Chapter 1

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TEN GIRLS FROM DICKENS

BY

KATE DICKINSON SWEETSER

AUTHOR OF

"TEN BOYS FROM DICKENS" "TEN GREAT ADVENTURERS" "BOOK OF INDIAN BRAVES" ETC.

ILLUSTRATED BY GEORGE ALFRED WILLIAMS

PREFACE

As a companion volume to Ten Boys from Dickens, this book of girl-life, portrayed by the great author, is offered.

The sketches have the same underlying motive as those of boy-life, and have been compiled in the same manner, with the same purpose in view.

Among them will be found several of the most popular of the creations of Dickens, notably, The Marchioness, Little Nell, Jenny Wren, and Florence Dombey, and it is hoped that in this presentation as simple stories of girlhood, their classic form and beauty may arouse in the young people of our day a new interest in the novels from which they are taken.

This volume and its companion will have accomplished their purpose when they have won fresh laurels and a wider audience for the famous writer to whom they are indebted for their existence.

K.D.S. _April, 1902_.

CONTENTS

THE MARCHIONESS.

MORLEENA KENWIGS.

LITTLE NELL.

THE INFANT PHENOMENON.

JENNY WREN.

SISSY JUPE.

FLORENCE DOMBEY.

CHARLEY.

TILLY SLOWBOY.

AGNES WICKFIELD.

THE MARCHIONESS

THE MARCHIONESS

The Marchioness was a small servant employed by Sampson Brass and his sister Sally, as general house-worker and drudge, in which capacity she was discovered by Mr. Richard Swiveller, upon the very first day of his entering the Brass establishment as clerk.

The Brasses' house was a small one in Bevis Marks, London, having upon its door a plate, "Brass, Solicitor," and a bill tied to the knocker, "First floor to let to a single gentleman," and served not only as habitation, but likewise as office for Sampson Brass,--of none too good legal repute,--and his sister; a gaunt, bony copy of her red-haired brother, who was his housekeeper, as well as his business partner.

When the Brasses decided to keep a clerk, Richard Swiveller was chosen to fill the place; and be it known to whom it may concern, that the said Richard was the merriest, laziest, weakest, most kind-hearted fellow who ever sowed a large crop of wild oats, and by a sudden stroke of good-luck found himself raised to a salaried position.

Clad in a blue jacket with a double row of gilt buttons, bought for acquatic expeditions, but now dedicated to office purposes, Richard entered upon his new duties, and during that first afternoon, while Mr. Brass and his sister were temporarily absent from the office, he began a minute examination of its contents.

Then, after assuaging his thirst with a pint of mild porter, and receiving and dismissing three or four small boys who dropped in on legal errands from other attorneys, with about as correct an understanding of their business as would have been shown by a clown in a pantomime under similar circumstances, he tried his hand at a pen-and-ink caricature of Miss Brass, in which work he was busily engaged, when there came a rapping at the office-door.

"Come in!" said Dick. "Don't stand on ceremony. The business will get rather complicated if I have many more customers. Come in!"

"Oh, please," said a little voice very low down in the doorway, "will you come and show the lodgings?"

Dick leaned over the table, and descried a small slipshod girl in a dirty coarse apron and bib, which left nothing of her visible but her face and feet. She might as well have been dressed in a violin case.

"Why, who are you?" said Dick.

To which the only reply was, "Oh, please, will you come and show the lodgings?"

There never was such an old-fashioned child in her looks and manner. She must have been at work from her cradle. She seemed as much afraid of Dick, as Dick was amazed at her.

"I haven't got anything to do with the lodgings," said Dick. "Tell 'em to call again."

"Oh, but please will you come and show the lodgings?" returned the girl; "it's eighteen shillings a week, and us finding plate and linen. Boots and clothes is extra, and fires in winter-time is eightpence a day."

"Why don't you show 'em yourself? You seem to know all about 'em," said Dick.

"Miss Sally said I wasn't to, because people wouldn't believe the attendance was good if they saw how small I was, first."

"Well, but they'll see how small you are afterwards, won't they?" said Dick.

