The Life And Adventures Of Nicholas Nickleby

C >> Charles Dickens >> The Life And Adventures Of Nicholas Nickleby


With this concluding sentiment, Newman Noggs, who had been perpetually
sitting down and getting up again all through his speech, which he had
delivered in a series of jerks; and who was, from the violent exercise
and the excitement combined, in a state of most intense and fiery heat;
became, without passing through any intermediate stage, stiff, upright,
and motionless, and so remained, staring at Ralph Nickleby with all his
might and main.

Ralph looked at him for an instant, and for an instant only; then, waved
his hand, and beating the ground with his foot, said in a choking voice:

'Go on, gentlemen, go on! I'm patient, you see. There's law to be had,
there's law. I shall call you to an account for this. Take care what you
say; I shall make you prove it.'

'The proof is ready,' returned brother Charles, 'quite ready to our
hands. The man Snawley, last night, made a confession.'

'Who may "the man Snawley" be,' returned Ralph, 'and what may his
"confession" have to do with my affairs?'

To this inquiry, put with a dogged inflexibility of manner, the old
gentleman returned no answer, but went on to say, that to show him how
much they were in earnest, it would be necessary to tell him, not only
what accusations were made against him, but what proof of them they
had, and how that proof had been acquired. This laying open of the whole
question brought up brother Ned, Tim Linkinwater, and Newman Noggs, all
three at once; who, after a vast deal of talking together, and a scene
of great confusion, laid before Ralph, in distinct terms, the following
statement.

That, Newman, having been solemnly assured by one not then producible
that Smike was not the son of Snawley, and this person having offered to
make oath to that effect, if necessary, they had by this communication
been first led to doubt the claim set up, which they would otherwise
have seen no reason to dispute, supported as it was by evidence which
they had no power of disproving. That, once suspecting the existence of
a conspiracy, they had no difficulty in tracing back its origin to the
malice of Ralph, and the vindictiveness and avarice of Squeers. That,
suspicion and proof being two very different things, they had been
advised by a lawyer, eminent for his sagacity and acuteness in such
practice, to resist the proceedings taken on the other side for the
recovery of the youth as slowly and artfully as possible, and meanwhile
to beset Snawley (with whom it was clear the main falsehood must rest);
to lead him, if possible, into contradictory and conflicting statements;
to harass him by all available means; and so to practise on his fears,
and regard for his own safety, as to induce him to divulge the whole
scheme, and to give up his employer and whomsoever else he could
implicate. That, all this had been skilfully done; but that Snawley,
who was well practised in the arts of low cunning and intrigue,
had successfully baffled all their attempts, until an unexpected
circumstance had brought him, last night, upon his knees.

It thus arose. When Newman Noggs reported that Squeers was again in
town, and that an interview of such secrecy had taken place between him
and Ralph that he had been sent out of the house, plainly lest he should
overhear a word, a watch was set upon the schoolmaster, in the hope
that something might be discovered which would throw some light upon
the suspected plot. It being found, however, that he held no further
communication with Ralph, nor any with Snawley, and lived quite alone,
they were completely at fault; the watch was withdrawn, and they would
have observed his motions no longer, if it had not happened that,
one night, Newman stumbled unobserved on him and Ralph in the street
together. Following them, he discovered, to his surprise, that they
repaired to various low lodging-houses, and taverns kept by broken
gamblers, to more than one of whom Ralph was known, and that they were
in pursuit--so he found by inquiries when they had left--of an
old woman, whose description exactly tallied with that of deaf Mrs
Sliderskew. Affairs now appearing to assume a more serious complexion,
the watch was renewed with increased vigilance; an officer was procured,
who took up his abode in the same tavern with Squeers: and by him and
Frank Cheeryble the footsteps of the unconscious schoolmaster were
dogged, until he was safely housed in the lodging at Lambeth. Mr Squeers
having shifted his lodging, the officer shifted his, and lying concealed
in the same street, and, indeed, in the opposite house, soon found that
Mr Squeers and Mrs Sliderskew were in constant communication.

