'am, can have been present, and failed to
mark the insulting freedom that their every look bespoke? Is it possible that
you can have avoided seeing, that these libertines, in their utter disrespect
for you, and utter disregard of all gentlemanly behaviour, and almost of
decency, have had but one object in introducing themselves here, and that the
furtherance of their designs upon a friendless, helpless girl, who, without this
humiliating confession, might have hoped to receive from one so much her senior
something like womanly aid and sympathy? I do not - I cannot believe it!«
    If poor Kate had possessed the slightest knowledge of the world, she
certainly would not have ventured, even in the excitement into which she had
been lashed, upon such an injudicious speech as this. Its effect was precisely
what a more experienced observer would have foreseen. Mrs. Wititterly received
the attack upon her veracity with exemplary calmness, and listened with the most
heroic fortitude to Kate's account of her own sufferings. But allusion being
made to her being held in disregard by the gentlemen, she evinced violent
emotion, and this blow was no sooner followed up by the remark concerning her
seniority, than she fell back upon the sofa, uttering dismal screams.
    »What is the matter!« cried Mr. Wititterly, bouncing into the room.
»Heavens, what do I see! Julia! Julia! look up, my life, look up!«
    But Julia looked down most perseveringly, and screamed still louder! so Mr.
Wititterly rang the bell, and danced in a frenzied manner round the sofa on
which Mrs. Wititterly lay; uttering perpetual cries for Sir Tumley Snuffim, and
never once leaving off to ask for any explanation of the scene before him.
    »Run for Sir Tumley,« cried Mr. Wititterly, menacing the page with both
fists. »I knew it, Miss Nickleby,« he said, looking round with an air of
melancholy triumph, »that society has been too much for her. This is all soul,
you know, every bit of it.« With this assurance Mr. Wititterly took up the
prostrate form of Mrs. Wititterly, and carried her bodily off to bed.
    Kate waited until Sir Tumley Snuffim had paid his visit and looked in with a
report, that, through the special interposition of a merciful Providence (thus
spake Sir Tumley), Mrs. Wititterly had gone to sleep. She then hastily attired
herself for walking, and leaving word that she should return within a couple of
hours, hurried away towards her uncle's house.
