" Go your ways," said Pinch, apostrophising
the coach : " I can hardly persuade myself but
you're alive, and are some great monster who
visits this place at certain intervals, to bear
my friends away into the world. You're more
exulting and rampant than usual to-night, I
think : and you may well crow over your prize ;
for he is a fine lad, an ingenuous lad, and has
but one fault that I know of : he don't mean
it, but he is most cruelly unjust to Pecksniff!"



CHAPTER III.

IN WHICH CERTAIN OTHER PERSONS ARE INTRODUCED;
ON THE SAME TERMS AS IN THE LAST CHAPTER.

,=7 ENTI0N has been already made
more than once, of a certain Dragon
who swung and creaked complain-
ingly before the village ale-house
{^^^^i door. A faded, and an ancient
dragon he was ; and many a wintry
storm of rain, snow, sleet, and hail,
had changed his colour from a gaudy
blue to a faint lack-lustre shade of grey.
But there he hung ; rearing in a state of mon-
strous imbecility, on his hind legs; waxing,
with every month that passed, so much more
dim and shapeless, that as you gazed at him on
one side of the sign-board it seemed as if he
must be gradually melting through it, and com-
ing out upon the other.

He was a courteous and considerate dragon
too ; or had been in his distincter days ; for in
the midst of his rampant feebleness, he kept one
of his fore paws near his nose, as though he
would say, " Don't mind me — it's only my fun j"




14



MARTIN CHUZZLEUTT.



while he held out the other, in polite and hos-
pitable entreaty. Indeed it must be conceded
to the whole brood of dragons of modern times,
that they have made a great advance in civilisa-
tion and refinement. They no longer demand
a beautiful virgin for breakfast every morning,
with as much regularity as any tame single gen-
tleman expects his hot roll, but rest content
with the society of idle bachelors and roving
married men : and they are now remarkable
rather for holding aloof from the softer sex
and discouraging their visits (especially on
Saturday nights), than for rudely insisting on
their company without any reference to their
inclinations, as they are known to have done in
days of yore.

Nor is this tribute to the reclaimed animals
in question, so wide a digression into the realms
of Natural History, as it may, at first sight, ap-
pear to be : for the present business of these
pages is with the dragon who had his retreat in
Mr. Pecksniff's neighbourhood, and that cour-
teous animal being already on the carpet,
there is nothing in the way of its immediate
transaction.

For many years, then, he had swung and
creaked, and flapped himself about, before the
two windows of the best bedroom in that house
of entertainment to which he lent his name; but
never in all his swinging, creaking, and flapping,
had there been such a stir within its dingy pre-
cincts, as on the evening next after that upon
which the incidents detailed in the last chapter,
occurred ; when there was such a hurrying up
and down stairs of feet, such a glancing of
lights, such a whispering of voices, such a smok-
ing and sputtering of wood newly lighted in a
damp chimney, such an airing of linen, such a
scorching smell of hot warming-pans, such a do-
mestic bustle and to-do, in short, as never
dragon, griffin, unicorn, or other animal of that
species presided over, since they first began to
interest themselves in household affairs.

An old gentleman and a young lady, travel-
ling, unattended, in a rusty old chariot with
post-horses ; coming nobody knew whence, and
going nobody knew whither ; had turned out of
the high road, and driven unexpectedly to the
Blue Dragon : and here was the old gentleman,
who had taken this step by reason of his sudden
illness in the carriage, suffering the most horrible
cramps and spasms, yet protesting and vowing
in the very midst of his pain, that he wouldn't
have a doctor sent for, and wouldn't take any
remedies but those which the young lady ad-
ministered from a small medicine-chest, and
wouldn't, in a word, do anything but terrify the



landlady out of her five wits, and obstinately
refuse compliance with every suggestion that was
made to him.

Of all the five hundred proposals for his relief
which the good woman poured out in less than
half-an-hour, he would entertain but one. That
was, that he should go to bed. And it was in
the preparation of his bed, and the arrangement
of his chamber, that all the stir was made in the
room behind the Dragon.

He was, beyond all question, very ill, and
suffered exceedingly : not the less, perhaps, be-
cause he was a strong and vigorous old man,
with a will of iron, and a voice of brass. But
neither the apprehensions which he plainly en-
tertained, at times, for his life, nor the great
pain he underwent, influenced his resolution in
the least degree. He would have no person
sent for. The worse he grew, the more rigid
and inflexible he became in his determination.
If they sent for any person to attend him, man,
woman, or child, he would leave the house
directly (so he told them), though he quitted
it on foot, and died upon the threshold of the
door.

