The Cricket on the Hearth
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Charles Dickens >> The Cricket on the Hearth
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While speaking, she had released May Fielding's hands, and clasped
her garments in an attitude of mingled supplication and love.
Sinking lower and lower down, as she proceeded in her strange
confession, she dropped at last at the feet of her friend, and hid
her blind face in the folds of her dress.
'Great Power!' exclaimed her father, smitten at one blow with the
truth, 'have I deceived her from the cradle, but to break her heart
at last!'
It was well for all of them that Dot, that beaming, useful, busy
little Dot - for such she was, whatever faults she had, and however
you may learn to hate her, in good time - it was well for all of
them, I say, that she was there: or where this would have ended,
it were hard to tell. But Dot, recovering her self-possession,
interposed, before May could reply, or Caleb say another word.
'Come, come, dear Bertha! come away with me! Give her your arm,
May. So! How composed she is, you see, already; and how good it
is of her to mind us,' said the cheery little woman, kissing her
upon the forehead. 'Come away, dear Bertha. Come! and here's her
good father will come with her; won't you, Caleb? To - be - sure!'
Well, well! she was a noble little Dot in such things, and it must
have been an obdurate nature that could have withstood her
influence. When she had got poor Caleb and his Bertha away, that
they might comfort and console each other, as she knew they only
could, she presently came bouncing back, - the saying is, as fresh
as any daisy; I say fresher - to mount guard over that bridling
little piece of consequence in the cap and gloves, and prevent the
dear old creature from making discoveries.
'So bring me the precious Baby, Tilly,' said she, drawing a chair
to the fire; 'and while I have it in my lap, here's Mrs. Fielding,
Tilly, will tell me all about the management of Babies, and put me
right in twenty points where I'm as wrong as can be. Won't you,
Mrs. Fielding?'
Not even the Welsh Giant, who, according to the popular expression,
was so 'slow' as to perform a fatal surgical operation upon
himself, in emulation of a juggling-trick achieved by his arch-
enemy at breakfast-time; not even he fell half so readily into the
snare prepared for him, as the old lady did into this artful
pitfall. The fact of Tackleton having walked out; and furthermore,
of two or three people having been talking together at a distance,
for two minutes, leaving her to her own resources; was quite enough
to have put her on her dignity, and the bewailment of that
mysterious convulsion in the Indigo trade, for four-and-twenty
hours. But this becoming deference to her experience, on the part
of the young mother, was so irresistible, that after a short
affectation of humility, she began to enlighten her with the best
grace in the world; and sitting bolt upright before the wicked Dot,
she did, in half an hour, deliver more infallible domestic recipes
and precepts, than would (if acted on) have utterly destroyed and
done up that Young Peerybingle, though he had been an Infant
Samson.
To change the theme, Dot did a little needlework - she carried the
contents of a whole workbox in her pocket; however she contrived
it, I don't know - then did a little nursing; then a little more
needlework; then had a little whispering chat with May, while the
old lady dozed; and so in little bits of bustle, which was quite
her manner always, found it a very short afternoon. Then, as it
grew dark, and as it was a solemn part of this Institution of the
Pic-Nic that she should perform all Bertha's household tasks, she
trimmed the fire, and swept the hearth, and set the tea-board out,
and drew the curtain, and lighted a candle. Then she played an air
or two on a rude kind of harp, which Caleb had contrived for
Bertha, and played them very well; for Nature had made her delicate
little ear as choice a one for music as it would have been for
jewels, if she had had any to wear. By this time it was the
established hour for having tea; and Tackleton came back again, to
share the meal, and spend the evening.
Caleb and Bertha had returned some time before, and Caleb had sat
down to his afternoon's work. But he couldn't settle to it, poor
fellow, being anxious and remorseful for his daughter. It was
touching to see him sitting idle on his working-stool, regarding
her so wistfully, and always saying in his face, 'Have I deceived
her from her cradle, but to break her heart!'
When it was night, and tea was done, and Dot had nothing more to do
in washing up the cups and saucers; in a word - for I must come to
it, and there is no use in putting it off - when the time drew nigh
for expecting the Carrier's return in every sound of distant
wheels, her manner changed again, her colour came and went, and she
was very restless. Not as good wives are, when listening for their
husbands. No, no, no. It was another sort of restlessness from
that.
Wheels heard. A horse's feet. The barking of a dog. The gradual
approach of all the sounds. The scratching paw of Boxer at the
door!
