As my sister's.
As my own.
I hear Conversation Kenge and the rest of them say to the new faces,
'Here's little Miss Flite.
Oh, you are new here; and you must come and be presented to little Miss Flite!'
Ve-ry good.
Proud I am sure to have the honour!
And we all laugh.
But, Fitz Jarndyce, I know what will happen.
I know, far better than they do, when the attraction has begun.
I know the signs, my dear.
I saw them begin in Gridley.
And I saw them end.
Fitz Jarndyce, my love," speaking low again, "I saw them beginning in our friend the ward in Jarndyce.
Let some one hold him back.
Or he'll be drawn to ruin."
She looked at me in silence for some moments, with her face gradually softening into a smile.
Seeming to fear that she had been too gloomy, and seeming also to lose the connexion in her mind, she said politely as she sipped her glass of wine,
"Yes, my dear, as I was saying, I expect a judgment shortly.
Then I shall release my birds, you know, and confer estates."
I was much impressed by her allusion to Richard and by the sad meaning, so sadly illustrated in her poor pinched form, that made its way through all her incoherence.
But happily for her, she was quite complacent again now and beamed with nods and smiles.
"But, my dear," she said, gaily, reaching another hand to put it upon mine.
"You have not congratulated me on my physician.
Positively not once, yet!"
I was obliged to confess that I did not quite know what she meant.
"My physician, Mr. Woodcourt, my dear, who was so exceedingly attentive to me.
Though his services were rendered quite gratuitously.
Until the Day of Judgment.
I mean THE judgment that will dissolve the spell upon me of the mace and seal."
"Mr. Woodcourt is so far away, now," said I, "that I thought the time for such congratulation was past, Miss Flite."
"But, my child," she returned, "is it possible that you don't know what has happened?"
"No," said I.
"Not what everybody has been talking of, my beloved Fitz Jarndyce!"
"No," said I.
"You forget how long I have been here."
"True!
My dear, for the moment--true.
I blame myself.
But my memory has been drawn out of me, with everything else, by what I mentioned.
Ve-ry strong influence, is it not?
Well, my dear, there has been a terrible shipwreck over in those East Indian seas."
"Mr. Woodcourt shipwrecked!"
"Don't be agitated, my dear.
He is safe.
An awful scene.
Death in all shapes.
Hundreds of dead and dying.
Fire, storm, and darkness.
Numbers of the drowning thrown upon a rock.