Multimedia Mania/abacus-multimedia-mania.iso/dp/0060/00608.txt

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$Unique_ID{bob00608}
$Pretitle{}
$Title{Hard Times
Chapter VII}
$Subtitle{}
$Author{Dickens, Charles}
$Affiliation{}
$Subject{father
sleary
sissy
louisa
gradgrind
now
thee
away
himself
night}
$Date{}
$Log{}
Title:       Hard Times
Book:        Book The Third: Garnering
Author:      Dickens, Charles

Chapter VII

Whelp-Hunting

     Before the ring formed round the Old Hell Shaft was broken, one figure
had disappeared from within it.  Mr. Bounderby and his shadow had not stood
near Louisa, who held her father's arm, but in a retired place by themselves.
When Mr. Gradgrind was summoned to the couch, Sissy, attentive to all that
happened, slipped behind that wicked shadow - a sight in the horror of his
face, if there had been eyes there for any sight but one - and whispered in
his ear.  Without turning his head, he conferred with her a few moments, and
vanished.  Thus the whelp had gone out of the circle before the people moved.

     When the father reached home, he sent a message to Mr. Bounderby's,
desiring his son to come to him directly.  The reply was, that Mr. Bounderby
having missed him in the crowd, and seeing nothing of him since, had supposed
him to be at Stone Lodge.

     "I believe, father," said Louisa, "he will not come back to town
to-night." Mr. Gradgrind turned away and said no more.

     In the morning he went down to the Bank himself as soon as it was opened,
and seeing his son's place empty (he had not the courage to look in at first),
went back along the street to meet Mr. Bounderby on his way there.  To whom he
said that, for reasons he would soon explain, but entreated not then to be
asked for, he had found it necessary to employ his son at a distance for a
little while.  Also, that he was charged with the duty of vindicating Stephen
Blackpool's memory, and declaring the thief.  Mr. Bounderby quite confounded,
stood stock-still in the street after his father-in-law had left him, swelling
like an immense soap-bubble, without its beauty.

     Mr. Gradgrind went home, locked himself in his room, and kept it all that
day.  When Sissy and Louisa tapped at his door, he said, without opening it,
"Not now, my dears; in the evening." On their return in the evening, he said,
"I am not able yet - to-morrow." He ate nothing all day, and had no candle
after dark: and they heard him walking to and fro late at night.

     But in the morning he appeared at breakfast at the usual hour, and took
his usual place at the table.  Aged and bent he looked, and quite bowed down;
and yet he looked a wiser man, and a better man, than in the days when in this
life he wanted nothing but Facts.  Before he left the room, he appointed a
time for them to come to him; and so with his gray head drooping went away.

     "Dear father," said Louisa, when they kept their appointment, "you have
three young children left.  They will be different, I will be different yet,
with Heaven's help."

     She gave her hand to Sissy, as if she meant with her help too.

     "Your wretched brother," said Mr. Gradgrind.  "Do you think he had
planned this robbery, when he went with you to the lodgings?"

     "I fear so, father.  I know he had wanted money very much, and had spent
a great deal."

     "The poor man being about to leave the town, it came into his evil brain
to cast suspicion on him?"

     "I think it must have flashed upon him while he sat there, father. For I
asked him to go there with me.  The visit did not originate with him."

     "He had some conversation with the poor man.  Did he take him aside?"

     "He took him out of the room.  I asked him afterwards, why he done so,
and he made a plausible excuse; but since last night, father, and when I
remember the circumstances by its light, I am afraid I can imagine too truly
what passed between them."

     "Let me know," said her father, "if your thoughts present your guilty
brother in the same dark view as mine."

     "I fear, father," hesitated Louisa, "that he must have made some
representation to Stephen Blackpool - perhaps in my name, perhaps in his own -
which induced him to do in good faith and honesty, what he had never done
before, and to wait about the Bank those two or three nights before he left
the town."

     "Too plain!" returned the father.  "Too plain!"

     He shaded his face, and remained silent for some moments.  Recovering
himself, he said:

     "And now, how is he to be found?  How is he to be saved from justice? In
the few hours that I can possibly allow to elapse before I publish the truth,
how is he to be found by us, and only by us?  Ten thousand pounds could not
effect it."

     "Sissy has effected it, father."

     He raised his eyes to where she stood, like a good fairy in his house,
and said in a tone of softened gratitude and grateful kindness, "It is always
you, my child!"

