第310章

Her own preparations were of the best, for they comprehended a delicate new loaf, a plate of fresh butter, a basin of fine white sugar, and other arrangements on the same scale. Even the snuff with which she now refreshed herself, was so choice in quality that she took a second pinch.

`There's the little bell a-ringing now,' said Mrs. Gamp, hurrying to the stair-head and looking over. `Betsey Prig, my -- why it's that there disapintin' Sweedlepipes, I do believe.'

`Yes, it's me,' said the barber in a faint voice: `I've just come in.'

`You're always a-comin' in, I think,' muttered Mrs. Gamp to herself, `except wen you're a-goin' out. I ha'n't no patience with that man!'

`Mrs. Gamp,' said the barber. `I say! Mrs. Gamp!'

`Well,' cried Mrs. Gamp, impatiently, as she descended the stairs. `What is it? Is the Thames a-fire, and cooking its own fish, Mr. Sweedlepipes?

Why wot's the man gone and been a-doin' of to himself? He's as white as chalk!'

She added the latter clause of inquiry, when she got downstairs, and found him seated in the shaving-chair, pale and disconsolate.

`You recollect,' said Poll. `You recollect young --'

`Not young Wilkins!' cried Mrs. Gamp. `Don't say young Wilkins, wotever you do. If young Wilkins's wife is took --'

`It isn't anybody's wife,' exclaimed the little barber. `Bailey, young Bailey!'

`Why, wot do you mean to say that chit's been a-doin' of?' retorted Mrs. Gamp, sharply. `Stuff and nonsense, Mrs. Sweedlepipes!'

`He hasn't been a-doing anything!' exclaimed poor Poll, quite desperate.

`What do you catch me up so short for, when you see me put out to that extent that I can hardly speak? He'll never do anything again. He's done for. He's killed. The first time I ever see that boy,' said Poll, `I charged him too much for a red-poll. I asked him three-halfpence for a penny one, because I was afraid he'd beat me down. But he didn't. And now he's dead; and if you was to crowd all the steam-engines and electric fluids that ever was, into this shop, and set 'em every one to work their hardest, they couldn't square the account, though it's only a ha'penny!'

Mr. Sweedlepipe turned aside to the towel, and wiped his eyes with it.

`And what a clever boy he was!' he said. `What a surprising young chap he was! How he talked! and what a deal he know'd! Shaved in this very chair he was; only for fun; it was all his fun; he was full of it. Ah! to think that he'll never be shaved in earnest! The birds might every one have died, and welcome,' cried the little barber, looking round him at the cages, and again applying to the towel, `sooner than I'd have heard this news!'

`How did you ever come to hear it?' said Mrs. Gamp. `who told you?'

`I went out,' returned the little barber, `into the City, to meet a sporting gent upon the Stock Exchange, that wanted a few slow pigeons to practise at; and when I'd done with him, I went to get a little drop of beer, and there I heard everybody a-talking about it. It's in the papers.'

`You are in a nice state of confugion, Mr. Sweedlepipes, you are!' said Mrs. Gamp, shaking her head; `and my opinion is, as half-adudgeon fresh young lively leeches on your temples, wouldn't be too much to clear your mind, which so I tell you. Wot were they a-talkin' on, and wot was in the papers?'

`All about it!' cried the barber. `What else do you suppose? Him and his master were upset on a journey, and he was carried to Salisbury, and was breathing his last when the account came away. He never spoke afterwards.

Not a single word. That's the worst of it to me; but that ain't all. His master can't be found. The other manager of their office in the city: Crimple, David Crimple: has gone off with the money, and is advertised for, with a reward, upon the walls. Mr. Montague, poor young Bailey's master (what a boy he was!) is advertised for, too. Some say he's slipped off, to join his friend abroad; some say he mayn't have got away yet; and they're looking for him high and low. Their office is a smash; a swindle altogether. But what's a Life Assurance office to a Life! And what a Life Young Bailey's was!'

`He was born into a wale,' said Mrs. Gamp, with philosophical coolness.

`and he lived in a wale; and he must take the consequences of sech a sitiwation.

But don't you hear nothink of Mr. Chuzzlewit in all this?'

`No,' said Poll, `nothing to speak of. His name wasn't printed as one of the board, though some people say it was just going to be. Some believe he was took in, and some believe he was one of the takers-in; but however that may be, they can't prove nothing against him. This morning he went up of his own accord afore the Lord Mayor or some of them City big-wigs, and complained that he'd been swindled, and that these two persons had gone off and cheated him, and that he had just found out that Montague's name wasn't even Montague, but something else. And they do say that he looked like Death, owing to his losses. But, Lord forgive me,' cried the barber, coming back again to the subject of his individual grief, `what's his looks to me! He might have died and welcome, fifty times, and not been such a loss as Bailey!'

At this juncture the little bell rang, and the deep voice of Mrs. Prig struck into the conversation.

`Oh! You're a-talkin' about it, are you!' observed that lady. `Well, I hope you've got it over, for I ain't interested in it myself.'

`My precious Betsey,' said Mrs. Gamp, `how late you are!'

The worthy Mrs. Prig replied, with some asperity, `that if perwerse people went off dead, when they was least expected, it warn't no fault of her'n.' And further, `that it was quite aggrawation enough to be made late when one was dropping for one's tea, without hearing on it again.'

Mrs. Gamp, deriving from this exhibition of repartee some clue to the state of Mrs. Prig's feelings, instantly conducted her upstairs: deeming that the sight of pickled salmon might work a softening change.

But Betsey Prig expected pickled salmon. It was obvious that she did; for her first words, after glancing at the table, were:

`I know'd she wouldn't have a cowcumber!'