Florence, Edith, and Mrs Skewton were together next day, and the
carriage was waiting at the door to take them out. For Cleopatra had
her galley again now, and Withers, no longer the-wan, stood upright in
a pigeon-breasted jacket and military trousers, behind her wheel-less
chair at dinner-time and butted no more. The hair of Withers was radiant
with pomatum, in these days of down, and he wore kid gloves and smelt of
the water of Cologne.

They were assembled in Cleopatra's room. The Serpent of old Nile (not
to mention her disrespectfully) was reposing on her sofa, sipping her
morning chocolate at three o'clock in the afternoon, and Flowers the
Maid was fastening on her youthful cuffs and frills, and performing a
kind of private coronation ceremony on her, with a peach-coloured velvet
bonnet; the artificial roses in which nodded to uncommon advantage, as
the palsy trifled with them, like a breeze.

'I think I am a little nervous this morning, Flowers,' said Mrs Skewton.
'My hand quite shakes.'

'You were the life of the party last night, Ma'am, you know,' returned
Flowers, 'and you suffer for it, to-day, you see.'

Edith, who had beckoned Florence to the window, and was looking out,
with her back turned on the toilet of her esteemed mother, suddenly
withdrew from it, as if it had lightened.

'My darling child,' cried Cleopatra, languidly, 'you are not nervous?
Don't tell me, my dear Edith, that you, so enviably self-possessed,
are beginning to be a martyr too, like your unfortunately constituted
mother! Withers, someone at the door.'

'Card, Ma'am,' said Withers, taking it towards Mrs Dombey.

'I am going out,' she said without looking at it.

'My dear love,' drawled Mrs Skewton, 'how very odd to send that message
without seeing the name! Bring it here, Withers. Dear me, my love; Mr
Carker, too! That very sensible person!'

'I am going out,' repeated Edith, in so imperious a tone that Withers,
going to the door, imperiously informed the servant who was waiting,
'Mrs Dombey is going out. Get along with you,' and shut it on him.

But the servant came back after a short absence, and whispered to
Withers again, who once more, and not very willingly, presented himself
before Mrs Dombey.

'If you please, Ma'am, Mr Carker sends his respectful compliments, and
begs you would spare him one minute, if you could--for business, Ma'am,
if you please.'

'Really, my love,' said Mrs Skewton in her mildest manner; for her
daughter's face was threatening; 'if you would allow me to offer a word,
I should recommend--'

'Show him this way,' said Edith. As Withers disappeared to execute
the command, she added, frowning on her mother, 'As he comes at your
recommendation, let him come to your room.'

'May I--shall I go away?' asked Florence, hurriedly.

Edith nodded yes, but on her way to the door Florence met the visitor
coming in. With the same disagreeable mixture of familiarity and
forbearance, with which he had first addressed her, he addressed her now
in his softest manner--hoped she was quite well--needed not to ask, with
such looks to anticipate the answer--had scarcely had the honour to know
her, last night, she was so greatly changed--and held the door open for
her to pass out; with a secret sense of power in her shrinking from
him, that all the deference and politeness of his manner could not quite
conceal.

He then bowed himself for a moment over Mrs Skewton's condescending
hand, and lastly bowed to Edith. Coldly returning his salute without
looking at him, and neither seating herself nor inviting him to be
seated, she waited for him to speak.

Entrenched in her pride and power, and with all the obduracy of her
spirit summoned about her, still her old conviction that she and her
mother had been known by this man in their worst colours, from their
first acquaintance; that every degradation she had suffered in her own
eyes was as plain to him as to herself; that he read her life as though
it were a vile book, and fluttered the leaves before her in slight
looks and tones of voice which no one else could detect; weakened
and undermined her. Proudly as she opposed herself to him, with her
commanding face exacting his humility, her disdainful lip repulsing
him, her bosom angry at his intrusion, and the dark lashes of her
eyes sullenly veiling their light, that no ray of it might shine upon
him--and submissively as he stood before her, with an entreating injured
manner, but with complete submission to her will--she knew, in her own
soul, that the cases were reversed, and that the triumph and superiority
were his, and that he knew it full well.

'I have presumed,' said Mr Carker, 'to solicit an interview, and I have
ventured to describe it as being one of business, because--'

'Perhaps you are charged by Mr Dombey with some message of reproof,'
said Edit 'You possess Mr Dombey's confidence in such an unusual degree,
Sir, that you would scarcely surprise me if that were your business.'

'I have no message to the lady who sheds a lustre upon his name,' said
Mr Carker. 'But I entreat that lady, on my own behalf to be just to a
very humble claimant for justice at her hands--a mere dependant of
Mr Dombey's--which is a position of humility; and to reflect upon my
perfect helplessness last night, and the impossibility of my avoiding
the share that was forced upon me in a very painful occasion.'

'My dearest Edith,' hinted Cleopatra in a low voice, as she held her
eye-glass aside, 'really very charming of Mr What's-his-name. And full
of heart!'

'For I do,' said Mr Carker, appealing to Mrs Skewton with a look of
grateful deference,--'I do venture to call it a painful occasion, though
merely because it was so to me, who had the misfortune to be present. So
slight a difference, as between the principals--between those who love
each other with disinterested devotion, and would make any sacrifice of
self in such a cause--is nothing. As Mrs Skewton herself expressed, with
so much truth and feeling last night, it is nothing.'

Edith could not look at him, but she said after a few moments.

'And your business, Sir--'

'Edith, my pet,' said Mrs Skewton, 'all this time Mr Carker is standing!
My dear Mr Carker, take a seat, I beg.'

He offered no reply to the mother, but fixed his eyes on the proud
daughter, as though he would only be bidden by her, and was resolved
to be bidden by her. Edith, in spite of herself sat down, and slightly
motioned with her hand to him to be seated too. No action could be
colder, haughtier, more insolent in its air of supremacy and disrespect,
but she had struggled against even that concession ineffectually, and it
was wrested from her. That was enough! Mr Carker sat down.

'May I be allowed, Madam,' said Carker, turning his white teeth on Mrs
Skewton like a light--'a lady of your excellent sense and quick feeling
will give me credit, for good reason, I am sure--to address what I have
to say, to Mrs Dombey, and to leave her to impart it to you who are her
best and dearest friend--next to Mr Dombey?'

Mrs Skewton would have retired, but Edith stopped her. Edith would have
stopped him too, and indignantly ordered him to speak openly or not at
all, but that he said, in a low Voice--'Miss Florence--the young lady
who has just left the room--'

Edith suffered him to proceed. She looked at him now. As he bent
forward, to be nearer, with the utmost show of delicacy and respect, and
with his teeth persuasively arrayed, in a self-depreciating smile, she
felt as if she could have struck him dead.

'Miss Florence's position,' he began, 'has been an unfortunate one.
I have a difficulty in alluding to it to you, whose attachment to her
father is naturally watchful and jealous of every word that applies to
him.' Always distinct and soft in speech, no language could describe the
extent of his distinctness and softness, when he said these words, or
came to any others of a similar import. 'But, as one who is devoted to
Mr Dombey in his different way, and whose life is passed in admiration
of Mr Dombey's character, may I say, without offence to your tenderness
as a wife, that Miss Florence has unhappily been neglected--by her
father. May I say by her father?'

Edith replied, 'I know it.'

'You know it!' said Mr Carker, with a great appearance of relief. 'It
removes a mountain from my breast. May I hope you know how the neglect
originated; in what an amiable phase of Mr Dombey's pride--character I
mean?'

'You may pass that by, Sir,' she returned, 'and come the sooner to the
end of what you have to say.'

'Indeed, I am sensible, Madam,' replied Carker,--'trust me, I am deeply
sensible, that Mr Dombey can require no justification in anything to
you. But, kindly judge of my breast by your own, and you will forgive my
interest in him, if in its excess, it goes at all astray.'

What a stab to her proud heart, to sit there, face to face with him, and
have him tendering her false oath at the altar again and again for her
acceptance, and pressing it upon her like the dregs of a sickening
cup she could not own her loathing of, or turn away from! How shame,
remorse, and passion raged within her, when, upright and majestic in her
beauty before him, she knew that in her spirit she was down at his feet!

'Miss Florence,' said Carker, 'left to the care--if one may call it
care--of servants and mercenary people, in every way her inferiors,
necessarily wanted some guide and compass in her younger days, and,
naturally, for want of them, has been indiscreet, and has in some degree
forgotten her station. There was some folly about one Walter, a common
lad, who is fortunately dead now: and some very undesirable association,
I regret to say, with certain coasting sailors, of anything but good
repute, and a runaway old bankrupt.'

'I have heard the circumstances, Sir,' said Edith, flashing her
disdainful glance upon him, 'and I know that you pervert them. You may
not know it. I hope so.'

'Pardon me,' said Mr Carker, 'I believe that nobody knows them so well
as I. Your generous and ardent nature, Madam--the same nature which is
so nobly imperative in vindication of your beloved and honoured husband,
and which has blessed him as even his merits deserve--I must respect,
defer to, bow before. But, as regards the circumstances, which is indeed
the business I presumed to solicit your attention to, I can have
no doubt, since, in the execution of my trust as Mr Dombey's
confidential--I presume to say--friend, I have fully ascertained them.
In my execution of that trust; in my deep concern, which you can so well
understand, for everything relating to him, intensified, if you will
(for I fear I labour under your displeasure), by the lower motive of
desire to prove my diligence, and make myself the more acceptable;
I have long pursued these circumstances by myself and trustworthy
instruments, and have innumerable and most minute proofs.'

She raised her eyes no higher than his mouth, but she saw the means of
mischief vaunted in every tooth it contained.

'Pardon me, Madam,' he continued, 'if in my perplexity, I presume to
take counsel with you, and to consult your pleasure. I think I have
observed that you are greatly interested in Miss Florence?'

What was there in her he had not observed, and did not know? Humbled
and yet maddened by the thought, in every new presentment of it, however
faint, she pressed her teeth upon her quivering lip to force composure
on it, and distantly inclined her head in reply.