     "We had our fears." Sissy explained, glancing at Louisa, "before
yesterday; and when I saw you brought to the side of the litter last night,
and heard what passed (being close to Rachael all the time), I went to him
when no one saw, and said to him, 'Don't look at me.  See where your father
is.  Escape at once, for his sake and your own!' He was in a tremble before I
whispered to him, and he started and trembled more then, and said, 'Where can
I go?  I have very little money, and I don't know who will hide me!" I thought
of father's old circus.  I have not forgotten where Mr. Sleary goes at this
time of year, and I read of him in a paper only the other day.  I told him to
hurry there, and tell his name, and ask Mr. Sleary to hide him till I came.
'I'll get to him before the morning,' he said.  And I saw him shrink away
among the people."

     "Thank Heaven!" exclaimed his father.  "He may be got abroad yet."

     It was the more hopeful as the town to which Sissy had directed him was
within three hours' journey of Liverpool, whence he could be swiftly
dispatched to any part of the world.  But, caution being necessary in
communicating with him - for there was a greater danger every moment of his
being suspected now, and nobody could be sure at heart, but that Mr. Bounderby
himself, in a bullying vein of public zeal, might play a Roman part - it was
consented that Sissy and Louisa should repair to the place in question, by a
circuitous course alone; and that the unhappy father, setting forth in an
opposite direction, should get round to the same bourne by another and wider
route.  It was further agreed that he should not present himself to Mr.
Sleary, lest his intentions should be mistrusted, or the intelligence of his
arrival should cause his son to take flight anew; but, that the communication
should be left to Sissy and Louisa to open; and that they should inform the
cause of so much misery and disgrace, of his father's being at hand and of the
purpose for which they had come.  When these arrangements had been well
considered and were fully understood by all three, it was time to begin to
carry them into execution.  Early in the afternoon, Mr. Gradgrind walked
direct from his own house into the country, to be taken up on the line by
which he was to travel; and at night the remaining two set forth upon their
different course, encouraged by not seeing any face they knew.

     The two travelled all night, except when they were left, for odd numbers
of minutes, at branch-places up illimitable flights of steps, or down wells -
which was the only variety of those branches - and, early in the morning, were
turned out on a swamp, a mile or two from the town they sought.  From this
dismal spot they were rescued by a savage old postilion, who happened to be up
early, kicking a horse in a fly; and so were smuggled into the town by all the
back lanes where the pigs lived: which, although not a magnificent or even
savoury approach, was, as is usual in such cases, the legitimate highway.

     The first thing they saw on entering the town was the skeleton of
Sleary's Circus.  The company had departed for another town more than twenty
miles off, and had opened there last night.  The connection between the two
places was by a hilly turnpike-road, and the travelling on that road was very
slow.  Though they took but a hasty breakfast, and no rest (which it would
have been in vain to seek under such circumstances), it was noon before they
began to find the bills of Sleary's Horseriding on barns and walls, and one
o'clock when they stopped in the market-place.

     A Grand Morning Performance by the Riders, commencing at that very hour,
was in course of announcement by the bellman as they set their feet upon the
stones of the street.  Sissy recommended that, to avoid making inquiries and
attracting attention in the town, they should present themselves to pay at the
door.  If Mr. Sleary were taking the money, he would be sure to know her, and
would proceed with discretion.  If he were not, he would be sure to see them
inside; and, knowing what he had done with the fugitive, would proceed with
discretion still.

     Therefore, they repaired, with fluttering hearts, to the well remembered
booth.  The flag with the inscription Sleary's Horseriding, was there; and the
Gothic niche was there; but Mr. Sleary was not there. Master Kidderminster,
grown too maturely turfy to be received by the wildest credulity as Cupid any
more, had yielded to the invincible force of circumstances (and his beard),
and, in the capacity of a man who made himself generally useful, presided on
this occasion over the exchequer - having also a drum in reserve, on which to
expend his leisure moments and superfluous forces.  In the extreme sharpness
of his look out for base coin, Mr. Kidderminster, as at present situated,
never saw anything but money; so Sissy passed him unrecognized, and they went
in.

