“There is not much company here, it would seem?” said Mr Dombey, in his own portentous gentlemanly way.
“I believe not. We see none.”
“Why really,” observed Mrs Skewton from her couch, “there are no people here just now with whom we care to associate.”
“They have not enough heart,” said Edith, with a smile. The very twilight of a smile: so singularly were its light and darkness blended.
“My dearest Edith rallies me, you see!” said her mother, shaking her head: which shook a little of itself sometimes, as if the palsy twinkled now and then in opposition to the diamonds. “Wicked one!”
“You have been here before, if I am not mistaken?” said Mr Dombey. Still to Edith.
“Oh, several times. I think we have been everywhere.”
“A beautiful country!”
“I suppose it is. Everybody says so.”
“Your cousin Feenix raves about it, Edith,” interposed her mother from her couch.