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cried out, 'Here's another wedding!' and roared and leaped for joy.

'The world has gone mad, I think,' said the single gentleman, pressing

through the concourse with his supposed bride. 'Stand back here, will

you, and let me knock.'

Anything that makes a noise is satisfactory to a crowd. A score of

dirty hands were raised directly to knock for him, and seldom has a

knocker of equal powers been made to produce more deafening sounds than

this particular engine on the occasion in question. Having rendered

these voluntary services, the throng modestly retired a little,

preferring that the single gentleman should bear their consequences

alone.

'Now, sir, what do you want!' said a man with a large white bow at his

button-hole, opening the door, and confronting him with a very stoical

aspect.

'Who has been married here, my friend?' said the single gentleman.

'I have.'

'You! and to whom in the devil's name?'

'What right have you to ask?' returned the bridegroom, eyeing him from

top to toe.

'What right!' cried the single gentleman, drawing the arm of Kit's

mother more tightly through his own, for that good woman evidently had

it in contemplation to run away. 'A right you little dream of. Mind,

good people, if this fellow has been marrying a minor--tut, tut, that

can't be. Where is the child you have here, my good fellow. You call

her Nell. Where is she?'

As he propounded this question, which Kit's mother echoed, somebody in

a room near at hand, uttered a great shriek, and a stout lady in a

white dress came running to the door, and supported herself upon the

bridegroom's arm.

'Where is she!' cried this lady. 'What news have you brought me? What

has become of her?'

The single gentleman started back, and gazed upon the face of the late

Mrs Jarley (that morning wedded to the philosophic George, to the

eternal wrath and despair of Mr Slum the poet), with looks of

conflicting apprehension, disappointment, and incredulity. At length

he stammered out,

'I ask YOU where she is? What do you mean?'

'Oh sir!' cried the bride, 'If you have come here to do her any good,

why weren't you here a week ago?'

'She is not--not dead?' said the person to whom she addressed herself,

turning very pale.

'No, not so bad as that.'

'I thank God!' cried the single gentleman feebly. 'Let me come in.'

They drew back to admit him, and when he had entered, closed the door.

'You see in me, good people,' he said, turning to the newly-married

couple, 'one to whom life itself is not dearer than the two persons

whom I seek. They would not know me. My features are strange to them,

but if they or either of them are here, take this good woman with you,

and let them see her first, for her they both know. If you deny them

from any mistaken regard or fear for them, judge of my intentions by

their recognition of this person as their old humble friend.'

'I always said it!' cried the bride, 'I knew she was not a common

child! Alas, sir! we have no power to help you, for all that we could

do, has been tried in vain.'

With that, they related to him, without disguise or concealment, all

that they knew of Nell and her grandfather, from their first meeting

with them, down to the time of their sudden disappearance; adding

(which was quite true) that they had made every possible effort to

trace them, but without success; having been at first in great alarm

for their safety, as well as on account of the suspicions to which they

themselves might one day be exposed in consequence of their abrupt

departure. They dwelt upon the old man's imbecility of mind, upon the

uneasiness the child had always testified when he was absent, upon the

company he had been supposed to keep, and upon the increased depression

which had gradually crept over her and changed her both in health and

spirits. Whether she had missed the old man in the night, and knowing

or conjecturing whither he had bent his steps, had gone in pursuit, or

whether they had left the house together, they had no means of

determining. Certain they considered it, that there was but slender

prospect left of hearing of them again, and that whether their flight

originated with the old man, or with the child, there was now no hope

of their return. To all this, the single gentleman listened with the

air of a man quite borne down by grief and disappointment. He shed

tears when they spoke of the grandfather, and appeared in deep

affliction.

Not to protract this portion of our narrative, and to make short work

of a long story, let it be briefly written that before the interview

came to a close, the single gentleman deemed he had sufficient evidence

of having been told the truth, and that he endeavoured to force upon

the bride and bridegroom an acknowledgment of their kindness to the

unfriended child, which, however, they steadily declined accepting. In

the end, the happy couple jolted away in the caravan to spend their

honeymoon in a country excursion; and the single gentleman and Kit's

mother stood ruefully before their carriage-door.

'Where shall we drive you, sir?' said the post-boy.

'You may drive me,' said the single gentleman, 'to the--' He was not

going to add 'inn,' but he added it for the sake of Kit's mother; and

to the inn they went.

Rumours had already got abroad that the little girl who used to show

the wax-work, was the child of great people who had been stolen from

her parents in infancy, and had only just been traced. Opinion was

divided whether she was the daughter of a prince, a duke, an earl, a

viscount, or a baron, but all agreed upon the main fact, and that the

single gentleman was her father; and all bent forward to catch a

glimpse, though it were only of the tip of his noble nose, as he rode

away, desponding, in his four-horse chaise.

What would he have given to know, and what sorrow would have been saved

if he had only known, that at that moment both child and grandfather

were seated in the old church porch, patiently awaiting the

schoolmaster's return!

CHAPTER 48

Popular rumour concerning the single gentleman and his errand,

travelling from mouth to mouth, and waxing stronger in the marvellous

as it was bandied about--for your popular rumour, unlike the rolling

stone of the proverb, is one which gathers a deal of moss in its

wanderings up and down--occasioned his dismounting at the inn-door to

be looked upon as an exciting and attractive spectacle, which could

scarcely be enough admired; and drew together a large concourse of

idlers, who having recently been, as it were, thrown out of employment

by the closing of the wax-work and the completion of the nuptial

ceremonies, considered his arrival as little else than a special

providence, and hailed it with demonstrations of the liveliest joy.

