It was his last demonstration for that time, but in the interval before
the day of his departure he was very imperious with the lawyers
concerned in his release, and a good deal of business was transacted.
Mr. Arthur Clennam received a cheque for £24 93. 8d. from the solicitors
of Edward Dorrit, Esq.--once "Tip"--with a note that the favour of the
advance now repaid had not been asked of him.
To the applications made by collegians within the so-soon-to-be-orphaned
Marshalsea for small sums of money, Mr. Dorrit responded with the
greatest liberality. He also invited the whole College to a
comprehensive entertainment in the yard, and went about among the
company on that occasion, and took notice of individuals, like a baron
of the olden time, in a rare good humour.
And now the final hour arrived when he and his family were to leave the
prison for ever. The carriage was reported ready in the outer courtyard.
Mr. Dorrit and his brother proceeded arm in arm, Edward Dorrit, Esq.,
and his sister Fanny followed, also arm in arm.
There was not a collegian within doors, nor a turnkey absent, as they
crossed the yard. Mr. Dorrit--whose meat and drink had many a time been
bought with money presented by some of those who stood to watch him
go--yielding to the vast speculation how the poor creatures were to get
on without him, was great, and sad, but not absorbed. He patted children
on the head like Sir Roger de Coverley going to church, spoke to people
in the background by their Christian names, and condescended to all
present.
At last three honest cheers announced that he had passed the gate, and
that the Marshalsea was an orphan.
Only when the family had got into their carriage, and not before, Miss
Fanny exclaimed, "Good gracious I Where's Amy?"
Her father had thought she was with her sister. Her sister had thought
she was somewhere or other. They had all trusted to find her, as they
had always done, quietly in the right place at the right moment. This
going away was, perhaps, the very first action of their joint lives that
they had got through without her.
"Now I do say, Pa," cried Miss Fanny, flushed and indignant, "that this
is disgraceful! Here is that child, Amy, in her ugly old shabby dress.
Disgracing us at the last moment by being carried out in that dress
after all. And by that Mr. Clennam too!"
Clennam appeared at the carriage-door, bearing the little insensible
figure in his arms.
"She has been forgotten," he said. "I ran up to her room, and found the
door open, and that she had fainted on the floor."
They received her in the carriage, and the attendant, getting between
Clennam and the carriage-door, with a sharp "By your leave, sir!"
bundled up the steps, and drove away.
_IV.--Another Prisoner in the Marshalsea_
The Dorrit family travelled abroad in handsome style, and in due time
Miss Fanny married.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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