The Life And Adventures Of Nicholas Nickleby
by
Charles Dickens

Part 20 out of 20



naturally. This fortune is destined to be yours, but you have a
greater fortune in her, sir, than you would have in money were it
forty times told. She chooses you, Mr Nickleby. She chooses as we,
her dearest friends, would have her choose. Frank chooses as we
would have HIM choose. He should have your sister's little hand,
sir, if she had refused it a score of times; ay, he should, and he
shall! You acted nobly, not knowing our sentiments, but now you
know them, sir, you must do as you are bid. What! You are the
children of a worthy gentleman! The time was, sir, when my dear
brother Ned and I were two poor simple-hearted boys, wandering,
almost barefoot, to seek our fortunes: are we changed in anything
but years and worldly circumstances since that time? No, God
forbid! Oh, Ned, Ned, Ned, what a happy day this is for you and me!
If our poor mother had only lived to see us now, Ned, how proud it
would have made her dear heart at last!'

Thus apostrophised, brother Ned, who had entered with Mrs Nickleby,
and who had been before unobserved by the young men, darted forward,
and fairly hugged brother Charles in his arms.

'Bring in my little Kate,' said the latter, after a short silence.
'Bring her in, Ned. Let me see Kate, let me kiss her. I have a
right to do so now; I was very near it when she first came; I have
often been very near it. Ah! Did you find the letter, my bird?
Did you find Madeline herself, waiting for you and expecting you?
Did you find that she had not quite forgotten her friend and nurse
and sweet companion? Why, this is almost the best of all!'

'Come, come,' said Ned, 'Frank will be jealous, and we shall have
some cutting of throats before dinner.'

'Then let him take her away, Ned, let him take her away. Madeline's
in the next room. Let all the lovers get out of the way, and talk
among themselves, if they've anything to say. Turn 'em out, Ned,
every one!'

Brother Charles began the clearance by leading the blushing girl to
the door, and dismissing her with a kiss. Frank was not very slow
to follow, and Nicholas had disappeared first of all. So there only
remained Mrs Nickleby and Miss La Creevy, who were both sobbing
heartily; the two brothers; and Tim Linkinwater, who now came in to
shake hands with everybody: his round face all radiant and beaming
with smiles.

'Well, Tim Linkinwater, sir,' said brother Charles, who was always
spokesman, 'now the young folks are happy, sir.'

'You didn't keep 'em in suspense as long as you said you would,
though,' returned Tim, archly. 'Why, Mr Nickleby and Mr Frank were
to have been in your room for I don't know how long; and I don't
know what you weren't to have told them before you came out with the
truth.'

'Now, did you ever know such a villain as this, Ned?' said the old
gentleman; 'did you ever know such a villain as Tim Linkinwater? He
accusing me of being impatient, and he the very man who has been
wearying us morning, noon, and night, and torturing us for leave to
go and tell 'em what was in store, before our plans were half
complete, or we had arranged a single thing. A treacherous dog!'

'So he is, brother Charles,' returned Ned; 'Tim is a treacherous
dog. Tim is not to be trusted. Tim is a wild young fellow. He
wants gravity and steadiness; he must sow his wild oats, and then
perhaps he'll become in time a respectable member of society.'

This being one of the standing jokes between the old fellows and
Tim, they all three laughed very heartily, and might have laughed
much longer, but that the brothers, seeing that Mrs Nickleby was
labouring to express her feelings, and was really overwhelmed by the
happiness of the time, took her between them, and led her from the
room under pretence of having to consult her on some most important
arrangements.

Now, Tim and Miss La Creevy had met very often, and had always been
very chatty and pleasant together--had always been great friends--
and consequently it was the most natural thing in the world that
Tim, finding that she still sobbed, should endeavour to console her.
As Miss La Creevy sat on a large old-fashioned window-seat, where
there was ample room for two, it was also natural that Tim should
sit down beside her; and as to Tim's being unusually spruce and
particular in his attire that day, why it was a high festival and a
great occasion, and that was the most natural thing of all.

Tim sat down beside Miss La Creevy, and, crossing one leg over the
other so that his foot--he had very comely feet and happened to be
wearing the neatest shoes and black silk stockings possible--should
come easily within the range of her eye, said in a soothing way:

'Don't cry!'

'I must,' rejoined Miss La Creevy.

'No, don't,' said Tim. 'Please don't; pray don't.'

'I am so happy!' sobbed the little woman.

'Then laugh,' said Tim. 'Do laugh.'

What in the world Tim was doing with his arm, it is impossible to
conjecture, but he knocked his elbow against that part of the window
which was quite on the other side of Miss La Creevy; and it is clear
that it could have no business there.