In this state of things, Arthur Gride was appealed to. The robbery,
partly owing to the inquisitiveness of the neighbours, and partly to
his own grief and rage, had, long ago, become known; but he positively
refused to give his sanction or yield any assistance to the old woman's
capture, and was seized with such a panic at the idea of being called
upon to give evidence against her, that he shut himself up close in his
house, and refused to hold communication with anybody. Upon this, the
pursuers took counsel together, and, coming so near the truth as to
arrive at the conclusion that Gride and Ralph, with Squeers for their
instrument, were negotiating for the recovery of some of the stolen
papers which would not bear the light, and might possibly explain the
hints relative to Madeline which Newman had overheard, resolved that Mrs
Sliderskew should be taken into custody before she had parted with
them: and Squeers too, if anything suspicious could be attached to
him. Accordingly, a search-warrant being procured, and all prepared, Mr
Squeers's window was watched, until his light was put out, and the time
arrived when, as had been previously ascertained, he usually visited
Mrs Sliderskew. This done, Frank Cheeryble and Newman stole upstairs to
listen to their discourse, and to give the signal to the officer at the
most favourable time. At what an opportune moment they arrived, how
they listened, and what they heard, is already known to the reader. Mr
Squeers, still half stunned, was hurried off with a stolen deed in his
possession, and Mrs Sliderskew was apprehended likewise. The information
being promptly carried to Snawley that Squeers was in custody--he was
not told for what--that worthy, first extorting a promise that he should
be kept harmless, declared the whole tale concerning Smike to be a
fiction and forgery, and implicated Ralph Nickleby to the fullest
extent. As to Mr Squeers, he had, that morning, undergone a private
examination before a magistrate; and, being unable to account
satisfactorily for his possession of the deed or his companionship with
Mrs Sliderskew, had been, with her, remanded for a week.

All these discoveries were now related to Ralph, circumstantially, and
in detail. Whatever impression they secretly produced, he suffered no
sign of emotion to escape him, but sat perfectly still, not raising his
frowning eyes from the ground, and covering his mouth with his hand.
When the narrative was concluded; he raised his head hastily, as if
about to speak, but on brother Charles resuming, fell into his old
attitude again.

'I told you this morning,' said the old gentleman, laying his hand upon
his brother's shoulder, 'that I came to you in mercy. How far you may be
implicated in this last transaction, or how far the person who is now
in custody may criminate you, you best know. But, justice must take its
course against the parties implicated in the plot against this poor,
unoffending, injured lad. It is not in my power, or in the power of my
brother Ned, to save you from the consequences. The utmost we can do is,
to warn you in time, and to give you an opportunity of escaping them. We
would not have an old man like you disgraced and punished by your near
relation; nor would we have him forget, like you, all ties of blood
and nature. We entreat you--brother Ned, you join me, I know, in this
entreaty, and so, Tim Linkinwater, do you, although you pretend to be an
obstinate dog, sir, and sit there frowning as if you didn't--we entreat
you to retire from London, to take shelter in some place where you will
be safe from the consequences of these wicked designs, and where you may
have time, sir, to atone for them, and to become a better man.'

'And do you think,' returned Ralph, rising, 'and do you think, you will
so easily crush ME? Do you think that a hundred well-arranged plans, or
a hundred suborned witnesses, or a hundred false curs at my heels, or a
hundred canting speeches full of oily words, will move me? I thank you
for disclosing your schemes, which I am now prepared for. You have not
the man to deal with that you think; try me! and remember that I
spit upon your fair words and false dealings, and dare you--provoke
you--taunt you--to do to me the very worst you can!'

Thus they parted, for that time; but the worst had not come yet.



CHAPTER 60

The Dangers thicken, and the Worst is told


Instead of going home, Ralph threw himself into the first street
cabriolet he could find, and, directing the driver towards the
police-office of the district in which Mr Squeers's misfortunes had
occurred, alighted at a short distance from it, and, discharging the
man, went the rest of his way thither on foot. Inquiring for the object
of his solicitude, he learnt that he had timed his visit well; for Mr
Squeers was, in fact, at that moment waiting for a hackney coach he had
ordered, and in which he purposed proceeding to his week's retirement,
like a gentleman.

Demanding speech with the prisoner, he was ushered into a kind of
waiting-room in which, by reason of his scholastic profession and
superior respectability, Mr Squeers had been permitted to pass the day.
Here, by the light of a guttering and blackened candle, he could barely
discern the schoolmaster, fast asleep on a bench in a remote corner.
An empty glass stood on a table before him, which, with his somnolent
condition and a very strong smell of brandy and water, forewarned
the visitor that Mr Squeers had been seeking, in creature comforts, a
temporary forgetfulness of his unpleasant situation.

