“I don’t mean that,” said Mrs. Boffin, with a worried look, “but I mean, don’t believe him to be anything but good and generous, Bella, because he is the best of men. No, I must say that much, Noddy. You are always the best of men.”

She made the declaration as if he were objecting to it: which assuredly he was not in any way.

“And as to you, my dear Bella,” said Mrs. Boffin, still with that distressed expression, “he is so much attached to you, whatever he says, that your own father has not a truer interest in you and can hardly like you better than he does.”

“Says too!” cried Mr. Boffin. “Whatever he says! Why, I say so, openly. Give me a kiss, my dear child, in saying Good Night, and let me confirm what my old lady tells you. I am very fond of you, my dear, and I am entirely of your mind, and you and I will take care that you shall be rich. These good looks of yours (which you have some right to be vain of, my dear, though you are not, you know) are worth money, and you shall make money of ’em. The money you will have, will be worth money, and you shall make money of that too. There’s a golden ball at your feet. Good night, my dear.”

Somehow, Bella was not so well pleased with this assurance and this prospect as she might have been. Somehow, when she put her arms round Mrs. Boffin’s neck and said Good Night, she derived a sense of unworthiness from the still anxious face of that good woman and her obvious wish to excuse her husband. “Why, what need to excuse him?” thought Bella, sitting down in her own room. “What he said was very sensible, I am sure, and very true, I am sure. It is only what I often say to myself. Don’t I like it then? No, I don’t like it, and, though he is my liberal benefactor, I disparage him for it. Then pray,” said Bella, sternly putting the question to herself in the looking-glass as usual, “what do you mean by this, you inconsistent little Beast?”

The looking-glass preserving a discreet ministerial silence when thus called upon for explanation, Bella went to bed with a weariness upon her spirit which was more than the weariness of want of sleep. And again in the morning, she looked for the cloud, and for the deepening of the cloud, upon the Golden Dustman’s face.

She had begun by this time to be his frequent companion in his morning strolls about the streets, and it was at this time that he made her a party to his engaging in a curious pursuit. Having been hard at work in one dull enclosure all his life, he had a child’s delight in looking at shops. It had been one of the first novelties and pleasures of his freedom, and was equally the delight of his wife. For many years their only walks in London had been taken on Sundays when the shops were shut; and when every day in the week became their holiday, they derived an enjoyment from the variety and fancy and beauty of the display in the windows, which seemed incapable of exhaustion. As if the principal streets were a great Theatre and the play were childishly new to them, Mr. and Mrs. Boffin, from the beginning of Bella’s intimacy in their house, had been constantly in the front row, charmed with all they saw and applauding vigorously. But now, Mr. Boffin’s interest began to centre in book-shops; and more than that — for that of itself would not have been much — in one exceptional kind of book.

“Look in here, my dear,” Mr. Boffin would say, checking Bella’s arm at a bookseller’s window; “you can read at sight, and your eyes are as sharp as they’re bright. Now, look well about you, my dear, and tell me if you see any book about a Miser.”

If Bella saw such a book, Mr. Boffin would instantly dart in and buy it. And still, as if they had not found it, they would seek out another book-shop, and Mr. Boffin would say, “Now, look well all round, my dear, for a Life of a Miser, or any book of that sort; any Lives of odd characters who may have been Misers.”

Bella, thus directed, would examine the window with the greatest attention, while Mr. Boffin would examine her face. The moment she pointed out any book as being entitled Lives of eccentric personages, Anecdotes of strange characters, Records of remarkable individuals, or anything to that purpose, Mr. Boffin’s countenance would light up, and he would instantly dart in and buy it. Size, price, quality, were of no account. Any