'This interest, Madam--so touching an evidence of everything associated
with Mr Dombey being dear to you--induces me to pause before I make him
acquainted with these circumstances, which, as yet, he does not know.
It so shakes me, if I may make the confession, in my allegiance, that
on the intimation of the least desire to that effect from you, I would
suppress them.'

Edith raised her head quickly, and starting back, bent her dark glance
upon him. He met it with his blandest and most deferential smile, and
went on.

'You say that as I describe them, they are perverted. I fear not--I fear
not: but let us assume that they are. The uneasiness I have for some
time felt on the subject, arises in this: that the mere circumstance of
such association often repeated, on the part of Miss Florence, however
innocently and confidingly, would be conclusive with Mr Dombey, already
predisposed against her, and would lead him to take some step (I know
he has occasionally contemplated it) of separation and alienation of her
from his home. Madam, bear with me, and remember my intercourse with Mr
Dombey, and my knowledge of him, and my reverence for him, almost
from childhood, when I say that if he has a fault, it is a lofty
stubbornness, rooted in that noble pride and sense of power which belong
to him, and which we must all defer to; which is not assailable like the
obstinacy of other characters; and which grows upon itself from day to
day, and year to year.'

She bent her glance upon him still; but, look as steadfast as she would,
her haughty nostrils dilated, and her breath came somewhat deeper, and
her lip would slightly curl, as he described that in his patron to which
they must all bow down. He saw it; and though his expression did not
change, she knew he saw it.

'Even so slight an incident as last night's,' he said, 'if I might refer
to it once more, would serve to illustrate my meaning, better than a
greater one. Dombey and Son know neither time, nor place, nor season,
but bear them all down. But I rejoice in its occurrence, for it has
opened the way for me to approach Mrs Dombey with this subject
to-day, even if it has entailed upon me the penalty of her temporary
displeasure. Madam, in the midst of my uneasiness and apprehension on
this subject, I was summoned by Mr Dombey to Leamington. There I saw
you. There I could not help knowing what relation you would shortly
occupy towards him--to his enduring happiness and yours. There I
resolved to await the time of your establishment at home here, and to do
as I have now done. I have, at heart, no fear that I shall be wanting
in my duty to Mr Dombey, if I bury what I know in your breast; for
where there is but one heart and mind between two persons--as in such
a marriage--one almost represents the other. I can acquit my conscience
therefore, almost equally, by confidence, on such a theme, in you or
him. For the reasons I have mentioned I would select you. May I aspire
to the distinction of believing that my confidence is accepted, and that
I am relieved from my responsibility?'

He long remembered the look she gave him--who could see it, and forget
it?--and the struggle that ensued within her. At last she said:

'I accept it, Sir You will please to consider this matter at an end, and
that it goes no farther.'

He bowed low, and rose. She rose too, and he took leave with all
humility. But Withers, meeting him on the stairs, stood amazed at the
beauty of his teeth, and at his brilliant smile; and as he rode away
upon his white-legged horse, the people took him for a dentist, such was
the dazzling show he made. The people took her, when she rode out in her
carriage presently, for a great lady, as happy as she was rich and fine.
But they had not seen her, just before, in her own room with no one by;
and they had not heard her utterance of the three words, 'Oh Florence,
Florence!'

Mrs Skewton, reposing on her sofa, and sipping her chocolate, had heard
nothing but the low word business, for which she had a mortal aversion,
insomuch that she had long banished it from her vocabulary, and had gone
nigh, in a charming manner and with an immense amount of heart, to say
nothing of soul, to ruin divers milliners and others in consequence.
Therefore Mrs Skewton asked no questions, and showed no curiosity.
Indeed, the peach-velvet bonnet gave her sufficient occupation out of
doors; for being perched on the back of her head, and the day being
rather windy, it was frantic to escape from Mrs Skewton's company,
and would be coaxed into no sort of compromise. When the carriage was
closed, and the wind shut out, the palsy played among the artificial
roses again like an almshouse-full of superannuated zephyrs; and
altogether Mrs Skewton had enough to do, and got on but indifferently.

She got on no better towards night; for when Mrs Dombey, in her
dressing-room, had been dressed and waiting for her half an hour, and Mr
Dombey, in the drawing-room, had paraded himself into a state of solemn
fretfulness (they were all three going out to dinner), Flowers the Maid
appeared with a pale face to Mrs Dombey, saying:

'If you please, Ma'am, I beg your pardon, but I can't do nothing with
Missis!'

'What do you mean?' asked Edith.

'Well, Ma'am,' replied the frightened maid, 'I hardly know. She's making
faces!'

Edith hurried with her to her mother's room. Cleopatra was arrayed in
full dress, with the diamonds, short sleeves, rouge, curls, teeth, and
other juvenility all complete; but Paralysis was not to be deceived, had
known her for the object of its errand, and had struck her at her glass,
where she lay like a horrible doll that had tumbled down.

They took her to pieces in very shame, and put the little of her that
was real on a bed. Doctors were sent for, and soon came. Powerful
remedies were resorted to; opinions given that she would rally from this
shock, but would not survive another; and there she lay speechless, and
staring at the ceiling, for days; sometimes making inarticulate sounds
in answer to such questions as did she know who were present, and the
like: sometimes giving no reply either by sign or gesture, or in her
unwinking eyes.

At length she began to recover consciousness, and in some degree the
power of motion, though not yet of speech. One day the use of her right
hand returned; and showing it to her maid who was in attendance on her,
and appearing very uneasy in her mind, she made signs for a pencil and
some paper. This the maid immediately provided, thinking she was going
to make a will, or write some last request; and Mrs Dombey being from
home, the maid awaited the result with solemn feelings.

After much painful scrawling and erasing, and putting in of wrong
characters, which seemed to tumble out of the pencil of their own
accord, the old woman produced this document:

              'Rose-coloured curtains.'

The maid being perfectly transfixed, and with tolerable reason,
Cleopatra amended the manuscript by adding two words more, when it stood
thus:

              'Rose-coloured curtains for doctors.'

The maid now perceived remotely that she wished these articles to be
provided for the better presentation of her complexion to the faculty;
and as those in the house who knew her best, had no doubt of the
correctness of this opinion, which she was soon able to establish for
herself the rose-coloured curtains were added to her bed, and she mended
with increased rapidity from that hour. She was soon able to sit up,
in curls and a laced cap and nightgown, and to have a little artificial
bloom dropped into the hollow caverns of her cheeks.

It was a tremendous sight to see this old woman in her finery leering
and mincing at Death, and playing off her youthful tricks upon him as if
he had been the Major; but an alteration in her mind that ensued on the
paralytic stroke was fraught with as much matter for reflection, and was
quite as ghastly.

Whether the weakening of her intellect made her more cunning and false
than before, or whether it confused her between what she had assumed
to be and what she really had been, or whether it had awakened any
glimmering of remorse, which could neither struggle into light nor get
back into total darkness, or whether, in the jumble of her faculties,
a combination of these effects had been shaken up, which is perhaps the
more likely supposition, the result was this:--That she became hugely
exacting in respect of Edith's affection and gratitude and attention to
her; highly laudatory of herself as a most inestimable parent; and very
jealous of having any rival in Edith's regard. Further, in place of
remembering that compact made between them for an avoidance of the
subject, she constantly alluded to her daughter's marriage as a proof
of her being an incomparable mother; and all this, with the weakness and
peevishness of such a state, always serving for a sarcastic commentary
on her levity and youthfulness.

'Where is Mrs Dombey?' she would say to her maid.

'Gone out, Ma'am.'

'Gone out! Does she go out to shun her Mama, Flowers?'

'La bless you, no, Ma'am. Mrs Dombey has only gone out for a ride with
Miss Florence.'

'Miss Florence. Who's Miss Florence? Don't tell me about Miss Florence.
What's Miss Florence to her, compared to me?'

The apposite display of the diamonds, or the peach-velvet bonnet (she
sat in the bonnet to receive visitors, weeks before she could stir out
of doors), or the dressing of her up in some gaud or other, usually
stopped the tears that began to flow hereabouts; and she would remain in
a complacent state until Edith came to see her; when, at a glance of the
proud face, she would relapse again.

'Well, I am sure, Edith!' she would cry, shaking her head.

'What is the matter, mother?'

'Matter! I really don't know what is the matter. The world is coming to
such an artificial and ungrateful state, that I begin to think there's
no Heart--or anything of that sort--left in it, positively. Withers is
more a child to me than you are. He attends to me much more than my own
daughter. I almost wish I didn't look so young--and all that kind of
thing--and then perhaps I should be more considered.'

'What would you have, mother?'

'Oh, a great deal, Edith,' impatiently.

'Is there anything you want that you have not? It is your own fault if
there be.'

'My own fault!' beginning to whimper. 'The parent I have been to you,
Edith: making you a companion from your cradle! And when you neglect me,
and have no more natural affection for me than if I was a stranger--not
a twentieth part of the affection that you have for Florence--but I am
only your mother, and should corrupt her in a day!--you reproach me with
its being my own fault.'

'Mother, mother, I reproach you with nothing. Why will you always dwell
on this?'

'Isn't it natural that I should dwell on this, when I am all affection
and sensitiveness, and am wounded in the cruellest way, whenever you
look at me?'

'I do not mean to wound you, mother. Have you no remembrance of what has
been said between us? Let the Past rest.'

'Yes, rest! And let gratitude to me rest; and let affection for me
rest; and let me rest in my out-of-the-way room, with no society and
no attention, while you find new relations to make much of, who have
no earthly claim upon you! Good gracious, Edith, do you know what an
elegant establishment you are at the head of?'

'Yes. Hush!'

'And that gentlemanly creature, Dombey? Do you know that you are married
to him, Edith, and that you have a settlement and a position, and a
carriage, and I don't know what?'

'Indeed, I know it, mother; well.'

'As you would have had with that delightful good soul--what did they
call him?--Granger--if he hadn't died. And who have you to thank for all
this, Edith?'

'You, mother; you.'

'Then put your arms round my neck, and kiss me; and show me, Edith,
that you know there never was a better Mama than I have been to you. And
don't let me become a perfect fright with teasing and wearing myself at
your ingratitude, or when I'm out again in society no soul will know me,
not even that hateful animal, the Major.'

