Bleak House. Чарльз Диккенс

      Miss Esther Summerson

      Oh, never, never, never shall I forget the emotion this letter caused in the house! It was so tender in them to care so much for me, it was so gracious in that father who had not forgotten me to have made my orphan way so smooth and easy and to have inclined so many youthful natures towards me, that I could hardly bear it. Not that I would have had them less sorry – I am afraid not; but the pleasure of it, and the pain of it, and the pride and joy of it, and the humble regret of it were so blended that my heart seemed almost breaking while it was full of rapture.

      The letter gave me only five days' notice of my removal. When every minute added to the proofs of love and kindness that were given me in those five days, and when at last the morning came and when they took me through all the rooms that I might see them for the last time, and when some cried, “Esther, dear, say good-bye to me here at my bedside, where you first spoke so kindly to me!” and when others asked me only to write their names, “With Esther's love,” and when they all surrounded me with their parting presents and clung to me weeping and cried, “What shall we do when dear, dear Esther's gone!” and when I tried to tell them how forbearing and how good they had all been to me and how I blessed and thanked them every one, what a heart I had!

      And when the two Miss Donnys grieved as much to part with me as the least among them, and when the maids said, “Bless you, miss, wherever you go!” and when the ugly lame old gardener, who I thought had hardly noticed me in all those years, came panting after the coach to give me a little nosegay of geraniums and told me I had been the light of his eyes – indeed the old man said so! – what a heart I had then!

      And could I help it if with all this, and the coming to the little school, and the unexpected sight of the poor children outside waving their hats and bonnets to me, and of a grey-haired gentleman and lady whose daughter I had helped to teach and at whose house I had visited (who were said to be the proudest people in all that country), caring for nothing but calling out, “Good-bye, Esther. May you be very happy!” – could I help it if I was quite bowed down in the coach by myself and said “Oh, I am so thankful, I am so thankful!” many times over!

      But of course I soon considered that I must not take tears where I was going after all that had been done for me. Therefore, of course, I made myself sob less and persuaded myself to be quiet by saying very often, “Esther, now you really must! This WILL NOT do!” I cheered myself up pretty well at last, though I am afraid I was longer about it than I ought to have been; and when I had cooled my eyes with lavender water, it was time to watch for London.

      I was quite persuaded that we were there when we were ten miles off, and when we really were there, that we should never get there. However, when we began to jolt upon a stone pavement, and particularly when every other conveyance seemed to be running into us, and we seemed to be running into every other conveyance, I began to believe that we really were approaching the end of our journey. Very soon afterwards we stopped.

      A young gentleman who had inked himself by accident addressed me from the pavement and said, “I am from Kenge and Carboy's, miss, of Lincoln's Inn.”

      “If you please, sir,” said I.

      He was very obliging, and as he handed me into a fly after superintending the removal of my boxes, I asked him whether there was a great fire anywhere? For the streets were so full of dense brown smoke that scarcely anything was to be seen.

      “Oh, dear no, miss,” he said. “This is a London particular.”

      I had never heard of such a thing.

      “A fog, miss,” said the young gentleman.

      “Oh, indeed!” said I.

      We drove slowly through the dirtiest and darkest streets that ever were seen in the world (I thought) and in such a distracting state of confusion that I wondered how the people kept their senses, until we passed into sudden quietude under an old gateway and drove on through a silent square until we came to an odd nook in a corner, where there was an entrance up a steep, broad flight of stairs, like an entrance to a church. And there really was a churchyard outside under some cloisters, for I saw the gravestones from the staircase window.

      This was Kenge and Carboy's. The young gentleman showed me through an outer office into Mr. Kenge's room – there was no one in it – and politely put an arm-chair for me by the fire. He then called my attention to a little looking-glass hanging from a nail on one side of the chimney-piece.

      “In case you should wish to look at yourself, miss, after the journey, as you're going before the Chancellor. Not that it's requisite, I am sure,” said the young gentleman civilly.

      “Going before the Chancellor?” I said, startled for a moment.

      “Only a matter of form, miss,” returned the young gentleman. “Mr. Kenge is in court now. He left his compliments, and would you partake of some refreshment” – there were biscuits and a decanter of wine on a small table – “and look over the paper,” which the young gentleman gave me as he spoke. He then stirred the fire and left me.

      Everything was so strange – the stranger from its being night in the day-time, the candles burning with a white flame, and looking raw and cold – that I read the words in the newspaper without knowing what they meant and found myself reading the same words repeatedly. As it was of no use going on in that way, I put the paper down, took a peep at my bonnet in the glass to see if it was neat, and looked at the room, which was not half lighted, and at the shabby, dusty tables, and at the piles of writings, and at a bookcase full of the most inexpressive-looking books that ever had anything to say for themselves. Then I went on, thinking, thinking, thinking; and the fire went on, burning, burning, burning; and the candles went on flickering and guttering, and there were no snuffers – until the young gentleman by and by brought a very dirty pair – for two hours.

      At last Mr. Kenge came. HE was not altered, but he was surprised to see how altered I was and appeared quite pleased. “As you are going to be the companion of the young lady who is now in the Chancellor's private room, Miss Summerson,” he said, “we thought it well that you should be in attendance also. You will not be discomposed by the Lord Chancellor, I dare say?”

      “No, sir,” I said, “I don't think I shall,” really not seeing on consideration why I should be.

      So Mr. Kenge gave me his arm and we went round the corner, under a colonnade, and in at a side door. And so we came, along a passage, into a comfortable sort of room where a young lady and a young gentleman were standing near a great, loud-roaring fire. A screen was interposed between them and it, and they were leaning on the screen, talking.

      They both looked up when I came in, and I saw in the young lady, with the fire shining upon her, such a beautiful girl! With such rich golden hair, such soft blue eyes, and such a bright, innocent, trusting face!

      “Miss Ada,” said Mr. Kenge, “this is Miss Summerson.”

      She came to meet me with a smile of welcome and her hand extended, but seemed to change her mind in a moment and kissed me. In short, she had such a natural, captivating, winning manner that in a few minutes we were sitting in the window-seat, with the light of the fire upon us, talking together as free and happy as could be.

      What a load off my mind! It was so delightful to know that she could confide in me and like me! It was so good of her, and so encouraging to me!

      The young gentleman was her distant cousin, she told me, and his name Richard Carstone. He was a handsome youth with an ingenuous face and a most engaging laugh; and after she had called him up to where we sat, he stood by us, in the light of the fire, talking gaily, like a light-hearted boy. He was very young, not more than nineteen then, if quite so much, but nearly two years older