think you're like the wul- 
 turs, pardner, and scent ’em out.” 
 
 He spoke in a dropped voice, and with more 
 than one glance at Lizzie who had pulled on 
 her hood again. Both men then looked with 
 a weird unholy interest at the wake of Gaffer’s 
 boat. 
 
 ‘* Rasy does it, betwixt us. 
 aboard, pardner ?” 
 
 ‘“* No,” said the other. In so surly atone that 
 the man, after a blank stare, acknowledged it 
 with the retort: 
 
 «¢__. Arn’t been eating nothing as has disagreed 
 with vou, have you, pardner?” 
 
 ‘Why, yes, I have,” said Gaffer. ‘‘I have 
 been swallowing too much of that word, Pard- 
 ner. Iam no pardner of yours.” 
 
 **Since when was you no pardner of mine, 
 Gaffer Hexam, Esquire ?” 
 
 «Since you was accused of robbing a man. 
 Accused of robbing a live man!” said Gaffer, 
 with great indignation. 
 
 ** And what if I had been accused of robbing 
 a dead inait, Gaffer 2” SE ie 
 
 ‘You COULDN'T do it.” 
 
 **Couldn’t you, Gaffer ?” 
 
 **No. 
 
 Has So 
 Ts it possible for a dead man to have money? . 
 
 “* So youre 
 
 Shall I take him 
 
 19 
 
 What world does a dead man belong to? "Toth- 
 er world. What world does money belong to? 
 This world. How can money be a corpse’s? 
 Can a corpse own it, want.it, spend it, claim it, 
 miss it? Don’t try to go confounding the rights 
 and wrongs of things in that way. But it’s wor- 
 thy-ef- the sneaking spirit that robs’a live Yan.” 
 
 “TIT tell you what it is— 
 
 ‘‘No you won’t. J’ll tell you’ what it is. 
 You’ve got off with a short time of it for putting 
 your hand in the pocket of a sailor, a live sailor. 
 Make the most of it and think yourself lucky, 
 but don’t think after that to come over me with 
 your pardners. We have worked together in 
 time past, but we work together no more in time 
 present nor yet future. _Let go. Cast off!” 
 
 ‘*Gaffer! If you think to get rid of me this 
 way—” 
 
 ‘If I don’t get rid of you this way, I'll try 
 another, and chop you over the fingers with the 
 stretcher, or take a pick at your head with the 
 boat-hook. Cast off! Pull you, Lizzie. Pull 
 home, since you won’t let your father pull.” 
 
 Lizzie shot ahead, and the other boat fell 
 astern. Lizzie’s father,.composing himself-into 
 the easy attitude of one who had asserted the 
 high moralities and taken .an-unassailable posi-. 
 
 tion, slowly lighted a pipe, and smoked, and | 
 
 took a survey of what he had in tow. What he 
 had tr tow, Tanged itsclf at him sometimes in an 
 awful manner when the boat was checked, and 
 sometimes seemed to try to wrench itself away, 
 though for the most part it followed submissive- 
 ly A neophyte might have fancied that the | 
 ripples passing over it were dreadfully like faint 
 changes of expression on a sightless face; but 
 Gaffer was no neophyte and had no fancies, 
 
 SP aR icsi eC ROT 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 THE MAN FROM SOMEWHERE. 
 
 Mr. and Mrs. Veneering were bran-new peo- 
 ple in a bran-new house in a bran-new quarter 
 of London. Every thing about the Veneerings_ 
 oe All their furniture 
 was new, all their friends were new, all their 
 servants were new, their plate was new, their 
 carriage was new, their harness was new, their 
 horses were new, their pictures were new, they 
 themselves were new, they were as newly mar- 
 ried as was lawfully compatible with their hav- 
 ing a bran-new baby, and if they had set upa 
 great-crandfather, he would have come home in 
 matting from the Pantechnicon, without a scratch 
 upon him, French polished to the crown of his 
 head. 
 
 For, in the Veneering establishment, from the 
 hall-chairs with the new coat of arms, to the 
 grand piano-forte with the new action, and up 
 stairs again to the new fire-escape, all things 
 were in a state of high varnish and polish. And 
 what was observable in the furniture, was observ- 
 able in the Veneerings—the surface smelt a little 
 too much of the work-shop and was a trifle sticky. 
 
 There was an innocent piece of dinner-furni- 
 ture that went upon easy castors and was kept 
 over a livery stable-yard in Duke Street, Saint 
 James’s, when not in use, to whom the Veneer- 
 ings were a source of blind confusion. The name 
 of this article was Twemlow. Being first cousin 
 
20: 
 
 to Lord Snigsworth, he was in frequent requisi- 
 
 a 
 
 F 
 
 tion, and at many houses might be said to repre- 
 sent the dining-table in its normal state. Mr, 
 and Mrs. Veneering, for example, arranging a 
 d iy" started wit wemlow, and 
 then put leaves in him, or added guests to him. 
 Sometimes, the table consisted of Twemlow and 
 half a dozen Ieaves; sometimes, of T'wemlow 
 and a dozen leaves; sometimes, Twemlow was 
 pulled out to his utmost extent of twenty leaves. 
 Mr. and Mrs. Veneering on occasions of cere- 
 mony faced each other in the centre of the board, 
 and thus the parallel still held; for, it always 
 happened that the_ more Twemlow was pulled 
 out, the further he found himself_from the cen- 
 
 ~tre;-and_the-nearer to the side-board at the one 
 
 ¢ 
 
 -pany” 
 
 eyd of the room, or the window-curtains at the 
 eG se é 
 
 "But, it was not this which steeped the feeble 
 soul of T'wemlow in confusion. This he was 
 used to, and could take soundings of. The abyss 
 to which he could find no bottom, and from 
 which started forth the engrossing and ever- 
 swelling difficulty of his life, was the insoluble 
 questi k 4 riend 
 
 or.pewest friend. To the excogitation of this | 
 
 problem, the harmless gentleman had devoted 
 many anxious hours, both in his lodgings over 
 the livery stable-yard, and in the cold gloom, 
 favorable to meditation, of Saint James’s Square. 
 Thus. Twemlow had first known Veneering at 
 his club, where Veneering then knew nobody but 
 the man who made them known to one another, 
 who seemed to be the most intimate friend he 
 had in the world, and whom he had known two 
 days—the bond of union between their souls, the 
 nefarious conduct of the committee respecting 
 the cookery of a fillet of veal, having been ac- 
 cidentally cemented at that date. Immediately 
 upon this, wemlow received an invitation to 
 dine with Veneering, and dined: the man being 
 a eee treats Ww 
 recéived an invitation to dine with the man, and 
 dined: Vencering being of the party. At the 
 man’s were a Member, an Engineer, a Payer-off 
 of the National Debt, a Poet, a Grievance, and 
 a Public Officer who all seemed to be utter stran- 
 gers to Veneering. And yet immediately after 
 that, Twemlow received an invitation to dine at 
 Veneerings, expressly to meet the Member, the 
 Engineer, the Payer-off of the National Debt, 
 the Poet, the Grievance, and the Public Office, 
 
 and, dining, discovered_that all of them were the 
 most intimate friends Veneerin ad ini 
 
 world;-and-thiat_the wive em (Who 
 were all there) were the objects of Mrs, Vencer- 
 ing’s most.devoted “affection and-—tender confi- 
 dence. _ ‘ 
 
 Thus it had come about, that Mr. Twemlow 
 had said to himself in his lodgings, with his 
 hand to his forehead: ‘‘T must not think of this. 
 This is enough to soften any man’s brain,”—and 
 yet was always thinking of it, and could never 
 form a conclusion. 
 
 This evening the Vencerings give a banquet. 
 Eleven leaves in the Twemlow ; fourteen in com- 
 - Four pigeon-breasted retainers in 
 plain clothes standing in line in the hall. A 
 fifth retainer, proceeding up the staircase with a 
 mournful air—as who should say, ‘‘ Here is an- 
 other wretched creature come to dinner; such is 
 life!” announces, ‘‘ Mis-tress Twemlow !” 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 Mrs. Veneering welcomes her sweet Mr. Twem- 
 low. Mr. Veneering welcomes his dear Twem- 
 low. Mrs. Veneering docs not expect that Mr. 
 ‘T'wemlow can in nature care much for such in- 
 sipid things as babies, but so old a friend must 
 please tolook at baby. ‘‘ Ah! You will know the 
 friend of your family better, ‘Tootleums,” says 
 Mr. Vencering, nodding emotionally at that new 
 article, ‘‘when you begin to take notice.” He 
 then begs to make his dear Twemlow known to 
 his two friends; Mr. Boots and Mr. Brewer— 
 and clearly has no distinct idea which is which, 
 
 But now a fearful circumstance oceurs. 
 
 ‘* Mis-ter and Mis-sis Podsnap !” 
 
 t 
 ‘““ My dear,” says Mr. Veneering to Mrs. Ve- 
 
 neering, with an air of much friendly interest, 
 while the door stands open, ‘‘the Podsnaps.” 
 
 A too, too smiling large man, with a fatal 
 freshness on him, appearing with his wife, in- 
 stantly deserts his wife and darts at Twemlow 
 with : 
 
 ‘‘How do you do? So glad to know you. 
 Charming house you have here. I hope we are 
 not late. So glad of this opportunity, I am 
 sure !” 
 
 When the first shock fell npon him, Twemlow 
 twice skipped back in his neat little shoes and 
 his neat little silk stockings of a by-gone fashion, 
 as if impelled to leap over a sofa behind him; 
 but the large man closed with him and proved 
 too strong. 
 
 ‘* Let me,” says the large man, trying to at- 
 tract the attention of his wife in the distance, 
 
 ‘“have the pleasure of presenting Mrs. Podsnap— 
 
 to her host. She will be,” in his fatal freshness 
 he seems to find perpetual verdure and eternal 
 youth in the phrase, ‘‘she will be so glad of the 
 opportunity, I am sure.” 
 
 In the mean time Mrs. Podsnap, unable to 
 originate a mistake on her own account, because 
 Mrs. Veneering is the only other lady there, does 
 her best in the way of handsomely supporting 
 her husband’s, by looking toward Mr. Twem- 
 low with a plaintive countenance and remarking 
 to Mrs. Veneering in a feeling manner, firstly, 
 
 that she fears he has been rather bilious of late, . . 
 and secondly, that the baby is already very like 
 
 him. 
 
 Mr. Veneering having this very evening set up 
 the shirt-front of the young Antinous (in new 
 worked cambric just come home), is not at all 
 complimented by being supposed to be Twem- 
 low, who is dry and weazen and thirty-five years 
 older. Mrs, Veneering equally resents the im- 
 putation of being the wife of Twemlow. As to 
 Twemlow, he is so sensible of being a much bet- 
 
 ter bred man than Veneering, that he considers. 
 
 the large man an offensive ass. 
 
 In this complicated dilemma, Mr. Veneering 
 approaches the large man with extended hand, 
 and smilingly assures that incorrigible personage 
 that he is delighted to see him: who in his fatal 
 freshness instantly replies: . 
 
 ‘Thank you. I am ashamed to say that I 
 can not at this moment recall where we met, 
 but I am so glad of this opportunity, I am sure!” 
 
 Then pouncing upon Twemlow, who holds 
 back with all his feeble might, he is haling him 
 off to present him, as Veneering, to Mrs. Pod- 
 
 snap, when the arrival of more guests unravels 
 
 It is questionable whether any man quite rel- — 
 ishes being mistaken for any other man; but, © 
 
the mistake. 
 hands with Veneering as Veneering, he re-shakes 
 
 hands with Twemlow as Twemlow, and winds | 
 ? 
 
 it all up to his own perfect satisfaction by saying 
 
 to the last-named, ‘‘ Ridiculous opportunity—but 
 
 so glad of it, Iam sure!” 
 
 Now, 'Twemlow having undergone this terrific 
 experience, having likewise noted the fusion of 
 Boots in Brewer and Brewer in Boots, and hay- 
 ing further observed that of the remaining seven 
 guests four discreet characters enter with wan- 
 dering eyes and wholly decline to commit them- 
 selves as to which is Veneering, until Veneering 
 has them in his grasp ;—T'wemlow having prof- 
 ited by these studies, finds his brain wholesome- 
 ly hardening as he approaches thé conclusion 
 
 that he really is Veneering’s oldest friend, when | 
 
 his brain softens again and all is lost, through 
 his eyes encountering Veneering and the large 
 man linked together as twin brothers in the back 
 drawing-room near the conservatory door, and 
 through his ears informing him in the tones of 
 Mrs. Veneering that the same large man is to 
 be baby’s godfather. 
 
 ‘Dinner is on the table !’’ 
 
 Thus the melancholy retainer, as who should 
 say, ‘‘ Come down and be poisoned, ye unhappy 
 children of mén !”’ 
 
 Twemlow, having no lady assigned him, goes 
 down in the rear, with his hand to his forehead. 
 
 Boots and Brewer, thinking him indisposed, 
 Whisper, ‘‘Man faint. Had no lunch.” But 
 is only stunned by the unvanquishable difti- 
 ty of his existence. 
 
 vived by soup, Twemlow discourses mildly 
 the Court Circular with Boots and Brewer. 
 appealed to, at the fish stage of the banquet, 
 Veneering, on the disputed question whether 
 cousin Lord Snigsworth is in or out of town? 
 
 Gives it that his cousin is out of town. ‘At 
 eerorthy Park ?” Veneering inquires. ‘‘ At 
 _ Snigsworthy,” Twemlow rejoins. Boots and 
 
 Brewer regard this as a man to be cultivated ; 
 and Veneering is clear that he is a remunerative 
 ‘atticle. Meantime the retainer goes round, like 
 gloomy Analytical Chemist: always seeming 
 y, after ** Chablis, Sir ?”—‘* You wouldn’t 
 i knew what it’s made of.” 
 ie great looking-glass above the side-board 
 is the table and the company. Reflects 
 mew Veneering crest, in gold and eke in 
 er, frosted and also thawed, a camel of all 
 ork. The Heralds’ College found out a Cru- 
 sading ancestor for Veneering who bore a camel 
 _on his shield (or might have done it if he had 
 thought of it), and a caravan of camels take 
 \charge of the fruits and flowers and candles, and 
 ‘kneel down to be loaded with the salt. Reflects 
 'Veneering; forty, wavy-haired, dark, tending to 
 corpulence, sly, mysterious, filmy—a kind of suf- 
 ficiently well-looking veiled-prophet, not proph- 
 -esying. Reflects Mrs. Veneering; fair, aquiline- 
 nosed and fingered, not so much light hair as 
 she might have, gorgeous in a. jewels, 
 enthusiastic, propitiatory, conscious that a cor- 
 ner of her husband’s veil is over herself. Re- 
 flects Podsnap: prosperously feeding, two little 
 light-colored wiry wings, one on either side of 
 his else bald head, looking as like his hair-brushes 
 
 as his hair, dissolving view of red beads on his! 
 
 forehead, large allowance of crumpled shirt-col- 
 lar up behind. Reflects Mrs. Podsnap; fine 
 
 | 
 
 21 
 
 Whereupon, having re-shaken' woman for Professor Owen, quantity of bone, 
 
 neck and nostrils like a rocking-horse, hard feat- 
 ures, majestic head-dress in which Podsnap has 
 hung golden offerings. Reflects Twemlow; gray, 
 dry, polite, susceptible to east wind, First-Gentle- 
 man-in-Europe collar and cravat, cheeks drawn 
 in as if he had made a great effort to retire into 
 himself some years ago, and had got so far and 
 had never got any farther. Reflects mature 
 young lady; raven locks, and complexion that 
 lights up well when. well powdered—as it is— 
 carrying on considerably in the captivation of 
 mature young gentleman; with too much nose 
 in his face, too much ginger in his whiskers, too 
 much torso in his waistcoat, too much sparkle 
 in his studs, his eyes, his buttons, his talk, and 
 his tecth. Reflects charming old Lady Tippins 
 on Veneering’s right; with an immense obtuse 
 drab oblong face, like a face in a table-spoon, 
 and a dyed Long Walk up to the top of her 
 head, as a convenient public approach to the 
 bunch of false hair behind, pleased to patronize 
 Mrs. Veneering opposite, who is pleased to be 
 patronized. Reflects a certain ‘¢ Mortimer,” an- 
 other of Veneering’s oldest friends; who never 
 was in the house before, and appears not to want 
 to come again, who sits disconsolate on Mrs. 
 Veneering’s left, and who was inveigled by Lady 
 Tippins (a friend of his boyhood) to come to 
 these people’s and talk, and who won’t talk. 
 Reflects Eugene, friend of Mortimer; buried 
 alive in the back of his chair, behind a shoulder 
 —with a powder-epaulet on it—of the mature 
 young lady, and gloomily resorting to the Cham- 
 pagne chalice whenever proftered by the Ana- 
 lytical Chemist. Lastly, the looking-glass re- 
 flects Boots and Brewer, and: two other stuffed 
 Buffers interposed between the rest of the com- 
 pany and possible accidents. 
 
 The Veneering dinners are excellent dinners 
 —or new people wouldn’t come—and all goes 
 well. 
 of experiments on her digestive functions, so 
 extremely complicated and daring, that if they 
 could be published with their results it might 
 benefit the human race. Having taken in pro- 
 visions from all parts of the world, this hardy 
 old cruiser has last touched at the North Pole, 
 when, as the ice-plates are being removed, the 
 following words fall from her: ; 
 
 ‘*T assure you, my dear Veneering—” 
 
 (Poor Twemlow’s hand approaches his fore- 
 head, for it would seem now that Lady Tippins 
 is going to be the oldest friend. ) 
 
 ‘*T assure you, my dear Veneering, that it is 
 the oddest affair! Like the advertising people, 
 I don’t ask you to trust me without offering a 
 respectable reference. Mortimer there, is my 
 reference, and knows all about it.” 
 
 Mortimer raises his drooping eyelids, and 
 slightly opens his mouth. But a faint smile, 
 expressive of ‘‘ What’s the use!’ passes over his 
 face, and he drops his eyelids and shuts his mouth, 
 
 ‘‘Now, Mortimer,” says Lady. Tippins, rap- 
 
 « 
 
 Notably, Lady Tippins has made a series. 
 
 ad 
 
 ping the sticks of her closed green fan upon the | 
 
 knuckles of her left hand—which is particularly 
 rich in knuckles, ‘‘I insist upon your telling all 
 that is to be told about the man from Jamaica.” 
 “‘Give you my honor I never heard of any 
 man from Jamaica, except the man who was a 
 brother,” replies Mortimer. © 
 “*'Tobago, then.” 
 
 a 
 
igi 
 
 me¢,..my—texe,” to Mrs. Veneering, 
 
 22 -- QUR MUTUAL FRIEND. Bia 
 
 ‘¢ Nor yet from Tobago.” 
 
 ‘¢ Except,”’ Eugene strikes in: so unexpected- 
 ly that the mature young Jady, who has forgot- 
 ten all about him, with a start takes the epaulet 
 out of his way: ‘‘except our friend who long 
 lived on ricé-pudding and isinglass, till at length 
 
 -to his something or other, his physician said 
 
 something else, and a leg of mutton somehow 
 ended in daygo.” 
 
 A reyiving impréssion goes round the table 
 that Eugene is coming out. An unfulfilled im- 
 pression, for he goes in again. 
 
 ‘‘ Now, my dear Mrs. Veneering,”’ quoth Lady 
 Tippins, ‘‘I appeal to you whether this is not 
 the basest conduct ever known in this world ? 
 I carry my lovers about, two or three at a time, 
 on condition that they are very obedient and de- 
 voted; and here is my old lover-in-chief, the 
 head of all my slaves, throwing off his allegiance 
 before company. And here is another of my 
 lovers, a rough Cymon at present certainly, but 
 of whom I[ had most hopeful expectations as to 
 his turning out well in course of time, pretend- 
 ing that he can’t remember his nursery rhymes! 
 
 On purpose to annoy me, for he knows how I! 
 
 dote upon them!” 
 
 A ghastly little fiction concerning her lovers 
 is Lady Tippins’s point. She is always attended 
 by a lover or two, and she keeps a little list of 
 her lovers, and she is always booking a new 
 lover, or striking out an old lover, or putting a 
 
 ~ Jover in her black list, or promoting a lover to 
 
 her blue list, or adding up her lovers, or oth- 
 erwise posting her book. Mrs. Veneering is 
 charmed by the humor, and so is Veneering. 
 Perhaps it is enhanced by a certain yellow play 
 in Lady Tippins’s throat, like the legs of scratch- 
 ing poultry. 
 
 ‘*T banish the false wretch from this moment, 
 and I strike him out of my Cupidon (my name 
 for my Ledger, my dear,) this very night. But 
 
 I am resolved to have_t he man 
 from So and I beg you to elicit it for 
 
 ‘as I have 
 lost my own influence. Oh, you perjured man!” 
 This to Mortimer, with a rattle of her fan. 
 
 ‘¢ We are all very much interested in the man 
 from Somewhere,” Veneering observes. 
 
 Then the four Buffers, taking heart of grace 
 all four at once, say: 
 
 ‘< Deeply interested !” 
 
 ‘¢ Quite excited !” 
 
 *¢ Dramatic !” 
 
 ‘‘Man from Nowhere, perhaps 
 
 And then Mrs. Veneering—for Lady Tip- 
 pins’s winning wiles are contagious—folds her 
 hands in the manner of a supplicating child, 
 turns to her left neighbor, and says, ‘‘' Tease! 
 Pay! Man from Tumwhere!” At which the 
 four Buffers, again mysteriously moved all four 
 at once, exclaim, ‘*‘ You can’t resist !” 
 
 “‘Upon my life,” says Mortimer languidly, 
 ‘T find it immensely embarrassing to have the 
 eyes of Europe upon me to this extent, and my 
 only consolation is that you will all of you exe- 
 crate Lady Tippins in your secret hearts when 
 you find, as you inevitably will, the man from 
 Somewhere a bore. Sorry to destroy romance 
 by fixing him with a local habitation, but he 
 comes from the place, the name of which es- 
 capes me, but will suggest itself to every body 
 else here, where they make the wine.” 
 
 9? 
 
 Eugene suggests ‘‘ Day and Martin’s.” 
 
 ‘‘No, not that place,” returns the unmoved 
 Mortimer, ‘‘that’s where they make the Port. © 
 My man comes from the country where they — 
 make the Cape Wine. But look here, old fellow ; 
 it’s not at all statistical and it’s rather odd.” : 
 
 It is always noticeable at the table of the — 
 Veneerings, that no man troubles himself much 
 about the Veneerings themselves, and that any 
 one who has any thing to tell, generally tells it _ 
 to any body else in preference. 
 
 ‘‘The man,” Mortimer goes on, addressing 
 Eugene, ‘‘whose name is Harmon, was_ only 
 son of a tremendous old rascal who made his 
 money by Dust.” 
 
 ‘Red velveteens and a bell?” the gloomy Eu- 
 gene inquires. 
 
 ‘* And a ladder and basket if you like. By 
 which means, or by others, he grew rich as a 
 Dust Contractor, and lived in a hollow in a 
 hilly country entirely composed of Dust. On his 
 own small estate the growling old vagabond 
 threw up his own mountain range, like an old 
 volcano, and its geological formation was Dust. 
 Coal-Dust, vegetable-dust, bone-dust, crockery 
 dust, rough dust and dust sifted—all manner of 
 Dust.” mY 
 
 A passing remembrance of Mrs. Veneering, 
 here induces Mortimer to address his next half- 
 dozen words to her; after which he wanders 
 away again, tries Twemlow and finds he doesn’t ~~ 
 answer, ultimately takes up with the Buffers who 
 receive him enthusiastically. le 
 
 ‘¢The moral being—I believe that’s the right 
 expression—of this exemplary person, deriy 
 its highest gratification from anathematizing 
 nearest relations and turning them out of do 
 Having begun (as was natural) by renderr 
 these attentions to the wife of his bosom, he next” 
 found himself at leisure’to bestow a similar rec-” 
 ognition on the claims of his daughter. He 
 chose a husband for her, entirely to his own 
 satisfaction and not in the least to hers, and pro- 
 ceeded to settle upon her, as her marriage por 
 tion, I don’t know how much Dust, but somes 
 thing immense. At this stage of the affair 
 poor girl respectfully intimated that she was 
 cretly engaged to that popular character wh 
 the novelists and versifiers calt Another 
 that such a marriage would make Dust 
 heart and Dust of her life—in short, wo 
 her up, on a very extensive scale, in her fathe 
 business. Immediately, the venerable parent— 
 on a cold winter’s night, it is said—anathema- 
 tized and turned her out.” f 
 
 Here, the Analytical Chemist, (who has evi- 
 dently formed avery low opinion of Mortimer’s 
 story) concedes a little claret to the Buffers; — 
 who, again mysteriously moved all four at once, 
 screw it slowly into themselves with a peculiar 
 twist of enjoyment, as they cry in chorus, ‘‘ Pray 
 go on.” 
 
 ‘“'The pecuniary resources of Another were, 
 as they usually are, of a very limited nature. [, 
 believe I am not using too strong an expression 
 when I say that Another was very hard up. 
 However, he married the young lady, and they 
 lived in an humble dwelling, probably possessing 
 a porch ornamented with honey-suckle and wood- 
 bine twining, until she died. I must refer you 
 to the Registrar of the District in which the hum- 
 ble dwelling was situated, for the certified cause 
 
<4 
 
 ‘ OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. — 
 
 of death; but early sorrow and. anxiety, may 
 have had to do with it, though they may not ap- 
 pear in the ruled pages and printed forms. In- 
 disputably this was the case with Another, for he 
 ‘Was so cut up by the loss of his young wife that 
 if he outlived her a year it was as much as he 
 did.” 
 
 ~ There is that in the indolent Mortimer, which 
 
 seems to hint that if good society might on any 
 
 -stantly, he absconded, and came over here. 
 : bi 3: 
 
 with great pains, but it is in him. 
 
 account allow itself to be impressible, he, one of 
 good society, might have the weakness to be im- 
 pressed by what he here relates. It is hidden 
 The gloomy 
 Eugene too, is not without some kindred touch ; 
 for when that appalling Lady Tippins. declares 
 that if Another had survived, he should: have 
 
 gone down at the head of her list of lovers—and 
 
 also when the mature young lady shrugs her 
 epaulets, and laughs at some private and con- 
 fidential comment from the mature young gen- 
 tleman—his gloom deepens to that degree that 
 he trifles quite ferociously with his dessert-knife. 
 
 Mortimer proceeds. 
 
 ** We must now return, as the novelists say, 
 and as we all wish they wouldn’t, to the man 
 from. Somewhere. Being a boy of fourteen, 
 ‘Cheaply educated at Brussels when his sister’s 
 expulsion befell, it was some little time before 
 he heard of it—probably from herself, for the 
 mother was dead; but that I don’t know. In- 
 He 
 must have been a boy of spirit and resource, to 
 get here on a stopped allowance of five sous a 
 week; but he did it somehow, and he burst in 
 
 ‘on his father, and pleaded hissister’s cause. 
 
 Venerable parent promptly resorts to anathema- 
 tization, and turns him.out of doors. Shocked 
 and tettified boy takes flight, seeks his fortune, 
 
 ‘gets aboard ship, ultimately, turns up on dry land 
 
 /among the Cape wine: a small proprietor, farm- 
 er, grower—whatever you like to call it.” 
 At this juncture, shuffling is heard in the hall, 
 and tapping is heard at the dining-room door. 
 Analytical Chemist goes to the door, confers an- 
 grily with unseen tapper, appears to become mol- 
 ified by descrying reason in the tapping, and 
 goes out. 
 __“So he was discovered, only the other day, 
 after having almost doubled his age; that is 
 to say, after having expatriated about fourteen 
 years.) 3 
 
 _ A Buffer, suddenly astounding the other three, 
 by detaching himself, and asserting individuali- 
 ty, inquires: ‘‘ How discovered, and why ?” 
 
 “Ah! Tobe sure. Thank you for remind- 
 ing me. Venerable parent dies.” 
 
 The same Buffer, emboldened by success, 
 says: ‘* When?” 
 
 ‘The other day. Ten or twelve months ago.” 
 
 The same Buffer inquires with smartness, 
 **What of?” But herein perishes a melancholy 
 example ; being regarded by the three other Buf- 
 fers with a stony stare, and attracting no further 
 attention from any mortal. 
 
 ** Venerable parent,” Mortimer repeats with a 
 
 passing remembrance that there is a Veneering 
 at table, and for the first time addressing him— 
 ** dies.” 
 _ The gratified Veneering repeats, gravely, 
 ‘dies ;” and folds his arms, and composes his 
 brew to hear it out in a judicial manner, when he 
 finds himself again deserted in the bleak world. 
 
 23 
 
 ‘His will is found,” says Mortimer, catching 
 
 Mrs. Podsnay’s rocking-horse’s eye. ‘It is 
 dated very soon after the son’s flight. It leaves 
 
 the lowest of the range of dust-mountains, with 
 some sort of a dwelling-house at its foot, to an 
 servant who is sole executor, and all the rest 
 
 of the property—which is very considerable—to 
 the son. He directs himself to be buried with 
 certain eccentric ceremonies and precautions 
 against his coming to life, with which I need 
 not bore you, and that’s all—except—” and 
 this ends the story. 
 
 The Analytical Chemist returning, every body 
 looks at him. Not because any body wants to 
 see him, but because of that subtle influence in 
 nature which impels humanity to embrace the 
 
 slightest opportunity of looking at any thing 
 
 rather than the person who addresses it. 
 ‘*-—-Exeept-that the son's inheriting is made 
 conditional on his marrying a girl, who atthe 
 date of the will was a child of four years old or 
 so, and who is now a marriageable young_wo- 
 
 man. Advertisement and inquiry discovered the — 
 
 son in a man from Somewhere, and at the pres- 
 ent moment he is on his way home from there— 
 no doubt, in a state of great astonishment—ta sne- 
 ceed to a very large fortune, and to take a wife:” 
 - Mrs. Podsnap inquires whether the young per- 
 son is a young person of personal charms? Mor- 
 timer is unable to report. 
 
 Mr. Podsnap inquires what would become of 
 | the very large fortune, in the event of the mar- 
 |riage condition not being fulfilled? Mortimer 
 
 replies, that by special testamentary clause it 
 would then go to the old servant above mention- 
 ed, passing over and excluding the son; also, that 
 if that son had not been living, the same old serv- 
 ant would have been sole residuary legatee. 
 
 Mrs. Veneering has just succeeded in waking 
 
 Lady Tippins from a snore, by dextrously shunt- 
 ing a train of plates and dishes at her knuckles 
 across the table; when every body but Morti- 
 mer himself becomes aware that the Analyticat 
 Chemist is, in a ghostly manner, offering him a 
 folded paper. Curiosity detains Mrs. Veneering 
 a few moments. 
 
 Mortimer, in spite of all the arts of the chemist, 
 placidly refreshes himself with a glass of Madei- 
 ra, and remains unconscious of the document 
 which engrosses the general attention, until Lady 
 Tippins (who has a habit of waking totally in- 
 sensible), having remembered where she is, and 
 recovered a perception of surrounding objects, 
 says: ‘‘ Falser man than Don Juan; why don’t 
 you take the note from the Commendatore ?” 
 Upon which, the chemist advances it under the 
 nose of Mortimer, who looks round at him, an 
 says: | ; 
 
 ‘¢ What’s this ?” 
 
 Analytical Chemist bends and whispers. 
 
 ‘Who ?” says Mortimer. 
 
 Analytical Chemist again bends and whispers. 
 
 Mortimer stares at him and unfolds the paper. 
 Reads it, reads it twice, turns it over to look at 
 the blank outside, reads it a third time. 
 
 ‘¢ This arrives in an extraordinarily opportune 
 manner,” says Mortimer then, looking with an 
 
 altered face round the table: ‘‘this is the con-. 
 
 clusion of the story of the identical man.” 
 ‘¢ Already married ?” one guesses, 
 ‘¢Declines to marry ?” another guesses. 
 ‘‘Codicil among the dust ?” another guesses. 
 
24 
 
 ‘¢Why, no,” says Mortimer; ‘‘ remarkable 
 thing, you are all wrong. ‘The story is complet- 
 er and rather more exciting than I supposed. 
 Man’s drowned !” . 
 
 ee 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 ANOTHER MAN. 
 
 As the disappearing skirts of the ladies ascend- 
 ed the Veneering staircase, Mortimer, following 
 them forth from the dining-room, turned-into a 
 back library of bran-new books, in bran-new bind- 
 iizs liberally gilded, and requested to see the 
 in ‘ssenger who had brought the paper. He wasa 
 boy of about fifteen. Mortimer looked at the boy, 
 and the boy looked at the bran-new pilgrims on 
 the wall, going to Canterbury in more gold frame 
 than procession, and more carving than country, 
 
 ‘¢ Whose writing is this ?” 
 
 Mine, Sir.” 
 
 “Who told you-to write it ?” 
 
 iss My father, Jesse Hexam.” 
 
 ‘“Ts it he who found the body ?” 
 
 aSTY eS Sirs” 
 
 ‘‘ What is your father ?” 
 
 The boy hesitated, looked reproachfully at the 
 pilgrims as if they had involved him in a little 
 difficulty, then said, folding a plait in the right 
 leg of his trowsers, ‘‘ He gets his living along- 
 shore.” 
 
 “Ts it far ?” 
 
 ‘*Ts which far ?” asked the boy, upon his guard, 
 and again upon the road to Canterbury. 
 
 “To your father’s ?” 
 
 ‘¢ It’s a goodish stretch, Sir. Icame up in a 
 cab, and the cab’s waiting to be paid. We could 
 go back in it before you paid it, if you liked. I 
 went first to your office, according to the direc- 
 tion of the papers found in the pockets, and there 
 I see nobody but a chap of about my age vie 
 
 sent me on here.” 
 
 Tftere was a curious mixture in the boy, of un- 
 
 completed savagery, and uncompleted ‘civiliza- 
 tion. His voice was hoarse and coarse, and his 
 face was coarse, and his,stunted figure was 
 coarse; but he was cleaner than other boys of 
 his type; and his writing, though large and 
 round, was good; and he glanced at the backs 
 of the books with an awakened curiosity that 
 went below the binding. No one who can read 
 ever locks at a book, even unopened on a shelf, 
 like one who can not. 
 
 “« Were any means taken, do you know, boy, 
 to ascertain if it was possible to restore life?” 
 Mortimer inquired, as he sought for his hat. 
 
 “You wouldn’t ask, Sir, if you knew his state. 
 Pharaoh’s multitude that were drowned in the 
 Red Sea, ain’t more beyond restoring to life. 
 If Lazarus was only half as far gone, that was 
 the greatest of all the miracles.” 
 
 “¢ Halloa!” cried Mortimer, turning round with 
 his hat upon his head, “ you ‘seem to be at home 
 in the Red Sea, my young friend ?” 
 
 “Read of it with teacher at the school,” said 
 the boy. 
 
 . “ And Lazarus ?” 
 
 “Yes, and him too. But don’t 3 vou tell my 
 father! We should have no peace in our place 
 if that pot touched upon. It’s my sister’s con- 
 triving.” 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. | cata 
 
 ‘*You seem to have a good sister.” 
 **She ain’t half bad,” said the boy ; 
 
 ‘but if 
 
 she knows her letters it’s the most she does—and : 
 
 them I learned her.” 
 
 The gloomy Eugene, with his hands in his — 
 
 pockets, had strolled in and assisted at the lat- 
 ter part of the dialogue; when the boy spoke 
 
 these words slightingly of his sister, he took him ~ 
 
 roughly enough by the chin, and turned up his 
 face to look at it. 
 
 ‘¢ Well, ’'m sure, Sir !” said the boy, resisting ; 
 
 ‘*T hope you'll know me again.” 
 
 Eugene vouchsafed no answer ; 
 proposal to Mortimer, ‘‘I’ll go with you, if you 
 like ?” 
 in the vehicle that had brought the boy ; the two 
 
 friends (once boys together at a public school) 
 
 ea 
 
 but made the © 
 
 So, they all three went away together ~ 
 
 inside, smoking cigars; the boy on the box be- | 
 
 side the driver. 
 ‘‘Let me see,” said Mortimer, as they went 
 along; ‘‘I have been, Eugene, upon the honor- 
 
 able roll of solicitors of the High Court of Chan- — 
 
 cery, and attorneys at Common Law, five years; 
 
 and—except gratuitously taking instructions on 
 an average once a fortnight, for the will of 
 Lady Tippins, who has nothing to leave—I have 
 had no scrap of business but this romantic busi- 
 ness.” 
 
 “ And I,” said Eugene, ‘‘have been ‘ called’ 
 
 seven years, and have had no business at all, and — 
 
 never shall have any. And if I had, I shouldn’t 
 know how to do it.” 
 
 “T am far from being clear as to the last 
 
 particular,’ returned Mortimer, with great com- 
 
 posure, ‘‘ that I have much advantage over you.” — 
 
 **T hate,” said Eugene, putting his legs up on 
 the opposite seat, ‘‘I hate my profession.” 
 
 ‘Shall I incommode you, if I put mine up 
 too?” returned Mortimer. ‘Thank you. I 
 hate mine.” 
 
 ‘‘It was forced upon me,” said the gloomy 
 Eugene, “because it was understood that we 
 wanted a barrister in the family. We have got 
 a precious one.” 
 
 ‘‘It was forced upon me,” said Mortimer, 
 ‘“because it was understood that we wanted a 
 solicitor in the family. And we have got a 
 precious one.’ 
 
 ‘‘ There are four of us, with our names paint-. 
 
 ed on a door-post in right of one black hole 
 
 called a set of chambers,” said Eugene; ‘‘and — 
 
 each of us has the fourth of a clerk—Cassim 
 Baba, in the robber’s cave—and Cassim is the 
 only respectable member of the party.” 
 
 “‘T am one by myself, one,” said Mortimer, 
 
 ‘high up an awful staircase commanding a 
 
 burial-ground; and I have a whole clerk to 
 myself, and he has nothing to do but look at 
 
 the burial-ground, and what he will turn out — 
 
 when arrived at maturity I can not conceive. 
 Whether, in that shabby rook’s nest, he is always 
 plotting wisdom, or plotting murder; whether 
 
 he will grow up, after so much solitary brood-_— 
 
 ing, to enlighten his fellow-creatures, or to poison 
 
 them; is the only speck of interest that presents - 
 
 itself to my professional view. 
 me alight? Thank you.” 
 ‘¢ Then idiots talk,” said Eugene, leaning back, 
 
 Will you give 
 
 folding his arms, smoking with his eyes shut, — 
 
 and speaking slightly through his nose, *‘of En- 
 ergy. If there is a word in the dictionary un~ 
 
 {der any letter from A to Z that I abominate, it 
 
 ae 
 i 
 ee 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 is energy. It is such a conventional supersti- 
 » tion, such parrot gabble! What the deuce! 
 
 - Am I to rush out into the street, collar the first 
 man of a wealthy appearance that I meet, shake 
 
 . him, and say, ‘Go to law upon the spot, you 
 
 “dog, and retain me, or I'll be the death of you ?’ 
 Yet that would be energy.” 
 
 *¢ Precisely my view of the case, Eugene, But 
 show me a good opportunity, show me some- 
 thing really worth being energetic about, and 
 Ili show you energy.” 
 
 ** And’so will I,” said Eugene. 
 
 And it is likely enough that ten thousand 
 other young men, within the limits of the London 
 Post-office town delivery, made the same hope- 
 ful remark in the course of the same evening. 
 
 The wheels rolled on, and rolled down by the 
 
 ~Monument and the Tower, and by the Docks; 
 down by Ratcliffe, and by Rotherhithe ;: down 
 by where accumulated scum of humanity seemed 
 to be washed from higher grounds, like so much 
 moral sewage, and to be pausing until its own 
 hveighit forced it over the bank and sunk it, in the 
 river. In and out among ships that seemed to 
 lave got ashore, and houses that seemed to have 
 ot afloat—among bowsprits staring into win- 
 lows, and windows, staring into water —the 
 wheels rolled on, until they stopped at a dark cor- 
 ner, river-washed and otherwise not washed at all, 
 where the boy alighted and opened the door. 
 
 ‘*You must walk the rest, Sir; it’s not many 
 yards.”” He spoke in the singular number, to 
 the express exclusion of Eugene. 
 
 ‘*This is a confoundedly out-of-the-way 
 place,” said Mortimer, slipping over the stones 
 and refuse on the shore, as the boy turned the 
 coricr sharp. 
 
 “‘Here’s my father’s, Sir; where the light is.” 
 
 The low building had the look of having once 
 been a mill. There was a rotten wart of wood 
 
 upon its forehead that seemed to indicate where 
 the sails had been, but the whole was very indis- 
 tinctly seen in the obscurity of the night. The 
 boy lifted the latch of the door, and they passed 
 at once into a low circular room, where a man 
 stood before a red fire, looking down into it, and 
 a girl sat engaged in needle-work. ‘The fire was 
 ‘In arusty brazier, not fitted to the hearth; and 
 a common Jamp, shaped like a hyacinth-root, 
 smoked and flared in the neck of a stone bottle 
 on the table. There was a wooden bunk or 
 berth in a corner, and in another corner a wood- 
 en stair leading above—so clumsy and steep that 
 it was little better than a ladder. ‘Two or three 
 old sculls and oars stood against the wall, and 
 against another part of the wall was a small 
 dresser, making a spare show of the commonest 
 articles of crockery and cooking-vessels. The 
 . ‘roof of the room was not. plastered, but was 
 formed of the flooring of the room above. This, 
 being very old, knotted, seamed and beamed, 
 gave a lowering aspect to the chamber; and 
 roof, and walls, and floor, alike abounding in 
 old smears of flour, red-lead (or some such stain 
 which it had probably acquired in warehousing), 
 and damp, alike had a look of decomposition. 
 
 ‘*The gentleman, father.” ’ 
 
 The figure at the red fire turned, raised its 
 _ ruffled head, and looked like a bird of prey. 
 
 “You're Mortimer Lightwood, Esquire; are 
 . you, Sir?” 
 **Mortimer Lightwood is my name. 
 
 What. 
 
 25. 
 
 you found,” said Mortimer, glancing rather 
 shrinkingly toward the bunk; ‘‘is it here?” 
 
 ‘*"Tain’t not to say here, but it’s close by. IT 
 do every thing reg’lar. I’ve giv’ notice of the 
 circumstarnce to the police, and the police have 
 took possession of it. No time ain’t been lost, 
 on any hand. ‘The police have put it into print 
 already, and here’s what the print says of it.” 
 
 Taking up the bottle with the lamp in it, he 
 held it near a paper on the wall, with the police 
 heading, Founp Drownep. ‘The two friends 
 read the hand-bill as it stuck against the wall, 
 and Gaffer read them as he held the light. 
 
 ‘Only papers on the unfortunate man, I see,” 
 said Lightwood, glancing from the description 
 of what was found, to the finder. 
 
 ‘*Only papers.” 
 
 Here the girl arose with her work in her hand, 
 and went out at the door. 
 
 ‘* No money,” pursued Mortimer; ‘but three- 
 pence in one of the skirt-pockets.” 
 
 ‘“Three. Penny. Pieces,’ said Gaffer Hex- 
 am, in as many sentences, 
 
 ‘‘The trowsers pockets empty, and turned in- 
 side out.” 
 
 Gaffer Hexam nodded. ‘But that’s common. 
 Whether it’s the wash of the tide or no, I can’t 
 say. Now, here,” moving the light to another 
 Found Drowned placard, ‘‘ his pockets was found 
 empty, and turned inside out. And here,” mov- 
 ing the light to another, ‘‘ her pocket was found 
 empty, and turned inside out. And so was this 
 one’s. And so was that one’s. I can’t read, 
 nor I don’t want to it, for I know ’em by their 
 places on the wall. This one was a sailor, with 
 two anchors and a flag and G. F. T. on his arm. 
 Look and see if he warn’t.” 
 
 *¢ Quite right.” 
 
 ‘*This one was the young woman in gray 
 boots, and her linen marked with a cross. Look 
 and see if she warn’t.” 
 
 ** Quite right.” . 
 
 “This is him as had a nasty cut over the eye. 
 This is them two young sisters what tie@ them- 
 selves together with’ a handkecher. This is the 
 drunken old chap, in a pair of ‘list slippers and 
 a night-cap, wot had offered—it afterward come 
 out—to make a hole in the water for a quartern © 
 of rum stood aforehand, and kept to his word for 
 the first and last time in his life. They pretty 
 well papers the room, you see; but I know ’em 
 all. I’m scholar enough!” 
 
 He waved the light over the whole, as if to 
 typify the light of his scholarly intelligence, and 
 then put it down on the table and stood behind 
 it looking intently at his visitors. He had the spe- 
 cial peculiarity of some birds of prey, that when 
 he knitted his brow his ruffled crest stood highest. 
 - “You did not find all these yourself; did 
 you?” asked Eugene. 
 
 To which the bird of prey slowly rejoined, 
 ‘¢ And what might your name be, now ?” 
 
 ‘“This is my friend,” Mortimer Lightwood 
 interposed; ‘‘ Mr. Eugene Wrayburn.” 
 
 “Mr. Eugene Wrayburn, is it? And what 
 might Mr. Eugene Wrayburn have asked of me?” 
 
 ‘*T asked you, simply, if you found all these 
 yourself?” 
 
 ‘*T answer you, simply, most on ’em.”” 
 
 **Do you suppose there has been much vio- 
 Jence and robbery, beforehand, among-.these 
 cases ?” ate 
 
26 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 ‘‘T don’t suppose at all about it,” returned 
 Gaffer. ‘I ain’t one of the supposing sort. If 
 you'd got your living to haul out of the river 
 every day of your life, you mightn’t be much 
 given to supposing. Am I to show the way ?” 
 
 As he opened the door, in pursuance of a nod 
 from Lightwood, an extremely pale and dis- 
 turbed face appeared in the doorway—the face 
 of a man much agitated. 
 
 ‘A body missing?” ‘asked Gaffer Hexam, 
 stopping short; ‘Sor a body found? Which?” 
 
 **T am lost,” replied the man, in a hurried 
 and an eager manner. 
 
 ‘SEostt” 
 
 ““J_J—-am a stranger, and don’t know the 
 way. I—I—want to find the place where I can 
 
 se2 what is described here. It is possible I may 
 cise it.” He was panting, and could hardly 
 speak; but, he showed a copy of the newly- 
 printed bill that was still wet upon the wall. 
 Perhaps its newness, or perhaps the accuracy of 
 his observation of its general look, guided Gaffer 
 to a ready conclusion. 
 
 “This gentleman, Mr. Lightwood, is on that 
 business.” 
 
 ‘Mr. Lightwood ?” 
 
 During a pause, Mortimer and the stranger 
 confronted each other. Neither knew the other. 
 
 ‘*[ think, Sir,” said Mortimer, breaking the 
 awkward silence with his airy self-possession, 
 ‘that you did me the honor to mention my 
 name ?” 
 
 **T repeated it, after this man.” 
 
 *¢You said you were a stranger in London?” 
 
 ** An utter stranger.” 
 
 ‘* Are you seeking a Mr. Harmon ?” 
 
 aN Oa), 
 
 “Then I believe I can assure you that you are 
 on a fruitless errand, and will not find what you 
 fear to find. Will you come with us ?” 
 
 A little winding through some muddy alleys 
 that might have been deposited by the last ill- 
 savored tide, brought them to the wicket-gate 
 and bright lamp of a Police Station; where they 
 found the Night-Inspector, with a pen and ink, 
 and ruler, posting up his books in a whitewashed 
 office, as studiously as if he were in a monastery 
 on the top of a mountain, and no howling fury 
 of a drunken woman were banging herself against 
 a cell-door in the back-yard at his elbow. With 
 the same air of a recluse much given to study, 
 he desisted from his books to bestow a distrust- 
 ful nod of recognition upon Gaffer, plainly im- 
 porting, ‘‘ Ah! we know all about you, and you’ll 
 overdo it some day ;’’ and to inform Mr. Morti- 
 mer Lightwood and friends, that he would at- 
 tend them immediately. Then, he finished 
 ruling the work he had in hand (it might have 
 been illuminating a missal, he was so calm), in 
 a very neat and methodical manner, showing 
 not the slightest consciousness of the woman who 
 ~ was banging herself with increased violence, and 
 shrieking most terrifically for some other wo- 
 man’s liver. 
 
 ‘¢ A bull’s-eye,” said the Night-Inspector, tak- 
 ing up his keys. Which a deferential satellite 
 produced. ‘* Now, gentlemen.” 
 
 With one of his keys he opened a cool grot at 
 the end of the yard, and they all went in. They 
 quickly came out again, no one speaking but 
 Eugene: who remarked to Mortimer, in a whis- 
 per, ‘‘ Not zuch worse than Lady Tippins.” 
 
 A 
 
 So, back to the whitewashed library of the 
 monastery—with that liver still in shrieking reqs 
 uisition, as it had been loudly, while they looked 
 at the silent sight they came to see—and there 
 
 through the merits of the case as summed up by 
 No clew to how body came into. 
 
 the Abbot. 
 river, Very often..was.no clew. Too late to 
 know for certain, whether injuries received be- 
 fore or after death; one excellent surgical opin- 
 ion said, before; other excellent surgical opin- 
 ion said, after. Steward of ship in which gen- 
 tleman came home passenger, had been round to 
 view, and had no doubt of identity. Likewise 
 could swear to clothes. And then, you see, you 
 had the papers, too. How was it he had totally 
 disappeared on leaving ship, ’till found in river ? 
 Well! Probably had been upon some little game. 
 Probably thought it a harmless game, wasn’t up 
 to things, and it turned out a fatal game. In- 
 quest to-morrow, and no doubt open verdict. 
 
 ‘Tt appears to have knocked your friend over 
 —knocked him completely off his legs,’’\Mr. In- 
 spector remarked, when he had finished his sum- 
 ming up. ‘It has given him a bad turn to be 
 sure!” This was said in a very low voice, and 
 with a searching look (not the first he had east) 
 at the stranger. 
 
 Mr. Lightwood explained that it was no friend 
 of his. 
 
 ‘¢Indeed?” said Mr. Inspector, with an at- 
 tentive ear; ‘‘where did you pick him up?” 
 
 Mr. Lightwood. explained further. 
 
 Mr. Inspector had delivered his summing up, 
 and had added these words, with his elbows lean- 
 ing on his desk, and the fingers and thumb of his 
 right hand, fitting themselves to the fingers and 
 thumb of his left. Mr. Inspector moved nothing 
 but his eyes, as he now added, raising his voice: 
 
 ‘‘Turned you faint, Sir! Seems you’re not 
 accustomed to this kind of work ?” 
 
 ~The stranger, who was leaning against the 
 chimney-piece with drooping head, looked round 
 and answered, ‘‘No. It’s a horrible sight!” 
 
 ‘*You expected to identify, Iam told, Sir?” 
 
 ay eae, 
 
 ‘* Tave you identified ?” 
 
 ‘*No. It’s a horrible sight. 
 horrible sight!” 
 
 ““Who did you think it might have been?” 
 asked Mr. Inspector. 
 Sir. Perhaps we can help you.” 
 
 ‘““No, no,” said the stranger; ‘‘it would be 
 quite useless. Good-night.” 
 
 Mr. Inspector had not moved, and had given no 
 order; but the satellite slipped his back against 
 the wicket, and laid his Jeft arm along the top 
 of it, and with his right hand turned the bull’s- 
 eye he had taken from his chief—in quite 4 cas- 
 ual manner—toward the stranger. 
 
 ““You. missed a friend, you know; or you 
 missed_a foe, you know; or you wouldn’t have 
 come here, you know. 
 sonable to ‘ask, who was. it?” 
 spector. 
 
 ‘*You must excuse my telling you. No class 
 of man can understand better than you, that 
 families may ‘not choose to publish their disa- 
 
 Oh! a horrible, 
 
 4; Thus, Mr. In- 
 
 greements and*misfortunes, except upon the.last__ 
 
 necessity” I do not dispute that you discharge 
 your duty in asking me the question; you will 
 not dispute my right to withhold the answer. 
 Good-night.” " 
 
 ‘*Give us a description, - 
 
 Well, then ; ain’t it rea- — 
 
 — 
 
 a ee 
 
 a 
 
 ee Se ee ee 
 
 ON a eee ee 
 
 ee 
 
 : 
 ’ 
 ' 
 j 
 ; 
 
 ee ee ee 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 _ Again he turned toward the wicket, where the 
 satellite, with his eye upon his chief, remained a 
 dumb statue. : 
 
 ** At least,” said Mr. Inspector, ‘‘ you will not 
 object to leave me your card, Sir?” 
 
 **T should not object, if [had one; but I have 
 not.” He reddened’ and was much confused as 
 he gave the answer. _ 
 
 “* At least,”’ said Mr. Inspector, with no change 
 of voice or manner, ‘‘ you will not object to write 
 down your name and address ?” 
 
 ““Not at all.” 
 
 Mr. Inspector dipped a pen in his inkstand, and 
 softly laid it on a piece of.paper close beside him; 
 then resumed his former attitude. The stranger 
 stepped up to the desk, and wrote in a rather 
 tremulous hand—Mr. Inspector taking sidelong 
 note of every hair of his head when it was bent 
 ‘down for the purpose—* Mr. Julius Handford, 
 Exchequer Coffee-House, Palace Yard, West- 
 minster.” 
 
 ‘* Staying there, I presume, Sir ?”’ 
 
 ‘Staying there.” 
 
 ‘<Consequently, from the country ?” 
 
 “Eh? Yes—from the country.” 
 
 ** Good-night, Sir.” 
 
 The satellite removed his arm and opened the 
 wicket, and Mr. Julius Handford went out. 
 
 ** Reserve!” said Mr.Inspector. ‘‘ Take care 
 of this piece of paper, keep him in view with- 
 out giving offense, ascertain that he is staying 
 
 there, and find out any thing you can about 
 him.” 
 
 The satellite was gone; and Mr. Inspector, 
 hecoming once again the quiet Abbot of that 
 Monastery, dipped his pen in his ink and re- 
 sumed his books. The two friends who had 
 watched him, more amused by the professional 
 manner than suspicious of Mr. Julius Handford, 
 inquired before taking their departure too wheth- 
 er he believed there was any thing that really 
 looked bad here? 
 
 The Abbot replied with reticence, ‘* Couldn’t 
 
 say. Ifa murder, any body might have done it. 
 Burglary or pocket- picking wanted ’prenticeship. 
 ‘ Not so, murder. We were all of us up to that. 
 Had seen scores of people come to identify, and 
 neyer saw one person struck in that particular 
 way. Might, however, have been Stomach, and 
 not Mind. Ifso,rum stomach. But to be sure 
 there were rum every things. Pity there was 
 not a word of truth in that superstition about 
 hodies bleeding when touched by the right hand; 
 you never got asign out of bodies. You got row 
 enough out of such as her—she was good for all 
 night now” (referring here to the banging de- 
 mands for the liver), ‘‘ but you got nothing out 
 of bodies if it was ever so.” 
 
 There being nothing more to be done until the 
 _ Inquest was held next day, the friends went away 
 together, and Gaffer Hex: am and his son went 
 their separate way. But, arriving at the last 
 corner, Gaffer bade his boy go home. while he 
 turned into a red-curtained tavern, that stood 
 dr opsically bulging over the aint causeway, ‘for 
 a half-a-pint.” 
 
 The boy lifted the latch he had lifted before, 
 and found his sister again seated before the fire 
 at her work. Who raised her head upon his 
 coming in and asking: 
 
 “Where did you go, Liz?” 
 
 **T went out in the dark.” 
 
 ‘There was no necessity for that. 
 right enough.” 
 
 ‘*One of the gentlemen, the one who didn’t 
 speak while I was there, looked hard at me. 
 And I was afraid he might know what my face 
 meant. But there! Don’ t mind me, Charley! 
 I was all in a tremble of another sort ‘when you: 
 owned to father you could write a little.” : 
 
 ‘‘Ah! But I made believe I wrote so badly, 
 as that it was odds-if any one could read it. 
 And when I wrote slowest and smeared out with 
 my finger most, father was best pleased, as he 
 stood looking over me.” 
 
 The girl put aside her work, and drawing her 
 seat close to his seat by the fire, laid her arm 
 gently on his shoulder. 
 
 ** You'll make the most of your time, Charley ; 
 
 It was all 
 
 | won’t you?” 
 
 *“Wontl? Come! Ilike that. Don’t 12” 
 ‘Yes, Charley, yes. You work hard at your 
 learning, Iknow. And I work a little, Charley, 
 and plan and contrive a little (wake out of my 
 sleep contriving sometimes), how to get together 
 a shilling now, and a shilling then, that shall 
 make father believe you are beginning to earn a 
 stray living along shore.” : 
 ‘*You are father’s favorite, and can make him 
 believe any thing.” . 
 “‘T wish I could, Charley! For if I could 
 make him believe that learning was a good thing, 
 
 'and that we might lead better lives, I should’ be 
 |a’most content to die.” 
 
 **Don’t talk stuff about dying, Liz.” 
 
 She placed her hands in one another on his 
 shoulder, and laving her rich brown cheek 
 against them as she looked down at the fire, 
 
 | went on thoughtfully : 
 
 ‘‘Of an evening, Charley, when you are at 
 the school, and father’s—”’ 
 
 ‘“‘At the Six Jolly Fellowship-Porters,” the 
 boy struck in, with a backward nod of his head 
 toward the public house. 
 
 ‘Yes. Then as I sit a-looking at the fire, I 
 seem to see in the burning coal—like where that 
 glow is now—” 
 
 ‘“'That’s gas, that is,” said the boy, ‘‘coming 
 out of a bit of a forest that’s been under the mud 
 that was under the water in the days of Noah’s * 
 Ark. Look here! When I take the poker—so 
 
 —and give it a dig—” 
 
 ** Don’t disturb it, Charley, or it'll be all in a , 
 blaze. It’s that dull glow near it, coming and 
 going, that I mean. When [ look at it of an 
 evening, it comes like pictures to me, Charley.” | 
 
 ‘¢ Show us a picture,” said the boy. ‘* Tell us 
 
 | where to look.” 
 
 ‘¢Ah! It wants my eyes, Charley.” 
 
 ‘‘Cut away then, and tell us what your eyes 
 make of it.” & 
 
 ‘¢Why, there are you and me, Charley, when 
 you. were quite a baby that never knew a mo- 
 ther—” 
 
 “¢Don’t go saying I never knew a mothe 
 interposed the boy, “‘for I knew a little sister 
 that was sister and mother both.” 
 
 The girl laughed delightedly, and her eyes 
 filled with pleasant tears, as he put both his 
 arms round her waist and so held her. 
 
 ‘¢There are yon and me, Charley, when fa- 
 ther was away at work and locked us out, for 
 fear we should set ourselves afire or fall out of 
 | window, sitting on the door-sill, sitting on other 
 
 r Y 
 
door-steps, sitting on the bank of the river, wan- 
 dering about to get through the time. You are 
 rather heavy to carry, Charley, and I am often 
 obliged to rest. Sometimes we are sleepy and 
 fall asleep together in a corner, sometimes we 
 are very hungry, sometimes we are a little fright- 
 éned, but what is oftenest hard upon us is the 
 cold. You remember, Charley?” 
 
 ‘‘T remember,” said the boy, pressing her to 
 him twice or thrice, ‘‘that, I snuggled under a 
 little shawl, and it was warm there.” 
 
 ‘¢ Sometimes it rains, and we crecp under a 
 boat or the like of that; sometimes it’s dark, 
 and we gét among the gaslights, sitting watching 
 the people as they go along the streets. At last, 
 up comes father and takes ushome. And home 
 seems such a shelter after out of doors! And 
 father pulls my shoes off, and dries my feet at 
 the fire, and has me to sit by him while he smokes 
 his pipe long after you are abed, and I notice 
 that father’s is a large hand but never a heavy 
 one when it touches me, and that father’s is a 
 yough voice but never an angry one when it 
 speaks to me. So, I grow up, and little by little 
 father trusts me, and makes me his companion, 
 and, let him be put out as he may, never once 
 strikes me.”’ 
 
 The listening boy gave a grunt here, as much 
 as to say ‘* But he strikes me though!” 
 
 ‘‘Those are some of the pictures of what is 
 past, Charley.” 
 
 ‘Cut away again,” said the boy, ‘‘and give 
 us a fortune-telling one; a future one.” 
 
 ‘*Well! There am I, continuing with father 
 and holding to father, because father loves me 
 and I love father. I can’t so much as read a 
 book, because, if I had learned, father would 
 have thought I was deserting him, and I should 
 have lost my influence. I have not the influ- 
 énce I want to have; I can not stop some dread- 
 ful things I try to stop, but I go on in the hope 
 and trust that the time willcome. Inthe mean 
 while I know that I am in some things a stay to 
 father, and that if I was not faithful to him he 
 would—in revenge-like, or in disappointment, or 
 both—go wild and bad.” 
 
 ‘¢Give us a touch of the fortune-telling pic- 
 tures about me.” 
 
 ‘‘T was passing on to them, Charley,” said the 
 girl, who had not changed her attitude since she 
 began, and who now mournfully shook her head ; 
 “the others were all leading up. ‘There are 
 you” 
 
 ‘“¢Where am I, Liz?” 
 
 ‘¢ Still in the hollow down by the flare.” 
 
 ‘‘There seems to be the dence-and-all in the 
 hollow down by the flare,” said the boy, glan- 
 cing from her eyes to the brazier, which had a 
 grisly skeleton look on its long thin legs. 
 
 ‘‘'There are you, Charley, working your way, 
 in secret from father, at the school; and you get 
 prizes; and you go on better and better; and 
 you come to be a—what was it you called it 
 when you told me about that?” 
 
 “Wa, ha! Fortune-telling not know the 
 name!” cried the boy, seeming to be rather re- 
 lieved by this default on the part of the hollow 
 down by the flare. ‘*‘ Pupil-teacher.” 
 
 “You come to he a pupil-teacher, and you 
 still go on better and better, and you rise to bea 
 master full of learning and respect. But the 
 secret has come to father’s knowledge long be- 
 
 made a new and good beginning. 
 
 “OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 fore, and it has divided you from father, and — 
 from me.” . i 
 
 “No it hasn’t!” 
 
 ‘Yes it has, Charley. Isee, as plain as plain: 
 can be, that your way is not ours, and that even 
 if father could be got to forgive your taking it 
 (which he never could be), that way of yours 
 would be darkened by our way. But I see too, 
 
 Charley—” | 
 ‘<Still as plain as plain can be, Liz?” asked 
 
 the boy, playfully. 
 
 “Ah! Still. Thatit is a great work to have 
 cut you away from father’s life, and to have 
 So there am 
 I, Charley, left alone with father, keeping him 
 as straight as I can, watching for more influence 
 than I have, and hoping that through some for- 
 tunate. chance, or when he is ill, or when—I 
 don’t know what—I may turn him to wish to do 
 better things.” 
 
 ‘You said you couldn’t read a book, Lizzie. 
 
 Your library of books is the hollow down by the 
 are, I think.” 
 ‘‘T should be very glad to be able to read real 
 books. I feel my want of learning very much, 
 Charley. But I should feel it much more, if I 
 didn’t know it to be a tie between me and fa- 
 ther.—Hark! Father’s tread!” 
 
 It being now past midnight, the bird of prey 
 went straight to roost. At mid-day following 
 he reappeared at the Six Jolly Fellowship-Por- 
 ters, in the character, not new to him, of a wit- 
 ness before a Coroner’s Jury. 
 
 Mr. Mortimer Lightwood, besides sustaining 
 the character of one of the witnesses, doubled 
 the part with that of the eminent solicitor who 
 watched the proceedings on behalf of the repre- 
 
 sentatives of the deceased, as was duly recorded . 
 
 in the-newspapers. Mr. Inspector watched the 
 proceedings too, and kept his watching closely 
 to himself. Mr. Julius Handford having given 
 his right address, and being reported in solvent 
 cireumstances as to his bill, though nothing more 
 was known of him at his hotel except that his 
 way of life was very retired, had no summons 
 to appear, and was merely present in the shades 
 of Mr. Inspector’s mind. 
 
 The case was made interesting to the public 
 by Mr. Mortimer Lightwood_ giving evidence 
 touching the circumstances under which the de- 
 ceased, Mr. John Harmon, had returned to En. 
 gland; exclusive private proprietorship in which 
 circumstances was set up at dinner-tables for 
 several days, by Veneering, ‘'wemlow, Podsnap, 
 and all the Buffers: who all related them ir- 
 reconcilably with one another, and contradicted 
 themselves. 
 testimony of Job Potterson, the ship’s steward, 
 and one Mr. Jacob Kibble, a fellow-passenger, 
 that the deceased Mr. John Harmon did bring 
 over, in a hand-valise with which he did disem- 
 bark, the sum he had realized by the forced sale 
 of his little landed property, and that the sum ex- 
 ceeded, in ready money, seven hundred pounds. 
 It was farther made interesting by the remark- 
 able experiences of Jesse Hexam in having res- 
 cued from the Thames so many dead bodies, 
 and for whose behoof a rapturous admirer, sub- 
 
 scribing himself ‘‘.A friend to Burial” (perhaps ° 
 an undertaker), sent eighteen postage-stamps, _ 
 
 and five ‘‘ Now Sir’’s to the editor of the Times. 
 Upon the evidence adduced before them the 
 
 ae ee ee ee ee 
 
 It was also made interesting by the 
 
 Ee 
 
 eS ee te 
 
 a a oe es 
 
 SS ee eS ee 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 Jury found, That the body of Mr. John Harmon 
 had been discovered floating in the. Thames, in 
 an advanced state of decay, and much injured, 
 and that the said Mr. John Harmon had come 
 
 by his death under. highly suspicions circum-. 
 
 stances, though by whose act or in what precise 
 manner there was no evidence before this Jury 
 to show. And they appended to their verdict a 
 recommendation to the Home Office (which Mr. 
 _ Inspector appeared to think highly sensible), to 
 otfer a reward for the solution of the mystery. 
 Within eight-and-forty hours a reward of One 
 
 Hundred Pounds was proclaimed, together with’ 
 
 a free pardon to any person or persons not the 
 actual perpetrator or perpetrators, and so forth 
 in due form. x 
 
 This Proclamation rendered Mr. Inspector 
 additionally studious, and caused him to stand 
 meditating on river-stairs and causeways, and to 
 go lurking about in boats, putting this and that 
 together. But, according to the success with 
 which you put this and that together, you get a 
 woman and a fish apart, or a Mermaid in com- 
 bination. And Mr. Inspector could turn out 
 nothing better than a Mermaid, which no Judge 
 and Jury would believe in. 
 
 Thus, like the tides on which it had been borne 
 to the knowledge of men, the Harmon Murder 
 -—as it came to be popularly called—went up and 
 down, and ebbed and flowed, now in the town, 
 now in the country, now among palaces, now 
 among hovels, now among lords and ladies and 
 gentletolks, now among laborers and hammerers 
 
 ‘and ballast-heavers, until at last, after a long 
 ‘Iterval of slack-water, it got out to sea and drift- 
 ‘ved away. 
 
 : ——.-—__—__ 
 
 CHAPTER IV.: 
 
 THE R. WILFER FAMILY. 
 
 \ReeryaLp WILFER is a name with rather a 
 grand sound, suggesting on first acquaintance 
 brasses in country churches, scrolls in stained- 
 glass windows, and generally the De Wilfers who 
 ‘came over with the Conqueror: For, it is a re- 
 markable-fact in genealogy that no De Any ones 
 ever came over with Any body else. 
 
 But, the Reginald Wilfer family were of such 
 commonplace extraction and pursuits that their 
 forefathers had for generations modestly snb- 
 sisted on the Docks, the Excise-Office, and the 
 
 »Custom-House, and the existing R. Wilfer was 
 a poor clerk.. So poor a clerk, though having a 
 limited salary and an unlimited family, that he 
 had never yet attained the modest object of his 
 ambition: which was, to wear a complete new 
 suit of clothes, hat and boots included, at one 
 ~'time. His black hat was brown before he coutd 
 afford a coat, his pantaloons were white at the 
 
 seams and knees before he could buy a pair of 
 
 boots, his boots had worn out before he could 
 treat himself to new pantaloons, and, by the time 
 he workéd round to the hat again, that shining 
 modern article roofed-in an ancient ruin of va- 
 rious periods, 
 
 If the conventional Cherub could ever grow 
 
 up and clothed, he might be photographed as a | 
 
 view of Wilfer. His chubby, smooth, innocent 
 appearance was a reason for his being always 
 treated with condescension when he was not put 
 down. A stranger entering his own poor house 
 
 “29 
 |at about ten o’clock p.m. might have been sur- 
 | prised to find him sitting up to supper. So boy- 
 ish was he in his curves and proportions, that 
 his old schoolmaster meeting him in Cheapside, 
 might have been unable to withstand the tempt- 
 ation of caning him on the spot. In short, ‘he 
 was the conventional cherub, after the supposi+ 
 titious shoot just mentioned, rather gray, with 
 signs of care on his expression, and in decidedly 
 insolvent circumstances. 
 
 He was shy, and unwilling to.own to the name 
 of Reginald, as being too aspiring and self-assert- 
 ive a name. In his signature he used only the 
 initial R., and imparted what it really stood for 
 |to none but chosen friends, under the seal of con- 
 | fidence. Qut of this, the facetious habit had 
 arisen in the neighborhood surrounding Mincing 
 Lane of making Christian names for him of ad- 
 jectives and participles beginning with R. Some 
 of these were more or less appropriate: as Rusty, 
 Retiring, Ruddy, Round, Ripe, Ridiculous, Ru- 
 minative ; others derived their point from. their 
 want of application—as Raging, Rattling, Roar- 
 ing, Raffish. But his popular name was Rum- 
 ty, which in a moment of inspiration had been 
 bestowed upon him by a gentleman of convivial 
 habits connected with the drug-market, as the 
 bevinning of a social chorus, his leading part in 
 the execution of which had Jed this gentleman 
 to the Temple of Fame, and of which the whole 
 expressive burden ran: F 
 
 *“RNumty iddity, row dow dow, 
 Sing toodlely, teedlely, bow wow wow.” 
 
 Thus he was constantly addressed, even in minor 
 notes on business, as ‘*‘ Dear Rumpty;” in answer 
 to which, he sedately signed himself, ‘‘ Yours 
 truly, R. Wilfer.” 
 
 He was clerk in the. drug-house of Chicksey, 
 Veneering, and Stobbles. Chicksey and Stob- 
 bles, his former masters, had both become ab- 
 sorbed in Veneering, once their traveler or com- 
 mission agent: who had signalized his accession 
 to supreme power by bringing into the business 
 a quantity of plate-glass window and French- 
 polished mahogany partition, and a gleaming 
 and enormous door-plate. 
 
 R. Wilfer locked up his desk one evening, 
 
 and, putting his bunch of keys in his pocket 
 much as if it were his peg-top, made for home. 
 His house was in the Holloway region north of | 
 London, and then divided from it by fields and 
 trees. Between Battle Bridge and that part of 
 the Holloway district in which he dwelt, was a 
 itract of suburban Sahara, where tiles and bricks 
 I ere burnt, bones were boiled, carpets were beat, 
 rubbish was shot, dogs were fought, and dust: 
 ‘was heaped by contractors. Skirting the border 
 ‘of this desert, by the way he took, when the light . 
 lof its kiln-fires made lurid smears on the fog, R. 
 | Wilfer sighed and shook his head. 
 | **Ah me!” said he, ‘what might have been 
 ‘is not what is!” 
 ‘With which commentary on human life, indi- 
 eating an experience of it not exclusively his | 
 own, he made the best of his way to the end of 
 his journey. ae 
 
 Mrs. Wilfer was, of course, a tall woman and 
 an angular. Her lord being cherubic, she was 
 “necessarily majestic, according to the principle 
 which matrimonially unites contrasts. She was 
 much given,to tying up her head in a pocket- 
 
oy, 
 handkerchief, knotted under the chin. This 
 head-gear, in conjunction witha pair of gloves 
 worn within doors, she seemed to consider as at 
 once a kind of armor against misfortune (invari- 
 ably assuming it when in low spirits or difficul- 
 ties), and as a species of full dress. It was there- 
 fore with some sinking of the spirit that her hus- 
 band beheld her thus “heroically attired, putting 
 down her candle in the little hall; and coming 
 down the door-steps through the little fr ‘ont court 
 to open the gate for him. 
 
 Something had gone wrong with the house- 
 door, for R. Wilfer stopped on the steps, staring 
 at it, and cried: ‘‘ Halloa?” 
 
 “Yes,” said Mrs. Wilfer, ‘‘the man came 
 himself with a pair of pincers, and took it off, 
 and took it away. He said that as he had no 
 expectation of ever being paid for it, and as he 
 had an order for another Lapis’ Scuoou door- 
 plate, it was better (burnished up) for the inter- 
 ests of all parties.” 
 
 ‘‘Perhaps it was, my dear; what do you 
 
 think ?” 
 
 ‘¢You are master here, R. W.,” returned his 
 wife. ‘It is as you think; not asI do. Per- 
 haps it might have been better if the man had 
 taken the door too ?” 
 
 mt My dear, we couldn’t have done without the 
 door.” 
 
 + Couldn’t we ?” 
 
 ‘*Why, my dear! Could we?” 
 
 ‘‘It is as you think, R. W.; not as I do.” 
 With those submissive words, the dutiful wife 
 preceded him down a few stairs to a little base- 
 ment front-room, half kitchen, half parlor, where 
 a girl of about nineteen, with an exceedingly 
 pretty figure and face, but with an impaticnt 
 and petulant expression both in her face and in 
 her shoulders (which in her sex and at her age 
 are very expressive of discontent), sat playing 
 draughts with a younger girl, who was the-youn- 
 gest_of the House of Wilfer. Not to encumber 
 this page by telling off the Wilfers in detail and 
 casting them up in the gross, it is enough for 
 the present that the rest were what is called 
 “out in the world,” in various ways, and that 
 they were Many. So many, that when one of 
 his dutiful children called in to see him, R. Wil- 
 fer generally seemed to say to himself, after a 
 little mental arithmetic, *‘Oh! here’s another 
 of ’em!” before adding aloud, ‘‘ How de do, 
 John,” or Susan, as the case might be. 
 
 ‘Well, Pigeywiggies,” said R. W., ‘‘ how de 
 do to-night? What I was thinking of, my dear,” 
 to Mrs. Wilfer already seated in a corner with 
 folded gloves, ‘‘ was, that as we have let our first 
 floor so well, and as we have now no place in 
 which you could teach pupils, even if pupils—” 
 
 ‘“The milkman said he knew of two young 
 ladies of the highest respectability who.were in 
 
 search of a suitable establishment, and he took 
 a card,” interposed Mrs. Wilfer, with severe mo- 
 notony, as if she were reading an Act of Parlia- 
 ment aloud. ‘* Tell your father whether it was 
 last Monday, Bella.”’ 
 
 ‘¢But we never heard any more of it, ma,” 
 said Bella, the elder girl. 
 
 ‘In addition to which, my dear,” her hus- 
 band urged, ‘‘if you have no place to put two 
 young persons into—” 
 
 ‘¢Pardon me,” Mrs. Wilfer again interposed ; 
 “they were not young persons. Two young 
 
 ‘where 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 ladies of the highest respectability. Tell your 
 fathers Bella, whether the milkman said so.” 
 
 nf My dear, it is the same thing.” 
 
 ‘No it is not,” said Mrs. Wilfer, with the 
 same impressive monotony. + Pay don me!” 
 
 ‘¢T mean, my dear, it is the same thing as to 
 space. As to space, If you have no space in 
 which to put twe youthful fellow-creatures, how- 
 ever eminently respectable, which I do not doubt, 
 are those youthfal fellow-creatures to be 
 accommodated? I carry it no further than that, 
 And solely looking at it,” said her husband, 
 making the stipulation at once in a conciliatory, 
 complimentary, and ‘fas I 
 am sure you will agree, my love—from a fellow- 
 creature point of view, my dear.” 
 
 ‘¢T have nothing more to say,” returned Mrs, 
 Wilfer, with a meek renunciatory action of her 
 gloves. ‘‘Itis.as you think, R. W.; not asI do.” 
 
 Here, the huffing of Miss Bella and the loss 
 of three of her men at a swoop, ag faa ated by 
 the coronation of an opponent, led to that young 
 lady’s jerking the draught-board and pieces oft 
 the table: which her. sister went down on her 
 knees to pick up. 
 
 ** Poor Bella!” said Mrs. Wilfer. 
 
 ‘* And poor Lavinia, perhaps, my dear? ?” sug- 
 gested R. W. 
 
 ‘‘ Pardon me,” said Mrs. Wilfer, ‘‘no!” 
 
 It was one of the worthy woman's specialties 
 that she had an amazing power of gratifying 
 her splenetic or worldly-minded humors by ex- 
 tolling her own family : which she thus proceed- 
 ed, in the present case, to do. 
 
 ‘No, R. W. Lavinia has not known the 
 trial that Bella has known. | The trial that your 
 daughter Bella has undergone, is, perhaps, with-- 
 out a parallel, and has been borne, I will say, 
 Nobly. When you_see your daughter Bella in 
 her black dress, which she alone of all the family 
 wears, and w hen you remember the circum- - 
 stances which have led to her wearing it, and 
 when you know how those circumstances have 
 been sustained, then, R. W., lay your head upon 
 your pillow and say, ‘ Poor Lavinia!’ ” 
 
 Here, Miss Lavinia, from her kneeling situa- 
 tion under the table, put in that she didn’t want 
 to be ‘‘ poored by pa,” or any body else. 
 
 ‘‘T am sure you do not, my dear,” returned 
 her mother, ‘‘for you have a fine brave spirit. 
 And your sister Cecilia has a fine brave spirit - 
 of another kind, a spirit of pure devotion, a 
 beau-ti-ful spirit! The self-sacrifice of Cecilia 
 reveals a pure and womanly character, very 
 seldom equaled—never surpassed. I have now 
 in my pocket a letter from your sister Cecilia, 
 received this morning—received three months 
 after her marriage, poor child’! in which she 
 tells me that her husband must unexpectedly 
 shelter under their roof his reduced aunt. ‘ But 
 I will be true to him, mamma,’ she touchingly 
 writes, ‘I will not leave him, I must not forget 
 that he is my husband. Let his aunt come!’ 
 If this-is not pathetic, if this is not woman’s de- 
 votion—!” 'The good lady waved her gloves in 
 a sense of the impossibility of saying more, and 
 tied the pocket-handkerchief over her head in a 
 tighter knot under her chin. 
 
 Bella, who was now seated on the rug to warm 
 herself, with her brown eyes on the fire and a 
 handful of her brown curls in her mouth, laughed 
 at this, and then.pouted.and half cried. 
 
 os 
 
‘‘T am sure,” said she, “though you have no 
 feeling fur me, pa, Iam one of the most unfor- 
 tunate girls that ever lived. You know how 
 poor we are” (it is probable he did, having some 
 reason to know it!), ‘‘and what a glimpse of 
 wealth I had, and how it melted away, and how 
 I am here in this ridiculous mourning—which I 
 hate !—a kind of a widow who never was mar- 
 ried. And yet you don’t feel for me.—Yes you 
 ‘do, yes you do.” . 
 
 This abrupt change was occasioned by her fa- 
 
 - ther’s faces She stopped to pull him down from 
 his. chair in an attitude highly favorable to stran- 
 gulation, and to give him. a kiss and a pat or 
 
 two on the cheek. ‘ 
 
 ‘‘ But you ought to feel for me, you’know, pa.” 
 
 ‘¢ My dear, I do.” ; 
 
 “Yes, and I say you ought to. If they had 
 ‘only left me alone and told me nothing about 
 it, it would have mattered much less. But that 
 nasty Mr. Lightwood feels it his duty, as he 
 
 ‘says, to write and tell me what is in reserve for 
 
 ‘me, and then I am obliged to get rid of George 
 | Sampson.” . 
 
 Here, Lavinia, rising to the surface with the 
 last draughtman rescued, interposed, ‘‘ You never 
 cared for George Sampson, Bella.” 
 
 “And did I say I did, miss?” Then, pout- 
 ing again, with the curls in her mouth; ‘‘ George 
 
 Sampson was very fond of me, and admired me 
 
 very much, and put up with every thing I did to 
 him.” : 
 
 “You were rude enough to him,” Lavinia 
 again interposed. 
 
 ‘* And did I say I wasn’t, miss? I am not 
 setting up to be sentimental about George Samp- 
 son. I only say George Sampson was better 
 than nothing.” 
 
 “You didn’t show him that you thought even 
 that,’’ Lavinia again interposed. 
 
 “Vou are a chit and a little idiot,” returned 
 Bella, ‘‘or you wouldn’t make such a dolly 
 speech. What did you expect me to do? Wait 
 till you are a woman, and don’t talk about what 
 you don’t understand. You only show your ig- 
 norance!” Then, whimpering again, and at in- 
 tervals biting the curls, and stopping to look how 
 much was bitten off, ‘‘It's a shame! There 
 never was such a hard case! I shouldn’t care 
 so much if it wasn’t so ridiculous. It was ridic- 
 ulons enough to have a stranger coming over to 
 marry me, whether he liked it or not. “It was 
 ridiculous enough to know what an embarrass- 
 ing meeting it would be, and how we never could 
 pretend to have an inclination of our own, either 
 of us. It was ridiculous enough to know~I 
 shouldn’t like him—how could I like him, left to 
 him in a will like a dozen of spoons, with every 
 ‘thing cut and dried beforehand, like orange 
 chips. Talk of orange flowers indeed! I de- 
 clare again it’s a shame! ‘Those ridiculous 
 points would have been smoothed away by the 
 money, for I love money, and want money 
 want it dreadfully. I hate te be poor, and we 
 are degradingly poor, offensively poor, misera- 
 bly poor, beastly poor. But here I am, left with 
 all the ridiculous parts of the situation remain-+ 
 
 ing, and, added to them all, this ridiculous | 
 
 dress! And if the truth was known, when the 
 Harmon murder was all over the town, and peo- 
 ple were speculating on its being suicide, I dare 
 say those impudent wretches at the clubs and 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 31 
 
 places made jokes about the miserable creature’s> 
 having preferred a watery grave to mez It’s 
 likely enough they took such liberties; J 
 shouldn’t wonder! I declare it’s a very hard 
 case indeed, and I am a most unfortunate girl, 
 The idea of being a kind of a widow, and never 
 having been married! And the idea of being as 
 poor as ever after all, and going into black, be- 
 sides, for a man I never saw, and should have 
 hated—as far as he was concerned—if I had 
 seen !” 
 
 The young lady’s lamentations were checked 
 at this point by a knuckle, knocking at the half- 
 open door of the room. ‘The knuckle had knock- 
 ed two or three times already, but had not been 
 heard. 
 
 ‘“Who is it?” said Mrs. Wilfer, in her Act- 
 of-Parliament manner. ‘*‘ Enter!” 
 
 A gentleman coming in, Miss Bella, with a 
 short and sharp exclamation, scrambled off the 
 hearth-rug and massed the bitten curls together 
 in their right place on her neck. 
 
 ‘<The servant-girl had her key in the door as 
 I came up, and directed me to this room, telling 
 me I was expected. JI am afraid I should have 
 asked her to announce me.” 
 
 ‘¢Pardon me,” returned Mrs. Wilfer. ‘‘ Not 
 at all. Two of my daughters. R. W., this is 
 the gentleman who has taken our first-floor. 
 He was so good as to make an appointment for 
 to-night, when you would be at home.” 
 
 A dark gentleman. Thirty at the most. An 
 expressive, one might say handsome, face. A 
 
 very bad manner. Inthe last degree constrain- 
 ed, reserved, diffident, troubled. His eyes were 
 on Miss Bella for an instant, and then looked at 
 the ground as he addressed the master of the 
 house. . 
 
 ‘«Seeing that I am quite satisfied, Mr. Wil- 
 fer, with the rooms, and with their situation, and 
 with their price, I suppose a memorandum be- 
 tween us of two or three lines, and a payment 
 down, will bind the bargain? I wish to send in 
 furniture without delay.” . 
 
 Two or three times during this short address, 
 the cherub addressed had made chubby motions 
 towards a chair. The gentleman now took it, 
 laying a hesitating hand on a corner of the ta- 
 ble, and with another hesitating hand lifting the 
 crown of his hat to his lips, and drawing it be- 
 fore his mouth. 
 
 “The gentleman, R. W.,” said Mrs. Wilfer, 
 ‘“proposes to take our apartments by the quar- 
 ter. A quarter’s notice on either side.” 
 
 ‘‘Shall I mention, Sir,” insinuated the land- 
 lord, expecting it to be received as a matter of 
 course, ‘‘the form of a reference ?” 
 
 ‘‘T think,” returned the gentleman, after a 
 pause, ‘‘that a reference is not necessary; nei- 
 ther, to say the truth, is it convenient, for I am 
 a stranger in London. I require no reference 
 from you, and perhaps, therefore, you will re- 
 quire none from me. That will be fair on both 
 sides. Indeed, I show the greater confidence 
 of the two, for I will pay in advance whatever 
 you please, and I am going to trust my furni- 
 ture here. Whereas, if you were in embarrassed 
 circumstances—this is merely supposititious—” 
 
 Conscience causing R. Wilfer to color, Mrs. 
 Wilfer, from a corner (she always got into state- 
 ly corners) came to the rescue with a deep-toned 
 ‘¢ Per-fectly.”’ 
 
32 
 
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paper and saying, ‘Where am I to go, pa? 
 Here, in this corner?” He looked at the beau- 
 tiful brown hair, shading the coquettish face; 
 he looked at the free dash of the signature, 
 which was a bold one for a woman’s; and then 
 ¢ they looked at one another. 
 
 “Much obliged to you, Miss Wilfer.” 
 
 “¢Obliged ?” : 
 
 ‘<T have given you so much trouble.” 
 
 “‘Sioning my name?) Yes, certainly. 
 am your landlord’s daughter, Sir.” 
 
 As there was nothing more to do but pay 
 eight sovereigns in earnest of the bargain, pock- 
 et the agreement, appoint.a time for the arrival 
 of his furniture and himself, and go, Mr. Roke- 
 smith did that as awkwardly as it might be done, 
 and was escorted by his landlord to the outer 
 air. When R,. Wilfer returned, candlestick in 
 hand, to the bosom of his family, he found the 
 bosom agitated. 
 
 ‘“‘Pa,” said Bella, ‘‘we have got a Murderer 
 for a tenant.” 
 
 Pa,” said Lavinia, ‘‘we have got a Robber.” 
 
 “To see him unable for his life to look any 
 body in the face!” said Bella. “There never 
 was such an exhibition.” 
 
 ‘‘ My dears,” said their father, “he is a diffi- 
 dent gentleman, and I should say particularly 
 so in the society of girls of your age.” 
 
 ‘¢ Nonsense, our age!” cried Bella, impatient- 
 ‘¢What’s that got to do with him ?” 
 ‘¢ Besides, we are not of the same age :— 
 which age?” demanded Lavinia. 
 
 “Never you mind, Lavvy,” retorted Bella; 
 “vou wait til you are of-an age to ask such 
 questions. Pa, mark my words! Between Mr. 
 Rokesmfith and me there is a natural antipathy 
 and a deep distrust; and something will come 
 of it!” 
 
 ‘My dear, and girls,” said the cherub-patri- 
 arch, “between Mr. Rokesmith and me there is 
 a matter of eight sovereigns, and something for 
 supper shall come of it, if you'll agree upon the 
 article.” . 
 
 This was a neat and happy turn to give the 
 subject, treats being rare in the Wilfer house- 
 
 hold, where a monotonous appearance of Dutch- 
 cheese at ten o’clock in the evening had been 
 rather frequently commented on by the dimpled 
 shoulders of Miss Bella. Indeed, the modest 
 Dutchman himself seemed conscious of his want 
 of variety, and generally came before the family 
 in a state of apologetic perspiration. After some 
 discussion on the relative merits of veal-cutlet, 
 sweet-bread, and lobster, a decision was pro- 
 nounced in favor of veal-cutlet. Mrs. Wilfer 
 then solemnly divested herself of her handker- 
 chief and gloves, as a preliminary sacrifice to 
 epreparing the frying-pan, and R. W. himself 
 went out to purchase the viand. He soon re- 
 turned, bearing the same in a fresh cabbage- 
 leaf, where it coyly embraced a rasher of ham. 
 Melodious sounds were not long in rising from 
 the frying-pan on the fire, or in seeming, as the 
 fire-light danced in the mellow halls of a couple 
 of full bottles on the table, to play appropriate 
 dance-music, 
 
 The cloth was laid by Lavvy. Bella, as the 
 acknowledged ornament of the family, employed 
 both her hands in giving her hair an additional 
 wave while sitting in the easiest chair, and oc- 
 
 - casionally threw in a direction touching the sup- 
 
 But I 
 
 ly. 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 33 
 
 per: as, ‘‘ Very brown, ma;” or, to her sister, 
 ‘¢Put the salt-cellar straight, miss, and don’t be 
 a dowdy little puss.” i 
 
 Meantime her father, chinking Mr. Roke- 
 smith’s gold as he sat expectant between his 
 knife and fork, remarked that six of those soy- 
 ereigns came just in time for their landlord, and 
 stood them in a little pile on the white table- 
 cloth to look at. 
 
 ‘¢T hate our landlord!” said Bella. 
 
 But, observing a fall in her father’s face, she 
 went and sat down by him at the table, and be- 
 gan touching up his hair with the handle of a 
 fork. It was one of the gitl’s spoiled ways to be 
 always arranging the family’s hair—perhaps he- 
 cause her own was so pretty, and occupied so 
 much of her attention. 
 
 ‘¢You deserve to have a house of your own; 
 don’t you, poor pa?” 
 
 ‘¢T don’t deserve it better than another, my 
 dear.” 
 
 ‘At any rate I, for one, want it more than 
 another,” said Bella, holding him by the chin, 
 as she stuck his flaxen hair on end, ‘‘and I 
 grudge this money going to the Monster that 
 swallows up so much, when we all want—every 
 thing. And if you say (as you want to say; I 
 know you want to say so, pa) ‘that’s neither 
 reasonable nor honest, Bella,’ then I answer, 
 ‘May be not, pa—very likely—but it’s one of 
 the consequences of being poor, and of thorough- 
 ly hating and detesting to be poor, and that’s my 
 case.’ Now, you look lovely, pa; why don’t 
 you always wear your hair like that? And here’s 
 the cutlet! If it isn’t very brown, ma, I can’t 
 eat it, and must have a bit put back to be done 
 expressly.” 
 
 However, as it was brown, even to Bella’s 
 taste, the young lady graciously partook of it 
 without reconsignment to the frying-pan, and 
 also, in due coutse, of the contents of the two 
 bottles: whereof one held Scotch ale and the 
 other rum. . The latter perfume, with the fos- 
 tering aid of boiling water and lemon-peel, dif- 
 fused itself throughout the room, and became so 
 highly concentrated around the warm fireside, 
 that the wind passing over the house roof must 
 have rushed off charged with a delicious whiff, 
 of it, after buzzing like a great bee at that par- 
 ticular chimney-pot. 
 
 “Pa,” said Bella, sipping the fragrant mixt- 
 ure and warming her favorite ankle; ‘‘ when 
 old Mr. Harmon made such a fool of me (not to 
 mention himself, as he is. dead), what do you 
 suppose he did it for?” 
 
 ‘‘Impossible to say, my dear. As I have told 
 -ou times out of number since his will was 
 brought to light, I doubt if I ever exchanged a 
 hundred words with the old gentleman. If it 
 was his whim to surprise us, his whim succeed- 
 ed. For he certainly did it.” 
 
 ‘And I was stamping my foot and screaming, 
 when he first took notice of me; was 1?” said 
 Bella. contemplating the ankle before mentioned. 
 
 ‘¢ You were stamping your little foot, my dear, 
 and screaming with your little voice, and laying 
 into me with your little bonnet, which you had 
 snatched off for the purpose,” returned her fa- 
 ther, as if the remembrance gave a relish to the 
 rum; ‘you were doing this one Sunday morn- 
 ing when I took you out, because I didn’t go 
 the exact way you wanted, when the old gentle- 
 
34 
 
 man, sitting on a seat near, said, ‘That’s a nice 
 girl; that’s a very nice girl; a promising girl!’ 
 And so you were, my dear.” 
 
 ‘‘And then he asked my name, did he, pa?” 
 
 “Then he asked your name, my dear, and | 
 
 mine; and on other Sunday mornings, when we 
 walked his way, we saw him again, and—and 
 really that’s all.” 
 
 ‘As that was all the rum and water too, or, in 
 other words, as R. W. delicately signified that 
 
 his glass was empty, by throwing back his head | 
 
 and standing the glass upside down on his nose 
 
 and upper lip, it might have been charitable in | 
 
 Mrs. Wilfer to suggest replenishment. But that 
 heroine briefly suggesting ‘‘ Bedtime” instead, 
 the bottles were put away, and the family re- 
 tired ; she cherubically escorted, like some se- 
 vere saint in a painting, or merely human mat- 
 ron allegorically treated. 
 
 *¢ And by this time to-morrow,” said Lavinia, 
 
 when the two girls were alone in their room, | 
 “we shall have Mr. Rokesmith here, and shall , 
 
 be expecting to have our throats cut.” 
 
 “*You needn’t stand between me and the can- 
 dle for all that,” retorted Bella. “This is an- 
 other of the consequences of being poor! The 
 
 idea of a girl with a really fine head of hair; 
 
 having to do it by one flat candle and a few. 
 
 19? 
 
 inches of looking-glass! 
 
 **You caught George Sampson with it, Bella, 
 bad as your means of dressing it are.” 
 
 ** You low little thing. Caught George Samp- 
 son with it! Don’t talk about catching people, 
 miss, till your own time for catching—as you 
 call it—comes.” 
 
 ‘* Perhaps it has come,” muttered Lavvy, with 
 a toss of her head. 
 
 ‘What did you say ?” asked Bella, very sharp- 
 
 ‘What did you say, miss ?” 
 
 Lavvy declining equally to repeat or to ex- 
 
 ly. 
 
 plain, Bella gradually lapsed over her hair-dress- | 
 
 ing into a soliloquy on the miseries of being 
 poor, as exemplified in having nothing to put 
 on, nothing to go out in, nothing to dress by, 
 
 only a nasty box to dress at instead of a com-_| 
 
 modious dressing-table, and being obliged to take 
 in suspicious lodgers. On the last grievance as 
 
 | 
 | 
 
 her climax she laid great stress—and might | 
 
 have laid greater, had she known that if Mr. 
 Julius Handford had a twin brother.upon. earth 
 Mr. John Rokesmith was the man. 
 
 eS 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 BOFFIN’S BOWER. 
 
 OvER against a London house, a corner 
 
 house not far from Cavendish Square, a man! 
 with a wooden leg had sat for some years, with | 
 
 his remaining foot in a basket in cold weather, 
 
 picking up a living on this wise:—Every morn- | 
 ing at eight o’clock he stumped to the corner, | 
 
 carrying a chair, a clothes-horse, a pair of tres- 
 tles, a board, a basket, and an umbrella, all 
 strapped together. Separating these, the board 
 and trestles became a counter, the basket sup- 
 plied the few small lots of fruit and sweets that 
 he offered for sale upon it and became a foot- 
 warmer, the unfolded clothes-horse displayed a 
 choice collection of half-penny ballads and be- 
 came a screen, and the stool planted within it 
 
 > 
 
 ay 
 
 UUR MUTUAL FRIEND. iis 
 
 became his post for the rest of the day. All 
 weathers saw the man at the post. This is to. 
 be accepted in a double sense, for he contrived . 
 
 a back to his wooden stool by placing it against * 
 When the weather was wet, he 
 
 the lamp-post. 
 put up his umbrella over his stock in trade, not- 
 over himself; when the weather was dry, he 
 furled that faded article, tied it round with a 
 piece of varn, and laid it cross-wise under the 
 trestles; where it looked like an unwholesomely- 
 
 forced lettuce that had lost in color and crisp- 
 
 ness what it had gained in size. 
 
 He had established his right to the corner, by 
 imperceptible prescription. He had neyer va-. 
 ried his ground an inch, but had in the begin- 
 ning diffidently taken the corner upon which the 
 side. of the house gave. A howling corner in 
 the winter-time, a dusty corner in the summer- 
 time, an undesirable corner at the best of times. 
 
 Shelterless fragments of straw and paper got up 
 
 revolving storms there, when the main street 
 was at peace; and the water-cart, as if it were 
 drunk or short-sighted, came blundering artd 
 jolting round it, making it muddy when all elsé 
 was clean. 
 
 On the front of his sale-board hung a little 
 placard, like a kettle-holder, bearing the inscrips 
 tion in his own‘small text: ‘ 
 
 Errands gone 
 
 On with ji 
 
 Delity By 
 
 Ladies and Gentlemen - 
 Tvemain 
 
 Your humble Serv: 
 Silas Wegg. 
 
 He had not only settled it with himself in course 
 of time, that he was errand-goer by appointment 
 to the house at the corner (though he received 
 such commissions not half a dozen times in a 
 year, and then only as some servant’s deputy), 
 but also that he was one of the house’s retainers 
 and owed vassalage to it and was bound to leal 
 and loyal interest in it. For this reason, he al- 
 ways spoke of it as ‘‘Our House,” and, though 
 his knowledge of its affairs was mostly specula- 
 tive and all wrong, claimed to be in its confi- 
 dence. On similar grounds he never beheld an 
 inmate at any one of its windows but he touched 
 his hat. Yet, he knew so little about the in- 
 mates that he gave them names of his own in- 
 vention; as ‘* Miss Elizabeth,” ‘* Master George,” 
 ‘* Aunt Jane,” “ Uncle Parker’—having no au- 
 thority whatever for any such designations, but 
 particularly the last—to which, as a natural con- 
 sequence, he stuck with great obstinacy, 
 
 Over the house itself he exercised the same 
 imaginary power as over its inhabitants and their 
 affairs. He had never been in it, the length of 
 a piece of fat black water-pipe which trailed it- 
 self over the area-door into a damp stone pas- 
 
 sage, and had rather the air of a leech on the — 
 
 house that had “taken” wonderfully ; but this 
 was no impediment to his arranging it accord- 
 ing to a plan of his own. It was a great dingy 
 house with a quantity of dim side window and 
 blank back premises, and -it cost his mind a 
 world of trouble so to lay it out as to account 
 
 for every thing in its external appearance. But, - 
 
 this once done, was quite satisfactory, and le 
 rested persuaded that he knew his way about 
 
 — 
 
 —_— ee ee ee 
 
ie Ye ear Wer i 7 
 
 Cae mee OP's pet 
 
 \ Fie * 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 ‘the house blindfold: from the barred garrets in 
 the high roof, to the two iron extinguishers be- 
 fore the main door—which seemed to request all 
 
 lively visitors to have the kindness to put them- 
 
 selves out, before entering. 
 
 Assuredly, this stall of Silas Wege’s was the 
 hardest little stall of all the sterile little stalls in 
 . London. It gave you the face-ache to look at 
 his apples, the stomach-ache to look at his or- 
 anges, the tooth-ache to look at his nuts. Of 
 the latter commodity he had always a grim lit- 
 tle heap, on which lay a little wooden measure 
 which had no discernible inside, and was con- 
 sidered to represent the penn’orth appointed by 
 Magna Charta.’ Whether from too much east 
 wind or no-—it was an easterly cornerthe stall, 
 fhe stock, and the keeper, were all as dry as the 
 Desert. _Wegg was a knotty man, and a close- 
 grained, with a face carved out of very hard ma- 
 terial, that had just as much play of expression 
 as a watchman’s rattle. -When he laughed, cer- 
 tain jerks occurred in it, and the rattle sprung. 
 Soot to say, he was so wooden a man that he 
 secined| to have taken his wooden leg naturally, 
 and rather suggested to the fanciful observer, 
 that he might be expected—if his dev clopment 
 received no untimely check—to be completely 
 set up with a pair of wooden legs in about six 
 months. 
 
 Mr. Wegg was an observant person, or, as he 
 himself said, ‘* took a powerful sight of notice.” 
 He saluted all his regular passers-by every day, 
 as he sat on his stool backed up by the ‘lamp- 
 post; and on the adaptable character of these 
 salutes he greatly plumed himself. Thus, to 
 the rector, he addressed a bow, compounded of 
 lay deference, and a slight touch of ihe shady 
 preliminary meditation at chureh; to the doc- 
 tor, a confidential bow, as to a gentleman whose 
 acquaintance with his inside he begged respect- 
 fully to acknowledge ; beforg the Quality he de- 
 _ lighted to abase himself ; ; and for Uncle Parker, 
 who was in the army (at least, so he had settled 
 it), he put his open hand to the side of his hat, 
 in a military manner which that angry-eyed, 
 buitoned-up inflammatory-faced old gentleman 
 appeared but imperfectly to appreciate. 
 
 The only article in which Silas dealt, that was 
 not hard, was gingerbread.- On a certain day, 
 some wretched infant having purchased the damp 
 gingerbread-horse (fearfully out of condition), 
 and the adhesive bird-cage, which had been ex- 
 posed for the day’s sale, he had taken a tin box 
 from under his stool to produce a relay of those 
 dreadful specimens, and was going to look in at 
 the lid, when he said to himself, pausing: ‘‘Oh! 
 _ Here you are again!” 
 
 The words referred to a broad, round-shoul- 
 dered, one-sided old fellow in mourning, coming 
 comically ambling toward the corner, dressed in 
 @ pea over-coat, and carrying a large stick. He 
 wore thick shoes, and thick leather gaiters, and 
 thick gloves like a hedger’s. Both as to his dress 
 and to himself he was of an overlapping rhinoc- 
 - eros build, with folds in his cheeks, and his fore- 
 head, and his eyelids, and his lips, and his ears; 
 
 but with bright, eager, childishly-inquiring, gray 
 eyes, under his ragged eyebrows, and _ broad- 
 _ brimmed hat. A very odd-looking old fellow 
 ~ altogether’ 
 _ ‘*Here you are again,” 
 musing. ‘‘And what are you now? 
 
 repeated Mr. Wegg, 
 
 Are you 
 
 35 
 
 in the Funns, or where are you? Have you 
 lately come to settle in this neighborhood, or do 
 you own to another enone ? Are youin 
 independent circumstances, or is it wasting the 
 motions of a bow on you? Come! ll specu- 
 late!. I'll invest a bow in you!” 
 
 Which Mr. Wegg, having replaced his tin box, 
 accoflingly did, as he rose to bait his ginger- 
 bread- -trap. for some other devoted infant. ‘he 
 
 salute was acknowledged with: 
 
 ‘¢Morning, Sir! Morning! Morning! 
 
 (** Calls me Sir!” said pe Wegg, to himself, 
 ‘¢ Te won't answer. A bow gone!”) 
 
 ** Morning, morning, morning!” 
 
 ‘* Appears to be rather a ’arty old cock, too,” 
 said Mr. Wees, as before. ‘‘Gcod-morning to 
 you, Sir.” 
 
 ‘* Do you remember me, then?” asked his new 
 acquaintance, stopping in his amble, one-sided, 
 before the stall, and speaking in a pouncing way, 
 though with great good-humor. 
 
 “oy have noticed you go past our house, Sir, 
 several times in the course of the last week or so.” 
 
 1? 
 
 ‘‘Qur house,” repeated the other. ‘‘ Mean- 
 ing— ?” 
 “Yes,” said Mr. Wegg, nodding, as the other 
 
 pointed the clumsy forefinger of his right glove 
 at the corner house. 
 
 *““Oh! Now, what,” pursued the old fellow, 
 in an inquisitive manner, carrying his knotted 
 stick in his left arm as if it were a baby, ‘‘ what 
 do they allow you now ?” 
 
 ‘¢Tt’s job work that I do for our house,’ ree 
 turned Silas, dryly, and with reticence; ‘‘it’s 
 not yet brought to an exact allowance.” 
 
 “Oh! It’s not yet brought to an exact al- 
 lowance? No! It’s not yet brought to an exact 
 allowance. Oh!—Morning, morning, morning!” 
 
 ‘* Appears to be rather a cracked old cock,” 
 thought Silas, qualifving his former good opin- 
 ion, as the other ambled off. But, in a moment 
 he was back again with the question: 
 
 ‘* How did you get your wooden leg ?” 
 
 Mr. Wegg replied (tartly to this personal in- 
 quiry), ‘‘In an accident.” 
 
 Do you. hkevterS 
 
 ‘Well! I haven't got to keep it warm,” Mr. 
 Wegg made answer, in a sort of desperation oe- 
 casioned by the singularity of the question. 
 
 ‘*He hasn’t,”’ repeated the other to his knot- 
 ted stick, as he gave it a hug; ‘‘he hasn’t cot— 
 ha !—ha !—to keep it warm! Did you ever hear 
 of the name of Boffin?” 
 
 ‘*No,” said Mr. Wegg, who was growing rest- 
 ive under this examination. ‘I never did hear 
 of the name of Boffin.” 
 
 ‘Do you like it ?” 
 
 ““Why, no,” retorted Mr. Wegg, again ap- 
 proaching desperation ; ‘‘I can’t say I do.” 
 
 ‘‘ Why don’t you like it 2” 
 
 “‘T don’t know why I don’t,” retorted Mr. 
 Wegg, approaching frenzy, ‘‘ but I don’t at all.’ 
 
 ‘*Now, I'l tell you something that'll zis’ 
 you sorry for that,” said the stranger, smiling. 
 ** My name's Boftin.” 
 
 “T can’t help it!” returned Mr. We Im- 
 plying in his manner the offensive addition, 
 ‘and if I could, I wouldn't.” 
 
 ‘‘But there’s another chance for you,” said 
 Mr. Boffin, smiling still; ‘‘ Do you like the name 
 of Nicodemus? Thinkitover. Nick, or Noddy.” 
 
 ‘Tt is not, Sir,” Mr. Wegg 1ejuined, as he sat 
 
55 
 
 a an 
 
 36 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 down on his stool, with an air of gentle resigna- | 
 
 tion, combined with melancholy candor; ‘‘it is 
 not a name as I could wish any one.that I had 
 a respect for, to call me by; but there may be 
 persons that would not view it with the same ob- 
 
 -Jections.—I don’t know why,” Mr. Wegg added, 
 
 anticipating another question. 
 
 “‘ Noddy Boftin,” said that gentleman. “?Nod- 
 dy. ‘That’s my name. Noddy—or Nick—Bof- 
 What’s your name ?” 
 
 “Silas Wegg.—I don’t,” said Mr. Wegg, 
 Being himself to take the same precaution 
 as before, ‘*I don’t know why Silas, and I don’t 
 know why Wegg.” 
 
 ‘¢Now, Wegg,” said Mr. Boffin, hugging his 
 stick closer, ‘‘T want to make a sort of offer to 
 you. Do you remember when you first see me?” 
 
 The wooden Wegg looked at him with a med- 
 itative eye, and also with a softened air as de- 
 serying possibility of profit. ‘Let me think. I 
 ain’t quite sure, and yet I generally take a pow- 
 erful sight of notice, too. Was it on a Monday 
 morning, when the butcher-boy had been to our 
 
 =? 
 
 house for orders, and bought a ballad of me, 
 
 which, being unacquainted with the tune, I run | 
 
 it over to him?”, 
 
 ‘‘Right, Wegg, 
 than one.” 
 
 ‘“Yes to be sure, Sir; he bought several; and 
 wishing to lay out his money to-the best, he took 
 my opinion to guide his choice, and we went over 
 the collection together. ‘Io be sure we did. 
 Here was him as it might be, and here was my- 
 self as it might be, and there was you, Mr. Boffin, 
 as you identically are, with vour self-same stick 
 under your very same arm, and your very same 
 back toward us. ‘To—be—sure!” added Mr. 
 Wegg, looking a little round Mr. Boffin, to take 
 him in the rear, and identify this last extraordi- 
 nary coincidence, ‘‘ your wery self-same back.’ 
 
 ‘What do you think I was doing, Wegg ?” 
 
 “T should judge, Sir, that you might be glan- 
 cing your eye down the street.’ 
 
 ‘‘No, Wegg. I was a-listening, 
 
 ‘Was you, indeed?” said Mr. Wegg, dubi- 
 Susiv. 
 
 ‘¢Not in a dishonorable way, Wegg, because 
 you was singing to the butcher; and you wouldn’ t 
 sing secrets to a butcher in the street, you know.’ 
 
 ‘“It never happened that I did so yet, to the 
 best of my remembrance,” said Mr. Wegg, cau- 
 tiously. ‘* But I might do it. A man can’t 
 say what he might wish to do some day or an- 
 other.” (This, not to release any little advant- 
 age he might derive from Mr. Boffin’s avowal.) 
 
 ‘¢Well,’’ repeated Boffin, ‘‘I was a-listening 
 to you and to him. And what do you—you 
 haven’t got another stool, have you? I’m rath- 
 er thick in my breath.” 
 
 ‘‘T haven’t got another, but. you’re welcome 
 to this; said Wegg, resigning it. ‘It’s a treat 
 to me to stand.”’ - 
 
 “Lard!” exclaimed Mr. Boffin, in a tone of 
 great enjoyment, as he settled himself down, 
 still nursing his stick like a baby, ‘‘it’s a pleas- 
 ant place, this! And then to be shut in on each 
 side, with these ballads, like so many book-leaf 
 blinkers!) Why, it’s delightful ?”’ 
 
 ‘¢Tf J am not mistaken, Sir,’ Mr. Wegg deli- 
 cately hinted, resting a hand on his stall, and 
 bending over the discursive Boffin, ‘‘ you alluded 
 to some offer or another that was in your mind ?” 
 
 right! But he bought more 
 
 ? 
 
 ‘I’m coming to it! Allright. I’m coming 
 to it! I was going to say that when [I listen- 
 ed that morning, I listened with hadmiration 
 amounting tohaw. I thought to myself, ‘Here’s a 
 man with a wooden leg—a literary mar. with—’” 
 
 ‘*N—not exactly so, Sir,” said Mr. Wegg. 
 
 ‘¢Why, you know every one of these songs by 
 name and by tune, and if you want to read or 
 to sing any one on ’em off straight, yon’ve only 
 to whip on your spectacles and do it! ! cried Mr. 
 Boftin. ‘¢I see you at it!” 
 
 - Well, Sir,” returned Mr. Wegg, with a con- 
 scious inclination of the head; ‘‘ we’ll say liter- 
 ary, then.” ; 
 
 “A literary man—with a wooden leg—and 
 all Print is open to him?!’ That’ s what I thonghy 
 to myself, that morning,” pursued Mr. Boffin, 
 leaning forward to describe, uncramped by the 
 clothes-horse, as Jarge an are as his right arm 
 could make; ‘‘‘all Print is open to him!’ 
 
 ‘sis. ‘*'That ain’t no word for it. 
 
 it is, ain’t it?” 
 
 ‘Why, truly, Sir,” Mr. Wegg admitted, with 
 modesty; “I helieve you couldn’t show me the 
 piece of English print that I wouldn’t be equal 
 to collaring and throwing.” 
 
 “*On the spot ?” said Mr. Boffin. 
 
 “*On the spot.” 
 
 ‘“‘T know’d it! Then consider this. Here 
 am J, a man without a wooden leg, and yet all 
 print is shut to me.” 
 
 ‘‘ Indeed, Sir?” Mr. Wegg returned with in- 
 creasing self-complacency. ‘‘ Education neg- 
 lected ?”’ 
 
 ‘¢ Neg—lected!” repeated Boffin with empha- 
 I don’t mean 
 to say but what if you showed me a B, I could 
 
 fin.” 
 
 “¢Come, come, Sir,’ said Mr. Wegg, throwing 
 in a little encouragement, ‘‘that’s something, 
 too.” ‘ 
 
 ‘¢Tr’s something,” answered Mr. Boffin, ‘‘ but 
 Ill take my oath it ain’t much.” 
 
 ef Perhaps it’s not as much as could be wish-. 
 ed by an inquiring mind, Sir,” Mr. Wegg ad- 
 mitted. 
 
 ‘¢ Now, look here. I’m retired from business, 
 Me and Mrs. Boffin—Henerictty Boffin—which 
 her father’s name was Henery, and her mother’s 
 name was Hetty, and so yon get it—we live on 
 a compittance, under the will of a diseased gov- 
 ernor.” 
 
 ‘‘Gentleman dead, Sir?” 
 
 Man alive, don’t I tell you? 
 governor ? 
 
 A diseased 
 
 mar-books. 
 I want to take it easy. But I want some read- 
 ing—some fine bold reading, some splendid book 
 in a gorging Lord Mayor’s-Show of wollumes” 
 (probably meaning gorgeous, but misled by as- 
 
 | pint of view, and take time to go by you. How — 
 ‘can I get that reading, Wegg? By,” tapping — 
 him on the breast with the head of his. thick 
 | stick, ‘‘ paying a man truly qualified to do it, so 
 | much an hour (say twopence) to come and do 
 it.” 
 
 ‘“‘Hem! Flattered, Sir, I am sure,” said 
 Wegg, beginning to regard himself in quite a 
 new light. ‘‘Hem! 
 i tioned, Sir?” 
 
 Now, it’s too late for me to begin — 
 shoveling and sifting at alphabeds and gram- | 
 I’m getting to be a old bird, and © 
 
 This is the offer you men- | 
 
 And | 
 
 so far give you change for it, as to answer Bof- -— 
 o ; “vd 
 
 ” 
 
 sociation of ideas); ‘‘as'll reach right down your i 
 
ew 
 Yes, Do you like it?” 
 
 ‘¢T am considering of it, Mr. Boffin.” 
 
 “‘T don’t,” said Boffin, in a free-handed man- 
 ner, ‘‘ want to tie a literary man—wzth a wood- 
 en leg—down too tight. A half-penny an hour 
 sha’n’t part us. The hours are your own to 
 choose, after you’ve done for the day with your 
 house here. I[ live over Maiden Lane way—out 
 Holloway direction—and you’ve only got to go 
 East-and-by-North when. you’ve finished here, 
 and you're there. ‘Twopence half-penny an 
 hour,” said Boffin, taking a piece of chalk from 
 his pocket and getting off the stool to work the 
 sum on the top of it in his own way; ‘‘two 
 long’uns and a short’?un—twopence half-penny ; 
 two short’uns is a long’un and two long’uns is 
 four long’uns—making five long’uns; six nights 
 a week at five long’uns a night,” scoring them 
 all down separately, ‘‘and you mount up to 
 thirty long’uns. A round’un! Half a crown!” 
 
 Pointing to this result as a large and satis- 
 factory one, Mr. Boffin smeared it out with his 
 moistened glove, and sat down on the remains. 
 
 “Half a crown,” said Wegg, meditating. 
 ‘Yes. (It ain’t much, Sir.) Half a crown.” 
 
 **Per week, you know.” 
 
 “Per week. Yes.* As to the amount of 
 strain upon the intellect now. Was you think- 
 
 ing at all of poetry ?”” Mr. Wegg inquired, mus- | 
 
 ing. 
 
 ‘* Would it come dearer ?”?) Mr. Boffin asked. 
 
 “‘It would come dearer,” Mr. Wegg returned. 
 “Vor when a person comes to grind off poetry 
 night after night, it is but right he should expect 
 to be paid for its weakening effect on his mind.” 
 
 **Yo tell you the truth, Wegg,” said Boffin, 
 **T wasn’t thinking of poetry, except in so fur 
 as this:—If you was to happen now and then 
 to feel yourself in the mind to tip me and Mrs. 
 -Boffin one of your ballads, why then we should 
 drop into poetry.” 
 
 **T follow you, Sir,” said Wegg. ‘‘ But not 
 being a regular musical professional, I should 
 be loath to engage myself for‘that ; and there- 
 fore when I dropped into poetry, I should ask 
 to be considered so fur, in the light of a friend.” 
 _ At this, Mr. Boffin’s eyes sparkled, and he 
 shook Silas earnestly by the hand: protesting 
 that it was more than he could have asked, and 
 that he took it very kindly indeed. 
 
 ‘*What do you think of the terms, Wegg ?” 
 Mr. Boffin then demanded, with unconcealed 
 anxiety. 
 
 Silas, who had stimulated this anxiety by his 
 hard reserve of manner, and who had begun to 
 
 understand his man very well, replied with an 
 air; as if he were saying something extraordi- 
 narily generous and great: 
 
 _ ** My. Boffin, I never bargain.’’ 
 
 **So I should have thought of you!” said Mr. 
 Boffin, admiringly. 
 
 eo ‘*No, Sir. I never did ’aggle and I never 
 “will *aggle. Consequently I meet you at once, 
 free and fair, with Done, for double the 
 money !” 
 
 Mr. Boffin seemed a little unprepared for this 
 conclusion, but assented, with the remark, ‘‘ You 
 know better what it ought to be than I do, 
 ’ Wegg,” and again shook hands with him upon 
 lt 
 
 “Could you begin to-night, Wegg?” he then 
 demanded, 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 37 
 
 “Yes, Sir,” said Mr. Wegg, careful to leave 
 all the eagerness to him. ‘‘I see no difficulty 
 if you wish it. You are provided with the need- 
 ful implement—a book, Sir?” 
 
 ‘Bought him at a sale,”*said Mr. Boffin. 
 ‘‘Eight wollumes. Red and gold. Purphk rib- 
 bon in every wollume, to keep the place where 
 you leave off. Do you know him?” 
 
 “The book’s name, Sir ?” inquired Silas. 
 
 **T thought you might have know’d him with- 
 out it,” said Mr. Boffin slightly disappointed. 
 
 i’ His name is Decline-And-Fall-Off-The-Roo- : 
 
 shan-Empire.” (Mr. Boftin’ went over these 
 
 stones slowly, and with much caution.) 
 
 ‘Ay indeed!” said Mr. Wegg, nodding his 
 head with an air of friendly recognition. 
 
 “You know him, Wegg ?”’ 
 
 ‘I haven’t been not to say right slap through 
 him, very lately,” Mr. Wegg made answer, 
 ‘‘having been otherways employed, Mr. Boffin. 
 But know him? Old familiar declining and 
 
 falling off the Rooshan? Rather, Sir! Ever 
 since [ was not so high as your stick. Ever 
 
 since my eldest brother left our cottage to enlist 
 into the army. On which occasion, as the bal- 
 lad that was made about it describes : 
 ‘6 Beside that enttage door, Mr. Boffin, 
 A girl was on her knees; 
 She held aloft a snowy scarf, Sir, 
 Which qny eldest brother noticed) fluttered in the 
 breeze. 
 She breathed a prayer for him, Mr. Boffin; 
 A prayer he coold not hear. 
 And my eldest brother lean’d upon his sword, Mr. Boffin, 
 And wiped away a tear.” 
 
 Much impressed by this family circumstance, 
 and also by the friendly disposition of Mr. Wegg, 
 as exemplified in his so soon dropping into po- 
 etry, Mr. Boftin again shook hands with that 
 ligneous sharper, and besought him to name his 
 hour. Mr. Wegg named eight. 
 
 ‘¢ Where I live,” said Mr. Boffin, ‘‘is called 
 The Bower. Boffin’s Bower is the name Mrs. 
 Boffin.christened.it when we come into it as a 
 property. If you should meet with any body 
 that don’t know it by that name (which hardly 
 any body does), when you’ve got nigh upon about 
 a odd mile, or say and a quarter if you like, up 
 Maiden Lane, Battle Bridge, ask for Harmony 
 Jail, and you'll be put right. I shall expect 
 you, Wegg,” said Mr. Boffin, clapping him on 
 the shoulder with the greatest enthusiasm, ‘* most 
 jyfully. I shall have no peace or patience till 
 you come. Print is now opening ahead of me. 
 This night, a literary man—with a wooden leg—” 
 he bestowed an admiring look upon that decora- 
 tion, as if it greatly enhanced the relish of Mr. 
 Wegg’s attainments—‘‘ will begin to lead me a 
 new life! My fist again, Wegg. Morning, 
 morning, morning!” 
 
 Left alone at his stall as the other ambled off, 
 Mr. Wegg subsided into his screen, produced a 
 small pocket-lIfandkerchief of a penitentially- 
 scrubbing character, and took himself by the 
 nose with a thoughtful aspect. Also, while he 
 still grasped that feature, he directed several 
 thoughtful looks down the street, after the re- 
 tiring figure of Mr. Boffin. But profound gray- 
 ity sat enthroned on Wegg’s countenance. For, 
 while he considered within himself that this was 
 an old fellow of rare simplicity, that this was an 
 opportunity to be improved, and that here might 
 be money to be got beyond present calculation, 
 
 i 
 
38 
 
 still he compromised himself by no admission that 
 his new engagement was at all out of his way, 
 or involved the least element of the ridiculous. 
 Mr. Wegg wonld even have picked a handsome 
 quarrel with any one who should have chal- 
 lenged his deep acquaintance with those afore- 
 said eight volumes of Decline and Fall. His 
 gravity was unusual, portentous, and immeas- 
 urable, not because he admitted any doubt of 
 himself, but because he perceived it necessary to 
 forestall any doubt of himself in others. And 
 herein he ranged with that very numerous class 
 of impostors, who are quite as determined to 
 keep up appearances to themselves, as to their 
 neighbors, 
 
 A certain loftiness, likewise, took possession 
 of Mr. Wegg; a condescending sense of being 
 in request as an official expounder of mysteries. 
 It did not move him to commercial greatness, 
 but rather to littleness, insomuch that if it had 
 been within the possibilities of things for the 
 wooden measure to hold fewer nuts than usual, 
 it would have done so that day. But, when 
 night came, and with her veiled eyes beheld 
 him stumping toward Boffin’s Bower, he was 
 elated too. 
 
 The Bower was as difficult to find as Fair 
 Rosamond’s without the clew. Mr. Wegg, hav- 
 ing reached the quarter indicated, inquired for 
 the Bower half a dozen times without the least 
 success, until he remembered to ask for Har? 
 mony Jail. ‘This occasiuned a quick change in 
 the spirits of a hoarse gentleman and a donkey, 
 whom he had much perplexed. 
 
 ‘Why, yer mean Old Harmon’s, do y@&?” 
 said the hoarse gentleman, who was drivin? his 
 donkey in a truck, with a carrot: for a whip. 
 Ze Why didn’t yer niver say $0? Eddard and 
 me is a goin’ by him! Jump in.’ 
 
 Mr. Wegg complied, and the hoarse gentle- 
 man invited his attention to the third person in 
 company, thus: 
 
 _ ** Now, you look at Eddard’s ears. 
 it as you named, agin? Whisper.” 
 
 Mr. Wegg whispered, ‘‘ Boffin’s Bower.” 
 
 ‘¢Eddard! (keep yer hi on his ears) cut away 
 to Boffin’s Bower !” 
 
 Edward, with his 
 immovable. 
 
 ‘¢Eddard! (keep yer hi on his ears) cut away 
 to Old Harmon’s.” 
 
 Edward instantly pricked up his ears to their 
 utmost, and rattled off at such a pace that Mr. 
 Wegg’s conversation was jolted out of him ina 
 most dislocated state. 
 
 ‘¢Was-it-Ev-verajail?” asked Mr. Wegg, hold- 
 ing on. 
 
 ‘Not proper jail, wot you and me would get 
 committed to,” returned his escort; ‘‘they giv’ 
 it the name, on accounts of Old Harmon living 
 solitary there.” 
 
 ** And-why-did-they-callitharm- Ony 2” asked 
 Wegg. 
 
 “On accounts of his never agreeing, with no- 
 body. Like aspeeches of chaff. Harmon’s Jail; 
 
 Harmony Jail. Working it round like.”’ 
 
 * — ** Doyouknow-Mist-Erboff-in ?” asked Wegg. 
 
 “‘T should think so! Every body do about 
 here. Eddard knows him. (Keep yer hi on his 
 
 ears.) Noddy Bofiin, Eddard!” 
 
 The effect of the name was so very alarming, 
 in respect of causing a ala disappearance 
 
 What was 
 
 ears lying back, remained 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 of Edward’s head, casting his hind hoofs in the 
 air, greatly accelerating the pace and increasing | 
 the jolting, that Mr. Wegg was fain to devote 
 his attention exclusively to holding on, and to. 
 relinquish his desire of ascertaining whether this — 
 homage to Boffin was to be considered compli- — 
 mentary or the reverse. 
 
 Presently, Edward stopped at a gateway, and 
 Wegg discreetly lost no time in slipping out at 
 the back of the truck. The moment he was 
 landed, his late driver, with a wave of the carrot, 
 said, ‘* Supper, Eddard !” and he, the hind hoofs, 
 the truck, and Edward, all seemed to fly into the 
 air together, in a kind ‘of apotheosis. 
 
 Pushing the gate, which stood ajar, Weil 
 looked into an inclosed space where certain tall 
 dark mounds rose high against the sky, and 
 where the pathway to the Bower was indicated, 
 as the moonlight showed, between two lines of 
 broken crockery set in ashes. A white figure ad-~ 
 vancing along this path, proved to be nothing 
 more ghostly than Mr. Boffin, easily attired for 
 the pursuit of knowledge, in an undress garment 
 of short white smock-frock. Having received 
 his literary friend with great cordiality, he con- 
 ducted him to the interior of the Bower and 
 there presented him to Mrs. Boffin:—a stout 
 
 | lady of a rubicund and cheerful aspect, dressed 
 
 (to Mr. Wegg’s consternation) in a low evening- 
 dress of sable satin, and a large black velvet hat 
 and feathers. 
 
 ‘*Mrs. Boffin, Wegg,”’ said Boffin, ‘‘is a high- 
 flier at Fashion. And her make is such, that 
 she does it credit. As to myself, I ain’t yet as 
 Fash’nable as I may come to be. Henerietty, 
 old lady, this is the gentleman that’s a-going to 
 decline and fall off the Rooshan Empire.” 
 
 “And I am sure [ hope it’ll do you both 
 good,” said Mrs. Boffin. 
 
 It was the queerest of rooms, fitted and fur- 
 nished more like a luxurious amateur tap-room — 
 than any thing else within the ken of Silas Wegg. 
 ‘There were two wooden settles by the fire, one 
 on either side of it, with a corresponding table 
 before each. On one of these tables the eight 
 volumes were ranged flat, in a row, like a gal- ~ 
 ranic battery; on the other, certain squat case- 
 bottles of inviting appearance seemed to stand 
 on tip-toe to exchange glances with Mr. Wegg — 
 over a front row of tumblers and a basin of white 
 sugar. Qn the hob, a kettle steamed; on the 
 hearth, a cat reposed. Facing the fire between 
 the settles, a sofa, a foot-stool, and a little table, 
 formed a centre-piece devoted to Mrs. Boffin. 
 They were garish in taste and color, but were 
 expensive articles of drawing-room furniture that 
 had a very odd look beside the settles and the 
 flaring gaslight pendent from the ceiling. There 
 was a flowery carpet on the floor; but, instead 
 of reaching to the fireside, its Flowing vegetation 
 stopped short at Mrs. Boftin’s footstool, and gave 
 place to a region of sand and saw-dust. Mi 
 Wegg also noticed, with admiring eyes, that, 
 while the flowery land displayed such hollow 
 ornamentation as stuffed birds and waxen fruits 
 
 under glass-shades, there were, in the, territory 
 
 where vegetation ceased, compensatory shelves 
 on which the best part of a large pie and like-~ 
 wise of a cold joint were plainly discernible 
 among other solids. The room itself was large, 
 though low; and the heavy frames of its old-— 
 fashioned windows, and the heavy beams in its — 
 
 * 
 Us 
 
crooked ceiling, seemed to indicate that it had 
 once been a house of some mark standing alone 
 in the country. 
 
 _ **Do you like it, Wegg?” asked Mr. Boffin, 
 in his pouncing manner. 
 
 ‘**LT admire it greatly, Sir,” said Wegg. 
 
 _ euliar comfort at this fireside, Sir.” 
 ‘Do you understand it, Wegg ?” 
 
 *“ Why, in a general way, Sir,” Mr. Wegg was 
 beginning slowly and knowingly, with his head 
 stuck on one side, as evasive people do begin, 
 when the other cut him short: 
 
 **You don’t understand it, Wegg, and I’ll ex- 
 plainit. These arrangements is made by mutual 
 consent between Mrs. Boffinand me. Mrs. Bof- 
 fin, as I’ve mentioned, is a highflier at Fashion; 
 at present 1m not. Idon’tgo higher than com- 
 fort, and comfort of the sort that I’m equal to 
 the enjyment of. Well then. Where would be 
 the good of Mrs. Boffin and me quarreling over 
 
 it? We never did quarrel, befure we come 
 into Boffin’s Bower as a property; why quarrel 
 
 when we have come into Boffin’s Bower as a 
 property? So Mrs. Boffin, she keeps up her 
 part of the room, in her way; I keep up my 
 part of the room in mine. 
 which we have at once, Sociability (I should go 
 melancholy mad without Mrs. Boftin), Fashion, 
 and Comfort. If I get by degrees to be a high- 
 er-flicr at Fashion, then Mrs. Boffin will by de- 
 grees come for’arder. If Mrs. Boffin should 
 ever be less of a dab at Fashion than she is at 
 the present time, then Mrs. Boffin’s carpet would 
 go back’arder. If we should both continny as 
 we are, why then here we are, and give us a kiss, 
 old lady.” 
 
 Mrs. Boffin, who, perpetually smiling, had 
 approached and drawn her plump arm through 
 
 cher lord’s, most willingly complied. Fashion, 
 in the form of her black velvet hat and feathers, 
 tried to preventsit; but got deservedly crushed 
 
 in the endeavor. 
 
 “So now, Wegg,” said Mr. Boffin, wiping his 
 mouth with an air of much refreshment, ‘‘you 
 begin to know us as we are. ‘This is a charm- 
 ing spot, is the Bower, but you must get to ap- 
 prechiate it by degrees. It’s a spot to find out 
 the merits of, little by little, and a new’un every 
 day. There's a serpentining walk up each of 
 the mounds, that gives you the yard and neigh- 
 borhood changing every moment. When you 
 get to the top, there’s a view of the neighboring 
 premises, not to be surpassed. The premises 
 of Mrs. Boffin’s late father (Canine Provision 
 Trade), you look down into, as if they was your 
 own. And the top of the High Mound is crowned 
 with a lattice-work Arbor, in which, if you don’t 
 read out loud many a book in the summer, ay, 
 and as a friend, drop many atime into poetry too, 
 it sha’n’t be my fault. Now, what'll you read on?” 
 
 “Thank you, Sir,” returned Wegg, as if there 
 
 _Were nothing new in his reading at all. ‘I gen- 
 erally do it on gin and water.” 
 
 ‘Keeps the organ moist, does it, Wegg?” 
 asked Mr. Boffin, with innocent eagerness. 
 
 ** N-no, Sir,” replied Wegg, coolly, ‘‘I should 
 hardly describe it so, Sir. I should say, mellers 
 it, Mellers it, is the word I should employ, Mr. 
 Boffin.” ‘grat 
 
 His wooden conceit and craft kept exact pace 
 with the delighted expectation of his victim. 
 The visions rising before his mercenary mind, 
 
 (35 Pe. 
 
 [ 
 
 In consequence of, 
 
 OUR MUTUAL-FRIEND, 
 
 | organ.” 
 
 a 
 
 38 
 
 pf the many ways in which this connection was 
 to be turned to account, never obscured the fore » 
 most idea natural to a dull overreaching man, 
 that he must not make himself too cheap. 
 
 Mrs. Boffin’s Fashion, as a less inexorable 
 deity than the idol usually worshiped under that 
 name, did not forbid her mixing for her literary 
 guest, or asking if he found ‘the result to his 
 liking. On his returning a gracious answer 
 and taking his place at the literary settle, Mr. 
 Boffin began to compose himself as a listener, at 
 the opposite settle, with exultant eyes. 
 
 ‘Sorry to deprive you of a pipe, Wegg,” he 
 said, filling his own, ‘t but you can’t do both to- 
 gether. Oh! and another thing I forgot. to 
 name! When you come in here of an evening, 
 and look round you, and notice any thing on a 
 shelf that happens to catch your fancy, mention 
 1h? 
 
 Wegg, who had heen going to put on his 
 spectacles, immediately laid them down, with 
 the sprightly observation: 
 
 ‘You read my thoughts, Sir, Do my eves 
 deceive me, or is that object up there a—a pie? 
 It can’t be a pie.” 
 
 ‘Yes, it’s a pic, Wegg,” replied Mr. Boffin, 
 with a glance of some little discomfiture at the 
 Decline and Fall. 
 
 ‘‘Have I lost my smell for fruits, or is it a 
 apple-pie, Sir?” asked Wegg. 
 
 **It’s a veal and ham pie,” said Mr. Boffin. 
 
 *‘Is it indeed, Sir? And it would be hard, 
 ‘Sir, to name the pie that is a better pie than a 
 weal and hammer,” said Mr. Wegg, nodding 
 his head emotionally. 
 
 ‘‘ Have some, Wegg ?” 
 
 ‘Thank you, Mr. Boffin, I think I will, at 
 your invitation. I wouldn’t at any other party’s, 
 at the present juncture; but at yours, Sir! 
 And meaty jelly too, especially when a little 
 salt, which is the case where there’s ham, is 
 mellering to the organ, is very mellering to the 
 Mr. Wegg did not say what organ, 
 but spoke with a cheerful generality. 
 
 So the pie was brought down, and the worthy 
 Mr. Boffin exercised his patience until Wegg, in 
 the exercise of his knife and fork, had finished 
 the dish: only profiting by the opportunity to 
 inform Wegg that, although it was not strictly 
 Fashionable to keep the contents of @ larder 
 thus exposed to view, he (Mr. Boffin) considered 
 it hospitable; for the reason, that instead of say- 
 ing, in a comparatively nnmeaning manner, to a 
 visitor, ‘There are such and such edibles down 
 stairs ; will you have any thing up?’ yon took 
 the bold practical course of saying, ‘Cast your 
 eye along the shelves, and, if you see any thing 
 you like there, haye it down.’ ” 
 
 And now, Mr. Wegg at length pushed. away 
 his plate and put on his spectacles, and Mr. 
 Boffin lighted his pipe and looked with beaming 
 eves into the opening world before him, and Mrs. 
 Boffin reclined in a fashionable manner on her 
 sofa: as one who would be part of the audience 
 if she found she could, and would go to sleep if 
 she found she couldn’t. 
 
 ‘*Hem!” began Wegg, ‘‘This, Mr. Boffin and 
 Lady, is the first chapter of the first wollume of 
 the Decline and Fall off—” hey he looked fiard 
 at the book, and stopped. © ; 
 
 ‘¢ What’s the matter, Wegg ?” 
 
 ‘¢ Why, it comes into my mind, do you know, 
 
40. 
 
 Sir,” said Wegg, with an air of insinuating 
 frankness (having first again looked hard at the 
 book), ‘‘that you made a little mistake this 
 morning, which I had meant to set you right 
 in, only something put it out of my head. I 
 think you said Rooshan Empire, Sir?” 
 
 ‘It is Rooshan; ain’t it, Wegg ?” 
 
 “No, Sir. Roman. Roman.” 
 
 ‘CWhat’s the difference, Wegg ?” 
 
 “The difference, Sir?” Mr. Wegg was fal- 
 tering and in danger of breaking down, when a 
 bright thought flashed upon him, ‘The differ- 
 ence, Sir? There you place me in a difficulty, 
 Mr. Boftin. Suffice it to observe, that the dif- 
 ference is best postponed to some other oceasion 
 when Mrs. Boffin does not honor us witi. her 
 company. In Mrs. Boffin’s presence, Sir, we 
 had better drop it.” 
 
 Mr, Wegg thus came out of his disadvantage 
 with quite a chivalrous air, and not only that, 
 but by dint of repeating with a manly delicagy, 
 ‘‘In Mrs. Boffin’s presence, Sir, we had better 
 
 drop it!’ turned the disadvantage on Boffin, who | 
 
 felt that he had’ committed himself in a very 
 painful manner. 
 
 Then, Mr. Wegg, in a dry unflinching way, 
 entered on his task; going straight across coun- 
 try at every thing that came before him ; taking 
 all the hard words, biographical.and geograph- 
 ical ;getting rather shaken by Hadhian, ‘Trajan, 
 and the Antonines; stumbling at Polybius (pro- 
 nounced Polly Beeious, and supposed by Mr. 
 Boftin to be a Roman virgin, and by Mrs. Boffins 
 to be responsible for that necessity of dropping 
 it); heavily unseated by Titus Antoninus Pius ; 
 up again and galloping smoothly with Augustus ; 
 finally, getting over the ground well with Com- 
 modus: who, unde: the appellation of Commo- 
 dious, was held by Mr. Boftin to have been quite 
 wnworthy of his English origin, and ‘‘not to 
 have acted up to his name” in his government of 
 the Roman people. With the death of this per- 
 sonage, Mr. Wegg terminated his first reading 5 
 long before which consummation several total 
 eclipses of Mrs. Boffin’s candle behind her black 
 velyet disk, would have been very alarming, but 
 for being regularly accompanied by a potent 
 smell of burnt pens when her feathers took fire, 
 which acted as a restorative and woke her. Mr. 
 Weeg, having read on by rote and attached as 
 fa ideas as possible to the text, came out of the 
 encounter fresh; but, Mr. Boffin, who had soon 
 laid down his unfinished pipe, and had ever since 
 sat intently staring with his eyes and mind at 
 the confounding enormities of the Romans, was 
 so severely punished that he could hardly wish 
 his literary friend Good-night, and articulate 
 ‘¢'l'o-morrow.” 
 
 ‘« Commodious,”’ gasped Mr. Boffin, staring at 
 the moon, after letting Wegg out at the. gate 
 and fastening it: ‘‘Commodious fights in that 
 wild-beast-show, seven hundred and thirty-five 
 times, in one character-only! As if that wasn’t 
 stunning enough, a hundred lions is turned into 
 the. same wild-beast-show all at once! Asif that 
 wasn’t stunning enough, Commodious, in another 
 character, kills ’em all off in a hundred goes! 
 As if that wasn’t stunning enough, Vittle-us (and 
 well named too)gats six millions’ worth, English 
 money, in seven months! Wegg takes it easy, 
 but upon-my-soul to a old bird like myself these 
 are scarers, And even now that Commodious is 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 strangled, I don’t see a way to our bettering our- _ 
 selves.” Mr. Boffin added, as he turned his pen. 
 sive steps toward the Bower and shook his head, 
 ‘¢T didn’t think this morning there was half so 
 many Scarers in Print. But I’m in for it ngw " 
 
 — 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 CUT ADRIFT. 
 
 Tue Six Jolly Fellowship - Porters, already 
 mentioned as atavern of a dropsical appearance, 
 had long settled down into a state of hale infirm- 
 ity. Inits whole constitution it had nota straight 
 floor, and hardly a straight line; but it had out- 
 lasted, and clearly would yet outlast, many a 
 better-trimmed building, many a sprucer public 
 house. Externally, it was a narrow lopsided 
 wooden jumble of corpulent windows heaped one 
 upon another as you might heap as many top> — 
 pling oranges, with a crazy wooden veranda — 
 impending over the water; indeed the whole 
 house, inclusive of the complaining flag-staff on 
 the roof, impended over the water, but seemed — 
 to have got into the condition of a faint-hearted — 
 diver who has paused so long on the brink that — 
 he will never go in at all, : a 
 
 This description applies to the river-frentage 
 of the Six Jolly Fellowship-Porters. The back 
 of the establishment, though the chief entrance 
 was there, so contracted that it merely repre- 
 sented in its connection with the front, the han-_ 
 dle of a flat-iron set upright on its broadest end. 
 This handle stood at the bottom of a wilderness 
 of court and alley: which wilderness pressed so 
 hard and close upon the Six Jolly Fellowship- 
 
 Porters as to leave the hostelry not an inch of — 
 
 ground beyond its door. For this reason, in. 
 combination with the fact that the house was” 
 all but afloat at high-water, when the Porters 
 had a family wash the linen subjected to that 
 operation might usually be seen drying on lines” 
 stretched across the reception-rooms and bed+ 
 chambers. 
 
 The wood forming the chimney-pieces, beams, — 
 partitions, floors and doors, of the Six Jolly Fel- 
 lowship-Porters, seemed in its old age franght 
 with confused memories of its youth. In many 
 
 places it had become gnarled and riven, accord- 
 
 ing to the manner of old trees; knots started ont 
 of it; and here and there it seemed to twist 1t-— 
 self into some likeness of boughs. In this state 
 
 of second childhood it had an air of being in its 
 
 own way garrulous about its early life. Not 
 without reason was it often asserted by the reg- 
 ular frequenters of the Porters, that when the™ 
 light shone full upon the grain of certain panels, 
 and particularly upon an old corner cupboard of © 
 walnut-wood in the bar, you might trace little 
 forests there, and tiny trees like the parent tree, 
 in full umbrageous leaf. 
 The bar of the Six Jolly Fellowship-Porters” 
 was a bar to soften the buman breast. The 
 available space in it was not much larger than a 
 hackney-coach; but no one could have wished 
 the bar bigger, that space was so girt in by cor-_ 
 pulent little casks, and by cordial-bottles radiant 
 with fictitious grapes in bunches, and by lemons 
 in nets, and by biscuits in baskets, and by the 
 polite beer-pulls that made low bows when cus~ 
 tomers were served with beer, and by the cheese 
 
 aa 
 : 
 
-in/a snug corner, and by the landlady’s own 
 small table in a snugger corner near the fire, 
 with the cloth everlastingly laid. This haven 
 was divided from the rough world by a glass 
 partition and a half door, with a leaden sill upon 
 ,it for the convenience of resting your liquor ; 
 - but, over this half door the bar’s snugness so 
 - gushed forth, that, albeit customers drank there 
 standing, in a dark and draughty passage where 
 they were shouldered by other customers passing 
 in and out, they always appeared to drink under 
 an enchanting delusion that they were in the bar 
 itself. 
 Hor the rest, both the tap and parlor of the 
 Six Jolly Fellowship-Porters gave upon the river, 
 .and had red curtains matching the noses of the 
 _ regular customers, and were provided with com- 
 Jortable fireside tin utensils, like models of sugar- 
 louf hats, made in that shape that they might, 
 with their pointed ends, seek out for themselves 
 glowing nooks in the depths of the red coals, 
 when they mulled your ale, or heated for you 
 those delectable drinks, Purl, Flip, and Dog’s 
 Nose. ‘The first of these humming compounds 
 was a specialty of the Porters, whieh, through 
 an inscription on its door-posts, gently appealed 
 
 to your feelings as, ‘‘The Early Purl House.” 
 
 For, it would seem that Purl must always be 
 taken early; though whether for any more dis- 
 tinctly stomachic reason than that, as the early 
 bird catches the worm, so the early purl catches 
 the customer, can not here be resolved. It only 
 remains to add that in the handle of the flat- 
 iron, and opposite the bar, was a very little. room 
 like a three-cornered hat, into which no direct 
 ¥ay of sun, moon, or star, ever penetrated, but 
 which was superstitiously regarded as a sanctu- 
 ary replete with comfort and retirement by gas- 
 Tight, and on the door of which was therefore 
 painted its alluring name: Cozy. 
 
 Miss Potterson, sole proprietor and manager 
 of the Fellowship-Porters, reigned supreme on 
 her throne, the Bar, and a man must have drunk 
 himself mad drunk indeed if he thought he could 
 
 contest a point with her. Being known on her 
 own authority as Miss Abbey Potterson, some 
 water-side heads, which (like the water) were 
 none of the clearest, harbored muddled notions 
 that, because of her dignity and firmness, she 
 Was named after, or in some sort related to, the 
 Abbey at Westminster. But, Abbey was only 
 short for Abigail, by which name Miss Potter- 
 son had been christened at Limehouse Church, 
 some sixty and odd years_before. 
 
 ** Now, you mind, you Riderhood,” said Miss 
 Abbey Potterson, with emphatic forefinger over 
 the half door, ‘‘the Fellowships don’t want you 
 at all, and would rather by far have your room 
 than your company ; but if you weré as welcome 
 here as you are not, you shouldn’t even then have 
 another drop of drink here this night, after this 
 present pint of beer. So make the most of it:? 
 
 “But you know, Miss Potterson,” this was 
 suggested very meekly though, ‘if I behave my- 
 self, you can’t help serving me, miss.” 
 
 _ * Can't 1!” said Abbey, with infinite expres- 
 sion. 
 
 *‘No, Miss Potterson ; because, you see, the 
 law—” We 
 
 “Lam the law here, my man,” returned Miss 
 Abbey, ‘‘and I’ll soon convince you of that, if 
 you doubt it at all.” 
 
 we 
 
 4 
 , 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 ship-Porters is not to be free to 
 
 “41 
 ‘“‘I never said I did doubt it at all, Miss 
 Abbey.” 
 
 ‘So much the better for you.” 
 
 Abbey the supreme threw the customer’s half- 
 pence into the till, and, seating herself in her 
 fireside-chair, resumed the newspaper she had 
 been reading. She was a tall, upright, well- 
 favored woman, though severe of countenance, 
 and had more of the air of a schoolmistress than 
 mistress of the Six Jolly Fellowship - Porters, 
 The man on the other side of the half door was 
 a water-side man with a squinting leer, and he 
 eyed her as if he were one of her pupils in dis- 
 grace. : 
 
 ‘* You're cruel hard upon me, Miss Potterson.” 
 
 Miss Potterson read her newspaper with con- 
 tracted brows, and took no notice until he whis« 
 pered: 
 
 ‘Miss Potterson! Ma’am! 
 half a word with you?” 
 
 Deigning then to turn her eyes sideways to- 
 ward the suppliant; Miss Potterson beheld him 
 knuckling his low forehead, and ducking at her 
 with his head, as if he were asking leave to fling 
 himself head foremost. over the half door and 
 alight on his feet in the bar, . 
 
 ‘* Well?” said Miss Potterson, with a manner 
 as short as she herself was lung, “ say your half 
 word. Bring it out.” 
 
 ‘Miss VPotterson! Ma’am! Wonul# you 
 *sxcuse me taking the liberty of asking, is it my 
 character that you take objections to?” 
 
 ‘* Certainly,” said Miss Potterson. 
 
 “Is it that yowre afraid of —” 
 
 “Iam not afraid of you,” interposed Miss 
 Potterson, ‘if you mean that.” 
 
 ** But I humbly don’t mean that, Miss Abbey.” 
 
 **Then what do you mean ?” 
 
 “You really are so cruel hard upon me! 
 What I was going to make inquiries was no 
 more than, might you have any apprehensions 
 — leastways beliefs or Suppositions — that the 
 company’s property mightn’t be altogether to he 
 
 Might I have 
 
 considered safe, if I used the house too regular ?’”” 
 
 ** What do you want to know for?” 
 
 ‘Well, Miss Abbey, respectfully meaning no, 
 offense to you, it would-be some satisfaction to. 
 & man’s mind to understand why the Fellow- 
 such as me, and 
 is to be free to such as Gaffer.” 
 
 The face of the hostess darkened with some 
 shadow of perplexity, as she replied: ‘Gaffer 
 has never been where you have been.” 
 
 ‘Signifying in Quod, Miss ? Perhaps not. 
 But he may have merited it. He may be sus-. 
 pected of far worse than ever I was.” 
 
 ‘* Who suspects him ?” 
 
 ‘‘Many, perhaps. One, beyond all doubts. 
 I do.” : 
 
 ** You are not much,” said Miss Abbey Pot-. 
 terson, knitting her brows again with disdain. 
 
 ‘But I was his pardner. Mind yon, Miss. 
 Abbey, I was his pardner. As such I know 
 more of the ins and outs of him than any person 
 living does. Notice this!’ I am the man that 
 was his pardner, and I am the man that sus- 
 pects him.” : 
 
 ‘*'Then,”’ suggested Miss Abhey, though with, 
 a deeper shade of perplexity than before, * you 
 criminate yourself.” 
 
 ‘*No I don’t, Miss Abbey. For how does it 
 stand? It stands this way. When I was hig 
 
42 
 
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 AT THE BAR. 
 
 pardner, I couldn’t never give him satisfaction. | 
 Why couldn't I never give him satisfaction? 
 Because my luck was bad; because I couldn’t 
 fin.] many enough of ’em. How was his luck? 
 Always good. Notice this! Always good! Ah! 
 'There’s a many games, Miss Abbey, in which 
 there’s chance, but there’s a many others in) 
 which there’s skill too, mixed along with it.” 
 ‘That Gaffer has a skill in finding what he 
 finds, who doubts, man?” asked Miss Abbey. 
 ‘CA skill in purwiding what he finds, per- 
 haps,” said Riderhood, shaking his evil head. 
 Miss Abbey knitted her brow at him, as he 
 darkly leered ateher. 
 ‘<Tf you're ont upon the river pretty nigh ev- 
 ery tide, and if you want to find a man or woman 
 in the river, you'll greatly help your luck, Miss, 
 
 Abbey, by knocking a man or woman on the 
 head aforehand and pitching ’em in.” . 
 ‘‘Gracious Lud!”) was the involuntary: ex- 
 clamation of Miss Potterson. : 
 ‘Mind you!” returned the other, stretching 
 forward over the half door to throw his words 
 into the bar; for his voice was as if the head of 
 his boat’s mop were down his throat; “I say 
 so, Miss Abbey! And mind you! Vil follow 
 him up, Miss Abbey! And mind you! Vi 
 bring him to book at last, if it’s twenty year 
 hence, I will! Who’s he, to be favored along 
 of his daughter? Ain’t I got a daughter of my 
 own!” oi 
 With that flourish, and seeming to have talked 
 himself rather more drunk and much more fero- 
 cious than he had begun by being, Mr. Rider- 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEN> : 43 
 
 4 
 hood took up his pint pot and swaggered off to 
 the tap-room. 
 
 Gaifer was not there, but a pretty strong mus- 
 
 ter of Miss Abbey’s pupils were, who exhibited, 
 When occasion required, the greatest docility, 
 On the clock’s striking ten, and Miss Abbey’s 
 appearing at the door, and addressing a certain 
 person in a faded scarlet jacket, with George 
 Jones, your time’s up! I told your wife you 
 should be punctual,” Jones submissively rose, 
 gave the company good-night, and retired. At 
 half-past ten, on Miss Abbey’s looking in again, 
 and saying, *¢ William Williams, Bob Glamour, 
 and Jonathan, you are all due,” Williams, Bob, 
 and Jonathan with similar meekness.-took their 
 leave and evaporated. Greater wonder than 
 these, when a bottle-nosed person in a glazed 
 that had after some considerable hesitation or- 
 dered another glass of gin-and-water of the at- 
 _tendant pot-boy, and when Miss Abbey, instead 
 of sending it, gPpeared in person, saying, ‘‘ Cap- 
 tain Joey, you have had as much as will do you 
 good,” not only did the captain feebly rub his 
 knees and contemplate the fire without offering 
 a word of protest, but the rest of the company 
 murmured, ‘‘Ay, ay, Captain, Miss Abbey’s 
 right; you be guided by Miss Abbey, Captain.” 
 Nor was Miss Abbey’s vigilance in anywise abat- 
 ed by this submission, but rather sharpened ; for, 
 ooking round on the deferential faces of her 
 chool, and descrying two other young persons in 
 eed of admonition, she thus bestowed it: ‘‘‘Tom 
 Lootle, it’s time for a young fellow who’s going 
 0 be married next month, to be at home and 
 sleep. And you needn’t nudge him, Mr. Jack 
 Mullins, for.I know your work begins early to- 
 morrow, and I séy the same to you... So.come! 
 Good-night, like good lads!” Upon which, the 
 blushing Tootle looked to Mullins, and the blush- 
 ing Mullins looked to Tootle, on the question 
 who should rife first, and finally both rose to- 
 gether and went out on the broad grin, followed 
 by Miss Abbey; in whose presence the company 
 did not take the liberty of grinning likewise. 
 In such an establishment, the white-aproned 
 
 pot-boy with his shirt-sleeves arranged in a tight | 
 
 roll on each bare shoulder, was a mere hint of 
 
 the possibility of physical force, thrown out as a 
 matter of state and form. ‘Exactly at the closing 
 hour, all the guests who were left filed out in 
 the best order: Miss Abbey standing at the half 
 door of the bar, to hold a ceremony of review 
 and dismissal. All wished Miss Abbey good- 
 night, and Miss Abbey wished good-night to all, 
 except Riderhood. The sapient pot-boy, looking 
 on officially, then had the conviction bornesin 
 upon his soul, that the man was evermore out- 
 cast and excommunicate from the Six Jolly Fel- 
 lowship-Porters. ; 
 
 ** You Bob Glibbery,” said Miss Abbey to this 
 pot-boy, “run round to Hexam’s and tell his 
 daughter Lizzie that { want to speak to her.” 
 
 With exemplary swiftness Bob Glibbery de- 
 parted, and returned. Lizzie, following him, 
 arrived as one of the two female domestics of 
 the Fellowship-Porters arranged on the snug 
 little table by the bar fire Miss Potterson’s Sup 
 per of hot sausages and mashed potatoes. 
 
 _ **Come in and sit ye down, gil,” said Miss 
 Abbey. Can you eat a bit 2” 
 _ “No, thank you, Miss. I have had my sup- 
 
 ARS 
 
 per. 
 
 ““T have had mine too, I think,” said Miss 
 Abbey, pushing away the untasted dish, ‘‘and 
 more than enough of it. Iam put out, Lizzie.” 
 
 ‘*f am very sorry for it, Miss.” 
 
 ‘* Then why, in the name of Goodness,” quoth 
 Miss Abbey, sharply, ‘do you do it?” 
 
 ‘* I do it, Miss!” 
 
 “There, there! Don’t look astonished. I 
 ought to have begun with a word of explanation, 
 but it’s my way to make short cuts at things. [ 
 always was a pepperer. You Bob Glibbery there, 
 put the chain upon the door and get ye down to 
 your supper.” 
 
 With an alacrity that seemed no less referable 
 to the pepperer fact than to the supper fact, Bob 
 obeyed, and his boots were heard descending to- 
 ward the bed of the river. 
 ~ Lizzie Hexam, Lizzie Hexam,”’ then began 
 Miss Potterson, ‘*how often have I held out to 
 you the opportunity of getting clear of your fa- 
 ther, and doing well ?” 
 
 —** Very often, Miss.” 
 
 “Very often? Yes! And I might as well 
 have spoken to the iron funnel of the strongest 
 sca-going steamer that passes the Fellowship- 
 Porters.” 
 
 ‘*No, Miss,” Lizzie pleaded: ‘because that 
 would not be thankful, and I am.” : 
 
 “I vow and declare I am half ashamed of 
 myself for taking such an interest in you,” said 
 Miss Abbey, pettishly, ‘for I don’t believe I 
 should do it if you were not good-looking. Why 
 ain’t you ugly ?” 
 
 Lizzie merely answered this difficult question 
 with an apologetic glance. 
 
 ‘* However, you ain’t,” resumed Miss Pot- 
 terson, ‘‘so it’s no use going into that. I must 
 take you asI find you. Which indeed is what 
 I’ve done. And you mean to say you are still 
 obstinate ?” 
 
 ‘* Not obstinate, Miss, I hope.” 
 
 “Firm (I suppose you call it) then?” 
 
 ** Yes, Miss. Fixed like.” 
 
 ‘‘Never was an obstinate person yet, who 
 would own to the word!” remarked Miss Pot- 
 terson, rubbing her vexed nose; ‘I’m sure I 
 would, if I was obstinate; but Iam a pepperer, 
 which is different. Lizzie Hexam, Lizzie Hex- 
 am, think again. Do you know the worst of your 
 father ?” 
 
 ed, opening her eyes. 
 
 ‘‘Do you know the suspicions to which your 
 father makes himself liable? Do you know the 
 | Suspicions that are actually about against him ?” 
 
 The consciousness of what he habitually did 
 oppressed the girl heavily, and she slowly cast 
 | down her eyes. 
 
 ‘Say, Lizzie. 
 Abbey. 
 
 ‘* Please to tell me what the suspicions are, 
 Miss,” she asked after a’ silence, with her eyes 
 upon the ground. . . 
 
 «It’s not an easy thing to tell a daughter, but 
 ‘it must be told. It is thought by some, then, 
 
 that your father helps to their death a few of 
 those that he finds dead.” 
 
 The relief of hearing what she felt sure was 
 _4 false suspicion, in place of the expected real 
 | and trne one, so lightened Lizzie’s breast for 
 the moment, that Miss Abbey was amazed at 
 | her demeanor, 
 
 Do you know?” urged Miss 
 
 “Do I know the worst of father!” she repeat-_ 
 
 She raised her eyes quickly, . — 
 
 ee 
 
rl 
 
 44 
 | 
 
 shook her head, and, in a kind of triumph, al- 
 
 most laughed. 
 
 ‘¢ They little know father who talk like that!” 
 
 (**She takes it,” thought Miss Abbey, ‘‘ very 
 quietly. She takes it with extraordinary quiet- 
 ness !’”) ; 
 
 ‘« And perhaps,” said Lizzie, as a recollection 
 flashed upon her, ‘‘it is some one who has a 
 grudge against father; some one who has threat- 
 ened father! Is it Riderhood, Miss?” 
 
 ‘Wells yes it. is.” 
 
 “Yes! He was father’s partner, and father 
 broke with him, and now he revenges himself. 
 Father broke with him when I was by, and he 
 was very angry at it, And besides, Miss Ab- 
 bey !—Will you never, without strong reason, 
 let pass your lips what I am going to say?” 
 
 She bent forward to say it in a whisper. 
 
 ‘<1 promise,” said Miss Abbey. 
 
 ‘‘Tt was on the night when the Harmon mur- 
 der was found out, through father, just above 
 bridge. And just below bridge, as we were 
 sculling home, Riderhood crept out of the dark 
 in his boat. And many and many times after- 
 ward, when such great pains were taken to come 
 to the bottom of the crime, and it never could 
 be come near, I thought in my own thoughts, 
 could Riderhood himself have done the murder, 
 and did he purposely let father find the body? 
 Tt seemed a’most wicked and cruel to so much 
 as think such a thing; but now that he tries to 
 throw it upon father, I go back to it as if it was 
 atruth. Can itbe atruth? ‘That was put into 
 my mind by the dead ?” 
 
 She asked this question rather of the fire than 
 of the hostess of the Fellowship-Porters, and 
 looked round the little bar with troubled eyes. 
 
 But, Miss Potterson, as a ready school mis- 
 tress accustomed to bring her pupils to book, set 
 the matter in a light that was essentially of this 
 world. 
 
 ‘You poor deluded girl,” she said, ‘don't 
 you see that you can’t open your mind to par- 
 ticular suspicions of one of the two, without 
 opening your mind to general suspicions of the 
 other? They had worked together. Their go- 
 ings-on had been going on for sometime. Even 
 granting that it was as you have had in your 
 thoughts, what the two had done together would 
 come familiar to the mind of one.” 
 
 “You don’t know father, Miss, when you 
 talk like that. Indeed, indeed, you don’t know 
 father.”’ 
 
 ‘‘ Lizzie, Lizzie,” said Miss Potterson. ‘‘ Leave 
 him. . You needn't break with him altogether, 
 but leave him. Do well away from him; not 
 because of what I have told you to-night—we'll 
 pass no judgment upon that, and we'll hope it 
 may not. be—but because of what I have urged 
 on you before. No matter whether it’s owing to 
 your good looks or not, I like you and I want 
 to serve you. Lizzie, come under my direction. 
 Don’t fling yourself away, my girl, but be per- 
 
 ~ suaded into being respectable and happy.” 
 
 In the sound good feeling and good sense of 
 her entreaty, Miss Abbey had softened into a 
 soothing tone, and had even drawn her arm 
 round the girl’s waist. But she only replied, 
 “Thank you, thank you! Ican’t. I won't. I 
 must not think of it. The harder father is borne 
 upon, the more he needs me to lean on.” 
 
 And then Miss Abbey, who, like all hard peo- 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 a 
 
 ple when they do soften, felt that there was con- — 
 
 siderable compensation owing to her, underwent 
 reaction and became frigid. 
 
 ‘T have done what I can,” she said, ‘‘and : 
 
 you must go your way. You make your bed, 
 and you must.lie on it. But tell your father one. 
 thing; he must not come here any more.” | 
 ‘Oh, Miss, will you forbid him the house 
 where I know he’s safe ?” ae | 
 
 ‘“The Fellowships,” returned Miss Abbey,  ~ 
 
 “las itself to look to, as well as others. It 
 has been hard work to establish order here, and 
 make the Fellowships what it is, and it is daily 
 and nightly hard work to keep it so.. The Fel- 
 lowships must not have a taint upon it that may 
 give it a bad name. I forbid the house to Rider- 
 hood, and I forbid the house to Gaffer. 
 bid both, equally. I find from Riderhood and 
 vou together, that there are suspicions against 
 both men, and I’m not going to take upon my- 
 self to decide betwixt them. ‘They are beth 
 tarred with a dirty brush, and I can’t have the 
 Fellowships tarred with the same brush. That’s 
 all J know.” 
 
 ‘* Good-night, Miss!’’ said Lizzie Hexam, sor- 
 rowfully. 
 
 ‘Hah !—Good-night!” returned Miss Abbey 
 with a shake of her head. 
 
 ‘‘ Believe me, Miss Abbey, I am truly grates 
 ful all the same.” , 
 
 ‘‘T can believe a good deal,” returned the 
 stately Abbey, ‘‘so I'll try to believe that too, 
 Lizzie.” 
 
 No supper did Miss Potterson take that night, 
 
 and only half her usual tumbler of hot Port Ne- — 
 And the female domestics—two robust ~ 
 
 gus. 
 sisters, with staring black eyes, shining flat red 
 
 faces, blunt noses, and strong black curls, like i 
 dolls—interchanged the sentiment that Missis — 
 
 had had her hair combed the wrong way by 
 somebody. And the pot-boy afterward remark- 
 ed, that he hadn’t been “‘so rattled to bed” since 
 his late mother had systematically accelerated 
 his retirement to rest with a poker. 
 
 The chaining of the door behind her, as she 
 went forth, disenchanted Lizzie Hexam of that 
 first relief she had felt. 
 and shrill, the river-side wilderness was melxn- 
 choly, and there was a sound of casting-out, in 
 the rattling of the iron-links, and the grati: g of 
 the bolts and staples under Miss Abbey’s hand. 
 As she came beneath the lowering sky, a sense 
 of being involved in a murky shade of Murder 
 dropped upon her; and, as the tidal swell of the 
 
 ‘river broke at her feet without her seeing how 
 ‘it»gathered, so, her thoughts startled her by 
 
 rushing out of an unseen void and striking at 
 her heart. pe: 
 Of her father’s being groundlessly suspected, 
 she felt sure. Sure. Sure. And yet, repeat 
 the word inwardly as often as she would, the 
 attempt to reason out and prove that she was 
 sure, always came after it and failed. 
 
 ther. 
 
 The night was black — 
 
 I for 9 
 
 Rider= | 
 hood had done the deed, and entrapped her fa= ~ 
 Riderhood had not done the deed, but 
 had resolved in his malice to turn against her — 
 father the appearances that were ready to his” 
 hand to distort. Equally and swiftly upon either 
 putting of the case, followed the frightful possi-_ 
 bility that her father, being innocent, yet might 
 come to be believed guilty. She had heard of 
 people suffering Death for bloodshed of which 
 
Amer us FS el os ia 
 
 they were afterward proved pure, and those ill- 
 fated persons were not, first, in that dangerous 
 wrong in which her father stood. Then at the 
 best, the beginning of his being set apart, whis- 
 pered against, and avoided, was a certain fact. 
 jit dated from that very night. And as-the great 
 black river with its dreary shores was soon lost 
 to her view in the gloom, so, she stood on the 
 river’s brink unable to see into the vast blank 
 misery of a life suspected, and fallen away from 
 by good. and bad, but knowing that it lay there 
 dim before her, stretching away to the great 
 ocean, Death. 
 One thing only was clear to the girl’s mind. 
  Accustomed from her very babyhood promptly 
 to do the thing that could be done—whether to 
 ,keep out weather, to ward off cold, to postpone 
 hunger, or what not—she started out of her 
 meditation, and ran home. 
 The room was quiet, and the lamp burnt on 
 the table. In the bunk in the torner her broth- 
 er lay asleep. She bent over him softly, kissed 
 him, and came to the table. 
 “By the time of Miss Abbey’s closing, and 
 by the run of the tide, it must be one. Tide’s 
 running up. Father at Chiswick, wouldn’t think 
 of coming down till after the turn; and that’s at 
 half after four. Ill call Charley at six. I shall 
 hear the church-clocks strike as I sit here.” 
 _ Very quietly she placed a chair before the 
 ‘scanty fire, and sat down in it, drawing her 
 shawi about her. 
 
 - **Charley’s hollow down by the flare is not 
 there now. Poor Charley!” 
 _ The clock struck two, and the clock struck 
 three, and the clock struck four, and she remain- 
 ed there, with a woman’s patience and her own 
 purpose. When the morning was well on be- 
 tween four and five, she slipped off her shoes 
 (that her going about might not wake Charley), 
 trimmed the fire sparingly, put water on to boil, 
 and set the table for breakfast. Then she went 
 up the ladder, lamp in hand, and came down 
 again, and glided about and about, making a 
 little bundle. Lastly, from her pocket, and from 
 the chimney-piece, and from an inverted basin 
 on the highest shelf, she brought. half-pence, a 
 few sixpences, fewer shillings, and fell to labori- 
 ously and noiselessly counting them, and setting 
 aside one little heap. She was still so engaged, 
 when she was startled by: 
 
 ‘*Hal-loa!” From her brother, sitting up in 
 
 bed. 
 
 **You made me jump, Charley.” 
 
 “Jump! Didn't you make me jump, when 
 
 I opened my eyes a moment ago, and sart you 
 sitting there, like the ghost of a girl-miser, in 
 the dead of the night ?” 
 
 ** It’s not the dead of the night, Charley. It’s 
 
 nigh six in the morning.” 
 
 *‘Isit though? But what are you up to, Liz?” 
 
 ** Still telling your fortune, Charley.” 
 
 ‘It seems to be a precious small one, if that’s 
 it,” said the boy. ‘* What are you putting that 
 little pile of money by itself for ?” 
 
 **For you, Charley.” 
 ** What do you mean?” 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 45 
 
 again, and staring at her through a storm of 
 toweling. 
 
 ‘*T never,” toweling at himself as if he were 
 his bitterest enemy, ‘‘ saw such a girl as you are. 
 What is the move, Liz?” 
 
 . ‘Are you almost ready for breakfast, Char- 
 ley ?” ; ? 
 
 ‘* You can pour it out. Hal-loa! Isay? And 
 a bundle ?” 
 
 ‘* And a bundle, Charley.” 
 
 ‘* You don’t mean it’s for me, too ?” 
 
 ‘*Yes, Charley; I do, indeed.” 
 
 More serious of face, and more slow of action, 
 than he had been, the boy completed his dress- 
 ing, and came and sat down at the little break- 
 fast-table, with his eyes amazedly directed to 
 her face. 
 
 ‘*You see, Charley dear, I have made up my 
 mind that this is the right time for your going 
 away from us. Over and above all the blessed 
 change of by-and-by, you’ll be much happier, 
 and do much better, even so soon as next month, 
 Even so soon as next week.” 
 
 ‘* How do you know I shall?” 
 
 ‘*T don’t quite know how, Charley, but I do.” 
 In. spite of her unchanged manner of speaking, 
 and her unchanged appearance of composure, 
 she scarcely trusted herself to look at him, but 
 kept her eyes employed on the cutting and but- 
 tering of his bread, and on the mixing of his 
 tea, and other such little preparations. ‘‘You 
 must leave father to me, Charley—I will do 
 what I can with him—but you must go.” 
 
 **You don’t stand upon ceremony, I think,” 
 grumbled the boy, throwing his bread and but- 
 ter about, in an‘ill humor. 
 
 She made him no answer. 
 
 ‘*T tell you what,’’ said the boy, then, burst- 
 ing out into an angry whimpering, ‘‘you’re a 
 selfish jade, and you think there’s not enough 
 for three of us, and you want to get rid of me.” ~ 
 
 ‘*Tf you believe so, Charley,—yes, then I be- 
 lieve too, that I am a selfish jade, and that I 
 think there’s not enough for three of us, and that 
 I want to get rid of you.” : 3 
 
 It was only when the boy rushed at her, and 
 threw his arms round her neck, that she lost her 
 self-restraint. But she lost it then, and wept 
 over him. 
 
 **Don’t cry, don’t cry! 
 Liz; I am satisfied to go. 
 away for my good.” 
 
 ‘‘Q, Charley, Charley, Heaven above us 
 knows I do!” 
 
 ““Yes, yes. Don’t mind what I said. Don’t 
 remember it. Kiss me.” : 
 
 After a silence, she loosed him, to dry her 
 eyes and regain her strong quiet influence. 
 
 ‘* Now listen, Charley dear. We both know 
 it must be done, and I alone know there is good 
 reason for its being done at once. Go straight 
 to the school, and say that you and I agreed 
 upon it—that we can’t ‘overcome father’s oppo- 
 sition—that father will never trouble them, but 
 will never take you back. You are a credit to. 
 the school, and you will be a greater credit to it_ 
 vet, and they will help you to get a living. Show 
 
 I am satisfied to go, 
 I know you send me 
 
 “Get out of bed, Charley, and get washed | what clothes you have brought, and what money, 
 
 and dressed, and then I'll tell you.” 
 Her composed manner, and her low distinet 
  Yoice, always had an influence over him. 
 
 Tlis ° 
 
 and say that [ will send some more money. If 
 I can get some in no other way, I will ask a 
 little help of those two gentlemen who came 
 
 head was soon in a basin of water, aud out of it, here that night.” 
 
46 
 
 ‘Tsay!’ cried her brother, quickly. ‘*‘ Don’t 
 you have it of that chap that took hold of me by 
 the chin! Don’t you have it of that Wrayburn 
 one!” 
 
 Perhaps a slight additional tinge of red flashed 
 up into her face and brow, as with a nod she 
 Jaid a hand upon his lips to keep him silently 
 attentive. 
 
 ‘¢And above all things mind this, Charley! 
 
 Be sure you always sjeak well of father. Be 
 sure you always give father his full due. . You 
 
 can’t deny, that because father has no learning 
 himself he is set against it in you; but favor no- 
 thing else against him, and be sure you say—as 
 you know—that your sister is devoted to him. 
 And if you should ever happen to hear any thing 
 said against father that is new to you, it will 
 not be true. Remember, Charley! It will not 
 be true.” 
 
 The boy looked at her with some donbt and 
 surprise, but she went on again without heed- 
 ing it. 
 
 ‘‘Above all things, remember! It will not be 
 true. I have nothing more to say, Charley dear, 
 except, be good, and get learning, and only think 
 of some things in the old life here, as if you,had 
 dreamed them in a dream last night. Good-by, 
 my Darling!” 
 
 Though so young, she infused into these part- 
 ing words a love that was far more like a mo- 
 ther’s than a sister’s, and before which the boy 
 was quite bowed down. After holding her to 
 his breast with a passionate cry, he took up his 
 bundle and darted out at the door, with an arm 
 across his eyes. 
 
 The white face of the winter day came slug- 
 gishly on, veiled in a frosty mist; and the shad- 
 owy ships in the river slowly changed to black 
 substances; and the sun, blood-red on the east- 
 ern marshes behind dark masts and yards, seemed 
 filled with the ruins of a forest it had set on fire. 
 Lizzie, looking for her father, saw him coming, 
 and stood upon the causeway that he might see 
 her. 
 
 He had nothing with him but his boat, and 
 came on apace. <A knot of those amphibious 
 human creatures who appear to have some mys- 
 terious power of extracting a subsistence out of 
 tidal water by looking at it, were gathered to- 
 gether about the causeway. As her father’s 
 boat grounded, they became contemplative of 
 the mud, and dispersed themselves. She saw 
 that the mute avoidance had begun. 
 
 Gaffer saw it, too, in so far as that he was 
 moved when he set foot on shore, to stare around 
 him. But he promptly set to work to haul up 
 his boat, and make her fast, and take the sculls 
 and rndder and rope out of her. Carrying these 
 with Lizzie’s aid, he passed up to his dwelling. 
 
 ‘Sit close to the fire, father, dear, while I 
 cook your breakfast. It’s all ready for cooking, 
 and only been waiting for you. You must be 
 frozen.” 
 
 “Well, Lizzie, I ain’t of a glow; that’s cer- 
 tain. And my hands seemed nailed through to 
 the sculls. See how dead they are!” Some- 
 thing suggestive in their color, and perhaps in 
 her face, struck him as he held them up; he 
 turned his shoulder and held them down to the 
 fire. 
 
 “You were not out in the perishing night, I 
 hope, father ?” 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 ‘‘No, my dear, Lay aboard a barge, by a 
 blazing coal-fire.—Where’s that boy 2” 
 
 ‘*'There’s a drop of brandy fur your tea, father, 
 if you'll put it in while I turn this bit of meat. 
 If the river was'to get frozen, there would be a 
 deal of distress; wouldn't thereszfather ?” 
 
 ‘‘Ah! there’s always enough of that,” said 
 Gaffer, dropping the liquor into his cup from a 
 squat black bottle, and dropping it slowly that 
 it might seem more; ‘‘ distress is forever a-going 
 about, like sut in the air—Ain’t that boy up 
 yet?” 
 
 ‘<The meat’s ready now, father. 
 it’s hot and comfortable, After you have fin- 
 ished, we'll turn round to the fire and talk.” 
 
 But he perceived that he was evaded, and, 
 having thrown a hasty angry glance toward the 
 bunk, plucked at a corner of her apron and 
 asked : 
 
 ‘‘What’s gone with that boy.2” 
 
 ‘Father, if you’ll begin your breakfast, Ill 
 sit by and tell you.” 
 
 He looked at her, stirred his tea and took two 
 or three gulps, then cut at his piece of hot steak 
 with his case-knife, and said, eating: 
 
 ‘*Now then. What’s gone with that boy ?””’ 
 
 ** Don’t be angry, dear. It seems, father, that . 
 
 he has-quite a gift of learning.” 
 
 Eat it while - 
 
 i 
 
 **Unnat’ral young beggar!’’ said the parent, . 
 
 shaking his knife in the air. 
 
 ‘*And that having this gift, and not being 
 
 equally good at other things, he has made shift 
 to get some schooling.” 
 
 ‘*Unnat’ral young beggar!” said the parent 
 again, with his former action. 
 
 ‘*__And that knowing you have nothing to 
 spare, father, and not wishing to be a burden on 
 you, he gradually made up his mind to go seck 
 his fortune out of learning. He went away this 
 morning, father, and he cried very much at go- 
 ing, and he hoped you would forgive him.” 
 
 ‘*Let him never come a nigh me to ask me 
 
 my forgiveness,’ said the father, again empha- 
 
 sizing his words with the knife, ‘* Let him never 
 come within sight of my eyes, nor yet within 
 reach of my arm. His own father ain’t good 
 enough for him. He’s disowned his own father. 
 His own father therefore disowns him for ever 
 and ever, as a unnat’ra] young beggar,” 
 
 ™ He had pushed away his plate. With the nat- 
 
 ural need of a strong rough man in anger, to do 
 something forcible, he now clutched his knife 
 overhand, and struck downward with it at the 
 end of every succeeding sentence. ,As he would 
 
 have struck with his own clenched fist if there © 
 
 had chanced to be nothing in it. 
 
 “He's welcome to go. He's more welcome to 
 fo than to stay. But let him never come back. 
 Let him never put his head inside that door. 
 And let you never speak a word more in his fa- 
 vor, or you'll disown your own father, likewise, 
 
 and what your father says of him he’ll have to. 
 
 come to say of you. Now I see why them men 
 yonder held aloof from me. ‘They says to one 
 another, ‘Here comes the man as ain’t good 
 enough for his own son!’ Lizzie—!” 
 
 But she stopped him with a ery. Looking at 
 her he saw her, with a face quite strange to him, 
 shrinking back against the wall, with her hands 
 before her eyes, fear 
 
 ** Father, don’t! JTean’t bear to see 
 ing with it. Put it down!” 
 
 ts 
 
 you strik- 
 
oe 
 ei. 
 
 £ 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 He looked at the knife; but in his astonish- 
 ment still held it. 
 
 ‘¢Father, it’s too horrible. 
 put it down!” 
 
 Confounded by her appearance and exclama- 
 tion, he tossed it away, and stood up with his 
 open hands held out before him. 
 
 “What's come to you, Liz? Can you think 
 I would strike at you with a knife?” 
 
 ‘*No, father, no; you would never hurt me.” 
 
 ¢¢ What should I hurt ?” 
 
 ‘¢ Nothing, dear father. On my knees, I am 
 certain, in my heart and soul I am certain, no- 
 thing! But it was too dreadful to bear; for it 
 looked—” her hands covering her face again, 
 **O it looked—” ‘ 
 
 ¢¢ What did it look like ?” 
 
 The recollection of his murderous figure, com- 
 bining with her trial of last night, and her trial 
 of the morning, caused her to drop at his feet; 
 without having answered. 
 
 He had never seen her so before. He raised 
 her with the utmost tenderness, calling her the 
 best of daughters, and ‘‘my poor pretty creetur,”’ 
 and laid her head upon his knee, and tried to 
 restore her. But failing, he laid her head gen- 
 tly down again, got a pillow and placed it un- 
 der her dark hair, and sought on the table for a 
 spoonful of brandy. There being none left, he 
 hurriedly caught up the empty bottle, and ran 
 out at the door. 
 
 He returned as hurriedly as he had gone, with 
 the bottle still empty. He kneeled down by her, 
 took her head on his arm, and moistened her 
 lips with a little water into which he dipped his 
 fingers: saying, fiercely, as he looked around, 
 now over this shoulder, now over that: 
 
 “Have we got a pest in the house? Is there 
 summ’at deadly sticking to my clothes? What’s 
 
 let loose upon us? Who loosed it?” 
 aca 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 MR. WEGG LOOKS AFTER HIMSELF. 
 
 Smas Wea«, being on his road to the Roman 
 Empire, approaches it by way of Clerkenwell. 
 The time is early in the evening; the weather 
 moist and raw. Mr. Wegg finds leisure to make 
 a little circuit, by reason that he folds his screen 
 early, now that he combines another source of 
 income with it, and also that he feels it due to 
 himself to be anxiously expected at the Bower. 
 ** Boffin will get all the eagerer for waiting a 
 bit,” says Silas, screwing up, as he stumps along, 
 first his right eye, and then his left. Which is 
 something superfluous in him, for Nature has al- 
 ready screwed both pretty tight. 
 
 ‘“‘If I get on with him as I expect to get on,” 
 Silas pursues, stumping and meditating, ‘it 
 wouldn’t become me to leave it here. It 
 wouldn’t be respectable.” Animated by this re- 
 flection, he stumps faster, and looks a long way 
 before him, as a man with an ambitious project 
 in abeyance often will do. 
 
 Aware of a working-jeweler popnlation taking 
 sanctuary about the church in Clerkenwell, Mr. 
 Wegg is conscious of an interest in, and a re- 
 
 pect for, the neighborhood. But his sensations 
 Im this regard halt as to their strict morality, as 
 
 47 
 
 lichts of a coat of invisibility in which to walk 
 
 off safely with the precious stones: and watch- 
 O put it down, | 
 
 cases, but stop short of any compunction for the 
 people who would lose the same. 
 
 Not, however, toward the ‘‘ shops” where cun- 
 ning artificers work in pearls and diamonds and 
 gold and silver, making their hands so rich, that 
 the enriched water in which they wash them is 
 bought for the refiners ;—not toward these docs 
 Mr. Wegg stump, but toward the poorer shops 
 of small retail traders in commodities to eat and 
 drink and keep folks warm, and of Italian frame- 
 makers, and of barbers, and of brokers, and of 
 dealers in dogs and singing-birds. From these, 
 in a narrow and a dirty street devoted to such 
 callings, Mr. Wegg selects one dark shop-win- 
 dow with a tallow-candle dimly burning in it, 
 surrounded by a muddle of objects vaguely re- 
 sembling pieces of leather and dry stick, but 
 among which nothing is resolvable into any thing 
 distinct, save the candle itself in its old tin can- 
 dlestick, and two preserved frogs fighting a small- 
 sword duel. Stumping with fresh vigor, he goes 
 in at the dark greasy entry, pushes a little greasy 
 dark reluctant side-door, and follows the door 
 into the little dark greasy shop. It is so dark 
 that nothing can be made out in it, over a little 
 counter, but another tallow-candle in another 
 old tin candlestick, cluse to the face of a man 
 stooping low in a chair. 
 
 Mr. Wegg nods to the face, ‘‘ Good-evening, 
 
 The face looking up is a sallow face with weak 
 eyes, surmounted by a tangle of reddish-dusty 
 hair. The owner of the face has no cravat on, 
 and has opened his tumbled shirt-collar to work 
 with the more ease. For the same reason he 
 has no coat on: only a loose waistcoat over his 
 yellow linen. His eyes are like the over-tried 
 eyes of an engraver, but he is not that; his ex- 
 pression and stoop are like those of a shoemaker, 
 but he is not that. 
 
 **Good-evening, Mr. Venus. 
 member ?” 
 
 With slowly dawning remembrance Mr. Ve- 
 nus rises, and holds his candle over the little 
 counter, and holds it down toward the legs, nat- 
 ural and artificial, of Mr. Wegg. 
 
 ‘To be sure /” he*says, then. 
 do?” 
 
 ‘““Wegg, you know,” that gentleman explains. 
 
 ‘* Yes, ves,” says the other. ‘* Hospital am- 
 putatioy?” 
 
 ** Just so,” says Mr. Wegge. 
 
 ‘¢Yes, yes,” quoth Venus. ‘*How do you 
 do? Sit down by the fire, and warm your— 
 your other one.” sh ae 
 
 The little counter being so short a counter 
 that it leaves the fire-place, which would have 
 been behind it if it had been longer, accessible, 
 Mr. Wegg sits down on a box in front of the 
 fire, and inhales a warm and comfortable smell 
 which is not the smell of the shop. For that,” 
 Mr. Wegg inwardly decides, as he takes a cor- 
 rective sniff or two, ‘‘is musty, leathery, feath- 
 ery, cellary, gluey, gummy, and,” with another 
 sniff, ‘‘as it might be, strong of old pairs of 
 bellows.” 
 
 ‘* My tea is drawing, and my muffin is on the 
 hob, Mr. Wegg; will you partake?” 
 
 It being one of Mr. Wegg’s guiding rules in 
 
 9 
 
 Don’t you re- 
 
 ‘* How do you 
 
 ‘life always to partake, he says he will. But, the 
 
 ne halts in his gait; for, they suggest the de-j little shop is so excessively dark, is stuck so full 
 
48 
 
 of black shelves and brackets and nooks and 
 corners, that he sees Mr. Venus’s cup and sau- 
 cer only because it is close under the candle, 
 and does not see from what mysterious recess 
 Mr. Venus produces another for himself, until 
 it is under his nose. Concurrently, Wegg per- 
 ceives a pretty little dead bird lying on the count- 
 er, with its head drooping on one side against 
 the rim of Mr. Venus’s saucer, and a long stiff 
 wire piercing its breast. As if it were Cock 
 Robin, the hero of the ballad, and Mr. Venus 
 were the sparrow with his bow and arrow, and 
 Mr. Wegg were the fly with his little eye. 
 
 Mr. Venus dives, and produces another muf- 
 fin, yet untoasted; taking the arrow out of the 
 breast of Cock Robin, he proceeds to toast it on 
 the end of that cruel instrument. When it is 
 brown, he dives again and produces butter, with 
 which he completes his work, 
 
 Mr. Wegg, as an artful man who is sure of 
 his supper by-and-by, presses muftin on his host 
 to soothe him into a compliant state of mind, 
 or, as one might say, to grease his works. As 
 the muffins disappear, little by little, the black 
 shelves and nooks and corners begin to appear, 
 and Mr. Wegg gradually acquires an imperfect 
 notion that over against him on the chimney- 
 piece is a Hindoo baby in a bottle, curved up 
 with his big head tucked under him, as though 
 he would instantly throw a somersault if the 
 bottle were large enough. 
 
 When. he deems Mr. Venus’s wheels sufficient- 
 ly lubricated, Mr. Wegg approaches his object 
 by asking, as he lightly taps his hands together, 
 to express an undesigning frame of mind; 
 
 *‘And how have I been going on, this long 
 time, Mr. Venus ?” 
 
 “Very bad,” says Mr. Venus, uncompromis- 
 ingly. . 
 
 ‘“What? Am TI still at home?” asks Wegg, 
 with an air of surprise. 
 
 ‘* Always at home.” 
 
 This would seem to be secretly agreeable to 
 Wegg, but he veils his feelings, and observes, 
 ‘Strange. To what do you attribute it?” 
 
 “I don’t know,” replies Venus, who is a hag- 
 gard melancholy man, speaking in a weak voice 
 of querulous complaint, ‘‘te what to attribute 
 it, Mr. Wegg. I can’t work you into a miscel- 
 Janeous one, nohow. Do what I will, you can’t 
 be got to fit. Any body with a passable knowl- 
 edge would pick you out at a look, and say,— 
 ‘No go! - Don’t match!” . 
 
 ‘‘Well, but hang it, Mr. Venus,” Wegg ex- 
 postulates with some little irritation, “that can’t 
 be personal and peculiar in me. It must often 
 happen with miscellaneous ones.” 
 
 ‘With ribs (I grant you) always. But not 
 else, When I prepare a miscellaneous one, I 
 know beforehand that I can’t keep to nature, 
 and be miscellaneous with ribs, because every 
 man has higgown ribs, and no other man’s will 
 go With them; but elseways I can be miscella- 
 neous, I have just sent home a Beauty—a per- 
 fect Beauty—to a school of art. One leg Bel- 
 gian, one leg English, and the pickings of eight 
 other people in it. Talk of not being qualified 
 to be miscellaneous! By rights you ought to be, 
 Mr. Wegg.”’ 
 
 Silas looks as hard at his one leg as he ean in 
 the dim light, and after a pause sulkily opines 
 “that it must be the fault of the other people. 
 
 fut 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. es 
 
 Or how do you mean to say it comes about ?” 
 he demands, impatiently. . 
 
 “I don’t know how it comes about. Stand 
 up a minute. Hold the light.” Mr. Venus 
 takes from a corner by his chair the bones of a 
 leg and foot, beautifully pure--and put together 
 with exquisite neatness. ‘These he compares 
 
 with Mr. Wegg’s leg; that gentleman looking. 
 
 on, as if he were being measured for a riding- 
 boot. ‘No, I don’t know how it is, but so it is. 
 You have got a twist in that bone, to the best of 
 my belief. J never saw the likes.of you.” 
 
 Mr. Wegg having looked distrustfully at his 
 own limb, and suspiciously at the pattern with 
 which it has been compared, makes the point: 
 
 ‘* Pll bet a pound that ain’t an English one!” 
 
 ‘‘An easy wager, when we run so much into 
 foreign! No, it belongs to that French gentle- 
 man.” 
 
 -As he nods toward a point of darkness be- 
 hind Mr. Wegg, the latter, with a slight start, 
 looks round for ‘‘that French gentleman,” whom 
 he at length descries to be represented (in a very 
 workman-like manner) by his ribs only, stand- 
 ing on a shelf in another corner, like a piéce of 
 armor or a pair of stays. 
 
 ‘*Oh!” says Mr. Wegg, with a sort of sense 
 of being introduced; ‘‘I dare say you were all 
 right enough in your own country, but I hope 
 no objections will be taken to my saving that 
 the Frenchman was never yet born as I should 
 wish to match.” 
 
 At this moment the greasy door is violently, 
 pushed inward, and a boy follows it, who says, 
 after having let it slam: 
 
 ‘‘Come for the stuffed canary.” 
 
 **It’s three-and-ninepence,” returns Venus; 
 ‘have you got the money ?” 
 
 The boy produces four shillings, Mr. Venus, 
 always in exceedingly low spirits and making 
 whimpering sounds, peers about for the stuffed 
 canary. 
 search, Mr. Wegg observes that he has a con- 
 venient little shelf near his knees, exclusively 
 appropriated to skeleton hands, which have very 
 much the appearance of wanting to lay hold of 
 him, From these Mr. Venus rescues the canary 
 in a glass case, and shows it to the boy. 
 
 ‘There!’ he whimpers. ‘‘There’s anima- 
 tion! On a twig, making up his mind to hop! 
 Take care of him; he’s a lovely specimen.— 
 And three-is four.” 
 
 The boy gathers up his change, and has pulled 
 the door open by a leather strap nailed to it for 
 the purpose, when Venus crics out: 
 
 **Stop him! Come back, you young villain! 
 You've got a tooth among them half-pence.” 
 
 ‘‘ How was I to know I’d got it? Yon giv it 
 me. I don’t want none of your teeth; I’ve got 
 enough of my own.” 
 selects it from his change, and throws it on 
 counter. 
 
 ‘Don’t sauce me, in the wicions pride of your 
 youth,” Mr. Venus retorts,pathetically, “‘* Don’t 
 hit me because you see I’m down. I’mlow enough 
 without that. It dropped into the till, I suppose. 
 They drop into every thing. There was two in 
 the coffee-pot at breakfast-time. Molars.” 
 
 ‘Very well, then,” argues the boy, ‘what. 
 do you call names for ?” 
 
 the 
 
 To which Mr. Venus only replies, shaking his 
 shock of dusty hair, and winking his weak eyes, ~ 
 
 On his taking the candle to assist-his 
 
 So the boy pipes, as he ° 
 
 oe ee 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 LUG: se i 
 EAI 
 
 —— 
 
 = \ WH I 
 
 ae . Me: 
 Se SSX WRN 
 ee Se 
 
 “LYV SIH JO SAIHdOUL AHL AGT GUGNNOUNNS saNaAA “yu 
 
 ‘Don’t sauce me, in the wicious pride of your 
 youth; don’t hit me, because you see I’m down. 
 You’ve no idea how small you’d come out, if I 
 had the articulating of you.” 
 
 This consideration seems to have its effect on 
 the boy, for he goes out grumbling. 
 
 **Oh dear me, dear me!” sighs Mr. Venus, 
 heavily, snuffing the candle, ‘‘the world that 
 appeared so flowery-has ceased to blow! 
 easting your eye round the shop, Mr. Wegg. Let 
 me show you a light. My working-bench. My 
 young man’s bench. A Wice. ‘Tools. Bones, 
 warious. Skulls; warious. Preserved Indian 
 baby. African ditto. Bottled preparations, 
 warious, Every thing within reach of your 
 hand, in good preservation. The mouldy ones 
 
 Yourre | 
 
 ey. ® 
 49 
 
 IS 
 
 tl 
 iN 
 SS 
 
 a SS = 
 
 N 
 
 = 
 
 atop. What’s in those hampers over them again, 
 I don’t quite remember. Say, human warious. 
 Cats. Articulated English baby. Dogs. Ducks. 
 Glass eyes, warious. Mummied bird. Dried cu- 
 ticle, warious. .Oh, dear me! Tha the gen- 
 eral panoramic view.” : 
 
 Having so held and waved the candle as that 
 all these heterogeneous objects seemed to come 
 forward obediently when they were named, and 
 then retire again, Mr. Venus despondently re- 
 peats, ‘‘ Oh dear me, dear me!” resumes his seat, 
 and with drooping despondency upon him, falls 
 to pouring himself out more tea. 
 
 ‘Where am 1?” asks Mr. Wegg. 
 
 _**You’re somewhere in the back shop across 
 theyard, Sir; and speaking quite candidly, I 
 
 r 
 & 
 
50 
 
 wish I'd never bought you of the Hospital Por- 
 ter.” 2 
 ‘¢ Now, look here; what did you give for me?” 
 
 ‘¢ Well,” replies Venus, blowing his tea: his 
 head and face peering out of the darkness, over 
 the smoke of it, as if he were modernizing the 
 old original rise in his family: ‘‘ you were one 
 of a warious lot, and I don’t know.” 
 
 Silas puts his point in the improved form of 
 ‘What will you take for me?” 
 
 “Well,” replies Venus, still blowing his tea, 
 ‘‘I’m not prepared, at a moment’s notice, to tell 
 you, Mr. Wegg.” 
 
 ‘¢Come! According to your own account 
 I’m not worth much,” Wegg reasons persua- 
 sively. 
 
 ‘<Not for miscellaneous working in, I grant 
 you, Mr. Wegg; but you might turn out valua- 
 ble yet, as a—’” here Mr. Venus takes a gulp of 
 tea, so hot that it makes him choke, and sets 
 his weak eyes watering; ‘‘as a Monstrosity, if 
 you'll excuse me.” 
 
 Repressing an indignant look, indicative of 
 any thing but a disposition to excuse him, Silas 
 pursues his point. 
 
 ‘‘T think you know me, Mr. Venus, and I 
 think you know I never bargain.” 
 
 Mr. Venus takes gulps of hot tea, shutting his 
 eyes at every gulp, and opening them again in 
 a spasmodic manner; but dees not commit him- 
 self to assent. 
 
 “‘T have a prospect of getting on in life and 
 elevating myself by my own independent exer- 
 tions,” says Wegg, feelingly, ‘“‘and I shouldn't 
 like—I tell you openly I should not like—under 
 euch circumstances, to be what I may call dis- 
 persed, a part of me here, and a part of me there, 
 but should wish to collect myself like a gentle 
 person,” 
 
 ‘<Tt’s a prospect at present, is it, Mr. Wegg? 
 Then you haven’t got the money for a deal about 
 you? Then I'll tell you what I'll do with you; 
 T'll hold you over. I am a man of my word, 
 and you needn’t be afraid of my disposing of 
 you. Illhold you over. That’s a promise. Oh 
 dear me, dear me!” 
 
 Fain to accept his promise, and wishing to 
 propitiate him, Mr. Wegg looks on as he sighs 
 “and pours himself out more tea, and then says, 
 
 trying to get a sympathetic tone into his voice : 
 
 ‘You seem very low, Mr. Venus. Is busi- 
 ness bad ?” 
 
 ‘‘ Never was so good.” 
 
 “Ts your hand out at all?” 
 
 ‘Never was so well in. Mr. Wegg, I’m not 
 only first in the trade, but I’m the trade. You 
 may go and buy a skeleton at the West End if 
 you like, and pay the West End price, but. it'll 
 be my putting together. Dve as much to do as 
 I can possibly do, with the assistance of my 
 
 young mgg, and I take a pride and a pleasure 
 in it.” 
 
 Mr. Venus thus delivers himself, his right 
 hand extended, his smoking saucer in his left 
 hand, protesting as though he were going to 
 burst into a flood of tears. 
 
 “That ain’t a state of things to make you 
 low, Mr. Venus.” 
 
 ‘¢Mr. Wegg, I know it ain’t. Mr. Wegg, not 
 to name myself as a workman without an equal, 
 I've gone on improving myself in my knowledge 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 perfect, Mr.Wegg, if yon was brought here 
 loose ina-bag-to-be articulated, Td ame your 
 smallest bones blindfold equally with yout larg- 
 est, as fast as T could pick ‘em out, and Vd sort 
 ’em all, and sort your wertebra, in a manner 
 that would equally surprise and charm you.” 
 
 ‘Well,’ remarks Silas (though not quite so 
 readily as last time), ‘‘ that ain’t a state of things 
 to be low about.—-Not for you to be low about, 
 least ways.” 
 
 ‘*Mr. Wegg, I know it ain’t; Mr. Wegg, I 
 know it ain’t. But it’s the heart that lowers 
 me, it is the heart! Be so good as take and 
 read that card out loud.”’ . 
 
 Silas receives one from his hand, which Venus 
 takes from a wonderful litter in a drawert, and, 
 putting on his spectacles, reads: 
 
 aoe Vir V eras, °” 
 
  *).¥ ee.) Go or,” 
 ‘¢¢ Preserver of Animals and Birds,’” 
 MY 6a. : Go'on. 
 
 ‘¢¢ Articulator of human bones.’ ” 
 
 ‘That's it,” witha groan. ‘*That’s it! Mr. 
 Wegg, I'm thirty-two, and a bachelor. Mr. 
 
 Wegg, I love her. Mr. Wegg, she is worthy 
 of being loved by a Potentate!” Here Silas is 
 rather alarmed by Mr. Venus’s springing to his 
 feet in the hurry of his spirits, and haggardly 
 confronting him with his hand on his coat cel- 
 lar; but Mr. Venus, begging pardon, sits down 
 again, saving, with the calmness of despair, 
 ‘¢ She objects to the business.” 
 
 ‘Does she know'the profits of it ?” 
 
 ‘¢She knows the profits of it, but she don’t 
 appreciate the art of it, and she objects to it. 
 ‘J do not wish,’ she writes in her own hand- 
 writing, ‘to regard myself, nor yet to be regard- 
 ed, in that boney light.’” 
 
 Mr. Venus pours himself ont more tea, with a 
 look and in an attitude of the deepest desola- 
 tion. 
 
 ‘¢ And so a man climbs to the top of the tree, 
 Mr. Wegg, only to see that there’s no look-out 
 when he’s up there! I sit here of a night sur- 
 rounded by the lovely trophies of my art, and 
 what have they done for me? Ruined me. 
 Brought me to the pass of being informed that 
 ‘she does not wish to regard herself, nor yet to 
 be regarded, in that boney light!?” Having 
 repeated the fatal expressions, Mr, Venus drinks 
 more tea by gulps, and offers an explanation of 
 his doing so. 
 
 “It lowers me. When I’m equally lowered 
 all over, lethargy sets in. By sticking to it till 
 one or tio in the morning, I get oblivion. Don't 
 let me detain you, Mr. Wegg. I’m not com- 
 pany for any one.” 
 
 ‘¢Ttis not on that account,” says Silas, rising, 
 
 “but because Pve got an appointment. 
 time I was at Harmon’s.” 
 
 “Eh?” said Mr. Venus. 
 Battle Bridge way ?” 
 
 Mr. Wegg admits that he is bound for that — 
 port. 
 
 “You ought to be in a good thing, if vou’ve 
 worked yourself in there. There’s lots of money. 
 going, there.” 
 
 ‘*To think,” says 
 catch it up so quick, and know about it. 
 derful!” 
 
 It’s 
 
 ‘‘Harmon’s, up 
 
 ‘Not at all, Mr.Wegg. The old gentleman _ 
 of Anatomy, till both by sight and by name I’m | wanted to know the nature and worth of every _ 
 
 rs 
 
 4 
 
 oh 
 
 Silas, ‘‘that you should. 
 Won- 
 
 ae 
 
 ; 
 on 
 4 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND, 
 
 51 
 
 thing that was found in the dust; and many’s; great confusion, by falling a victim to the fury 
 
 the bone, and feather, and what not, that he’s 
 brought to me.” 
 
 ‘Really, now!” 
 
 “Yes. (Oh dear me, dear me!) And he’s 
 buried quite in this neighborhood, you know. 
 Over yonder.” 
 
 Mr. Wegg does not know, but he makes as if 
 he did. by responsively nodding his head. He 
 also follows with his eyes .the toss of Venus's 
 head: as if to seek a direction to over yonder 
 _ *T took an interest in_that discovery in the 
 river,” says Venus. ‘*(She hadn’t written her 
 cutting refusal at that time.) I've got up there 
 never mind, though.” 
 
 He had raised the candle at arm’s-length to- 
 ward one of the dark shelves, and Mr. Wegg 
 had turned to l6ok, when he broke off. 
 
 “The old gentleman was well known all round 
 here. There used to be stories about his hav- 
 ing hidden all kinds of property in those dust 
 mounds. I suppose there was nothing in ’em. 
 _ Probably you know, Mr. Wegg ?” 
 
 * Nothing in ’em,” says Wegg, who has never 
 heard a word of this before. © 
 
 ** Don’t let me detain you. Good-night!” 
 
 The unfortunate Mr. Venus gives him a shake 
 of the hand with a shake of his own head, and 
 drooping down in his chair, proceeds to pour 
 himself out more tea. Mr. Wegg, looking back 
 over his shoulder as he pulls the door open by 
 the strap,.notices that the movement so shakes 
 the crazy shop, and so shakes a momentary flare 
 out of the candle, as that the babies—H indoo, 
 African, and British—the ‘‘human warious,” 
 the French gentleman, the green glass-eyed cats, 
 the dogs, the ducks, and all the rest of the col- 
 lection, show for an instant as if paralytically 
 animated; while even poor little Cock Robin at 
 Mr. Venus’s elbow turns over on his innocent 
 side. Next moment Mr. Wegg is stumping un- 
 der the gaslights and through the mud. 
 
 pote tke a 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 MR. BOFFIN IN CONSULTATION, 
 
 Wuosoever had gone out of Fleet Street into 
 the Temple at the date of this history, and had 
 wandered disconsolate about the Temple until 
 he stumbled on a dismal church-yard, and had 
 looked up at the dismal windows commanding 
 that church-yard until at the most dismal win- 
 dow of them all he saw a dismal boy, would in 
 him have beheld, at one grand comprehensive 
 swoop of the eye, the managing clerk, junior 
 clerk, common-law clerk, conveyancing clerk, 
 chancery clerk, every refinement and depart- 
 ment of clerk, of Mr. Mortimer Lightwood, ere- 
 while called in the newspapers eminent solic- 
 itor. 
 
 Mr Boffin having been several times in com- 
 munication with this clerkly essence, both on 
 its own ground and at the Bower, had no diffi- 
 culty in identifying it when he saw it up in its 
 dusty eyrie. ‘To the second floor on which the 
 window was situated, he ascended, much pre- 
 occupied in mind by the uncertainties besetting 
 the Roman Empire, and much regretting the 
 death of the amiable Pertinax: who only last 
 ‘Tight had left the imperial affairs in’a state of 
 her Ses een }.7> + ik if i 
 
 of the pretorian guards. 
 
 ** Morning, morning, morning!” said My, Bok 
 fin, with a wave of his hand, as the office-duvr 
 was opened by the dismak boy, whose appropri- 
 ate name was Blight. ‘* Governor in ?” 
 
 ‘*Mr. Lightwood gave you an appointment, 
 Sir, I think ?” 
 
 ‘*f don’t want him to give it, you know,” re- 
 turned Mr. Boffin; ‘Tl pay my way, my boy.” 
 
 ‘No doubt, Sir. Would you walk in? Mr. 
 Lightwood ain’t in at the present moment, but 
 I expect him back very shortly. Would you 
 take a seat in Mr. Lightwood’s room, Sir, while 
 [ look over our Appointment Book?” Young 
 Blight made a great show of fetching from his 
 desk a Jong thin manuscript volume with a brown 
 paper cover, and running his finger down the 
 day’s appointments, murmuring, ‘* Mr. Aggs, 
 Mr. Baggs, Mr. Caggs, Mr. Daggs, Mr. F ages, 
 Mr. Gaggs, Mr. Boffin. Yes, Sir; quite right. 
 You are a little before your time, Sir. Mr. Light- 
 wood will be in directly.” 
 
 ‘<T'm not in a hurry,” said Mr. Boffin. 
 
 “Thank you, Sir. ll take the opportunity, 
 if you please, of entering your name in our Call 
 ers’ Book for the day.” Young Blight made an- 
 other great show of changing the volume, taking 
 up a pen, sucking it, dipping it, and running over 
 previous entries before he wrote. As, “Mr. Al- 
 ley, Mr. Balley, Mr. Calley, Mr. Dalley, Mr. Fal- 
 ley, Mr. Galley, Mr. Halley, Mr. Lalley, Mr. 
 Malley. And Mr. Boffin.” 
 
 ‘* Strict system here; eh, my lad ?” said Mr. 
 
 - Boffin, as he was booked. 
 
 ‘Yes, Sir,” returned the boy. ‘‘I couldn’t get . 
 on without it.” 
 
 By which he probably meant that his mind 
 would have been shattered to pieces without 
 this fiction of an occupation. Wearing in his 
 solitary confinement no fetters that he could. 
 polish, and being provided with no drinking 
 cup that he could carve, he had fallen on the 
 device of ringing alphabetical changes into the 
 two volumes in question, or of entering vast 
 numbers of persons out of the Directory as trans- 
 acting business with Mr. Lightwood. It was the 
 more necessary for his spirits, because, being of 
 a sensitive temperament, he was apt to consider 
 it personally disgraceful to himself that his mas. 
 ter had no clients. 
 
 ‘“fow long have you been in the law, now ?” 
 asked Mr. Boffin, with a pounce, in his usual 
 inquisitive way. 
 
 ‘‘Pve been in the law, now, Sir, about three 
 years.” 
 
 ‘“‘ Must have been as good as born in it!” said 
 Mr. Boffin, with admiration. ‘* Do you like it ?” 
 
 *‘f don’t mind it much,” returned Young 
 Blight, heaving a sigh, as if its bitterness were 
 past. 
 
 ‘* What wages do you get ?”: % 
 
 *‘Half what I could wish,” replied young 
 Blight. ite 
 **What’s the whole that yon could wish ?” 
 
 ‘* Fifteen shillings a week,” said the boy. 
 
 **About how long might it take you now, at 
 a average rate of going, to be a Judge?” asked 
 Mr. Boffin, after surveying his small stature in 
 silence 
 
 The boy answered that he had not yet quite 
 worked out that little calculation. 
 
52 
 
 ‘‘T suppose there’s nothing to prevent your 
 going in for it?” said Mr. Boftin. 
 
 The boy virtually replied that as he had the 
 honor to be a Briton who never never never, 
 there was nothing to prevent ‘his going in for it. 
 
 Yet he seemed inclined to suspect that there 
 
 might be something to prevent his coming out 
 with it. 
 
 ‘‘Would a couple of pound help.you up at 
 all?” asked Mr. Boffin. 
 
 On this head young Blight had no doubt 
 whatever, so Mr. Boftin made him a present of 
 that sum of money, and thanked him for his at- 
 tention to his (Mr. Boffin’s) affairs; which, he 
 added, were now, he believed, as good as settled. 
 
 Then Mr. Boffin, with his stick at his-ear, 
 like a Familiar Spirit explaining the office to 
 him, sat staring at a little book-case of Law 
 Practice and Law Reports, and at a window, 
 and at an empty blue bag, and at a stick of seal- 
 ing-wax, and a pen, and a box of wafers, arid an 
 apple, and a writing-pad—ali very dusty—and 
 at a number of inky smears and blots, and at 
 an imperfectly - disguised gun-case pretending 
 to be something legal, and-at an iron box la- 
 beled Harmon Esrare, until Mr. Lightwood ap- 
 peared. 
 
 Mr. Lightwood explained that he came from 
 
 the proctor’s, with whom he had been engaged | 
 
 in transacting Mr. Boffin’s affairs. 
 
 ‘¢And they seem to have taken a deal out of 
 you!” said Mr. Boffin, with commiseration. 
 
 Mr. Lightwood, without explaining that his 
 weariness was chronic, proceeded with his expo- 
 sition that, all forms of law having been at length 
 complied with, will of Harmon deceased having 
 been proved, death of. Harmon next inheriting 
 having been proved, etc. and so forth, Court of 
 Chancery having been moved, ete. and so forth, he, 
 Mr. Lightwood, had now the great gratification, 
 honor, and happiness, again etc. and so forth, 
 of congratulating Mr. Boffin on coming into 
 possession, as residuary legatee, of upward of 
 one hundred thousand pounds, standing in the 
 books of the Governor.and Company of the Bank 
 of England, again etc. and so forth. 
 
 ‘¢ And what is particularly eligible in the prop- 
 erty, Mr. Boffin, is, that it involves no trouble. 
 There are no estates to manage, no rents to re- 
 turn so much per cent. upon in bad times (which 
 is an extremely dear way of getting your name 
 into the newspapers), no voters. to become par- 
 boiled in hot water with, no agents to take the 
 cream off the milk before it comes to table. You 
 could put the whole in a cash-box to-morrow 
 morning, and take it with you to—say, to the 
 Rocky Mountains. Inasmuch as every man,” 
 concluded Mr. Lightwood, with an indolent 
 smile, ‘‘ appears to be under a fatal spell which 
 obliges him, sooner or later, to mention the 
 Rocky Mountains im a tone of extreme famil- 
 larity togsome other man, I hope you’ll excuse 
 my pressing you into the service of that gigantic 
 range of geographical bores.” 
 
 Without following this last. remark very close- 
 ly, Mr. Boffin cast his perplexed gaze first at 
 the ceiling, and then at the carpet. 
 
 ‘¢ Well,” he remarked, ‘‘I don’t know what. 
 to say about it, I am sure. Iwas a’most as well 
 asI was. It’s a great lot to take care of.” 
 
 ‘My dear Mr. Boffin, then don't take care of | presence, he was a flinty-hearted rascal. % 
 
 it}? 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 ‘*ih ?” said that gentleman. 
 
 ‘¢ Speaking now,” returned Mortimer, ‘owith a 
 the irresponsible imbecility of a private indi — 
 vidual, and not with the profundity of a ororenr 
 sional adviser, I should_say that if the cireum- 
 stance of its being too much weighs upon your 
 mind, you have the haven of consolation open » 
 to you that you can easily make itless.. And if 
 you showld be apprehensive of the trouble of do- — 
 
 ing so, there is the further haven of consolation — 
 
 that any number of people will take the trouble 
 off your hands.’ 
 
 “Wl! I don’t quite see it,” retorted Mr. 
 Boffin, still perplexed., “That's not satisfac 
 tory, you know, what .you’re a-saying.’ 
 
 “Ts Any thing satisfactory, Mr. Boflin ?” asked — 
 Mortimer, raising his eyebrows. - 
 
 “T used to find it so,” answered Mr. Boffin, 
 with a wistful look. . ‘ "While I was foreman at 
 the Bower—afore it was the Bower—lI consid- © 
 eréd the business very satisfactory. The old 
 man was a awful Tartar (saying it, ’m sure, | 
 without disrespect to his memory) but the busi-— 
 ness was a pleasant one to look after, from be-_ 
 fore daylight to past dark. It’s a’most a pity,” 
 said Mr. Boffin, rubbing his ear, ‘‘ that he ever 
 went and made so much money. It would have 
 been better for him if he hadn’t so given him- 
 self up toit. You may depend upon it,” making 
 the discovery all of a sudden, ‘‘that he found’ 
 it a great lot to take care of !” | 
 
 Mr. Lightwood coughed, not convinced. 
 
 ‘* And speaking of satisfactory,” pursued Mr, 
 Boffin, ‘‘ why, Lord save us! when we come to 
 take it to pieces, bit by bit, where’s the satis- . 
 factoriness of the money as yet?. When the old 
 man does right the poor boy after all, the poor 
 boy gets no good of it. He gets made away gvith, © 
 at the moment when he’s lifting (as one may say) 
 the cup and sarser to his lips. Mr. Lightwood, 
 I will now name to you, that on behalf of the 
 poor dear boy, me and Mrs. Boffin have stood 
 out against the7old man times out of number, 
 till he has called us every name he could lay his © 
 tongue to. I have seen him, after Mrs. Boffin 
 has given him her mind respecting the claims 
 of the nat’ral affections, catch off Mrs. Boffin’s 
 bonnet (she wore, in general, a black straw, 
 perched as a matter of convenience on the top — 
 of her head), and send it spinning across the7 
 yard. Ihave indeed. And once, when he did — 
 this in a manner that amounted to personal, I 
 should have given him a rattler for himself, if — 
 Mrs. Boffin hadn’t thrown. herself betwixt us, 
 and received flush on the temple. Which dr opped — 
 her, Mr. Lightwood. Dropped her.” 
 
 Mr. Lightwood murmured ‘‘ Equal honor— 
 Mrs. Boffin’s head and heart.” 
 
 “You understand; I name this,” pursued Mr. — 
 Boffin, ‘‘to show you, now the affairs are wound — 
 up, that me and Mrs. Boffin have ever stood, as — 
 we were in Christian honor bound, the. chil | 
 dren’s friend. Me and Mrs. Boffin stood the poor 
 girl’s friend ; me and Mrs, Boftin stood the poor — 
 boy’s fr iend ; me and Mrs. Boffin up and faced — 
 the old-man when we momently expected. to be | 
 turned out for our pains. As to Mrs. Boffin,” $ 
 said Mr. Boffin, lowering his voice, (che | 
 mightn’t wish it mentioned now she’s Fashiousl 
 able, but she went so far as to tell him, in my 
 
 _ Mr. Lightwood murmured ‘ Vigorous Saxon 
 
 x 
 
: OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 spirit—Mrs. Boffin’ $ hola ty NA Ol uate eee 
 court and Cressy.” 
 ‘*The last time me and Mrs. Boftin saw the 
 _ poor boy,” said Mr. Boffin, warming (as fat 
 usually does) with a tendency to melt, ‘‘ he was 
 a child of seven year old. For when he come 
 back to make intercession for his sister, me and 
 Mrs. Boffin were away overlooking a country 
 contract which was to be sifted before carted, 
 and he was come and gone in a single hour. I 
 say he was a child of seyen year old. He was 
 going, away, all alone and forlorn, to’ that for- 
 eign school, and he come into our place, situate 
 up the yard of the present Bower, to have a warm 
 at our fire. There was his little scanty travel- 
 ing clothes upon him. There was his little scanty 
 box outside in the shivering wind, which I was 
 going to carry for him down to the steamboat, 
 as the old man wouldn’t hear of allowing a six- 
 pence coach-money. Mrs. Boffin, then quite a 
 young woman and a pictur of a full-blown rose, 
 stands him by her, kneels down at the fire, warms 
 her two’ open hands, and falls to rubbing his 
 cheeks; but seeing the tears come into the 
 child’s eyes, the tears come fast into her own, 
 and she holds him round the neck, like as if she 
 Was protecting him, and cries to me, ‘I’d give 
 the wide wide world, I would, to run away with 
 him!’ I don’t say but what it cut me, and but 
 what it at the same time heightened my feel- 
 ings of admiration for Mrs. Boffin. The poor 
 child clings to her for a while, as she clings to 
 him, and then, when the old man calls, he says 
 ‘I must. go! God bless you!’ and fora mo- 
 ment rests his heart against her bosom, and 
 looks up at both of us, as if it was in pain—in 
 agony. Such alook! I went aboard with him 
 CI gave him first what little treat I thought he’d 
 _ like), and I left him when he had fallen asleep 
 in his berth, and I came back to Mrs. Boffin. 
 But tell her what I would of how I had left, him, 
 it all went for nothing, for, according to her 
 thoughts, he never changed that look that he 
 had looked up at us two. But it did one piece 
 of good. Mrs. Boffin and me had no child of 
 our own, and had sometimes wished that how we 
 had one. But not now. ‘We might both of us 
 die,’ says Mrs. Boffin, ‘and other eyes might see 
 that lonelyook in our child.’ So of a night, 
 when it was very cold, or when the wind roared, 
 or the rain dripped heavy, she would wake sob- 
 - bing, and call out in a fluster, ‘Don’t you see 
 the poor child’s face? O shelter the poor child!’ 
 _—till in course of years it gently wore out, as 
 Many things do.” 
 **My dear Mr. Boffin, every thing wears to 
 rags,” said Mortimer, with a light laugh. 
 «y won't go so far as to say every thing,” re- 
 turned. Mr. Boffin, on whom his manner seemed 
 >to grate, “because there’s some things that I 
 never found among the dust. Well, Sir. So 
 Mrs. Boffin and me grow older and older in the 
 old man’s. service, living and working pretty 
 * hard in it, till the old man is discovered dead j in 
 his bed. Then Mrs. Botfin and me seal up his 
 box, always standing on the table at the side of 
 his bed, and having frequently heerd tell of the 
 Temple as a spot where lawyers’ dust is contract- 
 ed for, I come down here in search of a lawyer 
 to advise, and I see your young man up at this 
 " ~—present elevation, chopping at the flies on the 
 
 3 
 
 53 
 
 Hoy! not then having the pleasure of your ac- 
 quaintance, and by that means come to gain the 
 honor. ‘Phen you, and the gentleman in the un- 
 comfortable neckcloth under the little archway 
 in Saint Paul’s Church-yard—” 
 
 ‘< Doctors’ Commons,” observed Lightwood. 
 
 ‘*f understood it was ancther name,” said 
 My. Boffin, pausing, ‘‘ but you know best. Then 
 you and Doctor Scommons, you go to work, and 
 you do the thing that’s proper, and you and Joc- 
 tor S. take steps for finding out the poor boy, 
 and at last you do find out the poor boy, and me 
 and Mrs. Boffin often exchange the observation, 
 ‘We shall see him again, under happy circum- 
 stances.’ But it was never to be; and the want 
 of satisfactoriness is, that after all the money 
 never gets to him.” . 
 
 ‘¢ But it gets,” remarked Lightwood, with a 
 languid inclination of the head, ‘‘into excellent 
 hands.” 
 
 ‘*It gets into the hands of me and Mrs. Boffin 
 only this very day and hour, and that’s what I - 
 am working round to, having waited for this 
 day and hour a’ purpose. Mr. Lightwood, here 
 has been a wicked cruel murder. By that mur- 
 der me and Mrs. Boffin mysteriously profit. For 
 the apprehension and conviction of the murder- 
 er, we offer a reward of one tithe of the property 
 —a reward of Ten Thousand Pound.” 
 
 ‘Mr. Boffin, it’s too much.” 
 
 ‘¢Mr. Lightwood, me and Mrs. Boffin have 
 fixed the sum together, and we stand to it.” 
 
 ‘‘But let me represent to you,’ returned 
 Lightwood, ‘speaking now with professional 
 profundity, and not with individual imbecility, 
 that the offer of such an immense reward is a 
 temptation to forced suspicion, forced construe- 
 tion of circumstances, strained accusation, a 
 whole tool-box of edged tools.’ 
 
 ** Well,” said Mr. Boffin, a little staggered, 
 ‘that’s the sum we put o’ one side for the pur- 
 pose. Whether it shall be openly declared in 
 the new notices that must now be put about in 
 
 our names—” 
 
 ‘‘In your name, Mr. Boffin; in your name.” 
 
 ‘* Very well; in my name, which is the same 
 as Mrs. Boffin’s, and means both of us, is to be 
 considered in drawing ’em up. But this is the 
 first instruction that I, as the owner of the prop- 
 erty, give to my lawyer on coming into it.” 
 
 ‘*Your lawyer, Mr. Boffin,” returned Light- 
 wood, making a very short note of it with a very 
 rusty pen, ‘‘has the gratification of taking the 
 instruction. ‘here is another ?” 
 
 ‘*’ There is just one other, and no more. Make 
 me as compact a little will as can be recoficiled 
 with tightness, leaving the whole of the property 
 to ‘my beloved wife, Henerietty Boffin, sole ex- 
 ecutrix.’. Make it as short as you can, using 
 those words; but make it tight.” 
 
 At some loss to fathom Mr. Boffin’s notions 
 of a tight will, Lightwood felt his way. 
 
 ‘¢T beg your pardon, but professional profun- 
 dity must be exact. When you say tight—” 
 
 ‘‘T mean tight,” Mr. Boffin explained. 
 
 “Exactly so. And nothing can be more 
 laudable.. But is the tightness to bind Mrs. 
 Boffin to any and what conditions ?” 
 
 ‘Bind Mrs. Boffin ?” interposed her husband. 
 ‘*No! What are you thinking of! What I 
 want is, to make it all hers so tight as that her 
 
 ’ window-sill with his penknife, and I give him a | hold of it can’t be loosed.” 
 
ye 
 
 ee 
 
 theo 
 
 *‘Hers freely, to do what she likes with? | 
 Hers absolutely ?” 
 
 “ Absolutely ?” repeated Mr. Boffin, with a| 
 
 whort sturdy laugh. ‘*Hah! I should think 
 so! It would be handsome in me to begin to 
 bind Mrs. Boffin at this time of day!” 
 
 So that instruction, too, was taken by Mr. 
 Lightwood; and Mr. Lightwood, having taken 
 it, was in the act of showing Mr. Boftin out, 
 when Mr. Eugene Wrayburn almost jostled him 
 in the doorway. Consequently Mr. Lightwood 
 said, in his cool manner, ‘‘ Let me make you 
 two known to one another,” and further signi- 
 fied that Mr. Wrayburn was counsel learned in 
 the law, and that, partly in the way of business 
 and partly in the way of pleasure, he had im- 
 parted to Mr, Wrayburn some of the interesting 
 facts of Mr. Boffin’s biography. 
 
 ‘* Delighted,” suid Eugene—though he didn’t 
 look so—‘‘ to know Mr. Boffin.” 
 
 ‘“Thankee, Sir, thankee,” returned that gen- 
 tleman. ‘And how do you like the law ?” 
 
 ** A—not particularly,” returned Eugene. 
 
 “Too dry for you, eh? Well, I suppose it 
 wants some years of sticking to, before you mas- 
 ter it. But there’s nothing like work. Look at 
 the bees.” 
 
 ‘| beg your pardon,” returned Eugene, with 
 a reluctant smile, ‘‘ but will you excuse my men- 
 tioning that I always protest against being re- 
 ferred to the bees?” 
 
 **Do you!” said Mr. Boffin. 
 
 ‘*{ object on principle,” said Eugene, ‘‘as a 
 biped—” 
 
 ‘‘As'a what?” asked Mr. Boffin. 
 
 *‘As a two-footed creature ;—I object on prin- 
 ciple, as a two-footed creature, to being con- 
 stantly referred to insects and four-footed creat- 
 ures. I object to being required to model my 
 proceedings according to the proceedings of the 
 bee, or the dog, or ‘the spider, or the camel. I 
 fully admit that the camel, for instance, is’ an 
 excessively temperate person; but he has several 
 
 respect for you.” 
 
 stomachs to entertain himself with, and I have 
 only one. Besides, I am not fitted up with a 
 convenient cool cellar to keep my drink in.” 
 
 ‘But I said, you know,” urged Mr. Boffin, 
 rather at a loss for an answer, ‘‘the bee.” 
 
 ** Exactly, And may I represent to you that 
 it’s injudicious to say the bee? For the whole 
 case is assumed. Conceding for a moment that 
 there is any analogy between a bee and a man 
 in a shirt and pantaloons (which I deny), and 
 that it is settled that the man is to learn from 
 the bee (which I also deny), the question still re- 
 mains, What is he to learn? ‘lo imitate? Or 
 to avoid? When your friends the bees worry 
 themselves to that highly fluttered extent about 
 their sovereign, and become perfectly distracted 
 touching the slightest monarchical movement, 
 are we men to learn the greatness of Tuft-huut- 
 ing, or the littleness of the Court Circular? I 
 am not clear, Mr. Boffin, but that the hive may 
 be satirical.” 
 
 ‘** At all events, they work,” said Mr. Boffin. 
 
 ‘*Ye-es,” returned Eugene, disparagingly, 
 “they work; but don’t you think they overdo 
 it? They work so much more than they need— 
 they make so much more than they can eat— 
 they are so incessantly boring and buzzing at 
 their one idea till Death comes npon them—that 
 don’t you think they overdo it? And are hu- 
 
 # 
 
 a 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 man laborers to have no holidays because of 
 
 : 
 ee 
 
 the bees? And am I never to have change of — 
 
 air because the bees don’t ? 
 honey excellent at breakfast; but, regarded in 
 the light of my conventional schoolmaster and 
 
 moralist, I protest against the tyrannical hum- 
 
 bug of your friend the bee. With the highest. 
 
 ‘*’Thankee,” said Mr. Boffin. 
 morning !’ : 
 
 But the worthy Mr. Boffin jogged away with 
 a coufortless impression he could have dispensed 
 with, that there was a deal of unsatisfactoriness 
 in the world, besides what he had recalled as. 
 appertaining to the Harmon property. And he 
 was still jogging along Fleet Street in this con- 
 dition of mind, when he became aware that he 
 was closely tracked and observed by a man of 
 genteel appearance. 
 
 ‘‘ Now then,” said Mr. Boffin, stopping short,. 
 with his meditations brought to an abrupt check, 
 ‘*what’s the next article?” 2 
 
 ‘*T beg your pardon, Mr. Boffin.” — 
 
 ‘‘My name too, eh? How did you-come by. 
 it? I don’t know you.” 4% 
 
 ‘* No, Sir, you don’t know me.” 
 
 Mr. Boftin looked full at the man, and the 
 man looked full at him. ‘‘No,” said Mr. Bof-: 
 fin, after a glance at the pavement, as if it were 
 made of faces and he were trying to match the: 
 man’s, **I don’t know you.” 
 
 ‘*T am nobody,” said the stranger, ‘‘and net 
 likely to be known; but Mr. Botlin’s wealth—” 
 
 ‘*Oh! that’s got about already, has it?” mut- 
 tered Mr. Boftin. 
 
 ‘‘—And his romantic manner of acquiring it 
 make him conspicuous. You were pointed out 
 to me the other day.” 
 
 ‘* Well,”*said Mr. Boffin, ‘I should say I was 
 a disappintment to you when I was pinted out, 
 if your politeness would allow you to confess it, 
 for | am well aware I am not much to look at. 
 What might you want with me? Not in the 
 law, are you?” 
 
 UNG nih. 
 
 ‘‘ No information to give, for a reward ?” 
 
 e Nos Sire 
 
 There may have been a momentary mantlM{g 
 in the face of the man as he made the last-an-- 
 swer, but it passed directly. 
 
 “If I don’t mistake, you have followed me 
 from my lawyer’s and tried to fix my attention, 
 Say out! Have you? Or haven’t you?” de-. 
 manded Mr, Boffin, rather angry. 
 
 Xe 
 
 ‘Why have you?” 
 
 If you will allow me to walk beside you, Mr. 
 Boffin, I will tell you. Would you object to turn 
 aside into this place—I think it is called Clif. 
 ford’s Inn—where we can hear one another bet- 
 ter than in the roaring street ?” 
 
 (‘‘ Now,” thought Mr. Boffin, ‘‘if he proposes 
 a game at skittles, or meets a country gentle- 
 man just come into property, or produces any 
 article of jewelry he has found, Pll knock him 
 down !”’ 
 
 He Morning, 
 
 Mr. Boffin, I think — 
 
 With this discreet reflection, and car-_ 
 
 rying his stick in his arms much as Punch ecar- | 
 
 ries his, Mr. Boflin turned into Clifford’s Inn 
 
 aforesaid.) 
 ‘Mr. Boffin, I happened to be in Chancery 
 
 Lane this morning, when I saw you going along 
 
 before me. I took the liberty of following you, . 
 
 a 
 aa 
 
"ti 
 
 ie : 
 
 trying to make up my mind to speak to you, till 
 you went into your lawyer's. Then I waited 
 
 outside till you came out.” 
 
 (‘Don’t quite sound like: skittles, nor yet 
 country gentleman, nor yet jewelry,” thought 
 Mr. Boffin, ‘* but there’s no knowing.”) 
 
 **T am afraid my object is a bold one, I am 
 afraid it has little of the usual practical world 
 about it, but I venture it. If you ask me, or if 
 you ask yourself—which is more likely—what 
 emboldens me, I answer, I have been strongly 
 
 assured that you are a man of rectitude and plain 
 
 dealing, with the soundest of sound’hearts, and 
 that you are blessed in a wife distinguished by 
 the same qualities.” _ 
 
 ** Your information is true of Mrs. Boffin, any- 
 how,” was Mr. Boftin’s answer, as he surveyed 
 his new friend again. 
 pressed in the strange man’s manner, and he 
 walked with his eyes on the ground-—though 
 conscious, for all that, of Mr. Boffin’s observa- 
 tion—and he spoke in a subdued voice. But his 
 words came easily, and his voice was agreeable 
 
 in tone, albeit constrained. * 
 
 “When I add, I can discern for mysclf what 
 the general tongue says of you—that you are 
 quite unspoiled by Fortune, and not uplifted—I 
 trust you will not, as a man of an open nature, 
 suspect that I mean to flatter you, but will be- 
 lieve that all I mean is to excuse myself, these 
 
 _ being my only excuses for my present intru- 
 
 sion.” 
 
 (‘*How much?” thought Mr. Boftin. 
 must be coming to money. How much ?”) 
 
 “You will probably change your manner of 
 living, Mr. Boffin, in your changed circum- 
 stances. You will probably keep a larger 
 house, have many matters to arrange, and be 
 beset by numbers of correspondents. If you 
 would try me as your Seeretary—” 
 
 ‘As what?” cried Mr. Boflin, with his eyes 
 Wide open. 
 
 ** Your-Seerctary<2- 
 
 “Well,” said Mr. Boffin, under his breath, 
 
 ‘Tt 
 
 “that’s a queer thing!” 
 
 “QO,” pursued the stranger, wondering at Mr. 
 Bffin’s wonder, ‘‘if you would try me as your 
 Man of business under any name, I know you 
 would find me faithful and grateful, and I hope 
 you would find me useful. You may naturally 
 think that my immediate object is money. Not 
 so, for I would willingly serve you a year—two 
 years—any term you might appoint—before that 
 should begin to be a consideration between us.” 
 
 *‘ Where do you come’from ?” asked Mr. Bof- 
 fin. 
 
 ‘I come,” returned the other, meeting his 
 eye, ‘‘from_many. countries.” 
 
 Mr. Boffin’s acquaintance with the names and 
 Situations of foreign lands being limited in ex- 
 tent and somewhat confused in quality, he shaped 
 his next question on an elastic model. 
 
 **Prom—any particular place?” 
 
 **T have been in many places.” 
 
 “What have you been?” asked Mr. Boffin. 
 
 Here again he made no great advance, for 
 the reply was, ‘‘I have-been- avstudent*and a 
 traveler.”’ 
 
 “ But if it ain’t a liberty to plump it out,” said 
 
 Mr. Boffin, ‘“‘what do you do for your living?” 
 
 “T have mentioned,” returned the other, with 
 
 another look at him, and a smile, “ what I as- 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 There was something re- | 
 fan) 
 
 ye 
 goat 
 
 ‘pire todo. Ihave been superseded as to some 
 | slight intentions I had, and I may say that [ 
 have now to begin life.” 
 
 Not very well knowing how to get rid of this 
 applicant, and feeling the more embarrassed be- 
 cause his manner and appearance claimed a del- 
 icacy in which the worthy Mr. Boffin feared 
 he himself might be deficient, that gentleman. 
 glanced into the mouldy little plantation or cat- 
 preserve, of Clifford's Inn, as it was that day, 
 | in search of a suggestion. Sparrows were there, 
 cats were there, dry-rot and wet-rot were there, 
 but it was not otherwise a suggestive spot. 
 
 ‘‘ All this time,” said the stranger, producing 
 a little pocket-book and taking out a card, ‘I 
 jhave not mentioned my name. “My name is 
 Rokesmith. Ilodge at one Mr. Wilfer’s, at Hol- 
 loway.? 
 
 Mr. Boffin stared again. 
 
 ‘* Father of Miss Bella Wilfer ?”’ said he. 
 
 **My landlord has a daughter named Bella. 
 Yes; no doubt.” 
 
 Now this name had been more or less in Mr. 
 Boffin’s thoughts all the morning, and for days 
 before; therefore he said: 
 
 ‘<That’s singular, too!” unconsciously staring 
 again, past all bounds of good manners, with: 
 the card in his hand. ‘+ Though, by-the-by, I 
 suppose it was one of that family that pinted me 
 out ?” 
 
 -**No. I have never been in the streets with 
 one of them.” : 
 
 ‘*Heard me talked of among ’em, though ?” 
 
 *“No. I oceupy my own rooms, and have 
 held scarcely any communication with them.” 
 
 ** Qdder and odder!” said Mr. Boffin. ‘+ Well, 
 Sir, to tell you the truth, I don’t know what to 
 say to you.” 
 
 ‘*Say nothing,” returned Mr. Rokesmith ; 
 ‘fallow me to call on you in a few days. I 
 am not so unconscionable as to think it likely 
 that you would accept me on trust at first sight, 
 and take me out of the very street. Let me 
 come to you for your further opinion, at your 
 Jeisure.”’ ' 
 
 “That's fair, and I don’t object,” said Mr. 
 Boffin; ‘‘but it must be on condition that it’s 
 fully understood that I no more know that I 
 shall ever be in want of any gentleman as Secre- 
 tary—it was Secretary you said; wasn’t it?” 
 
 Yes.” ; * 
 
 Again Mr. Boffin’s eyes opened wide, and he 
 stared at the applicant from head to foot, re- 
 peating ‘‘ Queer!—You’re sure it was Secretary ? 
 Are you?” 
 
 ‘“‘T am sure I said so.” 
 
 —“‘ As Secretary,” repeated Mr. Boffin, 
 itating upon the word; ‘‘I no more know that 
 | 1 may ever want a Secretary, or what not, than 
 I do that I shall ever be in want of the man in 
 the moon. Me and Mrs. Boffin have not even 
 settled that we shall make any change in our 
 way of life. Mrs. Boffin’s inclinations certain- 
 ly do tend toward Fashion; but, being already 
 set up in a fashionable way at the Bower, she 
 may not make further alterations. However, 
 Sir, as you don’t press yourself, I wish to meet 
 you so far as saying, by all means call at the 
 Bower if you like. Call in the course of a week 
 or two. At the same time, I consider that I 
 Fought to name, in addition to what I have al- 
 : ready named, that I have in my employment a 
 
 Be 
 
 3, 
 
 ax 
 med-. 
 
 * 
 
5G f ! OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. : Py 
 
 literary man—wvrth a wooden leg—as I have no 
 thoughts of parting from.” 
 
 ‘*T regret to hear Iam in some sort antici- 
 pated,” Mr. Rokesmith answered, evidently hay- 
 ing heard it with surprise; ‘‘but perhaps other 
 duties might arise ?” 
 
 “*You see,” returned Mr. Boffin, with a con- 
 fidential sense of dignity, ‘‘as to my literary 
 man’s duties, they’re clear. Professionally he 
 declines and he falls, and as a friend he drops 
 into poetry.” 
 
 Without observing that these duties seemed by 
 no means clear to Mr. Rokesmith’s astonished 
 comprehension, Mr, Boffin went on: 
 
 ‘And now, Sir, I’ll wish you good-day. You 
 can call at the Bower any time in a week or two. 
 It’s not above a mile or so from you, and your 
 Jandlord can direct you to it. But as he may 
 not know it by its new name of Boffin’s Bower, 
 Say, when you inquire of him, it’s Harmon’s; 
 will you ?” 
 
 ‘‘ Harmoon’s,” repeated Mr, Rokesmith, seem-’ 
 
 ing to have caught the sound imperfectly, ‘‘ Har- 
 marn’s. How do you spell it ?” 
 
 ‘* Why, as to the spelling of it,’”’ returned Mr. 
 Boffin, with great presence of mind, ‘that’s 
 your look-out. Harmon’s is all you’ve got to 
 Say to im. Morning, morning, morning!” And 
 so departed, without looking back. 
 
 PEA AT OS 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 MR. AND MRS. BOFFIN IN CONSULTATION. 
 
 Betakine himself straight homeward, Mr. 
 Boffin, without further let or hindrance, arrived 
 at the Bower, and gave Mrs. Boffin (in a walk- 
 ing-dress of black velvet and feathers, like a 
 mourning coach-horse) an account of all he had 
 said and done since breakfast. 
 
 ‘This brings us round, my dear,” he then 
 pursued, ‘‘to the question we left unfinished: 
 namely, whether there’s to be any new go-in 
 for Fashion.” 
 
 ‘Now, I'll tell you what I want, Noddy,” 
 said Mrs. Boffin, smoothing her dress with an 
 air of immense enjoyment, ‘‘I want Society.” 
 
 ‘* Fashionable Society, my dear ?” 
 
 **Yes!” cried Mrs. Boffin, langhing with the 
 glee of achild. ‘Yes! It’s no good my being 
 kept here like Wax-Work; is it now ?” 
 
 ‘*People have to pay to see Wax-Work, my 
 dear,” returned her husband, ‘‘ whereas (though 
 you'd be cheap at the same money) the neigh- 
 bors is welcome to see you for nothing.” 
 
 ‘* But it don’t answer,” said the cheerful Mrs. 
 Boffin. ‘When we worked like the neighbors, 
 we suited one another. Now we have left work 
 off, we have left off suiting one another.” 
 
 ‘What, do you think of beginning work 
 again ?” Mr. Boffin hinted. 
 
 ‘*Out of the question! We have come into 
 a great fortune, and we must do what's right by 
 our fortune; we must act up to it.” 
 
 Mr. Boffin, who had a deep respect for his 
 wife’s intuitive wisdom, replied, though rather 
 pensively: ‘‘I suppose we must.”’ 
 
 ‘*It’s never been acted up to yet, and, conse- 
 quently, no good has come of it,” said Mrs. 
 Boffin. | 
 
 ‘* True, to the present time,” Mr. Boffin as- 
 
 ] 
 
 | 
 | 
 
 sented, with his former pensiveness, as he took — 
 his seat upon his settle. ‘1 hope good may be | 
 coming of it in the fature time. Toward which, — 
 what's your views, old lady ?” : 
 
 Mrs. Boffin, a smiling creature, broad of figure 
 and simple of nature, with her hands folded in 
 her lap, and with\buxom creases in her throat, | 
 proceeded to expound her views. . 
 
 “Tsay, a good house in a good neighborhood, 
 good things about us, good living, and good so- 
 ciety. J say, live like our means, without ex- 
 travagance, and be happy.” 
 
 ‘Yes. J say be happy, too,” assented the 
 still pensive Mr. Boffin. 3 
 
 ‘* Lor-a-mussy !” exclaimed Mrs. Boffin, langh- 
 ing and clapping her hands, and gayly rocking 
 herself to and fro, ‘‘when I think of me in a 
 light yellow chariot and pair, with silver-boxes 
 to the wheels—” 
 
 ‘Oh! you was thinking of that, was you, my 
 dear?” . 
 
 ‘*Yes!’’ cried the delighted creature.’ *¢ And _ 
 with a footman up behind, with a bar across, to 
 keep his legs from being poled! And with a- 
 coachman up in front, sinking down into a seat 
 big enough for three of him, all covered with 
 upholstery in green and white! And with two 
 bay horses tossing their heads and stepping high- 
 er than they trot long-ways! And with you 
 and me leaning back inside, as grand as nine-_ 
 pence! QOh-h-h-h My! Ha ha ha ha ha!” 
 
 Mrs. Boffin clapped her hands again, rocked 
 herself again, beat her feet upon the floor, and 
 wiped the tears of laughter from her eyes. 
 
 “And what, my old lady,” inquired Mr. Bof- 
 fin, when he also had sympathetically laughed : 
 ‘‘what’s your views on the subject of the Bower ?” 
 
 ‘Shut it up. Don’t part with it, but put some- 
 body in it, to keep it.” 
 
 ** Any other views ?” 
 
 ‘* Noddy,” said Mrs. Boffin, coming from her 
 fashionable sofa to his side on the plain settle, 
 and hooking her comfortable arm through his, 
 “Next I think—and I really have been think- 
 ing early and late—of the disappointed girl; 
 her that was so eruelly: disappointed, you know, 
 both of her husband and his riches. “Don’t you 
 think we might do something for her? Have 
 her to live with us? Or something of that sort?” 
 
 ** Ne-ver once thought of the way of doing it!” - 
 cried Mr. Boffin, smiting the table in his admi- 
 ration, ‘*What a thinking steam-ingein this 
 old lady is. And she don’t know how she does 
 it. Neither does the ingein!” 
 
 Mrs. Boffin pulled his nearest ear, in acknowl 
 edgment of this piece of philosophy, and then 
 said, gradually toning down toa motherly strain: | 
 ‘* Last, and not least, I have taken a fancy. You 
 remember dear little John Harmon, before he 
 went to school? Over yonder across the yard, 
 at our fire? Now that he is past all benefit of 
 the money, and it’s come to us, I should like to — 
 find some orphan child, and take. the boy and” 
 adopt him and give him John’s name, and pro- — 
 vide for him. Somehow, it would make mé 
 easier, I fancy. Say it’s only a whim—” 
 
 ‘* But I don’t say so,” interposed her husband. 
 
 **No, but deary, if you did—” 
 
 **T should be a Beast if I did,” her husband _ 
 interposed again. | 3 
 
 “'That’s as much as to say you agree? Good — 
 and kind of you, and like you, deary! And — 
 
 ¥ 
 
 2 
 
+ 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 don’t you begin to find it pleasant now,” said 
 Mrs. Boffin, once more radiant in her comely 
 way from head to foot, and once more smooth- 
 ing her dress with immense enjoyment, ‘‘don’t 
 you begin to find it pleasant already, to think 
 
 that a child will be made brighter, and better, 
 and happier, because of that poor sad child that 
 day? And isn’t it pleasant to know that the 
 good will be done with the poor sad child’s own 
 money ?” 
 
 ‘‘Yes; and it’s pleasant to know that you are 
 Mrs. Boffin,” said her husband, ‘and it’s been 
 a pleasant thing to know this many and many a 
 year!” It was ruin to Mrs. Boffin’s aspirations, 
 but, having so spoken, they sat side by side, a 
 hopelessly Unfashionable pair. 
 
 These two ignorant and unpolished people had 
 guided themselves so far on in their journey of 
 life by a religious sense of duty and desire to 
 do.right. Ten thousand weaknesses and ab- 
 surdities might have been detected in the breasts 
 of both; ten thousand vanities additional, possi- 
 bly, fn the breast of the woman. But the hard 
 wrathful and sordid nature that had wrung as 
 much work out of them as could be got in their 
 best days, for as little money as could be paid 
 to hurry on their worst, had never been so warp- 
 ed but that it knew their moral.straightness-and 
 respected it. In its own despite, in a constant 
 conflict with itself and them, it had done so. 
 And this is the eternal law. For, Evil often 
 stops short at itself and dies with the doer of it; 
 but Good, never. = 
 
 Through his ntost inveterate purposes, the 
 dead Jailer of Harmony Jail had known these 
 two faithful servants to be honest and true. 
 
 - While he raged at them and reviled them for 
 opposing him with the speech of the honest and 
 
 true, it had scratched his stony heart, and he 
 had perceived the powerlessness of all his wealth 
 to buy them if he had addressed himself to the 
 attempt. So, even while he was their griping 
 taskmaster and never gave them a good word, 
 he had written their names down in his will. 
 So, even while it was his daily declaration that 
 he mistrusted all mankind—and sorely indeed he 
 did mistrust all who bore any resemblance to 
 himself—he was as certain that these two people, 
 surviving him, would be trust-worthy in all things 
 from the greatest to the least, as he was that he 
 must surely die. ms 3 
 
 Mr. and Mrs. Boffin, sitting side by side, with 
 Fashion withdrawn to an immeasurable distance, 
 fell to discussing how they could best find their 
 orphan, Mrs. Boftin suggested advertisement in 
 the newspapers, requesting orphans answering 
 annexed description to apply at the Bower on a 
 certain day'; but Mr. Boffin wisely apprehending 
 obstruction of the neighboring thoroughfares by 
 
 _ orphan swarms, this course was negatived. Mrs. 
 
 Boffin next suggested application to their clergy- 
 man for a likely orphan. Mr, Boffin thinking 
 better of this scheme, they resolved to call upon 
 the reverend gentleman at once, and to take the 
 same opportunity of making acquaintance with 
 Miss Bella Wilfer. In order that these visits 
 might be visits of state, Mrs. Boffin’s equipage 
 was ordered out. | 
 This consisted of a long hammer-headed old 
 horse, formerly used in the business, attached to 
 a four-wheeled chaise of the same period, which 
 * had long been exclusively used by the Harmony 
 : eg 
 
 aN 
 
 ae 
 
 57 
 Jail poultry. as the favorite laying-place of sev- 
 eral discreet hens. An unwonted application of 
 corn to the horse, and of paint and varnish to 
 the carriage, when both fell in as a part of the 
 Boffin legacy, had made what Mr. Boftin con- 
 sidered a neat turn-out of the whole; and a’ 
 driver being added, in the person of a long ham- 
 mer-headed young man who was a very good 
 match for the horse, left nothing. to be desired, 
 He, too, had been formerly used in the business, 
 but was now entombed by an honest jobbing 
 tailor of the district in a perfect Sepulchre of 
 coat and gaiters, sealed with ponderous buttons, 
 
 Behind this domestic Mr. and Mrs. Boffin 
 took their seats in the back compartment of the 
 vehicle: which was sufficiently commodious, but 
 had an undignified and alarming tendency, in 
 getting over a rough crossing, to hiccup itself 
 away from the front compartment. On their 
 being descried emerging from the gates of the 
 Bower, the neighborhood turned out at door and 
 window to salute the Boftins. Among those who 
 were ever and again left behind, staring after 
 the equipage, were many youthful spirits, who 
 hailed it in stentorian tones with such congratu- 
 lations as ‘‘ Nod-dy Bof-fin!” * Bof-fin’s mon- 
 ey!” ‘*Down with the dust, Bof-fin!” and oth- 
 er similar compliments. These, the hammer- 
 headed young man took in such ill part that he ' 
 often impaired the majesty of the progress by 
 pulling up short, and making as though he would 
 alight to exterminate the offenders; a purpose 
 from which he only allowed himself to be dis- 
 suaded after long and lively arguments with his 
 employers. 
 
 At length the Bower district was left behind, 
 and the peaceful dwelling of the Reverend Frank 
 Milvey was gained. The Reverend Frank Mil- 
 
 _Yey’s abode was a very modest abode, because 
 
 his income was a very modest income. He was 
 officially accessible to every blundering old wo- 
 man who had incoherence to bestow upon him, 
 and readily received the Boffins. He was quite 
 a young man, expensively educated and wretch- 
 edly paid, with quite a young wife and half a 
 dozen quite young children. He was under the 
 necessity of teaching and translating from the 
 classics to eke out his scanty means, yet was 
 generally expected to have more time to spare 
 than the idlest person in the parish, and more 
 money than the richest. He accepted the need- 
 less ‘inequalities and inconsistencies of his life, 
 with a kind of conventional submission that was 
 almost slavish; and any daring layman who 
 would have adjusted such burdens as his, more 
 decently and graciously, would have had small 
 help from him. 
 
 With a ready patient face and manner, and 
 yet with a latent smile that showed a quick 
 enough observation of Mrs. Boftin’s dress, Mr. 
 Milvey, in his little back room—charged with 
 sounds and cries as though the six children above 
 were coming down through the ceiling, and the 
 roasting leg of mutton below were coming up 
 through the floor—listened to Mrs. Boffin’s state- 
 ment of her want of an orphan, | 
 
 ‘“*T think,” said Mr. Milvey, “‘that you have 
 never had a child of your own, Mr. and Mrs. 
 Boffin ?” ” 
 
 Never. 
 
 ** But, like the Kings and Queens in the Fairy 
 Tales, I suppose you have wished for one ?”” 
 
58 
 
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 _ OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
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 Va res ib 
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 HM 
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 —— < 
 
 —— 
 
 THE BOFFIN PROGRESS. 
 
 In a general way, yes. 
 
 Mr. Milvey smiled again, as he remarked to 
 himself, ‘‘‘Those kings and queens were always 
 wishing for children.” It occurrisg to him, per- 
 haps, that if they had been Curates, their wishes 
 might have tended in the opposite direction. 
 
 **T think,” he pursued, ‘‘ we had better take 
 Mrs. Milvey into our Council. She is indispens- 
 able to me. If you please, I’ll call her.” 
 
 So Mr. Milvey called, ‘‘Margaretta, my dear!” 
 and Mrs. Milvey came down. A pretty, bright 
 little woman, something worn by anxiety, who 
 had repressed many pretty tastes and bright fan- 
 cies, and substituted in their gtead schools, soup, 
 flannel, coals, and all the week-day cares and 
 
 _ Sunday coughs of a large population, young and. 
 
 old. As gallantly had Mr. Milvey repressed 
 
 old studies and old fellow-students, and taken 
 up among the poor and their children with the 
 hard erumbs of life. 
 
 ‘‘Mr. and Mrs. Boffin, my dear, whose good 
 fortune you have heard of.” 
 
 Mrs. Milvey, with the most unaffected grace 
 in the world, congratulated them, and was glad 
 to see them. Yet her engaging face, being an 
 open as well as a perceptive one, was not with- 
 out her husband’s latent smile. 
 
 “ Mrs. Boffin wishes to adopt a little boy, my 
 dear.” 
 
 Mrs. Milvey, looking rather alarmed, her hus- | 
 
 band added: 
 
 ‘¢ An orphan, my dear.” 
 
 ‘‘Oh!” said Mrs. Milvey, reassured for her 
 own little boys. — 
 
 much in himself that naturally belonged te his| ‘‘ And I was thinking, Margaretta, that per- 
 
difficult to discharge. 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 59 
 
 haps old Mrs. Goody’s deanaeiita might answer 
 the purpose.” : , 
 
 “Oh my dear Frank! I don’t think that 
 would do!” ' 7 
 
 Nor: ) 
 
 “Oh no!” 
 
 The smiling Mrs. Boffin, feeling it incumbent 
 on her to take part in the conversation, and 
 being charmed with the emphatic little wife and 
 her ready interest, here offered her acknowledg- 
 ments, and inquired what there was against 
 him? te’ 
 
 “‘T don’t think,” said Mrs. Milvey, glancing 
 at the Reverend Frank—‘‘and I believe my 
 husband will agree with me when he considers it 
 again—that you could possibly keep that orphan 
 
 clean from snuff. Because his grandmother takes 
 
 so many ounces, and drops it over him.” 
 
 ~** But he would not-be living with his grand- 
 mother then, Margaretta,” said Mr. Milvey. 
 
 ‘No, Frank, but it would be impossible to 
 keep her from Mrs. Botfin’s house; and the 
 more there was to eat and drink there, the oftener 
 she would go. And she is an inconvenient wo- 
 man. I hope it’s not uncharitable to remember 
 that last Christmas Eve she drank eleven cups 
 of tea, and grumbled all the time. And she is 
 not a grateful woman, Frank. You recollect her 
 
 _ addressing a crowd outside this house about her 
 wrongs, when, one night after we had gone to: 
 
 bed, she brought back the petticoat of new flan- 
 
 nel that had been given her, because it was too | 
 
 short.” 
 
 “That’s true,” said Mr. Milvey. ‘‘I don’t 
 think that would do. Would little Harrison—”’ 
 
 “Oh, Frank!” remonstrated his emphatic 
 wife. 
 
 “‘ He has no grandmother, my dear.” 
 
 **No, but I don’t think Mrs. Boffin would like 
 an orphan who squints so much.” 
 
 ‘‘'That’s true again,” said Mr. Milvey, becom- 
 ing haggard with perplexity. ‘‘If a little girl 
 would do—” 
 
 ‘But, my dear Frank, Mrs. Boffin wants a 
 boy.” 
 
 “'That’s true again,” said Mr. Milvey. ‘Tom 
 Bocker is. a nice boy” (thoughtfully). 
 
 ‘*But I doubt, Frank,” Mrs. Milvey hinted, 
 after a little hesitation; ‘‘if Mrs. Boffin wants 
 an orphan gute nineteen, who drives a cart and 
 waters the roads.” 
 
 Mr. Milvey referred the point to Mrs. Boffin in 
 a look; on that smiling lady’s shaking her black 
 velvet bonnet and bows, he remarked, in lower 
 spirits, ‘‘’That’s true again.”’ i 
 
 ‘*T am sure,’ said Mrs. Boffin, concerned at 
 giving so much trouble, ‘‘that if I had known 
 you would have taken so much pains, Sir—and 
 you too, ma’am—I don’t think I would have 
 come.” : 
 
 ** Pray don’t say that!” urged Mrs. Milvey. 
 
 **No, don’t say that,” assented Mr. Milvey, 
 “‘ because we are so much obliged to you for giy- 
 ing us the preference.” Which Mrs. Milvey con- 
 firmed ; and really the kind, conscientious couple 
 spoke as if they kept some profitable orphan ware- 
 house and were personally patronized. ‘‘ But it 
 is a responsible trust,”’ added Mr. Milvey, ‘‘ and 
 At the same time, we are 
 naturally very unwilling to lose the chance you 
 so kindly give us, and if yom could afford us a 
 day or two to look about us—you know, Marga- 
 
 retta, we might carefully examine the work-house, 
 and the Infant School, and your District.” 
 ‘*'To be sure!” said the emphatic little wife. 
 ‘‘We have orphans, I know,” pursued Mr. 
 Milvey, quite with the air as if he might have 
 added, ‘‘in stock,” and quite as anxiously as if 
 there were great competition in the business and 
 he were afraid of losing an order, ‘‘over at the 
 clay-pits; but they are employed by relations or 
 friends, and I am afraid it would come at last to 
 a transaction in the way of barter. And even 
 if you exchanged blankets for the child—or 
 books and firing—it would be impossible to pre- 
 vent their being turned into liquor.” 
 Accordingly, it was resolved that Mr. and 
 Mrs. Milvey should search for an orphan likely 
 to suit, and as free as possible from the foregoing 
 objections, and should communicate again with 
 Mrs. Boffin, Then Mr. Boffin took the liberty 
 of mentioning to Mr. Milvey that if Mr. Milvey 
 would do him the kindness to be perpetually his 
 banker to the extent of ‘‘a twenty-pound note 
 or so,” to be expended without any reference to 
 him, he would be heartily obliged. At this both 
 Mr. Milvey and Mrs. Milvey were quite as much 
 pleased as if they had no wants of their own, but 
 only knew what poverty was in the persons of 
 other people; and so the interview terminated 
 with satisfaction and good opinion on all sides. 
 ‘* Now, old lady,” said Mr. Boffin, as they re- 
 sumed their séats behind the hammer-headed 
 horse and man. ‘‘ having made a very agreeable 
 
 | visit there, we’ll try Wilfer’s.” 
 
 It appeared, on their drawing up at the fami- 
 ly gate, that to try Wilfer’s was a thing more 
 easily projected than done, on account of the ex- 
 treme difficulty of getting into that establishment ; 
 three pulls at the bell producing no external re- 
 sult, though each was attended by audible sounds 
 of scampering and rushing within. Atthe fourth 
 tug-—vindictively administered by the hammer- 
 headed young man—Miss Lavinia appeared, 
 emerging from the house in an accid 1tal man- 
 ner, with a bonnet and parasol, asd igning to 
 take a contemplative walk. The a ung lady 
 was astonished to find visitors at the gate, and 
 expressed her feelings in appropriate action, 
 
 ‘*Here’s Mr. and Mrs. Boffin!” growled the 
 hammer-headed young man througlthe bars of 
 the gate, and at the same time shaking it, as if 
 he were on view ina Menagerie, ‘‘they’ve been 
 here half an hour.” 
 
