`Oh,' replied Mrs Squeers, nodding her head at Nicholas, and eyeing him coldly from top to toe.
`He'll take a meal with us tonight,' said Squeers, `and go among the boys tomorrow morning. You can give him a shake-down here, tonight, can't you?'
`We must manage it somehow,' replied the lady. `You don't much mind how you sleep, I suppose, sir?'
No, indeed,' replied Nicholas, `I am not particular.'
`That's lucky,' said Mrs Squeers. And as the lady's humour was considered to lie chiefly in retort, Mr Squeers laughed heartily, and seemed to expect that Nicholas should do the same.
After some further conversation between the master and mistress relative to the success of Mr Squeers's trip and the people who had paid, and the people who had made default in payment, a young servant girl brought in a Yorkshire pie and some cold beef, which being set upon the table, the boy Smike appeared with a jug of ale.
Mr Squeers was emptying his great-coat pockets of letters to different boys, and other small documents, which he had brought down in them. The boy glanced, with an anxious and timid expression, at the papers, as if with a sickly hope that one among them might relate to him. The look was a very painful one, and went to Nicholas's heart at once; for it told a long and very sad history.
It induced him to consider the boy more attentively, and he was surprised to observe the extraordinary mixture of garments which formed his dress.
Although he could not have been less than eighteen or nineteen years old, and was tall for that age, he wore a skeleton suit, such as is usually put upon very little boys, and which, though most absurdly short in the arms and legs, was quite wide enough for his attenuated frame. In order that the lower part of his legs might be in perfect keeping with this singular dress, he had a very large pair of boots, originally made for tops, which might have been once worn by some stout farmer, but were now too patched and tattered for a beggar. Heaven knows how long he had been there, but he still wore the same linen which he had first taken down; for, round his neck, was a tattered child's frill, only half concealed by a coarse, man's neckerchief. He was lame; and as he feigned to be busy in arranging the table, glanced at the letters with a look so keen, and yet so dispirited and hopeless, that Nicholas could hardly bear to watch him.
`What are you bothering about there, Smike?' cried Mrs Squeers; `let the things alone, can't you?'
`Eh!' said Squeers, looking up. `Oh! it's you, is it?'
`Yes, sir,' replied the youth, pressing his hands together, as though to control, by force, the nervous wandering of his fingers. `Is there--'
`Well!' said Squeers.
`Have you--did anybody--has nothing been heard--about me?'
`Devil a bit,' replied Squeers testily.
The lad withdrew his eyes, and, putting his hand to his face, moved towards the door.
`Not a-word,' resumed Squeers, `and never will be. Now, this is a pretty sort of thing, isn't it, that you should have been left here, all these years, and no money paid after the first six:--nor no notice taken, nor no clue to be got who you belong to? It's a pretty sort of thing that Ishould have to feed a great fellow like you, and never hope to get one penny for it, isn't it?'
The boy put his hand to his head as if he were making an effort to recollect something, and then, looking vacantly at his questioner, gradually broke into a smile, and limped away.
`I'll tell you what, Squeers,' remarked his wife as the door closed, `I think that young chap's turning silly.'
`I hope not,' said the schoolmaster; `for he's a handy fellow out of doors, and worth his meat and drink, anyway. I should think he'd have wit enough for us though, if he was. But come; let's have supper, for I am hungry and tired, and want to get to bed.'
This reminder brought in an exclusive steak for Mr Squeers, who speedily proceeded to do it ample justice. Nicholas drew up his chair, but his appetite was effectually taken away.
`How's the steak, Squeers?' said Mrs S.
`Tender as a lamb,' replied Squeers. `Have a bit.'
`I couldn't eat a morsel,' replied his wife. `What'll the young man take, my dear?'
`Whatever he likes that's present,' rejoined Squeers, in a most unusual burst of generosity.
`What do you say, Mr Knuckleboy?' inquired Mrs Squeers.
`I'll take a little of the pie, if you please,' replied Nicholas. `Avery little, for I'm not hungry.'
Well, it's a pity to cut the pie if you're not hungry, isn't it?' said Mrs Squeers. `Will you try a bit of the beef?'
`Whatever you please,' replied Nicholas abstractedly; `it's all the same to me.'
Mrs Squeers looked vastly gracious on receiving this reply; and nodding to Squeers, as much as to say that she was glad to find the young man knew his station, assisted Nicholas to a slice of meat with her own fair hands.
`Ale, Squeery?' inquired the lady, winking and frowning to give him to understand that the question propounded, was, whether Nicholas should have ale, and not whether he (Squeers) would take any.
`Certainly,' said Squeers, re-telegraphing in the same manner. `A glassful.'
So Nicholas had a glassful, and being occupied with his own reflections, drank it, in happy innocence of all the foregone proceedings.
`Uncommon juicy steak that,' said Squeers, as he laid down his knife and fork, after plying it, in silence, for some time.
`It's prime meat,' rejoined his lady. `I bought a good large piece of it myself on purpose for--'
`For what!' exclaimed Squeers hastily. `Not for the--'
`No, no; not for them,' rejoined Mrs Squeers; `on purpose for you against you came home. Lor! you didn't think I could have made such a mistake as that.'
`Upon my word, my dear, I didn't know what you were going to say,' said Squeers, who had turned pale.
