men have condemned to imprisonment. I know of no better guardians; but you shall satisfy yourself before you go away. Wait a moment while I confer with the ladies.”
We stayed below for ten minutes. Then my uncle came down the stairs, and bade me return with him to be presented to the ladies, who had kindly accepted the charge, on condition, he said, of my good conduct.
I followed him, Mrs. Gambit keeping close to me. We stopped at a door on the first floor. The room was poor and shabby: the furniture, of which there was not much, was old and worn: there was no carpet: a white blind was half drawn over the window: the place, to judge by the presence of a saucepan, a kettle, and a gridiron, was apparently a kitchen as well as a sitting-room: all, except a great portrait of a gentleman, in majestic wig and splendid gown, which hung over the fireplace, was mean and pinched. Two ladies, of fifty or thereabouts, stood before me, holding out hands of welcome.
They were both exactly alike, being small and thin, with hollow cheeks, bright eyes, and pointed features like a pair of birds: they wore white caps, a sort of grey frock in cheap stuff: their hair was white: their hands were thin, with delicate fingers, transparent like the fingers of those who have been long in bed with sickness: they were of the same height, and appeared to be of the same age—namely, fifty or thereabouts. My first thought, as I looked at them, was that they had not enough to eat—which, indeed, like all first thoughts, was correct, because that had generally been the case with these poor creatures.
“Kitty,” said the Doctor, taking me by the hand, “I present you to Mrs. Esther Pimpernel”—here the lady on the left dipped and curtsied, and I also, mighty grave—“and to Mrs. Deborah Pimpernel”—here the same ceremony with the lady on the right. “Ladies, this is my niece Kitty Pleydell, daughter of my deceased sister Barbara and her husband Lawrence Pleydell of pious memory. I trust that in consenting thus generously to receive this child in your ward and keeping, you will find a reward for your benevolence in her obedience, docility, and gratitude.”
“Doctor,” murmured Mrs. Esther, in a voice like a turtledove’s for softness, “I am sure that a niece of yours must be all sensibility and goodness.”
“Goodness at least,” said her sister, in sharper tones.
I saw that the difference between the sisters lay chiefly in their voices.
“She will, I trust, be serviceable to you,” said the Doctor, waving his hand. “She hath been well and piously brought up to obedient ways. Under your care, ladies, I look for a good account of her.”
“Dear and reverend sir,” Mrs. Esther cooed, “we are pleased and happy to be of use to you in this matter. No doubt little miss, who is well grown of her years, will repay your kindness with her prayers. As for us, the memory of your past and present goodness——”
“Tut, tut!” he replied, shaking his great head till his cheeks waggled, “let us hear no more of that. In this place”—here he laid his right hand upon his heart, elevating his left, and leaning his head to one side—“in this place, where infamy and well-deserved misery attend most of those who dwell in it, it is yours, as it should be mine, to keep burning continually the pure flame of a Christian life.”
“How sweet! how noble!” murmured the sisters.
Was it possible? The man whom we had just seen reading the service of Mother Church, which my father had taught me to regard as little less sacred than the words of the Bible itself, in a squalid room, reeking with the fumes of rum and stale tobacco, before a gang of half-drunken sailors, assumed naturally and easily, as if it belonged to him, the attitude and language of one devoted entirely to the contemplation and practice of virtue and good works. Why, his face glowed with goodness like the sun at noonday, or the sun after a shower, or, say, the sun after a good action. The Doctor, indeed, as I learned later, could assume almost any character he pleased. It pleased him, not out of hypocrisy, but because for a time it was a return to the promise of his youth, to be with these ladies the devout Christian priest. In that character he felt, I am convinced, the words which came spontaneously to his lips: for the moment he was that character. Outside, in the Fleet Market, he was the great Dr. Shovel—great, because among the Fleet parsons he was the most successful, the most learned, the most eloquent, the most important. In his own room he married all comers, after the manner we have seen; and it raised the envy of his rivals to see how the crowd flocked to him. But in the evening he received his friends, and drank and talked with them in such fashion as I never saw, but of which I have heard. Again, it raised their envy to witness how men came from all quarters to drink with the Doctor. At that time he was no longer the Christian advocate, nor the clergyman; he was a rollicking, jovial, boon companion, who delighted to tell better stories, sing better songs, and hold better talk—meaning more witty, not more spiritual talk—than any of those who sat with him. I have never been able to comprehend what pleasure men, especially men of mature years, can find in telling stories, and laughing, drinking, smoking tobacco, and singing with one another. Women find their pleasures in more sober guise: they may lie in small things, but they are innocent. Think what this world would be were the women to live like the men, as disorderly, as wastefully, as noisily!
“Now, good woman,” said my uncle to Mrs. Gambit, “are you satisfied that my niece is in safe hands?”
“The hands are good enough,” replied the woman, looking round her; “but the place——”
“The place is what it is,” said the Doctor sharply; “we cannot alter the place.”
“Then I will go, sir.”
With that she gave me my parcel of money, kissed me and bade me farewell, curtsied to the ladies, and left us.
“I shall send up, ladies,” said the Doctor, “a few trifles of additional furniture: a couple of chairs, one of them an arm-chair—but not for this great, strong girl, if you please—a bed, a shelf for books; some cups and saucers we shall provide for you. And now, ladies, I wish you good-morning. And for your present wants—I mean the wants of this hungry country maid, who looks as if mutton hung in toothsome legs on every verdant hedge—this will, I think, suffice;” he placed money in Mrs. Esther’s hand—I could not but think how he had earned that money—and left us.
When he was gone the two ladies looked at each other with a strange, sad, and wistful expression, and Mrs. Esther, with the guineas in her hand, burst into tears.
CHAPTER VI.
HOW KITTY BEGAN TO ENJOY THE LIBERTIES OF THE FLEET.
Her tears disconcerted me extremely. What did she cry for? But she presently recovered and dried her eyes. Then she looked at me thoughtfully, and said—
“Sister, I suppose this child has been accustomed to have a dinner every day?”
“Surely,” replied Mrs. Deborah. “And to-day we shall dine.”
To-day we should all dine? Were there, then, days when we should all go hungry?
“You must know, my dear,” Mrs. Esther explained in a soft, sad voice, “that we are very poor. We have, therefore, on many days in a week to go without meat. Otherwise we should have to do worse”—she looked round the room and shuddered—“we should have to give up the independence of our solitude. Hunger, my child, is not the worst thing to bear.”
“A