'Do laugh,' said Tim, 'or I'll cry.'

'Why should you cry?' asked Miss La Creevy, smiling.

'Because I'm happy too,' said Tim. 'We are both happy, and I should
like to do as you do.'

Surely, there never was a man who fidgeted as Tim must have done
then; for he knocked the window again--almost in the same place--and
Miss La Creevy said she was sure he'd break it.

'I knew,' said Tim, 'that you would be pleased with this scene.'

'It was very thoughtful and kind to remember me,' returned Miss La
Creevy. 'Nothing could have delighted me half so much.'

Why on earth should Miss La Creevy and Tim Linkinwater have said all
this in a whisper? It was no secret. And why should Tim
Linkinwater have looked so hard at Miss La Creevy, and why should
Miss La Creevy have looked so hard at the ground?

'It's a pleasant thing,' said Tim, 'to people like us, who have
passed all our lives in the world alone, to see young folks that we
are fond of, brought together with so many years of happiness before
them.'

'Ah!' cried the little woman with all her heart, 'that it is!'

'Although,' pursued Tim 'although it makes one feel quite solitary
and cast away. Now don't it?'

Miss La Creevy said she didn't know. And why should she say she
didn't know? Because she must have known whether it did or not.

'It's almost enough to make us get married after all, isn't it?'
said Tim.

'Oh, nonsense!' replied Miss La Creevy, laughing. 'We are too old.'

'Not a bit,' said Tim; 'we are too old to be single. Why shouldn't
we both be married, instead of sitting through the long winter
evenings by our solitary firesides? Why shouldn't we make one
fireside of it, and marry each other?'

'Oh, Mr Linkinwater, you're joking!'

'No, no, I'm not. I'm not indeed,' said Tim. 'I will, if you will.
Do, my dear!'

'It would make people laugh so.'

'Let 'em laugh,' cried Tim stoutly; 'we have good tempers I know,
and we'll laugh too. Why, what hearty laughs we have had since
we've known each other!'

'So we have,' cried' Miss La Creevy--giving way a little, as Tim
thought.

'It has been the happiest time in all my life; at least, away from
the counting-house and Cheeryble Brothers,' said Tim. 'Do, my dear!
Now say you will.'

'No, no, we mustn't think of it,' returned Miss La Creevy. 'What
would the brothers say?'

'Why, God bless your soul!' cried Tim, innocently, 'you don't
suppose I should think of such a thing without their knowing it!
Why they left us here on purpose.'

'I can never look 'em in the face again!' exclaimed Miss La Creevy,
faintly.

'Come,' said Tim, 'let's be a comfortable couple. We shall live in
the old house here, where I have been for four-and-forty year; we
shall go to the old church, where I've been, every Sunday morning,
all through that time; we shall have all my old friends about us--
Dick, the archway, the pump, the flower-pots, and Mr Frank's
children, and Mr Nickleby's children, that we shall seem like
grandfather and grandmother to. Let's be a comfortable couple, and
take care of each other! And if we should get deaf, or lame, or
blind, or bed-ridden, how glad we shall be that we have somebody we
are fond of, always to talk to and sit with! Let's be a comfortable
couple. Now, do, my dear!'

Five minutes after this honest and straightforward speech, little
Miss La Creevy and Tim were talking as pleasantly as if they had
been married for a score of years, and had never once quarrelled all
the time; and five minutes after that, when Miss La Creevy had
bustled out to see if her eyes were red and put her hair to rights,
Tim moved with a stately step towards the drawing-room, exclaiming
as he went, 'There an't such another woman in all London! I KNOW
there an't!'

By this time, the apoplectic butler was nearly in fits, in
consequence of the unheard-of postponement of dinner. Nicholas, who
had been engaged in a manner in which every reader may imagine for
himself or herself, was hurrying downstairs in obedience to his
angry summons, when he encountered a new surprise.

On his way down, he overtook, in one of the passages, a stranger
genteelly dressed in black, who was also moving towards the dining-
room. As he was rather lame, and walked slowly, Nicholas lingered
behind, and was following him step by step, wondering who he was,
when he suddenly turned round and caught him by both hands.

'Newman Noggs!' cried Nicholas joyfully

'Ah! Newman, your own Newman, your own old faithful Newman! My dear
boy, my dear Nick, I give you joy--health, happiness, every
blessing! I can't bear it--it's too much, my dear boy--it makes a
child of me!'

'Where have you been?' said Nicholas. 'What have you been doing?
How often have I inquired for you, and been told that I should hear
before long!'

