Chapter 46

Nicholas Nickleby

by Charles Dickens

Throws some Light upon Nicholas's Love; but whether for Good or
Evil the Reader must determine

After an anxious consideration of the painful and embarrassing
position in which he was placed, Nicholas decided that he ought to
lose no time in frankly stating it to the kind brothers. Availing
himself of the first opportunity of being alone with Mr Charles
Cheeryble at the close of next day, he accordingly related Smike's
little history, and modestly but firmly expressed his hope that the
good old gentleman would, under such circumstances as he described,
hold him justified in adopting the extreme course of interfering
between parent and child, and upholding the latter in his
disobedience; even though his horror and dread of his father might
seem, and would doubtless be represented as, a thing so repulsive and
unnatural, as to render those who countenanced him in it, fit objects
of general detestation and abhorrence.

'So deeply rooted does this horror of the man appear to be,'
said Nicholas, 'that I can hardly believe he really is his son.
Nature does not seem to have implanted in his breast one lingering
feeling of affection for him, and surely she can never err.'

'My dear sir,' replied brother Charles, 'you fall into the very
common mistake of charging upon Nature, matters with which she has
not the smallest connection, and for which she is in no way
responsible. Men talk of Nature as an abstract thing, and lose sight
of what is natural while they do so. Here is a poor lad who has
never felt a parent's care, who has scarcely known anything all his
life but suffering and sorrow, presented to a man who he is told is
his father, and whose first act is to signify his intention of
putting an end to his short term of happiness, of consigning him to
his old fate, and taking him from the only friend he has ever had--
which is yourself. If Nature, in such a case, put into that lad's
breast but one secret prompting which urged him towards his father
and away from you, she would be a liar and an idiot.'

Nicholas was delighted to find that the old gentleman spoke so
warmly, and in the hope that he might say something more to the same
purpose, made no reply.

'The same mistake presents itself to me, in one shape or other,
at every turn,' said brother Charles. 'Parents who never showed
their love, complain of want of natural affection in their children;
children who never showed their duty, complain of want of natural
feeling in their parents; law-makers who find both so miserable that
their affections have never had enough of life's sun to develop them,
are loud in their moralisings over parents and children too, and cry
that the very ties of nature are disregarded. Natural affections and
instincts, my dear sir, are the most beautiful of the Almighty's
works, but like other beautiful works of His, they must be reared and
fostered, or it is as natural that they should be wholly obscured,
and that new feelings should usurp their place, as it is that the
sweetest productions of the earth, left untended, should be choked
with weeds and briers. I wish we could be brought to consider this,
and remembering natural obligations a little more at the right time,
talk about them a little less at the wrong one.'

After this, brother Charles, who had talked himself into a great
heat, stopped to cool a little, and then continued:

'I dare say you are surprised, my dear sir, that I have listened
to your recital with so little astonishment. That is easily
explained. Your uncle has been here this morning.'

Nicholas coloured, and drew back a step or two.

'Yes,' said the old gentleman, tapping his desk emphatically,
'here, in this room. He would listen neither to reason, feeling, nor
justice. But brother Ned was hard upon him; brother Ned, sir, might
have melted a paving-stone.'

'He came to--' said Nicholas.

'To complain of you,' returned brother Charles, 'to poison our
ears with calumnies and falsehoods; but he came on a fruitless
errand, and went away with some wholesome truths in his ear besides.
Brother Ned, my dear My Nickleby--brother Ned, sir, is a perfect
lion. So is Tim Linkinwater; Tim is quite a lion. We had Tim in to
face him at first, and Tim was at him, sir, before you could say
"Jack Robinson."'

'How can I ever thank you for all the deep obligations you
impose upon me every day?' said Nicholas.