'Whose step is that!' cried Bertha, starting up.
'Whose step?' returned the Carrier, standing in the portal, with
his brown face ruddy as a winter berry from the keen night air.
'Why, mine.'
'The other step,' said Bertha. 'The man's tread behind you!'
'She is not to be deceived,' observed the Carrier, laughing. 'Come
along, sir. You'll be welcome, never fear!'
He spoke in a loud tone; and as he spoke, the deaf old gentleman
entered.
'He's not so much a stranger, that you haven't seen him once,
Caleb,' said the Carrier. 'You'll give him house-room till we go?'
'Oh surely, John, and take it as an honour.'
'He's the best company on earth, to talk secrets in,' said John.
'I have reasonable good lungs, but he tries 'em, I can tell you.
Sit down, sir. All friends here, and glad to see you!'
When he had imparted this assurance, in a voice that amply
corroborated what he had said about his lungs, he added in his
natural tone, 'A chair in the chimney-corner, and leave to sit
quite silent and look pleasantly about him, is all he cares for.
He's easily pleased.'
Bertha had been listening intently. She called Caleb to her side,
when he had set the chair, and asked him, in a low voice, to
describe their visitor. When he had done so (truly now; with
scrupulous fidelity), she moved, for the first time since he had
come in, and sighed, and seemed to have no further interest
concerning him.
The Carrier was in high spirits, good fellow that he was, and
fonder of his little wife than ever.
'A clumsy Dot she was, this afternoon!' he said, encircling her
with his rough arm, as she stood, removed from the rest; 'and yet I
like her somehow. See yonder, Dot!'
He pointed to the old man. She looked down. I think she trembled.
'He's - ha ha ha! - he's full of admiration for you!' said the
Carrier. 'Talked of nothing else, the whole way here. Why, he's a
brave old boy. I like him for it!'
'I wish he had had a better subject, John,' she said, with an
uneasy glance about the room. At Tackleton especially.
'A better subject!' cried the jovial John. 'There's no such thing.
Come, off with the great-coat, off with the thick shawl, off with
the heavy wrappers! and a cosy half-hour by the fire! My humble
service, Mistress. A game at cribbage, you and I? That's hearty.
The cards and board, Dot. And a glass of beer here, if there's any
left, small wife!'
His challenge was addressed to the old lady, who accepting it with
gracious readiness, they were soon engaged upon the game. At
first, the Carrier looked about him sometimes, with a smile, or now
and then called Dot to peep over his shoulder at his hand, and
advise him on some knotty point. But his adversary being a rigid
disciplinarian, and subject to an occasional weakness in respect of
pegging more than she was entitled to, required such vigilance on
his part, as left him neither eyes nor ears to spare. Thus, his
whole attention gradually became absorbed upon the cards; and he
thought of nothing else, until a hand upon his shoulder restored
him to a consciousness of Tackleton.
'I am sorry to disturb you - but a word, directly.'
'I'm going to deal,' returned the Carrier. 'It's a crisis.'
'It is,' said Tackleton. 'Come here, man!'
There was that in his pale face which made the other rise
immediately, and ask him, in a hurry, what the matter was.
'Hush! John Peerybingle,' said Tackleton. 'I am sorry for this.
I am indeed. I have been afraid of it. I have suspected it from
the first.'
'What is it?' asked the Carrier, with a frightened aspect.
'Hush! I'll show you, if you'll come with me.'
The Carrier accompanied him, without another word. They went
across a yard, where the stars were shining, and by a little side-
door, into Tackleton's own counting-house, where there was a glass
window, commanding the ware-room, which was closed for the night.
There was no light in the counting-house itself, but there were
lamps in the long narrow ware-room; and consequently the window was
bright.
'A moment!' said Tackleton. 'Can you bear to look through that
window, do you think?'
'Why not?' returned the Carrier.
'A moment more,' said Tackleton. 'Don't commit any violence. It's
of no use. It's dangerous too. You're a strong-made man; and you
might do murder before you know it.'
The Carrier looked him in the face, and recoiled a step as if he
had been struck. In one stride he was at the window, and he saw -
Oh Shadow on the Hearth! Oh truthful Cricket! Oh perfidious Wife!