'I know, I know!' returned Newman. 'They wanted all the happiness
to come together. I've been helping 'em. I--I--look at me, Nick,
look at me!'

'You would never let ME do that,' said Nicholas in a tone of gentle
reproach.

'I didn't mind what I was, then. I shouldn't have had the heart to
put on gentleman's clothes. They would have reminded me of old
times and made me miserable. I am another man now, Nick. My dear
boy, I can't speak. Don't say anything to me. Don't think the worse
of me for these tears. You don't know what I feel today; you can't,
and never will!'

They walked in to dinner arm-in-arm, and sat down side by side.

Never was such a dinner as that, since the world began. There was
the superannuated bank clerk, Tim Linkinwater's friend; and there
was the chubby old lady, Tim Linkinwater's sister; and there was so
much attention from Tim Linkinwater's sister to Miss La Creevy, and
there were so many jokes from the superannuated bank clerk, and Tim
Linkinwater himself was in such tiptop spirits, and little Miss La
Creevy was in such a comical state, that of themselves they would
have composed the pleasantest party conceivable. Then, there was
Mrs Nickleby, so grand and complacent; Madeline and Kate, so
blushing and beautiful; Nicholas and Frank, so devoted and proud;
and all four so silently and tremblingly happy; there was Newman so
subdued yet so overjoyed, and there were the twin brothers so
delighted and interchanging such looks, that the old servant stood
transfixed behind his master's chair, and felt his eyes grow dim as
they wandered round the table.

When the first novelty of the meeting had worn off, and they began
truly to feel how happy they were, the conversation became more
general, and the harmony and pleasure if possible increased. The
brothers were in a perfect ecstasy; and their insisting on saluting
the ladies all round, before they would permit them to retire, gave
occasion to the superannuated bank clerk to say so many good things,
that he quite outshone himself, and was looked upon as a prodigy of
humour.

'Kate, my dear,' said Mrs Nickleby, taking her daughter aside, as
soon as they got upstairs, 'you don't really mean to tell me that
this is actually true about Miss La Creevy and Mr Linkinwater?'

'Indeed it is, mama.'

'Why, I never heard such a thing in my life!' exclaimed Mrs
Nickleby.

'Mr Linkinwater is a most excellent creature,' reasoned Kate, 'and,
for his age, quite young still.'

'For HIS age, my dear!' returned Mrs Nickleby, 'yes; nobody says
anything against him, except that I think he is the weakest and most
foolish man I ever knew. It's HER age I speak of. That he should
have gone and offered himself to a woman who must be--ah, half as
old again as I am--and that she should have dared to accept him! It
don't signify, Kate; I'm disgusted with her!'

Shaking her head very emphatically indeed, Mrs Nickleby swept away;
and all the evening, in the midst of the merriment and enjoyment
that ensued, and in which with that exception she freely
participated, conducted herself towards Miss La Creevy in a stately
and distant manner, designed to mark her sense of the impropriety of
her conduct, and to signify her extreme and cutting disapprobation
of the misdemeanour she had so flagrantly committed.



CHAPTER 64

An old Acquaintance is recognised under melancholy Circumstances,
and Dotheboys Hall breaks up for ever


Nicholas was one of those whose joy is incomplete unless it is
shared by the friends of adverse and less fortunate days.
Surrounded by every fascination of love and hope, his warm heart
yearned towards plain John Browdie. He remembered their first
meeting with a smile, and their second with a tear; saw poor Smike
once again with the bundle on his shoulder trudging patiently by his
side; and heard the honest Yorkshireman's rough words of
encouragement as he left them on their road to London.

Madeline and he sat down, very many times, jointly to produce a
letter which should acquaint John at full length with his altered
fortunes, and assure him of his friendship and gratitude. It so
happened, however, that the letter could never be written. Although
they applied themselves to it with the best intentions in the world,
it chanced that they always fell to talking about something else,
and when Nicholas tried it by himself, he found it impossible to
write one-half of what he wished to say, or to pen anything, indeed,
which on reperusal did not appear cold and unsatisfactory compared
with what he had in his mind. At last, after going on thus from day
to day, and reproaching himself more and more, he resolved (the more
readily as Madeline strongly urged him) to make a hasty trip into
Yorkshire, and present himself before Mr and Mrs Browdie without a
word of notice.

Thus it was that between seven and eight o'clock one evening, he and
Kate found themselves in the Saracen's Head booking-office, securing
a place to Greta Bridge by the next morning's coach. They had to go
westward, to procure some little necessaries for his journey, and,
as it was a fine night, they agreed to walk there, and ride home.

