Part 43 (1/2)

With which remarks, and many more, no less intellectual and to the purpose, Mr Mantalini kissed the fingers of his gloves to Ralph Nickleby, and drawing his lady's arly away

'So, so,'into his chair; 'this devil is loose again, and thwarting me, as he was born to do, at every turn He toldbetween us, sooner or later I'll make him a true prophet, for it shall surely co in his head

'No,' replied Ralph, with equal abruptness

Neithdrew his head, but thrust it in again

'You're quite sure you're not at home, are you?' said Newman

'What does the idiotnearly ever since they first came in, andhis hands

'Who has?' deence he had just heard, and his clerk's provoking coolness, to an intense pitch of irritation

The necessity of a reply was superseded by the unlooked-for entrance of a third party-the individual in question-who, bringing his one eye (for he had but one) to bear on Ralph Nickleby,bows, and sat himself down in an armchair, with his hands on his knees, and his short black trousers drawn up so high in the legs by the exertion of seating himself, that they scarcely reached below the tops of his Wellington boots

'Why, this IS a surprise!' said Ralph, bending his gaze upon the visitor, and half s as he scrutinised him attentively; 'I should know your face, Mr Squeers'

'Ah!' replied that worthy, 'and you'd have know'd it better, sir, if it hadn't been for all that I've been a-going through Just lift that little boy off the tall stool in the back-office, and tell hi himself to Newman 'Oh, he's lifted his-self off My son, sir, little Wackford What do you think of hi? Ain't he fit to bust out of his clothes, and start the seams, and make the very buttons fly off with his fatness? Here's flesh!+' cried Squeers, turning the boy about, and indenting the pluure with divers pokes and punches, to the great discomposure of his son and heir 'Here's firh of hier and thuood condition Master Squeers ht have been, he certainly did not present this re his finger and thumb in illustration of his remark, he uttered a sharp cry, and rubbed the place in the most natural manner possible

'Well,' remarked Squeers, a little disconcerted, 'I had hi, and he hasn't had his lunch yet Why you couldn't shut a bit of him in a door, when he's had his dinner Look at them tears, sir,' said Squeers, with a triumphant air, as Master Wackford wiped his eyes with the cuff of his jacket, 'there's oiliness!'

'He looks well, indeed,' returned Ralph, who, for some purposes of his own, seemed desirous to conciliate the schoolmaster 'But how is Mrs Squeers, and how are you?'

'Mrs Squeers, sir,' replied the proprietor of Dotheboys, 'is as she always is-a , and a coorging his-self with vittles, and then turning in; that's their way-got a abscess on him last week To see how she operated upon hih, and nodding his head a great many times, 'what a ed in a retrospective look, for some quarter of a minute, as if this allusion to his lady's excellences had naturally led his e in Yorkshi+re; and then looked at Ralph, as if waiting for hi

'Have you quite recovered that scoundrel's attack?' asked Ralph

'I've only just done it, if I've done it now,' replied Squeers 'I was one blessed bruise, sir,' said Squeers, touching first the roots of his hair, and then the toes of his boots, 'froar and brown paper, froht I suppose there was a matter of half a ream of brown paper stuck upon me, from first to last As I laid all of a heap in our kitchen, plastered all over, you e brown-paper parcel, chock full of nothing but groans Did I groan loud, Wackford, or did I groan soft?' asked Mr Squeers, appealing to his son

'Loud,' replied Wackford

'Was the boys sorry to see lad?' asked Mr Squeers, in a senti sharp round

'Sorry,' rejoined his son

'Oh!' said Squeers, catching him a smart box on the ear 'Then take your hands out of your pockets, and don't stamentleman's office, or I'll run away from my family and never come back any more; and then ould become of all them precious and forlorn lads as would be let loose on the world, without their best friend at their elbers?'

'Were you obliged to have medical attendance?' inquired Ralph

'Ay, was I,' rejoined Squeers, 'and a precious bill the h'

Ralph elevated his eyebrows in a ht be expressive of either sympathy or astonishment-just as the beholder was pleased to take it

'Yes, I paid it, every farthing,' replied Squeers, who seemed to know theof the question would induce him to subscribe towards the expenses; 'I wasn't out of pocket by it after all, either'

'No!' said Ralph

'Not a halfpenny,' replied Squeers 'The fact is, we have only one extra with our boys, and that is for doctors when required-and not then, unless we're sure of our customers Do you see?'

'I understand,' said Ralph

'Very good,' rejoined Squeers 'Then, after my bill was run up, we picked out five little boys (sons of small tradesmen, as was sure pay) that had never had the scarlet fever, and we sent one to a cottage where they'd got it, and he took it, and then we put the four others to sleep with him, and THEY took it, and then the doctor came and attended 'e 'em, and added it on to their little bills, and the parents paid it Ha! ha! ha!'

'And a good plan too,' said Ralph, eyeing the schoolmaster stealthily

'I believe you,' rejoined Squeers 'We always do it Why, when Mrs Squeers was brought to bed with little Wackford here, we ran the hooping-cough through half-a-dozen boys, and charged her expenses a 'ehed, but on this occasion he produced the nearest approach to it that he could, and waiting until Mr Squeers had enjoyed the professional joke to his heart's content, inquired what had brought hi law business,' replied Squeers, scratching his head, 'connected with an action, for what they call neglect of a boy I don't knohat they would have He had as good grazing, that boy had, as there is about us'

Ralph looked as if he did not quite understand the observation

'Grazing,' said Squeers, raising his voice, under the impression that as Ralph failed to coets weak and ill and don't relish his e of diet-turn hihbour's turnip field, or sometimes, if it's a delicate case, a turnip field and a piece of carrots alternately, and let him eat as many as he likes There an't better land in the country than this perwerse lad grazed on, and yet he goes and catches cold and indigestion and what not, and then his friends brings a lawsuit against ME! Now, you'd hardly suppose,' added Squeers,in his chair with the iratitude would carry them quite as far as that; would you?'

'A hard case, indeed,' observed Ralph

'You don't say more than the truth when you say that,' replied Squeers 'I don't suppose there's a , as possesses the fondness for youth that I do There's youth to the aht hundred pound a year at Dotheboys Hall at this present tiet 'e 'e at your old quarters?' asked Ralph

'Yes, we are at the Saracen,' replied Squeers, 'and as it don't want very long to the end of the half-year, we shall continney to stop there till I've collected the ht little Wackford up, on purpose to show to parents and guardians I shall put him in the advertisement, this time Look at that boy-hi, that boy is!'

'I should like to have a ith you,' said Ralph, who had both spoken and listened

'As many words as you like, sir,' rejoined Squeers 'Wackford, you go and play in the back office, and don't et thin, and that won't do You haven't got such a thing as twopence, Mr Nickleby, have you?' said Squeers, rattling a bunch of keys in his coat pocket, andall silver

'I-think I have,' said Ralph, very slowly, and producing, afterin an old drawer, a penny, a halfpenny, and two farthings