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once. A whisper passed among the elder collegians that he had been seen

at a mock auction in Moorfields, pretending to buy plated articles for

massive silver, and paying for them with the greatest liberality in

bank notes; but it never reached her ears. One evening she was alone at

work--standing up at the window, to save the twilight lingering above

the wall--when he opened the door and walked in.

She kissed and welcomed him; but was afraid to ask him any questions. He

saw how anxious and timid she was, and appeared sorry.

'I am afraid, Amy, you'll be vexed this time. Upon my life I am!'

'I am very sorry to hear you say so, Tip. Have you come back?'

'Why--yes.'

'Not expecting this time that what you had found would answer very well,

I am less surprised and sorry than I might have been, Tip.'

'Ah! But that's not the worst of it.'

'Not the worst of it?'

'Don't look so startled. No, Amy, not the worst of it. I have come back,

you see; but--DON'T look so startled--I have come back in what I may

call a new way. I am off the volunteer list altogether. I am in now, as

one of the regulars.'

'Oh! Don't say you are a prisoner, Tip! Don't, don't!'

'Well, I don't want to say it,' he returned in a reluctant tone; 'but if

you can't understand me without my saying it, what am I to do? I am in

for forty pound odd.'

For the first time in all those years, she sunk under her cares. She

cried, with her clasped hands lifted above her head, that it would kill

their father if he ever knew it; and fell down at Tip's graceless feet.

It was easier for Tip to bring her to her senses than for her to bring

him to understand that the Father of the Marshalsea would be beside

himself if he knew the truth. The thing was incomprehensible to Tip, and

altogether a fanciful notion. He yielded to it in that light only, when

he submitted to her entreaties, backed by those of his uncle and sister.

There was no want of precedent for his return; it was accounted for

to the father in the usual way; and the collegians, with a better

comprehension of the pious fraud than Tip, supported it loyally.

This was the life, and this the history, of the child of the Marshalsea

at twenty-two. With a still surviving attachment to the one miserable

yard and block of houses as her birthplace and home, she passed to and

fro in it shrinkingly now, with a womanly consciousness that she was

pointed out to every one. Since she had begun to work beyond the walls,

she had found it necessary to conceal where she lived, and to come and

go as secretly as she could, between the free city and the iron gates,

outside of which she had never slept in her life. Her original timidity

had grown with this concealment, and her light step and her little

figure shunned the thronged streets while they passed along them.

Worldly wise in hard and poor necessities, she was innocent in all

things else. Innocent, in the mist through which she saw her father,

and the prison, and the turbid living river that flowed through it and

flowed on.

This was the life, and this the history, of Little Dorrit; now going

home upon a dull September evening, observed at a distance by Arthur

Clennam. This was the life, and this the history, of Little Dorrit;

turning at the end of London Bridge, recrossing it, going back again,

passing on to Saint George's Church, turning back suddenly once more,

and flitting in at the open outer gate and little court-yard of the

Marshalsea.

CHAPTER 8. The Lock

Arthur Clennam stood in the street, waiting to ask some passer-by what

place that was. He suffered a few people to pass him in whose face there

was no encouragement to make the inquiry, and still stood pausing in the

street, when an old man came up and turned into the courtyard.

He stooped a good deal, and plodded along in a slow pre-occupied manner,

which made the bustling London thoroughfares no very safe resort for

him. He was dirtily and meanly dressed, in a threadbare coat, once blue,

reaching to his ankles and buttoned to his chin, where it vanished in

the pale ghost of a velvet collar. A piece of red cloth with which that

phantom had been stiffened in its lifetime was now laid bare, and poked

itself up, at the back of the old man's neck, into a confusion of grey

hair and rusty stock and buckle which altogether nearly poked his

hat off. A greasy hat it was, and a napless; impending over his eyes,

cracked and crumpled at the brim, and with a wisp of pocket-handkerchief

dangling out below it. His trousers were so long and loose, and his

shoes so clumsy and large, that he shuffled like an elephant; though how

much of this was gait, and how much trailing cloth and leather, no one

could have told. Under one arm he carried a limp and worn-out case,

containing some wind instrument; in the same hand he had a pennyworth

of snuff in a little packet of whitey-brown paper, from which he slowly

comforted his poor blue old nose with a lengthened-out pinch, as Arthur

Clennam looked at him. To this old man crossing the court-yard, he

preferred his inquiry, touching him on the shoulder. The old man stopped

and looked round, with the expression in his weak grey eyes of one whose

thoughts had been far off, and who was a little dull of hearing also.

