There is disquietude in Cook's Court, Cursitor Street. Blacksuspicion hides in that peaceful region. The mass of Cook'sCourtiers are in their usual state of mind, no better and no worse;but Mr. Snagsby is changed, and his little woman knows it.
For Tom-all-Alone's and Lincoln's Inn Fields persist in harnessingthemselves, a pair of ungovernable coursers, to the chariot of Mr.
Snagsby's imagination; and Mr. Bucket drives; and the passengersare Jo and Mr. Tulkinghorn; and the complete equipage whirls thoughthe law-stationery business at wild speed all round the clock.
Even in the little front kitchen where the family meals are taken,it rattles away at a smoking pace from the dinner-table, when Mr.
Snagsby pauses in carving the first slice of the leg of muttonbaked with potatoes and stares at the kitchen wall.
Mr. Snagsby cannot make out what it is that he has had to do with.
Something is wrong somewhere, but what something, what may come ofit, to whom, when, and from which unthought of and unheard ofquarter is the puzzle of his life. His remote impressions of therobes and coronets, the stars and garters, that sparkle through thesurface-dust of Mr. Tulkinghorn's chambers; his veneration for themysteries presided over by that best and closest of his customers,whom all the Inns of Court, all Chancery Lane, and all the legalneighbourhood agree to hold in awe; his remembrance of DetectiveMr. Bucket with his forefinger and his confidential manner,impossible to be evaded or declined, persuade him that he is aparty to some dangerous secret without knowing what it is. And itis the fearful peculiarity of this condition that, at any hour ofhis daily life, at any opening of the shop-door, at any pull of thebell, at any entrance of a messenger, or any delivery of a letter,the secret may take air and fire, explode, and blow up--Mr. Bucketonly knows whom.
For which reason, whenever a man unknown comes into the shop (asmany men unknown do) and says, "Is Mr. Snagsby in?" or words tothat innocent effect, Mr. Snagsby's heart knocks hard at his guiltybreast. He undergoes so much from such inquiries that when theyare made by boys he revenges himself by flipping at their ears overthe counter and asking the young dogs what they mean by it and whythey can't speak out at once? More impracticable men and boyspersist in walking into Mr. Snagsby's sleep and terrifying him withunaccountable questions, so that often when the cock at the littledairy in Cursitor Street breaks out in his usual absurd way aboutthe morning, Mr. Snagsby finds himself in a crisis of nightmare,with his little woman shaking him and saying "What's the matterwith the man!"The little woman herself is not the least item in his difficulty.
To know that he is always keeping a secret from her, that he hasunder all circumstances to conceal and hold fast a tender doubletooth, which her sharpness is ever ready to twist out of his head,gives Mr. Snagsby, in her dentistical presence, much of the air ofa dog who has a reservation from his master and will look anywhererather than meet his eye.
These various signs and tokens, marked by the little woman, are notlost upon her. They impel her to say, "Snagsby has something onhis mind!" And thus suspicion gets into Cook's Court, CursitorStreet. From suspicion to jealousy, Mrs. Snagsby finds the road asnatural and short as from Cook's Court to Chancery Lane. And thusjealousy gets into Cook's Court, Cursitor Street. Once there (andit was always lurking thereabout), it is very active and nimble inMrs. Snagsby's breast, prompting her to nocturnal examinations ofMr. Snagsby's pockets; to secret perusals of Mr. Snagsby's letters;to private researches in the day book and ledger, till, cash-box,and iron safe; to watchings at windows, listenings behind doors,and a general putting of this and that together by the wrong end.
Mrs. Snagsby is so perpetually on the alert that the house becomesghostly with creaking boards and rustling garments. The 'prenticesthink somebody may have been murdered there in bygone times.
Guster holds certain loose atoms of an idea (picked up at Tooting,where they were found floating among the orphans) that there isburied money underneath the cellar, guarded by an old man with awhite beard, who cannot get out for seven thousand years because hesaid the Lord's Prayer backwards.
"Who was Nimrod?" Mrs. Snagsby repeatedly inquires of herself.
"Who was that lady--that creature? And who is that boy?" Now,Nimrod being as dead as the mighty hunter whose name Mrs. Snagsbyhas appropriated, and the lady being unproducible, she directs hermental eye, for the present, with redoubled vigilance to the boy.
"And who," quoth Mrs. Snagsby for the thousand and first time, "isthat boy? Who is that--!" And there Mrs. Snagsby is seized withan inspiration.
He has no respect for Mr. Chadband. No, to be sure, and hewouldn't have, of course. Naturally he wouldn't, under thosecontagious circumstances. He was invited and appointed by Mr.
