Heaven knows what he sees. The green, green
woods of Chesney Wold, the noble house, the pictures
of his forefathers, strangers defacing them, officers
of police coarsely handling his most precious heirlooms,
thousands of fingers pointing at him, thousands of
faces sneering at him. But if such shadows flit
before him to his bewilderment, there is one other
shadow which he can name with something like distinctness
even yet and to which alone he addresses his tearing
of his white hair and his extended arms.
It is she in association with whom, saving that she
has been for years a main fibre of the root of his
dignity and pride, he has never had a selfish thought.
It is she whom he has loved, admired, honoured, and
set up for the world to respect. It is she who,
at the core of all the constrained formalities and
conventionalities of his life, has been a stock of
living tenderness and love, susceptible as nothing
else is of being struck with the agony he feels.
He sees her, almost to the exclusion of himself, and
cannot bear to look upon her cast down from the high
place she has graced so well.
And even to the point of his sinking on the ground,
oblivious of his suffering, he can yet pronounce her
name with something like distinctness in the midst
of those intrusive sounds, and in a tone of mourning
and compassion rather than reproach.
CHAPTER LV
Flight
Inspector Bucket of the Detective has not yet struck
his great blow, as just now chronicled, but is yet
refreshing himself with sleep preparatory to his field-day,
when through the night and along the freezing wintry
roads a chaise and pair comes out of Lincolnshire,
making its way towards London.
Railroads shall soon traverse all this country, and
with a rattle and a glare the engine and train shall
shoot like a meteor over the wide night-landscape,
turning the moon paler; but as yet such things are
non-existent in these parts, though not wholly unexpected.
Preparations are afoot, measurements are made, ground
is staked out. Bridges are begun, and their not
yet united piers desolately look at one another over
roads and streams like brick and mortar couples with
an obstacle to their union; fragments of embankments
are thrown up and left as precipices with torrents
of rusty carts and barrows tumbling over them; tripods
of tall poles appear on hilltops, where there are
rumours of tunnels; everything looks chaotic and abandoned
in full hopelessness. Along the freezing roads,
and through the night, the post-chaise makes its way
without a railroad on its mind.
Mrs. Rouncewell, so many years housekeeper at Chesney
Wold, sits within the chaise; and by her side sits
Mrs. Bagnet with her grey cloak and umbrella.
The old girl would prefer the bar in front, as being
exposed to the weather and a primitive sort of perch
more in accordance with her usual course of travelling,
but Mrs. Rouncewell is too thoughtful of her comfort
to admit of her proposing it. The old lady cannot
make enough of the old girl. She sits, in her
stately manner, holding her hand, and regardless of
its roughness, puts it often to her lips. “You
are a mother, my dear soul,” says she many times,
“and you found out my George’s mother!”
Copyrights
Bleak House from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.