The place they had just been in called up so many recollections, and
Kate had so many anecdotes of Madeline, and Nicholas so many
anecdotes of Frank, and each was so interested in what the other
said, and both were so happy and confiding, and had so much to talk
about, that it was not until they had plunged for a full half-hour
into that labyrinth of streets which lies between Seven Dials and
Soho, without emerging into any large thoroughfare, that Nicholas
began to think it just possible they might have lost their way.

The possibility was soon converted into a certainty; for, on looking
about, and walking first to one end of the street and then to the
other, he could find no landmark he could recognise, and was fain to
turn back again in quest of some place at which he could seek a
direction.

It was a by-street, and there was nobody about, or in the few
wretched shops they passed. Making towards a faint gleam of light
which streamed across the pavement from a cellar, Nicholas was about
to descend two or three steps so as to render himself visible to
those below and make his inquiry, when he was arrested by a loud
noise of scolding in a woman's voice.

'Oh come away!' said Kate, 'they are quarrelling. You'll be hurt.'

'Wait one instant, Kate. Let us hear if there's anything the
matter,' returned her brother. 'Hush!'

'You nasty, idle, vicious, good-for-nothing brute,' cried the woman,
stamping on the ground, 'why don't you turn the mangle?'

'So I am, my life and soul!' replied the man's voice. 'I am always
turning. I am perpetually turning, like a demd old horse in a
demnition mill. My life is one demd horrid grind!'

'Then why don't you go and list for a soldier?' retorted the woman;
'you're welcome to.'

'For a soldier!' cried the man. 'For a soldier! Would his joy and
gladness see him in a coarse red coat with a little tail? Would she
hear of his being slapped and beat by drummers demnebly? Would she
have him fire off real guns, and have his hair cut, and his whiskers
shaved, and his eyes turned right and left, and his trousers
pipeclayed?'

'Dear Nicholas,' whispered Kate, 'you don't know who that is. It's
Mr Mantalini I am confident.'

'Do make sure! Peep at him while I ask the way,' said Nicholas.
'Come down a step or two. Come!'

Drawing her after him, Nicholas crept down the steps and looked into
a small boarded cellar. There, amidst clothes-baskets and clothes,
stripped up to his shirt-sleeves, but wearing still an old patched
pair of pantaloons of superlative make, a once brilliant waistcoat,
and moustache and whiskers as of yore, but lacking their lustrous
dye--there, endeavouring to mollify the wrath of a buxom female--not
the lawful Madame Mantalini, but the proprietress of the concern--
and grinding meanwhile as if for very life at the mangle, whose
creaking noise, mingled with her shrill tones, appeared almost to
deafen him--there was the graceful, elegant, fascinating, and once
dashing Mantalini.

'Oh you false traitor!' cried the lady, threatening personal
violence on Mr Mantalini's face.

'False! Oh dem! Now my soul, my gentle, captivating, bewitching,
and most demnebly enslaving chick-a-biddy, be calm,' said Mr
Mantalini, humbly.

'I won't!' screamed the woman. 'I'll tear your eyes out!'

'Oh! What a demd savage lamb!' cried Mr Mantalini.

'You're never to be trusted,' screamed the woman; 'you were out all
day yesterday, and gallivanting somewhere I know. You know you were!
Isn't it enough that I paid two pound fourteen for you, and took you
out of prison and let you live here like a gentleman, but must you
go on like this: breaking, my heart besides?'

'I will never break its heart, I will be a good boy, and never do so
any more; I will never be naughty again; I beg its little pardon,'
said Mr Mantalini, dropping the handle of the mangle, and folding
his palms together; 'it is all up with its handsome friend! He has
gone to the demnition bow-wows. It will have pity? It will not
scratch and claw, but pet and comfort? Oh, demmit!'

Very little affected, to judge from her action, by this tender
appeal, the lady was on the point of returning some angry reply,
when Nicholas, raising his voice, asked his way to Piccadilly.

Mr Mantalini turned round, caught sight of Kate, and, without
another word, leapt at one bound into a bed which stood behind the
door, and drew the counterpane over his face: kicking meanwhile
convulsively.

'Demmit,' he cried, in a suffocating voice, 'it's little Nickleby!
Shut the door, put out the candle, turn me up in the bedstead! Oh,
dem, dem, dem!'

The woman looked, first at Nicholas, and then at Mr Mantalini, as if
uncertain on whom to visit this extraordinary behaviour; but Mr
Mantalini happening by ill-luck to thrust his nose from under the
bedclothes, in his anxiety to ascertain whether the visitors were
gone, she suddenly, and with a dexterity which could only have been
acquired by long practice, flung a pretty heavy clothes-basket at
him, with so good an aim that he kicked more violently than before,
though without venturing to make any effort to disengage his head,
which was quite extinguished. Thinking this a favourable
opportunity for departing before any of the torrent of her wrath
discharged itself upon him, Nicholas hurried Kate off, and left the
unfortunate subject of this unexpected recognition to explain his
conduct as he best could.