It was not a very easy matter to rouse him: so lethargic and heavy were
his slumbers. Regaining his faculties by slow and faint glimmerings, he
at length sat upright; and, displaying a very yellow face, a very
red nose, and a very bristly beard: the joint effect of which was
considerably heightened by a dirty white handkerchief, spotted with
blood, drawn over the crown of his head and tied under his chin: stared
ruefully at Ralph in silence, until his feelings found a vent in this
pithy sentence:

'I say, young fellow, you've been and done it now; you have!'

'What's the matter with your head?' asked Ralph.

'Why, your man, your informing kidnapping man, has been and broke it,'
rejoined Squeers sulkily; 'that's what's the matter with it. You've come
at last, have you?'

'Why have you not sent to me?' said Ralph. 'How could I come till I knew
what had befallen you?'

'My family!' hiccuped Mr Squeers, raising his eye to the ceiling: 'my
daughter, as is at that age when all the sensibilities is a-coming out
strong in blow--my son as is the young Norval of private life, and the
pride and ornament of a doting willage--here's a shock for my family!
The coat-of-arms of the Squeerses is tore, and their sun is gone down
into the ocean wave!'

'You have been drinking,' said Ralph, 'and have not yet slept yourself
sober.'

'I haven't been drinking YOUR health, my codger,' replied Mr Squeers;
'so you have nothing to do with that.'

Ralph suppressed the indignation which the schoolmaster's altered and
insolent manner awakened, and asked again why he had not sent to him.

'What should I get by sending to you?' returned Squeers. 'To be known to
be in with you wouldn't do me a deal of good, and they won't take bail
till they know something more of the case, so here am I hard and fast:
and there are you, loose and comfortable.'

'And so must you be in a few days,' retorted Ralph, with affected
good-humour. 'They can't hurt you, man.'

'Why, I suppose they can't do much to me, if I explain how it was that I
got into the good company of that there ca-daverous old Slider,' replied
Squeers viciously, 'who I wish was dead and buried, and resurrected and
dissected, and hung upon wires in a anatomical museum, before ever I'd
had anything to do with her. This is what him with the powdered head
says this morning, in so many words: "Prisoner! As you have been found
in company with this woman; as you were detected in possession of
this document; as you were engaged with her in fraudulently destroying
others, and can give no satisfactory account of yourself; I shall remand
you for a week, in order that inquiries may be made, and evidence got.
And meanwhile I can't take any bail for your appearance." Well then,
what I say now is, that I CAN give a satisfactory account of myself;
I can hand in the card of my establishment and say, "I am the Wackford
Squeers as is therein named, sir. I am the man as is guaranteed,
by unimpeachable references, to be a out-and-outer in morals and
uprightness of principle. Whatever is wrong in this business is no fault
of mine. I had no evil design in it, sir. I was not aware that anything
was wrong. I was merely employed by a friend, my friend Mr Ralph
Nickleby, of Golden Square. Send for him, sir, and ask him what he has
to say; he's the man; not me!"'

'What document was it that you had?' asked Ralph, evading, for the
moment, the point just raised.

'What document? Why, THE document,' replied Squeers. 'The Madeline
What's-her-name one. It was a will; that's what it was.'

'Of what nature, whose will, when dated, how benefiting her, to what
extent?' asked Ralph hurriedly.

'A will in her favour; that's all I know,' rejoined Squeers, 'and that's
more than you'd have known, if you'd had them bellows on your head. It's
all owing to your precious caution that they got hold of it. If you had
let me burn it, and taken my word that it was gone, it would have been a
heap of ashes behind the fire, instead of being whole and sound, inside
of my great-coat.'

'Beaten at every point!' muttered Ralph.

'Ah!' sighed Squeers, who, between the brandy and water and his broken
head, wandered strangely, 'at the delightful village of Dotheboys near
Greta Bridge in Yorkshire, youth are boarded, clothed, booked, washed,
furnished with pocket-money, provided with all necessaries, instructed
in all languages living and dead, mathematics, orthography, geometry,
astronomy, trigonometry--this is a altered state of trigonomics, this
is! A double 1--all, everything--a cobbler's weapon. U-p-up, adjective,
not down. S-q-u-double e-r-s-Squeers, noun substantive, a educator of
youth. Total, all up with Squeers!'

