Part 67 (1/2)

'Who is the owner of this house?' said Nicholas, hastily

An elderly woman was pointed out to hiently unwound Madeline's arms from the lifeless mass round which they were entwined: 'I represent this lady's nearest friends, as her servant here knows, and must remove her froe you confide her My name and address are upon that card, and you shall receive froeive me room and air for God's sake!'

The people fell back, scarce wondering more at what had just occurred, than at the excite the insensible girl in his arms, bore her from the chamber and downstairs into the room he had just quitted, followed by his sister and the faithful servant, whoed to procure a coach directly, while he and Kate bent over their beautiful charge and endeavoured, but in vain, to restore her to aniirl performed her office with such expedition, that in a very few minutes the coach was ready

Ralph Nickleby and Gride, stunned and paralysed by the awful event which had so suddenly overthrown their schemes (it would not otherwise, perhaps, have made much impression on they and precipitation of Nicholas, which bore down all before his like men in a dream or trance It was not until every preparation was made for Madeline's i she should not be taken away

'Who says so?' cried Nicholas, rising fro Madeline's lifeless hand in his

'I!' answered Ralph, hoarsely

'Hush, hush!+' cried the terrified Gride, catching hiain 'Hear what he says'

'Ay!' said Nicholas, extending his disengaged hand in the air, 'hear what he says That both your debts are paid in the one great debt of nature That the bond, due today at twelve, is noaste paper That your contemplated fraud shall be discovered yet That your schemes are known to man, and overthrown by Heaven Wretches, that he defies you both to do your worst'

'This ible, 'this man claims his wife, and he shall have her'

'That man claims what is not his, and he should not have her if he were fifty men, with fifty more to back him,' said Nicholas

'Who shall prevent hiht I should like to know,' said Ralph 'By what right I ask?'

'By this right That, knohat I do, you dare not teht; that those I serve, and ho and injury, are her nearest and her dearest friends In their name I bear her hence Give way!'

'One word!' cried Ralph, foa at the mouth

'Not one,' replied Nicholas, 'I will not hear of one-save this Look to yourself, and heed this warning that I give you! Your day is past, and night is comin' on'

'My curse, my bitter, deadly curse, upon you, boy!'

'Whence will curses co from a man like you? I tell you, thatabout your head; that the structures you have raised, through all your ill-spent life, are cru into dust; that your path is beset with spies; that this very day, ten thousand pounds of your hoarded wealth have gone in one great crash!+'

”Tis false!' cried Ralph, shrinking back

”Tis true, and you shall find it so I have no o first Lay not a hand on her, or on that woarments as they pass you by!-You let theain!'

Arthur Gride happened to be in the doorway, but whether intentionally or fro him aith such violence as to cause hile of the wall, and there knocked down; and then taking his beautiful burden in his arms rushed out No one cared to stop hih a mob of people, whom a report of the circu Madeline, in his excitement, as easily as if she were an infant, he reached the coach in which Kate and the girl were already waiting, and, confiding his charge to them, jumped up beside the coachman and bade him drive away

CHAPTER 55

Of Family Matters, Cares, Hopes, Disappointh Mrs Nickleby had been hter with every circumstance of Madeline Bray's history which was known to theh the responsible situation in which Nicholas stood had been carefully explained to her, and she had been prepared, even for the possible contingency of having to receive the young lady in her own house, improbable as such a result had appeared only a few minutes before it came about, still, Mrs Nickleby, from the moment when this confidence was first reposed in her, late on the previous evening, had remained in an unsatisfactory and profoundly uments could relieve her, and which every fresh soliloquy and reflection only aggravated ood lady argued; 'if the Mr Cheerybles don't want this young lady to be ainst the Lord Chancellor, make her a Chancery ward, and shut her up in the Fleet prison for safety?-I have read of such things in the newspapers a hundred times Or, if they are so very fond of her as Nicholas says they are, why don't theythey don't want her to be married, and don't want to marry her theo about the world, forbidding people's banns?'

