Page 159 - bleak-house

‘You know Mr. Gusher?’ said our visitor.
We were obliged to say that we had not the pleasure of
Mr. Gusher’s acquaintance.
‘The loss is yours, I assure you,’ said Mrs. Pardiggle with
her commanding deportment. ‘He is a very fervid, impas-
sioned speakerfull of fire! Stationed in a waggon on this
lawn, now, which, from the shape of the land, is naturally
adapted to a public meeting, he would improve almost any
occasion you could mention for hours and hours! By this
time, young ladies,’ said Mrs. Pardiggle, moving back to
her chair and overturning, as if by invisible agency, a little
round table at a considerable distance with my work-basket
on it, ‘by this time you have found me out, I dare say?’
This was really such a confusing question that Ada looked
at me in perfect dismay. As to the guilty nature of my own
consciousness after what I had been thinking, it must have
been expressed in the colour of my cheeks.
‘Found out, I mean,’ said Mrs. Pardiggle, ‘the prominent
point in my character. I am aware that it is so prominent as
to be discoverable immediately. I lay myself open to detec-
tion, I know. Well! I freely admit, I am a woman of business.
I love hard work; I enjoy hard work. The excitement does
me good. I am so accustomed and inured to hard work that
I don’t know what fatigue is.’
We murmured that it was very astonishing and very
gratifying, or something to that effect. I don’t think we
knew what it was either, but this is what our politeness ex-
pressed.
‘I do not understand what it is to be tired; you cannot tire

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