by Charles Dickens
Nicholas was of a naturally optimistic temper, however, and he lost as little time as possible brooding over his difficulties. Instead he began at once to try to make the school something more than a farce. He arranged a few regular lessons for the boys, and he treated the poor, half-starved pupils with such gentleness and sympathy that they passed from dumb amazement at the first to blind devotion. Indeed, there was not one of them who would not have lain down cheerfully and let him walk over his body; and the most devoted of them all was Smike.
Nicholas was the one ray of sunlight that had ever come into this wretched creature’s life. And in return, Smike now followed him to and fro, with an ever restless desire to serve or help him; anticipating such little wants as his humble ability could supply, and content only to be near him. He would sit beside him for hours, looking patiently into his face; and a word would brighten up his careworn visage, and call into it a passing gleam, even of happiness. He was an altered being; he had an object now; and that object was, to show his attachment to the only person—that person a stranger—who had treated him, not to say with kindness, but like a human creature.
Needless to say, Squeers speedily took a dislike to Nicholas. He knew of the scarcely concealed disdain with which his assistant regarded his methods. Squeers was jealous, also, of the influence which Nicholas had so soon acquired with the boys. Smike’s slavish affection was speedily discovered, and the crafty master was mean enough to strike at Nicholas through him.
Upon this poor being all the spleen and ill-humor that could not be vented on Nicholas were unceasingly bestowed. Drudgery would have been nothing—Smike was well used to that. Buffetings inflicted without cause would have been equally a matter of course; for to them also he had served a long and weary apprenticeship; but it was no sooner observed that he had become attached to Nicholas, than stripes and blows, stripes and blows, morning, noon, and night, were his only portion. Nicholas saw it, and ground his teeth at every repetition of the savage and cowardly attack. But at present he saw no way to aid the boy, for a protest would mean his own dismissal, and the lot of Smike and the others would become that much harder.
One day, after especially harsh treatment, the boy sat huddled in a dark corner by himself, sobbing as though his heart would break. The room was dark and deserted, when Nicholas entered, but he heard the sound of weeping and went over and laid his hand on the drudge’s head.
“Do not, for God’s sake!” said Nicholas, in an agitated voice; “I cannot bear to see you.”
“They are more hard with me than ever,” sobbed the boy.
“I know it,” rejoined Nicholas. “They are.”
“But for you,” said the outcast, “I should die. They would kill me, they would; I know they would.”
“You will do better, poor fellow,” replied Nicholas, shaking his head mournfully, “when I am gone.”
“Gone!” cried the other, looking intently in his face.
“Softly!” rejoined Nicholas. “Yes.”
“Are you going?” demanded the boy, in an earnest whisper.
“I cannot say,” replied Nicholas. “I was speaking more to my own thoughts than to you.”
“Tell me,” said the boy, imploringly, “oh, do tell me, will you go—will you?”
“I shall be driven to that at last!” said Nicholas. “The world is before me, after all.”
“Tell me,” urged Smike, “is the world as bad and dismal as this place?”
“Heaven forbid,” replied Nicholas, pursuing the train of his own thoughts; “its hardest, coarsest toil were happiness to this.”
“Should I ever meet you there?” demanded the boy, speaking with unusual wildness.
“Yes,” replied Nicholas, willing to soothe him.
“No, no!” said the other, clasping him by the hand. “Should I—should I—tell me that again! Say I should be sure to find you!”
“You would,” replied Nicholas, with the same humane intention, “and I would help and aid you, and not bring fresh sorrow on you as I have done here.”
The boy caught both the young man’s hands passionately in his, and hugging them to his breast, uttered a few broken sounds which were unintelligible. Squeers entered, at the moment, and he shrank back into his old corner.
The next morning—a cold, gray day in January—Nicholas was awakened by hearing the voice of Squeers roughly demanding, “Where’s that Smike?”
Nicholas looked over in the corner where the boy usually slept, but it was vacant; so he made no answer.
“Smike!” shouted Squeers.
“Do you want your head broke in a fresh place, Smike?” demanded his amiable lady, in the same key.
Still there was no reply, and still Nicholas stared about him, as did the greater part of the boys, who were by this time roused.
“Confound his impudence!” muttered Squeers, rapping the stair-rail impatiently with his cane. “Nickleby!”
“Well, sir.”
“Send that obstinate scoundrel down; don’t you hear me calling?”
“He is not here, sir,” replied Nicholas.
“Don’t tell me a lie,” retorted the schoolmaster. “He is.”
“He is not,” retorted Nicholas, angrily. “Don’t tell me one.”
“We shall soon see that,” said Mr. Squeers, rushing upstairs. “I’ll find him, I warrant you.”
With which assurance Mr. Squeers bounced into the dormitory, and, swinging his cane in the air ready for a blow, darted into the corner. The cane descended harmlessly upon the ground. There was nobody there.
“What does this mean?” said Squeers, turning round. “Where have you hid him?”
“I have seen nothing of him since last night,” replied Nicholas.
“Come,” blustered Squeers, “you won’t save him this way. Where is he?”