'Pray, sir,' said Arthur, repeating his question, 'what is this place?'

'Ay! This place?' returned the old man, staying his pinch of snuff on

its road, and pointing at the place without looking at it. 'This is the

Marshalsea, sir.'

'The debtors' prison?'

'Sir,' said the old man, with the air of deeming it not quite necessary

to insist upon that designation, 'the debtors' prison.'

He turned himself about, and went on.

'I beg your pardon,' said Arthur, stopping him once more, 'but will you

allow me to ask you another question? Can any one go in here?'

'Any one can go IN,' replied the old man; plainly adding by the

significance of his emphasis, 'but it is not every one who can go out.'

'Pardon me once more. Are you familiar with the place?'

'Sir,' returned the old man, squeezing his little packet of snuff in his

hand, and turning upon his interrogator as if such questions hurt him.

'I am.'

'I beg you to excuse me. I am not impertinently curious, but have a good

object. Do you know the name of Dorrit here?'

'My name, sir,' replied the old man most unexpectedly, 'is Dorrit.'

Arthur pulled off his hat to him. 'Grant me the favour of half-a-dozen

words. I was wholly unprepared for your announcement, and hope that

assurance is my sufficient apology for having taken the liberty of

addressing you. I have recently come home to England after a long

absence. I have seen at my mother's--Mrs Clennam in the city--a young

woman working at her needle, whom I have only heard addressed or spoken

of as Little Dorrit. I have felt sincerely interested in her, and have

had a great desire to know something more about her. I saw her, not a

minute before you came up, pass in at that door.'

The old man looked at him attentively. 'Are you a sailor, sir?' he

asked. He seemed a little disappointed by the shake of the head that

replied to him. 'Not a sailor? I judged from your sunburnt face that you

might be. Are you in earnest, sir?'

'I do assure you that I am, and do entreat you to believe that I am, in

plain earnest.'

'I know very little of the world, sir,' returned the other, who had a

weak and quavering voice. 'I am merely passing on, like the shadow over

the sun-dial. It would be worth no man's while to mislead me; it would

really be too easy--too poor a success, to yield any satisfaction. The

young woman whom you saw go in here is my brother's child. My brother

is William Dorrit; I am Frederick. You say you have seen her at your

mother's (I know your mother befriends her), you have felt an interest

in her, and you wish to know what she does here. Come and see.'

He went on again, and Arthur accompanied him.

'My brother,' said the old man, pausing on the step and slowly facing

round again, 'has been here many years; and much that happens even among

ourselves, out of doors, is kept from him for reasons that I needn't

enter upon now. Be so good as to say nothing of my niece's working at

her needle. Be so good as to say nothing that goes beyond what is said

among us. If you keep within our bounds, you cannot well be wrong. Now!

Come and see.'

Arthur followed him down a narrow entry, at the end of which a key was

turned, and a strong door was opened from within. It admitted them into

a lodge or lobby, across which they passed, and so through another door

and a grating into the prison. The old man always plodding on before,

turned round, in his slow, stiff, stooping manner, when they came to the

turnkey on duty, as if to present his companion. The turnkey nodded; and

the companion passed in without being asked whom he wanted.

The night was dark; and the prison lamps in the yard, and the candles in

the prison windows faintly shining behind many sorts of wry old curtain

and blind, had not the air of making it lighter. A few people loitered

about, but the greater part of the population was within doors. The old

man, taking the right-hand side of the yard, turned in at the third or

fourth doorway, and began to ascend the stairs. 'They are rather dark,

sir, but you will not find anything in the way.'

