She was exactly the same as when they had parted, just as handsome, just
as scornful, just as repressed. She manifested no surprise in seeing
them, nor any other emotion. She requested them to be seated; and
declining to take a seat herself, at once anticipated any introduction
of their business. 'I apprehend,' she said, 'that I know the cause of your favouring me
with this visit. We may come to it at once.'
'The cause then, ma'am,' said Mr Meagles, 'is Tattycoram.'
'So I supposed.' 'Miss Wade,' said Mr Meagles, 'will you be so kind as to say whether you
know anything of her?' 'Surely. I know she is here with me.'
'Then, ma'am,' said Mr Meagles, 'allow me to make known to you that I
shall be happy to have her back, and that my wife and daughter will
be happy to have her back. She has been with us a long time: we don't
forget her claims upon us, and I hope we know how to make allowances.'
'You hope to know how to make allowances?' she returned, in a level,
measured voice. 'For what?' 'I think my friend would say, Miss Wade,'
Arthur Clennam interposed,
seeing Mr Meagles rather at a loss, 'for the passionate sense that
sometimes comes upon the poor girl, of being at a disadvantage. Which
occasionally gets the better of better remembrances.'
The lady broke into a smile as she turned her eyes upon him. 'Indeed?'
was all she answered. She stood by the table so perfectly composed and still after this
acknowledgment of his remark that Mr Meagles stared at her under a sort
of fascination, and could not even look to Clennam to make another move.
After waiting, awkwardly enough, for some moments, Arthur said: 'Perhaps
it would be well if Mr Meagles could see her, Miss Wade?'
'That is easily done,' said she. 'Come here, child.' She had opened a
door while saying this, and now led the girl in by the hand. It was
very curious to see them standing together: the girl with her disengaged
fingers plaiting the bosom of her dress, half irresolutely, half
passionately; Miss Wade with her composed face attentively regarding
her, and suggesting to an observer, with extraordinary force, in her
composure itself (as a veil will suggest the form it covers), the
unquenchable passion of her own nature.
'See here,' she said, in the same level way as before. 'Here is your
patron, your master. He is willing to take you back, my dear, if you are
sensible of the favour and choose to go. You can be, again, a foil to
his pretty daughter, a slave to her pleasant wilfulness, and a toy in
the house showing the goodness of the family. You can have your droll
name again, playfully pointing you out and setting you apart, as it is
right that you should be pointed out and set apart. (Your birth, you
know; you must not forget your birth.) You can again be shown to this
gentleman's daughter, Harriet, and kept before her, as a living reminder
of her own superiority and her gracious condescension. You can recover
all these advantages and many more of the same kind which I dare say
start up in your memory while I speak, and which you lose in taking
refuge with me--you can recover them all by telling these gentlemen how
humbled and penitent you are, and by going back to them to be forgiven.
What do you say, Harriet? Will you go?'