The Charles Dickens Christmas Megapack Read online

  “But when she knew that Edward was alive, and had come back,” sobbed Dot, now speaking for herself, as she had burned to do, all through this narrative; “and when she knew his purpose, she advised him by all means to keep his secret close; for his old friend John Peerybingle was much too open in his nature, and too clumsy in all artifice—being a clumsy man in general,” said Dot, half laughing and half crying—“to keep it for him. And when she—that’s me, John,” sobbed the little woman—“told him all, and how his sweetheart had believed him to be dead; and how she had at last been over-persuaded by her mother into a marriage which the silly, dear old thing called advantageous; and when she—that’s me again, John—told him they were not yet married (though close upon it), and that it would be nothing but a sacrifice if it went on, for there was no love on her side; and when he went nearly mad with joy to hear it,—then she—that’s me again—said she would go between them, as she had often done before in old times, John, and would sound his sweetheart, and be sure that what she—me again, John—said and thought was right. And it was right, John! And they were brought together, John! And they were married, John, an hour ago! And here’s the Bride! And Gruff and Tackleton may die a bachelor! And I’m a happy little woman, May, God bless you!”

  She was an irresistible little woman, if that be anything to the purpose; and never so completely irresistible as in her present transports. There never were congratulations so endearing and delicious as those she lavished on herself and on the Bride.

  Amid the tumult of emotions in his breast, the honest Carrier had stood confounded. Flying, now, towards her, Dot stretched out her hand to stop him, and retreated as before.

  “No, John, no! Hear all! Don’t love me any more, John, till you’ve heard every word I have to say. It was wrong to have a secret from you, John. I’m very sorry. I didn’t think it any harm, till I came and sat down by you on the little stool last night. But when I knew, by what was written in your face, that you had seen me walking in the gallery with Edward, and when I knew what you thought, I felt how giddy and how wrong it was. But oh, dear John, how could you, could you think so?”

  Little woman, how she sobbed again! John Peerybingle would have caught her in his arms. But no; she wouldn’t let him.

  “Don’t love me yet, please, John! Not for a long time yet! When I was sad about this intended marriage, dear, it was because I remembered May and Edward such young lovers; and knew that her heart was far away from Tackleton. You believe that, now, don’t you, John?”

  John was going to make another rush at this appeal; but she stopped him again.

  “No; keep there, please, John! When I laugh at you, as I sometimes do, John, and call you clumsy and a dear old goose, and names of that sort, it’s because I love you, John, so well, and take such pleasure in your ways, and wouldn’t see you altered in the least respect to have you made a king to-morrow.”

  “Hooroar!” said Caleb with unusual vigour. “My opinion!”

  “And when I speak of people being middle-aged and steady, John, and pretend that we are a humdrum couple, going on in a jog-trot sort of way, it’s only because I’m such a silly little thing, John, that I like, sometimes, to act as a kind of Play with Baby, and all that: and make believe.”

  She saw that he was coming; and stopped him again. But she was very nearly too late.

  “No, don’t love me for another minute or two, if you please, John! What I want most to tell you, I have kept to the last. My dear, good, generous John, when we were talking the other night about the Cricket, I had it on my lips to say, that at first I did not love you quite so dearly as I do now; when I first came home here, I was half afraid that I mightn’t learn to love you every bit as well as I hoped and prayed I might—being so very young, John! But, dear John, every day and hour I loved you more and more. And if I could have loved you better than I do, the noble words I heard you say this morning would have made me. But I can’t. All the affection that I had (it was a great deal, John) I gave you, as you well deserve, long, long ago, and I have no more left to give. Now, my dear husband, take me to your heart again! That’s my home, John; and never, never think of sending me to any other!”

  You never will derive so much delight from seeing a glorious little woman in the arms of a third party as you would have felt if you had seen Dot run into the Carrier’s embrace. It was the most complete, unmitigated, soul-fraught little piece of earnestness that ever you beheld in all your days.