He saw her, with the old man - old no longer, but erect and gallant
- bearing in his hand the false white hair that had won his way
into their desolate and miserable home. He saw her listening to
him, as he bent his head to whisper in her ear; and suffering him
to clasp her round the waist, as they moved slowly down the dim
wooden gallery towards the door by which they had entered it. He
saw them stop, and saw her turn - to have the face, the face he
loved so, so presented to his view! - and saw her, with her own
hands, adjust the lie upon his head, laughing, as she did it, at
his unsuspicious nature!
He clenched his strong right hand at first, as if it would have
beaten down a lion. But opening it immediately again, he spread it
out before the eyes of Tackleton (for he was tender of her, even
then), and so, as they passed out, fell down upon a desk, and was
as weak as any infant.
He was wrapped up to the chin, and busy with his horse and parcels,
when she came into the room, prepared for going home.
'Now, John, dear! Good night, May! Good night, Bertha!'
Could she kiss them? Could she be blithe and cheerful in her
parting? Could she venture to reveal her face to them without a
blush? Yes. Tackleton observed her closely, and she did all this.
Tilly was hushing the Baby, and she crossed and re-crossed
Tackleton, a dozen times, repeating drowsily:
'Did the knowledge that it was to be its wifes, then, wring its
hearts almost to breaking; and did its fathers deceive it from its
cradles but to break its hearts at last!'
'Now, Tilly, give me the Baby! Good night, Mr. Tackleton. Where's
John, for goodness' sake?'
'He's going to walk beside the horse's head,' said Tackleton; who
helped her to her seat.
'My dear John. Walk? To-night?'
The muffled figure of her husband made a hasty sign in the
affirmative; and the false stranger and the little nurse being in
their places, the old horse moved off. Boxer, the unconscious
Boxer, running on before, running back, running round and round the
cart, and barking as triumphantly and merrily as ever.
When Tackleton had gone off likewise, escorting May and her mother
home, poor Caleb sat down by the fire beside his daughter; anxious
and remorseful at the core; and still saying in his wistful
contemplation of her, 'Have I deceived her from her cradle, but to
break her heart at last!'
The toys that had been set in motion for the Baby, had all stopped,
and run down, long ago. In the faint light and silence, the
imperturbably calm dolls, the agitated rocking-horses with
distended eyes and nostrils, the old gentlemen at the street-doors,
standing half doubled up upon their failing knees and ankles, the
wry-faced nut-crackers, the very Beasts upon their way into the
Ark, in twos, like a Boarding School out walking, might have been
imagined to be stricken motionless with fantastic wonder, at Dot
being false, or Tackleton beloved, under any combination of
circumstances.
CHAPTER III - Chirp the Third
THE Dutch clock in the corner struck Ten, when the Carrier sat down
by his fireside. So troubled and grief-worn, that he seemed to
scare the Cuckoo, who, having cut his ten melodious announcements
as short as possible, plunged back into the Moorish Palace again,
and clapped his little door behind him, as if the unwonted
spectacle were too much for his feelings.
If the little Haymaker had been armed with the sharpest of scythes,
and had cut at every stroke into the Carrier's heart, he never
could have gashed and wounded it, as Dot had done.
It was a heart so full of love for her; so bound up and held
together by innumerable threads of winning remembrance, spun from
the daily working of her many qualities of endearment; it was a
heart in which she had enshrined herself so gently and so closely;
a heart so single and so earnest in its Truth, so strong in right,
so weak in wrong; that it could cherish neither passion nor revenge
at first, and had only room to hold the broken image of its Idol.
But, slowly, slowly, as the Carrier sat brooding on his hearth, now
cold and dark, other and fiercer thoughts began to rise within him,
as an angry wind comes rising in the night. The Stranger was
beneath his outraged roof. Three steps would take him to his
chamber-door. One blow would beat it in. 'You might do murder
before you know it,' Tackleton had said. How could it be murder,
if he gave the villain time to grapple with him hand to hand! He
was the younger man.
It was an ill-timed thought, bad for the dark mood of his mind. It
was an angry thought, goading him to some avenging act, that should
change the cheerful house into a haunted place which lonely
travellers would dread to pass by night; and where the timid would
see shadows struggling in the ruined windows when the moon was dim,
and hear wild noises in the stormy weather.
He was the younger man! Yes, yes; some lover who had won the heart
that HE had never touched. Some lover of her early choice, of whom
she had thought and dreamed, for whom she had pined and pined, when
he had fancied her so happy by his side. O agony to think of it!