But, sometimes, when Edith went nearer to her, and bending down her
stately head, put her cold cheek to hers, the mother would draw back as
If she were afraid of her, and would fall into a fit of trembling, and
cry out that there was a wandering in her wits. And sometimes she would
entreat her, with humility, to sit down on the chair beside her bed, and
would look at her (as she sat there brooding) with a face that even the
rose-coloured curtains could not make otherwise than scared and wild.

The rose-coloured curtains blushed, in course of time, on Cleopatra's
bodily recovery, and on her dress--more juvenile than ever, to repair
the ravages of illness--and on the rouge, and on the teeth, and on
the curls, and on the diamonds, and the short sleeves, and the whole
wardrobe of the doll that had tumbled down before the mirror. They
blushed, too, now and then, upon an indistinctness in her speech which
she turned off with a girlish giggle, and on an occasional failing in
her memory, that had no rule in it, but came and went fantastically, as
if in mockery of her fantastic self.

But they never blushed upon a change in the new manner of her thought
and speech towards her daughter. And though that daughter often
came within their influence, they never blushed upon her loveliness
irradiated by a smile, or softened by the light of filial love, in its
stem beauty.

The next day, Carker comes to call on Edith. Florence hastily slips away to avoid him, and he meets with Edith and Mrs. Skewton. Carker claims that he is very uncomfortable with having been forced to witness a private altercation between husband and wife. Carker asks if he may speak to Edith alone, but she insists her mother stay. Carker says that he has noticed Florence's father neglects her, and that as a result, she has socialized with inappropriate individuals, including Walter. He says that he has proof that Florence has been socializing with Cuttle and Gills and others, and that while he has not yet told Dombey, he feels that he ought to. At the same time, he worries that the news will lead to Dombey severing ties with his daughter. He says has decided that telling her will be equivalent to telling Dombey, but as he departs Edith is very aware that this disclosure has been a form of threat and blackmail. Shortly afterwards, Mrs. Skewton suffers a stroke, leaving her bed-ridden and demanding


The forlorn Miss Tox, abandoned by her friend Louisa Chick, and bereft
of Mr Dombey's countenance--for no delicate pair of wedding cards,
united by a silver thread, graced the chimney-glass in Princess's
Place, or the harpsichord, or any of those little posts of display
which Lucretia reserved for holiday occupation--became depressed in her
spirits, and suffered much from melancholy. For a time the Bird Waltz
was unheard in Princess's Place, the plants were neglected, and dust
collected on the miniature of Miss Tox's ancestor with the powdered head
and pigtail.

Miss Tox, however, was not of an age or of a disposition long to abandon
herself to unavailing regrets. Only two notes of the harpsichord were
dumb from disuse when the Bird Waltz again warbled and trilled in
the crooked drawing-room: only one slip of geranium fell a victim to
imperfect nursing, before she was gardening at her green baskets again,
regularly every morning; the powdered-headed ancestor had not been under
a cloud for more than six weeks, when Miss Tox breathed on his benignant
visage, and polished him up with a piece of wash-leather.

Still, Miss Tox was lonely, and at a loss. Her attachments, however
ludicrously shown, were real and strong; and she was, as she expressed
it, 'deeply hurt by the unmerited contumely she had met with from
Louisa.' But there was no such thing as anger in Miss Tox's composition.
If she had ambled on through life, in her soft spoken way, without any
opinions, she had, at least, got so far without any harsh passions.
The mere sight of Louisa Chick in the street one day, at a considerable
distance, so overpowered her milky nature, that she was fain to seek
immediate refuge in a pastrycook's, and there, in a musty little back
room usually devoted to the consumption of soups, and pervaded by an
ox-tail atmosphere, relieve her feelings by weeping plentifully.

Against Mr Dombey Miss Tox hardly felt that she had any reason of
complaint. Her sense of that gentleman's magnificence was such, that
once removed from him, she felt as if her distance always had been
immeasurable, and as if he had greatly condescended in tolerating her at
all. No wife could be too handsome or too stately for him, according to
Miss Tox's sincere opinion. It was perfectly natural that in looking
for one, he should look high. Miss Tox with tears laid down this
proposition, and fully admitted it, twenty times a day. She never
recalled the lofty manner in which Mr Dombey had made her subservient to
his convenience and caprices, and had graciously permitted her to be
one of the nurses of his little son. She only thought, in her own words,
'that she had passed a great many happy hours in that house, which she
must ever remember with gratification, and that she could never cease to
regard Mr Dombey as one of the most impressive and dignified of men.'

Cut off, however, from the implacable Louisa, and being shy of the Major
(whom she viewed with some distrust now), Miss Tox found it very irksome
to know nothing of what was going on in Mr Dombey's establishment. And
as she really had got into the habit of considering Dombey and Son as
the pivot on which the world in general turned, she resolved, rather
than be ignorant of intelligence which so strongly interested her, to
cultivate her old acquaintance, Mrs Richards, who she knew, since
her last memorable appearance before Mr Dombey, was in the habit of
sometimes holding communication with his servants. Perhaps Miss Tox,
in seeking out the Toodle family, had the tender motive hidden in her
breast of having somebody to whom she could talk about Mr Dombey, no
matter how humble that somebody might be.

At all events, towards the Toodle habitation Miss Tox directed her steps
one evening, what time Mr Toodle, cindery and swart, was refreshing
himself with tea, in the bosom of his family. Mr Toodle had only three
stages of existence. He was either taking refreshment in the bosom just
mentioned, or he was tearing through the country at from twenty-five
to fifty miles an hour, or he was sleeping after his fatigues. He was
always in a whirlwind or a calm, and a peaceable, contented, easy-going
man Mr Toodle was in either state, who seemed to have made over all his
own inheritance of fuming and fretting to the engines with which he was
connected, which panted, and gasped, and chafed, and wore themselves
out, in a most unsparing manner, while Mr Toodle led a mild and equable
life.

'Polly, my gal,' said Mr Toodle, with a young Toodle on each knee, and
two more making tea for him, and plenty more scattered about--Mr Toodle
was never out of children, but always kept a good supply on hand--'you
ain't seen our Biler lately, have you?'

'No,' replied Polly, 'but he's almost certain to look in tonight. It's
his right evening, and he's very regular.'

'I suppose,' said Mr Toodle, relishing his meal infinitely, 'as our
Biler is a doin' now about as well as a boy can do, eh, Polly?'

'Oh! he's a doing beautiful!' responded Polly.

'He ain't got to be at all secret-like--has he, Polly?' inquired Mr
Toodle.

'No!' said Mrs Toodle, plumply.

'I'm glad he ain't got to be at all secret-like, Polly,' observed Mr
Toodle in his slow and measured way, and shovelling in his bread and
butter with a clasp knife, as if he were stoking himself, 'because that
don't look well; do it, Polly?'

'Why, of course it don't, father. How can you ask!'

'You see, my boys and gals,' said Mr Toodle, looking round upon his
family, 'wotever you're up to in a honest way, it's my opinion as you
can't do better than be open. If you find yourselves in cuttings or in
tunnels, don't you play no secret games. Keep your whistles going, and
let's know where you are.'

The rising Toodles set up a shrill murmur, expressive of their
resolution to profit by the paternal advice.

'But what makes you say this along of Rob, father?' asked his wife,
anxiously.

'Polly, old 'ooman,' said Mr Toodle, 'I don't know as I said it
partickler along o' Rob, I'm sure. I starts light with Rob only; I comes
to a branch; I takes on what I finds there; and a whole train of ideas
gets coupled on to him, afore I knows where I am, or where they
comes from. What a Junction a man's thoughts is,' said Mr Toodle,
'to-be-sure!'

This profound reflection Mr Toodle washed down with a pint mug of tea,
and proceeded to solidify with a great weight of bread and butter;
charging his young daughters meanwhile, to keep plenty of hot water in
the pot, as he was uncommon dry, and should take the indefinite quantity
of 'a sight of mugs,' before his thirst was appeased.

In satisfying himself, however, Mr Toodle was not regardless of the
younger branches about him, who, although they had made their own
evening repast, were on the look-out for irregular morsels, as
possessing a relish. These he distributed now and then to the expectant
circle, by holding out great wedges of bread and butter, to be bitten
at by the family in lawful succession, and by serving out small doses of
tea in like manner with a spoon; which snacks had such a relish in the
mouths of these young Toodles, that, after partaking of the same, they
performed private dances of ecstasy among themselves, and stood on
one leg apiece, and hopped, and indulged in other saltatory tokens of
gladness. These vents for their excitement found, they gradually closed
about Mr Toodle again, and eyed him hard as he got through more bread
and butter and tea; affecting, however, to have no further expectations
of their own in reference to those viands, but to be conversing on
foreign subjects, and whispering confidentially.

Mr Toodle, in the midst of this family group, and setting an awful
example to his children in the way of appetite, was conveying the two
young Toodles on his knees to Birmingham by special engine, and was
contemplating the rest over a barrier of bread and butter, when Rob the
Grinder, in his sou'wester hat and mourning slops, presented himself,
and was received with a general rush of brothers and sisters.

'Well, mother!' said Rob, dutifully kissing her; 'how are you, mother?'

'There's my boy!' cried Polly, giving him a hug and a pat on the back.
'Secret! Bless you, father, not he!'

This was intended for Mr Toodle's private edification, but Rob the
Grinder, whose withers were not unwrung, caught the words as they were
spoken.

'What! father's been a saying something more again me, has he?' cried
the injured innocent. 'Oh, what a hard thing it is that when a cove
has once gone a little wrong, a cove's own father should be always
a throwing it in his face behind his back! It's enough,' cried Rob,
resorting to his coat-cuff in anguish of spirit, 'to make a cove go and
do something, out of spite!'

'My poor boy!' cried Polly, 'father didn't mean anything.'

'If father didn't mean anything,' blubbered the injured Grinder, 'why
did he go and say anything, mother? Nobody thinks half so bad of me as
my own father does. What a unnatural thing! I wish somebody'd take and
chop my head off. Father wouldn't mind doing it, I believe, and I'd much
rather he did that than t'other.'

