e:

'I say! Little Mother!'

'Yes, Maggy.'

'If you an't got no secret of your own to tell him, tell him that about
the Princess. She had a secret, you know.'

'The Princess had a secret?' said Clennam, in some surprise. 'What
Princess was that, Maggy?'

'Lor! How you do go and bother a gal of ten,' said Maggy, 'catching the
poor thing up in that way. Whoever said the Princess had a secret? _I_
never said so.'

'I beg your pardon. I thought you did.'

'No, I didn't. How could I, when it was her as wanted to find it out? It
was the little woman as had the secret, and she was always a spinning at
her wheel. And so she says to her, why do you keep it there? And so the
t'other one says to her, no I don't; and so the t'other one says to her,
yes you do; and then they both goes to the cupboard, and there it is.
And she wouldn't go into the Hospital, and so she died. You know, Little
Mother; tell him that.

For it was a reg'lar good secret, that was!' cried Maggy, hugging
herself.

Arthur looked at Little Dorrit for help to comprehend this, and was
struck by seeing her so timid and red. But, when she told him that it
was only a Fairy Tale she had one day made up for Maggy, and that there
was nothing in it which she wouldn't be ashamed to tell again to anybody
else, even if she could remember it, he left the subject where it was.

However, he returned to his own subject by first entreating her to see
him oftener, and to remember that it was impossible to have a stronger
interest in her welfare than he had, or to be more set upon promoting it
than he was. When she answered fervently, she well knew that, she never
forgot it, he touched upon his second and more delicate point--the
suspicion he had formed.

'Little Dorrit,' he said, taking her hand again, and speaking lower than
he had spoken yet, so that even Maggy in the small room could not hear
him, 'another word. I have wanted very much to say this to you; I have
tried for opportunities. Don't mind me, who, for the matter of years,
might be your father or your uncle. Always think of me as quite an
old man. I know that all your devotion centres in this room, and
that nothing to the last will ever tempt you away from the duties you
discharge here. If I were not sure of it, I should, before now, have
implored you, and implored your father, to let me make some provision
for you in a more suitable place. But you may have an interest--I will
not say, now, though even