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Ah, the well-trodden paths of thought and study that predates his past learning! All tucked inside the new book bindings (constructed by himself, naturally) are his old notes, and as he feels the crinkle of their age between his fingers, he shivers with delight. Norrell adjusts his spectacles and peers down at a paragraph in his current book, a paragraph describing the notions of mysticism and rationalism, which has always troubled him.
Magicians are supposed to take walks; to adjoin the forces flowing through their feet to the natural flow of nature, to understand the primal quirks and cogs of magic. A fanciful notion, and Norrell has no time for fancy. He pulls forth a new page, sharpens his quill, dips it - oh how he loves the sooth of this familiar action - and begins to compose another deconstruction of yet another “great” magician's work. Such promise, he thinks, a tsk between his teeth. Always let down by subpar ideologies too alike to the old women who occupy shacks in the English woodland.
Childermass enters.
Like everything Childermass does and is, it is silent and of no disturbance to his master. Norrell, his back to the door and by extension Childermass, carefully folds the note and slips it between the pages of where the offending paragraph lies, now as a continuous offensive annotation. He closes the book, and like he does with every volume, has a quick inspection of its condition; when he is satisfied, it is placed beside its brothers on his shelves.
It is now he becomes aware of Childermass's purpose - his henchman with a face like a waterlogged willow is used to waiting for his master to complete each task before he attends to his services - and Norrell observes, with a quickening of his hands and a brightening of his eyes, an awaiting hoard of books, wrapped in brown paper, sat near the north end of his bookcase. He passes Childermass's shadow - before shooting him an accusatory glance.
With a sigh like a cracking dam, Childermass places his strong hands beneath the load, and sets it none too carefully on the table. Around him, beside him, nearly on top of him, Norrell's sighs and gasps and small, nervous jitters are an orchestra of Norrellite excitement. There are no men who have seen Norrell smile, except Childermass; there are no men who have seen him cry, laugh, squeal, and even kick over a little stool in a fit of bad temper, beside Childermass. This display, so alien to others, is a common pantomime for his handyman.
Norrell approaches the packages almost like a child approaching a happy dog, but when he unwraps them, inspects them, counts each and every page for any sign of imperfection (or any damage caused by Childermass's imaginary clumsiness) he finally instructs his servant to place them for future devouring on his reading table near the fire. Childermass knows, that once he is gone, all other studies will be abandoned for a night long voyage into the pages of these new books. Books of magic, indeed - they certainly transport his Master to another place, a place where he will forget to eat or drink and will not answer Childermass's weary knocking for his dinner tray. Eventually, a red eyed scholar will crack open the door and lob the reminder of his half eaten supper at his servant, causing the tray to topple, which will leave Childermass with plum pudding dripping off his nose and a door shut in his face.
Namely, seeing as his fate rests as profoundly on Norrell's well-being as much as the man's own, it is worth it.
.
.
There are times where Norrell feels Childermass in the room, feels the gloom drift down among his person like a depressed fog, feels the weight of Childermass's eyes, and he instructs, in his thin and grating voice, for Childermass to distract himself elsewhere. There are times - and god forbid, these times are such a waste of times! – when he struggles to see Childermass just as a serving shadow. What a pain, what a horrendous pain, it is - to be distracted by the rise and fall of another's breath, to feel the mass of Childermass, which in Norrell's mind equates to a black heavy raincloud - slugging its ways through the halls, even when his office is empty and it is nought by him. By living alone, with no other servants, why should the other half of the house feel so heavy, so occupied? At times, he merely wishes for his own peace of mind, for the easy and sweet suffocation of his books and quills, and so he sends Childermass away on simple errands, but errands that require long distances and that only hires the slowest coachmen.
But then when Childermass is gone, when the dank showers of his presence have passed, does Norrell feel the cold open air that follows - lonely, terrifyingly freeing, bitter air. He turns the pages of his books, rummages around in his notes and notebooks, until - disaster! The North West bookcase, fortunately the smallest, is toppled. He drops what he is doing, flees to its side, inspects - no, no! No feverishly ill fitted spell sent by another jealous magician, but a wonky foundation. Damn - damn that Childermass! Hadn't he seen to it? Well, why wasn't he seeing to it? And then it seizes him in a timid yelp; Childermass is crossing miles to require him a hard to find herb, upon which his stocks are full of, and he curses Childermass's incompetence in not knowing this was a fruitless errand (despite Norrell's insistence it was critical) and he curses the bookcase, for it is crushing centuries worth of magical tradition. He places his feeble, flabby arms beneath it, and finds he has no means of lifting it then if the Devil attempted to enter the Kingdom of Heaven. He calls out, by habit, for Childermass - and in a break of fear, he spies a dark shape spilling into the doorway.
It is no fairie, no conjured enemy. Childermass, his hat off, is leant against the door. He scratches the space between his nose and lip. For a moment, they look at each other; the servant, in his heavy walking coat with mud on his shoes, and the magician, with his cravat tugged loose and his wig askew.
"My apologies, sir," Childermass's voice is rough, quiet, but has the uncanny ability to fill whatever space it is in. "The coachman's wife is sick. We can't go forward with the trip today."
Childermass approaches; Norrell steps back.
Childermass takes off his coat with an uneasy shrug, gets to his knees, and lifts the bookcase. The muscles in his back contort, press through the cloth - Norrell's eyes fixate on it. The dirty white of the shirt reminds him of old paper, paper where ancient magic runs beneath the ink, shifting and turning in dark places.
The books lunge from their carefully plotted places; Norrell rushes to correct it, even with Childermass swearing and huffing under the load.
Later, he will berate Childermass for his clumsiness, for his inability to come when he is called for, but the future will call no longer for anymore unnecessary coach trips.