Chapter VI.
THE WAX-WORK SHOW.
When they had travelled slowly forward for some short distance, Nell looked timidly round the caravan. One half of it was carpeted, and so cut off at the farther end as to form a sleeping-place, which was shaded, like the little windows, with fair white curtains, though it was very small.
The other half served for a kitchen, and was fitted up with a stove, whose small chimney passed through the roof. It also held a larder, several chests, a great pitcher of water, a few cooking utensils and pieces of crockery.
The lady of the caravan sat at one window and little Nell and her grandfather sat at the other, while the machine jogged slowly onward. At first the two travellers spoke little, and only in whispers; but as they grew more used to the place they began to talk about the country through which they were passing, until the old man fell asleep. The lady of the caravan then asked Nell to come and sit beside her.
“Well, child,” she said, “how do you like this way of travelling?”
Nell replied that she thought it was very pleasant indeed. The lady of the caravan sat looking at the child for a long time in silence. Then, getting up, she brought out from a corner a large roll of canvas, about a yard in width, which she laid upon the floor, and spread open with her foot until it nearly reached from one end of the caravan to the other.
“There, child,” she said, “read that.”
Nell walked down it, and read aloud, in huge black letters, the words “JARLEY’S WAX-WORK.”
“Read it again,” said the lady.
“Jarley’s Wax-work,” repeated Nell.
“That’s me,” said the lady. “I am Mrs. Jarley.”
Giving the child a pleasant look, the lady of the caravan unfolded another scroll, on which were the words “One hundred figures the full size of life;” and then another, on which was written, “The only real wax-work in the world.”
When she had shown these to the astonished child, she brought forth several handbills used to announce the show, one of which ran:—
“If I knowed a donkey wot wouldn’t go
To see Mrs. Jarley’s wax-work show,
Do you think I’d acknowledge him?
Oh; no, no!
Then run to Jarley’s.”
When she had shown all these treasures to her young companion, Mrs. Jarley rolled them up, and having put them carefully away, sat down again, and looked at the child in triumph.
“Never go into the company of a Punch any more,” said Mrs. Jarley, “after this.”
“I never saw any wax-work, ma’am,” said Nell. “Is it funnier than Punch?”
“Funnier!” said Mrs. Jarley in a shrill voice. “It is not funny at all.”
“Oh!” said Nell very humbly.
“It isn’t funny at all,” repeated Mrs. Jarley. “It’s calm and—classical. No low beatings and knockings about, no jokings and squeakings, like your precious Punches, but always the same, and so like life that if wax-work only spoke and walked about, you’d hardly know the difference. I won’t go so far as to say that, as it is, I’ve seen wax-work quite like life, but I’ve certainly seen some life that was exactly like wax-work.”
“Is it here, ma’am?” asked Nell.
“Is what here, child?”
“The wax-work, ma’am.”
“Why, bless you, child, what are you thinking of? How could it be here, where you see everything except the inside of one little cupboard and a few boxes? It’s gone on in the other vans to the next town, and there it’ll be shown the day after to-morrow. You are going to the same town, and you’ll see it, I dare say. I suppose you couldn’t stop away if you was to try ever so much.”
“I shall not be in the town, I think, ma’am,” said the child.
“Not there!” cried Mrs. Jarley. “Then where will you be?”
“I—I—don’t quite know. I am not certain.”
“You don’t mean to say that you don’t know where you’re going to!” said the lady of the caravan. “What line are you in? You looked to me at the races, child, as if you were quite out of your place.”
“We were there quite by accident,” returned Nell; “we are poor people, ma’am, and are only wandering about. We have nothing to do; I wish we had.”
“You amaze me more and more,” said Mrs. Jarley after a while. “Why, what do you call yourselves? Not beggars?”
“Indeed, ma’am, I don’t know what else we are,” returned the child.
“Lord bless me!” said the lady of the caravan. “I never heard of such a thing. Who’d have thought it?”
She remained so long silent after this that Nell feared she was vexed. At length she said,—
“And yet you can read. And write too, I shouldn’t wonder?”
“Yes, ma’am,” said the child timidly.
“Well, and what a thing that is!” returned Mrs. Jarley. “I can’t.”
Nell said, “Indeed!” in a tone of surprise and doubt. Mrs. Jarley said no more, and after a while Nell withdrew to the other window and sat down near her grandfather, who was now awake.
After a while the lady of the caravan roused herself, and calling the driver to come under the window at which she was seated, spoke to him in a low tone of voice, as if she were asking his advice. This talk at length ended, she drew in her head again, and bade Nell come near.
“And the old gentleman too,” said Mrs. Jarley; “for I want to have a word with him.—Do you want a good place for your grandchild, master? If you do, I can put her in a way of getting one. What do you say?”
“I can’t leave her,” answered the old man. “What would become of me without her?”
“I should have thought you were old enough to take care of yourself, if ever you will be,” said Mrs. Jarley sharply.
“But he never will be,” said the child, in an earnest whisper. “I fear he never will be again. Pray do not speak harshly to him. We are very thankful to you,” she added aloud; “but neither of us could part from the other if all the wealth of the world were halved between us.”
Mrs. Jarley was a little taken aback at this, and looked somewhat crossly at the old man, who took Nell’s hand and kept it in his own. After a pause, she thrust her head out of the window again, and spoke once more to the driver.
Then she said to the old man, “If you work for yourself, there would be plenty for you to do in the way of helping to dust the figures, taking the checks, and so forth. What I want your grandchild for, is to point ’em out to the company.
“That would soon be learnt,” the lady went on, “and she has a way with her that people would like, though she does come after me; for I’ve always been used to go round with visitors myself, which I should keep on doing now, only that I do need a little ease.”
Then Mrs. Jarley said that as for salary she could not pledge herself until she had tested Nell’s fitness for the work. But board and lodging, both for her and her grandfather, she would give; and she also passed her word that the food should be always good and plentiful.
Nell and her grandfather talked it over; and while they were doing so Mrs. Jarley, with her hands behind her, walked up and down the caravan, as she had walked after tea on the green, with great dignity.
“Now, child?” cried Mrs. Jarley, coming to a halt, as Nell turned towards her.
“We are very much obliged to you, ma’am,” said Nell, “and will do as you wish.”
“And you’ll never be sorry for it,” returned Mrs. Jarley. “I am pretty sure of that. So as that’s all settled, let us have a bit of supper.”
In the meantime the caravan rolled on, and came at last upon the paved streets of a town, which were very quiet; for it was by this time near midnight, and the people were all abed. As it was too late to go to the exhibition room, they turned aside into a piece of waste ground that lay just within the old town gate, and drew up there for the night, near to another caravan in which part of the famous wax-work show had travelled.
This caravan, being now empty, was given to the old man as his sleeping-place; and within its wooden walls Nell made him up the best bed she could. For herself, she was to sleep in Mrs. Jarley’s own van as a special mark of that lady’s favour.
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