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The Floating Press - Charles Dickens

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68 pages

English

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This collaborative short story brings together the creative talents of four of the Victorian era's most popular fiction writers -- Wilkie Collins, Charles Dickens, Elizabeth Gaskell, and Adelaide Anne Procter each contributed a section to the work. When an elderly woman notices signs of activity at a supposedly abandoned home in her neighborhood, she devises a scheme to get to the bottom of the mysterious goings-on.

Informations

Publié par	The Floating Press
Date de parution	01 juillet 2011
Nombre de lectures	0
EAN13	9781775453918
Langue	English

Informations légales : prix de location à la page 0,0134€. Cette information est donnée uniquement à titre indicatif conformément à la législation en vigueur.

Extrait

A HOUSE TO LET
* * *
CHARLES DICKENS
WILKIE COLLINS
ELIZABETH GASKELL

*
A House to Let First published in 1858 ISBN 978-1-775453-91-8 © 2011 The Floating Press and its licensors. All rights reserved. While every effort has been used to ensure the accuracy and reliability of the information contained in The Floating Press edition of this book, The Floating Press does not assume liability or responsibility for any errors or omissions in this book. The Floating Press does not accept responsibility for loss suffered as a result of reliance upon the accuracy or currency of information contained in this book. Do not use while operating a motor vehicle or heavy equipment. Many suitcases look alike. Visit www.thefloatingpress.com
Contents
*
Over the Way The Manchester Marriage Going into Society Three Evenings in the House Trottle's Report Let at Last
Over the Way
*
I had been living at Tunbridge Wells and nowhere else, going on for tenyears, when my medical man—very clever in his profession, and theprettiest player I ever saw in my life of a hand at Long Whist, which wasa noble and a princely game before Short was heard of—said to me, oneday, as he sat feeling my pulse on the actual sofa which my poor dearsister Jane worked before her spine came on, and laid her on a board forfifteen months at a stretch—the most upright woman that ever lived—saidto me, "What we want, ma'am, is a fillip."
"Good gracious, goodness gracious, Doctor Towers!" says I, quite startledat the man, for he was so christened himself: "don't talk as if you werealluding to people's names; but say what you mean."
"I mean, my dear ma'am, that we want a little change of air and scene."
"Bless the man!" said I; "does he mean we or me!"
"I mean you, ma'am."
"Then Lard forgive you, Doctor Towers," I said; "why don't you get into ahabit of expressing yourself in a straightforward manner, like a loyalsubject of our gracious Queen Victoria, and a member of the Church ofEngland?"
Towers laughed, as he generally does when he has fidgetted me into any ofmy impatient ways—one of my states, as I call them—and then he began,—
"Tone, ma'am, Tone, is all you require!" He appealed to Trottle, whojust then came in with the coal-scuttle, looking, in his nice black suit,like an amiable man putting on coals from motives of benevolence.
Trottle (whom I always call my right hand) has been in my service two-and-thirty years. He entered my service, far away from England. He is thebest of creatures, and the most respectable of men; but, opinionated.
"What you want, ma'am," says Trottle, making up the fire in his quiet andskilful way, "is Tone."
"Lard forgive you both!" says I, bursting out a-laughing; "I see you arein a conspiracy against me, so I suppose you must do what you like withme, and take me to London for a change."
For some weeks Towers had hinted at London, and consequently I wasprepared for him. When we had got to this point, we got on soexpeditiously, that Trottle was packed off to London next day but one, tofind some sort of place for me to lay my troublesome old head in.
Trottle came back to me at the Wells after two days' absence, withaccounts of a charming place that could be taken for six months certain,with liberty to renew on the same terms for another six, and which reallydid afford every accommodation that I wanted.
"Could you really find no fault at all in the rooms, Trottle?" I askedhim.
"Not a single one, ma'am. They are exactly suitable to you. There isnot a fault in them. There is but one fault outside of them."
"And what's that?"
"They are opposite a House to Let."
"O!" I said, considering of it. "But is that such a very greatobjection?"
"I think it my duty to mention it, ma'am. It is a dull object to lookat. Otherwise, I was so greatly pleased with the lodging that I shouldhave closed with the terms at once, as I had your authority to do."
Trottle thinking so highly of the place, in my interest, I wished not todisappoint him. Consequently I said:
"The empty House may let, perhaps."
"O, dear no, ma'am," said Trottle, shaking his head with decision; "itwon't let. It never does let, ma'am."
"Mercy me! Why not?"
"Nobody knows, ma'am. All I have to mention is, ma'am, that the Housewon't let!"
"How long has this unfortunate House been to let, in the name ofFortune?" said I.
"Ever so long," said Trottle. "Years."
"Is it in ruins?"
"It's a good deal out of repair, ma'am, but it's not in ruins."
