The World's Greatest Books_ Volume 3 Part 15

"Because it's not polite!" said Mrs. Pipchin, snappishly.

"Not polite?" said Paul.

"No! And remember the story of the little boy that was gored to death by a mad bull for asking questions!"

"If the bull was mad," said Paul, "how did _he_ know that the boy had asked questions? n.o.body can go and whisper secrets to a mad bull. I don't believe that story."

"You don't believe it, sir?"

"No," said Paul.

"Not if it should happen to have been a tame bull, you little infidel?"

said Mrs. Pipchin.

As Paul had not considered the subject in that light, he allowed himself to be put down for the present.

Mr. Dombey came down to Brighton every Sunday, and Florence was her brother's constant companion.

At first, Paul got no stronger, and a little carriage was procured for him, in which he could lie at his ease and be wheeled down to the sea-side; there he would sit or lie for hours together; never so distressed as by the company of children--Florence alone excepted, always.

"Go away, if you please," he would say to any child who came up to him.

"Thank you, but I don't want you. I think you had better go and play, if you please."

His favourite spot was quite a lonely one, far away from most loungers; and, with Florence sitting by his side, and the wind blowing on his face, and the water near the wheels of his bed, he wanted nothing more.

"I want to know what it says," he said once, looking steadily in her face. "The sea, Floy, what is it that it keeps on saying?"

She told him that it was only the noise of the rolling waves.

"Yes, yes," he said. "But I know that they are always saying something.

Always the same thing. What place is over there?" He rose up, looking eagerly at the horizon.

She told him that there was another country opposite, but he said he didn't mean that; he meant farther away--farther away!

Very often afterwards, in the midst of their talk, he would break off, to try to understand what it was that the waves were always saying, and would rise up on his couch to look at that invisible region far away.

At the end of twelve months at Mrs. Pipchin's, Paul had grown strong enough to dispense with his little carriage, though he still looked thin and delicate.

Mr. Dombey therefore decided to remove him, not from Brighton, but to Doctor Blimber's educational establishment. "I fear," said Mr. Dombey, addressing Mrs. Pipchin, "that my son in his studies is behind many children of his age. Now instead of being behind his peers, my son ought to be before them--far before them. There is an eminence ready for him to mount upon. The education of my son must not be delayed. It must not be left imperfect."

Doctor Blimber only undertook the charge of ten young gentlemen, and his establishment was a great hot-house, in which there was a forcing apparatus incessantly at work.

Florence would remain at Mrs. Pipchin's, and for the first six months Paul would return there for the Sunday.

"Now, Paul," said Mr. Dombey exultingly, when they stood on the doctor's doorsteps, "This is the way, indeed, to be Dombey and Son, and have money. You are almost a man already."

"Almost," returned the child.

_III.--Doctor Blimber's Academy_

The Doctor was a portly gentleman in a suit of black, with strings at his knees, and stockings below them. He had a bald head, highly polished, a deep voice, and a chin so very double that it was a wonder how he ever managed to shave into the creases.

Mrs. Blimber was not learned herself, but she pretended to be, and that did quite as well.

As to Miss Blimber, there was no light nonsense about her. She was dry and sandy with working in the graves of dead languages.

Mr. Feeder, B.A., Dr. Blimber's a.s.sistant, was a kind of human barrel- organ, with a list of tunes at which he was continually working, over and over again, without any variation.

Under the forcing system at Dr. Blimber's a young gentleman usually took leave of his spirits in three weeks; he had all the cares of the world on his head in three months, and he conceived bitter sentiments against his parents or guardians in four.

The doctor was sitting in his study when Mr. Dombey and Paul arrived.

"And how do you do, sir?" he said to Mr. Dombey. "And how is my little friend?" It seemed to Paul as if the great clock in the hall took this up, and went on saying, "how, is, my, lit-tle friend? how, is, my, lit-tle friend?" over and over again.

Paul was handed over to Miss Blimber at once to be "brought on."

"Cornelia," said the doctor. "Dombey will be your charge at first. Bring him on, Cornelia, bring him on."

It was hard work, for no sooner had Paul mastered subject A than he was immediately provided with subject B, from which we pa.s.sed to C, and even D. Often he felt giddy and confused, and drowsy and dull.

But there were always the Sat.u.r.days when Florence came at noon to fetch him, and never would she, in any weather, stay away. Florence brought the school-books he was studying, and every Sat.u.r.day night would patiently a.s.sist him through so much as they could antic.i.p.ate together of his next week's work. And this saved him, possibly, from sinking underneath the burden which the fair Cornelia Blimber piled upon his back.

It was not that Miss Blimber meant to be too hard upon him, or that Dr.

Blimber meant to bear too heavily on the young gentlemen in general. But when Dr. Blimber said that Paul made great progress, and was naturally clever, Mr. Dombey was more bent than ever on his being forced and crammed.

Such spirits as he had at the outset Paul soon lost, of course. But he retained all that was strange, and odd, and thoughtful in his character; and Mrs. Blimber thought him "odd," and whispered that he was "old fas.h.i.+oned," and that was all.

Between little Paul Dombey the youngest, and Mr. Toots, the oldest of Dr. Blimber's young gentlemen, a strong attachment existed. Toots had "gone through" so much, that he had left off growing, and was free to pursue his own course of study, which was chiefly to write long letters to himself from persons of distinction, addressed "P. Toots, Esquire, Brighton," to preserve them in his desk with great care.

"How are you?" Toots would say to Paul, fifty times a day.

"Quite well, sir, thank you," Paul would answer.

"Shake hands," would be Toot's next advance. Which Paul, of course, would immediately do.

"I say!" cried Toots one evening, finding Paul looking out of the window. "I say, what do you think about?"

"Oh, I think about a great many things," replied Paul.

"Do you, though?" said Toots, appearing to consider that fact in itself surprising.

"If you had to die," said Paul, "don't you think you would rather die on a moonlight night, when the sky is quite clear, and the wind blowing, as it did last night?"

Mr. Toots, looking doubtfully at Paul, said he didn't know about that.

"It was a beautiful night," said Paul. "There was a boat over there, in the full light of the moon, a boat with a sail."

Mr. Toots, feeling called upon to say something, suggested "Smugglers,"