Page:Martin Chuzzlewit.djvu/383

Rh "There's nothin' he don't know; that's my opinion," observed Mrs. Gamp. "All the wickedness of the world is Print to him."

Mr. Bailey received this as a compliment, and said, adjusting his cravat, "reether so."

"As you knows Mrs. Chuzzlewit, you knows, p'raps, what her chris'en name is?" Mrs. Gamp observed.

"Charity," said Bailey.

"That it ain't!" cried Mrs. Gamp.

"Cherry, then," said Bailey. "Cherry's short for it. It's all the same.

"It don't begin with a C at all," retorted Mrs. Gamp, shaking her head. "It begins with a M."

"Whew!" cried Mr. Bailey, slapping a little cloud of pipeclay out of his left leg, "then he's been and married the merry one!"

As these words were mysterious, Mrs. Gamp called upon him to explain, which Mr. Bailey proceeded to do: that lady listening greedily to everything he said. He was yet in the fulness of his narrative when the sound of wheels, and a double knock at the street door, announced the arrival of the newly-married couple. Begging him to reserve what more he had to say, for her hearing on the way home, Mrs. Gamp took up the candle, and hurried away to receive and welcome the young mistress of the house.

"Wishing you appiness and joy with all my art," said Mrs. Gamp dropping a curtsey as they entered the hall; "and you too, sir. Your lady looks a little tired with the journey, Mr. Chuzzlewit, a pretty dear!"

"She has bothered enough about it," grumbled Mr. Jonas. "Now, show a light, will you!"

"This way, ma'am, if you please," said Mrs. Gamp, going up-stairs before them. "Things has been made as comfortable as they could be; but there's many things you 'll have to alter your own self when you gets time to look about you. Ah! sweet thing! But you don't," added Mrs. Gamp, internally, "you don't look much like a merry one, I must say!"

It was true; she did not. The death that had gone before the bridal seemed to have left its shade upon the house. The air was heavy and oppressive; the rooms were dark; a deep gloom filled up every chink and corner. Upon the hearthstone, like a creature of ill omen, sat the aged clerk, with his eyes fixed on some withered branches in the stove. He rose and looked at her.

"So there you are, Mr. Chuff," said Jonas carelessly, as he dusted his boots; "still in the land of the living, eh?"

"Still in the land of the living, sir," retorted Mrs. Gamp. "And Mr. Chuffey may thank you for it, as many and many a time I 've told him."

Mr. Jonas was not in the best of humours, for he merely said, as he looked round, "We don't want you any more, you know, Mrs. Gamp."

"I'm a going immediate, sir," returned the nurse; "unless there's nothink I can do for you, ma'am. Ain't there," said Mrs, Gamp, with a look of great sweetness, and rummaging all the time in her pocket; "ain't there nothink I can do for you, my little bird?"

"No," said Merry, almost crying. "You had better go away, please!"