The Old Curiosity Shop Part 74

Although this might have been a very comical thing to look at from a secure gallery, as a bull-fight is found to be a comfortable spectacle by those who are not in the arena, and a house on fire is better than a play to people who don't live near it, there was something in the earnestness of Mr Quilp's manner which made his legal adviser feel that the counting-house was a little too small, and a deal too lonely, for the complete enjoyment of these humours. Therefore, he stood as far off as he could, while the dwarf was thus engaged; whimpering out but feeble applause; and when Quilp left off and sat down again from pure exhaustion, approached with more obsequiousness than ever.

'Excellent indeed!' cried Bra.s.s. 'He he! Oh, very good Sir. You know,' said Sampson, looking round as if in appeal to the bruised animal, 'he's quite a remarkable man--quite!'

'Sit down,' said the dwarf. 'I bought the dog yesterday. I've been s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g gimlets into him, and sticking forks in his eyes, and cutting my name on him. I mean to burn him at last.'

'Ha ha!' cried Bra.s.s. 'Extremely entertaining, indeed!'

'Come here,' said Quilp, beckoning him to draw near. 'What's injudicious, hey?'

'Nothing Sir--nothing. Scarcely worth mentioning Sir; but I thought that song--admirably humorous in itself you know--was perhaps rather--'

'Yes,' said Quilp, 'rather what?'

'Just bordering, or as one may say remotely verging, upon the confines of injudiciousness perhaps, Sir,' returned Bra.s.s, looking timidly at the dwarf's cunning eyes, which were turned towards the fire and reflected its red light.

'Why?' inquired Quilp, without looking up.

'Why, you know, sir,' returned Bra.s.s, venturing to be more familiar: '--the fact is, sir, that any allusion to these little combinings together, of friends, for objects in themselves extremely laudable, but which the law terms conspiracies, are--you take me, sir?--best kept snug and among friends, you know.'

'Eh!' said Quilp, looking up with a perfectly vacant countenance.

'What do you mean?'

'Cautious, exceedingly cautious, very right and proper!' cried Bra.s.s, nodding his head. 'Mum, sir, even here--my meaning, sir, exactly.'

'YOUR meaning exactly, you brazen scarecrow,--what's your meaning?'

retorted Quilp. 'Why do you talk to me of combining together? Do I combine? Do I know anything about your combinings?'

'No no, sir--certainly not; not by any means,' returned Bra.s.s.

'If you so wink and nod at me,' said the dwarf, looking about him as if for his poker, 'I'll spoil the expression of your monkey's face, I will.' 'Don't put yourself out of the way I beg, sir,' rejoined Bra.s.s, checking himself with great alacrity. 'You're quite right, sir, quite right. I shouldn't have mentioned the subject, sir. It's much better not to. You're quite right, sir. Let us change it, if you please.

You were asking, sir, Sally told me, about our lodger. He has not returned, sir.'

'No?' said Quilp, heating some rum in a little saucepan, and watching it to prevent its boiling over. 'Why not?'

'Why, sir,' returned Bra.s.s, 'he--dear me, Mr Quilp, sir--'

'What's the matter?' said the dwarf, stopping his hand in the act of carrying the saucepan to his mouth.

'You have forgotten the water, sir,' said Bra.s.s. 'And--excuse me, sir--but it's burning hot.'

Deigning no other than a practical answer to this remonstrance, Mr Quilp raised the hot saucepan to his lips, and deliberately drank off all the spirit it contained, which might have been in quant.i.ty about half a pint, and had been but a moment before, when he took it off the fire, bubbling and hissing fiercely. Having swallowed this gentle stimulant, and shaken his fist at the admiral, he bade Mr Bra.s.s proceed.

'But first,' said Quilp, with his accustomed grin, 'have a drop yourself--a nice drop--a good, warm, fiery drop.'

'Why, sir,' replied Bra.s.s, 'if there was such a thing as a mouthful of water that could be got without trouble--'

'There's no such thing to be had here,' cried the dwarf. 'Water for lawyers! Melted lead and brimstone, you mean, nice hot blistering pitch and tar--that's the thing for them--eh, Bra.s.s, eh?'