  You may be sure the Carrier was in a state of perfect rapture; and you may be sure Dot was likewise; and you may be sure they all were, inclusive of Miss Slowboy, who wept copiously for joy, and, wishing to include her young charge in the general interchange of congratulations, handed round the Baby to everybody in succession, as if it were something to drink.

  But, now, the sound of wheels was heard again outside the door; and somebody exclaimed that Gruff and Tackleton was coming back. Speedily that worthy gentleman appeared, looking warm and flustered.

  “Why, what the Devil’s this, John Peerybingle?” said Tackleton. “There’s some mistake. I appointed Mrs. Tackleton to meet me at the church, and I’ll swear I passed her on the road, on her way here. Oh! here she is! I beg your pardon, sir; I haven’t the pleasure of knowing you; but, if you can do me the favour to spare this young lady, she has rather a particular engagement this morning.”

  “But I can’t spare her,” returned Edward. “I couldn’t think of it.”

  “What do you mean, you vagabond?” said Tackleton.

  “I mean that, as I can make allowance for your being vexed,” returned the other with a smile, “I am as deaf to harsh discourse this morning as I was to all discourse last night.”

  The look that Tackleton bestowed upon him, and the start he gave!

  “I am sorry, sir,” said Edward, holding out May’s left hand, and especially the third finger, “that the young lady can’t accompany you to church; but, as she has been there once this morning, perhaps you’ll excuse her.”

  Tackleton looked hard at the third finger, and took a little piece of silver paper, apparently containing a ring, from his waistcoat pocket.

  “Miss Slowboy,” said Tackleton, “will you have the kindness to throw that in the fire? Thankee.”

  “It was a previous engagement, quite an old engagement, that prevented my wife from keeping her appointment with you, I assure you,” said Edward.

  “Mr. Tackleton will do me the justice to acknowledge that I revealed it to him faithfully; and that I told him, many times, I never could forget it,” said May, blushing.

  “Oh, certainly!” said Tackleton. “Oh, to be sure! Oh, it’s all right, it’s quite correct! Mrs. Edward Plummer, I infer?”

  “That’s the name,” returned the bridegroom.

  “Ah! I shouldn’t have known you, sir,” said Tackleton, scrutinising his face narrowly, and making a low bow. “I give you joy, sir!”

  “Thankee.”

  “Mrs. Peerybingle,” said Tackleton, turning suddenly to where she stood with her husband; “I’m sorry. You haven’t done me a very great kindness, but, upon my life, I am sorry. You are better than I thought you. John Peerybingle, I am sorry. You understand me; that’s enough. It’s quite correct, ladies and gentlemen all, and perfectly satisfactory. Good morning!”

  With these words he carried it off, and carried himself off too: merely stopping at the door to take the flowers and favours from his horse’s head, and to kick that animal once in the ribs, as a means of informing him that there was a screw loose in his arrangements.

  Of course, it became a serious duty now to make such a day of it as should mark these events for a high Feast and Festival in the Peerybingle Calendar for evermore. Accordingly, Dot went to work to produce such an entertainment as should reflect undying honour on the house and on every one concerned; and, in a very short space of time, she was up to her dimpled elbows in flour, and whitening the Carrier’s coat, every time he came near her, by stopping him to
give him a kiss. That good fellow washed the greens, and peeled the turnips, and broke the plates, and upset iron pots full of cold water on the fire, and made himself useful in all sorts of ways: while a couple of professional assistants, hastily called in from somewhere in the neighbourhood, as on a point of life or death, ran against each other in all the doorways and round all the corners, and everybody tumbled over Tilly Slowboy and the Baby, everywhere. Tilly never came out in such force before. Her ubiquity was the theme of general admiration. She was a stumbling-block in the passage at five-and-twenty minutes past two; a man-trap in the kitchen at half-past two precisely; and a pitfall in the garret at five-and-twenty minutes to three. The Baby’s head was, as it were, a test and touchstone for every description of matter, animal, vegetable, and mineral. Nothing was in use that day that didn’t come, at some time or other, into close acquaintance with it.