She had been above-stairs with the Baby, getting it to bed. As he
sat brooding on the hearth, she came close beside him, without his
knowledge - in the turning of the rack of his great misery, he lost
all other sounds - and put her little stool at his feet. He only
knew it, when he felt her hand upon his own, and saw her looking up
into his face.
With wonder? No. It was his first impression, and he was fain to
look at her again, to set it right. No, not with wonder. With an
eager and inquiring look; but not with wonder. At first it was
alarmed and serious; then, it changed into a strange, wild,
dreadful smile of recognition of his thoughts; then, there was
nothing but her clasped hands on her brow, and her bent head, and
falling hair.
Though the power of Omnipotence had been his to wield at that
moment, he had too much of its diviner property of Mercy in his
breast, to have turned one feather's weight of it against her. But
he could not bear to see her crouching down upon the little seat
where he had often looked on her, with love and pride, so innocent
and gay; and, when she rose and left him, sobbing as she went, he
felt it a relief to have the vacant place beside him rather than
her so long-cherished presence. This in itself was anguish keener
than all, reminding him how desolate he was become, and how the
great bond of his life was rent asunder.
The more he felt this, and the more he knew he could have better
borne to see her lying prematurely dead before him with their
little child upon her breast, the higher and the stronger rose his
wrath against his enemy. He looked about him for a weapon.
There was a gun, hanging on the wall. He took it down, and moved a
pace or two towards the door of the perfidious Stranger's room. He
knew the gun was loaded. Some shadowy idea that it was just to
shoot this man like a wild beast, seized him, and dilated in his
mind until it grew into a monstrous demon in complete possession of
him, casting out all milder thoughts and setting up its undivided
empire.
That phrase is wrong. Not casting out his milder thoughts, but
artfully transforming them. Changing them into scourges to drive
him on. Turning water into blood, love into hate, gentleness into
blind ferocity. Her image, sorrowing, humbled, but still pleading
to his tenderness and mercy with resistless power, never left his
mind; but, staying there, it urged him to the door; raised the
weapon to his shoulder; fitted and nerved his finger to the
trigger; and cried 'Kill him! In his bed!'
He reversed the gun to beat the stock up the door; he already held
it lifted in the air; some indistinct design was in his thoughts of
calling out to him to fly, for God's sake, by the window -
When, suddenly, the struggling fire illumined the whole chimney
with a glow of light; and the Cricket on the Hearth began to Chirp!
No sound he could have heard, no human voice, not even hers, could
so have moved and softened him. The artless words in which she had
told him of her love for this same Cricket, were once more freshly
spoken; her trembling, earnest manner at the moment, was again
before him; her pleasant voice - O what a voice it was, for making
household music at the fireside of an honest man! - thrilled
through and through his better nature, and awoke it into life and
action.
He recoiled from the door, like a man walking in his sleep,
awakened from a frightful dream; and put the gun aside. Clasping
his hands before his face, he then sat down again beside the fire,
and found relief in tears.
The Cricket on the Hearth came out into the room, and stood in
Fairy shape before him.
'"I love it,"' said the Fairy Voice, repeating what he well
remembered, '"for the many times I have heard it, and the many
thoughts its harmless music has given me."'
'She said so!' cried the Carrier. 'True!'
'"This has been a happy home, John; and I love the Cricket for its
sake!"'
'It has been, Heaven knows,' returned the Carrier. 'She made it
happy, always, - until now.'
'So gracefully sweet-tempered; so domestic, joyful, busy, and
light-hearted!' said the Voice.
'Otherwise I never could have loved her as I did,' returned the
Carrier.
The Voice, correcting him, said 'do.'
The Carrier repeated 'as I did.' But not firmly. His faltering
tongue resisted his control, and would speak in its own way, for
itself and him.
The Figure, in an attitude of invocation, raised its hand and said:
'Upon your own hearth - '
'The hearth she has blighted,' interposed the Carrier.
'The hearth she has - how often! - blessed and brightened,' said
the Cricket; 'the hearth which, but for her, were only a few stones
and bricks and rusty bars, but which has been, through her, the
Altar of your Home; on which you have nightly sacrificed some petty
passion, selfishness, or care, and offered up the homage of a
tranquil mind, a trusting nature, and an overflowing heart; so that
the smoke from this poor chimney has gone upward with a better
fragrance than the richest incense that is burnt before the richest
shrines in all the gaudy temples of this world! - Upon your own
hearth; in its quiet sanctuary; surrounded by its gentle influences
and associations; hear her! Hear me! Hear everything that speaks
the language of your hearth and home!'