His running on, in this way, had afforded Ralph an opportunity of
recovering his presence of mind, which at once suggested to him
the necessity of removing, as far as possible, the schoolmaster's
misgivings, and leading him to believe that his safety and best policy
lay in the preservation of a rigid silence.

'I tell you, once again,' he said, 'they can't hurt you. You shall have
an action for false imprisonment, and make a profit of this, yet. We
will devise a story for you that should carry you through twenty times
such a trivial scrape as this; and if they want security in a thousand
pounds for your reappearance in case you should be called upon, you
shall have it. All you have to do is, to keep back the truth. You're a
little fuddled tonight, and may not be able to see this as clearly as
you would at another time; but this is what you must do, and you'll need
all your senses about you; for a slip might be awkward.'

'Oh!' said Squeers, who had looked cunningly at him, with his head stuck
on one side, like an old raven. 'That's what I'm to do, is it? Now then,
just you hear a word or two from me. I an't a-going to have any stories
made for me, and I an't a-going to stick to any. If I find matters going
again me, I shall expect you to take your share, and I'll take care you
do. You never said anything about danger. I never bargained for being
brought into such a plight as this, and I don't mean to take it as quiet
as you think. I let you lead me on, from one thing to another, because
we had been mixed up together in a certain sort of a way, and if you had
liked to be ill-natured you might perhaps have hurt the business, and
if you liked to be good-natured you might throw a good deal in my way.
Well; if all goes right now, that's quite correct, and I don't mind it;
but if anything goes wrong, then times are altered, and I shall just say
and do whatever I think may serve me most, and take advice from nobody.
My moral influence with them lads,' added Mr Squeers, with deeper
gravity, 'is a tottering to its basis. The images of Mrs Squeers, my
daughter, and my son Wackford, all short of vittles, is perpetually
before me; every other consideration melts away and vanishes, in front
of these; the only number in all arithmetic that I know of, as a husband
and a father, is number one, under this here most fatal go!'

How long Mr Squeers might have declaimed, or how stormy a discussion his
declamation might have led to, nobody knows. Being interrupted, at this
point, by the arrival of the coach and an attendant who was to bear
him company, he perched his hat with great dignity on the top of the
handkerchief that bound his head; and, thrusting one hand in his pocket,
and taking the attendant's arm with the other, suffered himself to be
led forth.

'As I supposed from his not sending!' thought Ralph. 'This fellow, I
plainly see through all his tipsy fooling, has made up his mind to turn
upon me. I am so beset and hemmed in, that they are not only all struck
with fear, but, like the beasts in the fable, have their fling at me
now, though time was, and no longer ago than yesterday too, when they
were all civility and compliance. But they shall not move me. I'll not
give way. I will not budge one inch!'

He went home, and was glad to find his housekeeper complaining of
illness, that he might have an excuse for being alone and sending her
away to where she lived: which was hard by. Then, he sat down by the
light of a single candle, and began to think, for the first time, on all
that had taken place that day.

He had neither eaten nor drunk since last night, and, in addition to the
anxiety of mind he had undergone, had been travelling about, from place
to place almost incessantly, for many hours. He felt sick and exhausted,
but could taste nothing save a glass of water, and continued to sit with
his head upon his hand; not resting nor thinking, but laboriously
trying to do both, and feeling that every sense but one of weariness and
desolation, was for the time benumbed.

It was nearly ten o'clock when he heard a knocking at the door, and
still sat quiet as before, as if he could not even bring his thoughts to
bear upon that. It had been often repeated, and he had, several times,
heard a voice outside, saying there was a light in the window (meaning,
as he knew, his own candle), before he could rouse himself and go
downstairs.

'Mr Nickleby, there is terrible news for you, and I am sent to beg you
will come with me directly,' said a voice he seemed to recognise. He
held his hand above his eyes, and, looking out, saw Tim Linkinwater on
the steps.

'Come where?' demanded Ralph.

'To our house, where you came this morning. I have a coach here.'

'Why should I go there?' said Ralph.

'Don't ask me why, but pray come with me.'

'Another edition of today!' returned Ralph, making as though he would
shut the door.

'No, no!' cried Tim, catching him by the arm and speaking most
earnestly; 'it is only that you may hear something that has occurred:
something very dreadful, Mr Nickleby, which concerns you nearly. Do you
think I would tell you so or come to you like this, if it were not the
case?'

