that instant,
the ugly misshapen Quilp!

The street beyond was so narrow, and the shadow of the houses on one
side of the way so deep, that he seemed to have risen out of the earth.
But there he was. The child withdrew into a dark corner, and saw him
pass close to her. He had a stick in his hand, and, when he had got
clear of the shadow of the gateway, he leant upon it, looked
back--directly, as it seemed, towards where she stood--and beckoned.

To her? oh no, thank God, not to her; for as she stood, in an
extremity of fear, hesitating whether to scream for help, or come from
her hiding-place and fly, before he should draw nearer, there issued
slowly forth from the arch another figure--that of a boy--who carried
on his back a trunk.

'Faster, sirrah!' cried Quilp, looking up at the old gateway, and
showing in the moonlight like some monstrous image that had come down
from its niche and was casting a backward glance at its old house,
'faster!'

'It's a dreadful heavy load, Sir,' the boy pleaded. 'I've come on very
fast, considering.'

'YOU have come fast, considering!' retorted Quilp; 'you creep, you dog,
you crawl, you measure distance like a worm. There are the chimes now,
half-past twelve.'

He stopped to listen, and then turning upon the boy with a suddenness
and ferocity that made him start, asked at what hour that London coach
passed the corner of the road. The boy replied, at one.

'Come on then,' said Quilp, 'or I shall be too late. Faster--do you
hear me? Faster.'

The boy made all the speed he could, and Quilp led onward, constantly
turning back to threaten him, and urge him to greater haste. Nell did
not dare to move until they were out of sight and hearing, and then
hurried to where she had left her grandfather, feeling as if the very
passing of the dwarf so near him must have filled him with alarm and
terror. But he was sleeping soundly, and she softly withdrew.

As she was making her way to her own bed, she determined to say nothing
of this adventure, as upon whatever errand the dwarf had come (and she
feared it must have been in search of them) it was clear by his inquiry
about the London coach that he was on his way homeward, and as he had
passed through that place, it was but reasonable to suppose that they
were safer from his inquiries there, than they could be elsewhere.
These reflections did not remove her own alarm, for she had been too
much terrified to be easily composed, and