'And pleads for her?' inquired the Carrier.
'All things that speak the language of your hearth and home, must
plead for her!' returned the Cricket. 'For they speak the truth.'
And while the Carrier, with his head upon his hands, continued to
sit meditating in his chair, the Presence stood beside him,
suggesting his reflections by its power, and presenting them before
him, as in a glass or picture. It was not a solitary Presence.
From the hearthstone, from the chimney, from the clock, the pipe,
the kettle, and the cradle; from the floor, the walls, the ceiling,
and the stairs; from the cart without, and the cupboard within, and
the household implements; from every thing and every place with
which she had ever been familiar, and with which she had ever
entwined one recollection of herself in her unhappy husband's mind;
Fairies came trooping forth. Not to stand beside him as the
Cricket did, but to busy and bestir themselves. To do all honour
to her image. To pull him by the skirts, and point to it when it
appeared. To cluster round it, and embrace it, and strew flowers
for it to tread on. To try to crown its fair head with their tiny
hands. To show that they were fond of it and loved it; and that
there was not one ugly, wicked or accusatory creature to claim
knowledge of it - none but their playful and approving selves.
His thoughts were constant to her image. It was always there.
She sat plying her needle, before the fire, and singing to herself.
Such a blithe, thriving, steady little Dot! The fairy figures
turned upon him all at once, by one consent, with one prodigious
concentrated stare, and seemed to say, 'Is this the light wife you
are mourning for!'
There were sounds of gaiety outside, musical instruments, and noisy
tongues, and laughter. A crowd of young merry-makers came pouring
in, among whom were May Fielding and a score of pretty girls. Dot
was the fairest of them all; as young as any of them too. They
came to summon her to join their party. It was a dance. If ever
little foot were made for dancing, hers was, surely. But she
laughed, and shook her head, and pointed to her cookery on the
fire, and her table ready spread: with an exulting defiance that
rendered her more charming than she was before. And so she merrily
dismissed them, nodding to her would-be partners, one by one, as
they passed, but with a comical indifference, enough to make them
go and drown themselves immediately if they were her admirers - and
they must have been so, more or less; they couldn't help it. And
yet indifference was not her character. O no! For presently,
there came a certain Carrier to the door; and bless her what a
welcome she bestowed upon him!
Again the staring figures turned upon him all at once, and seemed
to say, 'Is this the wife who has forsaken you!'
A shadow fell upon the mirror or the picture: call it what you
will. A great shadow of the Stranger, as he first stood underneath
their roof; covering its surface, and blotting out all other
objects. But the nimble Fairies worked like bees to clear it off
again. And Dot again was there. Still bright and beautiful.
Rocking her little Baby in its cradle, singing to it softly, and
resting her head upon a shoulder which had its counterpart in the
musing figure by which the Fairy Cricket stood.
The night - I mean the real night: not going by Fairy clocks - was
wearing now; and in this stage of the Carrier's thoughts, the moon
burst out, and shone brightly in the sky. Perhaps some calm and
quiet light had risen also, in his mind; and he could think more
soberly of what had happened.
Although the shadow of the Stranger fell at intervals upon the
glass - always distinct, and big, and thoroughly defined - it never
fell so darkly as at first. Whenever it appeared, the Fairies
uttered a general cry of consternation, and plied their little arms
and legs, with inconceivable activity, to rub it out. And whenever
they got at Dot again, and showed her to him once more, bright and
beautiful, they cheered in the most inspiring manner.
They never showed her, otherwise than beautiful and bright, for
they were Household Spirits to whom falsehood is annihilation; and
being so, what Dot was there for them, but the one active, beaming,
pleasant little creature who had been the light and sun of the
Carrier's Home!
The Fairies were prodigiously excited when they showed her, with
the Baby, gossiping among a knot of sage old matrons, and affecting
to be wondrous old and matronly herself, and leaning in a staid,
demure old way upon her husband's arm, attempting - she! such a bud
of a little woman - to convey the idea of having abjured the
vanities of the world in general, and of being the sort of person
to whom it was no novelty at all to be a mother; yet in the same
breath, they showed her, laughing at the Carrier for being awkward,
and pulling up his shirt-collar to make him smart, and mincing
merrily about that very room to teach him how to dance!
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