So Florence's adventure turned out very well in one way, since through
it she first met Walter Gay; but it turned out badly in another way, for
Mr. Dombey was angry that any one should have seen a daughter of his in
such a plight, and, unjustly enough, treasured this anger against
Walter. Florence, however, never forgot her rescuer after that day, and
as for Walter, he fell quite in love with her.

Florence loved her little brother very dearly, but Paul, in the constant
companionship of his father, grew up without boys or play. His face was
old and wistful, and he had an old-fashioned way of sitting, brooding
in his little arm-chair beside his father, looking into the fire. He
used to ask strange, wise questions, and the only time he seemed
childlike at all was when he was with Florence. He was never strong and
well, like her, but he grew tired easily, and used to say that his bones
ached.

Mr. Dombey at length grew anxious about Paul's health and sent him with
Florence to Brighton, a town on the sea-coast, to the house of a Mrs.
Pipchin, a stooped old lady with a mottled face, a hooked nose and a
hard gray eye.

Mrs. Pipchin took little children to board, and her idea of "managing"
them was to give them everything they didn't like and nothing they did
like. She lived in a gloomy house, so windy that it always sounded to
any one in it like a great shell which one had to hold to his ear
whether he liked it or not. The children there stayed most of the time
in a bare room they called "the dungeon," with a big ragged fireplace in
it. They, had only bread and butter and rice to eat, while Mrs. Pipchin
had tea and mutton chops and buttered toast and other nice things.

Little Paul's father did not know what a dreary place this was for a
child, or doubtless he would not have sent him there. Mr. Dombey knew so
little about children that it seemed as if he had never been a child
himself. Paul was not happy--except when he was out on the beach with
Florence, who used to draw him in a little carriage and sing to him and
tell him stories. Once a week Mr. Dombey came to Brighton and then she
and little Paul would go to his hotel to take tea with him.

Paul seemed to find a curious fascination in Mrs. Pipchin. He would sit
by the hour before the fire looking steadily at her, where she sat with
her old black cat beside her, till his gaze quite disturbed her. He did
not care to play with other children--only with Florence, whom