'By keeping silence upon the subject, my dear sir,' returned
brother Charles. 'You shall be righted. At least you shall not be
wronged. Nobody belonging to you shall be wronged. They shall not
hurt a hair of your head, or the boy's head, or your mother's head,
or your sister's head. I have said it, brother Ned has said it, Tim
Linkinwater has said it. We have all said it, and we'll all do it. I
have seen the father--if he is the father--and I suppose he must be.
He is a barbarian and a hypocrite, Mr Nickleby. I told him, "You are
a barbarian, sir." I did. I said, "You're a barbarian, sir." And
I'm glad of it, I am very glad I told him he was a barbarian, very
glad indeed!'

By this time brother Charles was in such a very warm state of
indignation, that Nicholas thought he might venture to put in a word,
but the moment he essayed to do so, Mr Cheeryble laid his hand softly
upon his arm, and pointed to a chair.

'The subject is at an end for the present,' said the old
gentleman, wiping his face. 'Don't revive it by a single word. I am
going to speak upon another subject, a confidential subject, Mr
Nickleby. We must be cool again, we must be cool.'

After two or three turns across the room he resumed his seat,
and drawing his chair nearer to that on which Nicholas was seated,
said:

'I am about to employ you, my dear sir, on a confidential and
delicate mission.'

'You might employ many a more able messenger, sir,' said
Nicholas, 'but a more trustworthy or zealous one, I may be bold to
say, you could not find.'

'Of that I am well assured,' returned brother Charles, 'well
assured. You will give me credit for thinking so, when I tell you
that the object of this mission is a young lady.'

'A young lady, sir!' cried Nicholas, quite trembling for the
moment with his eagerness to hear more.

'A very beautiful young lady,' said Mr Cheeryble, gravely.

'Pray go on, sir,' returned Nicholas.

'I am thinking how to do so,' said brother Charles; sadly, as it
seemed to his young friend, and with an expression allied to pain.
'You accidentally saw a young lady in this room one morning, my dear
sir, in a fainting fit. Do you remember? Perhaps you have
forgotten.'

'Oh no,' replied Nicholas, hurriedly. 'I--I--remember it very
well indeed.'

'She is the lady I speak of,' said brother Charles. Like the
famous parrot, Nicholas thought a great deal, but was unable to utter
a word.

'She is the daughter,' said Mr Cheeryble, 'of a lady who, when
she was a beautiful girl herself, and I was very many years younger,
I-- it seems a strange word for me to utter now--I loved very dearly.
You will smile, perhaps, to hear a grey-headed man talk about such
things. You will not offend me, for when I was as young as you, I
dare say I should have done the same.'

'I have no such inclination, indeed,' said Nicholas.

'My dear brother Ned,' continued Mr Cheeryble, 'was to have
married her sister, but she died. She is dead too now, and has been
for many years. She married her choice; and I wish I could add that
her after-life was as happy as God knows I ever prayed it might
be!'

A short silence intervened, which Nicholas made no effort to
break.

'If trial and calamity had fallen as lightly on his head, as in
the deepest truth of my own heart I ever hoped (for her sake) it
would, his life would have been one of peace and happiness,' said the
old gentleman calmly. 'It will be enough to say that this was not
the case; that she was not happy; that they fell into complicated
distresses and difficulties; that she came, twelve months before her
death, to appeal to my old friendship; sadly changed, sadly altered,
broken-spirited from suffering and ill-usage, and almost broken-
hearted. He readily availed himself of the money which, to give her
but one hour's peace of mind, I would have poured out as freely as
water--nay, he often sent her back for more--and yet even while he
squandered it, he made the very success of these, her applications to
me, the groundwork of cruel taunts and jeers, protesting that he knew
she thought with bitter remorse of the choice she had made, that she
had married him from motives of interest and vanity (he was a gay
young man with great friends about him when she chose him for her
husband), and venting in short upon her, by every unjust and unkind
means, the bitterness of that ruin and disappointment which had been
brought about by his profligacy alone. In those times this young
lady was a mere child. I never saw her again until that morning when
you saw her also, but my nephew, Frank--'

Nicholas started, and indistinctly apologising for the
interruption, begged his patron to proceed.

