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“I–don’t know you. What’s your name?” asked Florence.

“Mrs. Brown,” said the old woman, “Good Mrs. Brown. Susan ain’t far off,” said Good Mrs. Brown, “and the others are close to her, and nobody’s hurt.”

The child shed tears of delight on hearing this, and accompanied the old woman willingly. They had not gone far, when they stopped before a shabby little house in a dirty little lane. Opening the door with a key she took out of her pocket, Mrs. Brown pushed the child into a back room, where there was a great heap of rags lying on the floor, a heap of bones, and a heap of sifted dust. But there was no furniture at all, and the walls and ceiling were quite black.

The child became so terrified, that she was stricken speechless, and looked as though about to swoon.

“Now, don’t be a young mule,” said Good Mrs. Brown, reviving her with a shake. “I’m not a’ going to keep you, even above an hour. Don’t vex me. If you don’t, I tell you, I won’t hurt you. But if you do, I’ll kill you. I could have you killed at any time–even if you was in your own bed at home. Now let’s know who you are, and what you are, and all about it.”

The old woman’s threats and promises, and Florence’s habit of being quiet, and repressing what she felt, enabled her to tell her little history. Mrs. Brown listened attentively until she had finished.

“I want that pretty frock, Miss Dombey,” said Good Mrs. Brown, “and that little bonnet, and a petticoat or two, and those shoes, Miss Dombey, and anything else you can spare. Come! take ’em off.”

Florence obeyed as fast as her trembling hands could allow, keeping all the while, a frightened eye on Mrs. Brown, who examined each article of apparel at leisure, and seemed tolerably well satisfied with their quality and value; she then produced a worn-out girl’s cloak, and the crushed remnants of a girl’s bonnet, as well as other tattered things. In this dainty raiment she instructed Florence to dress herself, and as this seemed a prelude to her release, the child complied as fast as possible. Mrs. Brown then resumed her seat on the bones, and smoked a very short, black pipe, after which she gave the child a rabbit-skin to carry, that she might appear like her ordinary companion, and led her forth into the streets; but she cautioned her, with threats of deadly vengeance in case of disobedience, to go directly to her father’s office in the city, also to wait at the street corner where she would be left, until the clock struck three, and these directions Florence promised faithfully to observe.

At length Mrs. Brown left her changed and ragged little friend at a corner, where, true to her promise, she remained until the steeple rang out three o’clock, when after often looking over her shoulder, lest the all-powerful spies of Mrs. Brown should take offence at that, she hurried off as fast as she could in her slipshod shoes, holding the rabbit-skin tight in her hand.

Tired of walking, stunned by the noise and confusion, anxious for her brother and the nurses, terrified by what she had undergone, and what was yet before her, Florence once or twice could not help stopping and crying bitterly, but few people noticed her, in the garb she wore, or if they did, believed that she was tutored to excite compassion, and passed on. It was late in the afternoon when she peeped into a kind of wharf, and asked a stout man there if he could tell her the way to Dombey & Son’s.

The man looked attentively at her, then called another man, who ran up an archway, and very soon returned with a blithe-looking boy who he said was in Mr. Dombey’s employ.

Hearing this, Florence felt re-assured; ran eagerly up to him, and caught his hand in both of hers.