If the truth must be told, even Mr Swiveller’s approaches to the single gentleman were of a very distant kind, and met with small encouragement; but, as he never returned from a monosyllabic conference with the unknown, without quoting such expressions as ‘Swiveller, I know I can rely upon you,’—‘I have no hesitation5 in saying, Swiveller, that I entertain a regard for you,’—‘Swiveller, you are my friend, and will stand by me I am sure,’ with many other short speeches of the same familiar and confiding6 kind, purporting7 to have been addressed by the single gentleman to himself, and to form the staple8 of their ordinary discourse9, neither Mr Brass nor Miss Sally for a moment questioned the extent of his influence, but accorded to him their fullest and most unqualified belief. But quite apart from, and independent of, this source of popularity, Mr Swiveller had another, which promised to be equally enduring, and to lighten his position considerably10.
He found favour in the eyes of Miss Sally Brass. Let not the light scorners of female fascination11 erect12 their ears to listen to a new tale of love which shall serve them for a jest; for Miss Brass, however accurately13 formed to be beloved, was not of the loving kind. That amiable14 virgin15, having clung to the skirts of the Law from her earliest youth; having sustained herself by their aid, as it were, in her first running alone, and maintained a firm grasp upon them ever since; had passed her life in a kind of legal childhood. She had been remarkable16, when a tender prattler17 for an uncommon18 talent in counterfeiting19 the walk and manner of a bailiff: in which character she had learned to tap her little playfellows on the shoulder, and to carry them off to imaginary sponging-houses, with a correctness of imitation which was the surprise and delight of all who witnessed her performances, and which was only to be exceeded by her exquisite20 manner of putting an execution into her doll’s house, and taking an exact inventory21 of the chairs and tables. These artless sports had naturally soothed22 and cheered the decline of her widowed father: a most exemplary gentleman (called ‘old Foxey’ by his friends from his extreme sagacity,) who encouraged them to the utmost, and whose chief regret, on finding that he drew near to Houndsditch churchyard, was, that his daughter could not take out an attorney’s certificate and hold a place upon the roll. Filled with this affectionate and touching23 sorrow, he had solemnly confided24 her to his son Sampson as an invaluable25 auxiliary26; and from the old gentleman’s decease to the period of which we treat, Miss Sally Brass had been the prop27 and pillar of his business.
It is obvious that, having devoted28 herself from infancy29 to this one pursuit and study, Miss Brass could know but little of the world, otherwise than in connection with the law; and that from a lady gifted with such high tastes, proficiency30 in those gentler and softer arts in which women usually excel, was scarcely to be looked for. Miss Sally’s accomplishments31 were all of a masculine and strictly32 legal kind. They began with the practice of an attorney and they ended with it. She was in a state of lawful33 innocence34, so to speak. The law had been her nurse. And, as bandy-legs or such physical deformities in children are held to be the consequence of bad nursing, so, if in a mind so beautiful any moral twist or handiness could be found, Miss Sally Brass’s nurse was alone to blame.
It was on this lady, then, that Mr Swiveller burst in full freshness as something new and hitherto undreamed of, lighting35 up the office with scraps36 of song and merriment, conjuring37 with inkstands and boxes of wafers, catching38 three oranges in one hand, balancing stools upon his chin and penknives on his nose, and constantly performing a hundred other feats39 with equal ingenuity40; for with such unbendings did Richard, in Mr Brass’s absence, relieve the tedium41 of his confinement42. These social qualities, which Miss Sally first discovered by accident, gradually made such an impression upon her, that she would entreat43 Mr Swiveller to relax as though she were not by, which Mr Swiveller, nothing loth, would readily consent to do. By these means a friendship sprung up between them. Mr Swiveller gradually came to look upon her as her brother Sampson did, and as he would have looked upon any other clerk. He imparted to her the mystery of going the odd man or plain Newmarket for fruit, ginger-beer, baked potatoes, or even a modest quencher44, of which Miss Brass did not scruple45 to partake. He would often persuade her to undertake his share of writing in addition to her own; nay46, he would sometimes reward her with a hearty47 slap on the back, and protest that she was a devilish good fellow, a jolly dog, and so forth48; all of which compliments Miss Sally would receive in entire good part and with perfect satisfaction.
One circumstance troubled Mr Swiveller’s mind very much, and that was that the small servant always remained somewhere in the bowels49 of the earth under Bevis Marks, and never came to the surface unless the single gentleman rang his bell, 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 apron50, or looked out of any one of the windows, or stood at the street-door for a breath of air, or had any rest or enjoyment51 whatever. Nobody ever came to see her, nobody spoke52 of her, nobody cared about her. Mr Brass had said once, that he believed she was a ‘love-child’ (which means anything but a child of love), and that was all the information Richard Swiveller could obtain.