 ‘¢Who did you say ?” asked Miss Lavinia. ~ 
 
 ‘*Mr,. and Mrs. Borrin!” returned the young — 
 man, rising into a roar. 
 
 Miss Lavinia tripped up the steps to the house- 
 door, tripped dowmthe steps with the key, tripped 
 across the little garden, and opened the gate. 
 ‘* Please to walk in,” said Miss Lavinia, haughti-_ 
 ly. ‘* Our servant is out.” 
 
 Mr. and Mrs. Boffin complying, and pausing 
 in the little’ hall until Miss Lavinia came up to 
 show them where to go next, perceived three 
 pairs of listening legs upon the stairs above. 
 Mrs. Wilfer’s legs, Miss Bella’s legs, Mr. George 
 Sampson’s legs. 
 
 ‘¢ Mr. and Mrs. Boffin, I think?” said Lavinia, 
 in a warning voice. 
 
 Strained attention on the part of Mrs. Wilfer’s 
 legs, of Miss Bella’s legs, of Mr. George Samp- — 
 son’s legs. 
 
 ‘* Yes, Miss.” 
 
Se ae. 
 
 yy 
 
 60 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 “If you'll step this way—down these stairs— 
 Tl let Ma know.” 
 
 Excited flight ‘of Mrs. Wilfer’s legs, of Miss 
 Bella’s legs, of Mr. George Sampson’s legs. 
 
 After waiting some quarter of an hour alone 
 _in the family sitting-room, which presented traces 
 of having been so hastily arranged after a meal 
 that one might have doubted whether it was 
 made tidy for visitors, or cleared for blindman’s- 
 buff, Mr. and Mrs. Boffin became aware of the 
 entrance of Mrs. Wilfer, majestically faint, and 
 with a condescending stitch in her side: which 
 
 was her company manner. 
 “¢ Pardon me,” said Mrs. Wilfer, after the first 
 salutations, and as soon as she had adjusted the 
 handkerchief under her chin, and waved her 
 gloved hands, ‘‘to what am I indebted for this 
 honor ?” 
 
 ‘¢To make short of it, ma’am,” returned Mr. 
 Boffin, ‘‘ perhaps you may be acquainted with 
 the names of me and Mrs. Boffin, as having come 
 into a certain property.” 
 
 “‘T have heard, Sir,’’ returned Mrs. Wilfer, 
 with a dignified bend of her head, ‘‘of such 
 being the case.” 
 
 ‘¢And I dare say, ma’am,” pursued Mr. Bof- 
 fin, while Mrs. Boffin added confirmatory nods 
 and smiles, “ you are not very much inclined to 
 take kindly to us ?” 
 
 ‘¢Pardon me,” said Mrs. Wilfer. ‘‘’I'were 
 unjust to visit upon Mr, and Mrs. Boffin a ca- 
 lamity which was doubtless a dispensation.” 
 These words were rendered the more effective 
 by aserenely heroic expression of suffering. 
 
 ‘¢That’s fairly meant, I am sure,’”’ remarked 
 the honest Mr. Boffin; ‘‘ Mrs. Boffin and me, 
 ma’am, are plain people, and we don’t want to 
 pretend to any thing, nor yet to go round and 
 round at any thing: because there’s always a 
 straight way to every thing. Consequently, we 
 make this call to say, that we shall be glad to 
 have the honor and pleasure of your daughter’s 
 acquaintance, and that we shall be rejiced if 
 your daughter will come to consider our house 
 in the light of her home equally with this. In 
 short, we want to cheer your daughter, and to 
 give her the opportunity of sharing such pleas- 
 ures as we are a going to take ourselves. We 
 want to brisk her up, and brisk her about, and 
 give her a change.” 
 
 ‘¢That’s it!” said the open-hearted Mrs. Bof- 
 fin. ‘Lor! Let’s be comfortable.” 
 
 Mrs. Wilfer bent her head in a distant man- 
 ner to her lady visitor, and with majestic mo- 
 notony replied to the gentleman: 
 
 “Pardon me. I have several daughters. 
 Which of my daughters am I to understand is 
 - thus favored by the kind intentions of Mr. Bof- 
 fin and his lady ?” 
 
 *‘Don’t you see?” the ever-smiling Mrs. Bof- 
 
 fin put in. ‘Naturally, Miss Bella, you know.” 
 
 ‘¢Oh-h!” said Mrs. Wilfer, with a severely un- 
 convinced look. ‘My daughter Bella is access- 
 ible, and shall speak for herself.” Then open- 
 ing the door a little way, simultaneously with 
 a sound of scuttling outside it, the good lady 
 made the proclamation, ‘‘Send Miss Bella to 
 me!” Which proclamation, though grandly 
 formal, and one might almost say heraldic, to 
 hear, was in fact enunciated with her maternal 
 eyes reproachfally glaring on that young lady 
 im the flesh—and in so much of it that she was 
 
 f : 
 retiring with difficulty into the small closet un- 
 der the stairs, apprehensive of the emergence of 
 Mr. and Mrs: Boffin. ‘ 
 
 ‘‘The avocations of R. W., my husband,” 
 Mrs. Wilfer explained, on resuming her seat, 
 ‘“‘keep him fully engaged in the City at this 
 time of the day, or he would have had the hon- 
 or of participating in your reception beneath our 
 humble roof.” 
 
 ‘Very pleasant premises!” said Mr. Boffin, 
 cheerfully. 
 
 ‘¢Pardon me, Sir,’ returned Mrs. Wilfer, cor- 
 
 independent Poverty.” 
 
 Finding it rather difficult to pursue the con- 
 versation down this road, Mr. and Mrs. Boffin 
 sat staring at mid-air, and Mrs. Wilfer sat si- 
 lently, giving them to understand that every 
 breath she drew required to be drawn with a 
 self-denial rarely paralleled in history, until Miss 
 Bella appeared: whom Mrs. Wilfer presented, 
 and to whom she explained the purpose of the 
 visitors. 
 
 ‘¢T am much obliged to you, I am sure,” said 
 Miss. Bella, coldly shaking her curls, ‘‘but I~ 
 
 doubt if I have the inelination to go out at all.” 
 
 ‘¢ Bella!” Mrs. Wilfer admonished her; ‘‘ Bel- 
 la, you must conquer this.” 
 
 ‘¢ Yes, do what your Ma says, and conquer it, 
 my dear,” urged Mrs. Boftin, “‘ because we shall 
 be so glad to have you, and because you are 
 much too pretty to keep yourself shut up.” 
 With that the pleasant creature gave her a kiss, 
 and patted her on her dimpled: shoulders; Mrs. 
 Wilfer sitting stiffly by, like a functionary pre- 
 siding over an interview previous to an execu- 
 tion. 
 
 ‘¢We are going to move into a nice house,” 
 said- Mrs. Boffin, who was woman enough to 
 compromise Mr. Boffin on that point, when he 
 couldn’t very well contest it; ‘‘and we are go- 
 ing to set up a nice carriage, and we’ll go ev- 
 ery where and see every thing. And you 
 mustn't,” seating Bella beside her, and patting 
 her hand, ‘‘ you mustn’t feel a dislike to us to 
 begin with, because we couldn’t help it, you 
 know, my dear.” 
 
 With the natural tendency of youth to yield 
 to candor and sweet temper, Miss Bella was so 
 touched by the simplicity of this address that she 
 frankly returned Mrs. Boffin’s kiss. Not at all 
 to the satisfaction of that good woman of the 
 world, her mother, who sought to hold the ad- 
 vantageous ground of obliging the Boffins in- 
 stead of being obliged. 
 
 ‘*My youngest daughter, Lavinia,” said Mrs.. 
 
 Wilfer, glad to make a diversion, as that young 
 lady reappeared. “‘Mr. George Sampson, a 
 friend of the family.” BA 
 The friend of the family was in that stage of 
 the tender passion which bound him to regard 
 every body else as the foe of the family. He 
 put the round head of his cane in his mouth, 
 ‘like a stopper, when he sat down. As if he felt 
 himself full to the throat with affronting senti- 
 ‘ments. And he eyed the Bofiins with implaca- 
 ble eves. 
 | ‘If you like to bring your sister with you 
 when you come to stay with us,” said Mrs. Bof- 
 fin, ‘‘of course we shall be glad. The better 
 | you please yourself, Miss Bella, the better you’ll 
 _ please us.” | . | 
 
 recting him, ‘‘ it is the abode of conscious though’ 
 
 : 
 ie 
 f 
 is 
 
 Oe ee a ae 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 “Oh, my consent is of no consequence at all, 
 I suppose?” cried Miss Lavinia. | 
 ‘*Lavvy,” said her sister, in a low voice, 
 “have the goodness to be seen, and not heard.” 
 **No, I won’t,” replied the sharp Lavinia. 
 “Pm not a child, to be taken notice of by 
 strangers.” 
 **You are a child,” 
 “*I’m not a child,'and I won’t be taken notice 
 ‘Bring your sister,’ indeed!” 
 
 of. 
 
 “Lavinia!” said,’ Mrs. Wilfer. ‘“‘Hold! I 
 will not allow you to utter in my presence the 
 absurd suspicion that any strangers-—I care not 
 what their names—can patronize my child. Do 
 you dare to suppose, you ridiculous girl, that 
 Mr. and Mrs. Boflin would enter these doors 
 upon a patronizing errand; or, if they did, 
 would remain within them, only for one single 
 instant, while your mother had the strength yet 
 remaining in her vital frame to request them to 
 depart? You little know your mother if you 
 presume to think so.” 
 
 **It’s all very fine,” Lavinia began to grum- 
 ble, when Mrs. Wilfer repeated : 
 
 “Hold! I will not allow this. Do you not 
 know what is due to guests? Do you not com- 
 prehend that in presuming to bint that this lady 
 and gentleman could have any idea of patroniz- 
 ing any member of your family—I care not 
 which—you accuse them of an impertinence 
 little less than insane-?” 
 
 ‘Never mind me and Mrs, Boffin, ma’am,” 
 said Mr. Boffin, smilingly: ‘‘we don’t care.” 
 
 ‘ “ Pardon me, but J do,” returned Mrs. Wilfer. 
 
 Miss Lavinia Jaughed a short laugh as she 
 muttered, ‘‘ Yes, to be sure.” : 
 
 “ And I require my audacious child,” proceed- 
 ed Mrs. Wilfer, with a withering look at her 
 youngest, on whom it had not the slightest ef- 
 fect, ‘‘to please to be just to her sister Bella; to 
 remember that her sister Bella is much sought 
 after; and that when her sister Bella accepts an 
 attention, she considers herself to be conferring 
 qui-i-ite as mach honor”—this with an indig- 
 nant shiver—‘‘ as she receives.” 
 
 But here Miss Bella repudiated, and said qui- 
 etly, “I can. speak for myself, you know, ma. 
 You needn’t bring me in, please.” 
 
 “And it’s all very well aiming at others 
 through convenient me,” said the irrepressible 
 Lavinia, spitefully; ‘‘but I should like to ask 
 George Sampson what he says to it.” 
 
 ‘*“Mr. Sampson,” proclaimed Mrs. Wilfer, 
 seeing that young gentleman take his stopper 
 out, and so darkly fixing him with her eyes as 
 that he put it in again: ‘‘Mr. Sampson, asa 
 friend of this family and a frequenter of this 
 house, is, Iam persuaded, far too well-bred to 
 interpose on such an invitation.” 
 
 This exaltation of the young gentleman moved 
 the conscientious Mrs. Boffin to repentance for 
 having done him an injustice in her mind, and 
 consequently to saying that she and Mr. Boffin 
 would at any.time be glad to see him; an at- 
 tention which he handsomely acknowledged by 
 replying, with his stopper unremoved, ‘ Much 
 
 obliged to you, but I’m always engaged, day and | 
 
 night.” 
 
 However, Bella compensating for all. draw- 
 backs by responding to the advances of the Bof- 
 » fins in an engaging way, that easy pair were 
 
 on the whole well satisfied, and proposed to the 
 
 61 
 
 said Bella that as soon as they should be in a 
 condition to receive her in a manner suitable to 
 their desires, Mrs. Boftin should return with no- 
 tice of the fact. This arrangement Mrs. Wilfer 
 sanctioned with a stately inclination of her head 
 and wave of her gloves, as who should say, 
 ‘Your demerits shall be overlooked, and you 
 shall be mercifully gratified; poor people.” 
 
 ‘‘ By-the-by, ma’am,” said Mr: Boftin, turn- 
 ing back as he was going, ‘‘you havea lodger ?”’ 
 
 ‘A gentleman,” Mrs. Wilfer answered, quali- 
 fying the low expression, ‘ undoubtedly occupies 
 our first floor.” 
 
 “I may call him Our Mutual Friend,” said 
 Mr. Boffin.. ‘What sort of a fellow is Our 
 Mutual Friend, now? Do you like him?” 
 
 _ “Mr. Rokesmith is very. punctual, very-quiet, 
 a very eligible inmate.” 
 
 ‘* Because,” Mr. Boffin explained, “you must 
 know that I’m not particularly well acquainted 
 with Our Mutual Friend, for I have only seen 
 him once. You give a good account of him. 
 Is he at home?” 
 
 ‘““ Mr. Rokesmith is at home,” said Mrs. Wil- 
 fer; ‘‘indeed,” pointing through the window, 
 ‘‘there he stands at the garden gate. Waiting 
 for you, perhaps?” ' 
 
 ** Perhaps so,” replied Mr. Boffin. 
 come in, maybe.” 
 
 Bella had closely attended to this short dia- 
 logue. Accompanying Mrs. Boffin to the gate, 
 she as closely watched what followed. 
 
 ‘* How are you, Sir, how are you ?”’ said Mr. 
 Boffin. “This is Mrs. Boffin. Mr. Rokesmith, 
 that I told you of, my dear.” 
 
 She gave him good-day, and he bestirred him- 
 self and helped her to her seat, and the like, with 
 a ready hand. 
 
 ‘*Good-by for the present, Miss Bella,” said 
 Mrs. Boftin, calling out a hearty parting. ‘*We 
 shall meet again soon! And then I hope I 
 shall have my little John Harmon to shew you.” 
 
 Mr. Rokesmith, who was at the wheel adjust- 
 ing the skirts of her dress, suddenly looked be- 
 hind him and around him, and then looked up 
 at her, with a face so pale that Mrs, Boffin 
 cried ; t 
 
 ** Gracious And after.a moment, “ What’s 
 the matter, Sir?” 
 
 ‘‘How can you show her the Dead?” re- 
 turned Mr. Rokesmith. 
 
 ‘*Jt’s only an adopted child. One I have told 
 her of. One I’m going to give the name to!” 
 
 ‘You took me by surprise,” said Mr Roke- 
 smith, ‘‘and it sounded like an omen, that you 
 should speak of showing the Dead to one so 
 young and blooming.” MD 
 
 Now Bella suspected by this time that Mr. 
 Rokesmith admired her. Whether the know]- 
 edge (for it was rather that than suspicion) 
 caused her to incline to him a little more, or a 
 little less, than she had done at first; whether it 
 rendered her eager to find out more about him, 
 because she sought to establish reason for her 
 distrust, or because she sought to free him from 
 it; was as yet dark toher own heart. But at most. 
 times he occupied a great amount of her atten- 
 tion, and she had set her attention closely on 
 this incident. 
 
 That he knew it as well as she, she knew as 
 well as he, when they were left together stand- 
 ing on the path by the garlen gate. 
 
 ‘¢ Saw me 
 
 ee) 
 
( 
 
 62 
 
 <¢'Those are worthy people, Miss Wilfer.” 
 
 <‘Do you know them well?” asked Bella. 
 
 He smiled, reproaching her, and she colored, 
 reproaching herself—both, with the knowledge 
 that she had meant to entrap him into an an- 
 swer not true—when he said “I know of them.” 
 
 “Truly, he told us he had seen you but 
 once.” 
 
 “Truly, I supposed he did.” 
 
 ella was nervous now, and would have been 
 glad to recall ber question. 
 
 ‘You thought it strange that, feeling much 
 interested in you, I should start at what sound- 
 ed like a proposal to bring you into contact with 
 the murdered man who lies in his grave. I 
 might have known—of course in a moment 
 should have known—that it could not have that 
 meaning. But my interest remains.” 
 
 Re-entering the family-room in a meditative 
 state, Miss Bella was received by the irrepressi- 
 ble Lavinia with: 
 
 “There, Bella! At last I hope you have got, 
 your wishes realized—by your Boffins, You'll’ 
 
 e rich enough now—with your Boffins. You 
 can have as much flirting as you like—at your 
 Boffins. But you won’t take me to your Boffins, 
 I can tell you—you and your Boffins too!” 
 
 ‘Tf quoth Mr. George Sampson, moodily 
 pulling his stopper out, ‘‘ Miss Bella’s Mr. Boffin 
 comes any more of his nonsense to me, I only 
 wish him to understand, as betwixt man and 
 man, that he does it at his per—’’ and was go- 
 ing to say peril; but Miss Lavinia, having no 
 confidence in his mental powers, and feeling his 
 oration to have no definite application to any 
 circumstances, jerked his stopper in again, with 
 a sharpness that made his eyes water. 
 
 And now the worthy Mrs, Wilfer, having used 
 her youngest daughter as a lay-figure for the 
 edification of these Boffins, became bland to her, 
 and proceeded to develop her last instance of 
 force of character, which was still in reserve. 
 This was, to illuminate the family with her re- 
 markable powers as a physiognomist; powers 
 that terrified R. W. whenever let loose, as being 
 always fraught with gloom and evil which no 
 inferior prescience was aware of. Aud this Mrs. 
 Wilfer now did, be it observed, in jealousy of 
 these Boffins, in the very same moments when 
 she was already reflecting how she would flour- 
 ish these very same Boffins and the state they 
 kept, over the heads of her Boffinless friends. 
 
 ‘Of their manners,” said Mrs. Wilfer, ‘‘I 
 say nothing. Of their appearance, I say nothing. 
 Of the disinterestedness of their intentions to- 
 ward Bella, I say nothing. But the craft, the 
 secreey, the dark, deep underhanded plotting, 
 
 -written ia Mrs. Boffin’s countenance, make me 
 shudder.” 
 
 As an incontrovertible proof that those bale- 
 ful attributes were all there, Mrs. Wilfer shud- 
 dered on the spot. 
 
 a 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 A MARRIAGE CONTRACT. 
 
 THERE is excitement in the Vencering man- 
 sion. ‘The mature young lady is going to be 
 married (powder and all) to the mature young 
 gentleman, and she is to be married from the. 
 
 do with traffic in Shares. 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. | "a 
 
 Veneering house, and the Veneerings are to 
 give the breakfast. The Analytical;who ob- 
 jects as a matter of principle to every thing that 
 occurs on the premises, necessarily objects to the 
 match; but his consent has been dispensed with, 
 and a spring-van is delivering its load of green- 
 house plants at the door, in order that to-mor- 
 row’s feast may be crowned with flowers. 
 
 The mature young lady is a lady of property. 
 The mature young gentleman is a gentleman of 
 property. He invests his property. He goes, 
 in a condescending amateurish way, into the 
 City, attends meetings of Directors, and has to 
 As is well known to 
 the wise m their generation, traffic in Shares is 
 the one thing to have to do with in this world. 
 ‘Have no antecedents, no established character, 
 no cultivation, no ideas, no manners; -have 
 Shares. Have Shares enough to be on: Boards 
 of Direction in capital letters, oscillate on mys- 
 terious business between London and Paris, and 
 be great. Where does he come from? Shares. 
 Where is he going to? Shares. What are his 
 tastes? Shares. Has heany principles? Shares. 
 What squeezes him into Parliament? Shares. 
 Perhaps he never of himself achieved success in 
 any thing, never originated any thing, never 
 produced any thing? Sufficient answer to all; 
 Shares. O mighty Shares! To set those blar- 
 ing images so high, and to cause us smaller ver- 
 min, as under the influence of henbane or opi- 
 um, to cry out, night and day, ‘* Relieve us of 
 our money, scatter it for us, buy us and sell us, 
 ruin us, only we beseech ye take rank among 
 the-powers of the earth, and fatten on us!” 
 
 While the Loves and Graces have been pre- 
 paring this torch for Hymen, which is to be kin- 
 dled to-morrow, Mr. Twemlow has suffered much 
 in his mind. It would seem that both the ma- 
 ture young lady and the mature young gentle- ~ 
 man must indubitably be Veneering’s oldest 
 friends. Wards of his, perhaps? Yet that can 
 scarcely be, for they are older than himself. 
 Veneering has been in their confidence through- 
 out, and has done much to lure them to the al- 
 tar. He has mentioned to Twemlow how he 
 said to Mrs. Veneering, ‘“‘Anastatia, this must 
 be a match.” He has mentioned to Twemlow 
 how he regards Sophronia Akershem (the ma- 
 ture young lady) in the light of a sister, and 
 Alfred Lammle (the mature young gentleman) 
 in the light of a brother. ‘Twemlow has. asked 
 him whether he went to school as a junior with 
 Alfred? He has answered, ‘‘ Not exactly.” 
 Whether Sophronia was adopted by his mo- 
 ther? He has answered, ‘‘ Not precisely so.” 
 Twemlow’s hand has gone to his forehead with 
 a lost air. " 
 
 But, two or three weeks ago, Twemlow, sit- 
 ting over his newspaper, and over his dry toast 
 and weak tea, and over the stable-vyard in Duke 
 Street, St. James’s, received a highly-perfumed 
 cocked-hat and monogram from Mrs. Veneer- 
 ing, entreating her dearest Mr. T., if not partic- 
 ularly engaged that day, to come like a charm- 
 ing soul and make a fourth at dinner with dear 
 Mr. Podsnap, for the discussion of an interest- 
 ing family topic; the last three words doubly | 
 underlined and pointed with a note of admira- 
 tion. And Twemlow, replying, ‘‘ Not engaged, 
 and more than delighted,” goes, and this takes 
 place: vi) 4 
 
me Pew 
 
 Firs 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 ‘¢ My dear Twemlow,” 
 ready pense to Anastatia’s urtceremonious in- 
 vitation. is truly kind, and like an old, old friend. 
 You know our dear friend Podsnap ?” 
 
 Twemlow ought to know the dear friend Pod- 
 snap who covered him with so much confusion, 
 and he says he does knOw him, and Podsnap re- 
 ciprocates. 
 wrought upon in a short time, as to believe 
 he has been intimate in the house many, many, 
 many years. In the friendliest manner he is 
 making himself quite at home with: his back to 
 the fire, executing a statuette of the Colossus 
 at Rhodes. 
 feeble way how soon the Ve 
 come infected with the Veneering fiction. Not, 
 however, that he has the least notion of its be- 
 ing his Ow n case. 
 
 ‘“Our friends, Alfred and Sophronia,” pur- 
 sues Veneering the veiled prophet: ‘ our friends 
 Alfred and Sophronia, you will be glad to hear, 
 my. dear fellows, are going to be married. As 
 
 my wife and I make it a family affair, the en- | 
 tire direction of which we take npon ourselves, of | 
 
 course our first step is to communicate the fact 
 to our family friends. 
 
 (*Oh!” thinks Twemlow, with his eyes on 
 Podsnap, ‘‘then there, are only two of us, and 
 
 ’ he’s the other.”) 
 
 ‘*T did hope,” Veneering goes on, ‘‘to have 
 had Lady Tippins to meet you; but she is al- 
 ways in request, and is unfortunately engaged.” 
 
 (“ Oh!” thinks Twemlow, with his eyes wan- 
 dering, ‘‘then there are three of us, and she’s 
 the other.””) 
 
 ** Mortimer Lightwood,” resumes Venecring, 
 “whom you_both know, is out of town; but he 
 writes, in his whimsic al manner, that.as-we ask 
 him to be bridegroom’s best man when.the cere- 
 mony takes place, he will not refuse, though he 
 doesn’t see what he has to do with it.” 
 
 (“Oh!” thinks Twemlow, with his eyes roll- 
 ing, ‘‘then there are four of us, and he’s the 
 other.”’) 
 
 ‘Boots and Brewer,” observes Veneecring, 
 ‘whom you also know, I have not asked to- 
 day; but I reserve them for the occasion.” 
 
 (‘* Then,” thinks Twemlow, with his eves shut, 
 ‘‘there are si—” But here collapses and does 
 not completely recover until dinner is over and 
 the Analytical has been requested to withdraw. ) 
 
 ““We now come,” s says Veneering, ‘‘to the 
 point, the real point, of our little family consult- 
 ation. Sophronia, having lost both fat] ver and 
 mother, has no one to give her away.” 
 
 “Give her away yourself,” says Podsnap. 
 
 ““Mby dear Podsnap, no. For three reasons. 
 W, because I couldn’t take so much upon 
 myself when I have respected family friends to 
 remember. Secondly, because J am not so vain 
 as to think that I look the part. Thirdly, be- 
 cause Anastatia is a little superstitious on the 
 subject, and feels averse to my giving away any 
 body until baby is old enough to be married.” 
 
 ‘“What would happen if he did?” Podsnap 
 inquires of Mrs. Vencering. 
 
 ‘My dear Mr. Podsnap, it’s very foolish I 
 know, but I have an instinctive presentiment 
 that if Hamilton gave away any body else first, 
 he would never give away baby.” ‘Thus Mrs. 
 Veneering; with her open hands pressed to- 
 gether, and each of her eight aquiline fingers 
 
 Apparently, Podsnap has been so | 
 that 
 
 ‘Twemlow has before noticed in his | 
 eering guests be- 
 
 | 
 
 and fifty in number, ‘‘is now among us. 
 
 63 
 
 says Veneering, “your looking so very like her one aquiline nose that 
 
 the bran-new jewels on them seem necessary fur 
 distinction’s sake. 
 
 ‘* But, my dear Podsnap,” quoth Veneering, 
 “there ts a tried friend of our family who, I 
 think and hope you will agree with me, Podsnap, 
 is the friend on whom this agreeable duty almost 
 naturally devolves. . That friend,” saying the 
 words as if the company were about a hundred 
 That 
 friend is 'Twemlow.” 
 
 ‘*Certainly!” From Podsnap. 
 
 “That friend,” Veneering repeats with great- 
 er firmness, ‘‘is our dear good Twemlow. And 
 I can not sufficiently express to you, my dear 
 Podsnap, the pleasure I feel in having this opin- 
 ion of mine and Anastatia’s so readily confirmed 
 by you, that other equally familiar and tried 
 friend who stands in the proud position—I mean 
 who proudly stands in the position—or I ought 
 rather to say, who places Anastatia and myself 
 in the proud position of himself standing in the 
 simple position—of baby’s godfather.” And, in- 
 deed, Veneering is much relieved in mind to find 
 that Pod snap betrays no jealousy of Twemlow’s 
 elevation. 
 
 So it has come to pass that the spring-van is 
 strewing flowers on the rosy hours and on the 
 staircase, and that Twemlow is surveying the 
 ground on which he is to play his distinguished 
 part to-morrow. He has already been to the 
 church, and taken note of the various impedi- 
 ments in the aisle, under the auspices of an ex- 
 tremely dreary widow who opens the pews, and 
 whose left hand appears to be in a state of acute 
 rheumatism, but is in fact voluntarily doubled 
 up to-act as a moncy-box. 
 
 And now Veneering shoots out of the Study 
 wherein he is accustomed, when contemplative, 
 to give his mind to the carving and gilding of the 
 Pilgrims going to Canterbury, in order to show 
 T'wemlow the little flourish he has prepared for 
 the trumpets of fashion, describing how that on 
 the seventeenth instant, at St. James’s Church, 
 the-Reverend Blank Blank, assisted by the Rev- 
 erend Dash Dash, united in the bonds of mat- 
 rimony Alfred Lammle, Esquire, of Sackville 
 Street, Piccadilly, to Sophronia, only daughter 
 of the late Horatio Akershem, Esquire, of York- 
 shire. Also how the fair bride was married from 
 the house of Hamilton Veneering, Esquire, of 
 Stucconia, and was given away by Melvin Twem- 
 low, Esquire, of Duke Street, St. James’s, second 
 cousin to Lord Snigsworth, ef Snigsworthy Park. 
 While perusing which composition, ‘Twemlow 
 makes some opaque approach to perceiving that 
 if the Reverend Blank Blank and the Reverend 
 Dash Dash fail, after this introduction, to be- 
 come enrolled in the list of Veneering’s dearest 
 and oldest friends, they will have none but them- 
 selves to thank for it. 
 
 After which appears Sophronia (whom Twem- 
 low has seen twice in his lifetime), to thank 
 Twemlow for counterfeiting the late Horatio 
 Akershem Esquire, broadly of Yorkshire. And 
 after her appears Alfred (whom Twemlow has 
 seen once in his lifetime), to do the same and te 
 make a pasty sort of glitter, as if he were con- 
 structed for candle-light only, and had been let 
 out into daylight by some gr and mistake. And 
 after that comes. Mrs. Vencering, in a pervad- 
 ingly aquiline state of figure, and with transpar- 
 
& 
 
 64 
 
 ent little knobs on her temper, like the little 
 transparent knob on the bridge of her nose, 
 ‘*Worn out by worry and excitement,” as she 
 tells her dear Mr. Twemlow, and reluctantly re- 
 vived with curacoa by the Analytical. And after 
 that, the bridemaids begin to come by railroad 
 from various parts of the country, and to come 
 like adorable recruits enlisted by a sergeant not 
 present? for, on arriving at the Veneering dépét, 
 they are in a barrack of strangers. 
 
 So Twemlow goes home to Duke Street, St. 
 James’s, to take a plate of mutton broth with a 
 chop in it, and a look at the marriage-service, in 
 order that he may cut in at the right place to- 
 morrow; and he is low, and feels it dull over 
 
 the livery-stable yard, and is distinctly aware of }and lo the rest of the characters. 
 
 a dint in his heart, made by the most adorable 
 of the adorable bridemaids. For, the poor little 
 harmless gentleman once had his fancy, like the 
 rest of us, and she didn’t answer (as she often 
 does not), and he thinks the adorable bridemaid 
 is like the fancy as she was then (which she is 
 not at all), and that if the fancy had not mar- 
 ried some one else for.money, but had married 
 him for love, he and she would have been happy 
 (which they wouldn’t have been), and that she 
 has a tenderness for him still (whereas her tough- 
 ness is a proverb). Brooding over the fire, with 
 his dried little head in his dried little hands, 
 and his dried little elbows on his dried little 
 knees, ‘Twemlow is melancholy. ‘** No Adorable 
 to bear me company here!” thinks he. ‘* No 
 Adorable at the club! A waste, a waste, a 
 waste, my Twemlow!” And so drops asleep, 
 and has galvanic starts all over him. 
 
 Betimes next morning, that horrible old Lady 
 
 =4 Member of that gentleman’s family. 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND, 
 
 ing air upon him of having presupposed the 
 ceremony to be a funeral, and of, being disap- 
 pointed. The scene is the Vestry-room of St. 
 James’s Church, with a number of leathery old 
 registers on shelves, that. might be bound in 
 Lady Tippinses. 6 
 But, hark! A carriage at the gate, and Mor- 
 timer’s man arrives, looking rather like a spu- 
 rious Mephistopheles and an unacknowledged 
 Whom 
 | Lady Tippins, surveying through her eye-glass, 
 considers a fine man, and quite a catch; and of 
 whom Mortimer remarks, in the lowest spirits, 
 as he approaches, ‘‘I believe this is my fellow, 
 confound him!’ More carriages at the gate, 
 Whom 
 Lady Tippins, standing on a cushion, surveying: 
 through the eye-glass, thus checks off: ‘* Brides 
 five-and-forty if a day, thirty shillings a yard, 
 veil fifteen pound, pocket-hanckerchief a present. 
 Bridemaids; kept down for fear of outshining 
 bride, consequently not girls, twelve and six- 
 pence a yard# Veneering’s flowers, snub-nosed 
 
 ings, bonnets three pound ten. Twemlow; 
 blessed release for the dear man if she really was 
 his daughter, nervous even under the pretense 
 that she is, well he may be. Mrs. Veneering; 
 
 ever saw such velvet, say two_thousand pounds 
 as she stands, absolute jeweler’s window, father 
 must have been _a pawnbroker, or how could these 
 Attendant unknowns, pokey.” ¢ 
 
 neering, carriages rolling back to Stueconia, 
 
 servants with favors and flowers, Veneering’s 
 
 ippins (relict of the late Sir Thomas Tippins, | house reached, drawing-rooms most magnifi- 
 
 knighted in mistake for somebody else by His | cent. 
 
 Here, the Podsnaps await the happy 
 
 Majesty King George the Third, who, while per-f[party; Mr. Podsnap, with his hair-brushes made 
 1 forming the ceremony, was graciously pleasedj| the most. of; that imperial rocking-horse, Mrs. 
 
 to observe, ‘* What, what, what? 
 who? 
 and varnished for the interesting occasion. She 
 has a, reputation for giving smart.accounts. of 
 things, and she must be at these people’s early, 
 my dear, to lose nothing of the fun. Where- 
 about in the bonnet and drapery announced by 
 her name, any fragment of the real woman may 
 be concealed, is perhaps known to her maid; 
 but vou could easily buy all you see of her, in 
 Bond Street; or you might scalp her, and peel 
 her, and scrape her, and make two Lady Tip- 
 pinses out of her, and yet not penetrate to the 
 genuine article. She has a large gold eye- 
 glass, has Lady Tippins, to survey the proceed- 
 ings with. If she had one in each eye, it might 
 keep that other drooping lid up, and look more 
 uniform. But perennial youth is in her arti- 
 
 ficial flowers, and her list of lovers is full. 
 
 ‘* Mortimer, you wretch,” says Lady Tippins, 
 turning the eye-glass about and about, ‘‘ where 
 
 / is your charge, the bridegroom ?” 
 
 ‘¢Give you my honor,” returns Mortimer, ‘I 
 
 «don’t know, and I don’t care.” 
 
 Eugene is also in attendance, with a pervad- 
 
 Who, who, | Podsnap, majestically skittish. 
 Why, why, why?’’) begins to be dyed | Boots and Brewer, andthe two other Buffers ; 
 
 Here, too, are 
 
 each Buffer with a flower in his button-hole, 
 his hair curled, and his gloves buttoned on tight, 
 apparently come prepared, if any thing had hap- 
 pened to the bridegroom, to be married instant- 
 |ly. Here, too, the bride’s aunt and next rela- 
 tion; a widowed female of a Medusa sort, in a 
 
 i 
 
 creatures. Here, too, thé bride’s trustee ;-an 
 oilcake-fed style of business- gentleman with 
 moony spectacles, and an object of much in- 
 terest. Veneering launching himself upon this 
 trustee as his oldest friend (which makes seven, 
 Twemlow thought), and confidentially retiring 
 with him into the conservatory, it is understood 
 that Veneering is his co-trustee, and ag ney 
 are arranging about the fortune. Buffe¥s are 
 even overheard to whisper Thir-ty Thou-sand 
 Pou-nds! with a smack and a relish suggestive 
 of the very finest oysters. Pokey unknowns, 
 amazed to find how intimately they know Ve- 
 neering, pluck up spirit, fold their arms, and 
 begin to contradict him before breakfast. What 
 
 Sere naan eeLa 
 
 to a dignified conclusion several quarrels he | 
 has on hand with the pastry-cook’s men, an- — 
 
 one rather pretty but too conscious of her stock-, 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 nounces breakfast. Dining-room no less mag- 
 nificent than drawing-room; tables superb; all 
 the camels out, and all Jaden. Splendid cake, 
 covered with Cupids, silver, and true - lovers’ 
 knots. Splendid bracelet, produced by Veneer- 
 ing before going down, and clasped upon the 
 arm of bride. Yet nobody seems to think much 
 more of the Veneerings than if they were a tol- 
 erable landlord and landlady doing the thing in 
 the way of business at so much a head. ‘The 
 bride and bridegroom talk and laugh apart, as 
 2as always been their manner; andthe Buffers 
 -work their way through the dishes with system- 
 ‘.ati¢ perseverance, as has always been their man- 
 ner; and the pokey unknowns are exceedingly 
 
 eC cneaient to one another in invitations to take 
 £ 
 
 lasses of Champagne; but Mrs. Podsnap, arch- 
 ing her mane and rocking her grandest, has a 
 far more deferential audience than Mrs. Ve- 
 neering; and Podsnap all but does the honors. 
 Another dismal circumstance is, that Veneer- 
 ing, having the captivating Tippins on cone side 
 of him and the bride’s aunt on the other, finds 
 it immensely difficult to keep the peace. For, 
 
 Medusa, besides unmistakingly glaring petrifac- 
 ..tion at the fascinating Tippins, follows every 
 
 lively remark made by that dear creature with 
 -an audible snort: which may be referable to a 
 chronic cold in the head, but may also be refer- 
 able to indignation and contempt. And this 
 snort being regular in its reproduction, at length 
 comes to be expected by the company, who make 
 embarrassing pauses when it is falling due, and 
 by waiting for it, render it more emphatic when 
 it comes. The stony aunt has likewise. an in- 
 jurious way of rejecting all dishes whereof Lady 
 Tippins partakes: saying aloud when they are 
 protiered to her, ‘No, no, no, not for me. Take 
 > it away !”" As ‘with a set purpose of implying a 
 misgiving that if nourished upon similar meats | 
 she might come to be like that charmer, which | 
 would be a fatal consammation. Aware of her 
 enemy, Lady Tippins tries a youthful sally or 
 two, and tries the eye-glass; but, from the im- 
 penetrable cap and snorting armor of the stony | 
 aunt all weapons. rebound powerless. 
 
 Another objectionable circumstance is, that 
 the pokey unknowns support éach other in being 
 unimpressible. They persist in not being fright- 
 sei by the gold and silver camels, and ‘they are 
 
 anded together to defy the elaborate ly chased 
 
 ice-pails.. They even seem.to unite in some 
 vague utterance of the sentiment that the land- 
 Jord and landlady will make a pretty good profit 
 pnt of this, and they almost carry themselves like 
 customers. Nor is there compensating influence 
 in the adorable bridemaids; for, having very 
 little interest in the bride, and none at all in 
 one another, those lovely beings become, each 
 one on her own account, depreciatingly contem- 
 plative « of the millinery present ; while the bride- 
 groom’s man, exhausted, in the back of his chair, 
 appears to be i improving ‘the vec casion by peniten- 
 tially contemplating all the wrong he has ever 
 done ; the difference between him and his friend 
 Eugene being, that the latter, in the back of Azs 
 chair, appears to be contemplating all the wrong 
 he would like to CCE nouiatly to the present 
 company. 
 In which state of affairs, the usual ceremonies 
 rather droop and flag, and the splendid cake 
 when cut by the fair hand of the bride has but 
 
 A 
 
 65 
 
 an indigestible appearance. However, all the 
 things indispensable to’be said are said, and all 
 the things indispensable to be done are done (in, 
 cluding Lady ‘Tippins’s yawning ; falling asleep, 
 
 and waking insensible), and there is hurried 
 preparation for the nuptial journey to the Isle of 
 Wight, and the outer air teems with brass bands 
 and spectators. In full sight of whom, the ma- 
 lignant star of the Analytical has pre- -ordained 
 that pain and ridicule shall befall him. For he 
 standing on the doorsteps to grace the departur, 
 is suddenly caught a most prodigious thump 
 the side of his head with a heavy shoe, whic 
 Buffer in the hall, Champagne-flushed and w 
 | of aim, has borrowed on the spur of the mon 
 from the pastry-cook’s porter, to cast after 
 departing pair as an auspicious omen. 
 
 So they all go up again into the gorg 
 drawing-rooms—all of them flushed with b» 
 fast, as having taken scarlatina sociably— 
 there the combined unknowns do maligi 
 things with their legs to ottomans, and take % 
 much as possible ont of the splendid furniture. 
 And. so Lady Tippins, quite undetermined 
 whether to-day is the day before yesterday, or 
 the day after to-morrow, or the weck after next, 
 fades away; and Mortimer Lightwood and Eu- 
 gene fade away, and ‘Twemlow fades away, and 
 | the stony aunt goes away—she declines to fade, 
 proving rock to the last—and even the unknowns 
 | are slowly strained off, and it is all over. 
 
 All over, that is to say, for the time being. 
 But there is another time to come, and it comes 
 in about a fortnight, and it comes to Mr. and 
 Mrs. Lammile on the sands at Shanklin, in the 
 i Isle of Wight. 
 
 Mr. and Mrs. Lammle have walked for some 
 time on the Shanklin sands, and one ae see 
 by their footprints that they have not walked 
 arm in arm, and that they ‘have not walked in 
 a straight tr ‘ack, and that they have walked in 
 a moody humor; for the lady has prodded lit- 
 tle spirting holes in the damp sand before her 
 with her parasol, and the gentleman has trailed 
 his stick after him. As if he were of the Me- 
 phistopheles family indeed, and had walked with 
 a drooping tail. 
 
 ‘¢Do you mean to tell me, then, Sophronia—” 
 
 Thus he begins after a long silence, when 
 Sophronia flashes fiercely, and turns upon him. 
 
 **Pon’t put it upon me, Sir. I ask you, do 
 you mean to tell me?” 
 
 Mr. Lammile falls silent again, and they walk 
 as before. Mrs. Lammle opens her nostrils and 
 mbites her under “hip; Mr. Lammile takes his gin- 
 gerous Whiskers in his left hand, and, bringing 
 them together, frowns furtively at his beloved, 
 out of a thick gingerous bush. 
 
 “To J mean. to say!” Mrs. 
 time repeats, with indignation. ‘‘ Putting it on 
 me! The unmanly disingenuousnes ss!” 
 
 Mr. Lammle stops, releases his whisker s, and 
 looks at her. ‘‘ The what ?” 
 
 Mrs. Lammle haughtily replies, 
 ping, and without looking back: 
 ness.” 
 
 He is at her side again in a pace or two, and 
 he retorts, ‘‘That is not what you said. You 
 said disingenuousness.” 
 
 “What if I did ?” 
 
 ‘¢There isno ‘if’ in the case. You did.” 
 
 }  ‘*I did, then. And what of it?” 
 
 Lammle after a 
 
 without stop- 
 ‘¢'The mean- 
 
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OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. g 
 
 “*T asked Veneering, and he told me you were 
 mach.” 
 
 “* Veneering!”’ with great contempt. 
 what does. Veneering’know about me!”’ 
 
 ‘Was he not your trustee ?” 
 
 *“No. Ihave no trustee but the one you saw 
 on the day when you fraudulently married me. 
 “And his trust is not a very difficult one, for it,is 
 only an annuity of a hundred and fifteen pounds. 
 I think there are some odd shillings or pence, if 
 you are very particular.” 
 
 Mr. Lammle bestows a by no means loving 
 look upon the partner of his joys and sorrows, 
 ‘and jie mutiers something ; but checks himself. 
 
 ‘Question for question. Itis my turn again, 
 Mrs. Lammle. What made you suppose me a 
 man of property ?” 
 
 * “You made me suppose you so. Perhaps you 
 will deny that you always presented yourself to 
 me in that character ?” 
 
 _ ** But you asked somebody, too. 
 Lammile, admission for admission. 
 somebody ?” 
 
 **T asked Veneering.”’ 
 
 ‘* And Veneering knew as much of me as he 
 knew of you, or as any body knows of him.” 
 
 After more silent walking, the bride stops 
 short, to say in a passionate manner: 
 
 “J never will forgive the Veneerings for this!” 
 
 ** Neither will [,” returns the bridegroom. 
 
 With that they walk again; she, making 
 those angry spirts in the sand; he, dragging that 
 dejected tail. The tide is low, and seems to 
 have thrown them together high on the bare 
 shore. A gull-comes sweeping by their heads, 
 and flouts them. ‘There was a golden surface 
 on the brown cliffs but now, and behold they are 
 only damp earth. A taunting roar comes from 
 the sea, and the far-out rollers mount upon one 
 another, to look at the entrapped impostors, and 
 to join in impish and exultant gambols. * 
 
 **Do you pretend to believe,” Mrs. Lammle 
 ‘resumes, sternly, ‘‘ when you talk of my marry- 
 ing you for worldly advantages, that it was with- 
 in the bounds of reasonable probability that I 
 would have married you for yourself?” 
 
 ‘** Again there are two sides to the question, 
 ‘Mrs. Lammle. What do you pretend to believe ?” 
 
 _ **So you first deceive me and then insult me!” 
 cries the lady, with a heaving bosom. 
 
 **Not at all. Ihave originated nothing. The 
 double-edged question was yours.” 
 
 ** Was mine!” the bride repeats, and her par- 
 _asol breaks in her angry hand. 
 
 His color has turned to a livid white, and om- 
 ‘inous marks have come to light about his nose, 
 as if the finger of the very devil himself had, 
 within the last few moments, touched it here 
 and there. But he has repressive power, and 
 she has none. 
 
 “Throw it away,’’ he coolly recommends as 
 to the parasol ; *‘ you have made it useless; you 
 look ridiculous with it.” 
 
 Whereupon she calls him, in her rage, ‘‘A de- 
 liberate villain,” and so casts the broken thing 
 from her as that it strikes him in falling. The 
 finger-marks are something whiter for the in- 
 stant, but he walks on at, her side. 
 
 She bursts into tears) declaring herself the 
 wretchedest, the most deceived, the worst-used, 
 of women. Then she says that if she had the 
 courage to kill herself she would do it. Then 
 
 s¢ And 
 
 Come, Mrs. 
 You asked 
 
 67 
 
 she calls him vile impostor. Then she asks him, 
 why, in the disappointment of his base specula- 
 tion, he does not take her life with his own hand, 
 under the present favorable circumstances, Ther 
 she cries again. ‘Then she is enraged again, 
 and makes some mention of swindlers, Finally, 
 she sits down crying on a block of stone, and is 
 in all the known and unknown humors of her 
 sex at once. Pending her changes, those afore- 
 said marks in his face have come and gone, now 
 here now there, like white stops of a pipe on 
 which the diabolical performer has played a 
 tune. - Also his livid lips are parted at last, as 
 if he were breathless with running. Yet he is 
 not. io 
 
 ‘‘Now, get up,. Mrs. Lammle, and let us 
 speak reasonably.” 
 
 She sits upon her stone, and takes no heed af 
 him. 
 
 ‘*Get up, I tell you.” 
 
 taising her head, she looks contemptuously 
 in his face, and repeats, ** You tell me! ‘Tell 
 me, forsooth !” 
 
 She atfects not to know that his eyes are fas- 
 tened on her as she droops her head again; but 
 her whole figure reveals that she knows it un- 
 easily. 
 
 “Enough of this. 
 Get up.” ; 
 
 Yielding to his hand, she rises, and they walk 
 again; but this time with their faces turned to- 
 ward their place of residence. 
 
 ** Mrs. Lammile, we have both been deceiving, 
 and we bave both been deceived. We have both 
 
 Come! Do you hear? 
 
 been biting, and we have both been bitten. In 
 a nut-shell, there’s the state of the case.” 
 
 ‘*You sought me out—”’ 
 
 “Put! Let us have done with that. We 
 
 know very well how it was. Why should you 
 and I talk about it, when you and I can’t dis- 
 guise it? ‘To proceed. Jam disappointed, and 
 cut a poor figure.” 
 
 ‘¢Am Ino one?” 
 
 ‘* Some one—and I was coming to you, if you 
 had waited a moment. You, too, are disap- 
 pointed and cut a poor figure.” 
 
 **An injured figure !” 
 
 “You are now cool enough, Sophronia, to 
 see that you can’t be injured without my being 
 equally injured; and that therefore the mere 
 word is not to the purpose. When I look back, 
 I wonder how I can have been such» fool’as to 
 take you to so great an extent upon-trust.” 
 
 **And when I look back—” the bride cries, 
 interrupting. 
 
 ‘* And when you look back, you wonder how 
 you can have been—you'll excuse the word ?” 
 
 ‘*Most certainly, with so much reason.” 
 
 *¢__Such a fool as to take me to so great an 
 extent upon trust. But the folly is committed 
 on both sides. I can not get rid of you; you 
 can not get rid of me. What follows?” 
 
 ‘*Shame and misery,” the bride bitterly re- 
 plies. 
 
 ‘“¢T don’t know. A mutual understanding fol- 
 lows, and I think it may carry us through. 
 Here I split my discourse (give me your arm, 
 Sophronia) into three heads, to make it shorter 
 and plainer. Firstly, it’s enough to have been 
 done, without the mortification of being known 
 to have been done. So we agree to keep the 
 fact to ourselves. You agree?” | 
 
jee 
 
 the’ world ? 
 
 68 
 
 “Tf it is possible, I do.” 
 
 ‘¢ Possible! We have pretended well enough 
 to one another. Can’t we, united, pretend to 
 Agreed. Secondly, we owe the 
 Veneerings a grudge, and we owe all other peo- 
 ple the grudge of wishing them to be taken in, 
 as we ourselves have been taken in. Agreed?” 
 
 ““Yes. Agreed.” 
 
 ‘We come smoothly to thirdly.. You have 
 ealled me an adventurer, Sophronia. So [ am. 
 In plain uncomplimentary English, so I am, 
 So are you, my dear. So are many people. 
 
 We agree to keep our own secret, and to work 
 
 together in furtherance of our own schemes.” 
 
 ‘What schemes?” 
 
 ‘«¢ Any scheme that will bring us money. By 
 our own schemes, I mean our joint interest. 
 Agreed ?” 
 
 She answers, after a little hesitation, ‘‘I sup- 
 pose so. Agreed.” 
 
 ‘‘Carried at once, you see! Now, Sophronia, 
 only half a dozen words more. We know one 
 another perfectly. Don’t be tempted into twit- 
 
 ting me with the past knowledge that. you have 
 
 of me, because it is identical with the past knowl- 
 edge that I have of you, and in twitting me you 
 twit yourself, and I don’t want to hear vou do it. 
 With this good understanding established be- 
 tween us, it is better never done. ‘To wind up 
 all:—You have shown temper to-day, Sophronia. 
 Don’t be betrayed into doing so again, because 
 I have a Devil of a temper myself” 
 
 ‘So the happy pair, with this hopefal marriage 
 contract thus signed, sealed, and delivered, re- 
 pair homeward. If, when those infernal finger- 
 marks were on the white and breathless counte- 
 nance of Alfred Lammle, Esquire, they denoted 
 that he coneeived the purpose of subduing -his 
 dear wife Mrs. Alfred Lammle, by at once di- 
 vesting her of any lingering reality or pretense 
 of self-respect, the purpose would seem to have 
 been presently executed. The mature young 
 lady has mighty little need of powder now for 
 her downcast face as he escorts her in the light 
 of the setting sun to their abode of bliss. 
 
 <> 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 PODSNAPPERY. 
 
 Mr. Popsnap was well to do, and stood very 
 high in Mr. Podsnap’s opinion, Beginning with 
 a good inheritance, he had married a good in- 
 heritance, and had thriven exceedingly in the 
 Marine Insurance way, and was quite satisfied. 
 He never could make out why every body was 
 not quite satisfied, and he felt conscious that he 
 set a brilliant social example in being particu- 
 larly well satisfied with most things, and, above 
 all other things, with himself. 
 
 Thus happily acquainted with his own merit 
 and importance, Mr. Podsnap settled that what- 
 ever he put behind him he put ont of existence. 
 There was a dignified conclusiveness—not to add 
 
 grand convenience—in this way of getting rid 
 of disagreeables which had done much toward 
 establishing Mr. Podsnap in his lofty place in 
 
 r. Podsnap's satisfaction. ‘‘I don’t want to 
 
 now about it; I don’t choose to discuss it; I 
 ‘don’t admit it!” Mr. Podsnap had even ac- 
 
 [quired a peculiar flourish of his right arm in 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. , : 
 
 soften clearing the world. of its most difficult, 
 problems, by sweeping them behind him’ (and 
 consequently sheer away) with those words and_ 
 a flushed face. For they affronted him. = 
 
 Mr. Podsnap’s world was not a very large) 
 world, morally; no, nor even geographically ¢ | 
 seeing that although his business was sustained — 
 upon commerce with other countries, he consid~ 
 
 ered other countries, with that important reser=_ 
 
 vation, a mistake, and of their manners and_ 
 customs would conclusively observe, ‘‘ Not En-_ 
 b lish 1? when, Presto! with a flourish of the. 
 arm, and a flush of the face, they were swept 
 
 away.  Elsewise, the world got up at eight, 
 shaved close at a quarter past, breakfasted at 
 nine, went to the City at ten, came home at 
 half past five, and dined at seven. Mr. Pods 
 snap’s notions of the Arts in their integrity might 
 have been stated thus: Literature; large print, 
 respectfully descriptive cf getting up at eight, 
 shaving close at a quarter past, breakfasting at 
 ‘nine, going to the City at ten, coming home at 
 half past. five, and dining at seven. Painting 
 and Sculpture; models and. portraits represent- 
 ing Professors of getting up at eight, shaving 
 close at a quarter past, breakfasting at nine, go- 
 ing to the City at ten, coming home at half past 
 five, and dining at seven. Music; a respecta- 
 ble performance (without variations) on stringed 
 and wind instruments, sedately expressive of — 
 getting up at eight, shaving close at a quarter; 
 past, breakfasting at nine, gcing to the City ag 
 ten, coming home at half past five, and dining 
 at seven. Nothing else to be permitted to those 
 same vagrants the Arts, on pain of excommunis” 
 cation. Nothing else to Be—any: where! p. 
 As a so eminently respectable man, Mr. Pod-— 
 snap was sensible of its being required of him to 
 take Providence under his protection. - Conse= 
 quently he always knew exactly what Provi- 
 dence meant. Inferior and less respectable men” 
 might fall short of that mark, but Mr. Podsnap 
 was always up to’it.. And it was very remarkas- 
 ble (and must have be¢n very comfortable) that 
 what Providence meant was. invariably what 
 Mr. Podsnap meant. i 
 These may be said to have been the articles _ 
 of a faith and school which the present chapter 
 takes the liberty of calling, after its representa=_ 
 tive man, Podsnappery. ‘They were confined 
 within close bounds, as Mr. Podsnap’s own head 
 was confined by his shirt-collar; and they were 
 enuntiated with a sounding pomp that smacked 
 of the creaking of Mr. Podsnap’s own boots. 
 There was a Miss Podsnap. And this young— 
 rocking-horse was being trained in her mother 
 art of prancing in a stately manner without 
 ever getting on. But the high parental action 
 was not yet imparted to her, and in truth she” 
 was but an undersized damsel, with high shoul- 
 ders, low spirits, chilled elbows, and a rasped 
 surface of nose, who seemed to take occasional 
 frosty peeps out of childhood into womanhood, © 
 and to shrink back again, overcome by her mo-_ 
 ther’s headedress and her father from head to 
 foot—crushed by the mere dead-weight of Pod- 
 snappery. ; 
 A certain institutio 
 which he called “th@* young person”? may 
 considered to have been embodied in Miss Ped- 
 snap, his daughter. It was an inconvenient an l 
 exacting institution, as requiring every thing in 
 
et el ay 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 the universe to be filed down an fitted to it. 
 The question about every thing was, would it 
 bring a blush into the cheek of the young per- 
 son? . And the inconvenience of the young per- 
 son ‘was, ithat, -according to Mr. Podsnap, she 
 seemed always liable to burst into blushes when 
 there was no need at all. ‘There appeared to be 
 no line of demarkation between the young per- 
 son’s excessive innocence and another person’s 
 guiltiest knowledge. ‘Take Mr. Podsnap’s word 
 for it, and the soberest tints of drab, white, lilac, 
 and gray, were all flaming red to this. trouble- 
 some Bull of a young person. 
 
 The Podsnaps lived in a shady angle adie 
 ng Portman Square. They were a kind of peo- 
 Je certain to dwell in the shade, wherever they 
 welt. Miss Podsnap’s life had been, from her 
 rst appearance on this planet, altogether of a 
 
 shady order; for Mr. Podsnap’s young- person 
 was likely to get little good out of association 
 
 with other young persons, and had therefore | ¢ 
 
 been restricted to companionship with not very 
 congenial older persons, and with massive fur- 
 niture. Miss Podsnap’s early views of life being 
 principally derived from the reflections of it in 
 her father’s boots, and in the walnut and rose- 
 wood tables of the dim drawing-rooms, and in 
 their swarthy giants of looking-glasses, were of 
 a sombre east; and it was not wonderful that 
 now, when she was on most days solemnly 
 tooled through the Park by the side of her mo- 
 ther in a great tall custard-colored phaeton, she 
 shewed above the apron of that vehicle like a de- 
 jected young person sitting. up in bed to take a 
 startled look at things in genéral, and very 
 strongly desiring to get her head under the 
 counterpane again. 
 
 Said Mr. Podsnap to Mrs. Podsnap, ‘‘ Geor- 
 giana is almost eighteen.” 
 
 Said Mrs. Podsnap to Mr. Podsnap, assenting, 
 ** Almost eighteen.” 
 
 Said Mr. Podsnap then to Mrs. Podsnap, 
 “Really I think we should have some people on 
 Georgiana’s birthday.” 
 
 Said Mrs. Podsnap then to Mr. Podsnap, 
 «Which will enable us to clear off all those 
 people who.are due.” 
 
 So it came to pass that Mr. and Mrs. Pod- 
 snap requested the honor of the company of sevy- 
 entecn friends of their souls at dinner; and that 
 they substituted other friends of their souls for 
 such of the seventeen original friends of their 
 souls as deeply regretted that a prior engage- 
 ment prevented their having the honor of dining 
 with Mr. and Mrs. Podsnap, in pursuance of 
 their kind invitation; and that Mrs. Podsnap 
 said of all these inconsolable personages, as she 
 checked them off with a pencil in her list, 
 “ Asked, at any rate, and got rid of;” and that 
 they successfully disposed of a good many friends 
 of their souls in this way, and felt their con- 
 sciences much lightened. 
 
 There were still other friends of their souls 
 who were not entitled to be asked to dinner, but 
 had a claim to be invited to come and take a 
 haunch of mutton vapor-bath at half past nine. 
 For the clearing off of these worthies, Mrs. Pod- 
 snap added a small an@j early evening to the 
 dinner, and looked in af#the music-shop to be- 
 speak a well-conducted automaton to come and 
 play quadrilles for a carpet dance. 
 
 _’ Mr. and Mrs. Veneering, and Mr. and Mrs. 
 
 p62 
 
 Veneering’s bran-new bride and _ bridegroom, 
 were of the dinner company; but the Podsnap 
 establishment had nothing else in common with 
 the Veneerings. Mr. Podsnap could tolerate 
 taste in a mushroom man who stood in need of 
 that sort of thing, but was far above it himself, 
 Hideous solidity was the characteristic of the 
 Podsnap plate. Every thing was made to look 
 as heavy as it could, and to take up as much 
 room as possible, Every thing said boastfully, 
 ‘Here you have as much of me in my ugliness 
 as if I were only lead; but I am so many ounces 
 of precious metal worth so much an ounce ;— 
 wouldn’t you like to melt me down?” A aa 
 pulent straddling epergne, blotched all over as 
 if it had broken ont in an eruption rather than 
 
 ‘been ornamented, delivered this address from 
 
 an unsightly silver platform in the centre of the 
 table. Four silver wine-coolers, each furnished 
 with four staring heads, each head obtrusively 
 
 carrying a big silver ring in each of its ears, 
 conveyed the sentiment up and down the table, 
 and handed it on to the pot-bellied silver salt- 
 cellars. All the big silver'spoons and forks wid- 
 ened the mouths of the company expressly for 
 the purpose of thrusting the sentiment down 
 their throats with every morsel they ate. 
 
 The majority of the guests were like the plate, 
 and included several heavy articles weighing 
 ever so much. But there was a foreign gentle- 
 man among them: whom Mr. Podsnap had in- 
 vited after much debate with himself—believing 
 the whole European continent to be in mortal 
 alliance against the young person—and there 
 was a droll disposition, not only on the part oz 
 Mr. Podsnap but of every body else, to treat 
 him as if he were a child who was hard of hear, 
 ing. 
 
 As a delicate concession to this unfortunate- 
 ly-born foreigner, Mr. Podsnap, in receiving him, 
 had presented his wife as ‘‘ Madame Podsnap 3” 
 also his daughter as ‘‘ Mademoiselle Podsnap,” 
 with some inclination to add ‘‘ma fille,” in 
 which bold venture, however, he checked him- 
 self. The Veneerings being at that time the 
 only other arrivals, he had added (in a conde- 
 scendingly explanatory manner), ‘‘ Monsieur 
 Vey-nair-reeng,”” and had then subsided into 
 English. 
 
 ‘¢ How Do You Like London ?” Mr. Podsnap 
 now inquired from his station of host, as if he 
 were administering something in the nature of 
 a powder or potion to the deaf child ; ‘*‘ London, 
 Londres, London ?” 
 
 The foreign gentleman admired it. 
 
 ‘“‘ You find it Very Large ?” said Mr. Podsnap, 
 spaciously. 
 
 The foreign gentleman found it very large. 
 
 “And Very Rich ?” 
 
 The foreign gentleman found it, without 
 doubt, enormément riche. 
 
 “ Enormously Rich, We say,” returned Mr. 
 Podsnap, in a condescending manner. ‘‘Our 
 English adver bs do Not terminate in Mong, and 
 We Pronounce the ‘ch’ as if there were a ‘t’ 
 before it. We Say Ritch.” 
 
 ‘* Reetch,” remarked the foreign gentleman. 
 
 “And Do You Find, Sir,” pursued Mr. Pod- 
 snap, with dignity, ‘‘ Many Evidences that Strike 
 You, of our British Constitution in the Streets 
 Of The World’s Metropolis, London, Londres, 
 London ?” 
 
70- OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 The foreign gentieman begged to be pardoned, 
 but did not altogether understand. 
 
 “The Constitution Britannique,” Mr. Pod- 
 snap explained, as if he were teaching in an in- 
 fant school. ‘We Say British, But You Say 
 Britannique, You Know” (forgivingly, as if that 
 were not his fault). ‘* The Constitution, Sir.” 
 
 The foreign gentleman said, ‘‘ Mais, yees: I 
 know eem.” 
 
 A youngish sallowish gentleman in spectacles, 
 with a lumpy forehead, seated in a supplement- 
 ary chair at a corner of the table, here caused a 
 pr ofound sensation by saying, in a raised voice, 
 ‘* ESKER,” and then stopping dead. 
 
 ‘¢ Mais oui,” said the foreign gentleman, turn- 
 ing toward him. ‘S Est-ce-que ? Quoi donc ?” 
 
 But the gentleman with the lumpy forehead 
 having for the time delivered himself of all that 
 he found behind his lumps, spake for the time 
 no more. 
 
 “¢T Was Inquiring,’ said Mr. Podsnap, re- 
 suming the thread of his discourse, ‘‘ Whether 
 You Have Observed in our Streets as We should 
 
 “say, Upon our Pavvy as You would say, any 
 
 Tokens—” 
 
 The foreign gentleman, with patient courtesy 
 entreated pardon: ‘‘ But what was tokenz ?” 
 
 ‘¢ Marks,” said Mr. Podsnap ; ‘Signs, you 
 know, Appearances—Tr aces.’ 
 
 oe Ah! Of a Orse ?”’ inquired the foreign gen- 
 tleman. 
 
 ‘¢We call it Horse,” said Mr. Podsnap, with 
 forbearance. ‘‘In England, Angleterre, En- 
 gland, We Aspirate the ‘H,’ and We Say 
 ‘Horse.’ Only our Lower Classes Say ‘ Orse!’” 
 
 ‘‘Pardon,” said the foreign gentleman; ‘‘I 
 am alwiz wrong!” 
 
 ‘“¢Our Language,” said Mr. Podsnap, with a 
 gracious consciousness of being always right, 
 ‘Cis Difficult. Ours is a Copious Language, and 
 Trying to Strangers. I will not Pursue my 
 Question.” 
 
 But the lumpy gentleman, unwilling to ‘give 
 it up, again madly said, ‘‘ Esker,” and again 
 spake no more. 
 
 ‘(Tt merely referred,” Mr. Podsnap explain- 
 ed, with a sense of meritorious proprietorship, 
 “to Our Constitution, Sir. We Englishmen 
 are Very Proud of our Constitution, Sir. It 
 Was Bestowed Upon Us By Providence. No 
 Other Country is so Favored as This Country.” 
 
 ‘¢ And ozer countries ?—’’ the foreign gentle- 
 man was beginning, when Mr. Podsnap put him 
 right again. 
 
 ‘¢We do not say Ozer; we say Other: the 
 letters are ‘T’ and ‘H;’ You say Tay and Aish, 
 You Know; (still with clemency). ‘The sound 
 is ‘th’—‘th!” 
 
 “¢ And other countries,” said the foreign gen- 
 tleman. ‘‘'They do how?” 
 
 ‘«'Phey do, Sir,” returned Mr. Podsnap, grave- 
 ly shaking his head; ‘‘they do—I am sorry to 
 be obliged to say it—as they do.” 
 
 ‘*Tt was a little particular of Providence,” said 
 the foreign gentleman, laughing ; ‘for the fron- 
 tier is not large.” 
 
 ‘‘ Undoubtedly,” assented Mr. 
 ‘‘But So it is. It was the Charter of the 
 Land. This.Island’ was Blest, Sir,"tothe Di- 
 rect Exclusion of.such Osher Countries as—as 
 there may. happen to be. And if we were all 
 Englishmen present, I would say,” added Mr. 
 
 Podsnap ;} 
 
 Podsnap, looking round upon his compatriots, 
 and sounding solemnly with his theme, ‘that 
 there is in the Englishman a combination of” 
 qualities, a. modesty, an independence, a re-— 
 
 sponsibility, a repose, combined with an ab- 
 sence of every thing calculated to call a blush - 
 finte the cheek of a young person, which one 
 would seek in vain among the Nations of ne 
 
 Earth.” | 
 
 Having ‘delivered this little summary, Mr. 
 Podsnap’s face flushed as he thought of the re- 
 mote possibility of its being at all qualified by 
 any prejudiced citizen of any other country; 
 and, with his favorite right-arm flourish, he put_ 
 the ‘rest of Europe and the whole of Asia, Aft 
 rica, and America nowhere. 
 
 The audience were much edified by this pas- 
 sage of words; and Mr. Podsnap, feeling that 
 he was in rather remarkable force to-day, be- 
 came smiling and conversational. 
 
 ‘‘Has any thing more been heard, Veneer- 
 ing,” he inquired, ‘of the lucky legatee 1 Poe 
 
 ‘¢ Nothing more,” returned Veneering, “than 
 that he has come into possession of the proper-" 
 ty. Iam told people now call him The Golden 
 Dustman. I mentioned to you some time ago, 
 I think, that the young lady whose intended 
 husband was murdered is daughter to a. clerk” 
 of mine ?” 
 
 ‘Yes, you told m@that,” said Podsnap; ‘“‘and) 
 by-the-by, I wish you w ould tell it again heal 
 for it’s a curious coincidence—curious that the” 
 first news of the discovery should have been® 
 brought straight to your table (when I was 
 there), and curious that one of your peoplé 
 should have been so nearly interested init. Just 
 relate that, will you?” 
 
 Veneering was more than ready to do it, for” 
 he had prospered exceedingly upon the Har- 
 mon Murder, and had turned the social distine- 
 tion it conferred upon him to the account of 
 making several dozen of bran-new bosom friends. ~ 
 Indeed, such another lucky hit would almost” 
 have set him up in that way to his ‘sb 
 
 So, addressing himself to the most desirable of 
 his neighbors, while Mrs. Veneering secured the 
 next most desirable, he plunged into the case, — 
 and emerged from it twenty minutes afterward — 
 with a Bank Director inhis arms. In the mean 
 time, Mrs. Veneering had dived into the same 
 waters for a wealthy Ship-Broker, and had 
 brought him up, safe and sound, by the hair.” 
 Then Mrs. Veneering had to relate, to a larger 
 circle, how she had been to see the girl, and how | 
 she was really pretty, and (considering her sta 
 tion) presentable. And this she did with such 
 a successful display of her eight aquiline fingers, 
 and their encircling jewels, that she happily laid” 
 hold of a drifting “General Officer, his wife and - 
 daughter, and not only restored their animation — 
 which had become suspended, but made them 
 lively friends within an hour. | 
 Although Mr. Podsnap would in a general 
 way have highly disapproved of Bodies in riv- 
 ers as ineligible topics with reference to the 
 cheek of the young person, he had, as one may 
 say, a share in this affair which made him a 
 part proprictor. Asi 
 too, in the way of re 
 
 paid, and he was satisfied. 4 
 And now the atin of mutton jap 1 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 71 
 
 "“AUATIAIYNSAOd: 
 
 7} tie Bs 4 
 WWALE- 
 
 ¢ — = Wy Sr ~ 
 poe aS 3 = ss Z Si 
 BEE ip 
 = 
 
 LEH 
 
 GI i \ 
 ad OE =~ 
 EZ 
 
 having received a gamey infusion, and a few 
 last touches of swéets and coffee, was quite ready, 
 and the bathers came; but not before the dis- 
 creet automaton had got behind the bars of the 
 piano music-desk, and there presented the ap- 
 | pearance of a captive languishing in a rosewood 
 jail. And who now so pleasant or so well as- 
 jsorted as Mr. and Mrs. Alfred Lammle, he all 
 sparkle, she all graci ontentment, both at 
 occasienal intervals-e ging looks like part- 
 ners at cards who pla a game against All 
 England. > a 
 _ There was not mugaeogth among the bath- 
 
 NA 
 
 z Se 
 
 jj er 
 
 ers, but there was no youth (the young person 
 always excepted) in the articles of Podsnap- 
 pery. Bald bathers folded their arms and talk- 
 ed to Mr. Podsnap on the hearth-rug; sleek- 
 whiskered bathers, with hats in their hands, 
 lunged at Mrs. Podsnap and retreated; prowl- 
 
 ing bathers went about looking into ornamental 
 
 boxes and bowls as if they had suspicions of lar- 
 ceny on the part of the Podsnaps, and expected 
 to find something they had lost at the bottom; 
 bathers of the gentler sex sat silently comparing 
 ivory shoulders. All this time and always, poor 
 little Miss Podsnap, whose tiny efforts (if she 
 
72 
 
 had made any) were swallowed up in the mag- 
 nificence of her mother’s rocking, kept herself 
 as much out of sight and mind as she could, and 
 appeared to be counting on many dismal returns 
 of the day. It was somehow understood, as a 
 secret article in the state proprieties of Podsnap- 
 pery, that nothing must be said about the day. 
 Consequently this young damsel’s nativity, was 
 ‘hushed up and looked over, as if it were agreed 
 on all hands that it would have been better that 
 she had never been born. 
 
 The Lammles were so fond of the dear Ve- 
 
 neerings that they could not for some time de-. 
 
 tach themselves from those excellent friends; 
 but at length, either a very open smile on Mr. 
 Lammle’s part, or a very secret elevation of one 
 of his gingerous eyebrows—certainly the one or: 
 the other—seemed to say to Mrs. Lammle, 
 ‘Why don’t you play?” And so, looking 
 about her, she saw Miss Podsnap, and seeming 
 to say responsively, ‘‘That card?” and to be an- 
 swered, ‘‘ Yes,” went and sat beside Miss Pod- 
 snap. 
 
 Mrs. Lammle was overjoyed to escape into a 
 corner for a little quiet talk. 
 
 It promised to be a very quiet talk, for Miss 
 Podsnap replied in a flutter, ‘‘Oh! Indeed, it’s 
 very kind of you, but I am afraid I don’é talk.” 
 
 “Let us make a beginning,” said the insinu- 
 ating Mrs. Lammle, with her best smile. 
 
 ‘‘Oh! I am afraid you'll find me very dull. 
 But Ma talks!” 
 
 That was plainly to be seen, for Ma was talk- 
 ing then at her usual canter, with arched head 
 and mane, opened eyes and nostrils. 
 
 ‘Fond of reading, perhaps?” 
 
 ‘Yes. Atleast [—don't mind that so much,” 
 returned Miss Podsnap. 
 
 ‘¢ M—m—m—m—music.” 
 
 So insinuating was Mrs. Lammle that she got 
 half a dozen ms into the word before she got it 
 out. 
 
 ‘“‘T haven’t nerve to play evenif Icould. Ma 
 plays.” 
 
 (At exactly the same canter, and with a cer- 
 tain flourishing appearance of doing something, 
 Ma did, in fact, occasionally take a rock upon 
 the instrument.) 
 
 ‘¢ Of course you like dancing ?” 
 
 ‘Oh no, I don’t,” said Miss Podsnap. 
 
 ‘*No? With your youth and attractions? 
 Truly, my dear, you surprise me!” 
 
 “J can’t say,” observed Miss Podsnap, after 
 hesitating considerably, and_ stealing several 
 timid looks at Mrs. Lammle’s carefully ar- 
 ranged face, ‘‘how. I might have liked it if I 
 had been a—you won’t mention it, wid/ you?” 
 
 My. dearl-Never2? 
 
 ‘¢No, Lam sure you won’t. I can’t say then 
 how I should have liked it, if I had been a 
 chimney-sweep on May-day.” 
 
 ‘¢Gracious!” was the exelamation which 
 amazement elicited from Mrs, Lammle. 
 
 ‘““There! I knew you’d wonder. But you 
 won’t mention it, will you?” 
 
 <‘Upon my word, my love,” said Mrs. Lammle, 
 “you make me ten times more desirous, now I 
 talk to you, to know you well than I was when I 
 sat over yonder looking at you. How I wish we 
 could be real friends! Try me as a real friend. 
 Come! Don’t fancy me a frumpy old married 
 woman, my dear; I was married but’the other 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 ys \ iid ah cat CR 7 
 x 4 
 
 day, you know; I am dressed as a bride now, — 
 you see, About the chimney-sweeps?” 4 
 
 ‘sHush! Ma ll hear.” ~ 
 
 «She can’t hear from where she sits.” 
 
 ‘‘Don’t you be too sure of that,” said Miss_ 
 Podsnap, in a lower voice. ‘* Well, what I 
 mean is, that they seem to enjoy it.” 
 
 ‘‘ And that perhaps you would have enjoyed 
 it, if you had been one of them ?” i 
 
 Miss Podsnap nodded significantly. 
 
 ‘“Phen you don’t enjoy it now?” 
 
 ‘How is it possible?” said Miss Podsnap. 
 “(Oh it is such a dreadful thing! If I was” 
 wicked enough—and strong enough—to kill any” 
 body, it should be my partner.” ‘ 
 
 This was such an entirely new view of the 
 Terpsichorean art as socially practiced, that Mrs. 
 Lammile léoked at her young friend in some as-_ 
 tonishment. Her young friend sat nervously 
 twiddling her fingers in a pinioned attitude, as 
 if she were trying to hide her elbows. But this 
 latter Utopian object (in short sleeves) always 
 appeared to be the great inotiengyye aim of her 
 existence. ‘ 
 
 .“¢It sounds horrid, don’t it ?” said Miss Pod- 
 snap, with a penitential face. — 
 
 Mrs. Lamunle, not very well knowing what to 
 answer, resolved herself into a look of smiling 
 encouragement. - 
 
 ‘‘ But it is, and it always has been,” pursued 
 Miss Podsnap, ‘‘such atrial tome! Iso dread 
 being awful. Anditissoawful! No one knows” 
 what I suffered at Madame Sauteuse’s, where Ty 
 learned to dance and make presentation-courtes” 
 sies, and other dreadful things—or at least where. 
 they tried to teach me. Ma can do it.” if 
 
 ‘¢ At any rate, my love,” said Mrs. Lammle,? 
 soothingly, ‘‘ that’s over.” 
 
 ‘¢ Yes, it’s over,’ returned Miss Podsnap, ‘‘ but 
 there’s nothing gained by that. It’s worse here 
 than at Madame Sauteuse’s. Mawas there, and 
 Ma’s here; but Pa wasn’t there, and company 
 wasn’t there, and there were not real partners 
 there. Oh there’s Ma speaking to the man at 
 the piano! Oh there’s Ma going up to some- 
 body! Oh I know she’s going to bring him to 
 me! Ohplease don’t, please don’t, please don’t! 
 Oh keep away, keep away, keep away!” ‘These 
 pious ejaculations Miss Podsnap uttered with 
 her eyes closed, and her head leaning back 
 against the wall. iF 
 
 But the Ogre advanced under the pilotage of 
 Ma, and Ma said, ‘‘ Georgiana, Mr. Grompus,” 
 and the Ogre clutched his victim and bore her off 
 to his castle in the top couple. Then the discreet. 
 automaton who had surveyed his ground, played. 
 a blossomless tuneless ‘‘set,” and sixteen disci- 
 ples of Podsnappery went through the figures of 
 —1, Getting up at eight and shaving close at 4 
 quarter past—2, Breakfasting at nine—3, Going 
 to the City at ten—4, Coming home at half past 
 five—5, Dining at seven, and the grand chain, 
 
 While these solemnities were in progress, Mr, 
 Alfred Lammle (most loving of husbands) ap- 
 proached the chair of Mrs. Alfred Lammle (most 
 loving of wives), and bending over the back of it, 
 trifled for some few seconds with Mrs. Lammle’s 
 bracelet. Slightly imgcontrast with this brief 
 airy toying, one mit he noticed a certain 
 dark attention in . Lammle’s face as she 
 said some words with her eyes on Mr. Lammle’ 
 waistcoat, and seemed in return to receive some 
 
 a 
 
 ‘ 4 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 73 
 lesson. But it was all done as a breath passes 
 
 _ from a& mirror. 
 
 And now, the grand chain riveted to the las 
 link, the discreet automaton ceased, and the six- 
 
 teen, two and two, took a walk ameng the fur- 
 miture. And hereinthé unconsciousness of the 
 ‘Ogie Grompus was pleasantly conspicuous ; fer 
 
 _ that complacent monster, believing that he was 
 “giving Miss Podsnap a treat, prolonged to the 
 utmost stretch of possibility a peripatetic account 
 of an archery meeting; while his victim, head- 
 
 _ ing the procession of sixteen as it slowly circled 
 
 about, like a revolving funeral, never raised her 
 eyes except once to steal a glance at Mrs. Lammie, 
 expressive of intense despair. 
 
 At length the procession was dissolved by the 
 
 _ Violent arrival of a nutmeg, before which the 
 drawing-room door bounced open as if it were a 
 
 _ €annon-ball ; and while that fragrant article, dis- 
 persed through several glasses of colored warm 
 water, was going the round of society, Miss Pod- 
 snap returned to her seat by her new friend. 
 
 “Oh my goodness,” said Miss Podsnap. 
 «That's over! I hope you didn’t look at me.” 
 
 ** My dear, why not ?” 
 
 **Qh I know all about myself,” said Miss Pod- 
 snap. : 
 
 “YH tell you something J know about you, 
 my dear,” returned Mrs. Lammle, in her win- 
 ning way, ‘‘and that is, you are most unneces- 
 Sarily shy.” ; 
 
 *“Ma ain’t,” said Miss Podsnap. ‘—I de- 
 test you! Goalong!” This shot was leveled 
 under her breath at the gallant Grompus for be- 
 stowing an insinuating smile upon her in passing. 
 
 “Pardon me if I searcely see, my dear Miss 
 Podsnap,” Mrs. Lammle was beginning when the 
 
 _ young lady interposed. 
 
 “If we are going to be real friends (and I sup- 
 pose we are, for you are the only person who 
 ever proposed it) don’t let us be awful. It’s aw- 
 ful enough to be Miss Podsnap without being 
 called so. Cali me Georgiana.” 
 
 “ Dearest Georgiana,” Mrs. Lammle began 
 again. 
 
 “Thank you,” said Miss Podsnap. 
 
 **Dearest Georgiana, pardon me if I scarcely 
 ‘see, my love, why your mamma’s not being shy 
 
 is a reason why.you should be.” 
 
 **Don't you really see that ?” asked Miss Pod- 
 ‘Snap, plucking at her fingers in a troubled man- 
 ner, and furtively casting her eyes now on Mrs. 
 Lammie, now on the ground. ““Then perhaps 
 it isn’t?” 
 
 ___ “My dearest Georgiana, you defer much too 
 ‘readily to my poor opinion. Indeed it is not 
 
 _ ven an opinion, darling, for it is only a confes- 
 sion of my dullness.” 
 
 _ “Qh you are not dull,” returned Miss Pod- 
 ‘snap. “fam dull, but you couldn’t have made 
 me talk if you were.” 
 
 Some little touch of conscience answering this 
 perception of her having gained a purpose, called 
 bloom enough into Mrs. Lammle’s face to make 
 it look brighter as she sat smiling her best smile 
 on her dear Georgiana, and shaking her head 
 with an affectionate playfulness. Not that it 
 “Meant any thing, but that Georgiana seemed to 
 like it. = 
 
 ** What I mean is,” pursued Georgiana, “ that 
 Ma being so endowed with awfulness, and Pa 
 ‘being so endowed with awfulness, and there be- 
 
 ing so much awfulness every where—I mean, at 
 least, every where where I am—perhaps it makes 
 me who am so deficient in awfulness, and fright- 
 ened at it—I say it very badly—I don’t know 
 whether you can understand what I mean?” 
 
 “* Perfectly, dearest Georgiana!” Mrs. Lam- 
 mile was proceeding with every reassuring wile,. 
 when the head of that young lady suddenly went. 
 back against the wall again, and her eyes closed.. 
 
 “Oh there’s Ma being awful with somebod¢ 
 With a glass in his eye! Oh I know she's going: 
 to bring him here! Oh don’t bring him, don’t 
 bring him! Qh he'll be my partner with his. 
 glass in his eye! Oh what shall I do!” This. 
 time Georgiana accompanied her ejaculations. 
 with taps of her feet upou the floor, and was al- 
 together in quite a desperate condition. But. 
 there was no escape from the majestic Mrs. Pod-. 
 snap’s preduction of an ambling stranger, with, 
 one eve sc:ewed up into extinetion and the oth— 
 er framed and glazed, who, having looked down, 
 out of that organ, as_ifhe descried» Mise Pod-. 
 snap at the bettom-of some perpendicular shaft, 
 brought her to the surface,. and ambled. off with; 
 her. And then the captive at the piane played 
 another ‘‘set,” expressive of his mournful aspi-. 
 rations after freedom, and. other sixteen went: 
 through the former melancholy motions, and the. 
 ambler took Miss Podsnap for a furniture walk,, 
 as if he had strock out an entirely original con- 
 ception. ? 
 
 In the mean time a stray personage of a meek, 
 demeanor, who had wandered to the hearth-rug 
 and got among the heads of tribes: assembled, 
 there in conference with Mr. Podsnap, elimina 
 ted Mr. Podsnap’s flash and flourish by a highly 
 unpolite remark; no less than a reference to the 
 circumstance that some half-dozen people had 
 | fately died in the streets of starvation. It was 
 clearly ill-timed after dinner. It was not adapt- 
 ed to the cheek of the young person. It was not 
 in good taste. 
 
 ““T don’t believe it," said Mr. Podsnap, pat- 
 ting it behind him. 
 
 The meek man was afraid we must take it as 
 proved, because there were the Inquests and the 
 Registrar’s returns. 
 
 **'Then it was their own fault,” said Mr. Pod- 
 snap. 
 
 Veneering and other elders of tribes com- 
 mended this way out of it, At once a short eut 
 and a broad road. 
 
 The man of meek demeanor intimated that 
 truly it would seem, from the facts, as if starva- 
 tion had been forced upon the culprits in ques- 
 tion—as if, in their wretched manner, they had 
 made their weak protests against it—as if they 
 would have taken the libegty of staving it off if 
 they could—as if they would rather not have 
 been starved upon the whole, if perfectly agree- 
 able to all parties, 
 
 “There is not,” said Mr. Podsnap, flushing 
 angrily, “there is not a country in the world, 
 Sir, where so noble a provision is made for the 
 poor as in this country.” 
 
 The meek man was quite willing to concede 
 that, but perhaps it rendered the matter even 
 worse, as showing that there must be something 
 appallingly wrong somewhere. 
 
 ““Where?” said Mr. Podsnap. 
 
 The meck man hinted, Wouldn’t it be well to 
 ‘try; very seriously, to find out where? 
 
 m 
 Be x gn 
 
P ¥ 
 
 ae | 
 
 74 ce a OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 ‘¢ Ah!” said Mr. Podsnap. ‘‘ Easy to say 
 somewhere ; not so easy to say where! But I 
 see what you are driving at. I knew it from 
 the first. Centralization. No. Never with my 
 consent. Not English.” ) 
 
 An approving murmur arose from the heads 
 of tribes; as saying, ‘‘There you have him! 
 Hold him !” 
 
 He was not aware (the meek man submitted 
 of himself) that he was driving at any ization. 
 He had no favorite ization that he knew of. 
 But he certainly was more staggered by these 
 terrible occurrences than he was by names, of 
 howsoever so many syllables. Might he ask, 
 
 was dying of destitution and neglect necessarily 
 
 t 
 3 
 
 ~ English ?” 
 
 ‘“You know what the population of London 
 is, I suppose ?” said Mr. Podsnap. 
 
 The meek man supposed he did, but supposed 
 that had absolutely nothing to do with it, if its 
 laws were well administered. 
 
 ‘¢ And you know; at least I hope you know;” 
 said Mr. Podsnap, with severity, ‘‘that Provi- 
 dence has declared that you shall have the poor 
 
 _ always with you?” 
 
 The meek man also hoped he knew that. 
 
 ‘‘T am glad to hear it,” said Mr. Podsnap 
 with a portentous air. ‘Iam glad to hear it. 
 It will render you cautious how you fly in the 
 face of Providence.” 
 
 In reference to that absurd and irreverent 
 conventional phrase, the meek man said, for 
 which Mr. Podsnap was not responsible, -he the 
 meek man had no fear of doing any thing so 
 impossible; but— 
 
 But Mr. Podsnap felt that the time had come 
 for flushing and flourishing this meek man down 
 for good. So he said: 
 
 ““f must decline to pursue this painful discus- 
 sion. It is not pleasant to my feelings; it is 
 repugnant to my feelings. I have said that I do 
 not admit these things, JI have also said that 
 if they do occur (not that I admit it), the fault 
 lies with the sufferers themselves. It is not for 
 me’—Mr. Podsnap pointed ‘‘me” forcibly, as 
 adding by implication though it may be all very 
 well for you—‘‘it is not fur me to impugn the 
 workings of Providence. I know better than 
 that, I trust, and I have mentioned what the 
 intentions of Providence are. Besides,” said 
 Mr. Podsnap, flushing high up among his hair- 
 brushes, with a strong consciousness of personal 
 atfront, “‘the subject is a very disagreeable one. 
 I will go so far as to say it is an odious one. It 
 is not one to be introduced among our wives and 
 young persons, and I—”, He finished with that 
 flourish of his arm which added more express- 
 ively than any words, And I remove it from the 
 face of the earth, % 
 
 ' Simultaneously with this quenching of the 
 meek man’s ineffectual fire, Georgiana having 
 left the ambler up a lane of sofa, in a No Thor- 
 oughfare of back drawing-room, to find his own 
 way out, came back to Mrs. Lammle, And who 
 should be with Mrs. Lammle but Mr. Lammle. 
 So fond of her! 
 
 ‘« Alfred, my love, here is my friend. Geor- 
 giana, dearest girl, you must like my husband 
 next to me.” 
 
 Mr. Lammle was preud to be so soon distin- 
 guished by this special commendation to Miss 
 Podsnap’s favor. But if Mr, Lammle were prone 
 
 \ 
 
 i ai ee 
 
 to be jealous of his dear Sophronia’s friendships, — 
 he would be jealous of her feeling toward Miss 
 Podsnap. oe 
 “« Say Georgiana, darling,” interposed his wife, 
 ‘¢ Toward — shall 1?— Georgiana.” Mr.3 
 Lammle uttered the name, with a delicate curve — 
 of his right hand, from hi§ lips outward. For © 
 never have I known Sophronia (who is not apt | 
 to take sudden likings) so attracted and so cap-” 
 
 ‘tivated as she is by—shall I once more ?—Geor- 
 
 giana.” 
 The object of this homage sat uneasily enough 
 
 in receipt of it, and then said, turning to Mrs. — 
 
 Lammle, much embarrassed : ; 
 
 ‘tT wonder what you like me for! Iam sure” 
 I can’t think.” 
 ‘¢ Dearest Georgiana, for yourself. For your 
 
 difference from all around you.” . 
 
 ‘¢Well! That may be. For I think I like 
 you for your difference from all around me,” — 
 said Georgiana with a smile of relief. 4 
 
 ‘¢We must be going with the rest,” observed ~ 
 Mrs. Lammle, rising with a show of unwilling-— 
 ness, amidst a general dispersal. ‘* We are real 
 friends, Georgiana dear ?” ; 
 
 ‘* Real.” | 
 
 ‘6 Good-night, dear girl!” 
 
 She had established an attraction over the 
 shrinking nature upon which her smiling eyes 
 were fixed, for Georgiana held her hand while 
 she answered in a secret and half-frightened — 
 tone: i 
 
 ‘‘Don’t forget me when you are gone away. ¥ 
 And come again soon. Good-night!” ; 
 
 Charming to see Mr. and Mrs. Lammle tak- 
 ing leave so gracefully, and going down the stairs 
 so lovingly and sweetly. Not quite so charming ~ 
 to see their smiling faces fall and brood as they 
 dropped moodily into separate corners of their 
 little carriage. But to be sure that was a sight — 
 behind the scenes, which nobody saw, and which 
 nobody was meant to see. | 
 ~ Certain big, heavy vehicles, built on the model” 
 of the Podsnap plate, took away the heavy arti-_ 
 cles of guests weighing ever so much; and the 
 less valuable articles got away after their various” 
 manners; and the Podsnap plate was put to bed. 
 As Mr. Podsnap stood with his back to the draw- 
 ing-room fire, pulling up his shirt-collar, like a_ 
 veritable cock of the walk literally pluming him-" 
 self in the midst of his possessions, nothing would 
 have astonished him more than an intimation 
 that Miss Podsnap, or any other young person 
 properly born and bred, could not be exactly” 
 put away like the plate, brought out like the 
 plate, polished like the plate, counted, weighed, - 
 and valued like the plate. That such a young 
 person could possibly have a morbid vacancy im 
 the heart for any thing younger than the plate, © 
 or less monotonous than the plate; or that such 
 a young person’s thoughts could try to scale the 
 region bounded on the north, south, east, and 
 west, by the plate ; was a monstrous imaginaaaas 
 which he would on the spot have flourished into 
 space. This perhaps in some sort arose from 
 Mr. Podsnap’s blushing young person being, so- 
 to speak, all cheek: whereas there is a possibil- 
 ity that there may be young persons of a rather 
 more complex organilition. i, 
 
 If Mr. Podsnap, pulling up his shirt-collar,. 
 could only have heard himself called ‘“‘that fel- 
 low” in a certain short dialogue, which passed 
 
 A) 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 between Mr. and Mrs. Lammle in their opposite 
 corners of their little carriage, rolling home! 
 ‘¢ Sophronia, are you awake ?” 
 ‘* Am I likely to be asleep, Sir?” 
 “Very likely, I should think, after that fel- 
 ‘low’s company. Attend to what I am going to 
 | say. ” ‘ 
 
 gaid, have I not? What else have I been doin 
 all to-night ?” ne 
 
 “* Attend, I tell you” (in a raised voice), ‘‘ to 
 what Iam going to say. Keep close to that idiot 
 
 - girl. . Keep her. under your thumb. You have 
 her fast, and you are not to let her go. Do you 
 hear ?” 
 
 *‘T hear you.” 
 
 **I foresee there is money to be made out of 
 this, besides taking that fellow down a peg. We 
 
 owe each other money, you know.” . 
 
 Mrs. Lammle winced a little at the reminder, 
 ‘but only enough to shake her scents and essences 
 anew into the atmosphere of the little carriage 
 
 as she settled herself afresh in her own dark 
 corner. 
 ——$—$<p-—___—_——— 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 THE SWEAT OF AN HONEST MAN’S BROW. 
 
 Mr. Mortimer Licutwoop and Mr. Eugene 
 _ Wrayburn took a coffee-house dinner together in 
 Mr. Lightwood’s office. They had newly agreed 
 to set up a joint establishment together. They 
 _ had taken a bachelor cottage near Hampton, on 
 the brink of the Thames, with a lawn, and a 
 
 * boat-house, and all things fitting, and were to 
 float with the stream through the summer and 
 the Long Vacation. 
 
 It was not summer yet, but spring; and it was 
 not gentle spring ethereally mild, as in Thom- 
 son’s Seasons, but nipping spring with an east- 
 erly wind, as in Johnson’s, Jackson’s, Dickson’s,. 
 
 Smith’s, and Jones’s Seasons. The grating wind 
 ‘sawed rather than blew; and as it sawed, the 
 saw-dust whigled about the saw-pit. Every street 
 /Was a saw-pit, and there were no top-sawyers ; 
 / every passenger was an under-sawyer, with the 
 _ Saw-dust blinding him and choking him. 
 __ That mysterious paper currency which circu- 
 lates*in London when the wind blows, gyrated 
 here and there and every where. Whence can 
 it come, whither can it go? It hangs on every 
 bush, flutters in every tree, is caught flying by 
 the electric wires, haunts every inclosure, drinks 
 at every pump, cowers at every grating, shud- 
 ders upon every plot of grass, seeks rest in vain 
 _ behind the legions of iron rails. In Paris, where 
 nothing is wasted, costly and luxurious city 
 though it be, but where wonderful human ants 
 ereep out of holes and pick up every scrap, there 
 is no such thing. There, it blows nothing but 
 dust. There, sharp eyes and sharp stomachs 
 A Eee even the east wind, and get something out 
 Of it. 
 
 The wind sawed, and the saw-dust whirled. 
 The shrubs wrung their many hands,’ bemoaning 
 that they had been over-persuaded by the sun to 
 bud; the young wer lone the sparrows re- 
 pented of their early marriages, like men and 
 women; the colors of the rainbow were dis- 
 cernible, not in floral spring, but in the faces 
 
 ‘of the people whom it nibbled and pinched. 
 
 v ey 2 ee 
 
 ‘“‘T have attended to what you have already | 
 
 ba. 
 4 75 
 
 ‘And ever the wind sawed, and the saw-dust 
 whirled. : 
 
 When the spring evenings are too long and 
 light to shut out, and such weather is rife, the 
 city which Mr. Podsnap so explanatorily called 
 London, Londres, London, is at its worst. Such 
 a black shrill city, combining the qualities of a 
 smoky house and a scolding wife; such a gritty 
 city; such a hopeless city, with no rent in the 
 leaden canopy of its sky; such a beleaguered 
 city, invested by the great Marsh Forces of Essex 
 and Kent. So the two old school-fellows felt 
 it to be, as, their dinner done, they turned to- 
 ward the fire to smoke. Young Blight was gone, 
 the coffee-house waiter was gone, the plates and 
 
 ih 
 " 
 fy 
 
 dishes were gone, the wine was going—but not 
 
 in the same direction. 
 
 ‘**'The wind sounds up here,” quoth Eugene, 
 stirring the fire, ‘as if we were keeping a light- 
 house. I wish we were.” 
 
 ‘‘Don’t_ you think it would bore us?” Light- 
 wood asked. 
 
 ‘*Not more than any other place. And there 
 would be no Circuit to go. But that’s a selfish 
 consideration, personal to me.” ei 
 
 ‘*¢ And no clients to come,” added Lightwood. 
 ‘*Not that that’s a selfish consideration at all 
 personal to me.” 
 
 “If we were on an isolated rock in a stormy 
 sea,” said Eugene, smoking with his eyes on the 
 
 ‘fire, “‘ Lady Tippins couldn’t put off to visit us, 
 
 or, better still, might put off and get swamped. 
 People couldn’t ask one to wedding breakfasts. 
 There would be no Precedents to’ hammer at, 
 except the plain-sailing Precedent of keeping the 
 light up. It would be exciting to look-out for 
 wrecks.” | 
 
 ‘* But otherwise,” suggested Lightwood, ‘there 
 
 ‘might be a degree of sameness in the life.” 
 
 ‘¢T have thought of that also,” said Eugene, 
 as if he really had been considering the subject 
 in its various bearings with an eye to the busi- 
 
 yness; ‘‘but it would be a defined and limited 
 ‘monotony. 
 
 It would not extend beyond two 
 
 people. Now, it’s a question with me, Morti- 
 
 mer, whether a monotony defined with that pre- 
 cision and limited to that extent might not be 
 ‘more endurable than the unlimited monotony of 
 ‘one’s fellow-creatures.”’ 
 
 As Lightwood laughed and passed the wine 
 he remarked, ‘‘ We shall have an opportunity, in 
 our boating summer, of trying the question.” 
 
 ‘¢ Animperfect one,” Eugene acquiesced, with 
 a sigh, ‘‘but so we shall. I hope we may not 
 prove too much for one another.” 
 
 ‘*Now, regarding your respected father,” said 
 Lightwood, bringing him to a subject.they had 
 expressly appointed to discuss: always the most 
 slippery eel of eels of subjects to lay hold of. 
 
 ‘*Yes, regarding my respected -fathen,”’ as- 
 sented Eugene, settling himself in his arm-chair, 
 ‘¢T would rather have approached my respected 
 father by candle-light, as a theme requiring a 
 little artificial brilliancy; but we will take him 
 by twilight, enlivened with a glow of Wallsend.” 
 
 He stirred the fire again as he spoke, and hay- 
 ing made it blaze, resumed : 
 
 ‘¢ My respected father has found, down in the 
 
 parental neighborhood, a wife for his pot-gener=-. 
 
 ally-respected son.” 
 ‘* With some money, of course?” . 
 ‘‘ With some money, of course, or he would 
 
ae 
 
 “ : 
 76 
 
 not have found her. My respected father—let 
 me shorten the dutiful tautology by substituting 
 in future M. R. F., which sounds military, and 
 rather like the Duke of Wellington.” 
 ‘What an absurd fellow you are, Eugene!” 
 **Not at all, I assure you. M. R. F. having 
 always in the clearest manner provided (as he 
 calls it) for his children by prearranging from | 
 the hour of the birth of each, and sometimes | 
 from an earlier period, what the devoted : 
 
 | 
 { 
 { 
 i 
 i 
 | 
 H 
 
 victim’s calling and course in life should be, M. 
 R. F. prearranged for myself that I was to be 
 the barrister I am (with the slight addition of 
 an enormous practice, which has not accrued), 
 and also the married man I am not.” 
 
 ‘*'The first you have often told me.” 
 
 **'The first I have often told you. Consider- 
 ing myself sufficiently incongruous on my legal , 
 eminence, I have until now suppressed my do- 
 mestic destiny. You know M. R. F., but not 
 as well as Ido. If you knew him as well as I 
 do he would amuse you.” 
 
 ‘*Filially spoken, Eugene !” 
 
 ‘* Perfectly so, believe me; and with every 
 sentiment of affectionate deference toward M. 
 R. F. But if he amuses me, I can't help it. 
 When my eldest brother was born, of course the 
 rest of us knew (I mean the rest of us would 
 have known, if we had been in existence) that 
 he was heir to the Family Embarrassments— 
 we call it before company the Family Estate. 
 But when my second brother was going to be 
 born by-and-by, ‘this,’ says M. R. F., ‘is a lit- 
 tle pillar of the church.’ Was born, and be- 
 came a pillar of the church; a very shaky one. 
 My third brother. appeared, considerably in ad- 
 vance of his engagement to my mother; but M. 
 R. F., not at all put out by surprise, instantly 
 declared him a Circumnavigator. Was pitch- 
 forked into the Navy, but has not cireumnavi- 
 gated. I announced myself, and was disposed 
 of with the highly satisfactory results embodied | 
 before you. When my younger brother was half 
 an hour old, it was settled by M. R. F. that he 
 should have a mechanical genius. And so on. 
 Therefore I say that M. R. F. amuses me.” 
 
 “Touching the lady, Eugene.” 
 
 “There M. R. F. ceases to be amusing, be- 
 cause my intentions are opposed to touching the 
 lady.” 
 
 *‘Do you know her ?” 
 
 “Not in the least.” 
 
 ‘‘Hadn’t you better see her?” 
 
 “My dear Mortimer, you have studied my 
 character. Could I possibly go down there 
 labeled ‘Ervigrste. ON view,’ and meet the 
 lady similarly labeled? Any thing to carry 
 out M. R. F.’s arrangements, I am sure, with the 
 greatest pleasure—except matrimony. Could I 
 possibly support it? I, so soon bored, so con- 
 stantly, so fatally ?” 
 
 ‘‘But you are not a consistent fellow, Eu- 
 gene.” 
 
 ‘‘In susceptibility to boredom,” returned that , 
 worthy, ‘‘I assure 
 of mankind.” 
 
 ‘Why, it was but now that you were dwell- 
 ing on the advantages of a monotony of two.” 
 
 ‘*Jn adight-house. Do me the justice to re- 
 member the condition. In a light-house.” 
 
 Mortimer laughed again, and Eugene, having 
 laughed too for the first time, as if he found him- 
 
 you I am the most consistent 
 
 ee AL Lisi, 
 : mn: 
 a 
 ch 
 Pe 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. — Bie 
 
 self on reflection rather entertaining, relapsed 
 into his usual gloom, and drowsily said, as he 
 enjoyed his cigar, ‘‘ No, there is no help for it; 
 one of the prophetic deliveries of M. R. F. must 
 forever remain unfulfilled. With every disposi- 
 tion to oblige him, he must submit to a failure.” ~ 
 
 It had grown darker as they talked, and the © 
 wind was sawing and the saw-dust was whirling © 
 outside paler windows, The underlying church. ~ 
 yard was already settling into deep dim shade, 
 and the shade was creeping up to the house- 
 tops among which they sat. “As if,” said Eu. 
 gene, ‘‘as if the church-yard ghosts were rising.” 
 
 He had walked to the window with his cigar 
 in his mouth, to exalt its flavor by comparing — 
 the fireside with the outside, when he stopped — 
 midway on his return to his arm-chair, and 
 said: 
 
 ‘* Apparently one of the ghosts has lost its 
 way, and dropped in to be directed. Look at 
 this phantom !” 
 
 Lightwood, whose back was toward the door, 
 turned his head, and there, in the darkness of 
 the entry, stood a something in the likeness of a 
 man: to whom he addressed the not irrelevant 
 inquiry, ‘‘ Who the devil are you?” i) 
 
 ‘‘T ask your pardons, Governors,” replied the 
 ghost, in a hoarse double-barreled whisper, *‘ but 
 might either on you be Lawyer Lightwood ?” 
 
 ‘“ What do yow mean by not knocking at the 
 door ?’”’? demanded Mortimer. 
 
 ‘*T ask your pardons, Governors,” replied the — 
 ghost, as before, ‘‘but probable you was not — 
 aware your door stood open.” 5 
 
 ‘*What do you want?” 4 
 
 Hereunto the ghost again hoarsely replied, in 
 its double-barreled manner, ‘‘I ask your par- ° 
 dons, Governors, but might one on you be Law- 
 yer Lightwood ?” 
 
 ‘*Oneof us is,” said the owner of that name. 
 
 “All right, Governors Both,” returned the 
 ghost, carefully closing the room door; ‘*’tickler 
 business.” 
 
 Mortimer lighted the candles. They showed 
 the visitor to be an ill-looking ysitor with a_ 
 squinting leer, who, as he spoke, fumbled at an 
 old sodden fur cap, formless and mangy, that — 
 looked like a furry animal, dog or cat, puppy or 
 kitten, drowned and decaying. 
 
 ‘“Now,” said Mortimer, ‘‘ what is it ?” 
 
 ‘¢ Governors Both,” returned the man, in what 
 he meant to be a wheedling tone, ‘‘ which on you 
 might be Lawyer Lightwood ?” 
 
 pee tO: Mea 
 
 ‘*Lawyer Lightwood,” ducking at him with 
 a servile air, ‘‘I am a man as gets my living, 
 and as seeks to get my living, by the sweat of 
 my brow. Not to risk being done out of the 
 sweat of my brow by any chances, I should 
 wish, afore going further, to be swore in.” 
 
 ‘*T am not a swearer in of people, man.” i 
 
 The visitor, clearly any thing but reliant on — 
 this assurance Joggedly muttered ‘‘ Alfred Da- — 
 vid.” - 
 
 ‘Ts that your name?” asked Lightwood. 
 
 ‘‘My name?” returned the man. ‘No; I 
 want to take a Alfred David.” ; 
 
 (Which Eugene, smoking and contemplating — 
 him, interpreted as meaning Affidavit.) 
 
 ‘“*T tell you, my good fellow,” said Lightwood, _ 
 with his indolent laugh, ‘‘ that ] have nothing to 
 do with swearing.” i 
 
 eT 
 
 * Ww YAO ite yay y ce 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 Ve can swear at you,” Eugene explained ; 
 ‘‘andsocanI. But we can’t do more for you.” 
 
 Much discomfited by this information, the vis- 
 itor turned the drowned dog or cat, puppy or kit- 
 ten, about and about, and looked from one of 
 the Governors Both to the other of the Govern- 
 ors Both, while he deeply considered within him- 
 self. At length he decided: 
 
 ‘Then I must be took down.” 
 
 “Where?” asked Lightwood. 
 
 ‘‘Heres” said the man.’ ‘In pen and ink.” 
 
 ‘<First, let us know what your business is 
 about.” 
 
 ‘«Jt’s about,” ‘said the man, taking a step for- 
 ward, dropping his hoarse voice, and shading it 
 with his hand, ‘‘it’s about from five to ten thou- 
 sand pound reward. That’s what it’s about. 
 It’s about Murder. That's what it’s about.” 
 
 ““Come nearer the table. Sit down. Will 
 you have a glass of wine?” 
 
 “Yes, I will,” said the man; ‘‘and I don’t 
 deceive you, Governors.” 
 
 It was given him. Making a stiff arm to the 
 elbow, he poured the wine into his mouth, tilted 
 it into his right cheek, as saying, ‘‘ What do you 
 think of it?” tilted it into his left cheek, as say- 
 
 ing, ‘‘ What do you think of it?” jerked it into 
 his stomach, as saying, ‘* What do you think of 
 it?” To conelude, smacked his lips, as if all 
 three replied, ‘‘ We think well of it.” 
 
 ‘¢ Will you have another ?” 
 
 ‘¢Yes, I will,” he repeated, ‘‘and I don’t de- 
 ceive you, Governors.’”’ And also repeated the 
 other proceedings. 
 
 ‘¢Now,” began Lightwood, ‘‘what’s your 
 name ?” 
 
 ‘Why, there you’re rather fast, Lawyer Light- 
 wood,” he replied, in a remonstrant manner. 
 Don’t you see, Lawyer Lightwood? There 
 you're a little bit fast. I’m going to earn from 
 five to ten thousand pound by the sweat of my 
 brow; and as a poor man doing justice to the 
 sweat of my brow, is it likely I can afford to part 
 with so much as my name without its being took 
 down ?” 
 
 Deferring to the man’s sense of the binding 
 powers of pen and ink and paper, Lightwood 
 nodded acceptance of l:ugene’s nodded proposal 
 to take those spells in hand. Eugene, bringing 
 them to the table, sat down as clerk or notary. 
 
 “Now,” said Lightwood, ‘‘what’s your name?” 
 
 But further precaution was still due to the 
 sweat of this honest fellow’s brow. 
 
 ““T should wish, Lawyer Lightwood,” he stip- 
 ulated, ‘‘to have that 'T’other Governor as my 
 
 witness that what I said I said. Consequent, 
 will the T’other Governor be so good as chuck 
 me his name and where he lives?” 
 
 Eugene, cigar in mouth and pen in hand, 
 tossed him his card. After spelling it out slow- 
 ly, the man made it into a little roll, and tied it 
 
 up in an end of his neckerchief still more slowly. 
 _ “Now,” said Lightwood, for the third time, 
 **if you have quite completed your various prep- 
 ‘arations, my friend, and have fully ascertained 
 that your spirits are cool and not in any way 
 hurried, what’s your name?” 
 
 *¢ Roger Riderhood.” 
 
 ** Dwelling-place ?” 
 
 ** Lime’us Hole.” 
 
 **Calling or occupation ?” 
 
 Not quite so glib with this answer as with the 
 
 77 
 
 previous two, Mr. Riderhood gave in the defini- 
 tion, ‘* Waterside character.” 
 
 ‘‘Any thing against you?” Eugene quietly 
 put in, as he wrote. =» 
 
 Rather balked, Mr. Riderhood evasively re- 
 marked, with an innocent air, that he believed 
 the T’other Governor had asked him summa’t. 
 
 ‘‘Tver in trouble?” said Eugene. 
 
 “Once.” (Might happen to any man, Mr. 
 Riderhood added incidentally.) 
 
 “On suspicion of— ?” 
 
 ‘¢Qf seaman’s pocket,” said Mr. Riderhood. 
 ‘¢Whereby I was in reality the man’s best friend, 
 and tried to take care of him.” 
 
 ‘‘ With the sweat of your brow?” asked En- 
 gene. 
 
 ‘< Till it poured down like rain,” said Roger 
 Riderhood. j 
 
 Eugene leaned back in his chair, and smoked 
 with his eyes negligently turned on the inform- 
 er, and his pen ready to reduce him to more 
 writing. Lightwood also smoked, with his eyes 
 negligently turned on the informer. 
 
 ‘* Now let me be took down again,” said Ri- 
 derhood, when he had turned the drowned cap 
 over and under, and had brushed it the wrong 
 way (if it had a right way) with his sleeve. ‘‘T 
 give information that the man that done the 
 Harmon Murder is Gaffer Hexam, the man that 
 found the body. The hand of Jesse Hexam, 
 commonly called Gaffer on the river and along 
 shore, is the hand that done that deed. His 
 hand, and no other.” 
 
 The two friends glanced at one another with 
 more serious faces than they had shown yet. 
 
 ‘¢Tell us on what grounds you make this ac- 
 cusation,’’ said Mortimer Lightwood. 
 
 ‘On the grounds,” answered Riderhood, wip- 
 ing his face with his sleeve, ‘‘that I was Gaffer’s 
 pardner, and suspected of him many a long day 
 and many a dark night. On the grounds that I 
 knowed his ways. On the grounds that I broke 
 the pardnership because I see the danger ; which 
 I warn you his daughter may tell you another 
 story about that, for any think I can say, but 
 you know what it’ll be worth, for she’d tell you 
 lies, the world round and the heavens broad, to 
 save her father. On the grounds that it’s wel] un- 
 derstood along the caus’ays and the stairs that he 
 done it. On the grounds that he’s fell off from, 
 because he done it. On the grounds that I will 
 swear he done it. On the grounds that you may 
 take me where you will, and get me sworn to it. 
 ZT don’t want to back out of the consequences. I 
 have made up my mind. Take me any wheres.” 
 
 ‘¢ All this is nothing,” said Lightwood. 
 
 ‘‘ Nothing ?” repeated Riderhood, indignant- 
 ly and amazedly. 
 
 ‘‘Merely nothing. It goes to no more than 
 that you suspect this man of the crime. You 
 may do so with some reason, or you may do so 
 with no reason, but he can not be convicted on 
 your suspicion.” 
 
 ‘Haven't I said—I appeal to the Tother 
 Governor as my witness—haven’t I said from 
 the first minute that I opened my mouth in this 
 here world-without-end-everlasting chair” (he 
 evidently used that form of words as next in 
 force to an affidavit), ‘‘that I was willing to 
 swear thatthe done it? Haven't I said, Take 
 me and get me sworn to it? Don’t I say so © 
 now? You won't deny it, Lawyer Lightwood ?” - 
 
78 
 
 “Surely not; but you only offer to swear to 
 your suspicion, and I tell you it is not enough 
 to swear to your suspicion.” 
 
 ‘¢Not enough, ain’t it, Lawyer Lightwood ?” 
 he cautiously demanded. 
 
 ‘¢ Positively not.” 
 
 <¢And did I say it was enough? Now, I ap- 
 peal to the T’other Governor. Now, fair! Did 
 I say so?” 
 
 ‘He certainly has not said that he had no 
 more to tell,”’ Eugene observed in a low voice, 
 without looking at him, ‘‘ whatever he seemed 
 to imply.” . 
 
 ‘¢ Hah!” cried the informer, triumphantly per- 
 ceiving that the remark was generally in his 
 favor, though apparently not closely understand- 
 ing it. ‘‘Fort’nate for me I had a witness!” 
 
 ‘©Go on then,” said Lightwood. ‘‘ Say out 
 what you have to say. No after-thought.” 
 
 ‘¢Let me be took down then!” cried the in- 
 former, eagerly and anxiously. ‘‘ Let me be 
 took down, for by George and the Draggin I’m 
 a coming to it now! Don’t do nothing to keep 
 back from a honest man the fruits of the sweat 
 of his brow! I give information, then, that he 
 told me that he done it. Is that enough ?” 
 
 ‘‘Take care what you say, my friend,” re- 
 turned Mortimer. 
 
 ‘‘Lawyer Lightwood, take care, you, what I 
 say; for I judge you'll be answerable for foller- 
 ing it up!” Then, slowly and emphatically 
 beating it all out with his open right hand on 
 the palm of his left; ‘*1, Roger Riderhood, Lime- 
 ’as Hole, Waterside character, tell you, Law- 
 yer Lightwood, that the man Jesse Hexam, 
 commonly called upon the river, and along- 
 shore Gaffer, told me that he done the deed. 
 What’s more, he told me with his own lips that 
 he done the deed. What’s more, he said that 
 he done the deed. And [ll swear it!” 
 
 “Where did he tell you so?” 
 
 “ Outside,” replied Riderhood, always beating 
 it out, with his head determinedly set askew, and 
 his eyes watchfully dividing their attention be- 
 tween his two auditors, ‘outside the door of the 
 Six Jolly Fellowships, towards a quarter arter 
 twelve at midnight—but I will not in my con- 
 science undertake to swear to so fine a matter as 
 five minutes—on the night when he picked up 
 the body. ‘The Six Jolly Fellowships stands on 
 the spot still. The Six Jolly Fellowships won't 
 run away. If it turns out that’ he warn’t at the 
 Six Jolly Fellowships that night at midnight, 
 I’m a liar.” 
 
 “What did he gay?” , 
 
 <‘T’ll tell you (take me down, T’other Gov- 
 ernor, I ask no better). He come out first; I 
 come out last. I might be a minute arter him ; 
 I might be half a minute, I might be a quarter 
 of aminute; I can not swear to that, and there- 
 fore I won’t. That’s knowing the obligations 
 of a Alfred David, ain’t it?” 
 
 £50 ony.7! 
 
 “JT found him a waiting to speak to me. He 
 says to me, ‘Rogue Riderhood’—for that’s the 
 name I’m mostly called by—not for any mean- 
 ing in it, for meaning it has none, but because 
 of its being similar to Roger.” 
 
 ‘* Never mind that.” 
 
 ‘““*Scuse me, Lawyer Lightwood, it’s a part 
 of the truth, and as such I do mind it, and I 
 must mind it and I will mind it. ‘Rogue Ri- 
 
 ¢ 
 
 - OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 derhood,’ he says, ‘words passed betwixt us on — 
 the river to-night.” Which they had; ask his — 
 daughter! ‘I threatened you,’ he say, ‘to chop 
 you over the fingers with my boat’s stretcher, or 
 tnke a aim at your brains with my boat-hook. 
 
 1 did so on accounts of your looking too hard — 
 at what I had in tow, as if you was suspicious, — 
 and on accounts of your holding on to the gun- ~ 
 wale of my boat.’ I says to him, ‘Gaffez, I~ 
 know it.’ He says to me, ‘Rogue Riderhood, 
 you are aman ina dozen’—I think he-said ina ~ 
 score, but of that I am not positive, so take the 
 lowest figure, for precious be the obligations of 
 a Alfred David. ‘And,’ he says, ‘when your 
 fellow-men is up, be it their lives or be it their — 
 watches, sharp is ever the word with you. Had 
 you suspicions?’ I says, ‘Gaffer, I had; and 7 
 what’s more, I have.’ He falls a shaking, and ~ 
 he says ‘Of what?’ I says, ‘Of foul play.” He — 
 falls a shaking worse, and he says, ‘There was 
 foul play then. I done it for his money. Don’t © 
 betray me!’ Those were the words as ever he 
 used.”’ ; 
 
 There was a silence broken only by the fall of 
 the ashes in the grate. An opportunity which 
 the informer improved -by smearing himself all 
 over the head and neck and face with his — 
 drowned cap, and not at all improying his own 
 appearance. . 
 
 ‘¢What more?” asked Lightwood. 
 
 ‘Of him, d’ye mean, Lawyer Lightwood ?” 
 
 ‘¢ Of ‘any thing to the purpose.” P 
 
 ‘Now, I’m blest if I understand you, Gov- © 
 ernors Both,’ said the informer, in a creeping i 
 manner: propitiating both, though only one had ~ 
 spoken. ‘* What?  <Ain’t that enough ?” 
 
 ‘Did you ask him how he did it, where he 
 did it, when he did it ?” 
 
 ‘‘HWar be it from me, Lawyer Lightwood! I 
 was so troubled in mind, that I weuldn’t have 
 knowed more, no, not for the sum as { expect to 
 eam from you by the sweat of my brow, twice 
 told! I had put an end to the pardnership. I 
 had cut the connection. I couldn’t undo what 
 was done; and when he begs and prays, ‘ Old 
 pardner, on my knees, don’t split upon me!’ I 
 only makes answer, ‘ Never speak another word f 
 to Roger Riderhood, nor look him in the face! 4 
 and I shuns that man.” ‘ 
 
 Having given these words a swing to make ~ 
 them mount the higher-and go the further, Rogue ~ 
 Riderhood poured himself out another glass of © 
 wine unbidden, and seemed to chew it, as, with ~ 
 the half-emptied glass in his hand, he stared at — 
 
 tthe candles. a 
 
 Mortimer glanced at Eugene, but Eugene sat 
 glowering at his paper, and would give him no 
 responsive glance. Mortimer again turned to — 
 the informer, to whom he said: a 
 
 ‘¢You have been troubled in your mind a long © 
 time, man?” ‘e 
 
 Giving his wine a final chew, and swallowing — 
 it, the informer answered in a single word: 
 
 ‘¢ Tages !” 4 
 
 “¢ When all that stir was made, when the Goll 
 ernment reward was offered, when the police 
 were on the alert, when the whole country rang 
 with the crime!” said Mortimer, impatiently. 
 
 “Hah!” Mr. Riderhood very slowly and 
 hoarsely chimed in, with several retrospective 
 nods of his head. ‘* Warn’t I troubled in my 
 mind then!” a 
 
 hs 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 «¢ When conjecture ran wild, when the most 
 extravagant suspicions were afloat, when half a 
 dozen innocent people might have been laid by 
 the heels any hour in the day!” said Mortimer, 
 almost warming, 
 
 * Hah!” Mr. Riderhood chimed in, as be- 
 
 fore. ‘‘Warn’t I troubled in my mind through 
 it all!” 
 
 “But he hadn't,” said Eugene, drawing a 
 ‘Jady’s head upon his writing-paper, and touch- 
 ing it at intervals, ‘‘the opportunity then of 
 earning so much money, you see.” ~~ 
 
 *¢ The 'I’other Governor hits the nail, Lawyer 
 _Lightwood! It was that as turned me. I had 
 many times and again struggled to relieve my- 
 self of the trouble on my mind, but I couldn't 
 get it off. I had once very nigh got it off to 
 Miss Abbey Potterson which keeps the Six Jolly 
 Fellowships—there is the ’ouse, it won’t run 
 away—there lives the lady, she ain’t likely to be 
 struck dead afore you get there-—ask her !—but 
 I couldn’t do it. At last, out.comes the new 
 bill with your own lawful name, Lawyer Light- 
 wood, printed to it, and then I asks the question 
 of my own intellects, Am I to have this trouble 
 _ on my mind forever? Am I never to throw it 
 off? Am I always to think more of Gaffer than 
 of my own self? If he’s got a daughter, ain’t £ 
 got a daughter ?” | 
 
 ‘¢ And echo answered— ?” Eugene suggested. 
 
 ‘You have,” said Mr. Riderhood, in a firm 
 tone. ; 
 _ ‘Incidentally mentioning, at the same time, 
 
 her age?” inquired Eugene. 
 _ “Yes, governor. ‘Two-and-twenty last Octo- 
 ber. And then I put it to myself, ‘Regarding 
 the money. It is a pot of money.’ For it wa 
 pot,” said Mr. Riderhood, with candor, ‘‘and 
 why deny it?” 
 
 ‘¢Hearg” from Eugene, as he touched his 
 drawing. 
 . ***It is a pot of money; but is it a sin for a 
 laboring man that moistens every crust of bread 
 he earns with his tears—or if not with them, 
 with the colds he catches in his head—is it a sin 
 
 for that man to earn it? Say there is any thing | 
 
 _ again earning it. This I put to myself strong, 
 as in duty bound; ‘how can it be said without 
 blaming Lawyer Lightwood for offering it to be 
 earned?’ And was it for me to blame Lawyer 
 Lightwood? No.” 
 
 **No,”’ said Eugene. 
 
 ‘Certainly not, Governor,” Mr. Riderhood 
 acquiesced. ‘‘So I made up my mind to get 
 my trouble off my mind, and to earn by the sweat 
 sf my brow what was held out to me. And 
 what’s more,” he added, suddenly turning blood- 
 thirsty, ‘‘ I mean to have it! And now I tell you, 
 once and away, Lawyer Lightwood, that Jesse 
 Hexam, commonly called Gaffer, his hand and 
 no other, done the deed, on his own confession 
 tome. And [I give him up to you, and I want 
 him took. This night!” 
 
 After another silence, broken only by the fall 
 of the ashes in the grate, which attracted the in- 
 former’s attention as if it were the chinking of 
 money, Mortimer Lightwood leaned over ,his 
 friend, and said, in a whisper: (3 
 
 **T suppose I must go with this fellow to our 
 imperturbable friend at the police-station.” 
 
 ‘*T suppose,” said Eugene, ‘‘ there is no help 
 ~ for it.” 
 
 79 
 
 ‘Do you believe him ?” 
 
 ‘¢T believe him to be 4 thorough rascal. But “ 
 
 he may tell the truth for his own purpose, and 
 for this occasion only.” 4 
 
 “¢Tt doesn’t look like it.” 
 
 ‘¢ He doesn’t,” said Eugene. ‘‘ But neither 
 is his late partner, whom he denounces, a pre- 
 possessing person. The firm are cut-throat Shep- 
 herds both, in appearance. I should like to ask 
 him one thing.” 
 
 The subject of this conference sat leering at 
 the ashes, trying with all his might to overhear 
 what was said, but feigning abstraction as the 
 ‘Governors Both” glanced at him. 
 
 ‘* You mentioned (twice, I think) a daughter 
 of this Hexam’s,” said Eugene, aloud. “You 
 don’t mean to imply that she had any guilty 
 knowledge of the crime?” 
 
 The honest man, after considering—perhaps 
 considering how his answer might affect the 
 fruits of the sweat of his brow—replied, unre- 
 servedly, ‘‘No, I don’t.” 
 
 ‘¢ And you implicate no other person ?” 
 
 “Tt ain’t what I implicate, it’s what Gaffer 
 implicated,” was the dogged and determined an- 
 swer. ‘I don’t pretend to know more than that 
 his words to me was, ‘I done it.’ Those was 
 his words.” 
 
 ‘‘T must see this out, Mortimer,” whispered 
 Eugene, rising. ‘‘ How shall we go?” 
 
 ‘¢Let us walk,” whispered Lightwood, “and 
 give this fellow time to think of it.” 
 
 Having exchanged the question and answer, 
 they prepared themselves for going out, and Mr. 
 Riderhood rose. While extinguishing the can- 
 dles, Lightwood, quite as a matter of course, took 
 up the glass from which that honest gentleman 
 had drunk, and coolly tossed it under the grate, 
 
 99 
 
 | where it fell shivering into fragments. 
 
 ‘¢ Now, if you will take the lead,” said Light- 
 
 Se ae 
 
 wood, ‘‘Mr. Wrayburn and I will follow. You — 
 
 know where to go, I suppose ?”’ 
 
 ‘*T suppose I do, Lawyer Lightwood.” 
 
 ‘‘'Take the lead, then.” 
 
 The water-side character pulled his drowned 
 cap over his ears with both hands, and making 
 himself more round-shouldered than nature had 
 made him, by the sullen and persistent slouch 
 with which he went, went down the stairs, round 
 by the Temple Church, across the Temple into 
 Whitefriars, and so on by the water-side streets. 
 
 ‘‘Look at his hang-dog air,” said Lightwood, 
 following. 
 
 ‘‘Tt strikes me rather as a hang-man air,” re- 
 turned Eugene. ‘‘He has undeniable inten- 
 tions that way.” 
 
 They said little else as they followed. He 
 went on before them as an ugly Fate might have 
 done, and they kept him in view, and would have 
 been glad enough to Jose sight of him. But on 
 he went before them, always at the same dis- 
 tance, and the same rate. Aslant against the 
 hard implacable weather and the rough wind, 
 he was no more to be driven back than hurried 
 forward, but held on like an advancing Destiny. 
 There came, when they were about midway on 
 their journey, a heavy rush of hail, which in a 
 few minutes pelted the streets clear, and whiten- 
 ed them. It made no difference to him. A 
 man’s life being to be taken and the price of it 
 got, the hailstones to arrest the purpose must 
 lie larger and deeper than those. He crushed 
 
80 
 
 through them, leaving marks im the fast-melting 
 siush that were mere shapeless holes; one might 
 have fancied, following, that the very fashion of 
 humanity had departed from his feet. 
 
 The blast went by, and the moon contended 
 with the fast-flying clouds, and the wild disor- 
 der reigning up there made the pitiful tumults 
 in the strects of mo account. It was not that 
 the wind swept all the brawlers into places of 
 shelter, as it had swept the hail still lingering 
 im heaps wherever there was refuge for it; but 
 that it seemed as if the streets were absorbed by 
 the sky, and the night were al? in the air. 
 
 **If he has had time to think of it,” said Eu- 
 
 pene, *‘he has not had time to think better of it | 
 There is: 
 no sign of drawing back in him; and as I recol- 
 ject this place, we must be close upon the corner | 
 
 —or differently of it, if that’s better. 
 
 where we alighted that night.” 
 
 In fact, a few abrapt turns brought them to! 
 
 the river-side, where they had slipped about 
 among the stones, and where they now slipped 
 more ; the wind coming against them in slants 
 and flaws, across the tide and the windings of 
 the river, in a furious way. With that habit 
 of getting under the lee of any shelter which 
 water-side characters acquire, the water-side 
 character at present im question led the way to 
 the lee side of the Six Jolly Fellewship Porters 
 before he spoke. 
 
 ““Yook round here, Lawyer Lightwood, at 
 them red curtains. It’s the Fellowships, the 
 Youse as I told you wouldn’t run away. And 
 has it ran away ?” 
 
 Not showmg himself much impressed by this 
 remarkable confirmation of the informer’s evi- 
 dence, Lightwood inquired what other business 
 they had there ? 
 
 ‘‘I wished you to see the Fellowships for 
 yourself, Lawyer Lightwood, that you might 
 judge whether Pm a liar; and now I'll see 
 Gaffer’s window for myself, that we may know 
 whether he’s at home.” 
 
 With that he crept away. 
 
 “Fie’lt come back, I suppose?” murmured 
 Lightwood. 
 
 “Ay! and go through with it,” murmured 
 Eugene. 
 
 He came back after a very short interval in- 
 deed. 
 _ **Gaffer’s out, and his boat’s out. His daugh- 
 ter’s at home, sitting a-looking at the fire. 
 there’s some supper getting ready, so Gaffer’s 
 expected. i can find what move he’s upon, 
 easy enough, presently.” 
 
 ‘Then he beckoned and led the way again, and 
 they came to the police-station, still as clean and 
 cool and steady as before, saving that the flame 
 of its lamp—being but a lamp-flame, and only 
 attached to the Force as an outsider—flickered 
 in the wind. 
 
 Also, within doors, Mr. Inspector was at his 
 studies as of yore. He recognized the friends 
 the instant. thev reappeared, but their reappear. 
 ance had no effect on his composure. Not even 
 the circumstance that Riderhood was their con- 
 ductor moved him, otherwise than that as he 
 took a dip of ink he seemed, by a settlement of 
 his chin in his stock, to propound to that per- 
 sonage, without looking at him, the question, 
 ** What have yeu been up to last 2” 
 
 Mortimer Lightwood asked him, would he be 
 
 tyou. 
 
 But } 
 
 him to a satisfactory criminal total. 
 
 self and get the money. 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND | ord > 
 
 so good as Jook at those notes? Handing him — 
 Kugene’s. oe 
 
 Having read the first few lines, Mr. Inspector 
 mounted to that (for him) extraordinary pitch 
 of emotion that he said, ‘‘ Does either of you 
 two gentlemen happen to have a pinch of snuff 
 about him?” Finding that neither had, he did 
 quite as well without it, and read on. 
 
 ‘‘Have you heard these read?” he then de- 
 manded of the honest man. 
 
 ‘*No,’’ said Riderhood. | 
 
 ‘¢'Then you had better hear them.” And so 
 read them aloud in an official manner. 
 
 ** Are these notes correct, now,:as to the in- 
 formation you bring here and the evidence you 
 mean to give?” he asked, when he had finished 
 reading, 
 
 ‘*They are. They are as correct,” returned 
 Mr. Riderhood, *‘as ] am. I can’t say more 
 than that for ’em.” 
 
 ‘* Jl} take this man myself, Sir,” said Mr. In- 
 spector to Lightwood. ‘Then to Riderhood, ‘‘ Is 
 he athome? Where is he? What’s he doing? 
 
 | You have made it your business to know all about 
 
 him, no doubt.” 
 Riderhood said what he did know, and prom- _ 
 ised to find out in a few minutes what he didn’t 
 know. . MES 
 ‘¢ Stop,” said Mr. Inspector; ‘‘not till I tell 
 We mustn’t look like business. Would 
 you two gentlemen object to making a pretense 
 of taking a glass of something in my company 
 
 }at the Fellowships? Well-conducted house, and ; 
 
 highly respectable landlady.” é 
 ‘They replied that they would be happy te ~ 
 substitute a reality for the pretense, which, in 
 the main, appeared to be as one with Mr. In- 
 spector’s meaning. 
 ‘“Very good,” said he, taking his hat from 
 its peg, and putting a pair of handcuffs in his 
 pocket as if they were his gloves. ‘Reserve!’ 
 Reserve saluted. ‘* You know where to find 
 me?” Reserve again saluted. -‘¢ Riderhood, 
 when you have found out concerning his com- 
 ing home, come round to the window of Cosy, 
 tap twice at it, and wait forme. Now, gentle- 
 men?’ 
 As the three went out together, and Riderhood 
 slouched off from under the trembling lamp his 
 separate way, Lightwood asked the officer what 
 he thought of this? 
 Mr. Inspector replied, with due generality and 
 reticence, that it was always more likely that a 
 man had done a bad thing than that he hadn’t. 
 That he himself had several times ‘“‘reckoned _ 
 up” Gaffer, but had never been able to bring 
 That if this 
 story was true, it was only in part true. That 
 the two men, very shy characters, would have _ 
 been jointly and pretty equally ‘‘in it ;” but that 
 this man had ‘‘spotted” the other, to save him- 
 
 hes 
 « 
 
 oT ge aoe a 
 
 ‘And I think,’”” added Mr. Inspector, in con- 
 clusion, ‘‘that if all goes well with him, he’s in _ 
 a tolerable way of getting it. But as this is the: 
 Fellowships, gentlemen, where the Kghts are, I 
 recommend dropping the subject. You can’tdo — 
 better than be interested in some lime works — 
 any where down about Northfleet, and doubtful 
 whether some of your lime don’t get into bad 
 company, as it comes up in barges.” - 
 
 ‘You hear, Kugene ?” said Lightwood, over — 
 
oh a aa 
 
 his shoulder. ‘‘You are deeply interested in 
 lime.” | 
 
 ‘¢ Without lime,” returned that unmoved bar- 
 rister-at-law, ‘‘my existence would be unillu- 
 minated by a ray of hope.” 
 
 —_—_—_<——_— 
 
 CHAPTER XIIL 
 TRACKING THE BIRD OF PREY. 
 
 Tar two lime merchants, with their escort, 
 entered the dominions of Miss Abbey Potterson, 
 to whom their escort (presenting them and their 
 pretended business over the half-door of the bar 
 in a confidential way) preferred his figurative 
 request that ‘‘a mouthful of fire” might be 
 lighted in Cosy. Always well disposed to assist 
 the constituted authorities, Miss Abbey bade 
 Bob Ghiddery attend the gentlemen to that re- 
 treat, and promptly enliven it with fire and gas- 
 ‘light. Of this commission the bare-armed Bob, 
 leading the way with a flaming wisp of paper, so 
 speedily acquitted himself, that Cosy seemed to 
 leap out of a dark sleep and embrace them warm- 
 ly the moment they passed the lintels of its hos- 
 pitable door. . 
 
 ‘¢ They burn sherry very well here,” said Mr. 
 Inspector, asa piece of localintelligence. ‘‘ Per- 
 haps you gentlemen might like a bottle?” 
 
 The answer being By all means, Bob Gliddery 
 received his instructions from Mr. Inspector, and 
 departed in a becoming state of alacrity engen- 
 dered by reverence for the majesty of the law. 
 
 ‘¢Tt?s a certain fact,” said Mr. Inspector, ‘‘ that 
 this man we have received our information from,” 
 indicating Riderhood with his thumb over his 
 shoulder, ‘‘has for some time past given the 
 other man a bad name arising out of your lime 
 barges, and that the other man has been avoided 
 in consequence. I don’t say what it means or 
 proves, but it’s a certain fact. J had it first from 
 one of the opposite sex of my acquaintance,” 
 vaguely indicating Miss Abbey with his thumb 
 over his shoulder, ‘‘down away at a distance, 
 over yonder.” — 
 
 Then probably Mr. Inspector was not quite 
 unprepared for their visit that evening? Light- 
 wood hinted. 
 
 «¢ Well you see,” said Mr. Inspector, ‘it was 
 a question of making a move. It’s of no use 
 moving if you don’t know what your move is. 
 You had better by far keep still. In the matter 
 of this lime, I certainly had an idea that it might 
 Tie between the two men; I always had that 
 idea. Still I was forced to wait for a start, and 
 I wasn’t so lucky as to get a start. This man 
 that we have received our information from has 
 got a start, and if he don’t meet with a check he 
 ‘may make the running and come in first. There 
 may turn out to be something considerable for 
 him that comes in second, and I don’t mention 
 who may or who may not try for that place. 
 There’s duty to do, and I shall do it, under any 
 circumstances, to the best of my judgment and 
 ability.” 
 
 “Speaking as a shipper of lime—” began 
 Eugene. i 
 
 ‘¢ Which no man has a better right to do than 
 yourself, you know,” said’ Mr. Inspector. 
 
 “¢T hope not,”’ said Engene; ‘‘my father hay- 
 ing been a shipper of lime ‘before me, 
 
 81 
 
 grandfather-before-him-—in fact we having been 
 a family immersed to the crowns of our heads in 
 lime during several generations—I beg to ob- 
 serve that if this missing lime could be got hold 
 of without any young female relative of any dis- 
 tinguished gentleman engaged in the lime trade 
 (which I cherish next to my life) being present, 
 I think it might be a more agreeable proceeding 
 to the assisting by-standers, that is to say, lime- 
 burners.” 
 
 “¢T also,” said Lightwood, pushing his friend 
 aside with a laugh, ‘‘should much prefer that.” 
 
 ‘‘It shall be done, gentlemen, if it can be done 
 conveniently,” said Mr. Inspector, with coolness. 
 ‘There is no wish on my part to cause any dis- 
 tress in that quarter. Indeed, I am sorry for 
 that quarter.” | 
 
 ‘*'There was a boy in that quarter,” remarked 
 Eugene. ‘“ He is still there?” 
 
 ‘No,’ said Mr. Inspector. ‘‘ He has quitted 
 those works. He is otherwise disposed of.’ 
 
 ‘* Will she be left alone then?” asked Eu- 
 gene. 
 
 ‘<She will be left,”’ said Mr. Inspector, ‘‘alone.” 
 
 Bob’s reappearance with a steaming jug broke 
 off the conversation. But although the jug 
 steamed forth a delicious perfume, its contents 
 had not received that last happy touch which the 
 surpassing finish of the Six Jolly Fellowship 
 Porters imparted on such momentous occasions. 
 Bob carried in his left hand one of those iron 
 models of sugar-loaf hats, before mentioned, 
 into which he emptied the jug, and the pointed 
 end of which he thrust deep down into the fire, 
 so leaving it for a few moments while he disap- 
 peared and reappeared with three bright drink- 
 ing-glasses. Placing these on the table and 
 bending over the fire, meritoriously sensible of 
 the trying nature of his duty, he watched the 
 wreaths of steam, until at the special instant of 
 projection he caught up the iron vessel and gave 
 it one delicate twirl, causing it to send forth one 
 gentle hiss. ‘Then he restored the contents to 
 the jug; held over the steam of the jug each of 
 the three bright glasses in succession; finally 
 filled them all, and with a clear conscience 
 awaited the applause of his fellow-creatures. 
 
 It was bestowed (Mr. Inspector having pro- 
 posed as an appropriate sentiment ‘‘’The lime 
 trade!”), and Bob withdrew to report the com- 
 mendations of the guests to Miss Abbey in the 
 bar. It may be here in confidence admitted 
 that, the room being close shut in his absence, 
 there had not appeared to be the slightest rea- 
 son for the elaborate maintenance of this same 
 lime fiction. Only it had been regarded by 
 Mr. Inspector as so uncommonly satisfactory, 
 and so fraught with mysterious virtues, that 
 neither of his clients had presumed to ques- 
 tion it. 
 
 Two taps were now heard on the outside of 
 the window. Mr. Inspector, hastily fortifying 
 himself with another glass, strolled out with a 
 noiseless foot and an unoccupied countenance, 
 As one might go to survey the weather and the 
 general aspect of the heavenly bodies. 
 
 ‘¢ This is becoming grim, Mortimer,” said Eu- 
 gene, in a low voice. ‘I don’t like this.” | 
 
 “Nor I,’ said Lightwood. ‘Shall we go?” 
 
 “Being here, let us stay. You ought to see 
 it out, and I won’t leave you. Besides, that 
 
 and my | lonely girl with the dark hair runs in my head. 
 
82 
 
 It was little more than a glimpse we had of her 
 that last time, and yet I almost see her waiting 
 by the fire to-night. Do you feel like a dark 
 
 combination of traitor and pickpocket when you 
 think of that girl?” 
 
 ‘* Rather,”’ returned Lightwood. 
 
 **'Very-much so.” 
 
 Their escort strolled back again, and report- 
 ed, Divested of its various lime-lights and 
 shadows, his report went to the effect that Gaf- 
 fer was away in his boat, supposed to be on his 
 old look-out; that he had been expected last 
 high-water; that having missed it for some rea- 
 ‘son or other, he was not, according to his usual 
 habits at night, to be counted on before next 
 high-water, or it might be an hour or so later’ 
 that his daughter, surveyed through the win- 
 dow, would seem to be so expecting him, for 
 the supper was not cooking, but set out ready to 
 be cooked; that it would be high-water at about 
 one, and that it was now barely ten; that there 
 was nothing to be done but watch and wait; that 
 the informer was keeping wateh at the instant 
 of that present reporting, but that two heads 
 were better than one (especially when the sec- 
 ond was Mr. Inspector’s); and that the reporter 
 meant to share the watch. And forasmuch as 
 
 ' crouching under the lee of a hauled-up boat on 
 a night when it blew cold and strong, and when 
 the weather was varied with blasts of hail at 
 times, might be wearisome to amateurs, the re- 
 porter closed with the recommendation that the 
 two gentlemen should remain for a while, at any 
 rate, in their present quarters, which were weath- 
 er-tight and warm. 
 
 They were not inclined to dispute this rec- 
 ommendation, but they wanted to know where 
 they could join the watchers when so disposed. 
 Rather than trust to a’ verbal description of the 
 place, which might mislead, Eugene (with a less 
 weighty sense of personal trouble on him than 
 he usually had) would go out with Mr. Inspect- 
 or, note the spot, and come back. 
 
 On the shelving bank of the river, among the 
 slimy stones of a causeway—not the special 
 causeway of the Six Jolly Fellowships, which 
 had a landing-place of its own, but another, a 
 little removed, and very near to the old wind- 
 mill which was the denounced man’s dwelling- 
 place—were a few boats; some, moored and al- 
 ready beginning to float; others, hauled up above 
 the reach of the tide. Under one of these latter 
 Eugene’s companion disappeared.. And when 
 Eugene had observed its position with reference 
 to the other boats, and had made sure that he 
 could not miss it, he turned his eyes upon the 
 building where, as he had been told, the lonely 
 girl with the dark hair sat by the fire. 
 
 He could see the light of the fire shining 
 
 hrough the window. Perhaps it drew him on 
 
 to look in. Perhaps he had come out with the 
 express intention. That part of the bank hav- 
 ing rank grass growing on it, there was no diffi- 
 culty in getting close without any noise of foot- 
 steps: it was but to scramble up a ragged face 
 of pretty hard mud some three or four feet high, 
 and come upon the grass and to the window. 
 He came to the window by that means. 
 
 A She had no other light than the light of the 
 
 re; 
 
 “Do you?” 
 
 The unkindled lamp stood on the table. 
 She sat on the ground, looking at the brazier, 
 
 with her face leaning on her hand. ‘There was 
 
 “oe 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 a kind of film or flicker on her face, which at 
 first he took to be the fitful fire-light ; but, on a 
 second look, he saw that she was weeping. A 
 sad and solitary spectacle, as shown him by the 
 rising and the falling of the fire. f 
 
 It was a little window of but four pieces of 
 
 glass, and was not curtained; he chose it be-- 
 
 cause the larger window near it was. It show- 
 ed him the room, and the bills upon the wall 
 respecting the drowned people starting out and 
 receding by turns. But he glanced slightly at 
 them, though he looked long and steadily at 
 her. <A deep rich piece of color, with the brown 
 flush of her cheek and the shining lustre of her 
 hair, though sad and solitary, weeping ‘by the 
 rising and the falling of the fire. 
 
 She started up. He had been so very still 
 that he felt sure it was not he who had disturb- 
 ed her, so merely withdrew from the window 
 and stood neat it in-the shadow of.the wall. 
 She opened the door, and said, in an alarmed 
 tone, * Father, was that you calling me?” And 
 again, ‘Father!’ And once again, after list- 
 ening, ‘‘ Father! I thought I heard you éall me 
 twice before !”’ 
 
 No response. As she re-entered at the door 
 he dropped over the bank and made his way 
 back, among the ooze and near the hiding-place, 
 to Mortimer Lightwood: to whom he told what 
 he had seen of the girl, and how this was be- 
 coming very grim indeed. 
 
 “If the real man feels as guilty as I do,” said 
 Eugene, ‘‘he is remarkably uncomfortable,” 
 
 “Influence of secrecy,” suggested Lightwood. 
 
 ‘I am not at all obliged to it for making me 
 Guy Fawkes in the vault and a Sneak in the 
 area both at once,” said Eugene. ‘Give me 
 some more of that stuff.” 
 
 Lightwood helped him to some more of that 
 stuff, but it had been cooling, and didn’t answer 
 now. 
 
 **Pooh,” said Eugene, spitting it out among 
 the ashes. ‘‘ Tastes like the wash of the river.” 
 
 ‘‘ Are you so familiar with the flavor of the 
 wash of the river ?” 
 
 ‘I seem to be to-night. I feel as if I had 
 been half drowned, and swallowing a gallon of 
 
 it 99 . 
 
 ‘* Influence of locality,” suggested Lightwood. ’ 
 
 ‘You are mighty learned to-night, you and 
 your influences,” returned Eugene. ‘‘ How long 
 do we stay here ?” 
 
 ‘* How long do you think ?” 
 
 “If I could choose, I should say a minute,” 
 replied Eugene, ‘for the Jolly Fellowship Por- 
 ters are not the jolliest dogs I have known. 
 I suppose we are best here until they turn us out 
 with the other suspicious characters, at mid- 
 night.” ; 
 
 Thereupon he stirred the fire, and sat down 
 on one side of it. 
 made believe to compose himself patiently. + But 
 gradually he took the fidgets in one leg, and 
 then in the other leg, and then in one arm, and 
 then in the other arm, and then in his chin, and 
 then in his back, and then in his.forehead, and 
 then in his hair, and then in his nose; and then 
 he stretched himself recumbent on two chairs, 
 and groaned; and then he started up. 
 
 ‘Invisible insects of diabolical activity swarm 
 
 in this place. I am tickled and twitched all — 
 
 over. Mentally, I have now committed a bur- 
 
 But . 
 
 It struck eleven, and he 
 
 wg 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 BSS 
 RANNRK 
 
 SS AN XW \ 
 
 8 
 
 58 Bt Nh brat 
 Rtas 
 
 Nh 
 
 glary under the meanest circumstances, and the 
 myrmidons of justice are at my heels.”’ 
 
 ‘<I am quite as bad,” said Lightwood, sitting 
 up facing him, with a tumbled head, after going 
 through some wonderful evolutions, in which 
 his head had been the lowest part of him. ‘‘'This 
 restlessness began, with me, long ago. All the 
 
 time you were out I felt like Gulliver with the 
 
 Liliputians firing upon him.” 
 
 ‘It won’t do, Mortimer. We must get into 
 the air; we must join our dear friend and broth- 
 er, Riderhood. And let us tranquilize ourselves 
 by making a compact. Next time (with a view 
 to our peace of mind) we’ll commit the crime, 
 instead of taking the criminal. You swear it?” 
 ,. ‘ Certainly.” 
 
 a= ay Ue “y FY Ly 
 
 83 
 
 44. 
 SSLEL SM 
 
 ALL 
 
 AS 
 
 SAS 
 
 ERAS 
 SO 
 
 = Ss 
 
 WAITING FOR FATHER. 
 
 ‘¢Sworn! Let Tippins look to it. Her life’s 
 in danger.” | 
 
 Mortimer rang the bell to pay the score, and 
 Bob appeared to transact that business with him ; 
 whom Eugene, in his careless extravagance, ask- 
 ed if he would like a situation in the lime-trade ? 
 
 ‘“‘Thankee Sir, no Sir,’ said Bob. “I’ve a 
 good sitiwation here, Sir.” 
 
 ‘‘If you change your mind at any time,” re- 
 turned Eugene, ‘‘come to me at my works, and. 
 you'll always find an. opening in the lime-kiln.” 
 
 ‘¢'Thankee Sir,’’ said Bob. 
 
 ‘This is my partner,” said Eugene, ‘who 
 keeps the books and attends to the wages. A 
 fair day’s wages for a fair day’s workas ever my 
 
 “partner’s motto.” : 
 
 4, 
 
84 
 
 ‘Anda very good "un it is, gentlemen,” said 
 Bob, receiving his fee, and drawing a bow out 
 of his head with his right hand, very much as 
 he would have drawn a pint of beer out of the 
 beer engine. 
 
 ‘‘ Eugene,” Mortimer apostrophized him, 
 laughing quite heartily when they were alone 
 again, ‘‘ how can you be so ridiculous ?” 
 
 ‘*T am in a ridiculous humor,” quoth Eugene ; 
 “Tam a ridiculous fellow. Every thing is ri- 
 diculous. Come along!” 
 ~~ It passed into Mortimer Lightwood’s mind 
 
 that a change of some sort, best expressed per- 
 haps as an intensification of all that was wildest 
 and most negligent and reckless in his friend, 
 ghad come upon him in the last half hour or so. 
 Thoroughly used to him as he was, he found 
 something new and strained in him that was for 
 the moment perplexing. ‘This passed into his 
 mind, and passed out again; but he remember- 
 ed it afterward. 
 
 ‘““There’s where she sits, you see,” said Eu- 
 gene, when they were standing under the bank, 
 roared and riven at by the wind. ‘‘There’s the 
 light of her fire.” 
 
 “I'll take a peep through the window,” said 
 Mortimer. 
 
 ‘No, don’t!” Eugene caught him by the 
 arm. ‘‘ Best not make a show of her. Come 
 to our honest friend.” 
 
 He led him to the post of watch, and they 
 both dropped-down and crept under the lee of 
 the boat; a better shelter than it had seemed, 
 before being directly contrasted with the blowing 
 wind and the bare night. 
 
 ‘* Mr. Inspector at home ?” whispered Eugene. 
 
 ** Here I am, Sir.” 
 
 “‘ And our friend of the perspiring brow is at 
 the far corner there? Good. Any thing hap- 
 pened ?” 
 
 ‘His daughter has been out, thinking she 
 heard him calling, unless it was a sign to him 
 to keep out of the way. It might have been.” 
 
 ‘It might have been Rule Britannia,” mut- 
 tered Eugene, ‘‘but it wasn’t. Mortimer!” 
 
 “Here!” (On the other side of Mr. Inspector ) 
 
 *“Two burglaries now, and a forgery !” 
 
 With this indication of his depressed state of 
 mind Eugene fell silent. 
 
 They were all silent for a long while. As. it 
 got to be flood-tide, and the water came nearer 
 to them, noises on the river became more fre- 
 guent, and they listened more. To the turning 
 of steam-paddles, to the clinking of iron chain, 
 to the creaking of blocks, to the measured work- 
 ing of oars, to the occasional violent barking of 
 some passing dog on shipboard, who seemed to 
 scent them lying in their hiding-place. The 
 night was not so dark but that, besides the lights 
 at bows and mast-heads gliding to and fro, they 
 could discern some shadowy bulk attached; and 
 now and then a ghostly lighter with a large dark 
 sail, like a warning arm, would start up very 
 near them, pass on, and vanish. At this time 
 of their watch the water close to them would be 
 often agitated by some impulsion given it from 
 a distance. Often they believed this beat and 
 plash to be the boat they lay in wait for, running 
 in ashore; and again and again they would have 
 started up, but for the immobility with which 
 the informer, well used to the river, kept quiet 
 in his place. 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 The wind carried away the striking of the 
 
 great multitude of city church clocks, for those - 
 
 lay to leeward of them; but there were bells to 
 windward that told them of its being One—Two 
 —Three. 
 known how the night wore by the falling of the 
 tide, recorded in the appearance of an ever-wid- 
 ening black wet strip of shore, and the emerg- 
 ence of the paved causeway from the river, foot 
 by foot. 
 
 As the time so passed, this slinking business 
 became a more and more precarious one. It 
 would seem as if the man had had some intima- 
 tion of what was in hand against him, or had 
 taken fright? His movements might have been 
 planned to gain for him, in getting beyond their 
 reach, twelve hours’ advantage? The honest 
 man who had expended the sweat of his brow 
 became uneasy, and began to complain with bit- 
 terness of the proneness of mankind to cheat him 
 —him invested with the dignity of Labor! 
 
 Their retreat was so chosen that while they 
 could watch the river they could watch the house. 
 No one had passed in or out since the daughter 
 thought she heard the father calling. No one 
 could pass in or out without being seen. 
 
 ‘* But it will be light at five,” said Mr. In- 
 spector, ‘‘and then we shall be seen,” 
 
 ** Look here,” said Riderhood, ‘‘ what do you 
 say to this? He may have been lurking in and 
 out, and just holding his own between two or 
 three bridges for hours back.” 
 
 ‘What do you make of that ?” said Mr. In- 
 spector ; stoical, but contradictory. 
 
 ‘He may be doing so at this present time,” 
 
 ‘What do you make of that?” said Mr. In- 
 spector. 
 
 ‘‘My boat’s among them boats here at the 
 cause’ay.”’ 
 
 “And what do you make of your boat?” said 
 Mr. Inspector. ; 3 
 
 “What if I put off in her and take a look 
 round? I know his ways, and the likely nooks 
 he favors. I know where he’d be at such atime 
 of the tide, and where he’d be at such another 
 time. Ain’t I been his pardner? None of you 
 need show. None of you need stir. -I can shove 
 her off without help; and as to me being seen, 
 I’m about at all times.” , 
 
 ‘* You might have given a worse opinion,” said 
 Mr. Inspector, after briefconsideration. “ Try it 
 
 ‘Stop a bit. Let’s work it out. 
 you, I'll drop round under the Fellowships and 
 tip you a whistle.” 
 
 ‘‘If I might so far presume as to offer a sug- 
 gestion to my honorable and gallant friend, 
 whose knowledge of naval matters far be it from 
 me to impeach,”’ Eugene struck in with great 
 
 is to advertise mystery and invite speculation, 
 My honorable and gallant friend will, I trust, 
 
 ing out a remark which I feel to be due to this 
 house and the country.” 
 
 ‘Was that the ‘I’other Governor, or Lawyer 
 Lightwood ?” asked Riderhood ; for they spoke, 
 as they crouched or lay, without seeing one an- 
 other’s faces. hia 
 
 ‘In reply to the question put by my honora- 
 ble and gallant friend,” said Eugene, who was 
 lying on his back with his hat on his face, as an 
 [attitude highly expressive of watchfulness, ‘‘I 
 
 Without that aid they would have. 
 
 If I want 
 
 deliberation, ‘it would be, that to tip a whistle 
 
 | excuse me, as an independent member, for throw-. 
 
: OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. m wit 
 
 can have no hesitation in replying (it not being in- 
 consistent with the public service) that those ac- 
 cents were the accents of the T’other Governor.” 
 
 ‘¢You’ve tolerable good eyes, ain’t you, Gov- 
 ernor? You've all tolerable good eyes, ain’t 
 you?” demanded the informer. 
 
 All. 
 
 ‘Then if I row up under the Fellowships and 
 lay there, no need to whistle. You'll make out 
 that there’s a speck of something or another 
 there, and you'll know it’s me, and you'll come 
 down that cause’ay to me. Understood all?” 
 
 Understood all. ; 
 
 ‘+ Off she goes then!” 
 
 In a moment, with the wind cutting keenly 
 at him sideways, he was staggering down to his 
 boat; in a few moments he was clear, and creep- 
 ing up the river under their own shore. 
 
 ‘Eugene had raised himself on his elbow to 
 look into the darkness after him. ‘‘I wish the 
 
 boat of my honorable and gallant friend,” he 
 murmured, lying down again and speaking into 
 his hat, ‘‘may be endowed with philanthropy 
 enough to turn bottom upward and extinguish 
 him !—Mortimer.” 
 
 ‘‘ My honorable friend.” 
 
 ‘‘Three burglaries, two forgeries, and a mid- 
 night assassination.” 
 
 Yet, in spite of having those weights on his 
 conscience, Eugene was somewhat enlivened by 
 the late slight change in the circumstances of 
 affairs. So were his two companions. Its be- 
 ing a change was every thing. The suspense 
 seemed to have taken a new lease, and to have 
 begun afresh from a recent date. There was 
 something additional to look for. They were all 
 three more sharply on the alert, and less dead- 
 ened by the miserable influences of the place and 
 time. 
 
 More than an hour had passed, and they were 
 even dozing, when one of the three—each said 
 it was he, and he had not dozed—made out Ri- 
 derhood in his boat at the spot agreed on. They 
 sprang up, came out from their shelter, and went 
 down to him. When he saw them coming he 
 dropped alongside the causeway ; so that they, 
 standing on the causeway, could speak with him 
 in whispers, under the shadowy mass of the Six 
 Jolly Fellowship Porters fast asleep. 
 
 _ © Blest if I can make it out!” said he, staring 
 at them. 
 
 ‘‘ Make what out? Have you seen him?” 
 
 “No.” 
 
 ‘‘What have you seen?” asked Lightwood ; 
 for he was staring at them in the strangest way. 
 
 ‘¢T’ve seen his boat.” 
 
 . * Not empty ?” 
 
 _ . “Yes, empty. And what’s more,—adrift. 
 And what’s more,—with one scull gone. And 
 what’s more,—with t’other scull jammed in the 
 thowels and broke short off. And what’s more, 
 —the boat’s drove tight by the tide ’atwixt two 
 tiers of barges. And what’s more,—he’s in luck 
 again, by George if he ain’t !” 
 
 — 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 THE BIRD OF PREY BROUGHT DOWN. 
 
 Cotp on the shore, in the raw cold of that 
 leaden crisis in the four-and-twenty hours when 
 
 aA, 85 
 
 the vital force of all the noblest and prettiest 
 things that live is at its lowest, the three watch- 
 ers looked each at the blank faces of the other 
 two, and all at the blank face of Riderhood in 
 his boat. 
 
 ‘*Gaffer’s boat, Gaffer in luck again, and yet 
 no Gaffer!’ So spake Riderhood, staring dis- 
 consolate. 
 
 As if with one accord, they all turned their 
 eyes toward the light of the fire shining through 
 the window. It was fainter and duller. Per- 
 haps fire, like the higher animal and vegetable 
 life it helps to sustain, has its greatest tendency 
 toward death, when the night is dying and the 
 ay is not yet born. 
 
 “If it was me that had the law of this here 
 job in hand,” growled Riderhood with a threat- 
 ening shake of his head, ‘‘ blest if I wouldn’t lay 
 hold of her, at any rate!” 
 
 ‘¢ Av; but it is not you,” said Eugene. With 
 something so suddenly fierce in him that the in- 
 former returned, submissively: ‘ Well, well, well, 
 t’other governor, I didn’t say it was. A man 
 may speak.” 
 
 ‘¢ And vermin may be silent,” said Eugene. 
 ‘¢Hold your tongue, you water-rat !” 
 
 Astonished by his friend’s unusual heat, Light- 
 wood stared too, and then said: ‘‘ What can have 
 become of this nlan ?” 
 
 ‘‘Can’t imagine. Unless he dived overboard.” 
 The informer wiped his brow ruefully as he said 
 it, sitting in his boat and always staring discon- 
 solate. 
 
 ‘Did you make his boat fast ?” 
 
 ‘¢ She’s fast enough till the tide runs back. I 
 couldn’t make her faster than she is. Come 
 aboard of mine, and see for your ownselves.” . 
 
 There was a little backwardness in comply- 
 ing, for the freight looked too much for the boat 5 
 but on Riderhood’s protesting ‘‘ that he had had 
 half a dozen, dead and alive, in her afore now, 
 and she was nothing deep in the water nor down 
 in the stern even then, to speak of,” they care- 
 fully took their places, and trimmed the crazy 
 thing. While they were doing so, Riderhood 
 still sat staring disconsolate. 
 
 ‘Allright. Give way!” said Lightwood. 
 
 ‘¢Give way, by George!” repeated Riderhood, 
 before shoving off. ‘‘If he’s gone and made off 
 any how Lawyer Lightwood, it’s enough to make 
 
 me give way in a different manner. But he al- 
 ways was a cheat, con-found him! He always 
 was a infernal cheat, was Gaffer. Nothing 
 
 straightfor’ard, nothing on the square. So 
 mean, so underhanded. Never going through 
 with a thing, nor carrying it out like a man!” 
 
 ‘¢Halloo! Steady!” cried Eugene (he had re- 
 covered immediately on embarking), as they 
 bumped heavily against a pile; and then in a 
 lower voice reversed his late apostrophe by re- 
 marking (‘*I wish the boat of my honorable and 
 gallant friend may be endowed with philanthro- 
 py enough not to turn bottom-upward and ex- 
 tinguish us!) Steady, steady! Sit close, Mor- 
 timer. Here’s the hail again. See how it flies, 
 like a troop of wild-cats, at Mr. Riderhood’s 
 eyes!” 
 
 Indeed he had the full benefit of it, and it so 
 mauled him, though he bent his head low and 
 tried to present nothing but the mangy cap to 
 it, that he dropped under the lee of a tier of 
 shipping, and they lay there until it was over. 
 
86 iy 
 The squall had come up, like a spiteful messen- 
 ger before the morning; there followed in its 
 wake a ragged tear of light which ripped the 
 dark clouds until they showed a great gray hole 
 of day. 
 
 They were all shivering, and every thing about 
 them seemed to be shivering; the river itself, 
 craft, rigging, sails, such early smoke as there 
 yet was on the shore. Black with wet, and al- 
 tered to the eye by white patches of hail and 
 sleet, the huddled buildings looked lower than 
 usual, as if they were cowering, and had shrunk 
 with the cold. Very little life was to be seen 
 on either bank, windows and doors were shut, 
 and the staring black and white letters upon 
 @wharves and warehouses ‘‘ looked,’’ said Eugene 
 to Mortimer, ‘‘ like inscriptions over the graves 
 of dead businesses.” 
 
 As they glided slowly on, keeping under the 
 shore, and sneaking in and out among the ship- 
 ping by back-alleys of water, in a pilfering way 
 that seemed to be their boatman’s normal man- 
 ner of progression, all the objects among which 
 they crept were so huge in contrast with their 
 wretched boat as to threaten to crush it. Not 
 a ship’s hull, with its rusty iron links of cable 
 run out of hawse-holes long discolored with the 
 iron’s rusty tears, but seemed to be there with a 
 fell intention. Not a figure-head but had a 
 menacing look of bursting forward to run them 
 down. Not a sluice-gate, or a painted scale 
 upon a post or wall, showing the depth of wa- 
 ter, but seemed to hint, like the dreadfully face- 
 tious Wolf in bed in Grandmamma’s cottage, 
 ‘<That’s to drown you in, my dears!” Not a 
 lumbering black barge,- with its cracked and 
 blistered side impending over them, but seemed 
 to suck at the river with a thirst for sucking 
 » them under. And every thing so vaunted the 
 spoiling influences of water—discolored copper, 
 rotten wood, honey-combed stone, green dank 
 deposit —that the after-consequences of being 
 crushed, sucked under, and drawn down, looked 
 as ugly to the imagination as the main event. 
 
 Some half hour of this work, and Riderhood 
 unshipped his sculls, stood holding on to.a barge, 
 and hand over hand long-wise along the barge’s 
 side gradually worked his boat under her head 
 into a secret little nook of scummy water. And 
 driven into that nook, and wedged as he had 
 described, was Gaffer’s boat; that boat with the 
 stain still in it, bearing some resemblance to a 
 muffled human form. 
 
 ‘* Now tell me I’m a liar!” said the honest 
 man. 
 
 (‘‘With a morbid expectation,” murmured 
 Eugene to Lightwood, ‘‘that somebody is al- 
 ways going to tell him the truth.”) 
 
 ‘This is Hexam’s boat,” said Mr. Inspector. 
 *¢T know her well.” 
 
 *‘Look at the broken scull. Look at the 
 t’other scull gone. Now tell.meI am a liar!” 
 said the honest man. 
 
 Mr. Inspector stepped into the boat. 
 and Mortimer looked on. 
 
 ‘* And see now!” added Riderhood, creeping 
 aft, and showing a stretched rope made fast 
 there and towing overboard. ‘‘Didn’t I tell 
 you he was in luck again ?” 
 
 ‘* Haul in,” said Mr, Inspector. ' 
 
 ‘*Hasy to say haul in,” answered Riderhood. 
  “Notsoeasy done. His luck’s got fouled under 
 
 Eugene 
 
 va 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. «+ 
 
 the keels of the barges. I tried to haul in last 
 time, but I couldn’t. See how taut the line is!” 
 “‘T must have it up,” said Mr. Inspector. ‘I 
 am going to take this boat ashore, and his luce 
 along with it. Try easy now.” : 
 
 He tried easy now; but the luck resisted; © - 
 
 wouldn’t come. | 
 
 ‘‘T mean to have it, and the boat too,” said 
 Mr. Inspector, playing the line. 
 
 But still the luck resisted ; wouldn’t come, 
 
 ““Take care,” said Riderhood. ‘You'll dis. 
 figure. Or pull asunder perhaps.” 
 
 ‘‘T am not going to do either, not even to 
 your Grandmother,” said Mr. Inspector; ‘‘ but 
 I mean to have it. Come!” he added, at once 
 persuasively and with authority to the hidden 
 object in the water, as he played the line again; 
 ‘it’s no good this sort of game, you know. You 
 must come up. I mean to have you.” 
 
 There was so much virtue in this distinctly 
 and decidedly meaning to have it, that it yielded 
 a little, even while the line was played. 
 
 ‘*T told you so,” quoth Mr. Inspector, pulling 
 off his outer coat, and leaning well over the 
 stern with a will. ‘‘Come!” 
 
 It was an awful sort of fishing, but it no more 
 disconcerted Mr, Inspector than if he had been 
 fishing in a punt on a summer evening by some 
 soothing weir high up the peaceful river. After 
 certain minutes, and a few directions to the rest 
 to ‘‘ease her a little for’ard,” and ‘‘now ease 
 her a trifle aft,” and the like, he said, composed- 
 ly, ‘* All clear!” and the line and the boat came 
 free together, 
 
 Accepting Lightwood’s proffered hand to help 
 him up, he then put on his coat, and said to 
 Riderhood, ‘‘ Hand me over those spare sculls 
 of yours, and [ll pull this itito the nearest stairs, 
 Go ahead you, and keep out in pretty open wae. 
 ter, that I mayn’t get fouled again.” 
 
 His directions were obeyed, and they pulled 
 ashore directly; two in one boat, two in the 
 other. 
 
 ‘* Now,” said: Mr. Inspector, again to Rider- 
 
 hood, when they were all on the slushy stones; 1 
 
 ‘‘ you have had more practice in this than I have 
 had, and ought to be a better workman at it. 
 Undo the tow-rope, and we’ll help you haul in.’”” 
 
 Riderhood got into the boat accordingly. It 
 appeared as if he had scarcely had a moment's ~ 
 time to touch the rope or look over the stern, 
 when he came scrambling back, as pale as the 
 morning, and gasped out: : 
 
 “By the Lord, he’s done me!” 
 
 ‘“What do you mean?” they all demanded. © 
 » He pointed behind him at the boat, and gasped 
 to that degree that he dropped upon the stones 
 to get his breath. 
 
 ‘*Gaffer’s done me. It’s Gaffer!” | 
 
 They ran to the rope, leaving him gasping 
 there. Soon the form of the bird of prey, dead 
 some hours, lay stretched upon the shore, with . 
 
 a new-blast storming at it and clotting the wet a 
 
 hair with hailstones.: 
 
 Father, was that you callingme? Father! I 
 thought I heard you call me twice before! Words _ 
 never to be answered, those, upon the earth-side 
 The wind sweeps jeeringly over ~ 
 
 of the grave. 
 
 Father, whips him with the frayed ends of his — 
 dress and his jagged hair, tries to turn him where 
 he lies stark on his back, and force his face to- 
 ward the rising sun, that he may be shamed the 
 
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 _ Why not speak, Father? 
 
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 more. A lull, and the wind is secret and prying 
 
 _ with him; lifts and lets fall a rag; hides pal- 
 
 pitating under another rag ; runs nimbly through 
 his hair and beard. Then, in a rush, it cruelly 
 taunts him. Father, was that you calling me? 
 Was it you, the voiceless and the dead? Was it 
 you, thus buffeted as you lie here in a heap? 
 Was it you, thus baptized unto Death, with 
 these flying impurities now flung upon your face ? 
 Soaking into this 
 
 _ fiithy ground as you lie here, is your own shape. 
 _ Did you never see such a shape soaked into your 
 
 boat? Speak, Father. Speak to us, the winds, 
 
 _ the only listeners left you! 
 
 “Now see,” said Mr. Inspector, after mature 
 
 - deliberation ; kneeling on one knee beside the 
 
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 body, when they had stood looking down on the 
 drowned Man;yas he had many a time looked 
 down on many another man: ‘the way of it was_ 
 this. Of course you gentlemen hardly failed to 
 observe that he was towing by the neck and 
 arms,”’ 
 
 They had helped to release the rope, and of 
 course not. 
 
 ‘¢ And you will have observed before, and you 
 will observe now, that this knot, which was drawn 
 chock-tight round his neck by the strain of his 
 own arms, is a slip-knot:” holding it up for dem- 
 onstration. . 
 
 Plain enough. 
 
 ‘Likewise you will hay8 observed how he had 
 run the other end of this rope to his boat.” 
 
88 
 
 It had the curves and indentations in it still, 
 where it had been twined and bound. 
 
 ‘¢ Now see,” said Mr. Inspector, ‘‘see how it 
 works round upon him. It’s a wild tempestuous 
 evening when this man that was,” stooping to 
 wipe some hailstones out of his hair with an end 
 of his own drowned jacket, ‘‘—there! Now he’s 
 more like himself, though he’s badly bruised— 
 when this man that was rows-out upon the river 
 on his usual lay. He carries with him this coil 
 
 of rope. He always carries with him this coil 
 of rope. It’s as well known to me as he was 
 himself. Sometimes it lay in the bottom of his 
 boat. Sometimes he hung it loose round his 
 
 neck. He was a light-dresser was this man— 
 you see?” lifting the loose neckerchief over his 
 breast, and taking the opportunity of wiping the 
 dead lips with it—‘‘and when it was wet, or 
 freezing, or blew cold, he would hang this coil 
 of line round his neck. Last evening he does 
 this. Worse for him! He dodges about in his 
 boat, does this man, till he gets chilled. His 
 hands,” taking up one of them, which dropped 
 like a leaden weight, ‘‘get numbed. He sees 
 some object that’s in his way of business, float- 
 ing. He makes ready to secure that object. He 
 unwinds the end of his coil that he wants to take 
 some turns on in his boat, and he takes turns 
 enough on it to secure that it sha’n’t run out. 
 He makes it too secure, as it happens. Heisa 
 little longer about this than usual, his hands 
 being numbed. His object drifts up, before he 
 is quite ready for it. He catches at it, thinks 
 he'll make sure of the contents of the pockets 
 any how, in case he should be parted from it, 
 bends right over the stern, and in one of these 
 heavy squalls, or in the cross-swell of two steam- 
 ers, Or in not being quite prepared, or through 
 all or most or some, gets a lurch, overbalances 
 and goes head-foremost overboard. Now see! 
 He can swim, can this man, and instantly he 
 strikes out. But in such striking-out he tangles 
 his arms, pulls strong on the slip-knot, and it 
 runs home. The object he had expected to take 
 in tow floats by, and his own boat tows him 
 dead, to where we found him, all entangled in 
 his own line. You'll ask me how I make out 
 about the pockets? First, I'll tell you more; 
 there was silver in’em. How do I make that 
 out? Simple and satisfactory. Because he’s 
 got it here.” ‘The lecturer held up the tightly- 
 clenched right hand. 
 
 .** What is to be done with the remains?” 
 asked Lightwood. ’ 
 
 “‘Tf you wouldn’t object to standing by him 
 half a minute, Sir,” was the reply, ‘‘I’ll finds 
 the nearest of our men to come and take charge 
 of him—T still call it him, you see,” said Mr. 
 Inspector, looking back as he went, with a phil- 
 osophical smile upon the force of habit. 
 
 ‘¢Kugene,” said Lightwood—and was about 
 to add ‘‘we may wait at a little distance,” when 
 turning his head he found that no Eugene was 
 _ there. 
 
 He raised his voice and called ‘‘ Eugene! 
 Holloa!” But no Eugene replied. 
 
 It was broad daylight now, and he looked 
 about. But no Eugene was in all the view. 
 
 Mr. Inspector speedily returning down the 
 wooden stairs, with a police constable, Light- 
 wood asked him if hé’ had seen his friend leave 
 them? Mr. Inspector could not exactly say 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 Mi 
 
 ih 
 that he had seen him go, but had noticed that 
 he was restless. ae 
 
 *¢ Singular and entertaining combination, Sir, 
 your friend.” » 
 
 ‘*T wish it had not been a part of his singular 
 and entertaining combination to give me the 
 slip under these dreary circumstances at this 
 time of the morning,” said Lightwood. ‘‘Can 
 we get any thing hot to drink?” . 
 
 We could, and we did.. In a public-house 
 kitchen with a large fire. We got hot brandy 
 and water, and it revived us wonderfully. Mr. 
 Inspector having to Mr. Riderhood announced ~ 
 his official intention of ‘‘ keeping his eye upon 
 him,” stood him in a corner of the fire-place, 
 like a wet umbrella, and took no further out- 
 ward and visible notice of that honest man, ex- 
 cept ordering a separate service of brandy and 
 water for him: apparently out of the public 
 funds. | 
 
 As Mortimer Lightwood sat before the blaz- 
 ing fire, conscious of drinking brandy and water 
 then and there in his sleep, and yet at one and 
 the same time drinking burned sherry at the Six 
 Jolly Fellowships, and lying under the boat on 
 the river shore, and sitting in the boat that 
 Riderhood rowed, and listening to the lecture © 
 recently concluded, and having to dine in the 
 Temple with an unknown man, who described 
 himself as M. R. F. Eugene Gaffer Harmon, 
 and said he lived at Hailstorm—as he passed 
 through these curious vicissitudes of fatigue and 
 slumber, arranged upon the scale of a dozen 
 hours to the second, he became aware of an- 
 swering aloud a communication of pressing im- 
 portance that had never been made to him, and 
 then turned it into a cough on beholding Mr. 
 Inspector. For he felt, with some natural in- 
 dignation, that that functionary might other- 
 wise_suspect him of having closed his eyes, or — 
 wandered in his attention. . 4 
 
 ‘Here just before us, you see,” said Mr. In- 
 spector. 
 
 “¢ Tsee,” said Lightwood, with dignity. 
 
 ‘*And had hot brandy and water too, you 
 see,’’ said Mr. Inspector, ‘‘and then cut off ata — 
 great rate.” ‘a 
 
 ‘¢Who?” said Lightwood. 
 
 ‘*Your friend, you know.” 
 
 ‘*T know,” he replied, again with dignity. 
 
 After hearing, in a mist through which Mr. 
 Inspector loomed vague and large, that the offi- — 
 cer took upon himself to prepare the dead man’s — 
 daughter for what had befallen in the night, and 
 generally that he took every thing upon himself, 
 Mortimer Lightwood stumbled in his sleep to a 
 cab-stand, called a cab, and had entered the army 
 and committed a capital military offense and 
 been tried by court-martial and found guilty — 
 and had arranged his affairs and been marched 
 out to be shot, before the door banged. pe 
 
 Hard work rowing the cab through the City — 
 to the Temple, for a cup of from five to ten — 
 thousand pounds value, given by Mr. Boffin; 
 and hard work holding forth at that immeasurae 
 ble length to Eugene (when he had been rescued 
 with a rope from the running pavement) for 
 making off in thatextraordinary manner! But 
 he offered such ample apologies, and was so very 
 penitent, that when Lightwood got out of the ~ 
 cab, he gave the driver a particular charge to be — 
 careful of him. Which the driver (knowing — 
 
VW. 
 
 OUR MUTUAL ¥RIEND. 
 
 there was no other fare left inside) stared at 
 prodigiously. 
 
 In short, the mght’s work had so exhausted 
 and worn out this actor in it, that he had be- 
 come a mere somnambulist. He was too tired 
 to rest in his sleep, until he was even tired out 
 of bemg too tired, and dropped into oblivion. 
 Late in the afternoon he awoke, and, in some 
 anxiety sent round to Eugene’s lodging hard by 
 to inquire if he were up yet? 
 
 Oh yes, he was up. In fact, he had not been 
 tobed. He had justcome home. And here he 
 
 was, close following on the heels of the message. 
 
 ‘‘Why what bloodshot, draggled, disheveled 
 spectacle is this !’’ cried Mortimer. 
 
 ** Are my feathers so very much rumpled ?” 
 said Engene, coolly going up to the looking- 
 glass. ‘*They are rather out of sorts. But 
 consider. Such a night for plumage!” 
 
 “Such a night ?” repeated Mortimer. ** What 
 became of you in the morning ?” 
 
 ‘*My dear fellow,” said Engene, sitting on 
 
 his bed, ‘‘I felt that we had bored one another 
 
 so long, that an unbroken continuance of those 
 relations must inevitably terminate in onr flying 
 to opposite points of the earth. I also felt. that 
 I had committed every crime in the Newgate 
 Calendar. So, for mingled considerations of 
 friendship and felony, I took a walk.” 
 
 oS date Es 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 TWO NEW SERVANTS. 
 
 Mr. and Mrs. Boffin sat after breakfast, in 
 the Bower, a prey to prosperity. Mr. Boftin’s 
 face denoted Care and Complication. Many 
 disordered papers were before him, and he looked 
 at them about as hopefully as an innocent civil- 
 ian might look at a crowd of troops whom he 
 was required at five minutes’ notice to mancen- 
 vre and review. He had been engaged in some 
 attempts to make notes of these papers; but. be- 
 ing troubled (as men of his stamp often are) with 
 an exceedingly distrustful and corrective thumb, 
 that busy member had so often interposed to 
 smear his notes, that they were little more legi- 
 ble than the various impressions of itself, which 
 blurred his nose and forehead. It is curious to 
 consider, in such acase was Mr. Boffin’s, what a 
 cheap article ink is, and how far it may be made 
 to go. Asa grain of musk will scent a drawer 
 for many years, and still lose nothing appreci- 
 able of its original weight, so a halfpenny-worth 
 of ink would blot Mr. Boffin to the roots of his 
 
 hair and the calves of his legs, without inscrib- 
 ing a line on the paper before him, or appearing 
 
 to diminish in the inkstand. 
 
 Mr. Boffin was in such severe literary difficul- 
 ties that his eyes were prominent and fixed, and 
 his breathing was stertorous, when, to the great 
 relief of Mrs. Boffin, who observed these symp- 
 
 toms with alarm, the yard bell rang. ¢ 
 
 **'Who’s that, I wonder!” said Mrs. Boffin. 
 Mr. Boffin drew a long breath, laid down his 
 
 | pen, looked at his notes as doubting whether he 
 
 had the pleasure of their acquaintance, and ap- 
 peared, on a second perusal of their counte- 
 nances, to be confirmed in his impression that 
 he had not, when there was announced by the 
 
 hammer-headed young man: 
 
 4 
 
 89 
 
 **Mr. Rokesmith.” 
 
 **Oh!” said Mr. Boffin. ‘*Ohindeed! Our 
 and the Wilfers’ Mutual Friend, my dear. Yes. 
 Ask him to come in.” 
 
 Mr. Rokesmith appeared. 
 
 ‘Sit down, Sir,” said Mr. Boffin, shaking 
 hands with him. ‘Mrs, Bottin you’re already 
 acquainted with. Well, Sir, lam rather unpre- 
 pared to see you, for, to tell you the truth, I've 
 been so busy with one thing ‘and another that 
 T’ve not had time to turn your offer over.” 
 
 ‘*'That’s apology for both of us: for Mr. Bof- 
 fin, and for me as well,” said the smiling Mrs. 
 Boffin. ‘* But Lor! we can talk it over now; 
 can’t us?” 
 
 Mr. Rokesmith bowed, thanked her, and said 
 he hoped so. 
 
 ‘* Let me see then,” resumed Mr. Boffin, with 
 his hand to his chin. ‘‘It was Secretary that 
 you named ; wasn’t it ?” 
 
 ‘**{ said Secretary,” assented Mr. Rokesmith. 
 
 ‘It rather puzzled me at. the time,” said Mr. 
 Boffin, ‘Sand it rather puzzled me and Mrs. 
 Boffin when we spoke of it afterward, because 
 (not to make a mystery of our belief) we 
 have always believed a Secretary to be a piece 
 of furniture, mostly of mahogany, lined with 
 green baize or leather, with a lot of little draw. 
 ers init. Now, you won’t think I take a liberty 
 when I mention that you certainly ain’t that.” 
 
 ‘Certainly not,” said Mr. Rokesmith. But 
 he had used the word in the sense of Steward. 
 
 ‘* Why, as to Steward, von see,” returned Mr. 
 Boffin, with his hand still to his chin, ‘the odds 
 are that Mrs. Boffin and me may never go upon 
 the water. Being both bad sailors, we should 
 want a Steward if we did; but there’s generally 
 one provided.” 
 
 Mr. Rokesmith again explained; defining the 
 duties he sought to undertake, as those of gen- 
 eral superintendent, or manager, or overlooker, 
 or man of business. 
 
 ** Now, for instance—come!” said Mr. Boffin, 
 in his pouncing way. “If you entered my em- 
 ployment, what would you do ?” 
 
 ‘*T would keep exact accounts of all the ex- 
 penditure you sanctioned, Mr. Roftin. I would 
 write your letters, under your direction, Iwould 
 transact your business with people in your pay 
 or employment. I would,” with a glance and a 
 half-smile at the table, ‘‘ arrange your papers—” 
 
 Mr. Boffin rubbed his inky ear, and looked 
 at his wife. ; 
 
 **_ And so arrange them as to have them al- 
 
 -ways in order for immediate reference, with a 
 
 note of the contents of each outside it.” 
 
 ‘*T tell you what,” said Mr. Boffin, slowly 
 crnmpling his own blotted note in his hand; 
 ‘‘if you'll turn to at these present papers, and 
 see what vou can make of ’em, I shall know bet- 
 ter what I can make of you.” 
 
 No sooner said than done, Relinquishing his 
 hat and gloves, Mr. Rokesmith sat down quietly 
 at_ the table, arranged the open papers into an 
 orderly heap, cast his eyes over each in succes- 
 sion, folded it, docketed it on the outside, laid it 
 in a second heap, and when that second heap 
 was complete and the first gone, took from his 
 pocket a piece of string and tied it together with 
 a remarkably dextrous hand at a running curve 
 and a loop. 
 
 **Good!” said Mr. Beffin. ‘‘ Very good! 
 
99 
 
 Now let us hear what they’re all about; w ill 
 you be so good ?” 
 
 John Roksan read his abstracts aloud. — 
 They were all about the new house. Decora- 
 tor’s settings so much. Furniture estimate, 
 so much. Estimate for furniture of offices, 
 so much. Coach-maker’s estimate, so much. 
 Horse-dealer’s estimate, so much. 
 maker's estimate, so much. Goldsmith’s 
 mate, so much. ‘Total, so very much. Then 
 came correspondence. Acceptance of Mr. Bof- 
 fin’s offer of such a date, and to such an effect. 
 
 Rejection of Mr. Boffin’s proposal of such a date, | 
 Concerning Mr. Boffin’s . 
 
 and to such an effect. 
 scheme of such another, date to such another ef- | 
 fect. All compact and ‘methodical. 
 
 ** Apple-pie order!” said Mr, Boffin, after | 
 checking off each inscription with his hand, likea. 
 man beating time. ‘‘ And whatever you do with 
 your ink, I can't think, for you’re as clean asa 
 whistle after it. Now, astoa letter. Let's,” said 
 Mr. Boffin, rubbing his hands in his pleasantly 
 childish atlmiration, ‘*let’s try a letter next.” 
 
 ‘To whom shall it be addressed, Mr. Boffin?” 
 
 “‘Any one. Yourself.” 
 
 Mr. Rokesmith quickly wrote, and then read 
 aloud : 
 
 ‘** Mr. Boffin presents his compliments to 
 Mr. Jolin Rokesmith, and begs to say that he 
 has decided on giving Mr. John Rokesmith a 
 trial in the capacity he desires to fill. Mr. Bof- 
 fin takes Mr. John Rokesmith at his word, in 
 
 postponing to some indefinite period the consid- | 
 
 eration of salary. It is quite understood that 
 Mr. Boffin is in no way committed on that point. 
 Mr. Boffin has merely to add, that he relies on 
 Mr. John Rokesmith’s assurance that he will be 
 faithful and serviceable. Mr. John Rokesmith 
 will please enter on his duties immediately.’ ”’ 
 
 ‘*Well! Now, Noddy!” cried Mrs. Boffin, 
 clapping her hands, ‘¢ That ts a good one!” 
 
 Mr. Boffin was no less delighted; indeed, in 
 his own bosom, he regarded both the composition 
 itself and the device that had given birth to it, 
 as a very remarkable monument of human in- 
 genuity. 
 
 ‘* And I tell you, my deary,” said Mrs. Boffin, 
 
 ‘that if you don’t close with Mr. Rokesmith now | 
 
 at once, and if you ever go a muddling yourself 
 again with things never meant nor made for vou, 
 you'll have an apoplexy—besides iron-moulding 
 your linen—and you'll break my heart.” 
 
 Mr. Boffin embraced his spouse for these words 
 
 of wisdom, and then, congratulating John Roke- | 
 
 smith on the brilliancy of his achievements, gave 
 him his hand in pledge of their new relations. 
 So did Mrs. Boffin. 
 
 “Now,” said Mr. Boffin, who, in his frank- 
 ness, felt that it did not become him to have a 
 gentleman in his employment five minutes with- 
 out reposing some confidence in him, ‘‘ vou mnst 
 be let a little more into our affairs, Rokesmith. 
 I mentioned to you, when I made your acquaint- 
 ance, or I might better say when you made mine, 
 that Mrs. Boffin’s inclinations was setting in the 
 
 way of Fashion, but that I didn’t know how | guilty of a meanness, and to act like having © 
 | one’s head turned by the halls of dazzling light. — 
 Rokesmith, what shall we 
 
 fashionable we might or might not grow. Well! | 
 Mrs. Boffin has carried the day, and we’re go- 
 ing in neck and crop for Fashion.” 
 
 “‘T rather inferred that, Sir,” replied John 
 
 Rokesmith, ‘‘ from the scale on which your pew. 
 
 establishment 4 is to be maintained.” 
 
 Harness- . 
 esti- 
 
 ‘OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 said Mr. Boffin, ‘it’s to bea Spanker. | 
 
 oes,” 
 | The fact is, my literary man named to me that 
 
 = 5 Sop 
 
 a house with which he i is, as 1 may sidy, connect- 
 
 ed—in which he has an interest—”’ 
 
 ‘* As property ?” inquired John Ro kesmith. 
 
 “Why no,” said Mr. Boffin, 
 that; a sort of a family tie.” 
 
 ** Association ?” the Secretary suggested. . 
 
 ‘¢Ab!” said Mr. Boffin. ‘ Perhaps. Any- 
 how, he named to me that the house had a 
 board up, ‘ This Eminently Aristocratic Mansion 
 _to be let or sold.” Me and Mrs. Boftin went to 
 look at it, and finding it beyond a doubt Emi- 
 -nently Aristocratic (though a trifle high and 
 dull, which after all may be part of the same 
 | thing) took it. My literary man was.so friendly 
 | as to drop into a charming piece of poetry on that 
 occasion, in which he complimented Mrs. Boffin 
 _on coming into possession of—how did it £0, my 
 dear ?” 
 
 Mrs. Boffin replied : 
 
 “6¢The gay, the gay and festive scene, 
 The halls, the halls of dazzling light.’ 
 
 ““That’s it! And it was made neater by there 
 
 really being two halls in the house, a front ’un~ 
 He like-— 
 
 and a back ’un, besides the servants’, 
 wise dropped into a very pretty piece of poetry to 
 
 be sure, respecting the extent to which he would 
 
 ‘*‘not exactly 
 
 Vas Jes a es ae 
 
 be willing to put himself out of the way to bring © 
 Mrs. Boffin round, in case she should ever get — 
 
 low in her spirits in the house. 
 
 Mrs. Boffin has a _ 
 
 >s- 
 
 wonderful memory. Will you repeat it, my dear?” ~ 
 
 as she had received them. 
 
 ‘“**Tl]l tell thee how the maiden wept, Mrs. Boffin, 
 ‘* When her true love was slain ma'am, 
 
 ‘*And how her broken spirit slept, Mrs. Boffin, 
 “And never woke agiin ma’am. 
 
 ‘I'll tell thee (if agreeable to Mr. Boffin) how the steed 
 
 drew nigh, 
 * And left his lord afar; 
 
 ‘And if my tale (which. I hope Mr. Boffin might excuse) © 
 
 should make you sich, 
 ‘*Pll strike the light guitar.’ ” 
 
 ‘Correct to the letter!” said Mr. 
 
 in, in a beautiful manner.” 
 
 pleased. 
 
 | ‘* Now, you see, Rokesmith,” he went on, ‘‘a _ 
 literary man—with a wooden leg—is liable to- 
 I shall therefore cast about for com-_ 
 
 jealousy. 
 fortable ways and means of not calling up Wegg’s 
 
 jealousy, but of keeping } you in your department, 
 and keeping him in his.” ‘i 
 ‘¢What I say 18, 
 
 ‘¢Lor!’’ cried Mrs. Boffin. 
 the world’s wide enough for all of us!” 
 
 not literary. But when so, not so. 
 
 ble or of leaving the Bower. To let him feel 
 himself any ways slighted now would be to be 
 
 Which Lord forbid! 
 say about your living in the house?” 
 ‘*Tn this house ?” 
 ‘*No, no. 
 
 | house. In the new house?” 
 
 a 
 
 Mrs. Boffin complied, by reciting the verses in 
 which this obliging offer had been made, exactly 
 
 Boffin, | 
 “And I consider that the poetry brings us both 
 
 "The effect of the poem on the Secretary being — 
 evidently to astonish him, Mr. Botlin was con- — 
 firmed in his high opinion of it, and was stent 
 
 ‘*So it is, my dear,” said Mr. Boffin, ‘‘when ~ 
 And I am — 
 bound to bear in mind that T took Wegg on at a 
 time when I had no thought of being fashiona- — 
 
 I have got other plans for this 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIE 
 «That will be as you please, Mr. Boffin. I' 
 
 hold myself quite at your disposal, You know 
 where I live at present.” 
 
 ‘¢Well!” said Mr. Boffin, after considering 
 the point; ‘‘ suppose you keep as you are for the 
 present, and we'll decide by-and-by. You'll be- 
 gin to take charge at once, of all that’s going on 
 in the new house, will you?” 
 
 “¢Most willingly. I will begin this very day. 
 Will you give me the address ?” 
 
 Mr. Boffin repeated it, and the Secretary wrote 
 ijt down in his pocket-book. Mrs. Boffin took 
 the opportunity of his being so engaged to get a 
 better observation of his face than she had yet 
 taken. It impressed her in his favor, for she 
 nodded aside to Mr. Boffin, “ I like him.” 
 
 “J will see directly that every thing is in 
 train, Mr. Boffin.” 
 
 ““'Thank’ee. Being here, would you care at 
 all to look round the Bower ?” 
 
 ‘I should greatly like it. 
 much of its story.” 
 
 ‘‘Come!” said Mr. Boffin. 
 Boffin led the way. 
 
 A gloomy house the Bower, with sordid signs 
 on it of having been, through its long existence 
 as Harmony Jail, in miserly holding. Bare of 
 paint, bare of paper on the walls, bare of furni- 
 ture, bare of experience of human life. What- 
 ever is built by man for man’s occupation, must, 
 like natural creations, fulfill the intention of its 
 existence or soon perish. This old house had 
 wasted more from desuetude than it would have 
 wasted from use, twenty years for one. 
 
 A certain leanness falls upon houses not suffi- 
 
 ciently imbued with life (as if they were nour- 
 ished upon it), which was very noticeable here. 
 The staircase, balustrades, and rails had a spare 
 look—an air of being denuded to the bone— 
 which the panels of the walls and the jambs of 
 the doors and windows also bore. ‘The scanty 
 movables partook of it; save for the cleanliness 
 of the place, the dust into which they were all 
 resolving would have lain thick on the floors; 
 and those, both in color and in grain, were worn 
 like old faces that had kept much alone. 
 
 The bedroom where the clutching old man 
 had lost his grip on life was left as he had left 
 
 it. There was the old grisly four-post bedstead, 
 without hangings, and with a jail-like upper rim 
 of iron and spikes; and there was the old patch- 
 work counterpane. There was the tight-clenched 
 old bureau, receding atop like a bad and secret 
 forehead; there was the cumbersome old table 
 with twisted legs at the bedside; and.there was 
 the box upon it, in which the will.had-lain. <A 
 few old chairs with patch-work covers, under 
 Which the more precious stuff to be preserved 
 had slowly lost its quality of color without. im- 
 parting pleasure to any eye, stood against the 
 wall. A hard family likeness was on all these 
 
 things. 
 
 I have heard so 
 
 And heand Mrs. 
 
 ‘“The room was kept like this, Rokesmith,” | 
 
 said Mr. Boffin, ‘‘ against the son’s return. ‘In 
 short, every thing in the house was kept exactly 
 as it came to us for him to see and approve. 
 Even now, nothing is changed but ow own 
 reom below stairs that you have just left. 
 When the son came home for the last time in 
 his life, and for the last time in his life saw his 
 father, it was most likely in this room that they 
 met.” 
 
 : sh 
 
 x | 
 
 D. 91 
 
 _ As the Secretary looked all round it his eyes 
 rested on a side-door in a corner. 
 
 ‘* Another staircase,” said Mr. Boffin, unlock- 
 ing the door, ‘‘leading down into the yard. 
 We'll go down this way, as you may like to see 
 the yard, and it’s all in the road. When the 
 son was a little child it was up and down these 
 stairs that he mostly came and went to his fa- 
 ther. He was very timid of his father. I’ve 
 seen him sit on these stairs, in his shy way, poor 
 child, many a time. Me and Mrs. Boftin have 
 comforted him, sitting with his little book on 
 these stairs, often.” 
 
 ‘‘Ah! And his poor sister too,”-said Mrs, 
 Boffin. ‘‘And here’s the sunny place on the 
 white wall where they one day measured one 
 another. Their own little hands wrote up their 
 names here only with a pencil; but the names 
 are here still, and the poor dears gone forever.” 
 
 ‘*We must take care of the names, old lady,” 
 said Mr. Boffin. ‘‘We must take care of the 
 names. ‘They sha’n’t be rubbed out in our time, 
 nor yet, if we can help it, in the time after us. 
 Poor little children!” 
 
 ‘¢ Ah, poor little children!” said Mrs. Boffin. 
 
 ‘They had opened the door at the bottom of 
 the staircase giving on the yard, and they stood 
 in the sunlight, looking at the scrawl of the two 
 unsteady childish hands two or three steps up 
 the staircase. There was something in this 
 simple memento of a blighted childhood, and in 
 the tenderness of Mrs. Boffin, that touched the 
 Secretary. 
 
 Mr. Boffin then showed his new man of busi- 
 ness the Mounds, and his own particular Mound 
 which had been left him as his legacy under the 
 will before he acquired the whole estate. 
 
 see 6 would have been enough for us,” said 
 Mr. Boffin, ‘in case it had pleased God to 
 spare the last of those two young lives and sor- 
 rowful deaths. We didn’t want the rest.” 
 
 At the treasures of the yard, and at the out- 
 side of the house, and at the detached building 
 which Mr. Boffin pointed out as the residence. 
 of himself and his wife during the many years ~ 
 of their service, the Secretary looked with m- 
 terest. It was not until Mr. Boffin had shown 
 him every wonder of the Bower twice over that 
 he remembered his having duties to discharge 
 elsewhere. 
 
 ‘‘You have no instructions to give me, Mr. 
 Boffin, in reference to this place?” 
 
 ‘‘Not any, Rokesmith, No.” 
 
 ‘“¢Might I ask, without seeming impertinent, 
 whether you have any intention of selling it?” 
 
 ‘*Certainly not. In remembrance of our old 
 master, our old master’s children, and our old 
 service, me and Mrs. Boffin mean to keep it up 
 
 9 
 
 as it stands,”’ 
 
 The Secretary’s eyes glanced with so much 
 meaning in them at the Mounds that Mr. Boffin 
 said, as if in answer to a remark: “ 
 
 ‘CAy, ay, that’s another thing. I may sell 
 them, though I should be sorry to see the neigh- 
 borhood deprived of ’em too, It'll look but a 
 poor déad flat without the Mounds. Still I don’t 
 say that I’m going to keep ’em always there for 
 the sake of the beauty of the landscape. There’s 
 no hurry about it; that’s all I say at present. 
 I ain’t a scholar in much, Rokesmith, but I’m 
 a pretty fair scholar in dust. I can price the 
 Mounds to a fraction, and I know how they can 
 
92 
 
 be best disposed of, and likewise that they take 
 no harm by standing where they do. 
 look in to-morrow, will you be so kind ?” 
 
 ‘“Kvery day. And the sooner I can get you 
 into your new house, complete, the better you 
 will be pleased, Sir?” 
 
 ‘* Well, it ain’t that I’m in a mortal hurry,” 
 said Mr. Boffin; ‘‘only when you do pay people 
 for looking alive, it’s as well to know that they 
 are looking alive. Ain’t that your opinion ?” 
 
 ‘* Quite!’ replied the Secretary ; and so with- 
 drew. 
 
 ‘* Now,” said Mr. Boffin to himsclf, subsiding 
 into his regular series of turns in the yard, ‘if 
 I can make it comfortable with Wegg, my af- 
 fairs will be going smooth.” . 
 
 ‘The man of low cunning had, of course, ac- 
 quired a mastery over the man of high sim- 
 plicity. The mean man had, of course, got the 
 better of the generous man. How long such 
 conquests last is another matter; that they are 
 achieved, is everyday experience, not even to 
 be flourished away by Podsnappery itself. The 
 undesigning Boftin had become so far immeshed 
 by the wily Wegg that his mind misgave him he 
 was a very designing man indeed in purposing 
 to do more for Wegg. It seemed to him (so 
 skillful was Wegg) that he was plotting darkly, 
 
 when he was contriving to do the very thing that 
 
 Wegg was plotting to get him todo. And thus, 
 while he was mentally turning the kindest of 
 kind faces on Wegg this morning, he was not 
 absolutely sure but that he might somehow de- 
 serve the charge of turning his back on him. 
 
 For these reasons Mr. Boftin passed but anx- 
 
 ious hours until evening came, and with it Mr. 
 Wegg, stumping leisurely to the Roman Empire. 
 At about this period Mr. Boffin had become pro- 
 foundly interested in the fortunes of a great 
 military leader known to him as Bully Sawyers, 
 but perhaps better known to fame and easier of 
 identification by the classical student, under the 
 less Britannic name of Belisarius. Even this 
 general’s career paled in interest-for Mr. Boffin 
 before the clearing of his conscience with Wege; 
 and hence, when that literary gentleman had 
 according to custom eaten and drunk until he 
 was all a-glow, and when he took up his book 
 with the usual chirping introduction, ‘* And now, 
 Mr. Boffin, Sir, we’ll decline and we’ll fall!” 
 Mr. Boffin stopped him. 
 
 “You remember, Wegg, when I first told 
 you that I wanted to make a sort of. offer to 
 you ?” 
 
 ‘‘Let me get on my considering cap, Sir,” 
 replied that gentleman, turning the open book 
 face downward. ‘* When you first told me that 
 you wanted to make a sort of offer tome? Now 
 let me think” (as if there were the least neces- 
 sity). ‘*Yes, to be sure I do, Mr. Boffin. It 
 was at my corner. To be sure it was! You 
 had first asked me whether I liked your name, 
 and Candor had compelled a reply in the nega- 
 tive case. I little thought then, Sir, how famil- 
 iar that name would come to be!” 
 
 “I hope it will be more familiar still, Wegg.” 
 
 “Do you, Mr. Boftin? Much obliged to you, 
 I’m sure. Is it your pleasure, Sir, that we de- 
 cline and we fall?” with a feint of taking up the 
 book. 
 
 “Not just yet awhile, Wegg. In fact, Ihave 
 got another offer to make you.” 
 
 Yow ll | 
 
 Tay’ 5, * Pent, re ¥ | Se an Se 
 \ ‘ . ih, ob . 
 e cia \ 
 
 | 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 Mr. Wegg (who had had nothing else in his 
 mind for several nights) took off his spectacles — 
 with an air of bland surprise. 
 
 ‘And I hope you'll like it, Wegg.” 
 
 “Thank you, Sir,” returned that reticent in- 
 dividual. ‘I hope it may prove so. On all ae- 
 counts, Iam sure.’”’ (This, as a philanthropic 
 aspiration, 
 
 ‘What do you think,” said Mr. Boffin, ‘‘ of 
 not keeping a stall, Wegg ?” 
 
 ‘*T think, Sir,” replied Wegg, ‘that I should 
 like to be shown the gentleman prepared to make 
 it worth my while!” 
 
 “Here he is,” said Mr. Boffin. 
 
 Mr. Wegg was going to say, My Benefactor, 
 and had said My Bene, when a grandiloquent 
 change came over him. : 
 
 ‘*No, Mr. Boffin, not you, Sir. Any body 
 but you. Do not fear, Mr. Boffin, that I shall 
 contaminate the premises which your gold has 
 bought with my lowly pursuits. I am aware, 
 Sir, that it would not become me to carry on my 
 little traffic under the windows of your mansion. 
 I have already thought of that, and taken my 
 measures. No need to be bought out, Sir. — 
 Would Stepney Fields be considered intrusive? — 
 If not remote enough, I can goremoter.. In the 
 words of the poet’s song, which I do not quite 
 remember: : 
 Thrown on the wide world, doom’d to wander and roam, — 
 Bereft of my parents, bereft of a home, ; 
 
 A stranger to something and what’s his name joy, 
 Behold little Edmund the poor Peasant boy. 
 
 ’ 
 
 —And equally,” said Mr. Wegg, repairing the é 
 want of direct application in the last line, ‘*be=— 
 hold myself on a similar footing!” a 
 ‘*Now, Wegg, Wegg, Wegg,’’ remonstrated — 
 
 the excellent Boffin. ‘‘ You are too sensitive.” 
 
 ‘*I know I am, Sir,” returned Wegg, with 
 obstinate magnanimity. ‘‘I am acquainted with — 
 my faults. I always was, from a child, too sens- 
 itive.” ; 
 ‘* But listen,” pursued the Golden Dustmans; 
 ‘‘hear me out, Wegg. You have taken it into — 
 your head that I mean to pension you off.” : 
 ‘True, Sir,” returned Wegg, still with an 
 obstinate magnanimity. ‘I am acquainted — 
 with my faults. Far be it from me to deny 
 them. I have taken it into my head.” Ae 
 ** But I don’t mean it.” . 
 The assurance seemed hardly as comforting ‘ 
 to Mr. Wegg as Mr. Boffin intended it to be. — 
 Indeed, an appreciable elongation of his visage — 
 might have been observed as he replied: ‘s 
 ** Don’t you, indeed, Sir?” 
 “No,” pursued Mr. Boffin; “because that — 
 would express, as I understand it, that you were > 
 not going to do any thing to deserve your money. * 
 But you are; you are.” e 
 ‘That, Sir,” replied Mr. Wegg, cheering oa 
 Now, 
 
 bravely, ‘‘is quite another pair of shoes. 
 my independence as a man is again elevated. — 
 Now, I no longer ites 
 
 Weep for the hour, 
 
 When to Boffinses bower, 
 
 The Lord of the valley with offers came; 
 
 Neither does the moon hide her light 
 
 From the heavens to-night, ae 
 
 And weep behind her clouds o’er any individual in the’ 
 present Aol 
 
 Company's shame. 
 
 ——Please to proceed, Mr. Boffin.” Bi 
 ‘*Thank’ee, Wegg, both for your confidence 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 in me and for your frequent dropping into poetry; 
 both of which is friendly. . Well, then; my idea 
 is, that you should give up your stall, and that I 
 should put you into the Bower here, to keep it 
 for us. It’s a pleasant spot; and a man with 
 coals and candles and a pound a week might be 
 in clover here.” 
 
 “Hem! Would that man, Sir—we will say 
 that man, for the purposes of argueyment;” Mr. 
 Wegg made a smiling demonstration of great 
 pertspicuity here ; ‘‘ would-that man, Sir, be ex- 
 pected to throw any other capacity in, or would 
 any other capacity be considered extra? Now 
 let us (for the purposes of argueyment) suppose 
 that man to be engaged as a reader: say (for 
 the purposes of argueyment) in the evening. 
 Would that man’s pay as a reader in the even- 
 ing be added to the other amount, which, adopt- 
 ing your language, we will call clover; or would 
 it merge into that amount, or clover ?” 
 
 “Well,” said Mr. Boffin, “ I suppose it would 
 be added.” 
 
 ‘¢T suppose it would, Sir. You are right, Sir. 
 Exactly my own views, Mr. Boffin.” Here Wegg 
 rose, and balancing himself on his wooden leg, 
 fluttered over his prey with extended hand. 
 “‘Mr. Boffin, consider it done. Say no more, 
 Sir, not a word more. My stall and I are for- 
 ever parted. The collection of ballads will in 
 future be reserved for private study, with the 
 object of making poetry tributary’—Wegg was 
 so proud of having found this word that he said 
 it again, with a capital letter—‘‘ Tributary, to 
 friendship. Mr. Boffin, don’t allow yourself to 
 be made uncomfortable by the pang it gives me 
 to part from my stock and stall. Similar emo- 
 tion was undergone by my own father when 
 promoted for his merits from his occupation as 
 a waterman to a situation under Government. 
 ‘His Christian name was Thomas. His words 
 at the time (I was then an infant, but so deep 
 was their impression on me that I committed 
 _ them to memory) were: 
 
 - Then farewell my trim-built wherry, 
 Oars and coat and badge farewell! 
 Never more at Chelsea Ferry 
 Shall your Thomas take a spell! 
 
 —My father got over it, Mr. Boffin, and so shall 
 I ” 
 
 While delivering these valedictory observa- 
 tions, Wegg continually disappointed Mr. Boffin 
 of his hand by flourishing it in the air. He 
 ‘now darted it at his patron, who took it, and 
 felt his mind relieved of a great weight: ob- 
 serving that as they had arranged their joint 
 affairs so satisfactorily, he would now be glad to 
 look into those of Bully Sawyers. Which, in- 
 deed, had been left overnight in a very un- 
 _ promising posture, and for whose impending ex- 
 pedition against the Persians the weather had 
 been by no means favorable all day. 
 
 Mr. Wegg resumed his spectacles, therefore. 
 
 But Sawyers was not to be of the party that | 
 
 night; for, before Wegg had found his place, 
 Mrs. Boffin’s tread was heard upon the stairs, 
 so unusually heavy and hurried, that Mr. Bof- 
 fin would have started up at the sound, antici- 
 pating some occurrence much out of the com- 
 mon course, even though she had not also called 
 to him in an agitated tone. 
 
 93, 
 
 dark staircase, panting, with a lighted candle in 
 her hand. 
 
 ‘*What’s the matter,.my dear ?” 
 
 ‘*Y don't know; I don’t know; but I wish 
 you’d come up stairs.” 
 
 Much surprised, Mr. Boffin went up. stairs 
 and accompanied Mrs. Boftin into their own 
 room: a second large room on the same floor as 
 the room in which the late proprietor had died. 
 Mr. Boffin looked all round him, and saw no- 
 thing more unusual than various articles of fold- 
 ed linen on a large chest, which Mrs. Boffin had 
 been sorting. 
 
 ‘What is it, my dear? Why, you're fright- 
 ened! Yow frightened ?” 
 
 ‘‘f am not one of that sort, certainly,” said 
 Mrs. Boffin, as she sat down in a chair to re- 
 
 ‘cover herself, and took her husband’s arm; ‘but 
 
 it’s very strange!” 
 
 ‘* What is, my dear?” 
 
 ‘* Noddy, the faces of the old man and the two 
 children are all over the house to-night.”’ 
 
 **My dear?” exclaimed Mr. Boffin. But not 
 without a certain uncomfortable sensation glid- 
 ing down his back. 
 
 ‘*T know it must sound foolish, and yet it is : 
 S80.” \ 
 ‘* Where did you think you saw them ?” 
 
 **T don’t know that I think I saw them any 
 where. I felt them.” : 
 
 ‘* Touched them ?”’ 
 
 ‘*No. Felt them in the air. I was sorting 
 those things on the chest, and not thinking of 
 the old man or the children, but singing to my- 
 self} when all in a moment I felt there was a 
 face growing out of the dark.” . 
 
 ‘What face?” asked her husband, looking 
 about him. 
 
 ‘‘For a moment it was the old man’s, and 
 then it got younger. For a moment it was both 
 the children’s, and then it got older. For a 
 moment it was a strange face, and then it was 
 all the faces.” 
 
 * And then it was gone?” 
 
 “Yes; and then it was gone.” 
 
 ‘¢ Where were you then, old lady?” 
 
 ‘* Here, at the chest. Well; I got the better 
 of it, and went on sorting, and went on singing 
 to myself. ‘Lor!’ I says, ‘Tl think of some- 
 thing else—something comfortable—and put it 
 out of my head.’ So I thought of the new house 
 and Miss Bella Wilfer, and was thinking at a 
 great rate with that sheet there in my hand, 
 when, all of a sudden, the faces seemed to be 
 hidden in among the folds of it, and I let it 
 drop.” 
 
 As it still lay on the floor where it had fallen, 
 Mr. Boffin picked it up and laid it on the chest. 
 
 ** And then you ran down stairs ?” 
 
 “No. I thought I’d try another room, and 
 shake it off. I says to myself, ‘I’ll go and walk 
 slowly up and down the old man’s room three 
 times, from end to end, and then I shall have 
 conquered it.’ J went in with the candle in my 
 hand; but the moment I came near the bed the 
 air got thick with them.” 
 
 ** With the faces ?” 
 
 ‘“Yes, and I even felt that they were in the 
 
 ' dark behind the side-door, and on the little stair- 
 
 case, floating away into the yard. Then I call- 
 
 ‘ed you.” 
 __Mr. Boffin hurried out, and found her on the, Mr. Boftin, lost in amazement, looked at Mrs. 
 
atk 
 94 
 
 Boffin. Mrs. Boffin, lost in her own fluttered 
 inability to make this out, looked at Mr. Boffin. 
 
 “I think, my dear,” said the Golden Dust- 
 man, ‘‘I’ll at once get rid of Wegg for the 
 night, because he’s coming to inhabit the Bow- 
 er, and it might be put into his head or some- 
 body else’s, if he heard this and it got about, 
 that the house is haunted. Whereas we know 
 better. Don’t we ?” 
 
 ‘*T never had the feeling in the house be- 
 fore,” sail Mrs. Boffin; ‘*‘and I have been 
 about it alone at all hours of the night. I have 
 been in the house when Death was in it, and I 
 have been in the house when Murder was a new 
 part of its adventures, and I never had a fright 
 in it yet.” 
 
 ‘*And won't again, my dear,” said Mr. Bof- 
 fin. ‘‘ Depend upon it, it comes of thinking and 
 - dwelling on that dark spot.” 
 
 ‘*Yes; but why didn’t it come before?” asked 
 Mrs. Boffin. 
 
 This draft on Mr. Boffin’s philosophy could 
 only be met by that gentleman with the remark 
 that every thing that is at all. must begin at 
 some time. Then, tucking his wife’s arm under 
 his own, that she might not be left by herself to 
 be troubled again, he descended to release Wege. 
 Who, being something drowsy after his plentiful 
 repast, and constitutionally of a shirking tem- 
 perament, was well enough pleased to stump 
 away, without doing what he had come to do, 
 and was paid for doing. 
 
 Mv. Boffin then put on his hat, and Mrs. Bof- 
 fin her shawl; and the pair, further provided 
 with a bunch of keys and alighted lantern, wént 
 all over the dismal house — dismal every where 
 but in their own two rooms—from cellar to 
 cock-loft. Not resting satisfied with giving that 
 much chase to Mrs. Boffin’s fancies, they pur- 
 sued them into the yard and outbuildings, and 
 under the Mounds. And setting the lantern, 
 when all was done, at the foot of one of the 
 Mounds, they comfortably trotted to and fro for 
 an evening walk, to the end that the murky 
 cobwebs in Mrs. Boflin’s brain might be blown 
 away. 
 
 “There, my dear!” said Mr. Boftin when they 
 came in to supper. ‘‘'That was the treatment, 
 you see. Completely worked round, haven’t 
 you?” 
 
 ‘Yes, deary,” said Mrs. Boffin, laying aside 
 her shawl. ‘I’m not nervous any more. I’m 
 not a bit troubled now. I'd go any where about 
 the house the same as ever. But—” 
 
 “*Eh!” said Mr. Boffin. 
 
 ** But I’ve only to shut my eyes.” 
 
 ‘* And what then ?” 
 
 ‘* Why then,” said Mrs. Boffin, speaking with 
 her eyes closed, and her left hand thoughtfully 
 touching her brow, ‘then, there they are! The 
 ald man’s face, and it gets younger. The two 
 children’s faces, and they get older. A face 
 that I don’t know. And then all the faces!” 
 
 Opening her eyes again, and sceing her hus- 
 band’s face across the table, she leaned for- 
 ward to give if a pat on the check, and sat 
 down to supper, declaring it to be the best face 
 in the world. 
 
 ee rrr ae 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. } 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 MINDERS AND RE-MINDERS, 
 
 Tue Secretary lost no time in getting to work, — 
 and his vigilance. and method soon set their 
 mark on the Golden Dustman’s affairs. His. 
 earnestness in determining to understand the 
 length and breadth and depth of every piece of © 
 work submitted to him by his employer was as 
 special as his dispatch in transacting it. He ac- 
 cepted no information or explanation at second- 
 hand, but made himself the master of every 
 thing confided to him. 
 
 One part of the Secretary’s conduct, underly- 
 ing all the rest, might have been mistrusted by 
 a man with a better knowledge of men than the 
 Golden Dustman had. The Secretary was as 
 far from being inquisitive or intrusive as Secre- 
 tary could be, but nothing less than a complete 
 understanding of the whole of the affairs would ) 
 content him. It soon became apparent (from 
 the knowledge with which he set out) that he 
 must have been to the office where the ‘Harmon 
 will was registered, and must have read the will. 
 He anticipated Mr. Boffin’s consideration wheth- - 
 er he should be advised with on this or that 
 topic, by showing that he already knew of it and 
 understood it. He did this with no attempt at 
 concealment, seeming to be satisfied that it was 
 part of his duty to have prepared himself at all. 
 attainable points for its utmost discharge. 
 
 This might—let it be repeated—have awak- 
 ened some little vague mistrust in a man more 
 worldly-wise than the Golden Dustman. On 
 the other hand, the Secretary was discerning, 
 discreet, and silent, though as zealous as if the 
 affairs had been his own. He showed no love 
 of patronage or the command of money, but dis. 
 tinctly preferred resigning both to Mr. Boffin. 
 If, in his limited sphere, he sought power, it was 
 the power of knowledge; the power derivable 
 from a perfect comprehension of his business. 
 
 As on the Secretary’s face there was a name- — 
 less cloud, so on his manner there was a shadow. 
 equally indefinable. It was not that he was em- 
 barrassed, as on that first night with the Wil- 
 fer family; he was habitually unembarrassed 
 now, and yet the something remained. It was 
 not that his manner was bad, as on that occa- 
 sion; it was now very good, as being modest, 
 gracious, and ready. Yet the something never 
 left it. It has been written of men who have 
 undergone a cruel captivity, or who have passed 
 through a terrible strait, or who in self-pres- 
 ervation have killed a defenseless fellow-creat- 
 ure, that the record thereof has never faded from 
 their countenances until they died. Was there 
 any such record here? 4 
 
 He established a temporary office for himself 
 in the new house, and all went well under his 
 hand, with one singular exception. He mani- 
 festly objected to communicate with Mr. Bof- 
 fin’s solicitor. Two or three times, when there 
 was some slight occasion for his doing so, he ‘ 
 transferred the task to Mr. Boffin; and his eva- 
 sion of it soon becdme so curiously apparent, 
 that Mr. Boftin spoke to him on the subject of | 
 his reluctance. ¥ 
 
 ‘It is so,” the Secretary admitted. ‘*I would 
 rather not.” a 
 
 Had he any personal objection to Mr. Light- 
 wood? ro Se 
 
—©T don’t know him.” * 
 Had he suffered from lawsuits ? 
 
 ‘*Not more than other men,” was his short 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. | 
 
 95. 
 
 if 
 
 himself, in the tone in which he had said to his 
 
 eniployer, ‘7 don’t think it promises !”” 
 Among his first occupations the pursuit of 
 
 answer. . | that orphan wanted by Mrs. Boffin held a con- 
 Was he prejudiced against the race of law-| spicuous place. From the earliest moment of 
 yers? j his engagement he showed a particular desire 
 “No. But while I am in your employment, | to .please her, and, knowing her to have this 
 
 ‘Sir, I would rather be excused from going be- 
 tween the lawyer and the client. Of course if 
 you press it, Mr. Boffin, I am ready to comply. 
 But I should take it as a great favor if you would 
 not press it without urgent occasion.” 
 
 Now, it could not be said that thete was urg- 
 ent occasion, for Lightwood retained no other 
 affairs in his hands than such as still lingered 
 and languished about the undiscovered criminal, 
 and such as arose out of the purchase of the 
 house. Many other matters that might have 
 traveled to him now stopped short at the Secre- 
 tary, under whose administration they were far 
 more expeditiously and satisfactorily disposed of 
 than they would have been if they had got into 
 Young Blight’s domain. This the Golden Dust- 
 man quite understood. Even the matter immedi- 
 ately in hand was of very little moment as requir- 
 ing personal appearance on the Secretary’s part, 
 for it amounted to no more than this:—The 
 death of Hexam rendering the sweat of the hon- 
 est man’s brow unprofitabie, the honest man had 
 shufflingly declined to mpisten his brow for no- 
 thing, with that severe exertion which is known 
 
 ‘object at heart, he followed it up with unweary- 
 ing alacrity and interest, i 
 Mr. and Mrs. Milvey had found their search 
 a difficult one. Either an eligible orphan was 
 of the wrong sex (which almost always happen- 
 ed), or was too old, or too young, or too sickly, 
 -or too dirty, or too much accustomed to the 
 streets, or too likely to run away; or it was 
 found impossible to complete the philanthropic 
 transaction without buying the orphan. For, 
 the instant it became known that any body 
 wanted the orphan, up started some affection- 
 ate relative of the orphan who put a price upon 
 the orphan’s head. The suddenness of an or- 
 phan’s rise in the market was not to be“paral- 
 leled by the maddest records of the Stock Ex- 
 change. He would be at five thousand per 
 cent. discount out at nurse making a mud pie 
 at nine in the morning, and (being inquired 
 | for) would go up to five thousand per cent. pre- 
 mium before noon. The market was “rigged” 
 in various artful ways. Counterfeit stock got 
 into circulation. Parents boldly represented 
 themselves as dead, and brought their orphans 
 
 with them. Genuine orphan stock was surrep- 
 _titionsly withdrawn from the market. It being 
 announced, by emissaries posted for the pur- 
 pose, that Mr. and Mrs. Milvey were coming 
 
 in legal circles as swearing your way through a 
 ‘stone-wall. Consequently, that new light had 
 gone sputtering out. But the airing of the old 
 ‘facts had led some one concerned to suggest that 
 
 it would be well before they were reconsigned 
 to their gloomy shelf—now probably forever— 
 to induce or compel that Mr. Julius Handford 
 to reappear and be questioned. And all traces 
 of Mr. Julins-Handford being lost, Lightwood 
 ‘now referred to his client for authority to seek 
 him through public advertisement. 
 
 **Does your objection go to writing.te-Light- 
 wood, Rokesmith ?” 
 
 ** Not in the least, Sir.” 
 
 “Then perhaps you’ll write him 
 say he is free to do what he likes. Idon’t think 
 it promises.” 
 
 “‘T don’t think it promises,” said the Secre- 
 tary. 
 
 ** Still, he may do what he likes.” 
 
 “JT will write immediately. Let me thank 
 
 you for so considcrately yielding to my disin- | 
 
 clination. It may seem less unreasonable if I 
 avow to you that although I don’t know Mr. 
 Lightwood, I have a disagreeable association 
 connected with him. | It is not his fault; he is 
 not at all to blame for it, and does not even 
 _Know my name.” 
 
 Mr. Boffin dismissed the matter with a nod 
 or two. ‘The letter was written, and next day 
 Mr. Julius Handford was advertised for. He 
 was requested to place himself in communica- 
 tion with Mr. Mortimer Lightwood, as a possi- 
 ble means of furthering the ends of justice, and 
 .& reward was offered to any one acquainted 
 with his whereabout who would communicate 
 the same to the said Mr. Mortimer Lightwood 
 at his office in the Temple. Every day for six 
 weeks this advertisement appeared at the head 
 of all the newspapers, and every day for six 
 _Weeks the Secretary, when he saw it, said to 
 
 a line, and 
 
 down the court, orphan scrip would be instant- 
 ly concealed, and production refused, save on a 
 condition usually stated by the brokers as ‘‘a 
 ,gallon of beer.” Likewise, fluctuations of a 
 wild and South-Sea nature were occasioned by 
 | orphan-holders keeping back; and then rushing 
 into the market a dozen together. But the 
 uniform principle at the root of all these vari- 
 ous operations was bargain and sale; -and that 
 principle could not be recognized by Mr. and 
 Mrs. Milvey. 
 
 At length tidings were received by the Rev- 
 erend Frank of a charming orphan to be found 
 | at Brentford. One of the deceased parents (late 
 his parishioners) had a poor widowed grandmo- 
 ther in that agreeable town, and she, Mrs. Betty 
 | Higden, had carried off the orphan with mater- 
 nal care, but could not afford to keep him. 
 
 The Secretary proposed to Mrs. Bi ffin, either 
 to go down himself and take a preliminary sur- 
 vey of this orphan, or to drive her down, that 
 she might at once form her own opinion. irs. 
 Boffin preferring the latter course, they set off 
 one morning in a hired phacton, conveying the 
 hammer-headed young man behind them. 
 
 The abode of Mrs. Betty Higden was not easy 
 to find, lying in such complicated back settle- 
 
 ments of muddy Brentford that they left their | 
 
 equipage at the sign of the Three Magpies, and 
 went in search of it on foot. After many in- 
 quiries and defeats, there was pointed out to 
 them in a lane, a very small cottage residence, 
 with a board across ihe open doorway, hooked 
 on to which board by the arm-pits was a young 
 gentleman of tender years, angling for mud with 
 a headless wooden horse and line. In this young 
 
 | sporisman, distinguished by a crisply curling au- . 
 
ms 
 
 Wa. 
 
 FZ 
 
 Oe 
 
 AA 
 Woop 
 WY. 
 OM, 4 
 
 Sh i iP 
 NA 
 La 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 ' MRS. BOFFIN DISCOVERS AN ORPHAN. 
 
 burn head and a blnff countenance, the Secre- 
 tary descried the orphan. 
 
 It unfortunately happened as they quickened 
 their pace, that the orphan, lost to considera- 
 tions of personal safety in the ardor of the mo- 
 ment, overbalanced himself and toppled into the 
 street. Being an orphan of a chubby conforma- 
 tion, he then took to rolling, and had rolled into 
 the gutter before they conld come up. From 
 the gutter he was rescued by John Rokesmith, 
 and thus the first meeting with Mrs. Higden was 
 inaugurated by the awkward circumstance of 
 their being in possession—one would say at first 
 sight unlawful possession—of the orphan, upside 
 down and purple in the countenance. The board 
 across the doorway too, acting as a trap equally 
 for the feet of Mrs. Higden coming out, and the 
 
 ’ . 
 - 
 
 in, greatly increased the difficulty of the situa- 
 tion: to which the cries of the orphan imparted 
 | a lugubrious and inhuman character. 
 
 At first, it was impossible to explain, on ac- 
 ‘count of the orphan’s ‘‘holding his breath:” a 
 most terrific proceeding, superinducing in the 
 ‘orphan lead-color rigidity and a deadly silence, 
 ‘compared with which his cries were music yield- 
 ing the height of enjovment. But as he grad- 
 ually recovered, Mrs. Boffin gradually introduced 
 back to Mrs. Betty Higden’s home. 
 
 It was.then perceived to be a small home with 
 a large mangle in it, at the handle of which ma- 
 
 herself, and smiling peace was gradually wooed 
 
 chine stood a very long boy, with a very little 
 
 head, and an open mouth of disproportionate ~ 
 
 feet of Mrs. Boffin and John Rokesmith going 
 : 
 
, 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 capacity that seemed to assist his eyes in staring 
 at the visitors. In a corner below the mangle, 
 on a couple of stools, sat two very little children; 
 a boy and a girl; and when the very long boy, 
 in an interval of staring, took a turn at the man- 
 gle, it was alarming to see how it lunged itself 
 at those two innocents, like a catapult designed 
 for their destruction, harmlessly retiring when 
 within an inch of their heads. The room was 
 clean and neat. It had a brick floor, and a 
 window of diamond panes, and a flounce hang- 
 ing below the chimney-piece, and strings nailed 
 from bottom to top outside the window, on which 
 scarlet beans were to grow in the coming season 
 if the Fates were propitious. However propi- 
 tious they might have been in the seasons that 
 were gone to Betty Higden in the matter of 
 beans, they had not been very favorable in the 
 
 matter of coins ; for it was easy to see that she 
 
 was poor. 
 
 She was one of those old women, was Mrs. 
 Betty Higden, who by dint of an indomitable 
 purpose and a strong constitution fight out many 
 years, though each year has come with its new 
 knock-down blows fresh to the fight against her, 
 wearied by it; an active old woman, with a 
 bright dark eye and a resolute face, yet quite a 
 tender creature too; not a logically-reasoning 
 woman, but God is good, and hearts may count 
 in Heaven as high as heads. 
 
 ‘Yes, sure!” said she, when the business was 
 opened, ‘‘ Mrs. Milvey had the kindness to write 
 to me, ma'am, and I got Sloppy to read it. It 
 was a pretty letter. But she’s an affable lady.” 
 
 The visitors glanced at the long boy, who 
 seemed to indicate by a broader stare of his 
 mouth and eyes that in him Sloppy stood con- 
 fessed. 
 
 *“‘For I ain’t, you must know,” said Betty, 
 “much of a hand at reading writing-hand, 
 though I can read my Bible and most print. 
 
 And I do love a newspaper. You mightn’t think | 
 it, but Sloppy is a beautiful reader of a newspa-} 
 fthere. Come to us and find us all a-dying, and 
 Eset a light to us all where we lie, and let us all 
 sblaze away with the house into a heap of cinders, 
 Fsooner than move a corpse of us there!” 
 
 per. He-do the Police in different voices.” 
 The visitors’ again considered it a point of 
 
 politeness to look at Sloppy, who, looking at 
 
 them, suddenly threw back his head, extended 
 
 his mouth to its utmost width, and laughed loud }* 
 
 and long. At this the two innocents, with their 
 brains in that apparent danger, laughed, and 
 Mrs. Higden laughed, and the orphan laughed, 
 and then the visitors laughed. Which was more 
 cheerful than intelligible. 
 
 Then Sloppy seeming to be seized with an in- 
 dustrious mania or fury, turned to at the man- 
 gle, and impelled it at the heads of the innocents 
 With such a creaking and rumbling that Mrs, 
 Higden stopped him. 
 
 ‘The gentlefolks can’t hear themselves speak, 
 Sloppy. Bide a bit, bide a bit!” 
 
 ‘‘¥s that the dear child in your lap?” said 
 Mrs. Boflin. 
 
 ‘*Yes, ma’am, this is Johnny.” 
 
 ‘¢ Johnny, too!” cried Mrs. Boffin, turning to 
 the Secretary ; ‘‘already Johnny! Only one of 
 the two names left to give him! He’s a pretty 
 boy.” 
 
 With his chin tucked down in his shy child- 
 ixh manner, he was Jooking furtively, at Mrs. 
 Boffin out of his blue eyes, and reaching his fat 
 dimpled hand up to the lips of the old woman, 
 who was kissing it by times. 
 
 |old woman. 
 
 + ae 
 3 97 
 
 ‘ Yes, ma’am, he’s a pretty boy, he’s a dear 
 darling boy, he’s the child of my own last left 
 daughter’s daughter. But she’s gone the way 
 of all the rest.” 
 
 “'Fhose are not his brother and sister?” said 
 Mrs. Boftin. 
 
 *-QOh, dear no, ma’am. Those are Minders.” 
 
 *¢ Minders ?” the Secretary repeated. 
 
 ‘‘Left to be Minded, Sir. I keep a Minding- 
 School. I can take only three, on account of 
 the Mangle. But I love children, and Four- 
 pence a week is Four-pence. Come here, Tod- 
 dles and Poddles.” 
 
 Toddles was the pet-name of the boy ; Poddles 
 of the girl. At their little unsteady pace they 
 came across the floor, hand in hand, as if they 
 were traversing an extremely difficult road inter- 
 sected by brooks, and, when they had had their 
 heads patted by Mrs. Betty Higden, made lunges 
 at the orphan, dramatically representing an at- 
 tempt to bear him, crowing, into captivity and 
 slavery. All the three children enjoyed this to 
 a delightful extent, and the sympathetic Sloppy 
 again laughed long and loud. When it was dis- 
 creet to stop the play, Betty Higden said ‘‘Go 
 to your seats Toddles and Poddles,” and they 
 returned hand in hand across country, seeming 
 to find the brooks rather swollen by late rains. 
 
 *¢ And Master—or Mister—Sloppy ?” said the 
 Secretary, in doubt whether he was man, boy, 
 or what. 
 
 ‘¢ A Jove-child,” returned Betty Higden, drop- 
 ping her voice; ‘‘parents never known; found 
 in the street. He was brought up in the—” 
 with. a shiver of repugnance, ‘‘—the House.”’ 
 
 ‘¢'The Poor-house ?” said the Secretary. 
 
 Mrs. Higden set that resolute old face of hers, 
 and darkly nodded yes. 
 
 ‘¢You dislike the mention of it.” 
 
 ‘Dislike the mention of it?” answered the 
 ‘Kill me sooner than take me 
 there. Throw this pretty child under cart-horses’ 
 feet and a loaded wagon sooner than take him 
 
 a" 
 - 
 
 A surprising spirit in this lonely woman after 
 so many years of hard working, and hard living, 
 my Lords and Gentlemen and Honorable Boards! 
 What is it that we call it in our grandiose 
 speeches? British independence, rather per- 
 verted? Is that, or something like it, the ring 
 of the cant? 
 
 ‘‘Do I never read in the newspapers,” said 
 thedame, fondling the child—‘‘ God help me and 
 the like of me!—how the worn-out people that 
 do come down to that, get driven from post to 
 pillar and pillar to post, a-purpose to tire them 
 out! Do I never read how they are put off, put 
 off, put off—how they are grudged, grudged, 
 grudged, the shelter, or the doctor, or the drop 
 
 of physic, or the bit of bread? Do I never read 
 
 how they grow heart-sick of it and give it up, 
 after having let themselves drop so low, and how 
 they after all die out for want of help? Then I 
 say, I hope I can die as well as another, and I'll 
 die without that disgrace.” 
 
 Absolutely impossible my Lords and Gentle- 
 men and Honorable Boards, by any stretch of 
 legislative wisdom to set these perverse people 
 right in their logic? 
 
ae 
 98 ie us 
 
 ‘Johnny, my pretty,” continued old Betty, 
 caressing the child, and rather mourning over it 
 than speaking to it, ‘‘your old Granny Betty is 
 nigher fourscore year than threescore and ten. 
 She never begged nor had a penny of the Union 
 money in all her life. She paid scot and she 
 paid lot when she had money to pay; she work- 
 ed when she could, and she starved when she 
 must. You pray that your Granny may have 
 strength enough left her at the last (she’s strong 
 for an old one, Johnny) to get up from her bed 
 and run and hide herself, and swown to death in 
 a hole, sooner than fall into the hands of those 
 Cruel Jacks we read of, that dodge and drive, 
 and worry and weary, and scorn and shame, the 
 decent poor.” 
 
 A brilliant suecess, my Lords and Gentlemen 
 and Honorable Boards, to have brought it to this 
 in the minds of the best of the poor! Under sub- 
 mission, might it be worth thinking of, at any 
 odd time? 
 
 The fright and abhorrence that Mrs. Betty 
 Higden smoothed out of her strong face as she 
 ended this diversion showed how seriously she 
 had meant it. 
 
 ‘¢ And does he work for you?” asked the Sec- 
 retary, gently bringing the discourse back to 
 Master or Mister Sloppy. 
 
 *¢ Yes,” said Betty, with a good-humored smile 
 and nod of the head. ‘‘ And well too.” 
 
 *¢ Does he live here ?” 
 
 ‘‘He lives more here than any where. He 
 was thought to be no better than a Natural, and 
 first come to me as a Minder. I made interest 
 with Mr. Blogg the Beadle to have him as a 
 Minder, seeing him by chance up at church, and 
 thinking I might do something with him. For 
 he was a weak. rickety creetur then.” 
 ~ “Ts he called by his right name ?” 
 
 ‘Why, you see, speaking quite correctly, he 
 has no right name. JI always understood he took 
 his name from being found on a Sloppy night.” 
 
 ‘* He seems an amiable fellow.” 
 
 ‘* Bless you, Sir, there’s not a bit of him,” re- 
 turned Betty, ‘‘that’s not amiable. So you may 
 judge how amiable he is, by running your eye 
 along his heighth.” 
 
 Of an ungainly make was Sloppy. ‘Too much 
 of him longwise, too little of him broadwise, and 
 too many sharp angles of him angle-wise. One 
 of those shambling male human creatures, born 
 to be indiscreetly candid in the revelation of 
 buttons; every button he had about him glaring 
 at the public to a quite preternatural extent. A 
 considerable capital of knee and elbow and wrist 
 and ankle had Sloppy, and he didn’t know how 
 to dispose of it to the best advantage, but was 
 always investing it in wrong securities, and so 
 getting himself into embarrassed circumstances. 
 Full-Private Number One in the Awkward Squad 
 of the rank and file of life was Sloppy, and yet 
 had his glimmering notions of standing true to 
 the Colors. 
 
 ‘‘ And now,” said Mrs. Boffin, ‘‘ concerning 
 Johnny.” ~ 
 
 As Johnny, with his chin tucked in and his 
 lips pouting, reclined in Betty’s lap, concentrating 
 his blue eyes on the visitors and shading them 
 from observation with a dimpled arm, old Betty 
 took one of his fresh fat hands in her withered 
 right, and fell to gently beating it on her with- 
 ered left. 
 
 ‘Betty. 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 ‘‘Yes, ma’am. Concerning J ohnny.” 
 
 **If you trust the dear child to me,’ 
 Boffin, with a face inviting trust, 
 the best of homes, the best of care, the best of 
 education, the best of friends. Please God Ns 
 will be a true good mother to him!” 
 
 ‘¢T am thankful to vou, ma’am, and the dear 
 child would be thankful if he was old enough to 
 understand.” Still lightly beating the little hand 
 upon her own. ‘I wouldn’t stand in the dear 
 child’s light, not if I-had all my life before me 
 instead of a very little of it. But I hope you 
 won't take it ill that I cleave to the child closer 
 than words can tell, for he’s the last living thing 
 left me.” 
 
 ‘*Take it ill, my dear soul? Is it likely? 
 And you so tender of him as to bring him home 
 here !”” 
 
 ‘*T have seen,” said Betty, still with that light 
 beat upon her hard rough hand, ‘‘so many. of 
 them on my lap. And they are all gone but this 
 one! I am ashamed to seem so selfish, but I 
 don’t really mean it. It'll be the making of his 
 
 fortune, and he’ll be a gentleman when I am. 
 
 dead. J-—I—don’t know what comes over me, 
 J—try against it. Don’t notice me!” The light 
 beat stopped, the resolute mouth gave way, and 
 the fine strong old face broke up into Weakness 
 and tears. 
 
 Now, greatly to the relief of the visitors, the 
 emotional Sloppy no sooner beheld his patroness 
 in this condition, than, throwing back his’ head 
 and throwing open his mouth, he lifted up his 
 veice and bellowed. This alarming note of scme- 
 thing wrong instantly terrified 'Toddles and Pcud- 
 dles, who were no sooner heard to roar surpris- 
 
 ingly, than Johnny, curving himself the wrong . 
 
 way and striking out at Mrs. Boffin with a pair 
 of indifferent shoes, became a prey to despair. 
 The absurdity of the situation put its pathos to 
 the rout. Mrs. Betty Higden was herself in a 
 moment, and brought them all to order with 
 that speed, that Sloppy, stopping short in a poly- 
 syllabic bellow, transferred his energy to the 
 mangle, and had taken several penitential turns 
 before he could be stopped. 
 
 ‘¢There, there, there!’ said Mrs. Boffin, al- 
 most regarding her kind self as the most ruthless 
 of women. ‘‘ Nothing is going to be done. No- 
 body need be frightened. We’re all comforta- 
 ble; ain’t we, Mrs. Higden ?” 
 
 ‘¢Sure and certain we are,” returned Betty. 
 
 ‘*And there really is no hurry, you know,” 
 said Mrs. Boffin, in a lower voice. ‘‘ Take time 
 
 to think of it, my good creature!” 
 
 ‘*Don’t you fear me no more, ma’am,” said 
 ‘<I thought of it for good yesterday. I 
 don’t know what come over me just now, but 
 it'll] never come again.’ 
 
 ‘Well, then; Johnny shall have more time 
 to think of | returned Mrs. Boffin ; ‘‘ the pret- 
 ty child shall have time to get used to it. 
 you'll get him more used to it, if you think well 
 of it; won’t you?” 
 
 Betty undertook that, cheerfully and readily. 
 
 ‘¢Lor,’”’ cried Mrs. Boffin, looking radiantly 
 about her, ‘we want to make every body hap- 
 py, not dismal!—And perhaps you wouldn't 
 mind letting me know how used to it you beat 
 to get, and how it all goes on ?” 
 
 **T’ll send Sloppy,” said Mrs. Higden. 
 
 ‘* And this gentleman who has come with me 
 
 said Mrs, 
 
 “He shall have’ 
 
 And 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. ae 
 
 will pay him for his trouble,” said Mrs. Boffin. 
 ‘¢And Mr. Sloppy, whenever you come to my 
 house, be sure you never go away without hay- 
 ing had a good dinner of meat, beer, vegetables, 
 and pudding.” 
 
 This still further brightened the face of affairs; 
 for, the highly sympathetic Sloppy, first broad- | 
 ly staring and grinning, and then roaring with 
 laughter, Toddles and Poddles followed suit, and 
 Johnny trumped the trick. . T and P considering 
 these favorable circumstances for the resumption 
 of that dramatic descent upon Johnny, again 
 came across country hand in hand upon a buc- 
 caneering expedition; and this having been 
 fought out in the chimney-corner behind Mrs. 
 Higden’s chair, with great valor on both sides, 
 those desperate pirates returned hand in hand 
 to their stools, across the dry bed of a mountain 
 torrent. 
 
 .**You must tell me what I can do for you, 
 Betty my friend,” said Mrs. Boffin, confidential- 
 ly, ‘‘if not” to-day, next time.” 
 
 ““'Thank you all the same, ma’am, but I want 
 nothing for myself. I can work. I'm strong. 
 Lcan walk twenty mile if ['m put to it.” Old 
 Betty was proud, and said it with a sparkle in 
 her bright eyes. 
 
 ““Yes, but there are some little comforts that 
 you wouldn’ t be the worse for,” returned Mrs. 
 Boffin. Bless ye, I wasn’t born a lady any 
 more than you.” 
 
 “Tt seems to me,”’ said Betty, smiling, ‘‘ that 
 you were a born lady, and a true one, or there 
 never was a lady born. But I couldn’t take 
 any thing from you, my dear. I never did take 
 any thing from any one. It ain’t that I’m not 
 grateful, but 1 love to earn it better.” 
 
 *¢ Well, well!” returned Mrs. Boffin. ‘I only 
 spoke of little things, or I wouldn’t have taken 
 the liberty.” 
 
 Betty put her visitor’s hand to her lips, in ac- 
 knowledgment of the delicate answer. Won- 
 derfully upright her figure was, and wonderful- 
 ly self-reliant her look, as, standing facing her 
 visitor, she explained herself further. 
 
 ** If I could have kept the dear child, without 
 the dread that’s always upon me of his coming 
 to that fate [ have spoken of, I could never have 
 parted: with him, even to you. For I love him, 
 I love him, I love him! I love my husband 
 long dead and gone, in him; I love my children 
 dead and gone, in him; I love my young and 
 hopeful days dead and gone, in him. I couldn’t 
 sell that love, and look you in your bright kind 
 face, It’s a free gift. I am in want of nothing. 
 _ When my strength fails me, if I can but die out 
 quick and quiet, I shall be quite content. I 
 have stood between my dead and that shame I 
 have spoken of, and it has been kept off from 
 every one of them. Sewed into my gown,” with 
 her hand upon her breast, ‘‘is just enough to 
 lay me in the grave. Only see that it’s rightly 
 spent, so as I may rest free to the last from that 
 cruelty and disgrace, and you'll have done much 
 more than a little thing for me, and all that in 
 this present world my. heart is set upon.” 
 
 Mrs. Betty Higden’s visitor pressed her hand. 
 There was no more breaking up of the strong 
 old face into weakness. My Lords and Gentle- 
 men and Honorable Boards, it really was as 
 composed as our own a. Faces, and almost as dig- 
 nificd. 
 
 99 
 
 | And now, Johnny was to be inveigled into 
 occlipring-ae tempor ary position on Mis. Botfin’s 
 ‘lap. It was not-until he had-been- piqued.into 
 conipetition with the two diminutive Minders, 
 by seeing them successively raised to that post 
 and retire from it without injury; that he could 
 be by any means induced to leave Mrs. Betty 
 Higden’ S skirts ; toward which he exhibited, 
 even when in Mrs. Boffin’s embrace, strong 
 yearnings, spiritual and bodily ; the former ex- 
 pressed in a very gloomy visage, the latter in 
 extended arms. However, a general descrip- 
 tion of the toy-wonders lurking in Mrs. Boffin’s 
 house, so far conciliated this worldly-minded 
 orphan as to induce him to stare at her frown- 
 ingly, with a fist in his mouth, and even at length 
 to chuckle when a richly- caparisoned horse on 
 wheels, with a miraculous gift of cantering to 
 cake-shops, was mentioned. This sound being 
 taken up by the Minders, swelled into a raptur- 
 ous trio which gave general satisfaction. 
 
 So the interview was considered very success- 
 ful, and Mrs. Boffin was pleased, and all were 
 satisfied. Not least of all, Sloppy, who under- 
 took to conduct the visitors back by the best way 
 ‘to the Three Magpies, and whom the hammer- 
 headed young man much despised. 
 
 This piece of business thus put in train, the 
 Secretary drove Mrs. Boffin back to the Bower, 
 and found employment for himself at the new 
 house until evening. Whether, when evening 
 came, he took a way to his lodgings that led 
 through fields, with any design of finding Miss 
 Bella Wilfer in those fields, is not:so certain as 
 that she regularly walked there at that hour. 
 
 And, moreover, it is certain that there she 
 was. 
 
 No longer in mourning, Miss Bella was dress- 
 ed in as pretty colors as she’ cauld muster. There 
 is no-denying that she was as pretty as they, and 
 that she and the colors went very prettily to- 
 gether. She was reading as she walked, and of 
 course it is to be inferred, from her showing no 
 knowledge of Mr. Rokesmith’s approach, ‘that 
 she did not know he was approaching. 
 
 ‘* Kh?” said Miss Bella, raising her eyes fr om 
 her book, when he stopped before her. ‘Oh! 
 It’s you. » 
 
 “‘Only I. A fine evening!” 
 
 ‘“Is it?” said Bella, looking coldly round. 
 '**T suppose it is, now you mention it. I have 
 not been thinking of the evening.” 
 
 *¢So intent upon your book ?” 
 
 ‘¢ Ye-e-es,” replied Bella, with a drawl of in- 
 difference. 
 
 ‘¢ A love-story, Miss Wilfer fe: 
 
 ‘*Qh dear no, or I shouldn’t be reading it. 
 It’s more about money than any thing else.” 
 
 ‘*And does it say that money is better than 
 any thing?” 
 
 ‘Upon my word,” returned Bella, ‘‘I forget 
 what it says, but you can find out for yourself, 
 if you like, Mr. Rokesmith. I don’t want it any 
 more.” | 
 
 The Secretary took the book—she had flutter- 
 ed the leaves as if it were a fan—and walked 
 beside her. 
 
 ‘‘T am charged with a message for you, Miss 
 ‘Wilfer.” 
 
 ‘Impossible, I think!” said Bella, with an- 
 other drawl. 
 
 ‘‘From Mrs. Boffin. 
 
 She desired me to as- 
 
100 
 
 or two at furthest.” _ 
 
 Bella turned her head toward him, with her 
 pretty insolent eyebrows raised, and her eyelids 
 drooping. As much as to say, ‘‘How did you 
 come by the message, pray ?” 
 
 ‘*T have been waiting for an opportunity of 
 telling you that Iam Mr. Boffin’s Secretary ?” 
 
 ‘‘T am as wise as ever,” said Miss Bella, lofti- 
 ly, ‘‘ for I don’t know what a Secretary is. Not 
 that it signifies.” 
 
 “*Not at all.” 
 
 A covert glance at her face, as he walked be- 
 side her, showed him that she had not expected 
 his ready assent to that proposition. 
 
 ‘“'Then are you going to be always there, Mr. 
 Rokesmith ?” she inquired, as if that would be a 
 drawback. 
 
 ** Always? No, Very much there? Yes.” 
 
 ‘* Dear me!” drawled Bella, in a tone of mor- 
 tification. 
 
 ‘*But my position there as Secretary will be 
 very different from yours as’ guest. You will 
 know little or nothing about me. I shall trans- 
 act the business: you will transact the pleasure. 
 I-shall have my salary to earn; you will have 
 nothing to do but to enjoy and attract.” 
 
 “Attract, Sir?” said Bella, again with her 
 eyebrows raised, and her eyelids drooping. ‘‘I 
 don’t understand you.” 
 
 Without replying on this point, Mr. Rokesmith 
 went on. 
 
 “Excuse me; when I first saw you in your 
 black dress—” 
 
 (“ There!” was Miss Bella’s mental excla- 
 mation. ‘‘What did I say to them at home? 
 Every body noticed that ridiculous mourning.”) 
 
 ‘* When I first saw you in your black dress, I 
 was at a loss to account for that distinction be- 
 tween yourself and your family. I hope it was 
 not impertinent to speculate upon it ?” 
 
 ‘‘T hope not, I am sure,” said Miss Bella, 
 haughtily. ‘‘ But you ought to know best how 
 you speculated upon it.” 
 
 Mr. Rokesmith inclined his head in a depre- 
 catory manner, and went on. 
 
 “Since I have been intrusted with Mr. Bof- 
 fin’s affairs, 1 have necessarily come to~under- 
 stand the little mystery. I venture to remark 
 that I feel persuaded that much of -your- loss 
 may be repaired. I speak, of course, merely of 
 wealth, Miss Wilfer. ‘The loss of a perfect 
 stranger, whose worth, or worthlessness, I can 
 
 not estimate — nor you either—is beside the. 
 
 question. But this excellent gentleman and 
 lady are so full of simplicity, so full of gener- 
 Osity, so inclined toward you, and so desirous 
 to—how shall I express it ?—to make amends 
 for their good fortune, that you have only to re- 
 spond.” 
 
 As he watched her with another covert look, 
 he saw a certain ambitious triumph in her face 
 which no assumed coldness could conceal. 
 
 ‘¢As we have been brought under one roof. 
 by an accidental combination of circumstances, 
 which oddly extends itself to the new relations 
 before us, I have taken the liberty of saying 
 these few words. You don’t consider them in- 
 trusive I hope ?” said the Secretary, with defer- 
 ence. 
 
 ‘*Really, Mr. Rokesmith, I can’t say what 
 
 / 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 sure you of the pleasure she has in-finding that it consider them,” returned the young lady. — 
 she will be ready to receive you in another.week.|'*‘ They are perfectly new to me, and may be 
 founded altogether on your own imagination.” 
 
 ‘* You will see.” 
 
 These same fields were opposite the Wilfer 
 premises. The discreet Mrs. Wilfer now look- 
 ing out of window and beholding her daughter 
 in conference with her lodger, instantly tied up 
 her head and came out for a casual walk. 
 
 ‘*T have been telling Miss Wilfer,” said John 
 Rokesmith, as the majestic lady came stalking 
 up, “that I have become, by a curious chance, 
 Mr. Boffin’s Secretary or man of business.” 
 
 ‘‘T have not,” returned Mrs. Wilfer, waving 
 her gloves in her chronic state of dignity, and 
 vague ill-usage, ‘“‘the honor of any intimate 
 acquaintance with Mr. Boffin, and it is not for 
 
 me to congratulate that gentleman on the ac-- 
 
 quisition he has made.” 
 
 *¢ A poor one enough,” said Rokesmith. 
 
 ‘Pardon me,” returned Mrs. Wilfer, ‘‘ the 
 merits of Mr. Boffin may be highly distinguished 
 —may be more distinguished than the counte- 
 nance of Mrs. Boffin would imply—but it were 
 the insanity of humility to deem him worthy of 
 a better assistant.” 
 
 **You are very good. I have also been telling 
 Miss Wilfer that she is expected very shortly at 
 the new residence in town.” 
 
 ‘* Having tacitly consented,” said Mrs, Wilfer, — 
 
 with a grand shrug of her shoulders, and an- 
 other wave of her gloves, ‘‘ to my child’s accept- 
 ance of the proffered attentions of Mrs. Boffin, 
 I interpose no objection.” ; 
 
 Here Miss Bella offered the remonstrance: 
 * Don’t talk nonsense, ma, please.”’ 
 
 ‘** Peace !” said Mrs. Wilfer. 
 
 ‘No, ma, I am not going to be made so ab- 
 surd. Interposing objections !” 
 
 **T say,” repeated Mrs. Wilfer, with a vast 
 access of grandeur, ‘‘ that I am not going to in- 
 terpose objections. If Mrs. Boftin (to whose 
 countenance no disciple of Lavater could pos- 
 sibly for a single moment subscribe),” with a 
 shiver, ‘‘seeks to illuminate her new residence 
 in town with the attractions of a child of mine, 
 
 I am content that she should be favored by the 
 
 company of a child of mine.” 
 
 { 
 
 ee oe 
 
 = 
 
 i 
 
 — 
 
 4 
 
 eins 
 
 ‘*You use the word, ma’am, I have myself: = 
 
 used,” said Rokesmith, with a glance at Bella, 
 ‘‘when you speak of Miss Wilfer’s attractions 
 there.” 
 
 ‘*Pardon me,” returned Mrs. Wilfer, with | a 
 
 dreadful solemnity, ‘‘ but 1 had not finished.” 
 ‘¢ Pray excuse me.” 
 
 **T was about to say,’’ pursued Mrs. Wilfer, - 
 
 who clearly had not had the faintest idea of say- 
 ing any thing more: ‘‘ that when I use the term 
 attractions, I do so with the qualification that I 
 do not mean it in any way whatever.” 
 
 The excellent lady delivered this luminous 
 
 elucidation of her views with an air of greatly 
 obliging her hearers and greatly distinguishing 
 herself. Whereat Miss Bella laughed a scorn- 
 ful little laugh, and said: | 
 
 “‘ Quite enough about this, I am sure, on all 
 sides. Have the goodness, Mr. Rokesmith, to 
 give my love to Mrs. Boffin—” 
 
 ‘¢Pardon me!” cried Mrs. Wilfer. 
 pliments.” Y 
 
 ‘*Love!” repeated Bella, with a little stamp 
 of her foot. ; 
 
 ‘¢ Com- 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 **No!” said Mrs. Wilfer, monotonously. 
 *¢ Compliments.” 
 
 (‘*Say Miss Wilfer’s love, and Mrs. Wilfer’s 
 compliments,” the Secretary proposed, as a com- 
 promise. ) 
 
 ** And I shall be very glad to come when she 
 is ready for me. ‘The sooner the better.” 
 
 **One last word, Bella,” said Mrs. Wilfer, 
 
 ‘‘before descending to the family apartment. 
 
 I trust that as a child of mine you will ever be 
 sensible that it will be graceful in you, when as- 
 sociating with Mr. and Mrs. Boffin. upon equal 
 terms, to remember that the Secretary, Mr. 
 Rokesmith, as your father’s lodger, has a claim 
 on your good word.” 
 
 The condescension with which Mrs. Wilfer de- 
 livered this proclamation of patronage was as 
 wonderful as the swiftness with which the lodger 
 had lost caste in the Secretary. He smiled as 
 
 the mother retired down stairs; but his face fell, 
 
 as the daughter followed. 
 
 ‘*So insolent, so trivial, so capricious, so mer- 
 cenary, so careless, so hard to touch, so hard to 
 turn!” he said, bitterly. 
 
 And added as he went up stairs. 
 80 pretty, so pretty!” 
 
 And added presently, as he walked to and fro 
 in hisroom. ‘‘ And if she knew!’ 
 
 She knew that he was shaking the house by 
 his walking to and fro; and she declared it an- 
 other of the miseries of being poor, that you 
 couldn’t get rid of a haunting Secretary, stump 
 —stump—stumping overhead in the dark, like 
 a Ghost. 
 
 *¢ And yet 
 
 BESTE ARES SRS ERE ALS. 
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 A DISMAL SWAMP. 
 
 AND now, in the blooming summer days, be- 
 hold Mr, and Mrs. Boffin established in the-em- 
 inently aristocratic family mansion, and behold 
 all manner of crawling, creeping, fluttering, and 
 buzzing creatures, attracted by the gold dust of 
 the Golden Dustman! 
 
 Foremost among those leaving cards at the 
 eminently aristocratic door before it is quite 
 painted are the Veneerings: out of breath, one 
 might imagine, from the impetuosity of their 
 rush to the eminently aristocratic steps. One 
 -copper-plate Mrs. Veneering, two copper-plate 
 Mr. Veneerings, and a connubial copper-plate 
 Mr. and Mrs. Veneering, requesting the honor 
 of Mr. and Mrs, Boffin’s company at dinner 
 with the utmost Analytical solemnities. The 
 * enchanting Lady Tippins leaves acard. Twem- 
 _ low leavescards. A tall custard-colored phaeton 
 tooling up in a solemn manner leaves four cards; 
 to wit, a couple of Mr. Podsnaps, a Mrs. Pod- 
 snap, and a Miss Podsnap. All the world and 
 his wife and daughter leave cards. Sometimes 
 the world’s wife has so many daughters that her 
 card reads rather like a Miscellaneous Lot at an 
 Auction; comprising Mrs. Tapkins, Miss Tap- 
 kins, Miss.Frederica Tapkins, Miss Antonina 
 Tapkins, Miss Malvina Tapkins, and Miss Eu- 
 phemia Tapkins; at the same time, the same 
 lady leaves the card of Mrs. Henry George Al- 
 fred Swoshle, née Tapkins: also, a card, Mrs. 
 Tapkins at Home, Wednesdays, Music, Portland 
 Place. 
 