The next morning he began his journey. It was now cold, winter
weather: forcibly recalling to his mind under what circumstances he
had first travelled that road, and how many vicissitudes and changes
he had since undergone. He was alone inside the greater part of the
way, and sometimes, when he had fallen into a doze, and, rousing
himself, looked out of the window, and recognised some place which
he well remembered as having passed, either on his journey down, or
in the long walk back with poor Smike, he could hardly believe but
that all which had since happened had been a dream, and that they
were still plodding wearily on towards London, with the world before
them.

To render these recollections the more vivid, it came on to snow as
night set in; and, passing through Stamford and Grantham, and by the
little alehouse where he had heard the story of the bold Baron of
Grogzwig, everything looked as if he had seen it but yesterday, and
not even a flake of the white crust on the roofs had melted away.
Encouraging the train of ideas which flocked upon him, he could
almost persuade himself that he sat again outside the coach, with
Squeers and the boys; that he heard their voices in the air; and
that he felt again, but with a mingled sensation of pain and
pleasure now, that old sinking of the heart, and longing after home.
While he was yet yielding himself up to these fancies he fell
asleep, and, dreaming of Madeline, forgot them.

He slept at the inn at Greta Bridge on the night of his arrival,
and, rising at a very early hour next morning, walked to the market
town, and inquired for John Browdie's house. John lived in the
outskirts, now he was a family man; and as everbody knew him,
Nicholas had no difficulty in finding a boy who undertook to guide
him to his residence.

Dismissing his guide at the gate, and in his impatience not even
stopping to admire the thriving look of cottage or garden either,
Nicholas made his way to the kitchen door, and knocked lustily with
his stick.

'Halloa!' cried a voice inside. 'Wa'et be the matther noo? Be the
toon a-fire? Ding, but thou mak'st noise eneaf!'

With these words, John Browdie opened the door himself, and opening
his eyes too to their utmost width, cried, as he clapped his hands
together, and burst into a hearty roar:

'Ecod, it be the godfeyther, it be the godfeyther! Tilly, here be
Misther Nickleby. Gi' us thee hond, mun. Coom awa', coom awa'. In
wi 'un, doon beside the fire; tak' a soop o' thot. Dinnot say a
word till thou'st droonk it a'! Oop wi' it, mun. Ding! but I'm
reeght glod to see thee.'

Adapting his action to his text, John dragged Nicholas into the
kitchen, forced him down upon a huge settle beside a blazing fire,
poured out from an enormous bottle about a quarter of a pint of
spirits, thrust it into his hand, opened his mouth and threw back
his head as a sign to him to drink it instantly, and stood with a
broad grin of welcome overspreading his great red face like a jolly
giant.

'I might ha' knowa'd,' said John,;' that nobody but thou would ha'
coom wi' sike a knock as you. Thot was the wa' thou knocked at
schoolmeasther's door, eh? Ha, ha, ha! But I say; wa'at be a' this
aboot schoolmeasther?'

'You know it then?' said Nicholas.

'They were talking aboot it, doon toon, last neeght,' replied John,
'but neane on 'em seemed quite to un'erstan' it, loike.'

'After various shiftings and delays,' said Nicholas, 'he has been
sentenced to be transported for seven years, for being in the
unlawful possession of a stolen will; and, after that, he has to
suffer the consequence of a conspiracy.'

'Whew!' cried John, 'a conspiracy! Soom'at in the pooder-plot wa'?
Eh? Soom'at in the Guy Faux line?'

'No, no, no, a conspiracy connected with his school; I'll explain it
presently.'

'Thot's reeght!' said John, 'explain it arter breakfast, not noo,
for thou be'est hoongry, and so am I; and Tilly she mun' be at the
bottom o' a' explanations, for she says thot's the mutual
confidence. Ha, ha, ha! Ecod, it's a room start, is the mutual
confidence!'

The entrance of Mrs Browdie, with a smart cap on, and very many
apologies for their having been detected in the act of breakfasting
in the kitchen, stopped John in his discussion of this grave
subject, and hastened the breakfast: which, being composed of vast
mounds of toast, new-laid eggs, boiled ham, Yorkshire pie, and other
cold substantials (of which heavy relays were constantly appearing
from another kitchen under the direction of a very plump servant),
was admirably adapted to the cold bleak morning, and received the
utmost justice from all parties. At last, it came to a close; and
the fire which had been lighted in the best parlour having by this
time burnt up, they adjourned thither, to hear what Nicholas had to
tell.

