Mr. Venus could only repeat that it was his fixed intention to betake himself to the paths of science, and to walk in the same all the days of his life; not dropping down upon his fellow-creatures until they were deceased, and then only to articulate them to the best of his humble ability.
“How long could you be persuaded to keep up the appearance of remaining in it?” asked Mr. Boffin, retiring on his other idea. “Could you be got to do so, till the Mounds are gone?”
No. That would protract the mental uneasiness of Mr. Venus too long, he said.
“Not if I was to show you reason now?” demanded Mr. Boffin; “not if I was to show you good and sufficient reason?”
If by good and sufficient reason Mr. Boffin meant honest and unimpeachable reason, that might weigh with Mr. Venus against his personal wishes and convenience. But he must add that he saw no opening to the possibility of such reason being shown him.
“Come and see me, Venus,” said Mr. Boffin, “at my house.”
“Is the reason there, sir?” asked Mr. Venus, with an incredulous smile and blink.
“It may be, or may not be,” said Mr. Boffin, “just as you view it. But in the meantime don’t go out of the matter. Look here. Do this. Give me your word that you won’t take any steps with Wegg, without my knowledge, just as I have given you my word that I won’t without yours.”
“Done, Mr. Boffin!” said Venus, after brief consideration.
“Thank’ee, Venus, thank’ee, Venus! Done!”
“When shall I come to see you, Mr. Boffin.”
“When you like. The sooner the better. I must be going now. Good night, Venus.”
“Good night, sir.”
“And good night to the rest of the present company,” said Mr. Boffin, glancing round the shop. “They make a queer show, Venus, and I should like to be better acquainted with them some day. Good night, Venus, good night! Thankee, Venus, thankee, Venus!” With that he jogged out into the street, and jogged upon his homeward way.
“Now, I wonder,” he meditated as he went along, nursing his stick, “whether it can be, that Venus is setting himself to get the better of Wegg? Whether it can be, that he means, when I have bought Wegg out, to have me all to himself and to pick me clean to the bones!”
It was a cunning and suspicious idea, quite in the way of his school of misers, and he looked very cunning and suspicious as he went jogging through the streets. More than once or twice, more than twice or thrice, say half a dozen times, he took his stick from the arm on which he nursed it, and hit a straight sharp rap at the air with its head. Possibly the wooden countenance of Mr. Silas Wegg was incorporeally before him at those moments, for he hit with intense satisfaction.
He was within a few streets of his own house, when a little private carriage, coming in the contrary direction, passed him, turned round, and passed him again. It was a little carriage of eccentric movement, for again he heard it stop behind him and turn round, and again he saw it pass him. Then it stopped, and then went on, out of sight. But, not far out of sight, for, when he came to the corner of his own street, there it stood again.
There was a lady’s face at the window as he came up with this carriage, and he was passing it when the lady softly called to him by his name.
“I beg your pardon, Ma’am?” said Mr. Boffin, coming to a stop.
“It is Mrs. Lammle,” said the lady.
Mr. Boffin went up to the window, and hoped Mrs. Lammle was well.
“Not very well, dear Mr. Boffin; I have fluttered myself by being—perhaps foolishly—uneasy and anxious. I have been waiting for you some time. Can I speak to you?”
Mr. Boffin proposed that Mrs. Lammle should drive on to his house, a few hundred yards further.
“I would rather not, Mr. Boffin, unless you particularly wish it. I feel the difficulty and delicacy of the matter so much that I would rather avoid speaking to you at your own home. You must think this very strange?”
Mr. Boffin said no, but meant yes.
“It is because I am so grateful for the good opinion of all my friends, and am so touched by it, that I cannot bear to run the risk of forfeiting it in any case, even in the cause of duty. I have asked my husband (my dear Alfred, Mr. Boffin) whether it is the cause of duty, and he has most emphatically said Yes. I wish I had asked him sooner. It would have spared me much distress.”
(“Can this be more dropping down upon me!” thought Mr. Boffin, quite bewildered.)
“It was Alfred who sent me to you, Mr. Boffin. Alfred said, ‘Don’t come back, Sophronia, until you have seen Mr. Boffin, and told him all. Whatever he may think of it, he ought certainly to know it.’ Would you mind coming into the carriage?”
Mr. Boffin answered, “Not at all,” and took his seat at Mrs. Lammle’s side.
“Drive slowly anywhere,” Mrs. Lammle called to her coachman, “and don’t let the carriage rattle.”
“It must be more dropping down, I think,” said Mr. Boffin to himself. “What next?”
XV
The Golden Dustman at His Worst
The breakfast table at Mr. Boffin’s was usually a very pleasant one, and was always presided over by Bella. As though he began each new day in his healthy natural character, and some waking hours were necessary to his relapse into the corrupting influences of his wealth, the face and the demeanour of the Golden Dustman were generally unclouded at that meal. It would have been easy to believe then, that there was no change in him. It was as the day went on that the clouds gathered, and the brightness of the morning became obscured. One might have said that the shadows of
