Chapter 21

CHAPTER 21

Madam Mantalini finds herself in a Situation of some Difficulty, and
Miss Nickleby finds herself in no Situation at all

The agitation she had undergone, rendered Kate Nickleby unable to
resume her duties at the dressmaker's for three days, at the
expiration of which interval she betook herself at the accustomed
hour, and with languid steps, to the temple of fashion where Madame
Mantalini reigned paramount and supreme.

The ill-will of Miss Knag had lost nothing of its virulence in the
interval. The young ladies still scrupulously shrunk from all
companionship with their denounced associate; and when that
exemplary female arrived a few minutes afterwards, she was at no
pains to conceal the displeasure with which she regarded Kate's
return.

'Upon my word!' said Miss Knag, as the satellites flocked round, to
relieve her of her bonnet and shawl; 'I should have thought some
people would have had spirit enough to stop away altogether, when
they know what an incumbrance their presence is to right-minded
persons. But it's a queer world; oh! it's a queer world!'

Miss Knag, having passed this comment on the world, in the tone in
which most people do pass comments on the world when they are out of
temper, that is to say, as if they by no means belonged to it,
concluded by heaving a sigh, wherewith she seemed meekly to
compassionate the wickedness of mankind.

The attendants were not slow to echo the sigh, and Miss Knag was
apparently on the eve of favouring them with some further moral
reflections, when the voice of Madame Mantalini, conveyed through
the speaking-tube, ordered Miss Nickleby upstairs to assist in the
arrangement of the show-room; a distinction which caused Miss Knag
to toss her head so much, and bite her lips so hard, that her powers
of conversation were, for the time, annihilated.

'Well, Miss Nickleby, child,' said Madame Mantalini, when Kate
presented herself; 'are you quite well again?'

'A great deal better, thank you,' replied Kate.

'I wish I could say the same,' remarked Madame Mantalini, seating
herself with an air of weariness.

'Are you ill?' asked Kate. 'I am very sorry for that.'

'Not exactly ill, but worried, child--worried,' rejoined Madame.

'I am still more sorry to hear that,' said Kate, gently. 'Bodily
illness is more easy to bear than mental.'

'Ah! and it's much easier to talk than to bear either,' said Madame,
rubbing her nose with much irritability of manner. 'There, get to
your work, child, and put the things in order, do.'

While Kate was wondering within herself what these symptoms of
unusual vexation portended, Mr Mantalini put the tips of his
whiskers, and, by degrees, his