 Miss Bella Wilfer becomes_an inmate, for an 
 
 / 
 
 101 
 
 indefinite period, of the eminently aristocratic 
 dwelling. Mrs. Boffin bears Miss Bella away 
 to her Milliner’s and Dress-maker’s, and she gets 
 beautifully. dressed. The Vencerings find with 
 swift remorse that they have omitted to invite 
 Miss Bella Wilfer. One Mrs. Veneering and 
 one Mr. and Mrs. Veneering requesting that ad- 
 ditional honor, instantly do penance in white 
 cardboard on the hall table. Mrs, Tapkins like- 
 wise discovers her omission, and with prompti- 
 tude repairs it; for herself, for Miss Tapkins, 
 for Miss Frederica Tapkins, for Miss Antonina 
 Tapkins, for Miss Malvina Tapkins, and for Miss 
 Kuphemia Tapkins. Likewise, for Mrs. Henry 
 George Alfred Swoshle, née Tapkins. Likewise, 
 for Mrs. Tapkins at Home, Wednesdays, Music, 
 Portland Place. 
 
 Tradesmen’s books hunger, and tradesmen’s 
 mouths water, for the gold dust of the Golden 
 Dustman. As Mrs. Boffin and Miss Wilfer drive 
 out, or as Mr. Boffin walks out at his jog-trot 
 pace, the fishmonger pulls off his hat with an 
 air of reverence founded on conviction. His 
 men cleanse their fingers on their woolen aprons 
 before presuming to touch their foreheads to Mr. 
 Boffin or Lady. The gaping salmon and the 
 golden mullet lying on the slab seem to turn up 
 their eyes sidewise, as they would turn up their 
 hands, if they had any, in worshiping admira- 
 tion. The butcher, though a portly and a pros- 
 perous man, doesn’t know what to do with him- 
 self, so anxious is he to express humility when 
 discovered by the passing Boffins taking the air 
 in a mutton grove. Presents are made to the 
 Boffin servants, and bland strangers with busi- 
 ness-cards meeting said servants in the street, 
 offer hypothetical corruption. As, “ Supposing 
 I was to be favored with an order from Mr. Bof- 
 fin, my dear friend, it would be worth my while’ 
 ——to do a certain thing that I hope might not 
 prove wholly disagreeable to your feelings. 
 
 But no one knows so well as the Secretary, 
 who opens and reads the letters, what a set is 
 made at the man marked by a stroke of notori- 
 ety. Oh the varieties of dust for ocular use of- 
 fered in exchange for the gold dust of the Golden 
 Dustman! Fifty-seven churches to be erected 
 with half-crowns, forty-two parsonage houses to 
 be repaired with shillings, seven-and-twenty or- 
 gans to be built with half-pence, twelve hundred 
 children to be brought up on postage stamps. 
 Not that a half-crown, shilling, ha'i-penny, or 
 postage stamp would be particularly acceptable 
 from Mr. Boftin, but that it is so obvious he is 
 the man to make up the deficiency. And then 
 the charities, my Christian brother! And most- 
 ly in difficulties, yet mostly lavish, too, in the 
 expensive articles of print and paper. Large fat 
 private double letter, sealed with ducal coronet. 
 ‘* Nicodemus Boffin, Esquire. My Dear Sir,— 
 Having consented to preside at the forthcoming 
 Annual Dinner of the Family Party Fund, and 
 feeling deeply impressed with the immense use- 
 fulness of that noble Institution and the great 
 importance of its being supported by a List of 
 Stewards that shall prove to the public the in- 
 terest taken in it by popular and distinguished 
 men, I have undertaken to ask you to become 
 a Steward on that occasion. Soliciting your 
 favorable reply before the 14th instant, I am, 
 My Dear Sir, Your faithful Servant, Linsrrp. 
 P.S. The Steward’s fee is limitcd to three Guin- 
 
102 
 
 eas.” Friendly this, on the part of the Duke of 
 Linseed (and thoughtful in the postscript), only 
 lithographed by the hundred and presenting but 
 a pale individuality of address to Nicodemus 
 Boffin, Esquire, in quite another hand. It takes 
 two noble Earls and a Viscount, combined, to 
 inform Nicodemus Boffin, Esquire, in an equally 
 flattering manner, that an estimable lady in the 
 West of England has offered to present a purse 
 containing twenty pounds, to the Society for 
 Granting Annuities to Unassuming Members of 
 the Middle Classes, if twenty individuals will 
 previously present purses of one hundred pounds 
 each. And those benevolent noblemen very kind- 
 ly point out that if Nicodemus Boffin, Esquire, 
 should wish to present two or more purses, it 
 will not be inconsistent with the design of the 
 estimable lady in the West of England, provided 
 each purse be coupled with the name of some 
 member of his honored and respected family. 
 These are the corporate beggars. But there 
 are, besides, the individual beggars; and how 
 does the heart of the Secretary fail him when he 
 has to cope with then! And they must be coped 
 with to some extent, because they all inclose 
 documents (they call their scraps documents; 
 but they are, as to papers deserving the name, 
 what minced veal is to a calf), the non-return 
 of which would be their ruin. That is to say, 
 they are utterly ruined now, but they would be 
 more utterly ruined then. Among these corre- 
 spondents are several daughters of general of- 
 ficers, long accustomed to every luxury of life 
 (except spelling), who little thought, when their 
 gallant fathers waged war in the Peninsula, that 
 they would ever have to appeal to those whom 
 Providence, in its inscrutable wisdom, has bless- 
 ed with untold gold, and from among whom they 
 select the name of Nicodemus Boffin, Esquire, 
 for a maiden effort in this wise, understanding 
 that he has such a heart as never was. The 
 Secretary learns, too, that confidence between 
 man and wife would seem to obtain but rarely 
 when virtue is in distress, so numerous are the 
 wives who take up their pens to ask Mr. Boffin 
 for money without the knowledge of their de- 
 voted husbands, who would never permit it; 
 while, on the other hand, so numerous are the 
 husbands who take up their pens to ask Mr. 
 - Boffin for money without the knowledge of their 
 devoted wives, who would instantly go out of 
 their senses if they had the least suspicion of the 
 circumstance. ‘There are the inspired beggars, 
 too. These were sitting, only yesterday evening, 
 musing over a fragment of candle which must 
 soon go out and leave them in the dark for the 
 rest of their nights, when surely some Angel 
 whispered the name of Nicodemus Boffin, Es- 
 quire, to their souls, imparting rays of hope, nay 
 confidence, to which they had long been stran- 
 gers! Akin td these are the suggestively-be- 
 friended beggars, They were partaking of a 
 cold potato and water by the flickering and 
 gloomy light of a lucifer-match, in their lodg- 
 ings (rent considerably in arrear, and heartless 
 landlady threatening expulsion ‘‘like a dog” into 
 the streets), when a gifted friend happening to 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 look in, said, ‘‘ Write immediately to Nicodemus 
 Boffin, Esquire,” and would take no denial. 
 There are the- nobly independent beggars too. 
 ‘These, in the days of their abundance, ever re- 
 garded gold as dross, and have not yet got over 
 that only impediment in the way of their amass- 
 ing wealth, but they want no dross from Nico- 
 demus Boffin, Esquire; No, Mr. Boffin; the 
 world may term it pride, paltry pride if you 
 will, but they wouldn’t take it if you offered it ; 
 a loan, Sir—for fourteen weeks to the day, in- 
 terest calculated at the rate of five per cent. per 
 annum, to be bestowed upon any charitable in- 
 stitution you may name—is all they want of 
 you, and if you have the meanness to refuse it, 
 count on being despised by these. great spirits. 
 
 There are the beggars of punctual business-hab-. 
 
 its too. These will make an end of themselves 
 at a quarter to one P.M. on Tuesday, if no Post. 
 office order is in the interim received from Nic- 
 odemus Boffin, Esquire; arriving after a quarter 
 to one p.m. on ‘Tuesday, it need not be sent, as 
 
 they will then (having made an exact memoran= 
 
 dum of the heartless cireumstanees) be ‘‘ cold in 
 death.”” ‘There are the beggars on horseback 
 too, in another sense from the sense of the proy- 
 erb, These are mounted and ready to start on 
 the highway to affluence. The goal is before 
 them, the road is in the best condition, their 
 spurs are on, the steed is willing, but, at the 
 last moment, for want of some special thing—a 
 clock, a violin, an astronomical telescope, an 
 electrifying machine—they must dismount for- 
 ever, unless they receive its equivalent in money 
 from Nicodemus Boffin, Esquire. Less given to 
 detail are the beggars who make sporting ven- 
 tures. ‘These, usually to be addressed in reply 
 under initials at a country post-office, inquire in 
 feminine hands, Dare one who can not disclose 
 herself to Nicodemus Boffin, Esquire, but whose 
 name might startle him were it revealed, solicit 
 the immediate advance of two hundred pounds 
 from unexpected riches exercising their no- 
 blest privilege in the trust of a common human- 
 ity ? 
 
 Tn such a Dismal Swamp does the new house 
 stand, and through it does the Secretary daily 
 struggle breast-high. Not to mention all. the 
 people alive who have made inventions that won’t 
 act, and all the jobbers who job in all the job- 
 beries jobbed; though these may be regarded as 
 the Alligators of the Dismal Swamp, and are al- 
 ways lying by to drag the Golden Dustman un- 
 der 
 
 But the old house. There are no designs 
 against the Golden Dustman there? There are 
 no fish of the shark tribe in the Bower waters ? 
 Perhaps not. Still, Wegg is established there, 
 and would seem, judged by his secret proceed- 
 ings, to cherish a notion of making a discovery. 
 For, when a man with a wooden leg lies prone 
 on his stomach to peep under bedsteads; and 
 hops up ladders, like some extinct bird, to sur- 
 vey the tops of presses and cupboards; and pro- 
 vides himself an iron rod which he is always 
 
 poking and prodding into dust-mounds; the . 
 
 probability is that he expects to find something. 
 
 pees 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 BOOK I1—BIRDS 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 OF AN EDUCATIONAL CHARACTER. 
 
 Tue school at which young Charley Hexam 
 had first learned from a book—the streets be- 
 ing, for pupils of his degree, the great Prepara- 
 tory Establishment in which very much that is 
 
 never unlearned is learned without and before 
 hook—was a miserable loft in an unsavory yard. 
 Its atmosphere was oppressive and disagreeable ; 
 it was crowded, noisy, and confusing; half the 
 pupils dropped asleep, or fell into a state of 
 waking stupefaction ; the other half kept them 
 in either condition by maintaining a monoto- 
 nous droning noise, as if they were performing 
 Out of time and tune, on a ruder sort of bag- 
 pipe. The teachers, animated solely by good 
 ‘intentions, had no idea of execution, and a lam- 
 entable jumble was the upshot of their kind en- 
 deavors. 
 
 It was a school for all ages, and for both sex- 
 es. ‘The latter were kept apart, and the former 
 were partitioned off into square assortments. 
 Bat all the place was pervaded by a grimly In- 
 dicrous pretense that every pupil was childish 
 and innocent. This pretense, much favored by 
 the lady-visitors, led to the ghastliest absurdi- 
 ties. Young women old in the vices of the 
 commonest and worst life, were expected to pro- 
 fess themselves enthralled by the good child’s 
 book, the Adventures of Little Margery, who 
 resided in the village cottage by the mill; se- 
 verely reproved and morally squashed the mil- 
 ler, when she was five and he was fifty; divided 
 her porridge with singing birds; denied herself 
 
 “a new nankeen bonnet, on the ground that the 
 turnips did not wear nankeen bonnets, neither 
 did the sheep who ate them; who plaited straw 
 and delivered the dreariest orations to all com- 
 ers, at all sorts of unseasonable times. So, un- 
 wieldy young dredgers and hulking mud-larks 
 were referred to the experiences of Thomas 
 Twopence, who, having resolved not to rob (un- 
 der circumstances of uncommon atrocity) his 
 particular friend and benefactor, of eighteen- 
 pence, presently came into supernatural posses- 
 ‘sion of three and sixpence, and lived a shining 
 light ever afterward. (Note, that the benefac- 
 tor came to no good.) Several swaggering sin- 
 ners had written their own biographies in the 
 same strain; it always appearing from the les- 
 sons of those very boastful persons, that you 
 were to do good, not because it was good, but 
 because you were to. make a good thing of it. 
 Contrariwise, the adult pupils were taught to 
 Yead (if they could Jearn) out of the New Testa- 
 ment; and by dimt of stumbling over the sylla- 
 bles and keeping their bewildered eyes on the 
 particular syllables coming round to their turn, 
 were as absolutely ignorant of the sublime his- 
 tory, as if they had never seen or heard of it. 
 An exceedingly and confoundingly perplexing 
 jumble of a school, in fact, where black spirits 
 and gray, red spirits and white, jumbled jum- 
 
 103 
 
 OF A FEATHER. 
 
 bled jumbled jumbled, jumbled every night. 
 And particularly every Sunday night. For then, 
 an inclined plane of unfortunate infants would 
 be handed over to the prosiest and worst of all 
 the teachers with good intentions, whom nobody 
 older would endure. Who, taking his stand on 
 the floor before them as chief exccutioner, would 
 be attended by a conventional volunteer boy as 
 executioncr’s assistant. When and where it first 
 became the conventional system that a weary or 
 inattentive infant in a class must have its face 
 smoothed downward with a hot hand, or when 
 and where the conventional volunteer boy first 
 beheld such system in operation, and became in- 
 flamed with a sacred zeal to administer it, mate 
 ters not. It was the function of the chief exe- 
 cutioner to hold forth, and it was the function 
 of the acolyte to dart at sleeping infants, yawn- 
 ing infants, restless infants, whimpering infants, 
 and smooth their wretched faces; sometimes 
 with one hand, as if he were anointing them for 
 a whisker ; sometimes with both hands, applied 
 after the fashion of blinkers. And so the jum- 
 ble would be in action in this department for a 
 mortal hour; the exponent drawling on to My 
 Dearerr Childerrenerr, let us say, for example, 
 about the beautiful coming to the Sepulchre ; 
 and repeating the word Sepulchre (commonly 
 used among infants) five hundred times, and 
 never once hinting what it meant; the conven- 
 tional boy smoothing. away right and left, as an 
 infallible commentary; the whole hot-bed of 
 flushed and exhausted infants exchanging mea- 
 sles, rashes, whooping-cough, fever, and stomach 
 disorders, as if they were assembled in High 
 Market for the purpose. 
 
 Even in this temple of good intentions, an ex- 
 ceptionally sharp boy exceptionally determined 
 to learn, could learn something, and, having 
 learned it, could impart it much better than the 
 teachers; as being more knowing than they, and 
 not at the disadvantage in which they stood to- 
 ward the shrewder pupils. In this way it. had) 
 come about that Charley Hexam had risen in 
 the jumble, taught in the jumble, and been re- 
 ceived from the jumble into a better school. 
 
 ‘*So.you want to go and see your sister, Hex- 
 am ?” 
 
 ‘* If you please, Mr. Headstone.” 
 
 ‘* Thave half a mind to go with you. 
 does your sister live ?” 
 
 ‘Why, she is not settled yet, Mr. Headstone. 
 I’d rather you didn’t see her till she is settled, 
 if it was all the same to you.” - 
 
 ‘* Look here, Hexam.”: Mr. Bradley Head- 
 stone, highly certificated stipendiary schoolmas- 
 ter, drew his right forefinger through one of the 
 button-holes of the boy’s coat, and looked at it 
 attentively. ‘‘I hope your sister may be good 
 comiany for you ?” 
 
 ‘Why do you doubt it, Mr. Headstone?” 
 
 **T did not say I donbted it.” 
 
 ‘* No, Sir; you didn’t say so.” 
 Bradvey Headstone looked at his finger again, 
 
 Where 
 
104 
 
 closer, bit the side of it and looked at it again. 
 
 ‘You see, Ilexam, you will be one of us. In 
 good time you are sure to pass a creditable ex- 
 Then the 
 
 amination and become one of us. 
 question is-—” 
 
 The boy waited so long for the question, while 
 the schoolmaster looked at a new side of his fin- 
 ger, and bit it, and looked at it again, that at 
 
 length the boy repeated : 
 ‘The question is, Sir—?” 
 
 ‘‘Whether you had not better leave well 
 
 alone.”’ 
 
 “Ts it well to leave my sister alone, Mr. 
 
 Headstone ?” 
 
 ‘*T do not say so, because I do not know. I 
 I want 
 You know how well you are 
 
 put it to you. ITask you to think of it. 
 you to consider. 
 doing here.” 
 
 “After all, she got me here,” said the boy, 
 
 with a struggle. 
 
 ‘*Perceiving the necessity of it,” acquiesced 
 the schoolmaster, ‘‘and making up her mind 
 
 Yes.” 
 
 fully to the separation. 
 
 The boy, with a return of that former reluct- 
 ance or struggle or whatever it was, seemed to 
 At length he said, raising 
 
 debate with himself. 
 nis eyes to the master’s face: 
 ‘‘{ wish you’d come with me and see her, 
 
 Mr. Headstone, though she is-not settled. I 
 wish you’d come with me, and take her in the 
 
 rough, and judge her for yourself.” 
 
 “You are sure you would not like,” asked 
 
 the schoolmaster, ‘‘to prepare her?” 
 
 **My sister Lizzie,” said the boy, proudly, 
 ‘‘wants no preparing, Mr. Headstone. 
 she is, she is, and shows herself to be. 
 no pretending about my sister.” 
 
 His confidence in her sat more easily upon 
 him than the indecision with which he had 
 twice contended. It was his better nature to 
 be true to her, if it were his worse nature to be 
 wholly selfish. And as yet the better nature 
 had the stronger hold. 
 
 ‘‘Well, I can spare the evening,” said the 
 schoolmaster. ‘‘I am ready to walk with you.” 
 
 ‘“'Phank you, Mr. Headstone. And I am 
 ready to go.” 
 
 Bradley Headstone, in his decent black coat 
 and waistcoat, and decent white shirt, and de- 
 
 scent formal black tie, and decent pantaloons of 
 pepper and salt, with his decent silver watch in 
 his pocket and its decent hair-guard round his 
 neck, looked a thoroughly decent young man 
 of six-and-twenty.. He was never seen in any 
 other dress, and yet there was a certain stiffness 
 in his manner of wearing this, as if there were a 
 want of adaptation between him and it, recall- 
 ing some mechanics in their holiday clothes. 
 He had acquired mechanically a great store of 
 teacher’s knowledge. He could do mental arith- 
 metic mechanically, sing at sight mechanical- 
 ly, blow various wind instruments mechanical- 
 ly, even play the great church organ mechanic- 
 ally. From his early childhood up, his mind 
 had been a place of mechanical stowage. 
 arrangement of his wholesale warehouse, so that 
 it might be always ready to meet the demands 
 of retail dealers—history here, geography there, 
 astronomy to the right, political economy to the 
 left—natural history, the physical sciences, fig- 
 ures, music, the lower mathematics, and what 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 took it out of the button-hole and looked at it 
 
 What 
 
 There's | stone and young Charley Hexam that autumn © 
 
 The: 
 
 not, all in their several places—this care had 
 imparted to his countenance a look of care; | 
 while the habit of questioning and heing ques- | 
 tioned had given him a suspicious manner, or a 
 manner that would be better described as one — 
 of lying in wait, ‘There was a kind of settled — 
 trouble in the face. It was the face belonging | 
 to a naturally slow or inattentive intellect that > 
 had toiled hard to get what it had won, and | 
 that had to hold it now that it was gotten. He 
 always seemed to be uneasy lest any thing should © 
 be missing from his mental warehouse, and tak. 
 ing stock to assure himself. 8 
 
 Suppression of so much to make room for so _ 
 much had given him a constrained manner, © 
 over and above. Yet there was enough of what 7” 
 was animal, and of what was fiery (though © 
 smouldering), still visible in him, to suggest that | 
 if young Bradley Headstone, when a pauper lad, © 
 had chanced to be told off for the sea, he would © 
 not have been the last man in a ship's crew. © 
 Regarding that origin of his, he was proud,” 
 moody, and sullen, desiring it to be forgotten, ~ 
 And few people knew of it. , 
 
 In'some visits to the Jumble his attention had 
 been attracted to this bby Hexam. An undeni-_ 
 able boy for a pupil-teacher ; an undeniable boy © 
 to do credit to the master who should bring him 7 
 on. Combined with this consideration, there ~ 
 may have been some thought of the pauper lad 7 
 now never to be mentioned. Be that how it 7 
 might, he had with pains gradually worked the ~ 
 boy into his own school, and procured him some — 
 offices to discharge there, which were repaid ~ 
 with food and lodging. Such were the circum- 7 
 stances that had brought together Bradley Head- — 
 
 evening.. Autumn, because full half a year had 
 come and gone since the bird of prey lay dead — 
 upon the river-shore. 
 
 The schools—for they were twofold, as the 7 
 sexes—were down in that district of the flat. 
 country tending to the Thames, where Kent 
 and Surrey meet, and where the railways still 7 
 bestride the market-gardens that will soon die 
 under them. The schools were newly built, and | 
 there were so many like them all over the coun-_ 
 try that one might have thought the whole were © 
 but one restless edifice with the locomotive gift 7 
 of Aladdin’s palace. They were in a neighbor-_ 
 hood which looked like a toy neighborhood taken 
 in blocks out of a box by a child of particularly” 
 incoherent mind, and set up any how; here, one _ 
 side of a new street; there, a large solitary pubs 
 lic house facing nowhere; here, another unfin- 
 ished street already in ruins; there, a church; 
 here, an immense new warehouse; there, a di- 
 lapidated old country villa; then, a medley of © 
 black ditch, sparkling cucumber - frame, rank 
 field, richly cultivated kitchen-garden, brick 
 viaduct, arch-spanned canal, and disorder of 
 frowziness and fog. As if the child had given 
 the table a kick, and gone to sleep. q 
 
 But, even among school- buildings, school- 
 teachers, and school-pupils, all according to pats _ 
 tern and all engendered in the light of the latest — 
 Gospel according to Monotony, the older pattern — 
 into which so many fortunes have been shaped — 
 for good and evil, comes out. It came out in 
 Miss Peecher the schoolmistress, watering her — 
 flowers, as Mr. Bradley Headstone walked forth. 
 It came out in Miss Peecher the schoolmistres 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 watering the flowers in the little dusty bit of 
 
 garden attached to her small official residence, | 
 
 _ with little windows like the eyes in needies, and 
 
 _ little doors like the covers of school books. 
 
 Small, shining, neat, methodical, and buxom 
 was Miss Peecher: cherry-cheeked and tuneful 
 
 of voice. <A little pin-cushion, a little housewife, 
 
 ‘a little book, a little work-box, a little set of ta- 
 bles and weights and measures, and a little wo- 
 man, all in one. She could write a little essay 
 on any subject, exactly a slate long, beginning 
 
 at the left-hand top of one side and ending at 
 the right-hand bottom of the other, and the es- 
 
 “say should be strictly according to rule. : 
 Bradley Headstone had addressed a written pro- 
 posal of marriage to-her, she would probably 
 have replied in a complete little essay on the 
 themg exactly a slate long, but would certainly 
 
 have replied Yes. For she loved _him.. The de- 
 cent hair-guard that: went round his neck and 
 took care of his decent silver watch was an ob- 
 ject of envy to her. So would Miss Peecher 
 have gone round his neck and taken care of 
 
 ‘him. Of him, insensible. Because he did not 
 love Miss Peecher. 
 
 Miss Peecher’s favorite pupil, who assisted 
 
 - her in her little household, was in attendance 
 with a can of water to replenish her little wa- 
 tering-pot, and sufficiently divined the state of 
 
 Miss Peecher’s affections to feel it necessary 
 that she herself should love young Charley Hex- 
 am. So there was a double palpitation among 
 the double stocks and double wall-flowers when 
 the master and the boy looked over the little 
 gate. | 
 
 ‘‘A fine evening, Miss Peecher,” said the 
 Master. 
 
 ___‘*A very fine evening, Mr. Headstone,” said 
 
 Miss Peecher. ‘‘ Are you taking a walk ?” 
 
 ‘* Hexam and I are going to take a long walk.” 
 
 ‘“*Charming weather,” remarked Miss Peech- 
 
 -er, ‘‘ for a long walk.” . 
 
 ** Ours is rather on business than mere pleas- 
 ure,” said the Master. 
 
 Miss Peecher inverting her watering-pot, and 
 very carefully shaking out the few last drops over 
 a flower, as if there were some special virtue in 
 them which would make it a Jack’s bean-stalk 
 before morning, called for replenishment to her 
 pupil, who had been speaking to the boy. 
 
 **Good-night, Miss Peecher,” said the Master. 
 
 **Good-night, Mr, Headstone,” said the Mis- 
 tress. 
 
 The pupil had been, in her state of pupilage, 
 so imbued with the class-custom of stretching 
 out an arm, as if to hail a cab or omnibus, when- 
 
 ever she found she had an observation on hand 
 
 to offer to Miss Peecher, that she often did it in 
 their domestic relations; and she did it now. 
 
 _ Well, Mary Anne?” said Miss Peecher. 
 
 “If you please, ma’am, Hexam said they were 
 going to see his sister.” 
 
 _» “*But that can’t be, I.think,” returned Miss 
 Peecher : ‘‘ because Mr. Headstone can have no 
 business with her.” 
 
 _ Mary Anne again hailed. 
 
 _ “Well, Mary Anne?” } . 
 _ “Tf you please, ma’am, perhaps it’s Hexam’s 
 business ?” Mins 4 
 ___‘*That may be,” said Miss Peecher. ‘I 
 didn’t think of that. Not that it matters at 
 all.” mm 
 7 
 
 oer. 
 
 105 
 
 Mary Anne again hailed. 
 
 ** Well, Mary Anne ?” 
 
 ‘“They say she’s very handsome.” 
 
 ‘*Oh, Mary Anne, Mary Anne!” returned 
 Miss Peecher, slightly coloring and shaking her 
 head, a little out of humor; ‘how often have I 
 told you not to use that vague expression, not 
 to speak in that general way? When you say 
 they say, what do you mean? Part of speech 
 They ?” 
 
 Mary Anne hooked her right arm behind her 
 in her left hand, as being under examination, 
 and replied: 
 
 ‘¢ Personal pronoun.” 
 
 ‘* Person, ‘They ?” 
 
 ‘<'Third person.” 
 
 ‘¢ Number, They ?” 
 
 * Plural number.” 
 
 “Then how many do you mean, Mary Anne? 
 
 Two? Or more?” 
 
 ‘“‘I beg your pardon, ma’am,” said Mary 
 Anne, disconcerted now she came to think of 
 it; ‘*but I don’t know that IL mean more than 
 her brother himself.” As she said it, she un- 
 hooked her arm. 
 
 ‘*I felt convinced of it,” returned Miss Peech- 
 er, smiling again. ‘Now pray, Mary Anne, be 
 careful another time. He says-is very different 
 from they say, remember. Difference between 
 he says and they say? Give it me.” 
 
 Mary Anne immediately hooked her right arm 
 behind her in her left hand—an attitude abso- 
 lutely necessary to the situation—and replied: 
 **Qne is indicative mood, present tense, third 
 person singular, verb active to say. Other is 
 indicative mood, present. tense, third person 
 plural, verb active to say.” 
 
 **’Why verb active, Mary Anne?” 
 
 ** Because it takes a pronoun after it in the 
 objective case, Miss Peecher.” 
 
 ‘‘ Very good indeed,” remarked Miss Peecher, 
 with encouragement. ‘‘In fact, could not be | 
 better. Don’t forget to apply it, another time, ~ 
 Mary Anne.” This said, Miss Peecher finished 
 the watering of her flowers, and went into her 
 little official residence, and took a refresher of 
 the principal rivers and mountains of the world, 
 their breadths, depths, and heights, before set- 
 tling the measurements of the body of a dress. 
 for her own personal occupation. 
 
 Bradley Headstone and Charley Hexam duly 
 got to the Surrey side of Westminster Bridge, 
 and crossed the bridge, and made along the 
 Middlesex shore toward Millbank. In this re- 
 gion are a certain little street called Church 
 Street, and a certain little blind square, called 
 Smith Square, in the centre of which last re- 
 treat is a very hideous church with four towers 
 at the four corners, generally resembling some 
 petrified monster, frightful and gigantic, on its 
 back, with its legs in the air. ‘They found a tree 
 near by in a corner, and a blacksmith’s forge,. 
 and a timber-yard, and a dealer’s in old iron.. 
 What a rusty portion of a boiler and a great 
 iron wheel or so meant by lying half buried in 
 the dealer’s fore-court, nobody seemed to know 
 or to want to know. Like the Miller of ques- 
 tionable jollity in the song, They cared. for No=. 
 body, no not they, and Nobody cared for them. 
 
 After making the round of this place, and note 
 ing that there was a deadly kind of repose on it, 
 more as though it had taken laudanum than 
 
106 
 
 point where the street and the square joined, 
 and where there were some little quiet houses in 
 arow. ‘To these Charley Hexam finally led the 
 Way, and at one of these stopped. 
 
 ‘‘This must be where my sister lives, Sir. 
 This is where she came for a temporary lodging 
 soon after father’s death.” 
 
 ‘* How often have you seen her since ?” 
 
 ‘*Why, only twice, Sir,” returned the boy, 
 with his former reluctance ; ‘* but that’s as much 
 her doing as mine.” 
 
 ‘* How does she support herself?” 
 
 ‘* She was always a fair needle-woman, and 
 she keeps the stock-room of a seaman’s out- 
 fitter.” 
 
 ‘Does she ever work at her own lodging | 
 
 here ?” 
 
 ‘* Sometimes ; but her regular hours and reg- 
 ular occupation are at their place of business, I 
 believe, Sir. This is the number.” 
 
 The boy knocked at a door, and the door 
 promptly opened with a spring and a chek. <A 
 parlor door within a small entry stood open, and 
 disclosed a child—a dwarf—a girl—a something 
 —sitting on a little low old-fashioned arm-chair, 
 which had a kind of little working-bench be- 
 fore it. 
 
 ‘I can’t get up,” said the child, ‘* because my 
 back’s bad, and my legs are queer. But I’m the 
 person of the house.” 
 
 **Who else is at home ?”’ asked Charley Hex- 
 am, staring. 
 
 ‘* Nobody’s at home at present,” returned the 
 child, with a glib assertion of her dignity, ‘ex- 
 cept the person of the house. What did you 
 Want, young man?” 
 
 ‘| wanted to see my sister.” 
 
 ** Many young men have sisters,” returned the 
 child, ‘Give me your name, young man.” 
 
 The queer little figure, and the queer but not 
 
 ugly little face, with its bright gray eyes, were | 
 
 so sharp, that the sharpness of the manner secem- 
 ed unavoidable. As if, being turned out of that 
 mould. ic must be sharp. 
 
 ** Hexam is my name.” 
 
 ‘* Ah, indeed ?” said the person of the house. 
 “J thought it might be. Your sister will be in 
 in about a quarter of an hour. I am_ very fond 
 of your sister. Shc’s my particular friend. 
 Take a seat. And this genth:man’s name ?” 
 
 **Mr. Headstone, my schoolmaster.” 
 
 ‘Take aseat. And would vou please to shut 
 the street door first? I can’t very well do it 
 myself, because my back’s so bad, and my legs 
 are so queer,” 
 
 They complied in silence, and the little fignre 
 went on with its work of gumming or gluing to- 
 gether with a camel’s-hair brush certain picces 
 of card-board and thin wood, previously ent into 
 various shapes, The scissors and knives upon 
 the bench showed that the child herself had cut 
 them; and the bright scraps of velvet and silk 
 and ribbon also strewn upon the bench showed 
 that when duly stuffed (and stuffing too was 
 there), she was to cover them smartly. The 
 dexterity of her nimble fingers was remarkable, 
 and, as she brought two thin edges accurately 
 together by giving them a little bite, she would 
 
 gray eyes with a look that out-sharpened all her 
 other sharpness. : 
 
 ‘ders and shook her head. 
 
 ‘all night. 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 fallen into a natural rest, they stopped at the | ‘You can’t tell me the name of my trade, V'll 
 
 be bound,’’she said, after taking several of these 
 observations. 
 ‘¢You make pin-cushions,”’ said Charley, 
 ‘What else do I make?” 
 ‘* Pen-wipers,” said Bradley Headstone. 
 ‘Hal. ha! 
 a schoolmaster, but you can’t tell me.” 
 ‘*You do something,” he returned, pointing 
 
 to a corner of the little bench, ‘‘ with straw; but 
 
 I don’t know what.” 
 
 ** Well done you!” cried the person of the 
 house. ‘I only make pin-cushions and pen- 
 wipers to use up my waste, But my straw really 
 
 do | make with my straw ?” 
 
 *¢ Dinner-mats ?” 
 
 ** A schoolmaster, and says dinner-mats! Ill 
 give you a clew to my trade in a game of for- 
 feits. . I love my love with a B because she’s 
 Beautiful; I hate my love with a B because she 
 is Brazen; I took her to the sign of- the Blue 
 Boar, and I treated her with Bonnets; her 
 
 /name’s Bouncer, and she lives in Bedlam.— 
 
 Now, what do I make with my straw ?” 
 ’ “* Ladies’ bonnets ?” 
 
 ‘Fine ladies’,” said the person of the house, 
 nodding assent. ‘Dolls’. I’m a Doll’s Dress- 
 maker.” 
 
 “*T hope it’s a good business ?” 
 
 The person of the house shrugged her shoul- 
 ‘No. Poorly paid. 
 And I’m often so pressed for time! I had a 
 doll married, last week, and was obliged to work 
 And it’s not good for me, on account 
 of my back being so bad and my legs so queer.” 
 
 They looked at the little creature with a won- 
 der that did not diminish, and the schoolmaster 
 said: ‘*I am sorry your fine ladies are so incon- 
 siderate.”’ 
 
 ‘‘It’s the way with them,” said the person 
 of the house, shrugging her shonlders again. 
 ‘‘And they take no care of their clothes, and 
 they never keep to the same fashions a month. 
 I work for a doll with three daughters. Bless 
 you, she’s enough to ruin her husband!) 
 
 The person of the house gave a weird little 
 
 laugh here, and gave them another look out of 
 
 ‘the corners of her eyes. 
 
 | Doll I work for lost a canary-bird.” 
 
 | Hendstone. 
 
 She had an elfin chin 
 that was capable of great expression ; and when- 
 ever she gave this look she hitched this chin up. 
 As if her eyes and her chin worked together on 
 the same wires. 
 ‘‘ Are you always as busy as you are now ?” 
 ‘*Busier. I’m slack just now. I finished a 
 
 What else do I make? You’re | 
 
 does belong to my business. Try again, What - 
 
 large mourning order the day before yesterday. #) 
 
 The per- 
 
 then nodded her head several times, as who 
 should moralize, ‘*Oh this world, this world!” 
 ‘Are you alone all day?” asked Bradley 
 ‘Don’t any of the neighboring 
 children— ?” 
 “Ah, lud!” eried the person of the house, 
 with a little scream, as if the word had pricked 
 
 her. ‘*Don’t talk of children, T-ean’t bear 
 children. J know their tricks and their-man- | 
 ners.” She said this with an angry little shake — 
 
 of her right fist close before her eyes. 
 glance at the visitors out of the corners of her | 
 
 Perhaps it scarcely required the teacher-habit 
 
 to perceive that the doll’s dress-maker was ine 
 
 clined to be bitter on the difference between her 
 
 son of the house gave another little laugh, and — | 
 
 \ 
 
 1a 
 
 | 
 “| 
 | 
 | 
 
 | 
 
 I 
 
 { 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 self and other children. But both master and 
 pupil understood it so. 
 
 ‘* Always running about and screeching, al- 
 ways playing and fighting, always skip-skip-skip- 
 ping on the pavement and chalking it for their 
 games! Oh! J know their tricks and their man- 
 ners!”? Shaking the little fist as before. ‘‘And 
 that’s not all. - Ever so often calling names in 
 through @ person’s keyhole, and imitating a per- 
 ‘son’s back and legs, Oh! JZ know their tricks 
 and their manners. And IYI tell you what I'd 
 do to punish *em. ‘There’s doors under the 
 church in the Square—black doors, leading into 
 black vaults. Well! I'd open one of those doors, 
 and I’d cram ’em all in, and then I’d lock the 
 door and through the keyhole I'd blow in pep- 
 per.” 
 
 “‘What would be the good of blowing i in pep- 
 per?” asked Charley Hexam. 
 
 **'To set ’em sneezing,” said the person of the 
 house, “‘and make their eyes water. And when 
 they were all sneezing and inflamed, I’d mock 
 em through the keyhole. Just as they, with 
 their tricks and their manners, mock a person 
 
 through a person’s keyhole!” 
 
 An uncommonly emphatic shake of her little 
 fist close before her eyes seemed io ease the mind 
 of the person of the house; for she added with 
 recovered composure, ‘‘No, no, no. No chil- 
 dren for me. Give me grown-ups.” 
 
 It was difficult to guess the age of this strange 
 creature, for her poor figure furnished no clew 
 to it, and her face was at once so young and so 
 / old. Twelve, or at the most thirteen, might be 
 _ near the mark. 
 
 **T always did like grown-ups,” she went on, 
 *‘and always kept company with them. So 
 sensible. Sit so quiet. Don’t go prancing and 
 capering about! And I mean always to keep 
 among none but grown-ups till I marry. ‘I sup- 
 pose I must make up my mind to marry one of 
 ‘these days.” 
 
 She listened to a step outside that caught her 
 ear, and there was a soft knock at the door. 
 _ Pulling at a handle within her reach, she said, 
 with a pleased laugh: ‘‘ Now here, for instance, 
 is & grown-up that’s my particular friend!” and 
 Lizzie Hexam in a black dress entered the 
 
 _ room. 
 
 ‘*Charley! You!” 
 
 ‘Taking him to her arms in the old way—of 
 which he seemed a little ashamed—she saw no 
 one else. 
 
 »**' There, there, there, Liz, all right my dear. 
 See! Here’s Mr. Headstone come with me.” 
 Her eyes met those of the schoolmaster, who 
 had evidently expected to see a very different 
 - sort of person, and a murmured word or two of 
 salutation passed between them. She was a 
 little flurried by the unexpected visit, and the 
 schoolmaster was not at his ease. But he never 
 was, quite. 
 
 “T told Mr. Hdatucsre you were not settled, 
 Liz, but he was so kind as to take an interest in 
 coming, and so I brought him. How well you 
 look!” 
 
 Bradley seemed to think so. 
 
 “Ah! Don’t she, don’t she ?” cried the per- 
 son of the house, resuming her occupation, 
 _ though the twilight was falling fast. ‘‘I believe 
 you she does! But go on with your chat, one 
 and all: 
 
 WAS 
 Baars! |.) 
 Y vietes 
 , Way 
 
 107 
 
 ‘You one two three, 
 My com-pa-nie, 
 And don’ t mind me.’ 
 —pointing this impromptu rhyme with three 
 points of her thin forefinger. 
 
 ‘‘T didn’t expect a visit from you, Charley,” 
 said his sister. ‘‘I supposed that if you wanted 
 to see me you would have sent to me, appoint- 
 ing me to come somewhere near the school, as 
 I did last time. I saw my brother near ‘the 
 school, Sir,” to Bradley Headstone, ‘‘ because it’s 
 easier for me to go there than for him to come 
 here. I work about midway between the two 
 places.” 
 
 “You don’t see much of one another,” said 
 Bradley, not improving in respect of ease. 
 
 ‘*No.” With a rather sad shake of her 
 head. “Charley always does well, Mr. Head- 
 stone ?” 
 
 ‘* He could not do better. I regard his course 
 as quite plain before him.” 
 
 ‘‘] hoped so. I am so thankful. So well 
 done of you, Charley dear! It is better for me 
 not to come (except when he wants me) between 
 him and his prospects. You think so, Mr. Head- 
 stone ?”” 
 
 Conscious that his pupil-teacher was looking 
 for his answer, and that he himself had suggested 
 the boy’s keeping aloof from this sister, now seen 
 for the first time face to face, Bradley Head- 
 stone stammered : 
 
 ‘Your brother is very much occupied, you 
 know. He has to work hard. One can not but 
 say that the less his attention is diverted from 
 his work the better for his future. When he 
 shall have established himself, why then—it will 
 be another thing then.” 
 
 Lizzie shook her head again, and returned 
 With a quiet smile: ‘‘I always advised him as 
 you advise him. Did I not, Charley ?” 
 
 ‘* Well, never mind that now,” said the boy. 
 ‘* How are you getting on?” 
 
 ‘Very well, Charley. I want for nothing.” 
 
 “You have your own room here ?” 
 
 ‘*Oh yes. Up Stairs. And it’s quiet, and 
 pleasant, and airy.” 
 
 i And she always has the use of this room for 
 visitors,”’ said the person of the house, screwing 
 up one of her little bony fists, like an opera-glass, 
 and looking through it, with her eyes and her 
 chin in that quaint accordance. ‘‘ Always this 
 room for visitors; haven’t you, Lizzie dear ?” 
 
 It happened that Bradley Headstone noticed 
 a very slight action of Lizzie Hexam’s hand, as 
 though it checked the doll’s dress-maker. And 
 it happened that the latter noticed him in the 
 same instant; for she made a double eye-glass 
 of her two hands, looked at him through it, and 
 cried, with a waggish shake of her head: ‘‘Aha! 
 Canght you spying, did 1?” 
 
 It might have fallen out so, any way; but 
 Bradley Headstone also noticed that immediate- 
 ly after this, Lizzie, who had not taken off her 
 bonnet, rather hurriedly. proposed that as the 
 room was getting dark they should go out into 
 the air. They went out; the visitors saying 
 good-night to the doll’s dress-maker, whom they 
 left leaning back in her chair with her arms 
 crossed, singing to herself in a sweet thoughtful 
 little voice. 
 
 ‘¢T’ll saunter on by the river,” said Bradley. 
 ‘¢You will be glad to talk together.” 
 
108 , 
 
 As his uneasy figure went on before them 
 among the evening shadows the boy said to his 
 sister, petulantly : 
 
 ‘‘When are you going to settle yourself in 
 some Christian sort of place, Liz? I thought 
 you were going to do it before now.” 
 
 ‘I am very well where I am, Charley.” 
 
 ‘* Very well where you are! I am ashamed 
 to have brought Mr. Headstone with me. How 
 came you to get into such company as that ms 
 witch’s ?” : 
 
 ‘By chance at first, as it seemed, Charley. 
 But I think it must have been by something more 
 than chance, for that child— You remember 
 the bills upon the walls at home?” 
 
 “*Confound the bills upon the walls at home! 
 I want to forget the bills upon the walls at home, 
 and it would be better for you to do the same,” 
 grumbled the boy. ‘* Well; what of them?” 
 
 **' This child is the grandchild of the old man.” 
 
 **'What old man ?”’ 
 
 *“The terrible drunken old man in the list 
 slippers and the night-cap.” 
 
 The boy asked, rubbing his nose in a manner 
 that half expressed vexation at hearing so much, 
 and half curiosity to hear more: ‘‘ How came 
 
 ou to make that out? What a girl you are!” 
 
 “The child’s father is employed by the house 
 that employs me; that’s how I came to know it, 
 Charley. The father is like his own father, a 
 weak wretched trembling creature, falling to 
 pieces, never sober. But a good workman too, 
 at the work he does; The mother is dead. 
 This poor ailing little creature has come to be 
 what she is, surrounded by drunken people from 
 her cradle—if she ever had one, Charley.” 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 do, and mean to do. I know whai'I owe you: 
 | I said to Mr. Headstone this very evening, ‘After 
 all, my sister got me here.’ Well, then. Don’t 
 
 pull me back, and hold. me down. ‘That’s all I | 
 ask, and surely that’s not, unconscionable.” 
 
 She had kept a steadfast look upon him, and 
 she answered with composure : 
 
 ‘“‘T am not here selfishly, Charley. To please 
 myself, I could not be too far from that river.” 
 
 ‘Nor could you be too far from it to please 
 me. Let us get quit of itequally.. Why should 
 you linger about it any more than I? I giveita 
 wide berth.” 
 
 ‘*T can’t get away from it, I think,” said 
 Lizzie, passing her hand across her forehead. 
 ‘It’s no purpose of mine that I live by it still.” 
 
 ‘*There you go, Liz! Dreaming again! You 
 lodge yourself of your own accord in a house 
 with a drunken—tailor, I suppose—or something — 
 of the sort, and a little crooked antic of a-child, 
 or old person, or whatever it is, and then you~ 
 talk as if you were drawn or driven there. Now 
 do be more practical.” ; 
 
 She had been practical enough with him, in 
 suffering and striving for him; but she only laid 
 her hand upon his shoulder—not reproachfully 
 —and tapped it twice or thrice. She had been — 
 used to do so, to soothe him when she carried 
 him about, a child as heavy as herself. Tears 
 started to his eyes. : ‘* 
 
 ‘‘Upon my word, Liz,” drawing the back of 
 his hand across them, ‘‘I mean to be a good 
 brother to.you, and to prove that I know what 
 Towe you. All I say is, that I hope you'll con- 
 trol your fancies a little, on my account. Vil 
 get a school, and then you must come and live — 
 
 ‘*T don’t see what you have to do with her, for 
 all that,” said the boy. 
 
 “Don’t you, Charley ?” 
 
 The boy looked doggedly at the river. They 
 were at Millbank, and the river rolled on their 
 left. His sister.gently touched him on the shoul- 
 der, and pointed to it. 
 
 ‘* Any compensation—restitution—never mind 
 the word, you know my meaning. Father’s 
 grave.” 
 
 But he did not respond with any tenderness. 
 After a moody silence he broke out in an ill- 
 used tone: = 
 
 ‘‘ It'll be a very hard thing, Liz, if, when I 
 am trying my best to get up in the world, you 
 pull me back.” 
 
 ¢J, Charley ?” 
 
 “Yes, you, Liz. 
 
 Why can’t you let by-gones 
 be by-gones ? 
 
 Why can’t you, as Mr. Headstone 
 
 _ said to me this very evening about another mat- 
 
 At 
 
 raise myself, to shake you off, Liz. 
 carry youup with me. 
 
 ter, leave well alone? What we have got to do, 
 is, to turn our faces full in our new direction, 
 and keep straight on.” 
 
 “And never look back? Not even to try to 
 make some amends ?” 
 
 ‘* You are such a dreamer,” said the boy, with 
 his former petulance. ‘‘It was all very well 
 when we sat before the fire—when we looked | 
 into the hollow down by the flare—but we are 
 
 } looking into the real world now.” 
 
 ‘* Ah, we were looking into the real world 
 then, Charley !” 
 
 ‘J understand what you mean by that, but 
 you are not justified in it. I don’t want, as I 
 I want to 
 That’s what I want to 
 
 with me, and you'll have to control your faneies_ 
 then, so why not now? Now, say I haven’t — 
 vexed you.” *: 
 
 ‘*You haven’t, Charley, yon haven't.” 
 
 ‘“* And say I haven’t hurt you ” 
 
 “You haven't, Charley.” But this answer 
 was less ready. 
 
 ‘* Say you are sure J didn’t mean to. Come! — 
 There’s Mr. Headstone stopping, and looking 
 over the wall at the tide, to hint that it’s time to _ 
 go. Kiss me, and tell me that you know J didn’t 
 mean to hurt you.” 
 
 She told him so, and they embraced, and ~ 
 walked on and came up with the schoolmaster. 
 
 ‘* But we go yonr sister’s way,” he remarked, _ 
 when the boy told him he was ready. And ~ 
 with his cumbrous and uneasy action he stiffly — 
 offered her his arm. Her hand was just within © 
 it when she drew it back. He looked round — 
 with a start, as if he thought she had detected — 
 something that repelled her in the momentary — 
 touch. o 
 
 ‘*T will not go in just yet,” said Lizzie. ‘And > 
 you have a distance before you, and will walk 
 faster without me.”’ . 
 
 Being by this time close to Vauxhall Bridge, © 
 they resolved, in consequence, to take that way 
 over the Thames, and they left her; Bradley > 
 Headstone giving her his hand. at parting, and ~ 
 she thanking him for his care of her brother. | 
 
 The master and the pupil walked on rapid-— 
 ly and silently. They had nearly crossed the © 
 bridge when a gentleman came coolly saunter- 
 ing toward them, with a cigar in his mouth, 
 his coat thrown back, and his hands~ behinc 
 him. Something in the careless manner of this 
 
 WAG 
 
person, and in a certain lazily arrogant air with 
 
 _ which he approached, holding pussession of twice 
 
 ‘as much pavement as another would have claim- 
 ed, instantly caught the boy’s attention. As 
 the gentleman passed, the boy looked at him 
 narrowly, and then stood still, looking after him. 
 
 “¢ Who is it that you stare after ?”’ asked Brad- 
 lev. 
 
 “Why!” said the boy, with a confused and 
 pondering frown upon his face, ‘It as that 
 
 - Wrayburn one !” 
 
 Bradley. Headstone scrutinized the boy as 
 elosely.as the boy had scrutinized the gentle- 
 man. : 
 
 “IT bee your pardon, Mr. Headstone, but I 
 eouldn’t help wondering what in the world 
 brought Aim here!” 
 
 Though he said it as if his wonder were past 
 —at the same time resuming the walk—it was 
 not lost upon the master that he looked over his 
 shoulder after speaking, and that the same per- 
 plexed and pondering frown was heavy on his 
 
 - face. ? 
 
 *¢ You don’t appear to like your friend, Hex- 
 am?” 
 
 “‘T pon’T like 
 
 ‘Why not?” 
 
 ‘¢ He took hold of me by the chin in a precious 
 
 him,” said the boy. 
 
 impertinent way the first time I ever saw him,” 
 
 “* 
 
 tT 
 
 + 
 
 said the boy. 
 
 .* Again, why?” 
 
 “ Wor nothing. Or—it’s much the same—be- 
 
 cause something I happened to say about my sis- 
 
 ter didn’t happen to please him.” 
 ‘Then he knows your sister ?” 
 “¢ He didn’t at that time,” said the boy, still 
 
 -moodily pondering. 
 
 ‘¢ Does now ?” 
 
 The boy had so lost himself that he looked at 
 Mr. Bradley Headstone as they walked on side 
 by side, without attempting to reply until the 
 question had been repeated; then he nodded 
 and answered, ‘‘ Yes, Sir.” 
 
 ‘¢Going to see her, I dare sav.” 
 
 “‘Tt can’t be!” said the boy, quickly. ‘* He 
 doesn’t know her well enough. I should like.to 
 catch him at it!” 
 
 When they*had walked on for a time, more 
 rapidly than before, the master said, clasping 
 the pupil’s arm between the elbow and the shoul- 
 der with his hand: 
 
 “¢You were going to tell me something about 
 that person. What did you say his name was?” 
 
 ‘“Wravburn. Mr. Eugene Wrayburn. He 
 
 is what they call a barrister, with nothing to do. 
 The first time he came to our old place was 
 
 when my father was alive. He came on busi- 
 
 ‘ness; not that it was /’s business—he never 
 
 had any business—he was brought by a friend 
 of his.” 
 
 ‘¢ And the other times ?” 
 
 “There was only one other time that I know 
 of. When my father was killed by accident, he 
 chancel to be one of the finders. He was moon- 
 ing about, I suppose, taking liberties with peo- 
 ple’s chins; bnt there he was, somehow. He 
 brought the news home to my sister early in the 
 morning, and brought Miss Abbey Potterson, a 
 neighbor, to help break it to her. He was moon- 
 ing about the house when I was fetched home 
 
 in the afternoon—they didn’t know where to 
 
 find me till my sister could be brought round 
 
 oe 
 oe eee ae ff, 
 
 “OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 109 
 sufficiently to tell them—and then he mooned 
 away.” ‘ 
 
 *« And is that all?” 
 ‘¢'That’s all, Sir.” ‘ 
 
 Bradley Headstone gradually released the boy’s 
 arm, as if he were thoughtful, and they walked 
 on side by side as before. After a long silence 
 between them, Bradley resumed the talk. 
 
 ‘¢T suppose—your sister—’ with a curious 
 break both before and after the words, ‘‘has re- 
 ceived hardly any teaching, Hexam ?” 
 
 “Hardly any, Sir.” 
 
 “Sacrificed, no doubt, to her father’s objec- 
 tions. J remember them in your case. Yet— 
 your sister—scarcely looks or speaks like an ig- 
 norant person.” 
 
 ‘‘ Lizzie has as much thought as the best, Mr. - 
 Headstone. Too much, perhaps, without teach- 
 ing. I used to call the fire at home her books, 
 for she was always full of fancies—sometimes 
 quite wise fancies, considering—when she sat 
 looking at it.” 
 
 ‘¢T don’t like that,” said Bradley Headstone. 
 
 His pupil was a little surprised by this strik- 
 ing in with so sudden and decided and emo- 
 tional an objection, but took it as a proof of the 
 master’s interest in himself. It emboldened him 
 to sav: 
 
 ‘“‘T have never brought myself to mention it 
 openly to you, Mr. Headstone, and you're my 
 witness that I couldn’t even make up my mind 
 to take it from you before we came out to-night ; 
 but it’s a painful thing to think that if I get on 
 as well as you hope, I shall be—I won't say dis- 
 graced, because I don’t mean disgraced—but— 
 rather put to the blush if it was known—by a 
 sister who has been very good to me.” 
 
 ‘‘ Yes,” said Bradley Headstone in a slurring 
 way, for his mind scarcely seemed to touch that 
 point, so smoothly did it glide to another, ‘‘ and 
 there is this possibility to consider. Some man 
 who had worked his way might come to admire 
 —your sister—and might even in time bring 
 himself to think of marrying—your sister—and 
 it would be. a sad drawback and a heavy pen- 
 alty upon him, if, overcoming in his mind oth- 
 er inequalities of condition and other considera- 
 tions against it, this inequality and this consid- 
 eration remained in full force.” 
 
 ‘¢That’s much my own meaning, Sir.” 
 
 ‘* Ay, ay,” said Bradley Headstone, ‘‘ but you 
 spoke of a mere brother. Now the case I have 
 supposed would be a much stronger case; be- 
 cause an admirer, a husband, would form the 
 connection voluntarily, besides being obliged to 
 proclaim it: which a brother is not. After all, 
 you know, it must be said of you that you 
 couldn’t help yourself: while it would be said of 
 him, with equal reason, that he could.” 
 
 ‘‘That’s true, Sir. Sometimes since Lizzie 
 was left free by father’s death, I have thought 
 that such a young woman might soon acquire 
 more than enough to pass muster. And some- 
 times I have even thought that perhaps Miss 
 Peecher—” . 
 
 ‘sor the purpose, I would advise Nor Miss 
 Peecher,” Bradley Headstone struck in with a 
 recurrence of his late decision of manner. 
 
 ‘“¢Would you be so kind as to think of it for _ 
 me, Mr. Headstone?” , 
 
 ‘Yes, Hexam, yes. I'll think of it. Ill 
 think maturely of it. 1’ll think well of it.” 
 
 4 
 
 % 
 
110 
 Their walk was almost a silent one afterward 
 until it ended at the school-house. ‘There one 
 of neat Miss Peecher’s little windows, like the 
 eyes in needles, was illuminated, and in a corner 
 near it sat Mary Anne watching, while Miss 
 Peecher at the table stitched at the neat little 
 body she was making up by brown paper pattern 
 ‘for her own wearing.—N.B. Miss Peecher and 
 
 Miss Peecher’s pupils were not much encouraged 
 
 in the unscholastic art of needle-work by Gov- 
 ernment. 
 
 Mary Anne with her face to the window held 
 her arm up. 
 
 ‘*Well, Mary Anne?” 
 
 ‘*Mr. Headstone coming home, ma’am.” 
 
 In about a minute, Mary Anne again hailed. 
 
 **Yes, Mary Anne ?” 
 
 “*Gone in and locked his door, ma’am.”’ 
 
 Miss Peecher repressed a sigh as she gathered 
 her work together for bed, and transfixed that 
 part of her dress where her heart would have 
 been if she had had the dress on with a sharp, 
 . sharp needle. 
 
 ———————— 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 STILL EDUCATIONAL. 
 
 Tue person of the house, doll’s dress-maker 
 and manufacturer of ornamental pin-cushions 
 and pen-wipers, sat in her quaint little low arm- 
 chair, singing in the dark, until Lizzie came 
 back. The person of the house had attained 
 that dignity while yet of very tender years in- 
 deed through being the only trust-worthy person 
 in the house. 
 
 ‘** Well Lizzie-Mizzie-Wizzie,” said she, break- 
 ing off in her song. ‘* What’s the news out of 
 doors ?” 
 
 ‘*What’s the news in doors ?” returned Lizzie, 
 playfully smoothing the bright long fair hair 
 which grew very luxuriant and beautiful on the 
 head of the doll’s dress-maker. 
 
 ‘Let me see, said the blind man. Why the 
 last news is, that I don’t mean to marry your 
 brother.” 
 
 6 No eg 
 
 ‘*No-o,” shaking her head and her chin. 
 ‘Don’t like the boy.” - 
 
 ‘* What do you say to his master?” 
 
 **T say that I think he’s bespoke.” 
 
 Lizzie finished putting the hair carefully back 
 over the misshapen shoulders, and then light- 
 -ed acandle. It showed the little parlor to be 
 dingy, but orderly and clean. She stood it on 
 the mantle-shelf, remote from the dress-maker’s 
 eyes, and then put the room door open, and the 
 house door open, and turned the little low chair 
 and its occupant toward the outer air. It was 
 a sultry night, and this was a fine-weather ar- 
 rangement when the day’s work was done. ‘To 
 complete it, she seated herself in a chair by the 
 side of the little chair, and protectingly drew un- 
 der her arm the spare hand that crept up to her. 
 
 ‘This is what your loving Jenny Wren calls 
 the best time in the day and night,” said the 
 person of the house. Her real name was Fan- 
 ny Cleaver; but she had long ago chosen to be- 
 stow upon herself the appellation of Miss Jenny 
 Wren. * 
 
 ‘‘T have been thinking,” Jenny went on, ‘‘as 
 
 | looked prodigiously knowing. 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 I sat at work to-day, what a thing it would be 
 
 if I should be able to have your company till I ~ 
 
 am married, or at least courted. Because when 
 I am courted, I shall make Him do some of the 
 things that you do for me. He couldn’t brush 
 my hair like you do, or help me up and down 
 stairs like you do, and he couldn’t do any thing 
 like you do; but he could take my work home, 
 and he could call for orders in his clumsy way. 
 And he shall too. 
 tell him!” 5 
 
 Jenny Wren had her personal vanities—hap- 
 pily for her—and no intentions were stronger in 
 her breast than the various trials and torments 
 that were, in the fullness of time, to be inflicted 
 upon ‘*‘ him.” . 
 
 ‘* Wherever he may happen to be just at pres- 
 ent, or whoever he may happen to be,” said Miss 
 Wren, ‘“‘/ know his tricks and-his manners, and 
 I give him warning to look out.” 
 
 **Don’t you think you are rather hard upon 
 
 PU trot him about, I can ~ 
 
 him ?” asked her friend, smiling, and smoothing — 
 
 her hair. 
 
 ‘*Not a bit,” replied the sage Miss Wren, 
 with an air of vast experience. ‘‘My dear, 
 they don’t care for you, those fellows, if you’re 
 not hard upon’em. But I was saying If I should 
 be able to have your company. Ah! Whata 
 large If! Ain’t it?” aay 
 
 ‘‘T have no intention of parting company, 
 Jenny.” 
 
 **Don’t say that, or you'll go directly.” 
 
 ‘** Am I so little to be relied upon?” 
 
 ‘*You’re more to be relied upon than silver 
 and gold.” As she said it Miss Wren suddenly 
 broke off, screwed up her eyes and her chin, and 
 ** Aha! 
 
 ** Who comes here? 
 
 * A Grenadier. 
 
 ** What does he want? 
 
 ‘* A pot of beer. 
 
 And nothing else in the world, my dear!” 
 
 A man’s figure paused on the pavement at the 
 outer door. ‘‘Mr. Eugene Wrayburn, ain’t it?” 
 said Miss Wren. 
 
 **So I am told,” was the answer. 
 
 **You may come in, if you’re good.” 
 
 ‘*T am not. good,” said Eugene, ‘‘but-Pll — 
 
 come in.” 
 
 He gave his hand to Jenny Wren, and he 
 gave his hand to Lizzie, and he stood leaning 
 by the door at Lizzie’s side. He had been stroll- 
 
 ing with his cigar, he said (it was smoked out _ 
 
 and gone by this time), and he had strolled 
 
 ‘round to return in that direction that he might 
 
 e 
 
 look in as he passed. Had she not seen ‘her ~ 
 
 brother to-night ? 
 ‘* Yes,” said Lizzie, whose manner was a lit- 
 tle troubled. 
 
 ay 
 i): 
 
 Gracious condescension on our brother’s part! 
 Mr. Eugene Wrayburn thought he had passed © 
 my young gentleman on the bridge yonder. 
 
 Who was his friend with him ? 
 
 ‘“*'The schoolmaster,” 
 
 ‘To be sure. Looked like it.” 
 
 Lizzie sat so still that one could not have said 
 wherein the fact of her manner being troubled 
 was expressed; and yet one could not have 
 doubted it. 
 
 might have been rather more perceptible that 
 his attention was concentrated upon her for cer- 
 
 Eugene was as easy as ever; but 
 perhaps, as she sat with her eyes cast down, it 
 
‘eid WX 
 
 . gene. 
 
 ‘work and do it. 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 tain moments, than its concentration upon any 
 subject for any short time ever was elsewhere. 
 
 ‘¢T have nothing to report, Lizzie,” said Eu- 
 ‘¢ But, having promised you'that an eye 
 should be always kept on Mr. Riderhood through 
 my friend Lightwood, I like occasionally to re- 
 new my assurance that I keep my promise, and 
 keep my friend up to the mark.” 
 
 ‘“*T should not have doubted it, Sir.” 
 
 “Generally, I confess myself a man to be 
 doubted,” returned Eugene, coolly, ‘‘for all 
 that.” ; 
 
 “Why are you?” asked the sharp Miss Wren, 
 
 “‘ Because, my dear,” said the airy Eugene, 
 “‘T am a bad idle dog.” 
 
 ‘“Then why don’t you reform and be a good 
 dog ?” inquired: Miss Wren. 
 
 ‘‘Because, my dear,’ returned Eugene, 
 *‘there’s nobody who makes it worth my while. 
 Have you considered my suggestion, Lizzie?” 
 This in a lower voice, but only as if it were a 
 graver matter; not at all to the exclusion of 
 the person of the house. 
 
 “‘T have thought of it, Mr. Wrayburn, but I 
 have not been able to make up my mind to ac- 
 cept it.” 
 
 ‘False pride!” said Eugene. 
 
 **T think not, Mr. Wrayburn. I hope not.” 
 
 ‘False pride!” repeated Eugene. ‘‘ Why, 
 what else is it? The thing is worth nothing in 
 itself. The thing is worth nothing to me. 
 What can it be worth to me? You know the 
 most I make of it. I propose to be of some use 
 to somebody—which I never was in this world, 
 and never shall be on any other occasion—by 
 paying some qualified person of your own sex 
 and age so many (or rather so few) contempti- 
 
 -ble shillings to come here certain nights in the 
 
 week, and give you certain instructions which 
 you Wouldn’t want if you hadn’t been a self-de- 
 nying daughter and sister. You know that it’s 
 good to have it, or you would never have so de- 
 voted yourself to your brother’s having it. Then 
 why not have it: especially when our friend Miss 
 
 Jenny here would profit by it too? If I pro- 
 
 posed to be the teacher, or to attend the lessons 
 —obviously incongruons! —but as to that, I 
 might as well be on the other side of the globe, 
 or not on the globe at all. False pride, Lizzie. 
 Because true pride wouldn’t shame, or be shamed 
 by, your thankless brother.’ True pride wouldn’t 
 
 ‘have schoolmasters brought here, like doctors, 
 
 to look at a bad case. True pride would go to 
 You know that well enough, 
 for you know that your own true pride would do 
 it to-morrow if you had the ways and means, 
 which false’ pride won’t let me supply. Very 
 well. I add no more than this. Your false 
 pride does wrong to yourself, and does wrong to 
 
 your dead father.” 
 
 ‘¢How to my father, Mr. Wrayburn?” she 
 
 _ asked, with an anxions face. 
 
 “¢ How to your father? Can you ask! By 
 perpetuating the consequences of his ignorant 
 and blind obstinacy. By resolving not to set 
 right the wrong he did you. By determining 
 that the deprivation to which he condemned 
 you, and which he forced upon you, shall al- 
 
 ‘ways rest upon his head.” 
 
 It chanced to be a subtle string to sound, in 
 
 her who had so spoken to her brother within the 
 
 ~ hour. 
 
 It sounded far more forcibly, because of 
 
 111 
 
 the change in the speaker for the moment; the 
 
 passing appearance of earnestness, complete con- 
 
 viction, injured resentment of suspicion, gener- 
 ous and unselfish interest. All these qualities, 
 in him usually so light and careless, she felt to 
 be inseparable from some touch of their oppo- 
 sites in her own breast. She thought, had she, 
 so far below him and so different, rejected this 
 disinterestedness because of some vain Misgiv- 
 ing that he sought her out, or heeded any per- 
 sonal attractions that he might descry in: her? 
 The poor girl, pure of heart and purpose, could 
 not bear to think it. Sinking before her own 
 eyes as she suspected herself of it, she drooped 
 her head as though she had done him some 
 wicked and grievous injury, and broke into si- 
 lent tears. 
 
 ‘‘Don’t be distressed,” said Eugene, very, 
 very kindly. ‘I hope it is not I who have dis- 
 tressed you. J meant no more than to put the 
 matter in its true light before you; though I 
 acknowledge I did it selfishly enough, for I am 
 disappointed.” 
 
 Disappointed of doing her a service. 
 else could he be disappointed ? 
 
 ‘Tt won’t break my heart,” laughed Eugene; 
 ‘Cit won’t stay by me eight-and-forty hours; 
 but Iam genuinely disappointed. 1 had set my 
 fancy on doing this little thing for you and for 
 our friend Miss Jenny. ‘The novelty of my do- 
 ing any thing in the least useful had its charms. 
 I see now that I might have managed it better. 
 I might have affected to do it wholly for our 
 friend Miss J. I might have gotemyself up, 
 morally, as Sir Eugene Bountiful. But upon 
 my soul I can’t make flourishes, and I would 
 rather be disappointed than try.” 
 
 If he meant to follow home what was in Liz- 
 zie’s thoughts, it was skillfully done. If he fol- 
 lowed it by mere fortuitous coincidence, it was 
 done by an evil chance. 
 
 ‘Tt opened out so naturally before me,” said 
 Eugene. ‘‘The ball seemed so thrown into my 
 hands by accident! I happen to be originally 
 brought into contact with you, Lizzie, on those 
 two oceasions that you know of. I happen to 
 be able to promise you that a watch shall be 
 kept upon that false accuser, Riderhood. I hap- 
 pen to beable to give you some little consolation 
 in the darkest hour of your distress, by assuring 
 you that I don’t believe him. On the same oc- 
 casion I tell you that I am the idlest and least 
 of lawyers, but that I am better than none, in a 
 case I have noted down with my own hand, and 
 that you may be always sure of my best help, 
 and incidentally of Lightwood’s too, in your ef- 
 forts to clear your father. So it gradually takes 
 my fancy that I may help you—so easily !—to 
 clear your father of that other blame which I 
 mentioned a few minutes ago, and which is a 
 just and real one. I hope I have explained 
 myself, for I am heartily sorry to have distressed 
 you. I hate to claim to mean well, but I really 
 did mean honestly and simply well, and I want 
 you to know it.” 
 
 ‘¢T have never doubted that, Mr. Wrayburn,” 
 said Lizzie; the more repentant the less he 
 claimed. 
 
 ‘‘T am very glad to hear it. Though if you 
 had quite understood my whole meaning at first, 
 I think you would not have refused. Do you 
 think you would ?” 
 
 How 
 
112 
 
 ‘‘—I don’t know that I should, Mr. 
 burn.” 
 
 Well! 
 stand it-?” 
 
 ** It’s not easy for me to talk to you,” returned 
 Lizzie, in some confusion, ‘for you see all the 
 eonsequences of what I say as soon as I say it.” 
 
 ‘*Take all the consequences,” laughed Eu- 
 gene, ‘‘and take away my disappointment. 
 Lizzie Hexam, as I truly respect you, and as I 
 am your friend and a poor devil of a gentleman, 
 I protest I don’t even now understand why you 
 hesitate.” 
 
 There was an appearance of openness, trust- 
 fulness, unsuspecting generosity, in his words 
 and manner, that won the poor girl over; and 
 not only won her over, but again caused her to 
 feel as though she had been influenced by the 
 opposite qualities, with vanity at their head. 
 
 **I will not hesitate any longer, Mr. Wray- 
 burn. I hope you will not think the worse of 
 me for having hesitated at all. For myself and 
 for Jenny—you let me answer for you, Jenny 
 dear ?” 
 
 The little creature had been leaning back, ‘at- 
 tentive, with her elbows resting on the elbows of 
 her chair, and her chin upon her hands, With- 
 out changing her attitude, she answered, ‘* Yes!” 
 so suddenly that it rather seemed as if she had 
 chopped the monosyllable than spoken it. 
 
 ‘For myself and for Jenny, I thankfully ac- 
 cept your kind offer.” 
 
 ‘“Agreed! Dismissed!” said Eugene, giving 
 Lizzie his hand before lightly waving it, as if he 
 waved the whole subject away. ‘I hope it may 
 not be often that so much is made of so little.” 
 
 Then he fell to talking playfully with Jenny 
 Wren. ‘‘I think of setting up a doll, Miss Jen- 
 ny,”’ he said. 
 
 “You had better not, ”’replied the dress-maker. 
 
 Wry not ?” 
 
 **You are sure to break it. 
 do.” 
 
 ‘But that makes good for trade, you know, 
 Miss Wren,” returned Eugene. “Munch as 
 People’s breaking promises and contracts and 
 bargains of all sorts makes good for my trade.” 
 
 **t don’t know about that,” Miss Wren re- 
 torted; ‘‘bat you had better by half set up a 
 pen-wiper, and turn industrious, and use it.” 
 
 * Why, if we were all as industrious as you, 
 little Busy-Body, we should begin to work as 
 soon as we could crawl, and there would be a 
 bad thing!” 
 
 ‘Do you mean,” returned the little creature, 
 
 Wray- 
 
 Then why refuse now you do under- 
 
 All you children 
 
 with a ‘flush suffusing hér face, ‘‘ bad for your | 
 
 backs and your legs ?” ; 
 “*No, no, no,” said Eugene; shocked—to do 
 
 him justice—at the thought of trifling with her. 
 ‘* Bad for business, bad for business. | 
 If we all set to work as soon as we could use our 
 hands, it would be all over with the dolls’ dress-_ 
 
 infirmity. 
 
 makers.” 
 ‘‘There’s something in that,” replied Miss 
 Wren; ‘‘you have a sort of an idea in your 
 
 noddle sometimes.” Then, in a changed tone, | 
 
 ** Talking of ideas, my Lizzir,” they were sitting 
 _ bide by side as they had sat at first, “I wonder 
 
 how it happens that when I am work, work, . 
 working here, all alone in the summer-time, I | 
 
 smell flowers,” 
 ** As a commonplace individual, I should say,” 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 Eugene suggested languidly—for he was growing 
 weary of the person of the héuse—‘‘that you 
 smell flowers because you do smell flowers.” 
 
 ‘No I don’t,” said the little creature, resting 
 one arm upon the elbow of her chair, resting her 
 chin upon that hand, and looking vacantly be- 
 fore her; ‘‘ this is not a flowery neighborhood, 
 It’s any thing but that. And yet as I sit at 
 work I smell miles of flowers. I smell roses 
 till { think I see the rose-leayes lying in heaps, 
 bushels, on the floor. I smell fallen leayes till 
 I put down my hand—so-—and expect to make 
 them rustle. I smell the white and the pink 
 May in the hedges, and all sorts of flowers that 
 I never was among. For I have seen very few 
 flowers indeed in my life.” 
 
 ‘+ Pleasant fancies to have, Jenny dear !” said 
 her friend: with a glance toward Eugene as if 
 she would have asked him whether they were 
 given the child in compensation for her losses. 
 
 ‘*So I think, Lizzie, when they come to me. 
 And the birds I hear! Oh!” cried the little 
 creature, holding out her hand and looking up- 
 ward, ‘* how they sing!” 
 
 There was something in the face and action for 
 the moment quite inspired and beautiful. Then 
 the chin dropped musingly upon the hand again, 
 
 ‘‘Y dare say my birds sing better than other 
 birds, and my flowers smell befter than other 
 flowers. For when I was a little child,” in a 
 tone.as though it were ages ago, ‘‘the children 
 that I used to see early in the morning were very 
 different from any others that I ever saw. They 
 were not like me; they were not chilled, anx- 
 ious, ragged, or beaten; they were never in 
 pain. ‘They were not like the children of the 
 neighbors; they never made me tremble all over 
 by setting up shrill noises, and they never mock- 
 ed me. Such numbers of them too! All in 
 white dresses, and with something shining on 
 the borders, and on their heads, that I have 
 never been able to imitate with my work, though 
 I know it so well. They used to come down in 
 Jong bright slanting rows, and say all together, 
 ‘Who is this in pain! Who is this in pain!’ 
 When I told them who it was, they answered, 
 ‘Come and play with us!’ When I said “I nev. 
 er play! I can’t play! they swept about me 
 and took me up, and made me light. Then it 
 was all delicious ease and rest till they laid me 
 down, and said, all together, ‘Have patience, 
 and we will come again.’ Whenever they came 
 back, I used to know they were coming before 
 I saw the long bright rows, by hearing them 
 ask, all together a long way. off, ‘Who is this 
 in pain! who is this in pain!’ And I used to 
 cry out, ‘O my blessed children, it’s poor me, 
 Have pity on me. Take me up and make me 
 light!’”’ 
 
 By degrees, as she progressed in this remem- 
 branece, the hand was raised, the late ecstatic 
 look returned, and she became quite beautiful, 
 Having so paused for a moment, silent, with a 
 listening smile upon her face, she looked round 
 and recalled herself. 
 
 ‘What poor fun you think me; don’t you, 
 Mr, Wrayburn? You may well look tired of 
 me. But it’s Saturday night, and I won’t de- 
 tain vou,” . 
 
 “That is to say, Miss Wren,” observed Eu- 
 
 gene, quite ready to profit by the hint, ‘you 
 wish me to go ?” ee 
 
Ciliation. 
 
 Miss Wren. 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 ¢¢Well, it’s Saturday night,” she returned, 
 *¢and my child’s coming home. And my child 
 is a troublesome bad child, and costs me a world 
 of scolding. I would rather you didn’t see my 
 child.” 
 
 ‘© A doll.?” said Eugene, not understanding, 
 and looking for an explanation. 
 
 But Lizzie, with her lips only, shaping the 
 two words, ‘‘Her father,” he delayed no lon- 
 ger. He took his leave immediately. At the 
 corner of the street he stopped to light another 
 cigar, and possibly to ask himself ‘what he was 
 doing otherwise. If so, the answer was indefin- 
 ite and vague. Who knows what he is doing 
 who is careless what he does ! : 
 
 A man stumbled against him as he turned 
 away, who mumbled some maudlin apology. 
 Looking after this man, Eugene saw him go in 
 at the door by which he himself had just come 
 out. 2 
 
 ‘On the man’s stumbling into the room Lizzie 
 rose to leave it. 
 
 “Don’t go away, Miss Hexam,” he said in a 
 submissive manner, speaking thickly and with 
 difficulty. ‘* Don’t fly from unfortunate man in 
 shattered state of health. Give poor invalid 
 honor of your company. It ain’t—ain’t catch- 
 ing.” 
 
 Lizzie murmured that she had something to 
 do in her own room, and went away up stairs. 
 
 “¢How’s my Jenny?” said the man, timidly. 
 ‘¢How’s my Jenny Wren, best of children, ob- 
 ject dearest affections broken-hearted invalid ?” 
 
 To which the person of the house, stretching 
 out her arm in an attitude of command, replied 
 with irresponsive asperity : ‘‘Go along with you! 
 Go along into your corner! Get into your cor- 
 ner directly!” 
 
 The wretched spectacle made as if he would 
 have offered some remonstrance ; but not ven- 
 turing to resist the person of the house, thought 
 better of it, and went and sat down on a partic- 
 ular chair of disgrace. 
 
 ‘¢Qh-h-h!” cried the person of the house, 
 pointing her little finger. ‘‘You bad old boy! 
 QOh-h-h you naughty, wicked creature! What 
 do you mean by it ?” 
 
 The shaking figure, unnerved and disjointed 
 
 from head to foot, put out its two hands a little 
 
 way, as making overtures of peace and recon- 
 Abject tears stood in its eyes, and 
 stained the blotched red of its cheeks. The 
 swollen lead-colored under lip trembled with a 
 shameful whine. The whole indecorous thread- 
 bare ruin, from the broken shoes to the prema- 
 turely-gray scanty hair, groveled. Not with 
 any sense worthy to be called a sense, of this 
 dire reversal of the places of parent and child, 
 but in a pitiful expostulation to be let off from 
 ascolding. ~ 
 
 “¢T know your tricks and your manners,” cried 
 ‘¢ J know where you’ve been to!” 
 ich indeed it did not require discernment to 
 
 iscover). ‘*Oh, you disgraceful old chap!” 
 
 The very breathing of the figure was contempt- 
 ible, as it labored and rattled in that operation, 
 like a blundering clock. 
 
 “Slave, slave, slave, from morning to night,” 
 
 pursued the person of the house, ‘‘and all for | 
 
 this! What do you mean by it?” 
 There was something in that emphasized 
 
 113 
 
 ure, As often as the person of the house work- 
 ed her way round to it—even as soon as he saw 
 that it was coming—he collapsed in an extra 
 degree. 
 
 ‘‘T wish you had been taken up, and locked 
 up,” said the person of the house. ‘‘I wish you 
 had been poked into cells and black holes, and 
 run over by rats and spiders and beetles. J know 
 their tricks and their manners, and they’d have 
 tickled you nicely. Ain’t you ashamed of your- 
 self ?” 
 
 ‘¢Yes, my dear,” stammered the father. 
 
 ‘‘Then,” said the person of the house, terrify- 
 
 ing him by a grand muster of her spirits and 
 
 forces before recurring to the emphatic word, 
 ‘¢What do you mean by it?” 
 
 ¢¢ Circumstances over which had no control,” 
 was the miserable creature’s plea in extenuation. 
 
 ‘¢ 71] circumstance you and control you too,” 
 retorted the person of the house, speaking with 
 vehement sharpness, ‘‘if you talk in that way. 
 I'll give you in charge to the police, and have 
 you fined five shillings when you can’t pay, and 
 then I won’t pay the money for you, and you'll 
 be transported for life. How should you like to 
 be transported for life ?” 
 
 ‘¢Shouldn’t like it. Poor shattered invalid. 
 Trouble nobody long,” cried the wretched figure. 
 
 ‘¢ Come, come !”’ said the person of the house, 
 tapping the table near her in a business-like 
 manner, and shaking her head and her chin; 
 ‘you know what you’ve got to do. Put.down 
 your money this instant.” 
 
 The obedient figure began to rummage in its 
 pockets. | 
 
 ‘¢Spent a fortune out of your wages, [ll be 
 bound!” said the person of the house. ‘*‘ Put it 
 here! All you’ve got left! Every farthing!” 
 
 Such a business as he made of collecting it 
 from his dogs’-eared pockets; of expecting it in 
 this pocket, and not finding it; of not expecting 
 it in that pocket, and passing it over; of finding 
 no pocket where that other pocket ought to be! 
 
 ‘Ts this all??? demanded the person of the 
 house, when a confused heap of pence and shil- 
 lings lay on the table. 
 
 ‘‘Got no more,” was the rueful answer, with 
 an accordant shake of the head. 
 
 ‘Let me make sure. You know what you've 
 got to do. Turn all your pockets inside out, 
 and leave ’em so!” cried the person of the house. 
 
 He obeyed. And if any thing could have 
 made him look more abject or more dismally 
 ridiculous than before, it would have been his 
 so displaying himself. er 
 
 ‘‘ Here’s but seven and eight-pence half-pen- 
 ny!” exclaimed Miss Wren, after reducing the 
 heap to order. ‘*Oh, you prodigal old son! | 
 Now you shall be starved.” ; 
 
 ‘¢No, don’t starve me,” he urged, whimper- 
 He 
 ‘<If you were treated as you ought to be,” 
 said Miss Wren, ‘‘ you’d be fed upon the skew- 
 ers of cats’ meat ;—only the skewers, after the 
 cats had had the meat. As it is, go to bed.” 
 
 When he stumbled out of the corner to com~- 
 ply, he again put out both his hands, and plead- 
 ed: ‘Circumstances over which no control—” — 
 
 ‘Get along with you to bed!” cried Miss 
 Wren, snapping him up. ‘‘Don’t speak to me, 
 I’m not going to forgive you. Go to bed this 
 
 “What,” which absurdly frightened the fig- i moment !” 
 
 ° 
 
\4 
 
 ih { 
 
 i 
 
 WY Goon 
 
 | 
 
 \ 
 
 het ag OF 
 
 : 
 
 EG 
 
 ae 
 p/h 
 S———_—— 
 
 L 
 
 | 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 s . 
 
 N Nt 
 
 x 
 TRI 
 RNY 
 
 THE PERSON OF THE HOUSE AND THE BAD CHILD. 
 
 Seeing another emphatic ‘‘ What’ upon its 
 way, he evaded it by complying, and was heard 
 to shufiis heavily up stairs, and shut his door, 
 and throw himself on his bed. Within a little 
 while afterward Lizzie came down. 
 
 ‘* Shall we have our supper, Jenny dear?” 
 
 ‘“Ah! bless us and save us, we need have 
 something to keep us going,” returned Miss Jen- 
 ny, shrugging her shoulders. 
 
 Lizzie laid a cloth upon the little bench (more 
 handy for the person of the house than an ordi- 
 nary table), and put upon it such plain fare as 
 they were accustomed to have, and drew up a 
 stool for herself. 
 
 ‘*Now for supper! 
 of, Jenny darling?” 
 
 ‘*T was thinking,” she returned, coming out 
 of a deep study, ‘‘what I would do to Him if 
 he should turn out a drunkard.” 
 
 What are you thinking 
 
 **Oh, but he won’t,” said Lizzie. 
 take care of that, beforehand.” 
 
 “I shall try to take care of it beforehand, but 
 he might deceive me. Oh, my dear, all those 
 fellows with their tricks and their manners do 
 deceive!” With the little fist in full action. 
 ‘‘And if so, I tell you what I think I’d do. 
 When he was asleep, I’d make a spoon red-hot,’ 
 and I'd have some boiling liquor bubbling in a 
 sauce-pan, and I’d take it out hissing, and I’d 
 
 Vou lt 
 
 open his mouth with the other hand—or perhaps _ 
 he’d sleep with his mouth ready open—and I’d — ia 
 
 pour it down his throat, and blister it and choke 
 him.” 
 
 ‘fam sure you would do no such horrible 
 thing,” said Lizzie. . 
 
 ‘Shouldn't 1? Well; 
 But I should like to!” 
 
 ‘*T am equally sure you would not.” 
 
 ‘ a, t 
 
 Sige 
 
 Ay) 
 1A 
 
 perhaps I shouldn't. < 
 
- Duke Street, Saint James’s. 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 ‘‘Not even like to? Well, you generally 
 know best. Only you haven't always lived 
 among it as I have lived—and your back isn’t 
 bad and your legs are not queer.” 
 
 As they went on with their supper Lizzie 
 tried to bring her round to that prettier and 
 better state. But the charm was broken. The 
 person cf the house was the person of a house 
 full of sordid shames and cares, with an upper 
 room in which that abased figure.was infecting 
 even innocent sleep with sensual brutality and 
 degradation. The doll’s dress-maker had be- 
 come a little quaint shrew; of the world, world- 
 ly; of the earth, earthy. 
 
 - Poor doil’sdress-maker! How often so dragged 
 down by hands that should have raised her up; 
 how often so misdirected when losing her way 
 on the eternal road, and asking guidance. Poor, 
 poor little doll’s dress-maker !” 
 
 Cp Se ee 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 A PIECE OF WORK. 
 
 BRITANNIA, sitting meditating one fine day 
 (perhaps in the attitude in which she is present- 
 ed on the copper coinage), discovers all of a 
 sudden that she wants Veneering-in Parliament. 
 It occurs to her that Veneering is ‘‘a represent- 
 ative man’—which can not in these times be 
 
 * donbted—and that Her Majesty’s faithful Com- 
 
 mons are incomplete without him. So, Britan- 
 nia mentions to a legal gentleman of her ac- 
 quaintance that if Veneering will ‘‘ put down” 
 five thousand pounds, he may wiite a couple of 
 initial letters after his name at the extremely 
 cheap rate of two thousand five hundred per 
 letter. It is clearly understood between Britan- 
 nia and the legal gentleman that nobody is to 
 take up the five thousand pounds, but that be- 
 ing put down they will disappear by magical 
 conjuration and enchantment. 
 
 The legal gentleman in Britannia’s confidence 
 going straight from that lady to Vencering, thus 
 commissioned, Veneering declares himself high- 
 ly flattered, but requires breathing-time to as- 
 certain ‘‘ whether his friends will rally round 
 him.” Above all things, he says, it behooves 
 him to be clear, at a crisis of his importance, 
 “‘whether his friends will rally round him.” 
 The legal gentleman, in the interests of his cli- 
 ent can not allow much time for this purpose, 
 as the lady rather thinks she knows somebody 
 prepared to put down six thousand pounds; but 
 he says he will give Veneering four hours. 
 
 Veneering then says to Mrs. Veneering, ‘‘ We 
 must work,” and throws himself into a Hansom 
 cab. Mrs. Veneering in the same moment re- 
 linquishes baby to Nurse; presses her aquiline 
 hands upon her brow, to arrange the throbbing 
 intellect within; orders out the carriage; and 
 
 Tepeats in a distracted and devoted manner, 
 
 compounded of Ophelia and any self-immolat- 
 ing female of antiquity you may prefer, ‘‘We 
 
 - must work.” 
 
 Veneering having instructed his driver to 
 
 charge at the Public in the streets, like the 
 
 Life-Guards at Waterloo, is driven furiously to 
 There, he finds 
 Twemlow in his lodgings, fresh from the hands 
 
 # 
 
 of a secret artist who has been doing something . 
 
 115 
 to his hair with yolks of eggs. The process re- 
 quiring that ‘[wemlow shall, for two hours after 
 the application, allow his hair to stick upright 
 and dry gradually, he is in an appropriate state 
 for the receipt of startling intelligence ; looking 
 equally like the Monument on Fish Street Hill, 
 and King Priam on a certain incendiary occa- 
 sion not wholly unknown as a. neat point from 
 the classics. 
 
 ‘*My dear 'Twemlow,” says Veneering, grasp- 
 ing both his hands, ‘‘as the dearest and oldest 
 of my friends—”’ 
 
 (‘* Then there can be no more doubt about it 
 
 in future,” thinks Twemlow, ‘‘and I am!”’) 
 
 ‘¢_ Are you of opinion that your cousin, Lord 
 Snigsworth, would give his name as a Member 
 of my Committee? I don’t go so far as to ask 
 for his lordship; I only ask for his name. Do 
 you think he would give me his name ?” 
 
 In sudden low spirits, Twemlow replies, ‘‘I 
 don’t think hé would,” 
 
 ‘““My political opinions,” says Veneering, not 
 previously aware of having any, ‘‘are identical 
 with those of Lord Snigsworth, and perhaps as 
 a matter of public feeling and public principle 
 Lord Snigsworth would give me his name.” 
 
 ““It might be so,” says Twemlow; ‘*but—” 
 And perplexedly scratching*his head, forgetful 
 of the yolks of eggs, is the more discomfited by 
 being reminded how sticky he is. 
 
 ‘‘Between such old and intimate friends as 
 ourselves,’ pursues Veneering, ‘‘there should 
 in such a case be no reserve. Promise me that 
 if I ask you to do any thing for me which you 
 don’t like to do, or feel the slightest difficulty 
 in doing, you will freely tell me so.” 
 
 This Twemlow is so kind as to promise, with 
 every appearance of most heartily intending to 
 keep his word. 
 
 ‘¢ Would you have any objection to write down 
 to Snigsworthy Park, and ask this favor of Lord 
 Snigsworth? Of course if it were granted I 
 should know that I owed it solely to you; while 
 at the same time you would put it to Lord Snigs- 
 worth entirely upon public grounds, Would you 
 have any objection ?” 
 
 Says ‘T'wemlow, with his hand to his forehead, 
 ‘¢You have exacted a promise from me.” 
 
 ‘‘T have, my dear T'wemlow.” 
 
 ‘¢ And you expect me to keep it honorably.” 
 
 ‘“¢T do, my dear Twemlow.” 
 
 ‘“©On the whole, then;—observe me,” urges 
 Twemlow, with great nicety, as if, in the case. 
 of its having been off the whole, he would have 
 done. it directly—‘‘on the whole, I ‘must beg 
 you to excuse me from addressing any com- 
 munication to Lord Snigsworth.” : 
 
 ‘“‘ Bless you, bless you!” says Veneering ; hor- 
 ribly disappointed, but grasping him by both 
 hands again, in a particularly fervent manner. 
 
 It is not to be wondered at that poor Twem- 
 low should decline to inflict a letter on his no-. 
 ble cousin (who has gout in the temper), inas- 
 much as his noble cousin, who allows him a 
 small annuity on which he lives, takes it out of 
 him, as the phrase goes, in extreme severity ; 
 putting him, when he visits at Snigsworthy Payk, 
 under a kind of martial law; ordaining that he 
 shall hang his hat on a particular peg, sit on a 
 particular chair, talk on particular subjects to 
 particular people, and perform particular exer- 
 cises; such as sounding the praises of the Fam- 
 
 97 
 
116 
 ily Varnish (not to say Pictures), and abstain- 
 ing from the choicest of the Family Wines un- 
 less expressly invited to partake. 
 
 “One thing, however, I can do for you,” says 
 Twemlow; ‘and that is, work for you.” 
 
 Vencering blesses him again. r 
 
 ‘Pll go,” says Twemlow, in a rising hurry 
 of spirits, ‘‘to the club;—let us see now; what 
 o’clock is it?” 
 
 “Twenty minutes to eleven.”’ 
 
 _ **Pll be,” says Twemlow, ‘‘at the club by ten 
 minutes to twelve, and I’ll never leave it all day.” 
 
 Veneering feels that his friends are rallying 
 round him, and says, ‘‘Thank you, thank you. 
 I knew I could rely upon you. I said to Anas- 
 tatia before leaving home just now to come to 
 you—of course the first friend I have seen on a 
 subject so momentous to me, my dear Twem- 
 low—I said to Anastatia, ‘We must work.’ ” 
 
 ‘You were right, you were right,” replies 
 Twemlow. ‘Tell me. Is she working ?” 
 
 ** She is,” says Veneering. 
 
 **Good !” cries Twemlow, polite little gentle- 
 man that he is. ‘‘A woman’s tact is invalua- 
 ble, ‘To have the dear sex with us is to have 
 every thing with us.” 
 
 ** But you have not imparted to me,” remarks 
 Veneering, ‘‘ what You think of my entering the 
 House of Commons ?” 
 
 ‘*T think,” rejoins Twemlow, feelingly, ‘‘ that 
 it is the best club in London.” 
 
 Veneering again blesses him, plunges down 
 stairs, rushes into his Hansom, and directs the 
 driver to be up and at the British Public, and 
 to charge into the City. 
 
 Meanwhile Twemlow, in an increasing hurry 
 of spirits, gets his hair down as well as he can— 
 which is not very well; for, after these glutin- 
 ous applications it is restive, and has a surface 
 on it somewhat in the nature of pastry—and 
 gets to the club by the appointed time. At the 
 club he promptly secures a large window, writ- 
 ing materials, and all the newspapers, and es- 
 tablishes himself, immovable, to be respectfully 
 contemplated by Pall Mall. . Sometimes, when 
 a man enters who nods to him, Twemlow says, 
 **Do you know Veneering ?” Man says, ‘* No; 
 member of the club?” Twemlow says, “ Yes. 
 Coming in for Pocket-Breaches.” Man says, 
 ““ Ah! Hone he may find it worth the money!” 
 yawns, and saunters out. Toward six o’clock 
 
 of the afternoon Twemlow begins to persuade 
 eee £ 
 
 himself that he is positively jaded with work, 
 
 ~ and thinks it much to be regretted that he was 
 
 not brought up as a Parliamentary agent. 
 
 From Twemlow’s, Veneering dashes at Pod- 
 snap’s place of business. Finds Podsnap read- 
 ing the paper, standing, and inclined to be ora- 
 torical over the astonishing discovery he has 
 made, that Italy is not England. Respectfully. 
 entreats Podsnap’s pardon for stopping the flow 
 of his words of wisdom, and informs him what is 
 in the wind. Tells Podsnap that their political 
 opinions are identical. Gives Podsnap to un- 
 derstand that he, Veneering, formed his political 
 opinions while sitting at the feet of him, Pod- 
 snap. Seeks earnestly to know whether Pod- 
 snap “will rally round him ?” 
 
 Says Podsnap, something sternly. “ Now, 
 first of all, Veneering, do you ask my advice?” 
 
 _ Veneering falters that as so old and so dear a 
 friend— 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 ‘Yes, yes, that’s all very well,” says Pod- 
 snap; ‘‘but have you made up your mind to ™ 
 take this borough‘of Pocket-Breaches on its own 
 terms, or do you ask my opinion whether you 
 shall take it or leave it alone?” aed 
 
 Veneering repeats that his heart’s desire and 
 his soul’s thirst are, that Podsnap shall rally 
 round him. 
 
 ‘‘ Now, I'll be plain with vou, Veneering,” 
 says Podsnap, knitting his brows. ‘* You will 
 infer that Z don’t care about Parliament, from 
 the fact of my not being there ?” é 
 
 Why, of course Veneering knows that! Of 
 course Veneering knows that if Podsnap chose 
 to go there, he would be there, in a space of 
 time that might be stated by the light and 
 thoughtless as a jiffy. 
 
 ‘It is not worth my while,” pursues Pod- 
 snap, becoming handsomely mollified, ‘‘ and it 
 is the reverse of important to my position. But 
 it is not my wish to set myself up as law for 
 another man differently situated. You think it _ 
 is worth your while, and is important to your 
 position. Is that so?” 
 
 Always with the proviso that Podsnap will 
 rally round him, Veneering thinks it is so. . 
 
 ‘¢Then you don’t ask my advice,” says Pod- 
 snap. ‘Good. Then I won’t give it you. But 
 you do ask my help. Good. Then I'll work 
 for you.” 
 
 Veneering instantly blesses him, and apprises 
 him that Twemlow is already working. Pod-~ 
 snap does not quite approve that any body should 
 be already working—regarding it rather in the 
 light of a liberty—but tolerates Twemlow, and 
 says he is a well-connected old female who will 
 do no harm. 
 
 ‘T have nothing very particular to do to-day,” 
 adds Podsnap, ‘‘and I’ll mix with some influ- 
 ential people. I had engaged myself to dinner, 
 but Pll send Mrs Podsnap and get off going my- 
 self, and [ll dine with you at eight. It’s im- 
 portant we should report progress and compare 
 notes. Now let me see. You ought to have a 
 couple of active, energetic fellows, of gentleman- 
 ly manners, to go about.” 
 
 Veneering, after cogitation, thinks of Boots. 
 and Brewer. 
 
 “Whom I have met at your house,” says Pod- 
 snap. ‘*Yes. They'll do very well. Let them 
 each have a cab, and go about.” 
 
 Veneering immediately mentions what a bless- 
 ing he feels it to possess a friend capable of such 
 grand administrative suggestions, and really is 
 elated at this going about of Boots and Brewer, 
 as an idea wearing an electioneering aspect and 
 looking desperately like business. Leaving Pod- 
 snap, at a hand-gallop, he descends upon Boots 
 and Brewer, who enthusiastically rally round 
 him by at once bolting off in cabs, taking oppo- 
 site directions. Then Veneering repairs to the 
 legal gentleman in Britannia’s confidence, and 
 with him transacts some delicate affairs of busi- 
 ness, and issues an address to the independent 
 electors of Pocket-Breaches, announcing that he 
 is coming among them for their suffrages, as the 
 mariner returns to the home of his early child- 
 hood: a phrase which is none the worse for his 
 never having been near the place in his life, and 
 not even now distinctly knowing where it is. 
 
 Mrs. Veneering, during the same eventful 
 hours, is not idle. No sooner does the carriage 
 
Wee 2" 
 
 ‘the world! 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 turn ont, all complete, than she turns into it, all 
 complete, and gives the word ‘‘To Lady Tip- 
 pins’s.” ‘That charmer dwells over a stay-maker’s 
 in the Belgravian Borders, with a life-size mod- 
 el in the window on the ground-floor, of a dis- 
 tinguished beauty in a blue petticoat, stay-lace 
 in hand, looking over her shoulder at the town 
 in innocent surprise. As well she may, to find 
 herself dressing under the circumstances. 
 -Lady Tippins at home? Lady Tippins at 
 home, with the room darkened, and her back 
 (like the lady’s at the ground-floor window, 
 though for a different reason) cunningly turned 
 toward the light. Lady Tippins is so surprised 
 by seeing her dear Mrs. Veneering so early—in 
 the middle of the night, the pretty creature calls 
 it—that her eyelids almost go up, under the in- 
 fluence of that emotion. 
 
 To whom Mrs. Veneering incoherently com- 
 municates, how that Veneering has been offered 
 Pocket-Breaches; how thatit is the time for ral- 
 lying round; how that Veneering has said, ‘‘We 
 must work ;” how that she is here, as a wife and 
 mother, to entreat Lady Tippins to work ; how 
 that the carriage is at Lady Tippins’s disposal 
 for purposes of work; how that she, proprie- 
 tress of said bran-new elegant equipage, will re- 
 turn home on foot—on bleeding feet, if need be 
 
 —to work (not specifying how) until she drops 
 
 by the side of baby’s crib. 
 *“My love,” says: Lady Tippins, ‘‘ compose 
 yourself; we'll bring him in.” And Lady Tip- 
 
 ’ pins really does work, and work the Veneering 
 
 horses too; for she clatters about town all day, 
 calling upon every body she knows, and show- 
 ing her entertaining powers and green fan to 
 immense advantage, by rattling on with, My 
 dear soul, what do you think? What do you 
 suppose me to be? You'll never guess. I’m 
 pretending to be an electioneering agent. And 
 for what place of all places? Pocket-Breaches. 
 And why? Because the dearest friend I have 
 in the world has bought it. And who is the 
 dearest friend I have in the world?) A man of 
 the name of Veneering. Not omitting his wife, 
 who is the other dearest friend I have in the 
 world; and I positively declare I forgot their 
 baby, who is the other. And we are carrying 
 on this little farce to keep up appearances, and 
 isn’t it refreshing! Then, my precious child, 
 
 the fun of-it is that nobody knows who these 
 
 Veneerings are, and that they know nobody, and 
 that they have a house out of the Tales of the 
 Genii, and give dinners out of the Arabian 
 Nights, Curious to see ’em, my dear? Say 
 you'll know ’em. Come and dine with ’em. 
 They sha’n’t bore you. Say who shall meet 
 you. We'll make up a party of our own, and 
 I’|l engage that they shall not interfere with you 
 for one single moment. You really ought to see 
 their gold and silver camels. ‘I call their din- 
 ner-table the Caravan. Do come and dine with 
 my Veneerings, my own Veneerings, my ex- 
 elusive property, the dearest friends I have in 
 And above all, my dear, be sure 
 you promise me your vote and interest and all 
 
 sorts of plumpers for Pocket-Breaches; for we 
 -couldn’t think of spending sixpence on it, my 
 
 love, and can only consent to be brought in by 
 the spontaneous thingummies of the incorrupt- 
 
 ‘ible whatdoyoucallums. 
 
 Now the point of view seized by the be- 
 
 117) 
 
 witching Tippins, that this same working and 
 rallying round is to keep up appearances, may 
 have something in it, but not all the truth, 
 More is done, or considered to be done—which 
 does as well—by taking cabs, and ‘‘ going about,” 
 than the fair Tippins knew of. Many vast vague 
 reputations have been made solely by taking 
 cabs and goingabout. This particularly obtains 
 in all Parliamentary affairs. Whether the busi- 
 ness in hand be to get a man in, or get a man 
 out, or get a man over, or promote a railway, or 
 jockey a railway, or what else, nothing is under- 
 stood to be so effectual as scouring nowhere ina 
 violent hurry—in short, as taking cabs and going 
 about. 
 
 Probably because this reason is in the air, 
 Twemlow, far from being singular in his persua- 
 sion that he works like a Trojan, is capped by 
 Podsnap, who in his turn is capped by Boots 
 and Brewer. At eight o’clock, when all these 
 hard workers assemble to dine at Veneering’s, it 
 is understood that the cabs of Boots and Brewer 
 mustn’t leave the door, but that pails of water 
 must be brought from the nearest baiting-place, 
 and cast over the horses’ legs on the very spot, 
 lest Boots and Brewer should have instant occa- 
 sion to mount and away. ‘Those fleet messen- 
 gers require the Analytical to see that their hats 
 are deposited where they can be laid hold of at 
 an instant’s notice; and they dine (remarkably 
 well, though) with the air of firemen in charge 
 of an engine, expecting intelligence of some tre- 
 mendous conflagration. 
 
 Mrs. Veneering faintly remarks, as dinner 
 opens, that many such days would be too much 
 for her. 
 
 ‘“Many such days would be too much for all 
 of us,” says Podsnap; ‘but we’ll bring him in!” 
 
 ‘¢ We'll bring him in,” says Lady Tippins, 
 sportively waving her green fan. ‘‘ Veneering 
 forever!” 
 
 ‘¢We'll bring him in!” says Twemlow. 
 
 ‘We'll bring him in!” say Boots and Brewer. 
 
 Strictly speaking, it would be hard to show 
 cause why they should not bring him in, Pocket- 
 Breaches having closed its little bargain, and 
 there being no opposition. However, it is agreed 
 that they must ‘‘ work’ to the last, and that if 
 they did not work, something indefinite would 
 happen. It is likewise agreed that they are all 
 so exhausted with the work behind them, and 
 need to be fortified for the work before them, as 
 to. require peculiar strengthening from Veneer- 
 ing’s cellar. Therefore, the Analytical has or- 
 ders to produce the cream of the cream of his 
 bins, and therefore it falls out that rallying be- 
 comes rather a trying word for the occasion; 
 Lady Tippins being observed gamely to inculcate 
 the necessity of rearing round their dear Veneer- 
 ing; Podsnap advocating roaring round him 3 
 Boots and Brewer declaring their intention of 
 reeling round him; and Veneering thanking his 
 devoted friends one and all, with great emotion, 
 for rarullarulling round him. 
 
 In these inspiring moments Brewer strikes 
 out an idea which is the great hit of the day. 
 He consults his watch, and says (like Guy 
 Fawkes), he’ll now go down to the House of 
 Commons and see how things look. 
 
 ‘I'll keep about the lobby for an hour or so,” 
 says Brewer, with a deeply mysterious counte- 
 nance; ‘‘and if things look well, I won't come 
 
118 
 
 back, but will order my cab for nine in the morn- 
 ing.” 
 
 ‘You couldn’t do better,”’ says Podsnap. 
 
 Veneering expresses his inability ever to ac- 
 knowledge this last service. Tears stand in Mrs. 
 Veneering’s affectionate eyes. Boots shows envy, 
 loses ground, and is regarded as possessing a 
 second-rate mind. They all crowd to the door 
 to see Brewer off. Brewer says to his driver, 
 ** Now, is your horse pretty fresh ?”’ eying the 
 animal with critical scrutiny. Driver says he’s 
 -as fresh as butter. ‘‘ Put him along, then,” says 
 Brewer; ‘‘ House of Commons.” Driver darts 
 up, Brewer leaps in, they cheer him as he de- 
 parts, and Mr, Podsnap says, ‘‘ Mark my words, 
 Sir. That’s a man of resource; that’s’a man to 
 make his way in life.” 
 
 When the time comes for Veneering to de- 
 liver a neat and appropriate stammer to the men 
 of Pocket-Breaches, only Podsnap and Twem- 
 low accompany him by railway to that seques- 
 tered spot. The legal gentleman is at the Pock- 
 et-Breaches Branch Station, with an open car- 
 riage, with a printed bill ‘*‘ Veneering forever !” 
 Stuck upon it, as if it were a wall; and they 
 gloriously proceed, amidst the grins of the popu- 
 lace, to a feeble little town-hall on crutches, 
 with some onions and boot-laces under it, which 
 the legal gentleman says are a Market; and 
 from the front window of that edifice Veneering 
 ‘speaks to the listening earth, In the moment 
 of his taking his hat off, Podsnap, as per agree- 
 ment made with Mrs. Veneering, telegraphs to 
 that wife and mother, ‘‘ He’s up.” 
 
 Veneering loses his way in the usual No 
 Thoroughfares of speech, and Podsnap and 
 Twemlow say Hear hear! and sometimes, when 
 he can’t by any means back himself out of some 
 very unlucky No Thoroughfare, ‘* He-a-a-r 
 He-a-a-r!’’ with an air of facetious conviction, 
 as if the ingenuity of the thing gave them a sen- 
 sation of exquisite pleasure. But Veneering 
 makes two remarkably good points; so good, 
 that they are supposed to have been suggested 
 to him by the legal gentleman in Britannia’s 
 confidence, while briefly conferring on the 
 Stairs, 
 
 Point the first is this. Weneering institutes 
 an original comparison between the country and 
 a ship; pointedly calling the ship the Vessel of 
 the State, and the Minister the Man at the 
 Helm. Veneering’s object is to let Pocket- 
 Breaches know that his friend on his right 
 (Podsnap) is a man of wealth. Consequently 
 says he, ‘‘ And, gentlemen, when the timbers 
 of the Vessel of the State are unsound and the 
 Man at the Helm is unskillful, would those great 
 Marine Insurers, who rank among our world- 
 famed merchant -princes— would they insure 
 her, gentlemen? Would they underwrite her? 
 Would they incur a risk in her? Would they 
 have confidence in her? Why, gentlemen, if I 
 appealed to my honorable friend upon my right, 
 
 himself among the greatest and most respected | 
 
 of that great and much-respected class, he would 
 answer No!” 
 
 - Point the second is this. The telling fact that 
 Twemlow is related to Lord Snigsworth must be 
 let off. Veneering supposes a state of public 
 
 ‘affairs that probably never could by any possi- 
 
 bility exist (though this is not quite certain, in | 
 consequence of his picture being unintelligible | 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 to himself and every body else), and thus pro- 
 ceeds: ‘*Why, gentlemen, if I were to indicate 
 such a programme to any class of society, I say 
 it would be received with derision, would be 
 pointed at by the finger of scorn. If I indicated 
 such a programme to any worthy and intelligent 
 tradesman of your town—nay, I will here be 
 personal, and say Our town—what would he re- 
 ply? Hewould reply, ‘Away with it!’ That’s 
 
 what he would reply, gentlemen. - In his honest — 
 
 indignation he would reply, ‘Away with it! 
 But suppose I mounted higher in the social 
 scale. Suppose I drew my arm through the 
 arm of my respected friend upon my left, and, 
 walking with him through the ancestral woods 
 of his family, and under the spreading beeches 
 of Snigsworthy Park, approached the noble 
 hall, crossed the court-yard, entered by. the 
 door, went up the staircase, and, passing from 
 room to room, found myself at last in the august 
 presence of my friend’s near kinsman, Lord 
 Snigsworth. “And suppose I said to that. ven- 
 erable earl, ‘My Lord, I am here before your 
 
 lordship, presented by your lordship’s near kins-- 
 
 man, my friend upon my left, to indicate that 
 programme ;’ what would his lordship answer ? 
 Why, he would answer, ‘Away withit!’ That’s 
 what he would answer, gentlemen. ‘ Away 
 
 with it!’ Unconsciously using, in his exalted. 
 
 sphere, the exact language of the worthy and 
 intelligent tradesman of our town, the near and 
 dear kinsman of my friend upon my left would 
 answer in his wrath, ‘Away with it!” . 
 
 Veneering finishes with this last success, and 
 Mr. Podsnap telegraphs to Mrs. Veneering, 
 ‘* He’s down.” 
 
 Then dinner is had at the Hotel with the legal 
 gentleman, and then there are in due succession 
 nomination and declaration. Finally Mr. Pod- 
 snap telegraphs to Mrs. Veneering, ‘‘ We have 
 brought him in.” : 
 
 Another gorgeous dinner awaits them on their 
 return to the Vencering halls, and Lady Tippins 
 awaits them, and Boots and Brewer await them. 
 There is a modest assertion on every body’s part 
 that every body single-handed ‘‘brought him 
 in;” but in the main it is conceded by all that 
 that stroke of business on Brewer’s part, in go- 
 
 ing down to the House that night to see how. 
 
 things looked, was the master-stroke, 
 
 A touching little incident is related by Mrs. 
 Veneering in the course of the evening. Mrs. 
 Veneering is habitually disposed to be tearful, 
 and has an extra disposition that way after her 
 late excitement. Previous to withdrawing from 
 the dinner-table with Lady Tippins she says, in 
 a pathetic and physically weak manner: 
 
 ** You will all think it foolish of me, I know, 
 but I must mention it. As I sat by Baby’s 
 crib, on the night before the election, Baby was 
 very uneasy in her sleep.” 
 
 The Analytical chemist, who is gloomily look- 
 ing on, has diabolical impulses to suggest ‘‘ Wind” 
 and throw up his situation; but represses them. 
 
 ‘‘ After an interval almost convulsive, Baby 
 curled her little hands in one another and 
 smiled.” 
 
 Mrs, Veneering stopping here, Mr. Podsnap 
 deems it incumbent 
 why !” LS 
 
 ‘“‘Could it be, I asked myself,” says Mrs. 
 Veneering, looking about her for her pocket- 
 
 on him to say: ‘‘I wonder | 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
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 ty Zant a ets 
 NY 4) 
 ayy we 
 we 
 
 nr? 
 mae? 
 
 EY 
 (hintet 
 aut 
 
 N 
 AS 
 \ 
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 a 
 K 
 iM] 
 
 na 
 
 Hg 
 il 
 
 wt 
 
 pe PPE, 
 
 i 
 vay 
 i 
 
 y 
 ‘ 
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 — FES 
 
 a: 
 Lo 
 
 aa 
 FEF 
 
 aa a 
 
 BRINGING HIM IN. 
 
 handkerchief, ‘‘that the Fairies were telling 
 Baby that her papa would shortly be an M.P. ?” 
 
 So overcome by the sentiment is Mrs. Veneer- 
 in.s that they all get. up to make a clear stage for 
 Veneering, who goes round the table to the res- 
 
 cus and bears her out backward, with her feet |- 
 man. 
 
 impressively scraping the carpet: after remark- 
 iit that hor work has been too. much for her 
 strength. Whether the fairies made any men- 
 tion of the five thousand pounds, and it dis- 
 agreed with Baby, is not speculated upon. 
 
 Poor little Twemlow, quite done up, is touch- 
 ed, and still continues touched after he is safely 
 housed over the livery-stable yard in Duke Street, 
 Saint James’s. But there, upon his sofa, a tre- 
 méndous consideration breaks in upon the mild 
 Svntleman, putting all softer considerations to 
 the rout. 
 
 “Gracious Heayens! Now I have time to 
 
 think of it, he never saw one of his constituents 
 in all his days until we saw them together!” 
 
 After having paced the room in distress of 
 mind, with his hand to his forehead, the inno- 
 cent ‘Twemlow returns to his sofa.and moans: 
 
 ‘TY shall either go distraeted, or die, of this 
 He comes upon me too late in life. I 
 am not strong cnough to bear him!” 
 
 Se ea 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 CUPID PROMPTED. 
 
 To use the cold language of the world, Mrs. 
 Alfred Lammle rapidly improved the acquaint- 
 ance of Miss Podsnap. To use the warm lan- 
 guage of Mrs. Lammle, she and her sweet Geor- 
 giana soon became one—in heart, in mind, in 
 seniiment, in soul, 
 
igsis 
 
 120 
 
 ! 
 
 Whenever Georgiana could escape from the 
 thralldom of Podsnappery; could throw off the 
 bed-clothes of the custard-colored phaeton, and 
 get up; could shrink out of the range of her 
 mother’s rocking, and (so to speak) rescue her 
 poor little frosty toes from being rocked over ; 
 she repaired to her friend, Mrs. Alfred Lammle. 
 Mrs. Podsnap by no means objected. As a con- 
 sciously ‘‘ splendid woman,” accustomed to over- 
 hear herself so denominated by elderly osteolo- 
 gists pursuing their studies in dinner society, 
 Mrs. Podsnap could dispense with her daughter. 
 Mr. Podsnap, for his part, on being informed 
 where Georgiana was, swelled with patronage 
 of the Lammles. That they, when unable to lay 
 hold of him, should respectfully grasp at the hem 
 of his mantle; that they, when they could not 
 bask in the glory of him the sun, should take up 
 with the pale reflected light of the watery young 
 moon his daughter; appeared quite natural, be- 
 coming, and proper. It gave him a better opin- 
 ion of the discretion of the Lammles than he had 
 heretofore held, as showing that they apprecia- 
 ted the value of the connection. So, Georgiana 
 repairing to her friend, Mr. Podsnap went out 
 to dinner, and to dinner, and yet to dinner, arm 
 in arm with Mrs. Podsnap: settling his obstinate 
 head in his cravat and shirt-collar, much as if 
 he were performing on the Pandean pipes, in 
 his own honor, the triumphal march, See the 
 conquering Podsnap comes, Sound the trumpets, 
 beat the drums! 
 
 It was a trait in Mr. Podsnap’s character (and 
 in one form or other it will be generally seen to 
 pervade the depths and shallows of Podsnap- 
 pery), that he could not endure a hint ot dis- 
 paragement of any friend or acquaintance of his. 
 ‘* How dare vou ?” he would seem to say, in such 
 acase. ‘*Whatdoyou mean? I have licensed 
 this person. This person has taken out my cer- 
 tificate. Through this person you strike at me, 
 Podsnap the Great. And it is not that I par- 
 ticularly care for the person’s dignity, but that 
 I do most particularly care for Podsnap’s.”’ 
 Hence, if any one in his presence had presumed 
 to doubt the responsibility of the Lammles, he 
 would have been mightily huffed. Not that 
 any one did, for Veneering, M.P., was always 
 the authority for their being very rich, and per- 
 haps believed it. As indeed he might, if he 
 chose, for any thing he knew of the matter, 
 
 Mr. and Mrs. Lammle’s house in Sackville 
 Street, Piccadilly, was but a temporary resi- 
 dence. {[t had done well enough, they informed 
 their friends, for Mr. Lammle when a bachclor, 
 but it would not do now. So they were always 
 looking at palatial residences in the best situa- 
 
 tions, and always very nearly taking or buying | 
 
 one, but never’ quite concluding the bargain. 
 Hereby they made for themselves a shining little 
 reputation apart. People said, on seeing a va- 
 cant palatial residence, ‘‘ The very thing for the 
 Lammles!” and wrote to the Lammles about it, 
 and the Lammles always went to look at it, but 
 unfortunately it never exactly answered. In 
 
 short, they suffered so many disappointments | 
 
 that they began to think it would be necessary 
 to build a palatial residence. And hereby they 
 made another shining reputation; many persons 
 of their acquaintance becoming by anticipation 
 dissatisfied with their own houses, and envious 
 of the non-existent Lammle structure, 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 ft ‘ 
 
 The handsome fittings and furnishings of the 
 house in Sackville Street were piled thick and 
 high over the skeleton up stairs, and if it ever 
 whispered from under its load of upholstery, 
 ‘‘ Here 1 am in the closet!” it was to very few 
 ears, and certainly never to Miss Podsnap’s. 
 What Miss Podsnap was particularly charmed 
 with, next to the graces of her friend, was the 
 happiness of her friend’s married life. This wag 
 frequently their theme of conversation. 
 
 ‘“‘T am sure,” said Miss Podsnap, “ Mr, 
 'Lammle is like a lover. At least I—I should 
 think he was.” waka 
 
 ‘‘Georgiana, darling!” said Mrs. Lammle, 
 holding up a forefinger, ‘‘ Take care!” 
 
 ‘¢Oh my goodness me !” exclaimed Miss Pode 
 snap, reddening. ‘* What have I said now?” 
 
 ‘* Alfred, you know,” hinted Mrs, Lammle, 
 playfully shaking her head. ‘‘ You were nevor 
 to say Mr. Lammle any more, Georgiana.” 
 
 “Oh! Alfred, then. Iam glad it’s no worse; 
 I was afraid I had said something shocking. [I 
 am.always saying something wrong to ma.” 
 
 ‘“To me, Georgiana dearest ?” 
 
 I wish 
 
 **No, not to you; you are not ma. 
 you were.” 
 
 Mrs. Lammle bestowed a sweet and loving 
 smile upon her friend, which Miss Podsnap re- 
 turned as she best could. They sat at lunch in 
 Mrs. Lammle’s own boudoir. 
 
 ‘‘ And so, dearest Georgiana, Alfred is like 
 your notion of a lover?” 
 
 ‘*T don’t say that, Sophronia,” Georgiana re- 
 plied, beginning to conceal her elbows. ‘I 
 haven’t any notion of a lover. The dreadful 
 wretches that ma brings up at places to torment 
 me are not Iovers, I only mean that Mr.—” 
 
 ** Again, dearest Georgiana ?” 
 
 ‘*That Alfred—” 
 
 ‘¢Sounds much better, darling.” 
 
 ** Loves you so. He always treats you with 
 such delicate gallantry and attention. Now, 
 don’t he?” 
 
 ‘Truly, my dear,” said Mrs. Lammle, with 
 a rather singular expression crossing her face. 
 ‘I believe that he loves me fully as much as I 
 love him.” 
 
 ‘Oh, what happiness!” exclaimed Miss Pod- 
 snap. 
 
 “*But do you know, my Georgiana,” Mrs. 
 Lammle resumed presently, ‘‘ that there is some~. 
 ‘thing suspicious in your enthusiastic sympathy 
 | with Alfred’s tenderness ?” 
 
 **Good gracious no, I hope not!” 
 
 **Doesn’t it rather suggest,” said Mrs. Lam- 
 mle, archly, ‘‘that my Georgiana’s little heart. 
 | 1s—osty 
 
 **Oh don’t!” Miss Podsnap blushingly bee ¢ 
 sought her. ‘‘Please don’t! I assure you, So- 
 -phronia, chet I only praise Alfred because he is 
 your huspand and so fond of you.” . 
 
 Sophronia’s glance was as if a rather new 
 light broke in upon her. It shaded off into a. 
 cool-smile, as she said, with her eyes upon her 
 lunch, and her eyebrows raised : Ram a 
 | ‘‘ You are quite wrong, my love, in your guess 
 -at my meaning. What I insinuated was, that 
 my Georgiana’s little heart..was. growing~eon- 
 scious of a vacancy.” : 
 | “No, no, no,” said Georgiana. ‘‘I wouldn't — 
 
 have any body say any thing to me in that way 
 i for I don’t know how many thousand pounds.” 
 
 + 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 “In what way, my Georgiana?’’ inquired 
 Mrs. Lammle, still smiling coolly, with her 
 eyes upon her lunch, and her eyebrows raised. 
 
 ** You know,” returned poor little Miss Pod- 
 snap. “I think I should go out of my mind, 
 Sophronia, with vexation and shyness and de- 
 testation, if any body did. It’s enough for me 
 to see how loving you and your husband are. 
 That's a different thing. I couldn’t bear to have 
 any thing of that sort going on with myself. I 
 should beg and pray to—to have the person 
 taken away and trampled upon.” 
 
 Ah! here was Alfred. Having stolen in un- 
 observed, he playfully leaned on the back of So- 
 phronia’s chair, and, as Miss Podsnap saw him, 
 put one of Sophronia’s wandering locks to his 
 lips, and waved a kiss from it toward Miss Pod- 
 sfiap: 
 
 ‘What is this about husbands and detesta- 
 tions ?” inquired the captivating Alfred. 
 
 “Why, they say,” returned his wife, “that 
 listeners never hear any good of themselves; 
 though you—but pray how long have you been 
 here, Sir?” 
 
 ** This instant arrived, my own.” 
 
 “Then I may go on—though if you had been 
 here but a moment or two sooner, you would 
 have heard your praises sounded by Georgiana.” 
 
 ** Only, if they were to be called praises at all, 
 which I really don’t think they were,” explain- 
 ed Miss Podsnap in a flutter, “for being so de- 
 voted to Sophronia.” 
 
 “Sophronia!” murmured Alfred. ‘My life!” 
 and kissed her hand. In return for which she 
 kissed his watch-chain. 
 
 ‘* But it was not I who was to be taken away 
 and trampled upon, I hope?” said Alfred, draw- 
 ing a seat between them. 
 
 ‘* Ask Georgiana, my soul,” replied his wife. 
 
 Alfred touchingly appealed to Georgiana. 
 
 ‘*Oh, it was nobody,” replied Miss Podsnap. 
 “It was nonsense.” 
 
 *‘But if you are determined to know, Mr. 
 Inquisitive Pet, as I suppose you are,” said the 
 happy and fond Sophronia, smiling, ‘it was 
 any one who should venture to aspire to Geor- 
 giana,” 
 
 ‘* Sophronia, my love,” remonstrated Mr. 
 Lammle, becoming graver, ‘‘you are not scri- 
 cus ?” 
 
 ** Alfred, my love,” returned his wife, ‘I dare 
 say Georgiana was not, but lam.” 
 
 ‘Now this,” said Mr. Lammle, ‘shows the 
 accidental combinations that there are in things! 
 Could you believe, my Ownest, that I came in 
 here with the name of an aspirant to our Gcor- 
 giana on my lips?” 
 
 ‘Of course I could believe, Alfred,” said Mrs. 
 Lammle, ‘‘any thing that you told me.” 
 
 “You dear one! And I any thing that you 
 told me.” 
 
 How delightful those interchanges, and the 
 looks accompanying them! Now, if the skele- 
 ton up stairs had taken that opportunity, for in- 
 Stance, of calling out ‘‘Here I am, suffocating 
 in the closet!” 
 
 ‘I give you my honor, my dear Sophronia—” 
 
 **And I know what that is, love,” said she. 
 
 “You do, my darling—that I came into the 
 room all but uttering young Fledgeby’s name, 
 Tell Georgiana, dearest, about voung Fledgeby,” 
 “Oh: no, don’t! ek don't!” cricd Miss 
 
 121 
 Podsnap, putting her fingers in her ears. “I'd 
 rather not.” 
 
 Mrs. Lammle laughed in her gayest manner, 
 and, removing her Georgiana’s unresisting hands, 
 and playfully holding them in her own at arms’- 
 length, sometimes near together and sometimes 
 wide apart, went on: 
 
 ‘You must know, you dearly beloved little 
 goose, that once upon a time there was a cer- 
 tain person called young Fledgeby. And this 
 young Fledgeby, who was of an excellent fam- 
 ily and rich, was known to two other certain 
 persons, dearly attached to one another and 
 called Mr. and Mrs, Alfred Lammle. So this 
 young Fledgeby, being one night at the play, 
 there sees, with Mr. and Mrs. Alfred Lammile, a 
 certain heroine called—” 
 
 ‘* No, don’t say Georgiana Podsnap!” plead- 
 ed that young lady, almost in tears. “Please 
 don’t. Oh do do do say somebody else! Not 
 Georgiana Podsnap. Oh don’t, don’t, don’t!” 
 
 ‘* No other,” said Mrs. Lammle, laughing air- 
 ily, and, full of affectionate blandishments, open- 
 ing and closing Georgiana’s arms like a pair of 
 compasses, ‘‘than my little Georgiana Podsnap. 
 So this young Fledgeby goes to that Alfred 
 Lammle:and says—” 
 
 ‘* Oh ple-e-e-ease don’t!” eried Georgiana, as 
 if the supplication were being squeezed out of 
 her by powerful compression. ‘‘I so hate him 
 for saying it!” 
 
 ‘For saying what, my dear?” laughed Mrs, 
 Lammle. 
 
 ‘*Oh, I don’t know what he said,” cried Geor- 
 giana, wildly, ‘“‘but I hated him all the same 
 for saying it.” 
 
 ** My dear,” said Mrs. Lammle, always laugh- 
 ing in her most captivating way, ‘‘ the poor young 
 fellow only says that he is stricken all of a heap.” 
 
 ‘Qh, what shall I ever do!” interposed Geor- 
 giana, ‘*Oh my goodness what a Fool he must 
 be re 
 
 ‘‘_—And implores to be asked to dinner, and 
 to make a fourth at the play another time. 
 And so he dines to-morrow and goes to the. 
 Opera with us. That’s all. Except, my dear 
 Georgiana—and what will you think of this !-— 
 that he is infinitely shyer than you, and far 
 more afraid of you than you ever were of any 
 one in all your days!” 
 
 In perturbation of mind Miss Podsnap still 
 fumed and plucked at her hands a little, but 
 could not help laughing at the notion of any 
 body’s being afraid of her. With that advant- 
 age, Sophronia flattered her and rallied her more 
 successfully, and then the insinuating Alfred 
 flattered her and rallied her, and promised that 
 at any moment when she might require that serv- 
 ice at his hands he would take young Fledgeby 
 out and trample on him. Thus it remained - 
 amicably understood that young Fledgeby was 
 to come to admire, and that Georgiana was to 
 come to be admired; and Georgiana, with the 
 entirely new sensation in her breast of having 
 that prospect before her, and with many kisses 
 from her dear Sophronia in present possession, 
 preceded six feet one of discontented footman 
 (an amount of the article that always came for 
 her when she walked home) to her father’s dwell- 
 ing. 
 
 The happy pair being left together, Mrs.. 
 Lammile said to her husband: 
 
. 
 ' 
 
 122 . OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 “Tf I understand this girl, § 
 ous fascinations have wrodueed some effect upon 
 her. I mention the conquest in good time, be- 
 cause I apprehend your scheme to be more im- 
 portant to you than your vanity.” 
 
 There was a mirror on the wall before them, 
 and her eyes just caught him smirking in it. 
 She gave the reflected image a look of the deep- 
 est disdain, and the image received it in the 
 glass. Next moment they quietly eyed each 
 other, as if they, the principals, had had no part 
 in that expressive transaction. 
 
 It may have been that Mrs. Lammle tried in 
 some manner to excuse her conduct to herself 
 by ee the poor little victim of whom 
 she spoke with acrimonious contempt. It may 
 have been too that in this she did not quite suc- 
 ceed, fur it is very difficult to resist confidence, 
 and she knew she had Georgiana’s. 
 
 Nothing more was said between the happy 
 pair. Perhaps conspirators who have once es- 
 tablished an undéfstanding, may not be over- 
 fond of repeating the terms and objects of their 
 conspiracy. Next day came ; came Georgiana ; 
 and came Fledgeby. 
 
 Georgiana had by this time seen a good deal 
 of the house and its frequenters. As there was 
 a certain handsome room with a billiard-table 
 in it—on the ground-floor, eating out a back- 
 yard—which might have been Mr. Lammle’s 
 office. or library, but was called by neither name, 
 but simply Mr. Lammle’s room, so it would have 
 been hard for stronger female heads than Geor- 
 giana’s to determine whether its frequenters were 
 men of pleasure or men of business. Between 
 the room and the men there were strong points 
 of general resemblance. Both were too gaudy, 
 too slaugey, too odorous of cigars, and too much 
 given to horse-flesh; the latter characteristic 
 being exemplified in the room by its decorations, 
 and in the men by their conversation. High- 
 stepping horses seemed necessary to all Mr. 
 Lammile’s friends—as necessary as their trans- 
 action of business together in a gipsy way at un= 
 timely hours of the morning and evening, and in 
 rushes and snatches. ‘There were friends» who 
 seemed to be always coming and going across 
 the Channel, on errands about the Bourse, and 
 Greek and Spanish and India and Mexican and 
 par and premium and discount and tliree quar- 
 ters and seven eighths. There were other friends 
 who seemed to be always lolling and lounging 
 in and out of the City, on questions of the Bourse, 
 aud Greek and Spanish and India and Mexican 
 and par and premium and discount and three 
 quarters and seven eighths. They were all fe- 
 verish, boastful, and indefinably loose; and they 
 all ate and drank a great deal; and made bets 
 in eating and drinking. They all spoke of sums 
 of money, and only mentioned the sums and left 
 the money to be understood: as ‘‘ five and for- 
 ty thousand Tom,” or ‘* Two hundred and twen- 
 ty-two on every individual share in the lot Joe.” 
 They seemed to divide the world into tio classes 
 of people; people who were making: enormous 
 fortunes, and people who were being enormous- 
 ly ruined. They were always in a hurry, and 
 yet seemed to have nothing tangible to do : eXx- 
 cept a few of them (these, mostly asthmatic and 
 thick-lipped) who were forever demonstrating to 
 the rest, with gold pencil-cases which they could 
 
 hardly hold because of the big rings on their | 
 
 Sir, your danger-. 
 
 ‘ 
 forefingers, how money was to be made. Lastly, 
 they all swore at their grooms, and the grooms 
 were not quite.as respectful or complete as other 
 men’s grooms; seeming somehow to fall short. 
 
 of the groom point as their masters fell short of 
 
 the gentleman point. 
 
 Young Fledgeby was none of these. Young 
 Fledgeby had a peachy cheek, or.a cheek com- 
 pounded of the peach and the red red red wall 
 on which it grows, and was an awkward, sandy- 
 haired, small-eyed youth, exceeding slim (his 
 enemies would have said lanky), and prone to 
 self-examination in the articles of whisker and 
 mustache. 
 he anxiously expected, Fledgeby underwent re- 
 markable fluctuations of spirits, ranging along 
 the whole scale from confidence to despair, 
 There were times when he started, as exclaim- 
 ing ‘* By Jupiter, hert it is at last!” There were 
 
 other times when, being equally depressed, he. 
 
 would be seen to shake his head, and give up 
 hope. ‘To see him at those periods leaning ona 
 chimney-piece, like as on an urn containing the 
 ashes of his ambition, with the cheek that would 
 not sprout, upon the hand on which that cheek 
 had forced conviction, was a distressing sight. 
 
 Not so was Fledgeby seen on this occasion. 
 Arrayed in superb raiment, with his opera hat 
 under his arm, he concluded his self-examina- 
 tion hopefully, awaited the arrival of Miss Pod- 
 snap, and talked small-talk with Mrs. Lammle. 
 In facetious homage to the smallness of his talk, 
 and the jerky nature of his manners, Fledgeby’s 
 familiars had agreed to confer upon him (be- 
 hind his back) the honorary title of Fascination 
 Fledgeby. 
 
 ‘“Warm weather, Mrs. Lammle,’ said Fas- 
 cination Fledgeby. “Mrs. Lammle thought it 
 scarcely as W arm as it had been yesterday. 
 ‘‘ Perhaps not,” said Fascination Fledgeby. with 
 great quickness of repartee; ‘‘but I expect. it 
 will be devilish warm to-morrow.” 
 
 He threw off another little scintillation. ‘* Been 
 out to-day, Mrs. Lammle?”’ 
 
 Mrs. Lammle answered, for a short drive. 
 
 **Some people,” said Fascination Fledgeby, 
 ‘‘are accustomed to take long drives; but it 
 generally appears to me that if they make ’em 
 too long, they overdo it.” 
 
 Being in such feather, he might have sur- 
 passed himself in his next sally, had not Miss 
 Podsnap been announced. Mrs. Lammle flew 
 to embrace her darling little Georgy, and when 
 the first transports were over, presented Mr, 
 Fledgeby. ‘Mr. Lammle came on the scene last, 
 
 for he was always late, and so were the frequent- ~ 
 ers always late; all hands being bound to be | 
 
 made late, by private information about the 
 Bourse, and Greek and Spanish and India and 
 Mexican and par and premium and discount and 
 three quarters and seven eighths. 
 
 A handsome little dinner was served imme- 
 
 diately, and Mr. Lammle sat sparkling at his 
 end of the table, with his servant behind his 
 chair, and his ever-lingering doubts upon the 
 
 subject of his wages behind himself. Mr. Lam- 
 
 mle’s utmost powers of sparkling were in requi- 
 sition to-day, for Fascination Fledgeby and 
 
 Georgiana not only. struck each other speech- 
 
 less, but struck each other into astonishing atti- 
 tudes; Georgiana, as she sat facing Fledgeby, — 
 
 making such efforts to conceal her elbows as. 
 
 While feeling for the whisker that | 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 were totally incompatible with the use of a knife 
 and furk; and Fledgeby, as he sat facing Georgi- 
 ana, avoiding her countenance by every possible 
 device, and betraying the discomposure of his 
 mind in feeling for his whiskers with his spoon, 
 his wine-glass, and his bread. 
 
 So Mr. and Mrs. Alfred Lammle had to 
 prompt, and this 1 is how they prompted. 
 
 “* Georgiana,” said Mr. Lammle, low and 
 smiling, and sparkling all over like a harle- 
 quin; ‘‘ you are not in your ‘sual spirits. Why 
 are you not in your usual spirits, Georgiana ?” 
 
 Georgiana faltered that she was much the 
 same as she was in general; she was not aware 
 of being different. 
 
 *** Not aware of being different!” retorted Mr. 
 Alfred Lammle. ‘‘You, my dear Georgiana! 
 who were always so natural and unconstrained 
 with us!-who are such a relicf from the crowd 
 
 . that are all alike! who are the embodiment. of 
 gentleness, simplicity, and reality!” 
 
 Miss Podsnap looked at the door, as if. she 
 entertained confused thoughts of taking refuge 
 from these compliments in flight. 
 
 “Now, I will be judged,” said Mr. Lammle, 
 raising his voice a little, ‘‘by my friend Fledge- 
 by.” 
 
 “Oh pon’t!” Miss Podsnap faintly ejaculated: 
 when. Mrs. Lammle took the prompt-book. 
 
 “¢{ beg your pardon, Alfred, my dear, but I 
 can not part with Mr. Fledgeby quite yet; you 
 must wait for-him amoment. Mr. Fledgeby and 
 I are engaged in a personal discussion.” 
 
 Vledgeby must have conducted it on his side 
 with immense art, for no appearance of uttering 
 one syllable had escaped him. 
 
 ** A personal discussion, Sophronia, my love ? 
 What discussion? Fledgeby, I am _ jealous. 
 What en Fledgeby ?” 
 
 “Shall I tell him, Mr. Fledgeby ?” asked 
 Mrs. Lammle. 
 
 Trying to look as if he knew any thing about | 
 
 it, Fascination replied, ‘‘ Yes, tell him.” 
 ‘¢We were discussing then,” said Mrs. Lam- 
 “mile, ‘‘if you must know, Alfred, whether Mr. 
 Fledgeby was in his usual flow of spirits.” 
 
 ‘Why, that is the very point, Sophronia, that 
 Georgiana and [ were discussing as to herself! 
 What did Fledgeby say ?” 
 
 **Oh, a likely thing, Sir, that I am going to 
 tell you every thing, and be told nothing! What 
 did Georgiana say ?” 
 
 **Georgiana said she was doing her usual jus- 
 tice to herself to-day, and I said she was not.” 
 
 ‘¢ Precisely,” exclaimed Mrs, Lammle, ‘* what 
 I said to Mr. Fledgeby.” 
 
 Still wouldn’t do, They would not look at 
 one another. No, not even when the sparkling 
 host proposed that the quartette should take an 
 appropriately sparkling glass of wine. Georgi- 
 ana looked from her wine-glass at Mr. Lammle 
 
 and at Mrs. Lammle; but mightn’t, couldn’t, 
 shouldn't, wouldn’t, look at Mr. Fledgeby. Fas- 
 cination looked from his wine-glass at Mrs. 
 Lammle and at Mr. Lammle; but mightn’t, 
 eouldn’t, shouldn’t, wouldn’t, look at Georgiana. 
 
 More prompting was necessary. Cupid must 
 be brought up to the mark. The manager had 
 put him down in the bill for the part, and he 
 
 must play it. 
 Sophronia, my dear.” said Mr. Zammle, ‘ 
 don’t like the color of your dress.” 
 
 ” 
 
 ah | 
 
 ! 
 
 /one another. 
 
 123 
 
 “‘T appeal,” aia Mrs. Lammle, ‘to Mr, 
 
 Fledgeby.” 
 ‘* And I,” said Mr. Lammle, ‘‘to Georgiana.” 
 ‘*Georgy, my love,” remarked Mrs. Lammle 
 
 aside to her dear girl, ‘‘I rely upon you not to 
 
 go over to the opposition. 
 by.” 
 
 Fascination wished to know if the color were 
 not called rose-color? Yes, said Mr. Lammle; 
 actually he knew every thing ; it was really rose- 
 color. Fascination took rose-color to mean the 
 color of roses. (In this he was very warmly 
 supported by Mr. and Mrs. Lammle.) Fascina- 
 tion had heard the term Queen of Flowers ap- 
 plied to the Rose. Similarly, it might be said 
 that the dress was the Queen of Dresses. (‘* Very 
 happy, Fledgeby!” from Mr. Lammle.) Not- 
 withstanding, Fascination’s opinion was that-we 
 all had our eyes—or at least a large majority of 
 us—and that—and—and his further opinion was 
 several ands, with nothing beyond them. 
 
 “Oh, Mr. Fledgeby,” said Mrs. Lammle, “to 
 desert me in that way! Oh, Mr. Fledgepy, to 
 abandon my poor dear injured rose and declare 
 for blue!” 
 
 ** Victory, victory!”  cned: Mr. 
 
 “your dress is condemned, my dear.’ 
 
 ‘‘But what,” said Mrs. Lammle, stealing her 
 affectionate hand toward her dear girl's, *¢ what 
 does Georgy say ?” 
 
 ‘¢ She says,” replied Mr. Lammie, interpreting 
 for her, ‘‘that in her eyes you look well in any 
 color, Sophronia, and that if she had expected to 
 be embarrassed by so pretty a compliment as she 
 has received, she would have worn another color 
 herself. Though I tell her, in reply, that it 
 would not have saved her, for whatever color she 
 had worn would have been Biedgeby’ s color. 
 But what does Hledgeby say ?”’ 
 
 ‘‘Tie says,” replied Mrs. Lammle, fitebonees 
 ing for him, and patting the back of her dear 
 girl’s hand, as if it were Fledgeby who was pat- 
 ting it, ‘‘that it was no compliment, but a little 
 natural act of homage that he couldn’t resist. 
 And,” expressing more feeling as if it were more 
 feeling on the part of Fledgeby, ‘‘ he is right, he 
 is right!” 
 Stull, 
 
 Now, Mr. Fledge- 
 
 vi Lammle ; 
 
 no not even now, would they look at 
 Seeming to gnash his sparkling 
 teeth, studs, eyes, and buttons, all at once, Mr. 
 Lammie secretly bent a dark frown on the two, 
 expressive of an intense desire to bring them to- 
 gether by knocking their heads together. 
 ‘‘Have vou heard this opera of to-night, 
 Fledgeby ?” he asked, stopping. very short, to 
 prevent himself from running on into “ con- 
 
 found vou.” 
 
 ‘‘ Why no, not exactly,” said Fledgeby. ‘‘In 
 fact I don’t know a note of it.” 
 
 ‘* Neither do you know it, Georgy ?”” said Mrs. 
 Lammle. 
 
 ‘‘N-no,” replied Georgiana, faintly, under the 
 sympathetic coincidence. 
 
 ‘‘Why, then,” said Mrs. Lammle, charmed 
 by the discovery which flowed from the prem- 
 
 ises, ‘¢you neither of you know it! How charm- 
 
 ling !” 
 
 Even the craven Fledgeby felt that the time 
 was now come when he must strike a blow. He 
 struck it by saying, partly to Mrs. Lammle and 
 partly to the circumambient air, ‘2 consider my-. 
 self very fortunate in being reserved by—” 
 
 é 
 
124 
 
 As he stopped dead, Mr. Lammle, making 
 that gingerous bush of his whiskers to look out 
 of, offered him the word ‘‘ Destiny.” 
 
 ‘No, I wasn’t going to say that,” said Fledge- 
 by. ‘‘I was going to say Fate. I consider it 
 very fortunate that Fate has written in the book 
 of—in the book which is its own property—that 
 Ishould go to that opera for the first time under 
 the memorable circumstances of going with Miss 
 Podsnap.” 
 
 To which Georgiana replied, hooking her two 
 little fingers in one another, and addressing the 
 table-cloth, ‘* Thank you, but I generally go with 
 no one but you, Sophronia, and I like that very 
 much,” 
 
 Content perforce with this success for the time, 
 Mr. Lammle let Miss Podsnap out of the room, 
 as if he were opening her cage door, and Mrs. 
 Lammle followed. Coffee being presently served 
 up stairs, he kept a watch on Fledgeby until 
 Miss Podsnap’s cup was empty, and then direct- 
 ed him with his finger (as if that young gentle- 
 man were a slow Retriever) to go and fetch it. 
 This feat he performed, not only without failure, 
 but even with the original embellishment-of in- 
 forming Miss Podsnap that green tea was. con- 
 sidered bad for the nerves. Though there Miss 
 Podsnap unintentionally threw him out by falter- 
 ing, ‘‘Oh, is it indeed? How does it act?” 
 Which he was not prepared to elucidate. 
 
 The carriage announced, Mrs. Lammle said, 
 ** Don’t mind me, Mr. Fledgeby, my skirts and 
 cloak occupy both my hands; take Miss Pod- 
 snap.” And he took her, and Mrs. Lammle 
 went next, and Mr. Lammle went last, savagely 
 following his little flock like a drover. 
 
 But he was all sparkle and glitter in the box 
 at the Opera, and there he and his dear wife 
 made a conversation between Fledgeby and 
 Georgiana in the following ingenious and skill- 
 ful manner. They sat in this order: Mrs. Lam- 
 mile, Fascination Fledgeby, Georgiana, Mr. Lam- 
 mle. Mrs. Lammle made leading remarks to 
 Fledgeby, only requiring monosyllabic replies. 
 Mr. Lammle did the like with Georgiana. At 
 times Mrs. Lammle would lean forward to ad- 
 dress Mr, Lammle to this purpose. 
 
 *‘Alfred, my dear, Mr. Fledgeby very justly 
 says, apropos of the last scene, that true con- 
 stancy would not require any such stimulant as 
 the stage deems necessary.” To which Mr. 
 Lammile would reply, ‘‘ Ay, Sophronia, my love, 
 but as Georgiana has observed to me, the lady 
 had no sufficient reason to know the state of the 
 gentleman's affections.”” To which Mrs. Lam- 
 mle would rejoin, ‘‘ Very true, Alfred; but Mr. 
 Fledgeby points out,” this. To which Alfred 
 would demur: ‘* Undoubtedly, Sophronia, but 
 Georgiana acutely remarks,” that. Through this 
 device the two young people conversed at great 
 length and committed themselves to a variety 
 of delicate sentiments, without having once open- 
 ed their lips save to say yes or no, and even that 
 not to one another. 
 
 Fledgeby took his leave of Miss Podsnap at 
 the carriage door, and the Lammles dropped 
 her at her own home, and on the way Mrs. 
 Lammle archly rallied her, in her fond and pro- 
 tecting manner, by saying at intervals, ‘¢Oh 
 little Georgiana, little Georgiana!” Which was 
 not mucn; but the tone added, ‘‘ You have en- 
 slaved your Fledgeby.” 
 
 \ 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. _ 
 
 And thus the Lammles got home at last, and 
 
 the lady sat down moody and weary, looking at- 
 
 her dark lord engaged in a deed of violence’ 
 with a bottle of soda-water as though he were 
 wringing the neck of some unlucky creature and 
 pouring its blood down his throat. As he wiped 
 his dripping whiskers in an ogreish way, he met 
 her eyes, and pausing, said, with no very gentle 
 voice: 
 
 ‘* Well?” yi, 
 
 ‘‘Was such an absolute Booby necessary to 
 the purpose ?”’ ae 
 
 ‘“‘T know what Iam doing. He is no such 
 dolt as you suppose.” * 
 
 ‘* A genius, perhaps?” 
 
 ‘**You sneer, perhaps; and you take a lofty 
 air upon yourself, perhaps! But I tell you this: 
 —when that young fellow’s interest is concern- 
 ed, he holds as tight as a horse-leech. When 
 money is in question with that young fellow, he 
 is a match for the Devil.”’ 
 
 **Ts he a match for you?” 
 
 ‘*Heis. Almost as good a one as you thought 
 me for you. He has no quality of youth in him 
 but such as you have seen to-day. Touch him 
 upon money, and you touch no booby then. 
 He really is a dolt, I suppose, in other things; 
 but it answers his one purpose very well.” 
 
 ‘‘Has she money in her own right in any 
 case ?”” ) 
 
 ‘* Ay! she has money in her own right in any 
 case. You have done so well to-day, Sophronia, 
 that I answer the question, though you know J 
 object to any such questions. You have done so 
 well to-day, Sophronia, that you must be tirea, 
 Get to bed.” 
 
 En 
 
 CHAPTER V. / 
 MERCURY PROMPTING. 
 
 FLEDGEBY deserved Mr. Alfred Lammle’s eu. 
 logium. He was the meanest cur existing, with 
 a single pair of legs. And instinct (a word we 
 all clearly understand) going largely on four 
 legs, and reason always on two, meanness on 
 four legs never attains the perfection of mean- 
 ness on two. 
 
 The father of this young gentleman had been 
 a money-lender, who had transacted professional 
 business with the mother of this young gentle- 
 man, when he, the latter, was waiting in the 
 vast dark ante-chambers of the present world 
 to be born. The lady, a widow, being unable 
 to pay the money-lender, married him; and in 
 due course, Fledgeby was summoned out of the 
 vast dark ante-chambers to come and be pre- 
 sented to the Registrar-General. Rather a cu- 
 rious speculation how Fledgeby would otherwise 
 have disposed of his leisure until Doomsday. 
 
 Fledgeby’s mother offended her family by mar= 
 rying Fledgeby’s father. ‘ It is one of the easiest 
 achievements in life to offend your family when 
 your family want to get rid of you. Fledgeby’s 
 mother’s family had been very much offended 
 with her for being poor, and broke with her for 
 becoming comparatively rich. Fledgeby’s mo- 
 ther’s family was the Snigsworth family. She 
 had even the high honor to be cousin to Lord 
 Snigsworth—so many times removed that the 
 noble Earl would have had no compunetion in 
 
 removing her one tims more and dropping her > 
 
 ~ 
 
 4 
 , 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 \ 
 clean outside the cousinly pale; but cousin for 
 all that. 
 
 Among her pre-matrimonial transactions with 
 Fledgeby’s father, Fledgeby’s mother had raised 
 money of him at a great disadvantage on a cer- 
 tain reversionary interest. The reversion falling 
 in soon after they were married, Fledgeby’s fa- 
 ther laid hold of the cash for his separate use 
 and benefit. This led to subjective differences 
 of opinion, not to say objective interchanges of 
 bootjacks, backgammon boards, and other do- 
 mestic missiles, between Fledgeby’s father and 
 Fiedgeby’s mother, and those led to Fledgeby’s 
 mother spending as much monéy as she could, 
 
 and to Fledgeby’s father doing all he couldn't to. 
 
 restrain her. Fledgeby’s childhood had been, 
 in consequence, a stormy one; but the winds 
 and the waves had gone down in the grave, and 
 Fledgeby flourished alone. 
 
 He lived in chambers in the Albany, did 
 Fledgeby, and maintained a spruce appearance. 
 But his youthful fire was all composed of sparks 
 from the grindstone ; and as the sparks flew off, 
 went out, and never warmed any thing, be sure 
 that Fledgeby had his tools at the grindstone, 
 and turned it with a wary eye. 
 
 Mr. Alfred Lammle came round to the Albany 
 to breakfast with Fledgeby. Present on the ta- 
 ble, one scanty pot of tea, one scanty loaf, two 
 scanty pats of butter, two scanty rashers of ba- 
 con, two pitiful eggs, and an abundance of hand- 
 some china bought a second-hand bargain. 
 
 -* What did you think of Georgiana?” asked 
 Mr. Lammle. 
 
 “Why, Ill tell you,” said Fledgeby, very de- 
 liberately. 
 
 ** Do, my boy.” 
 
 **You misunderstand me,” said Fledgeby. 
 **T don’t mean I'll tell you that. I mean Dll 
 tell you something else.” 
 
 ‘*'Pell me any thing, old fellow 
 
 “* Ah, but there you misunderstand me again,” 
 said Fledgeby. ‘*I mean I'll tell you nothing.” 
 
 Mr. Lammle sparkled at him, but frowned at 
 him too. 
 
 “Look here,” said Fledgeby. ‘‘You’re deep 
 and you're ready. Whether I am deep or not, 
 never mind. I am not ready. But I can do 
 
 q?? 
 
 one thing, Lammle, I can hold my tongue.’ 
 
 And I intend always doing it.” 
 -**You aré’a long-headed fellow, Fledgeby,” 
 
 ‘*May be, or may not be. If I am a short- 
 tongued fellow, it may amount to the same thing. 
 Now, Lammle, I am never going to answer ques- 
 tions.” 
 
 ‘¢ My dear fellow, it was the simplest question 
 in the world.” 
 
 ‘‘Never mind. It seemed so, but things are 
 not always what they seem. I saw a man ex- 
 amined as a witness in Westminster Hall. Ques- 
 tions put to him seemed the simplest in the 
 world, but turned out to be any thing rather 
 than that, after he had answered ’em. Very 
 well. Then he should have held his tongue. 
 if he had held his tongue he would have kept 
 out of scrapes that he got into.” 
 
 ‘If I had held my tongue, you would never 
 have seen the subject of my question,” remarked 
 Lammle, darkening. 
 
 “Now, Laimmilc,” said Fascination Fledgeby, 
 calmly feeling for his whisker, ‘¢it won’t do. I 
 won't be led on into a discussion, I can’t man- 
 
 .. 
 
 125 
 age a discussion. But I can manage to hold 
 my tongue.” : 
 
 “Can?” Mr, Lammle fell back upon propi- 
 tiation. ‘‘I should think you could! Why, 
 when these fellows of our acquaintance drink 
 and you drink with them, the more talkative 
 they get, the more silent you get. The more 
 they let out, the more you keep in.” 
 
 ‘*T don’t object, Lammle,” returned Fledge- 
 by, with an internal chuckle, ‘‘to being under- 
 stood, though I object to being questioned. That 
 certainly 7s the way I do it.” 
 
 ‘* And when all the rest of us are discussing 
 our ventures, none of us ever know what a sin- 
 gle venture of yours is!” 
 
 ‘‘And none of you ever will from me, Lam- 
 mle,” replied Fledgeby, with another internal 
 chuckle; ‘‘that certainly is the way I do it.” 
 
 ‘‘Why of course it is, I know!” rejoined 
 Lammle, with a flourish of frankness, and a 
 laugh, and stretching out his hands as if to show 
 the universe a remarkable man in Fledgeby. 
 ‘‘If I hadn’t known it of my Fledgeby, should 
 I have proposed our little compact of advantage 
 to my Fledgeby ?” } 
 
 “Ah!” remarked Fascination, shaking his 
 head slyly. ‘‘ But I am not to be got at in that 
 way. Iam not vain....That-sortof-vanity don’t 
 pay, Lammle. No, no, no. Compliments only 
 make me hold my tongue the more.” 
 
 Alfred Lammle pushed his plate away (no 
 great sacrifice under the circumstances of there 
 being so little in it), thrust his hands in his 
 pockets, leaned back in his chair, and contem- 
 plated Fledgeby in silence. Then he slowly re- 
 leased his left hand from its pocket, and made 
 that bush of his whiskers, still contemplating 
 him in silence. Then he slowly broke silence, 
 and slowly said: ‘‘ What—the—Dev-il is this 
 fellow about this morning ?” 
 
 ‘*Now, look here, Lammle,”’ said Fascination 
 Fledgeby, with the meanest of twinkles in his 
 meanest of eyes: which were too near together, 
 by-the-way: ‘‘look here, Lammle: I am very 
 well aware that I didn’t show to advantage last 
 night, and that you and your wife—who, I con- 
 sider, is a very clever woman and an agreeable 
 woman—did. Iam not calculated to show to 
 advantage under that sort of circumstances. I 
 know very well you two did show to advantage, 
 and managed capitally. But don’t you on that 
 account come talking to me as if I were your 
 doll and puppet, because I am not.” 
 
 ‘¢And all this,’? cried Alfred, after studying 
 with a look the meanness that was fain to have 
 the meanest help, and yet was so mean as to 
 turn upon it: ‘‘all this because of one simple 
 natural question!” 
 
 “You should have waited till I thought prop- 
 
 er to say something about it myself. I don’t” 
 
 like your coming over me with your Georgi- 
 anas, as if you was her proprietor and mine 
 too.” 
 
 ‘¢ Well, when you are in the gracious mind 
 to say any thing about it of yourself,” retorted 
 Lammle, ‘‘ pray do,” ' 
 
 ‘¢T have done it. I have said you managed 
 capitally. You and your wife both. If you'll 
 go on managing capitally, I'll go on doing my 
 part. Only don’t crow.” 
 
 “T crowd’? exclaimed Lammle, shrugging his 
 shoulders. 
 
 i 
 
126 
 
 ‘*Or,” pursued the other—‘“ or take it in your 
 head that people are your puppets because they 
 don’t come out to advantage at the particular 
 moments when you do, with the assistance of a 
 very clever and agreeable wife. All the rest 
 keep on doing, and let Mrs. Lammle keep on 
 doing. Now, I have held my tongue when I 
 thought proper, and I have spoken when I 
 thought proper, and there’s an end of that. And 
 now the question is,’’ proceeded Fledgeby, with 
 the greatest reluctance, ‘‘ will you have another 
 egg oe? 
 
 ** No, I won't,” said Lammle, shortly. 
 
 ** Perhaps you’re right and will find yourself 
 better without it,” replied Fascination, in great- 
 ly improved spirits. ‘*To ask you if you'll 
 have another rasher would be unmeaning flat- 
 tery, for it would make you thirsty all day. 
 Will you have some more bread and butter ?” 
 
 ** No, I won't,” repeated Lammle. 
 
 *‘'Then I will,” said Fascination. And it was 
 not a mere retort for the sound’s sake, but was 
 a cheerful cogent consequence of the refusal ; 
 for if Lammle had applied himself again to the 
 loaf, it would have been so heavily visited, in 
 Fledgeby’s opinion, as to demand abstinence 
 from bread, on his part, for the remainder of 
 that meal at least, if not for the whole of the 
 next. 
 
 - Whether this young gentleman (for he was 
 but three-and-twenty) combined with the miser- 
 Jy vice of an old man any of the open-handed 
 vices of a young one, was a moot-point; so very 
 honorably did he keep his own counsel. He 
 was sensible of the value of appearances as an 
 investment, and liked to dress well; but he 
 drove a bargain for every movable about him, 
 from the coat on his back to the china on his 
 breakfast-table; and every bargain, by repre- 
 senting somebody’s ruin or somebody’s loss, ac- 
 quired a peculiar charm for him. It was a part 
 of his avarice to take, within narrow bounds, 
 long odds at races; if he won, he drove harder 
 bargains; if he lost, he half-starved himself un- 
 til next time. Why money should be so pre- 
 cious to an Ass too dull and mean to exchange 
 it for any other satisfaction, is strange 5 but 
 there is no animal so sure to get laden with it 
 as the Ass who sees nothing written on the face 
 of the earth and sky but the three letters L. 
 S. D.—not Luxury, Sensuality, Dissoluteness, 
 which they often stand for, but the three dry 
 
 letters. Your concentrated Fox is seldom com- 
 parable to your concentrated Ass in money- 
 breeding. 
 
 Fascination Fledgeby feigned to be a young 
 
 _ gentleman living on his means, but was known 
 secretly to be a kind of outlaw in the billebrok- 
 ing line, and to put money out at high interest 
 in various ways. . His circle of familiar acquaint- 
 ance, from Mr. Lammle round, all had a tonch 
 of the outlaw, as to their rovings in the merry 
 
 green-wood of Jobbery Fore-t, lying on the out-. 
 
 skirts of the Share-Market and the Stock Ex- 
 * change. 
 
 “I suppose you, Lammle,” said Fledgehy, 
 eating his bread and butter, “ always go in for 
 female society ?” 
 
 ** Always,” replied Lammle, glooming con- 
 siderably under his late treatment. 
 
 ‘‘Came natural to you, eh?” said Fledgeby. 
 
 **’Phe sex were pleased to like me, Sir,”’ said 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. _ . 
 
 Lammle, sulkily, but with the air of a man whe | 
 
 had not been able to help himself. 
 
 ** Made a pretty good thing of marrying, didn’t 
 
 you?” asked Fledgeby. hc Satie, 6 
 The other smiled (an ugly smile), and tapped 
 one tap upon his nose. 
 
 ‘* My late governor made a mess of it,” said’ 
 
 Fledgeby. ‘But Geor— 
 Georgina or Georgiana ?” 
 
 ‘* Georgiana.” m 
 
 “I was thinking yesterday, I didn’t know 
 there was such a name. I thought it must end 
 in ina,” | 
 
 66 Why 2 i] 
 
 ‘*Why, you play—if you can—the Concer- 
 
 Is the right name> 
 
 tina, you know,” replied Fledgeby, meditating | 
 
 very slowly. ‘* And you have—when you catch 
 it—the Scarlatina. And you can come down 
 from a balloon in a parach— No you can’t 
 though. Well, say Georgeute—I mean Georgi, 
 ana.” . 
 
 ‘*You were going to remark of Georgiana— ?” 
 Lammle moodily hinted, after waiting in vain.’ 
 
 ‘“*T was going to remark of Georgiana, Sir,” 
 said Fledgeby, not at all pleased to be reminded 
 of his having forgotten it, ‘‘that she don’t seem 
 to be violent. Don’t seem to be of the pitching- 
 order.” 
 
 ‘‘She has the gentleness of the dove, Mr. 
 Fledgeby.” 
 
 ‘“‘Of course you'll say so,” replied Fledgeby, 
 sharpening, the moment his interest was touched 
 by another. . ‘‘ But you know, the real look-out 
 is this: —what I say, not what yousay. I say— 
 having my late governor and my late mother in 
 my eye—that Georgiana don’t seem to be of the 
 pitching-in order.” 
 
 The respected Mr. Lammle was a bully, by 
 nature and by usual practice. Perceiving, as 
 Fledgeby’s affronts cumulated, that conciliation 
 by no means answered the purpose here, he now 
 
 directed a scowling look into Fledgeby’s small 
 
 eyes for the effect of the opposite treatment. 
 Satisfied by what he saw there, he burst into a 
 violent passion and struck his hand upon the 
 table, making the china ring and dance. 
 
 ‘“*You are a very offensive fellow, Sir,” cried 
 Mr. Lammle, rising. ‘‘ You area highly offens- 
 ive scoundrel. What do you mean by this be- 
 havior ?” 
 
 ‘I say!” remonstrated Fledgeby. 
 break out.” 
 
 » “You are a very offensive. fellow, Sir,” re- 
 peated Mr. Lammle. ‘‘ You are a highly offens. 
 ive scoundrel!” 
 
 ‘*T say, you know !” urged Fledgeby, quailing. 
 
 “Why, you coarse and vulgar vagabond !” 
 said Mr. Lammle, looking fiercely about him, 
 “if your servant was here to give me six-pence 
 of your money to get my boots cleancd after- 
 ward—for you are not worth the expenditure— 
 I'd kick you.” ; 
 
 *“No you wouldn’t,” pleaded Fledgeby. 
 am sure youd think better of it.” 
 
 **T tell you what, Mr. Fledgeby,” said Lam- 
 mle, advancing on him. ‘Since you presume 
 to contradict me, I’'Jl assert myself a little. Give 
 me your nose !” 
 
 ‘¢ Don’t 
 
 oe 
 
 Fledgeby covered it with his hand instead, and’ 
 
 said, retreating, ‘*I beg you won’t!” 
 ‘*Give me vour nose, Sir,” repeated Lammle. 
 
 Sull covering that feature and backing, Mr. ~ 
 
_Fledgeby reiterated (apparently with a severe 
 cold in his head), ‘‘I beg, I beg, you won’t.” 
 
 ** And this fellow,” exclaimed Lammle, stop- 
 ping and making the most.of his chest—‘*'This 
 fellow presumes on my having selected him out 
 of all the young fellows I know, for an advanta- 
 geous opportunity! ‘This fellow presumes on my 
 having in my desk round the corner his dirty 
 note of hand for a wretched sum payable on the 
 occurrence of a certain event, which event can 
 only be of my and my wife’s bringing about! 
 This fellow, Fledgeby, presumes to be imperti- 
 nent to me, Lammle. Give me your nose, Sir!” 
 
 **No! Stop! I beg your pardon,” said Fledge- 
 by, with humility. 
 
 **What do you say, Sir?” demanded Mr. 
 Lammle, seeming too furious to understand. 
 
 “I beg your pardon,” repeated Fledgeby. 
 
 ‘Repeat your words louder, Sir. The just 
 indignation of:a gentleman has sent the blood 
 boiling to my head. I don’t hear you.” ~ - 
 
 **T say,” repeated Fledgeby, with laborious 
 explanatory politeness, ‘‘I beg your pardon.” 
 
 Mr, Lammle paused. ‘‘ As a man of honor,” 
 said he, throwing himself into a chair, “I am 
 disarmed.” 
 
 Mr. Fledgeby also took a chair, though less 
 demonstratively, and by slow approaches re- 
 moved his hand from his nose. Some natural 
 diffidence assailed him as to blowing it, so short- 
 ly after its having assumed a personal and deli- 
 cate, not to say public, character; but he over- 
 came his scruples hy degrees, and modestly took 
 that liberty under an implied protest. 
 
 “Lammile,” he said, sneakingly, when that was 
 done, ‘‘I hope we are friends again 2” 
 
 ‘Mr. Fledgeby,” returned Lammle, ‘‘say no 
 more.” 
 
 *¢[ must have gone too far in making myself 
 disagreeable,” said Fledgeby, ‘‘ but I never in- 
 tended it.” 
 
 “Say no more, say no more!” Mr. Lammle/ 
 
 repeated in a magnificent tone. 
 —Fledgeby started—‘* hand.” 
 
 They shook hands, and on Mr. Lammle’s part, 
 in particular, there ensued great geniality. For 
 he was quite as much of a dastard as the other, 
 and had been in equal danger of falling into the 
 second place for good, when he took heart just 
 in time to act upon the information conveyed 
 to him by Fledgeby’s eye. 
 
 The breakfast ended in a perfect understand- 
 ing.. Incessant machinations were to be kept at 
 work by Mr. and Mrs. Lammle; love was to be 
 made for Fledgeby, and conquest was to be.in- 
 sured to him; he on his part very humbly ad- 
 mitting his defects as to the softer social-arts, 
 and entreating to be backed to the utmost by his 
 two able coadjutors. 
 
 Little recked Mr, Podsnap of the traps and 
 toils besetting his Young Person. He regarded 
 her as safe within the Temple of Podsnappery, 
 biding the fullness of time when she, Georgiana, 
 should take him, Fitz-Podsnap, who with all his 
 worldly goods should her endow. 
 a blush into the cheek of his standard Young 
 Person to have any thing to do with such mat- 
 ters save to take as directed, and with worldly 
 goods as per settlement to be endowed. Who 
 giveth this woman to be married to this man? 
 I, Podsnap. Perish the daring thought that any 
 ‘smaller creation should come between ! 
 
 ‘* Give me your” 
 
 It would cally 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 nose until the afternvon. 
 
 127 
 
 It was a public holiday, and Fledgeby did not 
 recover his spirits or his usual temperature of 
 Walking into the City 
 in the holiday afternoon, he walked against a 
 living stream setting out of it; and thus, when 
 he turned into the precincts of St. Mary Axe, he 
 found a prevalent repose and quiet there. A 
 yellow overhanging plaster-fronted house at which 
 he stopped was quiet too. The blinds were all 
 drawn down, and the inscription Pubsey and Co. 
 seemed to doze.in the counting-house window on 
 the ground-floor giving on the sleepy street. 
 
 Fledgeby knocked and rang, and Fledgeby 
 rang and knocked, but no one came. Fledgeby 
 crossed the narrow street and looked up at the 
 house-windows, but nobody looked down at 
 Fledgeby. He got out of temper, crossed the 
 narrow street again, and pulled the house-bell ag 
 if it were the house’s nose, arid he were taking a 
 hint from his late experience. His ear at the 
 keyhole seemed then, at last, to give him assur- 
 ance that something stirred within, His eye at 
 the keyhole seemed to confirm his ear, for he 
 angrily pulled the house’s nose again, and pulled 
 and pulled and continued to pull, until a human 
 nose appeared in the dark doorway, 
 
 ‘Now you, Sir!” cried Fledgeby. 
 are nice games!” 
 
 He addressed an old Jewish man in an an- 
 cient coat, long of skirt, and wide of pocket. 
 A venerable man, bald and shining at the top 
 of his head, and with long gray hair fiowing 
 down at its sides and mingling with his beard. 
 A man who with a graceful Eastern action of 
 homage bent his head, and stretched out his 
 hands with the palms downward, as if to depre- 
 cate the wrath of a superior. * 
 
 ‘‘ What have vou been up to?” said Fledge- 
 by, storming at him. 
 
 ‘¢ Generous Christian master,” urged the Jew- 
 ish man, ‘‘it being holiday I looked for’ no 
 one.”’ 
 
 ‘* Holiday be blowed!” said Fledgeby, enter- 
 ing. ‘*What have you got to do with holidays ? 
 Shut the door,” 
 
 With his former action the old man obeyed. 
 In the entry hung his rusty large-brimmed low- 
 crowned hat, as long out of date as his coat; in 
 the corner near it stood his staff—no walking- 
 stick, but a veritable staff. Fledgeby turned into 
 the counting-house, perched himself on a busi- 
 ness stool, and cocked his hat. There were 
 
 ‘<'These 
 
 light boxes on shelves in the counting-houze, and 
 
 strings of mock beads hanging up. There were 
 samples of cheap clocks, and samples of cheap 
 vases of flowers. Foreign toys, all. 
 
 Perched on the stool, with his hat cocked on 
 his head and one of his legs dangling, the youth 
 of Fledgeby hardly contrasted to advantage with 
 the age of the Jewish man as he stood with his 
 bare head bowed, and his eyes (which he only 
 raised in speaking) on the ground. His cloth- 
 ing was worn down to the rusty hue of the hat 
 in the entry, but though he looked shabby he did 
 not look mean. Now, Fledgeby, though not 
 shabby, did look mean, 
 
 * You have not told me what you were up to, 
 you, Sir,” said Fledgcby, scratching his head 
 with the brim of his hat. 
 
 ‘¢ Sir, I was breathing the air.” 
 
 ‘(Tn the cellar, that-you didn’t hear ?”’ 
 
 **On the house-top.” 
 
128 
 
 “Upon my soul! 
 
 That’s a way of doing 
 business.” — = 
 
 ‘¢Sir,” the old man represented with a grave | 
 
 and patient air, ‘‘there must be two parties to 
 
 the transaction of business, and the holiday has | 
 
 left me alone.”’ 
 
 ‘Ah! Can’t be buyer and seller too. That’s | 
 | come, Mr. Riah, we know the arts of your people’ 
 ‘‘At least we say truly, if we say so,” an-| 
 | it, fetch it; if it is not to be lent, keep it and say 
 
 what the Jews say; ain’t it?” 
 
 swered the old man with a smile. 
 
 ‘* Your people need speak the truth sometimes, 
 for they lie enough,” remarked Fascination 
 Fledgeby. 
 
 *¢Sir, there is,” returned the old man with 
 qiuet emphasis, ‘‘too much untruth among all 
 enominations of men.” 4 
 
 Rather dashed, Fascination Fledgeby fook 
 another scratch at his intellectual head with his 
 hat, to gain time for rallying. 
 
 ‘‘For instance,” he resumed, as though it/ 
 were he who had spoken last, ‘‘who but you’ 
 and I ever heard of a poor Jew?” 
 
 “The Jews,” said the old man, raising hi: 
 eyes from the ground with his former smile 
 “They hear of poor Jews often, and are very 
 good to them.” | 
 
 “Bother that!’ returned Fledgeby. ‘You 
 know what I mean. You'd persuade me if you 
 could that you are a poor Jew. I wish you’d 
 confess how much you really did make out of 
 my late governor, I should have a better opin- 
 ion of you.” 
 
 The old man only bent his head, and stretched 
 out his hands as before. 
 
 ‘*Don’t go on posturing like a Deaf and 
 Damb School,” said the ingenious Fledgeby, 
 ‘“‘but express yourself like a Christiam—or as 
 nearly as you can.” 
 
 ‘‘{ had had sickness and misfortunes, and 
 was so poor,” said the old man, ‘‘as hopelessly 
 to owe the father, principal and interest. The 
 son inheriting, was so merciful as to forgive me 
 both and place me. here.” 
 
 He made a little gesture as though he kissed 
 the hem of an imaginary garment worn by the 
 noble youth before him. It was humbly done, 
 but picturesquely, and was not abasing to the 
 doer. 
 
 ‘*You won’t say more, I see,” said Fledgeby, 
 looking at him as if he would like to try the ef- 
 fect of extracting a double-tooth or two, ‘‘and 
 s0 it’s of no use my putting it to you. But con- 
 fess this, Riah ; who believes you to be poor now?” 
 
 ‘* No one,” said the old man. 
 
 ‘*‘There you’re right,” assented Fledgeby. 
 
 ‘* No one,” repeated the old man with a grave 
 slow wave of his head. ‘* All scout it as a fable. 
 Were I to say ‘This little fancy business is not 
 mine ;’” with a lithe sweep of his easily-turhing 
 hand around him, to comprehend the various 
 objects on the shelves; ‘‘‘it is the little busi- 
 ness of a Christian young gentleman who places 
 me, his servant, in trust and charge here, and 
 to whom I am accountable for every single 
 bead,’ they would laugh. When, in the larger 
 money-business, I tell the borrowers—” 
 
 _ “Tsay, old chap!” interposed Fledgeby, ‘I 
 hope you mind what you do tell *em ?” 
 
 *¢ Sir, I tell them no more than [ am about to 
 repeat. When I tell them, ‘I can not promise 
 this, I can not answer for the other, I must see. 
 my principal, I have not the money, Fam a poor 
 
 { 
 
 | | : 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. ay | 
 
 man, and it does not rest with me,’ they are so 
 unbelieving and so impatient, that they some- 
 times curse me in Jehovah’s name.” , 
 
 ‘¢'That’s deuced good, that is!” said Fascina-. | 
 
 tion Fledgeby. 
 ‘And at other times 
 be done without these tricks, Mr. Riah? Come, 
 
 —my people !—‘ If the money is to be lent, fetch 
 so.” They never believe me.” 
 
 “* That's all right,” said Fascination Fledgeby. 
 
 ‘*’They say, ‘ We know, Mr. Riah, we know: 
 We have but to look at you, and we know.’” 
 
 ‘* Oh, a good ’un are you for the post,” thought 
 Fledgeby, ‘‘and a good ’un was I to mark you 
 out for it! I may be slow, but I am precious 
 isuire.” 
 
 Not a syllable of this reflection shaped itself 
 in any scrap of Mr. Fledgeby’s breath, lest it 
 should tend to put his servant’s price up. But 
 
 / 
 
 | looking at the old man as he stood quiet, with 
 
 his head bowed and his eyes cast down, he felt 
 that to relinquish an inch of his baldness, an inch 
 of his gray hair, an inch of his coat-skirt, an inch 
 of his hat-brim, an inch of his walking-staff, 
 would be to relinquish hundreds of pounds. 
 
 ‘* Look here, Riah,” said Fledgeby, mollified 
 by these self-approving considerations. ‘‘I want 
 to go a little more into buying up queer bills. 
 Look out in that direction.” 
 
 *¢Sir, it shall be done.” 
 
 ‘“‘Casting my eye over the accounts, I find 
 that branch of business pays pretty fairly, and I 
 am game for extending it.” I like to know peo- 
 ple’s affairs likewise. So look out.” 
 
 ‘*Sir, I will, promptly.” 
 
 ** Put it about in the right quarters, that you’ll 
 buy queer bills by the lamp—by the pound weight 
 if that’s all—supposing you sce your way to a 
 fair chance on lookfhg over the parcel. And 
 there’s one thing more. Come to me with the . 
 books for periodical inspection as usual, at eight 
 on Monday morning.” 
 
 Riah drew some folding tablets from his breast 
 and noted it down. 
 
 *“That’s all I wanted to say at the present 
 time,” continued Fledgeby in a grudging vein, 
 as he got off the stool, ‘except that I wish you’d 
 take the air where you can hear the bell, or the 
 knocker, either one of the two or both. By-the- 
 by, how do you take the air at the top of the 
 house? Do you stick your head out of a chim- 
 ney-pot ?”’ 
 
 ‘* Sir, there are leads there, and I have made 
 a little garden there.” 
 
 ‘*To bury your money in, you old dodger ?” 
 
 ‘* A thumb-nail’s space of garden would hold 
 the treasure J bury, master,” said Riah. ‘*'T'welve 
 shillings a week, even when they are an old 
 man’s wages, bury themselves,” 
 
 ‘*T should like to know what you really are 
 worth,” returned Fledgeby, with whom his 
 growing rich on that stipend and gratitude was 
 a very convenient fiction. ‘But come! Let’s, 
 have a look at your garden on the tiles before I 
 go 1” : 
 The old man took a step back, and hesitated. 
 ‘“Truly, Sir, I have company there.” 
 ‘* Have you, by George!” said Fledgeby; «I 
 suppose you happen to know whose premises 
 these are ?” 
 
 ; | 
 they say, ‘Can it never 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 129 
 
 = 
 
 \ fi i ‘ 
 ce 
 
 “i WWE 
 
 AS 
 
 jizz S 
 
 a=W 
 
 RIAH’S GUESTS. 
 
 ‘¢Sir, they are vours, and I'am your servant | bled by any such weak imagining, Fascination 
 in them.” Fledgeby merely speculated on the time of life 
 “Oh! I thought you might have overlooked | at which his beard had begun, and thought once 
 that,” retorted Fledgeby, with his eyes on Riah’s | more what a good ’un he was for the part. 
 beard as he felt for his own; ‘‘having company Some final wooden steps conducted them, 
 on my premises, vou know!” | stooping under a low pent-house roof, to the 
 , ‘*Come up and see the guests, Sir, I hope house-top. Riah stood still, and, turning to his 
 for your admission that they can do no harm.” | master, pointed out his guests. 
 Passing him with a courteous reverence, spe- |y Lizzie Hexam and Jenny Wren. For whom, 
 cially unlike any action thatMr. Fledgeby could ‘perhaps with some old instinct _of his race, the 
 ne his life have imparted to his own head and gentle Jew had spréad_a carpet. Seated on it, 
 hands, the old man began to ascend the stairs. ‘against no more romantic object than a black- 
 As he toiled on before, with his palm upon the ened chimney-stack over which some humble 
 _Stair-rail, and his long black skirt, a very gaber- | creeper had been trained, they both pored over 
 dine, overhanging each successive step, he might one book; both with attentive faces; Jenny with 
 have been the leader in some pilgrimage of de- the sharper; Lizzie with the more perplexed. 
 yotional ascent to a prophet’s tomb. Not trou- Another little book or two were lying near, and 
 
 Namen neers ee aan w Arai nga 
 
130 
 
 a common basket of common fruit, and another 
 
 basket full of strings of beads and tinsel scraps. 
 A few boxes of humble flowers 
 
 derness of dowager old chimneys twirled their 
 
 cowls and fluttered their smoke, rather as if. 
 
 they were bridling, and fanning themselves, and 
 looking on in a state of airy surprise. 
 
 Taking her eyes off the book, to test her mem- 
 ory of something in it, Lizzie was the first to see 
 herself observed. As she rose, Miss Wren like- 
 wise became conscious, and said, irreverently 
 addressing the great chief of the premises: 
 ‘* Whoever you are, J can’t get up, because my 
 back’s bad and my legs are queer.” 
 
 ‘“This is my master,” said Riah, stepping for- 
 ward. 
 
 (‘Don’t look like any body’s master,” ob- 
 served Miss Wren to herself, with a hitch of her 
 chin and eyes.) 
 
 ‘¢This, Sir,” pursued the old man, ‘‘is a little 
 dress-maker for little people. Explain to the 
 master, Jenny.” 
 
 *¢Dolls,- that’s all,” said) Jenny, shortly. 
 “*Very difficult to fit too, because their figures 
 are so uncertain. You never know where to 
 expect their waists.” 
 
 ‘¢ Her friend,” resumed the old man, motion- 
 ing toward Lizzie; ‘‘and as industrious as vir- 
 tuous. But that they both are. ‘They are busy 
 early and late, Sir, early and late; and in by- 
 times, as on this holiday, they go to book learn- 
 “Ing.” 
 
 ‘‘Not much good to be got out of that,” re- 
 marked Fledgeby. 
 
 *¢ Depends upon the person!’’ quoth Miss 
 Wren, snapping him up. 
 
 “*T made acquaintance with my guests, Sir,” 
 pursued the Jew, with an evident purpose of 
 drawing out the dress-maker, ‘‘through their 
 coming here to buy of our damage and waste 
 for Miss Jenny’s millinery. Our waste goes into 
 the best of company, Sir, on her rosy-cheeked 
 little customers. They wear it in their hair, and 
 on their ball-dresses, and even (so she tells me) 
 are presented at Court with it.” 
 
 ‘*Ah!”’ said Fledgeby, on whose intelligence 
 ‘~this doll-fancy made rather strong demands; 
 ‘*she’s been buying that basketful to-day, I sup- 
 pose ?”’ 
 
 ‘*¢*T suppose she has,”” Miss Jenny interposed ; 
 ‘Cand paying for it too, most likely !” 
 
 “* Let’s have a look at it,’’ said the suspicious 
 chief. Riah handed it to him. ‘* How much 
 for this now?” 
 
 “Two precious silver shillings,’ > said Miss 
 Wren. 
 
 Riah confirmed her with two nods, as Fledge- 
 by looked to him. A nod for each shilling, 
 
 ‘“Well,” said Fledgeby, poking into the con- 
 tents of the basket with his forefinger, ‘‘the 
 price is not so bad. You have got good meas- 
 ure, Miss What-is-it.” 
 
 ‘“Try Jenny,” suggested that young lady with 
 great calmness. 
 
 ‘“‘You have got good measure, Miss Jenny; 
 bnt the price is not so vad,—And you,” said 
 Fledgeby, turning to the other visitor, ‘do you 
 buy any thing here, miss?” 
 
 +¢'No,) Sir.” 
 
 “Nor sell any thing neither, miss ?” 
 
 “No, 'Sie” ‘wy 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIE 
 
 and evergreens 
 completed the garden; and the encompassing wil- 
 
 UND. 
 
 Looking askew at the questioner, Jenny stole 
 her hand up to her friend’s, and drew ‘her fr iend. 
 down, so that: she bent beside her on her knee, 
 
 “We are thankful to come here for rest, Oats, 
 said Jenny. ‘‘You see, you don’t know what 
 the rest of this place is.to us; does he, Lizzie? 
 It’s the quiet, and the air.” 
 
 “The quiet!” repeated Fledgeby, with a con- 
 temptuous turn of his head toward the City’s roar, 
 ‘And the air!” with a ‘‘ Poof!” at the smoke. 
 > “Ah!” said Jenny. ‘But it’s so high. 
 you see the clouds rushing on above the narrotv 
 streets, not minding them, and you see the gold- 
 en arrows pointing at the mountains in the sky 
 
 | from which the wind comes, and you feel as if 
 
 you were dead.” 
 
 The little creature looked above her, holding 
 up her slight transparent hand. 
 
 ‘* How do you feel when you are dead ?” ask- 
 ed Fledgeby, much perplexed. 
 
 ‘*Oh, so tranquil!” cried the little creature, 
 smiling. ‘*Oh, so peaceful and so thankful! 
 And you hear the people who are alive, crying, 
 and working, and calling to one another down 
 in the close dark streets, and you seem to pity 
 them so! And such a chain has fallen from 
 you, and such a strange good sorrowful hap pi 
 ness comes upon you! yr 
 
 Her eyes fell on. the old man, who, with his 
 hands folded, quietly looked on. 
 
 ‘Why it was only just now,” said the litle 
 
 creature, pointing at him, *‘that-I fancied I saw © 
 
 him come out of his grave! He toiled out at 
 that low door, so bent and worn, and then he 
 took his breath and stood upright, and locked 
 all round him at the sky, and the wind blew 
 upon him, and his life down in the dark was 
 over Till he was called back to life,” she add- 
 ed, looking round at Fledgeby with that lower 
 look of sharpness. ‘‘ Why did you call him 
 back ?” 
 
 ‘‘He was Jong enough coming, any how,” 
 grumbled Fledgeby. 
 
 “But you are not dead, you know,” said Jen- 
 ny Wre1.. ‘‘ Get down to life!” 
 
 Mr. Fledgeby seemed to think it rather a good — 
 
 suggestion, and with a nod turned round. As 
 Riah followed to attend him down the stairs, 
 the little creature called out. to the Jew in a sil- 
 very tone, ‘‘ Don’t be long gone. Come back 
 and be dead!” And still as they went down 
 they heard the little sweet voice, more and more 
 
 faintly, half calling and half singing, ‘‘Come * 
 
 back and be dead, Come back and be dead !” 
 When they got down into the entry, Fledge- 
 by, pausing under the shadow of the broad old 
 hat, and mechanically poising the staff, said to 
 the old man: . 
 “That's a handsome girl, that one in her 
 senses.’ 
 ‘¢ And as good as handsome,” answer =%5 Riah. 
 
 ‘* At all events,” observed "Fledgeby, with a_ 
 
 dry whistle, ‘‘ I hope she ain’t bad enough to put 
 any chap up to the fastenings, and get the prem- 
 ises broken open. You look out. Keep your 
 weather eye awake, and don’t make any more 
 acquaintances, however handsome. Of course 
 you always keep my name to yourself?” 
 
 ‘* Sir, assuredly bdo...” 
 
 “Tf they ask it, say it’s Pubsey, or say it's 
 Co, or say it’s any thing you ‘Tike, but. what it, 
 
 is.” 
 Nay 
 
 And | 
 
aad. 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 3 
 
 13L 
 
 His grateful servant—in whose race gratitude | burn could always awaken in him without seem- 
 
 is deep, strong, and enduring—bowed his head, 
 and actually did now put the hem of his‘coat to 
 his lips: though so lightly that the wearer knew 
 
 ’ nothing of it. 
 
 “man went his different way up stairs. 
 
 Thus, Fascination Fledgeby went his way, ex- 
 ulting in the artful cleverness with which he had 
 turned his thumb down on a Jew, and the old 
 As he 
 mounted, the call or song began to sound in his 
 ears again, and, looking above, he saw the face 
 of the little creature looking down out of a Glo- 
 ry of her long bright radiant hair, and musical- 
 ly repeating to him, like a vision: 
 
 ““Come up and be dead! Come up and be 
 
 dead !”’ 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 A RIDDLE WITHOUT AN ANSWER. 
 
 Acatin Mr. Mortimer Lightwood and Mr. 
 Eugene Wrayburn sat together in the Temple. 
 This evening, however, they were not together 
 in the place of business of the eminent solicitor, 
 
 ‘but in another dismal set of chambers facing it 
 
 ‘stretched out his legs on the hearth-rug, and 
 
 on the same second-floor; on whose dungeon- 
 like black outer door appeared the legend: 
 
 PRIVATE. 
 Mr. Evaene WRAYBURN. 
 Mr. Mortimer Ligutwoop. 
 (K#F° Mr, Lightwood’s Offices opposite.) 
 
 Appearances indicated that this establishment 
 was a very recent institution. The white letters 
 of the inscription were extremely white, and ex- 
 tremely strong to the sense of smell, the com- 
 plexion of the tables and chairs was (like Lady 
 Tippins’s) a little too blooming to be believed 
 in, and the carpets and floor-cloth seemed to 
 rush at the beholder’s face in the unusual prom- 
 inency of their patterns. But the Temple, ac- 
 customed to tone down both the still life and 
 the human life that has much to do with it, 
 would soon get the better of all that. 
 
 “Well!” said Eugene, on one side of the fire, 
 *¢T feel tolerably comfortable. I hope the up- 
 holsterer may do the same.” 
 
 “¢ Why shouldn’t he ?” asked Lightwood, from 
 the other side of the fire. 
 
 “To be sure,” pursued Eugene, reflecting, 
 ‘‘he is not in the secret of our pecuniary af- 
 fairs, so perhaps he may be in an easy frame of 
 mind.” 
 
 ‘©We shall pay him,” said Mortimer. 
 
 ‘Shall. we, really ?” returned Eugene, indo- 
 lently. surprised. ‘* You don’t say so!” 
 
 ‘‘T mean to pay him, Eugene, for my part,’ 
 said Mortimer, in a slightly injured tone. 
 
 *¢ Ah! I mean to pay him too,” retorted Eu- 
 gene. ‘* But then I mean so much that [—that 
 I don’t mean.’’ 
 
 ** Don’t mean ?” 
 
 *So much that I only mean and shall always 
 only mean and nothing more, my dear Morti- 
 mer. It’s the same thing.” 
 
 ‘His friend, lying back in his easy - chair, 
 watched him lying back in his easy-chair, as he 
 
 said, with the amused look that Eugene Wray- 
 
 ing to try or care; 
 
 ‘* Any how, your vagaries have increased the 
 bill.” 
 
 ‘*Calls the domestic virtues vagaries ! Y”? ex- 
 claimed Eugene, raising his eyes to the ceiling. 
 
 “This very complete little kitchen of ours, 
 said Mor timer, ‘*in which nothing will ever be 
 cooked—” 
 
 ‘My dear, dear. Mortimer,’ returned his 
 friend, lazily lifting his head a little to look at 
 him, ‘‘ how often have I pointed out to you that 
 its moral influence is the important thing ?” 
 
 “Its moral influence on this fellow,” 
 claimed Lightwood, laughing. 
 
 ‘*Do me the favor,” said Eugene, getting 
 out of his chair with much gravity, ‘‘ to come 
 and-inspect that feature-of our establishment 
 which you rashly disparage.” With that, tak- 
 ing up a candle, he conducted his chum into 
 the fourth room of the set of chambers—a little 
 narrow room—which was very completely and 
 neatly fitted as a kitchen. ‘*See!” said Ku- 
 gene, ‘‘ miniature flour-barrel, rolling-pin, spice- 
 box, shelf of brown jars, chopping-board, coffee- 
 mill, dresser elegantly furnished with crockery, 
 sauce-pans and pans, roasting jack, a charming 
 kettle, an armory of dish-covers. The moral in- 
 fluence of these objects, in forming the domestic 
 virtues, may have an immense influence upon 
 me; not upon you, for you are a hopeless case, 
 but upon me. In fact, I have an idea that I feel 
 the domestic virtues already forming. Do me 
 the favor to step into my bedroom. Secrétaire, 
 
 >) 
 
 e€x- 
 
 | you see, and abstruse set of solid mahogany pig- 
 
 eon-holes, one for every letter of the alphabet. 
 To what use do I devote them? I receive a bill 
 —say from Jones. I docket it neatly at the 
 secrétaire, Jones, and I put it into pigeon-hole 
 J. It’s the next thing to a receipt, and is quite 
 as satisfactory to me. And I very much wish, 
 Mortimer,” sitting on his bed, with the air of a 
 philosopher lecturing a disciple, “‘that my ex- 
 ample might induce you to cultivate habits of 
 punctuality and method; and, by means of the 
 moral influences with which I have surrounded 
 you, to repens’ the formation of the domestic 
 virtues.” 
 
 Mortimer layghed again, with his usual com- 
 mentaries of ** How can you be so ridiculous, 
 Eugene!” and ‘‘What an absurd fellow you 
 are!’ but when his laugh was out, there was 
 something serious, if not anxious, in his face. 
 Despite that pernicious assumption of lassitude 
 and indifference, which had become his second 
 nature, he was strongly attached to his friend. 
 He had founded himself npon Engene when they 
 were yet boys at school; and at this hour imi- 
 tated him no less, admired him no less, loved 
 him no less, than in those departed days. 
 
 ‘¢ Kugene,”’ said he, ‘‘if I could find you in 
 earnest for a minute, I would try to say an earn- 
 est word to you.’ 
 
 ‘¢ An earnest word ?” retealed Eugene. ‘‘The 
 moral influences are beginning to work. Say on.” 
 
 *¢ Well, I will,” returned the other, ‘‘ though 
 you are not earnest yet.” 
 
 ‘‘In this desire for earnestness,” murmured 
 Eugene, with the air of one who was meditating 
 deeply, ‘‘I trace the happy inflnences of the lit- 
 tle flour-barrel and the coffee-mill. Gratifying.” 
 
 ‘‘Rugene,” resumed Mortimer, disregarding 
 
132 
 
 the light interruption, and laying a hand upon 
 Eugene’s shoulder, as he, Mortimer, stood be- 
 fore him seated on his bed, ‘‘ you are withhold- 
 ing something from me.” 
 
 Eugene looked at him, but said nothing. 
 
 ** All this past summer you have been with- 
 holding something from me. Before we entered 
 on our boating vacation, you were as bent upon 
 it as I have seen you upon any thing since we 
 first rowed together. But you cared very little 
 for it when it came, often found it a tie and a 
 drag upon you, and were constantly away. Now 
 it was well enough half a dozen times, a dozen 
 times, twenty times, to say to me in your own 
 odd manner, which I know so well and like so 
 much, that your disappearances were precau- 
 tions against our boring one another; but of 
 course after a short while I began to know that 
 they covered something. I don’t ask what it is, 
 as you have not told me; but the fact is so. 
 Say, is it not?” 
 
 **T give you my word of honor, Mortimer,” 
 returned Eugene, after a serious pause of a few 
 moments, ‘‘that I don’t know.” . 
 
 ** Don’t know, Eugene ?” 
 
 ‘Upon my soul, don’t know. I know less 
 about myself than about most people in the 
 world, and I don’t know.” 
 
 **You have some design in your mind ?” 
 
 ‘‘Have 1? I don’t think I have.” 
 
 ** At any rate, you have some subject of in- 
 terest there which used not to be there ?” 
 
 ‘J really can’t say,” replied Eugene, shaking 
 his head blankly, after pausing again to recon- 
 sider. ‘‘ At times I have thought yes; at other 
 times I have thought no. Now I have been in- 
 clined to pursue such a subject; now I have felt 
 that it was absurd, and that it tired and embar- 
 rassed me. Absolutely, I can’t say. Frankly 
 and faithfully, I would if I could.” 
 
 So replying, he clapped a hand, in his turn, 
 on his friend’s shoulder, as he rose from his seat 
 upon the bed, and said: 
 
 ‘*You must take your friend as he is. You 
 know what I am, my dear Mortimer. You know 
 how dreadfully susceptible I am to boredom, 
 You know that when I became enough of a man 
 to find myself an embodied conundrum, I bored 
 myself to the last degree by trying to find out 
 what I meant. You know that at length I gave 
 it up, and declined to guess any more. Then 
 how can I possibly give you the answer that I 
 have not discovered? The old nursery form 
 runs, ‘ Riddle-me-riddle-me-ree, p’raps you can’t 
 tell me what this may be?’ My reply runs, ‘No. 
 Upon my life, I ean’t.’” 
 
 So much of what was fantastically true to his 
 own knowledge of this utterly careless Eugene, 
 mingled with the answer, that Mortimer could 
 not receive it as a mere evasion. Besides, it 
 was given with an engaging air of openness, 
 and of special exemption of the one friend he 
 valued, from his reckless indifference. 
 
 “*Come, dear boy!” said Eugene. 
 try the effect of smoking. 
 at all on this question, I will impart unreserv- 
 edly.” 
 
 They returned to the room they had come 
 from, and, finding it heated, opened a window. 
 Having lighted their cigars, they leaned out of 
 this window, smoking, and looking down at the 
 moonlight as it shone into the court below. 
 
 “ Let us 
 
 If it enlightens me. 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 ‘*No enlightenment,” resumed Eugene, after 
 certain minutes of silence. ‘I feel sincerely 
 apologetic, my dear Mortimer, but nothing 
 comes,” wae 
 
 -“ Tf nothing comes,” returned Mortimer, ‘‘ no- 
 thing can come from it. So I shall hope that 
 this may hold good throughout, and that there 
 may be nothing on foot. Nothing injurious to 
 you, Kugene, or—” 
 
 Eugene stayed him for a moment with his 
 
 hand on his arm, while he took a piece of earth 
 from an old flower-pot on the window-sill and 
 dextrously shot it at a little point of light oppo- 
 site; having done which to his satisfaction, hé 
 said, ‘‘ Or?” 
 ‘*Or injurious to any one else.” 
 “How,” said Eugene, taking another little 
 
 piece of earth, and shooting it with great pre- .— 
 
 cision at the former mark, ‘‘ how injurious to 
 any one else?” 
 
 **T don’t know.” 
 
 “* And,” said Eugene, taking, as he said the 
 word, another shot, ‘‘ to whom else ?” 
 
 **T don’t know.” 
 
 Checking himself with another piece of earth 
 in his hand, Eugene looked at his friend inquir- 
 ingly and a little suspiciously. There was no 
 concealed or half-expressed meaning in his face. 
 
 ‘*'T'wo belated wanderers in the mazes of the 
 law,” said Eugene, attracted by the sound of 
 footsteps, and glancing down as he spoke, ‘stray 
 into the court. ‘They examine the door-posts 
 of number one, seeking the name they want. 
 
 Not finding it at number one, they come to 
 
 number two. On the hat of wanderer number 
 two, the shorter one, I drop this pellet. . Hit- 
 ting him on the hat, I smoke serenely, and be- 
 come absorbed in contemplation of the sky.” 
 
 Both the wanderers looked up toward the 
 window; but after interchanging a mutter or 
 two, soon applied themselves to the door-posts 
 below. There they seemed to discover what 
 they wanted, for they disappeared from view by 
 entering at the doorway. ‘ When they emerge,” 
 said Eugene, ‘‘ you shall see me bring them both 
 down ;” and so prepared two pellets for the pur- 
 pose. 
 
 He had not reckoned on their seeking his 
 name, or Lightwood’s. But either the one or 
 
 the other would seem to be in question, for now ° 
 ‘Tam on. 
 duty to-night,” said Mortimer ; ‘‘ stay you where ~ 
 
 there came a knock at the door. 
 
 you are, Eugene.” Requiring no persuasion, 
 he staid there, smoking quietly, and not at all 
 curious to know who knocked, until Mortimer 
 
 spoke to him from within the room, and touch- — 
 
 ed him. Then, drawing in his head, he found 
 the visitors to be young Charley Hexam.and 
 the schoolmaster; both standing facing him, 
 and both recognized at a glance, 
 
 ‘You recollect this young fellow, Eugene?” 
 said Mortimer. 
 
 ‘‘ Let me look at him,” returned Wrayburn, 
 coolly. ‘Oh yes, yes. I recollect him!” 
 
 He had not been about to repeat that former — 
 
 action of taking him by the chin, but the boy 
 
 had suspected him of it, and had thrown up his — 
 Laughingly, Wray- | 
 
 burn looked to Lightwood for an explanation : 
 
 arm with an angry start. 
 
 of this odd visit. 
 ‘‘ He says he has something to say.”” 
 “* Surely it must be to you, Mortimer.” 
 
 4 
 7 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. . 
 
 **So I thought, but he says no. 
 to you.” 
 
 “Yes, I do say so,” interposed the boy. 
 ‘* And I mean to say what I want to say, too, 
 Mr. Eugene Wrayburn!” 
 
 Passing him with his eyes as if there were no- 
 thing where he stood, Eugene looked on to Brad- 
 ley Headstone. With consummate indolence 
 he turned to Mortimer, inquiring: ‘‘ And who 
 may this other person be?” a 
 
 **T am Charles Hexam’s friend,” said Brad- 
 ley; ‘1 am Charles Hexam’s schoolmaster.” 
 
 ‘*My good Sir, you should teach your pupils 
 better manners,” returned Eugene. 
 
 Composedly smoking, he leaned an elbow on 
 the chimney-piece, at the side of the fire, and 
 looked at the schoolmaster. It was a cruel 
 look, in its cold disdain of him, as a creature of 
 no worth. The schoolmaster looked at him, 
 and that, too, was a cruel look, though of the 
 different kind, that it had a raging jealousy and 
 fiery wrath in it. ‘ 
 
 Very remarkably, neither Eugene Wrayburn 
 nor Bradley Headstone looked at all at the boy. 
 Through the ensuing dialogue those two, no 
 matter who spoke, or whom was addressed, 
 looked at each other. There was some secret, 
 sure perception between them, which set them 
 against one another in all ways. 
 
 **In some high respects, Mr. Eugene Wray- 
 ‘burn,” said Bradley, answering him with pale 
 and quivering lips, ‘‘the natural feelings of my 
 pupils are stronger than my teaching.” 
 
 ‘‘{n most respects, I dare say,” replied Eu- 
 gene, enjoying his cigar, ‘‘ though whether high 
 or low is of noimportance. You have my name 
 very correctly. Pray what is yours ?” 
 
 ‘‘Tt can not concern you much to know, but—”’ 
 
 **'True,” interposed Eugene, striking sharply, 
 and cutting him short at his mistake, ‘it does 
 not concern meatalltoknow. I can say School- 
 master, which is a most respectable title. You 
 are right, Schoolmaster,’’ 
 
 It was not the dullest part of this goad in its 
 galling of Bradley Headstone, that he had made 
 it himself in a moment of incautious anger. He 
 tried to set his lips so as to prevent their quiv- 
 ering, but they quivered fast. 
 
 ‘*Mr. Eugene Wrayburn,” said the boy, ‘I 
 Want a word with you. I have wanted it so 
 much that we have looked out your address in 
 the book, and we have been to your office, and 
 we have come from your office here,” 
 
 “You have given yourself much trouble, 
 _Schoolmaster,” observed Eugene, blowing the 
 feathery ash from his cigar. ‘I hope it may 
 prove remunerative.” 
 
 ‘* And I am glad to speak,” pursued the boy, 
 **in presence of Mr. Lightwood, because it was 
 through Mr. Lightwood that you ever saw my 
 sister.” 
 
 For a mere moment Wrayburn turned his 
 _ eyes aside from the schoolmaster to note the ef- 
 fect of the last word on Mortimer, who, stand- 
 ing on the opposite side of the fire, as soon as the 
 word was spoken turned his face toward the fire 
 -and looked down into it. 
 
 “Similarly, it was through Mr. Lightwood 
 that you ever saw her again, for you were with 
 him on the night when my father was found, 
 and so I found you with her on the next day. 
 _ Since then you have seen my sister often. You 
 
 He says it is 
 
 138 
 And [ 
 
 ‘have seen my sister of:ener and oftener. 
 want to know why ?” 
 
 ** Was this worth while, Schoolmaster ?”” mur- 
 mured Kugene, with the air of a disinterested 
 adviser. ‘*So much trouble for nothing? You 
 should know best, but I think not.” 
 
 ‘“T don’t know, Mr. Wrayburn,” answered 
 Bradley, with his passion rising, ‘‘why you ad- 
 dress me—” 
 
 *¢ Don’t you?” said Eugene. ‘*ThenI won't.” 
 
 He said it so tauntingly in his perfect placid- 
 ity, that the respectable right-hand clutching the 
 respectable hair-guard of the respectable watch 
 could have wound it round his throat and stran- 
 gled him with it. Not another word did Eu- 
 gene deem it worth while to utter, but stood 
 leaning his head upon his hand, smoking, and 
 looking imperturbably at the chafing Bradley 
 Headstone with his clutching right hand, until 
 Bradley was well-nigh mad. 
 
 ‘*Mr. Wrayburn,” proceeded the boy, ‘‘ we 
 not only know this that I have charged upon 
 you, but we know more. It has not yet come 
 to my sister’s knowledge that we have found it 
 out, but we have. We had a plan, Mr. Head- 
 stone and I, for my sister’s education, and for 
 its being advised and overlooked by Mr. Head- 
 stone, who is a much more competent author- 
 ity, whatever you may pretend to think, as you 
 smoke, than you could produce, if you tried. 
 Then, what dowe find? What do we find, Mr. 
 Lightwood? Why, we find that my sister is al- 
 ready being taught without our knowing it. 
 We find that while my sister gives an unwilling 
 and cold ear to our schemes for her advantage 
 —I, her brother, and Mr. Headstone, the most 
 competent authority, as his certificates would 
 easily prove, that could be produced—she is 
 willfully and willingly profiting by other schemes. 
 Ay, and taking pains too, for I know what such 
 pains are. And so does Mr. Headstone! Well! 
 Somebody pays for this, is a thought that natu- 
 rally occurs to us; who pays? We apply our- 
 selves to find out, Mr. Lightwood, and we find 
 that your friend, this Mr. Eugene Wrayburn 
 here, pays. Then I ask him what right has he 
 to do it, and what does he mean by it, and how 
 comes he to be taking such a liberty without my 
 consent, when I am raising myself in the scale 
 of society by my own exertions and Mr. Head- 
 stone’s aid, and have no right to have any dark- 
 ness Cast upon my prospects, or any imputation 
 upon my respectability through my sister ?” 
 
 The boyish weakness of this speech, combined 
 with its great selfishness, made it a poor one in- 
 deed. And yet Bradley Headstone, used to the 
 little audience of a school, and unused to the 
 larger ways of men, showed a kind of exultation 
 in it. 
 
 ‘*Now I tell Mr. Eugene Wrayburn,” pursued 
 the boy, forced into the use of the third person 
 by the hopelessness of addressing him in the first, 
 ‘*that I object to his having any acquaintance 
 at all with my sister, and that I request him to 
 drop it altogether. He is not to take it into his 
 head that I am afraid of my sister’s caring for 
 him—” 
 
 (As the boy sneered, the Master sneered, and 
 Eugene blew off the feathery ash again.) 
 
 —‘*But I object to it, and that’s enough. I 
 am more important to my sister than-he»thinks, 
 As I raise myself, I intend to raisc her; she 
 
 4 
 
Ick 
 
 = 
 
 i} 
 
 ue 
 
 : t i “¢ 
 } il iil 
 NAR Hi 
 i 
 i 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 ee : 
 
 knows that, and she has to look to me for her 
 prospects. Now [ understand all this very well, 
 and so does Mr, Headstone. My sister is an 
 excellent girl, but she has some romantic no- 
 tions; not about such things as your Mr. Eugene 
 Wrayburns, but about the death of my father 
 and other matters of that sort, Mr. Wrayburn 
 encourages those notions to make himself of im- 
 portance, and so she thinks she ought to be grate- 
 ful to him, and perhaps even likes to be. Now 
 1 don’t choose her to be grateful to him, or to be 
 grateful to any body but ine, except. Mr. Head- 
 stone, And I tell Mr. Wrayburn thai if he 
 
 9" 
 
 es 
 SS 
 
 FORMING THE DOMESTIC VIRTUES. 
 
 yr 
 
 as 
 
 ahs 
 ay 
 
 ae 
 
 Nt 
 aR ge Ny 
 
 ) mah tod 
 
 Be 
 
 eT Has Wie 
 Yawn 
 
 don’t take heed of what I say, it will be worse 
 for her. Let him turn that over in his mem- 
 ory, and make sure of it. Worse for her!” 
 
 A pause ensued, in which the schoolmaster 
 looked very awkward, 
 
 “May I snggest, Schoolmaster,” said Eugene, 
 removing his fast-waning cigar from his lips to 
 
 glance at it, ‘that you can now take your pupil 
 rc 9 a ‘ 
 away. 
 
 ‘*And Mr. Lightwood,”’ added the boy, with» 
 
 a burning face, under the flaming aggravation — 
 of getting no sort-of answer or attention, ‘I- 
 hope you'll take notice of what I have said to. 
 
 a 
 
 he 
 ’ 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 your friend, and of what your friend has heard 
 me say, word by word, whatever he pretends to 
 the contrary, You are bound to take notice of 
 it, Mr. Lightwood, for, as I have already men- 
 tioned, you first brought your friend into my 
 sister’s Company, and but for you we never 
 should have seen him. ~ Lord knows none of us 
 ever wanted him, any more than any of us will 
 ever miss him. Now, Mr, Headstone, as Mr. 
 Eugene Wravburn has been obliged to hear what 
 I had to say, and couldn’t help himself, and as 
 I have said it out to the last word, we have done 
 all we wanted to do, and may go.” 
 
 “Go down stairs, and leave me a moment, 
 Hexam,” he returned. The boy complying with 
 
 an indignant look and as much noise as he could ° 
 
 make, swung out of the room, and Lightwood 
 
 went to the window, and leaned there, looking | 
 
 out. : 
 **You think me of no more value than the 
 ‘dirt under your feet,” said Bradley to Eugene, 
 ‘speaking in a carefully weighed and measured 
 ‘tone, or he could not have spoken at all. 
 
 - “T assure you, Schoolmaster,” replied Eu- 
 gene, “I don’t think about you.” 
 
 ‘«That’s not true,” returned the other; ‘you | 
 
 know better.” 
 
 **That’s coarse,” Eugene retorted; ‘‘but you | 
 
 don’t know better.” 
 
 “Mr, Wrayburn, at least I know very well that 
 it would be'idle to set myself against you in in- 
 solent words or overbearing manners. That lad 
 who has just gone out could put you to shame 
 in half a dozen branches of knowledge in half 
 an hour, but you can throw him aside like an in- 
 ferior. You can do as much by me, I have no 
 doubt, beforehand.” 
 
 ‘* Possilily,”’ remarked Engene. 
 
 ‘But I am more than a lad,” said Bradley, 
 with his clutching hand, “‘ and I wixu be heard, 
 Sir.” 
 
 ‘* As a schoolmaster,” said Eugene, ‘‘ you are 
 always being heard. That ought to content 
 you.” | 
 
 ‘* But it does not content me,” replied the oth- 
 er, white with passion. ‘‘Do you suppose that 
 
 aman, in forming himself for the duties I dis- | 
 
 charge, and in watching and repressing himself 
 daily to discharge them well, dismisses a man’s 
 nature ?” 
 
 “*T suppose you,” said Eugene, ‘‘ judging from 
 
 135 
 
 , with an errant motion of his hands as if he could 
 have torn himself. 
 
 Eugene Wrayburn looked on at him, as if he 
 found him beginning to be rather an entertain- 
 ing study. 
 
 ‘“Mr. Wrayburn, I desire to say something 
 to you on my own part.” 
 
 **Come, come, Schoolmaster,” returned Eu- 
 
 gene, with a languid approach to impatience as 
 the other again struggled with himself; ‘* say 
 what you have to say. And let me remind you 
 that the door is standing open, and your young 
 friend waiting for you on the stairs.” 
 “When [ accompanied that youth here, Sir, 
 'I did so with the purpose of adding, as a man 
 whom you should not be permitied to put aside, 
 in case you put him aside as a boy, that his in- 
 stinct is correct and right.’ Thus Bradley 
 | Headstone, with great «ffort and difficulty. 
 
 ‘Ts that all?” asked Kugene, 
 
 **No, Sir,” said,the other, flushed and fierce. 
 ‘“€T-strongly support him in his disapproval of 
 your visits to his sister, aud in bis objection to 
 your officionsness—and worse—in what you 
 | have taken upon yoursclf to do for her.” 
 
 **Is that all?” asked Eugene. 
 
 “No, Sir. I determined to tell you that you 
 are not justified in these proceedings, and that 
 they are injurious to his sister.” 
 
 ‘*Are you her schoolmaster“#s well as “her 
 brother's ?—Or perhaps you would like to be ?” 
 said Kugene. 
 
 It was a stab that the blood followed, in its 
 rush to Bradley Headstone’s face, as swiftly as 
 if it had been dealt with a dagger. ‘What do 
 
 you mean by that?” was as much as he could 
 Putter: ye 
 
 ‘* A natural ambition enough,” said Engene, 
 ‘coolly. ‘+ Far be it from me to say otherwise. 
 |The si: ter—who is'‘something too much upon 
 your lips, perhaps—is so very different from all 
 the associations to which she has been used, and 
 from all the low obscure people about her, that 
 | it is a very natural ambition.” 
 
 ‘¢Po you throw my obscurity in my tecth, 
 Mr. Wrayburn ?” ; 
 
 ‘¢That can hardly be, for I know nothing con- 
 cerning it, Schoalmaster, and seek to know no- 
 thing.” ™ 
 | **You reproach me with my origin,” said 
 Bradley Headstone; ‘you cast insinuations at 
 
 what I sce as I look at vou, to be rather too pas-w my bringing-up: But Ttell you, Sir, I have 
 sionate for a good schoolmaster.” As he spokey worked my way onward, out of both and in 
 
 he tossed away the end of his cigar. 
 ‘Passionate with you, Sir, I admit I am. 
 
 spite of both, and have a right to be considered 
 a better man than you, with better reasons for 
 
 Passionate with you, Sir, I respect myself for being proud.” 
 
 being. But I have not Devils for my pupils.” 
 “For your Teachers, I should rather say,” 
 replied Eugene. 
 “*Mr. Wrayburn.” 
 **Schoolmaster.” 
 **Sir, my name is Bradley Headstone.” 
 “* As you justly said, my good Sir, your name 
 can not concern me. Now, what more ?”’ 
 “*This more. 
 mine,” cried Bradley, breaking off to wipe the 
 Starting perspiration from his face as he shook 
 from head to foot, ‘that I can not so control 
 myself as to appear a stronger creature than this, 
 When a man who has not felt in all his life what 
 J have felt in a day can so command himself !” 
 
 ‘He said it in a very agony, and even followed it 
 MA 2 § J 
 
 Oh, what a misfortune is | 
 
 ‘* Wow I can reproach you with what is not 
 within my knowledge, or how I can cast stones 
 that were never in my hand, is a problem for the 
 | ingennity of a schoolmaster to prove,” returned 
 Eugene. ‘Is that all ?”’ 
 
 ‘*No, Sir. If you suppose that boy—” 
 
 ‘Who really will be tired of waiting,” 
 Eugene, politely. hie, 
 
 ‘Tf you suppose that boy to be friendless, Mr. 
 Wrayburn, you deceive yourself. I am_ his 
 friend, and you shall find me so.” 
 
 ‘And you will find Aim on the stairs, 
 marked Eugene. 
 
 ‘You may have promised yourself, Sir, that 
 you could 
 had to deal with a mere boy, inexperienced, 
 
 said 
 
 ” 
 
 re- 
 
 do what you chose here, because you. 
 
 % 
 
 ° 
 
136 
 
 friendless, and unassisted. But I give you warn- 
 ing that this mean calculation is wrong. You 
 have to do with a man also. -- You have to do 
 with me. I will support him, and, if need be, 
 require reparation for him. My hand and heart 
 are in this cause, and are open to him.” 
 
 ‘*And— quite a coincidence —the door is 
 open,” remarked Eugene, 
 
 “‘T scorn your shifty evasions, and I scorn 
 you,” said the schoolmaster. ‘In the mean- 
 ness of your nature you revile me with the 
 meanness of my birth. I hold you in contempt 
 for it. But if you don’t profit by this visit, and 
 act accordingly, you will find me as bitterly in 
 earnest against you as I could be if I deemed 
 you worth a second thought on my own ac- 
 count.” 
 
 With a consciously bad grace and stiff man- 
 ner, as Wrayburn looked so easily and calmly 
 on, he went out with these words, and the heavy 
 door closed like a furnace-door upon his red and 
 white heats of rage. 
 
 ‘A curious monomaniac,” said Eugene. 
 *‘The man seems to believe that every body 
 was acquainted with his mother !” 
 
 Mortimer Lightwood being still at the win- 
 dow, to which he had in delicacy withdrawn, 
 Eugene called to him, and he fell to slowly pac- 
 ing the room. 
 
 ‘* My dear fellow,” said Eugene, as he lighted 
 another cigar, ‘‘I fear my unexpected visitors 
 have been troublesome. If as a set-off (excuse 
 the legal phrase from a barrister-at-law) you 
 would like to ask Tippins to tea, I_pledge my- 
 self to make love to her.” 
 
 “Eugene, Eugene, Eugene,” replied Morti- 
 mer, still pacing the room, ‘‘I am sorry for this. 
 And to think that I have been so blind!” 
 
 ‘**How blind, dear boy?” inquired his un- 
 moved friend. 
 
 ‘What were your words that night at the 
 river-side public house?” said Lightwood, stop- 
 ping. ‘What was it that you asked me? Did 
 J feel like a dark combination of traitor and 
 pickpocket when I thought of that girl ?” 
 
 **I seem to remember the expression,” said 
 Eugene. 
 
 ‘* How do you feel when you think of her just 
 now ?” 
 
 His friend made no direct reply, but observed, 
 after a few whiffs of his cigar, ‘* Don’t mistake 
 the situation. ‘There is no better girl in all this 
 London than Lizzie Hexam. There is no bet- 
 ter among my people at home; no better among 
 your people.” | 
 
 ‘“¢Granted. What follows?” 
 
 “There,” said Eugene, looking after him du- 
 biously as he paced away to the other end of the 
 room, ‘‘you put me again upon guessing the 
 riddle that I have given up.” 
 
 ‘“‘ Hugene, do you design to capture and de- 
 sert this girl?” 
 
 *¢ My dear fellow, no.” 
 
 **Do you design to marry her?” - 
 
 *¢ My dear fellow, no.” 
 
 **Do you design to. pursue her ?” 
 
 “ My dear fellow, I don’t design any thing. 
 I have no design whatever. I am incapable of 
 designs. If I conceived a design I should speed- 
 ily abandon it, exhausted by the operation.” 
 
 ‘Oh Eugene, Eugene!” 
 
 “My dear Mortimer, not that tone of melan- 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 choly reproach, I entreat. What canI do more 
 than tell you all I know, and acknowledge my 
 
 ignorance of all I don’t know! How does that. : 
 
 little old song go, which, under pretense of being 
 
 cheerful, is by far the most lugubrious I ever | 
 
 heard in my life ? \ 
 
 ‘Away with melancholy, | 
 
 Nor doletul changes ring 1 
 
 On life-and human folly, : 
 
 But merrily, merrily sing 
 
 Fal la!’ 
 
 Don’t let us sing Fal la, my dear Mortimer — 
 (which is comparatively unmeaning), but let us 
 sing that we give up guessing the riddle alto-* 
 gether.” 
 
 ‘Are you in communication with this girl, 
 Eugene, and is what these people say true?” 
 
 “I concede both admissions to my honorable 
 and learned friend.” 
 
 ‘*'Then what is to come of it? What are 
 doing? Where are you,going ?” 
 
 ‘*My dear Mortimer, one would think the 
 schoolmaster had left behind him a catechising © 
 infection. You are ruffled by the want of an- 
 other cigar. Take one of these, I entreat. — 
 Light it at mine, which is in perfect order, 
 So! Now do me the justice to observe that I~ 
 am doing all I can toward self-improvement, 
 and that you have a light thrown on those 
 household implements which, when you only 
 saw them as in a glass darkly, you were hasti- : 
 ly—I must say hastily—inclined to depreciate. — 
 Sensible of my deficiencies, I have surrounded — 
 myself with moral influences expressly meant.to : 
 promote the formation of the domestic virtues, 
 To those influences, and to the improxing soci- | 
 ety of my friend from boyhood, commend me — 
 with your best wishes.” | 
 
 ‘* Ah, Eugene!” said Lightwood, affectionate- _ 
 ly, now standing near him, so that they both 
 stood in one little cloud of smoke; ‘‘I would 
 that you answered my three questions! What _ 
 is to come of it? What are you doing? Where : 
 
 you] 
 
 at 
 vi 
 a 
 
 are you going ?” 
 
 ‘And my dear Mortimer,” returned Eugene, 
 lightly fanning away the smoke with his hand 
 for the better exposition of his frankness of face 
 and manner, ‘‘ believe me, I would answer them 
 instantly if I could. But to enable me to do so, 
 I must first have found out the troublesome co-— 
 nundrum long abandoned. Here itis. Eugene 
 Wrayburn.” Tapping his forehead and breast. — 
 ‘* Riddle-me, riddle-me-rce, perhaps you can’t 
 tell me what this may be ?—No, upon my life, I~ 
 can’t. I give it up!” t 
 
 Secremappacen aecinctanitae 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 IN WHICH A FRIENDLY MOVE IS ORIGINATED. 
 
 Tue arrangement between Mr. Boffin and his _ 
 literary man, Mr. Silas Wegg, so far altered with — : 
 the altered habits of Mr. Boftin’s life, as that 
 the Roman Empire usually declined in the morn- 
 ing and in the eminently aristocratic family 
 mansion, rather than in the evening, as of yore, 
 and in Boffin’s Bower. There were occasions, 
 however, when Mr. Boffin, seeking a brief ref- 
 uge from the blandishments of fashion, would 
 present himself at the Bower after dark, to an- _ 
 
 ticipate the next sallying forth of Wegg, and 
 
me 
 _ would there, on the old settle, pursue the down- 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRI 
 
 ils 
 for 
 
 | gi i 137 
 uae icky 
 “ Thankee,” says Wegz. ‘‘ Now this affair 
 
 _, ward fortunes of those enervated and corrupted | is concluded, I may mention to you in a friendly 
 
 - masters of the world who were by this time on 
 
 their last legs. If Wegg had been worse paid 
 for his office, or better qualified to discharge it, 
 
 he would have considered these visits compli- | 
 
 mentary and agreeable; but, holding the posi- 
 tion of a handsomely-remunerated humbug, he 
 resented them. This was. quite according to 
 rule, for the incompetent servant, by whomsoey- 
 er employed, is always against his employer. 
 Eyen those born governors, noble and right hon- 
 orable creatures, who have been the most imbe- 
 cile in high places, have uniformly shown them- 
 selves the most opposed (sometimes in belying 
 distrust, sometimes in vapid insolence) to their 
 employer, 
 public master and servant, is equally true of the 
 private master and servant all the world over. 
 
 When Mr. Silas Wegg did at last obtain free 
 
 ~ access to *‘ Our House,”’ as he had been wont to 
 
 _ terless so long, and when he did at last find it in | 
 all particulars as different from his mental plans | 
 
 -eall the mansion outside which he had sat shel- 
 
 of it as according to the nature of things it well 
 could be, that far-seeing and far-reaching char- 
 
 : . . . 
 » acter, by way of asserting himself and making | 
 
 ~ out a case for compensation, affected to fall into 
 
 a melancholy strain of musing over the mournful 
 past; as if the house and he had had a fall in 
 
 life together. 
 
 *¢ And this, Sir,” Silas would say to his patron, 
 
 sadly nodding his head and musing, ‘‘ was once | 
 This, Sir, is the building from | 
 
 Our House! 
 which I have so often seen those great creatures, 
 Miss Elizabeth, Master George, Aunt Jane, and 
 Uncle Parker”—whose very names were of his 
 own inventing—‘‘ pass and repass! And has it 
 come to this, indeed! Ah dear me, dear me!” 
 .. So tender were his lamentations, that the 
 kindly Mr. Boffin was quite sorry for,him, and 
 
 almost felt mistrustful that in buying the house | 
 
 -he had done him an irreparable injury. 
 Two or three diplomatic interviews, the result 
 of great subtlety on Mr. Wegg’s part, but assum- 
 
 ‘ing the mask of careless yielding to a fortuitous | 
 
 combination of circumstances, impelling him to- 
 ward Clerkenwell, had enabled him to complete 
 
 his bargain with Mr. Venus. 
 
 ‘< Bring me round to the Bower,” said Silas 
 b) >) 
 
 ' when the bargain was closed, ‘‘next Saturday 
 - evening, and if a sociable glass of old Jamaikey 
 
 warm should meet your views, I am not the man 
 
 -.)to begrudge it.” 
 
 = 
 
 “You are aware of my being poor company, 
 Sir,” replied Mr. Venus ; ‘‘ but be it so.” 
 
 It being so, here is Saturday evening come, 
 and here is Mr. Venus come, and ringing at the 
 Bower-gate. 
 
 Mr. Wegg opens the gate, descries a sort of 
 brown paper truncheon under Mr. Venus’s arm, 
 and remarks, in a dry tone: ‘*Oh! I thought 
 
 perhaps you might. have come in a cab.” 
 
 “No, Mr. Wegg,” replies Venus. ‘‘ I am not 
 
 _ above a parcel.” 
 
 ‘Above a parcel! No!’ says Wegg, with 
 
 some dissatisfaction. But does not openly growl, 
 
 th. flowed.’’ 
 
 ‘4 certain sort of parcel might be above you.” 
 ‘‘Here is your purchase, Mr. Wegg,” says 
 _ Venus, politely handing it over, ‘‘and I am glad 
 to restore it to the source from whence it— 
 
 9 * 
 
 way that I’ve my doubts whether, if I had con- 
 
 sulted a lawyer, you could have kept this arti- 
 'cle back from me. 
 
 I only throw it out as a 
 legal point” f 
 ‘‘Do you think so, Mr. Wegg? I bought you 
 in open contract.” 
 ‘¢You can’t buy human flesh and blood in 
 this country, Sir; not alive, you can’t,” says 
 Wegg, shaking his head. ‘‘'Then query, bone ?” 
 ‘* As a legal point?” asks Venus. 
 ‘¢ As a legal point.” 
 ‘¢T am not competent to speak upon that, Mr. 
 
 | Wegg,” says Venus, reddening, and growing 
 /something louder; ‘‘but upon a point of fact I 
 What is in such wise true of the. 
 of fact I would have seen you—will you allow 
 
 think myself competent to speak; and as a point 
 
 me to say, further ?” 
 
 “‘T wouldn’t say more than further, if I was 
 you,” Mr. Wegg suggests, pacifically. 
 
 —‘* Before I'd have given that packet into 
 your hand without being paid my price for it. I 
 don’t pretend to know how the point of law may 
 stand, but I’m thoroughly confident upon the 
 point of fact.” 
 
 As Mr. Venus is irritable (no.doubt owing to 
 his disappointment in love), and as it is not the 
 cue of Mr. Wegg to have him out of temper, the 
 latter gentleman soothingly remarks, ‘*I only put 
 it as a little case; I only put it ha’porthetically.” 
 
 “Then I’d rather, Mr. Wegg, you put it an- 
 other time, penn’orthetically,’”’ is Mr. Venus’s re- 
 tort, ‘‘for I tell you candidly I don’t like your 
 little cases.” 
 
 Arrived by this time in Mr. Wegg’s sitting-* 
 room, made bright on the chilly evening by gas- 
 light and fire, Mr. Venus softens and compli- 
 ments him on his abode; profiting by the occa- 
 
 'sion to remind Wegg that he (Venus) told him 
 
 he had got into a good thing. 
 
 ‘¢ Tolerable,” Wegg rejoins.  ‘*But bear in 
 mind, Mr. Venus, that there’s no gold without 
 its alloy. Mix for yourself, and take a seat in. 
 the clrimbley-corner. Will you perform upon a 
 pipe, Sir?” . 
 
 ‘*T am but an indifferent performer, Sir,” re- 
 turns the other; “but [ll accompany you with 
 a whiff or two at intervals.” 
 
 So, Mr. Venus mixes, and Wegg mixes; and 
 Mr. Venus lights and puffs, and Wegg lights 
 and puffs. | 
 
 ‘¢ And there’s alloy even in this metal of yours, 
 Mr. Wegg, you was remarking ?” 
 
 ‘‘Mystery,” returns Wegg. ‘‘I don’t like it, 
 Mr. Venus. I don’t like to have the life knocked 
 out of former inhabitants of this house, in the 
 gloomy dark, and not know who did it.” 
 
 ‘¢ Might you have any suspicions, Mr. Wegg?” 
 
 ‘¢No,’’ returns that gentleman. ‘‘I know who 
 profits by it. But I’ve no suspicions.” 
 
 Having said which, Mr. Wegg smokes and 
 looks at the fire with a most determined expres- 
 sion of Charity; as if he had caught that car- 
 dinal virtue by the skirts as she felt it her pain- 
 ful duty to depart from him, and held her by. 
 main force. 
 
 ‘¢ Similarly,” resumes Wegg, ‘‘I have obser-— 
 vations as I can offer upon certain points and 
 parties; but I make no objections, Mr. Venus. 
 Here is an immense fortune drops from the clouds 
 upon a,person that shall be nameless. Here is 
 
138 
 
 a weekly allowance, with a certain weight of 
 coals, drops from the clouds upon me. Which 
 of us is the better man ? Not the person that 
 shall be nameless. ‘That’s an observation of 
 mine, but I don’t make it an objection. I take 
 
 my allowance and my certain weight of coals. 
 
 He takes his fortune. That’s the way it works.” 
 
 “Tt would be a good thing for me if I could 
 see things in the calm light you do, Mr. Wegg.”’ 
 
 ‘¢ Again look here,” pursues Silas, with an 
 oratorical flourish of his pipe and his wooden 
 leg: the latter having an undignified tendency 
 to tilt him back in his chair; ‘‘ here’s another 
 observation, Mr. Venus, unaccompanied with an 
 objection. Him that shall be nameless is liable 
 to be talked over. He gets talked over. Him 
 that shall be nameless, having me at his right 
 hand, naturally looking to be promoted higher, 
 and you may perhaps say meriting to be pro- 
 moted higher—” 
 
 (Mr. Venus murmurs that he does say so.) 
 
 ‘¢__Him that shall be nameless, under such 
 circumstances passes me by, and puts a talking- 
 over stranger above my head. Which of us two 
 is the better man? Which of us two can repeat 
 most poetry? Which of us two has, in the serv- 
 ice of him that shall be nameless, tackled the 
 Romans, both civil and military, till he has got 
 as husky as if he’d been weaned and ever since 
 brought up on saw-dust? Not the talking-over 
 stranger. Yet the house is as free to him as if 
 it was his, and he has his room, and is put upon 
 a footing, and draws about a thousand a year. 
 I am banished to the Bower, to be found in it 
 like a piece of furniture whenever wanted, Mer- 
 it, therefore, don’t win. That’s the way it works. 
 I observe it, because I can’t help observing it, 
 being accustomed to take a powerful sight of 
 notice; but I don’t object. Ever here before, 
 Mr. Venus ?” 
 
 ** Not inside the gate, Mr. Wegg.” 
 
 **You’ve been as far as the gate then, Mr. 
 Venus ?” 
 
 “Yes, Mr. Wegg, and peeped in from curi- 
 Osity.” 
 
 ** Did you see any thing ?” 
 
 ** Nothing but the dust-yard.” 
 
 Mr. Wegg rolls his eyes all round the room, 
 in that ever unsatisfied quest of his, and then 
 rolls his eyes all round Mr. Venus; as if sus- 
 picious of his having something about him to be 
 found out. 
 
 ‘¢ And yet, Sir,” he pursues, ‘* being acquaint- 
 ed with old Mr. Harmon, one wouldhave thought 
 it might have been polite in you, too, to give him 
 a call. And you're naturally of a polite dispo- 
 sition, you are.” This last clause as a softening 
 compliment to Mr. Venus. 
 
 ‘‘It is true, Sir,” replies Venus, winking his 
 weak eyes, and running his fingers through his 
 dusty shock of hair, ‘that I was so, before a 
 certain observation soured me. You understand 
 to what I allude, Mr. Wegg? To a certain»writ= 
 ten statement respecting not wishing to be re- 
 garded in a certain light. Since that all is fled, 
 save gall.” 
 
 ‘Not all,” says Mr. Wegg, in a tone of sen- 
 timental condolence. 
 
 ‘Yes’ Sir,” returns Venus, ‘all! The world 
 may deem it harsh, but 1’d,quite as soon pitch 
 into my best friend as not. Indeed, I’d soon- 
 er |” . 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 | 
 
 Involuntarily making a pass with his wooden 
 leg to guard himself as Mr. Venus springs up 
 in the emphasis of this unsociable declaration, 
 Mr. Wegg tilts-over on his back, chair and all, . 
 and-is rescued by that harmless misanthrope in — 
 a disjointed state, and ruefully rubbing his head. 
 
 ‘¢Why, you lost your balance, Mr. Wegg,” 
 says Venus, handing him his pipe. 
 
 ‘¢ And about time to do it,’”’ grumbles Silas, 
 ‘¢when a man’s visitors, without.a word of no- 
 tice, conduct themselves with the sudden wicious- 
 ness of Jacks-in-boxes! Don’t come flying out 
 of your chair like that, Mr.’Venus !” 
 
 *“‘T ask your pardon, Mr. Wegg. 
 soured,” 
 
 “‘Yes, but hang it,’ says Wegg, argumenta- 
 tively, ‘*a well-governed mind can be soured 
 sitting! And as to being regarded in lights, 
 there’s bumpey lights as wellas bony. Jn which,” 
 again rubbing his head, ‘‘ I object to regard my- 
 self.” 
 
 ‘¢T’ll bear it in memory, Sir.” 
 
 **Tf you'll be so good.” Mr. Wegg slowly 
 subdues his ironical tone and his lingering irri- 
 tation, and resumes his pipe. ‘‘ We were talk- 
 ing of old Mr. Harmon being a friend of yours.” 
 
 ‘¢Not a friend, Mr. Wegg. Only known to 
 speak to, and to have a little deal with now and 
 then. A very inquisitive character, Mr. Wegg, 
 regarding what was found in the dust. 
 quisitive as secret.” 
 
 ‘¢ Ah! You found him secret?” returns Wegg, 
 with a greedy relish. 
 
 ‘He had always the look of it, and the man- 
 ner of it.” 
 
 ‘* Ah!” with another roll of his eyes. ‘* As 
 to what was found in the dust now. Did you 
 ever hear him mention how he found it, my dear 
 friend? Living on the mysterious premises, one 
 would like to know. For instance, where he 
 found things? Or, for instance, how he set 
 about it? Whether he began at the top of the 
 mounds, or whether he began at the bottom. 
 Whether he prodded ;” Mr. Wegg’s pantomime 
 is skillful and expressive here; ‘‘ or whether he 
 scooped? Should you say scooped, my dear Mr. 
 Venus; or should you—as a man—say prod- 
 deh” 
 
 **f should say neither Mee Wegg.” 
 
 ‘* As a fellow-man, Mr. Venus—mix again— 
 why neither ?” 
 
 ‘“* Because I suppose, Sir, that what was found 
 was found in the sorting and sifting. All the 
 mounds are sorted and sifted ?” 
 
 ‘*You shall see em and pass your opinion. 
 Mix again.” dt 
 On each occasion of his saying ‘* mix again,” — 
 Mr. Wegg, with a hop on his wooden leg, hitch- 
 es his chair a little nearer; more as if he were 
 proposing that himself and Mr. Venus should 
 mix again, than that they should replenish their 
 
 glasses. 
 
 ‘* Living (as I said before) on the mysterious 
 premises,” says Werg when the other has acted 
 on his hospitable entreaty, ‘‘one likes to know. 
 Would you be inclined to say now—as a brother 
 —that he ever hid things in the dust, as well as 
 found ’em ?”’ * 
 
 ‘‘Mr. Wegg, on the whole I should say he 
 might.” ; F 
 
 Mr. Wegg claps on his spectacles, and ad- — 
 miringly surveys Mr. Venus from head to foot. 
 
 I am so 
 
 As in= —5 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 ‘*As a mortal equally with myself, whose 
 hand I take in mine for the first time this day, 
 having unaccountably overlooked that act so full 
 of boundless confidence binding a fellow-creetur 
 to a fellow-creetur,” says Wegg, holding Mr. 
 
 ~Venus’s palm out, flat and ready for smiting, 
 and now smiting it; ‘as sueh—and no other— 
 for I scorn all lowlier ties betwixt myself and the 
 man walking with his face erect that alone I call 
 my Twin—regarded and regarding in this trust- 
 ful bond—what do you think he might. have 
 hid ?” 
 
 ‘¢It is but a supposition, Mr. Wegg.” 
 
 ‘As a Being with his hand upon his heart,” 
 cries Wegg; and the apostrophe is not the less 
 impressive for the Being’s hand being actually 
 upon his rum and water, ‘ put your supposition 
 into language, and bring it out, Mr. Venus !”’ 
 
 *¢ We was the species of old gentleman, Sir,” 
 slowly returns that practical anatomist, after 
 drinking, ‘‘that I should judge likely to take 
 such opportunities as this place offered, of.stow- 
 ing away money, valuables, maybe papers.” 
 
 _* As one that was ever an ornament to human 
 life,” says Mr. Wegg, again holding out Mr. 
 . Venus’s palm as if he were going to tell his for- 
 tune by chiromancy, and holding his own up 
 ready for smiting it when the time should come; 
 ‘fas one that the poet might have had his eye 
 on in writing the national naval words: 
 Helm a-weather, now lay her close, 
 Yard arm and yard arm she lies; 
 Again, cried I, Mr. Venus, give her t*other dose, 
 Man shrouds and grapple, Sir, or she flies! 
 —that is to say, regarded in the light of true 
 British Oak, for such you are—explain, Mr. 
 Venus, the expression ‘ papers’ !” 
 
 ** Seeing that the old gentleman was generally 
 cutting off some near relation, or blocking out 
 some natural affection,” Mr. Venus rejoins, ** he 
 most likely made a good many wills and cod- 
 icils.”’ 
 
 The palm of Silas Wegg descends with a 
 sounding smack upon the palm of Venus, and 
 Wegg lavishly exclaims, ‘‘'T'win in opinion equal- 
 ly with feeling! Mix a little more!” 
 
 Having now hitched his wooden leg and his 
 chair close in front of Mr. Venus, Mr. Wegg rap- 
 idly mixes for both, gives his visitor his glass, 
 touches its rim with the rim of his own, puts his 
 own to his lips, puts it down, and spreading his 
 hands on his visitor’s knees thus addresses him: 
 
 ‘*Mr. Venus. It ain’t that-I object to being 
 passed over for a stranger, though I regard the 
 stranger as a more than doubtful customer. It 
 ain't for the sake of making money, though mon- 
 ey is ever welcome. It ain’t for myself, though 
 I am not so haughty as to be above doing my- 
 self a good turn. It’s for the cause of the right.” 
 
 Mr. Venus, passively winking his weak eyes 
 both at once, demands: ‘* What is, Mr. Wegg ?” 
 
 “The friendly move, Sir, that I now propose. 
 You see the move, Sir?” 
 
 *“Till you have pointed it out, Mr. Wegg, I 
 can’t say whether I do or not.” 
 
 “If there zs any thing to be found on these 
 premises, let us find it together. Let us make 
 the friendly move of agreeing to look for it “‘to- 
 gether. Let us make the friendly move of agree- 
 ing to share the profits of it equally betwixt us. 
 In the cause of the right.” Thus Silas assuming 
 a noble air. 
 
 te 
 
 139 
 
 ‘“*Then,’’ says Mr. Venus, looking up, after 
 meditating with his hair held in his hands, as if 
 he could only fix his-attention by fixing his head ; 
 ‘if any thing was to be unburied from under the 
 dust, it would be kept a secret by you and me? 
 Would that be it, Mr. Wegg?” 
 
 ‘“That would depend upon what it was, Mr. 
 Venus. Say it was money, or plate, or jewelry, 
 it would be as much ours as any body else’s.” 
 
 Mr. Venus rubs an eyebrow, interrogatively. 
 
 ‘In the cause of the right it would. Because 
 it would be unknowingly sold with the mounds 
 else, and the buyer would get what he was never 
 meant to have, and never bought. And what 
 would that be, Mr. Venus, but the cause of the 
 wrong ?” 
 
 ‘* Say it was papers,” Mr. Venus propounds. 
 
 ‘“* According to what they contained we should 
 offer to dispose of ’em to the parties most inter- 
 ested,” replies Wegg, promptly. 
 
 ‘Tn the cause of the right, Mr. Wegg ?” 
 
 ‘¢ Always so, Mr. Venus. Ifthe parties should 
 use them in the cause of the wrong, that would 
 be their act and deed. Mr, Venus. I have an 
 opinion of you, Sir, to which it is not easy to give 
 mouth... Since I called upon you that evening 
 when you were, as I may say, floating your pow- 
 erful mind in tea, I have felt that you required 
 to be roused with an object. In this friendly 
 move, Sir, you will have a glorious object to rouse 
 you.” 
 
 Mr. Wegg then goes on to enlarge upon what 
 throughout has been uppermost in his crafty 
 mind :—the qualifications of Mr. Venus for such 
 asearch. He expatiates on Mr. Venus’s patient 
 habits and delicate manipulation; on his skill in 
 piecing little things together ;‘on his knowledge 
 
 of various tissues and textures; on the likelihood 
 
 of small indications leading him on to the discov- 
 ery of great concealments. ‘*While as to my- 
 self,” says Wegg, ‘‘I am not good at it. Wheth- 
 er I gave myself up to prodding, or whether I 
 gave myself up to scooping, I couldn’t do it with 
 that delicate touch so as not to show that I was 
 disturbing the mounds. Quite different with 
 you, going to work (as you would) in the light of 
 a fellow-man, holily pledged in a friendly move 
 to his brother man.” Mr. Wegg next modestly 
 remarks on the want of adaptation in a wooden 
 leg to ladders and such like airy perches, and 
 also hints at an inherent tendency in that timber 
 fiction, when called into action for the purposes 
 of a promenade on an ashy slope, to stick itself 
 into the yielding foothold, and peg its owner to 
 one spot. Then, leaving this part of the subject, 
 he remarks on the special phenomenon that be- 
 fore his installation in the Bower, it was from 
 Mr. Venus that he first heard of the legend of 
 hidden wealth in the Mounds: ‘‘ which,” he ob- 
 serves with a vaguely pious air, ‘was surely 
 never meant for nothing.”’ Lastly, he returns 
 to the cause of the right, gloomily foreshadow- 
 ing the possibility of something being unearthed 
 to criminate Mr. Boffin (of whom he once more 
 eandidly admits it can not be denied that he 
 profits by a murder), and anticipating his de- 
 nunciation by the friendly movers to avenging 
 justice. And this, Mr. Wegg expressly points 
 out, not at all for the sake of the reward—though 
 it would be a want of principle not to take it. 
 To all this, Mr. Venus, with his shock of dusty 
 hair cocked after the manner of a terrier’s ears, 
 
140 
 attends profoundly. 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 When Mr. Wegg, having 
 
 ‘*Ts that any one I know ?” inquires the star- 
 
 finished, opens his arms wide, as if to show Mr. | ing Secretary. 
 
 Venus how bare his breast is, and then folds 
 them pending a reply, Mr. Venus winks at him 
 with both eyes some little time before speaking. 
 
 ‘“T see you have tried it by yourself, Mr. 
 Wegg,”’ he says when he does speak. ‘*You 
 have found out the difficulties by experience.” 
 
 ‘¢No, it can hardly be said that L have tried 
 it,’’ replies Wegg, a little dashed by the hint. 
 *¢] have just skimmed it. Skimmed it.” 
 
 ‘* And found nothing besides the difficulties ?” 
 
 Weegg shakes his head. 
 
 **I scarcely know what to say to this, Mr. 
 Weegg,” observes Venus, after ruminating for a 
 while. 
 
 ‘* Say yes,” Wegg naturally urges. 
 
 ‘Tf [ wasn’t soured, my answer would be no. 
 But being soured, Mr. Wegg, and driven. to 
 reckless madness and desperation, I suppose it’s 
 Yes.” 
 
 Wegg joyfully reproduces the two glasses, re- 
 peats the ceremony of clinking their rims, and 
 inwardly drinks with great heartiness to the 
 health and success in life of the young lady who 
 has reduced Mr. Venus to his present conven- 
 ient state of mind. 
 
 The articles of the friendly move are. then 
 severally recited and agreed upon. ‘They are 
 but secrecy, fidelity, and perseverance. The 
 Bower to be always free of access to Mr. Venus 
 for his researches, and every precaution to be 
 taken against their attracting observation in the 
 neighborhood. 
 
 ‘“'There’s a footstep!” exclaims Venus. 
 
 ‘* Where ?” cries Wegg, starting. 
 
 **Ontaide. St!’ 
 
 They are in the act of ratifying the treaty of 
 friendly move, by shaking hands upon it. They 
 softly break off, light their pipes which have 
 gone out, and lean back in their chairs. No 
 doubt, a footstep. It approaches the window, 
 and a hand taps at the glass. ‘*Come in!” 
 calls Wegg ; meaning come round by the door. 
 But the heavy old-fashioned sash is slowly raised, 
 and a head slowly looks in out of the dark back- 
 ground of night. 
 
 ** Pray is Mr. Silas Wegg here? 
 him !” 
 
 The friendly movers might not have been 
 quite at their ease, even though the visitor had 
 entered in the usual manner. But, leaning on 
 the breast-high window, and staring in out of 
 the darkness, they find the visitor extremely 
 embarrassing. Especially Mr. Venus: who re- 
 moves his pipe, draws back his head, and stares 
 at the starer, as if it were his own Hindoo baby 
 come to fetch him home. 
 
 ‘**Good-evening, Mr. Wegg. The yard gate- 
 lock should be looked to, if youplease ; it don’t 
 catch.” 
 
 “‘Ts it Mr. Rokesmith ?” falters Wegg. 
 
 ‘*Tt is Mr. Rokesmith. Don’t let me disturb 
 you. Jam not coming in. I have only a mes- 
 sage for you, which I undertook to deliver on 
 my way home to my lodgings. I was in two 
 minds about coming beyond the gate without 
 ringing: not knowing but you might have a 
 dog about.” 
 
 ‘¢T wish I had,” mutters Wegg, with his back 
 turned as he rose from his chair. ‘*St! Hush! 
 The talking-over stranger, Mr. Venus.” 
 
 Oh! I see 
 
 ‘*No, Mr. Rokesmith. Friend of mine. Pass-. 
 ing the evening with me.” 
 
 ‘*Oh! I beg his pardon; 
 you to know that he does not expect you to stay 
 at home any evening, on the chance of his com- 
 ing. It has oceurred to him that he may, with- 
 out intending it, have been a tie upon you. In 
 future, if he should come without notice, he will 
 take his chance of finding you, and it will be all 
 the same to him if he does not. I undertook to 
 tell you on my way. That’s all.” 
 
 With that, and ‘‘Good-night,” ¢he Secretary 
 lowers the window, and disappears. They list- 
 en, and hear his footsteps go back to the gate, 
 and hear the gate close after him. 
 
 ‘‘And for that individual, Mr. Venus,”. re- 
 marks Wegg, when he is fully gone, ‘*Z have 
 been passed over! Let me ask you what you 
 think of him ?” 
 
 Apparently, Mr. Venus does not know what 
 to think of him, for he makes sundry efforts to 
 reply, without delivering himself of any other 
 
 articulate utterance than that he has ‘‘a singu- 
 
 lar look.” 
 
 ‘*A double look, you mean, Sir,” rejoins 
 Wegg, playing bitterly upon the word. ‘‘That’s 
 his look. Any amount of singular look for me, 
 but not.a double look! That’s an underhanded 
 mind, Sir.” 
 
 ‘*Do you say there’s something against him ?” 
 Venus asks. 
 
 ‘*Something against him?” repeats Wegg. 
 ‘Something? What would the relief be to my 
 feelings—as a fellow-man—if I wasn’t the slave 
 of truth, and didn’t feel myself compelled to an- 
 swer, Every thing!” 
 
 See into what wonderful maudlin refuges 
 featherless ostriches plunge their heads! It is 
 such unspeakable moral compensation to Wegg 
 to be overcome by the consideration that Mr. 
 Rokesmith has an underhanded mind! 
 
 ‘*On this starlight night, Mr. Venus,” he re- 
 marks, when he is showing that friendly mover 
 out across the yard, and both are something the 
 worse for mixing again and again: “on this 
 starlight night to think that talking-over stran- 
 gers, and underhanded minds, can go walk- 
 ing home under the sky, as if they was all 
 square !”’ 
 
 ‘*'The spectacle of those orbs,” says Mr. Ve- 
 
 nus, gazing upward with his hat tumbling off, » 
 
 ‘*brings heavy on me her crushing words that 
 she did not wish to regard herself nor yet to be 
 regarded in that—” 
 
 ‘‘T know! Iknow! You needn’t repeat ’em,” 
 says Wegg, pressing his hand. ‘‘ But think how 
 those stars steady me in the cause of the right 
 against some that shall be nameless. It isn’t 
 that I bear malice. But see how they glisten 
 with old remembrances! Old remembrances 
 of what, Sir?” 
 
 Mr. Venus begins drearily replying, ‘‘ Of her 
 
 words, in her own handwriting, that she does _ 
 
 not wish to regard -herself, nor yet—” when 
 Silas cuts him short with dignity. 
 ‘*No, Sir! Remembrances of Our House, 
 
 of Master George, of Aunt Jane, of Uncle Park- 
 All offered up sacrifices to 
 the minion of fortune and the worm of the 
 
 er, all laid waste! 
 
 hour !” 
 
 Mr. Boffin wishes © 
 
 ‘ \ 
 
 a 
 
La 
 
 ae ti 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 IN WHICH AN INNOCENT ELOPEMENT OCCURS. 
 
 THE minion of fortune and the worm of the 
 hour, or in less cutting language, Nicodemus-- 
 Boffin, Esquire, the Golden Dustman, had be- 
 come as much at home in his eminently aristo= 
 cratic family mansion as he was likely ever to 
 be. He could not but feel that, like an em- 
 inently aristocratic family cheese, it was much 
 too large for his wants, and bred an infinite 
 amount of parasites; but he was content to re- 
 gard this drawback on his property as a sort 
 of perpetual Legacy Duty. He felt the more 
 resigned to it, forasmuch as Mrs. Boffin enjoy- 
 ed herself completely, and Miss Bella was. de- 
 lighted. 
 
 That young lady was, no doubt, an acquisition 
 to the Boflins. She was far too pretty to be un- 
 attractive any where, and far too quick of per- 
 ception to be below the tone of her new career. 
 Whether it improved her heart might be a mat- 
 ter of taste that was open to question; but as 
 touching another matter of taste, its improve- 
 ment of her appearance and manner, there could 
 be no question whatever. 
 
 And thus it soon came abont that Miss Bella 
 began to set Mrs. Boffin right; and even fur- 
 ther, that Miss Bella began to feel ill at ease, 
 and as it were responsible, when she saw Mrs. 
 Boffin going wrong. Not that so sweet a dispo- 
 sition and so sound a nature could ever go very 
 wrong even among the great visiting authorities 
 who agreed that the Boffins were ‘charmingly 
 vulgar” (which for certain was not their own 
 case in saying so), but that when she made aslip 
 on the social ice on which all the children of 
 Podsnappery, with genteel souls to be saved, are 
 required to skate in circles, or to slide in long 
 rows, she inevitably tripped Miss Bella up (so 
 that young lady felt), and caused her to experi- 
 ence great confusion under the glances of the 
 
 -more skillful performers engaged in those ice- 
 
 exercises. 
 
 At Miss Bella’s time of life it was not to be 
 expected that she should examine herself very 
 closely on the congruity or stability of her posi- 
 tion in Mr. Boffin’s house. And as she had 
 never. been sparing of complaints of her old 
 home when she had no other to compare it 
 With, so there was no novelty of ingratitude or 
 disdain in her very much preferring her new 
 one. 
 
 _ **An invaluable man is Rokesmith,” said Mr. 
 Boffin, after some two or three months. ‘But 
 IT can’t quite make him out.” 
 
 Neither could Bella, so she found the subject 
 rather interesting. 
 
 *‘ He takes more care of my affairs, morning, 
 noon, and night,” said Mr. Boffin, *‘ than fifty 
 other men put together either could or would; 
 and yet he has ways of his own that are like ty- 
 ing a scaffolding pole right across the road, and 
 bringing me up short when I am almost a-walk- 
 ing arm in arm with him.” 
 
 ‘“‘May I ask how so, Sir?” inquired Bella. 
 
 “Well, my dear,” said Mr. Boffin, “‘he won't. 
 meet any company here but you. When we 
 have visitors, I should wish him to have his reg- 
 
 ular place at the table like ourselves; but no, he 
 
 won’t take it.” 
 
 “If he considers himself above it,” said Miss 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 141 
 
 Bella, with an airy toss of her head, “I should 
 leave him alone.” 
 
 “It ain't that, my dear,” replied Mr. Boffin, 
 thinking it over. ‘*He don’t consider himself 
 above it.” 
 
 ‘*Perhaps he considers himself ‘beneath 
 suggested Bella. 
 best.” 
 
 ‘‘No, my dear; nor it ain’t that, neither. 
 No,” repeated Mr. Boffin, with a shake-of his 
 head, after again thinking it over: ‘‘ Rokesmith’s 
 a modest man, but he don’t consider himself be- 
 neath it.” 
 
 ‘Then what does he consider it, Sir?” asked 
 Bella. 
 
 ‘* Dashed if I know!” said Mr. Boffin. ‘It 
 seemed at first as if it was only Lightwood that 
 he objected to meet. And now it seems to be 
 every body, except you.” 
 
 **Oho!” thought Miss Bella. ‘‘In—deed! 
 That's it, is it!” For Mr. Mortimer Lightwood 
 had dined there two or three times, and she had 
 met him elsewhere, and he had shown her sume 
 attention. “Rather cool in a Secretary—and 
 Pa’s lodger—to make me the subject of his jeal- 
 ousy !” 
 
 That Pa’s daughter should be so contemptu- 
 ous of Pa’s lodger was odd; but there were odder 
 anomalies than that in the mind of the spoilt 
 girl: the doubly spoilt girl: spoilt first by pov- 
 erty, and then by wealth. Be it this history's 
 part, however, to leave them to unravel them- 
 selves. 
 
 ‘*A little too much, I think,” Miss Bella re- 
 flected scornfully, ‘to have Pa’s lodger laying 
 claim to me, and keeping eligible people off! A 
 little too much, indeed, to have the oppoftunities 
 opened to me by Mr. and Mrs. Boffin appropri- 
 ated by a mere Secretary and Pa’s lodger !” 
 
 Yet it was not so very long ago that Bella had 
 been fluttered by the discovery that this same 
 Secretary and lodger seemed to like her. Ah! 
 but the eminently aristocratic mansion and Mrs. 
 Boffin’s dress-maker had not come into play then. 
 
 In spite of his seemingly retiring manners a 
 very intrusive person, this Secretary and lodger, 
 in Miss Bella’s opinion. Always a light in his 
 oflice-room when we came home from the play 
 or Opera, and he always at the carriage-door to 
 hand us out... Always a provoking radiance too 
 on Mrs. Boffin’s face, and an abominably cheer- 
 ful reception of him,.as if it were possible seri- 
 ously to approve what the man had in his mind! 
 
 “* You never charge me, Miss Wilfer,”’ said the 
 Secretary, encountering her by chance alone in 
 the great drawing-room, ‘‘ with commissions for 
 home. I shall always be happy to execute any 
 commands you may have in that direction.” 
 
 ‘* Pray what may you mean, Mr. Rokesmith ?” 
 inquired Miss Bella, with languidly drooping eye- 
 lids. 
 
 ‘*By home? I mean your father’s house at 
 Holloway.” 
 
 She colored under the retort—so skillfully 
 thrust, that the words seemed to be merely a 
 plain answer, given in plain good faith —and 
 said, rather more emphatically and sharply: 
 
 ‘* What commissions and commands are you 
 speaking of ?” 
 
 **Only such little words of remembrance as I 
 assume you send somehow or other,” replied the 
 Secretary with his former air. ‘It would bea 
 
 idee 
 ‘If so, he ought to know 
 
4 
 
 ——— a 
 sxe 
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 Lz 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 raw, 
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 142 
 
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 Ya 
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 PA’S LODGER, AND PA'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 =| 
 
 : 
 
 let me add that perhaps they 
 
 think I report them to you, deliver little mes- 
 
 digressed from, 
 
 ”? 
 
 But I forbear to trouble 
 
 and the like. 
 as vou never ask me. 
 
 you, 
 
 im 
 
 Sir,” said Bella, looking at h 
 
 as if he had reproved her, ‘‘ to see them to-mor- | 
 ‘«Ts that,” he asked, hesitating, ‘‘said to me, 
 
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 know, I come and go between } pardon, Mr. Rokesm 
 
 if you would make me the bearer 
 
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 “Fe a 
 
 she felt that she had been | not help say 
 
 She was too quick in this petulant sally aga 
 
 *€ Pa’s lodger ;” and 
 
 “ 
 
 ‘ance to me,” said | sages, 
 
 at was your ex- 
 
 so when she met his quiet look. 
 ‘“They don’t send many—wh 
 pression ?—words of rememb1 
 
 Bella, making haste to take refuge in ill usage. 
 
 3 
 3 
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 Pa 
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 quentiv ask me about you 
 ch slight intelligence as I can. 
 
 sa 
 ‘“‘T hope it’s truly given, 
 
 give them 
 ‘‘T hope you can not doubt it, for it would be 
 
 very much against you, if you could.” 
 
 ““No, I do not doubt it. 
 
 ‘They frec 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 6¢To both? Shall I make it a message?” . 
 
 ‘¢You can if you like, Mr. Rokesmith. Mes- 
 .gage or no message, I am going to see them to- 
 morrow.” 
 
 ‘¢Then I will tell them so.” 
 
 He lingered a moment, as though to give her 
 the opportunity of prolonging the conversation 
 if she wished. As she remained silent, he left 
 her. ‘Two incidents of the little interview were 
 felt by Miss Bella herself, when alone again, to 
 be very curious, The first was, that he unques- 
 tionably left her with a penitent air upon her, 
 and a penitent feeling in her heart. The second 
 was, that she had not had an intention or a 
 thought of going home until she had announced 
 it to him as a settled design. 
 
 «¢ What can I mean by it, or what can he mean 
 by it?’? was her mental inquiry: ‘‘He has no 
 right to any power over me, and how do I come 
 to mind him when I don’t care for him ?” 
 
 Mrs. Boffin, insisting that Bella should make 
 to-morrow’s expedition in the chariot, she went 
 home in great grandeur. Mrs. Wilfer and Miss 
 Lavinia had speculated much on the probabili- 
 ties and improbabilities of her coming in this 
 gorgeous state, and, on beholding the chariot 
 from the window at which they were secreted to 
 look out for it, agreed that it must be detained 
 at the door as long as possible, for the-mortifica- 
 tion and confusion of the neighbors. Then they 
 repaired to the usual family room, to receive 
 Miss Bella with a becoming show of indiffer- 
 ence. 
 