"Ah! but then they'll have taken 'em for a fortnight certain," replied the child, with a shrewd look; "and people don't like moving when they're once settled."

"This is a queer sort of thing," muttered Dick, rising. "What do you mean to say you are--the cook?"

"Yes; I do plain cooking," replied the child. "I'm housemaid too. I do all the work of the house."

Just then certain sounds on the passage and staircase seemed to denote the applicant's impatience. Richard Swiveller, therefore, hurried out to meet and treat with the single gentleman.

He was a little surprised to perceive that the sounds were occasioned by the progress upstairs of a trunk, which the single gentleman and his coachman were endeavoring to convey up the steep ascent. Mr. Swiveller followed slowly behind, entering a new protest on every stair against the house of Mr. Sampson Brass being thus taken by storm.

To these remonstrances the single gentleman answered not a word, but when the trunk was at last got into the bedroom, sat down upon it, and wiped his bald head with his handkerchief. He then announced abruptly that he would take the room for two years, whereupon, handing a ten-pound note to the astonished Mr. Swiveller, he began to make ready to retire, as if it were night instead of day, and Mr. Swiveller walked downstairs into the office again, filled with wonderment concerning both the strange new lodger and the small servant who had appeared to answer the bell.

After that day, one circumstance troubled Mr. Swiveller's mind very much, and that was, that the small servant always remained somewhere in the bowels of the earth under Bevis Marks, and never came to the surface unless a bell rang, when she would answer it, and immediately disappear again. She never went out, or came into the office, or had a clean face, or took off the coarse apron, or looked out of any of the windows, or stood at the street door for a breath of air, or had any rest or enjoyment whatever. Nobody ever came to see her, nobody spoke of her, nobody cared about her.

"Now," said Dick, one day, walking up and down with his hands in his pockets; "I'd give something--if I had it--to know how they use that child, and where they keep her. I _should_ like to know how they use her!"

At that moment he caught a glimpse of Miss Brass flitting down the kitchen stairs. "And, by Jove!" thought Dick, "She's going to feed the small servant. Now or never!"

First peeping over the handrail, he groped his way down, and arrived at the kitchen door immediately after Miss Brass had entered the same, bearing in her hand a cold leg of mutton.

It was a very dark, miserable place, very low and very damp; the walls disfigured by a thousand rents and blotches. The water was trickling out of a leaky butt, and a most wretched cat was lapping up the drops with the sickly eagerness of starvation. The grate was screwed up so tight as to hold no more than a thin sandwich of fire. Everything was locked up; the coal-cellar, the candle-box, the salt-box, the meat-safe, were all padlocked. There was nothing that a beetle could have lunched on.

The small servant stood with humility in presence of Miss Sally, and hung her head.

"Are you there?" said Miss Sally.

"Yes ma'am," was the answer, in a weak voice.

"Go further away from the leg of mutton, or you'll be picking it, I know," said Miss Sally.

The girl withdrew into a corner, while Miss Brass opened the safe, and brought from it a dreary waste of cold potatoes, looking as eatable as Stonehenge. This she placed before the small servant, and then, taking up a great carving-knife, made a mighty show of sharpening it.

"Do you see this?" she said, slicing off about two square inches of cold mutton, and holding it out on the point of a fork.

The small servant looked hard enough at it with her hungry eyes to see every shred of it and answered, "Yes."

"Then don't you ever go and say," retorted Miss Sally, "that you hadn't meat here. There, eat it up."

This was soon done.

"Now, do you want any more?" said Miss Sally.

The hungry creature answered with a faint "No." They were evidently going through an established form.

"You've been helped once to meat," said Miss Brass, summing up the facts; "you have had as much as you can eat: you're asked if you want any more, and you answer 'No.' Then don't you ever go and say you were allowanced,--mind that!"

With those words, Miss Sally put the meat away, locked the meat-safe, and then overlooked the small servant while she finished the potatoes. After that, without the smallest cause, she rapped the child with the blade of the knife, now on her hand, now on her head, and now on her back. Then, after walking slowly backward towards the door, she darted suddenly forward, and falling on the small servant again, gave her some hard blows with her clenched fists. The victim cried, but in a subdued manner, as if she feared to raise her voice; and Miss Sally ascended the stairs just as Richard had safely reached the office, fairly beside himself with anger over the poor child's misery and ill-treatment.