The long and the short of this business was, that next day I had a pairof post-horses put to my chariot—for, I never travel by railway: notthat I have anything to say against railways, except that they came inwhen I was too old to take to them; and that they made ducks and drakesof a few turnpike-bonds I had—and so I went up myself, with Trottle inthe rumble, to look at the inside of this same lodging, and at theoutside of this same House.
As I say, I went and saw for myself. The lodging was perfect. That, Iwas sure it would be; because Trottle is the best judge of comfort Iknow. The empty house was an eyesore; and that I was sure it would betoo, for the same reason. However, setting the one thing against theother, the good against the bad, the lodging very soon got the victoryover the House. My lawyer, Mr. Squares, of Crown Office Row; Temple,drew up an agreement; which his young man jabbered over so dreadfullywhen he read it to me, that I didn't understand one word of it except myown name; and hardly that, and I signed it, and the other party signedit, and, in three weeks' time, I moved my old bones, bag and baggage, upto London.
For the first month or so, I arranged to leave Trottle at the Wells. Imade this arrangement, not only because there was a good deal to takecare of in the way of my school-children and pensioners, and also of anew stove in the hall to air the house in my absence, which appeared tome calculated to blow up and burst; but, likewise because I suspectTrottle (though the steadiest of men, and a widower between sixty andseventy) to be what I call rather a Philanderer. I mean, that when anyfriend comes down to see me and brings a maid, Trottle is alwaysremarkably ready to show that maid the Wells of an evening; and that Ihave more than once noticed the shadow of his arm, outside the room doornearly opposite my chair, encircling that maid's waist on the landing,like a table-cloth brush.
Therefore, I thought it just as well, before any London Philandering tookplace, that I should have a little time to look round me, and to see whatgirls were in and about the place. So, nobody stayed with me in my newlodging at first after Trottle had established me there safe and sound,but Peggy Flobbins, my maid; a most affectionate and attached woman, whonever was an object of Philandering since I have known her, and is notlikely to begin to become so after nine-and-twenty years next March.
It was the fifth of November when I first breakfasted in my new rooms.The Guys were going about in the brown fog, like magnified monsters ofinsects in table-beer, and there was a Guy resting on the door-steps ofthe House to Let. I put on my glasses, partly to see how the boys werepleased with what I sent them out by Peggy, and partly to make sure thatshe didn't approach too near the ridiculous object, which of course wasfull of sky-rockets, and might go off into bangs at any moment. In thisway it happened that the first time I ever looked at the House to Let,after I became its opposite neighbour, I had my glasses on. And thismight not have happened once in fifty times, for my sight is uncommonlygood for my time of life; and I wear glasses as little as I can, for fearof spoiling it.
I knew already that it was a ten-roomed house, very dirty, and muchdilapidated; that the area-rails were rusty and peeling away, and thattwo or three of them were wanting, or half-wanting; that there werebroken panes of glass in the windows, and blotches of mud on other panes,which the boys had thrown at them; that there was quite a collection ofstones in the area, also proceeding from those Young Mischiefs; thatthere were games chalked on the pavement before the house, and likenessesof ghosts chalked on the street-door; that the windows were all darkenedby rotting old blinds, or shutters, or both; that the bills "To Let," hadcurled up, as if the damp air of the place had given them cramps; or haddropped down into corners, as if they were no more. I had seen all thison my first visit, and I had remarked to Trottle, that the lower part ofthe black board about terms was split away; that the rest had becomeillegible, and that the very stone of the door-steps was broken across.Notwithstanding, I sat at my breakfast table on that Please to Rememberthe fifth of November morning, staring at the House through my glasses,as if I had never looked at it before.
All at once—in the first-floor window on my right—down in a low corner,at a hole in a blind or a shutter—I found that I was looking at a secretEye. The reflection of my fire may have touched it and made it shine;but, I saw it shine and vanish.
The eye might have seen me, or it might not have seen me, sitting therein the glow of my fire—you can take which probability you prefer,without offence—but something struck through my frame, as if the sparkleof this eye had been electric, and had flashed straight at me. It hadsuch an effect upon me, that I could not remain by myself, and I rang forFlobbins, and invented some little jobs for her, to keep her in the room.After my breakfast was cleared away, I sat in the same place with myglasses on, moving my head, now so, and now so, trying whether, with theshining of my fire and the flaws in the window-glass, I could reproduceany sparkle seeming to be up there, that was like the sparkle of an eye.But no; I could make nothing like it. I could make ripples and crookedlines in the front of the House to Let, and I could even twist one windowup and loop it into another