 ~The family room looked very small and very 
 mean, and the downward staircase by which it 
 wasattained looked very narrowand very crooked. 
 The little house and all its arrangements were a 
 poor contrast to the eminently aristocratic dwell- 
 ing. ‘I can hardly believe,” thought Bella, 
 “that I ever did endure life in this place!” 
 
 Gloomy majesty on the part of Mrs. Wilfer, 
 and native pertness on the part of Lavvy, did 
 not mend the matter. Bella really stood in nat- 
 ural need of a little help, and she got none. 
 
 ‘‘This,” said Mrs. Wilfer, presenting a cheek 
 to be kissed, as sympathetic and responsive as 
 the back of the bowl of a spoon, ‘‘is quite an 
 honor! You will probably find your sister Lay- 
 vy grown, Bella.” 
 
 “¢ Ma,” Miss Lavinia interposed, ‘‘there can be 
 no objection to your being aggravating, because 
 Bella richly deserves it; but I really must request 
 that you will not drag in such ridiculous non- 
 ‘ sense as my having grown when I am past the 
 growing age.” 
 
 “‘T grew myself,” Mrs. Wilfer sternly pro- 
 claimed, ‘‘after I was married.” 
 
 “Very well, Ma,” returned Lavvy, “then I 
 think you had much better have left it alone.” 
 The lofty glare with which the majestic wo- 
 man received this answer might have embar- 
 rassed a less pert opponent, but it had no effect 
 upon Lavinia: who, leaving her parent to the 
 enjoyment of any amount of glaring that she 
 might deem desirable under the circumstances, 
 accosted her sister, undismayed. : 
 
 ‘<I suppose you won’t consider yourself quite 
 disgraced, Bella, if I give you a kiss? Well! 
 _And how do you do, Bella? And how are your 
 - Boffins ?” 
 
 _ ** Peace!” exclaimed Mrs. Wilfer. ‘‘ Hold! 
 I will not suffer this tone of levity.” 
 
 143 
 
 ‘*My goodness me! How are your Spoffins, 
 then?” said Lavvy, ‘‘since Ma so very much 
 
 objects to your Boffins.”’ 
 
 ‘‘Impertinent, girl! Minx!” said Mrs. Wil- 
 fer, with dread severity. 
 
 “I don’t care whether I am a Minx or a 
 Sphinx,”’ returned Lavinia, coolly, tossing her 
 head; ‘‘it’s exactly the same thing to me, and 
 I'd every bit as soon be one as the other; but I 
 know this—I’ll not grow after I am married !” 
 
 ‘You will not? You will not?” repeated 
 Mrs. Wilfer, solemnly. 
 
 ‘“No, Ma, I will not. Nothing shall induce 
 me;;’ 
 
 Mrs. Wilfer, having waved her gloves, be- 
 came loftily pathetic. ‘‘But it was to be ex- 
 pected ;” thus she spake. ‘‘ A child of mine de- 
 serts me for the proud and prosperous, and an- 
 other child of mime despises me. It is quite 
 fitting.” 
 
 ‘“‘ Ma,” Bella struck in, ‘‘Mr. and Mrs. Boffin 
 are prosperous, no doubt; but you have no right 
 to say they are proud. You must know very 
 well that they are not.”’ 
 
 ‘¢In short, Ma,” said Lavvy, bouncing over to 
 the enemy without a word of notice, ‘* you must 
 know very well—or if you don’t, more shame for 
 you!—that Mr. and Mrs. Boffin are just.abso- 
 lute perfection.” 
 
 “Pruly;” returned Mrs. Wilfer, courteously 
 receiving the deserter, ‘‘it would seem that we 
 are required to think so. And this, Lavinia, is 
 my reason for objecting to a tone of levity. Mrs. 
 Boftin (of whose physiognomy I can never speak 
 with the composure I would desire to preserve) 
 and your mother are not on terms of intimacy. 
 It is not for a moment to be supposed that she 
 and her husband dare to presume to speak of 
 this family as the Wilfers. I can not therefore 
 
 ‘condescend to speak of them as the Boffins. 
 
 No; for such a tone—call it familiarity, levity, 
 equality, or what you will—would imply those 
 social interchanges which do not exist. Do I 
 render myself intelligible ?” 
 
 Without taking the least notice of this inquiry, 
 albeit delivered in an imposing and forensic 
 manner, Lavinia reminded her sister, ‘* After 
 all, you know, Bella, you haven’t told us how 
 your Whatshisnames are.” 
 
 “TI don’t want to speak of them here,” replied 
 Bella, suppressing indignation, and tapping her 
 foot on the floor. ‘‘They are much too kind 
 and too good to be drawn into these discus- 
 sions.” 
 
 ‘‘Why put it so?” demanded Mrs. Wilfer, 
 with biting sarcasm. ‘* Why adopt a circuitous 
 form of speech? It is polite and it is obliging ; 
 but why do it? Why not openly say that they 
 are much too kind and too good for ws? We 
 understand the allusion. Why disguise the 
 phrase ?”’ 
 
 ‘¢Ma,” said Bella, with one beat of her foot, 
 ‘¢vou are enough to drive a saint mad, and so is 
 Lavvy.” 
 
 “Unfortunate Lavvy!” 
 a tone of commiseration. ‘‘She always comes 
 in for it. My poor child!” But Lavvy, with 
 the snddenness of her former desertion, now 
 bounced over to the other enemy: very sharply 
 
 cried Mrs. Wilfer a 
 
 remarking, ‘‘ Don’t patronize meyMa,beeause I 
 
 can take care of myself.” 
 ‘‘T only wonder,” resumed Mrs. Wilfer, di-~ 
 
144 
 
 recting her observations to her elder daughter, 
 as safer on the whole than her utterly unman- 
 ageable younger, ‘‘that you found time and in- 
 clination to tear yourself from Mr. and Mrs. 
 Boffin, and come to see us at all. I only wonder 
 that our claims, contending against the superior 
 claims of Mr. and Mrs. Boftin, had any weight. 
 I feel [ ought to be thankful for gaining so much 
 in competition with Mr, amd Mrs. Boffin.” (The 
 good lady bitterly emphasized the first letter of 
 the word Boffin, as if it represented her chief 
 objection to the owners of that name, and as if 
 she could have borne Doffin, Moffin, or Poffin 
 much better.) 
 
 ‘¢Ma,”’ said Bella, angrily, ‘‘ you force me to 
 say that I am truly sorry I did come home, and 
 that I never will come home again, except when 
 poor dear Pais here. For, Pa is too magnani- 
 mous to feel envy and spite toward my generous 
 friends. and Pa is delicate enough and gentle 
 enough to remember the sort of little claim they 
 thought I had upon them, and the unusually try- 
 ing position in which, through no act of my own, 
 I had been placed. And I always did love poor 
 dear Pa better than all the rest of you put to- 
 gether, and I always do and I always shall!” 
 
 Here Bella, deriving no comfort from her 
 charming bonnet and her elegant dress, burst 
 into tears. 
 
 “*T think, R. W.,” cried Mrs. Wilfer, lifting 
 up her eyes and apostrophizing the air, ‘‘that if 
 you were present, it would be a trial to your feel- 
 ings to hear your wife and the mother of your 
 family depreciated in your name. But Fate has 
 spared you this, R. W., whatever it may have 
 thought proper to inflict upon her!” 
 
 Here Mrs. Wilfer burst into tears. 
 
 ‘*T hate the Boffins!” protested Miss Lavinia. 
 “T don’t care who objects to their being called 
 the Boffins.” I wit call ’em the Boffins. The 
 Boffins, the Boffins, the Boffins! And I say 
 they are mischief-making Boflins, and I say the 
 Bofttins have set Bella against me, and I tell the 
 Boffins to their faces:” which was not strictly 
 the fact, but the young lady was excited; ‘‘ that 
 they are detestable Boffins, disreputable Boffins, 
 odious Bofiins, beastly Boffins. There!” 
 
 Here Miss Lavinia burst into tears. 
 
 The front garden-gate clanked, and the Secre- 
 tary was seen coming at a brisk pace up the 
 steps. ‘‘Leave Me to onen the door to him,” 
 said Mrs. Wilfer, rising with stately resignation 
 as she shook her head and dried her eyes; ‘‘we 
 have at present no stipendiary girl to do so. 
 We have nothing to conceal. If he sees these 
 traces of emotion on our cheeks, let him construe 
 them as he may.” 
 
 With those words she stalked out. In a few 
 moments she stalked in again, proclaiming in 
 her heraldic manner, ‘‘Mr. Rokesmith is the 
 bearer of a packet for Migs Bella Wilfer.” 
 
 Mr. Rokesmith followed close upon his name, 
 and of course saw what was amiss. But he dis- 
 creetly affected to see nothing, and addressed 
 Miss Bella. 
 
 ‘‘Mr. Boffin intended to have placed this in 
 the carriage for you this morning. He wished 
 you to have it, as a little keepsake he had pre- 
 pared—it is only a purse, Miss Wilfer—but as 
 he was disappointed in his fancy, I volunteered 
 to come after you with it.” 
 
 Bella took it in her hand, and thanked him. 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 ‘We have been quarreling here a little, Mr. 
 
 Rokesmith, but not more than we used; you. 
 
 know our agreeable ways among ourselves. You 
 find me just going. Good-by, mamma. Good- 
 by, Lavvy !” 
 Bella turned to the door, The Secretary would 
 have attended her, but Mrs. Wilfer advancing 
 and saying with dignity, ‘‘Pardon me! Per- 
 mit me to assert my natural right to escort my 
 child to the equipage which is in waiting for 
 her,” he begged pardon and gaye place. It-was 
 a very magnificent spectacle indeed, to see“Mrs. 
 Wilfer throw open the house-door, and loudly 
 demand with extended gloves, ‘‘The male do- 
 mestic of Mrs. Boffin!” ‘To whom presenting 
 himself, she delivered the brief but majestic 
 charge, ‘‘ Miss Wilfer. Coming out!” and so 
 delivered her over, like a female Lieutenant of 
 the Tower relinquishing a State Prisoner. The 
 effect of this ceremonial was for some quarter 
 of an hour afterward perfectly paralyzing on the 
 neighbors, and was much enhanced by the wor- 
 thy lady airing herself for that term in a kind 
 of splendidly serene trance on the top: step. 
 
 When Bella was seated in the carriage, she 
 opened the little packet in her hand. It con- 
 tained a pretty purse, and the purse contained 
 a bank-note for fifty pounds. ‘‘This shall be 
 a joyful surprise for poor dear Pa,” said Bella, 
 ‘*and I'll take it myself into the City !” 
 
 As she was uninformed respecting the exact 
 
 locality of the place of business of Chicksey Ve- _ 
 
 neering and Stobbles, but knew it to be near 
 Mincing Lane, she directed herself to be driven 
 to the corner of that darksome spot. Thence 
 she dispatched ‘‘ the male domestic of Mrs. Bof- 
 fin” in search of the counting-honse of Chicksey 
 Veneering and Stobbles, with a message import- 
 ing that if R. Wilfer could come out, there was 
 a lady waiting who would be glad to speak with 
 him. ‘The delivery of these mysterious words 
 from the mouth of a footman caused so great 
 an excitement in the counting-house that a 
 youthful scout was instantly appointed to fol- 
 low Rumty, observe the lady, and come in with 
 his report. Nor was the agitation by any means 
 diminished when the scout rushed back with the 
 intelligence that the lady was ‘‘a slap-up gal in 
 a bang-up chariot.” 
 
 Rumty himself, with his pen behind his ear 
 under his rusty hat, arrived at the carriage-door 
 in a breathless condition, and had been fairly 
 lugged into the vehicle by his cravat and em- 
 braced almost unto choking, before he recog- 
 nized his daughter. ‘* My dear child!” he then 
 panted, incoherently. ‘*Good gracious me! 
 What a lovely woman you are! I thought you 
 had been unkind, and forgotten your mother and 
 sister.” 
 
 ‘*] have just been to see them, Pa dear.” 
 
 **Oh! and how—how did you'find your mo- 
 ther?” asked R. W., dubiously. 
 
 ‘¢ Very disagreeable, Pa, and so was Lavvy.” 
 
 “They are sometimes a little liable to it,” 
 observed the patient cherub; ‘‘ but I hope you 
 made allowances, Bella, my dear?’ 
 
 ‘“‘No. I was disagreeable too, Pa; we were 
 all of us disagreeable together. But I want you 
 to come and dine with me somewhere, Pa.” 
 
 ‘* Why, my dear, I have already partaken of 
 a—if one might mention such an article in this 
 
 superb chariot—of a—Saveloy,” replied R. Wil- a 
 
 And with a kiss for each Miss °° 
 
 ~ 
 
were wet), and he bobbed away again. 
 
 formed, that 
 him in ecstatic admiration twenty times, before 
 
 Nuts 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 fer, modestly dropping his voice on the word, as 
 he eyed the canary-colored fittings. - 
 
 Oh! That’s nothing, Pa.” 
 
 “Truly, it ain’t as much as one could some- 
 times wish it to be, my dear,” he admitted, 
 drawing his hand across his mouth. ‘‘ Still, 
 when circumstances over which yot have no 
 control interpose obstacles between yourself and 
 Small Germans, you can’t do better than bring 
 a contented mind to bear on”—again dropping 
 his voice in deference to the chariot—‘‘ Save- 
 
 . loys!” 
 
 **You poor good Pa! Pa do, I beg and pray, 
 get leave for the rest of the day, and come and 
 pass it with me!” 
 
 ‘Well, my dear, I'll cut back and ask for 
 leave.” 
 
 “‘But before you cut back,” said Bella, who 
 had already taken him by the chin, pulled his 
 hat otf, and begun to stick up his hair in her old 
 way, ‘‘do say that you are sure I am giddy and 
 -reaoarai but have never really slighted you, 
 
 ae? , ; 
 **My dear, I say it with all my heart. And 
 might I likewise observe;” her father delicately 
 
 hinted, with a glance out at window, ‘‘ that per- 
 
 haps it might be calculated to attract attention, 
 having one’s hair publicly done by a lovely wo- 
 man in an elegant turn-out in Fenchurch Street?” 
 
 Bella laughed and put on his hat again. But 
 when his boyish figure bobbed away, its shabbi- 
 ness and cheerful patience smote the tears out 
 of her eyes. ‘‘I hate that Secretary for think- 
 ing it of me,” she said to herself, ‘‘ and yet it 
 seems half true!” 
 
 Back came her father, more like a boy than 
 ever, in his release from school. “ All right, 
 my dear. Leave given at once. Really very 
 handsomely done!” 
 
 ‘‘ Now where can we find some quiet place, 
 Pa, in which I can wait for you while you go 
 on an errand for me, if send the carriage away?” 
 
 It demanded cogitation. ‘*Yousee, my dear,” 
 he explained, ‘‘you really have become such a 
 very lovely woman, that it ought to be a very 
 quiet place.” At length he suggested, ‘‘ Near 
 the garden up by the Trinity House on Tower 
 Hill.” So they were driven there, and Bella 
 
 dismissed the chariot; sending a penciled note 
 
 by it to Mrs. Boffin, that she was with her fa- 
 ther. 
 
 “‘Now, Pa, attend to what I am. going to say, 
 and promise and vow to be obedient.” 
 
 **T promise and vow, my dear.” 
 
 *¢You ask no questions. You take this purse; 
 you go to the nearest place where they keep.ev- 
 ery thing of the very very best, ready-made ; you 
 buy and put on the most beautiful suit of clothes, 
 the most beautiful hat, and the most beautiful pair 
 of bright boots (patent leather, Pa, mind!) that 
 are to be got for money; and you come back.to 
 me.” 
 
 “But, my dear Bella—” 
 
 “Take care, Pa!” pointing her forefinger at 
 him, merrily. ‘‘ You have promised and vowed. 
 It’s perjury, you know.” 
 
 There was water in the foolish little fellow’s 
 eyes, but she kissed them dry (though her own 
 After 
 half an hour he came back, so brilliantly trans- 
 ella was obliged to walk round 
 
 A 
 
 aa bn 
 * 
 
 : v F . 4 : 
 
 145 
 
 she could draw her arm through his, and de- 
 lightedly squeeze it. 
 
 ‘‘Now, Pa,” said Bella, hugging him close, 
 ‘¢take this lovely woman out to dinner.” 
 
 ‘¢'Where shall we go, my dear ?” 
 
 ‘*Greenwich!” said Bella, valiantly.’ ‘* And 
 be sure.you treat this lovely woman with every 
 thing of the best.” 
 
 While they were going along to take boat, 
 ‘*Don’t you wish, my dear,” said R. W., tim- 
 idly, ‘* that your mother was here ?” 
 
 **No, I don’t, Pa, for I like to have you all to © 
 myself to-day. I was always your little favorite 
 at home, and you were always mine. -We have 
 run away together often, before now; haven't 
 we, Pa?” 
 
 ‘* Ah, to be sure we have! Many a Sunday 
 when your mother was-—was a little liable to it,” 
 repeating his former delicate expression after 
 pausing to cough. 
 
 ‘‘Yes, and I am afraid I was seldom or never 
 as good as I ought to have been, Pa. I made 
 you carry me, over-and over again, when you 
 should have made me walk; and I often drove 
 you in harness, when you would much rather 
 have sat down and read your newspaper: 
 didn’t 1?” 
 
 ‘‘Sometimes, sometimes. But Lor, what a 
 child you were! What a companion you were !” 
 
 ‘“‘Companion? ‘That’s just what I want to be 
 to-day, Pa.” . 
 
 ‘‘You are safe to succeed, my love. Your 
 brothers and sisters have all in their turns-been 
 companions to me, to a.certain.extent,.but.only 
 to a certain extent. Your mother has, through- 
 out life, been a companion that any man might 
 —might look up to—and—and commit the say- 
 ings of, to memory—and—form himself upon— 
 if he—” 
 
 ‘‘Tf he liked the model ?” suggested Bella. 
 
 ‘¢ We-ell, ye-es,”’ he returned, thinking about 
 it, not quite satisfied with the phrase: ‘or per- 
 haps I might say, if it was in him. Supposing, 
 for instance, that'a man wanted to be always 
 marching, he would find your mother an ines- 
 timable companion. But if he had any taste 
 for walking, or should wish at any time to break 
 into a trot, he might sometimes find it a little 
 difficult to keep step with your mother. Or 
 take it this way, Bella,” he added, after a mo- 
 ment’s reflection: ‘‘Supposing that a man had 
 to go through life, we won’t say with a compan- 
 ion, but we'llsay toa tune. Very good. Sup- 
 posing that the tune allotted to him was the 
 Dead March in Saul. Well. It would be a 
 very suitable tune for particular occasions— 
 none better—but it would be difficult to keep 
 time with in the ordinary run of domestic trans- 
 actions. For instance, if he took his supper 
 after a hard day to the Dead March in Saul, 
 his food might be likely to sit heavy on him. 
 Or, if he was at any time inclined to relieve his 
 mind by singing a comic song or dancing a horn- 
 pipe, and was obliged to do it to the Dead March 
 in Saul, he might find himself put out in the ex- 
 ecution of his lively intentions.” 
 
 “Poor Pa!” thought Bella, as she hung upon 
 his arm. 
 
 ‘é Now, what I will say for you, my dear,” the 
 cherub pursued mildly and without a notion of 
 complaining, “is, that you are so adaptable. 
 So adaptable.” 
 
146._ 
 
 “Indeed I am afraid I have shown a wretched 
 temper, Pa. Iam afraid I have been very com- 
 plaining, and very capricious. Iseldom or never 
 thought of it before. But when I sat in the car- 
 rlage just now and saw you coming along the 
 pavement, I reproached myself.” 
 
 ‘¢ Not at all, my dear. Don't speak of such 
 a thing.” 
 
 A happy and a chatty man was Pa in his new 
 clothes that day. ‘Take it for all in all, it was 
 perhaps the happiest day he had ever known in. 
 his life; not even excepting that on which his 
 heroic partner had approached the nuptial altar 
 to the tune of the Dead March in Saul. 
 
 The little expedition down the river was de- 
 lightful, and the little room overlooking the 
 river into which they were shown for dinner 
 was delightful. Every thing was delightful. 
 The park was delightful, the punch was delight- 
 ful, the dishes of fish were delightful, the wine 
 was delightful. Bella was more delightful than 
 any other item in the festival; drawing Pa out 
 in the gayest manner; making a point of al- 
 ways mentioning herself as the lovely woman; 
 stimulating Pa to order thmgs, by declaring 
 that the lovely woman insisted on being treated 
 with them; and in short causing Pa to be quite 
 enraptured with the consideration that he was 
 the Pa of such a charming daughter. 
 
 And then, as they sat looking at the ships 
 and steamboats making their way to the sea 
 with the tide that was running down, the lovely 
 woman imagined all sorts of voyages for herself 
 and Pa. Now, Pa, in the character of owner 
 of a lumbering square-sailed collier, was tacking 
 away to Newcastle, to fetch black diamonds to 
 make his fortune with; now, Pa was going to 
 China in that handsome three-masted ship, to 
 bring home opium, with which he would forever 
 cut out Chicksey Veneering and Stobbles, and 
 to bring home silks and shawls without end for 
 the decoration of his charming daughter. Now, 
 John Harmon’s disastrous fate was all a dream, 
 and he had come home and found the lovely wo- 
 man just the article for him, and the lovely wo- 
 man had found him just the article for her, and 
 they were going away on a trip, in their gallant 
 bark, to look after their vines, with streamers 
 flying at all points, a band playing on deck, and 
 Pa established in the great cabin. Now, John 
 Harmon was consigned to his grave again, and 
 a merchant of immense wealth (name unknown) 
 had courted and married the lovely woman, and 
 he was so enormously rich that every thing you 
 saw upon the river sailing or steaming belonged 
 to him, and he kept a perfect fleet of yachts for 
 pleasure, and that little impudent yacht which 
 you saw over there, with the great white sail, 
 was called Zhe Bella, in honor of his wife, and 
 she held her state aboard when it pleased her, 
 like a modern Cleopatra. Anon, there would 
 embark in that troop-ship when she got to 
 Gravesend, a mighty general, of large property 
 (name also unknown), who wouldn’t hear of 
 going to victory without his wife, and whose 
 wife was the lovely woman, and she was des- 
 tined to become the idol of all the red coats and 
 blue jackets alow and aloft. And then again: 
 you saw that ship being towed out by a steam- 
 tug? Well! where did you suppose she was 
 going to? Shewas going among the coral reefs 
 and cocoa-nuts and all that sort of thing, and 
 
 she was chartered for a fortunate individual of. e | 
 
 the name of Pa (himself on board, and much 
 respected by all hands), and she was going, for 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND, | Clg 
 
 his sole profit and advantage, to fetch a cargo 
 
 of sweet-smelling woods, the most beautiful that 
 
 ever were seen, and the most. profitable that 
 never were heard of, and her cargo would be a 
 great fortune, as indeed it ought to be: the love- 
 ly woman who had purchased her and fitted her 
 
 expressly for this voyage being married to, an 
 
 Indian Prince, who was a Something-or-Other, 
 and who wore Cashmere shawls. all over him- 
 self, and diamonds and emeralds blazing in his 
 turban, and was beautifully coffee-colored and 
 excessively devoted, though a little too jealous. 
 Thus Bella ran on merrily, in a manner perfect- 
 ly enchanting to Pa, who was as willing to put 
 his head into the Sultan’s tub of water as the 
 beggar-boys below the window were to put their 
 heads in thé mud. 
 
 *“T suppose, my dear,” said Pa after dinner, 
 ‘““we may come to the conclusion at home that 
 we have lost you for good ?” ’ 
 
 Bella shook her head. Didn’t know. Couldn’t 
 say. All she was ablé to report was, that she 
 was most handsomely supplied with every thing 
 she could possibly want, and that whenever she 
 hinted at leaving Mr. and Mrs. Boffin, they 
 wouldn’t hear of it. 
 ~ “ And now, Pa,” pursued Bella, ‘‘I’ll make 
 a confession to you. J am the most mercenary 
 little wretch that ever-lived in the world.” 
 
 ‘**T should hardly have thought it of you, my 
 
 dear,” returned her father, first glancing at him- 
 
 self, and then at the dessert. 
 
 “ T understand what you mean, Pa, but it’s not 
 that. 
 money, but I do care so much for what it will 
 buy !” 
 
 “¢ Really I think most of us do,” returned R.W. 
 
 **But not to the dreadful extent that I do, 
 Pa. O-o!” cried Bella, screwing the exclama- 
 tion out of herself with a twist of her dimpled 
 chin. ‘‘I AM so mercenary !” 
 
 With a wistful glance R. W. said, in default 
 of having any thing better to say: ‘‘ About when 
 did you begin to feel it coming on, my dear ?” 
 
 ‘‘'That’s it, Pa. That’s the terrible part of it. 
 When I was at home, and only knew what it was 
 to be poor, I grumbled, but didn’t so much mind. 
 When 1 was at home expecting to be rich, I 
 
 thought vaguely of all the great things I would > 
 But when I had been disappointed of my — 
 
 do. 
 splendid fortune, and came to see it from day to 
 day in other hands, and to hgave before my eyes 
 what it could really do, then I became the mer- 
 cenary little wretch I am.” 
 
 ‘*Tt’s your fancy, my dear.” 
 
 “‘T can assure you it’s nothing of the sort, 
 Pa!” said Bella, nodding at him, with her very 
 
 ~ 
 
 pretty eyebrows raised as high as they would go,. 
 
 and looking comically frightened. ‘‘ It’s a fact. 
 I am always avariciously scheming.” 
 
 “Lor! But how?” 
 
 “T’ll tell you, Pa. I don’t mind telling you, 
 because we have always been favorites of each 
 other’s, and because you are not like a Pa, but 
 more like a sort of a younger brother with a dear 
 venerable chubbiness on him, And _ besides,” 
 
 added Bella, laughing as she pointed a rallying 
 finger at his face, ‘‘ because I have got you in — 
 
 my power. This is a secret expedition. Ifever 
 
 Fil 
 
 It’s not that I care for money to keep as __ 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 you tell of me, I'll tell of you. I'll tell Ma that , 
 
 ou dined at Greenwich.” 
 
 ‘¢Well; seriously, my dear,” observed R. W., 
 with some trepidation of manner, ‘‘it might be 
 as well not to mention it.” 
 
 Aha!” laughed Bella. ‘‘I knew you 
 wouldn’t like it, Sir! So you keep my confi- 
 dence, and Ill keep yours. But betray the love- 
 ly woman, and you shall find her a serpent. 
 Now, you may give mea kiss, Pa, and I should 
 like to give your hair a turn, because it has been 
 dreadfully neglected in my absence.” 
 
 Rk. W. submitted his head to the operator, and 
 the operator went on talking; at the same time 
 putting separate locks of his hair through a cu- 
 rious process of being smartly rolled over her two 
 revolving forefingers, which were then suddenly 
 pulled out of it in opposite lateral directions. 
 On each of these occasions the patient winced 
 and winked. 
 
 ‘*] have made up my mind that I must have 
 
 money, Pa. I feel that I can’t beg it, borrow 
 it, or steal it; and so I have resolved that I 
 must marry it.” 
 _ RR. W. cast up his eyes toward her, as well as 
 he could under the operating circumstances, and 
 said in a tone of remonstrance, ‘‘ My de-ar 
 Bella!” 
 
 ** Have resolved, I say, Pa, that to get money 
 I must marry money. In consequence of which, 
 I am always looking out for money to captivate.” 
 
 ** My de-a-r Bella!” 
 
 “*Yes, Pa, that is. the state of the case. If 
 ever there was a mercenary plotter whose 
 thoughts and designs were always in her mean 
 occupation, I am the amiable creature. But I 
 don’t care. I hate and detest being poor, and I 
 won't be poor if I can marry money. Now you 
 are deliciously fluffy, Pa, and in a state to aston- 
 ish the waiter and pay the bill.” 
 
 ‘** But, my dear Bella, this is quite alarming at 
 your age.” 
 
 - **T told you so, Pa, but you wouldn’t believe 
 it,” returned Bella, with a pleasant childish 
 gravity. ‘‘Isn’t it shocking ?” 
 
 **Tt would be quite so, if you fully knew what 
 you said, my dear, or meant it.” 
 
 “Well, Pa, I can only tell you that I mean 
 nothing else. ‘Talk to me of love!” said Bella, 
 contemptuously: though her face and figure cer- 
 tainly rendered the subject no incongruous one. 
 ** Talk to me of fiery dragons! But talk to me 
 of poverty and wealth, and there indeed we 
 touch upon realities.” 
 
 **My De-ar, tllis is becoming Awful—” her 
 father was emphatically beginning: when she 
 stopped him. 
 
 ‘*Pa, tell me. Did you marry money ?” 
 
 # ‘You know I didn’t, my dear,” 
 
 Bella hummed the Dead March in Saul, and 
 said, after all it signified very little! But see- 
 ing him look grave and downcast, she took him 
 round the neck and kissed him back to cheer- 
 fulness again. | 
 
 **T didn’t mean that last touch, Pa; it was 
 only said in joke. Now mind! You are not to 
 tell of me, and I'll not tell of you. And more 
 than that; I promise to have no secrets from 
 you, Pa, and you may make certain that, what- 
 
 ever mercenary things go on, I shall always tell 
 
 you all about them in strict confidence.” 
 
 147 
 
 the lovely woman, R. W. rang the bell, and paid 
 the bill. ‘* Now, all the rest of this, Pa,” said 
 Bella, rolling up the purse when they were alone 
 again, hammering it small with her little fist on 
 the table, and cramming it into one of the pock- 
 ets of his new waistcoat, ‘is for you, to buy 
 presents with for them at home, and to pay bills 
 with, and to divide as you like, and spend ex- 
 actly as you think proper. Last of all take no- 
 tice, Pa, that it’s not the fruit of any avaricious 
 scheme. Perhaps if it was, your little merce- 
 nary wretch of a daughter wouldn’t make so free 
 with it!” 
 
 After which, she tugged at his coat with both 
 hands, and pulled him all askew in buttoning 
 that garment over the precious waistcoat pocket, 
 and then tied her dimples into her bonnet-strings 
 in a very knowing way, and took him back ‘to 
 London. Arrived at Mr: Boffin’s door, she set . 
 him with his back against it, tenderly took him 
 by the ears as convenient handles for her pur- 
 pose, and kissed him until he knocked muffled 
 double knocks at the door with the back of his 
 head. That done, she once more reminded him 
 of their compact, and gayly parted from him. 
 
 Not so gayly, however, but that tears filled 
 her eyes as he went away down the dark street. 
 Not so gayly, but that she several times said, 
 ‘¢ Ah, poor little Pa! Ah, poor dear struggling 
 shabby little Pa!” before she took heart to knock 
 at the door. Not so gayly, but that the brilliant 
 furniture seemed to sgare her out of countenance 
 as if it insisted on being compared with the din- 
 gy furniture at home. Not so gayly, but that 
 she fell into very low spirits sitting late in her 
 own room, and very heartily wept, as she wish- 
 ed, now that the deceased old John Harmon had 
 never made a will about her, now that the de- 
 ceased young John Harmon had lived to marry 
 her. ‘Contradictory things to wish,” said Bella; 
 ‘‘but my life and fortunes are so contradictory 
 altogether, that what can I expect myself to be!” 
 
 ene 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 IN WHICH THE ORPHAN MAKES HIS WILL. 
 
 Tuer Secretary, working in the Dismal Swamp 
 betimes next morning, was informed that a youth 
 waited in the hall who gave the name of-Sloppy. 
 The footman who communicated this intelli- 
 gence made a decent pause before uttering the 
 name, to ¢xpress that it was forced on his re- 
 luctance by the youth in question, and that if 
 the youth had had the good sense and good taste 
 
 to inherit some other name it would have spared 
 
 the feclings of him the bearer. 
 
 ‘¢ Mrs. Boffin will be very well pleased,” said 
 the Secretary in a perfectly composed way. 
 *¢ Show him in.” 2 
 
 Mr. Sloppy being introduced, remained close 
 to the door: revealing in various parts of his 
 form many surprising, confounding, and incom- 
 prehensible buttons. 
 
 “‘T am glad to see you,”’ said John Rokesmith, 
 in a cheerful tone of welcome. ‘‘I have been 
 expecting you.” 
 
 Sloppy explained that he had meant to come 
 before, but that the Orphan (of whom he made 
 mention as Our Johnny) had been-ailing;-and 
 
 _ Fain to be satisfied with this concession from! he had waited to report him well. 
 
Dae Cub 
 
 148 
 
 ‘‘'Then he is well now?” said the Secretary. 
 
 ** No he ain’t,”’ said Sloppy. 
 
 Mr. Sloppy having shaken his head to a con- 
 siderable extent, proceeded to remark that he 
 thought Johnny ‘“‘ must have took ’em from the 
 Minders.” Being asked what he meant, he an- 
 swered, them that come out upon him and par- 
 tickler his chest. Being requested to explain 
 himself, he stated that there was some of ’em 
 wot you couldn’t kiver with a sixpence. Press- 
 ed to fall back upon a nominative case, he opined 
 that they wos about as red as ever red could be. 
 ** But as long as they strikes out’ards, Sir,” con- 
 tinued Sloppy, ‘‘they ain’t so much. It’s their 
 striking in’ards that’s to be kep off.” 
 
 John Rokesmith hoped the child had had med- 
 ical attendance? Oh yes, said Sloppy, he had 
 been took to the doctor’s shop once. And what 
 did the doctor call it? Rokesmith asked him. 
 After some perplexed reflection, Sloppy answer- 
 ed, brightening, ‘‘ He called it something as wos 
 wery long for spots.” Rokesmith suggested mea- 
 sles. ‘‘ No,’ said Sloppy, with confidence, ‘‘ ever 
 so much longer than them, Sir!” (Mr. Sloppy 
 was elevated by this fact, and seemed to consid- 
 er that it reflected credit on the poor little pa- 
 tient.) 
 
 ‘¢Mrs. Boffin will be sorry to hear this,” said 
 Rokesmith. 
 
 “*Mrs. Higden said so, Sir, when she kep it 
 from her, hoping as Our Johnny would work 
 round.” . 
 
 **But I hope he will!” said Rokesmith, with 
 @ quick turn upon the messenger. 
 
 ‘*T hope so,” answered Sloppy. ‘It all de- 
 pends on their striking in’ards.”” He then went 
 on to say that whether Johnny had ‘‘ took ’em” 
 from the Minders, or whether the Minders had 
 “took ’em” from Johnny, the Minders had been 
 sent home and had ‘‘ got ’em.” Furthermore, 
 that Mrs. Higden’s days and nights being devot- 
 ed to Our Johnny, who was never out of her lap, 
 the whole of the mangling arrangements had 
 devolved upon himself, and he had had ‘ray- 
 ther a tight time.” The ungainly piece of hon- 
 esty beamed and blushed as he said it, quite en- 
 raptured with the remembrance of having been 
 Berviceable. 
 
 “Last night,% said Sloppy, ‘‘when I was 
 a-turning at the wheel pretty late, the mangle 
 seemed to go like Our Johnny’s breathing. It 
 begun beautiful, then as it went out it shook a 
 little and got unsteady, then as it took the turn 
 to come home it had a rattle-like and lumbered 
 a bit, then it come smooth, and so it went on till 
 I scarce know’d which was mangle and which 
 was Our Johnny. Nor-Our Johnny, he scarce 
 know’d either, for sometimes when the mangle 
 lumbers he says, ‘Me choking, Granny !* and 
 Mrs. Higden holds him up in her lap and says 
 to me, ‘ Bide a bit, Sloppy,’ and we all stops to- 
 gether. And when our Johnny gets his breath- 
 ing again, I turns again, and we all goes on to- 
 gether.” 
 
 Sloppy had gradually expanded with his de- 
 scription into a stare and a vacant grin. He 
 now contracted, being silent, into a _half-re- 
 pressed gush of tears, and, under pretense of 
 being heated, drew the under part of his sleeve 
 across his eyes with a singularly awkward, la- 
 borious, and roundabout smear. 
 
 “ This is unfortunate,” said Rokesmith. ‘‘I 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 must go and break it to Mrs. Boffin. 
 here, Sloppy.” 
 
 Sloppy staid there, staring at the pattern of a 
 
 the paper on the wall, until the Secretary and 
 Mrs. Boftin came back together. And with Mrs. 
 
 Bofttin was a young lady (Miss Bella Wilfer by a 
 
 name) who was better worth staring at, it oc- 
 curred to Sloppy, than the best of wall-papering. 
 
 ‘* Ah, my poor dear pretty little John Har- 
 mon!” exclaimed Mrs. .Boffin. 
 
 ‘Yes, mum,” said the sympathetic Sloppy. 
 
 “You don’t think he is in a very, very bad 
 way, do you?” asked the pleasant creature with 
 her wholesome cordiality. 
 
 Put upon his good faith, and finding it in col- 
 lision with his inclinations, Sloppy threw back , 
 his head and uttered a mellifluous howl, round- 
 ed off with a sniff. 
 
 “So bad as that!” cried Mrs. Boffin. ‘‘ And 
 Betty Higden not to tell me of it sooner!” 
 
 “‘T think she might have been mistrustful, 
 mum,’ answered Sloppy, hesitating. 
 
 “ Of what, for Heaven’s sake ?” 
 
 “T think she might have been mistrustful, 
 mum,” returned’ Sloppy, with submission, ‘ of 
 standing in Our Johnny’s light. There’s so 
 much trouble in illness, and so much expense, 
 and she’s seen such a lot of its being objected 
 to. 7 
 
 ‘* But she never can have thought,” said Mrs,’ _ 
 
 Boffin, ‘‘ that I would grudge the dear child anys 
 
 thing ¢ 2 
 
 ‘*No, mum, but she might have thought (as 
 a habit-like) of its standing in Johnny’s light, - 
 and might have tried to bring him through it 
 unbeknownst.” 
 
 Sloppy knew his ground well. 
 herself in sickness, like a lower animal; to creep 
 out of sight and coil herself away and die, had 
 become this woman’s instinct. To catch up in 
 her arms the sick child who was dear to her, and 
 hide it as if it were a cfiminal, and keep cff all 
 ministration but such as her own ignorant ten- 
 derness and patience could supply, had become 
 this woman’s idca of maternal love, fidelity, and 
 duty. The shameful accounts we read, every 
 week in the Christian year, my lords and gen- 
 tlemen and honorable boards, the infamous rec- 
 
 ords of small official inhumanity, do not pass by 
 the people as they pass by us. And hence these 
 irrational, blind, and obstinate prejudices, so as- 
 tonishing to our magnificence, and having no 
 more reason in them—God save the Queen and 
 Con-found their politics—no, than smoke has in 
 coming from fire! 
 
 *¢ It’s not a right place for the poor child to 
 stay in,’ said Mrs. Boffin.. ‘*Tell us, dear Mr. 
 Rokesmith, what to do for the best.” 
 
 He had already thought what to’ do, and the 
 consultation was very short. He could pave the 
 way, he said, in half an hour, and then they 
 would go down to Brentford. ‘Pray take me,’ 
 said Bella. Therefore a carriage was or dered, 
 of capacity to take them all, and in the mean 
 time Sloppy was regaled, feasting alone in the 
 Secretary’s room, with a complete realization of 
 that fairy vision--meat, beer, vegetables, and 
 pudding. In consequence of which his buttons 
 became more importunate of public notice than 
 
 before, with the exception of two or three about 
 
 the region of the waistband, which modestly 
 withdrew into a creasy forement. iy 
 
 PLAN S11 Bt a Re ae aye Teen ROU (bi MRAM 
 
 “To conceal © 
 
 Stay you q 
 
 \ 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND, 
 
 149 
 2 
 # Mn 
 5 ine aver 
 E ae 
 4 Wy ia He 
 La , 
 HUE ete 
 i ; 
 EY gf 
 
 Punctual to the time appeared the carriage Guards might never have found him out. Bear. 
 
 and the Secretary. He sat on the box, and Mr. 
 Sloppy graced the rumble. 
 Magpies as before: where Mrs. Boffin and Miss 
 Bella were handed out, and whence they all went 
 on foot to Mrs. Betty Higden’s. 
 
 But, on the way down, they had. stopped at 
 toy-shop, and had bought that noble charger, 
 description of whose points and trappings had on 
 the last occasion conciliated the then worldly- 
 minded orphan, and also a Noah’s ark, and also 
 
 a 
 
 a yellow bird with an artificial voice in him, and 
 also a military doll so well dresse 
 
 So, to the Three | 
 
 a | 
 
 ing these gifts, they raised the latch of Betty 
 Higden’s door, and saw her sitting in the dim- 
 mest and furthest corner with poor Johnny in 
 her lap. 
 
 **And how’s my boy, Betty?” asked Mrs. 
 Boffin, sitting down beside her. 
 
 ‘*He’s bad! he’s bad!” said Betty. ‘‘I be- 
 gin to be afeerd he’ll not be yours any more than 
 mine. All others belonging to him have gone 
 to the Power and the Glory, and I have a mind 
 that they’re drawing him to them—leading him 
 
 d that if he had , away.” 
 
 _ only been of life-size his brother officers in the _** No, no, no,” said Mrs. Boffin. 
 
 . i 
 « 
 es 
 
 , q qaete = J 
 E> 4 oe ee 
 
150 
 
 ‘¢T don’t know why else he clenches his little 
 hand as if it had hold of a finger that I can’t 
 see. Look at it,” said Betty, opening the wrap- 
 pers in which the flushed child lay, and showing 
 his small right hand lying closed upon his breast. 
 “¢Tt’s always so. It don’t mind me.” 
 
 “Ts he asleep ?” 
 
 ‘*No, I think not, 
 _ Johnny ?” 
 
 “‘No,” said Johnny, with a quiet air of pity 
 for himself, and without opening his eyes. 
 
 “¢ Were’s the lady, Johnny. And the horse.” 
 
 Johnny could bear the lady with complete in- 
 difference, but not the horse, Opening his heavy 
 eyes, he slowly broke into a smile on beholding 
 that splendid phenomenon, and wanted to take 
 it in his arms. <As it was much too big, it was 
 put upon a chair where he could hold it by the 
 mane and contemplate it. Which he soon for- 
 got to do. 
 
 But, Johnny murmuring something with his 
 eyes closed, and Mrs. Bofiin not knowing what, 
 old Betty bent her ear to listen, and took pains 
 to understand. Being asked by her to repeat 
 what he had said, he did so two or three times, 
 and then it came out that he must have seen 
 more than they supposed when he looked up to 
 see the horse, for the murmur was, ‘‘ Who is 
 the boofer lady?” Now, the boofer, or beauti- 
 ful, lady was Bella; and whereas this notice 
 from the poor baby would have touched her of 
 itself, it was rendered more pathetic by the late 
 melting of her heart to her poor little father, 
 and their joke about the lovely woman. So, 
 Bella’s behavior was very tender and very natu- 
 ral when she kneeled on the brick floor to clasp 
 the child, and when the child, with a child’s ad- 
 miration of what is young and pretty, fondled 
 the boofer lady. 
 
 “‘ Now, my good dear Betty,” said Mrs. Bof- 
 fin, hoping that she saw her opportunity, and 
 laying her hand persuasively on her arm; “ we 
 have come to remove Johnny from this cottage 
 to where he can be taken better care of.” 
 
 Instantly, and before another word could be 
 spoken, the old woman started up with blazing 
 eyes, and rushed at the door with the sick 
 child. 
 
 ‘* Stand away from me every one of ye!’ she 
 cried out wildly. ‘‘I see what ye mean now. 
 Let me go my way, all of ye. I'd sooner kill 
 the Pretty, and kill myself!” 
 
 «Stay, stay!” said Rokesmith, soothing her. 
 “You don’t understand.” 
 
 *““T understand too well. 
 about it, Sir. Pve run from it too many a year. 
 No! Never for me, nor for the child, while 
 there’s water enough in England to cover us!” 
 
 The terror, the shame, the passion of horror 
 and repugnance, firing the worn face and per- 
 fectly maddening it, would have been a quite 
 terrible sight, if embodied in one old fellow- 
 creature alone. Yet it ‘‘crops up” —as our 
 slang goes—my lords and gentlemen and hon- 
 orable boards, in other fellow-creatures, rather 
 frequently ! 
 
 ‘* It’s been chasing me all my life, but it shall 
 never take me nor mine alive!” cried old Betty. 
 **T’ve done with ye. I'd have fastened door and 
 window and starved out, afore I’d ever have let 
 ye in, if I had known what ye came for!” 
 
 But, catching sight of Mrs. Boffin’s whole- 
 
 You’re not asleep, my 
 
 I know too much 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND 
 
 ‘ 
 
 some face, she relented, and crouching down — 
 by the door and bending over her burden to hush 
 it, said humbly: ‘*‘ Maybe my fears has put me | 
 wrong. If they have so, tell me, and the good: | 
 Lord torgiveme! I’m quick to take this fright, 
 I know, and my head is summ/’at light with — 
 wearying and watching.” 7 
 
 ‘“’There, there, there!’ returned Mrs. Bof- 
 fin. ‘*Come, come! Say no more of it, Bet- 
 ty. It was a mistake—a mistake. Any one of 
 us might have made it in your place, and felt 
 just as you do,” 
 
 ‘¢'The Lord bless ye!” said the old woman, 
 stretching out her hand, | 
 ‘* Now, see, Betty,” pursued the sweet com- 
 passionate soul, holding the hand kindly, ** what 
 I really did mean, and what I should have be- 
 gun by saying out, if I had only been a little 
 wiser and handier. We want to move Johnny 
 
 to a place where there are none but children; a ~~ 
 
 place set up on purpose for sick children; where 
 the good doctors and nurses pass their lives with 
 children, talk to none but children, touch none — 
 but children, comfort and cure none but chil- — 
 dren.” ~ a 
 
 ‘¢Ts there really such a place?” asked the old — 
 woman, with a gaze of wonder. 
 
 ‘Yes, Betty, on my word, and you shall see 
 it. If my home was a better place for the dear 
 boy I'd take him to it; but indeed indeed it’s 
 not.” 
 
 ‘*You shall take him,” returned Betty, fer- 
 vently kissing the comforting hand, ‘* where you 
 will, my deary. I am not so hard but that I 
 believe your face and voice, and I will, as long 
 as I can see and hear,” 
 
 This victory gained, Rokesmith made haste 
 to profit by it, for he saw how woefully time had 
 been lost. He dispatched Sloppy to bring the 
 carriage to the door; caused the child to be 
 carefully wrapped up; bade old Betty get her 
 bonnet on; collected the toys, enabling the lit- 
 tle fellow to comprehend that his treasures were 
 to be transported with him; and had all things 
 prepared so easily that they were ready for the 
 carriage as soon as it appeared, and in a minute 
 afterward were on their way. Sloppy they left 
 behind, relieving his overcharged breast with a 
 paroxysm of mangling. 
 
 At the Children’s Hospital the gallant steed, — 
 the Noah’s ark, the yellow bird, and the officer ~ 
 in the Guards, were made as welcome as their — 
 child-owner. But the doctor said aside to Roke- 
 smith, ‘‘This should have been days ago. Too 
 late!” | 
 However, they were all carried up into a fresh 
 airy room, and there Johnny came to himself, 
 out of a sleep or a swoon or whatever it was, 
 to find himself lying in a little quiet bed, with a 
 little platform over his breast, on which were 
 already arranged, to give him heart and urge 
 him to cheer up, the Noah’s ark, the noble steed, 
 and the yellow bird; with the officer in the 
 Guards doing duty over the whole, quite as much 
 to the satisfaction of his country as if he had _ 
 been upon Parade. And at the bed’s head was — 
 a colored picture beautiful to see, representing — 
 as it were another Johnny seated on the knee 
 of some Angel surely who loved little children, — 
 And, marvelous fact, to lie and stare at; John-— 
 ny had become one of a little family, all in little 
 quiet beds (except two playing dominoes in little © 
 
 4 
 iy 
 
-arm-chairs at a little table on the hearth): and 
 on all the little beds were little platforms where- 
 on were to be seen dolls’ houses, woolly dogs 
 with mechanical barks in them not very dis- 
 similar from the artificial voice pervading the 
 bowels of the yellow bird, tin armies, Moorish 
 tumblers, wooden tea-things, and the riches of 
 the earth. 
 
 - As Johnny murmured something in his placid 
 admiration, the ministering women at his bed’s 
 head asked him what he said. It seemed that 
 
 he wanted to know whether all these were broth- | 
 
 ers and sisters of his? So they told him yes. 
 It seemed then that he wanted to know whether 
 God had brought them all together there? So 
 they told him yes again. ‘They made out then 
 that he wanted to know whether they would all 
 get out of pain? So they answered yes to that 
 question likewise, and made him understand 
 that the reply included himself, 
 
 Johnny’s powers of sustaining conversation | 
 
 were as yet so very imperfectly developed, even 
 in a state of health, that in sickness they were 
 little more than monosyllabic. But he had to 
 be washed and tended, and: remedies were ap- 
 plied, and though those offices were far, far more 
 skillfully and lightly done than ever any thing 
 had been done for him in his little life, so rough 
 and short, they would have hurt and tired him 
 but for an amazing circumstance which laid hold 
 of his attention. This was no less than the ap- 
 
 pearance on his own little platform in pairs, of 
 All Creation, on its way into his own particular | 
 
 ark: the elephant leading, and the fly, with a 
 
 diffident sense of its size, politely bringing up the | 
 A very little brother lying in the next | 
 
 rear, 
 bed with a broken leg, was so enchanted by this 
 spectacle that his delight exalted its enthralling 
 interest; and so came rest and sleep, 
 ‘*I see you are not afraid to leave the dear 
 child here, Betty,” whispered Mrs, Boffin. 
 ‘No, ma’am. Most willingly, most thank- 
 fully, with all my heart and soul.” 
 So they kissed him, and left him there, and 
 _ old Betty was to come back early in the morning, 
 and nobody but Rokesmith knew for certain how 
 that the doctor had said ‘“ This should have been 
 days ago. Too late!” 
 
 But, Rokesmith knowing it, and knowing that | 
 __ his bearing it in mind would be acceptable there- | 
 after to that good woman who had been the only | 
 
 light in the childhood of desolate John Harmon 
 dead and gone, resolved that late at night he 
 
 would go back to the bedside of John Harmon’s - 
 
 namesake, and see how it fared with him. 
 
 The family whom God had brought together 
 were not all asleep, but were all quiet. From 
 - bed to bed a light womanly tread and a pleas- 
 ant fresh face passed in the silence of the night. 
 
 A little head would lift itself up into the soft- | 
 
 ened light here and there, to be kissed as the face 
 went by—for these little patients are very loving 
 —and would then submit itself to be composed 
 fo rest again. The mite with the broken leg 
 was restless, and moaned; but after a while 
 _ turned his face toward Johnny’s bed, to fortify 
 _ himself with a view of the ark, and fell asleep: 
 _ Over most of the beds the toys were yet grouped 
 _ as the children had left them when they last laid 
 
 themselves down, and, in their innocent gTo- 
 
 tesqueness and incongruity, they might» have 
 _ stood for the children’s dreams. 
 
 ‘oa _ OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 151 
 
 ' The doctor came in too, to see how it fared 
 with Johnny. * And he and Rokesmith stood to. 
 gether, looking down with compassion on him. 
 
 | **Whrat‘is it, Johnny?” Rokesmith was the 
 questioner, and put an arm round the poor baby 
 as he made a struggle. 
 
 ‘‘ Him!” said the little fellow. *Those 1” 
 
 The doctor was quick to understand children, 
 and, taking the horse, the ark, the yellow bird, 
 and the man in the Guards, from Johnny’s bed, 
 softly placed them on that of his next neighbor, 
 the mite with the broken leg. 
 
 With a weary and yet a pleased smile, and 
 with an action as if he stretched his little finger 
 out to rest, the child heaved his body on the sus- 
 taining arm, and seeking Rokesmith’s face with 
 his lips, said: 
 
 ‘* A kiss for the boofer lady.” 
 
 Having now bequeathed all he had to dispose 
 of, and arranged his affairs in this world, John- 
 ny, thus speaking, left it. 
 
 = 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 A SUCCESSOR. 
 
 Some of the Reverend Frank Milvey’s breth- 
 ren had found themselves exceedingly uncom- 
 fortable in their minds, because they were re- 
 quired to bury the dead too hopefully. But the 
 Reverend Frank, inclining to the belief that they 
 were required to do one or two other things (say 
 out of nine-and-thirty) calculated to trouble their 
 consciences rather more if they would think as 
 much about them, held his peace. 
 
 Indeed, the Reverend Frank Milvey was a for- 
 _bearing man, who noticed many sad warps and 
 blights in the vineyard wherein he worked, and 
 did not profess that they made him savagely 
 wise. He only learned that the more he him- 
 self knew, in his little limited human way, the 
 better he could distantly imagine what Omnis- 
 | clence might know. 
 
 Wherefore, if the Reverend Frank had had to 
 read the words that troubled some of his breth- 
 ren, and profitably touched innumerable hearts 
 'in a worse case than Johnny’s, he would have 
 done so out of the pity and humility of his soul. 
 Reading them over Johnny, he thought of his 
 own six children, but not of his poverty, and 
 read them with dimmed eyes. And very seri- 
 
 ously did he and his bright little wife, who had 
 been listening, look down into the small grave 
 | and walk home arm-in-arm. 
 | There was grief in the aristocratic house, and 
 there was joy in the Bower, Mr. Wegg argued, 
 if an orphan were wanted, was he not an orphan 
 himself, and could a better be desired? And 
 why go beating about Brentford bushes, seeking 
 orphans forsooth who had established no claims 
 upon you and made no sacrifices for you, when 
 here was an orphan ready to your hand who had 
 given up in your cause Miss Elizabeth, Master 
 George, Aunt Jane, and Uncle Parker ? i 
 | Mr. Wegg chuckled, consequently, when he 
 heard the tidings. Nay, it was afterward affirm- 
 ed by a witness who shall at present be nameless, 
 that in the seclusion of the Bower he poked out 
 his wooden leg, in the stage-ballet manner, and 
 executed a taunting or triumphant pirouette on 
 | the genuine leg remaining to him. 
 
152 ° 
 
 John Rokesmith’s manner toward Mrs. Boffin 
 at this time was more the manner of a young 
 man toward a mother than that of a Secretary 
 toward his employer’s wife. It had always been 
 marked by a subdued affectionate deference that 
 seemed to have sprung up on the very day of his 
 engagement ; whatever was odd in her dress or 
 her ways had seemed to have no oddity for him; 
 he had sometimes borne a quietly-amused face in 
 her company, but still it had seemed as if the 
 pleasure her genial temper and radiant nature 
 yielded him could have been quite as naturally 
 expressed in atear asin a smile. ‘The complete- 
 ness of his sympathy with her fancy for having 
 a little John Harmon to protect and rear, he had 
 shown in every act and word, and now that the 
 kind fancy was disappointed, he treated it with 
 a manly tenderness and respect for which she 
 could hardly thank him enough. 
 
 “But I do thank you, Mr. Rokesmith,” said 
 Mrs. Boffin, ‘‘and [thank you most kindly. You 
 love children.” 
 
 ‘¢T hope every body. does.” 
 
 “They ought,” said Mrs. Boffin; ‘‘but we don’t 
 all of us do what we ought; do us?” 
 
 John Rokesmith replied, ‘‘Some among us 
 supply the shortcomings of the rest. You have 
 loved children well, Mr. Boffin has told me.” 
 
 ‘¢Not a bit better than he has, but that’s his 
 way; he putsallthe good uponme. You speak 
 rather sadly, Mr. Rokesmith.” 
 
 Do 1? 
 
 “Tt sounds to me so. Were you one of many 
 children ?” 
 
 He shook his head. 
 
 “¢ An only child?” 
 
 ‘*No, there was another. Dead long ago.” 
 
 ‘¢ Father or mother alive ?” 
 
 “Dead.” 
 
 ‘* And the rest of your relations?” 
 
 ‘¢ead—if I ever had any living. 
 . heard of any.” 
 
 At this point of the dialogue Bella came in 
 with a light step. She paused at the door a mo- 
 ment, hesitating whether to remain or retire: 
 perplexed by finding that she was not ob- 
 served. 
 
 ‘*Now, don’t mind an old lady’s talk,” said 
 Mrs. Boffin, ‘‘ but tell me. Are you quite sure, 
 Mr. Rokesmith, that you have never had a dis- 
 appointment in love?” 
 
 ‘¢Quite sure. Why do you ask me?” 
 
 ‘* Why, for this reason. Sometimes you have 
 a kind of kept-down manner with you, which is 
 not like your age. You can’t be thirty ?” 
 
 ‘¢T am not yet thirty.” | 
 
 Deeming it high time to make her presence 
 known, Bella coughed here to attract attention, 
 begged pardon, and said she would go, fearing 
 that she interrupted some matter of business. 
 
 ‘No, don’t go,” rejoined Mrs. Boftin, ‘‘ be- 
 cause we are coming to business, instead of hav- 
 ing begun it, and you belong to it as much now, 
 my dear Bella, as I do. But I want my Noddy 
 to consult with us. Would somebody be so good 
 as find my Noddy for me?” 
 
 Rokesmith departed on that errand, and pres- 
 ently returned accompanied by Mr. Boffin at his 
 jog-trot. Bella felt a little vague trepidation as 
 to the subject-matter of this same consultation, 
 until Mrs. Boffin announced it. | 
 
 *¢ Now, you come and sit by me, my dear,” 
 
 N 
 
 I never 
 
 ry y WS eit) 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 said that worthy soul, taking her comfortable a 
 
 place on a large ottoman in the centre of the 
 
 room, and drawing her arm through Bella’s; 
 
 ‘¢and Noddy, you sit here, and Mr. Rokesmith 
 you sit there. Now, you see, what I want to 
 talk about, is this. Mr. and Mrs. Milvey have 
 sent me the kindest note possible (which Mr, 
 Rokesmith just now read to me out loud, for I 
 ain’t good at handwritings), offering to find me 
 another little child to name and educate and 
 bring up. Well. This has set me thinking.” 
 
 (‘* And she is a steam-ingein at it,” murmured 
 Mr. Boffin, in an admiring parenthesis, “ when 
 she once begins. It mayn’t be so easy to start 
 her ; but once started, she’s a ingein.’’) 
 
 ‘«¢__This has set me thinking, I say,” repeated 
 Mrs. Boffin, cordially beaming under the influ. 
 ence of her husband’s compliment, ‘‘ and I have 
 thought two things. First of all, that I have 
 grown timid of reviving John Harmon’s name. 
 It’s an unfortunate name, and I fancy I should 
 reproach myself if I gave it to another dear 
 child, and it proved again unlucky.) ~ 
 
 ‘¢ Now, whether,” said Mr. Boffin, gravely pro- 
 pounding a case for his Secretary's opinion 5 
 ‘¢ whether one might call that a superstition ?” 
 
 ‘Tt is a matter of feeling with Mrs. Boffin,” 
 said Rokesmith, gently. ‘‘The name has always 
 been unfortunate. It has now this new unfor- 
 tunate association connected with it. The name 
 has died out. Why revive it? Might I ask Miss 
 Wilfer what she thinks ?” 
 
 “Tt has not been a fortunate name for me,” 
 said Bella,.coloring—‘‘or at least it was not, 
 
 until it led to my being here—but that is not the. 
 
 point in my thoughts. As we had given the 
 
 name to the poor child, and as the poor child ~~ 
 
 took so lovingly to me, I think I should feel 
 jealous of calling another child by it. I think I 
 should feel as if the name had become en eared 
 to me, and [ had no right. to use it so.” 
 
 “ And that’s your opinion?” remarked Mr, 
 Boffin, observant of the Secretary’s face, and 
 again addressing him. . 
 
 ‘¢*T say again, it is a matter of feeling,” re- 
 turned the Secretary. 
 feeling very womanly and pretty.” 
 
 ‘Now, give us your opinion, Noddy,” said 
 Mrs. Boflin. 
 
 *¢ My opinion, old lady,’ 
 Dustman, ‘‘is your opinion.” 
 
 ‘¢Then,” said Mrs. Boffin, “‘we agree not to 
 
 revive John Harmon’s name, but to let it rest in. 
 
 the grave. It is, as Mr, Rokesmith says, a mat- 
 ter of feeling, but Lor how many matters are 
 matters of feeling! Well; and so I come to the 
 second thing I have thought of. You must 
 know, Bella, my dear, and Mr. Rokesmith, that 
 when I first named to my husband my thoughts 
 of adopting a little orphan boy in remembrance 
 of John Harmon, I further named’ to my hus; 
 band that it was comforting to think that how 
 the poor boy would be benefited by John’s own 
 money, and protected from John’s own forlorn- 
 ness.”’ 
 
 ‘¢ Hear, hear!” cried Mr. Boffin. ‘So she did. 
 
 Ancoar !” 
 
 ‘¢No, not Ancoar, Noddy, my dear,” returned 
 Mrs. Boffin, ‘‘ because I am going to say somes ~ 
 
 thing else. I meant that, I am sure, as much 
 as I still mean it. But this little death has mad 
 
 me ask myself the question, seriously, whether I | 
 
 ‘*T think Miss Wilfer’s 
 
 > returned the Golden 
 
 = 
 
 Ses 
 
 ee 
 
 = 
 
 Se as ax 
 
OUR. MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 wasn’t too bent upon pleasing myself. Else why 
 did I seek out so much for a pretty child, and a 
 child quite to my liking ? Wanting to do good, 
 why not do it for its own sake, and put my 
 tastes and likings by ?” 
 **Perhaps,” said Bella; and perhaps she said 
 
 it with some little sensitiveness arising out of | 
 
 _ those old curious relations of hers toward the 
 murdered man; ‘‘ perhaps, in reviving the name, 
 you would not have liked to give it to a less in- 
 teresting child than the original. He interested 
 you very much.” 
 
 ** Well, my dear,” returned Mrs. Boffin, giv- 
 ing her a squeeze, ‘‘it’s kind of you to find that 
 reason out, and I hope it may have been so, and 
 indeed to a certain extent I believe it was SO, 
 but I am afraid not to the whole extent. - How. 
 ever, that don’t come in question now, because 
 we have done with the name.” 
 
 **Laid it up as a remembrance,” 
 ‘Bella, musingly. 
 
 ‘*Much better said, my dear; laid it up as a 
 remembrance. Well then: I have been think. 
 ing if I take any orphan to provide for, let it not 
 be a pet and a plaything for me, but a creature 
 to be helped for its own sake.” 
 
 “* Not pretty then?” said Bella. 
 
 “No,” returned Mrs. Boffin, stoutly. 
 
 ** Nor prepossessing then ?” said Bella. 
 
 “No,” returned Mrs. Boftin.” ‘Not necessa- 
 rily so. That’s as it may happen. <A well-dis- 
 posed boy comes in my way who may be even a 
 little wanting in such advantages for getting on 
 in life, but is honest and industrious and requires 
 a helping hand and deserves it. If I am very 
 much in earnest and quite determined to be un- 
 selfish, let me take care of him.” 
 
 Here the footman whose feelings had been 
 hurt on the former occasion appeared, and cross- 
 ang to Rokesmith a 
 objectionable Sloppy. 
 
 The four members of Council looked at one 
 another, and paused. ‘Shall he be brought 
 ‘here, ma’am ?” asked Rokesmith. 
 
 _ * Yes,” said Mrs. Boffin. Whereupon the foot- 
 man disappeared, reappeared presenting Sloppy, 
 
 and retired much disgusted. 
 
 The consideration of Mrs. Boffin had clothed 
 Mr. Sloppy in a suit of black, on which the tailor 
 had received personal directions from Rokesmith 
 to expend the utmost cunning of his art, with a 
 
 suggested 
 
 view to the concealment of the cohering and sus- 
 
 taining buttons. But, so much more powerful 
 
 were the frailties of Sloppy’s form than the | 
 
 strongest resources of tailoring science, that he 
 _ how stood before the Council a perfect Argus in 
 the way of buttons: shining and winking and 
 gleaming and twinkling out of a hundred of 
 those eyes of bright metal, at the dazzled spec- 
 tators. The artistic taste of some unknown hat. 
 ter had furnished him with a hat-band of whole- 
 Sale capacity, which was fluted behind, from the 
 ¢€rown of his hat to the brim, and terminated 
 
 pologetically announced the | 
 
 ‘158 
 
 his coat, and a yawning gulf at his waistband, 
 
 Sloppy stood confessed. 
 
 ** And how is Betty, my good fellow?” Mrs, 
 Boffin asked him. ' 
 
 *“Thankee, mum,” said Sloppy, “ 
 ty nicely, and sending her dooty and 
 for the tea and all faviors, and wis] 
 the family’s healths.” 
 
 ‘* Have you just come, 
 
 ‘* Yes, mum.” ‘ 
 
 **Then you have not had your dinner yet ?” 
 
 ‘“‘No, mum. But I mean to it, For I ain’t 
 forgotten your handsome orders that I was never 
 to go away without having had_a good ‘un off of 
 meat and beer and pndding—no: there was four 
 of ’em, for I reckoned ‘em up when I had ’em; 
 meat one, beer two, vegetables three, and which 
 was four ?=Why, pudding, he was four!” Here 
 Sloppy threw his head back, opened his mouth 
 wide, and laughed rapturously. 
 
 ‘How are’ the two poor little Minders ¢” 
 asked Mrs. Boffin. 
 
 “ Striking right out, mum, and coming round 
 beautiful.’ 
 
 Mrs. Boffin looked on the other three members 
 of Council, and then said, beckoning with her 
 finger: 
 
 ‘* Sloppy.” 
 
 ‘Yes, mum. 
 
 ‘Come forward, Sloppy. 
 dine here every day ?” 
 
 ‘OFF of all four on ‘em, mum ? 
 Sloppy’s feelings obliged him to squ 
 and contract one leg at the knee. 
 
 ‘Yes. And should you like to ba always 
 taken care of here, if you were industrious and 
 deserving ?” 
 
 “Oh, mum !—But there’ 
 Sloppy, checking himself in his raptures, draw- 
 ing back, and shaking his head with very serious 
 meaning. ‘‘There’s Mrs. Higden. Mrs. Hig- 
 den goes before all. None can ever be better 
 friends to me than Mrs. Higden’s been. And 
 she must be turned for, must Mrs. Higden. 
 Where would Mrs. Higden be if she warn’t 
 turned for!” At the mere thought of Mrs. Hig. 
 den in this inconceivable affliction, Mr. Sloppy’s. 
 countenance became pale, and manifested the 
 most distressful emotions. 
 
 ‘You are as right as ri 
 said Mrs. Boffin, ‘‘ and far be it from me to tell 
 you otherwise. It shall be seen to. If Betty 
 Higden can be turned for all the same, you shall 
 come here and be taken care of for life, and be 
 made able to keep her in other ways than the 
 turning.” 
 
 ‘‘ Even as to that, mum,” answered the ec- 
 statie Sloppy, ‘‘ the turning might be done in the 
 night, don’t you see? I could be-here in the 
 day, and turn in the night. I don’t want no 
 sleep, J don’t. Or even if I any ways should 
 want a wink or two,” added Sloppy, after a mo- 
 ment’s apologetic reflection, ‘“‘I could take ’em 
 
 she do pret- 
 many thanks 
 ling to know 
 
 Sloppy ot 
 
 Should you like to 
 
 Oh, mum!” 
 eeZe his hat, 
 
 s Mrs. Higden,” said 
 
 ght can be, Sloppy,” 
 
 i 
 ! 
 
 in a black bunch, from which the imagination 
 shrunk discomfited and the reason revolted. 
 Some special powers with which his legs were 
 endowed had already hitched up his glossy trow- 
 sers at the ankles and bagged them at the knees : 
 while similar gifts in his arms had raised his 
 Coat-sleeves from his wrists and accumulated 
 them at his elbows. Thus set forth, with the 
 additional embellishments of a very little tail to! 
 10 
 
 turning. T’ve took ’em turning many a time, 
 and enjoyed ’em wonderful !” 
 
 On the grateful impulse of the moment Mr.. 
 Sloppy kissed Mrs. Boffin’s hand, and then de- 
 taching himself from that good creature that he 
 might have room enough for his feelings, threw 
 back his head, opened his mouth wide, and ut- 
 tered a dismal howl. It was ereditable t® his. 
 tenderness of heart, but sugyested that he might 
 
4 
 
 154 
 
 on occasion give some offense to the neighbors: | der the head ‘‘this,” present appearances and 
 
 the rather, as the footmau Jooked in, and begged 
 pardon, finding he. was not wanted, but excused 
 himself, on the ground “that he thought it was 
 Cats.” 
 
 ——__@———_—. 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 SOME AFFAIRS OF THE HEART. 
 
 Litrte Miss Peecher, from her little official 
 dwelling-house, with its little windows like the 
 eyes in needles, and its little doors like the coyv- 
 ers of school-books, was very observant indeed 
 of the object of her quiet affections. Love, 
 though said to be afflicted with blindness, is a 
 vigilant watchman, and Miss Peecher kept him 
 on double duty over Mr. Bradley Headstone. 
 It was not that she was naturally given to play- 
 ing the spy—it was not that she was at all se- 
 cret, plotting, or mean—it was simply that she 
 loved the irresponsive Bradley with all the primi- 
 tive and homely stock of love that had never 
 been examined or certificated out of her. IPfher 
 faithful slate had had the latent qualities of sym- 
 pathetic paper, and its pencil those of invisible 
 ink, many a little treatise calculated to astonish 
 the pupils would have come bursting through 
 the dry sums in school-time under the warming 
 influence of Miss Peecher’s bosom. For, often- 
 times when school was not, and her calm leisure 
 and calm little house were her own, Miss Peecher 
 would commit to the confidential slate an im- 
 aginary description of how, upon a balmy even- 
 ing at dusk, two figures might. have been» ob- 
 served in the market-garden ground-round the 
 
 corner, of whom one, being a manly form; bent | 
 
 over the other, being a womanly form of short 
 stature and some compactness, and breathed in 
 a low voice the words, ‘‘ Emma Peecher, wilt 
 thou be my own?” after which the womanly 
 form’s head reposed upon the manly form’s shoul- 
 der, and the nightingales tuned up. Thongh 
 all unseen, and unsuspected by the pupils, Brad- 
 ley Headstone even pervaded the school exer- 
 cises. Was Geography in question? He would 
 come triumphantly flying out of Vesuvius and 
 JEtna ahead of the lava, and would boil un- 
 harmed in the hot springs of Iceland, and would 
 float majestically down the Ganges and the Nile. 
 Vid History chronicle a king of men? Behold 
 him in pepper-and-salt pantaloons, with his 
 watch-guard round his neck. Were copies to 
 b2 written? In capital B’s and H’s most of the 
 girls under Miss Peecher’s tuition were half a 
 year ahead of every other letter in the alphabet. 
 And Mental Arithmetic, administered by Miss 
 Peecher, often devoted itself to providing Brad- 
 Jey Headstone with a wardrobe of fabulous ex- 
 tent: fourscore and four neck-ties at two and 
 nin ‘pence-halfpenny, two gross of silver watches 
 at four pounds fifteen and sixpencs, seventy-four 
 black hats at eighteen shillings; and many simi- 
 lar superfluities. : 
 
 The vigilant watchman, using his daily oppor- 
 tunities of turning his eyes in Bradlev’s direction, 
 soon apprised Miss Peecher that Bradley was 
 more preoccupied than had been his wont, and 
 more given to strolling about with a downcast 
 an | reserved face, turning something difficult in 
 his mind that was not in the scholastic syllabus. 
 Paiing this and that toge!her—combining un- 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 the intimacy with Charley Hexam, and ranging 
 under the head * that” the visit to his sister, the 
 watchman .reported to Miss Peecher his strong 
 suspicions that the sister was at the bottom of | 
 it. ‘ 
 
 ‘‘T wonder,” said Miss Peecher, as she sat — 
 making up her weekly report on a half-holiday 
 afternoon, ‘* what they call Hexam’s sister ?” 
 
 Mary Anne, at her needle-work, attendant and 
 attentive, held her arm up. 
 
 ‘¢ Well, Mary Anne?” 
 
 ‘¢She is named Lizzie, ma’am.” 
 
 ‘‘She can hardly be named Lizzie, I think, 
 Mary Anne,” returned Miss Peecher, in a tunes 
 fully instructive voice, ‘‘Is Lizzie a Christian’ 
 name, Mary Anne?” 
 
 Mary Anne laid down her work, rose, hooked 
 herself behind, as being under catechisation, and 
 replied: ‘No, it is a corruption, Miss Peecher.” 
 
 ‘Who gave her that name?” Miss Peecher 
 was going on, from the mere force of habit, when 
 she checked herself, on Mary Anne’s evincing 
 theological impatience to strike in with her god- 
 fathers and her godmothers, and said: ‘*I mean 
 of what name is it a corruption ?” 
 
 ‘‘ Elizabeth, or Eliza, Miss Peecher.” 
 
 ‘‘Right, Mary Anne. Whether there were 
 any Lizzies in the early Christian Church must 
 be considered very doubtful, very doubtful.” Miss 
 Peecher was exceedingly sage here. ‘‘Speak-— 
 ing correctly, we say, then, that Hexam’s sister ’ 
 is called Lizzie; not that she is named so. Do 
 we not, Mary Anne?” 
 
 ‘We do, Miss Peecher.” 
 
 ‘‘ And where,” pursued Miss Peecher, com- 
 placent in her little transparent fiction of con- 
 ducting the examination in a semi-official man-_ 
 ner for Mary Anne’s benefit, not her own, 
 ‘“‘where does this young woman, who is called 
 bat not named Lizzie, live? Think, now, be- 
 fore answering.” 
 
 ‘‘In Church Street, Smith Square, by Mill 
 Bank, ma’am.” 
 
 ‘*In Church Street, Smith Square, by Mill 
 Bank,” repeated Miss Peecher, as if possessed 
 beforchand of the book in which it was written. 
 ‘Exactly so. And what occupation does this 
 young woman pursue, Mary Anne? Take time.” 
 
 ‘¢She has a place of trust at an outfitter’s in _ 
 the City, ma’am.” 
 
 ‘Oh !” said Miss Peecher, pondering on it; 
 but smoothly added, in a confirmatory tone, — 
 ‘¢ At an outfitter’s in the City. Ye-es?” 
 
 ‘¢ And Charley—” Mary Ann was proceeding 
 when Miss Peecher stared. : . | 
 
 ‘¢T mean Hexam, Miss Peecher.”’ 
 
 “T should think you did, Mary Anne, 
 glad to hear you do. And Hexam—?” 
 
 ‘‘ Says,’’? Mary Anne went on, ‘‘that he isnot — 
 pleased with his sister, and that his sister won’t— 
 be guided by his advice, and persists in being — 
 guided by somebody else’s; and that—” 
 
 ‘‘Mr. Headstone coming across the garden!” — 
 exclaimed Miss Peecher, with a flushed glance— 
 at the looking-glass, ‘‘ You have answered very — 
 well, Mary Anne. You are forming an excel- 
 lent habit of arranging your thoughts clearly. 
 That will do.” | 
 
 The discreet Mary Anne resumed her seat and — 
 her silence, and stitched, and stitched, and was — 
 stitching when the schoolmaster’s shadow came 
 
 I ant 
 
in before him, announcing that he might be in- 
 stantly expected. 
 
 **Good-evening, Miss Peecher,” he said, pur- | ried face. 
 
 suing the shadow, and taking its place. 
 _**Good-evening, Mr. Headstone, Mary Anne, 
 a chair.” 
 
 ‘“‘Thank you,” said Bradley, seating himself 
 in his constrained manner. ‘*‘ This is but a fly- 
 ing visit. JI have looked in, on my way, to ask 
 a kindness of you as a neighbor.” 
 
 **Did you say on your way, Mr. Headstone ?” 
 asked Miss Peecher. 
 
 **On my way to—where I am going.” 
 
 “Church Street, Smith Square, by Mill 
 Bank,” repeated Miss Peecher, in her own 
 thoughts. 
 
 ‘““Charley Hexam has gone to get a book or 
 two he wants, and will probably be back before 
 me. As we leave my house empty, I took the 
 liberty of telling him I would leave the key here. 
 Would you kindly allow me to do so?” 
 
 - **Certainly, Mr. Headstone. Going for an 
 evening walk, Sir?” 
 
 ‘“* Partly for a walk, and partly for—on busi- 
 ness.”’ 
 
 “Business in Church Street, Smith Square, 
 by Mill Bank,” repeated Miss Peecher to her- 
 self. 
 
 ** Having said which,” pursued Bradley, lay- 
 ing his door-key on the table, ‘‘I must be al- 
 ready going. ‘There is nothing I can do tor 
 you, Miss Peecher ?” 
 
 ““'Thank you, Mr. Headstone. In which di- 
 
 ' rection ?” 
 
 **Jn the direction of Westminster.” 
 
 ** Mill Bank,” Miss Peecher repeated in her 
 own thoughts once again. ‘‘No, thank you, 
 Mr. Headstone; Ill not trouble you.” 
 
 **You couldn’t trouble me,” said the school- 
 master. 
 
 ‘* Ah!” returned Miss Peecher, though not 
 aloud; ‘but you can trouble me!” And for all 
 her quiet manney, and her quiet smile, she was 
 full of trouble as he went his way. 
 
 She was right touching his destination. He 
 held as straight a course for the house of the 
 
 dolls’ dress-maker as the wisdom of his ances- 
 
 tors, exemplified in the construction ofthe. in- 
 tervening streets, would let_him, and walked 
 with a bent head hammering at one fixed idea, 
 It had been an immovable idea since he first set 
 eyes upon her. It seemed to him as if all that 
 he could suppress in himself he had suppressed, 
 as if all that he could restrain in himself he had 
 restrained,-and the time had come—in a rush, 
 in a moment—when the power of self-command 
 had departed from him. Love at first sight is 
 a trite expression quite sufficiently discussed ; 
 enough that in certain smouldering natures like 
 this man’s, that passion leaps into a blaze, and 
 makes such head as fire does in a rage of wind, 
 when other passions, but for its mastery, could 
 be held in chains. As a multitude of weak, 
 imitative natures are always lying by, ready to 
 go mad upon the next wrong idea that may be 
 broached—in these times generally some form 
 of tribute to Somebody for something that never 
 was done, or, if ever done, that was done by 
 Somehody Else—so these less ordinary natures 
 
 “may lie by for years, ready on the touch of an 
 
 instant to burst into flame. 
 The schoolmaster went his way, brooding and 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 155 
 
 brooding, and a sense of being vanquished in g 
 struggle might have been pieced out of his wor- 
 Truly, in his breast there lingered a 
 resentful shame to find himself defeated by this 
 passion for Charley Hexam’s sister, though in 
 the very self-same moments he was concentrat- 
 ing himself upon the object of bringing the pas- 
 sion to a successful issue. 
 
 He appeared before the dolls’ dress-maker, 
 sitting alone at her work. ‘‘Oho!” thought 
 that sharp young personage, ‘‘it’s you, is it? J 
 know yourtricks and your manners, my friend !” 
 
 ‘‘ Hexam’s sister,” said Bradley Headstone, 
 ‘*is not come home yet ?” 
 
 ‘You are quite a conjurer,’ 
 Wren. 
 
 ‘*T will wait, if you please, for I want to speak 
 to her.” 
 
 **Do you?” returned Miss Wren. 
 I hope it’s mutual.” 
 
 Bradley glanced distrustfully at the shrewd 
 face again bending over the work, and said, try- 
 ing to conquer donbt and hesitation; 
 
 ‘*T hope you don’t imply that my visit will be 
 unacceptable to Hexam’s sister ?”” 
 
 ‘“There! Don’t call her that. I can’t bear 
 you to call her that,”’ returned Miss Wren, snap- 
 ping her fingers in a volley of impatient snaps, 
 ‘for I don’t like Hexam.” 
 
 ‘* Indeed ?” 
 
 ‘*No.” Miss Wren wrinkled her nose, to ex- 
 press dislike. ‘‘Selfish, Thinksonly.of him- 
 self. The way with all of you.” 
 
 *“The way with all of us? Then you don’t 
 like me ?”’ 
 
 **So-so,” replied Miss Wren, with a shrug and 
 alaugh. ‘*Don’t know much about you.” 
 
 ‘*But I was not aware it was the way with 
 all of us,” said Bradley, returning to the accu- 
 sation, a little injured. ‘‘Won’t you say, some 
 of us?” 
 
 ‘* Meaning,” returned the little creature, “ ev- 
 ery one of you, but you. Hah! Now look this 
 lady in the face. This is Mrs. Truth. The 
 Honorable. Full-dressed.” 
 
 Bradley glanced at the doll she held up for 
 his observation—which had been lying on its 
 face on her bench, while with a needle and 
 thread she fastened the dress on at the back— 
 and looked from it to her. 
 
 ‘*T stand the Honorable Mrs. T. on my bench 
 in this corner against the wall, where her blue 
 eyes can shine upon you,” pursued Miss Wren, 
 doing so, and making two little dabs at him in 
 the air with her needle, as if she pricked him 
 with it in his own eyes; ‘‘and I defy you to tell 
 me, with Mrs. T. for a witness, what you have 
 come here for.” 
 
 ‘¢To see Hexam’s sister.” 
 
 ‘“You don’t say so!’ retorted Miss Wren, 
 hitching her chin. ‘‘ But on whose account?” 
 
 ‘* Her own.” 
 
 ‘“‘Oh, Mrs. T.!” exclaimed Miss Wren. ‘ You 
 hear him !” 
 
 ‘¢To reason with her,” pursued Bradley, half 
 humoring what-was present, and half angry with 
 what was not present; ‘“for her own sake.” 
 
 “Oh, Mrs. T. !” exclaimed the dress-maker. 
 
 ‘¢ For-her.own sake,” repeated Bradley, warm- 
 ing, ‘‘and for her brother’s, and as a perfectly 
 disinterested person.” w 
 
 ‘‘Really, Mrs, T.,” remarked the dress-mak-~ 
 
 * 
 
 ? 
 
 returned Miss 
 
 *¢ Sit down. 
 
. 
 
 156 
 
 er, ‘‘since it comes to this, we must positively 
 turn you with your face to the wall.” She had 
 hardly done so when Lizzie Hexam arrived, 
 and showed some surprise on seeing Bradley 
 Headstone there, and Jenny shaking her little 
 fist at him close before her eyes, and the Hon- 
 orable Mrs. 'T. with her face to the wall. « 
 
 ‘¢ Here’s a perfectly disinterested person, Liz- 
 zie dear,’’ said the knowing Miss Wren, ‘‘come 
 to talk with you, for your own sake and your 
 brother’s. Think of that. I am sure there 
 ought to be no third party present at any thing 
 so very kind and so very serious; and so, if 
 you'll remove the third party up stairs, my dear, 
 the third party will retire.” 
 
 Lizzie took the hand which the dolls’ dress- 
 maker held out to her for the purpose of being 
 supported away, but only looked at her with an 
 inquiring smile, and made no other movement. 
 
 ‘*'The third party hobbles awfully, you know, 
 when she’s left to herself,” said Miss Wren, 
 ‘*“her back being so bad, and her legs so queer, 
 so she can’t retire gracefully unless you help her, 
 Lizzie.” 
 
 ‘¢She can do no better than stay where she 
 is,” returned Lizzie, releasing the hand, and 
 laying ber own lightly on Miss Jenny’s curls. 
 And then to Bradley: “‘ From Charley, Sir?” 
 
 In an irresolute way, and stealing a clumsy 
 look at her, Bradley rose to place a chair for her, 
 and then returned to his own. 
 
 “‘Strictly speaking,” said he, ‘*I come from 
 Charley, because I left him only a little while 
 ago; but I am not commissioned by Charley. 
 I come of my own spontaneous act.” 
 
 With her elbows on her bench, and her chin 
 upon her hands, Miss Jenny Wren sat looking 
 at him with a watchful sidelong look. Lizzie, 
 in her different way, sat looking at him too. 
 
 “The fact is,” began Bradley, with a mouth 
 so dry that he had some difficulty in articulating 
 his words: the consciousness of which rendered 
 his manner still more ungainly and undecided ; 
 “the truth is, that Charley, having no secrets 
 from me (to the best of my belief), has confided 
 the whole of this matter to me.” 
 
 He came to a stop, and Lizzie asked: ‘* What 
 matter, Sir?” 
 
 ‘I thought,” returned the schoolmaster, steal- 
 ing another look at her, and seeming to try in 
 vain to sustain it; for the look dropped as it 
 lighted on her eyes, ‘‘that it might be so super- 
 fluous as to be almost impertinent, to enter upon 
 a definition of it. My allusion was to this mat- 
 ter of your having put aside your brother’s plans 
 for you, and given the preference to those of Mr. 
 —I believe the name is Mr. Eugene Wrayburn.” 
 
 He made this point of not being certain of 
 the name, with another uneasy look at her, 
 which dropped like the last. 
 
 Nothing being said on the other side, he had 
 to begin again, and began with new embarrass- 
 ment. 
 
 “Your brother’s plans were communicated to 
 me when he first had them in his thoughts. In 
 point of fact he spoke to me about them when I 
 ~ was last here—when we were walking back to- 
 gether, and when I-—-when the impression was 
 fresh upon me of having seen his sister.” 
 
 There might have been no meaning in it, but 
 the little dress-maker here removed one of her 
 supporting hands from her chin, and musingly 
 
 great pains with us. : 
 said to her we hope in a very little while to he 
 
 ” 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. we 
 
 turned the Honorable Mrs. T. with her face to | 
 
 the company, That done she fell into her for- 
 mer attitude. Se ae 
 
 ‘¢T approved of his idea,” said Bradley, with 
 his uneasy look wandering to the doll, and un- 
 consciously resting there longer than it had rest- 
 ed on Lizzie, ‘*‘ both because your brother ought 
 naturally to be the originator cf any such scheme, 
 and because I hoped to be able to promote it. 
 I should have had inexpressible pleasure, I 
 should have taken inexpressible interest, in. pro- 
 moting it. Therefore I must acknowledge that 
 when your brother was disappointed, I too was 
 disappointed. I wish to avoid reservation or 
 concealment, and I fully acknowledge that.” 
 
 He appeared to have enconraged himself by 
 having got so far. At all events he went on 
 with much greater firmness and force of em- 
 phasis: though with a curious disposition to set 
 his teeth, and with a/ curious tight-screwing 
 movement of his right hand in the clenching. 
 palm of his left, like the action of one who was 
 being physically hurt, and was unwilling to ery 
 out. 
 
 ‘‘T am a man of strong feelings, and I have 
 strongly felt this disappointment. I do strongly 
 feel it. I don’t show what I feel; some of us 
 are obliged habitually to keep it down. To 
 keep it down. But to return to your brother. 
 He has taken the matter so much to heart that 
 he has remonstrated (in my presence he remon- 
 strated) with Mr. Eugene Wrayburn, if that be 
 the name. 
 any one not blinded to the real character of Mr. 
 —Mr. Eugene Wrayburn—would readily sup- 
 pose.” 
 
 He looked at Lizzie again, and held the look. 
 And his face turned from burning red to white, 
 and from white back to burning red, and so for 
 the time to lasting deadly white. 
 
 ‘* Finally, I resolved to come here alone and 
 appeal to you. I resolved to come here alone, 
 and entreat you to retract the- course you have 
 chosen, and instead of confiding in a mere 
 stranger—a person of most insolent behavior to 
 your brother and others—to prefer your brother 
 and your brother’s friend.” 
 
 Lizzie Hexam had changed color when those. 
 changes came over him, and her face now ex- 
 pressed some anger, more dislike, and even a 
 touch of fear. But she answered him very 
 steadily. 
 
 ‘*T can ‘vt loupt. Mr. Headstone, that your 
 visit is we?i meent. You have been so good a 
 friend to Ciaile hat I have no right to doubt 
 it. 1 have urine 
 accepted the heij to which he so much objects 
 before he made any plans for me; or certainly 
 before I knew of any. It was considerately and 
 delicately offered, and there were reasons that 
 had weight with me which should be as dear to 
 Charley as to me. I have no more to say to 
 Charley on this subject.” 
 
 His lips trembled and stood apart, as he fol- 
 
 lowed this repudiation of himself, and limitation | 
 
 of her words to her brother. 
 
 ‘‘T should have told Charley, if he had come _ 
 to me,” she resumed, as though it were an after- _ 
 thought, “that Jenny and I find our teacher © 
 
 very able and very patient, and that she takes 
 So much so, that we have 
 
 He did so quite ineffectually. As _ 
 
 | 
 
 to tell Charley, but that L | 
 
able to go on by ourselves. Charley knows 
 about teachers, and I should also have told him, 
 for his satisfaction, that ours comes from an in- 
 stitution where teachers are regularly brought 
 u Boe Z 
 Mi Ishould like to ask you,” said Bradley Head- 
 stone, grinding his words slowly out, as though 
 they came from a rusty mill; ‘‘I should like to 
 ask you, if I may without: offense, whether you 
 would have objected—no; rather, I should like 
 to say, if I may without offense, that I wish I 
 had had the opportunity of coming here with 
 your brother and devoting my poor abilities and 
 experience to your service.” 
 
 **’Thank you, Mr. Headstone.” 
 
 ** But I fear,” he pursued, after a pause, fur- 
 tively wrenching at the seat of his chair with 
 one hand, as if he would have wrenched the 
 chair to pieces, and gloomily observing her while 
 her eyes were cast down, ‘‘ that my humble serv- 
 ices would not have found much favor with you ?” 
 
 She made no reply, and the poor stricken 
 wretch sat contending with himself in a heat 
 of passion and torment. After a while he took 
 out his handkerchief and wiped his forehead and 
 hands. 
 
 ‘* There is only one thing more I had to say, 
 but it is the most important. There is a reason 
 against this matter, there is a personal relation 
 concerned in this matter, not yet explained to 
 you. It might—I don’t say it would—it might 
 —induce you to think differently. To proceed 
 under the present circumstances is out of the 
 question. Will you please come to the under- 
 
 ‘standing that there shall be another interview 
 on the subject ?” 
 
 “With Charley, Mr. Headstone ?” 
 
 ** With — well,” he answered, breaking off, 
 “yes! Say with him too, Will you please 
 
 come to the understanding that there must be |. 
 
 another interview under more favorable circum- 
 stances, before the whole case can be submit- 
 ted ?” 
 
 ‘I don’t,” said Lizzie, shaking her head, 
 “understand your meaning, Mr. Headstone.” 
 
 *‘Limit my meaning for the present,” he in- 
 terrupted, ‘‘to the whole case being submitted 
 to you in another interview.” 
 
 “What case, Mr. Headstone? What is want- 
 ing to it?” 
 
 ‘* You—you shall be informed in the other in- 
 terview.” Then he said, as if in a burst of irre- 
 pressible despair, ‘‘ I—I leave it all incomplete ! 
 There is a spell upon me, I think!” And then 
 added, almost as if he asked for pity, ‘“Good- 
 
 “night!” 
 
 He held out his hand. As she, with mani- 
 fest hesitation, not to say reluctance, touched it, 
 a strange tremble passed over him, and his face, 
 so deadly white, was moved as by a stroke of 
 pain. Then he was gone. 
 
 The dolls’ dress-maker sat with her attitude 
 unchanged, eying the door by which he had de- 
 parted, until Lizzie pushed her bench aside and 
 sat down near her. Then, eying Lizzie as she 
 had previously eyed Bradley and the door, Miss 
 Wren chopped that very sudden and keen chop 
 in which her jaws sometimes indulged, leaned 
 back in her chair with folded arms, and thus 
 ‘expressed herself: | 
 
 “Humph! If he—I mean, of course, my 
 dear, the party who is coming to cowt me when 
 
 a) 
 
 oe : <4 f 
 i ae 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 157 
 
 the time comes—should be that sort of man, he 
 may spare himself the trouble. He wouldn’t do 
 to be trotted about and made useful. He'd take 
 fire and blow up while he was about it.” 
 
 ** And so you would be rid of him,” said Liz- 
 zie, humoi.ng her. 
 
 ‘* Not so easily,” returned Miss Wren. 
 wouldn’t blow upalone. He’d carry me up with 
 him. J know his tricks and his manners.” 
 
 ‘‘ Would he want to hurt you, do you mean?” 
 asked Lizzie. 
 
 ‘‘Mightn’t exactly want to do it, my dear,” 
 returned Miss Wren; ‘but a lot of gunpowder 
 among lighted lucifer-matches in the next room 
 might almost as well be here.” 
 
 ‘“‘He is a gery strange man,” 
 thoughtfully. 
 
 ‘‘f wish he was so very strange a man as to: 
 be a total stranger,” answered the sharp little 
 thing. 
 
 It being Lizzie’s regular occupation when they 
 were alone of an evening to brush out and smooth 
 the long fair hair of the dolls’ dress-maker, she 
 unfastened a ribbon that kept it back while the 
 little creature was at her work, and it fell in a 
 beautiful shower over the poor shoulders that 
 were much in need of such adorning rain. ‘Not 
 now, Lizzie dear,” said Jenny; ‘let us have a 
 talk by the fire.” ‘With those words, she in her 
 turn loosened her friend’s dark hair, and it 
 dropped of its. own weight over her bosom, in 
 two. rich masses. Pretending to compare the 
 colors and admire the contrast, Jenny so man- 
 aged a mere touch or two of her nimble hands, 
 as that she herself laying a cheek on one of the 
 dark folds, seemed blinded by her own cluster- 
 ing curls to all but the fire, while the fine hand- 
 some face and brow of Lizzie were revealed with- 
 out obstruction in the sober light. 
 
 ‘‘Let us have a talk,” said Jenny, ‘about 
 Mr. Eugene Wrayburn.”’ 
 
 Something sparkled down among the fair hair 
 resting on the dark hair; and if it were not a 
 star—which it couldn’t be—it was an eye; and 
 if it were an eye, it was Jenny Wren’s eye, bright 
 and watchful as the bird’s whose name she had 
 taken. 
 
 ‘* Why about Mr. Wrayburn ?” Lizzie asked. 
 
 ‘*For no better reason than because I’m in 
 the humor. I wonder whether he’s rich!” 
 
 ** No, not rich.” 
 
 eR aCOOR £7 
 
 ‘*T think so, for a gentleman.” 
 
 ‘‘Ah! Tobe sure! Yes, he’s a gentleman. 
 Not of our sort; is he ?” 
 
 A shake of the head, a thoughtful shake of 
 the head, and the answer, softly spoken, ‘‘Oh 
 no, oh no!” | 
 
 The dolls’ dress-maker had an arm round her 
 friend’s waist. Adjusting the arm, she slyly 
 took the opportunity of blowing at her own hair 
 where it fell over her face; then the eye down 
 there, under lighter shadows sparkled more 
 brightly and appeared more watchful. 
 
 ‘When He turns up, he sha’n’t be a gentle- 
 man; I'll very soon send him packing, if he is. 
 However, he’s not Mr. Wrayburn; I haven’t 
 captivated him. I wonder whether any body 
 has, Lizzie !” f 
 
 “It is very likely.” 
 
 ‘‘Ts it very likely? I wonder who!” 
 “Ts it not very likely that some lady has 
 
 €¢ He 
 
 said Lizzie, 
 
158 
 
 been taken by him, and that he may love her | might even come to be much better than you 
 
 dearly ?” 
 ‘*Perhaps. I don’t know. 
 think of him, Lizzie, if you were a lady?” 
 
 ‘‘T a lady!” she repeated, laughing. ‘‘Such 
 
 a fancy!” 
 vs, 
 stance.” 
 
 ‘Ta lady! I, a poor girl who used to row 
 poor father on the river. I, who had rowed 
 poor father out and home on the very night 
 when I saw him for the first time. I, who was 
 - made so timid by his looking at me, that I got 
 up and went out!” 
 
 (‘* He did look at you, even that night, though 
 you were not a lady!” thought Miss Wren. ) 
 
 “Ta lady!” Lizzie went on in a low voice, 
 with her eyes upon the fire. ‘‘I, with poor fa- 
 ther’s grave not even cleared of undeserved stain 
 and shame, and he trying to clear it forme! I 
 a lady!” 
 
 “‘Only as a fancy, and for instance,” urged 
 Miss Wren. 
 
 ‘‘Too much, Jenny dear, too much! My 
 fancy is not able to get that far.” As the low 
 fire gleamed upon her, it showed her smiling 
 mournfully and abstractedly. 
 
 ‘* But Iam in the humor, and I must be hu- 
 mored, Lizzie, because after all I am a poor 
 little thing, and have had a hard day with my 
 bad child. Look in the fire, as I like to hear 
 you tell how you used to do when you lived in 
 that dreary old house that had once been a 
 wind-mill. Look in the—what was its name 
 when you told fortunes with your brother that 
 I don’t like?” 
 
 ‘* The hollow down by the flare?” 
 
 ‘Ah! ‘That’s the name! You can find a 
 ady there, J know.” 
 
 ‘¢ More easily than I can make one of such 
 material as myself, Jenny.” 
 
 The sparkling eye looked steadfastly up, as the 
 musing face looked thoughtfully down, ‘* Well?” 
 said the dolls’ dress-maker, ‘‘ We have found our 
 lady ?”’ 
 
 Lizzie nodded, and asked, 
 rich ?” 
 
 «She had better be, as he’s poor.” 
 
 ‘*She is very rich. Shall she be handsome ?” 
 
 ‘¢Even you can be that, Lizzie, so she ought 
 to be.” 
 
 ‘* She is very handsome.” 
 
 ‘* What does she say about him?” asked Miss 
 Jenny, in a low voice: watchful, through an in- 
 tervening silence, of the face looking down at the 
 fire. 
 
 ‘She is glad, glad, to be rich, that he may 
 have the money. She is glad, glad, to be beau- 
 tifal, that he may be proud of her. Her poor 
 heart—” 
 
 ‘¢Kh? Her poor heart?” said Miss Wren. 
 
 ‘¢ Her heart—is given him, with all its love 
 and truth. She would joyfully die with him, 
 or, better than that, die for him. She knows 
 he hasvfailings, but she thinks they have grown 
 up through his being like one cast away, for the 
 want of something to trust in, and care for, and 
 think well of. And she says, that lady rich 
 and beautiful that I can never come near, ‘Only 
 put me in that empty place, only try how little 
 I mind myself, only prove what a world of things 
 I will do and bear for you, and I hope that you 
 
 But say: just as a fancy, and for in- 
 
 *“ Shall she be 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. | ae 
 | 
 
 What would you | hardly worth the thinking of beside you. : 
 | 
 
 ‘dren!” 
 
 her as security. 
 
 are, through me who am so much worse, and 
 99> 
 
 As the face looking at the fire had become 
 exalted and forgetful in the rapture of these 
 words, the little creature, openly clearing away | 
 her fair hair with her disengaged hand, had 
 gazed at it with earnest attention and something 
 like alarm. Now that the speaker ceased, the 
 little creature laid down her head again, and | 
 moaned, ‘‘O me, O me, O me!” | 
 
 ‘‘In pain, dear Jenny?” asked Lizzy, as if 
 awakened. 
 
 ‘‘Yes, but not the old pain. Lay me down, 
 lay me down. Don’t go out of my sight to- 
 night. Lock the door and keep close to me.” 
 Then turning away her face, she said in a whis- 
 
 per to herself, ‘* My Lizzie, my poor Lizzie! 
 :O my blessed children, come back in the long 
 
 bright slanting rows, and come for her, not me. 
 She wants help more than I, my blessed chil- 
 
 She had stretched her hands up with that 
 higher and better look, and now she turned 
 again, and folded them round Lizzie’s neck, | 
 and rocked herself on Lizzie’s breast. 
 
 pS ek Bae 
 
 CHAPTER XII. | 
 MORE BIRDS OF PREY. 
 
 RocvEe Ripervoop dwelt deep and dark in 
 Limehouse Hole, among the riggers, and the 
 mast, oar, and block makers, and the boat-build- 
 ers, and the sail-lofts, as in a kind of ship’s hold 
 stored full of waterside characters, some no bet- 
 ter than himself, some very much better, and 
 none much worse. ‘The Hole, albeit in a gen- ) 
 eral way not over-nice in its choice of company, 
 was rather shy in reference to the honor of cul- 
 tivating the Rogue’s acquaintance; more fre- 
 quently giving him the cold shoulder than the 
 warm hand, and seldom or never drinking with 
 him unless at his own expense. A part of the 
 Hole, indeed, contained so much public spirit 
 and private virtue that not even this strong lev- 
 erage could move it to good fellowship with a 
 tainted accuser. But there may have been the 
 drawback on this magnanimous morality, that 
 its exponents held a true witness before Justice 
 to be the next unneighborly and accursed char- 
 acter to a false one. 
 
 Had it not been for the daughter whom he 
 often mentioned, Mr. Riderhood might have 
 found the Hole a mere grave as to any means 
 it would yield him of getting a living. But Miss 
 Pleasant Riderhood had some little position and 
 connection in Limehouse Hole. Upon the small- 
 est of small scales, she was an unlicensed pawn- 
 broker, keeping what was popularly called a 
 Leaving Shop, by lending insignificant sums on 
 insignificant articles of property deposited with 
 In her four-and-twentieth year 
 of life, Pleasant was already in her fifth year 
 of this way of trade. Her deceased mother had 
 established the business, and on that parent’s 
 demise she had appropriated a secret capital 
 of fifteen shillings to establishing herself in it; 
 the existence of such capital in a pillow being 
 the last intelligible confidential communication — 
 
 made to her by the departed, before suecumb-> _ 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 ing to dropsical conditions of snuff and gin, 
 incompatible equally with coherence and exist- 
 ence. 
 
 Why christened Pleasant, the late Mrs. Rid- 
 erhood might possibly have been at some time 
 able to explain, and possibly not. Her daugh- 
 ter had no information on that point. Pleas- 
 ant she found herself, and she couldn’t help it. 
 She had not been consulted on the question, 
 any more than on the question of her coming 
 into these terrestrial parts, to want a name. 
 Similarly, she found herself possessed of what 
 is colloquially termed_a swivel eye (derived from 
 her father), which she might perhaps have de- 
 clined if her sentiments on the subject had been 
 taken. She was not otherwise positively ill- 
 looking, though anxious, meagre, of a muddy 
 complexion, and looking as old again as she re- 
 ally was. ; 
 
 As some dogs have it in the blood, or are 
 
 trained, to worry certain creatures to a certain. 
 
 point, so—not to make the comparison disre- 
 spectfully — Pleasant Riderhood had it in the 
 blood, or had been trained, to regard seamen, 
 Wituin certuin limits, as her prey. Show her a 
 man in a blue jacket, and, figuratively speaking, 
 she pinned him instantly. Yet, all things con- 
 sidered, she was not of an evil mind or an un- 
 kindly disposition. For, observe how many things 
 were to be considered according to her own un- 
 fortunate experience. Show Pleasant Riderhood 
 a Wedding in the street, and she only saw two 
 people taking out a regular license to quarrel 
 and fight. Show her a Christening, and she 
 saw a little heathen personage having a quiie 
 superfluous name bestowed upon it, inasmuch 
 as it would be commonly addressed by some 
 abusive epithet: which little personage was tot 
 in the least wanted by any body, and would be 
 shoved and banged out of every body’s way, un- 
 til it should grow big enough to shove and bang. 
 Show her a Funeral, and she saw an unremun- 
 erative ceremony. in the nature of a black mas- 
 querade, conferring a temporary gentility on the 
 performers, at an immense expense, and_repre- 
 senting the only formal party ever given by the 
 deceased. Show her a live father, and she saw 
 but a duplicate of her own father, who from. her 
 infancy had been taken with fits and starts of 
 discharging his duty to her, which duty was. al- 
 Ways incorporated in the form of a fist or a 
 
 leathern strap, and being discharged hurt her,’ 
 
 All things considered, therefore, Pleasant Rid- 
 erhood was not so very, verv bad. ‘There was 
 even a touch of romance in her—of such ro- 
 miance as could creep into Limehouse Hole— 
 end maybe sometimes of a summer evening, 
 when she stood with folded arms at her shop- 
 door, looking from the reeking street to the sky 
 where the sun was setting, she may have had 
 some vaporous visions of far-off islands in the 
 southern seas or elsewhere (not being geograph- 
 ically particular), where it would be good to 
 roam with a congenial partner among groves of 
 bread-fruit, waiting for ships to be wafted from 
 the hollow ports of civilization. For, sailors to 
 ‘be ot the better of, were essential to Miss Pleas- 
 ant’s Eden. 
 
 Not on a summer evening did she come to her 
 little shop-door, when a certain man standing 
 over against: the house on the opposite side of the 
 street took notice of her. That was on a cold 
 
 159 
 
 shrewd windy evening, after dark. Pleasant 
 
 | Riderhood shared, with most of the lady inhab- 
 
 itants of the Hol, the peculiarity that her hair 
 was a ragged knot, constantly coming down be- 
 hind, and that she never could enter upon any 
 undertaking without first twisting. it into place. 
 At that particular moment, being newly come to 
 the threshold to take a look out of doors, she 
 was winding herself up with both hands after 
 this fashion. And so prevalent was the fashion, 
 that on the occasion of 4 fight or other disturb- 
 ance in tne Hole, the ladies would be seen flock- 
 ing from all quarters universally twisting their 
 back-hair as they came along, and many of them, 
 in the hurry of the moment, carrying their back- 
 combs in their mouths. 
 
 It was a wretched little shop, with a roof that 
 any man standing. in it could touch with his 
 hand; little better than a cellar or cave, down 
 three steps. Yet in its ill-lighted window, among 
 a flaring handkerchief or two, an old peacoat or 
 so, a few valueless watches and compasses, a jar 
 of tobacco and two crossed pipes, a bottle of wal- 
 nut ketchup, and some horrible sweets—these 
 creature discomforts serving as a blind to the 
 main business of the Leaving Shop—was dis- 
 played the inscription Sraman’s Boarpinc- 
 Ilousp. 
 
 Taking notice of Pleasant Riderhood at the 
 door, the man crossed so quickly that she was’ 
 still winding herself up, when he stood close be- 
 fore her. 
 
 ‘¢Ts vour father at home ?” said he. 
 
 ‘*} think he is,” returned Pleasant, dropping 
 herarms; ‘‘come in.” 
 
 It was a tentative reply, the man having a 
 sea-faring appearance. Her father was not at 
 home, and Pleasant knew it, ‘Take a seat by 
 the fire,” was her hospitable words, when she 
 had got him in; ‘men of your calling are al- 
 ways welcome here.” 
 
 ‘*Thankee,” said the man. 
 
 His manner was the manner of a sailor, and 
 his hands were the hands of a sailor, except that 
 they were smooth. Pleasant had an eye for 
 sailors, and she noticed the unused color and 
 texture of the hands, sunburnt though they were, 
 as sharply as she noticed their unmistakable 
 looseness and suppleness, as he sat himself down 
 with his left arm carelessly thrown across his 
 left leg a little above the knee, and the right 
 arm as carelessly thrown over the elbow of the 
 wooden chair, with the hand curved, half open 
 and half shut, as if it had just let go a rope. 
 
 ** Might vou be locking fora Boarding-House 2?” 
 Pleasant inquired, taking her observant stand on 
 one side of the fire. 
 
 *¢T don’t rightly know niy plans yet,” returned 
 the man. 
 
 ‘¢You ain’t looking for a Leaving Shop?” 
 
 ‘¢No,” said the man. 
 
 ‘*No,” assented Pleasant, ‘‘you’ve got too 
 much of an ontfit on vou for that. But if you 
 should want either, this is both.” . 
 
 ‘¢ Ay, ay!” said the man, glancing round the 
 place. ‘*I know. I’ve been here before.” 
 
 ‘Tid you Leave any thing when you were 
 here before?” asked Pleasant, with a view to. 
 principal and interest. 
 
 ‘“No.”?) The man shook his head. 
 
 ‘‘T am pretty sure you never boarded here ?” 
 
 “No.” The man again shvok his head. 
 
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 MISS RIDERHOOD AT HOME 
 
 **What did you do here when you were here 
 before?” asked Pleasant; ‘‘for I don’t remem- 
 b-r you.” 
 
 {t's not at all likely you should. I only 
 stood’at the door, one night—on the lower step 
 there—while a ship-mate of mine Jooked in to 
 speak to your father. I remember the place 
 well.” Looking very curiously round it, 
 
 ‘*Might that have been long ago?” 
 
 ** Ay, a goodish bit ago. When I came off 
 my last voyage.” 
 
 ‘*'Phen you have not been to sea lately ?” 
 
 “No. Been in the sick bay since then, and 
 been employed ashore.” 
 
 ‘“‘Then, to be sure, that accounts for your 
 hanils.” 
 
 The man with a keen look, a quick smile, and: 
 
 ‘*You’re 
 ‘That accounts for my 
 
 a change of manner, caught her up. 
 a good observer Yes. 
 hands.” 
 
 Pleasant was somewhat disquieted by his look, 
 and returned it suspiciously. Not only was his 
 change of manner, though very sudden, quite 
 collected, but his former manner, which he re- 
 sumed, had a certain suppressed confidence and 
 sense of power in it that were half threatening. 
 
 ‘“* Will your father be long?” he inquired. 
 
 ‘*T don’t know. I can’t say.” 
 
 ‘* As you supposed he was at home, it would 
 seem that he has just gone out? How’s that ?” 
 
 ‘‘T supposed he had come home,” Pleasant 
 explained, 
 
 ‘Oh! You supposed he had come home? 
 Then he has been some time out? How’s that ?” 
 
 ‘*T don’t want to deceive you. Father’s on 
 the river in his boat.” ‘ 
 
 “At the old work?” asked the man. 
 
 ‘*¢T don’t know what you mean,” said Pleas- 
 ant, shrinking a step back. ‘‘ What on earth — 
 d’ye want ?” ae: 
 
 Laer er’ 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 s*y fgon’t want to hurt your father. I don’t 
 ‘want wo say I might, if I chose. I want to speak 
 to him. Not much in that, is there? There 
 shall be no secrets from you; you shall be by. 
 And plainly, Miss hiderhood, there’s nothing to 
 be got out of me, or made of me. I am not 
 good for the Leaving Shop, I am not good for 
 the Boarding-House, I am not good for any thing 
 in your way to the extent of sixpenn’orth of half- 
 pence. Put the idea aside, and we shall get on 
 together.” 
 
 “But you’re a sea-faring man ?” argued Pleas- 
 ant, as if that were a sufficient reason for his be- 
 ing good for something in her way. 
 
 “Yes and no. I have been, and I may be 
 again. But Iamnot for you. Won't you take 
 my word for it ?” 
 
 The conversation had arrived at a crisis to 
 
 justify-Miss Pleasant’s hair in tumbling down. 
 
 It tumbled down accordingly, and she twisted it 
 up, looking from under her bent forehead at the 
 man. In taking stock of his familiarly worn 
 rough-weather nautical clothes, piece by piece, 
 she took stock of a formidable knife in a sheath 
 at his waist ready to his hand, and of a whistle 
 hanging round his neck, and of a short jagged 
 knotted club with a loaded head that peeped out 
 of a pocket of his loose outer jacket or frock. He 
 sat quietly looking at her; but, with these ap- 
 pendages partially revealing themselves, and with 
 a quantity of bristling oakum-colored head and 
 whisker, he had a formidable appearance. 
 
 - ‘*Won’t you take my word for it?” he asked 
 again. 
 
 Pleasant answered with a short dumb nod. 
 He rejoined with another short dumb nod. Then 
 
 ‘he got up and stood with his arms folded, in 
 front of the fire, looking down into it occasion- 
 ally, as she stood with her arms folded, leaning 
 against the side of the chimney-picce. 
 
 “To while away the time till your father 
 comes,” he said—‘‘ pray is there much robbing 
 and murdering of seamen about the water-side 
 now ?” 
 
 *“No,” said Pleasant. 
 
 (24 Any ?” 
 
 “Complaints of that sort are sometimes made 
 about Ratcliffe and Wapping, and up that way. 
 But who knows how many are true?” 
 
 ‘**'To be sure. And it don’t seem necessary.” 
 
 **That’s what I say,” observed Pleasant. 
 *“Where’s the reason for it? Bless the sailors, 
 it ain’t as if they ever could keep what they 
 have without it.” 
 
 “You're right. Their money may be soon 
 got out of them, without violence,” said the man. 
 
 “Of course it may,” said Pleasant; ‘and 
 then they ship again, and get more. And the 
 best thing for ’em, too, to ship again as soon as 
 ever they can be brought to it. They’re never 
 so well off as when they’re afloat.” 
 
 _ “Vil tell you why I ask,” pursued the visitor, 
 looking up from the fire. ‘‘I was once beset 
 that way myself, and left for dead.” 
 
 “No?” said Pleasant. ‘* Where did it hap- 
 pen?” 
 
 “Tt happened,” returned the man, with a 
 Tuminative air, as he drew his right. hand across 
 his chin, and dipped the other in the pocket of 
 his rough outer coat—‘‘ it happened somewhere 
 about here as I reckon. I don’t think it can 
 have been a mile from here.” . 
 
 Y# 
 
 he. 
 
 161 
 
 ** Were you drunk?” asked Pleasant. 
 
 “I was muddled, but not with fair drinking, 
 I had not been drinking, ‘you understand. A 
 mouthful did it.” 
 
 Pleasant with a grave look shook her head; 
 importing that she understood the process, but 
 decidedly disapproved. 
 
 ‘‘Fair trade is one thing,” said she, ‘but 
 that’s another. No one has a right to carry on 
 with Jack in that way.” 
 
 ‘“The sentiment does you credit,” returned 
 the man, with a grim smile; and added, in a 
 mutter, ‘the more so, as I believe it’s not your 
 father’s.—Yes, I had a bad time of it that time. 
 I lost every thing, and had a sharp struggle for 
 my life, weak as I was.” 
 
 ‘*Did you get the parties punished ?” asked 
 Pleasant. 
 
 ‘*A tremendous punishment followed,” said 
 the man, more seriously; ‘ but it was not of my 
 bringing about.” 
 
 ‘*Of whose, then?” asked Pleasant. 
 
 The man pointed upward with his forefinger, 
 and, slowly recovering that hand, settled his chin 
 in it again as he looked at the fire. Bringing 
 her inherited eye to bear upon him, Pleasant 
 Riderhood felt more and more uncomfortable, 
 his manner was so mysterious, so stern, so self- 
 possessed. 
 
 ‘* Any ways,” said the damsel, ‘‘I am glad 
 punishment followed, and I say so. Fair trade 
 with sea-faring men gets a bad name through 
 deeds of violence. I am as much against deeds 
 of violence being done to sea-faring men, as sea- 
 faring men can be themselves. I am of the 
 same opinion as my mother was, when she was 
 living. Fair trade, my mother used to say, but 
 no robbery and no blows.’ In the way of trade 
 Miss Pleasant would have taken—and indeed 
 did take when she could—as much as thirty 
 shillings a week for board that would be dear at 
 five, and likewise. conducted the Leaving busi- 
 ness upon correspondingly equitable principles ; 
 yet she had that tenderness of conscience and 
 those feelings of humanity, that the moment her 
 ideas of trade were overstepped, she became the 
 seaman’s champion, even against her father whom 
 she seldom otherwise resisted. 
 
 But she was here interrupted by her father’s 
 voice exclaiming angrily, ‘*‘ Now, Poll Parrot!” 
 and by her father’s hat being heavily flung from 
 his hand and striking her face. Accustomed to 
 such occasional manifestations of his sense of 
 parental duty, Pleasant merely wiped her face 
 on her hair (which of course had tumbled down) 
 before she twisted itup. This was another com- 
 mon procedure on the part of the ladies of the 
 Hole,when heated by verbal or fistic altercation. 
 
 ‘*Blest if I believe such a Poll Parrot as you 
 was ever learned to speak !”’ growled Mr. Rider- 
 hood, stooping to pick up his hat, and making 
 a feint at her with his head and right elbow ; for 
 he took the delicate subject of robbing seamen 
 in extraordinary dudgeon, and was out of hu- 
 mor too. ‘‘What are you Poll Parroting at 
 now? Ain’t you got nothing to do but fold 
 your arms and stand a Poll Parroting all night ?” 
 
 ‘* Let her alone,” urged the man. ‘‘ She was 
 only speaking to me.”’ 
 
 ‘¢ Let her alone too!”’ retorted Mr. Riderhood, 
 eying him all 2 oe “Do you know she’s my 
 daughter ?” 
 
162 
 
 ee a 
 
 «¢ And don’t you know that I won’t have no 
 Poll. Parroting.on the part of my daughter? 
 No, nor yet that I won’t take-no. Poll Parroting 
 from no man? And who may you be, and what 
 may you want?” 
 
 ‘How can I tell you until you are silent ?” 
 returned the other, fiercely. 
 
 “ Well,” said Mr. Rider hood, quailing a little, 
 ““T am willing to be silent for the purpose of 
 hearing. But don’t Poll Parrot me.’ 
 
 ‘‘ Are you thirsty, you?” the man asked, in 
 the same fierce, short way, after returning his 
 look. 
 
 ‘¢Why nat’rally,” said Mr. Riderhood, ‘‘ ain’t 
 T always thirsty!” (Indignant at the absurdity 
 of the question.) 
 
 “¢ What will you drink ?” demanded the man. 
 
 ‘¢ Sherry wine,” returned Mr. Riderhood, in 
 the same sharp tone, ‘if you're capable of it.’ 
 
 The man put his hand in his pocket, took ont 
 half a-sovereign, and begged the favor of Miss 
 Pleasant that she would fetch a bottle. ‘* With 
 the cork undrawn,” he ‘added, emphatically, 
 looking at her father. 
 
 “T’ll take my Alfred David,” muttered Mr. 
 Riderhood, slowly relaxing into a dark smile, 
 ‘that you know a move. Do J know you? 
 N-n-no, I don’t know you.” 
 
 The man replied, ‘‘No, you don’t know me.”’ 
 And so they stood looking at one another surli- 
 ly enough, until Pleasant came back. 
 
 ‘“There’s small glasses on the shelf,’ said 
 Riderhood to his daughter. ‘* Give me the one 
 without a foot. I gets my living by the sweat 
 
 of my brow, and it’s good enough for me.” ‘This 
 had a modest self-denying appearance; but it 
 
 soon turned out that as, by reason ofthe impos- 
 sibility of standing the glass upright while there 
 was any thing in it, it required to be emptied as 
 soon as filled, Mr, Riderhood managed to drink 
 in the proportion of three to one, 
 
 With his Fortunatus’s goblet ready in his hand, 
 Mr. Riderhood sat down on one side of the table 
 before the fire, and the strange man on the oth- 
 er: Pleasant occupying a stool between the lat- 
 ter and the fireside. The back-ground, com- 
 posed of handkerchiefs, coats, shirts, hats, and 
 other old articles ‘‘On Leaving,” had a general 
 dim resemblance to human listeners; especially 
 where a shiny black sou’wester suit and hat hung, 
 looking very like a clumsy mariner with his back 
 to the company, who was so curious to overhear, 
 that he paused for the purpose with his coat half 
 pulled on, and his shoulders up to his ears in 
 the uncompleted action. 
 
 The visitor first held the bottle against the 
 light of the candle, and next examined the top 
 of the cork. Satisfied that it had not been tam- 
 pered with, he slowly took from his breast-pocket 
 a rusty clasp-knife, and, with a cork-screw in 
 the handle, opened the wine. That done, he 
 looked at the cork, unscrewed it from the cork- 
 screw, laid each separately on the table, and, 
 with the end of the sailor’s knot of his necker- 
 chief, dusted the inside of the neck of the bottle. 
 All this with great deliberation. 
 
 At first Riderhood had sat with his footless 
 glass extended at arm’s-length for filling, while 
 the very deliberate stranger. seemed absorbed in 
 his preparations. But gradually his arm re- 
 verted home to him, and his glass was lowered 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 | and lowered un'il he rested it upside down upon 
 the table. By the same degrees his ‘attention 
 became concentrated on the knife. 
 as the man held out the bottle to fill all round, 
 
 Riderhood stood up, leaned over the table to look 
 
 closer at the knife, and stared from it to him. 
 ‘What's the matter?” asked the man, 
 ‘Why, I know that knife!” said Kiderhood. 
 ‘*Yes, I dare say you do.” he 
 
 He motioned to him to hold up his glass, ‘and 
 
 filled it. Riderhood emptied it to the last drop 
 and began again. 
 
 ‘¢'That there knife—” 
 
 “Stop,” said the man, composedly. ‘‘T was 
 going to drink to your daughter. Your health, 
 Miss Riderhood.” 
 
 “That knife was the knife of aseaman named 
 George Radfoot.” 
 
 ‘Tt was.” 
 
 ‘¢That seaman was well beknown to me.” 
 
 ‘*He was.” 6 
 
 ‘¢What’s come to him ?” 
 
 ‘Death has come to him. Death came to 
 him in an ugly shape. He looked,” said the 
 man, ‘* very horrible after it.” 
 
 ‘*¢ Arter what ?” said Riderhood, with a frown- 
 ing stare. 
 
 ** After he was killed.” 
 
 * Killed? Who killed him ?” 
 
 Only answering with a shrug, the man filled 
 the footless glass, and Riderwood emptied it: 
 looking amazedly from his daughter to his vis- 
 itor. 
 
 ‘¢You don’t mean to tell a honest man—” he 
 was recommencing with his empty glass in his 
 hand, when his eye became fascinated by the 
 stranger’s outer coat. He leaned across the table 
 to see it nearer, touched the sleeve, turned the 
 cuff to look at the sleeve-lining (the man, in his 
 perfect composure, offering not the least objec- 
 tion), and exclaimed, ‘‘It’s my belief as this 
 here coat was George Radfoot’s too!” 
 
 “You areright. He wore it the last time you 
 ever saw him, and the last time you ever will see 
 him—in this world,” 
 
 ‘‘Tt’s my belief you mean to tell me to my 
 face you killed him!” exclaimed Riderhood ; 
 but, nevertheless, allowing his glass to be filled 
 again, 
 
 The man only answered with another shrug, 
 
 and showed no symptom of confusion. 
 
 ‘Wish I may die if I know what to be up to 
 with this chap !’’ said Riderhood, after staring at 
 him, and tossing his last glassful down his throat. 
 ‘**Let’s know what to make of you. Say some- 
 thing plain.” 
 
 “¢T will,” returned the other, leaning forward 
 across the table, and speaking in a low, impress- 
 ive voice. ‘What a liar you are!” 
 
 The honest witness rose, and made as though 
 he would fling his glass inthe man’s face. The 
 man not wincing, and merely shaking his fore- 
 finger half knowingly, half menacinglv, the piece 
 of honesty thought better of it and sat down 
 again, putting the glass down too. 
 
 ‘“¢ And when you went to that lawyer yonder 
 in the Temple with that invented story,” said the 
 stranger, in an exasperatingly comfortable sort 
 of confidence, ‘‘ you might have had your strong 
 suspicions of a friend of vour own, you habeas 
 I think you had, you know.” 
 
 “* Me my suspicions? 
 
 Ving 
 
 And new,” 
 
 Of what friend 2” 
 
«Tell me again whose knife was this?” de- 
 manded the man. | 
 
 “It was possessed by, and was the property of 
 
 —him as [ have made mention on,” said Rider- 
 hood, stupidly evading the actual mention of the 
 name. __ 
 _ Tell me again whose coat was this?” 
 
 i a That there article of clothing likeways be- 
 longed to, and was wore by—him as I have made 
 
 <mention on,” was again the dull Old Bailey 
 
 evasion. 
 **] suspect that you gave him the credit of the 
 deed, and of keeping cleverly out of the way. 
 
 But there was small cleverness in his Keeping | 
 
 out of the way. The cleverness would have 
 
 been, to have got back for one single instant to 
 
 the light of the sun.” 
 
 “Things is come to a pretty pass,” growled 
 Mr. Riderhood, rising to his feet, goaded to 
 stand at bay, ‘‘ when bullyers as is wearing dead 
 
 men’s clothes, and bullyers as is armed with | 
 
 dead men’s knives, is to céme into the houses 
 ? 
 
 of honest live men, getting their livings by the | 
 
 sweats of their brows, and is to make these here 
 sort of charges with no rhyme and no reason, 
 neither the one nor yet the other! Why should 
 I have had my suspicions of him ?” 
 
 ‘* Because you knew him,” replied the man; 
 **because you had been one with him, and knew 
 his real character under a fair outside; because 
 
 on the night which you had afterward reason to 
 
 man. 
 
 believe to be the very night of the murder, he 
 came in here, within an hour of his having left 
 his ship in the docks, and asked you in what 
 lodgings he could find room. Was there no 
 stranger with him ?” 
 
 ‘*Pll take my world-without-end everlasting 
 Alfred David that you warn’t with him,” an- 
 swered Riderhood. ‘* You talk big, you do, but 
 things look pretty black against yourself, to my 
 thinking. You charge again’ me that George 
 Radfoot got lost sight of, and was no more 
 thought of. What’s that for a sailor? 
 there’s fifty such, out of sight and out of mind, 
 
 ten times as long as him—through entering in | 
 different names, re-shipping when the out’ard | 
 
 voyage is made, and what not—a turning up to 
 light every day about here, and no matter made 
 of it. Askmydaughter. You could goon Poll 
 Parroting enough with her, when [ warn’t come 
 in: Poll Parrot a little with her on this pint. 
 You and your suspicions of my suspicions of 
 him! What are my suspicions of you? You 
 tell me George Radfoot got killed. 
 who done it and how you know it, You carry 
 his knife and you wear his coat. I ask you how 
 you com: by ’em? Hand over that there. bot- 
 tle!” Here Mr. Riderhood appeared to labor 
 under a virtuous delusion that it was his own 
 property. ‘‘‘ And you,” he added, turning to his 
 daughter, as he filled the footless glass, ‘‘if it 
 warn't wasting good sherry wine on you, I’d 
 chuck this at you, for Poll Parroting with this 
 It’s along of Poll Parroting that such 
 like as him gets their suspicions, whereas I gets 
 mine by argueyment, and being nat’rally a hon- 
 est man, and sweating away at the brow as 4 
 honest man ought.” Here he filled the footless 
 goblet again, and stood chewing one half of its 
 contents and looking down into the other as he 
 
 _ slowly rolled the wine about in the glass; while 
 
 Pleasant, whose sympathetic hair had come 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 Why | 
 
 I ask you | 
 
 163 
 
 down on her being apostrophized, rearranged it, 
 much in the style of the tail of a horse when 
 proceeding to market to be sold. 
 
 ‘Well? Have you finished?’ asked the 
 strange man. 
 ‘‘ No,” said Riderhood, ‘‘I ain’t. Far from 
 
 it. Now then! ‘I want to know how George 
 Radfoct come by-his-death;-and-how, you come 
 by, his kit ?” . ; 
 |  “‘Ifyvou ever do know, you won’t know now.” 
 
 ** And next I want to know,” proceeded Rid- 
 erhood, “whether you mean to charge that 
 what-you-may-call-it-murder—” 
 
 ‘‘ Harmon murder, father,” suggested Pleas- 
 ant. 
 
 “No Poll Parroting!” he vociferated, in re- 
 ‘turn. ‘Keep your mouth shut!—I want to 
 know, you Sir, whether you charge that there 
 crime on George Radfoot ?” 
 | ‘If you ever do know, you won’t know now.” 
 ‘* Perhaps you done it yourself?” said Rider- 
 hood, with a threatening action. 
 ‘I alone know,” returned the man, sternly 
 | shaking his head, ‘‘the mysteries of that crime. 
 ‘Talone know that your trumped-up story can 
 not possibly be true. I alone know that it must 
 be altogether false, and that you must know it 
 to be altogether false. I come here to-night to 
 _ tell you so much of what I know, and no more.” 
 Mr. Riderhood, with his crooked eye upon his 
 Visitor, meditated for some moments, and then 
 refilled his glass, and tipped the contents down 
 _his throat in three tips, 
 “Shut the shop-door!” he then said to his 
 
 daughter, putting the glass suddenly down. 
 ‘‘And turn the key and stand by it! If you 
 ‘know all this, you Sir,” getting, as he spoke, 
 | between the visitor and the door, ‘why han’t 
 | you gone to Lawyer Lightwood ?” 
 | ‘That, also, is alone known to myself,” was 
 the cool answer. 
 
 ‘**Den’t you know that, if you didn’t do the 
 deed, what you say you could tell is worth from 
 five to ten thousand pound ?” asked Riderhood. 
 
 ‘*] know it very well, and when I claim the 
 money you Shall share it.” 
 
 The honest man paused, and drew a little 
 ‘nearer to the visitor, and a little further from 
 , the door. 
 
 ‘I know it,” repeated the man, quietly, ‘‘as 
 
 well as I know that you and George Radfoot 
 | were one together in more than one dark busi- 
 ness; and as well as I know that you, Roger 
 Riderhood, conspired against an innocent man 
 for blood-money ; and as well as I know that I 
 can-—and that I swear I will!—give you up on 
 both scores, and be proof against you in my own 
 person, if you defy me!” 
 
 ‘‘ Father !”’ cried Pleasant, from the door. 
 
 **Don’t defy him! Give way to him! Don’t 
 get into more trouble, father !” 
 
 ** Will you leave off a Poll Parroting, I ask 
 you ?” cried Mr. Riderhood, half beside himself 
 between the two. Then, propitiatingly and 
 crawlingly: ‘* You Sir! You han’t said what 
 you want of me. Is it fair, is it worthy of your- 
 self, to talk of my defying you afore ever you 
 say what you want of me?”’ . 
 
 ‘¢T don’t want much,’’ said the man. ‘‘ This 
 accusation of yours must not be left half made 
 and half unmade. What was done for the blood- 
 money must be thoroughly undone.” 
 
164 
 
 ‘Well; but Shipmate—” 
 
 ‘* Don’t call me Shipmate,” said the man. 
 
 ‘*Captain, then,’ urged Mr. Riderhood ; 
 “there! You won’t object to Captain. It’s 
 an honorable title, and you fully look it. Cap- 
 tain! <Ain’t the man dead? Now I ask you 
 fair. Ain’t Gaffer dead ?” 
 
 ‘¢ Well,” returned the other, with impatience, 
 **yes, he is dead. What then?” 
 
 “*Can words hurt a dead man, Captain? I 
 only ask you fair.” 
 
 “They can hurt the memory of a dead man, 
 and they can hurt his living children. How 
 many children had this man ?” 
 
 ““Meaning Gaffer, Captain ?” 
 
 ‘“‘Of whom else are we speaking?” returned 
 the other, with a movement of his foot, as if 
 Rogue Riderhood were beginning to sneak be- 
 fore him in the body as well as the spirit, and he 
 spurned him off. ‘‘I have heard of a daughter 
 and ason. I ask for information; I ask your 
 daughter; I prefer to speak to her. What chil- 
 dren did Hexam leave ?” 
 
 Pleasant, looking to her father for permission 
 to reply, that honest man exclaimed with great 
 bitterness : 
 
 “Why the devil don’t you answer the Cap- 
 tain? You can Poll Parrot enough when you 
 ain’t wanted to Poll Parrot, you perwerse jade!” 
 
 Thus encouraged, Pleasant explained that 
 there were only Lizzie, the daughter in ques- 
 tion, and the youth. Both very respectable, 
 she added. . 
 
 *¢Jt is dreadful that any stigma should attach 
 to them,”’ said the visitor, whom the considera- 
 tion rendered so uneasy that he rose, and paced 
 to and fro, muttering, ‘‘ Dreadful! Unfore- 
 seen? How could it be foreseen!” Then he 
 stopped, and asked aloud: ‘* Where do they live ?” 
 
 Pleasant further explained that only the daugh- 
 ter had resided with the father at the time of his 
 accidental death, and that she had immediately 
 afterward quitted the neighborhood. 
 
 ‘‘T know that,” said the man, ‘‘for I have 
 been to the place they dwelt in, at the time of 
 the inquest. Could you quietly find out for me 
 where she lives now ?” 
 
 Pleasant had no doubt she could do that. 
 Within what time, did she think? Within a 
 day. The visitor said that was well, and he 
 would return for the information, relying on its 
 being obtained. To this dialogue Riderhood 
 had attended in silence, and he now obsequious- 
 ly bespake the Captain. 
 
 ‘‘Captain! Mentioning them unfort’net words 
 of mine respecting Gatfter, it is contrairily to. be 
 bore in mind that Gaffer always were a precious 
 rascal, and that his line were a thieving line. 
 Likeways when I went to them two Governors, 
 Lawyer Lightwood and the t’other Governor, 
 with my information, I may have been a little 
 over-eager for the cause of justice, or (to put it 
 another way) a little over-stimilated by them feel- 
 ings which rouses a man up, when a pot of mon- 
 ey is going about, to get his hand into that pot 
 of money for his family’s sake. Besides which, 
 I think the wine of them two Governors was—I 
 will not say a hocussed wine, but fur from a 
 
 wine as was elthy for the mind. And there’s: 
 
 another thing to be remembered, Captain. Did 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 I stick to them words whew Gaffer was no more, 
 and did I say bold to them two Governors, 
 ‘Governors both, wot I informed I still inform ; 
 wot was took down I hold to?’ No. I says, 
 frank and open—no shuffling, mind you, Cap- 
 
 tain!—‘I may have been mistook, Pve been a 
 thinking of it, it mayn’t have been took down ~° 
 
 correct on-this and that, and I won’t swear to 
 thick and thin, I’d rayther forfeit. your good 
 opinions than do it.’ And so far as I know,” 
 
 concluded Mr. Riderhood, by way of proof and 
 evidence to character, ‘‘I have actiwally forfeit- . 
 
 ed the good opinions of several persons — even 
 your own, Captain, if l.understand your words— 
 but I'd sooner do it than be forswore. 
 
 ** You shall sign,” said the visitor, taking very 
 
 little heed of this oration, ‘‘a statement that it_ 
 
 was all utterly false, and the poor girl shall have 
 it. I will bring it with me for your signature 
 when I come again.” 
 
 ‘““When might you be expected, Captain ?” 
 inquired Riderhood, again dubiously getting be- 
 tween him and the door. : 
 
 *¢ Quite soon enough for you. I shall not dis- 
 appoint you; don’t be afraid.” 
 
 ‘*Might you be inclined to leave any name, 
 Captain ?” 
 
 ‘¢No, not at all. J have no such intention.’’ 
 
 ‘¢¢Shall’ is summ/’at of a hard word, Captain,” 
 urged Riderhood, still feebly dodging between 
 him and the door, as he advanced. ‘* When 
 you say a man ‘shall’ sign this and that and 
 tother, Captain, you order him about in a grand 
 sort of a way. Don’t it seem so to yourself?” 
 
 The man stood still, and angrily fixed him. 
 
 with his eyes. 
 
 ‘Father, father!”.entreated Pleasant, from 
 the door, with her disengaged hand nervously 
 trembling at her lips; ‘‘don’t! Don’t get into 
 trouble any more!” 
 
 ‘¢ Hear me out, Captain, hear me out! All 
 I was wishing to mention, Captain, afore you 
 took your departer,”’ said the sneaking Mr. Rid- 
 erhood, falling out of his path, ‘‘ was, your hand- 
 some words relating to the reward.” 
 
 **'When I claim it,” said the man, in a tone 
 which seemed to leave some such words as * you 
 sO: very distinctly understood, ‘you shall share 
 
 ° \ 
 
 Looking steadfastly at Riderhood, he once 
 more said in a low voice, this time with a grim 
 soic of admiration of him as a perfect piece of 
 evil, ‘‘ What a liar you are!” and, nodding his 
 head twice or thrice over the compliment, passed 
 out of the shop. But to Pleasant he said good- 
 night kindly. 
 
 The honest man who gained his living by the 
 sweat of his brow remained in a state akin to 
 stupefaction, until the footless glass and the un- 
 finished bottle conveyed themselves into his mind. 
 From his mind he conveyed them into his hands, 
 and so conveyed the last of the wine into his 
 stomach. When that was done, he awoke to a 
 clear perception that Poll Parroting was solely 
 chargeable with what had passed. Therefore, 
 not to be remiss in his duty as a father, he threw 
 a pair of sea-boots at Pleasant, which she ducked 
 
 to avoid, and then cried, poor thing, using her | 
 
 hair for a pocket-handkerchief, 
 
 There ; . 
 if that’s conspiracy, call me conspirator.” x 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 | mortals,” said he, to be looking into a church- 
 | yard on a wild windy night, and to feel that I no 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 A SOLO AND A DUET. 
 THE wind was blowing so hard when the vis- 
 
 itor came out at the shop-door into the darkness | 
 -and dirt of Limehouse Hole, that it almost blew 
 him in again. 
 
 Doors were slamming violently, 
 Jamps were flickering or blown out, signs were 
 rocking in their frames, the water of the ken- 
 nels, WMA cispersed, flew about in drops like 
 rain. Indifferent to the weather, and even pre- 
 
 ferring it to better weather for its clearance of 
 
 the streets, the man looked about him with a 
 scrutinizing glance. ‘‘Thus much I know,” he 
 murmured. ‘I have never been here since that 
 
 _ . night, and never was here before that night, but 
 
 thus much [ recognize. 
 
 I wonder which way 
 
 did we take when we came out of that shop. 
 
 _ he had begun. 
 
 We turned to the right as I have turned, but I 
 can recall no more. Did we go'by this alley ? 
 Or down that little lane ?” 
 
 He tried both, but both confused him equally, 
 and he came straying back to the same spot. 
 ‘J remember there were poles pushed out of 
 upper windows on which clothes were drying, 
 and I remember a low public house, and the 
 sound flowing down a narrow passage belong- 
 ing to it of the scraping of a fiddle and the shuf- 
 fling of feet. But here are all these things in the 
 lane, and here are all these things in the alley. 
 And I have nothing else in my mind but a wall, 
 a dark doorway, a flight of stairs, and a room.” 
 
 He tried a new direction, but made nothing 
 of it; walls, dark doorways, flights of stairs and 
 rooms, were too abundant. And, like most peo- 
 ple so puzzled, he again and again described a 
 circle, and found himself at the point from which 
 **'This is like what I have read 
 in narratives of escape from prison,” said he, 
 “‘where the little track of the fugitives in the 
 night always seems to take the shape of the 
 great round world, on which they wander; as 
 if it were a secret law.” 
 
 Here he ceased to be the oakum-headed, oak- 
 um-whiskered man on whom Miss Pleasant Rid- 
 erhood had looked, and, allowing for his being 
 still wrapped in a nautical over-coat, became as 
 like that same lost wanted Mr. Julius Hand- 
 ford as never man. was like another in. this 
 world. In the breast of the coat he stowed the 
 bristling hair and whisker, in a moment, as the 
 favoring wind went with him down a solitary 
 place that it had swept clear of passengers. Yet 
 in that same moment he was the Secretary also, 
 Mr. Boffin’s Secretary. For John Rokesmith, 
 
 "too, was as like that same lost wanted Mr. Ju- 
 
 lius Handford as never man was like another in 
 
 this world. ; ) 
 
 “I have no clew to the scene of my death,” 
 said he. ‘‘ Not that it matters now. But hav- 
 ing risked discovery by venturing here at all, I 
 Should have been glad to track some part of the 
 way.” With which singular words he aban- 
 doned his search, came up out of Limehouse 
 Hole, and took the way past Limehouse Church. 
 At the great iron gate of the church-yard he 
 Stopped and looked in. He looked up at the 
 Righ tower spectrally resisting the wind, and 
 
 he looked round at the white tombstones, like 
 
 _ enough to the dead in their winding-sheets, and 
 _ he counted the nine tolls of the clock-bell. 
 
 “It is a sensation not experienced by many 
 
 165 
 
 more hold a place amoung the living than these 
 dead do, and even to know that I lie buried 
 somewhere else, as they lie buried here. No- 
 thing uses me to it. A spirit that was once a 
 man could hardly feel stranger or lonelier, going 
 unrecognized among mankind, than I feel. 
 
 ‘* But this is the fanciful side of the situation. 
 It has a real side, so ditticult that, though I 
 think of it every day, I never thoroughly think 
 it out. Now let me determine to think it out as 
 I walk home. I know I evade it as many men 
 —perhaps most men—do evade thinking their 
 way through their greatest perplexity. I will 
 try to pin myself to mine. Don’t evade it, John 
 Harmon; don’t evade it; think it out! 
 
 ** When I came back to England, attracted to 
 the country with which I had none but most 
 miserable associations, by the accounts of my 
 fine inheritance that found me abroad, I came 
 back, shrinking from my father’s money, shrink- 
 ing from my father’s memory, mistrustful of be- 
 ing forced on a mercenary wife, mistrustful of 
 my father’s intention in thrusting that marriage 
 on me, mistrusiful that I was already growing 
 avaricious, mistrustful that I was slackening in 
 gratitude to the two dear noble honest friends 
 who had made the only sunlight in my childish 
 life or that of my heart-broken sister. I came 
 back, timid, divided in my mind, afraid of my- 
 self and every body here, knowing of nothing 
 but wretchedness that my father’s wealth had 
 ever brought about. Now, stop, and so far 
 think it out, John Harmon. Is thatso? That 
 is exactly so. 
 
 ‘On board serving as third mate was George 
 Radfoot. I knew nothing of him. His name 
 first became known to me about a week before 
 we sailed, through my being accosted by one of 
 the ship-agent’s clerks as ‘Mr. Radfoot.’ It 
 was one day when I had gone aboard to look to 
 my preparations, and the clerk, coming behind 
 me as I stood on deck, tapped me on the shoul- 
 der and said, ‘Mr. Radfoot, look here,’ referring 
 to some papers that he had in his hand. And 
 my name first became known to Radfoot, through 
 another clerk within a.day or two, and.while the 
 ship was yet in port, coming up behind him, tap- 
 ping him on the shoulder and beginning, ‘I beg 
 your pardon, Mr. Harmon—’ I believe we 
 were alike in bulk and stature but not other- 
 wise, and that we were not strikingly alike, even 
 in those respects, when we were together and 
 could be compared. 
 
 ‘* However, a sociable word or two on these 
 mistakes became an easy introduction’ between 
 us, and the weather was hot, and he helped me 
 to a cool cabin on deck along-side his own, and 
 his first school had been at Brussels as mine had 
 been, and he had learned French as [ had learned 
 it, and he had a little history of himself to re- 
 late—God only knows how much of it true, and 
 how much of it false—that had its likeness to 
 mine. I had been a seaman too. -So we got to 
 be confidential together, and the mote easily 
 yet, because he and every one on board had 
 known by general rumor what I was making the 
 voyage to England for. By such degrees and 
 means he came to the knowledge of my uneasi- 
 ness of mind, and of its setting at that time in 
 
166 
 
 the direction of desiring to see and form some 
 judgment of my allotted wife, before she could 
 possibly know me for myself; also to try Mrs. 
 Boffin and give her a glad surprise. So the 
 plot was made out of our getting common sail- 
 ors’ dresses (as he was able to guide me about 
 London), and throwing ourselves in Bella Wil- 
 fer’s neighborhood, and trying to put ourselves 
 in her way, and doing whatever chance might 
 favor on the spot, and seeing what came of it. 
 If nothing came of it I should be no worse off, 
 and there would merely be a short delay in my 
 presenting myself to Lightwood. I have all 
 these factsright? Yes. They are all accurate- 
 ly right. , 
 
 ‘¢His advantage in all this was, that for a 
 time I was to be lost. It might be for a day or 
 for two days, but I must be lost sight of on land- 
 ing, or there would be recognition, anticipation, 
 and failure. Therefore, I disembarked with my 
 valise in my hand—as Potterson the steward 
 and Mr. Jacob Kibble my fellow-passenger af- 
 terward remembered—and waited for him in the 
 dark by that very Limehouse Church which is 
 now behind me. 
 
 ‘‘As I had always shunned the port of Lon- 
 don, I only knew the church through his point- 
 ing out its spire from on board. Perhaps I 
 might recall, if it were any good to try, the way 
 by which I went to it alone from the river; but 
 how we two went from it to Riderhood’s shop I 
 don’t know—any more than I know what turns 
 we took and doubles we made after we left it. 
 The way was purposely confused, no doubt. 
 
 ‘*But let me go on thinking the facts out, 
 and avoid confusing them with my speculations. 
 Whether he took me by a straight way or a 
 crooked way, what is that to the purpose now? 
 Steady, John Harmon. 
 
 ‘*When we stopped at Riderhood’s, and he 
 asked that scoundrel a question or two, purport- 
 ing to refer only to the lodging-houses in which 
 there was accommodation for us had I the least 
 suspicion of him? None. Certainly none until 
 afterward when I held the clew. I think he 
 must have got from Riderhood in a paper the 
 drug, or whatever it was, that afterward stupe- 
 fied me, but I am far from sure. All I felt safe 
 in charging on him to-night was old companion- 
 ship in villainy between them. 
 guised intimacy, and the character I now know 
 Riderhood to bear, made that not at all adven- 
 turous. But I am not clear about the drug. 
 Thinking out the circumstances on which I found 
 my suspicion, they are only two. One: I re- 
 member his changing a small folded paper from 
 one pocket to another after we came out, which 
 he had not touched before. Two: I now know 
 Riderhood to have been previously taken up for 
 being concerned in the robbery of an unlucky sea- 
 man, to whom some sn¢h poison had been given. 
 
 ‘It is my conviction that we can not have 
 gone a mile from that shop before we came to 
 the wall, the dark doorway, the flight of stairs, 
 and the room. The night was particularly dark, 
 andit rained hard. As I think the circumstances 
 back I hear the rain splashing on the stone pave- 
 
 ment of the passage, which was not under cover, | 
 
 The room overlooked the river, or a dock, or a 
 creck, and the tide was out. Being possessed 
 of the time down to that point, I know by the 
 
 hour that it must Lave been about low water; | ning down, but I knew nothing of up or down — 
 
 Their--andis- 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 2) 
 
 but while the coffee was getting ready I drew 
 back the curtain (a dark-brown curtain), and, 
 looking out, knew by the kind of reflection be- 
 low, of the few neighboring lights, that they 
 were reflected in tidal mud. oe 
 
 “He had carried under his arm a canvas bag, 
 containing asuit of his clothes. I had no change 
 of under-clothes with me, as I was to buy slops. 
 ‘You are very wet, Mr.. Harmon’—I can hear 
 him saying—‘and I am quite dry tee this 
 good water-proof coat, Put on these clothes-of 
 mine, You may find on trying them that they 
 will answer your purpose to-morrow, as well as 
 the slops you mean to buy, or beiter. While 
 you change, Vl hurry the hot coffee.’ When he 
 came back I had his clothes on, and there was 
 a black man with him, wearing a lincn jacket, 
 like a steward, who put the smoking coffee on 
 the. table in a tray and never looked at me. I 
 am. so far literal and exact? Literal and exact, 
 T am certain. 
 
 ‘*Now I pass to sick and deranged impres- 
 sions; they are so strong, that I rely upon them ; 
 but there are spaces between them that I know 
 nothing about, and they are not pervaded by any 
 idea of time. 
 
 ‘*T had drank some coffee, when to my sense 
 of sight lie began to swell immensely, and some-. 
 thing urged me torushat him. We had astrug- 
 gle near the door. He got from me, through my 
 not knowing where to strike, in the whirling 
 round of the room, and the flashing of flames 
 of fire between us. I dropped down. Lying 
 helpless on the ground, I was turned over by a 
 foot. I was dragged by the neck into a corner. 
 I heard men speak together. I was turned over 
 by other feet. I saw a figure like myself lying 
 dressed in my clothes on a bed. What might 
 have been, for any thing I knew, a silence of 
 days, weeks, monthis, years, was broken by a yvio- 
 lent wrestling of men all over the room. The 
 figure like myself was assailed, and my valise 
 was in its hand. I was trodden upon and fallen ° 
 over. I heard a noise of bluws, and thought it 
 was a wood-cutter cutting down a tree. I could 
 not have said that my name was John Harmon 
 —I could not have thought it—I didn’t know it 
 —but when I heard the blows, I thought of the 
 wood-cutter and his axe, and had some dead idea 
 that I was lying in a forest. 
 
 “*"Phis is still correct? Still correct, with the 
 exception that I can not possibly express it to 
 myself without using the word I. But it was 
 not I. ‘There was no such thing as I, within my 
 knowledge. 
 
 ‘“It was only after a downward slide through 
 something like a tube, and then a great noise 
 and a sparkling and crackling as of fires, that 
 the consciousness came upon me, ‘This is John 
 Harmon drowning! John Harmon, struggle for 
 our life. John Harmén, call on Heaven and 
 save yourself!’ I think I cried it out aloud ina 
 great agony, and then a heavy horrid unintelli- 
 gible something vanished, and it was I who was 
 struggling there alone in the water. 
 
 ‘*T was very weak and faint, frightfully op- 
 pressed with drowsiness, and driving fast with 
 the tide. Looking over the black water, I saw 
 the lights racing past me on the two banks of 
 
 the river, as if they were eager to be gone and ~ 
 
 leave me dying in the dark. The tide was run- — 
 
 “ 
 
 \ 
 
 ' 
 1 
 
 y 
 
ry 
 
 y 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 167 
 
 * Dj MORE DEAD THAN ALIVE, 
 
 then. When, guiding myself safely with Heay- 
 _ en’s assistance before the tierce set of the water, 
 Tat last canght at a boat moored, one of a tier 
 of boats at a causeway, I was sucked under 
 her, and came’ up, only just alive, on the other 
 — gsicle. 
 q ‘‘ Was I Jong in the water? Long enough to 
 ‘|be chilled to the heart, but I don’t know how 
 long. Yet the cold was merciful, for it was the 
 cold night air and the rain that restored me from 
 ‘Naturally supposed me to have toppled in, drunk, 
 When I crept to the public house it belonged to; 
 for [had no notion where I was, and conld not 
 articulate—throngh the poison that had made 
 ~™: insensible having affected mv specch—and [ 
 supposed the night to be the previous night, as it 
 Was still dark and raining. But I had lost twen- 
 _ ty-four hours. 
 — “TL have checked the calculation often, and it 
 Must have been two nights that I lay recovering 
 rey. 
 
 " 
 
 & swoon on the stones of the causeway, They 
 
 | 
 
 in that public house. Letmesee. Yes. Iam 
 sure it was while I lay in that bed there, that the 
 thought entered my head of turning the danger 
 I had passed through to the account of being 
 for some time supposed to have disappeared mys- 
 teriously, and of proving Bella. The dread of 
 our being forced on one another, and perpetuat- 
 ing the fate that seemed to have fallen on my 
 father’s riches—the fate that they should lead to 
 nothing but evil—was strong upon the moral 
 timidity that dates from my childhood with my 
 poor sister, 
 
 ‘As to this hour I can not understand that 
 
 side of the river where I recovered the shore, 
 
 being the opposite side to that on which.I was 
 ensnared, I shall never understand it now. Even 
 at this moment, while I leave the river behind 
 me, going home, I can not conceive that it rolls 
 between me and that spot, or that the sea is 
 where it is. But this is not thinking it out; 
 this is making a leap to the present time. 
 
168 
 
 **T could not have done it, but for the fortune 
 in the water-proof belt round my body. Not a 
 great fortune, forty and odd pounds, for the in- 
 heritor of a hundred and odd thousand! But it 
 was enough. Without it I must have disclosed 
 myself. Without it I could never have gone 
 to the Exchequer Coffee-house, or taken Mrs. 
 Wilfer’s lodgings. 
 
 ‘¢ Some twelve days I lived at that hotel, be- 
 fore the night when I saw the corpse of Radfvot 
 at the Police Station. The inexpressible mental 
 horror that I labored under, as one of the conse- 
 quences of the poison, makes (the interval seem 
 greatly longer, but I know it can not have been 
 longer. That suffering has gradually weakened 
 and weakened since, and has only come upon 
 me by starts, and I hope I am free from it now ; 
 but even now I have sometimes to think, con- 
 strain myself, and stop before speaking, or I 
 could not say the words I want to say. 
 
 ** Again I ramble away from thinking it out 
 to theend. Itis not so far to the end that I need 
 be tempted to break off. Now, on straight! 
 
 ‘“‘f examined the newspapers every day for 
 tidings that I was missing, but saw none. Going 
 out that night to walk (for I kept retired while 
 it was light), I found a crowd assembled round 
 a placard posted at Whitehall. It described my- 
 self, John Harmon, as found dead and mutilated 
 in the river under circumstances of strong sus- 
 picion, described my dress, described the papers 
 in my pockets, and stated where I was lying for 
 recognition. In a wild incautious way I hurried 
 there, and there—with the horror of the death I 
 had escaped, before my eyes in its most appall- 
 ing shape, added to the inconceivable horror tor- 
 menting me at that time when the poisonous 
 stuff was strongest on me—I perceived that Rad- 
 foot had been murdered by some unknown hands 
 for the money for which’ he would have mur- 
 dered me, and that probably we had both been 
 shot into the river from the same dark place into 
 the same dark tide, when the stream ran deep 
 and strong. 
 
 ‘That night I almost gave up my mystery, 
 though I suspected no one, could offer no in- 
 formation, knew absolutely nothing save that the 
 murdered man was not I, but Radfoot. Next 
 day while I hesitated, and next day while I hes- 
 itated, it seemed as if the whole country were 
 determined to have me dead. The Inquest de- 
 clared me dead, the Government proclaimed me 
 dead; I could not listen at my fireside for five 
 minutes to the outer noises but it was borne into 
 my ears that I was dead. 
 
 ‘¢So John Harmon died, and Julius Hand- 
 ford disappeared, and John Rokesmith was born. 
 John Rokesmith’s intent to-night has been to 
 repair a wrong that he could never have imag- 
 ined possible, coming to his ears through the 
 Lightwood talk related to him, and which he is 
 bound by every consideration to remedy. In 
 that intent John Rokesmith will persevere, as 
 his duty is. 
 
 “* Now, is it all thought out? All to this time? 
 Nothing omitted? No, nothing. But beyond 
 this time? To think it out through the future 
 is a harder though a much shorter task than to 
 think it out through the past. John Harmon is 
 dead. Should John Harmon come to life? 
 
 “Tf yes, why? If no, why? 
 
 ‘* Take yes, first. To enlighten human Jus- 
 
 OUR MUTUAL ¥FRIEND. 
 
 tice concerning the offense of one far beyond it 
 
 who may have a living mother, ‘To enlighten it _ 
 with the lights of a stone passage, a flight of 
 stairs, a brown’ window-curtain, and a black 
 man. ‘To come into possession of my father’s 
 money, and wiih it sordidly to buy a beautiful — 
 creature whom I love 
 
 reason—but who would as soon love me for my 
 own sake as she would love the beggar at the 
 corner, What a use for tie money, and how 
 worthy of its old misuses! 
 
 *“* Now, take no, The reasons why John Har- 
 mon should not come to life. Because he has 
 passively allowed these dear old faithful friends 
 to pass into possession of the, property. 
 he sees them happy with it, making a good use 
 
 of it, effacing the old rust and tarnish on the © 
 
 money, Because they have virtually adopted 
 Bella, and will provide for her. Because there 
 is affection enough in her nature, and warmth 
 enough in her heart, to develop into something 
 
 enduringly good, under favorable conditions, 
 
 Because her faults have been intensified by her — 
 
 place in my father's will, and she is already 
 growing better. Because her marriage with 
 
 ai 
 
 John Harmon, after what I have heard from ~ 
 
 her own lips, would be a shocking mockery, of 
 which both she and I must always be conscious, 
 
 and which would degrade her in her mind, and © 
 Be- 
 cause if John Harmon comes to life and does © 
 not marry her, the property falls into the very ~ 
 
 me in mine, and each of us in the other’s. 
 
 hands that hold it now. 
 ‘What would I have? Dead, I have found 
 the true friends of my lifetime still as true as 
 
 tender, and as faithful as when I was alive, and — 
 making my memory an incentive to good ac- — 
 Dead, I have found 
 them when they might have slighted my name, — 
 and passed greedily over my grave to ease and — 
 wealth, lingering by the way, like single-hearted — 
 children, to recall their love for me when I was — 
 a poor frightened child. Dead, I have heard — 
 from the woman who would have been my wife 
 
 tions done in my name, 
 
 if I had lived the revolting truth that I should 
 
 have purchased her, caring nothing for me, as a 
 
 hyd 
 If the dead could _ 
 know, or do know, how the living use them, who — 
 among the hosts of dead has found a more dis- ~ 
 
 Sultan buys a slave. 
 ‘What would I have? 
 
 interested fidelity on earth than 1? Is not that 
 enough for me? If I had come back, these no- 
 ble creatures would have welcomed me, wept 
 over me, given up every thing to me with joy. | 
 I did not come back, and they have passed un- 
 spoiled into my place. 
 let Bella rest in hers. 
 
 **What course for me then? This. To live 
 the same quiet Secretary life, carefully avoiding 
 
 chances of recognition, until they shall have be- _ 
 
 come more accustomed to their altered state, 
 and until the great swarm of swindlers under 
 many names shall have found newer prey. By 
 
 that time, the method I am establishing through ri 
 all the affairs, and with which I will every day 
 take new pains to make them both familiar, will — 
 
 be, I may hope, a machine in such working or- 
 der as that they can keep it going. I know I_ 
 need but ask of their generosity to have. When 
 the right time comes, I will ask no more th 
 will replace me in my former path of life, a 
 
 [can not help it; reason © 
 has nothing to do with it; I love her against | 
 
 Becanse » 
 
 Let them rest in it, and 
 
TF 
 
 - he may. But John Harmon shall come back 
 no more. 
 hat I may never, in the days to come afar 
 _ off, have any weak misgiving that Bella might, 
 - im any contingency, have taken me for my own 
 _ Sake if I had plainly asked her, I will plainly 
 ask her; proving beyond all question what I al- 
 _ ready know too well. And now it is all thought 
 Out, from the beginning to the end, and my mind 
 is easier.” ; 
 
 So deeply engaged had the living-dead man 
 been, in thus communing with himself, that he 
 had regarded neither the wind nor the way, and 
 had resisted the former as instinctively as he had 
 pursued the latter. But being now come into 
 
 * the City, where there was a coach-stand, he stood 
 _irresolute whether to go to: his lodgings, or to go 
 first to Mr. Bottin’s house. He decided to go 
 round by the house, arguing, as he carried his 
 over-coat upon his arm, that it was less likely to 
 attract notice if left there than if taken to Hol- 
 toway: both Mrs. Wilfer and Miss Lavinia be- 
 __ ing ravenously curious touching every article of 
 which the lodger stood possessed. 
 __ Arriving at the house, he found that Mr. and 
 Mrs. Boffin were out, but that Miss Wilfer was 
 in the drawing-room. Miss Wilfer had remain- 
 ed at home, in consequence of not feeling very 
 well, and had inquired in the evening if Mr. 
 Rokesmith were in his room, 
 i “Make my compliments to Miss Wilfer, and 
 = say I am here*“now.” 
 Miss Wilfer’s compliments came down in re- 
 turn, and, if it were not too much trouble, would 
 _ Mr. Rokesmith be so kind as to come up before 
 he went? 
 
 ’ Tt was not too. much trouble, and Mr. Roke- 
 
 _ smith came up. 
 
 ~ Oh she looked very pretty, she looked very, 
 very pretty! If the father of the late John Har- 
 
 mon had but left his money unconditionally to 
 
 his son, and if his son had but lighted on this 
 _ lovable girl for himself, and had the happiness 
 to make her loving as well as lovable! 
 “Dear me! Are you not well, Mr. Roke- 
 smith ?” 
 
 “Yes, quite well. I was sorry to hear, when 
 
 I came in, that you were not.” 
 **A mere nothing. I had a headache—gone 
 ‘now—and was not quite fit for a hot theatre, so 
 Istaid at home. I asked you if you were not 
 well, because you look so white.” 
 ~**Dol? Ihave had a busy evening.” 
 She was on a low ottoman before the fire, with 
 a little shining jewel of a table, and her book 
 and her work, beside her. - Ah! what a differ- 
 ent life the late John Harmon’s, if it had been 
 his happy privilege to take his place upon that 
 ottoman, and draw his arm about that waist, 
 and say, ‘‘I hope the time has been long with- 
 out me? What a Home Goddess you look, my 
 darling!” 
 __ But the present John Rokesmith, far removed 
 _ from the late John Harmon, remained standing 
 at a distance. A little distance in respect of 
 _ Space, but a great distance in respect of separa- 
 
 tion. 
 
 i Aa OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 Tas ohn Rokesmith shall tread it as contentedly as | 
 
 _ “Mr. Rokesmith,” said Bella, taking up her 
 _ work, and inspecting it all round the corners, 
 
 **T wanted to say something to you when I could 
 ae 11 
 
 ‘169 
 
 have the opportunity, as an explanation why I 
 
 was rude to you the other day. You hav@ no 
 right to think ill of me, Sir.” | 
 
 The sharp little way in which she darted a 
 look at him, half sensitively injured, and half 
 pettishly, would have been very much admired 
 by the late John Harmon. 
 
 “You don’t know how well I think 
 Miss Wilfer.” 
 
 ‘Truly you must have a very high opinion 
 of me, Mr. Rokesmith, when you believe that in 
 prosperity I neglect and forget my old home.” 
 
 “*Do I believe so ?” 
 
 ‘*You did, Sir, at any rate,” returned Bella. 
 
 ‘I took the liberty of reminding you of a lit. 
 tle omission into which you had fallen—insens- 
 ibly and naturally fallen. It was no more than 
 that.” ' 
 
 ‘And I beg leave to ask you, Mr. Rokesmith,” 
 said Bella, ‘‘ why you took that liberty ?—I hope 
 there is no offense in the phrase; it is your own, 
 remember.” : 
 
 ‘* Because Iam truly, deeply, profoundly in- 
 terested in you, Miss Wilfer.. Because I wish to 
 see you always at your best. Because I—shall 
 I go on?” 
 
 ‘‘No, Sir,” returned Bella, with a burning 
 face, ‘‘ you have said more than enough. I beg 
 that you will ot go on. If you have any gen- 
 erosity, any honor, you will say no more.” 
 
 The late John Harmon, looking at the prond 
 face with the downcast eyes, and at the quick 
 breathing as it stirred the fall of bright brown 
 hair over the beautiful neck, would probably have 
 remained silent. 
 
 “I wish to speak to you, Sir,” said Bella, 
 ‘fonce for all, and I don’t know how to do it. 
 I have sat here all this evening, wishing to speak 
 to you, and determining to speak to you, and 
 feeling that Inmust. I beg for'a moment’s time.” 
 
 He remained silent, and she remained with 
 her face averted, sometimes making a slight 
 movement as if she would turn and speak. At 
 length she did so. | 
 
 ‘* You know how I am situated here, Sir, and 
 you know how I am situated at home. I must 
 speak to you for myself, since there is no one 
 about me whom I could ask to do so. It is not 
 gencrous in you, it is not honorable in you, to 
 conduet yourself toward me as you do,” 
 
 ‘*Ts it ungenerous or dishonorable to be de- 
 voted to you; fascinated by you?” 
 
 ** Preposterous!” said Bella. 
 
 The late John Harmon might have thought it 
 rather a contemptuous and lofty word of repudi- 
 ation. | 
 
 ‘‘T now feel obliged to go on,” pursued the . 
 Secretary, ‘‘ though it were only in self-explana- 
 tion and self-defense. I hope, Miss Wilfer, that 
 it is not unpardonable-—-even in me—to make an 
 honest declaration of an honest devotion to you.” 
 
 *‘An honest declaration!” repeated Bella, 
 with emphasis. 
 
 ‘*Ts it otherwise ?” 
 
 _ “JT must request, Sir,’ said Bella, taking ref- 
 uge in a touch of timely resentment, ‘‘that I 
 may not be questioned. You must excuse me 
 if I decline to be cross-examined.” . 
 
 “Oh, Miss Wilfer, this is hardly charitable. 
 
 of you, 
 
 J ask you nothing but what your own emphasis 
 
 suggests. However, I waive even that question. 
 But what I have declared I take my stand by. 
 
 e 
 
4 
 
 470 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 os 
 o> 
 
 + tele 
 
 I can not recall the avowal of my earnest and | pating, or knowing beforehand, that I should 
 
 deep attachment to you, and Ido not recall it.’ 
 **T reject it, Sir,” said Bella. 
 
 “TI should be blind and deaf if I were not pre- 
 Forgive my offense, for it 
 
 pared for the reply. 
 carries its punishment with it.” 
 ‘*What punishment ?” asked Bella. 
 
 ‘‘Is my present endurance none? But ex- 
 cuse me; I did not mean to cross-examine you 
 
 again.” 
 
 ‘You take advantage of a hasty word of 
 mine, 
 proach, ‘‘ to make me seem—lI don’t know what. 
 I spoke without consideration when I used it. 
 
 If that was bad, I am sorry; but you repeat it 
 
 after consideration, and that seems to me to be 
 at least no better.. For the rest, I beg it may 
 be understood, Mr. Rokesmith, that there is an 
 end of this between us, now and forever.” 
 
 **Now and forever,’’ he repeated. 
 
 “Yes. I appeal to you, Sir,” proceeded Bel- 
 la with increasing spirit, ‘‘not to pursue me. I 
 appeal to you not to take advantage of your po- 
 sition in this house to make my position in it 
 distressing and disagreeable. I appeal to you 
 to discontinue your habit of making your mis- 
 placed attentions as plain to Mrs. Botfin as to 
 me.” 
 
 “Have I done so?” 
 
 “*T should think you have,” replied Bella. 
 “‘In any case it is not your fault if you have 
 not, Mr. Rokesmith.” 
 
 ‘*T hope you are wrong in that impression. 
 I should be very sorry to have justified it. I 
 think I have not. For the future there is no 
 apprehension. It is all over.” 
 
 “‘T am much relieved to hear it,” said Bella. 
 **T have far other views in life, and why should 
 you waste your own?” 
 
 ‘‘Mine!” said the Secretary. ‘‘ My life!” 
 
 His curious tone caused Bella to glance at the 
 curious smile with which he said it. It was 
 gone as he glanced back. ‘‘ Pardon me, Miss 
 Wilfer,” he proceeded, when their eyes met; 
 - you have used some hard words, for which I 
 do not doubt you have a justification in your 
 mind that I do not understand. Ungenerous 
 and dishonorable! In what?” 
 
 ‘*T would rather not be asked,” said Bella, 
 haughtily looking down. 
 
 ‘‘T would rather not ask, but the question is 
 imposed upon me. Kindly explain; or if not 
 kindly, justly.” 
 
 ‘¢Oh, Sir!” said Bella, raising her eyes to his, 
 after a little struggle to forbear, ‘‘is it generous 
 and honorable to use the power here which your 
 favor with Mr. and Mrs. Boffin and your ability 
 in your place give you against me?” 
 
 ‘* Against you?” 
 
 “Is it generous and hdncrabla to form a plan 
 for gradually. bringing their influence to bear 
 upon a suit which I have shown you that I do 
 not like, and which I tell you that I utterly re- 
 ject ?”’ 
 
 : The late John Harmon could have borne a 
 
 9? 
 
 good deal, but he would have been cut to the! 
 
 heart by such a suspicion as this. . 
 ** Would it be generous and honorable to step 
 into your place—if you did so, for I don’t know 
 
 that you did, and I hope you did not—antici-| 
 
 e 
 
 ”* said Bella, with a little sting of self-re- 
 
 come here, and designing to take me at this dis-! 
 advantage ?” : 
 
 “This mean and cruel diadvatieae 
 the Secretary. 
 
 ‘¢ Yes,” assented Bella. 
 
 The Secretary kept silence for a little while; ; 
 then merely said, ‘‘ You are wholly mistaken, 
 Miss Wilfer ; wonder rfully mistaken. I can not 
 say, however, that it is your fault. If I deserve 
 better things of: you, you do not know it.” : 
 
 ‘¢ At least, Sir,’ retorted Bella, with her old 
 indignation rising, ‘‘ you know the history of my 
 being here at all. I have heard Mr. Boffin say 
 that you are master of every line and word of 
 that will, as you are master of all his affairs. 
 And was it not enough that I should have been 
 willed away, like a horse, or a dog, or a bird ; 
 but must you too begin to dispose of me in your 
 mind, and speculate in me, as soon as I had. 
 ceased to be the talk and the laugh of the town ? 
 Am I forever to be made the property of stran- 
 gers ?” 
 
 ‘¢ Believe me,’ ’ returned: the Secretary, “you. 
 are wonderfully mistaken.” ¢ ' 
 
 ‘‘T should be glad to know it,” answered 
 Bella. 
 
 **T doubt if you ever will. Good-night. Of — 
 course I shall be careful to conceal any traces 
 of this interview from Mr. and Mrs. Boffin, as i 
 long as I remain here. ‘Trust me, what you 
 have complained of is at an end forever.” ; 
 
 ‘‘T am glad I have spoken, then, Mr. Roke- ~ 
 smith. It has been painful and @ifficult, but it - 
 is done. If I have hurt you, I hope you will 
 forgive me. I am inexperienced and impetu- — 
 ous, and I have been a little spoiled; but I real- 
 ly am not so bad as I dare say I appear, or as 
 you think me.” 4 
 
 ; 
 
 said e 
 
 He quitted the room when Bella had said this, a 
 relenting in her willful-inconsistent way. Left — 
 alone, she threw herself back on her ottoman, 
 and said, ‘‘I didn’t know the lovely woman was — ‘ 
 such a Dr agon!” ‘Then she got up and looked 
 in the glass, and said to her image, ‘* You have a 
 been positively swelling your features, you little ~ 
 fool!” Then she took an impatient walk to the 
 other end of the room and back, and said, ‘I 
 wish Pa was here to have a talk about an avari- _ 
 cious marriage ; but he is better away, poor dear, 
 for I know I should pull his hair if he was here.” 
 And then she threw her work away, and threw ~ 
 her book after it, and sat down and hummed a ‘ 
 tune, and hummed it out of tune, and quarreled 
 with it. 
 
 And John Rokesmith, what did he ?. 
 
 He went down to his room, and buried John 
 Harmon many additional fathoms deep. He 
 took his hat and walked out, and, as he went to 
 Holloway or any where else—not at all minding 
 where—heaped mounds upon mounds of earth 
 over John Harmon’s grave. His walking did 
 not bring him home until the dawn of day. And 
 so busy had he been all night, piling and piling 
 weights. upon. weights’of earth.above John Har- 
 mon’s grave, that by thattime John Harmonlay __ 
 buried under a whole Alpine range; and still 
 the Sexton Rokesmith accumulated mountains _ 
 over him, lightening his labor with the dirge, 
 ** Cover him, crush him, keep him down!” 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 CHAPTERXIV. 
 STRONG OF PURPOSE. 
 
 TH sexton-task of piling earth above John 
 Harmon all night long was not conducive to 
 sound sleep; but Rokesmith had some broken 
 morning rest, and rose strengthened in his pur- 
 pose. It was all over now. No ghost should 
 
 trouble Mr. and Mrs. Boffin’s peace; invisible 
 
 ‘separate circumstances. 
 
 and voiceless, the ghost should look on for a lit- 
 tle while longer at the state of existence out of 
 which it had departed, and then should forever 
 cease to haunt the scenes in which it had no 
 
 lage. 
 , # went over it all again. He had lapsed 
 into the condition in which he found himself, as 
 many a man lapses into many a condition, with- 
 out perceiving the accumulative power of its 
 When.in the distrust 
 engendered by his wretched childhood and the 
 action for evil—never yet for good within his 
 knowledge then—of his father and his father’s 
 wealth on all within their influence, he conceived 
 
 the idea of his first deception, it was meant to 
 
 meant well toward her. 
 
 be harmless, it was to last but a few hours or 
 days, it was to involve in it only the girl so ca- 
 priciously forced upon him, and upon whom he 
 was so capriciously forced, and it was honestly 
 For if he had found 
 her unhappy in the prospect of that marriage 
 
 . (through'her heart inclining to another man or 
 
 for any other cause), he would seriously have 
 
 said: ‘‘ Thisis another of the old perverted uses 
 
 of the misery-making money. I will let it go to 
 
 - my and my sister’s only protectors and friends.” 
 
 When the snare into which he fell so outstripped 
 
 his first intention as that he found himself pla- 
 
 carded by the police authorities upon the London 
 
 walls for dead, he confusedly accepted the aid 
 
 - accession to the fortune. 
 
 that fell upon him, without considering how 
 firmly it must seem to fix the Boffins in their 
 When he saw them, 
 
 ‘and knew them, and even from his vantage- 
 
 - ground of inspection could find no flaw in them, 
 
 he asked himself, “ And shall I come to life to 
 dispossess such people as these?” There was 
 no good to set against the putting of them to 
 
 ‘that hard proof. He had heard from Bella’s 
 
 own lips when he stood tapping at the door on 
 
 that night of his taking the lodgings, that the 
 
 marriage would have been on her part thorough- 
 ly mercenary. He had since tried her, in his 
 own unknown person and supposed station, and 
 she not only rejected his advances but resented 
 them. Was it for him to have the shame of 
 buying her, or the meanness of punishing her ? 
 Yet, by coming to life, and accepting the condi- 
 tion of the inheritance, he must do the former ; 
 and by coming to life and rejecting it, he must 
 do the latter. a 
 
 Another consequence that he had never fore- 
 shadowed, was the implication of an innocent 
 man in his supposed murder. He would obtain 
 complete retractation from the accuser, and set 
 
 the wrong right; but clearly the wrong could} 
 
 never have been done if he had never planned a 
 deception. Then, whatever inconvenience or 
 distress of mind the deception cost him, it was 
 manful repentantly to accept’as among its con- 
 sequences, and make no complaint. 
 
 Thus John Rokesmith in the morning, and it 
 
 fe 
 171 
 
 buried. John Harmon still many fathoms deeper 
 than he had been buried in the night. 
 
 Going out earlier than he was accustomed to 
 do, he encountered the cherub at the door. The 
 cherub’s way was for a certain space his way, 
 and they walked together. 
 
 It was impossible not to notice the change in 
 the cherub’s appearance. The cherub felt very 
 conscious of it, and modestly remarked: ‘**A 
 present from my daughter Bella, Mr. Roke- 
 smith.” 
 
 The words gave the Secretary a stroke of 
 pleasure, for he remembered the fifty pounds, 
 and he still loved the girl. No doubt it was 
 very weak—it always is very weak, some author- 
 ities hold—but he loved the girl. 
 
 ‘¢T don’t know whether you happen to have 
 read many books of African Travel, Mr. Roke- 
 smith ?” said R. W. 
 
 ‘¢T have read several.” 
 
 ‘¢Well, you know, there’s usually a King 
 George, or a King Boy, or a King Sambo, or a 
 King Bill, or Bull, or Rum, or Junk, or what- 
 ever name the sailors may have happened to 
 give him.” 
 
 ‘¢ Where?” asked.Rokesmith. 
 
 ‘¢ Any where. Any where in Africa, I mean. 
 Pretty well every where, I may say; for black 
 kings are cheap—and J think’—said R. W., 
 with an apologetic air, ‘‘nasty.” 
 
 “‘T am much of your opinion, Mr. Wilfer. 
 You were going to say—?” 
 
 ‘“‘T was going to say, the king is generally 
 dressed in a London hat only, or a Manches- 
 ter pair of braces, or one epaulet, or a uniform 
 coat with his legs in the sleeves, or something 
 of that kind.” 
 
 ‘+ Just so,” said the Secretary. 
 
 “ In confidence, I assure you, Mr. Rokesmith,” 
 observed the cheerful cherub, “‘that when more 
 of my family were at home and to be provided 
 for, L used to remind myself immensely of that 
 king. You have no idea, as a single man, of 
 the difficulty I have had in wearing more than. 
 one good article at a time.”’ 
 
 ‘“‘T can-easily believe it, Mr. Wilfer.” 
 
 ‘¢T only mention it,” said R. W. in the warmth 
 of his heart, ‘¢as a proof of the amiable, delicate, 
 and considerate affection of my daughter Bella. — 
 If she had been a little spoiled, I couldn’t have 
 thought so very much of it, under the circum- 
 stances. But no, not a bit. And she is so very 
 pretty! I hope you agree with me in finding 
 her very pretty, Mr. Rokesmith ?” 
 
 ‘¢Certainly Ido. Every one must.” 
 
 ‘‘T hope so,” said the cherub. ‘‘ Indeed, I 
 have no doubt of it. This is a great advance- 
 ment for her in life, Mr. Rokesmith. A great 
 opening of her prospects.” — 
 
 ‘‘Miss Wilfer could have no better friends | 
 than Mr. and Mrs. Boffin.” 
 
 ‘Impossible! said the grateful cherub. 
 ‘‘Really I begin to think things are very well 
 asthey are. If Mr. John Harmon hadlived—” 
 
 ‘¢ He ts better dead,” said the Secretary. 
 
 ‘¢ No, I won’t go so far as to say that,” urged 
 the cherub, a little remonstrant against the very 
 decisive and unpitying tone; ‘ but he mightn’t 
 have suited Bella, or Bella mightn’t have suited — 
 
 him, or fifty things, whereas now I-hope-she can 
 
 choose for herself.”’ : 
 *¢ Has she—as you place the confidence in me 
 
172 
 
 -a weary way off, don’t you see? 
 
 Bes hs ss ie 
 
 of speaking on the subject, you will excuse my 
 asking—has’ she—perhaps— chosen?” faltered 
 the Secretary. 
 
 “Oh dear no!” returned R. W. 
 
 ** Young ladies sometimes,” Rokesmith hint- 
 ed, ‘‘ choose without mentioning theirehoice to 
 their fathers.” 
 
 ‘* Not in this case, Mr. Rokesmith. Between 
 my daughter Bella and me there is a regular 
 
 league and covenant of confidence. 4{t was rati- 
 
 fied only the other day. The ratification dates 
 from—these,’”’ said the cherub, giving a little pull 
 at the lappels of his coat and the pockets of his 
 trowsers. ‘‘Oh no, she has not chosen.. To be 
 sure, young George Sampson, in the days when 
 
 Mr. John Harmon—” 
 
 ** Who I wish had never been born!” said the 
 Secretary, with a gloomy brow. ~ 
 
 Rt. W. looked at him with surprise, as think- 
 ing he had contracted an unaccountable spite 
 against the poor deceased, and continued: ‘‘In 
 the days when Mr. John Harmon was being 
 sought out, young George Sampson certainly 
 was hovering about Bella, and Bella let him 
 hover. But it never was serivusly thought of, 
 and it’s still less than ever to be thought of now. 
 For Bella is ambitious, Mr. Rokesmith, and I 
 think [may predict wiil marry fortune. This 
 time, you see, she wiil have the person and the 
 property before her together, and will be able to 
 make her choice with her eyes open. This is my 
 road. J am yery sorry to part company so soon. 
 Good-morning, Sir!” 
 
 The Secretary pursued his way, not very much 
 elevated in spirits by this conversation, and, ar- 
 riving at the Boffin mansion, found Betty Hig- 
 den waiting for him. 
 
 ‘**T should thank you kindly, Sir,” said Bet- 
 ty, ‘‘if I might make so bold as have a word or 
 two wi’ you.” 
 
 She should have as many words as she liked, 
 he told her; and took her into his room, and 
 made her sit down. 
 
 ‘Tis concerning Sloppy, Sir,” said Betty. 
 
 *‘ And that’s how I come here by myself. Not 
 wishing him to know what I’m a-going to say to 
 you, I got the start of him early and walked 
 up.” 
 
 _ “You have wonderful energy,” returned Roke- 
 smith. ‘* You are as young as I am.” 
 
 Betty Higden gravely shook her head. ‘TJ 
 am strong for my time of Kfe, Sir, but not young, 
 thank the Lord!” 
 
 “Are you thankful for not being young ?” 
 
 “*Yes, Sir. If I was young, it would all have 
 to be gone through again, and the end would be 
 But never 
 mind me; ’tis concerning Sloppy.” 
 
 ‘*And what about him, Betty ?” 
 
 ‘eTis just this, Sir. It can’t be reasoned out 
 of his head by any powers of mine but what that 
 he can do right by your kind lady and gentle- 
 man and do his work for me, both together. 
 Now he can’t. To give himself up to being put 
 in the way of arning.a good living and getting 
 on, he must give me up. Well; he won't.” 
 
 ‘*T respect him for it,” said Rokesmith. 
 
 ** Do ye, Sir? I don’t know but what I do 
 
 myself. Still that don’t make it right to let him. 
 
 have his way. So as he won’t give me up, I’m 
 a-going to give him up.” 
 ‘* How, Betty ?” 
 
 . 
 
 $ fs Be 7 
 
 OUR: MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 ‘“J’m a-going to run away from him.” —- 
 With an astonishgd.gook at the indomitable 
 old face and the bight eyes the Secretary re- 
 peated, ‘‘Run away from him?” ; 
 ‘**Yes, Sir,” said Betty, with one nod. And 
 in the nod and in the firm set of her mouth 
 there was a vigor of purpose not to be doubted. 
 ‘*Comeé, come!” said the Secretary. ‘We 
 must talk about this. Let us take our time over 
 it, and try to get at the true sense of the case 
 and the true course, by degrees.” co 
 ‘** Now, lookee here, my dear,” returned old 
 
 Betty—‘‘asking your excuse for being so fa- — 
 
 your grandmother twice over. © Now, logkee 
 here. Tis a poor living and a hard as is t®#be 
 got out of this‘-work that ’m a doing now, and 
 but for Sloppy I don’t know as I should have 
 held to it this long. But it did just keep us on, 
 the two together. Now that I’m alone—with 
 even Johnny ‘gone—I’d far sooner be upon my 
 
 | feet and tiring of myself out, than a sitting fold- 
 
 ing and folding by the fire. And Ill tell you 
 why. ‘There’s a deadness steals over me at 
 times, that the kind of life favors and I don’t 
 like. Now, I seem to have Johnny in my arms 
 —now, his mother—now, his mother’s mother— 
 now, I seem to be a child myself, a lying once 
 again in the arms of my own mother—then [I 
 get numbed, thought and senses, till I start out 
 of my seat, afeerd that ’'m a growing like the 
 poor old people that they brick up in the Unions, 
 as you may sometimes see when they let ’em out 
 of the four walls to have a warm in the sun, 
 crawling quite scared about the streets. I was 
 a nimble girl, and have always been a active 
 body, as I told your lady, first time ever I see 
 her good face. I can still walk twenty mile if I 
 am put toit. I’d far better be a walking than a 
 getting numbed and dreary. I’m a good fair 
 knitter, and can make many little things to sell. 
 The loan from your lady and gentleman of . 
 twenty shillings to fit out a basket with would 
 be a fortune for me. ‘Trudging round the coun- 
 try and tiring of myself out, I shall keep the 
 deadness off, and get my own bread by my own 
 labor. And what more can I want?” — 
 
 ‘* And this is your plan,” said the Secretary, 
 
 ‘for running away ?”” 
 
 _ Show me a better! My deary, show me a 
 better! Why, I know very well,” said old Betty 
 Higden, ‘‘and you know very well, that your 
 lady and gentleman would set me up like a 
 queen for the rest of my life, if so be that we 
 could make it right among us to have it so. 
 But we can’t make it right among us to have it 
 so. I’ve never took charity yet, nor yet has any 
 one belonging to me. And it would be forsak- 
 ing of myself indeed, and forsaking of my chil- 
 dren dead and gone, and forsaking of their chil- 
 dren dead and gone, to set up a contradiction 
 now at last.” 
 
 ‘*Tt might come to be justifiable and unavoid- 
 able at last,” the Secretary gently hinted, witha 
 slight stress on the word. 
 
 “T hope it never will! It ain’t that I mean 
 
 to give offense by being anyways proud,” said 
 the old creature, simply, ‘‘ but that I want to 
 be of a piece like, and helpful of myself right 
 through to my death.” Hire at 
 
 ‘** And to be sure,” added the Secretary, as a 
 comfort for her, ‘Sloppy will be eagerly looking _ 
 
 nd 
 
Can Cas ae a 1 
 < : : + 
 
 forward to his opportunity of being to you what 
 you have been to him.” 
 
 Trust him for that, Sir!” said Betty, cheer- | 
 
 fully. ‘* Though he had need to be something 
 quick about it, for I'm a getting to be an old 
 one. But I’m a strong one too, and travel and 
 weather never hurt me yet! Now, be so kind 
 as speak for me to your lady and gentleman, 
 and tell ’em what I ask ‘of their good friendli- 
 ness to let me do, and‘why I ask it,” 
 
 The Secretary felt that there was no gain- 
 saying what was urged by this brave old heroine, 
 and he presently repaired to Mrs. Boffin and rec- 
 ommended her to let Betty Higden have her 
 way, at all events for the time. ‘‘It would be 
 far more satisfactory to your kind heart, I know,” 
 he said, ‘‘to provide for her, but @t may be a 
 _ duty to respect this independent spirit.” Mrs. 
 
 - Boffin was not proof against the consideration 
 set before her. She and her husband had 
 
 worked too, and had brought their simple faith: 
 
 and honor clean ont of dust-heaps. If they 
 owed a duty to Betty Higden, of a surety that 
 duty must be done. 
 
 **But, Betty,” said Mrs. Boffin, when she ac- | 
 __ companied John Rokesmith back to his room, 
 
 and shone upon her with the light of her radiant 
 face, ‘‘ granted all else, I think [ wouldn’t run 
 away.” ; . 
 
 “"T would come easier to Sloppy,” said Mrs. 
 Higden, shaking her head. <“’I'would come 
 €asier tome too. But ’tis as you please.” 
 
 ‘*When would you go?” | 
 
 “Now,” was the bright and ready answer. 
 “To-day, my deary, to-morrow. Bless ye, I 
 am used to it. I know many parts of the coun- 
 try well. When nothing else was to be done I 
 have worked in many a market-garden afore 
 now, and in many a hop-garden too.” 
 
 “If I give my consent to your going, Betty— 
 which Mr. Rokesmith thinks I ought to do—” 
 
 Betty thanked him with a grateful courtesy. 
 
 **__We must not lose sight of you. We must 
 not let you pass out of our knowledge. We 
 must know all about you.” 
 
 “Yes, my deary, but not through letter- 
 writing, because letter-writing—indeed, writing 
 of most sorts—hadn’t much. come up for such as 
 me when I was young. But I shall be to and 
 fro. No fear of my missing a chance of giving 
 myself a sight of your reviving face. Besides,” 
 said Betty, with logieal good faith, ‘¢I shall have 
 a debt to pay off, by littles, and naturally that 
 would bring me back if nothing else would.” 
 
 ‘Must it be done?” asked Mrs. Boffin, still 
 
 reluctant, of the Secretary. 
 ~  “T think it must.” 
 
 After more discussion it was agreed that it 
 should be done, and Mrs. Boffin summoned 
 Bella to note down the little purchases that were 
 necessary to set Betty up in trade, ‘*Don’t ye 
 be timorous for me, my dear,” said the stanch 
 old heart, observant of Bella’s face: ‘‘when I 
 take my seat with my work, clean and busy and 
 fresh, in a country market-place, I shall turn a 
 sixpence as sure as ever a farmer’s wife there.” 
 
 The Secretary took that opportunity of touch- 
 ing on the practical question of Mr. Sloppy’s 
 capabilities. He would have made a wonderful 
 _cabinet-maker, said Mrs. Higden, ‘‘if-there-had 
 been the money to put him to it.” She had seen 
 
 him handle tools that he had borrowed to mend 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 173 
 
 the mangle, or to knock.a broken piece of furni- 
 ture together, in a surprising manner. As to 
 constructing toys for the Minders, out of no- 
 thing, he had done that daily. And once as 
 many as a dozen people had got together in the 
 lane to see the neatness with which he fitted the 
 broken pieces of a foreign monkey’s musical in-. 
 strument. ‘*’That’s well,” said the Secretary, 
 ‘Tt will not be hard to find a trade for him.” 
 
 John Harmon being buried under mountains 
 now, the Secretary that very same day set him- 
 self to finish his affairs and have done with him. 
 He drew up an ample declaration, to be signed 
 by Rogue Riderhood (knowing he could get his 
 signature to it, by making him another and 
 much shorter evening call), and then considered 
 to whom should he give the document? To 
 Hexam’s son, or daughter? Resolved speedily, 
 to the daughter. But it would be safer to avoid 
 seeing the daughter; because the son had seen 
 Julius Handford, and—he could not be too care- 
 ful—there might possibly be some comparison 
 of notes between the son and daughter, which 
 woulgl awaken slumbering suspicion and lead to 
 consequences. ‘I might even,” he reflected, 
 ‘*be apprehended as having been concerned in 
 my own murder!” ‘Therefore, best to send it to 
 the daughter under cover by the post. Pleasant 
 Riderhood had undertaken to find out where 
 she lived, and it was not necessary that it should 
 be attended by a single word of explanation. So 
 far, straight, 
 
 But all that he knew of the daughter he de- 
 rived from Mrs. Boffin’s accounts of what she 
 heard from Mr. Lightwood, who seemed to have 
 a reputation for his manner of relating a story, 
 and to have made this story quite his own. It 
 interested him, and he would like to have the 
 means of knowing more—as, for instance, that 
 she received the exonerating paper, and that it 
 satisfied her—by opening some channel alto- 
 gether independent of Lightwood: who likewise 
 had seen Julius Handford, who had publicly ad- 
 vertised for Julius Handford, and whom of all 
 men he, the Secretary, most avoided. ‘But 
 with whom the common course of things might 
 bring the in a moment face to face any day in 
 the week or any hour in the day.” 
 
 Now, to cast about for some likely means of 
 opening such a channel. The boy, Hexam, was 
 training for and with a schoolmaster. The Sec- 
 retary knew it, because his sister’s share in that 
 disposal of him seemed to be the ‘best part of 
 Lightwood’s account of the family. This young 
 fellow, Sloppy, stood in need of some instruction. 
 If he, the Secretary, engaged that schoolmaster 
 to impart it to him the channel might be opened. 
 The next point was, did Mrs. Boffin know the 
 schoolmaster’s name? No, but she knew where 
 the school was. Quite enough. Promptly the 
 Secretary wrote to the master of that school, 
 
 ‘and that very evening Bradley Headstone an- 
 
 swered in person. 
 
 The Secretary stated to the schoolmaster how 
 the object was, to send to him for certain occa- 
 sional evening instruction, a youth whom Mr. 
 and Mrs. Boffin wished to help to an industri- 
 ous and useful place in life. The schoolmaster 
 was willing to undertake the charge of such a 
 pupil. The Secretary inquired on what terms? 
 The schoolmaster stated on what terms. Agreed 
 and disposed of, 
 
174 
 
 “¢May I ask, Sir,” said Bradley Headstone, 
 ‘<to whose good opinion I owe a recommenda- 
 tion to you?” 
 
 ““You should know that I am not the princi- 
 pal here. I am Mr. Boffin’s Secretary. Mr. 
 Boffin is a gentleman who inherited a property 
 of which you may have heard some public men- 
 tion: the Harmon property.” 
 
 ‘‘Mr. Harmon,” said Bradley: who would 
 have been a great deal more at a loss than he 
 was, if he had known to whom he spoke: ‘‘ was 
 murdered, and found in the river.” 
 
 ‘¢ Was murdered, and found in the river.” 
 
 ‘*Tt was not—” 
 
 ‘‘No,” interposed the Secretary, smiling, ‘‘it 
 was not he who recommended you. Mr. Boffin 
 heard of you through a certain Mr. Lightwood, 
 I think you know Mr. Lightwood, or know of 
 him ?” 
 
 ‘¢T know as much of him as I wish to know, » 
 
 Sir. I have no acquaintance with Mr. Light- 
 wood, and I desire none. I have no objection 
 to Mr. Lightwood, but I have a particular ob- 
 jection to some of Mr. Lightwood’s friends—in 
 short, to one of Mr. Lightwood’s friends. His 
 great friend.” 
 
 He could hardly get the words out, even then | 
 
 and there, so fierce did he grow (though keep- 
 ing himself down witli infinite pains of repres- 
 sion), when the careless and contemptuous bear- 
 ing of Eugene*Wrayburn rose before his mind, 
 
 The Secretary saw there was a strong feeling 
 here on some sore point, and he would have 
 made a diversion from it, but for Bradley’s hold- 
 ing to it in his cumbersome way. 
 
 ‘‘T have no objection to mention the friend by 
 name,” he said, doggedly. ‘‘The person I ob- 
 ject to is Mr. Eugene Wrayburn.” 
 
 The Secretary remembered him. In his dis- 
 turbed recollection of that night when he was 
 striving against the drugged drink, there was 
 but a dim image of Eugene’s person; but he re- 
 membered his name, and his manner of speak- 
 ing, and how he had gone with them to view the 
 body, and where he had stood, and what he had 
 said. 
 
 ‘*Pray, Mr. Headstone, what is the name,” 
 he asked, again trying to make a diversion, 
 ‘Cof young Hexam’s sister ?” 
 
 ‘¢Her name is Lizzie,” said the schoolmaster, 
 with a strong contraction of his whole face. 
 
 ‘« She is a young woman of a remarkable char- 
 acter; is she not?” . 
 
 ‘‘She is sufficiently remarkable to be very 
 superior to Mr. Eugene Wrayburn—though an 
 ordinary person might be that,’’ said the school- 
 master; ‘‘and I hope you will not think it im- 
 pertinent in me, Sir, to ask why you put the two 
 names together ?” 
 
 ‘‘By mere accident,” returned the Secretary. 
 ‘¢Observing that Mr. Wrayburn was a disagree- 
 able subject with you, I tried to get away from 
 it: though not very successfully, it would ap- 
 pear.” 
 
 ‘‘Do you know Mr. Wrayburn, Sir ?” 
 
 NO ty 
 
 ‘«Then perhaps the names can not be put to- 
 
 gether on'the authority of any representation of 
 
 his?” 
 ‘¢ Certainly not.” 
 ‘*T took the liberty to ask,” said Bradley, aft- 
 
 er casting his eyes on the ground, ‘‘ because he 
 
 wood, that he was your pupil. 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 is capable of making any representation, in the 
 swaggering levity of his insolence. I-——I hope 
 you will not misunderstand me, Sir. IJ—I am 
 much interested in this brother and sister, and 
 the subject awakens very strong feelings within 
 me. Very, very strong feelings.” With a shak- 
 ing hand Bradley took out his handkerchief and 
 wiped his brow. : . 
 
 The Secretary thought, as he glanced at the 
 schoolmaster’s face, that he had opened a chan- 
 nel here indeed, and that it was an unexpect- 
 edly dark and deep and stormy one, and diffi- 
 cult to sound. All at once, in the midst of his ~ 
 turbulent emotions, Bradley stopped and seemed’ 
 to challenge his look. Much as though-he sud- 
 denly asked him, ‘‘ What do you see in me?” 
 
 ‘‘The brether, young Hexam, was your real 
 recommendation here,” said the Secretary, quiet- 
 ly going back to the point; ‘‘Mr. and Mrs, 
 Boffin happening to know, through Mr. Light-) 
 Any thing that 
 I ask respecting the brother and sister, or either 
 of them, I ask for myself, out of my own inter- 
 est in the subject, and not in my official char- 
 acter, or on Mr. Boffin’s behalf. How I come 
 to be interested I need not explain. You know 
 the father’s connection with the discovery of Mr. 
 Harmon’s body.” 
 
 ‘¢Sir,” replied Bradley, very restlessly indeed, 
 ‘¢T know all the circumstances of that case.” 
 
 ‘‘Pray tell me, Mr. Headstone,” said the 
 Secretary. ‘Does the sister suffer under any 
 stigma because of the impossible accusation— 
 groundless would be a better word—that was 
 made against the father, and substantially with- 
 drawn ?” 
 
 ‘‘No, Sir,” returned Bradley, with a kind of 
 anger. 
 
 ‘‘T am very glad to hear it.” 
 
 ‘The sister,” said Bradley, separating his 
 words over-carefully, and speaking as if he were 
 repeating them from a book, ‘‘suffers under no 
 reproach that repels a man of unimpeachable 
 character, who has made for himself every step 
 of his way in life, from placing her in his own 
 station. I will not say, raising her to his own 
 station; I say, placing her init. The sister la- 
 bors under no reproach, unless she should un- 
 fortunately make it for herself. When such a 
 man is not deterred from regarding her as his 
 equal, and when he has convinced himself that 
 there is no blemish on her, I think the fact must 
 
 ‘| be taken to be pretty expressive.” 
 
 ‘¢ And there is such.a man?”»said the Secre- 
 tary. 
 
 Bradley Headstone knotted his brows, and 
 squared his large lower jaw, and fixed his eyes 
 on the ground with an air of determination that 
 seemed unnecessary to the occasion, as he re- 
 plied: ‘‘ And there is such a man.” : 
 
 The Secretary had no reason or excuse for 
 prolonging the conversation, and it ended here. 
 Within three hours the oakum-headed appari- 
 tion once more dived into the Leaving Shop, 
 and that night Rogue Riderhood’s recantation 
 lay in the post-office, addressed under cover to 
 Lizzie Hexam at her right address. 
 
 All these proceedings occupied John Roke- 
 smith so much that it was not until the follow- — 
 ing day that he saw Bella again... It seemed — 
 then to be tacitly understood between them that 
 they were to be as distantly easy as they could, © 
 
175 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 THE BOOFER LADY, 
 
176 
 
 without attracting the-attention of Mr, and Mrs. 
 Boffin to any marked change in their manner. 
 The fitting out of old Betty Higden was favora- 
 ble to this, as keeping Bella engaged and inter- 
 ested, and as occupying the general attention. 
 
 ‘¢T think,” said Rokesmith, when they all 
 stood about her, while she packed her tidy bask- 
 et—except Bella, who was busily helping on her 
 knees at the chair on which it stood; ‘‘that at 
 least you might keep a letter in your pocket, 
 Mrs. Higden, which I would write for you and 
 date from here, merely stating, in the names of 
 Mr. and Mrs. Boffin, that they are your friends ; 
 —I won't say patrons, because they wouldn’t like 
 it.” 
 
 ‘¢No, no, no,” said Mr. Boffin; ‘‘no patron- 
 izing! Let’s keep out of that, whatever we come 
 to.” 
 
 ‘¢There’s more than enough of that about, 
 without us; ain’t there, Noddy?” said Mrs. Bof- 
 fin. 
 
 ‘‘T believe you, old lady!” returned the Gold- 
 en Dustman. ‘‘Overmuch indeed!” 
 
 “But people sometimes like to be patronized ; 
 don’t they, Sir?” asked Bella, looking up. 
 
 “T don't. And if they do, my dear, they ought 
 to learn better,” said Mr. Boffin. ‘‘ Patrons and 
 Patronesses, and Vice-Patrons and Vice-Patron- 
 esses, and Deceased Patrons and Deceased Pa- 
 tronesses, and: Ex-Vice-Patrons and Ex-Vice- 
 Patronesses, what does it all mean in the books 
 of the Charities that come pouring in on Roke- 
 smith as he sits among ’em pretty well up to his 
 neck! If Mr. Tom Noakes gives his five shil- 
 lings ain’t he a Patron, and if Mrs. Jack Styles 
 gives her five shillings ain’t she a Patroness? 
 What escent it allabout? If it ain’t stark 
 staring Impudence, what do you call it?” 
 “Don’t be warm, Noddy,” Mrs. Boffin urged. 
 ‘¢Warm!” cried Mr. Boffin. ‘It’s enough 
 to make a man smoking hot. I can’t gorany 
 where without being Patronized. I don’t want 
 to be Patronized. If I buy a ticket for a Flower 
 Show, or a Music Show, or any sort of Show, 
 and pay pretty heavy for it, why am I to be Pa- 
 troned and Patronessed as if the Patrons and 
 Patronesses treated me? If there’s a good thing 
 to be dong, can’t it be done on its own merits ? 
 Tf there’s a bad thing to be done, can it ever be 
 Patroned anl Patronessed right? Yet*when a 
 new Institution’s going to be built, it seems to 
 me that the bricks and mortar ain’t made of 
 half so much consequence as the Patrons and 
 Patronesses; no, nor yet the objects. I wish 
 somebody would tell me whether other countries 
 get Patronized to any thing like the extent of 
 this one! And as to the Patrons and Patron- 
 esses themselves, I wonder they’re not ashamed 
 of themselves. They ain’t Pills, or Hair-Wash- 
 es, or Invigorating Nervous Essences, to be puffed 
 in that way !” 
 
 Having delivered himself of these remarks, 
 Mr. Boffin took a trot, according to his usual 
 custom, and trotted back to the spot from which 
 he had started. 
 
 *¢ As to the letter, Rokesmith,” said Mr. Bof- 
 fin, ‘‘you’re as right as a trivet. Give her the 
 letter, make her take the letter, put it in her 
 pocket by violence. She might fall sick.—You 
 know you might fall sick,” said Mr. Boffin, 
 ‘¢TDon’t deny it, Mrs. Higden, in your obstinacy ; 
 you know you might.” 
 
 ‘ing abided by him. 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 Old Betty laughed, and said that she would 
 take the letter and be thankful. 
 
 ‘“'That’s right!” said Mr. Boffin. 
 That’s sensible. 
 (for we never thought of it), but to Mr. Roke- 
 smith.” 
 
 ‘Come! 
 
 And don’t.be thankful to. us’ 
 
 The letter was written, and read to her, and. © 
 
 given to her. 
 
 ‘‘Now, how do you feel?” said Mr. Boffin. 
 *¢Do you like it?” . 
 
 ‘‘The letter, Sir?” said Betty. 
 beautiful letter !” : 
 
 ‘¢No, no, no; not the letter,” said Mr. Bof- 
 fin; ‘*the idea, Are you sure you're strong 
 enotgh to carry out the idea?” 
 
 ‘“‘T shall be stronger, and keep the deadness 
 off better, this way, than any way left open to 
 me, Sir.” 
 
 ‘‘Don’t say than any way left open, you 
 know,” urged Mr. Boffin; “because there are 
 ways without end. A. housekeeper would be 
 acceptable over yonder at the Bower, for in- 
 stance. Wouldn’t you like to see the Bower, 
 and know a retired literary man of the name of 
 Weegg that lives there—with a wooden leg ?” 
 
 Old Betty was proof even against this tempt- 
 ation, and fell to adjusting her black bonnet and 
 shawl. 
 
 ‘“‘T wouldn’t let you go, now it comes to this, 
 after all,” said Mr. Boffin, ‘‘if I didn’t hope that 
 it may make a man and a workman of Sloppy, 
 in as short a time as ever a man and a work- 
 man was made yet. Why, what have you got 
 there, Betty? Not a doll?” 
 
 It was the man in the Guards who had been 
 on duty over Johnny's bed. ‘The solitary old 
 woman showed what it was, and put it up qui- 
 etly in her dress. Then she gratefully took 
 leave of Mrs. Boffin, and of Mr. Boflin, and of 
 Rokesmith, and then put her old withered arms 
 round Bella’s young and blooming neck, and 
 said, repeating Johnny’s words; ‘* A kiss for.the 
 boofer lady.” 
 
 The Secretary looked on from a doorway at 
 
 “* Ay, it’s.ia 
 
 {the boofer lady thus encircled, and still looked 
 
 on at the boofer lady standing alone there, when 
 the determined old figure with its steady bright 
 eyes was trudging through the streets, away from 
 paralysis and pauperism. 
 
 A to sts BI ie SS 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 THE WHOLE CASE SO FAR. 
 
 Brapiey Heapstone held fast by that other 
 interview he was to have with Lizzie Hexam. 
 In stipulating for it he had been impelled by a 
 feeling little short of desperation, and the feel- 
 It was very soon after his 
 interview with the Secretary that he and Char- 
 ley Hexam set out one leaden evening, not un- 
 noticed by Miss Peecher, to have this desperate 
 interview accomplished. 
 
 “¢That dolls’ dress-maker,” said Bradley, ‘fis _ 
 
 favorable neither to me nor to you, Hexam.” 
 
 ‘“A pert crooked little chit, Mr. Headstone! 
 I knew she would put herself in the way, if she 
 could, and would be sure tostrike in with some- 
 thing impertinent. It was on that account that 
 I proposed our going to the City to-night and 
 meeting my sister.” 
 
 _§So I supposed,” said Bradley, getting hia 
 
 D 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 \ 
 \ 
 \ 
 
 \gloves on his nervous hands as he walked. ‘So 
 supposed.” 
 
 \** Nobody but my sister,” pursued Charley, 
 ‘would have found out such an extraordinary 
 companion. She has done it in a ridiculous 
 fancy of giving herself up to another. She told 
 me so that night when we went there.” | 
 
 ** Why should she give herself up to the dress- 
 maker?” asked Bradley. 
 
 “Qh!” said the boy; coloring. ‘One of her 
 romantic ideas! TI tried to convince her so, but 
 I didn’t succeed. However, what we have got 
 to do, is, to sueceed to-night, Mr. Headstone, 
 
 -and then all the rest follows.” 
 - You are still sanguine, Hexam.” 
 
 ‘Certainly Iam, Sir. Why, we have every 
 thing on our side.” 
 
 ** Except your sister, perhaps,” thought Brad- 
 ley. But he only gloomily thought it, and ‘said 
 nothing. 
 
 ‘Every thing on our side,” repeated the boy 
 with boyish confidence. ‘‘ Respectability, an ex- 
 cellent connection for me, common sense, every 
 thing !” 
 
 *“To be sure, your sister has always shown 
 
 ‘herself a devoted sister,” said Bradley, willing 
 to sustain himself on even that low ground of 
 hope. 
 
 ‘* Naturally, Mr. Headstone, I have a good 
 deal of influence with her. And now that you 
 have honored me with your confidence and spoken 
 to me first, I say again, we have every thing on 
 our side.” 
 
 And Bradley thought again, “Except your 
 ‘sister, perhaps.” 
 
 A gray dusty withered evening in London city 
 has not a hopeful aspect. ‘The closed warehouses 
 and offices have an air of death about them, and 
 the national dread of color has an air of mourn- 
 
 Ing. ‘The towers and steeples of the many house- 
 encompassed churches, dark and dingy as the 
 sky that seems descending on them, are no re- 
 lief to the general gloom; asun-dial on a church- 
 wall has the look, in its useless black shade, of 
 having failed in its business enterprise and stopped 
 
 payment forever: melancholy waifs and strays 
 of housekeepers and porters sweep melancholy 
 
 - waifs and strays of papers and pins into the ken- 
 
 nels, and other more melancholy waifs and strays 
 explore them, searching and stooping and poking 
 for any thing to sell. The set of humanity ont- 
 ward from the City is as a set of prisoners de- 
 parting from jail, and dismal Newgate seems 
 quite as fit a stronghold for the mighty Lord 
 Mayor as his own state-dwelling. 
 
 On such an evening, when the city grit gets, 
 
 into the hair and eyes and skin, and’ when the 
 fallen leaves of the few unhappy city trees grind 
 down in corners under wheels of wind, the school- 
 master and the pupil emerged upon the Leaden- 
 hall_ Street region, spying eastward for Lizzie. 
 Being something too soon in their arrival they 
 lurked-at“a corner, waiting for her to appéar. 
 “The best-looking ‘among-us: will not-loek-¥ery 
 well lurking at a corner, and Bradley came out 
 of that disadvantage very poorly indeed. 
 
 ™* “Here she comes, Mr. Headstone! Let us 
 go forward and meet her.” 
 _ As they advanced she saw them coming, and 
 seemed rather troubled. But she greeted her 
 brother with the usual warmth, and touched the 
 extended hand of Bradley. 
 
 eas: 
 ., an * ¢ bs 4 
 
 YP 
 
 . “* Why, where are you going, Charley, dear ?” 
 she asked him then. 
 
 ‘‘ Nowhere. We came on purpose to meet 
 you.” 
 
 ‘*'To meet me, Charley ?” 
 
 “*Yes.. We are going to walk with you. But 
 don’t let us take the great leading streets where 
 every one walks, and we can’t hear ourselves 
 speak. “Let us go by the quiet backways. Here’s 
 a large paved court by this church, and quiet, 
 too. Let us go up here.” 
 
 ‘* But it’s not in the way, Charley.” 
 
 “Yes it is,” said the boy, petulantly. 
 in my way, and my way is yours.” 
 
 She had not released his hand, and, still hold- 
 ing it, looked at him with a kind of appeal. He 
 avoided her eyes, under pretense of saying, 
 **Come along, Mr. Headstone.” Bradley walked 
 at his side—not at hers—and the brother and 
 sister walked hand inhand. The court brought: 
 them to a church-yard; a paved square court, 
 with a raised bank of earth about breast high, in 
 the middle, inclosed by iron rails. Here, con- 
 veniently and healthfully elevated above the level 
 of the living, were the dead, and the tombstones ; 
 some of the latter droopingly inclined from the 
 perpendicular, as if they were ashamed of the 
 lies they told. 
 
 They paced the whole of this place once, in a 
 constrained and uncomfortable manner, when 
 the boy stopped and said: 
 
 ** Lizzie, Mr. Headstone has something to say 
 toyou. I don’t wish to be an interruption either 
 to him or to you, and so I'll go and take a little 
 stroll and come back. I know in a general way 
 what Mr. Headstone intends to say, and I very 
 highly approve of it, as I hope—and indeed I do 
 not doubt—you will. I needn’t tell you, Lizzie, 
 that I am under great obligations to Mr. Head- 
 stone, and that I am very anxious for Mr. Head- 
 stone to succeed in all he undertakes. AsI hope 
 —and as, indeed, I don’t doubt—you must be.” 
 
 ‘‘Chatley,” returned his sister, detaining his 
 hand as he withdrew it, ‘*I think you had bet- 
 ter stay. I think Mr. Headstone had better not 
 say what he thinks of saying.” 
 
 ‘“Why, how do you know what it is?” re- 
 turned the boy. 
 
 ‘* Perhaps I don’t, but—” k 
 
 ** Perhaps you don’t? No, Liz, I should think 
 
 not. If you knew what it was you would’ give 
 me a very different answer. ‘There; let go; be 
 sensible. I wonder you don’t remember that Mr. 
 eadstone is looking on.” 
 She allowed him to separate himself from her, 
 and he, after saying, ‘‘ Now, Liz, be-a rational 
 girl and a good sister,” walked away. She re- 
 mained standing alone with Bradley Headstone, 
 and it was not until she raised her. eyes that he 
 spoke. 
 
 “I said,” he began, ‘‘when I saw you last, 
 that there was something. unexplained, which 
 might perhaps influence you. I have come this 
 evening to explain it. I hope you will not judge 
 of me by my hesitating manner when I speak to 
 you. You see me at my greatest disadvantage, 
 It is most unfortunate for me that I wish you to 
 see me at my best, and that I know you see’me 
 at my worst.”’ 
 
 She moved slowly on when he paused, and he 
 moved slowly on beside her. ~ | 
 
 ‘It seems egotistical to begin by saying so 
 
 eT t's 
 
178 
 
 much about myself,” he resumed, ‘‘ but whatever 
 I say to you seems, even in my own ears, below 
 what I want to say, and different from what I 
 want to say. I can’thelpit. So itis. You are 
 the ruin of me.” 
 
 She started at the passionate sound of the last 
 words, and at the passionate action of his hands, 
 with which they were accompanied. 
 
 ‘Yes! youare the ruin—the ruin—the ruin— 
 of me. ‘I have no resources in myself, I have no 
 confidence in myself, I have no government of 
 myself when you are near me or in my thoughts. 
 And you are always in my thoughts now. I 
 have never been quit of you since I first saw you. 
 Oh, that was a wretched day for me! That was 
 a wretched, miserable day !” 
 
 A touch of pity for him mingled with her. dis- 
 like of him, and she said: ‘‘ Mr. Headstone, I am 
 grieved to have done you any harm, but I have 
 never meant it.” 
 
 _ ‘¢There!” he cried, despairingly. ‘‘Now I 
 seem to have reproached you, instead of reveal- 
 ing to you the state of my own mind! Bear 
 with me. I am always wrong when you are in 
 question. It is my doom.” 
 
 Struggling with himself, and by times looking 
 up at the deserted windows of the houses as if 
 there could be any thing written in their grimy 
 panes that would help him, he paced the whole 
 pavement at her side before he spoke again. 
 
 “‘T must try to give expression to what is in 
 my mind; it shall and must be spoken. Though 
 you see me so confounded—though you strike 
 me so helpless—I ask you to believe that there 
 are many people who think well of me; that 
 there are some people who highly esteem me ; 
 that I have in my way won a station which is 
 considered worth winning.” 
 
 ‘¢Surely, Mr. Headstone, I do believe it. 
 Surely I have always known it from Charley.” 
 
 “TI ask you to believe that if I were to offer 
 my home such as it is, my‘station such as it is, 
 my affections such as they are, to any 8ne of the 
 best considered, and best qualified, and most 
 distinguished, among the young women engaged 
 in my calling, they would probably be accepted. 
 Even readily accepted.” 
 
 ‘¢T do not doubt it,” said Lizzie, with her eyes 
 upon the ground. 
 
 ‘‘T have sometimes had it in my thoughts to 
 make that offer and to settle down as many men 
 of my class do: I on the one side of a school, 
 my wife on the other, both of us interested in 
 the same work.” 
 
 ‘¢Why have you not done so?” asked Lizzie 
 Hexam. ‘* Why do you not do so ?” 
 
 ‘‘Far better that never did! The only one 
 grain of comfort I have had these many weeks,” 
 he said, always speaking passionately, and, when 
 most emphatic, repeating that former action of 
 his hands, which was like flinging his heart’s- 
 blood down before her in drops upon the pave- 
 ment stones; “the only one grain of comfort I 
 have had these many weeks is, that I never did. 
 For if I had, and if the same’spell had come upon 
 me for my ruin, I know I should have broken 
 that tie asunder as if it had been thread.” 
 
 She glanced at him with a glance of fear, and 
 a shrinking gesture. He answered, as if she had 
 
 spoken. 
 
 ‘No! It would not have been voluntary on 
 -my part, any more than it is voluntary in me to 
 
 | loose, was absolutely terrible. 
 
 ‘vain, and which overmasters me. 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 be here now. You draw me to you. If I were 
 shut up in a strong prison you would draw me 
 out.. I should break through the wall to come 
 to you. If I were lying on asick bed you would 
 draw me up—to stagger to your feet and fall 
 there.” gh 
 
 The wild energy of the man, now quite let 
 He stopped and 
 laid his hand upon a piece of the coping of the 
 burial-ground inclosure, as.if he would have 
 dislodged the stone. 
 
 ‘‘No man knows till the time comes what 
 depths are within him. To some men it never’ 
 comes; let them rest and be thankful! To me, 
 you brought it; on me, you forced it; and the 
 bottom of this raging sea,” striking himself upon 
 the breast, ‘‘has been heaved up ever since.” 
 
 “Mr. Headstone, I have heard enough. Let 
 me stop you here. It will be better for you and 
 better for me. Let us find my brother.” 
 
 ‘‘Not yet. It shall and must be spoken. I 
 have been in torments ever since I stopped short 
 of it before. You are alarmed. It is another of 
 my miseries that I can not speak to you or speak 
 of you without stumbling at every syllable, unless 
 I let the check go altogether and run mad. Here 
 is a man lighting the lamps. He will be gone 
 directly. JI entreat of you let us walk round this 
 place again. You have no reason to look alarm- 
 ed; I can restrain myself, and I will.” 
 
 She yitlded to the entreaty—how could she do 
 otherwise !—and they paced the stones in silence. 
 One by one the lights leaped up, making the cold 
 gray church-tower more remote, and they were 
 alone again. He said no more until they had — 
 regained the spot where he had broken off; 
 there, he again stood still, and again grasped ~ 
 the stone. In saying what he said then he never 
 looked at her; but looked at it and wrenched at 
 it. 
 
 Les 
 
 ‘You know what I am going to say. I love 
 you. What other men may mean when they ~ 
 
 use that expression I can not tell; what 7 mean 
 
 is, that I am under the influence of some tre-- 
 
 mendous attraction which I have resisted: in 
 
 You could , 
 draw me to fire, you could draw me to water, 
 
 you could draw me to the gallows, you could 
 
 draw me to any death, you could draw me to — 
 any thing I have most avoided, you could draw | 
 me to any exposure and disgrace. This and 
 
 the confusion of my thoughts, so that I.am fit 
 
 for nothing, is what I mean by your being the 
 
 ruin of me. But if you would return a favora- — 
 ble answer to my offer of myself in marriage, — 
 you could draw me to any good—every good— ~ 
 with equal force. My circumstances are quite — 
 easy, and you would want for nothing. My — 
 reputation stands quite high, and would be a_ 
 shield for yours. If you saw me at my work, — 
 able to do it well and respected in it, you might — 
 even come to take a sort of pride in me;—I 
 would try hard that you should. Whatever 
 
 considerations I may have thought of against 
 this offer I have conquered, and I make it with — 
 all my heart. Your brother favors me to the — 
 utmost, and it-is likely that we might live and ~ 
 work together; any how, it is certain that he 
 would have my best influence and support. I 
 don’t know that I could say more if I tried. tf 
 might only weaken what is ill enough said as it 
 is. J only add that if it is any claim on you to 
 
 y. 
 
 7 
 a 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 179 
 
 be in earnest, I am in thorough earnest, dread-| -He bit his lip again, and Jooked at her, and 
 ful earnest.” said never a word. 
 
 The powdered mortar from under the stone} ‘*You asked me to hear you out, and you 
 at which he wrenched rattled on the pavement | will not speak. Let me find my brother. 
 to confirm his words. ‘Stay! I threatened no one.” 
 
 ‘‘Mr. Headstone—” Her look dropped for an instant to his bleed- 
 
 **Stop! I implore you, before you answer|ing hand. He lifted it to his mouth, wiped it 
 me, to walk round this place once more. It | on his sleeve, and again folded it over the other. 
 will give you a minute’s time to think, and me | “‘ Mr. Kugene Wrayburn,” he repeated. 
 
 a minute’s time to get some fortitude together.” *‘ Why do you mention that name again and 
 
 Again she yielded to the entreaty, and again | again, Mr. Headstone ?” 
 they came back to the same place, and again he ‘* Because it is the text of the little I have 
 worked at the stone. left to say. Observe! ‘There are no threats in 
 
 **Ts it,” he said, with his attention apparently,| it. If I utter a threat, stop me, and fasten it 
 engrossed by it, ‘‘ yes, or no?” upon me. Mr. Eugene Wrayburn.”’ 
 
 ‘Mr. Headstone, I thank you sincerely, I) A worse threat than was conveyed in his man. 
 thank you gratefully, and hope you may find a | ner of uttering the name could hardly have es- 
 worthy wife before long and be very happy. But caped him. ; . 
 it is no.” ‘‘He haunts you. You accept favors from 
 
 “‘Is no short time necessary for reflection;|him. You are willing enough to listen to him. 
 no weeks or days?” he asked, in the same half- | I know it, as well as he docs.” 
 suffocated way. ‘Mr. Wrayburn has been considerate and 
 
 ** None whatever.” : good to me, Sir,” said Lizzie, proudly, ‘‘in con- 
 
 ‘Are you quite decided, and is there no | nection with the death and with the memory of 
 chance of any change in my favor?” my poor father.” 
 
 “Tam quite decided, Mr. Headstone, and I} “‘*No doubt. He is of course a very consid- 
 am bound to answer I am certain there is|erate and a very good man, Mr. Eugene Wray- 
 none.” | burn.” 
 
 ‘*Then,” said he, suddenly changing his tone | ;- ‘He is nothing to you, I think,” said Lizzie, 
 and turning to her, and bringing his clenched | with an indignation she could not repress. 
 hand down upon the stone with a force that laid] ‘“Oh yes, he is. There you mistake. He is 
 the knuckles raw and bleeding; ‘‘then I hope | much to me.” 
 that I may never kill him!” ‘* What can he be to you ?” . 
 
 _ The dark look of hatred and revenge with ** He can be arival to me among other things,” 
 _ which the words broke from his livid lips, and | said Bradley. 
 
 _ with which he stood holding out his smeared ‘““Mr. Headstone,” returned Lizzie, with a 
 hand as if it held some weapon and had just | burning face, ‘‘ it is cowardly in you to speak to 
 ~ struck a mortal blow, made her so afraid of him | me in this way. But it makes me able to tell 
 that she turned to run away. But he caught | you that I do not like you, and that I never 
 her by the arm. ) have liked you from the first, and that no oth- 
 
 **Mr. Headstone, let me go. Mr. Headstone, | er living creature has any thing to do with the 
 I must call for help!” effect you have produced upon me for your- 
 
 **Tt is I who should call for help,” he said; | self.” ~ * : } 
 you don’t know yet how much I need it.” His head bent for a moment, as if under a 
 
 The working of his face as she shrank from | weight, and he then looked up again, moisten- 
 it, glancing round for her brother and uncertain | ing his lips. ‘‘I was going on with the little I 
 _ what to do, might have extorted a cry from her | had left to say. I knew all this about Mr. Eu- 
 in another instant; but all at once he sternly | gene Wrayburn, all the while you were drawing 
 stopped it and fixed it, as if Death itself had | me to you.. Istrove against the knowledge, but 
 done so. quite in vain. It made no difference in me. 
 
 “There! You see I have recovered myself. | With Mr. Eugene Wrayburn in my mind, I went 
 _ Hear me out.” on. With Mr. Eugene Wrayburn in my mind, 
 
 With much of the dignity of courage, as she |I spoke to you just now. ‘With Mr. Eugene 
 recalled her self-reliant lifé and her right to be | Wrayburn in my mind, I have been set aside 
 free from accountability to this man, she re-| and I have been cast out.” 
 leased her arm from his grasp and stood look- ‘“If you give those names to my thanking you 
 ifig full at him. She had never been so hand-| for your proposal and declining it, is it my fault, 
 some, in his eyes. A shade came over them | Mr. Headstone?” said Lizzie, compassionating 
 while he looked back at her, as if she drew the | the bitter struggle he could not conceal, almost 
 very light out of them to herself. _|as much as she was repelled and alarmed by it. 
 
 “This time, at least, I will leave nothing un-| ‘*I am not complaining,” he returned, “I am 
 _ said,” he went on, folding his hands before him, | only stating the case. I had to wrestle with my 
 clearly to prevent his being betrayed into any | self-respect when I submitted to be drawn to you 
 impetuous gesture; ‘‘this last time at least I|in spite of Mr. Wrayburn. You may imagine 
 will not be tortured with after-thoughts of a lost | how low my self-respect lies now.” 
 
 Opportunity. Mr. Eugene Wrayburn.” She was hurt and angry.; but repressed her- 
 _ _ ** Was it of him you spoke in your ungovern- | self in consideration of his suffering, and of his 
 able rage and violence?” Lizzie Hexam de- | being her brother’s friend. 
 
 -manded with spirit. ‘¢ And it lies under his feet,” said Bradley, un- 
 
 He bit his lip, and looked at her, and said | folding his hands in spite of himself, and fierce- 
 never a word. ly motioning with them both toward the stones 
 
 “Was it Mr. Wrayburn that youthreatened?” | of the pavement. ‘‘Remember that! It lies 
 
180 
 
 under that fellow’s feet, and he treads upon it 
 and exults above it.” 
 
 ‘He does not!” said Lizzie. 
 
 “He does!” said Bradley. ‘I have stood 
 before him face to face, and he crushed me down 
 in the dirt of his contempt, and walked over me. 
 Why? Because he knew with triumph what 
 was in store for me to-night.” 
 
 ‘Oh, Mr. Headstone, you talk quite wildly.” 
 
 “¢ Quite collectedly. I know what I say too 
 well. Now I have said all. I have used no 
 threat, remember; I have done no more than 
 show you how the case stands ;—how the case 
 stands, so far.”’ 
 
 At this moment her brother sauntered into view 
 close by. She darted to him, and caught him 
 by the hand. Bradley followed, and laid his 
 heavy hand on the boy’s 8 Opposite ‘shoulder. 
 
 ‘Char ley Hexam, [am going home. I must 
 walk home by myself to-night, and get shut up 
 in my room without being spoken to. Give me 
 half an hour’s start, and let me be, till you find 
 me at my work in the morning. T shall be at 
 my work in the morning just as usual.” 
 
 ‘Clasping his hands, he uttered a short un- 
 earthly broken cry, and went his way. The 
 brother and sister were left looking at one an- 
 other near a lamp in the solitary church-yard, 
 and the boy’s face clouded and darkened as he 
 said, in a rough tone: ‘‘ What is the meaning 
 of this? What have you done to my best friend? 
 Out with the truth!” 
 
 “‘Charley !” said his sister. 
 more considerately !” 
 
 ‘‘T am not in the humor for consideration, 
 or for nonsense of any sort,” replied the boy. 
 “What have you been doing? Why has Mr. 
 Headstone gone from us in that way ?” 
 
 ‘‘He asked me—you know he asked me—to 
 be his wife, Charley.” 
 
 ‘‘ Well?” said the boy, impatiently. 
 
 “¢ And I was obliged to tell him that I could 
 not be his wife.” 
 
 ‘¢You were obliged to tell him,” repeated the 
 boy angrily, between his teeth, and rudely gai 
 ing her away. ‘‘ You were obliged to tell him! 
 Do you know that he is worth fifty of you?” 
 
 “Tt may easily be so, Charley, but I can not 
 marry him.’ 
 
 “You mean that you are conscious that you 
 can’t appreciate him, and don’t deserve him, I 
 suppose ?” 
 
 ‘‘T mean that I do not like him, Charley, and 
 that I will never marry him.’ 
 
 ‘Upon my soul,” ciated the boy, ‘** you 
 are a nice picture of a sister! Upon my soul, 
 you are a pretty piece of disinterestedness ! And 
 so all my endeavors to cancel the past and to 
 
 raise myself in the world, and to raise you with 
 me, are to be beaten down by your low whims ; 
 are they ?” 
 
 ‘¢T will not reproach you, Charley.” 
 
 ‘Hear her!” exclaimed the boy, looking 
 round at the darkness. ‘‘She won’t reproach 
 me! She does her best to destroy my fortunes 
 and her own, and she won’t reproach me! Why, 
 you'll tell me, next, that you won’t reproach Mr, 
 Headstone for coming out of the sphere to which 
 he is an ornament, and putting himself at your 
 feet, to be rejected by you!” 
 
 “¢No, Charley, I will only tell you, as I told 
 
 ** Speak a little 
 
 himself, that I thank him for doing so, that I a though he tried to conceal it. 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 sorry he did so, and that I hope he will do much ~ 
 better, and be happy.” 
 
 Some touch of compunction smote the boy’s 
 hardening heart as he looked upon her, his patient 
 little nurse in infancy, his patient friend, ad- 
 viser, and reclaimer in boyhood, the self- forge t- 
 ting sister who had done every thing for him. His ~ 
 tone relented, and he drew her arm through his. 
 
 ‘‘Now, come, Liz; don’t let us quarrel; let 
 us be reasonable, and talk this over like brother 
 and sister. Will you listen to me?” 
 
 ‘Oh, Charley!’ she replied, through her 
 starting tears; “do I not listen to you, and 
 hear many hard things?” 
 
 ‘¢Then I’m sorry. There, Liz! I am un- 
 feignedly sorry. Only you do put me out so. 
 Now see. Mr. Headstone is perfectly devoted to 
 you. » He has told me in the strongest manner 
 that he has never been his old self for one single 
 minute since I first brought him to see you. 
 Miss Peecher, our schoolmistress—pretty and — 
 young, and all that—is known to be very much » 
 attached to him, and he won’t so much as look 
 at her or hear of her. Now, his devotion to you 
 must be a disinterested one; mustn’t it? If he 
 married Miss Peecher, he would be a great deal 
 better off in all worldly respects than in marry- 
 ing you. Well then; he has nothing to get by 
 it, has he?” 
 
 ‘¢Nothing, Heaven knows!” 
 
 “Very well then,” said the boy; ‘that’s 
 something in his favor, and a great thing. Then 
 Icome in. Mr. Headstone has always got me — 
 on, and he has a good deal in his power, and of © 
 course if he was my brother-in-law he wouldn’t 
 get me on less, but would get me on more. r 
 Headstone comes and confides in me, in a ve 
 delicate way, and says, ‘I hope my marryi 
 your sister would be agreeable to you, Hexam, 
 and useful to you?’ I say, ‘There’s nothing in 
 the world, Mr. Headstone, that I could be bet- 
 ter pleased with” Mr. Headstone says, ‘Then 
 I may rely upon your intimate knowledge of me ~ 
 for your good word with your sister, Hexam ?? — 
 And I say, ‘ Certainly, Mr. Headstone, and nat- ‘ 
 urally I have a good deal of influence ‘with her." F 
 So Ihave; haven’t I, Liz?” 
 
 ‘¢ Yes, Charley. Lid 
 
 “Well said! Now, you see, we » begin to get 
 on, the moment we begin to be really talking it 
 over, like brother and sister. Very well. Then — 
 you come in. “ As Mr. Headstone’s wife you — 
 would be occupying a most respectable station, 
 and you would be holding a far better place in 
 society than you hold now, and you would at 
 length get quit of the river-side and the old dis« 
 agreeables belonging to it, and you would be rid — 
 for goad of dolls’ dress-makers and their drunk- | 5 
 en fathers, and the like of that. Not that I want — 
 to disparage Miss Jenny Wren: I dare say she — 
 is all very well in her way; but her way is not 
 your way as Mr. Headstone’s wife. . Now, you f 
 see, Liz, on all three accounts—on Mr. Head-_ 
 stone’s, on Mine, on yours—nothing could be betail 
 ter or more desirable.” d 
 
 They were walking slowly as the boy spoke, 
 and here he stood still to see what effect he had 
 made. His sister’s eyes were fixed upon him; 
 but as they showed no yielding, and as she r 
 mained silent, he walked her on again. ‘There 
 was some discomfiture in his tone as he resumed, 
 
 Sin 
 
18] 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
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 182 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 «¢ Having so much influence with you, Liz, as 
 Thave, perhaps I should have done better to have 
 had a little chat with you in the first instance, 
 before Mr. Headstone spoke for himself. “But 
 really all this in his favor seemed so plain and 
 undeniable, and I knew yéuto have always been 
 so reasonable and sensible, that I didn’t consider 
 it worth while. Very likely that was a mistake 
 of mine. However, it’s soon set right. All that 
 need be done to set it right, is for you to tell me 
 at once that I may go home and tell Mr. Head- 
 stone that what has taken place is not final, and 
 that it will all come round by-and-by.” 
 
 He stopped again. The pale face looked anx- 
 iously and lovingly at him, but she shook her 
 head. 
 
 ‘¢Can’t you speak ?” said the boy, sharply. 
 
 ‘¢T am very unwilling to speak, Charley. If 
 I must, I must. I can not authorize you to say 
 any such thing to Mr. Headstone: I can not al- 
 low you to say any such thing to Mr. Headstone. 
 Nothing rémains to be said to him from me, 
 
 after what I have said for good and all to- 
 
 night.” 
 
 *“ And this girl,” cried the boy, contemptu- 
 ously throwing her off again, ‘‘ calls herself a 
 sister !” 
 
 ‘Charley, dear, that is the second time that 
 you have almost struck me. Don’t be hurt by 
 my words. I don’t mean—Heaven forbid !— 
 that you intended it; but you hardly know with 
 what a sudden swing you removed yourself from 
 mie.”’ 
 
 ‘¢ However!” said the boy, taking no heed of 
 
 - the remonstrance, and pursuing his own morti- 
 
 fied disappointment, ‘I know what this means, 
 and you shall not disgrace me.” 
 
 ‘Tt means what I have told you, Charley, 
 and nothing more.” 
 
 “'That’s not true,” said the boy, in a violent 
 tone, ‘‘and you know it’s not. It means your 
 precious Mr. Wrayburn; that’s what it means.” 
 
 ‘¢ Charley! If you remember any old days of 
 ours together, forbear!” 
 
 ‘But you shall not disgrace me,” doggedly 
 pursued the boy. ‘I am determined that after 
 T have climbed up out of the mire you shall not 
 pull me down. You can’t disgrace me if I have 
 nothing to do with you, and I wil/ have nothing 
 to do with you for the future.” 
 
 ‘Charley! On many a night like this, and 
 many a worse night, I have sat on the stones of 
 the street, hushing youin my arms. Unsay those 
 words without even saying you are sorry for 
 them, and my arms are open to you still, and 
 so is my heart.” 
 
 ‘‘1’ll not unsay them. I’Jl say them again. 
 You are an inveterately bad girl, and a false sis- 
 ter, and I have done with you. Forever, I have 
 
 ~dene with you!” 
 
 liv threw up his ungrateful and ungracious 
 hand as if it set up a barrier between them, and 
 flung himself upon his heel and left her. She 
 remained impassive on the same spot, silent and 
 motionless, until the striking of the church clock 
 roused her, and she turned away. But then, 
 with the breaking up of her immobility came 
 the breaking up of the waters that the cold heart 
 of the selfish boy had frozen. And ‘‘O that I 
 were lying here with the dead!” and ‘* O Char- 
 ley, Charley, that this should be the end of our 
 pictures in the fire!” were all the words she said, 
 
 as she laid her face in her hands on the stone’ 
 coping. : To 
 
 A figure passed by, and passed on, but stopped 
 and looked round at her. , It was the figure 
 of an old man with a bowed head, wearing a 
 large brimmed low-crowned hat, and a long- 
 skirted coat. After hesitating a little the fig- 
 ure turned back, and, advancing with an air of 
 gentleness and compassion, said : 
 
 ‘¢Pardon me, young woman, for speaking to | 
 you, but you are under some distress of mind. 
 I can not pass upon my way and leave you weep- 
 ing here alone, as if there was nothing in the - 
 place. Can I help you? Can I do any thing 
 to give you.comfort?” . 
 
 ’. She raised her head at the sound of these kind 
 words, and answered gladly, ‘‘ Oh, Mr. Riah, is 
 it you ?” 
 
 <¢My daughter,” said the old man, ‘‘T stand 
 amazed! I spoke as to a stranger. Take my 
 arm, take my arm. What grieves you? Who 
 has done this? Poor girl, poor girl!” 
 
 ‘¢ My brother has quarreled with me,” sobbed 
 Lizzie, ‘‘and renounced me.” 
 
 ‘¢He is a thankless dog,” said the Jew, an- 
 grily. ‘‘Lethim go. Shake the dust from thy 
 feet and let him go. Come, daughter! Come 
 home with me—it is but across the road—and 
 take a little time to recover your peace and to © 
 make your eyes seemly, and then I will bear you 
 company through the streets. For it is past 
 your usual time, and will soon be late, and the 
 way is long, and there is much company out of 
 doors to-night.” : ; 
 
 She accepted the support he offered her, and | 
 they slowly passed out of the church-yard. They — 
 were in the act of emerging into the main thor- | 
 oughfare, when another figure loitering discon- — 
 tentedly by, and looking up the street and down © 
 it, and all about, started and exclaimed, ‘‘Liz- | 
 zie! why, where have you been? Why, what's — 
 the matter ?” a 
 
 As Eugene Wrayburn thus addressed her she | 
 drew closer to the Jew and bent her head. The © 
 Jew having taken in the whole of Eugene at one ~ 
 sharp glance, cast his eyes upon the ground, and 
 stood mute, ay q 
 
 ‘Lizzie, what is the matter?” 
 
 ‘Mr. Wrayburn, I can not tell you now. I 
 can not tell you to-night, if I ever can tell you. 
 Pray leave me.” . 
 
 ‘“But, Lizzie, I came expressly to join you. 
 I came to walk home with you, having dined — 
 at a coftee-house in this neighborhood and know= ~ 
 ing your hour. And I have been lingering — 
 about,” added Engene, “like a bailiff; or,” 
 with a look at Riah, ‘“‘an old clothesman.” | 
 
 The Jew lifted up his eyes, and took in Eu- 
 gene more at another glance. (i 
 
 ‘Myr, Wrayburn, pray, pray leave me with — 
 this protector. And one thing more. Pray, _ 
 pray be careful of yourself.” a 
 
 “Mysteries of Udelpho!’’ said Eugene, with a 
 look of wonder. ‘‘ May I be excused for ask- © 
 ing, in the elderly gentleman’s presence, who is 
 this kind protector ?” a 
 
 ‘A trust-worthy friend,”’ said Lizzie. 4 
 
 ‘¢ T will relieve him of his trust,” returned Eus” 
 gene. ‘But you must tell me, Lizzie, what is _ 
 the matter ?” . : | wh | 
 
 ‘‘Her brother is the matter,” said the old 
 man, lifting up his eyes again. ee 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 183 
 
 Our brother the matter 2?” returned Eugene, | of serious interest (setting off his carelessness, as 
 with airycontempt. ‘Our brother is not worth if it were assumed to calm her), that his lightest 
 a thought, far less a tear. What has our broth. touch, his lightest look, his very presence beside 
 er done?” Ms - | her in the dark common street, were like glimpses 
 _ The old man lifted up his eyes again, with | of an enchanted world, which it was natural for 
 one grave look at Wrayburn, and one grave jealousy and malice and all meanness to be un- 
 glance at Lizzie, as she stood looking down. | able to bear the brightness of, and to gird at as 
 Both were so full of meaning that even Eugene | bad spirits might. 
 was checked in his light career, and subsided| N othing more being said of repairing to Riah’s, 
 _ into a thoughtful ‘‘ Humph!” they went direct to Lizzie’s lodging. A little 
 With an air of perfect patience the old man, | short of the house-door she parted from them, 
 remaining mute and keeping his eyes.cast down, | and went in alone. 2 
 stood, retaining Lizzie’s arm, as though, in his ‘*Mr. Aaron,” said Eugene, when they were 
 habit of passive endurance, it would be all one | left together in the street, ‘‘ with many thanks 
 to him if he had stood there motionless all night. | for your company, it remains for me unwillingly 
 “If Mr. Aaron,” said Eugeng, who soon found | to say Farewell.” 
 this fatiguing, ‘will be good enough to relin- ‘* Sir,” returned the other, “T give you good- 
 quish his charge to me, he will be quite free | night, and I wish that you were not so thought- 
 for any engagement he may have at the Syna- | less.” 
 gogue. Mr. Aaron, will you have the kind- **Mr. Aaron,” returned Eugene, ‘TI give you 
 ness ?” good-night, and I wish (for you are a little dull) 
 _, But the old man stood stock still. that you were not so thoughtful.” 
 |e Good-evening, Mr. Aaron,” said Eugene,| But now, that his part was played out for the 
 politely ; ‘‘we need not detain you.” Then | evening, and when in turning his back upon the 
 turning to Lizzie, “Is our friend Mr. Aarén a|Jew he came off the stage, he was thoughtful 
 _ little deaf?” himself. ‘‘ How did Lightwood’s catechism run?” 
 “My hearing is very good, Christian gentle | he murmured, as he stopped to light his cigar. 
 man,” replied the old man, calmly, ‘but I will | ‘‘ What is to come of it? What are you doing ? 
 hear only one voice to-night desiring me to leave | Where are you going? We shall soon know 
 this damsel before I have conveyed her to her|now. Ah!” witha heavy sigh, - 
 home. If she requests it, [will do it. Iwilldo| The heavy sigh was repeated as if by an echo, 
 _ it for no one else.” ‘ an hour afterward, when Riah, who had been 
 **May I ask why so, Mr. Aaron?” said Eu- sitting on some dark steps in a corner over against 
 _ gene, quite undisturbed in his ease, the house, arose and went his patient way; steal- 
 __ “Excuse me. If she asks me, I will tell her,” | ing through the streets in his ancient dress, like 
 Teplied the old man. “I will tell no one elsew” | the ghost of a departed Time. 
 “TI do not ask you,” said Lizzie, ‘‘and I beg 
 you to take me home. Mr. Wrayburn, I have 
 had a bitter trial to-night, and I hope you will 
 not think me ungrateful, or mysterious, or change- 
 able. Iam neither; I am wretched. Pray re- 
 member what I said to you, Pray, pray take 
 _ Care.” 
 __ ** My dear Lizzie,” he returned, in alow voice, 
 _ bending over her on the other side; ‘‘of what? 
 Of whom?” . 
 ___ “Of any one you have lately seen and made 
 angry.” 
 _ Hesnapped his fingers and laughed. ‘‘Come,” 
 said he, ‘since no better may be, Mr. Aaron 
 and I will divide this trust, and see you home 
 together. Mr. Aaron on that side; I on this. 
 If perfectly agreeable to Mr. Aaron, the escort 
 will now proceed.” 
 He knew his power over her. He knew that 
 she would not insist upon his leaving her. He 
 knew that, her fears for him being aroused, she 
 would be uneasy if he were out of her sight. 
 For all his seeming levity and carelessness he 
 _knew whatever he chose to know of the thoughts 
 of her heart. raying herself for the bewilderment of the senses 
 And going on at her side, so gayly, regard- | of men, is known only to the Graces and her 
 less of all that had been urged against him; so maid; but perhaps even that engaging creature, 
 superior in his sallies and self-possession to the | though not reduced to the self-dependence of 
 gloomy ae her suitor and the selfish Twemlow, could dispense with a good deal of the 
 petulance of her brother; so faithful to her, as | trouble attendant on the daily restoration of her 
 it seemed, when her own stock was faithless; | charms, seeing that as to her face and neck this 
 what an immense advantage, what an overpow- | adorable divinity is, as it were, a diurnal species 
 ering influence, were his that night! Add to the | of lobster—throwing off a shell every forenoon, 
 rest, poor girl, that she had heard him vilified and needing to keep in a retired spot until the 
 for her sake, and that she had suffered for his, | new crust hardens. 
 and where the wonder that his occasional tones! Howbeit, Twemlow doth at length invest hime 
 
 —o—_—— - 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 AN ANNIVERSARY OCCASION. 
 
 THE estimable Twemlow, dressing himself in . 
 his lodgings over the stable-yard in Duke Street, 
 Saint James’s, and hearing the horses at their 
 toilet below, finds himself on the whole in a dis- 
 advantageous position as compared with the no- 
 ble animals at livery. - For whereas, on the one 
 hand, he has no attendant to slap him sounding- 
 ly and require him in gruff accents to come up 
 and come over, still,-on the other hand, he has 
 no attendant at all; and the mild gentleman’s 
 finger-joints and other joints working rustily in 
 the morning, he could deem it agreeable even to 
 be tied up by the countenance at his chamber- 
 door,,so he were there skillfully rubbed down 
 and slushed and sluiced and polished and clothed, 
 while himself taking merely a passive part in 
 these trying transactions. ae Sy 
 
 How the fascinating Tippins gets on when ar- 
 
184 
 
 self with collar and cravat and wristbands to his 
 knuckles, and goeth forth to breakfast. And to 
 breakfast with whom but his near neighbors, the 
 Lammles of Sackville Street, who have imparted 
 to him that he will meet his distant kinsman, 
 Mr. Fledgeby. The awful Snigsworth might 
 taboo and prohibit Fledgeby, but the peaceable 
 Twemlow reasons, “If he 7s my kinsman I didn’t 
 make him so, and to meet a man is not to know 
 him.” 
 
 It is the first anniversary of the happy mar- 
 riage of Mr. and Mrs. Lammle, and the celebra- 
 tion is a breakfast, because a dinner on the de- 
 sired scale of sumptuosity can not be achieved 
 within less limits than’ those of the non-existent 
 palatial residence of which so many people are 
 madly envious. So Twemlow trips with not a 
 little stiffness across Piccadilly, sensible of hav- 
 ing once been more upright in figure and less in 
 danger of being knocked down by swift vehicles. 
 To be sure that was in the days when he hoped 
 for leave from the dread Snigsworth to do some- 
 thing, or be something, in life,-and before that 
 magnificent Tartar issued the ukase, ‘*As he 
 will never distinguish himself, he must be a poor 
 gentleman-pensioner of mine, and let him here- 
 by consider himself pensioned.” 
 
 Ah! my Twemlow! Say, little feeble gray 
 personage, What thoughts are in thy breast to- 
 day, of the Fancy—so still to call her who bruised 
 thy heart when it was green and thy head brown 
 —and whether it be better or worse, more pain- 
 ful or less, to believe in the Fancy to this hour, 
 than to know her for a’ greedy armor-plated 
 crocodile, with no more capacity of imagining 
 the delicate:and sensitive and tender spot behind 
 thy waistcoat, than of going straight at it with 
 a knittiug-needle. Say likewise, my Twemlow, 
 whether it be the happier lot to be a poor rela- 
 tion of the great, or to stand in the wintry slush 
 giving the hack horses to drink out of the shal- 
 low tub at the coach-stand, into which thon hast 
 so nearly set thy uncertain foot. ‘T'wemlow says 
 nothing, and goes on. 
 
 As he approaches the Lammles’ door, drives 
 up a little one-horse carriage, containing Tip- 
 pins the «divine. Tippins, letting down the win- 
 dow, playfully extols the vigilance of her cava- 
 lier in being in waiting there to hand her out. 
 Twemlow hands her out with as much polite 
 gravity as if she were any thing real, and they 
 proceed up stairs: 'Tippins all abroad about the | 
 lees, and seeking to express that those unsteady 
 articles are only skipping in their native buoy- 
 ancy. . ; 
 
 And dear Mrs. Lammle and dear Mr. Lammle, 
 how do you dé, and when are you going down 
 to what’s-its-name place—Guy, Earl of Warwick, 
 you know—what is it ?—Dun Cow—to claim the 
 ditch of bacon? And Mortimer, whose name is 
 forever blotted ont from my list of lovers, by rea- 
 son first of fickleness and then of base desertion, 
 how do you do, wretch? And Mr. Wrayburn, 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 ™ 
 ee 
 
 - by 
 
 prose, for you haven’t opened your lips there yet, 
 and we are dying to hear what you haye got to 
 say to us! Miss Podsnap, charmed to see you. 
 Pa, here? No! Ma, neither? Oh! Mr. 
 Boots! Delighted. Mr. Brewer! This is a 
 eathering of the clans. Thus Tippins, and sur- 
 veys Fledgeby and outsiders through golden glass, 
 murmuring as she turns about and about, in. 
 her innocent giddy way, Any body else I know ? 
 No, I think not. Nobody there. Nobody there. 
 Nobody any where! ae 
 _ Mr. Lammle, all a-glitter, produces his friend 
 Fledgeby, as dying for the honor of presentation 
 to Lady Tippins. Fledgeby presented, has the 
 air of going to say something, has the air of 
 going to say nothing, has an air successively of 
 meditation, of resignation, and of desolation, 
 backs on Brewer, makes the tour of Boots, and 
 fades into the extreme back-ground, feeling for 
 his whisker, as if it might have turned up since 
 he was there five minutes ago. 
 
 But Lammle has him out again before he has 
 so much as completely ascertained the -bareness 
 of the land. He would seem to be ina bad way, — 
 Fledgeby; for Lammle represents him as dying 
 again. He is dying now, of want of presenta- 
 tion to Twemlow. . 
 
 Tiwemlow offers his hand. Glad to see him. 
 ‘Your mother, Sir, was a connection of mine.” 
 
 ‘‘T believe so,”’ says Fledgeby, ‘‘ but my mo- 
 ther and her family were two.” 
 
 “Are you staying in town?” asks Twemlow. 
 
 ‘‘T always am,” says Flédgeby. 
 
 ‘You like town,” says Twemlow. Butis felled 
 flat by Fledgeby’s taking it quite ill, and reply- 
 ing, No, he don’t like town. Lammile‘tries to 
 break the force of the fall by remarking that 
 some people do not like town. Fledgeby retort- 
 ing that he never heard of any such case but his © 
 own, Twemlow goes down again heavily. rl 
 
 “There is nothing new this morning, I sup-_ 
 pose ?” says Twemlow, returning to the mark 
 with great spirit. 
 
 Fledgeby has not heard of any thing. 
 
 f ‘‘No, there’s not a word of news, 
 
 Lammle. ; 
 
 4 ‘«Not a particle,” adds Boots. 
 
 ‘¢ Not an atom,” chimes in Brewer. fi 
 
 Somehow the execution of this little concert- a 
 ed piece appears to raise the general spirits as 4 
 with a sense of duty done, and sets the company © 
 agoing. Every body seems more equal than be- 4 
 fore to the calamity of being in the society of — 
 every body else. Even Engene standing in @ 4 
 window, moodily swinging the tassel of a blind, — 
 gives it a smarter jerk now, as if he found him- 
 self in better case. ; 
 
 - Breakfast announced. Every thing on table 
 showy and gaudy, but witha self-assertingly tem- 
 
 ee 
 
 Sige 
 
 i 
 
 ” says | 
 
 { 
 
 porary and nomadic air on the decorations, as i 
 boasting that they will be much more showy and © 
 
 gaudy in the palatial residence. Mr.lam mle s — 
 own particular servant behind his chair; the An- | 
 
 you here! What can you come for, because we 
 
 are all very sure beforehand that you are not, 
 going to talk!) And Veneering, M.P., how are 
 
 things going on down at the House, and when 
 
 will vou turn out those terrible people for us?) 
 
 And Mrs. Veneering, my dear, can it positively 
 be true that you go down to that stifling place 
 night after night, to hear those men prose? 
 Talking of which, Veneering, why don’t you 
 
 'alytical behind Veneering’s chair; instances ing 
 point that such servants fallginto two classes 3 _ 
 
 one mistrusting the master’s acquaintances, and ~ 
 ‘the other mistrusting the master. Mr. Lammle’s — 
 servant, of the second class. Appearing to be 
 \Jost in wonder and low spirits because the police 
 ; are so long in coming to take his master up om 
 some charge of the first magnitnde, 
 Vencering, M.P., on the right of Mrs. 
 
 BS 
 
 Lam- 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 mle; Twemlow on her left; Mrs. Veneering, 
 W.M.P. (wife of Member of Parliament), and 
 Lady ‘Tippins on Mr. Lammle’s right and left. 
 But be sure that well within the fascination of 
 Mr. Lammle’s eye and smile sits little Georgiana. 
 And be sure that close to little Georgiana, also 
 under inspection by the same gingerous gentle- 
 
 “man, sits Fledgeby. 
 
 Oftener than twice or thrice while breakfast 
 
 is in progress Mr. Twemlow gives a little sud- 
 
 den turn toward Mrs. Lammle, and then says to 
 her, ‘“‘I beg your pardon!” This not being 
 Twemlow’s usual way, why is it his way to-day ? 
 Why, the truth is, Twemlow repeatedly labors 
 under the impression that Mrs. Lammle is going 
 to speak to him, and turning finds that it is not 
 so, and mostly that she has her eyes upon Ve- 
 neering. Strange that this impression so abides 
 by Twemlow after being corrected, yet so it 
 
 a 38, 
 
 Lady Tippins partaking plentifully of the fruits 
 of the earth (including grape-juice in the cate- 
 gory) becomes livelier, and applies herself to 
 elicit sparks from Mortimer Lightwood. It is 
 always understood among the initiated, that that 
 
 faithless lover must be planted at table opposite 
 
 to Lady Tippins, who will then strike conversa- 
 tional fire out of him. In a pause of mastica- 
 tion and deglutition, Lady Tippins, contempla- 
 
 ting Mortimer, recalls that it was at our dear 
 
 Veneerings, and in the presence of a party who 
 are surely all here, that he told them his story 
 of the man.from somewhere, which afterward 
 became so horribly interesting and vulgarly pop- 
 ular. ; 
 
 ** Yes, Lady Tippins,” assents Mortimer; ‘as 
 they say on the stage, ‘Even so!’” 
 
 ‘“*Then we expect you,” retorts the charmer, 
 “to sustain your reputation, and tell us some- 
 thing else.” 
 
 ‘‘Lady Tippins, I exhausted myself for life 
 that day, and there is nothing more to be got 
 out of me.” 
 
 Mortimer parries thus, with a sense upon him 
 that elsewhere it is Eugene and not he who is 
 the jester, and that in these circles where Eugene 
 persists in being speechless, he, Mortimer, is 
 but the double of the friend on whom he has 
 founded himself. 
 
 ** But,” quoth the fascinating Tippins, “I am 
 resolved on getting something more out of you. 
 Traitor! what is this I hear about another dis- 
 appearance ?” 
 
 ‘* As it is you who have heard it,” returns 
 Lightwood, ‘perhaps you'll tell us.” 
 
 ‘‘Monster, away!” retorts Lady Tippins. 
 “Your own Golden Dustman referred me to 
 you.” 
 
 Mr. Lammle striking in here, proclaims aloud 
 that there is a sequel to the story of the-man 
 from somewhere. Silence ensues upon the proc- 
 lamation. 
 
 ‘I. assure you,” says Lightwood, glancing 
 round the table, ‘* I have nothing to tell.” But 
 Eugene adding in a low voice, ‘*There, tell it, 
 tell it!” he corrects himself with the addition, 
 ** Nothing worth mentioning.” 
 
 Boots and Brewer immediately perceive that 
 it is immensely worth mentioning, and become 
 
 politely clamorous. Veneering is also visited by 
 
 a perception to the same effect. But it is under- 
 stood that his attention is now rather used up, 
 12 
 
 185 
 and difficult to hold, that being the tone of the 
 House of Commons. 
 
 ‘* Pray don’t be at the trouble of composing 
 yourselves to listen,” says Mortimer Lightwood, 
 ‘‘ because I shall have finished long before you 
 have fallen into comfortable attitudes. It’s 
 like—” 
 
 ‘‘It’s like,” impatiently interrupts Eugene, 
 ‘*the children’s narrative : 
 
 *¢* Pll tell you a story 
 
 ‘«<Of Jack a Manory, 
 
 ‘*¢And now my story’s begun; 
 
 “6 Y'll tell you another 
 
 “¢Of Jack and his brother, 
 
 ***And now my story is done.’ 
 —Get on, and get it over!” 
 
 Eugene says this with a sound of vexation in 
 his voice, leaning back in his chair and looking 
 balefully at Lady Tippins, who nods to him as 
 her dear Bear, and playfully insinuates that she 
 (a self-evident proposition) is Beauty, and he 
 Beast. 
 
 ‘*'The reference,” proceeds Mortimer, ‘‘ which 
 I suppose to be made by my honorable and fair 
 enslaver opposite, is to the following circum- 
 stance. Very lately, the young woman, Lizzie 
 Hexam, daughter of the late Jesse Hexam, oth- 
 erwise Gaffer, who will be remembered to have 
 found the body of the man from somewhere, mys- 
 teriously received, she knew not from whom, an 
 xplicit retractation of the charges made against 
 her father by another water-side character of the 
 name of Riderhood. Nobody believed them, be- 
 cause little Rogue Riderhood—I am tempted into 
 the paraphrase by remembering the charming 
 wolf who would have rendered socicty a great 
 service if he had devoured Mr. Riderhood’s fa- 
 ther and mother in their infancy—had previous- 
 ly played fast and loose with the said charges, 
 and, in fact, abandoned them. However, the 
 retractation I have mentioned found its way into 
 Lizzie Hexam’s hands, with a general flavor on 
 it of having been favored by some anonymous 
 messenger in a dark cloak and slouched hat, 
 and was by her forwarded, in her father’s vindi- 
 cation, to Mr. Boffin, my client. You will ex- 
 cuse the phraseology of the shop, but as I never 
 had another client, and in all likelihood never 
 shall have, I am rather proud of him as a natu- 
 ral curiosity probably unique.” 
 