'I don't think you quite understand,' said Kate, gently

'Well I am sure, Kate, my dear, you're very polite!' replied Mrs Nickleby 'I have been married myself I hope, and I have seen other people reat experience, dear mama,' said Kate; 'I mean that perhaps you don't quite understand all the circumstances in this instance We have stated them aardly, I dare say'

'That I dare say you have,' retorted her mother, briskly 'That's very likely I ah, at the same time, as the circumstances speak for the that I do understand them, and perfectly well too; whatever you and Nicholas reat fussto marry somebody who is older than herself? Your poor papa was older than I was, four years and a half older Jane Dibabs-the Dibabses lived in the beautiful little thatched white house one story high, covered all over with ivy and creeping plants, with an exquisite little porch with twining honysuckles and all sorts of things: where the earwigs used to fall into one's tea on a su, and always fell upon their backs and kicked dreadfully, and where the frogs used to get into the rushlight shades when one stopped all night, and sit up and look through the little holes like Christians-Jane Dibabs, SHE reat deal older than herself, and WOULDall that could be said to the contrary, and she was so fond of hi was ever equal to it There was no fuss made about Jane Dibabs, and her husband was a most honourable and excellent man, and everybody spoke well of hidalen?'

'Her husband is much older; he is not her own choice; his character is the very reverse of that which you have just described Don't you see a broad destinction between the two cases?' said Kate

To this, Mrs Nickleby only replied that she durst say she was very stupid, indeed she had no doubt she was, for her own children almost as much as told her so, every day of her life; to be sure she was a little older than they, and perhaps soht reasonably to know best However, no doubt she rong; of course she was; she alas, she couldn't be right, she couldn't be expected to be; so she had better not expose herself any more; and to all Kate's conciliations and concessions for an hour ensuing, the good lady gave no other replies than Oh, certainly, why did they ask HER?, HER opinion was of no consequence, it didn't matter what SHE said, with many other rejoinders of the same class

In this franed for speech, by nods of the head, upliftings of the eyes, and little beginnings of groans, converted, as they attracted attention, into short coughs), Mrs Nickleby remained until Nicholas and Kate returned with the object of their solicitude; when, having by this ti besides interested in the trials of one so young and beautiful, she not only displayed the utreat credit to herself for reco the course of procedure which her son had adopted: frequently declaring, with an expressive look, that it was very fortunate things were AS they were: and hinting, that but for great encouragement and wisdoht to that pass

Not to strain the question whether Mrs Nickleby had or had not any great hand in bringing round for exultation The brothers, on their return, bestowed such commendations on Nicholas for the part he had taken, and evinced so much joy at the altered state of events and the recovery of their young friend fro, that, as she hter, she now considered the fortunes of the faood as' made Mr Charles Cheeryble, indeed, Mrs Nickleby positively asserted, had, in the first transports of his surprise and delight, 'as good as' said so Without precisely explaining what this qualification meant, she subsided, whenever she mentioned the subject, into such a mysterious and inity in perspective, that (vague and clouded though they were) she was, at such times, almost as happy as if she had really been perreat splendour

The sudden and terrible shock she had received, coreat affliction and anxiety oftith Recovering from the state of stupefaction into which the sudden death of her father happily plunged her, she only exchanged that condition for one of dangerous and active illness When the delicate physical pohich have been sustained by an unnatural strain upon the ies and a resolute deterree of prostration is usually proportionate to the strength of the effort which has previously upheld them Thus it was that the illness which fell on Madeline was of no slight or temporary nature, but one which, for a time, threatened her reason, and-scarcely worse-her life itself

Who, slowly recovering froerous, could be insensible to the unreentle, tender, earnest Kate? On whoht step, the delicate hand, the quiet, cheerful, noiseless discharge of those thousand little offices of kindness and relief which we feel so deeply e are ill, and forget so lightly e are well-on who heart stored with every pure and true affection that woer to the endearments and devotion of its own sex, save as it learnt the, keenly susceptible of the syht in vain? What wonder that days becaether! What wonder, if with every hour of returning health, there canition of the praises which Kate, when they recalled old scenes-they seeo-would lavish on her brother! Where would have been the wonder, even, if those praises had found a quick response in the breast of Madeline, and if, with the i in the features of his sister that she could scarcely separate the two, she had son to each the feelings they had first inspired, and had iratitude to Nicholas, soned to Kate?

