'Then why the devil didn't you come before?'
'Please, sir, I fell asleep over the fire,' answered Smike, with
humility.
'Fire! what fire? Where's there a fire?' demanded the schoolmaster,
sharply.
'Only in the kitchen, sir,' replied the boy. 'Missus said as I was
sitting up, I might go in there for a warm.'
'Your missus is a fool,' retorted Squeers. 'You'd have been a deuced
deal more wakeful in the cold, I'll engage.'
By this time Mr Squeers had dismounted; and after ordering the boy to
see to the pony, and to take care that he hadn't any more corn that
night, he told Nicholas to wait at the front-door a minute while he went
round and let him in.
A host of unpleasant misgivings, which had been crowding upon Nicholas
during the whole journey, thronged into his mind with redoubled
force when he was left alone. His great distance from home and the
impossibility of reaching it, except on foot, should he feel ever so
anxious to return, presented itself to him in most alarming colours; and
as he looked up at the dreary house and dark windows, and upon the wild
country round, covered with snow, he felt a depression of heart and
spirit which he had never experienced before.
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