The Solitary House (With Bonus Novels Bleak House and the Woman in White)

by Lynn Shepherd

  But I am anticipating now the purport of our conversation on the ride home, instead of first marrying Caddy. We all went to church, and Mr. Jellyby gave her away. Of the air with which old Mr. Turveydrop, with his hat under his left arm (the inside presented at the clergyman like a cannon), and his eyes creasing themselves up into his wig, stood, stiff and high-shouldered, behind us bridesmaids during the ceremony, and afterwards saluted us, I could never say enough to do it justice. Miss Wisk, whom I cannot report as prepossessing in appearance, and whose manner was grim, listened to the proceedings, as part of Woman’s wrongs, with a disdainful face. Mrs. Jellyby, with her calm smile and her bright eyes, looked the least concerned of all the company.

  We duly came back to breakfast, and Mrs. Jellyby sat at the head of the table, and Mr. Jellyby at the foot. Caddy had previously stolen upstairs, to hug the children again, and tell them that her name was Turveydrop. But this piece of information, instead of being an agreeable surprise to Peepy, threw him on his back in such transports of kicking grief, that I could do nothing on being sent for, but accede to the proposal that he should be admitted to the breakfast table. So he came down and sat in my lap; and Mrs. Jellyby, after saying, in reference to the state of his pinafore, “O you naughty Peepy, what a shocking little pig you are!” was not at all discomposed. He was very good, except that he brought down Noah with him (out of an ark I had given him before we went to church), and would dip him head first into the wine-glasses, and then put him in his mouth.

  My guardian, with his sweet temper and his quick perception and his amiable face, made something agreeable even out of the ungenial company. None of them seemed able to talk about anything but his, or her, own one subject, and none of them seemed able to talk about even that, as part of a world in which there was anything else; but my guardian turned it all to the merry encouragement of Caddy, and the honour of the occasion, and brought us through the breakfast nobly. What we should have done without him, I am afraid to think; for all the company despising the bride and bridegroom, and old Mr. Turveydrop—and old Mr. Turveydrop, in virtue of his Deportment, considering himself vastly superior to all the company—it was a very unpromising case.

  At last the time came when poor Caddy was to go, and when all her property was packed on the hired coach and pair that was to take her and her husband to Gravesend. It affected us to see Caddy clinging then, to her deplorable home, and hanging on her mother’s neck with the greatest tenderness.

  “I am very sorry I couldn’t go on writing from dictation, Ma,” sobbed Caddy. “I hope you forgive me now?”

  “O Caddy, Caddy!” said Mrs. Jellyby, “I have told you over and over again that I have engaged a boy, and there’s an end of it.”

  “You are sure you are not the least angry with me, Ma? Say you are sure before I go away, Ma?”

  “You foolish Caddy,” returned Mrs. Jellyby, “do I look angry, or have I inclination to be angry, or time to be angry? How can you?”

  “Take a little care of Pa while I am gone, Mama!”

  Mrs. Jellyby positively laughed at the fancy. “You romantic child,” said she, lightly patting Caddy’s back. “Go along. I am excellent friends with you. Now, good-bye, Caddy, and be very happy!”

  Then Caddy hung upon her father, and nursing his cheek against hers as if he were some poor dull child in pain. All this took place in the hall. Her father released her, took out his pocket-handkerchief, and sat down on the stairs with his head against the wall. I hope he found some consolation in walls. I almost think he did.

  And then Prince took her arm in his, and turned with great emotion and respect to his father, whose Deportment at that moment was overwhelming.

  “Thank you over and over again, father!” said Prince, kissing his hand. “I am very grateful for all your kindness and consideration regarding our marriage, and so, I can assure you, is Caddy.”

  “Very,” sobbed Caddy. “Ve-ry!”

  “My dear son,” said Mr. Turveydrop, “and dear daughter, I have done my duty. If the spirit of a sainted Wooman hovers above us, and looks down on the occasion, that, and your constant affection, will be my recompense. You will not fail in your duty, my son and daughter, I believe?”

  “Dear father, never!” cried Prince.

  “Never, never, dear Mr. Turveydrop!” said Caddy.

