“What, grandpa! Am I so like my poor little Uncle again?”
“Yes, Paul. But he was weak, and you are very strong.”
“Oh yes, I am very strong.”
“And he lay on a little bed beside the sea, and you can run about.”
And so they range away again, busily, for the white-haired gentleman likes best to see the child free and stirring; and as they go about together, the story of the bond between them goes about, and follows them.
But no one, except Florence, knows the measure of the white-haired gentleman’s affection for the girl. That story never goes about. The child herself almost wonders at a certain secrecy he keeps in it. He hoards her in his heart. He cannot bear to see a cloud upon her face. He cannot bear to see her sit apart. He fancies that she feels a slight, when there is none. He steals away to look at her, in her sleep. It pleases him to have her come, and wake him in the morning. He is fondest of her and most loving to her, when there is no creature by. The child says then, sometimes:
“Dear grandpapa, why do you cry when you kiss me?”
He only answers, “Little Florence! little Florence!” and smooths away the curls that shade her earnest eyes.
Colophon
Dombey and Son
was published in 1848 by
Charles Dickens.
This ebook was produced for
Standard Ebooks
by
Vince Rice,
and is based on a transcription produced in 1997 by
Neil McLachlan, Ted Davis, and David Widger
for
Project Gutenberg
and on digital scans from the
Internet Archive.
The cover page is adapted from
Lady Marjorie Manners, Aged 17,
a painting completed in 1900 by
James Jebusa Shannon.
The cover and title pages feature the
League Spartan and Sorts Mill Goudy
typefaces created in 2014 and 2009 by
The League of Moveable Type.
The first edition of this ebook was released on
February 13, 2023, 7:45 p.m.
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Uncopyright
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