ty and subserviency of this short
speech, a something like a snarl; and, for a moment, one might have
thought that the white teeth were prone to bite the hand they fawned
upon. But the Major thought nothing about it; and Mr Dombey lay
meditating with his eyes half shut, during the whole of the play, which
lasted until bed-time.

By that time, Mr Carker, though the winner, had mounted high into the
Major's good opinion, insomuch that when he left the Major at his own
room before going to bed, the Major as a special attention, sent the
Native--who always rested on a mattress spread upon the ground at his
master's door--along the gallery, to light him to his room in state.

There was a faint blur on the surface of the mirror in Mr Carker's
chamber, and its reflection was, perhaps, a false one. But it showed,
that night, the image of a man, who saw, in his fancy, a crowd of
people slumbering on the ground at his feet, like the poor Native at his
master's door: who picked his way among them: looking down, maliciously
enough: but trod upon no upturned face--as yet.

CHAPTER 27. Deeper Shadows

Mr Carker the Manager rose with the lark, and went out, walking in the
summer day. His meditations--and he meditated with contracted brows
while he strolled along--hardly seemed to soar as high as the lark, or
to mount in that direction; rather they kept close to their nest upon
the earth, and looked about, among the dust and worms. But there was not
a bird in the air, singing unseen, farther beyond the reach of human eye
than Mr Carker's thoughts. He had his face so perfectly under control,
that few could say more, in distinct terms, of its expression, than that
it smiled or that it pondered. It pondered now, intently. As the lark
rose higher, he sank deeper in thought. As the lark poured out her
melody clearer and stronger, he fell into a graver and profounder
silence. At length, when the lark came headlong down, with an
accumulating stream of song, and dropped among the green wheat near him,
rippling in the breath of the morning like a river, he sprang up from
his reverie, and looked round with a sudden smile, as courteous and
as soft as if he had had numerous observers to propitiate; nor did he
relapse, after being thus awakened; but clearing his face, like one who
bethought himself that it might otherwise wrinkle and tell tales, went
smiling on, as if for practice.

Perhaps with an eye to first impressions, Mr Carker was