h an uneasy glance towards it.
'But your grandfather--he used not to be so wretched?'

'Oh, no!' said the child eagerly, 'so different! We were once so happy
and he so cheerful and contented! You cannot think what a sad change
has fallen on us since.'

'I am very, very sorry, to hear you speak like this, my dear!' said Mrs
Quilp. And she spoke the truth.

'Thank you,' returned the child, kissing her cheek, 'you are always
kind to me, and it is a pleasure to talk to you. I can speak to no one
else about him, but poor Kit. I am very happy still, I ought to feel
happier perhaps than I do, but you cannot think how it grieves me
sometimes to see him alter so.'

'He'll alter again, Nelly,' said Mrs Quilp, 'and be what he was before.'

'Oh, if God would only let that come about!' said the child with
streaming eyes; 'but it is a long time now, since he first began to--I
thought I saw that door moving!'

'It's the wind,' said Mrs Quilp, faintly. 'Began to--'

'To be so thoughtful and dejected, and to forget our old way of
spending the time in the long evenings,' said the child. 'I used to
read to him by the fireside, and he sat listening, and when I stopped
and we began to talk, he told me about my mother, and how she once
looked and spoke just like me when she was a little child. Then he used
to take me on his knee, and try to make me understand that she was not
lying in her grave, but had flown to a beautiful country beyond the sky
where nothing died or ever grew old--we were very happy once!'

'Nelly, Nelly!' said the poor woman, 'I can't bear to see one as young
as you so sorrowful. Pray don't cry.'

'I do so very seldom,' said Nell,' but I have kept this to myself a
long time, and I am not quite well, I think, for the tears come into my
eyes and I cannot keep them back. I don't mind telling you my grief,
for I know you will not tell it to any one again.'

Mrs Quilp turned away her head and made no answer.

'Then,' said the child, 'we often walked in the fields and among the
green trees, and when we came home at night, we liked it better for
being tired, and said what a happy place it was. And if it was dark and
rather dull, we used to say, what did it matter to us, for it only made
us remember our last walk with greater pleasure, and look forward to
our next one. But now we never have these walks, and though it is the
same house it is darker and much more gloomy than it used to be,
indeed!'

She paused here,