'--My nephew, Frank, I say,' resumed Mr Cheeryble, 'encountered
her by accident, and lost sight of her almost in a minute afterwards,
within two days after he returned to England. Her father lay in some
secret place to avoid his creditors, reduced, between sickness and
poverty, to the verge of death, and she, a child,--we might almost
think, if we did not know the wisdom of all Heaven's decrees --who
should have blessed a better man, was steadily braving privation,
degradation, and everything most terrible to such a young and
delicate creature's heart, for the purpose of supporting him. She was
attended, sir,' said brother Charles, 'in these reverses, by one
faithful creature, who had been, in old times, a poor kitchen wench
in the family, who was then their solitary servant, but who might
have been, for the truth and fidelity of her heart--who might have
been--ah! the wife of Tim Linkinwater himself, sir!'

Pursuing this encomium upon the poor follower with such energy
and relish as no words can describe, brother Charles leant back in
his chair, and delivered the remainder of his relation with greater
composure.

It was in substance this: That proudly resisting all offers of
permanent aid and support from her late mother's friends, because
they were made conditional upon her quitting the wretched man, her
father, who had no friends left, and shrinking with instinctive
delicacy from appealing in their behalf to that true and noble heart
which he hated, and had, through its greatest and purest goodness,
deeply wronged by misconstruction and ill report, this young girl had
struggled alone and unassisted to maintain him by the labour of her
hands. That through the utmost depths of poverty and affliction she
had toiled, never turning aside for an instant from her task, never
wearied by the petulant gloom of a sick man sustained by no consoling
recollections of the past or hopes of the future; never repining for
the comforts she had rejected, or bewailing the hard lot she had
voluntarily incurred. That every little accomplishment she had
acquired in happier days had been put into requisition for this
purpose, and directed to this one end. That for two long years,
toiling by day and often too by night, working at the needle, the
pencil, and the pen, and submitting, as a daily governess, to such
caprices and indignities as women (with daughters too) too often love
to inflict upon their own sex when they serve in such capacities, as
though in jealousy of the superior intelligence which they are
necessitated to employ,--indignities, in ninety-nine cases out of
every hundred, heaped upon persons immeasurably and incalculably
their betters, but outweighing in comparison any that the most
heartless blackleg would put upon his groom--that for two long years,
by dint of labouring in all these capacities and wearying in none,
she had not succeeded in the sole aim and object of her life, but
that, overwhelmed by accumulated difficulties and disappointments,
she had been compelled to seek out her mother's old friend, and, with
a bursting heart, to confide in him at last.

'If I had been poor,' said brother Charles, with sparkling eyes;
'if I had been poor, Mr Nickleby, my dear sir, which thank God I am
not, I would have denied myself (of course anybody would under such
circumstances) the commonest necessaries of life, to help her. As it
is, the task is a difficult one. If her father were dead, nothing
could be easier, for then she should share and cheer the happiest
home that brother Ned and I could have, as if she were our child or
sister. But he is still alive. Nobody can help him; that has been
tried a thousand times; he was not abandoned by all without good
cause, I know.'

'Cannot she be persuaded to--' Nicholas hesitated when he had
got thus far.

'To leave him?' said brother Charles. 'Who could entreat a
child to desert her parent? Such entreaties, limited to her seeing
him occasionally, have been urged upon her--not by me--but always
with the same result.'

'Is he kind to her?' said Nicholas. 'Does he requite her
affection?'

'True kindness, considerate self-denying kindness, is not in his
nature,' returned Mr Cheeryble. 'Such kindness as he knows, he
regards her with, I believe. The mother was a gentle, loving,
confiding creature, and although he wounded her from their marriage
till her death as cruelly and wantonly as ever man did, she never
ceased to love him. She commended him on her death-bed to her
child's care. Her child has never forgotten it, and never will.'

'Have you no influence over him?' asked Nicholas.