  “This,” returned Mr. Turveydrop, “is as it should be. My children, my home is yours, my heart is yours, my all is yours. I will never leave you; nothing but Death shall part us. My dear son, you contemplate an absence of a week, I think?”

  “A week, dear father. We shall return home this day week.”

  “My dear child,” said Mr. Turveydrop, “let me, even under the present exceptional circumstances, recommend strict punctuality. It is highly important to keep the connexion together; and schools, if at all neglected, are apt to take offence.”

  “This day week, father, we shall be sure to be home to dinner.”

  “Good!” said Mr. Turveydrop. “You will find fires, my dear Caroline, in your own room, and dinner prepared in my apartment. Yes, yes, Prince!” anticipating some self-denying objection on his son’s part with a great air. “You and our Caroline will be strange in the upper part of the premises, and will, therefore, dine that day in my apartment. Now, bless ye!”

  They drove away; and whether I wondered most at Mrs. Jellyby, or at Mr. Turveydrop, I did not know. Ada and my guardian were in the same condition when we came to talk it over. But before we drove away, too, I received a most unexpected and eloquent compliment from Mr. Jellyby. He came to me in the hall, took both my hands, pressed them earnestly, and opened his mouth twice. I was so sure of his meaning, that I said, quite flurried, “You are very welcome, sir. Pray don’t mention it!”

  “I hope this marriage is for the best, Guardian,” said I, when we three were on our road home.

  “I hope it is, little woman. Patience. We shall see.”

  “Is the wind in the East today?” I ventured to ask him.

  He laughed heartily, and answered, “No.”

  “But it must have been this morning, I think,” said I.

  He answered “No,” again; and this time my dear girl confidently answered “No,” too, and shook the lovely head which, with its blooming flowers against the golden hair, was like the very Spring. “Much you know of East winds, my ugly darling,” said I, kissing her in my admiration—I couldn’t help it.

  Well! It was only their love for me, I know very well, and it is a long time ago. I must write it, even if I rub it out again, because it gives me so much pleasure. They said there could be no East wind where Somebody was; they said that wherever Dame Durden went, there was sunshine and summer air.

  CHAPTER 31

  NURSE AND PATIENT

  I had not been at home again many days, when one evening I went upstairs into my own room to take a peep over Charley’s shoulder, and see how she was getting on with her copy-book. Writing was a trying business to Charley, who seemed to have no natural power over a pen, but in whose hand every pen appeared to become perversely animated, and to go wrong and crooked, and to stop, and splash, and sidle into corners, like a saddle-donkey. It was very odd, to see what old letters Charley’s young hand had made; they, so wrinkled, and shrivelled, and tottering; it, so plump and round. Yet Charley was uncommonly expert at other things, and had as nimble little fingers as I ever watched.

  “Well, Charley,” said I, looking over a copy of the letter O in which it was presented as square, triangular, pear-shaped, and collapsed in all kinds of ways, “we are improving. If we only get to make it round, we shall be perfect, Charley.”

  Then I made one, and Charley made one, and the pen wouldn’t join Charley’s neatly, but twisted it up into a knot.

  “Never mind, Charley. We shall do it in time.”

  Charley laid down her pen, the copy being finished; opened and shut her cramped little hand; looked gravely at the page, half in pride and half in doubt; and got up, and dropped
me a curtsy.

  “Thank you, miss. If you please, miss, did you know a poor person of the name of Jenny?”

  “A brickmaker’s wife, Charley? Yes.”

  “She came and spoke to me when I was out a little while ago, and said you knew her, miss. She asked me if I wasn’t the young lady’s little maid—meaning you for the young lady, miss—and I said yes, miss.”

  “I thought she had left this neighbourhood altogether, Charley.”

  “So she had, miss, but she’s come back again to where she used to live—she and Liz. Did you know another poor person of the name of Liz, miss?”

  “I think I do, Charley, though not by name.”

  “That’s what she said!” returned Charley. “They have both come back, miss, and have been tramping high and low.”

  “Tramping high and low, have they, Charley?”

