Go downstairs and mind the shop."
"It's not open yet, sir," remonstrated Mr. Tulliver.
"Then it ought to be. I'll have no idling and shirking because I'm ill.
Go down and take down the shutters directly. Let the business go on just
as if I was there to watch it."
"I'm going, sir," whimpered the young man; "but it does seem rather a
poor return after having served you as I have, and loved you as if you'd
been my own father."
"Very much men love their fathers now-a-days! I didn't ask you to love
me, did I? or hire you for that, or pay you for it? Pshaw, man, I know
you. You wanted my money like the rest of them, and I didn't mind your
thinking there was a chance of your getting it. I've rather encouraged
the notion at odd times. It made you a better servant, and kept you
honest. But now that I'm dying, I can afford to tell the truth. This
young lady will have all my money, every sixpence of it, except
five-and-twenty pounds to Mrs. Mitchin yonder. And now you can go. You'd
have got something perhaps in a small way, if you'd been less of a sneak
and a listener; but you've played your cards a trifle too well."
The old man had raised himself up in his bed, and rallied considerably
while he made this speech. He seemed to take a malicious pleasure in his
shopman's disappointment.
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