 Although as easy as usual on the surface, 
 Lightwood is not quite as easy as usual below 
 it. With an air of not minding Eugene at all, 
 he feels that the subject is not altogether a safe 
 one in that connection. 
 
 ‘¢The natural curiosity which forms the sole 
 ornament of my professional museum,” he re- 
 sumes, ‘‘hereupon desires his Secretary—an in- 
 dividual of the hermit-crab or oyster species, 
 and whose name, I think, is Chokesmith—but 
 it doesn’t in the least matter—say Artichoke— 
 to put himself in communication with Lizzie 
 Hexam. Artichoke professes his readiness so 
 to do, endeavors to do so, but fails.” 
 
 ‘¢ Why fails?” asks Boots. 
 
 “ Tlow fails ?” asks Brewer. 
 
 ‘Pardon me,” returns Lightwood, ‘‘I must 
 postpone the reply for one moment, or we shall 
 have an anti-climax. Artichoke failing sig- 
 nally, my client refers the task to me: his pur- 
 pose being to advance the interests of the object 
 of his search. I proceed to put myself in com- 
 munication with her; I even happen to possess 
 
186 
 
 some special means,” with a glance at Eugene, 
 “of putting myself in communication with her; 
 but I fail too, because she has vanished.” 
 
 “Vanished !” is the general echo. 
 
 ‘* Disappeared,” says Mortimer. ‘* Nobody 
 knows how, nobody knows when, nobody knows 
 where. And so ends the story to which my hon- 
 orable and fair enslaver opposite referred.” 
 
 Tippins, with a bewitching little scream, opines 
 that we shall every one of us be murdered in 
 our beds. Kugene eyes her as if some of us 
 would be enough for him. Mrs. Veneering, 
 W.M.P., remarks that these social mysteries 
 make one afraid of leaving Baby. Veneering, | 
 M.P., wishes to be informed (with something of | 
 a second-hand air of seeing the Right Honora- | 
 ble Gentleman at the head of the Home Depart- 
 ment in his place) whether it is intended to be | 
 conveyed that the vanished person has been spir- 
 ited away or otherwise harmed? Instead of 
 Lightwood’s answering, Eugene answers, and 
 answers hastily and vexedly: ‘*No, no, no; he 
 doesn’t mean that; he means voluntarily van- 
 ished—but utterly—completely.” 
 
 However, the great subject of the happiness 
 of Mr. and Mrs. Lammle must not be allowed 
 to vanish with the other vanishments—with the 
 vanishing of the murderer, the vanishing of Ju- 
 lius Handford, the vanishing of Lizzie Hexam— 
 and therefore Veneering must recall the present 
 sheep to the pen from which they have strayed. 
 Who so fit to discourse of the happiness of Mr. 
 and Mrs. Lammle, they being the dearest and 
 oldest friends he has in the world; or what au- 
 dience so fit for him to take into his confidence 
 as that audience, a noun of multitude or signi- 
 fying many, who are all the oldest and dearest 
 friends he has in the world? So Veneering, 
 without the formality of rising, launches into a 
 farailiar oration, gradually toning into the Par- 
 liam mtary sing-song, in which he sees at that 
 board his dear friend Twemlow, who on that 
 day twelvemonth bestowed on his dear friend 
 Lammle the fair hand of his dear friend So- 
 phronia, and in which he also sees at that board 
 his dear friends Boots and Brewer, whose rally- 
 ing round him at a period when his dear friend 
 Lady Tipjins likewise rallied round him—ay, 
 and in the foremost rank—he can never forget 
 while memory holds her seat. But he is free to 
 confess that he misses from that baard his dear 
 old frien! Podsnap, thouzh he is well repregent- | 
 ed by his dear young friend Georgiana. And | 
 he further sees at that board (this he announces 
 with pomp, as if exulting in the powers of an | 
 extraordinary telescope) his friend Mr. Fledge- 
 by, if he will permit him to call him so. For all | 
 of these reasons, and many more which he right 
 well knows will have occurred to persons of your 
 exceptional acuteness, he is here to submit to 
 you that the time has arrived when, with our 
 hearts in our glasses, with tears in our eyes, 
 with blessings on our lips, and in a general way 
 with a profusion of gammon and spinach in our 
 emotional larders, we shonld one and all drink 
 to our dear friends the Lammles, wishing them 
 many many years as happy as the last, and many 
 many friends as congenially united as them- 
 selves. And this he will add, that Anastatia 
 Veneering (who is instantly heard to weep) is 
 formed on the same model as her old and chosen 
 friend Sophronia Lammle, in respect that she is. 
 
 | pitality. 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 devoted to the man who wooed and won her, 
 and nobly discharges the duties of a wife, 
 
 ‘‘Seeing no better way out of it, Veneering 
 here pulls up his oratorical Pegasus extremely 
 short, and plumps down, clean over his head, 
 with: ‘* Lammle, God bless you!” 
 
 Then Lammle. ‘Too much of him every way; 
 pervadingly too much nose of a coarse wrong 
 shape, and his nose in his mind and his man- 
 ners; too much smile to be real; too much 
 frown to be false; too many large teeth to be 
 Visible at once without suggesting a bite. He 
 thanks you, dear friends, for your kindly greet- 
 
 ing, and hopes to receive you—it may be on the 
 
 next of these delightful occasions—in a residence 
 better suited to your claims on the rites of hos- 
 He will never forget that at Veneer- 
 ing’s he first saw Sophronia. Sophronia will 
 never forget that at Venecring’s she first saw 
 him. They spoke of it soon after they were 
 married, and agreed that they would never for- 
 
 get it. In fact, to Veneering they owe their 
 union. ‘They hope to show their sense of this 
 
 some day (‘‘ No, no,” from Veneering’—oh yes, 
 yes, and let him rely upon it, they will if they 
 can! His marriage with Sophronia was not a 
 marriage of interest on either side: she had her 
 little fortune, he had his little fortune: they join- 
 ed their little fortunes: it was a marriage of 
 pure inclination and suitability. Thank you!, 
 Sophronia and he are fond of the society of 
 young people; but he is not sure that their 
 house would be a good house for young people 
 proposing to remain single, since the contempla- 
 tion of its domestic bliss might induce them to 
 change their minds. He will not apply this to 
 any one present; certainly not to their darling 
 little Georgiana, Again thank yon! N»ither, 
 by-the-by, will he apply it to his friend Fledge- 
 by. He thanks Vencering for the feeling man- 
 ner in which he referred to their common friend 
 Fledgeby, for he holds that gentleman in the 
 highest estimation. Thank you. In fact (re- 
 turning unexpectedly to Fledgeby), the better 
 you know him, the more you find in him that 
 you desire toknow. Againthank you! In his 
 dear Sophronia’s name and in his ayn, thank 
 you! 
 
 Mrs. Lammie has sat quite still, with her eyes 
 cast down upon the table-cloth. As Mr. Lam- 
 mle’s address ends, Twemlow once more turns 
 to her involuntarily, not eured yet of that often- 
 recurring impression that she is going to sp sak 
 to him. ‘This time she really is going to speak 
 to him. Veneering is talking with his other 
 next neighbor, and she speaks in a low voice. 
 
 ‘*Mr. Twemlow,” 
 
 He answers, ‘‘I beg your pardon? Yes?” 
 Still a little doubtful, because of her not looking 
 at him, 
 
 “You have the soul of a gentleman, and I 
 know I may trust you. Will you give me the 
 opportunity of saving a few words to you when 
 you come up stairs ?” 
 
 ‘* Assuredly. I shall be honored.” 
 
 ‘*Don’t seem to do so, if you please, and 
 don’t think it inconsistent if my manner should 
 be more careless than my words. I may be 
 watched.”’ 
 
 Intensely astonished, Twemlow pnts his hand 
 to his forehead, and sinks back in his chair med- 
 itating. Mrs. Lammle rises. All rice, ‘The 
 
val to taking an observation of Boots’s 
 
 _of being sold into wretchedness for life.” 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. \ 
 
 ladies go up stairs. The gentlemen soon saun- 
 ter after them. Fledgeby has devoted the inter- 
 whiskers, 
 Brewer’s whiskers, and Lammle’s whiskers, and 
 considering which pattern of whisker he would 
 prefer to produce out of himself by friction, if 
 the Genie of the cheek would only answer to his 
 rubbing. 
 
 In the drawing-room, groups form as usual. 
 Lightwood, Boots, and Brewer flutter like moths 
 around that yellow wax-candle—guttering down, 
 and with some hint of a winding-sheet in it— 
 Lady Tippins. Outsiders cultivate Vencering, 
 M.P., and Mrs. Veneering, W.M.P. Lammle 
 stands with folded arms, Mephistophelean in a 
 corner, with Georgiana and Fledgeby. Mrs. 
 Lammile, on a sofa by a table, invites Mr. Twem- 
 low’s.attention to a book of portraits in her hand. 
 
 Mr. Twemlow takes his station’ on a settee be- 
 fore her, and Mrs. Lammle shows him a portrait. 
 
 “You have reason to be surprised,” she: says, 
 softly, ‘‘ but I wish you wouldn’t look so, 
 
 Disturbed Twemlow, making an effort not to 
 look so, looks much more so. 
 
 **T think, Mr. Twemlow, you never saw that 
 distant connection of yours before to-day ?” 
 
 ‘“ No, never.” 
 **Now that you do see him, you see what he 
 
 You are not proud of him ?” 
 
 *“To say the truth, Mrs. Lammle, no.” 
 
 ‘Tf you knew more of him, you would be less 
 inclined to acknowledge him. Here is another 
 portrait. What do you think of it?” 
 
 Twemlow has just presence of mind enough to 
 say aloud: ‘‘ Very like! Uncommonly like!” 
 
 “You have noticed, perhaps, whom he favors 
 with his attentions?’ You notice where he is | 
 now, and how engazed ?” 
 
 “Yes, But Mr. Lammle—”’ 
 
 She darts a look at him which he ean not 
 comprehend, and shows him another portrait. 
 
 ‘* Very good; is it not?” 
 
 **Charming!” says ‘Twemlow. 
 
 , **So like as to be almost a caricature ?—Mr. 
 Twemlow, it is impossible to tell you. what the 
 struggle in my mind has been, before I could 
 bring myself to speak to you as I do now, It is 
 only i in the conviction that I may trust you nev- 
 er to betray me, that I can proceed, Sincerely 
 promise me that you never will betray my con- 
 fidence—that you will respect it, even though 
 you may no longer respect me—and I shall be 
 as satisfied as if you had sworn it.” 
 
 ‘*Madam, on the honor of a poor gentle- 
 man——” 
 
 “‘Thank you. I can desire no more. Mr. 
 Twemlow, I implore you to save that child!” 
 
 “That child ?” 
 
 ‘Georgiana. She will be sacrificed. She 
 will be inveigled and married to that connection 
 of yours. It is a partnership affair, a money- 
 speculation. . She has no strength of will or 
 character to help herself, and she is on the brink 
 
 is. 
 
 — 
 
 ‘““Amazing! But what can J do to prevent 
 it?” demands Twemlow, shocked and bewilder- 
 ed to the last degree. 
 
 ‘‘Here is another portrait. 
 a3 it?” 
 
 Aghast at the light manner of her throwing 
 her head back to look at it critically, Twemlow 
 still dimly perceives the expediency of throwing 
 
 And not good, 
 
 ‘can cause his vanity to take the alarm. 
 
 187 
 
 his own head back, and does so. Though he 
 no more sees the portrait than if it were in 
 China. 
 
 ‘* Decidedly not good,” says Mrs. Lammle. 
 ‘¢ Stiff and exaggerated !” 
 
 ‘*And ex— ” But ‘Twemlow, in his demol- 
 ished state, can not command the word, and 
 trails off into “« —actly so.’ 
 
 ‘Mr. T'wemlow, your word will have weight 
 with her pompous, self-blinded father, You 
 know how much he makes of your family. Lose 
 no.time. Warn him.’ 
 
 ‘But warn him against whom ?” 
 
 ** Against me,” 
 
 By great good fortune Twemlow receives a 
 stimulant at this critical instant. The stimu. 
 lant is Lammle’s voice. 
 
 -‘* Sophronia, my dear, what portraits are you 
 showing Twemlow ?” 
 
 ** Public characters, Alfred.” 
 
 ‘*Show him the last of me.” 
 
 ‘*Yes, Alfred.” 
 
 She puts the book down, takes another book 
 up, turns the leaves, and presents the portrait 
 to Twemlow. 
 
 ‘*That is the last of Mr. Lammle. Do you 
 think it good ?—Warn. her father against me. 
 I deserve it, for I have been in the scheme from 
 the first. It is my husband’s scheme, your con- 
 nection’s, and mine. I tell you this, only to 
 
 “show you the necessity of the poor little foolish 
 affectionate creature’s being befriended and res- 
 Peued. 
 /You will spare me so, far, and spare my hus- 
 eband. 
 “is all a mockery, hei is my husband, and we must 
 
 You will not repeat this to her father. 
 
 For, though this celebration of to-day 
 
 live-—Do you think it like 2” 
 
 Twemlow, in a stanned:condition, feigns to 
 compare the portrait in his hand with the orig- 
 inal looking toward him from his Mephistophe- 
 lean corner. 
 
 ‘* Very well indeed!” are at length the words 
 which Twemlow with great difficulty extracts 
 from himself, 
 
 ‘*T am glad you think so. 
 myself consider it the best. 
 dark. Now here, for instance, is another 
 Mr. Lammle— 
 
 “But I don’t understand; I don’t see my 
 way,’ Twemlow stammers, as he falters over 
 the book with his glass at his eye. ‘* How warn 
 her father, and not tell him? Tell him how 
 much? Tell him how little? I—I—am get- 
 ting lost.” 
 
 ‘¢Tell him: I am a match-maker; tell him I 
 am an artful and designing woman; tell him 
 you are sure his daughter is best ont of my 
 house and my company. Tell him—any such 
 things of me; they will all be true. You know 
 what a puffed-up man he is, and how easily you 
 Tell 
 him as much as will give him the alarm and 
 make him careful of her, and spare me the rest. 
 Mr. Twemlow, I feel my sudden degradation in* 
 your eyes ; familiar as I am with my degrada- 
 tion in my own eyes, I keenly feel the change 
 that must have come upon me in yours, in these 
 last few moments. But I trust to your good 
 faith with me as implicitly as when I began. 
 If you knew how often I have tried to speak to 
 you to-day you would almost pity me. I want 
 no new promise from you on my own account, 
 
 On the whole, I 
 The others are so 
 of 
 
Nae 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 for I am satisfied, and I always shall be satis- | low looking at Alfred’s portrait through his eye- 
 
 fied, with the promise you have given me. 
 can venture to say no more, for I see that I am 
 watched. If you would set my mind at rest 
 with the assurance that you will interpose with 
 the father and save this harmless girl, close that 
 book before you return it to me, and I shall 
 know what you mean, and deeply thank you in 
 my heart.—Alfred, Mr. Twemlow thinks the last 
 one the best, and quite agrees with you and me.” 
 
 Alfred advances. The groups break up. Lady 
 Tippins rises to go, and Mrs. Veneering follows 
 her leader. For the moment Mrs. Lammle does 
 not turn to them, but remains looking at '‘’wem- 
 
 I | glass. 
 
 The moment past, ‘Twemlow drops his 
 eye-glass at its ribbon’s length, rises, and closes 
 the book with an emphasis which makes that 
 fragile nursling of the fairies, Tippins, start. 
 
 Then good-by and good-by, and charming 
 occasion worthy of the Golden Age, and more 
 about the flitch of bacon, and the like of that; 
 and Twemlow goes staggering across Piccadilly 
 with his hand to his forehead, and is nearly run 
 down by a flushed letter-cart, and at last drops 
 safe in his easy-chair, innocent good gentleman, 
 with his hand to his forehead still, and his head 
 in a whirl. 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 189 
 
 BOOK IIL—A LONG LANE 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 LODGERS IN QUEER STREET. 
 
 Ir was a foggy day in London, and the: fog. 
 was heavy and dark... Animate London, with | 
 
 smarting eyes and irritated lungs, was blinking, 
 wheezing, and choking; 
 
 visible and invisible, and so being wholly neither. 
 Gaslights flared in the shops with a haggard 
 
 and unblessed air, as knowing themselves to-be | 
 
 night-creatures that had no business abroad un- 
 der the sun; while the sun itself, when it was 
 for a few moments dimly indicated through cir- 
 cling eddies of fog, showed as if it had gone out 
 and were collapsing flat and cold. Even in the 
 
 surrounding country it was a foggy day, but | 
 
 there the fog was gray, whereas in London it 
 was, at about the boundary line, dark yellow, 
 and a little within it brown, and then browner, 
 and then browner, until at the heart of the City 
 —which call Saint Mary Axe —it was rusty 
 black. From any point of the high ridge of land 
 
 northward, it might have been discerned that the | 
 
 loftiest buildings made an occasional struggle to 
 get their heads above the foggv sea, and espe- 
 cially that the great dome of Saint Paul’s seemed 
 to die hard; but this was not perceivable in the 
 streets at their feet, where the whole metropolis 
 was a heap of vapor charged with muffled sound 
 of wheels, and enfolding a gigantic catarrh. 
 
 At nine o’clock on such a morning, the place 
 of business of Pubsey and Co. was not the live- 
 liest object even in Saint Mary Axe—which is 
 not a very lively spot—with a sobbing gaslight 
 in the counting-house window, and a burglarious 
 stream of fog creeping in to strangle it through 
 the keyhole of the main door. But the light 
 went out, and the main door opened, and Riah 
 came forth with a bag under his arm. 
 
 Almost in the act of coming out at the door 
 Riah went into the fog, and was lost to the eyes 
 of Saint Mary Axe. But the eyes of this history 
 can follow him westward, by Cornhill, Cheap- 
 side, Fleet Street, and the Strand, to Piccadilly 
 and the Albany. ‘hither he went at his grave 
 and measured pace, staff in hand, skirt at heel; 
 and more than one head, turning to look back 
 at his venerable figure alréady lost in the mist, 
 supposed it to be some ordinary figure indistinct- 
 ly seen, which fancy and the fog had worked into 
 that passing likeness. 
 
 Arrived at the house in which his master’s 
 chambers were on the second-floor, Riah pro- 
 ceeded up the stairs, and paused at Fascination 
 Fledgeby’s door. Making free with neither bell 
 nor knocker, he struck upon the door with the 
 top of his staff, and, having listened, sat down 
 on the threshold. It was characteristic of his 
 habitual submission, that he sat down on the 
 
 raw dark staircase, as many of his ancestors had | 
 
 probably sat down in dungeons, taking what be- 
 fell him as it might befall. 
 
 inanimate London was | 
 a sooty spectre, divided in purpose between being | 
 hour more, during which added interval Riah 
 
 to be fain to blow upon his fingers, he arose and 
 knocked with his statf again, and listened again, 
 and again sat down to wait. ‘Thrice he repeated 
 these actions before his listening ears were greeted 
 by the voice of Fledgeby, calling from his bed, 
 ‘* Wold your row! Ill come and dpen the door 
 direetly !” But in lieu of coming directly, he 
 fell into a sweet sleep for some quarter of an 
 
 sat upon the stairs and waited with perfect pa- 
 tience. 
 
 At length the door stood open, and Mr. Fledge- 
 by’s retreating drapery plunged into bed again. 
 Following it at a respectful distance, Riah passed 
 into the bedchamber, where a fire had been 
 sometime lighted, and was burning briskly. 
 
 ‘Why, what time of night do you mean to 
 call it?” inquired Fledgeby, turning away be- 
 neath the clothes, and presenting a comfortable 
 
 rampart of shoulder to the chilled figure of the 
 
 old man. 
 
 ‘¢Sir, it is full half past ten in the morning.” 
 
 ““The deuce it is! Then it must be precious 
 foggy ?” . 
 
 ‘Very foggy, Sir.” 
 
 ‘¢ And raw, then ?” 
 
 **Chill and bitter,” said Riah, drawing out a 
 handkerchief, and wiping the moisture from his 
 beard and long gray hair as he stood on the verge 
 of the rug, with his eyes on the acceptable fire. 
 
 With a plunge of enjoyment Fledgeby settled 
 himself afresh, 
 
 ‘‘ Any snow, or sleet, or slush, or any thing 
 of that sort?” he asked. 
 
 ‘‘No, Sir, no. Not quite so bad as tuat. The 
 streets are pretty clean.” 
 
 ** You needn’t brag about it,” returned Fledge- 
 by, disappointed in his desire to heighten the 
 contrast between his bed and the streets. ‘‘ But 
 you're always bragging about something. Got 
 the books there ?” 
 
 ‘“'They are here, Sir.” 
 
 “Allright. Dll turn the general subject over 
 in my mind for a minute or two, and while I’m 
 about it you can empty your bag and get ready 
 for me.” 
 
 With another comfortable plunge Mr. Fledge- 
 by fell asleep again. The old man, having obeyed 
 his directions, sat down on the edge ef a chair, 
 and, folding his hands before him, gradually 
 yielded to the influence of the warmth, and 
 dozed. He was roused by Mr. Fledgeby’s ap- 
 pearing erect at the foot of the bed, in Turkish 
 slippérs, rose-colored Turkish trowsers (got cheap 
 from somebody who had cheated some other 
 somebody out of them), and a gown and cap to 
 correspond. In that costume he would have left 
 nothing to be desired, if he had been further 
 fitted out with a bottomless chair, a lantern, and 
 a bunch of matches. 
 
 ‘Now, old’un!” cried Fascination, in his light 
 raillery, ‘‘ what dodgery are you up to next, sit- 
 ting there with your eyes shut? You ain’t 
 
 After a time, when he had grown so cold as| asleep. Catch a weasel at it, and catch a Jew!” 
 
 Be 
 ae 
 
190 
 “Truly, Sir, I fear I nodded,” said the old 
 man. 
 ‘“Not you!” returned Fledgeby, with a cun- 
 
 ning look. ‘‘ A telling move with a good many, 
 I dare say, but it won’t put me off my guard. 
 
 Not a bad notion though, if you want to look in- 
 
 different in driving a bargain. Oh, you are a 
 dodger !” 
 
 The old man shook his head, gently repudi- 
 
 ating the imputation, and suppressed a sigh, and 
 
 moved to the table at which Mr. Fledgeby was 
 now pouring out for himself a cup of steaming 
 and fragrant coffee from a pot that had stood 
 ready on the hob. It was an edifying spectacle, 
 the young man in his easy-chair taking his coffee, 
 and the old man with his gray head bent, stand- 
 ing awaiting his pleasure. 
 
 ‘“Now!” said Fledgeby. ‘Fork out your 
 balance in hand, and prove by figures how you 
 make it out thatit ain’t more. First of all, light 
 that candle.” 
 
 Riah obeyed, and then taking a bag from his 
 breast, and referring to the sum in the accounts 
 for which they made him responsible, told it out 
 upon the table. Fledgeby told it again with 
 great care, and rang every sovereign. 
 
 ‘*T suppose,” he said, taking one up to eye it 
 closely, ‘‘you haven’t been lightening any of 
 these; but it’s a trade of your. people’s, you 
 know. Yow understand what sweating a pound 
 means; don’t you?” 
 
 ** Much as you do, Sir,” returned the old man, 
 with his hands under opposite cuffs of his loose 
 sleeves, as he stood at the table, deferentially 
 observant of the master’s face. “May I take 
 the liberty to say something ?” ; 
 
 ‘*You may,” Fledgeby graciously conceded. 
 
 ‘Do you not, Sir—without intending it—of a 
 surety without intending it—sometimes mingle 
 the character I fairly earn in your employment 
 with the character which it is your policy that I 
 should bear ?” 
 
 **T don’t find it worth my while to cut things 
 so fine as to go into the inquiry,” Fascination 
 coolly answered. 
 
 ‘* Not in justice ?” 
 
 ** Bother justice !’* said Fledgeby. 
 
 ‘* Not in generosity ?” 
 
 “Jews and generosity!” said Fledgeby. 
 *“'That’s a good connection! Bring out your 
 vouchers, and don’t talk Jerusalem palaver.” 
 
 The vouchers were produced, and for the next 
 
 f half hour Mr. Fledgeby concentrated his sublime 
 
 _ attention onthem. ‘They and the accounts were 
 
 all found correct, and the books and the papers 
 resumed their places in the bag. 
 
 ** Next,” said Fledgeby, ‘‘concerning that 
 
 -~ bill-broking branch of the business—the branch 
 
 I like best. What queer bills are to be bought, 
 
 and at what prices? You have got your list of 
 
 what’s in the market ?” 
 
 ‘Sir, a long list,” replied Riah, taking out a~business. 
 
 pocket-book, and selecting from its contents a 
 
 folded paper, which, being unfolded, became a 
 
 sheet of foolscap covered with close writing. 
 “Whew!” whistled Fledgebv, as he took it in 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 | ‘¢Half the lump will he waste-paper, one 
 knows beforehand,” said Fledgeby. ‘Can you 
 get it at waste-paper price? ‘That’s the ques- 
 tion.” 
 
 ‘Riah shook his head, and Fledgeby cast his 
 small eyes down the list. They presently began 
 to twinkle, and he no sooner became conscious 
 of their twinkling, than he looked up over his 
 shoulder at the grave face above him, and moved 
 _to the chimney-piece. Making a desk of it, he 
 stood there with his back to the old man, warm- 
 ing his knees, perusing the list at his leisure, and 
 often returning to some lines of it, as though 
 they were particularly interesting. At those 
 times he glanced in the chimney-glass to sce 
 what note the old man took of him. He took 
 none that could be detected, but, aware of his 
 employer’s suspicions, stood with his eyes on the 
 ground, ; 
 
 Mr. Fledgeby was thus amiably engaged when | 
 a step was heard at the outer door, and the door 
 was heard to open hastily. ‘‘Hark! That’s 
 your doing, yon Pump of Israel,” said Fledgeby ; 
 ‘‘you cant have shut it.” Then the step was 
 heard within, and the voice of Mr. Alfred 
 Lammle called aloud, ‘‘ Are you any where 
 here, Fledgeby?” To which Fledgeby, after 
 cautioning Riah in a low voice to take his cue 
 as it should be given him, replied, ‘*‘ Here I am!” 
 and opened his bedroom door. 
 
 ‘Come in!” said #ledgeby. ‘*This gentle- 
 man is only Pubsey and Co. of Saint Mary Axe, 
 that I am trying to make terms for an unfortu- 
 nate friend with in a matter of some dishonored 
 bills. But really Pubsey and Co. are so strict 
 with their debtors, and so hard to move, that [ 
 seem to be wasting my time. Can’t I make any 
 terms, with you on my friend’s part, Mr. Riah ?” 
 
 ‘*T am but the representative of another, Sir,” 
 returned the Jew, in a low voice. ‘JI do as I 
 am bidden by my principal. It is not my capi- 
 tal that is invested in the business. It is not my 
 profit that arises therefrom.” 
 
 ‘*Ha ha!” laughed Fledgeby. 
 
 “Ha ha!” laughed Lammle; 
 course. We know.” 
 
 **Devilish good, ain’t it, Lammle?” said 
 Fledgeby, unspeakably amused by his hidden 
 joke. 
 
 ‘* Always the same, always the same!” said 
 Lammle. ‘ Mr, —” 
 
 ‘*Riah, Pubsey, and Co., Saint Mary Axe,” 
 Fledgeby put in, as he wiped away the tears that 
 trickled from his eyes, so rare was his enjoyment 
 of his secret joke. 
 
 ‘*Mr. Riah is bound to observe the invariable 
 forms for such case#made and provided,” suid 
 Lammle. 
 
 ‘‘He is only the representative of another!” 
 cried Fledgeby. ‘Does as he is told by his 
 principal! Not his capital that’s invested in the 
 Oh, that’s good! Ha ha ha ha!” 
 | Mr. Lammle joined in the laugh and looked 
 knowing; and the more he did both, the more ex- 
 quisite the secret joke became for Mr. Fledgeby. 
 
 ‘* However,” said that fascinating gentl man, 
 
 | 
 
 | 
 
 ‘“*Lammle ?” 
 *'V es, OE 
 
 his hand. ‘Queer Street is full of lodgers just, wiping his eyes again, ‘¢if we go on in this way 
 at present! These are to be disposed of in par-|| we shall seem to be almost mnking game of Mr. 
 
 * eels; are they?” 
 
 ‘¢In parcels as set forth,” returned the old 
 
 he 
 7 
 
 man, looking over his ‘naster’s shoulder; ‘‘ or 
 
 the lump.” 
 
 | Riah, or of Pubsey and. Co., Saint Mary Axe, or 
 of somebody: which is far from our intention, 
 Mr. Riah, if you would ‘have the kindness to 
 
 _lstep into the next room for a few moments while 
 
OUR, MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 T speak with Mr. Lammle here, I should like to 
 
 191 
 “No,” said Fledgeby; ‘provided you have 
 
 try to make terms with you once again before ; brought my promissory note in your pocket, 
 
 you go.”’ 
 
 The old man, who had never raised his eyes 
 during the whole transaction of Mr. Fledgeby’s 
 joke, silently bowed and passed out by the door 
 which Fledgeby opened for him. Having closed 
 it on him, Fledgeby returned to Lammle, stand- 
 ing with his back to the bedroom fire, with one 
 hand under his coat-skirts, and all his whiskers 
 in the other. 
 
 ‘*Halloo!” said Fledgeby, 
 tang wrong!” ; 
 
 ‘** How do you know it ?”” demanded Lammle. 
 
 *‘ Because you show it,” replied Fledgeby in 
 unintentional rhyme. 
 
 ‘*Wellthen; thereis,” said Lammle; ‘there 
 is something wrong; the whole thing’s wrong.” 
 
 **T say!” remonstrated Fascination very slow- 
 ly, and sitting down with his hands on his knees 
 to stare at his glowering friend with his back to 
 the fire. . 
 
 **I tell you, Fledgeby,” repeated Lammle, 
 with a sweep of his right arm, ‘the whole 
 thing’s wrong. The game’s up.” — 
 
 ** What game’s up?” demanded Fledgeby, as 
 slowly as before, and more sternly. 
 
 ‘THE game. Our game. Read that.” 
 
 Fledgeby took a note from his extended hand 
 and read it aloud. ‘‘ Alfred Lammle, Esquire. 
 Sir: Allow Mrs. Podsnap and myself to express 
 our united sense of the polite attentions of Mrs. 
 Alfred Lammle and yourself toward our daugh- 
 _ter, Georgiana. Allow us also wholly to reject 
 them for the future, and to communicate our 
 final desire that the two families may become 
 entire strangers. I have the honor to be, Sir, 
 your most obedient and very humble servant, 
 JOHN Popsnap.” Fledgeby looked at the three 
 biank sides of this note, quite as long and earn- 
 estly as at the first expressive side, and then 
 looked at Lammle, who_responded with another 
 extensive sweep of his right arm. 
 
 ‘* Whose doing is this?” said Fledgeby. 
 
 ‘* Impossible to imagine,” said Lammle. 
 
 ** Perhaps,” suggested Fledgeby, after reflect- 
 ing with a very discontented brow, ‘‘somebody 
 has been giving you a bad character.” 
 
 ‘* Or you,” said Lammle, with a deeper frown. 
 
 Mr. Fledgeby appeared to be on the verge of 
 some mutinous expressions, when his hand hap- 
 pened to touch his nose. A certain remem- 
 brance connected with that feature operating as 
 a timely warning, he took it thoughtfully be- 
 tween his thumb and forefinger and pondered; 
 Lammle meanwhile eying him with furtive eyes. 
 
 “Well!” said Fledgeby. ‘‘This won't im- 
 prove with talking about. If we ever find out 
 who did it we’ll mark that person. There’s no- 
 thing more to be said, except that you undertook 
 _to do what circumstances prevent your doing.” 
 
 “And that you undertook to do what you 
 might have done by this time if you had made 
 a prompter use of circumstances,” snarled 
 Lammle. 
 
 “Hah! That,” remarked Fledgeby, with his 
 hands in the Turkish trowsers, ‘tis matter of 
 opinion.” 
 
 ‘Mr. Fledgeby,” said Lammle, in a bullying 
 tone, ‘‘am I to understand that you in any way 
 reflect upon me, or hint dissatisfaction with me, 
 _ in this affair ?” ; 
 
 *'There’s some- 
 
 shave sustained a loss here. 
 
 hands, it must have been fancy. 
 
 and now hand it over.” 
 
 Lammle produced it, not without reluctance, 
 Fledgeby looked at it, identified it, twisted it up, 
 and threw it into the fire. ‘They both looked at 
 it as it blazed, went out, and flew in feathery 
 ash up the chimney. | 
 
 ‘Now, Mr. Fledgeby,” said Lammle, as be- 
 fore; ‘‘am I to understand that. you in any way 
 reflect upon me, or hint dissatisfaction with me, 
 in this affair ?” 
 
 ‘*No,” said Fledgeby. 
 
 ‘* Finally and unreservedly no?” 
 
 ** Yes,/) 
 
 ** Rledgeby, my hand.” 
 
 Mr. Fledgeby took it, saying, ‘‘And if we 
 ever find out who did this, we’ll mark that per- 
 son. And in the most. friendly manner let me 
 mention one thing more. I don’t know what 
 your circumstances are, and I don’t ask. You 
 Many men are lia- 
 ble to be involved at times, and you may be, or 
 you may not be. But whatever you do, Lammle, 
 don't—don't—don’t, I beg of you—ever fall into 
 the hands of Pubsey and Co. in the next room, 
 for they are grinders. Regular flayers and grind- 
 ers, my dear Lammle,” repeated Fiedgeby with 
 a peculiar relish, ‘‘and they'll skin you by the 
 inch, from the nape of your neck to the sole of 
 your foot, and grind every inch of your. skin to 
 tooth-powder. You have seen what Mr. Riah 
 is. Never fall into his hands, Lammile, I beg 
 of you as a friend!” 
 
 Mr. Lammie, disclosing some alarm at the so- 
 lemnity of this affectionate adjuration, demand- 
 ed why the devil he ever should fall into the 
 hands of Pubsey and Co. ? 
 
 ‘To confess the fact, I was made a little un- 
 easy,” said the candid Fledgeby, ‘by the man- 
 ner in which that Jew looked at you when he 
 heard your name. I didn’t like hiseye. But it 
 may have been the heated fancy of a friend. Of 
 course if you are sure that you have no personal 
 security out, which you may not be quite equal 
 to meeting, and which can have got into his 
 Still, I didn’t 
 like his eye.” ; 
 
 The brooding Lammle, with certain white dints 
 coming and going in his palpitating nose, looked 
 as if some tormenting imp were pinching it. 
 Fledgeby, watching him with a twitch in his 
 mean face which did duty there for a smile, 
 looked very like the tormentor who was pinching. 
 
 “But I mustn’t keep him waiting too long,” 
 said Fledgeby, ‘‘or he’ll revenge it on my tn- 
 fortunate friend. | How’s vour very clever and 
 agr€eable wife? She knows we have broken 
 down ?” 
 
 ‘*T showed her the letter.” 
 
 ‘* Very much surprised?” asked Fledgeby. 
 
 ‘¢T think she would have been more so,” an- 
 swered Lammle, ‘‘if there had been more go in 
 
 ou ?” 
 
 ‘*Oh !—She lays it upon me, then ?” 
 
 ‘*Mr. Fledgeby, I will not have my words 
 misconstrued,” 
 
 ‘*Don’t break out, Lammle,” urged Fledgeby, 
 in a submissive tone, ‘‘ because there’s no occa- 
 sion. I only asked aquestion. Then she don’t 
 lay it upon me? To ask another question.” 
 
 ‘* No, Sir.” : 
 
192 
 
 Very good, ” said Fledgeby, plainly seeing 
 thatshedid. ‘*Mycompliments toher. Good- 
 b ” 
 
 They shook hands, and Lammle strode out 
 pondering. i ledgeby saw him into the fog, and, 
 returning to the fire'and musing with his face to 
 it, stretched the legs of the rose-colored Turkish 
 trowsers wide apart, and meditatively bent his 
 knees, as if he were going down upon them. 
 
 ‘¢ You have a pair of whiskers, Lummle, which 
 I never liked,” murmured Fledgeby, ‘‘and which 
 money can’t produce; you are boastful of your 
 manners and your conversation ; you wé anted to 
 pull my nose, and you have let me in for a fail- 
 ure, and your wife says I am the cause of it. 
 Tl ‘bowl you down. I will, though I have no 
 whiskers,” here he rubbed the places where they 
 were due, ‘‘and no manners, and no conversa- 
 tion |” 
 
 Having thus relieved his noble mind, he col- 
 lected the legs of the Turkish trowsers, straight- 
 ened himself on his knees, and called out to 
 Riah in the next room, ‘‘ Halloo, you Sir!” At 
 sight of the old man re-entering with a gentle- 
 ness monstrously in contrast with the character 
 he had given him, Mr. Fledgeby was so tickled 
 again, that he exclaimed, laughing, ‘‘ Good! 
 Good! Upon my soul it is uncommon good !” 
 
 ‘¢Now, old ’un,” proceeded Fledgeby, when 
 he had had his laugh out, ‘‘you’ll buy up these 
 lots that I mark with my pencil—there’s a tick 
 there, and a tick there, and a tick there—and I 
 wager twopence you'll afterward go on a squeez- 
 ing those Christians like the Jew you are. Now, 
 next you'll want a check—or you'll say you want 
 it, though you’ve capital enough somewhere, if 
 one only knew where, but you'd be peppered 
 and salted and grilled on a gridiron before you'd 
 own to it—and that check I'll write.” 
 
 When he had unlocked a drawer and taken a 
 key from it to open another drawer, in which 
 was another key that opened another drawer, in 
 which was another key that opened another 
 drawer, in which was the check-book; and when 
 he had written the check; and when, reversing 
 the key and drawer process, he had placed his 
 check-book in safety again, he beckoned the 
 old man, with the folded check, to come and 
 take it. 
 
 “Old ’un,” said Fledgeby, when the Jew had 
 put it in his pocket-book, and was putting that 
 in the breast of his outer garment; ‘‘so much 
 at present for my affairs. Now a word about 
 affairs that are not exactly mine. Where is 
 she ?” 
 
 With his hand not yet withdrawn from the 
 breast of his garment, Riah started and paused. 
 
 “Oho!” said Fledgeby. ‘‘ Didn’t expect it! 
 Where have you hidden her?” 
 
 Showing that he was taken by surprise, the 
 old man looked at his master with some passing 
 confusion, which the master highly enjoyed. 
 
 ‘*¢ Is she in the house [ pay rent and taxes for 
 in Saint Mary Axe ?” demanded Fledgeby. 
 
 PING, Sur: 
 
 ‘Ts she in your garden up atop of that house 
 —gone up to be dead, or whatever the game is?” 
 asked Fledgeby. 
 
 ‘*No, Sir.” 
 
 ‘¢ Where is she then ?” 
 
 Riah bent his eyes upon the ground, as if con- 
 sidering whether he could answer the question 
 
 roic bravery is flight.’ 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 without breach of faith, and then silently raised 
 them to Fledgeby’s face, as if he could ‘not. 
 
 “Come!” said Fledgeby. ‘‘ I won't press that 
 just now. But I want to know this, and I will’ 
 know this, mind you. What are you up to?” ~ 
 
 The old man, with an apologetic action of his 
 head and hands, as not comprehending the mas- 
 ter’s meaning, addressed to him a look of mute ~ 
 inquiry. 
 
 ‘You can’t be a gallivanting dodger,” said 
 Fledgeby. ‘* For you're a ‘regular pity the sor- 
 rows,’ you know—if you do know any Christian 
 rhyme—‘ whose trembling limbs have borne hin 
 to’—et cetrer. You're one of the Patriarchs; 
 yowre a shaky old card; and you can’t be in 
 love with this Lizzie?” 
 
 ‘*Oh, Sir!” expostulated Riah. 
 Sir, Sir!” 
 
 ‘¢Then why,” retorted Fledgeby, with some 
 slight tinge of a blush, ‘‘ don’t you out with your 
 reason for having your spoon in the sonp at all 2?” 
 
 ‘Sir, I will tell you the truth. But (your 
 pardon for the stipulation) it is in sacred confi- 
 dence; it is strictly upon honor.” 
 
 ‘¢ Honor too!” cried Fledgeby, with a mocking 
 lip. ‘* Honor among Jews. Well. Cut away.” 
 
 ‘¢Tt is upon honor, Sir?” the other still stip- 
 ulated, with respectful firmness. 
 
 **QOh, certainly. Honor brigh 
 by. 
 
 The old man, never bidden to sit down, stood 
 with an earnest hand laid on the back of the 
 young man’s easy-chair. The young man sat 
 looking at the fire with a face of listening curi- 
 osity, ready to check him off and catch him 
 tripping. 
 
 “Cut aw ay, » 
 your motive.’ 
 
 ‘¢Sir, Ihave no motive but to help the help- 
 less.” 
 
 Mr. Fledgeby could only express the feelings 
 to which this incredible statement gave rise in 
 his breast by a prodigiously long derisive sniff. 
 
 “ How I came to know, and much to esteem 
 and to respect, this damsel, I mentioned when 
 you saw her in my poor garden on the house- 
 top,” said the Jew. 
 
 ‘“‘Pid you?” said Fledgeby, distrustfully. 
 ‘¢ Well, perhaps you did, though.” 
 
 ‘¢The better I knew her, the more interest I 
 felt in her fortunes. They gathered to a crisis. 
 I found her beset by a selfish and ungrateful 
 brother, beset by an unacceptable wooer, beset 
 by the snares of a more powerful lover, beset by 
 the wiles of her own heart.” 
 
 ‘¢She took to one of the chaps then ?” 
 
 ‘¢Sir, it was only natural that she should in- 
 cline toward him, for he had many and great ad- 
 
 vantages. But he was not of her station, and 
 to marry her was not in his mind. Perils were 
 closing round her, and the circle was fast dark- 
 ening, when I—being as you have said, Sir, too 
 old and broken to be suspected of any feeling for 
 her but a father’s—stepped in, and counseled 
 flight. I said, ‘My daughter, there are times 
 ‘of moral danger when the hardest virtuous reso- 
 lution to form is flight, and when the most he- | 
 She answered, she had — 
 had this in her thoughts; but whither to fly with-_ 
 out help she knew not, and there were none to” 
 help her. I showed her there was one to hel, ) 
 her, and it was I. And she is gone.” 
 
 ‘Oh, Sir, 
 
 said Fledge- 
 
 said Fledgeby. ‘‘ Start with 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 ‘* What did you do with her?” asked Fledge- 
 by, feeling his cheek. 
 
 “*T placed her,” said the old man, ‘at a dis- 
 tance ;” with a grave, smooth, outward sweep 
 from one another of his two open hands at arm’s- 
 length; ‘‘at a distance—among certain of our 
 people, where her industry would serve her, and 
 where she could hope to exercise it, unassailed 
 from any quarter.” ; 
 
 Fledgeby’s eyes had come from the fire to no- 
 tice the action of his hands when he said ‘at a 
 distance.’’ Fledgeby now tried (very unsuccess- 
 fully) to imitate that action, as he shook his head 
 and said, ‘‘ Placed her in that direction, did 
 you? Qh you circular old dodger !” 
 
 With one hand across his breast and the oth- 
 er on the easy-chair, Riah, without justifying 
 himself, waited for further questioning. But 
 that it was hopeless to question him on that one 
 reserved point, Fledgeby, with his small eyes too 
 near together, saw full well. 
 
 ‘* Lizzie,” said Fledgeby, looking at the fire 
 again, and then looking up. ‘‘ Humph, Lizzie. 
 You didn’t tell me the other name in your gar- 
 den atop of the house. I'll be more communi- 
 Caiive with you. The other name’s Hexam.” 
 
 Riah bent his head in assent. 
 
 **Look here, you Sir,” said Fledgeby. ‘‘I 
 have a notion I know something of the invei- 
 gling chap, the powerful one. 
 to do with the law?” 
 
 **Nominally, I believe it his calling.” 
 
 ““[ thought so. Name any thing like Light- 
 wood ?” 
 
 “Sir, not at all like.” 
 
 ‘*“Come, old 'un,” said Fledgeby, meeting his 
 eyes with a wink, ‘‘say the name.” 
 
 ‘* Wrayburn.” ; 
 
 ‘‘ By Jupiter!”ecried Fledgeby. ‘* That one, 
 is it? I thought it might be the other, but I 
 never dreamt of.that one! I shouldn’t object 
 to your balking either of the pair, dodger, for 
 they are both conceited enough ; but that one is 
 
 scool a customer as ever I met with. Got a 
 eard besides, and presumes_upon-it. Well 
 
 Brightened by this unexpected commenda- 
 tion, Riah asked were there more instructions 
 for him ? 
 
 ‘*No,” said Fledgeby, ‘“‘ you may toddle now, 
 Judah, and grope about on the orders you have 
 got.” Dismissed with those pleasing words, the 
 old man took his broad hat and staff and left 
 the great presence: more asif he were some su- 
 perior creature benignantly blessing Mr. Fledge- 
 by than the poor dependent on whom he set his 
 foot. Left alone, Mr. Fledgeby locked his out- 
 er door and came back to his fire. 
 
 ‘‘ Well done you!” said Fascination to him- 
 self. ‘Slow, you may be; sure, you are!” 
 This he twice or thrice repeated with much 
 complacency, as he again dispersed the legs of 
 the Turkish trowsers and bent the knees. 
 
 ‘* A tidy shot that, I flatter myself,” he then 
 soliloquized. ‘‘And a Jew brought down with 
 it! Now, when I heard the story told at Lam- 
 mle’s, I didn’t make a jump at Riah. Not a bit 
 of it; I got at him by degrees.”” Herein he was 
 quite accurate; it being his habit not to jump, 
 or leap, or make an upward spring, at atiy thing 
 in life, but to crawl at every thing. 
 
 ‘I got at him,” pursucd Fledgeby, feeling 
 
 : 
 ae 
 Be, ; 
 
 Has he any thing | 
 
 193 
 
 for his whisker, ‘‘by degrees. If your Lam- 
 mles or your Lightwoods had got at him any- 
 how, they would have asked him the question 
 whether he hadn’t something to do with that 
 gal’s disappearance. I knew a better way of go- 
 ing to work. Having got behind the hedge, and 
 put him in the light, I took a shot at him and 
 brought him down plump. Oh! It don’t count 
 for much, being a Jew, in a match against me /” 
 
 Another dry twist in place of a smile made 
 his face crooked here. 
 
 ‘‘As to Christians,” proceeded Fledgeby, 
 ‘look out, fellow-Christians, particularly you 
 that lodge in Queer Street! I have got the run 
 of, Queer Street now, and you shall see some 
 
 o * 
 games there. To work a lot of power over you 
 and you not know it, knowing as you think your- 
 selves, would be almost worth laying out money 
 upon. But when it comes to squeezing a profit 
 out of you into the bargain, it’s something like!” 
 
 With this apostrophe Mr. Fledgeby appropri- 
 ately proceeded to divest himself of his Turkish 
 garments, and invest himself with Christian at- 
 tire. Pending which operation, and his morn- 
 ing ablutions, and his anointing of himself with 
 the last infallible preparation for the production 
 of luxuriant and glossy hair upon the human 
 countenance (quacks being the only sages he be- 
 ieved in besides usurers), the murky fog closed 
 ibout him and shut him up in its sooty embrace. 
 
 f it had never let him out any more, the world 
 ould have had no irreparable loss, but could 
 ave easily replaced him from its stock on hand. 
 
 -_ 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 A RESPECTED FRIEND IN A NEW ASPECT. 
 
 In the evening of this same foggy day when 
 the yellow window-blind of Pubsey and Co. was 
 drawn down upon the day’s work, Riah the Jew 
 once more came forth into Saint Mary Axe. 
 But this time he carried no bag, and was not 
 bound on his master’s affairs. He passed over 
 London Bridge, and returned to the Middlesex 
 shore by that of Westminster, and so, ever wad- 
 ing through the fog, waded to the door-step of 
 the dolls’ dress-maker. 
 
 Miss Wren expected him. He could see her 
 through the window by the light of her low fire 
 —carefully banked up with damp cinders that it 
 might last the longer and waste the less when 
 she was out—sitting waiting for him in her bon- 
 net. His tap at the glass roused her from the 
 musing solitude in which she sat, and she came 
 to the door to open it; aiding her steps with a 
 little crutch-stick. 
 
 ‘“*Good-evening, godmother !” said Miss Jen- 
 ny Wren. 
 
 The old man laughed, and gave her his arm 
 to lean on. 
 
 ‘¢Won’t yon come in and warm yourself, god- 
 mother?” asked Miss Jenny Wren. 
 
 “Not if you are ready, Cinderella, my dear.” 
 
 “Well!” exclaimed Miss Wren, delighted. 
 ‘¢Now you ARE a clever old boy! If we gave 
 prizes at this establishment (but we only keep 
 blanks), you should have the first silver medal 
 for taking me up so quick.” As she spake thus, 
 Miss Wren removed the key of the house-door 
 from the keyhole and put it in her pocket, and. 
 
194 
 
 then bustlingly closed the door, and tried it as 
 they both stood on the step. Satisfied that her 
 dwelling was sate, she drew one han& through 
 the old man’s arm and prepared to ply her 
 erutch-stick with the other.. But the key was an 
 instrument of such gigantic proportions, that be- 
 fore they started Riah proposed to carry it. 
 
 ‘CNo, no, no! Tl carry it myself,” returned 
 Miss Wren. ‘*I’m awfully lopsided, you know, 
 and stowed down in my pocket it'll trim the ship. 
 To let you into a secret, godmother, I wear my 
 pocket on my high side, 0’ purpose.” 
 
 With that they began their plodding through 
 the fog. 
 
 ‘¢ Yes, it was truly sharp of you, godmother,” 
 resumed Miss Wren with great approbation, 
 ‘*to understand me. But, you see, you are so 
 like the fairy. godmother in the bright little 
 books! You look so unlike the rest of people, 
 and so much as if you had changed yourself 
 into that shape, just this moment, with some 
 benevolent object. Boh!” cried Miss Jenny, 
 putting her face close tothe old man’s. ‘*I can 
 see your features, godmother, behind the beard.” 
 
 ** Does the fancy go to my changin& other ob- 
 jects too, Jenny ?” 
 
 ‘*Ah!’ That it-does! If you'd only borrow 
 my stick, and tap this piece of pavement—this 
 dirty stone that my foot taps—it would start up 
 a coach and six. Isay! Let’s believe so!” 
 
 ‘‘With all my heart,” replied the good old 
 man. 
 
 “And Dll tell you what I must ask you to do, 
 godmother. I must ask you to be so kind as 
 give my child a tap, and change him altogether. 
 O my child has been such a bad, bad child of 
 Jate! It worries me nearly out of my wits. Not 
 done a stroke of work these ten days. Has had 
 the horrors, too, and fancied that four copper- 
 colored men in red wanted to throw him into a 
 fiery furnace.” 
 
 ‘« But that’s dangerous, Jenny.” 
 
 ‘* Dangerous, godmother?” My bad child is 
 always dangerous, more or less. He might”— 
 here the little creature glanced back over her 
 shoulder at the sky—‘‘ be setting the house on 
 fire at this present moment. I don’t know who 
 would have a child, for my part! It’s no use 
 shaking him. I have shaken him till I have 
 made myself giddy. ‘Why don’t you mind 
 your Commandments and honor your parent, 
 you naughty old boy?’ I said to him all the 
 time, But he only whimpered and stared at me.” 
 
 ‘¢ What shall be changed, after him?” asked 
 Riah, in a compassionately playful voice. 
 
 ms Upon my word, godmother, I am afraid I 
 nust be selfish next, and get you to set me right 
 _n.the back and the legs. It’s a little thing to 
 
 -ou with your power, godmother, but it’s a great 
 deal to poor weak aching me.” 
 
 There was no querulous complaining in the 
 words, but they were not the less touching for 
 that. 
 
 “*.And then?” 
 
 Yes, and then— you know, godmother. 
 ‘“We’ll both jump up into the coach and six and 
 go to Lizzie. This reminds me, godmother, to 
 ask you a serious question. You are as wise as 
 wise can be (having been brought up by the 
 fairies), and you can tell me this: Is it better 
 to have had a good thing and lost it, or never to 
 have had it?” 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 «Explain, god-daughter.” 
 ‘J feel so-much more solitary and helpless 
 
 without Lizzie now, than I used to feel before I 
 
 knew her.” 
 said so.) 
 
 “Some beloved companionship fades out of 
 most lives, my dear,” said the Jew—‘‘that of a. 
 wife; and a fair daughter, and a son of promise, 
 has faded out of my own life—but the happiness 
 was,’ 
 
 ‘*Ah!” said Miss Wren thoughtfully, by no 
 means convinced, and chopping the exclama- 
 tion with that sharp little hatchet of hors; 
 ‘then I tell you what change I think you had 
 better begin with, godmother. You had better 
 change Is into Was and Was into Is, and keep 
 them so.” 
 
 ‘* Would that suit your case? Would you 
 not be always in pain then t ?” asked the old man, 
 tenderly. 
 
 ‘Right! exclaimed Miss Wren vat another 
 chop. ‘*You have changed me wiser, god- 
 mother.—Not,” she added with the quaint hitch 
 of her chin and eyes, **that you need be a very 
 wonderful godmother to do that deed.” 
 
 Thus conversing, and having crossed West- 
 minster Bridge, they traversed the ground that 
 Riah had lately traversed, and new ground like- 
 wise; for, when they had recrossed the Thames, 
 by way of London Bridge, they struck down hy 
 the river and held their still foggier course that 
 way. 
 
 But previously, as they were going along, 
 Jenny twisted her venerable friend aside to a 
 brilliantly-lighted toy-shop window, and said: 
 ‘** Now look at ’em! All my work!” 
 
 This referred to a dazzling semicircle of dolls 
 in all the colors of the rainbow, who were dressed 
 for presentation at court, for going to balls, for 
 going out driving, for going out on horseback, 
 for going out walking, for going to get married, 
 for going to help other dolls to get married, for 
 all the gay events of life. 
 
 ‘“Pretty, pretty, pretty!” said the old man 
 with a clap of his hands. ‘*Most elcgant 
 taste!” 
 
 ‘*Glad you like ‘em,” returned Miss Wren, 
 loftily. ‘*But the fun is, godmother, how I 
 
 make the great ladies try my dresses on. Though 
 it’s the hardest part of my business, and weuld 
 be, even if my back were not bad and my legs 
 queer,”’ 
 
 He looked at her ‘as not-understanding what 
 she said. 
 
 **Bless you, godmother,” said Miss Wren, 
 ‘*T have to scud about town at all hours, If it 
 was only sitting at my bench, eutting out and 
 sewing, it would be comparatively easy work; 
 but it’s the trying-on by the great ladies that 
 takes it out of me.” 
 
 ‘How, the trying-on ?”” asked Riah. 
 
 ‘What a moonev godmother you are, after 
 all!” returned Miss Wren. ‘ Look here. There’ $ 
 a Drawing-Room, or a grand day in the Park, 
 or a Show, or a Féte, or what you like. Very 
 well. I squeeze among the crowd, and I Jook 
 about me. When I see a great lady very suita- 
 ble for my business, I say, ‘ You'll do, my dear!’ 
 and I take particular notice of her, and run 
 home and cut her out and baste her. Then an- 
 other day I come scudding back again and try 
 on, and then I take particular notice of her > 
 
 (‘Tears were in her eyes as she 
 
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 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
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 WAYS 
 SX 
 avain. Sometimes she plainly seems to say, 
 
 ‘How that little creature is staring !’ and some- 
 times likes it and sometimes don’t, but much 
 More often yes than no. All the time I am 
 only saying to myself, ‘I must hollow out a bit 
 here ; I must slope away there,’ and I am mak- 
 ing a perfect slave of her, with making her try 
 on my doll’s dress. Evening parties are severer 
 work for me, because there’s only a doorway for 
 a full view, and what with hobbling among the 
 wheels of the carriages and the legs of the horses, 
 I fully expect to be run over some night. How- 
 ever, there I have ’em, just the same. When 
 they go bobbing into the hall from the carriage, 
 and catch a glimpse of my little physiognomy 
 poked out from behind a policeman’s cape in the 
 rain, I dare say they think I am wondering and 
 a of 
 
 little think they’re only working for my dolls! 
 There was Lady Belinda Whitrose. I made 
 her do double duty in one night. T said when 
 she came out of the carriage, * Youll do, my 
 dear!’ and I ran straight home and cut her out 
 and basted her. Back I came again, and wait- 
 ed behind the men that called the carriages. 
 Very bad night too. At last, ‘adv Belinda 
 Whitrose’s carriage! Lady Belinda Whitrose 
 coming down!’ And I made her try on—oh! 
 and take pains about it too—hefore she got seat- 
 ed. That’s Lady Belinda hanging up by the 
 waist, much too near the gaslight for a wax 
 one, with her toes turned in.” ; ; 
 When they had plodded on for some time nigh 
 the river, Riah asked the way to a certain tavern 
 
196 
 
 called the Six Jolly Fellowship Porters. Fol- 
 lowing the directions he received, they arrived, 
 after two or three puzzled stoppages for consid- 
 eration, and some uncertain looking about them, 
 at the door of Miss Abbey Potterson’s dominions. 
 A peep through the glass portion of the door re- 
 vealed to them the glories of the bar, and Miss 
 a\bbey herself seated in state on her snug throne, 
 reading the newspaper. 
 ence, thev presented themselves. 
 
 Taking her eyes off her newspaper, and paus- 
 ine with a suspended expression of countenance, 
 as if she must finish the paragraph in hand be- 
 fore undertaking any other business whatever, 
 Miss Abbey demanded, with aome slight asperi- 
 ty: *‘ Now, then, what’s for you?” 
 
 “Gould we see Miss Potterson?” asked the 
 old man, uncovering his head. 
 
 > <You"not only could, but you can and -you 
 do,” replied the hostess. 
 
 ‘‘ Might we speak with you, madam ?” 
 
 By this time Miss Abbey’s eyes had possessed 
 themselves of the small figure of Miss Jenny 
 Wren. For the closer observation of which, 
 Miss Abbey laid aside her newspaper, rose, and 
 looked over the half-door of the bar. The 
 crutch-stick seemed to entreat for its owner leave 
 to come in and rest by the fire; so Miss Abbey 
 opened the half-door, and said, as though reply- 
 ing to the crutch-stick: ‘* Yes, come in and rest 
 by the fire.” 
 
 ‘‘My name is Riah,” said the old man, with 
 courteous action, ‘‘and my avocation is in Lon- 
 don city. This, my young companion—” 
 
 ‘Stop a bit,” interposed Miss Wren, ‘I'll 
 give the lady my card.” She produced it from 
 her pocket with an air, after struggling with the 
 gigantic door-key which had got upon the top 
 of it and kept it down. Miss Abbey, with man- 
 ifest tokens of astonishment, took the diminutive 
 document, and found it to run concisely thus: 
 
 MISS JENNY WRENN, 
 DOLLS’ DRESS-MAKER. 
 
 Polls attended at their own Residences. 
 
 ‘¢Tud!” exclaimed Miss Potterson, staring. 
 And dropped the card. 
 
 ‘‘We take the liberty of coming, my young 
 companion and J, madam,” said Riah, ‘‘ on be- 
 half of Lizzie Hexam.” 
 
 Miss Potterson was stooping to loosen the bon- 
 net-strings of the dolls’ dress-maker. She looked 
 round rather angrily, and said: ‘‘ Lizzie Hexam 
 is a very proud young woman.” 
 
 ‘*« She would be so proud,” returned Riah, dex- 
 trously, “to stand well in your good opinion, 
 that before she quitted London for—” 
 
 ‘“‘ For where, in the name of the Cape of Good 
 Hope?” asked Miss Potterson, as though sup- 
 posing her to have emigrated. 
 
 ‘For the country,”’ was the cautious answer— 
 ‘¢she made us promise to come and show you a 
 paper, which she left in our hands for that spe- 
 cial purpose. I am an unserviceable friend of 
 hers, who began to know her after her departure 
 from this neighborhood. She has been for some 
 time living with my young companion, and has 
 been a helpful and a comfortable friend to her, 
 Much needed, madam,” he added, in a lower 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. Hye: 
 
 To whom, with defer- | 
 
 voice. ‘Believe me; if you knew all, much . 
 needed.” 
 
 “1 can believe that,” said Miss Abbey, with 
 a softening glance at the little creature. 
 
 ‘¢ And if it’s proud to have a heart that never 
 hardens, and a temper that never tires, anda 
 touch that never hurts,’’ Miss Jenny struck in, 
 flushed, ‘she is proud. And if it’s not, she is 
 NOT.” st 
 
 Her set purpose of contradicting Miss Abbey 
 point-blank, was so far from offending that dread 
 authority as to elicit a gracious smile. ‘* You | 
 do right, child,” said Miss Abbey, ‘‘ to speak well 
 of those who deserve well of you.” : 
 
 : 
 
 ‘‘ Right or wrong,” muttered Miss Wren, in- 
 audibly, with a visible hitch of her chin, “I 
 mean to do it, and you may make up your mind 
 to that, old lady.” 
 
 ‘Here is the paper, madam,” said the Jew, 
 delivering into Miss Potterson’s hands the orig- 
 inal document drawn up by Rokesmith, and — 
 signed by Riderhood. ‘* Will you please to read — 
 it?” 
 
 ‘But first of all,” said Miss Abbey, ‘‘—did 
 you ever taste shrub, child ?” 
 
 Miss Wren shook her head. 
 
 ‘* Should you like to?” 
 
 ‘¢ Should if it’s good,” returned Miss Wren. 
 
 ‘You shall try. And, if you find it good, I'll 
 mix some for you with hot water. Put your 
 poor little feet on the fender. It’s a cold, cold 
 night, and the fog clings so.” As Miss Abbey 
 helped her to turn her chair her loosened bonnet 
 dropped on the floor. ‘* Why, what lovely hair!” 
 cried Miss Abbey. ‘And enough to make wigs 
 for all the dolls in the world. What a quan- 
 tity!” 
 
 ‘¢ Call that a quantity ?” returned Miss Wren. 
 ‘¢Poof! What do you say to the rest of it?” 
 As she spoke, she untied a band, and the golden 
 stream fell over herself and over the chair, and 
 flewed down to the ground. Miss Abbey’s ad- 
 miration seemed to increase her perplexity. She 
 beckoned the Jew toward her, as she reached 
 down the shrub-bottle from its niche, and whis- 
 
 ered: 
 
 ‘¢ Child, or woman ?” 
 
 ‘¢Child in years,” was the answer ; ‘‘ woman 
 in self-reliance and trial.” e 
 
 ‘You are talking about Me, good people,” 
 thought Miss Jenny, sitting in her golden bower, — 
 warming her feet. ‘‘I can’t hear what you say, 
 but Z know your tricks and your manners!” 
 
 The shrub, when tasted from a spoon, perfect=_ 
 ly harmonizing with Miss Jenny’s palate, a ju= 
 dicious amount was mixed by Miss Potterson’s — 
 skillful hands, whereof Riah too partook. After 
 this preliminary Miss Abbey read the document 5 
 and, as often as she raised her eyebrows in so __ 
 doing, the watchful Miss Jenny accompanied the — 
 action with an expressive and emphatic sip of the 
 shrub and water. . 
 
 “As far as this goes,” said Miss Abbey Pot-_ 
 terson, when she had read it several times, and — 
 thought about it, ‘‘it proves (what didn’t much” 
 need proving) that Rogue Riderhood is a villain 
 I have my doubts whether he is not the villaim 
 who solely did the deed; but I have no expect- 
 ation of those doubts ever being cleared up now. 
 
 Lizzie’s self; because when things were at the — 
 worst I trusted her, had perfect confidence in 
 
 ha * ) Ny ™ 
 ae SB: ? SES ty ieee Sa c os 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND, 
 
 her, and tried to persuade her to come to me for 
 arefuge. I am very sorry to have done a man 
 ‘wrong, particularly when it can’t be undone. 
 _ Be kind enough to let Lizzie know what I say ; 
 not forgetting that if she will come to the Por- 
 ters, after all, by-gones being by-gones, she will 
 find a home at the Porters, and a friend at the 
 Porters. She knows Miss Abbey of old, remind 
 her, and she knows what-like the home, and 
 what-like the friend, 1s likely to turn out. Iam 
 generally short and sweet—or short and sour, 
 according as it may be and as opinions vary—” 
 remarked Miss Abbey, ‘‘and that’s about all I 
 have got to say, and enough too.” 
 
 But before the shrub and water was sipped 
 out, Miss Abbey bethought herself that she would 
 like to keep a copy of the paper by rer.) i" Tt’s 
 not long, Sir,” said she to Riah, “and perhaps 
 you wouldn’t mind just jotting it down.” The 
 old man willingly put on his spectacles, and, 
 standing at the little desk in the corner where 
 Miss Abbey filed her receipts and kept her sam- 
 ple vials (customers’ scores were interdicted by 
 the strict administration of the Porters), wrote 
 out the copy in a fair round character. As he 
 stood ‘there, doing his methodical penmanship, 
 his ancient scribe-like figure intent upon the 
 work, and the little dolls’ dress-maker sitting in 
 her golden bower before the fire, Miss Abbey had 
 her doubts whether she had not dreamed those 
 two rare figures into the bar of the Six Jolly Fel- 
 lowships, and might not wake with a nod next 
 moment and find them gone. 
 
 _ Miss Abbey had twice made the experiment 
 of shutting her eyes and opening them again, 
 still finding the figures there, when, dream-like, 
 a confused hubbub arose in the public room. 
 As she started up, and they all three looked at 
 one another, it became a noise of clamoring 
 voices and of the stir of feet; then all the win- 
 dows were heard to be hastily thrown up, and 
 shouts and cries came floating into the house 
 from the river. A moment more, and Bob Glid- 
 dery came clattering along the passage, with the 
 noise of all the nails in his boots condensed into 
 every separate nail. 
 
 “What is it?” asked Miss Abbey. 
 
 “*T’s summut run down in the fog, ma’am,” 
 answered Bob. ‘‘There’s ever so many people 
 in the river.” 
 
 “Tell "em to put on all the kettles!” cried 
 Miss Abbey. “See that the boiler’s full. Gat 
 a bath out. Hang some blankets to the fire. 
 Heat some stone bottles. Have your senses 
 about you, you girls down stairs, and use ’em.”' 
 
 While Miss Abbey partly delivered these di- 
 rections to Bob—whom she seized by the hair, 
 and whose head she knocked against the wall, 
 as a general injunction to vigilance and pres- 
 ence of mind—and partly hailed the kitchen 
 with them—the company in the public room, 
 jostling one another, rushed out to the cause- 
 Way, and the outer noise increased. 
 
 “Come and look,” said Miss Abbey to her 
 Visitors. They all three hurried to the vacated 
 public room, and passed by one of the windows 
 into the wooden veranda overhanging the river, 
 
 “Does any body down there know what has 
 happened ?”” demanded Miss Abbey, in her voice 
 ofauthority, 
 _ it’sasteamer, Miss Abbey,” cried one blurred 
 figure in the fog. — 
 
 197 
 
 ‘It always is a steamer, Miss Abbey,” cried 
 another. 
 
 ‘* Them’s her lights, Miss Abbey, wot you seo 
 a-blinking yonder,” cried another. i 
 
 *‘She’s a-blowing off her steam, 
 and that’s what makes the fog and the noise 
 worse, don’t you see?” explained another. 
 
 Boats were putting off, torches were lighting 
 up, people were rushing tumultuously. to the 
 water’s edge. Somé man fell in with a splash, 
 and was pulled out again with a roar of laugh- 
 ter. The drags were called for. A cry for the 
 life-buoy passed from mouth to mouth: It was 
 impossible to make out what was going on upon 
 the river, for every boat that put off sculled into 
 the fog and was lost to view at a boat’s-length. 
 Nothing was clear but that the unpopular steam- 
 cr was assailed with reproaches on all sides. 
 She was the Murderer, bound for Gallows Bay; 
 she was the Manslaughterer, bound for Penal 
 Settlement; her captain ought to be tried for 
 his life; her crew ran down men in row-boats 
 with a relish; she mashed up Thames lighter- 
 men with her paddles; she fired property with 
 her funnels; she always was, and she always 
 would be, wreaking destruction upon somebody 
 or something, after the manner of all her kind. 
 The whole bulk of the fog teemed with such 
 faunts, uttered in tones of universal hoarseness, 
 All the while the steamer’s lights moved spec- 
 trally a very little, as she lay-to, waiting the 
 upshot of whatever accident had happened, 
 Now she began burning blue-lights. These 
 made a luminous patch about her, as if she had 
 set the fog on fire, and in the patch—the cries 
 changing their note, and becoming more fitful 
 and more excited—shadows of men and boats 
 could be seen moving, while voices shouted : 
 “There!” “There again!” “*A couple more 
 strokes ahead!” “Hurrah!” **Look out!” 
 ‘Hold on!” ‘Hanlin! and the like. Last- 
 ly, with a few tumbling clots of blue fire, the 
 night closed in dark again, the wheels of the 
 steamer were heard revolving, and her lights 
 glided smoothly away in the direction of the 
 sea. 
 
 It appeared to Miss Abbey and her two com- 
 panions that a considerable time had been thus 
 occupied. There was now as eager a set to- 
 ward the shore beneath the house as there had 
 been from it; and it was only on the first boat 
 of the rush coming in that it was known what 
 had occurred. 
 
 ‘*Tf that’s Tom Tootle,” Miss Abbey made 
 proclamation, in her most commanding tones, 
 ‘*let him instantly come underneath here.” 
 
 The submissive Tom complied, attended by a 
 crowd. 
 
 ‘What 1s it, Tootle ?” demanded Miss Abbey. 
 
 ‘‘Tt’s a foreign steamer, Miss, run down a 
 wherry.” 
 
 ‘*How many in the wherry ?” 
 
 ‘*Qne man, Miss Abbey.” 
 
 ** Found ?” : 
 
 “‘Yes. He’s been under water a long time, 
 Miss; but they’ve grappled up the body.” 
 
 *‘Let ’em bring it here. You, Bob Gliddery, 
 shut the house-door, and stand by it on the in- 
 side, and don’t you open till I tell you. Any 
 police down there ?” : an 
 
 ‘‘Here, Miss Abbey,” was official rejoinder. 
 
 “After they have brought the body in, keep 
 
 Miss Abbey, 
 
maw 
 t 
 
 198 
 the crowd out, will you? 
 dery to shut ‘em out.” 
 
 “ All right, Miss Abbey.” 
 
 The autocratic landlady withdrew into the 
 house with Riah and Miss Jenny, and disposed 
 those forces, one on either side of her, within 
 the half-door of the bar, as behind a breast-work. 
 
 ‘You two stand close here,” said Miss Abbey, 
 ‘<and you'll come to no hurt, and see it brought 
 in. Bob, you stand by the door.” 
 
 That sentinel, smartly giving his rolled shirt- 
 sleeves an extra and a final tuck on his shoul- 
 ders, obeyed. 
 
 Sound of advancing voices, sound of advanc- 
 ing steps. Shufile and talk without, Moment- 
 ary pause. ‘I'wo peculiarly blunt knocks or 
 pokes at the door, as if the dead man arriving 
 on his back were striking at it with the soles of 
 his motionless feet. 
 
 ‘<'That’s the stretcher, or the shutter, which- 
 ever of the two they are carrying,” said Miss 
 Abbey, with expericnced ear. ‘Open, you 
 Bob!” 
 
 Door opened. Heavy tread of ladenmen. A 
 
 halt. A rush. Stoppage of rush. Door shut, 
 Baffled hoots from the vexed souls of disappoint- 
 ed outsiders. 
 
 ‘“Come on, men!” said Miss Abbey; for so 
 potent was she with her subjects that even then 
 the bearers awaited her permission, ‘*‘ First- 
 floor.” 
 
 The entry being low, and the staircase being 
 low, they so took up the burden they had set 
 down as to carry that low. The recumbent fig- 
 ure, in passing, lay hardly as high as the half- 
 door. 
 
 Miss Abbey started back at sight of it. “ Why, 
 good God!” said she, turning to her two com- 
 -panions, ‘‘that’s the very man who made the 
 {declaration we have just had in our hands. 
 
 . That’s Riderhood !” 
 
 And help Bob Glid- 
 
 —_——__@—_——__ 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THLE SAME RESPECTED FRIEND IN MORE AS- 
 PECTS THAN ONE. 
 
 In sooth, it is Riderhood and no other, or it is 
 the outer hu8k and’shell of Riderhood and no 
 other, that is borne into Miss Abbey’s first-floor 
 bedroom. Supple to twist and turn as the Rogue 
 has ever been, he is sufficiently rigid now; and 
 not without much shuffling of attendant feet, and 
 tilting of his bier this way and that way, and 
 peril even of his sliding off it and being tumbled 
 in a heap over the balustrades, can he be got up 
 stairs. 
 
 ‘¢ Fetch a doctor,” quoth Miss Abbey. And 
 then, ‘‘Fetch his daughter.” On both of which 
 errands quick messengers depart. 
 
 The doctor-seeking messenger meets the doc- 
 tor half-way, coming under convoy of police. 
 Doctor examines the dank carcass, and pro- 
 nounces, not hopefully, that it is worth while 
 trying to reanimate the same. 
 means are at once in action, and every body 
 present lends a hand, anda heart and soul. No 
 one has the least regard for the man; with them 
 all he has been an object of avoidance, suspicion, 
 and aversion; but the spark of life within him is 
 
 curiously separable from himself now, and they | 
 
 All the best | 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. Hae 
 
 have a deep interest in it, probably because it #s 
 life, and they are living and must die, 
 
 In answer to the doctor’s inquiry how did it 
 happen, and was any one to blame, Tom Tootle 
 gives in his verdict, unavoidable accident, and no 
 one to blame but the sufferer. ‘* He was slink- 
 ing about in his boat,” says Tom, ** which slink- 
 ing were, not to speak ill of the dead, the man- 
 ner of the man, when he come right athwart the 
 steamer’s bows and she cut him in two.” Mr. 
 Tootle is so far figurative, touching the dismem- 
 berment, as that he means the boat, and not the 
 man. For the man lies whole before them. 
 
 Captain Joey, the bottle-nosed regular cus- 
 tomer in the glazed hat, is a pupil of the much- 
 respected old school, and (having insinuated 
 himself into the chamber, in the execution of the 
 important service of carrying the drowned man’s 
 neckerchief) favors the doctor with a sagacious 
 old-scholastic suggestion that the body should be 
 hung up by the heels, ‘‘sim’lar,” says Captain 
 Joey, “*to mutton in a butcher’s shop,” and 
 should then, as a particularly choice manceuvre 
 for promoting easy respiration, be rolled upon 
 casks. 
 tain’s ancestors are received with such speechless 
 indignation by Miss Abbey, that she instantly 
 
 These scraps,of the wisdom of the cap-_ 
 
 seizes the captain by the collar, and without a — 
 
 single word ejects him, not presuming to remon- 
 strate, from the scene. 
 
 There then remain, to assist the doctor and — 
 
 Tom, only those three other regular customers, 
 Bob Glamour, William Williams, and Jonathan 
 
 ‘ 
 4 
 
 (family name of the latter, if any, unknown to” 
 
 mankind), who are quite enough. 
 
 Miss Abbey 
 
 having looked in to make sure that nothing is i 
 wanted, descends to the bar, and there awaits © 
 
 the result, with the gentle Jew and Miss Jenny 
 Wren. 
 
 If you are not gone for good, Mr. Riderhood, — 
 
 it would be something to know where you are — 
 
 hiding at present. This flabby lump of mor- 
 tality that we work so hard at with such patient 
 perseverance, yields no sign of you. If you are 
 gone for good, Rogue, it is very solemn, and if 
 you are coming back, it is hardly less so. 
 
 Nay, © 
 in the suspense and mystery of the latter ques-— 
 tion, involving that of where you may be now, — 
 
 y 
 
 | 
 ry 
 4) 
 
 there is a solemnity-even added to that of death, 
 making us who are in attendance alike afraid to” 
 
 look on you and to look off you, and making 
 those below start at the least sound of a creak- 
 ing plank in the floor. a 
 Stay! Did that eyelid tremble? So the doc- 
 tor, breathing low, and closely watching, asks 
 himself. “ 
 No. 
 Did that nostril twitch? 
 No. 
 This artificial respiration ceasing, do I feel 
 any faint flutter under my hand upon the chest? 
 No. 
 Over and over again No. 
 and over again, nevertheless. 
 See! A token of life! 
 of life! The spark may smoulder and go out, of 
 it may glow and expand, but see! 
 rough fellows, seeing, shed tears. Neither Ri- 
 derhood in this world, nor Riderhood in the oth- 
 er, could draw tears from them; but a strivil 
 human soul between the two can do it easily. 
 He is struggling to come back, Now, he 
 
 ne 
 
 * 
 
 i 
 
 | 
 
 Py) | 
 
 a 
 No. But try over’ 
 
 An indubitable token 
 
 The fou r 
 
 '; 
 iA 
 we 
 ‘ 
 
 i 
 A 
 i 
 
 wi 
 
x OUR MUTUAL FRIEND, 
 
 almost here, now he is far away again. Now he} hand. 
 
 is struggling harder to get back. And yet—like 
 us all, when we swoon—like us all, every day 
 of our lives when we wake—he is instinctively 
 unwilling to be restored to the consciousness of 
 this existence, and would be left dormant, if he 
 could. ; 
 
 Bob Gliddery returns with Pleasant Rider- 
 hood, who was out when sought for, and hard to 
 find. She has a shawl over her head, and her 
 
 first action, when she takes it off weeping, and 
 
 courtesies to Miss Abbey, is to wind her hair 
 ee hank 
 here.” 7 
 *‘f am bound to say, girl, I didn’t know who 
 it was,” returns Miss Abbey; ‘but I hope it 
 would have been pretty much the same if I had 
 known.” 
 
 _ Poor Pleasant, fortified with a sip of brandy, 
 is ushered into the first-floor chamber, She 
 could not express much sentiment about her fa- 
 
 up. 
 you, Miss Abbey, for having father 
 
 funeral oration, but she has a greater tenderness 
 
 for him than he ever had for her, and crying 
 
 bitterly when she sees him stretched unconscious, 
 asks the doctor, with clasped hands: ‘Is there 
 no hope, Sir? O poor father! Is poor father 
 dead ?” 
 
 To which the doctor, on one knee beside the 
 
 ~ body, busy and watchful, only rejoins without 
 
 looking round: ‘Nowy, my girl, unless you have 
 
 _the self-command to be perfectly quiet, Ican not 
 _ allow you to remain in the room.” — 
 
 Pleasant, consequently, wipes her eyes with 
 
 her back-hair, which is in fresh need ‘of being 
 
 wound up, and having got it out of the way, 
 
 watches with terrified interest all that goes on, 
 Her natural woman’s aptitude soon renders her 
 able to give a little help. Anticipating the doc- 
 
 tor’s want of this or that, she quietly has it ready, | 
 .end of the room, shunning him. 
 
 for him, and so by degrees is intrusted with the 
 
 charge of supporting her father’s head upon her | 
 
 arm. 
 
 It is something so new to Pleasant to see her 
 father an object of sympathy and interest, to 
 find any one very willing to tolerate his society 
 in this world, not to say pressingly and sooth- 
 
 ingly entreating him to belong to it, that it | 
 
 gives her a sensation she never experienced be- 
 fore. 
 main thus for a long time it would be a respect- 
 able change, floats in her mind. Also some 
 
 vague idea that the old evil is drowned out of 
 
 him, and that if he should happily come back to | 
 
 resume his occupation of the empty form that 
 lies upon the bed, his spirit will be altered. In 
 which state of mind she kisses the stony lips, 
 and quite believes that the impassive hand she 
 chafes will revive a tender hand, if it revive 
 ever. 
 
 Sweet delusion for Pleasant Riderhood. But 
 
 Some hazy idea that if affairs could re-. 
 
 _ther if she were called upon to pronounce his | 
 
 | 
 
 they minister to him with such extraordinary | 
 
 interest, their anxiety is so keen, their vigilance 
 18 80 great, their excited joy grows so intense as 
 
 the signs of life strengthen, that how can she | 
 
 Tesist it, poor thing! And now he begins to 
 
 | 
 \ 
 | 
 | 
 
 breathe naturally, and he stirs, and the doctor | 
 
 declares him to have come back from that inex- 
 plicable journey where he stopped on the dark 
 road, and to be here. ; 
 
 ~ Yom Tootle, who is nearest to the doctor when 
 ®s says this, grasps the doctor fervently by the 
 
 ee 
 a | 
 
 = 
 Ts" 
 
 | too. 
 
 _to ask a question. 
 Tell him. 
 
 Bob Glamour, William Williams, and 
 Jonathan of the no surname, all shake hands 
 with one another round, and with the doctor. 
 Bob GlAmour blows. his nose, and Jona- 
 than of the no surname is moved ‘to do like- 
 wise, but lacking a pocket-handkerchief aban- 
 dons that outlet for his emotion. Pleasant sheds 
 tears deserving her own name, and her sweet 
 delusion is at its height. 
 
 There is intelligence in his eyes. He wants 
 He wonders where he is. 
 
 ** Father, you were run down 
 and are at Miss Abbey Potterson’s 
 
 He stares at his -daughter, stares all around 
 him, closes his eyes, and lies slumbering on her 
 arm. 
 
 The short-lived delusion begins to fade. The 
 low, bad, unimpressible face is coming up from 
 the depths of the river, or what other depths, to 
 the surface again. As he grows warm, the doc- 
 tor and the four men cool. ‘As his lineaments 
 
 often with life, their faces and their hearts 
 
 on the river, 
 
 9 
 ° 
 
 ‘harden to him., 
 
 ‘* He will do now,” says the doctor, washing 
 his hands, and looking at the patient with grow- 
 ing disfavor. 
 
 ‘* Many a better man,” moralizes Tom Tootle 
 with a gloomy shake of the head, ‘ain't had his 
 luck.” 
 
 ‘* It’s to be hoped he’ll make a better use of: 
 his life,” says Bob Glamour, “ than I expect he 
 Will. 3 
 ‘*Or than he done afore,” adds William Will- 
 jams. 
 
 ‘‘But no, not he!” says Jonathan of the no 
 surname, clenching the quartette. 
 
 They speak in a low tone because of his 
 daughter, but she sees that they have all drawn 
 off, and that they stand in a group at the other 
 It would be 
 too much to suspect them of being sorry that he 
 didn’t die when he had done so much toward it, 
 but they clearly wish that they had had a better 
 subject to bestow their pains on. Intelligence is 
 conveyed to Miss Abbey in the bar, who reap- 
 pears on the scene, and contemplates from a dis- 
 tance, holding whispered discourse with the doc- 
 tor. The spark of life was deeply interesting 
 while it was in abeyance, but now that it has 
 
 | got established in Mr. Riderhood, there appears 
 
 to be a general desire that circumstances had 
 admitted of its being developed in any body else 
 rather than that. gentleman. 
 
 ‘* However,” says Miss Abbey, cheering them 
 up, ‘‘you have done your duty like good and 
 true men, and you had better come down and 
 take something at the expense of the Porters.” 
 
 This they all do, leaving the daughter watch- 
 ing the father. To whom, in their absence, Bob 
 Gliddery presents himself, 
 
 ‘His gills looks rum; don’t they ?” says Bob, 
 after inspecting the patient. 
 
 Pleasant faintly nods. 
 
 ‘¢His gills ‘ll look rummer when he wakes; 
 won’t they ?”’ says Bob. 
 
 Pleasant hopes not. Why? 
 
 ‘‘When he finds himself here, you know,”. 
 Bob explains. ‘Cause Miss Abbey forbid him 
 the house and ordered him out of it. But what 
 you may call the Fates ordered him into it again. 
 Which is rumness; ain’t it?” 
 
 199 
 
200 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 —s C 
 FZ, u 
 
 ww 
 <A —~_. 
 
 i} 
 
 4 
 i ! 
 
 ROGUE RIDERHOOD HIMSELF AGAIN, 
 
 ‘‘ He wouldn't have come here of his own ac-|_ He replies gruffly, ‘‘ Nothing to boast on. ’ 
 cord,” returns poor Pleasant, with an effort at | Having, in fact, returned to life in an uncom- 
 a little pride. | monly sulky state. 
 
 ‘*No,” retorts Bob. ‘* Nor he wouldn’t have ‘‘T don’t mean to preach; but I hope,” says 
 been let in, 1f he had.” the doctor, gravely shaking his head, ‘* that this 
 
 The short delusion is quite dispelled now. | escape may have a good effect upon you, Rider- 
 As plainly as she sees on her arm the old father, | hood.” 
 unimproved, Pleasant sees that every body there The patient’s discontented growl of a reply is 
 will cut him when he recovers consciousness. | not intelligible; his daughter, however, could 
 ‘<J'll take him away ever so soon as I can,” | interpret, if she would, that what he says is, he 
 thinks Pleasant with a sigh; ‘‘he’s best at | ‘*don’t want no Poll-Parroting.” 
 home.” Mr. Riderhood next demands his shirt, and 
 
 Presently they all return, and wait for him to | draws it on over his head (with his daughter’s 
 become conscious that they will all be glad to| help) exactly as if he had just had a Fight. | 
 get rid of him. Some clothes are got together| ‘ Warn’t it a steamer?” he pauscs to ask her. 
 
 for him to wear, his own being saturated with ‘¢'Yes, father.” . 
 water, and his present dress being composed of | ‘I'll have the law on her, bust her! and make — 
 blankets. her pay for it.” 4 
 
 Becoming more and more uncomfortable, as He then buttons his linen very moodily, twice 
 though the prevalent dislike were finding him|or thrice stopping to examine his arms and 
 out somewhere in his sleep and expressing itself | hands, as if to see what punishment he has re- — 
 to him, the patient at last opens his eyes wide, | ceived in the Fight. He then doggedly demands 
 and is assisted by his daughter to sit up in bed. | his other garments, and slowly gets them on, 
 
 “Well, Riderhood,” says the doctor, ‘ how | with an appearance of great malevolence toward — 
 do you feel ?” - | his late opponent and all the spectators. He 
 
has an impression that his nose is bleeding, and 
 
 several times draws the back of his hand across 
 it, and looks for the result, in.a pugilistic man- 
 ner, greatly strengthening that incongruous re- 
 semblance. 
 
 ** Where’s my fur cap?” he asks in a surly 
 voice, when he has shufiled his clothes on. 
 
 ‘* In the river,” somebody rejoins. 
 
 *“And warn’t there no honest man to pick it 
 up? OO’ course there was though, and to eut 
 off with it arterwards. You are a rare lot, all 
 on you!” 
 
 Thus, Mr. Riderhood: taking from the hands 
 of his daughter, with special ill-will, a lent cap, 
 and grumbling as he pulls it down over his ears. 
 Then, getting on his unsteady legs, leaning heav- 
 ily upon her, and growling ‘Hold still, can’t 
 you? What! You must be a staggering next, 
 must you?” he takes his departure out of the 
 ring in which he has had that little turn-up with 
 Death. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 A HAPPY RETURN OF THE DAY: 
 
 Mr. and Mrs. Wilfer had seen a full quarter 
 
 of a hundred more anniversaries of their wed- 
 ding-day than Mr. and Mrs. Lammle had seen 
 of theirs, but they still celebrated the occasion 
 in the bosom of their family. Not that these 
 celebrations ever resulted in any thing particu- 
 larly agreeable, or that the family was ever dis- 
 appointed by that circumstance on account of 
 having looked forward to the return of the au- 
 spicious day with sanguine anticipations of en- 
 joyment. It was kept morally, rather as a Fast 
 than a Feast, enabling Mrs. Wilfer to hold a 
 
 sombre darkling state, which exhibited that im- 
 
 4 
 
 pressive woman in her choicest colors. 
 
 The noble lady’s condition on these delightful 
 occasions was one compounded of heroic endur- 
 ance and heroic forgiveness. Lurid indications 
 of the better marriages she might have made 
 shone athwart the awful gloom of her compos- 
 ure, and fitfully revealed the cherub as a little 
 monster unaccountably favored by Heaven, who 
 had possessed himself of a blessing for which 
 many of his superiors had sued and contended 
 in vain. So firmly had this his position toward 
 his treasure become established, that when the 
 anniversary arrived, it always found him in an 
 apologetic state. It is not impossible that his 
 modest penitence may have even gone the length 
 of sometimes severely reproving him for that he 
 ever took the liberty of making so exalted a 
 character his wife. 
 
 As for the children of the union, their experi- 
 ence of these festivals had been sufficiently un- 
 comfortable to lead them annually to wish, when 
 out of their tenderest years, either that Ma had 
 married somebody else instead of much-teased 
 Pa, or that Pa had married somebody else in- 
 stead of Ma. When there came to be but two 
 sisters left at home, the daring mind of Bella on 
 the next of these occasions scaled the height of 
 wondering with droll vexation “‘what on earth 
 Pa ever could have seen in Ma, to induce him 
 to make such a little fool of himself as to ask her 
 to have him.” 
 
 The revolving year now bringing the day round 
 in its orderly sequence, Bella arrived in the Bof- 
 
 13 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 201 
 
 fin chariot to assist at the celebration. It was 
 the family custom, when the day recurred, to 
 sacrifice a pair of fowls on the altar of Hymen ; 
 and Bella had sent a note beforehand to inti- 
 mate that she would bring the votive offering 
 with her. So Bella and the fowls, by the unit- 
 ed energies of two horses, two men, four wheels, 
 and a plum-pudding carriage dog with as un- 
 comfortable a collar on as if he had been George 
 the Fourth, were deposited at the door of the 
 parental dwelling. They were there received 
 by Mrs. Wilfer in person, whose dignity on this, 
 as on most special occasions, was heightened by 
 a mysterious toothache. 
 
 ‘IT shall not require the carriage 
 said Bella. ‘I shall walk back.” 
 
 The male domestic of Mrs. Boffin touched his 
 hat, and in the act of departure had an awful 
 glare bestowed upon him by Mrs. Wilfer, in- 
 tended to carry deep into his audacious soul the 
 assurance that, whatever his private suspicions 
 might be, male domestics in livery were no rari- 
 ty there. 
 
 ‘* Well, dear Ma,” said Bella, ‘and how do 
 you do?” 
 
 ‘I am as well, Bella,” replied Mrs. Wilfer, 
 ‘*as can be expected.” 
 
 ‘‘ Dear me, Ma,” said Bella; ‘you talk as if 
 one was just born !” 
 
 *“That’s exactly what Ma has been doing,” 
 interposed Lavvy, over the maternal shoulder, 
 ‘fever since we got up this morning. It’s all 
 very well to laugh, Bella, but any thing more 
 exasperating it is impossible to conceive.” 
 
 Mrs. Wilfer, with a look too full of majesty to 
 be accompanied by any words, attended both 
 her daughters to the kitchen, where the sacrifice 
 was to be prepared. — 
 
 ‘Mr, Rokesmith,” said she, resignedly, ‘* has 
 been so polite as to place his sitting-room at our 
 disposal to-day. You will therefore, Bella, be 
 entertained in the humble abode of your par- 
 ents, so far in accordance with your present style 
 of living, that there will be a drawing-room for 
 your reception as well as.a dining-room. Your 
 papa invited Mr. Rokesmith to partake of our 
 lowly fare. In excusing himself on account of 
 a particular engagement he offered the use of 
 his apartment.” 
 
 Bella happened to know that he had no en- 
 gagement out of his own room at Mr. Boffin’s, 
 but she approved of his staying away. ‘*‘We 
 should only have put one another out of counte- 
 nance,” she thought, ‘‘and we do that quite oft- 
 en enough as it is.” 
 
 Yet she had sufficient curiosity about his room 
 to run up to it with the least possible delay, and 
 make a close inspection of its contents. It was 
 tastefully though economically furnished, and 
 very neatly arranged. ‘There were shelves and 
 stands of books—English, French, and Italian ; 
 and in a port-folio on the writing-table there 
 were sheets upon sheets of memoranda and cal- 
 culations in figures, evidently referring to the 
 Boffin property. On that table also, carefully 
 backed with canvas, varnished, mounted, and 
 rolled like a map, was the placard descriptive 
 of the murdered man who had come from afar 
 to be her husband, She shrank from this ghost- 
 ly surprise, and felt quite frightened as she rolled 
 and tied it up again. Peeping about here and 
 there she came upon a print, a graceful head of 
 
 at night,” 
 
202 
 
 a pretty woman, elegantly framed, hanging in 
 the corner by the easy-chair. ‘‘Oh, indeed, 
 Sir! said Bella, after stopping to ruminate be- 
 fore it. ‘*Oh, indeed, Sir! I fancy L can guess 
 whom you think that’s like. But Pll tell you 
 what it’s much more like—your impudence!” 
 Having said which she decamped: not solely 
 because she was offended, but because there was 
 nothing else to look at. 
 
 **Now, Ma,” said Bella, reappearing in the 
 kitchen with some remains of a blush, ‘‘you 
 and Lavvy think magnificent me fit for no- 
 
 thing, but I intend to prove the conirary. I 
 mean to be Cook to-day.” 
 ‘* Hold!” rejoined her majestic mother. ‘I 
 
 “an not permit it. Cook, in that dress!” 
 
 ‘¢ As for my dress, Ma,” returned Bella, mer- | 
 rily searching in a dresser-drawer, ‘I mean.-to 
 apron it and towel it all over the front; and as 
 to permission, 1 mean to do. without.” | 
 
 ** You cook ?”’ said Mrs. Wilfer. ‘‘ You, who , 
 never cooked when you were at home ?”’ 
 
 ‘<Yes, Ma,” returned Bella; ‘‘ that is precise- 
 ly the state of the case.” 
 
 She girded herself with a white apron, and 
 busily with knots and pins contrived a bib to it, 
 coming close and tight under her chin, as if it 
 had caught her round the neck to kiss her. | 
 Over this bib her dimples looked delightful, | 
 and under it her pretty figure not less so. | 
 ‘Now, Ma,” said Bella, pushing back her hair 
 from her temples with both hands, ‘‘ what’s 
 first ?” 
 
 “ First,” returned Mrs, Wilfer, solemnly, ‘‘if 
 you persist in what I can not but regard as con- 
 duct utterly incompatible with the equipage in 
 which you arrived—” 46 
 
 (* Which I'do,,Ma.”) % 
 
 ‘* First, then, you put the fowls down to the 
 fire.” : 
 
 ‘¢To—be—sure!” cried Bella; ‘‘and flour 
 them, and twirl them round, and there they go !” 
 sending them spinning ata greatrate. ‘* What’s 
 next, Ma?” 
 
 ** Next,” said Mrs. Wilfer with a wave of her 
 gloves, expressive of abdication under protest 
 from the culinary throne, ‘‘I would recommend 
 examination of the bacon in the sauce-pan on 
 the fire, and also of the potatoes by the applica- 
 tion of a fork. Preparation of the greens will 
 further become necessary if you persist in this 
 unseemly demeanor.” 
 
 “ As of course I do, Ma.” 
 
 Persisting, Bella gave her attention to one 
 thing and forgot the other, and gave her atten- 
 tion to the other and forgot the third, and re- 
 membering the third was distracted by the fourth, 
 and made amends whenever she went wrong by 
 giving the unfortunate fowls an extra spin, which | 
 made their chance of ever getting cooked ex- 
 ceedingly doubtful. But it was pleasant cook- | 
 ery too. Meantime Miss Lavinia, oscillating 
 between the kitchen and the opposite room, pre- | 
 pared the dining-table in the latter chamber. | 
 This office she (always doing her household 
 spiriting with unwillingness) performed in a 
 startling series of whisks and bumps; laying 
 the table-cloth as if she were raising the wind, 
 putting down the glasses and salt-cellars as if 
 she were knocking at the door, and clashing, the” 
 knives and forks in a skirmishing manner sug- | 
 gestive of hand-to-hand conflict. ; 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. ey 
 
 “Took at Ma,” whispered Lavinia to Bella 
 when this was done, and they stood over the 
 roasting fowls. ‘‘If one was the most dutiful 
 child in existence (of course on the whole one 
 hopes one is), isn’t she enough to make one 
 want to poke her with something wooden, sit- 
 ting there bolt upright in a corner?” 
 
 ‘Only suppose,” returned Bella, ‘‘ that poor 
 Pa was to sit bolt upright in another corner.” 
 
 ‘*My dear, he couldn’t do it,” said Lavvy. 
 ‘¢Pa would loll directly. But indeed I do not 
 believe there ever was any human creature who 
 could keep so bolt upright as Ma, or put such an 
 amount of aggravation into one back! What’s 
 the matter, Ma? Ain’t you well, Ma?” 
 
 ** Doubtless Iam very well,” returned Mrs. 
 Wilfer, turning her eyes upon her youngest born 
 with scornful fortitude. ‘*What should be the 
 matter with Me?” 
 
 “You don’t scem very brisk, Ma,” retorted 
 Lavvy the bold. 
 
 ‘* Brisk ?” repeated her parent, ‘* Brisk ? 
 Whence the low expression, Lavinia? If Iam 
 uncomplaining, if I am silently contented with 
 my lot, let that suffice for my family.” 
 
 ‘Well, Ma,” returned Lavvy, ‘‘since you 
 will force it out of me, I must respectfully take 
 
 _leave to say that vour family are no doubt under 
 
 the greatest obligations to you for having an 
 annual toothache on your wedding-day, and 
 that it’s very disinterested in you, and an im- 
 mense blessing to them. Still, on the whole, it 
 is possible to be too boastful even of that boon.” 
 
 ‘“*You incarnation of sauciness,” said Mrs. 
 Wilfer, ‘‘do you speak like that to me? On 
 this day, of all days in the year? Pray do you 
 know what would have become of you if I had 
 not bestowed my hand upon R. W., your father, 
 on this day ?” 
 
 ‘*No, Ma,” replied Lavvy, ‘‘I really do not; 
 
 and, with the greatest respect for your abilities 
 and information, I very much doubt if you do 
 either.” 
 
 Whether or no the sharp vigor of this’ sally 
 on a weak point of Mrs. Wilfer’s intrenchments 
 might have routed that heroine for the time, is 
 rendered uncertain by the arrival of a flag of” 
 truce in the person of Mr. George Sampson: 
 bidden to the feast as a friend of the family, 
 
 | whose affections were now understood to be in’ 
 
 course of transferrence from Bella to Lavinia, 
 and whom Lavinia kept—possibly in remem- 
 brance of his bad taste in having overlooked her 
 in the first instance—under a course of stinging 
 discipline. 
 “‘T congratulate you, Mrs. Wilfer,” said Mr. 
 
 George Sampson, who had meditated this neat 
 
 address while coming along, ‘‘on the day.” 
 Mrs. Wilfer thanked him with a magnanimous 
 sigh, and again became an unresisting prey to 
 that inscrutable toothache, 
 
 “I am surprised,” said Mr, Sampson, feebly, 
 ‘*that Miss Bella condescends to cook.” 
 
 Here Miss Lavinia descended on the ill-starred 
 young gentleman with a crushing supposition 
 that at all events it was no business of his. This 
 disposed of Mr. Sampson in a melancholy retire- 
 ment of spirit, until the cherub arrived, whose 
 amazement at the lovely woman’s occupation 
 was great. 
 
 However, she persisted in dishing the dinner 
 as well as cooking it, and then sat down, bibless 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 and apronless, to partake of it as an illustrious 
 guest: Mrs, Wilfer first responding to her hus- 
 band’s cheerful ‘‘ For what we are about to re- 
 ceive—” with a sepulchral Amen, calculated to 
 cast a damp upon the stoutest appetite. 
 
 ** But what,” said Bella, as she watched the 
 carving of the fowls, ** makes them pink inside, 
 I wonder, Pa! Is it the breed ?” 
 
 “No, I don’t think it’s the breed, my dear,” 
 returned Pa. ‘‘I rather think it is because they 
 are ot done.” 
 
 ‘They ought to be,” said Bella. 
 
 * Yes, Lam aware they ought to be, my dear,” 
 rejoined her father, ‘ but they—ain’t.” 
 
 So the gridiron was put in requisition, and 
 the good-tempered cherub, who was often as un- 
 cherubically employed in his own family:as if 
 he had been in the employment of some of the 
 Old Masters, undertook to grill the fowls. In- 
 deed, except in respect of staring about him (a 
 branch of the public service to which the picto- 
 rial cherub is much addicted), this domestic 
 cherub discharged as many odd functions as his 
 prototype ; with the difference, say, that he per- 
 formed with a blacking-brush on the family’s 
 boots, instead of performing on enormous wind 
 instruments and double-basses, and that he con- 
 ducted himself with cheerful alacrity to much 
 useful purpos», instead of foreshortening himself 
 in the air with the vagnest intentions. 
 
 Bella helped him with his supplemental cook- 
 ery, and made lim very happy, but put him in 
 mortal terror too by asking him, when they sat 
 down at table azain, how he supposed they couked 
 fowls at the Greenwich dinners, and whether he 
 believed they really were such pleasant dinners 
 as people said? His secret winks and nods of 
 remonstrance, in reply, made the mischievous 
 Bella laugh until she choked, and then Lavinia 
 was obliged to slap her on the back, and then 
 she laughed the more. 
 
 But her mother was a fine corrective at the 
 other end of the table; to whom her father, in 
 the innocence of his good-fellowship, at intervals 
 appealed with: ‘‘ My dear, I am afraid you are 
 not enjoying yourself?” 
 
 “Why so, R. W.?” she would sonorously re- 
 ply. 
 
 ** Because, my dear, you seem a little out of 
 sorts.” 
 
 **Not at all,” would be the rejoinder, in ex- 
 actly the same tone. 
 
 “* Would you take a merry-thought, my dear ?” 
 
 “Thank you. Iwill take whatever you please, 
 re ve 
 
 ‘* Well, but my dear, do you like it?” 
 
 **T like it as well as I like any thing, R. W.” 
 The stately woman would then, with a meritori- 
 ous appearance of devoting herself to the general 
 good, pursue her dinner as if she were feeding 
 somebody else on high public grounds. 
 
 Bella had brought dessert and two bottles of 
 wine, thus shedding unprecedented splendor on 
 the occasion. Mrs. Wilfer did the honors of the 
 first glass by proclaiming :>‘* R. W., I drink to 
 you.” 
 
 **Thank you, my dear. And I to you. 
 
 **Pa and Ma!” said Bella, 
 
 ‘*Permit me,” Mrs. Wilfer interposed, with 
 outstretched glove. ‘‘No. Ithink not. I drank 
 to your papa. If, however, you insist on includ- 
 ing me, I can in gratitude offer no objection.” 
 
 203 
 
 nf Why, Lor, Ma,” interposed Lavvy the bold, 
 ‘isn’t it the day that made you and Pa one and 
 the same? I have no patience!” _ 
 ** By whatever other circumstance the day may 
 be marked, it is not the day, Lavinia, on which 
 I will allow a child of mine to pounce upon 
 
 me. I beg nay, command !—that you will not. 
 pounce. R. W., it is appropriate to recall that 
 
 it is for you to command and for me to obey. It 
 is your house, and you are master’ at your own 
 table. Both our healths!” Drinking the toast 
 with tremendous stiffness. 
 
 “‘T really am a little afraid, my dear,” hinted 
 the cherub meekly, ‘that you are not enjoying 
 yourself?” 
 
 “On the contrary,” returned Mrs. 
 **quite so. Why should I not?” 
 
 ‘I thought, my dear, that perhaps your face 
 might—” 
 
 ‘* My face might be a martyrdom, but what 
 would that import, or who should know it, if I 
 smiled ?” 
 
 And she did smile; manifestly freezing the 
 blood of Mr. George Sampson by so doing. For 
 that young gentleman, catching her smiling eye, 
 was so very much appalled by its expression as 
 to cast about in his thoughts concerning what he 
 had done to bring it down upon himself. 
 
 “*The mind naturally falls,” said Mrs. Wilfer, 
 ‘shall I say into a reverie, or shall I say into a 
 retrospect? on a day like this.” 
 
 Lavvy, sitting with defiantly folded arms, re- 
 plied (but not audibly), ‘¢ For goodness’ sake say 
 whichever of the two you like best, Ma, and get 
 it’ over.” 
 
 “The mind,” pursued Mrs, Wilfer in an ora- 
 torical manner, “naturally reverts to Papa and 
 Mamma—I here allude to my parents—at a 
 period before the earliest dawn of this day. I 
 was considered tall; perhaps I was. Papa and 
 Mamma were unquestionably tall. JI have rare- 
 ly seen a finer woman than my mother; never 
 than my father.” 
 
 The irrepressible Lavvy remark:d aloud, 
 ‘Whatever grandpapa was, he wasn’t a female.” 
 
 ‘*Your grandpapa,”’ retorted Mrs. Wilfer, with 
 an awful look, and in an awful tone, ‘‘ was what 
 I describe him to have been, and would have 
 struck any of his grandchildren to the earth who 
 presumed to question it. It was one of mam- 
 ma’s cherished hopes that I should become unit- 
 ed to a tall member of society. It may have 
 been a weakness, but: if so, it was equally the 
 weakness, I believe, of King Frederick of Prus- 
 sia.” ‘These remarks being offered to Mr. George 
 Sampson, who had not the courage to come out 
 for single combat, but lurked with his chest un- 
 der the table and his eves cast down, Mrs. Wii- 
 fer proceeded, in a voice of increasing sternness 
 and impressiveness, until she should foree that 
 skulker to give himself up. ‘* Mamma would 
 appear to have had an indefinable foreboding 
 of what afterward happened, for she would fre- 
 quently urge upon me, ‘ Not a little man. Prom- 
 ise me, my child, not a little man. Never, nev- 
 er, never marry a little man!’ Papa also would 
 remark to me (he possessed extraordinary hu- 
 mor), ‘that a family of whales must not ally 
 themselves with sprats.’ His company was ea- 
 
 é 
 Wilfer, 
 
 ‘gerly sought, as may be supposed, by the wits of 
 
 the day, and our house was their continual re- 
 sort. I have known as many as three copper- 
 
204 
 
 plate engravers exchanging the most exquisite 
 sallies and retorts there at one time.” (Here 
 Mr. Sampson delivered himself captive, and said, 
 with an uneasy movement on his chair, that 
 three was a large number, and it must have been 
 highly entertaining.) ‘‘ Among the most prom- 
 inent members of that distinguished circle was 
 a gentleman measuring six feet four in height. 
 He was not an engraver.” (Here Mr. Sampson 
 said, with no reason whatever, Of course not.) 
 “‘This gentleman was so obliging as to honor 
 me with attentions which I could not fail to un- 
 derstand.” (Here Mr. Sampson murmured that 
 when it came to that you could always tell.) 
 ‘“] immediately announced to both my parents 
 that those attentions were misplaced, and that I 
 could not favor his suit. They inquired was he 
 too tall? I replied it was not the stature, but 
 the intellect was too lofty. At our house, I said, 
 the tone was too brilliant, the pressure was too 
 high, to be maintained by me, a mere wornan, 
 in everyday domestic life. I well remember 
 mamma’s clasping her hands, and exclaiming, 
 ‘This will end in a little man!’” (Here Mr. 
 Sampson glanced at his host and shook his head 
 with despondency.) ‘‘She afterward went so far 
 as to predict that it would end in a little man 
 whose mind would be below the average, but 
 that was in what I may denominate a paroxysm 
 of maternal disappointment. Within a month,” 
 said Mrs. Wilfer, deepening her voice, as if she 
 were relating a terrible ghost story, ‘“‘ within a 
 month I first saw R. W., my husband. Within 
 a year I married him. It is natural for the 
 mind to recall these dark coincidences on the 
 present day.” 
 
 Mr. Sampson at length released from the cus- 
 tody of Mrs. Wilfer’s eve, now drew a long 
 breath, and made the original and striking re- 
 mark that there was no accounting for these sort 
 of presentiments. R.W. scratched his head and 
 looked apologetically all round the table until he 
 came to his wife, when, observing her, as it were, 
 shrouded in a more sombre weight than before, 
 he once more hinted, ‘‘ My dear, I am really 
 afraid you are not altogether enjoying yourself?” 
 To which she once more replied, “‘ On the con- 
 trary, ds. vy." (tite so.” 
 
 The wretched Mr. Sampson’s position at this 
 agreeable entertainment was truly pitiable. For 
 not only was he exposed defenseless to the ha- 
 rangues of Mrs. Wilfer, but he received the ut- 
 most contumely at the hands of Lavinia; who, 
 partly to show Bella that she (Lavinia) could do 
 what she liked with him, and partly to pay him 
 off for still obviously admiring Bella’s beauty, 
 led him the life of a dog. Jlluminated on the 
 one hand by the stately graces of Mrs. Wilfer’s 
 oratory, and shadowed on the other by the checks 
 and frowns of the young lady to whom he had 
 devoted himself in his destitution, the sufferings 
 of this young gentleman were distressing to wit- 
 ness. If his mind for the moment reeled under 
 them, it may be urged, in extenuation of its 
 weakness, that it was constitutionally a knock- 
 knee’d mind, and never very strong upon its legs. 
 - The rosy hours were thus beguiled until it was 
 time for Bella to have Pa’s escort back. The 
 dimples duly tied up in the-bonnet-strings, and 
 
 the leave-taking done, they got out into the air, 
 
 and the cherub drew along breath as if he found 
 it refreshing. 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 ‘* Well, dear Pa,” said Bella, ‘‘the anniversa- 
 ry may be considered over.” 
 
 ‘* Yes, my dear,” returned the cherub, ‘‘ there’s 
 another of ’em gone.” 
 
 Bella drew his arm closer through hers as 
 they walked along, and gave it a number of 
 consolatory pats. ‘*Thank you, my dear,”*he 
 said, as if she had spoken; ‘¢I am all right, my 
 dear. Well, and how do you get on, Bella?” 
 
 **T am not at all improved, Pa.” 
 
 ** Ain't you really, though ?” 
 
 ‘*No, Pa. On the contrary, I am worse.” 
 
 ** Lor!” said the cherub. 
 
 *¢T am worse, Pa. I make so many calcula- 
 tions how much a year I must have when I mar- 
 ry, and what is the least I can manage to do 
 with, that J am beginning tos get wrinkles over 
 my nose. Did you notice any wrinkles over my 
 nose this evening, Pa?” 
 
 Pa laughing at this, Bella gave him two or 
 three shakes. re 
 
 “You won't laugh, Sir, when vou see your 
 lovely woman turning haggard. You had bet- 
 ter be prepared in time, I can tell you. I shall 
 not be able to keep my greediness for money out 
 of my eyes long, and when you see it there you'll 
 be sorry, and serve you right for not being warn- 
 ed in time. Now, Sir, we entered into a bond 
 of confidence. Have you any thing to impart?” 
 
 ‘*T thought it was you who was to impart, my 
 love.” 
 
 **Oh! did you indeed, Sir? Then why didn’t 
 you ask me the moment we came out? The 
 confidences of lovely women are not to be slight- 
 ed. However, I forgive you this once ;.and look 
 here, Pa, that’s’—Bella laid the little forefinger 
 of her right glove on her lip, and then Jaid it on 
 her father’s lip—‘‘ that’s a kiss for you. And 
 now I am going seriously to tell you—let me see 
 how many—four secrets. Mind! Serious, grave, 
 weighty secrets. Strictly between ourselves,” 
 
 ‘¢ Number one, my dear?” said her father, set- 
 tling her arm comfortably and confidentially. 
 
 ‘*Number one,” said Bella, ‘‘ will electrify 
 you, Pa 
 confused here in spite of her merry way of be- 
 ginning—‘* has made an offer to me?” 
 
 Pa looked in her face, and looked at the 
 ground, and looked in her face again, and de- 
 clared he could never guess. 
 
 “Mr, Rokesmith.” 
 
 “You don’t tell me so, my dear!” 
 
 ‘* Mis—ter Roke—smith, Pa,” said Bella, sep- 
 arating the syllables for emphasis. ‘ What do 
 you say to that ?” 
 
 Pa answered quietly with the counter-ques- 
 tion, ‘*‘ What did you say to that, my love 2?” 
 
 ‘‘T said No,” returned Bella, sharply. ‘Of 
 course.” 
 
 (Pes: 
 ting. 
 
 ‘And I told him why I thought it a betrayal 
 of trust on his part, and an affront to me,’’ said 
 Bella. 
 
 ‘““Yes. Tobe sure. Jam astonished indeed. 
 J wonder he committed himself without seeing 
 more of his way first. Now I think of it, I sus- 
 pect he always has admired you though, my 
 dear.” 
 
 ‘* A hackney coachman may admire me,” re- 
 marked Bella, with a touch of her mother’s loft- 
 iness. | 
 
 Of course,” said her father, medita- 
 
 oh Se een 1s oo 
 
 Who do you think has’—she was . 
 
eed 
 
 “It’s highly probable, my love. Number two, 
 my dear?” 
 
 “Number two, Pa, is much to the same pur- 
 pose, though mot so preposterous. Mr. Light- 
 wood would propose to me; if I would let him.” 
 
 ‘Then [ understand, my dear, that you don’t 
 intend to let him?” 
 
 Bella again saying, with her former emphasis, 
 **Why, of course not!” her father felt himself 
 bound to echo, ‘ Of course not.” 
 
 **T don’t care for him,” said Bella. 
 
 *“That’s enough,” her father interposed. 
 
 “No, Pa, it’s not enough,” rejoined Bella, 
 giving him another shake or two. ‘+ Haven’t I 
 told you what a mercenary little wretch I am? 
 It only becomes enough when he has no money, 
 and no clients, and no expectations, and no any 
 thing but debtsy’ 
 
 ‘*Hah!” said the cherub, a little depressed. 
 **Number three, my dear ?” 
 
 ‘* Number three, Pa, is a better thing. A gen- 
 erous thing, a noble thing, a delightful thing. 
 
 Mrs. Boffin has herself told me, as a secret, with | 
 
 her own kind lips—aid truer lips never opened 
 
 or closed in this life, I am sure—that they wish | 
 
 to see me well married, and that when I marry 
 with their consent they will portion me most 
 handsomely.” Here the grateful girl burst out 
 erying very heartily. 
 
 ** Don’t ery, my darling,” said her father, with | 
 
 his hand to his eyes; *‘it’s excusable in me to 
 
 be a little overcome when I find that my dear, 
 favorite child is, after al} disappointments, to be | 
 
 so provided for and so raised in the world; buat 
 don’t you ery, don’t you cry. I am very thank- 
 ful. I congratulate you with all my heart, my 
 dear.” The good soft little fellow, drying his 
 eyes here, Bella put her arms round his neck 
 and tenderly kissed him on the high road, pas- 
 sionately telling him he was the best of fathers 
 and the best of friends, and that on her wedding- 
 morning she would go down on her knees to 
 him and beg his pardon for having ever teased 
 him or seemed insensible to the worth of such a 
 patient, sympathetic, x. aial, fresh young heart. 
 At every one of her adjectives she redoubled her 
 Kisses, and finally kissed his hat off, and then 
 laughed immoderately when the wind took it 
 and he ran after it. 
 
 When he had recovered his hat and his breath, 
 and they were going on again once more, said 
 her father then: ‘* Number four, my dear ?” 
 
 Bella’s countenance fell in the midst of her 
 mirth. ‘S After all, perhaps I had better put off 
 number four, Pa. Let me try once more, if for 
 never so short a time, to hope that it may not 
 really be so.” 
 
 The change in her strengthened the cherub’s 
 interest in number four, and he said, quietly : 
 ‘*May not be so, my dear? May not be how, 
 my dear?” 
 
 Bella looked at him pensively, and shook her 
 
 head. 
 
 ‘And yet I know right well it is so, Pa. I 
 know it only too well.” 
 
 “My love,” returned her father, ‘‘ you make 
 mv quite uncomfortable. Have you said No to 
 any body else, my dear?” 
 
 ANOS Fr a,!s 
 
 **Yes to any body?” he suggested, lifting up 
 his eyebrows. 
 
 Noy Pa,” 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 205 
 
 ‘Is there any body else who would take his 
 chance between Yes and No, if you would let 
 him, my dear?” 
 
 ‘* Not that I know of, Pa.” ; 
 
 ‘*'There can’t be somebody who won't take his 
 chance when you want him to ?” said the cherub, 
 as a last resource. 
 
 ‘‘ Why, of course not, Pa,” said Beila, giving 
 him another shake or two. 
 
 ‘*No, of course not,” he assented. ** Bella, 
 my dear, Iam afraid I must either have no sleep 
 to-night, or I must press for number four.” 
 
 ‘*Qh, Pa, there is no good in number four! 
 T am so sorry for it, Iam so unwilling to believe 
 it, I have tried so earnestly not to sce it, that it 
 is very hard to tell, even to you. But Mr. Bof- 
 ‘fin is being spoiled by prosperity, and is chang- 
 ing every day.” 
 
 ‘* My dear Bella, I hope and trust not.” 
 
 ‘“*f have hoped and trusted not too, Pa; but 
 every day he changes for the worse, and for the 
 worse, Not to me—he is always much the same, 
 to me—but to others about him. Before my 
 eyes he grows suspicious, capricious, hard, ty- 
 rannical, unjust. If ever a good man were ruin- 
 ed by good fortune, it is my benefactor. And 
 yet, Pa, think how terrible the fascination of 
 money is! I see this, and hate this, and dread 
 this, and don’t know but that money might make 
 a much worse-change in me. And yet [ have 
 money always in my thoughts and my desires ; 
 and the whole life I place before myself is money, 
 money, money, and what money can make of 
 
 Bia, y 
 { life!” 
 
 pe Se See 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE GOLDEN DUSTMAN FALLS INTO BAD COM- 
 
 PANY. 
 
 Were Bella Wilfer’s bright and ready little 
 wits at fault, or was the Golden Dustman pass- 
 ing through the furnace of proof and coming out 
 dross? Ill news travels fast. We shall know full 
 | soon. 
 
 On that very night of her return from the Hap- 
 py Return, something chanced which Bella close- 
 ly followed with her eyes and ears. There was 
 an apartment at the side of the Boffin mansion, 
 ' known as Mr. Boffin’s room. Far less grand than 
 ; the rest of the house, it was far more comforta- 
 | ble, being pervaded by a certain air of home- 
 ly snugness, which upholstering despotism had 
 | banished to that spot when it inexorably set its 
 'face against Mr. Boffin’s appeals for mercy in 
 behalf of any other chamber. Thus, although a 
 room of modest situation—for its windows gave 
 on Silas Wegg’s old corner—and of no preten- 
 | sions to velvet, satin, or gilding, it had got it- 
 self established in a domestic position analogous 
 to that of an easy dressing-gown or pair of slip- 
 | pers; and whenever the family wanted to enjoy 
 a particularly pleasant fireside evening, they en- 
 joyed it, as an institution that must be, in Mr. 
 Boffin’s room. is te 
 
 Mr. and Mrs. Boffin were reported sitting in 
 this room when Bella got back. Entering it, 
 she found the Secretary there too; In official at- 
 tendance it would appear, for he was standing 
 with some papers in his hand by a table with 
 shaded candles on it, at which Mr. Boftin was 
 seated thrown back in his easy-chair. | 
 
206 
 
 **You are busy, Sir,” 
 at the door. 
 
 ‘* Not at all, my dear, not at all. You're one 
 of ourselves. We never make company of you. 
 Come in, come in, Here’s the old lady in her 
 usual place.” 
 | Mrs. Boffin adding her nod and smile of wel- 
 come to Mr. Boffin’s words, Bella took her book 
 to a chair in the fireside corner, by Mrs. Boffin’s 
 work-table. Mr. Boffin’s station was on the op- 
 posite side. 
 
 ‘¢Now, Rokesmith,” said the Golden Dust- 
 
 man, so sharply rapping the table to bespeak his 
 attention as Bella turned the leaves of her book 
 that she started; ‘* where were we ?” 
 
 *¢You were saying,. Sir,” returned the Secre- 
 tary, with an air of some reluctance and a glance 
 toward those others who were present, ‘that 
 you considered the time had come for fixing my 
 salary.” 
 
 ** Don’t be above calling it wages, man,” said 
 Mr. Boffin, testily. ‘‘ What the deuce! I never 
 talked of my salary when I was in service.” 
 
 ‘*My wages,” said the Secretary, correcting 
 himself, 
 
 _“ Rokesmith, you are not proud, I hope?” ob- 
 served Mr. Bois, eying him askance..: 
 
 **T hope not, Sir.” 
 
 “ Becanse I never was, when I was poor,” 
 said Mr Boffin. ‘‘ Poverty and pride don’t go 
 at all well together. Mind that. How can they 
 go well together? Why it stands to reason. A 
 man, being poor, has nothing to be proud of. 
 It’s nonsense.” 
 
 With a slight inclination of his head, and a 
 look of some surprise, the Secretary seemed to 
 assent by forming the syllables of the word ‘* non- 
 sense” on his lips. 
 
 ‘Now, concerning these same wages,” said 
 Mr. Boffin. ‘‘Sit down.” 
 
 » The Secretary sat down. 
 
 ‘Why didn’t you sit down before?” asked 
 Mr. Boffin, distrustfully. ‘I hope that wasn’t 
 pride ? But about these wages. Now, I've gone 
 into the matter, and I say two hundred a year, 
 What do you think of it? Do you think it’s 
 enough ? 
 
 ‘“Phank you. It is a fair proposal.” 
 
 **{ don’t say, you know,” Mr. Boflin stipulated, 
 **but what it may be more than enough. And 
 T'll tell you why, Rokesmith. A man of proper- 
 ty, like me, is bound to consider the market- 
 price. At first I didn’t evter into that as much 
 as I might have done; but I’ve got acquainted 
 with other men of pr uperty since, and I’ve got ac- 
 quainted with the duties of property. I mustn’t 
 go putting the market-price up because money 
 may happen not to be an object with me. A 
 
 sheep 1 is worth so much in the market, and I ought 
 to give it and no more. A secretary is worth so 
 much in the market, and I ought to give it and 
 no more. However, I don’t mind stretching a 
 point with you.’ 
 
 ‘Mr Boffin, you are very good,” replied the 
 Secretary, with an effort, 
 
 sc'Thén we put the figure,” said Mr, Boffin, 
 ‘at two hundred a year. Then the figure’s dis- 
 posed of. Now, there must be no misunderstand. 
 ing regarding what I buy for two hundred a 
 year. If I pay for a sheep, I buy it out and out. 
 Similarly, if I pay for a secretary, I buy him out 
 and out.” 
 
 said Bella, hesitating 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. . ; 
 
 **In other words, you purchase my whole 
 
 time ?”’ 
 
 ‘““Certainly Ido. Look here,’’ said Mr. Boffin, 
 
 **it ain’t that I want to occupy your whole time; 
 you can take up a book for a minute or two 
 when you’ve nothing better to do, though I think 
 you'll a’most always find something useful to 
 do. But I want to keep you in attendance. It’s 
 convenient to have you at all times ready on the 
 premises. Therefore, betwixt your breakfast and 
 your supper—on the premises I expect to find 
 you.” 
 
 The Secretary bowed. 
 
 ‘¢In by-gone days, when I was in service my- 
 self,” said Mr. Boffin, **I couldn’t go cutting 
 about at my will and pleasure, and you won’t 
 expect to go cutting about at your will and pleas- 
 ure. You’ve rather got into a habit of that, 
 lately; but perhaps it was for w ant, of a right 
 specification betwixt us. Now, let"there be a 
 right specification betwixt us, and let it be this, 
 If you want leave, ask for it.” 
 
 Again the Secretary bowed. His manner wag 
 
 uneasy and astonished, and showed a sense of 
 humiliation. 
 ‘“V’ll have a bell,” said Mr. Boffin, ‘hung 
 
 from this room to yours, and when I want you 
 Vl touch it. I don’t call to mind that I have 
 any thing more to say at the present moment.” 
 
 The Seeretary rose, gathered up his papers, 
 and withdrew. Bella’s eyes followed him to the 
 door, lighted on Mr. Boffin complacently throwr 
 back in his easy-chair, and drooped over her 
 book. 
 
 Ks haye let that chap, that young man of 
 mine,” said Mr. Boffin, taking a trot up and 
 down the room, ‘‘ yet above his work. It won't 
 do. I must have him down a peg. A man of 
 property owes a duty to other men of pr operty, 
 and must look sharp after his inferiors.” 
 
 Bella felt that Mrs. Boffin was not comforta- 
 ble, and that the eyes of that good creature 
 sought to discover from her face what attention 
 she had given to this discourse, and what impres- 
 sion it had made upon her. For which reason 
 Bella’s eves drooped more engrossedly over her 
 book, and she turned the page with an air of 
 profound absorption in it. 
 
 ‘‘ Noddy,” said Mrs. Boffin, after thoughtfully 
 pausing in her work. 
 
 ‘¢ My dear,” returned the Golden Dustman, 
 stopping short in his trot. 
 
 ‘*Excuse my putting it to you, Noddy, but 
 now really! Haven't you been a little strict 
 with Mr. Rokesmith to-night? Haven't vou 
 been a little—just a little littlk—not quite like 
 your old self?” 
 
 ‘Why, old woman, I hope so,” returned Mr. 
 Boffin, cheerfully, if not boastfully, 
 
 Ss Hope so, deary ?” 
 
 “Our old selves wouldn't do here, old lady. 
 Haven’t you found that out yet? Our old selves 
 would be fit for nothing here but to be robhed 
 and imposed upon. Our old selves weren’t peo- 
 ple of for tune ; our new selves are; it’s a great 
 difference.” 
 
 ‘¢Ah!” said Mrs. Boffin, pausing in her work 
 again, softly to draw a long breath and to look 
 at the fire. ‘‘ A great difference.” 
 
 ‘* And we must be up to the difference,” pur- 
 sued her husband; ‘‘we must be equal to the 
 change; that’s what we must be. We’ve got to 
 
 S niin 
 
hold our own now, against every body (for every 
 body’s hand is stretched out to be dipped into 
 our pockets), and we have got to recollect that 
 money makes money, as well as makes every 
 thing else.” 
 
 ‘¢Mentioning recollecting,” said Mrs. Boffin, 
 with her work abandoned, her eyes upon the fire, 
 and her chin upon her hand, ‘‘do you recollect, 
 
 Noddy, how you said to Mr. Rokesmith when he | 
 
 first came to see us at the Bower, and you en- 
 gaged him—how you said to him that if it had 
 pleased Heaven to send John Harmon to his for- 
 tune safe, we could have been content with the 
 one Mound which was our legacy, and should 
 never have wanted the rest ?” 
 
 ‘* Ay, I remember, old lady. But we hadn’t 
 tried what it was to have the rest then. Our 
 new shoes had come home, but we hadn’t put 
 ’em on. We're wearing ’em now, we’re wear- 
 ing ’em, and must step out accordingly.” 
 
 Mrs. Boffin took up her work again, and plied 
 her needle in silence. 
 
 “* As to Rokesmith, that voung man of mine,” 
 said Mr.. Boffin, dropping his voice and glanc- 
 ing toward the door with an apprehension of 
 being overheard by some eavesilropper there, 
 ‘*it’s the same with him as with the footmen. I 
 have found out that you must either scrunch 
 them, or let them scrunch you. If you ain’t 
 imperious with ’em, they won’t believe in your 
 being any better than themselves, if as good, | 
 after the stories (lies mostly) that they have 
 heard of vour beginnings. ‘There’s nothing be- 
 twixt stiffening yourself up, and throwing your- 
 self away; take my word for that, old lady.” 
 
 Bella ventured for a moment to look stealthi- 
 ly toward him under her eyelashes, and she saw 
 a dark cloud of suspicion, covetousness, and con- 
 ceit overshadowing the once open face. 
 
 ‘* Hows’ever,”’ said he, ‘*‘ this isn’t entertaining 
 to Miss Bella. Is it, Bella?” 
 
 A deceiving Bella she was, to look at him with 
 that pensively abstracted air, as if her mind were 
 full of her book, and she had not heard a single 
 word! 
 
 ‘“*Hah! Better employed than to attend to 
 it,” said Mr. Boffin. ‘That’s right, that’s right. 
 Especially as you have no call to be told how to 
 value yourself, my dear.” 
 
 Coloring a little under this compliment, Bella 
 returned, ‘‘I hope, Sir, you don’t think me 
 vain ?” 
 
 ‘*Not a bit, my dear,” said Mr. Boffin. ‘‘ But 
 I think it’s very creditable in you, at your age, 
 to be so well up with the pace of the world, and 
 to know what to go in for.. You are right. Go 
 in for money, my love. Money’s the article. 
 You'll make money of your good looks, and of 
 the money Mrs. Boffin and me will have the 
 pleasure of settling upon you, and you'll live | 
 and die rich. That’s the state to live and die 
 in!” said Mr. Boffin, in an unctuous manner. 
 #6 R—r—rich !” 
 
 There was an expression of distress in Mrs. 
 Boffin’s face, as, after watching her husband’s, | 
 she turned to their adopted girl, and said: 
 **Don’t mind him, Bella, my dear.” 
 
 “Kh?” cried Mr. Boffin. ‘‘ What! 
 mind him ?” 
 
 Not 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 because he is the best of men. 
 
 “‘T don’t mean that,” said Mrs. Boffin, with 
 a worried look, ‘* but I mean, don’t believe him 
 to be any thing but good and generous, Bella, 
 
 207 
 
 No, I must say 
 that much, Noddy. You are always the best of 
 men.” ; 
 
 _ She made the declaration as if he were object- 
 Ing to it; which assuredly he was not in any way. 
 
 ‘* And as to you, my dear Bella,” said Mrs, 
 Boffin, still with that distressed expression, ‘he 
 is so much attached to you, whatever he says, 
 that your own father has not a truer interest in 
 you and can hardly like you better than he does,” 
 
 ** Says too!” cried Mr. Boffin. ‘ Whatever 
 he says!) Why, I say so, openly. Give me a 
 kiss, my dear child, in saying Good-Night, and 
 let me confirm what my old lady tells you. I 
 am very fond of you, my dear, and I am entire- 
 ly of your mind, and you and I will take care 
 that you shall be rich. These good looks of 
 yours (which you have some right to be vain of, 
 my dear, though you are not, you know) are 
 worth money, and you shall make money of 
 ‘em. The money you will have will be worth 
 money, and you shall make money of that too. 
 There’s a golden ball at your feet. Good-night, 
 my dear.” 
 
 Somehow, Bella was not so well pleased with 
 this assurance and this prospect as she might, 
 have been. Somehow, when sh® put her arms 
 round Mrs. Boffin’s neck and said Good-Night, 
 she derived a sense of unworthiness from the still 
 
 ‘anxious face of that good woman, and her ob- 
 
 vious wish to excuse her husband. ‘* Why, 
 what need to excuse him ?” thought Bella, sit- 
 ting down in her own room. ‘‘ What he said 
 was very sensible, I am sure, and very true, I 
 am sure. It is only what I often say to myself. 
 Don’t I like it then? No, I don't like it, and, 
 though he is my liberal bencfactor, I disparage 
 him for it. Then pray,” said Bella, sternly 
 putting the question to herself in the looking- 
 
 glass as usual, ‘‘what do you mean by this, you 
 inconsistent little Beast ?” 
 
 The looking-glass preserving a discreet minis- 
 
 _ terial silence when thus called upon for explana- 
 
 tion, Bella went to bed with a weariness upon 
 her spirit which was more than the weariness of 
 want of sleep. And again in the morning she 
 
 i looked for the cloud, and for the deepening of 
 the cloud, upon the Golden Dustman’s face. 
 
 She had begun by this time to be his frequent 
 companion in his morning strolls about the 
 streets, and it was at this time that he made her 
 a party to his engaging in a curious pursuit. 
 Having been hard at work in one dull inclosure 
 all his life, he had a child’s delight in looking 
 at shops. It had been one of the first novelties 
 and pleasures of his freedom, and was equally 
 the delight of his wife. For many years their 
 only walks in London had been taken on Sun- 
 days when the shops were shut ; and when every 
 day in the week became their holiday they de- 
 rived an enjoyment from the variety and fancy 
 and beauty of the display in the windows, which 
 seemed incapable of exhaustion. As if the prin- 
 cipal streets were a great Theatre and the play 
 were childishly new to them, Mr. and Mrs. Bof- 
 fin, from the beginning of Bella's intimacy in 
 their house, had been constantly in the front 
 row, charmed with all they saw and applauding 
 vigorously. But now, Mr. Boffin’s interest be- 
 gan to centre in book-shops; and more than 
 that —for that of itself wonld not have been 
 much—in one exceptional kind of book. 
 
208 . 
 
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 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND, ) 
 
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 BIBLOMANIA OF THE GOLDEN DUSTMAN. 
 
 ‘*Look in here, my dear,” Mr. Boffin would 
 say, checking Bella’s arm at a bookseller’s win- 
 dow; ‘‘you can read at sight, and your eyes 
 are as sharp as they’re bright. Now, look well 
 about you, my dear, and tell me if you see any 
 book about a Miser.” 
 
 If Bella saw such a book Mr. Boffin would 
 instantly dart in and buy it. And still, as if 
 they had not found it, they would seek out an- 
 other book-shop, and Mr. Boffin would say, 
 *€ Now, look well all round, my dear, for a Life 
 of a Miser, or any book of that sort ; any Lives 
 of odd characters who may hayec been Misers.” 
 
 _ Bella, thus directed, would examine the win- 
 dow with the greatest attention. while Mr. Bof- 
 fin would examine her face. ‘The moment she 
 
 pointed out any book as being entitled Lives of 
 eccentric personages, Anecdotes of strange char- 
 acters, Records of remarkable individuals, or 
 any thing to that purpose, Mr. Boffin'’s counte- 
 nance would light up, and he would instantly 
 dart in and buy it. Size, price, quality, were 
 of no account. Any book that seemed to prom- 
 ise a chance of miserly biography Mr. Boffin 
 purchased without a moment’s delay and carried 
 home. Happening to be informed by a book- 
 seller that a portion of the Annual Register was 
 devoted to ‘‘Characters,”’ Mr. Boffin at once 
 bought a whole set of that ingenious compila- 
 tion, and began to carry it home piecemeal, 
 
 confiding a volume to Bella, and bearing three © _ 
 himsclf. ‘The completion of this labor occupied am 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 them about a fortnight. When the task was 
 \ done, Mr. Boffiv, with his appetite for Misers 
 
 whetted instead of satiated, began to look out; 
 | captivated by Alfred. 
 
 again. 
 
 “It very soon became unnecessary to tell Bella 
 what to look for, and an understanding was es- 
 tablished between her and Mr. Boffin that she 
 was always to look for Lives of Misers. 
 
 together, pursuing this stngular research. Mi- 
 serly literature not being abundant, the propor- 
 tion of failures to successes may have been as a 
 hundred to one; still Mr. Boftin, never wearied, 
 remained as avaricious for misers as he had 
 been at the first onset. It was curious that Bella 
 never saw the books about the house, nor did 
 she ever hear from Mr. Boffin one word of ref- 
 erence to their contents. He seemed to save 
 wp his Misers as they had saved up their money. 
 As they had been greedy for it, and secret about 
 it, and had hidden it, so he was greedy for them, 
 and secret about them, and hid them. But be- 
 yond all doubt it was to be noticed, and was by 
 Bella very clearly noticed, that, as he pursued 
 the acquisition of thos: dismal records with the 
 ardor of Don Quixote for his books of chivalry, 
 he began to spend his money with a more spar- 
 ing hand. And often when he came out.of a 
 shop with some new account of one of those 
 wretched lunatics, she would almost shrink from 
 the sly dry chuckle with which he would take 
 her arm again and trot away. It did not ap- 
 pear that Mrs. Boffin knew of this taste. He 
 made no allusion to it, except in the morning 
 walks when he and Bella were always alone; 
 and Bella, partly under the impression that he 
 took her into his confidence by implication, and 
 partly in remembrance of Mrs. Boffin’s anxious 
 face that night, held the same reserve. 
 
 While these occurrences were in progress, Mrs. 
 Lammle made the discovery that Bella had a 
 fascinating influence over her. The Lammles, 
 originally ~presented by the dear Veneerings, 
 visited the Boffins on all grand occasions, and 
 Mrs. Lammle had not previously found this out ; 
 but now the knowledge came upon her all at 
 once. It was a most extraordinary thing (she 
 said to Mrs. Boffin): she was foolishly suscep- 
 tible of the power of beauty, but it wasn’t alto- 
 gether that; she never had been able to resist a 
 natural grace of manner, but it wasn’t altogeth- 
 er that; it was more than that, and there was 
 no name for the indescribable extent and degree 
 to which she was captivated by this charming girl. 
 
 This charming girl having the words repeated 
 to her by Mrs. Boffin (who was proud of her be- 
 ing admired, and would have done any thing to 
 give her pleasure), naturally recognized in Mrs. 
 Lammle a woman of penetration and taste. Re- 
 sponding to the sentiments, by being very gra- 
 cious to Mrs. Lammle, she gave that lady the 
 means of so improving her opportunity, as that 
 the captivation became reciprocal, though al- 
 ways Wearing an appearance of greater sobriety 
 on Bella’s part than on the enthusiastic Sophro- 
 nias. Howbeit, they were so much together 
 that, for a time, the Boffin chariot held Mrs. 
 Lammile oftener than Mrs. Boffin: a preference 
 of which the latter worthy soul was not in the 
 Teast joalous, placidly remarking, ‘* Mrs. Lammle 
 is a younger companion for her than I am, and 
 Lor! she’s more fashionable.” 
 
 Morn- } 
 ing after morning they roamed about the town: 
 
 2c9 
 y But between Bella Wilfer and Georgiana Pod- 
 
 ‘Snap there was this one difference, among many 
 
 others, that Bella was in no danger of being 
 She distrusted and dis- 
 liked him. Indeed, her perception was so quick, 
 and her observation so sharp, that after all she 
 mistrusted his wife too, though with her giddy 
 vanity and willfulness she squeezed the mistrust 
 away into a corner of her mind, and blocked it 
 up there. 
 
 / Mrs. Lammle took the friendliest interest in 
 
 Bella’s making a good match. Mrs. Lammle 
 said, in a sportive way, she really must show 
 her beautiful Bella what kind of wealthy creat- 
 ures she and Alfred had on hand, who would ag 
 one man fall at her feet enslaved. Fitting occa- 
 sion made, Mrs. Lammle accordingly produced 
 the most passable of those feverish, boastful, and 
 indefinably loose gentlemen who were always 
 lounging in and out of the City on questions of 
 the Bourse and Greek and Spanish and India 
 and Mexican and par and premium and discount 
 and three-quarters and seven-eighths. Who in 
 their agreeable manner did homage to Bella as 
 if she were a compound of fine girl, thorough- 
 bred horse, well-built drag, and remarkable pipe. 
 But without the least effect, though even Mr, — 
 Fledgeby’s attractions were cast into the scale. 
 
 **] fear, Bella dear,” said Mrs. Lammle one 
 day in the chariot, ‘‘that you will be very hard 
 to please.” 
 
 ‘*T don’t expect to be pleased, dear,” said 
 Bella, with a languid turn of her eyes. 
 
 ‘*'Truly, my love,” returned Sophronia, shak- 
 ing her head, and smiling her best smile, ‘‘it 
 would not be very easy to find a man worthy of 
 your attractions.” 
 
 ‘The, question is not a man, my dear,” said 
 Bella, coolly, ‘‘ but an establishment.” 
 
 ‘*My love,” returned Mrs. Lammle, ‘‘ your 
 prudence amazes me—where did you study life 
 so well!—you are right. In such a case as 
 yours, the object is a fitting establishment. You 
 could not descend to an inadequate one from 
 Mr. Boffin’s house, and even if your beauty alone 
 could not command it, it is to be assumed that 
 Mr. and Mrs. Boffin will—” 
 
 ‘*Oh! they have already,” Bella interposed. 
 
 ‘*No! Have they really?” 
 
 A little vexed by a suspicion that she had 
 spoken precipitately, and withal a little defiant 
 of her own vexation, Bella determined not to 
 retreat. 
 
 ‘‘That is to say,” she explained, ‘‘ they have 
 told me they mean to portion me as their adopted 
 child, if you mean that. But don’t mention it.” 
 
 ‘¢ Mention it!” replied Mrs. Lammle, as if she 
 were full of awakened feeling at the suggestion 
 of such an impossibility. ‘* Men-tion it!” 
 
 ‘¢T don’t mind telling you, Mrs. Lammle—” 
 Bella began again. 
 
 ‘My love, say Sophronia, or: I must not say 
 Bella.” 
 
 With a little short, petulant ‘‘Oh!” Bella 
 complied. ‘*Oh!—- Sophronia then —TI don’t 
 mind telling you, Sophronia, that I am con- 
 vineed I have no heart, as people call it; and 
 that I think that sort of thing is nonsense,” 
 
 ‘Brave girl!) murmured Mrs. Lammle. 
 
 * “And so,” pursued Bella, ‘‘as to seeking to 
 please myself, I don’t; except in the one respect 
 Ihave mentioned. I am indifferent otherwise.” 
 
210 : 
 
 Mrs. Lammle, rallying her with an arch look 
 and her best smile, ‘‘you can’t help making a 
 proud and an admiring husband. You may not 
 care to please yourself, and you may not care to 
 please him, but you are not a free agent as to 
 pleasing: you are forced to do that, in spite of 
 yourself, my dear; so it may be a question wheth- 
 er you may not as well please yourself too, if you 
 can.” 
 
 Now, the very grossness of this flattery put 
 Bella upon proving that she actually did please 
 in spite of herself. She had a misgiving that 
 she was doing wrong—though she had an indis- 
 tinct foreshadowing that some harm might come 
 of it thereafter, she little thought what conse- 
 quences it would really bring about—but she 
 went on with her confidence. 
 
 **J)on’t talk of pleasing in spite of one’s self, 
 dear,” said Bella. ‘‘I have had enough of 
 that.” 
 
 “* Ay ?” cried Mrs. Lammle, 
 corroborated, Bella?” 
 
 **Never mind, Sophronia, we will not speak 
 of it any more. Don’t ask me about it.” 
 
 This plainly meaning Do ask me about it, 
 Mrs. Lammle did as she was requested. 
 
 “Tell me, Bella. -Come, my dear. What 
 provoking burr has been inconvenicntly attract- 
 ed to the charming skirts, and with difficulty 
 shaken off?” 
 
 “Provoking indeed,” said Bella, ‘‘and no 
 burr to boast of! But don’t ask me.” 
 
 *¢Shall I guess ?” 
 
 **You would never guess. 
 say to our Secretary ?” 
 
 ‘“My dear! The hermit Secretary, who 
 creeps up and down the back stairs, and is nev- 
 er seen !”’ 
 
 **T don’t know about his creeping up and 
 down the back stairs,” said Bella, rather con- 
 temptuously, ‘‘further than knowing that he 
 does no such thing; and as to his never being 
 seen, I should be content never to have seen 
 him, though he is quite as visible as you are. 
 But I pleased him (for my sins), and he had the 
 presumption to tell me so.” 
 
 “Phe man never made a declaration to you, 
 my dear Bella!” 
 
 “Are you sure of that, Sophronia?” said 
 Bella. ‘‘/ am not. In fact, I am sure of the 
 contrary.” 
 
 ‘The man must be mad,” said Mrs. Lammle, 
 with a kind of resignation. 
 
 ‘‘He appeared to be in his senses,” returned 
 Bella, tossing her head, ‘‘and he ‘had plenty to 
 say for himself. I told him my opinion of his 
 declaration and his conduct, and dismissed him. 
 Of course this has all been very inconvenient to 
 me, and very disagreeable. It has remained a 
 secret, however. That word reminds me to ob- 
 serve, Sophronia, that I have glided on into tell- 
 
 ‘*Am I already 
 
 What would you 
 
 -ing you the secret, and that I rely upon you 
 
 never to mention it.” 
 
 ‘* Mention it!’ repeated Mrs. Lammle, with 
 her former feeling. ‘* Men-tion it !” 
 
 This time Sophronia was so much in earnest 
 that she found it necessary to bend forward in 
 the carringe and give Bella a kiss. A Judas 
 
 order of kiss; for she thought, while she yet 
 
 pressed Bella’s hand after giving it, ‘* Upon vour 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 ‘*But you can’t help pleasing, Bella,” said) by the doting folly of a dustman, I need have. 
 ‘no relenting toward you. 
 sends me here, should forin any schemes fer. 
 }making you a victim, I should certainly not. cress 
 him again. 
 
 a : 
 if my husband, whe 
 
 ” 
 
 In those very same moments Bulla 
 was thinking, ‘‘ Why am I always at war with 
 myself? Why have I told, as if upon compul- 
 sion, what I knew all along I ought to have with- 
 held? Why am I making a friend of this wo- 
 man beside me, in spite of the whispers against 
 her that I hear in my. heart ?” 
 
 As usual, there was no answer in the looking- 
 glass when she got home and referred these 
 questions to it. Perhaps if she had consulted 
 some better oracle the result might have been 
 more satisfactory; but she did not, and all things 
 consequent marched the march before them. 
 
 On one point connected with the watch she 
 
 ‘kept on Mr. Boffin she felt very inquisitive, and 
 
 that was the question whether the Secretary 
 watched him too, and followed the sure and 
 steady change in him, as she did? Her very 
 limited intercourse with Mr. Rokesmith ren- 
 dered this hard to find out. Their communi- 
 
 -cation now at no time extended beyond the 
 
 preservation of commonplace appearances before 
 Mr. and Mrs. Boffin; and if Bella and the See- 
 retary were ever left alone together by any 
 chance he immediately withdrew. She con- 
 sulted his face when she could do so covertly, as 
 she worked or read, and could make nothing of 
 it. He looked subdued; but he had acquired a 
 strong command of feature, and, whenever Mr. 
 Boffin spoke to him in Bella’s presence, or what- 
 ever revelation of himself Mr. Boffin made, the 
 Secretary’s face changed no more than a wall, 
 A slightly knitted brow, that expressed nothing 
 but an almost mechanical attention, and a com- 
 pression of the mouth, that might have been a 
 guard against a scornful smile—these she saw 
 from morning to night, from day to day, from 
 week to week, monotonous, unvarying, set, as 
 in a piece of sculpture. 
 
 The worst of the matter was that it thus fell 
 out insensibly—and most provokingly, as Bella 
 complained to herself, in her impetuous little 
 manner—that her observation of Mr. B: ffin in- 
 volved a continual observation of Mr. Roke- 
 smith. ** Won’t ¢hat extract a look from him ?” 
 —‘*Can it be possible that makes no impression 
 on him?” Such questions Bella would propose 
 to herself, often as many times in a day as there 
 were hours in it. Impossible to know. Always 
 the same fixed face. 
 
 ‘*Can he be so base as to sell his very nature 
 for two hundred a year?” Bella would think. 
 And then, ‘*But why not? It’s a mere question 
 of price with others besides him. I suppose I 
 would sell mine if I could get enough for it.” 
 And so she would come round again to the war 
 with herself. 
 
 A kindof illegibility, though a different kind, 
 stole over Mr. Boffin’s face. Its old simplicity 
 of expression got masked by a certain craftiness 
 that assimilated even his good-humor to itself. 
 His very smile was cunning, as if he had been 
 studying smiles among the portraits of his misers. 
 Saving an occasional burst of impatience, or 
 
 coarse assertion of his mastery, his good-humor. 
 
 remained to him, but it had now a sordid alley 
 
 | of distrust; and though his eyes shonld twinkle 
 | own showing, you vain heartless girl, puffed up! and all his face should laugh, he would sit hold- — 
 
<5 Lie, sea Dee ST a 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 ing himself in his own arms, as if he had an in- 
 clination to hoard himself up, and must always 
 grudgingly stand on the defensive. . 
 
 What with taking heed of these two faces, and 
 what with feeling conscious that the stealthy oc- 
 cupation must set some mark on her own, Bella 
 soon began to think that there was not a candid 
 or a natural face among them all but Mrs. Bof- 
 fin’s. None the less because it was far less ra- 
 diant than of yore, faithfully reflecting in its 
 anxiety and regret every line of change in the 
 Golden Dustman’s, 
 
 * Rokesmith,” said Mr. Boffin, one evening 
 when they were all in his room again, and he 
 and the Secretary had been going over some ac- 
 counts, ‘* Il am spending too much money. Or 
 leastways, you are spending too much for me.” 
 
 ‘* You are rich, Sir.” ’ 
 
 “Tam not,” said Mr. Boffin. 
 
 The sharpness of the retort was next to telling 
 the Secretary that he lied. But it brought no 
 change of expression into the set face. 
 
 **{} tell you I am not rich,” repeated Mr. Bof- 
 fin, ‘‘and I won’t have it.” 
 
 ‘You are not rich, Sir?” repeated the Secre- 
 tary, in measured words. 
 
 ** Well,” returned Mr. Boffin, ‘if I am, that’s 
 my business. I am not going to spend at this 
 rate to please you or any body. You wouldn’t 
 like it if it was your money.” 
 
 ** Even in that impossible case, Sir, I—” 
 
 ** Hold your tongue!” said Mr. Boffin. ‘* You 
 oughtn’t to like it in any case. 
 mean to bé rude, but you put me out so, and 
 after all ?m master. I didn’t intend to tell you 
 to hold your tongue. 
 hold your tongue. Only, don’t contradict. Did 
 you ever come across the life of Mr. Elwes ?” 
 referring to his favorite subject at last. , 
 
 ‘<The miser ?” 
 
 ‘* Ah, people called him a miser! 
 always calling other people something. Did you 
 ever read about him?” 
 
 “T think so.” 
 
 ‘He never owned to being rich, and yet he 
 might have bought me twice over. Did you ever 
 hear of Daniel Dancer ?” 
 
 ‘* Another miser? Yes.” 
 
 ** He was a good ’un,” said Mr. Boffin, ‘and 
 he had a sister worthy of him. They never 
 called themselves rich neither. 
 called themselves rich, most likely they wouldn't 
 have been so.” 
 
 “They lived and died very miserably. Did 
 they not, Sir?” 
 
 ‘No, I don’t know that they did,” said Mr. 
 Boffin, curtly. 
 
 «Phen they are not the Misers I mean. Those 
 
 abj ct wretches—” ; 
 “Don’t call names, Rokesmith,” said Mr. 
 Boffin. 
 ** That exemplary brother and sister—lived 
 and died in the foulest and filthiest degradation.” 
 _ “They pleased themselves,” said Mr. Boffin, 
 **and I suppose they could have done no more 
 if they had spent their money. But, however, I 
 ain't going to fling mi#te away. Keep the ex- 
 pensesdown. The factis, vou ain’t enough here, 
 Rokesmith. It wants constant attention in the 
 littlest things. Some of us will be dying in a 
 _work-house next.” 
 ‘e ‘* As the persons you have just cited,” quietly 
 
 There! I didn’t | 
 
 IT beg vour pardon. Don’t | 
 
 People-are 
 
 If they had | 
 
 211 
 
 remarked the Secretary, ‘‘thought they would, 
 if I remember, Sir.” 
 
 ‘‘And very creditable in ’em, too,” said Mr. 
 Boffin, ‘+ Veryindependentin’em! But never 
 mind them just now. Have you given notice to 
 quit your lodgings ?” 
 
 ‘* Under your direction I have, Sir.” 
 
 ‘Then I tell you what,” said Mr. Boffin; 
 **pay the quarter’s reut—pay the quarter’s rent, 
 it'll be the ¢heapest thing in the end—and come 
 here at once, so that you may be always on the 
 spot, day and night, and keep the expenses down. 
 You'll charge the quarter’s rent to me, and we 
 must try and save it somewhere. You've got 
 some lovely furniture ; haven’t you?” 
 
 ‘<The furniture in my rooms is my own.” 
 
 “Then we sha'n’t have to buy any for you. 
 In case you was to think it,” said Mr. 3offin, 
 with a look of peculiar shrewdness, ‘so honor- 
 ably independent in you as to make it a relief to 
 your mind, to make that furniture over to me in 
 
 the light of a set-off against the quarter’s rent, 
 
 why ease your mind, ease your mind. I don’t 
 ask it, but I won’t stand in your way if you 
 should consider it due to yourself. As to your 
 room, choose any empty room at the top of the 
 house.” 
 
 ‘*Any empty room will do for me,” said the 
 Secretary. 
 
 ‘*You can take your pick,” said Mr. Boffin, 
 ‘Cand it'll be as good as eight or ten shillings a 
 week added to yourincome. Iwon’t deduct, for 
 it; [I look to you to make it up handsomely by 
 keeping the expenses down. Now, if vou’ll show 
 
 _a light, Pll come to your office-room and dispose 
 
 of a letter or two.” 
 
 On that clear, generous face of Mrs. Boffin’s 
 Bella had seen such traces of a pang at the heart 
 while this dialogue was being held, that she had 
 not the courage to turn her eves to it when they 
 were left alone. Feigning to be intent on her 
 
 /embroidery, she sat plying her needle until her 
 
 busy hand was stopped by Mrs. Boffin’s hand 
 being lightly laid upon it. Yielding to the touch, 
 she felt her hand carried to the good soul’s lips, 
 and felt a tear fall on it. 
 
 “Oh, my loved husband!” said Mrs. Boffin. 
 ‘This is hard to see and hear. But my dear 
 Bella, believe me that in spite of all the change 
 in him he is the best of men.” 
 
 He came back, at the moment when Bella had 
 taken the hand comfortinglv between her own. 
 
 ‘* ih ?” said he, mistrustfully looking in at the 
 door. ‘* What's she telling you?” 
 
 ‘¢ She is only praising you, Sir,’ said Bella. 
 
 ‘Praising me? You are sure? Not blam- 
 ing me for standing on my own defense against 
 a crew of plunderers, who would suck me dry by 
 dribblets? Not blaming me for getting a little 
 hoard together ?” 
 
 He came up to them, and his wife folded her 
 hands upon his shoulder, and shook her head as 
 she laid it on her hands. 
 
 ‘¢There, there, there!” urged Mr. Boffin, not 
 unkindly.  ‘* Don’t take on, old lady.” 
 
 ‘‘ But I can’t bear to see you so, my dear.” 
 
 ‘¢Nonsense! Recollect, we are not our old 
 selves. Recollect, we must scrunch or be 
 scrunched. Recollect, we must hold our own. 
 Recollect, money makes money. Don’t you be 
 uneasy, Bella, my child; don’t you be doubtful. 
 The more-I save, the more you shall have.” 
 
212 
 
 Bella thought it was well for his wife that she 
 was musing with her affectionate face on his 
 shoulder; for there was a cunning light in his 
 eyes as he said all this which seemed to cast a 
 disagreeable illumination on the change in him, 
 and make it morally uglier. 
 
 eS 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 THE GOLDEN DUSTMAN FALLS. INTO WORSE 
 COMPANY. 
 
 Ir had come to pass that Mr. Silas Wegg now 
 rarely attended the minion of fortune and the 
 worm of the hour, at his (the worm’s and ‘hin- 
 jon’s) own honse, but lay under general instruc- 
 tions to await him within a certain margin of 
 hours at the Bower. Mr. Wegg took this ar- 
 rangement in great dudgeon, because the ap- 
 pointed hours were evening hours, and those he 
 considered precious to the progress of the friend- 
 ly move. But it was quite in character, he bit- 
 terly remarked to Mr. Venus, that the upstart 
 who had trampled on those eminent creatures, 
 Miss Elizabeth, Master George, Aunt Jane, 
 and Uncle Parker, should oppress his literary 
 man. 
 
 The Roman Empire having worked out its de- 
 struction, Mr, Boffin next appeared in a cab 
 with Rollin’s Ancient History, which valuable 
 work being found to possess lethargic properties, 
 broke down, at about the period when the whole 
 of the army of Alexander the Macedonian (at 
 that time about forty thousand strong) burst into 
 tears simultaneously, on his being taken with a 
 shivering fit after bathing. The Wars of the 
 Jews, likewise languishing under Mr. Wegg’s 
 generalship, Mr. Boffin arrived in another cab 
 with Plutarch: whose Lives he found in the 
 sequel extremely entertaining, though he hoped 
 Plittarch might not expect him to believe them 
 all. What to believe, in the course of his read- 
 ing, was Mr. Boffin’s chief literary difficulty in- 
 deed; for some time he was divided in his mind 
 between half, all, or none; at length, when he 
 decided, as a moderate man, to compound with 
 half, the question still remained, which half? 
 And that stumbling-block he never got over. 
 
 One evening, when Silas Wegg had grown ac- 
 customed to the arrival of his patron in a cab, 
 accompanied by some profane historian charged 
 with unutterable names of incomprehensible peo- 
 ples, of impossible descent, waging wars any 
 number of years and syllables long, and carry- 
 ing illimitable hosts and riches about, with the 
 greatest ease, beyond the confines of geography 
 —one evening the usual time passed by, and no 
 patron appeared. After half an hour's grace 
 Mr. Wegg proceeded to the outer gate, and there 
 executed a whistle, conveying to Mr. Venus, if 
 perchance within hearing, the tidings of his 
 being at home and disengaged. Forth from the 
 shelter of a neighboring’ wall Mr. Venus then 
 emerged. 4 
 
 ‘‘Brother in arms,” said Mr. Wegg, in excel- 
 lent spirits, ‘f welcome !” 
 
 In return, Mr. Venus gave him a rather dry 
 good-evening. 
 
 ‘¢Walk in, brother,” said Silas, clapping him 
 on the shoulder, ‘‘and take your seat in my 
 chimley-corner; for what says the ballad? 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 ‘No malice to dread, Sir, 
 
 And no falsehood to fear, 
 
 But truth to delight me, Mr. Venus, 
 And I forgot what to cheer, 
 
 Li toddle dee om dee. 
 
 And something to guide, 
 
 My ain fireside, Sir, 
 
 My ain fireside.’ ”’ 
 
 With this quotation (depending for its neatness 
 rather on the spirit than the words) Mr. Wegg 
 conducted his guest to his hearth. 
 *¢ And you come, brother,” said Mr. Wegg, in 
 a hospitable glow, ‘‘ you come like I don’t know 
 what—exactly like it—I shouldn’t know you 
 from it—shedding a halo all around you.” 
 ‘¢ What kind of halo?” asked Mr. Venus. 
 "Ope, Sir,’ replied Silas. ‘*That’s your 
 halo.” 
 Mr. Venus appeared doubtful on the point, 
 and looked rather discontentedly at the fire. 
 “We'll devote the evening, brother,” ex- 
 claimed Wegg, ‘‘ to prosecute our friendly move. 
 And arterwards, crushing a flowing wine-cup 
 —which IJ allude to brewing rum and water— 
 we'll pledge one another. For what says the 
 Poet? 
 ‘And you needn’t Mr. Venus be your black bottle, 
 For surely [ll be mine, 
 And we'll take a glass with a slice of lemon in it to 
 which you're partial, 
 For auld lang syne.’” 
 
 » 
 
 This flow of quotation and hospitality in Wegg 
 indicated his observation of some little queru- 
 lousness on the part of Venus. 
 
 ‘¢ Why, as to the friendly move,” observed the 
 last-named gentleman, rubbing his knees peevish- 
 ly, ‘‘one of my objections to it is, that it don’t 
 move.” 
 
 “Rome, brother,” returned Wege: “a city 
 which Qt may not be generally known) origina- 
 ted in twins and a wolf, and ended in Imperial 
 marble: wasn’t built in a day.” 
 
 ‘‘Pid I say it was?” asked Venus. 
 
 ‘*No, you did not, brother. Well-inquired.”’ 
 
 ‘*But [I do say,” proceeded Venus, ‘that I 
 am taken from among my trophies of anatomy, 
 am called upon to exchange my human warious 
 for mere coal-ashes warious, and nothing comes 
 of it. I think I must give up.” 
 
 ‘“No, Sir!” remonstrated Wegg, enthusiastic 
 ally. ‘No, Sir! 
 
 ‘Charge, Chester, charge, 
 On, Mr. Venus, on!’ 
 Never say die, Sir! A man of your mark , 
 
 “It’s not so much saying it that I object to,” 
 returned Mr. Venus, ‘‘as doing it. And hav- 
 ing got to do it whether or no, I can’t afford 
 to waste my time on groping for nothing in cin- 
 ders.” i 
 ‘¢ But think how little time you have given to 
 the move, Sir, after all,” urged Wegg. ‘* Add 
 the evenings so occupied together, and what do 
 they come to? And you, Sir, harmonizer with 
 myself in opinions, views, and feelings, you with 
 
 99 
 
 ithe patience to fit together on wires the whole 
 
 frame-work of society—I allude to the human 
 skelinton—yon to give in so soon!” a 
 
 ‘‘T don’t like it,” returned Mr. Venus moodi- 
 ly, as he put his head between his knees and — 
 stuck up his dusty hair. ‘‘And there’s no en-_ 
 couragement to go on.” hs 
 
 ‘Not them Mounds without,” said Mr. Wegg, — 
 
 extending his right hand with an air of solemn ~ 
 1 Se 
 
_ ae 
 ‘ie 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 reasoning, ‘‘encouragement? Not them Mounds 
 now looking down upon us?” 
 
 “They’re too big,” grumbled Venus. ‘*What’s 
 a scratch here and a scrape there, a poke in this 
 place and a dig in the other, tothem? Besides; 
 what have we found ?” 
 
 ‘¢What have we found ?” cried Wegg, delighted 
 to be able to acquiesce. ‘‘Ah! There I grant 
 you, comrade. Nothing. But on the contrary, 
 comrade, what may we find? ‘There you'll grant 
 me. Any thing.” 
 
 *¢T don’t like it,” pettishly returned Venus as 
 before. ‘‘I came into it without enough con- 
 sideration. And besides again. Isn’t your own 
 Mr. Boffin well acquainted with the Mounds? 
 And wasn’t he well acquainted with the deceased 
 and his ways? And has he ever showed any ex- 
 pectation of finding any thing?” 
 
 At that moment wheels were heard. 
 
 _ **Now, I should be loth,” said Mr. Wegg, 
 with an air of patient injury, ‘‘to think so ill of 
 him as to suppose him capable of coming. at this 
 time of night. And yet it sounds like him.” 
 
 A ring at the yard bell. 
 
 *¢Itzs him,” said Mr. Wegg, ‘‘and he 7s capa- 
 ble of it. I am sorry, because I could have 
 wished to keep up a little lingering fragment of 
 respect for him.” 
 
 Here Mr. Boffin was heard lustily calling at 
 the yard gate, ‘‘ Halloa! Wegg! Halloa!”’ 
 
 “* Keep your seat, Mr. Venus, ’’said Wegg. 
 ‘“*He may not stop.” And then called out, 
 “Halloa, Sir! Halloa! I’m with you directly, 
 Sir! Half a minute, Mr. Boffin. Coming, Sir, 
 as fast as my leg will bring me!” And so with 
 a show of much cheerful alacrity stumped out 
 to the gate with a light, and there, through the 
 window of a cab, descried Mr. Boffin inside, 
 blocked up with books. 
 
 ‘* Here! lend a hand, Wegg,” said Mr. Bof- 
 fin, excitedly, ‘‘I can’t get out till the way is 
 cleared for me. This is the Annual Register, 
 Wegg, in a cab-full of wollumes. Do'you know 
 him?” 
 
 ‘‘ Know the Animal Register, Sir ?” returned 
 the Impostor, who had caught the name imper- 
 fectly. ‘* For a trifling wager, I think I could 
 find any Animal in him, blindfold, Mr. Boffin.” 
 
 *¢ And here’s Kirby’s Wonderful Museum,” 
 Said Mr. Boffin, “and Caulfield’s Characters, and 
 Wilson’s. Such Characters, Wegg, such Char- 
 acters! I must have one or two of the best of 
 ’em to-night. It’s amazing what places they 
 used to put the guineas in, wrapped up in rags. 
 Catch hold of that pile of wollumes, Wegg, or 
 it’ll bulge out and burst into the mud. Isthere 
 any one about to help?” 
 
 ‘*There’s afriend of mine, Sir, that had the 
 intention of spending the evening with me when 
 I gave you up—much against my will—for the 
 night.” 
 
 “* Call him out,” cried Mr. Boffin, in a bustle ; 
 ‘sot him to beara hand. Don’t drop that one 
 under your arm. It’s Dancer. Him and his 
 sister made pies of a dead sheep they found 
 when they were out a walking. Where’s your 
 friend? Oh, here’s your friend. Would you 
 be so good as help Wegg and myself with these 
 books? But don’t take Jemmy Taylor of South- 
 
 wark, nor yet Jemmy Wood of Gloucester. 
 These are the two Jemmys. I'll carry them 
 myself.” 
 
 a it " z. rm 
 
 213 
 
 Not ceasing to talk and bustle, in a state of 
 great excitement Mr. Boffin directed the re- 
 moval and arrangement of the books, appearing 
 to be in some sort beside himself until they were 
 all deposited on the floor, and the cab was dis- 
 missed, 
 
 4. a There!” said Mr. Boffin, gloating over them. 
 
 There thev are, like the four-and-twenty fid- 
 dlers—all of a row. Get on your spectacles, 
 Wegg; I know where to find the best of ’em, 
 and we'll have a taste at once of what we have 
 got before ts. What’s your friend’s name ?” 
 
 Mr. Wegg presented his friend as Mr. Venus. 
 
 ‘“Hh?” cried Mr. Boffin, catching at the 
 name. ‘* Of Clerkenwell ?” 
 
 “ Of Clerkenwell, Sir,” said Mr. Venus. 
 
 ‘* Why, I’ve heard of you,” cried Mr. Boffin. 
 ‘*T heard of you in the old man’s time. You 
 knew him. Did you ever buy any thing of 
 him ?” With piercing eagerness. 
 
 ‘¢No, Sir,” returned Venus.: 
 
 ‘* But he showed you things; didn’t he?” 
 
 Mr. Venus, with a glance at his friend, re- 
 plied in the aftirmative. 
 
 ‘¢ What did he show you ?” asked Mr: Boffin, 
 putting his hands behind him, and eagerly ad- 
 vancing his head. ‘‘Did he show you boxes, 
 little cabinets, pocket-books, parcels, any thing 
 locked or sealed, any thing tied up?” 
 
 Mr. Venus shook his head. 
 
 ‘*¢ Are you a judge of china?” 
 
 _ Mr. Venus again shook his head. 
 
 ‘¢ Because if he had ever showed you a tea- 
 pot Ishould be glad to know of it,” said Mr. 
 Boffin. And then, with his right hand at his 
 lips, repeated, thoughtfully, ‘a Tea-pot, a Tea- 
 pot,” and glanced over the books on the floor, as 
 if he knew there was something interesting con- 
 nected with a tea-pot somewhere among them. 
 
 Mr. Wegg and Mr. Venns looked at one anoth- 
 er wonderingly: and Mr..Wegg, in fitting on his 
 spectacles, opened his eyes wide, over their rims, 
 and tapped the side of his nose: as an admoni- 
 tion to Venus to keep himself generally wide 
 awake. 
 
 ‘¢A Tea-pot,” repeated Mr. Boffin, continu- 
 ing to muse and survey the books; ‘‘a Tea-pot, 
 a Tea-pot. Are you ready, Wegg ?” 
 
 ‘¢T am at your service, Sir,” replied that gen- 
 tleman, taking his usual seat on the usual set- 
 tle, ‘and poking his wooden leg under the table 
 before it. ‘*Mr. Venus, would you make your- 
 self useful, and take a seat beside me, Sir, for 
 the conveniency of snuffing the candles ?” 
 
 Venus complying with the invitation while it 
 was yet being given, Silas pegged at him with his 
 wooden leg, to call his particular attention to 
 Mr. Boffin standing musing before the fire, m 
 the space between the two settles. 
 
 ‘‘Hem! Ahem!” coughed Mr. Wegg, to at- 
 tract his employer’s attention. ‘‘ Would you 
 wish to commence with an Animal, Sir—from 
 the Register ?” 
 
 “No,” said Mr. Boffin, ‘‘no, Wegg.” — With 
 that, producing a little book from his breast- 
 pocket, he handed it with great care to the liter- 
 ary gentleman, and inquired, ‘‘ What do you 
 call that, Wegg ?” i ; 
 
 ‘¢ This, Sir,” replied Silas, adjusting his spec- 
 tacles, and referring to the title-page, ‘Sig Mer- 
 ryweather’s Lives and Anecdotes of Misers. Mr. 
 Venus, would you make yourself useful and draw 
 
214 y OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. — ; C 
 
 the candles a little nearer, Sir?” This to have 
 a special opportunity of bestowing a stare upon 
 his comrade. 
 
 ‘©Which of ’em have you got in that lot ?” ask- 
 ed Mr. Boffin. ‘* Can you find out pretty easy ?” 
 
 ‘¢ Well, Sir,” replied Silas, turning to the ta- 
 ble of contents and slowly fluttering the leaves 
 of the book, ‘*I should say they must be pretty 
 well all here, Sir; here’s a large assortment, 
 Sir; my eye catches John Overs, Sir, John Lit- 
 tle, Sir, Dick Jarrel, John Elwes, the Reverend 
 
 ' Mr. Jones of Blewbury, Vulture Hopkins, Da- 
 
 niel Dancer—” 
 
 ‘Give us Dancer, Wegg,” said Mr. Boffin. 
 
 With another stare at his comrade; Silas 
 sought and found the place. 
 
 ‘¢ Page a hundred and nine, Mr. Boffin. Chap- 
 ter eight. Contents of chapter, ‘ His birth and 
 estate. His garments and outward appearance. 
 Miss Dancer and her feminine graces. The Mi- 
 ser’s Mansion. The finding of a treasure. The 
 Story of the Mutton Pies. A Miser’s Idea of 
 Death. Bob, the Miser’s cur. Griffiths and 
 his Master. How to turn a penny. <A substi- 
 
 tute for a Fire. The Advantages of keeping a) 
 
 Snuff-box. The Miser dies without a Shirt. The 
 Treasures of a Dunghill— ”’ 
 
 ‘¢Bh? What's that ?” demanded Mr. Boffin. 
 
 “¢¢The Treasures,’ Sir,” repeated Silas, read- 
 ing very distinctly, ‘‘‘ ofa Dunghill.’ Mr. Ve- 
 nus, Sir, would you obleege with the snuffers ?” 
 This, to secure attention to his adding with his 
 lips only, ‘‘ Mounds !” 
 
 Mr. Boffin drew an arm-chair into the space 
 where he stood, and said, seating himself and 
 slyly rubbing his hands: 
 
 ‘¢ Give us Dancer.” 
 
 Mr. Wegg pursued the biography of that emi- 
 nent man through its various phases of avarice 
 and dirt, through Miss Dancer’s death on a sick 
 regimen of cold dumpling, and through Mr. 
 Dancer’s keeping his rags together with a hay- 
 band, and warming his dinner by sitting upon 
 it, down to the consolatory incident of his dying 
 naked in a sack. After which he read on as 
 follows: 
 
 «¢¢’The house, or rather the heap of ruins, in 
 which Mr. Dancer lived, and which at his death 
 devolved to the right of Captain Holmes, was a 
 most miserable, decayed building, for it had not 
 been repaired for more than half a century.’ ” 
 
 (Here Mr. Wegg eyed his comrade and the 
 room in which they sat: which had not been re- 
 paired for a long time.) 
 
 ‘¢* But though poor in external structure, the 
 ruinous fabric was very rich in the interior, It 
 took many weeks to explore its whole contents ; 
 and Captain Holmes found it a very agreeable 
 task to dive into the miser’s secret hoards,’ ”’ 
 
 (Here Mr. Wegg repeated ‘secret hoards,’ 
 and pegged his comrade again.) 
 
 ‘¢¢QOne of Mr. Dancer’s richest escretoires was 
 found to be a dung-heap in the cow-house; a 
 sum but little short of two thousand five hun- 
 dred pounds was contained in this rich piece of 
 manure; and in an old jacket, carefully tied, 
 and strongly nailed down to the manger, in 
 bank-notes and gold were found five hundred 
 pounds more.’” 
 
 (Here Mr. Wegg’s wooden leg started forward 
 under the table and slowly elevated itself as he 
 read on.) 
 
 ¢¢¢Several bowls were discovered filled with - 
 guineas and half guineas; and at different times 
 on searching the corners of the house they found 
 various parcels of bank-notes. Some were. 
 crammed into the crevices of the wall ;’” 
 
 (Here Mr. Venus looked at the wall.) 
 
 ‘¢<« Bundles were hid under the cushions and 
 covers of the chairs ;’” : 
 
 (Here Mr. Venus looked under himself on 
 the settle.) 
 
 ‘+ «Some were reposing snugly at the back of 
 the drawers; and notes amounting to six hun- 
 dred pounds were found neatly doubled up in 
 the inside of an old tea-pot. In the stable the . 
 Captain found jugs full of old dollars and shil- 
 lings. The chimney was not left unsearched, 
 and paid very well for the trouble; for in nine- 
 teen different holes, all filled with soot, were 
 found various sums of money, amounting to- 
 gether to more than two hundred pounds.’ ” 
 
 On the way-to this crisis Mr. Wegg’s wooden 
 leg had gradually elevated itself more and more, 
 
 a 
 
 /and he had nudged Mr. Venus with his opposite 
 
 elbow deeper and deeper, until at length the 
 preservation of his balance became incompati- 
 ble with the two actions, and he now dropped 
 over sideways. upon that gentleman, squeezing 
 him against the settle’s edge. Nor did cither 
 of the two, for some few seconds, make any 
 effort to recover himself; both remaining in a 
 kind of pecuniary swoon. 
 
 But the sight of Mr. Boffin sitting in the arm- 
 chair hugging himself, with his eyes npon the 
 fire, acted as a restorative. Counterfeiting a 
 sneeze to cover their movements, Mr. Wegg, 
 with a spasmodic ‘‘'Tish-ho!” pulled himself 
 
 Ne AD ga Oe ot 
 
 and Mr. Venus up in a masterly manner. 
 
 ‘‘Let’s have some more,” said Mr. Boffin, 
 hungrily. . ; 
 ‘‘ John Elwes is the next, Sir. Is it your 
 pleasure to take John Elwes?” 
 ‘Ah!’ said Mr. Boffin. ‘‘Let’s hear what 
 
 John did.” : 
 He did not appear to have hidden any thing, 
 so went off rather flatly. But an exemplary 7 
 
 lady named Wilcocks, who had stowed away ~ 
 gold and silver in a pickle-pot in a clock-case, 
 a canister-full of treasure in a hole under her 
 stairs, and a quantity of money in an old rat- 
 trap, revived the interest. To her sucecedod 
 another lady, claiming to be a pauper, whose 
 wealth was found wrapped up in little scraps of 
 paper and oldrag. To her, another lady, apple- 
 woman by trade, who had saved a fortune of ten 
 
 thousand pounds and hidden it ‘‘here and there, 
 in cracks and corners, behind bricks and under 
 the flooring.” To her, a French gentleman, 
 who had crammed up his chimney, rather to the 
 
 detriment of its drawing powers, ‘‘a leather 
 valise, containing twenty thousand francs, gold 
 coins, and a large quantity of precious stones,” 
 
 ; 
 (as discovered by a chimney-sweep after his é 
 
 death. By these steps Mr. Wegg arrived at a — 
 concluding instance of the human Magpie: q 
 
 ‘¢¢ Many years ago there lived at Cambridge 
 a miserly old couple of the name of Jardine: 
 they had two sons: the father was a perfect 
 miser, and at his death one thousand guineas — 
 were discovered secreted in his bed. The two — 
 sons grew upas parsimonious as their sire. 
 When about twenty vears of age they com- — 
 menced business at Cambridge as drapers, and _ 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 they continued there until their death. The es- 
 tablishment of the Messrs. Jardine was the most 
 dirty of all the shops in Cambridge. Customers 
 seldom went in to purchase, except perhaps out 
 of curiosity. ‘The brothers were most disreputa- 
 ble-looking beings; for, although surrounded 
 
 with gay apparel as their staple in trade, they 
 
 wore the most filthy rags themselves. It is said 
 that they had no bed, and, to save the expense 
 of one, always slept on a bundle of packing- 
 cloths under the counter. In their housekeep- 
 ing they were penurious in the extreme. A 
 
 joint of meat did not grace their board for. 
 
 twenty years. Yet when the first of the broth- 
 ers died, the other, much to his surprise, found 
 
 large sums of money which had been secreted | 
 
 even from him.” 
 
 ‘* There!’ cried Mr. Boffin. ‘Even from 
 him, you see! There was only two of ’em, and 
 yet one of ’em hid from the other.” 
 
 Mr. Venus, who since his introduction to the 
 French gentleman had been stooping to peer np 
 the chimney, had his attention recalled by the 
 last sentence, and took the liberty of repeat- 
 ing it. 
 
 _ “Do you like it?” asked Mr. Boffin, turning 
 suddenly. 
 
 ‘*T beg your pardon, Sir?” 
 
 ‘*Do you like what Wege’s been a-reading 2” 
 Mr Venus answered that he found it extreme- 
 
 _ ly interesting. | 
 
 ‘Then come again,” said Mr. Boffin, “and 
 hear some more. Come when you like; come 
 the day after to-morrow, half an hour sooner. 
 There’s plenty more; there’s no end to it.” 
 
 Mr. Venus expressed his acknowledgments 
 and accepted the invitation. 
 
 “Tt’s wonderful what’s been hid at one time 
 
 and another,” said Mr. Boffin, ruminating ; 
 
 ‘truly wonderful.” 
 ‘Meaning, Sir,” observed Wegg, with a pro- 
 pitiatory face to draw him out, and with another 
 
 ~ peg at his friend and brother, ‘‘in the wav of 
 pes ; 5 
 
 money.” 
 
 **Money,” said Mr. Boffin. “Ah! And 
 
 papers.” 
 
 . Mr. Wegg, in a languid transport, again 
 dropped over on Mr. Venus, and again recover- 
 ing himself, masked his emotions with a sneeze. 
 **Tish-ho! Did you say papers too, Sir? 
 Been hidden, Sir?” 
 Hidden and forgot,” said Mr. Boffin. 
 ** Why the bookseller that sold me the Wondor- 
 ful Museum—where’s the Wonderful Mnseum 2” 
 He was on his knees on the floor in a moment, 
 groping eagerly among the books. 
 **Can I assist you, Sir?” asked Wege. 
 “No, I have got it; here it is,” said Mr. 
 
 _ Boffin, dusting it with the sleeve of his coat. 
 
 **Wollume four. I know it was the fourth wol- 
 lume that the bookseller read it to me out of. 
 Look for it, Wegg.” 
 Silas took the book and turned the leaves. 
 **Romarkable petrefaction, Sir?” 
 “No, that’s not it,” said Mr. Boffin. ‘It 
 
 can’t have been a petrefaction.” 
 
 a 
 
 ¥; 
 \ 
 t 
 
 _ @.crown piece, Sir?” 
 
 “Memoirs of General John Reid, common- 
 ly called The Walking Rushlight, Sir? With 
 portrait?” 
 
 —** No, nor vet him,” said Mr. Boffin. 
 
 * Remarkabl* case of a man who swallowed 
 
 a. 
 
 4 2 
 
 Bo ‘Peak 3 
 
 ‘Boffin, waving his hand after a silence. 
 
 215 
 
 ‘**To hide it?” asked Mr. Boffin. 
 
 ‘Why, no, Sir,” replied Wegg, consulting 
 the text, ‘it appears to have been done by acci- 
 dent. Oh! This next must be it. ‘Singular 
 discovery of a will, lost twenty-one years,’ ” 
 
 ‘<That’s it!” cried Mr. Boffin. ‘Read that.” 
 
 “*A most extraordinary case,’” read Silas 
 Wegg aloud, “*was tried ‘at the last Marvybor- 
 ough assizes in Ireland. It was briefly ‘this: 
 Robert Baldwin, in March, 1782, made his will, 
 in which he devised the lands now in qucstion 
 to the children of his youngest son: soon afier 
 which his faculties failed him, and he became 
 altogether childish and died, above @¢ighty years 
 old. The defendant, the eldest son, immediate- 
 ly afterward gave out that his father had de- 
 stroyed the will; and no will being found he 
 entered into possession of the lands in question, 
 and so matters remained for twenty-one years, 
 the whole family during all that time believing 
 that the father had died without a will. But 
 after twenty-one years the defendant’s wife died, 
 and he very soon afterward, at the age of sev- 
 enty-eight, married a very young woman: which 
 caused some anxiety to his two sons, whose 
 poignant expressions of this feeling so exasper- 
 ated their father, that he in his resentment exe- 
 cuted a will to disinherit his eldest son, and in 
 his fit of anger showed it to his second son, who 
 instantly determined to get at it, and destroy 
 it, in order to preserve the property to his broth- 
 er, With this view, he broke open his father’s 
 desk, where he found—not his father’s will which 
 he sought afier, but the will of his grandfather, 
 which was then altogether forgotten in the fam- 
 ily.’ 7 
 
 ‘*There!” said Mr. Boffin. ‘‘See what men 
 put away and forget, or mean to destroy, and 
 don’t!” He then added in a slow tone, ‘¢ As— 
 ton—ish—ing!’ And as he rolled his eyes all 
 round the room, Wegg and Venus likewise roll- 
 ed their eyes all round the room. And then 
 Wegg, singly, fixed his eves on Mr. Boffin looking 
 at the fire again; as if he had a mind to spring 
 upon him and demand his thoughts or his life. 
 
 ‘* However, time’s up for to-night,” said Mr. 
 ‘¢ More 
 the day after to-morrow. Range the books upon 
 the shelves, Wegg. I dare say Mr. Venus will 
 be so kind as help vou.” 
 
 While speaking, he thrust his hand into. the 
 breast of his outer coat, and struggled with some 
 object there that was too large to be got out 
 easily. What was the stupefaction of the friend- 
 ly movers when this object at last emerging, 
 proved to be a much-dilapidated dark lantern ! 
 
 Without at all noticing the effect produced by 
 this little instrument, Mr. Boffin stood it on his 
 knee, and, producing a box of matches, delib- 
 erately lighted the candle in the Jantern, blew 
 out the kindled match, and cast the end into the 
 fire. ‘I’m going, Wegg,” he then announced, 
 ‘to take a turn about the place and round the 
 vard. I don’t want you. Me and this same 
 lantern have taken hundreds—thousands—of _ 
 such turns in our time together.” 
 
 “But [T conldn’t think, Sir—not on any ac- 
 count, [ couldn't,”—Wege was politely begin- 
 ning, when Mr. Boffin, who had risen and was 
 going toward the door, stopped: 
 
 “T have told you that I don’t want you, 
 
 Wegg.”’ 
 
se | OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. — oe 
 
 Wegg looked intelligently thoughtful, as if 
 that had not occurred to his mind until he now 
 brought it to bear on the circumstance. He 
 had nothing for it but to let Mr. Boffin go out 
 and shut the door behind him. But the instant 
 he was on the other side of it Wegg clutched 
 Venus with both hands, and said in a choking 
 whisper, as if he were being strangled: 
 
 ‘¢Mr. Venus, he must be followed, he must 
 be watched, he mustn’t be’ lost sight of for a 
 moment.” 
 
 ‘“Why mustn’t he?” 
 strangling. 
 
 ‘‘Comrade, you might have noticed I was a 
 little elewated in spirits when you come in to- 
 night. I’ve found something.” 
 
 ‘¢What have you found?” asked Venus, 
 clutching him with both hands, so that they 
 stood interlocked like a couple of preposterous 
 gladiators. 
 
 ‘<'There’s no time to tell you now. I think he 
 must have gone to look for it. We must have 
 an eye upon him instantly.” 
 
 Releasing each other, they crept to the door, 
 opened it softly, and peeped ont. It was a 
 cloudy night, and the black shadow of the 
 Mounds made the dark yard darker. ‘‘If not 
 a double swindler,” whispered Wegg, ‘‘why a 
 dark lantern? We could have seen what he 
 
 was about if she had carried a light one. Soft- 
 ly, this way.’ 
 
 Cautiously along the path that was bordered 
 by fragments of crockery set in ashes the two 
 stole after him. They could hear him at his pe- 
 culiar trot, crushing the loose cinders as he went. 
 ‘* He knows the place by heart,” muttered Silas, 
 ‘Cand don’t need to turn his lantern on, con- 
 found him!” But he did turn it on. almost in 
 that same instant, and flashed its light upon the 
 first of the Mounds. 
 
 ‘* Ts that the spot ?” asked Venus in a whisper. 
 
 ‘“‘He’s warm,”’ said Silas in the same tone. 
 ‘¢He’s precious warm. He’s close. I think he 
 must be going to look for it. What’s that he’s 
 got in his hand ?” 
 
 ‘“©A shovel,” answered Venus. ‘‘And he 
 knows how to use it, remember, > Aifty times as 
 well as either of us.’ 
 
 ‘“‘Tf he looks for it and misses it, partner,” 
 suggested Wegg, ‘‘ what shall we do 2” 
 
 ‘< First of all, wait till he does,’’ said Venus. 
 
 Discreet edviun too, for he darkened his lan- 
 tern again, and the mound turned black. After 
 a few seconds he turned the light on once more, 
 and was seen standing at the foot of the second 
 mound, slowly raising the lantern little by little 
 until he held it up at arm’s-length, as if he were 
 examining the condition of the “whole surface. 
 
 ‘*That can’t be the spot too?” said Venus. 
 
 ‘¢No,”’ said Wegg, ‘‘he’s getting cold.” 
 
 ‘Tt strikes me,” whispered Venus, ‘‘that he 
 wants to find out whether any one has been 
 groping about there.” 
 
 ‘‘Hush!” returned Wegg, ‘‘he’s getting cold- 
 er and colder.—Now he’s freezing !” 
 
 This exclamation was elicited by his having 
 turned the lantern off again, and on again, and 
 being visible at the foot of the third mound. 
 
 ‘“¢Why, he’s going up it!” said Venus. 
 
 “¢ Shovel and all!” said Wegg. : 
 
 At a nimbler trot, as if the shovel over his 
 shoulder stimulated him by reviving old associ- 
 
 asked Venus, also 
 
 ations, Mr. Boffin ascended the ‘‘serpentining — 
 walk,” up the Mound which he had described 
 to Silas Wegg on the occasion of their beginning 
 to decline and fall. On striking into it he turn- 
 ed his lantern off. The two followed him, stoop- 
 ing low, so that their figures might make no 
 mark in relief against the sky when he should 
 turn his lantern on again. Mr. Venus took the 
 lead, towing Mr. Wegg, in order that his re- 
 fractory leg might be promptly extricated from 
 any pitfalls it should dig for itself. They could 
 just make out that the Golden Dustman stopped 
 to breathe. Of course they stopped too, in- 
 stantly. 
 
 ‘«‘This is his own Mound,” whisper ed Wegg, 
 as he recovered his wind, “this one.’ 
 
 ‘¢ Why all three are his own,” returned Ves 
 nus. 
 
 ‘¢So he thinks; but he’s used to call this his 
 own, because it’s the one first left to him; the 
 one that was his legacy when it was all he ‘took 
 under the will.” 
 
 ‘‘ When he shows his light,” said Venus; 
 keeping watch upon his dusky figure all the 
 time, ‘drop lower and keep closer.’ 
 
 He went on again, and they followed again. 
 Gaining the top of the Mound, he turned on his 
 light—but only partially—and stood it on the: 
 ground. <A bare lopsided weather-beaten pole 
 was planted in the ashes there, and had been 
 there many a year. Hard by this pole lis lan- 
 tern stood: lighting a few feet of the lower part. 
 of it and a little of the ashy surface around, and 
 then casting off a purposeless little clear trail of 
 light into the air. 
 
 ‘‘He can never be going to dig up the pole!” 
 whispered Venus as they. dropped low and kept: 
 close. 
 
 ‘¢Perhaps it’s holler and full of something,” 
 whispered Wegg. 
 
 He was going to dig, with whatsoever object, ° 
 for he tucked up his enffs and spat on his hands, 
 and then went at it like an old digget as ‘he was. ° 
 He had no design upon the pole, except that he® 
 measured a shovel’s length from it before begin- 
 
 _ning, nor was it his purpose to dig deep. Some 
 
 dozen or so of expert strokes sufficed. ‘Then he 
 stopped, looked down into the cavity, bent. over 
 it, and took out what appeared to be an ordinary _ 
 case-bottle: one of those squat, high-shouldered, — 
 short-necked glass bottles which the Dutchman — 
 is said to keep his.Courage in. As soon as he 
 had done this he turned off his lantern, and - 
 they could hear that he was filling up the hole 
 in the dark. The ashes being easily moved by 
 a skillful hand, the spies took this as a hint to. 
 
 make off in good time.. Accordingly, Mr. ae 
 nus slipped past Mr. Wegg and towed him down. - 
 But Mr. Wegg’s descent was not. accomplished — ; 
 without some personal inconvenience, for his ~ 
 self-willed leg sticking into the ashes about half- — 
 way down, and time pressing, Mr. Venus took — 
 the liberty of hauling him from his tether by the f 
 collar: which occasioned him to make the rest — 
 of the journey on his back, with his head envel-_ 
 oped in the skirts of his coat, and his wooden — 
 leg coming last, like a drag. So flustered was 
 Mr. Wegg by this mode of tr aveling, that. when 
 he was set on the level ground with his intel-— 
 lectual developments uppermost, he was quite | 
 unconscious of his bearings, and had not the 
 least idea where his place of residence was to 
 
the pole atop, Sir.” 
 
 to it: 
 
 » ‘Yes; they’re 
 
 de ree! OUR MUTUAL FRIEND, 
 ia ode found, until Mr. Venus shoved him into it. 
 
 ‘Hyen then he staggered round and round, weak- 
 ly staring about him, until Mr. Venus with a 
 
 __ hard brush brushed his senses into him and the 
 
 dust out of him. 
 
 Mr. Boftin came down leisurely, for this brush- 
 ing process had been well accomplished, and Mr. 
 Venus had had time to take his breath, before 
 he reappeared. That he had the bottle some- 
 where about him conld not be doubted ; where, 
 Was not so clear. He wore a large rough coat, 
 buttoned over, and it might be in any one of 
 half a dozen pockets. 
 
 “@Vhat’s the matter, Wegg?” said Mr. Bof- 
 fin. ‘You aré as pale as a candle.” 
 
 Mr. Wegg replied, with literal exactness, that 
 he felt as if he had had a turn. 
 
 ** Bile,” said Mr. Boffin, blowing out the light 
 in the lantern, shutting it up, and stowing it 
 away in the breast of his coat as before, « Are 
 you subject to bile, Wegg 2” 
 
 Mr. Wegg again replied, with strict adher- | 
 , that he didn’t think he had ever | 
 sensation in his head, to any thing | 
 
 ence to truth 
 had a similar 
 like the same extent. 
 
 ** Physic yourself to-morrow, Wege,” said Mr. 
 Boffin, *‘to be in order for next night. By-the- 
 by, this neighborhood is going to have a loss, 
 Wege.” 
 
 A loss, Sir?” 
 
 “Going to lose the Mounds.” 
 
 _ The friendly movers made such an obvious 
 effort not to look atone another, that they might 
 as well have stared at one another with all their 
 might. 
 
 *“‘Have you parted with them, Mr. Boffin?” 
 asked Silas, | 
 going. Mine’s as good as gone 
 already.” : 
 _ “You mean the little one of the three, with 
 
 t 
 ** Yes,” said Mr. Boffin, rubbing his ear in his 
 
 » old way, with that new touch of craftiness added 
 It’il begin to | 
 
 “Tt has fetched a 
 be carted off to-morrow.” 
 ** Have you been ont to take leave of your old 
 friend, Sir?” asked Silas, jocosely. 
 _**No,” said Mr. Boffin. 
 put that in your head 2” 
 __ He was so sudden and rough, that Wege, who 
 
 penny. 
 
 had been hovering closer and closer to his skirts, 
 
 dispatching the back of his hand on exploring 
 -€xpeditions in search of the bottle’s surface, re- 
 tired two or three paces. ; 
 ** No offense, Sir,” said Wegg, humbly. 
 offense.” 
 _ Mr. Boffin eyed him as a dog might eye an- 
 ether dog who wanted his bone; and actually 
 retorted with a low growl, as the dog might have 
 ‘Yetorted. 
 _ *Good-night,” he said, after having sunk into 
 -& moody silence, with his hands clasped behind 
 him, and his eyes suspiciously wandering about 
 Weeg. “No! stop there. I know the way out, 
 and [ want no light.” 
 ee: Avarice, and the evening’s legends of avarice, 
 and the inflammatory etfect of what he had seen, 
 
 66 No 
 
 Ean perhaps the rush of his ill-conditioned blood | 
 
 to his brain in his descent, wrought Silas Wegg 
 such a pitch of insatiable appetite, that when 
 the door closed he made a swoop at it and drew 
 Venus along with him. 
 
 ae 14 
 
 \ eed 
 
 n, 
 Dot 
 a2 
 
 a 
 ; 
 
 **What the devil. 
 ; }it with an air of having been highlv—but dis- 
 
 ‘let him go! 
 
 217 
 
 ‘‘We mustn’t 
 He has got that bottle about him. 
 We must have that bottle a 
 
 “Why, you wouldn’t take it by force ?” said 
 Venus, restraining him, 
 
 ‘‘Wouldn’t I? Yes I would. 
 any force, F'd have it at 
 afraid of one old man 
 coward ?” 
 
 “Tam so afraid of you 
 muttered» Venus, sturdily, 
 arms, 
 
 . “Did you hear him ?” 
 you hear him say that he was resolved to disap- 
 point us? Did you hear him say, you cur, that 
 he was going to have the Mounds cleared off, 
 when no doubt the whole place will be rum- 
 maged? If you haven’t the spirit of a mouse to 
 defend your rights, Ihave. Let me go after him.” 
 
 Ag in his wildness he was making a strong 
 struggle for it, Mr. Venus deemed it expedient 
 to lift him, throw him, and fall with him; well 
 knowing that, once down, he would not be up 
 again easily with his wooden leg. So they both 
 rolled on the floor, and, as they did so, Mr, 
 Boffin shut the gate. 
 
 “He mustn’t go!” he cried. 
 
 I'd take it by 
 aly price! Are you so 
 as to let him go, you 
 
 as not to let you go,” 
 clasping him in hig 
 
 retorted Wegg. ‘Did 
 
 —_———-______. 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 THE FRIENDLY MOVE TAKES UP A STRONG 
 POSITION, 
 
 THE friendly movers sat upright on the floor, 
 panting and eying one another, after Mr. Boffin 
 had slammed the gate and gone away. In the 
 weak eyes of Venus, and in every reddish dust- 
 colored hair in his shock of hair, there was a 
 marked distrust of Wegg and an alertness to fly 
 at him on perceiving the smallest occasion. In 
 the. hard-grained face of Wegg, and in his stiff 
 knotty figure (he looked like a German wooden 
 toy), there was expressed a politic conciliation, 
 which had no spontaneity in it. © Both were 
 flushed, flustered, and rumpled, by the late 
 scuffle; and Wegg, in coming to the ground, 
 had received a humming knock on the back of 
 his devoted head, which caused him still to rub 
 
 agreeably—astonished, Each was silent for some 
 time, leaving it to the other to begin. 
 
 ‘* Brother,” said Wegg, at length breaking the 
 silence, ‘‘you were right, and I was wrong. I 
 forgot myself.” 
 
 Mr. Venus knowingly cocked his shock of hair: 
 as rather thinking Mr, Wegg had remembered 
 himself, in respect of appearing without any dis-. 
 guise, 
 
 ‘* But comrade,” pursued Wegg, “it was never 
 your lot to know Miss Elizabeth, Master George. 
 Aunt Jane, nor Uncle Parker.” 
 
 Mr. Venus admitted that he had never known 
 those distinguished persons, and added, in effect, 
 that he had never so much as desired the honor: 
 of their acquaintance. 
 
 ‘“Don’t say that, comrade!” retorted Wege: 
 ‘* No, don’t say that! Because, without having 
 known them, you never can fully know what it 
 is to be stimilated to frenzy by the sight of the 
 Usurper.” ; 
 
 Offering these excusatory words as if they re- 
 flected great credit on himself, Mr. Wegg: im- 
 
O18 
 
 pelled himself with his hands toward a clair in 
 a corner of the room, and there, after a variety 
 of awkward gambols, attained a perpendicular 
 * position. Mr. Venus also ruse. 
 
 ‘« Comrade,” said Wegg, ‘‘ take a seat. Com- 
 rade, what a speaking countenance is yours!” 
 
 Mr. Venus involuntarily smoothed his coun- 
 tenance, and looked at his hand, as if to see 
 whether any of its speaking properties came off. 
 
 ‘For clearly do know, mark you,” pursued 
 Wegg, pointing his words with his forefinger, 
 “¢clearly do I know what question your express- 
 ive features puts to me.”’ 
 
 ‘¢ What question ?” said Venus. 
 
 “The question,” returned Wegg, with a sort 
 of joyful affubility, ‘why I didn’t mention sooner 
 that I.had found something. Says your speak- 
 ing countenance to me: ‘Why didn’t you com- 
 municate that when I first come in this even- 
 ing? Why did you keep it back till you thought 
 Mr. Boffin had come to look for the article?’ 
 Your speaking countenance,” said Wegg, ‘‘ puts 
 it plainer than language. Now, you can’t read 
 in my face what answer I give ?” 
 
 ‘¢No, I can’t,” said Venus. 
 
 “‘T knew it! And why not?” returned Wegg, 
 with :the same joyful candor. ‘‘ Because I lay 
 no claims to a speaking countenance. Because 
 ZT am well aware of my deficiencies. All men 
 are not gifted alike. But I can answer in words. 
 And in what words? These. I wanted to give 
 you a delightful sap—pur—IzE 1” 
 
 Having thus elongated and emphasized the 
 word Surprise, Mr. Wegg_ shook his friend and 
 brother by both hands, and then clapped him on 
 poth knees, like an affectionate patron who en- 
 treated him not to mention so small a service as 
 that which it had been his happy privilege to 
 render. 
 
 ‘Your speaking countenance,” said Wegg, 
 ‘‘being answered to its satisfaction, only asks 
 then, ‘What have you found?’ Why, I hear it 
 sy the words!” 
 
 ‘¢Well?” retorted Venus, snappishly,. after 
 waiting invain, ‘‘If you hear it say the words, 
 why don’t you answer it ?” 
 
 ‘sHear me out!” said Wegg. ‘‘I’m a-going 
 to. Hear me out! Man and brother, partner 
 in feelings equally with undertakings and ac- 
 tions, I have found a cash-box.” 
 
 ‘¢ Where ?”’ ; 
 
 ‘¢__Hear me out!” said Wegg. (He tried to 
 reserve whatever he could, and, whenever gis- 
 closure was forced upon him, broke into a radi- 
 ant gush of Hear me out.) .‘‘On acertain day, 
 Sis f 
 
 «¢ When?” said Venus, bluntly. 
 
 ‘‘N—no,” returned Wegg, shaking his head 
 at once observantly, thoughtfully, and playfully. 
 ‘No, Sir! That’s not your expressive counte- 
 nance which asks that question. That’s your 
 voice; merely your voice. To proceed. Ona 
 certain day, Sir, I happened to be walking in 
 the yard—taking my lonely round—for in the 
 words of a friend of my own family, the author 
 of All’s Well arranged as a duet: 
 
 ‘Deserted, as you will remember, Mr. Venus, by the 
 waning moon, 
 
 When stars, it will occur to you before I mention it, 
 proclaim night's cheerless noon, 
 
 On tower, fort, or tented ground, 
 
 The sentry walks his lonely round, 
 
 The sentry walks:’ 
 
 | 
 i 
 | 
 | 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. aw 
 
 —under those circumstances, Sir, I happened te 
 be walking in the yard early one afternoon, and 
 happened to have an iron rod in my hand, with 
 which I have been sometimes accustomed to be- 
 guile the monotony of a literary life, when I 
 struck it against an object not necessary to trou- 
 ble you by naming—” 
 
 ‘It is necessary. What object?” demanded 
 Venus, in a wrathful tone, 
 
 ‘¢_ Hear me out!” said Wegg. ‘‘ The Pump. 
 —When I struck it against the Pump, and found, 
 not only that the top was loose and opened with 
 a lid, but that something in it rattled. That 
 something, comrade, I discovered to be agmall 
 flat oblong cash-box. Shall I say it was disap- 
 pintingly light ?” 
 
 ‘“'There were papers in it,” said Venus. 
 
 ‘¢There your expressive countenance speaks 
 indeed!” cried Wegg. ‘‘A paper. ‘The box 
 was locked, tied up, and sealed, and on the out- 
 side was a parchment label, with the writing, 
 ‘My WILL, JOHN HARMON, TEMPORARILY DEPOS- 
 ITED HERE.’ ” 
 
 ‘¢We must know its contents,” said Venus. 
 
 ‘‘__Hear me out!” cried Wegg. ‘‘I said so, 
 and I broke the box open.” 
 
 ‘Without coming to me!” exclaimed Ve- 
 nus. : 
 
 “Exactly so, Sir!” returned Wegg, blandly 
 and buoyantly. “I see I take you with me! 
 Hear, hear, hear! Resolved, as your discrim- 
 inating good sense perceives, that if you was to 
 have a sap—pur—izx it should be a complete 
 one! Well, Sir. And so, as you have hon- 
 ored me by anticipating, I examined the docu- 
 ment. Regularly executed, regularly witnessed, 
 very short. Inasmuch as he has never made — 
 friends, and has ever had a rebellious family, — 
 he, John Harmon, gives to Nicodemus Bofftn — 
 the Littke Mound, which is quite enough for F 
 him, and gives the whole rest and residue of his | 
 property to the Crown.” 
 
 ‘“‘The date of the will that has been proved 
 must be looked to,” remarked Venus. ‘It may — 
 be later than this one.” | 
 
 ‘‘__Hear me out!” cried Wegg. ‘I said so, 
 I paid a shilling (never mind your sixpence of | 
 it) to look up that will. Brother, that will is— 
 dated months before this will. And now, as a- 
 fellow-man, and as.a partner in a friendly move,” — 
 added Wegg, benignantly taking him by both — 
 hands again, and clapping him on both knees” 
 again, ‘*say have I completed my labor of love” 
 to your perfect satisfaction, and are you sap—_ 
 pur—IZED ?” pais 
 
 Mr. Venus contemplated his fellow-man and 
 partner with doubting eyes, and then rejoined 
 stiffly : oa 
 
 “This is great news indeed, Mr. Weegg. | 
 There’s no denying it. But I could have wish- 
 ed you had told it me before you got your fright 
 to-night, and I could have wished you had ever 
 asked me as your partner what we were to do, 
 before you thought you were dividing a respons-— 
 ibility.” a 
 
 ‘‘ Hear me out!” cried Wegg. ‘I knew 
 you was a-going to say so. But alone I bor 
 the anxiety, and alone I'll bear the blamel’ 
 This with an air of great magnanimity. 
 
 ‘ & Now,” said Venus. ‘“ Let’s see this will a 
 this box.” RS oa 
 
 ‘‘Do I understand, brother,” returned Wegt 
 
~o 
 
 ow 
 
 with considerable reluctance, ‘that it is your 
 wish to see this will and this—” 
 Mr. Venus smote the table with his hand. 
 _ Hear me out!” said Were. ‘‘Hear me 
 out! Jil go and fetch ’emn.” . 
 _ After being some time absent, as if in his coy- 
 e€tousness he could hardly make up ‘his mind to 
 produce the treasure to his partner, he returned 
 with an old leathern hat-box, into which he had 
 put the other box, for the better preservation of 
 commonplace appearances, and for the disarm- 
 ing of suspicion. ‘‘But I don’t half like open- 
 ing it here,” said Silas, in a low voice, looking 
 around: “‘he might come back, he may not be 
 gone; we don’t know what he may be up to, 
 after what we’ve seen.” 
 *There’s something in that,” assented Venus. 
 “Come to my place.” 
 i Jealous of the custody of the box, and yet 
 «fearful of opening it under the existing circum- 
 Stances, Wexg hesitated. ‘ Come, I tell you,” 
 repeated Venus, chafing, ‘‘to my place.” Not 
 very weil seeing his way to a refusal, Mr. Wegg 
 _ then rejoined in a gush, ‘‘—Hear me out!__ 
 Certainly.” So he locked up the Bower and 
 they set forth: Mr. Venus taking his arm, and 
 Keeping it with remarkable tenacity. 
 . They found the usual dim light burning in 
 the window of Mr. Venus’s establishment, im- 
 perfectly disclosing to the public the usual pair 
 of preserved frogs, sword in hand, -with their 
 point of honor still unsettled. Mr. Venus had 
 closed. his shop door on. coming out, and now 
 opened it with the key and shut it again as soon 
 as they were within; but not before he had put 
 up and barred the shutters of the shop window. 
 “No one can get in without being let in,”’ said 
 _he then, ‘‘and we couldn’t be more snug than 
 _ here.” So he raked together the yet warm cin- 
 ders in the rusty grate, and made‘a fire, and 
 trimmed the candle on the little counter. As 
 the fire cast its flickering gleams here and there 
 upon the dark greasy walls, the Hindoo baby, 
 the African baby, the articulated English baby, 
 the assortment of skulls, and the rest of the col- 
 lection, came starting to their various stations 
 as if they had all been out, like their master, 
 and were punctual in a general rendezvous to 
 assist at the secret. The French gentleman had 
 grown considerably since Mr. Wegg last saw him, 
 being now accommodated with a pair of legs and 
 a head, though his arms were yet in abeyance. 
 ‘To whomsoever the head had originally belonged, 
 Silas Wegg would have regarded it asa personal 
 favor if he had not cut quite so many teeth. 
 _ Silas took his seat in silence on the wooden 
 box before the fire, and Venus dropping into his 
 low chair produced from among his skeleton 
 hands his tea-tray and tea-cups, and put the 
 k-tile on. Silas inwardly approved of these 
 preparations, trusting they might end in Mr. 
 Venns’s diluting his intellect. 
 ‘Now, Sir,” said Venus, “all is safe and 
 arc Let us see this discovery.” 
 _ With still reluctant hands, and not without 
 several glances toward the skeleton hands, as if 
 e mistrusted that acouple of them might spring 
 orth and clutch the document, Wege opened 
 the hat-box and revealed the cash-box, opened 
 the cash-box and revealed the will. He held a 
 corner of it tight, while Venus, taking hold of an- 
 Other corner, searchingly and attentively read it. 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 219 
 
 ne Was I correct in my account of it, partner ?” 
 said Mr. Wegg at length. 
 
 ‘‘ Partner, you were,” said Mr. Venus. 
 
 Mr. Wegg thereupon made an easy, graceful 
 movement, as though he would fold it up; but 
 Mr. Venus held on by his corner. 
 
 ‘* No, Sir,”? said Mr. Venus, winking his weak 
 eyes and shaking his head, ‘No, partner. The 
 question is now brought up, who is going to take 
 care of this. Do you know who is going to take 
 care of this, partner ?” 
 
 ‘“‘T am,” said Wegg. 
 
 “Oh dear no, partner,” retorted V enus, 
 ‘* That's a mistake. Iam. Now look here, Mr. 
 Wegg. I don’t want to have any words with 
 you, and still less do I want to have any ana- 
 tomical pursuits with you.” 
 
 ‘“What do you mean ?” said Wegg, quickly. 
 
 ‘‘T mean, partner,” replied Venus, slowly, 
 ‘‘that it’s hardly possible for a man to feel in a 
 more amiable state toward another man than I 
 do toward you at this present moment. But I 
 am on my own ground, I am surrounded by the 
 trophies of my art, and my tools is very handy.” 
 
 ‘“*What do you mean, Mr. Venus?” asked 
 Wegg again. 
 
 ‘I am surrounded, as I have observed,” said 
 Mr. Venus, placidly, ‘by the trophies of my 
 art. They are numerous, my stock of human wa- 
 rious is large, the shop is preity well crammed, 
 and I don’t just now want any more trophies of: 
 my art. But I like my art, and I know how to 
 exercise my art.” 
 
 ‘* No man better,” assented Mr. Wegg, with a 
 somewhat staggered air. 
 
 **There’s the Miscellanies of several human 
 specimens,” said Venus, ‘‘ (though you mightn’t 
 think it) in the box on which you're sitting. 
 There’s the Miscellanies of several human speci- 
 mens in the lovely compo-one behind the door 3” 
 with a nod toward the French gentleman. ‘It 
 still wants a pair of arms. -I don’t say that I’m 
 in any hurry for ’em.” 
 
 ‘You must be wandering in your mind, part- 
 ner,’’ Silas remonstrated. 
 
 “* You'll excuse me if I wander,” returned 
 Venus; ‘‘I am sometimes rather subject to it. 
 I like my art, and I know how to exercise my 
 art, and I mean to have the keeping of this doe- 
 ument,”’ 7 
 
 ‘* But what has that got to do with your art, 
 partner ?” asked Wegg, in an insinuating tone. 
 
 Mr. Venus winked his chronically - fatigued 
 eyes both at once, and adjusting the kettle on 
 the fire, remarked to himself, in a hollow voice, 
 ‘*She’ll bile in a couple of minutes.” 
 
 Silas Wegg glanced at the kettle, glanced at 
 the shelves, glanced at the French gentleman 
 behind the door, and shrank a little as he glanced 
 at Mr. Venus winking his red eyes, and feel- 
 ing in his waistcoat pocket—as for a lancet, say 
 —with his unoccupied hand. He and Venus 
 were necessarily seated close together, as each 
 held a corner of the document, which was but a 
 common sheet of paper. ag 
 
 ‘* Partner,” said Wegg, even more insinua~ 
 tingly than before, ‘‘I propose that we cut it in 
 half, and each keep a half.” ; 
 
 Venus shook his shock of hair, as he replied, 
 ‘Tt wouldn’t do to mutilate it, partner. It 
 might seem tobe canceled. . ? 
 
 ** Partner,” said Wegg, after a silence, during 
 
220 
 
 ‘which they had contemplated one another, “ don’t 
 your speaking countenance say that you're a-go- 
 ing to suggest a middle course ?” 
 
 Venus shook his shock of hair as he replied, 
 ‘‘Partner, you have kept this paper from. me 
 once. You shall never keep it from me again. 
 I offer you the box and the label to take care of, 
 but I’ll take care of the paper.” 
 
 Silas hesitated a little longer, and then sud- 
 ‘denly releasing his corner, and resuming his 
 buoyant and benignant tone, exclaimed, ‘‘What’s 
 life without trustfulness! What’s a fellow-man 
 without honor! You’re welcome to it, partner, 
 in aspirit of trust and confidence.” 
 
 Continuing to wink his red eyes both together 
 
 —but in a self-communing way, and without any 
 show of triumph—Mr. Venus folded the paper 
 now left in his hand, and locked it in a drawer 
 behind him, and pocketed the key. He then 
 proposed “ A cup of tea, partner?” To which 
 Mr. Wegg returned, ‘‘ Thank’ee, partner,” and 
 the tea was made and poured out. 
 Next,” said Venus, blowing at his tea in 
 his saucer, and looking over it at his confiden- 
 tial friend, ‘‘comes the question, What's the 
 course to be pursued ?” 
 
 On this head Silas Wegg had much to say. 
 Silas had to say That, he would beg to remind 
 his comrade, brother, and partner, of the im- 
 pressive passages they had read that evening ; 
 of the evident parallel in Mr. Boffin’s mind be- 
 tween them and the late owner of the Bower, 
 and the present circumstances of the Bower ; of 
 the bottle; and of the box. That, the fortunes 
 of his brother and comrade, and of himself, were 
 evidently made, inasmuch as they had but to 
 put their price upon this document, and get that 
 price from the minion of fortune and the worm 
 of the hour: who now appeared to be léess of a 
 minion and more of a worm than had been pre- 
 viously supposed. ‘That, he considered it plain 
 that such price Was stateable in a single express- 
 ive word, and that the word was, ‘‘ Halves!” 
 That, the question then arose when ‘‘ Halves !” 
 should be called. ‘That, here he had a plan of 
 action to recommend, with a conditional clause. 
 That, the plan of action was that they should 
 lie by with patience; that, they should allow the 
 Mounds to be gradually leveled and cleared 
 away, while retaining to themselves their pres- 
 ent opportunity of watching the process—which 
 would be, he conceived, to put the trouble and 
 cost of daily digging and delving upon some- 
 body else, while they might nightly turn such 
 complete disturbance of the dust to the account 
 of their own private investigations—and that, 
 when the Mounds were gone, and they had 
 worked those chances for their own joint benefit 
 solely, they should then, and not before, explode 
 ‘on the minion and worm. But here came the 
 conditional clause, and to this he entreated the 
 special attention of his comrade, brother, and 
 partner. It was not to be borne that the min- 
 ion and worm should carry off any of that prop- 
 erty which was now to be regarded as their own 
 property. When he, Mr. Wegg, had seen the 
 minion surreptitiously making off with that bot- 
 tle, and its precious contents unknown, he had 
 looked upon him in the light of a mere robber, 
 and, as such, would have despoiled him of his 
 ill-gotten gain, but for the judicious interference 
 of his comrade, brother, and partner. There- 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 * 
 
 fore, the conditional clause he proposed was, 
 that, if the minion should return in his late 
 sneaking manner, and if, being closely. watched, 
 he should be found to possess himself of any 
 thing, no matter what, the sharp sword impend- 
 
 ‘ing over his head should be instantly shown him, 
 
 he should be strictly examined as to what he 
 knew or suspected, should be severely handled 
 by them his masters, and should be kept in a 
 state of abject moral bondage and slavery until 
 the time when they should see fit to permit him 
 to purchase his freedom at the price of half his 
 possessions. If, said Mr. Wege by way of per- 
 oration, he had erred in saying only ** Halves!” 
 he trusted to his comrade, brother, and partner 
 not to hesitate to set him right, and to reprove 
 his weakness. It might be more according to 
 the rights of things, to say Two-thirds ; it might 
 be more according to the rights-of-things,.to say 
 Three-fourths. On those points he was ever 
 open to correction. 
 
 Mr. Venus, having wafted his attention to 
 this discourse over three successive saucers of 
 tea, signified his concurrence in the views ad- 
 vanced. Inspirited hereby, Mr. Wegg extended 
 his right hand, and declared it to be a hand 
 which never yet. Without entering into more 
 minute particulars. Mr. Venns, sticking to his 
 tea, briefly professed his belief, as polite forms 
 required of him, that it was a hand which never 
 yet. But contented himself with looking at it, 
 and did not take it to his bosom. 
 
 “Brother,” said Wegg, when this happy un- 
 derstanding was established, “‘I should like to 
 ask you something. You remember the night 
 when I first looked in here, and found you float- 
 ing your powerful mind in tea?” 
 
 Still swilling tea, Mr. Venus nodded assent. 
 
 ‘¢ And there you sit, Sir,” pursued Wegg with 
 an air of thoughtful admiration, ‘‘as if you had 
 never left off! There you sit, Sir, as if you had 
 an unlimited capacity of assimilating the fla- 
 grant article! There you sit, Sir, in the midst 
 of your works, looking as if you’d been called 
 upon for Home, Sweet Home, and was obleeg- 
 ing the company ! 
 
 ‘A exile from home splendor dazzles in vain, 
 
 O give you your lowly Preparations again, 
 
 The birds stuffed so sweetly that can’t be expected to 
 come at your call, ; 
 
 Give you these with the peace of mind dearer than all. 
 Home, Home, Home, sweet Home?’ : 
 
 —Be it ever,” added Mr. Wegg in prose as he 
 glanced about the shop, ‘‘ever so ghastly, all 
 things considered, there’s no place like it.” 
 
 ‘¢You said you'd like to ask something; but — 
 you haven’t asked it,” remarked Venus, very un-_ 
 sympathetic in manner, 
 
 ‘‘Yourgpeace of mind,” said Wegg, offering _ 
 condolence, ‘‘ your peace of mind was in a poor 
 way that night. How’s it going on. Js it look~— 
 ing up at all?” ; 
 
 ‘¢She does not wish,” replied Mr. Venus with — 
 a comical mixture of indignant obstinacy and ~ 
 tender melancholy, ‘‘to regard herself, nor yet 
 to be regarded, in that particular light. There’s ij 
 no more to be said.” eg 
 
 ‘‘Ah, dear me, dear me!” exclaimed Wegg 
 with a sigh, but eying him while pretending to 
 keep him company in eying the fire, ‘‘such 1s 
 Woman! And I remember you said that night, 
 sitting there as I sat here—said that night when 
 
except for its plumage, very like myself. 
 
 had taken an interest in these very affairs. Such 
 
 is coincidence!” . 
 
 “Her father,” rejoined Venus, and then stopped 
 to swallow more tea, ‘‘her father was mixed up 
 in them.” aii 
 
 **You didn’t mention her name, Sir, I think ?” | 
 
 observed Wegg, pensively. ‘‘No, you didn’t 
 mention her name that night,” 
 
 ** Pleasant Riderhood.”’ 
 
 “In—deed!” cried Wegg. ‘Pleasant Rider- 
 hood. / There’s something moving in the name. 
 Pleasant. Dear me! Seems to express what 
 she might have been if she hadn’t made that un- 
 pleasant remark—and what she ain’t in conse- 
 quence of having made it. Would it at all pour 
 balm into your wounds, Mr. Venus, to inquire 
 how you came acquainted with her?” 
 
 **I was down at the water-side,” said Venus, 
 taking another gulp of tea and mournfully wink- 
 ing at the fire—‘‘ looking for parrots’ —taking 
 another gulp and stopping. 
 
 Mr. Wegg hinted, to jog his attention: ‘You 
 
 could hardly have been out parrot-shooting in 
 
 the British climate, Sir?” 
 ‘No, no, no,” said Venus, fretfully. ‘I was 
 down at the water-side looking for parrots brought 
 
 home by sailors, to buy for stuffing.” 
 
 MiBy, ay, ay, Sir!” 
 
 *‘—And looking for a nice pair of rattle- 
 snakes, to articulate for a Museum—when I was 
 doomed to fall in with her and deal with her. 
 It was just at the time of that discovery in the 
 river. Her father had seen the discovery being 
 towed in the river. .I made the popularity of 
 the subject a reason for going back to improve 
 the acquaintance, and I have never since been 
 the man Iwas. My very bones is rendered flab- 
 by by brooding over it. If they could be brought 
 to me loose, to sort, I should hardly have the 
 face to claim ’em as mine. To such an extent 
 have I fallen off under it.” 
 
 Mr. Wegg, less interested than he had been, 
 
 glanced at one particular shelf in the dark. 
 
 **Why I remember, Mr. Venus,” he said, in 
 a tone of friendly commiseration ‘‘(for I re- 
 member every word that falls from you, Sir), I 
 remember that you said that night, you had got 
 up there—and then your words was, ‘Never 
 mind.” 
 
 ‘*—The parrot that I bonght of her,” said 
 Venus, with a despondent rise and fall of his 
 eves. “Yes; there it lies on its side, dried up; 
 I’ve 
 never had the heart to ‘prepare it, and I never 
 shall have now.” 
 
 _ With a disappointed face, Silas mentally con- 
 
 signed this parrot to regions more than tropical, . 
 
 and, seeming for the time to have lost his power 
 of assuming an interest in the woes of Mr. Ve- 
 nus, fell to tightening his wooden leg as a prep- 
 aration for departure: its gymnastic perform- 
 ances of that evening having severely tried its 
 constitution, 
 
 After Silas had left the shop, hat-box in hand, 
 and had left Mr. Venus to lower himself to obliv- 
 
 ion-point with the requisite weight of tea, it 
 
 greatly preyed on his ingenuons mind that he 
 
 had taken this artist into partnership at all. He 
 bitterly felt that he had overreached himself in| 
 _ the beginning by grasping at Mr. Venus’s mere £ , 
 
 straws of hints, now shown to be worthless for | promised to protract itself through many days 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 your peace of mind was first laid low, that you 
 
 221 
 
 his purpose. Casting about for ways and means 
 of dissolving the connection without loss of mon- 
 ey, reproaching himself for having been betrayed 
 into an avowal of his secret, and complimenting 
 himself beyond measure on his purely accidental 
 good-luck, he beguiled ‘the distance between 
 Clerkenwell and the mansion of the Golden 
 Dustman. 
 
 For Silas Wegg felt it to be quite out of. the 
 question that he could lay his head upon his 
 pillow in peace without first hovering over Mr, 
 Boffin’s house in the superior character of its 
 Evil Genius. Power (unless it be the power of 
 intellect or virtue) has ever the greatest attrac- 
 tion for the lowest natures; and the mere defi- 
 ance of the unconscious house-front, with his 
 power to strip the roof off the inhabiting family 
 like the roof of a house of cards, was a treat 
 which had a charm for Silas Wegg. 
 
 As he hovered on the opposite side of the 
 street, exulting, the carriage drove up. 
 
 ‘“‘There’ll shortly be an end of you,” said 
 Wegg, threatening it with the hat-box. ‘‘ Your 
 varnish is fading.” 
 
 Mrs. Boffin descended and went in. 
 
 “ Look out for a fall, my Lady Dustwoman,” 
 said Wegg. 
 
 Bella lightly descended, and ran in after 
 her. 
 
 ‘**How brisk we are!” said Wegg. ‘‘You 
 won't run so gayly to your old shabby home, my 
 girl, You'll have to go there, though.” 
 
 A little while, and the Secretary came out. 
 
 ‘‘T was passed over for you,” said Wegg. 
 ‘* But you had better provide yourself with an- 
 other situation, young man.” 
 
 Mr. Boffin’s shadow passed upon the blinds 
 of three large windows as he trotted down the 
 room, and passed again as he went back: 
 
 ‘*Yoop!” cried Wegg. ‘‘You’re there, are 
 yon? Where’s the bottle? You would give 
 your bottle for my box, Dustman!” 
 
 Having now composed his mind for slumber, 
 he turned homeward. Such was the greed of 
 the fellow, that his mind had shot beyond halves, 
 two-thirds, three-fourths, and gone straight to 
 spoliation of the whole. ‘‘ Though that wouldn’t 
 | quite do,” he considered, growing cooler as he 
 got away. ‘‘That’s what would happen to him 
 if he didn’t buy us up. We should get nothing 
 by that.” ; 
 
 We so judge others by ourselves, that it had 
 never come into his head before that he might 
 not buy us up, and might prove honest, and pre- 
 fer to be poor. It caused him a slight tremor as 
 it passed; but a very slight one, for the idle 
 thought was gone directly. 
 
 ‘¢He’s grown too fond of money for that,” 
 said Wegg; ‘‘he’s grown too fond of money.’ 
 The burden fell into a strain or tune as he 
 stumped along the pavements. All the way 
 home he stumped it out of the rattling streets, 
 piano with his own foot, and forte with his wood- 
 en leg, ‘‘He’s Grown too FonD of MONEY for 
 THAT, he’s GROWN too FOND of MONEY.” — j 
 
 Even next day Silas soothed himself with this 
 melodious strain, when he was called out of bed 
 at daybreak to set open the yard-gate and admit 
 the train of carts and horses that came to carry 
 off the little Mound. And all day long, as he 
 kept unwinking watch on the slow process which _ 
 
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It may not be so written in the Gospel accord- 
 
 ing to Podsnappery ; you may not ‘‘ find these 
 words” for the text of a sermon, in the Returns 
 of the Board of Trade; but they have been the 
 truth since the foundations of the universe were 
 laid, and they will be the truth until the founda- 
 tions of the universe are shaken by the Builder. 
 This boastful hundivor of ours, which fails in 
 its terrors for the professional pauper, the sturdy 
 breaker of windows and the rampant tearer of 
 clothes, strikes with a cruel and a wicked stab 
 at the stricken sufferer, and is a horror to the 
 deserving and unfortunate. We must mend it, 
 lords and gentlemen and honorable boards, or in 
 its own evil hour it will mar every one of us. 
 
 Old Betty Higden fared upon her pilgrimage 
 as many ruggedly honest creatures, women and 
 men, fare on their toiling way along the roads 
 of life. Patiently to earn a spare bare living, and 
 quietly to die, untouched by work-house hands— 
 this was her highest sublunary hope. 
 
 Nothing had been heard of her at Mr. Boffin’s 
 house since she trudged off. The weather had 
 been hard and the roads had been bad, and her 
 spirit was up. A less stanch spirit might have 
 been subdued by such adverse influences; but 
 the loan for her little outfit was in no part re- 
 paid, and it had gone worse with her than she 
 had foreseen, and she was put upon proving her 
 case and maintaining her independence. 
 
 Faithful soul! When she had spoken to the 
 Secretary of that ‘‘ deadness that steals over me 
 at times,” her fortitude had made too little of 
 it. Oftener and ever oftener, it came stealing 
 over her; darker and ever darker, like the shad- 
 ow of advancing Death. That the shadow should 
 be deep as it came on, like the shadow of an 
 actual presence, was in accordance with the laws 
 of the physical world, for all the Light that shone 
 on Betty Higden lay beyond Death. 
 
 The poor old creature had taken the upward 
 course of the river Thames as her general track ; 
 it was the track in which her last home lay, and 
 of which she had last had local love and knowl- 
 edge. She had hovered for a little while in the 
 near neighborhood of her abandoned dwelling, 
 and had sold, and knitted and sold, and gone on. 
 In the pleasant towns of Chertsey, Walton, 
 Kingston, and Staines, her figure came to be 
 quite well known for some short weeks, and then 
 again passed on. 
 
 She would take her stand in market-places, 
 where there were such things, on market-days ; 
 at other times, in the busiest (that was seldom 
 very busv) portion of the little quiet High Street ; 
 at still other times she would explore the outly- 
 ing roads for great houses, and would ask leave 
 at the Lodge to pass in with her basket, and 
 would not often get it. But ladies in carriages 
 would frequently make purchases from her trifling 
 stock, and were usually pleased with her bright 
 eyes and her hopeful speech. In these and her 
 clean dress originated a fable that she was well- 
 to-do in the world: one might say, for her sta- 
 tion, rich. As making a comfortable provision 
 for its subject which costs nobody any thing, this 
 class of fable has long been popular. 
 
 In those pleasant little towns on Thames you 
 may hear the fall of the water over the weirs, or 
 even, in still weather, the rustle of the rushes ; 
 
 and from the bridge you may see the vonng riv- 
 er, dimpled like a young child, playfully gliding 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND, 
 
 223 
 
 away among the trees, unpolluted by the defile- 
 ments that lie in wait for it on its course, and as 
 yet out of hearing of the deep summons of the 
 sea. It were too much to pretend that Betty 
 Higden made out such thoughts; no; but she 
 heard the tender river whispering to smany like 
 | herself, ‘‘Come to me, come to me! When the 
 icruel shame and terror you have so long fled 
 ifrom most beset you, come to me! I am.-thg 
 Hae Officer appeinted by eternal ordinance 
 ito do my work; I am not held in estimation ac- 
 ycording as I shirk it. My breast is softer than 
 ithe pauper-nurse’s ; death in my arms is peace- 
 ‘fuller than among the pauper-wards. Come to 
 Ime!” 
 
 There was abundant place for gentler fancies 
 too, in her untutored mind. Those gentlefolks 
 and their children inside those fine houses, could 
 they think,-as they looked out at her, what it 
 was to be really hungry, really cold’? Did they 
 feel any of the wonder about her that she felt 
 about them? Bless the dear laughing children! 
 If they could have seen‘sick Johnny in her arms 
 would they have cried for pity? If they could 
 have seen dead Johnny on that little bed would 
 they have understood it? Bless the dear chil- 
 dren, for his sake, any how! So with the hum- 
 bler houses in the little street, the inner fire- 
 light shining on the panes as the outer twilight 
 darkened. When the families gathered indoors 
 there, for the night, it was only a foolish fancy 
 to feel as if it were a little hard in them to close 
 
 the shutter and blacken the flame. So with the 
 lighted shops, and speculations whether their 
 masters and mistresses taking tea in a perspec- 
 tive of back-parlor—not so far within but that 
 the flavor of ‘tea and toast came out, mingled 
 with the glow of light, into the street—ate or 
 drank or wore what they sold, with the greater 
 relish because they dealt in it. So with the 
 church-yard on a branch of the solitary way to 
 the night’s sleeping-place. ‘‘ Ah me! The dead 
 and I seem to have it pretty much to ourselves 
 in the dark and in this weather! But so much 
 the better for all who are warmly housed at 
 home.” The poor soul envied no one in bitter- 
 “ness, and grudged no one any thing. 
 
 But the old abhorrence grew stronger on her 
 as she grew weaker, and it found more sustain- 
 ing food than she did in her wanderings. Now, © 
 she would light upon the shameful spectacle of 
 some desolate creature—or some wretched rag- 
 ged groups of either sex, or of both sexes, with 
 children among them huddled together like tha 
 smaller vermin for a little warmth—lingering 
 and lingering on a doorstep, while the appointed 
 evader of the public trust did his dirty office of 
 trying to weary them out and so get rid of them. 
 Now, she would light upon some poor decent 
 person, like herself, going afoot on a pilgrimage 
 of many weary miles to see some worn-out rela- 
 tive or friend who had been charitably clutched 
 off to a great blank barren Union House, as far 
 from old home as the County Jail (the remote-~ 
 ness of which is always its worst punishment for’ 
 
 small rural offenders), and in its dietary, and in 
 its lodging, and in its tending of the sick, a 
 much more penal establishment. Sometimes she 
 would hear a newspaper read out, and would 
 learn how the Registrar-General cast up the units 
 that had within the last week died of want and 
 of exposure to the weather: for which that Re- 
 
224 
 
 cording Angel seemed to have a regular fixed 
 
 place in his sum, as if they were its half-pence. 
 All such things she would hear discussed, as we, 
 my lords and gentlemen and honorable boards, 
 in our unapproachable magnificence never hear 
 them, and from all such things she would fly 
 with the wings of raging Despair. 
 
 This is not to be received as a figure of speech. 
 Old Betty Higden however tired, however foot- 
 sore, would start up and be driven away by her 
 awakened’ horror of falling into the hands of 
 
 », Charity. It is a remarkable Christian improve- 
 
 \yment, to have made a pursuing Fury of the 
 
 1} Good Samaritan ; but it was so in this case, and 
 
 jf it is a type of many, many, many. 
 
 ' ‘Two incidents united to intensify the old un- 
 reasoning abhorrence — granted in a previous 
 place to be unreasoning, because the people al- 
 ways are unreasoning, and invariably make a 
 point ot producing all their smoke without fire. 
 
 One day she was sitting in a market-place on 
 a bench outside an inn, with her little wares for 
 sale, when the deadness that she strove against 
 came over her so heavily that the scene depart- 
 ed from before her eyes; when it returned, she 
 
 found herself on the ground, her head supported, 
 
 by some good-natured market-women, and a lit- 
 tle crowd about her. 
 
 ‘‘Are you better now, mother?” asked one 
 of the women. ‘‘Do you think you can do 
 nicely now ?” . 
 
 ‘* Have I been ill then ?” asked old Betty. 
 
 ** You have had a faint like,” was the answer, 
 “for a fit. It ain’t that you’ve been a-strug- 
 gling, mother, but you’ve been stiff and numbed.”’ 
 
 ‘‘Ah?!” said Betty, recovering her memory. 
 ‘It’s the numbness. Yes. It comes over me 
 at times.” 
 
 ‘Was it gone ?”’ the women asked her. 
 
 ‘*Tt’s gone now,” said Betty. ‘‘I shall be 
 stronger than I was afore. Many thanks to ye, 
 my dears, and when you come to be as old as I 
 am, may others do as much for you!” 
 
 They assisted her to rise, but she could not 
 stand yet, and they supported her when she sat 
 down again upon the bench. 
 
 ‘*My head’s a bit light, and my feet are a bit 
 heavy,” said old Betty, leaning her face drowsi- 
 ly on the breast of the woman who had spoken 
 before. ‘*They’ll both come nat’ral in a min- 
 ute. There’s nothing more the matter.” 
 
 ‘Ask her,” said some farmers standing by, 
 who had come out from their market-dinner, 
 ‘“who belongs to her.” 
 
 ‘Are there any folks belonging to you, mo- 
 ther ?” said the woman. 
 
 “*Yes, sure,” answered Betty. ‘I heerd the 
 gentleman say it, but I couldn’t answer quick 
 enough. There’s plenty belonging tome. Don’t 
 ye fear for me, my dear.” 
 
 ‘“But are any of ’em near here?” said the 
 men's voices; the women’s voices chiming in 
 when it was said, and prolonging the strain. 
 
 “Quite near enough,” said Betty, rousing 
 herself. ‘‘Don’t ye be afeard for me, neigh- 
 bors.” 
 
 ‘*But you are not fit to travel. Where are 
 you going ?”’ was the next compassionate chorus 
 she heard. 
 
 “Tm agoing to London when I’ve sold out 
 all,” said Betty, rising with difficulty. ‘I’ve 
 right good friends in Londun. I want for no- 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. | Be 
 
 thing. I shall come to no harm. Thankye. 
 Don’t ye be afeard for me.” 
 
 A well-meaning by-stander, yellow-legringed 
 and purple-faced, said hoarsely over his red 
 comforter, as she rose to her feet, that she 
 ‘‘oughtn’t to be let to go.” 
 
 ‘**For the Lord’s love don’t meddle with me!” 
 eried old Betty, all her fears crowding on her. 
 **T am quite well now, and I must go this min- 
 ute.” 
 
 She caught up her basket as she spoke and 
 was making an unsteady rush away from them, 
 when the same by-stander checked her with his 
 hand on her sleeve, and urged her to come with 
 him and see the parish doctor. Strengthening 
 herself by the utmost exercise of her resolution, 
 
 the poor trembling creature shook him off, al- 
 
 most fiercely, and took to flight. Nor did she 
 feel safe until she had set a mile or two of by- 
 road between herself and the market-place, and 
 had crept into a copse, like a hunted animal, to 
 hide and recover breath. Not until then for the 
 
 first time did she venture to recall how she had . 
 looked over her shoulder before turning out of’ 
 
 the town, and had seen the sign of the White 
 Lion hanging across the road, and the fluttering 
 market booths, and the old gray church, and the 
 little crowd gazing after her but not attempting 
 to follow her. 
 
 The-second frightening incident was this. She ~ 
 
 had been again as bad, and had been for some 
 days better, and was traveling along by a part 
 of the road where it touched the river, and in 
 wet seasons was so often overflowed by it that 
 there were tall white posts set up to mark the 
 way. A barge was being towed toward her, and 
 she sat down on the bank to rest and watch it. 
 
 As the tow-rope was slackened by a turn of the 
 
 stream and dipped into the water, such a con- 
 fusion stole into her mind that she thought she 
 saw the forms of her dead children and dead 
 grandchildren peopling the barge, and waving 
 their hands to her in solemn measure; then, as 
 the rope tightened and came up, dropping dia- 
 monds, it seemed to vibrate into two parallel 
 ropes and strike her, with a twang, though it 
 was far off. When she looked again, there was 
 no barge, no river, no daylight, and a man whom 
 she had never before seen held a candle close 
 to her face. 
 
 ‘Now, Missus,” said he; ‘where did you 
 come from and where are you going to ?” 
 
 The poor soul confusedly asked the counter- 
 question where she was? | 
 
 **T am the Lock,” said the man. 
 
 ‘<The Lock ?” 
 
 **T am the Deputy Lock, on job, and this is 
 the Lock-house, (Lock or Deputy Lock, it’s all 
 one, while the t’other man’s in the hospital.) 
 What’s your Parish?” 
 
 *¢ Parish !” 
 direetly, wildly feeling about her for her basket, 
 and gazing at him in affright. 
 
 ‘You'll be asked the question down town,” 
 
 said the man. ‘‘ They won’t let you be more 
 than a Casual there. They'll pass you on to 
 your settlement, Missis, with all speed. You're 
 
 not in a state to be let come upon strange par- 
 
 ishes ’ceptin as a Casual.” 
 ‘Twas the deadness again !”’ murmured Betty 
 Higden, with her hand to her head. 
 
 ““It was the deadness, there’s not a doubt. 
 
 She was up from the truckle-bed 
 
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 Hy 
 
 “THSITA THL 
 
 about it,” returned the man. ‘I should have 
 thought the deadness was a mild word for it, if 
 it had been named to me when we brought you 
 in. Have vou got any friends, Missis ?” 
 : he 
 The best of friends, Master.” 
 Le should recommend your looking ‘em up if 
 you consider ’em game to do any thing for you,” 
 said the Deputy Lock. ‘ Have you got any 
 - 99? 
 money ? 
 ‘* Just a morsel of money, Sir.” 
 “Do you want to keep it ?” 
 *eSure I do!” 
 66 id, 
 
 Well, vou know,” said the Deputy Lock, 
 shrugging his shoulders with his hands in’ his 
 pockets, and shaking his head in a sulkily omin~ 
 “ous manner, “the parish authorities downtown 
 
 will have it out of you, if you go on, you. may 
 | * + £ 7 ” 
 take your Alfred Dayid. 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 cerca eS: i) ! . 
 Se ee || 
 RGR 
 
 SS 
 
 (ee 
 
 = 
 
 f = Se ——— = — 
 SSS 
 
 4 LLALF 
 a5 4 aa Li} 
 
 PRN 
 {SV 
 
 ‘¢Then I’ll not go on.” 
 
 ‘¢ They'll make you pay, as fur as your money 
 will go,” pursued the Deputy, ‘‘for your reliefasa 
 Gasual and for your being passed to your Parish.” 
 
 ‘¢Thank ye kindly, Master, for your warning, 
 thank ye for your shelter, and good-night.” 
 
 ‘¢ Stop a bit,” said the Deputy, striking in be- 
 tween her and the door. ‘ Why are you all of 
 a shake, and what’s your hurry, Missis ?” 
 
 ‘Oh, Master, Master,” returned Betty Hig- 
 den, ‘I've fought against the Parish and fled 
 from it, all my life, and I want to die free of 
 it!” 
 
 ‘‘T don’t know,” said the Deputy, with delib- 
 eration, ‘‘as I ought to let you go. 1’m a hon- 
 est man as gets my living by the sweat of my 
 brow, and I may fall into trouble by letting you 
 go. I’ve fell into trouble afore now, by George, 
 
 225 
 
 ee 
 
226 
 
 and I know what it is, and it’s made me careful. 
 You might be took with your deadness again, 
 half a mile off—or half of half a quarter, for 
 the matter of that—and then it would be asked, 
 Why did that there honest Deputy Lock let her 
 go, instead of putting her safe with the Parish ? 
 That’s what a man of his character ought to 
 have done, it would be argueyfied,” said the 
 Deputy Lock, cunningly harping on the strong | 
 string of her terror; ‘‘ he ought to have handed | 
 her over safe to the Parish. ‘That was to be ex- 
 pected of a man of his merits.” 
 
 As he stood in the doorway the poor old care- 
 worn wayworn woman burst into tears, and 
 clasped her hands, as if in a very agony she 
 prayed to him. 
 
 “As [ve told you, Master, I’ve the best of 
 friends. This letter will show how true I spoke, 
 and they will be thankfy] for me.” 
 
 The Deputy Lock opened the letter with a 
 grave face, which underwent no cliange as he 
 eyed its contents. But it might have done, if he 
 could have read them. 
 
 “What amount of small change, Missis,” he 
 said, with an abstracted air, after a little medi- 
 tation, ‘might you call a morsel of money ?” 
 
 Hurriedly emptying her pocket, old Betty laid 
 down on the table a shilling, and two sixpenny | 
 pieces, and a few pence. 
 
 ‘Tf I was to let you go instead of handing 
 you over safe to the Parish,” said the Deputy, 
 counting the money with his eyes, ‘‘ might it be | 
 your own free wish to leave that there behind 
 rou?” 
 
 “Take it, Master, take it, and welcome and 
 thankful!” 
 
 “I’m a man,” said the Deputy, giving her | 
 back the letter, and pocketing the coins, one by 
 one, ‘‘as earns his living by the sweat of his. 
 brow ;” here he drew his sleeve across his fore- 
 head, as if this particular portion of his humble 
 gains were the result of sheer hard labor and 
 virtuous industry; ‘“‘and [I won’t stand in your 
 way. Go where you like.” 
 
 She was gone out of the Lock-house as soon 
 as he gave her this permission, and her tottering 
 steps were on the road again. But, afraid to go 
 back and afraid to go forward; secing what she 
 fled from, in the sky-glare of the lights of the 
 little town before her, and leaving a confused 
 horror of it every where behind her, as if she 
 had escaped it in every stone of every market- 
 place; she struck off by side ways, among which 
 she got bewildered and lost. That night she 
 took refuge from the Samaritan in his latest ac- 
 credited form, under a farmer’s rick; and if— 
 worth thinking of, perhaps, my fellow-Chris- 
 tians —the Samaritan had in the lonely night 
 ‘passed by on the other side,” she would have 
 most devoutly thanked High Heaven for her es- 
 eape from him. | 
 
 The morning found her afoot again, but fast 
 declining as to the clearness of her thoughts, 
 though not as to the steadiness of her purpose. 
 Comprehending that her strength was quitting 
 her, and that the struggle of her life was al- 
 most ended, she could neither reason out the 
 means of getting back to her protectors, nor 
 even form the idea. The overmastering dread, 
 and the proud stubborn resolution it engendered 
 in her to die undegraded, were the two distinct 
 impressions left in her failing mind. Supported 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. _ 
 
 only by a sense that she was bent on conquering 
 in her life-long fight, she went on. ; 
 
 The time was come now when the wants of 
 this little life were passing away from her. She 
 could not have swallowed food though a table 
 
 had been spread for her in the next field. The 
 
 day was cold and wet, but she scarcely knew it. 
 She crept on, poor soul, like a criminal afraid 
 of being taken, and felt little beyond the terror 
 of falling down while it was yet daylight, and 
 being found alive. She had no fear that she 
 would live through another night. 
 
 Sewn in the breast of her gown, the money to 
 pay for her burial was still intact. If she could 
 wear through the day, and then lie down to die 
 under cover of the darkness, she would die in< 
 dependent. If she were captured previously, | 
 the money would be taken from her as a pauper 
 who had no right to it, and she would be carried 
 to the accursed work-house. Gaining her end, 
 the letter would be found in her breast, along 
 with the money, and the gentlefolks would say 
 when it was given back to them, ‘She prized 
 
 it, did old Betty Higden; she was true to it’; 
 
 and while she lived she would never let it be 
 disgraced by falling into the hands of those that 
 she held in horror.” Most illogical, inconse- 
 quential, and light-headed, this; but travelers 
 in the valley of the shadow of death are apt to 
 
 be light-headed ; and worn-out old people of low 
 
 estate have a trick of reasoning as indifferently 
 as they live, and doubtless would appreciate our 
 
 of ten thousand a year. 
 
 So, keeping to by-ways, and shunning human 
 approach, this troublesome old woman hid her- 
 self, and fared on all through the dreary day, 
 Yet so unlike was she to vagrant hiders in gen- 
 eral that sometimes, as the day advanced, there 
 was a bright fire in her eyes, and a quicker beat- 
 
 ‘ing at her feeble heart, as though she said ex- 
 
 ultingly, ‘‘ The Lord will see me through it!” 
 By what visionary hands she was led along 
 upon that journey of escape from the Samaritan 5 
 by what voices, hushed in the grave, she seemed 
 to be addressed; how she fancied the dead child 
 in her arms again, and times innumerable ad- 
 justed her shawl to keep it warm; what infinite 
 variety of forms of tower and roof and steeple 
 the trees took; how many furious horsemen rode 
 at her, crying, ‘‘There she goes! Stop! Stop, 
 Betty Higden!’”’ and melted away as they came 
 close; be these things left untold. Faring on 
 and hiding, hiding and faring on, the poor harm- 
 less creature, as though she were a Murderess 
 and the whole country were up after her, wore 
 out the day and gained the night. . 
 
 ‘¢ Water-meadows, or such like,” she had some- — 
 
 times murmured, on the day’s pilgrimage, when 
 she had raised her head and taken any note of 
 the real objects aboutjher. There now arose it 
 the darkness a great building, full of lighted 
 windows. Smoke was issuing from a high chim- 
 
 ney in the rear of it, and there was the sound of - 
 
 a water-wheel at the side. Between her and the 
 building lay a piece of water, in which the light-” 
 ed windows were reflected, and on its nearest 
 margin was a plantation of trees.. ‘‘I humbly 
 
 Poor Law more philosophically on an imcome 
 
 ‘ 
 4 
 
 ! 
 
 ; 
 
 } 
 it 
 
 § 
 
 4 
 
 3 
 : 
 ’ 
 ‘ 
 
 t 
 i 
 L 
 
 thank the Power and the Glory,” said Betty a 
 
 Higden, holding up her withered hands, ‘‘ that 
 I have come to my journey’s end!” 
 
 She crept among the trees to the trunk of.a 
 
 fi 
 
 sh , } 
 « bs 8 al \ % 
 * om tale Bek 
 
tree whence she could see, beyond some inter- 
 vening trees and branches, the lighted windows, 
 ‘both in their reality and their reflection in the 
 water. She placed her ‘orderly little basket at 
 her side, and sank upon the ground, supporting 
 herself against the tree. . It brought to her mind 
 the foot of the Cross, and she committed her- 
 self to Him who died upon it. Her strength 
 held out to enable her to arrange the letter in 
 her breast, so as that it could be seen that she 
 had a paper there. It had held out for this, 
 and it departed when this was done. 
 
 ‘‘T am safe here,” was her last benumbed 
 thought. ‘* When Iam found dead at the foot 
 of the Cross it will be by some of my own sort ; 
 - some of the working people who work among 
 the lights yonder. I can not see the lighted 
 windows now, but they are there. I am thank- 
 ful for all!” 
 
 * * * * Xe * 
 
 The darkness gone, and a face bending 
 down. 
 
 **Tt can not be the boofer lady ?” 
 
 “T don’t understand what you say. Let me 
 wet your lips again with this brandy. TF have 
 been away to fetch it. Did you think that I 
 was long gone ?” 
 dt is as the face of a woman, shaded by a 
 
 quantity of rich dark hair. It is the earnest 
 ‘face of a woman who is young and handsome. 
 But all is over with me on earth, and this must 
 be an Angel. 
 
 *‘ Have I been long dead ?” 
 
 **T don’t understand what you say. Let me 
 wet your lips again. I hurried all I could, and 
 brought no one back with me, lest you should 
 die of the shock of strangers.” ‘ 
 
 **Am I not dead ?” 
 
 -**T can not understand what you say. Your 
 voice is so low and broken that Fcan not hear 
 you. Do you hear me?” 
 
 eves.” 
 
 “Do you mean Yes?” 
 
 patie Tag 
 
 “T was.coming from my work just now, along 
 the path outside (I was up with the night-hands 
 last night), and I heard a groan, and found you 
 lying here.” , 
 
 ** What work, deary ?” 
 
 “‘Did you ask what work? At the paper- 
 mill.” 
 
 ‘¢ Where is it ?” 
 
 ‘«Your face is turned up to the sky, and you 
 can’t see it. It is close by. You can see‘my 
 face, here, between you and the sky ?” 
 
 ess” 
 
 ** Dare I lift you?” 
 
 faNot yet.”: - 
 
 ** Not even lift your head to get it on my arm? 
 I will do it by very gentle degrees, You shall 
 hardly feel it.”’ 
 
 * “Not yet. Paper. Letter.” 
 _ “*This paper in your breast ?” 
 
 **Bless ye!” 
 
 - ‘*Yet me wet your lips again. 
 it? ‘To read it ?” 
 
 Bless ye!” . 
 
 ' She reads it with surprise, and looks down 
 with, a new expression and an added interest on 
 the motionless face she kneels beside. 
 
 “TI know these names. I have heard them 
 
 Am I to open 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 ‘your lips again, and your forehead. 
 
 227 
 
 ‘* Will you send it, my dear?” 
 ‘*f can not understand you. Let me wet 
 There, 
 These words 
 
 ‘* What was 
 
 O poor thing, poor thing!” 
 through her fast-dropping tears. 
 
 }it that you asked me? Wait till I bring my 
 
 ear quite close,” 
 
 ‘* Will you send it, my dear ?” 
 
 ‘Will I send it to the writers? Is that your 
 wish? Yes, certainly.” “ 
 
 ‘You'll not give it up to any one but them ?” 
 
 “No.” 
 
 *“ As you must grow old in time, and come to 
 your dying hour, my dear, you'll not give it up 
 to any one but them ?” 
 
 ‘*No. Most solemnly.” 
 
 ‘Never to the Parish!” with a’ convulsed 
 struggle. 
 
 ‘*No. Most solemnly.” 
 
 ‘*Nor let the Parish touch me, nor yet so 
 much as look at me!” with another struggle. 
 
 ‘No. Faithfully.” 
 
 A look of thankfulness and triumph lights the 
 worn old face. The eyes, which have been dark- 
 ly fixed upon the sky, turn with meaning in them 
 toward the compassionate face from which the 
 tears are dropping, and a smile is on the aged 
 lips as they ask: 
 
 ‘‘ What is your name, my dear?” 
 
 ‘*My name is Lizzie Hexam.” 
 
 ‘‘T must be sore disfigured. Are you afraid 
 to kiss me?” 
 
 The answer is, the ready pressure of her lips 
 upon the cold but smiling mouth. 
 
 ‘¢ Bless ye! Now lift me, my love.” 
 
 Lizzie Hexam very softly raised the weather- 
 stained gray head and lifted her as high as 
 Heaven. 
 
 pont Fe eS 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 SOMEBODY BECOMES THE SUBJECT OF A PRE- 
 ; DICTION. 
 
 ‘¢¢ Wr GIVE THEE HEARTY THANKS FOR THAT 
 IT HATH PLEASED THEE TO DELIVER THIS OUR 
 SISTER OUT OF THE MISERIES OF THIS SINFUL 
 WorRLD.’”? So read the Reverend Frank Mil- 
 vey in a not untroubled voice, for his heart mis- 
 gave him that all was not quite right between 
 us and our sister—or say our sister in Law— 
 Poor Law—and that we sometimes read these 
 words in an awful manner over our Sister and 
 our Brother too. 
 
 And Sloppy—on whom the brave deceased 
 had never turned her back until she ran away 
 from him, knowing that otherwise he would not 
 be separated from her—Sloppy could not in his 
 conscience as yet find the hearty thanks required 
 of it. Selfish in Sloppy, and yet excusable, it 
 may be humbly hoped, because our sister had 
 been more than his mother. 
 
 The words were read above the ashes of Betty 
 Higden, in a corner of a church-yard near the 
 river; in a church-yard so obscure that there 
 was nothing in it but grass-mounds, not so much 
 as one single tombstone. It might not be to do 
 an unreasonably great deal for the diggers and 
 hewers, in a registering age, if we ticketed their 
 graves at the common charge; so that a new 
 generation might know which was which: so 
 that the soldier, sailor, emigrant, coming home, 
 
228 
 
 should be able to identify. the resting-place of 
 father, mother, playmate, or betrothed. For | 
 we turn up our eyes and say that we are all | 
 like in death, and we might turn them down 
 nd work the saying out in this world, so far, 
 t would be sentimental, perhaps? But how 
 Hs.y ye, my lords and gentlemen and honorable 
 boards, shall we not find good standing-room left 
 {ra little sentiment, if we look into our crowds ? 
 
 Near unto the Reverend Frank Milvey as he 
 read stood his little wife, John Rokesmith the 
 Secretary, and Bella Wilfer. These, over and 
 above Sloppy, were the mourners at the lowly 
 grave. Not a penny had been added to the 
 money sewn in her dress: what her honest 
 spirit had so long projected was fulfilled. 
 
 ‘‘T’ye todk it in my head,” said Sloppy, lay- 
 ing it, inconsolable, against the church door, 
 when all was done: ‘I’ve took it in my wretch- 
 ed head that I might have sometimes turned a 
 little harder for her, and it cuts me deep to think 
 so now.” 
 
 The Reverend Frank Milvey, comforting 
 Sloppy, expounded. to him how the best of us 
 were more or less remiss in our turnings at our 
 respective Mangles—some of us very much so— 
 and how we were all a halting, failing, feeble, 
 and inconstant crew. 
 
 ‘She warn’t, Sir,” said Sloppy, taking this 
 
 ghostly counsel rather ill, in behalf of his late 
 benefactress. ‘‘ Let us speak for ourselves, Sir. 
 She went through with whatever duty she had 
 to do. She went through with me, she went 
 through with the Minders, she went through 
 with herself; she went through with every think. 
 O Mrs. Higden, Mrs. Higden, you was a wo- 
 man and a mother and a mangler in a million 
 million !” 
 
 With those heart-felt words Sloppy removed 
 his dejected head from the church door, and 
 took it back to the grave in the corner, and laid 
 it down there, and wept alone. ‘‘ Not a very 
 poor grave,” said the Reverend Frank Milvey, 
 brushing his hand across his eyes, ‘‘ when it has 
 that homely figure on it. Richer, I think, than 
 it could be made by most of the sculpture in 
 Westminster Abbey !” 
 
 They left him undisturbed and passed out at 
 the wicket-gate. The water-wheel of the paper- 
 -mill was audible there, and seemed to have a. 
 softening influence on the bright wintry scene. 
 They had arrived but a little while before, and 
 Lizzie Hexam now told them the little she could 
 add to the letter in which she had inclosed Mr, 
 Rokesmith’s letter and had asked for their in- 
 structions. ‘This was merely how she had heard 
 the groan, and what had afterward passed, and 
 how she had obtained leave for the remains 
 to be placed in that sweet, fresh, empty store- 
 room of the mill from which they had just 
 accompanied them to the church-yard, and 
 how the last requests had been religiously ob- 
 
 served, 
 
 ‘6T could not have done it all, or nearly all, 
 of myself,” said Lizzie. ‘‘I should not have 
 wanted the will; but I should not have had the 
 power, without our managing partner,” 
 
 ‘‘Surely not the Jew who received us?” said 
 Mrs. Milvey. 
 
 (‘« My dear,” observed her husband in paren- 
 thesis, ‘‘ why not ?’’) 
 
 ‘‘The gentlemanscertainly is a Jew,” said 
 
 favorable. 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. , 
 
 Lizzie, ‘and the Lady, his wife, is a Jéwess, 
 and I was first brought to their notice by a Jew. 
 But I think there can not be kinder people in 
 the world.” 
 
 ‘¢But suppose they try to convert you!” sug- 
 gested Mrs. Milvey, bristling in her good little 
 way, as a clergyman’s wife, 
 
 ‘*To do what, ma’am ?” asked Lizzie, with a 
 modest smile. 
 