Now, there being no medical practitioner
actually resident in the village, but a poor apo-
thecary who was also a grocer and general
dealer, the landlady had, upon her own respon-
sibility, sent for him, in the very first burst and
outset of the disaster. Of course it follows, as a
necessary result of his being wanted, that he was
not at home. He had gone some miles away,
and was not expected home until late at night ;
so, the landlady being by this time pretty well
beside herself, despatched the same messenger
in all haste for Mr. Pecksniff, as a learned man
who could bear a deal of responsibility, and
a moral man who could administer a world of
comfort to a troubled mind. That the guest
had need of some efficient service under the
latter head was obvious enough from the restless
expressions, importing, however, rather a worldly
than a spiritual anxiety, to which he gave frequent
utterance.

From this last-mentioned secret errand, the
messenger returned with no better news than
from the first ; Mr. Pecksniff was not at home.
However, they got the patient into bed, without
him ; and, in the course of two hours, he gra-
dually became so far better that there were much
longer intervals than at first between his terms
of suffering. By degrees, he ceased to suffer at
all : though his exhaustion was occasionally so
great, that it suggested hardly less alarm than
his actual endurance had done.

It was in one of his intervals of repose, when,



TWO TRAVELLERS AT THE DRAGON.



J 5



looking round with great caution, and reaching
uneasily out of his nest of pillows, be endea-
voured, with a strange air of secrecy and dis-
trust, to make use of the writing materials which
he had ordered to be placed on a table beside
him, that the young lady and the mistress of the
Blue Dragon, found themselves sitting side by
side before the fire in the sick chamber.

The mistress of the Blue Dragon was in out-
ward appearance just what a landlady should
be : broad, buxom, comfortable, and good-look-
ing, with a face of clear red and white, which by
its jovial aspect, at once bore testimony to her
hearty participation of the good things in the
larder and cellar, and to their thriving and
healthful influences. She was a widow, but
years ago had passed through her state of
weeds, and burst into flower again ; and in full
bloom she had continued ever since; and in
fall bloom she was now ; with roses on her
ample skirts, and roses on her bodice, roses in
her cap, roses in her cheeks, — ay, and roses,
worth the gathering too, on her lips, for that
matter. She had still a bright black eye, and
jet black hair; was comely, dimpled, plump,
and tight as a gooseberry ; and though she was
not exactly what the world calls young, you
may make an affidavit, on trust, before any
mayor or magistrate in Christendom, that there
are a great many young ladies in the world
(blessings on them, one and all !) whom you
wouldn't like half as well, or admire half as
much, as the beaming hostess of the Blue
Dragon.

As this fair matron sat beside the fire, she
glanced occasionally, with all the pride of owner-
ship, about the room ; which was a large apart-
ment, such as one may see in country places,
with a low roof and a sunken flooring, all down-
hill from the door, and a descent of two steps
on the inside, so exquisitely unexpected, that
strangers, despite the most elaborate cautioning,
usually dived in head-first, as into a plunging-
bath. It was none of your frivolous and pre-
posterously bright bedrooms, where nobody can
close an eye with any kind of propriety or
decent regard to the association of ideas ; but
it was a good, dull, leaden, drowsy place, where
every article of furniture reminded you that you
came there to sleep, and that you were expected
to go to sleep. There was no wakeful reflection
of the fire there, as in your modern chambers,
which upon the darkest nights have a watchful
consciousness of French polish ; the old Spanish
mahogany winked at it now and then, as a
dozing cat or dog might, nothing more. The
very size and shape, and hopeless immovability,



of the bedstead, and wardrobe, and in a minor
degree of even the chairs and tables, provoked
sleep ; they were plainly apoplectic and dis-
posed to snore. There were no staring por-
traits to remonstrate with you for being lazy ;
no round-eyed birds upon the curtains, disgust-
ingly wide awake, and insufferably prying. The
thick neutral hangings, and the dark blinds, and
the heavy heap of bed-clothes, were all designed
to hold in sleep, and act as non-conductors to
the day and getting up. Even the old stuffed
fox upon the top of the wardrobe was devoid of
any spark of vigilance, for his glass eye had
fallen out, and he slumbered as he stood.

The wandering attention of the mistress of
the Blue Dragon roved to these things but twice
or thrice, and then for but an instant at a time.
It soon deserted them, and even the distant
bed with its strange burden, for the young crea-
ture immediately before her, who, with her
downcast eyes intently fixed upon the fire, sat
wrapped in silent meditation.