“At the bottom of the nearest pond, for aught I know,” rejoined Nicholas, in a low voice, and fixing his eyes full on the master’s face.
“Confound you, what do you mean by that?” retorted Squeers. Without waiting for a reply, he inquired of the boys whether any one among them knew anything of their missing schoolmate.
There was a general hum of anxious denial, in the midst of which one shrill voice was heard to say (as, indeed, everybody thought):
“Please, sir, I think Smike’s run away, sir.”
“Ha!” cried Squeers, turning sharp round. “Who said that?”
And, pouncing suddenly, he seized a small urchin, who was rewarded for his suggestion so soundly that he howled with pain.
“There,” said Squeers. “Now, if any other boy thinks Smike has run away, I shall be glad to have a talk with him.”
There was, of course, a profound silence, during which Nicholas showed his disgust as plainly as looks could show it.
“Well, Nickleby,” said Squeers, eyeing him maliciously. “You think he has run away, I suppose?
“I think it extremely likely,” replied Nicholas, in a quiet manner.
“Oh, you do, do you?” sneered Squeers. “Maybe you know he has?”
“I know nothing of the kind.”
“He didn’t tell you he was going, I suppose, did he?” continued Squeers.
“He did not,” replied Nicholas; “I am very glad he did not, for it would then have been my duty to have warned you in time.”
“Which no doubt you would have been devilish sorry to do,” said Squeers, in a taunting fashion.
“I should indeed,” replied Nicholas.
Meanwhile Mrs. Squeers, who had been hunting elsewhere for the boy, bustled in with great excitement.
“He is off!” said she. “The cow-house and stable are locked up, so he can’t be there; and he’s not downstairs anywhere, for the girl has looked. He must have gone York way, and by a public road too.”
“Why must he?” inquired Squeers.
“Stupid!” said Mrs. Squeers, angrily. “He hadn’t any money, had he?”
“Never had a penny of his own in his whole life, that I know of,” replied Squeers.
“To be sure,” rejoined Mrs. Squeers, “and he didn’t take anything to eat with him; that I’ll answer for. So, of course, he must beg his way, and he could do that nowhere but on the public road.”
“That’s true,” exclaimed Squeers, clapping his hands.
“True! Yes; but you would never have thought of it, for all that, if I hadn’t said so,” replied his wife. “Now, if you take the chaise and go one road, and I borrow Swallow’s chaise and go the other, what with keeping our eyes open and asking questions, one or other of us is pretty certain to lay hold of him.”
The worthy lady’s plan was put into action without delay; while Nicholas remained behind in a tumult of anxiety. He realized the bitter consequences of Smike’s rash act. The boy was liable to freeze or starve to death on the roadside—which could not, perhaps, be much worse than to fall again into the clutches of Mr. and Mrs. Squeers.
All that day there was no tidings of the runaway. But at daybreak the second morning the sound of wheels was heard. Nicholas hardly dared to look out of the window; but he did so, and the very first object that met his eyes was the wretched Smike: so bedabbled with mud and rain, so haggard and worn and wild, that, but for his garments being such as no scarecrow was ever seen to wear, he might have been doubtful, even then, of his identity.
“Lift him out,” said Squeers, after he had literally feasted his eyes, in silence, upon the culprit. “Bring him in; bring him in!”
Smike, to all appearance more dead than alive, was brought into the house and securely locked up in a cellar until such time as Mr. Squeers should deem it expedient to operate upon him in presence of the assembled school.
After a hasty breakfast of very thin porridge, the boys were summoned to the schoolroom by resounding whacks on the desk from an ugly-looking whip in the hands of the master.
“Is every boy here?” asked Squeers, in a tremendous voice.
Every boy was there, but every boy was afraid to speak; so Squeers glared along the lines to assure himself; and every eye drooped, and every head cowered down, as he did so.
“Each boy keep his place,” said Squeers, administering his favorite blow to the desk, and regarding with gloomy satisfaction the universal start which it never failed to occasion. “Nickleby! to your desk, sir!”
It was remarked by more than one small observer that there was a very curious and unusual expression in the usher’s face; but he took his seat without opening his lips in reply. Squeers, casting a triumphant glance at his assistant and a scowl on the boys, left the room, and shortly afterwards returned, dragging Smike by the collar.
In any other place the appearance of the wretched, jaded, spiritless object would have occasioned a murmur of compassion and remonstrance. It had some effect, even there; for the lookers-on moved uneasily in their seats, and a few of the boldest ventured to steal looks at each other, expressive of indignation and pity.
They were lost on Squeers, however, whose gaze was fastened on the luckless Smike, as he inquired, according to custom in such cases, whether he had anything to say for himself.
“Nothing, I suppose?” said Squeers, with a diabolical grin.
Smike glanced round, and his eye rested, for an instant, on Nicholas, as if he had expected him to intercede; but his look was riveted on his desk.
“Have you anything to say?” demanded Squeers again, giving his right arm two or three flourishes to try its power and suppleness. “Stand a little out of the way, Mrs. Squeers, my dear; I’ve hardly got room enough.”
“Spare me, sir!” cried Smike.