'I, my dear sir! The last man in the world. Such are his
jealousy and hatred of me, that if he knew his daughter had opened
her heart to me, he would render her life miserable with his
reproaches; although--this is the inconsistency and selfishness of
his character--although if he knew that every penny she had came from
me, he would not relinquish one personal desire that the most
reckless expenditure of her scanty stock could gratify.'

'An unnatural scoundrel!' said Nicholas, indignantly.

'We will use no harsh terms,' said brother Charles, in a gentle
voice; 'but accommodate ourselves to the circumstances in which this
young lady is placed. Such assistance as I have prevailed upon her
to accept, I have been obliged, at her own earnest request, to dole
out in the smallest portions, lest he, finding how easily money was
procured, should squander it even more lightly than he is accustomed
to do. She has come to and fro, to and fro, secretly and by night,
to take even this; and I cannot bear that things should go on in this
way, Mr Nickleby, I really cannot bear it.'

Then it came out by little and little, how that the twins had
been revolving in their good old heads manifold plans and schemes for
helping this young lady in the most delicate and considerate way, and
so that her father should not suspect the source whence the aid was
derived; and how they had at last come to the conclusion, that the
best course would be to make a feint of purchasing her little
drawings and ornamental work at a high price, and keeping up a
constant demand for the same. For the furtherance of which end and
object it was necessary that somebody should represent the dealer in
such commodities, and after great deliberation they had pitched upon
Nicholas to support this character.

'He knows me,' said brother Charles, 'and he knows my brother
Ned. Neither of us would do. Frank is a very good fellow--a very
fine fellow--but we are afraid that he might be a little flighty and
thoughtless in such a delicate matter, and that he might, perhaps--
that he might, in short, be too susceptible (for she is a beautiful
creature, sir; just what her poor mother was), and falling in love
with her before he knew well his own mind, carry pain and sorrow into
that innocent breast, which we would be the humble instruments of
gradually making happy. He took an extraordinary interest in her
fortunes when he first happened to encounter her; and we gather from
the inquiries we have made of him, that it was she in whose behalf he
made that turmoil which led to your first acquaintance.'

Nicholas stammered out that he had before suspected the
possibility of such a thing; and in explanation of its having
occurred to him, described when and where he had seen the young lady
himself.

'Well; then you see,' continued brother Charles, 'that he
wouldn't do. Tim Linkinwater is out of the question; for Tim, sir,
is such a tremendous fellow, that he could never contain himself, but
would go to loggerheads with the father before he had been in the
place five minutes. You don't know what Tim is, sir, when he is
aroused by anything that appeals to his feelings very strongly; then
he is terrific, sir, is Tim Linkinwater, absolutely terrific. Now,
in you we can repose the strictest confidence; in you we have
seen--or at least I have seen, and that's the same thing, for there's
no difference between me and my brother Ned, except that he is the
finest creature that ever lived, and that there is not, and never
will be, anybody like him in all the world--in you we have seen
domestic virtues and affections, and delicacy of feeling, which
exactly qualify you for such an office. And you are the man,
sir.'

'The young lady, sir,' said Nicholas, who felt so embarrassed
that he had no small difficulty in saying anything at
all--'Does--is--is she a party to this innocent deceit?'

'Yes, yes,' returned Mr Cheeryble; 'at least she knows you come
from us; she does not know, however, but that we shall dispose of
these little productions that you'll purchase from time to time; and,
perhaps, if you did it very well (that is, very well indeed), perhaps
she might be brought to believe that we--that we made a profit of
them. Eh? Eh?'

In this guileless and most kind simplicity, brother Charles was
so happy, and in this possibility of the young lady being led to
think that she was under no obligation to him, he evidently felt so
sanguine and had so much delight, that Nicholas would not breathe a
doubt upon the subject.