Nicholas told them all, and never was there a story which awakened
so many emotions in the breasts of two eager listeners. At one
time, honest John groaned in sympathy, and at another roared with
joy; at one time he vowed to go up to London on purpose to get a
sight of the brothers Cheeryble; and, at another, swore that Tim
Linkinwater should receive such a ham by coach, and carriage free,
as mortal knife had never carved. When Nicholas began to describe
Madeline, he sat with his mouth wide open, nudging Mrs Browdie from
time to time, and exclaiming under his breath that she must be
'raa'ther a tidy sart,' and when he heard at last that his young
friend had come down purposely to communicate his good fortune, and
to convey to him all those assurances of friendship which he could
not state with sufficient warmth in writing--that the only object of
his journey was to share his happiness with them, and to tell them
that when he was married they must come up to see him, and that
Madeline insisted on it as well as he--John could hold out no
longer, but after looking indignantly at his wife, and demanding to
know what she was whimpering for, drew his coat sleeve over his eyes
and blubbered outright.

'Tell'ee wa'at though,' said John seriously, when a great deal had
been said on both sides, 'to return to schoolmeasther. If this news
aboot 'un has reached school today, the old 'ooman wean't have a
whole boan in her boddy, nor Fanny neither.'

'Oh, John!' cried Mrs Browdie.

'Ah! and Oh, John agean,' replied the Yorkshireman. 'I dinnot know
what they lads mightn't do. When it first got aboot that
schoolmeasther was in trouble, some feythers and moothers sent and
took their young chaps awa'. If them as is left, should know waat's
coom tiv'un, there'll be sike a revolution and rebel!--Ding! But I
think they'll a' gang daft, and spill bluid like wather!'

In fact, John Browdie's apprehensions were so strong that he
determined to ride over to the school without delay, and invited
Nicholas to accompany him, which, however, he declined, pleading
that his presence might perhaps aggravate the bitterness of their
adversity.

'Thot's true!' said John; 'I should ne'er ha' thought o' thot.'

'I must return tomorrow,' said Nicholas, 'but I mean to dine with
you today, and if Mrs Browdie can give me a bed--'

'Bed!' cried John, 'I wish thou couldst sleep in fower beds at once.
Ecod, thou shouldst have 'em a'. Bide till I coom back; on'y bide
till I coom back, and ecod we'll make a day of it.'

Giving his wife a hearty kiss, and Nicholas a no less hearty shake
of the hand, John mounted his horse and rode off: leaving Mrs
Browdie to apply herself to hospitable preparations, and his young
friend to stroll about the neighbourhood, and revisit spots which
were rendered familiar to him by many a miserable association.

John cantered away, and arriving at Dotheboys Hall, tied his horse
to a gate and made his way to the schoolroom door, which he found
locked on the inside. A tremendous noise and riot arose from
within, and, applying his eye to a convenient crevice in the wall,
he did not remain long in ignorance of its meaning.

The news of Mr Squeers's downfall had reached Dotheboys; that was
quite clear. To all appearance, it had very recently become known
to the young gentlemen; for the rebellion had just broken out.

It was one of the brimstone-and-treacle mornings, and Mrs Squeers
had entered school according to custom with the large bowl and
spoon, followed by Miss Squeers and the amiable Wackford: who,
during his father's absence, had taken upon him such minor branches
of the executive as kicking the pupils with his nailed boots,
pulling the hair of some of the smaller boys, pinching the others in
aggravating places, and rendering himself, in various similar ways,
a great comfort and happiness to his mother. Their entrance,
whether by premeditation or a simultaneous impulse, was the signal
of revolt. While one detachment rushed to the door and locked it,
and another mounted on the desks and forms, the stoutest (and
consequently the newest) boy seized the cane, and confronting Mrs
Squeers with a stern countenance, snatched off her cap and beaver
bonnet, put them on his own head, armed himself with the wooden
spoon, and bade her, on pain of death, go down upon her knees and
take a dose directly. Before that estimable lady could recover
herself, or offer the slightest retaliation, she was forced into a
kneeling posture by a crowd of shouting tormentors, and compelled to
swallow a spoonful of the odious mixture, rendered more than usually
savoury by the immersion in the bowl of Master Wackford's head,
whose ducking was intrusted to another rebel. The success of this
first achievement prompted the malicious crowd, whose faces were
clustered together in every variety of lank and half-starved
ugliness, to further acts of outrage. The leader was insisting upon
Mrs Squeers repeating her dose, Master Squeers was undergoing
another dip in the treacle, and a violent assault had been commenced
on Miss Squeers, when John Browdie, bursting open the door with a
vigorous kick, rushed to the rescue. The shouts, screams, groans,
hoots, and clapping of hands, suddenly ceased, and a dead silence
ensued.