 “To make you change your religion,” said 
 Mrs. Milvey. 
 
 Lizzie shock her head, still smiling. ‘*' They 
 have never asked me what my religionis. They 
 asked me what my story was, and I told them, 
 ‘They asked me to be industrious and faithful, 
 and I promised to be so.. They most willingly 
 and cheerfully do their duty to all of us who are 
 employed here, and we try to do ours to them. 
 Indeed they do much more than their duty to 
 us, for they are wonderfully mindful of us in 
 many ways.” 
 
 ‘‘It is easy to see you're a favorite, my dear,” 
 said little Mrs. Milvey, not quite pleased. 
 
 ‘It would be very ungrateful in me to say I 
 am not,” returned Lizzie, ‘‘for I have been al- 
 ready raised to a place of confidence here. But 
 that makes no difference in their following their 
 own religion and leaving allofustoours. They 
 never talk of theirs to us, and they never talk 
 of ours tous. If I was the last in the mill it 
 would be just the same. They never asked me 
 what religion that poor thing had followed.” 
 
 ‘‘My dear,” said Mrs. Milvey, aside to the 
 Reverend Frank, ‘‘I wish you would talk to 
 her.7 
 
 ‘‘My dear,” said the Reverend Frank aside 
 to his good little wife, ‘¢ I think I will leaye it to 
 somebody else. The circumstances are hardly 
 There are plenty of talkers going 
 about, my love, and she will soon find one.” 
 
 c 
 
 While this discourse was interchanging, both 
 
 Bella and the Secretary observed Lizzie Hexam, 
 with great attention. Brought face to face for 
 the first time with the daughter of his supposed 
 murderer, it was natural that John Harmon 
 should have his own secret reasons for’a careful 
 scrutiny of her countenance and manner. Bella 
 knew that Lizzie’s father had been falsely ae- 
 cused of the crime which had had so great an 
 influence on her own life and fortunes; and her- 
 interest, though it had no secret springs, like 
 that of the Secretary, was equally natural. Both 
 had expected to see something very different 
 from the real Lizzie Hexam, and thus it fell out 
 that she became the unconscious means of bring- 
 ing them together. 
 
 For, when they had walked on with her to the 
 
 little house in the clean .village by the paper- — 
 
 mill, where Lizzie had a lodging with an elder- 
 ly couple employed in the establishment, and 
 when Mrs. Milvey and Bella had been up to see 
 her room and had come down, the mill bell 
 rang. This called Lizzie away for the time, 
 and left the Secretary and Bella standing rather 
 awkwardly in the small street; Mrs. Milvey 
 being engaged in pursuing the village children, 
 
 /and her investigations whether they were in 
 
 danger of becoming children of Jsrac}; and the 
 Reverend Frank being engaged—to say the truth > 
 —in evading that branch of his spiritual fone- 
 tions, and getting out of sight surreptitiously. 
 Bella at length said: ; 
 
 Pye” 
 Laqun 
 
 Se 
 
 tS: 
 
 if 
 
 ue 
 | 
 P 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 -“Hadn’t we better talk about the commission 
 we have undertaken, Mr. Rokesmith ?” 
 
 ‘*By all means,” said the Secretary. 
 
 *‘T suppose,” faltered Bella, ‘‘that we are 
 both commissioned, or we shouldn’t both be 
 here ?” fs 
 _ I suppose so,” was the Secretary’s answer. 
 
 ‘¢ When I'proposed to come with Mr. and Mrs. 
 Milvey,” said*Bella, ‘‘ Mrs. Boffin urged me to 
 
 - do so, in order that I might give her my small 
 report—it’s not worth any thing, Mr. Rokesmith, 
 except for it’s being a woman’s—which indeed 
 with you may be a fresh reason for it’s being 
 worth nothing—of Lizzie Hexam,” 
 
 “Mr. Boffin,” said the Secretary, ‘‘ directed 
 me to come for the same purpose.” __ 
 
 As they spoke they were leaving the little 
 street and emerging on the wooded landscape by 
 the river. 
 
 _ “You think well of her, Mr. Rokesmith ?” 
 
 - pursued Bella, conscious of making all the ad- 
 vances. : 
 
 *¢T think highly of her.” 
 
 **T am so glad of that! Something quite re- 
 
 _ fined in her beauty, is there not ?” 
 
 ‘‘ Her appearance is very striking.” 
 
 ‘¢There is a shade of sadness upon her that is 
 quite touching. At least I—I am not setting up 
 my own poor opinion, you know, Mr. Roke- 
 smith,” said Bella, excusing and explaining her- 
 self in a pretty shy way; ‘‘I am consulting 
 
 ou.” j 
 
 ‘*T noticed that sadness. I hope it may not,” 
 said the Secretary in a lower voice, ‘‘be the re- 
 sult of the false accusation which has been re- 
 tracted.” . 
 
 When they had passed on a little further with- 
 
 out speaking, Bella, after stealing a glance or | 
 
 two at the Secretary, suddenly said: ~ 
 
 ‘¢Oh, Mr. Rokesmith, don’t be hard with me, 
 don’t be stern with me; be magnanimous! I 
 want to talk with you on equal terms.” 
 
 The Secretary as suddenly brightened, and. 
 
 “returned: ‘‘Upon my honor I had no thought 
 but for you. I forced myself to be constrained, 
 
 lest you might misinterpret my being more natu- | 
 
 ral. There. It’s gone.” 
 ‘Thank you,” said Bella, holding out her lit- 
 tle hand. ‘Forgive me.” | 
 “No!” cried the Secretary, eagerly. ‘‘ For- 
 give me!” For there were tears in her eyes, 
 and they were prettier in his sight (though they 
 smote him on the heart rather reproachfully 
 too) than any other glitter in the world. 
 When they had walked a little further : 
 " ‘You were going to speak to me,” said the 
 Secretary, with the shadow so long on him quite 
 
 thrown off and cast away, ‘‘ about Lizzie Hex- 
 
 -am. . So wasI going to speak to you, if I could 
 have begun.” 
 ‘Now that you can begin, Sir,” returned Bel- 
 la, with a look as if she italicized the word by 
 putting one of her dimples under it, ‘‘ what were 
 - you going to say ?” 
 ~ **You remember, of course, that in her short 
 ~Jetter to Mrs. Boffin—short, but containing ev- 
 ery thing to the purpose—she stipulated that 
 ~ either her name, or else her place of residence, 
 ‘must be kept strictly a secret among us.” 
 ~ Bella nodded Yes. 
 “‘Tt is my duty to find out why she made that 
 stipulation. I have it in charge from Mr. Boffin 
 
 229 
 
 to discover, and I am very desirous for myself 
 to discover, whether that retracted accusation 
 still leaves any stain upon her. I mean whether 
 it places her at any disadvantage tow 
 one, even toward herself.” 
 r 6 Yes,” said Bella, nodding thoughtfully ; “eT 
 understand. That seems wise and considerate.” 
 ‘*You may not have noticed, Miss Wilfer. that 
 | she has the same kind of interest in you thatvou 
 'have in her. Just as you are attracted by her 
 beaut— by her appearance and manner, she is 
 attracted by yours.” 
 
 **T certainly have not noticed it,” returned 
 Bella, again italicizing with the dimple, ‘and I 
 should have given her credit for—” 
 
 The Secretary with a smile held up his hand, 
 so plainly interposing ‘‘ not for better taste” that 
 Bella’s color deepened over the little piece of 
 coquetry she was checked in. 
 
 ‘* And so,” resumed the Secretary, ‘‘if you 
 would speak with her alone before we go away 
 from here, I feel quite sure that a natural and 
 easy confidence would arise between you. Of 
 course you would not be asked to betray it; and 
 of course you would not, if you were. But if 
 you do not object to put this question to her—to 
 ascertain for us her own feeling in this one matter 
 —you can do so at a far greater advantage than I 
 or any élse could. Mr. Boffin is anxious on the 
 subject. And I am,” added the Secretary after 
 a moment, ‘‘for a special reason, very anxious.” 
 
 ‘‘T shall be happy, Mr. Rokesmith,” returned 
 Bella, to be of the least use ; for I feel, after the 
 serious scene of to-day, that Iam useless enough 
 in this world.” 
 
 ‘*Don’t say that,” urged the Secretary. 
 
 ‘Oh, but I mean that,” said Bella, raising 
 her eyebrows. 
 
 ‘“No one is useless in this world,” retorted the 
 Secretary, ‘‘who lightens the burden of it for 
 any one else.” 
 
 ‘¢ But I assure you I don’t, Mr. Rokesmith,” 
 said Bella, half crying. 
 
 ‘*Not for your father ?” 
 
 ‘¢ Dear, loving, self-forgetting, easily-satisfied 
 Pa! Ohyes! He thinks so.” 
 
 ‘It is enough if he only thinks so,” said the 
 Secretary. ‘‘ Excuse the interruption: I don’t 
 like to hear you depreciate yourself.” 
 
 “But you once depreciated me, Sir,” thought 
 Bella, pouting, “‘and I hope you-may be satis- 
 fied with the consequences you brought upon 
 your head!” However, she said nothing to that 
 purpose ; she even said something to a different 
 purpose. 
 
 ‘¢ Mr. Rokesmith, it seems so long since we 
 spoke together naturally, that I am embarrassed 
 in approaching another subject. Mr. Boffin. 
 You know I am very grateful to him; don’t 
 you? You know I feel a true respect for him, 
 and am bound to him by the strong ties of his 
 own generosity ; now don’t you ?” 
 
 ‘Unquestionably. And also that you are his 
 favorite companion,” 
 
 ‘That makes it,” said Bella, ‘‘so very diffi- 
 cult to speak of him. But— Does he treat 
 | you well?” 
 
 ‘¢ Youn see how he treats me,” the Secretary 
 answered, with a patient and yet proud air. 
 
 ‘‘Yes, and I see it with pain,” said Bella, 
 very energetically. ; 
 
 The Secretary gave her such a radiant look, 
 
 ard any 
 
 = 
 
230 
 
 that if he had thanked her a hundred times he 
 could not have said as much as the look said. 
 “‘T see it with pain,”’ repeated Bella, ‘‘and it 
 often makes me miserable. Miserable, because 
 I can not bear to be supposed to approve of it, 
 or have any indirect share in it, Miserable, be- 
 
 ‘cause-Ican_not bear to be forced to admit to 
 
 myself that Fortune is spoiling Mr.Boffin.” 
 
 ‘¢ Miss Wilfer,”’ said the Secretary, with a 
 beaming face, ‘‘if you could know with what 
 delight I make the discovery that Fortune is not 
 spoiling you, you would know that it more than 
 compensates me for any slight at any other 
 hands.” 
 
 “Qh, don’t speak of me,” said Bella, giving 
 herself an impatient little slap with her glove. 
 **You don’t know me as well as—” 
 
 “* As vou know yourself?” suggested the Sec- 
 retary, finding that stopped. ‘* Do you know 
 yourselt ?”’ 
 
 *‘T know quite enough of myself,” said Bella, 
 with a charming air of being inclined to give 
 herself up as a bad job, ‘‘and I don’t improve 
 upon acquaintance. But Mr. Boffin.” 
 
 **’That Mr. Boffin’s.manner to me, or consid- 
 eration for me, is not what it used to be,” ob- 
 served the Secretary, ‘‘ must be admitted. It 
 is too plain to be denied.” 
 
 ‘* Are you disposed to deny it, Mr. Roke- 
 smith ?” asked Bella, with a look of wonder. 
 
 **Ought I not to be glad to do so, if I could; 
 though it were only for my own sake ?” 
 
 ‘“*Truly,” returned Bella, ‘it must try you 
 very much, and—you must please promise me 
 that you won’t take ill what I am going to add, 
 Mr. Rokesmith ?” 
 
 **J promise it with all my heart.” 
 
 **_ And it must sometimes, I should think,” 
 said Bella, hesitating, ‘“‘a little lower you in 
 your own estimation ?” 
 
 Assenting with a movement of his head, 
 though not at all looking as if it did, the Secre- 
 tary replied: 
 
 ‘*T have very strong reasons, Miss Wilfer, for 
 bearing with the drawbacks of my position in 
 the house we both inhabit. Believe that they 
 are not all mercenary, although I have, through 
 a series of strange fatalities, faded out of my 
 place in life. If what you see with such a 
 gracious and good sympathy is calculated to 
 rouse my pride, there are other considerations 
 (and those you do not see) urging me to quiet 
 endurance. ‘The latter are by far the stron- 
 
 er.”? 
 
 ‘I think I have noticed, Mr. Rokesmith,” 
 
 said Bella, looking at him with curiosity, as not | 
 
 quite making him out, ‘‘that you repress your- 
 self, and force yourself, to act a passive part.”’ 
 
 **You are right. I repress myself and force 
 myself to act a part. It is not in tameness of 
 spirit that I submit. I have a settled purpose.” 
 
 ** And a good one, I hope,” said Bella. 
 
 ‘*And a good one, I hope,” he ,answered, 
 looking steadily at her. 
 
 ‘‘Sometimes I have fancied, Sir,” said Bella, 
 turning away her eyes, ‘‘that your great regard 
 for Mrs. Boffin is a very powerful motive with 
 you.” 
 
 “You are right again; it is. I would do any 
 thing for her, bear any thing for her. There 
 are no words to express how I esteem that good, 
 good woman,” ~ 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. ~ 
 
 ‘*As I do too! MayI ask you one thing 
 more, Mr. Rokesmith ?” Ne a8 
 
 ‘‘Any thing more.” 
 
 ‘*Of course you see that she really suffers 
 when Mr. Boffin shows how he is changing ?” 
 
 ‘*T see it, every day, as you see it, and am 
 grieved to give her pain.” , 
 
 “To give her pain?” said Bella, repeating 
 the phrase quickly, with her eyebrows raised. 
 
 ‘‘T am generally the unfortunate cause of it.” 
 
 ‘Perhaps she says to you, as she often says 
 to me, that he is the best of men, in spite of 
 all.” i 
 
 *“T often overhear her, in her honest and 
 beautiful devotion to him, saying so to you,” 
 returned the Secretary, with the same steady 
 look, “ but I can not assert that she ever’says so 
 to me.” 
 
 Bella met the steady look for a moment with 
 a wistful, musing little look of her own, and 
 ‘then, nodding her pretty head several times, like 
 a dimpled philosopher (of the very best school) 
 who was moralizing on Life, heaved a little sigh, 
 and gave up things in general for a bad job, as 
 she had previously been inclined to give up her 
 self. 
 
 But for all that they had a very pleasant 
 walk. The trees were bare of leaves, and the 
 river was bare of water-lilies; but the sky was 
 not bare of its beautiful blue, and the water re-— 
 flected it, and a delicious wind ran with the 
 stream, touching the surface crisply. Perhaps 
 the old mirror was never yet made by human 
 hands, which, if all the images it has in its time 
 reflected could pass across its surface again, 
 would fail to reveal sone scene of horror or dis- ~ 
 jtress, But the great serene mirror of the river 
 seemed as if it might have reproduced all it had 
 ever reflected between those placid banks, and 
 brought nothing to the light save what was 
 peaceful, pastoral, and blooming. 
 
 So, they walked, speaking of the newly filled- 
 up grave, and of Johnny, and of many things. 
 So, on their return, they met brisk Mrs. Milvey — 
 coming to seek them, with the agreeable intelli- 
 gence that there was no fear for the village— 
 children, there being a Christian school in the 
 village, and no worse Judaical interference with ~ 
 it than to plant its garden. So, they got back: 
 to the village as Lizzie Hexam was coming from 
 the paper-mill, and Bella detached herself to 
 speak with her in her own home. 
 
 ‘**T am afraid it is a poor room for you,” said - 
 Lizzie, with a smile of welcome, as she offered - 
 the post of honor by the fireside. 
 
 ‘* Not so poor as you think, my dear,” returned 
 Bella, ‘‘if you knew all.” Indeed, though at-— 
 tained by some wonderful winding narrow stairs, 
 which seemed to have been erected in a pure 
 white chimney, and though very low in the ceil- 
 ing, and very rugged in the floor, and rather 
 blinking as to the proportions of its lattice win- — 
 dow, it was a pleasanter room than that despised 
 chamber once at home, in which Bella had first ~ 
 bemoaned the miseries of taking lodgers. 
 
 The day was closing as the two girls looked 
 at one another by the fireside. The dusky room 
 was lighted by the fire. The grate might have 
 | been the old brazier, and the glow might haye 
 | been the old hollow down by the flare. | 
 
 ‘*Tt’s quite new to me,” said Lizzie, ‘*to be 
 visited by a lady so nearly of my own age, and 
 
 * 
 
so pretty, as you. It’s a pleasure to me to look 
 “at you.” 
 _ J have nothing left to begin with,” returned 
 Bella, blushing, ‘‘ because I was going to say 
 that it was a pleasure to me to look at you, Liz- 
 _ iz, But we can begin without a beginning, 
 ean’t we ?” : 
 
 Lizzie took the pretty little hand that was held 
 out in as pretty a little frankness. 
 
 - “* Now, dear,” said Bella, drawing her chair 
 a little nearer, and taking Lizzie’s arm as if 
 they were going out for a walk, ‘‘I am com- 
 missioned with something to say, and I dare say 
 I shall say it wrong, but I won’t if I can help 
 it: It is in reference to your letter to Mr. and 
 Mrs. Boffin, and this is what it is. Let me see. 
 Oh yes! This is what it is.” 
 
 With this exordium Bella set forth that re- 
 quest of Lizzie’s touching secrecy, and delicately 
 spoke of that false accusation and its retracta- 
 tion, and asked might she beg to be informed 
 whether it had any bearing, near or remote, on 
 such request. ‘I feel, my dear,” said Bella, 
 quite amazing herself by the business-like man- 
 ner in which she was getting on, ‘‘ that the sub- 
 ject must be a painful one to you, but I am 
 mixed up in it also; for—I don’t know whether 
 you may know it or suspect it—I am the willed- 
 away girl who was to have been married to the 
 unfortunate gentleman, if he had been pleased to 
 approve of me. So I was dragged into the sub- 
 ject without my consent, and you were dragged 
 into it without your consent, and there is very 
 little to choose between us.” 
 
 **{¥ had no doubt,” said Lizzie, ‘‘that you 
 were the Miss Wilfer I have often heard named. 
 Can you tell me who my unknown friend is?” 
 
 * Unknown friend, my dear?” said Bella. 
 
 ** Who caused the charge against poor father 
 to be contradicted, and sent me the written 
 paper.” 
 
 Bella had never heard of him. 
 tion who he was. 
 
 ' **T should have been glad to thank him,” re- 
 turned Lizzie. ‘‘ He has done a great deal for 
 me. I must hope that he will let me thank him 
 some day. You asked me has it any thing to 
 do—” 
 
 ‘‘It or the accusation itself,” Bella put in. 
 
 **Yes. Has either any thing to do with my 
 wishing to live quite secret andretired here? No.” 
 
 As Lizzie Hexam shook her head in giving 
 this reply and as her glance sought the fire, there 
 was a quiet resolution in her folded hands, not 
 lost on Bella’s bright eyes. 
 
 ** Have you lived much alone ?”’ asked Bella. 
 
 ' Yes, It’s nothing new to me. I used to be 
 always alone many hours together, in the day 
 and in the night, when poor father was alive.” 
 
 “You have a brother, I have been told.” 
 
 ‘*I have a brother, but he is not friendly with 
 me. He is a very good boy though, and has 
 raised himself by his industry. I don’t complain 
 of him.’’ 
 
 _ As she said it, with her eyes upon the fire- 
 
 _ glow, there was an instantaneous escape of dis- 
 tress into her face. Bella scized the moment to 
 touch her hand. 
 
 —  “izzie, 1 .xh you would tell me whether 
 you have :ny friend of your own sex and age.” 
 
 ‘‘T have lived that lonely kind of life that I 
 have never had one,” was the answer. 
 
 Had no no- 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 Do you think you could? 
 
 231 
 
 “‘Nor I neither,” said Bella. ‘‘ Not that my 
 life has been lonely, for I could have sometimes 
 wished it lonelier, instead of having Ma going 
 on like the Tragic Muse with a face-ache in 
 majestic corners, and Lavvy being spiteful— 
 though. of course I am very fond of them both. 
 I wish you could make a friend of me, Lizzie, 
 I have no more of 
 what they call character, my dear, than a cana- 
 ry-bird, but I know I am trust-worthy,” 
 
 The wayward, playful, affectionate nature, 
 giddy for want of the weight of some sustaining 
 purpose, and capricious because it was always 
 fluttering among little things, was yet a capti- 
 vating one. To Lizzie it was so new, so pretty, 
 at once so womanly and so childish, that it won 
 her completely. And when Bella said again, 
 ‘*Do you think you could, Lizzie?” with her 
 eyebrows raised, her head inquiringly on one 
 side, and an odd doubt about it in her own bo- 
 som, Lizzie showed beyond all question that she 
 thought she could. 
 
 ‘“Tell me, my dear,” said Bella, “‘ what is the 
 matter, and why you live like this.” 
 
 Lizzie presently began, by way of prelude, 
 “You must. have many lovers—” when Bella 
 checked her with a little scream of astonish- 
 ment. 
 
 ‘¢ My dear, I haven’t one.” 
 
 ** Not one?” 
 
 ‘Well! Perhaps one,” said Bella. ‘I am 
 sure I don’t know. I had one, but what he may 
 think about it at the present time I can’t say. 
 Perhaps I have half a one (of course I don’t 
 count that Idiot, George Sampson). However, 
 never mind me. I want to hear about you.” 
 
 ‘*There is a certain man,” said Lizzie, ‘‘a 
 passionate and angry man, who says he loves 
 me, and who I must believe does love me. He 
 is the friend of my brother. I shrank from him 
 within myself when my brother first brought him 
 to me; but the last time I saw him he terrified 
 me more than I can say.” There she stopped. 
 
 ‘‘Did you come here to escape from him, 
 Lizzie ?” 
 
 ‘‘T came here immediately after he so alarm- 
 ed me.” 
 
 ‘¢ Are you afraid of him here?” 
 
 ‘‘T am not timid generally, but I am always 
 afraid of him, I am afraid to see a newspaper, 
 or to hear a word spoken of what is done in 
 London, lest he should have done some violence.” 
 
 “Then you are not afraid of him for yourself, 
 dear?” said Bella, after pondering on the words. 
 
 ‘‘T should be even that, if I met him about 
 here. I look round for him always, as I pass to 
 and fro at night.” . 
 
 ‘‘ Are you afraid of any thing he may do to 
 himself in London, my dear?” 
 
 ‘‘No. He might be fierce enough even to do 
 some violence to himself, but I don’t think of 
 that.” ines: 
 ‘Then it would almost seem, dear,” said 
 Bella, quaintly, ‘‘as if there must be somebody 
 else ?”” 
 
 Lizzie put her hands before her face for a 
 moment before replying: ‘‘‘The words are al- 
 ways in my ears, and the blow he struck upon a 
 stone-wall as he said them is always befure my 
 eyes. I have tried hard to think it not worth 
 remembering, but I can not make so little of it. 
 His hand was trickling down with blood as he 
 
232 
 
 said to me, ‘Then I hope that I may never kill 
 him!” ' | 
 Rather startled; Bella made and clasped a gir- 
 dle of her arms round Lizzie’s waist, and then 
 asked quictly, in a soft voice, as they both looked 
 at the fire: | 
 
 “Kill him! Is this man so jealous, then ?” 
 
 “Of a gentleman,” said Lizzie. | ‘‘ —I hardly 
 know how to tell you—of a gentleman far above 
 me and my way of life, who broke father’s death 
 to me, and has shown an interest in me since.” 
 
 ‘** Does he love you ?” 
 
 Lizzie shook her head. 
 
 ‘* Does he admire you?” 
 
 Lizzie ceased to shake her head, and pressed 
 her hand upon her living girdle. 
 
 ‘Is it through his influence that you came 
 here ?” 
 
 “Ono! And of all the world I wouldn’t have 
 him know that I am here, or get the least clew 
 where to find me.” 
 
 ** Lizzie, dear! Why?” asked Bella, in amaze- 
 Ment at this burst. But then quickly added, 
 reading Lizzie’s face: “No. Don't say why. 
 That was a foolish question of mine. I see, I 
 see.” . 
 
 There was silence between them. Lizzie, 
 with a drooping head, glanced down at the glow 
 in the fire where her first fancies had been nursed, 
 
 and her first escape made from the grim life out: 
 
 of which she had plucked her brother, foresee- 
 ing her reward. 
 
 “You know all now,” she said, raising her 
 eyes to Bella’s. ‘There is nothing left ont. 
 This is my reason for living secret here, with 
 the aid of a good old man who is my true friend. 
 For a short part of my life at home with father 
 I knew of things—don’t ask me what—that I set 
 my. face against, and tried to better. I don’t 
 think I could have done more, then, without let- 
 ting my hold on father go; but they sometimes 
 lie heavy on my mind. By doing all for the 
 best, I hope I may wear them out.” 
 
 ‘*And wear out too,” said Bella, soothingly, 
 ‘this weakness, Lizzie, in favor of one who is 
 not worthy of it.” 
 
 ‘*No. I don’t want to wear that out,” was 
 the flushed reply, “nor do I want to believe, 
 nor do I believe, that he is not worthy of it. 
 What should I gain by that, and how much 
 should I lose!” 
 
 Bella’s expressive little eyebrows remonstrated 
 with the fire for some short time before she re- 
 joined; 
 
 **Don’t think that I press you, Lizzie; but 
 wouldn’t you gain in peace, and hope, and even 
 in freedom? Wouldn’t it be better not to live a 
 secret life in hiding, and not to be shut out from 
 your natural and wholesome prospects? For 
 give my asking you, would that be no gain ?” 
 
 ** Does a woman’s heart that—that has that 
 weakness in it which you have spoken of,” re- 
 turned Lizzie, ‘‘seck to gain any thing?” 
 
 The question was so directly at variance with 
 Bella’s views in life, as set forth to her father, 
 that she said, internally, ‘* There, you little mer- 
 cenary wretch! Do you hear that? Ain’t you 
 
 ashamed of yourself?” and unclasped the girdle. 
 
 of her arms, expressly to give herself a peniten- 
 tial poke in the side... ., 
 “But you said, Lizzie,” observed Bella, re- 
 turning to her sae ion she had administer- 
 a 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 ed this chastisement, “that you would lose, be- 
 sides. Would you mind teiling me what you 
 would lose, Lizzie?” 3 
 
 ‘*T should lose some of the best recollections, 
 best encouragements, and best objects, that I 
 carry through my daily life. I should lose my 
 belief that if I had been his equal, and he had 
 loved me, I should have tried with all my might 
 to make him better and happier, as he would 
 have made me. I should lose almost all the 
 value that I put upon the little learning I have, 
 which is all owing’to him, and which I con- 
 quered the difficulties of, that he might not 
 think it thrown away upon me. I should lose 
 a kind of picture of him—or of what he might 
 have been, if I had been a lady, and he had 
 loved me—which is always with me, and which 
 I somehow feel that I could not do a mean ora 
 wrong thing before. I should leave off prizing 
 the remembrance that he has done me nothing 
 but good since I have known him, and that he 
 has made a change within me, like—like the 
 change in the grain of these hands, which were 
 coarse, and cracked, and hard, and brown when 
 I rowed on the river with father, and are soft- 
 ened and made supple by this new work as you 
 see them now.” 
 
 They trembled, but with no weakness, as she 
 showed them. 
 
 ‘*Understand me, my dear;” thus she weng 
 on. ‘I have never dreamed of the possibility 
 of his being any thing to me on this earth but 
 the kind of picture that I know I could not make 
 you understand, if the understanding was not in 
 your own breast already. I have no more dream- 
 ed of the possibility of my being his wife than 
 he ever has—and words could not be stronger 
 than that. And yet I love him. I love him 
 so much, and so dearly, that when I sometimes 
 think my life may be but a weary one, I am 
 proud of it and glad of it. Iam proud and glad 
 to suffer something for him, even though it is 
 of no service to him, and he will never know of 
 it or care for it.” 3 
 
 Bella sat enchained by the deep, unselfish 
 passion of this girl or woman of her own age, 
 courageously revealing itself in the confidence 
 of her sympathetic perception of its truth. And 
 yet she had never experienced any thing like it, 
 or thought of the existence of any thing like it, 
 
 ‘*It was late upon a wretched night,” said 
 
 Lizzie, ‘‘when his eyes first looked at me in my- 
 
 old river-side home, very different from this. 
 His eyes may never look at me again. I would 
 rather that they never did; I hope that they 
 never may. But I would not have the light of 
 them taken out of my life for any thing my life 
 can give me. . I have told you every thing now, 
 my dear. If it comes a little strange to me to 
 have parted with it, I am not sorry. I had no 
 thought of ever parting with a single word of it 
 a moment before you came in; but you came 
 in, and my mind changed.” 
 
 Bella kissed her on the cheek, and thanked 
 her warmly for her confidence. 
 said Bella, ‘‘I was more deserving of it.” 
 
 ‘* More deserving of it?” repeated Lizzie, with — 
 
 an incredulous smile, 
 
 ‘J don’t mean in respect of x. »ing if, said 
 Bella, ‘* because any one should tea. me to bits © 
 
 before getting at a syllable of it—though there’s 
 no merit in that, for I am naturally as obstinate 
 
 ‘“*T only wish,” 
 
| 
 | 
 
 3 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 as a Pig. What I mean is, Lizzie, that I am| 
 
 a”’mere impertinent 
 shame me.” 
 
 Lizzie put up the pretty brown hair that came 
 tumbling down, owing to the energy with which 
 Bella shook her head; and she remonstrated 
 while thus engaged, ‘‘ My dear!” ~ . 
 
 ** Oh, it’s all very well to call me your dear,” 
 seid Bella, with a pettish whimper, ‘‘and I am 
 glad to be called so, though I have slight enough 
 elaim to be. But I am such a nasty little thing!” 
 
 **My dear!” urged Lizzie again. 
 
 “Such a shallow, cold, worldly, Limited lit- 
 tle brute!” said Bella, bringing out her last ad- 
 
 jective with culminating force. 
 
 “Do you think,” inquired Lizzie with her 
 quiet smile, the hair being now secured, ‘that 
 I don’t know better ?” 
 
 ‘* Lo you know better though?” said Bella. 
 _**Do you really believe you know better? Oh, 
 I should be so glad if you did know better, but 
 I am so very much afraid that I must know 
 
 best !” 
 
 Lizzie asked her, laughing outright, whether 
 she ever saw her own face or heard her own 
 voice ? 
 
 “ I suppose so,” returned Bella; ‘I look inthe 
 glass often enough, and I chatter like a Magpie.” 
 
 “I have seen your face, and heard your voice, 
 at any rate,” said Lizzie, ‘‘ and they have tempt- 
 ed me to say to you—with a certainty of not 
 going wrong—what I thought I should never 
 gay toany one. Does that look ill ?” 
 
 “No, I hope it doesn’t,” pouted Bella, stop- 
 ping herself in something between a humored 
 laugh and a humored sob. ~ 
 
 ‘*T used once to see pictures in the fire,” said 
 Lizzie, playfully, ‘‘to please my brother. Shall 
 
 piece of conceit, and you 
 
 I tell you what I see down there where the fire | 
 
 glowing?” 
 
 They had risen, and were standing on the 
 hearth, the time being come for separating ; 
 ‘each had drawn an arm around the other to 
 take leave. 
 
 _ “Shall [ tell you,” asked Lizzie, “what I 
 see down there ?” 
 
 “Limited little b?” suggested Bella with her 
 eyebrows raised. 
 
 ‘*A heart well worth winning and well won. 
 A heart that, once won, goes through fire and 
 water for the winner, and never changes, and is 
 never daunted,” 
 
 **Girl’s heart ?” asked Bella, with ‘accompany- 
 ing eyebrows. 
 
 Lizzie nodded. 
 belongs—” 
 
 *<Ts yours,” suggested Bella, 
 
 **No. Most clearly and distinctly yours.” 
 
 So the interview terminated with pleasant 
 words on both sides, and with many reminders 
 on the part of Bella that they were friends, and 
 pledges that she would soon come down into 
 that part of the country again. Therewith Liz- 
 zie returned to her occupation, and Bella ran 
 over to the little inn to rejoin her company. 
 
 ‘* You look rather serious, Miss Wilfer,” was 
 the Secretary’s first remark. 
 
 “TJ feel rather serious,” returned Miss Wilfer. 
 
 She had nothing else to tell him but that Liz- 
 zve Hexam’s secret had no reference whatever to 
 the cruel charge, or its withdrawal. Oh yes 
 though! said Bella; she might as well mention 
 
 5 
 
 *¢ And the figure to which it 
 
 A] 
 
 ath “ 
 ie), ¢ tx 
 coe O 
 
 233 
 
 one other thing; Lizzie was very desirous to 
 thank her unknown friend who had sent her the 
 written retractation. Was she, indeed ? observed 
 the Secretary. Ah! Bella asked him, had he 
 any notion who that unknown friend might be ? 
 He had no notion whatever. 
 
 They were on the borders of Oxfordshire, so far 
 had poor old Betty Higden strayed. They were 
 to return by the train presently, and, the station 
 being near at hand, the Reverend Frank and 
 Mrs. Frank, and Sloppy and Bella and the Sec- 
 retary, set out to walk to it. Few rustic paths 
 are wide enough for five, and Bella and the 
 Secretary dropped behind. 
 
 **Can you believe, Mr. Rokesmith,” said Bella, 
 “that I feel as if whole years had passed since [ 
 went into Lizzie Hexam’s cottage ?” 
 ~ We have crowded a good deal into the day,” 
 he returned, ‘and you were much affected in 
 the church-yard. You are over-tired.” 
 
 “No, I am not at all tired. I have not quite 
 expressed what I mean. I don’t mean that I 
 feel as if a great space of time had gone by, but 
 that I feel as if much had happened—to myself, 
 you know.” 
 
 ‘* For good, I hope?” 
 
 ‘*T hope so,”’ said Bella. 
 
 “You are cold; I felt you tremble. Pray let 
 me put this wrapper of mine about you. May F 
 fold it over this shoulder without injuring your 
 dress? Now, it will be too heavy and too long. 
 Let me carry this end over my arm, as you have 
 no arm to give me.” 
 
 Yes she had though. How she got it out, im 
 her muffled state, Heaven knows; but she got 
 it out somehow—there it was—and slipped: it 
 through the Secretary’s, 
 
 ‘‘T have had a long and interesting talk with 
 Lizzie, Mr. Rokesmith, and she gave me her full 
 confidence.” 
 
 ‘* She could not withhold it,” said the Secre- 
 tary. 
 
 ‘‘f wonder how you come,” said Bella, stop- 
 ping short as she glanced at him, “to say to me 
 just what she said about it!” 
 
 “J infer that it must be because I feel just as. 
 she felt about it.” 
 
 ‘‘And how was that, do you mean to say,, 
 Sir?” asked Bella, moving again. 
 
 ‘That if you were inclined to win her confi- 
 dence—any body’s confidence—you were sure to 
 do it.” 
 
 The railway, at this point, knowingly shutting 
 a green eye and opening a red one, they had to 
 run for it. As Bella could not run easily so 
 wrapped up, the Secretary had to help her. 
 When she took her opposite place in the car- 
 riage corner, the brightness in her face was so 
 charming to behold, that on her exclaiming, 
 ‘“‘What beautiful stars and what a glorious 
 night !” the Secretary said ‘‘Yes,” but seemed 
 to prefer to see the night and the stars in the 
 light of her lovely little countenance to looking 
 out of window. 
 
 O boofer lady, fascinating boofer lady! If I 
 were but legally executor of Johnny’s will! If 
 I had but the right to pay your legacy and to 
 take your receipt!—Something to this purpose 
 surely mingled with the blast of the train as it 
 cleared the stations, all knowingly shutting up: 
 their green eyes and opening their red ones when. 
 they prepared to let the boofer lady pass. 
 
CHAPTER X. 
 
 SCOUTS OUT. 
 
 * Axnso, Miss Wren,” said Mr. Eugene Wray- 
 burn, ‘‘I can not persuade you to dress me a 
 doll?” 
 
 ‘‘No,” replied Miss Wren, snappishly ; fala 
 you want one, go and buy one at the shop.” 
 
 “ And my charming young coddaughter,” said 
 Mr. Wrayburn, plaintively, ‘‘ down in Hertford- 
 shire—”’ 
 
 (<‘Humbugshire you mean, I think,” inter- 
 posed Miss Wren. ) 
 
 ‘¢_is to be put upon the cold footing of the 
 general public, and is to derive no advantage 
 from my private acquaintance with the Court 
 Dress-maker ?” 
 
 ‘¢Tf it’s any advantage to your charming god- 
 child—and oh, a precious godfather she has 
 got!” replied Miss Wren, pricking at him in the 
 air with her needle, ‘‘to be informed that the 
 @ourt Dress-maker knows your tricks and your 
 manners, you may tell her so by post, with my 
 compliments.” 
 
 Miss Wren was busy at her work by candle- 
 light, and Mr. Wrayburn, half amused and half 
 vexed, and all idle and shiftless, stood by her 
 bench looking on. Miss Wren’s troublesome 
 child was in the corner in deep disgrace, and 
 exhibiting great wretchedness in the shivering 
 stage of prostration from drink. , 
 
 ‘‘Ugh, you disgraceful boy !” exclaimed Miss 
 Wren, attracted by the sound of his chattering 
 teeth, “I wish they’d all drop down your throat 
 and play at dice in your stomach! Boh, wicked 
 child! Bee-baa, black sheep!” 
 
 On her accompanying each of these reproaches 
 with a threatening stamp of the foot, the wretch- 
 ed creature protested with a whine. 
 
 ‘Pay five shillings for you indeed!” Miss 
 Wren proceeded; “how many hours do you 
 suppose it costs me to earn five shillings, you in- 
 famous boy ?—Don’t ery like that, or I'll throw 
 a doll at you. Pay five shillings fine for you in- 
 deed. Fine in more ways than one, I think! 
 I'd give the dustman five shillings to carry you 
 off in the dust cart.” 
 
 ‘‘No, no,” pleaded the 
 “ Picase 1’. 
 
 <‘ He’s enough to break his mother’s heart, is 
 this boy,” said Miss Wren, half appealing to 
 Eugene. ‘I wish I had never brought him up. 
 He’d be: sharper than a serpent’s tooth, if he 
 wasn’t as dull as ditch water. Look at him. 
 There’s a pretty object for a parent’s eyes!” 
 
 Assuredly, in his worse than swinish state (for 
 swine at least fatten on their guzzling, and make 
 themselves good to eat), he was a pretty object 
 for any eyes. 
 
 ‘A muddling and a swipey old child,” said 
 Miss Wren, rating him with great severity, ‘‘ fit 
 for nothing but to be preserved in the liquor that 
 destroys him, and put in a great glass bottle as 
 a sight for other swipey children of his own pat- 
 tern—if he has no consideration for his liver, has 
 he none for his mother ?” 
 
 ‘Yes. Deration, oh don’t!” cried the sub- 
 ject of these angry remarks. 
 
 ‘¢Oh don’t and oh don’t,” pursued Miss Wren. 
 
 ‘‘Tt’?s oh do and oh do. And why do you?” 
 
 “¢Won’t do so any more. Won't indeed. 
 
 Pray!” 
 
 absurd creature. 
 
 % 
 
 eg ) BO han CUA net hes 8 ots Ze 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. ——t*™” nyt 
 
 ‘¢'There!” said Miss Wren, covering her eyes 
 with her hand. ‘‘I can’t bear to look at you. 
 Go up stairs and get me my bonnet and shawl. 
 Make yourself useful in some way, bad boy, and 
 let me have your room instead of your company 
 for one half minute.” | f 
 
 Obeying her, he shambled out, and Eugene 
 Wrayburn saw the tears exude from between 
 the little creature’s fingers as she kept her hand 
 before her eyes. He was sorry, but his sympa- 
 thy did not moye his carelessness to do any thing 
 but feel sorry. ; 
 
 “J’m going to the Italian Opera to try on,” 
 said Miss Wren, taking away her hand after @ 
 little while, and laughing satirically to hide that 
 she had been crying; ‘“‘I must see your back 
 before I go, Mr. Wrayburn. .Let me first tell 
 you, once for all, that it’s of no use your paying 
 visits to me. You wouldn’t get what you want 
 of me, no, not if you brought pincers with you 
 to tear it out.” 
 
 ‘Are you so obstinate on the subject of a 
 doll’s dress for my godchild ?” ait 
 
 ‘Ah !? returned Miss Wren, with a hitch of 
 her chin, ‘I am so obstinate. And of course 
 it’s on the subject of a doll’s dress—or address— 
 whichever you like. Get along and give itup!” 
 
 Her degraded charge had come back, and was — 
 standing behind her with the bonnet and shawl. 
 
 ‘‘ Give ’em to me and get back into your cor- 
 ner, you naughty old thing!” said Miss Wren, 
 as she tured and espied him. ‘No, no, I 
 won’t have your help. Go into your corner, 
 this minute!” 
 
 The miserable man, feebly rubbing the back 
 of his faltering handstownward from the wrists, 
 shuffled on to his post of disgrace; but not with- 
 out a curious glance at Eugene in passing him, 
 accompanied with ‘what seemed as if it might 
 have been an action of his elbow, if any action 
 of any limb or joint he had would have an- 
 swered truly to his will, Taking no more par- 
 ticular notice of him than instinctively falling 
 away from the disagreeable contact, Eugene, 
 with a lazy compliment or so to Miss Wren, 
 begved leave to light his cigar, and departed. 
 
 ‘Now you prodigal old son,” said Jenny, 
 shaking her head and her emphatic little fore- 
 finger at her burden, ‘‘you sit there till I come ~ 
 back. You dare to move out of your corner for 
 a single instant while ’m gone, and Ill know 
 the reason why.” - 
 
 With this admonition she blew her work can 
 dles out, leaving him to the light of the fire, and, — 
 taking her big door-key in her pocket and her 
 erntch-stick in her hand, marched off. a 
 
 Eugene lounged slowly toward the Temple, ~ 
 smoking his cigar, but saw no more of the dolls’ 
 dress-maker, through the accident of their takmg _ 
 opposite sides of the street. He lounged along 
 moodily, and stopped at Charing, Cross to look 
 about him, with as little interest in the crowd as / 
 any man might take, and was lounging on again, — 
 when a most unexpected object caught his eyes. 
 No less an object than Jenny Wren’s bad boy 
 trying to make up his mind to cross the road, # 
 
 A more ridiculous and feeble spectacle than 
 this tottering wretch making unsteady salli 3 
 into the roadway, and as often staggering back 
 again, oppressed by terrors of vehicles that we eo. 
 a long way off or were nowhere, the streets could | 
 not have shown. Over and over again, wh 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 “the course was perfectly clear, he set out, got 
 half-way, described a loop, turned, and went 
 ‘back again, when he might have crossed and re- 
 crossed half a dozen times. Then he would 
 stand shivering on the edge of the pavement, 
 looking up the street and looking down, while 
 scores of people jostled him, and crossed, and 
 went on. Stimulated in course of time by the 
 sight of so many successes, he would make an- 
 other sally, make another loop, would all but 
 have his foot on the opposite pavement, would 
 see or imagine something coming, and would 
 stagger back again. There, he would stand 
 making spasmodic preparations as if for a great 
 leap, and at last would decide on a start at pre- 
 cisely the wrong moment, and would be roared 
 at by drivers, and would shrink back once more, 
 and stand in the old spot shivering, with the 
 whole of the proceedings to go through again. 
 
 “It strikes me,” remarked Eugene, coolly, 
 after watching him for some minutes, ‘that my 
 friend is likely to be rather behind time if he 
 has any appointment on hand.” With which 
 remark he strolled on, and. took no further 
 thought of him, ( 
 
 Lightwood was at home when he got to the 
 Chambers, and had dined alone there. Eugene 
 drew a chair to the fire by which he was having 
 his wine and reading the evening paper, and 
 brought a glass, and filled it for good fellow- 
 
 -ship’s sake, 
 
 ** My dear Mortimer, you are the express pic- 
 ture of contented industry, reposing (on credit) 
 after the virtuous labors of the day.” 
 
 ‘“My dear Eugene, you are the express pic- 
 ture of discontented idleness not reposing. at all. 
 ‘Where have you been?” 
 
 ‘*T have been,” replied Wrayburn, ‘‘—about 
 
 town. Ihave turned up at the present juncture 
 with the intention of consulting my highly intel- 
 ligent and respected solicitor on the position of 
 my affairs.” 
 
 ‘*Your highly intelligent and respected solic- 
 itor is of opinion that your affairs are in a bad 
 way, Eugene.” | 
 ' “Though whether,” said Eugene, thought- 
 fully, “that can be intelligently said, now, of 
 the affairs of a client who has nothing to lose 
 and who can not possibly be made to pay, may 
 be open to question.” 
 
 ‘You have fallen into the hands of the Jews, 
 Eugene.” 
 
 _ ““My dear boy,” returned the debtor, very 
 composedly taking up his glass, ‘“‘having pre- 
 viously fallen into the hands of some of the 
 Christians, I can bear it with philosophy.” 
 
 “I have had an interview to-day, Eugene, 
 with a Jew, who seems determined to press us 
 hard. Quite a Shylock, and quite a Patriarch. 
 A picturesque gray-headed and gray-bearded old 
 Jew, in a shovel-hat and gaberdine.” 
 
 “Not,” said Eugene, pausing in setting down 
 Mis glass, ‘surely not my worthy friend Mr. 
 Aaron ?” 
 
 _ ‘He calls himself Mr. Riah.” 
 
 ** By-the-by,” said Eugene, ‘it comes into 
 ‘my mind that—no doubt with an instinctive de- 
 
 ‘sire to receive him into the bosom of our Church 
 —ZT gave him the name of Aaron!” 
 
 “‘Hugene, Eugene,” returned Lightwood, ‘‘ you 
 are more ridiculous than usual. Say what you 
 
 mean.” 
 
 ee 
 
 235 
 
 ‘Merely, my dear fellow, that I have the 
 honor and pleasure of a speaking acquaintance 
 with such a Patriarch as you describe, and that 
 T address him as Mr. Aaron, because it appears 
 to me Hebraic, expressive, appropriate, and com- 
 plimentary. Notwithstanding which stron g rea- 
 sons for its being his name, it may not be his 
 name.” 
 
 ‘*I believe you are the absurdest man on the 
 face of the earth,” said Lightwood, laughing. 
 
 **Not at all, I assure you. Did he mention 
 that he knew me?” 
 
 ‘“‘He did not. He only said of you that he 
 expected to be paid by you.” 
 
 ‘¢ Which looks,” remarked Eugene, with much 
 gravity, ‘‘like not knowing me. I hope it may 
 not be my worthy friend Mr. Aaron, for, to tell 
 you the truth, Mortimer, I doubt he may have 
 a prepossession against me. I strongly suspect 
 him of having had a hand in spiriting away 
 Lizzie.” 
 
 ‘Every thing,” returned Lightwood, impa- 
 tiently, ‘seems, by a fatality, to bring us round 
 to Lizzie. ‘About town’ meant about Lizzie, 
 just now, Eugene.” 
 
 ‘*My solicitor, do you know,” observed Eu- 
 gene, turning round to the furniture, ‘‘is a man 
 of infinite discernment !” 
 
 “*Did it not, Eugene?” 
 
 ‘*Yes it did, Mortimer.’’ 
 
 “And yet, Eugene, you know you do not 
 really care for her.” 
 
 Eugene Wrayburn rose, and put his hands in 
 his pockets, and stood with a foot on the fender, 
 indolently rocking his body and looking at the 
 fire. After a prolonged pause he replied: “I 
 don’t know that. I must ask you not to say 
 that, as if we took it for granted.” ; 
 
 ‘“But if you do care for her, so much the 
 more should you leave her to herself.” 
 
 Having again paused as before, Eugene said: 
 ‘“*{ don’t know that either. But tell me. Did 
 you ever see me take so much trouble about any 
 thing as about this disappearance of hers? [I 
 ask, for information.” 
 
 “My dear Eugene, I wish I ever had !” 
 
 ‘Then you have not? Just so. You con- 
 firm my own impression. Does that look as if 
 I cared for her? I ask, for information.” 
 
 “T asked you for information, Eugene,” said 
 Mortimer, reproachfully. : 
 
 ‘¢ Dear boy, I know it, but I can’t give it. I 
 thirst for information. What do I mean? If 
 my taking so much trouble to recover her does — 
 not mean that I care for her, what does it mean ? 
 ‘If Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled pepper, 
 where’s the peck,’ etc. ?” oad tritle 
 
 Though he said this gayly, he said it with a 
 perplexed and inquisitive face, as if he actually 
 did not know what to make of himself. ‘‘ Look 
 on to the end—” Lightwood was beginning to 
 remonstrate, when he caught at the words: 
 
 ‘‘Ah! See now! That’s exactly what I am 
 capable of doing. How very acute you are, 
 Mortimer, in finding my weak place! When 
 we were at school together I got up my lessons 
 at the last moment, day by day and bit by bit; 
 now we are out in life together, I get up my 
 
 4 . ale 
 lessons in the same way. In the present task I 
 
 is: din 
 have not got beyond this: I am bent on finding 
 Lizzie, and I mean to find her, and I will take 
 any means of finding her that offer themselves. 
 
236 
 
 Fair means or foul means are all alike to me. 
 I,ask you—for information — what does that 
 mean? When I have found her I may ask you 
 —also for information—what do I mean now? 
 But it would be premature in this stage, and it’s 
 not the character of my mind.” 
 
 Lightwood was shaking his head over the air 
 with which his friend held forth thus—an air so 
 whimsically open and argumentative as almost 
 to deprive what he said of the appearance of 
 evasion—when a shuffling was heard at the out- 
 er door, and then an undecided knock, as though 
 some hand were groping for the knocker. ‘*'The 
 frolicsome youth of the neighborhood,” said Eu- 
 gene, ‘‘whom I should be delighted to pitch 
 from this elevation into the church-yard below, 
 without any intermediate ceremonies, have prob- 
 ably turned the lamp out. I am on duty to- 
 night, and will see to the door.” 
 
 His friend had barely had time to recall the 
 unprecedented gleam of determination with 
 which he had spoken of finding this girl, and 
 which had faded out of him with the breath of 
 - the spoken words, when Eugene came «back, 
 ushering in a most disgraceful shadow of a 
 man, shaking from head to foot, and clothed in 
 shabby grease and smear. 
 
 ‘This interesting gentleman,” said Eugene, 
 <¢is the son—the occasionally rather trying son, 
 for he has his failings—of a lady of my acquaint- 
 ance, My dear Mortimer—Mr. Dolls.” Eugene 
 had no idea what his name was, knowing the 
 little dress-maker’s to be assumed, but present- 
 ed him with easy confidence under the first ap- 
 pellation that his associations suggested. 
 
 ‘‘] gather, my dear Mortimer,” pursued Eu- 
 gene, as Lightwood stared at the obscene visitor, 
 “from the manner of Mr. Dolls—which is oc- 
 casionally complicated—that he desires to make 
 some communication to me. I have mentioned 
 to Mr. Dolls that you and [ are on terms of con- 
 fidence, and have requested Mr. Dolls to devel- 
 op his views here.” 
 
 The wretched object being much embarrassed 
 by holding what remained of hishat, Eugeneairily 
 tossed it to the door and put him down in a chair. 
 
 ‘Tt will be necessary, I think,” he observed, 
 ‘to wind up Mr. Dolls before any thing to any 
 mortal purpose can be got out of him. Brandy, 
 Mr. Dolls, or—?” 
 
 ‘‘Threepenn’orth Rum,” said Mr. Dolls. 
 
 A judiciously small quantity of the spirit was 
 given him in a wine-glass, and he began to con- 
 vey it to his mouth with all kinds of falterings 
 and gyrations on the road. 
 
 <“¢'T he nerves of Mr. Dolls,” remarked Eugene 
 to Lightwood, ‘‘ are considerably unstrung. And 
 I deem it on the whole expedient to fumigate 
 Mr. Dolls.” 
 
 He took the shovel from the grate, sprinkled 
 a few live ashes on it, and from a box on the 
 chimney-piece took a few pastiles, which he set 
 upon them; then with great composure began 
 placidly waving the shovel in front of Mr. Dolls 
 to cut him off from his company. 
 
 ‘Tord bless my soul, Eugene!” cried Light- 
 wood, laughing again, ‘what a mad fellow you 
 are! Why does this creature come tosee you?” 
 
 ‘¢We shall hear,” said Wrayburn, very ob- 
 servant of his face withal. ‘‘Nowthen. Speak 
 out. Don’t be afraid. State your business, 
 Dolls.” 
 
 & 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. * 
 
 and huskily. 
 With a stupid stare. 
 
 you want ?” 
 
 you wouldn't. 
 want t’know where she lives. Do you Mist 
 Wrayburn ?” ; 
 With a glance at his friend, Eugene replied to — 
 the question sternly, ‘‘I do.” 
 
 low voice, as he complied. ‘can you stoop to 
 the use of such an instrument as this?” 
 
 mer gleam of determination, ‘‘that I would 
 find her out by any means, fair or foul. These 
 are foul, and I’ll take them—if I am not first 
 tempted to break the head of Mr. Dolls with the | 
 fumigator. 1 
 you mean that? Speak! If that’s what you 
 
 pieces of himself while he tried in vain to pick 
 
 ‘‘Mist Wrayburn!” said the visitor, thickly 
 ‘s_’ Tis Mist Wrayburn, ain’t?” - 
 
 “Of course it is. Look at me. What do 
 
 Mr. Dolls collapsed in his chair and faintly 
 
 said, ‘‘ Threepenn’orth Rum.” 
 
 ‘¢Will you do me the favor, my dear Mor- 
 
 timer, to wind up Mr. Dolls again?” said Eu- 
 gene. 
 
 ‘‘T am occupied with the fumigation.” 
 A similar quantity was poured into his glass, 
 
 and he got it to his lips by similar circuitous 
 ways. 
 evident fear of running down again unless he 
 made haste, proceeded to business. 
 
 Having drunk it, Mr. Dolls, with an | 
 
 “ Mist Wrayburn. 
 You want that drection. 
 
 Tried to nudge you, but 
 You 
 
 ‘“T am er man,” said Mr. Dolls, trying to 
 
 smite himself on the breast, but bringing his 
 hand to bear upon the vicinity of his eye, “‘er 
 do it. 
 
 I am er man er do it.” 
 ‘What are you the man to do?” demanded 
 
 Eugene, still sternly. 
 
 ‘<Er give up that drection.” 
 ‘¢Have you got it?”» 
 With a most laborious attempt at pride and 
 
 dignity, Mr. Dolls rolled his head for some time, — 
 awakening the highest expectations, and then | 
 answered, as if it were the happiest point that 
 could possibly be expected of him: “No.” 
 
 «What do you mean then ?” 
 Mr. Dolls, collapsing in the drowsiest man- — 
 4 
 
 ner after his late intellectual triumph, replied: 
 
 ‘¢Threepenn’orth Rum.” 
 ‘¢ Wind him up again, my dear Mortimer,” 
 
 said Wrayburn; ‘‘wind him up again>’ § 
 
 ‘‘Kugene, Eugene,” urged Lightwood in a 
 
 “TJ said,” was the reply, made with that for- 
 
 Can vou get the direction? Do 
 
 have come for, say how much you want.”’ q 
 “Ten shillings—Threepenn’orths Rum,” said 7 
 Mr. Dolls. a 
 
 “¢You shall have it.” 
 
 ‘¢Bifteen shillings — Threepenn’orths Rum,” 
 said Mr. Dolls, making an attempt to stiffen 
 himself. 5 
 
 ‘‘You shall have it. Stopatthat. How will 7 
 you get the direction you talk of ?” ¥ 
 
 ‘‘T am er man,” said Mr. Dolls, with majesty, — 
 “er get it, Sir.” 
 
 ‘How will you get it, I ask you?” 
 
 ‘¢T am ill-used vidual,” said Mr. Dolls. | 
 ‘Blown up morning t’night. Called names. 
 She makes Mint money, Sir, and never stands © 
 Threepenn’orth Rum.” : ae 
 
 “Get on,” rejoined Eugene, tapping his pal- 
 sied head with the fire-shovel as it sank on his_ 
 breast. ‘* What comes next?” °° a, 
 
 Making a dignified attempt to gather himself 
 together, but, as it were, dropping half a dozen | 
 
 b 
 
“i Lin 
 
 WW 
 
 WO HIYO NNIAITAHL ,, 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 237 
 
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 A AWK 
 
 dit 
 
 Nay 
 
 — 
 
 iL se 
 jap a es 
 Aiggs kbd Zs ————— — 
 EPL A Lil g see % . 
 BLL ff — sania SS ee ue 
 Foal ‘ *. 
 
 TD 
 LL 
 
 up one, Mr. Dolls, swaying his head from side 
 to side, regarded his questioner with what he 
 supposed to be a haughty smile and a scornful 
 glance. 
 
 ‘©She looks upon me as mere child, Sir. I 
 am not mere child, Sir. Man. Man talent. 
 Lerrers pass betwixt ’em, Postman lerrers. 
 Easy for man talent er get drection as get his 
 own drection.” 
 
 ‘‘Get it then,” said Eugene; adding very 
 heartily under his breath, ‘‘—You Brute! Get 
 it, and bring it here to mé, and earn the money 
 for sixty threepenn’orths of rum, and drink them 
 all, one atop of another, and drink yourself 
 dead with all possible expedition.”” The latter 
 clauses of these special instructions he addressed 
 to the fire, as he gave it back the ashes he had 
 taken from it, and replaced the shovel. 
 
 _ Mr. Dolls now struck out the highly unexpect- 
 
 ——————— 
 s 
 
 ed discovery that he had been insulted by Light- 
 wood, and stated his desire to ‘‘have it out 
 with him” on the spot, and defied him to come 
 on, upon the liberal terms of a sovereign to a 
 half-penny. Mr. Dolls then fell a crying, and 
 then exhibited a tendency to fall asleep. This 
 last manifestation as by far the most alarming, 
 by reason of its threatening his prolonged stay 
 on the premises, necessitated vigorous measures. 
 Eugene picked up his worn-out hat with the 
 tongs, clapped it on his head, and, taking him 
 by the collar—all this at arm’s-length—conduct- 
 ed him down stairs and out of the precincts into 
 Fleet Street. There, he turned his face west- 
 ward, and left him. 
 
 When he got back, Lightwood was standing 
 over the fire, brooding in a sufficiently low-spir- 
 
 ited manner. 
 ‘1]] wash my hands of Mr. Dolls—physical- 
 
238 
 ly—” said Eugene, ‘‘ and be with you again di- 
 rectly, Mortimer.” 
 
 ‘¢{ would much prefer,” retorted Mortimer, 
 **vour washing your hands of Mr. Dolls, moral- 
 
 ly, Eugene.” 
 So would I,” said Eugene; ‘‘but you see, 
 dear boy, I can’t do without him.” 
 
 In a mintte or two he resumed his chair, as 
 perfectly unconcerned as usual, and rallied his 
 friend on having so narrowly escapied the prow- 
 ess of their muscular visitor. 
 
 ‘¢T can’t be amused on this theme,” said Mor- 
 timer, restlessly. ‘‘You can make almost any 
 theme amusing to me, Eugene, but not this.” 
 
 .  ** Well!’ cried Eugene, ‘“T am a little 
 ashamed of it myself, and therefore let us 
 change the subject.” 
 
 ‘<Tt is so deplorably underhanded,”’ said Mor- 
 timer. ‘It is so unworthy of you, this setting 
 on of such a shameful scout.” 
 
 ‘We have changed the subject!” exclaimed 
 Eugene airily. ‘‘ We have found a new one in 
 that word, scout. Don’t be like Patience on a 
 mantle-piece frowning at Dolls, but sit down, 
 and I'll tell you something that you really will 
 find amusing. Take a cigar. Look at this of 
 mine. I light it—draw one puff—breathe the 
 smoke out—there it goes—it’s Dolls—it’s gone 
 —and being gone you are a man again.” 
 
 ‘¢ Your subject,” said Mortimer, after lighting 
 a cigar, and comforting himself with a whiff or 
 two, ‘‘ was scouts, Eugene.” 
 
 ‘¢Exactly. Isn’t it droll that I never go out 
 after dark but I find myself attended always 
 by one scout, and often by two 2?” 
 
 Lightwood took his cigar from his lips in sur- 
 prise, yand looked at his fr iend, as if with a latent 
 suspicion that there must be a jest or hidden 
 meaning in his words. 
 
 **On my honor, no,” said Wrayburn, answer- 
 ing the look and smiling carelessly; ‘‘ I don’t 
 wonder at your supposing so, but on my honor, 
 no. I say what I mean. I never go out after 
 dark but I find myself in the ludicrous situa- 
 tion of being followed and observed at a dis- 
 tance, always by one scout, and often by two.” 
 
 _** Are you sure, Eugene ?”’ 
 
 “Sure ? My dear boy, they are always the 
 same.’ 
 
 ‘‘But there’s no process out against you. 
 The Jews only threaten. They have done no- 
 thing. Besides, they know where to find you, 
 and I represent you. Why take the trouble?” 
 
 “Observe the legal mind !” remarked Eugene, 
 turning round to the furniture again, with an air 
 of indolent rapture. ‘‘ Observe the dyer’s hand, 
 assimilating itself to what it works in—or would 
 work in, if any body would give it any thing to 
 do. Respected solicitor, it’s not that. The 
 schoolmaster’s abroad.” 
 
 “The schoolmaster ?” 
 
 ‘¢ Ay! Sometimes the schoolmaster and the 
 pupil are both abroad. Why, how soon you 
 rust inmy absence! You don’t understand yet ? 
 Those fellows who were here one night. ‘They 
 are the scouts I speak of, as doing me the honor 
 to attend me after dark.” 
 
 “¢ How long has this been going on?” asked 
 Lightwood, opposing a serious face to the laugh 
 of his friend. 
 
 _ TJ apprehend it has been going on ever since 
 a certain person went off. Probably it had 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. — _ 
 
 been going on some little time before I ie 
 
 it: which would bring it to about that time.” 
 
 ‘*Do you think they suppose you to have in- 
 veigled her away ?” 
 
 ‘‘ My dear Mortimer, you know the absorbing 
 nature of my professional occupations ; ; IT really 
 have not had leisure to think about it.” 
 
 ‘Have you asked them what they want? 
 Have you objected ?” 
 
 ‘¢Why should I ask them what they want, 
 dear fellow, when I am indifferent what they 
 want? Why should I express objection, when 
 I don’t object 2” 
 
 ‘¢You are in your most reckless mood. But 
 you called the situation just now a Judicrous 
 one; and most men object to that, even those 
 who are utterly indifferent to every thing else.” 
 
 ‘You charm me, Mortimer, with your read- 
 ing of my weaknesses. (By-the-by, that very 
 word, Reading, in its critical use, always charms 
 me. An actress’s Reading of a chamber-maid, 
 a dancer’s Reading of a hornpipe, a singer’s 
 Reading of a song, a marine-painter’s Reading 
 of the sea, the kettle-drum’s Reading of an in- 
 strumental passage, are phrases ever youthful 
 and delightful.) I was mentioning your per- 
 ception of my weaknesses. I own to the weak- 
 ness of objecting to occupy a ludicrous posi- 
 tion, and therefore I transfer the position to the 
 scouts.’ 
 
 “‘T wish, Eugene, you would speak a little 
 more soberly and plainly, if it were only out of 
 consideration for my feeling less at ease than 
 you do.’ a 
 
 ‘¢Then soberly and plainly, Mortimer, I goad 
 the schoolmaster to madness. I make the school- 
 master so ridiculous, and so aware of being made 
 ridiculous, that I see him chafe and fret at every 
 pore when we cross one another. 'The amiable 
 occupation has been the solace of my life, since I 
 was balked in the manner unnecessary to re- 
 call. Ihave derived inexpressible comfort from 
 it. Ido it thus: 
 little way, look in at a window, and furtively 
 look out for the schoolmaster. Sooner or later 
 I perceive the schoolmaster on the watch; some- 
 times accompanied by his hopeful pupil, oftener 
 pupil-less. Having made sure of his watching 
 me, I tempt him on, all over London. One 
 night I go east, another night north, in a few 
 nights I go all round the compass. Sometimes 
 I walk; sometimes I proceed in cabs, draining 
 the pocket of the schoolmaster who then follows 
 in cabs. I study and get up abstruse no Thor- 
 oughfares in the course of the day. With Vene- 
 tian mystery I seck those No Thoroughfares at 
 night, glide into them by means of dark courts, 
 tempt the schoolmaster to follow, turn suddenly, 
 and catch him before he can retreat. Then we 
 face one another, and I pass him as unaware of 
 his existence, and he undergoes grinding tor- 
 ments. Similarly, I walk at a great pace down 
 
 'a short street, rapidly turn the corner, and, get- 
 ting out of his view, as rapidly turn back. I 
 
 catch him coming on post, again pass him as 
 unaware of his existence, and again he under- 
 goes grinding torments. Night after night his 
 disappointment is acute, but hope springs eternal 
 
 _in the scholastic breast, and he follows me again 
 
 to-morrow. ‘Thus I enjoy the pleasures of the 
 
 chase, and derive great benefit from the health- - 
 i ful exercise. When I do not enjoy the pleasures — 
 
 I stroll out after dark, stroll a — 
 
ay. 
 bg 
 
 attention. 
 
 Eugene; ‘‘you have been too sedentary. 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. : 239 
 
 of the chase, for any thing I know he watches at 
 the Temple Gate all night.” 
 
 “This is an extraordinary story,” observed 
 Lightwood, who had heard it out with serious 
 ~**T don’t like it.” 
 
 “You are a little hipped, dear fellow,” said 
 Come 
 and enjoy the pleasures of the chase.” 
 
 ‘¢Do you mean that you believe he is watch- 
 ing now?” ° 
 
 ‘<T have not the slightest doubt he is.” 
 
 ‘¢ Have you seen him to-night?” 
 
 ‘J forgot to lqok for him when I was last 
 out,’ returned Eugene, with the calmest indif- 
 ference; ‘‘but I dare say he was there. Come! 
 Be a British sportsman, and enjoy the pleasures 
 of the chase. It will do you good.” 
 
 "Lightwood hesitated; but, yielding to his cu- 
 riosity, rose. 
 
 ‘¢ Bravo!” cried Eugene, rising too. ‘‘ Or, if 
 Yoicks would be in better keeping, consider that 
 I said Yoicks. . Look to your feet, Mortimer, for 
 we shall try your boots. When you are ready, 
 I am—need I say with a Hey Ho Chivey, and 
 likewise with a Hark Forward, Hark Forward, 
 Tantivy ?” 
 
 ‘¢ Will nothing make you serious?” said Mor- 
 timer, laughing through his gravity. 
 
 ‘‘T am always serious, but just now Iam a 
 little excited by the glorious fact that a souther- 
 iy wind and a cloudy sky proclaim a hunting 
 evening. Ready? So. We turn out the lamp 
 and shut the door, and take the field.” 
 
 As the two friends passed out of the Temple 
 into the public street, Eugene demanded with a 
 show of courteous patronage in which~direction 
 Mortimer would like the run to be? ‘There is 
 a rather difficult country about Bethnal Green,” 
 said Eugene, ‘‘and we have not taken in that di- 
 rection lately. Whatis your opinion of Bethnal 
 Green ?” Mortimer assented to Bethnal Green, 
 and they turned eastward. ‘‘Now, when we 
 come to St. Paul’s church-yard,” pursued Eu- 
 gene, ‘‘we'll loiter artfully, and Pll show you 
 the schoolmaster.” But they both saw him be- 
 fore they got there; alone, and stealing after 
 them in the shadow of the houses on the oppo- 
 site side of the way. 
 
 “Get your wind,” said Eugene, “for I am 
 off directly. Does it occur to you that the boys 
 of Merry England will begin to deteriorate in an 
 educational light if this lasts long? The school- 
 master can’t attend to me and the boys too. Got 
 your wind? I am off!” 
 
 At what a rate he went, to breathe the school- 
 master; and how he then lounged and loitered, 
 to put his patience to another kind of wear; what 
 preposterous ways he took, with no other object 
 on earth than to disappoint and punish him; 
 and how he wore him out by every piece of in- 
 genuity that his eccentric humor could devise ; 
 all this Lightwood noted with a feeling of aston- 
 ishment that so careless a man could be so wary, 
 and that so idle a man could take so much trou- 
 ble. At last, far on in the third hour of the 
 
 pleasures of the chase, when he had brought the 
 poor dogging wretch round again into the City,, 
 
 he twisted Mortimer up a few dark entries, twist- 
 ed him into a little square court, twisted hint 
 sharp round again, and they almost ran against 
 Bradley Headstone. 
 
 - $*And you see, as I was saying, Mortimer,” 
 
 remarked Eugene aloud with the utthost cool- 
 ness, as though there were no one within hears 
 ing but themselves: ‘‘and you see, as 1 was says 
 ing—undergoing grinding torments.” 
 
 It was not too strong a phrase for the occasion. 
 Looking like the hunted and not the hunter, 
 baffled, worn, with the exhaustion of deferred 
 hope and consuming hate and anger in his face, 
 white-lipped, wild-eyed, draggle-haired, seamed 
 with jealousy and anger, and torturing himself 
 with the conviction that he showed it all and 
 they exulted in it, he went by them in the dark, 
 like a haggard head suspended in the air: so 
 completely did the force of his expression cancel 
 his figure. 
 
 Mortimer Lightwood was not an extraordi- 
 narily impressible man, but this face impressed 
 him. He spoke of it more than once on the re- 
 mainder of the way home, and more than once 
 when they got home. 
 
 They had been abed in their respective rooms 
 two or three hours when Eugene was partly 
 awakened by hearing a footstep going about, 
 and was fully awakened by seeing Lightwood 
 standing at his bedside, 
 
 ‘¢ Nothing wrong, Mortimer ?” 
 
 Nos. 
 
 ‘¢What fancy takes you, then, for walking 
 about in the night ?” 
 
 ‘T am horribly wakeful.” 
 
 ‘¢ How comes that about, I wonder ?” 
 
 ‘¢ Eugene, I can not lose sight of that fellow’s 
 face.” 
 
 ‘¢Odd!” said Eugene, with a light laugh, ‘¢Z 
 can.” And turned over, and fell asleep again. 
 
 —_—__$_—$——__—— 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 IN THE DARK. 
 
 Turre was no sleep for Bradley Headstone 
 on that night when Eugene Wraybarn turned so 
 easily in his bed; there-was no sleep for little 
 Miss Peecher. Bradley consumed the lonely 
 hours, and consumed himself, in haunting the 
 
 spot where his careless rival lay a dreaming ; . 
 
 little Miss Peecher wore them away in listening 
 for the return home of the master of her heart, 
 and in sorrowfully presaging that much was 
 
 amiss with him. Yet more was amiss with him - 
 
 than Miss Peecher’s simply-arranged little work- 
 box of thoughts, fitted with no gloomy and dark 
 recesses, could hold. For the state of the man 
 was murderous. 
 
 The state of the man was murderous, and he 
 knew it. More: he irritated it with a kind of 
 perverse pleasure akin to that which a sick man 
 sometimes has in irritating a wound upon his 
 body. ‘Tied up all day with his disciplined show 
 upon him, subdued to the performance of his 
 routine of educational tricks, encircled by a gab- 
 bling crowd, he broke loose at night like an ill- 
 tamed wild animal. Under his daily restraint 
 it was his compensation, not his trouble, to give 
 a glance toward his state at night, and to the 
 freedom of its being indulged. If great crimin- 
 als told the truth—which, being great crimin- 
 als, they do not—they would very rarely tell of 
 their struggles against the crime, Their strug- 
 gles are toward it. They buffet with opposing 
 waves to gain the bloody shore, not to recede 
 
int 
 
 near upon two hours ago. 
 
 240 
 
 from it. This man perfectly comprehended that 
 he hated his rival with his strongest and worst 
 forces, and that if he tracked him to Lizzie 
 Hexam his so doing would never serve himself 
 with her, or serve her. All his pains were taken 
 
 .to the end that he might incense himself with 
 
 the sight of the detested figure in her company 
 and favor in her place of concealment. And he 
 knew as well what act of his would follow if he 
 did, as he knew that his mother had borne him. 
 Granted, that he may not have held it necessary 
 to make express mention to himself of the one 
 familiar truth any more than of the other. 
 
 He knew equally well that he fed his wrath 
 and hatred, and that he accumulated provoca- 
 tion and self-justification by being made the 
 nightly sport of the reckless and insolent Eu- 
 gene. Knowing all this, and still always going 
 on with infinite endurance, pains, and persever- 
 ance, could his dark soul doubt whither he went ? 
 
 Baitled, exasperated, and weary, he lingered 
 opposite the Temple gate when it closed on 
 Wrayburn and Lightwood, debating with him- 
 self should he go home for that time or should 
 he watch longer. Possessed in his jealousy by 
 the fixed idea that Wrayburn was in the secret, 
 if it were not altogether of his contriving, Brad- 
 ley was as confident of getting the better of him 
 at last by sullenly sticking to him, as he would 
 
 _ have been—and often had been—of mastering 
 
 any piece of study in the way of his vocation by 
 the like slow, persistent process. A man of rap- 
 id passions and sluggish intelligence, it had served 
 him often, and should serve him again. 
 
 The suspicion crossed him as he rested in a 
 doorway, with his eyes upon the Temple gate, 
 that perhaps she was even concealed in that set 
 of Chambers. It would furnish another reason 
 for Wrayburn’s purposeless walks, and it might 
 be. He thought of it and thought of it, until he 
 resolved to steal up the stairs, if the gate-keeper 
 would let him through, and listen. So, the hag- 
 gard head suspended in the air flitted across the 
 road, like the spectre of one of the many heads 
 erst hoisted upon neighboring Temple Bar, and 
 stopped before the watchman. 
 
 The watchman looked at it, and asked: ‘Who 
 for ?” 
 
 ‘¢Mr. Wrayburn.” 
 
 **Tt’s very late.’? 
 
 **He came back with Mr. Lightwood, I know, 
 But if he has gone to 
 bed ll put a paper in his letter-box. Iam ex- 
 pected,” 
 
 The watchman said no more, but opened the 
 gate, though rather doubtfully. Seeing, how- 
 ever, that the visitor went straight and fast in 
 the right direction, he seemed satisfied. 
 
 The haggard head floated up the dark stair- 
 case, and softly descended nearer to the floor 
 outside the outer door ofthe chambers. The doors 
 of the rooms within appeared to be standing 
 open. ‘There were rays of candlelight from one 
 of them, and there was the sound of a footstep 
 going about. There were two voices. The words 
 they uttered were not distinguishable, but they 
 were .both the voices of men. In a few mo- 
 ments the voices were silent, and there was no 
 sound of footstep, and the inner light went out. 
 If Lightwood could have seen the face which 
 kept him awake, staring and Nstening in the 
 darkness outside the door as he spoke of it, he 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 might have been less disposed to sleep through 
 the remainder of the night. 
 
 ‘*Not there,” said Bradley; ‘but she might 
 have been.” The head arose to its former height 
 from the ground, floated down the staircase again, 
 and passed on to the gate. A man was stand- 
 ing there in parley with the watchman. 
 
 “Oh!” said the watchman. ‘Here he is!” 
 
 Perceiving himself to be the antecedent, Brad- 
 ley looked from the watchman to the man. 
 
 ‘This man is leaving a letter for Mr. Light 
 wood,” the watchman explained, showing it in 
 his hand; ‘‘and I was mentioning that a per- 
 son had just gone up to Mr. Lightwood’s cham- 
 bers. It might be the same business perhaps ?” 
 
 ‘* No,” said Bradley, glancing at the man, who 
 was a stranger to him. 
 
 ‘“‘No,” the man assented in a surly way; 
 ‘my letter—it’s wrote by my daughter, but it’s 
 mine—is about my business, and my business 
 ain’t nobody else’s business.” 
 
 As Bradley passed out at the gate with an un- 
 decided foot he heard it shut behind him, and 
 heard the footstep of the man coming after him. 
 
 ‘“’Scuse me,” said the man, who appeared to 
 have been drinking, and rather stumbled at him 
 than touched him, to attract his attention; ‘but 
 might you be acquainted with the T’other Goy- 
 ernar?” is. 
 
 ‘“With whom ?” asked Bradley. 
 
 *‘With,” returned the man, pointing back. 
 ward over his right shoulder with his right 
 thumb, ‘‘the T’other Governor ?” 
 
 ‘‘{ don’t know what you mean.” 
 
 “Why look here,” hooking his proposition 
 on his left-hand fingers with the forefinger of 
 his right. ‘‘There’s two Governors, ain’t there ? 
 One and one, two—Lawyer Lightwood, my first 
 finger, he’s one, ain’t he? - Well; might you be 
 acquainted with my middle finger, the T’other ?” 
 
 ““T know quite as much of him,” said Brad- 
 ley, with a frown and a distant look before him, 
 ‘*as I want to know.” 
 
 ‘‘Hooroar!” cried the man. ‘* Hooroar 
 T’other t’other Governor.: Hooroar T’otherest 
 Governor! I am of your way of thinkin’.” 
 
 ‘Don’t make such a noise at this dead hour 
 of the night. What are you talking about ?” 
 
 ‘‘Look here, 'T’otherest Governor,” replied 
 the man, becoming hoarsely confidential. ‘‘The 
 T’other Governor he’s always joked his jokes 
 agin me, owing, as J believe, to my being a hon- 
 est man as gets my living by the sweat of my 
 brow. Which he ain’t, and he don’t.” 
 
 ** What is that to me?” 
 
 ‘*'T’otherest Governor,” returned the man in 
 a tone of injured innocence, “if you don’t care 
 to hear no more, don’t hear no more. You be- 
 gun it. You said, and likeways showed pretty 
 plain, as you warn’t by no means friendly to him. 
 But I don’t seek to force my company nor yet 
 my opinions on no man. I am a honest man, 
 that’s what I am. Put me in the dock any 
 where—I don’t care where—and I says, ‘My 
 Lord, Iam a honest man.’ Put me in the wit~ 
 ness-box any where—I don’t care where—and 
 I says the same to his lordship, and I kisses the 
 book. I don’t kiss my coat-cuff; I kisses the 
 book.” 
 
 It was not so much in deference to these 
 strong testimonials to character, as in his rest- 
 
 less casting about for any way or help toward 
 
i, ae 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 the discovery on which he was concentrated, 
 
 _ that Bradley Headstone replied: ‘‘ You needn’t 
 
 take offense. I didn't mean to stop you. You 
 were too loud in the open street; that was all.” 
 **T’otherest Governor,” replied Mr. Rider- 
 
 _ hood, mollified and mysterious, ‘‘I know wot it 
 
 is to be loud, and I know wot it is to be soft. 
 Nat’rally I do. It would be a wonder if I did 
 not, being by the Chris’en name of Roger, which 
 took it arter my own father, which took it from 
 his own father, though which of our fam’ly fust 
 took it nat’ral I will not in any ways mislead you 
 by undertakin’ to say. And wishing that your 
 elth may be better than your looks, which your 
 inside must be bad indeed if it’s on the footing 
 of your out.” 
 
 Startled by the implication that his face re- 
 vealed too much of his mind, Bradley made an 
 effort to clear his brow. It might be worth 
 knowing what this strange man’s business was 
 with Lightwood, or Wrayburn, or both, at such 
 an ‘unseasonable hour. He set himself to find 
 out, for the man might prove to be a messenger 
 between those two. 
 
 “*You call at the Temple late,” he remarked, 
 
 » with a lumbering show of ease. 
 
 *¢ Wish I may die,” cried Mr. Riderhood, with 
 a hoarse laugh, ‘‘if I warn’t a goin’ to say the 
 self-same words to you, T’otherest Governor!” 
 
 **It chanced so with me,”’ said Bradley, look- 
 ing disconcertedly about him. 
 
 ‘‘And it chanced so with me,” said Rider- 
 hood. ‘But I don’t mind telling you how. 
 Why should I mind telling you? I’m a Depu- 
 
 _ ty Lock-keeper up the river, and I was off duty 
 
 ‘yes'day, and I shall be on to-morrow.” ~ 
 
 “Yes?” d 
 
 “Yes, and I come to London to look arter 
 my private affairs. My private affairs is to get 
 appinted to the Lock as reg’lar keeper at fust 
 hand, and to have the law of a busted B’low- 
 Bridge steamer which drownded of me. I ain’t 
 a goin’ to be drownded and not paid for it!” 
 
 Bradley looked at him, as though he were 
 
 - Claiming to be a ghost. 
 
 “The steamer,” said Mr. Riderhood, obsti- 
 nately, ‘‘run me down and drownded of me. 
 Interference on the part of other parties brought 
 
 me round; but I never asked ’em to bring me 
 
 round, nor vet the steamer never asked ’em to 
 it. I mean to be paid for the life as the steam- 
 er took.” 
 
 _ “Was that your business at Mr. Lightwood’s 
 ehambers in the middle of the night?” asked 
 
 - Bradley, eving him with distrust. 
 
 “‘That and to get a writing to be fust-hand 
 Lock- keeper. A recommendation in writing 
 being looked for, who else ought to give it to 
 me? As I says in the letter in my daughter’s 
 
 _ hand, with my mark put to it to make it good 
 
 in law, Who but you, Lawyer Lightwood, ought 
 to hand over this here stifficate, and who but 
 you ought to go in for damages on my account 
 agin the Steamer? For (as I says under my 
 mark) I have had trouble enough along of you 
 and your friend. If you, Lawyer Lightwood, 
 had backed me good and true, and if the T’oth- 
 er Governor had took me down correct (I says 
 under my mark), I should have been worth 
 
 “money at the present time, instead of having a 
 
 barge-load of bad names chucked at me, and 
 
 being forced to eat my words, which is a unsat- 
 
 a 
 
 241 
 
 isfving: sort of food wotever a man’s appetite ! 
 And when you mention the middle of the night 
 T’otherest Governor,” growled Mr. Riderhood, 
 winding up his monotonous summary of his 
 wrongs, ‘*throw your eye on this here bundle 
 under my arm, and bear in mind that ['m a 
 walking back to my Lock, and that the Temple 
 laid upon my line of road.” 
 
 Bradley Headstone’s face had changed dur- 
 ing this latter recital, and he had observed the 
 speaker with a more sustained attention. 
 
 ‘Do you know,” said he, after a pause, dur- 
 ing which they walked on side by side, ‘that I 
 believe I could tell you your name, if I tried ?” 
 
 ‘Prove your opinion,” was the answer, ae- 
 companied with a stop and a stare. Try.” 
 
 ‘* Your name is Riderhood.”’ 
 
 ‘‘Pm blest if it ain’t,” returned that gentle- 
 man. ‘‘ But I don’t know your’n.” 
 
 ‘“That’s quite another thing,” said Bradley. 
 ‘*T never supposed’ you did.” 
 
 As Bradley walked on meditating, the Rogue 
 walked on at his side muttering. The purport 
 of the muttering was: ‘‘that Rogue Riderhood, 
 by George! seemed to be made public property 
 on, now, and that every man seemed to think 
 himself free to handle his name as if it was a 
 Street Pump.” The purport of the meditating 
 was: ‘‘ Here is an instrument. Can I use it?” 
 
 They had walked along the Strand, and into 
 Pall Mall, and had turned up-hill toward Hyde 
 Park Corner; Bradley Headstone waiting on 
 the pace and lead of Riderhood, and leaving him 
 
 to indicate the course. , So slow were the school- 
 master’s thoughts, and so indistinct his purposes 
 
 when they were but tributary to the one absorb- 
 ing purpose—or rather when, like dark trees 
 under a stormy sky, they only lined the long 
 vista at the end of which he saw those two figures 
 of Wrayburn and Lizzie on which his eyes were 
 fixed—that at least a good half-mile was trav- 
 ersed before he spoke again. Even then, it was 
 only to ask; 
 
 ‘* Where is your Lock ?” 
 
 ““Twenty mile and odd—call it five-and-twen- 
 ty mile and odd, if you like—up stream,” was the 
 sullen reply. 
 
 ‘¢ How is it called ?” 
 
 ‘‘Plashwater Weir Mill Lock.” 
 
 ‘¢ Suppose I was to offer you five shillings; © 
 
 what then?” 
 
 ‘‘Why, then, I’d take it,” said Mr. Rider- 
 hood. 
 
 The schoolmaster put his hand in his pocket, 
 and produced two half-crowns, and placed them 
 in Mr. Riderhood’s palm: who stopped at a con- 
 venient door-step to ring them both, before ac- 
 knowledging their receipt. 
 
 ‘‘There’s one thing about you, T’otherest 
 Governor,” said Riderhood, faring on again, 
 ‘<as looks well and goes fur. You're a ready- 
 money man. Now;” when he had carefully 
 pocketed the coins on that side of himself which 
 was furthest from his new friend; ‘‘ what’s this 
 for ?” 
 
 ‘¢ For you.” 
 ‘Why, o’ course I know that,” said Rider- 
 
 hood, as arguing something that was self-evi- 
 dent. ‘0’ course I know very well as no man 
 in his right senses would suppose as any think 
 would make me give it up agin. when I'd onee 
 got it. But what do you want for it?” 
 
 poe 
 
242 
 
 “‘T don’t know that I want any thing for it. 
 Or if I do want any thing for it, I don’t know 
 
 what it is.’ Bradley gave this answer in a 
 
 stolid, vacant, and self-communing marmer, 
 which Mr. Riderhood found very extraordinary. 
 ‘¢You have no good-will toward this Wray- 
 
 burn,” said Bradley, coming to the name in a 
 
 reluctant and forced way, as if he were dragged 
 to it. 
 
 << 'No,” 
 
 <¢ Neither have I.” 
 
 Riderhood nodded, and asked: ‘‘Is it for 
 
 j that rt ; 
 
 ‘‘Tt’s as much for that as any thing else. It’s 
 something to be agreed with, on a subject that 
 occupies so much of one’s thoughts.” 
 
 ‘Tt don’t agree with you,” returned Mr. Rider- 
 hood, bluntly. ‘‘No! It don’t, T’otherest Gov- 
 ernor, and it’s no use a lookin’ as if you wanted 
 to make out that it did. I tell you it rankles in 
 you. It rankles in you, rusts in you, and pisons 
 
 ou.” 
 Ais Say that it does so,” returned Bradley, with 
 quivering lips; ‘‘is there no cause for it ?” 
 
 ‘¢Cause enough, I’ll bet a pound!” said Mr. 
 Riderhood. 
 
 ‘¢ Haven’t you yourself declared that the fel- 
 low has heaped provocations, insults, and affronts 
 on you, or something to that effect? He has 
 done the same by me. He is made of venomous 
 insults and affronts, from the crown of his head 
 to the sole of his foot. Are you so hopeful or so 
 stupid as not to know that he and the other will 
 treat your application with contempt, and light 
 their cigars with it?” 
 
 ‘¢T shouldn’t wonder if they did, by George !” 
 said Riderhood, turning angrily. 
 
 “Jf they did! ‘They will. Let me ask you 
 a question. I know something more than your 
 name about you; I knew something about Gaffer 
 Hexam. When did you last set eyes upon his 
 daughter ?”’ 
 
 ‘¢ When did I last set eyes upon his daughter, 
 T’otherest Governor ?” repeated Mr. Riderhood, 
 growing intentionally slower of comprehension 
 as the other quickened in his speech. 
 
 ‘‘Yes, Not to speak to her. To see her— 
 any where ?” 
 
 The Rogue had got the clew he wanted, though 
 he held it with a clumsy hand. Looking per- 
 plexedly at the passionate face, as if he were 
 trying to work out a sum in his mind, he slowly 
 
 “answered: ‘‘I ain’t set eyes upon her-—never 
 
 once—not since the day of Gaffer’s death.” 
 
 ‘¢You know her well, by sight ?” 
 
 “‘T should think I did! No one better.” 
 
 *¢ And you know him as well?” 
 
 ‘¢Who's him ?” asked Riderhood, taking off 
 his hat and rubbing his forehead, as he directed 
 a dull look at his questioner. 
 
 ‘¢‘Curse the name! Is it so agreeable to you 
 
 - that von want to hear it again ?” 
 
 ‘<Oh! Hin?” said Riderhood, who had craft- 
 ily worked the schoolmaster into this corner, that 
 he might again take note of his face under its evil 
 possession. “¢ P’'d know Aim among a thousand.” 
 
 “Did you—” Bradley tried to ask it quietly ; 
 but, do what he might with his voice, he could 
 not subdue his face ;—‘‘did you ever see them 
 together ?” 
 
 (The Rogue had got the clew in both hands 
 
 now.) — 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. ~ 
 
 ie Uae 
 
 ‘<I see ’eni together, T’otherest Governor, on 
 the very day when Gaffer was towed ashore.” 
 
 Bradley could have hidden a reserved piece 
 of information from the sharp eyes of a whole 
 inquisitive class, but he could not veil from the 
 eyes of the ignorant Riderhood the withheld 
 question next in his breast. ‘‘ You shall put 
 it plain if you want it answered,” thought the 
 Rogue, doggedly ; ‘‘I ain’t a-going a wolunteer- 
 ing.” 
 
 ‘Well! was he insolent to her too?” asked 
 Bradley, after a struggle. ‘‘Or did he make a 
 show of being kind to her?” 
 
 ‘¢He made a show of being most uncommon 
 kind to her,” said Riderhood. ‘‘By George! 
 now I—” 
 
 His flying off at a tangent was indisputably 
 natural. Bradley looked at him for the reason. 
 
 ‘¢Now I think of it,” said Mr. Riderhood, 
 evasively, for he was substituting those words 
 for ‘* Now I see you so jealous,” which was the 
 phrase really in his mind; ‘‘P’r’aps he went 
 and took me down wrong, a purpose, on account 
 0’ being sweet upon her!” 
 
 The baseness of confirming him in this sus- 
 picion or pretense of one (for he could not have 
 really entertained it), was a line’s breadth be- 
 yond the mark the schoolmaster had reached. 
 The baseness of communing and intriguing with 
 the fellow who would have set that stain upon 
 her, and upon her brother too, was attained. 
 The line’s breadth further lay beyond. He 
 made no reply, but walked on with a lowering 
 face. 
 
 What he might gain by this acquaintance he 
 could not work out in his slow and cumbrous 
 thoughts. The man had an injury against the 
 object of his hatred, and that was something ; 
 though it was less than he supposed, for there 
 dwelt in the man no such deadly rage and re- 
 sentment as burned in his own breast. The man 
 knew her, and might by a fortunate chance see 
 her, or hear of her; that was something, as en- 
 listing one pair of eyes and ears the more. The 
 man was a bad man, and willing enough to be 
 in his pay. That was something, for his own 
 state and purpose were as bad as bad could be, 
 and he seemed to derive a vague support from 
 the possession of a congenial instrument, though 
 it might never be used. 
 
 Suddenly he stood still and asked Riderhood _ 
 point-blank if he knew where she was?  Clear- 
 ly, he did not know. He asked Riderhood if 
 he would be willing, in case any intelligence of 
 her, or of Wrayburn as seeking her or associa- 
 ting with her, should fall in his way, to com-— 
 municate it if it were paid for? He would be 
 very willing indeed. He was ‘‘agin ’em both,” 
 he said, with an oath, and for why? ’Cause 
 they had both stood betwixt him and his getting 
 his living by the sweat of his brow, 
 
 ‘Tt will not be long then,” said Bradley 
 Headstone, after some more discourse to this 
 effect, ‘‘ before we see one another again. Here 
 is the country road, and here is the day. Both 
 have come upon me by surprise.” a) 
 
 ‘‘ But, T’otherest Governor,” urged Mr. Rider- — 
 hood, “I don't know where to find you.” 
 
 ‘Tt is of no consequence. I know where to | 
 find you, and I’l] come to your Lock.” ya 
 
 ‘“‘ But, T’otherest Governor,” urged Mr. Rider — 
 hood again, ‘‘ no luck never come yet of a dry_ 
 
 7 
 
 y 
 
 yal 
 
 iver as 
 Pe bs eC een 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. | 343 
 
 acquaintance. Let’s wet it, in a mouthful of 
 rum and milk, T’otherest Governor.” 
 
 Bradley assenting, went with him into an early 
 public house, haunted by unsavory smells of 
 musty hay and stale. straw, where returning 
 carts, farmers’ men, gaunt dogs, fowls of a beery 
 breed, and certain human night-birds fluttering 
 
 ‘home to roost, were solacing themselves after 
 
 their several manners; and where not one of 
 the night-birds hovering about the sloppy bar 
 failed to discern at a glance in the passion-wasted 
 night-bird with respectable feathers the worst 
 
 —night-bird of all. 
 
 An inspiration of affection for a half-drunken 
 earter going his way led to Mr. Riderhood’s be- 
 ing elevated on a high heap of baskets on a wag- 
 on, and pursuing his journey recumbent on his 
 back with his head on his bundle. Bradley then 
 turned to retrace his steps, and by-and-by struck 
 off through little-traversed ways, and by-and-by 
 reached school and home. Up came the sun 
 to find him washed and brushed, methodically 
 dressed in decent black coat and waistcoat, de- 
 cent formal black tie, and pepper-and-salt panta- 
 loons, with his decent silver watch in its pocket, 
 and its decent hair-guard round his neck; a 
 scholastic huntsman clad for the field, with his 
 fresh pack yelping and barking around him. 
 
 Yet more really bewitched than the miscrable 
 creatures of the much-lamented times, who ac- 
 cused themselves of impossibilities under a con- 
 tagion of horror and the strongly suggestive in- 
 fluences of Torture, he had been ridden hard by 
 Evil Spirits in the night that was newly gone. 
 He had been spurred and whipped and. heavily 
 sweated. If a record of the sport had, usurped 
 the places of the peaceful texts from Scripture 
 on the wall, the most advanced of the scholars 
 might have taken fright and run away from their 
 master. 
 
 ea 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 MEANING MISCHIEF. 
 
 Up came the sun, streaming all over London, 
 and in its glorious impartiality even condescend- 
 
 ing to make prismatic sparkles in the whiskers’ 
 
 of Mr. Alfred Lammle as he sat at breakfast. 
 In need of some brightening from without was 
 Mr. Alfred Lammle, for he had the air of being 
 
 dull enough within, and looked grievously dis- 
 
 contented. 
 
 Mrs. Alfred Lammle faced her lord. The 
 happy pair of swindlers, with the comfortable 
 tie between them that each had swindled the 
 other, sat moodily observant of the table-cloth. 
 Things looked so gloomy in the breakfast-room, 
 albeit on the sunny side of Sackville Street, that 
 any of the family tradespeople glancing through 
 the blinds might have taken the hint to send in 
 his account and press for it. But this, indeed, 
 most of the family tradespeople had already 
 done, without the hint. 
 
 _ “Tt seems to me,” said Mrs. Lammle, “ that 
 you have had no money at all, ever since we 
 
 - have been married.” 
 
 ‘What seems to you,” said Mr. Lammle, ‘‘to 
 have been the case, may possibly have been the 
 ease. It doesn’t matter.” 
 
 Was it the specialty of Mr. and Mrs. Lammle, 
 
 or does it ever obtain with other loving couples? 
 
 , ee 
 
 a 
 
 In these matrimonial dialogues they neyer ad- 
 dressed each other, but always some invisible 
 presence that appeared to take a station about 
 midway between them. Perhaps the skeleton in 
 the cupboard comes out to be talked to on such 
 domestic occasions ? 
 
 ‘*T have never seen any money in the house,” 
 said Mrs. Lammle to the skeleton, ‘‘ except my 
 own annuity. That I swear.” 
 
 ‘**You needn’t take the trouble of swearing,” 
 said Mr. Lammle to the skeleton; ‘once more, 
 it doesn’t matter. You never turned your an- 
 nuity to so good an account,” 
 
 “Good an account! In what way?” asked 
 Mrs. Lammle. 
 
 ‘In the way of getting credit, and living 
 well,” said Mr. Lammle. 
 
 Perhaps the skeleton laughed scornfully on 
 being intrusted with this question and this an- 
 swer ; certainly Mrs. Lammle did, and Mr. Lam- 
 mle did. 
 
 ‘* And what is to happen next?” asked Mrs. 
 Lammile of the skeleton. 
 
 ‘Smash is to happen next,” said Mr. Lammle 
 to the same authority. 
 
 After this, Mrs. Lammle looked disdainfully 
 at the skeleton—but without carrying the look 
 on to Mr. Lammle—and drooped her eyes. 
 After that, Mr. Lammle did exactly the same 
 thing, and drooped his eyes. A ‘servant then 
 entering with toast, the skeleton retired into the 
 closet, and shut itself up. 
 
 ‘¢ Sophronia,” said Mr. Lammle, when the 
 servant had withdrawn. And then, very much 
 louder: ‘‘ Sophronia !”’ 
 
 *¢ Well ?” 
 
 ‘¢ Attend to me, if you please.” He eyed her 
 sternly until she did attend, and then went on. 
 “T want to take counsel with you. Come, 
 come; no more trifling. You know our league 
 and covenant. We are to work together for our 
 joint interest, and you are as knowing a hand 
 asIlam. We shouldn’t be together, if you were 
 not. What’s to be done? We are hemmed 
 into acorner. What shall we do?” 
 
 ‘‘Have you ao scheme on foot that will bring 
 in any thing?” 
 
 Mr. Lammle plunged into his whiskers for re- 
 flection, and came out hopeless: ‘‘ No; as ad- 
 venturers we are obliged to play rash games for 
 chances of high winnings, and there has been a 
 run of luck against us,” 
 
 . : e $3) 
 She was resuming, ‘‘ Have you nothing—” 
 
 when he stopped her. 
 
 ‘¢We, Sophronia. We, we, we.” 
 
 ‘¢ Have we nothing to sell?” 
 
 ‘‘Deuce a bit. I have given a Jew a bill of 
 sale on this furniture, and he could take it to- 
 morrow, to-day, now. He would have taken it 
 before now, I believe, but for Fledgeby.” 
 
 ‘What has Fledgeby to do with him?” 
 
 ‘‘Knew him. Cautioned me against him be- 
 fore I got into his claws. Couldn’t persuade 
 him then, in behalf of somebody else.” 
 
 ‘‘Do you mean that Fledgeby has at all soft- 
 ened him toward you?” 
 
 ‘Us, Sophronia. Us, us, us.” 
 
 ‘Toward us?” 
 
 ‘‘T mean that the Jew has not yet done what 
 he might have done, and that Fledgeby takes 
 the credit of having got him to hold his hand.” 
 
 ‘‘ Do you believe Fledgeby ?” 
 
 1h 
 
244 
 
 ‘¢ Sophronia, I never believe any body. I 
 never have, my dear, since I believed you. 
 it looks like it.” 
 
 Having given her this back-handed reminder 
 of her mutinous observations to the skeleton, Mr. 
 Lammle rose from table—perhaps, the better to 
 conceal a smile, and a white dint or two about 
 his nose—and took a turn on the carpet and 
 came to the hearth-rug. 
 
 “Tf we could have packed the brute off with | 
 upon the phrase, ‘‘ would not allow us to be si- 
 
 Georgiana; but however; that’s spilled milk.” 
 
 As Lammle, standing gathering up the.skirts | 
 speculation on the Secretary’s part, and so gross 
 
 of his dressing-gown with his back to the fire, 
 said this, looking down at his wife, she turned 
 pale and looked down at the ground. With a 
 
 sense of disloyalty upon her, and perhaps with a | 
 
 sense of personal danger—for she was afraid of 
 him—even afraid of his hand and afraid of his 
 foot, though he had never done her violence— 
 she hastened to put herself right in his eyes. 
 
 “If we could borrow money, Alfred—” 
 
 ‘¢ Bez money, borrow money, or steal money. 
 It would be all one to us, Sophronia,” her hus- 
 band struck in, 
 
 ‘¢__Then, we could weather this ?” 
 
 ‘No doubt. To offer another original and 
 undeniable remark, Sophronia, two and: two 
 make four.” 
 
 But, seeing that she was turning something 
 in her mind, he gathered up the skirts of his 
 dressing gown again, and, tucking them under 
 one arm, and collecting his ample whiskers in 
 his other hand, kept his eye upon her, silently. 
 
 “Tt is natural, Alfred,” she said, looking up 
 with some timidity into his face, ‘‘to think in 
 such an emergency of the richest people we 
 know, and the simplest.” 
 
 ‘¢ Just so, Sophronia.” 
 
 ‘¢'The Boffins.”’ 
 
 “¢ Just so, Sophronia.” 
 
 Ts there nothing to be done with them ?” 
 
 ‘What is there to be done with them, So- 
 phronia ?” 
 
 She cast about in her thoughts again, and he 
 kept his eye upon her as before. 
 
 ‘Of course I have repeatedly thought of the 
 Boffins, Sophronia,” he resumed, after a fruit- 
 less silence; ‘‘but I have seen my way to no- 
 thing. They are well gnarded. That infernal 
 Secretary stands between them and—people of 
 Acrit.”’ 
 
 ‘Tf he could be got rid of ?” said she, bright- 
 ening a little, after more casting about. 
 
 ‘¢Take time, Sophronia,” observed her watch- 
 ful husband, in a patronizing manner. 
 
 ‘If working him out of the way could be 
 presented in the light of a service to Mr. Bof- 
 fin ?” 
 
 ‘¢Take time, Sophronia.” 
 
 ‘‘We have remarked lately, Alfred, that the 
 old man is turning very suspicious and distrust- 
 ful.” 
 
 ‘¢ Miserly, too, my dear; which is far the most 
 unpromising for us. Nevertheless, take time, 
 Sophronia, take time.” 
 
 She took time, and then said: 
 
 ‘¢ Suppose we should address ourselves to that 
 tendency in him of which we have made our- 
 selves quite sure. Suppose my conscience—”’ 
 
 ‘¢And we know what a conscience it is, my 
 soul. Yes?” 
 
 ‘‘ Suppose my conscience should not allow me 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 to keep to myself any longer what that upstart 
 
 But | girl told me of the Secretary’s having made a 
 
 declaration to her. Suppose my conscience 
 
 ‘should oblige me to repeat it to Mr. Boffin.” 
 
 ‘‘T rather like that,” said Lammle. 
 
 ‘« Suppose I so repeated it to Mr. Boffin, as to 
 insinuate that my sensitive delicacy and honor—” 
 
 ‘¢ Very good words, Sophronia.” 
 
 ‘¢__As to insinuate that our sensitive delicacy 
 and honor,” she resumed, with a bitter stress 
 
 lent parties to so mercenary and designing a 
 
 a breach of faith toward his confiding employer, 
 Suppose I had imparted my virtuous uneasiness 
 to my excellent husband, and he had said, in his 
 integrity, ‘Sophronia, you must immediately 
 
 | disclose this to Mr. Boffin.’” 
 
 ‘‘Qnce more, Sophronia,” observed Lammle, 
 changing the leg on which he stood, ‘‘I rather 
 like that.” 
 
 ‘“You remark that he is well guarded,” she 
 pursued. ‘I think so too, But if this should 
 lead to his discharging his Secretary, there would 
 be a weak place made.” 
 
 ‘Go on expounding, Sophronia. ‘I begin to 
 like this very much.” 
 
 ‘Having, in our unimpeachable rectitude, 
 done him the service of opening his eyes to the 
 treachery of the person he trusted, we shall have 
 established a claim upon him and a confidence 
 with him. Whether it can be made much of, 
 or little of, we must wait—because we can’t help 
 it—to see. Probably we shall make the most 
 of it that is to be made.” 
 
 ‘¢ Probably,’ said Lammle. 
 
 “Do you think it impossible,” she asked, in 
 the same cold plotting way, ‘“*that you might re- 
 place the Secretary ?” 
 
 ‘‘Not impossible, Sophronia. It might be 
 brought about. At any rate it might be skill- 
 fully led up to.” 
 
 She nodded her understanding of the hint, as 
 she looked at the fire. ‘‘Mr. Lammle,” she 
 said, musingly: not without a slight ironical 
 touch: ‘*Mr. Lammle would be so delighted to 
 do any thing in his power. Mr. Lammle, him- 
 
 self a man of business as well as a capitalist. 
 
 Mr. Lammle, accustomed to be intrusted with 
 the most delicate affairs. Mr. Lammle, who 
 has managed my own little fortune so admirably, 
 but who, to be sure, began to make his reputa- 
 tion with the advantage of being a man of prop-. 
 erty, above temptation, and beyond suspicion.” 
 Mr. Lammle smiled, and even patted her on 
 the head. In his sinister relish of the scheme, 
 as he stood above her, making it the subject of 
 
 | his cogitations, he seemed to have twice as much 
 
 nose on his face as he had ever had in his life. 
 
 He stood pondering, and she sat looking at 
 the dusty fire without moving for some time. 
 But the moment he began to speak again she 
 looked up with a wince and attended to him, as 
 if that double-dealing of hers had been in her 
 mind, and the fear were revived in her of his 
 hand or his foot. . 
 
 ‘¢Tt appears to me, Sophronia, that you have 
 omitted one branch of the subject. Perhaps not, _ 
 for women understand women. We might oust 
 the girl herself?” ; 
 
 Mrs. Lammle shook her head. ‘She has an. 
 immensely strong hold upon them both, Alfred. 
 
 y a = * te 
 5 mt 2c) eee 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 - Not to be compared with that of a paid secre- 
 
 tary.”’ a , 
 
 i But the dear child,” said Lammle, with a 
 crooked smile, ‘‘ought to have been open with 
 her benefactor and benefactress. The darling 
 love ought to have reposed unbounded confi- 
 dence in her benefactor and benefactress.”’ 
 
 Sophronia shook her head again. 
 
 ‘¢Well! Women understand women,” said 
 her husband, rather disappointed. ‘‘I don’t press 
 it. It might be the making of our fortune to 
 make a clean sweep of them both. With me to 
 manage the property, and my wife to manage 
 the people—W hew !” 
 
 Again shaking her head, she returned: ‘‘ They 
 will never quarrel with the girl, They will never 
 punish the girl. We must accept the girl, rely 
 upon it.” 
 
 ‘© Well!” cried Lammle, shrugging his shoul- 
 ders, “so be it: only. always remember that we 
 don’t want her.” 
 
 ‘©Now the sole remaining question is,”’ said 
 Mrs. Lammle, ‘ when shall I begin?” 
 
 ““You can not begin too soon, Sophronia. 
 As I have told you, the condition of our affairs 
 is desperate, and may be blown upon at any mo- 
 ment.” 
 
 ‘‘T must secure Mr. Boffin alone, Alfred. If 
 his wife was present, she would throw oil upon 
 the waters. I know I should fail to move him 
 to an angry outburst if his wife was there. And 
 as to the girl herself—as I am going to betray her 
 confidence, she is equally out of the question.” 
 
 ‘Tt wouldn’t do to write for an appoint- 
 ment?’ said Lammle. 
 
 ‘“No, certainly not. They would wonder 
 among themselves why I wrote, and/I want to 
 have him wholly unprepared.” 
 
 ‘¢Call, and ask to see him alone ?” suggested 
 Lammle. 
 
 ‘*T would rather not dothateither. Leave it 
 tome. Spare me the little carriage for to-day, 
 and for to-morrow (if I don’t succeed to-day), 
 
 “and I'll lie in wait for him.” 
 
 It was barely settled when a manly form was 
 seen to pass the windows and heard to knock 
 -and ring. ‘‘Here’s Fledgeby,” said Lammle. 
 ‘He admires you, and has a high opinion of 
 
 you. I'll be out. 
 “with the Jew. His name is Riah, of the House 
 of Pubsey and Co.” Adding these words under 
 his breath, lest he should be audible in the erect 
 ears of Mr. Fledgeby, through two keyholes and 
 the hall, Lammle, making signals of discretion 
 to his servant, went softly up stairs. 
 
 ‘““Mr. Fledgeby,” said Mrs. Lammle, giving 
 him a very gracious reception, ‘‘so glad to see 
 “you! My poor dear Alfred, who is greatly wor- 
 ried just now about his affairs, went out rather 
 early. Dear Mr. Fledgeby, do sit down.” 
 
 Dear Mr. Fledgeby did sit down, and satisfied 
 himself (or, judging from the expression of his 
 countenance, dissatisfied himself) that nothing 
 ~ new had occurred in the way of whisker-sprout 
 ~ since he came round the corner from the Albany. 
 “Dear Mr. Fledgeby, it was needless to men- 
 ~ tion to you that my poor dear Alfred is much 
 - worried about his affairs at present, for he has 
 told me what a comfort you are to him in his 
 temporary difficulties, and what a great service 
 
 > 
 
 _* you have rendered him.” 
 
 yo Oh!” said Mr. Fledgeby. 
 
 Coax him to use his influence 
 
 245 
 
 “Yes,” said Mrs. Lammle. 
 
 ri didn’t know,” remarked Mr. Fledgeby, 
 trying a new part of his chair, ‘but that Lam- 
 mle might be reserved about his affairs.” 
 
 ‘Not to me,” said Mrs, Lammle, with deep 
 feeling. 
 
 ‘*Oh, indeed ?” said Fledgeby. 
 
 3 Not tome, dear Mr. Fledgeby. Tam his wife.” 
 
 Yes. I—I always understood so,” said. Mr, 
 Fledgeby. 
 
 ‘* And as the wife of Alfred, may I, dear Mr, 
 Fledgeby, wholly without his authority or knowl- 
 edge, as I am sure your discernment will per- 
 ceive, entreat you to continue that great service, 
 and once more use your well-earned influence 
 with Mr. Riah for a little more indulgence ? 
 The name I have heard Alfred mention, tossing 
 in his dreams, ts Riah; is it not?” 
 
 “<The name of the Creditor is Riah,” said Mr. 
 Fledgeby, with a rather uncompromising accent 
 on his noun-substantive. ‘‘Saint Mary Axe. 
 Pubsey and Co.” 
 
 ‘‘Oh yes!” exclaimed Mrs. Lammle, clasp- 
 ing her hands with a certain gushing wildness. 
 ‘*¢ Pubsey and Co. !” 
 
 ‘« The pleading of the feminine—”’ Mr. Fledge- 
 by began, and there stuck so long for a word to 
 get on with, that Mrs. Lammle offered him 
 sweetly, ‘‘ Heart ?” 
 
 ‘‘No,” said Mr. Fledgeby, ‘‘ Gender—is ever 
 what a man is bound to listen to, and I wish it 
 rested with myself. But this Riah is a nasty 
 one, Mrs. Lammle; he really is.”’ 
 
 ‘‘ Not if you speak to him, dear Mr. Fledgeby.” 
 
 ‘¢Upon my soul and body he is!” said Fledge- 
 by. 
 Me Try. Try once more, dearest Mr. Fledgeby. 
 What is there you can not do, if you will!” 
 
 ‘‘ Thank you,” said Fledgeby, ‘‘ you're very 
 complimentary to say so. I don’t mind trying 
 him again at your request. But of course I 
 can’t answer for the consequences. Riah is a 
 tough subject, and when he says he’ll do a thing, 
 he’ll do it.” 
 
 ‘« Exactly so,” cried Mrs. Lammle, ‘‘and when 
 he says to you he’ll wait, he’ll wait.” 
 
 (‘*She is a devilish clever woman,” thought 
 Fledgeby. ‘‘I didn’t see that opening, but she 
 spies it out and cuts into it as soon as it’s made.”) 
 
 ‘In point of fact, dear Mr. Fledgeby,” Mrs. 
 Lammle went on in a very interesting manner, 
 “ not to affect concealment of Alfred’s hopes, 
 to you who are so much his friend, there is a 
 distant break in his horizon.” 
 
 This figure of speech seemed rather mysteri- 
 ous to Fascination Fledgeby, who said, ‘* There’s 
 a what in his—eh ?” . 
 
 “ Alfred, dear Mr. Fledgeby, discussed with 
 me this very morning before he went out some 
 prospects he has, which might entirely change 
 the aspect of his present troubles.” 
 
 “ Really ?” said Fledgeby. 
 
 ‘Oh yes!” Here Mrs. Lammle brought her 
 handkerchief into play. ‘‘ And you know, dear 
 Mr. Fledgeby—you who study the human heart 
 and study the world—what an affliction it would 
 be to lose position and to lose credit, when abil- 
 ity to tide over a very short time might save all 
 
 ances.’ 
 pete Oh 1”? said Fledgeby. ‘‘Then you think, 
 Mrs. Lammle, that if Lammle got time he 
 wouldn’t burst up?—To use an expression, 
 
246 ' * 
 
 os bad 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 OS) 03 PUVA Scher a » Lhe 
 beat hy ee 
 
 Se ee AGS) PES: MEE SE seu 
 DG Pe en eee May 1 (dee Nes 
 nek gate RR a ; 
 
 ee 
 
 4 
 \} 
 \ y 
 \| | 
 ‘ \ 
 NNN 
 i AN 
 \ 
 SI \\ 
 AN 
 Ni 
 yy) 
 Ni 
 
 La 
 
 MR. FLEDGEBY DEPARTS ON HIS ERRAND OF MERCY. 
 
 Mr, Fledgeby apologetically explained, ‘* which 
 is adopted in the Money Market.” 
 
 ‘“Indeed yes. Truly, truly, yes!” 
 
 ‘“That makes all the difference,” said Fledge- 
 by. ‘*I’ll make a point of seeing Riah at once.” 
 
 ‘¢ Blessings on you, dearest Mr. Fledgeby !” 
 
 “Not at all,” said Fledgeby. She gave him 
 her hand. ‘‘The hand,” said Mr. Fledgeby, 
 ‘of a lovely and superior-minded female is ever 
 the repayment of a—” 
 
 ‘Noble action !” said Mrs. Lammle, extreme- 
 ly anxious to get rid of him. 
 
 “Tt wasn’t what I was going to say,” return- 
 ed Fledgeby, who never would, under any cir- 
 cumstances, accept a suggested expression, ‘‘ but 
 you're very complimentary. May I imprint a— 
 ‘a one—upon it. Good-morning !” 
 
 **T may depend upon your promptitude, dear- 
 est Mr, Fledgeby ?” 
 
 Said Fledgeby, looking back at the door and — 
 
 respectfully kissing his hand, ‘* You may depend 
 upon it.” 
 
 In fact, Mr. Fledgeby sped on his errand of 
 mercy through the streets at so brisk a rate that 
 his feet might have been winged by all the good 
 spirits that wait on Generosity. They might 
 have taken up their station in his breast, too, 
 for he was blithe and merry. There was quite 
 a fresh trill in his voice, when, arriving at the 
 counting-house in St. Mary Axe, and finding it, 
 
 | for the moment empty, he trolled forth at the 
 
 foot of the staircase: ‘‘ Now, Judah, what are 
 
 you up to there?” _ 
 
 The old man appeared, with his accustomed 
 deference. ~ 
 
 ‘‘ Holloa!” said Fledgeby, falling back, with 
 a wink. “You mean mischief, Jerusalem!” — 
 
 The old man raised his eyes inquiringly. _ 
 
 ee 
 ae 
 
a 
 
 won't you?” 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 “Yes, you do,” said Fledgeby. “Oh, you 
 sinner! Oh, you dodger! What! 
 
 are you? Nothing will’turn you, won’t it? 
 You won't be put off for another single minute, 
 Ordered to immediate action by the master’s 
 tone and look, the old man took up his hat from 
 the little counter where it lay. | 
 _.“You,have been told that he might pull 
 
 *thréugh it, if you didn’t go in to win, Wide- 
 
 Awake; have you?” said Fledgeby. ‘‘ And it’s 
 not your game that he should pull through it; 
 
 g@in’t it? You having got security, and there 
 
 being enough to pay you? Oh, you Jew!” 
 
 The old man stood irresolute and uncertain 
 for a moment, as if there might be further in- 
 structions for him in reserve. 
 
 **Do I go, Sir?” he at length asked in a low 
 voice. 
 
 “* Asks me if he is going!” exclaimed Fledge- 
 by. ‘Asks me, as if he didn’t know his own 
 purpose! Asks me, as if he hadn’t got his hat 
 on ready! Asks me, as if his sharp old eye— 
 why, it cuts like a knife—wasn’t looking at his 
 walking-stick by the door!” 
 
 “Do I go, Sir?” 
 
 *‘Do you go?” sneered Fledgeby. 
 you do go. ‘Toddle, Judah!” 
 
 * Yes, 
 
 —— 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 GIVE A DOG A BAD NAME, AND HANG HIM. 
 
 FascrnaTION FLEpDGEBY, left alone in the 
 counting-house, strolled about with his hat on 
 one side, whistling, and investigating the draw- 
 ers, and prying here and there for any small 
 evidences of his being cheated, but could find 
 none. ‘‘ Not his merit that he don’t cheat me,” 
 was Mr. Fledgeby’s commentary delivered with 
 a wink, ‘‘but my precaution.” He then with a 
 
 a lazy grandeur asserted his rights as lord of Pub- 
 sey and Co. by poking his cane at the stools and 
 
 > 
 
 _ boxes, and spitting in the fire-place, and so loi- 
 _ tered royally to the window and looked out into 
 
 the narrow street, with his small eyes just peer- 
 
 - ing over the top of Pubsey and Co.’s blind. As 
 a blind in more senses than one, it reminded 
 him that he was alone in the counting-house 
 with the front-door open. 
 
 He was moving 
 away to shut it, lest he should be injudiciously 
 identified with the establishment, when he was 
 stopped by some one coming to the door. 
 
 ‘This some one was the dolls’ dress-maker, 
 with a little basket on her arm, and her crutch 
 stick in her hand. Her keen eves had espied 
 Mr. Fledgeby before Mr. Fledgeby had espied 
 her, and he was paralyzed in his purpose of 
 
 ‘shutting her out, not so much by her approach- 
 
 ing the door, as by her favoring him with a 
 shower of nods, the instant he saw her. This 
 advantage she improved by hobbling up the 
 steps with such dispatch that before Mr. Fledge- 
 by could take measures for her finding nobody 
 at home, she was face to face with him in the 
 
 - counting-house. 
 
 ‘Hope I see you well, Sir,” said Miss Wren. 
 
 | “Mr. Riah in?” 
 
 Fledgeby had dropped into a chair, in the at- 
 
 _ titude of one waiting wearily. ‘‘I suppose he 
 
 ae 
 Ritesh ee 
 
 You're go- 
 ‘ing to act upon that bill of sale at Lammle’s, 
 
 247 | 
 
 will be back soon,” he replied; ‘he has cut out 
 and left me expecting him back, in an odd way. 
 Haven’t I seen you before ?” 
 
 “Once before—if you had your evesight,”’ re- 
 plied Miss Wren; the conditional clause in an 
 under-tone. 
 
 ‘* When you were carrying on some games up 
 at the top of the house. I remember. How’s 
 your friend ?” 
 
 ‘*I have more friends than one, Sir, I hope,” 
 replied Miss Wren. ‘‘ Which friend ?” 
 
 ““ Never mind,” said Mr. Fledgeby, shutting 
 up one eye, “tany of your friends, all your 
 friends. Are they pretty tolerable ?” 
 
 Somewhat confounded, Miss Wren parried the 
 pleasantry, and sat down in a corner behind the 
 door,*with her basket in her lap. By-and-by, 
 she said, breaking a long and patient silence: 
 
 “‘T beg your pardon, Sir, but I am used to 
 find Mr. Riah at this time, and so I generally 
 come at this time. I only want to buy my poor 
 little two shillings’ worth of waste. Perhaps 
 you'll kindly let me have it, and Ill trot off to 
 my work.” 
 
 ‘*7 let you have it?” said Fledgeby, turning 
 his head toward her; for he had been sitting 
 blinking at the light, and feeling his cheek, 
 “Why, you don’t really suppose that I have 
 any thing to do with the place, or the business ; 
 do you?” 
 
 ‘‘Suppose?” exclaimed Miss Wren. ‘*He 
 said, that day, you were the master !” 
 
 ‘“The old cock in black said? Riah said? 
 Why, he’d say any thing.” 
 
 ‘¢Well; but you said so. too,” returned Miss 
 Wren. ‘Or at least you took on like the mas- 
 ter, and didn’t contradict him.” 
 
 ‘¢One of his dodges,” said Mr. Fledgeby, with 
 a cool and contemptuous shrug. ‘‘ He’s made 
 of dodges. He said to me, ‘Come up to the 
 top of the house, Sir, and I’ll show you a hand- 
 some girl. But I shall call you the master.’ 
 So I went up to the top of the house and he 
 showed me the handsome girl (very well worth 
 looking at she was), and I was called the mas- 
 ter. I don’t know why. I dare say he don’t. 
 He loves a dodge for its own sake; being,” 
 added Mr. Fledgeby, after casting about for an 
 expressive phrase, “the dodgerest of all the 
 dodgers.” 
 
 ‘Oh my head!” cried the dolls’ dress-maker, 
 holding it with both her hands, as if it were 
 cracking, ‘* You can’t mean what you say.” 
 
 “I can, my little woman,” retorted Fledgeby, 
 ‘and I do, I assure you.’” att 
 
 This repudiation was not only an act of de- 
 liberate policy on Fledgeby’s part, in case of his 
 being surprised by any other caller, but was also 
 a retort upon Miss Wren for her over-sharpness, 
 and a pleasant instance of his humor as regarded 
 the old Jew. ‘He has got a bad name as an 
 old Jew, and he is paid for the use of it, and 
 I'll have my money’s worth out of him.” This 
 was Fledgeby’s habitual reflection in the way of 
 business, and it was sharpened just now by the 
 old man’s presuming to have a secret from him: 
 though of the secret itself, as annoying some- 
 body else whom he disliked, he by no means 
 disapproved. 
 
 Miss Wren with a fallen countenance sat be- 
 hind the door looking thoughtfully at the ground, 
 and the Jong and patient silence had again set 
 
248 
 
 in for some time, when the expression of Mr. 
 Fledgeby’s face betokened that through the up- 
 per portion of the door, which was of glass, he 
 saw some one faltering on the brink of the 
 counting-house. Presently there was a rustle 
 and a tap, and then some more rustling and an- 
 other tap. Fledgeby taking no notice, the door 
 was at length softly opened, and the dried face 
 of a mild little elderly gentleman looked in. 
 
 “Mr. Riah ?” said this visitor, very politely. 
 
 *“*T am waiting for him, Sir,” returned Mr. 
 Fledgeby. ‘‘He went out and left me here. I 
 expect him back every minute. Perhaps you 
 had better take a chair.” 
 
 The gentleman took a chair, and put his hand 
 to his forehead, as if he were in a melancholy 
 frame of mind. Mr. Fledgeby eyed him aside, 
 and seemed to relish his attitude. 
 
 ‘A fine day, Sir,” remarked Fledgeby. 
 
 The little dried gentleman was so occupied 
 with his own depressed reflections that he did 
 not notice the remark until the sound of Mr. 
 Fledgeby’s voice had died out of the counting- 
 house. Then he started, and said: ‘‘I beg 
 your pardon, Sir. I fear you spoke to me?” 
 
 “IT said,” remarked Fledgeby, a little louder 
 than before, ‘‘it was a fine day.” 
 
 “T beg your pardon. I beg your pardon. 
 Wea? 
 
 Again the little dried gentleman put his hand 
 to his forehead, and again Mr. Fledgeby seemed 
 to enjoy his doing it. When the gentleman 
 changed his attitude with a sigh, Fledgeby spake 
 with a grin. 
 
 ‘“¢ Mr. Twemlow, I think ?” 
 
 The dried gentleman seemed much surprised. 
 
 ‘* Had the pleasure of dining with you at 
 
 Lammle’s,”’ said Fledgeby. ‘‘Even have the 
 honor of being a connection of yours. An un- 
 expected sort of place this to meet in; but one 
 
 never knows, when one gets into the City, what 
 people one may knock up against. I hope vou 
 have your health, and are enjoying yourself.” 
 
 There might have been a touch of imperti- 
 nence in the last words; on the other hand, it 
 might have been but the native grace of Mr. 
 Fledgeby’s manner. Mr. Fledgeby sat on a 
 stool with a foot on the rail of another stool, and 
 his hat on. Mr. Twemlow had uncovered on 
 looking in at the door, and remained so. 
 
 Now the conscientious Twemlow, knowing 
 what he had done to thwart the gracious Fledge- 
 by, was particularly disconcerted by this en- 
 counter. He was as ill at ease as a gentleman 
 well could be. He felt himself bouné to con- 
 duct himself stiffly toward) Fledgeby, and he 
 made him a distant bow. Fledgeby made his 
 small eyes smaller in taking special note of his 
 manner. ‘The dolls’ dress-maker sat in her cor- 
 ner behind the door, with her eyes on the ground 
 and her hands folded on her basket, holding her 
 crutch-stick between them, and appearing to 
 take no heed of any thing. 
 
 ‘‘He’s a long time,” muttered Mr. Fledgeby, 
 looking at his watch. ‘What time may you 
 make it, Mr. Twemlow ?” 
 
 Mr. Twemlow maile it ten minutes past twelve, 
 Sir. 
 
 ‘‘ As near as a toucher,” assented Fledgeby. 
 “‘T hope, Mr. T'wemlow, your business here may 
 be of a more agreeable character than mine.” 
 
 “Thank you, Sir,” said Mr. Twemlow. 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. Pac ae 
 Fledgeby again made iis small eyes 1 nna 
 
 as he glanced with great complacency at Twem- 
 low, who was timorously tapping the table with 
 a folded letter, . 
 
 ‘‘ What I know of Mr. Riah,” said Fledgeby, 
 with a very disparaging utterance of. his name, 
 ‘*Jeads me to believe that this is about the shop 
 for disagreeable business. I have always found 
 him the bitingest and tightest screw in London,” 
 
 Mr. Twemlow acknowledged the remark with 
 a little distant bow. It evidently made him 
 nervous. : 
 
 ‘¢So much so,” pursued Fledgeby, “ that if it 
 wasn't to be true to a friend, nobody should 
 catch me waiting here a single minute. But 
 if you have friends in adversity, stand by them. 
 That’s what I say and act up to.” 
 
 The equitable Twemlow felt that this senti- 
 ment, irrespective of the utterer, demanded his 
 cordial assent. ‘You are very right, Sir,” he 
 rejoined with spirit. “You indicate the gener 
 ous and manly course.’ ; 
 
 ‘*Glad to have your approbation,” returned 
 Fledgeby. ‘‘It’sa coincidence, Mr; Twemlow ;” 
 here he descended from his perch, and saunter- 
 ed toward him; 
 ing by to-day are the friends at whose house I 
 met you! The Lammles. She’s a very taking 
 and agreeable woman ?” 
 
 Conscience smote the gentle Twemlow pale. 
 ‘*Yes,” he said. ‘* She is.” 
 
 “And when she appealed to me this morn- 
 ing to come and try what I could do to pacify 
 their creditor, this Mr. Riah—that I certainly 
 have gained some little influence with in trans- 
 acting business for another friend, but nothing 
 like so much as she supposes—and when a wo- 
 man like that spoke to me as her dearest Mr. 
 Fledgeby, and shed tears—why what could I 
 do, you know ?” 
 
 Twemlow gasped ‘‘ Nothing but céme.” 
 
 ‘*Nothing but come. And so I came. But 
 why,’ said Fledgeby, putting his hands in his 
 pockets and counterfeiting deep meditation, 
 ‘¢why Riah should have started up, when I told 
 him that the Lammles entreated him to hold 
 over a Bill of Sale he has on all their effects; 
 and why he should have cut out, saying he 
 would be. back directly; and why he should 
 have left me here alone so long; I can not un- 
 derstand.” 
 
 The chivalrous Twemlow, Knight of the Sim-: 
 ple Heart, was not in a condition to offer any 
 suggestion. He was too penitent, too remorse- 
 ful. For the first time in his life he had done 
 an underhanded action, and he had done wrong. 
 He had secretly interposed against this confiding 
 young man, for no better real reason than be- 
 cause the young man’s ways were not his ways. 
 
 But the confiding young man proceeded to 
 heap coals of fire on his sensitive head. 
 
 ‘‘T beg your pardon, Mr. Twemlow; you see — 
 
 IT am acquainted with the nature of the af- 
 fairs that are transacted here. Is there any 
 thing I can do for you here? You have always 
 been brought up as a gentleman, and never as 
 a man of business ;” another touch of possible 
 impertinence in this place; ‘‘and perhaps you — 
 are but a poor man of business. What else is 
 to be expected !”’ 
 
 ‘‘T am even a poorer man of incisions than I 
 am a man, Sir,” returned Twemlow, ‘and ka 
 
 ‘that the friends I am stand 
 
a 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND 
 
 * could hardly express my deficiency in a stronger 
 
 ry 
 ih 
 
 4 
 
 way. I[ really do not so much as clearly under- 
 stand my position in the matter on which I am 
 
 brought here. But there are reasons which make 
 
 me very delicate of accepting your assistance. I 
 
 _ am greatly, greatly, disinclined to profit byit. I 
 - don’t deserve it.” , 
 
 _ Good childish creature! Condemned to a pas- 
 sage through the world by such narrow little 
 dimly-lighted ways, and picking up so few specks 
 er spots on the road! 
 
 ** Perhaps,” said Fledgeby, ‘‘ you may be a 
 little proud of entering on the topic—having been 
 brought up as a gentleman.” 
 
 ** It’s not that, Sir,” returned Twemlow, ‘‘ it’s 
 not that. I hope I distinguish between true pride 
 
 -. and false pride.” 
 
 By! 
 
 - 
 
 __ know one from t’other. 
 _ place where even a man of business needs his 
 wits about him; and if mine can be of any use 
 
 ‘*] have no pride at all, myself,” said Fledge- 
 by, ‘‘and perhaps I don’t cut things so fine as to 
 But I know this is a 
 
 to you here, you’re welcome to them.” 
 
 “‘You are very good,” said Twemlow, falter- 
 ing. ‘‘But lam most unwilling—” 
 
 “‘T don’t, you know,’’ proceeded Fledgeby, 
 with an ill-favored glance, ‘‘ entertain the vanity 
 of supposing that my wits could be of any use to 
 you in society, but they might be here. You 
 cultivate society and society cultivates you, but 
 Mr. Riah’s not society. In society, Mr. Riah is 
 kept dark ; eh, Mr. T'wemlow ?” 
 
 Twemlow, much disturbed, and with his hand 
 fluttering about his forehead, replied: ‘‘ Quite 
 true.” 
 
 The confiding young man besought him to 
 ‘state his case. The innocent Twemlow; expect- 
 ing Fledgeby to be astounded by what he should 
 unfold, and not for an instant conceiving the 
 possibility of its happening every day, but treat- 
 ing of it ass terrible phenomenon occurring in 
 the course of ages, related how that he had had 
 
 _ .a deceased friend, a married civil officer with a 
 
 family, who had wanted money for change of 
 place on change of post, and how he, Twemlow, 
 had ‘‘ given him his name,” with the usual, but 
 in the eyes of Twemlow almost incredible result 
 that he had been left to repay what he had never 
 had. How, in the course of years, he had re- 
 ‘duced the principal by trifling sums, ‘* having,” 
 said Twemlow, ‘‘ always to observe great econo- 
 my, being in the enjoyment of a fixed income 
 limited in extent, and that depending on the mu- 
 nificence of a certain nobleman,” and had always 
 pinched the full interest out of himself with punc- 
 tual pinches. How he had come, in course of 
 time, to look upon this one only debt of his life as a 
 regular quarterly drawback, and no worse, when 
 “*his name’? had some way fallen into the pos- 
 
 session of Mr. Riah, who had sent him notice to 
 
 redeem it by paying up in full, in one plump 
 sum, or take tremendous consequences. ‘This, 
 with hazy remembrances of how he had been 
 earried to some office to ‘* confess judgment” (as 
 he recollected the phrase), and how he had been 
 carried to another office where his life was as- 
 sured for somebody not wholly unconnected with 
 
 the sherry trade whom he remembered by the 
 
 remarkable circumstance that he had a Stradua- 
 
 rius violin to dispose of, and also a Madonna, 
 formed the sum and substance of Mr. Twemlow’s 
 
 ‘narrative. ‘Through which stalked the shadow 
 
 16 
 
 249 
 
 of the awful Snigsworth, eyed afar off by money- 
 lenders as Security in the Mist, and menacing 
 Twemlow with his baronial truncheon. 
 
 To all, Mr. Fledgeby listened with the modest 
 gravity becoming a confiding young man who 
 knew it all beforehand, and, when it was finished, 
 seriously shook his head. ‘I don’t like, Mr. 
 Twemlow,” said Fledgeby, ‘I don’t like Riah’s 
 ealling in the principal. If he’s determined to 
 call it in, it must come.” 
 
 ‘** But supposing, Sir,” said Twemlow, down- 
 cast, ‘‘that it can’t come?” 
 
 ‘‘Then,” retorted Fledgeby, ‘‘you must go, 
 you know.” 
 
 ‘** Where?” asked Twemlow, faintly. 
 
 ‘To prison,” returned Fledgeby. _Whereat 
 Mr. 'T'wemlow leaned his innocent head upon his 
 hand, and moaned a little moan of distress and 
 disgrace. 
 
 ‘* However,” said Fledgeby, appearing to 
 pluck up his spirits, ‘‘ we’ll hope it’s not so bad 
 as that comes to. If you'll allow me, I'll men- 
 tion to Mr. Riah when he comes in, who you are, 
 and [ll tell him you’re my friend, and I’]1 say 
 my say for you, instead of your saying it for 
 yourself; I may be able-to do it in a more busi~ 
 ness-like way. You won’t consider it a liberty ?” 
 
 “JT thank you again and again, Sir,” said 
 Twemlow. ‘‘I am strong, strongly, disinclined 
 to avail myself of your generosity, though my 
 helplessness yields. For I can not but feel that 
 I—to put it in the mildest form of speech—that 
 I have done nothing to deserve it.” 
 
 ‘¢ Where can he be?” muttered Fledgeby, re- 
 ferring to his watch again. ‘* What can he have 
 gone out for? Did you ever see him, Mr. 
 Twemlow ?” 
 
 “¢ Never.” 
 
 ‘s He is a thorough Jew to look at, but he is 
 a more thorough Jew to deal with. He’s worst 
 when he’s quiet. If he’s quiet, I shall take it as 
 a very bad sign. Keep your eye upon him when 
 he comes in, and, if he’s quiet, don’t be hopeful. 
 Here he is!—he looks quiet.” 
 
 With these words, which had the effect of 
 causing the harmless Twemlow painful agita- 
 tion, Mr. Fledgeby withdrew to his former post, 
 and the old man entered the counting-house. 
 
 ‘Why, Mr. Riah,” said Fledgeby, ‘‘ I thought 
 you were lost!” 
 
 The old man, glancing at the stranger, stood 
 stock-still. He perceived that his master was 
 leading up to the orders he was to take, and he 
 waited to understand them. 
 
 ‘‘T really thought,” repeated Fledgeby slowly, 
 ‘that you were lost, Mr. Riah. Why, now I 
 look at you—but no, you can’t have done it; no, 
 you can’t have done it !”’ : 
 
 Hat in hand, the old man lifted his head, and 
 looked distressfully at Fledgeby, as seeking to 
 know what new moral burden he was to bear, 
 
 ‘You can’t have rushed ont to get the start 
 of every body else, and put in that bill of sale at 
 Lammile’s?” said Fledgeby. ‘‘ Say you haven't, 
 Mr. Riah.”’ : 
 
 ‘¢ Sir, I have,” replied the old man in a low 
 voice. . 
 
 ‘©Oh my eye!” cried Fledgeby. ‘‘ Tut, tut, 
 tut! Dear, dear, dear! Well! I knew you 
 were a hard customer, Mr. Riah, but I never 
 thought you were as hard as that.” : 
 
 ‘‘ Sir,” said the old man, with great uneasi- 
 
250 
 
 ness, ‘‘I do as I am directed. I am not the 
 principal here. Jam but the agent of a supe- 
 rior, and I have no choice, no power.” 
 
 ‘¢Don’t say so,” retorted Fledgeby, secretly 
 exultant as the old man stretched out his hands, 
 with a shrinking action of defending. himself 
 against the sharp construction of the two observ- 
 ers. ‘‘Don’t play the tune of the trade, Mr. 
 Riah. You’ve a right to get in your debts, if 
 you're determined to do it, but don’t pretend 
 what every one in your line regularly pretends. 
 At least, don’t do it to me. Why should yon, 
 Mr. Riah? You know I know all about you.” 
 
 The old man clasped the skirt of his long 
 coat with his disengaged hand, and directed a 
 wistful look at Fledgeby. 
 
 ‘¢And don’t,” said Fledgeby, ‘‘ don’t, I en- 
 treat you as a favor, Mr. Riah, be so devilish 
 meek, for I know what'll follow if you are. 
 Look here, Mr. Riah. This gentleman is Mr. 
 Twemlow.” 
 
 The Jew turned to him and bowed. That 
 -poor lamb bowed in return; polite, and terri- 
 fied. 
 
 ‘¢T have made such a failure,” proceeded 
 Fledgeby, ‘in trying to do any thing with you 
 for my friend Lammle, that I’ve hardly a hope 
 of doing any thing with you for my friend (and 
 connection indeed) Mr. Twemlow.. But I do 
 think that if you would do a favor for any body, 
 you would for me, and I won’t fail for want of 
 trying, and I’ve passed my promise to Mr. Twem- 
 low besides. Now, Mr. Riah, here is Mr. Twem- 
 low. Always good for his interest, always com- 
 ing up to time, always paying his little way. 
 Now, why should you press Mr. Twemlow? You 
 can’t have any spite against Mr. Twemlow! 
 Why not be easy with Mr. Twemlow ?” 
 
 The old man looked into Fledgeby’s little eyes 
 for any sign of leave to be easy with Mr. Twem- 
 low; but there was no sign in them. 
 
 ‘‘Mr. Twemlow is no connection of yours, 
 Mr. Riah,” said Fledgeby; ‘‘ you can’t want to 
 be even with him for having through life gone 
 in for a gentleman and hung on to his Family. 
 If Mr. Twemlow has a contempt for business, 
 what can it matter to you ?” 
 
 ‘¢ But pardon me,” interposed the gentle vic- 
 tim, ‘‘ I have not, I should consider it presump- 
 tion.” 
 
 ‘‘There, Mr. Riah!’ said Fledgeby, ‘‘isn’t 
 that handsomely said? Come! Make terms 
 with me for Mr. Twemlow.” 
 
 The old man looked again for any sign of 
 permission to spare the poor little gentleman. 
 No. Mr. Fledgeby meant him to be racked. 
 
 ‘‘T am very sorry, Mr. Twemlow,” said Riah. 
 ‘*T have my instructions. I am invested with 
 no authority for diverging from them. The 
 money must be paid.” 
 
 **In full and slap down, do you mean, Mr. 
 Riah ?” asked Fledgeby, to make things quite 
 explicit. 
 
 “In full, Sir, and at once,’’ was Riah’s an- 
 swer. 
 
 Mr. Fledgeby shook his head deploringly at 
 Twemlow, and mutely expressed in reference to 
 the venerable figure standing before him with 
 eyes upon the ground: ‘* What a Monster of 
 an Israelite this is!” 
 
 ‘‘Mr. Riah,” said Fledgeby. 
 
 The old man lifted up his eyes once more to 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. . 
 
 mi k oy 
 nt ; ie 
 api 
 
 the little eyes in Mr. Fledgeby’s head, wit! 
 some reviving hope that the sign might be com- 
 ing yet. a ch 
 
 ‘¢Mr. Riah, it’s of no use my holding back 
 the fact. There’s a certain great party in the 
 back-ground in Mr. Twemlow’s case, and you 
 know it.” 
 
 ‘¢ T-know it,” the old man admitted. 
 
 ‘¢Now, Ill put it as a plain point of business. ' 
 Mr. Riah. Are you fully determined (as a plain 
 point of business) either to have that said great 
 party’s security, or that said great party’s mon- 
 e rg 
 
 ently determined,’ answered Riah, as he — 
 read his master’s face, and learned the book. 
 
 ‘“ Not at all caring for, and indeed as it seems . 
 to me rather enjoying,” said Fledgeby, with pe- 
 euliar unction, ‘‘the precious kick-up and row ~ 
 that will come off between Mr. Twemlow and ~ 
 the said great party ?” 
 
 This required no answer, and received none. 
 Poor Mr. 'wemlow, who had betrayed the keen- 
 est mental terrors since his noble kinsman loomed — 
 in the perspective, rose with a sigh to take his 
 departure. ‘‘I thank you very much, Sir,” he 
 said, offering Fledgeby his feverish hand. ‘* You 
 have done me an unmerited service. Thank you, 
 thank you!” 
 
 ‘¢Don’t mention it,” answered Fledgeby. 
 **Tt’s a failure so far, but Vl stay behind and — 
 take another touch at Mr. Riah.” 
 
 ‘*Do not deceive yourself, Mr. Twemlow,” 
 said the Jew, then addressing him directly for 
 the first time. ‘*'There is no hope for you. You 
 must expect no leniency here. You must pay in 
 full, and you can not pay too promptly, or you 
 will be put to heavy charges. ‘Trust nothing to 
 me, Sir. Money, money, money.” When he 
 had said these words in an emphatic manner, he 
 acknowledged Mr. Twemlow’s still polite motion 
 of his head, and that amiable little worthy took ~ 
 his departure in the lowest spirits. 3 
 
 Fascination Fledgeby was in such a merry — 
 vein when the counting-house was cleared of — 
 him, that he had nothing for it but to go to the 
 window, and lean his arms on the frame of the — 
 blind, and have his silent laugh out, with his 
 back to his subordinate. When he turned round 
 again with a composed countenance, his subor- 
 dinate still stood in the same place, and the — 
 dolls’ dress-maker sat behind the door with a . 
 look of horror. 
 
 ‘¢‘Halloa?” cried Mr. Fledgeby, ‘‘you’re for- — 
 getting this young Jady, Mr. Riah, and she has ~ 
 been waiting long enough too. Sell her her — 
 waste, please, and give her good measure if you — 
 ean make up your mind to do the liberal thing ~ 
 for once.” a 
 
 He looked on for a time, as the Jew filled her ~ 
 little basket with such scraps as she was used to ~ 
 buy; but, his merry vein coming on again, he 
 was obliged to turn round to the window once 
 more, and lean his arms on the blind. 
 
 ‘‘There, my Cinderella dear,” said the old — 
 man in a whisper, and with a worn-out look, ~ 
 “the basket’s full now. Bless you! And get — 
 you gone !”’ 7 
 
 “Don’t call me your Cinderella dear,” re- — 
 turned Miss Wren. ‘Oh you cruel godmo-— 
 ther !” : ee 
 
 She shook that emphatie little forefinger of — 
 hers in his face at parting, as earnestly and re- 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 ij proachfully as she had ever shaken it at her grim 
 
 - old child at home. 
 
 _, ‘You are not the godmother at all!” said she. 
 “You are the Wolf in the Forest, the wicked 
 Wolf! And if ever my dear Lizzie is sgld and 
 betrayed, I shall know: who sold and betrayed 
 her !” “i 
 
 ! —___>—_—_ 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 ' MR. WEGG PREPARES A GRINDSTONE FOR MR. 
 BOFFIN’S NOSE. 
 
 Havine assisted at a few more expositions of 
 the lives of Misers, Mr. Venus became almost in- 
 dispensable to the evenings at the Bower. The 
 circumstance of having another listener to the 
 wonders unfolded by Wegg, or, as it were, an- 
 other calculator to cast up the guineas found in 
 tea-pots, chimneys, racks, and mangers, and other 
 such banks. of deposit, seemed greatly to height- 
 en Mr. Boffin’s enjoyment; while Silas Wegg, 
 for his part, though of a jealous temperament 
 which might under ordinary circumstances have 
 resented the anatomist’s getting into favor, was 
 ‘80 very anxious to keep his eye on that gentle- 
 man—lest, being too much left to himself, he 
 should be tempted to play any tricks with the 
 precious document in his keeping—that he nev- 
 er lost an opportunity of commending him to 
 Mr. Boffin’s notice as a third party whose com- 
 pany was much to be desired. Another friend- 
 ly demonstration toward him Mr. Wegg now 
 regularly gratified. Afier each sitting was over, 
 and the patronthad departed, Mr. Wegg invari- 
 ably saw Mr. Venus home. ‘To be suré, he as 
 invariably requested to be refreshed witlya sight 
 of the paper in which he was a joint proprietor ; 
 but he never failed to remark that it was the 
 great pleasure he derived from Mr. Venus’s im- 
 proving society which had insensibly lured him 
 round to Clerkenwell again, and that, finding 
 himself once more attracted to the spot by. the 
 social powers of Mr. V., he would beg leave to 
 go through that little incidental procedure, as a 
 matter of form. ‘‘ For well I know, Sir,” Mr. 
 Wegg would add, ‘‘that a man of your delicate 
 mind would wish to be checked off whenever the 
 opportunity arises, and it is not for me to balk 
 
 your feelings.” 
 
 A certain rustiness in Mr. Venus, which nev- 
 er became so lubricated by the oil of Mr. Wegg 
 but that he turned under the screw in a creak- 
 ing and stiff manner, was very noticeable at 
 about this period. While assisting at the literary 
 evenings he even went so far, on two or three oc- 
 casions, as to correct Mr. Wegg when he gross- 
 ly mispronounced a word, or made nonsense of 
 & passage; insomuch that Mr. Wegg took to 
 
 _ surveying his course in the day, and to making 
 arrangements for getting round rocks at night 
 instead of running straight upon them. Of the 
 
 _ slightest anatomical reference he became partic- 
 ularly shy, and, if he saw a bone ahead, would 
 go any distance out of his way rather than men- 
 tion it by name. 
 
 The adverse destinies ordained that one even- 
 ing Mr. Weégg’s laboring bark became beset by 
 
 _ polysyllables, and embarrassed among a perfect 
 archipelago of hard words. It being necessary 
 to take soundings every minute, and to feel the 
 way with the greatest caution, Mr. Wegg’s at- 
 
 ita, 
 
 tention was fully employed. 
 taken of this dilemma by Mr, Venus to pass a 
 scrap of paper into Mr. Boffin’s hand, and lay 
 his finger on his own lip. | 
 
 ae 
 a 
 
 251 
 
 Advantage was 
 
 When Mr. Boftin got home at night he found 
 
 that the paper contained Mr. Venus’s card and 
 these words: ‘*Should be glad to be honored 
 
 with a call respecting business of your own, 
 about dusk on an early evening.” 
 
 The very next evening saw Mr. Boffin peep- 
 ing in at the preserved frogs in Mr. Venus’s 
 shop-window, and saw Mr. Venus espying Mr. 
 Bottin with the readiness of one on the alert, 
 and beckoning that gentleman into his interior, 
 Responding, Mr. Boffin was invited to seat him- 
 self on the box of human miscellanies before the 
 fire, and did so, looking round the place with 
 admiring eyes. The fire being low and fitful, 
 and the dusk gloomy, the whole stock seemed 
 to be winking and blinking with both eyes, as 
 Mr. Venus did. The French gentleman, though 
 he had no eyes, was not at all behindhand, but 
 appeared, as the flame rose and fell, to open 
 and shut his no eyes, with the regularity of the 
 glass-eyed dogs and ducks and birds. The big- 
 headed babies were equally obliging in lending 
 their grotesque aid to the general effect. 
 
 ‘* You see, Mr. Venus, I’ve lost no time,” said 
 Mr. Boffin. ‘‘ Here I am.” 
 
 ‘‘ Here you are, Sir,” assented Mr. Venus. 
 
 “*T don’t like secrecy,” pursued Mr. Boftin— 
 ‘Cat least, not in a general way I don’t—but I 
 dare say you'll show me good reason for being 
 secret so far.” 
 
 ‘¢T think I shall, Sir,” returned Venus. | 
 
 ‘¢Good,” said Mr. Boffin. ‘‘ You don’t ex- 
 pect Wegg, I take it for granted ?” 
 
 ‘“No, Sir. I expect no one but the present 
 company.” 
 
 Mr. Boffin glanced about him, as accepting 
 under that inclusive denomination the French 
 gentleman and the circle in which he didn’t 
 move, and repeated, ‘‘ The present company.” 
 
 ‘¢ Sir,” said Mr. Venus, ‘‘ before entering upon 
 business, I shall have to ask you for your word 
 and honor that we are in confidence.” 
 
 ‘‘Let’s wait a bit and understand what the 
 expression means,” answered Mr. Boffin. ‘In 
 confidence for how long? In confidence forever 
 and a day ?” 
 
 ‘T take your hint, Sir,” said Venus; ‘‘you 
 think you might consider the business, when 
 you came to know it, to be of a nature incom- 
 patible with confidence on your part?” . 
 
 “T might,” said Mr. Boffin, with a cautions 
 look. 
 
 ‘True, Sir. Well, Sir,” observed Venus, aft- 
 er clutching at his dusty hair, to brighten his 
 ideas, ‘‘let us put it another way. I open the 
 business with you, relying upon your honor not 
 to do any thing in it, and not to mention me in 
 it, without my knowledge.” 
 
 ‘That sounds fair,” said Mr. Boffin. “I 
 agree to that.” 
 
 ‘¢T have your word and honor, Sir ?” 
 
 “My good fellow,” retorted Mr. Boffin, “you 
 have my word; and how you can have that, 
 without my honor too, I don’t know. I’ve sort- 
 ed a lot of dust in my time, but I never knew the 
 two things go into separate heaps.” 
 
 This remark seemed rather to abash Mr. Ve- 
 
 nus. He hesitated, and said, “‘ Very true, Sar 3" 
 
252 . OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 and again, ‘Very true, Sir,” before resuming | I am ever called upon for the trath, I tell it, but j 
 
 i! 
 
 the thread of his discourse. 
 
 “ Mr. Boftin, if I confess to you that I fell 
 into a proposal of which you were the sub- 
 ject, and of which you oughtn’t to have been 
 the subject, you will allow me to mention, and 
 will please take into favorable consideration, that 
 I was in a crushed state of mind ‘at the time.” 
 
 The Golden Dustman, with his hands folded 
 on the top of his stout stick, with his chin rest- 
 ing upon them, and with something leering and 
 whimsical in his eyes, gave a nod, and said, 
 ** Quite so, Venus.” 
 
 ‘+ That proposal, Sir, was a conspiring breach 
 of your confidence, to such an extent, that I 
 ought at once: to have made it known to you. 
 But I didn’t, Mr. Boffin, and I fell into it.” 
 
 Without moving eye or finger Mr. Boffin gave 
 another nod, and placidly repeated, ‘‘ Quite so, 
 Venus.” 
 
 “‘ Not that I was ever hearty in it, Sir,” the 
 penitent antagonist went on, ‘‘or that I ever 
 viewed myself with any thing but‘reproach for 
 having turned out of the paths of science into 
 the paths of—’’ He was going to say ‘‘ villainy,” 
 but, unwilling to press too hard upon himself, 
 substituted with great emphasis—‘* Weggery.”’ 
 
 Placid and whimsical of look as ever, Mr. 
 Boffin answered: ‘‘ Quite so, Venus.” 
 
 ‘¢ And now, Sir,” said Venus, ‘‘ having pre- 
 pared your mind in the rough, I will articulate 
 the details.” With which brief professional ex- 
 ordium, he entered on the history of the friend- 
 ly move, and truly recounted it. One might 
 
 have thought that it would have extracted some: 
 
 show of surprise or anger, or other emotion, 
 from Mr. Boffin, but it extracted nothing beyond 
 his former comment: ‘‘ Quite so, Venus.” 
 
 ‘*T have astonished you, Sir, I believe ?” said 
 Mr. Venus, pausing dubiously. 
 
 Mr. Boffin simply answered as aforesaid: 
 ** Quite so, Venus.”’ 
 
 By this time the astonishment was all on the 
 other side. It did not, however, so continue. 
 For, when Venus passed to Wegg’s discovery, 
 and from that to their having both seen Mr. 
 Boffin dig up the Dutch bottle, that gentleman 
 changed color, changed his attitude, became ex- 
 tremely restless, and ended (when Venus ended) 
 by being in a state of manifest anxiety, trepida- 
 tion, and confusion. 
 
 ‘*Now, Sir,” said Venus, finishing off; “you 
 best know what was in that Dutch bottle, and 
 why you dug it up, and took it away. I don’t 
 pretend to know any thing more about it than I 
 saw. All I know is this: I am proud of my 
 calling after all (though it has been attended by 
 one dreadful drawback which has told upon my 
 heart, and almost equally upon my skeleton), 
 and I mean to live by my calling. Putting the 
 sume meaning into other words, I do not mean 
 to turn a single dishonest penny by this affair. 
 As the best amends I can make you for having 
 ever gone into it, I make known to you, as a 
 warning, what Wegg has found out. My opin- 
 ion is, that Wegg is not to be silenced at a mod- 
 est price, and I build that opinion on his begin- 
 ning to dispose of your property the moment he 
 knew his power. Whether it’s worth your while 
 to silence him at any price, you will decide for 
 yourself, and take your measures accordingly. 
 As far as I am concerned, [have no price. If 
 
 I want to do no more than I have now done and — 
 ended.” Be Me. 
 
 ‘“Thank’ee, Venus P’ said Mr. Boffin, with a 
 hearty grip of his hand; ‘‘thank’ee, Venus, 
 thank’ee, Venus!” And then walked up and 
 down the little shop in great agitation. ‘But 
 look here, Venus,” he by-and-by resumed, nerv- 
 ously sitting down again; “if I have to buy: 
 Wegg up, I sha’n’t buy him any cheaper for 
 your being ovt of it. Instead of his having half 
 the money—it was to have been half, I suppose ? 
 Share and share alike ?” 
 
 ‘‘Tt was to have been half, Sir,” answered 
 Venus. : 
 
 ‘Instead of that, he’ll now have all. I shall 
 pay the same, if not more. For you tell me 
 he’s an unconscionable dog, a ravenous rascal,” 
 
 “ He is,” said Venus, 
 
 “Don’t you think, Venus,” insinuated Mr. 
 Boftin, after looking at the fire for a while— 
 **don’t you feel as if—you might like to pretend 
 to be in it till Wegg was brought up, and then 
 ease your mind by handing over to me what you 
 had made believe to pocket ?” 
 
 ** No, Idon’t, Sir,” returned Venus, very pos- 
 itively. 
 
 ‘‘Not to make amends?” 
 Boffin. 
 
 ‘‘No, Sir.. It seems to me, after maturely 
 thinking it over, that the best amends for hav- 
 ing got out of the square is to get back into the 
 square.” : 
 
 ‘¢ Humph !” mused Mr. Boffin. 
 say the square, you mean—” . * 
 
 “T mean,” said Venus, stoutly and shortly, 
 “the right.” 
 
 ‘‘Tt appears to me,” said Mr. Boffin, grum- 
 bling over the fire in an injured manner, “ that 
 the right is with me, if it’s any where. I have 
 much more right to the old man’s money than 
 the Crown can ever have. What was the Crown 
 to him except the King’s Taxes? Whereas, me 
 and my wife, we was all in all to him.” 
 
 Mr. Venus, with his head upon his hands, 
 rendered melancholy by the contemplation of 
 Mr. Boffin’s avarice, only murmured to steep 
 himself in the luxury of that frame of mind: 
 ‘She did not wish so to regard herself, nor yet 
 to be so regarded.” 
 
 ‘¢And how am I to live,” asked Mr. Boffin, 
 piteonsly, ‘‘if ’m to be going buying fellows up 
 ont of the little that I’ve got? And how am [ 
 to set about it? -When am [I to get my money 
 ready? When am I to make a bid? Yeu: 
 haven’t told me when he threatens to drop down 
 upon me.” 
 
 Venus explained under what conditions, and 
 with what views, the dropping down upon Mr. 
 Boffin was held. over until the Mounds should be 
 cleared away. Mr. Boffin listened attentively. 
 ‘*T suppose,” said he, with a gleam of hope, 
 ‘‘there’s no doubt about the genuineness and 
 date of this confounded will ?” 
 
 ‘ None whatever,” said Mr. Venus. 
 
 ‘Where might it be deposited at present?” 
 asked Mr. Boffin, in a wheedling tcne. 
 
 “¢Tt’s in my possession, Sir.” ; 
 
 “Ts it?” he cried, with great eagerness, — 
 ‘*Now, for any liberal sum of money that could — 
 a agreed upon, Venus, would you put it in the © 
 
 re?” ae 
 
 insinuated Mr. 
 
 ‘¢ When you 
 
> A 
 
 Me a ‘Na, 
 
 A 
 
 *—HSON §.NITGOE “UN YOT ANOLSANIUD V SUUVAAYK NOTM “IN 
 
 ' 
 
 ‘¢No, Sir, I wouldn’t,” interrupted Mr. Venus. 
 
 ‘¢ Nor pass it over to me?” 
 
 ‘¢That would be the same thing. No, Sir,” 
 said Mr. Venus. 
 
 The Golden Dustman seemed about to pursue 
 these questions, when a stumping noise was 
 heard outside, coming toward the door. ‘‘ Hush! 
 here’s Wegg!” said Venus. ‘‘Get behind the 
 young alligator in the corner, Mr. Boffin, and 
 judge him for yourself. I won’t light a candle 
 till he’s gone; there’ll only be the glow of the 
 fire; Wegg’s well acquainted with the alliga- 
 tor, and he won’t take particular notice of him. 
 Draw your legs in, Mr. Boffin, at present I see 
 a pair of shoes at the end of his tail. Get your 
 head well behind his smile, Mr. Boffin, and you'll 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 253 
 
 Woe 
 
 : Zz. g 
 Z CEP ILZ 
 
 “ir © 
 
 lie comfortable there; you'll find plenty of room 
 behind his smile. He’s a little dusty, but he’s 
 very like you in tone. Are you right, Sint. 
 
 Mr. Boffin had but whispered an affirmative 
 response, when Wegg came stumpingin. ‘ Part- 
 ner,” said that gentleman in a sprightly manner, 
 “ how’s yourself?” 
 
 ‘‘Tolerable,” returned Mr. Venus. “ Not 
 much to boast of.”’ 
 
 ‘‘In-deed!” said Wegg: ‘‘sorry, partner, that 
 you're not picking up faster, but your soul’s too 
 large for your body, Sir; that’s where it Is. 
 And how’s our stock in trade, partner? pate 
 bind, safe find, partner? Is that about it ? 
 
 ‘‘Do you wish to see it?” asked Venus. | 
 
 ‘‘Tf you please, partner,” said Weegs, rubbing 
 
 ba 
 
254 
 
 his hands. ‘‘I wish to see it jintly with your- 
 self. Or, in similar words to some that was set 
 to music some time back: 
 ‘TI wish you to see it with your eyes, 
 And I will pledge with mine.’ ” 
 Turning his back and turning a key, Mr. Ve- 
 nus produced the document, holding on by his 
 usual corner. Mr. Wegg, holding on by the 
 opposite corner, sat down on the seat so lately 
 vacated by Mr. Boffin, and looked itover. ‘* All 
 right, Sir,” he slowly and unwillingly admitted, 
 in his reluctance to loose his hold, ‘‘all right!” 
 And greedily watched his partner as he turned 
 his back again, and turned his key again. 
 ‘¢There’s nothing new, I suppose?” said Ve- 
 nus, resuming his low chair behind the counter. 
 ‘¢Yes there is, Sir,” replied Wegg; ‘‘ there 
 was something new this morning. That foxy 
 old grasper and griper—” , 
 ‘¢Mr. Boffin?” inquired Venus, with a glance 
 toward the alligator’s yard or two of smile. 
 _ **Mister be blowed!” cried Wegg, yielding to 
 
 his honest indignation. ‘‘Boffin. Dusty Bof- 
 fin. That foxy old grunter and grinder, Sir, 
 turns into the yard this morning, to meddle 
 with our property, a menial tool of his own, a 
 young man by the name of Sloppy. Ecod, when 
 . I say to him, ‘What do you want here, young 
 man? This is a private yard,’ he pulls out a 
 paper from Boffin’s other blackguard, the one 
 I was passed over for. ‘This is to authorize 
 Sloppy to overlook the carting and to watch the 
 work.’ That’s pretty strong, Ithink, Mr. Venus ?” 
 
 ‘“¢Remember he doesn’t know yet of our claim 
 on the property,” suggested Venus. 
 
 ‘¢Then he must have a hint of it,” said Wegg, 
 ‘Cand a strong one that’ll jog his terrors a bit. 
 Give him an inch, and he'll take an ell. Let 
 him alone this time, and what'll he do with our 
 property next? I tell you what, Mr. Venus; it 
 comes to this; I must be overbearing with Bof- 
 fin, or I shall fly into several pieces. I can’t 
 contain myself when I look at him. Every 
 time I see him putting his hand in his pocket, 
 I see him putting it into my pocket. Every 
 time I hear him jingling his money, I hear him 
 taking liberties with my money. Flesh and 
 blood can’t bear it. No,’ said Mr. Wegg, great- 
 ly exasperated, ‘‘and I'll go further. A wood- 
 en leg can’t bear it!” 
 
 ‘But, Mr. Wegg,” urged Venus, ‘it was 
 your own idea that he should not be exploded 
 upon till the Mounds were carted away.” 
 
 ‘¢ But it was likewise my idea, Mr. Venus,” 
 retorted Wegg, ‘‘that if he came sneaking and 
 sniffing about the property, he should be threat- 
 ened, given to understand that he has no right 
 to it, and be made our slave. Wasn’t that my 
 idea, Mr. Venus ?” 
 
 “Tt certainly was, Mr. Wegg.” 
 
 ‘‘Tt certainly was, as you say, partner,” as- 
 
 sented Wegg, put into a better humor by the. 
 
 ready admission. ‘‘Very well. I consider his 
 planting one of his menial tools in the yard an 
 act of sneaking and sniffing. And his nose 
 shall be put to the grindstone for it.” 
 
 ‘Tt was not your fault, Mr. Wegg, I must ad- 
 mit,” said Venus, ‘‘that he got off with the 
 Dutch bottle that night.” 
 
 ‘“©As you handsomely say again, partner! 
 Na, it wasenot my fault. Dd have had that bot- 
 tle out of him. Was it to be borne that he 
 
 yo \ \ 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. | 
 should come, like a thief in the dark, digging ~ 
 
 among stuff that was far more ours than his 
 (seeing that we could deprive him of every grain 
 of it, if he didn’t buy us at our own figure), and 
 carrying off treasure from its bowels? No, it 
 was not to be borne. And for that, too, his 
 nose shalf be put to the grindstone.” 
 
 ‘How do you propose to do it, Mr. Wegg ?” 
 
 ‘““T'o put his nose to the grindstone? I pro- 
 pose,” returned that estimable man, ‘‘to insult 
 him openly. And, if looking into this eye of 
 mine, he dares to offer a word in answer, to re- 
 tort upon him before he can take his breath, 
 ‘Add another word to that, you dusty old dog, 
 and you're a beggar.’”’ 
 
 ‘‘ Suppose he says nothing, Mr. Wegg?” 
 
 ‘‘Then,” replied Wegg, ‘‘we shall have come 
 to an understanding with very little trouble, and 
 Y'll break him and drive him, Mr. Venus. Tl 
 put him in harness, and V’ll bear him up tight, 
 and I’ll break him and drive him. ‘The harder 
 the old Dust is driven, Sir, the higher.he’ll pay. 
 And I mean to be paid high, Mr. Venus, I prom- 
 ise you.” 
 
 ‘You speak quite revengefully, Mr. Wegg.” 
 
 ‘*Revengefully, Sir? Is it for him that I 
 have declined and falled night after night? Is 
 it for his pleasure that I’ve waited at home of an 
 evening, like a set of skittles, to be set up and 
 knocked over, set up and knocked over, by what- 
 ever balls—or books—he chose to bring against 
 me? Why, I’m a hundred times the man he is, 
 Sir; five hundred times!” 
 
 Perhaps it was with the malicious intent of 
 urging him on to his worst that Mr. Venus look- 
 ed as if he doubted that. 
 
 ‘What? Was it outside the house at present 
 ockypied, to its disgrace, by that minion of for- 
 tune and worm of the hour,” said Wegg, falling 
 back upon his strongest terms of reprobation, 
 and slapping the counter, ‘‘ that I, Silas Wegg, 
 five hundred times the man he ever was, sat in 
 all weathers, waiting for a errand or a customer ? 
 Was it outside that very house as I first set eyes 
 upon him, rolling in the lap of luxury, when I 
 was a selling half-penny ballads there for a liv- 
 ing? And am Fto grovel in the dust for hem to 
 walk over? No!” ; 
 
 There was a grin upon the ghastly counte- 
 nance of the French gentleman under the influ- 
 ence of the fire-light, as if he were computing 
 how many thousand slanderers and traitors ar- 
 
 ray themselves against the fortunate, on prem- — 
 lises exactly answering to, those of Mr. Wegg. 
 ‘One might have fancied that the big-headed 
 babies were toppling over with their hydroceph- 
 alic attempts to reckon up the children of men — 
 who transform their benefactors into their injur- 
 ‘ers by the same process. The yard or two of 
 ‘smile on the part of the alligator might have 
 
 been invested with the meaning, ‘‘ All about this 
 was quite familiar knowledge down in the depths 
 of the slime, ages ago.” 
 
 - “But,” said Wegg, possibly with some slight 
 perception to the foregoing etfect, ‘‘ your speak- 
 ing countenance remarks, Mr. Venus, that I’m 
 duller and savager than usual. Perhaps I have 
 
 allowed myself to brood too much. Begone, — 
 
 dull Care! ’Tis gone, Sir. I’ve looked in 
 
 upon you, and empire resumes her sway. For, _ 
 as the song says—subject to your correction, — 
 
 Sir— 
 
 ee ee ee ee 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 ‘When the heart of a man is depressed with cares, 
 ~ The mist is dispelled if Venus appears. | 
 
 Like the notes of a fiddle, you sweetly, Sir, sweetly, 
 Raises our spirits and charms our ears.’ 
 
 Good-night,; Sir.” 
 
 ‘*T shall have a word or twox~to say to you, 
 Mr. Wegg, before long,” remarked Venus, ‘‘re- 
 specting my share in the project we’ve been 
 speaking of.” 
 
 “My time, Sir,” returned Wegg, ‘‘is yours. 
 In the mean while let it be fully understood that 
 I shall not neglect bringing the grindstone to 
 bear, nor yet bringing Dusty Boffin’s nose to it. 
 His nose once brought to it, shall be held to it 
 by these hands, Mr. Venus, till the sparks flies 
 out in showers.” 
 
 With this agreeable promise Wegg stumped 
 out, and shut the shop-door after him. ‘* Wait 
 till I light a candle, Mr. Boffin,” said Venus, 
 **and you'll come out more comfortable.” So, 
 he lighting-a candle and holding it up at arm’s- 
 length, Mr. Boffin disengaged himself from be- 
 hind the alligator’s smile, with an expression of 
 countenance so very downcast that it not only 
 appeared as if the alligator had the whole of the 
 joke to himself, but further as if it had been 
 conceived and executed at Mr. Boffin’s expense. 
 
 ‘<'That’s a treacherous fellow,” said Mr. Bof- 
 fin, dusting his arms and legs as he came forth, 
 the alligator having been but musty company. 
 ‘‘'That’s a dreadful fellow.” 
 
 ‘*'The alligator, Sir?” said Venus. 
 
 “*No, Venus, no. The Serpent.” 
 
 ** You'll have the goodness to notice, Mr. Bof- 
 fin,” remarked Venus, ‘‘that I said nothing to 
 him about my going out of the affair altogether, 
 because I didn’t wish to take you any ways by 
 surprise. But I can’t be too soon out of it for 
 my satisfaction, Mr. Boffin, and I now put it to 
 you when it will suit your views for me to re- 
 Wre??-* 
 
 ‘«Thank’ee, Venus, thank’ee, Venus; but I 
 don’t know what to say,” returned Mr. Boffin, 
 ‘*T don’t know what todo. He'll drop down on 
 me anyway. He seems fully determined to drop 
 down; don’t he?” 
 
 Mr. Venus opined that such was clearly his 
 intention. 
 
 “You might be a sort of protection for me, 
 if you remained in it,” said Mr. Boffin; ‘‘you 
 might stand betwixt him and me, and take the 
 edge off him. Don’t you feel as if you could 
 make a show of remaining in it, Venus, till I 
 had time to turn myself round ?” 
 
 Venus naturally inquired how long Mr. Bof- 
 fin thought it might take him to turn himself 
 reund ? 
 
 ‘“‘T am sure I don’t know,” was the answer, 
 given quite at a loss. ‘Every thing is so at 
 _ Sixes and seyens. If I had never come into the 
 property, I shouldn’t have minded. But being 
 in it, it would be very trying to be turned out; 
 now don’t you acknowledge that it would, Ve- 
 nus ?” 
 
 Mr. Venus preferred, he said, to leave Mr. 
 Boffin to arrive at his own conclusions on that 
 delicate question. 
 
 “‘T am sure I don’t know what to do,” said 
 Mr. Boffin. ‘‘If I ask advice of any one else, 
 it’s only letting in another person to be bought 
 out, and then I shall be ruined that way, and 
 - might as well have given up the property and 
 
 ¢ 
 
 a re 4! 
 
 255 
 gone slap to the work-house. If I was to take. 
 advice of my. young-man, Rokesmith, I should 
 have to buy Aim out, Sooner or later, of course, 
 he’d drop down upon me, like Wegg. I was 
 brought into the world to be dropped down upon, 
 it appears to me.” — 
 
 Mr. Venus listened to these lamentations in 
 silence, while Mr. Boffin jogged to and fro, hold- 
 ing his pockets as if he had a pain in them. © 
 
 ‘* After all, you haven’t said what you mean 
 to do yourself, Venus. When you do go ont of 
 it, how do you mean to go?” be 
 
 Venus replied that as Wegg had found the 
 document and handed it to him, it was his in- 
 tention to hand it back to Wegg, with the dec- 
 laration that he himself would have nothing to 
 say to it, or do with it, and that Wegg must act 
 as he chose, and take the consequences. 
 
 ‘¢And then he drops down with his whole 
 weight upon me!” cried Mr. Boffin, ruefully. 
 ‘*Pd sooner be dropped upon by you than by 
 him, or even by you jintly than by him alone.” 
 
 Mr. Venus could only repeat that it was his” & 
 
 fixed intention to betake himself to the paths of 
 science, and to walk in the same all the days of 
 his life; not dropping down upon his fellow- 
 creatures until they were deceased, and then 
 only to articulate them to the best of his humble 
 ability. 
 
 ‘¢ How long could you be persuaded to keep 
 up the appearance of remaining in it?” asked 
 Mr. Boffin, retiring on his other idea. ‘‘ Could 
 you be got to do so till the Mounds are gone?” 
 
 No. That would protract the mental uneasi- 
 ness of Mr. Venus too long, he said. 
 
 ‘*Not if I was tg show you reason now?” de. 
 manded Mr. Boffin; ‘‘not if I was to show you 
 good and sufficient reason ?” 
 
 If by good and sufficient reason Mr. Boffin 
 meant honest and unimpeachable reason, that 
 might weigh with Mr. Venus against his person- 
 al wishes and convenience. But he must add 
 that he saw no opening to the possibility of such 
 reason being shown him. 
 
 ‘*Come and see me, Venus,” said Mr. Boffin, 
 ‘Cat my house.” 
 
 ‘¢Ts the reason there, Sir?” asked Mr. Venus, 
 with an incredulous smile and blink. 
 
 ‘Tt may be, or may not be,” said Mr. Boffin, 
 “just as you view it. But in the mean time 
 don’t go out of the matter. Look here. Do 
 this. Give me your word that you won't take 
 any steps with Wegg without my knowledge, just 
 as I have given you my word that I won't with-. 
 out yours.” 
 
 “Done, Mr. Boffin!”” said Venus, after brief 
 consideration. A 
 
 ‘‘Thank’ee, Venus, thank’ee, Venus! Done! 
 
 ‘When shall I come to see you, Mr. Bof- 
 fin ?”’ ee 
 
 ‘When you like. The sooner the better. I 
 must be going now. Good-night, Venus.” 
 
 ‘¢ Good-night, Sir.” 
 
 “And good-night to the rest of the present 
 company,” said Mr. Boftin, glancing round the 
 shop. ‘They make a. queer show, Venus, and 
 I should like to be better acquainted with them 
 some day. Good-night, Venus, good-night ! 
 
 44 ; enus. 1 
 Thank’ee, Venus, thank’ee, V ie With that 
 he jogged out into the street, and jogged upon 
 his homeward way. é 
 
 “Now I wonder,” he meditated as he went 
 
pitt) t= een 
 
 256 
 
 along, nursing his stick, ‘‘ whether it can be that 
 Venus is setting himself to get the better of 
 Wegg? Whether it can be that he means, when 
 I have bought Wegg out, to have me all to him- 
 self, and to pick me clean to the bones !? 
 
 It was a cunning and suspicious idea, quite in 
 the way of his school of Misers, and he looked 
 very cunning and suspicious as he went jogging 
 through the streets. More than once or twice, 
 more than twice or thrice, say half a dozen times, 
 he took his stick from the arm on which he nursed 
 it, and hit a straight sharp rap at the air with 
 its head. Possibly the wooden countenance of 
 Mr. Silas Wegg was incorporeally before him at 
 those moments, for he hit with intense satisfac- 
 tion. 
 
 He was within a few streets of his own house 
 when a little private carriage, coming in the 
 contrary direction, passed him, turned round, 
 and passed him again. It was a little carriage 
 of eccentric. movement, for again he heard it 
 stop behind him and turn round, and again he 
 saw it pass him. ‘Then it stopped, and then 
 went on out of sight. But not far out of sight ; 
 for when he came to the corner of his own street 
 there it stood again. 
 
 There was a lady’s face at the window as he 
 came up with this carriage, and he was passing 
 it when the lady.softly called to him by his 
 name. 
 
 ‘(I beg your pardon, Ma’am?” said Mr. Bof- 
 fin, coming to a stop. 
 
 ‘Tt is Mrs. Lammle,” said the lady. 
 
 Mr. Boffin went up to the window, and hoped 
 Mrs. Lammle was well. 
 
 ‘Not very well, dear Mr. Boffin; I have flut- 
 tered myself by being—perhaps foolishly—un- 
 easy and anxious. I have been waiting for you 
 some time. Can I speak to you?” 
 
 Mr. Boffin proposed that Mrs. Lammle should 
 drive on to his house, a few hundred yards fur- 
 ther. 
 
 ‘¢T would rather not, Mr. Boffin, unless you 
 particularly wish it. I feel the difficulty and 
 delicacy of the matter so much that I would 
 rather avoid speaking to you at your own home. 
 You must think this very strange ?” 
 
 Mr. Boffin said no, but meant yes. 
 
 ‘“¢Tt is because I am so grateful for the good 
 opinion of all my friends, and am so touched by 
 it, that I can not bear to run the risk of forfeit- 
 ing it in any case, even in the cause of duty. I 
 have asked my husband (my dear Alfred, Mr. 
 Boffin) whether it 7s the cause of duty, and he 
 has most emphatically said Yes. I wish I had 
 asked him sooner. It would have spared me 
 much distress.”’ 
 
 (‘Can this be more dropping down upon me!” 
 thought Mr. Boffin, quite bewildered.) 
 
 ‘<It was Alfred who sent me to you, Mr, Bof- 
 fin. Alfred said, ‘Don’t come back, Sophronia, 
 until you have seen Mr. Boffin, and told him all. 
 Whatever he may think of it, he ought certainly 
 to know it.’ Would you mind coming into the 
 carriage ?” 
 
 Mr. Boffin answered, ‘‘ Not at all,” and took 
 his seat at Mrs. Lammle’s side. 
 
 ‘¢ Drive slowly any where,” Mrs. Lammle call- 
 ed to her coachman, ‘‘ and don’t let the carriage 
 rattle.” 
 
 “‘Tt must be more dropping down, I think,” 
 said Mr. Boffin to himself. ‘‘ What next?”* 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 THE GOLDEN DUSTMAN AT HIS WORST. 
 
 Tue breakfast-table at Mr. Boffin’s was usu- 
 ally a very pleasant one, and was always pre- 
 sided over by Bella. As though he began each 
 new day in his healthy natural character, and 
 some waking hours were necessary to his relapse 
 into the corrupting influences of his wealth, the 
 face and the demeanor of the Golden Dustman 
 were generally unclouded at that meal. It would 
 have been easy to believe then that there was no 
 change in him. It was as the day went on that 
 the clouds gathered, and the brightness of the 
 morning became obscured. One might have said 
 that the shadows of avarice and distrust length- 
 ened as his own shadow lengthened, and that 
 the night closed around him gradually. 
 
 But one morning, long afterward to be re- 
 membered, it was black midnight with the 
 Golden Dustman when he first appeared. His 
 altered character had never been so grossly 
 marked.. His bearing toward his Secretary was 
 so-eharged with insolent distrust and arrogance, 
 that the latter rose and left the table before 
 breakfast was half done. The look he directed 
 at the Secretary’s retiring figure was so cunning- 
 ly malignant, that Bella would have sat astound- 
 ed and indignant, even though he had not gone 
 the length of secretly threatening Rokesmith 
 with his clenched fist as he closed the door, 
 This unlucky morning, of all mornings in the 
 
 ‘year, was the morning next after Mr. Boffin’s 
 
 interview with Mrs. Lammle in her little car- 
 riage. “ 
 
 Bella looked to Mrs. Boffin’s face for com- 
 ment on, or explanation of, this stormy humor 
 in her husband, but none was there. An anx- 
 ious and a distressed observation of her own 
 face was all she could read in it. When they 
 were left alone together—which was not until 
 noon, for Mr. Boffin sat long in his easy-chair, 
 by turns jogging up and down the breakfast- 
 room, clenching his fist and muttering—Bella, 
 in consternation, asked her what had happened, 
 what was wrong? ‘‘I am forbidden to speak to 
 you about it, Bella dear; I mustn’t tell you,” 
 was all the answer she could get. And still, 
 whenever, in her wonder and dismay, she raised 
 her eyes to Mrs. Bofflin’s face, she saw in it the 
 same anxious and distressed observation of her 
 own. 
 
 Oppressed by her sense that trouble was im- 
 pending, and lost in speculations why Mrs. 
 Boffin should look at her as if she had any part 
 in it, Bella found the day long and dreary. It 
 was far on in the afternoon when, she being 
 
 ‘in her own room, a servant brought her a mes- 
 
 sage from Mr. Boffin begging her to come to 
 his. 3 
 
 Mrs. Boffin was there, seated on a re and 
 Mr. Boffin was jogging up and down.» On see- 
 ing Bella he stopped, beckoned her to him, and 
 drew her arm through his. 
 my dear,” he said, gently; ‘‘I am not angry 
 with you. Why you actually tremble! 
 be alarmed, Bella, my dear. I'll see you righted.” 
 
 *¢ See me fighted ?” thought Bella. Andthen 5 
 
 repeated aloud in a tone of astonishment: ‘‘ See 
 
 me righted, Sir?” » 
 “Ay, ay!” said Mr. Boffin. 
 
 ed. «Send Mr. Rokesmith here, you Sir.” 
 
 4 
 
 *¢ Don’t be alarmed, 
 
 Don’t. 
 
 «See you right 
 
wife, ‘you 
 
 Bella would have been lost in perplexity if 
 there had been pause enough; but the servant 
 found Mr. Rokesmith near at hand, and he al- 
 most immediately presented himself. 
 
 ‘*Shut the door, Sir!” said Mr. Boffin. “I 
 have got something to say to yow which I fancy 
 you'll not be pleased to hear.” - 
 
 “J am sorry to reply, Mr. Boffin,” returned 
 the Secretary, as, having closed the. door, he 
 turned and faced him, ‘‘that I think that very 
 
 likely.” 
 ~ “What do you mean?” blustered Mr. Boffin. 
 
 *“‘T mean that it has become no novelty to me 
 to hear from your lips what-I would rather not 
 
 ‘ hear.” 
 
 ‘‘Oh! Perhaps we shall change that,” said 
 Mr. Boffin with a threatening roll of his head. 
 
 ‘‘T hope so,” returned the Secretary. He 
 was quiet and respect* i; but stood, as Bella 
 thought (and was giad to think), on his man- 
 hood too.’ 
 
 ‘* Now, Sir,” said Mr. Boffin, “look at this 
 young lady on my arm.” 
 
 Bella involuntarily raising her eyes, when this 
 sudden reference was made to herself, met those 
 
 of Mr. Rokesmith. He was pale and seemed 
 
 agitated. Then her eyes passed on to Mrs. 
 Boffin’s, and she met the look again. In a flash 
 it enlightened her, and she began to understand 
 what she had done. 
 
 *“*T say to you, Sir,” Mr. Boffin repeated, 
 **Jook at this young lady on my arm.” 
 
 **T do so,” returned the Secretary. 
 
 As his glance rested again on Bella for a mo- 
 ment, she thought there was reproach init. But 
 it is possible that the reproach was within her- 
 self. ‘ . 
 ‘¢ How dare you, Sir,” said Mr. Boffin, ‘‘tam- 
 per, unknown to me, with this young lady ? How 
 dare you come out of your station, and your place 
 in my house, to pester this young lady with your 
 impudent addresses?” | 
 _ “TI must decline to answer questions,” said 
 the Secretary, ‘‘that are so offensively asked.” 
 
 ‘**You decline to answer?” retorted Mr. Bof- 
 fin. ‘You decline to answer, do you? Then 
 Yl tell you what it is, Rokesmith; I'll answer 
 for you. There are two sides to this matter, 
 and I'll take ’em separately. ‘The first side is, 
 sheer Insolence. That’s the first side.” 
 
 The Secretary smiled with some bitterness, as | 
 
 though he would have said, *‘ So I see and hear.” 
 
 “Tt was sheer Insolerce-in you, I tell you,” 
 said Mr. Boffin, ‘‘even to think of this young 
 lady. This young lady was far above you. This 
 young lady was no match for you. This young 
 
 _ lady was Jying in wait (as she was qualified to 
 
 do) for money, and you had no money.” 
 
 Bella hung her head and seemed to shrink a 
 little from Mr. Boffin’s protecting arm. 
 
 ‘What are you, I should like to know,” pur- 
 sued Mr. Boffin, ‘that you were to have the 
 audacity to follow up this young lady? This 
 young lady was looking about the market for a 
 good bid; she wasn’t in it to be snapped up by 
 fellows that had no money to lay out; nothing 
 
 _to buy with.” 
 
 **Oh, Mr. Boffin! Mrs. Boffin, pray say some- 
 thing for me!” murmured Bella, disengaging 
 her arm, and covering her face with her hands. 
 
 _**Old lady,” said Mr. Boffin, anticipating his 
 hold your tongue. Bella, my dear, 
 
 Rie ou 
 4 OY ae 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 257 
 
 don’t you let yourself be put out. Tl right 
 
 you.” 
 **But you don’t don’t ri 2 
 you don't, you don’t right me!” ex. 
 
 claimed Bella, with great emphasis. ‘ You 
 wrong me, wrong me!’ 
 ‘Don’t you be put ont, my dear,” compla- 
 
 cently retorted Mr. Boffin. “‘]’JI bring this 
 young man to book. Now, you Rokesmith! 
 You can’t decline to hear, you know, as well as 
 to answer. You hear me tell you that the first 
 side of your conduct was Insolence—Insolence 
 and Presumption. Answer me one thing, if 
 you can. Didn't this young lady tell you so 
 herself?” 
 
 “Did I, Mr. Rokesmith ?” asked Bella; with 
 her face still covered. ‘‘Oh say, Mr. Roke- 
 smith! Did 1?” 
 
 ‘*Don’t be distressed, Miss Wilfer; it matters 
 very httle now.” 
 
 “Ah! You can’t deny it, though!” said Mr. 
 Boffin, with a knowing shake of his head. 
 
 ‘* But I have asked him to forgive me since,” 
 cried Bella; ‘‘and I would ask him to forgive 
 me now again, upon my knees, if it would spare 
 him!” 
 
 Here Mrs. Boffin broke ont a-crying. 
 
 **Old lady,” said Mr. Boffin, ‘stop that noise! 
 Tender-hearted in you, Miss Bella; but I mean 
 to have it out right through with this young man, 
 having got him into a corner. Now, you Roke- 
 smith. I tell you that’s one side of your con- 
 duct—Insolence and Presumption. Now I’m 
 a-coming to the other, which is much worse, 
 This was a speculation of yours.” 
 
 ‘*‘T indignantly deny it.” 
 
 ‘*Tt’s of no use your denving it; it doesn’t 
 signify a bit whether you deny it or not; I’ve 
 got a head upon my shoulders, and it ain’t a 
 baby’s. What!” said Mr. Boffin, gathering him- 
 self together in his‘most suspicious attitude, and 
 wrinkling his face into a very map of curves and 
 corners. ‘Don’t I know what grabs are made 
 at aman with money? If I didn’t keep my eyes 
 open and my pockets buttoned, shouldn’t I be 
 brought to the work-house before I knew where 
 JT was? Wasn’t the experience of Dancer, and 
 Elwes, and Hopkins, and Blewbury Jones, and 
 ever so many more of ’em, similar to mine? 
 Didn’t every body want to make grabs at what 
 they’d got, and bring ’em to poverty and ruin ? 
 Weren't they forced to hide every thing belong- 
 ing to ’em, for fear it should be snatched from 
 ‘em? Of course they was. I shall be told next 
 that they didn’t know. human natur!” 
 
 ‘*They! Poor creatures,” murmured the Sec- 
 retary. 
 
 ‘What do you say?” asked Mr. Boffin, snap- 
 ping at him. ‘‘ However, you needn’t be at the 
 
 | trouble of repeating it, for it ain’t worth hear- 
 
 ing, and won’t go down with me. I’m a-going 
 to unfold your plan: before this young lady; ’m 
 a-going to show this young lady the second view 
 of yon; and nothing you can ‘say will stave it - 
 off. (Now, attend here, Bella, my dear.) Roke- 
 smith, yon’re a needy chap. You're a chap 
 that I pick up in the street. Are you, or ain’t 
 rou?” % 
 
 ‘© Go on, Mr. Boffin; don’t appeal to me. 
 
 ‘‘Not appeal to you,” retorted Mr. Boffin, as 
 if he hadn’t done so. ‘‘ No, I should hope not! 
 Appealing to you would be rather a rum course, 
 As I was saying, you’re a needy chap that I pick 
 
A 
 Pst) 
 
 258 
 
 A oe : 
 YY 
 Wy 
 
 Vy, 
 
 Ti Mm 
 Vile 
 
 up in the street. You come and ask me in the 
 street to take you for a Secretary, and I take 
 you. Very good.” 
 
 “* Very bad,” murmured the Secretary. 
 
 ‘‘ What do you say?” asked Mr. Boffin, snap- 
 ping at him again. 
 
 He returned no answer. Mr. Boffin, after 
 eying him with a comical look of discomfited 
 curiosity, was fain to begin afresh. 
 
 ‘This Rokesmith is.a needy young man that 
 I take for my Secretary out of the open street. 
 This Rokesmith gets acquainted with my affairs, 
 and gets to know that I mean to settle a sum 
 of money on this young lady. ‘Oho!’ says this 
 Rokesmith ;” here Mr. Boffin clapped a finger 
 against his nose, and tapped it several times 
 
 with a sneaking air, as embodying Rokesmith 
 
 \y 
 A wo 
 NS 
 
 \i 
 
 Ye Yi 
 
 confidentially confabulating with his own nose; 
 ‘¢¢This will be a good haul; Ill go in for this!’ 
 And so this Rokesmith, greedy and hungering, 
 begins a-creeping on his hands and knees to- 
 ward the money. Not so ba& a speculation 
 either: for if this young lady had had less spir- 
 it, or had had less sense, through being at all 
 in the romantic line, by George he might have 
 worked it out and made it pay! But fortunate- 
 ly she was too many for him, and a pretty figure 
 he cuts now he is exposed. 
 said Mr. Boftin, addressing Rokesmith himself 
 
 with ridiculous inconsistency. ‘Look athim!” — 
 ‘¢ Your unfortunate suspicions, Mr. Boffin—” 
 
 began the Secretary. * 
 
 ‘* Precious unfortunate for you, I can tell you,” 
 
 said Mr. Boffin. i 
 
 There he stands!” 
 
 —, 3 
 ae ee ee 
 
gt 
 
 ‘——are not to be combated by any one, and 
 dress myself to no such hopeless task. ° But 
 I will say a word upon the truth.” 
 
 “Yah! Much you care about the truth,” 
 said Mr. Boffin, with a snap of his.fingers. 
 Noddy! My dear: love!” expostulated his 
 wife. . 
 
 ‘Old lady,” returned Mr. Boffin, ‘‘ you ‘keep 
 still. I say to this Rokesmith here, much he 
 cares about the truth. I tell him again, much 
 he cares about the truth.” 
 
 ‘‘Qur connection being at an end, Mr. Bof- 
 
 | “>in,” said the Secretary, ‘‘it can be of very little 
 
 “moment to me what you say.” 
 
 J 
 
 Pence!’ 
 ae 
 
 “Oh! You are knowing enough,” retorted 
 Mr. Boffin, with a sly look, ‘‘to. have found out 
 that our connection’s at an end, eh? But you 
 can’t get beforehand with me. Look at this in 
 my hand. This is your pay, on your discharge. 
 You can only follow suit. You can’t deprive 
 me of the lead. Let’s have no pretending that 
 you discharge yourself. I discharge you.” 
 
 ‘*So that I go,” remarked the Secretary, wav- 
 ing the point aside with his hand, ‘‘it is all one 
 to me.” " 
 
 “Ts it?” said Mr. Boffin. ‘But it’s two to 
 me, let me tell you. Allowing a fellow that’s 
 found: out, to discharge himself, is one thing; 
 discharging him for insolence and presumption, 
 and likewise for designs upon his master’s mon- 
 ey, is another. One and one’s two; not one. 
 (Old lady, don’t you cut in. You keep still.)” 
 
 ‘* Have you said all you wish to say to me?” 
 demanded the Secretary. * 
 
 *¢T don’t know whether I have or not,” an- 
 swered Mr. Boffin. ‘‘It depends.” ~ 
 
 “« Perhaps you will consider whether there are 
 any other strong expressions that you would like 
 to bestow upon me?” 
 
 ‘‘1’ll consider that,” said. Mr. Boffin, obsti- 
 nately, ‘‘at my convenience, and not at yours. 
 You want the last word. It may not be suitable 
 to let you have it.” 
 
 “Noddy! My dear, dear Noddy! You sound 
 so hard!” cried poor Mrs. Boffin, not to be quite 
 repressed, ; 
 
 “Old lady,” said her husband, but without 
 harshness, ‘‘if you cut in when requested not, I’ll 
 get a pillow and carry you out of the room upon 
 it. What do vou want. to say, you Rokesmith?” 
 
 “*To you, Mr. Boffin, nothing. But to Miss 
 
 * Wilfer and to your good kind wife, a word.” 
 
 ~ © Out with it then,” replied Mr. Boffin, ‘‘and 
 cut it short, for we’ve had enough of you.” 
 
 “IT have borne,” said the Secretary, in a low 
 yoice, ‘* with my false position here, that I might 
 not be separated from Miss Wilfer. To be near 
 her has been a recompense to me from day to 
 day, even for the undeserved treatment I have 
 had here, and for the degraded aspect in which 
 she has often seen me. 
 
 the best of my belief, with a spoken syllable or a 
 look. But I have never changed in my devo- 
 tion to her, except—if she will forgive my say- 
 ing so—that it is deeper than it was, and better 
 founded.” | 
 
 *¢ Now, mark this chap’s saying Miss Wilfer, 
 when he means £ s. d./” cried Mr. Boffin, with 
 a cunning wink. ‘‘ Now, mark this chap’s mak- 
 ing Miss Wilfer stand for Pounds, Shillings, and 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 : ; : | 
 Since Miss Wilfer re- 
 jected me I have never again urged my suit, to 
 
 259 
 
 “My feeling for Miss Wilfer,” pursued the 
 Secretary, without deigning to notice him, “is 
 not one to be ashamed of. I avow it, I love 
 her. Let me go where I may when I presently 
 leave this house, I shall go into a blank life, 
 leaving her,” ei 
 
 ‘* Leaving £ s. d. behind me,” said Mr. Boffin 
 by way of commentary, with another wink. »~ 
 
 ‘*That I am incapable,” the Secretary went ~ 
 on, still without heeding him, “of a mercenary 
 project, or a mercenary thought in connection 
 with Miss Wilfer, is nothing meritorious in me,’ 
 because any prize that I could put before my 
 fancy would sink into insignificance beside her. 
 
 3 ¢ 
 
 If the greatest wealth or the highest rank were 
 
 hers, it would only be important in my sight as 
 removing her still farther from me, and making 
 me more hopeless, if that could be. Say,” re- 
 marked the Secretary, looking full at his late 
 master, ‘‘say that with a word she could strip 
 Mr. Boffin of his fortune and take possession of 
 
 it, she would be of no greater worth in my eyes 
 
 than she is.” 
 
 “What do you think by this time, old lady,” 
 asked Mr. Boftin, turning to his wife in a ban- 
 tering tone, ‘‘about this Rokesmith here, and 
 his caring for the truth? You needn’t say what 
 you think, my dear, because I don’t want you 
 to cut in, but you can think it all the same. 
 As to taking possession of my property, I war- 
 rant you he wouldn’t do that himself if he 
 could.” 
 
 ‘‘No,” returned the Secretary, with another 
 full look. 
 
 ‘¢ Ha, ha, ha!” laughed Mr. Boffin. ‘ There’s 
 nothing like a good ’un while you are about it.” 
 
 ‘¢T have been for a moment,” said the Secre- 
 tary, turning from him and falling into his for- 
 mer manner, ‘‘ diverted from the little I have 
 to say: My interest in Miss Wilfer began when 
 I first saw her; even began when I had only 
 heard of her. It was, in fact, the cause of my 
 throwing myself in Mr. Boffin’s way, and enter- 
 ing his service. Miss Wilfer has never known 
 this until now. I mention it now, only as a cor- 
 roboration (though I hope it may be needless) 
 of my being free from the sordid design attrib- 
 uted to me.” . 
 
 ‘‘ Now, this is a very artful dog,” said Mr. 
 Boffin, with a deep look. ‘*This is a longer- 
 headed schemer than I thought him. See how 
 patiently and methodically he goes to work. He 
 gets to know about me and my property, and 
 about this young lady, and her share in poor 
 young John’s story, and he puts this and that 
 together, and he says to himself, ‘11 get in with 
 Boffin, and I’ll get in with this young lady, and 
 V'll work ’em both at the same time, and I'll 
 bring my pigs. to market somewhere.’ I hear 
 him say it, bless you! Why, I look at him now, 
 and I see him say it!” ‘ 
 
 Mr. Boffin pointed at the culprit, as it were mm 
 the act, and hugged himself in his great pene- 
 tration. 
 
 ‘‘But luckily he hadn’t to deal with the peo- 
 ple he supposed, Bella my dear !’’ said Mr. Bof- 
 fin. ‘*No! Luckily he had to deal with you, 
 and with me, and with Daniel and Miss Dancer, 
 and with Elwes, and with Vulture Hopkins, and 
 with Blewbury Jones and all the rest of us, one 
 down t’other come on. And he’s beat, that’s 
 what he is; regularly beat. He thought to 
 
260 
 squeeze money ont of us, and he has done for 
 himself instead, Bella my dear !” 
 
 Bella my dear made no response, gave no sign 
 of acquiescence. When she had first covered her 
 face she had sunk upon a chair with her hands 
 
 resting on the back of it, and had never moved 
 since. There was a short silence at this point, 
 and Mrs. Boffin softly rose as if to go to her. 
 But Mr. Boffin stopped her with a gesture, and 
 she obediently sat down again and staid where 
 she was. 
 
 ‘¢There’s your pay, Mister Rokesmith,” said 
 the Golden Dustman, jerking the folded scrap 
 of paper he had in his hand toward his late 
 Secretary. ‘‘I dare say you can stoop to pick 
 it up, after what you have stooped to here.” 
 
 ‘‘T have stooped to nothing but this,” Roke- 
 smith answered, as he took it from the ground ; 
 ‘‘and this is mine, for I have earned it by the 
 hardest of hard labor.” 
 
 ‘‘ You're a pretty quick packer, I hope,” sa#d | 
 - Mr. Boffin; ‘‘ becausé the sooner you are gone, 
 bag and baggage, the better for all parties.” 
 
 ‘You need have no fear of my lingering.” 
 
 ‘“There’s just one thing though,” said Mr. 
 ‘Boffin, ‘‘ that I should like to ask you before we 
 come to a good riddance, if it was only to show 
 this young lady how conceited you schemers are, 
 in thinking that nobody finds out how you con- 
 tradict yourselves.” 
 
 “* Ask me any thing you wish to ask,” re- 
 turned Rokesmith, ‘‘ but use the expedition that 
 you recommend.” 
 
 * You pretend to have a mighty admiration 
 for this young lady?” said Mr. Boffin, laying 
 his hand protectingly on Bella’s head without 
 looking down at her. 
 
 “*T do not pretend.” 
 
 “Oh! Well. You have a mighty admiration 
 for this young lady—since you are so particu- 
 lar?” 
 
 ese 
 
 “‘How do you reconcile that with this young 
 lady’s being a weak-spirited, improvident idiot, 
 not knowing what was due to herself, flinging 
 up her money to the church weather-cocks, and 
 racing off at. a splitting pace for the work- 
 house ?” 
 
 “*T don’t understand you.” 
 
 ‘Don’t you? Or won't you? What else 
 could you have made this young lady out to be, 
 if she had listened to such addresses as yours ?” 
 
 ‘¢What else, if I had been so happy as to win 
 her affections and possess her heart ?” 
 
 ‘Win her affections,” retorted Mr. Boffin, 
 with ineffable contempt, ‘‘ and possess her heart! 
 Mew says the cat, Quack-quack says the duck, 
 Bow-wow-wow says the dog! Win her affec- 
 tions and possess her heart! Mew, Quack- 
 quack, Bow-wow !” 
 
 Jolin Rokesmith stared at him in his outburst, 
 as if with some faint idea that he had gone mad. 
 
 ‘‘What is due to this young lady,” said Mr. 
 Boffin, ‘Sis Money, and this young lady right 
 well knows it.”’ 
 
 ‘¢You slander the young lady.” » 
 
 ‘¢ You slander the young lady; you with your 
 affections and hearts and trumpery,” returned 
 Mr. Boffin. ‘‘It’s of a piece with the rest of 
 your behavior. I heard of these doings of vours 
 only last night, or you should have heard of ’em 
 from me sooner, take your oath of it. I heard 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. — Ne er 
 
 ‘break if this goes on! 
 
 “money. 
 ‘me speak to good little Pa, and lay my head 
 -upon his shoulder, and tell him all my gricfs. 
 
 of ’em from a lady with as good a head-piece as 
 the best, and she knows this young lady, and I 
 know this young lady, and we all three know 
 that it’s Money she makes a stand for—money, 
 money, money—and that you and your affec- 
 tions and hearts are a Lie, Sir!” 
 
 ‘¢Mrs. Boftin,” said Rokesmith, quietly tnrn- 
 ing to her, ‘‘for your delicate and unvarying 
 kindness I thank you with the warmest grati- 
 tude. Good-by! Miss Wilfer, good-by !” 
 
 ‘¢ And now, my dear,” said Mr. Boffin, laying 
 his hand ‘on Bella’s head again, ‘you may be- 
 gin to make yourself quite comfortable, and { 
 hope you feel that you’ve been righted.” 
 
 But Bella was so far from appearing to feel 
 it that she shrank from his hand and from the 
 chair, and, starting up in an incoherent passion 
 of tears, and stretching out her arms, cried, ‘‘O 
 Mr. Rokesmith, before you go, if you could but 
 ‘make me poor again! O! make me poor again, 
 ‘Somebody, I beg and pray, or my heart will 
 Pa, dear, make me poor 
 again and take me home! I was bad enough 
 there, but I have been so much worse here. 
 Don’t give me money, Mr. Boffin, I won’t have 
 Keep it away from me, and only let 
 
 Nobody else can understand me, nobody else 
 can comfort me, nobody else knows how un- 
 worthy I am, and yet can love me like a little 
 child. I am better with Pa than any one— 
 more innocent, more sorry, more glad!” So, 
 crying out in a wildeway that she could not bear 
 this, Bella drooped her head on Mrs. Boffin’s 
 ready breast. 
 
 John Rokesmith from his place in the room, 
 and Mr. Boffin from his, looked on at her in 
 silence until she was silent herself. ‘Then Mr. 
 Boffin observed, in a soothing and comfortable 
 tone, ‘‘ There, my dear, there; you are righted 
 now, and it’s all right. I don’t wonder, Vin 
 sure, at vour being a little flurried by haying a 
 scene with this fellow, but it’s all over, my deer, 
 and you're righted, and it’s—and it’s a//xizht!” 
 Which Mr. Boffin repeated with a highly satis- 
 fied air of completeness and finality. 
 
 ‘‘T hate you!” cried Bella, turning suddenly 
 upon him, with a stamp of her little feot—‘‘at 
 least, I can’t hate vou, but I don’t like you!” 
 
 ‘“Hun-ro!” exclaimed Mr. Boffin, in an 
 amazed under-tone. 
 
 “You're a scolding, unjust, abusive, aggra- 
 vating, bad old creature!’ cried Bella. 
 angry with my ungrateful self for calling you 
 names; but you are, you are; you know you 
 are !” 
 
 Mr.. Boffin stared here, and stared there, as 
 misdoubting that he must be in some sort of 
 fit. 
 
 ‘‘T have heard: you with shame,” said Bella. 
 ‘¢With shame for myself, and with shame for 
 you. You ought to be above the base tale-bear- 
 ing of a time-serving woman; but you are above 
 nothing now.” 
 
 Mr. Boffin, seeming to become convineed that, 
 
 this was a fit, rolled his eyes and loosened hae 
 neckcloth. 
 
 “When I eame here T respected you and hha 
 ored you, and I soon loved you,” cried Bella, 
 
 ‘“And now I can’t bear the sight of you. At 
 
 least, I don’t know that I ought to go so far as.’ | 
 
 “Jam? 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND, 
 
 that—only you’re a—you’re a Monster!” Hav- 
 ing shot this bolt out with a great expenditure 
 of force, Bella hysterically laughed and cried to- 
 gether. 
 
 **'The best wish I can wish you is;’’ said Bella, 
 returning to the charge, “‘that you had not one 
 single‘farthing in the world. If any true friend 
 and well-wisher could make you a bankrupt you 
 would be a Duck; but as a man of property you 
 are a Demon!” 
 
 After dispatching this second bolt with a still 
 greater expenditure of force, Bella laughed and 
 cried still more. 
 
 ‘“‘Mr. Rokesmith, pray stay one moment. 
 Pray hear one word from me before you go! I 
 am deeply sorry for the reproaches you have 
 borne on my account. Out of the depths of my 
 heart I earnestly and truly beg your pardon.” 
 
 As she stepped toward him, he met her. As 
 she gave him her hand, he put it to his lips, and 
 said, ‘‘God bless you!” No laughing was 
 mixed with Bella’s crying then; her tears were 
 pure and fervent. 
 
 **There is not an ungenerous word that I 
 have heard addressed to you—heard with scorn 
 
 and indignation, Mr. Rokesmith —but it has 
 wounded me far more than you, for I have de- 
 served it, and you never have. Mr. Rokesmith, 
 it is to me you owe this perverted account of 
 what passed between us that night. I parted 
 with the secret, even while I was angry with 
 myself for doing so. It -was very bad in me, but 
 indeed it was not wicked. 
 
 of conceit and folly—one of my many such mo- | 
 
 ments—one of my many such hours— years. 
 As I am punished for it severely, try to forgive 
 it 7 i, 
 
 **T do with all my soul.” 
 
 “Thank you. O thank you! Don’t part 
 from me till I have said one other word, to do 
 you justice. The only fault you can be truly 
 charged with, in having spoken to me as you did 
 that night—with how much delicacy and how 
 much forbearance no one but I can know or be 
 grateful to you for—is, that you laid yourself 
 open to be slighted by a worldly shallow girl 
 whose head was turned, and who was quite una- 
 ble to rise to the worth of what you offered her. 
 Mr. Rokesmith, that girl has often seen herself 
 in a pitiful and poor light since, but never in so 
 pitiful and poor a light as now, when the mean 
 
 ~tone in which she answered you—sordid and 
 vain girl that she was—has been echoed in her 
 ears by Mr. Boffin.” 
 
 He kissed her hand again. 
 
 “* Mr. Boffin’s speeches were detestable to me, 
 shocking to me,” said Bella, startling that gen- 
 tleman with another stamp of her little foot. 
 ** It is quite true that there was a time, and very 
 
 _ lately, when I deserved to be so ‘righted,’ Mr. 
 Rokesmith ; but I hope that I shall never de- 
 serve it again !” 
 
 He once more put her hand to his lips, and 
 then relinquished it, and left the room. Bella 
 was hurrying back to the chair in which she had 
 hidden her face so long, when, catching sight 
 of Mrs. Boffin by the way, she stopped at her. 
 ‘“‘He is gone,” sobbed Bella indignantly, de- 
 spairingly, in fifty ways at once, with her arms 
 round Mrs. Boffin’s neck. ‘He has been most 
 ‘shaméfully abused, and most unjustly and most 
 
 7 
 
 I did it in a moment! 
 
 261 
 
 All this time Mr. Boffin had been rolling his 
 eyes over his loosened neckerchief, as if his fit 
 were still upon him. Appearing now to think 
 that he was coming to, he stared straight before 
 him for a while, tied his neckerchief again, took 
 several long inspirations, swallowed several times, 
 and ultimately exclaimed’ with a deep sigh, as 
 
 if he felt himself on the whole better: ‘Well ‘aay 
 
 No word, good or bad, did Mrs. Boffin Say $ 
 but she tenderly took care of Bella, and glanced 
 at her husband as if for orders. Mr. Boffin, 
 without imparting any, took his seat on a chair 
 over against them, and there sat leaning for- 
 ward, with a fixed countenance, his legs apart, 
 a hand on each knee, and his elbows squared, 
 until Bella should dry her eyes and raise her 
 head, which in the fullness of time she did. 
 
 ‘“‘I must go home,” said Bella, rising hur- 
 riedly. ‘*I am very grateful to you for all you 
 have done for me, but I can’t stay here.” 
 
 * **My darling girl!” remonstrated Mrs. Boffin. 
 
 ‘“‘No, I can’t stay here,” said Bella; ‘I can’t 
 indeed. Ugh! you vicious old thing!” (This 
 to Mr. Boffin.) 
 
 ‘* Don’t be rash, my love,” urged Mrs. Boffin. 
 ‘<'Think well of what you do.” ane 
 
 **Yes, you had better think well,” said Mr. 
 Boffin. 
 
 ‘*J shall never more think well of you,” cried 
 Bella, cutting him short, with intent defiance in 
 her expressive little eyebrows, and championship 
 of the late Secretary in every dimple. ‘‘No! 
 never again! Your money has changed you 
 tomarble. Youareahard-hearted Miser. You 
 
 are worse than Dancer, worse than Hopkins, 
 worse than Blackberry Jones, worse than any 
 of the wretches. And more!” proceeded Bella, 
 ‘breaking into tears again, ‘‘you were wholly 
 ‘undeserving of the Gentleman you have lost.’? 
 
 ‘‘ Why, you don’t mean to say, Miss Bella,” 
 the Golden Dustman slowly remonstrated, ‘‘ that 
 you set up Rokesmith against me?” 
 
 “‘T do!” said Bella. ‘‘ He is worth a Million 
 of you.” 
 
 Very pretty she looked, though very angry, 
 as she made. herself as tall as she possibly could 
 (which was not extremely tall), and utterly re- 
 nounced her patron with a lofty toss of her rich 
 brown head. 4 
 . ‘J would rather he thought well of me,” said 
 Bella, ‘‘though he swept the street for bread, 
 
 hthan that you did, though you splashed the mud 
 ‘upon him from the wheels of a chariot of pure 
 
 izgold. ‘There !” 
 
 ‘¢ Well I’m sure!” cried Mr. Boffin, staring. 
 
 ‘¢And for a long time past, when you have 
 thought you set yourself above him, I have only 
 seen you under his feet,” said Bella—‘‘ There! 
 And throughout I saw in him the master, and I 
 saw in you the man—There! And when you 
 used him shamefully, I took his part and loved 
 him—There! I boast of it !” 
 
 After which strong avowal Bella underwent. 
 
 reaction, and cried to any extent, with her face 
 on the back of her chair. 
 
 ‘¢ Now, look here,” said Mr. Boffin, as soon 
 as he could find an opening for breaking the 
 silence and striking in. ‘‘ Give me your atten- 
 tion, Bella. I am not angry. 
 
 “‘T an!” said Bella. i 
 
 ‘“‘T say,” resumed the Golden Dustman, “T 
 
 _ basely driven away, and I am the cause of it!” ; am not angry, and I mean kindly to you, and I 
 
 Se De ‘ : " Rite fy 
 bee ay 7" “i ote. + a 
 
 e 
 
 i 
 
262 
 
 want to overlook this. So you'll stay where you 
 are, and we'll agree to say no more about it.” 
 
 ‘No, I can’t stay here,” cried Bella, rising | 
 hurriedly again; ‘‘ I can’t think of staying here. 
 I must go home for good.” 
 
 ‘Now, don’t be silly,” Mr. Boffin reasoned. 
 <¢Don’t do what you can’t undo; don’t do what 
 you’re sure to be sorry for.” 
 
 ‘‘T shall never be sorry for it,” said Bella; 
 ¢¢and I should always be sorry, and should every 
 minute of my life despise myself, if I remained 
 here after what has happened.” 
 
 ‘At least, Bella,’ argued Mr. Boffin, “let 
 there be no mistake about it. Look before you 
 leap, you know. Stay where you are, and all’s 
 well, and all’s as it was to be. Go away, and | 
 you can never come back.” 
 
 ‘‘T know that I can never come back, and 
 that’s what I mean,” said Bella. 
 
 ‘‘You mustn’t expect,” Mr. Boffin pursued, 
 ‘¢that I’m a-going to settle money on you, if 
 you leave us like this, because I am not. No, 
 Bella! Be careful! Not one brass farthing.” 
 
 “Expect!” said Bella, haughtily. ‘‘Do you 
 
 t 
 : 
 
 ‘think that any power on earth could make me 
 
 take it, if you did, Sir?” 
 
 But there was Mrs. Boffin to part from, and, 
 in the full flush of her dignity, the impressible 
 little soul collapsed again. Down upon her 
 knees before that good woman, she rocked her- 
 self upon her breast, and cried, and sobbed, and 
 folded her in her arms with all her might. 
 
 ‘‘You're a dear, a dear, the best of dears!” 
 cried Bella. ‘‘ You’re the best of human creat- 
 ures. I can never be thankful enough to you, 
 and can never forget you. If I should live to 
 be blind and deaf, I know I shall see and hear 
 you, in my fancy, to the last of my dim old 
 days !” 
 
 Mrs. Boffin wept most heartily, and embraced 
 her with all forfdness; but said not one single 
 word except that she was her dear girl. She 
 said that often enough, to be sure, for she said 
 it over and over again; but not one word else. 
 
 Bella broke from her at length, and was going 
 weeping out of the room, when, in her own little 
 queer affectionate way, she half relented toward 
 Mr. Boffin. 
 
 ‘‘Tam very glad,”’ sobbed Bella, ‘‘ that Tcalled 
 you names, Sir, because you richly deserved it. 
 But [ am very sorry that I called you names, 
 because you used to be so different. Say good- 
 by!” 
 
 " “ Good-by,” said Mr, Boffin, shortly. 
 
 ‘Tf I knew which of your hands was the least 
 spoiled, I would ask you to let me touch it,” said 
 Bella, ‘‘ for the last time. . But not because I re- 
 pent of what I have said to you. For I don’t. 
 It’s true!” 
 
 ‘Try the left hand,” said Mr. Boffin, holding 
 it out in a stolid manner; it’s the least used.” 
 
 ‘You have been wonderfully good and kind-to 
 me,” said Bella, ‘‘and I kiss it for that. You 
 have been as bad as bad could be to Mr. Roke- 
 smith, and I throw it away for that. Thank 
 
 rou for myself, and good-by !” 
 you yself, good-by ! 
 
 ‘* Good-by,” said Mr. Boffin as before. 
 
 Bella caught him round the neck and kissed 
 him, and ran out forever. 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. mr ket 
 
 She ran up stairs, and sat down on the floor 
 in her own room, and cried abundantly. 
 
 But 
 the day was declining, and she had no time to | 
 
 lose. She opened all the places where she kept 
 her dresses; selected only those she had brought 
 with her, leaving all the rest; and made a great 
 
 misshapen bundle of them, to be sent for after- 
 ward, 
 
 .“*I won’t take one of the others,” said Bella, 
 
 tying the knots of the bundle very tight, in the se- 
 
 verity of her resolution. ‘‘ I'll leave all the pres- 
 ents behind, and begin again entirely on my own 
 account.” That the resolution might be thor- 
 oughly carried into practice, she even changed 
 the dress she wore for that in which she had 
 come to the grand mansion. Even the bonnet 
 she put on was the bonnet that had mounted into 
 the Boffin chariot .at Holloway. 
 
 ‘Now I am complete,” said Bella. ‘‘Its a 
 little trying, but I have steeped my eyes im cold 
 water, and I won’t cry any more. You have 
 been apleasant room to me, dearroom. Adieu! 
 
 ‘We shall never see each other again.” 
 
 With a parting kiss of her fingers to it she 
 softly closed the door, and went with a light foot 
 down the great staircase, pausing and listening 
 as she went, that she might meet none of the 
 household. No one chanced to be about, and 
 she got down to the hall in quiet. The door of 
 the late Secretary’s.room stood open. She peeped 
 in as she passed, and divined from the emptiness 
 of his table, and the general appearance of things, 
 that he was already gone. Softly opening the 
 great hall door, and softly closing it upon her- 
 self, she turned and kissed it on the outside—in- 
 sensible old combination of wood and iron that 
 
 it was !—before she ran away from the house at — 
 
 a swift pace. . 
 ‘That was well done!” panted Bella, slack- 
 ening in the next street, and subsiding into a 
 walk. ‘If I had left myself any breath to ery 
 with, I should have cried again. Now poor 
 
 dear darling little Pa, you are going to see your — 
 
 lovely woman unexpectedly.” 
 
 ——-. &—- 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. “a 
 
 THE FEAST OF THE THREE HOBGOBLINS. 
 
 Tue City looked unpromising enough as Bella 
 made her way along its gritty streets. Most of 
 its money-mills were slackenin« sail, or had left 
 off grinding for the day. The master-millers 
 had already departed, and the journeymen were 
 departing. There was a jaded aspect on the 
 business lanes and courts, and the very pave- 
 ments had a weary appearance, confused by the 
 tread of a million of feet. 
 of night to temper down the day’s distraction of 
 so feverish a place. 
 newly-stopped whirling and grinding on the part 
 of the money-mills seemed to linger in the air, 
 and the quiet was more like the prostration of a 
 spent giant than the repose of one who.was re- 
 newing his strength. , 
 
 If Bella thought, as she glanced at the mighty 
 Bank, how agreeable it would be to have an 
 hour’s gardening there, with a bright copper 
 
 shovel, among the money, still she was not inan — 
 
 avaricious vein. “Much improved in that respeet, 
 
 and with certain half-formed images which had — 
 little gold in their composition, dancing before 
 her bright eyes, she arrived in the drug-flavored — 
 region of Mincing Lane, with the sensation of 
 
 ¢ 
 
 There must be hours ~ 
 
 As yet the worry of the — 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 ‘having just orened a drawer in a chemist’s 
 shop. 
 
 The counting-house of Chicksey, Vencering, 
 and Stobbles was pointed out by an elderly fe- 
 male accustomed to the care of offices, who 
 dropped upon Bella out of a public house, wip- 
 ing her mouth, and accounting for its humidity 
 on natural principles well known to the physical 
 sciences, by explaining that she had looked in at 
 the door to see what o’clock it was. The count- 
 ing-house was a wall-eyed ground-floor by a dark 
 gateway, and Bella was considering, as she ap- 
 proached it, could there be any precedent in the 
 City for her going in and asking for R. Wilfer, 
 when whom should she see, sitting at one of the 
 windows with the plate-glass sash raised, but R. 
 Wilfer himself, preparing to take a slight re- 
 fection ! 
 
 On approaching nearer, Bella discerned that 
 the refection had the appearance of a small cot- 
 tage-loaf and a pennyworth of milk. Simul- 
 taneously with this discovery on her part, her 
 father discovered her, and invoked the echoes of 
 Mincing Lane to exclaim ‘‘ My gracious me)” 
 
 He then came cherubically flying out without 
 a hat, and embraced her, and handed her in. 
 ‘For it’s after hours and I am all alone, my 
 dear,” he explained, ‘‘and am having—as I 
 sometimes do when they are all gone—a quiet 
 tea.” 
 
 Lookin# round the office, as if her father were 
 _a@ captive and this his cell, Bella hugged him 
 and choked him to her heart’s content. 
 
 **T never was so surprised, my dear!” said her 
 father. ‘‘I couldn’t believe my eyes. Upon 
 my life, I thought they had taken to_lying! 
 The idea of your coming down the Lane your- 
 self! Why didn’t you send the footman down 
 the Lane, my dear?” 
 
 **T have brought no footman with me, Pa.” 
 
 “*Oh indeed! But you have brought the ele- 
 gant turn-out, my love ?” 
 
 SN6Pa,” 
 
 ‘*You never can have walked, my dear?” 
 
 *¢ Yes, I have, Pa.” 
 
 He looked so very much astonished that Bella 
 could not make up her mind to break it to him 
 just yet. 
 
 “The consequence is, Pa, that your lovely 
 woman feels a little faint, and would very much 
 like to share your tea.” 
 
 | The cottage-loaf and the pennyworth.of milk 
 
 had been set forth on a sheet of paper on the 
 window-seat. The cherubic pocket-knife, with 
 the first bit of the loaf still on its point, lay be- 
 ‘side them where it had been hastily thrown 
 down. Bella took the bit off, and put it in her 
 mouth. ‘*My dear child,” said her father, 
 **the idea of your partaking of such lowly fare! 
 But at least you must have your own loaf and 
 your own penn’orth. One moment, my dear. 
 The Dairy is just over the way and round the 
 corner.” 
 
 Regardless of Bella’s dissuasions he ran out, 
 and quickly returned with the new supply. 
 **My dear child,” he said, as he spread it on 
 another piece of paper before her, ‘‘the idea of 
 a splendid—!” and then looked at her figure, 
 and stopped short. 
 
 ‘* What’s the matter, Pa?’ 
 
 “*__of a splendid female,” he resumed more 
 slowly, ‘‘ putting up with such accommodation 
 
 263 
 
 as the present !—Is that a new dress you have 
 on, my dear?” 
 
 ‘*No, Pa, an old one. 
 it?” | 
 ‘‘Why, I thought I remembered it, my dear!” 
 
 ‘You should, for you bought it, Pa.” 
 
 **Yes, I thought I bought it, my dear!” said 
 the cherub, giving himself a little shake, as if to 
 rouse his faculties. 
 
 ‘* And have you grown so fickle that you don’t 
 like your own taste, Pa dear ?” 
 
 ‘* Well, my love,” he returned, swallowing a 
 bit of the cottage-loaf with considerable effort, 
 for it seemed to stick by the way: ‘*I should 
 have thought it was hardly sufficiently splendid 
 for existing circumstances.” 
 
 *‘And so, Pa,” said Bella, moving coaxingly 
 to his side instead of remaining opposite, ‘‘ you 
 sometimes have a quiet tea here all alone? I 
 am not in the tea’s way, if I draw my arm over 
 your shoulder like this, Pa?” 
 
 ‘*Yes, my dear, and no, my dear. Yes tothe 
 first question, and Certainly Not to the second. 
 Respecting the quiet tea, my dear, why you see 
 the occupations of the day are sometimes a little 
 wearing; and if there’s nothing interposed be- 
 tween the day and your mother, why she is 
 sometimes a little wearing, too.” 
 
 ““T know, Pa.” . 
 
 ‘‘Yes, my dear. So sometimes I put a quiet 
 tea at the window here, with a little quiet con- 
 templation of the Lane (which comes soothing), 
 between the day, and domestic—” 
 
 ‘« Bliss,” suggested Bella, sorrowfully. 
 
 ‘¢ And domestic Bliss,” said her father, quite 
 contented to accept the phrase. 
 
 Bella kissed him. ‘‘ And it is in this dark 
 dingy place of captivity, poor dear, that you pass 
 all the hours of your life when you are not at 
 home ?” 
 
 ‘¢Not at home, or not on the road there, or 
 on the road here, my love. Yes. You see that 
 little desk in the corner ?” 
 
 ‘¢In the dark corner, furthest both from the 
 light and from the fire-place? The shabbiest 
 desk of all the desks ?” 
 
 ‘¢Now, does it really strike you in that point 
 of view, my dear?” said her father, surveying it 
 artistically with his head on one side: ‘‘ that’s 
 mine. ‘That’s called Rumty’s Perch.” 
 
 ‘¢ Whose Perch?” asked Bella with great in- 
 dignation. 
 
 “*Rumty’s. You see, being rather high and 
 up two steps they call it a Perch. And they 
 call me Rumty.” eee 
 
 ‘‘ How dare they!” exclaimed Bella. 
 
 ‘‘ They’re playful, Bella my dear ; they’re play- 
 ful. They’re more or less younger than I am, 
 and they’re playful. What does it matter? It 
 might be Surly, or Sulky, or fifty disagreeable 
 things that I really shouldn’t like to be con- 
 sidered. But Rumty! Lor, why not Rumty ?” 
 
 To inflict a heavy disappointment on this sweet 
 nature, which had been, through all her caprices, 
 the object of her recognition, love, and admira- 
 tion from infancy, Bella felt to be the hardest 
 task of her hard day. ‘‘I should have done 
 better,” she thought, ‘‘to tell him at first; I 
 should have done better to tell him just now, 
 when he had some slight misgiving; he is quite 
 happy again, and I shall make him wretched. 
 
 He was falling back on his loaf and milk, 
 
 Don’t you remember 
 
: © 
 264 
 
 bl 
 
 with the pleasantest composure, and Bella steal- 
 ing her arm a little closer about him, and at the 
 same time sticking up his hair with an irresisti- 
 ble propensity to play with him founded on the 
 habit of her whole life, had prepared herself. to 
 say: ‘‘Pa dear, don’t be cast down, but I must 
 tell you something disagreeable !” when he inter- 
 rupted her in an unlooked-for manner. 
 
 ‘My gracious me!” he exclaimed, invoking 
 the Mincing Lane echoes as before. ‘‘ This is 
 very extraordinary !” 
 
 ‘What is, Pa?” 
 
 ‘¢ Why here’s Mr. Rokesmith now!” 
 
 ‘‘No, no, Pa, no,” cried Bella, greatly flur- 
 ried. ‘Surely not.’ 
 
 ‘‘Yes there is! Look here 
 
 Sooth to say, Mr. Rokesmith not only passed 
 the window, but came into the counting-house. 
 And not only came into the counting-house, 
 ‘but, finding himself alone there with Bella and 
 her father, rushed at Bella and caught her in 
 ‘ his arms, with the rapturous words ‘‘ My dear, 
 dear girl; my gallant, generous, disinterested, 
 courageous, noble girl!’ And not only that 
 even (which one might have thought astonish- 
 ment enough for one dose), but Bella, after 
 hanging her head for a moment, lifted it up and 
 laid it on his breast, as if that were her head’s 
 chosen and lasting resting-place ! 
 
 ‘¢T knew you would come to him, and I fol- 
 lowed you,” said Rokesmith. ‘‘My love, my 
 life! You aRE mine?” . 
 
 To which Bella responded, ‘* Yes, I Am yours 
 if you think me worth taking!” And after that, 
 seemed to shrink to next to nothing in the clasp 
 
 9 
 
 of his arms, partly because it was such a strong | 
 
 one on his part, and partly because there was 
 such a yielding to it on hers. 
 
 The cherub, whose hair would have done for 
 itself, under the influence of this amazing spec- 
 tacle, what Bella had just now done for it, stag- 
 
 gered back into the window-seat from which he | 
 _not approve? Am I leading up to it right?” 
 
 had risen, and surveyed the pair with his eyes 
 dilated to their utmost. 
 
 ‘¢But we must think of dear Pa,” said Bella; 
 ‘*T haven’t told dear Pa; let us speak to Pa.” 
 Upon which they turned to do so. 
 
 ‘¢T wish first, my dear,” remarked the cherub 
 faintly, ‘‘that you’d have the kindness to sprin- 
 » kle me with a little milk, for I feel as if I was— 
 Going.”. 
 
 In fact, the good little fellow had become 
 alarmingly limp, and his senses seemed to be 
 rapidly escaping, from the knees upward. Bella 
 sprinkled him with kisses instead of milk, but 
 gave him a little of that article to drink; and 
 he gradually revived under her caressing care. 
 
 ‘¢We'll break it to you gently, dearest Pa,” 
 said Bella. 
 
 ‘My dear,” returned the cherub, looking at 
 them both, ‘‘you broke so much in the -first— 
 Gush, if I may so express myself—that I think 
 I am equal to a good large breakage now.” 
 
 ‘“Mr. Wilfer,” said John Rokesmith, excited- 
 ly and joyfully, ‘‘ Bella takes me, though I have 
 no fortune, even no present occupation; nothing 
 but what I can get in the life before us. Bella 
 takes me!” 
 
 . **Yes, I should rather have inferred, my dear 
 Sir,” returned the cherub feebly, ‘‘that Bella 
 took you, from what I have within these few 
 minutes remarked.” 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 patience with his hand, ‘‘a certain mercenary 
 
 ‘¢You don’t know, Pa,” said Bella, ‘‘ how iil 
 I have used him!’ lie 
 
 “You don’t know, Sir,” said Rokesmith, 
 what a heart she has!” 
 
 ‘You don’t know, Pa,” said Bella, ‘‘ what a 
 shocking creature I was growing, when he saved” 
 me from myself!” 
 
 ‘‘You don’t. know, Sir,” said Rokesmith, 
 ‘‘what a sacrifice she has made for me!” 
 
 ‘‘My dear Bella,” replied the cherub, still 
 pathetically scared, ‘‘and my dear John Roke- 
 smith, if you will allow me so to call you—” 
 
 ‘“‘Yes do, Pa; do!” urged Bella. ‘‘JZ 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. 
 
 ‘‘T 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 Roke- 
 smith mentioned, a while ago, that he had no 
 present occupation.” 
 
 ‘¢None,” said Rokesmith. 
 
 ‘No, Pa, none,” said Bella. 
 
 ‘¢From which I argue,” proceeded the cher- 
 ub, ‘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 
 
 *» 
 
 ? 
 
 young person distantly related to myself could 
 
 ‘‘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 relat- — 
 ed 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? AmT 
 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 my- — 
 self refused the price, took off the splendid fash- 
 ions that were part of it, put on the compara- 
 tively poor dress that I had last given her, and — 
 trusting to my supporting her in what was right, 
 came straight tome. 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 re 
 
 lated to myself,” said her good father, ‘‘ did a 
 
 well! The mercenary young person distantly — 
 related to myself did not trust tome in vain! I~ 
 
rn 
 
 here, is what tickles me. 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 admire this mercenary young person distantly 
 related to myself more in this dress than if she 
 kad come to me in China silks, Cashmere shawls, 
 and Golconda diamonds. I love this young per- 
 son dearly. I say to the man of this young per- 
 son’s heart, out of my heart and with all of it, 
 ‘My blessing on this engagement betwixt vou, 
 
 and she brings you a good fortune when she 
 
 brings you the poverty she has accepted for your 
 sake and tlie honest truth’s ’” 
 
 The stanch little man’s voice failed him as he 
 gave John Rokesmith his hand, and he was si- 
 lent, 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, Pll run over to the Dairy, and fetch hem 
 a cottage loaf and a drink of milk, that we may 
 all have tea together.” 
 
 It was, as Bella gayly 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, ‘‘Some- 
 body’s been drinking my milk!” It was a deli- 
 
 cious repast; by far the most delicious that 
 
 Bella, or John Rokesmith, or even R. Wilfer had 
 ever made. The uncongenial oddity of its sur- 
 roundings, with the two brass knobs of the iron 
 safe of Chicksey, Veneering, and Stobbles star- 
 ing 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 
 any thing of a tender natute should come off 
 f 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 fure- 
 shadowings 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?” 
 
 ‘oY ees7b a.” 
 
 “* 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 tune- 
 ful laugh: the tunefuler 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.” 
 
 ‘*] don’t mind, Pa.” 
 
 ‘“¢ And you must prepare yourself, you know, 
 
 _my precious,” said her father, with much gentle- 
 
 ness, ‘‘ for our looking very poor and meagre at 
 
 home, and being at the best but very uncomfort- 
 
 able, after Mr. Boffin’s house.” 
 
 “‘T don’t mind, Pa. I could bear much harder 
 
 trials—for John.” 
 
 17 
 
 265 
 
 _ The closing words were not so softly and blush- 
 ingly 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 gayly, and not ex- 
 pressing disapproval, ‘‘when you—when you 
 come back from retirement, my love, and reap- 
 pear 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 hap- 
 pier people, glad as most people were to shut it 
 up, they must have been superlatively happy in- 
 deed. 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 dis- 
 tance 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. 
 
 ‘‘T think, John,” the cherub hinted at last, 
 “that if you can spare me the young person dis- 
 tantly related to myself, Pll take her in.” 
 
 ‘‘T can’t spare her,” answered John, “but I 
 must lend her to you—My Darling!” A word 
 of magic which caused Bella instantly to disap- 
 pear again. 
 
 ‘‘Now, dearest Pa,” said Bella, when she be- 
 came 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 some- 
 thing 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!” Offshe 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, wait- 
 ed on by that attentive cavalier and friend of the 
 family, Mr. George Sampson. ‘““Why, it’s nev- 
 er Bella!” exclaimed Miss Lavvy, starting back 
 at the sight. And then bawled, ‘‘Ma! Here’s 
 Bella!” ee 
 
 This produced, before they could get into the 
 house, Mrs. Wilfer. Who, standing in the port- 
 al, received them with ghostly gloom, and all 
 her other appliances of ceremony. 
 
266 
 
 ‘‘ My child is welcome, though unlooked for,” 
 said she, at the time presenting her cheek as if 
 jt were a cool slate for visitors to enroll them- 
 selves upon. ‘*You, too, R. W., are welcome, 
 though late. Does the male domestic of Mrs. 
 Boffin hear me there?” ‘This deep-toned in- 
 ‘quiry 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 sol- 
 emnly turned upon: ‘‘you have taken the pre- 
 caution 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 intent- 
 ly eying 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 aw- 
 ful silence, retired into her corner of state back- 
 ward, 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, 
 ‘‘T have had a very serious difference with Mr. 
 Boffin on the subject of his treatment of a mem- 
 ber of his household, and it’s a final difference, 
 and there’s an end of all.” 
 
 ‘And Lam 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 Lavyy, in a sepul- 
 chral, 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 
 laboring 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 seaman- 
 ship he got his bark into deep water by murmur- 
 ing, ‘* 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 ?”’ 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. . me 
 
 ‘“‘Lavvy and Ma,” said Bella, ‘‘T 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 are not 
 sorry to see me, Ma dear,” kissing her; ‘‘ and I 
 
 hope you are not sorry to see me, Lavvy,”’ kiss- 
 fing her too; ‘¢and as I notice the lettuce Ma 
 mentioned on the table, I’ll make the salad.” 
 
 Bella playfully setting herself about the task, 
 Mrs. Wilfer’s impressive countenance followed 
 her with glaring eyes, presenting a combination 
 of the once popular sign of the Saracen’s Head 
 with a piece of Duteh clock-work, and suggest- 
 ing to an imaginative mind that from the com- | 
 position of the salad her daughter might pru- 
 dently omit the vinegar. But no word issued 
 from the majestic matron’s lips. And this was 
 more terrific to her husband (as perhaps she 
 knew) than any flow of eloquence with which 
 she could have edified the company. 
 
 ‘Now, Ma dear,” said Bella in due course, 
 ‘‘the salad’s ready, and it’s past supper-time.” 
 
 Mrs. Wilfer rose, but remained speechless. 
 ‘‘George!” said Miss Lavinia, in her voice of 
 warning, ‘‘Ma’s chair!” Mr. Sampson flew to 
 the excellent lady’s back, and followed her up 
 close, chair in hand, as she stalked to the ban- 
 quet. Arrived at the table, she took her rigid — 
 seat, after favoring Mr. Sampson with a glare — 
 for himself, which caused the young gentleman ~ 
 to retire to his place in much confusion. 
 
 The cherub not presuming to address so tre- 
 mendous an object, transacted her supper through 
 the agency of a third person, as ‘‘ Mutton to your 
 Ma, Bella, my dear;” and ‘‘Lavvy, I dare say 
 your Ma would.take some lettuce if you were to 
 put it on her plate.” Mrs. Wilfer’s manner of 
 receiving those viands was marked by petrified 
 absence of mind; in which state, likewise, she 
 partook of them, occasionally laying down her | 
 knife and fork, and saying within her own spir- 
 it, ‘¢ What is this I am doing?” and glaring at 
 one or other of the party, as ifin indignant search 
 of information. A magnetic result of such glar- 
 ing was, that the person glared at could not by 
 any means successfully pretend to be ignorant 
 of the fact; so that a by-stander, without be- 
 holding Mrs. Wilfer at all, must have known at 
 whom she was glaring, by seeing her refracted 
 from the countenance of the beglared one. 
 
 Miss Lavinia was extremely affable to Mr. 
 Sampson on this special occasion, and took the 
 opportunity of informing her sister why. . 
 
 ‘Tt was not worth troubling you about, Bel- 
 la, when you were in a sphere so far removed 
 from your family as to make it a matter in which 
 you could be expected to take very little inter- 
 est,” said Lavinia with a toss of herchin; “brut 
 George Sampson is paying his addresses to me.” 
 
 Bella was glad to hear it. Mr. Sampson be- 
 came thoughtfully red, and felt called upon to 
 encircle Miss Lavinia’s waist with his arm; but, 
 encountering a large pin in the young lady’s — 
 belt, scarified a-finger, uttered a sharp exclama-_ 
 tion, and attracted the lightning of Mrs. Wil- 
 fer’s glare. . 
 
 ‘‘George is getting on very well,”’ said Miss 
 Lavinia—which might not have been supposed © 
 at the moment—‘‘and I dare say we shall be — 
 married one of these days. I didn’t care to 
 mention it when you were with your Bof—" — 
 
 Se, 
 
 ' 
 v 
 ; 
 
 Wl 
 
 . 
 
or whether her spitefulness was evoked by Bella’s | 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 here Miss Lavinia checked herself in a bounce, | 
 and added more placidly, ‘‘ when you were with. 
 Mr. and Mrs. Boffin; but now I think it sisterly | 
 to name the circumstance.” | 
 “Thank you, Lavvy dear. I congratulate 
 you.” 3 
 ‘Thank you, Bella. The truth is, George 
 and I did discuss whether I should tell you; but 
 I said to George that you wouldn’t be much in- 
 terested in so paltry an affair, and that it was 
 far more likely you would rather detach your- 
 self from us altogether, than have him added to. 
 the rest of us,” . 
 “That was a mistake, dear Lavvy,” said | 
 Bella. ) 
 **It turns out to be,” replied Miss Lavinia ; 
 ‘*but circumstances have changed, you know, 
 my dear. George is in a new situation, and his 
 prospects are very good indeed. I shouldn't have 
 had the courag® to tell you so yesterday, when 
 you would have thought his prospects poor, and | 
 not worth notice; but [ feel quite bold to-night.” | 
 “When did you begin to feel timid, Lavvy ?” | 
 inquired Bella, with a smile. 
 .. “I didn’t say that I ever felt timid, Bella,” 
 replied the Irrepressible. ‘‘ But perhaps I might 
 have said, if I had not been restrained by deli- 
 cacy toward a sister’s feelings, that I have for 
 Some time felt independent; too independent, 
 my dear, to subject myself to have my intended 
 match (youll prick yourself again, George) 
 looked down upon. Is is not that I could have | 
 blamed you for looking down upon it, when you 
 were looking up to a rich and great match, 
 Bella; it is only that I was independent.” 
 Whether the Ivrepressible felt slighted by 
 Bella’s declaration that she would not quarrel, 
 
 ‘return to the sphere of Mr. George Sampson’s | 
 courtship, or whether it was a necessary fillip to 
 her spirits that she should come into collision 
 with somebody on the present occasion—any 
 how she made a dash at her stately parent now, 
 with the greatest impetuosity. 
 
 ‘* Ma, pray don’t sit staring at me in that in- 
 tensely aggravating manner! If you see a black | 
 on my nose, tell me so; if you don’t, leave me 
 alone.” 
 
 **Do you address Me in those words?’ said 
 Mrs. Wilfer. ‘‘Do you presume?” 
 ~ Don’t talk about presuming, Ma, for good- 
 ness’ sake. A girl who is old enough to be en- 
 gaged, is quite old enough to object to be stared 
 at as if she was a Clock.” 
 
 ** Audacious one!” said Mrs. Wilfer. ‘Your 
 grandmamma, if so addressed by one of her 
 daughters, at any age, would have insisted on 
 her retiring to a dark apartment.” 
 
 “My grandmamma,” returned Lavvy, fold- 
 ing her arms and leaning back in her chair, 
 *‘wouldn’t have sat staring people out of coun- 
 tenance, I think.” 
 
 “She would,” said Mrs. Wilfer. 
 
 “Then it’s a pity she didn’t know better,” said 
 Lavvy. ‘And if my grandmamma wasn’t in 
 her dotage when she took to insisting on people’s 
 retiring to dark apartments, she ought to have 
 been. A pretty exhibition my grandmamma 
 must have made of herself! I wonder whether 
 she ever insisted on people’s retiring into the ball 
 of St. Paul's; and if she did, how she got them 
 there !” 
 
 Tell me this, Lavinia. 
 -Mother’s sentiments, you had condeseended to 
 _allow yourself to be patronized by the Boffins, and 
 
 267 
 
 ** Silence!” proclaimed Mrs. Wilfer, “TI 
 command silence !” 
 
 ‘*T have not the slightest intention of being 
 silent, Ma,” returned Lavinia, coolly, ‘but quite 
 the contrary. Iam not going to be eyed us if J 
 had come from the Boffins, and sit silent under 
 it. I am not going to have George Sampson 
 
 eyed as if he had come from the Boffins, and sit 
 
 Silent under it. If Pa thinks proper to be eyed 
 
 as if he had come from the Boffins also, well and 
 good. I don’t choose to. And I won’t!” 
 Lavinia’s engineering having made this crook- 
 
 _ed opening at Bella, Mrs. Wilfer strode into it. 
 
 ‘* You rebellions spirit! You mutinous child! 
 If, in violation of your 
 
 if you had come from those halls of slavery—” 
 ‘“That’s mere nonsense, Ma,” said Lavinia. 
 ‘* How!” exclaimed Mrs. Wilfer, with sub- 
 lime severity. 
 ‘* Halls of slavery, Ma, is mere stuff and non- 
 sense,” returned the unmoved Irreprezsible. 
 ‘*T say, presumptuous child, if vou had come 
 from the neighborhood of Portland Place, bend- 
 
 ing under the yoke of patronage and attended - 
 
 by its domestics in glittering garb to visit me, 
 do you think my deep-seated feelings could have 
 been expressed in looks ?”’ 
 
 ‘* All I think about it is,” returned Lavinia, 
 ‘‘that [ should wish them expressed to the 
 right person.” 
 
 ‘“¢ And if,” pursued her mother, ‘if making 
 light of my warnings that the face of Mrs. Bof- 
 
 | fin alone was a face teeming with evil, yon had 
 
 clung to Mrs. Boffin instead of to me, and had 
 after all come home rejected by Mrs. Boffin, 
 trampled under foot by Mrs. Boffin, and cast 
 out by Mrs. Boffin, do you think my feelings 
 
 ‘could haye been expressed in looks ?” 
 
 Lavinia was about replying to her honored 
 parent that she might as well have dispense: 
 with her looks altogether then, when Bella rose 
 and said, ‘‘Good-night, dear Ma. J have had 
 a tiring day, and I’ll go to bed.” This broke 
 up the agreeable party. Mr. George Sampson 
 shortly afterward took his leave, accompanied by 
 Miss Lavinia with a candle as far as the hall, 
 and without a candle as far as the garden-gate ; 
 Mrs. Wilfer, washing her hands of the Boffins, 
 went to bed after the manner of Lady Macbeth ; 
 and R. W. was left alone among the dilanida- 
 tions of the supper-table, in a melancholy ati tule. 
 
 But a light footstep roused him from his 
 meditations, and it was Bella’s. Her pretty 
 hair was hanging all about her, and she had 
 tripped down softly, brush in hand, and bare- 
 foot, to say good-night to him. 
 
 ‘“My dear, vou most unquestionably are a 
 lovely “woman,” said the cherub, taking up a 
 tress in his hand, 
 
 ‘Look here, Sir,” said Bella; ‘‘when your 
 lovely woman marries, you shall have that piece 
 if you like, and shell make you a chain of it. 
 Would you prize that remembrance of the dear 
 creature ?” 
 
 ‘© Yes, my precious.” ; 
 ‘¢Then you shall have it if yon’re good, Sir. 
 
 Iam very, very sorry, dearest Pa, to have brought 
 home all this trouble.” ; 
 
 ‘‘ My pet,” returned her father, in the simplest 
 good faith, ‘‘don’t make yourself uneasy about 
 
268 
 
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 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
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 LEZ Ca 
 Sih 
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 hie I: 
 LIE 
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 Ze 
 
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 Fs 
 GEL IA 
 LAE a 
 
 SSF 
 POLL EE 
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 ok 
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 nh 
 SHAN 
 RS | 
 
 Ht 
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 ny ; 
 af Kt 
 
 THE LOVELY WOMAN HAS HER FORTUNE TOLD. 
 
 that. It really is not worth mentioning, because | 
 things at home would have taken pretty much | 
 the same turn any way. If your mother and 
 sister don’t find one subject to get at times a 
 little wearing on, they find another. We're 
 never out of a wearing subject, my dear, I assure 
 
 you. Iam afraid you find your old room with 
 Lavvy dreadfully inconvenient, Bella?” 
 
 «No I don’t, Pa; I don’t mind, Why don’t 
 I mind, do you think, Pa?” 
 
 ‘*Well, my child, you used to complain of it 
 when it wasn’t such a contrast as it must be now. 
 Upon my word, I can only answer, because you 
 are so much improved.” 
 
 ‘¢No, Pa. Because I am so thankful and so 
 happy !” 
 
 Here she choked him until her long hair made 
 him sneeze, and then she laughed until she made 
 him laugh, and then she choked him again that 
 
 they might not be overheard. 
 
 ‘‘Listen, Sir,” said Bella. ‘ Your lovely wo- 
 man was told her fortune to-night on her way 
 home. It won’t be a large fortune, because if 
 the lovely woman’s Intended gets a certain ap- 
 pointment that he hopes to get soon, she will 
 marry on a hundred and fifty pounds a year, 
 But that’s at first, and even if it should never 
 be more, the lovely woman will make it quite ~ 
 enough, But that’s not all, Sir, In the fore — 
 tune there’s a certain fair man—a little man, — 
 the fortune-teller. said—-who, it seems, will al- — 
 ways find himself near the lovely woman, and — 
 will always have kept, expressly for him, such a ~ 
 peaceful corner in the lovely woman's little honse 
 = never was, Tell me the name of that man, 
 
 ir,’ 
 
 ‘¢Ig he a Knave in the pack of cards?” in- — 
 quired the cherub, with a twinkle in his eyes. 
 
 “©Yes!” cried Bella, in high glee, choking — 
 him again. ‘‘He’s the Knave of Wilfers! - 
 
 ee ag 
 
‘a OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 * * 
 
 Dear Pa, the lovely woman means to look for- 
 ward to this fortune that has been told for her, 
 so delightfully, and to cause it to make her a 
 much better lovely woman than she ever has 
 been yet. What the little fair man is expected 
 to do, Sir, is to look forward to it also, by say- 
 ing to himself when he is in danger of being 
 over-worried, ‘I see land at last !’” 
 
 ‘*T sce land at last!” repeated her father. 
 
 ‘““There’s a dear Knave of Wilfers!” ex- 
 claimed Bella; then putting out her small white 
 bare foot, ‘‘ That’s the mark, Sir. Come to the 
 mark. Put your boot against it. We keep to 
 it together, mind! Now, Sir, you may kiss the 
 lovely woman before she runs away, so thankful 
 and so happy. O yes, fair little man, so thank- 
 ful and so happy!” 
 
 eee 
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 A SOCIAL CHORUS. 
 
 AMAZEMENT sits enthroned upon the counte- 
 nances of Mr. and Mrs. Alfred Lammle’s circle 
 of acquaintance, when the disposal of their first- 
 class furniture and effects (including a Billiard 
 Table in capital letters), ‘‘by auction, under a 
 bill of sale,” is publicly announced on a waving 
 hearth-rug in Sackville Street. But nobody is 
 half so much amazed as Hamilton Venecring, 
 Esquire, M.P. for Pocket Breaches, who in- 
 stantly begins to find out that the Lammles are 
 the only people ever entered on his soul’s regis- 
 ter who are not the oldest and dearest friends 
 he has in the world. .Mrs. Veneering, W.M.P. 
 for Pocket Breaches, like a faithful wife shares 
 her husband's discovery and inexpressible aston- 
 ishment. Perhaps the Veneerings twain may 
 deem the last unutterable feeling particularly 
 due to their reputation, by reason that once upon 
 a time some of the longer heads in the City are 
 whispered to have shaken themselves, when Ve- 
 neering’s extensive dealings and great wealth 
 were mentioned. But it is certain that neither 
 Mr. nor Mrs. Veneering can find words to won- 
 der in, and it becomes necessary that they give 
 to the oldest and dearest friends they have in the 
 world a wondering dinner. 
 
 For it is by this time noticeable that, what- 
 - ever befalls, the Veneerings must give a dinner 
 upon it. Lady Tippins lives in a chronic state 
 of invitation to dine with the Veneerings, and 
 in a chronic state of inflammation arising from 
 the dinners. Boots and Brewer go about in 
 - cabs, with no other intelligible business on earth 
 than to beat up people to come and dine with the 
 Veneerings. Veneering pervades the legislative 
 Idbbies, intent upon entrapping his fellow-legis- 
 -lators to dinner. Mrs. Veneering dined with 
 
 - five-and-twenty bran-new faces overnight; calls 
 upon them all to-day; sends them every one 
 ‘a dinner-card to-morrow, for the week after 
 -'next; before that dinner is digested, calls upon 
 their brothers and sisters, their sons and daugh- 
 ters, their nephews and nieces, their aunts and 
 uncles and cousins, and invites them all to din- 
 ner. And still, as at first, howsoever, the din- 
 ing circle widens, it is to be observed that all 
 »the diners are consistent in appearing to go to 
 the Veneerings, not to dine with Mr. and Mrs. 
 Venecring (which would seem to be the last 
 
 269 
 
 thing in their minds), but to dine with one an- 
 other, 
 
 Perhaps, after all—who knows?—Vencerigg 
 may find this dining, though expensive, remu- 
 nerative, in the sense that it makes champions. 
 Mr. Podsnap, as a representative man, is not 
 alone in caring very particularly for his own 
 dignity, if not for that of his acquaintances, and 
 therefore in angrily supporting the acquaintances 
 who have taken out his Permit, lest, in their 
 being lessened, he should be. The gold anit 
 silver camels, and the ice-pails, and the rest of 
 the Veneering table decorations, make a brilliant 
 show, and when I, Podsnap, casually remark elsc- 
 where that I dined last Monday with a gorgeous. 
 caravan of camels, I find it personally offensive 
 
 | to have it hinted to me that they are broken- 
 { kneed camels, or camels laboring under sus- 
 ipicion of any sort. 
 myself, I am above them; I am a more solid 
 man; but these camels have basked in the light 
 
 ‘“*T don’t display camels. 
 
 of my countenance, and how dare you, Sir, in- 
 
 | sinuate to me that I have irradiated any but un-. 
 
 impeachable camels ?” 
 
 The eamels are polishing up in the Analyt-. 
 ical’s pantry for the dinner of wonderment on 
 the oceasion of the Lammles going to pieces, 
 and Mr. Twemlow feels a little queer on the 
 sofa at his lodgings over the stable yard in 
 Duke Street, Saint James’s, in consequence of 
 having taken two advertised pills at about mid. 
 day, on the faith of the printed representation: 
 accompanying the box (price one and a penny 
 halfpenny, government stamp included), that: 
 the same ‘‘ will be found highly salutary as a. 
 precautionary measure in connection with the: 
 pleasures of the table.”’? To whom, while sickly: 
 with the fancy of an insoluble pill sticking in: 
 his gullet, and also with the sensation of a de-. 
 posit of warm gum languidly wandering within, 
 him a little lower down, a servant enters with 
 the announcement that a lady wishes to speak. 
 with him. 
 
 ‘* A lady!” says Twemlow, pluming his ruffled. 
 feathers. ‘* Ask the favor of the lady’s name.” 
 
 The lady’s name is Lammle. The lady will! 
 not detain Mr. Twemlow longer than a very few 
 minutes. The lady is sure that Mr. 'Twemlow 
 will do her the kindness to see her, on being told 
 that she particularly desires a short interview.. 
 
 The ladv has no doubt whatever of Mr. ‘Twem-. 
 1 Has. 
 
 low’s compliance when he hears hername. H 
 begged the servant to be particular not to mis- 
 take her name. Would have sent in a card, but 
 has none. 
 
 ‘¢ Show the lady in.” Lady shown in, comes 
 in. 
 
 Mr. Twemlow’s little rooms are modestly fur- 
 nished, in an old-fashioned manner (rather like 
 the housekeeper’s room at Snigsworthy Park), 
 and would be bare of mere ornament were it not 
 for a full-length engraving of the sublime Snigs- 
 worth over the chimney-picce, snorting at a 
 Corinthian column, with an enormous, roll of 
 paper at his feet, and a heavy curtain going to 
 tumble down on his head; those accessories be-- 
 ing understood to represent the noble lord as. 
 somehow in the act of saving his country. 
 
 ‘‘Pray take a seat, Mrs. Lammle.” Mrs. 
 Lammle takes a seat and opens the conversa- 
 tion. 
 
 ‘‘] have no doubt, Mr. Twemlow, that you. 
 
270 
 
 have heard of a reverse of fortune having be- 
 fallen us. Of course you have heard of it, for 
 no kind of news travels so fast—among vune’s 
 friends especially.” 
 
 Mindful of the wondering dinner, Twemlow, 
 with a little twinge, admits the imputation, 
 
 ‘¢ Probably it will not,” says Mrs. Lammle, 
 with a certain hardened manner upon her, that 
 makes ‘T'wemlow shrink, ‘‘ have surprised you 
 so much as some others, after what passed be- 
 tween us at the house which is now turned out 
 at windows, I have taken the liberty of calling 
 upon you, Mr, ‘T'wemlow, to add a sort of post- 
 script to what I said that day.” 
 
 Mr. Twemlow’s dry and hollow cheeks become 
 more dry and hollow at the prospect of some 
 new complication, 
 
 ‘Really,” says the uneasy little gentleman, 
 “** really, Mrs, Lammle, I should take it as a fa- 
 vor if you could excuse me from any further 
 confidence. It has ever been one of the objects 
 of my life—which, unfortunately, has not had 
 many ohjects—to be inoffensive, and to keep out 
 of cabals and interferences.” 
 
 Mrs. Lammle, by far the more observant of 
 
 | 
 
 | 
 
 ake Maia awe 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. aust oF 
 
 ‘Cas between me (from the first relying on your 
 honor) and you, that I will not waste anothe 
 word upon it.” She looks steadily at Mr. T'wem- 
 low, until, with a shrug, he makes her a little 
 one-sided bow, as though saying “‘ Yes, I think 
 you have a right to rely upon me,” and then 
 she moistens her lips, and shows a sense-of re- 
 licf. 
 
 ‘“‘T trust I have kept the promise I made 
 through your servant, that I would detain yowa 
 very few minutes. 
 Mr. Twemlow.” 
 
 ‘Stay !” says Twemlow, rising as she rises, 
 “Pardon me a moment. I should never have 
 sought you out, madam, to say what [ am going 
 to say, but since you have sought me out and 
 are here, I will throw it off my mind. Was it 
 quite consistent, in candor, with our taking that 
 
 resolution against Mr. Fledgeby, that you should 
 
 afterward address Mr. Fledgeby as your dear 
 and confidential friend, and entreat a favor of 
 Mr. Fledgeby ? Always supposing that you did ; 
 I assert no knowledge of my own on the “subject ; : 
 it has been represented to me that you did.” 
 ‘Then he told you?” retorts Mrs. Lammle, 
 
 the two, scarcely finds it necessary to look at! who again has saved her eyes while listening, 
 
 Twemlow while he speaks, so easily does she | 
 
 read him. 
 
 “‘My postscript—to retain the term I have 
 used””—says Mrs. Lammle, fixing her eyes on his 
 face, to enforce what she says _herself— 
 cides exactly with what vou say, Mr. Twemlow, 
 So far from troubling you with any new confi- 
 dence, I merely wish to remind you what the-old 
 one was. So far from asking you for interfer- 
 ence, I merely wish to claim your strict neutral- 
 ity.” ; 
 
 Twemlow going on to reply, she rests her eyes 
 again, knowing her ears to be quite enough for 
 the contents of so weak a vessel. 
 
 ‘*T can, I suppose,” says 'Twemlow, nervously, 
 ‘offer no reasonable objection to hearing any 
 thing that you do me the honor to wish to say 
 tome under those heads. But if 1 may, with all 
 possible delicacy and politeness, entreat you not 
 to range beyond them, I—I beg to do so.” 
 
 ‘<Sir,” says Mrs. Lammie, raising her eves to 
 his face again, and quite daunting him with her 
 hardened manner, ‘‘I imparted to you a certain 
 piece of knowledge, to be imparted again, as 
 you thonght best, to a certain person.” 
 
 ‘* Which I did,” says Twemlow. 
 
