CHAPTER I

TWO BREAKFASTS IN CLOISTERHAM

SERVICE is over — the early morning service in the old Cathedral of the ancient city of Cloisterham, and the few who have composed the small congregation are rapidly dispersing in various directions, when one of the Minor Canons, Mr. Crisparkle, stumbles over something lying crouched upon the ground at his feet; and saving himself with a start from the imminent danger of falling forward on his face, nearly goes to the other extreme of falling on his back.

Now for one who prides himself — and with reason — on the keenness of his vision, such a mishap, barely averted, is trying, to say the least; and when further aggravated by the cause, which grins up at you, delighted at your discomfiture, raising, at the same time, a stone threateningly, is very trying. The Minor Canon has a fine temper, but he says, sternly —

“What are you doing here, and what do you mean by lying right in my way like that?”

“What I’m a doin’ here?” says the ragged urchin, who calls himself Deputy; “a purty question that, for a clergyman and a minor canon! Hain’t I as much right to go to the Kinfreederal as you yourself? What do you mean by a falling over me, and a kickin’ my shins, without so much as a widdy warning? I’m man-servant in attendance on Her Royal’Ighness, the Princess Puffer, and I’m a waiting here fur to conduct her ‘ome.”

And Deputy, sharp-eyed and fleet of foot, slips past Mr. Crisparkle, and disappears round a corner, where a miserably-attired and trembling old woman has preceded him.

Mr. Crisparkle, in the course of a few minutes, arrives at the cosy home, upon the threshold of which he is accustomed to throw away all disagreeable thoughts. There he calls up a smile to his lips, assumes his usually elastic tread, and, humming a portion of the anthem so beautifully sung that morning by Mr. Jasper, the choir-master, and his choir, softly opens the dining-room door, whereupon his nose is welcomed by a mixture of Mocha, rasher and chop perfume, deliciously blended; and he himself by a charming little old lady, daintily attired as a china shepherdess, and radiant to behold. After an affectionate salutation of her, he sits down and attacks his breakfast with a good appetite. She watches him for a while, and then says —

“Septimus, tell me what has happened to vex you; for that something has, even my old eyes are still sharp enough to see. You brought a load upon your heart home from London. You took that load with you to the Cathedral, and you haven’t left it there, in spite of your singing and your brisk step. From your earliest infancy, your mind was always an open book for me; don’t, don’t shut it now.”

Here the old lady’s voice falters, and the tears rise to her bright eyes. A short pause, and the son slowly and hesitatingly speaks —

“You may be sure that you would be the first I should open my heart to on any and every occasion; and if on this one point I have kept it closed, it is because, unfortunately, you and I differ very much about it.”

The old lady rises, rings the bell, paces up and down the room in a hurried and nervous manner while the neat maid-servant clears away the things. Then, drawing a chair close to her son, and seating herself, she fixes her bright eyes keenly upon his troubled face, and speaks to this effect —

“Now that the plunge is made, and the ice broken, Sept, let me hear the whole. I don’t agree with you, and I tell you so beforehand; I do differ from you, and you may as well know it to begin with; but your troubles are my troubles, and your fears and anxieties must be mine, too. You have been to see Mr. Neville?”

“I have, ma.”

“And you visit him every time you go to London?”

“Certainly I do,” says the Minor Canon, and his troubled face becomes suddenly illuminated with a proud, exultant smile, which vanishes, however, immediately, though not before the anxious, scrutinising eyes of his mother have seized upon it and stored it up for future and careful examination. “Certainly, ma; it is all I can do for him now, poor fellow! But you must not imagine that my troubled thoughts came from him. It would, indeed, be impossible to meet him and his sister unmoved; to see how patiently they bear an affliction, so great, so terrible, that it would be no wonder if they sank under it.