It demanded cogitation. “You see, my dear,” he explained, “you really have become such a very lovely woman, that it ought to be a very quiet place.” At length he suggested, “Near the garden up by the Trinity House on Tower Hill.” So, they were driven there, and Bella dismissed the chariot; sending a pencilled note by it to Mrs. Boffin, that she was with her father.
“Now, Pa, attend to what I am going to say, and promise and vow to be obedient.”
“I promise and vow, my dear.”
“You ask no questions. You take this purse; you go to the nearest place where they keep everything of the very very best, ready made; you buy and put on, the most beautiful suit of clothes, the most beautiful hat, and the most beautiful pair of bright boots (patent leather, Pa, mind!) that are to be got for money; and you come back to me.”
“But, my dear Bella—”
“Take care, Pa!” pointing her forefinger at him, merrily. “You have promised and vowed. It’s perjury, you know.”
There was water in the foolish little fellow’s eyes, but she kissed them dry (though her own were wet), and he bobbed away again. After half an hour, he came back, so brilliantly transformed, that Bella was obliged to walk round him in ecstatic admiration twenty times, before she could draw her arm through his, and delightedly squeeze it.
“Now, Pa,” said Bella, hugging him close, “take this lovely woman out to dinner.”
“Where shall we go, my dear?”
“Greenwich!” said Bella, valiantly. “And be sure you treat this lovely woman with everything of the best.”
While they were going along to take boat, “Don’t you wish, my dear,” said R. W., timidly, “that your mother was here?”
“No, I don’t, Pa, for I like to have you all to myself today. I was always your little favourite at home, and you were always mine. We have run away together often, before now; haven’t we, Pa?”
“Ah, to be sure we have! Many a Sunday when your mother was—was a little liable to it,” repeating his former delicate expression after pausing to cough.
“Yes, and I am afraid I was seldom or never as good as I ought to have been, Pa. I made you carry me, over and over again, when you should have made me walk; and I often drove you in harness, when you would much rather have sat down and read your newspaper: didn’t I?”
“Sometimes, sometimes. But Lor, what a child you were! What a companion you were!”
“Companion? That’s just what I want to be today, Pa.”
“You are safe to succeed, my love. Your brothers and sisters have all in their turns been companions to me, to a certain extent, but only to a certain extent. Your mother has, throughout life, been a companion that any man might—might look up to—and—and commit the sayings of, to memory—and—form himself upon—if he—”
“If he liked the model?” suggested Bella.
“We‑ell, ye‑es,” he returned, thinking about it, not quite satisfied with the phrase: “or perhaps I might say, if it was in him. Supposing, for instance, that a man wanted to be always marching, he would find your mother an inestimable companion. But if he had any taste for walking, or should wish at any time to break into a trot, he might sometimes find it a little difficult to keep step with your mother. Or take it this way, Bella,” he added, after a moment’s reflection; “Supposing that a man had to go through life, we won’t say with a companion, but we’ll say to a tune. Very good. Supposing that the tune allotted to him was the Dead March in Saul. Well. It would be a very suitable tune for particular occasions—none better—but it would be difficult to keep time with in the ordinary run of domestic transactions. For instance, if he took his supper after a hard day, to the Dead March in Saul, his food might be likely to sit heavy on him. Or, if he was at any time inclined to relieve his mind by singing a comic song or dancing a hornpipe, and was obliged to do it to the Dead March in Saul, he might find himself put out in the execution of his lively intentions.”
“Poor Pa!” thought Bella, as she hung upon his arm.
“Now, what I will say for you, my dear,” the cherub pursued mildly and without a notion of complaining, “is, that you are so adaptable. So adaptable.”
“Indeed I am afraid I have shown a wretched temper, Pa. I am afraid I have been very complaining, and very capricious. I seldom or never thought of it before. But when I sat in the carriage just now and saw you coming along the pavement, I reproached myself.”
“Not at all, my dear. Don’t speak of such a thing.”
A happy and a chatty man was Pa in his new clothes that day. Take it for all in all, it was perhaps the happiest day he had ever known in his life; not even excepting that on which his heroic partner had approached the nuptial altar to the tune of the Dead March in Saul.
The little expedition down the river was delightful, and the little room overlooking the river into which they were shown for dinner was delightful. Everything was delightful. The park was delightful, the punch was delightful, the dishes of fish were delightful, the wine was delightful. Bella was more delightful than any other item in the festival; drawing Pa out in the gayest manner; making a point of always mentioning herself as the lovely woman; stimulating Pa to order things, by declaring that the lovely woman insisted on being treated with them; and in short causing Pa to be quite enraptured with the consideration that he was the Pa of such a charming daughter.
And then, as they sat looking at the ships and steamboats making their