During the following weeks, when he had become accustomed to the routine of work which he was expected to accomplish, and being often left alone in the office, Richard Swiveller began to find time hang heavy on his hands. For the better preservation of his cheerfulness, therefore, he accustomed himself to play at cribbage with a dummy. While he was silently conducting one of these games Mr. Swiveller began to think that he heard a kind of hard breathing sound, in the direction of the door, which it occurred to him, after some reflection, must proceed from the small servant, who always had a cold from damp living. Looking intently that way, he plainly distinguished an eye gleaming and glistening at the keyhole; and having now no doubt that his suspicions were correct he stole softly to the door, and pounced upon her before she was aware of his approach.

"Oh! I didn't mean any harm, indeed, upon my word I didn't," cried the small servant; "it's so very dull downstairs. Please don't you tell upon me, please don't."

"Tell upon you!" said Dick. "Do you mean to say you were looking through the keyhole for company?"

"Yes, upon my word I was," replied the small servant.

"How long have you been cooling your eye there?" said Dick.

"Oh, ever since you first began to play them cards, and long before."

"Well--come in," said Mr. Swiveller, after a little consideration. "Here--sit down, and I'll teach you how to play."

"Oh! I durstn't do it," rejoined the small servant; "Miss Sally 'ud kill me if she knowed I come up here."

"Have you got a fire downstairs?" said Dick.

"A very little one," replied the small servant.

"Miss Sally couldn't kill me if she knowed I went down there, so I'll come," said Richard, putting the cards into his pocket. "Why, how thin you are! What do you mean by it?"

"It an't my fault."

"Could you eat any bread and meat?" said Dick, taking down his hat "Yes? Ah! I thought so. Did you ever taste beer?"

"I had a sip of it once," said the small servant.

"Here's a state of things!" cried Mr. Swiveller, raising his eyes to the ceiling. "She never tasted it--it can't be tasted in a sip! Why, how old are you?"

"I don't know."

Mr. Swiveller opened his eyes very wide, and appeared thoughtful for a moment; then, bidding the child mind the door until he came back, vanished straightway.

Presently he returned, followed by a boy from the public-house, who bore a plate of bread and beef, and a great pot filled with choice purl. Relieving the boy of his burden, and charging his little companion to fasten the door to prevent surprise, Mr. Swiveller followed her into the kitchen.

"There!" said Richard, putting the plate before her. "First of all, clear that off, and then you'll see what's next."

The small servant needed no second bidding, and the plate was soon empty.

"Next," said Dick, handing the purl, "take a pull at that, but moderate your transports, for you're not used to it. Well, is it good?"

"Oh, _isn't_ it!" said the small servant.

Mr. Swiveller appeared immensely gratified over her enjoyment, and when she had satisfied her hunger, applied himself to teaching her the game, which she soon learned tolerably well, being both sharp-witted and cunning.

"Now," said Mr. Swiveller, "to make it seem more real and pleasant, I shall call you the Marchioness, do you hear?"

The small servant nodded.

"Then, Marchioness," said Mr. Swiveller, "fire away!"

The Marchioness, holding her cards very tight in both hands, considered which to play, and Mr. Swiveller, assuming the gay and fashionable air which such society required, waited for her lead.

They had played several rubbers, when the striking of ten o'clock rendered Mr. Swiveller mindful of the flight of time, and of the expediency of withdrawing before Mr. Sampson and Miss Sally Brass returned.

"With which object in view, Marchioness," said Mr. Swiveller gravely. "I shall ask your ladyship's permission to put the board in my pocket, and to retire. The Baron Sampsono Brasso and his fair sister are, you tell me, at the Play?" added Mr. Swiveller, leaning his left arm heavily upon the table, and raising his voice and his right leg after the manner of a theatrical bandit.

The Marchioness nodded.

"Ha!" said Mr. Swiveller, with a portentous frown. "'Tis well. Marchioness!--but no matter. Some wine there, ho! Marchioness, your health."

