ing for your mother in a pleasant
part of the country--(he had a presentation to some almshouses on the
borders of Cornwall, which had occurred to him more than once)--but as
you want to be together, I must do something else for her. She has a
little money?'

'A very little,' replied Kate.

'A little will go a long way if it's used sparingly,' said Ralph. 'She
must see how long she can make it last, living rent free. You leave your
lodgings on Saturday?'

'You told us to do so, uncle.'

'Yes; there is a house empty that belongs to me, which I can put you
into till it is let, and then, if nothing else turns up, perhaps I shall
have another. You must live there.'

'Is it far from here, sir?' inquired Kate.

'Pretty well,' said Ralph; 'in another quarter of the town--at the East
end; but I'll send my clerk down to you, at five o'clock on Saturday, to
take you there. Goodbye. You know your way? Straight on.'

Coldly shaking his niece's hand, Ralph left her at the top of Regent
Street, and turned down a by-thoroughfare, intent on schemes of
money-getting. Kate walked sadly back to their lodgings in the Strand.

CHAPTER 11

Newman Noggs inducts Mrs and Miss Nickleby into their New Dwelling in
the City

Miss Nickleby's reflections, as she wended her way homewards, were of
that desponding nature which the occurrences of the morning had been
sufficiently calculated to awaken. Her uncle's was not a manner likely
to dispel any doubts or apprehensions she might have formed, in the
outset, neither was the glimpse she had had of Madame Mantalini's
establishment by any means encouraging. It was with many gloomy
forebodings and misgivings, therefore, that she looked forward, with a
heavy heart, to the opening of her new career.

If her mother's consolations could have restored her to a pleasanter and
more enviable state of mind, there were abundance of them to produce the
effect. By the time Kate reached home, the good lady had called to mind
two authentic cases of milliners who had been possessed of considerable
property, though whether they had acquired it all in business, or had
had a capital to start with, or had been lucky and married to advantage,
she could not exactly remember. However, as she very logically remarked,
there must have been SOME young person in that way of business who had
made a fortune without having anything to begin with, and that being
taken for granted, why should not Kate do the same? Mi