'Ha ha ha!' laughed Mr Bra.s.s. 'Oh very biting! and yet it's like being tickled--there's a pleasure in it too, sir!'

'Drink that,' said the dwarf, who had by this time heated some more.

'Toss it off, don't leave any heeltap, scorch your throat and be happy!'

The wretched Sampson took a few short sips of the liquor, which immediately distilled itself into burning tears, and in that form came rolling down his cheeks into the pipkin again, turning the colour of his face and eyelids to a deep red, and giving rise to a violent fit of coughing, in the midst of which he was still heard to declare, with the constancy of a martyr, that it was 'beautiful indeed!' While he was yet in unspeakable agonies, the dwarf renewed their conversation.

'The lodger,' said Quilp, '--what about him?' 'He is still, sir,'

returned Bra.s.s, with intervals of coughing, 'stopping with the Garland family. He has only been home once, Sir, since the day of the examination of that culprit. He informed Mr Richard, sir, that he couldn't bear the house after what had taken place; that he was wretched in it; and that he looked upon himself as being in a certain kind of way the cause of the occurrence.--A very excellent lodger Sir.

I hope we may not lose him.'

'Yah!' cried the dwarf. 'Never thinking of anybody but yourself--why don't you retrench then--sc.r.a.pe up, h.o.a.rd, economise, eh?'

'Why, sir,' replied Bra.s.s, 'upon my word I think Sarah's as good an economiser as any going. I do indeed, Mr Quilp.'

'Moisten your clay, wet the other eye, drink, man!' cried the dwarf.

'You took a clerk to oblige me.'

'Delighted, sir, I am sure, at any time,' replied Sampson. 'Yes, Sir, I did.'

'Then now you may discharge him,' said Quilp. 'There's a means of retrenchment for you at once.'

'Discharge Mr Richard, sir?' cried Bra.s.s.

'Have you more than one clerk, you parrot, that you ask the question?

Yes.'

'Upon my word, Sir,' said Bra.s.s, 'I wasn't prepared for this-'

'How could you be?' sneered the dwarf, 'when I wasn't? How often am I to tell you that I brought him to you that I might always have my eye on him and know where he was--and that I had a plot, a scheme, a little quiet piece of enjoyment afoot, of which the very cream and essence was, that this old man and grandchild (who have sunk underground I think) should be, while he and his precious friend believed them rich, in reality as poor as frozen rats?'

'I quite understood that, sir,' rejoined Bra.s.s. 'Thoroughly.'

'Well, Sir,' retorted Quilp, 'and do you understand now, that they're not poor--that they can't be, if they have such men as your lodger searching for them, and scouring the country far and wide?'

'Of course I do, Sir,' said Sampson.

'Of course you do,' retorted the dwarf, viciously snapping at his words. 'Of course do you understand then, that it's no matter what comes of this fellow? of course do you understand that for any other purpose he's no man for me, nor for you?'

'I have frequently said to Sarah, sir,' returned Bra.s.s, 'that he was of no use at all in the business. You can't put any confidence in him, sir. If you'll believe me I've found that fellow, in the commonest little matters of the office that have been trusted to him, blurting out the truth, though expressly cautioned. The aggravation of that chap sir, has exceeded anything you can imagine, it has indeed.

Nothing but the respect and obligation I owe to you, sir--'

As it was plain that Sampson was bent on a complimentary harangue, unless he received a timely interruption, Mr Quilp politely tapped him on the crown of his head with the little saucepan, and requested that he would be so obliging as to hold his peace.

'Practical, sir, practical,' said Bra.s.s, rubbing the place and smiling; 'but still extremely pleasant--immensely so!'

'Hearken to me, will you?' returned Quilp, 'or I'll be a little more pleasant, presently. There's no chance of his comrade and friend returning. The scamp has been obliged to fly, as I learn, for some knavery, and has found his way abroad. Let him rot there.'

'Certainly, sir. Quite proper.--Forcible!' cried Bra.s.s, glancing at the admiral again, as if he made a third in company. 'Extremely forcible!'