“To nobody in the world, Sir,” replied Rob, shaking his head.
“Neither there,” said Mr. Carker, pointing to the place they had just left, “nor anywhere else. I’ll try how true and grateful you can be. I’ll prove you!” Making this, by his display of teeth and by the action of his head, as much a threat as a promise, he turned from Rob’s eyes, which were nailed upon him as if he had won the boy by a charm, body and soul, and rode away. But again becoming conscious, after trotting a short distance, that his devoted henchman, girt as before, was yielding him the same attendance, to the great amusement of sundry spectators, he reined up, and ordered him off. To ensure his obedience, he turned in the saddle and watched him as he retired. It was curious to see that even then Rob could not keep his eyes wholly averted from his patron’s face, but, constantly turning and turning again to look after him, involved himself in a tempest of buffetings and jostlings from the other passengers in the street: of which, in the pursuit of the one paramount idea, he was perfectly heedless.
Mr. Carker the Manager rode on at a foot-pace, with the easy air of one who had performed all the business of the day in a satisfactory manner, and got it comfortably off his mind. Complacent and affable as man could be, Mr. Carker picked his way along the streets and hummed a soft tune as he went. He seemed to purr, he was so glad.
And in some sort, Mr. Carker, in his fancy, basked upon a hearth too. Coiled up snugly at certain feet, he was ready for a spring, or for a tear, or for a scratch, or for a velvet touch, as the humour took him and occasion served. Was there any bird in a cage, that came in for a share of his regards?
“A very young lady!” thought Mr. Carker the Manager, through his song. “Ay! when I saw her last, she was a little child. With dark eyes and hair, I recollect, and a good face; a very good face! I daresay she’s pretty.”
More affable and pleasant yet, and humming his song until his many teeth vibrated to it, Mr. Carker picked his way along, and turned at last into the shady street where Mr. Dombey’s house stood. He had been so busy, winding webs round good faces, and obscuring them with meshes, that he hardly thought of being at this point of his ride, until, glancing down the cold perspective of tall houses, he reined in his horse quickly within a few yards of the door. But to explain why Mr. Carker reined in his horse quickly, and what he looked at in no small surprise, a few digressive words are necessary.
Mr. Toots, emancipated from the Blimber thraldom and coming into the possession of a certain portion of his worldly wealth, “which,” as he had been wont, during his last half-year’s probation, to communicate to Mr. Feeder every evening as a new discovery, “the executors couldn’t keep him out of” had applied himself with great diligence, to the science of Life. Fired with a noble emulation to pursue a brilliant and distinguished career, Mr. Toots had furnished a choice set of apartments; had established among them a sporting bower, embellished with the portraits of winning horses, in which he took no particle of interest; and a divan, which made him poorly. In this delicious abode, Mr. Toots devoted himself to the cultivation of those gentle arts which refine and humanise existence, his chief instructor in which was an interesting character called the Game Chicken, who was always to be heard of at the bar of the Black Badger, wore a shaggy white greatcoat in the warmest weather, and knocked Mr. Toots about the head three times a week, for the small consideration of ten and six per visit.
The Game Chicken, who was quite the Apollo of Mr. Toots’s Pantheon, had introduced to him a marker who taught billiards, a Life Guard who taught fencing, a jobmaster who taught riding, a Cornish gentleman who was up to anything in the athletic line, and two or three other friends connected no less intimately with the fine arts. Under whose auspices Mr. Toots could hardly fail to improve apace, and under whose tuition he went to work.
But however it came about, it came to pass, even while these gentlemen had the gloss of novelty upon them, that Mr. Toots felt, he didn’t know how, unsettled and uneasy. There were husks in his corn, that even Game Chickens couldn’t peck up; gloomy giants in his leisure, that even Game Chickens couldn’t knock down. Nothing seemed to do Mr. Toots so much good as incessantly leaving cards at Mr. Dombey’s door. No tax-gatherer in the British Dominions—that widespread territory on which the sun never sets, and where the tax-gatherer never goes to bed—was more regular and persevering in his calls than Mr. Toots.
Mr. Toots never went upstairs; and always performed the same ceremonies, richly dressed for the purpose, at the hall door.
“Oh! Good morning!” would be Mr. Toots’s first remark to the servant. “For Mr. Dombey,” would be Mr. Toots’s next remark, as he handed in a card. “For Miss Dombey,” would be his next, as he handed in another.
Mr. Toots would then turn round as if to go away; but the man knew him by this time, and knew he wouldn’t.
“Oh, I beg your pardon,” Mr. Toots would say, as if a thought had suddenly descended on him. “Is the young woman at home?”
The man would rather think she was, but wouldn’t quite know. Then he would ring a bell that rang upstairs, and would look up the staircase, and would say, yes, she was at home, and was coming down. Then Miss Nipper would appear, and