She was very young ; apparently not more
than seventeen ; timid and shrinking in her
manner, and yet with a greater share of self-
possession and control over her emotions than
usually belongs to a far more advanced period
of female life. This she had abundantly shown,
but now, in her tending of the sick gentleman.
She was short in stature ; and her figure was
slight, as became her years ; but all the charms
of youth and maidenhood set it off, and clus-
tered on her gentle brow. Her face was very
pale, in part no doubt from recent agitation.
Her dark brown hair, disordered from the same
cause, had fallen negligently from its bonds, and
hung upon her neck : for which instance of its
waywardness, no male observer would have had
the heart to blame it.

Her attire was that of a lady, but extremely
plain ; and in her manner, even when she sat
as still as she did then, there was an indefinable
something which appeared to be in kindred
with her scrupulously unpretending dress. She
had sat at first looking anxiously towards the
bed ; but seeing that the patient remained quiet,
and was busy with his writing, she had softly
moved her chair into its present place : partly,
as it seemed, from an instinctive consciousness
that he desired to avoid observation ; and partly
that she might, unseen by him, give some vent to
the natural feelings she had hitherto suppressed.

Of all this, and much more, the rosy landlady
of the Blue Dragon took an accurate note and
observation as only woman can take of woman.
And at length she said, in a voice too low, she
knew, to reach the bed :



IO



MARTIN CHUZZLEW1T.



" You have seen the gentleman in this way
before, miss? Is he used to these attacks?"

" I have seen him very ill before, but not so
ill as he has been to-night."

"What a Providence!" said the landlady of
the Dragon, " that you had the prescriptions and
the medicines with you, miss !"

"They are intended for such an emergency.
We never travel without them."

"Oh!" thought the hostess, "then we are
in the habit of travelling, and of travelling to-
gether."

She was so conscious of expressing this in her
face, that meeting the young lady's eyes imme-
diately afterwards, and being a very honest
hostess, she was rather confused.

" The gentleman — your grandpapa " — she re-
sumed, after a short pause, " being so bent on
having no assistance, must terrify you very
much, miss ?"

'• I have been very much alarmed to-night.
He — he is not my grandfather."

" Father, I should have said," returned the
hostess, sensible of having made an awkward
mistake.

" Nor my father," said the young lady. " Nor,"
she added, slightly smiling with a quick per-
ception of what the landlady was going to add,
" Nor my uncle. We are not related."

"Oh dear me!" returned the landlady, still
more embarrassed than before : " how could I
be so very much mistaken : knowing, as any-
body in their proper senses might, that when a
gentleman is ill, he looks so much older than
he really is ! That I should have called you,
' Miss,' too, Ma'am ! " But when she had pro-
ceeded thus far, she glanced involuntarily at the
third finger of the young lady's left hand, and
faltered again : for there was no ring upon it.

" When I told you we were not related," said
the other mildly, but not without confusion on
her own part, " I meant not in any way. Not
even by marriage. Did you call me, Martin ?"

"Call you?" cried the old man, looking
quickly up, and hurriedly drawing beneath the
coverlet, the paper on which he had been
writing. " No."

She had moved a pace or two towards the bed,
but stopped immediately, and went no farther.

" No," he repeated, with a petulant emphasis.
" Why do you ask me? If I had called you,
what need for such a question ?"

" It was the creaking of the sign outside, sir.
I dare say," observed the landlady : a suggestion
by the way (as she felt a moment after she had
made it), not at all complimentary to the voice
of the old gentleman.



" No matter what, ma'am," he rejoined : " it
wasn't I. Why how you stand there, Mary, as
if I had the plague ! But they're all afraid of
me," he added, leaning helplessly backwards on
his pillow, " even she ! There is a curse upon
me. What else have I to look for !''

" O dear, no. Oh no, I'm sure," said the
good-tempered landlady, rising and going to-
wards him. " Be of better cheer, sir. These
are only sick fancies."

" What are only sick fancies?" He retorted.
" What do you know about fancies ? Who told
you about fancies ? The old story ! Fancies ! "
" Only see again there, how you take one
up !" said the mistress of the Blue Dragon, with
unimpaired good humour. " Dear heart alive,
there is no harm in the word, sir, if it is an old
one. Folks in good health have their fancies
too, and strange ones, every day."

