It will naturally be very
painful to him to find that you are singular in your character and
conduct. It is naturally painful to us; for we can't like you, you
know, Dombey, as well as we could wish.'
She touched the child upon a tender point. He had secretly become
more and more solicitous from day to day, as the time of his departure
drew more near, that all the house should like him. From some hidden
reason, very imperfectly understood by himself - if understood at all
- he felt a gradually increasing impulse of affection, towards almost
everything and everybody in the place. He could not bear to think that
they would be quite indifferent to him when he was gone. He wanted
them to remember him kindly; and he had made it his business even to
conciliate a great hoarse shaggy dog, chained up at the back of the
house, who had previously been the terror of his life: that even he
might miss him when he was no longer there.
Little thinking that in this, he only showed again the difference
between himself and his compeers, poor tiny Paul set it forth to Miss
Blimber as well as he could, and begged her, in despite of the
official analysis, to have the goodness to try and like him. To Mrs
Blimber, who had joined them, he preferred the same petition: and when
that lady could not forbear, even in his presence, from giving
utterance to her often-repeated opinion, that he was an odd child,
Paul told her that he was sure she was quite right; that he thought it
must be his bones, but he didn't know; and that he hoped she would
overlook it, for he was fond of them all.
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