第 65 页

note and enclosure that afternoon, 'Heaven ever bless you!'

So, at last, Clennam's purpose in remaining was attained, and he could

speak to Little Dorrit with nobody by. Maggy counted as nobody, and she

was by.

CHAPTER 32. More Fortune-Telling

Maggy sat at her work in her great white cap with its quantity of opaque

frilling hiding what profile she had (she had none to spare), and her

serviceable eye brought to bear upon her occupation, on the window side

of the room. What with her flapping cap, and what with her unserviceable

eye, she was quite partitioned off from her Little Mother, whose seat

was opposite the window. The tread and shuffle of feet on the pavement

of the yard had much diminished since the taking of the Chair, the tide

of Collegians having set strongly in the direction of Harmony. Some few

who had no music in their souls, or no money in their pockets, dawdled

about; and the old spectacle of the visitor-wife and the depressed

unseasoned prisoner still lingered in corners, as broken cobwebs and

such unsightly discomforts draggle in corners of other places. It was

the quietest time the College knew, saving the night hours when the

Collegians took the benefit of the act of sleep. The occasional rattle

of applause upon the tables of the Snuggery, denoted the successful

termination of a morsel of Harmony; or the responsive acceptance, by

the united children, of some toast or sentiment offered to them by their

Father. Occasionally, a vocal strain more sonorous than the generality

informed the listener that some boastful bass was in blue water, or in

the hunting field, or with the reindeer, or on the mountain, or among

the heather; but the Marshal of the Marshalsea knew better, and had got

him hard and fast.

As Arthur Clennam moved to sit down by the side of Little Dorrit, she

trembled so that she had much ado to hold her needle. Clennam gently

put his hand upon her work, and said, 'Dear Little Dorrit, let me lay it

down.'

She yielded it to him, and he put it aside. Her hands were then

nervously clasping together, but he took one of them. 'How seldom I have

seen you lately, Little Dorrit!'

'I have been busy, sir.'

'But I heard only to-day,' said Clennam, 'by mere accident, of your

having been with those good people close by me. Why not come to me,

then?'

'I--I don't know. Or rather, I thought you might be busy too. You

generally are now, are you not?'

He saw her trembling little form and her downcast face, and the eyes

that drooped the moment they were raised to his--he saw them almost with

as much concern as tenderness.

'My child, your manner is so changed!'

The trembling was now quite beyond her control. Softly withdrawing her

hand, and laying it in her other hand, she sat before him with her head

bent and her whole form trembling.

'My own Little Dorrit,' said Clennam, compassionately.

She burst into tears. Maggy looked round of a sudden, and stared for at

least a minute; but did not interpose. Clennam waited some little while

before he spoke again.

'I cannot bear,' he said then, 'to see you weep; but I hope this is a

relief to an overcharged heart.'

'Yes it is, sir. Nothing but that.'

'Well, well! I feared you would think too much of what passed here just

now. It is of no moment; not the least. I am only unfortunate to have

come in the way. Let it go by with these tears. It is not worth one of

them. One of them? Such an idle thing should be repeated, with my glad

consent, fifty times a day, to save you a moment's heart-ache, Little

Dorrit.'

She had taken courage now, and answered, far more in her usual manner,

'You are so good! But even if there was nothing else in it to be sorry

for and ashamed of, it is such a bad return to you--'

'Hush!' said Clennam, smiling and touching her lips with his hand.

'Forgetfulness in you who remember so many and so much, would be new

indeed. Shall I remind you that I am not, and that I never was, anything

but the friend whom you agreed to trust? No. You remember it, don't

you?'

'I try to do so, or I should have broken the promise just now, when my

mistaken brother was here. You will consider his bringing-up in this

place, and will not judge him hardly, poor fellow, I know!' In raising

her eyes with these words, she observed his face more nearly than she

had done yet, and said, with a quick change of tone, 'You have not been

ill, Mr Clennam?'