All this time, however, there hovered upon the tip of his tongue
a confession that the very same objections which Mr Cheeryble had
stated to the employment of his nephew in this commission applied
with at least equal force and validity to himself, and a hundred
times had he been upon the point of avowing the real state of his
feelings, and entreating to be released from it. But as often,
treading upon the heels of this impulse, came another which urged him
to refrain, and to keep his secret to his own breast. 'Why should
I,' thought Nicholas, 'why should I throw difficulties in the way of
this benevolent and high-minded design? What if I do love and
reverence this good and lovely creature. Should I not appear a most
arrogant and shallow coxcomb if I gravely represented that there was
any danger of her falling in love with me? Besides, have I no
confidence in myself? Am I not now bound in honour to repress these
thoughts? Has not this excellent man a right to my best and
heartiest services, and should any considerations of self deter me
from rendering them?'

Asking himself such questions as these, Nicholas mentally
answered with great emphasis 'No!' and persuading himself that he was
a most conscientious and glorious martyr, nobly resolved to do what,
if he had examined his own heart a little more carefully, he would
have found he could not resist. Such is the sleight of hand by which
we juggle with ourselves, and change our very weaknesses into stanch
and most magnanimous virtues!

Mr Cheeryble, being of course wholly unsuspicious that such
reflections were presenting themselves to his young friend, proceeded
to give him the needful credentials and directions for his first
visit, which was to be made next morning; and all preliminaries being
arranged, and the strictest secrecy enjoined, Nicholas walked home
for the night very thoughtfully indeed.

The place to which Mr Cheeryble had directed him was a row of
mean and not over-cleanly houses, situated within 'the Rules' of the
King's Bench Prison, and not many hundred paces distant from the
obelisk in St George's Fields. The Rules are a certain liberty
adjoining the prison, and comprising some dozen streets in which
debtors who can raise money to pay large fees, from which their
creditors do not derive any benefit, are permitted to reside by the
wise provisions of the same enlightened laws which leave the debtor
who can raise no money to starve in jail, without the food, clothing,
lodging, or warmth, which are provided for felons convicted of the
most atrocious crimes that can disgrace humanity. There are many
pleasant fictions of the law in constant operation, but there is not
one so pleasant or practically humorous as that which supposes every
man to be of equal value in its impartial eye, and the benefits of
all laws to be equally attainable by all men, without the smallest
reference to the furniture of their pockets.

To the row of houses indicated to him by Mr Charles Cheeryble,
Nicholas directed his steps, without much troubling his head with
such matters as these; and at this row of houses--after traversing a
very dirty and dusty suburb, of which minor theatricals, shell-fish,
ginger-beer, spring vans, greengrocery, and brokers' shops, appeared
to compose the main and most prominent features--he at length arrived
with a palpitating heart. There were small gardens in front which,
being wholly neglected in all other respects, served as little pens
for the dust to collect in, until the wind came round the corner and
blew it down the road. Opening the rickety gate which, dangling on
its broken hinges before one of these, half admitted and half
repulsed the visitor, Nicholas knocked at the street door with a
faltering hand.

It was in truth a shabby house outside, with very dim parlour
windows and very small show of blinds, and very dirty muslin curtains
dangling across the lower panes on very loose and limp strings.
Neither, when the door was opened, did the inside appear to belie the
outward promise, as there was faded carpeting on the stairs and faded
oil-cloth in the passage; in addition to which discomforts a
gentleman Ruler was smoking hard in the front parlour (though it was
not yet noon), while the lady of the house was busily engaged in
turpentining the disjointed fragments of a tent-bedstead at the door
of the back parlour, as if in preparation for the reception of some
new lodger who had been fortunate enough to engage it.

Nicholas had ample time to make these observations while the
little boy, who went on errands for the lodgers, clattered down the
kitchen stairs and was heard to scream, as in some remote cellar, for
Miss Bray's servant, who, presently appearing and requesting him to
follow her, caused him to evince greater symptoms of nervousness and
disorder than so natural a consequence of his having inquired for
that young lady would seem calculated to occasion.

Upstairs he went, however, and into a front room he was shown,
and there, seated at a little table by the window, on which were
drawing materials with which she was occupied, sat the beautiful girl
who had so engrossed his thoughts, and who, surrounded by all the new
and strong interest which Nicholas attached to her story, seemed now,
in his eyes, a thousand times more beautiful than he had ever yet
supposed her.