The small servant, who was not so well acquainted with theatrical conventionalities as Mr. Swiveller, was rather alarmed by his manner, and showed it so plainly that he felt it necessary to discharge his brigand bearing for one more suitable to private life.

"I suppose," said Dick, "that they consult together a good deal, and talk about a great many people--about me, for instance, sometimes, eh, Marchioness?"

The Marchioness nodded amazingly.

"Complimentary?" asked Mr. Swiveller.

The Marchioness shook her head violently.

"H'm!" Dick muttered. "Would it be any breach of confidence, Marchioness, to relate what they say of the humble individual who has now the honor to--?"

"Miss Sally says you are a funny chap," replied his friend.

"Well, Marchioness," said Mr. Swiveller, "that's not uncomplimentary. Merriment, Marchioness, is not a bad of a degrading quality. Old King Cole was himself a merry old soul, if we may put any faith in the pages of history."

"But she says," pursued his companion, "that you aren't to be trusted."

"Why, really, Marchioness," said Mr. Swiveller thoughtfully, "it's a popular prejudice, and yet I'm sure I don't know why, for I've been trusted in my time to a considerable amount, and I can safely say that I never forsook my trust, until it deserted me--never. Mr. Brass is of the same opinion, I suppose?"

His friend nodded again, adding imploringly, "But don't you ever tell upon me, or I shall be beat to death."

"Marchioness," said Mr. Swiveller, rising, "the word of a gentleman is as good as his bond--sometimes better, as in the present case, where his bond might prove but a doubtful sort of security. I'm your friend, and I hope we shall play many more rubbers together. But, Marchioness," added Richard, "it occurs to me that you must be in the constant habit of airing your eye at keyholes to know this."

"I only wanted," replied the trembling Marchioness, "to know where the key of the meat-safe was hid--that was all; and I wouldn't have taken much if I had found it--only enough to squench my hunger."

"You didn't find it, then?" said Dick, "but, of course, you didn't, or of course you'd be plumper. Good-night, Marchioness, fare thee well, and if forever, then forever fare thee well. And put up the chain, Marchioness, in case of accidents!"

Upon repairing to Bevis Marks on the following morning, he found Miss Brass much agitated over the disappearance from the office of several small articles, as well as three half crowns, and Richard felt much troubled over the matter, saying to himself, "Then, by Jove, I'm afraid the Marchioness is done for!"

The more he discussed the subject in his thoughts, the more probable it appeared to Dick that the miserable little servant was the culprit. When he considered on what a spare allowance of food she lived, how neglected and untaught she was, and how her natural cunning had been sharpened by necessity and privation, he scarcely doubted it. And yet he pitied her so much, and felt so unwilling to have a matter of such gravity disturbing the oddity of their acquaintance, that he thought, rather than receive fifty pounds down, he would have the Marchioness proved innocent.

While the subject of the thefts was under discussion, Kit Nubbles, a lad in the employ of a Mr. Garland, passed through the office, on his way upstairs to the room of the Brasses' lodger, the single gentleman, who was an intimate friend of Kit's employer. The single gentleman having been confined to his room for some time by a slight illness, it had become Kit's daily custom to convey to him messages and notes from Mr. Garland, and not infrequently Sampson Brass would detain the lad in the office for a few words of pleasant conversation.

Having discharged his errand, Kit came downstairs again, finding no one in the office except Mr. Brass, who, after greeting him affably, requested him to mind the office for one minute while he ran upstairs. Mr. Brass returned almost immediately, Mr. Swiveller came in too, at the same instant, likewise Miss Sally, and Kit, released, at once set off on a run towards home, eager to make up for lost time. As he was running, he was suddenly arrested and held in restraint, by no less a person than Sampson Brass himself, accompanied by Mr. Swiveller.

A five-pound note was missing from the office. Kit had been alone there for some minutes. Who could have taken it but Kit?

Pleased to have suspicion diverted from the Marchioness, but loath to help in so unpleasant an affair, Mr. Swiveller reluctantly assisted in bearing the captive back to the office, Kit protesting his innocence at every step. They searched him, and there under the lining of his hat was the missing bank-note!