At these desperate words all the young Toodles shrieked; a pathetic
effect, which the Grinder improved by ironically adjuring them not to
cry for him, for they ought to hate him, they ought, if they was good
boys and girls; and this so touched the youngest Toodle but one, who was
easily moved, that it touched him not only in his spirit but in his wind
too; making him so purple that Mr Toodle in consternation carried him
out to the water-butt, and would have put him under the tap, but for his
being recovered by the sight of that instrument.

Matters having reached this point, Mr Toodle explained, and the virtuous
feelings of his son being thereby calmed, they shook hands, and harmony
reigned again.

'Will you do as I do, Biler, my boy?' inquired his father, returning to
his tea with new strength.

'No, thank'ee, father. Master and I had tea together.'

'And how is master, Rob?' said Polly.

'Well, I don't know, mother; not much to boast on. There ain't no
bis'ness done, you see. He don't know anything about it--the Cap'en
don't. There was a man come into the shop this very day, and says, "I
want a so-and-so," he says--some hard name or another. "A which?" says
the Cap'en. "A so-and-so," says the man. "Brother," says the Cap'en,
"will you take a observation round the shop." "Well," says the man,
"I've done." "Do you see wot you want?" says the Cap'en "No, I don't,"
says the man. "Do you know it wen you do see it?" says the Cap'en. "No,
I don't," says the man. "Why, then I tell you wot, my lad," says the
Cap'en, "you'd better go back and ask wot it's like, outside, for no
more don't I!"'

'That ain't the way to make money, though, is it?' said Polly.

'Money, mother! He'll never make money. He has such ways as I never see.
He ain't a bad master though, I'll say that for him. But that ain't much
to me, for I don't think I shall stop with him long.'

'Not stop in your place, Rob!' cried his mother; while Mr Toodle opened
his eyes.

'Not in that place, p'raps,' returned the Grinder, with a wink. 'I
shouldn't wonder--friends at court you know--but never you mind, mother,
just now; I'm all right, that's all.'

The indisputable proof afforded in these hints, and in the Grinder's
mysterious manner, of his not being subject to that failing which Mr
Toodle had, by implication, attributed to him, might have led to a
renewal of his wrongs, and of the sensation in the family, but for the
opportune arrival of another visitor, who, to Polly's great surprise,
appeared at the door, smiling patronage and friendship on all there.

'How do you do, Mrs Richards?' said Miss Tox. 'I have come to see you.
May I come in?'

The cheery face of Mrs Richards shone with a hospitable reply, and Miss
Tox, accepting the proffered chair, and grab fully recognising Mr Toodle
on her way to it, untied her bonnet strings, and said that in the first
place she must beg the dear children, one and all, to come and kiss her.

The ill-starred youngest Toodle but one, who would appear, from the
frequency of his domestic troubles, to have been born under an
unlucky planet, was prevented from performing his part in this general
salutation by having fixed the sou'wester hat (with which he had been
previously trifling) deep on his head, hind side before, and being
unable to get it off again; which accident presenting to his terrified
imagination a dismal picture of his passing the rest of his days in
darkness, and in hopeless seclusion from his friends and family, caused
him to struggle with great violence, and to utter suffocating cries.
Being released, his face was discovered to be very hot, and red, and
damp; and Miss Tox took him on her lap, much exhausted.

'You have almost forgotten me, Sir, I daresay,' said Miss Tox to Mr
Toodle.

'No, Ma'am, no,' said Toodle. 'But we've all on us got a little older
since then.'

'And how do you find yourself, Sir?' inquired Miss Tox, blandly.

'Hearty, Ma'am, thank'ee,' replied Toodle. 'How do you find yourself,
Ma'am? Do the rheumaticks keep off pretty well, Ma'am? We must all
expect to grow into 'em, as we gets on.'

'Thank you,' said Miss Tox. 'I have not felt any inconvenience from that
disorder yet.'

'You're wery fortunate, Ma'am,' returned Mr Toodle. 'Many people at
your time of life, Ma'am, is martyrs to it. There was my mother--' But
catching his wife's eye here, Mr Toodle judiciously buried the rest in
another mug of tea.

'You never mean to say, Mrs Richards,' cried Miss Tox, looking at Rob,
'that that is your--'

'Eldest, Ma'am,' said Polly. 'Yes, indeed, it is. That's the little
fellow, Ma'am, that was the innocent cause of so much.'

'This here, Ma'am,' said Toodle, 'is him with the short legs--and they
was,' said Mr Toodle, with a touch of poetry in his tone, 'unusual short
for leathers--as Mr Dombey made a Grinder on.'

The recollection almost overpowered Miss Tox. The subject of it had a
peculiar interest for her directly. She asked him to shake hands, and
congratulated his mother on his frank, ingenuous face. Rob, overhearing
her, called up a look, to justify the eulogium, but it was hardly the
right look.

'And now, Mrs Richards,' said Miss Tox,--'and you too, Sir,' addressing
Toodle--'I'll tell you, plainly and truly, what I have come here for.
You may be aware, Mrs Richards--and, possibly, you may be aware too,
Sir--that a little distance has interposed itself between me and some of
my friends, and that where I used to visit a good deal, I do not visit
now.'

Polly, who, with a woman's tact, understood this at once, expressed as
much in a little look. Mr Toodle, who had not the faintest idea of what
Miss Tox was talking about, expressed that also, in a stare.

'Of course,' said Miss Tox, 'how our little coolness has arisen is of no
moment, and does not require to be discussed. It is sufficient for me to
say, that I have the greatest possible respect for, and interest in,
Mr Dombey;' Miss Tox's voice faltered; 'and everything that relates to
him.'

Mr Toodle, enlightened, shook his head, and said he had heerd it said,
and, for his own part, he did think, as Mr Dombey was a difficult
subject.

'Pray don't say so, Sir, if you please,' returned Miss Tox. 'Let me
entreat you not to say so, Sir, either now, or at any future time. Such
observations cannot but be very painful to me; and to a gentleman,
whose mind is constituted as, I am quite sure, yours is, can afford no
permanent satisfaction.'

Mr Toodle, who had not entertained the least doubt of offering a remark
that would be received with acquiescence, was greatly confounded.

'All that I wish to say, Mrs Richards,' resumed Miss Tox,--'and I
address myself to you too, Sir,--is this. That any intelligence of the
proceedings of the family, of the welfare of the family, of the health
of the family, that reaches you, will be always most acceptable to me.
That I shall be always very glad to chat with Mrs Richards about the
family, and about old time And as Mrs Richards and I never had the least
difference (though I could wish now that we had been better acquainted,
but I have no one but myself to blame for that), I hope she will not
object to our being very good friends now, and to my coming backwards
and forwards here, when I like, without being a stranger. Now, I really
hope, Mrs Richards,' said Miss Tox--earnestly, 'that you will take this,
as I mean it, like a good-humoured creature, as you always were.'

Polly was gratified, and showed it. Mr Toodle didn't know whether he was
gratified or not, and preserved a stolid calmness.

'You see, Mrs Richards,' said Miss Tox--'and I hope you see too,
Sir--there are many little ways in which I can be slightly useful
to you, if you will make no stranger of me; and in which I shall be
delighted to be so. For instance, I can teach your children something.
I shall bring a few little books, if you'll allow me, and some work,
and of an evening now and then, they'll learn--dear me, they'll learn a
great deal, I trust, and be a credit to their teacher.'

Mr Toodle, who had a great respect for learning, jerked his head
approvingly at his wife, and moistened his hands with dawning
satisfaction.

'Then, not being a stranger, I shall be in nobody's way,' said Miss Tox,
'and everything will go on just as if I were not here. Mrs Richards will
do her mending, or her ironing, or her nursing, whatever it is, without
minding me: and you'll smoke your pipe, too, if you're so disposed, Sir,
won't you?'

'Thank'ee, Mum,' said Mr Toodle. 'Yes; I'll take my bit of backer.'

'Very good of you to say so, Sir,' rejoined Miss Tox, 'and I really do
assure you now, unfeignedly, that it will be a great comfort to me, and
that whatever good I may be fortunate enough to do the children, you
will more than pay back to me, if you'll enter into this little bargain
comfortably, and easily, and good-naturedly, without another word about
it.'

The bargain was ratified on the spot; and Miss Tox found herself so
much at home already, that without delay she instituted a preliminary
examination of the children all round--which Mr Toodle much admired--and
booked their ages, names, and acquirements, on a piece of paper. This
ceremony, and a little attendant gossip, prolonged the time until after
their usual hour of going to bed, and detained Miss Tox at the Toodle
fireside until it was too late for her to walk home alone. The gallant
Grinder, however, being still there, politely offered to attend her to
her own door; and as it was something to Miss Tox to be seen home by a
youth whom Mr Dombey had first inducted into those manly garments which
are rarely mentioned by name, she very readily accepted the proposal.

After shaking hands with Mr Toodle and Polly, and kissing all the
children, Miss Tox left the house, therefore, with unlimited popularity,
and carrying away with her so light a heart that it might have given Mrs
Chick offence if that good lady could have weighed it.

Rob the Grinder, in his modesty, would have walked behind, but Miss Tox
desired him to keep beside her, for conversational purposes; and, as she
afterwards expressed it to his mother, 'drew him out,' upon the road.

He drew out so bright, and clear, and shining, that Miss Tox was charmed
with him. The more Miss Tox drew him out, the finer he came--like wire.
There never was a better or more promising youth--a more affectionate,
steady, prudent, sober, honest, meek, candid young man--than Rob drew
out, that night.

'I am quite glad,' said Miss Tox, arrived at her own door, 'to know you.
I hope you'll consider me your friend, and that you'll come and see me
as often as you like. Do you keep a money-box?'

'Yes, Ma'am,' returned Rob; 'I'm saving up, against I've got enough to
put in the Bank, Ma'am.

'Very laudable indeed,' said Miss Tox. 'I'm glad to hear it. Put this
half-crown into it, if you please.'

'Oh thank you, Ma'am,' replied Rob, 'but really I couldn't think of
depriving you.'

