
agreeable. He met new groups of his countrymen, who had all a straggling air of
having at one time overblown themselves, like certain uncomfortable kinds of
flowers, and of being, now, mere weeds. They had all an air, too, of lounging
out a limited round, day after day, which strongly reminded him of the
Marshalsea. But, taking no further note of them than was sufficient to give
birth to the reflection, he sought out a certain street and number, which he
kept in his mind.
    »So Pancks said,« he murmured to himself, as he stopped before a dull house
answering to the address. »I suppose his information to be correct, and his
discovery, among Mr. Casby's loose papers, indisputable; but, without it, I
should hardly have supposed this to be a likely place.«
    A dead sort of house, with a dead wall over the way and a dead gateway at
the side, where a pendant bell-handle produced two dead tinkles, and a knocker
produced a dead, flat, surface-tapping, that seemed not to have depth enough in
it to penetrate even the cracked door. However, the door jarred open on a dead
sort of spring; and he closed it behind him as he entered a dull yard, soon
brought to a close at the back by another dead wall, where an attempt had been
made to train some creeping shrubs, which were dead; and to make a little
fountain in a grotto, which was dry; and to decorate that with a little statue,
which was gone.
    The entry to the house was on the left, and it was garnished as the outer
gateway was, with two printed bills in French and English, announcing Furnished
Apartments to let, with immediate possession. A strong cheerful peasant woman,
all stocking, petticoat, white cap, and ear-ring, stood here in a dark doorway,
and said with a pleasant show of teeth, »Ice-say! Seer! Who?«
    Clennam, replying in French, said the English lady; he wished to see the
English lady. »Enter then and ascend, if you please,« returned the peasant
woman, in French likewise. He did both, and followed her up a dark bare
staircase to a back room on the first-floor. Hence, there was a gloomy view of
the yard that was dull, and of the shrubs that were dead, and of the fountain
that was dry, and of the pedestal of the statue that was gone.
    »Monsieur Blandois,«