But how the graces and elegancies which she had dispersed about
the poorly-furnished room went to the heart of Nicholas! Flowers,
plants, birds, the harp, the old piano whose notes had sounded so
much sweeter in bygone times; how many struggles had it cost her to
keep these two last links of that broken chain which bound her yet to
home! With every slender ornament, the occupation of her leisure
hours, replete with that graceful charm which lingers in every little
tasteful work of woman's hands, how much patient endurance and how
many gentle affections were entwined! He felt as though the smile of
Heaven were on the little chamber; as though the beautiful devotion
of so young and weak a creature had shed a ray of its own on the
inanimate things around, and made them beautiful as itself; as though
the halo with which old painters surround the bright angels of a
sinless world played about a being akin in spirit to them, and its
light were visibly before him.

And yet Nicholas was in the Rules of the King's Bench Prison!
If he had been in Italy indeed, and the time had been sunset, and the
scene a stately terrace! But, there is one broad sky over all the
world, and whether it be blue or cloudy, the same heaven beyond it;
so, perhaps, he had no need of compunction for thinking as he did.

It is not to be supposed that he took in everything at one
glance, for he had as yet been unconscious of the presence of a sick
man propped up with pillows in an easy-chair, who, moving restlessly
and impatiently in his seat, attracted his attention.

He was scarce fifty, perhaps, but so emaciated as to appear much
older. His features presented the remains of a handsome countenance,
but one in which the embers of strong and impetuous passions were
easier to be traced than any expression which would have rendered a
far plainer face much more prepossessing. His looks were very
haggard, and his limbs and body literally worn to the bone, but there
was something of the old fire in the large sunken eye
notwithstanding, and it seemed to kindle afresh as he struck a thick
stick, with which he seemed to have supported himself in his seat,
impatiently on the floor twice or thrice, and called his daughter by
her name.

'Madeline, who is this? What does anybody want here? Who told
a stranger we could be seen? What is it?'

'I believe--' the young lady began, as she inclined her head
with an air of some confusion, in reply to the salutation of
Nicholas.

'You always believe,' returned her father, petulantly. 'What is
it?'

By this time Nicholas had recovered sufficient presence of mind
to speak for himself, so he said (as it had been agreed he should
say) that he had called about a pair of hand-screens, and some
painted velvet for an ottoman, both of which were required to be of
the most elegant design possible, neither time nor expense being of
the smallest consideration. He had also to pay for the two drawings,
with many thanks, and, advancing to the little table, he laid upon it
a bank note, folded in an envelope and sealed.

'See that the money is right, Madeline,' said the father. 'Open
the paper, my dear.'

'It's quite right, papa, I'm sure.'

'Here!' said Mr Bray, putting out his hand, and opening and
shutting his bony fingers with irritable impatience. 'Let me see.
What are you talking about, Madeline? You're sure? How can you be
sure of any such thing? Five pounds--well, is that right?'

'Quite,' said Madeline, bending over him. She was so busily
employed in arranging the pillows that Nicholas could not see her
face, but as she stooped he thought he saw a tear fall.

'Ring the bell, ring the bell,' said the sick man, with the same
nervous eagerness, and motioning towards it with such a quivering
hand that the bank note rustled in the air. 'Tell her to get it
changed, to get me a newspaper, to buy me some grapes, another bottle
of the wine that I had last week--and--and--I forget half I want just
now, but she can go out again. Let her get those first, those first.
Now, Madeline, my love, quick, quick! Good God, how slow you
are!'

'He remembers nothing that she wants!' thought Nicholas.
Perhaps something of what he thought was expressed in his
countenance, for the sick man, turning towards him with great
asperity, demanded to know if he waited for a receipt.

'It is no matter at all,' said Nicholas.