Ralph looked at him more closely. Seeing that he was indeed greatly
excited, he faltered, and could not tell what to say or think.

'You had better hear this now, than at any other time,' said Tim; 'it
may have some influence with you. For Heaven's sake come!'

Perhaps, at, another time, Ralph's obstinacy and dislike would have
been proof against any appeal from such a quarter, however emphatically
urged; but now, after a moment's hesitation, he went into the hall for
his hat, and returning, got into the coach without speaking a word.

Tim well remembered afterwards, and often said, that as Ralph Nickleby
went into the house for this purpose, he saw him, by the light of the
candle which he had set down upon a chair, reel and stagger like a
drunken man. He well remembered, too, that when he had placed his foot
upon the coach-steps, he turned round and looked upon him with a face so
ashy pale and so very wild and vacant that it made him shudder, and for
the moment almost afraid to follow. People were fond of saying that
he had some dark presentiment upon him then, but his emotion might,
perhaps, with greater show of reason, be referred to what he had
undergone that day.

A profound silence was observed during the ride. Arrived at their place
of destination, Ralph followed his conductor into the house, and into a
room where the two brothers were. He was so astounded, not to say awed,
by something of a mute compassion for himself which was visible in their
manner and in that of the old clerk, that he could scarcely speak.

Having taken a seat, however, he contrived to say, though in broken
words, 'What--what have you to say to me--more than has been said
already?'

The room was old and large, very imperfectly lighted, and terminated in
a bay window, about which hung some heavy drapery. Casting his eyes in
this direction as he spoke, he thought he made out the dusky figure of
a man. He was confirmed in this impression by seeing that the object
moved, as if uneasy under his scrutiny.

'Who's that yonder?' he said.

'One who has conveyed to us, within these two hours, the intelligence
which caused our sending to you,' replied brother Charles. 'Let him be,
sir, let him be for the present.'

'More riddles!' said Ralph, faintly. 'Well, sir?'

In turning his face towards the brothers he was obliged to avert it from
the window; but, before either of them could speak, he had looked round
again. It was evident that he was rendered restless and uncomfortable by
the presence of the unseen person; for he repeated this action several
times, and at length, as if in a nervous state which rendered him
positively unable to turn away from the place, sat so as to have it
opposite him, muttering as an excuse that he could not bear the light.

The brothers conferred apart for a short time: their manner showing
that they were agitated. Ralph glanced at them twice or thrice, and
ultimately said, with a great effort to recover his self-possession,
'Now, what is this? If I am brought from home at this time of night, let
it be for something. What have you got to tell me?' After a short pause,
he added, 'Is my niece dead?'

He had struck upon a key which rendered the task of commencement an
easier one. Brother Charles turned, and said that it was a death of
which they had to tell him, but that his niece was well.

'You don't mean to tell me,' said Ralph, as his eyes brightened, 'that
her brother's dead? No, that's too good. I'd not believe it, if you told
me so. It would be too welcome news to be true.'

'Shame on you, you hardened and unnatural man,' cried the other brother,
warmly. 'Prepare yourself for intelligence which, if you have any human
feeling in your breast, will make even you shrink and tremble. What if
we tell you that a poor unfortunate boy: a child in everything but never
having known one of those tender endearments, or one of those lightsome
hours which make our childhood a time to be remembered like a happy
dream through all our after life: a warm-hearted, harmless, affectionate
creature, who never offended you, or did you wrong, but on whom you have
vented the malice and hatred you have conceived for your nephew, and
whom you have made an instrument for wreaking your bad passions upon
him: what if we tell you that, sinking under your persecution, sir, and
the misery and ill-usage of a life short in years but long in suffering,
this poor creature has gone to tell his sad tale where, for your part in
it, you must surely answer?'

'If you tell me,' said Ralph; 'if you tell me that he is dead, I forgive
you all else. If you tell me that he is dead, I am in your debt and
bound to you for life. He is! I see it in your faces. Who triumphs now?
Is this your dreadful news; this your terrible intelligence? You see
how it moves me. You did well to send. I would have travelled a hundred
miles afoot, through mud, mire, and darkness, to hear this news just at
this time.'

Even then, moved as he was by this savage joy, Ralph could see in the
faces of the two brothers, mingling with their look of disgust and
horror, something of that indefinable compassion for himself which he
had noticed before.