“Oh! that’s all, is it?” said Squeers. “Yes, I’ll flog you within an inch of your life, and spare you that.”
“Ha, ha, ha,” laughed Mrs. Squeers, “that’s a good ‘un!”
“I was driven to do it,” said Smike, faintly, and casting another imploring look about him.
“Driven to do it, were you?” said Squeers. “Oh! it wasn’t your fault; it was mine, I suppose—eh?”
Then he caught the boy firmly in his grip. One desperate cut had fallen on his body—he was wincing from the lash and uttering a scream of pain—it was raised again, and again about to fall—when Nicholas Nickleby, suddenly starting up, cried “Stop!” in a voice that made the rafters ring.
“Who cried stop?” said Squeers, turning savagely round.
“I,” said Nicholas, stepping forward. “This must not go on.”
“Must not go on!” cried Squeers, almost in a shriek.
“No!” thundered Nicholas.
Aghast at the boldness of this interference, Squeers released his hold of Smike, and, falling back a pace or two, gazed upon Nicholas with looks that were positively frightful.
“I say must not!” repeated Nicholas, nothing daunted; “shall not! I will prevent it!”
Squeers continued to gaze upon him, with his eyes starting out of his head; but astonishment had actually, for the moment, bereft him of speech.
“You have disregarded all my quiet interference in the miserable lad’s behalf,” said Nicholas; “you have returned no answer to the letter in which I begged forgiveness for him, and offered to be responsible that he would remain quietly here. Don’t blame me for this public interference. You have brought it upon yourself; not I.”
“Sit down, beggar!” screamed Squeers, almost beside himself with rage, and seizing Smike as he spoke.
“Wretch,” rejoined Nicholas, fiercely, “touch him at your peril! I will not stand by, and see it done. My blood is up, and I have the strength of ten such men as you. Look to yourself, for by Heaven I will not spare you, if you drive me on!”
“Stand back,” cried Squeers, brandishing his weapon.
“I have a long series of insults to avenge,” said Nicholas, flushed with passion; “and my indignation is aggravated by the cruelties of this foul den. Have a care; for if you rouse me farther, the consequences shall fall heavily upon your own head!”
He had scarcely spoken, when Squeers, in a violent outbreak of wrath, struck him a blow across the face which raised up a bar of livid flesh as it was inflicted. Smarting with the agony of the blow, and concentrating into that one moment all its feelings of rage and scorn, Nicholas sprang upon him, wrested the weapon from his hand, and pinning him by the throat, beat the ruffian till he roared for mercy.
Then Nicholas left the astounded boys and the crestfallen master, and stalked out of the room. He looked anxiously around for Smike, as he closed the door, but he was nowhere to be seen.
There was nothing left for him to do. He must face the world again; but anything—he told himself—would be better than this. So he packed up a few clothes in a small valise, and, finding that nobody offered to oppose him, he marched boldly out by the front door and struck into the road which led to Greta Bridge.
He did not travel far that day, as there had been a heavy fall of snow which made the way toilsome and hard to find. He lay, that night, at a cottage, where beds were let at a cheap rate to the more humble class of travellers; and, rising betimes next morning, made his way before night to Boroughbridge. Passing through that town in search of some cheap resting-place, he stumbled upon an empty barn within a couple of hundred yards of the roadside; in a warm corner of which he stretched his weary limbs, and soon fell asleep.
When he awoke next morning, and tried to recollect his dreams, which had been all connected with his recent sojourn at Dotheboys Hall, he sat up, rubbed his eyes, and stared—not with the most composed countenance possible—at some motionless object which seemed to be stationed within a few yards in front of him.
“Strange!” cried Nicholas; “can this be some lingering creation of the visions that have scarcely left me! It cannot be real—and yet I—-I am awake! Smike!”
The form moved, rose, advanced, and dropped upon its knees at his feet. It was Smike indeed.
“Why do you kneel to me?” said Nicholas, hastily raising him.
“To go with you—anywhere—everywhere—to the world’s end!” replied Smike, clinging to his hand. “Let me, oh, do let me! You are my home—my kind friend—take me with you, pray!”
“I am a friend who can do little for you,” said Nicholas, kindly. “How came you here?”
He had followed him, it seemed; had never lost sight of him all the way; had watched while he slept, and when he halted for refreshment; and had feared to appear before, lest he should be sent back. He had not intended to appear now, but Nicholas had awakened more suddenly than he looked for, and he had had no time to conceal himself.
“Poor fellow!” said Nicholas, “your hard fate denies you any friend but one, and he is nearly as poor and helpless as yourself.”
“May I—may I go with you?” asked Smike, timidly. “I will be your faithful, hard-working servant, I will, indeed. I want no clothes,” added the poor creature, drawing his rags together; “these will do very well. I only want to be near you.”
“And you shall,” cried Nicholas. “And the world shall deal by you as it does by me, till one or both of us shall quit it for a better. Come!”
With these words he strapped his valise on his shoulders, and, taking his stick in one hand, extended the other to the delighted boy; and so they passed out of the old barn together.
And in the days to come—through thick and thin—Smike and Nicholas fought their battles together—and won!