  “Yes, miss.” If Charley could only have made the letters in her copy as round as the eyes with which she looked into my face, they would have been excellent. “And this poor person came about the house three or four days, hoping to get a glimpse of you, miss—all she wanted, she said—but you were away. That was when she saw me. She saw me a-going about, miss,” said Charley, with a short laugh of the greatest delight and pride, “and she thought I looked like your maid!”

  “Did she though, really, Charley?”

  “Yes, miss!” said Charley, “really and truly.” And Charley with another short laugh of the purest glee, made her eyes very round again, and looked as serious as became my maid. I was never tired of seeing Charley in the full enjoyment of that great dignity, standing before me with her youthful face and figure, and her steady manner, and her childish exultation breaking through it now and then in the pleasantest way.

  “And where did you see her, Charley?” said I.

  My little maid’s countenance fell, as she replied, “By the doctor’s shop, miss.” For Charley wore her black frock yet.

  I asked if the brickmaker’s wife were ill, but Charley said No. It was some one else. Some one in her cottage who had tramped down to Saint Albans, and was tramping he didn’t know where. A poor boy, Charley said. No father, no mother, no any one. “Like as Tom might have been, miss, if Emma and me had died after father,” said Charley, her round eyes filling with tears.

  “And she was getting medicine for him, Charley?”

  “She said, miss,” returned Charley, “how that he had once done as much for her.”

  My little maid’s face was so eager, and her quiet hands were folded so closely in one another as she stood looking at me, that I had no great difficulty in reading her thoughts. “Well, Charley,” said I, “it appears to me that you and I can do no better than go round to Jenny’s and see what’s the matter.”

  The alacrity with which Charley brought my bonnet and veil, and, having dressed me, quaintly pinned herself into her warm shawl and made herself look like a little old woman, sufficiently expressed her readiness. So Charley and I, without saying anything to any one, went out.

  It was a cold wild night, and the trees shuddered in the wind. The rain had been thick and heavy all day, and with little intermission for many days. None was falling just then, however. The sky had partly cleared, but was very gloomy—even above us, where a few stars were shining. In the north and north-west, where the sun had set three hours before, there was a pale dead light both beautiful and awful; and into it long sullen lines of cloud waved up, like a sea stricken immovable as it was heaving. Towards London, a lurid glare overhung the whole dark waste; and the contrast between these two lights, and the fancy which the redder light engendered of an unearthly fire, gleaming on all the unseen buildings of the city, and on all the faces of its many thousands of wondering inhabitants, was as solemn as might be.

  I had no thought, that night—none, I am quite sure—of what was soon to happen to me. But I have always remembered since, that when we had stopped at the garden-gate to look up at the sky, and when we went upon our way, I had for a moment an undefinable impression of myself as being something different from what I then was. I know it was then, and there, that I had it. I have ever since connected the feeling with that spot and time, and with everything associated with that spot and time, to the distant voices in the town, the barking of a dog, and the sound of wheels coming down the miry hill.

  It was Saturday night; and most of the people belonging to the place where we were going, were drinking elsewhere. We found it quieter than I had previously seen it, though quite as miserable. The kilns were burning, and stifling vapour set towards us with a pale-blue glare.

  We came to the cottage, where there was a feeble candle in the patched window. We tapped at the door, and went in. The mother of the little child who had died, was sitting in a chair on one side of the poor fire by the bed; and opposite to her, a wretched boy, supported by the chimney-piece, was cowering on the floor. He held under his arm, like a little bundle, a fragment of a fur cap; and as he tried to warm himself, he shook until the crazy door and window shook. The place was closer than before, and had an unhealthy, and a very peculiar smell.

  I had not lifted my veil when I first spoke to the woman, which was at the moment of our going in. The boy staggered up instantly, and stared at me with a remarkable expression of surprise and terror.

  His action was so quick, and my being the cause of it was so evident, that I stood still, instead of advancing nearer.

  “I won’t go no more to the berryin ground,” muttered the boy; “I ain’t a-going there, so I tell you!”

  I lifted my veil and spoke to the woman. She said to me in a low voice, “Don’t mind him, ma’am. He’ll soon come back to his head”; and said to him, “Jo, Jo, what’s the matter?”

  “I know wot she’s come for!” cried the boy.

  “Who?”