 ‘* And for doing which, I thank yous; though, 
 indeed, I scareely know why I turned traitress 
 to my ‘husband in the matter, for the girl is a 
 poor little fool, I was a poor little fool once 
 myself; I can find no better reason.” Seeing 
 the effect she produces on him by her indifferent 
 laugh and cold look, she keeps her eyes upon 
 jim as she proceeds, ‘‘ Mr. Twemlow, if you 
 
 s'iould chance to see my husband, or to see me, 
 or to see both of us, in the favor or confidence 
 of any one else—whether of our common ac- 
 quaintance or not, is of no conscquence—you 
 have no right to use against us the knowledge 
 J intrusted you with, for one special purpose 
 which has been accomplished, This is what I 
 eame to say. It is not a stipulation; to a gen- 
 tleman it is simply a reminder.” 
 
 Twemlow sits murmuring to himself with his 
 hand to his forehead. 
 
 ‘*It is so plain a case,”” Mrs. Lammle goes on, 
 
 ‘coins | 
 
 | 
 
 and uses them with strong effect while speak- 
 ing. 
 66 Ves ” 
 
 ‘Tt is strange that he should have told you 
 
 q 
 
 the truth,” says Mrs. Lammle, seriously ponder- 
 ing. ‘*Pray where did a circumstance so very 
 extraordinary happen ?” 
 
 Twemlow hesitates. He is shorter than the 
 lady as well as weaker, and, as she stands above 
 him with her hardened manner and her well- 
 
 used eyes, he finds himself at such a disadvant-. 
 
 ave that he would like to be of the opposite 
 SEX, 
 
 ‘* May I ask where it happened, Mr. Twem- 
 low? In strict confidence ?” 
 
 ‘¢] must confess,” says the mild little gentle- 
 
 /man, coming to his answer by degrees, ‘‘ that, I 
 
 felt some compunctions when Mr. Fledgeby men- 
 tioned it, I must admit that I could not regard 
 myself in an agreeable light. More particular- 
 ly, as Mr. Fledgeby did, with great. civility, 
 which I could not feel that I deserved from him, 
 render me the same service that you had en- 
 treated hii to render you.” 
 
 It isa part of the true nobility of the poor gen- 
 tleman’s soul to say this a, sentence. 
 wise,” he has reflected, “I shall assume-the su- 
 perior position of ite no difficulties of my 
 own, while I know of hers. Which would be 
 mean, very mean.” 
 
 ‘*Was Mr. Fledgeby’s advocacy as effectual 
 in your case as in ours?” Mrs. Lammle de- 
 mans, 
 
 “¢ As ineffectual.” 
 
 ‘<Can you make up your mind to tell me. 
 where you saw Mr. Fledgeby, Mr, ‘Twemlow ¢” 
 
 “T beg your pardon. I fully intended to have 
 done so, The reservation was not intentional. 
 I encountered Mr. Fledgeby, quite by accident, 
 on the spot.—-By the expression, on ‘the spot, s 
 mean at Mr. Riah’s in Saint Mary Axe.” 
 
 ‘‘ Have you the misfortune to be in Mr. Riah’s © 
 
 hands then ?” 
 
 ‘Unfortunately, madam,” returns Twemlow, 
 ‘the one money-obligation to which I stand 
 committed, the one debt of my ee (but it is a 
 
 I need trouble you no longer, * 
 
 a ee ee ee eee 
 
 ‘¢Other-— 
 
 A, ee Les ag ee Eo 
 
 Ss 
 
 we ee oe 
 
 as eee a 
 
_- words? Because they state the fact. 
 _you Aave no proof.” 
 
 just debt; pray observe that I don’t dispute it), 
 
 -has fallen into Mr. Riah’s hands.” 
 ‘¢Mr. Twemlow,” says Mrs. Lammle, fixing 
 
 his eyes with hers: which he would prevent’ her 
 doing if he could, but he can’t; “‘it has fallen 
 into Mr. Fledgeby’s hands. Mr. Riah is his 
 mask. It has fallen into Mr. Fledgeby’s hands. 
 Let me tell you that, for your guidance. The 
 information may be of use to you, if only to pre- 
 vent your credulity, in judging another man’s 
 truthfulness by your own, from being imposed 
 upon.” 
 
 ** Impossible !” cries Twemlow, standing aghast. 
 “¢How do you Know it ?” 
 
 ‘‘T scarcely know how I know it. The whole 
 train of circumstances seemed to take fire at 
 once, and show it to me.” 
 
 ‘Oh! Then you have no proof.” 
 
 ‘‘Tt is very strange,” savs Mrs. Lammle, cold- 
 
 ly and boldly, and with some disdain, ‘‘ how like 
 
 men are to one another in some things, though 
 their characters are as different as can be! No 
 two men can have less affinity between them, 
 
 . one would say, than Mr. Twemlow and my hus- 
 -band. Yet my husband replies to me ‘You 
 
 have no proof,’ and Mr. Twemlow replies to me 
 with the very same words!” 
 
 ‘‘But why, madam ?” Twemlow ventures gen- 
 tly to argue. ‘‘Consider why the very same 
 Because 
 
 ‘¢ Men are very wise in their way,” quoth Mrs. 
 
 Lammle, glancing haughtily at the Snigsworth 
 
 portrait, and shaking out her dress before de- 
 parting; ‘‘but they have wisdom to learn. My 
 husband; who is not over-confiding, ingenuous, 
 or inexperienced, sees this plain thing no more 
 than Mr. Twemlow.does—because there is no 
 proof! Yet I believe five women out of six, in 
 my place, would see it as clearly as Ido. How- 
 ever, I will never rest (if only in remembrance 
 of Mr. Fledgeby’s having kissed my hand) until 
 thy husband does see it. And you will do well 
 for yourself to see it from this time forth, Mr. 
 Twemlow, though I can give you no proof.” 
 
 As she moves toward the door, Mr. Twemlow, 
 attending on her, expresses his soothing hope 
 that the condition of Mr. Lammile’s affairs is not 
 irretrievable. © 
 
 ‘¢T don’t know,” Mrs. Lammle answers, stop- 
 
 ping, and sketching out the pattern of the paper | 
 
 on. the wall with the point of her parasol; ‘‘it 
 depends. There may be an opening for him 
 dawning now, or there may be none. We shall 
 soon find out, If none, we are bankrupt here, 
 and must go abroad, I suppose.” 
 - Mr. Twemlow, in his good-natured desire to 
 make the best of it, remarks that there are pleas- 
 ant lives abroad. 
 
 “Yes,” returns Mrs. Lammle, still sketching 
 on the wall; ‘but I doubt whether billiard-play- 
 
 ing, card-playing, and so forth, for the means | 
 
 to live under suspicion at a dirty table-d’hote, is 
 one of them.” 
 It is much for Mr. Lammle, Twemlow polite- 
 ly intimates (though greatly shocked), to have 
 one always beside him who is attached to him in 
 
 all his fortunes, and whose restraining influence 
 
 will prevent him from courses that would be 
 discreditable and ruinous. As he says it, Mrs. 
 Lammle leaves off sketching, and looks at him. 
 
 ‘‘ Restraining influence, Mr. Twemlow? We 
 
 Pee A i 
 te Sn mar 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 271 
 
 must eat and drink, and dress, and have a roof 
 over our heads. Always beside him and at- 
 tached in all his fortunes? Not much to boast 
 of in that; what can a woman at my age do? 
 My husband and I deceived one another when 
 we married; we must bear the consequences of 
 the deception—that is to say, bear one another, 
 and bear the burden of scheming together for 
 to-day’s dinner and to-morrow’s breakfast—till 
 death divorces us.” 
 
 With those words she walks out into Duke 
 Street, Saint James’s. Mr. Twemlow returning 
 to his sofa, lays down his aching head on its 
 slippery little horse-hair bolster, with a strong 
 internal conviction that a painful interview is 
 not the kind of thing to be taken after the din- 
 ner pills which are so highly salutary in connec- 
 tion with the pleasures of the table. 
 
 But six o’clock in the evening finds the wor- 
 thy little gentleman getting better, and also get- 
 ting himself into his obsolete little silk stockings 
 and pumps, for the wondering dinner at the Ve- 
 neerings. And seven o'clock in the evening 
 finds him trotting out into Duke Street, to trot 
 to the corner and save a sixpence in coach-hire. 
 
 Tippins the divine has dined herself into such 
 a condition by this time that a morbid mind 
 might desire her, for a blessed change, to sup at 
 last and turn into bed. Such a mind has Mr, 
 
 Eugene Wrayburn, whom Twemlow finds con- 
 
 templating Tippins with the moodiest of vis- 
 ages, while that playful creature rallies him on 
 being so long overdue at the woolsack. Skittish 
 is Tippins with Mortimer Lightwood too, and 
 has raps to give him with her fan for having 
 been best man at the nuptials of these deceiving 
 what’s-their-names who have, gone to picces. 
 Though, indeed, the fan is generally lively, and 
 taps away at the men in all ‘directions, with 
 something of a grizzly sound suggestive of the 
 clattering of Lady Tippins’s bones. 
 
 A new race of intimate friends has sprung up 
 at Veneecring’s since he went into Parliament 
 for the gnblic good, to whom Mrs. Veneering is 
 very attentive, ‘These friends, like astronomic- 
 al distances, are only to be spoken of in the very 
 largest figures. Boots says that one of them is 
 a Contractor who (it has been calculated) gives 
 employment, directly and indirectly, to five hun- 
 dred thousand men. Brewer says that another 
 of them isa Chairman, in such request at so 
 many Boards, so far apart, that he never tray- 
 els less by railway than three thousand miles a 
 week. Buffer says that another of them hadn't 
 a sixpence eighteen months ago, and, through 
 the brilliancy of his genius in getting those 
 shares issued at eighty-five, and buying them 
 all up with no money and selling them at par 
 for cash, has now three hundred and seventy- 
 five thousand pounds—Buffer particularly in- 
 sisting on the odd seventy-five, and declining to 
 take a farthing less. With Buffer, Boots, and 
 Brewer, Lady Tippins is eminently facetious on — 
 the subject of these Fathers of the Serip-Church : 
 surveying them through her eye-glass, and in- 
 quiring whether Boots and Brewer and Buffer 
 think they will make her fortune if she makes 
 love to them ? with other pleasantries of that na- 
 ture. Veneering, in his different way, 16 much 
 ocenpied with the Fathers too, piously retiring 
 with them into the conservatory, from which 
 retreat the word ‘‘Committce” is occasionally 
 
272 
 
 heard, and where the Fathers instruct Veneer- 
 ing how he must leave the valley of the piqno 
 on his left, take the level of the mantle-piece, 
 cross by an open cutting at the candelabra, seize 
 the carrying-traffic at the console, and cut up 
 the opposition root and branch at the window 
 curtains. 
 
 Mr. and Mrs, Podsnap are of the company, 
 and the Fathers descry in Mrs. Podsnap a fine 
 woman. She is consigned to a Father—Boots’s 
 Father, who employs five hundred thousand 
 men—and is brought to anchor on Veneering’s 
 left; thus affording opportunity to the sportive 
 Tippins on his right (he, as usual, being mere 
 vacant space), to entreat to be told something 
 about those loves of Navvies, and whether they 
 do really live on raw beef-steaks, and drink por- 
 ter out of their barrows. But in spite of such 
 little skirmishes jt is felt that this was to be a 
 wondering dinner, and that the wondering must 
 not be neglected. Accordingly, Brewer, as the 
 man who has the greatest reputation to sustain, 
 becomes the interpreter of the general instinct. 
 
 ‘IT took,” says Brewer, in a favorable pause, 
 **a cab this morning, and I rattled off to that 
 Sale.” 
 
 Boots (devoured by envy) says, ‘‘ So did I.” 
 
 Buffer says, ‘‘So did I;” but can find nobody 
 to care whether he did or not. 
 
 ‘¢ And what was it like ?” inquires Veneering. 
 
 **T assure you,” replies Brewer, looking about 
 for any body else to address his answer to, and 
 giving the preference to Lightwood; ‘I assure 
 you, the things were going for a song. Hand- 
 some things enough, but fetching nothing.” 
 
 **So [heard this afternoon,” says Lightwood. 
 
 Brewer begs to know now, would it be fair to 
 ask a professional man how—on—earth—these 
 — people—ever—did—come—to—such—a—to- 
 tal smash?” (Brewer’s divisions being for em- 
 phasis.) 
 
 Lightwood replies that he was consulted cer- 
 tainly, but could give no opinion which would 
 pay off the Bill of Sale, and thereforfviolates 
 no confidence in supposing that it came of their 
 living beyond their means. 
 
 ‘* But how,” says Veneering, ‘‘can people do 
 that!” 
 
 Hah! That is felt on all hands to be a shot 
 in the bull’s-eye. How can people do that! 
 The Analytical Chemist going round with Cham- 
 pagne looks very much as if he could give them 
 a pretty good idea how people did that, if he 
 had a mind. 
 
 ‘*How,”’ says Mrs. Veneering, laying down 
 her fork to press her aquiline hands together at 
 the tips of the fingers, and addressing the Fa- 
 ther who travels the three thousand miles per 
 week: ‘‘how a mother can look at her baby, 
 and know that she lives beyond her husband's 
 means, I can not imagine.”’ 
 
 Eugene suggests that Mrs. Lammle, not being 
 a mother, had no baby to look at. 
 
 **'True,” says Mrs. Veneering, ‘‘ but the prin- 
 eiple is the same.” 
 
 Boots is clear that the principle is the same. 
 Se is Buffer. It is the unfortunate destiny of 
 Buffer to damage a cause by espousing it. The 
 rest of the company have meekly yielded to the 
 proposition that the principle is the same, until 
 Buffer says it is; when instantly a general mur- 
 mur arises that the principle is not the same. 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 ‘the discussion of these people’s affairs. 
 
 Wa 4 
 
 % 
 
 “But I don’t understand,” says the Father 
 of the three hundred and seventy-five thousand 
 pounds, ‘‘—if these people spoken of occupied 
 the position of being in society—they were in 
 society ?” ‘ 
 
 Veneering is bound to confess that they dined 
 
 here, and were even married from here. 
 
 ‘‘Then I don’t understand,” pursues the Fa- 
 
 ther, ‘‘ how even their living beyond their means 
 could bring them to what has been termed a total 
 smash. Because there is always such a thing as 
 an adjustment of affairs in the case of people of 
 any standing at-all.” 
 
 Eugene (who would seem to be in a gloomy 
 state of suggestiveness) suggests, ‘* Suppose you 
 have no means and live beyond them ?” 
 
 This is too insolvent a state of things for the 
 Father to entertain. 
 of things for any one with any self-respect to en- 
 tertain, and is universally scouted. But it is so 
 amazing how any people can have come to a to- 
 tal smash that every body feels bound to account 
 for it specially. One of the Fathers says, ‘‘ Gam- 
 ing-table.” Another of the Fathers says, ‘‘ Spec- 
 ulated without knowing that speculation is a 
 science.” Boots says, ‘‘ Horses.” Lady Tippins 
 says to her fan, ‘*‘ Two establishments.” Mr. 
 Podsnap, saying nothing, is referred to for his 
 opinion; which he delivers as follows, much 
 flushed and extremely angry: 
 
 ‘“‘Don’t ask me. I desire to take no part in 
 I abhor 
 the subject. It is an odions subject, an offensive 
 subject, a subject that makes me sick, and I—” 
 And with his favorite right-arm flourish, which 
 sweeps away every thing and settles it forever, 
 Mr. Podsnap sweeps these inconveniently unex- 
 nlainable wretches who have lived beyond their 
 
 neans and gone to total smash off the face of 
 the universe. 
 
 Eugene, leaning back in his chair, is observ- 
 ing Mr. Podsnap with an irreverent face, and 
 may be about to offer a new suggestion, when 
 the Analytical is beheld in collision with the 
 Coachman; the Coachman manifesting a pur- 
 pose of coming at the company with a silver sal- 
 ver, as though intent upon making a collection 
 for his wife and family; the Analytical cutting 
 him off at the sideboard. The superior stateli- 
 ness, if not the superior generalship, of the Ana- 
 lytical prevails over a man who is as nothing off 
 the box; and the Coachman, yielding up his 
 salver, retires defeated. 
 
 Then the Analytical, perusing a scrap of pa- 
 per lying on the salver with the air of a literary 
 Censor, adjusts it, takes his time about going to 
 the table with it, and presents it to Mr. Eugene 
 Wrayburn. Whereupon the pleasant Tippins 
 says aloud, ‘*The Lord Chancellor has re- 
 signed !” 
 
 With distracting coolness and slowness—for he 
 knows the curiosity of the Charmer to be always 
 devouring—Eugene makes a pretense of getting 
 
 out an eyve-glass, polishing it, and reading the - 
 
 paper with difficulty, long after he has seen what 
 is written on.it. What is written on it in wet 
 ink, is: 
 
 ‘Young Blight.” 
 
 ‘“¢Waiting ?”? says Eugene over his shoulder, 
 in’ confidence, with the Analytical. 
 
 “ Waiting,”’ returns the Analytical, in re- 
 sponsive confidence, 
 
 It is too insolvent a state 
 
 ————————————— hl ee 
 
 7 
 r 
 4 
 i 
 
Eugene looks ‘‘ Excuse me” toward Mrs. Ve- 
 Neering, goes out, and finds Young Blight, Mor- 
 timer’s clerk, at the hall door. 
 
 **You told me to bring him, Sir, to wherever 
 you was, if he come while you was out and I was 
 in,” says that discreet young gentleman, stand- 
 ing on tip-toe to whisper; ‘‘and I’ve brought 
 him.” ; 
 
 ‘Sharp boy. Where is he?” asks Eugene. 
 
 ‘*He’s in a cab, Sir, at the door. I thought 
 it best not to show him, you see, if it could be 
 helped; for he’s a shaking all over, like—” 
 Blight’s simile is perhaps inspired by the sur- 
 rounding dishes of sweets—‘‘ like Glue Monge.” 
 
 ‘Sharp boy again,” returns Eugene. ‘‘I’ll 
 go to him.” 
 
 Goes out.straightway, and, leisurely leaning 
 his arms on the open window of a cab in wait- 
 ing, looks in at Mr. Dolls, who has brought his 
 own atmosphere with him, and would seem from 
 its odor to have brought it, for convenience of 
 earriage, in a rum-cask. 
 
 ‘* Now, Dolls, wake up!” 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 273 
 
 *‘Mist Wrayburn? Drection! Fifteen shil- 
 lings !” 
 
 After carefully reading the dingy scrap of pa- 
 per handed to him, and as carefully tucking it 
 into his waistcoat pocket, Eugene tells out the 
 money: beginning incautiously by telling the 
 first shilling into Mr. Dolls’s hand, which in- 
 stantly jerks it out of window; and ending by 
 telling the fifteen shillings on the seat. 
 
 “Give him a ride back to Charing Cross, 
 sharp boy, and there get rid of him.” 
 
 Returning to the dining-room, and pausing 
 for an instant behind the screen at the door, 
 Eugene overhears, above the hum and clatter, 
 the fair Tippins saying: ‘‘I am dying to ask 
 him what he was called out for!” 
 
 ‘* Are you?” mutters Eugene, ‘then perhaps 
 if you can’t ask him you'll die. So I'll be a ben- 
 efactor to society, and go. . Astroll and a cigar, 
 and I can think this over. Think this over.” 
 Thus, with a thoughtful face, he finds his hat 
 and cloak, unseen of the Analytical, and goes 
 his way. 
 
274 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. _ vi ce 
 
 Se alla a 
 
 BOOK IV.—A TURNING | 14 
 
 CHAPTER I. piece of paper, and, as he did so, knew his 
 ; man. y 
 ‘‘Ay, ay? It’s you, is it, honest friend?” | 
 PrasHwaTer Weir-Mill Lock looked tran- | said Eugene, seating himself preparatory to re- 
 quil and pretty on an evening in the summer | suming his sculs. ‘‘ You got the place, then ?” 
 time. A soft air stirred the leaves of the fresh ‘“‘T got the place, and no thanks to you for it, , 
 green trees, and passed like a smooth shad-| nor yet none to Lawyer Lightwood,” grufily an- | 
 ow over the river, and like a smoother shadow | swered Riderhood. 
 over the yielding grass. The voice of the falling ‘We saved our recommendation, honest fel- 
 water, like the voices of the sea and the wind, | low,” said Eugene, ‘‘for the next candidate— 4 
 were as an outer memory to a contemplative | the one who will offer himself when you are : 
 
 SETTING TRAPS. 
 
 listener; but not particularly so to Mr. Rider- | transported or hanged. Don’t be long about it; 
 hood, who sat on one of the blunt woodén levers | will you be so good ?” 
 of his lock-gates, dozing. Wine must be got} So imperturbable was the air with which he 
 into a butt by some agency before it can be drawn | gravely bent to his work that Riderhood re- ; 
 out; and the wine of sentiment never having | mained staring at him, without having found a 
 been got into Mr. Riderhood by any agency, | retort, until he had rowed past a line of wooden 
 nothing in natur@ tapped him. objects by the weir, which showed like huge tee- ' 
 As the Rogue sat, ever and again nodding | totums standing at rest in the water, and was al- j 
 himself off his balance, his recovery was always | most hidden by the drooping boughs on the left 
 attended by an angry stare and growl, as if, in| bank, as he rowed away, keeping out of the op- ; 
 the absence of any one else, he had aggressive | posing current. It being then too late to retort 
 inclinations toward himself. In one of these | with any effect—if that could ever have been 
 starts the ery of ‘‘ Lock ho! Lock!” prevented | done—the honest man confined. himself to curs- 
 his relapse into a doze. Shaking himself as he | ing and growling in a grim under-tone. Hav- 
 got up, like the surly brute he was, he gave his | ing then got his gates shut, he crossed back by 
 growl a responsive twist at the end, and turned | his plank lock-bridge to the towing-path side of * 
 his face down-stream to see who hailed. the river. 
 Tt was an amateur sculler, well up to his work If, in so doing, he took another glance at the 
 though taking it easily, in so light a boat that | bargeman, he did it by stealth. He cast him- 
 the Rogue remarked; “A little less on you, and | self on the grass by the Lock side, in an indolent 
 you'd a’most ha’ been a Wagerbut;” then went | way, with his back in that direction, and, having 
 to work at his windlass handles and sluices, to | gathered a few blades, fell to chewing them, 
 let the sculler in. As the latter stood in his| The dip of Eugene Wrayburn’s sculls had be- 
 boat, holding on by the boat-hook to the wood- | come hardly audible in his ears when the barge- 
 work at the lock side, waiting for the gates to | man passed him, putting the utmost width that 
 open, Rogue Riderhood recognized his ‘‘'T’other | he could between them, and keeping under the 
 governor,” Mr. Eugene Wrayburn; who was, | hedge. Then Riderhood sat up and took a long 
 however, too indifferent or too much engaged to | look at his figure, and then cried: ‘‘ Hi—i—i! 
 recognize him, Lock ho! Lock! Plashwater Weir-Mill Lock!” 
 The creaking lock-gates opened slowly, andthe | The bargeman stopped, and looked back. 
 light boat passed in as soon as there was room ‘¢ Plashwater Weir - Mill Lock, T’otherest 
 enough, and the creaking lock-gates closed upon | gov—er—nor—or—or—or!” cried Mr. Rider- 
 it, and it floated low down in the dock between | hood, with his hands to his mouth. 
 the two sets of gates, until the water should rise| The bargeman turned back. Approaching 
 and the second gates should open and let it out. | nearer and nearer, the bargeman became Brad- 
 When Riderhood had run to his second windlass | ley Headstone, in rough water-side second-hand 
 and turned it, and while he leaned against the | clothing. : 
 lever of that gate to help it to swing open pres- ‘Wish I may die,” said Riderhood, smiting 
 ently, he noticed, lying to rest under the green | his right leg, and laughing, as he sat on the © 
 hedge by the towing path astern of the Lock, a| grass, “if you ain’t ha’ been a imitating me, 
 
 . 
 : 
 ; 
 
 Bargeman. T’otherest governor! Never thought myself so 
 The water rose and rose as the sluice poured | good-looking afore |” s) 
 in, dispersing the scum which had formed be-| Truly, Bradley Headstone had taken careful 
 
 hind the lumbering gates, and sending the boat | note of the honest man’s dress in the course of i 
 up, so that the sculler gradually rose like an ap- | that night-walk they had had together. He q 
 parition against the light from the bargeman’s | must have committed it to memory, and slowly ‘ 
 point of view. Riderhood observed that the | got it by heart. It was exactly reproduced in 
 bargeman rose too, leaning on his arm, and/the dress he now wore. And whereas, in his 
 seemed to have his eyes fastened on the rising | own schoolmaster clothes, he usually looked as 
 figure. {if they were the clothes of some other man, he © 
 
 But there was the toll to be taken, as the | now looked, in the clothes of some other man or 
 gates were now complaining and opening. The | men, as if they were his own. f 
 T’other governor tossed it ashore, twisted in a| ‘* This your Lock?” said Bradley, whose sur- 
 
 > 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 prise had a genuine air; ‘they told me, where 
 I last inquired, it was the third I should come to. 
 This is only the second.” 
 
 “It’s my belief, governor,” returned Rider- 
 hood, with a wink and shake of his head, ‘that 
 you've dropped one in your counting. It ain’t 
 abs as you've been giving your mind to. No, 
 no! 
 
 As he expressively jerked his pointing finger 
 in the direction the boat had taken, a flush of 
 impatience mounted into Bradley’s face, and he 
 looked anxiously up.the river. 
 
 ‘It ain’t Locks as you've been a reckoning 
 up,” said Riderhood, when the schoolmaster’s 
 eyes came back again. ‘+No, no!” 
 
 “What other calculations do you. suppose I 
 have been occupied with? Mathematics ?” 
 
 *“‘T never heerd it called that. It’s a long 
 word for it. 
 said Riderhood, stubbornly chewing his grass. 
 
 eit, “What?” 
 
 ** Tl say them, instead of it, if you like,” was 
 the coolly growled reply. ‘It’s safer talk too.” 
 
 ** What do you mean that I should understand 
 by them ?” 
 
 ‘* Spites, affronts, offenses giv’ and took, dead- 
 ly aggrawations, such like,” answered Rider- 
 hood. 
 
 Do what Bradley Headstone would, he could 
 not keep that former flush of impatience out of 
 his face, or so master his eyes as to prevent their 
 again looking anxiously up the river. 
 
 ““Ha ha! Don’t be afcerd, 'T’otherest,” said 
 Riderhood. ‘The T’other’s got to make way 
 
 agin the stream, and he takes it easy. You can 
 soon come up with him. But wot's the good of 
 saying that to you! You know how fur you 
 
 could have outwalked him betwixt any wheres | 
 
 ‘about where he lost the tide—say Richmond— 
 and this, if you had had a mind to it.” 
 
 ‘You think I have been following him 2” said | 
 
 Bradley. 
 
 **] KNow you have.” said Riderhood. 
 
 ‘* Well! I have, I have,” Bradley admitted. 
 ** But,” with another anxious look up the river, 
 “he may land.” ; 
 
 **Hasy you! He won’t be lost if he does 
 land,” said Riderhood. ‘‘He must leave his 
 boat behind him. He can’t make a bundleor a 
 
 Hows’ever, p’raps you call it so,” | 
 
 parcel on it, and carry it ashore with him under 
 
 his arm.” 
 
 275 
 
 sullen ferocity, ‘‘of hoping as I was getting ready 
 
 to be hanged.” 
 
 _‘‘ Let him look to that,” cried Bradley. “Tet 
 him look to that!. It will be bad for him when 
 men he has injured, and at whom he has jeered 
 are thinking of getting hanged. Let him get 
 ready for his fate when that comes about. 
 There was more meaning in what he said than 
 he knew of, or he wouldn’t have had brains 
 enough to say it. Let him look to it; let bim 
 look to it!’ When men he has wronged, and on 
 whom he has bestowed his insolence, are getting 
 ready to be hanged, there is a death-bell ringing. 
 And not for them.” 
 
 Riderhood, looking fixedly at him, gradral- 
 ly arose from his recumbent posture while the 
 schoolmaster said these words with the utmost 
 concentration of rage and hatred. So, when 
 the words were all spoken, he too kneeled on 
 one knee on the grass, and the two men looked 
 at one another, 
 
 “Oh!” said Riderhood, very deliberately 
 spitting out the grass he had been chewing, 
 ‘Then, I make out, T’otherest, as he is a-going 
 to her ?” 
 
 ‘* He left London,” answered Bradley, ** yes- 
 terday. I have hardly a doubt, this time, that 
 at last he is going to her.” 
 
 ** You ain’t sure, then?” 
 
 ‘*T am as sure here,” said Bradley, with a 
 clutch at the breast of his coarse shirt, ‘‘as if it 
 
 was written there ;” with a blow or a stab at the 
 sky. 
 ‘‘Ah! But judging from the looks on you,” 
 
 retorted Riderhood, completely ridding himself 
 of his grass, and drawing his sleeve across his 
 mouth, ‘‘vou’ve made ekally sure afore, and 
 have got disapinted. It has told upon you.” 
 
 ‘* Listen,” said Bradley, in a low voice, bend- 
 ing forward to lay his hand upon the Lock-keep- 
 er’s shoulder. ‘These are my holidays.” 
 
 ‘*¢ Are they, by George!” muttered Riderhood, 
 with his eyes on the passion-wasted face. ‘* Your 
 working days must be stiff ‘uns if these is your 
 holidays.” 
 
 « And I have never left him,” pursued Brad- 
 
 ley, waving the interruption aside with an im- 
 
 patient hand, ‘since they began. And I never 
 
 will leave him now ‘till I have seen him with 
 
 her.” ; . 
 ‘“‘And when you have seen him with her? 
 
 **He was speaking to you just now,” said | said Riderhood. 
 
 Bradley, kneeling on one knee on the grass be- 
 side the Lock-kecper. ‘* What did he say ?” 
 
 *« Cheek,”’ said Riderhood. 
 
 Se What?” 
 
 **Cheek,” repeated Riderhood, with an angry 
 oath; ‘‘cheek is what he said. 
 _ nothing but cheek. I’d ha’ liked to plump down 
 aboard of him, neck and crop, with a heavy jump, 
 and sunk him.” 
 
 Bradley turned away his haggard face for a 
 fw moments, and then said, tearing up a tuft 
 of grass: , 
 
 *¢ Damn him!” 
 
 ‘*Hooroar!” cried Riderhood. ‘Does you 
 credit! Hooroar! I ery chorus to the T’oth- 
 erest.” 
 
 ‘¢What turn,” said Bradley, with an effort at 
 _ self-repression that forced him to wipe his face, 
 ‘“did his insolence take to-day ?” 
 
 He can’t say | 
 
 “Tt took the turn,” answered Riderhood, with - 
 
 *¢__T’l] come hack to you.” 
 
 Riderhood stiffened the knee on which he had 
 been resting, got up, and looked gloomily at his 
 new friend. After a few moments they walked 
 side by side in the direction the boat had taken, 
 as if by tacit consent; Bradley pressing forward, 
 and Riderhood holding back; Bradley getting 
 out his neat prim purse into his hand (a present 
 made him by penny subscription among his 
 pupils); and Riderhood, unfolding his arms to 
 smear his coat-cuff across his mouth with a 
 thoughtful air. 
 
 ‘‘T have a pound for you,” said Bradley. 
 
 * You’ve two,” said Riderhood. 
 
 Bradley held a sovereign between his fingers. 
 Slouching at his side with his eyes upon the 
 towing-path, Riderhood held his left hand open, 
 with a certain slight drawing action toward him- 
 self. Bradley dipped in his purse for another 
 sovereign, and two chinked in Riderhood’s hand, 
 
276 
 
 ening, drew them home to his pocket. 
 ‘¢Now, I must follow him,” said Bradley 
 Pegdatons, 
 
 fool!—to confuse observation, or divert atten-! of a long doze. 
 ut he must | barge through and was alone again, looking to 
 
 tion, if not solely to baffle me. 
 have the power of making himself invisible be- 
 fore he can shake Me off.” 
 
 Riderhood stopped. ‘‘If you don’t get disa- 
 pinted agin, T’otherest, maybe you'll put up at 
 the Lock-house when you come back ?” 
 
 ¢T will.” 
 
 Riderhood nodded, and the figure of the barge- 
 man went its way along the soft turf by the side 
 of the towing-path, keeping near the hedge and 
 moving quickly. They had turned a point from 
 which a long stretch of river was visible. A 
 stranger to the scene might have been certain 
 that here and there along the line of hedge a 
 
 figure stood, watching the bargeman, and wait- | 
 So he himself had | 
 
 ing for him to come up. 
 often believed at first, until his eyes became used 
 to the posts, bearing the dagger that slew Wat 
 Tyler, in the City of London shield. 
 
 Within Mr. Riderhood’s knowledge all dag- 
 gers were as one. Even to Bradley Headstone, 
 
 who could have told to the letter without book | 
 all about Wat Tyler, Lord Mayor Walworth, and | 
 
 the King, that it is dutiful for youth to know, 
 
 there was but one subject living in the world | 
 
 for every sharp destructive instrument that sum- 
 mer evening. So, Riderhood looking after him 
 as he went, and he with his furtive hand laid 
 upon the dagger as he passed it, and his eyes 
 upon the boat, were much upon a par. 
 
 The boat went on, under the arching trees, 
 and over their tranquil shadows in the water. 
 The bargeman skulking on the opposite bank 
 of the stream, went on after it. Sparkles of 
 light showed Riderhood when and where the 
 rower dipped his blades, until, even as he stood 
 idly watching, the sun went down and the land- 
 scape was dyed red. And then the red had the 
 appearance of fading out of it and mounting up 
 to Heaven, as we say that blood, guiltily shed, does. 
 
 Turning back toward his Lock (he had not 
 
 gone out of view of it), the Rogue pondered as | 
 
 deeply as it was within the contracted power of 
 such a fellow to do. ‘*Why did he copy my 
 clothes? He could have looked like what he 
 wanted to look like without that.” This was 
 the subject-matter in his thoughts; in which, 
 too, there came lumbering up, by times, like any 
 half floating and half sinking rubbish in the riv- 
 er, the question, Was it done by accident? The 
 setting of a trap for finding out whether it was 
 accidentally done, soon superseded, as a practi- 
 eal piece of cunning, the abstruser inquiry why 
 otherwise it was done. And he devised a means. 
 
 Rogue Riderhood went into his Lock-house, 
 and brought forth, into the now sober gray light, 
 his chest of clothes. Sitting on the grass beside 
 it, he turned out, one by one, the articles it con- 
 tained, until he came to a conspicuous bright 
 red neckerchief stained black here and there by 
 wear. It arrested his attention, and he sat paus- 
 ing over it, until he took off the rusty colorless 
 wisp that he wore round his throat, and substi- 
 tuted the red neckerchief, leaving the long ends 
 flowing. ‘‘ Now,” said the Rogue, “if arter he 
 sees me in this neckhankecher, I sce him in a 
 sim’lar neckhankecher, it won't be accident !”’ 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 the drawing action of which, promptly strength- Elated by his device, he carried his chest in again - 
 
 and went to supper. 
 
 ‘Lock ho! Lock!” It was’a light night,. 
 
 “He takes this river-road—the | and a barge coming down summoned him out 
 
 _In due course he had let the 
 
 the closing of his gates, when Bradley Head- 
 stone appeared before him, standing on the brink 
 of the Lock. 
 
 ‘¢ Halloa!” said Riderhood. 
 T’otherest ?” 
 
 ‘¢ He has put up for the night, at an Angler’s 
 Inn,” was the fatigued and hoarse reply. ** He 
 goes on, up the river, at six in the morning. I 
 have come back for a couple of hours’ rest.” 
 
 ‘You want ’em,” said Riderhood, making 
 toward the school master by his plank bridge. 
 
 ‘¢T don’t want them,” returned Bradley, irri- 
 tably, “‘ because I would rather not have them, 
 but would much prefer to follow him all night. 
 However, if he won’t lead I can’t follow. I 
 have been waiting about, until I could discover, 
 for a certainty, at what time he starts; if I 
 
 ‘‘ Back a’ready, 
 
 staid there.—This would be a bad pit for a man 
 to be flung into with his hands tied. These 
 slippery smooth walls would give him no chance. 
 
 down ?” 
 
 “Suck him down, or swaller him up, he 
 wouldn’t get out,”’ said Riderhood. ‘‘ Not even 
 if his hands warn’t tied, he wouldn’t. Shut him 
 in at both ends, and I’d give him a pint o’ old 
 ale ever to come up-to me standing here.” 
 
 Bradley looked down with a ghastly relish. 
 ‘You run about the brink, and run across it, in 
 this uncertain light, on a few inches width of 
 rotten wood,” said he. ‘‘I wonder you have 
 
 | be drowned, 
 
 no thought of being drowned.” 
 
 “*T can’t be!” said Riderhood. 
 
 ‘You can’t be drowned ?” 
 
 ‘No!’ said Riderhood, shaking his head with 
 an air of thorough conviction, ‘‘it’s well known. 
 I’ve been brought out o’ drowning, and I can’t 
 I wouldn’t have that there busted 
 B’lowbridger aware on it, or her people might 
 make it tell agin’ the damages I mean to get. 
 But it’s well known to water-side characters like 
 myself,.that him as has been brought out o’ 
 drowning, can never be drowned.” 
 
 Bradley smiled sourly at the ignorance he 
 would have corrected in one of his pupils, and 
 continued to look down into the water, as if the 
 place had a gloomy fascination for him. 
 
 ‘¢ You seem to like it,” said Riderhood. 
 
 He took no notice, but stood looking down, 
 as if he had not heard the words. There was a 
 
 that the Rogue found it hard to understand. It 
 was fierce, and full of purpose; but the purpose 
 might have been as much against himself as 
 _against another. If he had stepped back for a 
 spring, taken a leap, and thrown himself in, it 
 would have been no surprising sequel to the 
 look. ‘Perhaps his troubled soul, set upon some 
 
 violence and another. 
 
 : his elbow before he answered. i 
 
 couldn’t have made sure of it, I should have 
 
 And I suppose those gates would suck him 
 
 very dark expression on his face; an expression — 
 
 violence, did hover for the moment between that — F 
 
 “‘Didn’t you say,” asked Riderhood, after 
 watching him for a while with a sidelong glance, : 
 ‘*as you had come back for a couple 0’ hours’ | 
 rest?” But even then he had to jog him nw . 
 
_but no return of Bradley. 
 sultry and oppressive. 
 
 for three days. 
 Then I saw him wait for her and meet her. 
 ~ gaw them’—he stopped as though he were suffo- 
 
 _.. “Nothing.” 
 
 mickk : Fr b Pp Vee 3h Woke oe ee ng 
 Lf, ’ ’ ay a es ta fl mie 
 “ab May 5 i ait ree 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 feEh? Yes.” 
 
 ‘¢Hadn’t you better come in and take your 
 couple ©’ hours’ rest ?” 
 
 ‘¢Thank you. Yes.” 
 
 With the look of one just awakened he fol-_ 
 
 lowed Riderhood into the Lock-house, where the 
 Jatter produced from a cupboard some cold salt- 
 
 beef and half a loaf, some gin in a bottle, and. 
 
 some water in a jug. The last he brought in, 
 cocl and dripping, from the river. 
 
 277 
 
 ‘* How does that happen?” asked Riderhood. 
 ‘“T don’t know. I can’t keep it back. It has 
 happened twice—three times— four times—I 
 don’t know how many times—since last night. 
 I taste it, smell it, see it; it chokes me, and 
 
 then it breaks out like this.” 
 
 ‘¢There, ‘I’otherest,”’ said Riderhood, stoop- : 
 
 ing over him to put it off the table. “ You'd 
 better take a bite and a sup afore you takes your 
 snooze.” The draggling ends of the red neck- 
 erchief caught the schoolmaster’s eyes. Rider- 
 heod saw him look at it. 
 
 “Oh!” thought that worthy. ‘*You’re a- 
 taking notices, are you? Come! You shall 
 have a good squint at it then.” With which re- 
 flection he sat down on the other side of the ta- 
 ble, threw open his vest, and made a pretense of 
 retying the neckerchief with much deliberation. 
 
 Bradley ate and drank. As he sat at his 
 platter and mug Riderhood saw him, again and 
 yet again, steal a look at the neckerchief, as if 
 he were correcting his slow observation and 
 prompting his sluggish memory. ‘‘ When you're 
 ready for your snooze,” said that honest creat- 
 ure, ‘chuck yourself on my bed in the corner, 
 T’otherest. It’ll be broad day afore three. I'll 
 call you early.” 
 
 ‘] shall require no calling,” answered Brad- 
 lev. And soon afterward, divesting himself 
 only of his shoes and coat, lay down. 
 
 Riderhood, leaning back in his wooden arm- 
 chair, with his arms folded on his breast, looked 
 
 at him as he lay with his right hand clefiched in | 
 
 his slecp and his teeth set, until a film came 
 over his own sight and he slept too. He awoke 
 
 to find that it was daylight, aid that his visitor 
 
 was already astir, and going out to the river-side 
 to cool his head: *““Though I’m blest,” muttered 
 Riderhood at the Lock-house door, looking after 
 
 him, ‘‘if I think there’s water enough in all the | 
 
 19? 
 
 Thames to do that for you!”” Within five min- 
 utes he had taken his departure, and was pass- 
 
 ing on into the calm distance as he had passed | 
 
 yesterday. Riderhood knew when a fish leaped 
 
 by his starting and glancing round. 
 “Lock ho! Lock!” at intervals all day,.and | 
 | what you’re up to.” 
 
 ‘¢Lock ho! Lock!’ thrice in the ensuing night, 
 The second day was 
 
 der-storm came up, and had but newly broken 
 into a furions sweep of rain when he rushed in 
 
 at the door, like the storm itself. 
 
 “You've seen him with her!” exclaimed 
 Riderhood, starting up. 
 “*T have.” 
 ‘¢ Where ?” 
 
 *¢ At his journey’s end. 
 
 cating, and began again—‘‘I saw them walking 
 side by side last night.” 
 _ **What did you do?” 
 
 ‘¢What are you going to do?” 
 
 i: _ He dropped into a chair and langhed. Im- 
 
 bs 
 
 mediately afterward a great spirt of blood burst 
 
 __ from his nose. 
 
 In the afternoon a thun- | 
 
 His boat’s hauled up | 
 I heard him give the order. | 
 Ty. 
 
 | 
 
 ‘drank both in quick. succession. 
 
 and looked through the window at the 
 
 He went into the pelting rain again with his 
 head bare, and, bending low over the river, and 
 scooping up the water with his two hands, wash- 
 ed the blood away. All beyond his figure, as 
 Riderhood looked from the door, was a vast 
 dark curtain in solemn movement toward one 
 quarter of the heavens. He raised his head and 
 came back, wet from head to foot; but with the 
 lower part of his sleeves, where he had dipped 
 into the river, streaming water. 
 
 ‘¢ Your face is like a ghost’s,” said Riderhood. 
 
 ‘Did you ever see a ghost?” was the sullen 
 retort. 
 
 -‘T mean to say you’re quite wore out.” 
 
 ‘That may well be. I have had no rest since 
 T left here. I don’t remember that I have so 
 much as sat down since I left here.” 
 
 ‘¢ Tie down now, then,” said Riderhood. 
 
 ‘¢T will, if you'll give me something to quench 
 my thirst first.” 
 
 The bottle and jug were again produced, and 
 he mixed a weak dranght, and another, and 
 ‘““You asked 
 me something,” he said then. 
 
 ‘No, I didn’t,” replied Riderhood. 
 
 ‘T tell you,” retorted Bradley, turning upon 
 him in a wild and desperate ‘manner, ‘you 
 asked me something before I went out to wash 
 
 / my face in the river.” 
 
 ‘Oh! Then?” said Riderhood, backing a 
 little, ‘I asked you wot you wos a-going to 
 do.” 
 
 ‘‘¥Tow can a man in this state know?” he 
 answered, protesting with both his tremulous 
 hands, with an action so vigorously angry that 
 he shook the water from his sleeves upon the 
 floor as-if he had wrung them. ‘‘How can I 
 plan any thing if I haven't sleep ?” 
 
 “Why, that’s what I as good as said,” re- 
 turned the other. ‘‘Didn’t I say lie down?” 
 
 ‘© Well, perhaps you did.” 
 
 ‘¢Well! Anyways I says it again. Sleep 
 where vou slept last, the sounder and longer 
 arterward 
 
 you can sleep, the better you'll know 
 
 Ilis pointing to the truckle-bed in the corner 
 seemed gradually to bring that poor couch to 
 Bradlev’s wandering remembrance. He slipped 
 off his worn, down-trodden shoes, and cast hime 
 self heavily, all wet as he was, uj on the bed. 
 
 Riderhood sat down in his wooden arm-chair, 
 lightning 
 and listened to the thunder. But his thoughts 
 were far from being absorbed by the thunder and 
 the lightning, for again and again and again he 
 looked very curiously at the exhausted man upon 
 the bed. The man had turned up the collar of the 
 rough coat he wore to shelter himself from the 
 storm, and had buttoned it about his neck. Une 
 conscious of that, and of most things, he had left 
 the coat so, both when he had layed his face in 
 the river and when he had cast himself upon 
 the bed; though it would have been much easier 
 to him if he had unloosened it. 
 
 The thunder rolled heavily, and the forked 
 lightning seemed to make jagged rents in every 
 
278 
 
 \\ Wilt iy 
 \) ) 
 
 ‘ Y nN NY 
 NY 
 
 AN 
 AN \ i 
 
 \ 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. > 
 
 eh Bie al Bt a 
 eu ve > ‘i 
 
 IN THE LOCK-KEEPER’S HOUSE. 
 
 part of the vast curtain without, as Riderhood 
 sat by the window glancing at the bed. Some- 
 times he saw the man upon the bed by a red 
 light; sometimes by a blue; sometimes he 
 scarcely saw him in the darkness of the storm; 
 sometimes he saw nothing of him in the blind- 
 ing glare of palpitating white fire. Anon, the 
 rain would come again with a tremendous rush, 
 and the river would seem to rise to meet it, and 
 a blast of wind, bursting upon the door, would 
 flutter the hair and dress of the man, as if invis- 
 ible messengers were come around the bed to 
 carry him away. From all these phases of the 
 storm Riderhood would turn, as if they were in- 
 terruptions—rather striking interruptions, pos- 
 sibly, but interruptions still—of his scrutiny of 
 the sleeper, 
 
 ‘* He sleeps sound,” he said within himself; 
 *“yet he’s that up to me and that noticing of me 
 that my getting out of my chair may wake him, 
 when a rattling peal won’t, let alone my touch- 
 ing of him.” % 
 
 He very cautiously rose to his feet.‘ T’oth- 
 
 erest,”’ he said, in a low, calm voice, “are you 
 a lying easy? There’s a chill in the air, gov- 
 ernor. Shall I put a coat over you 2?” 
 
 No answer. 
 
 ‘*That’s about what it is a’ready, you see,” 
 muttered Riderhood, in a lower and a different 
 voice; ‘‘a coat over you, a coat over you !” 
 
 The sleeper moving an arm, he sat down again 
 in his chair, and feigned to watch the storm 
 from the window. It was a grand spectacle, but 
 not so grand as.to keep his eyes, for half a min- 
 ute together, from stealing a look at the man 
 upon the bed. 
 
 It was at the concealed throat of the sleeper 
 that Riderhood so often looked so curiously, 
 
 until ‘the sleep seemed to deepen into the stupor > 
 
 of the dead-tired in mind and body. Then Rider- 
 hood came from the window cautiously, and stood 
 by the bed. 
 
 ‘*Poor man!” he murmured in a low tone, 
 
 with a crafty face, and a very watchful eye and 
 ready foot, lest he should start up; ‘‘this here 
 
 coat of his must make him uneasy in his sleep, _ 
 
comfortable? Ah! I think I ought to it, poor 
 man. I think I will.” 
 
 He touched the first button with a very cau- 
 tious hand andastep backward. But the sleep- 
 er remaining in profound unconsciousness, he 
 touched the other buttons With a more assured 
 hand, and perhaps the more lightly on that ac- 
 count. Softly and slowly he opened the coat and 
 drew it back. . 
 
 The draggling ends of a bright-red neckerchief 
 were then disclosed, and he had even been at the 
 pains of dipping parts of it in some liquid, to 
 give it the appearance of having become stained 
 by wear. With a much-perplexed face Rider- 
 hood looked from it to the sleeper, and from the 
 sleeper to it, and finally crept back to his chair, 
 and there, with his hand to his chin, sat long in 
 ‘a brown study, looking at both. — 
 
 pa a Ns EY 
 
 | CHAPTER II. 
 THE GOLDEN DUSTMAN RISES A LITTLE. 
 
 Mr. and Mrs. Lammle had come to breakfast 
 with Mr. and Mrs. Boffin. They were not ab- 
 solutely uninvited, but had pressed themselves 
 with so much urgency on the golden couple, that 
 
 _ evasion of the honor and pleasure of their com- 
 
 pany would have been difficult, if desired. 
 They were in a charming state of mind, were 
 Mr, and’ Mrs, Lammle, and almost as fond of 
 Mr. and Mrs. Boffin as of one another. 
 
 **My dear Mrs. Boffin,’’ said Mrs. Lammle, 
 “it imparts new life to me to see my Alfred 
 in confidential communication with Mr. Boffin. 
 The two were formed to become intimate. So 
 much simplicity combined with so much force 
 of character, such natural sagacity united to 
 such amiability and gentleness—these are the 
 
 distinguishing characteristics of both.” 
 
 tle, archly. 
 
 This being said aloud gave Mr. Lammle an 
 opportunity, as he came with Mr. Boffin from 
 the window to the breakfast-table, of taking up 
 his dear and honored wife. . 
 
 _ “My Sophronia,” said that gentleman, ‘‘ your 
 too partial estimate of your poor husband’s char- 
 ; ; 
 
 *““No! Not too partial, Alfred,” urged the 
 lady, tenderly moved; ‘‘never say that.” 
 
 **My child, your favorable opinion, then, of 
 your husband—you don’t object to that phrase, 
 darling ?” . 
 
 ‘*How can J, Alfred ?” 
 
 ~*¢Your favorable opinion then, my Precious, 
 
 - does less than justice to Mr. Boffin, and more 
 
 than justice to me.” 
 
 *“To the first charge, Alfred, I plead guilty. | 
 
 But to the second, oh no, no!” 
 ** Less than justice to Mr. Boffin, Sophronia,” 
 
 said Mr. Lammle, soaring into a tone of moral 
 
 grandeur, ‘‘ because it represents. Mr. Boffin as 
 on a lower level; more than justice to me, So- 
 phronia, because it represents me as on Mr. Bof- 
 fin’s higher level. Mr. Boffin bears and forbears 
 far more than I could.” 
 
 “*Far more than you could for yourself, Al- 
 fred hee 
 
 _ ** My love, that is not the question.” 
 
 “Not the question, Lawyer ?” said Mrs. Lam- 
 
 4 
 
 ‘ OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 "Shall I loosen it for him, and make him more 
 
 279 
 
 ** No, dear Sophronia. 
 I regard Mr. Boffin as too generous, as possessed 
 of too much clemency, as being too good to per- 
 sons who are unworthy of him and ungrateful to 
 him. To those noble qualities I can lay no 
 claim. On the contrary, they rouse my indig- 
 nation when I see them in action.” 
 
 ‘Alfred t? 
 
 “They rouse my indignation, my dear, against 
 the unworthy persons, and give me a combative 
 desire to stand between Mr. Boffin and all sneh 
 persons. Why? Because in my lower nature 
 [ am more worldly and less delicate. Not being 
 so magnanimous as Mr. Boffin, I feel his inju- 
 ries more than he does himself, and fecl more 
 capable of opposing his injurers.” 
 
 It struck Mrs. Lammle that it appeared rath- 
 er difficult this morning to bring Mr. and Mrs, 
 Boffin into agreeable conversation. Here had 
 been several lures thrown out, and neither of 
 them had uttered a word. Here were she, Mrs. 
 Lammle, and her husband discoursing at once 
 affectingly and effectively, but discoursing alone. 
 Assuming that the dear old creatures were im- 
 pressed by what they heard, still one would like 
 to be sure of it, the more so, as at least one of 
 the dear old creatures was somewhat pointedly 
 referred to. If the dear old creatures were too 
 bashful or too dull to assume their required 
 places in the discussion, why then it would seem 
 desirable that the dear old creatures should be 
 taken by their heads and shoulders and brought 
 into it, 
 
 ‘‘But is not my husband saying in effect,” 
 asked Mrs. Lammle, therefore, with an innocent 
 air, of Mr. and Mrs, Boffin, ‘‘that he becomes 
 unmindful of his own temporary misfortunes in 
 his admiration of another whom he is burning 
 to serve? Andis not that making an admission 
 that his nature isa generous one? Iam wretch- 
 ed in argument, but surely this is so, dear Mr. 
 and Mrs. Boffin?” 
 
 Still, neither Mr. nor Mrs, Boffin said a word. 
 He sat with his eyes on his plate, eating his muf- 
 fins and ham, and she sat shyly looking at the 
 tea-pot. Mrs. Lammle’s innocent appeal was 
 merely thrown into the air, to mingle with the 
 steam of the urn. Glancing toward Mr. and 
 Mrs. Boffin, she very slightly raised her eye- 
 brows, as though inquiring of her husband: 
 ‘¢Do I notice any thing wrong here?” 
 
 Mr. Lammle, who had found his chest effect- 
 ive on a variety of occasions, manceuvred his 
 
 capacious shirt-front into the largest demonstra- 
 
 tion possible, and then smiling retorted on his 
 wife, thus: 
 
 ‘¢ Sophronia, darling, Mr. and Mrs. Boffin 
 will remind you of the old adage, that self-praise 
 is no recommendation.” 
 
 ‘‘ Self-praise, Alfred? Do you mean because 
 we are one and the same?” 
 
 ‘No, my dear child. I mean that you can 
 not fail to remember, if you reflect for a single 
 moment, that what you are pleased to compli- 
 ment me upon feeling in the case of Mr. Boffin 
 you have yourself confided to me as your own 
 feeling in the case of Mrs. Boffin. * 
 
 (‘‘I shall be beaten by this Lawyer, Mrs. 
 Lammle gayly whispered to Mrs. Boffin. I 
 am afraid I must admit it, if he presses me, for 
 it’s damagingly true.”) 
 
 Several white dints began to come and go 
 
 From my lower level © 
 
 a 
 
280 
 
 about Mr. Lammle’s nose, as he observed that 
 Mrs. Boffin merely looked up from the tea-pot 
 for a moment with an embarrassed smile, which 
 was no smile, and then looked down again. 
 
 “‘Do vou admit the charge, Sophronia?” in- 
 quired Alfred, in a rallying tone. — 
 
 ‘‘ Really, I think,” said Mrs. Lammle, still 
 gayly, ‘‘I must throw ‘myself on the protection 
 of the Court. Am I bound to answer that ques- 
 tion, my Lord?” ‘To Mr. Boffin. 
 
 * You needn’t, if you don’t like, ma’am,” was 
 his answer. ‘It’s not of the least consequence.” 
 
 Both husband and wife glanced at him, very 
 doubtfully. His manner was grave, but not 
 coarse, and derived some dignity from a certain 
 repressed dislike of the tone of the conversation. 
 
 Again Mrs. Lammle raised her eyebrows for 
 instruction from her husband. He replied in a 
 slight nod. ‘Try ’em again.” 
 
 ‘¢To protect myself against the suspicion of 
 covert self-laudation, my dear Mrs. Boffin,” said 
 the airy Mrs. Lammle therefore, ‘‘1 must tell 
 you how it was.” 
 
 ‘*No. Pray don’t,” Mr. Boffin interposed. 
 
 Mrs. Lammle turned to him laughingly. ‘The 
 Court objects ?” 
 
 ‘¢Ma’am,” said Mr. Boffin, “the Court (if I 
 am the Court) does object. The Court objects 
 for two reasons. First, because the Court don’t 
 think it fair. Secondly, because the dear oldlady, 
 Mrs. Court (if Iam Mr.) gets distressed by it.” 
 
 A very remarkable wavering between two 
 bearings — between her propitiatory bearing 
 there, and her defiant bearing at Mr. Twem- 
 low’s—was observable on the part of Mrs. Lam- 
 mle as she said: ‘*What does the Court not 
 consider fair?” 
 
 ‘‘ Letting you go on,” replied Mr. Boffin, nod- 
 ding his head soothingly, as who should say, 
 We won’t be harder on vou than we can help; 
 we'll make the best of it. ‘‘It’s not above- 
 board and it’s not fair. When the old lady is 
 uncomfortable, there’s sure to be good reason for 
 it. I see she is uncomfortable, and I plainly 
 see this is the good reason wherefore. Have you 
 breakfasted, ma’am.”’ 
 
 Mrs. Lammle, settling into her defiant man- 
 ner, pushed her plate away, looked at her hus- 
 band, and laughed; but by no means gayly. 
 
 “‘Have you breakfasted, Sir?” inquired Mr. 
 Boffin. 
 
 ‘¢Thank you,” replied Alfred, showing all his 
 teeth. ‘‘If Mrs. Boffin will oblige me, I'll take 
 another cup of tea.” 
 
 He spilled a little of it over the chest which 
 ought to have been so.effective, and which had 
 done so little; but on the whole drank it with 
 something of an air, though the coming and go- 
 ing dints got almost as large, the while, as if 
 they had been made by pressure of the tea-spoon. 
 ‘¢A thousand thanks,” he then observed. ‘‘I 
 have breakfasted.” 
 
 ‘¢ Now, which,” said Mr. Boffin softly, taking 
 
 out a pocket-book, ‘‘ which of you two is Cash- |. 
 
 ier ?” 
 
 “Sophronia, my dear,” remarked her hus- 
 band, as he leaned back in his chair, waving his 
 right hand toward her, while he hung his left 
 hand by the thumb in the arm-hole of his waist- 
 coat: ‘it shall be your department.” 
 
 “‘T would rather,” said Mr. Boffin, *‘that it 
 
 was your husband’s, ma’am, because—but never 
 
 * iS: 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. _. 
 
 : 
 
 mind, because. I would rather have to do with — 
 him. ~However, what I have to say, I will say 
 with as little offense as possible; if I can say 
 without any, I shall be heartily glad. You two 
 have done me a service, a very great service, in — 
 doing what you did (my old lady knows what % 
 
 was), and I have putginto this envelope a bank- 
 
 note for a hundred pound. I consider the serv- 
 
 ice well worth a hundred pound, and I am well 
 pleased to pay the money. 
 
 Would you do me 
 the favor to take it, and likewise*to accept my 
 thanks ?” 
 
 With a haughty action, and without looking 
 toward him, Mrs. Lammle held out her left 
 hand, and into it Mr. Boffin put the little pack- 
 et. When she had conveyed it to her bosom, 
 Mr. Lammle had the appearance of feeling re- 
 lieved, and breathing more freely, as not hav- 
 ing been quite certain that the hundred pounds ~ 
 were his until the note had been safely trans- 
 ferred out of Mr. Boffin’s keeping into his own 
 Sophronia’s. 
 
 ‘<It is not impossible,” said Mr. Boffin, ad- 
 dressing Alfred, ‘‘that you have had some gen-_ 
 eral idea, Sir, of replacing Rokesmith, in course 
 of time ?” 2 
 
 ‘¢Tt is not,” assented Alfred, with a glitter- 
 ing smile and a great deal of nose, ‘‘not im- 
 possible.” 
 
 “¢ And perhaps, ma’am,” pursued Mr. Boffin, 
 addressing Sophronia, ‘‘ you have been so kind 
 as to take up my old lady in your own mind, | 
 and to do her the honor of turning the question 
 over whether you mightn’t one of these days 
 have her in charge, like? Whether you mightn’t™ 
 be a sort of Miss Bella Wilfer to her, and some- 
 thing more ?” : 
 
 ‘‘T should hope,” returned Mrs. Lammle, 
 with a scornful look and in a loud voice, ‘‘ that 
 if I were any thing to your wife, Sir, I could 
 hardly fail to be something more than Miss Bel- 
 la Wilfer, as you call her.” a 
 
 ‘What do you call her, ma’am ?” asked Mr. 
 Boffin. , 
 
 Mrs. Lammle disdained to reply, and sat de-_ 
 fiantly beating one foot on the ground. 
 
 ‘¢ Again I think I may say, that’s not impos- 
 sible. Is it, Sir?” asked Mr. Boffin, turning to 
 Alfred. 
 
 ‘¢Tt is not,” said Alfred, smiling assent as be- 
 fore, ‘‘ not impossible.” 
 
 ‘‘Now,” said Mr. Boffin, gently, ‘‘it won’t 
 do. I dou’t wish to say a single word that 
 might be afterward remembered as unpleasant ; _ 
 but it won’t do.” ee 
 “© Sophronia, my love,” her husband repeat-_ 
 
 do.”’ + -s 
 ‘No,” said Mr. Boffin, with his voice still — 
 dropped, ‘it really won’t. You positively must 
 excuse us. If you'll go your way, we'll go ours, — 
 and so I hope this affair ends to the satisfaction 
 of all parties.” i 
 Mrs. Lammle gave him the look of a decided- 
 ly dissatisfied party demanding exemption from 
 the category ; but said nothing. 13 
 ‘¢'The best thing we can make of the affair,” _ 
 
 said Mr. Boffin, ‘‘is a matter of business, and 
 as a matter of business it’s brought to a conelu- ~ 
 
 sion. You have done me a great service, a very 
 
 great service, and I have paid for it. Is there — 
 
 any objection to the price ?” ie 
 nae” 
 
 ed, in a bantering manner, ‘‘you hear? Itwon't 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. < 
 
 _ Mr. and Mrs. Lammle looked at one another 
 across the table, but neither could say that-there 
 was. Mr. Lammle shrugged his shoulders, and 
 Mrs. Lammle sat rigid. , 
 _ “Very good,” said Mr. Boffin. “We hope 
 pny old lady and me) that you'll give us credit 
 or taking the plainest and honestest short-cut 
 that could be taken under the circumstances. 
 We have talked it over with a deal of care (my 
 old lady and me), and we have felt that at ail 
 to lead you on, or even at all to let you go.on 
 of your own selves, wouldn’t be the right thing. 
 So I have openly given you to understand that—” 
 Mr. Boffin sought for a new turn of speech, but 
 could find none so expressive as his former one, 
 repeated in aconfidential tone, *‘ —that it won’t 
 do. IfIcould have put the case more pleasant- 
 ly Twould; but I hope I haven’t put it very un- 
 pleasantly; at all events I haven’t meant to. 
 So,”’ said Mr. Boffin, by way of peroration, 
 “wishing you well in the Way you go, we now 
 conclude with the observation that perhaps you'll 
 go it.” . 
 
 Mr. Lammleyrose with an impudent laugh on 
 _his side of the table, and Mrs. Lammle rose with 
 a disdainful frown on hers. At this moment a 
 . hasty foot was heard on the staircase, and Geor- 
 ‘giana Podsnag broke into the room, unannounced 
 and in tears. : 
 
 ‘*Oh, my dear Sophronia!” cried Georgiana, 
 wringing: her hands as she ran up to embrace 
 her, ‘‘to think that you and Alfred should be ru- 
 ined! Qh, my poor dear Sophronia, to think that 
 you should have had a Sale at your house after all 
 your kindness tome! Oh, Mr. and Mrs. Boffin, 
 pray forgive me for thisintrusion, but you don’t 
 know how fond I was of Sophronia when Pa 
 wouldn’t let me go there any more, or what I 
 have felt fur Sophronia since I heard from Ma 
 of her having been brought low in the world! 
 You don’t, you can’t, you never can, think how 
 I have Jain awake at night and cried for my 
 good Sophronia, my first and only friend !” 
 
 Mrs. Lammle’s manner changed under the 
 poor silly girl’s embraces, and she turned ex- 
 tremely pale: directing one appealing look, first 
 to Mrs. Boffin, and then to Mr. Boffin. Both 
 understood her instantly, with a more delicate 
 subtlety than much better educated people, whose 
 perception came less directly from the heart, 
 could have brought to bear upon the case. 
 
 “TI haven’t a minute,” said poor little Georgi- 
 ana, *‘to stay.- I'am out shopping early with 
 Ma, and I said I had a headache and got Ma to 
 leave me outside in the phaeton, in Piccadilly, 
 and ran round to Sackville Street, and heard 
 that Sophronia was here, and then Ma came to 
 see, oh such a dreadful old stony woman from 
 the country in a turban in Portland Place, and 
 I said I wouldn’t go up with Ma, but would drive 
 
 round and leave cards for the Boffins, which is 
 
 taking a liberty with the name; but oh my| 
 
 goodness I am distracted, and the phaeton’s at 
 ‘the door, and what would Pa say if he knew it !” 
 
 ‘‘Don’t ye be timid, my dear,” said Mrs. 
 Boffin. ‘* You came in to see us.” 
 
 “Oh no, I didn’t,” cried Georgiana. ‘It’s 
 very impolite, I know, but I came to see my 
 poor Sophronia, my only friend. Oh! how I 
 felt the separation, my dear Sophronia, before I 
 
 281 
 
 There were actually tears in the bold wo- 
 man’s eyes, as the sofi-headed and soft-hearted 
 girl twined her arms about her neck. 
 
 ‘* But I’ve come on business,” said Georgiana, 
 sobbing and drying her face, and then searching 
 in a little reticule, ‘and if I don’t dispatch it I 
 shall have come for nothing, and oh good gra- 
 cious! what would Pa say if he knew of Sack- 
 ville Street, and what would Ma say if she was 
 kept waiting on the door-steps of that dreadful 
 turban, and there never were such pawing horses 
 as ours unsettling my mind every moment more 
 and more when I want more mind than I have 
 got, by pawing up Mr. Boffin’s street where they 
 have no business to be. Oh! where is, where is 
 it? Oh! I can't find it!” All this time sob- 
 bing and searching in the little reticule. 
 
 ‘* What do you miss, my dear?” asked Mr. Bof- 
 fin, stepping forward. 
 
 ‘‘ Oh! it’s little enough,” replied Georgiana, » 
 ‘‘ because Ma always treats me as if I was in the 
 nursery (I am sure I wish I was!), but I hardly 
 ever spend it and it has mounted up to fifteen 
 pounds, Sophronia, and I hope three five-pound 
 notes are better than nothing, though so little, 
 so little! And now I have found that—oh, my 
 goodness! there’s the other gone next! Oh no, 
 it isn’ there it is!” TRON 
 
 With that, always sobbing and searching in 
 the reticule, Georgiana produced a necklace. 
 
 ‘“‘ Ma says chits and jewels have no business 
 together,” pursued Georgiana, ‘and that’s. the 
 reason why I have no trinkets except this, but I 
 suppose my aunt Hawkinson was of a different 
 opinion, because she left me this, though I used 
 to think.she might just as well have buried it, 
 for it’s always kept in jewelers’ cotton. How- 
 ever, here it is, I am thankful to say, and of use 
 at last, and you’ll sell it, dear Sophronia, and 
 buy things with it.” 
 
 ** Give it to me,” said Mr. Boffin, gently tak- 
 ing it. ‘‘Tll see that it’s properly disposed 
 of... 
 
 ‘‘Oh! are you such a friend of Sophronia’s, 
 {r. Boffin ?” cried Georgiana. ‘*Oh, how good 
 of you! Oh, my gracious! there was something 
 Ise, and it’s gone out of my head! Oh no, it 
 isn’t, I remember what it was. My grandmam- 
 jma’s property, that'll come to me when I am of 
 age, Mr. Boffin, will be all my own, and neither 
 Pa nor Ma nor any body else will have any con- 
 trol over it, and what I wish to do is to make 
 some of it over somehow to Sophronia and Al-_ 
 fred, by signing something somewhere thav'll © 
 prevail on somebody to advance them something. 
 I want them to have something handsome to 
 bring them up in the world again. Oh, my 
 goodness me! Being such a friend of my dear 
 Sophronia’s, you won’t refuse me, will you? 
 ‘¢No, no,” said Mr. Boffin, ‘it shall be seen 
 ? 
 
 ‘¢Oh, thank you, thank you!” cried Georgi- 
 ana. ‘If my maid had a little note and half a 
 crown, I could run round to the pastrycook’s to 
 sign something, or I conld sign something in 
 the Square if somebody would come and cough 
 for me to let ’em in with the key, and would 
 bring a pen and ink with ’em and a bit of blcty 
 ting-paper. Oh, my gracious! I must tear ae 
 self away, or Pa and Ma will both find ont! 
 
 to 
 
 . tg te 
 knew you were brought low in the world, and| Dear, dear Sophronia, good, good-by! 
 
 how much more I feel it now!” 
 
 18 
 ih: 
 
 fries 
 
 The credulous little ereature again embraced 
 
282 
 
 | i>... 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 Mrs. Lammle most aff :ctionately, and then held | as she sketched, there was a struggle within her, 
 
 out her hand to Mr. Lamnuile. 
 
 ‘© Good-by, dear Mr. Lammle —I mean Al- 
 fred. You won’t think after to-day that I have 
 deserted you and Sophronia because you have 
 been brought low in the world, will you? Oh 
 me! oh me! I have been crying my eves out 
 of my head, and Ma will be sure to ask me 
 what’s the matter. Oh, take me down, some- 
 body, please, please, please !” 
 
 Mr. Boffin took her down, and saw her driven 
 away, with her poor little red eyes and weak 
 chin peering oyer the great apron of the custard- 
 colored phaeton, as if she had been ordered to 
 expiate some childish misdemeanor by going to 
 bed in the daylight, and were peeping over the 
 counterpane in a miserable flutter of repentance 
 and low spirits. Returning to the breakfast- 
 room, he found Mrs. Lammle still standing on 
 her side of the table, and Mr. Lammle on his. 
 
 ‘¢T’]] take care,” said Mr. Boffin, showing the 
 money and the necklace, ‘‘ that these are soon 
 given back.” 
 
 Mrs. Lammle had taken up her parasol from 
 
 a side-table, and stood sketching with it on the 
 pattern of the damask cloth, as she had sketched 
 on the pattern of Mr. 'Twemlow’s papered wall. 
 
 ‘*You will not undeceive her I hope, Mr. 
 Boffin ?” she said, turning her head toward him, 
 but not her eves. 
 
 ‘*No,” said Mr. Boffin. 
 
 ‘‘T mean, as to the worth and value of her 
 friend,” Mrs. Lammle explained, in a measured 
 voice, and with an emphasis on her last word. 
 
 ‘SNo,”’ he returned. ‘‘I may try to give a 
 hint at her home that she is in want of kind and 
 careful protection, but I shall say no more than 
 that to her parents, and I shall say nothing to 
 the young lady herself.” 
 
 ‘¢Mr. and Mrs. Boffin,” said Mrs. Lammle, 
 still sketching, and seeming to bestow great pains 
 upon it, ** there are not many people, I think, 
 who, under the circumstances, would have been 
 so considerate and sparing as you have been to 
 me just now. Do you care to be thanked ?” 
 
 ‘¢Thanks are always worth having,”’ said Mrs. 
 Boffin, in her ready good-nature. 
 
 “Then thank you both.” 
 
 ‘¢ Sophronia,” asked her husband, mockingly, 
 ‘are vou sentimental ?” 
 
 ‘© Well, well, my good Sir,” Mr. Boffin inter- 
 posed, ‘it’s a very good thing to think well of 
 another person, and it’s a very good thing to be 
 thonght well of 4y another person. Mrs. Lammle 
 will be none the worse for it, if she is.” 
 
 ‘Much obliged. But I asked Mrs. Lammle 
 if she was.” 
 
 She stood sketching on the table-cloth, with 
 her face clouded and set, and was silent. 
 
 ‘¢ Because,” said Alfred, ‘‘I am disposed to 
 be sentimental myself, on your appropriation of 
 the jewels and the money, Mr. Boffin. 
 
 you can buy things with the produce.” 
 ‘« Tf you sell it,” was Mr. Boffin’s comment, 
 as he put it in his pocket. 
 
 Alfred followed it with his looks, and also 
 
 As our 
 little Georgiana said, three five-pound notes are 
 botter than nothing, and if you sell a necklace 
 
 which found expression in the depth of the few 
 
 last lines the parasol point indented into the 
 table-cloth, and then some tears fell from her 
 eyes. 
 
 ‘Why, confound the woman,” exclaimed 
 aus b 
 
 }Lammle, ‘¢ she 7s-sentimental !” 
 
 She walked to the window, flinching under 
 his angry stare, looked out for a moment, and 
 turned round quite coldly. 
 
 ‘¢+You have had no former cause of complaint 
 on the sentimental score, Alfred, and you will 
 have none in future. It is not worth your no- 
 ticing. We go abroad soon, with the money we 
 have earned here ?” 
 
 ‘“You know we do; you know we must.” 
 
 ‘¢There is no fear of my taking any sentiment 
 with me. I should soon be eased of it if I did. 
 But it will be all left behind. It is all left be- 
 hind. Are you ready, Alfred ?” 
 
 ‘““What the deuce have I been waiting for 
 
 but you, Sophronia ?” 
 
 ‘Let us go then. J am sorry I have delayed 
 our dignified departure.” ‘ 
 
 She passed out and he followed her. Mr. 
 and Mrs. Boffin had the curiosity softly to raise 
 a window and look after them as they went down, 
 the long street. They walked arm in arm, show- 
 ily enough, but without appearing to interchange 
 a syllable. It might have been fanciful to sup- 
 pose that under their outer bearing there was 
 something of the shamed air of two cheats who 
 were linked together by concealed handcuffs; 
 but, not so, to suppose that they were haggard- 
 lv weary of one another, of themselves, and of 
 all this world. ‘In turning the strect corner they 
 might have turned out of this world, for any thing 
 Mr. and Mrs. Boffin ever saw of them to the con- 
 trary; for they set eyes on the Lammles never 
 more. 
 
 ae 
 
 a | 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 THE GOLDEN DUSTMAN SINKS AGAIN. 
 
 Tue evening of that day being one of the 
 reading evenings at the Bower, Mr. Boffin kissed 
 Mrs. Boffin after a five o’clock dinner, and trot- 
 ted out, nursing his big stick in both arms, so 
 that, as of old, it seemed to be whispering in 
 his car. He carried so very attentive an ex- 
 pression on his countenance that it appeared as 
 if the confidential discourse of the big stick re- 
 quired to be followed closely. 
 was like the face of a thoughtful listener to an 
 intricate communication, and, in trotting along, 
 he oceasionally glanced at that companion with 
 the look of a man who was interposing the re- 
 mark: ‘‘ You don’t mean it!” | 
 
 Mr. Boffin and his stick went on alone togeth- 
 er until they arrived at certain cross-ways where 
 they would be likely to fall in with any one com- 
 ing, at about the same time, from Clerkenwell to 
 the Bower. Here they stopped, and Mr. Boffin 
 consulted his watch. 
 
 ‘¢It wants five minutes, good, to Venus’s ap- 
 pointment,” said he. ‘* I’m rather early.” 
 
 But Venus was a punctual man, and, even as 
 
 nar arr Nie 
 
 Mr. Boffin’s face — 
 
 greedily pursned the notes until they vanished 
 into Mr. Boffin’s waistcoat pocket. Then he 
 directed a look, half exasperated and half jeer- 
 ing, at his wife. She still stood sketching ; but, 
 
 to be descried coming toward him. He quick-— 
 
 Mr. Boffin replaced his watch in its pocket, was a 
 
 ened his pace on seeing Mr. Boffin already at q 
 the place of mectingaan art soon at his side. 
 
 a 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 _ “Thank’ee, Venus,” said Mr. Boffin. “Thank- 
 ’ee, thank’ee, thank’ee!” 
 
 It would not have been very evident why he 
 thanked the anatomist, but for his furnishing 
 the explanation in what he went on to say. 
 
 “All right, Venus, all right. Now that 
 you’ve been to see me, and have consented to 
 ‘keep up the appearance before Wegg of re- 
 maining in it for a time, I have got a sort of a 
 backer. All right, Venus. ‘Thank’ee, Venus. 
 Thank’ee, thank’ee, thank’ee !” 
 
 Mr. Venus shook the proffered hand with a 
 
 modest air, and they pursued the direction of 
 the Bower. 
 
 “Do you think Wegg is likely to drop down 
 
 upon me to-night, Venus?” inquired Mr. Boffin, . 
 Sit, q ’ 
 
 wistfully, as they went along. 
 ‘*T think he is, Sir.” 
 ‘‘ Have you any particular reason for thinking 
 
 283 
 
 air was crest-fallen and submissive. Whispered 
 Wegg to Venus, as they crossed the yard be- 
 hind him: ‘*Look at the worm and minion; 
 he’s down in the mouth already.” Whispered 
 Venus to Wegg: ‘‘That’s because I’ve told 
 him. I’ve prepared the way for you.” 
 
 Mr. Boffin, entering the usual chamber, laid 
 his stick upon the settle usually reserved for 
 him, thrust his hands into his pockets, and, with 
 his shoulders raised and his hat drooping back 
 upon them, looked disconsolately at Wegg. 
 ‘““My friend and partner Mr..Venus gives me 
 to understand,” remarked that man of might, 
 addressing him, ‘‘that you are aware of our 
 power over you. Now, when you have took your 
 hat off, we'll go into that pint.” 
 
 Mr. Boffin shook it off with one shake, so that 
 it dropped on the floor behind him, and remain- 
 ed in his former attitude with his former rueful 
 
 look upon him.* 
 
 ‘¢ First of all, ’m a-going to call you Boffin, 
 for short,” said Wegg. ‘‘If you don’t like it, 
 it’s open to you to lump it.” 
 
 ‘¢T don’t mind it, Wegg,” Mr. Boffin replied. 
 
 ‘‘'That’s lucky for you, Boffin. Now, do you 
 want to be read to?” | 
 
 ‘J don’t particularly care about it to-night, 
 Wegg.” 
 
 ‘¢ Because if you did want to,” pursued Mr. 
 Wegg, the brilliancy of whose point was dimmed 
 by his having been unexpectedly answered, ‘‘ you 
 wouldn’t be. I’ve been your slave long enough. 
 I’m not to be trampled underfoot by a dustman 
 any more. With the single exception of the 
 salary, [ renounce the whole and total sitiwa- 
 tion.” 
 
 ‘¢ Since you say it is to be so, Wegg,” returned 
 Mr. Boffin, with folded hands, ‘‘1 suppose it 
 must be.” 
 
 ‘* J suppose it must be,” Wegg retorted. 
 ‘¢Next (to clear the ground before coming to 
 business), you’ve placed in this yard a skulking, 
 a sneaking, and a sniffing menial.” 
 
 ‘¢He hadn’t a cold in his head when I sent 
 him here,” said Mr. Boffin. 
 
 ‘¢ Boffin!” retorted Wegg, ‘I warn you not 
 to attempt a.joke with me!” 
 
 Here Mr, Venus interposed, and remarked 
 that he conceived Mr. Boffin to have taken the 
 description literally; the rather, forasmuch as 
 he, Mr. Venus, had himself supposed the menial 
 to have contracted an affliction or a habit of the 
 nose, invelving a serious drawback on the pleas- 
 ures of social intercourse, until he had discoy- 
 ered that Mr. Wegg’s description of him was to 
 be accepted as merely figurative. 
 
 “Any how, and every how,” said Wegg, “ he 
 has been planted here, and he is here. Now, I 
 won't have him here. So I call upon Boffin, 
 before I say another word, to fetch him in and 
 send him packing to the right-about.” 
 
 The unsuspecting Sloppy was at that moment 
 airing his many buttons within view of the win- 
 dow. Mr. Boffin, after a short interval of im- 
 passive discomfiture, opened the window and 
 beckoned him to come in. 
 
 ‘“‘T call upon Boffin,” said Wegg, with one 
 mi arm a-kimbo and his head on one side, like a 
 - An unholy glare of contradiction and offense | bullying counsel pausing for an answer from a 
 shone in the eyes of Mr. Wegg as he turned witness, ‘‘to inform that menial that I am Mas- 
 - the key on his patron, after ushering him into | ter here as 
 __ the yard with this vocal quotation. Mr. Boffin’s | In humb 
 
 , so, Venus?” 
 
 ‘¢ Well, Sir,” returned that personage, ‘‘ the 
 fact is, he has given me another look-in to make 
 sure of what he calls our stock-in-trade being 
 correct, and he has mentioned his intention that 
 he was not to be put off beginning with you the 
 
 “Very next time you should come. And this,” 
 hinted Mr. Venus, delicately, ‘‘being the very 
 next time, you know, Sir—” 
 
 _—f* Why, therefore you suppose he'll turn to 
 
 at the grindstone, eh, Wegg?” said Mr. Boffin. 
 
 ‘¢ Just so, Sir.” ; 
 
 Mr. Boffin took his’ nose in his hand, as if it 
 were already excoriated, and the sparks were | 
 beginning to fly out of that feature. ‘He's a 
 terrible fellow, Venus; he’s an awful fellow. 
 I don’t know how ever I shall go through with 
 it. You must stand by me, Venus, like a good 
 man and true. You'll do all you can to stand 
 by me, Venus; won’t you?” 
 
 Mr. Venus replied with the assurance that he 
 would; and Mr. Boffin, looking anxious and 
 dispirited, pursued the way in silence until they 
 rang at the Bower gate. The stumping approach 
 of Wegg was soon heard behind it, and as it 
 
 turned upon its hinges he became visible with 
 his hand on the lock. 
 
 ‘Mr. Boffin, Sir?” he remarked. 
 quite a stranger !” 
 
 “‘Yes. I’ve been otherwise occupied, Wegg.” 
 
 ‘¢ Have you indeed, Sir?” returned the literary 
 gentleman, with a threatening sneer. ‘‘ Hah! 
 I’ve been looking for you, Sir, rather what I: 
 
 ~ may call specially.” 
 ' “You don’t say so, Wegg ?” 
 
 ‘‘Yes, I do say so, Sir. And if you hadn’t 
 come round to me to-night, dash my wig if I 
 wouldn't have come round to you to-morrow. 
 Now! I tell you!” 
 
 ‘‘Nothing wrong, I hope, Wegg?”. 
 
 “Oh no, Mr. Boffin,” was the ironical an- 
 swer. ‘‘Nothing wrong! What should be 
 wrong in Boffinses Bower! Step in, Sir. 
 
 “6 You're 
 
 *¢¢Tf you'll come to the Bower I've shaded for you, 
 Your bed sha'n’t be roses all spangled with doo: 
 Will you, will you, will you, will you come to thie 
 
 Bower? 
 Oh, won’t you, won't you, won't you, won’t you come 
 to the Bower?"” 
 
 le obedience, when the button-gleam- 
 
284, 
 
 -ing Sloppy entered Mr. Boffin said to him: 
 r Sloppy, my fine fellow, Mr. Wegg is Master 
 here. He doesn’t want you, and you are to go 
 from here.” 
 
 ‘For good!” Mr. Wegg severely stipulated. 
 
 **Por ey ” said Mr. Boffin. 
 
 Sloppy stared, with both his eyes and all his 
 buttons, and his mouth wide open; but was with- 
 out loss of time escorted forth by Silas Wegg, 
 pushed out at the yard gate by the shoulders, 
 and locked out. 
 
 “The atomspear, ” said Wegg, stumping back 
 into the room again, a little reddened by his late 
 exertion, ‘‘is now freer for the purposes of res- 
 piration. Mr. Venus, Sir, take a chair. Bof- 
 fin, you may sit down.” 
 
 Mr. Boffin, still with his hands ruefully stuck 
 in his pockets, s sat on the edge of the settle, 
 shrunk into a small compass, and eyed the potent 
 Silas with conciliatory looks. 
 
 #* This gentleman,” said Silas Wegg, pointing 
 out Venus, ‘‘this gentleman, Boffin, is more 
 milk and watery with you than I'll be. But he 
 hasn’t borne the Roman yoke as I have, nor yet 
 he hasn’t been required to pander to your de- 
 praved appetite for miserly characters.” 
 
 ‘¢T never meant, my dear Wegg—” Mr. Boffin 
 was beginning, when Silas stopped him. 
 
 ‘«Hold your tongue, Boffin! Answer when 
 you're called upon to answer. You'll find you’ve 
 got quite enough to do. Now, you’re aware— 
 are you—that you're in possession of property to 
 which you’ve no right at all? Are you aware 
 of that ?” 
 
 ‘¢Venus tells me so,” said Mr. Boffin, glan- 
 cing toward him for any support he could give. 
 
 ‘“‘T tell you so,” returned Silas. ‘* Now, here’s 
 my hat, Boffin, and here’s my walking - stick. 
 Trifle with me,, and instead of making a ‘bar gain 
 with you, I'll put on my hat and take up my 
 walking-stick, and go ont and make a bargain 
 with the rightful owner.. Now, what do you say ?” 
 
 ‘¢T say,” returned Mr. Boffin, leaning forward 
 in alarmed appeal, with his hands on his knees, 
 “that I am sure I don’t want to trifle, Wegg. 
 I have said so to Venus.” 
 
 ‘¢ You certainly have, Sir,” said Venus. 
 
 ‘¢You’re too milk and watery with our friend, 
 you are indeed,” remonstrated Silas, with a dis- 
 approving shake of his wooden head. “Then 
 at once vou confess vourself desirous to come to 
 terms, do you, Boffin? Before you answer, 
 keep this hat well in your mind, and also this 
 walking-stick.” 
 
 ‘¢‘T am willing, Wegg; to come to terms.” 
 
 ‘* Willing won’t do, Boffin. I won’t take will- 
 ing. Are you desirous to come to terms? Do 
 you ask to be allowed as a favor to come to 
 terms?” Mr. Wegg again planted his arm, and 
 put his head on one side. 
 
 te Ves.” 
 
 “Yes what ?” said the inexorable Wegge: ‘‘I 
 won’t take yes. Jl have it out of you in full, 
 Boffin.” 
 
 “Dear me!” cried that unfortunate gentle- 
 man. ‘‘I amso worrited! I ask to be allowed 
 to come to terms, supposing your document is 
 all correct.” 
 
 ‘‘Don’t you be afraid of that,” said Silas, 
 poking his head athim. ‘You shall be satisfied 
 by seeing it. Mr. Venus will show it you, and 
 Pll hold you the while. Then you want to know 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. | 
 
 what the terms are. Is that about the sum and 
 substance of it? Will you or won't you answer, 
 Boffin?”’ For he had pansed a moment. 
 
 ‘*Dear me!” cried that unfortunate gentleman 
 again, ‘‘I am worrited to that degree that ’m 
 almost off my head. You hurry me so. Be so 
 good as name the terms, Wegg.” 
 
 ‘‘Now, mark, Boffin,” returned Silas: “ Mark 
 ’em well, because they re the lowest terms and 
 the only terms. You'll throw your Mound (the 
 little Mound as comes to you any way) into the 
 general estate, and then you'll divide the whole 
 property into three parts, and youll keep one 
 and hand over the others.” 
 
 Mr. Venus’s mouth screwed itself up as Mr. 
 Boffin’s face lengthened itself; Mr. Venus not 
 
 - oe 
 
 having been prepared for such a rapacious de- | 
 mand, j 
 
 ‘“Now, wait a bit, Boffin,” Wegg proceeded, 
 ‘*there’s something more. You’ve been a squan+ 
 dering this property—laying some of it out on 
 yourself. Jhat won’t do. You've , bought a 
 house. You'll be charged for it.” 
 
 ‘¢T shall be ruined, Wegg!” Mr. Boffin faint- 
 ly protested. 
 
 ‘¢Now, wait a bit, Boffin; there’s something 
 more. You'll leave me in sole custody of these 
 Mounds till they’re all laid low. If any walu- 
 ables should be found in ’em, I'll take care of 
 such waluables. You'll produce your contract 
 for the sale of the Mounds, that we may know 
 to a penny what they’re worth, and you’ll make 
 out likewise an exact list of all the other prop- 
 erty. When the Mounds is cleared away to 
 the last shovelful, the final diwision will come 
 off. ” 
 
 “Dreadful, dreadful, dreadful! I shall die 
 in a work-house!” cried the Golden Dustman, 
 with his hands to his head. 
 
 ‘¢Now, wait a bit, Boffin; there’s something 
 more. You've been unlawfully ferreting about 
 this yard. You’ve been seen in the act of ferret- 
 ing about this yard. Two pair of eyes at the 
 present moment brought to bear upon you, have 
 seen you dig up a Dutch bottle.” 
 
 ‘“It was mine, Wegg,” protested Mr. Boffin. 
 *¢T put it there myself.” 
 
 ‘¢ What was in it, Boffin?’” inquired Silas. 
 
 ‘‘Not gold, not silver, not bank-notes, not 
 jewels, nothing that you could turn into money, 
 Wegg; upon my soul!” 
 
 ‘*Prepared, Mr. Venus,” said Wegg, turning 
 to his partner with a knowing and superior air, 
 “for an ewasive answer on the part of our dusty 
 friend here, I have hit ont a little idea which [ 
 think will meet your views. We charge that 
 bottle against our dusty friend at a thousand 
 pound.” 
 
 Mr. Boffin drew a deep groan. 
 
 “Now, wait a bit, Boffin; there’s something 
 more. In your employment is an underhanded 
 sneak, named Rokesmith. It won’t answer to 
 have Aim about while this business of ours 1s 
 about. He must be discharged.” 
 
 ‘* Rokesmith is already discharged, ” said Mr. 
 Boffin, speaking in a muffled voice, with his 
 hands before his face, as he rocked himself on 
 the settle. 
 
 ‘¢ Already disch Rereal) is he ?” returned Wegg, 
 surprised. ‘‘Oh! Then, Boffin, I believe fase ty 
 nothing more at present.” 
 
 The unlucky gentleman continuing: to ‘rock 
 
 Oe, 
 
 Sse 
 
 j 
 * 
 J 
 ? 
 ) 
 } 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 himself to and fro, and to utter an occasional 
 moan, Mr. Venus’ besought him to bear up 
 against his reverses, and to take time to accus- 
 tom himself to the thought of his new position. 
 But his taking time was exactly the thing of all 
 others that Silas Wegg could not be induced to 
 hear of. ‘‘ Yes or no, and no half measures!” 
 was the motto which that obdurate person many 
 times repeated; shaking his fist at Mr. Boffin, 
 and pegging his motto into the floor with his 
 wooden leg, in a threatening and alarming man- 
 mer. 
 
 At length Mr. Boffin entreated to be allowed 
 a quarter of an hour’s grace, and a cooling walk 
 of that duration in the yard. With some diffi- 
 culty Mr. Wegg granted this great favor, but 
 only on condition that he accompanied Mr. 
 Boffin in his walk, as not knowing what he 
 might fraudulently unearth if he were left to 
 himself. A more absurd sight than Mr. Boffin 
 in his mental irritation trotting very nimbly, and 
 Mr. Wegg hopping after him with great exertion, 
 eager to watch the slightest turn of an eyelash, 
 » Jest it should indicate a spot rich with some se- 
 cret, assuredly had never been seen in the shad- 
 ow of the Mounds. Mr. Wegg was much dis- 
 tressed when the quarter of an hour expired, 
 and came hopping in, a very bad second. 
 
 “TI can’t help myself!” cried Mr. Boffin, 
 flouncing on the settle in a forlorn manner, 
 with his hands déep in his pockets, as if his 
 pockets had sunk. ‘‘ What’s the good of my 
 pretending to stand out, when I can’t help my- 
 self? I must give in to the terms. But I 
 should like to see the document.” 
 
 ‘Wegg, who was all for clenching the nail he 
 had so strongly driven home, announced that 
 Boffin should see it without an hour’s delay. 
 Taking him into custody for that purpose, or 
 overshadowing him as if he really were his Evil 
 Genius in visible form, Mr. Wegg clapped Mr. 
 Boffin’s hat upon the back of his head, and 
 walked him out by the arm, asserting a pro- 
 prietorship over his soul and body that was at 
 once more grim and more ridiculous than any 
 thing in Mr. Venus’s rare collection. That 
 light-haired gentleman followed close upon their 
 heels, at least backing up Mr. Boffin in a literal 
 sense, if he had not had recent opportunities of 
 doing so spiritually; while Mr. Boffin, trotting 
 on as hard as he could trot, involved Silas Wegg¢ 
 in frequent collisions with the public, much as.a 
 preoccupied blind man’s dog may be seen to 
 involve his master. 
 
 Thus they reached Mr. Venus’s establishment, 
 somewhat heated by the nature of their progress 
 thither. Mr. Wegg, especially, was in a flam- 
 ing glow, and stood in the little shop, panting 
 and mopping his head with his pocket-handker- 
 chief, speechless for several minutes. 
 
 Meanwhile Mr. Venus, who had left the du- 
 eling frogs to fight it out in his absence by 
 candle-light for the public delectation, put the 
 shutters up. When all was snug, and the shop- 
 door fastened, he snid to the perspiring Silas: 
 ‘¢T suppose, Mr. Wegg, we may now produce 
 the paper ?” 
 
 ‘¢Hold on a minute, Sir,” replied that dis- 
 ‘ereet character; ‘Shold on a minute, Will yon 
 obligingly shove that box—which you mentioned 
 on a former oceasion as containing miscellanies 
 , —toward me in the midst of the shop here?” 
 
 285 
 
 Mr. Venus did as he was asked. 
 
 - i Very good,” said Silas, looking about; 
 ‘ve—ry good. Will you hand me that chair, 
 Sir, to put a-top of it?” 
 
 Venus handed him the chair. 
 
 ‘* Now, Boffin,” said Wegg, “mount up here 
 and take your seat, will you?” 
 
 My. Boffin, as if he were about to have his 
 portrait painted, or to be electrified, or to be 
 made a Freemason, or to be placed at any other 
 solitary disadvantage, ascended the rostrum pre- 
 pared for him, 
 
 ‘**Now, Mr. Venus,” said Silas, taking off his 
 coat, ‘when I catches our friend here round the 
 arms and body, and pins him tight to the back 
 of the chair, you may show him what he wants 
 to see. If you'll open it and hold it well up in 
 one hand, Sir, and a candle in the other, he can 
 read it charming.” 
 
 Mr. Boffin seemed rather inclined to object to 
 these precautionary arrangements, but, being im- 
 mediately embraced by Wegg, resigned himself. 
 Venus then produced the document, and Mr. 
 Boffin slowly spelt it out aloud: so very slowly 
 that Wegg, who was holding him/in the chair 
 with the grip of a wrestler, became again exceed- 
 ingly the worse for his exertions. ‘‘ Say when 
 you’ve put it safe back, Mr. Venus,” he uttered 
 with difficulty, ‘for the strain of this js terri- 
 menjious.” 
 
 At length the document was restored to its 
 place; and Wegg, whose uncomfortable attitude 
 had been that of a very persevering man unsuc- 
 cessfully attempting to stand upon his head, took 
 a seat to recover himself. Mr. Boffin, for his 
 part, made no attempt to come down, but re- 
 mained aloft disconsolate. 
 
 ‘Well, Boffin,” said Wegg, as soon as he was 
 in a condition to speak. ‘‘ Now, you know.” 
 
 ‘Yes, Wegg,’’said Mr. Boffin, meekly. ‘‘ Now, 
 I know.” 
 
 ‘¢ You have no doubts about it, Boffin.” 
 
 ‘“‘No, Wegg. No, Wegg. None,” was the 
 slow and sad reply. 
 
 ‘‘Then, take care, you,” said Wegg, ‘‘ that 
 you stick to your conditions. Mr. Venus, if on 
 this auspicious occasion you should happen to 
 have a drop of any thing not quite so mild as 
 tea in the ’ouse, I think I’d take the friendly 
 liberty of asking you for a specimen of it.” 
 
 Mr. Venus, reminded of the duties of hospital- 
 ity, produced some rum. In answer to the in- 
 quiry, ‘‘ Will you mix it, Mr. Wegg ?” that gen- 
 tleman pleasantly rejoined, ‘I think not, Sir. 
 On so auspicious an occasion I prefer to take it 
 in the form of a Gum-Tickler.” 
 
 Mr. Boffin, declining rum, being still elevated 
 on his pedestal, was in a convenient position to 
 be addressed. Wegg having eyed him with an 
 impudent air at leisure, addressed him, there- 
 fore, while refreshing himself with his dram. 
 
 ‘¢ Bof—fin !” 
 
 ‘Yes, Wegg,” he answered, coming out of a 
 fit of abstraction, with a sigh. 
 
 ‘¢T haven’t mentioned one thing, because it’s 
 a detail that comes of course. You must be fol- 
 lowed up, you know. You must be kept under 
 inspection.” 
 a quite understand,” said Mr. Boffin. 
 
 ‘Pon't you?” sneered Wegg. _‘* Where's 
 vour wits, Boffin? ‘ill the Mounds is down 
 and this business completed, you're accountable 
 
 » 
 
286 
 
 for all the property, recollect. Consider your- 
 
 self accountable to me. Mr. Venus here being 
 
 too milk and watery with you, I am the boy for 
 ou.” 
 
 ‘¢T’ve been a-thinking,” said Mr. Boffin, in a 
 tone of despondency, ‘‘that I must keep the 
 knowledge from my old lady.” 
 
 ‘¢'The knowledge of the diwision, d’ye mean ?” 
 inquired Wegg, helping himself to a third Gum- 
 Tickler—for he had already taken a second. 
 
 ‘“ Yes, If she was to die first of us two she 
 might then think all her life, poor thing, that I 
 had got the rest of the fortune still, and was sav- 
 ing it.” 
 
 ‘“‘ I suspect, Boffin,” returned Wegg, shaking 
 his head sagaciously, and bestowing a wooden 
 wink upon him, ‘‘that you’ve found out some 
 account of some old chap, supposed to be a 
 Miser, who got himself the credit of having 
 much more money than he had. However, f 
 don’t mind.” 
 
 ‘‘Don’t you see, Wegg ?” Mr. Boffin feelingly 
 represented to him: ‘‘don’t you see? My old 
 lady has got so used to the property. It would 
 be such a hard surprise.” 
 
 ‘“*T don’t see it at all,” blustered Wegg. 
 “You'll have as much as I shall. And who are 
 
 ou ?” 
 
 ‘¢But then, again,” Mr. Boffin gently repre- 
 sented; ‘‘my old lady has very upright princi- 
 ples.” ‘i : 
 
 ‘¢Who’s your old lady,” returned Wegg, *‘to 
 set herself up for having uprighter principles 
 than mine ?” 
 
 Mr. Boffin seemed a little less patient at this 
 point than at any other of the negotiations. But 
 he commanded himself, and said tamely enough: 
 “T think it must be kept from my old lady, 
 Wegg.” 
 
 Well,” said Wegg, contemptuously, though, 
 perhaps, perceiving some hint of danger other- 
 wise, ‘*keep it from your old lady. J ain’t go- 
 ing to tell her. I can have you under close in- 
 spection without that. I’m as good a man as 
 you, and better. Ask me to dinner. Give me 
 the run of your ’ouse. I was good enough for 
 you and your old lady once, when I helped you 
 out with vour weal and hammers. Was there 
 no Miss Elizabeth, Master George, Aunt Jane, 
 and Uncle Parker, before you two?” 
 
 ‘‘Gently, Mr. Wegg, gently,’’ Venus urged. 
 
 ‘Milk and water-erily, you mean, Sir,” he 
 returned, with some little thickness of speech, in 
 consequence of the Gum-Ticklers having tickled 
 it. “Wve got him under inspection, and I'll 
 inspect him. 
 
 ‘*¢ Along the line the signal ran 
 England expects as this present man 
 Will keep Boffin to his duty.’ 
 —Boffin, I'll see you home.” 
 
 Mr. Boffin descended with an air of resigna- 
 tion, and gave himself up, after taking friendly 
 leave of Mr. Venus. Once more Inspector and 
 Inspected went through the streets together, and 
 so arrived at Mr. Boffin’s door. 
 
 But even there, when Mr. Boffin had given 
 his keeper good-night, and had let himself in 
 with his key, and had softly closed the door, 
 even there and then, the all-powerful Silas must 
 needs claim another assertion of his newly-as- 
 serted power. 
 
 -  “ Bof—fin!” he called through the keyhole. 
 
 ‘| and escape. 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 ‘‘Yes, Wegg,” was the reply through the same 
 channel. 
 
 ‘¢Come out. Show yourself again. 
 have another look at you!” : 
 
 Mr. Boffin—ah, how fallen from the high 
 estate of his honest simplicity!—opened the 
 door and obeyed. 
 
 ‘““Go in. You may get to bed now,’ 
 Wegg, with a@rin. . 
 
 Yhe door was hardly closed when he again 
 called through the keyhole: 
 
 ‘* Bof—fin !” 
 
 “Yes, Wegg.” Bug 
 
 This time Silas made no reply, but labored 
 with a will at turning an imaginary grindstone 
 outside the keyhole, while Mr. Boftin stooped at 
 it within; he then laughed silently, and stumped 
 home. 
 
 Let’s 
 
 > said 
 
 —_—_—_—>—_—_—- 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 A RUNAWAY MATOH., 
 
 Cuervsic Pa arose with as little noise as pos- 
 sible from beside majestic Ma, one morning early, 
 having a holiday before him. Pa and the lovely 
 woman had a rather particular appointment to 
 keep. 
 
 Yet Pa and the lovely woman were not going 
 out together. Bella was up before four, but had 
 no bonnet on, She was waiting at the foot of 
 the stairs—was sitting on the bottom stair, in 
 fact—to receive Pa when he came down, but her 
 only object seemed to be to get Pa well out of 
 the house. 
 
 ‘‘Your breakfast is ready, Sir,” 
 
 whispered 
 
 Bella, after greeting him with a hug, ‘‘and all 
 
 you have to do is to eat it up-and-drink it up, 
 How do you feel, Pa?” 
 
 ‘¢To the best of my judgment, like a house- 
 breaker new to the business, my dear, who can’t 
 make himself quite comfortable till he is off the 
 premises.” 
 
 Bella tucked her arm in his with a merry, 
 noiseless laugh, and they went down to the 
 kitchen on tip-toe; she stopping on every sep- 
 arate stair to put the tip of her forefinger on her 
 rosy lips, and then lay it on his lips, according 
 to her favorite petting way of kissing Pa. 
 
 ‘¢ How do. you feel, my love?” asked R. W., 
 as she gave him his breakfast. 
 
 ‘¢T feel as if the Fortune-teller was coming 
 true, dear Pa, and the fair little man was turn- 
 ing out as was predicted.” 
 
 ‘‘Ho! Only the fair little man?” said her 
 father. 
 
 Bella put another of those finger-seals upon 
 his lips, and then said, kneeling down by him as 
 he sat at table: ‘‘ Now, look here, Sir. If you 
 keep well up to the mark this day, what do you 
 think you deserve? What did I promise you 
 should have, if you were good, upon a Certain 
 occasion ?” 
 
 ‘‘Upon my word I don’t remember, Precious. 
 Yes, I do, though. Wasn’t it one of those 
 beau—tiful tresses?” with his caressing hand 
 upon her hair. 
 
 ‘¢ Wasn't it, too!” returned Bella, pretending 
 to pout. ‘Upon my word! Do you know, Sir, 
 that the Fortune-teller would give five thousand 
 guineas (if it was quite convenient to him, which 
 it isn’t) for the lovely piece I have cut off for 
 
 eh 
 
 er Rn 
 
§ 
 
 - 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 you? You can form no idea, Sir, of the number 
 of times he kissed quite a scrubby little piece— 
 in comparison—that I cut off for han. 
 he wears it, too, round his neck, I can tell you! 
 Near his heart!” said Bella, nodding. ‘‘ Ah! 
 very near his heart! 
 good, good boy, and you are the best of all the 
 dearest boys that ever were this morning, and 
 here’s the chain I have made of it, ga, and you 
 must let me put it round your neck with my own 
 
 loving hands.” 
 
 As Pa bent his head she cried over him a lit- 
 tle, and then said (after having stopped to dry 
 her eyes on his white waistcoat, the discovery 
 
 ‘of which incongruous circumstance made her 
 
 laugh): ‘‘ Now, darling Pa, give me your hands 
 
 that I may fold them together, and do you say | 
 
 after me :—My little Bella.” 
 ‘¢ My little Bella,” repeated Pa. 
 “‘T am very fond of you.” 
 “‘T am very fond of you, my darling,” said Pa. 
 .“ You mustn’t say any thing not dictated to 
 you, Sir. You daren’t do it in your responses 
 at Church, and you mustn’t do it in your re- 
 sponses out of Church.” 
 ‘¢T withdraw the darling,” said Pa. 
 ‘‘That’s a pious boy! Now again:—You 
 were always—” 
 ‘* You were always,” repeated Pa. 
 ** A vexatious—" 
 -**No you weren’t,” said Pa. 
 ‘¢ A vexatious (do you hear, Sir?), a vexa- 
 tious, capricious, thankless, troublesome Ani- 
 
 ‘mal; but I hope you'll do better in the time to 
 
 come, and I bless you and forgive you!” Here 
 she quite forgot that it was Pa’s turn to make 
 the responses, and clung to his neck.. ‘‘ Dear 
 Pa, if you knew how much I think this morning 
 of what you told me once, about the first time 
 of our seeing old Mr. Harmon, when I stamped 
 and screamed and beat you with my detestable 
 little bonnet! I feel as if I had been stamping 
 and screaming and beating you with my hateful 
 little bonnet ever since I was born, darling !” 
 
 _ “Nonsense, my love. And as to your bon- 
 nets, they have always been nice bonnets, for 
 they have always become you—or you have be- 
 come them; perhaps it was that—at every age.”’ 
 
 ‘¢Did I hurt you much, poor little Pa?” asked 
 Bella, laughing (notwithstanding her repent- 
 ance), with fantastic pleasure in the picture, 
 ‘when I beat you with my bonnet ?” 
 
 **No, my child. Wouldn’t have hurt a fly!” 
 
 ‘* Ay, but I am afraid I shouldn’t have beat 
 you at all unless I had meant to hurt you,” said 
 Bella. ‘‘ Did I pinch your legs, Pa?” 
 
 ** Not much, my dear; but I think it’s almost 
 time [—” 
 
 **Oh, yes!” cried Bella. ‘‘If I go on chat- 
 tering, you'll be taken alive. Fly, Pa, fly!” 
 
 So they went softly up the kitchen stairs on 
 tip-toe, and Bella with her light hand softly re- 
 moved the fastenings of the house-door, and Pa, 
 haying received a parting hug, made off. When 
 he had gone a little way he looked back. Upon 
 which Bella set another of those finger-seals 
 upon the air, and thrust out her little foot ex- 
 pressive ofthe mark. Pa, in appropriate action, 
 expressed fidelity to the mark, and made off as 
 fast as he could go. 
 
 Bella walked thoughtfully in the garden for 
 
 ‘an hour and more, and then, returning to the 
 
 And | 
 
 However, you have been a. 
 
 287 
 
 -bedroom where Lavvy the Irrepressible still 
 slumbered, pnt on a little bonnet of quiet, but 
 on the whole of sly appearance, which she had 
 yesterday made. ‘‘] am going for a walk, 
 Lavvy,” she said, as she stooped down and 
 kissed her. The Irrepressible, with a bounce in 
 the bed, and a remark that it wasn’t time to get 
 up yet, relapsed into unconsciousness, if she had 
 come out of it. 
 
 Behold Bella tripping along the. streets, the 
 dearest girl afoot under the summer sun! Be- 
 hold Pa waiting for Bella behind a pump, at 
 least three miles from the parental roof-tree. 
 Behold Bella and Pa aboard an early steamboat 
 bound for Greenwich. 
 
 Were they expected at Greenwich? Proba- 
 bly. At least, Mr. John Rokesmith was on the 
 pier looking out, about a couple of hours before 
 the coaly (but ‘to him gold-dusty) little steam- 
 boat got her steam up in London. Probably. 
 At least, Mr. John Rokesmith seemed perfectly 
 satisfied when he descried them on board. Prob. | 
 ably. At least, Bella no sooner stepped ashore 
 than she took Mr. John Rokesmith’s arm, with- 
 out evincing surprise, and the two walked away 
 together with an ethereal air of happiness which, 
 as it were, wafted up from the earth and drew 
 after them a gruff and glum old pensioner to see 
 it out. Two wooden legs had this gruff and 
 glum old pensioner, and, a minute before Bella 
 stepped out of the boat, and drew that confiding 
 little arm of hers through Rokesmith’s, he had 
 had no object in life but tobacco, and not enough 
 of that. Stranded was Gruff and Glum in a 
 harbor of everlasting mud, when all in an instant 
 Bella floated him, and away he went. 
 
 Say, chernbic parent taking the lead, in what 
 direction do we steer first? With some such in- 
 quiry in his thoughts, Gruff and Glum, stricken 
 by so sudden an interest that he perked his neck 
 and looked over the intervening people, as if he 
 were trying to stand on tip-toe with his two 
 wooden legs, took an observation of R. W. 
 There was no ‘‘ first” in the case, Gruff and 
 Glum made out; the cherubie parent was bear- 
 ing down and crowding on direct for Greenwich 
 church, to see his relations. 
 
 For Gruff and Glum, though most events 
 acted.on him simply as tobacco-stoppers, press- 
 ing down and condensing the quids within him, 
 might be imagined to trace a family resemblance 
 between the cherubs in the church architecture 
 and the cherub in the white waistcoat. Some , 
 remembrance of old Valentines, wherein a cher- 
 ub, less appropriately attired for a proverbially 
 uncertain climate, had been seen conducting 
 lovers to the altar, might have been fancied to 
 inflame the ardor of his timber toes. Be it as it 
 might, he gave his moorings the slip, and fol- 
 lowed in chase. 
 
 The eherub went before, all beaming smiles ; 
 Bella and John RKokesmith followed ; Gruff and 
 /Glum stuck to them like wax. For years the 
 wings of his mind had gone to look after the 
 legs of his body; but Bella had brought them 
 back for him per steamer, and they were spread 
 again. | 
 
 He was a slow sailer on a wind of happiness, 
 but he took a cross-cut for the rendezvous, and 
 pegged away as if he were scoring furiously at 
 cribbage. When the shadow of the church- 
 porch swallowed them up, victorious Gruff and 
 
288. OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 Glum likewise presented himself to be swallowed 
 up. And by this time the cherubic parent was 
 so fearful of surprise that, but for the two wooden 
 legs on which Gruff and Glum was reassuringly 
 mounted, his conscience might have introduced, 
 in the person of that pensioner, his own stately 
 lady disguised, arrived at Greenwich in a car 
 and griffins, like the spiteful Fairy at the chris- 
 tenings of the Princesses, to do something dread- 
 ful to the marriage service. And truly he had 
 a momentary reason to be pale of face, and to 
 whisper to Bella, “ You don’t think that can be 
 your Ma; do you, my dear?” on account of a 
 mysterious rustling and a stealthy movement 
 somewhere in the remote neighborhood of the 
 organ, though it was gone directly, and was 
 heard no more. Albeit it was heard of after- 
 ward, as will afterward be read in this veracious 
 register of marriage. 
 
 Who taketh? I, John, and so do I, Bella. 
 Who giveth? I, R.W. Forasmuch, Gruff and 
 Glum, as John and Bella have consented to- 
 gether in holy wedlock, you may (in short) con- 
 sider it done, and withdraw your two wooden 
 legs from this temple. To the foregoing pur- 
 port, the Minister speaking, as directed -by the 
 Rubric, to the People, selectly represented in 
 the present instance by G. and G. above men- 
 tioned. 
 
 And now, the church-porch having swallowed 
 up Bella Wilfer for ever and ever, had it not in 
 its power to relinquish that voung woman, but 
 slid into the happy sunlight, Mrs. John Roke- 
 smith instead. And long on the bright steps 
 stood Gruff and Glum, looking after the pretty 
 bride, with a narcotic consciousness of having 
 dreamed a dream. 
 
 After which, Bella took out from her pocket a 
 little letter, and re»d it aloud to Pa and John; 
 this being a true copy of the same: 
 
 ** DEAREST MA,—TI hope you won't be angry, but I am 
 most happily married to Mr. John Rokesmith, who loves 
 me bett r than I can ever deserve, except by loving hin 
 with all my heart. I thought it best not to mention it be- 
 forehand, in case it should cause any little difference at 
 home. Please tell darling Pa. With love to Lavvy, 
 
 *¢ Ever dearest Ma, 
 * Your affectionate daughter, 
 
 ** BELLA 
 “* (P.S.—Rokesmith).”” 
 
 Then John Rokesmith put the queen’s coun- 
 tenance on the letter—when had Her Gracious 
 Majesty looked so benign as on that blessed 
 morning !—and then Bella popped it into the 
 post-office, and said, merrily, ‘‘ Now, dearest Pa, 
 you are safe, and will never be taken alive!” 
 
 Pa was, at first, in the stirred depths of his 
 conscience, so far from sure of being safe yet, 
 that he made out majestic matrons lurking in 
 ambush among the harmless trees of Green- 
 wich Park, and seemed to sce a stately counte- 
 nance tied up in a well-known pocket-handker- 
 chief glooming down at him from a window of 
 the Observatory, where the Familiars of the As- 
 tronomer Royal nightly outwatch the winking 
 stars. But the minutes passing on and no Mrs, 
 Wilfer in the flesh appearing, he became more 
 confident, and so repaired with good heart and 
 appetite to Mr. and Mrs. John Rokesmith’s cot- 
 tage on Blackheath, where breakfast was ready. 
 
 A modest little cottage but a bright and a 
 fresh, and on the snowy table-cloth the prettiest 
 
 of little breakfasts. In waiting, too, like an at-!| we are a partnership of three, dear Pa.” 
 
 | 
 | 
 
 2 
 
 tendant summer breeze, a fluttering young dam- — : 
 sel, all pink and ribbons, blushing as if she had \ 
 been married instead of Bella, and yet assert- — 
 ing the triumph of her sex over both John and ; 
 Pa in an exulting and exalted flurry: as who — 
 should say, ‘‘‘This is what you must all come — 
 to, gentlemen, when we choose to bring you to 
 book.” ‘This same young damsel was Bella’s 
 serving-matl, and unto her did deliver a bunch 
 of keys, commanding treasures in the way of 
 dry-saltery, groceries, jams and pickles, the in- 
 vestigation of which made pastime after brenk- 
 fast, when Bella declared that ‘‘ Pa must taste. 
 every. thing, John. dear, or_it_swill<never be q 
 lucky,” and when Pa_had _all_sorts.ofthings = 
 poked into his mouth,-and-didn’t-quite know = 
 what to do with them when they were put-there. 
 
 Then they,.all three, out for a charming ride, 
 and for a charming stroll among heath in bloom, 
 and there behold the identical Gruff and Glum 
 with his wooden legs horizontally disposed be- 
 fore him, apparently sitting meditating on the 
 vicissitudes of life! ‘lo whom said Bella, in 
 her light-hearted surprise: ‘‘Oh! . How do you 
 do again? What a dear old pensioner you are!” 
 To which Gruff and Glum responded that he see 
 her married this morning, my Beauty, and that 
 if it warn’t a liberty he wished her ji and the 
 fairest of fair wind and weather; further, in a 
 general wav requesting to know what cheer? 
 and scrambling up on his two wooden legs ta 
 salute, hat in hand, ship-shape, with the gal- 
 lantry of a man-of-warsman and a heart.of oak. 
 
 It was a pleasant sight, in the midst of the 
 golden bloom, to see this salt old Gruff and 
 Glum waving his shovel hat at Bella, while his 
 thin white hair flowed free, as if she had once 
 more launched him into blue water again. ‘“¥ena—— 
 are a charming old pensioner,” said Bella, ‘‘and — 
 T am ‘sov-happy.that.1 svish I could=make you 
 happy.too.”-~Answered Gruff and Glum, ‘ Give 
 me leave to kiss your hand, my Lovely, and it’s 
 done!’’ So it was done to the general content- 
 ment; and if Gruff and Glnm didn’t in the 
 course of the afternoon splice the main brace, it 
 was not for want of the means of inflicting that 
 outrage on the feelings of the Infant Bands of 
 Hope. 
 
 But the marriage dinner was the crowning 
 success, for what had bride and bridegroom 
 plotted to do but to have and to hold that din- 
 ner in the very room of the very hotel where Pa 
 and the lovely woman had once dined together! 
 Bella sat between Pa and John, and divided her 
 attentions pretty equally, but felt it necessary (in 
 the waiter’s absence before dinner) to remind Pa 
 that she was his lovely woman no longer. 
 
 ‘*T am well aware of it, my dear,” returned 
 the cherub, ‘‘and I resign you willingly.” 
 
 ‘*Willingly, Sir? You ought to be broken- q 
 hearted.” 
 
 ‘*So I should be, my dear, if I thought that. 
 
 I was going to lose you.” .: % 
 
 ‘* But you know you are not; don’t you, poor 
 dear Pa? You know that you have only made 
 a new relation who will be as fond of you and _ 
 as thankful to you—for my sake and your own 
 
 y 
 
 lip again, and then on her husband’s. ‘Now, 
 
‘OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 SS " 
 
 SZ 
 
 “HOIMNGAGYID CY AANNIG ONIGGGM FHL 
 a Rs — 4 % = 
 
 LIZA ZZ LL 6A ge 
 ZAZEZ 
 
 = Gil =. 
 Uf} Yj} ) 
 The appearance of dinner here cut Bella short 
 in one of her disappearances: the more effectu- 
 ally, because it was put on under the auspices 
 of a solemn gentleman in black clothes and a 
 
 white cravat, who looked much more like a 
 clergyman than the clergyman, and seemed to 
 
 _have mounted a great deal higher in the church: 
 
 not to say, scaled the steeple. This dignitary, 
 
 conferring in secrecy with John Rokesmith on 
 the subject of punch and wines, bent his head 
 
 as though stooping to the Papistical practice of 
 receiving auricular confession. Likewise, on 
 John’s offering a suggestion which didn’t meet 
 his views, his face became overcast and reproach- 
 ful, as enjoining penance. 
 
 What a dinner! Specimens of all the fishes 
 
 ’ that swim in the sea surely had swum their way 
 to it, and if samples of the fishes of divers col- 
 
 ors that made a speech in the Arabian Nights 
 
 (quite a ministerial explanation in respect of 
 cloudiness), and then jumped out of the frying- 
 
 4 
 
 pan, were not to be recognized, it was only be- 
 
 > 
 
 289 
 
 cause they had all become of one hue by being 
 cooked in batter among the white-bait. Aud 
 the dishes being seasoned with Bliss—an article 
 which they are sometimes out of, at Greenwich 
 —were of perfect flavor, and the golden drinks 
 had been bottled in the golden age and hoard- 
 ing up their sparkles ever since. : 
 
 The best of it was, that Bella and John and 
 the cherub had made a covenant that they would 
 not reveal to mortal eyes any appearance what- 
 ever of being a wedding-party. Now, the su- 
 pervising dignitary, the Archbishop of Green- 
 wich, knew this as well as if he had performed 
 the nuptial ceremony, And the loftiness with 
 which his Grace entered into their confidence 
 without being invited, and insisted on a show, 
 of keeping the waiters out of it, was the crown- 
 ing glory of the entertainment. 
 
 There was an innocent young waiter of a slen- 
 der form and with weakish legs, as yet unversed 
 in the wiles of waiterhood, and but too evidently 
 of a romantic temperament, and deeply (it were 
 
290 
 
 not too much to add hopelessfy) in love with some 
 young female not awareof his merit. This guile- 
 less youth, descrying the position of affairs, which 
 even his innocence could not mistake, limited his 
 waiting to languishing admiringly against the 
 side-board when Bella didn’t want any thing, 
 and swooping at her when she did. Him, his 
 Grace the Archbishop perpetually obstructed, 
 
 utting him out with his elbow in the moment 
 of success, dispatching him in degrading quest 
 of melted butter, and, when by any chance he 
 got hold of any dish worth having, bereaving 
 him of it, and ordering him to stand back. 
 
 ‘¢ Pray excuse him, madam,” said the Arch- 
 bishop, in a low stately voice; ‘‘he is a very 
 young man on liking, and we don’t like him.” 
 
 This induced John Rokesmith to observe—by 
 way of making the thing more natural—‘‘ Bella, 
 
 _ my love, this is so much more successful than 
 any of our past anniversaries, that I think we 
 must keep our future anniversaries here.” 
 
 Whereunto Bella replied, with probably the 
 least successful attempt at looking matronly that 
 ever was seen: ‘‘ Indeed, I think so, John, dear.” 
 
 Here the Archbishop of Greenwich coughed a 
 stately cough to attract the attention of three of 
 his ministers present, and staring at them, seem- 
 ed to say: ‘‘I call upon you by your fealty to 
 believe this!” 
 
 With his own hands he afterward put on the 
 dessert, as remarking to the three guests, ‘‘ The 
 period has now arrived at which we can dispense 
 with the assistance of those fellows who are not 
 in our confidence,” and would have retired with 
 complete dignity but for a daring action issuing 
 from the misguided brain of the young man on 
 liking. He finding, by ill-fortune, a piece of 
 orange flower somewhere in the lobbies, now ap- 
 proached undetected with the same in a finger- 
 glass, and placed it on Bella's right hand. The 
 Archbishop instantly ejected and excommunica- 
 ted him; but the thing was done. 
 
 ‘‘T trust, madam,” said his Grace, returning 
 alone, ‘‘ that you will have the kindness to over- 
 look it, in consideration of its being the act of a 
 very young man who is merely here on liking, 
 and who will never answer.” 
 
 With that, he solemnly bowed and retired, and 
 they all burst into laughter, long and merry. 
 ‘« Disguise is of no use,” said Bella; ‘‘ they all 
 find me out; I think it must be, Pa and John 
 dear, because I look so happy !” 
 
 Her husband feeling it necessary at this point 
 to demand one of those mysterious disappear- 
 ances on Bella’s part, she dutifully obeyed; say- 
 ing in a softened voice from her place of con- 
 cealment : 
 
 ‘¢You remember how we talked about the 
 ships that day, Pa?” 
 
 ‘*Yes, my dear.” 
 
 ‘‘Isn’t it strange, now, to think that there was 
 no John in all the ships, Pa?” 
 
 ‘¢ Not at all, my dear.” 
 
 ‘Oh, Pa! Not at all?” 
 
 ‘¢No, my dear. How can we tell what com- 
 ing people are aboard the ships that may be sail- 
 
 ‘ing to us now from the unknown seas!” 
 
 Bella remaining invisible and silent, her fa- 
 ther remained at his dessert and wine, until he 
 remembered it was time for him to get home to 
 Holloway. ‘Though I positively can not tear 
 myself away,” he cherubically added, ‘‘—it 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. a) | 
 
 many happy returns of this most happy day.” 
 
 ‘*Hear! ten thousand’ times!” cried John. | 
 ‘¢T fill my glass and my precious wife's.” a 
 
 “Gentlemen,” said the cherub, inaudibly ad- | 
 dressing, in his Anglo-Saxon tendency to throw | 
 his feelings into the form~of a speech, the boys _ 
 down below, who were bidding against.each oth. _ 
 er to put their heads in the mud for sixpence: | 
 ‘‘Gentlemen—and Bella and John—you will © 
 readily suppose that it is not my intention to _ 
 trouble you with many observations on the pres- _ 
 ent occasion. You will also at once infer the — 
 nature and even the terms of the toast I am 
 about to propose on the present occasion. Gen-_ 
 tlemen—and Bella and John—the present occa- _ 
 sion is an occasion fraught with feelings that I 
 can not trust myself to express. But geritlemen — 
 and Bella and John—for the part I have had | 
 in it, for the confidence you have placed in me, _ 
 and for the affectionate good-nature and kind- 
 ness with which you have determined not to find — 
 me in the way, when I am well aware that I can_ 
 not be otherwise than in it more or less, I do _ 
 most heartily thank you. Gentlemen—and Bele 
 la and John—my love to you, and may we mect, 
 as on the present occasion, on many future oc-— 
 casions; that is to say, gentlemen—and Bella — 
 and John—on many happy returns of the pres- 
 ent happy oceasion.”” 
 
 Having thus coneluded his address, the amia=_ 
 ble cherub embraced his daughter, and took his _ 
 flight to the steamboat which was to convey him 
 to London, and was then lying at the floazing 
 pier, doing its best to bump the same to bits. — 
 But the happy couple were not going to part 
 with him in that way, and before he had been 
 on board two minutes there they were, looking 
 down at him from the wharf above. 4 
 
 ‘Pa, dear!” cried Bella, beckoning him with — 
 her parasol to approach the side, and bending — 
 gracefully to whisper. . 
 
 ‘‘Yes, my darling.” 
 
 ‘‘Did I beat you much with that horrid little _ 
 bonnet, Pa?” . 
 
 ‘¢ Nothing to speak of, my dear.” 
 
 ‘¢Did I pinch your legs, Pa?” 
 
 ‘*Only nicely, my pet.’ a 
 
 ‘‘You are sure you quite forgive me, Pa? © 
 Please, Pa, please, forgive me quite!” Half — 
 laughing at him and half crying to him, Fella ~ 
 besought him in the prettiest manner; in a~ 
 manner so engaging and so playful and so nat-_ 
 ural, that her cherubic parent made a coaxing — 
 face as if she had never grown up, and said, — 
 
 would be a sin—withont drinking to ne 
 
 “ What a silly little Mouse it is!” ‘ 
 ‘But you do forgive me that, and every thing — 
 else; don’t you, Pa?” ’ 
 
 ‘¢Yes, my dearest.” ‘e 
 ‘« And you don’t feel solitary or neglected, go- 
 ing away by yourself; do you, Pa?” : 
 ‘‘Lord bless you! No, my Life!” BY 
 ‘“‘Good-by, dearest Pa! Good-by!” i 
 ‘*Good-by, my darling! Take her away, my — 
 dear John. ‘Take her home!” ! 
 So, she leaning+on her husband’s arm, they 
 turned homeward by a rosy path which the gra-_ 
 cious sun struck out for them in its setting. — 
 And O there are days in this life worth life an@— 
 worth death. And O what a bright old song it 
 is, that O ’tis love, ’tis love, ’tis love, that make 
 the world go round! , at 
 
 a 
 iy 
 het 
 
 a 
 
CHAPTER V. 
 CONCERNING THE MENDICANT’S BRIDE. 
 
 ‘Tue impressive gloom with which Mrs. Wil- 
 fer received her husband on his return from the 
 wedding knocked so hard at the door of the 
 ‘cherubic conscience, and likewise so impaired 
 ‘the firmness of the cherubic legs, that the cul- 
 prit’s tottering condition of mind and body might 
 have aroused suspicion in less occupied persons 
 ‘than the grimly heroic lady, Miss Lavinia, and 
 ‘that esteemed friend of the family, Mr. George 
 ‘Sampson. But the attention of all three being 
 ‘fully possessed by the main fact of the marriage, 
 ‘they had happily none to bestow on the guilty 
 ‘conspirator; to which fortunate circumstance he 
 ‘owed the escape for which he was in nowise in- 
 ‘debted to himself. 
 
 “You do not, R. W.,” said Mrs. Wilfer from 
 her stately corner, ‘‘inquire for your daughter 
 Bella.” . 
 
 “To be sure, my dear,” he returned, with a 
 most flagrant assumption of unconsciousness, ‘‘ I 
 did omit it. How—or perhaps I should rather 
 say where—s Bella?” 
 
 “Not here,” Mrs. Wilfer proclaimed, with 
 folded arms. 
 
 The cherub faintly muttered something to the 
 abortive effect of ‘‘Oh, indeed, my dear!” 
 
 ‘¢ Not here,” repeated Mrs. Wilfer, in a stern 
 sonorous voice. “In a word, R. W., you have 
 no daughter Bella.” 
 
 ‘“‘No daughter Bella, my dear ?” 
 
 “No. Your daughter Bella” said Mrs. Wil- 
 fer, with the lofty air of fever having had the 
 least copartnership in that young lady: of whom 
 she now made reproachful mention as an article 
 of luxury which her husband had set up entirely 
 on his own account, and in direct opposition to 
 her advice: ‘‘—your daughter Bella has be- 
 stowed herself upon a Mendicant.”’ 
 
 ** Good gracious, my dear !” 
 
 ‘¢Show your father his daughter Bella’s let- 
 ter, Lavinia,” said Mrs. Wilfer, in her monoto- 
 nous Act of Parliament tone, and waving her 
 hand. ‘‘I think your father will admit it to be 
 documentary proof of what 1 tell him. I believe 
 your father is acquainted with his daughter Bel- 
 la’s writing. But I do not know. He may tell 
 you he is not. Nothing will surprise me.” 
 
 ' * Posted at Greenwich, and dated this morn- 
 ing,” said the Irrepressible, flouncing at-her fa- 
 ‘ther in handing him the evidence. ‘‘ Hopes Ma 
 -won’t be angry, but is happily married to Mr. 
 John Rokesmith, and didn’t mention it before- 
 hand to avoid words, and please tell darling you, 
 and love to me, and I should. like to know what 
 you'd have said if any other unmarried member 
 of the family had done it!” 
 
 ‘He read the letter, and faintly exclaimed, 
 ** Dear me!” 
 
 ‘* You may well say Dear me!” rejoined Mrs. 
 Wilfer, in a deep tone. Upon which encourage- 
 ment he said it again, though scarcely with the 
 success he had expected; for the scornful lady 
 then remarked, with extreme bitterness: ‘‘ You 
 said that before.’ 
 
 “It’s very surprising. But I suppose, my 
 dear,” hinted the cherub, as he folded the letter 
 after a disconcerting silence, ‘‘that we must 
 make the best of it? Would you object to my 
 pointing out, my dear, that Mr. John Rokesmith 
 
 rd 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 291 
 
 is not (so far asI am acquainted with him), 
 strictly speaking, a Mendicant ?” 
 
 ‘*Indeed ?” returned Mrs. Wilfer, with an 
 awful air of politeness. ‘‘‘Truly so? I was not 
 aware that Mr. John Rokesmith was a gentleman 
 of landed property. But I am much relieved to 
 hear it.” 
 
 ‘*T doubt if you have heard it, my dear,” the 
 cherub submitted with hesitation. : 
 
 ‘Thank you,” said Mrs. Wilfer. ‘‘I make 
 false statements, it appears? So be it.. If my 
 daughter flies in my face, surely my husband 
 may. ‘The one thing is not more unnatural than 
 the other. ‘There seems a fitness in the arrange- 
 ment. By all means!” Assuming, with a 
 shiver of resignation, a deadly cheerfulness. | 
 
 But here the Irrepressible skirmished into the 
 conflict, dragging the reluctant form of Mr. 
 Sampson after her. 
 
 ‘¢ Ma,’’ interposed the young lady, ‘‘I must 
 say I think it would be much better if you would 
 keep to the point, and not hold forth about peo- 
 ple’s flying into people’s faces, which is nothing 
 more nor less than impossible nonsense.” 
 
 ‘¢How!” exclaimed Mrs. Wilfer, knitting her 
 dark brows. 
 
 ‘‘ Just im-possible nonsense, Ma,” returned 
 Lavvy, ‘‘and George Sampson. knows it is, as 
 well as I do.” 
 
 Mrs. Wilfer suddenly becoming petrified, fixed 
 her indignant eyes upon the wretched George : 
 who, divided between the support due from him 
 to his love, and the support due from him to his 
 love’s mamma, supported nobody, not even him- 
 self. 
 
 ‘The true point is,” pursued Lavinia, ‘‘ that 
 Bella has behaved in a most unsisterly way to 
 me, and might have. severely compromised me 
 with George and with George’s family, by mak- 
 ing off and getting married in this very low and 
 disreputable manner—with some pew-opener or 
 other, I suppose, for a bridemaid—when she ought 
 to have confided in me, and ought to have said, 
 
 -*Tf, Lavvy, you consider it due to your engage- 
 
 ment with George that you should countenance 
 the occasion by being present, then, Lavvy, I 
 beg you to be present, keeping my secret from 
 Ma and Pa.’ As of course I should have done.” 
 
 ‘© As of course you would have done? In- 
 grate!’ exclaimed Mrs. Wilfer. ‘‘ Viper!” 
 
 ‘‘Tsay! You know, ma’am. Upon my honor 
 you mustn’t,’”’ Mr. Sampson remonstrated, shak- 
 ing his head seriously. ‘* With the highest re- 
 spect for you, ma’am, upon my life you mustn’t. 
 No, really, you know. When aman with the 
 feelings of a gentleman finds himself engaged to 
 a young lady, and it comes (even on the part of 
 a member of the family) to vipers, you know !— 
 I would merely put it to your own good feeling, 
 you know,” said Mr. Sampson, in rather lame 
 conclusion. 
 
 Mrs. Wilfer’s baleful stare at the young gen- 
 tleman in acknowledgment of his obliging inter- 
 ference was of such a nature that Miss Lavinia 
 burst into tears, and caught him round the neck 
 for his protection. 
 
 ‘¢My own unnatural mother,” screamed the 
 young lady, ‘‘ wants to annihilate George! But 
 you sha’n’t be annihilated, George. Tl die 
 first !” 
 
 Mr. Sampson, in the arms of his mistress, still 
 struggled to shake his head at Mrs. Wilfer, and 
 
292 
 
 to remark: ‘‘ With every sentiment of respect 
 for you, you know, ma’am—vipers really doesn’t 
 do you credit.” 
 
 “‘ You shall not be annihilated, George !”’ cried 
 Miss Lavinia. ‘* Ma shall destroy me first, and 
 then she’ll be contented. Oh, oh, oh! Have 
 I lured George from his happy home to expose 
 him to this! George, dear, be free! Leave 
 me, ever dearest George, to Ma and to my fate. 
 Give my love to your aunt, George dear, and im- 
 plore her not to curse the viper that has crossed 
 your path and blighted your existence. Oh, oh, 
 oh!” The young lady who, hysterically speak- 
 ing, was only just come of age, and had never 
 gone off yet, here fell into a highly creditable 
 crisis, which, regarded as a first performance, 
 was very successful ; Mr. Sampson, bending over 
 the body meanwhile, in a state of distraction 
 which induced him to address Mrs. Wilfer in 
 the inconsistent expressions: ‘*‘ Demon — with 
 the highest respect for you—behold your work !” 
 
 The cherub stood helplessly rubbing his chin 
 and looking on, but on the whole was inclined 
 to welcome this diversion as one in which, by 
 reason of the absorbent properties of hysterics, 
 the previous question would become absorbed. 
 And so, indeed, it proved, for the Irrepressible 
 gradually coming to herself, and asking with 
 wild emotion, ‘‘George dear, are you safe?” 
 and further, ‘‘ George love, what has happened ? 
 Where is Ma?” Mr. Sampson, with words of 
 comfort, raised her prostrate form, and handed 
 her to Mrs. Wilfer as if the young lady were 
 something in the nature of refreshments. Mrs. 
 Wilfer with dignity partaking of the refresh- 
 ments, by kissing her once on the brow (as if 
 accepting an oyster), Miss Lavvy, tottering, re- 
 turned to the protection of Mr. Sampson: to 
 whom she said, ‘‘ George dear, I am afraid I 
 have been foolish; but I am still a little weak 
 and giddy; don’t let go my hand, George!” 
 And whom she afterward greatly agitated at in- 
 tervals, by giving utterance, when least expect- 
 ed, to a sound between a sob and a bottle of 
 soda-water, that seemed to rend the bosom of 
 her frock. 
 
 Among the most remarkable effects of this 
 crisis may be mentioned its having, when peace 
 was restored, an inexplicable moral influence of 
 an elevating kind, on Miss Lavinia, Mrs. Wilfer, 
 and Mr. George Sampson, from which R. W. 
 was altogether excluded, as an outsider and non- 
 sympathizer. Miss Lavinia assumed a modest 
 air of having distinguished herself; Mrs. Wilfer, 
 a serene air of forgiveness and resignation ; Mr. 
 Sampson, an air of having been improved and 
 chastened. ‘The influence pervaded the spirit in 
 which they returned to the previous question. 
 
 “George dear,” said Lavvy, with a melan- 
 choly smile, ‘‘after what has passed, I am sure 
 Ma will tell Pa that he may tell Bella we shall 
 all be glad to see her and her husband.” 
 
 Mr. Sampson said he was sure of it too; mur- 
 muring how eminently he respected Mrs. Wilfer, 
 and ever must, and ever would. Never more 
 eminently, he added, than after what had passed. 
 
 ‘“¢ Far be it from me,” said Mrs. Wilfer, mak- 
 ing deep proclamation from her corner, ‘to run 
 counter to the feelings of a child of mine, and 
 of a Youth,” Mr. Sampson hardly seemed to like 
 that word, ‘‘who is the object of her maiden 
 preference. I may feel—nay, know—that I have 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 been deluded and deceived. I may feel—nay, 
 
 know—that I have been set aside and passed 
 over. I may feel—nay, know—that after having 
 so far overcome my repugnance toward Mr. and 
 Mrs. Boffin as to receive them under this roof, 
 
 and to consent to your daughter Bella’s,” here 
 
 turning to her husband, ‘residing under theirs, 
 
 it were well if your daughter Bella,” again turn. 
 
 ing to her husband, ‘‘ had profited in a worldly 
 point of view by a connection so distasteful, so 
 disreputable, I may feel—nay, know—-that in 
 uniting herself to Mr. Rokesmith she has united’ 
 herself to one who is, in spite of shallow sophist- 
 ry, a Mendicant. And I may feel well assured 
 that your daughter Bella,” again turning to her 
 husband, ‘does not exalt her family by beecom-— 
 ing a Mendicant’s bride. But I suppress what 
 I feel, and say nothing of it.” , | 
 
 Mr, Sampson murmured that this was the sort 
 of thing you might expect fronione who7had : 
 ever in her own family been an example-and 
 never an outrage. And ever more so (Mr. Samp- 
 son added, with some degree of obscurity), and 
 never more so, than in and through what had 
 passed. He must take the liberty of adding, — 
 that what was true of the mother was true of 
 the youngest daughter, and that he could never, 
 forget the touching feelings that the conduct of © 
 both had awakened within him. In conclusion,” 
 he did ‘hope ‘that there wasn’t a man-with a” 
 beating heart who was capable of something” 
 that remained undescribed, in consequence of” 
 Miss Lavinia’s stopping him as he reeled in his” 
 speech. 
 
 ‘¢ Therefore, R. W.,” said Mrs. Wilfer, resum- 
 ing her discourse and turning to her lord again, ° 
 ‘let your daughter Bella come when she will, 
 and she will be received. So,” after a short 
 pause, and an air of having taken medicine in’ 
 it, ‘‘so will her husband.” ae 
 
 ‘‘And I beg, Pa,” said Lavinia, ‘‘ that you" 
 will not tell Bella what I have undergone.  It- 
 can do no good, and it might cause her to re=— 
 proach herself.” ts 
 
 ‘‘My dearest girl,” urged Mr. Sampson, ‘she 
 ought to know it.” aK 
 
 ‘* No, George,” said Lavinia, in a tone of res-) 
 olute self-denial. ‘‘ No, dearest George, let it 
 be buried in oblivion.” sa 
 
 Mr. Sampson considered that ‘‘ too noble.” 
 
 ‘* Nothing is too noble, dearest George,” re 
 turned Lavinia. ‘‘ And Pa, I hope you will be” 
 careful not to refer before Bella, if you can help” 
 it, tomy engagement to George. It might seem» 
 like reminding her of her having cast herself” 
 away. And I hope, Pa, that you will think it~ 
 equally right to avoid mentioning George’s ris=" 
 ing prospects, when Bella is present. It might’ 
 seem like taunting her with her own poor for=- 
 tunes. Let me ever remember that I am her 
 younger sister, and ever spare her painful con= 
 trasts, which could not but wound her sharply.”* 
 
 Mr. Sampson expressed his belief that such — 
 was the demeanor of Angels. Miss Lavvy re-" 
 plied with solemnity, ‘‘No, dearest George, I 
 am but too well aware that I am merely hu- 
 man.” toe 
 
 Mrs. Wilfer, for her part, still further im- 
 proved the occasion by sitting with her eyes” 
 fastened on her husband, like two great black 
 notes of interrogation, severely inquiring, Are” 
 you looking into your breast? Do you deserve — 
 
your blessings? Can you lay your hand upon 
 
 your heart and say that you are worthy of so. 
 
 hysterical a daughter? I do not ask you if you 
 are worthy of such a wife—put Me out of the 
 juestion—but are you sufficiently conscious of, 
 and thankful for, the pervading moral grandeur 
 of the family spectacle on which you are gazing ? 
 
 These inquiries proved very harassing to R. W., 
 who, besides being a little disturbed by wine, 
 was in perpetual terror of committing himself 
 by the utterance of stray words that would be- 
 tray his guilty foreknowledge. However, the 
 scene being over, and—all things. considered— 
 ‘well over, he sought refuge in a doze; which 
 gave his lady immense offense. 
 
 **Can you think of your daughter Bella, and 
 sleep?” she disdainfully inquired. 
 
 _ Yo which he mildly answered, ‘‘ Yes, I think 
 Tecan, my dear.” 
 
 _‘*Then,” said Mrs, Wilfer, with solemn in- 
 dignation, ‘‘I would recommend you, if you 
 have a human feeling, to retire to bed.” 
 ~ “Thank you, my dear,” he replied; ‘‘I think 
 itis the best place for me.” And with these un- 
 sympathetic words very gladly withdrew. 
 
 Within a few weeks afterward the Mendi- 
 eant’s bride (arm in arm with the Mendicant) 
 came to tea, in fulfillment of an engagement 
 made through her father. And the way in 
 which the Mendicant’s bride dashed at the un- 
 assailable position so considerately to be held 
 by Miss Lavvy, and scattered the whole of the 
 works in all directions in a moment, was tri- 
 umphant. 
 
 _* Dearest Ma,” cried Bella, running into the 
 room with a radiant face, ‘Show do you do, 
 dearest Ma?”’ And then embraced her, joyous- 
 ly. ‘And Lavvy darling, how do you do, and 
 how’s George Sampson, and how is he getting 
 on, and when are you going to be married, and 
 how rich are you going to grow? You must tell 
 me all about it, Lavvy dear, immediately. John, 
 love, kiss Ma and Lavvy, and then we shall all 
 be at home and comfortable.” 
 
 Mrs. Wilfér stared, but was helpless. Miss 
 Lavinia stared, but was helpless. Apparently 
 
 With no compunction,. and assuredly with no 
 ceremony, Bella tossed her bonnet away, and 
 sat down to make the tea. 
 
 - **Dearest Ma and Lavvy, you both take sugar, 
 TIknow. And Pa (you good little Pa), you don’t 
 take milk. John does. JI didn’t before I was 
 married; but I do now, because John docs. 
 John dear, did you kiss Ma and Lavvy? Oh, 
 you did! Quite correct, John dear; but I 
 didn’t see you do it, so I asked. Cut some 
 bread and butter, John; that’s a love. Ma 
 likes it doubled. And now you must tell me, 
 dearest Ma and Lavvy, upon your words and 
 honors! Didn’t you for a moment—just a mo- 
 ment—think I was a dreadful little wretch when 
 I wrote to say I had run away ?” 
 
 Before Mrs. Wilfer could wave her gloves, 
 the Mendicant’s bride in her merriest affection- 
 ate manner went on again. 
 
 _ J think it must have made you rather cross, 
 dear Ma and Lavvy, and I know I deserved that 
 you should be very cross. But you see I had 
 been such a heedless, heartless creature, and had 
 Ted you so to expect that I should marry for 
 money, and so to make sure that I was incapa- 
 ble of marrying for love, that I thought you 
 
 Py 
 
 ¥ | OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 293 
 
 couldn’t believe me. Becanse, you see, you 
 didw’t know how much of Good, Good, Good, I 
 had learned from Jolin. Well! So I was sly 
 about it, and ashamed of what you supposed me 
 to be, and fearful that we couldn’t understand 
 one another and might come to words, which we 
 should all be sorry for afterward, and so I said 
 to John that if he liked to take me without any 
 fuss he might. And as he did like, I let him. 
 And we were married at Greenwich church in 
 the presence of nobody—except an unknown in- 
 dividual who dropped in,” here her eyes sparkled 
 more brightly, ‘‘and half a pensioner. And 
 now, isn’t it nice, dearest Ma and Lavvy, to 
 know that no words have been said which any 
 of us can be sorry for, and that we are all the 
 best of friends at the pleasantest of teas !” 
 
 Having got up and kissed them again, she 
 slipped back to her chair (after a Joop on the 
 road to squeeze her husband reand the neck) 
 and again went on. 
 
 *¢ And now you will naturally want to know, 
 dearest Ma and Lavvy, how we live, and what 
 we have got to live upon. Well! And so we 
 live on Blackheath, in the charm—ingest of 
 dolls’ houses, de—lightfully furnished, and we 
 have a clever little servant who is de—cidedly 
 pretty, and we are economical and-orderly, and 
 do every thing by clock-work, and we have a hun-- 
 dred and fifty pounds a year, and we have all 
 we want, and more. “And lastly, if you would 
 like to know in confidence, as perhaps you may, 
 what is my opinion of my husband, my opinion 
 is—that I almost love him!” 
 
 “¢ And if you would like to know in confidence, 
 as perhaps you may,” said her husband, smiling, 
 vas he stood by her side, without her having de- 
 tected his approach, ‘‘my opinion of my wife, 
 my opinion is—” But Bella started up, and 
 put her hand upon his lips. 
 
 ‘¢Stop, Sir! No, John, dear! Seriously! 
 Please not yet a while! I want to be something 
 so much worthier than the doll in the doll’s 
 house.” ‘ 
 
 ‘¢ My darling, are you not?” 
 
 ‘¢Not half, not a quarter, so much worthier 
 as I hope you may some day find me! ‘Try me 
 through some reverse, John—try me through 
 some trial—and tell them after that, what you 
 think of me.” 
 
 ‘¢T will, my Life,” said John. 
 Itz?) 
 
 ‘¢That’s my dear John. 
 a word now; will you?” 
 
 ‘And I won't,” said John, with a very ex- 
 pressive look of admiration around him, ‘‘speak 
 a word now!” 
 
 She laid her laughing cheek upon his breast to 
 thank him, and said, looking at the rest of them 
 sideways out of her bright eyes: ‘‘I’ll go further, 
 Pa and Ma and Lavvy. John don’t suspect it 
 —he has no idea of it—but I quite love him!” 
 
 Even Mrs. Wilfer relaxed under the influence 
 of her married daughter, and seemed in a ma- 
 jestic manner to imply remotely that if R. W. 
 had been a more deserving object, she too might 
 have condescended to come down from her ped- 
 estal for his beguilement. Miss Lavinia, on the 
 other hand, had strong doubts of the policy of 
 the course of treatment, and whether it might 
 not spoil Mr. Sampson, if experimented on in 
 the case of that young gentleman. RK. W. him- 
 
 ‘*T promise 
 
 And you won’t speak 
 
294 
 
 self was for his part convinced that he was father 
 of one of the most charming of girls, and that 
 Rokesmith was the most favored of men; which 
 opinion, if propounded to him, Rokesmith would 
 
 -yobably not have contested. 
 
 The newly-married pair left early so that they 
 might walk at leisure to their starting-place from 
 London for Greenwich. At first they were very 
 cheerful and talked much; but after a while 
 Bella fancied that her husband was turning 
 somewhat thoughtful. So she asked him: 
 
 ** John dear, what’s the matter ?” 
 
 ‘*Matter, my love?” 
 
 ‘*Won’t you tell me,” said Bella, looking up 
 into his face, ‘* what you are thinking of ?” 
 
 ‘‘'There’s not much in the thought, my soul. 
 T was thinking whether you wouldn’t like me to 
 be rich ?” 
 
 **You rich, John?” repeated Bella, shrinking 
 a little. 
 
 ‘*T mean, really rich. Say as rich as Mr. 
 Boffin. You would like that?” 
 
 **T should be almost afraid to try, John dear, 
 Was he much the better for his wealth? Was I 
 much the better for the little part I once had in 
 it ?”’ 
 
 ‘*But all people are not the worse for riches, 
 my own.” 
 
 ‘“Most people?” Bella musingly suggested 
 with raised eyebrows. : 
 
 ‘Nor even most people, it may be hoped. 
 If you were rich, for instance, you would have 
 a great power of doing good to others.” 
 
 ‘¢Yes, Sir, for instance,’’ Bella playfully re- 
 joined; ‘‘but should [ exercise the power, for 
 instance? And again, Sir, for instance; should 
 I, at the same time, have a great power of doing 
 harm to myself?” 
 
 Laughing and pressing her arm, he retorted 
 **But still, again for instance ; would you exer- 
 cise that power ?” 
 
 ‘**T don’t know,” said Bella, thoughtfully shak- 
 ing her head. ‘‘I hopenot. I think not. But 
 it’s so easy to hope not and think not, without 
 the riches.” 
 
 ‘¢ Why don’t you say, my darling—instead of 
 that phrase—being poor?” he asked, looking 
 earnestly at her. 
 
 ‘¢Why don’t I say, being poor? Because I 
 am not poor. Dear John, it’s not possible that 
 you suppose I think we are poor ?” 
 
 “*T do, my love.” 
 
 , “Oh, John?” : 
 
 ‘Understand me, sweet-heart. I know that I 
 am rich beyond all wealth in having you; but I 
 think of you and think for you. In such a 
 dress as you are wearing now you first char med 
 me, and in no dress could you ever look, to my 
 thinking, more graceful or more beautiful. But 
 you have admired many finer dresses this very 
 day; and is it not natural that I wish I could 
 give them to you?” 
 
 ‘*Tt’s very nice that you should wish it, John. 
 It brings these tears of grateful pleasure into my 
 eyes to hear you say so with such tenderness. 
 But I don’t want them.” 
 
 ‘¢ Again,” he pursued, “we are now walking 
 through the muddy streets. I love those pretty 
 feet so dearly that I feel as if I could not bear 
 the dirt to soil the sole of your shoe. Is it not 
 natural that I wish you could ride in a car- 
 riage ?” 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 : | aged nothing else. 
 
 ‘‘Tt’s very nice,” said Bella, glancing do Ne 
 
 ward at the feet in question, ‘‘ to know that you 
 admire them so much, John dear, and since you | 
 do, I am sorry that these shoes are a full size 
 
 too large. But I don’t want a carriage, believe 
 me.’ N 
 
 ‘You would dike one if you could have one, 
 
 Bella?” 
 “T shouldn't like it for its own sake half. so 
 well as such a wish for it. Dear John, your 
 
 wishes are as real to me as the wishes in the 
 Fairy story that were all fulfilled as soon as 
 
 spoken. Wish me every thing that you can wish | 
 
 for the woman you dearly love, and I have as | 
 
 good as got it, John. 
 John!” 
 They were not the less happy for such talk, 
 
 I have better than got it, 
 
 and home was not the less home for coming afta ; 
 Bella was fast developing a perfect genius — 
 
 it. 
 for home. All the loves and graces seemed (her 
 husband thought) to have taken domestic service 
 with her, and to help her to make home engaging. 
 Her married life glided happily on. She was” 
 
 alone all day, for, after an early breakfast, her — 
 
 husband repaired every morning to the City, 
 and did nob return until their late dinner hour. 
 He was *‘in a China house,” 
 Bella: tate she found quite satisfactory with- 
 
 out pursuing the China house into minuter de- | 
 
 tails than a wholesale vision of tea, rice, odd= 
 
 smelling silks, carved boxes, and tight-eyed peo- — 
 ple in more than double-soled shoes, with their — 
 pigtails pulling their heads of hair off, painted 
 She always walked — 
 
 on transparent porcelain. 
 
 i 
 
 he explained to — 
 
 | 
 
 with her husband to the railroad, and was al-— 
 
 ways there again to meet him; her old coquet- 
 
 tish ways a little sobered down (but not much), - 
 
 and her dress as daintily 
 
 and Bella returned home, the dress would be 
 laid aside, trim little wrappers and aprons would 
 be substituted, and Bella, putting back her hair 
 with both hands, as if she were making the most. 
 business-like arrangements for going dramatic- 
 ally distracted, would enter on the household 
 affairs of the day. Such weighing and mixing” 
 and chopping and grating, such dusting and 
 washing and polishing, such snipping and weed- 
 ing and troweling and other small gardening, © 
 such making and mending and folding and air- 
 ing, such diverse arrangements, and above all 
 such severe study! For Mrs. J. R., who had ~ 
 never been wont to do too much at home as 
 Miss B. W., was under the constant necessity 
 of referring for advice and support to a sage 
 volume entitled The Complete British Family. 
 Housewife, which she would sit consulting, with 
 her elbows on the table and her temples on her 
 hands, like some perplexed enchantress poring — 
 over the Black Art. This, principally because- 
 ithe Complete British Housewife, however sound 
 ‘a Briton at heart, was by no means an expert 
 Briton at expressing herself with clearness in 
 the British tongue, and sometimes might have 
 issued her directions to equal purpose in the 
 Kamskatchan language. In any crisis of this” 
 nature Bella would suddenly exclaim aloud, — 
 ‘*Oh you ridiculous old thing, what do yous 
 mean by that? You must have been drinking 
 And having made this marginal note, would 
 try the Housewife again, with all her imp! : 
 
 managed as if she man- 
 But John gone to business | 
 
4 
 
 me 
 
 ee ee 
 
 ‘There was likewise a coolness on the part of 
 
 ae 
 
 < 
 
 the British Housewife, which Mrs. John Roke- 
 
 ‘smith found highly exasperating. She would 
 ‘say, ‘‘ Take a salamander,” as if a general should 
 command a private to catch a Tartar. Or she 
 “would casually issue the order, ‘‘ Throw in a 
 handful—” of something entirely unattainable. 
 In these, the Housewife’s most glaring moments 
 of unreason, Bella would shut her up and knock 
 her on the table, apostrephizing her with the 
 ‘compliment, ‘‘O you are a stupid old Donkey ! 
 Where am [I to get it, do you think ?” 
 
 Another branch of study claimed the atten- 
 tion of Mrs. John Rokesmith for a regular pe- 
 riod every day. This was the mastering of the 
 newspaper, so that she might be close up with 
 John on general topics when John came home. 
 In her desire to be in all things his companion 
 she would have set herself with equal zeal to 
 master Algebra, or Enclid, if he had divided 
 his soul between her and either. Wonderful 
 was the way in which she would store up the 
 City Intelligence, and beamingly shed it upon 
 John in the course of the evening; incidentally 
 mentioning the commodities that were looking 
 up in the markets, and how much gold had been 
 taken to the Bank, and trying to look wise and 
 ‘serious over it until she would laugh at herself 
 ‘most charmingly and would say, kissing him: 
 Tt all comes of my love, John dear.” 
 
 For a City man John certainly did appear to 
 care as little as might be for the looking up or 
 looking down of things, as well as for the gold 
 ‘that got taken to the Bank. But he cared, be- 
 
 yond all expression, for his wife, as a most pre-, 
 
 cious and sweet commodity that was always 
 looking up, and that never was worth less than 
 all the gold in the world. And she, being in- 
 
 . spired by her affection, and having a quick wit 
 
 pe, 
 
 a 
 
 and a fine ready instinct, made amazing pro- 
 gress in her domestic efficiency, though, as an 
 endearing creature, she made no progress at all. 
 This was her husband’s verdict, and he justified 
 -it by telling her that she had begun her married 
 life as the most endearing creature that could 
 
 possibly be. 
 
 ‘And you have such a cheerful spirit!” he 
 said, fondly. ‘* You are like a bright light in 
 ‘the house.” 
 ~ “Am I truly, John?” 
 
 “Are you truly? Yes, indeed. 
 more, and much better.” 
 _ **Do you know, John dear,’ said Bella, tak- 
 
 Only much 
 
 ing him by a button of his coat, ‘that I some- 
 
 times, at odd moments—don’t laugh, John, 
 please.” 
 
 Nothing should induce John to do it, when 
 she asked him not to do it. 
 
 _**__That I sometimes think, John, I feel a 
 
 little serious.” 
 
 ** Are you too much alone, my darling?” 
 
 “QO dear, no, John! The time isso short that 
 I have not a moment too much in the week.” 
 
 ‘‘ Why serious, my life, then? When seri- 
 ous ?” . 
 _ **When I laugh, I think,” said Bella, langh- 
 ing as she laid her head upon his shoulder. 
 
 “You wouldn’t believe, Sir, that I feel serious 
 
 how? But Ido.” And she laughed again, and 
 
 _ Something glistened in her eyes. 
 i 
 
 _ ‘* Would you like to be rich, pet?” he asked 
 
 her, coaxingly. 
 ‘ hia. 
 
 OUR MUTYAL FRIEND. 
 
 | 
 
 295 
 “Rich, John! 
 
 questions ?” 
 
 ‘*Do you regret any thing, my love?” : 
 
 ‘Regret any thing? No!” Bella confidently 
 answered. But then, suddenly changing, she 
 said, between laughing and glistening: ‘*Oh 
 yes, Ido though. I regret Mrs. Boffin.” 
 
 ‘*], too, regret that separation very much. 
 But perhaps it is only temporary. Perhaps 
 things may so fall out as that you may some- 
 times see her again—as that we may sometimes 
 see her again.” Bella might be very anxious 
 on the subject, but she scarcely seemed so at the 
 moment, With an absent air she was investi- 
 gating that button on her husband’s coat when 
 Pa came in to spend the evening. 
 
 Pa had his special chair and his special cor- 
 ner reserved for him on all occasions, and— 
 without disparagement of his domestic joys— 
 was far happier there than any where. It was 
 always pleasantly droll to see Pa and Bella to- 
 gether; but on this present evening her hus- 
 band thought her more than usually fantastic 
 with him. 
 
 ‘‘You are a very good little boy,” said Bella, 
 ‘‘to come unexpectedly, as soon as you could 
 get out of school. And how have they used 
 you at school to-day, you dear?” 
 
 ‘‘ Well, my pet,” replied the cherub, smiling 
 and rubbing his hands as she sat him down in 
 his chair, “I attend two schools. There’s the 
 Mincing Lane establishment, and there’s your 
 mother’s Academy. Which might you mean, 
 my dear?” 
 
 ‘¢ Both,’’ said Bella. ° 
 
 ‘Both, eh? Why, to say the truth, both have 
 taken a little out of me to-day, my dear, but that 
 was to be expected. There’s no royal road to 
 learning; and what is life but learning !” 
 
 ‘*And what do you do with yourself when 
 you have got your learning by heart, you silly 
 child.?” 
 
 ‘* Why then, my dear,” said the cherub, after 
 
 How can you ask such goose’s 
 
 | a little consideration, ‘‘I suppose I die.” 
 
 ‘*You are a very bad boy,” retorted Bella, 
 ‘*to talk about dismal things and be out of 
 spirits.” 
 
 ‘¢My Bella,” rejoined her father, ‘*I am not 
 out of spirits. J am as gay asa lark.” Which 
 his face confirmed. 
 
 “Then if you are sure and certain it’s not 
 you, I suppose it must be I,” said Bella; ‘‘so I 
 won't do so any more. John dear, we must give 
 
 this little fellow his supper, you know.” 
 
 ‘¢Of course we must, my darling.” 
 
 ‘*He has been grubbing and grubbing at 
 school,” said Bella, looking at her father’s hand . 
 and lightly slapping it, ‘‘till he’s not fit to be 
 seen. O what a grubby child!” 
 
 ‘‘Indeed, my dear,” said her father, ‘‘I was 
 going to ask to be allowed to wash my hands, 
 only you find me out so soon.” 
 
 ‘¢Come here, Sir!” cried Bella, taking him 
 by the front of his coat, ‘‘come here and be 
 washed directly. You are not to be trusted to 
 do it for yourself. Come here, Sir!” 
 
 The cherub, to his genial amusement, was ac- 
 cordingly conducted to a little washing-room, 
 where Bella soaped his face and rubbed his face, 
 and soaped his hands and rubbed his hands, and 
 splashed him and rinsed him and toweled him, 
 until he was as red as beet-root, even to his very, 
 
296 OUR Mutha FRIEND. 
 
 ears: ‘‘ Now you must be brushed and combed, 
 Sir,” said Bella, busily. ‘‘ Hold the light, John. 
 Shut your eyes, Sir, and let me take hold of 
 your chin. Be good directly, and do as you 
 are told!” 
 
 Her father being more than willing to obey, 
 she dressed his hair in her most elaborate man- 
 ner, brushing it out straight, parting it, winding 
 it over her fingers, sticking it up on end, and 
 constantly falling back on John to get a good 
 look at the effect of it. Who always received 
 her on his disengaged arm, and detained her, 
 while the patient cherub stood waiting to be 
 finished. 
 
 ‘*There!” said Bella, when she had at last 
 completed the final touches. ‘Now, you are 
 something like a genteel boy! Put your jacket 
 on, and come and have your supper.” 
 
 The cherub investing himself with his coat 
 was led back to his corner—where, but for hav- 
 ing no egotism in his pleasant nature, he would 
 have answered well enough for that radiant 
 though self-sufficient boy, Jack Horner—Bella 
 with her own hands laid a cloth for him, and 
 brought him his supper on a tray, ‘‘ Stop a mo- 
 ment,” said she, ‘‘ we must keep his little clothes 
 clean ;” and tied a napkin under his chin, in a 
 very methodical manner. 
 
 While he took his supper Bella sat by him, 
 sometimes admonishing him to hold his fork by 
 the handle, like a polite child, and at other times 
 carving for him, or pouring out his drink. Fan- 
 tastic as it all was, and accustomed as she ever 
 had been to make a plaything of her good father, 
 ever delighted that she should put him to that 
 account, still there was an occasional something 
 on Bella’s part that was new. It could not be 
 said that she was less playful, whimsical, or nat- 
 ural than she always had been; but it seemed, 
 her husband thought, as if there were some rather 
 graver reason than he had supposed for what 
 she had so lately said, and as if, throughout all 
 this, there were glimpses of an underlying seri- 
 ousness, 
 
 It was a circumstance in support of this view 
 of the case, that when she had lighted her father’s 
 pipe, and mixed him his glass of grog, she sat 
 down on a stool between her father and her hus- 
 band, leaning her arm upon the latter, and was 
 
 very quiet. So quiet that, when her father rose. 
 
 to take his leave, she looked round with a start, 
 as if she had forgotten his being there. 
 
 ‘You go a little way with Pa, John?” 
 
 **Yes, my dear. Do you?” 
 
 ‘**] have not written to Lizzie Hexam since I 
 wrote and told her that I really had a lover—a 
 whole one. [I have often thonght I would like 
 to tell her how right she was when she pretended 
 to read in the live coals that I would go through 
 fire and water for him. I am in the humor to 
 tell her so to-night, John, and I’ll stay at home 
 and do it.” 
 
 ‘*You are tired.” 
 
 **Not at all tired, John dear, but in the hu- 
 mor to write to Lizzie. Good-night, dear Pa. 
 Good-night, you dear, good, gentle Pa!” 
 
 Left to herself, she sat down to write, and 
 wrote Lizzie a long letter. She had but com- 
 pleted it and read it over, when her husband 
 came back. ‘‘You are just in time, Sir,” said 
 Bella; ‘‘I am going to give you your first cur- 
 tain lecture. It shall be a parlor-curtain lecture. 
 § 
 
 You shall take this chair of mine when I haye 
 folded my letter, and I will take the stool (though — 
 you ought to take it, I can tell you, Sir, if it’s | 
 the stool of repentance), and you'll soon find | 
 yourself taken to task soundly.” a | 
 
 Her letter folded, sealed, and directed, and | 
 her pen wiped, and her middle finger wiped, and > 
 her desk locked up and put away, and these ~ 
 transactions performed with an air of severe bus- 
 iness sedateness, which the Complete British 
 Housewife might have assumed, and certainly © 
 would not have rounded off and broken down 
 in with a musical laugh, as Bella did: she placed 
 her husband in his chair, and placed herself upon 
 her stool. 
 
 ‘‘Now, Sir! To begin at the beginning. 
 What is your name?” 
 
 A question more decidedly rushing at the se- 
 cret he was keeping from her could not have 
 astounded him. But he kept his countenance 
 and his secret, and ayswered, ‘‘ John Rokesmith, 
 my dear.” 
 
 ‘*Good boy! - Who gave you that name ?” 
 
 With a returning suspicion that something 
 might have betrayed him to her, he answered, 
 interrogatively, ‘‘ My godfathers and my god- 
 mothers, dear love ?” 
 
 ‘Pretty good!” said Bella. ‘‘ Not goodest 
 good, because you hesitate about it. However, — 
 as you know your Catechism fairly, so far, VL_ 
 let you off the rest. Now, I am going to exam- © 
 ine you out of my own head. John dear, why — 
 did you go back, this evening, to the question 
 you once asked me before—would I like to be 
 rich?” 
 
 Again, his secret! He looked down at her as 
 she looked up at_him, with her hands folded on~ 
 his knee, and it was as nearly told as ever secret 
 was. 
 
 Having no reply ready, he could do no better 
 than embrace her, 
 
 ‘*In short, dear John,” said Bella, ‘‘ this is ~ 
 the topic of my lecture: I want nothing on earth, 
 and I want you to believe it.” | 
 
 ‘* Tf that’s all, the lecture may be considered 
 over, for I do.” 
 
 ‘‘Tt’s not all, John dear,” Bella hesitated. 
 ‘*Tt’s only Firstly. There’s a dreadful Seeond- 
 ly, and a dreadful Thirdly to come—as I used to 
 say to myself in sermon-time when I was a yery 
 small-sized sinner at church.” 
 
 ‘* Let them come, my dearest.” ag 
 
 *‘Are you sure, John dear; are you ab- © 
 solutely certain in your innermost heart of — 
 hearts— ?” ty 
 
 ‘¢ Which is not in my keeping,” he rejoined. _ 
 
 ‘No, John, but the key is.—Are you abso-— 
 lutely certain that down at the bottom of that 
 heart of hearts, which you have given to me as I — 
 have given mine to you, there is no remembrance — 
 that I was once very mercenary ?” 
 
 ‘‘ Why, if there were no remembrance in me 
 of the time you speak of,” he softly asked her 
 with his lips to hers, ‘‘ could I love you quite as 
 well as I do; could I have in the Calendar of 
 my life the brightest of its days; could I, when- 
 ever I look at your dear face, or hear your dear ~ 
 voice, see and hear my noble champion? It — 
 can never have been that which made you seri- — 
 ous, darling ?” } ia 
 
 ‘No, John, it wasn’t that, and still less was _ 
 it Mrs. Boffin, though I love her. Wait & mo- 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND, 
 
 ‘ment and J’ll go on with the lecture. Give me 
 a moment, because I like to ery for joy. It’s so 
 
 delicious, John dear, to cry for joy.” 
 
 - She did so on his neck, and, still clinging 
 there, laughed a little when she said, ‘‘I think 
 I am ready now for Thirdly, John.” 
 
 ‘«7 am ready for Thirdly,” said John, ‘ what- 
 ever itis.” > 
 
 ‘‘T believe, John,” pursued Bella, ‘that you 
 believe that I believe—” 
 
 ‘*My dear child,” cried her husband gayly, 
 “what a quantity of believing!” 
 
 } Tsn’t there ?” said Bella, with another laugh. 
 “‘T never knew such a quantity! It’s like verbs 
 in an exercise. But I can’t get on with less be- 
 lieving. I'll try again. I believe, dear John, 
 that you believe that I believe that we have as 
 much money as we require, and that we want 
 for nothing.” 
 
 “Jt is strictly true, Bella.” 
 
 ‘¢But if our money should by any means be 
 rendered not so much—if we had to stint our- 
 selves a little in purchases that we can af- 
 ford to make now — would you still have the 
 same confidence in my being quite contented, 
 John ?” 
 
 ‘« Precisely the same confidence, my soul.” 
 
 “Thank you, John dear, thousands upon 
 thousands of times. And I may take it for 
 granted, no doubt,” with a little faltering, ‘that 
 you would be quite as contented yourself, John ? 
 But, yes, I know I may. For, knowing: that I 
 should be so, how surely I may know that you 
 would be so; you who are so much stronger, and 
 firmer, and more reasonable and more generous, 
 than I am.” 
 
 <¢ Hush!” said her husband, ‘‘I must not hear 
 that. You are all wrong there, though other- 
 wise as right ascanbe. And now J] am brought 
 to a little piece of news, my dearest, that I might 
 have told you earlier in the evening. 1 have 
 strong reason for confidently believing that we 
 
 shall never be in the receipt of a smaller income 
 than our present income,” 
 
 She might have shown herself more interested 
 in the intelligence; but she had returned to the 
 investigation of the coat-button that had engaged 
 her attention a few hours before, and scarcely 
 seemed to heed what he said. 
 
 -¢ And now we have got to the bottom of it at 
 last,” cried her husband, rallying her, ‘‘ and this 
 is the thing that made you serious?” 
 
 ‘No, dear,” said Bella, twisting the button 
 and shaking her head, ‘‘it wasn’t this.” 
 
 ‘Why then, Lord bless this little wife of 
 mine, there’s a Fourthly!” exclaimed John. 
 
 “This worried me a little, and so did Second- 
 ly,” said Bella, occupied with the button, ‘‘ but 
 it was quite another sort of seriousness—a much 
 
 ‘deeper and quieter sort of seriousness—that I 
 
 _spoke of, John dear.” 
 
 As he bent his face to hers, she raised hers to 
 meet it, and laid her little right hand on his 
 eyes and kept it there... 
 
 ‘*Do you remember, John, on the day we 
 were married, Pa’s speaking of the ships that 
 might be sailing toward us from the unknown 
 seas ?” 
 ~ “Perfectly, my darling!” 
 
 _ J think......among them......there is a ship 
 
 - upon the ocean......bringing......to you and me 
 
  ,,..ee2 little baby, John.” 
 
 19 
 
 | 297 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 A CRY FOR HELP. 
 
 Tur Paper Mill had stopped work for the 
 night, and the paths and roads in its neighbor- 
 hood were sprinkled with clusters of people going 
 home from their day’s labor in it. There were 
 men, women, and children in the groups, and 
 there was no want of lively color to flutter in 
 the gentle evening wind. The mingling of 
 various voices and the sound of laughter made 
 a cheerful impression upon the ear, analogous 
 to that of the fluttering colors upon the eye. 
 Into the sheet of water reflecting the flushed sky 
 in the fore-ground of the living picture, a‘knot 
 of urchins were casting stones, and watching the 
 expansion of the rippling circles. So, in the 
 rosy evening, one might watch the ever-widen- 
 ing beauty of the landscape—beyond the newly- 
 released workers wending home — beyond the 
 silver river—beyond the deep green fields of 
 corn, so prospering, that the loiterers in their 
 narrow threads of pathway seemed to float im- 
 mersed breast-high—beyond the hedge-rows and 
 the clumps of trees—beyond the wind-mills on 
 the ridge—away to where the sky appeared to 
 meet the earth, as if there were no immensity 
 of space between mankind and Heaven. 
 
 It was a Saturday evening, and at such a time 
 the village dogs, always much more interested 
 in the doings of-humanity than in the affairs of 
 their own species, were particularly active. At 
 the general shop, at the butcher's and at the 
 public house, they evinced an inquiring spirit 
 never to be satiated ‘Their especial interest m 
 the public house would seem to imply some la- 
 tent rakishness in the canine character ; for lit- 
 tle was eaten there, and they, having no taste 
 for beer or tobacco (Mrs. Hubbard’s dog is said 
 to have smoked, but proof is wanting), could 
 only have been attracted by sympathy with loose 
 convivial habits. Moreover, a most wretched 
 fiddle played within; a fiddle so unutterably 
 vile, that one lean long-bodied cur, with a better 
 ear than the rest, found himself under compul- 
 sion at intervals to go round the corner and 
 howl. Yet even he returned to the public 
 house on each occasion with the tenacity of a 
 confirmed drunkard. 
 
 Fearful to relate, there was even a sort of lit- 
 tle Fair in the village. Some despairing ginger- 
 bread that had been vainly trying to dispose of 
 itself all over the country, and had cast a quan- 
 tity of dust upon its head in its mortification, 
 again appealed to the public from an infirm 
 booth. So did a heap of nuts, long, long exiled 
 from Barcelona, and yet speaking English so in- 
 differently as to call fourteen of themselves a 
 pint. A Peep-show which had originally start- 
 ed with the Battle of Waterloo, and had since 
 made it every other battle of later date by alter- 
 ing the Duke of Wellington’s nose, tempted the 
 student of illustrated history. A Fat Lady, per- 
 haps in part sustained upon postponed pork, her 
 professional associate being a Learned Pig, dis- 
 played her life-size picture in a low dress as she 
 appeared when presented at Court, several yards 
 round. All this was vicious spectacle as any 
 poor idea of amusement on the part of the rough- 
 er hewers of wood and drawers of water in this 
 land of England ever is and shall be. ‘They 
 must not vary. the rheumatism with amusement. 
 
Fi 
 
 298 ae 
 They may vary it with fever and ague, or with 
 as many rheumatic variations as they have 
 joints; but positively not with entertainment 
 after their own manner. 
 
 The various sounds arising from this scene of 
 depravity, and floating away into the still even- 
 ing air, made the evening, at any point which 
 they just reached fitfully, mellowed by the dis- 
 tance, more still by contrast. Such was the 
 stillness of the evening to Eugene Wrayburn, as 
 he walked by the river with his hands behind him. 
 
 He walked slowly, and with the measured step 
 and preoccupied air of one who was waiting. 
 He walked between the two points, an osier-bed 
 at this end and some floating lilies at that, and 
 at each point stopped and looked expectantly in 
 one direction. 
 
 “It is very quiet,’’ said he. 
 
 It was very quiet. Some sheep were grazing 
 on the grass by the river-side, and it seemed to 
 him that he had never before heard the crisp 
 tearing sound with which they cropped it. He 
 stopped idly, and looked at them. 
 
 ‘You are stupid enough, I suppose. But if 
 you are clever enough to get through life toler- 
 ably tg your satisfaction, you have got the better 
 of me, Man as I am, and Mutton as you are!” 
 
 A rustle in a field beyond the hedge attracted 
 his attention. ‘*What’s here to do?” he asked 
 himself, leisurely going toward the gate and look- 
 ingover. ‘‘Nojealous paper-miller? No pleas- 
 ures of the chase in this part of the country? 
 Mostly fishing hereabouts !”” 
 
 The field had been newly mown, and there 
 were yet the marks of the scythe on the yellow- 
 green ground, and the track of wheels where the 
 hay had been. carried. Following the tracks 
 with his eyes, the view closed with the new hay- 
 rick in a corner. 
 
 Now, if he had gone on to the hayrick, and 
 gone round it? But, say that the event was to 
 ve, as the event fell out, and how idle are such 
 suppositions! Besides, if he had gone; what is 
 there of warning in a Bargeman lying on his 
 face ? 
 
 ‘A bird flying to the hedge,” was all he 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 thought about it; and came back, and resumed 
 his walk. 
 
 “¢Tf J had not a reliance on her being truth- 
 ful,” said Eugene, after taking some half dozen 
 turns, ‘‘I should begin to think she had given 
 me the slip for the second time. But she prom- 
 ised, and she is a girl of her word.” 
 
 Turning again at the water-lilies, he saw her 
 coming, and advanced to meet her. 
 
 “‘T was saving to myself, Lizzie, that you 
 were sure to come, though you were late.” 
 
 “‘T had to linger through the village as if I 
 had no object before me, and I had to speak to 
 several people in passing along, Mr. Wray- 
 burn.” 
 
 ‘< Are the lads of the village—and the ladies 
 —stuch scandal-mongers ?”’ he asked, as he took 
 her hand and drew it through his arm. 
 
 She submitted to walk slowly on, with down- 
 cast eyes. He put her hand to his lips, and she 
 quietly drew it away. 
 
 ‘¢Will you walk beside me, Mr. Wrayburn, 
 and not touch me?” For his arm was already 
 stealing round her waist. | 
 
 She stopped again, and gave him an earnest, 
 supplicating look. ‘‘ Well, Lizzie, well!” said 
 
 he, in an easy way though ill at ease with him- 
 self, ‘“‘don’t be unhappy, don’t be reproachful.” 
 
 ‘*T can not help being unhappy, but I do not 
 mean to be reproachful. Mr. Wrayburn, I im- 
 
 plore you to go away from this neighborhood . 
 
 to-morrow morning.” 
 
 ‘‘Lizzie, Lizzie, Lizzie!” he remonstrated. 
 ‘* As well be reproachful as wholly unreasonable, 
 I can’t go away.” 
 
 ‘“Why not?” 
 
 “Faith!” said Eugene, in his airily candid 
 manner. ‘‘ Because you won't let me. Mind! 
 I don’t mean to be reproachful either. I don’t 
 complain that you design to keep mehere. But 
 you do it, you do it.” 
 
 ‘‘ Will you walk beside me, and not tonch 
 me,” for his arm was coming about her again; 
 ‘*while I speak to you yery seriously, Mr. Wray- 
 burn ?” 
 
 ‘<T will do any thing within the limits of pos- 
 
 sibility for you, Lizzie,” he answered with pleas- 
 ant gayety as he folded his arms. ‘‘See here! 
 Napoleon Bonaparte at St. Helena.” 
 
 ‘¢ When you spoke to me as I came from the 
 Mill the night before last,” said Lizzie, fixing 
 
 ‘her eyes upon him with the look of supplication 
 
 which troubled his better nature, ‘‘ you told me 
 
 |that you were much surprised to see me, and 
 
 that you were on a Solitary fishing excursion. 
 Was it true ?” 
 
 “‘It was not,” replied Eugene, composedly, 
 ‘in the least true. I came here because I had 
 information that I should find you here.” 
 
 **Can you imagine why I left London, Mr. 
 Wrayburn ?” 
 
 ‘‘T am afraid, Lizzie,’ he openly answered, 
 ‘*that you left London to get rid of me. It is 
 not flattering to my self-love, but I am afraid 
 you did.” 
 
 “T did.” 
 
 “ How could you be so cruel ?” 
 
 ‘*Q Mr. Wrayburn,” she answered, suddenly 
 breaking into tears, ‘‘is the cruelty on my side! 
 O Mr. Wrayburn, Mr. Wrayburn, is there no 
 cruelty in your being here to-night!” 
 
 ‘Tn the name of all that’s good—and that is 
 not conjuring you in my own name, for Heaven 
 knows I am not good”—said Eugene, don’t be 
 distressed !” 
 
 ‘¢ What else can I be, when I know the dis- 
 tance and the difference between us? What 
 else can I be, when to tell me why you came 
 here is to put me to shame!” said Lizzie, cov- 
 ering her face. 
 
 He looked at her with a real sentiment of re- 
 morseful tenderness and pity. It was not strong 
 enough to impel him to sacrifice himself and 
 spare her, but it was a strong emotion. 
 
 ‘¢ Lizzie! I never thought before that there 
 was a woman in the world who could affect me 
 so much by saying so little. But don’t be hard 
 in your construction of me. You don’t know 
 what my state of mind toward you is. 
 don’t know how you haunt me and bewilder me. 
 
 You” 
 
 ou don’t know how the cursed carelessness that _ 
 
 js over-officious in helping me at every other 
 turning of my life, won’r help me here. You 
 have struck it dead, I think, and I sometimes al- 
 
 ost wish you had struck me dead along with it.” 
 
 _ She had not been prepared for such passion- _ 
 
 ate expressions, and they awakened some nat- 
 
 ural sparks of feminine pride and joy in her 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 breast. To consider, wrong as he was, that he | 
 could care so much for her, and that she had 
 the power to move him so! 
 
 ‘It grieves you to see me distressed, Mr. 
 Wrayburn ; it gricves me to see you distressed. 
 1 don’t reproach you. Indeed I don’t reproach 
 you. You have not felt this as I feel it, being 
 so different from me, and beginning from an- 
 other point of view. You have not thought. But 
 I entreat you to think now, think now !’” 
 
 ‘“What am I to think of?” asked Eugene, 
 bitterly. | 
 
 ‘¢Think of me.” 
 
 ‘<Tell me how not to think of you, Lizzie, and 
 you'll change me altogether.” 
 
 “‘T don’t mean in that way. Think of me as 
 belonging to another station, and quite cut off 
 from you in honor. Remember that I have no 
 protector near me, unless I have one in your 
 noble heart. Respect my good name. If you 
 feel toward me, in one particular, as you might 
 if I was a lady, give me the full claims of a lady 
 upon your generous behavior. I am removed 
 from you and your family by being a working 
 girl. How true a gentleman to be as consid- 
 erate of me as if I was removed by being a 
 Queen !” 
 
 He would have been base indeed to have stood 
 untouched. by her appeal. His face expressed 
 contrition and indecision as he asked : 
 
 ‘¢Have I injured you so much, Lizzie ?”, 
 
 ‘‘No, no. You may set. me quite right. I 
 ‘don’t speak of the past, Mr. Wrayburn, but of 
 the present and the future. Are we not here | 
 now, because through two days you have fol- 
 lowed me so closely where there are so many 
 eyes to see you, that I consented to this appoint- 
 ment as an escape ?” 
 
 ‘< Again, not very flattering to my self-love,” 
 said Eugene, moodily; ‘‘but yes. Yes. Yes.” 
 
 ‘*Then I beseech you, Mr. Wrayburn, I beg 
 and pray you, leave this neighborhood. If you 
 do not, consider to what you will drive me.” 
 
 He did consider within himself for a moment | 
 or two, and then retorted, “Drive you? To° 
 what shall I drive you, Lizzie?” 
 
 ‘¢You will drive me away. I live here peace- 
 fully and respected, and I am well employed 
 here. You will force mé to quit this place as I 
 quitted London, and—-by following me again— | 
 will force me to quit the next place in which I 
 may find refuge, as I quitted this.” 
 
 «Are you so determined, Lizzie—forgive the | 
 word [ am going to use, for its literal truth—to | 
 fly from a lover ?” 
 
 ‘‘T am so determined,” she answered reso- | 
 -Jutely, though trembling, ‘to fly from such a 
 lover. There was a poor woman died here but a 
 ‘little while ago, scores of years older than I 
 am, whom I found by chance, Iving on the wet 
 earth. You may have heard some account of 
 her?” 
 
 *‘T think I have,” he answered, ‘‘if her name 
 was Higden.” 
 
 '. Her name was Higden. Though she was so 
 weak and old, she kept true to one purpose to 
 the very last. Even at the very last, she made 
 me promise that her purpose should be kept to, 
 after she was dead, so settled was her determin- 
 ation. What she did, I can.do. Mr. Wray- 
 burn, if I believed—but I do not believe—that 
 you could be so cruel to me as to drive me from 
 
 —\— 
 
 ‘looked at me so attentively ? 
 
 299 
 
 place to place to wear me out, you should drive 
 me to death and not do it.” , 
 
 He looked full at her handsome face, and in 
 his own handsome face there was a light of blend- 
 ed admiration, anger, and reproach, which she 
 —who loved him so in secret—whose heart had 
 long been so full, and he the cause of its over- 
 flowing—drooped before. She tried hard to re- 
 tain her firmness, but he saw it melting away 
 under his eyes. In the moment of its dissolu- 
 tion, and of his first full knowledge of his influ- 
 ence upon her, she dropped, and he caught her 
 on his arm. 
 
 “ Lizzie§ Rest soa moment. Answer what 
 I ask you. IfI had not been what you call re-. 
 moved from you and cut off from you, would 
 you have made this ‘appeal to me to leave you?” 
 
 ‘I don’t know, I don’t know. Don’t ask me, 
 Mr. Wrayburn. Let me go back.” 
 
 ‘“‘T swear to you, Lizzie, you shall go direct- 
 ly. I swear to you, you shall go alone. [ll not 
 accompany you, I'll not follow you, if you will 
 reply.” 
 
 ‘¢How can I, Mr. Wrayburn? How can I 
 tell you what I should have done if you had not 
 been what you are ?” i 
 
 ‘¢Tf I had not been what you make me out to 
 be,” he struck in, skillfully changing the form 
 of words, ‘‘ would you still have hated me ?” 
 
 ‘©( Mr. Wrayburn,” she replied appealingly, 
 and weeping, ‘‘ you know me better than to think 
 Ido!” 
 
 “Tf J had not been what you make me out to 
 be, Lizzie, would you still have been indifferent 
 to me?” 
 
 ‘©(Q Mr. Wrayburn,” she answered as before, 
 ‘¢you know me better than that too!” 
 
 There was something in the attitude of her 
 whole figure as he supported it, and she hung 
 her head, which besought him to be merciful 
 and not force her to disclose her heart. He was 
 
 not merciful with her, and he made her do it. 
 
 ‘If I know you better than quite to believe 
 (unfortunate dog that I am!) that you hate me, 
 or even that you are wholly indiffercnt to me, 
 
 | Lizzie, let me know so much more from your- 
 
 self before we separate, Let me know how you 
 would have dealt with me if you had regarded 
 
 -me as being what you would have considered 
 
 on equal terms with you.” 
 
 ‘‘Tt is impossible, Mr. Wrayburn. How can 
 I think of you as being on equal terms with me? 
 If my mind could put you on equal terms with 
 me, you could not be yourself. How could I 
 remember, then, the night when I first saw you, 
 and when I went out of the room because you 
 Or, the night that 
 passed into the morning when you broke to me 
 that my father was dead? Or, the nights when 
 
 | you used to come to see me at my next home? 
 
 Or, your having known how uninstructed I was, 
 and having caused me to be taught. better? Or, 
 my having so looked up to you and wondered at 
 you, and at first thought you so good to be at 
 all mindful of me?” 
 
 ‘Only ‘at first? thought me so good, Lizzie? 
 What did you think me after ‘at first?’ So bad ?” 
 
 ‘‘[ don’t say that. I don’t mean that. But 
 after the first wonder and pleasure of being no- 
 ticed by one so different from any one who had 
 ever spoken to me, I began to feel that it might 
 have been better if I had never seen you.” 
 
300 
 
 \ 
 
 “¢°Why ?” 
 
 ‘* Because you were so different,” she answered 
 in a lower voice. ‘‘ Because it was so endless, 
 so hopeless. Spare me!” 
 
 **Did you think for me at all, Lizzie?” he 
 asked, as if he were a little stung. 
 
 ‘*Not much, Mr. Wrayburn. Not much un- 
 til to-night.” 
 
 *¢ Will you tell me why ?” 
 
 “‘T never supposed until to-night that you 
 needed to be thought for. But if you do need 
 to be; if you do truly feel at heart that you have 
 indeed been toward me what you have called 
 yourself to-night, and that there is nothing for 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 nor follow you. 
 
 aN RS 4 
 SSN LS 
 
 THE PARTING BY THE RIVER, 
 
 us in this life but separation; then Heaven help 
 you, and Heaven bless you!” 
 
 The purity with which in these words she ex- 
 pressed something of her own love and her own 
 suffering, made a deep impression on him for 
 the passing time. He held her, almost as if she 
 were sanctified to him by death, and kissed her, 
 once, almost as he might have kissed the dead. 
 
 ‘“T promised that I would not accompany you, 
 Shall I keep you in view? You 
 have been agitated, and it’s growing dark.” 
 
 ‘‘T am used to be out alone at this hour, and 
 T entreat you not to doso.” hia 
 
 ‘“‘T promise. J can bring myself to promise 
 
 a 
 
; 
 i 
 
 + 
 
 - nothing more to-night, Lizzie, except that I will 
 try what I can do” 
 
 ‘There is but one means, Mr. Wrayburn, of 
 sparing yourself and of sparing me, every way. 
 Leave this neighborhood to-morrow morning.” 
 
 “¢T will try.” ) 
 
 As he spoke the words in a grave voice, she 
 put her hand in his, removed it, and went away 
 by the river-side. 
 
 ‘¢Now, could Mortimer believe this?” mur- 
 mured Eugene, still’ remaining, after a while, 
 where she had left him. ‘‘Can 1 even believe 
 it myself?” 
 
 Ue referred to the circumstance that there 
 were tears upon his hand, as he stood covering 
 
 -his eyes. ‘‘A most ridiculous position this to 
 be found out in!” was his next thonght. And 
 his next struck its root in a little rising resent- 
 ment against the cause of the tears. 
 
 ‘¢Yet I have gained a wonderful power over 
 her, too, let her be as much in earnest as she 
 will!” ae 
 
 The reflection brought back the yielding of 
 her face and form as she had drooped under 
 his gaze. Contemplating the reproduction, he 
 seemed to see, for the second time, in the ap- 
 peal and in the confession of weakness, a little 
 fear. 
 
 *¢ And she loves me. And so earnest a char- 
 cacter must be very earnest in that passion. She 
 ‘ean not choose for herself to be strong in this 
 fancy, wavering in that, and weak in the other’ 
 She must go through with her nature, as I must 
 go through with mine. If mine exacts its pains 
 and penalties all round, so must hers, I sup- 
 pose.” 
 
 Pursuing the inquiry into his own nature, he 
 thought, *‘ Now, if I married her. If, outfacing 
 the absurdity of the situation in correspondence 
 with M. R. F., I astonished M. R. F. to the ut- 
 most extent of his respected powers, by inform- 
 ing him that I had married her, how would M. 
 R. F. reason with the legal mind? ‘You wouldn't 
 marry for some money and some station, because 
 you were frightfully likely to become bored. Are 
 you less frightfully likely to become bored, mar- 
 rying for no money and no station? Are you 
 sure of yourself?’ egal mind, in spite of fo- 
 rensic protestations, must secretly admit, ‘Good 
 reasoning on the part of M. R. F. Noé sure of 
 myself.’ ” 
 
 In the very act of calling this tone of levity to 
 his aid he felt it to be profligate and worthless, 
 and asserted her against it. 
 
 ‘¢And yet,” said Eugene, ‘“‘I should like to 
 see the fellow (Mortimer excepted) who would 
 undertake to tell me that this was not a real 
 sentiment on my part, won out of me by her 
 beauty and her worth, in spite of myself, and 
 that I would not be true to her. I should par- 
 ticularly like to see thé fellow to-night who would 
 tell me so, or who would tell.me any thing that 
 could be construed to her disadvantage; for I 
 am wearily out of sorts with one Wrayburn who 
 ents a sorry figure, and I would far rather be 
 out of sorts with somebody else. ‘Eugene, Enu- 
 gene, Eugene, this is a bad business.’ Ah! So 
 go the Mortimer Lightwood bells, and they sound 
 melancholy to-night.” 
 
 Strolling on, he thought of something else to 
 take himself to task for. ‘‘ Where is the analo- 
 gy, Brute Beast,” he said impatiently, ‘ between 
 
 \ 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 ¥irty a : 
 301 
 
 ‘a woman whom your father coolly finds out for 
 you and a woman whom you have found out for 
 yourself, and have ever drifted after with more 
 and more of constancy since you first set eyes 
 upon her? Ass! Can you reason no better 
 than that?” 
 
 But again he subsided into a reminiscence of 
 his first full knowledge of his power just now, 
 and of her disclosure of her heart. ‘To try no 
 more to go away, and to try her again, was the 
 xeckless conclusion it turned uppermost. And 
 yet again, ‘‘ Eugene, Eugene, Eugene, this is a 
 bad business!” And, ‘*I wish I could stop the 
 Lightwood peal, for it sounds like a knell.” 
 
 Looking above, he found that the young moon | 
 
 was up, and that the stars were beginning to 
 shine in the sky from which the tones of red and 
 
 yellow were flickering out, in favor of the calm 
 blue of a summer night. He was still by the 
 river-side. Turning suddenly, he met a man so 
 close upon him that Eugene, surprised, stepped 
 back to avoid a collision. The man carried 
 something over his shoulder which might have 
 been a broken oar, or spar, or bar, and took no 
 notice of him, but passed on. 
 
 ‘“Halloa, friend!” said Eugene, calling after 
 him, ‘¢are you blind?” 
 
 The man made no reply, but went his way. 
 
 Eugene Wrayburn went the opposite way, with 
 his hands behind him and his purpose in his 
 thoughts. He passed the sheep, and passed the 
 gate, and came within hearing of the village 
 sounds, and came to the bridge. »The inn where 
 he staid, like the village and the Mill, was not 
 across the river, but on that side of the stream 
 on which he walked. However, knowing the 
 rushy bank and the back-water on the other 
 side to be a retired place, and feeling out of hu- 
 mor for noise or company, he crossed the bridge 
 and sauntered on: looking up ar the stars as 
 they seemed one by one to be kindled in the 
 sky, and looking down at the river as the same 
 stars seemed to be kindled deep in the water. 
 A landing-place overshadowed by a willow, and 
 a pleasure-boat lying moored there among somé 
 stakes, caught his eye as he passed along. The 
 
 Se 
 
 spot was in such dark shadow that he paused to _ 
 
 make out what was there, and then passed on 
 again. 
 
 The rippling of the river seemed to cause a 
 correspondent stir in his uneasy reflections. He 
 would have laid them asleep if he could, bat 
 they were in movement, like the stream, and all 
 tending one way with a strong current. As the 
 ripple under the moon broke unexpectedly now 
 and then, and palely flashed in a new shape and 
 with a new sound, so part of his thoughts start- 
 ed, unbidden, from the rest, and revealed their 
 wickedness. ‘‘Qut of the question to marry 
 her,” said Eugene, ‘¢and out of the question to 
 leave her. The crisis !”’ ; 
 
 He had sauntered far enough, Before turn- 
 ing to retrace his steps he stopped upon the 
 margin to look down at the reflected night. In 
 an instant, with a dreadful crash, the reflected 
 night turned crooked, flames shot jaggedly across 
 the air, and the moon and stars came bursting 
 from the sky. 
 
 Was he struck by lightning? With some in- 
 coherent, half-formed thought to that effect, he 
 turned under the blows that were blinding him 
 and mashing his life, and closed with a murder- 
 
} She had meditated ‘and taken comfort. 
 
 = bank much and newly trodden, where there lay 
 
 “the bank was bloody. 
 
 x 
 
 a ® 
 
 “even through the deep dark shadow, the sculls 
 wan a rack against the red-brick garden-wall. 
 
 \ 
 
 ‘the quiet of ‘the night. 
 
 ’ that the grass was bloody. Following the drops 
 
 302 
 
 er, whom he caught by a red neckerchief—un- 
 less the raining down of his own blood gave it 
 that hue. 
 
 Eugene was light, active, and expert; but his 
 arms were broken, or he was paralyzed, and 
 could do no more than hang on to the man, with 
 his head swung back, so that he could see ng- 
 thing but the heaving sky. After dragging at 
 the assailant, he fell on the b@k with him, and 
 then there was another great crash, and then a 
 splash, and all was done. 
 
 Lizzie Hexam, too, had avoided the noise, and 
 
 “the Saturday movement of people in the strag- 
 
 gling street, and chose to walk alone by the wa- 
 ter until her tears should be dry, and she could 
 so compose herself as to escape remark upon her 
 looking ill or unhappy on going home. The; 
 peaceful serenity of the hour and place, having 
 
 no-reproaches or evil intentions within her breast. 
 
 to contend against, sank healingly into its depths. 
 She, 
 too, was turning homeward when she heard a 
 strange sound. 
 _ It startled her, for it was like a sound of 
 blows. She stood still and listened. It sick- 
 ened her, for blows fell heavily and cruelly on 
 As she listened, unde- 
 cided, all was silent. As she yet listened, she 
 heard a faint groan and a fall into the river. 
 
 Her old bold life and habit instantly inspired 
 her. Without vain waste of breath in crying 
 for help where there were none to hear, she ran 
 toward the spot from which the sounds had 
 come. It lay between her and the bridge, but 
 it was more removed from her than she had 
 thought; the night being so very quiet, and 
 sound traveling far with the help of water. 
 
 At length she reached a part of the green 
 
 some broken splintered pieces of wood and some 
 torn fragments of clothes. Stooping, she saw 
 
 and smears, she saw that the watery margin of 
 Following the current 
 with her eyes, she saw a bloody face turned up 
 toward the moon and drifting away. 
 
 Now merciful Heaven be thanked for that old 
 time, and grant, O Blessed Lord, that through 
 thy wonderful workings it may turn to good at 
 ast! ‘To whomsoever the drifting face belongs, 
 be it man’s or woman’s, help my humble hands, 
 Lord God, to raise it from death and restore it 
 to some one to whom it must be dear! 
 
 It was thought, fervently thonght, but not for 
 a moment did the prayer check her. She was 
 away before it welled up in her mind, away, 
 swift and true, yet steady above all-—for without 
 steadiness it could n 
 ing-place under the willow-tree, where she also 
 had seen the boat lying moored among the 
 stakes.. 
 
 A sure touch of her old practiced hand, a sure 
 step of her old practiced foot, a sure light bal- 
 ance of her body, and she was in the boat. 
 quick glance of ler practiced eve showed her, 
 
 Another moment and she had cast off (taking 
 
 _ the line with her), and the boat had shot out 
 
 into the moonlight, and she was rowing down 
 the stream as never other woman rowed on En- 
 glish water. 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 re 
 
 Intently over her shoulder, without slackening 
 speed, she looked ahead for the drivi ing face. 
 She passed the scene of the struggle—yonder it 
 was, on her left, well over th 
 passed on her right the end of the village street,. 
 a hilly street that almost dipped into the river; 
 its sounds were growing faint again, and she 
 slackened; looking as the boat drove every 
 where, ever y where for the floating face. 
 
 She merely kept the boat before the stream 
 now, and rested on her oar s, knowing well that 
 if the face were not soon visible it had gone 
 down, and she would overshoot it. An un- 
 trained sight.would never have seen by the moon- 
 light what she saw_at the Jength_ of a few strokes 
 
 enssnr Arenn aenimncs e 
 
 astern. She saw ‘the drowning figure rise to the 
 surface, slighfly-struggle, and as if by instinet 
 turn over on its back to float. Just so had she 
 first dimly seen the face which she now dimly 
 saw again. 4- 
 
 Firm of look and firm of purpose, she intent- 
 hy watched its coming on, until it was very near 3 
 then, with a touch, “anshipped her sculls, and 
 crept aft in the boat, between kneeling and 
 crouching. Once, she let the body evade her, 
 not being sure of her grasp. Twice, and she 
 had seized it by its bloody hair. 
 
 It was insensible, if not virtually dead ; it was 
 mutilated, and streaked the water all about it 
 with dark red streaks. As it could not help it- 
 self, it was impossible for her to get it on board, 
 
 e_boat’s stern—she © 
 
 She bent over the stern to secure it with the« 
 
 line, and then the river and its shores rang to 
 the terrible ery she uttered. 
 
 But, as if possessed by supernatural spirit poke 
 strength, she lashed_it safe, resumed her. sea 
 and rowed in, desperately, for the nearest we 
 low water w Here she might run the boat aground. 
 Desperately, but not wildly, for she knew that 
 if she lost distinctness of intention all was lost 
 and gone. 
 
 She ran the boat ashore, went into the water, 
 released him from the line, and by main strength 
 lifted him in her arms and laid him in the bot- 
 tom of the boat. He had fearful wounds upon 
 
 him, and she bound them up with her dress torn , 
 
 into strips. Else, supposing him to be still alive, 
 she foresaw that he must bleed to death before 
 he could be landed at his inn, which was the 
 nearest place for succor. 
 
 This done very rapidly, she kissed his disfig- 
 ured forehead, looked up in angnish to the stars, 
 and blessed him and forgave him, ‘if she had 
 any thing to forgive.” It was only in that in- 
 stant that she thought of hersclf, and then she 
 thonght of herself only for him. 
 
 Now, merciful Heaven be thanked for that 
 old time, enabling me, without a wasted ngo- 
 ment, to have got the boat afloat again, and to 
 yew back against the stream! And grant, O 
 lessed Lord God, that through poor me he may 
 »e raised from death, and preserved to some one 
 Ise to whom he may be dear one day, though 
 ever dearer than to me! 
 
 She rowed hard—rowed desperately, but nev r 
 wildly—and seldom removed her eyes from hii 
 in the bottom of the boat. She had so laid him 
 there, as that she might see his disfigured face; 
 it was so much disfigured that his mother might 
 have covered it, but it was above and beyand 
 disfigurement in her eyes. 
 
 The boat touched the edge of the patch of i 
 
 ie 
 ¥ 
 
 { 
 
Yi, tgs 
 
 lawn, sloping gently to the water. ‘There were 
 ‘lights in the windows, but there chanced to be 
 no one out of doors. She made the boat fast, 
 and again by main strength took him up, and 
 
 ~ never laid him down until she laid him down in 
 
 the house. 
 
 Surge6ns were sent for, and she sat support- 
 ing his head. . She had oftentimes heard in days 
 that were gone how doctors would lift the hand 
 of an insensible wounded person, and would 
 drop it if the person were dead. She waited 
 for the awful moment when the doctors might 
 lift this hand, all broken and bruised, and let it 
 
 fall. 
 
 The first of the surgeons came, and asked, 
 before proceeding to his examination, ‘‘ Who 
 brought him in?” 
 
 ‘‘T brought him in, Sir,” answered Lizzie, at 
 whom all present looked. 
 
 ‘¢You, my dear? You could not lift, far less 
 carry, this weight.” 
 
 ‘‘T think I could not, at another time, 
 but I am sure I did.” 
 
 The surgeon looked at her with great atten- 
 tion, and with some compassion. Having with 
 a grave face touched the wounds upon the head, 
 
 _. and the broken arms, he took the hand. 
 
 O! would he let it drop? 
 
 He appeared irresolute. He did not retain 
 it, but laid it gently down, took a candle, looked 
 
 ~more closely at the injuries on the head, and at 
 the pupils of the eyes. That done, he replaced 
 the candle and took the hand again. Another 
 ‘surgeon then coming in, the two exchanged a 
 whisper, and the second took the hand. Nei- 
 ther did he let it fall at once, but kept it for a 
 while and laid it gently down. 
 
 ‘“ Attend to the poor girl,” said the first sur- 
 geon then. ‘*She is quite unconscious. She 
 sees nothing and hears nothing. All the better 
 for her! Don’t rouse her, if you can help it; 
 only move her. Poor girl, poor girl! She must 
 be amazingly strong of heart, but it is much to 
 be feared that she has set her heart upon the 
 dead. Be gentle with her.” 
 
 a 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 BETTER TO BE ABEL THAN CAIN. 
 Day was breaking at Plashwater Weir Mill 
 
 . Lock. Stars were yet visible, but there was dull 
 
 light in the east that was not the light of night. 
 The moon had gone down, and a mist crept 
 along the banks of the river, seen through which 
 the trees were the ghosts of trees, and the water 
 wag the ghost of water. This earth looked 
 spectral, and so did the pale stars: while the 
 cold eastern glare, expressionless as to heat or 
 color, with the eye of the firmament quenched, 
 
 might have been likened to the stare of the | 
 
 dead. 
 
 Perhaps it was so likened by the lonely Barge- 
 man, standing on the brink of the lock. . For 
 -eertain, Bradley Headstone looked that way, 
 when a chill air came up, and when it passed 
 on murmuring, as if it whispered something that 
 made the phantom trees and water tremble—or 
 threaten—for fancy might have made it either. 
 
 He turned away, and tried the Lock-house 
 door. It was fastened on the inside. 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 Sir ij 
 
 302 
 
 “*& Is he afraid of me?” he muttered, knocking. 
 
 Rogue Riderhood was soon roused, and soon 
 undrew the bolt and let him in. 
 
 ‘¢Why, T’otherest, I thought you had been 
 and got lost! ‘T'wo nights away! I a’most be- 
 lieved as you’d giv’ me the slip, and I had as 
 good as half a mind for to advertise you in the 
 newspapers to come for’ard.” 
 
 Bradley’s face turned so dark on this hint that 
 Riderhood deemed it expedient to soften it into 
 a compliment. 
 
 ‘‘But not you, governor, not you,” he went 
 on, stolidly shaking his head. ‘‘ For what did 
 I say to myself arter having amused myself with 
 that there stretch of a comic idea, as a sort of a 
 playful game? Why, I says to myself, ‘ He’s a 
 man o’ honor.’ That’s what J says to myself. 
 ‘He's a man o’ double honor.’ ” 
 
 Very remarkably, Riderhood put no question 
 to him. He had looked at him on opening the 
 door, and he now looked at him again (stealthily 
 this time), and the result of his looking was, that 
 he asked him no question. 
 
 ‘¢ You'll be for another forty on’em, governor, 
 as I judges, afore you turns your mind to break- 
 fast,” said Riderhood, when his visitor sat down, 
 resting his chin on his hand, with his eyes on the 
 ground. And very remarkably again: Rider 
 hood feigned to set the scanty furniture in or- 
 der, while he spoke, to have a show of reason for 
 not looking at him. 
 
 ‘Yes. I had better sleep, I think,” said 
 Bradley, without changing his position. 
 
 ‘‘T myself should recommend it, governor,” 
 assented Riderhood. ‘* Might you be anyways 
 dry ?” 
 
 ‘©Yes, I should like a drink,” said Bradley; 
 but without appearing to attend much. 
 
 Mr. Riderhood got out his bottle, and fetched 
 , his jugful of water, and administered a pota- 
 ‘tion. ‘Then he shook the coverlet of his bed and 
 spread it smooth, and Bradley stretched himself 
 upon it in the clothes he wore. Mr. Riderhood 
 poetically remarking that he would pick the 
 bones of his night’s rest, in his wooden chair, sat 
 in the window as before; but, as before. watched 
 the sleeper narrowly until he was very sound 
 asleep. Then he rose and looked at him close, 
 in the bright davlight, on every side, with great 
 minuteness. He went out to his Lock to sum 
 up what he had seen, 
 
 ‘¢One of his sleeves is tore right away below 
 the elber, and the t’other’s had a good rip at the 
 shoulder. He’s been hung on to, pretty tight, - 
 for. his shirt’s all tore out of the neck gathers. 
 He’s been in the grass, and he’s been in the wa- 
 ter. And he’s spotted, and I know with what, 
 and with whose. Hooroar!” 
 
 Bradley slept long. Early in the afternoon a 
 barge came down. Other barges had passed 
 through, both ways, before it; but the Lock- 
 keeper hailed only this particular barge for 
 news, as if he had made a time calculation with 
 some nicety. The men on board told him a 
 piece of news, and there was a lingering on 
 their part to enlarge upon it. 
 
 T\velve hours had intervened since Bradley’s 
 lying down, when he got up. | ‘‘ Not that I swal- 
 ler it,” said Riderhood, squinting at his Lock, 
 when he saw Bradley coming out of the house, 
 ‘Sas you've been a sleeping all the time, old 
 boy {37 
 
304 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 Bradley came to him, sitting on his wooden | a hitch of his head, as if-he disdainfully jerked 
 
 lever, and asked what o’clock it was? Rider- 
 hood told him it was between two and three. 
 
 ** When are you relieved ?” asked Bradley. 
 
 ** Day arter to-morrow, governor.” 
 
 ‘* Not sooner ?” 
 
 ** Not a inch sooner, governor.” 
 
 On both sides importance seemed attached to 
 this question of relief. Riderhood quite petted 
 his reply ; saying a second time, and prolonging 
 a negative roll of his head, ‘‘n—n—not a inch 
 sooner, governor.” 
 
 *‘Did I tell you I was going on to-night 2” 
 asked Bradley. 
 
 *“‘No, governor,” returned Riderhood, in a 
 cheerful, affable, and conversational manner, 
 “you did not tell me so. But most like you 
 meant to it and forgot to it. How, otherways, 
 could a doubt have come into your head about 
 it, governor ?” 
 
 ** As the sun 
 said Bradley. 
 
 **So much the more necessairy is a Peck,” 
 returned Riderhood. ‘‘Come in and have it, 
 T’otherest.”’ 
 
 The formality of spreading a tablecloth not 
 being observed in Mr. Riderhood’s establishment, 
 the serving of the ‘‘peck” was the affair of a 
 moment; it merely consisting in the handing 
 down of a capacious baking dish with three- 
 fourths of an immense meat pie in it, and the 
 production of two pocket-knives, an earthenware 
 mug, and a large brown bottle of beer, 
 
 Both ate and drank, but Riderhood much the 
 more abundantly. In lieu of plates, that honest 
 man cut two triangular pieces from the thick 
 erust of the pie, and laid them, inside upper- 
 most, upon the table: the one before himself, 
 and the other before his guest. Upon these 
 platters he placed two goodly portions of the 
 contents of the pie, thus imparting the unusual 
 interest to the entertainment that each partaker 
 scooped out the inside of his plate, and consumed 
 it with his other fare, besides having the sport 
 of pursuing the clots of congealed gravy over the 
 plain of the table, and successfully taking them 
 into his mouth at last from the blade, of his 
 knife, in case of their not first sliding off it. 
 
 Bradley Headstone was so remarkably awk- 
 ward at these exercises that the Rogue observed 
 it. 
 
 ‘Look out, T’otherest!” he cried, 
 cut your hand!” 
 
 But the caution came too late, for Bradley 
 gashed it at the instant. And, what was more 
 unlucky, in asking Riderhood to tie it up, and 
 in standing close to him for the purpose, he 
 shook his hand under the smart of the wound, 
 and shook blood over Riderhood’s dress. 
 
 When dinner was done, and when what re- 
 mained of the platters, and what remained of 
 the congealed gravy had been put back into 
 what remained of the pie, which served as an 
 economical investment for all miscellaneous sav- 
 ings, Riderhood filled the mug with beer. and 
 took a long drink. And now he did look at 
 Bradley, and with an evil eye. 
 
 **'T’otherest !” he said, hoarsely, as he bent 
 across the table to touch his arm. ‘‘ The news 
 has gone down the river afore you.” 
 
 ** What news ?”’ 
 
 “*Who do you think,” 
 
 goes down I intend to go on,” 
 
 “ you'll 
 
 the feint away, ‘‘picked up the body? Guess.” 
 
 “‘T am not good at guessing any thing.” 
 
 **She did. Hooroar ! 
 agin. She did.” 
 
 The convulsive twitching of Bradley Head- 
 stone’s face, and the sudden hot humor that 
 broke out upon it, showed how grimly the intel- 
 ligence touched him. But he said not a single 
 word, good or bad. He only smiled in a lower- 
 
 You had him there 
 
 ing manner, and got up and stood leaning at the - 
 
 window, looking through it. Riderhood follow- 
 ed him with his eyes. Riderhood cast down his 
 eyes on his own besprinkled clothes. Riderhood 
 began to have an air of being better at a guess 
 than Bradley owned to being. 
 
 ‘“‘T have been so long in want of rest,” said 
 the schoolmaster, ‘‘ that with your leave I’ll lie 
 down again.” 
 
 ‘* And welcome, T’otherest !” was the hospita- 
 ble answer of his host. He had laid himself 
 down without waiting for it, and he remained 
 upon the bed until the sun was low. When he 
 
 arose and came out to resume his journey he © 
 
 found his host waiting for him on the grass by 
 the towing-path outside the door. 
 
 ‘‘ Whenever it may be necessary that you and 
 I should have any further communication to- 
 gether,” said Bradley, ‘‘I willcome back. Good- 
 night!” 
 
 ‘* Well, since no better can be,” said Rider- 
 hood, turning on his heel, ‘‘Good-night!”” But 
 he turned again as the other set forth, and added 
 under his breath, looking after him with a leer: 
 ‘“You wouldn’t be let to go like that if my Re- 
 lief warn’t as good as come. I'll catch you up 
 in a mile.” 
 
 In a word, his real time of relief being that 
 evening at sunset, his mate came lounging in 
 within a quarter of an hour. Not staying to fill 
 up the utmost margin of his time, but borrowing 
 an hour or so, to be repaid again when he should 
 relieve his reliever, Riderhood. straightway fol- 
 lowed on the track of Bradley Headstone. 
 
 He was a better follower than Bradley. It 
 had been the calling of his life to slink and skulk 
 and dog and waylay, and he knew his calling 
 well. He effected such a forced march on lea 
 
 'ing the Lock House that he was. close up with 
 
 him—that is to say, as close up with him as he 
 deemed it convenient to be—before another Lock 
 was passed. His man looked back pretty often 
 as he went, but got no hint of him. He knew 
 how to take advantage of the ground, and where 
 
 to put the hedge between them, and where the 
 
 wall, and when to duck, and when to drop, and 
 had a thousand arts beyond the doomed Brad- 
 lev’s slow conception. 
 
 But all his arts were brought to a stand-still, 
 
 wo 
 
 like himself, when Bradley, turning into a green | 
 
 lane or riding by the river-side—a solitary spot 
 run wild in nettles, briers, and brambles, and 
 encumbered with the scathed trunks of a whole 
 hedgerow of felled trees, on the outskirts of a 
 little wood—began stepping on these trunks and 
 dropping down among them and stepping on 
 them again, apparently as a school-boy might 
 have done, but assuredly with no school-boy pur« 
 pose, or want of purpose. 
 
 ‘What are you up to?” muttered-Riderhood, 
 down in the ditch, and holding the hedge a lit- 
 
 % 
 
 said Riderhood, with | tle open with both hands. And soon his actions — 
 
‘ig 
 
 game!’ said Riderhood. 
 
 -With you, now. 
 
 made a most extraordinary reply. ‘‘ By George 
 and the Draggin !” cried Riderhood, ‘‘if he ain’t 
 a-going.to bathe !” 
 
 He had passed back, on and among the trunks 
 of trees again, and had passed on to the water- 
 side and had begun undressing on the grass. 
 For a moment it had a suspicious look of suicide, 
 arranged to counterfeit accident. ‘* But you 
 wouldn’t have fetched a bundle under your arm, 
 from among that timber, if-such was your 
 Nevertheless it was a 
 relief to him when the bather after a plunge and 
 a few strokes came out. ‘‘ For I shouldn't,” he 
 said in a feeling manner, ‘‘have liked to lose 
 you till I had made more money out of you 
 neither.”’ 
 
 Prone in another ditch (he had changed his 
 ditch as his man had changed his position), and 
 holding apart so small a patch of the hedge that 
 the sharpest eyes could not have detected him, 
 Rogue Riderhood watched the bather dressing. 
 And now gradually came the wonder that he 
 stood up, completely clothed, another man, and 
 not the Bargeman. 
 
 ‘¢ Aha!” said Riderhood. 
 dressed that night. I see. 
 Yow re deep. 
 
 ‘Much as you was 
 You're a taking me 
 But I knows a 
 deeper.” 
 
 When the bather had finished dressing he 
 kneeled on the grass, doing something with his 
 hands, and again stood up with his bundle un- 
 der his arm. Looking all around him with great 
 attention, he then went to the river’s edge, and 
 flung it in as far, and yet as lightly as he could. 
 It was not until he was so decidedly upon his 
 way again as to be beyond a bend of the river, 
 and for the time out of view, that Riderhood 
 scrambled from the ditch.’ 
 
 ‘‘ Now,” was his debate with himself, “ shall 
 I foller you on, or shall I let you loose for this 
 once, and go a fishing?” ‘The debate continu- 
 ing, he followed, as a precautio@uy measure in 
 any case, and got him again in sight. “If I 
 was to let you loose this once,” said Riderhood 
 then, still following, “I could make you come 
 to me agin, or I could find you ont in one way 
 or another. If I wasn’t to go a fishing others 
 might. I’ll let you loose this once and go a 
 fishing!’ With that, he suddenly dropped the 
 pursuit and tarned. 
 
 The miserable man whom he had released for 
 the time, but not for long, went on toward Lon- 
 don. Bradley was suspicious of every sound he 
 
 heard, and of every face he saw, but was under 
 
 a spell which very commonly falls upon the shed- 
 der of blood, and had no suspicion of the real 
 danger that lurked in his life, and would have 
 it yet. Riderhood was much _in his thonghts— 
 had never been out of his thoughts since the 
 night-adventure of their first meeting; but Ri- 
 derhood occupied a very different place there from 
 
 the place of pursuer; and Bradley had been at 
 
 #he pains of devising so many means of, fitting 
 that place to him, and of wedging him into it, 
 that higinind could not compass the possibility 
 And this is another 
 
 aS Sto nee 
 
 them, a 
 
 open. 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 305 
 
 Now, too, was he cursed with a state of mind 
 more wearing and more wearisome than remorse. 
 He had no remorse; but the evil-doer who can 
 hold that avenger at bay can not escape the slow- 
 er torture of incessantly doing the evil deed again 
 and doing it more efficiently. In the defensive 
 declarations and pretended confessions of mur- 
 derers, the pursuing shadow of this torture may 
 be traced through every lie they tell. If I had 
 done it as alleged, is it conceivable that I would 
 have made this and this mistake? If [ had done 
 fit as alleged, should I have left that unguarded 
 place which that false and wicked witness against 
 me so infamously deposed to? The state of that 
 wretch who continually finds the weak spots in 
 his own crime, and strives to strengthen them 
 when it is unchangeable, is a state that aggra- 
 vates the offense by doing the deed a thousand 
 times instead of once; but it is a state, too, that 
 tauntingly visits the offense upon a sullen unre- 
 pentant nature with its heaviest punishment ev- 
 ery time. 
 
 Bradley toiled on, chained heavily to the idea 
 of his hatred and his vengeance, and thinking 
 how he might have satiated both in many better 
 ways than the way he had taken. The instru- 
 ment might have been better, the spot and the 
 hour might have been better chosen. ‘To batter 
 a man down from behind in the dark, on the 
 brink of a river, was well enough, but he ought 
 to have been instantly disabled, whereas he had 
 turned and seized his assailant; and so, to end 
 it before chance-help came, and to be rid of him, 
 he had been hurriedly thrown backward into the 
 river before the life was fully beaten out of him. 
 Now if it could be done again, it must not be so 
 done. Supposing his head had been held down 
 under water for a while. Supposing the first 
 blow had been trner. Supposing he had been 
 shot. Supposing he had been strangled. Sup- 
 pose this way, that way, the other way. Sup- 
 pose any thing but getting unchained from the 
 one idea, for that was inexorably impossible. 
 
 The school reopened next day. The scholars 
 saw little or no change in their master’s face, for 
 it always wore its slowly laboring expression. 
 But as he heard his classes he was always do- 
 ing the deed and doing it better. As he paused 
 with his piece of chalk at the blackboard before 
 writing on it he was thinking of the spot, and 
 whether the water was not deeper and the fall 
 straighter, a little higher up, or a little lower 
 down. 
 two upon the board, and show himself what he 
 meant. He was doing it again and improving 
 on the manner, at prayers, in his mental arith- 
 metic, all through his questioning, all through 
 the day. 
 
 Charley Hexam was a master now, in another 
 school, under another head. It was evening, 
 and Bradley was walking in his garden, observed 
 from behind a blind by gentle little Miss Peech- 
 er, who contemplated offering him a loan of her 
 smelling-salts for headache, when Mary Anne, 
 in faithful attendance, held up her arm. 
 
 .*¢ Yes, Mary Anne?” 
 
 ‘Young Mr. Hexam, if you please, ma’am, 
 coming to see Mr. Headstone.” 
 
 ‘Very good, Mary Anne.” 
 
 Again Mary Anne held up her arm. 
 
 ‘¢You may speak, Mary Anne?” 
 
 ‘‘Mr. Headstone has beckoned young Mr. 
 
 He had half a mind to draw a line or, 
 
 é 
 
 s 
 
306 
 
 Hexam into his house, ma’am, and he has gone 
 in himself without waiting for young Mr. Hex- 
 am to come up, and now fe has gone in too, 
 ma’am, and has shut the door.” 
 
 ‘¢ With all my heart, Mary Anne.” — 
 
 And Mary Anne’s telegraphic arm worked. 
 
 ‘“What more, Mary Anne ?”’ 
 
 ‘¢They must find it rather dull and dark, Miss 
 Peecher, for the parlor blind’s down, and neither 
 of them pulls it up.” 
 
 ‘There is no accounting,” said good Miss 
 Peecher, with a little sad sigh which she re- 
 pressed by laying her hand on her neat method- 
 ical bodice, “ there is no accounting for tastes, 
 Mary Anne.” 
 
 Charley, entering the dark room, stopped short 
 when he saw his old friend in its yellow shade. 
 
 ‘*Come in, Hexam, come in.” 
 
 Charley advanced to take the hand that was 
 held out to him; but stopped again, short of it. 
 The heavy, bloodshot eyes of the schoolmaster, 
 rising to his face with an effort, met his look of 
 scrutiny.” 
 
 ‘¢ Mr. Headstone, what’s the matter ?” 
 
 ‘*Matter? Where?” 
 
 ‘“‘Mr. Headstone, have you heard the news ? 
 This news about the fellow, Mr. Eugene Wray- 
 burn? That he is killed ?” 
 
 “‘TTe is dead, then !” exclaimed Bradlev 
 
 Young Hexam standing looking at him, he 
 moistened his lips with his tongue, looked about 
 the room, glanced at his former pupil, and looked 
 down. ‘‘I heard of the outrage,” said Bradley, 
 trying to constrain his working mouth, ‘ but I 
 had not heard the end of it.” 
 
 ‘Where were you,” said the boy, advancing 
 a step as he lowered his voice, ‘‘ when it was 
 done? Stop! I don’t ask that. Don’t tell me. 
 If you force your confidence upon me, Mr. Head. 
 stone, I'll give up every word of it. Mind! 
 Take notice. Tl give up it, and I'll give up 
 you. I will!” 
 
 The wretched creature seemed to suffer acute- 
 ly under this renunciation. A desolate air of 
 utter and complete loneliness fell upon him, like 
 a visible shade. 
 
 ‘*Tt's for me to speak, not you,” said the boy. 
 ** Tf you do, you'll do it at your peril. Iam go- 
 ing to put your selfishness before you, Mr. Head- 
 stone—vour passionate, violent, and ungovern- 
 able selfishness—to show you why I can, and 
 why I will, have nothing more to do with you.” 
 
 He looked at young Hexam as if he were 
 waiting for a scholar to go on with a lesson that 
 he knew by heart and was deadly tired of. But 
 he had said his last word to him. 
 
 “If you had any part—I don’t say what—in 
 _ this attack,” pursued the boy ; ‘‘or if you knew 
 any thing about it—I don’t say how much—or 
 if you know who did it—I go no closer—vou did 
 an injury to me that’s never to be forgiven. 
 You know that I took you with me to his cham- 
 bers in the Temple when I told him my opin- 
 ion of him, and made myself responsible for my 
 opinion of you. You know that I took you with 
 me when I was watching him with a view to 
 recovering my sister and bringing her to her 
 senses; you know that I have allowed myself to 
 be mixed up with you, all through this business, 
 in favoring your desire to marry my sister. And 
 
 ow do you know that, pursuing the ends of 
 your own violent temper, you have not laid me 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 open to suspicion?’ Is that your gratitude to 
 me, Mr. Headstone?” ~~ 
 
 Bradley sat looking steadily before him at the 
 vacant air, As often as young Hexam stopped 
 he turned his eyes toward him, as if he were 
 waiting for him to go on with the lesson, and 
 get it done, As often as the boy resumed 
 Bradley resumed his fixed face. 
 
 “Tam going to be plain with you, Mr. Head- 
 stone,” said young Hexam, shaking his head in 
 a half-threatening manner, ‘‘ because this is no 
 time for affecting not to know things that I do 
 know—except certain things at which it might 
 not be very safe for you to hint again. What I 
 mean is this: if you were a good master, I was 
 a good pupil. I have done you plenty of credit, 
 and in improving my own reputation I have im- 
 proved yours quite as much. Very well then. 
 Starting on equal terms, I want to put before 
 you how you have shown your gratitude to me 
 for doing all I could to further your wishes with 
 reference to my sister. You have compromised 
 me by being seen about with me, endeavoring to 
 counteract this Mr. Eugene Wrayburn, | That’s 
 the first thing you have done. If my character, 
 and my now dropping you, help me out of that, 
 Mr. Headstone, the deliverance is to be attribu- 
 ted to me and not to you. No thanks to you 
 for it!” 
 
 The boy stopping again, he moved his eyes 
 
 again. 
 
 ‘‘T am going on, Mr. Headstone, don’t you | 
 
 be afraid. I am going on to the end, and I 
 have told you beforehand what the end is. 
 Now, you know my story. You are as well 
 aware as I am, that I have had many disad- 
 vantages to leave behind me in life.. You have 
 heard me mention my father, and you are suffi- 
 ciently acquainted with the fact that the home 
 from which I, as I may say, escaped, might 
 have been a more creditable one than it was, 
 My father died, and then it might have been 
 supposed that my way to respectability was 
 pretty clear, No. For then my sister be- 
 gins.” 
 
 He spoke as.confidently, and with as entire 
 an absence of any tell-tale color in his cheek, 
 as if there were no softening old time behind 
 him. Not wonderful, for there was none in his 
 hollow empty heart. What is there but self, 
 for selfishness to see behind it ? 
 
 ‘¢ When I speak of my sister I devoutly wish - 
 
 that you had never seen her, Mr. Headstone. 
 However, you did see her, and that’s uselegs 
 now. I confided in you abouther. I kplan 
 her character to you, and how she interposed 
 some ridiculous fanciful notions in the way of 
 our being as respectable as I tried for. You fell 
 in Jove with her, and I favored you with all my 
 might. She could not be induced to favor you, 
 and so we came into collision with this Mr. Eu- 
 gcene Wrayburn. Now, what have you done? 
 Why, von have justified my sister in being firm- 
 ly set against vou from first to last, and you 
 have put me in the wrong again! And why 
 have you done it? Because, Mr. 
 you are in all your passions so selfish, and so 
 concentrated upon yourself, that you have not 
 bestowed one proper thonght on me.’ 
 
 _ The cool conviction with which the boy took — 
 up and held his position could have been derived if 
 
 from no other vice in human nature. 
 
 Headstone, 
 
307 
 
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 308 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 small reparation, I hope you will think how re- 
 spectable you might have been yourself, and 
 will contemplate your blighted existence.” 
 
 Was it strange that the wretched man should 
 take this heavily to heart? Perhaps he. had 
 taken the boy to heart, first, through some long 
 he eal years; perhaps through the same years 
 ‘he had found his drudgery lightened by commu- 
 nication with a brighter and more apprehensive 
 spirit than his own; perhaps a family resem- 
 blance of face and voice between the boy and his 
 sister, smote him hard in the gloom of lis fallen 
 state. For whichsoever reason, or for all, he 
 drooped his devoted head when the boy was 
 gone, and shrank together on the floor, and 
 groveled there, with the palms of his hands 
 tight-clasping his hot temples, in unutterable 
 misery, and unrelieved by a single tear. 
 
 Rogue Riderhood had been busy with the 
 river that day. He had fished with assiduity on 
 the previous evening, but the light was short, 
 and he had fished unsuccessfully. He had 
 fished again that day with better luck, and had 
 carried his fish home to Plashwater Weir Mill 
 Lock-house in a bundle. 
 
 ee Ree 
 
 CHAPTER. VIII. 
 A FEW GRAINS OF PEPPER. 
 
 Tue dolls’ dress-maker went no more to the 
 business-premises of Pubsey and Co, in St. Mary 
 Axe, after chance had disclosed to her (as she 
 supposed) the flinty and hypocritical charac- 
 ter of Mr. Riah. She often moralized over her 
 work on the tricks and the manners of that ven- 
 erable cheat, but made her little purchases else- 
 ‘ where, .and lived a secluded life. After much 
 consultation with herself, she decided not to put 
 Lizzie Hexam on her guard against the old man, 
 arguing that the disappointment of finding him 
 out would come upon her quite soon enough. 
 Therefore, in her communication with her friend 
 by letter, she was silent on this theme, and prin- 
 cipally dilated on the backslidings of her bad 
 child, who every day grew worse and worse. 
 
 ‘*You wicked old boy,” Miss Wren would say 
 to him, with a menacing forefinger, “you'll 
 force me to run away from you, after all, you 
 will; and then you'll shake to bits, and there'll 
 be nobody to pick up the pieces !” 
 
 At this foreshadowing of a desolate decease 
 the wicked old bov would whine and whimper, 
 and would sit shaking himself into the lowest of 
 low spirits, until such time as he could shake 
 himself out of the house and shake another 
 threepennyworth into himself. But dead drunk 
 or dead sober (he had come to such a pass that 
 he was least alive in the latter state), it was al- 
 ways on the conscience of the paralytic scare- 
 crow that he had betrayed his sharp parent for 
 sixty threepennyworths of rum, which were all 
 gone, and that her sharpness would infallibly 
 detect his having done it, sooner or later. All 
 things considered therefore, and addition made 
 of the state of his body to the state of his mind, 
 the bed on which Mr. Dolls reposed was a bed 
 of roses from which the flowers and leaves had 
 entirely faded, leaving him to lie upon the thorns 
 and stalks. 
 
 > Noa b at tes VS res, AE Nees Bt odek ae ye 
 ices Kens Sd, omit Ae 
 
 On a certain day Miss Wren was alone at her 
 work, with the house-door set open for coolness, 
 and was trolling in a small sweet voice a mourn- r. 
 ful little song which might have been the song q 
 of the doll she was dressing, bemoaning the 
 brittleness and meltability of wax, when whom 
 should she descry standing on the pavement, — 
 looking in at her, but Mr. Fledgeby. é 
 
 ‘*T thought it was you?” said Fledgeby, com- 
 ing up the two steps. 
 
 ‘*Did you?’ Miss Wren retorted. ‘‘ And I 
 thought it was you, young man, Quite a coin- 
 cidence. Youre not mistaken, and I’m not 
 mistaken. How clever we are!” a 
 
 “Well, and how are you ?”’ said Fledgeby. a 
 
 ‘‘T am pretty much as usual, Sir,” replied © 
 Miss Wren. . “SA very unfortunate parent, wor- | 
 ried out of my life and senses by a very bad 
 child.’ 
 
 Fledgeby’s small eyes opened so wide that they — 
 might have passed for ordinary-sized eyes, as he — 
 stared about him for the very young person w hom 
 he supposed to be in question. 
 
 ‘¢But you’re not a parent,” said Miss Wren, 
 ‘Cand consequently it’s of no use talking to you 
 upon a family subject.—To what am [I to attrib- 
 ute the honor and favor ?” 
 
 ‘¢To a wish to improve your acquaintance,” 
 Mr. Fledgeby replied. 
 
 Miss Wren, stopping to bite her thread, looked 
 at him very knowingly. 
 
 ‘We never meet now,” said Fledgeby; ‘‘do 
 we ?” 
 
 ‘*No,” said Miss Wren, chopping off the 
 word. 
 
 ‘*So I had a mind,” pursned Fledgeby, ‘‘to 
 come and have a talk with you about our dodg- 
 ing friend, the child of Israel.’ 
 
 rz So he gave you my address; did he?” asked 
 Miss Wren. a 
 
 ““T got it out of him,” said Fledgeby, with a 
 stammer. 
 
 ‘You seem to see a good deal of him,” re- 
 marked Miss Wren, with shrewd distrust. ‘*A 
 good deal of him you seem to see, considering.” 
 
 ‘“‘Yes, Ido,” said Fledgeby. ‘*Considering,” 
 
 ‘¢Haven’t you,” inquired the dress-maker, 
 bending over the doll on which her art was be- 
 ing exercised, ‘‘ done interceding with him yet ?” 
 
 ‘*No,” said Fledgeby, shaking his head. 
 
 ‘*La! Been interceding with him. all this 
 time, and sticking to him still?” said Miss 
 Wren, busy with her work. 
 
 “Sticking to him is the word,” said Fledgeby. _ 
 
 Miss Wren pursued her occupation with a_ 
 concentrated air, and asked, after an interval of — 
 silent industry : 
 
 ‘¢ Are you in, the army ?” 
 
 ‘* Not exactly,” said Fledgeby, rather flattered 
 by the question. ee 
 ** Navy ?” asked Miss Wren. 
 ‘*N—no,” said Fledgeby. He qualified these 
 two negatives as if he were not absolutely im 
 
 either service, but was almost in both. 
 
 ‘* What are you then ?” demanded Miss Wren, 
 
 ‘*T am a gentleman, I am,” said Fledgeby. 
 
 ‘*Oh!” assented Jenny, screwing up her — 
 mouth with an appearance of conviction. ‘‘ Yes, e 
 to be sure! That accounts for your having so ~ 
 much time to give to interceding. But only t to bs 
 think how kind and SeaAY. a / gentleman rons o 
 must be !” 
 
fy 2 
 
 _He must have some object. 
 
 Mr. Fledgeby found that he was skating round 
 
 ie a board marked Dangerous, and had better cut 
 out a fresh track. 
 _erest of the dodgers,” said he. 
 
 ‘* Let’s get back to the dodg- 
 ‘*What’s he up 
 to in the case of your friend the handsome gal? 
 What’s his object ?”’ 
 ‘¢Can not undertake to say, Sir, I am sure!” 
 returned Miss Wren, composedly. 
 
 “‘He won't acknowledge where she’s: gone,” 
 said Fledgeby; ‘and I’ have a fancy that I 
 should like to have another look at her. Now 
 
 I know he knows where she is gone.” 
 
 ‘Can not undertake to say, Sir, I am sure!” 
 Miss Wren again rejoined. 
 “And you know where she is gone,” hazard- 
 
 ed Fledgeby. 
 
 ~ “Can not undertake to say, Sir, really,” re- 
 
 plied Miss Wren. 
 
 The quaint little chin met Mr. Fledgeby’s gaze 
 with such a bafiling hitch that that agreeable 
 gentleman was for some time at a loss how to 
 resume his fascinating part in the dialogue. At 
 
 length he said: 
 
 ad 
 
 ‘¢ Miss Jenny !—That’s your name, if I don’t 
 mistake ?” 
 
 ‘*¢ Probably you don’t mistake, Sir,” was Miss 
 Wren’s cool answer; ‘‘ because you had it on the 
 best authority. Mine, yon know.” 
 
 “Miss Jenny! Instead of coming up and 
 being dead, let’s come out and look alive. It’ 
 pay better, I assure you,” said Fledgeby, be- 
 stowing an inveigling twinkle or two upon the 
 dress-maker. ‘* You'll find it pay better.” 
 
 ‘* Perhaps,” said Miss Jenny, holding out her 
 doll at arm’s-length, and critically contemplat- 
 ing the effect of her art with her scissors on her 
 lips and her head thrown back, as if her interest 
 lay there, and not in the conversation; ‘* per- 
 
 ‘haps you'll explain your meaning, young man, 
 
 which is Greek to me.—You must have another 
 touch of blue in your trimming, my dear.” Hav- 
 ing addressed the last remark to her fair client, 
 Miss Wren proceeded to snip at some blue frag- 
 ments that lay before her among fragments of 
 all colors, and to thread a needle from a skein 
 of blue silk. 
 
 ~** Took here,” said Fledgeby.—‘‘ Are you at- 
 tending ?” 
 
 ‘“T am attending, Sir,’ replied Miss Wren, 
 without the slightest appearance of so doing. 
 
 *¢ Another touch of blue in your trimming, my 
 dear.”’ 
 
 “Well, look here,” said Fledgeby, rather dis- 
 couraged by the circumstances under which he 
 found himself pursuing the conversation. ‘‘If 
 you're attending—” pa), 3 
 
 (‘‘Light blue, my sweet young lady,” remark- 
 ed Miss Wren, in a sprightly tone, ‘‘ being best 
 
 suited to your fair complexion and your flaxen } 
 
 curls.””) 
 
 ~ “Tsay, if you're attending,” proceeded Fledge- 
 by, ‘‘it’ll pay better in this way. It'll lead in a 
 roundabout manner to your buying damage and 
 
 waste of Pubsey and Co. at a nominal price, or 
 
 even getting it for nothing.” . 
 ~ Aha!” thought the dress-emaker. ‘‘ But you 
 are not so roundabout, Little Eyes, that I don’t 
 
 notice your answering for Pubsey and Co. after 
 
 all! Little Eyes, Little Eyes, you're too cun- 
 
 ning by half.” | 
 
 “ And I take it for granted,” pursued Fledge- 
 by, “that to get the most of your materials for 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 ts 
 
 309 
 
 nothing would be well worth your while, Miss 
 Jenny ?” 
 
 ‘¢You may take it for granted,” returned the 
 dress-maker with many knowing nods, ‘‘that it’s 
 always well worth my while to make money.” 
 
 ‘* Now,” said Fledgeby, approvingly, ‘‘ you're 
 answering to a sensible purpose. Now, you're 
 coming out and looking alive! So I make so 
 free, Miss Jenny, as to offer the remark, that 
 you and Judah were too thick together to last. 
 You can’t come to be intimate with such a deep 
 file as Judah without beginning to see a little way 
 into him, you know,” said Fledgeby, with a wink 
 
 ‘*T must own,” returned the dress-maker, with 
 her eyes upon her work, ‘‘ that we are not good 
 friends at present.” 
 
 ‘*T know you're not good friends at present,” 
 said Fledgeby. ‘‘I know all about it. I should 
 like to pay off Judah by not letting him have 
 his own deep way in every thing. In most 
 things he’ll get it by hook or by crook, but— 
 hang it all!—don’t let him have his own deep 
 way in every thing. That’s too much.” Mr. 
 Fledgeby said this with someedisplay of indig- 
 nant warmth, as if he was counsel in the cause 
 for Virtue. 
 
 ‘How can I prevent his having his own way ?” 
 began the dress-maker. 
 
 “Deep way, I called it,” said Fledgeby. 
 
 _“__Fis own deep way, in any thing?” 
 ; “Tl tell you,” said Fledgeby. ‘I like to 
 hear you ask it, because it’s looking alive. It’s 
 what I should expect to find in one of your saga- 
 cious tinderstanding. Now, candidly.” 
 
 ‘¢Eh ?” cried Miss Jenny. 
 
 ‘‘T said, now candidly,” Mr. Fledgeby ex- 
 plained, a little put out. 
 
 **Oh-h'!” 
 
 ‘“T should be glad to countermine him re- 
 specting the handsome gal, your friend. He 
 means something there. You may depend upon 
 it, Judah means something there. He has a 
 motive, and of course his motive is a dark mo- 
 tive. Now, whatever his motive is, it’s neces~ 
 sary to his motive”—Mr. Fledgeby’s constructive 
 powers were not equal to the avoidance of some 
 tautology here—‘‘that it should be kept from 
 me what he has done with her. Sol put it to 
 you, who know: What has he done with her? 
 Task nomore. And is that asking much, when 
 you understand that it will pay?” 
 
 Miss Jenny Wren, who had cast her eyes upon * 
 the bench again after her last interruption, sat 
 looking at it, needle in hand but not working, 
 for some moments. She then briskly resumed 
 her work,and said, with a sidelong glance of her 
 eyes and chin at Mr. Fledgeby, 
 
 ‘¢ Where d’ye live?” 
 
 ‘‘ Albany, Piccadilly,” replied Fledgeby. » 
 
 ‘¢When are you at home?” 
 
 “When you like.” 
 
 ‘‘Breakfast-time ?” said Jenny, in her abrupt- 
 est and shortest manner. 
 
 ‘¢No better time in the day,” said Fledgeby. 
 
 “¢T’ll look in upon you to-morrow, young man. 
 Those two ladies,” pointing to dolls, ‘“‘have an 
 appointment in Bond Street at ten precisely. - 
 When I’ve dropped ’em there I'll drive round to 
 you.” With a weird little laugh Miss Jenny 
 pointed to her crutch-stick as her equipages 
 
 ‘‘ This is looking alive indeed!” cried Fledge: 
 by, rising. 
 
310 
 
 ‘‘Mark you! I promise you nothing,” said 
 the dolls’ dress-maker, dabbing two dabs at him 
 with her needle, as if she put out both his eyes. 
 
 ‘‘No, no. J understand,” returned Fledge- 
 by. ‘*The damage and waste question shall be 
 settled first. It shall be made to pay; don’t 
 
 you be afraid. Good-day, Miss Jenny.” 
 
 “‘Good-day, young man.” 
 
 Mr. Fledgeby’s prepossessing form withdrew 
 ‘itself; and the little dress-maker, clipping and 
 snipping and stitching, and stitching and snip- 
 ping and clipping, fell to work at a great rate; 
 musing and muttering all the time. 
 
 ‘‘Misty, misty, misty. Can’t make it out. 
 Little Eyes and the wolf in a conspiracy? Or 
 Little Eyes and the wolf against one another? 
 Can’t make it out. My poor Lizzie, have they 
 both designs against you, either way? Can’t 
 make it out. Is Little Eyes Pubsey, and the 
 wolf Co? Can’t make it out. Pubsey true to 
 Co, and Co to Pubsey? Pubsey false to Co, and 
 Co to Pubsey? Can’t make it out. What said 
 Little Eyes? ‘Now, candidly?’ Ah! How- 
 ever the cat jumps, he’s a liar. That's all I can 
 
 make out at present; but you may go to bed in 
 the Albany, Piccadilly, with that for your pillow, 
 young man!”’ Thereupon the little dress-maker 
 again dabbed out his eyes separately, and mak- 
 ing a loop in the air of her thread and deftly 
 catching it into a knot with her needle, seemed 
 to bowstring him into the bargain. 
 
 For the terrors undergone by Mr. Dolls that 
 evening when his little parent sat profoundly 
 meditating over her work, and when he imag- 
 ined himself found out, as often as she changed 
 her attitude, or turned her eyes toward him, 
 there is no adequate name. Moreover it was 
 her habit to shake her head at that wretched old 
 boy whenever she caught his eye as he shivered 
 and shook. What are popularly called ‘‘the 
 trembles” being in full force upon him that even- 
 ing, and likewise what are popularly called ‘‘ the 
 horrors,” he had a very bad time of it; which 
 was not made better by his being so remorseful 
 as frequently to moan ‘‘ Sixty threepenn’orths.” 
 This imperfect sentence not being at all intelli- 
 gible as a confession, but sounding like a Gar- 
 gantuan order for a dram, brought him into new 
 difficulties by occasioning his parent to pounce 
 at him in a more than usually snappish manner, 
 and to overwhelm him with bitter reproaches. 
 
 What was a bad time for Mr. Dolls could not 
 fail to be a bad time for the dolls’ dress-maker. 
 However, she was on the alert next morning, 
 and drove to Bond Street, and set down the two 
 ladies punctually, and then directed her equipage 
 to conduct her to the Albany. Arrived at the 
 doorway of the house in which Mr. Fledgeby’s 
 chambers were, she found a lady standing there 
 ina traveling dress, holding in her hand—of all 
 things in the world—a gentleman’s hat. 
 
 ‘““You want some one?” said the lady in a 
 stern manner, 
 
 ‘“‘T am going up stairs to Mr. Fledgeby’s.” 
 
 “You can not do that atthis moment. ‘There 
 is a gentleman with him. I am waiting for the 
 gentleman. His business with Mr. Fledgeby 
 will very soon be transacted, and then you can 
 go up. Until the gentleman comes down, you 
 must wait here.” 
 
 While speaking, and nvuorwiid: the lady kept 
 watchfully between her and the staircase, as if 
 
 ” 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 prepared to oppose her going up’ by force. ‘The 
 lady being of a stature to stop her with a hand, 
 and looking mightily determined,: the dress: 
 maker stood still. 
 
 - ¢©Well? Why do you listen?” asked the 
 lad \ 
 aT am not listening,” said the dress-maker. 
 
 ‘¢ What do you hear?” asked the lady, alter- 
 ing her phrase. 
 
 “Ts it a kind of a spluttering somewhere ?” 
 said the dress-maker, with an inquiring look. 
 
 ‘¢Mr. Fledgeby in his shower-bath, perhaps,” 
 remarked the lady, smiling. 
 
 ‘* And somebody’ s beating a carpet, I think ?” 
 
 *¢ Mr. Fledgeby’s carpet, I dare say,’ 
 the smiling lady. - 
 Miss Wren: had a reasonably good eye for 
 
 ’ replied — 
 
 smiles, being well accustomed to them on the — 
 
 part of her young friends, though their smiles 
 mostly ran smaller than in nature. But she 
 had never seen so singular a smile as that upon 
 this lady’s face, It ‘twitched her nostrils open 
 in a remarkable manner, and contracted her lips 
 and eyebrows. It was a smile of enjoyment too, 
 though of such a fierce kind that Miss Wren 
 thought she would rather not enjoy herself than 
 do it in that way. ; 
 
 ‘¢ Well!” said the lady, watching her. ‘ What 
 now ?” 
 
 ‘‘T hope there’s nothing the matter!” said the 
 dress-maker. 
 
 ‘‘Where ?” inquired the Jady. 
 
 ‘<T don’t know where,” said Miss Wren, star- 
 ing about her. ‘‘ But I never heard such odd 
 noises. Don’t you think I had better call some- 
 body ?” 
 
 ‘“‘T think you had better not,’ returned the 
 lady with a significant frown, and drawing 
 closer. 
 
 On this hint the dress-maker relinquished the — 
 
 idea, and stood looking at the lady as hard as 
 the lady looked at her. Meanwhile the dress- 
 maker listened with amazement to the odd noises 
 which still continued, and the lady listened too, 
 
 but with a coolness in which there was no trace — 
 
 of amazement. 
 Soon afterward came a slamming and bang- 
 ing of doors; and then came running down stairs 
 
 . . ii 
 a gentleman with whiskers, and out of breathy 
 
 who seemed to be red-hot. 
 “Is your business done, Alfred?” inquired, 
 the lady. 
 
 ‘Very thoroughly done,” replied the gentle-— 
 
 man, as he took “his hat from her. 
 
 “You can go up to Mr. Fledgeby as soon as 
 you like,” said the lady, moving haughtily away. — 
 
 “Oh! 
 of stick with you,” added the gentleman politely, — 
 ‘Cand say, if you please, that they come from 
 Mr, 
 leaving England. 
 
 Mr. Alfred Lammle. 
 
 good as not to forget the name.’ 
 
 The three pieces of stick were three brokeull i 
 and frayed fragments of a stout lithe cane. 
 Jenny taking them wonderingly, and the gentle. 
 man repeating witha grin, ** Mr. Alfred Lammle, 
 if you'll be so good. Compliments, on leaving 
 England,” the lady and gentleman walked away 
 quite deliberately, and Miss Jenny and her 
 crutch-stick went up stairs. 
 mle, Lammle?” Miss Jenny repeated as she 
 panted from stair to stair, ‘‘ where have I heard 
 
 fi 
 
 And you can take these three pieces — 
 
 Alfred Lammle, with his compliments on _ 
 Be 80 
 
 Miss 
 
 | 
 
 ‘¢Lammle, Lam- | 
 
f 
 
 Lana 
 j 
 
 en! 
 
 4 
 
 A 
 iu 
 oe a 
 
 7 
 
 at name? lLammle, Lammle? I know! 
 Saint Mary Axe!” 
 _ With a gleam of new intelligence in her sharp 
 
 face the dolls’ dress-maker pulled at Fledgeby’s 
 
 _ bell. No one answered; but from within the 
 chambers there proceeded a continuous splutter- 
 
 ing sound of a highly singular and unintelligible 
 nature. 
 
 **Good gracious! Is Little Eyes choking ?” 
 
 _eried Miss Jenny. 
 
 - standing ajar. 
 
 Pulling at the bell again and getting no re- 
 ply, she pushed the outer door, and found it 
 No one being visible on her 
 
 _ opening it wider, and the spluttering continu- 
 
 ing, she took the liberty of opening an inner 
 
 door, and then beheld the extraordinary spec- 
 _ tacle of Mr. Fledgeby in a shirt, a pair of Turk- 
 
 ish trowsers, and a Turkish cap, rolling over and 
 
 _ over on his own carpet, and spluttering wonder- 
 
 eye! 
 
 fully. 
 
 Oh Lord !” gasped Mr. Fledgeby. ‘‘Oh my 
 Stop thief! Iam strangling. Fire! Oh 
 myeye! A glass of water. Give mea glass of 
 water. Shut the door. Murder! Oh Lord!” 
 And then rolled and spluttered more than ever. 
 
 Hurrying into another room, Miss Jenny got 
 a glass of water, and brought it for Fledgebv’s 
 relief: who, gasping, spluttering, and rattling 
 in his throat betweenwhiles, drank: some water, 
 and laid his head faintly on her arm. 
 
 “°Oh my eye!” cried Fledgeby, struggling 
 anew. ‘‘It’s salt and snuff. It’s up my nose, 
 and down my throat, and in my windpipe. 
 Ugh! Ow! Ow! Ow! Ah—h—h—h!” And 
 here, crowing fearfully, with his eyes starting 
 out of his head, appeared to be contending with 
 every mortal disease incidental to poultry. 
 
 *¢ And Oh my eye, I'm so sore!” cried Fledge- 
 by, starting over on his back, in a spasmodic 
 way that caused the dress-maker to retreat to 
 the wall. ‘‘OhIsmart so! Do put something 
 to my back and arms, and legs and shoulders. 
 Ugh! It’s down my throat again and can’t 
 comeup. Ow! Ow! Ow! Ah—h—h—h! Oh 
 I smart so!” Here Mr. Fledgeby bounded up, 
 
 ‘and bounded down, and went rolling over and 
 
 over again. 
 The dolls’ dress-maker looked on. until he 
 
 rolled himself into a corner with his Turkish 
 
 slippers uppermost, and then, resolving in the 
 first place to address her ministration to the salt 
 and snuff,. gave him more water and slapped 
 his back. But the latter application was by no 
 means a success, causing Mr. Fledgeby to scream, 
 
 and to cry out, ‘*Oh my eve! don’t slap me! 
 
 I’m covered with weales and I smart so !” 
 
 _ However, he gradually ceased to choke and 
 crow, saving at intervals, and Miss Jenny got 
 him into an easy-chair: where, with his eves 
 
 red and watery, with his features swollen, and 
 
 with some half-dozen livid bars across his face, 
 
 _ he presented a most rueful sight. 
 
  gassin. Lammle. 
 
 ‘What ever possessed you to take salt and 
 snuff, young man?” inquired Miss Jenny. 
 
 **T didn’t take. it,” the dismal youth replied. 
 “Tt was crammed. into my mouth.” 
 
 ** Who crammed it?” asked Miss Jenny. 
 _ **fe did,” answered Fliedgeby. ‘‘The as- 
 He rubbed it into my mouth 
 and up my nose and down my throat—Ow! 
 Ow! Ow! Ah—h—h—h! Ugh!—to prevent 
 
 My crying out, and then cruelly assaulted me.” 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 311 
 
 ** With this ?” asked Miss Jenny, showing the 
 pieces of cane. 
 
 ‘‘That’s the wéapon,” said Fledgeby, eying 
 it with the air of an acquaintance. ‘ He broke 
 it over me. Oh I smart so! How did you 
 come by it ?” Na 
 
 ‘*When he ran down stairs and joined the 
 lady he had left in the hall with his hat”—Miss 
 Jenny began. 
 
 ** Oh!” groaned Mr. Fledgeby, writhing, ‘ she 
 was holding his hat, was she? I might have 
 known she was in it.” y 
 
 ‘‘ When he came down stairs and joined the 
 lady who wouldn’t let me come up, he gave me 
 the pieces for you, and I was to say, ‘ With Mr. 
 Alfred Lammle’s compliments on his leaving 
 England.’” Miss Jenny said it withsuch spite- 
 ful satisfaction, and such a hitch of her chin 
 and eyes as might have added to Mr. Fledgeby’s 
 miseries, if he could have noticed either, in his 
 bodily pain with his hand to his head. 
 
 ‘Shall I go for the police?” inquired Miss 
 Jenny, with a nimble start toward the door. 
 
 “Stop! No, don’t!” cried Fledgeby. ‘‘Don’t, 
 please. Wehad better keep it quiet. Will you 
 be so good as shut the door? Oh I do smart 
 so!” 
 
 In testimony of the extent to which he smart- 
 ed Mr. Fledgeby came wallowing ont of the 
 easy-chair and took another roll on the carpet. 
 
 ‘*Now the door’s shut,” said Mr. Fledgeby, 
 sitting up in anguish, with his Turkish cap half 
 on and half off, and the bars on his face getting 
 bluer, ‘‘do me the kindness to look at my back 
 and shoulders. They must be in an awful state, 
 for I hadn’t got my dressing-gown on when the 
 brute came rushing in. Cut my shirt away from 
 the collar; there’s a pair of scissors on that ta- 
 ble. ‘‘Oh!” groaned Mr. Fledgeby, with his 
 hand to his head again. ‘‘ How I do smart, to 
 be sure !” 
 
 ‘¢There?” inquired Miss Jenny, alluding to 
 the back and shoulders. 
 
 ‘¢Oh Lord, yes!’ moaned Fledgeby, rocking 
 himself. ‘‘ And all over! Every where!” 
 
 The busy little dress-maker quickly snipped 
 the shirt away, and laid bare the results of as fa- 
 rious and sound a thrashing aseven Mr. Fledge- 
 by merited. ‘‘ You may well smart, young 
 man !” exclaimed Miss Jenny. And stealthily 
 rubbed her little hands behind him, and poked 
 a few exultant pokes with her two forefingers 
 over the crown of his head. 
 
 ‘* What do you think of vinegar and brown 
 paper?” inquired the suffering Fledgeby, still 
 rocking and moaning. ‘Does it look as if 
 vinegar and brown paper was the sort of appli- 
 cation ?” 
 
 ‘¢ Yes,”’ said Miss Jenny, with asilent chuckle. 
 ‘‘Tt looks as if it ought to be Pickled.” 
 
 Mr. Fledgeby collapsed under the word ‘‘ Pick- 
 led,” and groaned again. ‘‘My kitchen is on 
 this floor,” he said; ‘‘ you'll find brown paper 
 in a dresser-drawer there, and a bottle of vin- 
 egar ona shelf. Would you have the kindness 
 to make a few plasters and put ’em on? It 
 can’t be kept too quiet.” 
 
 ‘‘One, two—hum— five, six. You'll want 
 six,’’ said the dress-maker. 
 
 ‘¢There’s smart enough,” whimpered Mr. 
 Fledgeby, groaning and writhing again, ‘‘ for 
 sixty.” 
 
 a ae 
 
5 = 
 
 312 
 
 Miss Jenny repaired to the kitchen, scissors in 
 hand, found the brown paper and found the vin- 
 egar, and skillfully cut out and steeped six large 
 
 _ plasters. When they were all lying ready on 
 "the dresser, an idea occurred to her as she was 
 about to gather them up. 
 «7 think,” said Miss Jenny, with a silent 
 laugh, ‘‘he ought to have a little pepper? Just 
 a few grains? I think the young man’s tricks 
 and manners make a claim upon his friends for 
 a little pepper ?” 
 
 Mr. Fledgeby’s evil star showing her the pep- 
 
 per-box on the chimney-piece, she climbed upon 
 
 a chair and got it down, and sprinkled all the, 
 plasters with a judicious hand. She then went | 
 
 back to Mr. Fledgeby and stuck them all on 
 him: Mr. Fledgeby uttering a sharp howl as 
 each was put in its place. 
 
 ‘¢There, young man!” said the dolls’ dress- 
 maker. ‘*Now I hope you feel pretty comfort- 
 able ?” 
 
