APTER 55

Of Family Matters, Cares, Hopes, Disappointments, and Sorrows

Although Mrs Nickleby had been made acquainted by her son and daughter
with every circumstance of Madeline Bray's history which was known to
them; although the responsible situation in which Nicholas stood had
been carefully explained to her, and she had been prepared, even for
the possible contingency of having to receive the young lady in her
own house, improbable as such a result had appeared only a few minutes
before it came about, still, Mrs Nickleby, from the moment when this
confidence was first reposed in her, late on the previous evening, had
remained in an unsatisfactory and profoundly mystified state, from which
no explanations or arguments could relieve her, and which every fresh
soliloquy and reflection only aggravated more and more.

'Bless my heart, Kate!' so the good lady argued; 'if the Mr Cheerybles
don't want this young lady to be married, why don't they file a bill
against the Lord Chancellor, make her a Chancery ward, and shut her
up in the Fleet prison for safety?--I have read of such things in the
newspapers a hundred times. Or, if they are so very fond of her as
Nicholas says they are, why don't they marry her themselves--one of them
I mean? And even supposing they don't want her to be married, and don't
want to marry her themselves, why in the name of wonder should Nicholas
go about the world, forbidding people's banns?'

'I don't think you quite understand,' said Kate, gently.

'Well I am sure, Kate, my dear, you're very polite!' replied Mrs
Nickleby. 'I have been married myself I hope, and I have seen other
people married. Not understand, indeed!'

'I know you have had great experience, dear mama,' said Kate; 'I mean
that perhaps you don't quite understand all the circumstances in this
instance. We have stated them awkwardly, I dare say.'

'That I dare say you have,' retorted her mother, briskly. 'That's very
likely. I am not to be held accountable for that; though, at the same
time, as the circumstances speak for themselves, I shall take the
liberty, my love, of saying that I do understand them, and perfectly
well too; whatever you and Nicholas may choose to think to the contrary.
Why is such a great fuss made because this Miss Magdalen is going to
marry somebody who is older than herself? Your poor papa was older than
I was, four years and a half older. Jane Dibabs--the Dibabses lived in
the beautiful little th