ther sent to night-school for a
time, and later taught herself fine sewing, so that at the time Arthur
Clennam returned to London she was working every day outside the walls,
for small wages. Each night she returned to the prison to prepare her
father's supper, bringing him whatever she could hide from her own
dinner at the house where she sewed, loving him devotedly through all.

She even had a would-be lover, too. The son of one of the turnkeys, a
young man with weak legs and weak, light hair, soft-hearted and
soft-headed, had long pursued her in vain. He was now engaged in seeking
comfort for his hopeless love by composing epitaphs for his own
tombstone, such as:

_______________________________________________
| |
| Here Lie the Mortal Remains of |
| JOHN CHIVERY |
| Never Anything Worth Mentioning |
| Who Died of a Broken Heart, Requesting With |
| His Last Breath that the Word |
| AMY |
| Might be Inscribed Over His Ashes |
| Which Was Done by His Afflicted Parents |
|_______________________________________________|

Old Mr. Dorrit held his position among the Marshalsea prisoners with
great fancied dignity and received all visitors and new-comers in his
room like a man of society at home. During that evening Arthur called on
him and treated the old man so courteously and talked to Little Dorrit
with such kindness that she began to love him from that moment.

Many things of Little Dorrit's pathetic story Arthur learned that night.
His first surprise at finding her in the Clennam house mingled strangely
with his old thought that his father on his death-bed seemed to be
troubled by some remorseful memory; and as he slept in the gloomy prison
he dreamed that the little seamstress was in some mysterious way mingled
with this wrong and remorse.

There was more truth than fancy in this dream. Not knowing the true
history of his parentage, and wholly ignorant of the sad life and death
of the poor singer, his own unhappy mother, Arthur had never heard the
name Dorrit. He did not know, to be sure, that it was the name of the
wealthy patron who had once educated her. As a matter of fact, this
patron had been Little Dorrit's own uncle, who now was living in
poverty. It was to his youngest nie