The child, bending down to listen to his words, could not help

remarking with what brightened eyes he continued to speak and

muse.

Yes,' he said, with a faint smile, 'it was the same when I was quite a

baby, and crawled about it, till I fell asleep. My father watched it then.'

Had you no mother?' asked the child.

No, she was dead. Women work hard in these parts. She worked

herself to death they told me, and, as they said so then, the fire has

gone on saying the same thing ever since. I suppose it was true. I have

always believed it.'

Were you brought up here, then?' said the child.

'Summer and winter,' he replied. 'Secretly at first, but when they

found it out, they let him keep me here. So the fire nursed me - the

same fire. It has never gone out.'

You are fond of it?' said the child.

Of course I am. He died before it. I saw him fall down - just there,

where those ashes are burning now - and wondered, I remember, why

it didn't help him.'

Have you been here ever since?' asked the child.

Ever since I came to watch it; but there was a while between, and a

very cold dreary while it was. It burned all the time though, and

roared and leaped when I came back, as it used to do in our play

days. You may guess, from looking at me, what kind of child I was,

but for all the difference between us I was a child, and when I saw you

in the street to-night, you put me in mind of myself, as I was after he

died, and made me wish to bring you to the fire. I thought of those old

times again, when I saw you sleeping by it. You should be sleeping

now. Lie down again, poor child, lie down again!'

With that, he led her to her rude couch, and covering her with the

clothes with which she had found herself enveloped when she woke,

returned to his seat, whence he moved no more unless to feed the

furnace, but remained motionless as a statue. The child continued to

watch him for a little time, but soon yielded to the drowsiness that

came upon her, and, in the dark strange place and on the heap of

ashes, slept as peacefully as if the room had been a palace chamber,

and the bed, a bed of down.

The Old Curiosity Shop