Chadband--why, Mrs. Snagsby heard it herself with her own ears!--tocome back, and be told where he was to go, to be addressed by Mr.
Chadband; and he never came! Why did he never come? Because hewas told not to come. Who told him not to come? Who? Ha, ha!
Mrs. Snagsby sees it all.
But happily (and Mrs. Snagsby tightly shakes her head and tightlysmiles) that boy was met by Mr. Chadband yesterday in the streets;and that boy, as affording a subject which Mr. Chadband desires toimprove for the spiritual delight of a select congregation, wasseized by Mr. Chadband and threatened with being delivered over tothe police unless he showed the reverend gentleman where he livedand unless he entered into, and fulfilled, an undertaking to appearin Cook's Court to-morrow night, "'to--mor--row--night," Mrs.
Snagsby repeats for mere emphasis with another tight smile andanother tight shake of her head; and to-morrow night that boy willbe here, and to-morrow night Mrs. Snagsby will have her eye uponhim and upon some one else; and oh, you may walk a long while inyour secret ways (says Mrs. Snagsby with haughtiness and scorn),but you can't blind ME!
Mrs. Snagsby sounds no timbrel in anybody's ears, but holds herpurpose quietly, and keeps her counsel. To-morrow comes, thesavoury preparations for the Oil Trade come, the evening comes.
Comes Mr. Snagsby in his black coat; come the Chadbands; come (whenthe gorging vessel is replete) the 'prentices and Guster, to beedified; comes at last, with his slouching head, and his shufllebackward, and his shuffle forward, and his shuffle to the right,and his shuffle to the left, and his bit of fur cap in his muddyhand, which he picks as if it were some mangy bird he had caughtand was plucking before eating raw, Jo, the very, very toughsubject Mr. Chadband is to improve.
Mrs. Snagsby screws a watchful glance on Jo as he is brought intothe little drawing-room by Guster. He looks at Mr. Snagsby themoment he comes in. Aha! Why does he look at Mr. Snagsby? Mr.
Snagsby looks at him. Why should he do that, but that Mrs. Snagsbysees it all? Why else should that look pass between them, why elseshould Mr. Snagsby be confused and cough a signal cough behind hishand? It is as clear as crystal that Mr. Snagsby is that boy'sfather.
'"Peace, my friends," says Chadband, rising and wiping the oilyexudations from his reverend visage. "Peace be with us! Myfriends, why with us? Because," with his fat smile, "it cannot beagainst us, because it must be for us; because it is not hardening,because it is softening; because it does not make war like thehawk, but comes home unto us like the dove. Therefore, my friends,peace be with us! My human boy, come forward!"Stretching forth his flabby paw, Mr. Chadband lays the same on Jo'sarm and considers where to station him. Jo, very doubtful of hisreverend friend's intentions and not at all clear but thatsomething practical and painful is going to be done to him,mutters, "You let me alone. I never said nothink to you. You letme alone.""No, my young friend," says Chadband smoothly, "I will not let youalone. And why? Because I am a harvest-labourer, because I am atoiler and a moiler, because you are delivered over unto me and arebecome as a precious instrument in my hands. My friends, may I soemploy this instrument as to use it to your advantage, to yourprofit, to your gain, to your welfare, to your enrichment! Myyoung friend, sit upon this stool."Jo, apparently possessed by an impression that the reverendgentleman wants to cut his hair, shields his head with both armsand is got into the required position with great difficulty andevery possible manifestation of reluctance.
When he is at last adjusted like a lay-figure, Mr. Chadband,retiring behind the table, holds up his bear's-paw and says, "Myfriends!" This is the signal for a general settlement of theaudience. The 'prentices giggle internally and nudge each other.
Guster falls into a staring and vacant state, compounded of astunned admiration of Mr. Chadband and pity for the friendlessoutcast whose condition touches her nearly. Mrs. Snagsby silentlylays trains of gunpowder. Mrs. Chadband composes herself grimly bythe fire and warms her knees, finding that sensation favourable tothe reception of eloquence.
It happens that Mr. Chadband has a pulpit habit of fixing somemember of his congregation with his eye and fatly arguing hispoints with that particular person, who is understood to beexpected to be moved to an occasional grunt, groan, gasp, or otheraudible expression of inward working, which expression of inwardworking, being echoed by some elderly lady in the next pew and socommunicated like a game of forfeits through a circle of the morefermentable sinners present, serves the purpose of parliamentarycheering and gets Mr. Chadband's steam up. From mere force of............