  “The lady there. She’s come to get me to go along with her to the berryin ground. I won’t go to the berryin ground. I don’t like the name on it. She might go a-berryin me.” His shivering came on again, and as he leaned against the wall, he shook the hovel.

  “He has been talking off and on about such like, all day, ma’am,” said Jenny, softly. “Why, how you stare! This is my Lady, Jo.”

  “Is it?” returned the boy, doubtfully, and surveying me with his arm held out above his burning eyes. “She looks to me the t’other one. It ain’t the bonnet, nor yet it ain’t the gownd, but she looks to me the t’other one.”

  My little Charley, with her premature experience of illness and trouble, had pulled off her bonnet and shawl, and now went quietly up to him with a chair, and sat him down in it like an old sick nurse. Except that no such attendant could have shown him Charley’s youthful face, which seemed to engage his confidence.

  “I say!” said the boy. “You tell me. Ain’t the lady the t’other lady?”

  Charley shook her head, as she methodically drew his rags about him and made him as warm as she could.

  “O!” the boy muttered. “Then I s’pose she ain’t.”

  “I came to see if I could do you any good,” said I. “What is the matter with you?”

  “I’m a-being froze,” returned the boy, hoarsely, with his haggard gaze wandering about me, “and then burnt up, and then froze, and then burnt up, ever so many times in a hour. And my head’s all sleepy, and all a-going mad-like—and I’m so dry—and my bones isn’t half so much bones as pain.”

  “When did he come here?” I asked the woman.

  “This morning, ma’am, I found him at the corner of the town. I had known him up in London yonder. Hadn’t I, Jo?”

  “Tom-all-Alone’s,” the boy replied.

  Whenever he fixed his attention or his eyes, it was only for a very little while. He soon began to droop his head again and roll it heavily, and speak as if he were half awake.

  “When did he come from London?” I asked.

  “I come from London yes’day,” said the boy himself, now flushed and hot. “I’m a-going somewheres.”

  �
��Where is he going?” I asked.

  “Somewheres,” repeated the boy, in a louder tone. “I have been moved on, and moved on, more nor ever I was afore, since the t’other one give me the sov’ring. Mrs. Snagsby, she’s always a-watching, and a-driving of me—what have I done to her?—and they’re all a-watching and a-driving of me. Every one of ’em’s doing of it, from the time when I don’t get up, to the time when I don’t go to bed. And I’m a-going somewheres. That’s where I’m a-going. She told me, down in Tom-all-Alone’s, as she came from Stolbuns, and so I took the Stolbuns Road. It’s as good as another.”

  He always concluded by addressing Charley.

  “What is to be done with him?” said I, taking the woman aside. “He could not travel in this state, even if he had a purpose, and knew where he was going!”

  “I know no more, ma’am, than the dead,” she replied, glancing compassionately at him. “Perhaps the dead know better, if they could only tell us. I’ve kept him here all day for pity’s sake, and I’ve given him broth and physic, and Liz has gone to try if any one will take him in (here’s my pretty in the bed—her child, but I call it mine); but I can’t keep him long, for if my husband was to come home and find him here, he’d be rough in putting him out, and might do him a hurt. Hark! Here comes Liz back!”

  The other woman came hurriedly in as she spoke, and the boy got up with a half-obscured sense that he was expected to be going. When the little child awoke, and when and how Charley got at it, took it out of bed, and began to walk about hushing it, I don’t know. There she was, doing all this, in a quiet motherly manner, as if she were living in Mrs. Blinder’s attic with Tom and Emma again.

  The friend had been here and there, and had been playing about from hand to hand, and had come back as she went. At first it was too early for the boy to be received into the proper refuge, and at last it was too late. One official sent her to another, and the other sent her back again to the first, and so backward and forward; until it appeared to me as if both must have been appointed for their skill in evading their duties, instead of performing them. And now, after all, she said, breathing quickly, for she had been running, and was frightened too, “Jenny, your master’s on the road home, and mine’s not far behind, and the Lord help the boy, for we can do no more for him!” They put a few halfpence together, and hurried them into his hand, and so, in an oblivious, half-thankful, half-insensible way, he shuffled out of the house.