‘I infer that you do not?’
’You are right. We hear the world wonder,
every day, at monsters of ingratitude. Did it
never occur to you that it often looks for monsters
of affection, as though they were things of course?’
They had reached the gate by this time, and bidding
each other good night, departed on their separate
ways.
That afternoon, when he had slept off his fatigue;
had shaved, and washed, and dressed, and freshened
himself from top to toe; when he had dined, comforted
himself with a pipe, an extra Toby, a nap in the great
arm-chair, and a quiet chat with Mrs Varden on everything
that had happened, was happening, or about to happen,
within the sphere of their domestic concern; the locksmith
sat himself down at the tea-table in the little back-parlour:
the rosiest, cosiest, merriest, heartiest, best-contented
old buck, in Great Britain or out of it.
There he sat, with his beaming eye on Mrs V., and
his shining face suffused with gladness, and his capacious
waistcoat smiling in every wrinkle, and his jovial
humour peeping from under the table in the very plumpness
of his legs; a sight to turn the vinegar of misanthropy
into purest milk of human kindness. There he
sat, watching his wife as she decorated the room with
flowers for the greater honour of Dolly and Joseph
Willet, who had gone out walking, and for whom the
tea-kettle had been singing gaily on the hob full
twenty minutes, chirping as never kettle chirped before;
for whom the best service of real undoubted china,
patterned with divers round-faced mandarins holding
up broad umbrellas, was now displayed in all its glory;
to tempt whose appetites a clear, transparent, juicy
ham, garnished with cool green lettuce-leaves and
fragrant cucumber, reposed upon a shady table, covered
with a snow-white cloth; for whose delight, preserves
and jams, crisp cakes and other pastry, short to eat,
with cunning twists, and cottage loaves, and rolls
of bread both white and brown, were all set forth
in rich profusion; in whose youth Mrs V. herself had
grown quite young, and stood there in a gown of red
and white: symmetrical in figure, buxom in bodice,
ruddy in cheek and lip, faultless in ankle, laughing
in face and mood, in all respects delicious to behold—there
sat the locksmith among all and every these delights,
the sun that shone upon them all: the centre
of the system: the source of light, heat, life,
and frank enjoyment in the bright household world.
And when had Dolly ever been the Dolly of that afternoon?
To see how she came in, arm-in-arm with Joe; and how
she made an effort not to blush or seem at all confused;
and how she made believe she didn’t care to sit
on his side of the table; and how she coaxed the locksmith
in a whisper not to joke; and how her colour came
and went in a little restless flutter of happiness,
which made her do everything wrong, and yet so charmingly
wrong that it was better than right!—why,
the locksmith could have looked on at this (as he
mentioned to Mrs Varden when they retired for the
night) for four-and-twenty hours at a stretch, and
never wished it done.