‘It’s of no use asking the dragon,’ thought Dick one day, as he sat contemplating53 the features of Miss Sally Brass. ‘I suspect if I asked any questions on that head, our alliance would be at an end. I wonder whether she is a dragon by-the-bye, or something in the mermaid54 way. She has rather a scaly55 appearance. But mermaids56 are fond of looking at themselves in the glass, which she can’t be. And they have a habit of combing their hair, which she hasn’t. No, she’s a dragon.’
‘Where are you going, old fellow?’ said Dick aloud, as Miss Sally wiped her pen as usual on the green dress, and uprose from her seat.
‘To dinner,’ answered the dragon.
‘To dinner!’ thought Dick, ‘that’s another circumstance. I don’t believe that small servant ever has anything to eat.’
‘Sammy won’t be home,’ said Miss Brass. ‘Stop till I come back. I sha’n’t be long.’
Dick nodded, and followed Miss Brass — with his eyes to the door, and with his ears to a little back parlour, where she and her brother took their meals.
‘Now,’ said Dick, 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. My mother must have been a very inquisitive57 woman; I have no doubt I’m marked with a note of interrogation somewhere. My feelings I smother58, but thou hast been the cause of this anguish59, my — upon my word,’ said Mr Swiveller, checking himself and falling thoughtfully into the client’s chair, ‘I should like to know how they use her!’
After running on, in this way, for some time, Mr Swiveller softly opened the office door, with the intention of darting60 across the street for a glass of the mild porter. At that moment he caught a parting glimpse of the brown head-dress 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 and allowing the head-dress to disappear in the darkness below, he groped his way down, and arrived at the door of a back kitchen immediately after Miss Brass had entered the same, bearing in her hand a cold leg of mutton. It was a very dark miserable62 place, very low and very damp: the walls disfigured by a thousand rents and blotches63. The water was trickling64 out of a leaky butt65, and a most wretched cat was lapping up the drops with the sickly eagerness of starvation. The grate, which was a wide one, was wound and screwed up tight, so as to hold no more than a little 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 beetle66 could have lunched upon. The pinched and meagre aspect of the place would have killed a chameleon67. He would have known, at the first mouthful, that the air was not eatable, and must have given up the ghost in despair.
The small servant stood with humility68 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 took a key from her pocket, and opening the safe, brought from it a dreary69 waste of cold potatoes, looking as eatable as Stonehenge. This she placed before the small servant, ordering her to sit down before it, and then, taking up a great carving-knife, made a mighty70 show of sharpening it upon the carving-fork.
‘Do you see this?’ said Miss Brass, slicing off about two square inches of cold mutton, after all this preparation, and holding it out on the point of the fork.
The small servant looked hard enough at it with her hungry eyes to see every shred71 of it, small as it was, 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 and locked the safe, and then drawing near to the small servant, overlooked her while she finished the potatoes.
It was plain that some extraordinary grudge72 was working in Miss Brass’s gentle breast, and that it was that which impelled73 her, without the smallest present cause, to rap the child with the blade of the knife, now on her hand, now on her head, and now on her back, as if she found it quite impossible to stand so close to her without administering a few slight knocks. But Mr Swiveller was not a little surprised to see his fellow-clerk, after walking slowly backwards74 towards the door, as if she were trying to withdraw herself from the room but could not accomplish it, dart61 suddenly forward, and falling on the small servant give her some hard blows with her clenched75 hand. The victim cried, but in a subdued76 manner as if she feared to raise her voice, and Miss Sally, comforting herself with a pinch of snuff, ascended77 the stairs, just as Richard had safely reached the office.