'I commend your independent spirit,' said Miss Tox, 'but it's no
deprivation, I assure you. I shall be offended if you don't take it, as
a mark of my good-will. Good-night, Robin.'

'Good-night, Ma'am,' said Rob, 'and thank you!'

Who ran sniggering off to get change, and tossed it away with a pieman.
But they never taught honour at the Grinders' School, where the system
that prevailed was particularly strong in the engendering of hypocrisy.
Insomuch, that many of the friends and masters of past Grinders said,
if this were what came of education for the common people, let us
have none. Some more rational said, let us have a better one. But the
governing powers of the Grinders' Company were always ready for them, by
picking out a few boys who had turned out well in spite of the system,
and roundly asserting that they could have only turned out well because
of it. Which settled the business of those objectors out of hand, and
established the glory of the Grinders' Institution.

Miss Tox is now very lonely, cut off from Mrs. Chick and any news of the Dombey family. She decides to seek out the Toodle family to give her someone to talk to. She arrives as the Toodle family is visiting with Rob, who is explaining that Cuttle is doing a bad job of running the instrument shop. Miss Tox explains that she has lost contact with Mrs. Chick and she will always be happy to hear anything about the Dombey family. She asks if she can visit, and make herself useful by teaching their numerous children. At the end of the night, Rob accompanies Miss Tox home and she is very impressed with him

This section plays with the theme of both failed and rekindled hopes. On the one hand, it seems increasingly clear that Walter's ship has been wrecked, and he has perished. However, the uncertain nature of there being no body to offer confirmation of his death makes this series of events difficult for others to accept, and the question of whether hope should be held out for his return haunts Cuttle. Moreover, Cuttle's basic hope and trust in human nature receives a serious blow: when he realizes that Carker lied to him and manipulated him, he is forced to confront the reality that not everyone can be trusted. The impact of that blow is clearly seen in the isolation Cuttle experiences. At the same time, however, he is unwilling to accept that Sol is also lost, and stubbornly nurses hope of his friend's return. In a parallel fashion, Miss Tox has very good reason to accept that her relations with the Dombey family are over, and yet she stubbornly clings to the hope of knowing what is happening with the family, initiating a relationship with the Toodle family for this purpose. In a novel with many characters and various plots, Dickens often uses these types of parallel experiences to highlight a shared, communal similarity between otherwise very different individuals. At the same time, Florence's initially bright hopes for a new family dynamic are challenged. It is clear that the relationship between her father and Edith is not a loving one, and shows few signs of improving. Not only will it not help Florence to draw closer to her father, but it also seems that she will be caught up in the middle, and used as a kind of pawn. The introduction of another plot develops the themes of disappointed hopes and bad parenting, as well as offering additional support for Carker's villainy. Alice Marwood serves as a foil character to Edith: like Edith, a greedy mother corrupted her in her youth. However, Alice's experiences have been much harsher for two reasons: she has explicitly transgressed against Victorian sexual norms, first by living as Carker's mistress, and then by working as a prostitute. While Edith may be ashamed of her behavior, she has still always behaved in ways that are socially sanctioned, and even encouraged. The key to this difference, as Alice makes clear, is the difference in their social standing. Because of their aristocratic heritage, Edith may be bought and sold, but it will be as a wife, ensuring she has legal rights and protections. For a poor woman like Alice, the best to hope for was an illicit position as a mistress; therefore, when Carker discarded her, she had no recourse. Alice's storyline also highlights the idea of vengeance and eventual consequences. Although it seems like Carker is profiting from his schemes as he draws ever more intimately into the Dombey family, Alice and her mother's hatred and desire to punish him shows that his past may still catch up with him. By extension, this also suggests that Dombey may eventually face consequences for the way he cruelly discards people around him.


Time, sure of foot and strong of will, had so pressed onward, that the
year enjoined by the old Instrument-maker, as the term during which his
friend should refrain from opening the sealed packet accompanying the
letter he had left for him, was now nearly expired, and Captain Cuttle
began to look at it, of an evening, with feelings of mystery and
uneasiness.

The Captain, in his honour, would as soon have thought of opening the
parcel one hour before the expiration of the term, as he would have
thought of opening himself, to study his own anatomy. He merely brought
it out, at a certain stage of his first evening pipe, laid it on the
table, and sat gazing at the outside of it, through the smoke, in silent
gravity, for two or three hours at a spell. Sometimes, when he had
contemplated it thus for a pretty long while, the Captain would hitch
his chair, by degrees, farther and farther off, as if to get beyond
the range of its fascination; but if this were his design, he never
succeeded: for even when he was brought up by the parlour wall, the
packet still attracted him; or if his eyes, in thoughtful wandering,
roved to the ceiling or the fire, its image immediately followed, and
posted itself conspicuously among the coals, or took up an advantageous
position on the whitewash.

In respect of Heart's Delight, the Captain's parental and admiration
knew no change. But since his last interview with Mr Carker, Captain
Cuttle had come to entertain doubts whether his former intervention in
behalf of that young lady and his dear boy Wal'r, had proved altogether
so favourable as he could have wished, and as he at the time believed.
The Captain was troubled with a serious misgiving that he had done more
harm than good, in short; and in his remorse and modesty he made the
best atonement he could think of, by putting himself out of the way of
doing any harm to anyone, and, as it were, throwing himself overboard
for a dangerous person.

Self-buried, therefore, among the instruments, the Captain never went
near Mr Dombey's house, or reported himself in any way to Florence or
Miss Nipper. He even severed himself from Mr Perch, on the occasion of
his next visit, by dryly informing that gentleman, that he thanked him
for his company, but had cut himself adrift from all such acquaintance,
as he didn't know what magazine he mightn't blow up, without meaning of
it. In this self-imposed retirement, the Captain passed whole days and
weeks without interchanging a word with anyone but Rob the Grinder, whom
he esteemed as a pattern of disinterested attachment and fidelity. In
this retirement, the Captain, gazing at the packet of an evening, would
sit smoking, and thinking of Florence and poor Walter, until they both
seemed to his homely fancy to be dead, and to have passed away into
eternal youth, the beautiful and innocent children of his first
remembrance.

The Captain did not, however, in his musings, neglect his own
improvement, or the mental culture of Rob the Grinder. That young man
was generally required to read out of some book to the Captain, for one
hour, every evening; and as the Captain implicitly believed that all
books were true, he accumulated, by this means, many remarkable facts.
On Sunday nights, the Captain always read for himself, before going to
bed, a certain Divine Sermon once delivered on a Mount; and although he
was accustomed to quote the text, without book, after his own manner,
he appeared to read it with as reverent an understanding of its heavenly
spirit, as if he had got it all by heart in Greek, and had been able
to write any number of fierce theological disquisitions on its every
phrase.

Rob the Grinder, whose reverence for the inspired writings, under
the admirable system of the Grinders' School, had been developed by
a perpetual bruising of his intellectual shins against all the proper
names of all the tribes of Judah, and by the monotonous repetition of
hard verses, especially by way of punishment, and by the parading of him
at six years old in leather breeches, three times a Sunday, very high
up, in a very hot church, with a great organ buzzing against his drowsy
head, like an exceedingly busy bee--Rob the Grinder made a mighty show
of being edified when the Captain ceased to read, and generally yawned
and nodded while the reading was in progress. The latter fact being
never so much as suspected by the good Captain.

Captain Cuttle, also, as a man of business; took to keeping books. In
these he entered observations on the weather, and on the currents of the
waggons and other vehicles: which he observed, in that quarter, to set
westward in the morning and during the greater part of the day, and
eastward towards the evening. Two or three stragglers appearing in one
week, who 'spoke him'--so the Captain entered it--on the subject of
spectacles, and who, without positively purchasing, said they would look
in again, the Captain decided that the business was improving, and made
an entry in the day-book to that effect: the wind then blowing (which he
first recorded) pretty fresh, west and by north; having changed in the
night.

One of the Captain's chief difficulties was Mr Toots, who called
frequently, and who without saying much seemed to have an idea that the
little back parlour was an eligible room to chuckle in, as he would sit
and avail himself of its accommodations in that regard by the half-hour
together, without at all advancing in intimacy with the Captain. The
Captain, rendered cautious by his late experience, was unable quite to
satisfy his mind whether Mr Toots was the mild subject he appeared to
be, or was a profoundly artful and dissimulating hypocrite. His frequent
reference to Miss Dombey was suspicious; but the Captain had a secret
kindness for Mr Toots's apparent reliance on him, and forbore to decide
against him for the present; merely eyeing him, with a sagacity not to
be described, whenever he approached the subject that was nearest to his
heart.

'Captain Gills,' blurted out Mr Toots, one day all at once, as his
manner was, 'do you think you could think favourably of that proposition
of mine, and give me the pleasure of your acquaintance?'

'Why, I tell you what it is, my lad,' replied the Captain, who had at
length concluded on a course of action; 'I've been turning that there,
over.'

'Captain Gills, it's very kind of you,' retorted Mr Toots. 'I'm much
obliged to you. Upon my word and honour, Captain Gills, it would be a
charity to give me the pleasure of your acquaintance. It really would.'

'You see, brother,' argued the Captain slowly, 'I don't know you.'

'But you never can know me, Captain Gills,' replied Mr Toots, steadfast
to his point, 'if you don't give me the pleasure of your acquaintance.'

The Captain seemed struck by the originality and power of this remark,
and looked at Mr Toots as if he thought there was a great deal more in
him than he had expected.

'Well said, my lad,' observed the Captain, nodding his head
thoughtfully; 'and true. Now look'ee here: You've made some observations
to me, which gives me to understand as you admire a certain sweet
creetur. Hey?'

'Captain Gills,' said Mr Toots, gesticulating violently with the hand in
which he held his hat, 'Admiration is not the word. Upon my honour, you
have no conception what my feelings are. If I could be dyed black, and
made Miss Dombey's slave, I should consider it a compliment. If, at
the sacrifice of all my property, I could get transmigrated into Miss
Dombey's dog--I--I really think I should never leave off wagging my
tail. I should be so perfectly happy, Captain Gills!'

