So
travelling had done him that much good, already.
Mr Bevan knocked at the door of a very neat house of moderate size, from
the parlour windows of which, lights were shining brightly into the now
dark street. It was quickly opened by a man with such a thoroughly Irish
face, that it seemed as if he ought, as a matter of right and principle,
to be in rags, and could have no sort of business to be looking
cheerfully at anybody out of a whole suit of clothes.
Commending Mark to the care of this phenomenon--for such he may be said
to have been in Martin's eyes--Mr Bevan led the way into the room
which had shed its cheerfulness upon the street, to whose occupants he
introduced Mr Chuzzlewit as a gentleman from England, whose acquaintance
he had recently had the pleasure to make. They gave him welcome in all
courtesy and politeness; and in less than five minutes' time he found
himself sitting very much at his ease by the fireside, and becoming
vastly well acquainted with the whole family.
There were two young ladies--one eighteen; the other twenty--both very
slender, but very pretty; their mother, who looked, as Martin thought
much older and more faded than she ought to have looked; and their
grandmother, a little sharp-eyed, quick old woman, who seemed to have
got past that stage, and to have come all right again.
Pages:
524
525
526
527
528
529
530
531
532
533
534
535
536
537
538
539
540
541
542
543
544
545
546
547
548