talk about favorites, you showed proper respect to me? To me, sir," said Mr. Creakle, darting his head at him suddenly, and drawing it back again, "the principal of this establishment, and your employer."
"It was not judicious, sir, I am willing to admit," said Mr. Mell. "I should not have done so, if I had been cool."
Here Steerforth struck in.
"Then he said I was mean, and then he said I was base, and then I called him a beggar. If I had been cool, perhaps I shouldn't have called him a beggar. But I did, and I am ready to take the consequences of it."
Without considering, perhaps, whether there were any consequences to be taken, I felt quite in a glow at this gallant speech. It made an impression on the boys too, for there was a low stir among them, though no one spoke a word.
"I am surprised, Steerforth—although your candor does you honor," said Mr. Creakle, "does you honor, certainly—I am surprised, Steerforth, I must say, that you should attach such an epithet to any person employed and paid in Salem House, sir."
Steerforth gave a short laugh.
"That's not an answer, sir," said Mr. Creakle, "to my remark. I expect more than that, from you, Steerforth."
If Mr. Mell looked homely, in my eyes, before the handsome boy, it would be quite impossible to say how homely Mr. Creakle looked.
"Let him deny it," said Steerforth.
"Deny that he is a beggar, Steerforth?" cried Mr. Creakle. "Why, where does he go a begging?"
"If he is not a beggar himself, his near relation's one," said Steerforth. "It's all the same."
He glanced at me, and Mr. Mell's hand gently patted me upon the shoulder. I looked up, with a flush upon my face and remorse in my heart, but Mr. Mell's eyes were fixed on Steerforth. He continued to pat me kindly on the shoulder, but he looked at him.
"Since you expect me, Mr. Creakle, to justify myself," said Steerforth, "and to say what I mean,—what I have to say is, that his mother lives on charity in an alms-house."
Mr. Mell still looked at him, and still patted me kindly on the shoulder, and said to himself, in a whisper, if I heard right: "Yes, I thought so."
Mr. Creakle turned to his assistant, with a severe frown and labored politeness.
"Now, you hear what this gentleman says, Mr. Mell. Have the goodness, if you please, to set him right before the assembled school."
"He is right, sir, without correction," returned Mr. Mell, in the midst of a dead silence; "what he has said, is true."
"Be so good then as declare publicly, will you," said Mr. Creakle, putting his head on one side, and rolling his eyes round the school, "whether it ever came to my knowledge until this moment?"
"I believe not directly," he returned.
"Why, you know not," said Mr. Creakle. "Don't you, man?"
"I apprehend you never supposed my worldly circumstances to be very good," replied the assistant. "You know what my position is, and always has been, here."
