'Maybe so, but I am sanguine, and did expect,' said Nicholas, 'and am
proportionately disappointed.' Saying which, he gave Newman an account
of his proceedings.

'If I could do anything,' said Nicholas, 'anything, however slight,
until Ralph Nickleby returns, and I have eased my mind by confronting
him, I should feel happier. I should think it no disgrace to work,
Heaven knows. Lying indolently here, like a half-tamed sullen beast,
distracts me.'

'I don't know,' said Newman; 'small things offer--they would pay the
rent, and more--but you wouldn't like them; no, you could hardly be
expected to undergo it--no, no.'

'What could I hardly be expected to undergo?' asked Nicholas, raising
his eyes. 'Show me, in this wide waste of London, any honest means by
which I could even defray the weekly hire of this poor room, and see if
I shrink from resorting to them! Undergo! I have undergone too much,
my friend, to feel pride or squeamishness now. Except--' added Nicholas
hastily, after a short silence, 'except such squeamishness as is common
honesty, and so much pride as constitutes self-respect. I see little
to choose, between assistant to a brutal pedagogue, and toad-eater to a
mean and ignorant upstart, be he member or no member.'

'I hardly know whether I should tell you what I heard this morning, or
not,' said Newman.

'Has it reference to what you said just now?' asked Nicholas.

'It has.'