Bleak House Charles Dickens (classic books to read .TXT) đ
- Author: Charles Dickens
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From the verdant undulations and the spreading oaks of the Dedlock property, Mr. Tulkinghorn transfers himself to the stale heat and dust of London. His manner of coming and going between the two places is one of his impenetrabilities. He walks into Chesney Wold as if it were next door to his chambers and returns to his chambers as if he had never been out of Lincolnâs Inn Fields. He neither changes his dress before the journey nor talks of it afterwards. He melted out of his turret-room this morning, just as now, in the late twilight, he melts into his own square.
Like a dingy London bird among the birds at roost in these pleasant fields, where the sheep are all made into parchment, the goats into wigs, and the pasture into chaff, the lawyer, smoke-dried and faded, dwelling among mankind but not consorting with them, aged without experience of genial youth, and so long used to make his cramped nest in holes and corners of human nature that he has forgotten its broader and better range, comes sauntering home. In the oven made by the hot pavements and hot buildings, he has baked himself dryer than usual; and he has in his thirsty mind his mellowed port-wine half a century old.
The lamplighter is skipping up and down his ladder on Mr. Tulkinghornâs side of the Fields when that high-priest of noble mysteries arrives at his own dull courtyard. He ascends the doorsteps and is gliding into the dusky hall when he encounters, on the top step, a bowing and propitiatory little man.
âIs that Snagsby?â
âYes, sir. I hope you are well, sir. I was just giving you up, sir, and going home.â
âAye? What is it? What do you want with me?â
âWell, sir,â says Mr. Snagsby, holding his hat at the side of his head in his deference towards his best customer, âI was wishful to say a word to you, sir.â
âCan you say it here?â
âPerfectly, sir.â
âSay it then.â The lawyer turns, leans his arms on the iron railing at the top of the steps, and looks at the lamplighter lighting the courtyard.
âIt is relating,â says Mr. Snagsby in a mysterious low voice, âit is relatingâ ânot to put too fine a point upon itâ âto the foreigner, sir!â
Mr. Tulkinghorn eyes him with some surprise. âWhat foreigner?â
âThe foreign female, sir. French, if I donât mistake? I am not acquainted with that language myself, but I should judge from her manners and appearance that she was French; anyways, certainly foreign. Her that was upstairs, sir, when Mr. Bucket and me had the honour of waiting upon you with the sweeping-boy that night.â
âOh! Yes, yes. Mademoiselle Hortense.â
âIndeed, sir?â Mr. Snagsby coughs his cough of submission behind his hat. âI am not acquainted myself with the names of foreigners in general, but I have no doubt it would be that.â Mr. Snagsby appears to have set out in this reply with some desperate design of repeating the name, but on reflection coughs again to excuse himself.
âAnd what can you have to say, Snagsby,â demands Mr. Tulkinghorn, âabout her?â
âWell, sir,â returns the stationer, shading his communication with his hat, âit falls a little hard upon me. My domestic happiness is very greatâ âat least, itâs as great as can be expected, Iâm sureâ âbut my little woman is rather given to jealousy. Not to put too fine a point upon it, she is very much given to jealousy. And you see, a foreign female of that genteel appearance coming into the shop, and hoveringâ âI should be the last to make use of a strong expression if I could avoid it, but hovering, sirâ âin the courtâ âyou know it isâ ânow ainât it? I only put it to yourself, sir.â
Mr. Snagsby, having said this in a very plaintive manner, throws in a cough of general application to fill up all the blanks.
âWhy, what do you mean?â asks Mr. Tulkinghorn.
âJust so, sir,â returns Mr. Snagsby; âI was sure you would feel it yourself and would excuse the reasonableness of my feelings when coupled with the known excitableness of my little woman. You see, the foreign femaleâ âwhich you mentioned her name just now, with quite a native sound I am sureâ âcaught up the word Snagsby that night, being uncommon quick, and made inquiry, and got the direction and come at dinnertime. Now Guster, our young woman, is timid and has fits, and she, taking fright at the foreignerâs looksâ âwhich are fierceâ âand at a grinding manner that she has of speakingâ âwhich is calculated to alarm a weak mindâ âgave way to it, instead of bearing up against it, and tumbled down the kitchen stairs out of one into another, such fits as I do sometimes think are never gone into, or come out of, in any house but ours. Consequently there was by good fortune ample occupation for my little woman, and only me to answer the shop. When she did say that Mr. Tulkinghorn, being always denied to her by his employer (which I had no doubt at the time was a foreign mode of viewing a clerk), she would do herself the pleasure of continually calling at my place until she was let in here. Since then she has been, as I began by saying, hovering, hovering, sirââ âMr. Snagsby repeats the word with pathetic emphasisâ ââin the court. The effects of which movement it is impossible to calculate. I shouldnât wonder if it might have already given rise to the painfullest mistakes even in the neighboursâ minds, not mentioning (if such a thing was possible) my little woman. Whereas, goodness knows,â says Mr. Snagsby, shaking his head, âI never had an idea of a foreign female, except as being formerly connected with a bunch of brooms and a baby, or
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