 Apparently Mr. Fledgeby did not, for he} 
 cried, by way of answer, ‘‘Oh—h how [ do) 
 
 smart!” 
 
 Miss Jenny got his Persian gown upon him, 
 extinguished his eyes crookedly with his Persian 
 cap, and helped him to his bed: upon which he 
 climbed groaning. ‘‘ Business between you and 
 me being out of the question to-day, young man, 
 and my time being precious,” said Miss Jenny 
 then, ‘‘I’ll make myself scarce. Are you com- 
 fortable now ?”’ 
 
 ‘Oh my eye!” cried Mr. Fledgeby. 
 Tain’t. Oh—h—h! how I do smart!” 
 
 The last thing Miss Jenny saw, as she looked 
 back before closing the room door, was Mr. 
 Fledgeby in the act of plunging and gamboling 
 ‘all over his bed, like a porpoise or dolphin in 
 its native element. She then shut the bedroom 
 door, and all the other doors, and going down 
 stairs and emerging from the Albany into the 
 
 ~~ busy streets, took omnibus for Saint Mary Axe: 
 pressing on the road all the gayly-dressed ladies 
 whom she could see from the window, and 
 making them unconscious lay-figures for dolls, 
 while she mentally cut them out and basted them. 
 
 “No, 
 
 —_—__>——_——_—— 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 TWO PLACES VACATED. 
 
 Set down by the omnibus at the corner of 
 Saint Mary Axe, and trusting to her feet and 
 her cruteh-stick within its precincts, the dolls’ 
 dress-maker proceeded to the place of busines 
 sof Pubsey and Co. All there was sunny an 
 quiet externally, and shady and quiet internally. 
 Hiding herself in the entry outside the glass 
 door, she could see from that post of observation 
 the old man in his spectacles sitting writing at 
 his desk. 
 
 ‘¢Boh!” cried the dress-maker, popping in 
 her head at the glass door. ‘‘Mr. Wolf at 
 home?” 
 
 The old man took his glasses off, and mildly 
 laid them down beside him. ‘‘ Ah! Jenny, is it 
 you? I though you had given me up.” 
 
 ‘¢ And so I had given up the treacherous wolf 
 of the forest,” she replied; ‘‘ but, godmother, it 
 
 strikes me you have come back. Iam not quite 
 sure, because the wolf and you change forms. I 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 9°) 
 
 want to ask you a question or two, to find ou 
 whether you are really godmother or reall: 
 wolf. May 1?” . hee 
 
 ‘‘Yes, Jenny, yes.” But Riah glanced to- 
 ward the door, as if he thought his principal — 
 might appear there, unseasonably. a 
 
 ‘< Tf you're afraid of the fox,” said Miss Jenny, — 
 ‘you may dismiss all present expectations of — 
 seeing that animal. He won’t show himself — 
 abroad for many a day.” i 
 
 ‘ What do you mean, my child ?” 
 
 ‘‘T mean, godmother,” replied Miss Wren, | 
 sitting down beside the Jew, ‘‘that the fox has 
 caught a famous flogging, and that if his skin 
 and bones are not tingling, aching, and smart-_ 
 ing at this present instant, no fox did ever tingle, ~ 
 ache, and smart.” ‘herewith Miss Jenny re-~ 
 lated what had come to pass in the a 
 
 omitting the few grains of pepper. “aa 
 
 ‘‘ Now, godmother,” she went on, ‘‘T partie- 7 
 ularly wish to ask you what has taken place here ~ 
 since I left the wolf here? Because I have an 7 
 idea about the size of a marble rolling about ins 
 my little noddle. First and foremost, are you 
 Pubsey and Co., or are you either? Upon your 
 solemn word and honor.” 
 ’ The old man shook his head. 
 
 ‘‘Secondly, isn’t Fledgeby both Pubsey and 
 Co. ?” . 
 
 The old man answered with a reluctant nod, — 
 
 ‘‘ My idea,” exclaimed Miss Wren, ‘‘is now 
 about the size of an orange. But before it gets — 
 any bigger, welcome back, dear godmother!” ~ 
 
 The little creature folded her arms about the — 
 old man’s neck with great earnestness, and kissed 
 him. ‘‘I humbly beg. your forgiveness, god-— 
 mother. I am truly sorry. I ought to have had 
 more faith in you. But what could I suppose” 
 when you said nothing for yourself, you know? — 
 I don’t mean to offer that as a justification, but” 
 what could I suppose when you were a silent 
 party to all he said? It did look bad; now” 
 didn’t it?” “a 
 
 ‘Tt looked so bad, Jenny,” responded the old” 
 man, with gravity, “that I will straightway tell” 
 you what an impression it wrought upon me. 17 
 was hateful in mine own eyes. I was hateful to” 
 myself, in being so hateful to the debtor and to 
 you. But more than that, and worse than thag, 
 and to pass out far and broad beyond myself— 
 I reflected that evening, sitting alone in my gar=_ 
 den on the house-top, that I was doing dishonor ~ 
 to my ancient faith and race. I reflected— 
 clearly reflected for the first time—that in bend 
 ing my neck to the yoke I was willing to wear 
 I bent the unwilling necks of the whole Jewish 
 people. For it is not, in Christian countries, 
 with the Jews as with other peoples. Men say. 
 ‘This is a bad Greek, but there are good Greek 
 This is a bad Turk, but there are good Turks, 
 Not so with the Jews. Men find the bad amon 
 us easily enough—among what peoples are tf) 
 bad not easily found ?—but they take the wor 
 of us as samples of the best: they take the lo 
 of us as presentations of the highest; and th 
 ; say, ‘All Jews are alike,’ If, doing what I w 
 content to do here, because I was grateful for t 
 
 past and have small need of money now, I hi 
 been a Christian, I could have done it, compr 
 mising no one but my individual self. But do. 
 ing it as a Jew, I could not choose but compro- 
 mise the Jews of all conditions and all countries, 
 
_.It is a little hard upon us, but it is the truth. 
 _ I would that all our people remembered it! 
 - Though I have little right to say so, seeing that 
 _it came home so late to me.” 
 
 The dolls’ dress-maker sat holding the old 
 _ man by the hand, and looking thoughtfully in 
 his face. 
 
 ‘Thus I reflected, I say, sitting that evening 
 in my garden on the house-top. And _ passing 
 the painful scene of that, day in review before me 
 ‘Many times, I always saw that the poor gentle- 
 man believed the story readily, because I was 
 one of the Jews—that you believed the story 
 readily, my child, because I was one of the Jews 
 —that the story itself first came into the inven- 
 tion of the originator thereof, because I was one 
 of the Jews. This was the result of my having 
 had you.three before me, face to face, and see- 
 ing the thing visibly presented as upon a thea- 
 tre. Wherefore I perceived that the obligation 
 was upon me to leave this service. But Jenny, 
 my dear,” said Riah, breaking off, “I promised 
 that you should pursue your questions, and I 
 obstruct them.” 
 
 “On the contrary, godmother; my idea is as 
 large now as a pumpkin—and you know what a 
 pumpkin is, don’t you? So you gave notice 
 that you were going? Does that come next ?” 
 asked Miss Jenny, with a look of close attention. 
 
 **I indited a letter to my master. Yes. To 
 that effect.” 
 
 **And what said Tingling-Tossing-Aching- 
 Scereaming-Scratching-Smarter ?” asked Miss 
 Wren, with an unspeakable enjoyment in the ut- 
 
 _ terance of those honorable titles and in the rec-. 
 ollection of the pepper. 
 
 *“He held me to certain months of servitude, 
 which were his lawful term of notice. They ex. 
 pire to-morrow. é 
 before—I had meant to set myself right with my 
 Cinderella.” 
 
 **My gdea is getting so immense now,” eried 
 Miss Wren, clasping her temples, “that my head 
 won't hold it! Listen, godmother; I am 20- 
 ing to expound. Little Eyes (that’s Screaming- 
 Scratching-Smarter) owes you a heavy grudge 
 for going. Li ttle Eves casts about. how. hest-to 
 pay you off..Little Kyes thinks of Lizzie. Lit- 
 
 because it’s dear to. him.’ 
 thinks, ‘I'll make love to her myself’ too;’ but 
 : that I can’t swear—all the rest I can. So, Lit- 
 tle Eyes comes to me, and I go to Little Kyes. 
 That’s the way of it. And now the murder’s 
 all out, I’m sorry,” added the dolls” dress-maker, 
 rigid from head to foot with energy as she shook 
 her little fist before her eyes, “that I didn’t give 
 him Cayenne pepper and chopped pickled Cap- 
 -sicum !” : ; 
 __ This expression of regret being but partially 
 intelligible to Mr. Riah, the old man reverted 
 to the injuries Fledgeby had received, and hint- 
 ed at the necessity of his at once going to tend 
 that beaten cur. 
 
 __ “Godmother, godmother, godmother!” cried 
 ‘Miss Wren irritably, ‘I really lose all patience 
 With you. One would think yon believed in 
 the Good Samaritan. How can you be so in- 
 “consistent ?” 
 
 ‘Jenny, dear,” began the old man gently, 
 
 “it is yam of our people to help—” | 
 
 \\, Coa 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 Upon their expiration—not'| 
 
 ed. 
 tle Kyes says to himself, ‘WH find out-where he | 
 has placed that girl, and Vl betray hissecret. | 
 Perhaps Little Eves , 
 
 313 
 “Oh! Bother your people!” interposed Miss 
 Wren, with a toss of her head. «If your peo- 
 ple don’t know better than to go and help Little 
 Keyes, it’s a pity they ever got out of Egypt. 
 Over and above that,” she added, ‘*he wouldn’t 
 take your help if you offered it. Too much 
 ashamed, Wants to keep it close and quiet, 
 and to keep you out of the Lo) pee 
 
 They were still debating this point when a 
 shadow darkened the entry, and the glass door 
 was opened by a messenger who brought a letter 
 unceremoniously addressed, ‘‘Riah.” ‘To which 
 he said there was an answer wanted. 
 
 The letter, which was scrawled in pencil up 
 hill and down hill and round crooked corners, 
 ran thus: 
 
 “OLD R1an,—Your accounts being all squared, 
 go. Shut up the place, turn out directly, and 
 send me the key by bearer. Go. You are an! 
 unthankful dog of a Jew. Get out. fk ay ay 
 
 The dolls’ dress-maker found it delicious to 
 trace the screaming and smarting of Little Eves 
 in the distorted writing of this epistle. She 
 laughed over it and jeered at it in a convenient 
 corner (to the great astonishment of the mes- 
 senger) while the old man got his few goods to- 
 gether ina black bag. That done, the shutters 
 of the upper windows closed, and the office blind 
 pulled down, they issned- forth upon the steps 
 with the attendant messenger, There, while 
 Miss Jennv held the bag, ‘the old man locked 
 the house door, and handed over the key to him; 
 who at onee retired with the same. 
 
 ‘* Well, godmother,” said Miss Wren, as they 
 remained upon the steps together, looking at 
 
 }one another. ‘‘ And so you're thrown upon the 
 
 world !” 
 
 ‘“It would appear so, Jenny, and somewhat 
 suddenly.” 
 
 ‘* Where are you 
 asked Miss Wren. 
 
 The old man smiled, but looked about him 
 with a look of having lost his way In life, which 
 did not escape the dolls’ dress-maker, 
 
 ‘Verily, Jenny,” said he, “the question is to 
 the purpose, and more easily asked than answer- 
 But as I have experience of the ready good- 
 will and good help of those who have given oe- 
 cupation to Lizzie, I think I will seck them out 
 for myself.” 2 
 
 ‘On foot?” asked Miss Wren, with a chop. 
 
 ‘‘ Ay!” said the old man. ‘‘ Have I not my 
 staff?” 
 
 It was exactly because he had his staff, and 
 presented so quaint an aspect, that she mistrust- 
 ed his making the journey. 
 
 “The best thing you can do,” said Jenny, 
 ‘‘for the time being, at all events, is to eome 
 home with me, godmother. Nobody’s there but 
 my bad child, and Lizzic’s lodging stands emp= 
 ty.” The old man when satisfied that no in- 
 convenience could be entailed on any one by his 
 compliance, readily complied; and the singular- 
 ly-assorted couple once more went through the 
 strects together, 
 
 Now, the bad child having been strictly charged 
 by his parent to remain at home in her absence, 
 of course went out; and, being in the very last 
 stage of mental decrepitnde, went out with two 
 objects: firstly, to establish a claim he conceived 
 himself to have upon any licensed victualer liv- 
 
 going to seck your fortune ?” 
 
 ob, more 
 
314 
 
 “ing, to be supplied with threepennyworth of rum 
 
 — 
 
 all 
 
 ' den Market and there bivouacked, to have 
 
 for nothing; and, secondly, to bestow some 
 maudlin remorse on Mr. Kkugene Wrayburn, and 
 see what profit came of it. Stumblingly pur- 
 suing these two designs—they both meant rum, 
 the only meaning of Which he was capable—the 
 degraded creature staggered into Covent Gar- 
 an 
 attack of the trembles succeeded by an attack 
 of the horrors, in a doorway. 
 
 This market of Covent Garden was quite out 
 the creature’s line of road, but it had the at- 
 traction for him which it has for the worst of 
 the solitary members of the drunken tribe. It 
 may be the companionship of the nightly stir, or 
 it may be the companionship of the gin and 
 beer that slop about among carters and huck- 
 sters, or it may be the companionship of the 
 
 radon vegetable refuse, which is so like their 
 
 own dress that perhaps they take the Market for 
 a great wardrobe; but be it what it mi: ay, you 
 shale Ho such individual drunkards on door- 
 steps any where as there. Of dozing women- 
 drunkards especially, you shall come upon such 
 pecimens there, in ‘the morning sunlight, as you 
 might seck ont of doors in vain through Lon- 
 don. Such stale, vapid, rejected cabbage-leaf 
 
 and cabbage-stalk dress; such damaged orange 
 countenance; such squashed pulp of humanity, 
 
 - are open to the day nowhere else. So the at- 
 traction of the Market drew Mr. Dolls to it, and 
 
 he had out his two fits of trembles and horrors 
 in a doorway on which a woman had had out 
 her sodden nap a few hours before. 
 
 There is a swarm of young savages always 
 flitting abont this same place, creeping off with 
 fragments of orange-chests, and mouldy litter 
 —Heaven knows into what holes they can con- 
 vey them, having no home!—whose bare feet 
 fall with a blunt, dull sofiness on the pavement 
 as the policeman hunts them, and who are (per- 
 haps for that reason) little heard by the Powers 
 that be, whereas in top-boots they would make 
 a deafening clatter. These, dehghting in the 
 trembles. and the horrors of Mr, Dolls, as in a 
 gratuitous drama, flocked about him in his door- 
 way, butted at him, leaped at him, and pelted 
 him. Hence, when he came out of his invalid 
 retirement and shook off that ragged train, he 
 was much bespattered, and in worse case than 
 ever. But not yet at his worst; for, going into 
 a public house, and being supplied in stress of 
 business with his rum, and seeking to vanish 
 without payment, he was collared, searched, 
 found penniless, and admonished not to try that 
 again, by having a pail of dirty water cast over 
 him. This application superinduced another fit 
 of the trembles; after which Mr. Dolls, as find- 
 ing himself in good cue for making a call on a 
 professional friend, addressed himself to the 
 Temple... 
 
 ‘There was nobody at the chambers but Young 
 Blight. That discreet youth, sensible of a cer- 
 tain incongruity in the association of such a 
 client with the business that might be coming 
 some day, with the best intentions temporized 
 with Dolls, and offered a shilling for coach-hire 
 home. Mr. Dolls, accepting the shilling, prompt- 
 ly laid it out in two threepennyworths of con- 
 spiracy against his life, and two threepenny- 
 worths of raging repentance, Returning to the 
 Chambers with which burden, he was descried 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEN D. 
 
 a 
 
 coming round into the court by the wary young 
 Blight watching from the window :. 
 object to expend his fary on the panels. sh 
 ‘he more the door resisted him the more dan- 
 gerous and imminent beqame that bloody con- 
 spiracy against his life. Force of police arriy-— 
 ing, he recognized i in them the conspirators, and 
 laid about him hoarsely, fiercely, staringly, con- 
 vulsively, foamingly. A humble machine, fa-— 
 
 ee to the conspirators, and called hy the ex-— 
 
 sressive name of Stretcher, being unavoidably 
 sent for, he was rendered a harmless bundle of 
 torn rags by being strapped down npon it, with 
 voice and consciousness gone out of him, and 
 life fast going. As this machine was borne out 
 at the Temple gate by four men the poor little 
 dolls’ dress-maker and her Jewish friend were 
 coming up the street. ) 
 
 ‘¢ Let us see what it is,” cried the dresem alee 
 ‘¢ Vet us make hast and look, godmother.” 
 
 ~The brisk little crutch-stick was but too brisk. 
 ‘“Oh, gentlemen, gentlemen, he belongs to me!” 
 
 “ Belongs to you?” said the head of the 
 party, stopping it. 
 
 “Oh yes, dear gentlemen, he’s my child, out 
 without leave. My poor, bad, bad boy! and he 
 don’t’ know me, he don’t know me! Oh, what 
 shall I do,” cried the little creature, wildly beat- 
 ing her he inds together, ‘*when my own child 
 don’t know me!” 
 
 The head of the party looked (as well he 
 might) to the old man for explanation. He 
 whispered, as the dolls’ dress-maker bent over 
 the exhausted form, and vainly tried to extract 
 some sign of recognition from it: ‘‘It’s her 
 drunken father.” 
 
 As the load was put down in the street, Riah 
 drew the head of the party aside, and whispered 
 that he thought the man was dying. ‘‘ No, sure- 
 ly not?” returned the other. But he became 
 less confident on looking, and directed the bear- 
 
 rs to * bring him to the nearest doctor’s shop.” 
 
 Thither he was brought; the window becom- 
 ing from within a wall of faces, deformed into 
 all kinds of shapes through the agency of globu- 
 lar red bottles, green bottles, blue bottles, and 
 other colored bottles. A ghastly light shining 
 
 upon him that he didn’t need, the beast so furi- q 
 
 ous but a few minutes gone was quiet enough 
 now, With a strange, mysterious writing on his 
 face, reflected from one of the great bottles, as 
 if Death had marked him: ‘‘ Mine.” 
 
 ‘The medical testimony was more precise and 
 more to the purpose than it sometimes is ina 
 Court of Justice. ‘You had betier send for 
 something to cover it. All’s over.’ 
 
 Therefore the police sent for something to 
 cover it, and it was covered and borne through ~ 
 
 the streets, the people falling away, After it- 
 
 went the dolls’ dress-maker, hiding her face in — 
 the Jewish skirts, and clinging to them with © 
 one hand, while with the other she plicd her — 
 
 stick. It was carried home, and, by reason 
 that the staircase was very narrow, it was put 
 
 down in the parlor—the little working-bench s 
 
 being set aside to make room for it—and ere 
 in the midst of the dolls with no speculation: in 
 their eyes, lay Mr. Dolls with no speculatiag in ri 
 his. 
 
 Many flaunting dolls had to be gayly dressed — 
 before the money was in the dress-maker’ 8 pocket 
 
 who instant. 
 ly closed the outer door, and left the miserable “ 
 
 ie 
 
3 to get mourning for Mr. Dolls. As the old man, 
 Riah, sat by, helping her in such small ways as he 
 
 her father. 
 
 “If my poor boy,” she would say, ‘‘ had been | 
 
 brought up better, he might have done better. 
 Not that I reproach myself. 
 cause for that.” 
 
 ‘*None indeed, Jenny, I am very certain.” 
 — Thank you, godmother. It cheers me to 
 hear you say so. But you see’it is so hard to 
 
 bring up a child well, when you work, work, | 
 When he was out of employ- 
 
 work, all day. 
 
 ment I couldn’t always keep him near me. He 
 
 got fractious and nervous, and I was obliged to | 
 
 let him go into the streets. And he never did 
 well in the streets, he never did well out of 
 sight. How often it happens with children !” 
 
 ‘«Too often, even in this sad sense !”” thought 
 the old man. | 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 ~ could, he found it difficult to make out whether | 
 she really did realize that the deceased had been 
 
 I hope I have no | 
 
 315 
 
 | while Lam gone. It’s not far off. And when 
 'I return, we'll have a cup ‘of tea, and a chat 
 over future arrangements. It’s a very plain last 
 house that. I have been able to give my poor un- 
 fortunate boy; but he’ll accept the will for the 
 deed, if he knows any thing about it; and if he 
 doesn’t know any thing about it,’ with a sob, 
 and wiping her eyes, ‘‘ why, it won’t matter to 
 him. I see the service in the Prayer-book says, 
 that we brought nothing into this world and it is 
 certain we can take nothing out. It comforts 
 
 world with him, when of course I must break 
 down in the attempt, and bring ’em all back 
 again. <As it is, there’ll be nothing to bring 
 back but me, and that’s quite consistent, for I 
 sha’n’t be brought back, some day !” 
 After that previous carrying of him in the 
 streets, the wretched old fellow seemed to be 
 
 ‘How can I say what I might have turned--twice buried. He was taken on the shoulders 
 
 out myself, but for my back having been so bad 
 and my legs “so queer, when I was young!” the 
 dress-maker would go on. ‘‘I had nothing to 
 do but.work, and so I worked. I couldn’t play. 
 Bat my poor unfortunate child could play, and 
 it turned out the worse for him.” 
 
 <¢ And not for him alone, Jenny.” 
 ‘Well! I don’t know, godmother. 
 
 He suf- 
 
 /very, very ill sometimes, Eca) 
 i quantity of names:” shaking her head over her 
 | work, and dropping tears. 
 
 his going wrong was much the worse for me. 
 If it ever was, let us forget it.” 
 
 ~——«« You are a good girl, you are a patient girl.” 
 
 <¢ As for patience,” she would reply with a | 
 
 shrug, ‘‘not much of that, godmother. If I 
 - had been patient I should never have called 
 him names, But I hope I did ir for his good. 
 ~And besides, I felt my responsibility as a mo- 
 ther so much. I tried reasoning, and reasoning 
 failed. I tried ecvuaxing, and coaxing failed. I 
 tried scolding, and scolding failed. But I was 
 bound to try every thing, you know, with such 
 a charge upon my hands. Where would have 
 _ focen my duty to my poor lost boy if I had not 
 tried every thing!” 
 
 With such talk, mostly in a cheerful tone on | 
 
 the part of the industrious little creature, the 
 day-work and the night-work were beguiled un- 
 til enough of smart dolls had gone forth to bring 
 into the kitchen, where the working-bench now 
 stood, the sombre stuff that the occasion required, 
 
 and to bring into the house the other sombre | 
 
 preparations. ‘‘ And now,” said Miss Jenny, 
 » “having knocked off my rosy-cheeked young 
 friends, Pll knock off my white-checked self.” 
 ' This referred to her making her own dress, 
 which at last was done. 
 
 stood upon a chair to look at the result in the 
 glass, ‘‘is, that you can’t charge any body else 
 > for the job, and the advantage is, that von 
 haven’t to go out to try on. Humph! Very 
 @ fair indeed! If He could see me now (whoever 
 he is) | hope he wouldn’t repent of his bargain !” 
 The simple arrangements were of her own 
 making, and were stated to Riah thus: 
 _ “T mean to go alone, godmother, in my usnal 
 carriage, and you'll be so kind as keep house 
 i » 
 
 ¥ 
 
 ‘<The disadvantage | 
 _,of making for yourself,” said Miss Jenny, as she | 
 
 of half a dozen blossom-faced men, who shnf- 
 fled with him to the church-yard, and who were 
 preceded by another blossom-faced man, affect- 
 ‘ing a stately stalk, as if he were a Policeman of 
 |the D(eath) Division, and ceremoniously pre- 
 tending not to know his intimate acquaintances, 
 as he led the pageant. Yet, the spectacie of 
 only one little mourner hobbling after, caused 
 many people to turn their heads with a look of 
 interest. 
 
 At last the troublesome deceased was got into 
 the ground, to be buried no more, and the state- 
 ly stalker stalked back before the solitary dress- 
 maker, as.if she were bound in honor to have no 
 notion of the way home. Those Furies, the 
 conventionalities, being thus appeased, he lett 
 her. 
 
 ‘‘T must have a very short ery, godmother, 
 before I cheer up for good,” said the little creat- 
 ure, coming in. ‘‘ Because after all a child is a 
 child, you know.” 
 
 It was a longer cry than might have been ex- 
 pected. Howbeit, it wore itself out in a shad- 
 owy corner, and then the dress-maker came 
 forth, and washed her face, and made the tea. 
 ‘¢You wouldn’t mind my eutting out something 
 while we are at tea, would you?” she asked her 
 Jewish friend, with a coaxing air. 
 
 “‘ Cinderella, dear child,” the old man expos- 
 tulated, ‘will you never rest ?” 
 
 ‘Oh! It’s not work, entting out a pattern 
 isn’t,” said Miss Jenny, with her busy little scis- 
 sors already snipping at some paper. ‘The 
 truth is, godmother, I want to fix it while I have 
 it correct in my mind.” 
 
 | 
 
 ““Yes, godmother. Saw it just now. Itsa 
 surplice, that’s what it is. Thing our clergymen 
 wear, you know,” explained Miss Jenny, in con- 
 sideration of his professing another faith. : 
 
 “And what have you to do with that, Jenny real 
 
 ‘Why, godmother,” replied the dress-maker, 
 ‘‘you must know that we Professors who live 
 upon our taste and invention are obliged to keep 
 our eves always open. And you know already 
 that I have many extra expenses to meet Just 
 now. So, it came into my head while I was 
 weeping at my poor boy’s grave, that something 
 in mv wav might be done with a clergyman.” 
 
 «What can be done?” asked the old man. 
 
 ‘‘Have you seen it to-day then?” asked Riah, 
 
 ry 
 
 me for not being able to hire a lot of stupid un- - 
 dertaker’s things for my poor child, and seem- . 
 ing as if I was trying to smuggle ’em out of this~ 
 
 dee 
 
ae 
 
 316. 
 
 SoTL L 
 EY, Lp 
 DLL 
 iy Weg i) 
 
 ty 
 
 Y jp 
 Uf i; Yip YY 
 4, Y Wig yey 
 i Ih Wy 
 Li y Wy 
 
 Wy i ies 
 Vy Wy 
 ig 
 Yelp 
 My Yip 
 
 — Ss 
 Ss HI 
 SS R 
 
 ‘¢Not a funeral, never fear!” returned Miss 
 
 - Jenny, anticipating his objection with a nod. 
 
 ‘¢'The public don’t like to be made melancholy, 
 
 I know very well. Iam seldom called upon to 
 
 put my young friends into mourning; not into 
 
 real mourning, that is; Court mourning they 
 
 -- are rather proud of. But a doll clergyman, my 
 
 dear—glossy black curls and whiskers—uniting 
 
 — two of my young friends in matrimony,” said 
 
 Miss Jenny, shaking her forefinger, ‘‘is quite 
 
 another affair. If you don’t see those three at 
 
 “the altar in Bond Street, in a jiffy, my name’s 
 -Jack Robinson !” 
 
 With her expert little ways in sharp action, 
 she had got a doll into whitey-brown paper or- 
 ders before the meal was over, and was display- 
 ing it for the edification of the Jewish mind, 
 when a knock was heard at the street-door. 
 Riah went to open it, and presently came back, 
 
 oS 
 
 that I am Mr. Mortimer Lightwood, and will _ 
 tell vou so.” ~ bes oa a 
 Riah bent his head in corroboration. ~~ Ae 9 
 
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 tip 
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 ‘ : 
 
 ushering in, with the grave and courteous air 
 that sat so well upon him, a gentleman. 
 
 The gentleman was a stranger to the dress- 
 
 aker; but even in the moment of his casting 
 his eyes upon her, there was something in his 
 manner which brought to her remembrance Mr. _ 
 Eugene Wrayburn. a 
 
 ‘¢ Pardon me,” said the gentleman. ‘**You are 
 the dolls’ dress-maker ?” 
 
 ‘“‘T am the dolls’ dress-maker, Sir.” 
 
 ‘¢ Lizzie Hexam’s friend ?” 
 “Yes, Sir,” replied Miss Jenny, instantly on 
 the defensive. ‘‘ And Lizzie Hexam’s friend.” —_ 
 
 ‘Here is a note from her, entreating you to _ 
 accede to the request of Mr. Mortimer Light- 
 wood, the bearer. Mr. Riah chances to know 
 
 | 
 
 % 
 
 j 
 “ 
 
 hi 
 L; 
 
 f 
 ct 
 i 
 
: 
 : 
 +e 
 fe 
 
 s 
 
 ee 
 
 = 
 
 —OWill you read the note ?” 
 “Ths very short,” said Jenny, with a look of 
 “wonder, when she had read it. 
 
 *<'There was no time to make it longer. Time 
 was so very precious. My dear friend Mr. Eu- 
 gene Wrayburn is dying.” 
 
 The dress-maker clasped her hands, and ut- 
 tered a little piteous cry. 
 
 ‘*Js dying,” repeated Lightwood, with emo- 
 tion, ‘“‘at some distance from here. He is sink- 
 ing under injuries received at the hands of a vil- 
 lain who attacked him in the dark. I come 
 straight from his bedside. He is almost always 
 insensible. In a short restless interval of sensi- 
 bility, or partial sensibility, Lmade out that he 
 asked for you to be brought to sit by him. Hardly 
 relying on my own F posit of the indistinct 
 sounds he made, I caused-Hizzié to hear them, 
 We were both suit that he asked for you.’ 
 
 The dress-maker, with her hands still clasped, 
 looked affrightedly from the one to thé other of 
 her two companions. 
 
 “*If you delay, he may die with his request 
 ungratified, with his last wish—intrusted to me 
 —we have ‘long been much more than brothers 
 —unfulfilled. I shall break down if I try to 
 say more.” 
 
 In a few moments the black bonnet and the 
 
 crutch=stick w were.on duty, the=good-Jew_was left: 
 
 in“posséssion of the house,and_the dolls’ dress- 
 maker, side_by side-ina—chaise with Mortimer, 
 Lightwo vood, was posting out of town, eae 
 
 > 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 THE DOLLS’ DRESS-MAKER DISCOVERS A WORD. 
 
 ~ A DARKENED and hushed room ; the river out- 
 side the windows flowing on to the vast ocean ; 
 a figure on the bed, swathed and bandaged and 
 bound, lying helpless on its back, with its two 
 useless arms in splints at its sides. Only two 
 
 ~days of usage so familiarized the little dress- | 
 
 maker with this scene, that it held the place 
 occupied two days ago by the recollections of 
 years. 
 He had scarcely moved since her arrival. 
 “Sometimes his eyes were open, sometimes closed. 
 When they were open, there was no meaning in 
 their unwinking stare at one spot straight before 
 them, unless for a moment the brow knitted into 
 7a faint expression of anger, or surprise. Then, 
 , Mortimer Lightwood would speak to him, and 
 
 on occasions he would be so far roused as to make 
 an attempt to pronounce his friend’s name. But, 
 in an instant consciousness was gone again, and 
 no spirit of Kugene was in Eugene’s crushed 
 outer form. 
 
 ' They provided Jenny with materials for ply- 
 ing her work, and she had a little table placed 
 at the foot of his bed. Sitting there, with her 
 rich shower of hair falling over the chair-back, 
 they hoped she might attract his notice. With 
 the same object she would sing, just above her 
 breath, when he opened his eyes, or she saw his 
 brow knit into that faint expression, so evanes- 
 cent that it was like a shape made in water. 
 ut as yet he had not heeded. The ‘‘they” here 
 entioned were the medical attendant; Lizzie, 
 vho was there in all her intrvals of rest ; and 
 aghtwood, who never left him. 
 
 — 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 317 
 
 The two days became three, and the three 
 days became four. At length, quite unexpect- 
 edly, he said something in a whisper. 
 
 ‘¢ What was it, my dear Eugene eo 
 
 ** Will you, Mortimer—” 
 
 “Will I— ?” 
 
 —‘*Send for her ?” 
 
 ‘¢ My dear fellow, she is here.” 
 
 Quite unconscious of the long blank, he sup- 
 posed that they were still speaking together. 
 
 The little dress-maker stood up at the foot of 
 the bed, humming her song, and nodded to him 
 brightly, “IT can’t shake hands, Jenny,” said 
 Eugene, with something of his old. look; ‘but I 
 am very glad to see you.” 
 
 Mortimer repeated this to her, for it could 
 only be made out by bending over him and 
 closely watching his attempts to say it. In ae 
 little while he added: 
 
 ‘* Ask her if she has seen the children.” 
 
 Mortimer could not. understand this, neither 
 could Jenny herself, until he added: 
 
 ** Ask her if she has smelt the flowers.” «= 
 
 ‘Oh! Tknow!” cried Jenny, ‘‘I understand 
 him now!” Then Lightwood yielded his place 
 to her quick approach, and she said, bending 
 over the bed, with that better look: ‘‘ You mean 
 my long bright slanting rows of children, who | 
 used to bring me ease and rest? You mean the ( 
 children who used to take me up, and make me 
 light ?” 
 
 Eugene smiled, ‘‘ Yes.” 
 
 ‘‘T have not seen them since I saw you. I 
 never see them now, but I am hardly ever in 
 pain now.” 
 
 ‘*Tt was a pretty fancy,” said Eugene. 
 
 ‘* But I have heard my birds sing,” cried the 
 little creature, ‘‘and I have smelt my flowers. 
 Yes, indeed I have! And both were most beau- 
 tiful and most Divine !” 
 
 ‘¢ Stay and help to nurse me,” said Eugene, 
 quietly. ‘TI should like you to have the fancy — 
 here, before I die.” 
 
 She touched his lips with her hand, and shaded ) 
 her eyes with that same hand as she went back 
 to her work and her little low song. He heard 
 the song with evident pleasure, until she allowed 
 it gradually to sink away into silence. 
 
 ‘* Mortimer.” 
 
 ‘*« My dear Eugene.” 
 
 ‘‘If you can give me any thing to keep me 
 here for only a few minutes—” 
 
 ‘¢To keep you here, Eugene ?” 
 
 ‘¢'To prevent my wandering away I don’t know 
 where—for I begin to be sensible that I have Just 
 come back, and that I shall lose myself again— 
 do so, dear boy !” 
 
 Mor timer gave him such stimulants as ooula 
 be given him with safety (they were always at 
 hand, ready), and bending over him once more, 
 was about to caution him, when he said: 
 
 ‘* Don’t tell me not to speak, for I must speak. 
 If you knew the harassing anxiety that gnaws 
 and wears me when I am wandering in those 
 places—where. are those endless places, Morti- 
 mer? They must be at an immense distance !” 
 
 He saw in his friend’s face that he was losing 
 himself; for he added after a moment; ‘‘ Don’t 
 be afraid—I am not@rone yet. What was it?” 
 
 ‘You wanted to tell me something, Eugene. 
 My-: oor dear fellow, vou wanted to say sore- 
 
 ed 
 
 i thing to your old fricnd—to the friend who has. 
 
818 
 
 always loved you, admired you, imitated you, 
 founded himself upon you, been’ nothing with- 
 
 out you, and who, God knows, would be here in| 
 
 your place if he could !” 
 
 “Tut, tut!” said Eugene, with a tender glance 
 as the other put his hand before his face. ‘*I 
 am not worth it. I acknowledge that I like it, 
 dear boy, but I am -not worth it. This attack, 
 my dear Mortimer; this murder—” 
 
 His friend leaned over him with renewed at- 
 tention, saying: ‘* You and I suspect some one.” 
 
 ‘More than suspect. But, Mortimer, while I 
 hie here, and when I lie here no longer, I trust | 
 to you that the perpetrator is never brought to 
 justice.” 
 
 ‘* Kugene ?” 
 
 **Her innocent reputation would be ruined, | 
 my friend. She would be punished, not he. 
 I have wronged her enough in fact; I have 
 wronged her still more in intention. You reec- 
 ollect what pavement is said to be made of good 
 intentions. It is made of bad intentions too. 
 Mortimer, I am lying on it, and I know!” | 
 
 ‘** Be comforted, my dear Eugene.” 
 
 **T will, when you have promised me. Dear | 
 Mortimer, the man must never be pursued. If | 
 he should be accused, you must keep him silent’ 
 and save him. Don’t think of avenging me ; | 
 think only of hushing the story and protecting 
 her. You can confuse the case, and turn aside | 
 the circumstances. Listen to what I say to you. 
 It was not the schoolmaster, Bradley Headstone. 
 Do you hear me? Twice; it was not the school- | 
 master, Bradley Headstone. Do you hear me? | 
 Three times; it was not the schoolmaster, Brad- 
 ley Headstone.” , 
 
 He stopped, exhausted. His speech had been 
 whispered, broken, and indistiact ; but by a great 
 effort he had made it plain enough to be unmis- 
 takable. 
 
 ‘Dear fellow, I am wandering away. Stay 
 me for another moment, if you can.” 
 
 Lightwood lifted his head at the neck, and 
 put a wine-glass to his lips. He rallied. 
 
 , . ‘I don’t know how long ago it was done, 
 whether weeks, days, or hours. No matter. 
 There is inquiry on foot, and pursuit. Say! 
 Is there not ?” 
 
 Py eso 
 
 ‘Check it; divert it! Don’t let her be 
 brought in question. Shield her. The guilty 
 man, brought to justice, would poison her name. 
 Let the guilty man go unpunished. Lizzie and 
 my reparation before all! Promise me!” 
 
 “Kugene, Ido. I promise you!” 
 
 In the act of turning his eyes gratefully to- 
 ward his friend he wandered away. His eyes 
 stood still, and settled into that former intent 
 unmeaning stare. 
 
 Hours and hours, days and nights, he remain- 
 ed in this same condition. There were times 
 ‘when he would calmly speak to his friend after 
 a long period of unconsciousness, and would say 
 he was better, and would ask for something. 
 
 Before it could be given him he would be gone 
 again. 
 
 The dolls’ dress-maker, all softened compas- 
 sion now, watched him with an earnestness that 
 never relaxed. She would regularly change the 
 ice, or the cooling spirit, on his head, and would 
 keep her ear at the pillow betweenwhiles, listen- 
 ing for any faint words that fell from him in his 
 
 ! ine speak first. 
 
 ' pee “ee hike 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 wanderings. It was amazing through how many 
 hours at a time she would remain beside him, in 
 a crouching attitude,, attentive: to his slightest 
 moan. As he could not move a hand, he could 
 make no sign of distress; but, through this close 
 watching (if through no secret sympathy or pow- 
 er) the little creature attained an understanding 
 of him that Lightwood did not possess. Morti- 
 mer would often turn to her, as if she were an 
 interpreter between this sentient world and the 
 insensible man ; and she would change the dress- 
 ing of a wound, or ease a ligature, or turn his 
 face, or alter the pressure of the bed-clothes on 
 
 him, with an absolute certainty of doing right. 
 
 The natural lightness and delicacy of touch 
 which had become very refined by practice in 
 her miniature work no doubt was inyolved in 
 
 _this; but her perception was at least as fine. 
 
 The one word, Lizzie, he muttered millions 
 of times. In a certain phase of his distressful 
 state, which was the worst to those who tended 
 him, he would roll his head upon the pillow, in- 
 cessantly repeating the name in a hurried and 
 
 | impatient manner, with the misery of a disturbed 
 
 mind, and the monotony of a machine. Equal- 
 ly, when he Jay still and staring, he’ would re- 
 peat it for hours without cessation, but then, al- 
 ways in a tone of subdued warning and horror. 
 Mer presence and her touch upon his breast or 
 face would often stop this, and then they learned 
 
 _to expect that he would for some time remain 
 still, with his eyes closed, and that he would be 
 
 conscious on opening them. But the heavy dis- 
 appointment of their hope—revived by the wel- 
 come silence of the room—-was, that his spirit 
 would glide away again and be lost in the mo- 
 ment of their joy that it was there. 
 
 This frequent rising of a drowning man from 
 the deep, to sink again, was dreadful to the be- 
 holders. But gradually the change stole upon 
 him that it became dreadful to himself. His 
 desire to impart something that was on_ his 
 mind, his unspeakable yearning to have speech 
 with his friend and make a communication to 
 
 | him, so troubled him when he recovered con- 
 
 scionsness that its term was thereby shortened. 
 
 As the man rising from the deep would disap- 
 ear the sooner for fighting with the water, so 
 e in his desperate struggle went down again. 
 
 One afternoon when he had been lying still, 
 and Lizzie, unrecognized, had just stolen out of 
 the room to pursue her occupation, he uttercd 
 Lightwood’s name. 
 
 ‘*My dear Engene, I am here.” 
 
 ‘* How long is this to last, Mortimer ?” 
 
 Lightwood shook his head. “Still, Eugene, 
 you are no worse than you were.” 
 
 ‘* But I know there’s no hope. Yet I pray it 
 may last long enough for you to do me one last 
 service, and for me to do one last action. Keep 
 me here a few moments, Mortimer. ‘Try, try !” 
 
 His friend gave him what aid he could, and 
 encouraged him to believe that he was more 
 composed, though even then his eyes were losing’ 
 the expression they so rarely recovered. 
 
 ‘*Hold me here. dear fellow, if you can. Stop 
 my wandering away, I am going!” ee 
 
 “Not yet, not vet. Tell me, dear Eugene, 
 what is it I shall do?” af 
 
 ‘‘Keep me here for only a single minute. I 
 am going away again. Don’t let me go. Hear 
 Stop me—stop me!” yt 
 
 <—~ 
 
 se 
 
d 
 
 ‘ad ‘¢My poor Eugene, try to be calm.” 
 “TI dotry, Itryso hard. If you only knew 
 how hard! Don’t let me wander till I have 
 spoken. Give me a little more wine.” 
 
 Lightwood complied. Eugene, with a most 
 pathetic struggle against the unconsciousness 
 that was coming over him, and with a look of 
 appeal that affected his friend profoundly, said: 
 
 *©You can leave me with Jenny, while you 
 oer to her and tell:her what I beseech of her, 
 
 ou can leave me with Jenny while you are 
 gone. ‘There’s not much for you to do. You 
 won't be long away.” 
 
 ‘¢No, no, no. But tell me what it is that I 
 shall do, Eugene!” 
 
 ‘“‘T am going! You can’t hold me.” 
 
 ‘Tell me in a word, Eugene!” 
 
 His eyes were fixed again, and the only word 
 that came from his lips was the word millions of 
 times repeated. Lizzie, Lizzie, Lizzie. 
 
 But the watchful little dress-maker had been 
 vigilant as ever in her watch, and she now came 
 up and touched Lightwood’s arm as he looked 
 down at his friend, despairingly. : 
 
 ‘‘ Hush!” she said, with her finger on her lips. 
 *¢ His eyes are closing. He’ll be conscious when 
 he next opens them. Shall I give you a leading 
 word to say to him ?” 
 
 ‘© Jenny, if you could only give me the right 
 word !” 
 
 “Tcan. Stoop down.” 
 
 He stooped, and she whispered in his ear. 
 She whispered in his ear one short word of a sin- 
 gle syllable. Lightwood started, and looked at 
 her. 
 
 ‘Try it,” said the little creature, with an ex- 
 cited and exultant face. She then bent over the 
 unconscious man, and, for the first time, kissed 
 him on the cheek, and kissed the poor maimed 
 hand that was nearest to her. Then, she with- 
 drew to the foot of the bed. 
 
 Some two hours afterward, Mortimer Light- 
 wood saw his consciousness come back, and in- 
 - stantly, but very tranquilly, bent over him. 
 
 ‘<¢ Don’t speak, Eugene. Do no more than look 
 at me, and listen to me. You follow what I say.” 
 He moved his head in assent. ’ 
 
 “TI am going on from the point where we 
 broke off. Is the word we should soon have 
 come to—is it—Wife?” 
 
 ‘¢Q God bless you, Mortimer !” 
 
 ‘“‘Hush! Don’t be agitated. Don’t speak. 
 Hear me, dear Eugene. Your mind will be 
 more at peace, lying here, if you make Lizzie 
 your wife. You wish me to speak to her, and 
 tell her so, and entreat her to be your wife. 
 You ask her to kneel at this bedside and be mar- 
 ried to you, that your reparation may be‘com- 
 plete. Is that so?” 
 
 ‘“‘Yes. God bless you! Yes.” 
 
 ‘¢Tt shall be done, Eugene. ‘Trust it to me. 
 I shall have to go away for some few hours, to 
 give effect to your wishes. You see this is un- 
 avoidable ?” 
 
 ‘Dear friend, I said so.” 
 
 “True. But I had not the clew then. 
 do you think I got it ?” 
 
 Glancing wistfully around, Eugene saw Miss 
 Jenny at the foot of the bed, looking at him with 
 her elbows on the bed, and her head upon her 
 hands. There was a trace of his whimsical air 
 upon him as he tried to smile at her. 
 
 How 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 ‘¢ Yes indeed,” said Lightwood, ‘the discov-~ 
 ery was hers. Observe, my dear Eugene ; while 
 I am away you will know that I have discharged 
 my trust with Lizzie, by finding her here, in my 
 present place at your bedside, to leave you no 
 more. <A final word before I go. ‘This is the 
 right course of a true man, Eugene. And [ 
 solemnly believe, with all my soul, that if Prov- 
 idence should mercifully restore you to us, you 
 will be blessed with a noble wife in the preserver 
 of your life, whom you will dearly love.” 
 
 ‘¢Amen. Iam sure of that. But I shall not 
 come through it, Mortimer.” 
 
 ‘¢¥ou will not be the less hopeful or less 
 strong, for this, Eugene.” 
 
 ‘No. Touch my face with yours, in case I 
 should not hold out till yon come back. I love 
 you, Mortimer. Don’t be uneasy for me while 
 your are gone, If my dear brave girl will take 
 me, I feel persuaded that I shall live long enough 
 to be married, dear fellow.” 
 
 Miss Jenny gave up altogether on this part- 
 ing taking place between the friends, and, sitting 
 with her back toward the bed in the bower made 
 by her bright hair, wept heartily, though noise- 
 lessly. Mortimer Lightwood was soon gone. 
 As the evening light lengthened the heavy re- 
 flections of the trees in the river, another figure 
 came with a soft step into the sick room. 
 
 ‘(Is he conscious?” asked the little dress- 
 maker, as the figure took its station by the pil- 
 low. For, Jenny had given place to it immedi- 
 ately, and could not see the sufferer’s face, in 
 the dark room, from her new and remeved po- 
 sition. 
 
 ‘¢ He is conscious, Jenny,” murmured Eugene 
 for himself. ‘‘ He knows his wife.” 
 
 ——— ed 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 EFFECT IS GIVEN TO THE DOLLS’ DRESS-MAK~ 
 ER’S DISCOVERY. 
 
 Mrs. Joun RoKESMITH sat at needle-work in 
 her neat little room, beside a basket of neat lit- 
 tle articles of clothing, which presented so much 
 
 of the appearance of being in the dolls’ dress- 
 
 maker’s way of business, that one might have 
 supposed she was going to set up in opposition 
 to Miss Wren. Whether the Complete British 
 Family Housewife had imparted sage counsel 
 anent them, did not appear, but probably not, 
 as that cloudy oracle was nowhere visible. For 
 certain, however, Mrs. John Rokesmith stitched 
 at them with so dextrous a hand, that she must 
 have taken lessons of somebody. Love is in all 
 
 ‘things a most wonderful teacher, and perhaps 
 
 love (from a pictorial point of view, with nothing 
 on but a thimble) had been teaching this branch 
 of needle-work to Mrs. John Rokesmith, 
 
 It was near John’s time for coming home, but 
 as-Mrs. John was desirous to finish a special tri- 
 umph of her skill before dinner, she did not go 
 out to meet him. Placidly, though rather con- 
 sequentially smiling, she sat stitching away with 
 a regular sound, like a sort of dimpled little 
 charming Dresden-china clock by the very best 
 maker. 
 
 A knock at the door, and a ring at the. bell. 
 Not John, or Bella would have flown out to 
 ineet him. Then who, if not John? Bella was 
 
820 
 
 ‘asking herself the question, when that flutter- 
 ing little fool of a servant fluttered in, saying, 
 Mr. Lightwood!” 
 
 Oh good gracious ! 
 
 Bella had but time to throw a handkerchief 
 over the basket, when Mr. Lightwood made his 
 bow. There was something amiss with Mr. 
 Lightwood, for he was strangely grave and 
 looked ill. 
 
 With a brief reference to the happy time when 
 it had been his privilege to know Mrs. Roke- 
 smith as Miss Wilfer, Mr. Lightwood explained 
 what was amiss with him and why he came. He 
 came bearing Lizzie Hexam’s earnest hope that 
 Mrs. John Rokesmith would see her married. 
 
 Bella was so fluttered by the request, and by 
 the short narrative he had feelingly given her, 
 that there never was a more timely smelling- 
 bottle than John’s knock. ‘* My husband,” 
 
 said Bella; ‘‘ Pll bring him in.” 
 
 But that turned out to be more easily said 
 than done; for, the instant she mentioned Mr. 
 Lightwood’s name, John stopped, with his hand 
 upon the lock of the room door. 
 
 ‘*Come up stairs, my darling.” 
 
 Bella was amazed by the flush in his face, and 
 by his sudden turning away. ‘What can it 
 mean?” she thought, as she accompanied him 
 up stairs, 
 
 ‘Now, my life,” said John, taking her on his 
 knee, ‘‘tell me all about it.” 
 
 All very well to say, ‘‘ Tell me all about it;” 
 but John was very much confused. His atten- 
 tion evidently trailed off, now and then, even 
 while Bella told him all about it. Yet she knew 
 that he took a great interest in Lizzie and her 
 fortunes. What could it mean ? 
 
 ‘‘ You will come to this marriage with me, 
 John dear?” ‘ 
 
 ‘* N—no, my love; I can’t do that.” 
 
 ** You can’t do that, John ?” 
 
 ** No, my dear, it’s quite out of the question. 
 Not to be thought of.” ‘ 
 
 ** Am I to go alone, John ?” : 
 
 “No, my dear, you will go with Mr. Light- 
 NEOOG LT ut 
 
 ‘** Don’t you think it’s time we went down to 
 Mr. Lightwood, John dear?” Bella insinuated. 
 
 ‘* My darling, it’s almost time you went, but I 
 must ask you to excuse me to him altogether.” 
 
 ‘‘You never mean, Juhn dear, that you are 
 not going to see him? Why, he knows you 
 have come home. I told him so.” . . 
 
 ‘*That’s a little unfortunate, but it can’t be 
 helped. Unfortunate or fortunate, I positively 
 can not see him, my love.” 
 
 Bella cast about in her mind what could be 
 his reason for this nnaccountable behavior, as 
 she sat on his knee looking at him in astonish- 
 ment and pouting a little. A weak reason pre- 
 sented itself. 
 
 “ John dear, you*never can be jealous of Mr. 
 Lightwood ?” 
 
 ‘* Why, my precious child,” returned her hus- 
 band, laughing outright, ‘* how could I be jeal- 
 ous of him? Why should I be jealous of him ?” 
 
 ‘Because you know, John,” pursued Bella, 
 pouting a little more, ‘‘though he did rather ad- 
 mire me once, it was not my fault.” 
 
 _ “Tt was your fault that [ admired yon,” re- 
 turned her husband, with a look of pride in her, 
 *“fand why not your fault that he admired you? 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 But I jealous on that account? Why, I must — 
 go distracted for life if I turned jealous of every — 
 one who used to find my wife beautiful and win- ~ 
 
 Te OED Aimee N ie olan se hae oe Pata cha chs he A IE ee ny 
 Seat t ‘ ae ‘ 
 
 PE Nar ty at 
 
 ning!” 
 
 ‘‘T am half angry with you, John dear,” said 
 Bella, laughing a little, “‘and half pleased with 
 you; because you are such a stupid old fellow, 
 and yet you say nice things, as if you meant 
 them. Don’t be mysterious, Sir. What harm 
 do you know of Mr. Lightwood ?” 
 
 **None, my love.” 
 
 ‘‘ What has he ever done to you, John?” 
 
 ‘‘He has never done any thing to me, my 
 dear. Iknow no more against him than I know 
 against Mr. Wrayburn; he has never done any 
 thing to me; neither has Mr. Wrayburn. And 
 yet I have exactly the same objegtion to both 
 of them,” 
 
 ‘*Oh, John!” retorted Bella, as if she were 
 giving him up for a bad job, as she used to give 
 up herself. ‘You are nothing better than a 
 sphinx! And a married sphinx isn’t a—isn’t a 
 
 nice confidential husband,” said Bella, in a tone 
 
 of injury. 
 
 ‘* Bella, my life,” said John Rokesmith, touch- 
 ing her cheek, with a grave smile, as she cast 
 down her eyes and pouted again; ‘look at me. 
 I want to speak to you.” 
 
 ‘*In earnest, Blue Beard of the secret cham- 
 ber?” asked Bella, clearing her pretty face. 
 
 ‘‘In earnest. And I confess to the secret 
 chamber. Don’t you remember that you asked 
 me not to declare what I thought of your higher 
 qualities until you had been tried ?” 
 
 ‘‘Yes, John dear. And I fully meant it, and 
 I fully mean it.” 
 
 “The time will come, my darling—I am no 
 prophet, but I say so—when you wid be tried. 
 The time will come, I think, when you will un- 
 dergo a trial through which you will never pass 
 quite triumphantly for me unless you can put 
 perfect faith in me.” 
 
 ‘Then you may be sure of me, John dear, 
 for I can put perfect faith in you, and I do, and 
 I always, always will. Don’t judge me by a 
 little thing like this, John. In little things I 
 am a little thing myself—I always was. But in 
 great things I hope not; I don’t mean to boast, 
 John dear, but I hope not.” 
 
 He was even better convinced of the truth of 
 what she said than she was as he felt her loving 
 arms about him. If the Golden Dustman’s rieh- 
 es had been his to stake, he would have staked 
 them to the last farthing on the fidelity through 
 good and evil of her affectionate and trusting 
 heart. 
 
 ‘‘ Now [ll go down to, and go away with, Mr. 
 Lightwood,” said Bella, springing up, 
 are the most creasing and tumbling Clumsy- 
 Boots of a packer, John, that ever was; but if 
 
 you're quite good, and will promise never to do. 
 so any more (though I don’t know what you 
 
 have done!), you may pack me a little bag for a 
 night, while I get my bonnet on.” 
 
 He gayly complied, and she tied her dimpled 
 chin up, and shook her head into her bonnet, 
 and pulled out the bows of her bonnet-strings, 
 and got her gloves on, finger by finger, and final- 
 ly got them on her little plump hands, and bade 
 him good-by, and went down. 
 impatience was,much relieved when he 
 
 . found 
 her dressed for departure. 
 
 "ee 
 
 ‘Vor 
 
 Mr. Lightwood’s. 
 
“Oh, I forgot!” ‘replied Bella. ‘‘ His best 
 compliments. His face is swollen to the size of 
 two faces, and he is to go to bed directly, poor 
 fellow, to wait for the doctor, who is coming to 
 lance him.” 
 
 ‘It is curious,” observed Lightwood, ‘‘ that I 
 have never yet seen Mr. Rokesmith, though we 
 have been engaged in the same affairs.” 
 
 ‘¢ Really ?” said the unblushing Bella, 
 
 TT begin to think,” observed Lightwood, 
 **that I never shall see him.” 
 
 “These things happen so oddly sometimes,” 
 said Bella, with a steady countenance, ‘‘ that 
 there seems a kind of fatality in them. But I 
 am quite ready, Mr. Lightwood.” 
 
 They started directly in a little carriage that 
 Lightwood had brought with him from never- 
 to-be-forgotten Greenwich; and from Green- 
 wich they started directly for London; and in 
 London they waited at a railway station until 
 such time as the Reverend Frank Milvey, and 
 Margaretta his wife, with whom Mortimer Light- 
 wood had been already in conference, should 
 come and join them. 
 
 That worthy couple were delayed by a por- 
 tentous old parishioner of the female gender, 
 who was one of the plagues of their lives, and 
 with whom they bore with most exemplary sweet- 
 ness -and good-humor, notwithstanding her hay- 
 ing an infection of absurdity about her that com- 
 municated itself to every thing with which, and 
 every body with whom, she came in contact. 
 She was a member of the Reverend Frank’s con- 
 gregation, and made a point of distinguishing 
 herself in that body by conspicuously weeping at 
 every thing, however cheering, said by the Rey- 
 erend Frank in his public ministration; also, 
 by applying to herself the various lamentations 
 
 of David, and complaining in a personally in- 
 
 jured manner (much in arrear of the clerk and 
 the rest of the respondents) that her enemies 
 were digging pitfalls about her, and breaking 
 her with rods of iron. Indéed, this old widow 
 discharged herself of that portion of the Morn- 
 ing and Evening Service as if she were lodging 
 a complaint on oath and applying for a warrant 
 before a mazistrate. But this was not her most 
 inconvenient characteristic, for that took the 
 form of an impression, usually recurring in in- 
 clement weather and at about daybreak, that 
 she had something on her mind, and stood in 
 immediate necd of the Reverend Frank to come 
 and take it off. Many a time had that kind 
 creature got up, and gone out to Mrs. Sprodgkin 
 (such was the disciple’s name), suppressing a 
 ‘strong sense of her comicality by his strong sense 
 of duty, and perfectly knowing that nothing but 
 a cold would come of it. However, beyond 
 themselves, the Reverend Frank Milvey and Mrs. 
 Milvey seldom hinted that Mrs. Sprodgkin was 
 hardly worth the trouble she gave; but both 
 made the best of her, as they did of all their 
 troubles. 
 
 ‘This very exacting member of the fold ap- 
 peared to be endowed with a sixth sense, in re- 
 gard of knowing when the Reverend Frank Mil- 
 vey least desired her company, and with prompti- 
 tude appearing in his little hall. Consequently, 
 when the Reverend Frank had willingly engaged 
 
 ; that he and his wife would accompany Light- 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 Mr, Rokesmith goes with us?” he said, hesi- 
 tating, with a look toward the door. 
 
 321 
 
 wood back, he said, as a matter of course: ** We 
 must make haste to get out, Margaretta, my 
 dear, or we shall be descended on by Mrs. 
 Sprodgkin.” ‘To which Mrs. Milvey replied, in 
 her pleasantly emphatic way, ‘‘Oh yes, for she 
 is such a marplot, Frank, and does worry so!” 
 Words that were scarcely uttered when their 
 theme was announced as in faithful attendance 
 below, desiring counsel on a spiritual matter. 
 The points on which Mrs. Sprodgkin sought 
 elucidation being seldom of a pressing nature 
 (as Who begat Whom, or some information con- 
 cerning the Amorites), Mrs. Milvey on this spe- 
 cial occasion resorted to the device of buying her 
 off with a present of tea and sugar, and a loaf 
 and butter. ‘These gifts Mrs. Sprodgkin ac- 
 cepted, but still insisted on dutifully remaining 
 in the hall, to courtesy to the Reverend Frank 
 as he came forth. Who, incantiously saying in 
 his genial manner, ‘‘ Well, Sally, there you 
 are!” involved himself in a discursive address 
 from Mrs. Sprodgkin, revolving around the re- 
 sult that she regarded tea and sugar in the light 
 of myrrh and frankincense, and considered bread 
 and butter identical with locusts and wild honey. 
 Having communicated this edifying piece of in- 
 formation, Mrs. Sprodgkin was left still unad- 
 journed in the hall, and Mr. and Mrs. Milvey 
 hurried in a heated condition to the railway sta~- 
 tion. All of which is here recorded to the honor 
 of that good Christian pair, representatives of 
 hundreds of other good Christian pairs as con- 
 scientious and as useful, who merge the small- 
 ness of their work in its greatness, and feel in 
 no danger of losing dignity when they adapt 
 ‘themselves to incomprehensible humbugs. 
 
 ‘¢Detained at the last moment by one who 
 had a claim upon me,” was the Reverend Frank’s 
 apology -to Lightwood, taking no thought of 
 himself. To which Mrs. Milvey added, taking 
 thought for him, like the championing little wife 
 she was; ‘Oh yes, detained at the last moment. 
 But as to the claim, Frank, I must say that I do 
 think you are over-considerate sometimes, and 
 allow that to be a Little abused.” 
 
 Bella felt conscious, in spite of her late pledge 
 for herself, that her husband’s absence would 
 give disagreeable oceasion for surprise to the 
 Milveys. Nor could she appear quite at her 
 ease when Mrs. Milvey asked: 
 
 ‘¢ How is Mr. Rokesmith, and zs he gone be- 
 fore us, or does he follow us ?” 
 
 It becoming necessary, upon this, to send him 
 to bed again and hold him in waiting to be 
 lanced again, Bella did it. But not half as well 
 on the second occasion as on the first; for, a 
 twice-told white one seems almost to become a 
 black one, when you are not used to it. 
 
 “‘Oh dear!” said Mrs. Milvey, ‘‘I am so 
 sorry! Mr. Rokesmith took such an interest in 
 Lizzie Hexam, when we were there before. And 
 if we had only known of his face, we could have 
 given him something that would have kept it 
 down long enough for so short a purpose.”’ 
 
 By way of making the white one whiter, Bella 
 hastened to stipulate that he was not in pain, 
 Mrs. Milvey was so glad of it. 
 
 “T don’t know how it is,’ said Mrs. Milvey, 
 ‘Cand I am sure you don’t, Frank, but the clergy 
 and their wives seem to cause swelled faces. 
 Whenever I take notice of a child in the school, 
 it seems to me as if its face swelled instantly. 
 
Frank never makes acquaintance with a new old 
 
 329 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 woman, but she gets the face-ache. And an- 
 other thing is, we do make the poor children | 
 sniff so. I don’t know how we do it, and I 
 should be so glad not to; but the more we take 
 notice of them, the more they sniff. Just as 
 they do when the text is given out.—Frank, 
 that’s a schoolmaster. I have seen him some- 
 where. 
 
 The reference was to a young man of reserved 
 appearance, ina coat and waistcoat of black, 
 and pantaloons of pepper and salt. He had 
 come into the office of the station, from its in- 
 terior, in an unsettled way, immediately after 
 Lightwood had gone out to the train; and he 
 had been hurriedly reading the printed bills and 
 notices on the wall. He had had a wandering 
 interest in what was said among the people wait- 
 ing there and passing toand fro. He had drawn 
 hearer, at about the time when Mrs. Milvey 
 mentioned Lizzie Hexam, and had- remained 
 near since: though always glancing toward the 
 door by which Lightwood had gone out. He 
 stood with his back toward them, and his gloved 
 hands clasped behind him. There was now so 
 evident a faltering upon him, expressive of in- 
 decision whether or no he should express his 
 having heard himself referred to, that Mr. Mil-. 
 vey spoke to him. 
 
 “‘T can not recall your name,” he said, ‘‘ but 
 I remember to have seen you in your school.” 
 
 .“* My name is Bradley Headstone, Sir,” he re- 
 plied, backing into a more retired place. 
 
 ‘*T ought to have remembered it,” said: Mr. 
 Milvey, giving him his hand. “TI hope you are 
 well? <A little overworked, I am afraid ?” 
 
 ‘* Yes, I am overworked just at present, Sir.” 
 
 ‘‘Had no play in your last holiday time?” 
 
 SING Rite. 
 
 ** All work and no play, Mr. Headstone, will 
 not make dullness, in your case, I dare say; 
 but it will make dyspepsia, if you don’t take 
 care.” . 
 
 ‘*T will endeavor to take care, Sir. Might 
 I beg leave to speak to you, outside, a mo- 
 ment ?” . 
 
 ‘* By all means.” 
 
 It was evening, and the office was well lighted. 
 The schoolmaster, who had never remitted his 
 watch on Lightwood’s door, now moved by an- 
 other door to a corner without, where there was 
 more shadow than light; and said, plucking at 
 his gloves: 
 
 **One of your ladies, Sir, mentioned within 
 my hearing a name that I am acquainted with; 
 I may say, well acquainted with. The name of 
 the sister of an old pupil of mine. He was my 
 pupil for a long time, and has got on and gone 
 upward rapidly. The name of Hexam. The 
 name of Lizzie Hexam.” He seemed to be a 
 shy man, struggling against nervousness, and 
 spoke in a very constrained way. The break he 
 set between his two last sentences was quite em- 
 barrassing to his hearer. 
 
 ‘* Yes,” replied Mr, Milvey. ‘‘ We are going 
 down to see her.” 
 
 ‘‘f gathered as much, Sir. I hope there is 
 nothing gis with the sister of my old pupil? 
 I hope bereavement has befallen her. I 
 hope she is in no affliction? Has lost no—rela- 
 
 he answered in his usual open way. | 
 
 ‘*T am glad-to tell you, Mr. Headstone, that 
 the sister of your old pupil has not sustained 
 any such loss. You thought I might be going 
 down to bury some one ?” ws 
 
 ‘* That may have been the connection of ideas, 
 Sir, with your clerical character, but I was no€ 
 conscious of it.—Then you are not, Sir?” 
 
 A man with a very odd manner indeed, and 
 with a lurking look that was quite oppressive. 
 
 “No. In fact,” said Mr. Milvey, ‘‘ since you 
 are so interested in the sister of your old pupil, 
 I may as well tell you that Iam going down to 
 marry her.” . 
 
 The schoolmaster started back. 
 
 ‘*Not to marry her myself,” said Mr. Mil- 
 vey, with a smile, ‘‘ because I have a wife al- 
 
 wedding.” TaD Se 
 
 Bradley Headstone caught hold of a pillar be- 
 hind him. If Mr. Milvey knew an ashy face 
 when he saw it, he saw it then, h 
 
 ‘*You are quite ill, Mr. Headstone!” 
 
 “It is not much, Sir.. It will pass over very 
 soon. I am accustomed to be seized with gid- 
 diness. Don’t let me detain you, Sir; I stand 
 in need of no assistance, I thank you. Much 
 obliged by your sparing me these. minutes of 
 your time.” 
 
 As Mr. Milvey, who had no more minutes to 
 spare, made a suitable reply and turned back 
 into the office, he observed the schoolmaster to 
 lean against the pillar with his hat in his hand, 
 and to pull at his neekeloth as if he were trying 
 to tear it off. The Reverend Frank accordingly 
 directed the notice of one of the attendants to 
 him, by saying: ‘*There is a person outside whe 
 seems to be really ill, and to require some help, 
 though he says he does not.” 
 
 Lightwood had by this time secured their 
 
 rung. ‘They took their seats, and were begin- 
 ning to move out of the station, when the same 
 attendant came ruining along the platform, look 
 ing into all the carriages. 
 
 “Oh! You are here, Sir!’ he said, spring- 
 ing on the step, and holding the window-frame 
 by his elbow, as the carriage moved. ‘‘ That 
 person you pointed out to me is in a fit.” 
 
 ‘*T infer from what he told me that he is sub- 
 ject to such attacks. He will come to, in the 
 air, in a little while.” 
 
 He was took very bad to be sure, and was 
 biting and knocking about him (the man said) 
 furiously. Would the gentleman give him) his 
 card, as he had seen him first? The gentleman 
 
 more of the man attacked than that he was a 
 man of a very respectable occupation,,who had 
 said he was out of health, as his appearanee 
 would of itself have indicated. The attendant 
 received the card, watched his opportunity for 
 sliding down, slid down, and soitended. 
 
 Then, the train rattled among the house-tops, 
 and among the ragged sides of houses torn down 
 
 and under the fruitful earth, until it shot across 
 
 -bomb-shell, and gone again as if it had exploded 
 
 tion ?” in the rush of smoke and steam and glare, A 
 
 _ Mr. Milvey thought this a man with a very{ little more, and again it roared across the river, 
 
 odd manner, and a dark downward look; but 
 
 ready. To perform the marriage service at her — 
 
 places, and the departure-bell was about to be 
 
 did so, with the explanation that he knew no 
 
 to make way for it, and over the swarming streets, 
 
 the river: bursting over the qniet surface like a 
 
___— 
 
 EP 
 
 (ana 
 
 a great rocket: spurning the watery turnings | 
 
 and doublings with ineffable contempt, and go- 
 ing straight to its end, as Father Time goes to 
 his. To whom it is no matter what living wa- 
 ters run high or low, reflect the heavenly lights 
 and darknesses, produce their little growth of 
 weeds and flowers, turn here, turn there, are 
 noisy or still, are troubled or at rest, for their 
 course has one sure termination, though their 
 sources and devices are many. 
 
 Then, a carriage ride succeeded, near the sol- 
 emn river, stealing away by night, as all things 
 steal away, by night and by day, so quietly yield- 
 ing to the attraction of the loadstone rock of 
 Eternity ; and the nearer they drew to the cham- 
 ber where Eugene lay, the more they feared that 
 they might find his wanderings done. At last 
 they saw its dim light shining out, and it gave 
 them hope: though Lightwood faltered as he 
 thought; ‘‘If he were gone, she would still be 
 sitting by him.” 
 
 Z Ss 
 ree 
 = Sag 
 
 EUGENE’S BEDSIDE. 
 
 But he lay quiet, half in stupor, half in sleep. 
 Bella, entering with a raised admonitory finger, 
 kissed Lizzie softly, but said not a word. Nei- 
 ther did any of them speak, but all sat down at 
 the foot of the bed, silently waiting. And now, 
 in this night-watch, mingling with the flow of 
 the river and with,the rush of the train, came 
 the questions into Bella’s mind again: What 
 could be in the depths of that mystery of John’s? 
 Why was it that he had never been seen by 
 Mr. Lightwood, whom he still avoided? When 
 would that trial come, through which her faith 
 in, and her duty to, her dear husband, was to 
 carry her, rendering him triumphant? For, 
 that had been his term. Her passing through 
 the trial was to make the man she loved with all 
 her heart triumphant. Term not to sink out 
 of sight in Bella’s breast. 
 
 Far on in the night Eugene opened his eyes. 
 He was sensible, and said at once: ‘‘ How does 
 the time go? Has our Mortimer come hack ?” 
 
 > 
 
324 
 
 Lightwood was there immediately, to answer 
 
 for himself. ‘* Yes, Eugene, and all is ready.” 
 
 ‘* Dear boy!” returned Eugene with a smile, 
 “‘we both thank you heartily. Lizzie, tell 
 them how welcome they are, and that I would 
 be eloquent if I could.” 
 
 “There is no need,” said Mr. Milvey. ‘*We 
 know it. Are you better, Mr. Wrayburn ?” 
 
 ‘“‘T am much happier,” said Eugene. 
 
 ‘Much better too, I hope ?” 
 
 Eugene turned his eyes toward Lizzie, as if 
 to spare her, and answered nothing. 
 
 Then, they all stood around the bed, and Mr. 
 Milvey, opening his book, began the service ; so 
 rarely associated with the shadow of death ; so 
 inseparable in the mind from a flush of life and 
 gayety and hope and health and joy. Bella 
 thought how different from her own sunny little 
 wedding, and wept. Mrs. Milvey overflowed 
 with pity, and wept too. The dolls’. dress- 
 maker, with her hands before her face, wept in 
 her golden bower. Reading in a low clear 
 voice, and bending over Eugene, who kept his 
 eyes upon him, Mr. Milvey did his office with 
 suitable simplicity. As the bridegroom could 
 ‘not move his hand, they touched his fingers with 
 the ring, and so put it on the bride. When the 
 two plighted their troth she laid her hand on 
 his, and kept it there. When the ceremony was 
 done, and all the rest departed from the room, 
 she drew her arm under his head, and laid her 
 own head down upon the pillow by his side. 
 
 ‘‘Undraw the curtains, my dear girl,” said 
 Eugene, after a while, ‘‘and let us see our wed- 
 ding-day.” 
 
 The sun was rising, and his first rays struck 
 into the room as she came back and put her 
 lips to his. ‘‘I bless the day!” said Eugene. 
 **T bless the day!” said Lizzie. 
 
 “You have made a poor marriage of it, my 
 sweet wife,” said Eugene. ‘‘ A shattered, grace- 
 less fellow, stretched at his length here, and 
 next to nothing for’you when you are a young 
 widow.” 
 
 ‘“‘T have made the marriage that I would 
 have given all the world to dare to hope for,” 
 she replied. 
 
 ‘*You have thrown yourself away,” said Eu- 
 gene, shaking his head. ‘‘ But you have fol- 
 lowed the treasure of your heart. My justifica- 
 tion is, that you had thrown that away first, 
 dear girl!” 
 
 ““No. I had given it to you.” 
 
 ‘“'The same thing, my poor Lizzie!” 
 
 ‘‘Hush, hush! A very different thing.” 
 
 There were tears in his eves, and she be- 
 sought him toclose them. ‘‘ No,” said Eugene, 
 again shaking his head; ‘‘let me look at you, 
 Lizzie, while I can. You brave devoted girl! 
 You heroine !”’ 
 
 Her own eyes filled under his praises. And 
 when he mustered strength to move his wounded 
 head a very little way, and lay it on her bosom, 
 the tears of both fell. 
 
 ‘*Lizzie,” said Eugene, after a_ silence: 
 “‘when you see me wandering away from this 
 refuge that I have so ill deserved, speak to me 
 by my name, and [ think I shall come back.” 
 
 ‘* Yes, dear Eugene.” 
 
 “There!” he exclaimed, smiling. ‘‘I should 
 have gone then, but for that!” j 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 be sinking into insensibility, she said, in a calm 
 loving voice: ‘* Eugene, my dear htsband!”? 
 He immediately answered: ‘*There again! 
 You see how you can recall me!” And, after- 
 ward, when he could not speak, he still an- 
 swered by a slight movement of his head upon 
 her bosom. 
 
 The sun was high in the sky when she gen- 
 tly disengaged herself to give him the stimulants 
 and nourishment he required. The utter help- 
 lessness of the wreck of him that lay cast ashore 
 there now alarmed her, but he himself appeared 
 a little more hopeful. 
 
 ‘‘Ah, my beloved Lizzie!” he said, faintly. 
 
 ‘‘How shall I ever pay all I owe you, if I re-_ 
 
 cover]? oY 
 
 ‘Don’t be ashamed of me,” she replied, ‘‘ and 
 you will have more than paid all.” 
 
 ‘*It would require a life, Lizzie, to pay all; 
 more than a life.” 
 
 “‘Live for that, then; live for me, Eugene; 
 live to see how hard I will try to improve my- 
 self, and never to discredit you.” 
 
 “My darling girl,” he replied, rallying more 
 of his old manner than he had ever yet got to- 
 gether. ‘‘QOn the contrary, I have been think- 
 ing whether it is not the best thing I can do, to 
 die.” 
 
 ‘“The best thing you can do, to leave me with 
 a broken heart ?”’ 
 
 “*T don’t mean that, my dear girl. I was not 
 thinking of that. What I was thinking of was 
 this. Out of your compassion for me, in this 
 maimed and broken state, you make so much of 
 me—you think so well of me—you love me so 
 
 dearly.” 
 
 ‘Heaven knows I love you dearly !” 
 
 ‘*And Heaven knows I prize it! Well. If. 
 
 I live, you'll find me out.” 
 
 *‘T shall find out that my husband has’a mine 
 of purpose and energy, and will turn it to the 
 best account ?” 
 
 ‘‘T. hope so, dearest Lizzie,” said Eugene, 
 wistfully, and yet somewhat whimsically, ‘I 
 hope so. But I can’t summon the vanity to 
 think so. Howcan I think so, looking back on 
 such a trifling wasted youth as mine! I hum- 
 bly hope it; but I daren’t believe it. Thereisa 
 
 sharp misgiving in my conscience that if I were - 
 
 to live I should disappoint your good opinion 
 and my own—and that I ought to die, my dear !” 
 
 PE ES ent a 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 THE PASSING SHADOW. 
 
 THe winds and tides rose and fell a certain 
 number of times, the earth moved round the sun 
 
 a certain number of times, the ship upon the _ 
 
 ocean made her voyage safely, and brought a 
 baby-Bella home. Then who so blest and happy 
 as Mrs. John Rokesmith, saving and excepting 
 Mr. John Rokesmith ! 
 
 ‘‘ Would you not like to be rich now, my dar- 
 ling ?” 
 
 ‘‘ How can you ask me such a question, John 
 dear? AmInotrich?” ~— 
 
 These were among the first words spoken near 
 
 the baby-Bella as she lay asleep. She soon 
 proved to be a baby of wonderful intelligence, 
 
 A little while afterward, when he appeared to | evincing the strongest objection to her grand- 
 
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 ee s NN 
 
 325 
 
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 AANA 
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 NS 
 TSS 
 SS 
 
 se 
 
 LIGHTWOOD AT LAST. 
 
326 
 
 mother’s soeiety, and being invariably seized with 
 a painful acidity of the stomach when that digni- 
 fied lady honored her with any attention, 
 
 It was charming to see Bella contemplating 
 this baby, and finding out her own dimples in 
 that tiny reflection, as if she were looking in-the 
 glass without personal vanity. Her cherubic 
 father justly remarked to her husband that the 
 baby seemed to make her younger than before, 
 reminding him of the days when she had a pet 
 doll and used to talk to it as she carried it about, 
 The world might have been challenged to pro- 
 duce another baby who had such a store of pleas- 
 ant nonsense said and sung to it, as Bella said 
 and sung to this baby ; or who was dressed and 
 undressed as often in four-and-twenty hours as 
 
 Bella dressed and undressed this baby; or who | 
 
 was held behind doors and poked out to stop its 
 father’s way when he came home, as this baby 
 was; or, in a word, who did half the number of 
 baby things, through the lively invention of a 
 gay and proud young mother, that this inex- 
 haustible baby did. 
 
 The inexhaustible baby was two or three 
 months old when Bella began to notice a cloud 
 upon her husband’s brow. Watching it, she 
 saw a gathering and deepening anxicty there, 
 which caused her great disquiet. More than 
 ouce she awoke him muttering in his sleep; and, 
 though he muttered nothing worse than her own 
 name, it was plain to her that his restlessness 
 originated in some load of care. Therefore, 
 Bella at length put in her claim to divide this 
 Joad, and bear her half of it. 
 
 ‘You know, John dear,” she said, cheerily | 
 
 reverting to their former conversation, ‘‘that I 
 
 hope I may safely be trusted in great things. 
 
 And it surely can not be a little thing that causes 
 you so much uneasiness. It’s very considerate 
 of you to try to hide from me that you are un- 
 comfortable about something, but it’s quite im- 
 possible to be done, John love.” 
 
 “‘f admit that I am rather uneasy, my own.” 
 
 ‘‘Then please to tell me what about, Sir.” 
 
 But no, he. evaded that. ‘‘Never mind!” 
 thought Bella, resolutely. ‘John requires me 
 to put perfect faith in him, and he shall not be 
 disappointed.” 
 
 She went up to London one day to meet him, 
 in order that they might make some purchases. 
 She found him waiting for her at her journey’s 
 end, and they walked away together through 
 the streets. He was in gay spirits, though still 
 harping on that notion of their being rich; and 
 he said, now let them make believe that yonder 
 
 fine carriage was theirs, and that it was waiting | 
 
 to take them home to a fine house they iad: 
 what would Bella, in that case, best like to find 
 in the house? Well! Bella didn’t know: al- 
 ready having every thing she wanted, she couldn’t 
 say. But by degrees she was led on to confess 
 that she would like to have for the inexhaustible 
 baby such a nursery as never was seen. It was 
 to be “a very rainbow for colors,” as she was 
 quite sure baby noticed colors; and the stair- 
 case was to be adorned with the most exquisite 
 flowers, as she was absolutely certain baby no- 
 ticed flowers; and there was to be an aviary 
 some where, of the loveliest little birds, as there 
 
 was not the smallest doubt in the world that | leave of me here. At all events,’? added Roke- _ 
 
 at'a 
 
 baby noticed birds. Was there nothing else ? 
 No, John dear, The predilections of the inex- 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 x h Byes i BN th 
 
 haustible baby being 
 
 provided for, Bella could 
 think of nothing else, . 
 
 : 
 
 They were chatting on in this way, and John 
 
 had suggested, ‘‘ No jewels for your own wear, 
 for instance?” and Bella had replied, laughing. 
 O! if he came to that, yes, there might be a 
 beautiful ivory case of jewels on her dressing- 
 table; when these pictures were in a moment 
 darkened and blotted ont. 
 
 They turned a corner, and met Mr. Light- 
 
 wood. 
 
 He stopped as if he were petrified by the sight 
 of Bella’s husband, who in the same moment had 
 changed color. 
 
 ‘‘ Mr. Lightwood and I have met before,” he 
 said. ‘ 
 
 ‘* Met before, John ?” Bella repeated in a tone 
 of wonder. ‘‘ My, Lightwood told me he had 
 never seen you.” . 
 
 ‘«T did not then know that I had,” said Light- 
 wood, discomposed on heraccount. ‘I believed 
 that I had only’: heard of—Mr. Rokesmith.” 
 With an emphasis on the name. ; 
 
 ‘““When Mr. Lightwood saw’ me, my love,” 
 observed her husband, not avoiding his eye, but 
 'looking at him, ‘‘my name was Julius Hand- 
 ford.” 
 
 Julius Handford! ~ The name that Bella had 
 'so often seen in old newspapers, when she was 
 an inmate of Mr. Boffin’s house! | Julius Hand- 
 
 ford, who had been publicly entreated to appear, 
 
 _ and for intelligence of whom a reward had been 
 | publicly offered! 
 
 ‘*T would have avoided mentioning it in your 
 
 presence,” said Lightwood to Bella, delicately ; 
 _‘* but since your husband mentions it himself, 
 I must confirm his strange admission. I saw 
 him as Mr. Julius Handford, and I afterward 
 (unquestionably to his knowledge) took great 
 pains to trace him out.” 
 
 “Quite true. But it was not my object or my 
 interest,” said Rokesmith, quietly, ‘‘ to be traced 
 out.” 
 
 Bella looked from the one to the other in 
 
 | amazement. 
 
 ‘* Mr. Lightwood,” pursued her husband, ‘‘ as. 
 
 | chance has brought us face to face at last—which 
 | is not to be wondered at, for the wonder is, that, 
 in spite of all my pains to the contrary, chance 
 has not confronted us together sooner—I have 
 only to remind you that you have been at my 
 house, and to add that I have not changed my 
 | residence.” 
 
 | ‘Sir,” returned Lightwood, with a meaning 
 
 painful one. I hope that no complicity in a 
 | very dark transaction may attach to you; but 
 you can not fail to know that your own extraor- 
 dinary conduct has laid you under suspicion.” 
 
 ‘*T know it has,” was all the reply. 
 
 ‘* My professional duty,” said Lightwood, hes- 
 itating, with another glance toward Bella, ‘‘is 
 greatly at variance with my personal inclination; 
 
 whether I am justified in taking leave of you 
 here, with your whole course unexplained.” 
 Bella caught her husband by the hand. 
 ** Don’t be alarmed, my darling. 
 wood will find that he is quite justifiedsin taking 
 
 ismith, ‘‘he will find that I mean to take leave 
 of him here.” may ty 
 
 glance toward Bella, ‘‘my position is a truly . 
 
 but I doubt, Mr. Handford, or Mr. Rokesmith, — 
 
 Mr. Light-_ 
 
**T think, Sir,” said Lightwood, ‘‘you can 
 
 a scarcely deny that when I came to your house 
 
 on the occasion to which you have referred you 
 
 _ ayoided me of a set purpose.” 
 - . Mr, Lightwood, I assure you I have no dis- 
 
 position to deny it, or intention to deny it. I 
 
 should have continued to avoid you, in pursu- 
 
 . Bella on his arm; 
 
 ance of the same set purpose, for a short time 
 longer, if we had not met now. I am going 
 straight home, and shall remain at home to- 
 morrow until noon. Hereafter I hope we may 
 be better acquainted. Good-day.” 
 Lightwood stood irresolute, but Bella’s hus- 
 band passed him in the steadiest manner, with 
 and they went home wight 
 encountering any further remonstrance or/mol- 
 
 ‘estation from any one. 
 
 When they had dined and were alone, John 
 
 - Rokesmith said to his wife, who had preserved 
 her cheerfulness: ‘‘ And you don’t ask me, my. 
 
 dear, why I bore that name?” 
 
 **No, John love. I should dearly like to 
 know, of course” (which her anxions face con- 
 firmed); “but I wait until you can tell me of 
 your own free-will. You asked me if I could 
 
 have perfect faith in you, and I said yes, and I 
 
 meant it.” ; 
 
 It did not escape Bella’s notice that he began 
 to look triumphant. She wanted no strength- 
 ening in her firmness; but if she had had need 
 of any, she would have derived it from his kin- 
 dling face. 
 
 “You can not have been prepared, my dear- 
 est, for such a discovery as that this mysterious 
 Mr. Handford was identical with your hus- 
 band?” ; Ba 
 
 ‘**No, John dear, of course not. But you 
 told me to prepare to be tried, and I prepared 
 myself.” 
 
 He drew her to nestle closer to him, and told 
 her it would soon be over and the truth would 
 soon appear. “And now,” he went on, ‘lay 
 stress, my dear, on these words that I am going 
 to add. I stand in no kind of peril, and I can 
 
 _ by possibility be hurt at no one’s hand.” 
 
 “You are quite, quite sure of that, John 
 dear ?” 
 
 **Not a hair of my head! Moreover, I have 
 done no wrong, and have injured no man. Shall 
 IT swear it?” 
 
 ‘*No, John!” cried Bella, laying her hand 
 upon his lips with a proud look: ‘‘Never to 
 me!” 3 
 ‘* But circumstances,” he went on ‘*—TI can, 
 and I will, disperse them in a moment—have 
 surrounded me with one of the strangest sus- 
 picions ever known. You heard Mr. Lightwood 
 speak of a dark transaction ?” 
 
 ** Yes, John.” 
 
 ** You are prepared to hear explicitly what he 
 meant ?”’ 
 
 ‘*Yes, John.” 
 
 ‘* My life, he meant the murder of John Har- 
 mon, your allotted husband.” 
 
 With a fast palpitating heart Bella grasped 
 him by the arm. ‘‘You éan not be suspected, 
 John?” 
 
 *¢ Dear love, I can be—for I am!” 
 
 There was silence between them as she sat 
 looking in lis face, with the color quite gone 
 from her own face and lips. ‘‘ How dare they !” 
 she cried at length, in a burst of generous in- 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 From her husband on her birthday’ 
 
 327 
 
 dignation. ‘‘My beloved husband, how dare 
 they !” 
 
 _ He caught her in his arms as she opened hers, 
 and held her to his heart. “ Even knowing 
 this, you can trust me, Bella ?” 
 
 ‘**T can trust you, John dear, with all my soul. 
 If I could not trust you, I should fall dead at 
 your feet.” 
 
 The kindling triumph in his face was bright 
 indeed as he looked up and rapturously exclaim- 
 ed, what had he done to deserve the blessing of 
 this dear, confiding creature’s heart! Again she 
 put her hand upon his lips, saying, ** Hush!” 
 and then told him, in her own little, natural, 
 pathetic way, that if all the world were against 
 him she would be for him; that if all the world 
 repudiated him she would believe him; that if 
 he were infamous in other eyes he would be 
 honored in hers; and that, under the worst un- 
 merifed suspicion, she would devote her life to 
 consoling him, and imparting her own faith in 
 him to their little child. 
 
 A twilight calm of happiness then succeeding 
 to their radiant noon, they remained at peace 
 until a strange voice in the room startled them 
 both. The room being by that time dark, the 
 voice said, ‘Don’t let the lady be alarmed by 
 my striking a light,” and immediately a match 
 rattled and glimmered in a hand. The hand 
 and the match and the voice were then seen by 
 John Rokesmith to belong to Mr. Inspector, 
 once meditatively active in this chronicle. 
 
 ‘*f take the liberty,” said Mr. Inspector, in a 
 business-like manner, ‘‘to bring myself to the 
 recollection of Mr. Julius Handford, who gave 
 me his name and address down at our place a 
 considerable time ago. Would the lady object 
 to my lighting the pair of candles on the chim- 
 ney-piece, to throw a further light upon the sub- 
 ject? No? Thank you, ma’am. Now we look 
 cheerful !” 
 
 Mr. Inspector, in a dark-blue buttoned-up 
 frock-coat and pantaloons, presented a servicea- 
 ble, half-pay, Royal Arms kind of appearance, 
 ashe applied his pocket-handkerchief to his nose 
 and bowed to the lady. 
 
 **'You favored me, Mr. Handford,” said Mr. 
 Inspector, ‘‘by writing down your name and 
 address, and I produce the piece of paper on 
 which you wrote it. Comparing the same with 
 the writing on the fly-leaf of this book on the 
 table—and a sweet pretty volume it is—I find 
 the writing of the entry, ‘Mrs. John Rokesmith. 
 and very 
 gratifying to the feelings such memorials are— 
 to correspond exactly. Can I have a word with 
 
 you ?” 
 
 Here, if you please,” 
 
 ‘* Certainly. 
 reply. 
 
 ‘¢ Why,” retorted Mr. Inspector, again using 
 his pocket handkerchief, ‘‘ though there’s no- 
 thing for the lady to be at all alarmed at, still, 
 ladies are apt to take alarm at matters of busi- 
 ness—being of that fragile sex that they’re not 
 accustomed to them when not of a strictly do- 
 mestic character—and I do generally make it a 
 rule to propose retirement from the presence of 
 ladies, before entering upon business topics. Or 
 perhaps,” Mr. Inspector hinted, ‘‘if the lady was 
 to step up stairs, and take a look at baby now!” 
 
 “ Mrs. Rokesmith,” her husband was begin- 
 ning; when Mr. Inspector, regarding the words 
 
 was the 
 
 * 
 
© 
 
 328 
 
 as an introduction, said, ‘‘ Happy, I am sure, to 
 have the honor.” 
 
 ‘¢ Mrs, Rokesmith,” resumed her husband, ‘* is 
 satisfied that she can have no reason for being 
 alarmed, whatever the business is.” 
 
 ‘Really? Is that so?” said Mr. Inspector. 
 **But it’s a sex to live and learn from, and 
 there’s nothing a lady can’t. accomplish when she 
 Once fully gives her mind to it. It’s the case 
 with my own wife. Well, ma’am, this good 
 gentleman of yours has given rise to a rather 
 large amount of trouble which might have been 
 avoided if he had come forward and explained 
 himself. Well you see! He didn’t come for- 
 ward and explain himself. Consequently, now 
 that we meet, him and me, you'll say—and say 
 right—that there’s nothing to be alarmed at, in 
 my proposing to him to come forward—or, put- 
 ting the same meaning in another form, to come 
 along with me—and explain himself.” 
 
 When Mr. Inspector put it in-that other form, 
 **to come along with me,” there was a relishing 
 roll in his voice, and his eye beamed with an 
 official lustre. 
 
 ‘Do you propose to take me into custody ?” 
 inquired John Rokesmith, very coolly. 
 
 ‘‘ Why argue?” returned Mr. Inspector in a 
 comfortable sort of remonstrance ; ‘‘ain’t it 
 enough that I propose that you shall come along 
 with me?” 
 
 “For what reason ?” 
 
 ‘* Lord bless my soul and body !” returned Mr. 
 Inspector, ‘‘I wonder at it in a man of your 
 education. Why argue ?” 
 
 ‘What do you charge against me ?” 
 
 ‘*I wonder at you before a lady,” said Mr. 
 Inspector, shaking his head reproachfully: ‘+I 
 wonder, brought up as you have been, you 
 haven’t a more delicate mind! I charge yon, 
 then, with being some way concerned in the 
 Harmon Murder. I don’t say whether before, 
 or in, or after, the fact. I don’t say whether 
 with having some knowledge of it that hasn’t 
 come out.” 
 
 ‘* You don’t surprise me. 
 this afternoon.” 
 
 **Don’t!” said Mr. Inspector. ‘‘ Why, why 
 argue? It’s my duty to inform you that what- 
 ever you say will be used against you.” 
 
 **T don’t think it*will.” 
 
 **But [ tell you it will,” said Mr. Inspector. 
 ‘* Now, having received the caution, do you still 
 say that you foresaw my visit this afternoon ?” 
 
 ‘‘Yes. And I will say something more, if 
 you will step with me into the next room.” 
 
 With a reassuring kiss on the lips of the fright- 
 ened Bella, her husband (to whom Mr. Inspector 
 obligingly offered his arm) took up a candle 
 and withdrew with that gentleman. They were 
 a full half-hour in conference. When they re- 
 turned Mr. Inspector looked considerably aston- 
 ished. 
 
 ‘*T have invited this worthy officer, my dear,” 
 said John, ‘‘to make a short excursion with me 
 in which you shall be a sharer. He will take 
 something to eat and drink, I dare say, on your 
 invitation, while you are getting your bonnet 
 ON! Ac . 
 
 Mr. Inspector declined eating, but assented to 
 the proposal of a glass of brandy and water. 
 Mixing this cold, and pensively consuming it, 
 he broke at intervals into such soliloquies as that 
 
 I foresaw your visit 
 
 TEE Stn Re Oy 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 4 
 
 And bowed, with gallantry. — 
 
 he never did know such a move, that he never 
 had been so graveled, and that what a game was _ 
 this to try the. sort of stuff a*man’s opinion of 
 himself was made of! Concurrently with these 
 comments, he more than once burst out a laugh- 
 ing, with the half-enjoying and half-piqued air 
 of a man who had given up a good conundrum, 
 after much guessing, and been told the answer, 
 Bella was so timid of him, that she noted these 
 things in a half-shrinking, half-perceptive way, 
 and similarly noted that there was a great change 
 in his manner toward John. That coming-along- 
 with-him deportment was now lost in long mus- 
 ing looks at John and at herself, and sometimes 
 in slow heavy rubs of his hand across his fore-- 
 head, as if he were ironing out the creases which 
 his deep pondering made there. He had had 
 
 some coughing and whistling satellites secretly iy 
 gravitating toward him about the premises, but if 
 they were now dismissed, and he eyed John as 
 if he had meant to do him a public service, but t 
 had unfortunately been anticipated. Whether ~ 
 Bella might have noted any thing more, if she 
 had been less afraid of him, she could not de- ~ 
 termine; but it was all inexplicable to her, and 
 
 not the faintest flash of the real state of the case 
 broke in upon her mind. | Mr. Inspector’s in- 
 creased notice of herself, and knowing way of 
 raising his eyebrows when their eyes by any 
 chance met, as if he put the question ‘‘ Don’t 
 you see?” augmented her timidity, and, conse- 
 quently, her perplexity. For all these reasons, 
 when he and she and John, at toward nine 
 o'clock of a winter evening, went to London, and 
 began driving from London Bridge, among low- 
 lying water-side wharves and docks and strange 
 places, Bella was in the state of a dreamer ; per- 
 fectly unable to account for her being there, per- 
 fectly unable to forecast what would happen — 
 | next, or whither she was going, or why; certain 
 of nothing in the immediate present, but that 
 she confided in John, and that John seémed 
 somehow to be getting more triumphant. But 
 what a certainty was that! 
 
 They alighted at last at the corner of a court, 
 where there was a building with a bright lamp 
 and a wicket gate. Its orderly appearance was 
 very unlike that of the surrounding neighbor- 
 hood, and was explained by the inscription Po- 
 LICE STATION, 
 
 ‘*We are uot going in here, John?” said 
 Bella, clinging to him. 
 
 ‘Yes, my dear; but of our own accord. We 
 shall come out again as easily, never fear.” : 
 
 The whitewashed room was pure white as of 
 old, the methodical book-keeping was in peace- 
 ful progress as of old, and some distant howler 
 was banging against a cell door as of old. The 
 sanctuary was not a permanent abiding-place; 
 but a kind of criminal Pickford’s. The lower 
 passions and vices were regularly ticked off in 
 the books, warehoused in. the cells, carted away 
 as per accompanying invoice, and left no mark 
 upon it. ie 
 
 Mr. Inspector placed two chairs for his visit- 
 ors before the fire, and communed in a low voice 
 with a brother of his order (also of a half-pay — 
 and Royal Arms aspect), who, judged only by 
 his oceupation at the moment, might have been 
 a writing-master, setting copies. ‘Their confer 
 ence done, Mr. Inspector returned to the fire- 
 place, and, having observed that he would step ye 
 
 ee 
 abe 
 
 + ie 
 
round to the Fellowships and see how matters 
 stood, went out. He soon came back again, 
 saying, ‘‘ Nothing could be better, for they’re at 
 Supper with Miss Abbey in the bar;” and then 
 they all three went out together. 
 
 Still, as in a dream, Bella found herself en- 
 tering a snug old-fashioned public house, and 
 found herself smuggled into a little three-cor- 
 nered room nearly.opposite the bar of that es- 
 tablishment. Mr. Inspector achieved the smug- 
 gling of herself and John into this queer room, 
 ealled Cozy in an inscription on the dooy, by 
 entering in the narrow passage first in fe 
 and suddenly turning round upon them with 
 
 extended arms, as if they had been two sheep. 
 The room was lighted for their reception. 
 
 ‘* Now,” said Mr. Inspector to John, turning 
 
 _-the gas lower; ‘Tl mix with ’em in a casual 
 way, and when I say Identification, perhaps 
 you'll show yourself.” 
 
 John nodded, and Mr. Inspector went alone 
 to the half-door of the bar. From the dim door- 
 way of Cozy, within which Bella and her hus- 
 band stood, they could see a comfortable little 
 party of three persons sitting at supper in the 
 bar, and could hear every thing that was said. 
 
 The three persons were Miss Abbey and two 
 male guests. To whom collectively Mr. In- 
 spector remarked that the weather was getting 
 sharp for the time of year. 
 
 “‘It need be sharp to suit your wits, Sir,” 
 said Miss Abbey. ‘‘What have you got in 
 hand now ?” 
 
 “Thanking you for your compliment: not 
 much, Miss Abbey,” was Mr. Inspector’s rejoin- 
 der. 
 
 ‘Who have you got in Cozy?” asked Miss 
 “Abbey. 
 
 _**Only a gentleman and his wife, Miss.” 
 
 “And who are they? If one may ask it with- 
 eut detriment to your deep plans in the interests 
 ef the honest public?” said Miss Abbey, proud 
 of Mr. Inspector as an administrative genius. 
 
 “They are strangers in this part of the town, 
 Miss Abbey. They are waiting till I shall want 
 
 the gentleman to show himself somewhere, for 
 half a moment.” 
 
 ‘While they’re waiting,” said Miss Abbey, 
 ~ *couldn’t you join us?” ‘ 
 
 Mr. Inspector immediately slipped into the 
 bar, and sat down at the side of the half-door, 
 with his back toward the passage, and directly 
 facing the two guests. ‘‘I don’t take my sup- 
 per till later in the night,” said he, ‘‘and there- 
 fore I won’t disturb the compactness of\ the ta- 
 ‘ble. But I'll take a glass of flip, if that’s flip in 
 the jug in the fender.” 
 
 ‘«That’s flip,” replied Miss Abbey, ‘‘ and it’s 
 _my making, and if even you can find out better 
 
 i shall be glad to know where.”’ Filling him, 
 with hospitable hands, a steaming tumbler, Miss 
 Abbey replaced the jug by the fire; the com- 
 pany not having yet arrived at the flip stage of 
 their supper, but being as yet skirmishing with 
 strong ale. 
 
 ‘¢Ah—h!” cried Mr.-Inspector. ‘'That’s the 
 smack! There’s not a Detective in the Force, 
 
 * Miss Abbey, that could find out better stuff than 
 that.” 
 
 *¢Glad to hear you say so,” rejoined Miss Ab- 
 bey. ‘‘You ought to know, if any body does.” 
 Ore MY. J HAC aga Mr. Inspeetor contin- 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 329 
 
 ued, ‘I drink your health. Mr. Jacob Kibble, 
 I drink yours. Hope you have made a prosper 
 ous voyage home, gentlemen both.” _ 
 
 Mr. Kibble, an unctuous broad man of few 
 words and many mouthfuls, said, more briefly 
 than pointedly, raising his ale to his lips: ‘‘Same 
 to you.” Mr. Job Potterson, a semi-seafaring 
 man of obliging demeanor, said, ‘‘ Thank you, 
 Siri). 
 
 ‘*Lord bless my soul and body!” cried Mr. 
 Inspector. ‘‘Talk of trades, Miss Abbey, and 
 the way they set their marks on men” (a subject — 
 which nobody had approached); who wouldn't 
 know your brother to be a Steward! There’sa 
 bright and ready twinkle in his eye, there’s a 
 neatness in his action; there’s a smartness in his 
 figure, there’s an air of reliability about him in 
 case you wanted a basin, which points out the 
 steward! And Mr. Kibble; ain’t he Passenger, 
 allover? While there’s that mercantile cut upon 
 him which would make you happy to give him 
 credit for five hundred pound, don’t you see the 
 salt sea shining on him too?” 
 
 ‘* You do, I dare say,” returned Miss Abbey, 
 “but £ don’t. And as for stewarding, I think 
 it’s time my brother gave that up, and took this 
 House in hand on his sister’s retiring. The 
 House will go to pieces if he don’t. I wouldn’t 
 sell it for any money that could be told out, to a 
 person that I couldn’t depend upon to be a Law 
 to the Porters, as I have been.” 
 
 ‘There you’re right, Miss,” said Mr. Inspect- 
 or.’ ‘*A better kept house is not known to our 
 men. What do I say? Half so well a kept 
 house is not known to our men. Show the Force 
 the Six Jolly Fellowship Porters, and the Force 
 —to a constable—will show you a piece of per- 
 fection, Mr. Kibble.” 
 
 That gentleman, with a very serious shake of 
 his head, subscribed the article. 
 
 ‘¢And talk of Time slipping by you, as if it 
 was an animal at rustic sports with its tail 
 soaped,” said Mr. Inspector (again, a subject 
 which nobody had approached); ‘‘why, well 
 you may. Well you may. How has it slipped 
 by us, since the time when Mr. Job Potterson 
 here present, Mr. Jacob Kibble here present, 
 and an Officer of the Force here present, first 
 came together on a matter of Identification!” 
 
 Bella’s husband stepped softly to the half-door 
 of the bar, and stood there. 
 
 “Flow has Time slipped by us,” Mr. Inspect- 
 or went on, slowly, with his eyes narrowly ob- 
 servant of the two guests, ‘‘since we three very 
 men, at an Inquest in this very house—Mr. Kib- 
 ble? Taken ill, Sir?” 
 
 Mr. Kibble had staggered up, with his lower 
 jaw dropped, catching Potterson by the shoul- 
 der, and pointing to the half-door. He now 
 cried out: ‘“‘Potterson! Look! Look there!’ 
 Potterson started up, started back, and exclaim- 
 ed: ‘‘ Heaven defend us, what’s that!’ Bella’s 
 husband stepped back to Bella, took her in his 
 arms (for she was terrified by the unintelligible 
 
 . terror of the two men), and shut the door of the 
 
 little room. A hurry of voices succeeded, in 
 which Mr. Inspector’s voice was busiest; it grad- 
 ually slackened and sank; and Mr. Inspector re- 
 appeared. ‘‘Sharp’s the word, Sir!” he said, 
 looking in with a knowing wink. ‘‘ We’ll get 
 your lady out at once.” Immediately Bella and 
 her husband were under the stars, making their 
 
330 
 
 way back alone to the vehicle they had kept in 
 waiting. 
 
 All this was most extraordinary, and Bella 
 could make nothing of it but that John was in 
 the right. How in the right, and how suspect- 
 ed of being in the wrong, she could not divine. 
 Some vague idea that he had never really as- 
 ‘sumed the name of Handford, and that there 
 was a remarkable likeness between him and that 
 mysterious person, was her nearest approach to 
 any definite explanation. But John was tri- 
 umphant; that much was made apparent; and 
 she could wait for the rest. 
 
 When John came home to dinner next day 
 he said, sitting down on the sofa by Bella and 
 baby-Bella: ‘‘ My dear, I have a piece of news 
 to tell you. I have left the China House.” 
 
 As he seemed to like having left it, Bella took 
 it for granted that there was no misfortune in 
 the case. 
 
 ‘In a word, my love,” said John, ‘‘the China 
 House is broken up and abolished. ‘There is no 
 such thing any more.” 
 
 “Then are you already in another House, 
 John ?” . 
 
 **Yes, my darling. I am in another way of 
 business. And I am rather better off.” 
 
 The inexhaustible baby was instantly made to 
 congratulate him, and to say, with appropriate 
 action on the part of a very limp arm and a 
 speckled fist: ‘‘‘Three cheers, ladies and gem- 
 plemorums. *“Hoo—ray !” 
 
 ‘*T am afraid, my life,” said John, ‘that you 
 have become very much attached to this cot- 
 tage 2?” 
 
 ‘¢ Afraid I have, John? Of course I have.” 
 
 ‘The reason why [I said afraid,” returned 
 John, ‘‘is, because we must move.” 
 
 **O John!” , 
 
 *“Yes, my dear, we must move. We must 
 have our head-quarters in London now. In 
 short, there’s a dwelling-house rent-free, at- 
 tached to my new position, and we must occupy 
 it.” 
 
 **That’s a gain, John.” 
 
 ‘* Yes, my dear, it is undoubtedly a gain.” 
 
 He gave her a very blithe look, and a very 
 sly look. Which occasioned the inexhaustible 
 baby to square at him with the speckled fists, 
 and demand in a threatening manner what he 
 meant ? 
 
 **My love, you said it was a gain, and I 
 said it was a gain, A very innocent remark, 
 surely.” bene: 
 
 ‘*T won’t,” said the inexhaustible baby, ‘‘ —al- 
 low—you—to make—game—of—my—venera- 
 ble—Ma.” At each division administering a 
 soft facer with one of the speckled fists. 
 
 John having stooped down to receive these 
 punishing visitations, Bella asked him, would it 
 be necessary to move soon? Why yes, indeed 
 (said John), he did propose that they should 
 move very soon. Taking the furniture with 
 them, of course (said Bella)? Why, no (said 
 John), the fact was, that the house was—in a 
 sort of a kind of a way—furnished already. 
 
 The inexhaustible baby, hearing this, resumed 
 the offensive, and said: ‘* But there’s nd nursery 
 for me, Sir. What do you mean, marble-heart- 
 ed parent?” To which the marble-hearted pa- 
 
 rent rejoined that there was a—sort of a kind| house and home, my deary !” 
 
 “ap 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 of a—nursery, and it might be “made to do.” “a 
 ‘Made to do?” returned the Inexhaustible, ad- 
 
 ministering more punishment; ‘‘what do you 
 take me for?” And was then turned over on 
 
 its back in Bella’s lap, and smothered with — 
 
 kisses. 
 
 ‘‘But really, John dear,” said Bella, flushed 
 in quite a lovely manner by these exercises, 
 ‘will the new house, just as it stands, do for 
 baby? ‘That’s the question.” 
 
 “*T felt that to be the question,” he returned, 
 ‘and therefore I arranged that you should come 
 with me and look at it to-morrow morning.” 
 Appointment made, accordingly, for Bella to go 
 up with him to-morrow morning; John kissed ; 
 and Bella delighted. ij 
 
 When they reached London in pursuance of 
 their little plan they took coach and drove west- 
 ward. Not only drove westward, but drove inte 
 that particular westward division which Bella 
 had seen last when she turned her face from 
 Mr. Boffin’s door. Not only drove into that 
 particular division, but drove at last into that 
 very street. Not only drove into that very street, 
 but stopped at last at that very house. 
 
 ‘* John dear!’ cried Bella, looking out of 
 window in a flutter. ‘‘Do you see where we 
 are ?” ‘ 
 
 ‘Yes, my love. The coachman’s quite right.” 
 
 The house-door was opened without any — 
 
 knocking or ringing, and John promptly helped 
 her out. The servant who stood holding thé 
 door asked no question of John, neither did he 
 go before them or follow them as they went 
 straight up stairs. It was only her husband’s 
 encircling arm, urging her on, that prevented 
 Bella from stopping at the foot of the staircase. 
 As they ascended, it was seen to be tastefully 
 ornamented with most beautiful flowers. 
 
 “OQ John!” said Bella, faintly. ‘‘ What does 
 this mean ?” . 
 
 ‘* Nothing, my darling, nothing. Let us ge 
 on.” ; 
 
 Going on alittle higher, they came to a charm- 
 ing aviary, in which a number of tropical birds, 
 more gorgeous in color than the flowers, were 
 flying about; and among those birds were gold 
 and silver fish, and mosses, and water-lilies, and 
 a fountain, and all manner of wonders. — 
 
 ‘*Q my dear John!” said Bella. ‘‘ What does 
 this mean ?” 
 
 ‘Nothing, my darling, nothing. Let us go 
 on.” ; 
 
 They went on, until they came to adoor. As 
 John put out his hand to open it, Bella caught 
 his hand. 
 
 ‘*T don’t know what it means, but it’s too 
 much for me. Hold me, John, love.” 
 
 John caught her up in his arm, and lightly _ 
 
 dashed into the room with her. 
 Behold Mr. and Mrs. Boffin, beaming! 
 
 sy, running to Bella with tears of joy pouring 
 down her comely face, and folding her to her 
 comfortable breast, with the words: “My deary 
 deary, deary girl, that Noddy and me saw mar- 
 ried and couldn’t wish joy to, or so much as speak 
 to! My deary, deary, deary, wife of John and 
 mother of his little child! My loving loving, 
 bright bright, Pretty Pretty! Welcome to your 
 
 Bers 
 hold Mrs. Boffin clapping her hands in an ecsta-- 
 
 x 
 ; 
 * 
 
‘band.”’ 
 
 -. more, I did! 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 SHOWING HOW THE GOLDEN DUSTMAN 
 TO SCATTER DUST. 
 
 HELPED 
 
 In all the first bewilderment of her wonder, 
 the most bewilderingly wonderful thing to Bella 
 
 -was the shining countenance of Mr. Boffin. 
 
 That his wife should be joyous, open-hearted, 
 and genial, or that her face should express every 
 quality that was large and trusting, and no.quali- 
 ty that was little or mean, was accordant with 
 Bella’s experience. But that he, with a pgfiect 
 ly beneficent air and a plump rosy face, should 
 
 be standing there, looking at her and John, like | 
 For, | 
 how had he looked when she last saw him in that | 
 
 some jovial good spirit, was marvelous. 
 
 very room (it was the room in which she had 
 given him that piece of her mind at parting), 
 
 and what had become of all those crooked lines | 
 
 of suspicion, avarice, and distrust, that twisted 
 his visage then? 
 
 Mrs. Boffin seated Bella on the large ottoman, 
 and seated herself beside her, and John her hus- 
 band seated himself on the other side of-her, and 
 Mr. Boffin stood beaming at every one and every 
 thing he could see, with surpassing jollity and 
 enjoyment. Mrs. Boffin was then taken with a 
 laughing fit of clapping her hands, and clapping 
 her knees, and rocking herself to and fro, and 
 then with another laughing fit of embracing Bel- 
 la, and rocking her to and fro—both fits of con- 
 siderable duration. 
 
 **Old lady, old lady,” said.Mr. Boffin, at 
 length; “‘ if-you don’t begin somebody else must.” 
 
 “I'm agoing to begin, Noddy, my dear,” re- 
 turned Mrs. Boffin. “Only it isn’t easy for a 
 person to know where to begin, when a person is 
 in this state of delight and happiness. Bella, my 
 dear. Tell me, who’s this?’ 
 
 ‘‘Who is this?” repeated Bella. ‘‘ My hus- 
 
 **Ah! But tell me his name, deary!” cried 
 Mrs. Boffin. 
 
 “ Rokesmith.” ! 
 
 No, it ain’t!” cried Mrs. Boffin, clapping 
 her hands, and shaking her head. ‘‘Not a bit 
 of it.” : 
 
 ‘¢ Handford then,” suggested Bella. 
 
 “*No, it ain’t!” cried Mrs. Boffin, again clap- 
 ping her hands and shaking her head. ‘‘Nota 
 bit of it.” 
 
 ‘* At least his name is John, I suppose ?” said 
 Bella. 
 
 “* Ah! I should think so, deary !” cried Mrs. 
 Boffin. ‘‘I should hope so! Many and many 
 is the time I have called him by his name of 
 John. But what’s his other name, his true other 
 name? Give a guess, my pretty!” 
 
 **T can’t guess,” said Bella, turning her pale 
 face from one to another. 
 
 “7 could,” cried Mrs. Boffin, ‘‘and what’s 
 I found him out, all in a flash as 
 I may say, one night. Didn’t I, Noddy?” 
 
 “Ay! That the old lady did!” said Mr. Bof- 
 fin, with stout pride in the circumstance. 
 
 ‘* Harkee to me, deary,”’ pursued Mrs. Boffin, 
 
 _-taking Bella’s hands between her own, and gen- 
 
 tly beating on them from time totime. ‘‘It was 
 
 _ after a particular night when John had been dis- 
 
 appointed—as he thought—in his affections. It 
 was after a night when John had made an offer 
 to a certain young lady, and the certain young 
 
 | 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 331 
 
 lady had refused it. It was after a particular 
 
 “night, when he felt himself cast-away-like, and 
 had made up his mind to go seck his fortune. It 
 
 was the very next night. My Noddy wanted a 
 
 | paper out of his Secretary’s room, and I says to 
 
 Noddy, ‘I am going by the door, and I'll ask 
 him for it.’ I tapped at his door, and he didn’t 
 hear me. I looked in, and saw him a sitting 
 lonely by his fire, brooding over it. He chanced 
 to look up with a pleased kind of smile in my 
 company when he saw me, and then in a single 
 moment every grain of the gunpowder that had 
 been lying sprinkled thick about him ever since 
 I first set eyes upon him as a man at the Bower, 
 
 took fire! Too many a time had I seen him sit-’ 
 ting lonely, when he was a poor ehild, to be 
 
 pitied, heart and hand! Too many a-time had 
 I seen him in need of being brightened up with 
 a comforting word! ‘Too many and too many 
 a time to be mistaken, when that glimpse of him 
 come at last! No, no! I just makes out to cry, 
 
 ‘I know you now! You're John!’ And he 
 catches me as I drops.—So what,” said Mrs. 
 
 Bofiin, breaking off in the rush of her speech to 
 
 smile most radiantly, ‘‘might you think by this 
 time that your husband’s name was, dear ?” 
 
 ** Not,” returned Bella, with quivering lips; 
 “(not Harmon?. That’s not possible ?” 
 
 ‘*Don’t tremble. Why not possible, deary, 
 when so many things are possible ?” demanded 
 Mrs. Boffin, in a soothing tone. 
 
 ‘‘He was killed,” gasped Bella. 
 
 “Thought to be,” said’ Mrs. Boffin. ‘But. 
 if ever John Harmon drew the breath of life on 
 earth, that is certainly John Harmon’s arm 
 round your waist now, my pretty. If ever John 
 Harmon had a wife on earth, that wife is cer- 
 tainly you. If ever John Harmon and his wife 
 had a child on earth, that child is certainly this.” 
 
 By a master-stroke of secret arrangement the 
 inexhaustible baby here appeared at the door, 
 suspended in mid-air by invisible agency. Mrs. 
 Boffin, plunging at it, brought. it to Bella’s lap, 
 where both Mrs. and Mr. Boffin (as the say- 
 ing is) ‘*took it out of” the Inexhaustible in 
 a shower of caresses. It was only this timely 
 appearance that kept Bella from swooning. 
 This, and her husband’s earnestness in explain- 
 ing further to her how it had come to pass that 
 he had been supposed to be slain, and had even 
 
 ‘been suspected of his own murder; also, how 
 
 he had put a pious frand upon her which had 
 preyed upon his mind, as the time for its dis- 
 closure approached, lest she might not make 
 full allowance for the object’ with which it had 
 originated, and in which it had fully developed. 
 
 ‘¢ But bless ye, my beauty!’ cried Mrs. Boffin, 
 taking him up short at this point, with another 
 hearty clap of her hands. ‘‘It wasn’t John only 
 that was in it. We was all of us in it.” 
 
 ‘¢T don’t,” said Bella, looking vacantly from 
 one to another, ‘‘ yet understand—” , 
 
 ‘SOF course you don’t, my deary,” exclaimed 
 Mrs. Boffin. ‘How can you till you're told! 
 So now I am agoing to tell you. So you put 
 your two hands between my two hands again,” 
 cried the comfortable creature, embracing her, 
 ‘with that blessed little picter lying on your 
 lap, and you shall be told all the story. Now, 
 I’m agoing to tell the story. Once, twice, three 
 times, and the horses is off. Here they go! 
 When I cries out that night, ‘I know you now, 
 
332 
 
 youre John!’—which was my exact words; 
 wasn’t they, John ?” : 
 
 ‘“‘Your exact words,” said John, laying his 
 hand on hers. 
 
 ‘¢ That’s a very good arrangement,”’ cried Mrs, 
 Boffin. ‘‘Keepitthere, John. And as we was 
 all of us in it, Noddy you come and lay yours a 
 top of his, and we won’t break the pile till the 
 story’s done.” 
 
 Mr. Boffin hitched up a chair and added his 
 ‘broad brown right hand to the heap. 
 
 ‘¢That’s capital!’ said Mrs. Boffin, giving it 
 akiss. ‘‘ Seems quite a family building; don’t 
 it? Butthe horses isoff. Well! WhenI cries 
 out that night, ‘I know you now! you're John?’ 
 John catches of me, it istrue; but I ain’t a light 
 weight, bless ye, and he’s forced to let me down. 
 Noddy, he hears a noise, and in he trots, and as 
 soon as I anyways comes to myself I calls to him, 
 ‘ Noddy, well I might say as I did say, that night 
 at the Bower, for the Lord be thankful this is 
 John!’ On which he gives a heave, and down 
 he goes likewise, with his head under the writ- 
 ing-table. This brings me round comfortable, 
 and that brings him round comfortable, and 
 then John and him and me we all fall a crying 
 for joy.” 
 
 ““Yes! They ery for joy, my darling,” her 
 husband struck in. ‘*‘Youunderstand? These 
 two, whom I come to life to disappoint and dis- 
 possess, cry for joy!” 
 
 Bella looked at him confusedly, and looked 
 again at Mrs. Boffin’s radiant face. 
 
 ‘¢'That’s right, my dear, don’t you mind him,” 
 said Mrs. Boffin, ‘‘stick to me. Well! Then 
 we sits down, gradually gets cool, and holds a 
 confabulation. John, he tells us how he is de- 
 spairing in his mind on accounts of a certain 
 fair young person, and how, if I hadn’t found 
 him out, he was'going away to seek his fortune 
 
 far and wide, and had fully meant never to come | 
 
 to life, but to leave the property as our wrongful 
 inheritance forever and a day. At which you 
 never see a man so frightened as my Noddy was. 
 For to think that he should have come into the 
 
 property wrongful, however innocent, and—more | 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 | corner. 
 
 than that—might-have gone on keeping it to his | 
 
 dying day, turned him whiter than chalk.” 
 
 ‘* And you too,” said Mr. Boffin. 
 
 ‘¢Don’t you mind him, neither, my deary,” re- 
 sumed Mrs. Boffin; ‘‘stick tome. This brings 
 up a confabulation regarding the certain fair 
 young person; when Noddy he gives it as his 
 opinion that she is a deary creetur. ‘She may 
 be a leetle spoilt, and nat’rally spoilt,’ he says, 
 “by circumstances, but that’s only on the sur- 
 face, and I lay my life,’ he says, ‘that she’s the 
 true golden gold at heart.’” 
 
 ‘¢So did you,” said Mr. Boffin. 
 
 ‘Don’t you mind him a single morsel, my 
 dear,” proceeded Mrs. Boffin, ‘‘ but stick to me. 
 Then says John, O, if he could but prove so! 
 Then we hoth of us ups and says, that minute, 
 ‘Prove so!’ ” 
 
 With a start Bella directed a hurried glance 
 toward Mr. Boffin. But he was sitting thought- 
 fully smiling at that broad brown hand of his, 
 and either didn’t see it, or would take no notice 
 of it. 
 
 ‘¢*Prove it, John!’ we says,” repeated Mrs. 
 Boffin. ‘‘ ‘Prove it and overcome your doubts 
 With triumph, and be happy for the first time in 
 
 your life, and for the rest of your life.’ 
 puts John in a state, to be sure. ‘Then we says, 
 ‘What will content you? If she was to stand 
 up for you when you was slighted, if she was te 
 show herself of a generous mind when you was 
 oppressed, if she was to be truest to you when 
 you was poorest and friendliest, and all this 
 against her own seeming. interest, how would 
 that do?? ‘Do? says John, ‘it would raise me 
 to the skies.’ ‘Then,’ says my Noddy, ‘make 
 your preparations for the ascent, John, it being 
 my firm belief that up you go!’” 
 
 Bella caught Mr. Boffin’s twinkling eye for 
 half an instant; but he got it away from her 
 and restored it to his broad brown hand. 
 
 ‘From the first you was always a special fa- 
 
 vorite of Noddy’s,” said Mrs. Boffin, shaking 
 
 her head. .‘¢O you were! And if I had been 
 inclined to be jealous, I*don’t know what I 
 mightn’t have done to you. But as I wasn’t— 
 why, my beauty,” with a hearty laugh and an 
 embrace, ‘‘I made you a special favorite of my 
 own too. But the horses is coming round the 
 Well! ‘Then says my Noddy, shaking 
 his sides till he was fit to make ’em ache again: 
 ‘Look out for being slighted and oppressed, 
 John, for if ever a man had a hard master you 
 shall find me from this present time to be such 
 to you.’ And then he began!” cried Mrs, Bof- 
 fin, in an ecstasy of admiration. ‘‘ Lord bless 
 you, then he began! And how he did begin; 
 didn’t he!” 
 
 Bella looked half frightened, and yet half 
 
 laughed. 
 
 ‘But, bless you,” pursued Mrs. Boffin, ‘if 
 you could have seen him of a night, at that time 
 of it! The way he'd sit and chuckle over him- 
 self! The way he’d say ‘I’ve been a regular 
 brown bear to-day,’ and take himself in his arms 
 and hug himself at the thoughts of the brute he 
 had pretended! But every night he says to me; 
 ‘Better and better, old lady. What did we say 
 of her? She'll come through it, the true golden 
 gold. This’ll be the happiest piece of work we 
 ever done.’ And then he’d say, ‘Tl be a griz- 
 zlier old growler to-morrow!’ and laugh, he 
 would, till John and me was often forced to 
 slap his back, and bring it out of his windpipes 
 with a little water.” 
 
 Mr. Boffin, with his face bent over his heavy 
 hand, made no sound, but rolled his shoulders 
 when thus referred to as if he were vastly enjoy- 
 ing himself. 
 
 ‘¢ And so, my good and pretty,” pursued Mrs. 
 Boffin, ‘‘ you was married, and there was we hid 
 up in the church-organ by this husband of yours ; 
 for he wouldn’t let us out with it then, as was 
 first meant. ‘No,’ he says, ‘she’s so unselfish 
 and contented that I can’t afford to be rich yet. 
 I must wait a little longer.’ Then, when baby 
 was expected, he says, ‘She is such a cheerful, 
 
 This 
 
 : 
 
 glorious housewife that I can’t afford to be rich — e 
 
 yet. I must wait a little longer.’ Then, when 
 baby was born, he says, ‘She is so much better 
 
 than she ever was that I can’t afford to be rich 
 
 yet. I must wait a little longer.’ 
 goes on and on, till I says outright, ‘ Now, John, 
 
 And so he 
 
 if you don’t fix a time for setting her up in her — eB 
 
 own house and home, and letting us walk ont | 
 Then he says hell — 
 
 of it, Ill turn Informer.’ 
 only wait to triumph beyond what we ever 
 thought possible, and to show her to us better 
 
 * aa 
 
 ee “i 
 
than even we ever supposed ; and he says, ‘She 
 ’ shall see me under suspicion of having murdered 
 myself, and you shall see how trusting and how 
 true she'll be.’ 
 that, and he was right, and here you are, and 
 the horses is in, and the story is done, and God 
 bless you my Beauty, and God bless us all!” 
 
 The pile of hands dispersed, and Bella and 
 Mrs. Boffin took a good long hug of one another : 
 to the apparent peril-of the inexhaustible baby, 
 lying staring in Bella’s lap. : 
 
 ** But ts the story done?” said Bella, ponder- 
 ing. ‘‘Is there no more of it?” 
 
 ‘‘What more of it should there be, deary ?” 
 returned Mrs. Boffin, full of glee. 
 
 ** Are you sure you have left nothing out of 
 it?” asked Bella. 
 
 **T don’t think I have,’ said Mrs. Boffin, 
 archly. 
 
 “‘John dear,” said Bella, ‘‘you’re a good 
 nurse; will you please hold baby?” 
 
 those words, Bella looked hard at Mr. Boffin, 
 who had moved to a table where he was leaning 
 his head upon his hand with his face turned 
 away, and, quietly settling herself on her knees 
 at his side, and drawing one arm over his shoul- 
 der, said: ‘‘ Please, I beg your pardon, and I 
 made a small mistake of a word when I took 
 leave of you last. Please I think you are better 
 (not worse) than Hopkins, better (not worse) 
 than Dancer, better (not worse) than Black- 
 berry Jones, better (not worse) than any of 
 them! Please something more!” cried Bella, 
 
 with an exultant ringing laugh as she struggled | 
 with him and forced him to turn his delighted 
 
 face to hers. | ‘‘ Please I have found out some- 
 thing not yet mentioned. Please I don’t believe 
 you are a hard-hearted miser at all, and please 
 I don’t-believe you ever for one single minute 
 were I"? 
 
 At this Mrs. Boffin fairly screamed with rap- 
 ture, and sat beating her feet npon the floor, 
 
 ¢lapping her hands, and bobbing herself back- | 
 ward and forward like a demented member of | 
 
 some Mandarin’s family. 
 
 “QO, I understand you now, Sir!” cried Bella. 
 ““T want neither you nor any one else to tell me 
 the rest of the story. I can tell it to you, now, 
 if you would like to hear it.” 
 
 ‘Can you, my dear?” said Mr. Boffin. “Tell 
 it then.” 
 
 ‘* What?” cried Bella, holding him prisoner 
 by the coat with both hands. ‘‘ When you saw 
 what a greedy little wretch you were the patron 
 of, you determined to show her how much mis- 
 used and misprized riches could do, and often 
 had done, to spoil people; did you? Not car- 
 ing what she thought of vou (and Goodness 
 knows that was of no consequence!) vou showed 
 her, in yourself, the most detestable sides of 
 wealth, saying in your own mind, ‘ This shallow 
 creature would never work the truth out of her 
 own weak soul, if she had a hundred vears to 
 do it in; but a glaring instance kept before her 
 may open even her eyes and set her thinking. 
 That was what you said to yourself; was it, 
 Sir?” 
 
 **J never said any thing of the sort,” Mr. 
 Boffin declared, in a state of the highest enjoy- 
 ment. 
 
 ‘*'Then you ought to have said it, Sir,” re- 
 
 Well! Noddy and me agreed to | 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 333 | 
 
 turned Bella, giving him two pulls and one kiss, 
 
 _‘*for you must have thought and meant it. You 
 
 saw that good fortune was turning my stupid 
 head and hardening my silly heart—was making. 
 me grasping, calculating, insolent, insufferable 
 ——and you took the pains to be the dearest and 
 kindest finger-post that ever was set up any 
 where, pointing out the road that I was taking 
 and the end it led to. Confess instantly !” 
 
 ‘* John,” said Mr. Boffin, one broad vicce of 
 sunshine from head to foot, “I wish you’d help 
 me out of this.” 
 
 **You can’t be heard by counsel, Sir,” re- 
 turned Bella. ‘You must speak for yourself, 
 Confess instantly !” 
 
 ** Well, my dear,” said Mr. Boffin, ‘the truth 
 is, that when we did go in for the little scheme 
 that my old lady has pinted out, I did put it to 
 John, what did he think of going in for some 
 
 /such general scheme as you have pinted out? 
 
 Having | 
 deposited the Inexhaustible in his arms with 
 
 But I didn’t in any way so word it, because I 
 didn’t in any way so mean it. I only said to 
 John, wouldn’t it be more consistent, me going 
 in for being a reg’lar brown bear respecting him, 
 to go in as a reg’lar brown bear all round ?” 
 
 “Confess this minute, Sir,” said Bella, ‘that 
 you did it to correct and amend me!” 
 
 ‘Certainly, my dear child,” said Mr. Boffin, 
 ‘J didn’t do it to harm you; you may be sure . 
 of that. And I did hope it might just hint a. 
 caution. Still, it ought to be mentioned that no 
 sooner had my old lady found out Jobn, than 
 John made known to her and me that he had 
 had his eye upon a thankless person by the name 
 of Silas Wegg. Partly for the punishment of 
 which Wegg, by leading him on in a very un- 
 handsome and underhanded game that he was 
 playing, them books that you and.me bought so 
 many of together (and, by-the-by, my dear, he © 
 wasn’t Blackberry Jones, but Blewberry) was 
 read aloud to me by that person of the name of 
 Silas Wegg aforesaid.” 
 
 Bella, whe was still on her knees at Mr. Bof- 
 fin’s feet, gradually sank down into a sitting pos- 
 ture on the ground, as she meditated more and 
 more thoughtfully, with her eyes upon his beam- 
 ing face. 
 
 ‘¢Still,”’ said Bella, after this meditative pause, 
 
 ‘there remain two things that I can not under- 
 
 stand. Mrs. Boffin never supposed any part of 
 the change in Mr. Boffin to be real; did she ?— 
 You never did; did you?” asked Bella, turning 
 to her. 
 
 ““No!” returned Mrs. Boffin, with a most ro- 
 tund and glowing negative. 
 
 ‘¢And yet you took it very much to heart,” 
 said Bella, ‘<I remember its making you very 
 uneasy indeed.” 
 
 ‘¢Keod, you see Mrs. John has a sharp eye, 
 John!” eried Mr. Boftin, shaking his head with 
 anadmiring air. ‘‘ You're right, my dear. The 
 old lady nearly blowed us into shivers and smith- 
 ers, Many times.” 
 
 ‘©Why?” asked Bella. ‘* How did that hap- 
 pen, when she was in your secret?” 
 
 ‘‘Why, it was a weakness in the old lady,” 
 said Mr. Boffin; “and yet, to tell you the whole 
 truth and nothing but the truth, I’m rather proud 
 of it. My dear, the old lady thinks so high of 
 me that she couldn’t abear to see and hear me 
 
 coming out as a reg’lar brown one. Conldn’t 
 abear to make-believe as I meant it! In conse- 
 
334 
 
 quence of which, we was everlastingly in dan- 
 ger with her.” 
 
 Mrs. Boffin laughed heartily at herself; but a 
 certain glistening in her honest eyes revealed that 
 she was by no means cured of that dangerous 
 propensity. 
 
 ‘‘T assure you, my dear,” said Mr. Boffin, 
 ¢¢ that on the celebrated day when I made what 
 has since been agreed upon to be my grandest 
 demonstration—I allude to Mew says the cat, 
 Quack quack says the duck, and Bow-wow-wow 
 says the dog—I assure you, my dear, that on 
 
 ¥that celebrated day, them flinty and unbelieving 
 words hit my old lady so hard on my account, 
 that I had to hold her, to prevent her running 
 out after you, and defending me by saying I was 
 playing a part.” 
 
 Mrs. Boffin laughed heartily again, and her 
 eyes glistened again, and it then appeared, not 
 only that in that burst of sarcastic eloquence 
 Mr. Boffin was considered by his two fellow-con- 
 spirators to have outdone himself, but that in 
 his own opinion it was a remarkable achievement. 
 ‘“‘Never thought of it afore the moment, my 
 dear!” he observed to Bella. ‘‘When John 
 said, if he had been so happy as to win your af- 
 fections and possess your heart, it come into my 
 head to turn round upon him with ‘ Win her af- 
 fections and possess her heart! Mew says the 
 cat, Quack quack says the duck, and Bow-wow- 
 wow says the dog.’ I couldn’t tell you how it 
 come into my head or where from, but it had so 
 much the sound of a rasper that 1 own to you it 
 astonished myself. I was awful nigh bursting 
 out a laughing though, when it made John stare!” 
 
 ‘You said, my pretty,” Mrs. Boffin reminded 
 Bella, ‘‘that there was one other thing you 
 couldn’t understand.” 
 
 ‘<Q yes!” cried Bella, covering her face with 
 her hands, ‘‘but that I never shall be able to 
 understand as long as I live. It is, how John 
 could love me so when I so little deserved it, and 
 how you, Mr. and Mrs. Boffin, could be so for- 
 getful of yourselves, and take such pains and 
 trouble, to make me a little better, and after all 
 to help him to so unworthy a wife. But I am 
 very, very grateful.” 
 
 It was John Harmon’s turn then—John Har- 
 mon now for good, and John Rokesmith for nev- 
 ermore—to plead with her (quite unnecessarily ) 
 in behalf of his deception, and to tell her, over 
 and over again, that it had been prolonged by 
 »her own winning graces in her supposed station 
 of life. This led on to many interchanges of en- 
 dearment and enjoyment on all sides, in the 
 midst of which the Inexhaustible being observed 
 staring, in a most imbecile manner, on Mrs. Bof- 
 fin’s breast, was pronounced to be supernaturally 
 intelligent as to the whole transaction, and was 
 made to declare to the ladies and gemplemorums, 
 with a wave of the speckled fist (with difficulty 
 detached from an exceedingly short waist), *‘I 
 have already informed my venerable Ma that I 
 know all about it!” 
 
 ‘Phen, said John Harmon, would Mrs. John 
 Harmon come and see her house? And a dainty 
 house it was, and a tastefully beautiful; and 
 they went throngh it in procession; the Inex- 
 haustible on Mrs. Boffin’s bosom (still staring) 
 occupying the middle station, and Mr. Boffin 
 bringing upthe rear. And on Bella’s exquisite 
 toilet-table was an ivory casket, and in the cask- 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 Wegg felt too sensibly relieved by the close of 
 
 et were jewels the like of which she had never 
 dreamed of, and aloft on an upper floor was a 
 nursery garnished as with rainbows; ‘‘ though 
 we were hard put to it,” said John Harmon, ‘to 
 get it done in so short a time.” 
 
 The house inspected, emissaries removed the 
 Inexhaustible, who was shortly afterward heard 
 screaming among the rainbows ; whereupon Bella 
 withdrew herself from the presence and knowl- 
 edge of gemplemorums, and the screaming ceased, — 
 and smiling Peace associated herself with that 
 young olive branch. 
 
 ‘©Come and look in, Noddy!” said Mrs. Bof- i 
 fin to Mr. Boffin. i 
 
 Mr. Boffin, submitting to be led on tip-toe to Ng 
 the nursery door, looked in with immense satis- 
 faction, although there was nothing to see but 
 Bella in a musing state of happiness, seated in 
 a little low chair upon the hearth, with her child 
 
 in her fair young arms, and her soft eyelashes iu 
 shading her eyes from the fire. i 
 ‘Tt looks as if the old man’s spirit had found a 
 
 rest at last; don’t it?” said Mrs. Boffin. 
 “Yes, old lady.” ft 
 ‘¢ And as if his money had turned bright again, 9! 
 
 after a long long rust in the dark, and was at 
 
 last a beginning to sparkle in the sunlight ?” 
 ‘Yes, old lady.” ; %, 
 ‘s And it makes a pretty and a promising pie- q 
 
 ter; don’t it?” or 
 ‘Yes, old lady.” i 
 But, aware at the instant of a fine opening for ; 
 
 a point, Mr. Boffin quenched that observation in 
 this—delivered in the grizzliest growling of the * 
 regular brown bear. ‘* A pretty and a hopeful ; 
 picter? Mew, Quack quack, Bow-wow!” And ts 
 then trotted silently down stairs, with his shoul . 
 ders in a state of the liveliest commotion. Ҥ 
 —— yy 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 CHECKMATE TO THE FRIENDLY MOVE. 
 
 Mr. and Mrs. John Harmon had so timed 
 their taking possession of their rightful name 
 and their London honse, that. the event befell on i 
 the very day when the last wagon load of the i 
 last Mound was driven out at the gates of Bof- 
 fin’s Bower. As it jolted away Mr. Wegg felt 
 that the last load was correspondingly removed 
 from his mind, and hailed the auspicious season 
 when that black sheep, Boffin, was to be closely 
 sheared. 
 
 Over the whole slow process of leveling the A 
 Mounds Silas had kept watch with rapacious a 
 eyes. But eyes no less rapacious had watched : 
 the growth of the Mounds in years by-gone, and 
 had vigilantly sifted the dust of which they were 
 composed. No valuablesturned up. Howshould 
 there be any, seeing that the old hard jailer of 
 Harmony Jail had coined every waif and stray 
 into money long before ? 
 
 Though disappointed by this bare result, Mr. 
 
 the labor to grumble to any great extent. A 
 foreman representative of the dust contractors, 
 purchasers of the Mounds, had worn Mr. Wegg 
 down to skin and bone. ‘This supervisor of the 
 proceedings, asserting his employers’ rights to 
 cart off by daylight, nightlight, torehlight, when 
 they would, must have been the death of Silas 
 
 te i 
 
335 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 —— ‘| 
 
 | 
 
 NURSERY DOOR. 
 
 MR. BOFFIN DOES THE HONORS OF THE 
 
eA 
 
 ¥ 
 
 Ar ; hi, 4 : 
 
 i) 
 
 WiBEe WF 
 
 if the work had lasted much longer. Seeming 
 never to need sleep himself, he would reappear, 
 
 with a tied-up broken head, in fantail hat and 
 
 vélveteen smalls, like an accursed goblin, at 
 the most unholy and untimely hours. Tired out 
 by keeping close ward over a long day’s work in 
 fog and rain, Silas would have just crawled to 
 bed and be dozing, when a horrid shake and 
 rumble under his pillow would announce an ap- 
 proaching train of carts, escorted by this Demon 
 of Unrest, to fall to work again. At another 
 time, he would be rumbled up out of his sound- 
 est sleep, in the dead of the night; at another, 
 would be kept at his post eight-and-forty hours 
 onend. The more his persecutor besought him 
 not to trouble himself to turn out, the more sus- 
 picious was the crafty Wegg that indications 
 had been observed of something hidden some- 
 where, and that attempts were en foot to cir- 
 cumvent him. So continually broken was his 
 rest through these means, that he led the life of 
 having wagered to keep ten thousand dog-watch- 
 es in ten thousand hours, and looked piteously 
 upon himself as always getting up and yet never 
 going to bed. §o gaunt and haggard had he 
 grown at last, that his wooden leg showed dis- 
 proportionate, and presented a thriving appear- 
 ance in contrast with the rest of his plagued 
 body, which might almost have been termed 
 ehubby. 
 
 However, Wegg’s comfort was,. that all his | 
 disagreeables were now oyer, and that he was | 
 
 immediately coming into his property. Of late, 
 the grindstone did undoubtedly appear to have 
 been whirling at his own nose rather than Bof- 
 
 fin’s, but Boffin’s nose was now to be sharpened | 
 
 fine. Thus far Mr. Wegg had let his dusty friend 
 off lightly, having been balked in that amiable 
 design of frequently dining with him, by the 
 machinations of the sleepless dustman. He had 
 been constrained to depute Mr. Venus to keep 
 their dusty friend, Boffin, under inspection, while 
 he himself turned lank and lean at the Bower. 
 
 To Mr. Venus’s museum Mr. Wegg repaired 
 when at length the Mounds were down and gone. 
 It being evening, he found that gentleman, as 
 he expected, seated over his fire; but did not 
 find him, as he expected, floating his powerful 
 mind in tea. 
 
 ‘*Why, you smell rather comfortable’ here !” 
 said Wegg, seeming to take it ill, and stopping 
 and sniffing as he entered. 
 
 “*T am rather comfortable, Sir,’ said Venus, 
 
 ** You don’t use lemon in your business, do 
 you?” asked Wegg, sniffing again. 
 
 “No, Mr. Wegg,” said Venus. ‘‘ When I 
 use it at all, I mostly use it in cobblers’ punch.” 
 
 ‘* What do you call cobblers’ punch ?” de- 
 manded Wegg, in a worse humor than before. 
 
 “It’s difficult to impart the receipt for it, Sir,” 
 returned Venus, ‘‘ because, however particular 
 you may be in allotting your materials, so much 
 will still depend upon the individual gifts, and 
 there being a feeling thrown into it. But the 
 ground-work is gin.”’ 
 
 ‘In a Dutch bottle?” said Wegg, gloomily, 
 as he sat himself down. 
 
 ‘* Very good, Sir, very good!” cried Venus. 
 ** Will you partake, Sir?” 
 
 ‘Will I partake ?” returned Wegg very surli- 
 ly. “Why, of course I will! Wed a man par- 
 take, as has been tormented out ef his five senses 
 
 OUR’ MUTUAL BRIEND, FOR Oe 
 
 ‘sprightly manner, ‘‘] suspect you could hardly 
 
 fretted out of your bed, and your sleep, and your “A 
 
 5 
 
 by an everlasting dustman with his head tied up! 
 Will he, too! As if he woulda’t !” : 
 
 ‘‘Don’t let it put you out, Mr. Wegg. You 
 don’t seem in your usual spirits.”’ 
 
 ‘* Tf you come to that, you don’t seem in your 
 usual spirits,” growled Wegg. ‘You seem to 
 be setting up for lively.” 
 
 This circumstance appeared, in his then state 
 of mind, to give Mr. Wegg uncommon offense. 
 
 “* And you’ve. been having your hair cut!” 
 said Wegg, missing the usual dusty shock. 
 
 “Yes, Mr.Wegg. Butdon’t let that put you 
 out, either.” \ 
 
 ‘¢ And I am blest if you ain’t getting fat!” 
 said Wegg, with culminating discontent. ‘‘What 
 are vou going to.do next ?” 
 
 — Well, Mr. Wegg,” said Venus, smiling ina 
 
 guess what I am going to do next.” 
 
 ‘*J don’t want to guess,” retorted Wegg. ‘All 
 Pve.got to, say is, that it’s well for you that the 
 diwision of labor has been what it has-been. 
 It’s well for you to have had so light a part in’ 
 this business, when mine has been so heavy. ) 
 You haven’t had your rest broke, I’ll be bound.” 3 
 
 ‘*Not at all, Sir,” said Venus. ‘* Never rested . 
 so well in all my life, I thank you.” a 
 
 ‘*Ah!” grumbled Wegg, ‘‘ you should have Mi 
 been me. If you had been me, and had been 
 
 meals, and your mind, for a stretch of months 
 together, yowd have been out of condition and 
 out of sorts.” 
 
 ‘* Certainly, it has trained you down, Mr. 
 Wegg,” said Venus, contemplating his figure 
 with an artist’s eye. “Trained you down very 
 low, ithas! So weazen and yellow is the kiver- 
 ing upon your bones, that one might almost 
 fancy you had come to give a look-in upon the 
 French gentleman in the corner, instead of me.” . 
 
 Mr. Wegg, glancing in great dudgeon toward wh 
 the French gentleman’s corner, seemed to notice ‘ho 
 something new there, which induced him te 
 glance at the opposite corner, and then to put 
 on his glasses and stare at all the nooks and 
 corners of the dim shop in succession. : 
 ‘* Why, you’ve been having the place cleaned 
 1” he exclaimed. 
 
 ““Yes, Mr. Wegg. By the hand of adorable 
 woman.” . 
 
 **Then what you're going to do next, I sup-g 
 pose, is to get married ?” 
 
 ‘¢'That’s it, Sir.” 
 
 Silas took off his glasses again—finding him- 
 self too intensely disgusted by the sprightly ap- 
 pearance of his friend and partner to bear a 
 magnified view of him—and made the inquiry :, 
 
 “*'To the old party ?” 
 
 “Mr, Wegg!” said Venus, with a sudden flush 
 of wrath. ‘‘The lady in question is not a old 
 party.” 
 
 ‘*J meant,” explained Wegg, testily, ‘‘to the 
 party as formerly objected ?” 
 
 ‘‘Mr. Wegg,’’ said Venus, ‘‘in a case of so 
 much delicacy, I must trouble you to say what 
 you mean. There are strings that must not be 
 played upon. No Sir! Not sounded, unless in 
 the most respectful and tuneful manner. Of 
 such melodious strings is Miss Pleasant Rider- 
 hood formed.” 
 
 ‘‘Then it ts the lady as formerly objected ?” 
 said Wegg. 
 
 ap 
 
POL ge pe 
 
 fae tee ae 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 Sir,” returned Venus with dignity, ‘‘I ac- 
 eept the altered phrase. It is the lady as for- 
 merly objected.” 
 
 *¢ When is it to come off ?” asked Silas. 
 
 ‘¢Mr. Wegg,” said Venus, with another flush. 
 “T can not permit it to be put in the form of a 
 Fight. I must temperately but firmly call upon 
 you, Sir; to amend that question.” 
 
 ‘¢When is the lady,” Wegg reluctantly de- 
 manded, constraining’ his ill-temper in remem- 
 brance of the partnership and its stock in td, 
 ‘‘agoing to give*her ’and where she has already 
 given her ’art ?” 
 
 ‘“‘ Sir,” returned Venus, ‘*I again accept the 
 altered phrase, and with pleasure. The lady is 
 agoing to give her ’and where she has already 
 given her ’art next Monday.” 
 
 ‘Then the lady’s objection has been met ?” 
 said Silas. 
 
 “Mr. Wegg,” said Venus, ‘‘as I did name 
 to you, I think, on a former occasion, if not on 
 former occasions—” 
 
 <¢On former occasions,” interrupted Wegg. 
 
 «_What,” pursued Venus, ‘‘ what the nature 
 of the lady’s objection was, I may impart, with- 
 out violating any of the tender confidences since 
 sprung up between the lady and myself, how it 
 has been met, through the kind interference of 
 two good friends of mine: one, previously ac- 
 quainted with the lady: and one, not. The 
 pint was thrown out, Sir, by those two friends 
 when they did me the great service of waiting 
 on the lady to try if a union betwixt the lady 
 
 and me could not be brought to bear—the pint, ’ 
 
 I say, was thrown out by them, Sir, whether if, 
 after marriage, I confined myself to the articu- 
 lation of men, children, and the lower animals, 
 
 _it might not relieve the lady’s mind of her feel- 
 
 ing respecting being—as a lady—regarded in a 
 bony light. It was a happy thought, Sir, and 
 it took root.” 
 
 ‘¢Tt would seem, Mr. Venus,” observed Wegg, 
 with a touch of distrust, ‘‘that you are flush of 
 friends ?” 
 
 “« Pretty well, Sir,” that gentleman answered, 
 in atone of placid mystery. ‘‘So-so, Sir. Pretty 
 well.” 
 
 <¢ However,” said Wegg, after eying him 
 with another touch of distrust, ‘‘I wish you joy. 
 One man spends his fortune in one way, and 
 another in another. You are going to try mat- 
 rimony. I mean to try traveling.” 
 
 ‘‘Indeed, Mr. Wegg ?” 
 
 ‘¢ Change of air, sea-scenery, and my natural 
 rest, I hope may bring me round after the per- 
 secutions I have undergone from the dustman 
 with his head tied up, which I just now men- 
 tioned. The tough job being ended and the 
 Mounds laid low, the hour is come for Boffin to 
 stump up. Would ten to-morrow morning suit 
 you, partner, for finally bringing Boffin’s nose 
 to the grindstone ?” 
 
 Ten to-morrow morning would quite suit Mr. 
 Venus for that excellent purpose. 
 
 ‘¢You have had him well under inspection, I 
 hope ?” said Silas. 
 
 Mr. Venus had had him under inspection pretty 
 well every day. 
 
 ‘¢Sappose you was just to step round to-night 
 then, and give him orders from me—I say from 
 me, because he knows J won’t be played with— 
 to be ready with his papers, his accounts, and 
 
 his cash, at that time in the morning?” said 
 Wegg. ‘‘And as a matter of form, which will 
 be agreeable to your own feelings, before we go 
 out (for Pll walk wigh you part of the way, 
 though my leg gives under me with weariness), 
 let’s have a look at the stock in trade.” 
 
 Mr. Venus produced it, and it was perfectly 
 
 337 ai ate 
 
 i 
 
 correct; Mr. Venus undertook to produce it 
 
 again in the morning, and to keep tryst with 
 Mr. Wegg on Boffin’s doorstep as the clock struck 
 ten. At a certain point of the road between 
 Clerkenwell and Boffin’s house (Mr. Wegg ex- 
 pressly insisted that there should be no prefix to 
 the Golden Dustman’s name) thé partners sepa-} 
 rated for the night. 
 
 It was a very bad night; to which succeeded 
 a very bad morning. ‘The streets were so un- 
 usually slushy, muddy, and miserable, in the 
 morning, that Wegg rode to the scene of action; 
 arguing that a man who was, as it were, going 
 to the Bank to draw out a handsome property 
 could well afford that trifling expense. 
 
 Venus was punctual, and Wegg undertook te 
 knock ai the door and conduct the conference. 
 Door knocked at. Door opened. 
 
 ‘¢ Botfin ‘at home?” 
 
 The servant replied that Afr. Boffin was a 
 home. ; 
 
 “ Fell do,” said Wegg, ‘‘though it ain’t 
 what I call him.” 
 
 The servant inquired if they had any appoint- 
 ment ? 
 
 ‘* Now I tell you what, young fellow,” said 
 Wegg, ‘‘I won’t have it. This won't do for 
 me. I don’t want menials. I want Boffin.” 
 
 They were shown into a waiting-room, where 
 the all-powerful Wegg wore his hat, and whis- 
 tled, and with his forefinger stirred up a clock 
 that stood upon the chimney-piece until he made 
 it strike. In a few minutes they were shown up 
 stairs into what used to be Boffin’s room ; which, 
 besides the door of entrance, had folding-doors 
 in it, to make it one of a suit of rooms when 
 occasion required. Here Botfin was seated at a 
 library-table, and here Mr. Wegg, having impe- 
 riously motioned the servant to withdraw, drew 
 up a chair and seated himself, in his hat, close 
 beside him. Here also Mr. Wegg instantly un- 
 derwent the remarkable experience of having 
 his hat twitched off his head and thrown out of 
 a window, which was opened and shut for the 
 purpose. 
 
 ‘* Be careful what insolent liberties you take 
 in that gentleman’s presence,” said the owner 
 of the hand which had done this, ‘‘or I will 
 throw you after it.” 
 
 Wegg involuntarily clapped his hand to his 
 bare head, and stared at the Secretary. For it 
 was he addressed him with a severe counte- 
 nance, and who had come in quietly by the fold- 
 ing-doors. 
 
 ‘Qh! said Wegg, as soon as he recovered 
 his suspended power of speech. ‘* Very good! 
 
 > 
 
 I gave directions for you to be dismissed. And 
 you ain’t gone, ain’t you? Oh! We'll look 
 
 into this presently. Very good!” 
 ‘*No, nor J ain’t gone,” said another voice. 
 Somebody else had come in quietly by the 
 folding-doors. Turning his head, Wegg beheld 
 his persecutor, the ever-wakeful dustman, ac- 
 
 -eoutred with fantail hat and velveteen smalls 
 
 complete. Who, untying his tied-up broken 
 
Liha stat 
 
 338 
 
 head, revealed a head that was whole and a face 
 that was Sloppy’s. 
 
 ‘*Ha, ha, ha, gentlemen!” roared Sloppy, in 
 a peal of laughter, and with immeasurable rel- 
 ish. ‘‘He never thought’as I could sleep stand- 
 ing, and often done it when I turned for Mrs. 
 Higden! He never thought as I used to give 
 Mrs. Higden the Police-news in different voices! 
 But I did lead him a life all through it, gentle- 
 men, I hope I really and truly pip !”” Here Mr. 
 Sloppy opening his mouth to a quite alarming 
 extent, and throwing back his head to peal 
 again, revealed incalculable buttons. 
 
 ‘*Oh!” said Wegg, slightly discomfited, but 
 not much as yet: ‘fone and one is two not dis- 
 miissed, is it? Bof—fin! Just let me ask a 
 - question. Who set this chap on, in this dress, 
 when the carting began? Who employed this 
 fellow ?” 
 
 ‘‘Tsay!” remonstrated Sloppy, jerking his 
 head forward. ‘* No fellows, or J'll throw you 
 out of winder!” 
 
 Mr. Boffin appeased him with a wave of his 
 hand, and said: ‘*I employed him, Wegg.” 
 
 ‘*Oh! You employed him, Boffin? Very 
 good. Mr. Venus, we raise our terms, and we 
 can’t do better than proceed to business. Bof— 
 fin! I want the room cleared of these two 
 scum.” 
 
 ‘*'That’s not going to be done, Wegg,” replied 
 Mr. Boftin, sitting composedly on the library- 
 table, at one end, while the Secretary sat com- 
 posedly on it at the other. 
 
 ‘‘ Bof—fin! Not going to be done?” repeat- 
 ed Wegg. ‘* Not at your peril?” . 
 
 “No, Wegg,” said Mr. Boffin, shaking his 
 head good-humoredly. ‘*Not at my peril, and 
 not on any other germs.” 
 
 Wegg reflected a moment, and then said: 
 ‘Mr. Venus, will you be so good as hand me 
 over that same dockyment ?” 
 
 ** Certainly, Sir,” replied Venus, handing it. 
 
 to him with much politeness, ‘‘ There it is. 
 Having now, Sir, parted with it, I wish to make 
 a small observation: not so much because it is 
 any ways necessary, or expresses any new doc- 
 trine or discovery, as because it is a comfort to 
 my mind. Silas Wegg, you are a precious old 
 rascal,” 
 
 Mr. Wegg, who, as if anticipating a compli- 
 ment, had been beating time with the ‘paper to 
 the other’s politeness until this unexpected con- 
 clusion came upon him, stopped rather abruptly. 
 
 “Silas Wegg,” said Venus, ‘‘know that I 
 took the liberty of taking Mr. Boffin into our 
 concern, as a sleeping partner, at a very early 
 period of our firm’s existence.” 
 
 **Quite true,” added Mr. Boffin; ‘‘and I 
 tested Venus by making him a pretended pro- 
 posal or two; and I found him on the whole a 
 very honest man, Wegg.”’ 
 
 ‘* So Mr. Boffin, in his indulgence, is pleased 
 to say,” Venus remarked: ‘‘though in the be- 
 ginning of this dirt my hands were not, for a few 
 hours, quite as clean as I could wish. But I 
 hope I made early and full amends.” 
 
 ** Venus, you did,” said Mr. Boffin. ‘‘ Cer- 
 tainly, certainly, certainly.” 
 
 Venus inclined his head with respect and grat- 
 itude. ‘‘Thank you, Sir. Iam much obliged 
 to you. Sir, for all. For your good opinion now, 
 for your way of receiving and encouraging me 
 
 ee, 1” keh 
 eo hie ieee 
 
 OUR‘\MUTUAL FRIEND; 
 
 “ae 
 
 when I first put myself in communication with 
 you, and for the influence since so kindly brought * 
 
 to bear upon a certain lady, both by yourself and 
 by Mr. John Harmon.” ‘To whom, when thus 
 making mention of him, he also bowed. 
 
 Wegg followed the name with sharp ears and 
 the action with sharp eyes, and a certain cring- 
 ing air was infusing itself into his bullying air, 
 when his attention was re-claimed by Venus. 
 
 ‘““Kivery thing else between you and me, Mr. 
 Wegg,” said Venus, ‘‘ now explains itself, and 
 you can now make out, Sir, without further 
 words from me. But totally to prevent any un- 
 pleasantness or mistake that might arise on what 
 I consider an important point, to be made quite 
 clear at the close of our acquaintance, I beg the 
 leave of Mr. Boffin and Mr. John Harmon to 
 repeat an observation which I have already had 
 the pleasure of bringing under your notice. 
 are a precious old rascal !” 
 
 ‘*You are a fool,” said Wegg, with a snap 
 of his fingers, ‘‘and [I'd have got rid of you be- 
 fore now, if I could have struck out any way of 
 doing it. I have thought it over, I can tell you. 
 You may go, and welcome. You leave the more 
 for me. Because, you know,” said Wegg, di- 
 viding his next observation between Mr. Boffin 
 and Mr. Harmon, ‘‘I am worth my price, and 
 I mean to have it. This getting off is all very 
 well in its way, and it tells with such an ana- 
 tomical Pump as this one,” pointing out Mr. 
 Venus, ‘‘but it won’t do with a Man. I am 
 here to be bought off, and I have named my 
 figure. Now, buy me, or leave me.” 
 
 “Pll leave you, Wegg,” said Mr. Boffin, 
 Jaughing, ‘‘as far as I am concerned.” 
 
 ‘* Bof—fin !” replied Wegg, turning upon him 
 with a severe air, ‘‘I understand your new-born 
 boldness. I see the brass underneath your sil- 
 ver. You have got your nose put out of joint. 
 Knowing that you’ve nothing at stake, you can 
 afford to come the independent game. Why, 
 you're just so much smeary glass to see through, 
 you know! But Mr. Harmon is in another sit- 
 iwation. What Mr. Harmon risks is quite an- 
 other pair of shoes. Now, I’ve heerd something 
 lately about this being Mr. Harmon—I make out 
 now some hints that ’'ve met on that subject 
 in the newspaper—and I drop you, Bof—fin, as 
 beneath my notice. J ask Mr. Harmon whether 
 he has any idea of the contents of this present 
 paper ?” 
 
 **It is a will of my late father’s, of more re- 
 cent date than the will proved by Mr. Boffin 
 (address whom again, as you have addressed 
 him already, and I’ll knock you down), leaving 
 the whole of his property to the Crown,” said 
 John Harmon, with as much indifference as was 
 compatible with extreme sternness. 
 
 “Right you are!” cried Wegg. ‘Then,’ 
 screwing the weight of his body upon his wood- 
 en leg, and screwing his wooden head very much 
 on one side, and screwing up one eye: ‘‘ then, 
 I put the question to you, what’s this paper 
 worth?” 
 
 “‘Nothing,” said John Harmon. 
 
 Wegg had repeated the word with a sneer, 
 and was entering on some sarcastic retort, when, 
 to his boundless amazement, he found himself 
 gripped by the cravat; shaken until his teeth 
 
 chattered; shoved back, staggering, into a'cor- — 
 
 ner of the room; and pinned there. 
 
 You | 
 
 nn 
 2) 
 
 ‘ 
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 . ge ee. 
 
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 sl 
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 i 
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 4 
 
309 
 
 A 33 
 
 ] if f 
 
 ‘OUR MUTUAL FRIEND, 
 
 y 
 
 Y Yj 
 
 THE DUTCH BOTTLE. 
 
340 
 
 “You scoundrel!” said John Harmon, whose 
 sea-faring hold was like that of a vice. 
 
 ‘You’re knocking my head against the wall,” 
 urged Silas, faintly. 
 
 ‘‘T mean to knock your head against the 
 wall,” returned John Harmon, suiting his ac- 
 tion to his words, with the heartiest good-will ; 
 ‘and I’d give a thousand pounds for leave to 
 knock your brains out, Listen, you scoundrel, 
 and look at that Dutch bottle.” 
 
 Sloppy held it up, for his edification. 
 
 ‘¢That Dutch bottle, scoundrel, contained the 
 latest will of the many wills made by my unhap- 
 py self-tormenting father. ‘That will gives ev- 
 - ery thing absolutely to my noble benefactor and 
 - yours, Mr. Boffin, excluding and reviling me, 
 and my sister (then already.dead of a broken 
 heart), by name. That Dutch bottle was found 
 by my noble benefactor and yours, after he en- 
 tered on possession of the estate. That Dutch 
 bottle distressed him beyond measure, because, 
 though I and my sister were both no more, it 
 cast a slur upon our memory which he knew we 
 
 had done nothing in our miserable youth to de- | 
 
 serve. ‘That Dutch bottle, therefore, he buried 
 in the Mound belonging to him, and there it lay 
 while you, you thankless wretch, were prodding 
 and poking—often very near it, I dare s: ry. His 
 intention was, that it should never see the light , 
 but he was afraid to destroy it, lest to destroy 
 such a document, even with his great generous 
 motive, might be an offense at law. After the 
 discovery was made here who I was, Mr. Boffin, 
 still restless on the subject, told me, upon cer- 
 tain conditions impossible for such a hound as 
 you to appreciate, the secret of that Dutch bot- 
 tle. Lurged upon him the necessity of its being 
 dug up, and the paper being legally produced 
 and established. The first thing vou saw him 
 do, and the second thing has been done without 
 your knowledge. Consequently, the paper now 
 rattling in your hand as I shake you—and I 
 should like to shake the life out of you—is worth 
 less than the rotten cork of the Dutch bottle, do 
 you understand ?” 
 
 Judging from the fallen countenance of Silas 
 as his head wagged backward and forward in a 
 most uncomfortable manner, he did understand, 
 
 “Now, scoundrel,” said John Harmon, tak- 
 ing another sailor-like turn on his cravat and 
 holding him in his corner at arm’s-length, ‘I 
 shall make two more short speeches to you, be- 
 cause I hope they will torment you. Your dis- 
 covery was a genuine discovery (such as it was), 
 for nobody had thought of- looking into that 
 place, Neither did we know you had made it 
 until Venus spoke to Mr. Boffin, though I kept 
 you under good observation from my first ap- 
 pearance here, and though Sloppy has long made 
 it the chief occupation and delight of his life to 
 attend you like your shadow. I tell you this, 
 that you may know we knew enough of you to 
 persuade Mr. Boffin to let us lead you on, de- 
 luded, to the last possible moment, in order that 
 your disappointment might be the heaviest pos- 
 sible disappointment. That’s the first short 
 speech, do you understand ?” 
 
 Here John Harmon assisted his comprehen- 
 sion with another shake. 
 
 ‘*Now, scoundrel,” he pursued, ‘‘I am going 
 
 to finish. You supposed me just now to be the 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 But through any act of my father’s, or by any 
 
 right I have? No. 
 of Mr. Boffin. 
 with me, before parting with the secret of the 
 Dutch bottle, were, that I should take the for. 
 tune, and that he should take his Mound and no 
 more. I owe every thing I possess solely to the 
 disinterestedness, ‘uprightness, tenderness, good- 
 ness (there are no words to satisfy me) of Mr. 
 and Mrs. Boffin. 
 knew, I saw such a mud-worm as you presume 
 to rise in this house against this noble soul, the 
 wonder is,’ added John Harmon through his 
 clenched teeth, and with a very ugly turn in- 
 deed on Wegg’s cravat, ‘‘ that I didn’t try to 
 twist your head off, and fling that out of win- 
 dow! So. That’s the last short speech, do you 
 understand ?” 
 
 Silas, released, put his hand to his throat, 
 cleared it, and looked asif he had a rather large 
 fish bone in that region. Simultaneously with 
 this action on his part in his corner, a singular, 
 and on the surface an incomprehensible, move- 
 /ment was made by Mr. Sloppy: who began back- 
 ing toward Mr. Wegg along the wall, in the 
 -manner of a porter or heaver who is about to lift 
 a sack of flour or coals. 
 
 ‘¢T am sorry, Wegg,” said Mr. Boffin, in his 
 clemency, ‘‘ that my old lady and I can’t havea 
 ‘better opinion of yon than the bad one we are 
 forced to entertain. 
 leave you, after all said and done, worse off in 
 ‘life than I found you. Therefore say in a word, 
 
 Through the niuiificencel 
 
 another stall.’’ 
 
 *¢ And in another place,” John Harmon struck 
 in. ‘* You don’t come outside these windows.” 
 
 “Mr. Boffin,” returned Wegg. in avaricious 
 humiliation: “when I first had the honor of 
 making your acquaintance, I had got together a 
 collection of ballads which was, I may say, above 
 price.” 
 
 “Then they can’t be paid for,” said John 
 Harmon, ‘and you had better not try, my dear 
 Sir.” 
 
 ‘**Pardon me, Mr. Boffin,’ 
 with a malignant glance in the last speaker's di- 
 rection, ‘‘I was putting the case to you, who, if 
 my senses did not deceive me, put the case to 
 me. I had a very choice collection of ballads, 
 and there was a new stock of gingerbread in the 
 tin box. Isay no more, but would rather leave 
 it to you.” 
 
 “But it’s difficult to name what’s right,” said 
 Mr. Boffin uneasily, with his hand in his pocket, 
 
 ‘‘and I don’t want to go beyond what's right, 
 because you really have turned out such a very 
 bad customer. So artful, and so ungrateful you 
 have been, Wegg; for when did I ever injure 
 
 ou?” 
 
 ‘““There was also,” 
 meditative manner, ‘‘a errand connection, in 
 which I was much respected. But I would not 
 
 wish to be deemed covetuous, and I would rather — ‘ 
 
 leave it to you, Mr. Boffin.” 
 
 ‘*Upon my word, I don’t know what to put it 
 at,”’ the Golden Dustman muttered. 
 
 "There was likewise,” resumed Wegg, ‘a 
 pair of trestles, for which alone a Irish person, 
 who was deemed a judge of trestles, offered five 
 
 possessor of my father’s property.k—So I am. , have lost by it—and there was a stool, a um- 
 
 “The conditions that he made - 
 
 But I shouldn’t like to 
 
 before we part, what it’ll cost to set you up in 
 
 * resumed Weegg, ~ 
 
 Mr. Wegg went on, in a. 
 
 . 
 
 _ And when, knowing what I 
 
 D 
 
 & 
 
 kaey! 
 
 and six—a sum I would not hear of, for I should 
 
OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 341 
 brella, a clothes-horse, and a tray. But I leave | den, or the overweighted slave, can for certain 
 it to you, Mr. Boffin.” instants shift the physical load,'and find some 
 
 The Golden Dustman seeming to be engaged | slight respite even in enforcing additional pain 
 in some abstruse calculation, Mr. Wegg assisted | upon such a set of muscles or such a limb. 
 him with the following additional items. Not even that poor mockery of relief could the 
 
 ** There was, further, Miss Elizabeth, Master | wretched man obtain, under the steady pressure 
 George, Aunt Jane, and Uncle Parker. Ah! | of the infernal atmosphere into which he had 
 When a man thinks of the loss of such patron- | entered, | 
 age as that; when a man finds so fair a garden |, ‘lime.went by, and no visible suspicion dogged 
 rooted up by pigs; he finds it hard indeed, withy\ him ; time went by, and in such public accounts 
 out going high, to work it into money. But/I| of the attack as were renewed at intervals, he 
 leave it wholly to you, Sir.” began to see Mr. Lightwood (who acted as law- 
 
 Mr Sloppy still continued his singular, and | yer for the injured man) straying further from 
 on the surface his incomprehensible, movement. | the fact, going wider of the issue, and evidently 
 
 ‘¢ Leading on has been mentioned,” said Wegg, | slackening in his zeal. By degrees a glimmer- 
 with a melancholy air, ‘‘ and it’s not easy to say | ing of the cause of this began to break on Brad- 
 how far the tone of my mind may have been | ley’s sight. Then came the chance encounter 
 lowered by unwholesome reading on the subject | with Mr. Milvey at the railway station (where 
 of Misers, when you was leading me and others | he often lingered in his leisure hours, as a place 
 on to think you one yourself, Sir. All I can say | where any fresh news of his deed would be cir- 
 is, that I felt my tone of mind a lowering at the | culated, or any placard referring to it would be 
 time. And how can aman puta price upon his | posted), and then he saw in the light what he 
 mind! There was likewise a hat just now. But | had brought about. 
 
 I leave the ole to you, Mr. Boffin.” For then he saw that through his.desperate 
 ‘*Come!” said Mr. Boffin. ‘‘Here’sacouple | attempt to separate those two forever he had 
 of pound.” been made the means of uniting them. ‘That he 
 
 ‘¢In justice to myself, I couldn’t take it, Sir.” | had dipped his hands in blood to mark himself 
 
 The words were but out of his mouth when | a miserable fool and tool. That Eugene Wray- 
 John Harmon lifted his finger, and Sloppy, who | burn, for his wife’s sake, set him aside and left 
 was now close to Wegg, backed to Wegg’s back, |} him to crawl along his blasted course. He 
 stooped, grasped his coat collar behind with both | thought of Fate, or Providence, or be the di- 
 hands, and deftly swung him up like the sack | recting Power what it might, as having put a 
 of flour or coals before mentioned. A counte- | fraud upon him—overreached him—and in his 
 nance of special discontent and amazement Mr. | impotent mad rage bit, and tore, and had his fit. 
 Weegg exhibited in this position, with his but-| New assurance of the truth came upon him 
 tons almost as prominently on view as Sloppy’s | in the next few following days, when it was put 
 own, and with his wooden leg in a highly unac- | forth how the wounded man had been married 
 commodating state. But not for many seconds | on his bed, and to whom, and how, though al- 
 was his countenance visible in the room; for | ways in a dangerous condition, he was a shade 
 Sloppy lightly trotted out with him and trotted | better. Bradley would far rather have been 
 down the staircase, Mr. Venus attending to open | seized for his murder than he would have read 
 the street door. Mr. Sloppy’s instructions had | that passage, knowing himself spared, and know- 
 been to deposit his burden in the road; but a | ing why. 
 scavenger’s cart happening to stand unattended | . But, not to be still further defrauded and over- 
 at the corner, with its little ladder planted against | reached—which he would be if implicated by 
 the wheel, Mr. S. found it impossible to resist | Riderhood, and punished by the law for his ab- 
 ‘the temptation of shooting Mr. Silas Wegg into | ject failure, as though it had been a success— 
 the cart’s contents. A somewhat difficult feat, | he kept close in his school during the day, ven- 
 -achieved with great dexterity, and with a pro- | tured out warily at night, and went no more to 
 
 digious splash. the railway station. He examined the advertise- 
 a a ments in the newspapers for any sign that Rider- 
 
 hood acted on his hinted threat of so summon- 
 
 CHAPTER XV. ing him to renew their acquaintance, but found 
 
 none. Having paid him handsomely for the 
 eee oe oH IN THE TRAYS Te support and accommodation he had had at the 
 erent Lock House, and knowing him to be a very ig- 
 How Bradley Headstone had been racked and | norant man who could not write, he began to 
 riven in his mind since the quiet evening when | doubt whether he was to be feared at all, or 
 by the river-side he had risen, as it were, out | whether they need ever meet again. 
 of the ashes of the Bargeman, none but he could | All this time his mind was never off the rack, 
 have told. Not even he could have told, for|and his raging sense of having been made to 
 such misery can only be felt. fling himself across the chasm which divided 
 ’ First, he had to bear the combined weight of | those two, and bridge it over for their coming 
 the knowledge of what he had done, of that | together, never cooled down. This horrible con- 
 haunting reproach that he might have done it so | dition brought on other fits. He could not have 
 much better, and of the dread of discovery. This |said how many, or when; but he saw in the 
 was load enough to crush him, and he labored | faces of his pupils that they had seen him in 
 under it day and night. It was as heavy on him | that state, and that they were possessed by a 
 in his scanty sleep as in his red-eyed waking | dread of his relapsing. 
 hours. It bore him down with adread unchang-| One winter day, when a slight fall of snow was 
 ing monotony, in which there was not a mo-| feathering the sills and frames of the school- 
 ment’s variety. The overweighted beast of bur- | room windows, he stood at his blackboard, cray- 
 
242 
 
 on in hand, about to commence with a class; 
 when, reading in the countenances of those boys 
 that there was something wrong, and that they 
 seemed in alarm for him, he turned his eyes to 
 the door foward which they faeed. He then 
 saw a slouching man of forbidding appearance 
 standing in the midst of the school, with a bun- 
 die under his arm; and saw that it was Rider- 
 hood. 
 
 He sat down on a stool which one of his boys 
 put for him, and he had a passing knowledge 
 that he was in danger of falling, and that his 
 face was becoming distorted. But the fit went 
 off for that time, and he wiped his mouth, and 
 stood up again. 
 
 ‘Bee your pardon, governor! By your leave!” 
 said Riderhood, knuckling his forehead, with a 
 chuckle and a leer. ‘* What place may this 
 be ?” , 
 
 ‘This is a school.” 
 
 ‘¢ Where young folks learns wot’s right?” said 
 Riderhood, gravely nodding. ‘‘ Beg your par- 
 don, governor! By your leave! But who teach- 
 es this school ?” 
 
 vag as 
 
 ‘‘You’re the master, are you, learned gov- 
 ernor ?” 
 
 ‘Yes. Jam the master.” 
 
 *¢ And a lovely thing it must be,” said Rider- 
 hood, ‘‘fur to learn young folks wot’s right, and 
 fur to know wot they know wot you do it. Beg 
 your pardon, learned governor! By your leave! 
 That there blackboard; wot’s it for ?” 
 
 ‘Tt is for drawing on, or writing on.’ 
 
 *“Ts it though!” “said Riderhood. Who'd 
 have thought it, from the looks on it! Would 
 you be so kind as write your name upon it, 
 learned governor?” (In a wheedling tone.) 
 
 Bradley hesitated for a moment; but placed 
 his usual signature, enlarged, upon the board. 
 
 ‘*T ain’t a learned character myself,” said 
 Riderhood, surveying the class, ‘‘but I do ad- 
 mire learning in others. I should dear ly like to 
 hear these here young folks read that there name 
 off from the writing.” 
 
 The arms of the class went up. At the mis- 
 erable master’s nod the shrill chorus arose: 
 ‘* Bradley Headstone !” 
 
 ‘¢No?” cried Riderhood. ‘* You don’t mean 
 it? Headstone! Why, that’s in a church- 
 yard. Hooroar for another turn !”’ 
 
 Another tossing of arms, another nod, and 
 another shrill chorus: ‘‘ Bradley Headstone!” 
 
 ‘“‘T’ve got it now!” said Riderhood, after at- 
 tentively listening, and internally repeating: 
 ‘“‘Bradley. I see. Chris’en name, Bradley, 
 sim’lar to Roger, which is my own. Eh? 
 Fam’ly name, Headstone, sim’lar to Riderhood, 
 which is my own. Eh?” 
 
 - Shrill chorus. ‘‘ Yes!” 
 
 ‘*¢ Might you be acquainted, learned governor,” 
 said Riderhood, ‘‘ with a person of abont your 
 own heighth and breadth, and wot’ud pull down 
 in a scale about your own weight, answering to 
 a name sounding summat like Totherest ?” 
 
 With a desperation in him that made him 
 perfectly quiet, though his jaw was heavily 
 squared; with his eyes upon Riderhood; and 
 with traces of quickened breathing in his nos- 
 trils, the schoolmaster replied, in a suppressed 
 voice, after a pause: ‘I think I know the man 
 you mean,’ 
 
 i hal we 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 ‘‘T thought you knowed the man I mean), 
 learned governor. I want the man.” ' 
 
 With a half glance around him at his pupile’ me 
 
 Bradley returned : ‘‘ Do yousuppose he is here ?” 
 
 ‘‘ Begging your pardon, learned governor, and 
 by your leave,” said Riderhood, with a laugh, 
 ‘“how could I suppose he’s here, when there’s 
 nobody here but you, and me, and these young 
 lambs wot youre a learning on? But he i is 
 most excellent company, that man, and I want 
 him to come ‘and see me at my Lock, up the 
 river.’ 
 
 ‘‘T’l] tell him so.” 
 
 ‘¢D’ye think he’ll come?” asked Riderhood. 
 
 ‘*T am sure he will.” 
 
 “Having got your word for him,” said Riders 
 hood, ‘*I shall count upon him. 'p’ raps you’d 
 so fin obleege me, learned governor, as tell him 
 that if he don’t come precious soon I'll Jook him 
 u be sy 
 ‘* He shall know it.” 
 
 ‘“‘Thankee. As I says a while ago,” pursued 
 Riderhood, changing his hoarse tone and leering 
 round upon the class again, ‘‘ though not a learn- 
 
 ed character my own self, T do admire learning » 
 
 in others, to be sure! Being here and having 
 met with your kind attention, Master, might I, 
 afore I go, ask a question of these here young 
 lambs of yourn ?” 
 
 ‘¢Tf it is in the way of school,” said Bradley, 
 always sustaining his dark look at the other, and 
 speaking in his suppressed voice, ‘‘ you may.” 
 
 ce Oh ! 
 erhood. ‘‘Ill pound it, Master, to be in the 
 way of school. Wot’s the diwisions of water, 
 my lambs? Wot sorts of water is there on the 
 land ?” 
 
 Shrill chorus: ‘‘ Seas, rivers, lakes, and ponds.” 
 
 ‘¢ Seas, rivers, lakes, and ponds,” said Rider- 
 hood, ‘‘They’ve got all the lot, Master! Blowed 
 if I shouldn’t have left out lakes, never having 
 clapped eyes upon one, to my knowledge. Seas, 
 rivers, lakes, and ponds. 
 they catches in seas, rivers, lakes, and ponds?” 
 
 Shrill chorus (with some contempt for the ease 
 ofthe question): ‘‘ Fish !” 
 
 ‘Good agin!” said Riderhood. ‘But wot 
 else is it, my lambs, as they sometimes ketches 
 in rivers 2” 
 
 Chorus at aloss. One shrill voice: ‘* Weed ” 
 
 ‘* Good agin!” cried Riderhood. ‘ But it ain’t 
 weed neither. You'll never guess, my dears. 
 
 Wot is it, besides fish, as they sometimes ketch- — 
 
 es in rivers? Well! Ill tell you. 
 clothes.” 
 
 Bradley’s face changed. 
 
 ‘¢ Leastways, lambs,” said Riderhood, observ- 
 ing him out of the corners of his eyes, ‘‘ that’s 
 wot I my own self sometimes ketches in rivers. 
 For strike me blind, my lambs, if I didn’t keteh 
 in a river the wery bundle under my arm!” 
 
 The class looked at the master, as if appeal- 
 ing from the irregular entrapment of this mode 
 of examination. The master looked at the 
 examiner, as if he would have torn him to 
 pieces. 
 
 ‘‘T ask your pardon, learned ? Na ” said 
 Riderhood, smearing his sleeve across his mouth 
 as he laughed with a relish, ‘‘’tain’t fair to the 
 lambs, I know. It wos a bit of fun of mine. 
 But upon my soul I drawed this here bundle out 
 of a river! It’s a Bargeman’s suit of clothes. 
 
 It’s suits*0’ 
 
 It’s in the way of school!” cried Rid- 
 
 Wot is it, lambs, as — 
 
You see, it had been sunk there by the man as 
 
 - wore it, and I got it up.” 
 
 _ **How do you know it was sunk by the man 
 who wore it ?” asked Bradley. 
 
 “«’*Cause I see him do it,” said Riderhood. 
 
 They looked at each other. Bradley, slowly 
 withdrawing his eyes, turned his face to the 
 blackboard and slowly wiped his name out. 
 
 _ **A heap of thanks, Master,” said Riderhood, 
 “for bestowing so much of your time, and of the 
 lambses’ time, upon a man as hasn’t got no oth- 
 er recommendation to you than being a honest 
 man. Wishing to see.at my Lock up the river 
 the person as we’ve spoke of, and as you've an- 
 
 ~ swered for, I takes my*leave of the lambs and 
 
 of their learned governor both.” 
 
 With those words he slouched out of the 
 school, leaving the master to get through his 
 weary work as he might, and leaving the whis- 
 pering pupils to observe the master’s face until he 
 fell into the fit which had been long impending. 
 
 The next day but one was Saturday, and a 
 holiday. Bradley rose early, and set out on 
 foot for Plashwater Weir Mill Lock. He rose 
 so early that it was not yet light when he began 
 his journey. Before extinguishing the candle 
 by which he had dressed himself he made a lit- 
 tle parcel of his decent silver watch and its de- 
 cent guard, and wrote inside the paper: ‘‘ Kind- 
 ly take care of these for me.” He then addressed 
 
 _ the parcel to Miss Peecher, and left it on the most 
 
 protected corner of the little seat in her little 
 
 - porch. | 
 It was a cold hard easterly morning when he: 
 
 latched the garden gate and turned away. The 
 light snowfall which had feathered his school- 
 
 - room windows on the Thursday still lingered in 
 
 blew black. 
 
 the air, and was falling white, while the wind 
 The tardy day did' not appear un- 
 til he had been on foot two hours, and had trav- 
 ersed a great part of London from east to west. 
 Such breakfast as he had he took at the com- 
 fortless public house where he had parted from 
 Riderhood on the occasion of their night-walk. 
 He took it, standing at the littered bar, and 
 looked loweringly at. a man who stood where 
 
 _ Riderhood had stood that early morning. 
 
 when the night closed in. 
 
 He outwalked the short day, and was on the 
 towing-path by the river, somewhat foot-sore, 
 Still two or three 
 miles short of the Lock, he slackened his pace 
 then, but went steadily on. The ground was 
 now covered with snow, though thinly, and there 
 were floating lumps of ice in the more exposed 
 parts of the river, and broken sheets of ice un- 
 der the shelter of the banks. He took heed of 
 nothing but the ice, the snow, and the distance, 
 
 until he saw a light ahead, which he knew 
 
 _ had absolute possession of the dreary scene. 
 the distance before him, lay the place where he 
 _had struck the worse than useless blows that 
 
 gleamed from the Lock House window. It ar- 
 rested his steps, and he looked all around. The 
 ice, and the snow, and he, and the one light, 
 In 
 
 mocked him with Lizgie’s presence there as Eu- 
 gene’s wife. In the distance behind him, lay 
 the place where the children with pointing arms 
 had seemed to devote him to the demons in cry- 
 ing out hisname. Within there, where the light 
 was, was the man who as to both distances could 
 give him up to ruin. ‘To these limits had his 
 world shrunk. 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 b 343, 
 
 He mended his pace, keeping his eyes upon 
 the light with a strange intensity, as if he were 
 taking aim at it. When he approached it so 
 nearly as that it parted into rays, they seemed 
 to fasten themselves to him and draw him on. 
 When he struck the door with his hand, his foot 
 followed so quickly on his hand that he was in 
 the room before he was bidden to enter, 
 
 The light was the joint product of a fire anda 
 candle. Between the two, with his feet on the 
 iron fender, sat Riderhood, pipe in mouth. 
 
 He looked up with a surly nod when his visit- 
 orcamein. His visitor looked down with a surly 
 nod. His outer clothing removed, the visitor then 
 took a seat on the opposite side of the fire. 
 
 ‘*Not a smoker, I think?” said Ridcrhood, 
 pushing a bottle to him across the table. 
 
 RENO 9: 
 
 They both lapsed into silence with their eyes 
 upon the fire. 
 
 ‘¢You don’t need to be told I am here,” said 
 Bradley at length. ‘* Who is to begin ?” 
 
 ‘¢Tll begin,” said Riderhood, ‘‘when I’ve 
 smoked this here pipe out.” 
 
 He finished it with great deliberation, knocked 
 out the ashes on the hob, and put it by. 
 
 ‘‘Vll begin,” he then repeated, ‘‘ Bradley 
 Headstone, Master, if you wish it.” 
 
 ‘‘Wish it? I wish to know what you want 
 with me.” 
 
 ‘¢ And so you shall.” Riderhood had looked 
 hard at his hands and’ his pockets, apparently 
 as a precautionary measure lest he should have 
 any weapon about him. But he now leaned for- 
 ward, turning the collar of his waistcoat with an 
 inquisitive finger, and asked, ‘‘ Why, where’s 
 your watch ?” 
 
 **T have left it behind.” 
 
 ‘“‘T wantit. But it can be fetched. I’ve took 
 a fancy to it.” 
 
 ‘Bradley answered with a contemptuous laugh. 
 
 ‘*T want it,” repeated Riderhood, in a louder 
 voice, ‘and I mean to have it.” 
 
 ‘That is what you want of me, is it ?” 
 
 **No,’”’ said Riderhood, still louder; ‘‘it’s 
 on’y part of what I want of you. Iwant money 
 of you.” - 
 
 ‘Any thing else?” 
 
 ‘¢ Every think else!’? roared Riderhood, in a 
 very loud and furious way.  ‘‘ Answer me like 
 that and I won’t talk to you at all.” 
 
 Bradley looked at him. 
 
 ‘¢ Don’t so much as look at me like that or I 
 won’t talk to you at all,” vociferated Riderhood. 
 ‘‘But, instead of talking, Pll bring my hand 
 down upon you with all its weight,” heavily 
 smiting the table with great force, ‘‘and smash 
 rou!” 
 ve Go on,’ said Bradley, after moistening his 
 lips. 
 
 eo! I’m agoing on. Don’t you fear but Pl 
 go on full-fast enough for you, and fur enough 
 for you, without your telling. Look here, Brad- 
 ley Headstone, Master. You might have split 
 the T’other governor to chips and wedges, with- 
 out my caring, except that I might have come 
 upon you for a glass or so now and then. Else » 
 why have to do with you at all? But when you 
 copied my clothes, and when you copied my 
 neckhankercher, and when you shook blood 
 upon me after you had done the trick, you did 
 wot I’ll be paid for and paid heavy for. If it 
 
a: 
 
 344 
 
 come to be throw’d upon you, you was to be 
 ready to throw it upon me, was you? Where 
 else but in Plashwater Weir Mill Lock was 
 there a man dressed according as described ? 
 Where else but in Plashwater Weir Mill Lock 
 was there a man as had had words with him 
 coming through in his boat ? Look at the Lock- 
 keeper in Plashwater Weir Mill Lock, in them 
 same answering clothes and with that’same an- 
 swering red neckhankercher, and see whether his 
 clothes happens to be bloody or not. Yes, they 
 do happen to be bloody. Ah, you sly devil!” 
 
 _ Bradley, very white, sat looking at him in 
 silence. 
 
 ‘‘But two could play at your game,” said 
 Riderhood, snapping his fingers at him half a 
 dozen times, ‘‘and [ played it long ago; long 
 afore you tried your clumsy hand at it; in days 
 when you hadn’t begun croaking your lecters or 
 what not in your school. I know to a figure 
 how you done it. Where you stole away I 
 could steal away arter you, and do it knowinger 
 than you. I know how you come away from 
 London in your own clothes, and where you 
 changed your clothes and hid your clothes. 
 see you with my own eyes take your own clothes 
 from their hiding-place among them felled trees 
 and take a dip in the river to account for your 
 dressing yourself, to any one as might come by. 
 I see you rise up Bradley Headstone, Master, 
 where you sat down Bargeman. I see you 
 pitch your Bargeman’s bffndle into the river. I 
 hooked your Bargeman’s bundle out of the river. 
 
 ’ 
 
 L 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. — 
 
 I’ve got your Bargeman’s clothes, tore this way | 
 
 and that way with the scuffle, stained green with 
 the grass, and spattered all over with what bust 
 from the blows. I’ve got them, and I’ve got 
 you. I don’t care a curse for the ‘T’other gov- 
 ernor, alive or dead, but I care a many curses 
 for my own self. And as you laid your plots 
 agin me and was a sly devil agin me, I'll be 
 paid for it—I'll be paid for it—DIl be paid for it 
 —till I’ve drained you dry!” 
 
 Bradley looked at the fire with a working face 
 and was silent for awhile. At last he said, with 
 what seemed an inconsistent composure of voice 
 and feature : 
 
 ‘You can’t get blood out of a stone, Rider- 
 hood.” 
 
 “J can get money out of a schoolmaster 
 though.” 
 
 “You can’t get out of me what is not in me. 
 You can’t wrest from me what I have not got. 
 Mine is but a poor calling. You have had more 
 than two guineas from me already. Do you know 
 how long it has taken me (allowing for a long 
 and arduous training) to earn such a sum ?” 
 
 ‘¢T don’t know, nor I don’t care. Yours is a 
 ’spectable calling. ‘Tosave your ’spectability it’s 
 worth your while to pawn every article of clothes 
 you've got, sell every stick in your house, and 
 
 beg and borrow every penny you can get trusted 
 - with. When you’ve done that and handed over 
 T'll leave you. Not afore.” 
 
 ‘“¢ How do you mean, you'll leave me ?”’ 
 
 ‘‘T mean as I’ll keep you company, wherever 
 you go, when you go away from here. Let the 
 Lock take care of itself. ll take care of you, 
 once I’ve got you.” 
 
 Bradley again looked at the fire.. Eying him 
 aside, Riderhood took up his pipe, refilled it, 
 lighted it, and sat smoking. Bradley leaned 
 his elbows on his knees, and his head upon his 
 
 Any 
 
 hands, and looked at the fire with a most intent 
 
 -abstraction. F 
 
 ‘‘Riderhood,” he said, raising himself in his — 
 
 chair, after a long silence, and drawing out his 
 purse and putting it on the table. ) 
 with this, which is all the money I have; say I~ 
 let you have my watch; say that every quarter, 
 when I draw my salary, I pay you a certain por- 
 tion of it.” . eit 
 ‘‘Say nothing of the sort,” retorted Riders 
 hood, shaking his head ashe smoked. ‘“ You've 
 got away once, and I won’t run the chance agin. 
 I've had trouble enough to find you, and shouldn’t 
 have found you, if I hadn’t seen you slipping 
 along the street overnight, and watched you till 
 you was safe housed. I'll have one settlement 
 with you for good and all.” 
 ‘¢ Riderhood, I am a man who has lived a se- 
 cluded life. I have no resources beyond myself. 
 I have absolutely no friends.” i; 
 ‘‘That’s a lie,” said Riderhood.  ‘‘ You’ve 
 got one friend as I knows of; one as is good for 
 a Savings Bank book, or I’m a blue monkey!” 
 Bradley’s face darkened, and his hand slowly 
 closed on the purse and drew it back, as he sat 
 listening for what the other should go on to say. 
 ‘‘T went into the wrong shop, fust, last'Thurs- 
 day,” said Riderhood. ‘‘ Found myself among 
 the young ladies, by George! Over the young. 
 ladies, I see a Missis. That Missis is sweet 
 enough upon you, Master, to sell herself up, slap, 
 to get you out of trouble. Make her doit then.” 
 Bradley stared at him so very suddenly that 
 Riderhood not quite knowing how to take it, af- 
 
 | fected to be occupied with the encircling smoke 
 
 from his pipe; fanning it away with his hand, 
 and blowing it off. 
 
 ‘“You spoke to the mistress, did you?” in- 
 quired Bradley, with that former composure of 
 voice and featuré that seemed inconsistent, and — 
 with averted eyes. 
 
 ‘¢ Poof! Yes,” said Riderhood, 
 attention from the smoke. I spoke to her. 
 
 I 
 
 frawing his _ 
 
 ‘* Say I part’ s 
 
 ~ 
 ‘“-* 
 
 fe j 
 
 ae 
 ® 
 
 me 
 
 Ag 
 a 
 
 ee 
 
 7 
 J 
 
 ¥ 
 ss 
 
 a 
 P 
 
 _ 
 
 . 
 
 ‘ 
 
 didn’t say much to her. She was put in a fluster ~ 
 
 by my dropping in among the young ladies (I 
 never did set up for a lady’s man), and she took — 
 me into her parlor to hope as there was nothing 
 wrong. I tells her, ‘O no, nothing wrong. 
 The master’s my wery good friend. But I see 
 
 is 
 
 ay 
 
 5 
 ¥ 
 
 t 
 
 how the land laid, and that she was comfortable _ 
 
 off.” 
 Bradley put the purse in his pocket, grasped — 
 
 a 
 v 
 
 his left wrist with his right hand, and sat rigid- ~ 
 
 ly contemplating the fire. . 
 ‘¢She couldn’t live more handy to you than ~ 
 
 she does,” said Riderhood, ‘¢and when I goes ~ 
 
 home with you (as of course I am agoing), I 
 
 recommend you to clean her out without loss of ~ 
 
 time. You can marry her arter you and me 
 have come to a settlement. She’s nice-looking, — 
 and I know you can’t be keeping company with 
 
 no one else, havirig been so lately disapinted in ~ 
 
 another quarter.” } Con 
 Not one other word did Bradley utter all that” 
 
 night. Not once did he change his attitude, or — 
 Rigid before — 
 
 loosen his hold upon his wrist. 
 
 the fire, as if it were a charmed flame that was — 
 
 turning him old, he sat, with the dark lines 
 deepening in his face, its stare becoming more — 
 
 and more haggard, its surface turning whiter _ 
 , 
 
 P 
 
 and whiter as if it were being overspread with 
 ashes, and the very texture and color of his hair. 
 degenerating. 
 
 e 
 
 ; 
 
Ji0 NONVHS FM OL TION 
 
 a AOE 
 
 ain 
 
 Trees 
 eee 
 
 ———_——s 
 
 — Sa 
 an 
 
 aS 
 
 ae 
 
 = eee 
 
 Sa 
 
 f 
 
 if 
 
 # 
 ia) 
 
 on ty 
 
 f] 
 
 SS 
 
 345 
 
346 
 
 Not until the late daylight made the window 
 transparent did this decaying statue move. Then 
 it slowly arose, and sat in the window, looking 
 out. 
 
 Riderhood had kept his chair all night. In 
 the earlier part of the night he had muttered 
 twice or thrice that it was bitter cold; or that 
 the fire burned fast, when he got upto mend it; 
 but as he could elicit from his companion nei- 
 ther sound nor movement, he had afterward held 
 his peace. He was making some disorderly 
 preparations for coffee, when Bradley came 
 
 from the window and put on his outer coat and 
 
 hat. 
 
 ‘* Hadn’t us better have a bit o’ breakfast afore 
 we start?” said Riderhood. ‘It ain’t good to 
 freeze a empty stomach, Master.” 
 
 Without a sign to show that he heard, Brad- 
 ley walked out of the Lock House. Catching 
 up from the table a piece of bread, and taking 
 his Bargeman’s bundle under his arm, Rider- 
 hood immediately followed him. Bradley turned 
 toward London. Riderhood caught him up, and 
 walked at his side. 
 
 The two men trudged on, side by side, in si- 
 lence, full three miles. Suddenly, Bradley turn- 
 ed to retrace his course. Instantly, Riderhood 
 turned likewise, and they went back side by 
 side. 
 
 Bradley re-entered the Lock House. So did 
 Riderhood. Bradley sat down in the window. 
 Riderhood warmed himself at the fire. After an 
 hour or more, Bradley abruptly got up again, 
 and again went out, but this time turned the 
 other*way. Riderhood was close after him, 
 caught him up in a few paces, and walked at 
 his side. 
 
 This time, as before, when he found his at- 
 tendant not to be shaken off, Bradley suddenly 
 turned back. This time, as before, Riderhood 
 turned back along with him. But not this time, 
 as before, did they go into the Lock House, for 
 Bradley came to a stand on the snow-covered 
 turf by the Lock, looking up the river and down 
 the river. Navigation was impeded by the frost, 
 and the scene was a mere white and yellow des- 
 ert. 
 
 <¢ Come, come, Master,” urged Riderhood, at 
 his side. ‘‘* This is a dry game. And where's 
 the good of it? You can’t get rid of me, ex- 
 cept by coming to a settlement. I am agoing 
 along with you wherever you go.” 
 
 Without a word of reply, Bradley passed quick- 
 ly from him over the wooden bridge on the lock 
 gates. ‘* Why, there’s even less sense in this 
 move than t’other,’’ said Riderhood, following. 
 ‘The Weir’s there, and you'll have to come 
 back, you know.” 
 
 Without taking the least notice, Bradley leaned 
 his body against a post, in a resting attitude, and 
 there rested with his eyes cast down. — ** Being 
 brought here,” said Riderhood, gruffly, ‘ PI turn 
 it to some use by changing my gates.” With a 
 rattle and a rush of water he then swung-to the 
 lock gates that were standing open, before open- 
 ing the others. So, both sets of gates were, for 
 the moment, closed. ~ 
 
 “You'd better by far be reasonable, Bradlev 
 Headstone, Master,” said Riderhood, ‘‘or I'll 
 drain you all the dryer for it, when we do set- 
 tle. —Ah!. Would you!” é 
 
 Bradley had canght him round the body. 
 seemed to be girdled with an iron ring. 
 
 He 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 were on the brink of the Lock, about midway 
 
 between the two sets of gates. 
 
 “Tet go!” said Riderhood, ‘for Pll get my ‘ 
 
 knife out and slash you wherever I can cut you. — 
 
 Let go!” ; 
 
 Bradley was drawing to the Lock-edge. 
 erhood was drawing away from it. It was a 
 
 strong grapple, and a fierce struggle, arm and . 
 
 leg. Bradley got him round, with his back to 
 the Lock, and’still worked him backward. i 
 
 “‘Let go!’ said Riderhood. ‘‘Stop! 
 are you trying at? You can’t drown Me. Ain't 
 I told you that the man as has come through 
 drowning can never be drowned? I.can’t be 
 drowned.” . 
 
 “TI can be!” returned Bradley, in a despe- 
 rate, clenched voice. ‘‘I am resolved to be. 
 I'll hold you living, and I’ll hold you dead. Come 
 down!” 
 
 Riderhood went over into the smooth pit, back- 
 ward, and Bradley Headstone upon him. When 
 the two were found, lying under the ooze and 
 scum behind one of the rotting gates, Riderhood’s 
 hold had relaxed, .probably in falling, and his 
 eyes were staring upward. But he was girdled 
 still with Bradley’s iron ring, and the rivets of 
 the iron ring held tight. 
 
 eS 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 PERSONS AND THINGS IN GENERAL, 
 
 Mr. and Mrs. John Harmon’s first delightfal 
 occupation was, to set all matters right that had 
 strayed in any way wrong, or that might, could, 
 would, or should, have strayed in any way wrong, 
 while their name was in abeyance. In tracing 
 out affairs for which John’s fictitious death was 
 to be considered in any way responsible, they 
 used a very broad and free construction ; regard- 
 ing, for instance, the dolls’ dress-maker as hav- 
 ing a claim on their protection, because of her 
 association with Mrs. Eugene Wrayburn, and be- 
 cause of Mrs. Eugene’s old association, in her 
 turn, with the dark side of the story. It followed 
 that the old man, Riah, as a good and servicea- 
 ble friend to both, was not to be disclaimed. Nor 
 even Mr. Inspector, as having been trepanned 
 into an industrious hunt on a false scent. It may 
 be remarked, in connection with that worthy of- 
 ficer, that a rumor shortly afterward pervaded 
 the Force, to the effect that he had. confided to 
 Miss Abbey Potterson, over a jug of mellow flip 
 in the bar of the Six Jolly Fellowship Porters, 
 that he ‘didn’t stand to lose a farthing” through 
 Mr. Harmon’s coming to life, but was quite as 
 
 well satisfied as if that gentleman had been bar-_ 
 barously murdered, and he (Mr. Inspector) had ~ 
 
 pocketed the government reward. 
 
 In all their arrangements of such nature, Mr. + 
 
 and Mrs. John Harmon derived much assistance 
 from their eminent solicitor, Mr. Mortimer Light- 
 wood; who laid about him professionally with 
 such unwonted dispatch and intention, that a 
 piece of work was vigorously pursucd as soon as 
 cut out; whereby Young Blight was acted on as 
 by that transatlantic dram which is poetically 
 
 ‘named An Eye-Opener, and found himself star- 
 
 ing at real clients instead of out of window. The 
 accessibility of Riah proving very useful as to # 
 
 few hints toward the disentanglement of Eugene’s 
 They | affairs, Lightwood applied himself with infinit® — 
 
 Ride 4 
 
 What 
 
 } 
 
_ zest to attacking and harassing Mr. Fledgeby: 
 who, discovering himself in danger of being 
 blown into the air by certain explosive transac- 
 tions in which he had been engaged, and having 
 been already flayed under his beating, came to 
 a parley and asked for quarter. ‘The harmless 
 Twemlow profited by the conditions entered into, 
 though he littlethought it. Mr. Riah unaccount- 
 ‘ably melted; waited in person on him over the 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 847 
 
 | ‘*Go it!” cried Mr, Sampson, becoming, on 
 the shortest notice, a prey to despair. ‘Oh yes! 
 Go-it, Miss Lavinia Wilfer !” 
 
 ‘What you may mean, George Sampson, by 
 your omnibus-driving expressions, I can not pre- 
 tend to imagine. Neither,” said Miss Lavinia, 
 ‘““Mr. George Sampson, do I wish to imagine. 
 It is enough for me to know in my own heart 
 that Iam not going to—” having imprudently 
 
 stable-yard in Duke Street, St. James’s, no lom=-got into a sentence without préviding a way out 
 
 ger ravening but mild, to inform him that pay- 
 ment of interest as heretofore, but henceforth at 
 ‘Mr. Lightwood’s offices, would appease his Jew- 
 ish rancor; and departed with the secret that 
 Mr. John Harmon had advanced the money and 
 ‘become the creditor. Thus was the sublime 
 Snigsworth’s wrath averted, and thus did he 
 snort no larger amount of moral grandeur at 
 the Corinthian column in the print over the fire- 
 place, than was normally in his (and the British) 
 constitution. 
 
 Mrs. Wilfer’s first visit :to the Mendicant’s 
 bride at the new abode of Mendicancy, was a 
 grand event. Pa had been sent for into the City, 
 on the very day of taking possession, and had 
 been stunned with astonishment, and brought-to, 
 and led about the house by one ear, to behold 
 its various treasures, and. had been enraptured 
 and enchanted. Pa had also been appointed 
 Secretary, and had been enjoined to give instant 
 notice of res’gnation to Chicksey, Veneering, 
 and Stobbles, for ever and ever. But Ma came 
 later, and came, as was her due, in state. 
 
 The carriage was sent for Ma, who entered it 
 with a bearing worthy of the occasion, accom- 
 panied, rather than supported, by Miss Lavinia, 
 who altogether declined to recognize the mater- 
 nal majesty. Mr. George Sampson meekly fol- 
 lowed. He was received in the vehicle, by Mrs. 
 Wilier, as if admitted to the honor of assisting at 
 _ a funeral in the family, and she then issued the 
 order, ** Onward!” to the Mendicant’s menial. 
 
 ‘¢T wish to goodness, Ma,” said Lavvy, throw- 
 ing herself back among the cushions, with her 
 arms crossed, ‘‘that you'd loll a little.” 
 
 ‘¢How!” fepeated Mrs. Wilfer. ‘‘ Loll!” 
 
 ‘6 Yes, Ma.” 
 
 ‘*T hope,” said the impressive lady, ‘‘I am 
 incapable of it.” 
 
 ‘¢T am sure you look so, Ma. 
 
 should go out to dine with one’s own* daughter | daughter. 
 
 of it, Miss Lavinia was constrained to close with 
 ‘*going to go it.” A weak conclusion, which, 
 however, derived some appearance of strength 
 from disdain. 
 
 ““Oh yes!” cried Mr. Sampson, with bitter- 
 ness. ‘Thus it everis. I never—” 
 
 ‘*If you mean to say,” Miss Lavvy cut him 
 short, ‘‘that you never brought up a young ga- 
 zelle, you may save yourself the trouble, because 
 
 did. We know you better.” 
 home-thrust. ) 
 
 ‘¢ Lavinia,” returned Mr. Sampson, in a dis- 
 mal vein, ‘‘I did not mean to say so. What I 
 did mean to say was, that I never expected to 
 retain my favored place in this family after For- 
 tune shed her beams upon it. Why do you take 
 | me,” said Mr, Sampson, ‘‘ to the glittering halls 
 with which I can never compete, and then taunt 
 me with my moderate salary? Is it generous? 
 Is it kind ?” 5 
 
 The stately lady, Mrs. Wilfer, perceiving he 
 opportunity of delivering a few remarks from the 
 throne, here took up the altercation. 
 
 ‘‘Mr. Sampson,” she began, ‘‘I can not per- 
 mit you to misrepresent the intentions of a child 
 of mine.” 
 
 ‘¢ Let him alone, Ma,” Miss Lavvy interposed 
 with haughtiness. ‘‘It is indifferent to me what 
 he says or does.” | 
 
 ‘*Nay, Lavinia,” quoth Mrs, Wilfer, ‘‘ this 
 touches the blood of the family. If Mr. George 
 Sampson attributes, even to my youngest daugh- 
 ter—” 
 
 (‘*I don’t see why you should use the word 
 ‘even,’ Ma,” Miss Lavvy interposed, ‘‘ because 
 I am quite as important. as any of the others.”) 
 
 ‘¢ Peace!” said Mrs. Wilfer, solemnly. ‘I 
 repeat, If Mr. George Sampson attributes to my 
 youngest daughter groveling motives, he attrib- 
 
 (As if this were a 
 
 But why one | utes them equally to the mother of my youngest 
 
 That mother repudiates them, and 
 
 or sister, as if one’s under-petticoat was a back- | demands of Mr. George Sampson, as a youth of 
 
 board, I do noé understand.” 
 ‘¢Neither do I understand,” retorted Mrs. 
 
 honor, what he wowld have? I may be mistaken 
 —nothing is more likely—but Mr. George Samp- 
 
 Wilfer, with deep scorn, ‘‘how a young lady | son,” proceeded Mrs. Wilfer, majestically wav- 
 can mention the garment in the name of which | ing her gloves, ‘‘ appears to me to be seated in a 
 
 you have indulged. 
 
 I blush for you.” 
 
 first-class equipage. Mr. George Sampson ap- 
 
 “Thank you, Ma,” said Lavvy, yawning, | pears to me to be on his way, by his own admis- 
 ‘but I can do it for myself, I am obliged to | sion, to a residence that may be termed Palatial. 
 
 - you, when there’s any occasion.” 
 
 Mr. George Sampson appears to me to be invited 
 
 Here Mr. Sampson, with the view of estab- | to participate in the—shall I say the—Elevation 
 lishing harmony, which he never under any cir- | which has descended on the family with which 
 
 cumstances succeeded in doing, said, with an 
 agreeable smile: “ After all, you know, ma’am, 
 we know it’s there.” And:immediately felt that 
 he had committed himself. 
 
 “©We know it’s there!” said Mrs. Wilfer, 
 glaring. . 
 
 ‘** Really, George,” remonstrated Miss La- 
 vinia, ‘‘ I must say that I don’t understand your 
 allusions, and that I think you might be more 
 delicate and less personal.” 
 
 he is ambitious, shall I say to Mingle? Whence, 
 then, this tone on Mr. Sampson’s part ?” 
 
 ‘Tt is only, ma’am,” Mr. Sampson explained, 
 in exceedingly low spirits, ‘‘ because, in a pecu- 
 niary sense, I am painfully conscious of my un- 
 worthiness, Lavinia is now highly connected. 
 Can I hope that she will still remain the same 
 Lavinia as of old? And is it not pardonable if 
 I feel sensitive when I see a disposition on her 
 | part to take me up short?” 
 
 nobody in this carriage’ supposes that you ever ° 
 
348 
 
 ‘““If you are not satisfied with your position, 
 Sir,” observed Miss Lavinia, with much polite- 
 ness, ‘‘we can set you down at any turning you 
 may please to indicate to my sister's coachman.” 
 
 ‘‘Pearest Lavinia,” urged Mr. Sampson, pa- 
 thetically, ‘‘I adore you.” 
 
 ‘‘Then if you can’t do it in a more agreeable 
 manner,” returned the young lady, ‘‘ I wish you 
 wouldn’t.” 
 
 ‘‘T also,” pursued Mr. Sampson, ‘‘respect 
 you, ma’am, to an extent which must ever be 
 below your merits, I am well aware, but still up 
 to an uncommon mark. Bear with a wretch, 
 Lavinia, bear with a wretch, ma’am, who feels 
 the noble sacrifices you make for him, but is 
 goaded almost to madness,” Mr. Sampson slapped 
 his forehead, ‘‘ when he thinks of competing with 
 the rich and influential.” 
 
 ‘When you have to compete with the rich 
 and influential it will probably be mentioned to 
 you,” said Miss Lavvy, “‘in good time. At 
 least it will if the case is my case.” 
 
 Mr. Sampson immediately expressed his fer- 
 vent opinion that this was ‘‘ more than human,” 
 and was brought upon his knees at ‘Miss La- 
 vinia’s feet. 
 
 It was the crowning addition indispensable to 
 the full enjoyment of both mother and daughter, 
 to bear Mr. Sampson, a grateful captive, into 
 the glittering halls he had mentioned, and to 
 parade him through the same, at once a living 
 witness of their glory, and a bright instance of 
 their condescension. Ascending the staircase, 
 Miss Lavinia permitted him to walk at her side, 
 with the air of saying: ‘‘ Notwithstanding all 
 these surroundings, I am yours as yet, George. 
 How long it may last is another question, but I 
 am yours as yet.” She also benignantly inti- 
 mated to him, aloud, the nature of the objects 
 upon which he looked, and to which he was un- 
 accustomed: as, ‘‘ Exotics, George,” ‘‘ An avi- 
 ary, George,” ‘‘ An ormolu clock, George,” and 
 the like. While, through the whole of the dec- 
 orations, Mrs. Wilfer led the way with the bear- 
 ing of a Savage Chief, who would feel himself 
 compromised by manifesting the slightest token 
 of surprise or admiration. 
 
 Indeed, the bearing of this impressive woman 
 throughout the day was a pattern to all impress- 
 ive women under similar circumstances. She 
 renewed the acquaintance of Mr. and Mrs. Bof- 
 fin, as if Mr. and Mrs. Boffin had said of her 
 what she had said of them, and as if Time alone 
 could quite wear her injury out. She regarded 
 every servant who approached her as her sworn 
 ‘enemy, expressly intending to offer her affronts 
 with the dishes, and to pour forth outrages. on 
 her moral feelings from the decanters. She sat 
 erect at table, on the right hand of her son-in- 
 law, as half suspecting poison in the viands, and 
 as bearing up with native force of character 
 against other deadly ambushes. Her carriage 
 toward Bella was as a carriage toward a young 
 lady of good position whom she had met in so- 
 ciety a few years ago. Even when, slightly 
 thawing under the influence of sparkling Cham- 
 pagne, she related to her son-in-law some pas- 
 sages of domestic interest concerning her papa, 
 she infused into the narrative such Arctic sug- 
 gestions of her having been an unappreciated 
 blessing to mankind, since her papa’s days, and 
 
 also of that gentleman’s having been a frosty im- 
 
 personation of a frosty race, as struck cold to 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. iy i 
 
 the stomachs of the hearers. The Inexhaustible 
 being produced, staring, and evidently intending ~ 
 a weak and washy smile shortly, no sooner be- 
 held her than it was stricken spasmodic and in- — 
 When she took her leave at last, it — 
 would have been hard to say whether it was with 
 the air of going to the scaffold herself, or of 
 leaving the inmates of the house for immediate 
 execution. 
 merrily, and told his wife, when he and she were 
 alone, that her natural ways had never seemed P 
 so dearly natural as beside this foil, and that 
 although he did not dispute her being her father’s 
 
 consolable. 
 
 ” 
 
 Yet John Harmon enjoyed it all 
 
 daughter, he should ever remain steadfast in the 
 
 faith that she could not be her mother’s. © 
 
 This visit was, as has been said, a grand event. 
 
 Another event, not grand, but deemed in the 
 
 house a special one, occurred at about the same 
 period; and this was the first interview between 
 Mr. Sloppy and Miss Wren. 
 
 The dolls’ dress-maker, being at work for the 
 Tnexhaustible upon.a full-dressed doll some two 
 sizes larger than that young person, Mr, Sloppy 
 undertook to call for it, and did so. 
 
 ‘‘Come in, Sir,” said Miss Wren, who was 
 working at her bench. ‘‘ And who may you be?” 
 
 Mr. Sloppy introduced himself by name and 
 
 buttons. 
 ‘Oh, indeed!” cried Jenny. ‘‘Ah! I have 
 
 been looking forward to knowing you. I heard 
 of your distinguishing yourself.” . 
 ‘“‘Did you, Miss?” grinned Sloppy. ‘‘T am 
 
 sure I am glad to hear it, but I don’t know how.” 
 
 ‘‘Pitching somebody into a mud-cart,” said 
 Miss Wren. ; 
 
 “Qh! That way!” cried Sloppy. 
 Miss.” And threw back his head and laughed. 
 
 ‘Bless us!” exclaimed Miss Wren, with a 
 start. ‘*Don’t open your mouth as wide as 
 that, young man, or it'll catch so, and not shut 
 again some day.” 
 
 Mr. Sloppy opened it, if possible, wider, and 
 kept it open until his laugh was out. 
 
 ‘“Why, you're like the giant,” said Miss 
 Wren, ‘“‘when he came home in the land of 
 Beanstalk, and wanted Jack for sypper.” 
 
 “Was he good-looking, Miss ?” asked Sloppy. 
 
 ‘¢No,” said Miss Wren, ‘‘ Ugly.” 
 
 Her visitor glanced round the room—which 
 had many comforts in it now that had not been 
 in it before—and said: ‘‘ This is a pretty place, 
 Miss.” | 
 
 ‘Glad you think so, Sir,” returned Miss 
 Wren. © ‘* And what do you think of Me?” 
 
 The honesty of Mr. Sloppy being severely 
 
 taxed by the question, he twisted a button, 
 
 grinned, and faltered. 
 
 ‘¢Qut with it!” said Miss Wren, with an arch 
 look. ‘‘Don’t you think me a queer little com- 
 icality ?” 
 asking the question, she shook her hair down. 
 
 “Oh!” cried Sloppy, in a burst of admira- 
 tion. ‘*Whata lot, and what a color!” 
 
 Miss Wren, with her usual expressive hitch, © 
 
 went on with her work. But left her hair as it 
 
 was; not displeased by the effect it had made. 
 ‘You don’t live here alone, do you, Miss?” 
 
 asked Sloppy. 
 
 - No,” said Miss Wren, with a chop. 
 
 here with my fairy godmother.” | 
 “With—” Mr. Sloppy couldn’t make it out; 
 
 ‘¢with who did you say, Miss?” 
 
 Veg.” 
 
 In shaking her head at him, afier ~ 
 
 *¢ Live ‘ i 
 
 -_—L- 
 
Well!” replied Miss Wren, more seriously, 
 “With my second father. Or with my first, for 
 that matter.” And she shook her head and 
 drew asigh. “If you had known a poor child 
 I used to have here,” she added, ‘you'd have 
 understood me. But you didn’t, and you can't. 
 All the better!” 
 
 ‘“‘You must have been taught a long time,” 
 
 said Sloppy, glancing at the array of dolls in| ‘* What a question !” cried Miss Wren. 
 
 hand, ‘* before you came to work so neatly, Miss, 
 and with such a pretty taste.” 
 
 *“‘Never was taught a stitch, young man!” 
 returned the dress-maker, tossing her head. 
 “* Just gobbled and gobbled, till I found out how 
 to doit. Badly enough at first, but better now.” 
 
 “‘And here have I,” said Sloppy, in some- 
 thing of a self-reproachful tone, ‘‘ been a learn- 
 ing and a learning, and here has Mr. Boffin 
 been a paying and a paying, ever so long!” 
 
 ‘‘T have heard what your trade is,” observed 
 Miss Wren ; “it’s cabinet-making.” 
 
 Mr. Sleppy nodded. ‘‘ Now that the Mounds 
 is done with, it is. I'll tell you what, Miss. I 
 should like to make you something.” 
 
 **Much obliged. But what?” 
 
 “I could make you,” said Sloppy, surveying 
 the room, ‘‘I could make you a handy set of 
 nests to lay the dolls in. Or I could make you 
 a handy little set of drawers to keep your silks, 
 and threads, and scraps in. Or I could turn 
 you a rare handle for that crutch-stick, if it be- 
 longs to him you call your father.” 
 
 “It belongs to me,”’ returned the little creat- 
 ure, with a quick flush of her face and neck. 
 **T am lame.” 
 
 Poor Sloppy flushed too, for there was an in- 
 Stinctive delicacy behind his buttons, and his 
 own hand had struck it. He said, perhaps, the 
 best thing in the way of amends that could be 
 said, ‘‘f am very glad it’s yours, because I’d 
 rather ornament it for you than for any one 
 else. Please may I look at it ?” 
 
 Miss Wren was in the act of handing it to 
 him over her bench when she paused. ‘But 
 
 you had better see me use it,” she said, sharply. 
 “This is the way. Hoppetty, Kicketty, Pep- 
 peg-peg. Not pretty; is it?” 
 
 “It seems to me that you hardly want it at 
 all,” said Sloppy. 
 
 The little dressmaker sat down again, and 
 gave it into his hand, saying, with that better 
 look upon her, and with a smile: ‘Thank 
 you!” 
 
 ‘* And as concerning the nests and the draw- 
 ers,” said Sloppy, after measuring the handle on 
 his sleeve, and softly standing the stick aside 
 against the wall, ‘‘ why, it would be a real pleas- 
 ure to me. I’ve heerd tell that you can sing 
 most beautiful; and I should be better paid 
 with a song than with any money; for I always 
 loved the likes of that, and often giv’ Mrs. Hig- 
 den and Johnny a comic song myself, with 
 ‘Spoken’ in it. Though that’s not your sort, 
 I'll wager.” 
 
 ‘*You are a very kind young man,” returned 
 the dress-maker; ‘‘a really kind young man. 
 I accept your offer.—I suppose He won’t mind,” 
 ‘she added as an after-thought, shrugging her 
 _ shoulders; ‘‘and if he does he may !” 
 
 ___“* Meaning him that you call your father, 
 Miss ?” asked Sloppy. 
 
 ‘* No, no,” replied Miss Wren. ‘‘ Him, Him, 
 
 Him !” . 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 349 
 
 “‘Him, him, him?” repeated Sloppy, staring 
 about, as if for Him. 
 
 ‘‘Him who is coming to court and marry 
 me,” returned Miss Wren. ‘Dear me, how 
 slow you are!” 
 
 ‘Oh! Hin!” said Sloppy. And seemed to 
 turn thoughtful and a little troubled; ‘*I never 
 thought of him. When is he coming, Miss ?” 
 
 “* How 
 should Z know !” 
 _ “Where is he coming from, Miss?” 
 
 ‘* Why, good gracious, how can J tell! He 
 is coming from somewhere or other, I suppose, 
 and he is coming some day or other, I suppose. 
 £ don’t know any more about him at present.” 
 
 This tickled Mr. Sloppy as an extraordinarily 
 | good joke, and he threw back his head and 
 laughed with measureless enjoyment. At the 
 sight of him laughing in that absurd way the 
 doll? dress-maker laughed very heartily indeed. 
 So they both laughed till they were tired. 
 
 ‘* There, there, there!” said Miss Wren. 
 ‘*For goodness’ sake stop, Giant, or I shall be 
 swallowed up alive before I know it. And to 
 this minute you haven’t said what you’ve come 
 for.” 
 
 “I have come for little Miss Harmonses doll,” 
 said Sloppy. 
 ~**T thought as much,” remarked Miss Wren, 
 ‘‘and here is little Miss Harmonses doll wait- 
 ing for you. She’s folded up in silver paper, 
 you see, as if she was wrapped from head to foot 
 in new Bank-notes. Take care of her, and 
 there’s my hand, and thank you again.” 
 
 ‘‘PIl take more care of her than if she was a 
 gold image,” said Sloppy, ‘‘and there's. both my 
 hands, Miss, and I'll soon come back again. ’ 
 
 But the greatest’ event of all, in the new life 
 of Mr-and Mrs. John Harmon, was a visit from 
 Mr,.and Mrs, Eugene Wrayburn. Sadly wan 
 and worn was the once gallant Eugene, and 
 walked resting on his wife’s arm, and leaning 
 heavily upon a stick. But he was daily grow- 
 ing stronger and better, and it was declared by 
 the medical attendants that he might not be 
 much disfigured by-and-by. It was a grand 
 event, indeed, when Mr. and Mrs. Eugene Wray- 
 burn came to stay at Mr. and Mrs. John Har- 
 mon’s house: where, by-the-way, Mr. and Mrs. 
 Boffin (exquisitely happy, and daily cruising 
 about to look at shops) were likewise staying 
 indefinitely. 
 
 To Mr. Eugene Wrayburn, in confidence, did 
 Mrs. John Harmon impart what she had known 
 of the state of his wife’s affections, in his reck- 
 less time. And to Mrs. John Harmon, in con- 
 fidence, did Mr. Eugene Wrayburn impart that, 
 please God, she should see how his wife had 
 changed him! 
 
 ‘‘T make no protestations,” said Eugene; 
 ‘¢who does, who means them!—I have made 
 a resolution.” 
 
 ‘*But would you believe, Bella,”’ interposed 
 his wife, coming to resume her nurse’s place at 
 his side, for he never got on well without her: 
 ‘‘ that on our wedding-day he told me he almost 
 thought the best thing he could do was to die ?” 
 
 ** As I didn’t do it, Lizzie,’ said Eugene, *‘ Vl 
 do that better thing you suggested—for your 
 sake.” t 
 
 That same afternoon, Eugene lying on his 
 couch in his own room up stairs, Lightwood 
 
850 
 
 came to chat with him, while Bella took his | if I were ashamed of her! 
 
 wife out for a ride. 
 will make her go,” Eugene had said; so, Bella 
 had playfully forced her. 
 
 ‘‘ Dear old fellow,” Eugene began with Light- 
 wood, reaching up his hand, *‘you couldn’t have 
 come at a better time, for my mind is full, and 
 -Iwant to empty it. First, of my present, before 
 I touch upon my future. M. R. F., who is a 
 much younger cavalier than’I, and a professed 
 admirer of beauty, was so affable as to remark 
 the other day (he paid us a visit of two days up 
 the river there, and much objected to the ac- 
 commodation of the hotel), that Lizzie ought to 
 have her portrait painted. Which, coming from 
 M. R. F., may be considered equivalent to a 
 melodramatic blessing.” 
 
 ‘“You are getting well,” said Mortimer, with 
 a smile. 
 
 ‘“‘ Really,” said Eugene, ‘‘I mean it. When 
 M. R. F. said that, and followed it up by roll- 
 ing the claret (for which he called, and I paid) 
 in his mouth, and saying, ‘My dear son, why 
 do you drink this trash?’ it was tantamount— 
 in him—to a paternal benediction on our union, 
 accompanied with a gush of tears. The cool- 
 ness of M. R. F. is not to be measured by ordi- 
 
 nary standards.” 
 
 *¢ True enough,” said Lightwood. 
 
 “‘That’s all,” pursued Eugene, ‘that I shall 
 ever hear from M. R. F. on the subject, and he 
 will continue to saunter through the world with 
 his hat on:one side. My marriage being thus 
 solemnly recognized at the family altar, I have 
 no further trouble on that score. 
 really have done wonders for me, Mortimer, in 
 easing my money-perplexities, and with such 4 
 guardian and steward beside me, as the preserv- 
 er of my life (I am hardly strong yet, you see, 
 for I am not man enough to refer to her without 
 a trembling voice—she is so inexpressibly dear 
 to me, Mortimer!), the little that I can call my 
 own will be more than it ever has been. It need 
 be more, for you know what it always has been 
 in my hands. Nothing.” 
 
 ‘Worse than nothing, I fancy, Eugene. My 
 own small income (I devoutly wish that my 
 grandfather had left it to the Ocean rather than 
 to me!) has been an effective Something, in the 
 way of preventing me from turning to at Any 
 thing. And I think yours has been much the 
 same.’ 
 
 miners ehake the voice .of wisdom,” said 
 Eugene. ‘ We are shepherds both. In turn- 
 ing to at last, we turn to in earnest. Let us say 
 no more of that, fora few years to come. Now, 
 I have had an idea, Mortimer, of taking myself 
 
 and my wife to one ‘of the colonies, and working 
 out my vocation there.” 
 
 “TI should be lost without you, Eugene; but 
 you may be right.” 
 
 “No,” said Eugene, emphatically. 
 Tight Wr ong.’ 
 
 e said it with such a lively—almost angry 
 —flash, that Mortimer showed himself greatly 
 surprised. 
 
 “Yon think this thumped head of mine is 
 excited?” Eugene went on, with a high look ; 
 “not so, believe me. I can say to you of the 
 healthful music of my pulse what Hamlet said 
 of his: My blood is up, but wholesomely up, 
 when I think of it. Tell me! 
 coward to Lizzie, and sneak away with her, as 
 
 “ Not 
 
 Next, you | 
 
 Shall I turn. 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 
 ‘‘Nothing short of force! friend’s part in this world be, Mortimer, if she 
 
 I 
 
 Where would your - 
 
 had turned coward to him, and on immeasurably — 
 better occasion ?” 
 
 ‘Honorable and stanch,” said Lightwood. 
 ** And yet, Hugene—” 
 
 ‘‘And yet what, Mortimer?” 
 
 “And yet, are you sure that you might. not 
 feel (for her sake, I say for her sake) any slight 
 coldness toward her on the part of—Society ?” 
 
 “Oh! You and I may well stumble at the - 
 word,” returned Eugene, laughing. ‘‘Do we 
 mean our T'ippins ?” a 
 
 ‘¢Perhaps we do,” said Mortimer, laughing 
 also. 
 
 ‘¢ Faith, we po!” returned Eugene, with great 
 animation. ‘‘We may hide behind the bush ; 
 and beat about it, but we po! Now, my wife is f 
 something nearer to my heart, Mortimer, than 
 Tippins is,“and I owe her a little more than I 
 owe to Tippins, and I am rather prouder of her 
 than I ever was of Tippins. Therefage,;I will 
 fight.it out to the last gasp, with her and for her, 
 here, in the open field. When I hide her, or 
 strike for her, faint-heartedly, in a hole or a 
 corner, do you, whom I love next best upon 
 earth, tell me what I shall most righteously de- 
 serve to be told:—that she would have done 
 well to turn me over with her foot that night 
 when I lay bleeding to death, and spat in my 
 dastard face.” _ 
 
 The glow that shone upon him as he spoke 
 the words so irradiated his features that he look- 
 ed, for the time, as though he had never been 
 mutilated. His friend responded as Eugene 
 would have had him respond, and they dis- 
 coursed of the future until Lizzie came back. 
 After resuming her place at his side, and ten- 
 derly touching his hands and his head, she said: 
 
 ‘*Kugene, dear, you made me go out, but I 
 ought to have staid with you. You are more — 
 flushed than you have been for many days. 
 What have you been doing ?” . 
 
 “Nothing,” replied Eugene, ‘‘but looking for- 
 ward to your coming back.” 
 
 “And talking to “Mr. Lightwood,” said Liz- | 
 zie, turning to him with a smile. ‘“‘Butit can ~ 
 not have been Society that disturbed you.” 
 
 “Faith, my dear love!” retorted Eugene, in 
 his old airy manner, as he laughed and kissed 
 her, ‘¢I rather think.it was Society, though !” 
 
 The word ran so much in Mortimer Light- 
 wood’s thoughts as he went home to the Temple j 
 that night, that he resolved to take a look at 
 Society, which he had not seen for a consider- 
 able period. 
 
 en ae ee ee ee 
 
 a ee 
 
 Se ee a 
 
 Siete ines 
 
 CHAPTER THE LAST. 
 THE VOICE OF SOCIETY. 
 Brnooves Mortimer Lightwood, therefore, to 
 
 ‘answer a dinner card from Mr. and Mrs. Veneer- 
 
 ing requesting the honor, and to signify that Mr. 
 Mortimer Lightwood will be happy to have the 
 other honor. The Veneerings have been, as ~ 
 usual, indefatigably dealing dinner cards to So- 
 ciety, and whoever desires to take a hand had 
 best be quick about it, for it is written in-the 
 Books of the Insolvent Fates that Veneering 
 shall make a resounding smash next week. 
 Yes. Having found out the clew to that great 
 mystery how people can contrive to live beyond 
 
ies as legislator deputed to the Universe by the 
 - pure electors of Pocket Breeches, it shall come 
 
 their means, and having over-jobbed his jobber- 
 
 to pass next week that Veneering will accept 
 the Chiltern Hundreds, that the legal gentle- 
 man in Britannia’s, confidence will again accept 
 the Pocket Breeches Thousands, and that the 
 Veneerings will retire to Calais, there to live on 
 Mrs. Veneering’s diamonds (in which Mr. Ve- 
 neering, 
 time invested considerable sums), and to relate 
 to Neptune and others, how that, before Ve~ 
 neering retired from Parliament, the House of 
 Commons was cemposed of himself and the 
 six hundred and fifty-seven dearest and oldest 
 friends he had in the werld. It shall likewise 
 come to pass, at as nearly as possible the same 
 period, that Seciety will discover that it always 
 did despise Veneering, and distrust Veneering, 
 and that when it went to Veneering’s to dinner 
 it always had misvivings—though very secretly 
 at the time, it would seem, and in a perfectly 
 private and confidential manner. 
 The next week’s books of the Insolvent Fates, 
 however, being not yet opened, there is the usu- 
 al rush to the Veneerings, ef the people who 
 go to their house to dine with one another and 
 not with them. There is Lady Tippins. ‘There 
 are Podsnap the Great and Mrs. Podsnap. There 
 is Twemlow. ‘There are Buffer, Boots, and Brew- 
 er. There is the Contractor, who is Providence 
 to five hundred thousand men., There is the 
 Chairman, traveling three thousand miles per 
 week. ‘There is the brilliant genius who turned 
 the shares into that remarkably exact sum of 
 three hundred and seventy-five thousand pounds, 
 
 no shillings, and no pence. 
 
 To whom add Mortimer Lightwood, coming 
 in among them with a reassumption of his old 
 languid air, founded on Eugene, and belonging 
 to the days when he told the story of the man 
 from Somewhere. 
 
 That fresh fairy, Tippins, all but screams at 
 sight of her false swain. She summons the de- 
 serter to her with her fan;, but the deserter, pre- 
 determined not to come, talks Britain with Pod- 
 snap. Podsnap always talks Britain, and talks 
 as if he were a sort of Private Watchman em- 
 ployed, in the British interests, against the rest 
 of the world. ‘‘ We know what Russia means, 
 Sir,” says Podsnap; ‘‘we know what France 
 wants; we see what America is up to; but we' 
 know what England is. That’s enough for us.” | 
 
 However, when dinner is served, and Light- 
 wood drops into his old place over against Lady 
 Tippins, she can be fended off no longer. ** Long | 
 banished Robinson Crusoe,” says the charmer, 
 exchanging salutations, “ how did you leave the 
 Island ?”’ 
 
 *“Thank you,” says Lightwood. ‘It made 
 no complaint of being in pain any where.” 
 
 ‘Say, how did you leave the savages?” asks 
 Lady Tippins. 
 
 They were becoming civilized when I left 
 Juan Fernandez,” says Lightwood. ‘‘At least they 
 were eating one another, which looked like it.” 
 
 ‘*'Tormentor!” returns the dear young creat- 
 ure. ‘*You know what I mean, and you trifle 
 with my impatience, ‘Tell me something, im- 
 mediately, about the married pair. You were. 
 at the wedding.” 
 
 ““Was I, by-the-by ?” 
 at great leisure, to consider. 
 
 Mortimer pretends, 
 **So I was!” 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND, 851 
 
 ‘* How was the bride dressed? In rowing cos. 
 tume ?” 
 
 Mertimer looks gloomy, and declines to an- 
 swer. . 
 
 “I hope she steered herself, skiffed herself, 
 paddled herself, larboarded and starboarded her- 
 self, or whatever the technical term is, to the 
 ceremony ?” continues the playful ‘Tippins. 
 
 “‘ However she get to it she graced it,” says 
 
 as a gooi husband, has from time.to | Mortimer. 
 
 Lady Tippins with a skittish little scream at- 
 tracts the general attention. ‘‘Graced it! ‘Take 
 care of me if I faint, Veneering. He means to 
 tell us that a horrid female waterman is grace- 
 ful!” ; 
 
 ‘Pardon me. I mean to tell you nothing, 
 Lady ‘Tippins,” replies Lightwood. And keeps 
 his word by eating his dinner with a show of the 
 utmost indifference. 
 
 ‘*You shall not escape me in this way, you 
 morose backwoods-man,” retorts Lady Tippins. 
 ‘*You shall not evade the question, to screen 
 your friend Engene who has made this exhibi- 
 tion of himself. ‘The knowledge shall be brought 
 home to you that such a ridiculous affair is con-. 
 demned by the voice of Society. My dear Mrs. 
 Veneering, do let us resolve ourselves into a 
 Committee of the whole House on the subject.” 
 . Mrs. Veneering, always charmed by this rat- 
 tling sylph, cries: “Qh yes! Do let us resolve 
 ourselves into a Committee of the whole House!’ 
 So delicious!” Veneering says, ‘‘ As many as. 
 are of that opinion, say Aye—contrary, No—the 
 Ayes have it.” But nobody takes the slightest: 
 notice of his joke. 
 
 “Now, I am Chairwoman of Committees!’ - 
 cries Lady Tippins. 
 
 (‘‘What spirits she has!” exclaims Mrs. Ve-- 
 neering ; to whom likewise nobody attends.) 
 
 ‘cAnd this,” pursues the sprightly one, ‘‘is a 
 Committee of the whole House to what-you-may- 
 eall-it-—elicit, I suappose—the voice of Society. 
 The question before the Committee is, whether: 
 
 a young man of very fair family, good appear-. 
 ance, and some talent, makes a fool or a wise 
 ‘man of himself in marrying a female waterman, 
 turned factory girl.” 
 
 ‘* Hardly so, I think,” the stubborn Mortimer 
 strikes in. ‘‘I take the question to be, whether 
 such a man as you describe, Lady Tippins, does. 
 right or wrong in marrying a brave woman (I 
 say nothing of her beauty), who has saved his. 
 life, with a wonderful energy and address ; whom 
 he knows to be virtuous and possessed of re- 
 markable qualities; whom he has long admired, 
 and who is deeply attached to him.” 
 
 ‘But, excuse me,” says Podsnap, with his 
 temper and his shirt-collar about equally rum- 
 pled; ‘‘was this young woman ever a female 
 waterman ?” 
 
 ‘‘Never. But she sometimes rowed in a boat 
 with her father, I believe.” 
 
 General sensation against the young woman. 
 Brewer shakes his head. Boots shakes his head. 
 Buffer shakes his head. 
 
 ; ‘**And now, Mr, Lightwood, was she ever,” 
 ursues Podsnap, with his indignation rising high 
 into those hair-brushes of his, ‘‘a factory girl ?’”” 
 
 ‘¢Never. But she had some employment in 
 a paper mill, I believe.” . 
 
 General sensation, repeated. Brewersays, **Oh 
 dear!” Boots says, *SOh dear!” Buffer says, 
 ‘“‘Qh dear!” All, in a rumbling tone of protest. 
 
eee 
 
 ae Mah 
 s 
 
 352 
 
 —and that I desire to know no more about it.” 
 
 ‘¢ Now I wonder,” thinks Mortimer, amused 
 | : ’ ? 
 
 “‘whether you are the voice of Society !”) 
 
 ‘‘Hear, hear, hear!” cries Lady Tippins. 
 “Your opinion of this mésalliance, honorable 
 colleague of the honorable member who has just 
 
 sat down ?” 
 
 Mrs. Podsnap is of opinion that in these mat- 
 ters there should be an equality of station and 
 fortune, and that a man accustomed to Society 
 should look out for a woman accustomed to So- 
 ciety and capable of bearing her part in it with 
 —an ease and elegance of carriage—that—” 
 Mrs. Podsnap stops there, delicately intimating 
 that every such man should look out for a fine 
 woman as nearly resembling herself as he may 
 
 hope to discover. 
 
 (‘* Now I wonder,” thinks Mortimer, * wheth-’ 
 
 er you are the Voice!’’) 
 
 Lady Tippins next canvasses the Contractor, 
 of five hundred thousand power. 
 this potentate, that what the man in question 
 
 should have done, would have been, to buy the 
 young woman a boat and a small annuity, and 
 set her up for herself. These things are a ques- 
 You buy the 
 You buy 
 
 tion of beef-steaks and porter. 
 young woman a boat. Very good. 
 her, at the same time, a small annuity. You 
 speak of that annuity in pounds sterling, but it 
 
 is in reality so many pounds of beef-steaks and so 
 On the one hand, the 
 
 many pints of porter. 
 young woman has the boar. On the other hand, 
 she consumes so many pounds of beef-steaks and 
 so many pints of porter. ‘Those beef-steaks and 
 that porter are the fuel to that young woman’s 
 engine. She derives therefrom a certain amount 
 of power to row the boat; that power will pro- 
 duce so much money; and thus you get at the 
 young woman’s income. That (it seems to the 
 Contraetor) is the way of looking at it. 
 
 The fair enslaver having fallen into one of her 
 gentle sleeps during this last exposition, nobody 
 likes towake her. Fortunately, she comes awake 
 of herself, and puts the question to the Wander- 
 ing Chairman. The Wanderer can only speak 
 of the case as if it were his own. If such a 
 young woman as the young woman described, 
 had saved his own life, he would have been very 
 much obliged to her, wouldn’t have married her, 
 and would have got her a berth in an Electric 
 Telegraph Office, where young women answer 
 very well. 
 
 What does the Genius of the three hundred 
 and seventy-five thousand pounds, no shillings, 
 and no pence, think? He can’t say what he 
 thinks, without asking: Had the young woman 
 any money ? 
 
 ‘* No,” says Lightwood, in an uncompromis- | 
 
 ing voice; ‘*no money.” 
 
 ‘¢ Madness and moonshine,” is‘then the com- 
 pressed verdict of the Genius. “A man may 
 do any thing lawful, for money. But for no 
 money ?—Bosh !” 
 
 What does Boots say ? 
 
 & 
 
 OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 
 ‘‘Then all J have to say is,” returns Podsnap, 
 putting the thing away with his right arm, “that 
 my gorge rises against such a marriage—that it 
 offends and disgusts me—that it makes me sick 
 
 It appears to 
 
 twenty thousand pound. 
 What does Brewer say ? 
 Brewer says what Boots says. 
 What does Buffer say. 
 
 bathing-woman, and bolted. ‘i 
 
 Lady Tippins fancies she has collected the suf- 
 frages of the whole Committee (nobody dream- 
 ing of asking the Veneerings for their opinion), 
 
 glass, she perceives Mr. Twemlow with his hand 
 to his forehead, . 
 
 Good gracious!’ My Twemlow forgotten! My 
 dearest! My own! What is his vote ? 
 
 Twemlow has the air of being ill at ease, as 
 he takes his hand from his forehead and replies. 
 
 ‘TY am disposed to think,” says he, ‘‘ that this 
 is a question of the feelings of a gentleman.” 
 
 ‘A gentleman can have no feelings who con- 
 tracts such a marriage,” flushes Podsnap, 
 
 ‘* Pardon me, Sir,” says Twemlow, rather less 
 mildly than usual, ‘*I don’t agree with you. If 
 this gentleman's feelings of gratitude, of respect, 
 of admiration, and affection, induced him (as I 
 presume they did) to marry this lady—? 
 
 ~ This lady!” echoes Podsnap. 
 
 “* Sir,” returns Twemlow, with his wristbands 
 bristling a little, ‘‘you repeat the word ; J repeat 
 the word. 
 call her if the gentleman were present ?” 
 
 This being something in the nature of a poser 
 for Podsnap, he merely waves it away with a 
 speechless wave. ' 
 
 ‘* I say,” resumes Twemlow, ‘‘if such feelings 
 on the part of this gentleman induced this gen- 
 tleman to marry this lady, I think he is the 
 greater gentleman for the action, and makes her 
 the greater lady. I beg to say, that when I nse 
 the word gentleman, I use it in the sense in 
 which the degree may be attained by any man, 
 The feelings of a gentleman I hold sacred, and 
 I confess I am not comfortable when they are 
 made the subject of sport or general discussion.” 
 
 ‘*T should like to know,” sneers Podsnap, 
 ‘‘ whether your noble relation would be of your 
 opinion,” 
 
 ‘‘ Mr. Podsnap,”’ retorts Twemlow, ‘ permit 
 me. He might be, or he might not be. I can 
 not say. But I could not allow even him to dic- 
 tate to me on a point of great delicacy, on which 
 I feel very strongly.” . 
 
 Somehow a canopy of wet blanket seems to 
 descend upon the company, and Lady 'Tippins 
 Was never known to turn so very greedy or so 
 very cross. Mortimer Lightwood alone bright- 
 ens. He has been asking himself, as to every 
 other member of the Committee in turn, “I 
 wonder whether you are the Voice!” But he 
 does not ask himself the question after Twemlow 
 has spoken, and he glances in T'wemlow’s direc- 
 tion as if he were grateful. 
 disperse—by which time Mr. and Mrs. Veneer- 
 ing have had quite as much as they want of the 
 honor, and the guests have had quite as much 
 
 as they want of the other honor—Mortimer sees 
 Twemlow home, shakes hands with him cordial- 
 ly at parting, and fares to the Temple, gayly. 
 
 THE END. 
 
 Boots says he wouldn't have done it under a 
 
 Buffer says he knows a man who married a 
 
 when, looking round the table through her eye= 
 
 This lady. What else would you. 
 
 When the company - 
 
 ete ee ee 
 
 Sa ee 
 
 timed Bin 2 
 
 y 
 
eal 
 
 Peek oO CeR TT Py, 
 
 IN LIEU OF PREFACE. 
 
 WuEn I devised this story, I foresaw the likelihood that a class of readers 
 and commentators would suppose that I was at great pains to conceal exactly 
 what I was at great pains to suggest: namely, that Mr. John Harmon was not 
 slain, and that Mr. John Rokesmith was he. Pleasing myself with the idea 
 that the supposition might in part arise out of some ingenuity in the story, and 
 thinking it worth while, in the interests of art, to hint to an audience that an 
 artist (of whatever denomination) may perhaps be trusted to know what he is 
 about in his vocation, if they will concede him a little patience, I was not alarmed 
 by the anticipation. 
 
 To keep for a long time unsuspected, yet always working itself out, another 
 purpose originating in that leading incident, and turning it to a pleasant and 
 useful account at last, was at once the most interesting and the most difficult 
 part of my design. Its difficulty was much enhanced by the mode of publica- 
 tion ; for it would be very unreasonable to expect that many readers, pursuing 
 @ story in portions from month to month through nineteen months, will, until 
 they have it before them complete, perceive the relations of its finer threads to 
 the whole pattern which is always before the eyes of the story-weaver at his 
 loom. Yet, that I hold the advantages of the mode of publication to outweigh 
 its disadvantages, may be easily believed of one who revived it in the Pickwick 
 Papers after long disuse, and has pursued it ever since. 
 
 There is sometimes an odd disposition in this country to dispute as improba. 
 ble in fiction what are the commonest experiences in fact. Therefore I note 
 here, though it may not be at all necessary, that there are hundreds of Will 
 Cases (as they are called) far more remarkable than that fancied in this book; 
 and that the stores of the Prerogative Office teem with instances of testators 
 who have made, changed, contradicted, hidden, forgotten, left canceled, and left 
 uneanceled, each many more wills than were ever made by the ele Mr. Har- 
 mon of Harmony Jail. 
 
 In my social experiences, since Mrs. Betty Higden came upon the scene and 
 left it, I have found Circumlocutional authorities disposed to be warm with me 
 on the subject of my view of the Poor Law. My friend Mr. Bounderby could 
 never see any difference between leaving the Coketown “hands” exactly as 
 
 they were, and requiring them to be fed with turtle soup and ane out of 
 
— 
 
 ue 0 as tee ee ae eee yes ”™ pig WA) 3 oe) Lat 
 AA PUMrON Fick Wi ata MT Naa in aS Se a 
 
 i hy RM } en : J 4 ee ae ae 
 
 D eu AS iy x ) 
 
 * 354 ~\ POSTSCRIPT. © 
 
 gold spoons. Idiotic propositions of a parallel nature have been freely offered 
 for my acceptance, and I have been called upon to admit that I would give 
 
 Poor Law relief to any body, any where, any how. Putting this nonsense aside, 
 I have observed a suspicious tendency in the various authorities to divide into 
 
 two parties; the one contending that there are no deserving Poor who prefer 
 death by slow starvation and bitter weather to the mercies of some Relieving 
 Officers and some Union Houses; the other admitting that there are such Poor, 
 but denying that they have any cause or reason for what they do, The rec- 
 ords in our newspapers, the late exposure by Tue Lancer, and the common 
 sense and senses of common people, furnish too abundant evidence against both 
 defenses. But that my view of the Poor Law may not be mistaken or misrep- 
 resented, I will state it. I believe there has been in England, since the days of 
 
 the Sruarrs, no law so often infamously administered, no law so often openly 
 
 violated, no law habitually so ill-supervised. In the majority of the shameful 
 
 _ cases of disease and death from destitution that shock the Public and disgrace 
 
 the country, the illegality is quite equal to the inhumanity—and known lan- 
 guage could say no more of their lawlessness. 
 
 On Friday the Ninth of June, in the present year, Mr. and Mrs. Boffin (in 
 their manuscript dress of receiving Mr. and Mrs. Lammle at breakfast) were on 
 the Southeastern Railway with me in a terribly destructive accident. "When I 
 had done what I could to help others, I climbed back into my carriage—nearly 
 turned over a viaduct, and caught aslant upon the turn—to extricate the worthy 
 couple. They were much soiled, but otherwise unhurt. The same happy re- 
 sult attended Miss Bella Wilfer on her wedding-day, and Mr. Riderhood in- 
 specting Bradley Headstone’s red neckerchief as he lay asleep. I remember 
 with devout thankfulness that I can never be nearer parting company with my 
 readers forever than I was then, until there shall be written against my life the 
 two words with which I have this day closed this book—Tux Enp. 
 
 September 2, 1865. 
 
 lr a. oe 
 
 ee 
 
1 ala MRM he PTY 
 
 T. B, PETERSON ano BROTHERS’ NEW BOOKS, 
 
 WP OS™ Peo 
 
 Just Published, and will be Sent Free of Postage to all, on Receipt of Retail Price, 
 
 Price of each Book on this Page, $1.50 in Paper, or $2.00 in Cloth 
 
 — OO 
 
 MILDRED ARKELL. By Mrs. Wood. * * 
 LORD OAKBURN’S DAUGHTERS. By Mrs. Wood. 
 OSWALD CRAY. By Mrs. Henry Wood. 
 
 SHADOW OF ASHLYDYAT. By Mrs. Henry Wood. 
 SQUIRE TREVLYN’& HEIR. By Mrs. Wood. 
 
 THE CASTLE’S HEIR. By Mrs. Henry Wood. —~—~ 
 VERNER’S PRIDE. By Mrs. Henry Wood. ; 
 HIGH LIFE IN WASHINGTON. By Mrs. Lasselle. 
 THE BEAUTIFUL WIDOW. By Mrs. Shelly. 
 
 SIX NIGHTS WITH THE WASHINGTONIANS. 
 LOVE AND MONEY. By J.B. Jones. 
 
 SILENT STRUGGLES. By Mrs. Ann S. Stephens. 
 THE MATCHMAKER. By Beatrice Reynolds. 
 LORRIMER LITTLEGOOD. By Frank Fairlegh. 
 THE REFUGEE. By Herman Melville. 
 
 THE FORSAKEN DAUGHTER. A Love Story. 
 MODERN CHIVALRY. By H. H. Brackenridge. 
 COAL AND COAL OIL. By Professor Bowen. 
 FAMILY SECRETS. By Author of ‘‘ Family Pride.’ 
 THE BROTHER’S SECRET. By William Godwin. 
 FLIRTATIONS IN FASHIONABLE LIFE. 
 FAMILY PRIDE. By author of “ Pique.” 
 
 THE LOST LOVE. By author of ‘John Drayton.” 
 THE BRIDAL EVE. By Mrs. E.D. E. N. Southworth. 
 THE PRIDE OF LIFE. By Lady Jane Scott. 
 
 THE DESERTED WIFE. By Mrs. Southworth. 
 
 THE LOST DAUGHTER. By Caroline Lee Hentz. 
 BOHEMIANS OF LONDON. By E.M. Whitty. 
 
 THE RIVAL BELLES. By J. B. Jones. 
 
 THE DEVOT"®D BRIDE. By St. George Tucker. 
 LOVE AND (UTY. By Mrs. Hubbach. 
 
 SELF SACRI¥ICE. By author “‘ Margaret Maitland.” 
 THE REJEC’ED WIFE. By Mrs. Ann S. Stephens. 
 WOMAN IN BLACK. By author ‘ Man in Grey.” 
 PETERSONS’ NEW COOK BOOK. — 
 
 THE COWAFD. A War Novel. By Henry Morford. 
 THE WIPE’ SECRET. By Mrs. Ann S, Stephens. 
 LADIES’ GUIDE to NEEDLEWORK and Embroidery. 
 LADIES’ GUIDE TO TRUE POLITENESS. 
 WIDDIFIELD’S NEW COOK BOOK. 
 
 MISS LESLIE’S NEW COOKERY BOOK. 
 
 MRS. HALE’S NEW COOK BOOK. 
 
 MISS LESLIE’S NEW RECEIPT BOOK. 
 
 MRS. HALE’S RECEIPTS FOR THE MILLION. 
 THE DAYS OF SHODDY. By Henry Morford. 
 SHOULDER-STRAPS. The Great Novel of the War. 
 ERNEST LINWOOD. By Mrs. Caroline Lee Hentz. 
 THE FATAL MARRIAGE. By Mrs. Southworth. 
 THE CONSCRIPT. By Alexander Dumas. 
 
 LOVE’S LABOR WON. By Mrs. Southworth. 
 CAMILLE; or THE FATE OF A COQUETTE. 
 THE INITIALS. A Love Story. 
 
 COUNT OF MONTE CRISTO. By Alexander Dumas. 
 THE WANDERING JEW. Illustrated. By Eugene Sue. 
 THE MYSTERIES OF PARIS. By Eugene Sue. 
 TEN THOUSAND A YEAR. By S. C. Warren. 
 
 THE GIPSY'S PROPHECY By Mrs. Southworth. 
 PLANTER’S NORTHERN BRIDE. By Mrs. Hentz. 
 FATHER AND DAUGHTER. By Fredrika Bremer. 
 THE NEIGHBORS. By Fredrika Bremer. 
 
 THE FOUR SISTERS. By Fredrika Bremer. 
 
 THE HOME. By Fredrika Bremer. 
 
 FASHION AND FAMINE. By Mrs. Ann S. Stephens. 
 DOESTICKS’ LETTERS. By Q. K. P. Doesticks. 
 GAMBLING EXPOSED. By J. H. Green. 
 
 _OLD STONE MANSION. By Charles J. Peterson. 
 THE WATCHMAN. By J. A. Maitland. 
 
 THE LOST HEIRESS, By Mrs. E. D.E.N. Southworth. 
 COURTSHIP AND MATRIMONY. By Robert Morris. 
 LOVE AFTER MARRIAGE. By Mrs. C. Lee Hentz. 
 COUSIN HARRY. By Mrs. Grey. 
 
 THE DEAD SECRET. By Wilkie Collins, 
 
 THE CAVALIER. By G. P. R. James. 
 
 THE BELLE OF WASHINGTON. By Mrs. Lasselle. 
 THE MOTHER-IN-LAW. By Mrs. Southworth. 
 
 THE CURSE OF CLIFTON. By Mrs. Southworth. 
 
 “BRIDE OF THE WILDERNESS. 
 
 LINDA. by Mrs. Caroline Lee Hentz. 
 
 ROBERT GRAHAM. By Mrs. Caroline Lee Hentz. 
 THE OLD HOMESTEAD. By Mrs. Ann S. Stephens. 
 THE ELEPHANT CLUB. By Q. K. P. Doesticks. 
 THE GAMBLER’S LIFE. By J. H. Green. 
 
 KATE AYLESFORD. By Charles J. Peterson. 
 DIARY OF AN OLD DOCTOR. By J. A. Maitland. 
 THE HAUNTED HOMESTEAD. By Mrs. Southworth 
 THE BORDER ROVER. By Emerson Bennett. 
 CLARA MORELAND. By Emerson Bennett. 
 
 THE CROSSED PATH. By Wilkie Collins. 
 
 THE LITTLE BEAUTY. By Mrs. Grey. 
 
 LORD MONTAGU’S PAGE By G.P. R. James. 
 RETRIBUTION. By Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth. 
 THE BANISHED SON. By Mts. Caroline Lee Hentz 
 THE HEIRESS. By Mrs. Ann S. stephens. 
 
 THE WITCHES OF NEW YORK. By Doesticks. 
 HARRY COVERDALE’S: Courtship and Marriage. 
 JUDGE HALIBURTON’S YANKEE STORIES, 
 THE LADY OF THE ISLE. By Mrs. Southworth. 
 THE MISSING BRIDE. By Mrs. Southworth. 
 COURTSHIP AND MARRIAGE. By Mrs. Hentz. 
 HELEN AND ARTHUR. By Mrs. C. Lee Hentz. 
 PLU-RI-BUS-TAH. By Q. K. P. Doesticks. 
 
 THE REFORMED GAMBLER. By J. H. Green. 
 SECRET B .ND OF BROTHERS. By J. H. Green. 
 LIZZY GLENN. By T.S§. Arthur. 
 
 THE WANDERER. By J. A. Maitland. 
 
 THE TWO SISTERS. | By Mrs. E.D. E. N. Southworth. 
 THE THREE BEAUTIES. By Mrs. Southworth. 
 RENA; OR, TILE SNOW-BIRD. By Mrs. Uentz. 
 HIGH LIFE IN NEW YORK. By Jonathan Slick. 
 INDIANA. A Love 8 ory. By Geo. Sand. 
 
 THE WIFE’S VICTORY. By Mrs. Southworth. 
 VIVIA, SECRET OF POWER. By Mrs. Southworth 
 THE JEALOUS HUSBAND. A Love Story. 
 EOLINE; OR MAGNOLIA VALE. By Mrs. Hentz. 
 MARCUS WARLAND. By Mrs. Caroline Lee Hentz. 
 DISCARDED DAUGHTER. By Mrs. Southworth. 
 INDIA. By Mrs. Emma D. E. N. Southworth. 
 
 THE - PLANTER’S DAUGUTER. A Pure Love Story. 
 THE LAWYER’S STORY. By J. A. Maitland. 
 
 By E. Bennett. 
 VIOLA; or, ADVENTURES in FAR SOUTH-WEST. 
 THE FORGED WILL. By Emerson Bennett. 
 
 THE THREE COUSINS. By J. A. Meitland. 
 
 KATE CLARENDON. By Emerson Bennett. 
 SARTAROE. By James A. Maitland. 
 
 ELLEN NORBURY. By Emerson Benuett. 
 
 LIFE AND BEAUTIES OF FANNY FERN. 
 
 LIFE AND LECTURES OF LOLA MONTEZ, 
 WILD SOUTHERN SCENES. By J. B. Jones. 
 HUMORS OF FALCONBRIDGE, 
 
 LADY MAUD. By Pierce Egan. 
 
 CURRER LYLE; Or, Autobiography of an Actress. 
 SAM SLICK, THE CLOCKMAKER. By Sam Slick. 
 MAJOR JONES’ COURTSHIP AND TRAVELS. 
 MAJOR JONES’ SCENES IN GEORGIA. 
 
 SIMON SUGGS’ ADVENTURES AND TRAVELS. 
 MAJOR THORPE 83S SCENES IN ARKANSAW. 
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