'No.'

'Nor tried? Nor hurt?' she asked him, anxiously.

It fell to Clennam now, to be not quite certain how to answer. He said

in reply:

'To speak the truth, I have been a little troubled, but it is over.

Do I show it so plainly? I ought to have more fortitude and self-command

than that. I thought I had. I must learn them of you. Who could teach me

better!'

He never thought that she saw in him what no one else could see. He

never thought that in the whole world there were no other eyes that

looked upon him with the same light and strength as hers.

'But it brings me to something that I wish to say,' he continued, 'and

therefore I will not quarrel even with my own face for telling tales

and being unfaithful to me. Besides, it is a privilege and pleasure to

confide in my Little Dorrit. Let me confess then, that, forgetting how

grave I was, and how old I was, and how the time for such things had

gone by me with the many years of sameness and little happiness that

made up my long life far away, without marking it--that, forgetting all

this, I fancied I loved some one.'

'Do I know her, sir?' asked Little Dorrit.

'No, my child.'

'Not the lady who has been kind to me for your sake?'

'Flora. No, no. Do you think--'

'I never quite thought so,' said Little Dorrit, more to herself than

him. 'I did wonder at it a little.'

'Well!' said Clennam, abiding by the feeling that had fallen on him in

the avenue on the night of the roses, the feeling that he was an

older man, who had done with that tender part of life, 'I found out my

mistake, and I thought about it a little--in short, a good deal--and got

wiser. Being wiser, I counted up my years and considered what I am, and

looked back, and looked forward, and found that I should soon be grey. I

found that I had climbed the hill, and passed the level ground upon the

top, and was descending quickly.'

If he had known the sharpness of the pain he caused the patient heart,

in speaking thus! While doing it, too, with the purpose of easing and

serving her.

'I found that the day when any such thing would have been graceful in

me, or good in me, or hopeful or happy for me or any one in connection

with me, was gone, and would never shine again.'

O! If he had known, if he had known! If he could have seen the dagger in

his hand, and the cruel wounds it struck in the faithful bleeding breast

of his Little Dorrit!

'All that is over, and I have turned my face from it. Why do I speak of

this to Little Dorrit? Why do I show you, my child, the space of years

that there is between us, and recall to you that I have passed, by the

amount of your whole life, the time that is present to you?'

'Because you trust me, I hope. Because you know that nothing can touch

you without touching me; that nothing can make you happy or unhappy, but

it must make me, who am so grateful to you, the same.'

He heard the thrill in her voice, he saw her earnest face, he saw her

clear true eyes, he saw the quickened bosom that would have joyfully

thrown itself before him to receive a mortal wound directed at his

breast, with the dying cry, 'I love him!' and the remotest suspicion

of the truth never dawned upon his mind. No. He saw the devoted little

creature with her worn shoes, in her common dress, in her jail-home; a

slender child in body, a strong heroine in soul; and the light of her

domestic story made all else dark to him.

'For those reasons assuredly, Little Dorrit, but for another too. So

far removed, so different, and so much older, I am the better fitted for

your friend and adviser. I mean, I am the more easily to be trusted;

and any little constraint that you might feel with another, may vanish

before me. Why have you kept so retired from me? Tell me.'

'I am better here. My place and use are here. I am much better here,'

said Little Dorrit, faintly.

'So you said that day upon the bridge. I thought of it much afterwards.

Have you no secret you could entrust to me, with hope and comfort, if

you would!'

'Secret? No, I have no secret,' said Little Dorrit in some trouble.

They had been speaking in low voices; more because it was natural to

what they said to adopt that tone, than with any care to reserve it from

Maggy at her work. All of a sudden Maggy stared again, and this time

spoke:

'I say! Little Mother!'

'Yes, Maggy.'

'If you an't got no secret of your own to tell him, tell him that about

the Princess. She had a secret, you know.'

