Little Dorrit, Charles Dickens [big ebook reader txt] 📗

his whole bearing towards her, there was the well-known shadow of the Marshalsea wall. It took a new shape, but it was the old sad shadow. She began with sorrowful unwillingness to acknowledge to herself that she was not strong enough to keep off the fear that no space in the life of man could overcome that quarter of a century behind the prison bars. She had no blame to bestow upon him, therefore: nothing to reproach him with, no emotions in her faithful heart but great compassion and unbounded tenderness.

This is why it was, that, even as he sat before her on his sofa, in the brilliant light of a bright Italian day, the wonderful city without and the splendours of an old palace within, she saw him at the moment in the long-familiar gloom of his Marshalsea lodging, and wished to take her seat beside him, and comfort him, and be again full of confidence with him, and of usefulness to him. If he divined what was in her thoughts, his own were not in tune with it. After some uneasy moving in his seat, he got up and walked about, looking very much dissatisfied.

“Is there anything else you wish to say to me, dear father?”

“No, no. Nothing else.”

“I am sorry you have not been pleased with me, dear. I hope you will not think of me with displeasure now. I am going to try, more than ever, to adapt myself as you wish to what surrounds me⁠—for indeed I have tried all along, though I have failed, I know.”

“Amy,” he returned, turning short upon her. “You⁠—ha⁠—habitually hurt me.”

“Hurt you, father! I!”

“There is a⁠—hum⁠—a topic,” said Mr. Dorrit, looking all about the ceiling of the room, and never at the attentive, uncomplainingly shocked face, “a painful topic, a series of events which I wish⁠—ha⁠—altogether to obliterate. This is understood by your sister, who has already remonstrated with you in my presence; it is understood by your brother; it is understood by⁠—ha hum⁠—by everyone of delicacy and sensitiveness except yourself⁠—ha⁠—I am sorry to say, except yourself. You, Amy⁠—hum⁠—you alone and only you⁠—constantly revive the topic, though not in words.”

She laid her hand on his arm. She did nothing more. She gently touched him. The trembling hand may have said, with some expression, “Think of me, think how I have worked, think of my many cares!” But she said not a syllable herself.

There was a reproach in the touch so addressed to him that she had not foreseen, or she would have withheld her hand. He began to justify himself in a heated, stumbling, angry manner, which made nothing of it.

“I was there all those years. I was⁠—ha⁠—universally acknowledged as the head of the place. I⁠—hum⁠—I caused you to be respected there, Amy. I⁠—ha hum⁠—I gave my family a position there. I deserve a return. I claim a return. I say, sweep it off the face of the earth and begin afresh. Is that much? I ask, is that much?”

He did not once look at her, as he rambled on in this way; but gesticulated at, and appealed to, the empty air.

“I have suffered. Probably I know how much I have suffered better than anyone⁠—ha⁠—I say than anyone! If I can put that aside, if I can eradicate the marks of what I have endured, and can emerge before the world⁠—a⁠—ha⁠—gentleman unspoiled, unspotted⁠—is it a great deal to expect⁠—I say again, is it a great deal to expect⁠—that my children should⁠—hum⁠—do the same and sweep that accursed experience off the face of the earth?”

In spite of his flustered state, he made all these exclamations in a carefully suppressed voice, lest the valet should overhear anything.

“Accordingly, they do it. Your sister does it. Your brother does it. You alone, my favourite child, whom I made the friend and companion of my life when you were a mere⁠—hum⁠—baby, do not do it. You alone say you can’t do it. I provide you with valuable assistance to do it. I attach an accomplished and highly bred lady⁠—ha⁠—Mrs. General, to you, for the purpose of doing it. Is it surprising that I should be displeased? Is it necessary that I should defend myself for expressing my displeasure? No!”

Notwithstanding which, he continued to defend himself, without any abatement of his flushed mood.

“I am careful to appeal to that lady for confirmation, before I express any displeasure at all. I⁠—hum⁠—I necessarily make that appeal within limited bounds, or I⁠—ha⁠—should render legible, by that lady, what I desire to be blotted out. Am I selfish? Do I complain for my own sake? No. No. Principally for⁠—ha hum⁠—your sake, Amy.”

This last consideration plainly appeared, from his manner of pursuing it, to have just that instant come into his head.

“I said I was hurt. So I am. So I⁠—ha⁠—am determined to be, whatever is advanced to the contrary. I am hurt that my daughter, seated in the⁠—hum⁠—lap of fortune, should mope and retire and proclaim herself unequal to her destiny. I am hurt that she should⁠—ha⁠—systematically reproduce what the rest of us blot out; and seem⁠—hum⁠—I had almost said positively anxious⁠—to announce to wealthy and distinguished society that she was born and bred in⁠—ha hum⁠—a place that I myself decline to name. But there is no inconsistency⁠—ha⁠—not the least, in my feeling hurt, and yet complaining principally for your sake, Amy. I do; I say again, I do. It is for your sake that I wish you, under the auspices of Mrs. General, to form a⁠—hum⁠—a surface. It is for your sake that I wish you to have a⁠—ha⁠—truly refined mind, and (in the striking words of Mrs. General) to be ignorant of everything that is not perfectly proper, placid, and pleasant.”

He had been running down by jerks, during his last speech, like a sort of ill-adjusted alarm. The touch was still upon his arm. He fell silent; and after looking about the ceiling again for a little while, looked down at her. Her head drooped, and he could not see her face;