'My dear,' Mrs Nickleby would say, co into the room with an elaborate caution, calculated to discompose the nerves of an invalid rather allop; 'how do you find yourself tonight? I hope you are better'

'Al down her work, and taking Madeline's hand in hers

'Kate!' Mrs Nickleby would say, reprovingly, 'don't talk so loud' (the worthy lady herself talking in a whisper that would have made the blood of the stoutest man run cold in his veins)

Kate would take this reproof very quietly, and Mrs Nickleby,every board creak and every thread rustle as she moved stealthily about, would add: 'My son Nicholas has just co to custom, my dear, to know, from your own lips, exactly how you are; for he won't take my account, and never will'

'He is later than usual to-night,' perhaps Madeline would reply 'Nearly half an hour'

'Well, I never saw such people in all my life as you are, for tireat astonishment; 'I declare I never did! I had not the least idea that Nicholas was after his time, not the s of, Kate my dear-used to say, that appetite was the best clock in the world, but you have no appetite, my dear Miss Bray, I wish you had, and uponthat would give you one I am sure I don't know, but I have heard that two or three dozen native lobsters give an appetite, though that co after all, for I suppose you must have an appetite before you can take 'em If I said lobsters, I h really how you came to know about Nicholas-'

'We happened to be just talking about him,about anything else, Kate, and upon htless You can find subjects enough to talk about sometimes, and when you kno important it is to keep up Miss Bray's spirits, and interest her, and all that, it really is quite extraordinary to me what can induce you to keep on prose, prose, prose, din, din, din, everlastingly, upon the saood one, and I know you mean very well; but I will say this-that if it wasn't for me, I really don't knoould become of Miss Bray's spirits, and so I tell the doctor every day He says he wonders how I sustain my own, and I am sure I very often wonder myself how I can contrive to keep up as I do Of course it's an exertion, but still, when I kno ed topraiseworthy in that, but it's necessary, and I do it'

With that, Mrs Nickleby would draw up a chair, and for soreat variety of distracting topics in theherself away, at length, on the plea that she o and amuse Nicholas while he took his supper After a preli of his spirits with the information that she considered the patient decidedly worse, she would further cheer hi how dull, listless, and low-spirited Miss Bray was, because Kate foolishly talked about nothing else but hihly co reth on the arduous duties she had perfor how, if anything were to happen to herself, the faet on without her

At other tiht, he would be accompanied by Mr Frank Cheeryble, as commissioned by the brothers to inquire how Madeline was that evening On such occasions (and they were of very frequent occurrence), Mrs Nickleby deemed it of particular importance that she should have her wits about her; for, frons and tokens which had attracted her attention, she shrewdly suspected that Mr Frank, interested as his uncles were in Madeline, came quite as much to see Kate as to inquire after her; the more especially as the brothers were in constant communication with the medical man, came backwards and forwards very frequently themselves, and received a full report fro These were proud times for Mrs Nickleby; never was anybody half so discreet and sage as she, or half so eneralshi+p, and such unfathoht to bear upon Mr Frank, with the view of ascertaining whether her suspicions ell founded: and if so, of tantalising hi himself upon her merciful consideration Extensive was the artillery, heavy and light, which Mrs Nickleby brought into play for the furtherance of these great schemes; various and opposite theabout the end she had in view At one time, she was all cordiality and ease; at another, all stiffness and frigidity Now, she would seem to open her whole heart to her unhappy victim; the next time they met, she would receive hiht had broken in upon her, and, guessing his intentions, she had resolved to check them in the bud; as if she felt it her bounden duty to act with Spartan fire hopes which never could be realised At other times, when Nicholas was not there to overhear, and Kate was upstairs busily tending her sick friend, the worthy lady would throw out dark hints of an intention to send her daughter to France for three or four years, or to Scotland for the iues, or to A and tedious separation Nay, she even went so far as to hint, obscurely, at an attachhbour of theirs, one Horatio Peltirogus (a young gentleht have been, at that time, four years old, or thereabouts), and to represent it, indeed, as al for her daughter's final decision, to come off with the sanction of the church, and to the unspeakable happiness and content of all parties

It was in the full pride and glory of having sprung this last ht with extraordinary success, that Mrs Nickleby took the opportunity of being left alone with her son before retiring to rest, to sound hi that they could have but one opinion respecting it To this end, she approached the question with divers laudatory and appropriate reeneral aht, ht He is a fine fellow'

'Good-looking, too,' said Mrs Nickleby