Harmless as this speech appeared to be, it
acted on the traveller's distrust, like oil on fire.
He raised his head up in the bed, and, fixing on
her two dark eyes whose brightness was exag-
gerated by the paleness of his hollow cheeks,
as they in turn, together with his straggling
locks of long grey hair, were rendered whiter by
the tight black velvet skull-cap which he wore,
he searched her face intently.

" Ah ! you begin too soon," he said, in so
low a voice that he seemed to be thinking it,
rather than addressing her. " But you lose no
time. You do your errand, and you earn your
fee. Now, who may be your client?"

The landlady looked in great astonishment at
her whom he called Mary, and finding no re-
joinder in the drooping face, looked back again
at him. At first she had recoiled involuntarily,
supposing him disordered in his mind ; but the
slow composure of his manner, and the settled
purpose announced in his strong features, an 1
gathering, most of all, about his puckered
mouth, forbade the supposition.

" Come," he said, " tell me who is it ? Being
here, it is not very hard for me to guess, you
may suppose."

" Martin," interposed the young lady, laying
her hand upon his arm; "reflect how short a
time we have been in this house, and that even
your name is unknown here."

" Unless," he said, " you — ." He was evi-
dently tempted to express a suspicion of her
having broken his confidence in favour of the
landlady, but either remembering her tender
nursing, or being moved in some sort, by her
face, he checked himself, and changing his
uneasy posture in the bed, was silent.

" There!" said Mrs. Lupin : for in that name



THE DRAGON IN DANGER.



17



the Blue Dragon was licensed to furnish enter-
tainment both to man and beast. " Now, you
will be well again, sir. You forgot, for the
moment, that there were none but friends here."

" Oh ! " cried the old man moaning impa-
tiently, as he tossed one restless arm upon the
coverlet, 4 - why do you talk to me of friends !
Can you or anybody teach me to know who are
my friends, and who my enemies ? "

'•• At least," urged Mrs. Lupin gently, " this
young lady is your friend, I'm sure."



" She has no temptation to be otherwise,"
cried the old man, like one whose hope and
confidence were utterly exhausted. " 1 suppose
she is. Heaven knows. There : let me try to
sleep. Leave the candle where it is."

As they retired from the bed, he drew forth
the writing which had occupied him so long,
and holding it in the flame of the taper burnt it to
ashes. That done, he extinguished the light, and
turning his face away with a heavy sigh, drew
the coverlet about his head, and lay quite still.




- WE WILL SAY, IF YOU PLEASE," ADDED MR. PECKSNIFF, WITH GREAT TENDERNESS OK MANNER,
"THAT IT ARISES FROM A COLD IN THE HEAD, OR IS ATTRIBUTABLE TO SNUFF, OR SMELLING-
SALTS, OR ONIONS, OR ANYTHING BUT THE REAL CAUSE."



This destruction of the paper, both as being
strangely inconsistent with the labour he had
devoted to it and as involving considerable
danger of fire to the Dragon, occasioned Mrs.
Lupin not a little consternation. But the young
lady evincing no surprise, curiosity, or alarm,
whispered her, with many thanks for her solici-
tude and company, that she would remain there
some time longer ; and that she begged her not
Martin Chuzzlewit, 2.



to share her watch, as she was well used to being
alone, and would pass the time in reading.

Mrs. Lupin had her full share and dividend
of that large capital of curiosity which is inhe-
rited by her sex, and at another time it might
have been difficult so to impress this hint upon
her as to induce her to take it. But now, in
sheer wonder and amazement at these mysteries,
she withdrew at once, and repairing straight-

15



i8



TIN CHUZZLEWIT.



v/ay to her own little parlour below-stairs, sat
down in her easy-chair with unnatural compo-
sure. At this very crisis, a step was heard in
the entry, and Mr. Pecks liff, looking sweetly
over the half-door of the bar, and into the vista
of snug privacy beyond, murmured :

" Good evening, Mrs. Lupin!"

" Oh dear me, sir 1" she cried, advancing to re-
ceive him, " I am so very glad you have come."

•• And / am very glad I have come," said
Mr. Pecksniff, " if I can be of service. I am
very glad I have come. What is the matter,
Mrs. Lupin?"

" A gentleman taken ill upon the road, has been
so very bad up-stairs, sir," said the tearful hostess.

" A gentleman taken ill upon the road, has
been so very bad up-stairs, has he?" repeated
Mr. Pecksniff. "Well, well !"

