‘So we have,’ cried Miss La Creevy—giving way a little, as Tim thought.
‘It has been the happiest time in all my life; at least, away from the counting-house and Cheeryble Brothers,’ said Tim. ‘Do, my dear! Now say you will.’
‘No, no, we mustn’t think of it,’ returned Miss La Creevy. ‘What would the brothers say?’
‘Why, God bless your soul!’ cried Tim, innocently, ‘you don’t suppose I should think of such a thing without their knowing it! Why they left us here on purpose.’
‘I can never look ‘em in the face again!’ exclaimed Miss La Creevy, faintly.
‘Come,’ said Tim, ‘let’s be a comfortable couple. We shall live in the old house here, where I have been for four-and-forty year; we shall go to the old church, where I’ve been, every Sunday morning, all through that time; we shall have all my old friends about us—Dick, the archway, the pump, the flower-pots, and Mr. Frank’s children, and Mr. Nickleby’s children, that we shall seem like grandfather and grandmother to. Let’s be a comfortable couple, and take care of each other! And if we should get deaf, or lame, or blind, or bed-ridden, how glad we shall be that we have somebody we are fond of, always to talk to and sit with! Let’s be a comfortable couple. Now, do, my dear!’
Five minutes after this honest and straightforward speech, little Miss La Creevy and Tim were talking as pleasantly as if they had been married for a score of years, and had never once quarrelled all the time; and five minutes after that, when Miss La Creevy had bustled out to see if her eyes were red and put her hair to rights, Tim moved with a stately step towards the drawing-room, exclaiming as he went, ‘There an’t such another woman in all London! I know there an’t!’
By this time, the apoplectic butler was nearly in fits, in consequence of the unheard-of postponement of dinner. Nicholas, who had been engaged in a manner in which every reader may imagine for himself or herself, was hurrying downstairs in obedience to his angry summons, when he encountered a new surprise.
On his way down, he overtook, in one of the passages, a stranger genteelly dressed in black, who was also moving towards the dining-room. As he was rather lame, and walked slowly, Nicholas lingered behind, and was following him step by step, wondering who he was, when he suddenly turned round and caught him by both hands.
‘Newman Noggs!’ cried Nicholas joyfully