On our way home, I so conciliated Peepy’s affections
by buying him a windmill and two flour-sacks that
he would suffer nobody else to take off his hat and
gloves and would sit nowhere at dinner but at my side.
Caddy sat upon the other side of me, next to Ada,
to whom we imparted the whole history of the engagement
as soon as we got back. We made much of Caddy,
and Peepy too; and Caddy brightened exceedingly; and
my guardian was as merry as we were; and we were all
very happy indeed until Caddy went home at night in
a hackney-coach, with Peepy fast asleep, but holding
tight to the windmill.
I have forgotten to mention—at least I
have not mentioned—that
Mr. Woodcourt was the same dark young surgeon whom
we had met at
Mr. Badger’s. Or that Mr. Jarndyce invited
him to dinner that day.
Or that he came. Or that when they were all
gone and I said to
Ada, “Now, my darling, let us have a little
talk about Richard!”
Ada laughed and said—
But I don’t think it matters what my darling
said. She was always merry.
Bell Yard
While we were in London Mr. Jarndyce was constantly
beset by the crowd of excitable ladies and gentlemen
whose proceedings had so much astonished us.
Mr. Quale, who presented himself soon after our arrival,
was in all such excitements. He seemed to project
those two shining knobs of temples of his into everything
that went on and to brush his hair farther and farther
back, until the very roots were almost ready to fly
out of his head in inappeasable philanthropy.
All objects were alike to him, but he was always
particularly ready for anything in the way of a testimonial
to any one. His great power seemed to be his
power of indiscriminate admiration. He would
sit for any length of time, with the utmost enjoyment,
bathing his temples in the light of any order of luminary.
Having first seen him perfectly swallowed up in admiration
of Mrs. Jellyby, I had supposed her to be the absorbing
object of his devotion. I soon discovered my
mistake and found him to be train-bearer and organ-blower
to a whole procession of people.
Mrs. Pardiggle came one day for a subscription to
something, and with her, Mr. Quale. Whatever
Mrs. Pardiggle said, Mr. Quale repeated to us; and
just as he had drawn Mrs. Jellyby out, he drew Mrs.
Pardiggle out. Mrs. Pardiggle wrote a letter
of introduction to my guardian in behalf of her eloquent
friend Mr. Gusher. With Mr. Gusher appeared
Mr. Quale again. Mr. Gusher, being a flabby
gentleman with a moist surface and eyes so much too
small for his moon of a face that they seemed to have
been originally made for somebody else, was not at
first sight prepossessing; yet he was scarcely seated
before Mr. Quale asked Ada and me, not inaudibly,
whether he was not a great creature—which
he certainly was, flabbily speaking, though Mr. Quale
meant in intellectual beauty— and whether
we were not struck by his massive configuration of
brow. In short, we heard of a great many missions
of various sorts among this set of people, but nothing
respecting them was half so clear to us as that it
was Mr. Quale’s mission to be in ecstasies with
everybody else’s mission and that it was the
most popular mission of all.