Now there was nothing that one may call
decidedly original in this remark, nor can it be
exactly said to have contained any wise precept
theretofore unknown to mankind, or to have
opened any hidden source of consolation : but
Mr. Pecksniff's manner was so bland, and he
nodded his head so soothingly, and showed in
everything such an affable sense of his own
excellence, that anybody would have been, as
Mrs. Lupin was, comforted by the mere voice
and presence of such a man ; and, though he
had merely said " a verb must agree with its
nominative case in number and person, my good
friend," or " eight times eight are sixty-four, my
worthy soul," must have felt deeply grateful to
him for his humanity and wisdom.

" And how," asked Mr. Pecksniff, drawing off
his gloves and warming his hands before the
lire, as benevolently as if they were somebody
else's, not his : "and how is he now?"

"He is better, and quite tranquil," answered
Mrs. Lupin.

" He is better, and quite tranquil," said
Pecksniff. "Very well ! ve-ry well !"

Here again, though the statement was Mrs.
Lupin's and not Mr. Pecksniff's, Mr. Pecksniff
made it his own and consoled her with it. It
was not much when Mrs. Lupin said it, but it
was a whole book when Mr. Pecksniff said it.
" /observe," he seemed to say, " and, through
me, morality in general remarks, that he is
better and quite tranquil."

"There must be weighty matters on his
mind though," said the hostess, shaking her
head, "for he talks, sir, in the strangest way
you ever heard. He is far from easy in his
thoughts, and wants some proper advice from
those whose goodness makes it worth his ha\

" Then," said Mr. Pecksniff, " he is the sort



of customer for me." But though he said this
in the plainest language, he didn't speak a word.
He only shook his head : disparagingly of him-
self too.

" I am afraid, sir," continued the landlady,
first looking round to assure herself that there
was nobody within hearing, and then looking
down upon the floor. " I am very much afraid,
sir, that his conscience is troubled by his not
being related — or — or even married to — a very
young lady — "

■'Mrs. Lupin!" said Mr. Pecksniff, holding
up his hand with something in his manner as
nearly approaching to se. erity, - any expression
of his, mild being that he was, could ever do.
" Person ! young person ?"

"A very young person," said Mrs. Lupin,
courtesying and blushing : " I beg your pardon,
sir, but I have been so hurried to-night, that 1
don't know what I say — who is with him now."

"Who is with him now," ruminated Mr.
Pecksniff, warming his back (as he had warmed
his hands) as if it were a widow's back, or an
orphan's back, or an enemy's back, or a back
that any less excellent man would have suffered
to be cold : " Oh dear me, dear me ! "

" At the same time I am bound to say, and I
do say with all my heart," observed the hostess,,
earnestly, " that her looks and manner almost
disarm suspicion."

" Your suspicion, Mrs. Lupin," said Mr.
Pecksniff gravely, " is very natural."

Touching which remark, let it be written
down to their confusion, that the enemies of
this worthy man unblushingly maintained that
he always said of what was very bad, that it was
very natural ; and that he unconsciously be-
trayed his own nature in doing so.

" Your suspicion, Mrs. Lupin," he repeated,
" is very natural, and I have no doubt correct.
I will wait upon these travellers."

With that he took off his great-coat, and
having run his fingers through his hair, thrust
one hand gently in the bosom of las waistcoat,,
and meekly signed to her to lead the way.

"Shall I knock?" asked Mrs. Lupin, w
they reached the chamber door.

"No," said Mr. Pecksniff, "enter if you
please."

They went in on tiptoe : or rather the hostess
took that precaution, for Mr. Pecksniff always
walked softly. The old gentleman was stiil
asleep, and his young companion still sat read-
ing by the fire.

" I am afraid," said Mr. Pecksniff, pausing at
the door, and giving his head a melancholy
roll, " I am afraid that this looks artful. I am



THE GOOD MAN ASSERTS HIMSELF WITH DIGNITY.



*9



afraid, Mrs. Lupin, do you know, that this looks
very artful !"

As he finished this whisper, he advanced,
before the hostess ; and at the same time the
young lady, hearing footsteps, rose. Mr. Peck-
sniff glanced at the volume she held, and
whispered Mrs. Lupin again : if possible, with
increased despondency.

"Yes, ma'am," he said, "it is a good book.
I was fearful of that beforehand. 1 am appre-
hensive that this is a very deep thing indeed !"

" What gentleman is this ?" inquired the
object of his virtuous doubts.

" Hush ! don't trouble yourself, ma'am," said
Mr. Pecksniff, as the landlady was about to
answer. " This young " — in spite of himself he
hesitated when ' person ' rose to his lips, and