Not at all participating in the general sensation, but wearing the

depressed and wearied look of one who sought to meditate on his

disappointment in silence and privacy, the single gentleman alighted,

and handed out Kit's mother with a gloomy politeness which impressed

the lookers-on extremely. That done, he gave her his arm and escorted

her into the house, while several active waiters ran on before as a

skirmishing party, to clear the way and to show the room which was

ready for their reception.

'Any room will do,' said the single gentleman. 'Let it be near at

hand, that's all.'

'Close here, sir, if you please to walk this way.'

'Would the gentleman like this room?' said a voice, as a little

out-of-the-way door at the foot of the well staircase flew briskly open

and a head popped out. 'He's quite welcome to it. He's as welcome as

flowers in May, or coals at Christmas. Would you like this room, sir?

Honour me by walking in. Do me the favour, pray.'

'Goodness gracious me!' cried Kit's mother, falling back in extreme

surprise, 'only think of this!'

She had some reason to be astonished, for the person who proffered the

gracious invitation was no other than Daniel Quilp. The little door

out of which he had thrust his head was close to the inn larder; and

there he stood, bowing with grotesque politeness; as much at his ease

as if the door were that of his own house; blighting all the legs of

mutton and cold roast fowls by his close companionship, and looking

like the evil genius of the cellars come from underground upon some

work of mischief.

'Would you do me the honour?' said Quilp.

'I prefer being alone,' replied the single gentleman.

'Oh!' said Quilp. And with that, he darted in again with one jerk and

clapped the little door to, like a figure in a Dutch clock when the

hour strikes.

'Why it was only last night, sir,' whispered Kit's mother, 'that I left

him in Little Bethel.'

'Indeed!' said her fellow-passenger. 'When did that person come here,

waiter?'

'Come down by the night-coach, this morning, sir.'

'Humph! And when is he going?'

'Can't say, sir, really. When the chambermaid asked him just now if he

should want a bed, sir, he first made faces at her, and then wanted to

kiss her.'

'Beg him to walk this way,' said the single gentleman. 'I should be

glad to exchange a word with him, tell him. Beg him to come at once,

do you hear?'

The man stared on receiving these instructions, for the single

gentleman had not only displayed as much astonishment as Kit's mother

at sight of the dwarf, but, standing in no fear of him, had been at

less pains to conceal his dislike and repugnance. He departed on his

errand, however, and immediately returned, ushering in its object.

'Your servant, sir,' said the dwarf, 'I encountered your messenger

half-way. I thought you'd allow me to pay my compliments to you. I

hope you're well. I hope you're very well.'

There was a short pause, while the dwarf, with half-shut eyes and

puckered face, stood waiting for an answer. Receiving none, he turned

towards his more familiar acquaintance.

'Christopher's mother!' he cried. 'Such a dear lady, such a worthy

woman, so blest in her honest son! How is Christopher's mother? Have

change of air and scene improved her? Her little family too, and

Christopher? Do they thrive? Do they flourish? Are they growing into

worthy citizens, eh?'

Making his voice ascend in the scale with every succeeding question, Mr

Quilp finished in a shrill squeak, and subsided into the panting look

which was customary with him, and which, whether it were assumed or

natural, had equally the effect of banishing all expression from his

face, and rendering it, as far as it afforded any index to his mood or

meaning, a perfect blank.

'Mr Quilp,' said the single gentleman.

The dwarf put his hand to his great flapped ear, and counterfeited the

closest attention.

'We two have met before--'

'Surely,' cried Quilp, nodding his head. 'Oh surely, sir. Such an

honour and pleasure--it's both, Christopher's mother, it's both--is

not to be forgotten so soon. By no means!'

'You may remember that the day I arrived in London, and found the house

to which I drove, empty and deserted, I was directed by some of the

neighbours to you, and waited upon you without stopping for rest or

refreshment?'

'How precipitate that was, and yet what an earnest and vigorous

measure!' said Quilp, conferring with himself, in imitation of his

friend Mr Sampson Brass.

'I found,' said the single gentleman, 'you most unaccountably, in

possession of everything that had so recently belonged to another man,

and that other man, who up to the time of your entering upon his

property had been looked upon as affluent, reduced to sudden beggary,

and driven from house and home.'

'We had warrant for what we did, my good sir,' rejoined Quilp, 'we had

our warrant. Don't say driven either. He went of his own

accord--vanished in the night, sir.'

'No matter,' said the single gentleman angrily. 'He was gone.'

'Yes, he was gone,' said Quilp, with the same exasperating composure.

'No doubt he was gone. The only question was, where. And it's a

question still.'

'Now, what am I to think,' said the single gentleman, sternly regarding

him, 'of you, who, plainly indisposed to give me any information

then--nay, obviously holding back, and sheltering yourself with all

kinds of cunning, trickery, and evasion--are dogging my footsteps now?'

'I dogging!' cried Quilp.

'Why, are you not?' returned his questioner, fretted into a state of

the utmost irritation. 'Were you not a few hours since, sixty miles

off, and in the chapel to which this good woman goes to say her

prayers?'

'She was there too, I think?' said Quilp, still perfectly unmoved. 'I

might say, if I was inclined to be rude, how do I know but you are

dogging MY footsteps. Yes, I was at chapel. What then? I've read in

books that pilgrims were used to go to chapel before they went on

journeys, to put up petitions for their safe return. Wise men!

journeys are very perilous--especially outside the coach. Wheels come

off, horses take fright, coachmen drive too fast, coaches overturn. I

always go to chapel before I start on journeys. It's the last thing I

do on such occasions, indeed.'

That Quilp lied most heartily in this speech, it needed no very great

penetration to discover, although for anything that he suffered to

appear in his face, voice, or manner, he might have been clinging to