The only bit of youth was Nell herself; and yet she had a strange intermingling of dignity and responsibility, in spite of her small figure and childish ways. Her fourteen years of life had left her undecided between childhood and girlhood. She had not begun to grow up; and yet she was an orphan, accustomed to doing everything for herself.
Her grandfather tried in his way to take care of her, for he loved her dearly. But between the tending of his shop and the mysterious journeys which he made night after night, the child was often sent upon strange errands or left alone in the old house. And at all times it was she who took care of him. But the old man did not see that this lonely life was putting lines of sorrow into her face. To him she was still the child of yesterday, care-free and happy.
She had been happy once. She had gone singing through the dim rooms, and moving with gay step among their dusty treasures, making them older by her young life, and sterner and more grim by her cheerful presence. But now the chambers were cold and gloomy, and when she left her own little room to while away the tedious hours, and sat in one of them, she was still and motionless as their inanimate occupants, and had no heart to startle the echoes—hoarse from their long silence—with her voice.
In one of these rooms was a window looking into the street, where the child sat, many and many a long evening, and often far into the night, alone and thoughtful. None are so anxious as those who watch and wait; and at these times mournful fancies came flocking on her mind in crowds.
She knew instinctively that her grandfather was hiding something from her. What it was she could not guess; but these regular journeys at night, while she watched and waited, left him only the more fretful and careworn. He seemed to have a constant fever for something; yet all he would say was that he would some day leave her a fortune. Meanwhile he had fallen into the clutches of Quilp a terrible dwarf, who had lent him money from time to time, until the entire contents of the shop were mortgaged. So it is not strange that Little Nell should have mournful thoughts.
When the night had worn away, the child would close the window and even smile, with the first dawn of light, at her night-time fears. Then after praying earnestly for her grandfather and the restoring of their former happy days, she would unlatch the door for him and fall into a troubled sleep.
One night the old man said that he would not leave home. The child's face lit up at the news, but became grave again when she saw how worried he looked.
"You took my note safely to Mr. Quilp, you say?" he asked fretfully. "What did he tell you, Nell?"
"Exactly what I told you, dear grandfather, indeed."
"True," said the old man, faintly. "Yes. But tell me again, Nell. My head fails me. What was it that he told you? Nothing more than that he would see me to-morrow or next day? That was in the note."