‘All the way up here!’ cried Sir Mulberry, seizing upon the chance of discovering where Mrs. Nickleby had come from. ‘What a confounded distance! How far do you call it now?’
‘How far do I call it?’ said Mrs. Nickleby. ‘Let me see. It’s just a mile from our door to the Old Bailey.’
‘No, no. Not so much as that,’ urged Sir Mulberry.
‘Oh! It is indeed,’ said Mrs. Nickleby. ‘I appeal to his lordship.’
‘I should decidedly say it was a mile,’ remarked Lord Frederick, with a solemn aspect.
‘It must be; it can’t be a yard less,’ said Mrs. Nickleby. ‘All down Newgate Street, all down Cheapside, all up Lombard Street, down Gracechurch Street, and along Thames Street, as far as Spigwiffin’s Wharf. Oh! It’s a mile.’
‘Yes, on second thoughts I should say it was,’ replied Sir Mulberry. ‘But you don’t surely mean to walk all the way back?’
‘Oh, no,’ rejoined Mrs. Nickleby. ‘I shall go back in an omnibus. I didn’t travel about in omnibuses, when my poor dear Nicholas was alive, brother-in-law. But as it is, you know—’
‘Yes, yes,’ replied Ralph impatiently, ‘and you had better get back before dark.’
‘Thank you, brother-in-law, so I had,’ returned Mrs. Nickleby. ‘I think I had better say goodbye, at once.’