 this point, but to
consider it a very important part of your instructions.«
    Mr. Carker bowed his head, and rising from the table, and standing
thoughtfully before the fire, with his hand to his smooth chin, looked down at
Mr. Dombey with the evil slyness of some monkish carving, half human and half
brute; or like a leering face on an old water-spout. Mr. Dombey, recovering his
composure by degrees, or cooling his emotion in his sense of having taken a high
position, sat gradually stiffening again, and looking at the parrot as she swung
to and fro, in her great wedding ring.
    »I beg your pardon,« said Carker, after a silence, suddenly resuming his
chair, and drawing it opposite to Mr. Dombey's, »but let me understand. Mrs.
Dombey is aware of the probability of your making me the organ of your
displeasure?«
    »Yes,« replied Mr. Dombey. »I have said so.«
    »Yes,« rejoined Carker, quickly; »but why?«
    »Why!« Mr. Dombey repeated, not without hesitation. »Because I told her.«
    »Aye,« replied Carker. »But why did you tell her? You see,« he continued
with a smile, and softly laying his velvet hand, as a cat might have laid its
sheathed claws, on Mr. Dombey's arm; »if I perfectly understand what is in your
mind, I am so much more likely to be useful, and to have the happiness of being
effectually employed. I think I do understand. I have not the honour of Mrs.
Dombey's good opinion. In my position, I have no reason to expect it; but I take
the fact to be, that I have not got it?«
    »Possibly not,« said Mr. Dombey.
    »Consequently,« pursued Carker, »your making these communications to Mrs.
Dombey through me, is sure to be particularly unpalatable to that lady?«
    »It appears to me,« said Mr. Dombey, with haughty reserve, and yet with some
embarrassment, »that Mrs. Dombey's views upon the subject form no part of it as
it presents itself to you and me, Carker. But it may be so.«
    »And - pardon me - do I misconceive you,« said Carker, »when I think you
descry in this, a likely means of humbling Mrs. Dombey's pride - I use the word
as expressive of a quality which
