“Well!” said Mrs. Chick, with a sweet smile, “after this, I forgive Fanny everything!”
It was a declaration in a Christian spirit, and Mrs. Chick felt that it did her good. Not that she had anything particular to forgive in her sister-in-law, nor indeed anything at all, except her having married her brother—in itself a species of audacity—and her having, in the course of events, given birth to a girl instead of a boy: which, as Mrs. Chick had frequently observed, was not quite what she had expected of her, and was not a pleasant return for all the attention and distinction she had met with.
Mr. Dombey being hastily summoned out of the room at this moment, the two ladies were left alone together. Miss Tox immediately became spasmodic.
“I knew you would admire my brother. I told you so beforehand, my dear,” said Louisa.
Miss Tox’s hands and eyes expressed how much.
“And as to his property, my dear!”
“Ah!” said Miss Tox, with deep feeling.
“Im‑mense!”
“But his deportment, my dear Louisa!” said Miss Tox. “His presence! His dignity! No portrait that I have ever seen of anyone has been half so replete with those qualities. Something so stately, you know: so uncompromising: so very wide across the chest: so upright! A pecuniary Duke of York, my love, and nothing short of it!” said Miss Tox. “That’s what I should designate him.”
“Why, my dear Paul!” exclaimed his sister, as he returned, “you look quite pale! There’s nothing the matter?”
“I am sorry to say, Louisa, that they tell me that Fanny—”
“Now, my dear Paul,” returned his sister rising, “don’t believe it. If you have any reliance on my experience, Paul, you may rest assured that there is nothing wanting but an effort on Fanny’s part. And that effort,” she continued, taking off her bonnet, and adjusting her cap and gloves, in a businesslike manner, “she must be encouraged, and really, if necessary, urged to make. Now, my dear Paul, come upstairs with me.”
Mr. Dombey, who, besides being generally influenced by his sister for the reason already mentioned, had really faith in her as an experienced and bustling matron, acquiesced; and followed her, at once, to the sick chamber.
The lady lay upon her bed as he had left her, clasping her little daughter to her breast. The child clung close about her, with the same intensity as before, and never raised her head, or moved her soft cheek from her mother’s face, or looked on those who stood around, or spoke, or moved, or shed a tear.
“Restless without the little girl,” the Doctor whispered Mr. Dombey. “We found it best to have her in again.”
There was such a solemn stillness round the bed; and the two medical attendants seemed to look on the impassive form with so much compassion and so little hope, that Mrs. Chick was for the moment diverted from her purpose. But presently summoning courage, and what she called presence of mind, she sat down by the bedside, and said in the low precise tone of one who endeavours to awaken a sleeper:
“Fanny! Fanny!”
There was no sound in answer but the loud ticking of Mr. Dombey’s watch and Doctor Parker Peps’s watch, which seemed in the silence to be running a race.
“Fanny, my dear,” said Mrs. Chick, with assumed lightness, “here’s Mr. Dombey come to see you. Won’t you speak to him? They want to lay your little boy—the baby, Fanny, you know; you have hardly seen him yet, I think—in bed; but they can’t till you rouse yourself a little. Don’t you think it’s time you roused yourself a little? Eh?”
She bent her ear to the bed, and listened: at the same time looking round at the bystanders, and holding up her finger.
“Eh?” she repeated, “what was it you said, Fanny? I didn’t hear you.”
No word or sound in answer. Mr. Dombey’s watch and Dr. Parker Peps’s watch seemed to be racing faster.
“Now, really, Fanny my dear,” said the sister-in-law, altering her position, and speaking less confidently, and more earnestly, in spite of herself, “I shall have to be quite cross with you, if you don’t rouse yourself. It’s necessary for you to make an effort, and perhaps a very great and painful effort which you are not disposed to make; but this is a world of effort you know, Fanny, and we must never yield, when so much depends upon us. Come! Try! I must really scold you if you don’t!”
The race in the ensuing pause was fierce and furious. The watches seemed to jostle, and to trip each other up.
“Fanny!” said Louisa, glancing round, with a gathering alarm. “Only look at me. Only open your eyes to show me that you hear and understand me; will you? Good Heaven, gentlemen, what is to be done!”
The two medical attendants exchanged a look across the bed; and the Physician, stooping down, whispered in the child’s ear. Not having understood the purport of his whisper, the little creature turned her perfectly colourless face and deep dark eyes towards him; but without loosening her hold in the least.
The whisper was repeated.
“Mama!” said the child.
The little voice, familiar and dearly loved, awakened some show of consciousness, even at that ebb. For