     The Emperor of Japan, on a steady old white horse stencilled with black
spots, was twirling five wash-hand basins at once, as it is the favourite
recreation of that monarch to do.  Sissy, though well acquainted with his
Royal line, had no personal knowledge of the present Emperor, and his reign
was peaceful.  Miss Josephine Sleary, in her celebrated graceful Equestrian
Tyrolean Flower-Act was then announced by a new clown (who humorously said
Cauliflower Act), and Mr. Sleary appeared, leading her in.

     Mr. Sleary had only made one cut at the Clown with his long whip-lash,
and the Clown had only said, "If you do it again, I'll throw the horse at
you!" when Sissy was recognised both by father and daughter. But they got
through the Act with great self-possession; and Mr. Sleary, saving for the
first instant, conveyed no more expression into his locomotive eye than into
his fixed one.  The performance seemed a little long to Sissy and Louisa,
particularly when it stopped to afford the Clown an opportunity of telling Mr.
Sleary (who said "Indeed, sir!" to all his observations in the calmest way,
and with his eye on the house), about two legs sitting on three legs looking
at one leg, when in came four legs, and laid hold of one leg, and up got two
legs, caught hold of three legs, and threw 'em at four legs, who ran away with
one leg.  For, although an ingenious Allegory relating to a butcher, a
three-legged stool, a dog, and a leg of mutton, this narrative consumed time;
and they were in great suspense.  At last, however, little fair-haired
Josephine made her curtsey amid great applause; and the Clown, left alone in
the ring, had just warmed himself, and said, "Now I'll have a turn!" when
Sissy was touched on the shoulder, and beckoned out.

     She took Louisa with her; and they were received by Mr. Sleary in a very
little private apartment, with canvas sides, a grass floor, and a wooden
ceiling all aslant, on which the box company stamped their approbation, as if
they were coming through.  "Thethilia," said Mr. Sleary, who had brandy and
water at hand, "it doth me good to thee you. You wath alwayth a favourite with
uth, and you've have done uth credit thinth the old timeth I'm thure.  You
mutht thee our people, my dear, afore we thpeak of bithnith, or they'll break
their hearts - ethpethially the women.  Here'th Jothphine hath been and got
married to E. W. B. Childerth, and thee hath got a boy, and though he'th only
three yearth old, he thtickth on to any pony you can bring againth him.  He'th
named The Little Wonder Of Thcolathic Equitation; and if you don't hear of
that boy at Athley'th, you'll hear of him at Parith.  And you recollect
Kidderminthter, that wath thought to be rather thweet upon yourthelf. Well.
He'th married too.  Married a widder.  Old enough to be hith mother.  Thee
wath Tightrope, thee wath, and now thee'th nothing - on accounth of fat.
They've got two children, tho we're thtrong in the Fairy bithnith and the
Nurthery dodge.  If you wath to thee our Children in the Wood, with their
father and mother both a dyin' on a horthe - their uncle a rethieving of 'em
ath hith wardth, upon a horthe - themthelvth both a goin' a blackberryin' on a
horthe - and the Robinth a coming in to cover 'em with leavth, upon a horthe -
you'd thay it wath the completetht thing ath ever you thet your eyeth on!  And
you remember Emma Gordon, my dear, ath wath a'motht a mother to you?  Of
courthe you do; I needn't athk. Well!  Emma, thee lotht her huthband.  He wath
throw'd a heavy back-fall off a Elephant in a thort of a Pagoda thing ath the
Thultan of the Indieth, and he never got the better of it; and thee married a
thecond time - married a Cheethe-monger ath fell in love with her from the
front - and he'th a Overtheer and makin' a fortun."

     These various changes, Mr. Sleary, very short of breath now, related with
heartiness, and with a wonderful kind of innocence, considering what a bleary
and brandy-and-watery old veteran he was.  Afterwards he brought in Josephine,
and E. W. B. Childers (rather deeply-lined in the jaws by daylight), and The
Little Wonder of Scholastic Equitation, and in a word, all the company.
Amazing creatures they were in Louisa's eyes, so white and pink of complexion,
so scant of dress, and so demonstrative of leg; but it was very agreeable to
see them crowding about Sissy, and very natural in Sissy to be unable to
refrain from tears.

     "There!  Now Thethilia hath kithd all the children, and hugged all the
women, and thaken handth all round with all the men, clear, every one of you,
and ring in the band for the thecond part!"

     As soon as they were gone, he continued in a low tone.  "Now, Thethilia,
I don't athk to know any thecret, but I thuppothe I may conthider thith to be
Mith Thquire."