Mr Toots said it with watery eyes, and pressed his hat against his bosom
with deep emotion.

'My lad,' returned the Captain, moved to compassion, 'if you're in
arnest--'

'Captain Gills,' cried Mr Toots, 'I'm in such a state of mind, and am so
dreadfully in earnest, that if I could swear to it upon a hot piece
of iron, or a live coal, or melted lead, or burning sealing-wax, Or
anything of that sort, I should be glad to hurt myself, as a relief to
my feelings.' And Mr Toots looked hurriedly about the room, as if for
some sufficiently painful means of accomplishing his dread purpose.

The Captain pushed his glazed hat back upon his head, stroked his
face down with his heavy hand--making his nose more mottled in the
process--and planting himself before Mr Toots, and hooking him by the
lapel of his coat, addressed him in these words, while Mr Toots looked
up into his face, with much attention and some wonder.

'If you're in arnest, you see, my lad,' said the Captain, 'you're a
object of clemency, and clemency is the brightest jewel in the crown of
a Briton's head, for which you'll overhaul the constitution as laid down
in Rule Britannia, and, when found, that is the charter as them garden
angels was a singing of, so many times over. Stand by! This here
proposal o' you'rn takes me a little aback. And why? Because I holds
my own only, you understand, in these here waters, and haven't got no
consort, and may be don't wish for none. Steady! You hailed me first,
along of a certain young lady, as you was chartered by. Now if you and
me is to keep one another's company at all, that there young creetur's
name must never be named nor referred to. I don't know what harm mayn't
have been done by naming of it too free, afore now, and thereby I brings
up short. D'ye make me out pretty clear, brother?'

'Well, you'll excuse me, Captain Gills,' replied Mr Toots, 'if I don't
quite follow you sometimes. But upon my word I--it's a hard thing,
Captain Gills, not to be able to mention Miss Dombey. I really have
got such a dreadful load here!'--Mr Toots pathetically touched his
shirt-front with both hands--'that I feel night and day, exactly as if
somebody was sitting upon me.'

'Them,' said the Captain, 'is the terms I offer. If they're hard upon
you, brother, as mayhap they are, give 'em a wide berth, sheer off, and
part company cheerily!'

'Captain Gills,' returned Mr Toots, 'I hardly know how it is, but after
what you told me when I came here, for the first time, I--I feel that
I'd rather think about Miss Dombey in your society than talk about her
in almost anybody else's. Therefore, Captain Gills, if you'll give me
the pleasure of your acquaintance, I shall be very happy to accept it
on your own conditions. I wish to be honourable, Captain Gills,' said Mr
Toots, holding back his extended hand for a moment, 'and therefore I
am obliged to say that I can not help thinking about Miss Dombey. It's
impossible for me to make a promise not to think about her.'

'My lad,' said the Captain, whose opinion of Mr Toots was much improved
by this candid avowal, 'a man's thoughts is like the winds, and nobody
can't answer for 'em for certain, any length of time together. Is it a
treaty as to words?'

'As to words, Captain Gills,' returned Mr Toots, 'I think I can bind
myself.'

Mr Toots gave Captain Cuttle his hand upon it, then and there; and the
Captain with a pleasant and gracious show of condescension, bestowed
his acquaintance upon him formally. Mr Toots seemed much relieved
and gladdened by the acquisition, and chuckled rapturously during the
remainder of his visit. The Captain, for his part, was not ill pleased
to occupy that position of patronage, and was exceedingly well satisfied
by his own prudence and foresight.

But rich as Captain Cuttle was in the latter quality, he received a
surprise that same evening from a no less ingenuous and simple youth,
than Rob the Grinder. That artless lad, drinking tea at the same table,
and bending meekly over his cup and saucer, having taken sidelong
observations of his master for some time, who was reading the newspaper
with great difficulty, but much dignity, through his glasses, broke
silence by saying--

'Oh! I beg your pardon, Captain, but you mayn't be in want of any
pigeons, may you, Sir?'

'No, my lad,' replied the Captain.

'Because I was wishing to dispose of mine, Captain,' said Rob.

'Ay, ay?' cried the Captain, lifting up his bushy eyebrows a little.

'Yes; I'm going, Captain, if you please,' said Rob.

'Going? Where are you going?' asked the Captain, looking round at him
over the glasses.

'What? didn't you know that I was going to leave you, Captain?' asked
Rob, with a sneaking smile.

The Captain put down the paper, took off his spectacles, and brought his
eyes to bear on the deserter.

'Oh yes, Captain, I am going to give you warning. I thought you'd
have known that beforehand, perhaps,' said Rob, rubbing his hands, and
getting up. 'If you could be so good as provide yourself soon, Captain,
it would be a great convenience to me. You couldn't provide yourself by
to-morrow morning, I am afraid, Captain: could you, do you think?'

'And you're a going to desert your colours, are you, my lad?' said the
Captain, after a long examination of his face.

'Oh, it's very hard upon a cove, Captain,' cried the tender Rob, injured
and indignant in a moment, 'that he can't give lawful warning, without
being frowned at in that way, and called a deserter. You haven't any
right to call a poor cove names, Captain. It ain't because I'm a servant
and you're a master, that you're to go and libel me. What wrong have I
done? Come, Captain, let me know what my crime is, will you?'

The stricken Grinder wept, and put his coat-cuff in his eye.

'Come, Captain,' cried the injured youth, 'give my crime a name! What
have I been and done? Have I stolen any of the property? have I set the
house a-fire? If I have, why don't you give me in charge, and try it?
But to take away the character of a lad that's been a good servant to
you, because he can't afford to stand in his own light for your good,
what a injury it is, and what a bad return for faithful service! This is
the way young coves is spiled and drove wrong. I wonder at you, Captain,
I do.'

All of which the Grinder howled forth in a lachrymose whine, and backing
carefully towards the door.

'And so you've got another berth, have you, my lad?' said the Captain,
eyeing him intently.

'Yes, Captain, since you put it in that shape, I have got another
berth,' cried Rob, backing more and more; 'a better berth than I've got
here, and one where I don't so much as want your good word, Captain,
which is fort'nate for me, after all the dirt you've throw'd at me,
because I'm poor, and can't afford to stand in my own light for your
good. Yes, I have got another berth; and if it wasn't for leaving you
unprovided, Captain, I'd go to it now, sooner than I'd take them names
from you, because I'm poor, and can't afford to stand in my own light
for your good. Why do you reproach me for being poor, and not standing
in my own light for your good, Captain? How can you so demean yourself?'

'Look ye here, my boy,' replied the peaceful Captain. 'Don't you pay out
no more of them words.'

'Well, then, don't you pay in no more of your words, Captain,' retorted
the roused innocent, getting louder in his whine, and backing into the
shop. 'I'd sooner you took my blood than my character.'

'Because,' pursued the Captain calmly, 'you have heerd, may be, of such
a thing as a rope's end.'

'Oh, have I though, Captain?' cried the taunting Grinder. 'No I haven't.
I never heerd of any such a article!'

'Well,' said the Captain, 'it's my belief as you'll know more about
it pretty soon, if you don't keep a bright look-out. I can read your
signals, my lad. You may go.'

'Oh! I may go at once, may I, Captain?' cried Rob, exulting in his
success. 'But mind! I never asked to go at once, Captain. You are not
to take away my character again, because you send me off of your own
accord. And you're not to stop any of my wages, Captain!'

His employer settled the last point by producing the tin canister and
telling the Grinder's money out in full upon the table. Rob, snivelling
and sobbing, and grievously wounded in his feelings, took up the
pieces one by one, with a sob and a snivel for each, and tied them up
separately in knots in his pockethandkerchief; then he ascended to the
roof of the house and filled his hat and pockets with pigeons;
then, came down to his bed under the counter and made up his bundle,
snivelling and sobbing louder, as if he were cut to the heart by old
associations; then he whined, 'Good-night, Captain. I leave you without
malice!' and then, going out upon the door-step, pulled the little
Midshipman's nose as a parting indignity, and went away down the street
grinning triumphantly.

The Captain, left to himself, resumed his perusal of the news as if
nothing unusual or unexpected had taken place, and went reading on with
the greatest assiduity. But never a word did Captain Cuttle understand,
though he read a vast number, for Rob the Grinder was scampering up one
column and down another all through the newspaper.

It is doubtful whether the worthy Captain had ever felt himself quite
abandoned until now; but now, old Sol Gills, Walter, and Heart's Delight
were lost to him indeed, and now Mr Carker deceived and jeered him
cruelly. They were all represented in the false Rob, to whom he had held
forth many a time on the recollections that were warm within him; he had
believed in the false Rob, and had been glad to believe in him; he had
made a companion of him as the last of the old ship's company; he had
taken the command of the little Midshipman with him at his right hand;
he had meant to do his duty by him, and had felt almost as kindly
towards the boy as if they had been shipwrecked and cast upon a desert
place together. And now, that the false Rob had brought distrust,
treachery, and meanness into the very parlour, which was a kind of
sacred place, Captain Cuttle felt as if the parlour might have gone down
next, and not surprised him much by its sinking, or given him any very
great concern.

Therefore Captain Cuttle read the newspaper with profound attention and
no comprehension, and therefore Captain Cuttle said nothing whatever
about Rob to himself, or admitted to himself that he was thinking about
him, or would recognise in the most distant manner that Rob had anything
to do with his feeling as lonely as Robinson Crusoe.

In the same composed, business-like way, the Captain stepped over
to Leadenhall Market in the dusk, and effected an arrangement with a
private watchman on duty there, to come and put up and take down the
shutters of the wooden Midshipman every night and morning. He then
called in at the eating-house to diminish by one half the daily rations
theretofore supplied to the Midshipman, and at the public-house to stop
the traitor's beer. 'My young man,' said the Captain, in explanation to
the young lady at the bar, 'my young man having bettered himself, Miss.'
Lastly, the Captain resolved to take possession of the bed under the
counter, and to turn in there o' nights instead of upstairs, as sole
guardian of the property.

