‘He has done it!’ said Tim, looking round at his employers and shaking his head triumphantly. ‘His capital B’s and D’s are exactly like mine; he dots all his small i’s and crosses every t as he writes it. There an’t such a young man as this in all London,’ said Tim, clapping Nicholas on the back; ‘not one. Don’t tell me! The city can’t produce his equal. I challenge the city to do it!’
With this casting down of his gauntlet, Tim Linkinwater struck the desk such a blow with his clenched fist, that the old blackbird tumbled off his perch with the start it gave him, and actually uttered a feeble croak, in the extremity of his astonishment.
‘Well said, Tim—well said, Tim Linkinwater!’ cried brother Charles, scarcely less pleased than Tim himself, and clapping his hands gently as he spoke. ‘I knew our young friend would take great pains, and I was quite certain he would succeed, in no time. Didn’t I say so, brother Ned?’
‘You did, my dear brother; certainly, my dear brother, you said so, and you were quite right,’ replied Ned. ‘Quite right. Tim Linkinwater is excited, but he is justly excited, properly excited. Tim is a fine fellow. Tim Linkinwater, sir—you’re a fine fellow.’
‘Here’s a pleasant thing to think of!’ said Tim, wholly regardless of this address to himself, and raising his spectacles from the ledger to the brothers. ‘Here’s a pleasant thing. Do you suppose I haven’t often thought of what would become of these books when I was gone? Do you suppose I haven’t often thought that things might go on irregular and untidy here, after I was taken away? But now,’ said Tim, extending his forefinger towards Nicholas, ‘now, when I’ve shown him a little more, I’m satisfied. The business will go on, when I’m dead, as well as it did when I was alive—just the same—and I shall have the satisfaction of knowing that there never were such books—never were such books! No, nor never will be such books—as the books of Cheeryble Brothers.’
Having thus expressed his sentiments, Mr. Linkinwater gave vent to a short laugh, indicative of defiance to the cities of London and Westminster, and, turning again to his desk, quietly carried seventy-six from the last column he had added up, and went on with his work.
‘Tim Linkinwater, sir,’ said brother Charles; ‘give me your hand, sir. This is your birthday. How dare you talk about anything else till you have been wished many happy returns of the day, Tim Linkinwater? God bless you, Tim! God bless you!’
‘My dear brother,’ said the other, seizing Tim’s disengaged fist, ‘Tim Linkinwater looks ten years younger than he did on his last birthday.’
‘Brother Ned, my dear boy,’ returned the other old fellow, ‘I believe that Tim Linkinwater was born a hundred and fifty years old, and is gradually coming down to five-and-twenty; for he’s younger every birthday than he was the year before.’
‘So he is, brother Charles, so he is,’ replied brother Ned. ‘There’s not a doubt about it.’
‘Remember, Tim,’ said brother Charles, ‘that we dine at half-past five today instead of two o’clock; we always depart from our usual custom on this anniversary, as you very well know, Tim Linkinwater. Mr. Nickleby, my dear sir, you will make one. Tim Linkinwater, give me your snuff-box as a remembrance to brother Charles and myself of an attached and faithful rascal, and take that, in exchange, as a feeble mark of our respect and esteem, and don’t open it until you go to bed, and never say another word upon the subject, or I’ll kill the blackbird. A dog! He should have had a golden cage half-a-dozen years ago, if it would have made him or his master a bit the happier. Now, brother Ned, my dear fellow, I’m ready. At half-past five, remember, Mr. Nickleby! Tim Linkinwater, sir, take care of Mr. Nickleby at half-past five. Now, brother Ned.’
Chattering away thus, according to custom, to prevent the possibility of any thanks or acknowledgment being expressed on the other side, the twins trotted off, arm-in-arm; having endowed Tim Linkinwater with a costly gold snuff-box, enclosing a bank note worth more than its value ten times told.
At a quarter past five o’clock, punctual to the minute, arrived, according to annual usage, Tim Linkinwater’s sister; and a great to-do there was, between Tim Linkinwater’s sister and the old housekeeper, respecting Tim Linkinwater’s sister’s cap, which had been dispatched, per boy, from the house of the family where Tim Linkinwater’s sister boarded, and had not yet come to hand: notwithstanding that it had been packed up in a bandbox, and the bandbox in a handkerchief, and the handkerchief tied on to the boy’s arm; and notwithstanding, too, that the place of its consignment had been duly set forth, at full length, on the back of an old letter, and the boy enjoined, under pain of divers horrible penalties, the full extent of which the eye of man could not foresee, to deliver the same with all possible speed, and not to loiter by the way. Tim Linkinwater’s sister lamented; the housekeeper condoled; and both kept thrusting their heads out of the second-floor window to see if the boy was ‘coming’—which would have been highly satisfactory, and, upon the whole, tantamount to his being come, as the distance to the corner was not quite five yards—when, all of a sudden, and when he was least expected, the messenger, carrying the bandbox with elaborate caution, appeared in an exactly opposite direction, puffing and panting for breath, and flushed with recent exercise; as well he might be; for he had taken the air, in the first instance, behind a hackney coach that went to Camberwell, and had followed two Punches afterwards and had seen the Stilts home to their own door. The cap was all safe, however—that was one comfort—and it was no use scolding him—that was another; so the boy went upon his way rejoicing, and Tim Linkinwater’s sister presented herself to the company below-stairs, just five minutes after the half-hour had struck by Tim Linkinwater’s own infallible clock.
The company consisted of the brothers Cheeryble, Tim Linkinwater, a ruddy-faced white-headed friend of Tim’s (who was a superannuated bank clerk), and Nicholas, who was presented to Tim Linkinwater’s sister with much gravity and solemnity. The party being now completed, brother Ned rang for dinner, and, dinner being shortly afterwards announced, led Tim Linkinwater’s sister into the next room, where it was set forth with great preparation. Then, brother Ned took the head of the table, and brother Charles the foot; and Tim Linkinwater’s sister sat on the left hand of brother Ned, and Tim Linkinwater himself on his right: and an ancient butler of apoplectic appearance, and with very short legs, took up his position at the back of brother Ned’s armchair, and, waving his right arm preparatory to taking off the covers with a flourish, stood bolt upright and motionless.
‘For these and all other blessings, brother Charles,’ said Ned.
‘Lord, make us truly thankful, brother Ned,’ said Charles.
Whereupon the apoplectic butler whisked off the top of the soup tureen, and shot, all at once, into a state of violent activity.
There was abundance of conversation, and little fear of its ever flagging, for the good-humour of the glorious old twins drew everybody out, and Tim Linkinwater’s sister went off into a long and circumstantial account of Tim Linkinwater’s infancy, immediately after the very first glass of champagne—taking care to premise that she was very much Tim’s junior, and had only become acquainted with the facts from their being preserved and handed down in the family. This history concluded, brother Ned related how that, exactly thirty-five years ago, Tim Linkinwater was suspected to have received a love-letter, and how that vague information had been brought to the counting-house of his having been seen walking down Cheapside with an uncommonly handsome spinster; at which there was a roar of laughter, and Tim Linkinwater being charged with blushing, and called upon to explain, denied that the accusation was true; and further, that there would have been any harm in it if it had been; which last position occasioned the superannuated bank clerk to laugh tremendously, and to declare that it was the very best thing he had ever heard in his life, and that Tim Linkinwater might say a great many things before he said anything which would beat that.
There was one little ceremony peculiar to the day, both the matter and manner of which made a very strong impression upon Nicholas. The cloth having been removed and