  Then there was a great Expedition set on foot to go and find out Mrs. Fielding; and to be dismally penitent to that excellent gentlewoman; and to bring her back, by force, if needful, to be happy and forgiving. And when the Expedition first discovered her, she would listen to no terms at all, but said, an unspeakable number of times, that ever she should have lived to see the day! and couldn’t be got to say anything else, except “Now carry me to the grave”: which seemed absurd, on account of her not being dead, or anything at all like it. After a time she lapsed into a state of dreadful calmness, and observed that, when that unfortunate train of circumstances had occurred in the Indigo Trade, she had foreseen that she would be exposed, during her whole life, to every species of insult and contumely; and that she was glad to find it was the case; and begged they wouldn’t trouble themselves about her,—for what was she?—oh dear! a nobody!—but would forget that such a being lived, and would take their course in life without her. From this bitterly sarcastic mood she passed into an angry one, in which she gave vent to the remarkable expression that the worm would turn if trodden on; and, after that, she yielded to a soft regret, and said, if they had only given her their confidence, what might she not have had it in her power to suggest! Taking advantage of this crisis in her feelings, the Expedition embraced her; and she very soon had her gloves on, and was on her way to John Peerybingle’s in a state of unimpeachable gentility; with a paper parcel at her side containing a cap of state, almost as tall, and quite as stiff, as a mitre.

  Then, there were Dot’s father and mother to come in another little chaise; and they were behind their time; and fears were entertained; and there was much looking out for them down the road; and Mrs. Fielding always would look in the wrong and morally impossible direction; and, being apprised thereof, hoped she might take the liberty of looking where she pleased. At last they came; a chubby little couple, jogging along in a snug and comfortable little way that quite belonged to the Dot family; and Dot and her mother, side by side, were wonderful to see. They were so like each other.

  Then Dot’s mother had to renew her acquaintance with May’s mother; and May’s mother always stood on her gentility; and Dot’s mother never stood on anything but her active little feet. And old Dot—so to call Dot’s father, I forgot it wasn’t his right name, but never mind—took liberties, and shook hands at first sight, and seemed to think a cap but so much starch and muslin, and didn’t defer himself at all to the Indigo Trade, but said there was no help for it now; and, in Mrs. Fielding’s summing up, was a good-natured kind of man—but coarse, my dear.

  I wouldn’t have missed Dot, doing the honours in her wedding-gown, my benison on her bright face! for any money. No! nor the good Carrier, so jovial and so ruddy, at the bottom of the table. Nor the brown, fresh sailor-fellow, and his handsome wife. Nor any one among them. To have missed the dinner would have been to miss as jolly and as stout a meal as man need eat; and to have missed the overflowing cups in which they drank The Wedding Day would have been the greatest miss of all.

  After dinner Caleb sang the song about the Sparkling Bowl. As I’m a living man, hoping to keep so for a year or two, he sang it through.

  And, by-the-bye, a most unlooked-for incident occurred, just as he finished the last verse.

  There was a tap at the door; and a man came staggering in, without saying with your leave, or by your leave, with something heavy on his head. Setting this down in the middle of the table, symmetrically in the centre of the nuts and apples, he said:

  “Mr. Tackleton’s compliments, and, as he hasn’t got no use for the cake himself, p’raps you’ll eat it.”

  And, with those words, he walked off.

  There was some surprise among the company, as you may imagine. Mrs. Fielding, being a lady of infinite discernment, suggested that the cake was poisoned, and related a narrative of a cake which, within her knowledge, had turned a seminary for young ladies blue. But she was overruled by acclamation; and the cake was cut by May with much ceremony and rejoicing.