He paused for a moment before opening a door on the second story. He had

no sooner turned the handle than the visitor saw Little Dorrit, and saw

the reason of her setting so much store by dining alone.

She had brought the meat home that she should have eaten herself, and

was already warming it on a gridiron over the fire for her father, clad

in an old grey gown and a black cap, awaiting his supper at the table.

A clean cloth was spread before him, with knife, fork, and spoon,

salt-cellar, pepper-box, glass, and pewter ale-pot. Such zests as his

particular little phial of cayenne pepper and his pennyworth of pickles

in a saucer, were not wanting.

She started, coloured deeply, and turned white. The visitor, more with

his eyes than by the slight impulsive motion of his hand, entreated her

to be reassured and to trust him.

'I found this gentleman,' said the uncle--'Mr Clennam, William, son of

Amy's friend--at the outer gate, wishful, as he was going by, of paying

his respects, but hesitating whether to come in or not. This is my

brother William, sir.'

'I hope,' said Arthur, very doubtful what to say, 'that my respect for

your daughter may explain and justify my desire to be presented to you,

sir.'

'Mr Clennam,' returned the other, rising, taking his cap off in the

flat of his hand, and so holding it, ready to put on again, 'you do me

honour. You are welcome, sir;' with a low bow. 'Frederick, a chair. Pray

sit down, Mr Clennam.'

He put his black cap on again as he had taken it off, and resumed his

own seat. There was a wonderful air of benignity and patronage in his

manner. These were the ceremonies with which he received the collegians.

'You are welcome to the Marshalsea, sir. I have welcomed many gentlemen

to these walls. Perhaps you are aware--my daughter Amy may have

mentioned that I am the Father of this place.'

'I--so I have understood,' said Arthur, dashing at the assertion.

'You know, I dare say, that my daughter Amy was born here. A good girl,

sir, a dear girl, and long a comfort and support to me. Amy, my dear,

put this dish on; Mr Clennam will excuse the primitive customs to which

we are reduced here. Is it a compliment to ask you if you would do me

the honour, sir, to--'

'Thank you,' returned Arthur. 'Not a morsel.'

He felt himself quite lost in wonder at the manner of the man, and that

the probability of his daughter's having had a reserve as to her family

history, should be so far out of his mind.

She filled his glass, put all the little matters on the table ready to

his hand, and then sat beside him while he ate his supper. Evidently in

observance of their nightly custom, she put some bread before herself,

and touched his glass with her lips; but Arthur saw she was troubled

and took nothing. Her look at her father, half admiring him and proud

of him, half ashamed for him, all devoted and loving, went to his inmost

heart.

The Father of the Marshalsea condescended towards his brother as an

amiable, well-meaning man; a private character, who had not arrived at

distinction. 'Frederick,' said he, 'you and Fanny sup at your lodgings

to-night, I know. What have you done with Fanny, Frederick?' 'She is

walking with Tip.'

'Tip--as you may know--is my son, Mr Clennam. He has been a little

wild, and difficult to settle, but his introduction to the world was

rather'--he shrugged his shoulders with a faint sigh, and looked round

the room--'a little adverse. Your first visit here, sir?'

'My first.'

'You could hardly have been here since your boyhood without my

knowledge. It very seldom happens that anybody--of any pretensions-any

pretensions--comes here without being presented to me.'

'As many as forty or fifty in a day have been introduced to my brother,'

said Frederick, faintly lighting up with a ray of pride.

'Yes!' the Father of the Marshalsea assented. 'We have even exceeded

that number. On a fine Sunday in term time, it is quite a Levee--quite

a Levee. Amy, my dear, I have been trying half the day to remember the

name of the gentleman from Camberwell who was introduced to me last

Christmas week by that agreeable coal-merchant who was remanded for six

months.'