Chapter 9 - Page 2

it was not
difficult to identify as the nondescript messengers, go-betweens,
and errand-bearers of the place. Some of them had been lounging in
the rain until the gate should open; others, who had timed their
arrival with greater nicety, were coming up now, and passing in
with damp whitey-brown paper bags from the grocers, loaves of
bread, lumps of butter, eggs, milk, and the like. The shabbiness
of these attendants upon shabbiness, the poverty of these insolvent
waiters upon insolvency, was a sight to see. Such threadbare coats
and trousers, such fusty gowns and shawls, such squashed hats and
bonnets, such boots and shoes, such umbrellas and walking-sticks,
never were seen in Rag Fair. All of them wore the cast-off clothes
of other men and women, were made up of patches and pieces of other
people's individuality, and had no sartorial existence of their own
proper. Their walk was the walk of a race apart. They had a
peculiar way of doggedly slinking round the corner, as if they were
eternally going to the pawnbroker's. When they coughed, they
coughed like people accustomed to be forgotten on doorsteps and in
draughty passages, waiting for answers to letters in faded ink,
which gave the recipients of those manuscripts great mental
disturbance and no satisfaction. As they eyed the stranger in
passing, they eyed him with borrowing eyes--hungry, sharp,
speculative as to his softness if they were accredited to him, and
the likelihood of his standing something handsome. Mendicity on
commission stooped in their high shoulders, shambled in their
unsteady legs, buttoned and pinned and darned and dragged their
clothes, frayed their button-holes, leaked out of their figures in
dirty little ends of tape, and issued from their mouths in
alcoholic breathings.

As these people passed him standing still in the court-yard, and
one of them turned back to inquire if he could assist him with his
services, it came into Arthur Clennam's mind that he would speak to
Little Dorrit again before he went away. She would have recovered
her first surprise, and might feel easier with him. He asked this
member of the fraternity (who had two red herrings in his hand, and
a loaf and a blacking brush under his arm), where was the nearest
place to get a cup of coffee at. The nondescript replied in
encouraging terms, and brought him to a coffee-shop in the street
within a stone's throw.

'Do you know Miss Dorrit?' asked the new client.

The nondescript knew two Miss Dorrits; one who was born inside--
That was the one! That was the one? The nondescript had known her
many years. In regard of the other Miss Dorrit, the nondescript
lodged in the same house with herself and uncle.

This changed the client's