From this bed Captain Cuttle daily rose thenceforth, and clapped on
his glazed hat at six o'clock in the morning, with the solitary air of
Crusoe finishing his toilet with his goat-skin cap; and although his
fears of a visitation from the savage tribe, MacStinger, were somewhat
cooled, as similar apprehensions on the part of that lone mariner
used to be by the lapse of a long interval without any symptoms of the
cannibals, he still observed a regular routine of defensive operations,
and never encountered a bonnet without previous survey from his castle
of retreat. In the meantime (during which he received no call from Mr
Toots, who wrote to say he was out of town) his own voice began to have
a strange sound in his ears; and he acquired such habits of profound
meditation from much polishing and stowing away of the stock, and from
much sitting behind the counter reading, or looking out of window, that
the red rim made on his forehead by the hard glazed hat, sometimes ached
again with excess of reflection.

The year being now expired, Captain Cuttle deemed it expedient to open
the packet; but as he had always designed doing this in the presence of
Rob the Grinder, who had brought it to him, and as he had an idea
that it would be regular and ship-shape to open it in the presence
of somebody, he was sadly put to it for want of a witness. In this
difficulty, he hailed one day with unusual delight the announcement in
the Shipping Intelligence of the arrival of the Cautious Clara, Captain
John Bunsby, from a coasting voyage; and to that philosopher immediately
dispatched a letter by post, enjoining inviolable secrecy as to his
place of residence, and requesting to be favoured with an early visit,
in the evening season.

Bunsby, who was one of those sages who act upon conviction, took
some days to get the conviction thoroughly into his mind, that he had
received a letter to this effect. But when he had grappled with the
fact, and mastered it, he promptly sent his boy with the message, 'He's
a coming to-night.' Who being instructed to deliver those words and
disappear, fulfilled his mission like a tarry spirit, charged with a
mysterious warning.

The Captain, well pleased to receive it, made preparation of pipes and
rum and water, and awaited his visitor in the back parlour. At the hour
of eight, a deep lowing, as of a nautical Bull, outside the shop-door,
succeeded by the knocking of a stick on the panel, announced to the
listening ear of Captain Cuttle, that Bunsby was alongside; whom he
instantly admitted, shaggy and loose, and with his stolid mahogany
visage, as usual, appearing to have no consciousness of anything before
it, but to be attentively observing something that was taking place in
quite another part of the world.

'Bunsby,' said the Captain, grasping him by the hand, 'what cheer, my
lad, what cheer?'

'Shipmet,' replied the voice within Bunsby, unaccompanied by any sign on
the part of the Commander himself, 'hearty, hearty.'

'Bunsby!' said the Captain, rendering irrepressible homage to his
genius, 'here you are! a man as can give an opinion as is brighter than
di'monds--and give me the lad with the tarry trousers as shines to me
like di'monds bright, for which you'll overhaul the Stanfell's Budget,
and when found make a note. Here you are, a man as gave an opinion in
this here very place, that has come true, every letter on it,' which the
Captain sincerely believed.

'Ay, ay?' growled Bunsby.

'Every letter,' said the Captain.

'For why?' growled Bunsby, looking at his friend for the first time.
'Which way? If so, why not? Therefore.' With these oracular words--they
seemed almost to make the Captain giddy; they launched him upon such a
sea of speculation and conjecture--the sage submitted to be helped off
with his pilot-coat, and accompanied his friend into the back parlour,
where his hand presently alighted on the rum-bottle, from which he
brewed a stiff glass of grog; and presently afterwards on a pipe, which
he filled, lighted, and began to smoke.

Captain Cuttle, imitating his visitor in the matter of these
particulars, though the rapt and imperturbable manner of the great
Commander was far above his powers, sat in the opposite corner of the
fireside, observing him respectfully, and as if he waited for some
encouragement or expression of curiosity on Bunsby's part which should
lead him to his own affairs. But as the mahogany philosopher gave no
evidence of being sentient of anything but warmth and tobacco, except
once, when taking his pipe from his lips to make room for his glass, he
incidentally remarked with exceeding gruffness, that his name was
Jack Bunsby--a declaration that presented but small opening for
conversation--the Captain bespeaking his attention in a short
complimentary exordium, narrated the whole history of Uncle Sol's
departure, with the change it had produced in his own life and fortunes;
and concluded by placing the packet on the table.

After a long pause, Mr Bunsby nodded his head.

'Open?' said the Captain.

Bunsby nodded again.

The Captain accordingly broke the seal, and disclosed to view two folded
papers, of which he severally read the endorsements, thus: 'Last Will
and Testament of Solomon Gills.' 'Letter for Ned Cuttle.'

Bunsby, with his eye on the coast of Greenland, seemed to listen for the
contents. The Captain therefore hemmed to clear his throat, and read the
letter aloud.

'"My dear Ned Cuttle. When I left home for the West Indies"--'

Here the Captain stopped, and looked hard at Bunsby, who looked fixedly
at the coast of Greenland.

'--"in forlorn search of intelligence of my dear boy, I knew that if you
were acquainted with my design, you would thwart it, or accompany me;
and therefore I kept it secret. If you ever read this letter, Ned, I am
likely to be dead. You will easily forgive an old friend's folly then,
and will feel for the restlessness and uncertainty in which he wandered
away on such a wild voyage. So no more of that. I have little hope that
my poor boy will ever read these words, or gladden your eyes with
the sight of his frank face any more." No, no; no more,' said Captain
Cuttle, sorrowfully meditating; 'no more. There he lays, all his days--'

Mr Bunsby, who had a musical ear, suddenly bellowed, 'In the Bays
of Biscay, O!' which so affected the good Captain, as an appropriate
tribute to departed worth, that he shook him by the hand in
acknowledgment, and was fain to wipe his eyes.

'Well, well!' said the Captain with a sigh, as the Lament of Bunsby
ceased to ring and vibrate in the skylight. 'Affliction sore, long time
he bore, and let us overhaul the wollume, and there find it.'

'Physicians,' observed Bunsby, 'was in vain.'

'Ay, ay, to be sure,' said the Captain, 'what's the good o' them in two
or three hundred fathoms o' water!' Then, returning to the letter, he
read on:--'"But if he should be by, when it is opened;"' the Captain
involuntarily looked round, and shook his head; '"or should know of it
at any other time;"' the Captain shook his head again; '"my blessing on
him! In case the accompanying paper is not legally written, it matters
very little, for there is no one interested but you and he, and my plain
wish is, that if he is living he should have what little there may be,
and if (as I fear) otherwise, that you should have it, Ned. You
will respect my wish, I know. God bless you for it, and for all your
friendliness besides, to Solomon Gills." Bunsby!' said the Captain,
appealing to him solemnly, 'what do you make of this? There you sit, a
man as has had his head broke from infancy up'ards, and has got a new
opinion into it at every seam as has been opened. Now, what do you make
o' this?'

'If so be,' returned Bunsby, with unusual promptitude, 'as he's dead,
my opinion is he won't come back no more. If so be as he's alive, my
opinion is he will. Do I say he will? No. Why not? Because the bearings
of this obserwation lays in the application on it.'

'Bunsby!' said Captain Cuttle, who would seem to have estimated the
value of his distinguished friend's opinions in proportion to the
immensity of the difficulty he experienced in making anything out of
them; 'Bunsby,' said the Captain, quite confounded by admiration, 'you
carry a weight of mind easy, as would swamp one of my tonnage soon. But
in regard o' this here will, I don't mean to take no steps towards the
property--Lord forbid!--except to keep it for a more rightful owner; and
I hope yet as the rightful owner, Sol Gills, is living and'll come back,
strange as it is that he ain't forwarded no dispatches. Now, what is
your opinion, Bunsby, as to stowing of these here papers away again, and
marking outside as they was opened, such a day, in the presence of John
Bunsby and Ed'ard Cuttle?'

Bunsby, descrying no objection, on the coast of Greenland or elsewhere,
to this proposal, it was carried into execution; and that great man,
bringing his eye into the present for a moment, affixed his sign-manual
to the cover, totally abstaining, with characteristic modesty, from
the use of capital letters. Captain Cuttle, having attached his own
left-handed signature, and locked up the packet in the iron safe,
entreated his guest to mix another glass and smoke another pipe; and
doing the like himself, fell a musing over the fire on the possible
fortunes of the poor old Instrument-maker.

And now a surprise occurred, so overwhelming and terrific that Captain
Cuttle, unsupported by the presence of Bunsby, must have sunk beneath
it, and been a lost man from that fatal hour.

How the Captain, even in the satisfaction of admitting such a guest,
could have only shut the door, and not locked it, of which negligence
he was undoubtedly guilty, is one of those questions that must for ever
remain mere points of speculation, or vague charges against destiny.
But by that unlocked door, at this quiet moment, did the fell MacStinger
dash into the parlour, bringing Alexander MacStinger in her parental
arms, and confusion and vengeance (not to mention Juliana MacStinger,
and the sweet child's brother, Charles MacStinger, popularly known about
the scenes of his youthful sports, as Chowley) in her train. She came
so swiftly and so silently, like a rushing air from the neighbourhood of
the East India Docks, that Captain Cuttle found himself in the very act
of sitting looking at her, before the calm face with which he had been
meditating, changed to one of horror and dismay.

But the moment Captain Cuttle understood the full extent of his
misfortune, self-preservation dictated an attempt at flight. Darting at
the little door which opened from the parlour on the steep little range
of cellar-steps, the Captain made a rush, head-foremost, at the latter,
like a man indifferent to bruises and contusions, who only sought to
hide himself in the bowels of the earth. In this gallant effort he
would probably have succeeded, but for the affectionate dispositions
of Juliana and Chowley, who pinning him by the legs--one of those
dear children holding on to each--claimed him as their friend, with
lamentable cries. In the meantime, Mrs MacStinger, who never entered
upon any action of importance without previously inverting Alexander
MacStinger, to bring him within the range of a brisk battery of slaps,
and then sitting him down to cool as the reader first beheld him,
performed that solemn rite, as if on this occasion it were a sacrifice
to the Furies; and having deposited the victim on the floor, made at the
Captain with a strength of purpose that appeared to threaten scratches
to the interposing Bunsby.