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1
lodgings
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| n. 出租的房舍, 寄宿舍 | |
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brass
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| n.黄铜；黄铜器，铜管乐器 | |
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inmate
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| n.被收容者；(房屋等的)居住人；住院人 | |
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lodger
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| n.寄宿人，房客 | |
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hesitation
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| n.犹豫，踌躇 | |
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confiding
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| adj.相信人的，易于相信的v.吐露（秘密，心事等）( confide的现在分词 )；（向某人）吐露（隐私、秘密等） | |
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purporting
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| v.声称是…，（装得）像是…的样子( purport的现在分词 ) | |
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staple
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| n.主要产物，常用品，主要要素，原料，订书钉，钩环；adj.主要的，重要的；vt.分类 | |
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discourse
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| n.论文，演说；谈话；话语；vi.讲述，著述 | |
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considerably
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| adv.极大地；相当大地；在很大程度上 | |
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fascination
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| n.令人着迷的事物，魅力，迷恋 | |
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erect
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| n./v.树立，建立，使竖立；adj.直立的，垂直的 | |
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accurately
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| adv.准确地，精确地 | |
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amiable
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| adj.和蔼可亲的，友善的，亲切的 | |
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virgin
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| n.处女，未婚女子；adj.未经使用的；未经开发的 | |
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remarkable
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| adj.显著的，异常的，非凡的，值得注意的 | |
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prattler
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| n.空谈者 | |
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uncommon
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| adj.罕见的，非凡的，不平常的 | |
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counterfeiting
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| n.伪造v.仿制，造假( counterfeit的现在分词 ) | |
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exquisite
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| adj.精美的；敏锐的；剧烈的，感觉强烈的 | |
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inventory
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| n.详细目录，存货清单 | |
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soothed
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| v.安慰( soothe的过去式和过去分词 )；抚慰；使舒服；减轻痛苦 | |
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23
touching
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| adj.动人的，使人感伤的 | |
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confided
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| v.吐露（秘密，心事等）( confide的过去式和过去分词 )；（向某人）吐露（隐私、秘密等） | |
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invaluable
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| adj.无价的，非常宝贵的，极为贵重的 | |
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auxiliary
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| adj.辅助的，备用的 | |
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prop
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| vt.支撑；n.支柱，支撑物；支持者，靠山 | |
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devoted
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| adj.忠诚的，忠实的，热心的，献身于...的 | |
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infancy
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| n.婴儿期；幼年期；初期 | |
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proficiency
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| n.精通，熟练，精练 | |
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accomplishments
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| n.造诣；完成( accomplishment的名词复数 )；技能；成绩；成就 | |
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strictly
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| adv.严厉地，严格地；严密地 | |
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lawful
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| adj.法律许可的，守法的，合法的 | |
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innocence
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| n.无罪；天真；无害 | |
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lighting
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| n.照明，光线的明暗，舞台灯光 | |
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scraps
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| 油渣 | |
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conjuring
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| n.魔术 | |
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catching
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| adj.易传染的，有魅力的，迷人的，接住 | |
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feats
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| 功绩，伟业，技艺( feat的名词复数 ) | |
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40
ingenuity
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| n.别出心裁；善于发明创造 | |
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tedium
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| n.单调；烦闷 | |
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42
confinement
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| n.幽禁，拘留，监禁；分娩；限制，局限 | |
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entreat
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| v.恳求，恳请 | |
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quencher
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| 淬火，骤冷； 猝灭 | |
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45
scruple
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| n./v.顾忌，迟疑 | |
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46
nay
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| adv.不；n.反对票，投反对票者 | |
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47
hearty
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| adj.热情友好的；衷心的；尽情的，纵情的 | |
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forth
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| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
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bowels
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| n.肠，内脏，内部；肠( bowel的名词复数 )；内部，最深处 | |
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50
apron
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| n.围裙；工作裙 | |
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51
enjoyment
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| n.乐趣；享有；享用 | |
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52
spoke
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| n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说 | |
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53
contemplating
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| 深思，细想，仔细考虑( contemplate的现在分词 )； 注视，凝视； 考虑接受（发生某事的可能性）； 深思熟虑，沉思，苦思冥想 | |
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54
mermaid
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| n.美人鱼 | |
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scaly
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| adj.鱼鳞状的；干燥粗糙的 | |
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56
mermaids
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| n.（传说中的）美人鱼( mermaid的名词复数 ) | |
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57
inquisitive
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| adj.求知欲强的，好奇的，好寻根究底的 | |
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58
smother
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| vt./vi.使窒息；抑制；闷死；n.浓烟；窒息 | |
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59
anguish
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| n.(尤指心灵上的)极度痛苦，烦恼 | |
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60
darting
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| v.投掷，投射( dart的现在分词 )；向前冲，飞奔 | |
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dart
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| v.猛冲，投掷；n.飞镖，猛冲 | |
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miserable
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| adj.悲惨的，痛苦的；可怜的，糟糕的 | |
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blotches
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| n.（皮肤上的）红斑，疹块( blotch的名词复数 )；大滴 [大片]（墨水或颜色的）污渍 | |
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64
trickling
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| n.油画底色含油太多而成泡沫状突起v.滴( trickle的现在分词 )；淌；使)慢慢走；缓慢移动 | |
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butt
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| n.笑柄；烟蒂；枪托；臀部；v.用头撞或顶 | |
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beetle
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| n.甲虫，近视眼的人 | |
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chameleon
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| n.变色龙，蜥蜴；善变之人 | |
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68
humility
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| n.谦逊，谦恭 | |
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dreary
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| adj.令人沮丧的，沉闷的，单调乏味的 | |
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mighty
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| adj.强有力的；巨大的 | |
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71
shred
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| v.撕成碎片，变成碎片；n.碎布条，细片，些少 | |
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grudge
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| n.不满，怨恨，妒嫉；vt.勉强给，不情愿做 | |
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impelled
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| v.推动、推进或敦促某人做某事( impel的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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74
backwards
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| adv.往回地，向原处，倒，相反，前后倒置地 | |
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75
clenched
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| v.紧握，抓紧，咬紧( clench的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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76
subdued
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| adj. 屈服的，柔和的，减弱的 动词subdue的过去式和过去分词 | |
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ascended
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| v.上升，攀登( ascend的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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