opposite; the
violoncello lying snugly on the sofa between them.

'You will not be surprised at my coming alone, or at John's not having
told you I was coming,' said Harriet; 'and you will believe that, when I
tell you why I have come. May I do so now?'

'You can do nothing better.'

'You were not busy?'

He pointed to the violoncello lying on the sofa, and said 'I have been,
all day. Here's my witness. I have been confiding all my cares to it. I
wish I had none but my own to tell.'

'Is the House at an end?' said Harriet, earnestly.

'Completely at an end.'

'Will it never be resumed?'

'Never.'

The bright expression of her face was not overshadowed as her lips
silently repeated the word. He seemed to observe this with some little
involuntary surprise: and said again:

'Never. You remember what I told you. It has been, all along, impossible
to convince him; impossible to reason with him; sometimes, impossible
even to approach him. The worst has happened; and the House has fallen,
never to be built up any more.'

'And Mr Dombey, is he personally ruined?'

'Ruined.'

'Will he have no private fortune left? Nothing?'

A certain eagerness in her voice, and something that was almost joyful
in her look, seemed to surprise him more and more; to disappoint him
too, and jar discordantly against his own emotions. He drummed with the
fingers of one hand on the table, looking wistfully at her, and shaking
his head, said, after a pause:

'The extent of Mr Dombey's resources is not accurately within my
knowledge; but though they are doubtless very large, his obligations are
enormous. He is a gentleman of high honour and integrity. Any man in
his position could, and many a man in his position would, have saved
himself, by making terms which would have very slightly, almost
insensibly, increased the losses of those who had had dealings with him,
and left him a remnant to live upon. But he is resolved on payment to
the last farthing of his means. His own words are, that they will clear,
or nearly clear, the House, and that no one can lose much. Ah, Miss
Harriet, it would do us no harm to remember oftener than we do, that
vices are sometimes only virtues carried to excess! His pride shows well
in this.'

She heard him with little or no change in her expression, and with a
divided attention that showed her to be busy with something in her own
mind. When he was silent, she asked him hurriedly:

'Have you seen him l