'Ye be noice chaps,' said John, looking steadily round. 'What's to
do here, thou yoong dogs?'

'Squeers is in prison, and we are going to run away!' cried a score
of shrill voices. 'We won't stop, we won't stop!'

'Weel then, dinnot stop,' replied John; 'who waants thee to stop?
Roon awa' loike men, but dinnot hurt the women.'

'Hurrah!' cried the shrill voices, more shrilly still.

'Hurrah?' repeated John. 'Weel, hurrah loike men too. Noo then,
look out. Hip--hip,--hip--hurrah!'

'Hurrah!' cried the voices.

'Hurrah! Agean;' said John. 'Looder still.'

The boys obeyed.

'Anoother!' said John. 'Dinnot be afeared on it. Let's have a good
'un!'

'Hurrah!'

'Noo then,' said John, 'let's have yan more to end wi', and then
coot off as quick as you loike. Tak'a good breath noo--Squeers be
in jail--the school's brokken oop--it's a' ower--past and gane--
think o' thot, and let it be a hearty 'un! Hurrah!'

Such a cheer arose as the walls of Dotheboys Hall had never echoed
before, and were destined never to respond to again. When the sound
had died away, the school was empty; and of the busy noisy crowd
which had peopled it but five minutes before, not one remained.

'Very well, Mr Browdie!' said Miss Squeers, hot and flushed from the
recent encounter, but vixenish to the last; 'you've been and excited
our boys to run away. Now see if we don't pay you out for that,
sir! If my pa IS unfortunate and trod down by henemies, we're not
going to be basely crowed and conquered over by you and 'Tilda.'

'Noa!' replied John bluntly, 'thou bean't. Tak' thy oath o' thot.
Think betther o' us, Fanny. I tell 'ee both, that I'm glod the auld
man has been caught out at last--dom'd glod--but ye'll sooffer eneaf
wi'out any crowin' fra' me, and I be not the mun to crow, nor be
Tilly the lass, so I tell 'ee flat. More than thot, I tell 'ee noo,
that if thou need'st friends to help thee awa' from this place--
dinnot turn up thy nose, Fanny, thou may'st--thou'lt foind Tilly and
I wi' a thout o' old times aboot us, ready to lend thee a hond. And
when I say thot, dinnot think I be asheamed of waa't I've deane, for
I say again, Hurrah! and dom the schoolmeasther. There!'

His parting words concluded, John Browdie strode heavily out,
remounted his nag, put him once more into a smart canter, and,
carolling lustily forth some fragments of an old song, to which the
horse's hoofs rang a merry accompaniment, sped back to his pretty
wife and to Nicholas.

For some days afterwards, the neighbouring country was overrun with
boys, who, the report went, had been secretly furnished by Mr and
Mrs Browdie, not only with a hearty meal of bread and meat, but with
sundry shillings and sixpences to help them on their way. To this
rumour John always returned a stout denial, which he accompanied,
however, with a lurking grin, that rendered the suspicious doubtful,
and fully confirmed all previous believers.

There were a few timid young children, who, miserable as they had
been, and many as were the tears they had shed in the wretched
school, still knew no other home, and had formed for it a sort of
attachment, which made them weep when the bolder spirits fled, and
cling to it as a refuge. Of these, some were found crying under
hedges and in such places, frightened at the solitude. One had a
dead bird in a little cage; he had wandered nearly twenty miles, and
when his poor favourite died, lost courage, and lay down beside him.
Another was discovered in a yard hard by the school, sleeping with a
dog, who bit at those who came to remove him, and licked the
sleeping child's pale face.

They were taken back, and some other stragglers were recovered, but
by degrees they were claimed, or lost again; and, in course of time,
Dotheboys Hall and its last breaking-up began to be forgotten by the
neighbours, or to be only spoken of as among the things that had
been.



CHAPTER 65

Conclusion


When her term of mourning had expired, Madeline gave her hand and
fortune to Nicholas; and, on the same day and at the same time, Kate
became Mrs Frank Cheeryble. It was expected that Tim Linkinwater
and Miss La Creevy would have made a third couple on the occasion,
but they declined, and two or three weeks afterwards went out
together one morning before breakfast, and, coming back with merry
faces, were found to have been quietly married that day.

