Still Robert smoothed his hair; still he answered—“Come to see the ship, sir. Nothing more, sir.”
“Indeed,” said Carraways. “Well, then, Robert; let’s go and look a little for’ard. I havn’t seen the caboose yet, myself. Come, Basil.” And the wary man moved onward with the two, leaving Jenny Topps in charge of Mrs. Carraways and Bessy. Scarcely had the three men proceeded beyond the mainmast, when the three women had plunged into the subject that, as Carraways knew, he alone should fail to fathom.
“Well, then, dear ma’am, if you’ll not tell Robert that I told you,” said Jenny, burning to speak, “we’ve made up our minds to go wherever you go; and we’ve come to take our places.”
“My dear Jenny,” said Mrs. Carraways, touched by the affectionate fidelity of the young couple, “my good girl, I hope you have well considered this step. It would make us all very unhappy, should you for a moment repent it. To leave your friends”—
“But we’ve none to leave; for father goes with us,” cried Jenny, pouring out her news. “And you can’t believe how happy the old man is at the thought of it. He says it will be so beautiful for him in his old age to carry reading and writing to the children in the wilderness. For he declares he will have a school there, if all his scholars learn under the naked sky, and sit upon stumps of trees. You can’t think how happy he is. And then, ma’am”—added Jenny with graver looks—“I’m sure it will be the saving of Robert. It will, indeed, ma’am. That cab-work, ma’am,” and Jenny raised her hands, “is dreadful.”
“It must be,” said Mrs. Carraways. “Out all weathers.”
“It isn’t so much the weather, as the company. It ’ud spoil an angel to be a cabman,” averred Jenny—“waiting for the people, he has to wait for, so late at clubs. But, pray, ma’am, don’t tell master, ma’am; for Robert’s set his heart upon surprising him when he finds him in the ship. And it will make Robert so happy to wait upon master all the passage; and me to wait upon you—and I’m never ill, never. Been up and down to Blackwall a dozen times, and felt it no more than if I’d been in my own room. And so, I’m sure, I can be of some use to you.”
“My good, good girl,” cried Bessy, giving both her hands to the excellent creature.
“And above all,” said Jenny, very seriously, “there is one thing in this passage that will be a great load off my mind. It is this. The passage, they say, lasts four months. Now in that time, I shall be certain sure to finish my patchwork quilt.”
Here Carraways and Basil returned, Topps following apart. Mrs. Topps, dropping a hasty curtsey, made off to her husband, and Carraways regarding his wife and daughter, with laughing, curious looks,—with Basil conducted them from the ship. The guilty Mrs. Topps, hanging on her husband’s arm, had an instant dread that her lord would question her upon the suspected subject of conversation with the ladies. Whereupon, with fine instinct, she resolved to be beforehand in the way of interrogation.—“Robert, my dear,” said Jenny, with the deferential air of a scholar; “Robert, what did Mr. Carraways mean when he said he hated dog—dogmatism?” Topps was puzzled. “Robert, my dear,” Jenny urged, “what—what in the world is dogmatism?”