Still protesting his innocence, and completely stunned by the calamity which had come upon him, the lad was borne off to prison, where, after eleven weary days had dragged away, he was brought to trial. Richard Swiveller was called as a witness against Kit, and told his tale with reluctance, and an evident desire to make the best of it, for the lad's sake. His kind heart was also touched with pity for Kit's poor widowed mother, who sobbed out again and again, that she had never had cause to doubt her son's honesty, and she never would.

When the trial was ended, and Kit found guilty, Richard bore the lad's fainting mother swiftly off in a coach he had ready for the purpose, and on the way comforted her in his own peculiar fashion, perpetrating the most astounding absurdities of quotation from song and poem that ever were heard. Reaching her home, he stayed till she was recovered; then returned to Bevis Marks, where Mr. Brass met him with the news that his services would be no longer required in the establishment.

Feeling sure that this verdict was in consequence of his defence of Kit, Mr. Swiveller took his dismissal in profound silence, and turned his back upon Bevis Marks, big with designs for the comforting of Kit's mother, and the aid of Kit himself. His only regret in regard to the matter was in having to leave the Marchioness alone and unprotected in the hands of the Brasses, and little did he dream that to the small servant herself, to the Marchioness, rather than to him, Kit and his mother were to owe their heaviest debt of gratitude--but it was so to be.

That very night Mr. Richard was seized with an alarming illness, and in twenty-four hours was stricken with a raging fever, and lay tossing upon his hot, uneasy bed, unconscious of anything but weariness and worry and pain, until at length he sank into a deep sleep. He awoke, and with a sensation of blissful rest better than sleep itself, began to dimly remember, and to think what a long night it had been, and to wonder whether he had not been delirious once or twice. Still, he felt indifferent and happy, and having no curiosity to pursue the subject, remained in a waking slumber until his attention was attracted by a cough. This made him doubt whether he had locked his door last night, and feel a little surprised at having a companion in the room. But he lacked energy to follow up this train of thought, and in a luxury of repose, lay staring at some green stripes on the bed furniture, and associating them strangely, with patches of fresh turf, while the yellow ground between made gravel walks, and so helped out a long perspective of trim gardens.

He was rambling in imagination on these terraces, when he heard the cough once more. Raising himself a little in the bed, he looked about him.

The same room, certainly, but with what unbounded astonishment did he see bottles, and basins, and articles of linen airing by the fire--all very clean and neat, but quite different from anything he had left there when he went to bed! The atmosphere too filled with a cool smell of herbs and vinegar; the floor newly sprinkled; the--the what?--the Marchioness!

Yes; playing cribbage with herself at the table. There she sat, intent upon her game, coughing now and then in a subdued manner, as if she feared to disturb him, going through all the mysteries of cribbage as if she had been in full practice from her cradle!

Mr. Swiveller contemplated these things for a short time, then laid his head on the pillow again.

"I'm dreaming," thought Richard, "that's clear. When I went to bed my hands were not made of egg-shells, and now I can almost see through 'em. If this is not a dream, I have woke up, by mistake, in an Arabian Night instead of a London one. But I have no doubt I'm asleep. Not the least."

Here the small servant had another cough.

"Very remarkable!" thought Mr. Swiveller. "I never dreamed such a real cough as that before. There's another--and another--I say!--I'm dreaming rather fast!

"It's an Arabian Night; that's what it is," said Richard. "I'm in Damascus or Grand Cairo. The Marchioness is a Genie and having had a wager with another Genie about who is the handsomest young man alive, and the worthiest to be the husband of the Princess of China, has brought me away, room and all, to compare us together."

Not feeling quite satisfied with this explanation, Mr. Swiveller determined to take the first opportunity of addressing his companion. An occasion soon presented itself. The Marchioness dealt, turned up a knave, and omitted to take the usual advantage, upon which Mr. Swiveller called out as loud as he could--"Two for his heels!"

The Marchioness jumped up quickly, and clapped her hands.

"Arabian Night certainly," thought Mr. Swiveller; "they always clap their hands, instead of ringing the bell. Now for the two thousand black slaves with jars and jewels on their heads!"