'The Princess had a secret?' said Clennam, in some surprise. 'What

Princess was that, Maggy?'

'Lor! How you do go and bother a gal of ten,' said Maggy, 'catching the

poor thing up in that way. Whoever said the Princess had a secret? _I_

never said so.'

'I beg your pardon. I thought you did.'

'No, I didn't. How could I, when it was her as wanted to find it out? It

was the little woman as had the secret, and she was always a spinning at

her wheel. And so she says to her, why do you keep it there? And so the

t'other one says to her, no I don't; and so the t'other one says to her,

yes you do; and then they both goes to the cupboard, and there it is.

And she wouldn't go into the Hospital, and so she died. You know, Little

Mother; tell him that.

For it was a reg'lar good secret, that was!' cried Maggy, hugging

herself.

Arthur looked at Little Dorrit for help to comprehend this, and was

struck by seeing her so timid and red. But, when she told him that it

was only a Fairy Tale she had one day made up for Maggy, and that there

was nothing in it which she wouldn't be ashamed to tell again to anybody

else, even if she could remember it, he left the subject where it was.

However, he returned to his own subject by first entreating her to see

him oftener, and to remember that it was impossible to have a stronger

interest in her welfare than he had, or to be more set upon promoting it

than he was. When she answered fervently, she well knew that, she never

forgot it, he touched upon his second and more delicate point--the

suspicion he had formed.

'Little Dorrit,' he said, taking her hand again, and speaking lower than

he had spoken yet, so that even Maggy in the small room could not hear

him, 'another word. I have wanted very much to say this to you; I have

tried for opportunities. Don't mind me, who, for the matter of years,

might be your father or your uncle. Always think of me as quite an

old man. I know that all your devotion centres in this room, and

that nothing to the last will ever tempt you away from the duties you

discharge here. If I were not sure of it, I should, before now, have

implored you, and implored your father, to let me make some provision

for you in a more suitable place. But you may have an interest--I will

not say, now, though even that might be--may have, at another time,

an interest in some one else; an interest not incompatible with your

affection here.'

She was very, very pale, and silently shook her head.

'It may be, dear Little Dorrit.'

'No. No. No.' She shook her head, after each slow repetition of

the word, with an air of quiet desolation that he remembered long

afterwards. The time came when he remembered it well, long afterwards,

within those prison walls; within that very room.

'But, if it ever should be, tell me so, my dear child. Entrust the truth

to me, point out the object of such an interest to me, and I will try

with all the zeal, and honour, and friendship and respect that I feel

for you, good Little Dorrit of my heart, to do you a lasting service.'

'O thank you, thank you! But, O no, O no, O no!' She said this, looking

at him with her work-worn hands folded together, and in the same

resigned accents as before.

'I press for no confidence now. I only ask you to repose unhesitating

trust in me.'

'Can I do less than that, when you are so good!'

'Then you will trust me fully? Will have no secret unhappiness, or

anxiety, concealed from me?'

'Almost none.'

'And you have none now?'

She shook her head. But she was very pale.

'When I lie down to-night, and my thoughts come back--as they will, for

they do every night, even when I have not seen you--to this sad place, I

may believe that there is no grief beyond this room, now, and its usual

occupants, which preys on Little Dorrit's mind?'

She seemed to catch at these words--that he remembered, too, long

afterwards--and said, more brightly, 'Yes, Mr Clennam; yes, you may!'

The crazy staircase, usually not slow to give notice when any one was

coming up or down, here creaked under a quick tread, and a further sound

was heard upon it, as if a little steam-engine with more steam than it

knew what to do with, were working towards the room. As it approached,

which it did very rapidly, it laboured with increased energy; and,

after knocking at the door, it sounded as if it were stooping down and

snorting in at the keyhole.

Before Maggy could open the door, Mr Pancks, opening it from without,

stood without a hat and with his bare head in the wildest condition,

looking at Clennam and Little Dorrit, over her shoulder.