So, the woman and the child had gone by, and gone on, and five had
sounded from the steeples. They were walking slowly towards the east,
already looking for the first pale streak of day, when a woman came
after them. 'What are you doing with the child?' she said to Maggy.
She was young--far too young to be there, Heaven knows!--and neither
ugly nor wicked-looking. She spoke coarsely, but with no naturally
coarse voice; there was even something musical in its sound. 'What are
you doing with yourself?' retorted Maggy, for want Of a better answer. 'Can't you see, without my telling you?' 'I don't know as I can,' said Maggy.
'Killing myself! Now I have answered you, answer me. What are you doing
with the child?' The supposed child kept her head drooped down, and kept her form close
at Maggy's side. 'Poor thing!' said the woman. 'Have you no feeling, that you keep her
out in the cruel streets at such a time as this? Have you no eyes, that
you don't see how delicate and slender she is? Have you no sense (you
don't look as if you had much) that you don't take more pity on this
cold and trembling little hand?'
She had stepped across to that side, and held the hand between her own
two, chafing it. 'Kiss a poor lost creature, dear,' she said, bending
her face, 'and tell me where's she taking you.' Little Dorrit turned towards her. 'Why, my God!' she said, recoiling, 'you're a woman!'
'Don't mind that!' said Little Dorrit, clasping one of her hands that
had suddenly released hers. 'I am not afraid of you.' 'Then you had better be,' she answered. 'Have you no mother?' 'No.' 'No father?' 'Yes, a very dear one.' 'Go home to him, and be afraid of me. Let me go. Good night!' 'I must thank you first; let me speak to you as if I really were a
child.' 'You can't do it,' said the woman. 'You are kind and innocent; but you
can't look at me out of a child's eyes. I never should have touched you,
but I thought that you were a child.' And with a strange, wild cry, she
went away.
No day yet in the sky, but there was day in the resounding stones of
the streets; in the waggons, carts, and coaches; in the workers going
to various occupations; in the opening of early shops; in the traffic
at markets; in the stir of the riverside. There was coming day in the
flaring lights, with a feebler colour in them than they would have had
at another time; coming day in the increased sharpness of the air, and
the ghastly dying of the night.