The money which Nicholas acquired in right of his wife he invested
in the firm of Cheeryble Brothers, in which Frank had become a
partner. Before many years elapsed, the business began to be
carried on in the names of 'Cheeryble and Nickleby,' so that Mrs
Nickleby's prophetic anticipations were realised at last.

The twin brothers retired. Who needs to be told that THEY were
happy? They were surrounded by happiness of their own creation, and
lived but to increase it.

Tim Linkinwater condescended, after much entreaty and brow-beating,
to accept a share in the house; but he could never be prevailed upon
to suffer the publication of his name as a partner, and always
persisted in the punctual and regular discharge of his clerkly
duties.

He and his wife lived in the old house, and occupied the very
bedchamber in which he had slept for four-and-forty years. As his
wife grew older, she became even a more cheerful and light-hearted
little creature; and it was a common saying among their friends,
that it was impossible to say which looked the happier, Tim as he
sat calmly smiling in his elbow-chair on one side of the fire, or
his brisk little wife chatting and laughing, and constantly bustling
in and out of hers, on the other.

Dick, the blackbird, was removed from the counting-house and
promoted to a warm corner in the common sitting-room. Beneath his
cage hung two miniatures, of Mrs Linkinwater's execution; one
representing herself, and the other Tim; and both smiling very hard
at all beholders. Tim's head being powdered like a twelfth cake,
and his spectacles copied with great nicety, strangers detected a
close resemblance to him at the first glance, and this leading them
to suspect that the other must be his wife, and emboldening them to
say so without scruple, Mrs Linkinwater grew very proud of these
achievements in time, and considered them among the most successful
likenesses she had ever painted. Tim had the profoundest faith in
them, likewise; for on this, as on all other subjects, they held but
one opinion; and if ever there were a 'comfortable couple' in the
world, it was Mr and Mrs Linkinwater.

Ralph, having died intestate, and having no relations but those with
whom he had lived in such enmity, they would have become in legal
course his heirs. But they could not bear the thought of growing
rich on money so acquired, and felt as though they could never hope
to prosper with it. They made no claim to his wealth; and the
riches for which he had toiled all his days, and burdened his soul
with so many evil deeds, were swept at last into the coffers of the
state, and no man was the better or the happier for them.

Arthur Gride was tried for the unlawful possession of the will,
which he had either procured to be stolen, or had dishonestly
acquired and retained by other means as bad. By dint of an
ingenious counsel, and a legal flaw, he escaped; but only to undergo
a worse punishment; for, some years afterwards, his house was broken
open in the night by robbers, tempted by the rumours of his great
wealth, and he was found murdered in his bed.

Mrs Sliderskew went beyond the seas at nearly the same time as Mr
Squeers, and in the course of nature never returned. Brooker died
penitent. Sir Mulberry Hawk lived abroad for some years, courted
and caressed, and in high repute as a fine dashing fellow.
Ultimately, returning to this country, he was thrown into jail for
debt, and there perished miserably, as such high spirits generally
do.

The first act of Nicholas, when he became a rich and prosperous
merchant, was to buy his father's old house. As time crept on, and
there came gradually about him a group of lovely children, it was
altered and enlarged; but none of the old rooms were ever pulled
down, no old tree was ever rooted up, nothing with which there was
any association of bygone times was ever removed or changed.

Within a stone's throw was another retreat, enlivened by children's
pleasant voices too; and here was Kate, with many new cares and
occupations, and many new faces courting her sweet smile (and one so
like her own, that to her mother she seemed a child again), the same
true gentle creature, the same fond sister, the same in the love of
all about her, as in her girlish days.

Mrs Nickleby lived, sometimes with her daughter, and sometimes with
her son, accompanying one or other of them to London at those
periods when the cares of business obliged both families to reside
there, and always preserving a great appearance of dignity, and
relating her experiences (especially on points connected with the
management and bringing-up of children) with much solemnity and
importance. It was a very long time before she could be induced to
receive Mrs Linkinwater into favour, and it is even doubtful whether
she ever thoroughly forgave her.

There was one grey-haired, quiet, harmless gentleman, who, winter
and summer, lived in a little cottage hard by Nicholas's house, and,
when he was not there, assumed the superintendence of affairs. His
chief pleasure and delight was in the children, with whom he was a
child himself, and master of the revels. The little people could do
nothing without dear Newman Noggs.

The grass was green above the dead boy's grave, and trodden by feet
so small and light, that not a daisy drooped its head beneath their
pressure. Through all the spring and summertime, garlands of fresh
flowers, wreathed by infant hands, rested on the stone; and, when
the children came to change them lest they should wither and be
pleasant to him no longer, their eyes filled with tears, and they
spoke low and softly of their poor dead cousin.







 


Back to Full Books