nd no one understood him. Mrs Blimber thought him 'odd,'
and sometimes the servants said among themselves that little Dombey
'moped;' but that was all.

Unless young Toots had some idea on the subject, to the expression of
which he was wholly unequal. Ideas, like ghosts (according to the common
notion of ghosts), must be spoken to a little before they will explain
themselves; and Toots had long left off asking any questions of his own
mind. Some mist there may have been, issuing from that leaden casket,
his cranium, which, if it could have taken shape and form, would have
become a genie; but it could not; and it only so far followed the
example of the smoke in the Arabian story, as to roll out in a thick
cloud, and there hang and hover. But it left a little figure visible
upon a lonely shore, and Toots was always staring at it.

'How are you?' he would say to Paul, fifty times a day. 'Quite well,
Sir, thank you,' Paul would answer. 'Shake hands,' would be Toots's next
advance.

Which Paul, of course, would immediately do. Mr Toots generally said
again, after a long interval of staring and hard breathing, 'How are
you?' To which Paul again replied, 'Quite well, Sir, thank you.'

One evening Mr Toots was sitting at his desk, oppressed by
correspondence, when a great purpose seemed to flash upon him. He laid
down his pen, and went off to seek Paul, whom he found at last, after a
long search, looking through the window of his little bedroom.

'I say!' cried Toots, speaking the moment he entered the room, lest he
should forget it; 'what do you think about?'

'Oh! I think about a great many things,' replied Paul.

'Do you, though?' said Toots, appearing to consider that fact in itself
surprising. 'If you had to die,' said Paul, looking up into his face--Mr
Toots started, and seemed much disturbed.

'Don't you think you would rather die on a moonlight night, when the sky
was quite clear, and the wind blowing, as it did last night?'

Mr Toots said, looking doubtfully at Paul, and shaking his head, that he
didn't know about that.

'Not blowing, at least,' said Paul, 'but sounding in the air like the
sea sounds in the shells. It was a beautiful night. When I had listened
to the water for a long time, I got up and looked out. There was a boat
over there, in the full light of the moon; a boat with a sail.'

The child looked at him so steadfastly, and spoke so earnestly, that
Mr Toots, feeling himself called upon to say