previously regaled with cold leg of mutton and bread and cheese, soon afterwards took leave; Kate amusing herself all the way home with the recollection of her last glimpse of Mr. Mortimer Knag deeply abstracted in the shop, and Mrs. Nickleby by debating within herself whether the dress -making firm would ultimately become "Mantalini, Knag, and Nickleby," or "Mantalini, Nickleby, and Knag."
At this high point, Miss Knag's friendship remained for three whole days, much to the wonderment of Madame MantaliHi's young ladies who had never beheld such constancy in that quarter before, but on the fourth it received a check no less violent than sudden, which thus occurred.
It happened that an old lord of great family, who was going to marry a young lady of no family in particular, came with the young lady, and the young lady's sister, to witness the ceremony of trying on two nuptial bonnets which had been ordered the day before; and Madame Mantalini announcing the fact in a shrill treble through the speaking-pipe, which communicated with the work-room, Miss Knag darted hastily up stairs with a bonnet in each hand, and presented herself in the show-room in a charming state of palpitation, intended to demonstrate her enthusiasm in the cause. The bonnets were no sooner fairly on, than Miss Knag and Madame Mantalini fell into convulsions of admiration.
"A most elegant appearance," said Madame Mantalini.
"I never saw anything so exquisite in all my life," said Miss Knag.
Now the old lord, who was a very old lord, said nothing, but mumbled and chuckled in a state of great delight, no less with the nuptial bonnets and their wearers, than with his own address in getting such a fine woman for his wife; and the young lady, who was a very lively young lady, seeing the old lord in this rapturous condition, chased the old lord behind a cheval-glass, and then and there kissed him, while Madame Mantalini and the other young lady looked discreetly another way.
But pending the salutation, Miss Knag, who was tinged with curiosity, stepped accidentally behind the glass, and encountered the lively young lady's eye just at the very moment when she kissed the old lord; upon which the young lady in a pouting manner murmured something about "an old thing," and "great impertinence," and finished by darting a look of displeasure at Miss Knag and smiling contemptuously.
"Madam Mantalini," said the young lady.
"Ma'am," said Madame Mantalini.
"Pray have up that pretty young creature we saw yesterday."
"Oh yes, do," said the sister.
"Of all things in the world, Madame Mantalini," said the lord's intended, throwing herself languidly on a sofa, "I hate being waited upon by frights or elderly persons. Let me always see that young creature, I beg, whenever I come."
"By all means," said the old lord; "the lovely young creature, by all means."
"Everybody is talking about her," said the young lady, in the same careless manner; "and my lord, being a great admirer of beauty, must positively see her."