     "This is his sister.  Yes."

     "And t'other on'th daughter.  That'h what I mean.  Hope I thee you well,
mith.  And I hope the Thquire'th well?"

     "My father will be here soon," said Louisa, anxious to bring him to the
point.  "Is my brother safe?"

     "Thafe and thound!" he replied.  "I want you jutht to take a peep at the
Ring, mith, through there.  Thethilia, you know the dodgeth; find a thpy-hole
for yourthelf."

     They each looked through a chinck in the boards.

     "That'h Jack the Giant Killer - piethe of comic infant bithnith," said
Sleary.  "There'th a property-houthe, you thee, for Jack to hide in; there'th
my Clown with a thauthpanlid and a thpit, for Jack'th thervant; there'th
little Jack himthelf in a thplendid thoot of armour; there'th two comic black
thervants twithe ath big ath the houthe, to thtand by it and to bring it in
and clear it; and the Giant (a very ecthpenthive bathket one), he an't on yet.
Now, do you know thee 'em all?"

     "Yes," they both said.

     "Look at 'em again," said Sleary, "look at 'em well.  You thee 'em all?
Very good.  Now, mith;" he put a form for them to sit on; "I have my
opinionth, and the Thquire your father hath hith.  I don't want to know what
your brother'th been up to; ith better for me not to know.  All I thay ith,
the Thquire hath thtood by Thethilia, and I'll thtand by the Thquire.  Your
brother ith one o' them black thervanth."

     Louisa uttered an exclamation, partly of distress, partly of
satisfaction.

     "Ith a fact," said Sleary, "and even knowin' it, you couldn't put your
finger on him.  Let the Thquire come.  I thall keep your brother here after
the performanth.  I thant undreth him, nor yet wath hith paint off. Let the
Thquire come here after the performanth, or come here yourthelf after the
performanth, and you thall find your brother, and have the whole plathe to
talk to him in.  Never mind the lookth of him, ath long ath he'th well hid."

     Louisa, with many thanks and with a lightened load, detained Mr. Sleary
no longer then.  She left her love for her brother, with her eyes full of
tears; and she and Sissy went away until later in the afternoon.

     Mr. Gradgrind arrived within an hour afterwards.  He too had encountered
no one whom he knew; and was now sanguine with Sleary's assistance, of getting
his disgraced son to Liverpool in the night.  As neither of the three could be
his companion without almost indentifying him under any disguise, he prepared
a letter to a correspondent whom he could trust, beseeching him to ship the
bearer off at any cost, to North or South America, or any distant part of the
world to which he could be the most speedily and privately dispatched.

     This done, they walked about, waiting for the Circus to be quite vacated;
not only by the audience, but by the company and by the horses. After watching
it a long time, they saw Mr. Sleary bring out a chair and sit down by the
side-door smoking; as if that were the signal that they might approach.

     "Your thervant, Thquire," was his cautious salutation as they passed in.
"If you want me you'll find me here.  You musthn't mind your thon having a
comic livery on."

     They all three went in; and Mr. Gradgrind sat down forlorn, on the
Clown's performing chair in the middle of the ring.  On one of the back
benches, remote in the subdued light and the strangeness of the place, sat the
villainous whelp, sulky to the last, whom he had the misery to call his son.

     In a preposterous coat, like a beadle's, with cuffs and flaps exaggerated
to an unspeakable extent; in an immense waistcoat, knee-breeches, buckled
shoes, and a mad cocked hat; with nothing fitting him, and everything of
coarse material, moth-eaten, and full of holes; with seams in his black face,
where fear and heat had started through the greasy composition daubed all over
it; anything so grimly, detestably, ridiculously shameful as the whelp in his
comic livery, Mr. Gradgrind never could by any other means have believed in,
weighable and measurable fact though it was.  And one of his model children
had come to this!

     At first the whelp would not draw any nearer, but persisted in remaining
up there by himself.  Yielding at length, if any concession so sullenly made
can be called yielding, to the entreaties of Sissy - for Louisa he disowned
altogether - he came down, bench by bench, until he stood in the sawdust, on
the verge of the circle, as far as possible, within its limits, from where his
father sat.

     "How was this done?" asked the father.

     "How was what done?" moodily answered the son.

     "This robbery," said the father, raising his voice upon the word.