'No matter! what do you mean, sir?' was the tart rejoinder. 'No
matter! Do you think you bring your paltry money here as a favour or
a gift; or as a matter of business, and in return for value received?
D--n you, sir, because you can't appreciate the time and taste which
are bestowed upon the goods you deal in, do you think you give your
money away? Do you know that you are talking to a gentleman, sir,
who at one time could have bought up fifty such men as you and all
you have? What do you mean?'

'I merely mean that as I shall have many dealings with this
lady, if she will kindly allow me, I will not trouble her with such
forms,' said Nicholas.

'Then I mean, if you please, that we'll have as many forms as we
can, returned the father. 'My daughter, sir, requires no kindness
from you or anybody else. Have the goodness to confine your dealings
strictly to trade and business, and not to travel beyond it. Every
petty tradesman is to begin to pity her now, is he? Upon my soul!
Very pretty. Madeline, my dear, give him a receipt; and mind you
always do so.'

While she was feigning to write it, and Nicholas was ruminating
upon the extraordinary but by no means uncommon character thus
presented to his observation, the invalid, who appeared at times to
suffer great bodily pain, sank back in his chair and moaned out a
feeble complaint that the girl had been gone an hour, and that
everybody conspired to goad him.

'When,' said Nicholas, as he took the piece of paper, 'when
shall I call again?'

This was addressed to the daughter, but the father answered
immediately.

'When you're requested to call, sir, and not before. Don't
worry and persecute. Madeline, my dear, when is this person to call
again?'

'Oh, not for a long time, not for three or four weeks; it is not
necessary, indeed; I can do without,' said the young lady, with great
eagerness.

'Why, how are we to do without?' urged her father, not speaking
above his breath. 'Three or four weeks, Madeline! Three or four
weeks!'

'Then sooner, sooner, if you please,' said the young lady,
turning to Nicholas.

'Three or four weeks!' muttered the father. 'Madeline, what on
earth--do nothing for three or four weeks!'

'It is a long time, ma'am,' said Nicholas.

'You think so, do you?' retorted the father, angrily. 'If I
chose to beg, sir, and stoop to ask assistance from people I despise,
three or four months would not be a long time; three or four years
would not be a long time. Understand, sir, that is if I chose to be
dependent; but as I don't, you may call in a week.'

Nicholas bowed low to the young lady and retired, pondering upon
Mr Bray's ideas of independence, and devoutly hoping that there might
be few such independent spirits as he mingling with the baser clay of
humanity.

He heard a light footstep above him as he descended the stairs,
and looking round saw that the young lady was standing there, and
glancing timidly towards him, seemed to hesitate whether she should
call him back or no. The best way of settling the question was to
turn back at once, which Nicholas did.

'I don't know whether I do right in asking you, sir,' said
Madeline, hurriedly, 'but pray, pray, do not mention to my poor
mother's dear friends what has passed here today. He has suffered
much, and is worse this morning. I beg you, sir, as a boon, a favour
to myself.'

'You have but to hint a wish,' returned Nicholas fervently, 'and
I would hazard my life to gratify it.'

'You speak hastily, sir.'

'Truly and sincerely,' rejoined Nicholas, his lips trembling as
he formed the words, 'if ever man spoke truly yet. I am not skilled
in disguising my feelings, and if I were, I could not hide my heart
from you. Dear madam, as I know your history, and feel as men and
angels must who hear and see such things, I do entreat you to believe
that I would die to serve you.'

The young lady turned away her head, and was plainly weeping.

'Forgive me,' said Nicholas, with respectful earnestness, 'if I
seem to say too much, or to presume upon the confidence which has
been intrusted to me. But I could not leave you as if my interest
and sympathy expired with the commission of the day. I am your
faithful servant, humbly devoted to you from this hour, devoted in
strict truth and honour to him who sent me here, and in pure
integrity of heart, and distant respect for you. If I meant more or
less than this, I should be unworthy his regard, and false to the
very nature that prompts the honest words I utter.'

She waved her hand, entreating him to be gone, but answered not
a word. Nicholas could say no more, and silently withdrew. And thus
ended his first interview with Madeline Bray.