The cries of the two elder MacStingers, and the wailing of young
Alexander, who may be said to have passed a piebald childhood, forasmuch
as he was black in the face during one half of that fairy period of
existence, combined to make this visitation the more awful. But when
silence reigned again, and the Captain, in a violent perspiration, stood
meekly looking at Mrs MacStinger, its terrors were at their height.

'Oh, Cap'en Cuttle, Cap'en Cuttle!' said Mrs MacStinger, making her chin
rigid, and shaking it in unison with what, but for the weakness of her
sex, might be described as her fist. 'Oh, Cap'en Cuttle, Cap'en Cuttle,
do you dare to look me in the face, and not be struck down in the
berth!'

The Captain, who looked anything but daring, feebly muttered 'Stand by!'

'Oh I was a weak and trusting Fool when I took you under my roof, Cap'en
Cuttle, I was!' cried Mrs MacStinger. 'To think of the benefits I've
showered on that man, and the way in which I brought my children up to
love and honour him as if he was a father to 'em, when there ain't a
housekeeper, no nor a lodger in our street, don't know that I lost money
by that man, and by his guzzlings and his muzzlings'--Mrs MacStinger
used the last word for the joint sake of alliteration and aggravation,
rather than for the expression of any idea--'and when they cried out one
and all, shame upon him for putting upon an industrious woman, up early
and late for the good of her young family, and keeping her poor place so
clean that a individual might have ate his dinner, yes, and his tea too,
if he was so disposed, off any one of the floors or stairs, in spite
of all his guzzlings and his muzzlings, such was the care and pains
bestowed upon him!'

Mrs MacStinger stopped to fetch her breath; and her face flushed with
triumph in this second happy introduction of Captain Cuttle's muzzlings.

'And he runs awa-a-a-y!' cried Mrs MacStinger, with a lengthening out of
the last syllable that made the unfortunate Captain regard himself as
the meanest of men; 'and keeps away a twelve-month! From a woman! Such
is his conscience! He hasn't the courage to meet her hi-i-igh;' long
syllable again; 'but steals away, like a fellon. Why, if that baby of
mine,' said Mrs MacStinger, with sudden rapidity, 'was to offer to go
and steal away, I'd do my duty as a mother by him, till he was covered
with wales!'

The young Alexander, interpreting this into a positive promise, to be
shortly redeemed, tumbled over with fear and grief, and lay upon the
floor, exhibiting the soles of his shoes and making such a deafening
outcry, that Mrs MacStinger found it necessary to take him up in her
arms, where she quieted him, ever and anon, as he broke out again, by a
shake that seemed enough to loosen his teeth.

'A pretty sort of a man is Cap'en Cuttle,' said Mrs MacStinger, with a
sharp stress on the first syllable of the Captain's name, 'to take on
for--and to lose sleep for--and to faint along of--and to think dead
forsooth--and to go up and down the blessed town like a madwoman, asking
questions after! Oh, a pretty sort of a man! Ha ha ha ha! He's worth all
that trouble and distress of mind, and much more. That's nothing, bless
you! Ha ha ha ha! Cap'en Cuttle,' said Mrs MacStinger, with severe
reaction in her voice and manner, 'I wish to know if you're a-coming
home.'

The frightened Captain looked into his hat, as if he saw nothing for it
but to put it on, and give himself up.

'Cap'en Cuttle,' repeated Mrs MacStinger, in the same determined manner,
'I wish to know if you're a-coming home, Sir.'

The Captain seemed quite ready to go, but faintly suggested something to
the effect of 'not making so much noise about it.'

'Ay, ay, ay,' said Bunsby, in a soothing tone. 'Awast, my lass, awast!'

'And who may you be, if you please!' retorted Mrs MacStinger, with
chaste loftiness. 'Did you ever lodge at Number Nine, Brig Place, Sir?
My memory may be bad, but not with me, I think. There was a Mrs Jollson
lived at Number Nine before me, and perhaps you're mistaking me for her.
That is my only ways of accounting for your familiarity, Sir.'

'Come, come, my lass, awast, awast!' said Bunsby.

Captain Cuttle could hardly believe it, even of this great man, though
he saw it done with his waking eyes; but Bunsby, advancing boldly, put
his shaggy blue arm round Mrs MacStinger, and so softened her by his
magic way of doing it, and by these few words--he said no more--that
she melted into tears, after looking upon him for a few moments, and
observed that a child might conquer her now, she was so low in her
courage.

Speechless and utterly amazed, the Captain saw him gradually persuade
this inexorable woman into the shop, return for rum and water and a
candle, take them to her, and pacify her without appearing to utter one
word. Presently he looked in with his pilot-coat on, and said, 'Cuttle,
I'm a-going to act as convoy home;' and Captain Cuttle, more to his
confusion than if he had been put in irons himself, for safe transport
to Brig Place, saw the family pacifically filing off, with Mrs
MacStinger at their head. He had scarcely time to take down his
canister, and stealthily convey some money into the hands of Juliana
MacStinger, his former favourite, and Chowley, who had the claim upon
him that he was naturally of a maritime build, before the Midshipman was
abandoned by them all; and Bunsby whispering that he'd carry on smart,
and hail Ned Cuttle again before he went aboard, shut the door upon
himself, as the last member of the party.

Some uneasy ideas that he must be walking in his sleep, or that he had
been troubled with phantoms, and not a family of flesh and blood, beset
the Captain at first, when he went back to the little parlour, and found
himself alone. Illimitable faith in, and immeasurable admiration of, the
Commander of the Cautious Clara, succeeded, and threw the Captain into a
wondering trance.

Still, as time wore on, and Bunsby failed to reappear, the Captain began
to entertain uncomfortable doubts of another kind. Whether Bunsby had
been artfully decoyed to Brig Place, and was there detained in safe
custody as hostage for his friend; in which case it would become the
Captain, as a man of honour, to release him, by the sacrifice of his own
liberty. Whether he had been attacked and defeated by Mrs MacStinger,
and was ashamed to show himself after his discomfiture. Whether Mrs
MacStinger, thinking better of it, in the uncertainty of her temper,
had turned back to board the Midshipman again, and Bunsby, pretending to
conduct her by a short cut, was endeavouring to lose the family amid
the wilds and savage places of the City. Above all, what it would behove
him, Captain Cuttle, to do, in case of his hearing no more, either of
the MacStingers or of Bunsby, which, in these wonderful and unforeseen
conjunctions of events, might possibly happen.

He debated all this until he was tired; and still no Bunsby. He made
up his bed under the counter, all ready for turning in; and still no
Bunsby. At length, when the Captain had given him up, for that night
at least, and had begun to undress, the sound of approaching wheels was
heard, and, stopping at the door, was succeeded by Bunsby's hail.

The Captain trembled to think that Mrs MacStinger was not to be got rid
of, and had been brought back in a coach.

But no. Bunsby was accompanied by nothing but a large box, which he
hauled into the shop with his own hands, and as soon as he had hauled
in, sat upon. Captain Cuttle knew it for the chest he had left at
Mrs MacStinger's house, and looking, candle in hand, at Bunsby more
attentively, believed that he was three sheets in the wind, or, in
plain words, drunk. It was difficult, however, to be sure of this; the
Commander having no trace of expression in his face when sober.

'Cuttle,' said the Commander, getting off the chest, and opening the
lid, 'are these here your traps?'

Captain Cuttle looked in and identified his property.

'Done pretty taut and trim, hey, shipmet?' said Bunsby.

The grateful and bewildered Captain grasped him by the hand, and was
launching into a reply expressive of his astonished feelings, when
Bunsby disengaged himself by a jerk of his wrist, and seemed to make an
effort to wink with his revolving eye, the only effect of which attempt,
in his condition, was nearly to over-balance him. He then abruptly
opened the door, and shot away to rejoin the Cautious Clara with all
speed--supposed to be his invariable custom, whenever he considered he
had made a point.

As it was not his humour to be often sought, Captain Cuttle decided
not to go or send to him next day, or until he should make his gracious
pleasure known in such wise, or failing that, until some little time
should have lapsed. The Captain, therefore, renewed his solitary life
next morning, and thought profoundly, many mornings, noons, and nights,
of old Sol Gills, and Bunsby's sentiments concerning him, and the hopes
there were of his return. Much of such thinking strengthened Captain
Cuttle's hopes; and he humoured them and himself by watching for the
Instrument-maker at the door--as he ventured to do now, in his strange
liberty--and setting his chair in its place, and arranging the little
parlour as it used to be, in case he should come home unexpectedly. He
likewise, in his thoughtfulness, took down a certain little miniature
of Walter as a schoolboy, from its accustomed nail, lest it should
shock the old man on his return. The Captain had his presentiments, too,
sometimes, that he would come on such a day; and one particular Sunday,
even ordered a double allowance of dinner, he was so sanguine. But come,
old Solomon did not; and still the neighbours noticed how the seafaring
man in the glazed hat, stood at the shop-door of an evening, looking up
and down the street.

Captain Cuttle, remorseful that his meddling may have had negative consequences in the past, avoids anyone and anything to do with the Dombey family. He is even slightly suspicious of Toots, who often comes to visit. One day, Rob announces that he will be leaving for another position. Captain Cuttle is now very lonely, and also faced with a problem, as the date has come for him to open the sealed document Sol left for him, and he wants someone else to witness this. He arranges for Bunsby to come and visit him. He opens the packet to find a will and a letter to him. The letter explains that Sol has journeyed to the West Indies in search of Walter; he kept his purpose a secret so that Cuttle could not stop him, or try to accompany him. By specifying a year's waiting period, he assumed that he would be dead if Cuttle were opening the letter. If Walter has been found he will inherit all that belonged to Sol, and if not he leaves everything to Cuttle. As they discuss this news, Cuttle's feared landlady Mrs. Macstinger arrives, having finally tracked him down. While Cuttle is horrified, Bunsby manages to calm her down, and takes her home. He returns later that night to bring the items Cuttle had left at his lodgings when he slipped away. Now that he knows Sol did not commit suicide, Cuttle continues to nurse hope he might eventually come home