     "I forced the safe myself over night, and shut it up ajar before I went
away.  I had had the key that was found, made long before.  I dropped it that
morning, that it might be supposed to have been used.  I didn't take the money
all at once.  I pretended to put my balance away every night, but I didn't.
Now you know all about it."

     "If a thunderbolt had fallen on me," said the father, "it would have
shocked me less than this!"

     "I don't see why," grumbled the son.  "So many people are employed in
situations of trust; so many people, out of so many, will be dishonest.  I
have heard you talk, a hundred times, of its being a law.  How can I help
laws?  You have comforted others with such things, father.  Comfort yourself!"

     The father buried his face in his hands, and the son stood in his
disgraceful grotesqueness; biting straw: his hands, with the black party worn
away inside, looking like the hands of a monkey.  The evening was fast closing
in; and from time to time, he turned the whites of his eyes restlessly and
impatiently towards his father.  They were the only parts of his face that
showed any life or expression, the pigment upon it was so thick.

     "You must be got to Liverpool, and sent abroad."

     "I suppose I must.  I can't be more miserable anywhere," whimpered the
whelp, "than I have been here, ever since I can remember.  That's one thing."

     Mr. Gradgrind went to the door, and returned with Sleary, to whom he
submitted the question, How to get this deplorable object away?

     "Why, I've been thinking of it, Thquire.  There'th not muth time to
lothe, tho you muth thay yeth or no.  Ith over twenty mileth to the rail.
Thereth a coath in in half an hour, that goeth to the rail, 'purpothe to cath
the mail train.  That train will take him right to Liverpool."

     "But look at him," groaned Mr. Gradgrind.  "Will any coach - "

     "I don't mean that he thould go in the comic livery," said Sleary. "Thay
the word, and I'll make a Jothkin of him, out of the wardrobe, in five
minutes."

     "I don't understand," said Mr. Gradgrind.

     "A Jothkin - a Carter.  Make up your mind quick, Thquire, There'll be
beer to feth.  I've never met with nothing but beer ath'll ever clean a comic
blackamoor."

     Mr. Gradgrind rapidly assented; Mr. Sleary rapidly turned out from a box,
a smock frock, a felt hat, and other essentials; the whelp rapidly changed
clothes behind a screen of baize; Mr. Sleary rapidly brought beer, and washed
him white again.

     "Now," said Sleary, "come along to the coath, and jump up behind; I'll go
with you there, and they'll thuppothe you one of my people.  Thay farewell to
your family, and tharp'th the word." With which he delicately retired.

     "Here is your letter," said Mr. Gradgrind.  "All necessary means will be
provided for you.  Atone, by repentance and better conduct, for the shocking
action you have committed, and the dreadful consequences to which it has led.
Give me your hand, my poor boy, and may God forgive you as I do!"

     The culprit was moved to a few abject tears by these words and their
pathetic tone.  But, when Louisa opened her arms, he repulsed her afresh.

     "Not you.  I don't want to have anything to say to you!"

     "O Tom, Tom, do we end so, after all my love!"

     "After all your love!" he returned, obdurately.  "Pretty love! Leaving
old Bounderby to himself, and packing my best friend Mr. Harthouse off, and
going home just when I was in the greatest danger.  Pretty love that!  Coming
out with every word about our having gone to that place, when you saw the net
was gathering round me.  Pretty love that!  You have regularly given me up.
You never cared for me."

     "Tharp'th the word!" said Sleary at the door.

     They all confusedly went out: Louisa crying to him that she forgave him,
and loved him still, and that he would one day be sorry to have left her so,
and glad to think of these her last words, far away: when some one ran against
them.  Mr. Gradgrind and Sissy, who were both before him while his sister yet
clung to his shoulder, stopped and recoiled.

     For, there was Bitzer, out of breath, his thin lips parted, his thin
nostrils distended, his white eyelashes quivering, his colourless face more
colourless than ever, as if he ran himself into a white heat, when other
people ran themselves into a glow.  There he stood, panting and heaving, as if
he had never stopped since the night, now long ago, when he had run them down
before.

     "I'm sorry to interfere with your plans," said Bitzer, shaking his head,
"but I can't allow myself to be done by horseriders.  I must have young Mr.
Tom; he mustn't be got away by horseriders; here he is in a smock frock, and I
must have him!"

     By the collar, too, it seemed.  For, so he took possession of him.