  I don’t think any one had tasted it, when there came another tap at the door, and the same man appeared again, having under his arm a vast brown-paper parcel.

  “Mr. Tackleton’s compliments, and he’s sent a few toys for the Babby. They ain’t ugly.”

  After the delivery of which expressions, he retired again.

  The whole party would have experienced great difficulty in finding words for their astonishment, even if they had had ample time to seek them. But they had none at all; for the messenger had scarcely shut the door behind him, when there came another tap, and Tackleton himself walked in.

  “Mrs. Peerybingle!” said the toy merchant, hat in hand, “I’m sorry. I’m more sorry than I was this morning. I have had time to think of it. John Peerybingle! I am sour by disposition; but I can’t help being sweetened, more or less, by coming face to face with such a man as you. Caleb! This unconscious little nurse gave me a broken hint last night, of which I have found the thread. I blush to think how easily I might have bound you and your daughter to me, and what a miserable idiot I was when I took her for one! Friends, one and all, my house is very lonely to-night. I have not so much as a Cricket on my Hearth. I have scared them all away. Be gracious to me: let me join this happy party!”

  He was at home in five minutes. You never saw such a fellow. What had he been doing with himself all his life, never to have known before his great capacity of being jovial? Or what had the Fairies been doing with him, to have effected such a change?

  “John! you won’t send me home this evening, will you?” whispered Dot.

  He had been very near it, though.

  There wanted but one living creature to make the party complete; and, in the twinkling of an eye, there he was, very thirsty with hard running, and engaged in hopeless endeavours to squeeze his head into a narrow pitcher. He had gone with the cart to its journey’s end, very much disgusted with the absence of his master, and stupendously rebellious to the Deputy. After lingering about the stable for some little time, vainly attempting to incite the old horse to the mutinous act of returning on his own account, he had walked into the taproom, and laid himself down before the fire. But, suddenly yielding to the conviction that the Deputy was a humbug, and must be abandoned, he had got up again, turned tail, and come home.

  There was a dance in the evening. With which general mention of that recreation, I should have left it alone, if I had not some reason to suppose that it was quite an original dance, and one of a most uncommon figure. It was formed in an odd way; in this way.

  Edward, that sailor-fellow—a good free dashing sort of fellow he was—had been telling them various marvels concerning parrots, and mines, and Mexicans, and gold dust, when all at once he took it in his head to jump up from his seat and propose a dance; for Bertha’s harp was there, and she such a hand upon it as you seldom hear. Dot (sly little piece of affectation when she chose) said her dancing days were over; I think because the Carrier was smoking his pipe, and she liked sitting by him best. Mrs. Fielding had no choice, of course, but to say her dancing days were over, after that; and everybody said th
e same, except May; May was ready.

  So, May and Edward get up, amid great applause, to dance alone; and Bertha plays her liveliest tune.

  Well! if you’ll believe me, they had not been dancing five minutes, when suddenly the Carrier flings his pipe away, takes Dot round the waist, dashes out into the room, and starts off with her, toe and heel, quite wonderfully. Tackleton no sooner sees this than he skims across to Mrs. Fielding, takes her round the waist, and follows suit. Old Dot no sooner sees this than up he is, all alive, whisks off Mrs. Dot into the middle of the dance, and is foremost there. Caleb no sooner sees this than he clutches Tilly Slowboy by both hands, and goes off at score; Miss Slowboy, firm in the belief that diving hotly in among the other couples, and effecting any number of concussions with them, is your only principle of footing it.

  Hark! how the Cricket joins the music with its Chirp, Chirp, Chirp; and how the kettle hums!

  * * * *

  But what is this? Even as I listen to them blithely, and turn towards Dot, for one last glimpse of a little figure very pleasant to me, she and the rest have vanished into air, and I am left alone. A Cricket sings upon the Hearth; a broken child’s toy lies upon the ground: and nothing else remains.

  THE BATTLE OF LIFE

  CHAPTER I

  Part The First